Most of us don't like risk and uncertainty. That's too bad, because there's no shortage of either.
The free world has a responsibility to help Cubans mastermind a "velvet revolution" of their own Castro vs. Cuba
Eye on Politics & Law Lords: Young man Luther
In the first of two articles on The Latham Diaries David Burchell discusses the relationship between politics and the media
I ut off buying The Latham Diaries when they were first released in mid-September. There are some journalists and novelists for whom writing appears to be a kind of therapy. Their plan, it seems, is to ‘work through’ their anger, traumas and personal disturbances on the page, the better to fight through the fog of their own complicated personalities to the glimpsed rays of sunshine beyond. I’ve got no particular problem with this approach to self-help, except one. If you insist upon using art as your therapy, hang the results on your own wall; don’t ask me to hang it on mine.
• The Latham Diaries [I've been trying to get Tony Harris, friend, some time colleague, Auditor General and Fin Review columnists to post on Troppo for some time. He sent me the fantastic piece you see below the fold - which he published in the Fin on Saturday. Bob Carr, Marcus Aurelius and PPPs ; A Former Police Chief Calls for Drug Sanity ; Elections Around the World ]
• · John von Doussa - Democratic Audit of Australia, Australian National University Human rights and national security ; John Quiggin We will find ways of getting by without cheap oil and coal Price matters
• · · How can a country that victimises its greatest living writer also join the EU? Turkey: Salman Rushdie ; Beattie moots tax on interstate migrants
• · · · Only 9 per cent of Australians attend church The future of Australian secularism ; Overtly Christian parties might be polling modestly, but their influence is broader God and the New Zealand 2005 election
• · · · · A review of private rental support programs: final report ; Giving Australia: research on philanthropy in Australia
• · · · · · Immigrant satisfaction: what is it? does it matter? ; Michael Gordon introduces Ali Mullaie, one of the refugees he interviewed on Nauru for his new book, Freeing Ali: The Human Face of the Pacific Solution Freeing Ali