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As I’ve said many times, as soon as a public, media, or person frames our complicated world of policy options as either a binary or continuum of two sides, then it’s all about in- and out-groups, and our shared world of policy disagreements isn’t the kind of disagreement that can help communities come to pragmatic solutions. It’s some degree of demagoguery. Maybe it’s a horse race, maybe it’s a full-throated call for political or physical extermination. But it’s never useful for effective deliberation, about anything. Because there are never just two sides about any policy.

One of the least understood but most consequential aspects of American government is the United States Federal Reserve System. Bankers, investors, and even the president sit with bated breath, waiting to see how the Fed will manage interest rates.

The Fed is so important to the world economy that the president sometimes may feel the need to voice his administration’s position and hope the chair of the Federal Reserve will acquiesce to his wishes. Sometimes, however, he may point out issues with the chair’s performance, puncturing the claim of central bank independence. President Trump recently accused Fed Chair Jerome Powell of being too late with interest rate cuts, “except when it came to the Election period when he lowered [interest rates] in order to help Sleepy Joe Biden, later Kamala, get elected.”

The Wrap with Matt Grudnoff

This week, we published important research that looked at terrible flaws in the GST that are costing Australians billions of dollars in important government services, like health, education, housing, and infrastructure.

When the GST was introduced, it was promised to be a growth tax that would help make the states and territories financially independent. But growth in the GST has not kept up with the rest of the economy. The slow growing GST means less revenue flowing to the states and territories, forcing cost cutting to essential public services.

This slow growth is expected to continue, costing the states and territories $26 billion this financial year and a staggering $122 billion over the next four years.

Short-changing the states and territories is having real impacts on the vital government services they provide. Shortfalls in funding of health, education, and other vital public services are commonplace across Australia.

The slow growth in the GST is caused by rising inequality, which is driving less spending on things that are subject to the GST. For example, the housing affordability crisis means people are spending more on rent and mortgage repayments, which means they have less money to spend on things that are subject to the GST.

Everyone is speculating about what drove a young man to assassinate Charlie Kirk. But for academics like us, the more pressing lesson lies not in the mind of the killer, but in the conditions that elevated Kirk to such notoriety.

Kirk’s voice echoed against the awkward silence of scholars who are afraid to speak out against ideas they know are wrong. On many campuses today, a dominant cohort of faculty and administrators openly promote progressive and liberal positions in policy, curriculum, and student life, while those with traditional or conservative views hold their tongues, fearing social backlash or professional reprisals. Among students, the same imbalance prevails: liberal voices are amplified while conservative and nonconforming perspectives struggle to be heard.

Such reticence from the dissenting few amplified the shock felt by the majority of students each time Kirk appeared on campuses to openly challenge what he saw as comfortable orthodoxy. Liberals and progressives were not prepared to receive any pushback to their assumptions about equity versus equality, Critical Race Theory, gender identity, cosmopolitanism, or the expansion of state power into private life.

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.

The Kirk Awakening | The Roundtable Ep. 286

Special guest Ryder Selmi, longtime friend of Charlie Kirk and Strategy Director at Beck & Stone, joins the hosts this week to recount his experience attending Charlie Kirk’s memorial service on Monday. There, Erika Kirk forgave her husband’s assassin in a moment of prayer, joined by Trump and more than 200,000 attendees at an Arizona stadium—a moment emblematic of Charlie’s faith and his movement. Reactions from the Left elite have ranged from bewilderment to spite, epitomized by Jimmy Kimmel’s distasteful attempt to pin the assassination on MAGA. The late-night host was then briefly pulled from air, now made a “martyr” by Hollywood to distract from their offenses. Plus: media recommendations!

On this episode of Dollars & Sense, Greg and Elinor discuss Jim Chalmers vs red tape, what the latest inflation data could mean for the November rates decision, and how governments could ensure GST revenues keep up with economic growth.

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 the Australia Institute website.

This discussion was recorded on Thursday 25 September 2025.

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

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

Show notes:

Today, at the United Nations, the governments of Colombia and Vanuatu are publicly announcing a plan to host the First International Conference for the Phase-Out of Fossil Fuels in April, 2026.

Australia Institute research has, for many years, proved that the best way to limit the devastating impact of climate change is to phase out the burning of fossil fuels.

The Australia Institute welcomes this long-overdue news.

“Many UN treaties began from countries working outside the formal process, building momentum until the formal processes finally, sometime begrudgingly, adopted them,” said Leanne Minshull, co-Executive Director at The Australia Institute.

“My hope is that this announcement, this week is the beginning of the end for Australia’s – and the world’s – fossil fuel industries.

“Australia has an opportunity to show genuine climate leadership, and support Vanuatu and Colombia’s process for a global phase out of fossil fuels. Missing this opportunity would expose our bid to host COP31 in late 2026 as an exercise in greenwashing rather than real action.

“The Australia Institute has been working to phase out fossil fuels for decades. We launched our No New Coal Mines work at the 2015 Paris COP meeting, supported by then-President of Kiribati, Anote Tong.”

Pablo Azar, Francesca Carapella, JP Perez-Sangimino, Nathan Swem, and Alexandros P. Vardoulakis

In the post below, the last one that I am publishing on Substack, I am explaining why I left my academic career, left the United States, left Substack – and need your support now, as I am launching my career as a full-time writer. Come join me over at Democracy Americana’s new home on Steady:

Read Democracy Americana on Steady

If you were already subscribed to Democracy Americana, I have automatically transferred you over to Steady and you should already have this post in your email inbox. For a short transition period, I will also transfer new subscribers on here over to our new home. If you have any problems, please don’t hesitate to contact me at newsletter@democracyamericana.com and I promise we will get it sorted out.

This is a similar line to the one often used by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Energy Minister Chris Bowen, suggesting Australia needs more gas to underpin the nation’s electricity supply.

Australia Institute research, using the government’s and the gas companies’ own data, proves this is simply not true.

Australia has so much gas that it exports most of it, royalty-free, overseas. Even then, there is enough uncontracted gas to comfortably supply all of Australia’s domestic and manufacturing needs.

The analysis shows that so-called shortages are the result of too much gas being exported, not a shortage of gas coming from underground.

There’s also significant data to show that batteries are a  lower-cost alternative to gas for firming renewables.

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 18, 2025.

The Discipline of Political Economy at the University of Sydney is advertising a continuing education focused position, to be appointed at either Lecturer or Senior Lecturer level. This position is part of the University of Sydney Horizon Educators program.

The position is based in the School of Social and Political Sciences (SSPS) and will make a significant contribution to the Discipline of Political Economy’s pluralist, heterodox and interdisciplinary program of political economy teaching and learning at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels. The appointee will also conduct research in their area of study and/or in pedagogical practice, design and evaluation, and contribute to educational and other leadership and governance priorities in SSPS. Applicants with capabilities in teaching foundational political economy, international political economy and interdisciplinary units of study are particularly encouraged to apply.

Selection Criteria:

This interview is also available on podcast platforms and Rumble.

Medea Benjamin and CODEPINK, the organization she cofounded, are synonymous with accosting power in the United States. Their fearless confrontations with the nation’s most prominent and powerful politicians in the halls of Congress, often seen through viral videos, are a stark embodiment of the First Amendment. Despite over 20 years of activism and consistent critique of America’s representatives over their subservience to the military industrial complex and other big money interests, their ability to have these conversations is beginning to dwindle.

In a world where a Supreme Court nominee can’t safely say what a woman is, perhaps we should be unfazed by a U.S. senator who insists that the concept of God-given natural rights is really crypto-Iranian theocracy. In the week leading up to the assassination of Charlie Kirk, that is exactly what Virginia Senator Tim Kaine claimed.

The Left has long recoiled from natural rights, which rest on a truth (gasp) about human nature (deeper gasp). They axiomatically hold that all rights are just privileges bestowed by the state and that there is no truth, only persuasive assertions that serve the Left’s power.

Senator Kaine therefore rejects the truth about human nature on which the American republic is founded: that all people—no matter their differences in ability or circumstances—have natural rights. That in the possession and exercise of these rights we are indeed equal. And that the source of these rights is God, not the state nor the common acquiescence of the community.

Pablo Azar, Francesca Carapella, JP Perez-Sangimino, Nathan Swem, and Alexandros P. Vardoulakis

On this episode of Follow the Money, Australia Institute Executive Director Richard Denniss joins Ebony Bennett to discuss the National Climate Risk Assessment, the Government’s new emissions reduction targets, and its disastrous decision to approve the North West Shelf gas expansion.

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

Guest: Richard Denniss, Executive Director, the Australia Institute // @richarddenniss

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

Show notes:

Labor’s 62 to 70% climate target does not align with the science, but can be met by phasing out fossil fuels, the Australia Institute (September 2025)

Devastating climate risk assessment shows fossil fuel exports must end, the Australia Institute (September 2025)