As I just discovered this morning, Al Jazeera has been putting news clips from its English channel onto Youtube for about two months now.

Maritime pirates have been romanticised over the years, whether it's Errol Flynn as Captain Blood, Johnny Depp as Keith Richards, or Captain Feathersword as The Fifth Wiggle. But the fact is that piracy happens on the high seas even today and it's a pretty nasty business.

Japan has been sidestepping international whaling bans for two decades under the euphemistic banner of "scientific research". Japan intends to add humpback whales to their culinary scientific research list later this year.

Among the countries Japan has brought on board in their attempts to stack the International Whaling Commission are six in the Caribbean: Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St Kitts and Nevis, St Lucia, St Vincent and the Grenadines. No doubt there's a promise of foreign aid in there. Maybe they'll build sushi bars in all those brand new cricket stadia.

With any luck, he'll be our Prime Minister by the time Australia Day comes around again: