In politics, the ability to entertain is underrated… Donald Trump and Kemi Badenoch may not, at first sight, have a great deal in common. Both are in politics, of course, but the first is a deeply unattractive narcissist who loudly mutilates the English language and has the attention span of a blowfly on speed, while […]

Submission I welcome the opportunity to make a submission to the Covid Response enquiry. I am a private citizen, and was 69 years old at the outset of the pandemic. In 1977, aged 25, I suffered an attack of poliomyelitis, which nearly killed me, left me extensively paralysed, and importantly for present purposes, gave me […]

The difference between a sceptic and a mere contrarian is that a sceptic questions his own beliefs as fastidiously as he does other people’s. As this interview by Dr John Campbell of a sceptical doctor and former consultant pathologist reveals, however, it’s possible for even the most sceptical of us to underestimate the degree to […]

Dr John Campbell creates so many good videos that it would be tedious to bring them all to the attention of Harrumpfers. Instead, I urge you to follow his feed. I have for some years been taking a Vitamin D3 supplement, consisting of a single 1000IU capsule per day. I did this on the advice […]

As the shock of Hamas’ attack on Israel continues to reverberate around the world, the extent of anti-Israel sentiment on display has provoked a great deal of agonised confusion over the question of freedom of expression. Many from my end of the political spectrum, who have rightly bemoaned the curtailment of freedom of speech inherent […]

The Silly Billies are winning – for now. Harrumpf readers probably won’t need reminding of the phenomenon I call the Silly Billy Effect. When the number of people who have responded to a perceived threat by panicking, enacting costly, counterproductive and unethical regulations and generally behaving like silly billies exceeds the number of people who […]

In my last post, I expressed the hope that the Voice referendum had let the genie of Australian common sense out of its bottle, and might be the start of the rehabilitation of Australian liberal conservatism. It’s clear from Saturday’s result that a sizeable chunk of the rural aboriginal population share my distrust of their […]

The Voice referendum could be the start of a sea change in Australian politics. As a modest contributor, in time and money, to the campaign to reject the proposal to enshrine in the Australian Constitution, I join what I now know to be a considerable majority of my compatriots in breathing a sigh of relief […]

The Devil you know… In his latest podcast, the excellent Neil Oliver takes aim at the Canadian establishment for its apparent ignorance of history in lionising Jaroslav Hunka, a 98 year-old Ukrainian who served in a Waffen SS unit fighting against the Soviet Union. In doing so, I feel he takes less care than he […]

This post relates to an interview with Prof Niall Ferguson, which came up non my Youtube feed and which I took to be more or less contemporary. I penned and posted a riposte in the comments, before realising it was probably in fact a couple of years old. On reflection, though, it’s a pretty good […]