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We wish all our visitors a Happy Christmas and New Year

This is the time to wish all our readers a Happy and Relaxing Festive Season with your Family, and to thank all of you who have sustained The Political Sword throughout 2017.

First, thanks go to our writers. Ken Wolff and 2353NM, who joined me to author countless articles on TPS and TPS Extra during 2017. Sadly, dear Ken died during the year. We miss him greatly.

Their pieces have been of universally excellent standard on subjects of relevance to the political scene here and overseas. The insights that these pieces have brought to readers have been deeply appreciated.

The Australian Independent Media Network (AIMN) has reproduced many of these pieces on its site. Our thanks go to Michael Taylor who operates the Network.

Backing up our authors is our coding expert Bacchus, who, working behind the scene, ensures that the pieces appear in word-perfect shape with graphics in place. This is a time consuming and exacting process, for which we all thank him. He, with the other authors and my dear spouse, proofread the pieces to ensure that they appear error-free. We are thankful for their attention to this demanding task.

Even further behind the scene is our Webmaster, who maintains the backend of The Political Sword. He has ensured that it performed as expected. We thank him for his support, now in its tenth year.

This year he has spent many months reshaping the site, using a blog engine that he designed himself. It offers many new features and a unique vibrancy. You have experienced it since its launch in October. We are sure you will continue to enjoy it during 2108.

The TPS Ambassadors have given great support to The Political Sword throughout 2017 by publicising on Facebook and Twitter every new piece posted on the site. We thank all of you for your continuing contribution to TPS.

Finally, we thank all of you who have visited The Political Sword during the year, and those of you who have left comments that have added so much to the value of the site.

We hope you have a refreshing break over the end-of-year period and that you will join us again in 2018.

There will continue to be much to write about in these turbulent political times, here and around the world. Now we have a brilliant new blog site on which to display our offerings.

With warmest Christmas Greetings and every Good Wish for 2018.

Ad Astra
Ad.astra5@me.com

Season’s Greetings

Another year is behind us. It’s been the most torrid since the end of WWII. I don’t need to elaborate. Yet it has not bowed us. The human organism has a vast capacity to adapt and accomodate. While some have complained, most have simply ‘sucked it up’. Can you remember when last we have had to endur...

  • 23/12/2020

The mug punter

When we entered 2020, Prime Minister Scott Morrison was ‘livin’ the dream’. He had narrowly won the 2019 election and after a few months of pushing the tautological fiction that the Australian budget was already in surplus next year, he was kicking back in Hawaii with ‘Jen and the girls’ having a gr...

  • 17/12/2020

Vale 2020

As we exit the year past, what do you consider to be the most significant event of 2020? Among a plethora of extraordinary events, as a doctor, the occurrence of COVID-19 gets my vote. Why? Look at the statistics: At the time of publication, this is the stark situation worldwide: Cas...

  • 15/12/2020

The dangerous toll of entrenched belief

The world is redolent with danger. Even small children know the dangers in their playground: he knows he can fall from the monkey bars; she knows she can be injured by the seesaw if it gyrates unexpectedly. Every bulletin of news reminds us of dangers: on the road, at the seaside, on the ocean, at t...

  • 11/12/2020

The cost of ideology

Given recent events in Australia, you could say the price of political ideology is $1.2Billion, as that is the settlement the Coalition government negotiated to make the ‘robodebt’ class action go away without a court case. Probably more telling is there appears to be nothing for the thousands that ...

  • 7/12/2020

Guiliani

Guiliani You know him well. He’s been in the public eye for decades. Now, he’s Donald Trump’s attorney, caught in the middle of Trump’s futile campaign to wrest the presidency from Joe Biden, the acknowledged and certified winner of the recent election. That he is prepared to join Trump in this ...

  • 3/12/2020

You gotta hit bottom

Sitting on this side of the Pacific, it seems that the USA has chosen a new President after one term. A sitting President who is eligible for reelection has been defeated only 10 times in US history. While the razzle-dazzle and showbiz style of the US election campaigns is ongoing and seems to be ac...

  • 30/11/2020

Trump is a cult leader

Do you sometimes ask yourself how it is that President Trump is able to attract and hold such a devoted collection of admirers, some of whom insist they ‘would die for him’? Are you amazed that they come out on the streets again and again in their thousands to cheer him and rail angrily against thos...

  • 26/11/2020

It's the planet stupid

At the recent full year results release, the ANZ announced it planned to be a business that generated net zero emissions by 2050. This report in The Guardian gives considerable detail on the ANZ’s plan for the future and also discusses Agriculture Minister David Littleproud and Deputy Prime Minister...

  • 23/11/2020

Trumpism

First, let’s examine the meaning of the suffix: ‘ism’. Wikipedia says it means “taking side with" or "imitation of", and is often used in association with philosophies, theories, religions, social and artistic movements, and behaviours. So let’s use that suffix with Trump: Trumpism, although he ...

  • 16/11/2020

How about some honesty

The last weekend in October would have been a pretty horrible time for Victorians. First on Saturday they found out that Mike Brady can sing ‘Up there Cazaly’ without 100,000 of his closest friends around him at the MCG. To add insult to injury, the ‘backing band’ was the Queensland Symphony Orchest...

  • 11/11/2020

A new normal - yeah right

I bought some milk at my local Supermarket yesterday. It cost me $3.59. The checkout operator didn’t ask me about my ability to pay for the milk in comparison to the person in front or behind me as the sale price is based on the ability of Coles to arrange for the milk to be produced and transported...

  • 4/11/2020

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3 COMMENTS

2353NM

24/12/2017

I too wish all the 'co-conspirators' and readers of The Political Sword the happiest of Christmases and a wonderful 2018. Enjoy some time with your families, celebrate the everyday, drive safely and take care.

TalkTurkey

26/12/2017

Hi to all at TPS. I'm still around but Comrades I find it hard to say anything helpful. If I say anything more it will inevitably be unhelpful - I'm so sorry to you personally Ad that we haven't beaten these bastards and so now we get Trump and Barnaby Joyce and craziness reigns supreme all around the world. So all I will do to the wise people here - because Ad's friends are indeed wise - is to wish you well and happy for the times to come. But you know you always have those wishes anyway. Cheers.*

*Anagram of Escher! 

Ad Astra

27/12/2017

Talk Turkey

How good to see your comment.

Indeed the world is in a sorry state, and politics is distressingly awful. I suppose it has been worse, but it’s hard to remember when it was as bad as it is now.

All during 2017 politicians the world over have exhibited the most selfish, the most incompetent, and the least statesman behaviour we have ever seen.

With Donald Trump raving daily from the White House, Kim Jung-un raving recklessly from Pyongyang, Therese May stumbling at every step as she tries to achieve Brexit, Benjamin Netanyahu aggressively pursuing his selfish agenda, Chinese leaders flexing their economic and territorial muscles, Vladimir Putin making international power plays, African leaders in cut-throat fights for power, and at home a pathetic Malcolm Turnbull constrained by uncertainty and indecision, it’s hard to pick an admirable world leader. Angela Merkel and Justin Trudeau are the only ones who come to mind.

I suppose all we can do is to go on pointing out the worldwide scourge of inequality, the widespread disregard for the environment, and the incompetence of our politicians in dealing with these existential threats, and hope that 2018 might be a brighter year.

The voices of the people, our voices, may be the only ones that can influence political behaviour. So try we must, always.

All the best to you and J for 2018. 

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