Police do not kill black Americans in greater numbers than Caucasians and Hispanics. Australian Aborigines do not die in custody more than other Australians. The pay gap between women and men is a myth. Ah, you say, but such 'facts' are articles of modern faith. Well, yes, but only by dent of circular logic and much sleight of hand

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The sad reality is that Victorians have been miserably betrayed by their federal and state governments in many ways and on many levels. Premier Andrews is a leader of authoritarian inclinations and, to its shame, the Morrison government has tacitly consented to the deplorable oppression being visited 24/7 on that unfortunate state's population

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While those pushing legislation to break the seal of Confession insist it will protect the victims of child sexual abuse, the effect is likely to be the exact opposite. The grave risk is that victims will not disclose that abuse in the confessional if the priest is obliged to make a mandatory report

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Al Gore is a bad enough climate hustler, but Cool Australia's insidious and habitually untrue scare stories being taught in the overwhelming majority of Australian schools are worse. If Johnny can't read it may well be because his attention has been captured by tall tales of climate refugees, wicked capitalists, the evils of eating meat and imminent planetary doom

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The frontrunner and current hot tip to fill America's Supreme Court vacancy is Amy Coney Barrett. She’s not yet 50, so a lifetime appointment could see her a SCOTUS fixture for perhaps 30 years, if Ginsburg's legal longevity is any guide. First, though, the replacement -- be it Barrett or someone else -- must run the Left's gauntlet of slanders and violence

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Walk unthinkingly in front of a car and, apart from an immediate and rather painful lesson in the physics of propelled objects, what you will learn is that emergency wards are staffed with lovely, caring people who drive you half crazy before finally agreeing to let you limp home

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It has been 140 years since Ned Kelly held innocent Victorians hostage at Glenrowan, costing two of them their lives. Things are a bit different these days: an entire state is the captive of a Premier whose every latest entry in a growing ledger of incompetence is matched by the further, step-by-step dismantling of his subjects' liberties

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Apart from Victoria, whose staggering COVID death toll is testament to official incompetence that failed to protect the vulnerable elderly, Australia has done rather well in terms of fatalities. Yet border closures, panicked policies and consequent economic ruin remain the order of the day. Perhaps our leaders should listen to Irish biochemist Ivor Cummins

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Many medical advances have emerged from evil origins, Nazi experimentation on humans coming readily to mind. As the global effort to produce a COVID-19 vaccine is seeing, in some cases, the use of aborted fetal tissue, surely the moral question must hinge on the issue of consent

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While art and literature tended to stagnate in the 18th century, the same can't be said of music. In the ninth installment of Mervyn Bendle's guide to Sir Kenneth Clark's 'Civilisation', Bach, Handel, Haydn, and especially Mozart write the soundtrack for the cultural shift to Romanticism and, ultimately, the implied rejection of civilisation itself

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