September 4 – 10, 2021

A Covid-19 patient being cared for in the intensive care unit of St Vincent’s Hospital, Sydney.

News

Exclusive: Covid-19 hospitalisations three times higher than reported

Rick Morton Victoria and NSW are at a crisis point, with Covid-19 hospitalisations being underreported and cascading impacts on ambulance services and medical staffing.

News

Image for article: What can the world teach us about opening up with Covid-19?

News

What can the world teach us about opening up with Covid-19?

Hannah Ryan As the federal government pushes towards reopening on the back of high vaccination numbers, the nation can learn its biggest lessons from other countries that have exited harsh lockdowns in a bid to establish Covid normal.

Image for article: What is behind Morrison's positive shift?

News

What is behind Morrison’s positive shift?

Karen Middleton While the government pivots to upbeat messaging and the AMA calls for greater honesty around reopening, the Doherty Institute modelling shows that lockdowns may continue, even at high vaccination rates.

Image for article: Family ties crucial to coping with the pandemic

News

Family ties crucial to coping with the pandemic

Vyshnavee Wijekumar In Western Sydney, multigenerational families living in migrant households are finding new ways to confront the pandemic.

Image for article: Why your current car may be the last fossil-fuel vehicle you own

News

Why your current car may be the last fossil-fuel vehicle you own

Mike Seccombe Australians are taking up electric vehicles in increasing numbers, but the country is still a long way behind Europe. Now states are offering incentives, and charging infrastructure is being planned, with price parity only a few years away.

Image for article: Biden calls Kabul evacuation an extraordinary success

World

Biden calls Kabul evacuation an extraordinary success

Jonathan Pearlman Alleged mastermind of Bali bombings on trial in Cuba. China limits online gaming for under 18s. United Nations marks success of global ban on leaded petrol as Algeria runs out.

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Opinion

Opinion

Rory Callinan
The Brereton inquiry and the fall of Kabul

“In late May, Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Foreign Minister Marise Payne issued a joint press release announcing the imminent closure of the Australian embassy in Afghanistan due to the ‘increasingly uncertain security environment’. ”

Opinion

Paul Bongiorno
Morrison in damage control

“Scott Morrison is flailing about as he struggles to get back on the ‘narrow path’ he keeps talking about to deliver him another election victory. Nowhere is this more obvious than the desperate damage control he embarked on earlier this week, when it was obvious he had misread the mood of the nation. Most particularly, what had escaped him was the deeper concerns of people in states free of Covid-19.”

Opinion

John Hewson
The merit of privatisation has been lost through greed

“One of the most compelling public policy initiatives globally over the past several decades, but unfortunately one of the most poorly implemented, has been privatisation. That is the concept of transferring business, industry or services from public to private ownership and management control.”

Letters, Cartoon & Editorial

Cartoon

ReadCartoon image, links to full cartoon page

Editorial
Taking the money

One argument is a slippery slope. If the government asked business to pay back $13 billion in undeserved pandemic subsidies, it would look a lot like accountability. And if they were to ask for that of business, then what accountability might they have to ask of themselves?

Letters

Letting women speak

Dhanya Mani has penned an elegy of profound emotional strength, every word expressing the dignity and significance of the life of her friend and confidante (“Remembering Kate”, August 28–September 3). …

Afghanistan left to the Taliban

Sarah Price’s piece “I am human first of all” (August 28–September 3) is a truly gut-wrenching one, which I read with a rising sense of despair. T. S. Eliot came to mind: …

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Culture

Books

Image for article: Sold Down the River

Scott Hamilton and Stuart Kells
Sold Down the River

Image for article: Always

Morris Gleitzman
Always

Image for article: The Magician

Colm Tóibín
The Magician

Life

Image for article: Cabbage cream with cabbage, parmesan and toasted buckwheat

Food

Cabbage cream with cabbage, parmesan and toasted buckwheat

O Tama Carey

Image for article: How to write a song

Life

How to write a song

Alex Gow Australian musicians including Bernard Fanning, Sarah Blasko and Paul Kelly  share the creative practices they have in common when writing songs.

Image for article: A pandemic of the homesick

Health

A pandemic of the homesick

Melanie Cheng Homesickness is no longer classified as a disease, yet it causes both anxiety and depression. The pandemic has magnified the grief and loss of distance and separation.

Sport

Ben Simmons and the yips

Martin McKenzie-Murray Once revered for his on-court magic, basketballer Ben Simmons is now ridiculed for his brazen refusal to put up shots. What next for the out-of-sorts Aussie superstar?

Image for article: Ben Simmons and the yips

Puzzles

The Cryptic

link to this week\'s crossword

Crossword No. 365

The Quiz

1. The AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine is now known by what brand name in Australia?
2. A coracle is: (a) a small boat; (b) a musical instrument; or (c) a crustacean?
3. Which novel begins: “1801 – I have just returned from a visit to my landlord – the solitary neighbour that I shall be troubled with”?
4. The daughter of which American rock star won a silver medal at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics? (Bonus point for naming the sport she competed in.)
5. What same word can precede each of the following to make new words: crop, house, cast, stretch, field?
6. What name does singer Melissa Viviane Jefferson use professionally?
7. Who commanded the French army at the Battle of Waterloo?
8. Aruba is an island nation in which sea?
9. Males of which Australian mammal have poison spurs on their hind legs?
10. Which word starting with ‘e’ refers to Holy Communion in the Catholic Church?

Click through for answers.

Quotes

Disease

“So we threw the kitchen sink at it, all kinds of meds.”

Joe RoganThe world’s biggest podcaster reveals he took an untested ivermectin treatment after contracting Covid-19. The worming drug is mostly used on animals and libertarians.

Race

“Not one person ever expressed offence.”

Erin MolanThe broadcaster defends a series of Asian accents she used on air, as part of her defamation case against Daily Mail Australia. She says she was not being racist: she was impersonating a racist scene from a film, which is different.

Dishes

“He’s actually on the dishes, would you believe, because there’s just the two of us there.”

Josh FrydenbergThe treasurer describes living with Scott Morrison in The Lodge during lockdown. Other times he’s actually on quarantine and vaccinations, would you believe.

Travel

“Obviously the AFL has essential people. Mr McGuire is not one of them.”

Mark McGowanThe Western Australian premier confirms that Eddie McGuire will not be allowed into the state to cover the AFL grand final. Somehow a man with an 88 per cent approval rating is still finding new ways to be popular.

Diplomacy

“I’m enjoying a week’s break in France. They’ve learned to live with Covid here not lurch from one damaging lockdown to another!”

Alexander DownerThe former Foreign minister enjoys a holiday in France. Most of the country has learnt to live with the virus, except for the 126,000 who didn’t and died.

Law

“As of now, most abortion is banned in Texas.”

Marc HearronThe lawyer from the Center for Reproductive Rights responds to a United States Supreme Court decision that upheld Texas’s restriction on abortion access. The main family planning available in the state is once again school shootings.

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