Just when you think that the Australian Government cannot sink any lower, the prime minister still manages to surprise! (more…)
Category: Politics
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Australia is one trade deal away from backing authoritarians, says Taiwan
In the grand tradition of diplomatic overreach, Taiwan’s deputy foreign minister recently offered some sweet and spicy talking points to our media: semiconductors are tanks, China is akin to WWII Germany, and if Australia doesn’t fast-track Taiwan into the CPTPP, we might all wake up speaking Mandarin under a fascist AI regime, as reported by News Corp and 7 News. (more…)
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Chasing a chimera: The political dream of AUKUS that consumes reality
For the sake of taxpayers, let’s hope that the Audit Office is inspecting the AUKUS books closely. (more…)
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Washington and the Gaza war: How the US uses its support for Israel to assert global dominance
Since the outbreak of the Gaza war on 7 October 2023, Washington has made its position clear: full and unconditional support for Israel. (more…)
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MAGA 2.0: Making China great again
In Donald Trump’s make-believe world prices are falling, the economy is booming, he is bringing peace all around the world, and gas costs less than US$2 a gallon. (more…)
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Absent – The 3D essentials: Discipline, direction and determination
Why did the Jakarta student riots of 1998 succeed in ousting President Soeharto while this week’s public displays of outrage seem doomed to fail? (more…)
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Taking a win from Alaska
On 15 August, US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin met in Alaska, the first head-of-state meeting between the two countries since the Ukraine War began. (more…)
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The Earth is under chemical attack
The largest of the 10 catastrophic threats now facing humanity is global poisoning, yet it receives less attention from science, government and society than all the others. (more…)
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How the ALP built the market that is destroying public schools
Australia’s public school system is in crisis, underfunded, residualised, and struggling to retain teachers. (more…)
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The murder of journalists as an act of censorship
Western reporters should by now know almost all journalists, doctors, nurses and teachers in Gaza are Hamas members, just as some UN employees are Hamas militants. – Chris Mitchell, The Australian, 18 August 2025. (more…)
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Managing a mature Australia-China relationship
The Australia–China bilateral relationship remains strong, despite Australian concerns about China’s commitment to a free and open rules-based trading system. Trump’s disruptive tariffs demonstrate that Australia must balance its relationship with the United States while ramping up cooperation on regional economic and trade issues with China. (more…)
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Have Trump’s cuts made Australians kinder? 2025 aid attitudes survey
Aid hasn’t been an easy sell in Australia. In all the surveys we’ve run since 2015, more respondents have thought Australia gave too much aid than thought it gave too little. In our 2024 survey, 40% of respondents said Australia gave too much, while only 22% said it gave too little. (more…)
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We have arrested the development of our young
I hope you’re not among those silly people who concluded last week’s economic reform roundtable was just a talkfest that will lead to nothing concrete. Breaking news: we have to get together and talk about things before we agree on what our biggest problems are and what we will do about them. (more…)
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Carbon bootprints: How war is fuelling climate catastrophe
The military-industrial complex’s vast carbon footprint is deliberately hidden from public view, while we get gaslit into using paper straws. (more…)
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Death or displacement, ‘Please no more polite language about the Netanyahu evil’
Gazans experiencing 688 days of bombing and killing now face Netanyahu’s latest final solution the destruction of Gaza City and displacement of the surviving population. (more…)
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The West’s long struggle against genocide prevention: Obliteration and complicity
Dr. Steinbock’s highly topical new book The Obliteration Doctrine is about the genocide in Gaza, the West’s complicity and long struggle against genocide prevention. In this Q&A with Dr. Steinbock, we will focus on just a few themes of the his highly topical new book. (more…)
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ABS decision to reuse biased, coercive Census religion question puts human rights in the spotlight
In about 12 months from now, Australians will again be asked to fill in a Census form that seeks information on all kinds of important questions. (more…)
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Israel and its allies: When friendship means silence
Israel frequently presents itself as a nation surrounded by hostility, relying on close alliances with Western countries for both security and legitimacy. (more…)
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Why the NDIS inevitably went pear-shaped!
I was a part of the old (underfunded, unfair, fragmented, and inefficient, according to the Productivity Commission) state-run system. (more…)
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For 35 years after Vietnam, we had a self-reliant defence policy. We need it again
The US is almost always at war, not in defence of values and democracy but in its “manifest destiny” as the world hegemon. (more…)
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Redefining Hamas, pleading for a peace force
In conflicts, unless perception of opponents is re-defined, claims as to who is worthy, who unworthy are repeated and resolution remains elusive. (more…)
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Malign AI could change Australian election results, says judge
Justice David Mossop of the ACT Supreme Court has issued a call to arms for lawyers generally, and the High Court in particular, to prepare for palpable threats to “a small, naive democracy like Australia”. (more…)
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The ABC’s public comment guidelines: A ‘crackdown’ on management, not workers
The ABC’s new public comment guidelines, which replace its existing “personal use of social media” policy and follow the debacle of the Antoinette Lattouf affair, have been portrayed by rival media organisations as “a crackdown”, “a gag order”, “a hit” on ABC employees, and other such alarming epithets. (more…)
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As press freedom groups decry latest ‘murder’ of journalists by Israel, fury grows over impunity
“Israel’s broadcasted killing of journalists in Gaza continues while the world watches and fails to act firmly on the most horrific attacks the press has ever faced in recent history,” said one press freedom advocate. (more…)
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Caritas Internationalis statement on the man-made famine and assault on Gaza City
On 20 August 2025, Israeli forces stormed Gaza City, where nearly one million displaced civilians had sought refuge, many already starving. (more…)
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Don’t mention the war’s end
Only the very alert readers of Australian media have discovered this is the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II, and more importantly, the defeat of fascism. There is the odd whisper, a low key event in Townsville, a fleeting acknowledgement and little else. (more…)
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This is what happens when money dies
Israel has blocked the transfer of currency into Gaza; the result is catastrophic. (more…)
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Honeymoon over: Trump divorces India
In 2019, Donald Trump and Narendra Modi paraded their bromance with a 50,000-person “Howdy Modi” rally in Houston. (more…)
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Asia’s response to a leaderless trading system
Policy uncertainty reshapes trade slowly and then suddenly. The investments that build trade relationships are long-term choices. (more…)
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John Menadue in conversation with David Marr
In a wide-ranging discussion, P&I editor-in-chief John Menadue discusses a life full of achievement driven by conviction, and nominates seeing off the White Australia policy and establishing P&I as highlights. He is speaking with David Marr on ABC Radio National’s Late Night Live. (more…)