I received this email today from Andrew Gunn:

 

I learnt this morning that one of the current Japanese hostages in Iraq is a friend of a friend – a Japanese peace activist who hosted one of my children during a school trip to Japan.

She’s asking for people to write a couple of emails.

Here’s a quote of background info –

As you may know, 3 Japanese humanitarian and peace activist/journalists are in hostage in Iraq. One of them is dear friend of mine. See below.

They say unless Japanese Self Defence Force withdrow form Iraq within 3 days, they will kill all 3, burn them alive and cut them into pieces. They don’t know who those Japanese are. They are my friends. They are peace activists and humanitarian volunteers who have been really helping Iraqi children who are suffering from DU or/and from the war. Can you send an e-mail to Aljazeera, informing those hostages are against war and occupation and they are in Iraq to make peace, to make SDF back home.

Mr. Noriaki Imai is my dear friend who has been working to stop the use of DU (depleted uranium) and who is against war and occupation. He just graduated from high school and went to Iraq to help Iraqi children who are suffering from the contamination of DU.

Ms. Nahoko Takato is humanitarian volunteer who has been helping street children who lost parents and home in the war. Her work has been really very appreciated by Iraqi people. She moved so many Japanese and her work has woken up many Japanese.

Mr. Soichiro Koriyama is a freelance photographer who is working with Imai. They went to write an article for Asahi Weekly.

The group who took the hostage says that they will kill all 3 unless Japanese Self Defence Force withdraw from Iraq.

In my opinion, this war is wrong from the beginning as Kucinich says, and Japan should not have sent our troops, which is violating our Peace Constitution.

The suggested actions were to:

1. Email Prime Minister Koizumi at koizumi@mmz.kantei.go.jp to ask that the Japanese SDF be withdrawn from Iraq.

2. Contact Aljazeera to tell them that these Japanese hostages are peace activists who are there to help suffering Iraqis and do not support the war. Go to Aljazeera and click on ‘Your Feedback’ in the left column.

Thanks.

Tonight, great Iraq links, and the beginnings of discussion on where America goes from here. Have a happy Easter.

 

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Scott Burchill recommends Bush and Blair have lit a fire which could consume them, the Iraqi uprising will drive home the forgotten lessons of empire:

Where are they now, the cheerleaders for war on Iraq? Where are the US Republican hawks who predicted the Anglo-American invasion would be a “cakewalk”, greeted by cheering Iraqis? Or the liberal apologists, who hailed a “new dawn” for freedom and democracy in the Arab world as US marines swathed Baghdad in the stars and stripes a year ago? Some, like the Sun newspaper – which yesterday claimed Iraqis recognise that occupation is in their “own long-term good” and are not in “bloody revolt” at all – appear to be in an advanced state of denial.

Scott also recommends Former iraqi enemies unite to fight U.S.

Antony Loewenstein: “I can’t believe Robert Fisk is now in Fallujah. Now, that’s bravery. See Iraq on the brink of anarchy.”

Allen Jay: “Further to Peter Evans’ note in Uniting Iraqis, American style about CNN changing the terminology of `civilian contractors’, Webdiary readers may like to refer to their employer’s website for a reality check and to this backgrounder from Counterpunch. Do you want these guys to bring Freedom and Democracy to a town near you? These guys were all ex special forces and were not there on some peace and good government mission – more likely contract killing – so the fact that there were reprisals should neither surprise nor alarm.”

Max Phillips: “I’ve just found graphic evidence of what our job is in Iraq. Don’t click if you’re queasy. Chest thumping about not “cutting and running” by Howard and Downer makes you sick when you see these Al Jeezera images.”

Brian McKinlay: Juan Cole has been a most prescient observer of Iraq. He’s the author of a major work on Shia islam, and predicted the very events now unfolding.

The journos union, the Media Alliance: “Today marks the anniversary of the US shelling of the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad. Two journalists were killed and three wounded when 150 journalists in the hotel came under fire. No satisfactory explanation has been given as to why the attack occurred. Since hostilities in Iraq began in March 2003 seven journalists have been killed in four separate instances of “friendly fire” by US forces. Today media workers and supporters are signing a petition to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. To read and sign the petition, go to ifj.”

Tim Gillin: Check out James Bovard’s book ‘Tyranny and terror’, the best of the post 9-11 crop of books. I have sent him a couple of emails and found him helpful. And see this Bovard interview.

Antony Loewenstein recommends a new book, The Buying of the President 2004: Who’s Really Bankrolling Bush and His Democratic Challengers – and What They Expect in Return, by Charles Lewis.

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MURDOCH WATCH

Murdoch backs Howard one day after moving News Limited offshore (what’s the betting the Foreign Investment Review Board will let him keep Brisbane’s Courier Mail despite the ban on foreigners owning more than 25 percent of a newspaper?) On the same bloody day as Murdoch and Alan Jones have a chat, Daryl Williams says he’ll try real hard to get Howard’s cross media laws through. Wouldn’t you just love a Murdoch owned TV network? Remember when Williams’ predecessor Richard Alston said during the cross media debate last year that Murdoch didn’t care about cross media changes and that the changes were to help the small players? Bullshit. Murdoch wants the changes bad, and said so to Jonesie.

The New York Times has run a piece on Latham, because Murdoch has noticed him! The Yanks know where the power really is, alright. See The Labor Party challenger, Mark Latham, says he’d take the Australians out of Iraq:

A candidate for higher office in Australia, especially one hoping to be prime minister, is rarely taken seriously until the home-born international media magnate Rupert Murdoch shows interest. So when the spirited new leader of the Labor Party, Mark Latham, 43, who is now ahead in the polls against the long serving conservative incumbent John Howard, turned up for supper at the Murdoch ranch, people took notice.’

I wonder if Lachlan asked Latham to make no trouble when Dad turned an Australian owned paper, The Courier Mail, foreign? Labor’s raised no questions.

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SHORTIES

Stephen Cox in Darwin: It’s good to see the sanity of Webdiary back and on the trail of the misguided misfit G. W. Bush and his idiot followers. For those of us who advocated that invading Iraq was wrong, unlawful, and just bloody stupid, we can no longer stand up proudly screaming “WE WERE RIGHT YOU IDIOTS” – because far too many people have been, and continue to be, killed, including those poor American troops who have lost their lives.”

Phil Moffat: The war in Iraq was executed to eliminate Saddam’s WM so said the Coalition of the Willing. We now know Iraq has no WMDs and all the war has achieved is to turn Iraq into a bloody mess. Maybe it is time for Saddam to return to his old job, reinstate his army and get the place under control. After all John Howard made it absolutely clear to us that we would not be involved in the war if it wasn’t for WMDs.

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WHAT NOW? THE BEST NEXT MOVE IN IRAQ

Chris Murphy in Southport, Queensland (and see his information website)

The leader in the New Statesman on April 7, Iraq: how to move on, concludes:

Countries are best left to sort out their affairs and achieve their own liberation, as eastern Europe and South Africa did. Iraq, it is said, would face civil war – but that is the oldest excuse for prolonging colonial occupation. The Americans should leave promptly and completely, and be replaced by the UN – if the Iraqis wish it. Now move on.

The crowd – the same mob who eventually sided with Bush and supported the invasion of Iraq – will scream at the conclusion drawn by the New Statesman. “We can’t go backwards!” they will cry. True, and more’s the pity, but they refuse to admit that the so-called `Coalition of the Willing’ is digging itself deeper and deeper each day.

And the hole they dig will inevitably become a grave, just like Vietnam.

“We must do something!” Oh yeah? What? Persevere with the concept of a democratic Iraq?

Hardly. No one with any knowledge of the history and culture of the country believes that aim is – or ever was – achievable, in any way. Only ignorant numbskulls like Bush and Rumsfeld figured there was some way to unite 24 million people of starkly different backgrounds in a peaceful democracy in the Western tradition. Those who did know but had other agendas, like Chalabi and Wolfowitz, simply fed these numbskulls that simplistic line to get their own covert outcomes.

What else can now be done? Bomb the recalcitrants into submission?

Sure. Moqtada al-Sadr, the revolting leader of a Shi’ite break-away group, currently has a very small following. The moderates, who still control millions of Shi’ites, know very well that government is theirs for the taking in a democracy. Only a civil war could stop them. Until now, the big threat of that was from the Sunni minority.

Enter the Americans. Blasting their way into a Shi’ite mosque and killing those inside, even rebellious fanatics, is certainly no way to foster stability amongst the majority Shi’ites, who will now be forced to choose who is “them” and who is “us”. Bush and Rumsfeld need to learn – fast – that guided weapons and helicopter gunships will never win hearts and minds.

What else? Stay in Iraq, but stand back and hope that people are reasonable? Like the Iraqis are going to resort to reason and peace, when all the invaders have achieved so far has been at the barrel of a gun or bought using a bag of greenbacks. Regrettably, America has lost its ability to lead by example, because its example is ignorance, unilateralism, stubbornness, force, and violence.

This is a no-win situation. Like Vietnam, there is no alternative but to “cut and run”. And just like Vietnam, it will take decades for both Iraq and the United States to recover. So be it. At least next time, the people of America just might stand up to the next generation of ignorant numbskulls when they call for war.

But when that happens, look up. The sky will be filled with pink pigs.

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Peter Funnell in Canberra

What is happening now in Iraq is far more dangerous than the short conventional war that overthrew Saddam’s regime. The place is going off like a firecracker. Coordinated attacks in lots of places. Seems they caught the marines with their pants down around their ankles, which is unusual. Then, we need to remember, the majority of the US troops are now reservists or national guard (not sure if this is true of marines). I really wonder at the quality of the US troops.

There is only one solution available to the US – to escalate the fighting and engage with the Iraqi militias – but that’s not easy with irregular forces who must be enjoying a high level of local support. But the US is likely to see this as the only hope they have to assert control and achieve some form of law and order�. They have nothing else at their disposal and at the moment, they are a risk every minute of every day. Doesn’t exactly make for clear thinking.

If it happens it will be awful. I can’t see Bush agreeing to withdraw, just as the US did not in Vietnam. This is worse than Vietnam.

This is the price of war. An illegal war. A war based on falsehood. A war that has brought a frightening level of slaughter, injury, poverty and radicalism to Iraq. Why shouldn’t we label Bush, Blair and Howard war criminals?

I’ve decided to republish Mark Latham’s speech to Parliament on the eve of war in Iraq, on March 19, 2003. It scrubs up damn well on the eve of the first anniversary of the toppling of Saddam’s statue on April 10, 2003 (see Whose flag?). Pre war political speeches by the father of the US Senate Robert Byrd also stand the test of time – see A lonely voice in a US Senate silent on war and Today, I Weep for my Country…. And see his powerful post-war speech on 21 May, 2003, The Truth Will Emerge.

 

Contrast the blind certainty of John Howard, who, on March 9, 2003, in the countdown to war, was asked: How hard have you wrestled with it (going to war)?

Howard: You always anguish over something like this, but I have never thought of changing my position. Never.(From Howard: Never in doubt on Iraq)

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The march of folly

by Mark Latham

In her outstanding book The March of Folly the American historian, Barbara Tuchman, looks at the reasons why nations and governments often act in a manner contrary to their self-interest.

She writes that throughout human endeavour “government remains the paramount area of folly because it is there that men seek power over others – only to lose it over themselves”.

For Tuchman, persistence in error is the problem. When leaders abandon reason and rationality, when they fail to recognise mistakes, when they refuse to withdraw from bad policy – no matter the damage they are doing to themselves and their nations – this is the march of folly.

Vietnam was an example of this process. Fearful of McCarthyism and right-wing opinion at home, successive American leaders – from Eisenhower to Nixon – refused to be the first president to concede ground to communism.

This is why they fought an unwinnable war for so long. This is why they pushed their country deeper and deeper into the folly of a counter-productive foreign policy.

I believe that something similar is happening in the United States today. Post-September 11, the American people want revenge for the attack on their country and the Bush Administration is determined to give it to them.

It is determined to wage war on Iraq and Saddam Hussein. Even if this means damaging America’s long-term interests. Even if this means diverting resources from the real war against terror. Even if this means trashing the UN system. Even if this means dividing the Western world and gutting NATO. Even if this means generating a new wave of anti-American sentiment around the world.

After the attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon, people were worried about what Al-Qaeda might do next. Today they are worried about what President Bush might do next.

This is the march of folly and shamefully, the Australian Government is following the United States down this path. This is the worst piece of Australian foreign policy since Vietnam.

The Prime Minister has made a crude judgement post-September 11 that the world has just one super-power and, in the war against terror, Australia needs to get with the power, no matter the cost to our independence and international standing. He is not interested in arguments about the soundness of US policy or the need for global power-sharing and cooperation. The Howard Government is determined to follow the leader.

This approach is spelt out in the Government’s recent Strategic Review, a remarkably simplistic document that even goes as far as endorsing the Son of Star Wars: American missile defence. Incredibly, this is not to protect Australian cities and territory. Rather, it recognises that under this Government, wherever the US army goes across the globe, the ADF will automatically follow.

This is not a white paper but a tissue paper, to cover the Government’s radical shift in defence policy. The old DOA was Defence of Australia. The new DOA is Defence of America.

The Howard Government has turned Australia’s national security upside down. It has handed over our sovereignty to the United States and left our country exposed to the adventurism of the Bush Administration.

For some of the media-elites, to say these things is seen as anti-American. In my case, I greatly admire the achievements of the United States people. I’m not anti-American. I’m anti-Bush. I’m anti-the right-wing hawks of the Republican Party. I’m anti-war.

The United States is a great and powerful nation. But being powerful doesn’t always mean that nations and politicians get it right.

It is in Australia’s interests to question US foreign policy and the competence of world leaders. Australian lives are now on the line. Our troops in Iraq are effectively under the command of George W Bush. No nation should just sleepwalk into war.

An unnecessary war

When people ask: what is the alternative to war, I say that the answer is quite simple. The alternative to war is peaceful disarmament.

On 7 March the chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix reported that substantial progress had been made and that Iraq could be disarmed peacefully within a matter of months.

He said: “We are not watching the breaking of toothpicks. Lethal weapons are being destroyed.” He refuted US intelligence claims about the use of mobile production units for biological weapons, stating that, “No evidence of proscribed activities has so far been found.”

There is a huge credibility gap in the argument for war. We now know – as incredible as it may seem – that large slabs of the British Government’s dossier on Iraq were plagiarised from university students.

In this country, a senior ONA officer, Andrew Wilkie, has blown the whistle on the true nature of Australian intelligence reports. In his assessment:

“Iraq does not pose a security threat to the US, the UK, Australia or any other country at this point in time. Their military is very small, their weapons of mass destruction program is fragmented and contained and there is no hard evidence of any active cooperation between Iraq and Al-Qaeda The bottom line is that this war against Iraq is totally unrelated to the war on terror.”

So why the mad rush to war? Why does Australia need to act outside the UN system when the independent report of the weapons inspectors has said that peaceful disarmament is possible?

Why does Australia need to launch an unprovoked attack on another nation – a nation that doesn’t threaten us? Why have we sent our best troops and equipment to the other side of the world when they should be here, guarding our country against real threats, against the real terrorists?

Why do we need to be part of a war that involves the slaughter of tens of thousands of civilians? Why are our military forces striking a country where half the population is under the age of 15? That’s 12 million boys and girls, their lives now at risk because of George Bush, Tony Blair and John Howard.

None of these things need to happen. Peaceful disarmament is possible. This war is simply unnecessary.

More problems than it solves

It will create more problems than it solves. It will cause enormous suffering and instability in the post-war reconstruction of Iraq. It will breed a new generation of terrorists and increase the likelihood of terrorist activity on Australian soil.

The war against terror must target terrorists, not the women and children of nation states. It must solve problems, like catching Bin Laden, wiping out Al-Qaeda and addressing the Palestinian question. It must attack the core reasons for terrorism, rather than being diverted into conflict in Iraq.

The Republican Right in the United States has tried to legitimise its policies by talking of the so-called Clash of Civilisations – the struggle between Western values and Islamic culture. I regard this theory as nonsense.

The real clash is within a civilisation – the civil war within Islam itself, the struggle between militant fundamentalists and moderate Muslims. We need to do everything we can to ensure that the moderates win.

We need to find a lasting peace in the Middle East, not start a new war in the region. We need to address the burning problem of Third World poverty, overcoming the injustices that fundamentalists thrive on. This is why the invasion of Iraq is such bad policy. It is contrary to each of these goals.

A dangerous doctrine

There is another reason for opposing this war: it is based on a dangerous doctrine.

Sixty years ago mankind developed the capacity to destroy itself, most notably through nuclear weapons of mass destruction. Since then the world has managed to survive, mainly through policies of deterrence and containment. In the post-war years, this was known as the Truman doctrine.

The United Nations has also played a role. It may not be perfect, but it is still the best system we have for fostering international goodwill and cooperation. To ignore and then belittle the will of the United Nations at this crucial time represents an appalling shift in Australian foreign policy.

Even worse, and without any real debate, the Howard Government has embraced the new Bush doctrine of pre-emption. This doctrine overturns 60 years of successful US foreign policy, 60 years of deterrence and containment. It gives the US a mandate to launch pre-emptive strikes on other nations – nations that it deems to be evil. Bush has abandoned President Clinton’s emphasis on multilateralism and gone down the dangerous path of unilateralism.

Make no mistake. A world based on threats of military action, a world based on pre-emptive strikes is a world about to do itself terrible harm.

The folly of this approach can be seen on the Korean peninsula. Two-and-a-half years ago at the Sydney Olympics, the North and South Korean teams marched together. This was seen as a wonderful sign for the future. It gave the world hope for political and economic cooperation, resolving an international trouble spot.

Eighteen months ago, the North Korean leadership was in China studying the benefits of economic openness and liberalisation. Again, it seemed that the North Korean problem would solve itself. Like other communist regimes, under the weight of economic failure, it was going to reform from within.

Then 14 months ago President Bush included North Korea in his Axis of Evil speech, threatening military pre-emption. Not surprisingly, North Korea is now racing to defend itself, weaponising its nuclear power. In response, Japan has said that it too needs nuclear weapons.

This is the problem with pre-emption. It creates an international environment based on suspicion and escalation. In our country, bizarrely enough, the Prime Minister has said that we need a nuclear missile shield to defend ourselves against North Korea.

This is the madness of escalation. And none of it has anything to do with the war against terror. Not the development of Japanese nuclear capacity. Not the creation of an Australian missile shield. Osama bin Laden must be laughing himself silly.

We cannot run the world according to threats and first-strike thinking. Not a world in which 26 nations have chemical weapons and 20 have biological weapons. Not a world in which India and Pakistan both have nuclear weapons. Not a world plagued by the non-stop violence of the Middle East.

History tells us that deterrence and containment are the only answers. Along with the age-old hope of cooperation between nations.

This is where I fundamentally disagree with Bush’s policy. In outlining his new doctrine in September last year, he said that, “In the new world we have entered, the only path to safety is the path of action.”

I believe in this new world, as well as the old, the only path to safety is international cooperation. Multilateralism, not unilateralism. Containment, not pre-emption. Peace, not an unnecessary war in Iraq.

International power-sharing

Along with most Australians, I do not want a world in which one country has all the power. I do not want a world based on Axis of Evil rhetoric and the constant threat of pre-emption.

There is a better way. It is called the United Nations. This means respecting the findings of Hans Blix. This means respecting international opinion – in this case, the position of France, Germany, Russia and China. It means sharing power across the globe, instead of allowing one nation to appoint itself as the global policeman.

There was a time, of course, when George W Bush seemed to believe in these ideals. During the 2000 Presidential campaign he said that he wanted the United States to take a lower profile in international affairs, to be “a more humble power”.

His radical shift in policy has, in fact, humiliated his nation. He has provoked anti-American sentiment internationally. He has divided the Western alliance and badly damaged NATO.

I ask this simple question: who was the last world leader to unite France, Germany, Russia and China? This is an unprecedented coalition. From the right-wing Gaullists in France, to the social democrats in Germany, to Putin’s Russia, to the Communist Party of China, international opinion has united against the United States.

Around the globe, people do not want a world in which one country has all the power. They want power-sharing and cooperation.

This should be the basis of Australia’s foreign policy. The Howard Government believes in a uni-polar world in which the primacy of the United States is beyond challenge. I believe in a multi-polar world, recognising not just American power but also, China as an emerging super-power, plus the supra-national power of the European Union.

Australia is one of the few countries in the world well-placed to have strong relations with all three. In the Labor Party, this is not just an opportunity for the future. It is part of our political legacy.

Just as Curtin established the US relationship, just as Calwell established the European migration program, just as Whitlam established relations with the People’s Republic of China, the next Labor Government will have to realign and rebalance Australia’s foreign policy. Nothing is more important than getting these relationships right.

The US relationship

The great irony of the Government’s strategy is that it actually weakens our relationship with the United States.

Like any alliance, ANZUS works best when it is based on an equal partnership, when both partners bring something to the table. Under the Howard Government, Australia brings nothing but subservience. This is hurting the strength and viability of the relationship.

In practice, we matter to the Americans when we matter in Asia. The alliance is strongest when Australian diplomacy is able to influence outcomes in our part of the world. This is when the United States has reason to rely on us, to treat Australia as an equal partner.

Under this Government, of course, our influence in Asia is minor. Our neighbours shake their heads in disbelief when they see Australia echoing the American line, when they see our Prime Minister calling himself a deputy sheriff.

These are Asian nations that fought long and hard against colonialism. They are proud nations with little respect for countries that act like client states. They have independent foreign policies of their own, and they expect the same from Australia.

Mr Howard thinks the ultimate guarantor of Australia’s security is the US alliance. That’s nonsense. The ultimate guarantor of Australia’s security is the soundness of our foreign policy and the strength of our armed forces.

We need an alliance with the United States. But we also live in a new world, with new threats and new doctrines. The Howard Government has not handled these challenges well.

The next Labor Government will need to repair the damage, to rebalance the relationship. I support the American alliance, but it must be an alliance between equals – a genuine partnership, rather than the deputy sheriff role we have today.

Conclusion

The key divide in Australian politics is now clear. The Liberals have become an American war party. Labor stands for global power-sharing and cooperation. We stand for national security based on collective security. We stand for an independent foreign policy.

The Liberals stand for war. They stand for unprovoked attacks on other countries, because the United States wants it that way. The Prime Minister is too weak to say No to George W Bush.

This is the march of folly. The folly of bad foreign policy. The folly of a government that refuses to concede its error of judgement. The folly of a government that is sending Australia into an unnecessary and unwanted war, with all the horror of military and civilian casualties.

This is a war that will create more problems than it solves. It will create a new generation of terrorists. It has already divided our nation and broken the Western alliance.

I urge the Government, even at this late hour, to change its mind. Listen to the words of Barbara Tuchman: “In the search for wiser government we should look for the test of character first. And the test should be moral courage”.

Surely there is someone in this Government who can pass the test of moral courage, who can stand up and oppose this war. If just eight Government members were willing to cross the floor, the will of this parliament, the will of our democracy would prevail. We could stop Australia’s involvement in this unjust and unnecessary war.

Six months ago in this place, 24 Government members voted against stem cell research because of what they considered to be the sanctity of life, the sanctity of embryonic stem cells.

Today we are not talking about single cells. We are talking about real human lives. We are talking about the lives of 12 million Iraqi children, little boys and girls and their families.

Where are these 24 MPs today? They’re no longer defending the sanctity of life. They’ve joined the American war party.

I oppose the Government’s motion. I oppose the war in Iraq and I urge members opposite – those who can find the moral courage, those who truly believe in the sanctity of life – to do the same.

Randy Paul runs a great blog that specialises in Latin America, but he has dug up a quote from American founding father James Madison that might be (or should be) the guiding motto of political blogging:

 

“A popular Government, without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy; or, perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.”

Yes, despite the fact that it sometimes looks more like a contact sport than knowledge governing ignorance, there is much in the blogosphere to enlighten us.

Jason Soon talks plainly on a number of topics including the economics of open source software and the pros and cons of a flat tax.

Indonesia had elections this week and Alan at Southerly Buster covered it in a number of posts, including this analysis of the results. Keep scrolling down the page for more. Also on Indonesia watch was The Swanker, who gives the latest counting here, and discusses some of the background issues here.

Before Iraq there was Afghanistan and after Iraq there will still be Afghanistan, as Martial reminds us in this series of posts that are a diary account of his recent visit there:

“It is my impression that the Taliban, at long last and two years late, are on their last legs. It is crucial to not let them off the hook this time. But, as good as that news is, it is important to be prepared for the violence which is likely to break out once the Taliban are known to be broken.”

This sort of firsthand account is priceless, and Martial headed back to Afghanistan on Monday so there will no doubt be more blogging on the topic.

Seeing we have a bit of theme going here about blogs as sources of political knowledge, it is definitely worth mentioning Simon’s post about the Chinese government trying to ban blogs.

In local politics, Chris Sheil wondered if there was trouble in paradise for Mark Latham and continued his invaluable series, the Shorter Gerard Henderson. Steve Edwards had a close look at Latham’s recent foreign policy speech and concludes, amongst other things, that “it is mostly a rehashing of old Keating era slogans based on some outdated premises about how global and regional ‘institutions’ ought to work.”

Rob Corr pointed out the idiocies in the voting system used in the recent NSW local elections and also caught Peter Costello out in another case of phoney GST scaremongering.

Gary Sauer-Thompson, who often covers environmental issues in detail, tells us that Wilson Tuckey is “placing barriers to the public policy shift to a sustainable Australia.” And speaking of “sustainability” Keith Suterexpands the concept.

Internationally, it was all Iraq all of the time as violence surged. The growing unrest prompted John Quiggin to argue that “that the most plausible option for a stable allocation of power in Iraq is a de facto two-state solution in which the Kurds get effective autonomy and a share of the oil and the rest of Iraq gets a government which will be dominated by the Shiites.”

I had some follow up thoughts on John’s comments at my place.

But really, the most informed comment about Iraq comes from a Juan Cole who says:

It seems inevitable to me that the US military will pursue a war to the death with the Army of the Mahdi, the Sadrist movement, and Muqtada al-Sadr himself. They will of course win this struggle on the surface and in the short term, because of their massive firepower. But the Sadrists will simply go underground and mount a longterm guerrilla insurgency similar to that in the Sunni areas.”

As the blogs of the right will probably seek to portray all this as nay-saying and gloommungering, let me point out that the Iraqi Olympic team has a new logo. Yay!

On a gentler note, Boynton continues her endless search for meaning and introduces us to this handy engine for discovering what ails you. James Russell reproduces a comment that explains the internet and alsofarewells David and Margaret from SBS.

Barista is briefly interested in Robert Mitchum’s bum and also recommends Realtime, while the Living Room continues its series of blogtips, which are becoming an invaluable resource for new bloggers.

Finally, Meg Lees is continues to lead the way for bloggin politicians. But she should get serious and add a comments facility.

Iraq, Iraq. Here we go again. But first, Webdiary’s intern Judith Ireland has discovered that the Liberal Party has removed its history from its website. How fitting, since it has dumped liberal philosophy:

 

The `Our History’ page on the Liberal Party’s web site has gone into hiding. The page disappeared from its usual home under the `About the Liberal Party’ section sometime in early to mid March.

The page is still on the server and can be found by going directly to its URL. But because `Our History’ is no longer officially linked on the site, it is now invisible to visitors who don’t know its exact address.

Our History contains a brief run down of the Liberal Party’s formation and development between 1944 and 1949 from the first meeting to its first electoral success. It then provides a four-sentence summary of the Liberal federal governments since that time.

The Liberal Secretariat said it was unaware that the page was missing and suggested that information contained in `Our History’ had probably been divided across other pages on the web site. But whilst the site certainly contains information about the beliefs, achievements and structure of the Liberal Party, details of the party’s formation do not appear any where else except in `Our History’.

The entire Liberal Party web site has been upgraded with a new design and extra information within the last two weeks and the Secretariat also suggested that `Our History’ might not have been transferred from the old site yet. But as `Our History’ has the same design as all other pages on the new site, perhaps its link was lost in the move.

The rest of the site does not appear to be experiencing any other technical difficulties.

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NOTICEBOARD

Scott Burchill:“Could it be that Washington has achieved something neither Saddam or anyone else could achieve – bring the Shia and Sunni together in a united opposition to occupation?” See Muslim Rivals Unite In Baghdad Uprising.

Peter Cook in Brisbane:“David Clark in The Guardian sums it all up rather well: The war on terror misfired. Blame it all on the neo-cons.

Christopher Dunne:“If you haven’t heard any Republicans from Texas deconstruct neo-conservative philosophy and trace its paternity to Machiavelli, then this is for you: We’ve Been “Neo-conned”!

The US government wants to lock out journos and transmit its propaganda direct to the people: U.S. military finds way around the press corps.

John Boase: Who wrote this in 2000? “The president must remember that the military is a special instrument. It is lethal, and it is meant to be. It is not a civilian police force. It is not a political referee. And it is most certainly not designed to build a civilian society.” Condoleezza Rice, Bush’s national security adviser, who’ll give evidence under protest to the S11 inquiry overnight.

Stephen Pirie: “Re Robert Bosler’s piece on political creativity, Why is Latham alarming?, I recently wrote a book called Awkward Truths which more fully explains the art and function of creativity within political, social and gender contexts.

From the spam bank: “Visit arabiaenquiries to find out how to win business deals in the Middle East.”

Peter Botsman: “I am pleased to announce that Australian Prospect is now live. The first edition is `New Provident: Partnerships with Indigenous Australia’.

***

Peter Evans

I believe that CNN is shifting its description of the 4 “civilian contractors” killed in Falluja. Today it reports: “U.S. Marines fought skirmishes with Iraqi fighters Monday in and around the restive city of Fallujah, closing off the city in response to the killing and mutilation of four American security guards last week.”

Now that they are being called more like what they were, the new description raises lots of questions: Were they armed? If so, what with? Were they wearing uniforms? If so, what kind? Was their vehicle marked or unmarked? If marked, with what markings? What were they doing where they were? Why were there only two of them, given the dangers in Falluja? What battlefield status did they have? If they were not civilians, what were they? Combatants, spies, or what? Was their presence in a battle zone covered by the Geneva convention? Or could they, in fact, be described by the Americanism “illegal combatants”.

The CNN.com change in terminology, presumably based on more information, is welcome if it helps reach the truth. Unfortunately, it is late in the process. And the truth has already been sacrificed.

***

Brian McKinlay in Greensborough, Victoria

Several US sites I’ve been reading are warning about the manipulation and politicisation of the news flowing from the Coalition Forces’ media outlet in Baghdad. The organisation, known as “The Office of Strategic Communication” (Stratcom) operates within the US compound in central Baghdad. Its critics say it’s a part of the Republican Party’s election machinery funded with great dollops of taxpayer money.

The service director is Dan Senor, a graduate of Hebrew University, friend of Pearle and Wolfowitz and other neo-con insiders. Senor has also worked for the Bush family investment and oil-company Carlyle Investments, said to have extensive Saudi links.

Amongst the 58 senior staffers at the Stratcom Office in Baghdad, 21 were long-term Republican Party activists and staff members in the U.S.A, and its Democratic Party critics say it targeted news-release from Iraq to deflect unfavourable news coverage which would have harmed Bush and tried to deflect public interest from Senator Kerry during the Democratic primary elections.

They may wince now at two recent headlines which appeared on press releases. One read “Beautification Plan for Baghdad Ready to begin ” whilst a second read “The reality is nothing like you see on television “.(Ouch!!) So when you come across a piece of what looks like tailor-made GOOD NEWS FROM IRAQ, remember that it was probably tailored to meet George Bush’s political needs.

***

Marie Berghuis

I was interested to learn on the SBS Insight program last night, `Should we withdraw our troops from Iraq’, that we have about 300 personnel serving in Iraq, and that no journalist is allowed to interview them. Basically they are working on the outskirts of Iraq as air traffic controllers.

I don’t know why some get so upset that we would consider withdrawing a mere 300 troops from Iraq, or believe the statement from Howard that if we did we would be giving into terrorism. What a laugh! Our troops are not reconstructing Iraq or helping Iraqis – all they are doing is air traffic control at the airport and a few other administrative jobs due to be taken over by private contractors.

If we wanted to help Iraqi people we should join with a UN peace force to protect them and rebuild essential services. We do have a moral obligation to help fix up the disgraceful mess created by the `trio of the willing’. It’s a pity we couldn’t send messrs Bush, Blair and Howard (the three warlords) over to Iraq for six months! As in all wars it is the young and innocent who are sacrificed.

***

Tracy Rice

After watching Insight, what concerns me is that Australian troops, the Iraq war and the War Against Terrorism are being used as political footballs. I hope politicians of all persuasions can put Australia’s safety and welfare above party politics. Questions I have asked myself and which I can not find answers to are:

* What is our goal in Iraq ? What is the timeline of bringing our troops home? What are the other alternatives? What commitments have we already made regarding the War on Terror? How can we assist Iraq in a constructive way?

* Do we know what present US government’s foreign policy plans are for Iraq, Afghanistan and the rest of the world ? Is Australia signed up for a wild ride with USA on foreign affairs not knowing where we are going, who we are fighting and why or for how long and how much it will cost us?

* How are we protecting Australia against terrorism here at home? What is the terrorist threat inside Australia and with our near neighbours? Have we learned any important lessons regarding relying on other nations intelligence to make important decisions to protect Australia or entering into wars?

***

Trevor Kerr

On SBS last night, Jenny Brockie brought together a festoon of knowledge, talent and experience to exchange views on the Iraq situation. Only a couple of them were blowing smoke, and one was a twit from the Institute of Public Affairs (Margo: Howard’s favourite `think tank’, funded by big business) He was patriotically waving the Stars ‘n Stripes and rabbiting on about freedom, human rights and democracy. From his tone, the junta in Burma should be worried. But I guess that wasn’t in the script he had been bid to follow.

The bloke from a US think tank (Friedman) was more impressive with his authority and passion for the US system. Which leads me to suppose one of the main differences between us and them is that citizens of the US have an opportunity be involved, from grassroots up, in the election of their head of state. Whereas, over here, the head of state is handpicked by someone who may be despised by half the populace.

We are involved with our democratic system for about ten minutes at the ballot box, where we will be affected by the chosen issues of the day (or hour), such as the current price of petrol.

It’s no wonder Aussies are nonchalant about their democratic rights. My secret hope is that Latham, having been brave enough to pop the Iraq bubble, will run with fixed-terms and head-of-state as campaign issues

Rupert Murdoch, already an American citizen, pulls up News Limited’s stumps from Australia to become an American company and the very next day presumes to tell Australians what to think and who to vote for!

Murdoch backs Bush and wants troops to stay reports his decrees on Sydney radio today:

Media baron Rupert Murdoch today backed George Bush to win a second term, said Australian troops should see the job through in Iraq, and said he would push for changes to Australia’s cross-media and foreign media ownership laws, despite shifting News Corporation to the US.

The News Corporation chairman said today the coalition of the willing had largely been successful and Australia needed to maintain its presence.

“We have no alternative – we must see the job through,” Mr Murdoch told 2GB radio.

He also said George W Bush would win a second term at the US presidential election in November because the American people strongly supported the president’s efforts in Iraq and the resurging US economy.

“They’re with him on that, completely. He’s going to walk it (the election) in,” he said. (The interview with, you guessed it, Howard favourite Alan Jones, is at interview.)

So Murdoch and his papers and TV empire back Bush and Howard. Murdoch’s proved a loyal ally to Bush and Howard, in exchange for more power, of course. See Murdoch: Cheap oil the prize, Murdoch’s war: 175 generals on song and Murdoch’s war on truth in war reporting. And see Webdiary’s cross media archive for his attempt to extend his domination of Australian media, courtesy of Howard.

Murdoch and his editors have lots of tricks to mess with your minds. He brought his editors and selected commentators from around the world to Cancun recently and ensured they knew the line. Bush’s national security adviser Condi Rice obeyed her masters voice and addressed the Murdoch crew, as did UK opposition leader Michael Howard. (Last year Murdoch publicly announced that his UK papers would switch their support from Blair to Howard because he didn’t like Blair’s wish to endorse a European constitution. He had the hide to say this would downgrade “our” sovereignty – he must have meant “our” in the Murdoch nation sense.)

Murdoch helps fund the Washington neo-con bible the Weekly Standard. Last year, the magazine falsely claimed it had proof there were links between Saddam and al Qaeda before S11. Murdoch’s New York Postand The Australian dutifully republished it as truth, minus official denials by the US Defense Department (see His lie-master’s apprentices).

And have a look at Tuesday’s Australian, which headlined its Newspoll ‘Latham’s bubble bursts’. It must have given one Stephen Morris the results in advance, because on the opinion page that very day he wrote Latham an open letter condemning his ‘troops home’ policy, citing “today’s Newspoll”!

What can the people do?

For a start, we can expose the hypocrisy of Murdoch and his media mouthpieces. Eddie Davers did it in Overland magazine. In Our Australian? Murdoch’s flagship and shifting US attitudes to Iraq, he examines howThe Australian reported Saddam when the Americans liked him:

“In Australia, one newspaper now stands out for its hawkish tone. ‘The Australian’ (was) the loudest and most persistent in calling for an invasion of Iraq. It never tires of reminding its readers that Saddam Hussein used chemical weapons (sing along) against his own people. It is worth reviewing how ‘The Australian’ covered the atrocities when they actually occurred. Quantitative aspects of the coverage are revealing; today’s profusion is in marked contrast to the paucity of coverage during the 1980s. However, this article focuses on the qualitative aspects: how reports were packaged, what was stressed and what was de-emphasised, and the nature of visual coverage.”

We can also get together and seek real answers to important questions on Iraq from politicians where WE live. The North shore Peace and Democracy Group is leading the way. Last year, it organised a political panel to answer community questions on why we went to war – see Tony Abbott to eyeball North Shore against the War: Truth possible, Don’t let pollies get away with murder, Liberal elder to Abbott: Dear friend, make amends on Iraq and The Valder indictment: full text.

Their latest event, called ‘Secrets and lies destroy democracy: a discussion on the impact of decisions behind closed doors on democracy in Australia’ will be held Monday 3 May, 2004 at 7:30pm at Willoughby Town Hall, 409 Victoria Avenue, Chatswood (400m from Chatswood Station). On the panel: Senator Marise Payne (Liberal), Kevin Rudd (Labor), Kerry Nettle (Greens) and Aden Ridgeway (Democrats).

The questions to be asked of each panellist are:

1. We were told the invasion of Iraq was necessary because of Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction. John Howard said on 14 March 2003: “If Iraq had genuinely disarmed, I couldnt justify on its own a military invasion of Iraq to change the regime.” How can we trust future justifications for war in the light of this?

2. There has been little informed democratic debate in Australia about the causes of terrorism, in particular the unresolved Israel-Palestine conflict. The War on Terror cannot succeed by dealing with the symptoms alone. How can Australia work to address the causes?

3. “It wasn’t a time in our history to have a great and historic breach with the United States,” Alexander Downer said recently. Does a request for support from the US automatically and always pre-empt Australian policy and budgets at the expense of education, health and welfare, and if not, how should we decide which requests to refuse?

4. Free trade agreements and decisions that impact on all our lives are negotiated behind closed doors, without the wider participation of the Australian people. How can these decisions be made more democratically?

5. The present rigid control of Australian political parties over its members effectively hijacks much of the decision-making process from open debate in the parliamentary chambers – where it is meant to be – and cloaks it in secrecy behind the closed doors of party rooms. Should this be allowed?

6. Australians are very cynical about the political process, and the extent to which secrecy and falsehood are used to justify policy decisions. How can our faith in the system be restored?

Everyone is welcome to go along. For details of the group’s next venture, go to ademocraticaustralia.com

This is the text of Mark Latham’s speech on Labor foreign policy to the Lowy Institute in Sydney today.

 

Labor and the world

Australians are entitled to know how a party seeking to govern this country will protect Australia�s security and advance the country�s interests. This is the central responsibility of any Australian Government. It is the foundation of our capacity to create the sort of society we want.

Today, I want to describe to you the way in which the Labor Party looks at the world, at the fundamentals of our approach. In some areas of international policy we agree with the Government. In others we strongly disagree. These differences revolve less around any dispute about what is happening in the world than about what Australia can, and should, do about it.

The world which the next Labor Government will confront is very different from the world the last Labor Government faced. The Cold War which shaped so much of the history of the second half of the 20th Century � and of the Labor Party itself � is over. The West won the conflict, something for which we should always be grateful. In the end, effective statecraft and a large element of luck freed us from the awful pressure of a world dependent on a balance of terror, in which a slight miscalculation could have destroyed human life itself.

We have entered this new century with a single strategic and political superpower, the United States. Now alone among the nation states, it has the capacity to project and deploy military power anywhere in the world. It has assumed the ultimate responsibility: global leadership for the purpose of global cooperation and security. We all have a huge interest in this responsibility being met.

Meanwhile, another equally important force is transforming the world. Economic globalisation – open trade and financial flows made possible by the great technological revolution in communications. Globalisation is making the world more interdependent. It is blurring the traditional distinctions between domestic and foreign policy. By bringing into the world economy vast new areas of humanity, globalisation is generating new and important opportunities for Australia and many parts of the developing world.

So now, with the Cold War over and globalisation advancing, we have a global strategic environment dominated by one powerful country while, on the economic front, we have a quite different sort of world � an increasingly interdependent and multipolar one. This has created two power gaps globally. The first: the gap between the world�s sole superpower and the group of prosperous economic states that rely heavily on the effective stewardship of American economic and foreign policy.

The second gap is a prosperity gap: the growing inequality between developed and developing nations. This is where we need to see globalisation as an opportunity, rather than a threat. Opening up the world�s trading and investment channels so that all continents and all citizens may benefit from the power of economic integration.

As a developed economy and medium sized power, Australia has a role to play in bridging these two gaps. We should always be proactive, always ambitious for what Australian foreign policy can achieve. Through the anticipation of change and the skilful shaping of it, we can step up through the weight divisions of international diplomacy. This has always been the Labor way: ambitious for Australia and our contribution to the world.

In my speech to the Labor Party conference earlier this year, I said that Labor�s foreign policy is based on three pillars � support for the United Nations and multilateral institutions, our alliance with the United States and our engagement with Asia. Let me begin with relations with our major ally.

The American Alliance

The alliance relationship between Australia and the United States was first forged under John Curtin and Labor. It continued to grow and expand under later Labor Governments � and under US Administrations as politically different as those of Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton. Labor believes in the value of the alliance not only to Australia and to the United States, but to the international community as a whole. We believe, however, that Australia has a role to play that is more than simply one of nodding agreement. We see ourselves as an equal partner.

This is how we successfully managed the relationship in the past and how we should manage it in future. The United States is a great and robust democracy. The country was founded on the revolutionary conviction that its strength depends upon the free expression of contending ideas. At any time, a wide variety of views are expressed within its political debate. Often sharper views than those which are the currency of Australian politics.

We understand this in Australia. The alliance is weakened unless each side expresses its convictions clearly and contributes ideas and energy to the common cause. Vitality in the relationship is, in fact, the lifeblood of it. This is a point of departure in Australian foreign policy.

The conservatives have always positioned the American Alliance as some sort of insurance policy, the premium for which is paid through Australian military commitments. This is how Australia got into Vietnam and now, the same in Iraq. Following the United States to buy insurance, rather than for reasons of policy. In Vietnam, against the �downward thrust� of Asian communism. In Iraq, as a Deputy Sheriff.

Labor has a different view of the Australian-American Alliance. We believe in Australia�s strength and sovereignty, building up our self-reliance within the terms of the Alliance. This means directing our military capabilities primarily to the Defence of Australia, its territories and national interests, rather than to expeditionary forces overseas. It means running a sovereign foreign policy � always, Australia first.

And in the war against terror, it means strengthening the homefront: a Department of Homeland Security, an Australian Coastguard, improved port and airport security and upgrading domestic intelligence. Every dollar Australia spends on adventurism overseas, such as the conflict in Iraq, is a dollar that cannot be committed to the Australian homefront.

Labor believes in an equal partnership with the United States. As a smaller and less powerful nation, we need to bring other qualities to the table, uniquely Australian qualities that strengthen our side of the relationship. There are three elements to this approach:

1. The importance of the intelligence relationship, based on the joint management and control of facilities in Australia.

In the war against terror, the intelligence relationship has become the most important aspect of the Alliance. During the Cold War, the challenge was to deal with the Soviet Union. The task now is more complex: to identify and deal with a wide range of individuals and other targets of interest. This can not be achieved on a global scale without a strategic Australian contribution.

2. Australia�s unique role in Asia – a Western nation inside Asia, with the potential to open up new markets and build regional cooperation.

This can be a real asset for the United States, as it was in the relationship between the Keating and Clinton Administrations in the 1990s. The United States assigns a higher value to an alliance partner that is competent rather than compliant.

3. The strength of Australian personnel and policy.

This was a feature of the Hawke and Keating years � the respect for Australia that our Prime Ministers, Foreign Ministers and Defence Ministers generated in Washington. Not as Deputy Sheriffs, not as insurance holders, but as equals, as genuine partners at the negotiating table. This is what I expect from the next Labor Government � Australian self-reliance and self-respect within the terms of the American Alliance.

***

Asian Engagement

The next pillar of Labor�s foreign policy is our relationship with the region: with Asia and the countries of the South Pacific. At the core of this policy is a core Labor idea, developed during our last term in government: Australia must find its security in Asia and not from Asia.

This means a strong and active engagement with the countries of the region. Not window dressing or rote recitals of intentions, but wholehearted engagement. It means the policy cannot simply be about looking wistfully to a strategic guarantor, no matter how close or sympathetic that supposed guarantor may be.

Australia followed that policy between the two World Wars and we nearly paid the ultimate price for it in 1942. History demands that we learn the lesson. We cannot procure our security from Asia and we should not try. Our continent is not some kind of moveable raft which we can shift at our strategic pleasure. We need to grow our relationship with the region and the United States concurrently.

There is no doubt that since 1996, when Labor was last in office, the landscape has changed. The 1997 financial crisis was a major shake-out of the global economy and a severe blow to many Asian countries. It particularly hit the countries closest to Australia in Southeast Asia, Indonesia hardest of all.

But the economic reconstructions brought with them political change. The region is now more democratic than ever and better for it. We are dealing now, not with highly centralised and highly personalised governments of the kind our predecessors were obliged to deal, but with more independent parliaments and a freer media. Indeed, a more decentralised politics. This requires us to make a much broader and more sustained effort to project our interests and to engage more thoroughly with the people of the region. And I say, the people, not just their governments.

The language governments use and the way they see themselves in this matters. The alliance with the United States is not an impediment to our relationship with Asia. It never was under Hawke or Keating. What really matters is whether Australia is seen as an independent, creative member of the regional community or as a branch office of some old world club. If we lecture or hector or thump our chests, as the Howard Government has done, we will get the obvious response. And so far, we have. By contrast, during the period of the last Labor Government, we were able to advance on both fronts � with Washington and with the region.

Asia will become more and not less important to Australia. China, the world�s most populous economy, is continuing its strong growth and reform program. India is in the middle of one of the most exciting periods of its long history as it works towards economic openness. This is why Australia should see itself as an Indian Ocean nation as well as a Pacific nation. There are also encouraging signs of change in Japan�s economic and political outlook after more than a decade of stagnation.

Australia already exports five times as much to Asia as it does to the United States. And these new developments open up new opportunities for our country. This is the region where our natural trade advantages lie � not just in raw materials and agriculture but in services like education and health. It is where most of our bread will be buttered.

For this reason, many of us are worried that Australia is being marginalised at the wrong time, during this new and exciting period of growth. The issues in Asia, of course, are not just economic. Serious security problems remain in the Taiwan Straits and in North Korea. And transnational challenges, like the handling of environmental degradation and the spread of diseases like SARS and Avian flu are pressing.

The development of new forms of Asian regionalism, from which Australia is excluded, is a matter of concern to Labor. ASEAN Plus Three and the China ASEAN free trade area are two key organisations from which Australia has been locked out. If not for Labor�s APEC initiative and ASEAN Regional Forum, Australia today would be excluded from all Asian forums.

The next Labor Government will push back into Asia and the compelling benefits of multilateralism. In particular, this approach will define our trade policy. If the world�s economies go down the Howard Government�s preferred path of bilateralism, it will produce a spaghetti bowl of confusing and often conflicting trade agreements.

This is why Labor believes in multilateralism, most of all through the WTO and in Asia. This is where the big economic gains lie for us. This is where the weight of Labor�s trade policy will always rest. Asian engagement: it�s our great and enduring ambition for the Australian economy.

We are also ambitious for Australia�s role in our immediate neighbourhood. Even the Howard Government would now admit that it took its eye off the Pacific Islands, post-1996. This meant that instead of anticipating problems and dealing with them at source, they were allowed to fester � ultimately requiring rescue packages in the Solomons and PNG.

A Labor Government will restore the pre-1996 responsibilities of an Assistant Minister for the Pacific Islands (in this case, assisting Kevin Rudd). We will also work closely with New Zealand and the international financial institutions to give sharper and more effective leadership to our Pacific neighbours.

Australian foreign policy needs to be relevant to our time and place in the world. And if we are not relevant to the Pacific Islands, we are missing the most obvious of opportunities for Australian diplomacy.

***

A Multilateral World

The third pillar of Labor�s policy is the world�s multilateral institutions. One of the important policy differences between Labor and the Coalition is that we have a much stronger sense of community. I have always thought Mr Howard and the Coalition took a cue from Margaret Thatcher�s remark that there is no such thing as society. That is, there is no such thing as a global community.

The Coalition emphasises bilateralism. We think that effective multilateralism is the key to maintaining global peace and prosperity. And to addressing issues like the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, poverty and global warming. These institutions are not an end in themselves � but they are a means to an end. And that is an inclusive international community which, by effectively managing the interests of a complex world, finds ways of resolving problems, without resorting to force.

Labor shares some of the contemporary frustration with multilateral institutions. There is no doubt that the global machinery is yet to reach its full potential. Almost every one of the major multilateral institutions needs structural reform if they are to adequately represent the realities of the new post-Cold War world. This includes the United Nations and its Security Council and economic organisations like the IMF, the World Bank and the G8.

As a party, we have a long history of support for reform of the United Nations and other organisations. We have always made a positive contribution. But we disagree fundamentally with the Howard Government�s response which has been to pack its bags and go home when confronted with decisions it does not like. Worse than that, its downgrading of these organisations. Its veiled contempt. Not only does this do Australia no good, it does the world no good.

Labor believes that the true course for world progress lies in it being run cooperatively. Not confrontationally. And more representatively; giving the emerging states a real say in things. And regions too. Letting them be heard and be seen to be heard. For instance, it is incongruous that the G8 includes countries the size of Italy and Canada but not China or India.

The Cold War is over and has been won, yet the world is still organised on the template of 1947. Half a century has gone by, yet little in the power sharing or strategic structure has changed. Japan, the second largest economy and Germany, the largest West European economy, are not even permanent members of the UN Security Council. Is it any wonder the UN has become less effective, given it is less representative than it should be.

These are vital issues for an Australian Government with a mind for internationalism and multilateralism. These are areas where our capacity to thoughtfully and usefully engage with the United States matters. Fawning compliance never amounted to a policy. I believe the American polity would welcome our active and constructive engagement. I say this because, in the past, it always has.

There has rarely been a more important time for liberal internationalism. The end of the Cold War, the spread of wealth and the information revolution have changed the nature of the threats our predecessors faced. We are unlikely in the foreseeable future to confront a direct military challenge to Australia, but issues such as weapons proliferation, people smuggling and, above all, terrorism present new and exacting challenges.

On terrorism, we know the struggle will be long and sustained. The dangers terrorism presents have to be addressed on many fronts. We have to deliver comprehensive policing, effective monitoring of entry points, seamless coordination among Federal Government agencies and between Canberra and the States and Territories. And we won�t succeed without cooperation with our closest neighbours, particularly Indonesia.

Above all, we need good intelligence and objective intelligence. And a Government which does not try to draw on it selectively for political purposes. Or one which pressures advisers into only giving the advice that the Government wants to hear.

***

Conflict in Iraq

One of Labor�s first tasks will be to extract Australia from the Howard Government�s failed policies in Iraq. This has been one of the great debacles of Australian foreign policy � a war conducted for a purpose that was not true, a war conducted under the banner of the Doctrine of Pre-emption. This was supposed to be the great conservative contribution to the struggle against terrorism � a new way of thinking about and running the world. In practice, the Doctrine came and went with the blink of an eye.

Most Australians now acknowledge that the Howard Government�s policy in Iraq has been a contributing factor to the terrorist threat in this country. The Government�s recent abuse of Australia�s intelligence agencies has also increased the level of risk for Australians in Iraq, both military and civilian. So, too, the conflict in Iraq has diverted resources from the real war against terror. If all the time, effort and money used to invade and occupy Iraq had been used to target the terrorists themselves � to hunt down bin Laden, to break up Al Qaeda, to smash the networks of terrorist activity in South-East Asia � then the world today would be a safer place.

The Doctrine of Pre-emption failed in Iraq because there was nothing to pre-empt. No Weapons of Mass Destruction were used during the conflict and none have been found since. We now know that Western intelligence in Iraq was quite limited. In reality, the scientists who were supposed to be developing WMD spent the money elsewhere. As ever, in a Third World nation, chaos and corruption prevailed. There was nothing to pre-empt.

The Howard Government sent young Australians to war based on a hunch. Having got it wrong, the thing that I find most disturbing is their lack of remorse. Or sense of apology.

As with other international engagements such as Afghanistan and Somalia, Australia needs an exit strategy from Iraq. The most appropriate starting point is the transition to a new sovereign Iraqi Government in mid-2004. On this basis, Labor has declared its intention of having the Australian troops home by Christmas. Having strongly opposed the war and been proven correct, we see no need for an indefinite deployment, especially when Australia has so many other commitments closer to home. The thing about Iraq is that we had no business being there.

***

Conclusion

If I had to identify the key difference between Labor and the Coalition, it lies in the size of our ambition for Australia and in our confidence in this country�s capacity to shape events ourselves. Labor has never seen Australia as a bit player. We have never seen our future as someone else�s deputy. I have a stronger conviction than Mr Howard that Australia can, on its own and by virtue of its own good work, make a real impact on the shape of our region and even the shape of the world.

World politics, like domestic politics, can change quickly. Unexpected events � whether welcome ones like the end of the Cold War or unwelcome ones like September 11 � constantly overturn conventional wisdom and require new policy responses. This is why a political party needs to bring to office a set of underlying principles which will guide its response to the unpredictable events which it will inevitably confront.

For Labor, these principles are:

� That protecting the country and its people is the core and central responsibility of government.

� That Australia has a significant role to play in the world. And that good policy and the anticipation of change can make a difference.

� While our national interests will always be global, our diplomatic resources are finite and we need to focus where our interests are deepest and the prospects for our influence greatest. This is undoubtedly in the region around us � Asia and the Pacific and Indian Oceans.

� The Alliance with the United States is a Labor legacy of which we are very proud. It has been strong in the past. And it will be strong in the future. It is always most productive when each partner is contributing ideas and sharing problems, when it takes the form of an equal partnership.

� And finally, active reform and engagement with the United Nations and other multilateral processes can help build a better and more prosperous world. As ever, cooperation and power sharing are the great hope of humankind.

These convictions will guide me as I talk about these great challenges with the Australian people over the coming months. And, if we are successful later this year, they will guide the policy of the next Australian Labor Government.

When the government shuts up the information shop, people who want the truth take the long way home. The public got no answers at all on the government’s cash for comment deal revealed by Labor’s communications spokesman Lindsay Tanner two weeks ago – see Whatever it takes: the Howard Government’s cash for comment play and Is the government ethical? No comment – so I’ve put in three Freedom of Information requests.

 

Lindsay has lodged a question on notice to the Minister (see below), and Webdiary reader Reg Boyle emailed the communications minister Daryl Williams. Lo and behold, Williams announced his retirement!

Reg Boyle in Westleigh, Sydney

Margo, I’m sure it was your article on Universal McCann and the Liberal Party that caused me to write to Mr Williams last Saturday. I am more than a little startled to find that he announced his retirement less than 48 hours later. I do hope it wasn’t me. 🙂

*

Dear Mr Williams,

I have just finished reading your maiden speech. I am impressed with its noble tone though I must disagree with you that the Liberal Party has indeed got, in the true terms of the word liberal, the same noble aims.

There is no doubt in my mind after reading your speech, that deceptive and manipulative advertising, such as that involving Universal McCann, and similar deceptions, do not sit well with your moral code. Unfortunately you are associated with a Prime Minister whose moral code reflects badly on all the members of his government. Because of this, I doubt there is much you personally can do to repair this cynically undemocratic practice.

I write merely to let you know I am conscious of the situation and will be doing all in my puny power to ensure that your government has the mantle of trust ripped from its unworthy shoulders.

May you prosper, but not your less worthy associates.

Reg Boyle, Westleigh, another 1950s teenager.

***

Lindsay Tanner’s parliamentary question on notice

April 2 2004

Question on Notice to the Hon Daryl Williams Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts and The Hon Peter Costello Minister Representing the Minister for Finance

I refer the Government’s strategy to advertise the state of telecommunications services in regional Australia and in particular the strategy provided by Universal McCann, tabled by me in Parliament on March 24 2003.

Who commissioned the strategy from Universal McCann?

Who made the decision to commission Universal McCann?

Who liaised with Universal McCann on behalf of the Government with respect to completion of the contract?

Is there any Government guideline governing the use of Government advertising to induce favourable editorial comment in a newspaper? If so, what does this guideline state?

When did the Government decide not to proceed with the Universal McCann proposal to obtain favourable editorial comment from regional newspapers in return for additional advertising?

Who made the decision?

When were Universal McCann advised of this decision, and how were they advised prior to March 24, 2004?

Were any newspaper advertisements in this campaign placed?

If so in which newspapers were these advertisements placed?

Was any editorial comment provided on return?

Which organisations were advised of the contents of the Universal McCann strategy?

Has any subsequent advice varying or revoking that strategy been provided to such organisations?

Webdiarists go for it today on Iraq, our troops, Webdiary’s lack of female contributors and a good old bitch about Robert Bosler’s Why is Latham alarming?

On Bosler, I’d like to exempt our news editor Richard Woolveridge of responsibility for pointing to Robert off the front. This decision was made by a female producer in his absence. I guess our female creative impulses took over. I love Robert’s work, not least because it eschews the standard way of talking politics.

I’ll start with my email of the day, from Russell Dovey in Canberra:

The Shiite uprisings in Iraq provoked by both Moqtada Al-Sadr’s blind hatred of the US and Paul Bremer’s heavy-handed stupidity show Australians exactly why this is no longer our war. To stay and keep the peace under a UN mandate would be morally justifiable. When the US government asks us to stand with them as they create a new Palestine, however, we must have the courage to say no.

The parallels between the occupation of Iraq and the occupation of Palestine have been growing less tenuous by the day. The current episode of attack, retribution and revenge makes it blatantly obvious that the US looks to Israel’s presence in Palestine as an example of how to run a country.

Iraq needs a UN peacekeeping force commanded by a UN authority before it devolves entirely into civil war. If this is not done, Australian troops will not be able to improve the lives of Iraqis and they will merely be there to prop up George Bush’s collapsing credibility.

IRAQ NOTICEBOARD

Scott Burchill recommends On the brink of anarchy in The Guardian and Seymour Hersch on The other war: why Bush’s Afghanistan problem won’t go away in The New Yorker. On Afghanistan, also see Alexander the Great also got in trouble here.

Antony Loewenstein recommends Naomi Klein’s report from Iraq in The battle the US wants to provoke and Robert Fisk’s report Dust off the flak jacket. Lay low. And stay off the streets…

Antony also recommends In Their Skin, where four journos discuss the important job of “entering Iraqi minds to see what they think and feel about the American occupation”.

John Boase recommends this buzzflash interview with Craig Unger, author of ‘House of Bush, House of Saud’. “Now the Saudis are pumping money into Pakistan,” John notes. An extract:

In essence, the Bush Cartel has sold Americans a bill of goods. They have diverted our attention from the major nation state supporting Al-Qaeda because they don’t want to attack their own business partners, including the Saudi who bailed Harken Oil out. He’s the same guy that was deeply involved with BCCI, the corrupt bank that Poppy Bush and many of his cohorts were associated with. There are plenty more like him. Just read Unger’s book.

Carl Cranstone recommends Poisoned? Shocking report reveals local troops may be victims of america’s high-tech weapons. “In light of this article, when is the job done in Iraq? What about the cleanup from the use of Depleted Uranium ammunitions? Is that part of the job?”

I recommend Online Opinion’s analysis of Latham’s latest poll result, Gravity asserts itself.

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IRAQ

Paul McIntosh in Albury, NSW: Lefties and others who do not seem to care about important alliances keep coming up with half baked reasons to pull out of Iraq whilst ignoring the reason why we are there. It’s Terrorism, stupid.

Helen Monaghan: Reading the SMH and Paul MeGeough’s courageous articles it seems increasingly evident that the Iraqis just wish we would go. It surprises and alarms me that Australians are still divided on this matter.

Alan Duffy in Carlingford, NSW: Funny isn’t it. The very day that Mark Latham’s alleged honeymoon with the public goes down the toilet, his fellow ALP comrade delivers a rip-off mini budget in NSW that absolutely, totally, unequivocally guarantees that the Latham prime ministership will forever remain a bridge too far. And here I was, thinking Bob Carr didn’t have the national interest at heart.

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Sharon Burner

A point which hasn’t been mentioned during the recent troops debate relates to engagement. Since Tampa, children overboard etc, columnists have noted that where the electorate disengages from political debate and retreats to the self-focused domain of tax cuts and domestic budgets, conservative parties tend to do far better. Hugh Mackay gave a good example last year in Why we are so disengaged.

Viewed from this perspective, the ‘Latham effect’ may be to re-engage the mainstream with political issues. If this is so, Latham and the ALP would not be overly concerned with how the “Troops home by Christmas” issue turns out, because what it ultimately means is that the electorate is paying attention again. So when the ALP speaks about those things people REALLY care about (health and education, judging from consistent polling) people will actually hear them.

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Peter R Green in Marrickville

Simon Martin sees the issue clearly enough when he says in Webdiarist’s verdict: troops out, please:

“Bush and his neo-cons are taking the current and future earnings of the country and tipping it into the coffers of the major donors to the Republican Party. This makes Bush a very powerful man and the heads of these companies (and their shareholders) much richer at the expense of Americans who cant afford health insurance, their own home, or even to put food on the table.”

What he misses is the extent to which this is the story of our world. The Robber Barons are breaking free from strictures built up over the past 2000 years. The kings may now go under different titles – as may the local lords, whose stronghold is a corporation rather than a castle. But the game is very much the same as it was in 1200AD.

Today’s Kings pay off barons so that the barons will let them retain their thrones. Barons hire and fire from among the peasantry without much concern for justice or fairness and run their own affairs with minimal interference from those who pay lip service to the doctrine of separation of the religion of Mammon from the business of the State.

Simon is describing the resurgence of feudalism, and what I can’t understand is that the homeless, starving, uninsured masses are so prone to applaud those who are doing it to them.

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Damien Hogan

Professor Ramesh Thakur says in Latham’s pullout plan breaches international law: academic that “By invading Iraq, Australia had

confiscated its sovereignty, and became legally, politically and morally responsible for security, services, welfare and all other responsibilities of government until sovereignty was returned to the Iraqi people.”

This does not immediately imply that a military presence is the best way to achieve this end.

In fact, one could argue that our legal obligations require withdrawing our troops, if this can be shown to be the best way to further “security, services, welfare and all other responsibilities of government”.

It would be foolish to think that assault rifles are the best, let alone the only way to help the Iraqis.

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John Boase

A few points in response to Noel Hadjimichael’s column Heh lefties, wind down the propaganda war! Iraq is about as central to the ‘war on terror’ as I am. It is a sideshow, a massively expensive distraction from the main game.

As Dick Clarke says: bin Laden must have been WILLING Bush ‘Invade Iraq, invade Iraq!’ (See Kerryn Higgs’ excellent summary of Clarke’s testimony in Bush on the ropes: his awful deeds post S11.) Bin Laden could not have hoped for a better result. The invasion has galvanised anti-US opinion, dissipating much of the sympathy post-9/11; it has stretched the resources of the US army, involving unprecedented numbers of reservists; it is providing work experience for terrorists; it continues to inflict enormous damage on the US economy.

I refer Noel to the writings of Jessica Stern of Harvard, in particular her articles on al Qaeda and on Pakistan. Stern is a highly-regarded expert on international terrorism. See theproteanenemy and Pakistan. Read together, these articles provide a chilling account of the real nature of international terrorism and identify Pakistan as the main game.

Forget Iraq, comrades, and keep your eyes on events in Pakistan, ironically now a ‘major ally’ of the US. Colin Powell’s recent whitewashing of the infamous Dr Khan, who actually HAD WMD and flogged nuclear technology to nasty regimes, was breathtaking considering what he had said about Iraq at the UN.

A challenge, Noel: read the two Stern articles then write us a piece on Pakistan. Stern’s work is authoritative and sobering. It gets the brain in gear and prevents foaming at the mouth.

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Jason Eyre

The frustrating thing about Mr. Latham’s recent hammering by the Government and large slabs of the media on the issue of troop withdrawal from Iraq is that the ALP seems content to wear the charge that they are advocating a policy of ‘Cut and Run’. This pithy little phrase – first aired by Mr. Howard in Parliament – was taken up uncritically by the press as a shorthand way of summing up Labor’s position. Unfortunately for Mr. Latham and the ALP, the phrase has stuck.

It doesn’t matter that when you read over the transcripts of Labour’s policy position the notion of troop withdrawal invariably comes with caveats such as “as soon as possible” or “once our obligations have been discharged”. It is too late to point all this out now that the distinction has been drawn. It is Christmas or nothing.

To think that ALP policy has effectively been set in stone by Mike Carlton is irritating. Poor show.

Prescription: Labour should now emphasise their own caveats, their own ifs, buts and maybes: that they want to withdraw our forces as soon as possible, yes, but only when the ‘job’ is done; if this means withdrawing troops by Christmas then wouldn’t that be great? But if the ‘job’ is not done, then they will have to stay. Reluctantly, but out of a sense of duty.

They will be accused of back-tracking, of capitulating to Howard’s pressure, but the ALP should wear it. Besides, the records show that this has been their position all along. There is no backflip to speak of, it’s just a matter of emphasis and spin. The storm won’t last long.

All of this will provide the ALP with the opportunity to seize back the initiative on the Iraq debate (or bury it altogether). As recent contributors to Webdiary have pointed out, the question of what the “job” actually is has not been identified by the Government. Tricky questions have yet to be asked.

This is where Labor can claim the upper hand: they have advanced an exit strategy. Mr. Howard and the Liberals – who appear to have an open-ended commitment subject to White House approval – have not.

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Matt Southon

I’ve been a keen follower of Mr Latham for many years and am glad to see that faith rewarded with a new freshness in what was becoming a very stale affair. I’ve read with interest the discussion surrounding Latham’s troops decision, and I wonder if he is up to something bigger.

Initially, Latham beat Howard to the punch by setting the agenda on domestic political issues, leaving Howard in a spin (pardon the pun) and without a hard target. This early agenda reflected a community keen to respond to issues of family and role models, with Howard continually flummoxed by Latham’s enthusiasm and announcements worlds away from the PM’s agenda. I wondered if Howard may hold off on an election until he saw a point of attack. The longer he waited, the more opportunities for Latham to stuff up, so to speak.

With Latham suddenly turning debate back to national security, Howard has found himself back on comfortable ground, and Latham has arguably had his first ‘trip up’. If Latham continues to stare back at Johnny on this point, the PM may feel he has an angle on which to launch the election debate agenda and set a date (my bet is last weekend of August).

It is a classic trap. Latham has seen that Howard is weak in his ability to connect with punters and bereft of ideas in relation to real domestic issues. Once Howard sets a date, Latham can again shift the agenda back to domestic issues (This is a strength, as people want to hear Latham and he can therefore trigger debates where Crean could not and Beazley would not.

The worsening situation in Iraq see more horrific stories aired, and the public will realise that they do not want to see five Australians burnt and dragged behind vehicles. This will strengthen Latham’s call to get troops home as soon as practicable.

Therefore, the recent troops home call may be seen as a ‘red rag to a bull’. The hope is that the bull will not see behind the rag to the sword of domestic issues upon which he will be finally impaled .

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Peter Funnell in Canberra

Robert Bosler’s article on Latham/Howard was very good. Today’s opinion poll result (how good are these polls??) illustrates Bosler’s observations about fear of Latham, as does the troops home by Christmas/intelligence briefing issues.

I read your comment about being angry with Latham and why. What was he supposed to do? I don’t think he has lost a thing, mate. I would not have made the case the way he did, but I do want an end to the Coalition of the Willing and the UN to take over.

I also wanted Howard boiled in oil for deceiving the nation on the reason for going to war, but he seems to have weathered that storm. The notion that we don’t “cut and run” is tosh! We can get out of what’s wrong as soon as we can and make good the damage done as best we can with the UN.

Iraq is busting wide open and it must be nearly impossible to plan tactically on the ground to contain the ever increasing violent civil disorder. There is no law and order in Iraq, there is only a military conqueror, an invader.

We are going down the toilet in Iraq and the US is finding it hard to maintain the commitment, let alone increase it, which is what it needs to do if it is to regain military control. Every conceivable anger, pent up frustration and grievance – the US has killed a lot of Iraqis in two wars and decade of sanctions – is now being directed at the US. They will beat the US, but what will be left will be a shit heap. At least it’s their shit heap. Then what happens? We did this, not Saddam!

I think Latham has scared Howard witless. Howard must be getting close to pulling the early election trigger.

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Max Phillips

I’d like to challenge Webdiary readers who think the troops should stay in Iraq to state what jobs the Australian troops need to do that Iraqis are incapable of doing. To me this “doing the job” thing is the new imperialism’s version of ‘civilising the savages’.

Iraq is the birth place of civilisation. Its culture is deeper and more sophisticated than ours. Iraqis are relatively well educated and modern. Iraqis are not stupid or inferior or incapable of ‘doing the job’ themselves. To imply they need our guidance or American guidance is an insult and rooted in racism. There are Iraqi air traffic controllers who are perfectly capable of “doing the job” of air traffic control at Baghdad airport. The Australian controllers are doing them out of a job – bloody scabs!

Our real employment in Iraq is as a side-kick enforcer for American imperialism. The actual job we are doing is one of oppressing Iraqis and subjugating them to Western power and capital. This is not a job to be proud of and we should cease it now. Persistence in folly is not a virtue.

Of course “doing the job” is the equivalent of 2001’s “queue jumpers”. No decent Aussie wants to support queue jumping or shirking responsibility. Clever politics, but a complete whitewash of the real issue. Whether we fall for the shallow spin and re-elect Howard, or whether we see through it will be interesting. With events in America and Iraq spiralling out of control it seems our political fate could well be decided by external events anyway.

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BAGGING BOSLER’S Why is Latham alarming?

But first, a fan….

Peter Woon

I have just returned from a fortnight in the UK having lived there during the Thatcher era and then in Australia for the last 14 years. It was a reminder that the UK experience brings no comfort to those who cower in the shadows of the Tory creed of visionless rearrangement and the atrophication of a nation’s creative spirit. For at the end of Tory rule in the UK, the community was perfused with creative release, a celebration enfusing Brit Pop, Cool Britannia and renewed exploration of the human spirit.

When Howard is discarded at the next election it will be by tsunamic flood as the nation enjoys a seismic shift away from the oppressive politics of fear, uncertainty, doubt and outright deceit which typify an uncreative leader. This is what happened in the UK. And Australia can look forward to a celebration of our creative and community spirit.

There is no comfort either to those who excuse leadership fuelled by voters’ greed and ignorance by arguments of economic mastery. In Australia, Howard inherited the good economic work done by Paul Keating – and yes, his mistake was to celebrate his vision without converting the punter to stakeholder. In the UK, the most enduring period of economic stability has, horror of horrors, been achieved by the New Labour government!

Tory apologists also conveniently forget that Thatcher’s economic record was fiddled through the gift of black gold from North Sea Oil, an influx of foreign currency from reprocessing other nations’ nuclear waste and the selling of any national asset which could be put on the national shop shelf.

The question comes down to what sort of leadership we value. Is it one sustained through the inspiration of the nation’s creative and compassionate spirit or one suckled on self interest and deceit?

Do we really want to live in a country where people with brains and education are denigrated with a label of elite? Are we really to become a nation which does not care when we are lied to by our government? Or are we ready to believe in the promise of a new order, one in which we can dare to value a diversity of humanity rather than transient personal materialism? Are are we prepared to champion the enduring and wholesome for our individual and collective good in such a new order?

This change is about what we value. If we value a creative nation then change is our mandate. If we value open, honest government and constructive debate then we should kick and scream until we get it. And if we know that the way forward is based on a mutual and coherent core of values and things we collectively value, then we should vote for the leadership which will govern in the directions which such values dictate, and not on short term number crunching by unremarkable people hiding in shadowy political burrows.

Don’t confuse the intermittent Howard government morality-based furphy with a coherent approach to take the nation forward which enmeshes a value set. Even leading edge corporations have worked this out and have moved beyond economic rationalism to values-based management.

Our choice is indeed stark. Do we suffer petrification through continued stasis and inertia or do we trust our inner, creative, inspirational, communal selves and take on the challenge of change?

Then, in our new creative community, we can look back at Howard and see him for what he was as surely as looking at the internal organs of those sliced animals in formaldehyde created by Damien Hirst as part of the Cool Britannia uprising of our British cousins.

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Noel Hall: I was astonished to read this meaningless drivel, and alarmed that the Herald would have any interest in publishing it- to the point of placing it on the main page. I applaud your attempt to provide a forum of opinion, but please raise the bar for content.

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Harry Heidelberg

Those Bosler pieces are amazing. I hope he keeps turning them in. I rarely agree with anything in them but they are fun to read. The first line on Howard says he’s “a solicitor”. Yeah, right. So why not call Latham “an economist” in HIS first line?

Bosler tries to make Latham sound like some kind of romantic Australian poet laureate driven by creative urges. He is no such thing. He is a bull in a china shop. He crashes through roaring here, roaring there and breaking lots of china. People like that are great to have as mates, because they are always entertaining and make you laugh. It’s the unpredictability and the twists and turns that make it so much fun.

I don’t want a mate as a prime minister, though. When Latham broke the cab drivers arm, was that the male or female side of his creativity? A form of creative destruction perhaps? I think there are only two interpretations of Latham: (1) Bull in a china shop and (2) Typical NSW ALP Mate/Thug.

Then again, judging personalities – and art for that matter – is purely subjective! Right now I am struggling to see Latham other than as he appears.

PS: If anyone is creative……..it is John Howard! Look at the stories he weaves – they take imagination and creativity! John Howard is the most radical PM we have ever had (except perhaps Whitlam). His style is more Machiavellian rather than bull in a china shop. Creativity takes many forms.

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Helen Darville

I don’t like to pour cold water on people (having had it done to me plenty of times), but Robert Bosler’s Mark Missives are full of the same twee rhetoric that floated around Keating and no doubt contributed to Labor’s devastating electoral defeat. For the record:

1. There is nothing special about artists.

2. Artists have no particular vision, and are neither more capable nor more sensitive than the rest of us.

3. Every job is important. If you don’t believe me, try living in a city where the plumbers or garbage collectors have gone on strike.

I have slowly come round to the view that Australians are right to distrust intellectuals (by which I mean cultural poseurs, not the simply clever). Many intellectuals are extraordinarily narrow, having decided that they have the answer and that the rest of us are far too insensitive to understand the answer.

I lost count of the number of times during my brief run on the ‘literary circuit’ that I had Henry Moore [sculptor] quoted at me: “Artists are the eyes for other people.” Well, no, they bloody well are not; people have their own eyes with which to see the world. They don’t need some literary twit full of his own importance to tell them ‘You’re too common to describe the world for yourself; better let me do it for you.”

Mark Latham is an interesting leader; like Howard, he is essentially conservative and populist. He wants to dismantle ATSIC and bring the troops home – both popular ideas in the blue-collar fringes where Labor has lost ground.

Unlike Howard, Latham is personally aggressive and highly intelligent. He could combust before the election; he may well combust after it. Either way, it’ll be interesting to watch.

But please, no paeans to the new man. He’s a politician, for God’s sake. The sort of person who only wins glory in retrospect.

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WEBDIARY’S GENDER PROBLEM

Harry Heidelberg

Susan Metcalfe is clearly a gender junkie (see What’s the job and when is it done?). She is unable to look at anything in the world other than through the prism of gender. Given that Susan thinks such matters are so critical to debate, my recommendation is that you have a pop up form for each Webdiary contributor. They would need to disclose the following characteristics which would clearly be central to any contribution they might make:

1. Gender 2. Religion 3. Race 4. Sexual Preference 5. Disability Status 6. Incomes in Bands of AUD 10,000 7. Proof of identity (birth certificate extract sufficient) 8. Criminal record 9. Credit record 10. Body Mass Index.

Of course there are many more deeply personal things that would impact the perspective of the contributors. Why stop with gender? It is arguable, totally arguable, that any one of the ten items above may be MORE influential on a person’s life and views compared with gender.

For Susan the central issue is gender and she expects it to be that way for the rest of us. Well for many it is not! For some that is the least of their problems or concerns. She says: “What is so wrong with wanting to hear a bit less from men and more from some of the great women out there instead?”

Precisely. And I will help her along by being the first man she’ll be hearing a lot less of.

Harry Heidelberg is a Webdiary columnist.

Air Force One is a powerful symbol of the 228 year old institution of the American presidency, a symbol of a power that is literally projected around the globe. Nowhere is the technological, political and ideological prowess of the United States better encapsulated.

The nuclear launch codes are carried in ‘the football’ on Air Force One. Air Force One delivers the American President, and whenever this enormous aircraft touches down or takes off a powerful statement is made. We know how John Howard reacted to the power of Air Force One when it arrived in Canberra last year. It can leave you spellbound.

I was on the tarmac at Sydney airport in 1996 when President Clinton arrived.

As one who loves to travel, I find great meaning in arriving and departing from a place. These moments are particularly poignant when they involve immediate family or close friends, but Air Force One is all about power, not love. And just as Air Force One can deliver power, it also takes it away.

The most tragic case of Air Force One removing power was in 1963, when it carried the corpse of John F. Kennedy from Dallas back to Washington. On board was Lyndon Johnson, who was sworn into office at 30,000 feet. Jacqueline Kennedy was in the background. Her pink dress was covered in her husband’s blood. Her husband was in the rear compartment in a coffin.

The Nixon presidency was another American tragedy. Everyone has seen the image of Nixon boarding Marine One bound for the base to board Air Force One. He had brought great shame to the American presidency and Air Force One would take him home. As the aircraft made its long transcontinental journey back to California, he and those on board heard President Ford being sworn into office.

As the aircraft passed over a town I once lived, it ceased to be Air Force One. Air traffic control at Kansas City Center changed the aircraft designation to that of a regular Air Force flight. It was no longer Air Force One; it no longer carried the American President. The power had been transferred.

I once fantasised about being in Washington to see President Dean inaugurated. That will never happen now. My more mundane fantasy now is closer to reality. My dream is of the day when President Bush passes over Kansas City Center on his way to Crawford, Texas. The radio will crackle “This is Kansas City Center; your designation changes from Air Force One to regular flight 6294 past this point”. The subtext: “You are now a nobody”.

It will bring closure to another American tragedy – the George W. Bush presidency. Almost ironically, it will also be a symbol of America’s strength – the peaceful transition of power.

This man, who is probably not the legitimate President of the United States, will return to where he belongs. Home on the range, back in Crawford, Texas.

Then, perhaps, the rest of us can hold out some very small hope of a better world. I’d rather a small hope than none at all. My dreams are now more modest, but I hold onto them nevertheless.