An estimated 40 million USD has been spent on parties to commemorate the re-coronation of King George II and Queen Laura. Not one cent of this was given up to assist victims of the Indian Ocean tsunami. Nor, indeed, to the residents of Fallujah displaced by the US Army's scorched earth pursuit of "freedom" and "liberty".

The Washington Post did an extensive photo blog of Thursday night's load of balls. The evening, of course, is a thank you for all those people and organisations who bankroll the GOP version of "freedom" and "liberty". Check out whitehouseforsale.org.

Mike Carlton has said his bit on the coronation in today's Sydney Morning Herald. But for classic fairandbalanced journalism, watch the video of Fox "News" Channel anchor Brigitte Quinn as a fluff interview with Vanity Fair contributing editor Judy Bachrach about coronation day fails to follow The Party Line.

Some interesting discussion of the Quinn-Bachrach exchange at newshounds.us.

Friday's Democracy Now! has a wrap of the counter-inaugural protests held in Washington on Thursday, including footage of a speech by Ramsay Clark calling for George W Bush's impeachment.

I couldn't be bothered watching any of the telecasts of the load of balls yesterday. It was an appropriate time for me to go out and see a film about another great warrior for freedom and liberty, Ernesto (Che) Guevara. But more about "Diarios de motocicleta" later.