Flat White

In-depth analysis of the day’s news, plus stories and gossip from Australian politics.

The critics trumped

13 December 2016 12:47 pm

Five weeks after Donald Trump’s election it’s time to stop the endless finger-pointing and hand-wringing about missing the biggest story…

Censorship, trigger warnings and “free speech”: the National Union of Students meets

13 December 2016 7:15 am

This week the rabble that is the National Union of Students will hold their annual National Conference in Geelong at Deakin…

Scandal and geopolitics Gangnam style: the impeachment of Park Geun-hye

12 December 2016 5:27 pm

The South Korean national assembly’s decision on Friday to impeach President Park Geun-hye came as no great surprise. Since October…

How green is the grass on the other side

12 December 2016 12:13 pm

The change of prime minister has put New Zealand in the news on this side of the ditch, and we…

The green autism

12 December 2016 7:19 am

Dear Leader slayed it on The Bolt Report the other day: With the same force we said ‘Stop the Boats’,…

A pile of crap from the ABC. Literally…

11 December 2016 12:01 pm

It’s 19 years since South Park sparked a seasonal scatological scandal with the episode Mr Hankey, the Christmas Poo. Now…

A Sydney Grammar alumnus writes about Malcolm

11 December 2016 9:26 am

From the Flat White mailbag: As you would know, my old school has produced three prime ministers: The First (Barton);…

Christmas in South Sudan

10 December 2016 7:06 am

Ten days before Christmas 2013 a civil war started in the new nation of South Sudan. The events leading up…

Why the lights went out on SA Labor

9 December 2016 12:54 pm

This week the SA Labor Premier, Jay Weatherill, took the lead in the national energy debate, suggesting the creation of an inter-state emissions…

The Age’s morning glory

9 December 2016 11:03 am

We knew its recently departed editor-in-chief Mark Forbes was a sleazebag, but even then it was still generally believed The…

When did aristocracy come back into vogue?

9 December 2016 7:13 am

Listen these days to some of the world’s elite politicians, commentators and officials pontificate and you’d think you were living…

Trevor Goddard: the end of a grand innings

8 December 2016 1:28 pm

When stumps were drawn at the Wanderers on January 26th, 1965 the Springbok captain, Trevor Goddard, was 11 runs shy…

Green-left legerdemain doesn’t make religion relevant

8 December 2016 7:09 am

It has long been obvious that the political agenda of some Catholic organisations and schools rest solidly within the Green-left…

The High Court should affirm the people, not the government, are truly sovereign

7 December 2016 8:55 pm

Why has there been such a long-term decline in maths and science learning in our schools, and in the qualifications…

Presenting… The 2016 Nannies

7 December 2016 3:18 pm

Animal rights group People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) was the winner of the 2016 Nanny State Awards, for…

Jessie

7 December 2016 1:32 pm

Jessie Margaret Noble, formerly Dingle, died in Bundaberg last week, November 29, 2016 to be exact. She was 97. Who,…

Silent night, godless night

7 December 2016 7:16 am

Almost 30 years ago, fresh from Hawaii, I visited my daughter’s grade one class in Brisbane to show off my…

Freedom of association: sanity succeeds on Spring Street

6 December 2016 5:33 pm

On Tuesday afternoon, Victoria’s upper house of Parliament voted down the Labor Government’s Equal Opportunity Amendment Bill. The Bill was…

Voltaire, Waleed Aly and the 18d trope

6 December 2016 1:10 pm

It has been a dismal year for the commanders and foot soldiers in Australia’s war against so-called hate speech. In several recent ground operations, the massed forces of contemporary…

John Key’s class act

6 December 2016 7:10 am

There’s a photo taken in South Africa after Nelson Mandela’s funeral.  Three Anglosphere PMs, Tony Abbott, Canada’s Stephen Harper and…

Daniel Andrews digs in against freedom of association

5 December 2016 8:07 pm

The restricting of freedom of association and freedom of religion is back on the agenda in Victorian Parliament this week.…

What’s gone wrong in South Australia?

5 December 2016 5:04 pm

What’s gone wrong in South Australia? For much of the population, not very much, really. Most services are quite good, infrastructure development has…

A human rights charter: monster or liberator?

5 December 2016 1:09 pm

At the recent Queensland state Labor conference Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk announced the government’s commitment to a human rights act, modelled…

Everything you always wanted to know about the Alt-Right* (*but were afraid to ask)

5 December 2016 7:16 am

BOSTON, UNITED STATES — The Alt-Right hysteria sweeping the Western world is as overwrought as it is alarming. On the…

The harpies take the weekend off

4 December 2016 8:37 pm

There’s no business like show business, as the old song goes – and no feminism as purely exhibitionistic as the…