The most significant thing to come out of The Chaser’s APEC motorcade gag, was not that $160 million of security failed to protect the U.S. president, but this quote from NSW Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione in relation to the stunt:

We have snipers deployed around the city. They weren’t there for show, they mean business, that’s what they were there for.

To shoot comedians perhaps? The Chaser guys were obviously no threat to the president, however, how close could they have gotten before being shot by a sniper? This seems to be the ghist of Mr Scipione’s threat, that it would be possible for a sniper to shoot someone dead, even if they posed no threat to anyone’s life.

Enough of our rights have been taken away already, such as not being allowed into Circular Quay and the Opera House security area, and people who are arrested shall be held without charge or bail. I thought that our rights were there so that laws couldn’t be made to deprive us of them. What’s the point, if our government can just turn around and make any draconian law they please?

This farce could have been held in many different places in Australia, without shutting down our entire CBD for a full week. If not Canberra, then perhaps some country town where security would be easier to manage. What do the APEC delegates need? A place to eat, sleep and meet, and little else. They don’t need a harbour view, they don’t need an animal petting zoo, and they certainly don’t need hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of fireworks over Sydney harbour, to which the citizens of Sydney are told to stay away.

Our Foreign Minister and resident clown Alexander Downer, explained a few days ago on ABC’s Lateline, why APEC was to be held in Sydney:

I often say to people there are 10 or so cities in the world you’ve got to see before you die, and definitely one of them is Sydney. Even though I’m from Adelaide, Sydney is a wonderful city, so we can be enormously proud of showcasing Sydney to the world.

Sydney has literally been shut down all week. And regardless whether you think APEC is a good thing or not, it shouldn’t have been held in the middle of Sydney.

To borrow from a bill board in Pitt St mall this week:

21 great wankers, 1 great city