If you go to court in the US on any issues to do with abortion or IVF you might end up confronting a judge who decides your case on his personal theocratic beliefs or one who relies on dodgy science.

Recently the Alabama chief justice, Tom Parker, who ruled that embryos are ‘extrauterine children’, gave a clear example of the theocratic foundation of his thinking when he said: “The people of Alabama have declared the public policy of this State to be that unborn human life is sacred. We believe that each human being, from the moment of conception, is made in the image of God, created by Him to reflect His likeness … [they] have required us to treat every human being in accordance with the fear of a holy God who made them in his image.” read more

When Twiggy Forrest, Private Eye, The Financial Times and Bloomberg all describe why nuclear power is not the answer you have to wonder why Peter Dutton can’t hear the message.

Why Dutton doesn’t was nailed by Forrest at a recent National Press Club address where he said:  “If you think that nuclear came out of nowhere, no, it didn’t. It’s been pushed by the fossil fuel sector as a great way to delay the whole country for 20 years from switching over to fossil fuels forever. read more

Despite the belief of many Americans – and endless US propaganda – the US has never been a full democracy.

Putting aside the obvious fact that until the 1960s African Americans were disenfranchised, and murdered for campaigning for civil rights, America did make some progress from the 1960s onwards. read more

As sure as night follows day business leaders and media warn of the cataclysmic consequences of workers getting paid more, going on strike or even wanting to avoid being called at 2am over something which could have been left until after breakfast at least but occurred to the boss when he/she was in a hotel room in another time zone. read more

Reading the latest Scanlon Foundation social cohesion report makes you aware that there are two quite distinct images of Australia.

One – totally dark and doom laden – is depicted in the mass and social media and the other – clear-eyed about both serious problems and opportunities – is depicted in the 2023 Scanlon Foundation annual Mapping Social Cohesion report. read more

If anyone ever imagined that commemoration of our war dead was not an opportunity to make political points look no further than the Daily Last Post ceremony at the Australian War Memorial at the recent opening of Federal Parliament.

We need to honour any Australian who died in war and remember those who came back and the problems they faced when they did. read more

US politicians and others are always boasting about the US being the greatest in just about any category you can think of – from the record for eating hot dogs in a given time to their so-called democracy.

But perhaps the greatest boast is that it is a peace-loving state committed to protecting the world. read more

In the 20^th century a series of UK investigations, including the Leveson Inquiry, demonstrated that Murdoch newspapers had engaged in phone hacking, police bribery and resort to dodgy private investigators.

A subsequent parliamentary committee found that Rupert had exhibited ‘wilful blindness’ to what was going on and that he was not a fit person to be running a major international company. read more

Divisions on the Australian War Memorial Council and political pressure are putting Memorial staff in a difficult position over the depiction of Frontier Wars. This has become clearer as time passes and more evidence becomes available.

The immediate past Council Chair, Brendan Nelson, and the current Chair, Kim Beazley, have both committed to the representation of the Frontier Wars, though the extent of this commitment has been muddied as more information has come out on the qualifications and fudges included in the original August 2022 Council decision. read more

A day after posting on the Murdoch infestation at the Nine Newspapers mastheads comes the sad news of the death of one of the journalists who made The Age a great newspaper.

Tim Colebatch could seemingly write on anything. He was a perceptive environmental reporter when such rounds were just being established; covered US politics from Washington; provided sophisticated analysis of election results; and, was that rare thing in journalism – highly numerate. read more