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Yahoo: Labor Party leader Kevin Rudd swept to power in Australian elections Saturday, ending an 11-year conservative era and promising major changes to policies on global warming and his country’s role in the Iraq war.
“Today Australia has looked to the future,” Rudd said in a nationally televised victory speech, to wild cheers from supporters. “Today the Australian people have decided that we as a nation will move forward … to embrace the future, together to write a new page in our nation’s history.”
The win marked a humiliating end to the career of outgoing Prime Minister John Howard, who became Australia’s second-longest serving leader — and who had appeared almost unassailable as little as a year ago... Read on… President Bush just lost another lap dog. Rudd said he’d take Australian troops out of Iraq and sign the Kyoto treaty if elected, so here’s his chance. It really looks as if right wing conservatism is on the wane the world over. And I have to wonder how much of that is the result of the Iraq war and cozying up to George W. Bush, one of the worlds most unpopular people.
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Rudd said he’d take Australian troops out of Iraq and sign the Kyoto treaty if elected, so here’s his chance. Point of Information: Australia already signed Kyoto, in 1998, though its Parliament has yet to ratify it.
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some RKMB'ers are Obsessed with Black People Hmmm? 5000+ posts
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Besides the election defeat of pro-Bush, pro-war John Howard, the new incoming PM of Poland also plans to remove troops from Iraq in 2008. That's gratitude for you. Don't they know in Poland that we saved them and they owe America eternally, right or wrong? We saved them, daggumit. Oh, Fox News will have a go at them soon enough. Yes indeed. Kielbasa will now be known as "Freedom Sausage" and pirogies will now be called "Freedom Dumplings." Tune in to Fox News for more details. You ever get the feeling people are sick of Bush and his war?
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Australia refused to ratify Kyoto because Howard refused to allow it. He was originally a global warming skeptic. Then he switched his argument to economics - that Australia only pollutes 1% of the global total and the economic effect of signing Kyoto was disproportionately high. My feeling was that it was to back Bush.
Howard was a very popular prime minister - the second longest serving one, at 11 and a half years in office - but he was a very polarising figure, and an unquestioning supporter of Bush.
On Iraq, I suspect there will now be a major policy shift and Australian troops will be brought home quickly.
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Besides the election defeat of pro-Bush, pro-war John Howard, the new incoming PM of Poland also plans to remove troops from Iraq in 2008. That's gratitude for you. Don't they know in Poland that we saved them and they owe America eternally, right or wrong? We saved them, daggumit. You know that it was the Soviet Union that "saved" Poland from Germany, and why Poland have good reasons to not be too grateful for that? (The Soviet invasion of Eastern Poland in the beginning of WWII, the Katyn massacre, puppet government after WWII, etc.) Or do you mean that USA saved Poland by winning the Cold War?
"Batman is only meaningful as an answer to a world which in its basics is chaotic and in the hands of the wrong people, where no justice can be found. I think it's very suitable to our perception of the world's condition today... Batman embodies the will to resist evil" -Frank Miller
"Conan, what's the meaning of life?"
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-Conan the Barbarian
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"If I had a dime for every time Pariah was right about something I'd owe twenty cents."
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I meant the latter. There was a whole sentence on FOX pulling out the Ronald Reagan clips there but I omitted it at the last minute because it was too too snarky. Back to topic: Paragraph after paragraph in this Op-Ed reminds me of Bush and the American experience of recent years. A few pieces below, but follow the link and read it all if you have time. The perspective on incoming Rudd is very much worth reading. Howard had promised that Australia would be relaxed and comfortable under his rule, yet this year Australians had become more fearful and suspicious of each other than ever, a state of affairs that Howard's government seemed happy to exploit.
Howard's divisiveness and his skilful manipulation of public opinion obscured the strange paradoxes of his era. If he flirted with racism, it was nevertheless under him that Australia ended up with the largest immigration programme in its history. His foreign policy was notoriously sycophantic to the Bush administration....
...Howard's seeming blandness disguised his ruthless determination radically to reshape Australia. His politicisation of the public service severely weakened that institution; his government's ceaseless and ferocious attacking of alternative points of opinion brought a disturbing conformity to Australian public life; and he stacked body after body with sycophants and far-right ideologues to prosecute his causes through society....
His condoning of the imprisonment of David Hicks at Guantánamo Bay without trial for five years, and the subsequent gagging of Hicks until after the election, suggested a growing contempt for human rights and the rule of law that was most frighteningly on display with his anti-terrorism legislation, much criticised for its provisions of secret trials and imprisonment...
Then something strange happened: history changed and the times no longer were his. His ever lonelier support for the Bush administration's adventurism looked increasingly foolish and possibly dangerous. The very climate of Australia was transformed. Every mainland capital city now has a water supply crisis so severe that people have been murdered by neighbours for watering gardens. Yet in the midst of a once-in-a-thousand-years drought, Howard remained until late last year a climate sceptic. His supporters dismissed global warming as they had so much else - more hysteria from the left. But it wasn't: it was the world and the world had changed.
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Right off the bat, the new Australian Prime Minister changes priorities. Will we see the same next year in the US? Newly elected leader Kevin Rudd moved quickly Sunday to bring Australia into international talks on fighting global warming, and to head off potentially thorny relations with the United States and key Asian neighbors.
The emphatic victory for Rudd's Labor Party swings Australia toward the political left after almost 12 years of conservative rule, and puts it at odds with key security ally Washington on two crucial policy issues — Iraq and global warming.
The day after sweeping to power in general elections, Rudd went straight into work mode, holding meetings with government officials about the mechanics of signing the Kyoto Protocol on cutting greenhouse gas emissions. How many of our allies still stand with Bush on climate change? Hmmm, there's China and Russia who also prefer pretending it's an issue to ignore and there's some nutty guy in Eastern Europe (Czech Republic?) who calls it a hoax but Bush is even more isolated than ever these days. Makes me more even more anxious for '08 already actually..
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Given that the Democrats control Congress right now, what's stopping them from ratifying Kyoto today if they wanted to?
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Given that the Democrats control Congress right now, what's stopping them from ratifying Kyoto today if they wanted to? The same thing that's preventing them from doing just about everything else. A slim majority and a Bush veto.
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Actually, the treaty was signed in 1997. The President can't veto it. The Senate, however, voted against it (95-0).
If the Senate truly believes that it is a good idea, why not ratify it now?
Let's face it: the odds are that, if a Democrat wins in 08, he or she will probably do exactly what Bill Clinton did with the treaty back in 1997: make a lot a noise about it, but not actually put it in practice.
It'll be like the Iraq pullout: they'll promise it to the leftie base to get them energized but as soon as a Democrat takes office they'll realize they can't actually act on that promise.
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Point of clarification. The Dem congress can't do much because of the Bush veto as it concerns Iraq or much of anything else. If the country really wants change they need to elect more Democrats next time. A razor thin majority with a Republican president doesn't cut it.
Fair play!
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I take it you didn't actually read my post before responding to it, since I mentioned that the veto issue wasn't really applicable to the treaty?  But thank you for illustrating my point that the democrats are just spouting rhetoric in the hopes of fooling people into thinking electing them will accomplish something here.
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I was responding to the rhetoric at the end of your post about promises/Iraq & congress G-man.
Fair play!
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Your "response" consisted of illustrating my second point and completely ignoring my first point. Again, I have to wonder if you actually read what people write before responding.
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It's always tough having any type of dialogue with you G-man. My response was aimed at your last paragraph. Actually, the treaty was signed in 1997. The President can't veto it. The Senate, however, voted against it (95-0).
If the Senate truly believes that it is a good idea, why not ratify it now?
Let's face it: the odds are that, if a Democrat wins in 08, he or she will probably do exactly what Bill Clinton did with the treaty back in 1997: make a lot a noise about it, but not actually put it in practice.
It'll be like the Iraq pullout: they'll promise it to the leftie base to get them energized but as soon as a Democrat takes office they'll realize they can't actually act on that promise. Your comparison to the treaty & Iraq are not valid. Bush's veto does come into play as it concerns Iraq.
Fair play!
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Right off the bat, the new Australian Prime Minister changes priorities. Will we see the same next year in the US? Newly elected leader Kevin Rudd moved quickly Sunday to bring Australia into international talks on fighting global warming, and to head off potentially thorny relations with the United States and key Asian neighbors.
The emphatic victory for Rudd's Labor Party swings Australia toward the political left after almost 12 years of conservative rule, and puts it at odds with key security ally Washington on two crucial policy issues — Iraq and global warming.
The day after sweeping to power in general elections, Rudd went straight into work mode, holding meetings with government officials about the mechanics of signing the Kyoto Protocol on cutting greenhouse gas emissions. How many of our allies still stand with Bush on climate change? Hmmm, there's China and Russia who also prefer pretending it's an issue to ignore and there's some nutty guy in Eastern Europe (Czech Republic?) who calls it a hoax but Bush is even more isolated than ever these days. Makes me more even more anxious for '08 already actually.. I believe the nutty guy is from Poland, considering how much brown coal that country burns...
"Batman is only meaningful as an answer to a world which in its basics is chaotic and in the hands of the wrong people, where no justice can be found. I think it's very suitable to our perception of the world's condition today... Batman embodies the will to resist evil" -Frank Miller
"Conan, what's the meaning of life?"
"To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentations of their women!"
-Conan the Barbarian
"Well, yeah."
-Jason E. Perkins
"If I had a dime for every time Pariah was right about something I'd owe twenty cents."
-Ultimate Jaburg53
"Fair enough. I defer to your expertise."
-Prometheus
Rack MisterJLA!
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Who will I break next? 15000+ posts
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This is how you bsams. Pay attention whomod.
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