Oakes the only one asking the right questions about the AFP handling of the Australia Day incident?

So much was avoidable about what happened this Australia Day just gone. Any Canberran would have known that the 40th Anniversary of the establishment of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy would attract an emotionally charged audience. Any Canberran knows that the Lobby Restaurant is virtually next to the Tent Embassy.

http://www.canberratimes.com.au/multimedia/33572/448362/january-27-2012.aspx

How come then that the Australian Federal Police - Canberra's police force - didn't connect that having the two events side-by-side was a recipe for problems?

Why is it that Laurie Oakes seems to be the only one in our mainstream media asking questions about the incompetence of the AFP in anticipating this, and then in the way they managed the extraction of the nation's top two political representatives?

But it has to be said the operation could have been handled better. It was anything but copybook. Clumsy is the word that comes to mind.

It is obvious the first priority in such a situation has to be the safety of the Prime Minister. But those assigned to the personal protection detail are told that maintaining as much dignity as possible for the PM is also important.

That is where Gillard was let down. She should have walked out like a prime minister, an expert said yesterday. Instead, she looked like a frightened rag doll. After all, there were not thousands of protesters - just a hundred or so.

Canberra police should have been able to clear a path to the roadway so that the PM's security people could walk her to her car.

Forming a flying wedge around Gillard and Abbott and making them exit the restaurant at a run was unnecessary and smacked of panic. And it pretty much guaranteed that a female prime minister wearing high-heeled shoes would trip and fall, resulting in the kind of undignified coverage we have seen in newspapers and on television.

But a bigger concern is that those responsible for the PM's security were apparently taken by surprise.

Her program is supposed to be checked thoroughly in advance for potential security problems. ASIO looks at it, as well as the Australian Federal Police. Here we had the PM and Opposition Leader scheduled to attend a function at a location only a stone's throw from 40th anniversary celebrations at the Aboriginal tent embassy.

It was an occasion that would inevitably involve the most hardcore and embittered Aboriginal activists. Yet nobody - not even the spooks at ASIO - spotted a potential problem.

And it has caused immeasurable damage to the cause of reconciliation to boot. Not just by setting loose the wannabe shock jocks. Even otherwise respectable media leaders have gone feral on this. Mark Furler in the Sunshine Coast Daily, for example:

Riot did little for the cause

What riot? Fracas sure but no riot. Not by a long shot. Error of judgement by a sub-editor wording up the headline? Maybe, but Furler is the Editor-In-Chief of the Sunshine Coast Daily, so he's the one who signs off every headline too. Disappointing. Very disappointing.