This week: the banks, the big corporations and the coronavirus All in this together? Bankers, CEOs and company directors emerged from the 2008 Global Financial Crisis (GFC) better off than before it. This was true in the US, the UK and Australia. They walked away unscathed from the financial catastrophe which they had created but…
Another menu of independent current affairs: US Democrats face choice between VP Joe Biden (right) and Senator Bernie Sanders (left); Why Donald Trump is a moving target; The “scramble for Africa” was repeated around the world; Brixton leader “Red” Ted Knight dies in London, aged 86; plus Quote of the Week and Mark Latham’s love-in…
BOOK REVIEW Hasbara and identity theft: a Melbourne case study By DR DAVID FABER The dark arts of economy with the truth have long been part of political manipulation. Why take the risk of lying outright and being caught out when fudging the truth will do and be more effective? As such they have been…
Another exclusive feast of current affairs items: Scott Morrison’s “sports rorts” overshadowed by Nigel Scullion’s misuse of funds for Aborigines; New Yorkers squeezing last drop of profit from share market; bringing back some Aussie words; how America’s Pilgrims survived and prospered; Pentecostal pastor sums up coronavirus; Plug of the Week from Rowan Cahill. How the…
1) BOOK REVIEW Murder in Melbourne: The untold story of Aiia Maasarwe by Alex Mitchell, 2020 Kevin Bain writes: This little book added important aspects to my awareness of this terrible event, which I discuss below. My interest in reading it was because of one thing that I found so sad at the time, which was reported…
BOOK REVIEW Murder in Melbourne: The untold story of Aiia Maasarwe by Alex Mitchell, 2020 Bishop George Browning writes: The plight of Palestinians in their homeland was tragically on display in the aftermath of the brutal Melbourne rape and murder of Aiia Maasarwe. Her killer, Codey Herrmann, a 20-year-old Aborigine with no prior history of crime or…
BOOK REVIEW Ten Doors Down by Robert Tickner, published by SCRIBE, Melbourne 2020 Reviewed by ALEX MITCHELL Robert Tickner, who served in the Hawke and Keating Governments as Minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs, was too nice to be a politician. He was too humble, way too honest and he cared about serving the…
An exclusive feast of current affairs items: Global rallies for release of Julian Assange; Rupert Murdoch empire grows like virus; Murdoch goes after ABC Classic Radio; “Fatty O’Barrell” fits India perfectly; House of Lords savages rebirth of apartheid; The New Yorker morphs into Clinton-Obama-Biden tool; Rush Limbaugh unlocked Julian Assange wins global support On 24…
Senior Palestine ex-diplomat condemns Trump “peace deal” Ali Kazak, a former Palestinian ambassador and ex-head of Palestine’s delegation to Australia, New Zealand and the South Pacific, has rejected the so-called “deal of the century” cooked up by US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. For the record, the deal’s advocates are both…
David Hickie, former editor-in-chief of the Sydney Morning Herald and Sun-Herald, looks beyond the headlines in the coverage of crime BOOK REVIEW: Murder in Melbourne: The untold story of Aiia Maasarwe by Alex Mitchell (2020) DAVID HICKIE WRITES: Over Xmas/New Year I read Kate McClymont and Vanda Carson’s forensically detailed tome Dead Man Walking: The murky world of…
