Interesting comments.

Good for them. When Australian leadership is so defective as to even let 'bin Laden' into the country (and lie - call it a security zone), then anyone who exposes those leaders to be just like George Jr must be praised. Pranksters are the real patriots. Those who disparage APEC Pranksters must love incompetent leaders and liars. The only honest answer: Australian security was 100% at fault. No matter how much fault is applied to others, Australian security responsible for a vast number of world leaders failed so completely as to be considered criminally negligent.

Kill the messenger - a 'bin Laden' who exposes defective government leaders? Only a defective government does that. An honest Howard would have put every security manager up before the press to apologize to Australia for being so incompetent. And then also apologize personally for having assigned incompetent people.

Since Howard will not do that (he is too much a politician; cannot be honest), then good people praise the most patriotic Australians for exposing incompetence. Good people publicly note the similarities between Howard, George Jr, and Milosevic. Milosevic was not incompetent.

We did the same thing in America. When news reporters exposed zero security in most every airport (confirming what airport security people had been saying for years and were ignored), what did America do? Passed laws making it illegal for reporters to investigate defective airport security. Again, kill the messenger. Protect the incompetant.

A tribute to Australian security - they all but invited the real bin Laden to join them in ficticous security zone. bin Laden should have sent his ambassadors. Would it take massive deaths before Australians realize where real fault lies - Howard's administration? Is that what it takes - massive deaths - for Australians to identify their only problem - Howard's incompetent security people?

Why the double standard? Howard's people were criminally negligent. The only reason management does its job: those who are incompetent must be treated this ruthlessly.

Kudos to the APEC Pranksters. What is the best thing that came out of that conference? Exposed was the competence of Howard's people to worldwide scrutiny. Now everyone should be asking how deep a pathetic leadership cancer lies. What else have they been covering up? What Howard does to correct such massive incompetence will further define him. Prosecuting the Pranksters only says Howard is even more guilty - cannot deal with the real problem - his incompetent security people.

So tell us. How many publicly apologized for being incompetent? Zero? What has Howard done about his incompetent subordinates? Or does he just cure symptoms - instead prosecute patriotic Australians? How many security people have already been demoted? The only crime was incompetent government security people. That should be one to five years prison for putting so many world leaders at risk - by being criminally incompetent.

If a doctor performs an operation and the patient dies due to incompetence, then we prosecute. With leaders, consequences should be even more severe. Why the double standard? Pranksters have only exposed these questions to the benefit of everyone in the world. Why are some so nice to Howard's administration when incompetence was so severe?

I doubt anyone is going to be very nice to Howards administration when the next election comes around. He's likely to lose by a large margin, but it wont be because of this so called prank.

Why is it Howard's fault that these so called professionals, didnt do the job they were employed to do?

I agree with some of your stuff, and if I read it with my Australian accent, I read a fair amount of sarcasm....but, I dont get why its Howard's fault.

He didnt let the chasers in the security zone, he trusted people who were employed to do that job.

I dont think Johnny will be out next election....this happens everytime.

When it comes to crunch time, people get nervous and stick with what they know.

I'd bet my last cent on Howard losing office. He's unlikely to even win his own seat. His most recent announcement, while placating some, will only alienate swing voters even more because I doubt there are too many people who think Costello is a good option, and the party knows it. There'll be a leadership challenge when Howard retires and the party will degenerate into a shit fight. Let's also not forget about the IR laws. A lot of people from poorer socio-economic areas have traditionally voted conservative because they rely on their 'boss' to take care of them, but these new laws are what have really wrecked Howards chances. He's doing the unskilled labourers over and they know it. He doesn't have a hope in hades.

Meanwhile, teflon Kev can do just about anything and the polls continue to surge. Is he more trustworthy than any other politician? I don't think so. What I do think is that he's a very smart operator and the party have put the right man in charge in order to win the next election.

According to tw, it doesn't matter what country you come from, it's the person in the top job who's responsible for everything. Even bridge collapses and dickheads pulling pranks.

I don't think it's Howards fault either and I doubt anyone else with any reasonable powers of logic would think so either.

I'm outraged! How dare they destroy our illusion of security? We've paid a lot of money for that.

There was no sarcasm intended. For example I was damn serious; it clearly was a fictitious security zone. If the real bin Laden (or his agents) had killed leaders, then we should blame bin Laden and not Howard's administration? No sarcasm.

People fail to perform their jobs due to a well understood management concept called 'attitude and knowledge'. A concept that is often disparaged in some business schools where "there was plenty of blame to go around". The boss must empower his people to operate independently as defined by that ‘attitude and knowledge’. The boss is responsible for what happens even though the boss is not directly involved in the planning or execution of those plans. “The buck stops…” where? Anything less is wacko liberal excuses about "its not fair".

For example, do you think Patton did planning for his European military victories? Of course not. Other Generals commanded all those divisions. Other Generals made all plans that won battles. But Patton was fully responsible when those Generals failed. After all, it was Patton's 'bigger picture' that determined whether those divisions won or lost. Patton spent significant time traveling from unit to battlefield to front line confirming that his people had that 'attitude and knowledge'. That is what top management does because top management is responsible for all failures.

The US soldier was winning most battles in Nam. Why was the war lost? Liars - top management – especially Westmoreland – lost that war. He was fully responsible for massive actions conducted in wrong directions - in direct contradiction to well proven military science 101 concepts. Top management was responsible for those resulting defeats. An invincible army was defeated because their top manager was (in this case) one of this nation’s least competent four stars.

Howard was not involved in the planning? Howard was to host leaders for about 1/2 the world's GDP. He was not involved in the planning? Of course he was. The entire ‘attitude and knowledge’ is directly traceable to Howard. And if those people did not perform their job, well, what did Howard do about it? But again, that is 100% on Howard.

The only reason Pranksters succeeded - Howard's planning was that incompetent. Meanwhile, Patton's plans (which he did almost nothing to detail) were highly regarded. Patton got the praise. Howard deserves worldwide condemnation. To be so callous over his (his people's) incompetence also should be widely noted. No sarcasm. The people of Australia are owed an apology by those security people for being so incompetent. Instead Howard would cure a symptom of his incompetence? Instead the government would prosecute the Pranksters? Exactly what bad management does. Cure the symptoms. Cast blame elsewhere. The buck does not stop with Howard, does it.

The whole world was watching as Prankster demonstrated incompetent security planning at the highest levels at Howard's party. A responsible Howard would apologize for that security disaster, investigate like it was the Challenger, and massively correct discovered competence problems. My bet. Howard will ignore it because ‘being honest about a problem’ is secondary to dishonest politicians. Which is why the people who murdered seven Challenger astronauts got away with murder. They could not find a single engeineer who said it was safe to launch Challenger. Those who 'feel' they had reasonable powers of logic forgot to blame those who knew and murdered those seven astronauts anyway. The failure was that well understood to anyone with reasonable powers of logic. But too many would rather 'feel' than grasp the hard reality of facts. 85% of all problems are directly traceable to top management. Why does Toyota make reliale cars and GM make crap? Comes from the exact same management concepts. 85% of all problems are directly traceable to top management.

that's a load of crap. Top management should be able to delegate duties. If someone fails in their duty then they're the ones responsible.

In this case it was the security company, and I'm sure they're suffering for the lapse.

Management Rule #1 - You can delegate authority but not responsibility.

So you agree with tw's point of view? Mr Howard is responsible for poor security?

The buck stops at the top.

There are some who say the security was over the top in any case. My theory is that if that was the case, it possibly became too difficult to regulate which led to the above mentioned breech. That is to say, there were not enough highly trained staff available to do the job required.

I disagree that Howard is personally responsible. A PM cannot be held personally responsible for everything that happens, either good or bad. By that I mean that if a minister does a great job with something, no one then goes and says, "Oh Howard has done a great job". Does it reflect poorly on Howard? Yes of course, but he's not the one responsible.

Sure, someone in his government was responsible, but I don't think the buck stops at Howard. I think it stops a long time before it even gets to him.

Delegating duties never means surrendering responsibility. But that was Skilling and Lay's reasoning to proclaim innocence. You have justified their defense. According to Aliantha, Skilling and Lay were completely innocent because they delegated the work. Skilling and Lay could not possibly know of Enron's bankruptcy? Milosevic is completely innocent of genocide because he delegated the job and could not know what was happening. Blame stopped "a long time before it even gets to him"? Only if you never learned what management is about.

How many 'reasons why' were posted and ignored? Attitude and knowledge. Ignored. Why Patton was a successful general. Ignored. Why Westmoreland was obviously a horrible general. Ignored. What did Howard do when his security people were incompetent? So far - nothing. Milosevic - ignored. Clearly Milosevic was not personally responsible for a massacre of thousands. He could not have known.

Deming's famous red bead experiment was so significant as to become part of the Smithsonian collection. Any real leader knows the concepts. Mary Walton summarized it: I appreciate your need to be fair. Get over it. Nothing is fair about being the boss. You also provide zero reasons to contradict that reality. Howard was responsible for safety of a major percentage of the world's leaders. He could not know about security? Bull. It was his job. The consequences were so severe that it had to be a #1 on Howard's task list. If subordinates are incompetent, Howard provided defective 'attitude and knowledge'. What defines how the system works? 'Attitude and knowledge'. That 'system' determines how subordinates perform.

Why prosecute the Pranksters? Howard must get you to ignore the real failure. Security for so many leaders was Howard's responsibility - no one else. Those security people work for Howard. He did not know about security when security was THAT important? And Milosevic did not know about ethnic cleansing.

Howard failed three times over. He failed to take seriously something that was that important. He failed to provide his people with the appropriate 'attitude and knowledge'. He apparently failed to go after reasons for those security failures. Instead he has you blaming symptoms of incompetent security - the Pranksters. Howard has you ignoring his failures three times over. Howard has gotten a naive public to cast blame elsewhere. Classic of a superb lying politician and an incompetent leader.

The only remaining question is whether Howard will continue to fail - ignore reasons for those failures and do nothing about it.

rant on rant off. Nice work grasshopper

Is it out of your system now tw? How many more times would you like to say the same thing? How many other issues would you like to bring up which are not related to the topic?

I don't see how this can possibly be compared to genocide, and to be quite frank, if someone had happened to blow up one or two foolish leaders the world might end up being a better place anyway. Who knows, maybe someone could have even snuck up on Johnny and given him a heart attack or something.

In any case, he wont be running the country in a few months anyway, so you should be able to sleep a little easier then tw.

When teaching the mentally challenged, repetition is essential. Howard will blame the Pranksters so that you will ignore his massive failure. Such denial will not change as long as you know - and never learned. You even posted 'crap' as if that was a logical reason. 'Crap' really said Aliantha knows only using feelings. Repetitition is necessary when confronting such emotional denial. Hit concrete enough times and it will eventually crack.

Slam. 85% of all problems are directly traceable to top management. Apparently you have not yet gotten far enough to grasp W E Deming or even concepts in Ayn Rand stories. Slam. When you do, then you will appreciate the game Howard is playing; why he needs you to blame the Pranksters rather than Howard. The top manager was #1 responsible for security and safety of leaders who represent almost 1/2 the world's economy. Howard could not even do that simple task? Slam. Worse, he got Aliantha to blame others AND to remain so hardheaded as to ignore those realities. Aliantha even posted one word - 'crap' - as if proof. One word defines your entire comprehension of managment training? If so, then you represent the kind of supporter Howard needs.

There was no security zone - a management failure. Nobody could provide security because the system failed. Slam. You will understand that when you begin learning management theory. Currently Aliantha remains in denial without even knowing why.

When top management says there is plenty of blame to go around, then 99% of all problems are directly traceable to top management. Slam.