PETER VAN ONSELEN
Peter van Onselen is Contributing Editor at The Australian, writing weekly columns for the business section on Wednesdays and the focus section on the weekends. He also writes a weekly column in the News Ltd Sunday papers and hosts "Australian Agenda" and "The Contrarians" on Sky News. Dr van Onselen is a Winthrop Professor at The University of Western Australia, and co-authored John Winston Howard: The Biography.
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Swan's got gold for policy backflips
NOR does he mind leaving colleagues floundering in the mire.
GST Pandora's Box must be opened
THE case for upping the tax, and redistributing it, is powerful.
No way back from these figures
JULIA Gillard needed to have a poll lead on the Coalition going into the summer break.
Not factions but flawed individuals
FACTIONS aren't to blame for the mess in which Labor finds itself today in NSW, individuals are.
Many targets, yet opposition shoots wide
WHATEVER the truth of the claims and counter-claims concerning the AWU affair, the fact is both main party leaders are damaged goods.
A truly horrific policy
LABOR'S plan to allow asylum-seekers to live in the community shows it has abandoned one of its guiding principles.
Abbott needs new direction
HE may appear lost in space, but Labor's task is astronomical.
Public loses from stitch-up by Labor
ATTEMPTS to damage the Coalition's credibility backfired when the trustworthiness of what Labor said came into question.
Tax that brings liabilities not revenue
IT'S hard to believe but royalty credits are accruing under the mining levy.
Misogyny debate's unwitting victim
JULIA Gillard's three biggest supporters are also Labor's worst performers.
There's sexism, and then there's barbs
HYPOCRISY has run like a thread through Labor's gender campaign.
Embarrassing finale of a lost cause
IS it possible for a political party and a prime minister to have more egg on their collective faces than Labor and Julia Gillard do right now?
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Labor losing edge as champion of super
THE government is wrong to use superannuation 'reforms' to find budget savings.
Apology by Jones signifies nothing
PREVIOUSLY when Jones has apologised for his vile commentary about Julia Gillard it hasn't changed his approach.
Trickery helps balance budget
WAYNE Swan's flawed economic strategy is flawed politically too.
Worst of times for a beastly outburst
CORY Bernardi might well have escaped punishment if the Coalition were not under rare pressure.
Burke revealed as appalling policymaker
THE super-trawler ban is not only bad decision-making, it is also rude.
Awkward for Swan but worse for miners
THE cost of higher royalties is Swan's problem but, soon enough, higher royalties will become a problem for miners.
PM blew chance to tap into mining mindset
THE resources sector, Australia's engine, deserved a better approach than Julia Gillard gave it at a conference this week.
Mine games go down like lead
THE PM's speech at the Association of Mining and Exploration Companies conference was a classic case of not understanding one's audience.
Policy rush a headache for Abbott
AUSTRALIAN politics is in a really interesting situation right now.
No smoking gun for Gillard accusers
BY definition, proving one's innocence is outside the framework of a democratic legal system.
Let's dispel a few myths
OFFSHORE processing is a smokescreen for political cowardice.
Hopefuls need to talk about Kevin
FANCY being Bill Shorten right now, or for that matter any other Labor leadership aspirant considering life at the top.
Gillard's new shock tactics
THE strategy is take the focus off Abbott and attack the states on power prices.
NDIS: no votes in playing politics
THE Prime Minister's refusal to back the levy proposal says a lot about her priorities.
Another wasted chance for Gillard
GILLARD'S decision to reject a levy to fund the National Disability Insurance Scheme is yet another poor one.
Swan a repeat offender
IT takes intestinal fortitude to be a good minister and he doesn't have it.
Survival fuels leadership noise
THE bottom-up drive to axe another PM builds but will Shorten, Crean and Albanese acquiesce?
Julia talks BlackBerrys, others iPhones
JULIA Gillard started her dialogue yesterday with a simple example to illustrate why it was so important that Australia innovate.
Politicians prove a point on hate media
THE political class professes outrage at media attacks, yet it wins easily on sheer nastiness.
Feud may cost minor party dearly
WHY would either side want to maintain such a dysfunctional situation after the war of words over the weekend?
Policy belittles a civilised society
IT'S high time parties stopped promoting draconian refugee 'solutions'.
An end to the blame game
POLITICAL point scoring should be set aside over asylum-seekers.
Credibility cuts both ways on carbon
TONY Abbott's scare campaign leaves him open to challenge despite the ETS's failings.
Abbott needs to cull his slackers
THERE are plenty of underperformers on the Coalition frontbench.
