Uncategorized
Hugo Chávez: Spiritual Leader of The Woke
The 1999 Venezuelan Constitution, sponsored by the late Hugo Chávez as the foundation for his nascent revolution, has been described as “the non-sexist Magna Carta.” The writers of the document went to great lengths to use the Spanish masculine and feminine forms throughout the text. For example, presidente and presidenta are both used in quick succession to refer to the role of president, even though...
Interest Rates In The Upside-Down and Why They Are Going Up
Real interest rates are negative at the moment. By keeping them this way, the RBA is encouraging spending, facilitating the transfer of wealth from savers to borrowers and causing malinvestment. That may seem to be a lot to unpack – but economics isn’t hard. Yes, there are people who are paid to make it look hard but let me step...
No. No. No. It’s Not A Chinese Spy Balloon
This month, there were reports of a Chinese 'spy balloon' flying over the airspace of the United States. Back home, we next had an announcement from Senator James Paterson (Liberal, Victoria) that there were more than 900 CCP surveillance cameras installed in various Commonwealth departments, including Defence and Foreign Affairs offices. It’s unnerving to discover Beijing’s surveillance of democratic nations, its governments and individual citizens. However,...
Free Markets Work Better for Energy
Energy is again front and centre in the news with the debate over the merits of nuclear energy becoming mainstream. But then last week the Prime Minister announced a new scheme to subsidise the manufacture of solar panels in Australia. One wonders whether this is to support industry or just to close down a debating point against solar -...
A Digital Dark Age (part 2)
The only currency that matters is power – getting it and holding on to it. Attaining power these days involves denigrating and silencing your opponents in any way possible: censoring them, branding what they say as misinformation, disinformation or malinformation, with the primary aim being to prevent them getting their message out. As has been observed, ‘When ideas are bad, censorship...
GST is Better than Income Tax
In my last article I argued that a flat and broad-based income tax is much the same as a broad-based GST, so we have little reason to hate the concept of income tax more than the concept of GST. I argued this by setting out an imaginary scenario with five citizens, one business, and no government. But there is an...
UAE Facilitating Australian Crime?
A recent article in the Age (https://www.theage.com.au/national/australian-drug-smuggling-suspects-right-at-home-as-dubai-makes-world-s-worst-welcome-20240514-p5jdg7.html) argues that authorities in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) are immoral for not preventing Australia’s most revered mega criminals from visiting and buying property there. According to the Age, we should all be outraged that the UAE is not doing the job Australian law enforcement is failing to do. But apparently it is...
Windfall?
The Guardian recently said the quiet part out loud – the Coalition’s pivot towards nuclear energy is scaring away the big money that is backing renewables. That’s right, the mere fact that the Federal Opposition (who aren’t fancied to win the next election mind you) has proposed nuclear energy for Australia is enough to put investors off backing renewable projects....
25 Provocative Predictions for 2024 from the World’s #1 Political Observer
GOVERNMENT OVERREACH 1.Habeas corpus will not be restored in Australia 2.The Australian Federal Budget will be in deficit and expenditure will increase on the previous year Correct: “A deficit of $28.3 billion is forecast in 2024–25.”Source: Statement 1: Budget Overview. Page 2. https://budget.gov.au/content/bp1/download/bp1_bs-1.pdf. Correct: Forecast expenditures for 2023-24 and 2024-25 are $691,070,000,000 and $734,518,000,000 respectively.Source: Statement 6: Expenses and Net Capital Investment. Page 233....
