The Australian federal government has shown itself to be powerless to control the big banks and corporations. These huge institutions have thumbed their noses at the timid words of the Federal Treasurer.

The central goal of the United States is control of the planet, power to install governments subservient to its demands, power to privatize and deregulate the economies of every nation in the world, the power to inflict on peoples everywhere “free market” corporate capitalism.

A shooting rampage occurred on December 14 at a private sports club in Sasebo City in Nagasaki Prefecture, killing a 26-year-old woman and a 36-year-old man and injuring 6 people, including two children.

Fairly commonly these days, poets end their volumes with a short prose section, usually footnotes or glosses on the poems.

In drafting the next fiscal year’s military budget, the Japanese government is discussing with the U.S. government to what extent Japan will bear the cost of the stationing of U.S. forces in Japan – the so-called “sympathy budget.”

Monday was Human Rights Day — the anniversary of the proclamation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948.

With the support of the Japanese Communist, Democratic, and Social Democratic parties, the House of Councilors in its plenary session on November 28 passed a bill to repeal the Special Measures Law on Iraq that allows the Self-Defense Forces to be dispatched to Iraq.

There is nothing like a severe defeat to bring out the critics. That is what is happening to John Howard as he sinks slowly into the shadows of politics.

Japanese Communist Party Chair Shii Kazuo in the talks urged the prime minister to engage in diplomatic efforts to eradicate terrorism, investigate the defense scandal, and increase the social welfare budget.

The comprehensive defeat of the Howard government and Howard himself is a great victory for the Australian labour movement, from Kevin Rudd to the tens of thousands of rank and file trade unionists and the members of many other community organizations.

Fukuda vowed that he will make the “utmost effort” to get an anti-terrorism special measures bill enacted as early as possible in order to resume the Maritime Self-Defense force refueling mission in the Indian Ocean.

The decisive defeat of the Coalition Government in last Saturday’s federal elections was a great victory for the labour movement, for the thousands of rank and file trade unionists and members of the Labor Party, for Your Rights @ Work groups and thousands of rank and file workers.

Regarding the movement toward establishing a “two-party system,” the DPJ has put more emphasis on its “confrontational tactics” since Mr. Ozawa became its leader. The LDP and the DPJ share the same political line concerning the main political issues.

A coalition of major media players recently released a report from an audit into the state of free speech in Australia. It is a disquieting document.

In opposition to the anti-terrorism special measures bill, constitutional revision, and consumption tax hikes, a rally was held on October 28 in Tokyo, in which some 42,000 workers and citizens took part from across the country.

The Howard Government was re-elected in 2004 largely on the basis of Liberal Party promises of record low interest rates as against high interest rates and bad economic management from a Labor Government.

Moriya Takemasa, who was the vice defense minister until the end of August, maintained a cozy relation on golf courses and at restaurants with a former executive of “Yamada Corporation."

The Congress and its spokespersons have been on overdrive selling a number of myths about the benefits of the India-US Nuclear Deal.

The [ultra-right] Liberal Party launched its official vote-buying election campaign with the promise of another $34 billion in income tax cuts over the next three years.

In order to justify the Maritime Self-Defense Force refueling operation in the Indian Ocean, both the government and a Liberal Democratic Party Diet member in a House of Representatives Budget Committee meeting on October 9 stressed that the MSDF operation is different from the U.S. use of force in Afghanistan and that the operation is necessary for Japan to secure its oil supply.