January 2020 Volume LXIV, Number 1-2, No. 563
The Postmodern Pursuit of Global Governance
Just Another Fabrication
Catholic Authority in the Anglican Church
Hong Kong’s Fiery Message to the World
New Light on ‘The Leopard’
Restoring Hope to the Australian Economy
Contents
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A subjectivistic relativism, the suspicion that truth is not really truth but simply a tool to assert power, has seeped into virtually all areas of Western life, manifesting itself especially in identity politics and political correctness. If there is hope it is to be found in former Soviet vassals, where they know firsthand the peril of prescribed beliefsJanuary 28, 2020
20 mins
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According to Geoffrey Robertson, the most notable Australian item in the British Museum is the Gweagal Shield, which he maintains was 'plundered' at Botany Bay by James Cook, whom he also holds responsible the 'bullet hole' at its centre. Not a word of that is true, as the most cursory checking of readily available sources would have shownApril 24, 2024
9 mins
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As an Anglo-Catholic, I was interested in the canonisation of […]December 30, 2019
21 mins
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It’s 9 p.m., Saturday November 23, at a bar called […]
December 30, 2019
11 mins
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'The Leopard', E.M. Forster observed, is one of 'the great lonely books'. If the prestigious protagonist felt lonely, then how much more isolated his real-life grandson, diminished representative of a discredited class and heir to almost worthless estates? In his worthwhile 'Lampedusa' author Steven Price addresses that question and othersFebruary 2, 2020
6 mins
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When he was the federal Treasurer, Wayne Swan never tired […]
December 30, 2019
19 mins
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Sir: The other day I thought I could feel a […]
December 30, 2019
7 mins
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An idiot is simply a stupid person. A crank may actually be quite clever, but he or she is in possession of One Big Idea (or maybe two) that drives him to promote it interminably and with no sense proportion or practicality. They must be beloved of God because he made so very manyJanuary 19, 2020
9 mins
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When David Merritt's son was slain in London by a terrorist newly released from prison, the father interrupted his grieving to hope that the unfortunate incident would not promote more “draconian” sentences. An Islamist firebrand would see this wish as further confirmation of the West's weakness. To my ears, though, it resonated with moral preeningFebruary 6, 2020
8 mins
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Democracy depends on assimilation. Australia should, of course, allow its citizens to embrace whatever cultures they choose, but it should not question the unity of its own civic community by officially promoting the idea that immigrants are expected to exempt themselves from itFebruary 20, 2020
28 mins
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Some 180 years since its creation as a British colony and a little over two decades after being handed back to China, Beijing's ultra-high-handed pressure on Hong Kong and its people can hasten only one likely consequence: the death of the place as we have known itFebruary 4, 2020
9 mins
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Mardi Gras revellers still claim that homosexuality -- cosseted, empowered and itself intolerant of dissent -- remains such a catalyst for its adherents' oppression that our biggest city must be closed down because dykes on bikes, drag queens and gyrating young men to fluorescent underpants need to be reassured they are accepted by the wider populationFebruary 26, 2020
10 mins
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It is important to look more closely at the effects of 'puberty blockers' and cross-sex hormones because their use is fundamental to medical intervention in childhood gender dysphoria. Proponents maintain they are 'safe and entirely reversible' when they are nothing of the kindJanuary 3, 2020
23 mins
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What to make of green-minded millenarians, Extinction Rebellion and the child activist Greta Thunberg, who have convinced governments to declare 'climate emergencies'? History suggests, and the present confirms, the failure of such prophecies only inspires true believers to even more frantic demonstrations of their faith and fervourJanuary 16, 2020
21 mins
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The new chairman of the ABC, Ita Buttrose, has called for greater cultural diversity while doubling down on the state-funded broadcaster’s political uniformity. Given his affection for 'useful idiots', Vladimir Lenin would understand, just as he would approve of climate emergencies and schools teaching what to think, not how to thinkJanuary 23, 2020
21 mins
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Having sat on the RBA Board ex officio in my then capacity as Secretary to the Treasury, I know how decisions are taken within that body. In recent years, most particularly since September 2016, those decisions have brought little credit to an institution that should be, and once was, a respected national institutionJanuary 20, 2020
22 mins
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Empires were, without exception, terrible things, or so the orthodoxy of the Left insists. The disparagement attached to imperial systems, notably those of Britain and Austria-Hungary, appears less grounded, once a fuller range of empires, past, present and future, is consideredJanuary 30, 2020
11 mins
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That the Sydney Morning Herald once boasted a sane, erudite and balanced editorial writer will strike those who have only known that sad publication in its current and debased manifestation as inconceivable. But once, when adults ruled the editorial floor, just such a man helmed its leader pageFebruary 28, 2020
10 mins
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Resident for almost a decade at the Villawood Detention Centre, the serial plaintiff destroyed his passport, uses false names and has a history of presenting himself in other countries in unsatisfactory circumstances. How many fair hearings can we afford to give an unlawful non-citizen? There must be a time when that willingness comes to an endFebruary 12, 2020
38 mins
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A decline in religious observance is unfolding in the West; certainly, when it comes to Christianity. How is morality doing? My view, and I am far from alone in this, is that morality is suffering. Moral values are not being reinforced as they shouldFebruary 19, 2020
17 mins
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The promotion of a rights agenda continues to be prominent in public discourse, but troubling problems call into question the unqualified emphasis on its expansion. It is time to revisit philosopher Denis de Rougemont's thoughts on vocation -- the gift of oneself to others -- as more helpful for the individual and thus for societyFebruary 24, 2020
24 mins
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Nick Hasluck succeeded in establishing himself as a novelist of note while pursuing a career in law that led to a seat on the Supreme Court of Western Australia. His latest book is a first-hand account of the world he experienced in England and on the Continent through the mid-1960s
December 30, 2019
11 mins
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Winston Churchill had no doubt of the importance of studying […]
December 30, 2019
7 mins
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The new generation of Australian business pooh-bahs proudly call themselves […]
December 30, 2019
6 mins
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'History seen through a half-open door' is the way writer Stephen Poliakoff describes his account of the little known and less remembered Prince John, autistic son of George V, who died in 1919. It's also a label that might well be applied to 'Summer of Rockets', a six-part BBC mini-series of twists and intrigue set in the UK of the Cold WarFebruary 16, 2020
23 mins
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Yves Montand's wistful air, a lifelong Communist's novel of life and death on Britain's speedway circuit, a staple in a black American folksinger's repetoire-- there is far more to Banjo Paterson's song, and what it has inspired, than the mere tale of a light-fingered itinerant coming to a watery endFebruary 22, 2020
48 mins
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A recent visit to Toowoomba, after an absence of some […]
December 30, 2019
14 mins
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Shoulders How is it they are still so real? We […]
December 30, 2019
2 mins
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Yearning is the Word I would love that one last […]
December 30, 2019
2 mins
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Grit Dehydrated sea-spit, All things come down to it, in […]
December 30, 2019
1 mins
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Black Fur Bookends Crouching next to my little dog I […]
December 30, 2019
2 mins
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The Miracle of the Thumbtack The bricks sit heavily atop […]
December 30, 2019
4 mins
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Canberra “The king is dead! The king is dead!” confirms […]
December 30, 2019
1 mins
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Lear “I am a man / More sinn’d against than […]
December 30, 2019
1 mins
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Manly Maybe Smells of chicken Pizza shops and fish Maybe […]
December 30, 2019
2 mins
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Touch They’ve been doing this for 22 years on a […]
December 30, 2019
2 mins
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Red Chapel St Stephen’s single bell is still, its call […]
December 30, 2019
2 mins
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Flying solo It’s Friday night and a boy at the […]
December 30, 2019
1 mins
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Amateur Theatrics 1 Exit the King Playing the King in […]
December 30, 2019
1 mins
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You Are Old, Father Grouper (With apologies to Lewis Carroll’s […]
December 30, 2019
3 mins
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The Kalderími The priest, white-bearded and blue-robed, rode down on […]
December 30, 2019
1 mins
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Drying It took us by surprise to walk into that […]
December 30, 2019
1 mins
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Even republicans don’t really care about the republic, which explains why they’ve let the debate stall at exactly where it was in 1999—and why they’re content to allow a failed prime minister and a grown man with a pirate fetish to be the public faces of their little movementFebruary 9, 2020
8 mins
