July 26, 2021

Lockdown protesters march across the flat earth

Once more unto the breach of commonsense and science, they come. The anti-vaxxers and anti-maskers. Blinded by ignorance and feverish self-righteousness, its a wonder they dont march off the edge of the flat earth.

June 21, 2021

G7: Australia on the world stage for the wrong reasons

In summits, those involved never get everything they want. The trick is to persuade your audience particularly your domestic one that you have got most of it.

August 15, 2024

Nagasaki, the forgotten bomb

At 11am Japanese time on 9 August 1945, the second, often forgotten, atomic bomb to be dropped from US B-29 ‘Bockscar’, on a Japanese city exploded in the Urakami Valley, an extension of the city of Nagasaki. The bomb was to have been dropped over downtown Nagasaki, but aim was poor.

July 30, 2024

Starmer may fix the NHS, but wholesale change is needed in our Western societies for better health

The glories of modern medicine are abundant: diseases once considered incurable are now within therapeutic range. Recently a new mechanical heart, developed by an Australian and weighing a mere half kilo or so, was successfully installed in a patient in the US. While its long-term effectiveness awaits proof, it has been hailed as a turning point in the management of chronic heart failure. The pharmacopoeia of miracle drugs keeps growing. No technical limits on our ability to prolong and improve life are yet apparent.

August 12, 2023

Political instability and Nigers biggest problem

West Africa is emerging as a highly unstable region and massive over-population is at the heart of the problem.

July 4, 2022

Preparations for war stifle advocacy for peace

When reporting on Russian atrocities, mainstream media have also been preoccupied with the supply of arms to Ukraine, with news of Finland and Sweden joining NATO and with fingers crossed forecasts of the defeat of Russia. In media minds and in academic circles, advocacy of peace finds little or no space.

September 26, 2021

How the Doherty model has been politically weaponised.

Political agendas have become more important than health policy in our current response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

May 20, 2021

Australia's fundamental fiscal dilemma

This was a big pump-priming budget. The maximum deficit as a proportion of GDP is 7.8% which makes the deepest deficits of the Rudd (4.2%) and Whitlam (2.8%) governments look modest. It discards the governments pre-pandemic commitment to return to surplus. Of the $92 billion of new spending over the next four years, two-thirds is funded by windfall gains from a recession shorter than expected. The rest is from letting the deficit rip.

December 15, 2020

Politicians and Prosecutions

Straining gnats and swallowing camels is not reserved for biblical Pharisees. Australians in the 21st-century witness pious adherence to matters that have certain importance, but which are secondary to, and meant to serve, the great human principles of ‘justice, mercy, good faith’ (Matt. 23:23-24).

August 11, 2024

On fairness, our futures seem grim under Albo

Has the ALP read the Voice referendum loss as indicating limited voter support for First Nations rights, with an election soon?

May 29, 2024

Nova Peris' apologism for colonialism and genocide

In repeating blatant Zionist propaganda to justify her support for Israel, Nova Peris erroneously and harmfully conflates Jewish identity with support for the Zionist project in Palestine, which in effect depicts all Jews as complicit in Israel’s criminality. Her abject apologism also betrays all indigenous peoples’ struggles against colonial oppression.

September 4, 2023

Health ministers maybe in office but seldom in power

The major barrier to health reform is the power of providers or at least their assumed power.

August 15, 2023

At National Conference, the ALP has the chance to recognise Palestine as a state

The 1948 Palestinian catastrophe, known to Palestinians as the Naqba, saw 750,000 of their predecessors driven from their lands, over 500 villages and towns destroyed, the extent of the killings, destruction and dispossession denied and no-one held accountable. How should Australia respond?

July 9, 2023

Will fast-growing India overtake decelerating China?

India has an economy that is growing faster than Chinas six per cent versus four per cent and it has a population that is expanding while that of its Asian neighbour is shrinking.

May 4, 2023

Australias special responsibilities

Do some states have special responsibilities or obligations to help solve collective action problems as a consequence of their position in the international system? Australia should.

April 19, 2023

The derangement of the American mind

The world, we have a problem. It is Houston.

July 13, 2022

Jonathan Holmes: Pressing for freedom

An open letter to Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus QC.

April 3, 2022

Children suffer the most in war

The nightly television coverage of the war in Ukraine is increasingly bleak. We see a distraught mother who has lost all her possessions. The camera moves to her three-year-old daughter in a pink coat, playing while her mother speaks. She seems happy enough. We are tempted to think At least the children are OK. But the children are not OK. In war it is the children who suffer the most.

September 8, 2021

Bidens folly: a virtual summit with real consequences

President Joe Biden will convene a virtual Summit for Democracy in December a brave and foolish move, given the political paralysis and discord in the US.

November 26, 2020

Thug culture, not a warrior culture, to blame

Losers commit war crimes and are punished and pilloried in news articles, books, documentaries and movies while cover-ups by the victors of their atrocities ensure the winners evade justice.

August 10, 2024

Zionist bullying distorts politics, media and education

In addition to physical or psychological abuse, bullies use power in relationships to pressure others to adopt their world views. The bullying may appear in letters, lobbying, radio and television interviews, secret meetings with politicians and business leaders and even in legal action against those who criticise the bullies’ points of view.

July 10, 2024

Why does Albanese pander to his enemies and neglect his friends?

Before leaving the Labor Party, Senator Fatima Payman made it clear she did not sign up to a Labor Government whose caucus had not itself signed up to the Labor Party platform which required a recognition of the state of Palestine and a two-party solution to the Middle East’s endless malaise. She made that discovery after the events of 7 October 2023, spoke up accordingly, and crossed a personal Rubicon in the Senate by voting for a Greens’ motion calling for recognition.

July 7, 2024

Gaza and the West Bank: ancient semitic antipathies drive the bloodshed

It is estimated that from October 7, 2023 until May, 2024, close to 36,000 Palestinians and 1500 Israelis have lost their lives in the Hamas-Israel war. Thousands more Gazans have perished from malnutrition or disease or have disappeared under mountains of sand and rubble.

June 30, 2024

America’s arrogant imperialism on full display in Tbilisi

The Black Sea country of Georgia was recently convulsed by protests over the passage of legislation requiring disclosure of foreign funding of NGOs. The controversy is a big deal in Tbilisi. However, the issue doesn’t matter much in America. At least, it shouldn’t.

August 23, 2023

Marles coughs up the sad truth about AUKUS

Richard Marles said the quiet bit out loud ahead of the ALP conference AUKUS debate while Prime Minister Anthony Albanese seems to have been, er, economical with the truth.

July 5, 2023

Corruption and the expenditure of public funds

Although Gladys Berejiklians intervention to fund projects in her boyfriends electorate may not have been illegal, it should have been. The legislation and rules governing the financial management of public programs should be tightened to prevent such pork barrelling.

July 6, 2022

Flood misunderstanding, miscommunication, extremes and records

Last Monday, a couple spoke to an ABC television reporter on the back steps of their home on the edge of Wollongongs Lake Illawarra. They were confident that the flood they could see in front of them would not rise beyond the level it had reached. After all, theyd been living there for 19 years and no flood in that time had exceeded that level.

December 2, 2020

George Browning. Is the Anglican Church about to split?

‘The Conversation’ recently published an article co-authored by Dorothy Ann Lee and Muriel Porter under the heading Is the Anglican Church about to split? It is facing the gravest threat to its unity in more than 200 years.

April 1, 2020

GEOFF RABY.- China is coming out the winner in the coronavirus pandemic

With increased confidence in the Chinese bond market and lagging health measures taken in many of the worlds richest countries, Beijing may come out as an economic winner after the global coronavirus pandemic.

June 15, 2024

Dutton re-ignites climate war and weaponises immigration policy - Weekly Roundup

Dutton re-ignites the climate war and weaponises immigration policy, the economy shows early signs of recovery from decades of the Coalition’s low-wage-low-productivity policy, the struggle between authoritarian populism and democracy heats up. Read on for the weekly roundup of links to articles, podcasts, reports and other media on current economic and political issues.

May 22, 2024

Don't mention the "G" word

“It’s not the word I would use”… As Western Australian Senator Fatima Payman breaks party ranks to condemn the Gazan genocide, Defence Minister Richard Marles, in defiance of the International Court of Justice and United Nations, is attempting to shield Israel and deter MPs from using the term ‘genocide’ .

April 16, 2024

Over Dutton now looms the spectre of a quick trip to Government House

By mid-May, Budget time, the Albanese government will be a week short of two years in power. Albanese is moving into the zone where he could confidently approach the Governor-General, new or old, for an early election, perhaps as early as July, unexceptionably in October or November.

May 23, 2023

The precipice: An open letter to the Prime Minister of Papua-New Guinea

The cancellation of Joe Bidens visit to PNG is a gift. A gift of more time to step back from a precipice. The brutal choice, Mr. Prime Minister, is now between your nations finest hour and its flip side, its darkest, its recolonisation, this time, as an American client state, a pawn in Americas plans for nuclear war with China.

September 4, 2022

Getting away with mid-air murder

_Studying in Europe was to be a highlight of Munir Said Thalibs career. The voice of the Indonesian activist and forceful critic of the armys human rights record was being heard internationally. His opponents hoped a spell abroad might silence the censure. Instead, it was amplified. Now itll be turned off as time for action expires.

July 10, 2022

Superiority born from class: Lowy Institutes Michael Fullilove on Julian Assange

Beware privileged people who have learned to speak with confidence yet appear blind to the benefits of social class. Beware powerful people who claim that democratic governments, in the US, UK, Australia, administer justice always according to some time-honoured principle about rules of law.

March 1, 2021

Opportunity Lost: spark of a healthier nation was quickly snuffed out

Ten months ago I wrote about the opportunities the pandemic provided to tackle the many problems of our health system. I have watched with dismay as those opportunities have been frittered away, first by the Federal Government and more recently by the federal Labor Party.

May 11, 2020

JOHN MENADUE. Comments in Pearls and Irritations

We are receiving an increased volume of comments on articles. That is very encouraging. But if comments are to be posted they should not exceed 100 words and must include the full name of the writer.

August 2, 2024

War in a hot climate: the luxury of AUKUS in a time of global overheating

The Roman emperor Nero was a horrible, horrible man, as Donald Trump might put it. His murderous reign of terror has certainly earned him a place in the history books, but the only thing most people believe about him is certainly false: that he played the fiddle while Rome burned. He may have strummed his cithara while the conflagration raged, but even this much is uncertain.

July 21, 2024

It’s bigger than NATO and it’s heading our way

Australia and New Zealand’s populations must now wake up to the fact that our countries have been drawn into what ForeignPolicy.com called the knitting together of “the United States’ patchwork of different regional security systems into a global security architecture of networked alliances and partnerships.”

May 28, 2024

It is never acceptable to target Jews for the actions of the Israeli state

The Jewish Council of Australia strongly condemns the antisemitic vandalism that defiled the front fence of Mount Scopus Memorial College’s Burwood campus on Saturday.

May 10, 2024

Faced with an Israeli Pariah, Wong decides on Palestinian statehood

Foreign Minister Penny Wong conveys Australia’s decision on Friday 10 May to the UN General Assembly on whether Palestine should be admitted as a full member. This, after years of conflict over Palestine between Labor and the Coalition, and disagreement within the ALP, is a definitional moment for Australia.

April 30, 2023

Let's not talk down to China, but remember its past civilisation

Tianxia, under Heaven, is a concept deriving from ancient China, but undergoing numerous interpretations over the ages. It refers to an idealised territorial/moral world order, equal but harmonious._

April 25, 2023

Why have living standards stagnated and inequality increased?

Failure to adequately tax mining super profits has greatly damaged the Australian economy.

Living standards have stagnated in the last decade or so, while inequality has increased. This article argues that the two are related and that the concentration of profit growth in the mining sector is an obvious reason why the increase in inequality was so much worse here in Australia than elsewhere.

April 4, 2023

A boom-gate falls across the highway to reform

Reform has its limits. Even as the Labor Government makes good several of its promised changes in economic and social policy, the boom-gate has dropped on defence and foreign affairs.

July 6, 2022

The international prime minister

Anthony Albanese is right to be taking time to meet key international leaders in his early days. But he faces a bigger task at home to create awareness of the growing challenges Australia faces in its immediate region.

August 10, 2021

Happy Anniversary, Indonesia. Must catch up sometime. We dont seem to care!

Gday Cobbers, hear its your Big Bash next Tuesday. Have a good one, yeah? Sorry, cant make it, lockdowns and all that, know youll understand. Anyway, heres a few cards.

July 22, 2021

Allah is calling; loudly in Indonesia.

The new word on the block is Isoman, a portmanteau of isolasi and mandiri, meaning self-isolation. Its another place to die in Indonesia along with hospitals.

July 3, 2024

AUKUS enthusiasts are still preparing for the wrong war

Even some of the more thoughtful justifications of AUKUS are ultimately implausible as they ignore real and immediate threats while inflating the significance of improbable dangers Australia can do little to address.

June 2, 2024

A Catholic church responsive to the human needs of our fellow citizens

Analysing contemporary Catholicism requires a bit more knowledge than merely quoting a couple of reactionary Catholics – as does a recent New Statesman article.

Pearls and Irritations

John Menadue's Public Policy Journal