Bolivian Writing

There are so many good pieces anaylising the situation in Bolivia today, that I feel it is better to link to them. They all are much better than I can write, check them out.

Eyes on US Troops in Paraguay as Bolivian Election Nears by Benjamin Dangl

Nick Buxton is an english man living in La Paz, his blog has a number of personal stories which give you a powerful idea of the realities of life in Bolivia

Jim Shultz has lived here for almost 8 years and offers a very good anyalsis of different campaigns on his blog.

WE QUALIFIED!

I hardly ever support Australia when they play sport, any form of nationalism makes me uncomfortable, except when it comes to soccer.

Australia has qualifed for the World Cup for the first time since 1974, and only the second time in the history of the competition.

I watched Australia lose to Argentina in 1993, I cried when we should have beaten Iran in 1997, and well, Uruguay 4 years ago was a disaster. If anyone has ever read Fever Pitch by Nick Hornby, youll know how I feel right now.

The great thing is we qualified on our own merit, we beat a South American team and we deserve to go. Alot of debate surrounds providing a direct qualifying spot for Oceana, but I, for one, think its much better to qualify the hard way, and show the world we deserve to go, than be given a spot.

We might lose every game in the compeition, but who cares. WE ARE GOING TO GERMANY!

I watched the first leg in a small cafe in La Paz, I didnt get up at 5am to watch the game in Sydney, I knew my heart could not withstand a penalty shot out, which is what I suspected it would end up in. But I was there in spirit.

Well done boys!

Lies and Irresponsibility

"it is deeply irresponsible to rewrite the history of how that war began."

George W Bush, 11 November 2005

What sort of a statement is this? Rewrite history? No one is rewriting history, we are telling the truth. They lied and cheated their way into war. For those of us who knew the truth from the start, its small condolences that we have been proven right again and again.

What makes me angry the most is the media and those who claim the moral high ground, most of those supported the war from the start. HOW DARE THEY claim now that they were lied too. It was them who claimed the anti-war movement was misguided and in support of Saddam Hussain, it was them who gobbled up everything Bush, Blair, Howard etc said without criticism and without question.

I was on anti-war rallies in 3 Continents - Europe, Australia and North America. I was part of the march in London that had 1 million people on it. I was part of the 78% of world population who was against the war. The war is wrong, always has been and always will be. History will prove this, but it wont bring back the thousands of innocents that have died in the process.

It is irresponsible to not tell the truth. It is irresponsible to allow the deaths of thousands of innocents in the name of oil. It is irresponsible (and criminal) to use phosphorous on human beings. Everything the Bush govnt, and in absolute support of it, the Howard Govnt does is irresponsible.

The world cannot survive another 3 years of Bush and his cronies. Ive heard people say, "we survived Regan, we can survive Bush", sure, we can, but the Middle East and Latin American and other countries cannot.

Its time for regime change.