September 10 – 16, 2022
News
Comment
Comment
Ian Lowe
A troubling environment
“Our environment is in deep trouble. We are all suffering as a result. Elected officials at all levels behave as if tackling the problem is a luxury, an optional extra if time and resources are available after meeting the much more important challenges of growing the economy. We are not even treating the symptoms and there is no appetite to address the underlying causes.”
Comment
Paul Bongiorno
Industrial-strength labour reforms
“Anthony Albanese is storming the Bastille erected by a sclerotic government more intent on its own maintenance of power and privilege than effectively advancing the national interest. The spectacle may not be as dramatic as that moment in French history that saw the old order swept aside in bloody revolutionary fervour, but its significance for Australia could be just as profound.”
Comment
John Hewson
Getting the jobs done
“The successful jobs and skills summit clearly established the significance to our future of improving our national productivity, yet it didn’t attempt to fill in the detail of how to achieve this. The government needs to adopt a clear objective to improve productivity – perhaps a simple target such as doubling the national rate of productivity growth by 2030, or even earlier.”
Letters, Cartoon & Editorial
Culture
The Influence
Joëlle Gergis
For Joëlle Gergis, the film Baraka is a reminder of the love that drives her work to preserve our planet.
Fiction
A dead thing
“You’re a dead thing now, but you keep telling me that I should smile more. You can’t speak (your unfortunate throat), so you mime these things with your hands and your eyes. This tires you out and so your throat deconstructs. Your eyes become more insistent, even as your throat yawns wide and red. If someone else ever saw you, I am certain they would scream.”
Books
Life
Puzzles
Quotes
Media
“It seems we are no longer able to have an alternative and respectfully different view than what the tribe expects you to believe.”
The conservative broadcaster fills a page of the Herald Sun with his objections to being silenced, under the headline “I’m old, male & cancelled”. He’s had it up to here, but that’s only about 5'1".
Celebrity
“That young man did not spit on anyone.”
The legendary singer weighs in on footage that appeared to show Harry Styles spitting on co-star Chris Pine at the premiere of Don’t Worry Darling in Venice. Whether or not Styles is a queerbaiter, Pine does look like someone who likes to be spat on.
Security
“I know that national security professionals … are shaking their heads at what damage might have been done.”
The former CIA chief expresses astonishment that Donald Trump illegally took reports on the identities of intelligence sources to his Florida residence. As Russian spies say: go to Mar-a-Lago for the crab bisque, stay for the HUMINT reports.
Politics
“We have no idea what it means for the mining sector.”
The opposition leader outlines his key concern over an Indigenous Voice to Parliament. He falsely warned the Voice might have a veto power over new projects, presumably thinking it would be modelled on his party’s deal with the Minerals Council of Australia.
Television
“Almost every male character so far is a coward, a jerk or both. Only Galadriel is brave, smart and nice.”
The billionaire complains about the writing in The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. As society’s closest parallel to Sauron, he speaks with unique authority.
Power
“I’ve explained the situation and I don’t expect everybody to agree.”
The former prime minister explains that he didn’t apologise for swearing himself in to secret ministries because he didn’t want to get caught up in the “political circus”. Either way, the guy’s a clown.
