From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
WHENEVER will they learn learn? Voters have scant interest in political braggadocio cultivated specifically to score cheap, political points, and creating furores of dubious...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
THE time has come for the silent majority to tell the vocal minority to back-off! Wokeism, with all its extremism, must be curbed. Published research...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
WHEN precisely, in the span of time, were journalists touched by the cosmos with the exclusive responsibility of predicting the future shape and form...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
Time-and-tide take the edge from our childhood recollections; however, there are those elements which never fade… Of the myriad treasured remembrances from Gwalia, an Australian/European...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
At school, football was not my sport-of-first-choice. I was too skinny; too self-conscious. Paradoxically, it has played a major part in my career. The...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
“’Allo, ’allo, ’allo,” said Constable Plod, clasping his hands behind his back, and rising-and-falling on the balls of his large, flat feet. For fans of...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
The more one sees and reads, the more one is convinced our lives are being controlled by characters who are, at best, average in...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
Being a small part of a successful television programme is most rewarding; however, it does have one serious disadvantage. The passage of time… I never...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
How could it be? The 2024 NAPLAN results show: one-in-three Australian school students is not meeting literacy and numeracy benchmarks. One-in-ten requires additional support. It...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
BACK in his Italian, Tuscan village, my father, Ginger, was a pastore — a shepherd. They made pecorino cheese. In Australia, he taught himself...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
Don't answer the foolish arguments of fools, or you will become as foolish as they. Conversely, be sure to answer the foolish arguments of...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
IT is too easy to reflect; to say: “things were so much better back then.” In truth: fact and fiction become clouded — distance...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
The Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, used a Labor caucus gathering to remind colleagues they sit in the House of Representatives, and the Senate, by...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli
It is impossible to fathom how we came to this precarious pass. From an ethos when the world was the oyster-of-the-young, our youth, through...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli for 10 March
When I acquired my little cottage in Ballarat I hoped for fairies at the bottom of the garden. That would have been perfection. BE...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli – 25 February
The Premier of Victoria Jacinta Allan delivered to the State Parliament, and all those Victorian children who suffered institutional abuse, a superbly measured and...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli – 18 February
The discovery of a once-familiar childhood image is comforting. Viewed through the sands-of-time, it conjures a memory-flood from a distant time-and-place in one’s life. IT...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli – 11 February
The ABC is an important broadcasting institution. It is the voice of the people. It must be impartial, unfailingly. THE increasing inclination of journalists to...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli – 4 February
It was simple: you worked a second job - usually in the hospitality industry; saved a 10 per cent deposit; met with your bank...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli – 26 January
If you will: exercise your imagination! If a hostile nation were to invade Australia and claim possession, and then you were expected to celebrate...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli – 21 January
On the original production of HAIR, I worked with some colleagues who took illegal drugs. It was the ethos of “take trips/get high/laugh, joke,...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli – 14 January
Increasingly, it is becoming more difficult to have a civil, vigorous conversation without becoming embroiled in accusations of disrespect, discrimination, racial vilification, and generally...
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli – 07 January
Sometimes I feel I am marching to the beat of my own drum, regardless; or perhaps I am a relic from a forgotten past....
From the desk of Roland Rocchiccioli – 31 December
I am not looking to pick an argument, but it is Happy New Year, and not Happy New Year’s - which refers only to...