McBride's secret strategy.

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👨🏼‍⚖️ David McBride's Legal Fund

G’day Fearmongers —

As we head into the long weekend known as Australian Halloween, ANZAC Day, I thought we should chat with a former solider who represents Australians at their best.

David McBride is up for a jail sentence of ‘UNLIMITED YEARS’ after he blew the whistle on astonishing accounts of misconduct and warcrimes by Australian special Forces in Afghanistan.

He did this six years ago — 2017!

He’s been in legal limbo ever since.

But now he’s forced the Australian Defence Force into court in November, and will have his moment to show he was just, and right to release the information he did.

In this conversation McBride and I chat about:

• Tactics and strategy in the court room.

• If media will be allowed inside his trial.

• Why he's losing weight

• How he finds joy in this very stressful time.

• And his laugh — is it real?

This episode is followed up by one of favourite live shows from last year, our live show on Australian Secrecy on stage at the Festival Of Dangerous Ideas.

It's one of our best — and a reminder around ANZAC Day that there are Some soliders who are fighting the good fight, that need our support.

Chip into help David McBride and his legal fees here.

Cheers

Dan

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0:00  
This podcast is supported in part by Australian ethical. G'day Lewis.

0:05  
Hey Dan, how you doing?

0:06  
Look, I'm well and you know, thanks for jumping on the zone for this very casual introduction to this week's A Rational Fear.

0:13  
Oh, that's why you're not wearing pants. Yet like

0:16  
Karl Stefanovic in the Sunday lift out this week. And you know what I remember doing a pilot for channel 10 with Heath Franklin and Tom Glesson where we all were newsman wearing shorts, because we thought that was funny. And now the actual news men are wearing shorts because they think it's funny. This comedy crossover with news is really hurting all the real comedians who really want to try and get jobs on the media.

0:39  
Yeah, I know that in that interview, Karl Stefanovic does talk about how you know at the end of the day there journos? Are you we've seen this show? Well, I mean, we haven't. But I've, I've heard about it.

0:53  
Yeah. I mean, more. More people listen to this podcast than watch the Today Show.

1:00  
I could on him. He's got 17 houses.

1:03  
Yeah, all up and down the East Coast. Look, I just thought it'd be good to get you on and say thank you to the audience for coming out to our live shows. This month. We've had such a huge run. Adelaide, Melbourne, Brisbane, thank you so much. Some of the best shows we've ever done.

1:18  
So fun, really great. I like wall-to-wall. I've had such a great time. We've had incredible guests. We've had beautiful crowds. It has been really fun. It's it's sort of like, I feel like we just need to I wish there were more comedy festivals. Just keep going.

1:32  
Well, there are it's just not you know, it's very difficult to tour a six person show. Once a festival, it just doesn't financially make sense. If you want to help it make financially make sense. Please join us on Patreon patreon.com For slash A Rational Fear. And I want to say a big shout out to everyone who came especially to our Melbourne show and helped us launch the the Tim Smith fence auction and I'll have you know, Lewis, we have a buyer, and they forked out $3,701 For the Tim Smith fence well done, so that's amazing.

2:05  
Yeah, so much to whoever that that is. Maybe it was Tim Smith, just trying to buy back his own piece of history.

2:12  
I can tell you, you and I both know the buyer. They are a prominent Australian person who wishes to Rene remain anonymous. But I can't you know, I probably won't even tell you off air like that. That's how that's how that's how funny they are about it. That's

2:27  
so interesting. I wonder who it could be Is it is it Anthony Albanese?

2:34  
I mean, Anthony Albanese knows who I am. I don't know who he is. I once did it. Anthony Albanese came to FBI radio once and then cut a cake for FBI. Oh, wow. And I made equipment. I made a clip in the room going up. Bloody politicians always making cuts and he said, are good on your dad always telling jokes.

2:54  
Well, I played footy against him and broke his finger.

2:57  
Ah, excellent. So we're on his radar. Not a good way. But yeah, without. I know if you can imagine someone who loves us politics because of Chappaquiddick who loves comedy, and loves the intersection of US politics, Victorian politics, tomfoolery and comedy. Then you might form a picture in your mind's eye, who this person might be. Oh, yeah, they also have to have $3,701. Spare to throw electrical jacks.

3:25  
Interesting. Interesting. All right. Well, I'll ponder on that. And, you know, feel free to take guesses at home if you like, you'll never know the answer, nor will I. Alright, we're

3:35  
going to be back to regular programming next week, this week, because Anzac Day is coming up this weekend, I thought we'd play one of our better live shows Lewis, the one we did on Australian secrecy laws. That was a cracker show.

3:46  
Or the one at Festival of Dangerous Ideas. Yeah, yeah,

3:50  
really, really good show. And it's got an interview with David McBride in it. But I've also done a follow up interview with David McBride today, where we kind of have a little bit of exclusive about how he's going to play the Commonwealth at their own game. And he kind of talks through strategies and tactics about how he and his legal team are approaching their big November court date, something that's in the interview. So I'll just tell you now, but it's so interesting, because he goes, I asked him, will this particular court case be secret? He said, Well, I keep saying it's secret, but they keep sending me legal letters saying, don't tell everyone. It's secret, because it won't be secret, unless it has to do with national security. Was like, didn't you just didn't? Aren't you on trial for leaking a whole bunch of stuff to do with national security? Is it Yeah, that's the point. That's the whole point.

4:36  
I mean, that I think if you haven't listened to this episode before, David ribride talking about some of the farcical situation that he went through, is just it's obviously terrifying, but it is also very funny in a sort of weird, sort of catch 22 Orwellian sense.

4:54  
Yeah, it's, it's really great chat. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to play the interview first debrided Today, and then we'll play the live show. So you know there's some comedy at the end, but it's worth listening to David McBride before you get to the big show. Thanks for joining us, Louis. Oh, a pleasure. Enjoy this show. Yeah, and next week we will maybe be live from Sydney Comedy Festival will say the interview with David McBride and the live show. From the federal dangerous ideas were made on unseeded Gadigal. Land in the urination. Rip.

5:23  
This is a rational fear.

5:26  
We've got a very special guest in the podcast studio. David McBride. You might have seen him on Law and Order Special Victims Unit or the practice is also in all the real girls, American actor David McBride. Welcome to the show.

5:39  
I would love for you to Lauren on the Special Victims Unit that was that was a little bit it was a little bit

5:47  
weak. Now of course that is not the David ribride from Special Victims Unit we've got Australia's David McBride from special whistleblowers. You know, you may have heard David on the podcast before he's a former military officer who's served with both the ADF and the British Army's in Ireland and Afghanistan and other places we can talk about. He now faces of course, unlimited years in jail for blowing the whistle on war crimes committed by Australian Special Forces in Afghanistan. David, welcome back to irrational fear.

6:17  
Thank you very much. We leave about 500 metres from each other

6:21  
always whistleblowing.

6:25  
Sorry, I shouldn't say that. A lot of houses and 500.

6:33  
That's right. And one of the one of the joys of going for morning coffee is seeing David McBride and Jake walking in the park and throwing throwing the ball. So it's, I thought I saw him. I saw I saw you the other day. I was like, Oh, we're gonna get David on the podcast again, catch up where he's at. There's been a bit of news. Since last time we've spoken. It's

6:52  
funny that we're joined podcasters minds a little bit smaller than yours. And I was like the kick exactly the same thing. I was thinking I gotta get down on my porch.

7:00  
Well, we'll, we'll definitely do a mutual podcasters Appreciation Society. You've been in limbo for a long time. In your situation. Where are we up to with your story? It seems like quite a bit of movement is happening. And it's all heading towards November.

7:16  
Yeah, yeah, no, we have it. And you can feel the change in that we have a court date finally. And even though that was always likely to happen, until it's set in stone, you don't really believe it. But now we have a court date. We have a judge. And year it's getting that ground roast like we did when you're parachuting and you suddenly it looks a long way away, and you're suddenly the tree start coming

7:43  
out. Thanks for using a metaphor all of us can relate to. What does it mean for you to kind of have that court date? And, you know, to for someone to go, you know what, Dave, we actually are going to take this to court?

7:59  
It is it does make you take a sharp intake of breath, I have to say, because you think Well, I've been saying all along and it's true, you know, if I have to go to jail or go to jail, but then you suddenly think wow, after I done it did a quick calculation, a three week trial starting on the 13th of November. That will take it into early December and early there's a good chance I won't be coming out of the court. And you think of that you think of them saying they probably they weren't sent it to me on that day. But they will probably say take him downstairs. And I've got two teenage kids. So you do think about that you think about what are they going to think when Daddy gets the taken downstairs instead of let out and on the 13th of Well, it'd be the fourth of December or something. And you you know, never may see that the light of day again. So that does bring things into sharp relief. And then I say well, actually you've always you know, you do believe in getting change, and you do believe in what you're doing. And you've got a lot of support. So have no fear of that. But you do your weaker moments. You do. Yeah, because it is that is the day that it makes you enjoy the days and Bondi and in watching TV with the kids, etc. You think wow, this could be the last time I sit down and watch a movie or go for a swim on a beautiful day. I mean,

9:33  
2017 was so long ago feels like an Aeon ago when you know the Afghanistan files came out. Does it feel like it for me? You know, seeing your story kind of unfold? It's like, well, we've had a change in government. They could have been something else. I know there was with the new government there was moves to try and get you this whole thing. Now. Has Richard miles missed his opportunity to do that.

9:59  
Yeah, I think so. And the legal world is a relatively small world and we have kind of fires and you hear it, we hear that, even with his case, it wasn't easy to get dropped. And even though the Attorney General had said even before the election, and afterwards, I'm going to drop this this is bad. It's a disgrace. It wasn't a it wasn't didn't come without pushback from the unelected people say,

10:27  
Where's your court going to be held? Is it going to be held in the ICT? It's in the ISIS? So will it be sacred it will media be allowed to go, given that high profile nature of it up to this point, like it'd be so strange to hold on? It's

10:39  
funny. And again, it's good to be able to talk to you and your listeners to our level of sophistication, because the finer points are quite interesting. Yeah. Obviously, secret trials is something

10:52  
it's something we don't have in Australia. Yes.

10:54  
And it rankles with them. When we throw that around. We get we get letters from the Attorney General's Office is funny they do actually, I used to laugh when I first started out my youtube and had about six viewers, six of the five of them would have been from the Attorney General's at least book by the FBI face up,

11:15  
looking forward to the Attorney General becoming a Patreon subscriber.

11:20  
I should put some gods in which you have to pay a lot of money and have to pay for but they say they don't like the idea of it's been a secret trial. And every time we say it's a secret trial, like they said this, let us say it's not a secret trials. Don't put that out. But the thing about it is there. They just say we're only going to close it if there's national security information discussed. And their definition of national security is like where the where the toilets were. So it's gonna be

11:49  
women toilets. We're in a war that we're no longer Yeah. Now run by other people. Yeah.

11:55  
And it's sort of sad is pretty funny. And they always, but it's a sore point. And so they say it's not a secret trials only going to be sequences exits, so it's likely

12:04  
nothing you released was of national security? Well, no, it's kind of a national shame that I

12:12  
mean, and it's not because it's gone on for so long. You probably know that I'm not going to fight it to death over you know, if they have to close the court, they have to close the court. I'm satisfied with the Australian judges, and that we will get a good hearing. And if it's a close call, I don't think that that will affect it. But it's annoying in the sense that it's just well it's just annoying because it's not even the prosecutors arguing that it's the it's the Attorney General's who are for those who watch Boston Legal or whatever it it. Normally you've got the to the to the prosecutor and the defendants, but we've got a third party and the court is sit at a separate table. And they they kind of they're there to protect the information as what they say in inverted commas, which says who's that who's that is the Attorney General's as opposed to the Commonwealth prosecutor. Right? They are the ones that shut the court down and say, like, for example, we're going now spies told us when the when the Attorney General's department in inverted commas took exception to the evidence we wanted to call in the last hearing. Apparently, the actual Attorney General was surprised. He didn't know about it, because they did the day before. So it suggests that it's actually the Department of Defence or the spooks or someone who who, who works under the umbrella of Attorney General's but it's not actually lawyers. Right. So

13:38  
the Attorney General Department is actually it's a complete misnomer.

13:44  
It's like a cover, you will let that Asus as part of the Attorney General's. Right. Okay. And

13:50  
thankfully, they don't have a remit to look at local podcasts, though we do serve in America, so maybe maybe five eyes are scanning this podcast. To get back Tony's general lucky I

14:04  
could look out the window and I could see if we suddenly get a whole lot of black SUVs.

14:10  
David, this is the eastern suburbs is this black SUVs every three seconds. Just don't go outside rosebay High School. As part of these, this feels very strategic, you know, a lot of what you're doing in terms of how you're placing yourself, it feels like you and your team are playing chess against people who have never played chess before. Is it? What's the similarity to kind of fighting in the legal system to kind of strategizing in the field like as a

14:41  
is very similar. It's very similar. You chess game is exactly right. With that you make a move and you're trying to see what their counter move is and that's there's been a lot of that going on. I think that's why we have so much exposure from the Attorney General because I didn't make any secret of it to begin with only Would have been nice. I'm too impatient to hold in Australia. But I said, I want to put the government on trial. And even though I'm the defendant, I get the chance to call generals in, for example, and cross examine them. And you could even call them by subpoena.

15:16  
This says, This isn't a government show. This is David McBride.

15:21  
And I think I've wanted to leave and though I was like, talking, I think they've taken it seriously. That's why.

15:29  
So you, you basically call their bluff here right now. They're like, Oh, my

15:32  
God is gonna put the government on Trump's side, they've got all these people crawling over. Because even when I subpoenaed all these people, the government argued against them coming, which which, again, is so counterintuitive, it's like, Well, surely, if they've got nothing to hide, they'd want to come in and say,

15:50  
instead of the Commonwealth is calling it Commonwealth, we need two witnesses. Yeah, they've got 22. Actually, I don't need that many to say, Yeah, David ribride took a bunch of stuff at Tulsa Tulsa journal,

16:00  
particularly because I've admitted that it's been well publicised. So yeah, I know, that's just that's just out there. You know, you're ridiculous. It's sort of like, well, yeah,

16:11  
let me quote from the ABC article data.

16:14  
Yeah, it's like, it's still on the internet, a lot of it, apparently. And I made a detailed statement to the police. Because I didn't know that was like the chess game. I didn't want to have it. Look them kill me with the death of 1000 cuts where they proved that I gave the documents so why

16:31  
are they calling 22 witnesses when you've kind of you've you are pleading not guilty. But you've also told police exactly what happened.

16:39  
Yeah, I say I gave the documents. I admit that. And but I didn't because I was justified. So it's really just a legal argument. They don't they probably only got 22 Witnesses probably to try to rubbish me or even though it's not relevant, it may backfire on them then because the problem is we're bringing 22 Witnesses in. And again, I'm giving you a free kick here people from the Attorney General's is that they can you only the one of them to stuff up badly around get mauled in the cross examination, could could

17:06  
I be a witness? You'll be like, I don't know.

17:14  
And then we'll do our own media say, Oh, they're witness was terrible.

17:19  
He's flustered. There's an audition to become a witness in the broadcast. So it's strategy wise, you mean, you don't have to talk about your strategy here because you know, there'll be listening. But all you can if you want, like what all for you. This is a kind of strange thing where you've blocked the government, they've come through and get the cord, your bluff. Are you ready to kind of put the government on trial now, in this regard?

17:46  
Yeah, I think it'll, if I can call witnesses, I think I think it'll be great. Because I'll be saying, if you didn't know about the war crimes and actively tried to cover them up, why did you do this? Why did you do that? Why did you do X Y Zed? And I don't think their answers are going to be very good. What they will be doing in return is, is to try to say, Well, you're not allowed to call it those witnesses. But one of the advantages we've got is that it's a criminal trial, they have to prove beyond reasonable doubt that I wrote the law. And so if there is a doubt that I actually did the right thing, it should go in my favour.

18:28  
I have grave doubts that you've done the right thing, personally.

18:34  
Yeah, so it's so yeah, all of that the tactics is, that is, I don't mind him, revealing it because of you when you believe in what you believe. You know, that's, that's all part of it. I've got a lot of faith in the judgement of God. And I think that we will get a good run. And as I said, it was quite hard to get my lawyers to understand it, because lawyers being lawyers, they always want to take the path of least release resistance, and then they'd want you to you know, plead guilty somehow or plead insanity or something like helpful friends sometimes tell me to pray and say, Thank you. Thank you for that.

19:10  
This is a problem because I know many I'm friends with many lawyers who have gotten to run businesses and they are very justice focused people who are very indignant whenever they there is an injustice in the world. And they're very stubborn folks. I've had many former bosses who who are like that who have formal lawyers, but this is you representing yourself in representing something that is incredibly just in many respects, when you are talking to your legal team. Do they? Like how complicated is it in the room, you know, with with kind of their what they what they have they perceived to be the cases and what you perceived a bit yeah, no, it's

19:56  
good question. Again, this is this is good territory. You're getting an exclusive because we've never really I've never really talked about this with anyone else because it's quite it's quite esoteric but it was edgy to begin with I sacked a few lawyers when I first started out because they were doing the old car mechanic thing when you bring your car only opens up the bonnet and he goes sharp and take a breath. It's gotta be this is gonna be expensive. So I had especially being a lawyer and you end give you all this boilerplate about how you know how hard it's gonna be and kind of imply that you've really made a bad a tough exam because the last thing I need is someone to bring me down and tell me it's going to be tough. I know it's going to be tough. Yeah. And yeah, to begin with my even my own lawyers who I love I love dearly and it's a bit like and you probably find this in the podcast world or whatever. You don't really need someone who agrees with you all the time. It's best to have some sort of reading in Yang I guess you know you that your partner is slightly bring something you

21:05  
want. If you want like radical candour you want someone to call you?

21:09  
And so there wasn't I think they thought I was a bit nuts to begin with and why I think that didn't take me very seriously. My 30 But now, they have I think that that is it, like in all good movies or whatever that we have gone. You know, the good cop, bad cop sort of thing. We've we've got a bit of mutual respect now. And I remember you're my bike and it's doubly funny because my lawyer is a former media guide, Mark Davis arrived. And so he's he's an expert at all that kind of area. He once heard me give an interview. On the radio, he said he looked quite surprised you say you're actually pretty good at this. So it's, yeah, they I think they could. We don't always see eye to eye on everything. We had to find a barrister and we and I was like no, no, you know, I wanted a real showman who's gonna go out and thump the table and Tom Cruise have a few good men. I know. I know. We need someone you know who's is a bit more sanguine. And it's getting by the Lord. It's so we have. We have a few. But actually, it's nice down. Things have changed. We have a genuinely good report. I used to like, every time my lawyers call me, I'd screen the calls because I thought they can only be like the headmaster, and only call me and tell me take the tweet down. What are you doing with them then now they call me usually to give me good news. Even though I still been that Naughty Boy am I still kind of screwed. They're called still don't take valiantly

22:52  
as we head into November. Are you expecting more press to kind of come with that November date?

22:59  
I don't know it has improved which is great. You know, there was a Guardian article as soon as we got the court date there was a Guardian article. In fact, that's how I heard about the court day was the Guardian as I was going through my morning Twitter

23:13  
page to subscribe a handsome man it was well that's my question to you is you know this is a personal question Dave because you know a few years ago you were packing on the pounds but now you're really quite fit you're getting fit because either a you're getting more pictures taken by the presser be you might have to go to jail

23:32  
when you're one of the terrible things is, is that they often show the fat photo

23:38  
I want to call him up and say that's a very old day.

23:46  
I haven't got the government telling you to do that. But yeah, I think it's a bit of both

23:52  
maybe this could be the first thing you say in court. Before we start Can I just tell you to members of the press please use more current photos

24:01  
and yeah, it's kind of a it's a bit of both I guess it's fine I've been I'm now living here in Bondi and I've got a personal trailer and it's which is I need because I do have mental ill I do I don't wake up feeling good. But once I go and do a hard workout and for those on you know a serious mental health for what helped me to go back to the go back to the past you know, go back to when I used to box in which I used to train at uni and it brings back nice apart from this sort of endorphin rush or whatever it brings back nice memories. But ya know, it's it's a good, good thing to kind of feel and look differently. I had a drink problem. I had an amphetamine problem I had because saying that I don't get too hard on myself because it was hard. The early days were really hard. You know, you'd come back and theories If and most whistleblowers say this, they say, you know, Jeff Morris gives advice to whistleblowers, the Commonwealth Bank was well, and he says, he doesn't beat around the bush is quite a good. All the beds are the general and he's always like, your marriage will fail. You know, you will. Your kids want to speak to you, blah, blah, blah, he lists all the things that are definitely going to happen. And it's kind of even though it's very harsh, is is his right and to get through those first months, because it's there's a lot of cycle and it is funny how we all have our own identities, and it comes a bit from work and whatever. And the thing about being a whistleblower is you lose that you're no longer a soldier, no longer you know, Ivanka, and you losing your identity is hard.

25:50  
So it's part of this fitness regime. Is this part of you kind of remoulding your identity or Yeah, resurface. Yeah, that's right.

25:58  
I mean, again, to be honest, trolling things you can control. Yeah, is a bit of, I guess, insider information. You know, I want to look, I want to look like a soldier when I'm going to court because that's what I still feel. I don't want to you know, people, a lot of not people judge you on your looks, but also, I judge myself, I guess, and it's, it's, it's a method of representing myself as best I can, I guess. Yeah. And also, it's the short term benefits for my mental I mean, I don't, I don't always feel great, but I feel so much better after I go for a run

26:33  
in this really stressful time for you. What, how are you finding joy at this time?

26:39  
I watch movies I watch. I'm one of the things I do with my seven, eight year old as I go through my favourite movies from from the past, particularly ones which you know, a bit coyly like A Few Good Men or we would send of a woman the other night and we anything which has got some sort of Last of the Mohicans, and we try to find things with some sort of theme in it. I listened to a lot of tech now back in the 90s when I had left for British Army, misspent youth or whatever. And that kind of becomes like the soundtrack to your to your own personal movie. And I've got that dog, which was annoying everybody with its noises Jake, who gives me his kind of is funny because he's sort of annoying. He wants a walk every hour on the hour. It's got some sort of unionised thing and but every time I go to bed at night, and here is little Steffi snoring next to me, it, it makes me feel happy. So that that is something I recommend, but the supporters really make it for me every time I read a message of support, and that's changed. I used to get hate mail saying you need to be harmed, you need to be killed.

27:47  
All those people are in jail for

27:51  
not doing so well. Yeah. And but now I get you know, people saying nice things and that an effect on a friendly John is the friendly juries fundraiser, because I guess it's on the front of the jury. I guess their comments are more candid because they're not talking to you. And someone said, Oh, he's got a joy. You can you could cut your bread or something. And then someone else said, yeah, he's too good lucky to get a job. He's a DILF and someone said it to me and I said it to my kids. And I'm like, oh my god

I read another funny thing is the kids boarding school and they you know, there's a vaping vaping crisis. And my youngest one is typically she's like they she doesn't fight but she hangs around with them. And they did lock her searches. They did they did like a random locker search and sure her locker got searched there was a there was a vape wrapper or something in there. And so we've got a family group chat with my ex wife are the two kids and she was like I got busted today the locker search but they didn't have a warrant. My wife said brides are not scared of searches just said nothing so they do have a bit of humour funny

29:31  
David, before you go, can I get Can you just do one minute of laughing for me

You've got such a great laugh. We'll just go one minute David McBride laughing and this will sell this on our website.

29:48  
It will be pretty good. People they're my kids say that I could say oh, all our friends love your laugh. They hear you when you come to the school. They hear you 100 metres away he laughing I I used to be embarrassed.

30:04  
Just for people listening. Just press you on it. It's a genuine laugh, isn't it?

30:11  
I love laughing at myself because I forget the stupid shit I do. It was situation and my children are always laughing at me. They go Oh, Dad, I can't believe you post. Leave you posted that. I tried to get the one of them to come down and watch this watch you do podcast as it should be because it'd be good for your media career in real life. Maybe a comedian,

30:36  
come sit in my bedroom and watch me talk to your dad.

30:40  
Dad, think about the other ones.

30:43  
That's fine. It's like watching watching someone wash their hair. Well, David, thank you so much for keeping us in touch with your story. And I hope people follow it as soon as November gets close. So is there something folks can do to kind of keep abreast of everything or support you in any meaningful way.

31:03  
I've got a YouTube channel. I'd love people to watch that. And David McBride trialling it's called major Dave McBride. I'm climbing up the list of search engines coming up over the bloody actor. And I've got a GoFundMe as well. Which is something I helped major David McBride with his fight for justice. I'm very great. I've had a lot of support and I can't say this is one of the things one of the Silver Linings on this is that you you get messages which I get quite emotional. I've I actually find it quite hard to read all the beautiful messages I get saying well behind you, you're a hero, blah, blah, blah. In a weird way. It's hard for me to read it.

31:45  
This sounds like a tender day.

31:49  
Very well. But that is you know, that is really very nice to uh, yeah, a lot of a lot of great support a lot of really good people in Australia and most of all, most of it has actually come from independent media from people like yourself friendly jordiz A lot of young people you know, it's interesting to see that there's a bit of a divide in Australia now there's people that watch mainstream news and this and lot of young people who just only do podcasts and things like that and that's how they get their information that's if someone young comes up and sometimes people like a day cafe where we see each other someone came up last week and said I'll you know good on you and if he was a filmmaker Can I make a film for you? And that was through friendly joints you know that you know, which is fantastic that people watch that stuff and take it seriously and and see you and say hello so anybody any any message of support is is is fantastic. It really gives you you think I can you get some wonderful message do you think I can go to jail? I can go to drug with with that kind of support. You can you can do anything.

33:02  
Great. Thanks, David. Thank you.

33:05  
The Oh fear is rational.

33:10  
Louis, I've got a confession to make. When I was young, I was very unethical. I used to steal mini DV tapes from Grace brothers to make films because they were so expensive like I remember being 15 years old sneaking into grace brothers to steal little cassettes.

33:30  
So is the confession that you're 97 years old

33:38  
No, I'm just trying to tell you some unethical behaviour.

33:41  
Oh right. Okay, now it's your turn. Well, when I was 15 I did some human trafficking I regret it I really do regret

33:54  
a big report came out from for market forces his way to say that a whole bunch of super funds were invested in unethical behaviour including including some of the top a super funds invested in fossil fuels. The super fund that looks after our show Australian ethical doesn't do any of that and they don't do any human trafficking which Lewis has a real beanies bonnet about He really hates Lu human trafficking on a scale of one to 10 Where is human trafficking for you Louis?

34:20  
Well, it's not I mean, obviously, now that I've put my own human trafficking past behind me I just It blows my mind that there could be a superfund out there a building in Australia with a big super name on it and somewhere they are dealing with money that has in some way touched human trafficking. It is mind blowing to me and have a think about that and have something about your super because can you imagine if the money in your account some way touched that trade?

34:53  
Yeah, crazy. You know as big as you know, as a beginner human trafficking Santa Claus. You know those gnomes you know, they come from far away.

35:00  
I did not know the elves.

35:03  
Those elves

35:06  
and they're not they're not Cubans I'm not saying you know I don't want to get into species

35:11  
don't get into semantics. This is not the David asshole podcast

35:16  
fun anagram of elves if you get a free subscription to this

35:22  
big thank you to Australian ethical for supporting the podcast. Oh hello everyone yay

round of applause We haven't even done anything. It's fantastic joy. We recording a live podcast of our shows. So you are an integral part of the show. So it's important to clap and cheer and laugh at all the jokes no matter the quality of the jokes. Yeah,

35:49  
that's right. Yes, like, move that person to the front. Yeah, well, we've got a seat down here for you. Particularly at the top. At the very start of the show. Dan likes to start the show with three big jokes. terrible jokes very, very in quality.

36:05  
And they are wafting. Terrible, yeah, really.

36:08  
For his sake. I beg if you clap and Chi just pretend they're really good.

36:15  
It's a format point of the show. We want to we want to be as close to the weekly as possible.

36:22  
It's gonna be a really fun show. This is an incredible house. And let's firstly just give it a huge round of applause. Yeah, carriage works with festival genius idea.

36:29  
Yeah. Thanks for having us here. On den.

36:32  
And I'm Louis. Yeah.

36:33  
And we'll introduce these folks in a second. All right, great. I'm recording my own of irrational fear on Gadigal land in the Euro nation. Sovereignty was never seated. We need a treaty. Let's start the show.

36:44  
A rational fear contains naughty words like bricks. Canberra. Fed COMM And section 40 of our rational view recommended listening by immature audiences.

36:57  
leaked documents show that top defence officials were kept in the dark about submarine contracts. When asked about it, Scott Morrison said he wouldn't talk about ongoing underwater matters. And in order to increase transparency, Anthony Albanese ordered all government ministers to leave their dream journals unlocked. And Governor General David Hurley becomes a Patreon supporter of irrational fear. No jokes. He is the best Governor General ever. Viva la Governor General. It's the 17th of September 2022. And you'll if you're listening to this it means I'm in a secret prison in Tuggeranong. This is a rational

Welcome to rational fear. I'm your host former sovereign Daniel itch and this is the show live at the Festival of Dangerous Ideas. This is the podcast where we make fun of the toughest topics because you know if we don't we try. Let's meet our fear mongers for tonight. She's been uncovering lies in Sydney for over 25 years. Tonight we'll ask her for her tips about how to lie to her face. It's the host of Liar Liar Kate McClymont. Now, Kate, it's not what we're talking about tonight. But everyone in this room wants to know did the husband do it?

38:21  
Oh, you haven't left me with a foot to stand on.

38:26  
Don't be fooled by this man's accent. He's so Australian. He makes the rest of us look like immigrants from the New York Times it's Damien caves. Damien when it comes to learning about Australia, is there something you haven't quite mastered yet?

38:42  
You know, I just discovered what it means to have a smoko still learn

38:48  
and she's covered everything this year from Canberra to Kev tonight will be her toughest assignment yet, please give it up for Amber shocks. And as a cranky journalist who is more transparent Russia or Australia

39:06  
spends the metrics transparent about body composition that's transparent about ability to succumb to peer pressure. That's elbow.

39:16  
And he's the former Australian defence lawyer turn whistleblower. Now professional panel guest is David McBride. David, is there anything funny about the being the enemy of the state?

39:30  
Well, it certainly makes your dating life a lot better. You say, Oh, I'm a lawyer. They're like, Oh, sickness, my boyfriend over there. You say I'm facing unlimited time in jail. You must be doing

39:49  
really up for a one night stand. Very day. And he's a government employee who's seen too much. And he's come here tonight to say enough is enough. It's Lewis over Louis some. What secrets will you be revealing tonight?

40:05  
What secrets? Yeah. Gosh, I'm gonna tell you. I can't What can I tell you who's gonna win the 100 100 next year? The audience here would probably really

40:15  
care about that. All these people are ageing into the demographic. And he's on the paths and paths tonight is still in vain for the news fighters podcast. Well, this is great. Well, what a stellar lineup, we have got more influence and power on this panel than inside Scott Morrison's head. It's very exciting. You know, I don't blame him for signing up for more than one job. There's, there's of course a labour crisis going on. It's pretty hard to find good help. We'll have more on the Morrison ministries a little later on. In fact, we'll hear from all of our fear mongers in just a second. But first, I'm going to do a bit of a deep dive to set the context for tonight's performances. I'm here to tell a story. There's an island in the Pacific that is on the verge of autocracy, its leaders have acquired a huge amount of power over its citizens. They re journalists for reporting on crimes the state has committed, they lock up whistleblowers, for calling out corruption. If doctors and teachers talk about the jobs on social media, they could go to jail. And they banned reporting on certain modes of transport. So where the bloody hell are you? Well, if you answer that question out loud, you could go to jail, but I say because I'm brave. I'm not a coward. It's New Zealand and we need to keep an eye on. No, it's us. It's Australia. Prior to the National Security Information Act of 2004. The top three Australian secrets were the Vegemite recipe, the Australia two winged keel and Harold Holt's post Prime Ministerial career as a taxi driver in Bundaberg. No one ever talks about it. That's it. That's all the secrets we had in Australia, pre 2004. There was of course, our Pine Gap. But that's more of an American CFSR secret. Yeah. And the only person that can lose their job if they talk about is the prime minister. Everything else? Yes. Oh, because everything else is on the table until 911, which was or in Australia's case. 911 was the tamper crisis. And that's when the National Information Security Act came in. And then the She'll be right. No work and fairies version of Australia was locked away in John Howard's basement never to be seen again. Instead, we have a bunch of legislation that makes transparency harder than ever. The National Information Security Act is one thing up is the big one. Okay. Anything deemed by the government that is of a national security risk can't be reported on or it can't even go to court. And if it does go to court, you'll never hear about it. Like the case of witness J discovered in 2019, a person who was secretly jailed in the ICT, we don't know their name. We don't know their crime, their sentence or what they were sentenced for. The only thing we do know is what they might look like thanks to a court sketch from the secret trial. Yeah. Look around you. It could be could be any one of us and how we know they exist in the first place was that they actually were writing a memoir in jail. And the AFP went and raided their cell and they were so pissed off that the AFP raided their self to take their memoir away. They took the AC T government to court to complain about it. And then we only find out about it because a Judge Burns read it out in court, and everyone's like, what the fuck with this secret guy kept from? Then there was witness Kay a secret trial against a whistleblower who revealed that Australian secret agents bugged East Timor Prime Minister's office when we were negotiating Castile that was in 2004. That deal got torn up went to The Hague as there's a whole deal. They got renegotiated again, and then it wasn't until 2014. Witness Kay went to trial in secret in Australia, a decade later. Now, this should be concerning, because we don't know how many secret cases there are like this. They could be 1000s. I'm not an expert. But I think we should definitely investigate witnesses a through AI. Now, that's one part secret trials, right. A couple of other things you should think about is this misnamed Freedom of Information Act, because it's not free, and you don't get any information. Journalists or anyone who's interested can actually request documents from the government, but it costs us shitloads of money. And if you're a journalist, it can take forever and go past your deadline. And they're pretty much useless when it comes back. When news organisations have the resources and time to challenge the government. It's a whole process. You got to go through the Information Commissioner, the Administrative Appeals Tribunal and then the federal court, and that process can take up to three fucking years to do that which case in our hypothetical, that journalist would have been laid off by several news organisations. But on the upside is now working inside the Prime Minister and Cabinet so they can look at all the documents they want. And then this is this is the national cabinet, a regular meeting of premiers First Ministers and the Prime Minister. It was created during COVID to talk about what COVID? Presumably, we actually don't know because it's secret, South Australia might want to change the size of their rail gauge again and ruin the dream to boomers across the country in the Indian Pacific. We don't know. We need to know. We just have a minute song select joke. Really excited for that. Used to be called COAG. I don't know if anyone remembers this, the Commonwealth Heads of Government. But it was changed for two reasons. First of all, it sounded like a brand of glue. And then Scott Morrison renamed the national cabinet that so he could basically claim that all the meetings were cabinet in confidence, like the real Commonwealth cabinet, but it's not. It's just made up. Morrison just fucking made it up for

45:47  
now. He's a cabinet maker as well. He's a cabinet maker.

45:55  
Oh, that was good. Thank you.

45:58  
Thank you, sir. You're allowed to lobby you don't have to say that was good. But I'll tell you.

46:04  
There are heroes on this island like the Auditor General whose great work includes sifting through tonnes of Excel spreadsheets to find any anomalies exposed waste and conflicts of interest. Here's what the Auditor General has done in the last little bit. You may remember the leppington triangles sportswriting carpark roads. Yeah, pretty good. What an incredible group of public service heroes give him a round of applause pretty amazing work and what was their reward? Well, the Morison government defunded the pump by $14 million. Meaning that the Australian National Audit Office can now only complete 38 audits a year 38. That's not many. I think Angus Taylor has more offshore bank accounts than that. So yeah. I don't know if you've picked up a trend here. But these secrecy laws have been around a while but it seems like they've only been used in the last 10 years or so. It could have gotten into power 10 years or so. Is anyone who got their theory first public ministry 10 years or so. One prominent Senior Counsel Jeffrey Watson points the day that transparency died in Australia. Here's the exact date transparency died on Friday, the eighth of November 2013. It happened at a media briefing called then by the Immigration Minister, Scott Morrison, you may remember it

47:21  
the overnight incident. What's become a vet vote of asylum seekers. I will not comment further in relation to onboarding matters. Thank you. General, this is a great public intro we're not in relation to on water matters. Have they been coming further in relation to on water matters? I think we've dealt with that question in terms

47:43  
of making a judgement if they've done something because do customer Australia? Doesn't that mean that your tax base policy is kind of

47:49  
well, you've made a whole bunch of presumptions there, which I'm not about to speculate, maybe you can leave them up for? Well, you're the one making the presumptions that may

47:56  
be the case of the overnight incident is not resolved. And that's why more information is not

48:01  
forthcoming. It's an ongoing operational matter. And the persons that were at risk have all been accounted for. We're not going to go into the micro detail of these operational matters. What we are saying is that we rented assistance, and all the people and all the people have been accounted for so we can go around this for a lot longer. But that is the position. Scary what you get now, isn't it? Wow,

48:27  
absolutely wild. You'll remember

48:29  
that. You notice Angus Campbell before he became

48:33  
Chief of Defence straight after this? Yeah, like a year later. He was the chief of talent sports. Yeah, so if you remember Do you remember that phrase I will not comment in relation to home order matters, man it was unrepeated every press conference for like six months until the press got bored and stopped going to those press conferences. He was even number five on the hottest 100 of that. Which is amazing. Also, it was on afternoon game shows as well.

48:59  
The final question was $7,000 God ego take a look at this picture. What's the well known catchphrase?

49:09  
It's an ongoing operational matter.

49:13  
Close Hey, I bet the audience knows well it was.

49:24  
Sadly, Scott, you missed out on the $7,000 which isn't enough to buy you a journalist visa the epi you get anyway. I didn't get a logo.

49:35  
That joke relies so heavily on people remembering birthdays.

49:41  
Instead of showing the first competition shown as Geoffrey Watson SC put it, there was a hint in those words that it might have something to do with national security. But that was never the case. There was no evidence was ever produced at once the government got away with it once they got a taste for it. And that kind of secrecy is alluring and has an addictive quality as what's inputted to me by phone just like in sports. Once one side of the game starts cheating and gets away with it, both sides start cheating and we're already seeing labour hinting that they will continue on with national cabinet in secret. So this is where we are on this island today laws designed to protect its citizens instead use to protect the fragile egos of megalomaniacs we elect. Yeah. And it seems today, everything on this island is secret for no good reason as Damian cave put it, in a great 2019 article, titled Australian might be the world's most secretive democracy. This is what he wrote. The most recent expansion of government secrecy came last year with an espionage bill that increased criminal penalties for sharing information being classified, even if even if a document happened to be as harmless as a cafeteria menu. So the other day, I tested it out, I reached out to Aziz cafe, in the middle of Parliament House, you need a pass to get into it. Or the politicians and lobbyists go there. And I sent them a text and asked them to send me a photo of the menu and they sent it through. Fantastic and don't worry, the sources were redacted.

In case you're wondering, they're the soup of the day is chicken. Yeah, so the guy

apparently got a problem for me to check. That's good. That we're very happy. So there we go. Everyone at Festival of Dangerous Ideas, please give it up for Damien cage. Thank you.

51:46  
You know, thanks, Dan. When I when I wrote that article, actually, you know, people thought I was crazy, calling Australia this extremely secret of democracy. But now that we have a prime minister with lots of secret jobs, maybe it's not so crazy. And maybe it's not just the crazy American who's, who's saying it. You know, since I wrote that story, there have been many more examples, lots of which you went into. But, you know, I think it's important to recognise that it's not just Canberra that this problem exists in. And, you know, I run into it all over the country when I'm dealing with people as a reporter. And I have a small story, a small example that will show you just how much it handles some of the most important issues at the local level. Like, can we get this image perhaps the giant banana, giant caveman banana? Let me back up for a minute. So we have a newsletter that The New York Times publishes every week called the Australia letter, which is basically a reporter riffing about the news of the week with a little bit of perspective. And so one week better Odell does a wonderful writer for us and Melbourne said, you know, I want to write about this public art thing. It's involves bananas and frogs and, and babies, and I had no idea what she was talking about. But I figured, yeah, for sure, go for it. So shockingly, after it runs, I get this email from somebody that says the subject line is immediate removal of article. And I'm wondering what on earth this is about, right. So I look in and I see that it's about the newsletter, which makes me go back and try to understand what this giant banana he-man thing is all about. And it turns out that there was an exchange being offered between, you know, a local council in Melbourne, and John Oliver, the comedian who John basically wanted to take this lovely piece of art off the hands of Melbourne and trade, and give them basically some frogs with some legs that were open a little bit wider than his approach. And along with that, he also had some babies that had been washed up on the shore and Texas, beautiful babies like this. And so he offered to trade these wonderful pieces of art for the human banana. Basha was in favour of this plan. She loved the frogs, I think. So as you can see, this was a serious job of public interest journalism in Australia's greatest interests, which is why I was really surprised when I got an email and concerned I should say, and the subject line was immediate removal of article. I mean, that's a pretty big request. We don't take down articles from the New York Times, sometimes we attach a correction, maybe an Editor's Note, but take it down. I literally can't think of a single time that that's happened. And I worry that there must be some serious flaw in what Bashar had written. But no, it turns out that the person in local government had an email exchange with her about whether the dolls could go into the recycling machine. And she was quoted as saying, and this is the exact quote, I don't know what the dolls are made of. So I can't officially comment either way. She wrote that in the email that her name was attached and that it wasn't supposed to be because she did not consent to it, and was not an authorised spokesperson for the Council. This is Council policy, she said. So at this point, I feel kind of bad. And I'm wondering like maybe this is just the person who happened to be in the office that day. So I go out and I look on LinkedIn, and I discovered that her actual title is Senior Advisor for media and communications. We had a bit more back and forth by email and she said that she was when she was quoted, it was always without a name. Now Nope. In this exchange with special did she request anonymity not that we would have granted it. But the whole thing started to feel pretty ridiculous to me. I mean, here's a person who was being paid with tax dollars to give the media information, demanding an article be spiked because she kind of did her job with a weird nothing burger have a comment about scary robbery, baby dolls. Like really this is how far down the rabbit hole Australian secrecy has gone. But the thing is, I'd been around. And I could also see that this really wasn't just her fault, right? This was bigger than her. This council did have a secrecy policy for almost everything. And everyone, just like Australia has a secrecy default. For far too many things. As Dan mentioned, it's a habit, it gets addictive. She was just following the written and unwritten rules for the world's most secretive democracy. And I was pretty sure she didn't even see the context that way. So I tried to write back to her politely. And this is what I wrote. The problem here, it seems to me is the Australian practice of withholding names. In general, if you work for a public entity in a democracy, anonymity is not assumed you work for the public at taxpayer expense. And so in the future, if you don't want to be named, please make that clear in your exchange with New York Times reporters, and we can respond accordingly. She wrote me back and said, Thank you. This has been a huge lesson for me, in terms of dealing with reporters. Now again,

56:15  
this was her job. So she was she was the senior media advisor. Yeah, exactly.

56:19  
Now, I wish that this was the only absurd example of Australia's secrecy default in the years since I wrote that article, but it's not. There was also the time when I filed a public records request for some insight and what kinds of things the Foreign Investment Review Board was rejecting. I started out asking for companies and industries in the countries involved for every decision, I wanted to basically know what kinds of things were being rejected from China, in particular what or not, they said no to that. So then I just asked for numbers, lands statistics for which countries had applied and been rejected. I asked for ratios of accepted investments, anything that would give me any insight into what this very important government body was doing. And they said no to all of it. They just assumed it was a national security threat, whether or not China bought a dairy farm or not. More recently, and I'll end with this, I ran into a senior Australian diplomat at an event who told me a handful of mildly insightful things about Australian foreign policy. At the end of our little chat, he looked at me in the eyes and he said, You can't quote or refer to anything I told you. I told him not to worry that I've been talking to a lot of Western officials from the US the UK a whole bunch of things on this story I was working on. So the most that I could imagine doing was combining what he said with others, and referring it to something like Western officials in his eyes when Drew wide with fear. No, I've gotten in trouble for that. I've gotten in trouble for that, too. You can't do that you just can't. And again, none of what he told me amounted to state secrets, but he was completely stressed. It was like he feared being jailed or fired or killed for saying very, very little out. And that's really the problem here. The culture of secrecy has become so dominant in Australia that it muzzles voices and censors people who are responsible for this democracy, instead of recognising that their roles include an obligation to the public to explain why they are what they are doing is good for the country. They behave as if telling the media and the public anything is a violation of ethics. And they are disciplined with that priority in mind, stay silent, keep information private, or else. Don't make any mistake. This is an authoritarian instinct. I've seen it in dictatorships around the world, and it's toxic and contagious. It's an attitude that strikes fear into everyone and anyone who has an urge to share important information that we deserve to know. One more thing, though some figures in Australian life, perhaps that former prime minister or perhaps another member who we've tussled with, I think in the media quite a bit named Peter Dutton, have a far worse reputation on secrecy than others. But it is not a partisan problem. It's a political problem and a power problem and a habit problem. Even after Scott Morrison took on all those extra jobs, you did not see the Albanese government immediately promised to tackle the problem of secrecy all over government. And it's not clear if the Prime Minister ever will get around to dealing with it. This is the case even though countless studies show that secrecy undermines trust in democracy and creates the conditions for corruption and mismanagement. Australians really deserve better. My hope is that someday we get to a place where every official can speak freely, including those who have something to say about a gross baby doll washing up on shore, or a banana he-man public art project and

59:21  
I want to jump in because what you said rang true and I get it forget it later. But the they had a thing in the Defence Force about private privacy. I don't think people understood the idea. Obviously, you don't want people finding out about your sexual preference or whatever, because through some sort of a lake, but they took it very seriously. And we were in in dropping bombs on people in the Middle East. And I kid you not. There was like a senior defence lawyer. You're sort of like targeting this terrorist and you said to say a Hellfire besar they were like, I'm not sure we may be breaching their privacy. How can I voice the whole action?

1:00:08  
Jamie has anything else? Kind of you've been here five years does anything else surprise you at all now due to kind of around secrecy in Australian Government?

1:00:17  
You know, I think I'm constantly surprised by moments like the one I just described, where it's so deeply ingrained in the culture that the default setting is to just not attach a name or under an understanding of accountability at the low, low level. So that's the first thing. It's just throughout the culture. And then the second thing is, though, that I'm so pleasantly surprised when people actually trust me and do help me like there was one time I was in like the small town in South Australia doing a story about I think there was a it was a memorial to a massacre against the local Aboriginal people. And somebody in government, this was a very really big controversial conflict in this small town. But someone quietly at some point, handed me the small blue book, and he said, This is the phone numbers for everyone in this town. You can call whoever you want. Don't tell anyone I gave it. And I don't know why he trusted me with that. But I'm so grateful to those people who, who, you know, feel that they've taken a chance on me as a journalist, and I'm, and that surprises me, because it's so rare, unfortunately. Yeah. Great. And what was the diplomat? What was he saying to you? Was he saying stuff? Like, you know, we sell a lot of sheep in Australia. You know, he was like talking about like other leaders and like, things that were totally part of the public record. Like, I think he maybe he thought he was saying these brilliant things, but I'd heard all of it. But

1:01:32  
how much that has trickled down to normal conversation for I'll have dinner with a friend and they're just talking about that average Wednesday, and they'll stop themselves and they'll be like, this is off the record.

1:01:43  
Yeah, exactly. That sense of self importance to I guess it's part of the secrecy thing. It's like whatever I'm doing it. I think it helps people sort of feel important to feel as though the menu for a restaurant might be secret.

1:01:54  
All right, great. Well, I'm looking forward to the next secret spilled by Amber Schultz.

1:02:04  
Last week, I went to this really glamorous event called the midwinter ball. So for those of you that don't know it's in Parliament, and it's an opportunity for journalists to cosplay, a stage three tax cut recipients. We all go and the whole poi