Rants for September, 2004

I don't recall meeting with Cardinal Pell (who is a fine man) during the election campaign. If you don't recall meeting with Cardinal Pell (who is a fine man,) you should say so, too. It's important to be clear and upfront about these things, or people will get the wrong idea.

Health minister Tony Abbott isn't afraid to not recall meeting Cardinal Pell (who is a fine man) during the election campaign. He spoke forthrightly on the ABC's Lateline last night:

TONY JONES: Tony Abbott on another matter, have you met Archbishop Pell during the election campaign?

TONY ABBOTT: Not that I can recall.

TONY JONES: Not that you can recall, because we believe that you've had at least one meeting with him quite recently?

You don't recall that?

TONY ABBOTT: Well, when?

Where?

TONY JONES: At the presbytery in Sydney.

TONY ABBOTT: Ah, actually now that you do mention it, I did met with Cardinal Pell.

So what?

Why shouldn't I meet with Cardinal Pell?

TONY JONES: Why couldn't you recall meeting him, I think, 10 days ago?

TONY ABBOTT: Look, whenever it was, so what?

Why shouldn't I meet Cardinal Pell.

Cardinal Pell is a fine man.

(via Chris G)

Carl Fyffe left a comment asking what political options Bush had in Iraq:

For more than 9 years the world played the political game with Iraq, and never could find out for sure whether or not there were weapons in the country.

If dealing with a country that is not playing by the rules for 9 years is a violence first policy, then I would like to know what you would consider a politics first policy.

The Bush administration had many political options open to it in 2002. Here’s four off the top of my head:

• The most obvious one would have been to let Iraq lie a while. The situation had already festered for nine years and another year while the US military finished in Afghanistan would have made little difference to the Iraq problem, but a big difference to the Iraq solution.

• More constructively, Bush could have tackled the ineffective sanctions against Iraq. The US government is in strong position to shame those who were part of the corruption, and wheel and deal to ensure that food and medical supplies went into the country while hard currency did not.

• Bush could have made complying with weapons inspections more palatable to Iraq by removing its spies from the inspection team. I can’t imagine the US being fully cooperative if Iraqi spies had been appointed by the U.N. to inspect US military bases, so why should Saddam have been fully cooperative with US spies in Iraqi military bases?

• Finally, I am certain that the $100 billion dollars already spent on war in Iraq, would have been better spent reducing the systemic factors that support terrorism and dictatorships in the middle-east.

I’d like to take a moment to thank whoever it was who decided that Boolean should not implement Comparable in JDK 1.4. It must have been tough avoiding the temptation to add the five lines to the JDK, especially since Byte, Character, Short, Long, Float, Double, and String all have a compareTo() method.

Not only does this masterstroke assist the relentless fight against JDK bloat, it also causes some particularly bizzare ClassCastExceptions, enhancing my reputation amongst those that treat Java programmers like animist witch doctors, and assuring my continued employment.

So, thankyou. Thankyou so much.

(Sadly, this feature has been removed in JDK 1.5. As a workaround, I suggest throwing ClassCastExceptions from a java.util.TimerTask.)

The cost of war in Iraq so far:

I have to wonder if the US government could have justified running such a deficit to support on a less deadly solution to the danger of WMDs, introducing democracy to the Middle East, removing a dictator, or securing an oil supply. I don't think they could have.

I first wrote this as a comment on Keith’s weblog. After a day it’s still on my mind, so here it is, for all to see.

I recently read this story from Mike, followed by this story via Keith.

Both Keith and Mike are telling a story of a little girl suffering an undeniable injustice, and both stories provoked sympathetic responses from me. Further, both are using the story to support their weblogs’ overarching narrative – Keith of the unreasonableness of John Kerry and his supporters, Mike of the unreasonableness of the current war in Iraq.

But the contrast between the stories is what blew me away. In Keith’s story the girl ends up in tears, while in Mike’s story the little girl ends up in a coffin. On one hand, having your daughter’s property destroyed, and on the other having your daughter destroyed.

I still can’t respond emotionally to both stories at the same time, and “it’s doing me head in”.

(PS: It looks like the story about little girl having her sign torn up is a fake. If it is, count me angry at being manipulated.)

My evil twin, Nala Neerg, was created in a freak teleporter accident during an audition for “redshirt #19” in “Star Trek Down Under: Throw Another Shrimp on The Barbie.” I’m telling you, when the beam up starts, you better not be holding a burrito. Anyway, it turns out that Nala is a Right Wing Death Blogger, and since I haven’t written for a while, Nala offers this piece for your enjoyment and edification. Over to you, Nala.

We all trust John Howard. Honest John always does the right thing, so he couldn’t possibly be campaigning on trust if we didn’t trust him. And when his ministers say they’re going to chase down James Hardie, we know they’re doing it, because we trust John, and John trusts them.

So why would the Netherland’s government lie to the unions about meeting with the Australian government? The ABC reports:

“The Netherlands Government is quite adamant in telling us there’s been no approach from the Federal Government of Australia in relation to James Hardie on this issue,” he said.

Obviously, this is a plot by the Netherland’s government to overthrow the Federal Australian Liberal party. I mean, Phillip Ruddock has been all over this James Hardie thing since July, and it’s not like this is a low priority issue, so how could they deny it?

It’s time to hold the Dutch government accountable for their lies.

I keep coming across the meme, expressed as question, “Why do people hate John Howard so much?” It’s a loaded question, but one worth pondering. Indeed, one reason we voted for the Liberal party in ‘96 was that, in contrast to Paul Keating, John Howard didn’t inspire strong feelings. What could he possibly be doing to inspire such an adverse emotional reaction from so many people?

If you want to know the answer to that question I suggest that you read this letter by farmer Sue Bradford to her local MP, published by Margo Kingston. It’s much, much better reading than the ALP‘s facile 27 Lies pamphlet.

PS: Just for the record, I don’t hate John Howard, but I do think the consistent disrespect he has shown the Australian people warrants voting him out of office. It also warrants giving the Liberal party at least three years “in the political wilderness” to effect some serious internal change.

Robert Manne wrote an opinion piece in the Herald today, When lies can be quite honourable. Although it makes no direct reference to it, Manne’s article seems to revolve around the ALP‘s Truth Overboard: 27 Lies pamphlet.

First, Manne draws the distinction between a broken promise and a lie. The majority of the 27 lies counted by Labor are not lies, but broken promises. Manne argues that broken promises are a fact of political life, and with three terms under their belt, any government would leave a good trail of them. I don’t think the Liberals have been particularly bad in this respect.

To my mind, the highlight of the article is Manne’s novel explanation for the way John Howard presented dodgy weapons of mass destruction intelligence as truth:

On September 11, 2001 Howard pledged an oath of fealty to the US. From that moment, in the prosecution of the war on terrorism, he was willing to believe whatever it was the Americans happened to believe. He had willingly suspended his capacity for disbelief.

Manne seems to be pleading some kind of temporary insanity on Howard’s behalf. For the entire three year term, John Howard has put the US need for retribution ahead of Australia’s integrity. It’s a bizzare scenario, but the kindest explanation that I’ve seen for his deceptive conduct.

Manne also tackles the children overboard fiasco, and considers the proposition that this might have been an “honourable” lie. Definitely worth a read.