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Tag Pearls and Irritations

Why the Australian Secret Intelligence Service should be Abolished. Holiday Reading.

By Brian Toohey: Pearls and Irritations The Australian Secret Intelligence Service was established in 1950 to conduct spying overseas and morally repulsive covert operations. It had a slow start, but in the 1970s it sent three staff to Chile to… Continue Reading →

Why are Australian Government Officials Manufacturing False Espionage Threats?

By Brian Toohey: Pearls and Irritations. Government ministers and senior officials are conditioning Australians to become frightened, very frightened. The Home Affairs minister Clare O’Neil warns they face a “dystopian future” from cyber-crime, foreign interference and threats to our democracy…. Continue Reading →

Albanese and the Australian Labor Party, Running Scared

By Allan Patience: Pearls and Irritations Hard core supporters of Australia’s alliance with America – in Australia, the USA, and in the UK – were no doubt thrilled by Anthony Albanese’s full-throated defence of the AUKUS deal at the ALP’s… Continue Reading →

Abandoned sovereignty: Australia’s Intelligence Function Colonised by US

By Mike Scrafton: Pearls and Irritations. That the Albanese government could further compromise Australia’s sovereignty, international integrity and national interests seemed inconceivable. Yet, intelligence, a vital government function inextricably connected with independence and protecting national interest, is being penetrated and colonised… Continue Reading →

Prigozhin’s Folly: Seymour Hersch. Pearls and Irritations.

The Russian ‘revolt’ that wasn’t strengthens Putin’s hand. The Biden administration had a glorious few days. The ongoing disaster in Ukraine slipped from the headlines to be replaced by the “revolt,” as a New York Times headline put it, of Yevgeny Prigozhin,… Continue Reading →

Vale Bruce Haigh

By Julian Cribb: Pearls and Irritations Bruce Haigh, who died on April 7, was a diplomat, an adventurer, an artist and writer, a humanist, a romantic and a man with a deep love of his country, who mourned its fading… Continue Reading →

Four Dud Australian War Prime Ministers: Geo-strategically barren, unable to identify Australia’s Interests

By Mike Gilligan: Pearls and Irritations The risks for Australia in joining another “failed” American war, this one contrived to crush China, are worse than even-money, and climbing. The consequences verge on existential. Australia’s wartime Prime Minister John Curtin wrote to… Continue Reading →

John Pilger: “Assange is the Courageous Embodiment of a Struggle against the most Oppressive Forces in our World”

From Pearls and Irritations. In an interview with the World Socialist Web Site, renowned Australian investigative journalist John Pilger has warned that the “US is close to getting its hands on” the courageous WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange. Last month, British Home… Continue Reading →

The United States, the Pacific Bully

By Brian Toohey: Pearls and Irritations. The US dominates the Pacific Islands to an extent China can never hope to achieve. With Australia’s support, the US is now engaged in an arms build-up in its Pacific territories and de-facto colonies… Continue Reading →

Look at Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison and See For Yourself. The Best of 2021.

By Bruce Haigh: Pearls and Irritations. Australia’s ruling Liberal National Party coalition, led by the mendacious Morrison, is in a bad place. Morally bankrupt, it is destructive, by default and design. Many have followed, both blindly and with intent, and… Continue Reading →

Sleaze And Self-interest Everywhere: Australia 2021

Pearls and Irritations Who among us, eighteen months ago, could have believed the mess this country is now in? Few can doubt Australia is at a turning point in its history. The debacle is writ large. The current Cabinet reshuffle will please… Continue Reading →

US Continues Pursuit of Assange, and Australia Neglects its Moral Obligation to Protect Him

By Greg Barns: Pearls and Irritations This week Australian citizen Julian Assange’s long running battle against extradition to the United States where he faces espionage legislation charges relating to his publication in 2010 of material that revealed war crimes by… Continue Reading →

Advice Being Tailored For Political, Not Medical, Purposes

By Jack Waterford: Pearls and Irritations Scott Morrison has repeatedly reiterated that all decisions in relation to Coronavirus public health measures have been taken in accordance with medical advice. But the advice itself has frequently been considerably less than transparent,… Continue Reading →

Morrison’s Minders At The Heart Of His Doldrums

By Jack Waterford: Pearls and Irritations. Perhaps a day will come when the champion rorters, liars, and conscious mis-managers of public resources are before a serious corruption commission and out on their ears. The political and administrative dominance of the… Continue Reading →

A Culture Of Corruption Is Engulfing The Australian Government

By Jenny Hocking: Pearls and Irritations A culture of corruption is engulfing the Morrison government. It’s not just the endless graft and largesse – the million-dollar contracts to Liberal linked companies, the generously (mis)allocated ‘grants’ to coalition seats, the personal… Continue Reading →

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s Method – If You Don’t Ask, You Can’t Tell

By Jack Waterford: Pearls and Irritations Some prime ministers are more practised liars than others. Some can confuse, distract and prevaricate in such a way as to strangle the truth. Morrison, however, is a special case. He does not seem… Continue Reading →

Can It Get Worse After Trump?

By Alison Broinowski with Pearls and Irritations When Joe Biden is in the White House and Donald Trump is back in his tower or at his resort, some things about the Trump years will be missed. As newly elected leaders… Continue Reading →

Secrecy Covers Up Abuse of Power and Poor Performance by Australia’s Security Services

By Jack Waterford with Pearls and Irritations One would have to go back to the 1970s to find the nation so ill-served. All the more so as politicians have politicised national security, and reverted to 1960s games of gathering and… Continue Reading →

How Academics Are Killing Freelancers

By Duncan Graham with Pearls and Irritations Thou woldest han oure labour al for noght. The hye god, that al this world hath wrough Seith that the workman worthy is his hyre. Geoffrey Chaucer: The Summoner’s Tale. What fools we journalists are… Continue Reading →

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