Tony Abbott, the ‘masochist’ conservative warlord
It’s all hands on deck to save the Liberal Party (not necessarily the Coalition). The return of former Prime Minister…
The watershed legal moment that could drown Australia in climate reparations
Something terrifying happened last week. The UN General Assembly supported the International Court of Justice in its shameless climate crusade…
Angus Taylor calls the PM an ‘arrogant pr–k’
The Leader of the Opposition, Angus Taylor, has dished out a bit of much-needed character. Angus Taylor quietly interjected ‘arrogant prick’…
Alex Antic doesn’t like Paris either
Calling the Paris Agreement ‘just a piece of paper’ is a mistake that will haunt the Coalition, possibly all the…
Australia’s universities don’t have a funding problem
This week, both the Sydney Morning Herald and the Australian Financial Review have revealed that most Australian universities have dropped…
The beginning of the end – for Labor
This wasn’t just a Budget, it was electoral suicide. Anyone still cheering it on either hasn’t read the fine print…
The electorate is in revolt: here is why
Following voter revolts in the UK, France, Germany, Italy, and other European countries, Australians are now punishing the parties that…
Albanese’s regional Australia is being subsidised by $5 coffees
You don’t have to tell me that most politicians and policymakers are out of touch with small businesses in regional…
To save the Liberal Party, the delegates must go
Last weekend was a watershed for the Liberal Party reform movement with the election of former Prime Minister Tony Abbott…
When risk becomes the enemy
There is an old criticism of socialism that it is what happens when the weakest and most envious among us…
An unclear endgame
The US perception of achievements in Iran is a double-edged sword. The US administration may assume it has destroyed the…
The failure of Jim Chalmers
Jim Chalmers has a big job which he’s not executing very well – reduce government expenditure to align with income,…
The trickle-down AI revolution?
The vibes around artificial intelligence in the workforce are becoming increasingly dystopian. As governments around the world race to ‘win’…
Why won’t you take a knee for Nowak?
Southampton is seething; some might even suggest that the ‘Tiber is foaming’ – and the average punter has decided to…
Gilding the Lily
Supporting small income tax cuts is gilding the lily if bracket creep and investment taxes reverse those cuts. It is…
Gold rush on black market tobacco
As a government, if you wish to stop a destructive public behaviour – you punish it. This can be through…
Hyper candidate forensics
If our ancestors knew half the things we know about their contemporary politicians, would they have voted the same way?…
The horrifying demise of Australian small businesses
When the Federal Budget was released last month, some prominent entrepreneurs and founders came out to lament the impact it…
The political pendulum is moving to the centre-right
When explaining the dramatic rise of One Nation, surging from just over 6 per cent of the primary vote at…
The Architecture Cult
Like so many others, I was lured into architecture as a child by the seductive glow of British television. Grand…
Australia’s eSafety Commissioner loses again – A victory for free speech | Celine Baumgarten S3 Ep 18
Celine Baumgarten (Celine Against the Machine) has celebrated her SECOND victory against the eSafety Commissioner. This wasn’t only a personal…
Did Donald Trump conquer the world with witty insults? | Joel Gilbert S3 Ep 17
Did Donald Trump conquer the world with witty insults? I’m joined by Joel Gilbert to discuss the genius of humour…
Digital tyranny or ‘child safety’? 😵 & the bitcoin revolution | Efrat Fenigson S3 Ep 16
When Australia’s Under 16 social media ban started locking adult political writers out of #Substack – it was just the…
Teals should be terrified
I received a worried message from one of my oldest friends recently. She has a brother with a significant disability,…
A Beech of judicial etiquette
You’ve all seen the story by now. High Court judge Robert Beech-Jones decides to deliver a diatribe up in Townsville…
The Albo Manifesto
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels opened their 1848 manifesto with the claim that ‘the history of all hitherto existing society…
Menzies would not have built One Nation
One of the more dubious claims in Australian politics at present is that One Nation represents the future of Australian…
Disunited Kingdom
Would England be better off without Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland? This may seem an extraordinary question but it is…
NZ’s latest party hates Israel
One of New Zealand’s proudest claims to fame, just behind the pavlova dessert and the All Blacks, is being the…
Justice miscarried
For more than five minutes of human history, society accepted biological reality as a simple fact. In primary schools everywhere,…
Put out more flags
And then there were two. With the swearing in of David Farley as the member for Farrer, One Nation has…
Did Andrew need to charge his Royal Lodge tenants full rent?
Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was photographed driving yesterday with a large bruise on his face. Whichever unfortunate ‘well-placed source’ that has the…
David Lammy’s leadership challenge denial
There is not a leadership contest to enter “at this stage”, says deputy prime minister David Lammy as he offers…
Burnham’s leadership ambitions have fooled no one
Andy Burnham finally confirmed last night that he is indeed standing for the Labour leadership – just in case anyone…
Andy Burnham is doing himself no favours with the bond markets
If we have learned anything from the Makerfield by-election campaign it is what a slippery character Andy Burnham is. Last…
Why can’t Elon Musk leave Britain alone?
Why is Elon Musk so obsessed with what’s going on in Britain? The billionaire owner of Tesla and X has…
Does government spending pay for itself?
At the time of Rachel Reeves’s big-spending first Budget in 2024, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) came under criticism…
The disturbing truth about the National Association of Muslim Police
The official representative body for Muslim police officers in Britain has branded Zionism “one of the manifestations of anti-Muslim hatred,”…
PETA wants to replace K-9 units with tactical robots
Picture this: you’re walking down the sidewalk on a bright summer’s day. A K-9 patrol vehicle parks nearby – but…
60 Minutes has been tarnished for years
Almost every mainstream media figure had the same take on this week’s CBS News staff revolt against the new management…
Emotional politicians create bad policies
We have now reached the stage of political debate around Henry Nowak’s murder where politicians are talking more about tone…
Darren Jones’ Mandy memory failure
If you’re not a fan of any of the current contenders for Labour leader, then why not try Darren Jones?…
Russia is relying on drones to bring it victory in Ukraine
Earlier this week, Ukraine was subjected to one of the largest aerial assaults by Russia since the start of Vladimir…
The row over English becoming an official language of New Zealand
Parliamentarians in New Zealand have been limbering up for an oddly unedifying debate over what ought to be the most…
What they don’t tell you about Christmas in New Zealand
‘I still think New Zealand the most beautiful country I have ever seen,’ Agatha Christie marvelled in 1922. Evidently she’s…
What will Jacinda Ardern do next?
When I first met Jacinda Ardern in the early 2010s, the notion that the young MP with the toothy smile…
The de-Wokification of New Zealand’s education system
The conservative coalition government of New Zealand came to office promising to wind back an enormous, government-run system of ‘Woke’…
The Pope’s merciless war against the Old Rite
Such stuff as dreams are made on
When Ken Branagh took the stage of the Royal Shakespeare Theatre at Stratford for the first time in thirty years…
Elegance and intrigue
Anyone who knows the Sixties can easily be reminded of the beauty and the authority of Sidney Poitier. The MTC…
Sex symbol or respected actor?
You don’t have to be any specific age to thrill to the Opera Australia production of La Traviata. It is…
A masterpiece of economy
There’s something very odd about the fuss that’s been made about David Szalay who won the Booker a few months…
Jaded and adrift: I Want You to Be Happy, by Jem Calder, reviewed
Two people make an awkward stab at a relationship, even as both flounder under the realities of modern life. Yes,…
The world’s most beautiful man in a den of iniquity
A photograph from the late 1960s shows a lavishly underdressed Marianne Faithfull sandwiched between Alain Delon, the most beautiful man…
Mapping the Emerald Isle: Land, by Maggie O’Farrell, reviewed
Maggie O’Farrell’s two previous historical novels, Hamnet and The Marriage Portrait, made her a household name. Land marks a return…
Signs of impending doom: The Given World, by Melissa Harrison, reviewed
Melissa Harrison’s bestselling 2018 novel All Among the Barley, set in the early 1930s, was much concerned with the pace…
The importance of fairy tales in testing times
In the realm of magic and imagination, human nature can be better understood than in the world of our everyday…
The Panic of 1873 seems eerily familiar
On 18 September 1873, the leading American bank Jay Cooke & Co collapsed after a disastrous bet on the railroad…
Will robots simply bore us to extinction?
A few years ago, when ChatGPT and Claude were beginning to take off, some tech leaders seemed to develop a…
The humiliating truth about the way we think
Over the long span of human existence, different cultures have held varying notions as to how responsible we are for…