A Clarke and Dawe style television interview set. A suited interviewer sits in a grey armchair facing a second chair occupied by a figure whose head has been replaced by a framed oil painting of an LNG tanker labelled AUS-INC. and LIQUEFIED SOVEREIGNTY. Small plastic figurines of cheering people stand at the bottom of the frame.

Clarke and Dawe tribute: The PM Explains Gas

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Shell’s Australian chair fronted a Senate inquiry into gas taxation and couldn’t say how much revenue Shell makes from selling Australian gas. She was, however, very clear on the ill-advised part. Urban Wronski channels Clarke and Dawe to interview the Prime Minister about the gas we own, the tax we don’t collect, and the modelling that takes time.

A weathered man in a high-visibility orange work shirt sits in the cab of an old ute at a sparse rural petrol station, looking down at a long paper receipt in both hands. A diesel bowser and a brick servo building are visible through the windscreen. The landscape beyond is flat, dry and overcast.

THE RECEIPT Part One: Where Does the Money Go?

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At the Ararat servo, a bloke stares at a $255 diesel receipt and says nothing. That silence is the sound of geopolitics arriving in the western districts. Jim Chalmers is in Washington being told to tighten his belt while Iran runs a tollbooth on the world’s oil supply and Woodside counts its war dividend. Urban Wronski follows the money.

A dark editorial cartoon showing a self-satisfied bureaucrat at a desk marked “Sustainability Taskforce” signing documents while a exhausted woman with an NDIS appeal folder sits in a waiting room behind him, and through the window a nuclear submarine sits in dry dock with a $425 billion price tag.

Governments Just Get On With the Job: Mark Butler’s Razor Gang and the NDIS They Want You to Forget

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Lisa Goodwin’s twins are autistic. She applied three times, fought for years,
and when Labor announced its latest cuts she called it “a betrayal.” Urban
Wronski on Mark Butler’s razor gang, the $425 billion submarine program eating
the fiscal space disabled children once occupied, the algorithm that replaces
human judgment, and the shearing sheds that would not recognise the party
that grew from them.

A darkly comic music-hall illustration showing an oversized grotesque figure in a business suit pointing at a gilded mushroom cloud chandelier, while in the background a bombed city silhouette looms and a child holds an almost-empty water bottle beside a drainage culvert.

The Lovely War

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Donald Trump threatens Iran the way he once threatened a recalcitrant steak: same wounded, flinty, infant-king fury. A working homage to Martin Amis — on the Epstein flights, the six-billion-dollar goon squad, the taunting of a proud civilisation, and a nine-year-old girl in Minab waiting for the water that is her birthright. The infant-king has other plans.

Two figures in a satirical theatrical setting -- one in a suit holding a Bible and military briefing document with a lanyard reading "Office of Sacred Communications," the other a composed interviewer with a clipboard -- lit by a single spotlight, with St Peter's Basilica and a naval carrier group suggested in the background shadows.

The Holy War on the Holy See

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Pete Hegseth has a muscular theology. The Pope has Augustine on his side and refugees on his schedule. The Vice President has been explaining Just War theory to an Augustinian. Clarke and Dawe have two chairs, a lanyard marked “Office of Sacred Communications,” and the truth hiding in plain sight. Urban Wronski referees.

Richard Marles, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defence, at a press conference projecting institutional confidence while Australia’s defence procurement record, AUKUS submarine delays, the Washington happenstance encounter, and the Geelong refinery fire suggest a more complicated story

DeadWood Marles: Australia’s Liberal in Drag

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He is, in the most precise political sense available, a Liberal in drag. Same tough talk on alliances and deterrence. Same fondness for American hardware and AUKUS largesse. Wrapped in just enough factional red to keep the true believers satisfied. All suit, no spark. And a remarkable talent for making national security sound like a mildly confusing numbers meeting that ran somewhat overtime. Urban Wronski profiles Richard “DeadWood” Marles, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defence.