Now is the time for the Nation State to reassert its control over multinational entities. Multinationals advance an agenda that is self-serving. These agendas may be separate from, and at times, above, a nation’s law. Financial gain is at its heart. Arthur Andersen, a former large international consultancy that collapsed in 2002, “struggled to balance Continue reading »
Government
Ten years ago Anthony King and Ivor Crewe published their book – The Blunders of Our Governments. They ranged over the Millennium Dome; the 20 billion pounds wasted on a failed scheme to upgrade London’s Underground; punishing tens of thousands of single mothers into poverty; massive IT disaster’s such as the Blair Governments NHS scheme; Continue reading »
In 1795, in his Treatise on Perpetual Peace, philosopher Immanuel Kant advocated rationality about peace by repudiating any plans for military domination, by respect for non-violence and by aiming to abolish standing armies. In 2023, Australia signed up to an AUKUS alliance with the UK and US to acquire nuclear submarines in preparation for a Continue reading »
A battle of ideas is being fought in Australia. And the front line is the drive to war and the demonisation of China. There is a battle but it is a one-sided affair. Ranged against those who seek a sane and rational world are powerful voices. The government, of whatever persuasion pays think tanks handsomely Continue reading »
Senator Linda Reynolds is suggesting that she might seek to take her complaints of ill-treatment during the controversy of the Bruce Lehrman rape allegation to the new National Anti-Corruption Commission. That would include, we gather, allegations that Senator Katy Gallagher was briefed by the alleged victim and her boyfriend before the allegations had been made Continue reading »
Earlier this year, I wrote on the potential risks of the new Pacific Engagement Visa (PEV) that will provide a lottery-based pathway to permanent residence for nationals of Pacific Islands and Timor Leste. With the visa starting on 1 July 2023, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), which has policy responsibility for the Continue reading »
Documents publicly available make it clear that Saudi Arabian government officials assisted the two 9/11 hijackers, Nawaf Al-Hazmi and Khalid Al-Midhar, who crashed an airliner into the Pentagon. Newly released testimonies further reveal that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was aware of the activities of the two hijackers before the 9/11 attacks and suggest that Continue reading »
Australia is fast approaching a reckoning with its past, its present and the state of the nation’s soul. And if the last month is any indication to go by, we will be found wanting. A hundred years ago, Sigmund Freud wrote a paper called, Mourning and Melancholia. In it he mapped the divergent paths of Continue reading »
The judgement on Ben Roberts-Smith’s defamation case delivered a heavily damning summary of conduct. That would have come as little surprise to many; rumour abounded for a decade or more. Not only has Roberts-Smith been severely impacted. The ordure is spread widely but not thinly. It will stick perniciously to individuals (Roberts-Smith being just one), Continue reading »
Labor’s ability to seamlessly follow in the Coalition’s strategic footsteps is showing welcome signs of weakening as opponents of AUKUS and the submarine deal find their voice. By any measure, Anthony Albanese and his government have been a disappointment. True, Albanese has an authentic, anachronistic and atypical backstory, but that hasn’t stopped him from displaying Continue reading »