Archives: Letters to the Editor

The US-China confrontation which Gareth Evans raises also takes place beyond our region, at least a confrontation in US eyes. Compare the report on a meeting just held in China, ,with a report in April by the head of the US Africom, especially the last section summing up the strategic competition being waged by the US against China in Africa, based on a skewed US view of China’s current role in that continent.

At the international meeting in China, it was all about win-win co-operation, respect for different versions of government, and positive development for the benefit of all humankind, a stance endorsed by Xi Jinping.

By contrast, the US report expends a good deal of energy on simply slagging off China, rather than taking the approach of working together for the greatest good of the greatest number of the people living in the African continent.

Good on Margaret Beavis and her health profession colleagues. There has to some way to cut through the government’s support by inaction of the Palestine holocaust.

However, that way clearly isn’t to write to the prime minister. I have just been informed, as a result of an FOI request for his responses to webmails to him on Palestine since October 2023, that no such responses exist.

That is even though there are at least over 65,000 pieces of relevant correspondence to him. It was suggested that instead one should write to Penny Wong.

Good points and contributes to a body of writing about controlling population growth. A dimension overlooked is the impact of animal production – both farmed animals and “wild catch”.

There are estimated to be 80 billion farmed animals across the world. Most grain production is used to feed farmed animals. We would have more food to feed people if grains were directly available for people and not via the inefficient process of converting into animal products.

There are also the dimensions of climate impact and animal cruelty involved in consuming animal products in comparison to plant products.

“The days of the world letting America live beyond its means are rapidly coming to an end.” What needs to come to an end is the close ties with the market and government.

To think that running a business and running a country are the same thing is absolutely ridiculous. A business has an obligation to make a profit and a government has social obligations. That countries have excessive debt is due to excessive spending with private companies who can only be trusted to make a profit. They will not pay any more than they have to, and disregard safety and environmental laws.

Private companies don’t contribute to political parties without expecting a profit/return on their investment. In a democracy, governments have an obligation to the people to give them the best lifestyle the country can afford by legislating and regulating what is best for all.

Therein lies the issue with a democracy that can be bought by billionaires and bankrupts. As all the traits of the “worse form of government“ thrive, it’s time to find a better one. Australia is a good place to start.

One would hope that universities would include consideration of society’s needs in decisions about which disciplines they wanted to house, not a simple examination of enrolment numbers.

If enrolments for mathematics and English courses declined at Macquarie University, Downton, Parkinson et al. would probably conclude that society no longer needs people who know the square root of zero or when it is legitimate to happily split an infinitive.

An appropriate response to declining enrolment numbers (assuming that is what Macquarie University has experienced in sociology) would be to ask whether the knowledge and skills taught by that discipline contribute to a thriving society and if so why numbers are declining.

That’s not to say that every university should cater to every conceivable discipline but it is to argue for sound decision making, honesty and transparency by university decision makers – factors not obviously present in Macquarie University’s decision to axe sociology.

I should declare that I have a PhD in sociology and consider the knowledge and skills gained by studying the discipline are at least as important for society as those gained from mathematics, languages, economics, business studies and many other disciplines, including medicine.

John Dwyer’s 9 July article on the epidemic of misinformation about the safety of vaccines omits in his bio his previous connections with Friends of Science in Medicine, an ultra-conservative organisation characterised by a narrow scientism. Dr Kerryn Phelps, formerly president of the Australian Medical Association, has been a strong critic of Dwyer’s approach.

Phelps herself and her partner were both damaged by the COVID vaccines, and other highly qualified medical experts have questioned the mainstream story on COVID vaccines.

For example, Wendy Hoy AO, Professor of Medicine at UQ, states in her foreword to a detailed 2022 report by Phillip M. Altman BPharm (Hons), MSc, PhD, Clinical Trial & Pharmaceutical Regulatory Affairs Consultant: “It is abundantly clear that there has been repression and suppression in scientific circles and the media of any views or suggestions that run counter to the government/mainstream narrative. However, many studies now indicate that the COVID-19 vaccines, especially the mRNA vaccines, are less than ‘safe and effective’, and the ramifications are truly confronting.”

Public trust in vaccines was damaged during the COVID pandemic by the relentless and authoritarian exhortations from politicians and bureaucrats. More of the same from John Dwyer is unlikely to improve matters.

I seem to recall that one of the purported arguments against the Voice proposal was that one segment of Australian society would receive special treatment and that this inequality should therefore not be supported.

I wonder how our Indigenous community are feeling right now. I wait with breathless anticipation for the Opposition to run the same argument this time around.

As a 73-year-old who left school at the end of year 11, I’ve never been understand the concept of continual profit/growth.

Like compound interest, the profit/growth included the growth of the year before and in the end required dramatic change — eg expansion of output, reduction of staff etc — to be achieved and in the end it was not achievable.

I have watched as multiple government institutions have been privatised, primarily to reduce taxation, only to find that eventually the services once provided had reduced and the government has had to step in for all the reasons that the government was originally there to start with. For example, electricity supply was taken over because private companies would only service the profitable areas/cities, so too telecommunications, banking and health.

Talkback radio is awash with complaints about poor service in the bush largely bought about by governments selling off utilities to ensure low taxes for a limited time. I understand our self-serving politicians promoting low taxes, but not why so few can see the end coming. I cannot understand why the media promotes the mantra of the day and hide the truth.

As the nightly news is flooded by Donald Trump, his irrelevance becomes more and more obvious.

Putin, Netanyahu and Xi Jinping, the real major players, humour and ignore him and the next level of leaders have come to realise that that’s the way to handle him.

It is becoming more and more obvious that the US Congress, the stock market and even his appointees are going about their business recognising that the king wears no clothes.

I would go far as to suggest that he be given the Nobel Peace Prize that he covets (because Obama got one) so he can go back to signing hats and knocking divets into golf corse around the world before the US loses all credibility and a real power struggle ends life on the planet and before the climate gets to do the job we humans have started.
The end is nigh .

Last night, on SBS News a feeler was cautiously put to air about settlers and the IDF increasing their activities agains Christians in Palestine.

As the world turns a blind eye to the attacks on Palestinians that the IDF is “looking into“, the bombings, starvation and the purging of ethnic groups (anyone other than Israelis) from their Old Testament-given homeland gathers momentum with Trump’s approval.

Greg Barns’ analysis of the antisemitism envoy’s report and recommendations outlines the dangerous implications of it for Australian society.

This outcome was entirely foreseeable and it beggars belief the government succumbed to pressure from the pro-Israel lobby and the Murdoch cheer squad to establish this position and commission the report. Albanese now has to walk back on these recommendations while the usual suspects paint him as soft on antisemitism.

Albanese’s political problems pale in comparison with the real dangers these recommendations pose for Australian society. The erosion of the right to protest is already occurring in some states and this trend would be exacerbated if the envoy’s plan was adopted. Equally worrying are the censorship elements of the report relating to civic institutions and the arts.

I urge all readers to watch Sarah Ferguson’s interview of Jillian Segal on 7.30 on 10 July 2025. Segal was far from convincing in justifying the monitoring of the ABC and SBS for antisemitic content and could cite no specific examples of such content. It was all about “the vibes” it seems.

The sooner this report is buried, the better.

It’s bad enough that we have an antisemitism envoy at all when the nation made clear it didn’t want a “divisive” Indigenous Voice to Parliament.

Envoy Segal’s proposed measures to deal with antisemitism should be dismissed from the start, based as they are on the IHRA definition of same. It is appalling that our government and universities have adopted that definition.

That definition robs us of our rights to free speech and protest about actions of Israel and its government. No nation is immune to criticism. Israel is not an exception and it is not antisemitic to say, in current circumstances, that Israel is committing genocide in Palestine. If it became a crime to say so and jail were the punishment, we would have to provide accommodation for many thousands of Australians.

Antisemitism laws should never be adopted for a particular group. Such laws should be generic, covering all races, creeds, nations, etc, with examples from specific groups only as appropriate.

It will be interesting to read the anti-islamophobia envoy’s forthcoming recommendations to see if he will also advocate suspension of our basic rights. Or will Mr Malik be looking at fostering the rights of ‘all’ of us?

The Big Ride for Palestine raises between $20,000 to $30,000 per year for Palestinian charities e.g a kindergarten, an agricultural development project. The complexity and expense of transmitting the funds to the charities is beyond the capacity of such a small fund-raising project.

They arranged for APHEDA – Union Aid Abroad to transmit the funds as it has well-established means to do so. APHEDA refused to act as a conduit for the funds if any of the participants expressed overt support for Boycott Divestment Sanctions or if any BDS logos appeared on the riders apparel.

APHEDA made it clear that they feared that their government funding would be suspended if they had any association with BDS. Curtailment of the freedom of political expression is already in place. What is happening is not Trumpian so much as McCarthyism.

Clear analysis from Professor Gareth Evans. Max gratitude.

Not only would any contribution to a Taiwan battle be militarily insignificant, the response to our engagement by a riled Beijing could be effected without them sending any military force our way. We have near zero maritime capacity. We don’t own or don’t crew the trading vessels. They are foreign owned by entities we have no leverage with. But China does.

China could bring Australian trade to a halt, by decree, without sending a single warship to sea. By the proverbial stroke of a pen they could announce an embargo:

“From the 8th of [insert date six months ahead] any vessel that has visited an Australian port in the previous three months will be banned from all Chinese ports. Any business or entity that operates ships that visit Australia may have all other vessels it operates also banned from Chinese ports.”

In Morrison’s term, Beijing displayed a willingness to punish Australia with trade, as if an analogue for the US, and that was when the WTO still meant something.

I’m more than a little sick of hearing the mantra about Israel’s “right to self-defence”. That right is restricted by proportionality, something that Israel’s genocide goes far beyond in Palestine.

What about an occupied territory’s right to humane treatment and its land not being annexed? And their right to attempt to free themselves from their captors? When will we hear something, anything, about those rights? … Rights that have only ever been abused, never honoured, by Israel in Palestine.

Francesca Albanese has heroically and steadfastly stood up for the genuine rule of law… not that also sickening “international rules-based order” which is a “whatever I say goes” US American Humpty-Dumpty construct that, among other things, falsely condones the US being Israel’s partner in genocide.

No wonder this 21st century saint has been sanctioned by the US. She’s holding up a mirror to its evil. If only our Anthony had a fraction of Francesca’s courage and integrity.

Geraldine Schwarz wrote in Les Amnésiques that her grandparents, along with so many Germans, were “Mitläufer”, those who turned a blind eye to Hitler’s policies, when convenient, particularly when it involved some material advantage, such as taking over a business that Jews were forced to sell on the cheap to “Aryans”.

This is what her grandparents did. Her father, however, rejected what his parents had done. He recognised that if people in a culture that produced Bach, Beethoven and Goethe could do such things, or turn a blind eye to it, then anyone can.

Schwarz can now add to her list of those capable, those who had suffered so much. There will be material advantages for Israelis in ridding Gaza of Palestinians, and isn’t that what the settlements are all about? We are witnessing one of history’s great ironies in Gaza. It is encouraging to see that so many Jews are aware of the irony and are not the Hebrew equivalent of the Mitläufer.

Australia needs the other Albanese – Francesca, the special raporteur with the UN, with her superb courage, focus and global leadership. This is in marked contrast to our largely invisible and visionless namesake PM.

She gets the attention of Trump’s senior diplomat/enforcer Marco Rubio with her plain language accusations related to America’s role in the Gaza genocide. Rubio responded with personal threats and sanctions. Albo, by contrast, can’t apparently even get a phone call with the top end of Trump’s governing circus and he continues to be cowed locally by the Zionist lobby with their ridiculous demands for student inaction over IDF attrocities.

Francesca names the arms builders and the bankers behind the Israeli genocide. Albo’s Government adopts the ostrich posture regarding Australia’s arms manufacturers and contributors. Albo lacks the courage to tackle a no-brainer issue in plain sight like the idiotic advertising coming from the gambling lobby. He has shown little vision for Australia despite his huge electoral majority. Take a look at your namesake, Albo. There is a lot you can learn.

Just a further note on the suggestion being made that BRICS is on the ropes, I suggest having a look at the detailed report on what was discussed and progress that was made.

It paints a far more accurate picture together of the continuing success of the BRICS group in re-shaping the world into a multilateral one as opposed to the US unipolar dictatorship.

I back Fred Zhang to the hilt, 100%. I’m 5th generation South Australian. I love China. I hate the US.

… and of course, I love Coopers Beer.

Can a movement that conflates Jewish identity with the policies of the Israeli state — and that brands all criticism of that state as antisemitism — end up becoming antisemitic itself?

I strongly concur with this concern. Zionism, in its modern political form, has become entangled with the systemic displacement and disenfranchisement of the Palestinian people.

The very idea of a Jewish homeland — which arose from centuries of persecution culminating in the horrors of 1933–1945 — is rooted in a need for safety and dignity. That need is real. But what are we to make of the fact that, in practice, this homeland now appears to depend on the ongoing humiliation, confinement and annihilation of another people?

As we confront the actions of the Israeli Government today, I am deeply troubled by the increasing use of the term “antisemitism” as a shield against legitimate political criticism. In Australia and elsewhere, politicians are now asserting that criticism of Israel — or of the IDF — is tantamount to antisemitism. That is a serious and dangerous distortion.

Gareth Evans’ gratuitously rude reference to “outright military aggression — Hitler, Tojo or Putin-style” — spoils an otherwise admirable essay on how and why Australia should now reposition itself in the China-US strategic equation.

Gareth knows better. He has read Sachs and Mearsheimer. He knows how they and many other scholars have demolished the Western propaganda myth that Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 was unprovoked aggression. He knows Putin was forced into this after eight years of the Kiev Banderist regime’s rejection of Russian peace efforts and its murderous aggression and human rights abuses against Russian Ukrainians since 2014.

He knows of the imminent full scale genocidal final assault by the Kiev regime on the rebel Donbass region. Or is Gareth so conditioned to Australia’s Russophobic intellectual climate that he now flings off such gratuitous insults without thinking how unfounded his words are?

In April, just a third of Australians backed higher defence spending. Bravo! Depressingly, global military outlays hit $2,718 billion in 2024 — up 9.4% on 2023 and the sharpest rise since the Cold War, says the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. Sadly, NATO aims to push spending to 5% of GDP by 2035.

Militaries are massive polluters, responsible for at least 5.5% of global emissions – likely more, given secrecy and the exclusion of wartime emissions. Australia explicitly excluded military emissions from its 2022 climate pledges.
However, now that Australia has a Defence Net Zero Strategy launched in 2024, the ADF can begin to fight the climate crisis too – a justifiable use of any increase in spending.

And while we’re at it, let’s join the other 121 nations in the Non-Aligned Movement. As you report, an ABC poll published in April found “two-thirds of Australians say the United States can’t be trusted as a security ally and want to develop a more independent defence capacity”.

Let’s choose security through sustainability and sovereignty – not more bombs, bases, and blind allegiance.

I write regarding “The Texas flood, Australia and the psychology of evacuation” (Chas Keys, July 12, 2025). Reading Mr Keys’ article reminded me of the catastrophic bushfire which raged through eastern Victoria and descended on Mallacoota in late December 2019-early January 2020. (Few will forget the many out-of-control bushfires that devastated large areas of eastern NSW and Victoria that summer.)

Mallacoota is a popular holiday destination, situated on the Lakes Entrance waterways. In December and January, the population swells from between 1000 to 2000 to about 10,000. While there are conflicting reports about the timing and nature of warnings given, it is agreed that the conditions were likely to lead to a catastrophic situation.

Nonetheless, approximately one half of the residents decided to wait out the looming crisis. With land access cut off, the subsequent rescue of residents by naval vessels was as dramatic and it was effective,

Thank you, Chas Keys, for shedding light on the factors that influence the decision-making of populations when faced with circumstances of rapidly evolving danger due to natural disasters; and for pointing to measures that may assist in ensuring the safety of those directly affected in the future.

if we were to replace China with Israel in all these conversations it would surely be antisemitic and we would need an envoy. I’m surprised that all this anti-China talk isn’t treason, considering that China is our largest trading partner and in most circumstances everything is framed from an economic point of view.

From an Australian perspective, it has taken at least a year and many dollars to get the courts to consider what is antisemitic (not the same as racism) and what reporters can and can’t report under freedom of the press about Israel and the IDF .

The reporters are fortunate to be reporting from Australia as the life span of media in Palestine appears to be disproportionately short.

What would it take or cost to get the press and the opposition (apparently supporting businesses and farmers) to stop this barrage of misinformation about China and all things Chinese?

How would the appointment of a Sinophobia envoy be reported?

I suspect in the history of Australia, Sinophobia would rate alongside antisemitism and all the other undesirable isms.

As my local village (one of those Blue Mountains vintage, ye olde world villages) now boosts a garish, three-meter, neon green sign at its highway entrance reading “Massage Centre”, I slap my forehead in despair that we are becoming Americanised so fast that apathetic acceptance seems the general response.

After the PM’s trip to China, and Trump’s penchant for playground-style payback, I wonder if we should just trump Trump’s move and rearrange the AUKUS acronym to USUKA.

So the Zionists, Jillian Segal and her husband John Roth, massive supporters of the Advance party, spread lies and disinformation about an Aboriginal voice (among other things), and yet demand a Jewish voice.

They demand unbiased news, etc. I’m surprised they actually know how to spell the word; obviously, they don’t know its meaning. Some things are just wrong, and you can’t be unbiased; eg, Nazi gas chambers, My Lai massacre, and purposely starving children while denying them medication. Unless God says it’s OK.

How about a voice for atheists? Goodbye to SBS, Al Jazeera, TRT news and anything else not catering to their “unbiased” point of view.

I read Peter Tregear’s article and I agree with some, though not all, of his summation.

What the ANU administration has wrought upon what was on the way to becoming one of the great institutions of learning for musicians — akin to the Julliard School of Music, (at which my father spent most of a year studying the teaching of excellence in musicianship) — is a condemnation of the stupidity and arrogance of university academics as administrators.

I have worked at ANU and consulted for a number of years at USyd; with many wonderful academics and truly woeful administrators. Academia and the performing arts are ghastly bedfellows.

I disagree with Tregear that musicology is of equal importance to musicianship. I could be persuaded if I see a concert hall audience stand in applause of a paper on musicology. I have seen this happen for outstanding performances.

But I write to correct a misapprehension on the part of Tregear concerning the conception of the CSM.

No history of the CSM is accurate without appreciation of the role that Sir Richard Kingsland (whose contribution to Australia is vastly underrated) played in creating the CSM.

I know, I was there.

The nightly news is full of conflicts.

Conflicts that have been brewing for generations fuelled by colonial interference, religious conflicts often about like religions verses similar religion. Until we start truly recording the history of these conflicts, we will never put an end to them.

The Israelis are writing the narrative of this conflict and, in turn, the Palestinians will write their own history and the conflict will never end. The cost in human and economic terms will continue to escalate.

In the meantime, the real world conflict between the climate and capitalism will take second place at an obvious cost yet to be realised and those with the least capital will suffer the most.

This contribution is well and truly up to Binoy’s usual excellent standard. It has context and real journalistic analysis.

Albanese has “special envoys” for antisemitism, Islamophobia, and social cohesion, an ideological race commissioner plus a First Nations ambassador.

Via endless mass migration, he’s doing roughly 75% population replacement. His immigration pacts uniquely favour qualifications and students from Modi’s India. In effect, he’s engineering an “Indian electorates” to add to the “Chinese electorates” that helped to stymie, in turn, Dutton, Morrison, and Shorten.

It’s true that Donald Trump is targeting recalcitrant universities, but Albanese’s free-ranging ethnic and population engineering are very much his own. Memo: so-called culture wars don’t just come from the right.