In-depth analysis of the day’s news, plus stories and gossip from Australian politics.
The real story of the Q Society dinner
Jacqueline Maley’s report of Thursday night’s Sydney Q Society dinner published on the Sydney Morning Herald’s website on Friday has…
An inconvenient record
I’ll tell you a tale and it won’t take me long, all climate alarmists are bastards. Not only do they…
Renewables: stupid is as stupid does
Recent (and frequent) power failures and ever increasing renewable energy targets by Labor States makes it seem like Australia is…
What would have happened if she had a gun…
Last week a woman named Teresa Bradford was stabbed to death by her husband. Speaking at the crime scene, Detective…
Now the Liberal loyalists must make their case
Liberal Party loyalists, right-wing pragmatists, and parliamentary purists are currently wringing their hands and lambasting Cory Bernardi’s decision to break away from the Coalition as variously…
Advice for the South Australian Liberal leader
Dear Steven, I used to have a boat next to yours at the yacht club and we spoke occasionally. Never…
E-cigarettes, not prohibition, are the best way to reduce smoking
Anti-tobacco crusaders are becoming increasingly honest about their end goal of banning smoking, with the Cancer Council of Queensland calling…
Cory is not the enemy
As a member of the Liberal Party, and as a conservative classical liberal, I think it would have been better…
Dear Cory…
Dear Cory Your resignation is not one of insignificance and it has been met with a mixed reaction from Liberal…
Euthanasia: abandoning the aged
Recently my mother and I had to decide whether our 16-year-old dog required surgery. The need was clear, without going…
Are you a conservative, or a Liberal Party diehard?
Since the formation of the Australian Conservatives, many of my hand-to-God conservative mates have been passing around a quote from…
The 16 per cent non-solution
As you read this it will have been half a year since Mr Turnbull and the Coalition limped back into…
Some senators have guts
Cory Bernardi is the worst sort of politician. He is the sort of politician who makes it plain that he…
Fairfax on Trump. Measured. Always
You thought Fairfax got carried away when the Abbott Clerical Dictatorship (© Gerard Henderson) came to power? Since The Donald…
Cory finally gets off the pot
So Cory Bernardi has finally done it. Today he leaves the Liberal party for his own vanity project, taking the six-year…
A plunge into politics as Trainspotting meets The West Wing
Australia’s federal parliament isn’t normally associated with sex, drugs and dance parties and nor should it, because they’re rare occurrences.…
Full circle after 65 years on the throne
The first British (and Australian) monarch to spend sixty-five years on the Throne, today Her Majesty the Queen celebrates her ‘Blue Sapphire…
The ABC: would you miss it if it wasn’t there?
“The ABC is letting Australia down in terms of news presentation,” Paul Keating declaimed in typical style late last year.…
No one loses from the Cory caper
Since Tony Abbott’s ouster, the Liberal bosses’ efforts to purge conservatives from power has been in stark defiance to global…
A lecture from UQ on diversity and tolerance – not
Lofty notions of free enquiry, open debate and tolerance are paid no shortage of lip service in Australian universities. In…
Domestic violence leave doesn’t fix the problem
ACTU President Ged Kearney last year took to the stage at the International Labor Organisation conference to make an impassioned…
Black gold
Last Wednesday, attentive readers may recall, Prime Minister Turnbull gave a Press Club presentation designed to re-start his government. It…
Revealed: how your taxes fund the 18c Fan Club
One of the most obvious features of the parliamentary inquiry into section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act has been…
The Nauru deal: don’t say we didn’t warn ya
Back in November, just after the presidential election, Neil Brown wrote a cracker of a column for the Speccie. It…
Worst. Phone call. Evah. Really?
It’s impossible to say for sure whether this business about a phone call between Turnbull and Trump is true. It smacks of…