Good morning!! Here's my latest for @crikey.com.au -> one of the reasons the CCA weakened its climate target suggestions is the possibility of uncontrolled data centre growth. I found the lobbyists already working to sell them as 'climate solutions' in Aus ---->>>>>

'God, having kept a few of his belongings in the storage shed of my soul, turned the locker over to the sharks at Storage War$ and fled'. Writing about possibly the happiest/most stressful moment I've had since living in Paris. Newsletters can be fun! rick-morton.ghost.io/a-gladiator-...

How fitting his mum’s name is sue. Another failed attempt to sue. www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

Absolutely fighting for my life outside a primary school in Paris trying to return a ball to the kids who kicked it over the Jurassic Park sized playground fence. Also: some shortlist admin and world is fuky. My newsletter this week. Sign up, si tu aimes. rick-morton.ghost.io/a-gladiator-...

I went down to try out the toughest spot kit in France: The Lucarne d'Evry. It's a 43-centimetre window to a bin room in the Parisian banlieue that became a viral challenge and then a national competition. It's also a way to celebrate a forgotten side of France. observer.co.uk/news/interna...

I'm always glad to see @squigglyrick.bsky.social take on the absolute mess that is university governance www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/educati...

Read Mean Streak by @squigglyrick.bsky.social It is a great and detailed account of the #Robodebt debacle.

Ezra Klein really is a fucking pikelet isnt he

Bishop needs to go as well. There is no sensible governance arrangement where she gets to lead appointing a new VC. A new Chancellor / Chair and then a deep breath followed by a proper process to appoint a new VC / CEO needed. www.abc.net.au/news/2025-09...

Perfect photo for the circumstances

nine ate seven

By her own definition, with apologies to Douglas Adams, she should now have her office funding cut and disappear in a puff of logic

had any higher court been possible BRS might have kicked someone off of it, so probably for the best he stops here

Being the Special Envoy for Antisemitism and refusing to address nazis is like being the Special Envoy for Black Lung Disease refusing to address coal. www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

So much I could say about the Robodebt Class Action re-settlement. But I am tired and in another time zone and will simply leave this here instead.

Newsletterin' again. 'Salamander are well known for regenerating limbs and tails but some can also re-grow vital internal organs including the heart which means – unique in all the animal kingdom – salamanders have never invented country and western music.' rick-morton.ghost.io/makes-the-he...

I’m sure this point has been made elsewhere but not only did they openly lie about how many recommendations were in the robodebt final report, the one they erased was to reform FOI and now they’re heading in the opposite direction. Surprise is not a feature of my reaction.

👇🏻👇🏻👇🏻

As govt prepares to remove children from the NDIS, the agency in charge of the scheme has been torn to shreds by the administrative review tribunal for breaking the law, 'repeated non-compliance' and conduct that constitutes contempt. A pattern emerges. www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/politic...

Wonderful to have @squigglyrick.bsky.social back on 7am this morning. 7ampodcast.com.au/episodes/thr...

"Maybe you will build those toxic – emotionally, spiritually, environmentally – simulacra engines and suck up all the water and tank the energy grid w/ the demand for the worst art ever made." @squigglyrick.bsky.social takes on AI slop (unlike AI slop, it's ace) rick-morton.ghost.io/crumbs-at-th...

Last night I started watching the 2012 French (children's) film based on the Marsupilami cartoon I used to watch as a kid and am now about to clock on for a creative writing class that I teach. For some reason I find this very funny.

It is precisely as we have always said. This moment, a long time in the works (with many failed attempts) will likely succeed under Labor which created the scheme.

Bad news days for AI and everyone who slops it. 'If your incredible business idea – key word here, business – is to bake cakes for sale and then you complain that you have to pay for eggs and flour then I have some terrible news about your business idea and also quite possibly your soul and brain.'

imagine being called a weak politician by a guy committing a genocide

'One of the proposed solutions to the fact that these AI companies are already stealing the work of creatives, writers and artists is not to wonder – not even performatively – about how to protect the output of the creators but to suggest formalising the theft'. rick-morton.ghost.io/crumbs-at-th...

As at 30/5/25, there were 32,212 on income management (IM): - 10,838 on old IM (BasicsCard) and 21,373 on enhanced IM (SmartCard) - 8.3% (2,664) were voluntary, the rest under compulsory measures - around 82% (26,310) on IM identify as Indigenous data.gov.au/data/dataset...

Well there you go. Bendigo Writers Festival has been absolutely played, forced to do the dirty work of lobbyists by their sponsor. When these threats come knocking, academic institutions should be doing everything to protect and defend this country’s cultural events, not become Israel’s enforcer.

Commonwealth Ombudsman already smashed them and now not even govt's chosen auditing firm can say if the house of cards system of punitive mutual obligations is legal. Quite literally, they say, it is indefensible. Yet it persists. Even after Robodebt. www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/politic...

Donbas, don’t sell

Mean Streak has been shortlisted for the Prime Minister's Literary Awards in the non-fiction category. Stoked, of course, but particularly because I think this episode deserves to linger in the consciousness for as long as possible.

Another in a long, long, long and utterly indefensible list of war crimes

ah ha ha ha ha ha

I'll be on RN News Breakfast ~8.15am talking about Com'wlth Ombudsman's damning report into this story from November last year. Confirms all and more, as welfare recipients have been saying for YEARS. Ombo report here: www.ombudsman.gov.au/__data/asset... www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/law-cri...

I have finally encountered the French bureaucracy so many warned me about. 'It was like asking for directions on a hike and then having someone throw a compass into a ravine to help.' Read and subscribe to support my translation fees to the French Govt: rick-morton.ghost.io/blesse-this-...

Tomorrow, wherever you get your podcasts…

Very good reporting—correctly outlines these aren't all problems easily attributed to IT issues with the TCF. Fundamentally, it's these departments' MANY failures to apply social security law correctly as formal policy which causes harm—the TCF exposes recipients to this on an industrial scale.

Australian Public Service Commission Gordon de Brouwer was subject to two complaints and two investigations over his handling of the Robodebt referrals, he has now been cleared of any wrongdoing. Gee I wonder who made those complaints! www.canberratimes.com.au/story/903018...

In this article, Rick identified Centrelink's incorrect interpretation of section 42AM of the Social Security Administration Act. Well, here's another tribunal decision overturning a payment cancellation under that interpretation of 42AM, upheld by the Centrelink review officer.

Hey, is Plibersek’s office the first one in the entire government to admit there were 57 recommendations?

Ooft quite a correction

Scholars of genocide demand an end to Israel’s atrocities www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

bee just off camera holding a gun: “now write”

A disabled woman, limited English, was cut from welfare for 6 MONTHS due to comedy of errors starting with private, $1.3bn job service 'provider' and ending with govt getting their law wrong. Six days after she appealed, dept acted. To protect themselves. www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/law-cri...

On that score, not wishing to see the slaughter of children in particular, I used to think I belonged to a unity ticket. What a sick void it is to confront, for certain now, that this common humanity is not so common after all. End of my newsletter: rick-morton.ghost.io/a-room-of-on...

Happy and honoured to be appointed Poetry Editor with the wonderful @austbookreview.bsky.social and to work with editor Dr Georgina Arnott

Yessssssssss

Roy Morgan has now restored this data and analysis in full, almost three weeks after it was taken down

Entire UK government gets arrested