Greenies grossed out by free speech reform

Greens senator Nick McKim attacked The Australian in the Senate (for the hundredth time) over our coverage of the PM’s freedom of speech reforms. Senate, yesterday:

Fair dinkum, down there at Holt Street they’re celebrating like they’ve stormed the bloody Bastille. And those self-styled freedom warriors ... they’ve finally bullied a craven Prime Minister ... But I’ve got to say 16, that is (holds up 10 fingers, then six fingers) 16 articles, is more than just a tad excessive, it’s just onanistic.

Bill Leak’s son Johannes sums up why this paper thinks section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act must change. The Australian, yesterday:

Those laws, and those thought police, represent the slippery slope towards authoritarianism.

Hasn’t Senator McKim got more important things to do than attack the poor old Oz? Like banning the President of the United States? Nick McKim’s website, February 8:

Consistent with our position that Parliament should have the final say on Australia going to war, we believe that Parliament should have the right to refuse entry to, or deport, foreign leaders on the basis of their character ... This issue has been crystallised for us by Donald Trump becoming US President.

The Guardian’s political editor ­Katharine Murphy doesn’t like the government’s planned 18C changes. The Guardian Australia, Tuesday:

The Coalition is unable to drop this particular hot potato, despite senior players like Barnaby Joyce and Scott Morrison saying very clearly that the issue really isn’t a priority down the back paddock, or in the cafe where you picked up your coffee this morning, because a significant bloc in the right faction of the Liberal party intended to keep on pushing ...

Lots of people in our Newspoll think 18C is important, Katharine. The Australian, Tuesday:

The Coalition partyroom meeting today comes as voters show they are ready to support sweeping change to race-hate laws ... 47 per cent of voters backed this option while 39 per cent opposed it.

And just wait till someone tells Katharine Murphy how many leftie voters want 18C fixed.The Australian, continued:

The survey showed that 45 per cent of Labor voters and 37 per cent of Greens voters are in favour of replacing “offend” and “insult” with “harass” to set a higher benchmark.

Katharine Murphy says this “freedom” rubbish is a News Corp plot. The Guardian Australia, continued:

For months, the Australian has run a full-tilt campaign on 18C that looks, quite frankly, borderline unhinged to anyone outside Holt Street ... The Fox Lite crew on the Sky News night shift have also been rumbling away, in their little harshly lit cupboards, making gutting 18C a test of Malcolm Turnbull’s conservative bona fides.

Sky News host Paul Murray was more upset at the sledge aimed at Sky News’s set. Paul Murray Live, Tuesday:

It’s an expensive cupboard, darl ...

Murphy should read Caroline Overington on why reforming 18C matters. The Australian, yesterday:

They don’t come for the beaches, or for the babes. No, the reason Australia ranks No 1 in the world as a place to live ... is that Australians are protected in all their endeavours by an intricate, invisible structure of rights, including, but not limited to ... the inalienable right of a cartoonist to both shine a light, and poke the bear.