Comrade Ferguson told viewers (if viewers there were) that O’Toole possessed “one of the sharpest views on the dynamics of American politics” and that “he’s one of the world’s most influential columnists”. Impressive, eh? The problem was that the world’s greatest columnist did not have much more to say than what a reasonably well-informed viewer would already have known.
O’Toole said that “nobody knows” whether Kamala Harris will defeat Donald Trump in the US presidential election on 5 November. Quelle surprise! And he spoke about the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in 1968 – yes, over half a century ago.
The Irish Times columnist, who said he was a liberal (in the North American sense of the term), argued that Trump “doesn’t have policies” and is “not about achieving anything”. This would surprise some followers of US politics who are of the view that the former president wants to clamp down on unlawful immigrants and more besides.
As the interview came to a close, Comrade Ferguson asked, “Is there Trumpism after Trump?” Comrade O’Toole described this as a “fascinating question”. Really. He said that “if you go back two years … thinking Republicans” wanted “Trumpism without Trump”. Is any avid reader following this verbal sludge?
The interview ended with Fintan O’Toole implying that the prospect of a Trump victory was “terrifying” and with Sarah Ferguson urging viewers to “take a deep breath for the entire world”. And so cometh the end during which Ferguson declared “Fintan O’Toole, I could talk to you all night but stop I must.” To which Ellie’s (male) co-owner says: “Thank God.” (with a capital “G”)
● AMID THE WATCHES, PERFUME AND GULFSTREAM ADS THIS AFR MAGAZINE DEPICTS MAX CHANDLER-MATHER & MARK SCOTT AS MORE POWERFUL THAN APPEARS TO BE THE CASE
It was a September Surprise – in more ways than one – when The Australian Financial Review Magazine’s annual Power issue landed on Ellie’s kennel on Friday 27 September. Not with a bang but with a very loud bang – after all, it’s 68 pages long.
For the record, Ellie’s (male) co-owner does not believe in the Power Thing with respect to democratic societies. The likes of Vladimir Putin in Russia and Xi Jinping in China have power – they are dictators. But the likes of Anthony Albanese in Australia and Giorgia Meloni in Italy have legitimate authority bestowed on them by electors. However, MWD acknowledges that the AFR Magazine’s “Legitimate Authority” special would sound a bit flat.
Rising early this morning, Gerard Henderson spent more time examining the fine watches in the “Power” issue than reading the words churned out by the likes of Phillip Coorey, Tom McIlroy, James Curran and James Thomson. There was only one woman word-churner, Emma Connors, who covered Critical Thinking.
However, Hendo did take a quick glimpse at the photos-drawings and was surprised to learn that a couple of blokes have more “Power” than he imagined. Here they are:
According to AFR Magazine judges, the Hyphenated Green Max Chandler-Mather is the ninth most powerful man in Australia. Turn it up.
Comrade Chandler-Mather belongs to the Greens Political Party which has four seats in the House of Representatives – where the Albanese Labor government has an absolute majority. That’s not power. That’s just a media opportunity to get an interview (yet again) with PK on ABC RN Breakfast to have an early morning socialist rant.
Then just after the advertisement for Hermes Paris’ Barénia perfume Hendo located the Power Sectoral list. Included in the Education section was, wait for it, Sydney University vice-chancellor Mark (“Please call me professor”) Scott. Fancy that.
On Thursday 26 September, a cry was heard across the land demanding that Scott resign due to his inability to quell anti-Semitism on the Sydney University campus. But on Friday 27 September, the AFR Magazine reckoned that he was the fourth most powerful possessor of Power Sectoral – whatever that might mean.
Among those calling for Mark Scott’s resignation on 26 September was Opposition leader Peter Dutton who, according to the AFR, is Australia’s fifth most powerful person. If the AFR is correct, Scott will be gone by the end of September. Welcoming the thought, Hendo admired the advertisement for the Gulfstream G700.
CAN YOU BEAR IT?
● ZOE DANIEL, THE EX-ABC TEAL, GOLDSTEIN NEWSLETTER CONTAINS MUCH HYPE BUT LITTLE ACHIEVEMENT
As Media Watch Dog members are well aware, Ellie’s (male) co-owner has an abiding interest in the Teals. This is because the likes of Zoe Daniel, Allegra Spender, Kate Chaney and Monique Ryan get considerable coverage on the ABC. In spite of the fact that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese leads a majority Labor government and is not reliant on any member of the teals collective to get the government’s legislation through the House of Representatives.
But MWD digresses. MWD takes particular interest in Zoe Daniel, the teal Independent for Goldstein in view of the fact that she is of-the-media with a past at the taxpayer-funded public broadcaster.
Lotsa thanks to the reader who happened to be visiting Melbourne on 25 September and happened to come across a team of Zoe Luvvies at the Hampton Railway Station in Goldstein (in affluent southeast metropolitan Melbourne). They were handing out copies of Comrade Daniel’s taxpayer-funded Goldstein Independent newsletter. This is what MWD’s avid reader had to say:
I am in my, and your, hometown of Melbourne on a family visit and this morning encountered a group of Teal supporters in their bright T-shirts handing out Zoe Daniel’s latest “Goldstein Independent” at the Hampton railway station, which I gratefully accepted as I am always courteous.
I read her newsletter, all 12 pages, and found that Zoe Daniel lists numerous “attempts” (my word) but no real achievements in her latest Winter electorate newsletter.
She uses a lot of different words instead of “attempts”. She advocates, she pushes, she discusses, she supports, she welcomes, she maintains, she meets, she is concerned, she advocates, she seeks, she fights, she campaigns, she encourages, she starts, she petitions, she argues, she leads, she opposes, she hosts, she calls – but she is yet to actually achieve anything. In fact, I counted her usage of all those words, instead of “attempts” and it amounted to 48 times. In addition, she mentions her own name 74 times. Can You Bear It?
Keep Morale High.
Kind regards
[Name & email address supplied]
MWD’s avid reader has a point. Zoe Daniel’s list of “policy achievements” in her latest Goldstein Independent newsletter is high on aspiration but dead last on achievement.
Moreover, the teal comrade invites readers of her newsletter (if readers there are) to “Join the conversation on Facebook at ‘Zoe Daniel for Goldstein’”.
MWD would readily engage in a discussion with Comrade Daniel – but not a clichéd “conversation”. Moreover, what’s a nice eco-catastrophist like Ms Daniel doing using what other eco-catastrophists call “dead trees” to circulate her written words? Which raises another question: Can You Bear It?
● THE SATURDAY PAPER’S MIKE SECCOMBE USES ANONYMOUS SOURCES TO BLAME CONSERVATIVES FOR THE LIBERAL PARTY’S VICTORIAN WOES
The Saturday Paper – proprietor Morry Schwartz, editor-in-chief Erik Jensen – is a paper of the inner-city left, by the inner-city left and for the inner-city left (to rework Abraham Lincoln’s turn of phrase). It is one of Schwartz Media’s left-wing publications – others are The Monthly and Quarterly Essay. However, at least Schwartz Media publications are free of Green Left rants about Israel and avoid publishing the anti-Semitism of Hamas and Hezbollah sympathisers.
As avid Media Watch Dog readers know, The Saturday Paper is a non-newspaper newspaper. In that it contains no news. Since it goes to print on Thursday in time to arrive in inner-city coffee shops on Saturday mornings – Ellie’s (male) co-owner reads it at Gin + Tonic time on Mondays. What’s the hurry?
But MWD digresses. On 21 September, The Saturday Paper carried a front-page story by Mike Seccombe, TSP’s national correspondent, titled “Abbott was up to his neck in it: The collapse of the Victorian Liberals”. It was a typical TSP attack on the Liberal Party – in this instance focused on Moira Deeming’s defamation action against John Pesutto – the leader of the Victorian Liberal Party – which is currently before the Federal Court. Somehow or other, Comrade Seccombe managed to blame former prime minister Tony Abbott and his supporters for this unholy mess.
It was one of those media attacks on political conservatives which relies on material from anonymous sources. Meaning that the reader has no idea about the credibility of the material.
First up, Mike Seccombe cited a “former [Liberal Party] colleague” of Deeming – note that Ms Deeming has been expelled from the Parliamentary Liberal Party – plus “another Liberal insider”. There was also “another Liberal insider” along with “a party member”. Plus “another source”. The only names named were present and past Liberal Party operatives who Comrade Seccombe was criticising – including Tony Abbott, Michael Sukkar, Michael Kroger and Peta Credlin.
In other words, The Saturday Paper’s report was useless – since its national correspondent could not find one source to support his view who was willing to put their name to a quote. This is incompetent journalism. More importantly – Can You Bear It?
● THE GUARDIAN/ABC AXIS AT WORK – THE GUARDIAN’S KAREN MIDDLETON SNEERS AT PETER DUTTON ON ABC’S LATE NIGHT LIVE
While on the topic of The Saturday Paper, it is not so long ago Karen Middleton moved from the non-news newspaper to The Guardian Australia. From one left-wing outlet to another. This means that Comrade Middleton became part of The Guardian-ABC Axis – since the ABC invariably looks to the left-wing Guardian Australia’s wage slaves to provide commentators for such programs on ABC TV as Insiders, ABC TV News Breakfast, Radio National Breakfast, Late Night Live and so on.
On 22 September, Comrade Middleton stood in for Laura Tingle in the LNL Monday political commentary slot. Let’s go to the transcript from the start of the interview:
David Marr: Peter Dutton today, singing fresh anthems of praise for nuclear power, but anything at all on the cost of his seven reactors?
Karen Middleton: No. [Laughs] In fact, it was a little bit of a disappointment in that regard. It’s interesting, David, this was a speech that’s been locked in for some time …. It was badged as, under the title “A nuclear-powered Australia: Could it work?”. So, there’s been great anticipation that maybe, finally, this would be the place and time where we would hear more substance about the Coalition’s policy on nuclear power. We know that they’re planning to put nuclear reactors on seven sites across Australia. We know they favour small modular reactors. We don’t really know much else, and unfortunately. We still don’t [Laughs] because it didn’t happen.
How about that? It would be expected that a Guardian Australia journalist would criticise a Liberal Party leader like Peter Dutton. But Ms Middleton could have done so without sneering laughter. How unprofessional can a Canberra Press Gallery journalist get on a taxpayer funded public broadcaster? Can You Bear It?
[No, not really, now that you ask. I note that Comrade Middleton appeared on RN Breakfast on 24 July when the following exchange took place:
Patricia Karvelas: Peter Dutton is in Israel.
Karen Middleton: He is in Israel. He’s gone to Israel to get a briefing from the Israeli government and visit some of the sites of the October 7 attack. So that tells you he will continue to prosecute the case on Israel’s behalf, I think.
[No it doesn’t. Peter Dutton does not prosecute any case on Israel’s behalf. Rather, he prosecutes the case on what he regards as Australia’s national interest with respect to the Middle East. Comrade Middleton may disagree with Dutton’s foreign policy positions. But that’s the role of an activist. The Guardian’s political editor should be able to perform professionally while on the taxpayer funded public broadcaster. MWD Editor.]
● ABC TV NEWS BREAKFAST’S BRIDGET BRENNAN THROWS THE SWITCH TO ACTIVISM IN AGREEING WITH AL JAZEERA COMMENTATOR
While on the topic of activist journalists, how is the call by new ABC chair Kim Williams going? You know, Mr Williams’ view that if ABC journalists “don’t want to reflect a view that aspires to impartiality, don’t work at the ABC”. Not too well, it would appear.
Take the case of Bridget Brennan, a co-presenter of the ABC TV’s News Breakfast. On 24 September she interviewed Mohamed Moawad, an Arab American journalist. Discussion soon turned to the decision of the Israeli government to temporarily close the Al Jazeera office in Ramallah on the West Bank for about 45 days. The Israel Defence Forces are at war with Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. And Israel’s government maintains that Al Jazeera’s offices are being used to support terrorist activities.
Let’s go to the transcript for an idea of the interview:
Mohamed Moawad: When you see these heavily armed officers storming an office, which is a space dedicated for journalism, it’s a shock. It’s a shocking event, and it was really chilling for us to, watching this on air, because at the moment, Walid [Omary] was preparing to go on air to report on what’s happening in Israel and Lebanon. This happened, and we were able to capture this on air, and it was a devastating moment and an escalation, and an escalation that is part of a cycle of intimidation that the Israeli government unleashed against Al Jazeera …. They have done to shut down our office in Ramallah this time. And back in May in Jerusalem and Israel, they have killed our colleagues.
Bridget Brennan: Shocking. And how important do you think it was the decision to continue broadcasting while this raid was underway?
Mr Mohamed Moawad described it as “shocking” that Israel has temporarily closed the Al Jazeera office in Ramallah.
Bridget Brennan’s response was to concur with her interviewee that Israel’s actions were “shocking”. This is an intervention of an activist – not a journalist seeking information. Which suggests that Kim Williams’ message has yet to get through to the comrades at the ABC.
EDITORIAL
KIM WILLIAMS’ 2024 LOWY INSTITUTE MEDIA LECTURE OVERLOOKS THE LACK OF VIEWPOINT DIVERSITY WITHIN THE ABC
Media Watch Dog is of the view that individuals should be given time to work into a job before their performance is assessed.
That’s why MWD has written little about Kim Williams’ appointment as ABC chair. MWD has welcomed Mr Williams’ call that ABC journalists who want to be activists should get another job. MWD also supports the ABC chair’s view that the taxpayer funded public broadcaster should have more extensive information and serious national news along with more Australian documentaries of higher quality. Some of these matters were raised by Kim Williams in his 2024 Lowy Institute Media Lecture which was delivered on the evening of 25 September.
However, there was one problem in the address. The ABC chair referred to “the never-ending assault on difference which too often characterises society today”. Yet Kim Williams presides over the ABC which lacks viewpoint diversity – or viewpoint differences. It is a conservative free zone without one conservative presenter, producer or editor for any of its important news and current affairs programs. Not one. And many of its discussion panels are lacking in, and sometimes devoid of, viewpoint diversity. In that conservative views are not heard. This has been documented in MWD and elsewhere over the years. The ABC itself is at war with difference.
Kim Williams also attacked what he termed Fake News – in capital letters. This occurred towards the end of the second page of a 9-page speech. Yet on Page 7 he acknowledged that the ABC “has commissioned an independent review” concerning the serious allegations that the ABC distorted a report about Australian forces in Afghanistan.
The ABC has already paid out close to $3 million in damages and costs for defaming commando Heston Russell with respect to his service in Afghanistan. Now Russell is considering another action against the ABC for what is alleged to be another defamation.
Janine Perrett, who is currently standing in for Paul Barry as presenter of ABC TV’s Media Watch program, commented on 23 September: “Hopefully a full inquiry will not only provide answers but also some accountability – because this hasn’t just cost the ABC plenty of money but also its trusted reputation”. [I note that Ms Perrett is a significant improvement on Mr Barry in this job. – MWD Editor.]
MWD is not sure that the ABC has so “trusted” a reputation – in view of its coverage of Cardinal George Pell, former NSW premier Neville Wran, Donald J. Trump and Russia and more besides in recent years.
What was missing from Kim Williams’ Lowy Lecture is any consideration of the fact that the ABC’s lack of viewpoint diversity contributes to the fact that it produces its very own Fake News – in capital letters.
A NIKI SAVVA MOMENT
IN WHICH COMRADE SAVVA USES HER HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES SPEAKER’S LECTURE TO RANT AT PETER DUTTON, THE LIBERAL PARTY & ‘THE MURDOCH MOB’
There was enormous interest in Gerard Henderson’s Weekend Australian column on 21 September (see here) where he mentioned, in passing, Niki Savva’s appearance on ABC Radio National’s Late Night Live (aka Late Night Left). The date was Monday 16 September. Comrade Savva was interviewed by presenter David Marr about the Speaker’s Lecture which she delivered in Parliament House the previous week.
Savva told Marr that “the Liberal Party that [Robert] Menzies founded is actually no longer with us; it’s called the Liberal Party but it’s not the Liberal Party as created by Menzies; it’s a different beast altogether”.
This is absolute tosh – as Henderson pointed out in his column. Robert Menzies was no left liberal (in the North American sense of the term). Rather he was a political conservative who was a strong believer in personal freedom. The Liberal Party of today is still very much Menzies’ child.
Comrade Savva’s speech was given on Monday 9 September. On Tuesday 10 September, The Age and Sydney Morning Herald ran what was described as “a transcript” of the Speaker’s Lecture. In fact, the piece which appeared in Nine Newspapers consisted of only the second half of the speech. Moreover, certain changes were made. For example, in the Lecture on the Parliament House website reference is made to the “Murdoch mob”. In Nine newspapers, however, the reference was to “the Murdoch empire”. How about that?
[Interesting fudge here. I wonder if Niki Savva ever referred to her employer as “the Murdoch mob” when she worked and later wrote columns for The Australian. Just a thought. – MWD Editor.]
As avid readers know only too well, Media Watch Dog runs John Laws Style Deliberate Mistakes and usually refrains from criticising the typographical errors, misspellings and so on of others. But the House of Representatives is a well-staffed government-funded outfit and should have the ability to check errors before they are placed on the Parliament House website.
In any event, MWD makes the following comments on the 2024 Speaker’s Lecture – in the hope that howlers will be noticed.
• In his introduction, The Hon Milton Dick MP, Speaker of the House of Representatives, refers to Michelle Gratton (it’s Grattan). He concluded:
Laurie Oakes once described Niki as someone who writes without fear, tells it like she sees it, and doesn’t run with the pack and doesn’t flinch under fire. She’s made an extraordinary contribution to public debate, and this should be celebrated. Please welcome Niki Savva.
It’s not clear what the Speaker was expecting. But the early part of Savva’s speech was an all-out attack on Liberal Party leader Peter Dutton – delivered at a taxpayer-funded event. She made no substantial criticism of the Labor Party or the Teal Independents.
• Early on, Savva asked “why do warriors of the left and right trawl for fights, whether on gender, climate change, immigration, race or religion?” She appeared to present herself as the “sensible centre”. Here there is a lack of self-awareness – since Savva is a warrior herself when it comes to her views.
• Then Savva criticised Peter Dutton for disagreeing with the Australian Electoral Commission’s decision to accept a tick in the “Yes” or “No” boxes as a valid vote in the referendum on the Voice – but not a cross. She described Dutton’s position as “completely outrageous” and continued:
It was one of the lowest of the many low points in that campaign, ranking alongside attacks, particularly from the Murdoch mob, on those denouncing racism rather than the racism itself – a technique they have perfected. It’s worth wondering what might have happened if the vote had gone the other way. If the yes vote was 60% and no 40%, would we have witnessed our own version of January 6? Dutton’s attack on the AEC was a Trumpian moment, followed in March by another Trumpian moment when he criticised another respected institution, the CSIRO, for reporting that nuclear power did not stack up for Australia. Seeking to discredit its report, Dutton described it as “not genuine.”
This is just hyperbole. Comrade Savva has no knowledge of what would have happened if “Yes” prevailed in the Voice referendum. But it is most unlikely the “No” supporters would have engaged in a riot. It’s simplistic abuse to imply that because Donald Trump challenged the results of the 2020 US presidential election Peter Dutton would have imitated him in 2023. As to the CSIRO report on nuclear power, Dutton’s criticism was not of its scientific analysis but of its economic (unscientific) modelling. What’s wrong with that?
• Then there was Comrade Savva’s sneer at Sky News Australia – along with linking the Opposition leader with “the Nigel Farages and the Donald Trumps of the world”. Groan. Like him or loathe him (Savva is in the second category), Dutton is quite a different character from both Farage and Trump.
• Soon after, Niki Savva referred to Warren Denning’s book Caucus Crisis: The Rise and Fall of the Scullin Government (1937, reprinted 1982) – about the collapse of the Scullin Labor government in 1931. She thanked “Laurie Oaks [sic]” for “gifting” her this book. Savva has reported on Australian politics for around half a century but seems not to have been aware of this important book before receiving a copy from Laurie Oakes. She commented:
Denning wrote that during Scullen’s [sic] tenure there were grave fears massive riots caused by widespread poverty and joblessness would trigger a breakdown of social cohesion.
There were three other references to Jim Scullen (sic). No doubt Warren Denning had reason to write this about Australia in 1931 but that’s almost a century ago and of little relevance to contemporary Australia.
• Like many left-of-centre journalists, Savva likes Liberals who cross the floor and are left-of-centre. Such as Bridget Archer, the Liberal Party MP for Bass in Tasmania. She wrote:
Coalition MPs treasure their right to cross the floor. Yet a few poor souls … are vilified or isolated if they dare do it. Bridget Archer seems destined to spend her political life on the back bench, despite increasing her margin in 2022 and even if promoting an intelligent woman with small l liberal values would signal there is a place for such people inside the Liberal Party.
In fact, Gavin Pearce, the Liberal Party MP for the neighbouring seat of Braddon, performed better than Bridget Archer in 2019 and 2022. Pearce is neither a small “l” Liberal nor a floor-crosser.
It’s not clear why MPs who vote against their party should get preferment over those who remain loyal. What’s more, Bridget Archer campaigned with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for a “Yes” vote in Bass – but “No” prevailed by a substantial margin. Moreover, there are quite a few small “l” liberals in the contemporary Liberal Party.
• Niki Savva had this to say about the 2022 election in her speech which remains on the Parliament House website:
In 2022, the Liberal primary vote fell to a dismal 23.89%, while Labour’s [sic] dropped to 32.58%. Almost one in three voters opted for minors or independents.
This was corrected in The Age and SMH version of the speech to read:
In 2022, the Liberal Party vote fell to a dismal 23.89 per cent (with another 11.6 per cent from the Nationals and Queensland’s LNP) …
While all Coalition candidates run as Liberal Nationals in Queensland, if elected they caucus with either the Liberals or the Nationals, no different than Coalition MPs from other states. Indeed, currently the leaders of both the federal Liberal and National parties, Peter Dutton and David Littleproud, ran as LNP candidates in Queensland.
By using the primary vote figure for just the Liberal Party – excluding the votes of Queenslanders who voted for a Liberal National candidate who, if elected, would caucus with the Liberals – Savva is undercounting the Liberal primary vote by around 900,000. When these are added to the Liberal votes from other states, the total comes out at just over 30 per cent of all voters, not the 23.89 per cent claimed by Niki Savva.
The voters ignored by Niki Savva include the 41,657 voters who put a 1 next to Peter Dutton’s name in Dickson. These voters would no doubt be surprised to learn that, based on Savva’s figures, they are not Liberal voters. Yet, this howler remains uncorrected on the Australian Parliament website.
• According to Savva, “historians could pinpoint May 21, 2022 [i.e. the day of the 2022 election] as the day the Menzies Party died”. The Liberal Party is not dead – and Dutton is closer to the Menzies tradition than Savva’s fave Malcolm Turnbull. Savva continued:
… the dominant Right [in the Liberal Party] will not concede or retreat. The few remaining Liberal moderates can surrender, join the Teals, or hope someone founds a new socially liberal, economically conservative party. One former pm I know has the resources. I doubt he has the will.
The reference is to Malcolm Turnbull. Savva overlooked the fact that, when Liberal Party leader, Malcolm Turnbull lost 14 seats at the 2016 election and nearly lost majority government – not a great qualification for creating a new political party.
• Comrade Savva concluded her (somewhat polemical) Speaker’s Lecture by stating that it was “not called a lecture for nothing” and advising that she would finish “with a bit more advice for politicians and journalists”. She then called on politicians and journalists to “show respect” for one another and not tell lies.
This is the same Niki Savva who referred to the “Murdoch mob” and who wrote in her book So Greek: Confessions of a Conservative Leftie: “Journalists can, and do, get away with lying; politicians and staff can’t – nor should they”. And she boasted about how she had once misled Bob Hawke. Fancy that.
• Niki Savva declared that “if you do your job well you will upset people and you will be called names like ‘Tory bitch’ or ‘fat arsed bitch’” and added – “that’s me and Laura”. What Savva refrained from saying was that the comment in both cases was made by a prominent Labor Party identity – and not by an Australian version of Donald Trump.
* * * * *
In the overwhelming majority of her Sydney Morning Herald and Age columns, Niki Savva bags the Liberal Party and fangs Peter Dutton. Invited to give the important Speakers’ Lecture she did more of the same.
Verily, A Niki Savva Moment.
SHANE WRIGHT & CANDLESTICKS
As Media Watch Dog readers are well aware, Nine’s Shane Wright has risen without trace (as the late Kitty Muggeridge once said about the late David Frost) to become the senior economics correspondent for The Age and Sydney Morning Herald – not having published anything of note apart from newspaper articles and columns plus the occasional essay. Even so, you would expect a person in such an elevated position to know about the international energy market.
It’s only a few years since your man Wright ridiculed anyone who said that coal had any future as a part of energy supply – even in such markets as India, China and Indonesia. He declared on ABC TV Insiders on 11 June, 2017 that “coal is like candlesticks” and compared those who said that there is still a demand for Australian coal exports with members of the Candle Makers Union circa 1870 who (allegedly) argued the case for candles over electricity. Now read on.
FEDERAL LABOR FORGETS TO CONSULT WITH NINE’s SHANE WRIGHT BEFORE APPROVING COAL MINE EXTENSIONS
On Tuesday 24 September, federal Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek approved three proposed coal mine extensions in NSW. The extensions are for Mach Energy’s mine at Mount Pleasant and Yancoal’s mine at Ravensworth, both located in the Hunter Valley, as well as Whitehaven Coal’s mine at Narrabri in Northern NSW. The extensions will keep the mines operating into the 2030s and 2040s.
The mine extensions were condemned by environmental groups, the leftist Australia Institute, The Greens and the teal Independents. Nevertheless, federal Labor seems happy to promote the jobs that will be protected and created in regional NSW. And that nations dependent on Australia’s coal exports will be able to keep the lights on.
It appears Tanya Plibersek forgot to consult with the senior economics correspondent at The Age and Sydney Morning Herald, who would have told her there is no more demand for Hunter coal than for Byron Bay candlesticks.
DOCUMENTATION
DEBORAH CONWAY AND PATRICIA KARVELAS – THE BACKGROUND
On Monday 23 September the singer/auditor Deborah Conway addressed The Sydney Institute on the topic Life After The Book of Life (Allen & Unwin). She mentioned how her circumstances changed after she was interviewed by Patricia Karvelas on ABC Radio National Breakfast soon after the publication of her book. Here’s why.
This is an extract of what Conway said at the Sydney Institute, Monday 23 September 2024:
On November 26th Mushroom held a 50th Anniversary Celebration at which we were asked to perform. The audience was a full house at Rod Laver Arena, 12,000 strong, and around 2 million watching on free to air TV. Willy & I wore white suits, blue shirts, he wore a white yarmulke, I wore my oversized Magen David. I introduced It’s Only the Beginning saying, Michael (Gudinski) hated what I wore in the video clip for this song (you’ll recall it was plus 4’s) but I think he would have loved this outfit. I had marked us as targets.
A few pics were snapped backstage & went up online. Me posing with a couple of Yothu Yindi members and Kate Ceberano. There was an outpouring of support from some in our social media pages, but the post also attracted a lot of ugly, faintly threatening commentary referencing blood on the white suits of genocide supporters. The genocide supporter slur was baffling. Hang on, I don’t support genocide, never have as a matter of fact. Regardless the calls for hanging our heads in shame, we are disgusting, everything we have ever touched is now tainted and the very personal slur, of being a talentless has-been, made frequent appearances.
A few weeks later the Sydney Theatre Company opening night of The Seagull, caused uproar when 3 of the cast members donned keffiyehs for their curtain call. The fallout was intense; board members resigned, subscribers cancelled, donations were withdrawn. In the wake of all this I was invited to talk to Patricia Karvelas on Radio National. The interview was supposed to be about the equivalence, if there was any, between the STC donning keffiyehs and Willy & I dressing as we did for the Mushroom event. It could have been an interesting discussion but my interviewer was not to be mollified merely with the sartorial and so within a few minutes the conversation turned to Gaza with Ms Karvelas insisting Israel was solely & only fully responsible for the high death toll of innocent civilians. The next few moments became ground zero for my total fall from grace. The haters have relished decoupling a very few words (7 to be exact) from the context of their intent & wave them as a flag to proclaim my craven disregard for human suffering. The meaning of my words in context, are when Hamas puts weapons in the hands of underage boys to point at the enemy, they use them as fighters & then use them in the childhood casualty count. To say this is a horrendous, cynical exploitation of young lives is a chronic understatement but the mountain of evidence remains unexamined by the pro-Palestine groups defending Hamas as freedom fighters.
This is the question that Karvelas asked in an interview on RN Breakfast 15 December 2023, and how Conway responded to the question:
Patrica Karvelas: You mentioned Israel has a right to defend itself and we hear that language a lot, but at the same time, there has been a disproportionate impact on innocents, innocent people.
Deborah Conway: And yet I hear that I hear that response a lot …
Patrica Karvelas: But lots of kids. I mean, we know they’re not Hamas, right?
Deborah Conway: Well, you know, this depends on what you what you call kids, but you see young people, you know, 16, 17-year-old young boys toting rifles, I’ve seen plenty of photos of that stuff. So you know that unfortunately, they Hamas recruits boys that are not men yet. And so they are counted –
Patrica Karvelas: But there are a lot of really young people dying.
Deborah Conway: Can I – there are a lot of young people dying. But I believe that the responsibility for that lies pretty squarely with Hamas who have embedded themselves in the civilian population, who have not allowed the Gazans to move south when Israel asked them to …
Here is a question directed to Deborah Conway in the question and answer portion of her Sydney Institute speech, addressing the Patricia Karvelas interview:
Question: I listened to your interview with Patricia Karvelas, and I agree that it was completely misinterpreted, not even by her, but by others, because what you’re essentially saying is what you said tonight, that men of 16 and 17 are not children if they’ve got rifles in their hand. But compare that treatment you got with the treatment that recently of people like Antony Loewenstein, who got the whole of Australian Story [on the ABC], and most recently, Louise Adler in The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald. How do you feel about that lot?
Deborah Conway: I think I’m confused, really. I find Louise Adler a very confusing human being. I’m not quite sure what she’s trying to prove, but people like Louise Adler and Antony Loewenstein are incredibly useful to the people who are pushing this leftist line of Israel being a genocidal, colonialist, racist, apartheid entity. Because, you know, they are Jews who side with that point of view. And so they can be wheeled out and held up as an example to say, “look these, these Jews believe that this is correct. So how can it be otherwise”. But you know, they’re not representative of the Jewish community in Australia, far, far from it. Most Jews in Australia, most Jews around the world, you would count themselves as people who believe that Israel has the right to exist, ie, Zionists. And this, of course, there are people who don’t believe that, and some of them are Jews and, and they become the spokespeople because they justify this terrible other position that everybody wants to, you know, to tear it up. And, yeah I am, I’m sorry that they’re that they are given such huge platforms to say this stuff.
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