Issue 36 – 18 – 24 March 2021

ASIO, Coalition show complete ignorance on right-wing extremism
Guy Rundle | Crikey
To recap: ASIO has recently reclassified specific terror threats as general ones, relabelling Islamist terror and right-wing terror as “religious” and “ideological” respectively. This move appears to be in response to ideological pressure from within the Coalition to sever the visible public link between the mainstream right, and the increasingly deranged and violent far right growing in numbers across the western world.

‘Except by Chance’: The Christchurch Inquiry
Faisal Al-Assad | Arena Quarterly
For many in Muslim and left communities, the ineffectiveness of the inquiry was a foregone conclusion well before the release of the report. 

Could the biggest result of pandemic stimulus and low interest rates be higher house prices in Australia?
Greg Jericho | The Guardian
House prices keep going up. Regardless of falls in employment or a sharper drop in national production than has ever been experienced, through 2020 house prices around the country rose and once again in Sydney the median price is $1m.

Crocodile tears no mask for Coalition’s economic war on women
Alison Pennington | Michael West Media
Well may Scott Morrison tear up as he relates how his daughters, wife and widowed mother drive his every decision. The facts are that every move of the Coalition government ensures women are poorer, more insecure at work and more vulnerable to violence on the job. The Industrial Relations bill pushed through last week is a final nail in the coffin for women. 

My hope for the March4Justice and beyond is that we consider the plight of Black women in Australia
Latoya Aroha Rule | The Guardian
To assume parity is to negate the experiences, the stories, the histories, the research and the ongoing privileges for others that deny Black women access to safe Black space – by rendering Black women invisible, largely through the subjugation of Black women in places like prisons and police cells. It’s this enduring, hierarchical process that poses questions to me like: “What happens after the rally?”

A socialist feminism for these times
Reihana Mohideen | Green Left Weekly
There is an active, strong and militant women’s movement in the Philippines. To a large degree, the women’s movement is also an anti-capitalist movement, and it has had a significant political impact on the left, the labour movement and on politics in general.

There’s more to running the state than keeping a lid on wages and debt
Ross Gittins | Nine Newspapers
After 10 years in power, the NSW Coalition government boasts about its economic management. Let’s unpack that.

The ark is not going to save us — collective resistance will
Pip Hinman | Green Left Weekly
These floods – we are being told by some – are a “once-in-a-hundred year event”. But they are not: they are a reminder of the dangers of extreme weather events brought on by anthropogenic climate change. The drenching across most of NSW and parts of Queensland comes on the heels of several years of drought and the catastrophic  Black Summer fires. 

The watchdog that doesn’t bark: corruption in the Australian media
Bernard Keane | Crikey
Australia’s media are a key component of any anti-corruption agenda. Media companies have campaigned for greater transparency, and governments work assiduously to thwart journalists’ requests for information and efforts to hold them to account. But the media are also part of Australia’s corruption problem.

The US-Australia Alliance Is a Charter for Imperialism, Not a Defensive Pact
Rory Anderson | Jacobin
Prime Minister Scott Morrison claims that the alliance with Washington is crucial to keep Australia safe from aggressors. But a look at history shows this to be a myth. The alliance has always been a vehicle for Australia’s rulers’ imperial ambitions.

Casual Wage Theft in the Corporate University
Ellyse Fenton, Liam Kane | Arena
Tertiary employment systems rightly recognise that teaching requires work that is done outside of class time. However, they also legitimise exploitation by fixing the number of hours that can be paid for teaching work. This means academic casuals are effectively paid by the piece, rather than by the hour.

Bloody Sunday in the Philippines
Julien Q. Macandili, Ben Reid | Red Flag
Clothing donated for a relief operation was instead used to wipe Emmanuel Asuncion’s blood off the floor of the Worker’s Assistance Center in the Calabarzon region of the Philippines on 7 March. Not too far away in Batangas, the 9-year-old son of Chai Lemita Evangelista and Ariel Evangelista hid under his bed after witnessing the state-sanctioned murder of his parents in their bamboo home.

 After Geelong’s 4000-strong #March4Justice: Why we need to keep marching against misogyny
Jackie Kriz | Green Left Weekly

Prime Minister says no ‘mainstream support’ for constitutional recognition, ignores Uluru Statement
Rachael Knowles | National Indigenous Times

Colonialism continues with First Nations’ water dispossession
Tracey Carpenter | Green Left Weekly

Reef cash splash: COVID scheme looks suspiciously like corporate welfare
Georgia Wilkins | Crikey

PNG on the brink of Covid-19 catastrophe
Jonathan Pearlman | The Saturday Paper

Celebrating the Paris Commune of 1871
Sandra Bloodworth | Green Left Weekly

What went right in the twentieth century
John Quiggin | Inside Story

Turkey Is Trying to Ban the Socialist, Pro-Kurdish HDP
Alp Kayserilioğlu, Güney Işikara, Max Zirngast, Jacobin

Disadvantage accelerates as private school funding rises six times public schools over the decade
Trevor Cobbold | Michael West Media

Victoria to expand prison system one week after death in custody
Rachael Knowles | National Indigenous Times

The COVID vaccine you haven’t heard about
Allen Myers | Red Flag

Earth to Josh: Treasurer Frydenberg’s ‘world-leading economy’ claim is false
Alan Austin | Michael West Media

The digital transformation of the Australian economy
Paul Budde | Independent Australia

Italy’s Amazon Strike Shows How Workers Across the Supply Chain Can Unite
Francesco Massimo | Jacobin

Equivocating over the existence of rightwing extremism will cost Australia dearly 
Elliott Brennan | The Guardian