Thanks, I didn’t catch the sarcasm, which was what had me confused.

A coerced oath isn’t really an oath at all. But Thorpe wasn’t coerced into becoming a senator. She wasn’t forced to run for election. Once elected she wasn’t forced to take an oath. She chose to do those things because she thought it would benefit what she’s trying to achieve.

Now, I’m not pro monarchy, and I’m not against Thorpe advocating for aboriginal sovereignty. But saying “you are not my king” but also having sworn “faithful and true allegiance” to that king just doesn’t sit well together for me.

Senators are required to make an Oath or Affirmation as follows:

OATH I,…, do swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to His Majesty King Charles the Third, His heirs and successors according to law. SO HELP ME GOD!

AFFIRMATION I,…, do solemnly and sincerely affirm and declare that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to His Majesty King Charles the Third, His heirs and successors according to law.

Source: https://peo.gov.au/understand-our-parliament/your-questions-on-notice/questions/what-is-the-oath-of-office-that-is-taken-by-new-senators-and-members-of-the-house-o-representatives-when-they-are-sworn-in

Regardless of what you think of the monarchy, and whether you think that oath is an outright stupid anachronism, it’s still the oath she took. It comes across as plain poor conduct to act that way while acting in her capacity of Senator.

It’s more expensive to become a republic at this point. Australia would need a referendum to change the Constitution. The last referendum attempt to become a republic was in 1999 and failed, but cost $66m.

The last referundum in Australia was last year and while the AEC has not fully costed it, I’ve seen one estimate of it costing $450m.

I agree with you there, and think your active wording is better.

What confuses me is that I don’t see the conceptual jump from the Guardian using a passive voice which de-emphasises the Israeli government’s responsibility in this, and rampant antisemitism. Particularly when you give examples of how this is a larger problem in media.

Unless I’m missing something here, is it not more likely to be just a questionable grammatical choice with no ill intent?

Are you suggesting the current military offensive is not in response to the attack in October last year?

It sounds like you are taking an unnecessarily narrow definition of “trigger,” and painting that as some sort of bad faith “rampant antisemitism.”

I vote the 7 August should hereafter be declared “Succulent Chinese Meal Day” in tribute.

But earlier this month, he said he would move the company’s headquarters to Austin, citing a new Golden State law meant to protect LGBTQ+ children as the “final straw.”

Imagine being so full of hate for a highly vulnerable group of people that you base your business decisions around it.

It’s not really a debate about continuing to rely on fossil fuels. For context, in Australia the conservative coalition (for some reason) has an idealogical bee in its bonnet about investing more heavily in renewable energy sources, instead arguing that nuclear energy production is the way of the future.

But quoting it implies it’s an invalid claim.

Interesting. I read the quotes as meaning: someone else said it, it’s not just some opinion we made up. In this case, it was reporting the coroner’s official finding.

In other words, I understood it to be reinforcing the claim rather than invalidating it.

There’s plenty of good reasons to dislike Woolies, but them making a commercial decision to stop stocking products that people aren’t buying is not big on the list.

A certain portion of the population seems to already deify anything Trump says.

Depends. What are you trying to achieve? The US has constitutional protection for freedom of speech, but it doesn’t seem to prevent police aggressively breaking up protests they don’t like.

There are other things I think are more of a priority. For example, I would rather have strong media laws that prevent the mega-rich from using the media as de facto cheerleaders for their political interests.

American Officeworks

This is terrible for all involved. Even if the driver did everything right and couldn’t have foreseen this, he will still always be the guy who ploughed into a bunch of families and kids.

I think it’s far more likely that any lobbying to stymie rail expansion is coming from toll road operators like Transurban.

I don’t know about that. When I used to ride a bike to work near a busy truck route, I felt like the truck drivers were the most courteous and conscious of keeping a safe distance. Normal car drivers were a mixed bag: usually not a problem, but not reliable enough to trust. But bus drivers… it felt like bus drivers were actively pissed off by the existence of cyclists.

Time for him to get on the beers.

While there is plenty of scope for justifiable criticism about the form of the amendment that’s going ahead, it’s too late for that argument to achieve much. The wording is set, the date is set, the taxpayer money is already being spent.

Since it is going ahead anyway, do you think voting no will make governments revisit further steps in the future faster than a yes vote?

Personally, I doubt it would. Progress is more likely to be gained by having something, no matter how small, already in place so that a future amendment can build on it, rather than trying for something more substantial from scratch.

The summary missed an important part that makes this ridiculous:

During the same interview, Ms Keen-Minshull had said she would likely not have time to pursue legal action against Mr Pesutto over his comments.