Australia's monolingual handicap is a national economic, security and cultural disgrace
It seems to me one of the most damning policy indictments of the Howard era. On page 29 of Saturday’s Australian Financial Review (28 April), Luke Slattery outlined the appalling state of second language learning in Australia and its impact on Australian business now and in the future.
The decline of language learning during the Howard era flies in the face of our growing integration into the regional and world economies.
Australia’s shameful record on language learning has been apparent to me for a long time. In the 1970s and 80s the Catholic High School I attended in multicultural Auburn in Western Sydney was perhaps less than 40% Anglo Australian. The rest of the students were mainly Lebanese, Croation, Italian, Greek, Serbian, Vietnamese and Turkish. Students attending this ethnically diverse school were not given the opportunity to learn a second language. It wasn’t an option for us.
I didn’t become aware of how appalling this was until I travelled in Europe for the first time in the late 80s. It was there I realised that being monolingual was the unusual state rather than the other way around.
Living in Asia during the past 13 years has further heightened my awareness of Australia’s linguistic handicap.
Slattery’s AFR piece focuses on how our second language aversion damages our business competitiveness. Business schools the world over have recognised that second language skills help make better businesses from the CEO down. Most Australians in business are being left behind by this movement towards a multilingual global workplace. Even compared to Great Britain, the United States and New Zealand, Australia is at the bottom of the pile. That puts us at the bottom of the bottom of the pile in the OECD.
Australia’s retarded second language development is not only a handicap to our business development. It has serious security and cultural dimensions also.
Fewer Australians are studying Asian and regional languages and cultures than at the start of the Howard government. This is despite the fact that we now have Australian troops deployed in Timor, The Solomons, Afghanistan and Iraq and we have a pressing security concern with Islamic extremism in Indonesia. That Australia can massively increase defence expenditure without a parallel investment in language and cultural learning represents a terrible diseconomy. From Baghdad to Washington and from Kabul to Dili and Honiara, top military brass reiterate that these battles can’t be won with weapons alone. If language and cultural knowledge are vital weapons in the conflicts Australia is presently engaged in, we should feel vulnerable.
Then there is the simple cultural dimension. By many measures, Australia’s multiculturalism flourishes. How much richer might it be if all Australians had a wider interest and understanding of the many cultures in our midst?
Correcting Australia’s language handicap is a ten-year investment. Our current and future economic, security and cultural needs require that this investment be made quickly.
Tuesday, 1 May 2007
Thursday, 19 April 2007
BAGHDAD AND VIRGINIA TECH
As America suffers, mourns and asks why, following this week’s senseless tragedy at Virginia Tech, Iraqis in Baghdad may be hoping that it will give the world a tiny insight into the horror that is their daily existence in a city of daily suicide bombings of even greater lethality.
As we are bombarded with intimate details about the life and motives of the Virginia killer I wonder whether we might be better equipped to fight our “war on terror” if a similar public analysis of the lives and motives of the perpetrators of suicide bombings around the world occurred. Given how prolific they are, it is incredible how little we know of them. Most people would be hard pressed to name more than one of the September 11 hijackers. Few could say anything of substance about them.
And as we read of the lives shattered by 23 year old Cho Seung-Hui’s bloody rampage, it points to an obscene contrast in the lack of detail presented on the hundreds of faceless simple people who fall victim to hideous violence in Iraq each day.
As we are bombarded with intimate details about the life and motives of the Virginia killer I wonder whether we might be better equipped to fight our “war on terror” if a similar public analysis of the lives and motives of the perpetrators of suicide bombings around the world occurred. Given how prolific they are, it is incredible how little we know of them. Most people would be hard pressed to name more than one of the September 11 hijackers. Few could say anything of substance about them.
And as we read of the lives shattered by 23 year old Cho Seung-Hui’s bloody rampage, it points to an obscene contrast in the lack of detail presented on the hundreds of faceless simple people who fall victim to hideous violence in Iraq each day.
RUDD'S CANCELLED VIETNAM VOYAGE
Facing an election on matters of grave national and international importance, the amount of media interest in the Rudd Vietnam story has been ridiculous
An outsider arriving in Australia last week would have assumed that Kevin Rudd had hurled abuse at Australia’s Vietnam Veterans and poured scorn on their service. The amount of media energy expended on this story once again shows a democracy terribly distracted from the many serious issues at hand by nonsense.
Hours of television and millions of pages of newsprint were devoted to a beat up of monumental scale. Whatever is being said about the “false dawn” service planned for Vietnam, it was always dependent on the agreement of the veterans who were intended to participate in it. Major events, including those as reverent as an Anzac service often make compromises for television coverage. It can easily be argued that such tweaking gives a wider audience an opportunity to share in the event complementing its significance.
The idea that it is sacrilege to canvas the possibility of an earlier service with interested parties is extreme. Neither is there any indication that Kevin Rudd was involved in such canvassing.
So, his failure was to miss an email from an important military figure - an unfortunate oversight. The lack of perspective of many commentators who suggested that Rudd’s failure on this matter was comparable to the Howard and Downer oversight failures with the AWB in Iraq is distressing.
The Blairesque “spin at all costs” style of his media machine is the only thing that the Opposition Leader needs to apologise for.
An outsider arriving in Australia last week would have assumed that Kevin Rudd had hurled abuse at Australia’s Vietnam Veterans and poured scorn on their service. The amount of media energy expended on this story once again shows a democracy terribly distracted from the many serious issues at hand by nonsense.
Hours of television and millions of pages of newsprint were devoted to a beat up of monumental scale. Whatever is being said about the “false dawn” service planned for Vietnam, it was always dependent on the agreement of the veterans who were intended to participate in it. Major events, including those as reverent as an Anzac service often make compromises for television coverage. It can easily be argued that such tweaking gives a wider audience an opportunity to share in the event complementing its significance.
The idea that it is sacrilege to canvas the possibility of an earlier service with interested parties is extreme. Neither is there any indication that Kevin Rudd was involved in such canvassing.
So, his failure was to miss an email from an important military figure - an unfortunate oversight. The lack of perspective of many commentators who suggested that Rudd’s failure on this matter was comparable to the Howard and Downer oversight failures with the AWB in Iraq is distressing.
The Blairesque “spin at all costs” style of his media machine is the only thing that the Opposition Leader needs to apologise for.
PAUL KEATING AND CHINA
Paul Keating's normally fine critical eye seems to be losing its focus with China
Paul Keating is probably John Howard’s most longstanding, vigorous and vicious critic. Sometimes his critique is more vicious than valuable. He’s amusing to listen to but you sometimes come away wondering more about Keating’s visceral hatred and bitterness than the particular issue that he is discussing.
I’m a great Keating fan. I think he was a great Prime Minister. I admired his mind, his vision and his readiness to take risks for the good of the country both as Treasurer and Prime Minister. I shook his hand at a Condell Park polling booth in the 80s and again in Vietnam in the 90s. I found him an inspiring leader. His capacity to embrace the full range of national issues from the economy to indigenous affairs, foreign policy and the arts was remarkable. He made Australia think big and broad about its past and its future.
In contrast, the Howard years have been small minded and uninspired. Howard expressed contempt for the “vision” thing from the outset and he has been true to his commitment to vision free government.
But this piece is about Keating not Howard.
And I’m starting to have some serious reservations about 21st century Keating. As a very high-end business consultant with a special interest in China, there is a sense that Keating might be losing some of his breadth of vision and appetite for risk.
Last week’s Sydney Morning Herald carried a belated story about a recent Keating speech, Banks Servicing Communities in the Context of a Burgeoning China - 26 March 2007, (available on Keating’s website). The crux of the story is Keating’s expectation that China will exercise its great power in the coming decades magnanimously.
Keating says,
It will deal through these structures (regional groupings such as ASEAN + 3) with, I believe, a great degree of maturity and regard for the nations which are party to its growth and development and central to the peace and order of the region. I believe China will adopt a quite considerate approach to the countries around it.
These words sound more like the anodyne pronouncements of China’s Foreign Ministry than those of an incisive international analyst. Keating, after broaching so many uncomfortable truths about Australia seems to be reluctant to acknowledge all the complexity that will accompany a Chinese ascendancy.
I heard similar pronouncements of unfounded optimism on China's rise some years ago from the former PM at a lecture at Sydney's Seymour Centre.
Keating’s optimism about China is far from well founded.
It is way too early to call what kind of player China will be on the international stage. The signals are mixed. To express such confidence about China’s future international posture may be good sense for Keating the business consultant, it does not seem to take account of the variable signals China is sending. It seems also to diminish a man from whom we expect to hear candour.
China’s support for the government of Sudan, in order to reap the energy dividend from the country’s oil wealth, hardly constitutes responsible or benign international citizenship. China has actively thwarted international attempts to get UN peacekeepers into Darfur. There are signs recently that China’s position here may be changing. It is too early to be sure.
In Myanmar, China’s “respect” for sovereignty has seen the establishment of a very significant economic beachhead in a country that is home to one of the planet’s most odious regimes. China’s broad economic activity in Myanmar significantly diminishes the impact of any international boycott. Arguably the contest between China and India for the affections of Burma’s rogue regime negates the strategic rationale of an economic boycott as a device for bringing political reform to the country.
In the Pacific, there is also a sense that China and Taiwan are involving themselves in local politics in ways that are not always helpful to the countries involved.
The world also continues to accept a less than enlightened position from China on Taiwan. Similar issues in other parts of the world would be resolved by referendum. Not with China. And nor does anybody in the corridors of Western foreign ministries see the need to at least suggest a democratic solution. It’s hard to imagine a similar position being adopted by the developed world in any other case – especially when Taiwan’s flourishing democracy is considered.
This is not to assume a negative view of China’s likely future position in world affairs. It is to argue that it’s too early to know - and to suggest that Mr Keating’s China interests are colouring his normally finely tuned critical eye. One can’t ignore China’s continued poor record on human rights or its current influence on world affairs when projecting a likely future role. There are definite causes for optimism – as there are causes for concern. Mr Keating can’t be expected to hector the Chinese. Nobody would benefit from that. A more measured position would be more credible. In China, measured voices calling for change are getting a hearing. Keating would be better using his enormous talents and likely influence to present something more nuanced and original than something from a Chinese Foreign Ministry template.
Paul Keating is probably John Howard’s most longstanding, vigorous and vicious critic. Sometimes his critique is more vicious than valuable. He’s amusing to listen to but you sometimes come away wondering more about Keating’s visceral hatred and bitterness than the particular issue that he is discussing.
I’m a great Keating fan. I think he was a great Prime Minister. I admired his mind, his vision and his readiness to take risks for the good of the country both as Treasurer and Prime Minister. I shook his hand at a Condell Park polling booth in the 80s and again in Vietnam in the 90s. I found him an inspiring leader. His capacity to embrace the full range of national issues from the economy to indigenous affairs, foreign policy and the arts was remarkable. He made Australia think big and broad about its past and its future.
In contrast, the Howard years have been small minded and uninspired. Howard expressed contempt for the “vision” thing from the outset and he has been true to his commitment to vision free government.
But this piece is about Keating not Howard.
And I’m starting to have some serious reservations about 21st century Keating. As a very high-end business consultant with a special interest in China, there is a sense that Keating might be losing some of his breadth of vision and appetite for risk.
Last week’s Sydney Morning Herald carried a belated story about a recent Keating speech, Banks Servicing Communities in the Context of a Burgeoning China - 26 March 2007, (available on Keating’s website). The crux of the story is Keating’s expectation that China will exercise its great power in the coming decades magnanimously.
Keating says,
It will deal through these structures (regional groupings such as ASEAN + 3) with, I believe, a great degree of maturity and regard for the nations which are party to its growth and development and central to the peace and order of the region. I believe China will adopt a quite considerate approach to the countries around it.
These words sound more like the anodyne pronouncements of China’s Foreign Ministry than those of an incisive international analyst. Keating, after broaching so many uncomfortable truths about Australia seems to be reluctant to acknowledge all the complexity that will accompany a Chinese ascendancy.
I heard similar pronouncements of unfounded optimism on China's rise some years ago from the former PM at a lecture at Sydney's Seymour Centre.
Keating’s optimism about China is far from well founded.
It is way too early to call what kind of player China will be on the international stage. The signals are mixed. To express such confidence about China’s future international posture may be good sense for Keating the business consultant, it does not seem to take account of the variable signals China is sending. It seems also to diminish a man from whom we expect to hear candour.
China’s support for the government of Sudan, in order to reap the energy dividend from the country’s oil wealth, hardly constitutes responsible or benign international citizenship. China has actively thwarted international attempts to get UN peacekeepers into Darfur. There are signs recently that China’s position here may be changing. It is too early to be sure.
In Myanmar, China’s “respect” for sovereignty has seen the establishment of a very significant economic beachhead in a country that is home to one of the planet’s most odious regimes. China’s broad economic activity in Myanmar significantly diminishes the impact of any international boycott. Arguably the contest between China and India for the affections of Burma’s rogue regime negates the strategic rationale of an economic boycott as a device for bringing political reform to the country.
In the Pacific, there is also a sense that China and Taiwan are involving themselves in local politics in ways that are not always helpful to the countries involved.
The world also continues to accept a less than enlightened position from China on Taiwan. Similar issues in other parts of the world would be resolved by referendum. Not with China. And nor does anybody in the corridors of Western foreign ministries see the need to at least suggest a democratic solution. It’s hard to imagine a similar position being adopted by the developed world in any other case – especially when Taiwan’s flourishing democracy is considered.
This is not to assume a negative view of China’s likely future position in world affairs. It is to argue that it’s too early to know - and to suggest that Mr Keating’s China interests are colouring his normally finely tuned critical eye. One can’t ignore China’s continued poor record on human rights or its current influence on world affairs when projecting a likely future role. There are definite causes for optimism – as there are causes for concern. Mr Keating can’t be expected to hector the Chinese. Nobody would benefit from that. A more measured position would be more credible. In China, measured voices calling for change are getting a hearing. Keating would be better using his enormous talents and likely influence to present something more nuanced and original than something from a Chinese Foreign Ministry template.
Friday, 30 March 2007
THE PILGER PROBLEM
Introduction
The piece below was written in January 2006. I have decided to publish it on this blog after listening to Pilger speaking with Philip Adams this week on Late Night Live about Bobby Kennedy. In a few simple sentences Pilger managed to despatch all American Presidents including and since Eisenhower to a hell of ethical ignominy.
The question I was hoping for from Adams was "Is America unique in its capacity to churn out the worst possible leaders? Do other countries (apart from US allies of course) ever produce leaders of equivalent moral depravity as the United States or is it a special US gene? Has there ever been a relatively good leader in the US or anywhere else?
Pilger's angles on so many issues are absurd. He is one of the few progressive writers who fits the ideological template so over played on by Henderson, Devine and others.
Perhaps the most adsurd outburst from Pilger was an effort to place Clinton and Bush in similar camps in terms of creating international chaos and destruction. This is patently ridiculous and shows the simplistic untextured views that provide Pilger his platform.
Anyway, here is the piece from early 2006.
John Pilger’s new book is called Tell Me No Lies. It’s a collection of some of the most important investigative journalism of the past six decades. I have only read some of the book but with familiar names like Wilfred Burchett, Seymour Hersh, Greg Palast and Eric Schlosser aboard it is sure to be an excellent read.
Here in Sydney, the book’s release coincides with the John Pilger Film Festival and I attended last night to view two of Pilger’s Vietnam documentaries – The Quiet Mutiny (1970) and Last Battle (1995) and to hear the man speak in person.
Pilger is a man revered by some, hated by many. I’m really not sure how to place him. I sympathise with so much of what he has to say. Yet, I feel very uncomfortable with his approach and analysis.
In my first few years of living in Vietnam, I made a point of reading many of Pilger’s books including Heroes and later Distant Voices. I have also read A Secret Country and The New Rulers of the World. I had a great regard for Pilger and his morally charged crusading style. He had a big impact on my twenty something world view. My worshipping of the campaigner has subsided in recent years and I have struggled to make sense of my ambivalence.
Last night’s films crystalised my dilemma.
Pilger forces his positions on the reader or viewer and often uses either dubious techniques or thin and questionable arguments to make his case. A favourite Pilger subject matter and one about which I have some knowledge is Vietnam – during the war and after. A viewing of Pilger’s film on post war Vietnam (1995) provides few insights into the reality of the country and would likely be viewed as offensive and patronising to Vietnamese of all political colours. Pilger cannot transcend his pre 1975 Vietnam War era headspace. He can view the Vietnamese only as victims – mostly of American misdeeds.
Massive as these misdeeds were, Vietnam’s story, like so many of those that Pilger reduces to morality tales drained of all complexity, is one of more grey than Pilger is able to acknowledge. Americans and South Vietnamese tarred with one brush = evil imperialist / corrupt traitors. Vietnamese and Vietnamese villagers = practitioners of high morality and justice. Pilger does not state these things. His presentation of the “facts” and his glaring omissions paint the picture for him.
It’s hard to pick Pilger’s most grievous distortion. Two howlers do spring to mind (I’m finishing this piece some weeks later now). At one point in the film, Pilger laments the Vietnamese government’s abandonment of collectivised agriculture in the 1980s. You would have to search very hard through the villages of Vietnam and through to the most hard core Communist cadres to find someone to support Pilger’s position on this. Rural and city dwelling Vietnamese have vivid memories of the total breakdown in the food supply that followed collectivisation (there was plenty of corrupt distribution also). Starvation was rampant and even those in there mid to late twenties in modern Vietnam remember!
The other grievous distortion is Pilger’s obliviousness to the extraordinary positive energy of Vietnam. Vietnam’s story is one of tragedy and determined recovery. The recovery is imperfect of course. But to spend time in contemporary Vietnam and not be swept up in the positive energy of the place requires the most dogged war correspondent nostalgia. I have seen it frequently in Vietnam with war correspondents.
Pilger’s approach to the world has won him a legion of admirers in Australia and abroad. I still agree with a good many of the positions he puts on many issues. The problem is that his approach can only reinforce existing entrenched opinion. His style and discipline will never open any closed minds. He’s like an aged rock star belting out the tunes that made him famous to his old fans – but unable to reach out to a different audience. And surely the different audience is the one that really matters?
The piece below was written in January 2006. I have decided to publish it on this blog after listening to Pilger speaking with Philip Adams this week on Late Night Live about Bobby Kennedy. In a few simple sentences Pilger managed to despatch all American Presidents including and since Eisenhower to a hell of ethical ignominy.
The question I was hoping for from Adams was "Is America unique in its capacity to churn out the worst possible leaders? Do other countries (apart from US allies of course) ever produce leaders of equivalent moral depravity as the United States or is it a special US gene? Has there ever been a relatively good leader in the US or anywhere else?
Pilger's angles on so many issues are absurd. He is one of the few progressive writers who fits the ideological template so over played on by Henderson, Devine and others.
Perhaps the most adsurd outburst from Pilger was an effort to place Clinton and Bush in similar camps in terms of creating international chaos and destruction. This is patently ridiculous and shows the simplistic untextured views that provide Pilger his platform.
Anyway, here is the piece from early 2006.
John Pilger’s new book is called Tell Me No Lies. It’s a collection of some of the most important investigative journalism of the past six decades. I have only read some of the book but with familiar names like Wilfred Burchett, Seymour Hersh, Greg Palast and Eric Schlosser aboard it is sure to be an excellent read.
Here in Sydney, the book’s release coincides with the John Pilger Film Festival and I attended last night to view two of Pilger’s Vietnam documentaries – The Quiet Mutiny (1970) and Last Battle (1995) and to hear the man speak in person.
Pilger is a man revered by some, hated by many. I’m really not sure how to place him. I sympathise with so much of what he has to say. Yet, I feel very uncomfortable with his approach and analysis.
In my first few years of living in Vietnam, I made a point of reading many of Pilger’s books including Heroes and later Distant Voices. I have also read A Secret Country and The New Rulers of the World. I had a great regard for Pilger and his morally charged crusading style. He had a big impact on my twenty something world view. My worshipping of the campaigner has subsided in recent years and I have struggled to make sense of my ambivalence.
Last night’s films crystalised my dilemma.
Pilger forces his positions on the reader or viewer and often uses either dubious techniques or thin and questionable arguments to make his case. A favourite Pilger subject matter and one about which I have some knowledge is Vietnam – during the war and after. A viewing of Pilger’s film on post war Vietnam (1995) provides few insights into the reality of the country and would likely be viewed as offensive and patronising to Vietnamese of all political colours. Pilger cannot transcend his pre 1975 Vietnam War era headspace. He can view the Vietnamese only as victims – mostly of American misdeeds.
Massive as these misdeeds were, Vietnam’s story, like so many of those that Pilger reduces to morality tales drained of all complexity, is one of more grey than Pilger is able to acknowledge. Americans and South Vietnamese tarred with one brush = evil imperialist / corrupt traitors. Vietnamese and Vietnamese villagers = practitioners of high morality and justice. Pilger does not state these things. His presentation of the “facts” and his glaring omissions paint the picture for him.
It’s hard to pick Pilger’s most grievous distortion. Two howlers do spring to mind (I’m finishing this piece some weeks later now). At one point in the film, Pilger laments the Vietnamese government’s abandonment of collectivised agriculture in the 1980s. You would have to search very hard through the villages of Vietnam and through to the most hard core Communist cadres to find someone to support Pilger’s position on this. Rural and city dwelling Vietnamese have vivid memories of the total breakdown in the food supply that followed collectivisation (there was plenty of corrupt distribution also). Starvation was rampant and even those in there mid to late twenties in modern Vietnam remember!
The other grievous distortion is Pilger’s obliviousness to the extraordinary positive energy of Vietnam. Vietnam’s story is one of tragedy and determined recovery. The recovery is imperfect of course. But to spend time in contemporary Vietnam and not be swept up in the positive energy of the place requires the most dogged war correspondent nostalgia. I have seen it frequently in Vietnam with war correspondents.
Pilger’s approach to the world has won him a legion of admirers in Australia and abroad. I still agree with a good many of the positions he puts on many issues. The problem is that his approach can only reinforce existing entrenched opinion. His style and discipline will never open any closed minds. He’s like an aged rock star belting out the tunes that made him famous to his old fans – but unable to reach out to a different audience. And surely the different audience is the one that really matters?
Monday, 19 March 2007
ANOTHER IRAQ ANNIVERSARY
The lack of depth and highly partisan nature of Australia's Iraq discussion reflects poorly on our media and our democracy
Last week I watched the PBS Iraq war documentary, “The Dark Side”. With a particular focus on Vice President Cheney, the programme looked in detail at the use of the attacks of September 11 to build the case for the disastrous war in Iraq. It was amazing viewing, especially in light of the seniority and credibility of those in the defense and intelligence establishments who chose to speak out about their experiences and in some cases contributions to the Iraq war debacle and the lies upon which it was built.
Bob Woodward’s book State Of Denial is similarly remarkable in its detail and its sources. The picture of deceit, arrogance and incompetence Woodward paints is astonishing. What is also incredible is the depth of the sources. These are not partisan Democrats, New York Times liberals or any of the usual bogeymen. They are mostly senior Defense (including former Defense Secretary Rumsfeld) and Intelligence personnel or White House insiders. Their credentials are impeccable.
There are now dozens of serious films and books on the Bush administration’s deceit and incompetence in Iraq. The electoral consequences of this outpouring and introspection by both those associated with the war and its opponents took its toll in November’s congressional elections. State Of Denial must have helped put the final nails in Donald Rumsfeld’s coffin also.
Diverse views on the Iraq conflict coexist in the Republican Party, the Democrat Party, the US right and the liberal left.
Australia is a key member of the alliance that elected to wage war in Iraq. So where are the books and documentaries about the incompetence and deceit that led us into the war? Where are the senior military and defence officials that feel sick with their involvement? Where are the senior members of the Liberal government who think it’s time there was some honesty in the discussion of why Australian soldiers were sent to Iraq four years ago?
Australians have been opposed to the Iraq War from the outset. If our politicians are able to take cover from the absence of Australian combat casualties, they should be forced to account for Iraq’s downward spiral into violence, hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths, the creation of an al Qaeda hothouse, an emboldened Iran and a rallying call for terrorists the world over.
Both the United States and the United Kingdom have endured painful introspection over the Iraq war and especially the decisions that led to the conflict. Australia’s debate has been far less far reaching. Australia is weaker for the low quality of our Iraq debate and less likely to learn the painful lessons that Americans and Britons are now all too conscious of. Australia’s media has a lot to answer for.
Notes
Brian Toohey seems alone as an Australian journalist who has sought to unravel the inside story of the Howard government’s short cuts to war. His most recent piece in the AFR March 17 – “Howard’s choice: when to recall troops” and a similar piece this time last year, stand out.
For a glimpse of the The Dark Side documentary, click here
Last week I watched the PBS Iraq war documentary, “The Dark Side”. With a particular focus on Vice President Cheney, the programme looked in detail at the use of the attacks of September 11 to build the case for the disastrous war in Iraq. It was amazing viewing, especially in light of the seniority and credibility of those in the defense and intelligence establishments who chose to speak out about their experiences and in some cases contributions to the Iraq war debacle and the lies upon which it was built.
Bob Woodward’s book State Of Denial is similarly remarkable in its detail and its sources. The picture of deceit, arrogance and incompetence Woodward paints is astonishing. What is also incredible is the depth of the sources. These are not partisan Democrats, New York Times liberals or any of the usual bogeymen. They are mostly senior Defense (including former Defense Secretary Rumsfeld) and Intelligence personnel or White House insiders. Their credentials are impeccable.
There are now dozens of serious films and books on the Bush administration’s deceit and incompetence in Iraq. The electoral consequences of this outpouring and introspection by both those associated with the war and its opponents took its toll in November’s congressional elections. State Of Denial must have helped put the final nails in Donald Rumsfeld’s coffin also.
Diverse views on the Iraq conflict coexist in the Republican Party, the Democrat Party, the US right and the liberal left.
Australia is a key member of the alliance that elected to wage war in Iraq. So where are the books and documentaries about the incompetence and deceit that led us into the war? Where are the senior military and defence officials that feel sick with their involvement? Where are the senior members of the Liberal government who think it’s time there was some honesty in the discussion of why Australian soldiers were sent to Iraq four years ago?
Australians have been opposed to the Iraq War from the outset. If our politicians are able to take cover from the absence of Australian combat casualties, they should be forced to account for Iraq’s downward spiral into violence, hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths, the creation of an al Qaeda hothouse, an emboldened Iran and a rallying call for terrorists the world over.
Both the United States and the United Kingdom have endured painful introspection over the Iraq war and especially the decisions that led to the conflict. Australia’s debate has been far less far reaching. Australia is weaker for the low quality of our Iraq debate and less likely to learn the painful lessons that Americans and Britons are now all too conscious of. Australia’s media has a lot to answer for.
Notes
Brian Toohey seems alone as an Australian journalist who has sought to unravel the inside story of the Howard government’s short cuts to war. His most recent piece in the AFR March 17 – “Howard’s choice: when to recall troops” and a similar piece this time last year, stand out.
For a glimpse of the The Dark Side documentary, click here
Tuesday, 13 March 2007
MURDOCH'S AUSTRALIAN FLAGSHIP ASSUMES ELECTION FOOTING
The Murdoch press's Australian flagship is in election mode
The Weekend Australian has assumed its non-too subtle election posture during the past fortnight. A similar position was assumed prior to the last election. The paper’s opinion writers are not only almost unanimously supportive of the coalition. They seem to be strategic campaign partners.
And so we’re off again.
Perhaps the most outrageous piece was a front page leader on March 3. It ran “Hicks ‘al Qaeda’s 24 carat golden boy”. The message was clear. And the millions of people who read the headline that Saturday but never even purchased the paper let alone read the story, carry it with them. Problem was that the story leader and the story content were profoundly different. The piece went on to tell of how Feroz Habbasi, a former Al Qaeda operative and Guantanamo Bay inmate had retracted all of his statement about Hicks including the ’24 carat claim’.
Just imagine your own name or perhaps that of Mr Murdoch or Chris Mitchell (Editor in Chief of the Oz) in a front page leader in The Australian - Mr ‘select name’ serial 'select crime' only to read the article to discover an untested and since retracted claim was the basis for the leader. And then you have a sense of editorial standards Murdoch / Mitchell style.
So was this just sloppy leader writing or something more sinister? Read the Australian for a few weeks and judge for yourself.
David Hicks is clearly an issue of deep concern to the Government. You don’t ignore an issue for five years only to champion it with vigour unless the electoral alarm bells are ringing. And who benefits from the airing of untested claims about Hicks and his Al Qaeda activities?
Whatever Hicks’s crimes, he deserves a proper trial.
Not all of the Australian’s opinion writers are in the conservative camp of course. Philip Adams clearly is not. Matt Price would seem to have progressive sympathies but is more cynical than anything else. Paul Kelly can come down on either side. Noel Pearson’s views fall in and outside both camps.
What distinguishes Shanahan, Sheridan, Albrechtsen, Pearson (Christopher) et. al. from those listed above is their ubiquity in column inches, the rabidity of their views and their almost totally dependable political partisanship.
Philip Adams may be the most “liberal” of The Australian’s commentators but he can’t be depended on by Labor or anybody else to sing to the prevailing ALP chorus. Same for the rest.
The Conservative chorus joins Howard in perfect pitch – almost without exception. How dreary. Don’t listen to me. Read them and judge for yourself.
Gerard Henderson and others frequently lament the failure of conservative commentary to penetrate in Australia. Of course the shock jocks penetrate but it's difficult to find penetrating conservative opinion writing. If conservative writers could decouple from the Howard government and stand up for conservative issues, we’d all be better off.
The Weekend Australian has assumed its non-too subtle election posture during the past fortnight. A similar position was assumed prior to the last election. The paper’s opinion writers are not only almost unanimously supportive of the coalition. They seem to be strategic campaign partners.
And so we’re off again.
Perhaps the most outrageous piece was a front page leader on March 3. It ran “Hicks ‘al Qaeda’s 24 carat golden boy”. The message was clear. And the millions of people who read the headline that Saturday but never even purchased the paper let alone read the story, carry it with them. Problem was that the story leader and the story content were profoundly different. The piece went on to tell of how Feroz Habbasi, a former Al Qaeda operative and Guantanamo Bay inmate had retracted all of his statement about Hicks including the ’24 carat claim’.
Just imagine your own name or perhaps that of Mr Murdoch or Chris Mitchell (Editor in Chief of the Oz) in a front page leader in The Australian - Mr ‘select name’ serial 'select crime' only to read the article to discover an untested and since retracted claim was the basis for the leader. And then you have a sense of editorial standards Murdoch / Mitchell style.
So was this just sloppy leader writing or something more sinister? Read the Australian for a few weeks and judge for yourself.
David Hicks is clearly an issue of deep concern to the Government. You don’t ignore an issue for five years only to champion it with vigour unless the electoral alarm bells are ringing. And who benefits from the airing of untested claims about Hicks and his Al Qaeda activities?
Whatever Hicks’s crimes, he deserves a proper trial.
Not all of the Australian’s opinion writers are in the conservative camp of course. Philip Adams clearly is not. Matt Price would seem to have progressive sympathies but is more cynical than anything else. Paul Kelly can come down on either side. Noel Pearson’s views fall in and outside both camps.
What distinguishes Shanahan, Sheridan, Albrechtsen, Pearson (Christopher) et. al. from those listed above is their ubiquity in column inches, the rabidity of their views and their almost totally dependable political partisanship.
Philip Adams may be the most “liberal” of The Australian’s commentators but he can’t be depended on by Labor or anybody else to sing to the prevailing ALP chorus. Same for the rest.
The Conservative chorus joins Howard in perfect pitch – almost without exception. How dreary. Don’t listen to me. Read them and judge for yourself.
Gerard Henderson and others frequently lament the failure of conservative commentary to penetrate in Australia. Of course the shock jocks penetrate but it's difficult to find penetrating conservative opinion writing. If conservative writers could decouple from the Howard government and stand up for conservative issues, we’d all be better off.
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