KEY POINTS:
Nothing makes the case for empire so compellingly as its absence and nothing vindicates the musty code of honour more than the conduct of its guardians.
A coup and a killing prove that point with brutal clarity. Superficially, they appear unrelated; just another two random events that hit
the headlines.
But the reason we should - no, must - remember these two is because each has provoked a similar and equally derisory response.
In the case of the coup, we say we're appalled.
From the safety of their parliamentary offices, the beneficiaries of our democracy condemn Commodore Bainimarama for usurping the democracy of others. They invite the Fijian people to resist his assault on their institutions and warn the Commodore he will pay a high price if he ignores them.
And when he does, our plucky democrats declare New Zealand off limits to all Fijian sportspeople - except the Sevens team who will be allowed to play at January's tournament in Wellington because it's the biggest event of the year. Cancellation would cost a lot of money, the Prime Minister explained during her weekly breakfast TV infomercial. There is no point in our paying the price for a coup somewhere else.
Except that we've said it's intolerable. Not unlike apartheid, which, applying the principles of today, we would have opposed by refusing to play any South African sports team apart from the Springboks. Or, going back a little further, if escaping penalty and avoiding cost is the true measure of conviction, we would presumably have agreed to fight the Fascists in 1939 only on condition that we could sub-contract all combat operations.
Say what you like about empires (and for many people, that's not a lot), the evidence of history is that when their self-interest was threatened or their principles offended, the response was more than empty words.
Confronted by that which affronted them, empires responded with more than sound and fury. When necessary, they added fury to their sound.
We may snigger today at gunboat diplomacy but gumboat diplomacy, the toothless howls of indignant bystanders, is equally laughable.
If Bainimarama is trembling, it will only be with mirth as he realises how quickly self-interest muzzled our objection to his Chilean excursion.
Having posed as democracy's champions, we meekly left the moral high ground in order to play the game. The Commodore will know that if his enemies put dollars before democracy, it won't be hard to find (unwelcome) friends who'll do the same.
Finding anyone prepared to accept responsibility for the death of Liam Ashley will be a harder task. Granted the privilege of judging their own offence, the Corrections Department - in whose care Liam was - released its report into his murder this week. And the report reached a most convenient conclusion.
Apparently, the system killed Liam. Not people, the system. He was a victim of process. Liam Ashley was murdered by mistakes. And nobody made them.
Encouraged by this nebulous verdict, the high and the mighty moved quickly to exonerate themselves.
Our guards complied fully with the terms of the contract, said the man from Chubb. So that's all right.
I've talked to the minister, said Barry Matthews, the head of Corrections, and he's satisfied with my efforts. So that's good too. Mr Matthews needn't search his own conscience and draw his own conclusions.
If duty is in the eye of the beholder and the beholder is happy, everything's fine. No need to resign. In the wine industry, yes, but not the public service.
Mr Matthews' department had, after all, arranged for the van to be ceremonially cleansed and blessed after Liam was killed inside it. Which is no more and no less than we would expect.
That leaves only the Minister of Corrections, Damien O'Connor. And he says his responsibility is "to make sure that the systems cannot allow this to happen ever again".
So he won't resign. Not when his rightful place is at the helm, overseeing change and ensuring that the very same people who created the system which "allowed this to happen" set about replacing it immediately with a new and better system that will "prevent similar tragedies occurring in the future".
Precisely why people officially declared not responsible for the death of a child in their care should then be entrusted with the responsibility of safeguarding anyone, anywhere, at any time is difficult to explain.
Although the minister will likely attempt to do so. He is, after all, alive and well and still enjoying the privileges of office.
What is harder to explain is why we tolerate "a system" so willing to betray honour.
Liam Ashley's death wasn't sanctioned by the state, but it was sanctioned by the laziness, carelessness, incompetence, neglect or indifference of people employed by the state.
For a government, there can be no failure more abject than one which makes "this system" an accessory to murder.
But no one's to blame. And the van's been blessed. And the system will be fixed. So all is well. Except that the empty remorse we've seen this week is proof that our politicians and civil servants expect privilege without obligation and exercise power without honour.
The official response to this killing and that coup suggests those who are supreme today don't know the meaning of sacrifice.
