Prime Minister John Howard has once again embarrassed Australia amongst its friends.

He is the undisputed master of callous domestic media manipulation in Australia already, but give him the unqualified backing of a punch-drunk George W Bush and you see him turn into a man who has lost any idea of the values of tolerance and friendliness that are the genius and pride of our country.

He thinks that being tough will impress people. I presume all the bullies who picked on him at school impressed him with how quickly they could make him submit. Fifty years later, the most expert politician in Australia, surrounded by unscrupulous cronies who will flagrantly ignore international standards of decent behaviour for the sake of vote-winning political stunts, now thinks it's his turn to be a bully. But we're not in the schoolyard anymore. He is an utter embarrassment.

People of Southeast Asia, please accept the apologies of myself and all my friends and family for this sad state of affairs. John Howard's tough-guy rhetoric reflects very little indeed about Australia.