Dear Mr Abbott,
I am writing on behalf of your daughters, and indeed all women in the country you lead.
We face financial ruin, but most of us don’t realise it. We think our superannuation system is ticking away in the background, taking care of our future while we’re busy taking care of everything else. Instead, super is inherently sexist. And if we don’t act together I have no doubt the new GFC will be the Girls’ Financial Crisis.
We live 4.4 years longer than men – and no, I know there’s nothing you can do about that. I only point it out because it means our super stash has to stretch further.
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The problem is that super is earnings-based, so our stashes are invariably smaller than our male counterparts’.
Remember that we earn 18 per cent less than...
Lifestyle
Dear Judge,
I am writing this open letter, both for public educational purposes and as a “heads up” for the courts. Along with other observers, I feel serious concern about recurring reports of human rights violations emanating from your court in an ongoing family dispute over child custody.
In one case in question, the “back story” has been going on for a considerable time, and the core issues in the case are not uncommon. One party’s aim seems to be to keep the other party from any normal custody sharing of their minor child. The strategy being used to achieve this is also a very common one: repeated allegations of abuse, anger and poor control. Despite the fact that the standard investigations into these allegations have found no substance to them, the allegations are repeated...
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An Open Letter to My Newsie Friends,
As a freshman, I never imagined my writing would grow to possess meaning. I never even thought anyone would actually read anything I wrote. Yet here I am, four years later, an editor in newspaper about to attend college for a journalism degree. However, I know none of this would be possible without everyone I know and love in newspaper.
Nabila: I will start by apologizing for constantly mispronouncing your name when we first met. You have such a honest and bright personality, and always tried to put forth your best work. With your honesty and unique style, your future looks bright.
Melissa: Oh Melissa. How will I survive college without your infamous laugh? What will I do without your bubbly personality to brighten my day? I honestly loved...
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Dear Jane and Candice,
We are writing to you to request that you correct some serious factual errors contained in your article "The 'One in Three' claim about male domestic violence victims is a myth" (April 30). We sincerely hope that Daily Life adheres to the principles of the Australian Press Council concerning accuracy and clarity.
We believe the errors to be as follows:
1. You state that the One in Three Campaign website claims the source of the 'One in Three' claim is The Australia Bureau of Statistics (ABS) Personal Safety Survey (PSS). This is quite incorrect. If you look at the overview page on our website, you will see that we cite seventeen different authoritative sources, including the PSS, but also other community surveys, crime, police, homicide, hospital, and...
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Dear Inventor of Stick Figure Family Car Decals,
At any given stoplight, I can be blessed with the knowledge that the moron in front of me summers on Nantucket, loves her Wheaten Terrier, has a son on the honor roll at Beaver Buck Country Day School and (to toot her own horn) married a Harvard alum. Lucky her!
Now, because of your idiotic invention, I have the pleasure of adding these fine details: Her name is Bethany, her husband’s name is Colby II, her son’s name is Colby III, and the dog’s name is Harley. Bethany loves to cook, Colby III plays lacrosse, and Colby II apparently loves to carry his briefcase around. Oh, and look at that—number 2 is on the way and it’s a girl!
Please stop polluting our driving landscape with these asinine stickers. We all know what I am talking...
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Dear Sirs,
I write to each of you individually, in the name of present and future generations.
It is often said that one person cannot change the world, but today you are that person. You have been selected as your people's leaders.
You owe them, and to those to come, a world of peace and prosperity, a world in which we can live and our children grow without the fear of nuclear weapons, of no chances, of no future.
It is your moral and genetic duty to restore peace. You have that ability. Your people, my people, our people do not want wars, we want peace.
The Hammurabi code, "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth" has been proven a bad policy. Countless generations have employed it with disastrous consequences.
It is time to render it obsolete and find a new way. I know...
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Dear Mr. President,
It is time to move forward with Egypt. The Administration’s current stance towards that historic ally since the removal of Muhammad Morsi and the influence of the Muslim Brotherhood in July of 2013 has not only undermined U.S.-Egyptian relations but created a dangerous leadership vacuum that emboldens militant Islam.
America needs to act, now. Egypt is in a fragile state, and we believe that long-term U.S. security and even the goal of eventual peace in the Middle East is best served by siding with the majority of the Egyptian people, who rose up against a budding Islamist dictatorship last summer and have been fighting Islamist terrorism ever since. This engagement should begin immediately with the provision of promised military and political support to Egypt...
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Dear Senator Feingold,
On April 17, 2003 I attended your listening session at UW Oshkosh. You took offense to my remarks challenging you to speak out against the Iraq war on the floor of the US Senate while the war is in progress. As you know, Senator Bob LaFollette spoke out against World War I as the war raged. Since you and your supporters habitually link your conduct to LaFollette, I expected you to demand publicly that the Senate debate the merits of the war even as the bullets fly. Instead, you've charted a politically safe course as evidenced by this statement released to the press:
"American troops have been called to action in Iraq - I am confident in their abilities, and I hope for a swift victory and for their safe and quick return. In recent months the country has...
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Dear Attorney General Eric Holder,
This letter is in regards to your March 4, 2015 press conference on the DOJ’s Ferguson report.
You said you wanted to address the causes of what you called the “powder keg” of Ferguson. You talked about how local authorities use law enforcement for revenue generation (“policing-for-profit”), and how municipal court practices disproportionately harm African American residents. You talked about how this causes an “intensely charged atmosphere” where residents feel they are under “assault and under siege” by police. You attribute this to “implicit and explicit racial bias.” You noted – correctly — that these kinds of “powder kegs” are not exclusive to Ferguson, but pervade across the United States. You also asserted that “violence is never justified...
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Dear Dr. Sagan:
We were deeply impressed by your article on "The Nuclear Winter" that appeared in the October 30 issue of Parade magazine -- as, no doubt, were many thousands of other people throughout the nation. While it has long been common knowledge that a nuclear war would have dreadful effects, these latest findings by you and your colleagues should do much to dispel the illusions, still held by some, regarding the survivability or "winnability" of a nuclear war, even a "limited" one.
We were also heartened by your call for "the ingenuity and dedication that went into developing strategic weapons systems in the first place" to now "be devoted to finding a way out of the deadly trap we have set for ourselves." We concur, and it is to contribute toward this effort to "finding a...
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