Writer
Jack Waterford
John Waterford AM, better known as Jack Waterford, is an Australian journalist and commentator.
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How our tax system is making the rich richer. And the poor poorer
Australians frozen out of the housing market cannot expect that government is going to do anything that effectively closes the gap between current house prices and what most of the unhoused could afford as a deposit. Modern politicians of all stripes are all agreed that their political survival depends on doing the maximum to sustain Continue reading »
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No slowing the ACT rape merry-go-round
Litigation about the alleged rape in a minister’s office at Parliament House in 2019 – more than five years ago – seems to continue to multiply, if with ever decreasing prospects of ever resolving any issues at the heart of the matter. This is something that is now, at law, unknowable in any sort of Continue reading »
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ASIO needs a boss who can stand above the tumult
At the height of the argument about western conviction that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction in 2002, Tony Blair’s minder, Alastair Campbell was accused of asking intelligence agencies to “sex up” what passed for evidence. The satirical magazine Private Eye published a cover with Alastair Campbell’s child asking, “What did you do in Continue reading »
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Australia’s First Nations still looking over the 1788 chasm
More than four months after a crushing defeat in the Voice referendum, and soon after the Closing the Gap report confirmed that there was almost no progress in improving Aboriginal lives last year, Aboriginal players in the yes case are moving towards an inquest into how their case went so terribly wrong. Continue reading »
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Israel’s propaganda has ceased to convince or persuade even its friends
Israel’s citizens seem either blithely unaware of the world’s horror at the terror raining down on Gaza, or do not care. Whichever, the barbarity has stripped it of the significant moral advantage given by the Hamas atrocities of October 7, and have caused fundamental reappraisal of Israel’s standing among people once disposed to be sympathetic Continue reading »
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When open justice is an optional ingredient
I had been assuming that Julian Assange, whose case comes up for adjudication in the British Courts soon, was a shoo-in for being Australia’s prisoner of conscience of the decade, but a late entry into the competition is Michael Pezzullo, who appears to have been condemned by an Australian Star Chamber convening in secret, without Continue reading »
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Opportunity for real tax reform goes wanting
I very much doubt that Anthony Albanese will be losing much sleep from opposition claims that he is a liar, or not to be trusted on anything after his volte face on tax cuts focused at higher income earners. That’s even if you regard as a lie an election promise which is subsequently not followed Continue reading »
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Australia’s biggest handicap: believing our own bullshit about our military
One of the many things Australians should consider as they contemplate our nationhood on the day set aside for this purpose is our glorious tradition of being not very good at fighting wars. We boast of our military traditions, our baptisms of fire and of our long traditions of unquestioning obedience and eager anticipation of Continue reading »
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Tide turning on boat people bastardry
A day I have long prophesied, and for which I have been yearning may be at hand. It’s a pity that the Albanese government does not really deserve a place at any celebrations, and may indeed, try to frustrate them. Continue reading »
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Oppressive secrecy needs more dashes of cold water yet
We can all be glad that judges constituting the ACT Court of Appeal in the Bernard Collaery case had a more liberal view of the need for open justice than the judge who had been set to hear the case. This was before the Attorney-General, Mark Dreyfus, stepped in to drop the prosecution altogether. But Continue reading »
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Release the full report on Mike Pezzullo’s misdeeds
It is time for Albanese to take the public into his confidence. He has an instinct for secretiveness that almost matches that of Scott Morrison. Continue reading »
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Plodding Labor will rue its missed opportunities
Labor will have – already has – squandered its time and its opportunities. It needs leadership of guts and vision, not timidity, caution and mortal terror of offending anyone. Continue reading »
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Holding Justice in contempt: Janet Albrechtsen and a new weapon for rape defendants
The contempts highlighted by Justice Michael Lee in the recent defamation case between Bruce Lehrmann and Channel 10 are minor compared with the blatant leaking of phone transcripts. During the Lehrmann case, police handed to Lehrmann’s solicitors thousands of pages of texts and emails between the alleged victim and others, from nearly a year before Continue reading »
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Biden unable to slow the Israeli slaughter
Israel is a nation not greatly given to following advice, even from its great and powerful friends and guarantors, unless and to the extent it accords with its own judgment of where its national interest lies. That’s partly because it sees itself as being surrounded by enemies, ever in a desperate position, and bound to Continue reading »
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Shiver runs up and breaks the Labor spine
There is never a bottom to Labor ministerial cowardice and incompetence when manipulated mob fury is at its height. On immigration policy, Labor has surrendered, and is dancing to Dutton’s tune. Continue reading »
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Was Pezzullo recording leak from a federal agency monitoring his communications?
The sacking of Mike Pezzullo was inevitable once Nine media published his email correspondence with a Liberal party lobbyist and powerbroker. So far, however, the Public Service Commission and the government is doing altogether too much to avoid detailing the circumstances that provide chapter and verse of the numerous improprieties that covered the correspondence, or Continue reading »
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The Attorney who chooses his battles, too rarely
Mark Dreyfus is one of those who gives every appearance of being intimidated by the national security state. Continue reading »
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Gutless leaders without faith, hope or charity
People often say that we get the politicians we deserve, but I am not sure that even the Australians who voted no at the recent referendum deserve what passed for political leadership and quality representation that has been on recent display. Continue reading »
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Judicial activism overturns years of inhumane cruelty on immigration detention
It is, alas, far too early to proclaim the end of Australia’s barbarous and inhumane refugee management system. But a series of recent High Court decisions cutting back, on constitutional grounds, the arbitrary powers of immigration ministers and bureaucrats may well be later seen as the moment that the tide turned on a nightmare that Continue reading »
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Israel’s moral power ebbing away in a human rights catastrophe
Israel’s strategic choices, as Israelis see it, are rather like those sometimes argued for Australia. It wants powerful friends but cannot take them for granted. Ultimately it must depend on itself, if needs be alone. Surrounded by deadly enemies, it must make the cost of conquest so high, and so uncertain, that invaders are deterred. Continue reading »
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Hamas has set a trap. It depends on Israel’s brutal response
In the 75 years since it won nationhood in a field of blood, Israel has fought many wars against its neighbours and its indigenous population. Each has been an existential struggle, because its enemies wanted – still do – to annihilate it altogether. Continue reading »
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Culture and Religion, International relations, Israel / Palestine, Politics, Religion and Faith, World
Israel will never be safe until Palestine is free
No attempt to “explain”, rationalise, find some counter-“equivalence” for, nor any attempt to see matters through the eyes and the experiences of the murderers rather than the immediate victims can justify or forgive the barbaric massacre of Israeli children, women and men by Hamas warriors after they broke out of Gaza. It does not forgive Continue reading »
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The Voice has been silenced, but now we must listen
As vanquished Australians, white and black, fell back in ruin, defeat and humiliation on Saturday, the most galling prospect they must face is that for many of the victorious, the Voice battle was but the first engagement in a longer war. They do not want to give their enemies time for regrouping, or even for Continue reading »
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Will referendum defeat foretell doom for Albanese?
There’s no spin or ex-post facto interpretation of the likely defeat of the Aboriginal Voice referendum able to disguise a resounding setback for Aboriginal Australians. Continue reading »
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PwC: $1 Billion in penalties would be a fair settlement
Sooner or later – many hope sooner – people will decide that the scourging and self-flagellation of PriceWaterhouseCoopers and the big consultancies has gone far enough. A few penances – perhaps if the AFP are up to it, a few prosecutions – and government departments can resume the business of outsourcing most of its thinking Continue reading »
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Did unlamented Pezzullo dream of taking the Chinese surrender in Beijing?
I have never had much regard for Mike Pezzullo, and my regard is lower for the disclosures this week of Nine and Fairfax journalists of his secret email correspondence with politicians he thought he might be able to influence. As any number of people have said, his position is untenable, and he must look forward Continue reading »
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Let’s avoid more Covid disasters. The public already knows who to blame
During Australia’s Covid-19 pandemic response, some companies received billions in contracts made without tender, sometimes by ministerial intervention. It would be too much, of course, to hope that anything the inquiry into the pandemic response does to address this issue will be taken up with any enthusiasm by the Albanese government. It seems to have Continue reading »
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Australia’s secretive defence establishment: the real enemies of truth and freedom
Australia, with fewer secrets to hide, is more compulsively secretive than the US, China or NATO. Continue reading »
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Dutton has made himself the Voice target
It may be too late for supporters of the Yes cause at the referendum to retrieve their initially majority support among the population. Continue reading »
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Labor’s weakness for little rorts
When Labor next loses state office in NSW, it will almost certainly be entirely its own fault. One might have expected that the party’s twelve years in the wilderness would have taught it something about restraint, and about the risks of reverting to its ancient, and traditional ways. Not a bit of it. Continue reading »