THE cat fight between John Laws and Alan Jones must not be allowed to obscure the serious questions that have arisen concerning the Chairman of the Australian Broadcasting Authority (ABA), “Professor” David Flint.
As a believer in the Constitutional Monarchy I have long held the view that Professor Flint is […] Continue Reading…

ANYONE who watched the “A Current Affair” expose on Brisbane “entrepreneur” Keith Lloyd and his association with the Shafston International College could not help but be appalled at the revelations, and alarmed at the possible wider implications.
I did not know until I saw the program that the particular college […] Continue Reading…

John Howard credits the rise in enrolments at private schools to a desire by parents to have their children taught values in education. I think he is only partly right. It is a desire to have children taught the “right” values. There is no such thing as […] Continue Reading…

This is my last ‘Ambit Gambit’ blog entry. In it I’ll make a few comments on how I think the whole Internet thing is going.
The Internet is undoubtedly an amazing invention, perhaps as important in its long–term impact as writing. The form still has some way to go to […] Continue Reading…

Politicians’ wives, or ex-wives, have been in the news a bit of late. In Australia, we seem to hear from the missus when she can confirm her husband was the drongo we always suspected him to be.
America, meanwhile, prefers to see its political spouses gazing lovingly like a […] Continue Reading…

Every now and then you get what is called in the parlance a “get out of jail free card”. I think I got one of those last night when the Liberal Party preselected Dr Ingrid Tall to be the candidate for the seat of Brisbane in the next […] Continue Reading…

Discussion surrounding sexual assault allegations levelled at some sportsmen has challenged the idea that maleness is naturally expressed by certain behaviours. The Family Court’s decision last week to approve a 13-year-old’s eventual transition from woman to man appears, at a time when masculinity and femininity are viewed as […] Continue Reading…

UNTIL recently I was never attracted to the idea of a Bill of Rights to “guarantee” our basic freedoms, including the freedom of speech.
The antics of the Queensland Division of the Liberal Party in threatening to expel any member who dared criticise it, notwithstanding the merit of the criticism, […] Continue Reading…

The fuse President Bush stuck into the Middle East powder keg and lit with the invasion of Iraq has suddenly started burning a lot faster. Along with the start of the second phase of the Iraq war, Ariel Sharon’s latest moves to effect an endgame in Israel guarantee interesting […] Continue Reading…

I recently wrote a piece for ‘OnLine Opinion’ criticising various aspects of our parliamentary practice, among other things. One of the points I made is that there are too many lawyers in parliament and parliament operates too much like a courtroom.
The fundamentally legalistic nature of parliament hit me one […] Continue Reading…