“Were they promises?” “They were statements.” “Promises?” “Statements.” “Is there a difference?”
The Prime Minister explains housing policy, the Australian dream, and why he’ll be at the Mid-Winter Ball.
Category: Albanese government
The Invisible Press, Part 2
The Australian Harrow does not use needles. It uses bail conditions, suppression orders, national security legislation, and pre-trial process that can run for years before a single day in open court. David McBride got six years in gaol for telling the truth. Bernard Collaery was prosecuted for defending his client. The penal colony never really ended. It merely changed its dress code.
The Great Digital Enclosure: How Google is Stealing the Future of Independent Journalism
Google’s AI Overviews are strip-mining independent online writing. It’s institutionalised theft. And the regulatory framework is standing in the rubble, blinking.
Uninvestable, A Clarke and Dawe sketch
This sketch is written in the tradition of John Clarke and Bryan Dawe, whose work set the standard for Australian political satire. It is offered as homage, not impersonation. John Clarke died in April 2017. Bryan Dawe continues to work as a writer and performer. … Continue reading Uninvestable, A Clarke and Dawe sketch
Clarke and Dawe tribute: The PM Explains Gas
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.
THE RECEIPT: the tab
The receipt from the Ararat servo gets longer. Palantir Technologies is watching every movement of every Coles shelf-stacker. The AI bubble is burning gas to produce, so far, almost nothing of measurable value. And thirty-five thousand Victorian teachers walked off the job to tell us what this is all costing. Urban Wronski tallies the full tab.
Governments Just Get On With the Job: Mark Butler’s Razor Gang and the NDIS They Want You to Forget
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.
Caps Off: How Mark Hammond’s Appointment Completes Labor’s Capture by Uncle Sam and the AUKUS Boondoggle
Albanese grins in his USS Vermont cap. Hammond smiles in his Chief of Navy lid. The submariners have taken the wheel of Australian defence — $368 billion, phantom crews, obsolete technology, and a slow bicycle ride to yesterday’s wars. Urban Wronski on how Labor completed its capture by Uncle Sam. With a little help from Clarke and Dawe.
The Biggest Peacetime Increase in Our Nation’s History
Defence Minister Richard Marles announces Australia’s largest peacetime defence spending hike while the Geelong refinery burns and fuel reserves hit five weeks. A deadpan account of spending better, NATO accounting, and submarines arriving in the 2040s.
Not Reporting A War Part 2
Pete Hegseth is the Peter Principle applied to the largest weapons arsenal in human history. Pine Gap guides the missiles. Australian-made F-35 parts are in the payload. And our media calls it a partnership. Part Two of Urban Wronski’s investigation into what Australia’s press is not reporting, and what our silence is costing.
Urban Wronski Writes 