AlternateRoute

We have just had the inconvenience of having our city visitied by US Vice President Dick Cheney.

The hassle started a few days ago when there was a deafening sound out my office window and all of the windows were shaking. Looking out I saw an army blackhawk helicopter hovering above the building across the road. It flew off, did a lap of the city and came back again. This continued for well over an hour.

Last night the police started gathering in the city. At the last minute they revoked the permission for a protest march to walk from the Town Hall to the US Consulate and threatened to arrest anyone who attempted to leave the area. (And I thought that we were living in a democracy. Surely the deputy head of the “world’s greatest democracy” would be happy to see how actively we embrace the concept.)

I got home without further hassle, had dinner and took my step daughter out for a driving lesson. On the way home we came past the airport, about 3km and 4 minutes from home. Without any prior warning the police closed off the road (the main road from the airport to the city) and stopped traffic for about twenty minutes. Then a motorcade of motorcycle police, big black Limos, a few buses and a couple of ambulances came past. The road contiues to be blocked for a further 10 minutes before we could move on. Apparently this is done in the name of security. But it sure pissed off a lot of people. If one of the missing army rocket launchers had have been lying around I would have “popped a cap in Dick’s ass” yelling “Next time take the train you bloody tourist!”.

I also don’t like the way that laws that the rest of us have to obey are ignored by Dick and his cronies. For example, he is allowed to walk around the streets surrounded by armed guards. Do those guys have Australian security guard tickets? I doubt it. He also bought his own Limo over here. Did he run it over the pits at the RTA and get it registered first? No. Did he have the standard “Left Hand Drive” warning sign on the back? No.

Jesus Dick, if you are so unpopular that you can only visit a city if everyone else is removed from the city first, then stay home. If you need to talk to someone, use the bloody telephone.

This entry was posted on Friday, February 23rd, 2007 at 1100 and is filed under Life, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.