People & associates
Chris Berg
Westerners consumed by tech toys wallow in misplaced guilt
Concern for Chinese factory workers is patronising and simplistic. Nothing demonstrates how self-absorbed Western moral sensibilities are than the...
Tasers: the non-lethal force that kills
It's time to stop describing Tasers as "non-lethal" weapons. They are quasi-lethal. At best. That much should be clear from the death of...
Newspapers tangled in politics... that's yesterday's news
Every generation thinks the world they are presented with is unique. Reflecting on the 1819 parliamentary session, the British conservative Henry...
We're bombarded with swearing but who #*@%*! cares?
''I like swearing; I think it's very healthy,'' Ewan McGregor told a celebrity gossip magazine last week. Good for Ewan. He could have added:...
Foreign investment and the whims of politicians
In September 2009, economics officials from the US embassy sat down with the then-head of Australia's Foreign Investment Review Board (FIRB),...
Regulating from a distance: Finkelstein, politics, power
The structure of the News Media Council proposed by Ray Finkelstein is complicated. The council would consist of a chair and 20 other members. Half...
Free press to be sacrificed for political retribution
Freedom of the media is too important to be controlled by government. The Independent Media Inquiry has proposed just what was expected: an...
The decriminalisation (or even legalisation) of drugs
It doesn't take more than a moment of thought to recognise that the rulings on which drugs are legal or illegal are governed by no particular...
O'Farrell's campaign finance reforms are abominable
As a general rule, any government that changes the rules of elections and political campaigns should be looked upon sceptically. It's too easy to...
Behavioural economics: an excuse to tax and regulate
Few areas of study are as fashionable as behavioural economics - the integration of psychological factors into economic analysis. No wonder....