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The Political Sword 2009

The Political Sword resumes usual activity today.  With the resumption of Federal Parliament tomorrow, there will be plenty of political activity upon which to comment. 

The prime focus of this site is Federal politics, the reporting of it, and the comments and opinions expressed in the media.  One aim is to critique the media’s contribution to an understanding of, and informed discourse about the political process, with the hope that standards of journalism might be improved.  An article on Crikey’s Content Makers titled How Blogging Changes Journalists suggests that journalists are susceptible to the opinions of bloggers, and as a consequence may change their behaviour.  So there is hope.

The site’s additional features are intended to make it easier for visitors to keep up with political blogs; Blog Watch is updated as new items appear on the main political blog sites.  Government Watch is updated whenever the ALP website is updated and Opposition Watch when the Liberal website is updated.  It is hoped these features will provide an easy way of checking the original media releases, speeches, doorstops and media interviews that are posted on these websites, from which the media derive much of their content.

As the number of items on both Government Watch and Opposition Watch is large, a new page will be started for each at the beginning of each month.  The current month is the one with the month in capitals under ‘site pages’.

In response to a request, the font size used on the site has been increased.  I would appreciate feedback about this change.

I look forward to resuming the dialogue with visitors that began in the second half of 2008.  Suggestions for improvement of the site will be welcome.

Ad astra

Time to say goodbye

To me, Ad Astra, “Time to say goodbye” are among the saddest words in our language. Yet say them now we must. I chose Ad Astra as my moniker because my secondary school’s motto is ‘sic itur ad astra’, which can be liberally interpreted as: “Here is the way to the stars”. How inspiring these word...

  • 19/12/2022

Have we got a deal for you

There is a conspiracy theory that suggests that birds (in the USA at least) aren’t real. The claim is that all the birds in the USA were hunted down by the government between the late 50’s and early 70s and replaced with bird like drones to spy on you. According to the theory President John F. Kenne...

  • 12/12/2022

Get out of the gutter

You may not have heard of Mike Rinder. A Scientologist for most of his life, at the age of 52 he walked out, and as a result lost his family, friends, employment and pretty well everything else in his life. RInder has written a book on his time in Scientology, runs a website that questions Scientolo...

  • 5/12/2022

Was Amtrak Joe derailed?

Prior to becoming President, Joe Biden was a US Senator for around 36 years. He is known as Amtrak Joe as he routinely took the daily 90 minute each way train trip (on the USA’s national passenger train network — Amtrak) from his home in Delaware to Washington DC to represent his state. If you liste...

  • 28/11/2022

If employers can measure well-being...

Last September, you might have seen Qantas CEO Alan Joyce received a pay increase of $278,000 per annum. It seems that Joyce has met or exceeded the performance goals set by his employers and contractually has earned the reward. It does, however, raise a larger question. Joyce's pay increase for t...

  • 21/11/2022

Coming back to haunt you

In his recent Budget reply speech, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton laboured (pun intended) on the increasingly difficult to achieve promise by Prime Minister Albanese that power bills will be $275 less in 2025. While the government is claiming the modelling done in 2021 supports the accuracy of the p...

  • 14/11/2022

The good economic units

Wellbeing and politics have collided in the past couple of weeks. Federal Treasurer Dr Jim Chalmers has started a conversation about measuring the ‘wellbeing’ of the nation as a result of the measures in the budget. The Opposition, as you would expect, has poured scorn on the idea. On a purely lo...

  • 7/11/2022

Do you want to smile or frown

Recently, in what could be described as an epic fail in recruiting practices, the Essendon Football Club hired and accepted the resignation of the same CEO within a day. The issue was that the CEO was also the Chairman of ‘City on the Hill’, a church that seems to promote some conservative views on ...

  • 2/11/2022

We can do it better

It was probably co-incidental that the Australian Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) was held in Sydney around the time the NRL and AFL finals were occurring. CPAC originally advertised the conference would be at Luna Park — until Luna Park claimed they had never had a booking. The Conf...

  • 24/10/2022

The voice

Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong recently addressed the United Nations General Assembly in New York. Accompanying Wong on the trip was Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen and ‘Special Envoy for Reconciliation’ Pat Dodson. Wong told the General Assembly that Australia believed the UN an...

  • 17/10/2022

Kicking climate down the road

You’re probably aware of some who don't see the need to reduce emissions. They have a lot of different reasons or excuses for the position, including the current systems have served us well in the past, we’re only a small population so our changes won’t mean much or just a general reluctance to cons...

  • 10/10/2022

A home amongst the gumtrees

A local real estate agent rings me every couple of months asking if I am willing to sell my house. So far he's tried the 'look how much you could get' strategy, 'the market is moving, you don’t want to miss out’ strategy and telling me he could help me buy another house if I did sell; to which my re...

  • 3/10/2022

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4 COMMENTS

Ebenezer

2/02/2009Welcome back Ad, looking forward to your insightful posts. Thanks for the new features. Cheers Eb. :)

Rx

2/02/2009Good to have you back, Ad Astra. I noticed the change in font size as soon as I opened the page. Any chance, while you're sifting through the media's coverage of politics, of doing a column, or perhaps a series of columns, on Piers Akerman? It's not that I think he needs the publicity. Nor will I read his pieces on line or in hard copy myself. But he is surely one of the most biased, blinkered and agenda-driven "commentators" in Australia, and thus warrants some close analysis and attention, don't you think. Cheers, and all the best for the blog for the new year. Rx

janice

3/02/2009Thank you for the added features, Ad astra, especially the larger font size.

Ad astra reply

7/02/2009Rx, I noted your request for a column on Piers Akerman. I've long abandoned reading his heavily biassed pieces, and hope we've seen the last of him on [i]Insiders[/i]. I've looked at a couple of his pieces since your request arrived. He's getting worse! I doubt if I've got the stomach to tackle his ravings, which leave me infuriated. If I do summon the strength, it won't be a long piece.

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T-w-o take away o-n-e equals?

Heat not a furnace for your foe so hot that it do singe yourself.

William Shakespeare: Henry VIII.

Where the populace rise at once against the never-ending audacity of elected persons.

Walt Whitman

Science must begin with myths, and with the criticism of myths.

Karl Popper

He was like a cock who thought the sun had risen to hear him crow.

George Eliot

To err is human. To blame someone else is politics.

Hubert H. Humphrey