November 2022 Volume Volume LXVI, Number 10, No. 591
How Xi Misreads the Taiwan Battlefield
The Rise and Fall of Sovereignty in Europe
Every Conservative is Worse than Previous Conservatives
Mussolini Past and Present
What American Conservatism Exists to Conserve
Atlas Hugged
Contents
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Storms, treacherous currents, shallow waters and other factors mean there are only four months of the year in which China could mount an invasion. And there is a further complication. One to two million troops would be needed to subdue and occupy the island but, according to Chinese sources, they will not be battle-ready for at least five yearsFebruary 13, 2024
31 mins
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During the Brexit campaign, the Chancellor of the Exchequer (a Remainer) opined that sovereignty was rather an 'esoteric' matter, as if it were something the voters would find hard to understand, and should be reserved for experts to discuss. Do citizens in Europe and elsewhere want that? It is doubtful they will be askedMarch 15, 2023
26 mins
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There is an established pattern which will soon focus on Peter Dutton, who has not yet been framed by the Left as worse than Scott Morrison. But that will come as surely as the sun rises in the morning, with the Coalition leader certain to be denounced as the worst and most repugnant creature since Tony Abbott, who was worse than John Howard. Conservative evil is not identified by specific acts but by sequenceMarch 11, 2023
9 mins
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Paul Corner's Mussolini in Myth and Memory is a good book but far from a great one. While he writes with admirable lucidity, he also succumbs to the temptation of regurgitating modern memes without questioning them. Thus, laughably, does Donald Trump raise 'the spectre of a new Fascism'. Get past those deficiencies and what remains does a creditable job of deflating many persistent myths about Il Duce and his timesFebruary 23, 2023
10 mins
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The American experience is a vivid example of how conservatism adapts itself to a particular national circumstance. Writing from the perspective of an American conservative, let me attempt to explain why and how our US conservatism is distinctive and, beyond that, what it should attempt to conserve in our deeply troubled ageNovember 30, 2022
18 mins
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Unlike colleagues, as Stewart Cockburn explained to his wife, he was not a practitioner of journalism’s sub-crafts: 'cheating on expenses' and 'beating up stories'. As daughter Jennifer chronicles in Writing for his Life, he was a witness to the rise of the Murdochs and the transformation of the news businessNovember 29, 2022
13 mins
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Any system built on lies will eventually collapse, but it will cause great harm before this collapse and what replaces it may not be any better. Throughout, decent people will need to protect their own humanness by developing virtue and bravely living in truthNovember 27, 2022
13 mins
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On the day before Queen Elizabeth's coronation, Peter O’Brien was arrested in Dublin and fined three pounds for crying out 'God Save the Queen'. At her funeral so many decades later, one of the mourners was convicted IRA terrorist Alex Maskey, who spent his latter 30 years working for peace. Her Majesty would have been pleasedNovember 27, 2022
17 mins
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Progressivess always have trouble with the working poor. They prefer the kind of abject Dickensian poverty that can be ministered to, the kind that calls out for boldly intrusive policies and new government interventions. But poor people getting by, making do? That would be an affront to the progressive sensibility, which always requires a villainNovember 25, 2022
9 mins
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Henry Reynolds is always simplistic, always unreliable. Though his selection and use of sources is dazzlingly inept, his political objective is clear—the destruction of modern Australia and its replacement by Balkanised race states. To this end, in an excursion into unpardonable error, he twists and grossly misquotes Jeremy BenthamNovember 23, 2022
11 mins
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No one likes Kamala Harris. No one even feels bad for not liking her. Her boss doesn’t like her; her aides don’t like her; even her Irish terrier doesn’t like her. Sixty per cent of Americans think Biden is unfit to be president, and the other sixty per cent feel the same way about Trump. But all 120 per cent loathe Kamala HarrisNovember 23, 2022
8 mins
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Hugh White's Sleepwalk to War: Australia’s Unthinking Alliance with America is a genuinely memorable achievement, for few authors ever manage to get so much wrong in so relatively few words. As a blueprint for relations with Beijing and the US, its diagnosis is misguided and prognosis laughableNovember 21, 2022
16 mins
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Originally, Gustave Eiffel's marvel was scheduled to be demolished after twenty years, but due to its enormous international popularity, it remains standing and will continue to do so most likely in perpetuity. A new film chronicles how, why and with what in mind the tower came to be builtNovember 19, 2022
13 mins
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There are errors in Shadowlands: A Journey Through Lost Britain but they are minor and do little to diminish author Matthew Green's empathetic erudition or cloud his conjuration of still-potent places -- redolent symbols of sacrifice and future fragility in a Britain he observes less through its attributes than their absenceNovember 17, 2022
7 mins
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'Vivienne nearly was the death of me, but she kept the poet alive,' wrote T.S. Eliot some 12 years after the death of the wife whose sundry ailments, instability and mental cruelty made his life a misery. Nevertheless the torments of their marriage conferred its dividend: 'It brought the state of mind out of which came The Waste Land'November 16, 2022
20 mins
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Sovereignty and native title, Bain Attwood points out in his worthwhile new book, were the subject of enormous political debate in New Zealand in the 1840s and 1850s, yet barely discussed in Australia. His meticulously researched explanation why this was so is as an antidote to the simplistic 'normative history' currently in vogueNovember 16, 2022
11 mins
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Among his other insights, John Howard in his new book perceptively notes that the single largest failure of the Coalition under Scott Morrison was the failure to present 'a clear policy manifesto for the future'. Add missteps and intemperate attacks on Christine Holgate and Andrew Laming and, well, its no surprise Anthony Albanese now occupies The LodgeNovember 12, 2022
11 mins
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The great battles occupy less than fifty pages in most translations. It is not that the chaotic battles are an afterthought. Rather, the real war that the characters struggle through is the battle with themselves, the world, and the other flesh-and-blood humans who dot the landscape of Tolstoy’s magisterial portraitNovember 10, 2022
14 mins
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As James McAuley put it almost sixty years ago in A Primer of Australian Versification: 'What is the relation between poetry and personal experience; and in particular what are the ways in which a personal element enters poetry?' Two new volumes lend that question a fresh pertinenceNovember 9, 2022
9 mins
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Lying for the Admiralty is both a compelling take on the political climate behind the founding of Australia and an impressively researched page-turner. Author Margaret Cameron-Ash shows that Cook turned his hand to spying and deception, even to the extent of omitting Sydney Harbour and Bass Strait from the maps he chartedNovember 8, 2022
8 mins
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When the High Court overturned Peter Ridd's lower-court victory against James Cook University it was a decision to chill the hearts and still the tongues of every scientist in every scientific institution in Australia. Now that a report detailing the Reef's ruddy good health has vindicated the banished professor and damned his critics, where does he go to get an apology?November 1, 2022
22 mins
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Swan Fishing Sad that such cruel means should be required […]October 29, 2022
2 mins
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My Goat and I My goat lives in a field […]
October 29, 2022
2 mins
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Fracture A small thing. Insignificant, really. Out of play, […]
October 29, 2022
1 mins
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Lot’s Wife As soon as she turned her head she […]
October 29, 2022
1 mins
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Saturday Morning A gentle morning glazes the lagoon. Two […]
October 29, 2022
1 mins
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Winter Wax It settled like a wintered wax. I could […]
October 29, 2022
1 mins
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An absolutely ordinary murder after Les Murray The word goes […]
October 29, 2022
3 mins
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Can It (Aussie Style) It’s enough to make one chunder […]
October 29, 2022
1 mins
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Destiny As Harold drew his burnished sword of war, With […]
October 29, 2022
1 mins
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Letter to My Father Old man in exile, self-imposed, do […]
October 29, 2022
2 mins
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Aubade For one moment, death puts down its drum, and […]
October 29, 2022
1 mins
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My Sunday wars The cars in reverential ranks are few […]
October 29, 2022
2 mins
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Piano Bar Ritz-Carlton, Double Bay Tilt the glass a little, […]
October 29, 2022
2 mins
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Time in Time This is the time in time […]
October 29, 2022
2 mins
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The Elocution of Billy Graham The mesmeric Billy Graham pronounced […]
October 29, 2022
2 mins
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The Remnant Very early in the lambency of the almost […]
October 29, 2022
1 mins
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He was at the pantry door when she asked him […]
October 29, 2022
7 mins
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The Gospel of Judas The name Judas has come to […]
October 29, 2022
37 mins
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The Commission for Life, Family and Public Engagement of the […]
October 29, 2022
32 mins
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For once, Emmanuel Macron found the right words—and they were […]
October 29, 2022
8 mins
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On the afternoon of the Queen’s death, I was attending […]
October 29, 2022
9 mins
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SIR: The Chief Justice of Victoria is the initiator of […]
October 29, 2022
6 mins
