In May of 2016 Donald Trump tweeted a photo of himself eating a taco bowl at his office at Trump tower, in a naked attempt to improve his poor standing with Hispanic Americans. The photo showed Trump grinning and giving his trademark thumbs-up as he dug into the tasty dish. ‘I Love Hispanics!’ he wrote, unconvincingly. In the background of the shot was the standard stuff you might expect from Donald Trump – photos of himself, golfing trophies, two (apparently) […]

The worst of it is that we’re just half way through Australia’s normal fire season. Who is to say what devastation a scorching late summer might wreak on our already scarred landscape. But some day the mercury will fall and the rains will come, and when the fires finally go out Australia is going to have to face the reality that this has at last ended the debate as to whether climate change threatens human life on this dry continent. […]

Champagne corks were conspicuous by their absence as Amazon recently announced plans to expand their operation in Australia by opening a new warehouse in Perth. Australia’s ‘boom to bust’ capital is experiencing its weakest economy in over two decades, and retailers have borne the brunt as the commodity miracle has come spectacularly to an end. At the mineral boom’s zenith, more than a 747-full of people were arriving to live in WA each week, but the one dimensional nature of […]

Thinking he would lose and in order to save money, Donald Trump hired a small hotel ballroom for the Republican reception on the night of the 2016 election, so when he and his family emerged at 2.50am even the stage looked crowded. Trump’s entourage seemed genuinely shocked by the result. There were tears backstage. Right to the last moment, no-one had expected him to win. For the next few weeks there were calls for electoral college officers to change their […]

In April 2017, less than three months after taking office, Donald Trump repealed legislation outlawing the hunting and killing of hibernating bears in Alaska. The news, which conservationists said would ‘shock the conscience’ of animal lovers, was greeted with incredulity by a world more used to Obama-era morality. At around the same time, the Trump administration also passed a law specifically aimed at allowing easier purchase of weapons by people with severe mental illness. This wasn’t one clause within a […]

What would you say about the health of a democracy if a rural party got ten representative seats for 4.5% of the vote, while the Greens got more than double as many votes but just one seat? How representative of the national mood would it be if a coalition of parties retained power by a tiny margin, then started implementing a hard-right agenda despite a flat-lining economy and unprecedented environmental threat? What would it mean if a billionaire spent $60 […]