This is a slightly edited version of a piece I wrote some time ago for Heretical, the University of Queensland’s Women’s Area publication. I thought I would drag it out since Cheryl Kernot has been mentioned again as a warning about Peter Garrett’s potential new career as a Labor parliamentarian. The inference of this discussion […]

Mark Latham’s cancellation of his plans to travel to the USA later this year was smart, judging from the electoral problems John Howard’s trip is generating him. I am not in the school which says that George W Bush is stupid. He may not be the intellectually sharpest tool in the shed, but since when […]

HAVING written, speeches, statements and communications strategies for politicians here and in Papua New Guinea for over 30 years I perhaps have a greater appreciation than most of good communicators. I am old enough to have heard Sir Robert Menzies speak at Brisbane City Hall, and listen in to his parliamentary addresses on radio, but […]

I recently invested some time investigating a government press release merely to find it was one of the worst beat-ups I have ever seen. Rather than waste my time, I’ve decided to write about the experience. The release came to me courtesy of another, perhaps more gullible, Liberal Party friend. I received an email with […]

According to Rory Callinan in The Australian Afghanistan is expecting a bumper 3600 tonne opium crop – the same as last year. This “will provide a huge narcotics war chest for Taliban and al-Qaeda terrorists who have been squeezed by new financial tracking operations.” In fact, it might be larger than Rory suggests, because Reuters […]

This piece is dedicated to the good and caring folk at the Australian Family Association, because that little girl on Play School with her two mummies should know she doesn’t have a real family. Troubled station Channel 35 has finally won over men aged 17-99 with its new drama series, The Letter L. The show’s […]

IF you have been delayed by the inexcusable closure of all but one lane in Edward Street Brisbane you have my sympathy, for that is more than the Brisbane City Council, or Watpac, will give you. When I read that the BCC was closing all but one lane of a very busy, already congested, city […]

It’s been a tough few months for the man The Sydney Morning Herald’s P P McGuiness astutely, and without overstatement, labelled “the most recent victim of the lynch mob mentality rife in Australian public debate”. As I wait for Professor David Flint at Posh, the restaurant for mainstream Australians who can afford it, I speculate […]

There were 47 words in last Friday’s interview between Ryan MHR Michael Johnson and ABC Radio’s Steve Austin that have the potential to do the Howard Government much more damage than the Trish Draper affair. They could mean that the Liberal Party organization will be forced to look at disciplining Mr Johnson. That the Australian […]

Recent academic polling suggests that voters would rather have increased services than tax cuts. Despite that both Liberal and Labor are offering tax cuts as well as increased services. What is happening? Are they catering for all opinions, or do they think that the polls are wrong? Our research throws light on that. The question, […]