News
Notes from the Abbott insurgency
“After nearly two years on the sidelines, Abbott hasn’t changed his approach: any time a bell rings, he starts punching wildly.”
Back with headland speeches and a renewed manifesto, Tony Abbott has taken off the gloves in his fight to knock out Malcolm Turnbull.
News
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News
The dispute over climbing Wollumbin-Mount Warning
To the Bundjalung people, Wollumbin-Mount Warning is a sacred site. It is also a major Tweed Valley tourist attraction and the centre of a debate over who should be allowed to visit its summit.
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News
Inside the bitter Greens civil war
“Both Lee Rhiannon and Richard Di Natale acknowledge this battle is about more than a piece of paper.”
The suspension of Greens NSW senator Lee Rhiannon is less about Gonski than it is about ongoing animosities and a federal push to reform the party’s decision-making processes.
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News
Growing homelessness in Washington, DC
As low-cost housing in America’s inner cities is routed by gentrification, and unemployment and feeble wage growth dogs workers, homelessness is booming – including in the nation’s capital.
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News
Don Dale lessons
“The harmful effects of incarceration are embedded in the physical facilities themselves, creating a toxic environment where staff and kids are inevitably caught in their roles of guard and prisoner.”
Expert testimony from a US juvenile corrections director about his transformation of Washington’s notorious Oak Hill facility provides the Northern Territory royal commission with possible prescriptions for the failures of Don Dale.
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World
Saudi ultimatum for Qatar has echoes of war
Xi Jinping visits Hong Kong on 20th anniversary. Brandis and Dutton push 'Five Eyes' on encryption. Australian Defence secretary candidates.
Opinion
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Opinion
Marcia Langton
Adani, native title and risky strategies
“Fortunately, common sense has prevailed with the McGlade amendments passed in the senate. As a result, one or a few native title applicants are now not able to disqualify a lawful agreement settled by the majority of the members of their group by playing green lawfare politics.”
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Opinion
Paul Bongiorno
Pyne and Abbott deliver Turnbull a rough ride
“Bolt invited renegade Liberal senator Cory Bernardi on his show to begin what is now a Pyne pile-on. Bernardi, who betrayed the Liberal Party to form his own Australian Conservatives, claimed “Christopher Pyne is the most untrustworthy person he has ever met in politics”. He said he was cooking something up to get same-sex marriage off the agenda, “but the price of that will be it will destroy the Liberal Party.” ”
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Diary
Gadfly
We shall fight on free speeches
It was uplifting to read Little Winston Howard’s gushing endorsement of Reverend Peter Kurti’s tome The Tyranny of Tolerance. The book is a long whinge about mainstream beliefs being criticised by anyone outside the mainstream. At least that’s what it appears to be about, plus the Rev is alert to the dangerous attempt by “social engineers” to let girls wear trousers instead of skirts to school. Another vital value mercilessly under attack.
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Letters & Editorial
Cartoon
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Editorial
Pell’s day in court
This is not a piece about guilt. A court will decide that. This is a piece about a church that is finally being forced to address accusations of child abuse where they should always have been addressed: under the law.
Letters
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Links between acts of violence
Martin McKenzie-Murray (“A history of violence”, June 24-30) raises the interesting possibility of a link between domestic violence and jihadism. While this may be complicated by a million …
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When rationality goes out the window
Things must be tough on the starboard side of politics when three conservative ministers, all law school graduates, move from dog-whistling their anxious rabble to spearheading it (Mike Seccombe, …
Culture
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Culture
‘Fight Club’ producer Ross Grayson Bell
When no studio wanted to touch Fight Club, producer Ross Grayson Bell fought hard to get the film green-lighted. Now, he’s back home in Australia and pulling no punches with budding storytellers.
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Art
A Working Model of the World
An eclectic collection at UNSW Galleries explores human interaction with working models, as they straddle the divide between the imagined and the functional.
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Portrait
Nino, Spence and the pastor
“Nino shuffles into the back of the church. He wears a pilling navy jumper, shrunken brown blazer and a pair of pants, baggy around his tiny body. His skin is the texture of dried fruit and his face is scrunched up in thought.”
Food
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Food
Crème brûlée with poached rhubarb
“Crème brûlée is not really a difficult recipe and not overly challenging to master. Understanding the temperature of your oven helps, as does removing the custard from the oven just as it sets. Left too long in the oven it will slowly start to curdle. The most challenging thing at home is caramelising the thin layer of sugar on the top of the set cream.”
Life
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Health
Hormonal therapy for autism
Developments in autism research suggest hormonal treatments could make expensive and time-consuming early behavioural therapies more attainable and successful.
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Technology
Fighting online tracking with obfuscation
To combat Google tracking the success of their advertisers by matching credit card purchases with personal online activity, dissenters are employing ‘obfuscation’ apps to confuse the data.
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Sport
Great strides: Cassie Fien, 31, marathon runner
Reigning Gold Coast Half Marathon champion Cassie Fien on mixing her Defence Force career with competitive running.
Books
The Quiz
1. Dulcinea was the love interest of which fictional character?
2. Which is closer to mainland Africa: Mauritius or Madagascar?
3. Who is the patron saint of lost causes?
4. There have been the same number of Australian men’s Test cricket captains as United States presidents. How many?
5. American outlaw Henry McCarty, aka William Henry Bonney, was better known by what alias?
6. 44 is the international dialling code for which country?
7. The Greek hero Odysseus is known by what name in Roman myths?
8. What word beginning with ‘r’ refers to the change of direction of a ray of light, radio wave etc, in passing obliquely from one medium into another?
9. Name the daughter of a famous entertainer who appears on the cover of Vogue Australia’s July 2017 issue?
10. Which country scored a resounding victory in the ICC Champions Trophy final last month? (Bonus point for naming the team they beat.)
Quotes
DECORATING
“We couldn’t comment on the decor at Trump Golf clubs one way or another.”
The White House spokeswoman declines to remark on a fake and self-serving Time cover seen on the walls of several Trump golf clubhouses. Being fake and self-serving helped the cover fit in among the other decorating choices.
POLITICS
“I mean the public did vote for him, but he’s got to do the right thing.”
The former premier of Queensland encourages Malcolm Turnbull to resign. The best advice comes from mayors who were so terrible as state leaders they lost their seats in their first term.
CRIME
“Victoria Police Chief Graham Ashton desperate for a distraction from the crime epidemic he’s incapable of stopping #HuntingCatholics.”
The News Corp columnist criticises the charges made against George Pell for alleged historic child sexual offences. Charging the third-highest-ranked Catholic in the world with alleged sex crimes does seem like an extreme way to distract from an imagined gang of Sudanese children, but who are we to judge?
SPORT
“I’m embarrassed and I’m sorry for that.”
The jockey apologises after testing positive for a banned substance at a race in Swan Hill. Unfortunately for Payne, the appetite suppressant in question was not the food in Swan Hill.
LAW
“If you want to call him names, call him names. Just don’t call him guilty.”
The lawyer representing pharmaceutical investor Martin Shkreli in a fraud trial confronts his client’s deep unlikeability. It goes with the territory when you are best known for cynically pricing HIV sufferers out of treatment and generally being a jerk.
DEATH
“He was as kindly, dignified, charming and lovable as the immortal Paddington Bear he gave us.”
The broadcaster marks the death of Michael Bond, the creator of Paddington Bear. Bond was 91 and enjoyed marmalade.