News update for Mon 20 Jan 2025

Your trusted guide to the top independent news and views of the day...

Jan 20, 2025

Welcome to your TrueNorth news update where every weekday afternoon we share curated articles from Australia’s independent news media sector.

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Scroll down for today’s news and views…

TODAY’S BREAKING NEWS UPDATES: See all the breaking news of the day through The Guardian here - and through 6 News here

Laura Tingle: Peter Dutton can't dodge the spotlight as the election draws closer — or his unresolved problems - ABC News

So far, Dutton's refusal, or inability, to undertake a reshuffle of his frontbench has largely gone under the radar, despite the fact he has to replace two very senior colleagues in Simon Birmingham and Paul Fletcher.

The brawling between factions, and particularly the struggle for control by conservatives (which is manifesting itself publicly in the push by Tony Abbott and others to try to install Warren Mundine in Fletcher's seat of Bradfield) has made settling the question of whether Voice supporter Julian Leeser comes back to the front bench very fraught.

Also read > Anthony Albanese’s inaction drives Labor Party towards extinction - Richard Flanagan for The SMH/Age (paywall)

‘More reactive … more suspicious’: Dutton sharpens focus on teal seats - The Saturday Paper

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has shifted his campaign strategy to again involve the teal electorates, although moderates in the party say he is still using ‘the Trump playbook’.

If Peter Dutton ever had a so-called “two-term strategy”, that strategy disappeared on Sunday when he soft-launched his election campaign in the Victorian seat of Chisholm.

No longer was he accepting that the Albanese government would likely win a second term. There was no hint of the strategy some have identified, where the Coalition would focus on Queensland and the regions this election before recapturing city seats in the next cycle. He was going for it all in one.

Also read > Federal election 2025: Teal wave swells in WA as Moore candidate announced - PWA

Ed Coper: The new public square is fact-free social media – and it couldn’t come at a worse time for Australia - The Guardian

Social media disinformation is incredibly effective at short-circuiting the usual connection between reality and fiction, even with factchecking in place. Layer on top of that the nefarious actors who understand this, and will exploit it for their gain – coincidentally all following the same playbook and all seeming to align with the continued and prolonged use of fossil fuels – and you have the crucible of our upcoming Australian election.

Welcome to anti-teal crusaders Australians for Prosperity, run by a former Liberal MP, receiving funding from the coal lobby and currently spamming your Facebook feed with propaganda.

It is the same for rightwing lobby group Advance, which fuelled misinformation during the voice referendum, and any clingers-on you find at Cpac (the conservative talkfest itself borrowed directly from the US) like the Institute of Public Affairs and other members of the Atlas network. These are often ‘dark money’ funded, bringing a hysteria to our feeds that will kill any chance at sensible climate debate this election.

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'Everyone wants to be my friend': The people paying millions for access to Trump - 7am Podcast

Donald Trump will be president again by tomorrow, and he says “everybody” wants to be his friend. And while it might not be everybody, plenty do. Trump’s broken the record for the amount of money that’s been donated to a US presidential inauguration fund, with $US200 million coming in from billionaires and companies all wanting time with him. These funds are not just for throwing a party. The money can also be used in secretive ways and aren't subject to the same rules as campaign funds. Today, Public Citizen’s lobbyist on ethics and campaign finance, Craig Holman, on who is giving Trump money, and what they’re getting out of it.

Listen to the 7am Podcast

Also >

Australian billionaires Anthony Pratt and Gina Rinehart praise Trump in US newspaper ads ahead of inauguration - The Guardian
What to expect from the first week of Trump 2.0 - The Daily Aus Podcast
President Trump and Australia's National Security - Pearls and Irritations
Donald Trump's win highlights the dark side of productivity and growth - Alan Kohler for ABC News
America is open for business: Trump’s merry gathering of elites - Bernard Keane for Crikey (paywall)

The tech gods arrive: As our new broverlords ascend to the presidential dais, it's up to us now - Carole Cadwalladr

And so it begins…

Tomorrow will see the inauguration of President Trump. And this time around, there’s one crucial difference. His tech bro allies will be front and centre: Musk, Zuckerberg, Bezos. NBC has reported they will be on the platform. This is the image that is going to be seared into our eyeballs and that sets the tone and the expectation for the next four years.

The ascension of the tech gods to the presidential dais is a remarkable journey.

Joe Biden’s presidency will be remembered as one that did not match the times, and a leader who failed to realise it - The Conversation

Should a US president by judged by what they achieved, or by what they failed to do?

Joe Biden’s administration is over. Though we have an extensive record, it is difficult to assess his presidency. At its outset, Biden promised hope, a return to normalcy, to be a bridge between generations, to restore democracy.

Four years on, what remains?

The Democratic Party is in disarray, its next generation of leaders unclear. Donald Trump is returning to the White House, his myrmidons clutching an extensive plan for radically recasting the United States in their image.

2025: Democracy under threat again, notably in the Americas - Independent Australia

WILL THE 2024 pattern of dissatisfied voters punishing incumbent governments be replicated this year?

Will Australian voters emulate their American cousins and turf out a successful progressive party after a malicious campaign of blatant misinformation? Or will it copy France and India, where regimes were returned with black eyes?

How will having a lifelong criminal grifter again leading the USA change the nation, and the world?

These are among the questions posed in another vital year for democracy.

Also read > The Trump revolution: where it came from and where it’s going - The Conversation

Another BRIC in the wall: Indonesia joins BRICS+ - Pearls and Irritations

Indonesia has just become the 10th full member nation of BRICS+, the first nation in South East Asia to gain such membership. The announcement was made, 1st January, by Brazil, currently holding the revolving chair of BRICS+.

Having the world’s fourth largest population (280 million with 165 million of them under 30) and projected soon to be the world’s fourth largest economy, Indonesia clearly will make a significant contribution to the bloc.

With the admission of Indonesia six of the G20 nations are now members of BRICS+.

BHP’s big wage theft unveiled – the whistleblower and the coal miner - Michael West Media

As the Same Job Same Pay showdown over labour hire loopholes kicks off in Court today, there is the matter of a BHP $2.5B wage theft nobody wants to touch.

Simon Turner and James Joseph were both injured at BHP’s Mt Arthur Coal. One blue collar, the other white. Turner was a coal miner who drove coal trucks, Joseph was a human resources executive who worked a keyboard.

Despite their different roles, both were covered under the Black Coal Award at the time of their injuries.

Ceasefire in Palestine: Exposing injustice, global failures, and the uncertain road ahead - New Politics

The conflict has exposed not only the brutality of Israeli policies but also the structural failures of an international community unwilling or unable to uphold its own standards.

The ceasefire in Palestine has offered a reprieve from the violence and destruction that has been inflicted upon Gaza since October 2023 but a deeper historical and political analysis shows a continuing pattern of oppression, resistance, and repeated failures by the international community to address the main issues.

These hostilities are not isolated recent events but are deeply entrenched in the history of occupation, and it is important to remember how we have arrived at this point.

Dutton’s business lunch idea takes the piss out of the entire notion of worthwhile public policy - Crikey

Peter Dutton’s dearth of policies just months, and more likely weeks, out from a federal election hasn’t yet begun to tell against him in the polls, even as the mainstream media belatedly starts to notice.

He has no cost of living policies beyond the insistence that building nuclear reactors for hundreds of billions of dollars by the late 2040s will lower power bills immediately, and a commitment to establishing divestment powers, but only for large retailers.

He has a housing policy inherited from Scott Morrison, to allow first home buyers to use their super, thereby inflating house prices even more.

Australian billionaires make $67,000 an hour, Oxfam says in call for tax on super-rich - The Guardian

Australia’s 47 billionaires take home an average of A$67,000 an hour, over 1,300 times more than the average Australian, new Oxfam analysis reveals, as the anti-poverty organisation calls for the major parties to tax the fortunes of the super-rich to tackle inequality.

Using data from Forbes’ real-time billionaires list – which categorises billionaires in US dollars – to identify Australian billionaires, the report Takers Not Makers calculated that in 2024 Australian billionaire wealth rose by more than 8% or A$28bn, at a staggering rate of A$3.2m an hour.