Back via Bali

I've been away. Or rather, my attention has been elsewhere. Namely the Australian election. For those tuning in late, we had a change of government with a swing of 5.something% removing John Howard from government and a Bush friend from the world stage. Howard also lost his own seat in parliment, which in our system is, like, ouchy.

Any lessons for the US election? Probably not a lot. The key issues were workplace relations and climate change. New PM Kevin Rudd has moved swiftly on the latter and ratified Kyoto before rushing off to the Bali conference, with a bunch of cabinet members in tow, to join the rest of the world in locking horns with the American delegation. All of which tells you that the centre/left in the western world generally is opposed to the Bush administration on climate change. But you knew that already.

Illustrative perhaps of the new government's contrasts with Howard is the rapid promiotion of Senator Penny Wong to cabinet as Minister for Climate Change. As well as being, in one pundit's memorable phrase, tough as nails and smart as paint, the senator also happens to be female, asian, mulitlingual and gay. I'm sure the culture warriors Bush sent to Bali to obstruct for their country didn't know where to start with Senator Wong. Their loss.

Speaking of the Bali conference. The lack of coverage in the US media was pretty depressing (although not as depressing as the US delegation's appalling positions on the issues). It was about the future of the planet for heavens sake. It was front page news here every day for a week but hardly rated a mention in your media. I normally avoid gratuitous America bashing, but I'm afraid in this case I'm falling back on the old, what planet are you people on?