Is war in sight?

I know I do go on about the Herald and I know it is not my business to tell the Editor where to put the copy; but I could not help but notice that today's print edition had a huge photo and story on the front cover about convicts being pressed to clean up tagging on the railway corridors of Auckland; meanwhile, this story about a planned attack on Iran was relegated to one of the obscure pages.

It is written by Catherine Field - a real journalist, the Herald's own, a grown-up, a good writer, etc. Its subject is really important - the USofA and Israel are planning to attack Iran. There goes the neighbourhood: the media are being manipulated to make this plan acceptable. The USofA and Europe are at odds. That ghastly war criminal President Bush is planning to hand his successor a burning chalice, while leaving office covered in war. All of it is bad

I hate to say it, but I must: our media, and us media consumers, can be stupidly provincial. Things happen far away – daccord, because everything is far away. But we don't seem to grasp how much they matter. Or perhaps they don't. Perhaps Laura Norder stories and celebrity gossip are more important than war news.

Perhaps it's just me.

My title is that of the original war-scare story, the 1875 Berliner Post article which probably was planted by Bismarck, should anybody care.

I expect people care even less about Canterbury Rock. Here is Caravan: