opinion
editorial
editorial September 18, 2021
Morrison’s decision to enter a trilateral pact built around nuclear hardware is a horrifying miscalculation. It places Australia on the front line of any future war with China.
editorial September 11, 2021
The letter is very clear. It is addressed to Health Minister Greg Hunt and was sent by Pfizer on June 30 last year. Four days earlier, the company had begun correspondence with the Health Department.
editorial September 4, 2021
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?
editorial August 28, 2021
John Howard’s wife once complained to a cartoonist that he was drawing her husband too small. She insisted Howard was the same height as Bob Hawke. In the cartoons, he seemed much shorter: head and shoulders below him. The cartoonist paused and then explained that what he was depicting was moral stature.
editorial August 21, 2021
To understand the inhumanity of Australia’s position on refugees from Afghanistan, it helps to understand the self-deception at the heart of our immigration policy. Decades spent arguing that any form of compassion would undermine the system have deadened our politics. They have created a kind of moral numbness that puts decisions outside the reach of logic or decency. To question one part of this would collapse all of it, and so no questions are asked.
editorial August 14, 2021
The argument from the coal lobby is simple. It says that burning Australian coal helps lower carbon emissions. Burning Australian coal is good for the planet.
editorial August 7, 2021
There are two overriding beliefs that guide Scott Morrison as prime minister: the first is a belief in secrecy, and his right to it when making decisions; the second is Morrison’s belief that his saying something makes it true.
editorial July 31, 2021
Fifteen years ago, Warren Entsch pushed three black-and-white photographs of a woman in lingerie across his desk. “There’s my missus. Look at that,” he told the journalist sitting opposite. “Good-looking bird and I love her to bits.”
editorial July 24, 2021
As you read through the latest intergenerational report, the section on climate change stands out for the simple reason that it contains no projections. The numbers exist, just as they do for population growth and productivity, but they are not included. The Saturday Paper understands Treasury was pressured by the Morrison government to leave them out.
editorial July 17, 2021
By now it is staringly obvious that we need a royal commission into the procurement and rollout of Australia’s vaccine program. This government held one into roof insulation and another into the renovation of an old kitchen, so it should not be too great an ask.
editorial July 10, 2021
Finally there is confirmation of what has long seemed obvious: Scott Morrison is a bully. Behind that smirk-set jaw is a pure and startling rage. He is gripped by the indignation of certainty. Julia Banks describes Morrison as “menacing, controlling wallpaper”. From the time he realised she would not contest the 2019 election, he wanted her silence. “He wanted me to be quiet, he wanted me out of the parliament,” she says. “I mean, he wanted me out of the country …”
