Values, ethics, fear – Australian women and children in the Al Roj Camp
Politicians frequently appeal to Judaeo–Christian values, yet retreat from them when fear dominates debate. The test is whether those values guide policy when it is hardest to apply them.
Recent articles in Politics
24 February 2026
Capital gains tax should increase
Reducing the capital gains tax discount would make the tax system fairer, raise much-needed revenue and have little effect on housing supply, given how constrained that supply already is.
24 February 2026
Albanese’s real opponent is not Angus Taylor
Coalition turmoil has handed Anthony Albanese political space few prime ministers enjoy. Whether he uses it to govern with purpose – or continues to drift – is now the central question.
24 February 2026
Australia’s moral failure over women and children in Syria
Australian citizens and their children remain stranded in Syrian camps as political fear eclipses care, responsibility and legal obligation – with damaging consequences for public decency.
24 February 2026
Malcolm Fraser and Fraser Island
One year after the 1975 Dismissal, Malcolm Fraser overruled state pressure and commercial interests to halt sand mining on K’Gari – a decision that reshaped Australia’s environmental history.
24 February 2026
Death tolls, settlements and the closing space for a two-state future
New research confirms that far more Palestinians have been killed in Gaza than first acknowledged, while settlement expansion and political rhetoric point to deeper structural realities.
24 February 2026
Carney and Albanese and the collapse of global order?
Ahead of Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney's visit to Australia next month, it is time to ask will Australia embrace Carney's call to harness middle power clout.
23 February 2026
Could old rivalries spur Albanese to act on human rights?
Kevin Rudd had the groundwork, the evidence and the political moment for a Human Rights Act – and still walked away. Anthony Albanese now has the same opportunity, and no obvious excuse not to take it.
23 February 2026
Globalisation of occupation: when genocide becomes an international project
Thousands of foreign nationals are serving in Israel’s military with the legal tolerance of their home states, while peaceful protest against the war is criminalised. This double standard exposes a deep failure of international law and accountability.
23 February 2026
Starlink, China and the governance of low Earth orbit
China’s massive satellite filings highlight how low Earth orbit has already been transformed by industrial-scale deployment – and how existing governance is struggling to keep pace.
23 February 2026
One error and damned forever?
Women and children held in Syrian detention camps force Australia to choose between rhetoric and the rule of law.
23 February 2026
Countering bully, tyrant Trump’s intimidating expletives – it could work
Donald Trump’s rise and endurance rest on intimidation, repetition and media amplification – and on the long failure of opponents to confront those tactics directly.
23 February 2026
Deep thinking needed on AI, not shallow predictions
Confident predictions about artificial intelligence dominate public debate – but history suggests forecasting technological futures is a poor guide for policy. What matters more are the conditions that shape how AI is actually used.
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