London-born NSW Rhodes scholar, priest, journalist, volunteer fire-fighter, and parliamentarian, Tony Abbott has been the federal member for Warringhah on Sydney’s northern beaches since 1994.A longtime devotee of B.A (Bob) Santamaria, and a fearless champion of Catholic action and of what he terms ‘the evolving family’, the feisty Abbott has a reputation of being the Liberal Party’s most relentless parliamentary pugilist and ideological warrior.
Yet, apart from a deep commitment to key conservative values, to those who don’t know him personally Battlelines demonstrates an appealing vulnerability in Abbott that is often …

AS A student at Melbourne Boys’ High School, I vividly remember our brilliantly wayward British history teacher, Ben Munday, recounting the exploits of the World War I German cruiser the Emden, which in just three months sank 15 Allied freighters.
Captained by the aristocratic Karl von Muller – who deliberately avoided civilian casualties – the Emden daringly attacked the ports of Madras and Penang, in the process setting fire to Allied oil tanks and destroying French and Russian warships.
After the Emden was sunk by the HMAS Sydney off the Cocos Islands, …

When a person has committed a crime so serious that society decides to incarcerate them for it, the main aspect of that punishment is generally a loss of liberty.
Without the freedom to associate, people can’t offend against the general public anymore and hopefully they learn how painful it is to be kept away from society so they will think twice about committing that offence when they get out.
But what is the effect of cutting off all access and information about sex and sexuality to prisoners? This is the key topic …

ANDREW Fisher was born in Crosshouse, a coalmining town in Ayrshire, Scotland, in 1862, and went to work in the mines at 13. He became involved in the union and lost his job.
In 1885 he and his brother migrated to Queensland in search of work. He found it at first in the mines; this staunchly teetotal Presbyterian went on to serve three terms as Australia’s prime minister: 1908-09, 1910-13 and 1914-15. As historian Peter Bastian points out, his 1758 days as a Labor PM would not be bettered until Bob …

THE designation of William Charles Wentworth as “Australia’s greatest native son” is that of Manning Clark. Nevertheless, Andrew Tink’s use of the phrase as the subtitle for his book suggests this biography is somewhat breathless.
Certainly it is nothing like John Ritchie’s measured The Wentworths: Father and Son, published 10 years ago by Melbourne University Press.
Moreover Tink, who until 2006 was shadow attorney-general and shadow leader of the house in the NSW parliament, is given to overstatement. Thus in chapter 26, Wentworth Demands Self-government, he maintains that his subject “resembled the …