En Passant

The capitalist media reports and emphasises or spins things that reinforce a capitalist world view. To seriously report, let alone investigate, police violence against medics, or domestic violence, might undermine two key pillars of capitalist society – the police and the family.

Khodr Moustafa Taha allegedly tweeted Victoria Police and said: ‘I’m going to hurt your officers.’ Police raided his property, investigated all his online accounts and charged him with among other things ‘using a carriage service to menace, harass or cause offence.’ Yet when two people post on my blog ‘They should put a bullet in you, for the good of everyone else’ and ‘I hope you drown next time you go and do one of your little aquarobics classes friend’ there are no raids, no investigations, no charges, by either Victoria Police or, because I live in the A.C.T., the Australian Federal Police. What explains the difference?

Any response to my now over 11 month old complaint?

Danny Katch in Socialist Worker US reports on the Staten Island grand jury decision in the Eric Garner case – and the bitter anger of opponents of police violence as they mobilize yet again. Here is a snippet.

But the video wasn’t the key. As in Ferguson, the real key was the unspoken rule of the criminal injustice system: Killer cops are above the law – and they can get away with murder.

Rebecca Barrigos writes in Red Flag:

To enable mass arrests, the Magistrates Court will be open 24 hours a day from 10 November. Magistrates will preside via video link at a special “G20 Offender Processing Centre” at the Supreme Court. There will be a presumption against bail in order to keep those arrested detained for the duration of the summit.

The real threat in Brisbane is not violent protesters, but the increase in the state’s powers.

To read the whole article click here.

I get a bit of a run in today’s opinion piece by Jack Waterford, editor at large of The Canberra Times. He says in part: When John Passant, well known left-wing ratbag, activist and taxation expert, republished on his website some tendentious material about a Melbourne demonstration, “I received a torrent of abuse in the […]

A snippet from my latest article in New Matilda about police inaction against death threats and abusive posts from Victorian police headquarters. ‘Another commenter who called themselves Dirty Unwashedc*nts (DUC) among other things said: ‘Never let the truth get in the way of a good story hey cockhead?’ There were other abusive comments from them. […]

SocialistWorker.org writers Eric Ruder, Elizabeth Schulte, Trish Kahle and Donny Schraffenberger traveled to Ferguson to provide this account in Socialist Worker US of a community rising up against police violence, despite a crackdown that turns their city into a war zone each night.

Lex Wotton, the heroic Palm Islander who was jailed after leading protests against racist police violence, is set to break a long silence says Red Flag. He has confirmed his intention to speak at the Marxism 2014 conference in Melbourne next weekend, 17-20 April.

The mood of the rally can be summed up in the words of Marlene Wharton, who said, “I am here today to support my friend, my sister, my people against the brutality of the police and what they did to Sheila. This has got to stop. My grandparents fought for the rights of our people back in the day, then my father fought, then my uncles, and now I’m the next generation and I’m not going to stop the struggle and I don’t want anyone else to stop either”.