But
I am glad I am in America. Australians like to mock America, but its constitution would make this kind of internet filtering and government tampering impossible. The
technical and legal impossibilities aside, it is a stupid policy that should be dumped for the extravagant waste of money and banal, un-thought and anti-liberty legislation that it is. If people want that kind of filtering they can get it easily, and more cheaply, from the private market. The whole idea that government can provide this form of censoring in a functioning liberal democracy is ridiculous.
Once again, I am glad I am not living in Australia. This kind of censorship, no matter how benevolent it is predicated, remains government censorship. Not only is this policy politically and technically a bad one, it is at odds with the liberties inherent in limited government and the dominance of the individual over the state as a political entity.
Crunchgear has a good summary of the difficulty of the oppositional politics:
Again, as with the Great Usenet Purge of 2008, it's hard to defend against censorship when officials hide behind things like child pornography and terrorism. No one wants to be seen as being "soft" on such topics, and the nuance required to successfully argue against this type of censorship is often difficult to articulate in a media environment of 60-second sound bites and screaming Drudge sirens.
The High Court in Australia has already ruled that by inference the constitution of Australia protects free political speech, so I suspect the first time a political site is filtered then this legislation will be going to the High Court.
Australia should have adopted a Washington Constitution in 1901 with enumerated rights - not a Westminster one which is a weaker protection for individual liberties from the executive. I firmly believe that more than ever.
Via Slashdot Nick Minchin starts an
op-ed in the SMH with, "Underlying the Rudd Government's plan to screen the internet is an offensive message: that parents cannot be trusted to mind their children online." How frustrating for Australians that they are stuck with this bad policy and a change in government has not tanked it. This legislation
started in 1999 with the Liberal Party - of which Nick Minchin was a cabinet minister in - and now the Labor Party, for reasons of similar politics, have continued the bad policy.
Most Popular on South Sea Republic
The articles that have been viewed the most:
Most Popular Restaurants in Phoenix
Phoenix Eats Out is the restaurant review site for
Phoenix,
Scottsdale and
Old Town Scottsdale which lists the modernist and contemporary restaurants, taverns and bars in the greater Phoenix area.
This is the list of the most popular restaurants pages from phoenixeatsout.com that have been viewed the most;
My personal favourite restaurants in Phoenix are
AZ88,
Postinos,
Bomberos with
Grazie,
Humble Pie,
Orange Table,
The Vig,
Fez and others coming close behind. View the complete list with the photo-journalistic style images on
phoenixeatsout.com
Most Popular Hikes in Arizona
Arizona is an outdoor state and has lots of hiking in the city and around the state. Phoenix is unusual for most cities in having several large mountains in the center of the city with great hiking. Anyone who comes to Phoenix has to do the
Echo Canyon trail on Camelback and the
Summit Hike on Squaw Peak or Piesta Peak. The views of the city, suburbs and surrounding mountains are wonderful from Camelback and Piesta Peak.
For more experienced hikers there is the McDowell Mountains in North Scottsdale that has several difficult and strenuous hikes in
Tom's Thumb and
Bell Pass. Alternatively, you can hike the highest mountain in Arizona. At 12,600 feet
Humphrey's Peak is a long and difficult hike.
Alternate Australian Constitutions
Between 2004 and 2009 this site,
southsearepublic.org, was a constitutional blog based on scoop which focused on Australian and global constitutional issues.
One of the strongest aspects of it was the development of constitutions by those involved in the blog. These constitutions are the outcome:
The constitutions were built using principles from Montesquieu's separation of powers, the enlightnment's universal political rights and the ancient Athenian technology of sortition and choice by lot.
Archives For South Sea Republic
South Sea Republic started in 2004 as an Australian constitutional blog in 2004 based on scoop software. It was an immigrative outgrowth of Kuro5hin. The archives for each year since then;
The articles are ordered by views.
Who Is Cam Riley
I am an Australian living in the United States as a permanent resident.
I am a software developer by trade and mostly work in Java and jump between middleware and front end.
I originally worked in the New York area of the United States in telecommunications before moving to Washington DC and
working in a mix of telecommunications, energy and ITS. I started my own software company before heading out to
Arizona and working with Shutterfly. Since then I have joined a startup in the Phoenix area and am thoroughly enjoying myself.
I do a lot of photography which I post on this website, but also on flickr. I have a photo-journalistic website which lists
the modernist and contemporary restaurants in phoenix. I have a site on the
Australian Flying Corps [AFC] which has been around since the 1990s and which I unfortunately
lost the .org URL to during a life event; however, it is under the
www.australianflyingcorps.com URL now.
The AFC website has gone through several iterations since the 90s and the two most recent are
Australian Flying Corps Archives(2004-2002) and
Australian Flying Corps Archives(2002-1999) which are good places to start.
Websites Worth Reading
Websites of friends, colleagues and of interest;
