The relationship between Australia and China, once characterised by regard and mutual curiosity, has recently been extremely turbulent. However, it was not always this way. This essay will examine the argument that the missed opportunities, evident mutual incomprehension, falling out, and apparent rehabilitation after the election of a Labor Government can be best understood in Continue reading »
politics
Since when did PEACE become a political statement?? On Easter Friday, 28th March 2024 at 5.30 am, Sydney artists Justine Muller (me) and Raymond Lalotoa hung a 5-metre hand-painted banner with the words PEACE NOW and a white dove off the Kings Cross walkway, facing oncoming traffic from the Eastern Suburbs towards the CBD. (documented by Continue reading »
When I arrived in Melbourne from Scotland in 2004 to edit The Age, I was shocked that the country only had two major media owners. In the years since, that concentration of ownership has only intensified, with a swathe of outlets closing and many parts of regional and rural Australia rendered “news deserts”; left without Continue reading »
If Labor permits the next election to be a referendum about nuclear power, there’s a very good chance that Peter Dutton would win handsomely. For one thing it will be on ground of the Opposition’s choosing. For another, it would not be a poll about nuclear power for very long, but an open-ended referendum about Continue reading »
“I said on one of the Israeli channels… that he, Hitler, cannot live in the same world as long as one Jew still lives. This Islamo Nazism and the Jews cannot live together. Definitely, not in the same world, he [Hitler] said. But definitely not in the same country. That’s what I said. … And Continue reading »
Or 'Honey, I Cooked the Kids." Continue reading »
The opinion polls tell us that cost-of-living pressures are the number one political issue. This is the obvious reason why the Liberals under Dutton are rising in the polls, and Labor is losing ground electorally. Furthermore, while many of us readers of Pearls & Irritations feel that Dutton has made a complete fool of himself Continue reading »
The mayhem of the last eight months suggests that the United States remains ascendant in the Middle East, and its global hegemonic presence undiminished. Reality points in a different direction. In this series, Joseph Camilleri explains how, despite its global military reach and expanding alliances in Europe and Asia, America today stands adrift and diminished. Continue reading »
Opposition leader, Peter Dutton, fresh off releasing no new details of his nuclear power policy, has reacted angrily to all those against the policy (sic) saying: ”let them eat yellow cake.” ”Bloody Greenies, inner city elite and the so-called journalists... Read More ›
David Daokui Li says China’s decision makers have finally come around to stimulating domestic consumption rather than investment, and for that Beijing will provide more welfare. The Communist Party of China has said the upcoming Third Plenary Session of its current 20th Central Committee will focus on “deepening comprehensive reform to advance Chinese modernisation.” Based Continue reading »