"There are some legitimate security issues, but I believe many of the objections the administration is making are not for security reasons, but to disguise mistakes that were made prior to Sept. 11." -- Bob Graham
Bob Graham (born 1942) is an Australian children's author and illustrator. His books include Max, which won the Nestlé Smarties Book Prize Gold Award, Jethro Byrd, Fairy Child, which won the Kate Greenaway Medal, and "Let's Get A Pup!" Said Kate which won the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award.
"A significant number of pages and sentences that the administration wants to keep in a classified status have already been released publicly, some of it by public statements of the leadership of the CIA and the FBI.""During the Cold War, we gathered information by listening to the Soviets, taking pictures of the Soviets, and we allowed our human intelligence to decline.""Gen. Tommy Franks told me the war was being compromised as specialized personnel and equipment were being shifted from Afghanistan to prepare for the war in Iraq - a war more than a year away.""I consider my voice to be a centrist moderate voice among the nine Democratic candidates.""I had earlier concluded that a war with Iraq would be a distraction from the successful and expeditious completion of our aims in Afghanistan. Now I had come to question whether the White House was telling the truth.""I have had national security background, 10 years on the Intelligence Committee, the last two years as chair.""I keep lists of names of people that I have met, a list of things to do day by day as well as a log of how my time is consumed throughout the day. It's a very important part of my personal discipline.""I presumed the president was being truthful until a series of events undercut that confidence.""I voted no on the resolution to give the president authority to go to war against Iraq. I was able to apply caveat emptor. Most of my colleagues could not.""I would give relief from the first $10,000 of the payroll tax. I would allow small businesses to accelerate depreciation so they would have an incentive to buy now rather than defer. I would also give to the states $40 billion of relief.""In my judgment, the greatest risks are international terrorist groups like al Qaeda and Hezbollah. The war in Iraq has taken our attention off those priorities.""It's fundamentally unfair to have so much of the tax relief go to so few. And it is a 10-year tax plan rather than one, as mine, focused on the next two years, which in my opinion is the critical time to jumpstart the economy.""The American people do not have the information upon which they can hold the administration and responsible agencies accountable. I call that a coverup.""The American people have been denied important information for their own protection.""The American people should be informed about what kind of capability terrorists have inside the United States. They should be informed of why we are not using information to do a more effective job of dealing with terrorists.""The doctors have given me a green light. They have said that my heart is significantly more efficient today than it was four months ago. And I am anxious to be the next president of the United States.""The president has undermined trust. No longer will the members of Congress be entitled to accept his veracity. Caveat emptor has become the word. Every member of Congress is on his or her own to determine the truth.""The president, clearly as a result of the war and the afterglow of the war, is in a time of great attention.""This president has been reluctant to hold anybody accountable. No one was held accountable after September the 11th. Nobody's been held accountable after the clear flaws in intelligence leading up to the war in Iraq.""Today 80 percent of all the oil that comes out of the Gulf is from 1,000 feet or more and today almost a third of it is more than 5,000 feet below the surface. What hasn't happened is the safety and the ability to respond to a negative event such as this blowout, has been far outrun by the technology of drilling itself. We need to close that gap.""We are in possession of what I think to be compelling evidence that Saddam Hussein has, and has had for a number of years, a developing capacity for the production and storage of weapons of mass destruction.""We need to have a strong defense focused on areas that are in the greatest vulnerability. I have been very concerned about America's 361 seaports as a point in which terrorist activities and materials could be brought into the country.""We need to make a greater investment in human intelligence.""We need to make is to strengthen the position of the director of the CIA.""We ought to recognize that we have an offensive responsibility to take the war to the terrorists where they are. That responsibility has waned in the last year as military and intelligence resources were withdrawn from Afghanistan and Pakistan to be used in Iraq.""With terrorist groups like al Qaeda, you can't learn what you want to learn about their capabilities and their future plans by taking a picture of it, and they've learned not to use the telephone.""Yes, more than 100 Democrats voted to authorize Bush to take the nation to war. Most of them did so in the belief that the president and his administration were truthful in their statements that Saddam Hussein was a gathering menace."
Many of his books have won Children's Book Council of Australia awards. A scene from Greetings from Sandy Beach appeared on a 1996 Australia Post stamp; one in a series of four stamps commemorating Australian children's books. Bob's books are found in many of Australia's primary school and public libraries and are often the Book of the Month in library-based reading programmes such as The Little Big Book Club.Graham's most recent book, Dimity Dumpty: The story of Humpty's little sister, received positive reviews in the Australian press and was listed by the Children's' Book Council of Australia as a Notable Book of 2007.
1982 Illustrated the music and lyric booklet for ABC Radio's Sing primary school music broadcast, a much-desired commission
1986First there was Frances won the Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award, Picture Books category
1988Crusher is Coming won the Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award, Picture Books category
1990Grandad's Magic was honoured in Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award, Picture Books category
1991Greetings from Sandy Beach won the Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award, Picture Books category
1992Rose Meets Mr Wintergarten was highly commended in the Australian federal government's Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission's Human Rights Awards, Children's' Literature category
1993Rose Meets Mr Wintergarten won the Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award, Picture Books category
1993Rose Meets Mr Wintergarten was a joint winner of The Australian Psychological Society's biannual Children's Peace Literature Award
1998Queenie the Bantam was shortlisted for Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award, Picture Books category
1999Buffy - An Adventure Story won the Nestlé Smarties Book Prize Silver Award
2000Buffy - An Adventure Story won the Tasmanian government's CYBER [Children's Yearly Best Ever Reads] award, Picture Books category
2000Buffy - An Adventure Story was shortlisted for Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award, Picture Books category
2000Max won the Nestlé Smarties Book Prize Gold Award
2001Max was honoured in Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award, Early Childhood category
2002"Let's Get A Pup!" Said Kate won Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award, Early Childhood category
2002"Let's Get A Pup!" Said Kate won the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award.
2002Jethro Byrd, Fairy Child was shortlisted for Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award, Picture Book category
2002Jethro Byrd, Fairy Child won the Kate Greenaway Medal (Bob donated the monetary portion of the award to refugees)
2005Aristotle shortlisted for Blue Peter Book Awards
2005Tales from the Waterhole was shortlisted for Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award, Early Childhood category
