President Barack Obama to address Australian parliamentUNITED States President Barack Obama will address a special joint sitting of federal parliament in Canberra on March 23.And Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono will deliver a speech to parliament when he visits Australia next week.Anthony Albanese, in his role as leader of the government in the House of Representatives, has confirmed that parliament will be specially recalled for the US President in three weeks' time."The visit of President Barack Obama will of course generate a great deal of interest from the Australian public and indeed we will be honoured by his presence in Canberra on that day,'' Mr Albanese said.The last American president to address the Australian parliament was George W Bush in October 2003.Mr Obama is likely to bypass Victoria on his four day trip to Australia, spending his time in Sydney and Canberra.The President will be accompanied by his wife, Michelle, and children Malia and Sasha. The family have expressed interest in seeing wildlife including koalas, kangaroos, wombats and platypuses.The Indonisian President will give his address next Wednesday, March 10, at 2pm."This is an important visit by our nearest neighbour and a good friend of Australia,'' Mr Albanese said.Mr Albanese said it would be the first time an Indonesian president had addressed the Australian parliament.
Hey, Phil, can you keep him?Please? ? ? ? ? ?
Send him on a walkabout!!!
Federal Opposition Leader Tony Abbott got lost in the central Australian outback and was forced to send a text message to his press secretary: "WERELOSTNEARFOSSILCREEK".While Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was gearing up for a big health announcement, his opposite number was yesterday contemplating a cold and uncomfortable night, lost and sleeping rough, before being saved.Just before lunchtime yesterday, Mr Abbott set off with a small party on "quad" four-wheeled motorbikes to ride deep into Watarrka country in search of Aboriginal sacred sites.
send him out with Tony Abbotthttp://www.smh.com.au/national/tony-abbott-lost-in-the-outback-20100303-phd9.html
US PRESIDENT Barack Obama has confirmed he will delay his visit to Australia by three days due to the fierce battle at home over health reformObama spokesman Robert Gibbs made the announcement on his Twitter feed, a day after saying the trip would not be postponed, reflecting the fast-shifting debate on an issue testing the president's political credibility. Gibbs also said Obama's wife Michelle and daughters Malia and Sasha would no longer join the president on a poignant journey to Indonesia, where he lived as a boy for four years with his beloved late mother. "The president will delay leaving for Indonesia and Australia -- will now leave Sunday -- the first lady and the girls will not be on the trip," Gibbs wrote. In his daily briefing, Gibbs was repeatedly pressed on whether the president's threatened effort to pass health care reform, could further delay the visit to Asia but refused to budge. "The president is going on a trip on the 21st," Gibbs said repeatedly. The trip now figures to be an even faster sprint through Indonesia and Australia than previously scheduled, though the White House says it must go on as both nations are vital to Obama's bid to revive US Asia-Pacific policy. Obama has billed himself as America's first "Pacific president" and his journey had been timed to coincide with the school's spring break to allow the president to take his family. The fact he must leave his daughters at home, may take the gloss off the trip for Obama and disappoint his hosts. Gibbs however said even in Obama's original itinerary, there had never been plans for the president to visit his old school or the house where he lived when he was in Jakarta as a boy between 1967 and 1971. "The United States has been absent from the Asia Pacific region, we can't lead in this region of the world without strong bilateral relationships with Indonesia and Australia," Gibbs said. The president is also due to stop in the Pacific Ocean island of Guam, an unincorporated US territory, on the way to Asia, to see American troops. The White House had been pressing the House of Representatives to hold a key vote on Obama's flagship health care reforms before his original departure date on March 18, but it became clear that that deadline was unrealistic. The delay will also likely fan fresh doubts about the capacity of Democratic leaders in the House of Representatives to put together a majority of votes for the embattled effort to overhaul America's mostly private health care system. Obama has spent over a year trying to cajole Congress into passing the kind of sweeping health care reform that has eluded Democratic presidents for decades. In recent days, he has escalated the fight, staking his own political credibility and authority on passing the bid to expand access to health care for millions of Americans and to cut costs and rein in insurance giants. In a delicate piece of political choreography, Obama wants the House of Representatives to pass a Senate health care bill, then for both chambers to endorse a package of "fixes" to harmonize the final legislation. Obama, who lived in Jakarta with his late mother Ann Dunham in the 1960s, said last year in Singapore that he was looking forward to visiting his old haunts in Indonesia. He was invited to make the trip by Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, and both sides have said they plan to use Obama's childhood ties to the country to further tighten a crucial pan-Pacific relationship.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has sympathised with Barack Obama's last-minute decision to scrap his visit to Australia, saying they share the challenges of major health reform and difficult Senates.
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