Conservatives would love Dutton to slash ABC funding
Panic entered the headlines earlier today when word leaked that Opposition Leader Peter Dutton might engage in a bit of…
Labor and its gangrenous alliance
Labor and the Greens have been locked in an unofficial coalition for decades. Recently, they have been joined by the…
The usual suspects aren’t happy about Victoria’s crackdown on crime
After softening Victoria’s bail laws in a misguided fit of compassion that saw crime rates soar and victims pile up,…
Budget reply: back on track
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton began his Budget reply by thanking Australians for listening and reminding them that they would soon…
Australian Christians Party wins its first seat in WA
Although the election in WA turned over a very disappointing result for conservatives overall, there have been some huge wins…
Angus Taylor’s Budget Reply leaves conservatives wanting more
From the National Press Club: Australia has had record numbers of business failures on top of declining productivity. That means…
A conservative action plan
The election is over, and the results are clear: the Liberal Party under-performed – badly. Because of that, Western Australia…
A bill of natural rights for Australia
With the Australian federal election (declared for May 3, 2025), now in campaign mode, let’s look at a crucial aspect…
A belief in ‘fairness’ is critical to democracy
In a democracy, the perception of fairness is as crucial as actual fairness. If citizens believe the ‘game is rigged’,…
The schemers, the naive, and the fearful
It was late Sunday morning, March 23, 2025, when Kathrine posted her question in the reader comments at the end…
Who has the courage to fix workplace law?
Will politics defeat sensible labour policy, just as it has with taxation, our disgraceful duplicative mining approvals procedures, and our…
Labor clueless on foreign affairs
Goodness knows why the Chinese government would want to put pressure on the Albanese government during an election campaign, but…
The UK, a nation in crisis?
As the plane turned onto the runway, I stole one last glimpse out the window before leaving Heathrow. I felt…
Tough love for the Coalition as its campaign is slow to get going
I’m writing this at lunchtime on Monday. In federal election campaigns, for logistical necessity major policy drops and media opportunities…
Billboard Chris is the hero Australia needs against ideologically driven government censorship
I doubt any sane person has heard or read the phrase ‘her penis’ without rolling their eyes. For female victims…
Do Australians care about free speech?
‘Free speech’ is losing its position in the political conversation. It’s not only because rising middle-class poverty is shifting people’s…
A book, a calculator and a hip flask
Each year I ponder whether my attendance at the budget lock-up will be my last. Can I really take another…
Faint-hearted
The election is upon us. So if you were looking for a word to describe what Mr Dutton and the…
Thriving on uncertainty
The index spiked to 139 when Russia defaulted in 1998. The 9/11 attacks on the US in 2001 boosted the…
Veneztralia
Following his election as Venezuelan President in 1999, Hugo Chávez launched a series of radical reforms known as the Bolivarian…
Voice by stealth
‘You can’t fatten a pig on market day,’ John Howard would say. As Australia’s longest-serving Liberal prime minister other than…
The carbon crisis
We have a carbon dioxide crisis in Australia. There is not enough of the gas produced locally. We import carbon…
The Carbon Inquisition
It was hidden in one line of Peter Dutton’s budget reply speech. But it is a crucial reason the Albanese…
Albanese’s squalid trickery
Why would Anthony Albanese stoop to such squalid trickery? This stemmed from the recent budget scheduled because Albanese decided that…
Why Israel is ramping up its war on terror
The war in Gaza has entered a more consequential and unforgiving phase. Early this morning, Palestinian sources reported that Israeli…
Marine Le Pen is in a race against the clock
Marine Le Pen is fighting back, launching an all-out counterattack against a Paris court’s decision to suspend her from politics.…
Trump is starting to face tariff blowback
Liberation Day? Pshaw. President Trump may be gloating about imposing sweeping tariffs on America’s allies and adversaries abroad, but he…
We’re still suffering from social long Covid
It’s not unusual, after running a focus group, for a particular comment to stay with you for days. Ordinary people…
New Zealand’s cringeworthy new tourism slogan
‘Everyone must go!’ New Zealand’s new tourism declares, but so far almost everyone seems to be cringing. The prime minister…
The sacred sites fandango
The second-highest mountain in New Zealand has been granted ‘personhood’ by the NZ parliament because it is regarded as the…
Operation Resolution: cleaning up after HMNZS Manawanui
HMNZS Manawanui, formally a chirpy red and yellow MV Edda Fonn, sank on October 6 much to the shock of…
Why is this New Zealand airport clamping down on hugs?
‘Whenever I get gloomy with the state of the world,’ Hugh Grant famously offered in the heartwarming opening scene of Love,…
Will Trump join the strongman club?
Unsurpassable
It’s a weird connection but they say Donald Trump is devoted to his presidential predecessor Andrew Jackson who was popular…
Intensely engaging
The Australian National Academy of Music gala performance on Friday 21 March was dazzling with guest conductor Asher Fisch leading…
Theatre vultures will kill
Having a sportswriter father is no excuse. The young man was tall, long fair-haired with a hat. ‘What do you…
Netflix’s Adolescence is far from perfect
According to one gushing review, Netflix’s Adolescence is the ‘most brilliant TV drama in years’. And that verdict is at…
The sin of TDS
admire the nerve, the gall, the sheer chutzpah. Here we have a book about the mental decline of Joe Biden…
Heroes of the Norwegian resistance
Reading Robert Ferguson’s fascinating history of the experiences of the Norwegians during the five years of German occupation between 1940…
Deep mysteries: Twist, by Colum McCann, reviewed
On the first page of Colum McCann’s compelling novel Twist we meet the two leads: John A. Conway, who has…
Why, at 75, does Graydon Carter still feel the need to impress?
When I started working for Vanity Fair in 1995 I remember coming into the office one morning to discover that…
A meditation on the beauty of carbon
There’s a scene in Evelyn Waugh’s The Loved One in which a magazine’s advice columnist ‘the Guru Brahmin’ (in fact…
A novel in disguise: Theory & Practice, by Michelle de Kretser, reviewed
Michelle de Kretser, of a Sri Lankan family living in Australia, is an exceptional novelist – perhaps among the ten…
Bringing modernism to the masses in 20th-century Britain
The second world war was won in the cafés of central Europe – the intellectual milieu that produced Edward Teller,…
Escape into fantasy: Stories of Ireland, by Brian Friel, reviewed
Before Brian Friel earned renown as a dramatist, he wrote short stories, many of which first appeared in the New…