Who needs an Indigenous voice to parliament when we have Patricia Karvelas’s?

Patricia Karvelas, host of ABC Radio National Breakfast. Picture: Julian Kingma

CRIKEY’S DEPUTY EDITOR CAMERON WILSON STILL ATTEMPTING TO MAKE A JOKE ABOUT THE TITAN TRAGEDY

As avid Media Watch Dog readers will recall, last week’s issue focused on the pathetic “joke” made by Crikey deputy editor Cameron (Cam) Wilson about the five men – one of whom was young – who were destined to perish on the Titan submersible which was exploring the wreck of the Titanic. When Comrade Wilson sent out his tweet on Tuesday 20 June it appeared likely that all aboard the Titan were already dead – this was confirmed on Friday 23 June. The story of Comrade Wilson’s appalling indiscretion was broken by Sky News followed by the Daily Mail. Guess what? For the second week in a row, ABC TV Media Watch presenter Paul Barry desisted from his usual sneering at Sky News and praised its coverage of – with the Daily Mail – of what he termed Wilson’s disgraceful tweets.

Clearly this was not a view shared by some of Mr Barry’s ABC colleagues. Cameron – or “Cam” as he was called – appeared on The Drum last night. Kathryn Robinson was in the presenter’s chair. But she made no mention of Comrade Wilson’s insensitivity of recent memory. Nor did anyone else.

So there you have it. Cam Wilson put out a disgraceful tweet on one week and was invited into The Drum the following week – where he lectured the audience (if audience there was) on integrity. Yes, integrity.

By the way, Comrade Wilson has neither apologised nor expressed regret for his Titan “humour”. Nor has Crikey’s management or editor – in particular Crikey’s proprietor Eric Beecher. In fact, your man Wilson laughed at the issue yesterday when he sent out this tweet:

The ABC has invited me to do an impassioned defence of my subs tweets and I have accepted their offer.

So the death of the Titan five is still a joke to Crikey’s deputy editor. Meanwhile he bored viewers with an account of how he was about to become a father for the first time. Groan.

CAN YOU BEAR IT?

● TODD SAMPSON THROWS THE SWITCH TO YEAR 12 IN FLASHING HIS WTF? T SHIRT ON ABC TV

As far as Media Watch Dog can work it out, the Sydney-born Todd Sampson’s birth date is somewhere around 1970. By the way, that’s Sydney in Canada’s Nova Scotia province. It seems that your man Sampson, who presents himself as a documentary maker and television presenter, and appears on ABC’S TV’s Gruen and The Project, is 50-something.

However, you would not know this by watching him on the taxpayer funded public broadcaster. On 22 June, for example, Sampson wore a t-shirt on which was printed “WTF?” By the way, for any avid reader over 98 1/2, that’s short for “What The F---?”. Clever eh?

It would seem that the good people at the ABC thought it appropriate to allow the middle-aged man to go all Year 12 and attempt to shock the Gruen audience, on what was the shortest day of the (Southern Hemisphere) year, by confronting them with an oh-so-shocking T-shirt. Really.

Marketing guru Todd Sampson .

By the way, according to Wikipedia, Todd Sampson is the co-creator of the Earth Hour initiative – whereby citizens are encouraged to turn off the lights for one hour once a year around March in order to do the right thing by the environment. In Sydney (the Australian one) Earth Hour is followed soon after in June by the Vivid Light festival whereby, for a couple of weeks, the CBD businesses are encouraged to put on as many lights as possible to celebrate something or other. As your man Sampson might put it – this is very much a WTF? moment.

As MWD recalls, Todd Sampson won an award for his science documentary series Redesign My Brain. MWD suggests that his next task should be “Redesign My T- Shirt”. Can You Bear It?

● READ ALL ABOUT IT (ALAS): NINE’S THOMAS MITCHELL TRAVELS TO MUDGEE AND BACK

Media Watch Dog just loves it when journalists write about the subject they know best. Namely, the SELF.

And so Thomas Mitchell’s column in the Sun-Herald is a welcome arrival at around Hangover Time every Sunday morning. Here’s how The Thought of Mitchell commenced last Sunday:

It only took me two hours and three glasses of wine to consider uprooting my entire life and starting fresh in Mudgee.

“We could be happy here,” I said to my wife. We were sitting at a winery, and it’s hard to be unhappy at a winery, but I genuinely believed in the dream I was peddling. “Just think about it, I could get a job, you could join the CWA, we could open a bed’n’breakfast!”

It didn’t get much better. Except for the fact that in the next para Comrade Mitchell admitted that he was “delusional”. And, yes, by now the reference was not to “three glasses of wine” but to “three bottles”. Well done, don’t you think?

And then your man Mitchell went on and on about an escape to the country along with a reference to “too many local Rieslings”. Until he realises that – you’ve guessed it – the coffee is better in the city as is the Wi-Fi. The column ended with the Sun-Herald columnist declaring that he at least returned home with a case of wine.

Which raises the question: why does Nine publish such sludge? And, more importantly, Can You Bear It?

The late former Labor leader Simon Crean.

● 7.30’s ADAM HARVEY SMOOTHS OVER THE ONE-TIME KIM BEAZLEY/SIMON CREAN RIVALRY

One time Labor Party leader Simon Crean (1949-2023), who held ministerial roles in the governments led by Bob Hawke, Paul Keating, Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard, was a good friend of The Sydney Institute, which he addressed on a number of occasions. Gerard Henderson and the Media Watch Dog team regret his sudden death and extend sympathies to his family and friends.

On Monday 16 June, the ABC TV 7.30 program ran a report by Adam Harvey – who interviewed three Labor Party figures. Namely, former ministers Greg Combet and Kim Beazley, along with current minister Clare O’Neil. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s comments on Simon Crean’s death were also reported.

All of Simon Crean’s one-time colleagues spoke well of him. Fair enough. But 7.30 did not put to air any analysis of why Simon Crean lost the Labor Party leadership after only two years in the job. Mr Crean was the only Labor leader at the federal level to be replaced before being given a chance to contest an election. Apart from Billy Hughes who quit/was expelled by Labor on account of his support for conscription for overseas service during the First World War. This was the occasion of the Australian Labor Party’s first split.

This is how Adam Harvey described the situation with respect to Simon Crean’s brief period as the Labor leader between Kim Beazley and Mark Latham:

Adam Harvey: He [Simon Crean] stood up to George Bush and John Howard, he sparred with Kim Beazley and was eventually replaced as opposition leader by Mark Latham.

This is not quite correct. Simon Crean became Labor leader in November 2001 after the ALP’s defeat at the 2001 election by the John Howard-led Coalition. It was a difficult time for an Opposition leader. In June 2003, there was a leadership spill when Crean was challenged by Beazley. Crean won the ballot by 58 to 34 votes but his leadership was severely damaged. He stepped down as leader in November 2003.

Kim Beazley and Mark Latham contested the leadership ballot and Latham defeated Beazley by a mere one vote. It was reported at the time that Latham won on the back of strong support from left-wing feminists – including Julia Gillard, Penny Wong and Nicola Roxon. How about that? Anthony Albanese voted for Beazley over Latham.

None of these (difficult) matters were mentioned by Adam Harvey. The fact is that Mark Latham never challenged Simon Crean but Kim Beazley did. However, Mr Beazley appears not to have been asked about the matter by ABC’s 7.30.

Can You Bear It?

INTERRUPTER OF THE WEEK

PATRICIA KARVELAS STARS IN HER INTERRUPTIONS OF SIMON BIRMINGHAM AND EVEN HITS THE “NO” SWITCH TO SILENCE FELLOW JOURNALIST SAMANTHA MAIDEN

The usual winner of this prestigious award, David Speers, is taking it easier on the interruptions these days so a new winner has emerged – host of RN Breakfast

Patricia (“Call me PK”) Karvelas.

As an ABC employee, PK is supposed to remain impartial on the issues of the day.

Something she reminded Peter FitzSimons of, when in his Sun-Herald column on 30 April, he referred to PK as “one of the most prominent supporters of the voice”. So, it must be pure coincidence that her most frequent interruptions come in interviews with supporters of the No case for the voice – or voice undecideds, as in the case of this week’s award-winning interview.

Karvelas with the Minister for Indigenous Australians Linda Burney.

On Wednesday 28 June, Karvelas interviewed Shadow Foreign Minister Simon Birmingham. The interview began with matters of foreign affairs, as you’d expect, but quickly moved to the voice. Birmingham was interrogated by PK for his decision to not campaign for the voice, or state his views one way or the other – something apparently unacceptable to Patricia “I am impartial on the voice” Karvelas.

See an excerpt from the transcript below, where Birmingham was interrupted relentlessly – nine times in the space of a few minutes – while trying to explain his views.

Simon Birmingham: Well, Patricia, I’ve been, I’ve been clear that I don’t intend to actively campaign in the referendum. I have plenty of things, the issues we’ve just been talking about to focus my time on. I wish the country weren’t in a situation where it appears to be having vote that is so evenly divided and the possibility of a constitutional referendum on this issue failing. I would much have rathered a situation –

Patricia Karvelas: [Interjecting] Wouldn’t there be less of a risk of it failing if leading moderates, like you, were clear about what you really thought?

Simon Birmingham: Well I wish that, I wish my one voice was so powerful, but ultimately my vote will be the same as your vote and the same as each and every other listeners –

Patricia Karvelas: [Interjecting] Sure, and what will your vote be?

Simon Birmingham: – and in context of this referendum, and my vote, I will get to cast the same as everyone else in a secret ballot Patricia, but –

Patricia Karvelas: [Interjecting] Are you gonna keep it private?

Simon Birmingham: Well, it is a secret ballot for every single Australian. I wish that we had a situation where the model that was being put forward was one that could have achieved broader support, that didn’t have the questions about executive government lingering over it, that actually had greater chance of success. And it’s unfortunate to see the debate in the situation that it’s in right now.

Patricia Karvelas: Okay. Why aren’t you taking a position? I mean, you’re making it clear that you want it to be private. If it’s private, that means you are actually sitting on the fence. Why have you decided to do that?

Simon Birmingham: Patricia, I think you can hear from my answer there, that I am in some ways conflicted and think this is a very difficult situation the country has been put in. That, that we have got a question before us, and a proposed change before us that even some of the staunchest supporters, such as Greg Craven, or Julian Leeser who’ve been there at the outset–

Patricia Karvelas: [Interjecting] But they’re, they’re supporting it.

Simon Birmingham: – have expressed their deep reservations –

Patricia Karvelas: [Interjecting] They’re supporting it now.

Simon Birmingham: They are supporting it but they have expressed deep deep reservations –

Patricia Karvelas: [Interjecting] So why aren’t you as a leading moderate? And so it went on, even after Birmingham pointed out that “we are spending now more time on this issue, as the shadow Foreign Minister, than on the issues we were just talking about with the global ramifications they’re having.”

Karvelas’ love for interruptions was also on display this morning, in the weekly politics discussion with David Speers and Samantha Maiden. Karvelas seemingly went into panic mode when Maiden suggested she might disagree with David Speers concerning the NSW ICAC’s findings with respect to former NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian:

David Speers: And I’m not sure what you’re taking issue with me on. So, anyway, I agree with you –

Samantha Maiden: You said, you said that ICAC had not found that it was a criminal –

Patricia Karvelas: [Interjecting] No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. But there is a distinction because they have said that, that Daryl Maguire should be referred to the DPP, and then the DPP makes a judgement.

David Speers is quite capable of explaining himself – and interrupting others – but PK apparently wanted to increase her interruption tally for the week. Karvelas has identified her interruption habit in the past, for example in this interview with Karen Andrews of 20 April 2023:

Karen Andrews: When I talk to people about parliament, they remember Question Time. And that’s the bit that they don’t like. I mean, if you ask a question, you should get an answer, just like you should Patricia. You ask me a question, I should be answering it.

Patricia Karvelas: You’ve been answering them. So I don’t need to interrupt very much. People often say ‘Why do you interrupt?’ You’ve answered all my questions.

So there you have it – if you answer PK’s questions to a satisfactory level, you won’t be interrupted. Unless you get interrupted so much that you’re unable to answer the questions. Although on occasion, evasive answers have been congratulated. Such was the case of an April 2023 interview with Tanya Plibersek, where PK said a vague answer was “deftly handled”, or a May 2023 interview with economist Rod Sims, who was congratulated on “keeping out of the political fray”. Increased interruptions often seem to occur with conservative politicians, but as this is the “impartial” ABC, this is of course completely coincidental.

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Until next time.

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