DID you watch any of Blair’s appearance at the Iraq inquiry? The former PM faced a gruelling six-hour session. During that time he was questioned about everything from his relationship with George Bush to his feelings on Saddam Hussein. Tricky Tony answered in a calm and composed way before wrapping up by declaring that he had NO regrets about going to war and that he’d do it again. Woah,that’s controversial stuff Mr Blair, especially since nearly 200 British soldiers and over 90,000 Iraqi civilians died in the conflict. Still, you’ve got to give it to Tony, he’s stuck to his principles. He hasn’t backed down or tried to pass the buck to someone else.He just continues to declare that Saddam would have posed a massive threat to world peace and was a “monster” who needed to be removed. Shame none of the evidence shows he had ANY weapons of mass destruction. At all. I say the war was a mistake. I voted against it back in 2003 and I’d do that again. No one denies Saddam was a bad bugger. But there were better ways of dealing with him than following bumbling Bush with troops, tanks and no plan for what to do after we’d toppled the dodgy dictator. Despite the good things he did, Tony will always be remembered for the UK’s biggest foreign policy cock-up in the late 20th century. The focus now should be on the future. We should make sure Iraq has the support it needs to rebuild. Then maybe we can start to make amends for these colossal and deadly blunders.
SPACE lovers the world over were gutted last week when President Barack Obama pulled the plug on the US “Constellation” space programme. The project – launched by George W Bush in 2003 – aimed to put men back on the moon by 2020 and kick-start the space race to Mars. But the new President didn’t like the way things were going over at NASA and canned Constellation even though more than five billion dollars had already been spent on it! Obama now wants private companies to step in. That means instead of shuttles being launched by NASA, who have an imperfect but reasonable record stretching back decades, we could see the likes of “EasyShuttle” and “Ryanspace” launching folk into orbit. I like Obama but he’s made the wrong call here. This century will almost certainly see humans on Mars, developments at the international space station and an exciting space race with China. But it won’t be a contest if the US government isn’t prepared to go all the way with big-deal projects. Cancelling Constellation is a real blow to space exploration, but there may be a final twist in the tale. A group of courageous Congressmen are getting together to try to save the programme by scuppering Obama’s plans. If they get enough support he may have a real fight on his hands and the Leader of the Free World may end up saying: “Houston, I have a problem!” And unless he does change his mind, I bet the next moon visitors will be chewing chow mein instead of biting into a Burger King. As defeats go, that would be a Double Whopper... with cheese!
ON Tuesday US firm Kraft finally completed its long-expected takeover of Cadbury. This kicked off a whole heap of controversy for a ton of reasons. First off, a lot of folk see Cadbury as a great British institution that should stay in British hands, instead of some US multinational. Secondly, some are saying Britain should recover from recession by investing in its companies and not flogging them off. And most importantly, workers worry their jobs will be axed to pay off Kraft’s massive debts. I’m inclined to agree with these concerns. It’s important to let businesses make their own business decisions, but will Kraft really do Cadbury any favours? The government should make sure the jobs are safe and Kraft should make sure they respect what Cadbury means to Britain. For a lot of people Cadbury is about far more than Wispas, Crunchies and Dairy Milk, it’s about history, pride and a lot of people’s livelihoods. It may be about
sweets,but the takeover stands to leave a very bitter taste.
sweets,but the takeover stands to leave a very bitter taste.
ARGENTINEAN President Cristina Fernandez found a novel way of boosting her country’s pork industry this week – by claiming that it is better for your sex life than Viagra! Cheeky Cristina floated her theory at a meeting of major pig farmers and even revealed that she and her husband had enjoyed a particularly raunchy weekend after eating a lot of pork. Argies are the world’s biggest consumers of beef so their pork industry often suffers as a result.A lot of folk reckon that the president’s idea will now give it a much needed lift. I guess the only losers are those in the Viagra industry who will probably suffer when everyone starts switching to pork chops. But we all know that the situation would be a lot different if you could buy the Daily Sport in Argentina. When it comes to waking up next to Hannah Owens versus a bacon sandwich, which would you prefer?
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