Keywords: Five Billion Years
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AUSTRALIA
- Dustin Halse
- 07 August 2019
7 Comments
Robert Harris' The Gang of One ranges through Harris' five published books and a number of uncollected poems. Early work grows from his occasionally lonely, knockabout life and reveals not only a talent for catching the essence of fleeting memories and perceptions but also a mordant touch that gives edge to memory.
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INTERNATIONAL
- Jeff Sparrow
- 08 July 2019
5 Comments
When discussing climate change, it's easy to depict the world's reliance on fossil fuels as primarily a technological problem, to be resolved by new methods for harnessing renewable energies. But that's only part of the story, as the example of Saudi Arabia shows.
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ARTS AND CULTURE
- Barry Gittins
- 17 April 2019
4 Comments
This journey outwards is threatened by demagoguery. The UN's treaty declaring 'celestial bodies shall be used exclusively for peaceful purposes' has been challenged by sabre-rattling by Donald Trump, with his declaration that 'it is not enough to have American presence in space; we must have American dominance'.
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AUSTRALIA
- Jeff Sparrow
- 31 January 2019
18 Comments
John Howard promised to 'stay the course' in Afghanistan. So too did Tony Abbott, Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard. So complete was the political consensus that parliament didn't even debate the Afghan intervention until nine years after it began. Now that there's no longer a course on which to stay, we're due some accountability.
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AUSTRALIA
- El Gibbs
- 21 November 2018
10 Comments
Australia’s income support system and employment services have shifted to an ever harsher regime of compliance and penalty, while failing to find work for hundreds of thousands of people.
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AUSTRALIA
- Fatima Measham
- 11 October 2018
7 Comments
New South Wales premier Gladys Berejiklian's call to halve the state's migrant intake, and Federal minister for cities Alan Tudge's proposed a mandatory five-year regional settlement scheme for migrants, have both left policy observers scratching their heads. And with good reason.
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ECONOMICS
The proposed tax cuts will create long-term structural changes to government revenue sources, which may prove to be economic folly in future-proofing Australia against global economic shocks, and in dealing with current unmet needs of poor and vulnerable Australians.
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ECONOMICS
- David James
- 20 April 2018
6 Comments
As the West flirts with starting World War III in Syria, it is worth examining some of the financial and business dynamics behind the US 'military industrial complex'. War may not be good business, but it is big business. And in contrast to Russia and China, the industry in the US is heavily privatised, including the use of mercenaries.
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ENVIRONMENT
- Greg Foyster
- 16 March 2018
5 Comments
The complexity of environmental policy in SA echoes a broader trend in environment issues: climate change has monopolised the debate, squeezing out local conservation concerns. The upshot is a Left-leaning government can be progressive on clean energy, while holding a regressive stance on less prominent topics.
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ECONOMICS
- Joe Zabar
- 27 February 2018
'Francis' statement is not one merely for theological or academic contemplation. It is in effect Francis' call to establish a new benchmark for our economy, one where exclusion and inequality are no longer a natural and accepted consequence of its operation.' Director of Economic Policy for Catholic Social Services Australia addresses the CSSA annual conference in Melbourne, February 2018.
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ENVIRONMENT
- Greg Foyster
- 14 September 2017
6 Comments
There are lots of reasons why China wants to accelerate the uptake of electric vehicles. It desperately needs to curb air pollution, which the World Health Organization estimates kills more than a million of its citizens each year. It also wants to reduce dependence on imported oil, and help meet climate change targets. Most crucial, however, is China's intention to dominate the global market for electric vehicles and the technology that powers them, lithium-ion batteries.
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AUSTRALIA
Plagued by sluggish uptake, clinician reticence and a substantial privacy backlash, the $1.2 billion My Health Record has proven, thus far, something of a lemon. The putative benefits of an electronic health record have been expounded at length by the government. But for success there must be buy-in, and for buy-in, there must be trust, according to the Productivity Commission. Both are lacking, and it is important to consider why.
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