Business confidence, as a result, is at record lows. There's speculation that the Federal Minister, Jocelyn Newman, is considering quitting politics after 14 years. Senator Newman says she hasn't yet made up her mind. One of Australia s most successful living authors, Tom Keneally, is packing to leave for the Horn of Africa on a one-man peace mission. Keneally whose novel Towards Asmera chronicled an earlier phase of Eritrea s cycle of famine and war, is now desperately worried about the current war with Ethiopia.
Whale meet again.
That s the message that Japan wants Australians to get in a letter-drop that s started around the country. The Japanese Whaling Association, via a Melbourne Public Relations firm, launched the mass-mail blitz today. The fires are the latest outbreak of a peculiarly Melbourne form of delinquency hedge burning.