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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

Unraveling Frydenberg’s Mind

Since Treasurer Josh Frydenberg sits side-by-side with PM Morrison at the pinnacle of the Morrison government, it is appropriate that we query the state of his mind, just as we sought to understand Morrison’s in Unraveling Morrison’s Mind. There is no evidence that he is attracted to the conspiracy ...

  • 3/12/2019

What goes around

Instead of complying with treaty obligations, the Morrison LNP Government is spending like a drunken sailor in an attempt to win a political war to demonstrate how evil and horrible the people who have sought refugee status in Australia after arriving by boat really are. Not only are Morrison and Du...

  • 25/11/2019

Unraveling Morrison’s mind

Warning: This piece contains disturbing material. By keeping it brief I hope any mental distress it might cause will be minimized. Did you see Michael Pascoe’s article in the October 23 edition of The New Daily: What we don’t know: Is our Prime Minister a nutter? As Pascoe is a balanced ...

  • 15/11/2019

Quiet Australians

Sorry Mr Morrison, I don’t want to be one of your quiet Australians. The problem with being quiet is that I would give the impression I implicitly support whatever you, Dutton and the other Ministers do in my name, solely because I didn’t say what I think, feel, believe or observe. The other issue i...

  • 11/11/2019

Don't shoot the messenger

Those that live outside the south-east corner of Queensland probably don’t take much notice of the politics of the Brisbane City Council. Brisbane has an annual budget and population larger than Tasmania and, somewhat unusually for Australia, is a Council comprising mostly overtly party political el...

  • 4/11/2019

Peeling the skin off the avocado

Recall how you felt when you last fondled a plump avocado, deep green, beautifully formed, slightly soft to the touch, seemingly ripe for consumption, only to find that when your knife punctured its alluring skin and peeled it back you were greeted by grey spots, rotting inedible pulp, and precious ...

  • 28/10/2019

Protest tactics matter

Those that demonstrated around the world for ‘Extinction Rebellion’ recently have certainly been making headlines. Pity it is for the wrong reasons. On an intellectual level, their point is sound — unless there is meaningful and urgent efforts across the world to mitigate climate change, there is an...

  • 21/10/2019

Is Donald Trump mad? - revisited

Around two years ago, The Political Sword published Is Donald Trump mad? In November of last year, we published Is Donald Trump crumbling? It could be argued that Trump’s recent behaviour warrants another such article. But why bother? We’ve said it all before, as have columnists the world ...

  • 14/10/2019

Do unto others

Who knows if the pages of Morrison’s Bible might be missing the pages that discuss ’do unto others as you wish them do to you’? Those words are one version of ’the golden rule’ which is a tenet of most religions according to Wikipedia. His years as Immigration Minister and then Treasurer demonstrate...

  • 7/10/2019

Your input is valuable

Since 2015, Australian telecommunications providers have been required to keep the metadata relating to your and my electronic conversations, internet searches, text messages, emails and so on for a period of two years. Apparently, our ‘security’ depends on the government of the day knowing that the...

  • 30/09/2019

The hazard of heedless politicians

No ‘heedless’ is not a misprint; nor should it have been ‘headless’, although some might prefer that descriptor with poultry overtones! ‘Heedless’ signifies an alarming propensity so many politicians exhibit – the capacity to ignore evidence that does not align with their entrenched beliefs, their u...

  • 23/09/2019

The yoke of inequality burdens us all

It was in 2012 that The Price of Inequality by Nobel Prize winner Joseh Stiglitz was published in America and the United Kingdom. In 2013 it was distributed worldwide by Penguin Books. This seminal work, tellingly subtitled How Today's Divided Society Endangers Our Future was widely acknowledged.As ...

  • 17/09/2019

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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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How many umbrellas are there if I start with two and take 2 away?

Vote for the man who promises least; he'll be the least disappointing.

Bernard Baruch

Science must begin with myths, and with the criticism of myths.

Karl Popper

You must not fight too often with one enemy, or you will teach him all your art of war.

Napoleon Bonaparte

The flood of money that gushes into politics today is a pollution of democracy.

Theodore H White

“I don’t oppose Islam as a country, but I do feel that their laws should not be welcome here".

Stephanie Bannister - One Nation candidate