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Mark - Breakfast E-P: …

Well … we got HALF the Exacta here on ABC NewsRadio yesterday.

Firstly — with help of National Australia Bank’s Dave de Garis — we faithfully promised you a quarter-percentage point increase at 2:30pm Eastern Summer Time.

And the Reserve Bank of Australia duly delivered.

Bit of a different story in the Melbourne at 3pm.

Deb Spillane & our Racing Editor Helen Thomas said “Go Bart”.

Ah well, it’s not like we were alone in tipping “Viewed” & “Roman Emperor”….with “Allez Wonder” as an outside chance.

Not that any of that should take away from a terrific run by “Shocking”, a faultless preparation by Mark Kavanagh and a brave ride by Corey Brown.

But what really struck me about yesterday was the “Australianness” of it all:

+ The tormented jockey who finally cracked the Cup on his ninth attempt

+The long queue around the corner in the ABC Newsroom as young and old lined up to get their horses in Cup sweeps.

+The idiot-proof Melbourne Cup betting slips in the TAB for the once-a-year punters.

+The glasses of cheap champers passed around in plastic cups in offices all around the country.

+The nation glued to a TV set or a radio for an agonising three minutes.

+The frocks and fascinators at Flemington.

+The early starters crashed out in the car park.

+My 5-year old winning the “Best Dressed Lady” award at her sweltering kindy Cup Day BBQ.

A great national celebration.

What got me thinking about all this?

I was listening to the BBC via ABC NewsRadio last night and I heard that in France, President Sarkozy’s government has launched a “grand” debate about what it means to be French.

“The national soul-searching will bring together students, parents, teachers, unions, religious leaders and others to mull over such questions as whether youths should be required to sing the national anthem at least once a year, how to integrate immigrants, and whether Muslim women should be allowed to wear veils”, according to Ireland’s Independent newspaper.

The aim, according to the Christian Science Monitor, is “How to define French tradition at a time when France faces burgeoning African, Arab, and Asian immigrants, and other changes in a globalising world.”

Is one of the world’s great cultures, with its amazing tradition of gastronomy, literature, art, music, architecture, philosophy and political thought really facing such a crisis of confidence that it feels the need to define exactly what it is to be Gallic?

That it feels that there’s no symbol or occasion that everyone in France could rally around and celebrate?

Maybe they could start by declaring a national holiday for the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe…..