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On 29 July, 2024, Dr José Ramos-Horta, President of the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste met in Beijing with Chinese People’s Republic President Xi Jinping to upgrade the relationship between the two countries to “Comprehensive Strategic Partnership”. On the one hand Ramos Horta punctured Canberra fears of a Timor-Leste – China Security Agreement, but on the Continue reading »

The headline above is outrageous and incendiary – it is also unquestionably true. We have a duty to bear witness to what the Palestinians must endure. The great Israeli journalist Gideon Levy wrote powerfully a couple of days ago about the rape culture that is part of the Israeli war machine. Riots occurred at the Continue reading »

On 6 Aug, 1945, approximately 200,000 people in the hitherto untouched town of Hiroshima perished in the worlds first use of a nuclear weapon in anger. On 9th Aug, a somewhat smaller number in Nagasaki likewise perished. Only the authority of secretary of state Stimson, who had visited the city of Kyoto, famous for its Continue reading »

Patricia Karvelas’s article reflecting on the Labor government’s ‘timid’, ‘pragmatic’, ‘realistic’ change of course in pursuit of bipartisanship on Indigenous affairs made for uber-depressing reading (ABC News, online, ‘Timidity reigns as Anthony Albanese backs away from Makarrata at Garma Festival’, 5th August). It confirmed that the institutional racism prosecuted by the No campaign, is alive Continue reading »

Two news items last week completely reversed the economic outlooks in Australia and America. In Australia, the trimmed mean inflation rate for June was 3.8%, which was below the 4.0% expected. This convinced economist that the RBA won’t increase its cash rate in August but instead will reduce it later this year if inflation keeps Continue reading »

Much has been made by the International Education Industry of a 2023-24 Treasury estimate that 84 percent of overseas students go home. Apart from the accuracy of this estimate over ten years after the Knight Review recommendations were implemented, the Industry argues that because a large percentage of students go home, there is no need Continue reading »

In response to riots, attacks on police, and destruction of property in numerous British cities, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer says ‘I utterly condemn the right wing thuggery we have witnessed this week-end.’ To hold perpetrators of violence accountable, he promises the full weight of the law: arrests, convictions and sentencing. A more immediate task, Continue reading »

The question of who is responsible for causing the Ukraine war has been a deeply contentious issue since Russia invaded Ukraine on 24 February 2022. The answer to this question matters enormously because the war has been a disaster for a variety of reasons, the most important of which is that Ukraine has effectively been Continue reading »

People often object to criticisms of Israel’s ongoing mass atrocity in Gaza by saying, “Well what SHOULD Israel have done in response to October 7 then?” They say it like the question should confound you, as though it’s some kind of thought-terminating unanswerable Zen koan or something. But it isn’t. The question is very answerable, Continue reading »

2018 was a record-setting year for stocks, but it’s one investors would rather forget. The Dow fell 5.6%. The S&P 500 was down 6.2% and the Nasdaq fell 4%. It was the worst year for stocks since 2008 and only the second year the Dow and S&P 500 fell in the past decade.Dec 31, 2018 While MAGA tries to convince people that a 2.3% drop in the DOW today is a "Kamala Crash," even though she's not President, they completely have amnesia about the multiple "Trump crashes" that we saw when Trump WAS President. And no, don't say, "it was COVID" because what I'm… pic.twitter.com/YS7x9uloXq — Ed Krassenstein (@EdKrassen) August 5, 2024 I just thought it was worth pointing this out when you hear the Trumpers screeching about the “Kamala crash” over the next few days. I have no idea what the market’s are going to do but I know that they will be saying that they never went down with Trump. They did, even beyond COVID.

Dear Children:

All my real estate, savings, and tangible assets are to go to all of you, and if you don’t want them, to Goodwill or the thrift shop. Or just find someone who looks like they need them. Some things that don’t look like much are more valuable than you might think, like the cowboy boots I wore in college. They are still good. I wore them at Woodstock!

The same is true for my digital estate. I left a fourteen-page list of passwords in that wooden box that Grandpa made himself—you know, the one he was always bragging about. I may have changed some of them since I last printed out the list, but you can probably figure them out. (I’m not writing anything down: the NSA!)

But here’s the idea. They are usually combinations of the first letters of titles of books that I was reading, or wanted to read, combined with numbers. I used the book about Vikings a lot, and the one about rattlesnakes, but also some lines from the poem about the captain that Grandpa liked.

The Justice Minister has said the Government will 'make sure' that anyone jailed over the riots has a 'prison place waiting for them'

Middle-American White Dad I felt that all the choices were pretty good and Walz is one of the best. He’s a progressive who knows how to talk about progressive issues in ways that sound very accessible to middle Americans. He’s an American archetype — a football coach. I think he makes a very good pair with Harris.

Monkey-wrenching the democracies “The real threat to democracy is a failure to imagine the worst-case scenario,” Tony Gerber, co-director with Jesse Moss, told NPR Monday in an interview about their new documentary War Game. The film simulates U.S. officials responding to a post-election coup after a disputed election. “Insurgents take capitals, questioning the president’s military control,” says IMDB. Officials must counter a “Red Cell” radical faction coordinated by a fictional “Order of Columbus.” Gerber is wrong here. The real threat to democracy is the flagged-bedecked Americans in diapers who have rejected democracy, the Constitution, and America’s founding vision for strongman rule. (And Supreme Court justices prepared to prop it up.) Republicans plan to open a second front after November 5. The election they expect to lose at the ballot box they plan to win, or at least thwart, in court. Georgia is just one battlefield. But the threat of violence War Game postulates is real. For those not paying attention, right-wing riots broke out over the weekend across England and in Ireland. Police arrested hundreds.

Time is running out to be on it “It’s OK to vote against Donald Trump,” Mesa, Arizona’s Republican mayor, John Giles told a press conference on Monday. Giles remains a registered Republican but is stumping for Kamala Harris. He hopes to see the GOP “get away from the personality cult our party has become.” “I think the time has come for us as Arizona Republicans to admit the obvious,” Giles told reporters, “which is that our party’s nominee is not qualified for office and that we need to vote for the adult in the room, and that is Kamala Harris.” “Character matters,” said former GOP state Rep. Robin Shaw. The Harris campaign days ago named Giles and Shaw to head up a task force to do outreach to Arizona Republicans: “As a lifelong Arizonan and longtime Republican, I strongly believe in defending democracy and standing up for our personal freedoms. Donald Trump and JD Vance represent the greatest threat to American values and institutions that I have seen in my lifetime – and that’s why I am committed to defeating him in November,” Giles said in a written statement.

Paul Davidson, the co-founder of the Journal of Post Keynesian Economics (JPKE) and a leading Post Keynesian economist, died on June 20, 2024, in Chicago. He was born in Brooklyn, NY, on October 23, 1930, about a year after the Great Crash of 1929. He was a staunch defender of the importance of John Maynard […]

I understand she’s wonderful. I have no serious critiques. My only concern is… is she electable?

I know she’s a fantastic communicator. Every clip of her I see, I’m blown away by her knowledge, poise, and warm meme-able laugh. I just worry about what others think of her. Not everyone is as willing as I am to take substance, style, content, reputation, qualifications, and confidence over vague vibes. Will they find her electable?

I will vote for her, for sure. No question. I’m a male feminist. And I’m hearing plenty of people say the same thing, including those who were planning to vote for the other guy. But even though millions of individual Americans are willing to cast their ballots for her, I’m just not sure she’s as electable as we need her to be.

When I ask people if they’re with her, they say yes. But when I ask if they find her electable, almost everyone says no. Or they say yes. Or they say, “What does that mean?” which is rude. I’m just trying to make conversation. All of which is to say: I’m worried.

She’s just so much. I won’t explain. I worry she’s not electable.

Last Friday’s news was dominated by the ‘biggest IT outage in history’, as   a bug in a routine software update cascaded into a global crisis.  Millions of computers were knocked out, thousands of flights  cancelled,  hospital operations  postponed,  television channels went off the air, payments systems  crashed,  supply chains  froze. In  short the digital foundations … Continue reading Letter to the TLS on AI 22nd of July

In his interesting opinion article (Robots sacked, screenings shut down: a new movement of luddites is rising up against AI, 27 July), Ed Newton-Rex misses one of the most serious concerns about artificial intelligence: its surveillance potential. Governments have always spied on their subjects/citizens: technology multiplies their powers of spying. In his novel 1984, George … Continue reading Letter in the Guardian on AI 2nd of August 2024

Sir, William Hague poses a false alternative: letting Russia win or allowing Ukraine to fire western-supplied missiles deep in Russian territory. There is better way: a negotiated peace, involving neither a Ukrainian defeat nor military escalation. This requires a recognition that Ukraine has already won its most important victory. Putin expected to be in Kyiv … Continue reading Letter in the Times on Ukraine 24th of July 2024