Good morning, this is Imogen Dewey bringing you the main stories and must-reads on Monday 9 November.
Top stories
President Donald Trump has refused to concede the election after Democratic challenger Joe Biden was declared the winner on Saturday, and continues to play golf as he continues to make baseless claims of voter fraud. With a vengeful and fearful lame duck incumbent, some analysts fear the next 11 weeks could be the most dangerous in US history. But the president-elect has already announced his plans to tackle the coronavirus pandemic. His policy to commit to net zero carbon emissions by 2050 could bring the Paris climate goals “within striking distance”, and opposition climate change minister Mark Butler says his victory brings an important message for Australia: that unity and ambitious climate policy can win elections.
And now the US, and the world, are preparing for a change in management: Scott Morrison flagged an Australia invite for Joe Biden to Australia in 2021 and Kevin Rudd and Malcolm Turnbull welcomed the defeat of “Murdoch’s man”, but in the US, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez criticised the Democratic party for incompetence, warning the Biden administration could lose big in 2022 if it doesn’t put progressives in top spots. Boris Johnson risked opening a rift with Biden, insisting a Brexit bill that reneges on part of the EU withdrawal agreement would go ahead as planned. And top Republican Mitt Romney said Trump should “be careful” throwing around claims of a “stolen election”. The president’s increasingly desperate bid to hang on to the White House crossed into abject farce when his campaign staged a “major” press conference between a crematorium and a sex shop in the car park of Four Seasons Total Landscaping, a suspected mixup with Four Seasons hotel in Philadelphia.
Labor has accused the Coalition of “stacking” the administrative appeals tribunal after a member was revealed to be working as a lobbyist, a potential conflict of interest. The AAT has asked ex-Liberal staffer Tony Barry to explain his work as a consultant for a lobbying firm. Shadow attorney general Mark Dreyfus has used the revelation to renew Labor’s critique that Christian Porter and his predecessor, George Brandis, have stacked the tribunal with more than 70 Coalition mates. Dreyfus said Porter “has no excuses – he can’t feign ignorance”. “He needs to explain what he proposes to do about this clear and inherent conflict of interest.”
Australia
Despite a major push to online services, Centrelink office waiting times have ballooned as the agency continues to shut or merge shopfronts. Australians waited 30% longer on average in the past financial year compared with 2015-16.
Victorians are now free to travel wherever they like within the state and the “ring of steel” separating metropolitan Melbourne and regional Victoria will be scrapped at midnight after nine days with no new coronavirus cases. Other Covid restrictions have also been eased, including some limits on gatherings.
Labor is likely to try to amend the Morrison government’s jobmaker package, over concerns employers may sack older workers and replace them with younger people on a youth wage subsidy. The opposition may also back a Greens proposal on the issue when federal parliament resumes today.
Alleged Chinese spy Chunsheng Chen left behind several threads that have baffled authorities when he departed Australia last year, after being publicly outed as a suspected Communist party operative.
The world
The number of coronavirus cases worldwide has passed 50 million, according to the Johns Hopkins University tracker, which showed that the US, India and Brazil have the highest figures.
Most world leaders rushed to congratulate Joe Biden on his election, but Russia and China, two likely losers from the defeat of Donald Trump, remained silent, perhaps waiting for the outgoing president to concede defeat.
Ireland and India both celebrated the US election: Joe Biden’s ancestral home in the west of Ireland (Ballina, County Mayo) with champagne, Guinness, flags and a declaration it was now Bidenland; and locals in Thulasendrapuram in South India, where US vice-president-elect Kamala Harris’ grandfather was born, with prayers and firecrackers for the “daughter of our village”.
Riot police fired water cannon at crowds of Thai pro-democracy protesters as they attempted to reach Bangkok’s Grand Palace on Sunday to hand-deliver letters urging reform of the country’s powerful monarchy.
Heavy casualties have been reported in ongoing clashes between the Ethiopian army and troops loyal to the ruling party of the restive northern province of Tigray.
Recommended reads
“Deregulating childcare in Australia won’t make it better. Education will,” writes social activist and advisor Wendy McCarthy. “We need to catch up to the rest of the world when it comes to preparing our future workforce.” After 40 years arguing for quality early childhood education and care, she says the public conversation and gathering momentum around childcare reform has been heartening – “a rare bright spot in a terribly bleak year”. But a few familiar arguments need to be put to bed with a short history lesson.
Gabriel Byrne’s autobiography confronts the abuse he experienced at the hands of the Catholic church. “There’s a shame about men speaking out. A sense that if you were abused, it was your own fault. Men are not supposed to talk about their feelings. Men have to be strong and men don’t cry … It still makes me angry.” He has just as much contempt for Hollywood – and US presidents from Obama to Trump. All the same, while Catherine Shoard concedes Byrne might sound splenetic on the page, “folded on a sofa, he is as mild and smiley as a tortoise”.
“Five stores email you on the same day. There’s a big sale coming … By the time you log off the next day, a little dazed, you have an extra set of bedsheets and a popcorn machine you had no intention of buying.” It’s not your imagination, writes Alyx Gorman, there really are more online sales now – and from Click Frenzy to Cyber Monday, they’re becoming an “unofficial sport”. One ad expert says there’s “something biological going on, that creates a frenzied momentum and scale”. But while these impulses are all great for retailers, they’re not always so good for consumers.
Listen
Medical textbooks are full of anatomical pictures of the penis, but the clitoris barely rates a mention, with many medical professionals uncomfortable even talking about it. In this episode of Full Story, reporter Calla Wahlquist and associate news editor Gabrielle Jackson explain the history and science of the clitoris, and speak to the scientists and artists dedicated to demystifying it.
Full Story is Guardian Australia’s daily news podcast. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or any other podcasting app.
Sport
The talking points may centre around two red cards, but the Wallabies will disembark their Bledisloe Cup rollercoaster in the knowledge this new generation can beat the All Blacks. The chaotic final was the first Test Australia has won under coach Dave Rennie.
Nick Kyrgios has spoken about his struggle with depression which he says left him in a “lonely, dark place”. The 25-year-old Australian began seeing a psychologist in 2018 to “get on top of his mental health” while he also vowed to reduce his schedule.
Media roundup
The suicide of an 11-year-old girl has put a confronting spotlight on the public housing crisis, the West Australian reports, highlighting the stress placed on families forced into overcrowded conditions. Companies and institutions across banking, finance, defence, communications, food and grocery and higher education sectors will have to strengthen their cyber defences and cooperate with national security agencies, according to the Australian, amid increasing threats from state-based actors and transnational criminal organisations. Australians overwhelmingly support compulsory superannuation payments climbing to 12%, but businesses fear it could cause problems, the Herald Sun says.
Coming up
Federal parliament resumes for a week-long sitting in Canberra.
Naidoc Week continues today, with the 2020 theme “Always was, always will be” acknowledging the spiritual and cultural connection of Indigenous people to country.
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