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How Australia beat the Springboks

AUSTRALIAN rugby writers are in the seventh heaven after their national team, the Wallabies, ensured the ouster of the defending champions, South Africa, in the world cup rugby tournament over the weekend.

Australia was behind the Springboks in every possible aspect of the game but still ran out 11-9 winners. In the process of trying to explain this, writers from the Australian side have put forward every possible reason – the relative age of the two teams (Australia had a much younger team), the lack of strategy on the part of the South Africans, the courage of the Australians, etc etc

Nobody, but nobody, is willing to look at the fact that the presence of a referee from the southern hemisphere played a big role in the Australian win. Not that the referee was one-sided and favoured Australia – no, he had a very good game. But his interpretation of the rules went Australia’s way due to the prevailing circumstances.
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The revolution is on hold

MONTHS after the governments of both Egypt and Tunisia were toppled, protests continue apace in Yemen and Syria but there is no end in sight, one way or the other. In Libya, on the other hand, it seems to be the end of the road for Muammar Gaddafi.

In Syria and Yemen, the governments are hanging on because the US has been unable to provide military aid through its proxies; an attempt by the US to pass a resolution in the UN Security Council against Syria was vetoed by both Russia and China.

The same two countries have connections to Yemen, Russia from the old days when there were two countries, North and South Yemen, the latter friendly to the old USSR. That the US has been unable to get Russia and China on-side is an indication of how much the US has lost its clout as a superpower.
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Myer is a sad shadow of what it used to be

MYER is one of Australia’s two biggest department stores – and by that I mean stores which belong to Australians. Over the 14 years that I have been visiting the store, it has noticeably gone downhill.

I visited the store this morning to send a gift to the daughter of a friend who is getting married shortly. Myer has a gift registry where a couple can create their own wishlist and send the number of the list to their intended guests.

The guests then either visit the store or else call up and order an item from the list; one has the option of having it delivered to the residence of the bride and groom.
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Serena Williams is one good reason why people dislike the USA

SHE is often touted as one of the better women’s tennis players of the modern era. But Serena Williams is just an ugly example of American arrogance, someone who can never be wrong, someone who carries a chip on her shoulder that is even bigger than her behind (and the latter does take some beating).

Williams contested the US Open final a couple of days ago, her opponent being Australian Samantha Stosur. She was soundly beaten, but made her own news by behaving like a buffoon.
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Why is Wayne Barnes allowed to referee rugby games?

During the last World Cup rugby tournament in France, Englishman Wayne Barnes ensured that tournament favourites New Zealand would be thrown out at the quarter-final stage by allowing a French try that was scored off a blatant forward pass.

And this wasn’t one of those line-ball decisions – there was a difference of about two metres between the two French players who exchanged the pass.

Now Barnes has done it again, denying Wales a chance of defeating the reigning champions, South Africa, at the 2011 championships.
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Why was the US attacked on September 11, 2001?

THIS weekend will mark 10 years since the World Trade Centre was brought down by Islamic fundamentalists in a spectacular attack that changed life in the US. But till today, we have had no answer to the question why.

The Middle East correspondent of The Independent, Robert Fisk, tells of an incident shortly after the attacks, when he was interviewed along with Alan Dershowitz, the well-known US lawyer.

Fisk, like any good journalist, raised the question of why the attacks had taken place; as he explained it, even in the case of a small robbery, the first thing the police try to find out is possible motive.
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Refugee deal hits the skids

THE Australian government, looking to cater to the wishes of the redneck element of the population, drafted a refugee swap deal some months ago, whereby it would send 800 asylum-seekers to Malaysia to be processed.

In return, the government would accept 4000 refugees – people who had been processed through the system – from Malaysia.

The High Court has now struck down this deal after a challenge was launched by a lawyer.
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Australia’s tactics for World Cup rugby fraught with danger

AUSTRALIA enters next month’s World Cup rugby union tournament as one of the teams in with a chance — at least, based on the personnel and the strengths of the other teams involved.

But the Australian coach, New Zealander Robbie Deans, is resorting to a gameplan that has been tried before — when he was the understudy to John Mitchell, the coach for the All Blacks at the 2003 Cup. And Mitchell’s tactics failed that time.

In 2003, the Auckland Blues won the super rugby title. Mitchell based his national team for the cup on four players from the Blues – mercurial stand-off Carlos Spencer, wingers Doug Howlett and Josevata Rokocoko, and full-back Malili Muliaina.
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Sri Lanka is losing the propaganda battle over war crimes

WHEN a sovereign nation has to respond to charges made in a TV documentary that screens in just a few countries, no matter how serious those charges are, then it has well and truly lost the battle to convince people that it is in the right.

Sri Lanka finds itself in this position after having, rather foolishly, decided to respond to a documentary made by Britain’s Channel 4 about alleged war crimes committed during the war against the Tamil Tiger separatist movement that ended in May 2009. (The programme is also available on YouTube; just search for “Sri Lanka killing fields”.)

The Lankan bid to refute the claims came a few days after Channel 4 broadcast even more evidence of Colombo’s complicity in war crimes – evidence given by two unnamed soldiers who went to the extent of claiming that the orders to kill Tamils en masse in order to get the war over with came from the country’s defence secretary, Gotabaya Rakapakse.
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Why the ABC has been forced to cut programs

THE Australian Broadcasting Corporation has announced cuts to a number of programs which will result in staff in some centres losing their jobs. Surprisingly, the corporation, a government-funded entity, has cited “falling audiences for some programmes” as one reason why it had to make these cuts.

It tells the tale of the corporation in just those few words. Exactly why a government-funded organisation should be chasing behind ratings is not clear.

But the ABC has become like any other commercial network and wants to ape them. It wants to be in the limelight, not to provide services for the diverse range of people who live in Australia.
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