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In the US we see Trump thinking he is the victim of massive fraud while the rest of the country has moved on and are waiting for the change that is coming on January 20 next year! The pandemic just seems to get worse and the death rates are really becoming alarming.
In the UK we see a fall in case numbers in the pandemic and a very gradual relaxation of the rules. They are moving slowly, taking note that the US economy has shrunk by the largest amount in 300 years in the last week or so!
In OZ we remain a pandemic island while coming to terms with the apparent war crimes that have been committed in our name and wondering what next China will do to try and hurt us!
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Major Issues.
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https://www.afr.com/world/asia/australia-japan-pact-is-about-us-20201122-p56gta
Australia-Japan pact is about US
Australia and Japan are ill-placed to strike a security alliance, but moves towards an agreement mark and advance in middle power co-operation aimed at keeping the United States engaged in the Asia Pacific as China's influence grows.
Ben Ascione Contributor
Nov 22, 2020 – 1.39pm
Last week, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison became the first foreign leader to be hosted face-to-face by Japan’s new PM, Yoshihide Suga, after his predecessor, Shinzo Abe, stepped down in September.
But was the visit worth the risk of travel in the midst of a pandemic?
The most high-profile outcome was the announcement of an "in-principle agreement" on a Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA) that’s yet to be signed.
This will enable Australia and Japan to streamline the stationing of the Australian Defence Force in Japan and the Japan Self-Defence Forces (SDF) in Australia, to facilitate joint military exercises and disaster relief and to bolster interoperability.
It makes the RAA the second such agreement Japan has signed – after its 1960 Status of Forces Agreement with the United States. The RAA would cement Australia and Japan as each other’s second most important security partner after their respective alliances with the United States.
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Empty nesters rule the roost as retired tenants fall behind
Jennifer Duke
Economics correspondent
November 23, 2020 — 12.00am
Nest egg is one of the most overworked terms for retirement savings. It's deployed every so often to solve a First World problem of economics reporters trying not to bore readers by saying the same thing repeatedly.
But after 638 pages of the long-awaited Retirement Income Review it's clear the golden egg isn't the main worry (nor the goose laying it). The bigger issue is the nest itself.
This report, led by former Treasury deputy secretary Mike Callaghan, found the current system, including the 9.5 per cent paid into superannuation, is performing pretty well. Most people actually need to be encouraged to use up more of their wealth, and the majority of retired households are not in financial stress.
Unfortunately, two groups were found to be more at risk of falling on hard times at the end of their working life: those who rent and "involuntary retirees" who lose their jobs and cannot find another before reaching pension age. Those who fall into both of these categories have an even tougher time making ends meet, potentially relying on the government or loved ones to stay afloat.
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Batteries and gold power new mining projects
By Shane Wright
November 23, 2020 — 12.01am
Growing demand for batteries and electric cars coupled with gold prices pushed higher by fears over the response of central banks to the coronavirus pandemic have under-pinned a surge in Australian resources and energy projects.
Data released on Monday by the Federal Industry Department's Office of Chief Economist shows a 30 per cent lift in the number of committed resource projects this year with much of the growth in gold and battery-related minerals.
But the same report shows the growing troubles facing the coal industry as weak prices and increasing concern about its long-term viability due to efforts to stop global warming delay key investment decisions.
Over the past year, the department estimates there are 335 projects worth $334 billion either at the publicly announced, feasible, committed or completed level. It is a 19 per cent increase in the number of projects and 4 per cent lift in value over 2019.
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Local stocks trump cash as rich-listers bank on a healthy outlook
By Charlotte Grieve
November 23, 2020 — 12.00am
As the dust settled on last summer's bushfires and the local coronavirus numbers started climbing, Crestone Wealth Management’s chief investment officer Scott Haslem and his team flipped the switch on customer outreach to overdrive.
Crestone manages money for some of the country's wealthiest people, from high net worth to ultra-high net worth, and the stakes were pretty high as the pandemic knocked the wind out of global markets. Weekly online webinars were set up and attended by 900 clients at a time and individual advisers were told to check in with clients over the phone, sometimes daily.
"It was about communicating with our clients, working with them to sort through the noise, that comes from the media, the panic, the crisis," Haslem says. "When you engage an adviser, the most beneficial time you have with that adviser is not when markets are going up, it’s when markets are volatile and there is a crisis afoot."
The main message from Crestone to its clients was to ignore the noise and stick to the plan. Be disciplined, trust the strategy and whatever happened – do not switch to cash. As global share prices started falling by double digits through March, Haslem says sticking to that script became paramount.
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Australia has made itself an outlier in its dealings with China
Our inability to chew diplomatic gum and walk at the same time has left us on the outer even amongst a host of other nations that have trouble with China.
Geoff Raby Columnist
Nov 23, 2020 – 10.35am
The Prime Minister’s dash to Japan to meet the new Japanese Prime Minister – the first foreign leader to do so – should be welcomed.
It is unusual in terms of diplomatic protocol for an established leader to visit a newly appointed leader, not the other way around, unless it is the US for which normal protocol seldom applies.
Far from being seen as kow-towing to the Japanese, Morrison’s visit has however underscored how much the world has changed around Australia.
It is also a further example of how Australian foreign policy has started to notice this fact and the need for Australia to adopt more realist positions in foreign policy.
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https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/china-needlessly-hurting-australia-ties-pm-20201123-p56gxv
China needlessly hurting Australia ties
Phillip Coorey Political editor
Nov 23, 2020 – 8.00pm
Scott Morrison has accused China of needlessly damaging the relationship with Australia by wrongly assuming his government was doing the bidding of the United States by taking steps to safeguard sovereignty.
In a major foreign policy address to a British think tank on Monday night, the Prime Minister stressed Australia should not have to choose between its "enduring alliance" with the US and an "open, transparent and mutually beneficial relationship" with China.
But trying to be "true to our values and the protection of our own sovereignty" was not straightforward "in the midst of strategic competition between the United States and China".
"It is made more complex by the assumptions cast on Australia’s actions,'' he said.
"Our actions are wrongly seen and interpreted by some only through the lens of the strategic competition between China and the United States.
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Australia will not be deputy sheriff in US-China tensions, Morrison declares
By Rob Harris and Anthony Galloway
November 23, 2020 — 8.00pm
Prime Minister Scott Morrison says Australia's pursuit of its national interests on the world stage has been wrongly interpreted as siding with the United States over China, declaring his government will not make a "binary choice" between the superpowers.
In fresh attempts to thaw the frosty relationship between Canberra and Beijing, Mr Morrison used a speech to a British think tank to declare the most significant geopolitical challenge of the future would be dealing with the complexities of tensions between the world's largest economic and military powers.
Mr Morrison said it was wrong to describe the strategic competition between Washington and Beijing as a new Cold War, with the world no longer divided into two blocs with their own economic realm.
He said Australia's relationships were made more complex by assumptions about Canberra's actions such as raids on Chinese journalists and academic visa cancellations, calling for an independent investigation into the origins of COVID-19, banning Huawei from the nation's 5G network in 2018 and blocking 10 Chinese foreign investment deals across infrastructure and agriculture.
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https://www.smh.com.au/national/justice-must-be-served-to-atone-for-war-crimes-20201123-p56h1a.html
Justice must be served to atone for war crimes
Geoffrey Robertson
Human rights barrister and author
November 24, 2020 — 12.10am
For centuries, it has been a war crime for soldiers to kill surrendered prisoners or innocent civilians.
The shame that Australia must bear for the bestial conduct of its SAS in Afghanistan, now publicised throughout the world, has at least been mitigated by the thoroughness of the Brereton investigation and the government's undertaking to pursue consequent prosecutions.
In this we can take a certain pride – compared with other countries that cover up atrocities by their forces, we refuse to turn a blind eye towards crimes against humanity committed by our own.
Australia is under an international duty to investigate, and where appropriate to prosecute, suspected war criminals because it has ratified the statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC). If it does not, ADF suspects could face indictment in the Hague. But declarations by the Prime Minister and opposition leaders and commanders of the Defence Force demonstrate a determination far beyond this, to vindicate the moral values that were trashed by a perverted "warrior culture".
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Andrew Hastie: My great shame ... but our boys were left in degrading war
Former Special Air Services troop commander and federal Liberal MP Andrew Hastie has for the first time voiced his personal shame over the war crimes alleged to have been carried out by soldiers he served with in Afghanistan, but said people needed to understand the brutality of our longest-running war.
In a deeply personal account of his own time on the front line with the elite unit, the West Australian MP said the over-reliance on the elite unit in trying to fight a war without a visible victory had hardened the hearts of those sent to fight it.
“People lost their way,” Mr Hastie said.
“Many people want to know: how did this happen?
“First, we have forgotten basic truths about human nature that previous generations of Australians better understood.
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SAS must put honour before glory
‘Grieved’ and ‘shamed’ by the Brereton report, soldier turned federal Liberal MP Andrew Hastie says ‘we ignored the true nature of war and sanitised it’.
By Andrew Hastie
November 23, 2020
Red rocky earth cut into our flesh, numbing our hands. It was well after midnight, perhaps 3am. Floodlights lit up the group.
Cadence push-ups on bleeding knuckles in the dead of night is the sort of misery that either consumes you, or clarifies your sense of mission.
Corporal Ben Roberts-Smith, fresh back from the Battle of Tizak, towered over us, the 25 officer candidates on the 2010 Special Air Service Regiment selection course, his displeasure writ large in his menacing body language. He switched out our hand position from palms down to knuckles.
“You f..king officers. You always take the easy option. Lower. Hold!”
An eternity passed as our fatigued muscles trembled close to the ground.
“Raise!”
The irony might have been lost on him, but not on me. Humbling myself before Ben Roberts-Smith was not easy. Nor would be serving in the SASR in the weeks, months and years ahead. SASR selection is an exacting experience. For an officer, your command, leadership and character is closely scrutinised for 21 days. They break down your body to see who you really are and what you are like when you’re tired, hungry and dejected.
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https://www.afr.com/companies/energy/let-s-get-on-with-it-urges-energy-chief-20201124-p56hfb
'Let's get on with it', urges energy chief
Mark Ludlow and Angela Macdonald-Smith
Nov 24, 2020 – 7.30pm
Energy Security Board chair Kerry Schott has told governments and energy companies to "get on with it" and push through desperately needed reforms to the National Electricity Market to deal with the transition to a low-emissions economy.
While NSW's new energy infrastructure plan continued to divide governments, regulators and energy companies, Dr Schott warned politicians not to get in the way of the clean energy revolution transforming the power system.
She said the redesign of the post-2025 NEM – to deal with the influx of renewables and gradual exit of coal-fired power – was unstoppable.
"I would stress that the change going on is profound and urge everyone to calm down and let's get on with it," she told The Australian Financial Review Energy & Climate Summit on Tuesday.
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Sovereign Australia is free to choose both China and America
Being forced to make a binary choice between China and US in not in Australia's national interest. Our major trade and alliance partners both need to respect that.
Scott Morrison Contributor
Nov 25, 2020 – 12.00am
We are confronted by a range of formidable challenges.
After a "unipolar moment" lasting just two or three decades, a new era of geopolitical competition is under way.
It is a form of geopolitical contest different from the Cold War. The world is not divided into two blocs, each with their own economic realm. Our world is one shaped by decades of growing economic interdependence.
At its peak during the Cold War, trade between the two major superpowers was around $2 billion a year. Today, the value of bilateral trade between the United States and China is $2 billion a day.
Today, the two biggest powers are the largest or second largest trading partners for most of the world.
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Extent of universities' reliance on international students laid bare
Robert Bolton Education editor
Nov 25, 2020 – 12.01am
Universities earned more than $10 billion in international student fees in 2019 – a record 27 per cent of their revenue – but as a consequence when the data for 2020 and 2021 is released universities will show "a fall from a great height", says commentator Andrew Norton.
Two universities, Monash and Sydney, raked in more than a billion dollars each from fee-paying overseas students in 2019. International students contributed more than $3.5 billion in fees alone to the Victorian economy, and $3.3 billion to NSW.
The 2019 Financial Report for Higher Education Providers was published by the government on Wednesday.
The collapse in international student business in 2020 has damaged the sector, leading to up to 11,000 job losses and a shortfall of more that $4 billion in money for research.
Professor Norton, who analyses higher education for the Australian National University, said international students "filled the gap" when Commonwealth funding dropped.
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Australia's lending laws are overdue for an overhaul
By Anna Bligh
November 25, 2020 — 11.00am
They say a week is a long time in politics. If that’s true – eleven years is an eternity.
That’s how long it’s been since the Australian parliament passed the National Consumer Credit Protection Act to "modernise Australia’s consumer credit laws".
It was 2009; smack in the middle of the fallout from the global financial crisis. So this law was touted as an important piece of reform. To quote Chris Bowen, the then Minister for Financial Services, Superannuation and Corporate Law: "This piece of legislation will—for the first time in our country’s history—provide for one, single, standard and uniform regime for consumer credit regulation and oversight."
The problem is, it hasn’t.
In the years since, it has been over-run by hundreds of pages of guidance and expectations, different rules across different regulators, and new consumer protections introduced before and after the Royal Commission.
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Retirement Income Review: Don't hold your breath while you wait for change
Noel Whittaker
Money columnist
November 24, 2020 — 10.00pm
Treasury's long-awaited Retirement Income Review was delivered to much fanfare.
The latest in a long list of inquiries into our retirement system, what made this 638-page opus unusual is that it made no recommendations – it just provided information.
However, don’t hold your breath for any of the ideas it floated to see the light of day, if past experience is any guide.
Remember the Henry tax review? That report, commissioned by the Rudd government in 2008 and released in 2010, contained no less than 138 recommendations, most of which have been ignored. Those that were were changed almost beyond recognition.
Then, in 2014, we had the 320-page Murray report into our financial system, which made 44 recommendations, most of which failed to fly.
In 2015, the Committee for Economic Development of Australia published a comprehensive paper titled The Super Challenge of Retirement Income Policy.
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Hopes China row has cooled after nod to Scott Morrison’s ‘positive comments’
Beijing has acknowledged Scott Morrison’s “positive comments” about China in a sign the seven-month diplomatic spat with Australia’s biggest trading partner may be cooling.
“China noticed Prime Minister Morrison’s positive comments on the global influence of China’s economic growth and China’s poverty alleviation efforts,” said foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian on Tuesday evening in Beijing.
“We hope Australia will make independent, objective, sensible choices that serve its own interests,” the foreign ministry spokesperson said at a daily press conference.
Those comments were a notable change from the bombastic tone Chinese foreign ministry has used about the Morrison government since April when it enraged Xi Jinping’s administration by Australia’s championing an inquiry into the origins of the coronavirus.
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https://www.afr.com/world/asia/no-wonder-china-is-confused-by-us-20201124-p56hlq
No wonder China is confused by us
China has changed since 2012. But the Australian government's messaging seems to have changed even more.
James Laurenceson Contributor
Nov 25, 2020 – 4.37pm
Prime Minister Scott Morrison said in June that on China his government had “done nothing to injure that partnership – nothing at all”.
This week, he attributed worsening tensions to “some misunderstandings”. To be precise, China’s misunderstandings.
This is a strikingly one-sided reading of developments.
Meanwhile, spare a thought for the 8184 local businesses that sold 461,027 consignments to China last year. Encouraged by successive Australian governments, they have invested millions of dollars of their own money and spent years building connections to the world’s fastest growing market. That access is now at risk.
Trade delivers one in five Australian jobs. And in the year to October, China’s share of Australia’s goods trade hit a record high of 35.1 per cent.
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Landmark NSW energy bill passes after more than 30 hours of debate
By Alexandra Smith
November 25, 2020 — 6.28pm
The Berejiklian government's landmark renewable energy bill has passed the NSW upper house after more than 30 hours of continuous debate amid a concerted effort from One Nation to block it.
One Nation leader Mark Latham moved to stymie the legislation by introducing 249 amendments, which forced the upper house to sit around the clock from 11am on Tuesday.
The final vote on the Electricity Infrastructure Investment Bill passed about 5.45pm on Wednesday, almost 31 hours later.
NSW Energy Minister Matt Kean said the passing of the bill was a "historic victory for the people of NSW" and every member of Parliament who supported the bill "deserves credit".
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https://www.afr.com/policy/foreign-affairs/morrison-has-misread-china-20201126-p56i2f
Morrison has misread China
The Prime Minister thinks he can set the terms with Beijing. But hard choices and compromises are required to manage our region's ruthless great power.
Hugh White Contributor
Nov 26, 2020 – 12.21pm
We should not be surprised that Australia is finding it hard to get our relations with China right, because we have never encountered a country like this before.
China today is a ruthless country determined to use its growing power to expand its influence and reshape our region to suit its interests, with little if any regard for the interests of others. But it is also a country that we must learn to work with, and not just because no other country will offer anything like the same export opportunities in the years and decades ahead.
As our region’s strongest state by far, it will do more than any other country to shape Asia diplomatically and strategically, with huge consequences for our future security and influence.
That means China is more important to us in more ways than any country has ever been, except for our great allies Britain and America, and China is not in any sense an ally, let alone a "mate". There will never be any sentimental ballast in this relationship, from either side – just the cold, hard calculus of advantage.
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Why Rudd is wrong about Australia's climate isolation
The former PM say greenhouse gas inaction risks making us a global pariah. In reality, Australia's technology-first approach to cutting carbon emissions is setting an example for the world.
Dave Sharma Contributor
Nov 26, 2020 – 12.54pm
One of the curious features of domestic political debate in Australia is the naive assumption that the rest of the world devotes a great deal of time scrutinising Australian policy.
This is usually quickly followed by claims that Australia faces international isolation unless we embrace the particular policy being advocated.
Kevin Rudd was at it this week, warning us hysterically that we risked becoming a global pariah unless we embraced his preferred energy policies. Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese made the unsubstantiated claim a few weeks back that, with a Biden administration in the United States, Australia was now "isolated" on climate change.
The idea that other nations spend much time focused on Australian policy is a vanity.
Like Australia, they are overwhelmingly focused on domestic issues. And to the extent they think about us, the Australian reputation internationally is overwhelmingly a positive one. We are seen as a constructive nation which does good in the world.
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Multi-country talks secure Kylie Moore-Gilbert's release
Andrew Tillett Political correspondent
Nov 26, 2020 – 6.18pm
High level talks to free Melbourne academic Kylie Moore-Gilbert involved Israel and Thailand as part of a complex prisoner swap that led to the release of three terrorists who had tried to kill Israeli diplomats.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison refused to confirm details of the exchange after lengthy negotiations secured Dr Moore-Gilbert's release more than two years after she was accused of being a spy and jailed.
Dr Moore-Gilbert, 33, is on her way back home on a chartered flight. She will be required to undergo 14 days hotel quarantine upon her return, though she will be allowed to receive support during that time as she adjusts back to everyday life.
Mr Morrison, who spoke to Dr Moore-Gilbert, hailed her release as a "miracle" as he condemned the Iranian regime's use of "hostage diplomacy" to gain leverage in the west.
"The detention of Australians for no reason that can be substantiated is just not on," he said.
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Australian academic traded for Thai bomb plot prisoners
By Anthony Galloway and Rachael Dexter
Updated November 26, 2020 — 11.18amfirst published at 10.46am
Three Iranian men linked to a botched 2012 bomb plot in Bangkok have been released by Thai authorities in exchange for Australian-British academic Kylie Moore-Gilbert, who has been detained in Iran for more than two years.
The Cambridge University-educated 33-year-old, who was freed on Thursday morning, was picked up at Tehran airport while leaving the country after attending an academic conference in 2018.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has said he is "thrilled and relieved" by the news that jailed Australian woman Kylie Moore-Gilbert has been released by Iran.
Dr Moore-Gilbert, who most recently worked as a lecturer in Islamic studies at the University of Melbourne, was sent to Tehran's Evin prison, convicted of spying and sentenced to 10 years behind bars. She vehemently denied the charges and maintained her innocence.
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Netflix to face local content quota under proposed Australian TV reforms
By Lisa Visentin and Zoe Samios
November 27, 2020 — 12.00am
Netflix and other global streaming services could be forced to spend millions of dollars on Australian programs and films under major changes to media laws proposed by the federal government that could level the regulatory playing field with free-to-air TV networks.
The government is also considering scrapping annual broadcast spectrum taxes for commercial TV networks and replacing them with a new licensing regime which could save broadcasters up to $12 million each year.
Federal Communications and Arts Minister Paul Fletcher, who will launch a green paper with the proposed reforms on Friday, said the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic had reinforced the need for regulatory action to help the TV industry.
"What we are proposing would rebalance Australia's media regulations so that the industry can continue to support jobs, connect communities, and keep Australian stories on our screens regardless of whether they prefer to watch free-to-air television, subscription television or video-on-demand services," Mr Fletcher said.
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Australian coal flotilla stuck off the Chinese coast tops 80 ships
The Australian coal flotilla stuck off the Chinese coast has swollen to more than 80 ships carrying blacklisted cargo worth more than $1.1bn, prompting the Morrison government to raise concerns about “discriminatory action”.
The Australian can also reveal coal exports to China have plunged by 96 per cent in the first three weeks of November, as a go-slow by Chinese officials crunches the nation’s second biggest export industry.
Trade Minister Simon Birmingham said reports of the growing delays had raised the government’s concerns about the trade practices China was deploying. “We are working closely with the industry as well as seeking assurances and clarity from Chinese authorities that this is not discriminatory action against Australian coal,” he said.
“We reiterate that all terms of our free-trade agreement and world trade obligations between Australia and China should be upheld and respected.”
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Trading Day: Stocks slip as China moves hit Treasury Wine
Welcome to the Trading Day blog for Friday, November 27. Australian stocks were lower at midday, dragged down by Treasury Wine Estates after reports of China moves against Australian winemakers, and despite a Bega Cheese surge. However the ASX remained on course to end the week ahead.
Eli Greenblat 27 November, 2020 | 1.03pm
Winemakers probe China dumping claim
Australia’s $45 billion wine industry is seeking clarification from the Chinese government’s Ministry of Commerce over an announcement posted to its website that suggests winemakers have been found guilty of dumping wine in China and harming its local industry.
A statement on the ministry’s website, in Chinese, states that preliminary findings have found Australia engaged in dumping of cheap wine.
It puts at risk $1.3 billion a year in exports of Australian wine to China and comes as Australia faces a number of damaging trade disputes with the country. Eighty coal ships are stuck offshore as customs authorities at Chinese ports decline to process them, while Australian seafood and commodities such as timber and cotton have also been blocked.
The Ministry of Commerce statement also reveals the Chinese government will take action against imported Australian wine, likely tariffs. However it is unclear what that action could be and the size of any tariffs placed on Australian wine.
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Australia slams China's trade thuggery after wine hit job
Andrew Tillett and Simon Evans
Nov 27, 2020 – 5.51pm
Trade Minister Simon Birmingham has accused China of a "deliberate strategy" of using trade sanctions to politically punish Australia after Beijing imposed tariffs of up to 212 per cent on Australian wine, which he warns will destroy the viability of a $1.3 billion export market.
Senator Birmingham said China went against both the terms of the China-Australia free trade agreement and World Trade organisation rules by imposing anti-dumping duties.
It is the first time the government has publicly linked the succession of trade strikes against Australian exporters – which also includes bans on lobster, beef, cotton and timber exports, delaying delivery of coal shipments and punitive tariffs on barley – to the hostile relationship between Canberra and Beijing.
The announcement of the tariffs left winemakers scrambling and triggered a trading halt for Treasury Wine Estates, with its shares plunging 11.3 per cent to $9.23 before trading was halted.
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https://www.afr.com/world/asia/china-cannot-have-it-both-ways-on-trade-20201127-p56igk
China cannot have it both ways on trade
Beijing's tactic of using trade as a political stick against Australia will not impress the rest of the world.
Natasha Kassam Contributor
Nov 27, 2020 – 11.02am
It is getting hard to believe China’s leaders when they say the country "will hold high the banner of free trade and multilateralism". China has paraded the ASEAN-led Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, and this week Xi Jinping floated the idea of joining the resurrected Trans-Pacific Partnership.
In the same breath, China is targeting exports from 13 Australian industries worth $54 billion, almost entirely outside of established mechanisms for trade disputes. This contradiction is indicative of many others that are exposing weaknesses in China’s strategy.
As much as China’s officials claim that the delays on Australian exports are in line with quality procedures, anti-dumping regulations and quotas, the now-famed list of "14 grievances" tell another story. The Chinese embassy’s list of irritations was lengthy, spanning concerns from foreign investment decisions to unfriendly media reporting.
None of this is surprising to Australians; Chinese government officials and state-owned media alike have complained about all of these issues in real time, very loudly.
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The submarine project is drifting into very deep water
Andrew Tillett Political correspondent
Nov 27, 2020 – 3.26pm
When you live with the threat of invasion permanently hovering over your head, it tends to focus the mind.
Taiwan this week began construction on its homegrown submarine. The island's navy has ordered eight-diesel electric boats, with delivery of the first due in 2024.
In contrast, Australia will have to wait until the mid 2030s until it gets the first of its new submarines, similarly diesel-electric propelled.
Taiwan's actions – it currently operates a fleet of four submarines, two of which date back to the 1940s – is part of the arms race by Asian nations to expand their submarine operations.
US satellite imagery last month showed a Chinese shipyard being extended to accommodate construction of more nuclear-powered submarines. Japan last month launched the first of its new class of submarines. And South Korea launched the second of its large submarines, joining the club of nations able to design and build its own submarines.
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Making retirees spend all their money 'next major battleground'
Ronald Mizen Reporter
Nov 27, 2020 – 5.11pm
Convincing retirees to draw down on superannuation and eat into the equity of the family home to fund their golden years will be the next major policy battleground, industry leaders say.
While conceding the short-term question of increasing the super guarantee rate from 9.5 to 12 per cent was an easy political decision, the long-term structural issue that needed to be addressed was one of retiree behaviour.
Former ASIC deputy chairman Jeremy Cooper said while encouraging people to draw down on their accumulated wealth in retirement might be good public policy, "several million retirees completely disagree."
"It doesn't matter whether they disagree through biases or misinformation, but they're deliberately and purposefully conserving that capital, and there's your battleground," he said.
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How Australia negotiated the release of Kylie Moore-Gilbert from Iran
By Anthony Galloway
November 28, 2020 — 5.00am
Scott Morrison was in The Lodge in Canberra on Wednesday night when he received a phone call from his senior policy adviser with the news the Prime Minister had been sweating on for the past year. Australian academic Kylie-Moore Gilbert had been freed by Iran after more than two years in some of the world's most notorious prisons.
Morrison, still in quarantine following a trip to Japan the week prior, reacted with nothing short of "pure joy".
After 804 days, Australian academic Kylie Moore-Gilbert has been released from an Iranian jail in a prisoner swap.
Moore-Gilbert, a Melbourne University lecturer, was not only out of jail but out of Iran – on the very same plane that had an hour earlier dropped off three Iranian men who had been jailed in Thailand over a 2012 bombing in Bangkok.
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Men who hate women and their online refuge of scoundrels
Julia Baird
Journalist, broadcaster, historian and author
November 28, 2020 — 12.00am
When I started hosting a TV show, I didn’t expect that every day when I signed off and returned to my computer, there’d be a message from a bloke telling me which particular implement or technique he’d employ to anally rape me, but there it was. I have now grown so used to threats of violence I often forget to report them. To do so often seems only to be trimming leaves from a weed, or playing an unwinnable game of whack-a-mole.
For others it’s much, much worse. For women of colour particularly. Some men receive foul abuse, especially Indigenous and Muslim men, but for women it is particularly virulent and violent. And there is growing evidence such threats are increasingly being acted on offline. So why don’t we take it more seriously?
This week, a new survey of international media workers released by the International Centre for Journalists and UNESCO found almost three in four women had experienced online abuse, harassment, threats and attacks. Crucially, one in five women had been abused and attacked offline, in ways “they believe were connected with online violence they had experienced”. And evidence suggests this abuse has grown worse during the pandemic.
Every time this happens to me, people tell me to get off social media. This is not the answer. Those scrotes will simply place another woman in the crosshairs.
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Bowen tells Labor faithful the path back to government is through the suburbs
By Rob Harris
November 28, 2020 — 12.00am
Opposition frontbencher Chris Bowen says Labor must do better to embrace the aspirations of suburban Australians if it has any chance of returning to government following three successive federal election losses.
Mr Bowen, viewed among colleagues as a future leadership candidate, will tell his party's faithful in NSW on Saturday that as the federal opposition grapples with an identity crisis, it must not think it faces a choice between appealing to inner-city voters or those in regional Australia.
The federal caucus has been bitterly divided over the question of climate targets during the past 12 months. Veteran frontbencher Joel Fitzgibbon quit his resources portfolio earlier this month, warning the party would further alienate its blue-collar working base if it pushed for deeper cuts in carbon emissions.
Mr Bowen, a member of the influential NSW Right faction and former shadow treasurer to Bill Shorten, said he was frustrated at the debate over the future policy direction of the party.
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Coronavirus And Impacts.
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Learnings from the pizza box: build trust, not fear
The lie "that broke the camel's back" and threw South Australia into lockdown has shone a light on the difficult business of getting by in Australia's black economy.
Jill Margo Health editor
Nov 22, 2020 – 5.56pm
South Australia’s contact tracing episode has drawn attention to an issue that could potentially disrupt control of COVID-19.
It has highlighted the tension between public health policy imperatives and legal imperatives and the difficulty deciding which should receive priority in a pandemic.
The current narrative is that a single lie from a man who worked in a pizza bar sent 1.7 million residents into a six-day lockdown. The lie was exposed and the lockdown was reversed on the weekend.
That other factors influenced the decision to lockdown was made clear when the SA Police Commissioner, Grant Stevens, described the man’s deception as “the straw that broke the camel's back".
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'How sweet it is': Sutton savours end of second wave as Queensland eyes opening border to Victorians
By Rachael Dexter and Craig Butt
Updated November 24, 2020 — 11.20am first published at 7.51am
Victoria's second COVID-19 wave has officially ended after a man in his 90s was discharged from hospital on Monday, leaving the state with no active cases for the first time in almost nine months.
Monash Health confirmed the man, who has been treated at Monash Medical Centre for more than three weeks alongside his wife, was discharged on Monday evening.
Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has welcomed the news that there are now zero active coronavirus cases in the state.
In another major shift towards COVID-normal, Victorians could be able to enter Queensland from next week.
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Evidence builds that an early mutation made the pandemic harder to stop
By James Glanz, Benedict Carey and Hannah Beech
November 25, 2020 — 2.09am
As the coronavirus swept across the world, it picked up random alterations to its genetic sequence. Like meaningless typos in a script, most of those mutations made no difference in how the virus behaved.
However, one mutation near the beginning of the pandemic did make a difference, multiple new findings suggest, helping the virus spread more easily from person to person and making the pandemic harder to stop.
The mutation, known as 614G, was first spotted in eastern China in January and then spread quickly throughout Europe and New York City. Within months, the variant took over much of the world, displacing other variants.
For months, scientists have been fiercely debating why. Researchers at Los Alamos National Laboratory argued in May that the variant had probably evolved the ability to infect people more efficiently. Many were sceptical, arguing that the variant may have been simply lucky, appearing more often by chance in large epidemics, like Northern Italy's, that seeded outbreaks elsewhere.
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The sick global economy needs more than a vaccine
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
November 25, 2020 — 9.00am
The vaccines from Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca have pulled forward the expected timetable of global economic and financial recovery by roughly a month to six weeks. They reduce the period of maximum damage to the productive base of the economy, and therefore lower the risk of dangerous metastasis. The mere prospect of vaccines amounts to economic stimulus. It lifts output through confidence channels and helps to unlock frozen investment.
The breakthroughs are a superb scientific achievement. Ten years' work has been packed into 10 months.
Yet the vaccines come too late to stop Wave Two of COVID-19 sweeping through the G7 economic bloc this northern hemisphere winter. They will not avert a certain double-dip recession in Europe, or a partial double-dip in America, or clear away the legacy cost of soaring corporate and public debt ratios.
Nor do they change the market calculus significantly. Most banks and hedge funds had already priced in a successful vaccine for early 2021. Equity investors have already pocketed much of the implied relief.
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What the world can learn from the COVID-19 pandemic
Coronavirus has been a far more devastating shock than economists expected, and there are already important lessons on how to manage better in the future.
Martin Wolf Columnist
Nov 25, 2020 – 11.08am
The most important single thing we have learnt from COVID-19 is how much damage may be done by a relatively mild pandemic by long-term historical standards.
To call it mild is not to belittle the suffering it has caused, and will continue to cause, before an effective vaccination program is rolled out and sustained globally. But COVID-19 has demonstrated a social and economic vulnerability far greater than experts imagined. It is important to understand why this is the case and learn how to manage the impact of such diseases better in future.
In a recent paper, David Cutler and Lawrence Summers of Harvard estimate the total cost of COVID-19 to the US alone at $US16 trillion ($21.7 trillion). This amounts to 75 per cent of a year’s US gross domestic product.
Almost half of this is the cumulative value of lost GDP estimated by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office. The rest is the cost of premature death and impairment of physical and mental health, according to values customarily used for the world’s richest big economy. The total cost is, they judge, four times that of the recession after the 2008 financial crisis. If the cost to the world were also to be 75 per cent of annual GDP, it would be around $US96 trillion, at purchasing power parity exchange rates. That is almost certainly an overestimate. Nevertheless, the cost is huge.
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No vaccine for a US economy that's sicker than it looks
A likely end to the pandemic next year has not relieved the pressures building up for a double-dip recession in the US.
Stephen Roach Contributor
Nov 25, 2020 – 2.18pm
Suddenly, there is a credible case for a vaccine-led economic recovery. Modern science has delivered what must certainly be one of the greatest miracles of my long lifetime. Just as COVID-19 dragged the world economy into the sharpest and deepest recession on record, an equally powerful symmetry on the upside now seems possible.
If only it were that easy. With COVID-19 still raging – and rates of infection, hospitalisation, and death now spiralling out of control (again) – the near-term risks to economic activity have tipped decidedly to the downside in the US and Europe. The combination of pandemic fatigue and the politicisation of public health practices has come into play at precisely the moment when the long-anticipated second wave of COVID-19 is at hand.
Unfortunately, this fits the script of the dreaded double-dip recession that I warned of recently. The bottom-line bears repeating: apparent economic recoveries in the US have given way to relapses in eight of the 11 business cycles since World War II. The relapses reflect two conditions: lingering vulnerability from the recession itself and the likelihood of aftershocks. Unfortunately, both conditions have now been satisfied.
Vulnerability is hardly debatable. Notwithstanding the record 33 per cent annualised snapback in real GDP growth in the third quarter of this year, the US economy was still 3.5 per cent below its previous peak in the fourth quarter of 2019. With the exception of the 4 per cent peak-to-trough decline during the 2008-09 global financial crisis, the current 3.5 per cent gap is as large as that recorded in the depths of every other post-1945 US recession.
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Climate Change
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Electricity road map will power prosperity
In a low-carbon world, renewable energy is an economic opportunity NSW is seizing by supporting investments that keep prices down and the lights on.
Matt Kean Contributor
Nov 22, 2020 – 2.05pm
For more than a decade, Australian politics has been ravaged by the climate wars, dividing the country between those focused on the economy and those focused on addressing climate change.
But two things have changed since the climate wars began.
First, the cost of renewables has plummeted. Wind and solar are now the cheapest form of energy and, according to the Australian Energy Market Operator and the CSIRO, they are the cheapest form of reliable energy when backed up by pumped hydro (which stores energy by pumping water up a hill when electricity is cheap and generates electricity by letting the water run down the hill when it is expensive).
Second, the global economy is decarbonising. China has committed to net zero emissions by 2060. South Korea and Japan recently committed to net zero emissions by 2050, joining allies such as Britain, New Zealand, France and Germany.
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Royal Commissions And The Like.
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National Budget Issues.
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Abandoning super increases just the start of retirement rethink
The 648-page myth-busting superannuation review is a once in a generation chance to ignore vested interest and reset Australia's retirement income policy assumptions.
Brendan Coates Contributor
Nov 22, 2020 – 12.29pm
It’s more than a quarter of a century since the Keating government introduced a retirement-incomes package in 1992 and Vince Fitzgerald reported on national savings in 1993. Ever since, Australia’s retirement incomes policy has been dominated by their assumptions.
A generation of policy thinkers assumed that people won’t have enough money in retirement and that the federal budget will not be able to maintain the age pension, which in any case would leave many impoverished. That thinking has guided the push for higher compulsory superannuation contributions, and support for generous superannuation tax breaks to top-up workers’ retirement savings.
But the Morrison government’s 648-page Retirement Income Review, the July 2020 final report released on Friday, should force many to confront these long-held shibboleths.
First, the review finds that our retirement system is delivering for most Australians.
Most workers today can look forward to a standard of living in retirement that’s on par with their standard of living while working, and often higher. The typical single worker can expect to replace 88 per cent of their pre-retirement earnings, and the typical couple 82 per cent, well above the 65-to-75 per cent benchmark nominated by the review. Even most Australians who work part-time or have broken work histories will hit this benchmark.
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Eslake changes view on 12pc super rise
Jonathan Shapiro and Tom McIlroy
Nov 22, 2020 – 6.28pm
The increase in the super guarantee should be scrapped to aid a jobs-led recovery, say experts and economists, raising further questions about Labor's dogged defence of the legislated increase despite the evidence presented by the Callaghan review's final report.
The Grattan Institute's Brendan Coates said a clear implication of the review was that the increases "should be abandoned" as the report showed workers were saving about the right amount to maintain living standards in retirement.
"Why force them to save more than is necessary?" Mr Coates told The Australian Financial Review.
The findings of Friday's Retirement Income Review final report were backed by analysis separately compiled by the Grattan Institute and the Reserve Bank that concluded that workers would pay for the compulsory super increases via lower growth in wages.
"Workers’ weaker bargaining power at a time of high unemployment makes it more likely, not less, that they will pay for higher super," Mr Coates said.
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'Cushioning the decline': RBA finds JobKeeper saved 700,000 jobs
By Jennifer Duke
November 23, 2020 — 12.27pm
The Reserve Bank estimates another 700,000 workers would have lost their jobs during the first six months of the coronavirus-induced recession if the federal government had not introduced the $101.3 billion JobKeeper scheme.
A research paper from RBA economists James Bishop and Iris Day released on Monday found the wage subsidy scheme, introduced at the height of the pandemic to help businesses pay staff, supported 3.5 million people at 900,000 businesses between April and July 2020. They estimated that of these people, one in five would have been made unemployed without the government assistance, pushing the jobless rate 5 percentage points higher to about 12 per cent.
"We find that JobKeeper played an important role in cushioning the decline in employment over the first half of 2020," the report said.
"The actual fall in employment over the first half of 2020 was 650,000. As such, our estimates imply that overall employment losses would have been twice as large over this period without JobKeeper."
The first six months of the scheme cost $70 billion and the RBA found, on the assumption a similar number of roles were saved over the full period, the cost of saving each job was $100,000.
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Withdrawing super for first home a very good investment, says Bernie Fraser
By Jennifer Duke
November 23, 2020 — 7.00pm
Former Reserve Bank governor Bernie Fraser says low-income workers should be allowed to withdraw some of their superannuation early to buy a first home, while former prime minister Kevin Rudd, super funds and Labor warn such a scheme would push property prices higher.
Liberal MP Tim Wilson and a group of like-minded senators and backbenchers including Liberal MP John Alexander and senators Andrew Bragg and Gerard Rennick want home ownership considered a retirement priority and workers able to tap into super for a deposit.
Mr Wilson launched a campaign on Monday lobbying for housing to take precedence over super following the release of a 638-page review of the retirement system that repeatedly referred to the financial benefits of owning a home.
Mr Fraser said he saw a good case for enabling people to draw upon part of their super to buy a home when they might otherwise not be able to afford a deposit.
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Deep flaws were built into compulsory superannuation
It’s a pretty lame joke, the one about the bloke asking for directions to Dublin. But the punchline — that this is not a good place to start — has become a metaphor for many public policy failings.
While the principles that should apply to good public policy in particular areas are well understood, the starting point — a starting point that itself is often the result of decades-old government decisions — will mean it’s not always possible to implement those principles.
Retirement incomes policy illustrates this. The combination of a means-tested Age Pension and compulsory superannuation with generous tax concessions results in a costly system generating a number of inequities, albeit one that broadly generates adequate retirement incomes.
It’s a great deal for the superannuation funds and the sub-industries that hang off them — but that shouldn’t be an objective of policy.
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Review shows how super can change for the better
The Callaghan review provides a platform to rise above a highly partisan superannuation debate and find the best ways for older Australians to use all their assets more efficiently to secure lifetime financial security.
Nov 26, 2020 – 12.00am
The compulsory superannuation system has been good for Australia. The $3 trillion superannuation pool has become the nation’s largest source of capital formation. As Paul Keating says, it has allowed Australians to own more equity in the global economy than the rest of the world owns in Australia.
That provides useful macroeconomic ballast for a commodity-exporting nation. Forcing people to save 9.5 per cent of their salaries is a serious imposition on individual choice. But it can be justified as correcting the under-saving encouraged by the moral hazard of a government-guaranteed age pension, and for practically supporting comfortable living standards for older Australians.
Hence the importance of the Retirement Income Review led by former Treasury official Mike Callaghan. The resulting 648-page report should provide a platform to rise above a highly partisan debate, the legacy of Labor’s decision to embed compulsory super within industrial relations awards that, by default, have channelled contributions into union-dominated industry funds.
The most heated part of this debate is over the review’s questioning of the Labor-legislated staged increases in the superannuation guarantee to 12 per cent of salaries between July 1 next year and 2025. The point confirmed by the review’s commissioned research is that the increased super contributions effectively will come out of wages growth.
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New modelling predicts up to 1.75 million Aussies tipped into housing stress when Jobseeker ends
Frightening new modelling predicts unemployment could rise to more than 15 per cent in 2021.
Ellen Ransley
NCA NewsWire
November 26, 202010:19am
More than 1.7 million Australians could be unemployed in 2021 once the government’s COVID-19 financial assistance ends, according to frightening new modelling.
The report, from the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute (AHURI) says total unemployment could peak at 15.1 per cent next year under the most severe of three scenarios modelled.
Even the mildest indicates more than one million, or 8.7 per cent, would be left jobless.
As of October, the Australian Bureau of Statistics estimates 960,900, or 7 per cent, are unemployed.
The modelling, undertaken by researchers from the University of Adelaide and Curtin University, found at least 103,500 households went into “housing affordability stress” as a result of the pandemic.
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Health Issues.
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Ramsay pledges to help with public system wait times globally
By Emma Koehn
November 24, 2020 — 11.01am
Ramsay Health Care boss Craig McNally says the $15 billion private hospital operator will work with governments across the world to offer its services to reduce public hospital wait times amid the COVID-19 recovery.
Mr McNally told investors in an address to the company's annual general meeting on Tuesday this cooperation could be in place for several years and boost patient volumes across Ramsay's networks.
"We believe these opportunities could deliver additional volumes over several years as the world gradually learns to live with the virus and hopefully in time a vaccine becomes widely available," he said.
Earlier this month Ramsay warned investors it could not give earnings guidance and was facing "volatile" conditions as Australia returned to "COVID-normal", while the company's European and British operations grappled with second waves of the virus.
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McGorry's Headspace may lose privileged position
Jill Margo Health editor
Nov 26, 2020 – 12.00am
The privileged position occupied by Headspace has come under threat in the Productivity Commission’s mental health report, which describes the benefits of the psychological therapy services it offers to young clients as "small".
Headspace, the flagship mental health service for Australians aged 12-25 founded by former Australian of the Year Professor Patrick McGorry, has 125 centres across the country that act as one-stop shops for those needing help with mental health and other life issues.
Headspace is at the heart of the government’s vision for youth primary mental health services, says Health Minister Greg Hunt.
Government bodies that allocate primary mental health funding are bound to buy $163 million in services from these centres. Rather than being automatically entitled to these funds, the report suggests Headspace centres prove their worth.
It recommends the government bodies, known as Primary Health Networks or PHNs, be liberated from the obligation to fund Headspace and be free to choose services they judge best suited to their regions.
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Pandemic highlights need for new dawn in healthcare
As 2020 draws to a close, the big theme of the year for policymakers, investors, economists, scientists and ordinary people has been healthcare.
From vaccines to PPE (which has now passed into the popular lexicon) to disease testing to digital medical services, 2020 has accelerated the focus on a sector that was already skyrocketing with an ageing population.
Companies such as Massachusetts-based biotech Moderna that were little known earlier this year are now front-page news.
The Nasdaq-listed Moderna has soared from just below $US18 a share early in the year through the $US100 mark on news of this month of its development of a COVID-19 vaccine and is now trading around $US98.
New York pharmaceutical company Pfizer, better known to some as the developer of Viagra, is now famous for its involvement in another COVID-19 vaccine.
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International Issues.
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'Like Frankenstein's monster': judge throws out Trump's best hope
Mark Scolforo and Colleen Long
Updated Nov 22, 2020 – 4.14pm, first published at 12.54pm
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania | A federal judge issued a scathing order dismissing Donald Trump's futile effort to block the certification of votes in Pennsylvania, shooting down the President's best hope of overturning the election result.
The case was always a long shot to stop President-elect Joe Biden's inauguration, but was critical to Mr Trump’s campaign, mostly because of the number of electoral votes – 20 – at stake in Pennsylvania. His personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, stepped into a courtroom for the first time in decades to argue the case.
US District Court Judge Matthew Brann wrote in his order that Mr Trump had asked the court to disenfranchise almost 7 million voters.
“One might expect that when seeking such a startling outcome, a plaintiff would come formidably armed with compelling legal arguments and factual proof of rampant corruption," Brann wrote, so much that the court would have no option but to stop the certification even though it would impact so many people. “That has not happened.”
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Fed spat raises fears Trump wants to 'burn the house down'
Stephen Bartholomeusz
Senior business columnist
November 23, 2020 — 11.49am
Late last week something unusual, indeed probably unprecedented, occurred. The US Federal Reserve Board publicly disagreed with a decision by the US Treasury Secretary, Steve Mnuchin, instructing the US central bank to return all unused funds in the emergency loan facilities the US put in place when the pandemic caused turmoil in financial markets.
The funds are part of a $US454 billion ($620 billion) congressional appropriation that was a key element of the US response to the pandemic. They effectively underwrite any losses the Fed might incur from loans made to small businesses, companies and municipalities.
While only a very small number of loans – about $US25 billion have been made via the facilities - their existence is regarded as having played a major role in calming the markets when they were engulfed by panic in March as the severity of the coronavirus threat became clear.
Subsequently, markets settled, credit markets reopened, the cost of credit fell and the stress in bond markets disappeared. The existence of the facilities is credited as having played an important role in reassuring the markets and borrowers that the Fed had their backs.
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Donald Trump continues to challenge election results as legal options dwindle
Donald Trump’s campaign to prove massive election fraud is running out of time and support as more Republicans distance themselves and key states prepare to declare Joe Biden the winner.
It comes as the president-elect Joe Biden is set to announce his first Cabinet posts on Wednesday (AEDT), possibly including his secretaries of Treasury and for State.
As the president continued on his increasingly unlikely quest to overturn the election result, his ally and former Republican Governor of New Jersey Chris Christie slammed Mr Trump’s legal team as a ‘national embarrassment.’
“Elections have consequences and we cannot continue to act as if something happened here that didn’t happen,” Mr Christie said.
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America’s unfolding double tragedy
The double tragedy unfolding in the United States is like a horror movie that you can’t stop watching.
The two horrors – the blowout in COVID-19 cases and the collapse of national governance – are related, of course, but there is possibly more long-term damage being caused by the latter than the nearly 2000 deaths per day from the virus, as horrifying as that statistic is.
America’s 592 cases per day per million people is twice that of the next worst country, the UK, and seven times the global average, and there is no sign of that peaking or any reason to think it will.
With the incoming Biden administration being prevented from undertaking a normal transition, and unable to prepare to take over managing the pandemic on January 20, nothing will be done nationally until well after that. Goodness knows what the case numbers and deaths could be by the end of summer, or by the time a vaccine is widely available, whenever that might be.
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Might Taiwan be the next Franz Ferdinand moment?
Amid escalating US-China rivalry, Taiwan is considered the most likely trigger for a hot war. Should it occur, Australia would be caught on the horns of a dilemma.
By Alan Dupont
November 22, 2020
On June 28, 1914, the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir presumptive to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian empire, triggered the most destructive war in human history. Just 25 years later, Nazi Germany’s invasion of Poland, a middling European power, ignited a second global conflagration.
In the dystopian world of the 2030s, ravaged by war and pestilence, the last remaining students of the once vibrant discipline of history ponder their lecturer’s question. How could small, relatively insignificant Taiwan – denied even the trappings of statehood – have precipitated a cascading series of events that culminated in the outbreak of a third global conflict?
Improbable? Fanciful? Cold War thinking? Henry Kissinger disagrees. The 97-year-old doyen of hard-nosed realists and the architect of the 1972 US rapprochement with China recently warned that unless there is some basis for co-operative action between the two super powers “the world will slide into a catastrophe comparable to World War 1”.
As Australia’s intelligence community ponders the consequences of the worsening US-China rivalry, Taiwan is considered the most likely trigger for a hot war between them. Should it occur, Australia would be caught on the horns of a dilemma. Refusing to support Taiwan would anger Washington, calling into question our commitment to the ANZUS treaty and the whole alliance network that underpins our security. But sailing to the rescue of Taiwan would risk severing already strained ties with China.
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Trump's stunts push GOP towards boiling point
The US President is making life more difficult for those in the party who disagree with him: he could be acquiring firepower to contest the next election.
Daniel W. Drezner Contributor
Nov 23, 2020 – 2.57pm
Sophisticated readers are no doubt aware of the parable of how to boil a frog.
The key is not to put the frog in very hot water to start – it will jump out of the pot. Instead, put the frog in tepid water and turn up the heat very slowly. Then the frog boils without being able to perceive the slowly escalating threat.
For close to a decade, the GOP approached Donald Trump first as a problem that needed to be handled, then as a nominee who needed to be tolerated, then as a president who has been able to deliver some political and policy victories. Some Republicans bolted early, and even current Republicans will resist him when they think no one is looking. Most did not.
In the main, however, the GOP has passively enabled Trump's dubious legal efforts to resist Joe Biden's convincing election win earlier this month. A variety of logics have been proffered for Republican obeisance.
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https://www.afr.com/world/north-america/corporate-america-s-deal-with-the-devil-20201123-p56gzw
Corporate America’s deal with the devil
At first, big business wanted Donald Trump. But now he refuses to go and CEOs are desperate for Joe Biden to get things under control.
Rana Foroohar Contributor
Nov 23, 2020 – 10.32am
Last week, 30 chief executives of America’s top 100 largest companies hastily came together in an online dawn meeting to discuss US President Donald Trump’s unsupported claims that the US election had been “stolen” from him.
The executives were trying to figure out how to best leverage their personal and organisational influence to ensure a peaceful transition of power, a hallmark of the US political system. Some participants felt that worries of a potential coup were overblown. Others thought they weren’t. Most just wanted an end to election turmoil. Within days, other groups, like the US Chamber of Commerce, were calling for Mr Trump to stop delaying the transition. Business, as always, hates uncertainty.
Reading the news, I had conflicting feelings. On the one hand, I was glad business leaders were thinking about the importance of liberal democracy in America and how to defend it. I also couldn’t help but feel that some of the corporate concern was a bit “too little, too late”. Most big business trade groups had been supportive of the Trump administration when it was getting ready to pass what turned out to be the largest corporate tax cuts since the George W Bush era.
I also worried that, even if people like me were glad that business elites were finally taking seriously the disruption to the election process and, moreover, were thinking about how to ensure a smooth transition, there were still over 72 million people who voted for Mr Trump and some of them might not agree.
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https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/biden-needs-to-break-up-with-the-stock-market-20201124-p56hcs
Biden needs to break-up with the stock market
The extreme codependency between the market and President Donald Trump has led to collateral damage risks and unintended consequences.
Mohamed El-Erian Contributor
Nov 24, 2020 – 9.22am
As US president-elect Joe Biden contemplates his first 100 days in office, he should consider what can be done over time to reduce the extreme co-dependency that developed between his predecessor and the US stock market.
Mr Biden is unlikely to put this very high up on the list of challenges he faces. However, the longer he delays in deciding and communicating his approach, the greater the likelihood that he will confront the same dilemma the current leaders of the US Federal Reserve and European Central Bank faced early in their tenures. He might wish to do one thing and be forced into the opposite course of action.
Donald Trump believed, and repeatedly stated publicly that the stock market validated his policies as president. The more the market rose, the greater the affirmation of his “Make America Great Again” agenda.
The president’s approach was music to investors’ ears. They saw it as supporting, both directly and indirectly, the notion that policymakers needed asset prices to head ever higher. It reinforced the longstanding belief of a “Fed put” — shorthand for the view that the Fed will always step in to rescue the markets — to such an extent that investor conditioning changed markedly.
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Trump orders transfer of power, effectively conceding election
Jacob Greber United States correspondent
Nov 24, 2020 – 10.32am
Washington | Donald Trump has all but conceded the 2020 presidential election after approving the formal transition of the US government to Joe Biden's incoming administration.
Mr Trump said in a tweet late on Monday (Tuesday AEDT) that he has recommended the official in charge of triggering the transition to "do what needs to be done with regard to initial protocols, and have told my team to do the same."
He indicated that his appeals against the election result would continue and "I believe we will prevail!".
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Joe Biden picks former Fed chief Janet Yellen as Treasury Secretary
Jacob Greber United States correspondent
Nov 24, 2020 – 7.42am
Washington | Joe Biden has reportedly chosen Janet Yellen to be his most powerful economic policymaker, elevating the former Federal Reserve chair, reluctant interest rate hiker and pro-fiscal stimulus advocate into the Treasury Secretary role.
If confirmed, Dr Yellen would become become America's 78th Treasury Secretary and the first woman to hold that job, reinforcing Mr Biden's determination to break new ground with his cabinet.
The US dollar fell while US stocks rose almost 1 per cent as investors bet a Treasury under Dr Yellen would result in additional support for the pandemic-impacted US economy.
Mr Biden's decision was first reported by The Wall Street Journal on Monday (Tuesday AEDT) and backed up by other US media organisations just hours after the president-elect announced his top foreign policy and national security team.
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Resigned to the pandemic, Brits are now indifferent to the death toll
By Bevan Shields
London: When Boris Johnson announced England's second national shutdown on October 31, my phone lit up as family, friends and colleagues in Australia shared disbelief over Britain's mounting death toll and expressed sympathy about facing another lockdown.
They had good reason to raise the former - in the 25 days since, 8796 people have died from COVID-19 in the United Kingdom, and about 34,000 were admitted to hospital. While deaths are not spiking as sharply as earlier this year, they are high and likely to stay high for the next few months.
But my Australian friends needn't have worried about the latter because this lockdown has looked and felt nothing like the one in April and May. As cases climbed, the public largely carried on with life. Crowds rammed weekend markets at Greenwich and queued in long lines for the click-and-collect service at Apple's Covent Garden store. The line to get into Borough Market on Saturday snaked around the block.
They were out and about because the rules mostly allowed it. Lockdown 2.0 has been much less strict than the first and much less severe than Melbourne's shutdown even though the health situation is far worse.
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Americans had to wait 16 days for the lamest of backdowns
Following two weeks of politicking that was equal parts laughable and chilling, Donald Trump has run out of road to prove his claims the election was stolen.
Jacob Greber United States correspondent
Nov 24, 2020 – 3.50pm
Washington | Donald Trump’s non-conceding concession was – in the end – as pathetic and weak as it sounded.
Rather than fronting up with dignity to the basic reality that the jig is up on his presidency, Trump buried the historic news of his capitulation in two mealy-mouthed tweets.
History will record that he finally acknowledged his administration's end by portraying himself as doing the decent thing and allowing a put-upon bureaucratic functionary in charge of green-lighting transitions to give Joe Biden’s team a proper start.
“In the best interest of our Country,” Trump said he was recommending that Emily Murphy, administrator of the General Services Administration, “do what needs to be done with regard to initial protocols, and have told my team to do the same”.
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Cost of pandemic plunges British economy into deepest fall in 300 years
By Latika Bourke
November 26, 2020 — 7.32am
London: The last time the British economy contracted by 11 per cent, Captain Cook had still not been born.
On Tuesday night (AEDT) Chancellor Rishi Sunak, who has not even been in the job for 12 months, laid out the full historic context of the economic carnage caused by the coronavirus pandemic and the subsequent economic shutdowns in a speech which revealed the hit was unlike anything seen for 300 years.
They include an 11.3 per cent plunge in GDP in 2020, causing long-term economic scarring that would see 2.6 million people plunged into unemployment and the largest peacetime record in government borrowing, worth £394 billion ($706 billion), or 19 per cent of GDP.
Sunak said the economy's output would not return until it's pre-crisis levels until the end of 2022.
"And the economic damage is likely to be lasting," Sunak said.
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Britain’s economy shrinks most in 300 years
· The Times
Rishi Sunak said that Britain’s economic emergency had only just begun as the long-term damage that the pandemic has inflicted on growth, jobs and the public finances was laid bare.
The chancellor of the exchequer froze public sector pay and reduced foreign aid on Wednesday but must still find tens of billions in tax rises and spending cuts to stop debt from running out of control.
The independent budget watchdog said that the economy would be 11.3 per cent smaller this year than was forecast before COVID-19, the biggest fall for 300 years, and still 3 per cent smaller by 2025 owing to “long-term scarring”.
It is not forecast to return to 2019 levels until late in 2022, meaning that coronavirus has cost the country three years of growth, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR).
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Islamic State targets Africa in tectonic terror shift
· The Times
Islamic State terrorism is surging in Africa while in the western world the threat from far-right extremists has overtaken that from jihadists.
The 2020 Global Terrorism Index found that despite a fall in the global terrorist death toll for the fifth year running, Africa was suffering a dramatic increase in jihadist violence linked to Islamic State.
“The centre of gravity for Isis has now shifted to sub-Saharan Africa,” said Steve Killelea, founder of the Institute of Economic and Peace which produces the annual index. “Seven of the ten countries with the largest increases in terrorism all reside in sub-Saharan Africa.”
Isis violence has surged in Mozambique, Mali, Niger, Cameroon, Congo and Burkina Faso, the last of which registered an almost sixfold increase in deaths from terrorism. All are experiencing civil conflicts that Isis-linked groups have exploited.
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The assault on Biden’s presidency has already begun
Chris Zappone
Digital Foreign Editor
November 27, 2020 — 8.13am
Reality appeared to hit US President Donald Trump this week when the General Services Administration gave approval for the transfer of presidential power to Joe Biden to begin. But don't be fooled: reality will not be where Trump wages a long campaign against President-elect Joe Biden.
The assault will be conducted in the realm of unreality, as Trump's Twitter account shows. "Our case STRONGLY continues, we will keep up the good fight, and I believe we will prevail!" "RIGGED ELECTION!" "2020 is a long way from over". He participated by phone in hearings in the Pennsylvania State Senate on the issue of "massive voter fraud".
The disconnect with the facts on the ground recalls how Trump questioned president Barack Obama's citizenship during his terms in office. Now Trump is again trying to create something – the perception of a "stolen" election, charges of illegitimate power, Biden “voter fraud” claims – from nothing.
It appears effective, too: While one third of US voters believe Biden won because of voter fraud, 77 per cent of Republicans believe that's the reason for his victory, according to a Monmouth University poll.
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Donald Trump says he will leave the White House if Electoral College votes for Biden
By Jeff Mason
November 27, 2020 — 10.02am
Washington: US President Donald Trump said he will leave the White House if the Electoral College votes for Democratic President-elect Joe Biden.
In the nearest he has come to a concession, Republican Trump said if Biden is certified the election winner by the Electoral College he will depart the White House. Biden is due to be inaugurated on January 20.
The Electoral College is due to meet on December 14.
Trump made the comments at the White House on Thursday, local time, after speaking to US troops during the traditional Thanksgiving Day address to US servicemembers.
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It's payback time for Yellen, the economist who was too short for Trump
By Paul Krugman
November 27, 2020 — 10.01am
It's hard to overstate the enthusiasm among economists over Joe Biden's selection of Janet Yellen as the next secretary of the Treasury.
Some of this enthusiasm reflects the groundbreaking nature of her appointment. She won't just be the first woman to hold the job; she'll be the first person to have held all three of the traditional top US policy positions in economics — chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, chair of the Federal Reserve and now Treasury secretary.
And yes, there's a bit of payback for Donald Trump, who denied her a well-earned second term as Fed chair, reportedly in part because he thought she was too short.
But the good news about Yellen goes beyond her ridiculously distinguished career in public service. Before she held office, she was a serious researcher. And she was, in particular, one of the leading figures in an intellectual movement that helped save macroeconomics as a useful discipline when that usefulness was under both external and internal assault.
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If Australia declines it will be by choice, not chance
Earlier this month, an unofficial statement emerged from the Chinese embassy in Canberra accusing the Australian government of “poisoning bilateral relations”.
Then a Chinese government official stated that “China is angry. If you make China the enemy, China will be the enemy”. This followed recent Chinese government trade-related injunctions on Australian exports.
Following that, former Australian ambassador to China Geoff Raby suggested the Foreign Minister “should drop some positive remark about China into a speech” and allow the diplomatic service to use its dark arts to smooth relations. Then Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison does drop some positive remarks in a speech and an adviser to Chinese Premier Li Keqiang comments that “China noticed the goodwill Australia expressed supporting China”.
This is not the opening of a spy thriller but a real-time demonstration of Australia’s growing challenge in managing its core security and economic dilemma; that our largest trading partner, China, is a geostrategic competitor of our key security ally, America.
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Prominent Iranian nuclear scientist killed in attack outside Tehran
Kareem Fahim, Joby Warrick and Miriam Berger
Nov 28, 2020 – 7.38am
Istanbul | A prominent Iranian nuclear scientist who was seen as a driving force behind Tehran's disbanded effort to build a nuclear weapon nearly two decades ago was killed on Friday outside Tehran in an apparent targeted ambush, Iranian officials said.
Iran's foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, described the attack on the scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, as the work of "state terror" and implicated Israel as having a possible role. Officials in Israel had no comment.
The killing of Fakhrizadeh - on a road in Damavand east of Tehran - was the third high-profile attack to shake Tehran's leadership in less than a year.
In January, a US drone strike in Baghdad killed Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani, Iran's most powerful military commander and head of its special-operations forces abroad. And in August, Israeli agents acting on behalf of American officials assassinated a senior al-Qaida official in Tehran, according to a US official.
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China's new digital front has caught the world napping
Eryk Bagshaw
China correspondent
November 27, 2020 — 10.48am
A month after China's central bank distributed its first $1 million in digital currency, the Reserve Bank, Commonwealth Bank and National Australia Bank announced they were starting a research paper.
The research would explore the potential use and implications of a central bank digital currency, the RBA and two of Australia's largest lenders said. The financial pillars noted its use "remains an open question".
In Shenzhen and soon, Suzhou, in eastern China, millions of Chinese consumers will become the first to spend their digital currency after six years of development by Chinese authorities. The chasm between China and Australia's experiences of the digital economy could have profound consequences, not just for the speed at which Chinese consumers can mop-up discounts - but for control, surveillance, diplomacy and international sanctions.
The world's governments should pay attention now, according to a report by the International Cyber Policy Centre at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.
China's "digital currency/electronic payment" platform, known as DC/EP or the digital renminbi, is the anti-crypto currency. Where bitcoin sought to unshackle cryptocurrency traders from the rigours of central banks, DC/EP could one day bring more than 1 billion people under the surveillance of the Chinese government.
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I look forward to comments on all this!
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David.
