tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37725862011-04-22T08:50:29.954+10:30ABCwatchThe <a href="http://www.abc.net.au">Australian Broadcasting Corporation</a>: too important to be left to its Friends. <a href="mailto:uncleabc0001@yahoo.com">Email.</a>Auntienoreply@blogger.comBlogger13071100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1104464333358575422004-12-31T14:17:00.000+11:002004-12-31T14:38:53.356+11:00So this is what the old fool has been doing? All those hours locked away in the library, the mounting pile of empty bottles, and all for this?
I would have preferred adultery, but that was too much to hope for. From now on Uncle will be sharing sleeping quarters with the dog.
Let me assure those of you foolish enough to read this "blog" that I and my darling communards will not be deterred by Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1103020191103022542004-12-14T20:56:00.000+11:002004-12-14T22:25:53.146+11:00We are, as the pretentious like to say, on the cusp of change. The world is moving under us and we progressives must promote the politics of compassion against those who promote sheer, bloody-minded reaction to the seismic tide of history.
Remember the names Mulan and Mundine. They will stand for the coming era of Aboriginal policy as Wattie Creek and Lingiari did for the last.
Mulan is a Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1102935586749308192004-12-13T21:47:00.000+11:002004-12-13T22:13:31.096+11:00Media myths dismissed.
1. Global warming is raising the temperature of the surface of the world's oceans and threatening a catastrophic decline in coral reefs.
Such evidence as there is points the other way: New Australian research claims the world's coral reefs could expand in size by as much as a third as oceans heat up.
2. In a major embarrassment to the US's Iraq policy, Secretary of Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1102557373366997752004-12-09T13:45:00.000+11:002004-12-09T20:30:00.346+11:00The tawdry stunt that began with Mike Scrafton's letter to The Australian accusing the Prime Minister of deliberately misleading the nation over the kids overboard affair has come to its inevitably tawdry conclusion.
The Senate Committee's Labor majority has found in favour of Scrafton and against the Prime Minister. In one sense that is a remarkable achievement. As Senator Brandis's questioningAuntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1102554006380684212004-12-09T11:50:00.000+11:002004-12-09T12:00:06.380+11:00Southpaw and Moore.
A telling comparison of Auntie film critic David Stratton's response to the politics of Michael Moore (four stars for Fahrenheit 911) and the politics of South Park's Team America (one star).
The difference? Moore attacked Bush with lies and innuendo. Team America satirises Hollywood leftism (among other targets) in its own terms.
On Auntie, one's OK, the other's notAuntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1102552693147798142004-12-09T11:33:00.000+11:002004-12-09T11:38:13.146+11:00When Andrei Illarianov tried to tell Phillip Adams this the other day, According to the Kyoto protocol proponents, Australia and the US are the rogue nations. But in the eyes of the absolute majority of the world, they are reasonable and smart.
After all, Australia and the US -- along with nine developed countries and 167 other nations -- are refusing to undertake legal obligations in Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1102552263892897282004-12-09T11:24:00.000+11:002004-12-09T11:31:03.893+11:00About one third of Great Aunt Beeb's staff face the axe, if their new boss has his way.
The idea is to push funding from overheads and ancillary activities to programme-making.
Director-General Mark Thompson's other aims are to step back from reality programming and to hive off the commercial product sales.
Here's hoping for an Antipodean version. Anything that would reduce our Auntie'sAuntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1102550149148610612004-12-09T10:51:00.000+11:002004-12-09T10:55:49.146+11:00Corrupting the young is one of the few vocations left to aged Uncles, so this note was especially welcome: If memory serves, yours is the first blog I've ever visited, after one night getting really fed up with Tony Jones or the like and I typed something about 'ABC dissent' into ANZWERS. I got a link to you. Blogs were totally unknown to me then but I've never looked back since, so for that I Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1102546885445480622004-12-09T09:46:00.000+11:002004-12-09T10:46:56.450+11:00Who watches Auntie's Media Watchers? Why, the Watchers themselves, of course. And they really love what they see. At times, I've got on and I've been furious. I've been lofty. I've been continuously hilariously funny, of course.That's the tagline David Marr gives himself for his three years' work pontificating from the Media Watch chair.
Let's not be too concerned about a Presenter's self-praiseAuntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1102229101820874522004-12-05T17:24:00.000+11:002004-12-05T17:48:25.220+11:00Who cares who the people of the Ukraine want for their President, when it's the resurrection of the Soviet Union that really matters, according to the Guardian's Jonathan Steele.
Yuschenko is no better a person than Russia's favourite Yanukovich, and look who's supporting him.
Not President Bush, as it turns out, who's happy to see the Ukraine within the Russian sphere of influence, but the Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1102035166483421322004-12-03T11:47:00.000+11:002004-12-03T11:52:46.483+11:00One Presidential candidate is in prison for multiple murders.
Another is under indictment in the US.
These Palestinians sure know how to run interesting elections.
All we could offer the world was Mark Latham.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1102034671791308752004-12-03T11:40:00.000+11:002004-12-03T11:44:31.790+11:00Roger Sandall has been reflecting on the historical background of today's Sudan.
* Because much of 19th-century civilization in the Nile Valley depended on slave labor, in the fields, the house, and the boudoir
* Because both Ismail Pasha and his Prime Minister were deeply insincere and hoped, in their heart of hearts, that nothing would be done to disturb their lifestyle ...
They therefore Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1102031976836036662004-12-03T10:33:00.000+11:002004-12-03T10:59:36.836+11:00The Ivorian insurgency is not getting a good press, at least from the BBC, which thinks claims that French soldiers have indulged in some decapitation to be less than credible. Our own Auntie thinks French 'peace-keepers' are just doing their job.
When French forces suffered the indignity of friendly fire, they responded by destroying the Ivorian air force. President Gbagbo thought that an Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101947111450671462004-12-02T11:17:00.000+11:002004-12-02T11:36:28.650+11:00How to be unilateral, in a multilateral kind of way.
This lesson comes to us from the European Union, which has bribed the Iranian regime to pretend to respect European influence, just for a little while.
The Europeans have done this by promising to prevent the UN acting on its non-proliferation policies.
As they can, since two of the Europeans on the delegation have Security Council vetoes.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101946302192997282004-12-02T11:07:00.000+11:002004-12-02T11:11:42.193+11:00Mark Latham's leadership is strong, as even his enemies concede, at least until sometime next year. Unless they can agree on someone better, sooner.
It's called the Switkowski gambit.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101714964278433832004-11-29T18:50:00.000+11:002004-11-29T22:14:13.550+11:00Young reader BM needs toughening up. He complains to Auntie and she agrees with him, so he stacks on a nervy.
I know it's unprecedented. Five independent enquiries wouldn't achieve it for Minister Alston. A crocodile in your bath is a more probable occurrence. But here at ABCwatch we expect sang-froid of our readers.
Here's Auntie's reply: Thank you for your email of 15 November regarding the Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101713117932764292004-11-29T17:54:00.000+11:002004-11-29T18:48:20.873+11:00There are so many good signs of the terminal state of Latham Labor that the man's own attempts at self-destruction seem superfluous. Welcome, nonetheless.
As Latham holds Stephen Conroy in a head-lock while the latter expresses 'regret' over the current state of affairs you can't fail to notice that the strangled tone of Conroy's voice results from the fact that his gritted teeth are fastened onAuntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101363294352966382004-11-25T17:10:00.000+11:002004-11-25T17:42:25.016+11:00African nations have blocked moves in the UN to condemn the murderous practices of the governments of the Sudan and Zimbabwe. "The African group remains unwavering in its total rejection of the country-specific resolutions within the UN," the South African representative, Pitso Montwedi, said.
He says that resolutions targeting individual countries run against the principles of "friendly Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101338572735390242004-11-25T10:16:00.000+11:002004-11-25T10:22:52.736+11:00CorrectionHere's a big-media blogger who's prepared to confess his mistakes: Yesterday's item on Yasser Arafat (since corrected) should have stated, "Arafat is in stable condition after dying at a Paris hospital," not "Ararat." We inadvertently brought the mountain to Mohammed.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101338045717069132004-11-25T10:08:00.000+11:002004-11-25T10:14:05.716+11:00By stepping aside from his 60 Minutes gig, Dan Rather has foreshadowed the findings of CBS's independent review of Rathergate - the use by Rather and his CBS minders of the Bill Burkett forgeries.
By continuing with CBS as a reporter Rather ensures CBS will continue to live with the consequences of his blatant partisanship.
For all the reaction to Rather, and much on Rather's consistent Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101336746715791812004-11-25T09:39:00.000+11:002004-11-25T09:52:26.716+11:00You and I are growing older, and so is the population of Australia.
It's a disaster, according to this report: The booming aged population will halve economic growth in 20 years, leaving a $2200 billion budget hole over 40 years, a report warnsIt's a bonanza, according to this one:Australia will enjoy a golden era of income growth as wealthy baby-boomers retire leaving a legacy of an efficient Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101087187793710692004-11-22T13:28:00.000+11:002004-11-22T12:37:05.440+11:00The Australian Democrats confront death.
"This is so unfair!"(From ex-leader, Meg Lees)
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101086674564870462004-11-22T13:16:00.000+11:002004-11-22T12:27:21.486+11:00Ralph Zwier is experienced in responding to Auntie's surreptitous preaching of communard politics, in his case her treatment of Israel. It's a thankless task, and complaining to the ABA is not much more rewarding, despite Auntie's own Media Watch finding a couple of scratches from the old ABA pussy-cat intolerable.
Among Zwier's discoveries is this remarkable ABA declaration. "... the Code does Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101085693807636902004-11-22T13:00:00.000+11:002004-11-22T12:09:02.233+11:00Uncle is usually in bed with his last whisky by 10.00pm, but Tony Jones of Lateline never sleeps. Nor does his predictable communard mind-set, as wakeful listener GG observed recently. It's a classic, and well worth a little more attention.
"TONY JONES: Well, Harlan Ullman, it must be a sad day for you to see a man of such potential [Colin Powell] brought so low?
HARLAN ULLMAN, POLITICAL Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101085078677174882004-11-22T11:48:00.000+11:002004-11-22T11:57:58.676+11:00Blind strokingReader JK wonders if I heard our Gastropod interviewing Boyer Lecturer Peter Conrad. Negative. Auntie's choices for Boyer Lecturers range from the sublime to the ridiculous and from hearing his first lecture I concluded that Conrad was, outside his own field, as close to the bottom as, say, Eva Cox, my personal dross standard. Conrad is pretty unreadable as a writer, and sounds much the same.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101019010626312002004-11-21T17:23:00.000+11:002004-11-21T17:36:50.626+11:00Pastor Terry Lane and Senator-elect Steven Fielding used to thump the same Bible, before the Pastor bowed his head to Lord Marx. Still, Lane, like a few others in the Auntie commune, keeps examining the Senator to be for signs that he will be just a stooge for the Assemblies of God, or John Howard, or both. He does it again on today's In the National Interest, repeated tomorrow at 1.00 pm AEDT.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1101018149905873122004-11-21T17:18:00.000+11:002004-11-21T17:22:29.906+11:00You know that Auntie can not take a partisan position on Australian politics.
There are no holds when it comes to other countries. Take this leading question from Mark Colvin, reflecting on the recent US elections: Do you think that they will go ahead in exactly the same way they have before, or do you think that they will look and try and examine their mistakes?When you read the interview it Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100999412187270802004-11-21T11:56:00.000+11:002004-11-21T17:18:41.883+11:00According to some media reports, the message Robert Kagan brought to his Australian audience was that US foreign policy could not be legitimate without the prior endorsement by others of its actions. In fact Kagan was saying something much more intelligent.
Those who criticised the US and its coalition partners over the liberation of Iraq were not the apostles of civilised international Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100652613452924732004-11-17T11:38:00.000+11:002004-11-21T17:46:04.990+11:00The attention given by the media to the apparent killing of a wounded killer by a marine in Falluja is outrageous trial and conviction by media. We see the act, but nothing of the circumstances, except that "he had returned to duty after being shot in the face a day earlier".
This was a matter that should have been reported and investigated. Any military proceedings that follow must now be seenAuntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100651781825920442004-11-17T11:32:00.000+11:002004-11-17T11:38:16.256+11:00Once again, al Jazeera wimps out on showing one of its Islamist affiliate's propaganda films. This one features Margaret Hassan, whose slaughter the Islamists think a triumph.
Since al Jazeera has a policy of showing the snuff pics produced by its associates, this decision can only be interpreted as censorship, and as censorship in the interests of its friends, not of its viewers.
Six years Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100650954818589692004-11-17T11:20:00.000+11:002004-11-17T11:22:34.820+11:00Lawyer Christopher S Carson (his friends call him Kit) presents here the evidence for the close involvement of Saddam's Iraq in the preparations for 9/11. It's a conspiracy theory, but with added evidence.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100648741289709622004-11-17T10:39:00.000+11:002004-11-17T11:30:11.373+11:00Senator Bob Brown, who used to hold the balance of power in the Senate, finds new US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice very scary. "Condaleeza Rice is not a warm human being," Senator Brown told reporters.
"She's George W. Bush's echo.
"But she's lacking the compassion we need to see in the office of secretary of state for the most powerful nation on the planet."
Senator Brown said there Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100646943020544792004-11-17T10:07:00.000+11:002004-11-17T10:26:18.810+11:00The beat goes on...Colin Powell was "the voice of moderation in the Bush administration" according to Auntie's television news service last night. By the same standards, ABC news is the epitome of journalism among Australia's media.
Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, whose conviction of spying for Stalin against their country, the US, has since been confirmed from Soviet sources, are still 'so-called spies', according toAuntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100563582694198942004-11-16T11:02:00.000+11:002004-11-17T10:07:27.613+11:00Fallujah is no longer a quagmire for the Yanks, so it must be a disaster for the remaining citizens, according to the Fairfax-Auntie axis.
Those citizens who offended the Islamist former rulers of Falluja might see things differently, if they have survived their terrorist masters. Their options were obedience or death.
Two female bodies found yesterday suggest such threats were far from idle. Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100560332093870992004-11-16T10:08:00.000+11:002004-11-16T10:18:39.520+11:00The Dutch continue to move westwards across the Atlantic, propelled by the facts of their domestic Islamism if not by any new rhetoric. At this point, the Dutch seem more inclined to move from Live and Let Live to its opposite, and are calling for laws that make the Patriot Act look like Kumbayah. ... On Friday, the Dutch parliament requested a new law that would forbid mosques to employ imams Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100557172933381472004-11-16T09:15:00.000+11:002004-11-16T09:19:32.933+11:00James Taranto is a Kiwi.
Here's proof. Yasser Arafat's death was doubtless a necessary condition for peace between Israel and the Palestinian Arabs, but a look at the news of the past few days suggests it'll be far from suffucient
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100485255433121982004-11-15T13:09:00.000+11:002004-11-15T13:23:25.740+11:00Auntie's communards grant no claim on the part of Israel's courts to dispense justice, but there is an objective and a partisan way to tie the noose. Auntie's news service seems fated always to choose the partisan way, as in this account, drawn to my attention by reader BM. "Mr Barghouti [a possible successor to Yasser Arafat] is serving five life-terms in an Israeli prison for allegedly Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100477033329811202004-11-15T11:00:00.000+11:002004-11-15T11:03:53.330+11:00In the 'so-called war' on terror the weapons are terrifyingly real. Sharif al-Masri, an Egyptian who was captured in late August near Pakistan's border with Iran and Afghanistan, has told his interrogators of "al-Qaeda's interest in moving nuclear materials from Europe to either the U.S. or Mexico," according to a report circulating among U.S. government officials.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100476197912111072004-11-15T10:27:00.000+11:002004-11-15T10:57:20.990+11:00The 'G' word was mentioned in Radio National Breakfast's account this morning of the mass murder, rape and destruction in Darfur.
Auntie has been reluctant to call the policies of the Sudanese government genocide, although it meets the broad definition set out in the international convention on genocide. Now she says what's going in Darfur is "what some are calling "genocide"."
Auntie has no Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100422413698758302004-11-14T19:45:00.000+11:002004-11-14T19:53:33.700+11:00A sense of history helps us understand the way the left rationalises US victories into disasters, as reader JW observes in this long, but valuable, observation on Auntie's coverage of the liberation of Falluja.The attached PDF is just to avoid any stealth editing on the part of the ABC, the Transcript of their Nov 12th report on Fallujah on The World Today is at:http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100222592247817802004-11-12T13:06:00.000+11:002004-11-12T12:57:31.760+11:00If you're sometimes slow to move out of your chair after a heavy Sunday lunch you've probably been caught by one of Pastor Terry Lane's Sunday sermons. These are occasions for the old Groucho Marxist to find stroke-pals who might confirm him in his communard faith.
You know the main doctrines by heart, I'm sure, since you're listening to our ABC. Profit is evil, more government is better Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100219310832925052004-11-12T11:25:00.000+11:002004-11-12T11:28:30.833+11:00The left's favourite Israeli, Mordechai Vanunu, has been arrested for passing classified information on to foreigners.
This will only strengthen his case with those awarding Nobel Peace Prizes.
Failing that, there's the consolation of the Sydney Peace-through-leftist-politics Prize
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100218437588766992004-11-12T11:02:00.000+11:002004-11-12T13:18:21.673+11:00Kofi Annan wants the US-Iraqi forces to cease and desist in their assault on Falluja, despite its role in organising violence against the innocent.
Annan is not only worried about the suffering of innocent civilians. He thinks the Falluja 'insurgents' are thoughtful types who might just stop doing it if they are left alone: Persuading elements who are currently alienated from, or sceptical aboutAuntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100217439228337482004-11-12T10:42:00.000+11:002004-11-12T11:23:16.223+11:00Australia is a nation divided in its evaluation of Yasser Arafat, if you read our views from the editorial staff of Henny Herald and the Australian.
The Aus's stories discuss the political implications of the death of a political leader: Death gives peace a chance, Legacy is a divided, shattered people, The two Yasser Arafats.
Henny's stories give us, in respectful tones, the death of a Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100216481087360722004-11-12T10:38:00.000+11:002004-11-12T10:41:21.086+11:00The van Gogh killing is indeed like 9/11 in one respect; too many left intellectuals are saying he brought it on himself by criticising Islam.
Stefan Beck reminds us that "In moral terms, there is precious little difference between murdering a crude, blustering filmmaker and murdering schoolchildren in Beslan. Too much of the commentary on Theo van Gogh has obscured this fact".
You just can't Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100215999921540412004-11-12T10:22:00.000+11:002004-11-12T10:33:19.920+11:00Who you calling dumb?
The Daily Mirror labels Republican voters 'dumb'. In fact, according to exit polls, they're not all the solid, provincial, high-school graduated, church-going citizens the left loves to despise. They're at least as well educated as Democrat voters. This trend toward more educated voters siding with the GOP coincided with the results of the 2002 national elections in which "Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100214326615457802004-11-12T09:58:00.000+11:002004-11-12T10:05:26.616+11:00Even the Democrat campaigners aren't complaining their man was robbed of victory in the US Presidential elections, but still the conspiracy theories are spreading. the theories are coming from respected sources -- college engineering professors fascinated by voting technology, Internet journalists, election reform activists.I don't know which is worse, respecting bloggers or calling them Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100048131979364222004-11-10T11:52:00.000+11:002004-11-10T11:55:31.980+11:00"French doctors are carefully watching terrorist leader Yasser Arafat; if his condition improves significantly, they may be able to pronounce him dead today", reports the delightfully evil James Taranto (updating site).
He's also more reliable than any statement out of the Palestinian authorities.Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100046851599181382004-11-10T11:29:00.000+11:002004-11-14T20:04:39.670+11:00The Smithsonian Institution, no novice in the culture wars, co-sponsored a contest for teachers. They had to propose teaching plans to guide students to an understanding of 9/11.
Do you have a sense of dread already? Call it rational anxiety, because here, in Jacob Laksin's summary, is the result. Call it Blame America 101. Outspoken leftist activist and fifth grade teacher Bob Peterson, whose Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100044951979412972004-11-10T11:00:00.000+11:002004-11-10T11:25:57.513+11:00In response to the hysterical warnings about the triumph of Christian 'fundamentalism' within George W Bush's victory comes this sharp rejoinder from Christopher Hitchins: Only one faction in American politics has found itself able to make excuses for the kind of religious fanaticism that immediately menaces us in the here and now. And that faction, I am sorry and furious to say, is the left.And Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100043800662523002004-11-10T10:40:00.000+11:002004-11-10T10:54:43.643+11:00It was quagmire in Falluja almost the moment the first shots were fired, according to the New York Times's Dexter Filkins.
But a few short hours and some fine Filkins-fiskin' by Roger Kimball have changed the picture.
The marines are now in the centre of Falluja.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1100043426456002212004-11-10T09:40:00.000+11:002004-11-10T10:37:06.456+11:00Will Holland be the first of the liberal democracies to mount a serious resistance to its indigenous Islamism? Certainly the first in Europe?
The answer's yes, according to Happy Feder , who says the murder of film-maker Theo van Gogh is Holland's 9/11.
You wouldn't know it from Dutch official reaction. An artist who painted a mural showing an angel with the text 'Thou shalt not kill' was Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099968989098070862004-11-09T13:28:00.000+11:002004-11-09T14:00:27.406+11:00'I haven't a peaceful bone in my body', Sydney 'Peace' Prize winner Arundhati Roy tells her admiring audience, and that includes Auntie's captive audience on Radio National.
'I regard this prize as recognition for the kind of politics I represent', Roy continues.
And that means the kind of politics you can hear at any anti-globo, Yank-bashing rally outside the nearest international talk-fest.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099882187749543752004-11-08T13:47:00.000+11:002004-11-08T13:49:47.750+11:00At last a positive suggestion for improving things in Iraq.
Reader PM proposes swapping Malcolm Fraser for hostage Margaret Hassan.
Uncle will kick in the air fare.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099881706063711162004-11-08T13:32:00.000+11:002004-11-08T13:44:43.463+11:00You always knew that George W was responsible for climate change, but Lateline makes that view ABC policy.
According to reader GG, this was the message on Friday night: JOHN STEWART: Just two months ago, Florida was struck by some of the worst hurricanes in years.
But voters in Florida didn't make a connection between the extreme weather and the world's deteriorating environment.
Instead, the Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099872757701453402004-11-08T11:09:00.000+11:002004-11-08T11:12:37.700+11:00Many are no doubt weeping at the slow demise of Yasser Arafat, but why is the BBC among them?
Perhaps reporter Barbara Plett can explain. She said: "When the helicopter carrying the frail old man rose above his ruined compound, I started to cry . . . without warning." Almost as a footnote, she later admitted that an "ambivalence towards violence" was one of his failings.Perhaps it's one of Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099871106326409492004-11-08T10:41:00.000+11:002004-11-08T15:01:15.510+11:00How should Uncle persuade Auntie to improve her ways?
Lots of good advice from various influential mullahs is available. "The Koranic verse refers only to a disobedient wife...First you must admonish...Then comes the stage of sending her to a separate bed...If this does not help either...it is said, 'and beat them'... What's better, that she gets slapped, or that she ruins her family, herself, Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099870349717526422004-11-08T10:29:00.000+11:002004-11-08T10:59:21.756+11:00American pacifist women copy the propaganda techniques of Australian women who were copying some other American women, and Christopher Orlet copies Uncle's headline, Pubes for Peace.
The intellectual property protections in the Australia-US Free Trade Agreement need to be strengthened.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099869861814616602004-11-08T09:55:00.000+11:002004-11-08T10:24:21.816+11:00SAFE HANDS FOR A TROUBLED WORLD; MULTILATERALISM ROUND-UP
In the Ivory Coast, France is calling for more UN support to relieve it from the burdens of its unilateral military involvement. The latest violence began when Ivorian aircraft attacked the former rebel-controlled city of Bouake.
French peacekeepers who were stationed near the city were also killed in the raid.
French President JacquesAuntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099868118918186282004-11-08T09:47:00.000+11:002004-11-08T14:58:53.523+11:00What a spray young Andrew Bolt copped from Mike Seccombe on the ABC's confessional Sunday political discussion program, Insiders, yesterday! Fellow panellist, the Age's Mischa Schubert, joined in the flogging, of course. Auntie always likes to keep these horrible conservatives on the outside.
Bolt took it all like a man. He knows, I'm sure, that Seccombe's real target was not Bolt but those 'Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099645813510271072004-11-05T20:08:00.000+11:002004-11-05T20:10:13.510+11:00The Tories are stuffed. If you needed any convincing that British Conservatism is in a hole, read this mourning editorial by Peter Oborne, on the Kerry victory that never was.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099613198575725852004-11-05T11:04:00.000+11:002004-11-05T11:15:39.130+11:00A good collection of sore-heads, and sore-head-kickers, over at MCJ
My favourtie sore-head is George Soros: When asked what he planned to do if Kerry lost the election, Soros said that he plans to enter a monastery for a time because he will need to contemplate what is wrong with the people of this country. Anyone know of a monastery with gold taps in the bathrooms?
The Guardian is protecting Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099610346862754422004-11-05T10:13:00.000+11:002004-11-05T11:51:47.776+11:00I need to update my earlier post on David Marr's trashing of the ABA report into biases in Auntie's political reporting.
It is now clearer why Media Watch took the scalpel to some of the ABA's detail. It was misrepresenting the ABA's overall and devastating conclusion.
Here's what David Marr told us on Monday night, quoting selectively from the ABA report: "The ABA considers that the program Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099608004662477722004-11-05T09:34:00.000+11:002004-11-05T10:48:21.430+11:00US TO BOMB AUSTRALIA, the Age's screamer of a headline this morning, is only the most extravagant of the left's midnight horrors at the re-election of President Bush.
The Michael Moore left in the US told them that it must not happen and it would not happen. What went wrong?
Before the election it was all about Iraq, oil and US unilateralism in world affairs.
The day after and it's all about Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099454613816016302004-11-03T14:45:00.000+11:002004-11-03T15:03:33.816+11:00Uncle's call: Bush by a comfortable margin.
Now let's go looking for sour grapes, despair, calumny and dread, among other negative emotions.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099450431576434632004-11-03T13:51:00.000+11:002004-11-03T14:45:21.573+11:00Ohio 15% counted; Bush 52%
Later (2.30 AET): with 32% counted, it's still Bush 52%.
Florida 68% counted: Bush 53%.
Auntie thinks the key states too close to call.
I'm happy to drink alone.
2.40 AET. New Hampshire is really too close to call. With almost half the precincts counted it's 50:50.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099449652923849292004-11-03T13:37:00.000+11:002004-11-03T13:50:22.466+11:00Unwilling to pull the knife on Margaret Hassan, but willing to toture her, Hassan's kidnapers have threatened to hand her over to throat-cutting cultist Zarqawi.
The latest video released by the kidnapers was considered by al Jazeera too distressing to broadcast. Considering the scenes they have broadcast, we must ask whether they think it too distressing for their viewers or too damaging to theAuntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099448915320974092004-11-03T13:23:00.000+11:002004-11-03T13:33:50.316+11:00With seven percent of Ohio precincts counted, it's Bush by 52% to 47%.
With 53 percent of Florida precincts counted, it's Bush by 53% to 46%.
Feeling better now?
On the other hand, in Pennsylvania its Kerry by 71:28%
In New Hampshire it's Kerry by 51%, with 21% of the precincts counted.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099427082938323322004-11-03T07:21:00.000+11:002004-11-03T16:42:04.020+11:00Another step taken in the retreat of European liberties before the spread of its Islamic populations as Dutch film maker Theo van Gogh is shot dead for his doco on Islamic culture's underside.
Meanwhile the Sudanese government has broken the veil of its sponsored militias by openly attacking the Darfurian Africans in their UN-sponsored camps in Sudan. Another challenge the UN will fail to Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099426797581143142004-11-03T07:17:00.000+11:002004-11-03T08:00:04.646+11:00Kerry is in the lead in Ohio and Florida, according to Drudge's reading of the exit polls, but the sample is unreliable.
Meanwhile, Australian punters give the race to Bush. They outguessed the pundits on the Australian election. Can they do the same in foreign parts?
The Poms may be plunging heavily on Kerry, but their bookies have run out of fingers to tally the bets.
Yesterday, Auntie's Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099350758105482852004-11-02T10:10:00.000+11:002004-11-02T10:12:38.106+11:00A last pre-poll word on the media's betrothal to John Kerry, from Mark Steyn of course.
When he [Bill Clinton] left, the Democrats became a party running on personality with no personalities to run. Hence, the Kerry candidacy. Despite the best efforts of American editorialists, there's no there there.Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099309933549664772004-11-01T22:39:00.000+11:002004-11-01T22:52:13.550+11:00In the greatest leap forward for Human Rights since Libya was elected to the chair of the UN's committee on the subject, China has endorsed Senator Kerry by criticising President Bush's decision to liberate Iraq. China has assailed what it calls the "Bush doctrine" on the eve of the US election, saying the Iraq war has ruined the global anti-terror coalition and has blamed arrogance for problems Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099308248232639752004-11-01T22:06:00.000+11:002004-11-01T22:36:38.030+11:00First one, and now two indpendent enquiries have found Radio National's AM programme guilty of serious breaches of journalistic good practice. The first independent review was in fact chosen by the ABC itself, but we'll let that pass for the moment.
The offences all related to the reporting of the Iraq liberation, and especially to presenter Linda Mottram's leading questions and the assumptions Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099295941143033672004-11-01T18:56:00.000+11:002004-11-01T18:59:01.143+11:00According to reader WP, Blogger.com managed to protect aspiring ABCwatch readers from unbearable disappointment by keeping the site in purdah for at least 36 hours from Friday. Good timing, my lords.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1099291692366527512004-11-01T17:39:00.000+11:002004-11-01T18:44:27.456+11:00He doesn't make the trains run on time, he hasn't collectivised agriculture, but still the appeasement-minded of the left and right boost the standing of the death-cultist bin Laden. It's the 1930s reaction, but to a celebrity killer rather than a head of state.
Bin Laden has only to send out a scratchy videotape to his media mouthpiece Al Jazeera and Henny Herald grants him the role of a voice Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098871596390532302004-10-27T20:35:00.000+10:302004-10-27T20:36:36.390+10:30Uncle is travelling. See you next week.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098748524206446832004-10-26T10:19:00.000+10:302004-10-26T12:05:48.426+10:30You want undergraduate? Here it is, from the home of the perpetual under-graduation of the human spirit, the UK Guardian, in the form it took before some post-posting censorship.
The pre-text for this are the Bush-Kerry debates.
Quite frankly, [Bush] the man's either wired or mad. If it's the former, he should be flung out of office: tarred, feathered and kicked in the nuts. ... Each time he Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098747616008165562004-10-26T09:59:00.000+10:302004-10-26T10:10:16.010+10:30The New York Times is working with the Kerry camp to re-cast Senator Kerry's political past.
The record shows Kerry as one of the Vietnam War era's radical leftists. He thought Ho Chi Minh the "George Washington of Vietnam", branded his own military as systematic and deliberate war criminals, and coordinated his anti-war activities with the North Vietnamese.
The fact of Kerry's Paris Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098667626532524582004-10-25T11:48:00.000+10:302004-10-25T11:59:25.236+10:30If Mark Latham is a strong leader, he's a very stupid strong leader.
Letting his preferred candidate for shadow Treasurer, Julia Gillard, announce her withdrawal from the contest is fine for Gillard, but it makes Latham look weak.
If he really thought she was the best person for the job of helping him re-construct Labor as an election-winning party then he should have stuck to his guns.
If Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098666964297955442004-10-25T11:43:00.000+10:302004-10-25T11:46:04.296+10:30Two ways to get your hands dirty, and the US Presidential election provides a choice, according to Mark Steyn. One thousand Americans are killed in 18 months in Iraq, and it's a quagmire. One thousand Quebecers are killed by insufficient hand-washing in their filthy, decrepit health care system, and kindly progressive Americans can't wait to bring it south of the border. If one has to die for a Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098419954627637622004-10-22T15:01:00.000+10:302004-10-22T15:09:14.626+10:30The reason the UN can't join the war on terror, despite regular pious resolutions, is the UN's Islamic faction, the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, according to Joshua Maravchik. At bottom everyone understands what terrorism is: the deliberate targeting of civilians. The Islamic Conference, however, has insisted that terrorism must be defined not by the nature of the act but by its Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098417941949727262004-10-22T14:22:00.000+10:302004-10-22T14:46:50.670+10:30Something you don't want to be - a hubristic politician whose electoral nemesis has arrived.
Take Lord Bob-Brown of the Barricades, the spokesman for all things green and good in the mainstream left media. He was predicting six Senate seats and a popular vote that would make the Greens the balancing third force in Australian politics. Despite massive exposure by Auntie and her like-minds in the Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098414233512082192004-10-22T13:13:00.000+10:302004-10-22T14:10:22.283+10:30Leave the country! bellows High Court judge Michael Kirby this morning. He's talking to those peasants, or Parliamentarians, foolish enough to want fundamental reform of our industrial relations system. Those who want more dramatic change, as distinct from constant adjustment, need to look for another country.Kirby's really a very helpful fellow. We don't want our elected Parliaments wasting Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098343804321250922004-10-21T17:48:00.000+10:302004-10-21T18:23:53.463+10:30CURIOSITIES
Mark Latham has promised "a more aggressive pro-market reform agenda". To help him along he is sacking front-benchers with economic expertise and promoting "talented young progressive women". Of these the one most likely to be Latham's shadow Treasurer is Julia Gillard. She owes her front bench position to her market-hostile Scocialist Left faction. Good luck, Mark.
Alexander DownerAuntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098315819314016192004-10-21T10:02:00.000+10:302004-10-21T18:31:18.476+10:30It is 'unprecedented' for a US media organisation to involve itself so directly in politcal campaigning as Sinclair Broadcasting Group, said Phillip Adams's US stroke-pal Bruce Shapiro on Lateline's repeat yesterday. SBG were planning to broadcast Stolen Honor, a mirror-Mooreish attack on John Kerry.
Shapiro igores Rathergate and the long, widespread tradition of pro-Democrat media activism it Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098226791980443272004-10-20T09:25:00.000+10:302004-10-20T09:32:31.106+10:30Here's a challenge for the communards at Harris Street.
Are those who kidnaped the Care Australia worker in Baghdad 'insurgents',' nationalist insurgents', or 'common criminals'.
The name 'terrorist' is excluded, of course, because George Bush uses it.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098225598193553962004-10-20T09:03:00.000+10:302004-10-20T09:23:59.856+10:30At last, a move on al Hilaly.
A new organisation claiming to be representative of politically moderate Muslims has been established. Its aim is to supplant the temporising Australian Federation of Islamic Councils and their honorary Mufti, Sheik al Hilaly.
The organisation is called Darul Fatwa, or the Islamic High Council of Australia, and claims membership of 20 organisations, according to Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098157800350591062004-10-19T14:10:00.000+10:302004-10-19T14:40:26.156+10:30The French Press Agency is re-cycling the pacifist-left front organisation that was given so much free time by Auntie a few months ago - Military Families Speak Out.
Perhaps they sound more credible in French.
This time the ordinary-American-who-got-turned-into-an-anti-war-activist-only-because-of-Bush is one Connie Cominsky. Her face is showing up in advertisements for groups such as Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098149617061285612004-10-19T11:58:00.000+10:302004-10-19T12:03:37.060+10:30German unions blame score-settling by the Bush administration for the loss of jobs at Opel's car assembly factory. (Opel is a subsidiary of GM) The workers’ council cannot prove the involvement of major politics at GM. But it is true that members of GM´s top management are contributors to Bush´s election campaign.In sane countries they just look at the sales figures for their products to explain Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098148331935929662004-10-19T11:37:00.000+10:302004-10-19T11:42:11.936+10:30Is this a conspiracy of the welfare lobby? Only after our recent federal election do we learn that Australia is not plunging down the slope towards greater inequality, with the rich fattening themselves at the expense of the poor.
In fact the poor are getting richer faster than the rest, according to this report.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098146136759963342004-10-19T11:00:00.000+10:302004-10-19T11:23:31.413+10:30Those of you sharing ABCwatch's outrage at Auntie's selective campaign against Christians involving themselves in politics anywhere but on the left should read Gerard Henderson's column in this morning's Henny Herald.
Then you might ask old Bill Jonas of HREOC whether his concern with religious vilification extends to those Christians who haven't converted to lord Marx. And, if not, why not.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098145064977565962004-10-19T10:43:00.000+10:302004-10-19T10:54:13.716+10:30The seven men arrested in Spain as part of a suspected terrorist ring have Australian connections. Those arrested included at least four Algerians and one Moroccan in the cities of Madrid, El Ejido, Gandia, Malaga and Almeria.
They were identified as Smail Latrech, Ali Omar "Jelloul", Djamel Merabet, Mourat Yala "Abu Anas", Ahmed Mohamed and Magid Mchmacha. One remained unidentified.At present Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098143482591861832004-10-19T09:51:00.000+10:302004-10-19T10:42:04.030+10:30Thanks to John Martinkus, kidnaped in Baghdad while freelancing for SBS television, Auntie has a new word for terrorists in Iraq. They are now "nationalists" or "nationalist insurgents". The expressions were used both on ABC news and Radio National Breakfast today, so we can assume ABC policy stands behind them.
What interesting political thinkers work for Auntie!
When does an 'insurgent' Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098098467680906382004-10-18T21:48:00.000+10:302004-10-18T21:51:07.680+10:30Not such a stupid idea this.
Lenny Glynn proposes giving all Iraqis a direct monetary stake in stability by givng them an individual share in the oil revenues.
It may be beyond the Iraqi administration's administrative capacity at present, the the money is coming in from two million barrels a day, and the politics is spot on.
Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098097954591242912004-10-18T21:38:00.000+10:302004-10-18T21:53:07.860+10:30The odds on Latham's leadership lasting the distance to the next election have lengthened considerably.
There is a danger that the Opposition leader's back bench will be stronger than his front bench. Bob McMullan has now joined Kim Beazley and Craig Emerson after refusing a humiliating demotion.
McMullan's problem was supporting Beazley in the last leadership ballot. Emerson's sin was not to Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098088487430227012004-10-18T18:56:00.000+10:302004-10-18T19:04:47.430+10:30Kofi Annan thinks the world is not a safer place since the US began its campaign against Islamist terrorism, according to Auntie's PM program tonight.
Annan cites as evidence continuing terrorist attacks, and the situation in Iraq.
Annan makes no reference to the situation in the Sudan. It follows the the government-run mayhem in the Sudan does not fit the United Nations definition of a Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098065245247601882004-10-18T13:35:00.000+10:302004-10-18T12:37:25.246+10:30John Howard's rhetoric rings Mark Steyn's bell.But Howard, for a man routinely described as having no charisma, manages to hit just the right tone. The French got all the attention in the days after September 11 with that Le Monde headline – "Nous sommes tous Americains" – but even at the time I preferred Howard's take: "There's no point in a situation like this being an 80 per cent ally." Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098063644985191372004-10-18T11:47:00.000+10:302004-10-19T11:50:38.006+10:30The word around Auntie's Ultimo bunker is that Tony Jones is under pressure for his extraordinary Lateline attack on Minister Tony Abbott's religious practices.
You may recall Jones also implied directly that Cardinal Pell had conspired with Tony Abbott and Anglican bishops to attack Labor's education policies.
It turned out that Jones's evidence for these charges was actually evidence against Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098061147676638592004-10-18T11:20:00.000+10:302004-10-18T11:43:16.610+10:30Good news! John Kerry is standing in the wrong election.
'The world wants me' was Kerry's message to a meeting of supporters, according to this morning's Henny Herald.
"The world is waiting for the United States of America they know and love," he told a rally of at least 5000 supporters in Wisconsin in a reference to worldwide opinion polls that show that Mr Bush's policies have stirred Auntienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3772586.post-1098015270169270062004-10-17T22:27:00.000+10:302004-10-17T22:51:59.340+10:30It shouldn't happen doesn't mean it won't.
Mark Steyn is convinced that the absurdity of John Kerry's description of the war of Islamist terror on the US as a "nuisance" will not wash with voters. This is aside from the basic defect of the argument: If some gal in your building is working as a prostitute, that's a nuisance -- condoms in the elevator, johns in the lobby; if Islamists seize the Auntienoreply@blogger.com