How long oh lord!...
Fathers, sun and the holy post
Hundreds of believers are flocking to the Coogee Beach headland to see what
they say is an apparition of the Virgin Mary.
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/01/30/1043804464591.html
The PM is a turd...After watching our Prime Minister waffle and prevaricate
with Kerry O'Brien, it seems the only comfort the Australian people can
taken from his otherwise kow-towing blind support of George Bush and Tony
'Some People I Know Think I'm Crazy' Blair, is that Australia won't lend
support to a military war involving nuclear weapons. To think we should
even need such reassurance?
Given that Blair must be off his rocker to even contemplate the unthinkable
with his whatever it takes line of attack to topple Saddam Hussein, it was
about the only unequivocal comfort you could take out of the PM's lapdog
defence of an American industrial-military complex intent on an American
war against Iraq.
Does anyone at this point seriously believe after the almighty build up of
American and British military might, and now not even a token contribution
from Australia, that somehow Saddam will blink in the face of such
provocation? That regardless of any 'smoking gun' findings being produced
by the UN weapons inspection team, that with no last minute and totally
uncharacteristic change of heart from Iraq, the Bush war machine will not
go to war? Sure there will be immense pressure on the likes of permanent
Security Council allies Germany and France to change their currently
strongly held position against war, but Russia and China will be far less
likely to vote for war. For the US coalition to ignore potentially most of
Europe is to invite political and diplomatic disaster for all concerned.
Yet that is exactly what Bush and Blair and Howard himself are ultimately
prepared to do and why? Howard last night stated Saddam has weapons of mass
destruction and he must be forced to give them up. So far he knows more
than the UN. Plenty of other countries have them yet no such action is
contemplated against them. But Iraq is a rogue state and we must remember
they have gone to war against neighbours Iran and Kuwait. God knows the
their own Kurds and many of his population live in dread of their dictator
leader. But then the US had no problem when Saddam attacked Iran before so
their outrage on that score is discredited. Worse Saddam is actually a
former star pupil of American foreign opportunism.
As with the propping up of so many South American military juntas that now
haunts the history of their foreign policy, it is part of the contagion
abroad that now feeds if not hatred, then at the very least distrust and
cynicism as to America's intentions. It is a consequence that seems to
escape both the US Government and its people. Being internationally
disliked or seen as the bad guy is simply not in the national psyche, and
now Howard seems hell bent on Australian joining their company without the
US financial and military might to say 'so what'?
The issue for Australia and its PM are these. Nobody elected John Howard to
go to war yet he believes he has a moral right to do just that. Parliament
has not sat and voted to go to war, and yet he is quite prepared to
consider such debate when it is too late. Australian public opinion
increasingly hardens against war unless it is specifically UN approved, but
while he takes account of it, he makes it clear on the ABC is might be of
little consequence should he so decide. His dismissive and seemingly
unilateral leadership is frightening in its blind obedience to US interests.
Howard seems determined to carelessly involve Australia in a war where many
think the real goals are less about toppling a dictator or rogue state
(there are already plenty of those), than driven by America's future
economic dependence on control or influence over foreign oil reserves. We
have no business fighting for oil on the other side of the world, and why
do we feel it's so necessary to be seen up front and centre as a primary
lap dog of American economic/ political imperialism? Similarly we can only
shake our heads and wonder why Tony Blair should revisit notions of empire
by taking his own country to war where his countrymen are similarly
unconvinced? How Iraq threatens our own interests when so many of our
neighbours and trading partners will only view our complicity as hostile,
is not only tragic but likely to be long remembered. As a small nation on
the cusp of Asia, unlike the US we cannot just buy our way into future
considerations when we risk massive alienation. The world does not owe
Australia either a living or respectability when we lose our moral
perspective or show scant regard for the broader feelings of that world.
The world does not need war and the war against terrorism is not predicated
on the annihilation of the Iraqi military or Saddam as its head. They may
not be our friends and yet they are one of our leading trading partners. No
one has yet managed to connect them overtly with the events of September
11, or the Bali bombing so just what is it that our military is fighting
for if we go to war? Howard is obsessed by weapons of mass destruction and
months ago we were assured by the US that it had conclusive proof of
Saddam's systematic development of such a programme, so why is it proving
so hard to nail him via the inspections?
Our military heads to the Middle East preparing to fight for Howard's ideal
of an Australia that sees it's role primarily as being a loyal and faithful
servant of George Bush. Fighting a war alongside America as a willing
accomplice of military adventurism. Even as the normally gung-ho post
September 11, American population is now like our own, also getting cold
feet unless the UN provides the rubber stamp. Howard resolutely refuses to
indicate that if America goes to war regardless of UN support, we will
dutifully follow? But on that score he kids no one except perhaps himself!
He does nothing to dissuade us from the notion that when push comes to
shove, we belong by the side of the US in the theatre of war and public
opinion be dammed. He thinks he is showing leadership merely by the act of
leading. To see us going to war is not to marvel at his leadership but to
despair that enough Australian's trusted him in the first place when we
voted him in on a platform of xenophobic deceit via the 'children
overboard' demonisation. It is chilling to think how otherwise helpless
refugees were cynically used as a defensive shield to con the Australian
voter. Now we are being lied to and conned again over ultimately bombing
and killing ten of thousands of innocent people, and sending our own
military to war.
On the ABC he declares any ultimate act of war as his constitutional right.
He concedes it might even precede tokenistic parliamentary debate after the
event. Or knowing in advance that a majority of his countrymen may strongly
disapprove. His political radar conveniently chooses to ignore our system
of democratic process and accountability. If he felt otherwise he would
immediately recall Parliament and allow a full debate, let alone the
Australian public to become more fully involved in the issues. Instead he
seems determined to placate an American president all too ready to ignore
possibly both the UN and world opinion.
It's impossible to ignore the spectre of a reckless Australian Prime
Minister about to impose on all of us a most terrible legacy. History is
littered with the blood of well-intentioned zealots who believe that
against the tide of public opinion, they have the only one that counts.
John Howard is surely a leader we can no longer afford to have?
For Peter Costello there may not be a better time to stand up and be
counted. Saddam might not deserve it but surely we are entitled to play by
the rules when it matters most and not ignore them when it suits those so
intent on doing so? Otherwise we are no better than him. This seems to the
prevailing wisdom of Blair and Bush, and Howard too. That the end justifies
the means! It seldom does.
http://www.crikey.com.au/columnists/2003/01/26/20030126iraqpeace.html
