club chaos

a coalition moon?

Images...such as they be...by Father Park.

Excuse the seventies, late night (after 10:00pm closing) focus - I'm still getting used to this digital/telescope thing. It would help to have a "T-ring" for the camera as well. I had to do it sooner or later: I was told in no uncertain terms by Ck. And, as we all know, I "allus do as I told!"

Several guiness and fried Indian fish have resulted in the following. Senior postulant Astronomer, Josh, lines up the "blood moon"...

And...away we shoot....

kornhausplatz, bern, switzerland

Image by Harry Heidelberg

apec fun

A Sydneyphere podcast. Listen to it here.

the inlet, port douglas

Image by Harry Heidelberg.... this one actually taken with my mobile phone

the weekend approaches

Image by Harry Heidelberg

now bush makes vietnam comparisons

By Father Park

The prattle and hum(bug) of Bush foreign policy continues apace. The Iraqis, it seems, are not terribly worthy of the attentions of the US and its allies in Iraq. This, it seems, is squarely their fault. It would seem that the Iraqi government is not up to the task of bringing under control the waring factions that have been tearing apart Iraq these past four or so years. US patience is wearing thin with Bush, on Tuesday, declaring "a certain level of frustration" with the Iraqi government's lack of progress in bringing this lot under control. Even Howard and Downer have chastised the naughty Iraqi democratic government.

One would think that the Coalition of the Willing has done such an exemplary job.

There is little point in revisiting the information that was available to those in control of US policy on Iraq at the war's outset; the predictions of resistance and of the "sectarian" violence that would be uncorked in the vacuum to follow "Shock and Awe"; of the manifest errors of the occupation and its satrap, Bremmer. These are well documented. It is, though, just a little rich to berate a neophyte Iraqi government for failure to replace the jeannie - uncorked by the Coalition - back in the bottle; a government birthed from the loins of sectarian violence and structured firmly along those divisions with representative numbers manipulated in favour of one over others.

Then we have this speech by Bush comparing the Iraq project to the "Japan war"; to the Korean war and to the Vietnamese war. This is in no way comparable to the constitutional "defanging" and democratising of Japan and the defence of South Korea. There is no second world war being fought here. There was no foreign aggression against Iraq by any communist regime. Perhaps it might be loosely compared to the self-interested German intervention in Spain in the thirties. Might. Then this:

"Whatever your position in that debate (the American involvement and pull-out from Vietnam), one unmistakable legacy of Vietnam is that the price of America's withdrawal was paid by millions of innocent citizens whose agonies would add to our vocabulary new terms like 'boat people', 're-education camps' and 'killing fields'.

Just which version of history is this? From where does Bush obtain this idea? Any reading of the history of US involvement in that ill-conceived and executed war would tell him why Cambodia descended into that hell. It had little to do with the US's withdrawal from Vietnam and much to do with Nixon's secret little undeclared war on Cambodia.

jolanda meets with director general of the education department

Details on the Challita blog.

damian...mayor of verdun - the fruit bat shire

Image by Pahoff

And, after five pm...

greg, greg...

By Father Park

Karl Rove was one of the most important, and famous, presidential advisors in America's long, turbulent and enthralling history.

Oh what gushing, gurgling nonsense. And Greg Sheridan, the master of such tripe, is the gusher of course. Whilst not quite approaching the lofty heights of his fawning pieces about supping with Suharto it doesn't fall too far short.

"Most important" advisor? Surely that would depend - in great part - upon the recipient of the advice as much as the advice? And what of the advice? Just what was its nature? If one is to believe the adulatory, credulous Sheridan it had nothing whatsoever to do with the palpable failures of what is a failed and discredited administration:

It would be absurd to blame Rove for Iraq. Further, it's wrong to see Rove as excessively partisan.

No, of course not. This is a bloke who has - in an entirely partisan fashion - chosen to diligently work for the election of candidate W Bush since the gubernatorial race in Texas of '94. Whilst Sheridan is correct to state that Rove is not to "blame" for Iraq, it would similarly absurd for anyone to think that the "technical, tactical and strategic genius" of Bush's campaigns to have been silent on the issue and its handling.

Resignations are expected in the year or so that runs out an administration's last gasps. Some of those administrations continue to be relevant and effective. This one will not. It has not, in truth, been so for some considerable time. The hauteur and arrogance displayed by many of its officials and the hubris that followed its 2004 return have crippled it.

My opinion of the current US administration is, of course, well known on Harry's blog. That has gained me the epithet of "hater of the US" in the past. This is a nonsense. This is the worst administration since the Harding administration and I believe that history - when I am gone - will record it as such. Its execution of foreign policy has been of a gallows nature in its results for the US. It has been clumsy, ill conceived and - at times - rank amateur.

If Greg Sheridan believes that Rove is "one of the most important" presidential advisors in "America's long and turbulent history" then he needs to read some more of that country's history.

Problem is, I know that he has. What then does that say of his judgment?

committeman rudd has promised to set up planning units, chair committees and open summits | has this man ever made a decision on his own? in fact, is he a man at all?

Image by Harry Heidelberg | click to enlarge