In "Who's for Breakfast, Mr Jones?", David Salter investigates talkback titan Alan Jones. Analysing the Sydney radio ratings, he finds that Jones's legendary political power is illusory: a myth propagated by the "armies of PR urgers, political touts and spin doctors" who assume that Jones's share of the talk-radio market equates to enormous influence.

In "The Nelson Touch", Gideon Haigh uncovers the new censorship: university research funding. Goaded by Andrew Bolt's Herald Sun columns criticising Australian Research Council grants to academics, then-education minister Brendan Nelson intervened, radically reorganising the grant-allocation process and blocking ARC funding to projects.

In "Cut!", Peter Craven looks at the state of Australian film, interviewing industry luminaries Sigrid Thorton, Tom Burstall, Fred Schepisi and Brian Rosen to find out whether — as is widely believed — local film and television are in financial and cultural crisis.

In The Nation Reviewed, Robert Manne examines the Howard government's avoidance of the Westminster principle of ministerial responsibility, from the 'children overboard' affair and the detention of Cornelia Rau to the repeated failures of the foreign affairs department in the AWB scandal. There's also Kaz Cooke on cosmetic surgery, Mungo MacCallum on Cyclone Larry and the Great Barrier Reef, Tim Lane on the AFL's drug war, and James Kirby on ABC Learning Centres' domination of the child-care industry.

In Arts & Letters, Robert Forster is both captivated and frustrated by the second album from New York's unpredictable, much-hyped Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Show Your Bones is a shift away from art-rock, and sees the Yeah Yeah Yeahs experimenting with dark folk and classic rock. Plus, Henry Reynolds responds to Michael Connor's The Invention of Terra Nullius, Owen Richardson dissects Michael Haneke's Hidden, and Kerryn Goldsworthy reflects on the troubled series Commander in Chief.