Sony pulls The Interview, but was it the honourable thing to do?

(Transcript from The Viewpoint Podcast)

Last month, Sony Pictures' computer systems were hacked, and the FBI now says that North Korea was behind the hack, a charge North Korea denies, though they suggest some of their sympathisers may have been involved. This week, with some US cinema chains pulling out of showing the Sony Pictures film The Interview, a comedy about an attempted assassination of North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, Sony decided to pull the release of the film. It will not now go out to cinemas worldwide on Christmas Day.

North Korea claimed that Sony were “abetting a terrorist act” by making the film. Err, perhaps they know something we don't and two journalists actually did manage to kill Kim Jong Un, and one of his doubles has had to stand in for him. I mean, with North Korea not being transparent with information, who'd really know?

Whether North Korea were involved in the hack directly, indirectly, or not at all, the actions of Sony, a company that originated in Japan, where honour is a big thing, their actions this week in pulling the film, strike me as less than honourable. Political pressure is not something that any company should ever give in to, and their actions may have just enboldened North Korea into thinking they can get away with other cyber actions like this one.

The Oil Price, Russia and OPEC.

(Transcript from The Viewpoint Podcast)

The price of oil has made a major shift downward in recent weeks, falling to around $60 a barrel for North Sea Brent Crude, and below $60 for West Texas Intermediate. For most of us, it will mean that it will cost us less to fill up our cars, and prices for the goods on our shelves should start falling because transportation will start costing less as well.

But there's much more to it than that, especially for Russia. Oil revenues are a big part of their government's income, and the drop from over $120 a barrel to around $60, means that Russia's budget, which was calculated at a higher price, will not be able to spend as much money as they previously thought. The drop in the Oil price even sent the Russian Rouble shooting up against the dollar, to almost 80 roubles to the dollar, before settling OPEC even decided not to cut production to force prices higher, and whilst most saw that as a shot across the bows of US shale oil producers, Russia's aggression against Ukraine may have also played a part as neither the US nor Russia are part of the international cartel.

Russian President Vladimir Putin held his usual end of year press conference this week, and like previous Soviet Premiers and dictators worldwide, blamed the West for what is happening with his economy. And whilst it's true that the West's economic sanctions have hurt Russia to some degree, OPEC's refusal to cut production of oil in order to raise the price on international commodities markets will do far more to damage the Russian economy than the west's sanctions.

And who are these OPEC members who will hurt Russia's economy so badly? Algeria, Angola, Ecuador, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Nigeria, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Venezuela and the Islamic Republic of Iran. Not a single western country in the cartel, not even the UK. Maybe Putin should get some of his Russia Today buddies to start going after Iran's Press TV.

The Sydney Siege: The wrong conclusion, the wrong lesson.

(Transcript from The Viewpoint Podcast)

Welcome to the programme, thank you for downloading and listening to this podcast. We're going to start with the story that has been dominating the news all week from Australia, and that was the siege at a Sydney chocolate cafe. When it started, I hoped and prayed for a swift, safe and just conclusion. My prayer was not answered. It wasn't swift. The siege lasted over 16 hours. It wasn't a safe conclusion, as police were forced into storming the cafe by the actions of the gunman. Nor was it a just conclusion. Two of the hostages were killed in the siege, as was the gunman. I would have prefered that the gunman had been able to be taken alive, to stand trial for his crimes.

Yes, crimes, and not just this siege. He was already on bail for a string of offences when he took those people hostage. He should have been standing trial for those crimes. Instead, he is dead, and we will never truly know what drove him to do this. Now there is a query about how the gunman was allowed to be on bail, and this is one of the issues that will have to be investigated, but it looks like an individual failing case, rather than something systemic.

However, this hasn't stopped some trying to take advantage of this issue to try to push their pet projects onto the agenda. Such as Senator David Leyonhjelm, advocating that Australia should follow the US example of arming citizens, and allowing for guns to be concealed about the person. He says he wants a discussion about the right to practical self defense, saying that “What happened in that cafe would have been most unlikely to have occurred in Florida, Texas, or Vermont, or Alaska in America...” Evidently, he's not heard about the large number of violent deaths that occur in America due to the prevalence of guns. Gun deaths in the US are around 100 times higher in the US, than in Australia. I didn't agree with former PM John Howard on a lot of things, but he was right, when he increased controls on gun ownership after the Port Arthur massacre. And so Senator David Leyonhjelm wins this week's W.T.F. Award in the Idiot Brigade Awards.

The Sydney Siege: 3 dead, and political opportunism.

The siege that had been taken place at a Sydney cafe, ended with a storming of the cafe, after a total of a dozen hostages had managed to get out.  It was believed there were still 9 hostages in there when Australia’s Special Forces Police made their storming raid.

And 3 lives were lost in that raid.  One of those, was the gunman, the perpetrator, who was identified as Man Haron Monis, who was an Iranian cleric, who was on bail for a number of offences.

Some wondered whether he was with Islamic State, he wasn’t nor did he show their flag, despite what some have said but more on that later, and some wondered whether he was doing this alone, and yes he was.

But 2 of the hostages also lost their lives in the storming.  Whether that was from the gunman’s gun or the police’s guns, we will probably never know.  One of them was a lawyer, the other was the manager of the cafe.  Two lives cruelly cut short.

But something else was lost in that raid.  Understanding.  We will never learn what drove the man to take these hostages, what his motivations were, what was going on inside his head, and that is a missed opportunity. 

And then Australia’s Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, made it worse.

During the siege, he had been rightfully careful with his choice of words, not calling it terrorism, not referring to it as anything other than a criminal act, with the possibility of a political motivation, a possibility that unfortunately can never now be proved or disproved.

But after it, he reverted to type and waded into the quagmire.

"He had a long history of violent crime, infatuation with extremism and mental instability, We know that he sent offensive letters to the families of Australian soldiers killed in Afghanistan and was found guilty of offences related to this.  We also know that he posted graphic extremist material online. As the siege unfolded yesterday, he sought to cloak his actions with the symbolism of the ISIL death cult.  Tragically, there are people in our community ready to engage in politically motivated violence.  Australians should be reassured by the way our law enforcement and security agencies responded to this brush with terrorism,"

“…this brush with terrorism”?  Every time you call an act such as this terrorism, you are legitimising the cause that drives it.  It is an act of criminality, plain and simple, and that’s how you should be categorising it, and talking about it.  You call it terrorism, and call the perpetrators terrorists, and the criminals believe you just acknowledged that they are right to do what they are doing.  So, never call it terrorism, or call them terrorists.

The other statement I take serious issue with is this one, “he sought to cloak his actions with the symbolism of the ISIL death cult”.  Because every black flag with Arabic writing on it, must be the flag of ISIL(!).  In fact, the flag that was displayed early on in the siege, wasn’t an ISIL flag at all.  In fact, it’s a standard Islamic flag, a Shahada flag, which represents a general expression of faith in Islam.  The writing on it reads, "There is no god but Allah; Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah."  The same phrase is on the flag of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

Symbolism of ISIL?  Only in the most shallowest of ways, and in fact, the ISIL flag, doesn’t use that phrase or classical Arabic style of writing.  The script on the ISIL flag, looks almost like it was written by a child, it’s got that very handwritten, amateur quality to it.

Tony Abbott, in that one post-siege statement, took his grade for how he’d handled that, down from a B+, to a D-.  He really should have stuck much closer to the original script that he’d been using during the siege.

When the siege started, I hoped and prayed for a swift, but just, conclusion.  The conclusion was swift, but it was also brutal, and to lose the lives of two of the hostages in that raid, will be leaving a bitter aftertaste in the mouths of the Special Forces Police who carried out that raid.  I wanted the perpetrator taken alive, to stand trial for his crimes, and to find out what his mind-set was.  We’ll never get that, and the justice that was so badly needed at the end of this siege, was lost in a hail of bullets.

The Viewpoint Podcast–Episode 1a–Torture report released, needs prosecutions

This week, we saw a report from the Senate Intelligence Committee, chaired by Senator Dianne Fienstein, on the “enhanced interrogation techniques” that the CIA used in the aftermath of September 11^th 2001. Okay, let's stop right there. “Enhanced Interrogation Techniques”? That's political speak, for the T word, because the T word can lead you into all sorts of legal trouble. The T word? You know, torture. So let's call a spade a spade and say exactly what this was. It was torture, that's what the CIA did for over 6 years, in the aftermath of September 11^th 2001.

That same month, President Bush, ordered the use of these techniques. He ordered the CIA to torture prisoners. And he used 9/11 as a justification. These techniques were used until November 2007. And in all that time, according to the report, they were not an effective means of acquiring intelligence or gaining co-operation from detainees. The CIA made claims about the effectiveness of these techniques, that didn't actually stack up or stand up to any scrutiny at all.

And the craziest thing about this is, there are people still defending the use of torture. George W Bush back in 2010, said to NBC News “Using these techniques saved lives, my job was to protect America”. Yeah, right, you'd already failed on that count when you ignored a report that was given to you back in 2001, which had said that Osama Bin Laden was determined to attack America, and afterwards, we had 9/11. So you'd already failed to do your job, and you ordered the CIA to torture prisoners as retribution for that.

Bill O'Reilly of Fox News is also siding with the torturers. In a recent Talking Points commentary on his show The O'Reilly Factor, he said and I quote, “Based on available evidence, "Talking Points" is siding with the CIA people. Look, we're fighting a war... ...Bad things happen in war. After the German SS massacred Americans during the Battle of the Bulge, U.S. troops shot and killed Germans who had their hands up trying to surrender. That was wrong. But it happened and the U.S. high command largely overlooked it, understanding the tremendous emotions involved.
It is the same thing with coerced interrogation.” I wonder what available evidence you're basing that on, Bill, because I have some available evidence, which I'll talk about in a minute, that puts things in a completely different light.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney, the day the report was released, appeared on Fox News Channel's Special Report with Bret Baier, and defended the use of torture. He said the CIA deserved “credit not condemnation” for the use of torture, and asked “What are you prepared to do to get the truth against future attacks against the United States?” Well, we know how far you are prepared to go, Mr Cheney. You saw how it was done when you were part of the Nixon administration during the Watergate scandal, a scandal that cost your boss his job. And if you are prepared to break international law to do what you want, then you should face the consequences of that.

Yes, that's right. I said break international law, and that's what Bush, Cheney, Alberto Gonzales, and the people at the CIA did. In most postings I have seen on this story, they have referenced the UN Universal Declaration on Human Rights, which was originally written in 1948. Article 5 of the declaration states that, “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.” That is the complete article, as found on the UN's website. That is everything it says. Often as well, they reference Article 7 of the declaration, which says, “All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.” Now these became international law in 1976 after being incorporated into the International Bill Of Human Rights, which was ratified in that year, but in 1984, the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment came into being, and was ratified in 1986, becoming international law then, and it is articles under this convention that really defeat all the justifications, all the defences, all the 'we did this for good reasons' arguments that we have heard for years.

International Law is quite explicit on this. Article 2 of the convention reads as follows.

1. Each State Party shall take effective legislative, administrative, judicial or other measures to prevent acts of torture in any territory under its jurisdiction.
2. No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture.
3. An order from a superior officer or a public authority may not be invoked as a justification of torture.

Well, there's no ambiguity there. No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, may be invoked as a justifcation for torture. Not even 9/11. And those who justify it, defend it, and support it, should understand that. No justification for torture, or “enhanced interrogation techniques” as the Bush administration liked to call it. And now, they have to do something about it.

United Nations Special Rapporteur on counter terrorism and human rights, Ben Emmerson, said in a statement earlier this week, “The individuals responsible for the criminal conspiracy revealed in today’s report must be brought to justice, and must face criminal penalties commensurate with the gravity of their crimes. The fact that the policies revealed in this report were authorised at a high level within the US Government provides no excuse whatsoever. Indeed, it reinforces the need for criminal accountability. International law prohibits the granting of immunities to public officials who have engaged in acts of torture. This applies not only to the actual perpetrators but also to those senior officials within the US Government who devised, planned and authorised these crimes. As a matter of international law, the US is legally obliged to bring those responsible to justice. The UN Convention Against Torture and the UN Convention on Enforced Disappearances require States to prosecute acts of torture and enforced disappearance where there is sufficient evidence to provide a reasonable prospect of conviction. States are not free to maintain or permit impunity for these grave crimes. It is no defence for a public official to claim that they were acting on superior orders. CIA officers who physically committed acts of torture therefore bear individual criminal responsibility for their conduct, and cannot hide behind the authorisation they were given by their superiors.

Human Rights Watch have also called for prosecutions as well. And the ACLU wants a special prosecutor appointed. But there it is, The US government is legally, and indeed, morally obliged to bring Bush, Cheney and the others to justice. It cannot just move on and leave this in the past, because it will never be left in the past, until the criminals are prosecuted for what they've done. In his Talking Points commentary, Bill O'Reilly said that opinion lines are drawn on ideology. No, they are drawn on legality. On one side, you have those who are trying to get away with doing something blatantly illegal under international law, and on the other side, you have those who know it's illegal and want to see justice take it's course, and to frame it in political or ideological terms, is completely dishonest. Bill also asked in his talking points commentary, who would you rather have protecting you -- Bush and Cheney, or those who oppose “enhanced interrogation techniques”. Given the evidence I have at my disposal, including international law, my answer is clear, I'd rather have people who do not use torture, rather than George W Bush and Dick Cheney.