The (2022 Australian) election campaign has started and is already living down to my worst expectations. Neither of the major parties has anything of significance to offer on the issues that face us (climate change, poverty and inequality, wage stagnation, housing etc), though Labor is marginally less bad than the LNP. This ought to be good for the Greens, but they are stuck at 10 per cent of the vote, perhaps because people don’t fully understand that a second preference is worth just as much as primary vote for Labor.
So, although I’m inevitably asked to do a lot of election commentary, I’m doing my best to ignore the whole sorry business and focus on the policy issues that are being ignored. Here are a few examples from The Conversation
Time’s up: why Australia has to quit stalling and wean itself off fossil fuel
The Greens’ liveable income guarantee is a serious idea the major parties won’t touch – yet
Atomic disruption: how Russia’s war on Ukraine has rattled the nuclear world order
If there are topics you think I should be talking about, feel free to mention them in comments
In personal news, I’m training for the Gold Coast Marathon, hoping to beat a PB of 4:06:18, set in 2014. I’ll never have a better chance
Not sure if I have missed this in the Ukraine war coverage. But are there any prisoners of war, from either side? There does seem to be a lot of bodies.