September 16, 2024

What we know about Australia’s arms exports: we’ve analysed the data

Thousands of protesters have been out in force in Melbourne last week to disrupt the Land Forces International Land Defence Exposition, where defence companies from around the world are showcasing their latest designs in weapons and technology.

April 22, 2024

The Belfast Good Friday Agreement – a model for Palestine?

The continuing horror in Gaza touches us all deeply, even if only vicariously. It leads us ineluctably to the question, often asked in exasperation: Is there no solution? But we’ve been here before and some point to the 1998 Belfast Good Friday Agreement (BGFA), which ended the Troubles in Northern Ireland, as a possible model for the problem of Palestine. How plausible is that approach?

August 3, 2023

Why does the Australian Government fear dissent on AUKUS and Palestine?

Desperate to present a united front at the forthcoming Labor conference in Brisbane, the Albanese government looks to prevent delegates voting on the merits of the AUKUS alliance and for recognition of Palestine as a state. On two crucial issues, dissent is feared. An opportunity for informed debate will be lost. Toeing a party line is the priority. On each issue, Australias identity as an independent, human rights respecting country is at stake, so why fear debate?

July 5, 2023

Peace in Ukraine? Faltering counter-offensive, failed coup

The aftermath of Ukraines ailing counter-offensive may be the countrys last chance to avert the utter destruction of a senseless forever war.

June 9, 2023

Did the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki end the war?

In 2016, President Obama visited Hiroshima. He was the first US President to do so since the bombing in 1945. He said that he would not be apologising for the dropping of the bomb and would not try and second-guess President Harry Truman’s decision.

April 11, 2023

Whitlock and Jones: Former top U.S. admiral cashes in on nuclear sub deal with Australia

In its quest to build nuclear-powered submarines, the government of Australia recently hired a little-known, one-person consulting firm from Virginia: Briny Deep, write Craig Whitlock and Nate Jones in the Washington Post.

September 27, 2022

We are at war and it may soon be nuclear war

We are in a far more dangerous situation than the Cold War, or either of two world wars.

September 14, 2021

Economists' proposals show responsible welfare reform is possible

The next election is likely to continue the grim outlook for welfare beneficiaries regardless of whether the Coalition or Labor wins. A healthy democracy should do a lot better than this. There is no shortage of good ideas.

August 29, 2021

Covid-19 Infections, Vaccinations, Lockdowns, and the Economy

The Morrison Government is desperate to end lockdowns, not least because of what they see as the damage the lockdowns are doing to the economy.

August 22, 2021

Easy lies and influence: the familiar face of corruption in Australia

We are currently witnessing widespread loss of trust in government. Not just in the rapid slide in the popularity of the federal government and the personal standing of the Prime Minister, but the growing mistrust of initiatives and policies designed to manage the crises confronting us and those that are imminent.

November 19, 2020

Where the bloody hell is it? Did Scott Morrison lie about the report that saved his bacon at Tourism Australia?

Scott Morrison was sacked as managing director of Tourism Australia in 2006 with a year left to run on his contract. For 14 years the reason for the sacking has remained one of the best kept secrets in Parliament. Now, FoI documents accessed byJommy Teereveal the PM either lied about a critical probity report, or numerous government departments and agencies are so incompetent that all of them together, coincidentally, jointly and severally lost it.

September 7, 2024

A movement to suspend Israel from the UN needs a country to take the lead

In the United Nations General Assembly, the Israeli ambassador at the time, Gilad Erdan, used a paper shredder to destroy pages of the UN Charter, saying that countries who back Palestine’s bid to join the UN are “shredding the UN Charter with your own hands”. (May 10, 2024) Meanwhile, a push by some Palestinian civil society groups to suspend Israel from the UN lacks a key element: A country to lead the initiative. Yet, the calls to oust Israel may intensify during the opening session of the General Assembly in September.

July 15, 2024

Fundamental economic reform called for ahead of China’s Third Plenum

“The core factor causing current economic problems is not real estate but the contraction of government spending” according to David Daokui Li, Tsinghua University. “The entire government’s operational orientation needs to be changed by reforming the fiscal and tax systems and local officials’ assessment indicators to shift government incentives from investment and project-oriented policies to policies that provide basic social welfare and help people increase disposable income to boost consumption, transforming the government from an investment-oriented government to a social welfare service-oriented government,” Li said.

May 31, 2024

Student protesters have done honour to themselves, and their University

For weeks encampment protests in universities have been occurring throughout Australia. Media coverage has to a significant extent been adverse, and undeservedly so. The public record suggests the protestors have been overwhelmingly well-behaved. And yet, Vice-Chancellors are said to have been pressed to stop the protests. There has even been conjecture that offending students might be disciplined in some way. Can we be assisted by history in this instance?

April 21, 2024

The urgency of Palestinian statehood

It is time for Israel to recognize the force of the rapidly growing international movement to recognize Palestinian statehood, not as the final outcome of a political settlement but as a path to achieving it.

September 22, 2023

Freedom of the press barons?

The disinformation (read: lies and bullshit) being propagated about the indigenous Voice to Parliament by the Murdoch media, among others, harms our society. It promotes division, celebrates and cultivates ignorance and bigotry, oppresses a minority and diminishes us all. Why do we tolerate such behaviour?

May 30, 2023

Australia and apartheid Israel: not to act is to condone

The recent Robert Gregory blog in Australian Jewish News demands a response.

July 8, 2022

Weekly roundup Saturday 9 July

Weekly roundup of links to articles, reports, podcasts and other media on current political and economic issues in public policy.

May 22, 2022

The continuing collapse of the primary vote of the major parties

Labors primary vote in the election fell by just over half of one percent to its lowest level in recent history, but it still won an extraordinary victory in Saturdays election. It did so mostly because the Liberals (minus the National Party) suffered an even larger fall, its vote dropping by over 4 per cent in its worst ever electoral performance.

August 29, 2021

The Americanisation of Australia's agriculture labour market

Minister Littleproud will know that like their counterparts in the USA, farmers in Australia have become increasingly accustomed to using asylum seekers and the rapidly growing cohort of unsuccessful asylum seekers for cheap and easily exploitable labour.

June 16, 2021

As Biden inflicts a new cold war, his acolyte Morrison shows he has learned nothing from his blunders on China

Morrisons first trip overseas since COVID has shown him as one-eyed, unfair and unwise in his attempt to push his anti-China agenda on the world stage. He has succeeded in making a bad situation even worse. His worship-America policy has helped Biden into a new cold war, this time aimed against China.

February 16, 2021

Move over neoliberalism; rentier capitalism is now king

Because the average persons prosperity is shrinking, they can’t buy so much stuff. Companies are instead generating profits by getting hold of assets to rent out, such as housing and roads. This financial capitalism has huge political ramifications for the Left, but it is not listening.

December 14, 2020

Brexit: The cliff is being pushed further back!

The negotiators have been given a few more days to achieve what they havent been able to in more than four years. Has there ever been such a prolonged display of muddled statecraft - negotiations that affect peoples lives and businesses to a far greater degree than in any other deal?

December 2, 2020

Monthly digest on housing affordability and homelessness Oct/Nov 2020

The following is the latest instalment of a monthly digest of interesting articles, research reports, policy announcements and other material relevant to housing stress/affordability and homelessness with hypertext links to the relevant source.

October 20, 2020

Adding complexity, taxes the issue of equity Part 1

More sensible than the Governments Stage 3 tax cuts would be the approach put forward by the Henry Tax Review of an explicit and high tax threshold and no means-tested tax offsets.

September 21, 2023

NATO admits that Ukraine war is a war of NATO expansion

During the disastrous Vietnam War, it was said that the US government treated the public like a mushroom farm: keeping it in the dark and feeding it with manure. The heroic Daniel Ellsberg leaked the Pentagon Papers documenting the unrelenting US government lying about the war in order to protect politicians who would be embarrassed by the truth. A half century later, during the Ukraine War, the manure is piled even higher.

May 6, 2023

Environment: the real meaning of CCS: capitalism, corporations and subsidies

Carbon Capture and Storage, nothing but an inadequate fig leaf for obscene government endorsed corporate practices. Direct Air Capture may play a useful climate role in a few decades. Banks still lending trillions to fossil fuel companies.

May 1, 2023

Age equality: one of the great human rights issues of our time

In 2006, someone supposedly speaking for Generation Y wrote a book addressed to baby Boomers called Please Just F* Off: Its Our Turn Now. The person who wrote that book in 2006 at the age of 25 is now 42. One day we will all be cast as the villains. Its just a matter of time.

August 19, 2022

This week with Peter Sainsbury on catastrophic Climate Endgame

Scientists call ignoring Climate Endgame dangerous. Bidens persistence navigates the Inflation Reduction Act through Congress. Renewables keep getting cheaper.

September 15, 2021

70 years and several sea changes later, ANZUS Treaty serves a different world

When the ANZUS Treaty was signed 70 years ago, Japan was considered a dangerous aggressor, and China was a friend.

September 13, 2021

Reaching 80% vaccination isn't the same for all communities. The vulnerable will continue to suffer.

The NSW government has made much of the promise that something good will happen when localities achieve 80 per cent of second jabs of eligible people. But not all numbers are equal.

June 10, 2021

The value pack relationship with China

Relations with China are increasingly discussed in terms of values. Liberal values featured inthe Prime Ministers speech in Perth this week. I propose the need to define the term and to rectify the name, as Confucius said, and to consider how and where it is applied. Then, and only then, can we bring such dialogue back on track.

June 1, 2024

Trump the felon or Trump the saviour?

The stunning conviction in New York of Donald Trump on 34 felony counts is more likely to encourage his legion of supporters than otherwise.

May 27, 2024

Immigration removal legislation: put away the sledgehammer

The High Court decision in the ASF17 case removed the apparent driver for the government’s sledgehammer immigration removal legislation. There is little evidence that the legislation would work as intended. A sledgehammer is not much use for a problem which is more akin to undoing a couple of tight screws. The government should drop the legislation and completely redevelop its immigration compliance and removal strategy.

April 28, 2024

Modi puts religion at centre of campaign – Asian Media Report

In Asian media this week: Hate speech an appeal to ‘bigoted supporters’. Plus: High-tech shake-up for China’s military; EU sings ‘old colonial song’; Bomb plot trial starts in Hong Kong; Recognition urged for Myanmar opposition; West’s chip restrictions ‘will not work’.

August 30, 2023

An Australian Holocaust: greenhouse gas emissions and mass deaths

Australian governments and mining firms are cold-bloodedly contemplating the needless deaths of 5.3 million human beings many of them our own citizens - from climate causes resulting from new Australian fossil fuels developments.

July 22, 2023

Environment: Carbon bombs will explode all hopes of 1.5

There are over 400 fossil fuel projects each with the potential to release more than 1 Gt of CO2. Serious environmental and human rights problems associated with mining the energy transitions essential metals. Barry Commoner described the problem and its cause 60 years ago.

September 2, 2022

Weekly roundup 3 September pity Dutton couldn't make it to the summit

Weekly roundup of links to articles, reports, podcasts and other media on current political and economic issues in public policy.

July 21, 2022

Australia and the New China Threat: Globalised political opportunism

The development of a China Threat in Australian political discourse is nothing new. The apparent threat of being swamped by Chinese migrant workers played a major role in bringing the colonies together at the time of Federation, resulting in the Commonwealths White Australia Policy as the first act of the new parliament.

May 16, 2022

Election 2022: no education minister and an opposition without a school funding policy

Anthony Albanese and Tanya Plibersek taunt Scott Morrison, calling on him to identify who is actually education minister - the disgraced Alan Tudge or the disgraceful Stuart Robert - but Labor has questions of its own to answer.

September 22, 2021

With allies like these, Australia doesn't need enemies

As Australia’s trade dispute with China continues, allies who have pledged solidarity with Australia have been moving into the trade spaces from which we’ve been evicted. Hardly ‘protecting our back’ as the US boasts.

September 7, 2021

The White Mans Media must be challenged in the post western world

_When a news network based in India or a newspaper based in Nigeria or Hong Kong can be held in the same high regard as The New York Times or the Financial Times, we will know that we have succeeded in eradicating global white privilege in the media.

July 12, 2021

Peace and global citizenship: student's present concerns and future hopes

Zoom conversations with students from Brazil, Japan, Malaysia, France, India, Bangladesh and Ghana, reveal dismay about universal cruelties but also their hopes to experience peaceful futures.

January 28, 2021

Attempts to build a new anti-China alliance will fail

A massive economic ecosystem centred on China is evolving in the region. Yet Australia is playing itself out of the game. It dug itself into a hole when it humiliated China by calling for an international inquiry into Covid-19. All of Asia is watching to see who will blink first, and it is unlikely to be Beijing.

January 10, 2021

George Pell could comment 'Don't say I didn't warn you'

Sensational news stories about Vatican finances are two-a-penny. But for the first time Australia features in a scandal with claims that since 2014 1.4 billion (A$2.3 billion) of Vatican money ended-up in the Great South Land.

December 17, 2020

China 'bullies'; US engages in 'robust diplomacy'

As 2020 becomes 2021, one thing remains certain. The Australia-US alliance will continue to threaten the peace of the region and Australia’s economic security. Australia seems prepared to gamble on the US maintaining its supremacy.

November 30, 2020

Reflections on the economic record of the Trump Administration

It no doubt came as a shock to many (non-American) observers of the recent US election that almost 74 million Americans (more than 47% of those who voted) would have preferred Donald Trump to remain in the White House for another four years. Like many among Americas academic, media, and corporate elites, outside observers have long struggled to understand the reasons for Trumps ongoing popularity with such a large proportion of the American population.

November 22, 2020

The escalating risk to Australia's vehicle fleet. Australia applies the brakes again and again.

Gas-guzzlers in Europe are quickly becoming a thing of the past so guess where theyre headed instead.

September 3, 2024

P&I thriving is up to us

This is a topic difficult to raise without it sounding like a sermon. And although I happen to be writing on a Sunday (and was ordained as an Interfaith, post-denominational minister nearly 20 years ago) “sermonising” has never worked for me: not in the getting or the giving.

Pearls and Irritations

John Menadue's Public Policy Journal