Category: politics
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Navigating Centrelink: A Modern Tragedy in Endless Parts
I make the call with the rejection letter in my hand. The phone rings for a moment, then the line goes dead. I really never thought I’d long for the days when being on hold to Centrelink for hours was the best possible option. Now the phones don’t work at all. I drive to […]
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A special message for Trump’s inauguration
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The Theory of Everything
I’m tremendously excited to be have worked on The Theory of Everything as a part of the Brisbane Festival. The director, Thomas Quirk, produced one of my all time favourite theatrical works, The Raven, which was an interactive performance piece about Edgar Allen Poe. It also starred one of my best friends, the supernaturally brilliant […]
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Heroes.
My kid brother and I have a tradition of going to see all the superhero movies. We load up on sugary delights and soak up 90 minutes of explosions and musclebound superhumans with our eyes. It’s appropriate that we accompany trashy action films with junk food, because they are essentially junk food for the brain; […]
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Campbell: The Shocking True Story of a ‘Man’ Who Hated The Arts So Much You’d Think An Artist Stabbed His Puppy As Part of an Abstract Performance Piece
Dear Campbell, Having just read the news that the Queensland Theatre Company censored a joke at your expense due to concerns that it might affect their funding, I thought I’d let you know that I’ve been inspired to write a play about your life. The current working title is Campbell: The Shocking True Story of a […]
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Reduce Translink fares: 3600 signatures and counting…
SIGN HERE Brisbane’s public transport prices are now the most expensive in Australia and among the highest in the world. High prices are causing more people to choose to drive instead of using public transport thus increasing traffic, pollution and potentially raising the number of drunk drivers on the road. Lowering the cost of living […]
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A poem for Christopher Pyne
Christopher Pyne, you’ve got me pining for a time When we had an education minister with half a mind You stick to your area of expertise, I’ll stick to mine If you need an expert on education, a phone call my way would be well worth your while If I need an expert on being […]
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VLAD = Very Lucky Australian Dictator
My dearest Newman it’s your old pal JD here. As you know, I do my utmost to be a law-abiding citizen, no matter how ineffective, draconian or heavily criticised by experts the laws in question may be. After all, we all know that pesky experts just get in the way of progress, right? What with […]
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Don’t ever contact me again for any reason including the apocalypse.
Dear Teresa, After receiving personally addressed but entirely unsolicited mail from your office for the third time, I decided I would send you a polite request to never again send me any kind of communication at all, ever. This includes, but is not limited to, letters, phone calls, text messages, morse code, Da Vinci […]
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Tony Abbott’s morning schedule
6.30 Tony is awakened by the sounds of the dozens of minimum wage employees that he keeps in a cage in his quarters gnashing their teeth and wailing. He throws them a few chunks of bread and a splash of water, chuckling as he tells them that if they’re good, more should ‘trickle down’ later […]