It's episode 200! Hurrah.
Dominic Kelly is a political historian and Honorary Research Fellow at La Trobe University. His 2019 book Political Troglodytes and Economic Lunatics: The Hard Right in Australia examines the activities and influence of four Australian right-wing single-issue advocacy groups: the H.R. Nicholls Society (focussed on industrial relations), the Samuel Griffiths Society (constitutional issues and federalism), the Bennelong Society (Indigenous issues) and the Lavoisier Group (climate change). All four groups were created and steered by three central figures: mining executive Hugh Morgan, his speechwriter Ray Evans and former public servant John Stone. It's a fascinating and (blackly) amusing history.
Here Dominic lays out just how far these four societies have pulled Australia to the right over the past thirty years, what the Left can learn from them and what it shows us about the role that mining interests play in Australian politics.
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I was recently on another episode of The Little Dum Dum Club alongside the very funny Nick Capper
Buy Political Troglodytes and Economic Lunatics on Black Inc. Books
Cause of the Week: Australian Unemployed Workers' Union (unemployedworkersunion.com)