Monday 26 March 2012

A few little things.

1) Queensland election. The Labor Party brought down from government in its own right (unicameral parliament, so whoever gets the lower house gets everything) to a rump of seven seats (possibly less, given that former Premier Anna Bligh is said to now be retiring after the event of her party's thrashing). In part a thrashing for State failures, in part a thrashing for Federal frustrations. Some don't want to accept this result, on the basis that the primary vote for the LNP (the winners) was < 50%, but that's how a preferential voting system across multiple electorates works.

2) The Trayvon Martin case. I've felt sort of uneasy about the twitter-trending and one-sided eulogies bouncing around Facebook, but haven't been able to put my finger on why. It occurred to me last night that the more people who read these one-sided accounts (all strongly in favour of the deceased and vilifying the defendant), the more difficult it could be to find 12 good wo/men and true to form an unbiased jury. Two options then - either the defendant goes in front of a hostile jury (no better than a lynch mob) or we get mistrial after mistrial and he must walk free (until someone takes it upon themselves to murder him in retaliation).

This is all the more worrying given that it's possibly not the one-sided tale the eulogies would have us believe. Yes, the accused is a twit not to have gone to the hospital and have his injuries documented if the link has anything at all to it. Yes, the police probably should have arrested him for the record (if only so that his mugshot would record said injuries). Yes, he should explain himself in front of a jury - but I'm worried that it will be a jury of public opinion and not a properly conducted criminal trial.

I suspect the more facts that come to light, the more holes we will see in the surface story.

3) A systematic deliberate murderer of little Jewish chilldren is a systematic deliberate murderer of little Jewish children. That is all he is. He is not a martyr. If he wanted to be a martyr, he should have gone to Palestine or Afghanistan or any one of a number of places and martyred himself in combat with Israeli or American soldiers. No amount of intellectual waffle can excuse his actions. If the Palestinians want to stop being bombed by the Israelis, FUCKING STOP FIRING ROCKETS INTO ISRAEL, YOU MORONS.