from Crikey .....

Pollies grumble at writers' fest: 'good govt and ALP are strangers'

Margot Saville writes:

from Crikey .....

A fascinating, and depressing, graph popped up in The Economist this week ...

It got us thinking. If every Australian over 17 loses an average of $1300 a year on gambling - that's about $22 billion for the whole country each year - how does this compare with the money we actually spend on tangible things? And how does it compare to the money that we could spend on important or valuable things?

OK, so here's what President Barack Obama should say today about the Middle East. We will leave Afghanistan tomorrow. We will leave Iraq tomorrow. We will stop giving unconditional, craven support to Israel.

Americans will force the Israelis - and the European Union - to end their siege of Gaza. We will withhold all future funding for Israel unless it ends, totally and unconditionally, its building of colonies on Arab land that does not belong to it.

Out of all the various groups of asylum seekers in Australia, why are asylum seekers arriving by boat being persecuted by the Australian Government?

Why is Prime Minister Julia Gillard being so vindictive to desperate people arriving by boat on our shores? Why does she allow the erratic Tony Abbott and his attack dog, Scott Morrison, to set the boat arrival agenda? They don't make an issue of refugees arriving by aircraft, however those arriving by boat receive their racist bile in bucket loads.

First it was the grocery giants, then the petrol retailers, then the banks and the mining companies. Now it's the turn of Big Tobacco to unleash a campaign of mass confusion on the Australian public in an attempt to undermine government reform of an industry.

Leading this latest blitzkrieg of bluster, the boss of British American Tobacco Australia, David Crow, held a press conference to spell out the various ills that will beset this world if the government is successful in having all cigarettes sold in plain packaging.

The government has accused Tony Abbott of being in bed with big tobacco after the fitness fanatic and former health minister backed away from supporting plain packaging for cigarettes.

After saying begrudgingly a year ago he supported plain cigarette packets with very graphic warnings, the Opposition Leader said yesterday he was unconvinced the changes would help reduce smoking.

The Nationals declared it would not support the move to plain packaging.

The Liberal Party accepts donations from tobacco companies, and the Health Minister, Nicola Roxon, implied this was behind Mr Abbott's reluctance.

The Greek tragedy that is now befalling Strauss-Kahn is the latest in a series of similar cases of sex-related scandal that over the past few years have also involved former World Bank boss Paul Wolfowitz and former Malaysian finance minister (and close friend of Wolfowitz) Anwar Ibrahim.

The Queen arrived in the Republic of Ireland on Tuesday to start the first visit by a British monarch in a century.

Accompanied by Prince Philip, she touched down at Casement Aerodrome, south-west of Dublin, at 11.55am local time to start the historic four-day visit, which is taking place amid a huge security lockdown.

The jet taxied with the sovereign's standard, which bears an Irish harp, flying from the cockpit window. Two lines of troops formed a guard of honour either side of the red carpet at the aerodrome.

When Obama defended his military actions in Libya, he said "Some nations may be able to turn a blind eye to atrocities in other countries. The United States of America is different." Two weeks later, the Arab League asked the Security Council to consider imposing a no-fly-zone over the Gaza Strip in order to protect civilians from Israeli air strikes. But the United States, an uncritical ally of Israel, will never allow the passage of such a resolution, regardless of the number of Palestinian civilians Israel kills. This is a double standard.

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott is enjoying a big jump in popularity after last week's federal budget and the Government's asylum seeker deal with Malaysia.

A Herald/Nielsen poll has Mr Abbott's approval rating above Prime Minister Julia Gillard for the first time.

He rose three points to 45 per cent, while Ms Gillard slipped two points to 43 per cent.

Ms Gillard, however, has maintained her lead as preferred prime minister, 47 to 42 per cent.

About six in 10 voters polled are against the asylum seeker-swapping deal with Malaysia, while about eight in 10 said it would not make any difference to boat arrivals.

ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates — Late one night last November, a plane carrying dozens of Colombian men touched down in this glittering seaside capital. Whisked through customs by an Emirati intelligence officer, the group boarded an unmarked bus and drove roughly 20 miles to a windswept military complex in the desert sand.

The Colombians had entered the United Arab Emirates posing as construction workers. In fact, they were soldiers for a secret American-led mercenary army being built by Erik Prince, the billionaire founder of Blackwater Worldwide, with $529 million from the oil-soaked sheikdom.