Politics
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DEMETRI SEVASTOPULO AND DAVID BOND . UK National Cyber Security Centre says Huawei is manageable risk to 5G( Financial Times London 18.2.2019
British intelligence has concluded that it is possible to mitigate the risk from using Huawei equipment in 5G networks, in a serious blow to US efforts to persuade allies to ban the Chinese supplier from high-speed telecommunications systems. Continue reading »
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JOHN TULLOH. The ties that bind – the US and Saudi Arabia.
If an international criminal like ‘El Chapo’, the Mexican drug baron, can be tried (and convicted) in the US within two years of falling into American hands, why can’t the surviving alleged perpetrators of the 9/11 atrocity? Why is it that relatives of the 9/11 victims suing for damages have yet to see a day Continue reading »
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LAURA TINGLE. Senior bureaucrats send a message to the Government and the Opposition (ABC 19.2.2019)
The political significance of his [Mr Pezzullo’s] interventions are twofold — the first is that it makes clear the security establishment does not believe the legislative changes, of themselves, will spark a wave of new boat arrivals. The second is that, just as Mr Lewis and Mr Pezzullo were sending a clear message to the Continue reading »
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PETER BROOKS. Will Labor Really Be Brave On Health Reform – Response To National Press Club Address By Catherine King.
The major challenges that beset our health system are well articulated with the obvious commitment to strengthening Medicare, making it fairer and tackling some of the major funding deficits introduced over the past decade such as the Medicare rebate freeze. The major and anticipated announcement of the establishment of the Australian Health Reform Commission is Continue reading »
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ALAN PEARS. The Politics of Confusion on Achieving the Paris Commitment
Will Australia meet the government’s Paris climate commitment? Experts disagree, while the government avoids explaining exactly how it will achieve its goal. This creates confusion and conflict, which suits the government in the lead-up to the election. Lack of information and widespread disruptive change mean it is not yet possible to make a definitive judgement. Continue reading »
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MICHAEL KEATING. National Security: How Professional is the Advice?
Prime Minister Morrison and Minister Dutton have launched a scare campaign over the Medivac Bill, alleging that 1000 refugees will arrive in Australia from Manus and Nauru in a matter of weeks, which will in turn start the boats coming again. In an effort to gain some credibility for this claim, the Government has cited Continue reading »
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PAUL BONGIORNO. Did Scott Morrison miss his Tampa moment? (The New Daily 18.2.2019)
The question playing on the minds of nervous Coalition MPs is whether Scott Morrison has missed his “Tampa moment”. Should the embattled Prime Minister have seized the moment of last week’s humiliating government defeat in Parliament to have called an immediate election? Continue reading »
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MUNGO MACCALLUM. The marketeer in the Lodge.
In the world of marketing, there are no such things as losses – only opportunities; and Scott Morrison, if he is nothing else, is a dedicated marketeer. Continue reading »
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BRUCE LINDSAY. Reflections on the Murray Darling Basin Royal Commission
The headline findings of the Royal Commission into the Murray Darling Basin – unlawfulness, incompetence, regulatory capture – are spectacular. Despite its strong scientific base, the Murray-Darling Basin Plan has been undermined by the power of vested interests and a general ambivalence toward rivers. But responses to the Commissioner’s report by governments, opposition parties, the Continue reading »
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TIM WOODRUFF. Health Reform From Labor: Does the Policy Match the Vision?
ALP health spokesperson Catherine King addressed the National Press Club this week to expound Labor’s vision of health care changes if it wins office. Perhaps the highlight of the address was a restatement of Labor’s vision ‘of a truly universal health care system in which every Australian has affordable access to the high-quality health care Continue reading »
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TONY SMITH. Last hurrah for New South Wales Coalition Government – a festival election?
The Coalition Government in New South Wales faces the fixed four year election in late March. It has been looking desperate for the last couple of years and has come under pressure recently about drug deaths at music festivals. Its decided course of action in this area might well alienate younger voters and prove to Continue reading »
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ABUL RIZVI. Questions for Dutton on his record border protection failure.
The mainstream media (other than The Australian, The Daily Telegraph, Herald-Sun, Daily Mail, Sky News After Dark, Alan Jones, Ray Hadley and their ilk who usually obsess about border protection) has at last picked up on Dutton’s failure to secure our borders. Dutton now holds the record as the Immigration Minister under whom Australia received Continue reading »
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JACK WATERFORD. The silence of public service lambs used by a panicking government. (Canberra Times 16.2.2019)
One can take it as read that public servants do not like being used and abused by ministers, and verballed for partisan political purposes. Particularly when an election is due and the indications are that a new lot of ministers will soon be in charge. But public service leaders of gumption and character are supposed Continue reading »
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PETER SAINSBURY. Sunday environmental round up, 17 February 2019
It may be too slow but the policy environment around climate change is moving. Recently in NSW we have seen a mine proposal refused because of its impact on climate change and the release of a report calling for the development of a plan for the Hunter Valley to transition away from coal. In the Continue reading »
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MARIE McINERNEY. Labor would set up Aust Health Reform Commission if it wins 2019 poll (Croakey).
Labor’s announcement on Wednesday that it would establish a permanent Australian Health Reform Commission has been welcomed though all eyes will of course be on the detail and the funding commitments to emerge in the leadup to the next federal election. Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE. Scott Morrison did not stop the boats.
The myth is repeated time and time again that Scott Morrison ,the Coalition and Operation Sovereign Borders stopped the boats. They did not. But if you tell a lie time and time again people will believe it. It is a marketing trick that Scott Morrison has learned well. I expect that many in the media Continue reading »
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RUTH ADLER. Brexit uncertainties fuel speculation on Irish unification referendum
With weeks remaining until the 29 March deadline for a deal on Brexit, there is speculation that failure to reach agreement will result in increased momentum for a referendum on Irish unification under the Good Friday Agreement. Several Cabinet Ministers in Theresa May’s government are reportedly seriously concerned about the prospect, with one describing it Continue reading »
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DIANNE HERIOT. New Zealand and Federation. (Parliamentary Library Flag Post 25.1.2019)
While New Zealand participated in the Australasian Federation Conference convened in Melbourne in 1890, it had little real enthusiasm for the prospect of federating with the Australian colonies. As Sir John Hall, then Premier of New Zealand and one of two New Zealand delegates to the Conference, observed: Nature has made 1200 impediments to the inclusion of New Zealand Continue reading »
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HUGH WHITE. The US shouldn’t go to war with China over Taiwan—and nor should Australia (ASPI: THE STRATEGIST, 13 Feb 2019)
Paul Dibb, in his recent Strategist post, writes that America’s strategic position in Asia would be fatally undermined if it didn’t go to war with China if China attacked Taiwan, and that Australia’s alliance with America would be fatally undermined if we didn’t then go to war with China too. The conclusion he draws is that, in the Continue reading »
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Scott John Morrison: Where the bloody hell did he come from? (Michael West)
It’s not every Prime Minister who loses a vote on his government’s own legislation. The man who ended an 80 year run not only definitely deserves a special mention in Australia’s political history but a closer look at just where the hell he came from. Michael Sainsbury unpacks the peripatetic pre-parliamentary adventures of Scott John Morrison. Continue reading »
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MARGARET REYNOLDS. I love the ABC and I Vote!!
Several public policy issues will be vigorously debated when Australians vote in this year’s Federal Election. But the one policy area where a vast majority of Australians can agree is that our national public broadcaster- the A B C- must be protected. More than 80 per cent of Australians trust the ABC above all other Continue reading »
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ALISON BROINOWSKI. Australian values in free fall.
What Australians value and what they fear are not, apparently, clear to the latest Prime Minister. Scott Morrison’s election campaign, which began at the National Press Club on 11 February, failed to assure voters that his government understands either what they resent or what they want.Two days later, the Coalition lost a vote on the Continue reading »
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JON STANFORD. Comment on Mike Scrapton’s article ‘The casual talk of war’.
Isn’t it interesting that in the Prime Minister’s attempt yesterday to make us all very frightened indeed about the national security threats that a Labor government would expose us to — ranging from hordes of asylum seekers at the gates, including paedophiles and murderers in their ranks, to increased domestic violence against women — he Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE. Getting behind the lies, fake news and spin on refugees and asylum seekers. (Michael West’s blog 13.2.2019)
It is remarkable that mainstream media, without exception, continues to ignore the facts on asylum seekers arriving in Australia by boat and air. Michael West has written on the subject today in his blog. See Michael’s article reprinted below. Continue reading »
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KIM WINGEREI Political Bastardy and Silly Politics
The franking credits scare campaign by the LNP is working. Once again, sensible tax reforms is sacrificed on the altar of short-term politics and the absence of a holistic approach. Once again politics gets in the way of policy making. Once again, fear and obfuscation are winning. Continue reading »
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ANDREW GLIKSON. Imagining the real: Two minutes to mid-night on the Clock of the Atomic Scientists
On January 24, 2019, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists stated: “Humanity now faces two simultaneous existential threats, either of which would be cause for extreme concern and immediate attention. These major threats—nuclear weapons and climate change—were exacerbated this past year (2018) by the increased use of information warfare to undermine democracy around the world, Continue reading »
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PAUL BONGIORNO. Scott Morrison has formally hit the panic button. (The New Daily 12.2.2019)
Scott Morrison is desperately in need of a circuit breaker. Something dramatic to save his government and pull off an unlikely election win. The opinion polls are stubbornly stuck in wipeout territory, the latest Newspoll just confirming the trend not only since August, but since the last federal election in 2016. Nothing is working, not Continue reading »
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MUNGO MACCALLUM. Who could have predicted that Kenneth Hayne would turn out to be such an old softie?
For months the stern, uncompromising judicial figure has presided over his royal commission with imperial authority, a veritable Judge Dredd inspiring fear and trepidation among scores of witnesses ever wary that at any moment he could reach for the black cap. And when his verdict was delivered, it was appropriately full of fire and brimstone, Continue reading »
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GREG BAILEY. The Liberal National Party, the Baby-boomers and the quest for victory in the May Election.
If, as seems likely from the polls, the ALP wins the next federal election it will not be through the failure of the LNP to throw up a massive scare campaign. Conservative parties ranging from the medium to the far right adopt lowest common denominator strategies to foment an underlying sense of fear that seems Continue reading »