Chaser's APEC Stunts: Aussie Cahootery

[Blashyrkh]

What do you guys think?

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=256135
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=294173

As background, The Chaser are a comedy team in Australia, with a weekly show called "The Chaser's War on Everything". Very satirical, sometimes political and pulling the curtain aside to display the imcompetence of the people we put in charge. Lots of live stunts involving security guards.

Personally, I think it's awesome that they went ahead with this. The security measures in place are ridiculous and have been proven to be useless. As was pointed out by The Chaser themselves, had one these highly organised terrorist sleeper cells decided to do this stunt, filling the cars with plastic explosive rather than a bad Osama double, we'd be looking at Australia's 9/11 and the possible assasination of Dubya. Pretty fucking serious.

Unfortunately, I think they're going to have the book thrown at them for exposing the largest security operation in Australia to be an absolute fraud.

[MrModerate]

1. Don't know how Aussie authorities go about "throwing the book . . ."

But they've got to be hugely embarassed.

Also, a valuable tactical lesson has been demonstrated -- check the motorcades, guys, don't just assume it's legit because it's made up of multiple matching vehicles.

[Blashyrkh]

2. They've been charged under specific new APEC laws and are facing up to 6 months jail.

I reckon they might put them away for maybe 30 days just to make a point.

[MrModerate]

3. Again, I'm pretty ignorant of Aussie legal practices . . .

But in the US, clever lawyers (and most good ones are, at the very least, clever) could keep this boiling as an intolerable embarassment for the government for years before any resolution came about.