Double Standards

[kneeshooter]

Sometimes I worry that I can't keep up with the changing world. I seem to remember not so long ago dear old General, sorry President Musharraf was being treated as a pariah for having conducted a military coup in Pakistan. Now he's off to tea with Dubya at Camp David and last week visited Tony in Downing Street.

However, to counter any implied cynicism and to stop me getting too annoyed about things that I can have very little personal influence over - I'll end with a joke - "Ethical Foreign Policy".

Beh!

Comments

[kneeshooter]

This talk of boundaries reminds me of something I heard on the Radio the other week about the "Longest Straight line in the world" - the eastern boundary of Western Australia. The 'net then jumped to my rescue...

Western Australia - South Australia - Northern Territory Border
A glance at most maps of Australia will tell you something that isn't quite true. The border that runs along the eastern edge of Western Australia is not actually one continuous straight line.

The survey of the W.A. border was first discussed in 1911, but it wasn't until 1922 that an agreement was signed between then Prime Minister W.M. Hughes, and Acting Premier for South Australia, Mr. Bice, and the Premier of Western Australia, Sir James Mitchell. The agreement set out the border as being a line determined by the 129th meridian east longtitude. However, the agreement required that the boundary be defined by lines running north and south from independantly fixed points at Deakin and Argyle. When survey work began on the South Australia - Northern Territory border in 1963, it was quickly realised that the earlier agreement precluded the possibility of these lines meeting exactly.

Precise survey methods confirmed this, and in June 1968, two monuments - approximately 127 metres apart - were erected at the junction of the boundaries. This ceremony was attended by the respective Surveyor Generals, H.Comm from Western Australia, H.A. Bailey from South Australia, and P.J. Wells from the Northern Territory. The monuments common to all three territories was named Surveyor General's Corner at the suggestion of the Director of National Mapping. One interesting piece of trivia is that fewer people have visited this site than have been to the South Pole.

[oldnick.livejournal.com]

Interesting.

Being a bit ofg a map geek I immediately grabbed my atlas to look at this, and tried to find Deakin and Argyle.

The frightening discovery was trhat they were respectively 80 & 60 miles inland - and still almost looked to be on the coast on my map. It's a long straight-ish line.