By this author
Editor’s Note June 2016
blog
Three weeks into the eight-week election campaign, some things are clear. Bill Shorten’s confidence is up, and he seems to be having fun. His party, while vulnerable to the common Coalition attacks, and notwithstanding minor hiccups, has sharper messages …
Editor’s Note April 2016
blog
Prime Minister Turnbull’s announcement last week certainly set the political class abuzz. Parliament would be prorogued, paving the way for a double-dissolution election. It was a stroke of genius. To the Australian public, harder to impress these …
Editor’s Note May 2016
Politics
“Our prime minister says that we must ‘live within our means’,” writes Don Watson. “The treasurer and the minister for finance both say it. As is the custom, having said it once, they have said it again and again.” It’s …
Editor’s Note March 2016
Politics
In 2014, Malcolm Turnbull said Australia’s tax system was “too tough on people earning income, i.e. the entrepreneurs, the people who are growing and driving, younger people in jobs, working hard, making money in their businesses. It is too tough …
The start-up whisperer
Politics
Just how innovative is the Turnbull government’s innovation package?
Editor’s Note February 2016
blog
David Bulmer-Rizzi, 32, was recently killed in a freak accident in Adelaide, while honeymooning there with his husband, Marco. The couple were married last year in the United Kingdom, but under South Australian law their marital status wasn’t recognised. …
Editor’s Note December 2015 – January 2016
blog
Despite our professed love of irreverence and larrikinism, Australians often have a hard time accepting criticism of our own patriotic ideals, and would prefer not to talk about difficult truths. So it’s with a certain amount of nervous energy that …
Editor’s Note November 2015
blog
Has there been an independent politician in Australia’s history as successful as Nick Xenophon? At the last election, he polled more upper house votes in South Australia than the Labor Party. At the next one, he’ll be leading a new party and fielding …
Plebiscite ploy
Today
The new same-sex marriage proposal from Warren Entsch and Malcolm Turnbull is an attempt to outmanoeuvre their own party
Distinct signs of competence
Today
The government’s post-Abbott cleanup is going well
Cashless welfare
Today
There is a strong case for the trial of the Health Welfare Card in some Indigenous communities
Metadata retention begins
Today
New anti-privacy law is another step down a dangerous path
Kids in camps
Today
Public opposition to keeping children in immigration detention is reaching a critical point
