Uncle Frank on Censorship

Here’s a classic vid of Frank Zappa saying it like it needs to be said. And there’s an excellent interview with Frank Zappa by Gerald Seligman here, where Frank argues cogently against the proponents of censorship.

Statistically, I think, that since the beginning of musical time there have been more hymns than there are heavy metal songs. And if the number of words written about Jesus or doing good had any effect, then we’d all be really terrific people, wouldn’t we? Or when they start talking about factors pertaining to suicide, the largest single instance of suicide in the last decade is Jonestown, and there was no Ozzie Ozborne or AC/DC albums down there: there was only religious fanaticism.

Some more of our favourite Uncle Frank pearlers:

“My best advice to anyone who wants to raise a happy, mentally healthy child is: Keep him or her as far away from a church as you can.”

The crux of the biscuit is: If it entertains you, fine. Enjoy it. If it doesn’t, then blow it out your ass. I do it to amuse myself. If I like it, I release it. If somebody else likes it, that’s a bonus.

There is no such thing as a dirty word. Nor is there a word so powerful, that it’s going to send the listener to the lake of fire upon hearing it.

Frank may have been inspired by Francis Bacon, who in the 15th century opined

Liberty of speech invites and provokes liberty to be used again, and so bringeth much to a man’s knowledge.

Kangaroo court gags Hicks

David Hicks gagged

Playing along with the criminal United Stupids government in order to come home to Asstralia post haste, Hicks has acquiesced to a laughable token 9 month sentence in addition to time already served, with a total 7 year sentence, provided he shuts his mouth for a year and withdraws claims he was mistreated by the torturing septics.

He will serve his time in Australia under a plea deal and must arrive in Australia before May 29, 2007.

This means he’ll be free at the end of December 07, after the next federal election. The rodent will be able to lie that he has supported a Asstralian citizen’s rights whilst protecting the infantile Whorestralian public from the Hicks menace.

Terry Hicks however pointed out that

his son was forced to undergo a plea-bargain and his case was never properly tested in court.

“Nobody will ever know what the evidence was.”

Hicks home soonAnd that’s how opaque, dictatorial regimes like it.

Greens leader, Bob Brown foresees the action to come:

“However the minute Hicks arrives in Australia, our legitimate justice system kicks into action. It may hold some nasty shocks for the Howard government which has endorsed this illegal process at Guantanamo Bay.”

Hicks is bound by the “court” orders consequent to his plea bargain which have been strongly criticised by civil rights lawyers:

They were especially critical of the order forbidding Hicks from protesting any mistreatment, saying such a requirement would be unconstitutional in a civilian US court.

“If the United States were not ashamed of its conduct, it wouldn’t hide behind a gag order,” said Ben Wizner, staff lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union.

“The agreement says he wasn’t mistreated. Why aren’t we allowed to judge for ourselves?”

David Hicks guilty of being fatTerry Hicks commented

“The Americans made David sign a paper to say he was never abused… when we knew he has been – David told us.”

Mr Hicks said David would have to think about whether he would want to tell his story.

“Once David’s home he’ll have time to think about that,” he said.

“Who knows, he may want to change his mind.”

We can but hope so … we can be pretty certain the rodent will attempt to capitalise on a silenced Hicks’ misfortunes to boost his woeful electoral position.

Hicks pleads guilty to sham court

David Hicks pleads guiltyAccording to David Hicks’ dad, Terry, his son has taken the go home card offered by his jailers, pleading guilty to providing material support to terrorists “because he was desperate to escape five years of ‘hell’ in Guantanamo Bay” and return to Whorestralia.

During his Kafkesque incarceration, whilst awaiting charges to be concocted by the United Stupids military kangaroo court, Hicks has maintained his innocence.

He decided to plead guilty yesterday to one count of material support of terrorism at a late-night, unscheduled hearing of the military commission, after an apparent deal between his defence team and the prosecution.

It’s likely he will serve any sentence in a maximum security prison in South Asstralia and be home before the federal election.

The reprehensible rodent characteristically applauded Hicks’ plea as “a vindication of the military commission process”, whilst to his credit, Nat’s renegade senator Barnaby Joyce commented

“The only thing that is guilty here is the judicial process under which he was being tried.”

US war criminalsTerry and David’s sister Stephanie flew home from Guantanamo

despite being told as the aircraft was on the tarmac that Hicks was about to plead guilty. Mr Hicks had flown in earlier in the day and spent several hours with his son. They both cried. It was their first contact in more than two years.

Terry Hicks said: “He knows that John Howard and the Government is frightened that he will do something when he gets back. What the hell is he going to do? He did nothing in Afghanistan … His main aim is to come back to Australia, see his kids, and settle down.”

Blaming the Australian government for pressuring his son to plead guilty, Terry said

“They demonised him, they pre-judged him for five years. I suppose Mr Howard would be throwing his hands up with glee at the moment but as far as I’m concerned this was a way out for David regardless of whether he was guilty or innocent, we’ll never ever know now.”

Howard’s dread locked holiday

Howard on HolidaysLabor Party supporters will be grinning from ear to ear today. With

the rodent’s electoral prospects have never looked bleaker. To top it off, there are accusations that David Hicks was sedated before being told of the last dodgy charges against him. Hick’s lawyer in the federal case against the Whorestralian gobblement is intimating the ratbag gang may be hauled into court.

The legal action, which is due to begin in May, argues that the Government breached its duty of care to Hicks by not demanding the US Government release him from Guantanamo Bay as other countries had done with their citizens.

Hicks’s lawyer, David McLeod, told the ABC that besides the Prime Minister, Attorney-General Philip Ruddock and Foreign Minister Alexander Downer could also be called to the witness box.

Mr McLeod said most of the evidence for the case would be agreed to without the need to call witnesses before the trial went ahead.

“If it can’t be agreed, then there will be a request for certain witnesses and it may well include Mr Downer and Mr Ruddock and indeed Mr Howard as potential witnesses,” Mr McLeod said.

To highlight his dire plight for the past five years, Amnesty International is exhibiting a reconstruction of Hicks’ Guantanamo cell at Martin Place in Sydney. People experiencing the conditions of Hicks’ inhumane incarceration have described their reactions as “traumatising”.

IT consultant Nikki Lee, 33, said it was a surreal experience stepping inside the replica cell, which includes a short bunk bed, a narrow window and a stainless steel toilet and wash basin.

“It’s very small and quite terrifying really to imagine spending that much time in there,” she said.

“It makes it more real and unreal at the same time because it doesn’t seem that this could happen to someone who has not committed a crime.”

Fitted with a security camera on which people can record their thoughts, the art vérité exhibition will soon tour to other states.

We’ll be leaving a strong message of disgust when the wardrobe-sized room visits Queensland. Wonder how many people have already expressed their wish for the ratbags to trade places with Hicks?

Thinking of Leaving Asstralia?

Howard Bush First Family

Be afraid, be very afraid. You can’t rely on the current Howard government to help you out if you’re in strife abroad. The value of being Australian diminishes daily under little Johnny’s uncaring, unscrupulous, double-dealing regime.

Outside court, opposition legal affairs spokesman Kelvin Thomson slammed Mr Bennett’s argument that the government had no legal obligation to help citizens abroad, saying it would “send a shiver down the spine” of Australians overseas.

He said the comments were in stark contrast to Mr Downer’s “boast back in 1997 that `the duty to protect our citizens overseas is a fundamental responsibility’.

Today’s Age editorial highlights Howard’s treason against us Aussies:

What a state of affairs. If there is no legal requirement, then for all intents and purposes a government can wash its hands of its duty to a citizen caught up in trouble abroad, irrespective of whether a person is perpetrator or victim. It makes carrying the Australian passport seem just a little less comforting.

The Judge hearing the Federal Court case against the Howard mob, Justice Brian Tamblin, has reserved his judgement due to the complexity of the case. One would think it would be cut and dried that the role of our government is to represent and protect the interests of its citizens wherever they may be. Apparently not.

Little Johnny’s mob could have past retrospective legislation to enable Hicks to be tried in Whorestralia had they wished and didn’t. Former Lib appointed judge, Stephen Charles, QC, comments on such a Whorestralian trial and reveals possible reasons why little Johnny failed to pursue a fair trial for Hicks in Whorestralia:

“The coercive methods used by investigators would be examined in detail, further damaging the reputations of the US military and both the US and Australian governments. The conclusion seems inescapable that the Australian Government was concerned that the evidence upon which the prosecution relied for a conviction of Mr Hicks would be rejected in a trial in Australia … and that it did not wish him to be tried before an Australian court, precisely because such a trial would have to be a fair one.”

Mr Charles is one of a band of former judges, including former Family Court chief justice Alastair Nicholson and former High Court judge Mary Gaudron, to have spoken out against the Federal Government’s treatment of Hicks.