Latest Articles
We are encouraged to rely more and more on government officials to do for us what we could equally well do for ourselves—and, maybe more importantly, not to do what might help us solve our own problems.
Sep 08 2024
10 mins
If we imagine a metric called the Pinocchio Scale, which measures the number of lies told by a politician as a percentage of his or her overall public statements, our current prime minister (for want of a better description), Airbus Albo, has moved well into uncharted territory.
Sep 06 2024
5 mins
14 things about Teddy
De Mortuis Nil Nisi Bunkum
Teddy Kennedy died last week, in case you missed it. Being his co-religionist, I have prayed for his soul. But amid the grief – which extended to a leading story on the 7.30 Report – I find myself asking: just what did Teddy Kennedy actually achieve in his (for a male Kennedy) unusually long life, and his five glorious decades in the US Senate?
Teddy Kennedy – or (as we must apparently now call him) Senator Edward Kennedy, elder statesman and pillar of reform – is currently being described as ‘the brother who mattered most’, and a champion of many great causes. He is being credited with everything from achieving peace in Northern Ireland to saving schools and healing the sick.
In retrospect, I don’t think many of Teddy’s really great achievements have been praised enough. It’s easy to remember minor achievements like driving his first wife to drink and Mary Jo Kopechne into a pond, and yet so many other things go unacknowledged. So here is a list of…
Madam: Archbishop Fisher (July-August 2024) does not resist the attacks on his church by the political, social or scientific atheists and those who insist on not being told what to do.
Aug 29 2024
6 mins
To claim Aborigines have the world's oldest continuous culture is to misunderstand the meaning of culture, which continuously changes over time and location. For a culture not to change over time would be a reproach and certainly not a cause for celebration, for it would indicate that there had been no capacity to adapt. Clearly this has not been the case
Aug 20 2024
23 mins
A friend and longtime supporter of Quadrant, Clive James sent us a poem in 2010, which we published in our December issue. Like the Taronga Park Aquarium he recalls in its 'mocked-up sandstone cave' it's not to be forgotten
Aug 16 2024
2 mins
