What the general told me about Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal in the early days of the Obama administration. During the first year of the Obama administration, I spent months in the summer and fall of 2009 reporting about the Pakistani nuclear arsenal from here in Washington; from Islamabad, the Pakistani capital; from New Delhi, the Indian Continue reading »
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India as the Chair of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) hosted the SCO Defence Ministers’ Meeting on 28 April. Largely unreported in Western media, the meeting underlined important divergences in the narrative promoted by US-centric media that suggests India and China have irreconcilable differences. The first striking illustration of this spirit of cooperation between India and Continue reading »
The French Government’s Research Minister, Silvie Retailleau, has announced a plan to shake up the country’s scientific research including investing an extra Euro 26 billion (equivalent to A$42.5 billion.) It is in stark contrast to the Australian situation where we spend $11.9 billion on research. To put that in perspective the French spend 2.3 % Continue reading »
For someone who is experiencing gambling harm, either due to their own gambling or someone else’s gambling, finding a quality service is often difficult. People with lived experience regularly tell us they struggle to find independent and quality information about what is on offer and the likely outcomes of any referral. The harms from gambling Continue reading »
As 2022 closed, WA’s main juvenile detention centre, Banksia Hill, grabbed national attention when one of its buildings was burned to the ground by rioting inmates, who scaled the fences in a stand-off with the riot squad. As 2023 unfolds, it’s still getting headlines as the state’s Commissioner for Children and Young People declares that Continue reading »
The Saudi-Iranian normalisation deal brokered by China has sent shockwaves throughout the region. Regional actors had not expected China to suddenly desire a political role in the Persian Gulf. Others were skeptical of Beijing’s diplomatic capacity and skills. Few, however, were as surprised as foreign policy hands in Washington – even though it is the Continue reading »
Week-end Wrap – Political Economy – May 7, 2023
by Tony Wikrent
The ‘Free Market’ is a Fever Dream and Adam Smith Wasn’t in It [YouTube]
[Rhodes Center Podcast, via YouTube, Mar 31, 2023]
Mark Blyth interviews “Jacob Soll… professor of philosophy, history, and accounting at the University of Southern California, and in his book “Free Market: The History of an Idea,” he begins way back in ancient Rome, stops in 17th-century France with Louis XIV’s minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert, and, on the way to the present, barely mentions Adam Smith at all.”
COFFS Quilters and Needlecraft Inc (CQ&N), who keenly knit for purpose creating squares and blankets going towards the international Wrap With Love project, have a new drop-off point for people making material donations. The CQ&N club meets every Thursday at the Cavanbah Centre from 8.30am to 12 midday, where members will be happy to receive...
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JETTY Dunecare members celebrated winning Coffs Harbour Regional Landcare’s (CHRL) Dee Wallace Memorial Award 2022 for 40 years of diligent work on their extensive patch of Coffs coastline with an Open Day on Saturday 29 April. Held adjacent to Jetty Dunecare’s shed at the Jetty Foreshores, the celebrations included guest speaker Peter Hardwick, a bush...
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EVERYONE is invited to come along to the Coffs Harbour Neighbourhood Centre Open Day on Thursday 11 May from 8am to 2pm. Coinciding with Neighbourhood Centre Week, which this year has a theme of ‘Locals Connecting Locals’, the Open Day is set up to foster a sense of collective belonging and engagement. Advertise with News...
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CONSERVATIONISTS across the Coffs Coast and beyond were heartened by State Labor’s pledge to create a Great Koala National Park (GKNP). However, the new State Government is yet to provide any detail, and local proponents of the GKNP are concerned that key areas of forests are slated for logging and that Penny Sharpe, who holds...
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This exhortation for women to have as many babies as they can possibly have is a huge part of the Great Replacement Theory. And don’t ever kid yourself — by that they mean the great “dark” Replacement Theory. It’s white women who they want breeding like rabbits. (See: Viktor Orban) This is the intersection of racism, xenophobia and misogyny. Anti-birth control and abortion as a way of forcing the white majority to have very large families so as not to be “out-bred” by the people of color. It’s really not all that complicated. Here is an example of how that idea is being mainstreamed: The Deseret News is under fire for promoting an op-ed that praised Tucker Carlson’s views, even after The New York Times unveiled what appears to be a racist text message he sent after the Jan. 6 insurrection.
IN memory of her late sister Mel, Raleigh Coffee and Eats owner Dianne Knobloch will host a Biggest Morning Tea event in support of the work of the Cancer Council. On Tuesday 16 May, Mel’s High Tea will be a fine affair, serving up at 10am. Advertise with News of The Area today. It’s worth...
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MUM’S the word at the upcoming Made with Love Market on Sunday 7 May from 9am-2pm on the Level 1 Carpark at Park Beach Plaza. Curated to tick all the boxes when it comes to buying a gift; the market supports handmade, has an array of unique and special wares for mum, and keeps it...
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CITY of Coffs Harbour’s Living Lightly program is funding three free workshops in May. The first workshop offered by the Nana Glen Food Collective (NGFC) is ‘Basic Home Herbal Remedies’, to be facilitated by Coramba homestead owner Jodie Nancarrow on Saturday 6 May, which booked out quickly. Advertise with News of The Area today. It’s...
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IN delivering her account of life at Pete’s Place, as guest speaker at Coffs Harbour Lions Club’s recent meeting, manager Anna Scott’s tale stirred the listeners to want to help. Pete’s Place is the drop-in centre for people experiencing, or at risk of, homelessness, located within Coffs Harbour Neighbourhood Centre. Advertise with News of The...
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DI WOODS, former manager at the Coffs Harbour Neighbourhood Centre, has been named the 2023 Coffs Harbour Electorate Local Woman of the Year Award, an honour that recognises the significant support she has given to the local community. This is an award program that recognises one woman from every electorate in NSW. Advertise with News...
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TICKETS for the Coffs Youth Climate Alliance (CYCA) concert at the Botanic Gardens last Friday April 28 sold out quickly. The youth-led event featured six primarily youth bands, with all proceeds donated to support the Alliance’s activities in advocating for climate action and combating homelessness in the local community. Advertise with News of The Area...
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Hoping Clarence and Ginni read Politico and see my latest cartoon there.
Refusing to adequately react to the ongoing epidemic of gun violence? There’s an app for that!My latest in today’s Los Angeles Times:
I think we’ve all had our eyes opened about the dangers of letting this extremist GOP take over state houses. They’re building a farm team for national politics and it’s scary as hell. Just take a look at Florida if you want to feel the hair on the back of your neck stand up. Howie Klein sent this out to Blue America members this morning. And In The Process Help Your Favorite Candidate Win $1,000 From Blue America We’ll get into the contest in a second; I just want to make sure that you know that the Virginia legislative elections are this year, 2023, not next year like most elections. We’re trying to flip the House of Delegates blue and expand the narrow Democratic lead in the state Senate. Blue America has identified 5 crucial progressive races for this contest, 2 for Senate seats and 3 for House seats.
Is unsorting America even possible? Bill Bishop’s “The Big Sort,” considered Americans’ tendency to self-segregate into communities “with people who live, think, and vote like we do.” There are also economic consequences to that. Inequality follows. American society has “become less random” as it has “become more unequal,” observes Princeton sociologist Dalton Conley. He offers a quirky thought experiment in The New Yorker on how, had we the will, we might tackle inequality resulting from geography and the birth lottery. His answer to the problem that “when rich people are asked to pay more in taxes, or to send their children to school with poorer kids, they tend to move,” is a lottery of another sort. But is inequality a problem for most Americans? Or do they see inequality as “the way things are.” Meritocracy, the prosperity gospel, and royalist sentiment argue vigorously for the status quo. Whatever. Conley’s is a thought experiment: The core issue is that our social contract is based on place: we make decisions and fund our government in a fundamentally local way.
The Movimento Sociale Italiano (Italian Social Movement Party or ‘MSI’) was founded in 1946 on ‘the assumption that fascism was not a parenthesis in Italian history, a twenty-year aberration, but a movement, a set of ideas and values, that survived military defeat,’ according to its founder Giorgio Almirante. Like Almirante, most of MSI’s leaders were […]
“the price of freedom”? “For years now, after one massacre or another,” writes Heather Cox Richardson this mourning, “I have written some version of the same article, explaining that the nation’s current gun free-for-all is not traditional but, rather, is a symptom of the takeover of our nation by a radical extremist minority.” A minority that, like Bill O’Reilly, considers daily slaughter “the price of freedom.” None of that was normal until about the time Ronald Reagan and Movement Conservatism arrived in full. Fueled by National Rifle Association money, the right twisted the Second Amendment into an “unfettered right to own and carry weapons.” They’ve turned America into a place Old West residents of Tombstone and Dodge City would not recognize. At least eight dead and nine injured at a suburban Dallas, Texas outlet mall (Washington Post): Six of the eight people killed were found dead at the scene. At least nine people injured in the shootingwere taken to hospitals by the local fire department, Allen Fire Chief Jon Boyd said.