When politicians talk of 'security', be on your guard

I doubt if you’re waiting with bated breath for next Tuesday night’s federal budget but, since it’s the big set-piece event of my year, I’ve started limbering up. I’ve set my bulldust detector to ping every time I see or hear the word “security”. May I suggest you do the same?We’ve been hearing a lot of that word lately, particularly from Anthony Albanese and his treasurer, Jim Chalmers. It comes with many adjectives – energy...

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How we're scammed by our fear of terrorism

These days there aren't many scams bigger than all the fuss we're making about the threat of terrorism coming to our shores. What makes the scam worse is that we bring it on ourselves. But I'm not first to point out that this degree of concern is totally out of whack with the actual risk of being attacked. In the past two decades, just three people have died as victims of terrorist attacks (broadly defined) in Australia. They...

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The game pollies play rather than governing

It came to me while I was lying awake the other night: the business, union and community worthies at last week's National Reform Summit thought the way to make progress was to hammer out a compromise proposal most people could agree to. You hand it to the government, the opposition agrees, they whack it through parliament and problem solved. But that's not the game Tony Abbott is playing. He doesn't want agreement, he wants...

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