Victimhood Incorporated
The other coronavirus toll
We know all too well about the coronavirus death toll, but what about its household and financial impact? Treasurer Josh…
The states have hijacked power policy - and activists are coming for the sceptic's seats
State governments have now taken control of electricity policy from the Commonwealth. Although state control potentially allows alternative approaches to…
Meet Dictator Dan’s Department of Fairness
To be honest I really couldn’t believe what I was seeing. For all the spin-doctoring, the hundreds of thousands paid…
Bring out McGimp
Western Australian Premier Mark McGowan isn’t a native sandgroper. He’s from Newcastle and only washed up in the West thanks…
Dr Jill and the importance of being qualified
Dr Jill wants to be Dr Phil, that is the question: whether you are a wanker for calling yourself a Doctor when you’re…
All meat is plant based
Wandering recently through an arcade popular with the green smoothie set, I saw a sign boasting: “Plant Based Meat”. Someone…
Victimhood Incorporated
Thanks to Israeli scientists we now have a psychological profile of a large section of our population and the body politic: A…
Home ownership or super: the true retirement wealth issue
Another review of the retirement income system has come — and it seems, gone — without clearly having achieved its…
Boris Johnson’s Christmas Covid gamble
Boris Johnson is taking a gamble with his decision to stick with the easing of Covid restrictions for Christmas. The…
The Democrats don’t care what you think about their scandals
I’ve watched with a mixture of amusement and surprise over the last few days as my right-wing friends have descended…
Europe’s slow vaccine approval is testing Germany’s patience
The Bundestag can’t be an easy place to be a politician right now. At the start of the pandemic, Germany…
Why is the National Trust so determined to lecture its members?
Can the National Trust dumb down any further? Its latest crazed venture, the Colonial Countryside project, is ‘a child-led history…
Star power
The last time Jupiter and Saturn aligned this closely, Genghis Khan was implementing his Great Reset across much of Eurasia.…
Sorry states of play
For most Australians, I suspect, one of the big discoveries of 2020 would have been the extent to which our…
History written in stone
Rare permanent springs in the barren arid outback were sites of gushing spa waters in former tropical times. These springs…
Balmain calling
Earlier this year, I was in London in the (very) early stages of pre-production of a brilliant script by David…
Van & the pandemic
Last year I spent a long and convivial morning in Belfast in the company of Van Morrison. True, Morrison was…
Ludwig van & the pandemic
The past year was marked by pandemic-induced losses. Apart from illness, death and economic devastation, we sustained a serious cultural…
Cherry-picking the hockey stick
Whatever else the hysteria over Wuhan flu did to the world, it obliterated the alarmist global warming fearmongering for a…
Summer books
A decade from now, we might look back at 2020 and laugh. Then again, maybe not. It has been a…
Orson Welles
It seems on the face of it the oddest proposition on earth. David Fincher, the famous Hollywood director of Fight…
David Hallberg (centre) and Artists of The Australian Ballet
It is indeed a new era. The Australian Ballet announced its 2021 season under the new artistic direction of David…
Ned Kelly
All the young millennials I know were raging in Melbourne the other Saturday night and so were some of their…
Australian Brandenburg Orchestra
Time to look to the future; performing arts companies are encouraging us to do so through their subscription seasons now…
Behind bars
This is the prison diary that should never have been written because Cardinal George Pell should never have been in…
Office boy
For most of us, going to work means going to an office, to sit at a desk and perform bureaucratic…
The brutality of the Gulag was totally dehumanising
‘It was a gray mass of people in rags, lying motionless with bloodless, pale faces, cropped hair, with a shifty,…
Unpleasant smells can actually enhance pleasure
Harold McGee’s Nose Dive: A Field Guide to the World’s Smells is an ambitious and enormous work. Indeed it’s so…
Joseph Ratzinger’s coat of many colours
A common but flawed assumption about Joseph Ratzinger is that he is simply an ardent conservative. That’s the figure we…
James Kelman’s ‘Memoirs’ are a misnomer
James Kelman doubtless remains best known for his 1994 Booker prize win for How Late It Was, How Late and…
The serious business of graphic novels
One of the running jokes about ‘serious’ graphic novels is that so many seem to consist, one way and another,…
Transport to Australia was the saving of Carmen Callil’s family
If 2020 has given us something to talk about other than Covid, it’s been history — and, more precisely, to…