Australia’s obsession with every little political twist or swing in the US seems to grow with each day, with the latest event to gain saturation coverage being the first presidential debate of the current American political cycle. The event was shown live on the public broadcaster, though it is highly debatable whether an Australian audience, Continue reading »
politics
The Frontier Wars were fought in every part of the vast Australian continent from the 1790’s to the 1920’s. How could they be overlooked in local or even in global history? The ownership and control of a continental landmass was at stake. First Nations’ warriors bled and died on, and for, their own country. Why Continue reading »
Do Gazans truly die when their body is not whole or cannot be found and when they cannot be properly grieved? This is now a strange scene; to be at a funeral and see a shroud, inside which is a whole body with two hands, ten fingers, two feet, and a head. Nowadays, we Gazans Continue reading »
Nuclear energy proponents are disseminating several myths that are receiving little or no challenge in the mainstream media. They are incorrect or misleading. Continue reading »
Senator Fatima Payman’s riveting conversation with David Speers on Sunday’s ABC Insiders program was powerful, erudite, compassionate and completely in line with Labor Party policy on Palestine. With her call for the party to recognise Palestine and take action to stop the massacres, the genocide and the forced starvation that is currently taking place in Continue reading »
One myth that keeps cropping up about Ukraine is that it has been plagued by outsized far right or neo-Nazi influences, particularly during the Maidan protests of 2014 and the later Donbas conflict. This claim is a favourite of Jeffrey Sachs, echoed in recent articles in P and I by Paul Heywood-Smith and Keri McKern, Continue reading »
On 1 July, an important change in the industrial relations landscape came into force. Industrial awards (‘modern awards’, as they’re now called), that set minimum standards in workplaces, will include guarantees of rights for workplace union delegates. All new enterprise agreements must also include such provisions. This is a result of the first part of Continue reading »
President Bongbong Marcos played down the ramming of a Filipino Navy boat by a Chinese coastguard on 17 June. Calling it an accident, not amounting to an armed attack, when the photos showed otherwise. It was an embarrassing afterthought for a Head of State. The incident at Second Thomas Shoal has clearly breached Article IV Continue reading »
The Australian All-Ords index rose 8.3% during the financial year ending last Sunday. But Australia’s economy has had a dismal time with real GDP per capita contracting in each of the five quarters to March 2024. With annual CPI inflation rebounding after earlier falls, the market now expects the RBA to further dampen consumer spending Continue reading »
Even some of the more thoughtful justifications of AUKUS are ultimately implausible as they ignore real and immediate threats while inflating the significance of improbable dangers Australia can do little to address. Continue reading »