There used to be an expression, “If you’re guilty, get Galbally!”
Mm, I don’t know why that pops into my head because I wanted to remind everyone that people have the right to a presumption of innocence… Unless, of course, they’re people on Nauru and Manus needing medical attention.
Now I know what some of you are thinking. How come Georgie Porgie was granted bail to get his knees done after he’d been convicted of a sex crime? Ok, I realise this was probably why the Murdoch press was squealing about dangerous people being allowed out bail, but it seems strange to you lot reading this. It’s simple really, We suspect asylum seekers of terrible crimes but if they’d been found guilty, they’d be entitled to medical treatment. After all, just because someone is a criminal doesn’t mean we should deny them basic rights.
Cardinal Pell raised ten things in his defence…
While I’m no lawyer, I wasn’t in the trial and I don’t have the benefit of omnipresence, I can certainly say that the last of them that I read was hardly a defence at all. The final defence was that the accuser hadn’t mentioned it before he did…
Taking a very deep breathe, I have to tell you that one of my best friends was sexually abused as a young teenager. He didn’t tell me for a number of years. He didn’t tell his mother until she was asked to be a character witness for the man who’d abused him. He didn’t tell the authorities until he was prepared to be a witness in a trial where the perpetrator was on trial. He was in his forties by then. He’s dead now.
As a defence, being late to tell those who love you and actually believing that you’d have the power to do something about it, is hardly something I’d bring up as a defence. Rape is about power, and powerful people can convince you to say nothing. If you believe that – for even one moment that’s a defence – I would like to say, fuck you, Cardinal Pell and all who sail with you.
However, I’m a fair man and Pell had other defences. For a start, he suggested that he may have been observed in the sacristy. It was a “public” place with priests going to and fro… Someone may have seen what he was up to.
Mm, well that’s quite a defence. Yes, I can see that being caught would be a deterrent. I mean. let’s go back to the last century and remember how priests caught by other priests were treated. Remember how all those priests were defrocked by their bishops…So many priests were caught and reported by other members of the church. And they were disgraced and defrocked and shunned by the Church and… Oh, sorry, that – like Pell suggested about the accusation by the victim – is one of those fantasies that people would like to believe.
If Pell had been discovered, he would have been reported to the Archbishop… You know, himself. Of course, I suspect that like Pell in Ballarat who didn’t “take much interest” in such things, they’d have just looked the other way and presumed that he had God on his side.
Still, Pell is appealing…
Ok, not to me, but certainly to John Howard who told us that he knew about the conviction but he’s still get’s a thumbs up from old “we shall decide who enters and the circumstances in which they enter”! And Mandy Vanstone expresses her disappointment that she couldn’t give Pell the thumbs up… in a figurative, not literal sense.
Are these people lacking all understanding? Have they decided to destroy the Liberal Party in the hope that they’ll be able to form the IPA party or join Cory Bernardi’s Conservative Party?
I mean, were I standing for the Liberal Party… And believe me, I’m not standing for this pack of paedophile apologists any longer… But were I standing for the Party, I’d be very concerned that a reference from John Howard would be a kiss of death.
BUT VANILLA FFS
When Richter suggested that it was on the vanilla end of offences, I couldn’t believe my ears. It was apparently quick and simple.
“You’re honour, I wish to put forward that my client has always suffered from premature ejaculation and so any rape offence conviction should take this into account when sentencing.”
VANILLA FFS
And we hear those who’ve been squawking for tougher sentences and bail being too easy to get defending a convicted criminal on the grounds that they don’t want him to be guilty because it just makes them look foolish.
I remember reading a column by Bolt where he wrote that people just weren’t prepared to say that the emperor had new clothes… Of course, I did wonder whether he was aware that the whole point of the story was that it was the sycophants who weren’t prepared to say that he didn’t, and that it took a child to point out the truth. I thought it may have been a cry for help. You know, don’t blame me for what I write. I know that He is naked but I’m forced to write nonsense by my editor…
But now I know. Bolt, Howard and others are prepared to tell us that the Emperor is, of course, the Emperor and any judgement by lesser mortals is wrong.
Look, look, the Emperor has removed his sacrificial robes sayeth the Child.
Impossible, he’d need the help of his Master of Ceremonies who never left his side for even one momentary toilet break in all the time they celebrated Mass.
What would a child know? Even after a judge and jury, we support him; he’s fully clothed.
Naked emperor? A fairy story…
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