British MPs in the dark about Beijing’s threats
Following the killing of Sir David Amess, there has been much discussion in recent weeks about the safety of elected representatives. But…
Pfizer’s Covid pill breakthrough
After the UK medicines regulator yesterday approved Merck’s Covid pill for use on recently infected, vulnerable patients, Pfizer announced its…
Cold War, hot planet
Chelyabinsk is one of the most polluted places in the world. On 29 September 1957, an explosion ripped through the…
By the book
As Scott Morrison gallivanted on the Glasgow stage this week, rubbing elbows (literally) with the likes of Joe Biden, Boris…
Latham’s Law
The calamity that is net zero Climate change is the longest-running show in Australian politics. But for one group in…
Australian notes
The great dumbing down While cleaning out some boxes the other day I came across one of my old school…
The Crucible
Sometimes you think the Apocalypse doesn’t go away. It just takes new and frightful forms. No sooner was the lockdown…
Aussie Life
I’m not sure what the sacking of Michael Leunig says more about; the state of Australian journalism or the status…
Climate doom is harming the young
The Satanists came out to play in Noosa last week on Hallowe’en, staging a Black Mass at the Surf Club…
Kiwi notes
Our tired democracy teeters When is enough? When Aucklanders recently heard the seemingly interminable lockdown which the Prime Minister Jacinda…
Titans of tennis
Louis MacNeice once wrote that if you want to know what chasing the Grail is like, ask Lancelot not Galahad.…
Banished queen
Shakespeare wastes no time on Lear’s backstory; we meet the brutal old autocrat as he divides his kingdom between two…
Bridge
There isn’t much Nick Sandqvist (my first bridge partner, teacher and great friend) doesn’t know about bridge. He has been…
The tyrant of Tirana
For many in the West, Albania remains as remote and shadowy as the fictional Syldavia of the Tintin comics. The…
2531: Villainy
The unclued lights, two of two words, are of a kind. Across 1 Eastern divine seen in pilgrimage returning to…
