July 2, 2025

Gaza’s Hunger Games

Israel is weaponising starvation. The objective is to dismantle all remnants of civil society and reduce Palestinians to herds of desperate scavengers who can be driven from historic Palestine.

June 10, 2025

Six more giant gas projects could join Labor's latest carbon bomb

While Woodside’s North West Shelf gas plant approval has led to a chorus of protest, there are at least half a dozen more projects in the pipeline that could add to Australia’s emissions.

July 9, 2025

Freedom of speech and chants

“Death, death to the IDF [Israel Defence Forces]” and “Death, death to the IOF [Israeli Occupying Force]”. Chants that some in the Palestinian support movement in Melbourne used last weekend.

July 7, 2025

Message from the editor

My sincere thanks to all who made a contribution to our June fundraising appeal with the terrific team at the Australian Cultural Fund.

June 12, 2025

Hugh White and our post-American future

In his new Quarterly Essay, Hard New World, Hugh White delivers a devastating attack on Australia’s current defence policies.

May 11, 2025

Dutton’s election campaign rout lets RBA off the hook

Reserve Bank governor Michele Bullock must be breathing a quiet sigh of relief now the Albanese Government has been triumphantly returned to office. If you can’t think why she should be relieved, you’re helping make my point.

May 18, 2025

Accountability and war reporting

Most reporting of Western wars and conflict — as with current reporting of Palestine and early reporting of Vietnam 50 years ago — is missing context and interpretation.

April 10, 2025

If I was immigration minister, I would develop a population plan

If there is one thing politicians should have learnt in the last three years, it is that Australians expect them to manage long-term net migration and thus our rate of population growth.

April 17, 2025

Inspiring Australia?

With 48% of voters paying little or no attention to the campaign, according to an Essential poll, Senator Kim Carr, a former Labor minister, takes a look at how the two major parties have performed in what he describes as an uninspiring campaign.

May 28, 2025

Australia still doing little as the Gaza genocide gets worse

Australia doesn’t mind imposing sanctions on nations or groups it regards as being deserving of punishment for their nefarious activities, Russia, Iran and Zimbabwe to name a few.

June 9, 2025

Message from the editor

One of the things I love most about this job is the reading and listening (to radio).

May 31, 2025

'A big deal': Bowen says hosting COP31 will lift Australia’s standing and help accelerate renewables shift

Australia’s bid to co-host the United Nations COP31 climate talks in 2026 with Pacific nations has been described by Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen as a “remarkable opportunity” to restore Australia’s international climate leadership and help shape the global clean energy conversation.

October 14, 2018

KIM WINGEREI. A Secular Nation

Australia is a secular nation. It is enshrined in our constitution, yet we have a Prime Minister and many others in Parliament who don’t quite seem to understand what that means. The Ruddock report reveals not only state laws in possible conflict with federal law, but with the constitution and the principles of secularism.

May 29, 2025

Diplomats prepare ground for June conference on two-state solution for Israel and Palestine

We know that 67% of Australians believe Israel should not be withholding food, water and medical aid from civilians in Gaza (You Gov poll May 2025). Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has called it an outrage.

May 24, 2025

Diplomatic tsunami on Palestine

Europe begins to act against Israel’s “complete madness” in Gaza, in the wake of a wave of diplomatic incidents.

May 12, 2025

Message from the editor

Welcome to a new week, a new pope, a new cabinet and a new Opposition Leader. And for the first time, there are at least 57% women in the ALP caucus and record numbers of women across the federal Parliament.

June 6, 2025

China and the art of war

I have a love-hate relationship with China. As a university student, I was entranced by China’s history and rich culture.

May 4, 2025

Why extremists see gold in the migration debate

An immigration debate in an era of rising extremism is fertile ground for a noisy minority keen to distort the facts to sell their “white Australia”.

April 9, 2025

Making science great again – or not

In the US, the freshly installed administration of President Donald Trump is attempting to drastically reshape science. Here we focus on interventions that are relevant to epidemiology and public health.

April 28, 2025

Message from the editor

I’ll walk down to the local primary school next Saturday and cast my vote, but I will be in a minority. Most of my kids and both my parents would have already cast their ballots, along with two-thirds of the rest of the community.

June 21, 2025

IDF actions in Gaza directly contradict Jewish ethical tradition

The Israeli response to the Hamas attacks on 7 October 2023 has been massive and all-encompassing.

May 30, 2025

In the name of humanity, the barbarism in Gaza must stop

Over the last 18 months, the world has witnessed undiluted militarised cruelty targeting the entire population and the supportive natural habitat of Gaza – with not so much as an ounce of mercy or compassion, let alone justice, or sensitivity to issues of ecological viability.

May 22, 2025

David Littleproud cites nuclear energy disagreement as major factor in Coalition split

Nationals’ leader David Littleproud has singled out nuclear energy as a key reason for his party’s spectacular split from the Liberals, as both parties seek to rebuild following the Coalition’s devastating election loss.

May 7, 2025

Will the new pope be a Francis clone?

The 133 cardinals under the age of 80 have been in formal regular sessions in the Vatican most days listening to each other’s speeches and, more importantly, getting together in informal meetings in ecclesiastical colleges, restaurants, embassies, apartments, and pizza parlours in the Borgo near the Vatican.

June 4, 2025

A carbon tax and some key policy challenges

A carbon tax will obviously help reduce carbon emissions and achievement of the net zero target, but it will also help raise the revenue needed to fund essential government services and promote Australia’s economic development.

June 28, 2025

No time to dye: ABC’s China bias is licensed to kill credibility

The ABC has long held a reputation as Australia’s sober, publicly-funded bulwark against tabloid sensationalism – the broadcaster you turn to when you want analysis, not alarmism.

May 21, 2025

RCEP can aid in battle against global protectionism

The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, created to promote open trade and regional integration, offers a powerful platform to resist rising global protectionism.

June 14, 2025

Tasmania in the news for all the wrong reasons

It’s rare that the biggest news in Australian politics emanates from Tasmania.

June 13, 2025

Investing in Pearls

There’s a certain frisson as well as tension to this time of the year (June). It’s the time when those of us lucky enough (with enough) to have to make tax decisions can choose where to make a tax-deductible contribution that will, indeed et voila, lessen our tax bill while (possibly) benefitting a good cause.

June 11, 2025

Palestine and the gravitational politics of erasure

What we are witnessing in Gaza is not only a genocide of lives, but a systematic campaign to obliterate a people’s cultural identity, memory and future.

June 19, 2025

Stop Netanyahu before he gets us all killed

We could soon see several nuclear powers pitted against each other and dragging the world closer to nuclear annihilation.

July 5, 2025

Trump tariff deals with Japan, India bogged down – Asian Media Report

In Asian media this week: Trade pact sealed with Vietnam. Plus: Dalai Lama at 90 – the institution will continue; Region’s newspapers show disdain for NATO; China, Pakistan setting up new South Asian bloc; Canberra, Beijing squabble over project naming rights.

June 23, 2025

Message from the editor

One of the things that sets Pearls and Irritations apart is the calibre of our contributors.

June 22, 2025

Writers bearing witness in a time of genocide

I’ve been thinking a lot about an honours thesis I wrote more than 20 years ago, that thing you sweated through, that maybe your mother skimmed, that you stuck in the back of a cupboard somewhere never to be read or thought of again.

April 24, 2025

Trump’s shadow is all over this election

The president is bringing out the differences between political cultures and traditions in Australia and the US, especially in attitudes towards what government can and should do.

July 3, 2025

So... calling for peace isn’t enough, but dropping bombs gets a free pass?

When China submitted a draft UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Iran, the response wasn’t debate or discussion. It was suspicion.

May 14, 2025

Bowen confirmed as climate and energy minister, Watt gets environment

Chris Bowen has been confirmed as climate and energy minister in the new Albanese Government, while Murray Watt has been appointed minister for the environment and water as part of a reshuffle announced on Monday.

April 25, 2025

Pope Francis was a man from the peripheries

In the much-discussed novel and movie Conclave, the cardinals eventually elected a truly pastoral, caring man as pope, someone close to the people – just like Pope Francis.

April 12, 2025

Australia’s fading democracy calls for radical rethinking

Donald Trump has declared a global trade war and unsurprisingly America’s most faithful ally has not been spared.

April 8, 2025

Trump’s tariffs deliver a harsh truth for Australia

Too little thought has been given to the future of the Australian economy against the backdrop of a protectionist America.

June 30, 2025

Message from the editor

As I prepare the lists of articles for publication each day, I am very aware that many of our stories talk of death, destruction and cruelty.

June 18, 2025

The bamboo ceiling is still very much in place Down Under

Our business sector lacks the skills to do business in Asia. And instead of improving, the situation is getting markedly worse.

April 15, 2025

Managing overseas student policy is key to keeping migration numbers in check. If I was immigration minister, Part 2

Ever since Scott Morrison told overseas students to go home at the start of the pandemic and then stomped on the student visa accelerator once the pandemic ended, overseas student numbers have increased and policy has been fraught with constant changes to reduce the inflow of students.

June 24, 2025

Bombing Iran is part of the US' repetitive compulsion for war, war, war

“As we have seen yet again in recent hours, the political and media culture of the United States is heavily inclined toward glorifying the use of the US’ second-to-none destructive air power.”

June 3, 2025

Christianity: the antithesis of Zionism

Zionism has both secular nationalist roots, as well as religious messianic roots. But neither have any basis in Christianity.

April 30, 2025

Message from the editor-in-chief: Genocide is not newsworthy in The Australian

Our mainstream media have manufactured public consent to the genocide.The Australian has become a parody of a newspaper.

June 7, 2025

Build-up to the ultimate surveillance state has just begun

While most of us are transfixed daily by more horrific atrocities, potentially deadlier operations are likely to far outlast the genocide in Gaza.

May 25, 2025

Greg Sheridan piles on the Murdoch delusions

While Paul Kelly has written wisely about Donald Trump, many of his Murdoch colleagues appear discombobulated by the real estate developer’s return to the US presidency. Who can blame them? They’re not alone.

May 17, 2025

An open letter to Penny Wong seeking action on Palestine

Dear Minister,

Responding to war crimes committed against the Palestinian people

Congratulations on Labor’s achievement of another term of government. We hope this term will be one in which everything possible is done to promote, support and invest in peace, without which Australians - and others - cannot be secure.

Pearls and Irritations

John Menadue's Public Policy Journal