Media Madness by Howard Kurtz

$39.99 AUD

Category: Non Fiction

"The mainstream media's obsessive hatred for President Trump outruns his anti-media fixation by a country mile, argues this evenhanded and incisive study of press relations with the Trump administration." -Publishers Weekly "'Defiance Disorder' Another new book describes chaos in Trump's White House"- Ashley Parker, Washington Post According to the media, Donald Trump could never become president. Now many are on a mission to prove he shouldn't be president. The Trump administration and the press are at war--and as in any war, the first casualty has been truth. Bestselling author Howard Kurtz, host of Fox News's Media Buzz and former Washington Post columnist, offers a stunning expos&eacute of how supposedly objective journalists, alarmed by Trump's success, have moved into the opposing camp.   Kurtz's exclusive, in-depth, behind-the-scenes interviews with reporters, anchors, and insiders within the Trump White House reveal the unprecedented hostility between the media and the president they cover.   In Media Madness, you'll learn: Why White House strategist Steve Bannon told Trump he is in danger of being impeached How the love-hate relationship between the president and Morning Joe hosts--Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski--turned entirely to hate How Kellyanne Conway felt betrayed by journalists who befriended her--and how she fought back How elite, mainstream news reporters--named and quoted--openly express their blatant contempt for Trump How Bannon tried to block short-lived Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci--and why Trump soured on him How Ivanka and Jared Kushner aren't the liberals the pundits want them to be--and why Trump tried to discourage them from joining the White House Why Trump believes some journalists harbor hatred for him--and how some liberals despise his voters How Trump is a far more pragmatic politician than the press often acknowledges (and how the press dismisses his flip-flops when he flops their way) What Trump got wrong about Charlottesville--and how Steve Bannon predicted the debacle How the media consistently overreached on the Russian "collusion" scandal Why Trump actually likes journalists, secretly meets with them, and allows the press unprecedented access Why Reince Priebus couldn't do his job--and the real reason he left the White House How Sean Spicer privately berated journalists for bad reporting--and why he and Kellyanne Conway were relentlessly attacked by the media Never before has there been such an eye-opening, shocking look at what the White House and the media think about each other. It's not pretty. But it also makes for the most important political book of the year.     ...Show more

The Coal Curse: Quarterly Essay 78 by Judith Brett

$22.99 AUD

Category: Non Fiction

Australia is the world’s biggest coal exporter, accounting for over a third of coal exports worldwide. In 2018, coal overtook iron ore as our most valuable export. Scott Morrison’s government has embraced coal, doubling down on supporting the industry, calling climate-based boycotts of coal companies “indulgent and selfish” and vowing to stop protestors. But what does our increased reliance on coal mean for the nation? For the economy and the environment? And where will it leave us when the world stops buying it? In this nuanced and insightful essay, Judith Brett looks at the consequences of Australia’s coal addiction, from stalled climate-change policy to tensions between farmers and miners. She assesses where to next for a fractious Coalition and the Quiet Australians. ...Show more

Waleed Aly (I Know This to Be True): On Sincerity, Compassion and Integrity by Geoff Blackwell; Waleed Aly

$17.99 AUD

Category: Non Fiction

One of Australia's leading commentators on national and international issues, Waleed Aly answers fundamental questions about leadership and what really matters to him. Waleed Aly is an Australian broadcaster, journalist, academic and musician. As co-host of The Project, a daily primetime television news and current affairs programme, he is one Australia's leading commentators on national and international issues. Reflecting on his childhood, career and values, he discusses the importance of taking risks, standing by your beliefs and above all, being honest. Self-deprecating and empathetic, his words offer hope and guidance to anyone struggling to find their way and all who champion equality. Created in collaboration with the Nelson Mandela Foundation, I Know This to Be True is an uplifting new series inspired by his legacy. Extraordinary figures from diverse backgrounds answer the same questions, sharing their compelling stories, guiding ideals, and insightful wisdom. The result is a collection brimming with messages of leadership, courage, compassion and hope. Delivered in lovely, giftable hardcovers with vivid photographic portraits throughout, these books offer encouragement and guidance to future leaders and anyone hoping to make a positive impact on the world.Royalties from sales of I Know This To Be True will support language translation and free access to the films, books and educational programmes in all countries with developing economies, or economies in transition, as defined by United Nations annual classifications. ...Show more

Body Count: How Climate Change is Killing Us by Paddy Manning

$32.99 AUD

Category: Non Fiction

'Our house is on fire,' 16-year-old Swedish school strike activist Greta Thunberg told world leaders in 2019. Across an angry year of weather, Australians watched it in real-time: record heatwaves and worsening drought, unprecedented fish kills in the Murray-Darling Basin and devastating wildfires acro ss Queensland and NSW - this is climate change, a terrifying portent for the most arid continent on earth. But most shocking of all is the untold human toll - escalating human deaths in Australia and beyond. The climate crisis is now a health emergency, with extreme weather events, disease, mental illness and infrastructure collapse killing what the WHO predicts will be millions around the world over the next decade. Shocking and undeniable, Manning reveals what climate change really looks like, telling the moving stories of victims, their families and doctors - putting names and faces to the people who have already paid the ultimate price for inaction on the biggest moral challenge of our century. ...Show more

The System: Who Owns the Internet, and How It Owns Us by James Ball

$29.99 AUD

Category: Non Fiction

The internet is a network of physical cables and connections, a web of wires enmeshing the world, linking huge data centres to one another and eventually to us. All are owned by someone, financed by someone, regulated by someone. We refer to the internet as abstract from reality. By doing so, we obscure where the real power lies. In this powerful and necessary book, James Ball sets out on a global journey into the inner workings of the system. From the computer scientists to the cable guys, the billionaire investors to the ad men, the intelligence agencies to the regulators, these are the real-life figures powering the internet and pulling the strings of our society. Ball brilliantly shows how an invention once hailed as a democratising force has concentrated power in places it already existed so that the system, in other words, remains the same as it did before. ...Show more

Hidden Hand: Exposing How the Chinese Communist Party Is Reshaping the World by Clive Hamilton; Mareike Ohlberg

$32.99 AUD

Category: Non Fiction

In this landmark follow-up to the bestselling Silent Invasion, Hidden Hand exposes the Chinese Communist Party’s global program of influence and subversion, and the threat it poses to democracy. With its enormous economic power, China is now a global political and mi litary force engaged in an ideological struggle with the West. Combining a mass of evidence with unique insights, Clive Hamilton and Mareike Ohlberg lay bare the nature and extent of the Chinese Communist Party’s influence operations across the Western world – in politics, business, universities, think tanks and international institutions such as the UN. This new authoritarian power is using democracy to undermine democracy in pursuit of its global ambitions. Combining meticulous research with compelling prose, Hidden Hand brings to light the Chinese Communist Party's threats to democratic freedoms and national sovereignty across Europe and North America – and show how we might push back against its autocratic influence. Governments around the world are in the early stages of a repositioning of power, as China rises and the United States is drawn into direct competition. But some are beginning to wonder whether, for all of the economic benefits, engaging with China carries unseen dangers. China is now determined to reshape the world in its image. The party is not interested in democracy. It divides the world into those who can be won over, and enemies. They have already lured many leaders to their corner; others are weighing up a devil's bargain. Through its exercise of 'sharp power', the party is weakening global institutions, ferociously targeting individual corporations, and threatening freedom of expression from the arts to academia. At the same time, security services are increasingly worried about incursions into our communications infrastructure. Indeed, the vaunted Great Firewall is seen as a temporary measure, only necessary until the party has transformed the conversation at the global level. We have already missed too many warning signs - now it is time to wake up.   ...Show more

To Plea or Not to Plea: The Story of Rick Gates and the Mueller Investigation by Barak Daphne

$34.99 AUD

Category: Non Fiction

Daphne Barak goes behind the scenes of the Mueller report into Russian interference in the US Presidential election, revealing how one of the key witnesses was turned by the special counsel, and how the ordeal affected his life. On the morning the first indictments of the Mueller investigation were hand ed down, Rick Gates had two choices: either stand trial for thirty-two counts of serious federal crimes, all of which concerned work with Paul Manafort, or take a plea deal and surrender himself to the special counsel. having been abandoned by Manafort and forced to stand for his crimes alone, gates took the deal. Then the real trouble began. As soon as Gates pled guilty, Barak writes, he became the property of the special counsel's office. He was forced to be "on call" at all times, and he gave more than 300 hours of recorded testimony. He was forced to abandon his cancer-stricken wife in her time of need, and gave up valuable time with his children. But with the help of his friends and family, he came out the other side stronger, finally ready to tell his story for the first time. ...Show more

How to Win an Election by Wallace, Chris

$29.99 AUD

Category: Non Fiction

The Truth Hurts by Andrew Boe

$32.99 AUD

Category: Non Fiction

Criminal justice systems have not been designed to seek the truth. In places like Australia, it remains an adversarial blood sport often distracted by smoke and mirrors. Navigating through it is difficult and uncertain for any one of us but more so if you are poor, not white - or not white enough - not a straight male or have no formal education. Drawing on his experiences as a child of Burmese migrants fleeing a military junta and his evolution from a naive law clerk, too shy to speak, into a lawyer whose ponytailed flamboyance and unbridled willingness to speak truth to power riled many within the legal establishment, Andrew Boe delves into cases that he found unable to leave behind. These cases have shaped who he has become. Taking us from a suicide in the Gibson Desert to a death on Palm Island, places where race relations are often stalled in a colonial time warp; to an isolated rural home, and the question of what is self-defence after a woman's decades of domestic abuse; to meet children abandoned, 'stolen' and then fought over; and into prison interview rooms and courthouses around the country where he defended serial killers, rapists, child sex offenders, murderers as well as the odd politician - holding fast to the premise that either every one of us is entitled to the presumption of innocence or none of us are. THE TRUTH HURTS is an unflinching exploration of the fault lines in our justice system by an outsider who found his way in. With forthright and uncompromising focus, Boe, now a barrister, spares no one, including himself, in this thought-provoking and at times brutal account. He argues that to give each other 'a fair go', we should all first acknowledge the flaws in the system, address our collective weaknesses and contribute to a real conversation about the human cost of not getting to the truth. ...Show more

I Know This to Be True: The Guiding Principles of Nelson Mandela by Sello Hatang; Verne Harris

$17.99 AUD

Category: Non Fiction

A unique insight into the qualities, routines and disciplines of Nelson Mandela, revolutionary anti-apartheid leader and first president of a democratic South Africa (1994-99).

After Australia by Michael Mohammed Ahmad (Editor)

$24.99 AUD

Category: Non Fiction

Climate catastrophe, police brutality, white genocide, totalitarian rule and the erasure of black history provide the backdrop for stories of love, courage and hope. In this unflinching new anthology, eleven of Australia's most daring Indigenous writers and writers of colour provide a glimpse of Austral ia as we head toward the year 2050. Featuring Ambelin Kwaymullina, Claire G. Coleman, Omar Sakr, Future D. Fidel, Karen Wyld, Khalid Warsame, Kaya Lattimore, Sarah Ross, Zoya Patel, Michelle Law and Hannah Donnelly. Edited by Michael Mohammed Ahmad. Original concept by Lena Nahlous. Published by Affirm Press in partnership with Diversity Arts Australia and Sweatshop Literacy Movement. ...Show more

The Case of George Pell: Reckoning with Child Sexual Abuse by Clergy by Melissa Davey

$35.00 AUD

Category: Non Fiction

Guardian Australia's Melbourne bureau chief Melissa Davey covered Cardinal George Pell's evidence at the royal commission into child sexual abuses, and attended each of his trials for his alleged historic sexual offences against children--his committal hearing, mistrial, retrial, and appeal. What she sa w, heard, and read made her determined to produce a dispassionate and thorough rendition of what occurred.The Case of George Pell is the result--an authoritative account of those trials, of the basis for the guilty verdict, and of the backlash to that verdict. It is inevitably not only about Cardinal Pell but also about justice in the age of conservative media, about culture wars, and about the broader context of clergy abuse. Despite a five-year-long sexual-abuse enquiry, three trials of one of the most senior Catholics in the world, and saturation coverage of the issue, it became evident to Davey that many myths about the nature of child sexual abuse persist--and that, for some people, the evidence of victims can never be allowed to tarnish the reputation of the church and its practitioners. The Case of George Pell is not just about one alleged offender, and one complainant. It is also about how the sexual abuse of children occurs--and has been allowed to continue. ...Show more