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A Brush With the Past
Abstract perspective: Jules Sher’s great gift. I’ve always had a soft spot for emigrés. Well, to vary the scope and reach of showgirl and model Mandy Rice-Davies’ excellent point made under duress in 1963, I am one, so I would. Emigrés add piquancy to whatever melting pot it is in which they’ve chosen to live;… Continue reading
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Undone by Hubris
You have to feel sorry for Nemesis, the Greek god of vengeance. Her mythology is rather more grand – certainly it is more sweeping – than the banal, long-running and still ongoing factional split in the Australian Liberal Party. Though Tony Abbott and Malcolm Turnbull might choose to demur. Hubris is like that, and both… Continue reading
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SHOW US YER UNDIES
AUSTRALIA DAY 2024 Do they have little flags on them, like the ones on toothpicks that are condemned to celebrate Australia Day by being stuck into sausages or lamingtons? If not, you’re not a patriotic Aussie and you should get back on the boat, or whatever. Such is the banality and tenor of debate in… Continue reading
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When Mr Keating Came to Town
Just a quick note, on current matters. Paul Keating will be feeling pleased with himself. He’s managed to distress a number of luvvies, media and otherwise, with his remarks at the National Press Club in Canberra on Tuesday. He even got a reprimand from the prime minister for daring to say that diplomacy was about… Continue reading
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The Mad World of Manipulative Mendacity
How The Australian’s breaking news website portrayed China’s response on Mar. 14. The boys are about with their tin drums again. They’re dressing in uniform and singing marching songs. The Australian’s breaking news service popped up this colourful fear-maker yesterday asserting that the Chinese have said we’re a target. They haven’t, and won’t, short of… Continue reading
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I Confess
AUSTRALIA | Taking it on the chin Like the flatfooted NSW premier, Dom Perrottet, though in my case through a compulsion known only to someone else’s god, I feel the need to confess. Moreover, the significant lack of judgment of which I am culpable and for which I am compelled by unknown forces to plead… Continue reading
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Poltergeists of Christmas
Where we live, in a small area on the outer edge of the ever expanding Australian suburban universe, we are a fail-to-fit on most of the local demographics. This doesn’t worry us. We’ve never been fit-in people. But it does interest us. Most of the time, when the tradies who make up most of the… Continue reading
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Lunch is off: Thanks Jetstar
Sunday, Nov. 6, 2022 Today, we were supposed to be lunching at Wise (a favourite winery) at Eagle Bay, with a friend we haven’t seen for so many years that we’ve lost count and who was flying in from Melbourne for the occasion, and others. Supposed being the operative word. Jetstar intervened. They’re so good… Continue reading
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Getting Down to Business
AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Tuesday, June 7, 2022 That’s the thing about writing fortnightly political and current affairs commentaries: My friend and long-ago colleague Dennis Atkins, a veteran of the Queensland and national political media field, wrote exactly what I had planned to write for this column, in the May 31 edition of the online newspaper InQueensland.… Continue reading
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On with the show: The (new) gang’s all here
AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Tuesday, May 24, 2022 Australia’s voters have delivered a Labor government. Some will see this as a sea change, a fundamental shift in the electoral demographics. Others may cautiously view the result of Saturday’s election – when it finally becomes clear in all its detail, which is unlikely to be this week –… Continue reading