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Less than a week out from The Australia Institute’s 2025 Climate Integrity Summit, it’s been revealed that organisations like Telstra, Australia Post, PWC and the NRMA – and more than a hundred others – have walked away from the Federal Government’s Climate Active scheme.

Australians are fed up with polluters buying carbon credits of questionable quality rather than making real investments in real reductions in the amount of fossil fuels they are burning.

The public knows the difference between greenwashing and real action on climate change. Now, corporate Australia is getting the message. Many companies are choosing not to be associated with programs which lack integrity.

“Even PwC doesn’t respect the integrity of the accounting standards behind the Commonwealth Government’s own carbon offsetting scheme. When PwC is telling you to pull your socks up, you know you have an integrity problem,” said Richard Denniss, Executive Director of The Australia Institute.

“A growing number of Australians are sick of the greenwashing and accounting tricks, and simply want their governments to drive a real reduction in fossil fuel use. That’s why climate scientists and business people like Andrew Forrest are calling for real zero targets to replace the vague net zero targets which rely on carbon offsetting.

Notes on the Crises pivoted over the weekend into around the clock coverage of the Trump-Musk Treasury Payments Crisis of 2025

Read Part 0, Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 & Part 4

UPDATE 4:21 PM: MARKO ELEZ HAS RESIGNED. WALL STREET JOURNAL CLAIMS IT WAS OVER "RACIST POSTS". OBVIOUSLY NOT TRUE- WIRED, TALKING POINTS MEMO AND I GOT HIM. NEED TO REST, MORE TOMORROW

Notes on the Crises pivoted over the weekend into around the clock coverage of the Trump-Musk Treasury Payments Crisis of 2025

The Trump Administration’s decision to contest the dominant interpretation of the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment is a sign that we might be living in an era of regime politics.

Near the beginning of his Crisis of the Two Constitutions, Charles Kesler distinguishes “normal politics” from “regime politics”:

Normal politics takes place within an accepted political and constitutional order, and concerns means, not ends. That is, the purposes and limits of politics are agreed; the debate is over how to achieve those purposes while observing those limits. By contrast, regime politics is about who rules and for the sake of what ends or principles. It unsettles any existing political order, as well as its limits. It raises anew the basic questions of who counts as a citizen, what are the goals of the political community, and what do we honor or revere together as a people.

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.

Belt and DOGE | The Roundtable Ep. 253

On this episode of Dollars & Sense, Australia Institute Senior Economist and Elinor Johnston-Leek discuss how our housing and superannuation policies are fuelling wealth inequality.

This discussion was recorded on Thursday 6 February 2025 and things may have changed since recording.

Order What’s the Big Idea? 32 Big Ideas for a Better Australia now, via the Australia Institute website.

Host: Matt Grudnoff, Senior Economist, the Australia Institute and Centre for Future Work // @mattgrudnoff

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

Show notes:

Superannuation tax concessions are making inequality worse by Greg Jericho, the Australia Institute (July 2024)

Income and wealth inequality in Australia by David Richardson and Frank Stilwell, the Australia Institute (July 2024)

Introduction

In our work as organisers and campaigners, there is often an element of debate or conflict in our work, especially when it comes to shifting power and lobbying external decision-makers. But what about conflict within our spaces? How we approach it, hold each other accountable, and move through it requires practice.

This article reflects on key learnings from a workshop facilitated by Noura Mansour, a Palestinian activist, and Anisha Senaratne, a Naarm based facilitator, at the FWD+Organise Conference in Naarm/Melbourne in December 2024.

The workshop explored the intersections of personal and political conflict, applying a decolonial lens and lived experiences to examine how conflict transformation can be a powerful tool in both our personal and political lives.

Leaning into conflict is political. – Anisha Senaratne

Decolonial Theory 

Noura and Anisha began the workshop with a grounding in decolonial theory.

From a decolonial perspective, conflict is not just something to resolve or manage – it is an opportunity to transform systems and cultures that perpetuate harm and inequality.

Frederick Douglass once denounced the Supreme Court’s ruling in Dred Scott v. Sandford as constituting “an open, glaring, and scandalous tissue of lies.” For the massive violence it did to both the Constitution and to the principles upon which that charter is based, that opprobrium is richly deserved.

Forty-one years later, the Court issued a decision that deserves, but has largely avoided, the same kind of vituperation. In United States v. Wong Kim Ark, the Court maintained that the Constitution, particularly the 14th Amendment, incorporated the British common law doctrine of birthright citizenship, and that America’s Founding Fathers intended that this doctrine should prevail in America.

For quality of constitutional and historical reasoning, Wong Kim Ark is every bit as defective as Dred Scott. Yet while Dred Scott is universally condemned, Wong Kim Ark’s conclusions are generally accepted, even if few today are familiar with the case. The pernicious shadow of Wong Kim Ark continues to poison our law and policy regarding immigration.

If you are a current or former career Bureau of the Fiscal Service Employee, especially if you’re a legacy IT programmer with years of experience and especially if you are a COBOL programmer currently working on the PAM, SPS or any other adjacent team, contact me over email or over signal — linked here. My Signal username is “NathanTankus.01”. Legal counsel sources and payments level sources at the Federal Reserve are also helpful. I am also looking for sources at FINCEN

If you are a current or former career Bureau of the Fiscal Service Employee, especially if you’re a legacy IT programmer with years of experience and especially if you are a COBOL programmer currently working on the PAM, SPS or any other adjacent team, contact me over email or over signal — linked here. My Signal username is “NathanTankus.01”. Legal counsel sources and payments level sources at the Federal Reserve are also helpful. I am also looking for sources at FINCEN

“Defeats will be defeats and lassitude will be lassitude. But we can improve our propaganda.” (Carl Rowan, Director of the US Information Agency, June 1964, FRUS #189 I: 429).

This interview is also available on podcast platforms and Rumble.

Farah El-Sharif, writer, academic and Visiting Scholar at Stanford, is uncompromisingly blunt in her assessment of the Middle East. The decades of repression faced by an entire people have produced a fragmented society—culturally and through colonially imposed borders. To help understand why the Muslim world is so broken, corrupt and full of contradictions, El Sherif joins host Chris Hedges on this episode of The Chris Hedges Report.

On this episode of Follow the Money, Democracy & Accountability Director Bill Browne joins us to discuss the latest political donations data and why tens of thousands of Australians are concerned about the Government’s proposed electoral changes.

This discussion was recorded on Tuesday 4 February 2025 and things may have changed since recording.

Order What’s the Big Idea? 32 Big Ideas for a Better Australia now, via the Australia Institute website.

Guest: Bill Browne, Director, Democracy & Accountability, the Australia Institute // @browne90

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

Show notes: 

Electoral Reform Bill analysis by Bill Browne and Joshua Black, the Australia Institute (February 2025)

SIGN NOW: Protect our elections!, the Australia Institute

Theme music: Blue Dot Sessions

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.

Higher Education Reform Part I | Cincinnatus Series Ep. 1

Kicking off the Cincinnatus Series, Claremont Institute president Ryan Williams is joined by Inez Stepman, Scott Yenor, and David Azerrad to discuss leftist agendas within universities, and the opportunity for state legislatures to pull the reins and reverse course. Among the levers for dismantling the radical ideological infrastructures are the creation of state-controlled accreditation agencies, funding restrictions, and a renewed focus on student outcomes. The guests discuss these topics, potential pitfalls, and more!

Recommended reading:

How Trump Can Make Universities Great Again

Australia’s higher education system is broken. University Vice-Chancellors – the CEOs of today’s corporatised higher education system – are among the highest paid in the world. Meanwhile, students suffer from expensive degrees, expanding debts and meagre income support, and staff are subjected to job insecurity, casualisation, hours of unpaid work and even outright employment law contraventions.

None of this is inevitable. Government choices matter, Australia created the current system, and Australia can create a better system that prioritises students and workers. Other countries have shown that this can work. In the words of Australia Institute Executive Director Richard Denniss

“…just consider the fact that in Norway, they tax the fossil fuel industry and give kids free university education, in Australia we subsidise the fossil fuel industry and charge kids a fortune to go to university.”