Tougher citizenship rules announced by the Prime Minister today will require applicants to prove their allegiance to Australia and its values and demonstrate stronger English language skills.

Mr Turnbull says his government is doing migrants a big favour by raising the required English language standard. But the Greens argue a harder test will exclude people who would otherwise make good citizens.

Labor's given initial backing to the Government's proposals. But it says the Government is only making the changes because of divisions within the coalition. 

“We are fighting in Korea so we won’t have to fight in Wichita, or in Chicago, or in New Orleans, or in San Francisco Bay.”

-  President Harry S Truman, 1952

It’s a lazy Sunday. There’s not much on. Rain is falling on corrugated roof creating a rhythm of thought-provoking questions that are not easily put aside. The word democracy keeps insinuating itself upon me. I know I have written about it unendingly but the political person who lives within me tells me I must incessantly return to it. Our democracy is in an unholy mess and my desire, before my candle extracts its last breath, is that it is rescued from its dank demise.

The real kicker in the long run is Shorten and Turnbull supporting the insane Von Trump family who are intent on running the US middle class and poor into the ground while saving themselves by joining the inner circle of US war mongers driven by an out of control Military Industrial Complex. He is not simply “Clinton Light” … he is now Clinton’s clone.

The Trump administration and its allies will "deal" with North Korea if China does not force the rogue state to abandon its nuclear weapons program, US Vice-President Mike Pence declared following talks with Malcolm Turnbull at Sydney's Admiralty House.

French voters will go to the polls on Sunday to vote for a new president. The election will have profound reverberations around the world. Will France take a nationalist turn to the right? Will it seek to withdraw from the European Union and restrict immigration? Will a young candidate with a pro-Europe, pro-immigration message convince enough of his voters to actually show up? Will the "French Bernie Sanders" upset the establishment and convince voters that his left-wing populism is the way to go?

Malcolm Turnbull is finally trying to answer the lingering question of what he stands for.

It is no trivial matter because the hollowness at the core of his Government has been its fatal flaw.

History is repeating itself. Medicare was created by the Whitlam government because of the abject failure of private health insurance or, as it was then called, voluntary health insurance.

As a result of the growth of private health insurance since 1999 under the Howard government, Medicare is now seriously threatened. Government subsidies for private health insurance will take us back to the pre-Whitlam and pre-Medicare era.

A white cloud of pesticides had drifted into Fidelia Morales's back yard, coating her children's swing set.

The 40-year-old mother of five gestured toward the citrus groves that surround her house in California's Central Valley as she recounted when an air blast sprayer sent chemicals floating onto her property last year – landing on her family's red and blue jungle gym.

On April 15, a Navy photo showed the USS Carl Vinson south of its base in Singapore when it was supposed to be headed north towards North Korea per Trump’s orders. Trump said in an interview with FOX on April 9 that he dispatched the supercarrier the day prior to send a powerful message to Pyongyang.