Target Centermass

I said I had faith in the Aussies as they began going to the polls Down Under, and they redeemed that faith.

Now, fresh off his victory, Prime Minister John Howard has firmly entrenched his country as one of our staunchest allies.

Australian troops will stay in Iraq (news – web sites), Prime Minister John Howard declared Monday, as the stock market in Sydney hit a record high following the conservative leader’s election to a historic fourth term.

At his first news conference since Saturday’s election increased the parliament majority of his center-right coalition, Howard said his priorities were guarding the nation’s security, working with allies to fight terrorism and maintaining the booming economy.

The victory was a resounding vote of confidence in the government’s handling of Australia’s economy, which has low inflation, unemployment and interest rates, a budget surplus and low government debt.

All this despite the antics of John Kerry’s sister.

It should be noted that not all of Howard’s opposition have decided to take the results gracefully.

Voter ignorance, greed and apathy returned the Coalition to government, a South Australian Greens MP said today.

Kris Hanna, a former state Labor backbencher who joined the Greens last year, today said he was disappointed with the majority of Australian voters.

“(Labor Leader Mark) Latham did his best to offer an alternative but too many Australians were not discerning or caring enough to vote (Prime Minister John) Howard out,” Mr Hanna said.

Mr. Hanna missed his true calling as a Florida Democrat.

Way to go, ‘Stros!

The Houston Astros have finally shrugged off the albatross that has been their playoff history, eliminating the Atlanta Braves 12-3 in a decisive game five.

Next up: St. Louis for the National League pennant.

EDIT: More details here.

Overall, [Carlos] Beltran broke the Houston record for postseason homers.

In a poignant note, the record was formerly held by Ken Caminiti, who hit three in an opening-round loss to the Braves in 1999. Caminiti, who spent 10 seasons with the Astros, died Sunday of an apparent heart attack at age 41.

The news hit Caminiti’s former teammates — Biggio and Bagwell — especially hard. “I guess the best thing we can do today for him is just go out and play well,” Biggio said before the game.

Mission accomplished.

Texas’ recent redistricting has left two current congressmen, Pete Sessions and Martin Frost, slugging it out against each other in a bitterly-contested affair. A poll released today shows Sessions holding a lead only three weeks before the election.

U.S. Rep. Pete Sessions is slightly ahead of his Democratic rival, U.S. Rep. Martin Frost, in one of the nation’s most watched congressional races, according to a newspaper poll of likely voters.

Sessions has 50 percent to Frost’s 44 percent in the survey, which polled 800 likely voters last week for The Dallas Morning News. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percent.

Pollsters randomly selected 32nd Congressional District households with published telephone numbers. The survey was conducted by Iowa-based public opinion firm Selzer & Co.

Frost, Texas’ most senior congressman, was forced to run in Sessions’ Republican-leaning district after Republicans decimated Frost’s district in off-year political remapping.

Frost immediately attacked the poll, contending it undersampled hispanics, who represent over a third of the district’s population.

Representative of the animosity shown throughout this campaign, the Frost camp called Sessions a hypocrite for streaking thirty years ago as a college freshman.

Democrats today circulated old newspaper clippings of a 1974 college streaking stunt staged by hundreds of students at Southwest Texas State University, including an 18-year-old Pete Sessions.

Sessions, a conservative Republican who wrote a column condemning Janet Jackson’s nude display during this year’s Super Bowl halftime performance, apparently bared his bottom with about 300 male and female students on the streets of San Marcos during the two-night rampage.

….

Sessions’ campaign isn’t denying the congressman’s public nudeness.

“Congressman Sessions’ old school days are long gone,” said Sessions’ spokesman Chris Homan. “He recognizes it as an immature action of an 18-year-old college freshman.”

But Frost’s campaign is holding Sessions’ bare bod to the fire.

“Pete Sessions exposed himself to children and strangers,” said Frost spokesman Justin Kitsch. “He’s exposed himself as a hypocrite as well.”

Sessions’ spokesman dismissed the comparison of Sessions’ juvenile acts to those of Jackson, who revealed her breast in front of millions of Super Bowl watchers at the finale of a halftime performance with singer Justin Timberlake.

This isn’t exactly the kind of exposure the four-term Republican wants in the final three weeks of a tight race with Frost, a 13-term Democrat. The two incumbents are battling for Republican-leaning Dallas area District 32 in what is expected to be the most expensive race in the country.

There has been much silliness of this sort, as well as more serious allegations, by both sides in this contest. However, decades-old college frivolity is not going to alter Session’s poll lead. As a resident of a nearby district who actually works within the confines of the 32nd, I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that Sessions will carry the day on Nov. 2.

Continuing their Orwellian repainting of events, the Chinese stand by their view of 1989′s massacre at Tiananmen.

Chinese President Hu Jintao says Beijing has no intention of reversing its view of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests.

Mr. Hu made the comment Saturday in Beijing at a news conference with French President Jacques Chirac.

When asked about the Tiananmen events, President Hu said there has been no consideration of re-classifying the official view that they were a subversive riot. He said the government’s decision to put down the protests led to China’s later economic growth.

The statements were Mr. Hu’s first public comments on the Tiananmen protests since he became head of the Chinese military last month.

Second verse, same as the first.

Mr. Hu, ask Lenin, Stalin, et al., about their control of history. Their versions held true only for a time. However, today’s more accurate view of history is not on their side of the story. And the world moves ever quickly onwards. Your spin of history may not outlast your days.