On 14 February, Indonesia holds simultaneous elections for the presidency and national and regional legislatures. The runes suggest the current Defence Minister, Prabowo Subianto is on track to be the next President. He will not be boring. To win a presidential election, a presidential/vice-presidential ticket must gain more than 50% of the vote. If none Continue reading »
politics
The Australian Parliament failed to recognise its responsibilities last week when Greens Leader Adam Bandt, responding to the International Court of Justice interim ruling to prevent genocide, initiated a vote for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. Australians are indebted to human rights champions Adam Bandt, Elizabeth Watson Brown, Stephen Bates, Max Chandler-Mather, Helen Haines and Continue reading »
The hottest January ever recorded in human history has passed, with barely a nod from governments worldwide and international media. For a full year, the Earth has now exceeded the +1.5 degrees danger level set by the Paris Agreement in 2015. And 2024 may be hotter still, US scientists are warning. Wildfires rage unchecked over Continue reading »
"Something worth noting (and may not be readily apparent): Yang Hengjun is an Australian citizen. But to the Chinese government, he's Chinese."
It was interesting to spend a few weeks in London recently and catch up with friends and research colleagues. It always focuses the mind on issues when one is in situ rather than gazing at data and reports from afar. My view of British Labour as being incapable of providing the British people with a…
An empty bucket, a Zappos shoebox, potting soil, a collapsed dog crate, a dog bed, a broken lamp wrapped in duct tape, some synthetic firewood—the flotsam and jetsam of the half-forgotten years. These leftovers from past lives accumulate in suburban garages as the people who once wanted them get older and older. Useless and unnoticed, […]
The post The Memory Hole appeared first on The New York Review of Books.
The Opposition’s shadow minister for home and foreign affairs, Barnaby Joyce, has blamed the stress of the bonk ban on his most recent drunken Wednesday night antics, which involved him falling off a planter box and swearing loudly into his... Read More ›
Ai Weiwei joins a long line of dissenters such as Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and Liu Xiaobo who became disenchanted by the West. After criticising Israel for its scorched-earth military operation in Gaza and defending Palestinian human rights, Chinese dissident artist Ai Weiwei had his long-planned exhibition at the famed Lisson Gallery in London abruptly cancelled in Continue reading »
US politicians and others are always boasting about the US being the greatest in just about any category you can think of – from the record for eating hot dogs in a given time to their so-called democracy. But perhaps the greatest boast is that it is a peace-loving state committed to protecting the world. Continue reading »