Category Archives: national

Obligatory election prediction

Posted on July 22, 2010 by Jarrah

Barring any game-changing developments, Labor will win. They were going to win with Rudd as leader anyway, but they’ll probably do slightly better with Gillard. The deposing of Rudd will not be a big factor by the end of the … Continue reading →

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Where the Australian Greens go wrong

Posted on June 4, 2010 by Jarrah

I have voted Green more often than I have voted Labor (I’ve never voted for the party I’m a member of, but that’s because there hasn’t been a candidate in my electorate yet). I do so for a number of … Continue reading →

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Censorship is ***** **** *******

Posted on December 18, 2009 by Jarrah

Against the odds, Senator Conroy is going ahead with his ill-conceived plan to force mandatory filtering at the ISP level. Despite multiple experts from academia and the industry saying it’s a bad idea, he is going to ignore any dissent … Continue reading →

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Competition. It works, bitches.*

Posted on December 11, 2009 by Jarrah

I’ve long extolled the benefits of companies competing for consumers’ business. According to orthodox economics, it reduces prices, and therefore profits, and thus shifts the division of the economic surplus towards consumers. Competition is generally a Good Thing. Unless you’re … Continue reading →

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Spoilt sports

Posted on November 18, 2009 by Jarrah

Sport. Despite Australia’s rise up the obesity rankings, it holds an important place in our culture and identity. One may quibble that nowadays our self-image of a super-sporty nation is becoming apocryphal, but it’s still a strong belief. It’s not … Continue reading →

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Higher pay for MPs

Posted on April 29, 2009 by Jarrah

Well, technically speaking it’s an increase in their electorate allowance, but anything left over at the end of the year is treated as personal income, so it’s not surprising that MPs consider it “a de facto part of their salary”. … Continue reading →

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Andrew Bolt is an idiot

Posted on April 17, 2009 by Jarrah

But luckily, because I’m slow and lazy, a bucketful of bloggers have already demolished his idiocy about refugees so that I don’t have to. The best I’ve seen is by Possum Comitatus at Crikey: Bolt’s argument is as predictable as … Continue reading →

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Druggies join the ranks of the undeserving

Posted on March 27, 2009 by Jarrah

Here in Australia, people getting unemployment benefits have to perform certain obligations in order to qualify. Centrelink describes it as having to “actively look for work, accept suitable work offers and undertake extra activities to improve your chances of finding … Continue reading →

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Faulkner v Conroy

Posted on March 25, 2009 by Jarrah

Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Senator Stephen Conroy, is getting a lot of negative press in the blogosphere for his idiotic insistence on pressing ahead with an idiotic internet censorship scheme. Rightly so – it will infantilise … Continue reading →

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Resale royalties

Posted on February 22, 2009 by Jarrah

I’ve been reading a recent House of Representatives standing committee report on the Resale Royalty Right for Visual Artists Bill 2008 *. Essentially, it looks at the implementation and possible consequences of the proposed legislation to give a proportion of … Continue reading →

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