One moment Alexander Downer is ringing newspapers suggesting that Santo Santoro is suicidal. The next moment Santoro is proving that whilst he is “cidal” it is not “sui” but rather “Fleggi”, judging by this article inThe Courier Mail. Bruce Flegg, with the willing connivance of Brisbane’s only daily newspaper, is portrayed as being at war […]

Bruce Flegg, Parliamentary Leader of the Queensland Liberal Party, obviously believes that there is a larger dimension to the Santoro scandal. “However, what’s been revealed subsequently was no oversight and I think it needs to be investigated further,” he told ABC Radio. In other words – you don’t forget to declare these sorts of things, […]

Not only has Khalid Shaikh Mohammed admitted to being behind every terrorist act of the 20th Century, apart from the assisination of the Archduke Ferdinand where he merely carried the drinks, but now Santo Santoro admits to not just one, not just two, not even three, but fifty or sixty breaches of the disclosure rules. […]

We completed our first focus group on the NSW election last night. You can download the transcript from here. They were all people who indicated that they would vote against their traditional habits in this election, or had yet to make up their mind. There was a mixture of Labor, Liberal and Independents in the […]

It’s good to see that The Courier Mail is not as cosy with Santo as it used to be – two front page stories (one here) criticising him over his breach of the ministerial code of conduct. Time was when his spin was likely to dominate whatever Liberal Party story they were covering. This morning […]

It’s a pretty open secret that Santo Santoro and I aren’t the best of mates, and that I think the Queensland Liberal Party would be best off without him. But, try as I may, I can’t see too much in his latest controversy. He appears to have bought a small parcel of shares in an […]

The Australian reports that Peter Debnam is going for the protest vote. Perhaps he has been reading the “speech” that I drafted for John Brogden last election. Or it might be die to NSW Liberal State Director Graham Jaeschke, who was a valuable part of the Queensland Liberal team that crafted the protest vote campaign […]

Brian Burdekin, author of the 1989 Our Homeless Children, Report of the National Inquiry into Homeless Children, claimed yesterday on AM that youth homelessness leads to an increase in mental breakdown and substance abuse. This assertion was not questioned by the interviewer, and contradicts what I would have thought was the case. Does anyone have […]

I wasn’t so much shocked by Manning Clark’s exaggeration of his experience of Kristallnacht by claiming to be there when he wasn’t, as his biographer’s view that you don’t go to Clark for facts. So the question is, what do you go to Clark for? Do you go to Clark to look up who won […]

Not often I do a post and events over-take it immediately, but that’s what happened to the previous one. Ian Campbell has resigned from cabinet. Howard’s not noted for sacking ministers, and this is probably a record for the speed with which it occurred, which means that Howard smells blood. Rudd is now effectively jammed. […]