things to like about Laurie Oakes

His name is Laurie Oakes. Why is he so amazing? Because he writes stuff like this (from today's Bulletin).

• "The Australian Prime Minister, as usual, echoes what is being said in Washington."
• "If these catastrophic consequences come to pass, the architects of the Iraq war, not its opponents, will be to blame."
• "Howard would like us to rule off the book, and forget how we got into the Iraq mess in the first place."
• "The Iraq exploit was a bad idea badly executed, and Howard was in it up to his neck. He used to boast that Australia was no mere follower, but actually had a key role in planning the operation. He cannot avoid responsibility for what is now increasingly recognised, even among conservative commentators and Republican politicians, as a disaster."

Yes, yes, yes. Do not let Howard get away with this. Chateau VVB marched with many other middle-type Australians, and got vilified for it, because we knew the war was wrong. To be fair, we didn't know it was going to be so comprehensively stuffed up. And having spent a few years in some places equally repugnant to liberal western values as Iraq - try Burma - we wondered why Iraq? Ha ha.

And something that always intrigued me was how Australia's participation in the COW was represented in news reports. The European news reports at the time of the invasion were all about the US, UK, Spain and Poland. Makes sense. But there was no mention of Australia at all, even in US and UK reports as I recall, whereas here of course we got the full government-mandated and officially endorsed line both direct from (insert disgusting but accurate characterisation here) and their paid lackeys in the News Ltd press about our key role. And there was no doubt that Howard was being, er, less than frank, when he said no decision had been taken to join in the invasion.

Speaking of News Ltd, what would you give to see the Oakes line in one of their papers? I'd almost reinstate my sub to The Australian for that.