News
Don Dale guard Conan Zamolo’s disturbing testimony
“Zamolo wanted to be liked, he said; he wanted to be good to the “kids”. It appeared he did so by assuming a similar level of maturity as them.”
As the royal commission continues in the Northern Territory, a culture of brutal dysfunction emerges.
News
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News
New ACTU secretary Sally McManus on the new IR battlegrounds
“McManus attributes the government’s new legislative move against the unions to Turnbull being insecure about his own leadership. ”
The new ACTU leadership finds the Turnbull government more ideologically anti-union than John Howard’s.
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News
The Nant whisky and Angus cattle investment scandal
The saga for investors in Nant whisky has taken a fresh turn with many being told their liquor doesn’t exist. So what about their money?
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News
The gas industry’s power play
“What we have here is an industry holding Australia to ransom. It’s using this leverage to try to open up new coal seam gas fields.”
Long-term mismanagement of Australia’s gas industry has seen price gouging by cartels and the possible need for imports. Even if the government can put things to right, natural gas will never again be a cheap alternative fossil fuel.
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News
Turkish cleric Gülen's Australian supporters fear reprisals
Fethullah Gülen has become enemy No. 1 of President Erdoğan of Turkey, leaving the US-based Muslim cleric’s supporters, including those in Australia, fearful for their livelihoods and freedom.
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World
The everyday tools of the modern terrorist
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang visits Australia; Rex Tillerson in Asia; FBI denies wire-tapping Trump Tower.
Opinion
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Opinion
Bob Brown
In defence of civil disobedience
“Where the bounds of acceptable civil disobedience in a democracy lie is a debate that will be with us so long as times change and society transforms. Implying, as The Australian does, that civil disobedience against bad laws has no place at all takes our country closer to autocracy than most citizens would want to go. ”
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Opinion
Paul Bongiorno
The Racial Discrimination Act’s section 18c charade
“On Wednesday, Labor tried to have the bills debated in the house of representatives. Bill Shorten said the government’s choice of the senate was nothing more than a cynical attempt by the prime minister ‘to be able to make the claim to the extreme elements in his party room that his government is taking action … while hoping MPs in the chamber can avoid having to vote on the issue’. The champions of free speech in the government immediately gagged the debate. So the plan to ‘strengthen the protection of free speech’, as Turnbull claimed, was dead on arrival. But the charade had to be played out, and not without damage in the broader electorate.”
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Diary
Gadfly
Out of harmony’s way
Harmony Day turned into a triumph for pinkish-coloured people. PM Turnbull and his pale-skinned sidekick Bookshelves “Bigot” Brandis say it’s important for our free speech that tinted people be subject to offence, insults and humiliation – but no harassment, please. The Macquarie Dictionary says that “harass” means “to trouble by repeated attacks, incursions, etc ... to disturb persistently”.
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Letters & Editorial
Cartoon
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Editorial
Purpose riven
In Canberra much of the week’s politics was spent on changes to the laws regulating the racist mistreatment of minorities. These are changes with little popular support. They show a government legislating for itself.
Letters
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Energy policy fails to enlighten
Paul Bongiorno has written, “Ten years of brutal, opportunistic politics has left this nation with no credible energy policy” (“Time for new tricks, not old dogma”, …
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Zero rating for Turnbull
I do not believe it is wishful thinking to suggest the Turnbull government has no hope of anything more than a single term, if indeed, it survives that far. Any relief, however, needs to be tempered by …
Culture
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Culture
Writer Jessica Friedmann on postnatal depression and motherhood
Following her experience of postnatal depression, writer Jessica Friedmann hopes to provoke discussion of parenthood beyond the clichés of gushing Instagram accounts or nappy-change horror stories.
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Art
Visions of Utopia and Superposition of three types
Two exhibitions of utopian abstraction enable comparison of pure ideological approaches with something gentler. The latter is more satisfying.
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Portrait
Writer and activist Jeff Sparrow
“When we meet for our ackee fry-up, he’s just returned from a trip to the United States, researching for his recently published biography of Paul Robeson. He talks of the tragic unease of researching an African-American icon in Charleston around the time of the shooting massacre at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, a hate-crime in which nine African Americans were murdered. ”
Food
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Food
Winning the cold raw
Steak tartare is a very important part of the classic French bistro. Often horse is used. Personally, I prefer the beef. I’ve eaten quite a few versions, using various cuts of meat. I’ve seen it with an aged piece of beef, but I prefer to use fresh cuts. The tenderness is not an issue because you’re dicing the meat anyway, and you add so many flavours that the ageing becomes kind of redundant.
Life
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Travel
The Museum of Jurassic Technology
LA’s Museum of Jurassic Technology presents a disorienting collection of true, plausible and unlikely artefacts, enjoyably posing more questions than answers.
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Life
Greening cities
Singapore is leading the world in greening its urban areas – an example Australia, as it exits another record-breaking summer, could do well to follow.
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Sport
Power supplier: Brendon Ah Chee, 23, Australian rules footballer
Port Adelaide’s Brendon Ah Chee on his unusual surname and improving the Indigenous space in the AFL.
Books
The Quiz
1. Who wrote the 1871 book The Descent of Man?
2. Pulmonary refers to what part of the human body?
3. Accra is the capital of which African nation?
4. Who succeeded Indira Gandhi as prime minister of India following her assassination? (Bonus point for naming the year she was killed.)
5. The Australian company CSR, founded in 1855, was originally associated with which industry?
6. Name the creator of the children’s book characters Hairy Maclary and Slinky Malinki?
7. A standard Scrabble game comprises how many tiles?
8. Which Australian basketballer this month fractured his leg during his debut with the Cleveland Cavaliers?
9. Which brewery recently used links to the Bible Society of Australia in a marketing campaign?
10. Is Whitby jet (a) a Royal Air Force fighter plane; (b) a semi-precious gemstone; or (c) a breed of cat native to South America?
Quotes
RACISM
“I am also pleased that the government will rein in the Australian Human Rights Commission which has morphed into self-appointed thought police.”
The Liberal senator celebrates proposed changes to the Racial Discrimination Act. Of all that’s wrong with Abetz and others on this issue, here’s one point: the “thought police” are appointed by government.
ALLOWANCES
“I get a travel allowance, others get penalty rates – it’s part of the package.”
The minister for small business defends a lurk in which he paid his wife $50,000 of public money so he could stay in her apartment while parliament sits. Which is just like penalty rates, if you think of Canberra as a long weekend.
LOVE
“Being attacked by animals doesn’t really do it for me.”
The British backpacker rebukes Lee De Paauw, who was mauled by a crocodile after jumping into a river to impress her. Romance is dead in Innisfail.
SPORT
“You won’t believe me ... he was playing with his dog.”
The Collingwood coach explains how midfielder Jordan De Goey broke his hand. Buckley was right: people didn’t believe him. Being a footballer, De Goey broke it in a bar fight in St Kilda.
DETENTION
“There is an infinite scream inside of me, and I can’t hold it in anymore.”
The partner of Omid Masoumali reflects on the year since he self-immolated on Nauru. There is no joke for this item.
WELFARE
“There were times when I would sit in a corner and cry because I felt so ashamed.”
The Tasmanian senator argues against cuts to welfare, drawing on her own experience of life on a disability pension. There is no joke for this item either.