Kevin Rudd and Tony Abbott, the chief barbarians of political capitalism, will battle it out on 7 September. On those areas they both think they can win popular support and votes, like asylum seekers, they will try to outbid each other in cruelty.

The failure of Keynesianism to address the collapse in profit rates across the developed world in the late 1960s and early 1970s saw neoliberalism become the dominant ideology and practice of economic policy of the one percent in those countries, with Pinochet, Thatcher, Reagan and Hawke leading the way. This is as true of tax as any other area of policy and practice.

"It used to be the most beautiful place on Earth. I thought that I'd die down there." The wistful words of Mike Schaff crackle through the co-pilot headphones as he banks his single-propeller plane to make one last circle over the small jumble of homes and canals deep in the verdant bayou country of Louisiana that he has called home all his life.

(This is a repeat of a Gus article on climate change and the dangerous denialists...)

Bulga’s residents thought they had won a victory against a mine expansion which seemed sure to decimate their tiny Hunter Valley town. And then the government arrived to help.

It was the tiny town that hit back. And won.

Some schools in Australia are preaching the message that students can ‘overcome’ their same-sex attraction.

Densely populated and slightly old-fashioned, the suburb of Toongabbie sits right in the middle of Sydney’s western suburban mass.

Former senior Labor ministers Michael Costa, Tony Kelly and Joe Tripodi are to be embroiled in a fresh investigation by the Independent Commission Against Corruption which has launched another fully-fledged graft inquiry into the former minister Eddie Obeid.

Yes, the government can search your email, chats, searches, attachments. Snowden's most shocking leak yet reveals America's National Security State.

from Crikey ….

You better be careful blowing the whistle - new laws have holes.

Tony Abbott's latest speech confirms fact-checking in federal politics remains a faraway fantasy.

At a time when good faith would seem pretty important, the man who would be Australia's leader frequently makes statements contradicted by the evidence.