Senior CSIRO scientists are discussing scenarios in which parts of northern Australia become unliveable and reef ecosystems collapse, and asking why the country is not confronting those risks openly.

Senior CSIRO scientists have had a candid internal discussion about the threats posed by a warming world and how to convey them to the public, including that northern Australia will become unliveable and Great Barrier Reef corals that “all turn white forever”.

Peter Hannam

Hopes that the federal anti-corruption watch puppy might be resuscitated by a change of leadership have been dashed, writes Michael Pascoe. The NACC is only capable of embarrassing itself. 

The National Anti-Corruption Commission is now making the case itself that it is useless. On a bang-for-buck basis, any marginal difference the NACC might be making to corruption at the federal level simply isn’t worth the candle. 

NACC declares itself useless, the joke worsens

by Michael Pascoe

SpaceX has closed a “loophole” that allowed the Ukrainian military to use the civilian satellite internet network for offensive drone strikes, Elon Musk has announced, telling warmongers who prolong the conflict to “burn in hell.”

The billionaire’s harsh remarks on Saturday come amid a deepening rift between Washington and Kiev, with US President Donald Trump accusing Vladimir Zelensky of repeatedly rejecting opportunities to end the conflict and worsening global fuel shortages by attacking Russian oil infrastructure.

These days, European headlines resemble reports from a war zone: from stormed city halls in Marseille and Lille, to looted boutiques along the French Riviera, burned tourist offices in Lyon, and clouds of tear gas enveloping the Élysée Palace. The ‘day of rage’ in France drew over 800,000 protesters onto the streets – an event that was dismissed by Paris and the European mainstream as merely the “spontaneous revolt of the outskirts” or a “raid by migrants.” However, a closer look at the ‘rebels’ reveals respectable, bourgeois-looking students and well-off citizens engaging in destruction and violence.

Europe’s next crisis is already hiding behind the riots

The streets may eventually fall silent, but the struggle over who governs, who pays and what survives is only beginning

BY Ksenia Smertina

In 1989 peaceful revolutions reunited East and West Germany and Eastern and Western Europe. Or at least most of Eastern and Western Europe. It was the year that Europeans chose freedom, rejected socialism, bound democracies in an ever closer union, and embraced “living in truth.” 

It was also the year that USA strategists armed the Gates of Europe to expand NATO ever eastward. Thirty-seven years later the fabric of the Velvet Revolution is stained and torn. Did Europe choose freedom and truth in that heady year, or did 1989 make Europe into a vassal serving the Atlantic Ring of Power?

The Other Europe: How Europe Chose Freedom, Truth and Unity in 1989, But . . .

Then Lost Them To Gain The Atlantic Ring of Power

BY Jeff Rich

You’ve heard many tributes to Helen Haines. You’re about to hear many more. Don’t be fooled. Australia is on the brink of missing the moment. If so, nothing significant will change. We’d not be returning to business as usual. We’d be descending into violence as foretold.

Anthony Albanese must call Angus Taylor stat, and here’s what he must say

BY Peter Hartcher/SMH

What we’ve heard about so far today — and will continue to hear about — is not a collection of separate problems. It’s all one problem: the deep state of the world is trying to consolidate the entire world into a one-world government and has developed many different mechanisms of control to achieve that end. A major part of that initiative is to cause all our institutions to fail us. 

Deep State of the World

BY MERYL NASS

What you’ve heard about the fundamental problems in education, healthcare, agriculture, government regulation, the news media, censorship, and propaganda is all part of that same agenda, in my view.

A number of American lawmakers intend to block the Trump administration’s deal to ease sanctions on Russian diesel through April and are threatening action against US companies involved in the trade. The bipartisan group is also planning to block the US Treasury from issuing such a waiver in the future. 

US President Donald Trump announced the deal earlier this month, as US diesel prices hit a record $6.50+ per gallon in September and prices in parts of California topped $8. Under the waiver, struck just weeks ahead of the impending November midterm elections, Moscow agreed to immediately put 300,000 tons of diesel into the market, and commit to further releases.  

Over the past week, mass protests and strikes have spread across Europe and internationally. In France, more than half a million people marched on October 17, as “yellow vests” protesting fuel prices joined high school students who have blockaded their schools for a month. On Wednesday, students, teachers and doctors marched in some 50 Greek cities. Protesters clashed with police in Milan, workers marched in Lisbon and Porto, Albanian students clashed with police, and Serbian students marched on Belgrade.

The global rebellion of youth and workers and the war frenzy of the ruling class

BY WSWS Editorial Board

Students and workers also took to the streets in Chile, India and Mexico. In Canada, over 9,000 autoworkers voted by 97 percent to authorize a strike against Stellantis.

The main theme of the Russia-Ukraine conflict this year has been the so-called ‘war of cities’, characterized by mutual strategic strikes on targets in the rear. In the first half of the year, Kiev had managed to bolster its strike capabilities and even attempted to pressure Moscow into accepting its terms for a ceasefire.

What’s on Russia’s target list – and why?

From ammunition depots to digital infrastructure, a closer look at Moscow’s expanding air campaign against Ukraine

BY Sergey Poletaev

FULL: 'Double Standards...': John Laughland Uncovers Shocking EU Lies On Russia War | NDTV World

John Laughland exposes how European leaders push contradictory war propaganda while turning diplomacy into pure coercion against Russia.

European Narrative Paradox: Political analyst John Laughland points out the logical impossibility pushed by European leadership—claiming Russia is losing in Ukraine while simultaneously asserting Russia will invade Europe.
Failure of Diplomacy: Laughland asserts that diplomacy with Europe is currently impossible because European states treat diplomacy not as an avenue for peace, but as coercion by other means.
Cognitive Dissonance in Foreign Policy: The address highlights how Western institutions have abandoned strategic realism and factual analysis in favor of moral dogmatism and forced compliance.

"Being the ambassador to Russia was probably the hardest assignment of my career," Lynne Tracy, who represented the US in Moscow from 2023 to 2025, tells the BBC.

US, UK and European diplomats once played a crucial role in Russia, defusing tensions even at the worst moments of the Cold War.

Surveillance and 'constant paranoia': Western diplomats tell BBC of life in war-time Moscow

BY Liza Fokht

Russia remains ready to negotiate a lasting settlement in Ukraine but will achieve its objectives regardless, Russian President Vladimir Putin told journalist Pavel Zarubin on Thursday. He also outright rejected “schizophrenic” claims in Western media that Moscow could be seeking a war with Europe.

Putin’s comments followed nearly three hours of talks with US envoy Steve Witkoff in St. Petersburg on Wednesday. Witkoff brought new peace talk proposals following his own discussions with Vladimir Zelensky, Finnish President Alexander Stubb, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s Chief of Staff Bjoern Siebert, and Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store in Oslo.

One Nation wants to restart native forest logging in Victoria, but decades of losses, shrinking timber supply and a $402 million legal claim show why the industry ended.

One Nation has released its policy to bring back native forest logging in Victoria. The numbers don’t support it.

Years of financial losses, not politics, had already put Victoria’s native forest logging industry in trouble.

David Lindenmayer