January 4, 2023

For a different angle on Ukraine

Starting with Robert Parrys groundbreaking reporting on the 2014 Maidan coup, through the Russian intervention this year, Consortium News has been a leading source of analysis on Ukraine that defies the psyopcracy.

February 14, 2025

Pope Francis and zero tolerance of child sexual abuse

Since his election in 2013, Pope Francis has publicly claimed eight times that the Catholic Church practises “zero tolerance” towards child sexual abuse by clergy. At worst, this is simply untrue, and at best, like Humpty Dumpty in Alice in Wonderland, he makes the expression mean whatever he wants it to mean.

October 6, 2024

We can resist the US military empire that threatens us all

Australia has always been aligned with military empires: first the British Empire and now that of the USA. In the current era this alignment is misguided. It comes with enormous social and economic costs and does not protect us from current threats - indeed it makes us more of a target. There are alternatives, and we can work together towards them.

March 24, 2024

Why are Liberals trashing relations with WAs biggest export customer?

Andrew Hastie and Tony Abbott are trying to install a candidate in WA who has written a fictional book to scare people about a Chinese invasion of Australia.

March 8, 2024

Government grovels to the gambling lobby: Weekly Roundup

How scare campaigns work; the government grovels to the gambling lobby; what the media missed in the Dunkley by-election; hedgehogs, foxes and national accounts. Read on for the weekly roundup of links to articles, podcasts, reports and other media on current economic and political issues.

October 6, 2023

Vale Dianne Feinstein: Persecutor of Assange, servant of the US imperium

_She was the longest-serving female senator in US history, a trailblazer for women in politics and a champion for social justice and gun control. So began a piece from the Sydney Morning Herald_s North America correspondent on the passing of Californian Democratic Senator, Dianne Feinstein.

October 2, 2023

Five Eyes spotlights the dark side of Modis India

We often advocate the promotion of a rules-based order. From time to time, respect for the UN Charteris also invoked. But for all the talk, there are still a few nations who shape the agenda and seek to define the norms. This cannot go on indefinitely. Nor will it go unchallenged. - Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, India Minister of External Affairs at UN General Assembly, 26 September 2023.

March 15, 2023

How can it be that Australia has actually gone backwards in knowledge of China?!

At exactly the same time as proclaimed experts from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute are telling us to prepare for war with China within three years or so, people who have done proper research on the situation with China studies are saying our record is disappointing, indeed getting worse, not better.

March 4, 2023

Western leaders privately say Ukraine cant win the war

_The German and French leaders have told Ukraine they must seek peace with Russia in exchange for a post-war defence pact, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.

November 24, 2022

The central importance of Chinas common prosperity

Nikkei diplomatic correspondent Ken Moriyasu debunks the notion that Xi Jinping has been set up as some sort of President-for-life, stressing that Xis tenure is conspicuously dependent on maintaining overall performance legitimacy at a time when head winds look set to dominate.

April 3, 2025

China can neatly sidestep Trump's tariffs

China cannot ignore Trump, but it can evade him._

April 1, 2025

Is DEI really about justice or just what’s comfortable?

Diversity, equity and inclusion programs have been under attack lately – defunded in the US, dismissed as “divisive” by Australia’s Opposition Leader and treated as a box-ticking exercise in many workplaces. But after everything we’ve seen in Gaza, isn’t it time to ask – What is DEI really about?

February 25, 2024

Amidst rising American poverty, $6M per missile response in US war on Yemen

In October last year, Time Magazine reported a serious lift in poverty levels across America. You can read the full chilling report here.

February 23, 2024

Tribute to a great public sector reformer, Don Nicholls AM

My late friend and mentor Don Nicholls was one of the great public servants of NSW where he was Chief Economist and then Deputy Secretary, NSW Treasury.

January 9, 2024

Gut instincts and North Korean relations

Between years 2000 and 2018 the North Korea and South Korea governments issued three joint declarations all promising South Korean economic aid to North Korea and North Korean moves to denuclearisation.

October 25, 2023

Michael Pascoe: Dingo Warriors bait Albaneses China visit

Former Australian ambassador to China, Geoff Raby, last week wrote a piece praising the rise of diplomacy in our dealings with Beijing, claiming that since changing prime minister, we dont have a defence minister and senior public servants beating the drums of war, running roughshod over the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

March 25, 2023

Majority oppose U.S. war on China

The majority of Australians prefer a policy of neutrality and oppose joining US wars under the ANZUS alliance, polling shows.

March 14, 2023

Reshaping Australia: the Whitlam government and telecommunications policy

One of the Whitlam government’s first major reform programs was focused on telecommunications. In January 1973, Whitlam announced a royal commission to investigate the Postmaster-General’s Department (PMG) and provide recommendations on Australia’s ‘present and future needs’.

March 9, 2023

The BBC: a giant propaganda unit promoting the Ukrainian cause

In 2015 a BBC documentary on You Tube showed us the remarkable scene of a Ukrainian military unit trying to enter the outskirts of Slovyansk in the Donbas.

February 18, 2023

Valuable or valued: implications for employment policy

If the COVID-19 pandemic is teaching us anything it is the important contribution of doctors, nurses, pharmacists, allied health professionals, hospital workers and teachers. Health, people, and communities are precious.

December 26, 2022

Canadas Indo-Pacific strategy: from UN peacekeeper to US sentinel State

In a recentarticlein the Ottawa_Hill-Times, journalist David Crane asked an important question: Is Canada trying to match or outdo American hostility to China?_

March 12, 2025

Telling Chinese stories the Chinese way: Why is Ne Zha 2 more than a blockbuster?

One day in February, I had just finished watching Ne Zha 2 when I checked my phone and discovered that the animated film had already grossed more than US$1.38 billion globally – a figure I never imagined a Chinese animated film would earn.

March 4, 2025

Lithgow leading the charge: Why rail electrification is Australia’s best bet for fuel security and economic growth

The recent article by Christopher M. Johnson on Australia’s liquid fuel security risks underscores an urgent reality: our nation remains dangerously dependent on imported oil. As global supply chains face increasing instability, the risks to Australia’s economy and national security are mounting. The solution is clear – electrification of transport, particularly rail, offers a pathway to energy independence, economic growth, and environmental sustainability.

December 7, 2024

'Frontlines of a crisis we did not create': Low-lying nations make climate case to ICJ

“What started in the Pacific is now a historic climate justice campaign, as the world’s most urgent problem of climate change reaches the world’s highest court,” said one campaigner.

November 22, 2024

Does race influence Western support in international conflicts?

The ongoing genocide in Gaza forces us to confront an uncomfortable reality: why does the West seem to prioritise some conflicts while others, particularly in Africa, go unnoticed? It raises a critical question: does race…does colour influence how Western nations choose where to focus their attention and resources?

October 28, 2024

Breaking the deadlock in Japan-North Korean relations

To break the deadlock in Japan-North Korea relations, Japan’s new Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, has proposed liaison offices in the capitals of both countries to resolve the poisonous abductees issue - the fate of Japanese citizens abducted by North Korea in the seventies and eighties.

October 15, 2024

Under the shadow of a NATO-Russia nuclear war, Hibakusha awarded Nobel Peace Prize

As Vladimir Putin deploys mobile missile launchers throughout the Siberian Taiga armed with Yars heavy duty ICBMs, while making nuclear threats and claiming that these forces have been placed on a higher level of alert (though this isn’t necessarily so), NATO seems intent on compounding what seems already threatening and dangerous enough with the performance of the annual Steadfast Noon nuclear exercises, in which NATO literally rehearses for the apocalypse. It seems that this year the exercise is more ‘real’ than previously.

March 20, 2024

Universities make astounding discovery: AUKUS lacks a social licence!

A not-so-happy anniversary: Usually, a first anniversary is an occasion for all-round rejoicing and back-slapping. So, it was to be expected that thered be universal self-congratulation on the first anniversary of Anthony Albaneses, Rishi Sunaks and Joe Bidens announcement on 13 March 2023 that Australia would purchase nuclear-powered attack-class submarines from the US as part of Australias participation in the AUKUS agreement.

February 13, 2024

How the CIA destabilises the world

There are three basic problems with the CIA: its objectives, methods, and unaccountability. Its operational objectives are whatever the CIA or the President of the United States defines to be in the U.S. interest at a given time, irrespective of international law or U.S. law. Its methods are secretive and duplicitous. Its unaccountability means that the CIA and president run foreign policy without any public scrutiny. Congress is a doormat, a sideshow.

December 3, 2023

The musician and the soldier: Two revolutionary lives

A frontline medic writes of two individuals she met in Kayah State, whose stories exemplify the diverse ways Myanmars youth are contributing to, and sacrificing for, the revolution.

November 13, 2023

The ghosts in the vote machine in Indonesia

Indonesian politics is about personalities, not policy. Some among the 20,000 candidates for national and regional office at the globes biggest one-day ballot next year must be driven by altruism_. But how to vote? Who do the dead recommend?_

October 20, 2023

War mongering through the Scott Morrison lens

The former Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison continues to maintain his role as the countrys noisiest anti-Beijing figure. Still a federal member of the New South Wales seat of Cook (when will sod and off make union regarding him?), he is showing electors, each and every day, why his resignation is in order.

March 11, 2023

"A narcissist always searching for a new niche?" Brendan Nelsons autobiography: Part 1

Nelson has been described as a bullshit artist, a narcissist, a charlatan, oleaginous, and having a glass jaw. Each descriptor is incomplete, some even unfair. Yet, throughout his career he has been popular across the political spectrum. Why?

January 21, 2023

How Hong Kong leader’s Middle East tour could herald seismic shift in China-Saudi Arabia relationship

As geopolitical winds tilt China and Saudi Arabia towards greater interdependence, Hong Kong could play a critical role in unlocking both countries’ strategic objectives.

John Lee must position Hong Kong to deliver unique value in the emerging petro-yuan market in a way that complements Riyadh’s development as a trading centre for renminbi securities.

January 5, 2023

Pattens propaganda: barrack-room lawyers phony Hong Kong analysis debunked

In legal circles, outsiders who hold forth on legal issues without understanding the law or knowing the facts are held in particular contempt. They are known as barrack-room lawyers, a term that originally derived from military slang.

November 23, 2022

The coming Sinophobic calamity

Neither the red wave nor the blue one materialised in the latest election, which removes some of the impetus for the coming congressional Sinophobic rampage.

December 3, 2024

Terminology: The trap that is being carefully set

Terminology, take care. Take care Pearls & Irritations that you don’t fall into the trap - fall into the trap that is being carefully set.

October 19, 2024

Who really owns the South China Sea?

We are told the AUKUS ‘security partnership’ with the US and UK requires Australia to acquire a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines (SSNs) to accompany AUKUS. They will operate mainly in the South China Sea, allegedly to deter China’s ’expansionist’ goals.

October 14, 2024

Staving off the collapse of Western civilisation: A personal introduction to the CAMS/CAN model

As a transsexual woman driven by a deep curiosity about the flow of events, the past few years have been especially challenging. Nonetheless, I rose to the task, guided by the principle that truth must be defended. During this time, I have written 30 essays that meet high editorial standards, along with at least as many that remain as “personal notes.”

March 9, 2024

Thinking intensely about the holocaust, Israel and Gaza

The vengeful, scheming, genocidal response unleashed since October last year in Gaza, by Israel, has prompted a profoundly intensified global review of the punishing history related to the establishment of the State of Israel and its colonial-settler expansion ever since 1948.

January 19, 2024

The Gaza Strip: A struggle for daily survival amid death, exhaustion and despair

Every time I visit Gaza, I witness how people have sunk further into despair, with the struggle for survival consuming every hour.

November 26, 2023

Unlocking Pakistan's 5G potential: A call to action

In March 1995, Pakistan’s Ministry of Information and Broadcasting took a bold step by granting a 15-year license to M/s Pay TV to establish a wireless TV network. The intention was clear: to harness the potential of wireless technology for the nation’s development. Years later, we find ourselves at a crossroads, with the promise of 5G technology on the horizon. However, this promise is marred by a complex web of legal battles and mismanagement that threaten to derail Pakistan’s digital future.

March 10, 2023

Silent collaborator

Exclusive new Declassified Australia report details Australias official neglect of detained WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, revealed in Federal Government files obtained under FOI legislation.

February 26, 2023

Australia needs to think beyond China about data security

The discussion on TikTok and Hikvision infiltration in Australian government departments has centred inarticulately and dogmatically on the country of origin. But there are other more realistic and probable security threats lurking in plain sight.

February 17, 2023

Willing servant: Australias acceptance of US nuclear ambiguity

The AUKUS alliance is increasingly adopting a nuclear tone. First came the promise to furnish Australia with nuclear powered submarines, absent nuclear weapons, a point that did not dissuade critics such as Indonesia. Then came the announcement to deploy six B-52 bombers to the Northern Territorys Tindal airbase, south of Darwin, an exercise underwritten by the Pentagon.

November 5, 2022

The Budget and the APS

The budget papers reveal considerable action to progress the Albanese Governments APS reforms recently set out by Katy Gallagher. However, not all of the budget measures are clear yet, some are questionable and there remain important measures still to be pursued.

October 1, 2022

Zionism, anti-semitism and the British Labour Party

Last week Ali Kazak re-published an article,

The article was said to be by Yvonne Ridley and dated 23.12.2021. It addressed the prospect of (o)ne 82-year-old woman in Britain(being) expelled from the Labour Party having been accused of posting anti-Semitic views on social networks. Diana Neslen, though, is Jewish. The views essentially questioned Zionism, asserting that it was based on lies.

February 8, 2023

Putin's twilight: a prelude to darkness or a new dawn?

In his post on 7 January Lawrence Freedman concluded that “The question of what it takes to get Russia to abandon its war of conquest remains unanswered.”

March 13, 2025

Australia’s defence: Navigating US-China tensions

A significant intelligence failure to detect live-firing by Chinese warships near Australia, has exposed Defence weaknesses, and the fact that when it counts, we are all alone.

Pearls and Irritations

John Menadue's Public Policy Journal