The latest round of international climate change talks finished on Friday in discord and disappointment, with some participants concerned that important progress made last year was being unpicked.

At the talks, countries were supposed to set out a workplan on negotiations that should result in a new global climate treaty, to be drafted by the end of 2015 and to come into force in 2020. But participants told the Guardian they were downbeat, disappointed and frustrated that the decision to work on a new treaty – reached after marathon late-running talks last December in Durban – was being questioned.

The fetid cloud of hypocrisy rising from our federal Parliament must surely by now be visible from space.

Strip away all the insincere grandstanding about due process and parliamentary standards and you get a government motivated by clinging to power and an opposition motivated by the burning desire to bring that government down, whatever it takes.

The Queensland independent Bob Katter wants a return to an economic past that should be consigned to history.

Julia Gillard has promised no Australian worker will miss out on a job as a result of the Federal Government's decision to allow mining magnate Gina Rinehart to import more than 1700 workers for an iron ore project in Western Australia.

Disgraced former NSW minister for energy Ian Macdonald is to face a new corruption inquiry into the granting of coal exploration licences.

"The Commission has been investigating allegations that corrupt conduct has occurred in connection with the granting of certain coalmining tenements in NSW," the Independent Commission Against Inquiry said in a statement.

NATO concluded its two-day summit in Chicago Monday with a formal ratification of the Obama administration's plans for a phased drawdown of occupation forces from Afghanistan over the next two and a half years, while laying the groundwork for a continued US-led military presence in the country through 2024 and beyond.

When Tony Abbott recently accused the Labor government's budget of being a foray into class warfare, he tried to make this sound like a dirty trick. But what's wrong with a little class warfare? Isn't it the job of an alleged workers' party to represent its less privileged constituents?

Labor was quick to deny the accusation, which tells us Abbott may have been on to something. The fact that Australia is a deeply divided nation is something most politicians are reluctant to admit publicly; for them, "class" is a dirty word.

Recent months have seen a flurry of headlines about cuts (often called "threats") to the U.S. defense budget. Last week, lawmakers in the House of Representatives even passed a bill that was meant to spare national security spending from future cuts by reducing school-lunch funding and other social programs.

Here, then, is a simple question that, for some curious reason, no one bothers to ask, no less answer: How much are we spending on national security these days? With major wars winding down, has Washington already cut such spending so close to the bone that further reductions would be perilous to our safety?

adaptation of a Rembrant painting by Gus Raphael...

from The Power Index .....

Suspended Labor MP Craig Thomson took to the floor of the parliament yesterday to defend himself against claims of misuse of union funds.

Speaking under parliamentary privilege, he made a series of allegations against key figures as being complicit in a prostitute conspiracy and for leading a lynch mob against him. Here's the line-up of who he named: 

Marco Bolano, HSU deputy secretary

This is the judgment levelled by Opposition leader Tony Abbott of Craig Thomson's explanation to parliament of claims he misused union funds for personal perks and pleasures.

It is clear there is no love lost between the Liberal leader and the exiled Labor MP with Mr Thomson describing Mr Abbott as unfit to be Prime Minister - and an MP - yesterday.

Mr Thomson told parliament yesterday he was innocent of fraud allegations arising from his time as a union leader, using the speech to hit out at the Opposition and the media for hounding him and his family and placing his mental health at risk.

Here is an excerpt from President Barack Obama's remarks on Sunday in Chicago after meeting with Afghan President Hamid Karzai: