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Dec 2007 - Jan 2008

  • December 2007 - January 2008
    | Dec 2007 - Jan 2008
  • Comment
    Judith Brett | The Nation Reviewed | Dec 2007 - Jan 2008 | Politics

    Now that John Howard has finally gone, it is possible to start thinking about the future again. All through 2007, as it looked more and more likely that Kevin Rudd would lead Labor to victory, it was hard to think beyond election night. Could Howard perform a miracle after a...

  • Dropping the Ball
    Mungo MacCallum | The Nation Reviewed | Dec 2007 - Jan 2008 | Society & Culture

    About two and a half thousand years ago, the historian Herodotus records, the Persian tyrant Xerxes was rampaging through northern Greece at the head of the greatest army the world had seen. He had forced the pass at Thermopylae, and now had an apparently clear run of less...

  • Society of Birds
    Don Watson | The Nation Reviewed | Dec 2007 - Jan 2008 | Society & Culture

    EE Cummings prayed that his heart would always be open to little birds. My family, the maternal side especially, has always shared some of his sentiment. It goes back to the clearing of the forest. As the trees went, the little birds came and dwelt in the hydrangeas under the...

  • The Sense of Danger
    | The Nation Reviewed | Dec 2007 - Jan 2008 | Media | Society & Culture

    In an early episode of The Sopranos, the young gangster Christopher Moltisanti decides to take an acting-for-writers course to help him with his screenplay. He wants to write the next Goodfellas (hey, even bully boys need creative fulfilment), but he's...

  • What a Pratt
    James Kirby | The Nation Reviewed | Dec 2007 - Jan 2008 | Business

    The woman on the radio had called to complain. "I want to talk about Richard Pratt," she said. "I don't really understand what he did. But I don't like it." Nobody, it seems, likes to see very rich people behaving badly - like a double-parked...

  • Buyer’s Market
    Gay Bilson | The Nation Reviewed | Dec 2007 - Jan 2008 | Society & Culture

    Tasting Australia, a biennial event in Adelaide, is aptly named, for although it delivers a dizzying series of culinary entertainments for local audiences eager to get close to their favourite cookbook writer, who usually has a show on pay-TV which spawns collections of...

  • Dogs of War
    Charles Firth | The Nation Reviewed | Dec 2007 - Jan 2008 | Media

    In the advertising business, there is a phenomenon called the Puppy Dog Effect. When a firm is pitching several different concepts for a television commercial, they will often slip footage of a puppy dog into the mock-up of their favourite idea, even if the product being...

  • New Teeth for Aunty: Reinvigorating the National Broadcaster
    Robert Manne | The Monthly Essays | Dec 2007 - Jan 2008 | Media

    This outline of my daily routine should at least make one thing clear: the ABC plays a very important part in my life. As it does for very many Australians. There is almost no institution in Australia that is more generally trusted, valued and loved than the ABC, as survey...

  • Mission Drift: A Report From Afghanistan
    Chris Masters | The Monthly Essays | Dec 2007 - Jan 2008 | Foreign Affairs

    My visit began in late May 2007. It was not yet summer, but at midnight the air-conditioning was still welcome. Over here even the tents are climate-controlled. Sleep does not come in large rations. At 2 am on my first morning we were mustered and stumbled towards a convoy of...