Archives: Letters to the Editor

David Spratt accuses the Government of ‘climate policy blindness’. This debilitating condition affects both Labor and the Coalition. They suffer because they each have too much to lose by opening their eyes to the stark climate future that we face. This blindness enables them to continue to give support to, and accept substantial donations from, the fossil fuel industry, and may ease concerns among some about their employability post-parliament.

We must attack this blindness by addressing its roots: for example strictly limit political donations, and establish a fair ‘cooling-off’ period for retiring politicians before they take up lucrative private-sector jobs. These steps are among those which have been proposed in this parliament by community-based independent MPs, who have, in their time in parliament, highlighted how politicians of integrity, not beholden to major donors, can and will face up to the real challenges.

The climate crisis is real, and near. We need governments with integrity and courage to tackle the root causes of the problems we face: first, urgently, to rid our politics of corruption through undue influence; and then, as quickly as we can, to move our economy and way of life to an environmentally sustainable footing.

Recently I’ve been wondering if the forthcoming election might give an indicative answer to just how large or small the influential Jewish lobby (AIJAC and the like) is within the Jewish community itself.

Reading her bio at the end of her excellent article (Ice Hockey Australia branded antisemitic….), I thought “another one” when I read that Cathy Peters is Jewish. There are a “lot” of Jewish people who oppose the genocide in Gaza, no doubt at great personal cost in some cases. In terms of influence, money talks … right across the spectrum of groups, causes, industries, ethnicities. That’s far from a Jewish preserve. But votes also count.

A lot of Jewish people live in close proximity to each other so might voting results indicate how pro-Israel or anti-genocide Jewish people are in electorates that have a significant Jewish population? Or are those who are anti-genocide not living in close-knit Jewish areas? If booth-by-booth results could give some indication, it might, hopefully, encourage Labor to be more bold in word “and deed” in condemning Israel and supporting Palestinians by knowing, while they might lose pro-Israel lobby dollars, they will gain more votes, and integrity, by being actively anti-genocide.

Dear Editor,

An Objection

As a passionate Animal Activist who also greatly cares about Social & Environmental justice I found the title of this article offensive to our poor dogs who do not deserve to be so badly insulted by being associated with / and describing these so unethical immoral people who have no shame.

Dogs are such beautiful Sentient Beings and should not be denigrated in this way – nor should any other animal species.

There are better more apt negative descriptions to be used ( eg scum) without harming the image and reputations of our so precious beautiful 4 legged friends.

My thanks,

Elizabeth Attard

I was interested in the Medical drawbacks of Nuclear Energy. However, another issue is heat generation.
With the uNclear (Nuclear) policy, one fact that has not been considered is the need for cooling.

These proposed Nuclear plants will be larger than the Coal plants they replace. This requires a large amount of cooling water. The waste heat is released into this body of water which raises the lake water temperature. This raising temperature causes changes in the ecology of the lake to the detriment of the natural balance.

Comparing Nuclear to other forms of energy generation such as wind or SolarPV, the latter do not require cooling.

I note Richard Bean’s analysis of interviews on ABC Radio National’s Breakfast program suggesting pro-Israel bias in the ABC.

I wish to share a letter I wrote to the ABC in November 2023, seeking clarification about a two-part discussion on “Big Ideas” entitled “Newsroom ethics and the Israel-Gaza war” which,   I suggested,  could plausibly be interpreted as having a panel skewed against the Israeli perspective.

This is obviously not intended to be a systematic rebuttal of Bean’s piece. It is simply one counter-example intended to complicate the picture presented in Bean’s study, and to indicate that ABC coverage of the conflict and how it is reported is not routinely and uniformly pro-Israel. (Note –  I am not suggesting that any of the views expressed by any of the panelists on Big Ideas are invalid or illegitimate, just that such views are sometimes foregrounded by the ABC).

 

Letter to the ABC Ombusman, dated 26-11-23

In a recent “Big Ideas” panel discussion (and here), “Newsroom ethics and the Israel-Gaza war”, the ABC addressed the challenges inherent in reporting on the Israel-Palestine conflict, particularly since 7th October with divergent, passionately held views expressed in the media, at university campuses and schools and on Australian streets.

The panel, moderated by Martin Newman, had six participants. Two participants, Monica Attard and Karen Percy, highlighted key journalistic principles and the practical challenges encountered in reporting Israel-Palestine. They both appeared to take a relatively neutral stance on the issue at hand. (Regarding this neutrality, it is noted that the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance, of which Karen Percy is Media President, signed an open letter presenting a very one sided view of the conflict and its reporting. Percy did not sign in her own name.)

There were four other speakers.

Amy McQuire is an indigenous Australian woman who identifies a connectedness between Australian Indigenous and Palestinian struggles and has expressed solidarity with Palestinians. Rawan Damen is a member of Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism and director of the documentary Al Nakba. Zahera Harb is a London journalist who worked for many years in Lebanon and is also a member of Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism. All three are clearly highly accomplished and articulate but more or less strongly expressed concerns held by the pro-Palestinian segments of the community. If Antony Lowenstein, a Jewish Australian writer/journalist was chosen to provide balance to the panel, he was clearly a poor pick. Lowenstein, author of “My Israel Question”, essentially made his name as a Jewish critic of Israel.

Thus four of the six panelists (or potentially five, given the Percy’s position at the MEAA) appeared to have strong commitments to the “Palestinian side” of this issue. There was no one on the panel to provide a counter view (from an Israeli perpsective).

Moderator Martin Newman didn’t help achieve balance with a Dorothy Dixer to Rawan Damen (asking about reticence to use the word genocide for Israel’s actions), by supporting Anthony Lowenstein’s response to a comment from Monica Attard and by inviting an anecdote from a journalist who described being fired for expressing his views critical of reporting.

While the ABC is to be congratulated for convening a panel on this challenging area of reporting, it is concerning and indeed ironic, that the composition of the panel seemed to reproduce the very problem it was set up to examine. It is astounding that the ABC failed to take care in seeking genuine balance in the preparation of this important journalistic discussion.

 Can the ABC provide further background on this? Was there any effort made to seek balance on this panel? If not, how can the ABC justify such a skewed panel selection?

 

The Ombudsman’s reply is copied below in full.

 

I’ll highlight just three points from the ABC Ombudsman’s reply:

The reply doesn’t really address the core concern raised, but simply states that “panel composition is not determinative of compliance with the ABC’s impartiality standards”.

It notes the report was “not a debate about whether Israel should or should not have invaded Gaza” which is irrelevant as this was not the concern raised in my letter.

It notes that one of the issues touched upon was “coverage privileging certain perspectives”, yet fails to adequately respond to the concern that it was precisely this issue of privileging that was reproduced in the panel.

 

The Ombudsman’s reply in full:

Ombudsman Investigation Report— 15 December 2023

Big Ideas – ‘Newsroom ethics and the Israel-Gaza war’— 23 November 2023

Summary

The Ombudsman’s Office received five content complaints about a panel discussion broadcast as part of RN’s Big Ideas program. The complaints were similarly worded and argued that the panel composition was skewed towards a Palestinian position on the Israel-Gaza conflict, and as a result the program lacked impartiality.

Analysis

The Ombudsman has noted in previous investigation reports that panel composition is not determinative of compliance with the ABC’s impartiality standards. Moreover, in this case, the panel was not selected by ABC staff, but by organisers of the panel discussion, the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS).

The complaints primarily focussed on the background of panellists, except broadly noting that predominantly pro-Palestinian positions were expressed during the discussion. Two complainants noted:

Moderator Martin Newman didn’t help achieve balance with a Dorothy Dixer to Rawan Damen (asking about reticence to use the word “genocide” for Israel’s actions), by supporting Antony Loewenstein’s response to a comment from Monica Attard and by inviting an anecdote from a journalist who described being fired for expressing his views critical of reporting.

The program submitted:

The focus of the panel was specifically the challenges journalists and newsroom staff face in reporting on the Gaza conflict. It was not a debate about whether Israel should or should not have invaded Gaza.

Host Natasha Mitchell’s introduction Listed some of the media-related challenges which would be discussed including the spread of misinformation and conflicting narratives.

The panel’s aim was to air these issues openly and respectfully. Speakers were given allotted time to make their case and there was some general discussion about the points raised.

In the raw transcript UTS organisers note that ‘they reached out to some Jewish journalists’

While there wasn’t much time given for speakers to address each other’s points, there were certainly questions about some of the more sweeping statements made, including the notion that the media has silenced Palestinian voices in favour of Israeli voices.

We accept the program’s submission that the debate was focussed on the challenges faced by journalists covering the Israel-Gaza conflict, rather than the conflict itself. It was appropriately introduced as such by the program’s presenter.

ABC OMBUDSMAN

Within this editorial focus, critical perspectives were expressed on a variety of issues, including the difficulty of verifying claims, mis- and disinformation, contested terms, coverage privileging certain perspectives and sources, pressure brought to bear on journalists by lobby groups, self-censorship and whether journalists should be able to include their own perspectives and lived experience in the way they cover the conflict. Some perspectives expressed by panellists were explicitly challenged, with Monica Attard contradicting an alleged ‘silencing’ of Palestinian voices in mainstream media coverage and lack of attributing ‘violence’ to Israel. Ms Attard also queried a suggestion of journalists being ‘activists, and alleged lack of acknowledgment of a freelance Palestinian journalist filing for the ABC being killed in Gaza.

We note that the moderator allowed panellists to comprehensively express their views and respond to each other, and invited audience members to ask questions or contribute further relevant perspectives, without providing commentary on the issues himself.

Ombudsman’s Finding

The program did not breach the ABC’s editorial standards for impartiality.

Fiona Cameron

ABC Ombudsman

 

 

Andrew Wirth is a member of the Melbourne Jewish community. He is unaffiliated with any communal political organisations.

We don’t live in a democracy we live in a capitalist society. The greatest threat to our so-called democracy is our political system. The rise of the right, the war on woke, divide in communities along religious, racial, economic grounds, the preparation for war, the power of the billionaires, the loss of truth are all signs of a failed system.

These issues are not isolated to the US, but remember where you saw it first and the constant bombardment of US politics in all media is not news, it’s come join us.

It will not be until we have real truth, laws that apply politically to all aspects of our lives and truth, laws with teeth that are supported by a proper lawyer-proof regulatory framework that applies to every one that democracy will be in place.

When we have Parliamentary privilege with truth penalties, a speaker with real punch, truth in media laws, open-ended funding to the ICAC, open-ended funding to government auditors and ACC, equal funding to the poorest and the richest in the court system, and we abolish commercial-in-confidence for taxpayer spends then we will live in a truly equal democracy. .

Refaat Ibrahim tries to describe in words the horror of the last 15 months in Gaza. A serious question which arises is how one section of a religious group, and a small one at that in world terms, is able to exercise so much control over the foreign policy of the governments of secular states such as the US, UK, Australia and Germany. Surely the Holocaust, terrible though it was, can’t explain that stranglehold.

Well, the government certainly does not think so. My husband is a “young” 85-year-old.

Two years ago he mislaid his Australian passport, he needed to travel to visit a family member so he asked for a replacement. To his astonishment, DOHA refused to give him one. He has retained eight Australian passports, all giving his nationality as Australian and confirming him to be a citizen of Australia.

He was not born in Australia, he arrived aged two as an evacuee with his mother in 1942, both British subjects. He was educated in Geelong, called up for National service at 18, married an Australian, worked for many years in Melbourne, and raised a family.

Yet at 82, they have told him that “in their opinion” he is not Australian. The reason given is that he cannot provide a certificate. NAA confirm no certificates were given in the 1940s and they keep no records for British subjects’ passports prior to 1980. DFAT told him that his first passport was issued to him in 1980 and were perplexed when he gave them the details of his 1975 passport, which they agreed was indeed a legitimate document. It is a disgrace.

Thank you for the Michael Keating article adding more evidence to debunk the myth that Liberals are better economic managers than Labor. John Menadue addressed this myth in his 11 April 2019 article. That article highlighted the enormous damage that the Howard/Costello Government did by “locking in negative gearing concessions and generous treatment of capital gains which have been at great cost to the government in lost revenue”.

They also introduced tax-free superannuation benefits, family trust concessions, franking credit rebates and a whole series of decisions on spending and tax that have caused continuing budget difficulties.

Menadue also pointed out that only two Australian treasurers have been awarded the coveted Euromoney “Finance Minister of the Year”: Paul Keating and Wayne Swan, both Labor Treasurers, and that the IMF had described the Howard/Costello years as a period of “fiscal profligacy”.

Why does the myth persist when the evidence is so clear over the last 30 years? The evidence on this is also clear. What skills the Liberals lack in economic management they make up for in selling their image and messages.

Thanks to Noel Turnbull for summarising the findings of The Scanlon Foundation Research Institute Social Cohesion Mapping 2024 Report.

I don’t agree, however, with the suggestion that we should be troubled that “49% of people (now) say the number of immigrants is too high” (a significant increase from previous surveys). There are many non-racist reasons for opposing too high a level of immigration. These include concerns about how big a population Australia’s natural resources can support; concerns about the impact of rapid population growth on our housing crisis; concerns about the exploitation involved in many of Australia’s migration pathways; and concerns about our ability to successfully integrate high numbers of migrants into our communities.

There is a often a reflex reaction by people of progressive views against those who oppose our current high immigration levels. I believe the issues are complex, requiring respectful and nuanced discussion.

I wrote to various government officials regarding the above tour, but did not receive a response. However I received a response from Santos, which I am not allowed to copy to you, but will paraphrase as follows:

Thanks for the letter. Santos realise that this is a sensitive topic and sympathise with those who are affected by events in the Middle East.

Because this race is under the umbrella of Union Cycliste Internationale, the Israeli team is required to receive an invitation to participate.

Thanks for my letter.

What a cop-out!

A striking statement from Noel Turnbull: the worldwide phenomenon that people suffering from financial hardship are more likely to have negative attitudes to migrants, immigration and different religious faiths to themselves “explains much about the Dutton appeal”.

Peter Dutton is a divider. He is an (albeit paler) imitation of Trump, master of division via hate and blame. Dutton might attempt to rehabilitate his reputation over the next few months, or double down. Either way, his record stands: walking out of Rudd’s apology to the stolen generations, the “African gangs” accusation, “jokes” about rising sea levels in the Pacific Island nations, and many divisive decisions and statements on immigration. He has the backing of the Murdoch media which peddles hate-filled misinformation.

This latest social cohesion research shows “71% agree that accepting immigrants from many different countries makes Australia stronger, while four in five agree that multiculturalism has been good for Australia”. We need to promote the positive and call out the dog-whistling which will inevitably ramp up during the election campaign.

A decreasing number of attendees at the Adelaide 500 complain about Victoria stealing our Grand Prix. That’s largely because there is a decreasing number of attendees and those numbers are including the attendees at the post-race concerts.

I’m told that SA Treasury advised against renewing the contract. The last three times the previous Liberal Government listened the Labor Government reinstated it. When there was a protest for it, more people attended to save a stately home from road works than to reinstate the car race.

Rumour has it as part of a Party Pete factional deal to get the then Leader of the Opposition nominated. As for the condition of South Australian roads, it’s taken 50 years to get the South Road finished one day.

Every time I hear people complaining about the state of SA roads, I invite them to come see the A1 state of our Street Circuit, SA’s most resurfaced road. The truth is that commercial in-confidence should never apply to taxpayers’ money. Both sides of politics defend it because they both need it to hide their shonky deals.

“The Morrison and Albanese governments have effectively handed sovereignty, independent decision-making, as well as a blank cheque to the United States. In other words, Australian wealth will be transferred to the United States, for the benefit of the United States, whilst Australia and Australians wear the costs.”

Win or lose at the coming election, Albanese has to go. We need a new generation of politicians to rise up and say “Enough is enough” to slavish devotion to all things USAmerican. We need politicians who will ensure that our common wealth is not shipped off-shore by multi-nationals who pay little or no taxes here and not donated the the US military-industrial complex.

Let’s start improving our schools and hospitals, let’s get on with providing housing for the young and dignified care for the aged, let’s get the the potholes in our roads filled. And to make that possible in a liveable world, we really must get on with decarbonisation and producing renewable energy for us all.

When any and every attempt at a political solution is ignored by the Israeli Government, if no action is taken, nothing will change until the last Gazan is wiped from the face of the earth.

Australia’s response is an utter disgrace, as exemplified by the letter sent on behalf of Penny Wong and the plan for our attorney-general to go to Israel to repair Australia’s “friendship” with that country.

It was fine, and effective, to boycott South Africa on account of its apartheid regime. Surely nothing less than BDS should be our minimum action in regard to Israel as it practises both apartheid and genocide.

I am not a religious person, but I really appreciated reading Bishop Browning’s assessment of Christian values and the contrast with a Conservative’s self-interest. The world would be a better place if we took more notice of people like Bishop Browning.

I must have read dozens of excellent articles on these pages, including this one, on various aspects of the situation in Gaza and the Middle East, yet the slaughter of Palestinians continues with barely a murmur from the Australian Government. We need to take our opposition further.

I suggest using the anti-Vietnam protests of the 1960s and early 70s as a model (yes, I was there!). A nationwide, co-ordinated, “Moratorium” would be a good first step. (As well as individual state-based committees, there was also a National Co-ordinating Committee).

The immediate aims of this Moratorium would include, at a minimum, recognition of the State of Palestine based on the 1967 borders, and withdrawal of Israel from the occupied territories.

“Countries will find greater agreement with the late Henry Kissinger’s much quoted warning on international relations: ‘It may be dangerous to be America’s enemy but to be America’s friend is fatal’.”

We could tear up every agreement ever signed and not give them another cent, if Australia (or any country) is in strife, the US will help if it’s in the interests of the US.

And if it’s not in the interests of the US, we’ll be on our own, no matter what agreements have been signed, promises made, or how many squillions of dollars we’ve sent or spent on their behalf.

Given the instability (see how polite I am?) in the US, now is the time to cut the apron strings and learn to stand on our own two feet, dealing with other nations as equals, not boot-licking (polite again!) as we do now.

Looking at aerial shots of fire-stricken parts of LA, what other place in the world does it remind you of? Yes, Gaza. Destroying food aid, including Australian, in Gaza is reprehensible, but the full scale of destruction there, as we know is, sadly, much much greater.

Both Gaza and LA are very sad events, one brought about by Biden and the US’ over the top response to 7 October, and the other, LA, so far as we know, by natural events. We mourn the huge loss of life in Gaza, and are thankful that the loss of life in LA so far is about one five thousandth of that in Gaza.

My complaint letter to the ABC in response to one of Eric Tlozek’s news report from Damascus was critical of Tlozek’s reporting, certainly, as Gayle Davies suggests in her letter (6/1/25).

As an ABC correspondent in the Middle East (and as one who appears to speak Arabic), Tlozek should be aware of the dangers confronting Syria now that HTS is in charge and thousands of armed ‘jihadists’, many of them foreigners, are roaming Syria. A genocide on the scale of Rwanda’s could be committed in coming months. We should not be blind to this possibility.

As for the alleged sarin gas attack in Damascus in 2013, we would only need to have read Paul Malone’s article in the SMH to understand the controversy surrounding it. Tlozek should not let the word of someone presenting himself as a witness override the analysis of top scientists and investigative journalists.

When we are being dumbed down by our ABC, it means our politicians and public servants are, as well. It does not bode well for Australia.

We rely on ABC managers and journalists to abide by ABC Standards. Regarding Syria, they have been breaching them with impunity for 13 years.

Dr Helen McCue, the views expressed in your article are most definitely not yours alone. They are the views of many Australians who, disgusted, sickened and angered by the duplicitous and mealy-mouthed words and actions of our government, long for our nation to make a stand for peace, for justice and for compassion.

How can we live happily in Australia knowing that so many people in Gaza are being killed, bereaved, maimed, starved and left to suffer their pain?

The headline alone was enough for me to think about Norway. Not surprising, as I grew up there in the 50s and 60s. I went to the very best secondary school in the country, not because my parents had money, they didn’t, but because I had good primary school results. I had the same German teacher as the present King Harald.

When I migrated to WA in 1966, as an unworldly lad of 19, it took me three months to start wondering what was this nonsense (being polite here) of digging iron ore out of the ground, loading it into ships, and sending it off to (in those days) Japan. Why weren’t they building a smelter in Port Hedland?

I have never stopped wondering, wondering about just about everything to do with anything we do in this country of squandered opportunities. Natural resources. Future fund (ours is a joke). Housing (the worst part of which is that negative gearing sucks Mum’s and Dad’s investments away from productive enterprises). And now, to cap it all, nuclear power stations.

All Australian MPs should be obliged to spend three months in Norway learning how to run a country.

Greg Barns and fellow P&I contributors raise serious questions about this trip. I am trying to imagine what is being said.

“Look Bibi, socially cohering to you is getting very difficult for us in Oz. As the point man for the IRBO in Oz, I’d have to arrest you if you visited. I did manage to get one of your men, who is also an Aussie, off a charge of being an alleged accessory to a war crimes case over killing 50000 people, which was privately brought in Oz, although I did allow another Aussie to go to jail for reporting war crimes by our own troops.

“Anthony’s namesake at the UN, Francesca, is giving us absolute hell. How am I to continue to not say anything about you implementing the book of Joshua in Palestine?

I know we’ve got an ex-PM who is still comfortable with jointly attacking a foreign country leading to 500,000 deaths over imaginary weapons, so your Lavender and its high target to non-freedom fighter ratio, which has racked up the deaths of tens of thousands of women and children, might seem small beer, but, mate, you’ve got to stop, regardless of what our Zionists at home say.”

It is difficult, if not impossible, to morally defend the political cowardice displayed by Australian politicians and their inherent racism, when they fail utterly to condemn what the world recognises as the crimes of genocide and ethnic cleansing when committed by the criminal Zionist state of Israel.

The Albanese Government remains so terrified of the Zionist lobby in Australia that it has been prepared to sacrifice any claim it might have had to moral rectitude, in pursuit of its continuation in a “power” without moral purpose!

James Curran’s article provides much to consider.

However, I hasten to query why we continue to characterise this organisation as other than what it so evidently is – a lobbying entity for the armament manufacturers / AKA military-industrial complex.

Uniquely (I hope), given the almost automatic post-political career step for ministers for defence into armament manufacturers’ employ — either directly or as a lobbyist — we have the nauseating burden of being the taxpayer support base for the whole wretched affair of creating evermore opportunity for said armament manufacturers to increase profits.

War per se is not actually required, just dog-whistling at an ear piercing level. Of course, war maximises those profits. See also the financial returns for the major protagonist companies just from Israel vs anybody near it or Russia vs Ukraine in the past 24 months.

And both our major political parties jump into step smartly. People should read Curran’s Unholy Fury for an insight into what a genuinely courageous, Australia-centric prime minister did when faced with the situation of Australia having been dragged into a foul and unjust conflict.

We may have abolished the wonderful British tradition of transportation except for refugees or maybe we have run out of places to transport the poor. The legal system is very much biased towards those with the money to pay.

How often do our politicians and their staffers end up in goal ? I am aware of cases where the poor for a similar charge have been convicted and completed their sentence before a politician has been convicted or sentenced (Then I think they are only fined a sum which they could afford).

How many royal commissions into deaths in custody do we need to see that the poorest of our poor are disproportionately incarcerated? There are no votes in prevention and rehabilitation, but there are votes in rhetoric and incarceration even when we in SA “Rack them pack them and stack them“. In the US private jails are a very profitable business; will that become our new place of deportation?

Irrespective of the nature of the Assad regime, if the stories I read are correct then this seems to be another al-Qaeda associated mob ushered in with the help of the CIA.

It seems that the capacity of the US to incite trouble anywhere in the world has no limitations.

Thank you James – your statement “ASPI was created by the Howard Government in 2001 to provide contestable advice on Australian defence policy” has me wondering about the advice related to the 2004 decision to join the illegal Iraq coalition.

But other matters come to mind as well: your words had me thinking further about my sense of the persistent decline, if not absence, of political education that should be a political party’s mandate. Shouldn’t that be where the contest is joined? How and why have our major parties capitulated into seeing themselves as “social engineers”?

Peter Varghese evidently sees ASPI as a “think tank”. My question then: is it to be the task of “think tanks” — by proffering “contestable advice” — to provide the outlook(s) needed to be understood by the Parliament’s electors concerning the right path to maintain and promote public justice?

If so, then the “think tanks” should be offering a service of self-critical research that explains how they have historically displaced political parties as the electorate’s major public-legal educators. Could “think tanks” be co-perpetrators of a development in our political culture by which accountability to electors has been hollowed out and made problematic?

Joe Laurie’s essay is a model of scrupulous accuracy . It is an epitaph to the cruelty and mendacity of US policies on Ukraine under three past presidents Obama, Trump and Biden that have led to over a million dead Ukrainian soldiers and many dead civilians , broken families, and a broken country.

The only solution — Lauria prudently does not go here, though he accepts the facts that Russia has won the war — is for the incoming Trump administration to work sincerely with Putin without playing more Cold War games to bring about real and permanent peace in a smaller non-belligerent neutral Ukraine that respects the human rights of all its citizens.

There are no other solutions now. For Trump to try to continue to play Cold War games with and in Ukraine would be cruel folly. Australian diplomacy should move to this position.

After three years, Ukraine has been shredded. Russia is winning the war with an enhanced military, a robust economy, an established and supported leader and a respected position in the world.

In opposition, we have a Europe reeling from sanctions blowback, recessions looming and EU nation states’ leaders falling by the wayside. And so they should, having abandoned Europe’s source of reliable and cheap energy, the energy that fuelled Europe’s economic well-being

NATO is looking like a busted flush.

Nuclear is an option, but given the proven success of Russia’s countering every weapons system supplied to date by the West to Ukraine, is that any kind of a good idea?

So, what happened? An historical perspective helps.

Once a century for three centuries a Western leader decided to march on Moscow. Napoleon went first, then Hitler and now Biden.

Will the lesson be learned? Don’t poke the Bear.

A good place to start repairing the rips in the world’s political garment would be to take the political group known as neocons who gained office and power in the US during the Clinton administrations in the 1990s, and show them the door.