FRANCIS BOYLE, fboyle at law.uiuc.edu

Professor of international law at the University of Illinois College of Law in Champaign and author of Palestine, Palestinians, and International Law, Boyle said today: "This week, President Obama has attacked the Palestinian UN membership bid as a 'distraction' and Secretary of State Clinton has claimed the U.S. 'strongly supports' the two-state solution but that the 'way of getting a lasting solution is through direct negotiations between the parties.'

Britain has amended a law that allowed for issuing arrest warrants against Israeli politicians who visit the country, British Ambassador Matthew Gould announced Thursday.

Gould called opposition leader Tzipi Livni, against whom an arrest warrant was issued in 2009 & told her the Queen has signed the amendment "to ensure that the UK's justice system can no longer be abused for political reasons."

The Queen Has Lost Her Royal Marbles

Defence Minister Stephen Smith said this week that Afghanistan would be high on the agenda at top-level talks in the United States marking the 60th year of the Australia-US alliance.

The AUSMIN talks will be held in San Francisco, where Australia and the US signed the ANZUS treaty in September 1951, binding Australia to cooperate with the US on defence matters in the Pacific.

"It's the 60th anniversary of our alliance with the United States - the US alliance continues to be the pillar and the bedrock of our strategic, security and defence arrangements," Mr Smith told reporters in Sydney.

Ray Finkelstein QC's media inquiry may not pursue bias in the media, but The Power Index hears that broadcasting regulator ACMA has already got Alan Jones and 2GB in its sights.

ACMA has confirmed with The Power Index it is investigating three separate complaints of bias or factual inaccuracy against Jones, and another two complaints relating to fellow 2GB presenter Chris Smith.

Since the complaints were made up to six months ago, it's likely that some or all are close to resolution.

from Crikey ....

Thomson allegations pick long-standing wounds at HSU

Crikey senior journalist Andrew Crook writes:

To put it bluntly, every single chapter in the history of the extension of U.S. power has opened with the same sentence: "Innocent Americans were treacherously attacked..."

- Remember theMainein Havana harbor in 1898(274 dead)?

- TheLusitaniatorpedoed by a German U-boat in 1915(1,198 drowned, including 128 Americans)?

- Pancho Villa's raid on Columbus, New Mexico, in 1916 (18 U.S citizens killed)?

- Pearl Harbor (2,402 dead)?

Same sneak attack, same righteous national outrage. Same pretext for clandestine agendas.

Things look pretty bad for Labor at the moment.

Indeed most commentators say defeat is inevitable and it's just a matter of time, with pokies early next year as the possible alliance-breaker.

For true believers like me it's heartbreaking. Much has changed in party politics but it still matters which party is in power. As Paul Keating said it defines the nation.

One thing is for certain, every Labor MP will be on edge and full of advice for party and faction leaders. Those of a conservative disposition will be calling for calm and the risk-takers will be contemplating if not advocating change.

Tony Karon in Time.com shows what happens when you brutally occupy another people for decades; the world gets sick of it:

Airspace was still closed to civil flights. British intelligence chiefs had flown by military aircraft to Washington to confer with their American counterparts. After their discussions had been concluded, they repaired to the British embassy and there talked late into the night. One of those present was Eliza Manningham-Buller, then deputy head of the British Security Service and responsible for its intelligence operations and subsequently its chief.

On 13 September, one of the world's biggest arms fairs opens in London, backed by the British government. On 8 September, the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry will hold a preview entitled "Middle East: A vast market for UK defence and security companies". The host was the Royal Bank of Scotland, a major investor in cluster bombs.

Legislation brought in since September 11 has hurt social cohesion and civil liberties.

The failed prosecution of Jack Thomas and at least four men from the Benbrika group who were acquitted of being members of a home-grown jihadist organisation in 2008 has not only eroded public confidence in counterterrorism agencies but also hurt our relationship with large sections of the Muslim community.

Engagement and dialogue became a distant secondary consideration during those prosecutions.

A forecast by the immigration department head, Andrew Metcalfe, that London and Paris-style social unrest would break out in Australian cities if 600 boat people arrived a month has caused outrage, and calls for his sacking.

The words have threatened Labor's multicultural credentials, with groups including the Federation of Ethnic Communities Councils labelling them ''inflammatory'' and ''devastating''.

from Crikey .....

GDP figures out this morning were stronger than expected. The Australian economy grew by 1.2% in the June quarter, real gross domestic income grew 6.5% in the 2010-11 financial year -- the largest growth since 1987-88.

Nice maths for Treasurer Wayne Swan. If only President Obama could boast a better set of figures. Obama will take the nation through the numbers of his jobs package plan Thursday night (US time) in his address to Congress.

from Crikey .....

Buried in the glossy pages of the October edition of UK Vogue is the revelation, midway through an interview with Wendi Deng (who wasn't sleeping due to the stress of the phone-hacking scandal, thanks for asking), that former British PM Tony Blair is godfather to Rupert's and Wendi's daughter Grace.

from Crikey .....

We trust Laurie Oakes and George Negus to bring us the news. But not Alan Jones and Andrew Bolt.

And the news is worse for Bolt, the nation's pre-eminent conservative crusader, with more than half of respondents to an Essential Research survey not knowing who he is.

Essential put a number of journalists and commentators to its weekly online panel to ask who they most trusted. The results perhaps aren't surprising, and skewed with state-based stars, but show among the trustworthy and reviled that some of the nation's hot-headed megaphones aren't as famous as they might think.