Short shots on Webdiary, the cost of electing someone in the US, diet and Springfield map. More writings on Howard's announcement of hearsay when it came to SMS, an old fossil rolls out a plan to deal with Jemaah Islamiah.

Poll: Which US State is Springfield in?

Shorts

• Webdiary gets 391 comments . A truism of the web is people are busting to be heard, and any outlet for that is a good outlet. Great to see. Margo Kingston's writings are blog style though, nothing really innovative there. Since Fairfax is hosting it, I am interested to see if they come up with some innovative way of leveraging their reporting expertise into some kind of system that allows comments and ratings. Doing an MLP (Major Link Propagation) or Blog isn't enough.
• The Washington Post reports that George Bush is lambasting John Kerry's policies as costing $2 trillion. However the Post totaled Bush's initiatives from his speeches for his second term and discovered Bush plans to spend $3 trillion. I am encouraged to know; that despite the outcome of the US election, America will be in safe fiscal hands. It is best IMO if Kerry wins, at least he has to deal with a Republican controlled Congress, which may stop some of the bleeding. But this Congress has broken all records for earmarkings and pork. So that may not save the US from a recession the government made them have.
• I, Cammo diet not adhered to last week. Ate chocolate marshmallow puffs and drank a litre of chocolate milk. I don't recall those being in my diet, but they taste so good ....
• Covered on slashdot , but worthy of re-linking again; A Detailed Map of Springfield . Personally I reckon the Simpson's Springfield is in Virginia.

Howard Gets Caught Again

The Sydney Morning Herald catches Howard and Downer employing scare tactics again. From an article by Tom Allard ;

The Prime Minister and Foreign Minister knowingly relied on third-hand hearsay for their claim there was a text message warning of last week's bombing of the Australian embassy in Jakarta.

The Herald has learned the source was a former Australian army officer who runs a security firm in Jakarta. Intelligence analysts said yesterday that the claims were "garbage grade" and were puzzled as to why the Government went public with it on Friday.

As the New Yorkers say, "Enough already". Message to John Howard; show some semblance of dignity, and show some respect for the Australian people rather than the contempt you obviously have. The Australian people do not want to be lied to, they do not want to be whipped up into a frenzy of fear and paranoia; so please stop doing it.

It also makes clear that the Howard government cannot be trusted with national security. Indonesia is our front-line of defence in the battle against terrorism; Howard and Downer abusing that relationship for their own domestic fear factories earned this response from the Indonesian Ambassador; Imron Cotan .

The Indonesian ambassador, Imron Cotan, gently chided Howard and Downer yesterday. In declining to speculate on the matter, he said: "For me, we should let the police forces do the investigating and find the answers. I would understand that in the early hours some people might have had misleading information."

This is why Indonesia has been so successful in handling terrorism, and why Australia and the US have been so pitiful at it. Indonesia has a better grasp of what is needed than Australia does. It also appears the Indonesia politicians also have a better understanding of terrorism than Howard and Downer do.

Margo Kingston believes Howard's attempt to blame the Polri (Indonesia Police) has damaged Australian national interests;

Howard's statement helped him politically, sure, but the consequences of what he did were all bad for Australia - for our national interest. ... John Howard is a dangerous man to lead Australia. He has no limits when it comes to domestic political advantage, even the national interest.

Whatever Howard's domestic political motivations, his foreign policy as shown in the last eight years is not sufficient to create any productive outcomes in battling terrorism. His subservience to the United States in foreign and defence policy has only exacerbated the problems of disorder and lawlessness in the Middle East and Afghanistan. Both are now thriving havens for new terrorist groups to recruit and operate from.

His view of the world in dividing it into the anglosphere and others, born of a belief in British heritage is an archaic mindset, that does not do modern Australians, their culture or society any favours. It is a crushing and claustrophobic worldview, unfit for a " Greater Australia ". This attempt to apportion blame on the country that has been taking the punches from terrorists for Australia, and handling them admirably, is not fit for an Australian statesman who should be seeking common purpose with our Indonesia neighbours, so both countries can live without the civil disturbance of terrorism.

Labor's foreign policy of "Asian Engagement" and regionalism is far better suited for the challenges that tactics of terror is throwing at Australia. John Howard and Alexander Downer have to go. Not only has Australia, Australian culture and Australian society passed them by, but so has world events. They are dinosaurs from a static "sheeps back" Australia; completely uncomfortable in the modern Australia that matured with the great Australian cultural awakening in the 80's and early 90's.

Dealing with Jemaah Islamiah

A tired old fossil looks to the Malayan Emergency for inspiration in a poor op-ed. Williams' plan includes banning Jemaah Islamiah like the British banned the Malayan Communist Party, his other solutions for Indonesia all include overt statism. As an example;

Other policies that could be implemented include making travel more difficult, particularly to and from the Philippines. This can be achieved by, for example, carrying out more patrols in areas where JI is based, implementing better border controls and introducing penalties for travelling to the Philippines without having the relevant papers in order.

Just make it more difficult, a pain in the arse; so the thousand or so JI members out of the 220 million Indonesians are inconvenienced too. And;

Education programs would also be needed to point out that the activities of JI are opposed to the interests of the state and the population as a whole, highlighting the downside that JI reduces foreign investment, resulting in fewer jobs.

Opposed to the interests of the state? This country has just got through fifty years of dictatorship and is finally enjoying the liberty that comes from no longer being oppressed by the arms of government. This isn't 21st Century Colonial Australia that still thinks it is British. This is Indonesia. In the short term Indonesia will need to deal with the fanatical schools, they will also have to continue their police work in rooting out terrorist cells.

Regionally, it is in no nations, or anyones interest for terrorism to become an accepted part of life. This will require all the nations in the South Pacific and South-East Asia to come together and work out a plan of action against terrorism and then enact those principles into a document. This treaty should be revisited each year with all nations being involved an update the treaty and document to any changing needs.

This treaty would include regional responses to defence, security, terrorism, weapons proliferation, human trafficking and police co-operation. The more inclusive the treaty the better, so terrorists have a piece of paper they can look at and know they have no place to hide and noone condoning their criminal behaviour.

Teh Intraweb and Political Influence

The raising of concerns of the forgery of the CBS document on little green footballs showed the internet at what it does best, publishing information and disseminating it quickly. It seems these sites gain the most notoriety when the information is novel, like Drudge posting the blue dress issue and little green footballs posting the forgery issue.

I am finding dailykos.com and redstate.org fascinating, not from a participatory perspective but from a political influence view. Both sites have a rather homogeneous community. And both sites use their influence to raise money for candidates for their respective parties. Dailykos donations have a 1c added on the end so that it can be tracked, while redstate.org put 2c on any donation.

The US legislators coin is money, it is how influence and access is bought in Washington. Not only that, legislators are surprisingly cheap to buy off. For as little as a $40,000 investment in a Senator, Mickey Mouse can be maintained in copyright protection perpetually.

If a site with 10,000 users who donate money to the sites cheerleading projects, that is a powerful special interest group in Washington, that could be capable of influencing legislation the same way corporate lobbyists have. It is possible that the leaders (heads) of these sites, may take up the role of representing their sites special interests in Washington.

At the moment dailykos is united behind the principle, "Anybody But Bush" (ABB). In contrast redstate.org has a stronger site personality tied to the Republican party. If Kerry gets in, it will be interesting to see what happens to dailykos. While it is a Democratic bent, its only social binding is ABB.Once their party is in power will the site's community fracture and splinter across the internet, their job done; or will they form a special interest group that raises money to influence legislators and specific legislation.

I hope Kerry gets in, so I can see what happens. ( btw I touched on this subject in a comment elsewhere )

Websites and Australian Politics

The ruling class in the US is the entrepreneurial class. In Australia it is the political and intellectual elite that make up the ruling class. John Howard and Mark Latham have both been careerist politicians (another good reason to put a twenty-five year term limit on parliamentarians). Policy is created by the intellectual elite, ie the economic rationalists, the foreign policy regionalists, the culture wars, etc. Whereas when Cheney wanted to make an Energy Bill invited the Energy companies to his office to tell him what to do.

I don't see an Australian version of dailykos.com or redstate.org having any effect on the political landscape unless it manages to create and propagate a policy meme into the intellectual elite that the parties draw from. The ability to raise money, or create a secure group think environment won't work in Australian politics.

Vive le revolution.

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