Finally a conservative voice on Imperator Fish

You may think this blogsite is all just a laugh, but let me assure you that you could not be more wrong. In fact, I consider it my public duty to provide informative and balanced opinion and commentary.

But I’ve received a flood of emails* asking for a more conservative point of view, and for the views of the Right to be better represented on this blogsite.

These emails forced me to confront my own liberal biases. So that is why I recruited none other than the distinguished Dr. Frank Shizenhausen to contribute to this site.

I’m sure you know Dr. Shizenhausen’s work, but let me recite some of his career highlights so far:

• Studied at the prestigious University of Slough, where he graduated in Zoology with honours.
• Completed masters and doctorate in Resource Management and Town Planning at Ulan Bator Tech.
• Founder of the Centre for Research and Policy (CRAP), a policy think-tank that has influenced conservative movements in all corners of the Wairarapa region.
• Keynote Speaker at last year’s ARSE (Against Reason, Science and the Enlightenment) Annual Conference.
• Third Runner Up in the Pams Baking Powder Columnist of the Year Award, 2008.
• Bestselling Author of Common Cents: How Thinking Ruined The Economy.

And now here is the first of Frank’s hard-hitting columns.

Scott

* I sent them myself, just to be sure they got to me.

If the Waihopai spybase trial tells us anything, it is that we must immediately abolish the claim of right defence.

It is simply intolerable that a jury of ordinary people, in a one-off case with unusual circumstances involving no harm to people, could have allowed this monstrous trio to go free. This verdict threatens all of us. Especially our children. And our domes.

John Key is right to compare this to the provocation debate we had a few months ago. We abolished the partial defence of provocation, so we can act quickly when we need to. Even though the provocation debate went on for years and years and was the subject of more than one Law Commission report. And even though the provocation defence was used in numerous cases with often troubling results. Yes, this is just like the provocation debate.

This case sets a precedent for any crackpot on a mission. By “precedent” I don’t mean a legal precedent, because anyone who isn’t a complete halfwit* knows jury decisions don’t have any precedent value at all. So when I wave the term “precedent-setting” about, just go with me. Don’t over-analyse everything. Over-analysing things is what got us into this mess into the first place.

Let’s also remember for a moment that these defendants were effectively articulate hippies. Nowadays, in this permissive society we live in, hippies are given the freedom to do as they please. But nobody every questions why this should be so. Why, in a country that is suffering an appalling child abuse epidemic, and where welfare dependency and violent crime are the norm for many, do we tolerate hippies at all?

Once upon a time someone who dressed differently to you and me would be stoned to death, or burned at the stake. We all know we can’t go back to those glorious days, but isn’t it tempting still to think of the society we left behind? Was slavery really that bad?

Contrast the fate of the Waihopai trio now with the sentence handed down to Stephen Versalko. He probably should have been less greedy, but at least he wore a collar in court. Six years seems a bit harsh, considering robbing from a bank is a victimless crime, because they just print some money when they need more of it, don’t they?

Compare that with the damage the trio could have done to a nebulous and shadowy security apparatus whose machinations nobody but a select few really understand. Maybe the damage was only a pin-prick, but if you stick a pin in someone’s eye that’s got to be GBH.

The verdict forces us to face some uncomfortable facts. Is it time we abolished juries altogether? They can’t be trusted to apply common sense any more. That’s what happens when you let the elderly or unemployed dominate juries. 

But judges are a problem too, because they allow the chronic inefficiency of the system to fester into absurd results. The money we waste on the judicial system is obscene. If there was ever an area of the economy crying out for deregulation, surely this is it. If someone really wants their case to go before a judge and jury they should damn well pay for the privilege themselves.

And don’t even get me started on legal aid. If you can’t afford a lawyer, it’s your own fault for spending so much time and money breeding like rabbits and smoking P. You people are all the same.

We simply cannot live in a society where juries are allowed to make up any kind of verdict they like. That provides uncertainty, and the markets hate uncertainty.

I say, I’m feeling rather faint. Damn liberals must have poisoned my water!

*Or a Prime Minister. Our PM is a busy man and can’t be expected to understand basic details of how the justice system works.