WHAT WE FACE

By Eric D. Butler
If a person has never seen a high quality article, nor heard about it, it is understandable that he may feel that the article he has is the best possible. It is difficult, perhaps impossible, for many of the younger generation to accept the fact that at the beginning of this century the world was a much saner and more civilised place in which to live than it is today. The great Roman philosopher and statesman, Cicero, had relatively little success in warning his fellows that their Civilisation was collapsing. Cicero was regarded by many as an alarmist. One of the moral giants of this century, the Russian exile, Solzhenitsyn, has been also described as an alarmist because he warns that Western Civilisation is disintegrating.

The reality of disintegration is difficult to accept by those who have grown up during the period of disintegration. Manifestations of the disintegration are accepted as the norm. Cut off from their spiritual and cultural roots, and conditioned by the "social sciences" many of the young have been reduced to a level where they not only reject traditional forms of behaviour, but traditional values and institutions. 1985 was designated as the Year of the Child by the UN, but it was a year in which all forms of child abuse, much of it in the classrooms, increased. Surely it is something akin to a sick joke to now have a UN year for promoting peace? Most of the "peace studies" are designed to distort the realities of the world, and to help to further disarm the West, morally and physically, in the face of the growing totalitarian threat. The main totalitarian threat is internal, not external. If the internal threat could be defeated, it would be easier to deal with the external threat.

Compared with today's world, the early years of this century were like a Golden Age. Pax Britannica was far from perfect, but it was a major stabilising and civilising influence right throughout the world. Lenin correctly insisted that the British Empire was the major barrier to the creation of the type of totalitarian monster he and his fellow criminals had in mind. If anyone of the old British world had suggested the necessity for Human Rights Commissions, or "Bills of Rights", he would have been regarded either as an idiot or a subversive.

Relative to the productive capacity available at the time, the general standard of living was higher than it is today. The tyranny of the petty official was minimal compared with the bureaucratic lawlessness of today. Like today, it was the forces associated with financial orthodoxy, which were the main internal subversive influence. These forces have been responsible for a series of self inflicted wounds starting with the Anglo-Boer War. Disaster has followed disaster during this century of growing violence. The retreat from a Civilisation which was a glowing incarnation of Greece, Rome and Christian values, can be measured by the subordination of the individual to the collective, and the escalating growth of centralised power in all spheres political, economic and financial.

In modern times the Black Magic known as debt finance, the worship of an abstraction called Money, has been the mask behind which the drive for centralised power has operated. Amalgamation follows amalgamation, only made possible because the Debt Merchants give their blessing. Using political puppets like Malcolm Fraser, the Debt Merchants and their agents determined that little Rhodesia had to become Zimbabwe. They have now determined that South Africa must also capitulate. And what, of Australia, with its astronomical debt, when it feels the heat of an international campaign which insists that it must also become a part of the Pacific Common Market?

The desperate plight of the world manifests itself in a frustrated President Reagan, leader of the biggest nation of the West, rightfully condeming guerrilla terror tactics against civilians, specifically naming Gaddafi of Libya as one who should be selected for reprisals because of Libya's association with terrorist activities. But President Reagan has failed in his denunciation of terrorism to name the main supporter of terrorist activities throughout the world, the Soviet Union. The Soviet continues to indiscriminately kill and maim in Afghanistan.

All Western nations, including Australia, continue to help sustain the Soviet with exports of vast quantities of food, strategic metals, and technology. The Debt Merchants continue to help finance the Soviet and its allies, while the witch doctors, the economic experts, insist that continued exporting to the Soviet bloc is essential to sustain the economies of the exporting nations. Western Europeans nations decline to join the American programme of economic sanctions against Libya for the same basic reason that the U.S.A. continues to send economic aid to the Soviet, and which now threatens to intensify an international trade war by subsidising vast quantities of American food exports. The madness, which insists that nations grow wealthier by exporting more than they import - the "favourable balance of trade" doctrine, makes it inevitable that 1986 will see still greater international convulsions.

In selecting Gaddafi as the main target of his wrath against terrorism, Reagan has unfortunately made it possible for Gaddafi, strongly disliked by many of his fellow Arabs, to gain the support of most of the Arab world, which, in spite of internal differences, is united in its opposition to International Zionism. The Zionist State of Israel was established by a terror campaign, and Zionists have never flinched from using terror tactics when thought necessary.

As predicted by non Zionist Jews like Dr. Alfred Lilienthal, Zionist terror has served the Soviet's strategy of fragmenting and penetrating the Moslem world. The attempted isolation of Gaddafi only set back the prospects of moderate Arab leaders achieving a Peace programme with Israel and stabilising the Middle East.

The Reagan Administration is a captive of the very revolutionary forces it is seeking to curb. Enormous American economic resources have been devoted to attempting to halt the Marxist backed revolutionary movements sweeping Latin-America, while at the same time the crushing debt programmes of the International Bankers create the very conditions in which Marxist revolutionaries flourish. President Marcos of the Philippines is no saint, but if he is replaced by a pro-Communist regime, it will be primarily because of the policies of the International Debt Merchants.

In the absence of a basic change in financial policies, America itself is now threatened with the debt problem, both externally and domestically. Massive deficits have failed to sustain the much-vaunted American economic recovery, with another major economic down turn developing. Members of the American rural community are just as desperate as those of the Australian rural community. The suicide rate increases as do marriage break ups. There is nothing more deadly than the debt terror.

1986 starts with Australia sinking at an accelerating rate into a crisis of the most horrendous proportions. An oppressed and depressed rural community is becoming divided now between those who recommend "direct action" and those who rightfully fear the consequences of "taking the law into their own hands". The sands of history are dotted with the skeletons of the failed. The attempts by desperate people to solve major problems by methods, which ignore the correct principles of association.

It is as certain as the sunrise where the policies of the Hawke Government are taking Australia. The attempt to impose a UN promoted Bill of Rights, the programme for eliminating Christian and Independent Schools, and the continuation of heavy taxation, high interest rates and escalating debt, are guaranteed to produce more conflict and social disintegration. If the Human Rights Commission is given the totalitarian powers included in the Bill of Rights, we can expect to see the League of Rights become the first major target for attack.

The Canadian situation is an indication of the shape of things to come. Book banning will start. The Hawke Government and its Marxist backers only constitute such a threat because of the abject failure of the "Opposition" parties. There is no doubt that if Bob Hawke and associates can find a plausible excuse, they will be tempted to hold yet another early election at a time when they are almost certain to win because of lack of any genuine opposition.

It is dangerously futile to believe that it is possible to effect any major changes through the existing Liberal and National Parties. What is required is a grassroots movement led by men and women who are primarily concerned about service rather than power, and who have a sufficient grasp of the correct principles of association, and representative government, to foster a unity of purpose amongst electors to back only those political candidates who agree that their first loyalty is to their electors and to their policy requirements.

In spite of the widespread subversion and perversion of all kinds there still is a great reservoir of moral strength amongst the Australian people. Can that strength be tapped for a constructive national programme before it is dissipated? That is the fundamental question we face today. The League of Rights alone possesses within its ranks the knowledge, the expertise and the type of leadership, which can bring a coherent and. constructive programme out of the growing ferment throughout Australia.

RSL ON BILL OF RIGHTS

Fortunately there have been some excellent letters in the media, drawing attention to the many dangers in the Bill of Rights. The RSL is to be congratulated on its stand against the Bill of Rights and for its excellent statement on the Bill, which reads as follows:

"The Returned Services League of Australia believes the proposed Bill of Rights poses grave threats to the freedom of individual Australians. "The League's position is based on the firmly held belief that in our democracy, Australians are afforded the dignity of the individual and the rights and freedoms are fundamental possessions of the individual and are not privileges conferred by governments.
"Australians heritage of rights and freedoms is protected by the accumulative process of statute law, common law and precedent. Our system of checks and balances protects against the abuse of an individual's dignity. "Our system represents the collective wisdom and accumulated experience evolved over centuries. It is backed by freely elected parliaments and is founded on the determination to protect individual freedoms. Australia's two hundred years history portrays our struggle to obtain and protect our dignity. In a truly democratic society the individual's freedom resides in the respect by the majority for the rights of others, together with tolerance, fair play and support for the Rule of Law. "To live in a common law country is in itself the very best guarantee of the rights of the individual.
"What are some of our rights? "The freedom of thought, conscience, religion and expression. The right to own property. The right to utilise our natural wealth and talents and to dispose of them as we think fit. The right to marry and to found a family. The right to rear our children and instruct them in the religion of our choice. The freedom of choice to join a union or an association or not to join a union or association. The right to question those who invade our rights and to invoke the protection of the courts. The right to a public and fair trial. The right to confront and question those who accuse us. The rights to call witnesses and refuse to testify against themselves.
"Where is the clamour from the majority of Australians for reform and protection of our rights? Where is the threat to our society that government must legislate? Are Australians' rights and freedoms so threatened as to need such a radical change in our system, such an intrusion into the balance between the States and the Federal Government? The League, through its 270,000 members and association with other ex-service organisations, has not witnessed the demand.
"The irony of the proposal currently before the federal Parliament is that it extols many of the rights already possessed by Australians, yet the powers to be given to the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission will violate many of the rights now available. The Commission will be empowered to summon individuals, compel the production of documents and conduct non-public hearings. Those summoned to appear must testify under oath and without the benefit of legal representation. The outcome may render a person liable to criminal penalties. Where are the elementary rules of justice? Is it acceptable to Australians that an unelected body should exercise such power?
"International covenants, upon which the current proposal is based, may be useful, but Australians do not need international covenants to tell us what are our rights. Successful Bills of Rights have not been directed to enunciating human rights, but to defining the limit of government power. "To define rights in an Act of Parliament is in itself a violation of rights. If a right is not included does that right exist? How can the few people who work to draft the list of rights include all rights and freedoms? How can all rights and freedoms be covered within the limitations of the words of our language? The League believes that governments should not legislate to tell free people what they can do. "They should legislate to tell free people what they cannot do and let them get on with living their lives."

The RSL statement concludes by quoting Sir Henry Gibbs, Chief Justice of the High Court: "If society is tolerant and rational, it does not need a Bill of Rights. If it is not, no Bill of Rights will preserve it."