News
Comment
Comment
Kim Rubenstein
Stranded citizens an international disgrace
“On Tuesday, Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced a pause on direct passenger flights between India and Australia, with consideration of further flights to be made by May 15. Australians stranded in India, who make up almost a third of those now stuck overseas for more than a year, now have no way to return home. No other democratic country has placed such extreme measures on its citizens.”
Comment
Paul Bongiorno
Politics, Morrison and faith
“It may console some Australians to know that their prime minister is doing God’s work. Millions of others are more likely to be confused, and even flabbergasted. Yet courtesy of a scratchy YouTube video, shot at a Pentecostal conference on the Gold Coast last week, Scott Morrison has given us a window into the soul he has otherwise kept shut, sharing with fellow Pentecostals how he sees his beliefs as a mission statement for his prime ministership.”
Letters, Cartoon & Editorial
Culture
Profile
Barrister Geoffrey Robertson
After a lifetime spent defending human rights, Geoffrey Robertson’s faith in international law is fading. But he is fighting on.
In Progress
Dan Spielman
Stage and screen actor Dan Spielman has a substantial side hustle as a woodworker and joiner. His workshop practice informs his on-camera work – and vice versa – in fascinating, unexpected ways.
Poetry
Three poems
“The dilemma of writing a poem without light, / without the amenities of paper and ink / without the digital keyboard / but with memory correcting each verse / like a clock tired of telling the time, / a fallen rhythm into language / in the calm of the dawn.
Only then, re-reading it / from the blue caressing / the dew on the glass in my window.
Only printing it in the flight / of the last waking dream.”
Books
Life
Puzzles
Quotes
Percussion
“In a world of perpetual tension and dread, the drums of war beat – sometimes faintly and distantly, and at other times more loudly and ever closer.”
The Home Affairs secretary warns Australia to brace for “the curse of war”. He’s requested people now call him the “Keith Moon of bureaucratic middle management”.
Medicine
“It’s only one shot, rather than two.”
The Superannuation minister incorrectly states that Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine is only a single dose. Sky News issued no correction, but the channel’s fact-checker is still playing catch-up from Craig Kelly’s last interview.
Internet
“My linktr.ee has also been disabled.”
The crossbench MP and noted vaccine aristarch is deplatformed from the link-sharing website. After being banned from Facebook, twice, for spreading misinformation, and from Instagram, you know it’s this one that really hurts.
Credentials
“As a medically trained person, I really genuinely just had no idea that ADHD and hyperactivity was an adult condition.”
The Liberal MP announces he’s been diagnosed with ADHD and now understands his behaviour towards women was inappropriate. Luckily the condition did not affect his ability to get three master’s degrees.
Cinema
“I have always found goodness in the people I’ve met everywhere I went in the world.”
The Nomadland director accepts the Academy Award for Best Director, becoming the first woman of colour to win the prize. Finding the goodness even in Amazon’s exploitative conditions for factory workers truly is a feat.
Dobbing
“You just can’t sit on the JobSeeker payment and expect your neighbours to cover that lifestyle.”
The Employment minister defends a new hotline that allows employers to report job applicants who don’t accept work offers. In a fair world, this hotline would just ring through to a message bank recording that politely told the caller to get a life.
