MARCH 21, 2020

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Welcome to Crikey Weekender.

Back in a February edition — when all we had battling for our attention were catastrophic bushfires and grants scandals — we said that we hoped the news would stay just as busy throughout the year.

We couldn’t have predicted the speed at which COVID-19 would alter every facet of our lives. Coronavirus has created a completely new speed for news — as Kishor Napier-Raman and Bernard Keane put it, look away from your phone for one moment and everything has changed.

But as much as coronavirus dominates the media landscape, it’s important to remember that some of the country’s most important stories are occurring right under our noses: take the ombudsman’s decision to investigate the AFP over its handling of the Angus Taylor-Clover Moore scandal, for example.

The world’s pandemic plans aren’t the only things moving quickly. Blink and you’ll miss it.

Stay safe and have a great weekend,

Peter Fray
Editor-in-chief

How quickly things are changing

“	Life in the time of COVID-19, however, is much quicker again. Look away from your screen for a moment and there’ll be another death, another 100 cases, another lockdown, another closure, another sport shut down. — Kishor Napier-Raman and Bernard Keane

Life in the time of COVID-19, however, is much quicker again. Look away from your screen for a moment and there’ll be another death, another 100 cases, another lockdown, another closure, another sport shut down.

Ombudsman investigates AFP over failing to investigate Angus Taylor

DAVID HARDAKER 2 minute read

One way or another, we're getting an investigation.

Vegas is closed, but Crown and Star keep pokies rolling. How immune is gambling to the crisis?

STEPHEN MAYNE 4 minute read

Clubs and casinos have resisted turning off pokie machines in the face of the coronavirus pandemic. How long will they hold out against advice?

In other news… yes, there has been other news

ANDREW P STREET 3 minute read

Tony Abbott's spending spree, more inland rail promsies and SA Water drama. We've rounded up the news that might have missed this week (for obvious reasons).

Government losing control as crisis tests basic skills and demands hard choices

BERNARD KEANE 5 minute read

The government has been stuck in political mode for so long that the challenge of actual leadership may be beyond its reach.

The world is confronting some radical notions: firstly, that society does exist…

“	The US, its government having denigrated Italy, is on the edge of becoming Italy. The big corporations have staked their claim, with their hustled involvement in mass testing, eager to increase their role in regulation and control until they are fully quasi-state institutions. — Guy Rundle

World responses to economic slowdown have demonstrated how the real nature of production is inherently social — and how most classical-liberal justifications are fantasies about how the world works.

One month with COVID-19: the rhetorical evolution of Trump and Morrison

KISHOR NAPIER-RAMAN 4 minute read

As the coronavirus has spread and changed, so has the way Scott Morrison and Donald Trump talk about it.

The case for lockdown: it’s just not a time for half measures

ADAM SCHWAB 3 minute read

The first step to recovery is admitting you’ve got a problem. The issue in Australia is that Scott Morrison and his team of medical advisers don’t seem to be grasping the full extent of that problem.

Here’s a mad thought: let’s save the real things like, er, the people

GUY RUNDLE 4 minute read

Plans to prop up already shambolic corporations will impoverish us all, invite economic disaster and destroy much of what we truly value.

Morrison breaks his political habit and fights fear on schools with facts

BERNARD KEANE 3 minute read

Throughout his time in politics, Scott Morrison has made an art form of exploiting fear for political gain. Now fear is his political enemy, not an ally,

An incomplete list of things that are un-Australian

“	Panic buyers now join a long, storied list of people and things that Australian politicians have decided are un-Australian, from left-wing activists, to head-butting Tony Abbott. — Kishor Napier-Raman

An incomplete list of people and things that Australian politicians have decided are un-Australian.

Stimulus Watch: how much are countries throwing at their economies?

AMBER SCHULTZ 4 minute read

Australia's stimulus package is already looking like a small fish in the big sea of the world's economic responses to the coronavirus.

Claims of racism fuel escalating media war between China and Washington

JOHN FITZGERALD 3 minute read

Unsurprisingly, barbs traded between China and the US over responsibility for coronavirus are part of a much larger power play.

School closures should not be left too late, experts warn

GEORGIA WILKINS 3 minute read

The government has resisted shutting down schools as part of its plan to combat the coronavirus. But if it doesn't act soon, it may end up being too late.

Australia can afford a $100 billion stimulus, and we may need it

BERNARD KEANE 4 minute read

When the Rudd government sent the deficit soaring voters and commentators were shocked. We all had to adjust to a new order of magnitude in deficit spending in order to avoid a recession, and we may have to again.