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Tony Abbott warned that Australia could go the way of Greece with excessive debt. Such claims reflect a climate of exaggerated concern about debt. Instead Australia could be taking advantage of historically low interest rates and embarking on major infrastructure projects, increasing employment and laying the basis for sustained growth in productivity.
Last week we witnessed one of the most powerful articulations of gender equality by any prime minister. Sadly on the same day the Government and Opposition pushed through legislation to force 140,000 sole parents onto the inadequate Newstart Allowance. Gender analysis is mainstream; it is time for class analysis to become so too.
Money is not like water, that 'flows' around the world, reaching 'equilibrium', or experiencing 'volatility'. It is transactions between people, based on trust. It enables the cooperation that forms the basis of social life. Human beings should be at the centre. Yet that is the opposite of what is happening.
Teacher organisations have advocated for one sector rather than opposing the whole flawed structure. Catholic bishops have insisted on public subsidies for avowedly exclusive schools. Governments have adopted policies which have entrenched a socially counter-productive organisation of a major public institution. How many more generations has this scheme of things got left to run?
Greeks expect the positive outcome of last weekend's election to be weak and short-lived. Austerity has brought predictable unemployment, homelessness, and a rising suicide rate. The elderly are reminded of the fear and the helplessness that accompanied the hideous years of the Civil War and the dictatorship of the Colonels.
Joe Hockey provoked outrage with his recent suggestion that we should rely on families rather than the state for social welfare. His premise that high social spending leads to debt and decline reflects the GDP fetish of fundamentalist economists that Joseph Stiglitz blames for Europe's current economic problems.
The Budget confirms one thing that both sides of politics agree on, and that's their belief in the existence of an undeserving poor. There's nothing wrong with bringing home the bacon for middle Australia. But the people living at the rough end of Struggle Street are trying to get by on baked beans.
The dismissal of Gough Whitlam by then Governor-General Sir John Kerr in 1975 has been described as the greatest political and constitutional crisis in Australia's history. It seems pallid in comparison with what is now happening here in Greece.
Many Italian protesters have called 12 November a day of liberation. This is a misunderstanding of what has happened. One does not have to be a fan of Silvio Berlusconi's sordid regime to see the madness of austerity that is stripping away the sovereignty of states through the eurozone.
The weak August retail sales have disturbed market watchers. The more ideologically inclined have blamed lefties who look down on shopping and consuming. Throughout history simplicity, thrift and voluntary poverty have been valued highly by many philosophies and religions.
The current narrative about the ALP says the party losing its soul and ultimately turning its back on those Australians it is meant to represent. The Tasmanian experience suggests the same might be said for the Greens in the Federal Parliament, who assume the balance of power in the Senate today.
Ireland's election was all about how to repay the country's debts. One hundred and fifty predominantly well-educated and skilled young people are expected to emigrate each day over the next two years; not only because they have no jobs, but because they have no hope.