By Phil on November 20, 2009
As Imre Salusinszky noted a few days ago, the McGurk inquiry into planning decisions made for land in the Badgery’s Creek area of western Sydney has found that, ‘no NSW Labor politician or government official has acted corruptly.’ In handing [...]
Posted in Ethics, Law, NSW Government, Politics, Sydney | Tagged Kristina Keneally, mcgurk, nathan rees, new south wales, NSW, planning, Sylvia Hale |
By Mark Bahnisch on November 20, 2009
In the wake of his avowal of climate change denialism on Four Corners, Nick Minchin has spent the second last week of the Parliamentary year stoking the fires of Coalition opposition to the CPRS. Tony Abbott, previously a ‘skeptic’ who [...]
Posted in Climate change, Economics, Energy, Howardia, Immigration, Politics | Tagged asylum seekers, Barnaby Joyce, boat people, brown jobs, climate change policy, Coal industry, Copenhagen, cprs, denialism, emissions trading legislation, employment, green jobs, John Howard, liberal leadership, Liberal Party, Malcolm Turnbull, Nationals, Nick Minchin, Penny Wong, polling, refugees, Rudd government, Tony Abbott |
By Robert Merkel on November 20, 2009
Possum’s analysis of Morgan polling on the issue of climate change and the CPRS indicates that there has been a softening of belief in anthropogenic global warming, and support for the CPRS. However, that softening is mostly in the ranks [...]
Posted in Climate change, Politics |
By Paul Norton on November 19, 2009
Having re-read the book earlier this year, it is unnerving to reflect on how closely life has imitated art in this awful story from Tasmania.
Posted in Books, Writers & Writing, Crime, Life |
By Robert Merkel on November 19, 2009
As previously noted, finding out what’s going on with the Australian deployment in Afghanistan is almost impossible. Therefore, this piece by the ABC’s Hungry Beast is a fairly rare data point, and a fascinating one: …Eventually, we found one currently-serving [...]
Posted in Afghanistan, Foreign policy, Media, Security, War |
By tigtog on November 19, 2009
Fairfax has a piece on myths about obesity that is sensible and properly science-based, and which they are promoting in the banner area of the front page? Maybe there’s something to all this approaching-2012-apocalypso after all. The layout is better [...]
Posted in Media, Medicine, Sociology | Tagged big fat lies, body mass index, exercise, nutrition, obesity myths |
By Mark Bahnisch on November 18, 2009
Peter Van Onselen’s new role at Newspoll Central appears to be a second string Dennis Shanahan, adding a second dose of commentary on the almighty Newspoll a day after the master pronounces on how it is to be interpreted. Van [...]
Posted in Media, Polls | Tagged ALP, bounce, Coalition, Dennis Shanahan, Federal election 2007, GFC, global financial crisis, honeymoon, Imre Salusinszky, john della bosca, John Howard, Kevin Rudd, Kristina Keneally, liberal leadership, Liberal Party, nathan rees, Newspoll, Nick Minchin, NSW Labor, NSW Labor conference, Peter Van Onselen, Polls, Rudd government, service delivery, state labor |
By dk.au on November 18, 2009
Arguably the biggest gambit of price theorists attempting to upscale their successes with small, well defined pollution rights trading schemes is that the economy/politics boundary in allocating permits can be located empirically. In the well ordered Popperian world of (neo)liberal [...]
Posted in Climate change, Economics, Energy, Environment, Sociology |
By Mark Bahnisch on November 18, 2009
I referred in an earlier post to Paul Kelly’s style of commentary – a mix of oracular pronouncement and portentous ponderings about the primacy of narrative. I actually read his March of Patriots a while back, and planned to review [...]
Posted in Australiana, History, Howardia, Media, Politics, Sociology | Tagged Book review, Guy Rundle, History, Insiders, John Howard, march of history, narrative, Nationalism, Paul Keating, Paul Kelly, political history, reform, Sociology |
By Mark Bahnisch on November 17, 2009
It would be interesting to study the role of the economics editor. In Australia, at least, those papers and media outlets which employ such a person appear to see the role as enforcing the BCA line on liberal economics, even [...]
Posted in Advertising, Culture, Economics, Markets, Media, Politics, Sociology, The Web | Tagged Andrew Charlton, BCA, commentariat, confession, Culture, cyber-utopianism, discourse, economic policy, economics journalism, ideology, Kevin Rudd, March of Patriots, marketing, Michael Sutchbury, michel foucault, Monthly Essay, narrative, narratology, neo-liberalism, Paul Kelly, policy narrative, productivity commission, reason, Rudd government, Sociology, therapeutic cultures, truth |
By Robert Merkel on November 17, 2009
In this post-footy, post-Spring-Carnival, pre-international-cricket sporting lull, some people’s minds are turning to the long-term trends in Aussie sport. And Crikey’s sport blog has a piece by Bobas, a rugby devotee, on the state of Australia’s five big professional male [...]
Posted in Culture, Media, Sport |
Of media narratives, truth and narratologies
By Mark Bahnisch on November 17, 2009
It would be interesting to study the role of the economics editor. In Australia, at least, those papers and media outlets which employ such a person appear to see the role as enforcing the BCA line on liberal economics, even [...]
Posted in Advertising, Culture, Economics, Markets, Media, Politics, Sociology, The Web | Tagged Andrew Charlton, BCA, commentariat, confession, Culture, cyber-utopianism, discourse, economic policy, economics journalism, ideology, Kevin Rudd, March of Patriots, marketing, Michael Sutchbury, michel foucault, Monthly Essay, narrative, narratology, neo-liberalism, Paul Kelly, policy narrative, productivity commission, reason, Rudd government, Sociology, therapeutic cultures, truth | 46 Responses