The increase in house prices is not good news for everybody

For those who don't own a home, rising prices are making them poorer - much poorer - increasing rents and making it next to impossible for them to buy a home.

For those who own their own home, rising prices have no benefit at all. Selling one to buy another is a zero-sum game unless you're dramatically downsizing or moving somewhere (relatively) cheaper.

The only people who benefit are those who own more properties than their own home, a group which certainly includes many politicians.

Of course there are other beneficiaries including banks and real estate agents. This does explain governments' and the real estate industry's propaganda. What it doesn't explain is the media's uncritical and unbalanced reporting of price increases as beneficial.

Joe Biden should be set aside as president. A President Harris would be America's first female president of colour, would be able to demonstrate competence in the role ahead of the poll, and would have the advantage of incumbency.

She would also be debating Trump on a level playing field, not as a Vice-President taking on a former president.

It didn't take long. The Olympics are meant to be the ideal, the best of the best but humans are flawed. We have had Charlotte Dujardin going home after a video apparently showing animal cruelty emerged. Meanwhile a convicted child rapist from the Netherlands is competing.

Previously the main form of cheating was the use of drugs, although another example that deserves a mention is taking a ride in a car during the 1904 marathon. But now cheating has gone high-tech.

A Canadian soccer team staff member used a drone to spy on the New Zealand training session, presumably to see if they had some new strategies. It probably won't be the last "cheating" incident we will hear about. The IOC must ensure the events are clean and fair. The 2026 Commonwealth Games have been abandoned, with little hope of revival, as they were too expensive and interest was waning. Let's see the best of the people.

Jack Waterford (July 20) thinks it is "more likely that Trump will continue with politics of isolationism and increased unwillingness to become engaged in foreign wars ... the big risk to AUKUS ... is likely that it will wither on the vine".

If Waterford's analysis is correct, a Trump presidency doesn't look such a disaster after all.

I am genuinely pleased when I become aware of people, such as Tony Henshaw, having a good experience with the Canberra hospital system (Letters, July 22).

However, "one swallow doesn't make a summer". I can provide a very, very long list of instances of bad care, over many years, in respect of numerous family members.

Instances include treatment that actually endangered the health of patients (e.g. overdosing with medication that inadvertently caused my wife to stop breathing).

Despite the best efforts of individual dedicated and hard-working individual staff members, entering the Canberra hospital system is something that I and my family members have, over the years, come to dread.

And, as for visiting patients at Canberra Hospital, twice I tried to visit a very sick patient, couldn't find a park, and had to go home again.

Mokhles Sidden (Letters, July 24) suggests Israel's attack on Yemen in the wake of the Houthi drone attack that killed a man in Tel Aviv shows a lack of tolerance or restraint.

The Iranian-backed Houthis have fired at least 200 projectiles at Israel, including missiles and drones, and have targeted ships with any relationship to Israel, no matter how tenuous. Yet this is the first time Israel has responded. I'd call that restrained.

I think it was in Frederick Forsyth's The Day of the Jackal that the statement was made that it is impossible to prevent an assassination attempt by a single person acting alone if that person is prepared to risk their own life. By firing an AR-15 from an exposed position, Trump's "apprentice" assassin certainly risked his own life.

Seeing it is now half a century since the film hit the cinemas the rabid right press should know the Secret Service agents did the best that they possibly could.

Was the shooter at the Trump political rally streaming Australia's national broadcaster?

Its casually one-eyed, over-the-top demonisation of Donald Trump in its Four Corners series, which equates a second term for the former president with the end of civilisation as we know it, was so lurid as to out-shriek Rupert Murdoch's most discredited tabloids.

I am bemused by the rash of rural outrage over the installation of renewable infrastructure in regional Australia. The latest example is coverage of the Wallaroo solar farm.

Much of this outrage comes from small hobby farmers, bush retreaters and lifestyle changers along with commercial farmers.

This rural outrage is about loss of amenity, views and so forth. But so much of this rural land occupation has changed the landscape forever. Habitat loss continues to take place in many areas at an unacceptable rate.

Those who are outraged don't seem to appreciate what the consequences of global warming will mean for their "amenity".

In March US Vice-President Harris called for "an immediate ceasefire" in Gaza after the "immense scale of suffering".

President Biden, if only for his legacy, must do what it takes to protect civilians in Gaza either by getting the UN to send in a peacekeeping force presence or giving US forces the nod to go in to protect civilians from further attacks. There is no justification for military attacks on civilians anywhere.

It amuses me when people complain about the Americanisation of Australian English. Who cares? Language is all the better for being a fluid beast that is democratically wrangled to people's liking, rather than being tamed by the smarties.

Also, much of what is derided as "American" is actually British in origin. One example was the recent letters pages backlash (another nasty American term) against "gotten". The word was used for centuries by English scribblers such as Billy Shakespeare and Chuck Dickens.

That said, I nearly spat out my cornflakes when I read James Mahoney's letter (July 17) complaining about the use of "beltway". Apart from "beltway" being a great lexical innovation to describe a ring-road that links to a highway, the metaphorical use of "belt" to describe a region where things are concentrated has been used for centuries in Britain and Australia.

This fits with the area around Parliament House so why not use it?

I'm sorry Yankers (a neologism of my own creation to describe those who want to yank American words from our language) your chaste Australian language is always swiping right to have fun with new words. You just need to "chillax, dudes".

I am a pro-democracy activist and human rights defender and I am banned from stepping on American soil, the world leader of democracy. Benjamin Netanyahu who many deem a war criminal not only gets to give yet another speech to both houses of the US Congress, he gets a standing ovation from many of those present.

The AFP asking for dash cam footage of errant drivers rings hollow. A while ago I was the victim of a burglary and had credit cards stolen. The bank notified me when someone tried to use them at a bottle shop. The shop management supplied me with CCTV footage and promised more.

The AFP not only showed no interest in this but castigated shop management for supplying it. This resulted in provisional plans for "citizen sleuths" to identify the perpetrators. These were shelved when police bumped into the thieves, still in possession of some of the stolen goods.

If dash cam footage is enough for conviction why not cut out the middleman and solve it yourself?

The best way to handle the morons who are vandalising our war memorials is to remove their handiwork quickly and quietly and then say no more.

They are doing this to spark outrage and get publicity. Don't give them what they want.

The CSIRO gave us the science on global warming and energy generation, as has the IPCC. The climate deniers simply stick their fingers in their ears and sing "la la-la la-la". So who do you think should be listened to about "the science"?

Ex- NSW premier (and treasurer) Dominic Perrottet thinks Canberra is too cold but is taking his family to Washington DC. Wow. He'll be back.

Pope perfectly conveys how federal Labor's environmental credentials are all show and no go (Cartoon, July 24). By issuing permits for offshore gas exploration and unproven carbon dumping projects, Labor is actively fuelling the fossil fuel industry and subsequently, accelerating global heating. How will we explain these dangerous decisions to our children?

It has now been more than two weeks since PM Albanese announced that he was appointing a special envoy to combat anti-Semitism in Australia. He also foreshadowed he would appoint a special envoy to combat Islamophobia. As yet, no such appointment has been made. I can only assume the PM is having trouble identifying a suitable candidate.

Mokhles Sidden asks, while talking about the tit-for-tat armed exchanges between Hamas and the Israelis, (Letters, July 24) have the Israelis heard of "tolerance" or "restraint". The answer is a resounding "no". The religions of both these groups espouse "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth". It is pointless imposing New Testament-inspired morality on them.

How can it possibly be acceptable for someone to be not just on active service with, but to be a public spokesperson for, ACT Policing while actively campaigning for election to the ACT Legislative Assembly?

My latest ActewAGL account shows I used less electricity than for the same period last year. But the cost is $100 more. This is blatant price-gouging. The federal government should launch an inquiry into price-gouging by power companies.

Kym MacMillan (Letters, July 25) says that the many senior Democrats denying Biden's failing capabilities were a threat to American democracy. Perhaps. But what about the fawning sycophants around former president Donald Trump who have denied for nearly four years that he lost the 2020 election when he clearly did. Which is the bigger threat?