Implications of Far Right Protests

A ‘critical junction’: What Melbourne’s protests mean for the federal election
Josh Butler | The New Daily
Amid widespread condemnation of death threats made by some of the protesters, the United Australia Party, One Nation and the Liberal Democrats are all targeting the vocal minority who took to Melbourne’s streets with platforms opposing lockdowns and vaccine mandates.

QAnon: how the far-right cult took Australians down a ‘rabbit hole’ of extremism
Van Badham | The Guardian
As had happened in Germany, QAnon seeded its Australian iteration through the networks of the wellness community. It was a bourgeois place in which those fearful of “precarity” came to seek comfort. 

Liberals incite Far-Right to lynch Andrews
Michelle Pini | Independent Australia

Why we need to take a stand against the fake ‘freedom’ of the far right
James Plested | Red Flag

Australian big business and anti-lockdown movement unite against state government’s pandemic bill
Oscar Grenfell | World Socialist Web Site

Climate

From Global Leaders to Fossil Fools
Clare Wright | Meanjin
It’s official. Australia has been deemed the world’s worst performer at COP26. 

‘Glasgow Pact’ keeps pressure on climate laggards like Australia, even after watering it down
Michael Mazengarb | Renew Economy 
Of crucial relevance to the Australian context is an agreement that countries will review and announce new 2030 emissions reduction targets ahead of the next conference.

Wood for the Trees: rush to green hydrogen masks mammoth plans to wood-chip the forests
Suzanne Arnold | Michael West

COP26: Net zero 2050 and 1.5°C are not compatible
David Spratt | Green Left

PM ignores our modelling experts and hires a controversial global consultant
Noel Turnbull | Pearls and Irritations

Climate Apartheid: Border walls and the fight for climate justice
Susan Price | Green Left

Audacity of hype: Scott Morrison is betting voters will settle for plans over performance
Richard Denniss | The Guardian
Asking economists to predict the likely costs of technologies that haven’t been invented yet is fantasy stuff. You can see why Morrison is a fan.

Our White Man’s Media again hides important Australian news about China
John Menadue | Pearls and Irritations
China has just signed two major LNG contracts with US companies at the expense of Australia. There has been little mention of it in any Australian media.

Shape of Things

Neoliberalism wrecked our chance to fix the climate crisis – and leftwing statements of faith have changed nothing
Jeff Sparrow | The Guardian
Atmospheric carbon does not care about culture war. Neither should we.

The culture war army prepares for battle ahead of federal election
Guy Rundle | Crikey
We can comfortably say that a full political culture war is on the way, assembled overseas and applied shakily to local conditions. It’s going to be plonked down in the middle of everything, it’s going to be on critical race theory, curriculum, education etc, and it’s going to be absurd and hideous

The evolution of woke: once hip and well-informed, now a sneaky shiv of abuse
Christopher Warren | Crikey

Can artists revive dead city centres? Without long-term tenancies it’s window dressing
Kate Shaw | The Conversation
You can’t just add instant culture to activate an area. These kinds of efforts are not just exploitative, there is no evidence that they work. Temporary use arrangements in Australia keep artists on the edge of being thrown out at any time.

Work

In modern Australia, why must caring for your family come second to your work duties? 
Van Badham | The Guardian
“That’s not in my statement of duties” is not something a parent can announce to the universe when all their children come down with gastro infections in the middle of the night. 

Workers strike across Toll Group warehouses
April Holcombe | Red Flag
More than 100 workers have begun indefinite strike action at the Toll Yennora distribution centre in Sydney’s west.

Farmers and business demand Morrison give them back their ‘slaves’
Alan Kohler | The New Daily
They’re demanding to get their imported ‘slaves’ (aka temporary visa holders) back again, to put a lid on wages.

ACTU: Insecure jobs means people have to work more
Paul Oboohov | Green Left

Punishment and Power

Monsters under the bed: drugs, stigma and the AFP
Ben Brooker | Overland
Under the so-called ‘war on drugs’ the police have a vested interested in making bogeymen out of drug users who, we are told by the AFP, ‘bankroll criminals who enslave women and destroy the environment’. 

Australian drug laws doing more harm than good
David McIlveen | Independent Australia

Always Bet on Black (Power)
Chelsea Watego | Meanjin
As a Blackfulla, I don’t claim to speak for a people, but I do write from a place. A place of power. Mine.

Australia Is Lobbying for a New Cold War Between China and America
Gary Pearce | Jacobin
Paranoia about Chinese influence in Australia is on the rise — and the Australian ruling class is stoking tensions between China and the United States. For the sake of world peace and prosperity, they have to be stopped.

Micronesia: farewell Paradise, hello superpower rivalry
Contributors  | Vanguard