The ‘United Nations Command’ provides the US with the perfect camouflaged vehicle for a global military alliance against China and North Korea. Over the past couple of years there has been a flurry of activity linking NATO, and some of its constituent countries with the states of American East Asia, principally Japan, South Korea, Australia Continue reading »
politics
Every time I visit Gaza, I witness how people have sunk further into despair, with the struggle for survival consuming every hour. In the south, around Rafah, makeshift structures of plastic sheeting have mushroomed everywhere including on the streets, with people trying to protect themselves from the cold and rain. Each one of these flimsy Continue reading »
Evidence for a 520 km diameter impact crater, 3 times larger than the Chicxulub crater left from the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs, has been discovered in Deniliquin, Australia. Close analogies exist between the atmospheric effects of large asteroid impacts and those of greenhouse-induced climate change in terms of initial clouding by aerosols, consequent cooling, Continue reading »
General Soeharto who ruled Indonesia for 32 years last century used to stage a ‘Festival of Democracy’ every five years. This was export quality irony – the results were known before the poll papers were printed. That’s not the case this year as the Republic now has an apparently independent Komisi Pemilihan Umum, (General Elections Continue reading »
In response to South Africa’s suit before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) charging Israel with genocide in Gaza, Australian politicians have refused to support a significant international means of ending this slaughter of Palestinians. Instead, party leaders search for words to disguise cowardice, to camouflage the lack of courage required to avoid offending Israel Continue reading »
The Biden administration has officially re-designated Ansarallah — the dominant force in Yemen also known as the Houthis — as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist entity. The White House claims the designation is an appropriate response to the group’s attacks on US military vessels and commercial ships in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, saying those attacks “fit the textbook definition Continue reading »
The University is a place of questioning, investigation, reason and discovery. The University is corruptible and perennially corrupted, yes, but always open to such endeavours. Zionism has no place in the University – period. Other than as a historical subject and as a pathology for dissection. Political Zionism drove the forging of the state of Continue reading »
It is hard to see how it is in Australia’s interests to support Israel’s actions in Gaza. I first came across Colin Rubenstein of the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC) in March 2001 – twenty three years ago – when I was involved in a debate with him about the proposed USA National Missile Continue reading »
Last year was the most widely anticipated recession in history because tight monetary policy, slower government spending and higher oil prices normally spell doom. Yet total economic output (GDP) in both America and Australia kept growing in real (after inflation) terms. So, what can we expect in 2024? Will economists get it right this year Continue reading »
This is extraordinary because the states supporting Israel, above all the United States, have claimed the high moral and legal ground and lectured the states of the Global South about the importance of the rule of law. Recall Samuel Huntington’s controversial, yet influential, 1993 Foreign Affairs article, “The Clash of Civilisations,” which ends with the Continue reading »