How can any sane person think that this man should have this power?

'Yahoo! News' report:

The White House Correspondents Association is moving Fox News up to the front row in the briefing room, according to sources familiar with the process. The WHCA board's decision was unanimous. [It's now confirmed; see update below.]

Since the retirement of veteran journalist Helen Thomas, three news organizations — Fox News, Bloomberg News and NPR — each argued that it should move to the front row. Fox News will join the broadcast networks and CNN up front. ...

"Discredited", "Shameless", "Despicable" and "Chutzpah" will all be re-defined in dictionaries in the near future.

Dogwhistling

... My Saturday morning paper tells me I should run away ...

'Run Away', Drawn From Bees [2010]

The Saturday edition [31/7/10] of the 'Gold Coast Bulletin' asks:

Why are there so many Indian cabbies on the Gold Coast?

When the real question is:

How can Murdoch's rags continue to get away with this shit?

How? Easy, it's because everyone lets him get away with it. You are responsible every time you buy a product from him.

You are reading this because you have a brain.

It is YOUR fault that this is happening to our country and to democracy all over the Murdoch-controlled world. You are to blame if you are not criticising the garbage his shills spout. You are responsible if you let people tell you something is a fact "because I read it in the paper".

Murdoch only gets away with this crap because YOU allow it.

Why is the Federal Government's Asia-Pacific television service going to tender?

'Crikey!' report [27/7/10]:

... As The Australian itself pointed out yesterday in a separate article: "The battle of Australia Network comes at a particularly tense time for the ABC and Sky, which is owned by Seven, Nine and and BSkyB (part-owned by News Corporation, publisher of the Australian). The two broadcasters are now direct competitors following the launch of the ABC's 24-hour news channel."

The Weekend Australian's editorial went on to sledge the ABC and its managing director Mark Scott over everything from Q&A host Tony Jones' interviewing style to the various agendas of morning radio hosts ...

(Isn't it interesting that although they have commercial arrangements with each other, the Murdoch media continually attack the ABC, while the ABC never criticise the Murdoch media?)

Surely if taxpayer dollars are involved, this network should be run by the national broadcaster?

Do you really want an American corporation running the Australia Network? Because that's what will happen.

Demand that your local candidate will keep this service in the public's hands.

More proof Brisbane needs another newspaper

Ask your candidates how they will tackle the lack of media diversity in this country.

'Brisbane Times' report [27/7/10]:

Queensland Health's most senior bureaucrat has condemned a newspaper for going into a hospital room to interview a grieving injured father without seeking permission.

Jade Quilligan, 22, died last month after allegedly shooting her ex-husband Lenny Comollatti, 36, and killing their eight-month-old son Anthony in central Queensland.

Queensland Health director Michael Reid argues The Courier-Mail breached "moral standards" by interviewing Mr Comollatti while he was recovering from gunshot wounds.

In a letter to Queensland Newspapers editor-in-chief David Fagan, seen by brisbanetimes.com.au, Mr Reid says he is concerned about the episode.

"The Courier-Mail holds itself up to the public of Queensland as a champion of the people - an establishment that goes into battle for those who can not fight for themselves," he writes in the letter, dated July 14.

"Yet your newspaper had a journalist enter a Queensland Health hospital at Rockhampton, without permission, to talk with a patient, without his consent, less than two days after his eight month old child was allegedly shot to death by his former wife, who was later found dead at the scene of a car accident."

Mr Reid says other media organisations had contacted Queensland Health public affairs staffers to request an interview, but the man "made it very clear he wanted time to grieve, time to understand what had happened".

"The Courier-Mail sells the article resulting from this interview with a grieving and injured man as an exclusive - exclusive because other media had the compassion to follow the known protocols," he writes.

"Your own article says the patient appealed for privacy, but he was offered none."

In the article, headlined Shot dad tells of horror and published on July 9, Mr Comollatti said he was "not up to saying much" and was still in shock.

"Everybody's talking about it too much already," the newspaper quoted him as saying.

"I'm just trying to get over it myself."

At the time, Mr Comollatti was reported to be awaiting surgery for gunshot wounds to the stomach.

Mr Fagan last night defended the journalist who visited the hospital.

"Queensland Health has peddled this letter everywhere," he said.

"We stand by our reporter who identified himself to the person he was interviewing.

"That's what journalism is.

"We don't need the approval of a government authority to speak to a citizen in this country."

Mr Reid declined to speak about the matter yesterday.

"The letter was intended to be a private communication to the editor of The Courier-Mail and as such I will not make any comment," he said in a short emailed statement.

London health authorities complained in 2005 after Australian journalists were caught "sneaking into hospitals" carrying bunches of flowers to interview bomb blast victims, ABC's Media Watch program reported.

Many Queenslanders would agree this is certainly not the worst thing the 'Courier-Mail' has done, but it's typical.

The Murdoch Press are not about journalism, they are thugs and propagandists for the neoliberal cause.

News Ltd. has a long, well documented criminal history. For Fagan to keep hiding behind the excuse of journalism when he is defending these kind of unethical acts is unacceptable.

Keep speaking out against this immoral, undemocratic organisation.

"The ABC does not have a policy regarding Murdoch press"

That's the response we received to our recent question about why negative stories about News Ltd. never mention it by name.

They are at it again, with the story about Shirley Sherrod ('World Today' 22/7/10):

... LISA MILLAR: But it was only the first part of that speech that was posted on a website by a conservative blogger. And it sent the right wing hosts and cable networks into a spin.

The agriculture secretary Tom Vilsack demanded her resignation....

The Fairfax press managed to name "Fox" as the culprit [23/7/10]:

A black public servant, whose father was murdered by a white man in 1965 and who has spent four decades working against injustice, has found herself at the centre of a storm exposing America's fragile race relations.

Shirley Sherrod was sacked on Monday as the Department of Agriculture's director of rural development in Georgia after a conservative website accused her of making racists remarks captured in a video.

The 2½-minute clip taken from a speech Ms Sherrod gave in March went viral, drawing the attention of the White House and department officials, who apparently feared an attack from a right-wing commentator.

Ms Sherrod had referred to an incident 24 years earlier when she had been working for a farm assistance group, admitting she had not done all that she could do to help a white farmer, whom she described as ''acting superior''. The website, BigGovernment.com, said this was ''evidence of racism coming from a federal employee''.

An Agriculture under-secretary ordered Ms Sherrod to resign and apparently referred to the prospect of the incident appearing on Fox News.

Even the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People condemned her comments.

With Fox News running the story ''Racism Caught on Tape'', Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsak said he required ''zero tolerance'' on discrimination.

But the rush to judgment had overlooked one thing: Ms Sherrod's words had been taken out of context, plucked from her 43-minute speech in which she went on to say that meeting that white farmer in 1986 had actually changed her views.

''Working with him made me see that it's really about those who have versus those who don't,'' she told her audience. ''You know, and they could be black, they could be white, they could be Hispanic.''

The white farmer and his wife also came forward. ''She's a good friend,'' said Eloise Spooner. ''She helped us save our farm.'' And by Wednesday evening, once the full speech had been reviewed, Ms Sherrod had received apologies from the White House and from Mr Vilsak, who immediately offered her a new job.

''This is a good woman,'' he said. ''She's been put through hell, and I could have done, and should have done, a better job … The decision should have been [taken] with more thought and with far less haste.''

Ms Sherrod's father was shot dead by a white farmer in 1965, but an all-white grand jury refused to charge the killer. ...

Maybe it's time the ABC got itself a policy about the Murdoch Press.

"Save Our Spit!"

Save Our Broadwater!
Save Our Gold Coast!
Save Our State!
Save Our Country!
Save The Planet!

Stop Murdoch!

Like most cities and towns around Australia, the Gold Coast is cursed with Murdoch newspapers.

On the Northern end of the Gold Coast there is no alternative.

Overwhelmingly united and strong local opposition to a proposed cruise ship terminal, headed by the "Save Our Spit" group, killed the idea dead a few years ago. It was a stupid idea and was roundly rejected by the local community. So where does a desperate development crazy group turn when the local people have sent them packing?

Over the past few weeks, the Murdoch Press have dug up and begun flogging the rotted carcass of the dead horse known as the Gold Coast Cruise Ship Terminal on the Southport Spit.

A genuine, honest, trusted local newspaper would send this lot packing, again. Or at least pretend to acknowledge the local opposition to their plans to takeover and destroy our public paradise by the sea.

That's why these ruthless developers love Rupert Murdoch's rags. They are not genuine, not actually local, and are demonstrably untrustworthy.

If you want to stop this madness, again, and send a powerful message to that old American who thinks he can run your country: Boycott Rupert Murdoch's 'Gold Coast Bulletin'.

Don't buy it.

Tell your local business friends that you will be forced to stop doing business with them if they give him their advertising dollars.

You'll help save the spit, but you might also help save our democracy and 'journalism' from destruction.

FOXTEL is not the real thing

They are trying everything they can to get you to spend your hard earned dollars on their propaganda.

The latest desperate advertisement (on free to air television) uses this old Australian hit:

'The Real Thing', recorded by Russell Morris, produced by Ian "Molly" Meldrum and written by Johnny Young [1969]:

Come and see the real thing, come and see the real thing, come and see
Come and see the real thing, come and see the real thing, come and see
There’s a meaning there, but the meaning there doesn’t really mean a thing
Come and see the real thing, come and see the real thing, come and see
I am the real thing!

Oo mama mow-mow (repeat x 4)

Oo mama mama mama mama mama mama mow
Tryin’ hard to understand the meaning that you’ll see in me
Tryin’ hard to understand the meaning that you’ll see in me
There’s a meaning there, but the meaning there doesn’t really mean a thing
Come and see the real thing, come and see the real thing, come and see
I am the real thing!

Oo mama mow-mow (repeat x 4)

I am not seeing you
I am not seeing you
Ahhhhh!

I am the real thing!
(ad-lib fade-out)

The children's choir singing toward the end is the Hitler Youth singing "Die Jugend Marschiert" (Youth on the March)

How appropriate.