At first, the 2022 election looked like being another fake contest between two major parties which offered voters little new, and little choice, particularly on foreign affairs and defence. (more…)
Alison Broinowski
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If America really is ‘back’, it needs to set an example on human rights and charity in Afghanistan
Over it’s 20 year war in Afghanistan the US inflicted untold death and destruction.Now with sanctions and boycotts it is inflicting even more suffering. Yet it continues to preach about human rights abuses by China and others.
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The hypocrisy behind Biden’s rallying call for democracy
The US president has urged the “free world” to guard against authoritarian threats to democracy, ignoring America’s own history.
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Australia diplomacy: how to lose friends and influence no one
Australia’s diplomatic missteps and lack of independence in foreign affairs and defence have brought a damaging loss of international trust. (more…)
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The origins of COVID-19: why we are still in the dark
The attempts to discover the truth about the origins of the pandemic have been undermined by secrecy, vested interests, suspicion, accusations and politics.
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The media hides the information we need about Julian Assange
Our mainstream media have treated Julian Assange as the bad guy for over a decade. Which is where the virus again raises its ugly head.
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What really happened — not just in Wuhan — to spark the COVID-19 pandemic
After months of advance publicity, book extracts and a Sky News documentary, most of us already know where Sharri Markson and News Corp believe the COVID-19 pandemic began.
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Losing Paul Barratt
Just before his major surgery in April, Paul Barratt emailed his friends and colleagues, quoting Captain Lawrence Oates: “I am just going outside and it may be some time.”
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White Man’s Media-Why cleaning up the government and media is women’s work
We let powerful global institutions control the narrative, and it’s up to women to put a stop to it.
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Best we don’t ask why we go to war.
Australia seems to hold more inquiries into itself than almost any other country. We inquire into everything, from Indigenous deaths in custody, child sexual abuse, and same sex marriage to bank misdemeanours, casino operations, pandemic responses, and alleged war crimes. There’s one exception to our obsession with self-scrutiny: Australia’s wars.
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Is cleaning up government and media women’s work?
Most of those who brought us this Anthropocene age are white, grey, male, and stale. It is now the virocene, the envirocene, and the pyrocene age too, thanks to the younger and even richer men who are taking over from them.
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What are hostilities if not war?
Rarely is the United States not at war. Trump didn’t start any wars, but he didn’t end any either. Biden is keeping America’s enemies and adding new ones. Congressional control over how the US goes to war and what it’s called has again become a pressing issue. (more…)
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Virtuous and vicious virology
If virologists are independent seekers after scientific truth, dedicated to advancing human wellbeing, recent revelations about their profession make it look more like mud-wrestling. (more…)
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The Stench of COVID Coverups.
Most of us who read Pearls and Irritations are not virologists, mainstream media journalists, Americans, or Chinese. As the nasty details about the pandemic emerge, that’s just as well, if we want the truth.
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Banging on about war. What for?
War used to be regarded as a failure of diplomacy. Now in Australia, we are being told to prepare for it. Why?
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Is News Corp back onto weapons of mass destruction?
Australians born in the last century remember how the ‘war on terror’ began in 2001. The same con trick is being tried on us again, for war with China. (more…)
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Armenia, genocide, and Australia
For all our talk about not forgetting, Australia has a selective memory about Armenia and other atrocities.
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Out of this war, ready for the next?
Afghanistan has joined Australia’s list of lost wars, and it’s our longest. The Prime Minister’s tears on announcing it may have been for that, or for Australia’s 41 dead, 249 wounded, estimated 500 veteran suicides, and innumerable cases of PTSD, at a cost of A$10 billion. (more…)
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Who wants war with Iran? Not Australia
Iran has resented the US ever since the CIA and MI6 overthrew Prime Minister Mossadegh in 1953. For its part, the US has wanted vengeance against Iran ever since the Islamic revolution ousted their ally and Israel’s, Mohammad Reza Shah. Iran is the last of the seven countries listed in 2000 by the Neo-conservatives to have their governments overthrown as part of their Project for a New American Century.
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Throwing stones in the Uighur glasshouse
On his last day at work for the Trump Administration, Mike Pompeo accused China of genocide against the Uighurs in Xinjiang province, which the Chinese Foreign Ministry vehemently denied. His successor as Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken, supports the accusation and has repeated it. (more…)
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US government changes hands but Assange approach will stay the same
The Australian government’s unwillingness to protect one of its own, coupled with Biden’s contradictory remarks about WikiLeaks, means nothing is likely to stop the wheels of British and American justice grinding towards the predictable result. (more…)
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Why does Australia allow the US to choose our enemies?
Trump was right: the US fights ‘forever wars’, and only the names of the enemies change. America is never without an enemy, an heir and a spare. Military force remains the default American response to most problems. Australia needs to warn the new US administration that we’re not interested in illegal, expeditionary wars.
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Right outcome, wrong reasons on Julian Assange
British justice has been done, but it is hard to fathom. Assange’s crime is different from the usual. He embarrassed the US by revealing activities recorded by Americans themselves, and the lawlessness of the US military that continues every day, all round the world. (more…)
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Can it get worse after Trump?
When Joe Biden is in the White House and Donald Trump is back in his tower or at his resort, some things about the Trump years will be missed.
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Darylgate: a Federal matter as well
A week is a short time in politics. In less than that time, an affair emerged that had lasted five years if you believe Gladys, or seven if you believe Daryl. (more…)
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Julian Assange and failure of mainstream media
On 18 September, a little over a year since Amal Clooney was appointed as the UK’s special envoy for media freedom, she resigned. Among Clooney’s barrister colleagues are Geoffrey Robertson, Jennifer Robinson, and Gareth Pierce, all of whom, at their Doughty Chambers human rights practice, are advocates for Julian Assange.
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It is time for a political solution to the Julian Assange persecution.
A travesty that passes for British justice has now run its course at the Old Bailey.
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The National Insecurity State
When the ‘war on terror’ was only seven years old, an Australian former Ambassador to Beijing pointed to its risks and costs for Australia. Garry Woodard warned that rather than protecting ‘national security’, such an open-ended war could widen our obligations to the US and narrow our options in dealing with China.
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The military-industrial-intelligence-security complex
In 1961 President Eisenhower warned that a vast and permanent ‘military-industrial complex’ could produce ‘the disastrous rise of misplaced power’. Earlier, US Senators Robert La Follette and J. William Fulbright also foresaw the dangers of militarisation. Now we have a military/industrial/security/intelligence complex, and it is dangerous. (more…)
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What else have the Archives got?
Jenny Hocking’s persistence has revealed the ‘Palace Letters’ between Canberra and London which the National Archives didn’t want Australians to see. If there were other exchanges with Washington and Langley they may be even more reluctant.
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