November 2004

Indonesia spied on Australia

Submitted by rickeyre on

We shouldn't be too surprised about this. Everyone does it to everyone eles, abd we just don't hear about it except when spooks get caught, like the Mossad agents in New Zealand.

Channel Nine's Sunday did a report yesterday morning. Included is an interview with retiring Indonesian intelligence chief General Mahmud Hendropriyono.

Transcript at http://sunday.ninemsn.com.au/sunday/cover_stories/transcript_1683.asp

Four more years of Barney

Submitted by rickeyre on

He seems to have secured a mandate based on his policies of pre-emptive war, war on the environment, crony capitalism, veiled racism, homophobia and a fundamentalism that would make the Taliban proud... our country is split down the middle creating a cultural civil war that is not going away any time soon. It is a fight over values in which there is very little middle ground remaining. The stakes are extremely high for all we hold dear.
- John Passcantando, Executive Director, Greenpeace, 4.11.04

Tomateros!

Submitted by rickeyre on

Los Tomateros de CuliacanLos Tomateros de Culiacan are leading the Mexican Pacific League! They are 16-9 after beating Los Venados de Mazatlan 10-9 in 11 innings on Thursday.

Come on ye Tomato Growers!

Canberra newspaper office raided

Submitted by rickeyre on

Imagine John Howard ordering the Federal Police to raid a News Limited newspaper office to seize documents. A ridiculous concept, of course. He would never upset Rupert Murdoch like that. Nor would he disturb the Fairfax corporation, or the West Australian, or Rural Press, or any other newspaper publisher in this country... would he?

If it's the National Indigenous Times, he would.

November 11 Remembrance Day

Submitted by rickeyre on

11 November 1918: The armistice that brought the Great War to an end. It was meant to be The War to End All Wars, but as we watch the videophone images from Fallujah, we know that this was a forlorn hope. While intolerance, greed and ignorance prevail in the world's corridors of power, we shall never successfully manage international conflict.

More on Arafat

Submitted by rickeyre on

Your Excellency,

On the sad occasion of the death of President Yasser Arafat, we extend our condolences to the Palestinian people and to the leadership of the Palestinian Authority. We also ask God’s comfort for the members of his family in this time of deep grief.

President Arafat will be remembered for bringing the Palestinian people together and for his unique and tenacious contribution to the cause of establishing their national home.

Yasser Arafat 1929-2004

Submitted by rickeyre on

The death of Yasser Arafat has just been announced.

His importance as a leader of the Palestinian resistance over the past half century cannot be over-estimated. His methods were not always defensible, and while his presidency of the Palestinian territories in the last decade were a fitting reward for a lifetime of struggle, he really did not have the qualities to manage the conflicts of the past few years.

His treatment by Israel over the past two years has been appalling, and one has to wonder whether his death was entirely due to natural causes.

Welcome to the People's Republic of Sunraysia

Submitted by rickeyre on

Premier Steve Bracks should get to Mildura now and start talking before he needs a visa to do so.
- Cr Vernon Knight, Mildura Rural City Council, 28.10.04

Mildura is thinking about seceding from Victoria and joining either New South Wales or South Australia. This comes after the Victorian Government proposed a toxic waste dump at Hattah-Nowingi, about 40km south of Mildura near the Calder Highway.

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