Sir Phil the Greek; the truth
Who would have predicted that Prince Philip’s knighthood would have been marked by a serious tactical blunder? That wasn’t the knighthood. It was the commentariat overplaying its hand and revealing...
View ArticleThe age of self-obsession
It’s not every day that someone performs a gynaecological exposé at one of the world’s most hallowed art institutions. So it was surprising that the arrest of Deborah de Robertis at the Musée d’Orsay...
View ArticleBusiness/Robbery etc
While Gina Rinehart managed to emerge financially undamaged from her $300 million foolish five-year foray into Fairfax shares, she remained humiliatingly defeated in her attempt to have some influence...
View ArticleWhen it comes to free speech, we’re all hypocrites
Like a few of his other ‘principled’ policies, Tony Abbott’s commitment to revising the legislative prohibition against insulting or offending someone on the basis of his or her race or ethnicity...
View ArticleGoing troppo
Just what is happening up there in the Territory? Insomniacs and news junkies stood together as Sky News’ Dan Bourchier popped up on our screens at midnight. The Chief Minister of the Northern...
View ArticleThe Y.U.U.Y. disease
Let me put my money where my mouth is and make this bold prediction. Tony Abbott can save his leadership of the Liberal Party, and his Prime Ministership. It is not too late. But he will need to...
View ArticleAbbott and the Gumbys
Backbenchers call them the Gumby ministers. The reference is to Monty Python’s sketch about a dim-witted brain surgeon and his bone-headed patient, a devastating critique of the duds on Tony Abbott’s...
View ArticleFreedom of speech, but…
Was the Copenhagen gunman actually trying to highlight the absurdity of arguments against absolute freedom of speech? Probably not, but you have to hand it to him. His timing was impeccable. Actually,...
View ArticlePaying lip service to the Holocaust
On 27 January 2015 commemorations were held around the world to mark the 70th Anniversary of the Liberation by Soviet Troops of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest of the Nazi extermination camps. The...
View ArticleBlack humour
Every day for one year — as termites invaded the Aboriginal housing commission where Nakkiah Lui’s grandparents lived — Lui and her mother called the commission’s office to complain and beg for...
View ArticleThe harlot throughout the ages
Like some banana republic, Australia is in the middle of an attempted coup. Not by the army, but by the commentariat. Their theme is ‘Tony Abbott must change, and anyway, his government is doomed.’...
View ArticleOut of Commission
The starting gun on industrial relations reform has been fired. The Productivity Commission is about to begin a comprehensive inquiry into workplace matters; the Coalition Government is promising to...
View ArticleThe liberation of butter
The liberation of butter from the dietary exile to which stern medical opinion had condemned it makes you wonder what else that we’ve been magisterially told is bad for us might yet be rehabilitated....
View ArticleBusiness/Robbery etc
It was hidden away last week in the finance pages. But it will have a far greater impact on Australians than is normal for an overseas iron ore mining company’s annual production report. Brazil’s Vale...
View ArticleSex, lies and, er, rape
Wait — it’s now a crime to fib your way into bed with someone? That is the take-home message of the Kafkaesque case of Akis Emmanouel Livas, who recently was sentenced to eight months in prison by the...
View ArticleRight wing hunting pack
It’s possible that Australia soon will have a new Prime Minister. Tony Abbott, seriously wounded by the recent spill, struggles to survive. Every move he makes, every breath he takes, is scrutinised by...
View ArticleThe Forgotten Lawyer
‘I have been a lawyer for 46 years. I have never had any suggestion of impropriety or work that was not of the appropriate standard. I have been able to practise law in commercial legal practice, in...
View ArticleLet him who is without sin…
Let me lay down two propositions. The first is that labour relations in this country are in a bad way, too centralised, too inflexible, too much a throwback to the pre-Howard 1980s and early 1990s....
View ArticleFarrago of leaks, libels and downright lies
The principal skill of some Liberal MPs, acquired over years of taxpayer funded mobile telephoning, is Machiavellian intrigue. Normally, this is in the service of some factional boss who has...
View ArticleBusiness/Robbery etc
Bribery-prone foreign bank employees and do-gooder whistleblowers, we salute you! They, along with some long overdue international tax agreements, are at last bringing a sudden and, for many...
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