November 21 – 27, 2020 | The Saturday Paper

News

How ‘prestige, status and power’ led to Australia’s war crimes

“The IGADF has recommended compensation be paid to the families of Afghan victims without waiting for criminal prosecutions. ‘It is simply the right thing to do,’ it says.”

Karen Middleton Commanders were told about possible war crimes being committed by Australian soldiers but dismissed the warnings as ‘Taliban propaganda’.

News

Big picture: Robo-debt, politics and poverty

Rick Morton A landmark Productivity Commission report into mental illness provides a road map to reduce harm, but it chafes against deep-seated government ideology.

News

The failures behind the destruction of the Juukan Gorge caves

Mike Seccombe As a senate inquiry investigates Rio Tinto’s destruction of the Juukan Gorge caves, Senator Pat Dodson says a royal commission into the entire Native Title Act may be necessary as the law ‘has been basically brought into disrepute by the capacity of those who are rich and powerful’.

News

Phishing expeditions in the Cocos Islands

“In what appear to be repeated and ongoing breaches of Australia’s Interactive Gambling Act, dozens of internet casinos and online bookmakers are operating in the islands’ webspace.”

Jack Kerr An abundance of online gambling and phishing scams linked to an Australian territory raises questions about law enforcement online – but also about ‘digital colonisation’ and who is getting rich on the internet.

News

Covid-19 and the bushfire season

Max Opray While South Australia scrambles to contain its coronavirus outbreak, there are concerns whether the state – and the rest of the country – will be able to cope with the dual crises of the pandemic and bushfire season.

World

Pro-democracy opposition quits in protest in Hong Kong

Jonathan Pearlman Donald Trump pushes on with troop withdrawals. PNG parliament adjourned until April. Covid-19 vaccine diplomacy fears over global availability.

Opinion

James Boyce
Colonisation and disease

“As a remarkable year nears its end, it seems a once-in-a-century opportunity to reflect on the most traumatic event in modern Australian history has been squandered. In 2020, Australians have become more conversant with the ravages of the Spanish flu and the mediaeval plague. But not even Covid-19 could induce public reflection on the pathogens that killed so many Indigenous Australians after the colonisation of this land.”

Opinion

Paul Bongiorno
Robo-debt: a government-sanctioned debt sentence

“An inconvenient truth rocked the Morrison government this week when it was finally brought to some account over the long-running robo-debt scandal … Don’t imagine the architect of the scheme, the prime minister himself, doesn’t realise how big a disaster this is. Scott Morrison went to great lengths to create a diversion, knowing the robo-debt story would break this week.”

Diary

Gadfly
A sorry slate of affairs

Richard Ackland Like flies they drop, as quickly as their pants. In recent days, it has been Hugh (Percy) Marks, the Nine Entertainment panjandrum, and Carl Lentz. Yes, Lentz, the “celebrity pastor” dishing out blessings for Brian Houston at the New York branch of the Hillsong business. Carl, who strayed from the paths of righteousness with someone other than Mrs Lentz, has been defrocked by Brian. For good measure, Mrs Lentz’s pastoral duties at the New York office were also terminated.

The politics of deploying the SAS

Karen Middleton The decision to use the SAS on high-tempo deployments was political: it made Australia a useful ally to the US. It may have also contributed to a culture of abuse.

Letters, Cartoon & Editorial

Cartoon

Read

Editorial
Genie in the subtle energy lamp

It’s not only Pete Evans. He’s just the untreated symptom of a politics that cannot deal with complexity. It is a politics without any real constituency, stretching and searching to find something that might give it power.

Letters

Getting through to Rupert

Mike Seccombe asks “How do you cure a cancer like Rupert Murdoch?” (November 14-20) The short answer is by refusing to buy, or read online, his newspapers; and refusing to watch Sky News. As a …

Former PMs had their chance

I buy your newspaper every week to support independent print media. I also understand that print media is battling to stay afloat because younger readers get their news off the internet and the advertising …

Culture

Profile

Drill rapper Snoee Badman

Mahmood Fazal Snoee Badman – the first Australian to release an EP from inside a maximum-security prison – embodies a punk defiance to institutional brutality. “I have a lot of violence to write about. Jail is not good for anyone … Prison gives you a lot of hatred.”

Theatre

Wicked Sisters

Cassie Tongue Returning to the stage after almost two decades, Alma De Groen’s Wicked Sisters now reads like a study of the generational failures of white feminism.

Art

Arthur Streeton

Miriam Cosic A new Streeton retrospective at the Art Gallery of New South Wales reveals a painter who speaks dazzlingly to our present.

Fiction

Brazen stats of empire

“I am a dressmaker who does alterations to make a living. You might call me a tailor, but what would you know? How long would you spend down here in the heat, working 12-hour shifts? And this is better than when I worked in the shop with 30 others doing the same thing – making shirts where if one sleeve was slightly shorter than another, it made no difference. It’s impossible to plumb the depths of cultural and familial exploitation in this, to work around your presumptions, your impositions, your faux guilts and apologies. You read me as you choose to read me within the matrix of your expectations, the stereotypes of avoidance. And even the word ‘stereotype’ becomes a trigger, a way through the labyrinth of concerns.”

John Kinsella

Life

Food

Roasted green asparagus and pickled white asparagus with tarama

David Moyle

Sport

Gay pride and prejudice

Daniel Herborn While many sporting bodies have begun actively promoting LGBTQIA+ inclusion, queer youth are still dropping out of sport at a higher rate than their straight peers and openly out male elite athletes remain a rarity.

Books

Barry Jones
What Is To Be Done

Leah Jing McIntosh, Cher Tan, Adalya Nash Hussein, Hassan Abul (eds)
Collisions

Philip Salom
The Fifth Season

Puzzles

The Cryptic

Crossword No. 328

The Quiz

1. In which city was John F. Kennedy assassinated? (Bonus point for naming what the ‘F’ stands for.)

2. Which musical features the songs “Sweet Transvestite”, “Science Fiction” and “Dammit, Janet”?

3. Panzer tanks were used in World War II by the army of which nation?

4. The title of which movie, nominated in the 1990s for a Best Picture Oscar, shares all but one letter with a Best Picture winner of the 2010s?

5. In Greek mythology, who, starting with ‘P’, is the Queen of the Underworld?

6. How many of the four-game 2020 Bledisloe Cup series did the All Blacks win?

7. Who is Scotland’s first minister?

8. What acid is produced by some ants?

9. Is Namibia in northern, southern, eastern or western Africa?

10. What is the most common element in Earth’s crust?

Click through for answers.

Quotes

Policy

“This should read Socialist Victorian Government spends $5.3 billion to entrench inequality.”

Jason FalinskiThe Liberal MP offers his take on the Andrews government’s announcement it will build 12,000 new units of public housing. The Coalition prefers entrenching inequality through means that end up costing only $1.2 billion in an out-of-court settlement.

Trade

“China needs us just as much as we need China, as far as trade is concerned.”

Michael McCormackThe acting prime minister offers a blindly optimistic view of Australia’s place in the world and somehow makes the country long for Scott Morrison’s return.

Afghanistan

“He has put his medals up as collateral on a loan and will relinquish them if required.”

Kerry StokesThe Seven chairman outlines the deal behind his offer to cover former SAS soldier Ben Roberts-Smith’s legal costs. A roundabout way for Stokes to add to his Victoria Cross collection but dealer’s choice.

IGADF

“The show trial of Australia’s elite Special Air Service Regiment (SAS) will mar the decades of valiant service these countless personnel have given.”

Pauline HansonThe One Nation leader responds to a four-year investigation that alleges Australian soldiers were involved in the murder of 39 Afghan civilians. Shortly, the party will launch its new slogan: “We’ve got the guts to defend war criminals.”

Climate

“We do not deny climate change, we are not deniers.”

Rupert MurdochThe News Corp tycoon addresses his son James’s departure from the company’s board. When deniers deny being deniers because they are in denial about the consequences of their denial, we truly have entered the Anthropocene.

1984

“I think a lot of the guidelines you’re seeing are Orwellian.”

Kayleigh McEnanyThe White House press secretary derides gathering limits put in place by some US states for Thanksgiving. Not even Orwell could have dreamed up police using tear gas to disband peaceful protesters so the president could have a photo-op holding a Bible in front of a church.

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