Club Troppo

I must confess I've been somewhat baffled by Fretilin claims over the last few days that former Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri enjoys an immunity from prosecution as a parliamentarian. There certainly isn't any such immunity in the Timor Leste Constitution . The only relevant pr...

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Here's an interesting abstract from the excellent Brookings-AEI joint centre on regulation suggesting that if real estate markets were regulated nationally to provide transparent listings, the real estate market - and in particular the market in real estate agents would be muc...

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I had a free Village pass to the movies which expired tonight so went to see Wah Wah . I don't recommend it - but then again it's not bad. Like a lot of movies these days it has excellent acting. It's consciously serious and 'art house' rather than going for the ratings. It's...

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New Matilda is running a fairly standard piece [subscription required] about the inadequacies of GDP as a measure of wellbeing. It all goes off in the predictable directions - we're getting richer but no happier, we're getting more selfish, less community minded, we're running...

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Published last week in Crikey Speakers of parliament are well remunerated. In the commonwealth they receive nearly $200,000, more than most ministers and 75 per cent above the salary paid to parliamentarians. And they are well cosseted. They enjoy extensive office suites with...

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Yesterday's Independent newspaper carries a powerful article by Henry Porter . It charts the loss of civil liberties in the UK created by nine years of the Blair Government. He describes clearly and powerfully how, given a choice between personal liberty and collective securit...

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From a few weeks back. The High Court decided in 1997 - the case was Lange v the ABC - that Australia's constitution necessarily implies "a limitation on legislative and executive power to deny the electors and their representatives information concerning the conduct of the ex...

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Belated Match Report, I know. But, having finally caught up with the tape, I do have a few thoughts to share, not all about that match (video highlights here now). Match Highlights: Matt Rogers : Sure, he went off and would have been sick to do it, but he's a sure thing to sta...

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I was wired at birth to allocate capital and was lucky enough to have people around me early on - my parents and teachers and Susie - who helped me to make the most of that. Warren Buffett It's presumably in the papers and I've missed it, or it's a hoax but courtesy of slashdo...

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Other things being equal, taxing goods is bad. Of course other things are not equal and we need the money. But we should only be taxing goods after we've exhausted the scope to tax bads. Taxing bads is good because the effect of the tax is to reduce the output of the bad. Thus...

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Ross Gittins has a nice piece in Saturday's SMH on the economic nonsense talked about 'competitiveness'. He begins with this quote from Hugh Morgan. As the pace of globalisation increases, the reality is that governments are in competition with each other. This means that the...

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David "Barista" Tiley is out of hospital after a harrowing surgical and subsequent ordeal. Fortunately, as ubiquitous commenter Nabakov observes, the loss of part of the bowel and the whole of his spleen (not to mention a heart attack along the way) hasn't done David's writing...

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[photopress:snap.jpg,full,pp_empty] Take it from me, snapping your fingers at a waiter does not work.

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What is Timor Leste President Xanana Gusmao up to in threatening to resign ? Is it just a spur of the moment emotional outburst, behaviour for which the President has been known in the past? Or is there a greater element of strategic calculation involved? If Gusmao does in fac...

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Peter Costello has announced that 4,100 pages of inoperative law will be removed from the taxation legislation. This is a Good Thing I guess, but I'm not sure I'd give it a reception quite as enthusiastic as Henry Thornton . You little ripper! Treasurer Peter Costello is going...

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I don't mind the odd cleansing ale but it seems that the result of the annual Rugby League Week players poll revealed a culture of binge drinking . And with perfect timing Parra's Tim Smith is ejected from a hotel after an altercation with cricket star Micheal Clarke and the D...

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Readers with an interest in NT politics might care to tune into the streaming audio version of this morning's ABC Local Radio morning program, where (among others) yours truly discussed a sudden outbreak of ill-discipline in the Martin government backbench. A memo from indigen...

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I only have a few observations to make, and won't have an after match report this time - I won't even be able to see this match live. Which is a shame because it will surely be worth watching! I think it will be a great contest, and I wouldn't be surprised if Australia win by...

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