The federal opposition is in damage control following firebrand senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price’s claims the government is accepting “large numbers” of Indian migrants into Australia to bolster Labor’s vote, claiming that a Redbridge poll had found that 85% 0f those who have Indian ancestry voted for Labor (on a two party preferred vote). read more

The following post is by Associate Professor in History at Deakin University, Carolyn Holbrook.

The Australian War Memorial is in the news for reportedly retrospectively changing the rules of its Les Carlyon prize for military history. This resulted in it not being awarded to Walkley award-winning journalist Chris Masters’ book about disgraced special forces soldier Ben Roberts-Smith. read more

Pearls and Irritations today published Peter Stanley’s piece on the latest Australian War Memorial example of the AWM trying to deny the realities of our military history.

Peter wrote: The Australian War Memorial remains one of Australia’s most cherished national institutions, attracting a million visitors, mainly tourists, to Canberra each year. read more

Donald Trump sinks lower and lower in polls and rhetoric. And every day he takes the US a step further along the road to being a Fascist state. Indeed, the film Civil War – released before Trump was re-elected – is looking increasingly prescient.

In the film Kirsten Durst plays a journalist crossing a dystopian civil war landscape and (spoiler alert) dies protecting a young journalist from a demented President trying to kill her. This is obviously fictional as Trump probably wouldn’t know one end of a gun from the other – and given his aversion to military service – would probably not know how to use it if he did. The film seemed a bit like a documentary – if a very uncomfortable one. read more

You could be forgiven for thinking that Robert Darnton and others had left nothing for anyone to say about the French Revolution – not that this stops many from holding forth anyway.

Yet Antoine Parent, a French economist at University Paris 8, is one of the co-authors of a study published in Nature (27/8) which uses epidemiology to explain the Great Fear which preceded the Revolution. Their findings go beyond the Revolution and have significant implications for today’s political environment. read more

Is the AI boom heading towards a bust – just like many other boom and bust developments of the past?

Four researchers at MIT NANDA have published a report – The State of AI in business 2025 – which raises some interesting facts.

They said: “Despite $30-40 billion in enterprise investments in GenAI, this report uncovers a surprising result in that 95% of organisations are getting zero return.” read more

Opinion polling may be very useful for making political predictions but there is one thing which is even better – elections – as one recent US one illustrates.

On August 26 an election in Iowa’s 1^st Senate district – a seat Trump won by 11% in 2024 – the Democrat candidate Catelin Drey defeated Republican Christopher Prosch by a margin of 10% breaking the supermajority that Iowa Republicans had in the state legislature. read more

While there is no doubt that our acquisition of nuclear subs from the US will either be massively delayed and over budget or binned on some Trumpian whim what’s worse is that we may never get our multi-billion dollar deposit back if that occurs.

This is in stark contrast with Canada which is buying subs – albeit not nuclear – which can be delivered by 2035.Timely delivery is important to the Canadians given that Trump continues to threaten Canada with annexation and is bristling at the economic damage Canada is doing to the US through widespread boycotts and other activities ranging from Mark Carney’s rapier to Doug Ford’s elbows up. read more

The RSL has been a significant force in Australian politics but it’s clear it is now suffering from a range of problems. Once upon a time it had easy access to government, but the interests of veterans are now far more diverse and complex than in the past. It needs more than a regular visit to have tea with the Minister as was the practice of yore. read more

Back in 2024 the blog speculated on the many missed opportunities in Australian political history. It asked if only we had done some things and not done some we did. 

Reading it almost a year later it still seems relevant. This is what we wrote back then:

Everyone has the odd ‘if only’ thought from time to time. read more