Julia has a cow

Julia Gillard can't take a trick at the moment, that's for sure. The latest one being on the Indonesian cattle issue. Of course no one was happy seeing the conditions in some Indonesian slaughterhouses, but stopping the whole export industry for six months when thousands of cattle are about to get on ships?

This was also a rare occasion when Bob Katter also came close to making sense. On Lateline last night, he made the point that I have not seen much of in the media reporting: how the hell did the Australians involved in setting up that box system that is designed to get cattle on their side in about the clumsiest way possible ever think that was going to look good to Australian animal rights people?

As Katter said:

I mean, when I saw that box I just couldn't believe that anyone could have been so stupid as to design that thing. ...

This person tonight admitted that they knew what was going on, that they'd sent people in to have look at this, they knew what was going on and they've known for years and years and years about it and they've done absolutely nothing about it except to provide a stupid box.

If you're going to but the animal in a box anyway, why not make it one which properly holds the beast while you have access to slit its throat while thus constrained? Surely this is possible.

There was also a decent bit of commentary about the issue in an article in the Australian this morning too.