Shanghai Sam says sorry for taking Chinese donations

Labor’s Sam Dastyari calls for a ban on all political donations. The ABC’s Australian Story, yesterday:

It needs to come to an end, and the time for that is now.

Yes, that Dastyari.The Australian, September 8 last year:

Labor’s moral authority has ­suffered a blow, with its leading crusader against banks and big business forced to resign from Bill Shorten’s frontbench for accepting money from Chinese ­companies.

Better late than never, we suppose. From Australian Story, yesterday:

I come at this from someone who wasn’t just part of the arms race … I was one of the weapon suppliers in this arms race …

But Sam did a lot more than just take some foreign dough … The Australian, September 8 last year:

The senator, who said Australia should “remain neutral and ­respect” China’s position on the South China Sea dispute, denied the comments had been influenced by the payments,

We reckon Sam has a bit to go before he washes away that sin … Dastyari in Australian Story, yesterday:

I’m not a person who is prone, or had been prone, to long periods of self-reflection, but sometimes self-reflection is foisted upon you.

Talking of sin, Peter FitzSimons declares Julia Baird is infallible in The Sydney Morning Herald, Saturday:

My “sister from another mister”, Julia Baird, comes out with a deeply researched essay for ABC News, with a story also on the ABC’s 7.30 noting a shocking pattern of domestic violence by some churchgoing men against their wives …

The same story that was panned by the researchers Baird cited in her work? The Australian, July 26:

Two US experts whose research was relied on by an ABC 7.30 television report claiming “sporadic” Christian churchgoers are the worst wife-beaters say they were misrepresented …

FitzSimons in the Herald, Saturday:

The usual bovver boys lined up both her and the ABC, ranting with their bullying bullshit that it was all an ABC conspiracy to destroy Christianity etc.

Is Archdeacon Kara Hartley a bovver boy? The Australian, July 22:

A senior female Anglican leader has expressed “disappointment” that her “positive” story in fighting domestic violence was ignored by the ABC in its controversial TV program …

FitzSimons continues defending his buddy. The Herald, Saturday:

Her report, furthermore, was so strongly researched, not a single error was found …

Baird should have spoken to the researchers she based her entire report on. The Australian, July 26:

Phoenix Seminary theology and ethics professor Steven Tracy and sociologist Bradford Wilcox also said the ABC journalists … did not contact them …

Then, maybe, she would never have left this important piece of data out of her 7.30 broadcast … Patriarchy and Domestic Violence: Challenging Common Misconceptions by Steve Tracy, September 2007:

Conservative Protestant men who attend church regularly are found to be the least likely group to engage in domestic violence …

Tracy’s comment to the ABC’s Media Watch really says it all, July 24:

It is all too easy to cherry pick sound bites … you should be even-handed …