Dumb Animals

Once again I feel ashamed to be Australian. Or, more correctly, I am ashamed of my right-wing Liberal government's actions. After the US predictably vetoed a UN Security Council resolution condemning Israel's threats to remove or kill Yassar Arafat, a similar motion was passed at the UN General Assembly by a resounding margin, 133 to 4. The four countries which voted against were the US and Israel (of course), with token support from the Marshall Islands and Micronesia. But another 15 countries, including Australia, abstained.

I'm not the only person pissed off their government. The California election debacle is once again raising the spectre of lawyers stealing elections from the people at the behest of Big Brother. As the NY Times reports, "the same germs that have made California the Fabulous Invalid of national politics ... are pulsing through the bloodstream of American democracy more broadly."

"There is a national dissatisfaction," says Curtis B. Gans, the director of the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate in Washington. "The electorate is very deeply and partisanly polarized, and there is a dissatisfaction with this type of politics, which yields very little but inaction on a whole series of relevant issues."

Speaking of inaction, it will be very interesting to see whether the Europeans can agree to bail out Iraq's bloodied invaders, Bush and Blair. The only danger for Chirac and Schroeder is that they will be blamed again if no deal can be reached. Aside from that, they have nothing to lose and these is no reason why they should negotiate anything but an ideal UN agreement. As the Guardian reports, "success depends on Mr Bush and his advisers overcoming their state of denial, admitting the US needs help and agreeing to work along the lines proposed by France. Common sense insists America's discredited leaders open their eyes. Pride and prejudice suggest they may not."

Meanwhile, at the Baghdad Zoo, US soldiers have shot dead a tiger. The soldiers had passed through the outer cage and were hand-feeding the tiger through the inner bars. When it mauled a soldier's arm, a colleague shot the beast dead. Stupid animal. It should have known there is no such thing as a free lunch.