John Menadue

Writing in the Canberra Times John Warhurst examines the wealth of the Catholic Church, a topic that has come to prominence in terms of its capacity to provide monetary compensation to victims of sexual abuse.

Phillip Adams interviews Professor Shae McCrystal of the Law Faculty at the University of Sydney, on Australia’s industrial relations system. McCrystal explains developments leading up to present arrangements and problems with the Fair Work Act.  She calls for restoration of aspects of the twentieth century arbitration system to compensate for workers’ loss of bargaining powers.

“The Australian Government should consider setting up, or at least subsidise, a major domestic and exporting cigarette industry in Australia, even if the subsidies go to foreign companies or that the domestic industry is run by foreign companies” writes Crispin Hull in the Canberra Times. Before you send him an angry E-mail, have a look at his well-reasoned argument.

Private health insurance is back in the news, with articles by Fairfax journalists Esther Han and Ross Gittins.  Esther Han explains why people are giving up private insurance, while Ross Gittins says private insurance is a “con job”: private health insurance is “such bad value that, when John Howard sought to prop up the private system, he had to make it subject to a tax rebate”.

Barnaby Joyce and the changing landscape of the news media – Tim Dunlop

Barnaby Joyce has leapt to international prominence – New York Times.

Labor’s energy spending spree has electrified the South Australian election – the Guardian

Daniel Ellsberg worries about nuclear war – New York Review of Books

On Saturday Extra the 17^th February, Andrew West fills in for Geraldine Doogue. Items include: cleaning up the cleaning business, an accreditation scheme for companies doing the right thing by their employees with UTS associate professor Sarah Kaine; what will be the geopolitical hotspots for the Trump government in 2018 with the University of Melbourne’s Timothy Lynch and University of Sydney’s Brendon O’Connor; how can the Centre Left combat rising populism, anti-immigration parties with Flinders University’s Rob Manwaring; journalist Anneliese Rohrer discusses the conservative/far right coalition ruling her country Austria and US academic Marie Griffith on why sex has fractured US politics. That’s Saturday Extra www.abc.net.au/rn/saturdayextra

Proposed here is whether the wise counsel of Jesus of Nazareth, Adam Smith, George Kennan and legions of other insightful souls might well provide a sound basis for solutions to the world’s self-made catastrophic disasters – a vitally crucial issue demanding action before ‘point of no return’ overtakes all.  (more…)

In 2016, Australia’s bilateral trade with China in goods and services topped AU$155 billion (US$122 billion), growing three times faster than world trade as a whole. China was Australia’s largest export market and largest source of imports. It was also the largest source of foreign investment for the third consecutive year. (more…)

It was Tony Abbott who bestowed the appellation “best retail politician in the country” on Barnaby Joyce. Even now, some continue to preface their comments about him by claiming he is possessed of some form of political genius. It is true that Joyce has been successful at the time-honoured Nationals tactic of demanding handouts for farmers despite a complete lack of policy rationale (beyond Joyce’s personal and, given recent events, now ironic vision of Australian agriculture as a rural idyll of white heterosexual families). Hundreds of millions of dollars have been wasted on irrigation infrastructure and concessional loans to farmers at Joyce’s behest. But a quick check of Joyce’s other career highlights suggests he has serially been a problem for his own side of politics.  (more…)

Are we heading for another Saturday Night Massacre? – Woodward and Bernstein.

The wall Street “correction” is a financial phenomenon, only loosely connected to the real economy. As ABC Business Editor Ian Verrender explains, “markets — and particularly Wall Street — disconnected from economic fundamentals years ago”.  High American share values have been driven by years of easy monetary policy, and more recently by Trump’s fiscal recklessness. Mild monetary tightening has caused a panic.

Just in time for Valentine’s Day, the ABC has kicked off its new program The Economists with a session on the economics of love.  Peter Martin discusses the economics of loyalty – to one’s companion, friends, children, country.  Such loyalty may not align with the “rational” economics of self-interest, but it has huge evolutionary advantages.

Fairfax journalist Jessica Irvine writes about corruption. No the brown-paper-bag-full-of-$50-notes corruption, but the corruption that emerges when governments regulate markets. She points out that  “rent-seeking, the practice of attempting to manipulate government decisions to earn profits above what would otherwise be required to stay in business, is now rife”.

Dispatchable wind and solar will be the death of coal and gas – RenewEconomy

Why not fund an Australian tobacco industry?  We’re doing it for weapons – Crispin Hull

Security agencies use their cock-ups to demand more power they don’t need – Jack Waterford

NSW minister altered Barwon-Darling water sharing plan to favour irrigators – the Guardian..

Why Antonio Gramsci is the marxist thinker of our times – New Statesman

Church leaders never fully acknowledged that the culture, structure, processes of the church were part of the problem – Fatima Measham

The family who owns Tasmania’s gambling industry – the Canberra Times.

An aspiring Democrat Presidential  candidate takes on a bank and wins – New Republic

Is private health insurance a con? The answer is in the graphs  – Greg Jericho

Tesla big battery is already bringing Australia’s gas cartel to heel – RenewEconomy

“Private health insurance rebates don’t serve their purpose. Let’s talk about scrapping them” – the Conversation.

On Saturday Extra with Geraldine Doogue this 10^th February: political controversy continues in Kenya that now has a President and a “People’s President”, guests Nic Cheeseman from the University of Birmingham and columnist with Kenya’s Daily Nation and Njoki Wamai, a Kenyan researcher at the University of Cambridge; how the manslaughter charge of a junior British doctor who has also been struck off the medical register has concerned the medical profession in Australia with former President of the AMA and former chair of the WMA Mukesh Haikerwal and health economist Stephen Duckett; the Winter Olympics have begun in South Korea and  Scott Snyder, from the  Council on Foreign Affairs compares today’s situation with that of the Summer Olympics thirty years ago in South Korea and North Asia expert Rana Mitter on the lingering tensions between Japan, China and the Korean Peninsula and the promising situation of an upcoming summit between these countries (sans North Korea). In a good news story, journalist Lisa du Bode discusses the success of women farming seaweed in Zanzibar. www.abc.net.au/rn/saturdayextra

 

 

 

 

Recently Iranian women started a movement  all over the country especially in Tehran . They stand on a platform, take their scarves off and drape them over a street sign. It is in protest again the Islamic dress code . In Tehran, 28 women have been caught and gaoled so far . The first woman arrested did it in Tehran’s Revolution Street so they are called “The Girls of Revolution Street.”  See photos. (more…)

Recently in P & I the question has been raised as to how we can get better government – parliamentary reform, more professional public service, changes in economic policy and so on. But it is the answer to the question above which seems to have got lost.  (more…)

Every February, the Australian Electoral Commission releases data on political donations for the previous financial year. The data routinely show that among the ffbiggest corporate political donors are mining, infrastructure and defence companies and groups. (more…)

The big story about this week’s political donations disclosures is how little they really tell us. Over the last decade the major parties have routinely only transparently disclosed 10-20% of their incomes as donations. (more…)