Martin McKenzie-Murray Despised by Trump supporters for one reason, and Clinton supporters for another, sacked FBI director James Comey is a critic of America’s ‘moral error’.

Karen Middleton Treasurer Scott Morrison’s plan to frame the coming budget as responsible investment was derailed this week by conflicting government messages.

Mike Seccombe While the government remains focused on neoliberal solutions to inequality, homelessness and hunger worsen. Some in the sector wonder whether it is deliberate.

Kate Holden After a decade of critical acclaim as Pikelet, musician Evelyn Ida Morris is releasing the first music under their own name – a grand suite of piano songs, both sung and speechless, about the experience of being non-binary. “Non-binary is very strange, because it’s about preserving that internal space, and feeling proud of it, and finding ways to communicate it.”

Annie Smithers The tiny spud-pickers’ cottages dotted around the farms are testimony to a world where creature comforts were non-existent. And now at the beginning of May each year, when the harvest of potatoes is settling into full swing and the temperature is starting to drop, Trentham celebrates its heritage with a yearly Spudfest. So, to feel part of the local pride on May 5, here is a potato gnocchi dish, resplendent with brussels sprouts and hazelnuts – all things that thrive here in the hills of central Victoria.

Omar J. Sakr I have lived my life in the shadow of a myth: the angry Arab, the enraged ethnic, the unruly barbarians. It was made mythic only by a white conservative media. At home I knew one reality close to this – worn Arab hands that held the cane, the belt, the brush, the wooden spoon, the broad shoe, the vacuum cord that split my skin – but this iteration of violence was not what the world feared. It was the public kind they knew and cared about, specific acts of violence by men of colour that could fire the torrid imagination.

Paul Bongiorno Credlin is no run-of-the-mill commentator. One veteran Liberal says there’s no doubt she’s one of the key campaign strategists for the Abbott camp. ‘She’s a player,’ he says. Just how big a player is hard to determine. But so deep are the suspicions within the party that another backbencher says he wouldn’t be surprised if she had a hand in a sensational story, in the News Corp tabloids, saying Turnbull has personal investments worth a million dollars in a fund that profits when Australian companies lose.

Richard Ackland Hankies were dabbing at moistened eyes as soprano Nicole Car and the Australian Chamber Orchestra were at their most passionate on Saturday night. Mozart, Beethoven and Verdi were on the bill as the Melbourne soprano held everyone in her spell. Hairs on the back of eminent backs were standing on end all over Sydney’s City Recital Hall, and no doubt the ACO’s inaugural outing of the 1726 “Belgiorno” Stradivarius was partly responsible. There were so many celebs in the crowd that Gadfly lost count.

It is important, though, to remember Hunt’s ministry – his responsibilities to health. It is as health minister that Hunt refuses to condemn gay conversion therapy. It is as health minister that he pretends the torment of young queer people in the name of religious doctrine is a freedom of speech issue. In other countries, this kind of psychological abuse is illegal. In Australia, the health minister entertains it on national radio.

James Norman A series of legal battles to prevent mining exploration on Olkola land in Cape York has highlighted the limitations of native title and Aboriginal land rights without the right of veto.

Hamish McDonald James Comey on press tour; Trump still pulling punches with Moscow; Israel–Iran hostilities deepen.

Peter Craven Elijah Moshinsky’s interpretation of Verdi’s tragic masterpiece La Traviata has been wowing Opera Australia audiences since the ’90s. The latest iteration – both visually rich and lovingly handled by its stars – doesn’t let down the canon.

Romy Ash Visiting New Zealand poet Hera Lindsay Bird in Wellington.

Andy Hazel The windswept Shetland Islands harbour a culture equal parts Norse and Scottish, leaving English-speaking visitors feeling always on the edge of something familiar.

Evelyn Lewin Mounting evidence suggests genuine improvement from taking placebos, even when a patient is informed their treatment has no physiological benefit.

Richard Cooke Rhiannan Iffland on the mental and physical challenges involved in plunging from a five-storey-high cliff.

Cindy MacDonald Test your general knowledge with our weekly quiz.