Some say China will grow old before it grows rich, or that its economy, riven with corruption and distorted by increasing state control, is a house of cards. Perhaps. But Xi or no Xi, a country as powerful as China has become will remain an economic and strategic threat so long as it remains a one-party totalitarian state

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The Meritorious Unit Citation, which generals Brereton and Campbell want stripped from some 3000 Afghanistan veterans, would be the decoration least valued by those who wear its emblem. But like all decorations it symbolises something greater -- in this instance, a huge and thoughtless insult to the innocent

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A common thread of progressive doctrine crystallised as I was told to stow my unacceptable perspective. Ideas that are derided and dismissed as 'dangerous', 'oppressive', 'homophobic', 'full of bigotry' and 'patriarchal conditioning' are swept away in the name of what the Left defines as moral virtue

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Known as 'New Identifiers', their numbers help to explain why each latest census records an ever-growing number of respondents who, for any number of reasons, identify as 'Aboriginal'. Consider, for example, Tasmania, where fecundity goes nowhere near explaining the indigenous population rocketing from 671 in 1971 to 19,625 in 2016

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'Credible' just means it isn’t incredible, and that is a good enough standard for the advocates, touts and urgers pushing their particular barrows into the headlines. That self-interest and ideology inspire some to deceive and suppress is no surprise. That journalists refuse to question such agendas and their purported 'facts' is reprehensible

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No one with even a shred of decency defends the shooting of unarmed prisoners, as alleged in the Brereton Report. And no one can observe the way Defence has confronted the report's aftermath without the deepest misgivings about the nous and competence of those who seem unable to say the word 'alleged'

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If the SASR engaged in 'blooding', as has been alleged, that was one crime for which no excuse can be accepted. But there is another hardly less repugnant violation: if subordinates were bullied into taking innocent lives, the obligation not only to lead troops but to protect them was heinously betrayed by their superiors

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Teenage Aboriginal suicides won't end because NRL stars refuse to sing the National Anthem. As for indigenous academics, they are happiest pontificating about flags, the Constitution and the date of Australia Day. So where are the voices, especially in their own communities, demanding abusers pay for their crimes?

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Popular drama tends to present democracies as flawed at best and monstrously corrupt otherwise, an impression apt to be be bolstered in the young by teachers spouting post-modern bile. It's past time, I reckon, for the movies to depict what the alternative is like, with bloody China standing ready for its closeup

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