Barnstormer
I joined the South Australian division of the Liberal Party…
Last week, I received a message from two friends on one day. They had tried to join the Liberal Party…
Crikey, it’s the Irwins
The biggest takeaway from Andrew Denton’s 2003 interview with Steve Irwin on Enough Rope was how much Steve idolised his father Bob.…
Is Joyce the right choice?
Having snapped at Nationals leader Michael McCormack’s heels for the best part of two years, forcibly deposed leader Barnaby Joyce…
Is this Australia’s William Jennings Bryan moment?
William Jennings Bryan? Never heard of him? Take a look at Wikipedia: William Jennings Bryan (March 19, 1860 – July…
Barnstormer
Scholars of the classics will remember that quote from This Is Spın̈al Tap: “It’s such a fine line between stupid…
Annastacia Palaszczuk crowns her coronavirus queen
Ironic. Coronavirus is known as coronavirus because of the “coronas”, the crown shapes on its cells. The measures taken against…
The national curriculum doesn’t just threaten our children. It’s a threat to the future of our nation
Australia’s educational performance has been in decline since the 1970s, but this is no accident. It is by design, curriculum…
Good. Gooder?
For decades, Australian men have been caricatured as foolish idiots in advertising. Men are presented as stupid, useless or otherwise…
How Russia lurched from vaccine victory to Covid crisis
Russia made headlines last August when it triumphantly unveiled its pioneering coronavirus vaccine, Sputnik V. But now, nearly a year…
Remainers declare war on Fox's biscuits
Next Thursday is election day in the Batley and Spen by-election and with polls showing a six point Tory lead,…
Pope puts EU founder on the road to sainthood
To many in Brussels, the French statesman is already a saint. But now Pope Francis has decided to put Robert Schuman…
Boris shouldn’t write off fossil fuels just yet
At last week’s G7 summit, Boris Johnson pushed his fellow leaders to back his climate finance plan to support large-scale…
A great badness is abroad
I was recently contacted by a highly intelligent woman whose granddaughter came home from school very upset about things she…
Kiwi Life
Of the various little stories about the rather wonderful Joni Mitchell in her early years, my favourite concerns Leonard Cohen.…
Kiwi Language
A friend of mine recently sent me a notice from a big law firm announcing the introduction of ‘Gender Affirmation…
While we were sleeping, New Zealand has lost a democracy
Jacinda Ardern believes New Zealand will become a republic. It’s all right, though, because she’s not in a hurry. But…
Fables of the Dark Emu
With the power of the ABC’s propaganda unit behind it, Dark Emu, by the self-proclaimed Aboriginal historian Bruce Pascoe sold…
Digital revolt & anarchy in the air
Comedian Kitty Flanagan suffered a discombobulating start to her new national tour in Noosa recently, during a riff on how…
Don’t cheer for NSW
The Berejiklian government in New South Wales is rightly patted on the back for its mature approach to the management…
Pravda rides again
In the West today we can see that a once free press is voluntarily becoming unfree. Or such is the…
The Last Emperor
As Australians now know, hell hath no fury like a dictator scorned. They have learned the hard way that Canberra’s…
Black Parents Matter
You are probably familiar with the concept of parenthood. It denotes a certain set of responsibilities in relation to a…
Abbott’s leadership
We do, indeed, live in strange times. Not so long ago, the thought that I would be nodding in agreement…
Covid’s warped vaccines
Samuel Langley, the inventor of a catastrophically incompetent ‘flying’ machine is a striking example of governments picking losers. When his…
Andrea Riseborough
National Treasure is a remarkable piece of TV drama, and it looks for a long, bewildering moment like a masterpiece.…
Divine Vinyl Survives
Two weeks ago, a fire broke out at the Universal Studios in Hollywood, 13 years to the day after another…
Dylan
Bob Dylan turned 80 the other week. Does that seem to consign not just the vanished twentieth century but the…
Festival music in Townsville
For those music lovers who can travel, the prospect of a festival in Townsville in mid-winter is an alluring one.…
Pure, white and native: the birch as a symbol of Russian nationalism
The image of the birch tree in popular Russian culture is as manifold as the trees themselves, but we could…
A hymn to the hummingbird — one of the most astonishing organisms on Earth
Along with coral reefs and their fish, tropical butterflies and birds of paradise, hummingbirds must be among the most beautiful…
O father, where art thou? Fox Fires, by Wyl Menmuir, reviewed
Wyl Menmuir’s first novel, The Many, was a surprise inclusion on the 2016 Booker Prize longlist. It drew praise for…
Secret treaties and games of cat and mouse: a choice of recent crime fiction
Almost any promising writer of spy fiction can expect at some point to be called the ‘next Le Carré’, an…
Snakes alive! Playing cricket in Latin America
Cricket in Latin America sounds like an oxymoron. Yet in almost every country in the region willow was hitting leather…
A divided city: the Big Three fall out in post-war Berlin
When did the Cold War start? Not when the second world war ended. There were many differences between the Soviet…
The great betrayal of Ethel Rosenberg
Ethel Rosenberg was an exceptional woman. Born with a painful curvature of the spine to a poor family of Jewish…
Billy Wilder — the making of a great film director
Before Billy Wilder became the celebrated director of films such as Sunset Boulevard, Some Like It Hot and The Apartment…
