After 11 years of conservative rule Australia makes a jump to the left (details here). Labor promised to sign the Kyoto treaty, get the troops out of Iraq (but hopefully still support the war in Afghanistan) and rolling bad some labor laws which favored the bosses.

I hope for all my Oz friends that the new government REALLY does something about the environment - even when it will decades until nature will react to any human efforts. Australia suffers tremendously from one heat wave after another, the wildlife and the great reefs are greatly endangered and have already taken a lot of damage.

But this election also influences the world stage: George Bush has now lost most of his Coalition of the Willing. Spain went left, Italy went left, Australia went left. Germany’s Frau Merkel is not very willing either nor is Britain’s Gordon Brown. Only France’s Sarkozy seems pretty excited about following America into a new war.