George Cheihk could be the all-time heavyweight of political donors, both state and federal. I’ve been contacted to point out that I’ve under-stated George Cheihk’s contributions to the Liberal and Labor Parties. (See my earlier posts here and here.) It seems that the total Mr Cheihk gave to both sides in 2003-2004 was $570,260.80. That’s […]

We seem to be simultaneously in a time of strident secularity and one where it is unprecedently fashionable for politicians to declare their Christianity, and Christians to want to interfere in politics, as Christians. Industrial relations policy is the arena where most of the action is at the moment. You have Kim Beazley’s declaration to […]

A little while ago I drew attention to the prevalence of developer donations to both sides of politics. Maybe we are about to find out much more about it. The biggest donor to the Liberal Party is George Cheihk who passed across around $250,000, giving him almost first mortgagee status. His donations to the ALP […]

Some people think Premier Peter Beattie has lost it. Based on some of the things he has been saying lately, they could be right. For example, he blamed Queenslanders’ unhealthy lifestyles for the hospital crisis. Apparently eating muesli and walking every morning means you’ll never be sick. Hmmm. Insult as a re-election technique – it’s […]

Sometimes I wonder why I vote Liberal, then I remember, the other guys have even less to recommend them. Take fuel policy. Resources Minister Ian Macfarlane is supposed to have good free market credentials, so why is he pushing for tax concessions for oil exploration at a time when the oil price is providing all […]

Appointing Winston Peters as Foreign Minister would be the equivalent of a Kim Beazley making Pauline Hanson, Foreign Affairs Minister, in order to run a tenuous minority government. The only difference is that Peters is Maori while Hanson isn’t Aboriginal. Couldn’t have happened here, could it? Well, it could in Tasmania, which is the only […]

Watching the dignitaries arrive at the 80th birthday celebrations for Baroness Thatcher in London last week it struck me that such an array of guests simply could not be assembled for a retired and respected political leader in Australia. Among the guests was John Major, who deposed Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister. Various members of […]

One of the joys of early morning radio is that there are few advertisements, so you can imagine my consternation when I tuned into 4KQ at 4.30 this morning and was greeted with yet another taxpayer funded ‘Work Choices’ advertisement. Part of my work requires me to listen to radio talk shows, and watch television […]

Given that property developers and Queensland politics are so entwined I’ve been fascinated by the way the state government has set the CMC onto certain Gold Coast City Councillors. They may well be corrupt, but if they are, they wouldn’t be on their pat malone, and there could be even bigger skeletons on all sides […]

One of the most frequent left critiques of John Howard is that he has created a climate of fear in Australia. What makes this observation interesting is that when we survey vast numbers of people we find that those who vote for Howard are most likely to be optimists, with the pessimists congregated around Beazley, […]