Coming Out As A Republican To My Democrat Family Went Worse Than Coming Out Gay

I am not a sex offender. But a number of my friends no longer have time to see me. Lifelong acquaintances now regard me with fear and distrust. I have been unfriended en masse on social media and excoriated by friends who deign to remain. And I have been singly excluded from social gatherings when the rest of my family was invited.

No, I am not a sex offender. I am something even worse than that. I am a Donald Trump supporter.

I was raised in a liberal Jewish family in Washington DC, where my dad served as a Democratic congressman for Los Angeles. Accordingly, I was indoctrinated with all of the correct values and views.

When I was seven, my dad took me on a celebrity-packed camping trip to Death Valley as part of a campaign to protect California’s deserts. Israel took center stage in family discussions. I attended a Quaker elementary school, where I learned the black national anthem before I knew the “Star Spangled Banner.” In high school art class, I even chose to focus on man’s destruction of the environment. I came out to my family as gay at the ripe age of 20, and they were duly overjoyed.

It was always a given that Republicans are bad people, representative of that shameful sliver of our flawed society that values money above the planet and think the world would be better off if everyone were a straight, white male. At a minimum they are racist, misogynistic and homophobic. Left to their own devices, they would exclude ethnic minorities from everything, kick sinful gay offspring onto the streets, and pave our parks over with oil derricks.

Of course, there are the less malicious Republicans, the ones who have fallen victim to their gun-toting, Bible-thumping families and sadly do not know any better than what they have been told. This type is not entirely to blame for their ignorance; they just deserve our pity. These truths are held by my family and our extended social and political networks to be self-evident.

These Ideas Didn’t Work Out Long-Term

When, in my adulthood, the liberal policy agenda became problematic for me, I found myself at a loss. I began to raise questions with my family and friends, and met resistance. It was not because my concerns were particularly inappropriate; I was just not supposed to be questioning at all.

One could disagree with nuances, but not the judgment of the (then) president, or the party. Period. The irony of this apparent intolerance for diversity of thought by the party claiming to champion the rights of groups underserved by the status quo was not lost on me.

For the first time in my progressive life, standing up for the values that I most strongly espouse—truth, morality, self-reliance, boundaries, tolerance, and a healthy dose of Jewish skepticism—was damaging my reputation and character. When I publicly opposed my dad’s support of the Iran deal, I was admonished. I had few friends with whom I could have a civil political conversation: one stopped all communication with me for two weeks because Trump won the presidency.

If Republicans are bad, Trump is nothing less than Satan embodied. Post-election family gatherings devolved into group Trump-bashing, which intensified as more rumors of my dubious views wafted across town. I did not even bother going to gay pride because it was fused with a Resist march. If you do not want to impeach our president, you have no place in gay life.

I was labeled a white supremacist by a friend I’ve known my entire life, and completely dropped with no explanation by another dear friend and self-anointed giant of the gay civil rights movement to whom my father had introduced me 15 years ago.

Your Platitudes Don’t Work Out In Real Life

Yes, I was in despair, but I was also outraged at not being understood for views that felt so plainly obvious to me logically and experientially. These were not pie-in-the-sky views I was advocating in order to provoke. The Affordable Care Act has made medical treatment of my bipolar disorder more expensive than ever. Under the nuclear agreement, Iran flagrantly continues to enrich uranium and fund terrorist activities.

As a small business owner, I am regularly assaulted with financially crushing, nonsensical red tape and bureaucracy, much implemented as lip service to environmental protection. With few exceptions, every one of my good friends feels more economically hopeless after the “recovery” than before, and abject homelessness on the streets of my beloved city has swelled to egregious levels.

In desperation, like a closeted teenager sneaking into a porn theater, I surreptitiously began to explore the forbidden territories of Fox News and other conservative outlets. Incredibly, I found myself agreeing more often than not.

Fine, I thought, but that is where I had to draw the line. A couple of conservative encounters does not a conservative make, right? Until more liberals began to recognize the disingenuousness and destructiveness of my party’s stances, I just resolved to stick it out. I did everything in my power to avoid that one last unspeakable, fatal option: turning Republican.

Harvey Weinstein Was the Last Straw

Then Harvey Weinstein provided me the impetus I lacked: the media outlets that had enabled and covered up his indiscretions for years were the same major public voices for the Democratic Party, the self-proclaimed party of worker’s and women’s rights. The game was up; two and two could no longer be five. I reached my threshold where no amount of hypothetical Republican bigotry or greed could approach the magnitude of hypocrisy, corruption, or criminality I saw rotting the Democrats to the core. I jumped ship.

I found out almost immediately that the Republican Party is not only not evil, but populated with nice, intelligent, humble people. Days after I added myself to the Log Cabin Republican mailing list, I saw an invite to attend a gathering with Chadwick Moore, an independent journalist and one of two lapsed gay Democrats I had heard of.

When Chadwick spoke, I was stunned: every sentence, every nuance and anecdote of his beautifully articulate, moving talk resonated almost identically with my own experience. From Chadwick and the dozens of other Log Cabin attendees that night, I learned I am not the only gay person to question Democrats or to be ostracized for doing so—by a longshot. The political climate has made it prohibitive for most of us to have a voice and find each other.

Seeing virtue (or perhaps just a lack of evil) in my compatriots finally allowed me to see it in myself. I am now certain that I can be a gay, Jewish Republican and still be a good person and a useful citizen.

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'Sex is a blood sport both sides can get hurt': Pioneering feminist GERMAINE GREER has kept silent on the Hollywood sex scandal — until now

A rather senile ramble below but she doesn't seem much bothered about the present situation

What does 'Me too' mean after all? Apparently it means 'I too have been propositioned' or 'Advances have been made to me, too'.

The understanding is that the female speaker preserved her virtue in spite of all the odds and the male predator was sent away with his tail between his legs.

My father's generation called the men in such cases 'wolves'; others called them 'mashers'. Played in the movies by Leslie Phillips or Terry-Thomas or Sid James, they were figures of fun, leering, slavering fools who never ever succeeded in their attempts to corrupt women who were younger, smarter and sexier than they.

The behaviour of such lecherous characters has always been pathetic and/or ludicrous, as much of Harvey Weinstein's seems to be. Anybody who exposes his or her genitalia, the flasher on the escalator, say, may imagine that he or she is displaying sexual power, but the fact is the opposite. Weinstein is not a Don Juan but a sexual incompetent, and, but for his power in la-la land, profoundly resistible.

Accusations of rape are a different matter, of course, but the difficulty is that the issue is one of consent. The case used to be that if a man sincerely believed sex to be consensual he could not be found guilty of rape, but with convictions difficult to come by, this criterion has been loosening.

In my view (not commonly held) the law of rape is medieval and profoundly misogynistic. It is due for a radical overhaul, but in the cacophony of prosecutions and lawsuits that is coming our way, it is unlikely to get it.

What we can expect now is that the people accused of sexual misconduct — so far all of them men — will use every resource available to them to fight the accusations. The principal, and in many cases the only, testimony against them is the narratives of the victims.

All the accused will be expertly defended; while the complainants may believe that they are parties to the litigation they are actually — unless what has been brought is a civil suit — simply exhibits in the case. The duty of the defending team will be to discredit them. Eight women have already accepted payments from Weinstein for their silence; they may well find breaking that silence will have devalued their evidence.

It is worth bearing in mind that though almost 60 women came forward with allegations against Bill Cosby, allegations that included rape, drug-facilitated sexual assault, sexual battery and child sexual abuse, the one criminal case finally brought against him has resulted in a mistrial.

In the military, and other organisations founded on similar principles, there has always been a rule that fraternisation between the ranks is not on. A person, male or female, with power over subordinates cannot be permitted to make a pass at any of them because he or she could be using a position of power to secure sexual favours by threat or coercion.

Teachers may not seduce their students while they are students, though quite a few will marry a student after graduation. If a teaching assistant only a year or two ahead of you puts a hand on your knee during a tutorial, you'd be a fool to spend the weekend weeping. One word of complaint could lose him or her the job, in which case weeping would be appropriate, for him or her, not for you.

Sex has always been a bloodsport and players on both sides can get hurt. The aggressor takes a risk and the victim, especially if he or she is the only other person in the aggressor's hotel room, runs a risk.

In the Thirties, during the Depression, one of the few ways young women could earn a living was by carrying out secretarial duties for travelling businessmen — in their hotel rooms. In 1932, when Joan Crawford played Flaemmchen in Grand Hotel, the 'little stenographess' herself was on the make, with a collection of glamour photos she could show to a likely contender.

She was also sharp, tough and aware that she couldn't give away what had to serve as her meal-ticket. Not nice, not Doris Day certainly, but more dignified than all this weeping and wailing about unwelcome advances.

Meryl Streep, doyenne of women in film, accepting Best Actress at the National Board of Review awards gala, confused her audience by singing the praises of men: 'I love men', she carolled. 'Oh my God! Yeah, I know it's the year of the woman and everything, but oh my God! The men! All my mentors have been men.'

Which is not surprising seeing as nearly all the people in a position to mentor her were men.

'I have experienced things, mostly when I was young and pretty. Nobody comes on to me [now],' she told The New York Times. 'But back in the day, when everybody was doing cocaine, there was a lot of behaviour that was inexcusable. But now that people are older, and more sober, there has to be forgiveness, and that's the way I feel about it. I was really beaten up, but I don't want to ruin somebody's mature life. I just don't.'

This extraordinary statement doesn't bear thinking about. The cocaine was illegal, but the sex wasn't. What 'beaten up' means in the context is unimaginable.

Perhaps Streep will be subpoenaed one day and made to explain herself, but I wouldn't hold my breath. No one has accused Weinstein of doing cocaine and as Streep has said he was 'a champion of really great work'.

The original Me Too movement was set up nearly ten years ago by black activist Tarana Burke to address the problem of sexual abuse among black female blue collar workers. As such, it was massively ignored by white feminist activists until, in October last year, actress Alyssa Milano sent out a tweet inviting women protesting against sexual harassment to post #metoo as a status update.

When Time Magazine put Me Too on the cover as person of the year, Tarana Burke was not included on that cover.

Bestselling author Shirley Conran, 85, advised working women in her book Superwoman, that 'life is too short to stuff a mushroom'. Divorced from Sir Terence Conran, she has two sons, Jasper and Sebastian.

During the Sixties, sexual harassment, and indeed sexual molestation, were everyday risks. Yes, people got fired — but it was the women, not the men.

What I remember about the men back then is that they were always vicious in their punishment if they were turned down. And they had long memories. They would see that you didn't get promoted, or were even demoted. A man in a rank above you found it easy to punish you for not giving in to him. And if you complained? No one ever took you seriously and nothing at all would happen except you may find yourself suddenly given a worse job to do.

In the late Sixties and early Seventies, I led a group of women journalists in protests, sit-ins and demos for gender equality. We were fighting for equal pay and equal opportunities, and there was even a torch-lit march on Downing Street. Yet I haven't felt the need to add my voice to the MeToo movement today. I don't think the women behind it especially need my generation's help — they're getting on just fine by themselves.

As for the French women who wrote that long-winded whine of a letter, well, they're in a very lucky position: they are powerful and are perfectly able to make it clear to a man that they don't want his attention. But that's not the case for all women. It's easier to see off unwanted advances when you're rich and famous.

Having said that, I'd be astonished if Catherine Deneuve hadn't been sexually harassed or molested in all her years in the film industry — if she hadn't had her knees touched, if we could put it as daintily as that. Every single woman I know has, at some point in her life, been sexually harassed. I suffered severely from it.

Is touching a woman on the knee a crime? I think touching anywhere needs to be forbidden as then it's clear: a person must not touch someone else's breasts, bum, big toe . . . anything.

If a man wants to make a sexual advance to a woman, he has eyes to signal and a mouth to tell her she's beautiful or ask whether she would like a drink, to which she can respond as she pleases. He doesn't need to touch to make his meaning clear. Touching may give an unattractive man a sexual frisson but annoy a woman who feels that if she objects, the man will say: 'Oh, it was accidental'.

Fundamentally we should all have our own space and no one should invade it. And if a man engages in frottage on the Tube, then of course that's wrong and women should jab back with their elbows, or better still, an umbrella. It's actually very simple. If you try to touch a goldfish in a bowl, it will dart away to the other side. In my view, we should all be untouchable in our own space, just like the goldfish.

In any case, feminists have other battles on their hands right now. I think we should set our sights very firmly on the BBC and on big private corporations, where women are still not being paid as much as men for doing the same work.

It's illegal, and I don't know why people aren't in prison for it. I find it hard to believe — and extremely depressing — that almost 50 years after our marches and protests, almost 50 years after the Equal Pay Act, our public broadcaster still doesn't have parity of pay.

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Illegal Immigration And Crime

The stunning numbers the Left cannot refute.

On December 21, 2017 the Department of Justice issued a press release, "Departments of Justice and Homeland Security Release Data on Incarcerated Aliens-94 Percent of All Confirmed Aliens in DOJ Custody Are Unlawfully Present."   The initial statistic cited in the title of that DOJ press release shows that there is a truly significant distinction to be drawn between aliens who are lawfully present in the United States and aliens who are illegally present in the United States, either because they have entered the United States illegally or they have violated the terms of admission after entering the United States via the inspections procedure at ports of entry.   The press release begins with the following statement: 

President Trump's Executive Order on Enhancing Public Safety in the Interior of the United States requires the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to collect relevant data and provide quarterly reports on data collection efforts. On Dec. 18, 2017, DOJ and DHS released the FY 2017 4th Quarter Alien Incarceration Report, complying with this order.  The report found that more than one-in-five of all persons in Bureau of Prisons custody were foreign born, and that 94 percent of confirmed aliens in custody were unlawfully present.

Although immigration anarchists have consistently manipulated language, engaged in tactics of bullying and intimidation and, when all else failed, flat-out lied about every aspect of immigration, the Trump administration is providing the truth.

 The DOJ press release, upon which my commentary today is based, lays out the cold, hard and unequivocal facts. It is significant to note that the title of the press release included the phrase, "confirmed aliens in DOJ custody" because all too frequently aliens who face deportation make false claims to United States citizenship to avoid being deported.  Therefore there may even be more deportable aliens in federal custody, while the actual number of such aliens in local and state custody are unknown and unknowable particularly in Sanctuary Cities and Sanctuary States.   Here is an excerpt from the press release that provides some quick statistics and a paragraph that addresses the lack of information about aliens in city and state facilities. 

A total of 58,766 known or suspected aliens were in DOJ custody at the end of FY 2017, including 39,455 persons in BOP custody and 19,311 in USMS custody. Of this total, 37,557 people had been confirmed by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to be aliens (i.e., non-citizens and non-nationals), while 21,209 foreign-born people were still under investigation by ICE to determine alienage and/or removability.   Among the 37,557 confirmed aliens, 35,334 people (94 percent) were unlawfully present. These numbers include a 92 percent unlawful rate among 24,476 confirmed aliens in BOP custody and a 97 percent unlawful rate among 13,081 confirmed aliens in USMS custody   This report does not include data on the foreign-born or alien populations in state prisons and local jails because state and local facilities do not routinely provide DHS or DOJ with comprehensive information about their inmates and detainees-which account for approximately 90 percent of the total U.S. incarcerated population.

For decades, the truth has been carefully kept from Americans by globalist politicians from both political parties.  They have been far more concerned about doing the bidding of the globalist special interest groups that fund their campaigns, than they have been about the threats that open borders and immigration anarchy pose to public safety and national security.   On April 19, 2016, towards the end of the Obama administration, the House Subcommittee on Immigration and Border Security conducted a hearing on the topic, "The Real Victims of a Reckless and Lawless Immigration Policy: Families and Survivors Speak Out on the Real Cost of This Administration's Policies."

I wrote about that hearing in an article which also included links to statements made by Rep. Trey Gowdy, the Chairman of the subcommittee, who opened the hearing with his statement that set the tone for what would follow. Breitbart.com used one of Rep. Gowdy's statements as the title for their article, "Trey Gowdy: More Illegal Immigrants Convicted of Crimes At Large in the U.S. Than The Population of Pittsburgh."

At that same hearing Congressman Lamar Smith noted that although it has been estimated that illegal aliens account for about 3% of the U.S. population, they account for 30% of all murders -- making illegal aliens 10 times more likely to commit murder than anyone else. Adding that huge number of at-large criminal aliens to the huge number of criminal aliens who are incarcerated in prisons provides a measure of the true scope of the immigration crisis that can only be solved by ramping up efforts and resources to secure our nation's borders and enforce our nation's immigration laws from within the interior of the United States.   The blunt honesty of Chairman Gowdy and Representative Smith contrasts directly with the propaganda spewed by globalists such as Jimmy Carter, the originator of the Orwellian  term "undocumented immigrant."

Beginning with Carter's administration, the globalist immigration anarchists have embarked on a campaign of deceit.  Their goal was to erase America's borders and flood America with a virtually unlimited supply of cheap and exploitable workers, an unlimited supply of foreign tourists and foreign students and ultimately new voters who would be indebted to the politicians who made their presence in the United States possible.   To further obfuscate the truth, Carter demanded that all INS employees substitute the term "immigrant" for the term "alien" even though the term alien is an integral part of the immigration laws of the United States and is defined by the Immigration and Nationality Act simply as "Any person, not a citizen or national of the United States.  Under his campaign of deceit, illegal aliens were be referred to as  "undocumented immigrants" as though all that these illegal aliens lacked was a piece of paper. The truth is that aliens who run our borders are not undocumented, they are un-inspected. 

Here is a bit of clarity: the difference between an illegal alien and an immigrant is compared to the difference between a burglar and a houseguest.   Today so-called sanctuary cities betray America, Americans and immigrants and pose a clear and immediate danger to public safety and national security as their leaders resort to similar Orwellian propaganda to justify their dangerous illegal policies. Those cities should be referred to as "magnet cities" because they attract transnational criminals, fugitives and terrorists and flood the labor market with illegal aliens who displace American and lawful immigrant workers and undermine wages and working conditions.

This past year Congress conducted hearings about America's gang crisis, particularly MS-13, once again disclosing the deadly impact of failures of immigration law enforcement.

Today immigration anarchists continue to tell lies. They say that if local police were to work in coordination with immigration law enforcement authorities that illegal alien victims of crime would be fearful of coming forward to report crimes committed against them.   

In reality, visas are available for illegal alien crime victims that would enable them to remain in the U.S. if they cooperate with police in identifying the criminals.  Other visas are also available for illegal aliens who, although not the victims of crimes, nevertheless provide actionable intelligence to law enforcement to combat criminals and terrorists and the organizations to which they may belong.

Throughout my career with the INS one of my key areas of responsibility was to use my authority as an INS agent to cultivate informants and cooperating witnesses within ethnic immigrant communities to assist in criminal investigations on the local, state and federal levels.   This was particularly true when I was assigned as the first INS representative to the Unified Intelligence Division of the DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration) and subsequently promoted and assigned, as a Senior Special Agent, to the Organized Crime, Drug Enforcement Task Force.

Indeed, this was one of the critical elements of my annual evaluation.   If advocates for Sanctuary Cities were truly concerned about "immigrants" why in the world aren't they providing information about the visas that are available to illegal aliens who cooperate with law enforcement authorities?  The answer is self-evident- they don't care about the immigrants, only about promoting their false narrative.

Another deceitful claim is that through implementation of "Comprehensive Immigration Reform" our authorities would be able to get all of the illegal aliens "out of the shadows" so we would finally know who is here.

In reality, terrorists might avail themselves of the opportunity to acquire new identities if their biometrics were not on file while those alien criminals fugitives and terrorist aliens who know that their biometrics are likely on file, would simply remain in the shadows. 

CBP (Customs and Border Protection) has more than 60,000 employees, including inspectors at ports of entry and Border Patrol agents.  If, as immigration anarchists claim, it does not matter how aliens enter the United States, why do we need to continue to fund CBP?   The answer, of course, is self-evident. 

President Trump understands the truth and is acting appropriately.  All rational Americans should be appreciative and supportive of his efforts to protect America and Americans. 

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‘Creeping Stalinism’: secrecy law could imprison Australian whistleblowers and journalists

The article below is lengthy but is from the Leftist "Guardian" so, as usual tells only half the story. The laws discussed are regrettable but the whole reason for a crackdown is that Leftist public servants ignore their duty to be politicaly impartial and so will do anything to embarrass a conservative government.  They are an Australian version of the anti-democratic "deep state" that is doing its best to hobble America's duly elected President Trump

Government whistleblowers and journalists who report on leaked information could face 20 years’ imprisonment if changes to Australia’s official secrecy laws pass parliament.

The overhauled offence provisions, introduced to the House of Representatives in December just hours after marriage equality became law, form part of the Coalition government’s broader crackdown on treason, espionage and foreign interference. If passed, the reform will increase tenfold the maximum penalties for anyone communicating information potentially harmful to the national interest, where that information is obtained via a government official without authorisation.

“This is ‘creeping Stalinism,’” said Ethicos Group specialist Howard Whitton, who has advised governments and the United Nations ethics office on whistleblower policy. “The absolute protection of principled disclosure of wrongdoing – unfettered by government – must be preserved, or Australia will become a laughing stock internationally.”

Australia’s existing official secrecy laws date back to 1914, when sections 70 and 79 of the federal Crimes Act were hurriedly introduced following the outbreak of the first world war. Describing prior prohibitions as “shamefully lax”, the attorney general (and future prime minister) Billy Hughes imposed a penalty of two years’ imprisonment on public servants who disclosed any government information without authorisation. No defences were made available.

Despite the draconian nature of such wartime provisions, that legislation has remained law in Australia over the following century with only minimal amendment. In 2008, the Rudd government asked the Australian Law Reform Commission to hold an inquiry, which resulted in modest reform proposals in its report Secrecy Laws and Open Government in Australia.

“Reform of Australia’s secrecy laws is long overdue,” said Hugh de Kretser, executive director of the Human Rights Law Centre. “After a careful and comprehensive review, the ALRC concluded that our secrecy laws were excessive and needed to be better targeted to protect legitimate government interests. Instead of acting on the ALRC’s recommendations, the Abbott government intensified our secrecy laws with the introduction of the Australian Border Force secrecy provisions and expansive Asio secrecy laws.”

The reality is public interest defences to alleged criminal acts are few and far between

That trend looks set to continue. The proposed legislation criminalises communicating or otherwise dealing with information where that information was obtained by a public servant and is “inherently harmful” or likely to harm “Australia’s interests”. The former is defined as including any information produced by a security agency, while the latter includes prejudicing Australia’s international relations “in any way” or damaging relations between the federal government and a state.

“These broad definitions, coupled with penalties of up to 20 years in prison, raise serious risks of stifling the free flow of information and leaving Australian people ignorant of important matters in the public interest,” de Kretser said. “Open government is a foundational principle of democracy. Australians have a right to know what their government does in their name. Of course, some information must remain secret to protect our security and national interests. But these proposed laws have not got the balance right.”

The new provisions are primarily directed at commonwealth officers, defined to include current and former public servants, contractors, defence force personnel and employees of businesses who provide services to the federal government. But the expansive wording of the offences means any person who comes into contact with information obtained by a commonwealth officer could fall within the legislation’s scope.

The prescribed penalty ranges from five to 15 years’ imprisonment for standard offences, stretching to 20 years for aggravated offences. Aggravating circumstances include where the relevant information was classified secret or above, the person committing the offence held a government security clearance, or the offence involved five or more records each with a security classification.

These aggravation provisions appear intentionally designed to target Edward Snowden-type leakers. The bill’s explanatory memorandum even provides an example strikingly similar to the Snowden case, a contractor who leaked extensive American intelligence information to the Guardian and other publications. “Person A is employed as an IT systems administrator at a commonwealth government intelligence agency,” the explanatory memorandum hypothesised. “Throughout his employment Person A copied 1,000 electronic files from the agency’s internal holdings to a personal hard drive … Person A publishes all 1,000 documents on the internet.”

This impetus for the new offences mirrors that of stalled attempts to reform official secrecy laws in the UK, which were described last year by Open Rights Group chief executive Jim Killock as “a full-front attack … squarely aimed at the Guardian and Edward Snowden.”

“The suggested changes take the wrong lessons from the Snowden and other revelations, and ignore the reality of the connected, global information environment in which we now live,” said Gill Phillips, director of editorial legal services at Guardian News and Media. “If public interest journalism is made harder or even criminalised, there is a real risk that whistleblowers will bypass responsible journalists altogether, and simply anonymously self-publish data leaks online, without any accountability.”

While journalists are partially protected by a defence established in the new laws, this safeguard has been derided as insufficient. Journalists prosecuted under the offence would be required to satisfy a court that their reporting met vaguely defined criteria, said the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance (MEAA) chief executive Paul Murphy.

“The explanatory memorandum states that journalist protections are lost if they are not engaged in what is deemed to be ‘fair and accurate reporting’ and in circumstances where it is alleged their reporting is ‘distorted,’” he said. “The protection is entirely unavailable if the subject matter is said to not be in the public interest. This is a very broad term.

“A further issue is the definition of ‘journalist’ used in the bill. The MEAA acknowledges that this definition covers journalists not regularly employed in a professional capacity and may include a person who self-publishes news or news analysis, but anchoring the definition of journalists to the dictionary meaning could well prove a mistake down the track and lead to legitimate coverage being excluded from the bill’s modest protections.”

The proposed legislation additionally provides that the public interest test will not be met where the information concerns the identify of intelligence officers, or if the journalist’s conduct could endanger public health or safety. The draft statute is also ambiguous about the legal test to be applied: whether the reporting must objectively be in the public interest or whether it is sufficient for the journalist to reasonably believe it to be so.

“It is always hard to know how this type of defence will work until you see how a judge interprets it,” said Phillips. “On the face of it, it is a good thing that thought is being given to the inclusion of a public interest defence, especially as there is not one presently available. However, the reality is that public interest defences to alleged criminal acts are few and far between. What we do know from our experience in other areas of the law is that it can be hard for journalists where the evidential burden, as I understand is being proposed here, rests on them.”

Public servant whistleblowers will not enjoy the benefit of a public interest defence. While the offences are not applicable where the information is disclosed through appropriate channels via the Public Interest Disclosure Act, the federal whistleblower protection scheme, that law has often been criticised as ineffective and is awaiting reform.

The approach taken in the proposed reform, according to Murphy, “ignores the inherent weaknesses of these laws to protect complainants and preserve their rights. These changes represent a substantial threat to whistleblowers and journalists who seek to publish critical public information. Whistleblowers in Australia get punished; it is as simple as that. Laws like these create further disincentives for people who witness wrongdoing and corruption to air their concerns.”

“This is a corruption issue, not a free speech issue,” added Whitton. “Australia is at serious risk of state capture if whistleblowers are not protected.”

Prime minister Malcolm Turnbull’s second reading speech to the House of Representatives gave little attention to this element of the amendment bill, with the term “secrecy” appearing just once.

A spokesperson for the Attorney General’s Department said: “The government is committed to striking the right balance between openness and transparency in government and the legitimate need to protect some commonwealth information.

“Protecting Australia from espionage and foreign interference relies heavily on having strong protections for our information, especially where disclosure causes harm to an essential public interest. The unauthorised disclosure or use of certain information can prejudice national security and defence, or our relationships with other countries, and as such criminal offences are necessary to deter such disclosures and punish them if they do occur.”

The Commonwealth Ombudsman’s office said: “Given that unauthorised disclosures do not receive protection for disclosers, the ombudsman encourages public officials to make their disclosures in accordance with the Public Interest Disclosure Act.”

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Political correctness is most pervasive in universities and colleges but I rarely report the  incidents concerned here as I have a separate blog for educational matters.

American "liberals" often deny being Leftists and say that they are very different from the Communist rulers of  other countries.  The only real difference, however, is how much power they have.  In America, their power is limited by democracy.  To see what they WOULD be like with more power, look at where they ARE already  very powerful: in America's educational system -- particularly in the universities and colleges.  They show there the same respect for free-speech and political diversity that Stalin did:  None.  So look to the colleges to see  what the whole country would be like if "liberals" had their way.  It would be a dictatorship.

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, GREENIE WATCH,   EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and  DISSECTING LEFTISM.   My Home Pages are here or   here or   here.  Email me (John Ray) here.  Email me (John Ray) here. 

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