A Round Of Applause For Columbus, Please He Came Home Cleaner Than We Think

Sydney Morning Herald

Tuesday March 18, 2003

Doug Anderson

Secrets of the Dead

7.30pm, SBS: Did you see Phyllis? Saigon Rose? Venereal disease has numerous forms but not even the witty Monty Python song, enumerating the varieties, can make it a laughing matter. Three years after Columbus hit America, a new disease hit Europe. It was deadly, devastating and prevalent among the era's equivalent of jetsetters the well-travelled and promiscuous (thunderous applause = the clap). Given the timing, it was assumed that syphilis was a facet of the New World/Columbian exchange along with Europe's acceptance of the humble spud and tobacco. It seemed logical, and science accepted the proposition. The conquistadors took the common cold and smallpox to the New World and brought home the clap. But archaeologists, digging away in old graveyards, have found evidence that syphilis was common in Italy, France and especially Britain well before Columbus set sail. Why was the plague of 1495 so devastating?

Ricki Lake

11am, 7: In the 21st century, where consumer indulgence and instant gratification propel economies and shape social trends, it's a wonder Western society hasn't embraced mail-order brides with the enthusiasm that has made mobile phones a must in every pocket and handbag.

Renowned thinker and sociologist Ricki Lake opens her Pandora's box of bovine inanity to survey the curious mating rituals of loonies whose level of dignity is sufficiently low to designate them ideal participants in her renowned ``relationships" program.

Massive Landmarks of the 20th Century

Midnight, ABC: When Apollo 11 made its historic lunar touchdown, the astronauts' wives and families sat at home, watching television, praying and sharing the wonder of the moment with a gobsmacked world. All well and good. But this reflection on those events should be viewed as an appetiser for another doco that SBS has slated for screening in April. It examines the back-up strategy to be employed if all wasn't well and good. The Dark Side of the Moon purports to reveal how Stanley Kubrick was called in by President Nixon to supervise the creation of faked film footage in case the relay of images from Armstrong, Aldrin and Michael Collins failed. Typical spin doctoring with a vicious CIA codicil in the tail. As Pink Floyd noted on their album Dark Side of the Moon: ``The lunatic is on the grass ..." Nixon was on something rather stronger, I fancy, doubtless supplied by Dr Grassy Knolls.

The Cutting Edge

8.30pm, SBS: Saddam's Friends. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Even so, Saddam Hussein seems somewhat short of people willing to sing the Neighbours theme song with him. Which is why he has to put in so many good words for himself and floodhis benighted nation with his likeness.

Yet a brief squiz down the telescope of time reveals that this wasn't always the case. In fact some of the people leading the charge to knock his block off once considered Saddam a decent cove. Donald Rumsfeld used to have his ear, and it's no secret Jacques Chirac spent a good deal of time smoodging in Baghdad particularly in 1974 when he sold the oil-drenched state a nuclear reactor. The deal he cut provided France with heaps of oil. Israel whacked the facility in 1981 after scientists reconfigured it to produce fissile material. The Iran-Iraq war (1980-88) saw Germany supply Iraq with the means of producing chemical and biological arms and Rumsfeld flogged a batch of sophisticated Harpoon missiles to Saddam's regime to enhance its capacity to scupper the ayatollahs. With friends like these ...