Who was the highest paid individual in Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign during the first half of October as it headed down the homestretch? 

Not Randy Scheunemann, Mr. McCain’s chief foreign policy adviser; not Nicolle Wallace, his senior communications staffer. It was Amy Strozzi, Gov. Sarah Palin’s travelling makeup artist, according to a new filing with the Federal Election Commission on Thursday night. 

from Crikey ….. 

Acquittal of Thomas another blow for the war on terror  

from Crikey ….. 

NT intervention: Macklin ignores review board in favour of anecdotes  

Professor Jon Altman from the Australian National University writes:  

Even before the spectacular presidential election campaign became a national obsession, and the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression crowded out other news, coverage of the Iraq War had dwindled to next to nothing.  

National newspapers had long since discontinued their daily feasts of multiple - usually front page – reports on the country, replacing them with meager meals of mostly inside-the-fold summary stories.  

This November, Americans face a choice. But the choice not between John McCain or Barak Obama; it is between submitting to the will of the corporate-military establishment or taking a moral stand in boycotting their rigged institutions of fake democracy.  

Facing a firing line of questions from Washington lawmakers, Alan Greenspan, the former Federal Reserve chairman once considered the infallible maestro of the financial system, admitted on Thursday that he “made a mistake” in trusting that free markets could regulate themselves without government oversight. 

The Australian Federal Police is accepting no blame for the detention and charging of Gold Coast doctor Mohammed Haneef last year.

A public version of AFP submissions to the Clarke inquiry into the Haneef case released yesterday blames Scotland Yard for providing incorrect information and the office of the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions for advising that Dr Haneef be charged. 

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has said she believes the Middle East is a better place for the policies of President George Bush. 

Speaking to the BBC, Ms Rice insisted that a US-inspired 'freedom agenda' had taken hold in the Middle East. 

President Bush will convene leaders of 20 nations in Washington on Nov. 15 for an emergency summit meeting to discuss the economic crisis, the White House said Wednesday.  

But the session, coming less than two weeks after the presidential election, could put Mr. Bush on a collision course with his successor. 

Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) governor Glenn Stevens says he supports the Government's move to guarantee unlimited bank deposits. 

A newspaper report today claims the RBA is concerned the Government's recent decision to provide an unlimited guarantee of all bank deposits is distorting the market.

from Crikey ….. 

This morning Treasury Secretary Ken Henry talked - when permitted to by Coalition senators - about the Rudd Government’s bank guarantee and the claims, made with alarming prominence in The Australian yesterday, that the RBA had always wanted a cap on it.  

On the brief occasions when the President now appears in the Rose Garden to "comfort" or "reassure" a shock-and-awed nation, you can almost hear those legions of ducks quacking lamely in the background.  

Ordinary Cubans could reasonably be excused for wondering why the fates have dealt them such a rotten hand over the years, but at last it seems that their luck may have changed.  

US President George W Bush's first Secretary of State, Colin Powell, has endorsed Democratic election candidate Barack Obama for the White House. 

Backing Mr Obama over John McCain, the Republican Party's choice to succeed Mr Bush in November, he said the Democrat had the 'ability to inspire'.