One of the most devastating effects of the war on drugs has been on people of colour in the US, especially African-Americans. I’ve long believed that a serious society would consider decriminalising if not legalising drugs, a point I argued in a recent Guardian column. Now, some positive news from the US (via the New…
Showing all posts in June 2019
What is vulture capitalism doing to our world?
My follow article appears today in The Conversation: The story in last weekend’s Sydney’s… Daily Telegraph… was stark: “[Prime Minister] Kevin Rudd will warn people smugglers he stands ready to create an island from hell in Papua New Guinea housing 10,000 asylum seekers.” The message, an “exclusive” by News Corp Australia journalist Samantha Maiden, was to inform…
Centre for Public Christianity discusses For God’s Sake
The new book… For God’s Sake… is a discussion between an Atheist, a Jew, a Christian and a Muslim about the big questions of life. CPX invited Jane Caro, Antony Loewenstein and Simon Smart to discuss their reasons for writing the book and to debate some of the questions that are raised in it.
Post Wikileaks snub, hard having faith in Amazon with Washington Post
The role of an accountable press has never been more important. The role of Wikileaks, whistle-blowers, Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden should inspire us all and bring a realisation that transparency in a democracy requires brave souls. Here’s a great piece by Jay Rosen at his PressThink site: In exchanges with Washington Post reporter Barton…
Profits of Doom extract: politicised, privatised and silenced by bureaucracy
The following… appears in the wonderful publication Right Now, an online site dedicated to human rights: In his new book,… Profits of Doom,… independent Australian journalist Antony Loewenstein travels to Curtin Immigration Detention Centre and Christmas Island to investigate the reality of Australia’s, notoriously… secretive, privatised detention facilities for asylum seekers.… In this excerpt, Loewenstein is on Christmas Island (CI)…
The daily inhumanity of Guantanamo Bay
Devastating article by writer John Grisham in the New York Times: About two months ago I learned that some of my books had been banned at Guantánamo Bay. Apparently detainees were requesting them, and their lawyers were delivering them to the prison, but they were not being allowed in because of “impermissible content.” I became…
The Australian reviews Profits of Doom
The following review by Miriam Cosic appears in Rupert Murdoch’s Australian newspaper today: In his recent book What Money Can’t Buy: The Moral Limits of Markets, American philosopher Michael Sandel explores ethical realms subverted by economic models. It is a bravura critique but there are surprising gaps when it comes to the modern nation-state’s supposed…
Radio Adelaide interview on Murdoch media and supposed objectivity
Following my recent Guardian column pushing for greater media accountability over voting intentions and bias, I was interviewed yesterday by Radio Adelaide about issues of media transparency:
What if our future isn’t filled with renewable energy?
Michael Klare, TomDispatch: When it comes to energy and economics in the climate-change era, nothing is what it seems.… Most of us believe (or want to believe) that the second carbon era, the Age of Oil, will soon be superseded by the Age of Renewables, just as oil had long since superseded the Age of…
ABC Adelaide on Profits of Doom and vulture capitalism
Discussing the realities of crony capitalism is rare in the mainstream media. My interview this week with ABC Adelaide… about my book Profits of Doom… gave me the opportunity to talk about private mercenaries in Afghanistan and the attempts by multinational Rio Tinto to re-open its polluting mine in Bougainville in Papua New Guinea: