“My country, the U.S., is unrecognisable. I’m not sure who runs the country. I do not believe it is the president.”, says Jeffrey Sachs in a speech at a Saving Humanity and Planet Earth (SHAPE) seminar, Melbourne, Australia. “U.S. actions are putting us on a path to war with China in the same way that Continue reading »
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Does it really matter that Australia’s defence policy has no moorings, and is created unaware of past pain, lessons and policy responses? By agents with unknown interests. And that American influence has been ushered into this void, most recently by Minister Marles? ‘De-risking’ is the latest term in geopolitics. It mostly concerns China. European leaders Continue reading »
For a few days, China, like the rest of the world, was transfixed by the Wagner Group’s tactical advance on Moscow, threatening the stability of the Russian government and the rule of President Vladimir Putin before the challenge collapsed suddenly. The mercenary army plot was worthy of the composer Richard Wagner, for whom the Group Continue reading »
Australia is the only democratic country in the world without a charter of human rights in either legislation or the Constitution. On 1 July the deadline for submissions will close on the federal government’s current Inquiry into Australia’s Human Rights Framework. In this Inquiry the government is seeking comments on whether the Human Rights Framework Continue reading »
While much of humanity was glued to the unfolding drama over one tiny submarine, the Earth we all inhabit is slowly, steadily and implacably imploding around us. Ocean temperatures are raging off the scale, icecaps are melting and seas rising, forests are ablaze across continents, ‘heat bombs’ in heavily populated regions are pushing them into Continue reading »
Call it Carr’s law. I’m pretty confident it withstands any testing. It’s simple: find someone talking up war with China and, if they were around 20 years ago, you find they were a supporter of the Iraq invasion. Few learn from error. On the other hand, stupidity is a constant in human affairs. Against it, Continue reading »
Opposition to the AUKUS deal among rank and file Labor supporters and similarly aligned voters is increasing by the day. It’s not simply because AUKUS is a malignant inheritance from the Morrison government that people who voted Labor at the last election are expressing their alarm about it today. On every level it is so obviously Continue reading »
Since a United Nations General Assembly Resolution vote in November 2012, Palestine has had the status of a state within the UN system. It is not a full member state but, like the Holy See, a non-member observer state. Australia – after a heady debate within the Gillard cabinet – abstained on that vote. The State Continue reading »
China’s power has replaced the United States’ in the eyes of most of our Asian neighbours, according to the latest Lowy Institute Asia Power Snapshot. What are the implications for Australia? The Lowy survey contains interesting findings. Over the last five years, Chinese influence in Southeast Asia has risen at the expense of the US, Continue reading »
In 2016, President Obama visited Hiroshima. He was the first US President to do so since the bombing in 1945. He said that he would not be apologising for the dropping of the bomb and would not try and second-guess President Harry Truman’s decision. A repost from May 27, 2016 The widely accepted moral justification Continue reading »