AN INSIDER’S OUTSIDE VIEW OF AUSTRALIAN POLITICS AND ECONOMICS.
Join Richard Denniss, The Australia Institute’s chief economist, as he tackles Australia’s most important political and economic issues in a new weekly podcast from Schwartz Media. This is an insider’s outside view, making sense of the country and where it’s headed.
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This week
Making sense of the PM's first two years
Two years after he took power, it is possible to judge Malcolm Turnbull against the standards he set when he challenged for the leadership.Turnbull has given us the unique experience of business confidence generally increasing while consumer confidence deteriorates.
Climate action stalling here and in America
The federal government is ignoring the realities of climate change – mirroring trends towards inaction in American politics.
Victoria’s Federal Court will decide whether a poker machine has been illegally designed to entrap users, in the first case of its kind in the country.
Bundaberg, Australia's Newstart capital
As the federal government plans to expand its cashless welfare card program to Bundaberg, the residents of Australia’s ‘dole capital’ say the problem is that there simply aren’t any jobs.
Artist Mikala Dwyer on ‘befriending’ chemotherapy
Recovering from chemotherapy, Mikala Dwyer is using her highly personal installations to reflect her own chemical journey towards healing. “It’s really weird stuff that pulls apart your DNA, and arranges things and puts it back together again. It did definitely creep into the work.”
Lamb kebabs with eggplant & Turkish chilli
A key flavour that makes a kebab a kebab is the coals it is cooked on. The wood infuses the meat with its greatest character. The concept of dicing the meat into two-centimetre cubes means there is more surface to take on the flavour of the coals and also of the marinade.
Women's entrappings of high office
In the past few years, almost a quarter of the small number of women who lead nations have either lost office because of charges of corruption or other criminal behaviour, or are fighting such accusations, or have members of their families who have been similarly accused. Could this be right? Could it possibly be true that so many female leaders are guilty of abusing their powers? Or is something else going on?
Turnbull turns Chifley on energy
The chutzpah of Turnbull strongarming Vesey can only be explained as desperation borne of diabolical politics within the government spilling over into the public’s perceptions of division and inertia. So, unable to enact the sort of energy policy recommended by his own Finkel report, the prime minister has begun a pantomime, hoping his finger-pointing and name-calling will fool the audience into thinking he’s doing something.
Gadfly: John’s no in game of Tones
Little Winston Howard was out of the blocks with a piece in The Catholic Boys Daily, “kickstarting” the “No” case. The diminutive koala is concerned that churches, free speech and children will be threatened if the marriage equality postal survey results in a “Yes” outcome.
“Hitler had concentration camps for these gay people – one of the two good things he did,” the caller said. “The other one was build the autobahn.” There is no real point to the postal survey on marriage equality except this: it licences hate speech and gives platform to views that are otherwise so despicable as to be absent from public debate.
The director of the Global Change Institute at the University of Queensland, Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, talks about the grim realities of climate change and how we must choose which reefs to save.
Suu Kyi’s precarious position on Rohingyas
North Korea crisis eases. Singapore gets first female president. Elgin Marbles in Brexit play.
Gary Abrahams’ production of Angels in America is stark and shrewd, and has in Helen Morse a virtuosic display of restrained acting.
Talking to the author of Looking for Alibrandi at the St Albans Writers’ Festival.
Intent on growing native orchids, the author finds the only club that she wants to have her as a member.
Can comedy be a tool in mental health care? People providing a platform for expressing personal experiences and a less clinical environment for talking about illness think it can.
High achiever: Rory Lobb, 24, Australian rules footballer
GWS Giants’ Rory Lobb on making the finals again and the taxing workload that goes into playing in the AFL.
What is the official residence of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge?
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