Incoming Feed Items

The American Mind’s ‘Editorial Roundtable’ podcast is a weekly conversation with Ryan Williams, Spencer Klavan, and Mike Sabo devoted to uncovering the ideas and principles that drive American political life. Stream here or download from your favorite podcast host.

Remembering Charlie | The Roundtable Ep. 285

On this episode of Dollars & Sense, Greg returns from his holiday to talk about the National Climate Risk Assessment reveals about the future of the Australian economy. Plus: the tricky task of measuring inflation for sectors like health and aged care and why the government’s wellbeing budget is falling flat.

Tickets for our Revenue Summit at Parliament House in Canberra, featuring Hon Steven Miles MP, Senator Larissa Waters, Senator David Pocock, Dr Kate Chaney MP, Greg Jericho and more – are available now.  You can buy second release tickets for just $109 via our website.

Dead Centre: How political pragmatism is killing us by Richard Denniss is available now via Australia Institute Press.

Host: Greg Jericho, Chief Economist, the Australia Institute // @grogsgamut

Host: Elinor Johnston-Leek, Senior Content Producer, the Australia Institute // @elinorjohnstonleek

Show notes:

National Climate Risk Assessment, Australian Climate Service

By Rainer Kattel

Three paradigms for digital transformation: identity-first, user-first, and sovereignty-first

Digital transformation is often sold as a panacea for doing away with the ills of existing public services: sleek interfaces, no forms, no friction. In others words, doing away with bureaucacry. But the paradox is quite obvious: getting to “zero bureaucracy” takes a lot of bureaucracy. The real question isn’t whether we need it, but what kind — and how we design routines and infrastructures so that bureaucracy orchestrates public value rather than obstructs it or enables extraction of value from socities. This blog summarises my talk for a Public Digital organised event for policy makers from the Dominican Republic on September 11.

All organisations are, at their core, bundles of routines. These routines never exist in isolation: they co-evolve with infrastructures — laws, funding arrangements, political systems, and of course with digital infrastructres such as data registries or identity systems. Together, routines and infrastructures generate path dependencies that shape which innovations are possible and what kinds of public value can be produced. Once such patterns settle, they are remarkably difficult to change.

Listen to the full conversation on the Perspectives Journal podcast, available to subscribe on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Amazon Music, and all other major podcast platforms.

With the release of OpenAI’s Chat GPT-5, artificial intelligence has vaulted forward again. But this is no ordinary tech update. With each new development in this technology, America and the world edge closer to something resembling a world-historical revolution.

Technological and economic shifts have always marched hand in hand, but this wave of automation threatens to upend labor markets like never before, creating what historian Yuval Noah Harari chillingly calls a “useless class.” And in a nation already fractured and struggling to find its shared identity, it would be insane to think of such a transformation without acknowledging that it risks igniting unrest on a scale far beyond mere economic anxiety.

Policymakers must stop treating AI as a purely economic—or geopolitical—matter. They must treat it as a question of national survival. 

Throughout history, as Carl Benedikt Frey and Michael Osborne remind us, “technological progress has vastly shifted the composition of employment.” John Maynard Keynes famously cautioned that the pain from these changes “often springs not from the rheumatics of old age, but from the growing-pains of over-rapid changes.” Both observations may ring true today—but this rupture is unlike any before. 

This poem was written by guest writer Barbara Kyei as part of our place-based organising work and community reporting project in Brent. Welcome to OUR Brent? Our commonality is for everyone to be welcomed Welcome not for what you are but rather who you are. Welcomed to our city Welcome to our community Welcomed into […]

The post Welcome to Our Brent appeared first on Equality Trust.

This article is read by Eunice Wong, a Juilliard-trained actor, featured on Audible's list of Best Women Narrators. Her work is on the annual Best Audiobooks lists of the New York Times, Audible, AudioFile, & Library Journal. www.eunicewong.actor

Text originally published September 10, 2025.

When Prime Minister Carney agreed to drop the digital services tax under pressure from the United States, Europe was watching closely. Under President Trump’s “America First” foreign policy, the US had already unleashed a diplomatic storm against its supposed ally — threatening to sanction EU officials over a European Union law, the Digital Services Act, that aims to increase accountability and limit the spread of illegal content on large platforms. It may seem like a risky time for bold policy leadership, but short-term trade agreements and other giveaways on tech issues will only invite further coercion to bend to the US’s will.

When I found myself as the Director of the First Year Composition program, I also found myself in the same odd conversation more than once.

This blog was written by guest writer Riham Lotfi as part of our place-based organising work and community reporting project in Brent. Becoming a Brent Community Reporter has been more than just a role — it’s been a personal mission. As a mother, an educator, and a resident of Brent, I’ve always cared about social […]

The post Reporting Inequality, Amplifying Voices in Brent appeared first on Equality Trust.

As Bitcoin continues to carve out a larger and larger share of the global financial system, the question of what truly drives its price has never been more important. For years, commentators have pointed to “Fed liquidity” as the main force behind Bitcoin’s price action. But as I argue in my latest video, this explanation doesn’t hold up under scrutiny. Instead, the evidence strongly suggests that fiscal flows—not monetary liquidity—are the true driver of Bitcoin’s long-term price trajectory.

Why “Fed Liquidity” Falls Short

In the post-COVID era, analysts have been quick to tie Bitcoin’s movements to changes in so-called Fed liquidity. Whether through quantitative easing (QE), reverse repos, the Treasury General Account (TGA), or reserve balances, the idea was that when the Fed injected liquidity, Bitcoin’s price would rise.

But there’s a fundamental flaw in this argument: Fed liquidity only swaps assets, it doesn’t add new ones. QE and related tools merely change the composition of private sector balance sheets; they don’t create new net financial assets. That means there’s no direct channel for these measures to bid up Bitcoin—or any other financial asset—in a sustainable way.

There is a growing urgency within the Trump Administration to take on what the president has called “the radical left lunatics” following the assassination of conservative icon Charlie Kirk. But despite much of the talk from the Right, including even from the administration itself, there is no easy way to dismantle the far-left’s networks. Defeating the forces arrayed against the American republic will require a detailed understanding of the enemy and a systematic plan to break up their networks, utilizing all methods of national power.

Defining Terms

The biggest initial problem the Trump Administration faces in confronting the radical Left is a refusal by the national security, federal law enforcement, and intelligence apparatuses to even recognize whom the president has identified as a threat.

This blog was written by guest writer Beanica Tripoli as part of our place-based organising work and community reporting project in Brent. As a Politics & International Relations master’s student who has always been passionate about social justice, it has been a privilege to work as a Brent Community Reporter with the Equality Trust. I’ve […]

The post My Experience as a Community Reporter appeared first on Equality Trust.

On this episode of Follow the Money, former Labor Senator for New South Wales Doug Cameron speaks about the Australia-US relationship, the “madness” of AUKUS, and how the federal government can prepare for peace – not war.

The 2025 Laurie Carmichael Lecture was delivered on Wednesday 10 September and presented by the Carmichael Centre at the Australia Institute’s Centre for Future Work.

You can sign our petition calling on the Australian Government to launch a parliamentary inquiry into AUKUS.

After America: Australia and the new world order by Emma Shortis and Dead Centre: How political pragmatism is killing us by Richard Denniss are available now via the Australia Institute website.

Guest: Doug Cameron, former Labor Senator for New South Wales // @DougCameron51

Host: Ebony Bennett, Deputy Director, the Australia Institute // @ebonybennett

Show notes:

On September 10, 2025, Charlie Kirk was assassinated for the political sin of showing up on college campuses across our country and taking and answering questions. These queries came from students and guests whether they were allies or adversaries—or simply curious-minded Americans engaging in their unalienable birthright to engage in civics openly.

Charlie Kirk was martyred for the free exercise of his First Amendment rights. And the right to free speech, which he championed, was critically wounded in the attack.

The aftermath marks a turning point in our nation’s “house divided” future.

Let’s do as Charlie did masterfully and probe the mindset of the other—in this case his assassin’s and that of his like-minded enablers. It was Charlie’s way. It is the Socratic way. It is the Western Civ, the American way.

Who will rid us of this meddlesome apostle of free expression?

Progressives don’t like to think of themselves as King Henry, the man who uttered the fateful words that caused four loyalists to murder Thomas Becket. But where else can their constant denunciations of Republicans as “Nazis” or “fascists” lead?

A young man, who was being groomed to be a moral monster by our culture and the passions it unleashes, heard the dog whistle call to arms, seized the opportunity of a public event in his home state, and did what was collectively seen by his ilk as necessary and proper.

Today marks one year since the publication of the first Tasmanian State of Environment Report in 15 years.

This report provides critical health checks for Tasmania’s environment, which is fundamental to Tasmanians’ health and their economy.

The Tasmanian Government has had more than 12 months to address the threats the environment is facing, and based on the available information, nothing has changed.

The report raised the alarm for an environment in decline and facing multiple threats.

It found the majority of environmental indicators were ‘getting worse’ – ranging from deteriorating beaches and rapid native vegetation loss to the increase in animals and plants threatened with extinction.

Over a third of indicators are now classified as in ‘poor condition’, including Tasmania’s native bird populations.

The government agreed to prioritise developing a long-term vision and strategy for Tasmania’s environment, as recommended by the Tasmanian Planning Commission, to safeguard the long-term environmental health of the state.

It also agreed to prioritise developing an environmental data strategy, to assess which environmental laws need reform, and to improve native vegetation mapping and information.

“Without adequate government investment, the state’s iconic natural assets will continue to degrade, which will likely have a damaging effect on the state’s economy, employment and the health of Tasmanians,” said Eloise Carr, Director of The Australia Institute Tasmania.

The assassination of Charlie Kirk is a watershed moment in the contest of ideologies—and increasingly of peoples—in America.

On the one hand are what might be called the restorationists, who yearn for a common culture that has been eroding since the 1970s, and mostly vanished in the 2010s. The most recent example of this tendency is Utah Governor Spencer Cox’s press conference announcing that Charlie Kirk’s killer was captured. Cox issued a well-meaning exhortation to all Americans to “find an off ramp, or else it’s going to get much worse.” In this vision, Kirk’s brutal murder is an episode that shocks us as a people into pursuing greater concord and amity.

The governor should be credited with categorically rejecting political violence and laying out an optimistic vision. His prescription and analysis are technically correct—but also contextually and prudentially wrong. The restorationists have an aspiration but not a case. It’s a problem worth understanding.

Edmund Burke once wrote, “Circumstances…give in reality to every political principle its distinguishing colour and discriminating effect.” The circumstances in America now must be described accurately. There is no roughly equitable contest of sides, each with its own dangerous extremists. It is not, for example, Northern Ireland of a generation past. Instead, we are in a contest in which one side overwhelmingly reserves violence to itself and employs it freely.

That side is, of course, the Left.

The Discipline of Political Economy and the Journal of Australian Political Economy (JAPE) welcome submissions for our forthcoming Teaching Political Economy Symposium to be held on Monday December 8th at the University of Sydney. This workshop is being held as part of a suite of events celebrating the 50th anniversary of Political Economy at the University of Sydney. In 1975, a full program of study in political economy was offered for the first time at an Australian university, following a significant student-staff campaign for a pluralist and practical economics curriculum. On this important anniversary, we seek submissions on the past, present and future of political economy pedagogy and education both at Sydney and in other institutions in Australia and internationally. Papers presented at the workshop will be considered for inclusion in a dedicated winter 2026 issue of JAPE.

We welcome the submission of abstracts in the areas of:

Listen to the full conversation on the Perspectives Journal podcast, available to subscribe on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Amazon Music, and all other major podcast platforms.