Before we open the celebratory champagne on the armistice of the global trade war – which is in all likelihood just a partial ceasefire – it is important to remember that all bets are off as far as American global engagement is concerned. And no one is safe from the ire of the Trump Administration.

On Monday, Trump’s top economic advisor, Steve Miran, called for ‘improved burden-sharing at the global level’ for what America’s service in providing global public goods. By that, he meant America’s military protection and provision of the US dollar and government bonds (i.e. US government debt). 

Whatever you think of America’s global military presence and actions, it is interesting that Trump, and so many around him, consider it a burden for America, that it is a net receiver of goods from the rest of the world. Only a failed domestic economic system can turn a stream of imperial tributes into a chronic social problem.

I’ll spare you the details of Steve Miran’s argument – including outright identifying China as America’s biggest adversary who helped create the Global Financial Crisis. He suggested five ideas for burden sharing, including accepting American tariffs without retaliation, buying more US-made weapons, and – can you believe it – “simply write checks to Treasury that help us finance global public goods”.

So, on top of sending us your produce in exchange for some IOUs we can type up on a keyboard (which you have probably made in the first place), you should also send us back some of that dollar you made on that sale!

Just soak in that for a second. I can’t image it would have gone unnoticed in countries like Vietnam, Indonesia, India, and so on, who have a significant reliance on exporting to the US. And if Australia want to maintain its influence in its regional neighbourhood, it would be well-advised to distance itself from America’s outright predatory stance.

The inimitable and irrepressible Amy has returned!

Appropriately caffeinated and ready to rumble.

It’s been a pleasure.

Hello, Amy Remeikis back with you for a little bit – big snaps to Glenn for stepping in – he is a total superstar.

A simpler way to raise revenue and pay for things than the Coalition’s new mining-windfall-thingy-tax-diversion-magic would be to just stop giving away gas.

We estimated recently that if the Commonwealth just charged existing royalty rates on all the gas it gives away, it could raise $3.6b/year.

There’s no reason existing rates couldn’t be increased by 50% to raise $6.9 billion/year.

This could pay for things immediately rather than based on future maybe-interest from some difficult-to-understand fund.

There’s been a lot of talk about why Peter Dutton is struggling in the polls in the Press Gallery over the past week.

Many feel it’s because, until now, he’s only taken easy questions from mates, usually with very few voters few watching or listening.

When he says something silly, he just disappears for a few days and, by the time he sticks his head up again, the political debate has moved on.

Amy wrote a fantastic column about this in The New Daily:

https://www.thenewdaily.com.au/news/politics/australian-politics/federal-election-2025/2025/04/05/peter-dutton-election-test

Without naming the Sky after darkers, who have almost non-existent audiences, the PM contrasts his record with Mr Dutton’s comparative inaccessibility to political journalists.

To be fair, I can say from experience, the PM goes on Sky News and takes hard questions from real journalists like Andrew Clennell, Kieran Gilbert and Peter Stefanovic.

Anthony Albanese:

I am always up for sit downs of course, and I think if you compare my availability to the media with the other side, I think they had two press conferences in Canberra before the national press gallery. In the same time I had 36. 36. So I’m available. I don’t just talk to one radio station and one late night TV channel, and I will leave it to you to work out what one that is. But I talk to everyone. That is the way that I engage. Look, you go through changes in society, we live in a much more fragmented society than we used to. And it is to be the case that people watched the ABC, or Channel 7, or Channel Nine, or Channel Ten news, and in more recent times, SBS as well, so there was a common set of facts, and they picked up the paper in the morning, a common paper, there was some commonality there, and that was how they got their information. So, therefore, there was less diversity and less noise, and genuine information.

The PM says he’s not getting ahead of himself when asked about a visit to Washington (“I intend to go there”) … but clearly he’s been doing a big of legacy thinking. A place in history beckons. And he knows it.

It is hard for Labor to win elections. We’ve won one in three. No Prime Minister has served out a full term having been elected by the people and been re-elected since John Howard in 2004. For 21 years we’ve had a (revolving) door of Prime Ministers. One of the things I offer at this election is not just me but a team who are competent, orderly, who are engaged, on top of their briefs, on top of their portfolios.

Next question is to the Prime Minister, about the government’s climate ambitions.

We have a plan to get to the 43% target. The Safeguard Mechanism together developed with the integrated systems plan developed by the Australian Energy Market Operator provides a pathway, certainty for business investment. The problem is that the former government had 23 different policies and did not land one. It changed. To talk about gas, they stood up day after day in Parliament and said they were going to have a lead recovery and nothing happened. Nothing happened. You can’t deal with economic policy just through media releases and a different announcement every day. What you need is a certainty and the business community asked for certainty. We’ve given it that. At 2030 target, a pathway to get there. The transition of course is in the context of the former Coalition, 23 policies, none of them landed. 28 coal-fired power stations in Australia. 24 of the 28 announced their closure during the period of the former government. 24 out of 28 and nothing happened. Nothing happened, no planning for energy security and indeed they just south of here at Collinsville, in North Queensland, they gave proponents of a new coal fired power station. Where is it? Nowhere. Because it didn’t stack up.

Labor star (and giant) candidate Matt Smith gets his first question of the presser … from the PM!

The former NBL player cuts an imposing figure.

Thank you. I take the opportunity to thank the Prime Minister deliver some fantastic health outcomes for our community. We’ve been struggling to keep people in radiology in the regions and what we’ve found in the evidence suggests the only radiology school in Queensland at the moment is in Mackay. This is an investment in Cairns’ economic future. You think about it, different universities, they last for a long time. Oxford has been around for a long time. It drives the economy. Cairns is lucky to have two world-class universities. I say this to everyone thinking about a career. Come to Cairns. Study. Get qualified and build your life here.

Question:

Your Treasurer accused Peter Dutton of being a DOGE sycophant, borrowing policy from elsewhere. Do you agree with your Treasurer that he is a DOGE sycophant that’s adopted Donald Trump’s policies?

Anthony Albanese:

What’s interesting is the shadow Assistant Treasurer online has made a statement, very close confidant of Peter Dutton. When Jacinta Price was appointed as the shadow minister reflecting government efficiency referred very directly to DOGE and said that’s the model they would have. Peter Dutton has said on education, I don’t know why we have so many people in education if we don’t run schools. He said the same about health and hospitals. Peter Dutton, if you look at policies, people will be able to draw their own conclusions. I think on where some of the public service cuts, some of the rhetoric that comes through, some of the culture wars that have attempted to be stopped, people will look at similar policies around the world and they will make their own decisions.

Anthony Albanese turns the tariff debate against Peter Dutton and his tendency to tell a late-night, right-wing screamer something they want to hear in an echo chamber … then pretend it didn’t happen when he speaks to actual journalists.

You have to be an adult. You do not dial it up to 11 at every opportunity, which is what Peter Dutton’s plan is on everything. Just to say the first thing that comes into your head and pretend you have not said it and wind it back and never talk about it again. What you need to do in dealing with the United States, in dealing with other diplomatic relations as well, is to be consistent. That is what we have been.