April 27 – May 3, 2019
News
Comment
Comment
A.J. Brown
Matters of trust in public office
“The nation will soon head to the polls with public integrity a higher-profile issue than perhaps ever before in Australian history. The two major parties, however, seem to be the last people in the country to realise this. Trust took a dive not only because citizens suddenly felt unsure that their vote mattered. It was also the flip side – concern about the failure of due democratic process and the role of undue influences over the decision-making in Australia’s highest office. This is the message the major parties seem to have missed.”
Comment
Paul Bongiorno
Coalition takes water, presses on
“Just when many of his troops were beginning to believe Scott Morrison’s Easter prayers might be answered, their hopes were shattered by Barnaby Joyce. The New England MP has form in derailing Liberal prime ministers when they appear to be making headway – just ask Malcolm Turnbull. The $79 million water buyback imbroglio had been simmering for more than a week, ever since The Project on the Ten Network picked up the work of business journalist Michael West in a major report.”
Letters, Poem & Editorial
Culture
Profile
Angelica Mesiti emergent in Venice
As Sydney-born, Paris-based artist Angelica Mesiti prepares to show her three-channel video work Assembly in the Australian pavilion at the Venice Biennale, she talks about emotional responses, music as a salve and the vital need for connection. “Dissonance is a word that was really important to this work. Basically, the work is using music as a metaphor. It travels through dissonance, through harmony, through polyphony, through cacophony.”
Music
SOAK’s Grim Town
Her astonishing debut album saw SOAK become the youngest artist to be shortlisted for the prestigious Mercury Music Prize. So, can her ambitious follow-up, Grim Town, reach the heights of her early success?
Portrait
Top End Wedding actress Miranda Tapsell
“I’m really thankful that I’m living in a climate where there’s Crazy Rich Asians, The Big Sick and The Incredible Jessica James on Netflix. These are people who aren’t Aboriginal but they are from a marginalised ethnic background, and they’re trying to understand themselves in a relationship. It did give me that permission to stand on my own two feet and trust what I was saying. ”
Books
Life
Puzzles
Quotes
DARWINISM
“What happened to the dinosaurs? How did they die off? Humans didn’t create it.”
The One Nation leader scoffs at the human-induced climate change during an interview on Today with Deborah Knight, who in that moment presumably welcomed the idea of an asteroid speeding towards her at 7000 kilometres an hour.
LEADERSHIP
“The prime minister’s job isn’t to be the court jester, it’s to be the man with the plan.”
The Labor leader vows to stop Scott Morrison running “around the country taking his happy pills”. Bill Shorten is promising rhymes in place of jokes, much like musical comedy group Tripod.
POETRY
“Scandal is his shadow.”
The United Australia Party candidate describes Barnaby Joyce, who was absent from a candidate forum. It remains to be seen whether Clive Palmer will tolerate having another poet in his party.
PREFERENCES
“He’s big enough to do that for himself.”
The prime minister takes the moral high ground, deciding not to use his announcement of a preference deal with the United Australia Party to taunt Clive Palmer, who once likened Morrison to Heinrich Himmler.
AMERICA
“That’s why today I’m announcing my candidacy for president of the United States.”
The former vice-president puts up his hand for the Democratic nomination. He promised not to put said hand on to the lower back of any women in his vicinity.
ELECTION
“How much worse does this candidate’s behaviour have to get before Scott Morrison takes action?”
Labor’s education spokesperson slams Kate Ashmor over recently surfaced letters the Liberal candidate wrote voicing support for public funding of private schools. Probably to the level of an indictable offence, if Gladys Liu is anything to go by.
