New Matilda on the economy

‘Surprise! Lifestyle economy hits the wall. World’s best everything an illusion. Treasurer blames crook shipping terminal. Some Australians will remember when Labor governments were unfailingly flogged for much smaller current account deficits than the present one.’
https://www.newmatilda.com/admin/preview/home/articledetail.asp?ArticleID=512

Honesty Matters: the ethics of daily life – Julian Burnside

‘It is difficult to understand why the government insisted on removing a family it had damaged so badly, unless its purpose was to send a message: not to people smugglers, but to us. Its message to us is this: We hold absolute power; we do not have to acknowledge public sentiment; we can crush anyone who messes with us.’ https://www.newmatilda.com/admin/preview/home/articledetail.asp?ArticleID=510

Competing futures – Greg Barns

‘While a free trade agreement with China is not universally applauded in this country, the Howard government believes that we can ill-afford not to hitch our train to the fastest growing economy in the world. It’s not in Australia’s immediate diplomatic and trade interests to be picking a fight with China.’ https://www.newmatilda.com/admin/preview/home/articledetail.asp?ArticleID=508

Letter from New York – Susie Carleton

‘As The Voices of Haiti sang a medley of pan African anthems to illustrate the dream of Malcolm X, 2000 people rose to their feet, with one raised, clenched fist, singing with one voice. Here was the fearless passion of a humiliated people with little to lose, who will not be silenced in their own home and who have identified their adversary.’
https://www.newmatilda.com/admin/preview/home/articledetail.asp?ArticleID=506

Visiting Ned in Long Bay – John Dale

Six years ago Arthur ‘Neddy’ Smith was acquitted in the New South Wales Supreme Court on the charge of murdering whistle-blower Sallie-Anne Huckstepp. Despite having confessed on tape to strangling Huckstepp, Smith later claimed his ‘confessions’ were lies. A year earlier Smith had been found guilty of the murder of brothel-keeper Harvey Jones. In both the Huckstepp and Jones matters the Crown case was based on secretly-taped conversations between Smith and a cellmate in Long Bay’s Special Purpose Prison.
https://www.newmatilda.com/admin/preview/home/articledetail.asp?ArticleID=502