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12th July 2003 AUSTRALIAN DIARY

- HEROIN INJECTION ROOMS & GAYS IN AUSTRALIA-

The NSW premier is a labour party member, and we are told does not drive a car and likes reading history. Apart from those failings, he is a shrewd ex-journalist politician, who seems to know that the best government is unobtrusive.

Last year he announced that Heroin Injection rooms would be permitted under aegis of church sponsorship. These rooms do not supply drugs, and police are not encouraged to lurk around. Drug users are told that they may bring their drugs to the injection room, (somewhere in King's Cross, Sydney) and, using clean needles (provided on site presumably) have their "hit".

As a libertarian I applaud this initiative as a step in the right direction. So far as I am concerned, if someone wants to ingest known poisons, then that is that human being's right. No drug whatsoever should be "illegal". Doctors should be allowed to freely prescribe any drug to any person, after explaining any hazards associated (like addiction, damage to neural cells, etc). Back in the eighteenth century, opiates and like drugs were declared "bad" because workers who used them became unreliable workers. Quite likely, that is also the mental set that motivated "the prohibition". Also, like alcohol & tobacco, the young should be prohibited from poisoning themselves.

Similar thinking prompts my attitude to gays. As an enthusiastic heterosexual I am quite unconcerned by the decrease in competition that occurs when consenting males engage in homosexual activities.

- PALESTINE & IRAQ -

Now that Saddam has been displaced, perhaps the world community can begin to anticipate peace in the middle east. Admittedly, Syria and Iran still seem to be active, but Iran is not a dictatorship, and Syria, although a dictatorship on paper, is seen on closer inspection to be an oligarchy of tribal leaders. (It is perhaps incredible to realize, but a strong central dictatorship as existed in Iraq is actually a socio-political advance on a petty warlord oligarchy, as exists in countries like Syria and The Lebanon.)

Bush's plans to introduce democracy to Iraq are likely to meet with incomprehension and resistance from the muslim population. Democracy and the Muslim religion are contradictory concepts. Mahommed was not a democrat. As in the time of the prophet, most muslims expect to be ruled by a "wise" autocrat, preferably a holy man who rules as an absolute, altruistic monarch.

Iran is a theocracy, which is at best an anarchy or democracy of theologians. To become a power in Iran, a man must become a holy man (Mullah) through study of the Koran, the Sharia and other Muslim holy books, then he must appear in Qom and debate or proselytize his way to power by strength of personality or religious inspiration (or whatever). Subordinate to the theocracy, Iran also has a democratically elected parliament, whose deliberations are subject to theocratic intervention and veto by Qom.

- SECURITY -

I have previously theorized that a database of relationships (family, social, business) of Israel & Palestine would be a prime weapon in the war on terrorism. Such a database would be constructed with a census database as a frame, and could ideally be updated in real time by optical and auditory data collected by public cameras and microphones. In such a way, the location and contacts of all people could be known. Although definite information as to whether such a database is under construction is not available, there are omens that construction is in progress.

There are problems concerning the unfair advantage that such a database might give to those who had exclusive access. The fairest protection would be that such a database should be a public database, accessible by logged internet. Being public would not reduce the efficacy of the database, but would curb surreptitious use.

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