Pre-Wiki whinge

EVERY morsel of information about man-of-the-moment Julian Assange is being seized on, so why should Strewth be any different? He wrote exclusively for The Australian yesterday, but it wasn't the first time.

EVERY morsel of information about man-of-the-moment Julian Assange is being seized on, so why should Strewth be any different? He wrote exclusively for The Australian yesterday, but it wasn't the first time.

In 2006, Assange, while living in Melbourne and rearing his teenage son Daniel, wrote to the editor in language guaranteed to get a run: "Thank you, thank you, thank you for your series of articles on how schools fail gifted children." He sent his son to the University of Melbourne and the Centre for Adult Education for mature-age students because there was no scheme with equivalent flexibility for gifted children. "This summer he wrote his first scientific paper while at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute," the proud father wrote before accusing Australia of not caring about its bright children, its greatest resource. "The Left doesn't care because it sees them as privileged poppies who must be cut down. The Right has decided to let the market care for it in the form of private schools. In the US, the situation is quite different; there is no tall poppy syndrome and relatively few private schools." All that was needed was "a guardian willing to hack a path through the system for them". Assange will need a guardian of his own, we suspect. It is the only Assange letter we have published.

Same wavelength

ONE apparent motive driving Julian Assange is a desire to tell the truth. So how nice it is to get a note from the assistant secretary of the US State Department's public affairs bureau, Philip J. Crowley. Announcing the US decision to host UNESCO's World Press Freedom Day in early May next year, Crowley becomes almost lyrical about a free press and the open society it encourages. The theme is new media. "The United States places technology and innovation at the forefront of its diplomatic and development efforts," Crowley says, and who are we to quibble? "New media has empowered citizens around the world to report on their circumstances, express opinions on world events, and exchange information in environments sometimes hostile to such exercises of individuals' right to freedom of expression." This must have been written especially for Assange "At the same time, we are concerned about the determination of some governments to censor and silence individuals, and to restrict the free flow of information." The World Press Freedom Day will show how the US is committed to support and "expand press freedom and the free flow of information in this digital age".

Who needs cables?

A SCAN of our files turns up numerous references to Kevin Rudd's control-freak persona in The Australian since Rudd Labor was elected in 2007, although Strewth has always preferred to admire him for being adept at multi-tasking. But, as Tony Abbott observes, Australians don't need US diplomatic cables to understand that Rudd likes to have his hand on all the levers. "You only needed to listen to Labor members around the corridors of parliament," the Iron Monk notes with a thin spread of relish. The whole world knew.

What's in a name?

DESPITE Tony Abbott's attempt to Australianise Assange's name (Ass-an-gie, Strewth, December 6), we are sure the "g" should be soft as in sponge. A fine definition of the name's meaning comes from Adam Hills via Twitter: Assange (verb): to prosecute someone for one thing when you really want to prosecute them for another. "My client was assanged, your honour."

No comment in full

FEDERAL School Education, Early Childhood and Youth Minister Peter Garrett was asked yesterday: "Do you think Kevin Rudd is an abrasive control freak?" His reply should be bottled for its hapless attempt at obfuscation. "Well, on that basis I'm very happy to let that question be noted, but no more than that. I have no comment to make about those matters at all. I'm looking forward to going back and sitting down with my ministerial colleagues and continuing the work that we're doing at the ministerial council."

Return of Kev-isms

AS prime minister, Kevin Rudd was always in trouble for jargon and self-conscious slang: programmatic specificity and fair shake of the sauce bottle. Now that he's Foreign Minister, he has slipped back into the habit. Yesterday, in four interviews he used "water off a duck's back" nine times and not being Robinson Crusoe four times and didn't have his tummy tickled three times. Meanwhile, Julia Gillard keeps talking about the "transformative" power of education. Is there something in the Lodge's water?

Missing dinner guest

FORMER England Test cricket captain David Gower was a no-show at a dinner hosted by University College London in Adelaide on Tuesday. Gower is rumoured to have been the mediator between Ian Botham and Ian Chappell, who had to be pulled apart in the latest bout of their long-running feud. The chair next to British consul-general Stuart Gill was left vacant. Gower missed Penfolds Bin 707, St Henri shiraz and Grange Hermitage.