IN THE NEWS
PM blitz to fire up attack on Coalition’s nuclear plan (AAP) — Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is beginning his day in Rockhampton as his tour of electorates in Queensland, the Northern Territory and Western Australia continues. The AAP reports the PM will once again criticise the Coalition’s nuclear power plans with Treasurer Jim Chalmers calling it “economic madness” and claiming it would leave Queensland’s households worse off. Yesterday Albanese announced $7.2 billion in funding to upgrade the 1,600km-long Bruce Highway in the state. The opposition said the pledge showed the PM only cared about Queensland’s regional infrastructure when an election was looming, the AAP adds.
Justin Trudeau stepping down as Liberal leader, to stay on as PM for now (CTV News) — On Monday, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced he was stepping down as leader of the governing Liberal Party after almost a decade as PM. “Last night over dinner, I told my kids about the decision I’m sharing with you today,” the 53-year-old said at a press conference outside his official Rideau Cottage residence. “This country deserves a real choice in the next election, and it has become clear to me that if I’m having to fight internal battles, I cannot be the best option in that election.” CTV News reports he also announced Parliament would be prorogued until March as the Liberal Party searches for his replacement. Trudeau says he plans to stay on as PM until a successor is found. Trudeau had been under increasing pressure to step down and the resignation of his key deputy, former finance minister Chrystia Freeland, last month appears to have finally ended his time in power.
Starmer attacks spread of “lies” on grooming gangs as he hits back at Musk (BBC) — UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer on Monday attacked politicians and activists “spreading lies and misinformation” over grooming gangs, the BBC reports. It comes after billionaire Elon Musk posted countless messages on his social media platform X criticising Starmer’s time as director of public prosecutions between 2008 and 2013, claiming the PM had failed to tackle the issue. In response, Starmer said the online debate around grooming gangs had “crossed a line”. “We have seen this playbook many times – whipping up of intimidation and of threats of violence, hoping that the media will amplify it. Those who are spreading lies and misinformation as far and as wide as possible are not interested in victims, they’re interested in themselves.” The BBC reports the government has been urged to summon the US ambassador over Musk’s comments, given the billionaire’s role in the upcoming Donald Trump administration.
Congress certifies Trump’s 2024 election win (CNN) — US Vice President Kamala Harris had the rather unenviable job of officially confirming her defeat in last year’s election. CNN reports “the electoral college vote count went smoothly and no objections or disturbances occurred”, with Harris presiding over proceedings. Harris announced the certification of the count and therefore Donald Trump’s victory on Monday afternoon. He will be sworn in as president on January 20.
Top flight: Australia, England, India in talks to split Tests in two (The Sydney Morning Herald) — Shortly after Australia’s lauded 3-1 Test series victory over India comes the news “Australia, England, India and the International Cricket Council’s new chair Jay Shah are in talks to split Test cricket into two divisions so the big three nations can play each other more often”, the SMH reports. Cricket Australia chair Mike Baird and England Cricket Board chair Richard Thompson are set to meet with Shah later this month with the idea of a two-tier structure for Test cricket “firmly on the agenda”, the paper cites sources as claiming.
WHAT I’M READING
Congress has now formally certified Donald Trump’s election victory and in two weeks we’ll get his second inauguration. As we wait for that spectacle, Semafor has been looking into the news that director Brett Ratner, who was “forced out of Hollywood at the peak of the #MeToo movement”, will direct a documentary about First Lady Melania Trump for Amazon.
“Amazon’s purchase of the Melania Trump documentary is the latest entry in an escalating, head-snapping bidding war by the giant tech platforms to ingratiate themselves with an incoming president their executives had, in the past, criticised. Amazon founder and Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos had positioned himself as a Trump critic before swiveling to support the president-elect this fall.
“But the documentary, and Ratner’s return, also represent a changed cultural moment, in which the values and icons of Trump’s MAGA movement are making their way ‘upstream’ from politics into mass American culture, as the conservative media activist Andrew Breitbart used to put it. And the culture’s new gatekeepers — the tech platforms, first of all — are rejecting progressive judgments on people and content.”
Elsewhere, Harper’s Magazine has published an extract from Liz Pelly’s upcoming book on the rise of Spotify. In this particular section, Pelly looks at how popular playlists are allegedly populated with low-cost stock music, and the impact that is having on the music industry.
“In a Slack channel dedicated to discussing the ethics of streaming, Spotify’s own employees debated the fairness of the PFC [Perfect Fit Content] program. ‘I wonder how much these plays ‘steal’ from actual ‘normal’ artists,’ one employee asked. And yet as far as the public was concerned, the company had gone to great lengths to keep the initiative under wraps.
“Perhaps Spotify understood the stakes — that when it removed real classical, jazz, and ambient artists from popular playlists and replaced them with low-budget stock muzak, it was steamrolling real music cultures, actual traditions within which artists were trying to make a living. Or perhaps the company was aware that this project to cheapen music contradicted so many of the ideals upon which its brand had been built. Spotify had long marketed itself as the ultimate platform for discovery — and who was going to get excited about ‘discovering’ a bunch of stock music? Artists had been sold the idea that streaming was the ultimate meritocracy — that the best would rise to the top because users voted by listening.”
Confession time. I am an absolute sucker for Netflix sports documentaries (see yesterday’s Summer Worm for some very interesting reporting on the ways the streamer feeds us all content). My latest obsession is Starting 5, which follows basketball superstars Jimmy Butler, Anthony Edwards, LeBron James, Domantas Sabonis and Jayson Tatum through the 2023-24 NBA season. I was already a basketball fan but the increase in my reading led me to this intriguing piece in The Atlantic by Marcus Thompson II last month on Edwards’ new jump shot this season. The piece looks at how Minnesota Timberwolves assistant coach Chris Hines and 23-year-old Edwards developed his game.
“Ant-Man has authored another avenue for awe. One of the league’s most captivating players added to a bag of brilliance already brimming with personality. ‘It’s not the prettiest,’ he declared, giving the nod to Kevin Durant, Steph Curry and Klay Thompson. ‘They’ve got some pretty-ass jumpers. I’m not trying to have the prettiest jumper. I just want it to go in. Yeah, it looks good. But as long as it goes in, it looks better.’
“However, beauty comes with a cost. For Edwards, it was paid through a process as methodical as it has been relentless. Hines and Edwards pieced it together as a long-term project. Like so much with Edwards, his capacity was obvious. The talent drips off him like Jheri curl juice. The last four years were dedicated to harnessing his all-world abilities, as will be the next 10 years.”
POLITICS REPORTER’S SUMMER MEDIA DIET
In my ears: This summer holiday I’ve been going through another serious Brian Wilson phase, returning to the Beach Boys songwriter’s music over and over and over. I’ve been especially hooked on 1971’s Surf’s Up, a Beach Boys album whose title track is a pop masterpiece originally intended for the abandoned and legendary 1967 psychedelic concept album Smile. Have a listen to the vocal melodies on that song, and then check out the hauntingly sad “‘Til I die”, from the same album: “I’m a cork on the ocean/Floating over the raging sea/How deep is the ocean?/How deep is the ocean?/I lost my way/Hey, hey, hey”” How’s that for an uplifting summer song? Smile, Wilson’s magnum opus, was finally finished in 2004, and I’ve been obsessed with that record as well. There’s a documentary on the abandonment of the original album and the completion of the modern-day version titled Beautiful Dreamer, which is available to watch on YouTube, for those who want to find out why Wilson is considered by many to be one of the greatest pop composers of all time.
On my screen: After being urged for months to check out the British spy series Slow Horses I finally got around to it over the break, and I was immediately hooked. Gary Oldman is excellent as the rude and slovenly Jackson Lamb, the boss of a team of MI5 rejects. The latest and fourth season premiered last September and the series has been renewed for a further two seasons, so it’s not too late to get onboard the hype train. The classic Christmas movies didn’t hit as hard this year as they usually do. Am I just picking the wrong ones? How the Grinch Stole Christmas, the 2000 Jim Carrey flick, I found basically unwatchable. Was it always so annoying, or have I just grown old and turned into a Grinch myself?
At my breakfast table: I’ve basically only opened the newspapers to do the cryptic crosswords. My favourite setter is Liam Runnalls, also known as LR, whose cryptics appear on Tuesdays in The Sydney Morning Herald and on Saturdays in The Saturday Paper. The Weekend Australian’s cryptic crossword — syndicated via The Times and often quite obviously written for a UK audience — is a fun and often difficult one as well. For international news, I always go to the Associated Press. The US newswire is renowned for its accuracy, globe-spanning network of reporters, and its breadth of coverage, and the content is totally free. When I’ve headed off to the beach I’ve packed either Vanity Fair or Thrasher Magazine.
On my plate: Christmas is a great time to enjoy Swedish food. Unlike Australians, Swedes tend to stick to one pretty specific menu for Christmas, and it’s a huge one: the traditional “Christmas table” includes dishes like cured salmon, pickled herring, glazed ham, meatballs, pate, potato bakes, sausages and spiced bread. There are even special soft drinks and beers that are only consumed at Christmas. Organisations like Swedes in Sydney and SWEA Melbourne, and eateries like Fika Swedish Eatery in Manly, NSW arrange yearly feasts, and it’s well worth a try if you’ve never had the full experience.
Say What?
Regardless of who is in power in Canberra, Victorians deserve their fair share of infrastructure funding.
Jacinta Allan
In unsurprising news, after Anthony Albanese pledged billions to upgrade Queensland roads on his not-yet-the-election-campaign-tour, Victoria, NSW and Western Australia immediately called for more federal funding too.
THE COMMENTARIAT
Sorry Tony, but the only person you have to blame for being booted out of office is yourself — Malcolm Farr (Guardian Australia): It wasn’t a deep state or tyrannical public service that brought [former prime minister Tony Abbott] down.
Voters had cheered him into office to become their voice. That support collapsed when voters realised he had stopped listening to anything but the cheers.
One consequence of politicians blaming other elements of government for their own failures is that it can encourage people who want to dismantle those elements, many of which help safeguard democracy. We should all take as a warning Trump’s dangerous threat to the US Justice Department — hostile because it has done its job — as one of those consequences.
Abolish the Golden Globes — Anna Marks, Adam Sternbergh and Jessica Grose (The New York Times):
Sternbergh: Perhaps another path to relevance for the Globes would be embracing an activist political role. An activist Globes would have more overtly celebrated “The Apprentice,” rather than leaving it for Sebastian Stan to mention in an acceptance speech for an award he won for a different movie. The big wins for “Emilia Pérez” did feel somewhat political, given that its subject matter — gender transition — has become so politically charged.
Marks: That film’s lead actress, Karla Sofía Gascón, gave the most overtly political speech of the night. Perhaps it was so personal that it didn’t feel out of place. Is the key to politics at awards shows that the most powerful and wealthy people who attend actually have a stake in the issue at hand?
Grose: Yeah, probably — otherwise it just looks like rich people cosplaying as social justice warriors for a night before returning to their mansions. No-one wants to hear celebrities talking about politics directly anymore.
