The Wentworth defeat has many fathers, not just Malcolm Turnbull
So it has come to pass. Wentworth has been lost by the Liberals with the biggest by-election swing against a…
The Opera House is not a billboard – for anyone or any cause
I have a reluctant confession to make. I sort of agree with Bill Shorten. Sort of. The Sydney Opera House…
The ‘tampon tax’ is not sexist. Removing it is
The price of a name-brand pack of ladies’ sanitary pads with wings is around $5.00. A packet of name-brand extra-absorbent…
MBT: Malcolm Boycott Turnbull?
In the annals of Test cricket, there’s never been a cricketer as self-centred, single-minded and selfish as English batsman Geoffrey…
Will we hear of political bullying that doesn’t fit the Fairfax/ABC agenda?
While Australian federal politics remains discombobulated about alleged bullying in the parliamentary Liberal party, across the Ditch there’s been an…
Hunt finally sees sense on vaping
It took a while, but yesterday there was a strange burst of rationality from the ship of fools also known…
Be an advocate, Prime Minister – not an evangelist
Scott Morrison has made a good start to his prime ministership. He has gone some way to rallying his divided…
Why make a traitor a martyr, Mr Morrison?
Chelsea Manning is a no freedom fighter. ‘She’ is a traitor who betrayed her country and the cause of freedom…
Honouring Abbott
If Malcolm Turnbull’s mainstream and social media defenders have their way, the parliamentary Liberal party’s mayhem last week will be…
Abbott’s a better option than Dutton, but…
As Malcolm Turnbull limps into the second week of a tumultuous parliamentary sitting, his leadership is under threat whether he…
The Victorian Liberal Punch and Judy preselection show
Last week, the Financial Review highlighted how utterly underprepared the Liberal party is compared to Labor in contesting marginal seats.…
Tampon tax cut won’t stop votes flowing from Coalition
Treasurer Scott Morrison has bowed to the agitation of vocal feminists and the likes of GetUp! and is dropping GST…
There’s still time to avoid Coalition carnage
If you want to know why the government is in deep trouble after Super Saturday, go no further than the…
Super Saturday: a tossers’ picnic
When it comes to elections, bookies are perhaps an even better form guide than the plethora of public and private…
The Big Public Health donkeys
Public health Pooh-Bah bullies are at it again. With the Victorian and federal elections heaving into sight, this week a…
Victorian Liberals can’t afford to gamble
Many litigants are like gamblers on the pokies. Having had the satisfaction of winning a small jackpot, they punt, punt…
Never interrupt your enemy
Napoleon Bonaparte once observed, ‘never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake’. Politics can be defined as war…
Punish Pooh-bahs, not poor people
An ancient dead white bloke, Aristotle, conceived a world with natural masters and servants, writing ‘That some should rule, and…
Will the Cormack-Liberal jaw-jaw lead to more war-war?
At the moment I’m re-reading AJP Taylor’s classic The Origins of the Second World War. In his uniquely lucid and…
Memo various Victorian Liberals: don’t offer a solution when you are the problem
Just as Liberal preselection wars are hotting up in NSW, David Crowe reported in Fairfax Media on Thursday that Victoria Liberal Party…
Liberals note: only the impotent are pure
I read with great interest David Pellowe’s response to my Flat White article on factionalism in the Victorian division of…
What’s going on in the Victorian Liberals?
It seems that some in the Victorian division of the Liberal party want to lose elections more than win them.…
NDIS: When will the other shoe drop?
In announcing today that — way hey! — the Turnbull government now has a revenue windfall to fully fund the…
Boundary re-draws have a silver lining for the Coalition, if not the poor PM
In the world of political nerdery, nothing beats electoral redistributions. Who wins, who loses, new primary and two party-preferred margins,…
“Life is short but smokers’ lives are shorter. Legalise vaping now.”
The much-anticipated House of Representatives committee report on e-cigarettes and personal vaporisers – in other words, vaping – was tabled…
