Farmers, grocers back Labor price inquiry call

Federal Government ministers are laughing off the plans to investigate grocery prices.

Farmers and independent grocers are calling on the Federal Government to take up Labor's plans for an inquiry into grocery pricing.

Opposition Leader Kevin Rudd says if Labor wins government, he would empower the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) to find out whether supermarkets are price gouging.

Flaw in Coalition defences exposed

Gerard Henderson (The Sydney Morning Herald - Opinions 10/07/07)

July 10, 2007

It's not often that an Australian defence minister makes it on to the international news bulletins. But Brendan Nelson managed to do so last week - and all for the wrong reasons - by appearing to link Australia's Iraq commitment to oil.

‘Nicolas Sarkozy was a divisive figure during his campaign for the French presidency. But he's governing as a uniter, not a divider.

George W. Bush ran for president in 2000 promising to ease partisan divisions. He has left our politics a wreck of recrimination, anger and polarization.

This weekend, the contrast between Sarkozy and Bush could not have been more conspicuous.

from the ABC .....

Iraq never about oil: Nelson

Today Dr Nelson said resource security was a separate issue.

Defence Minister Brendan Nelson has distanced himself from comments he made yesterday about a link between oil security and the need for Australian troops to stay in Iraq.

On Wednesday Dr Nelson said oil security was one of the reasons Australian forces should not leave Iraq.

Iraq oil security in Australia's interest: Nelson

Dr Nelson says energy security is extremely important to all nations.

The Federal Government says oil is a key reason to keep Australian troops in Iraq, but says it was not the reason for the original invasion.

Bush Rationale on Libby Stirs Legal Debate

By ADAM LIPTAK

Published: July 4, 2007

In commuting I. Lewis Libby Jr.'s 30-month prison sentence on Monday, President Bush drew on the same array of arguments about the federal sentencing system often made by defense lawyers - and routinely and strenuously opposed by his own Justice Department.

‘Indeed so secrecy-fixated is this White House that John Dean, Richard Nixon's White House counsel, was once quoted in the Daily Telegraph of London as saying, "Bush and Cheney are a throwback to the Nixon time. All government business is filtered through a political process at this White House, which is the most secretive ever to run the United States."

Not to put too fine a point on it, but when Nixon's consigliere calls you secretive, it's like Tony Soprano saying you have anger-management issues.

Bush looks to his father to mend relations with Putin

By Rupert Cornwell in Washington

Published: 30 June 2007

‘Tomorrow's summit between George Bush and Vladimir Putin raises the intriguing question of whether the shadow of the father can help the son bring an end to the frostiest period in ties between the United States and Russia since the Cold War?

from Crikey …..

Compassionate & caring PM with a $1.8billion winner

Richard Farmer writes:

‘The union movement's hard men are babes alongside John Howard's mob. Really. Profanity in a blue singlet is meaningless, comparatively. The real goons in public life are mostly in parliamentary politics, whatever their ideological allegiance, and not on the shop floor. There is a stunning quote in the book The Hollow Men that says: "We assume politicians are without honour. Not that men in high places lie, only that they do so with such indifference, so endlessly, still expecting to be believed. We are accustomed to the contempt inherent in the political life."

General's Report on Iraq Progress Has Competition

By DAVID E. SANGER and THOM SHANKER

Published: June 24, 2007

Cheney in Dispute on Oversight of His Office

By SCOTT SHANE

Published: June 22, 2007

For four years, Vice President Dick Cheney has resisted routine oversight of his office's handling of classified information, and when the office in charge of overseeing classification in the executive branch objected, the vice president's office suggested that the oversight office be shut down, according to documents released today by a Democratic congressman.

Cross yourself before driving' Vatican tells motorists

By Barbara Miller

The Vatican is urging motorists not to use their vehicles as an expression of power.

The Vatican has taken a break from matters purely theological to issue a list of Ten Commandments on driving.

The document urges motorists to be charitable, not to use their vehicles as an expression of power and to cross themselves before setting off on their journey.

from Crikey …..

Coonan's policy lacks byte (and other nerd jokes)

Crikey’s resident nerd and lapsed tech journalist Marcus Westbury writes…

Cuba's 'first lady' dies

Vilma Espin, one of the most powerful women in the Cuban revolution that brought her brother-in-law Fidel Castro to power, has died aged 77.

A key figure in advancing women's equality in communist Cuba, Espin was married to Fidel Castro's younger brother Raul, who took over as acting president in July 2006 after the Fidel underwent surgery.

Espin became Cuba's unofficial first lady because Fidel Castro's wife, Dalia Soto del Valle, never played an official role.

A trained chemical engineer, she became a senior figure in the communist regime, where she championed women's rights as president of the Federation of Cuban Women (FMC).

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