2020

You are here:

Home
2020

Aug192020

NOTHING IN OUR CONSTITUTION WOULD PREVENT A DISMISSAL TODAY

HISTORY & PHILOSOPHY, POLITICSAugust 19, 2020

by Colin Teese Now that the tumult and the shouting has died down, it is time to look behind the mere pages of the “Palace Papers”, and to examine in detail some of the less considered aspects of what happened on Armistice Day 1975. But first, let’s sweep aside some of the headline stuff. Did the Queen know about what was going on? Of course she did. No release of documents was necessary for us to know this. The fact that the Palace opposed the release of the documents settles that question. What is more, after the Dismissal, the Queen…

To access the full article, please subscribe OR login.

Read article

POETRY

POETRY LETTERS & HUMOURAugust 19, 2020

LOOKING OUT TO SEA I see him sprawled on his back on a beach Ulysses. He is lying, his clasped hands supporting his head, beyond reach of human memory, wounded in one eye. His sighted eye is not scanning the sky programming information for survival, but turned inward, where he sees Penelope at the stone parapet, awaiting his arrival. After ten years, she still looks out to sea. JUST CARE She’s over eighty but he’s telling her off, sarcastic at her expense, a not-so-weighty as hurtful put down, less caustic than condescending. She slips away from listening looking…

To access the full article, please subscribe OR login.

Read article

Aug192020

BEIJING REGIME TIGHTENS GRIP ON HONG KONG

FOREIGN AFFAIRSAugust 19, 2020

by Peter Westmore Following its imposition of a so-called “National Security Law” – actually a law suppressing free speech in Hong Kong – the Beijing-appointed Government of Hong Kong has stepped up its efforts to silence Beijing’s many critics in Hong Kong. Four students aged between 16 and 21 were arrested in Hong Kong for breaching the “National Security Law”, after advocating independence for Hong Kong. The new law, which was never put before Hong Kong’s legislature before being imposed by the Hong Kong Government, stipulates that secessionist crimes are punishable by terms of up to life imprisonment. Following this,…

To access the full article, please subscribe OR login.

Read article

SURVIVAL AND BETRAYAL

MUSIC CINEMA & BOOKSAugust 19, 2020

THE DECEPTIONS by Suzanne Leal Allen & Unwin, Crows Nest, NSW Paperback: 277 pages Price: AUD$29.95 Reviewed by Michael E. Daniel Actions have consequences, many of which affect people for the rest of their long lives, and their descendants. This idea is central to Suzanne Leal’s latest novel, The Deceptions. A lawyer by profession, Leal has again incorporated a Holocaust story into her work. The inspiration of one of the central aspects of the plot, namely a gendarme befriending a Jewess, came from her former landlord and Holocaust survivor, Fred Perger. Many of Perger’s other anecdotes formed the basis of…

To access the full article, please subscribe OR login.

Read article