Storm Fan Jason Koo vs. News Ltd

Congratulations to Melbourne Storm fan Jason Koo for taking action against Murdoch's destructive stranglehold on Australia.

From Fairfax:

Jason Koo, who has been following the Storm since their admission to the NRL in 1998, was ordered to leave the News Ltd-owned club's home ground during Saturday night's match against Cronulla after unfurling a number of banners protesting against the media company's stance on the salary cap scandal that resulted in the club being stripped of two premierships and forced to play for no competition points.

One banner called for the reinstatement of the four independent directors sacked by News Ltd after they took court action against the penalties. Others read: ''News enriched while Storm left to die'' and ''We support our players, coach and staff - not News Ltd''.

Koo said stadium security staff told him the banners were offensive to News Ltd. He has since made a video defending his actions that was posted online yesterday, along with another video bearing footage of the banners and his eviction from the ground.

''We must be really hitting News Ltd where it hurts; they know that what we are doing is getting to them and this is their way of trying to silence us,'' Koo said.

Watch his video about the incident at "madfan".

Congratulations, Jason. The more people take direct action in standing up against Rupert Murdoch the sooner his power will be reduced to some level safe for our democracy, planet and sport!

To work for Murdoch do you have to prove you have the ability to make shit up?

The small number of corflutes on display around the Gold Coast are mostly LNP

Over the past month, from Paradise Point to the Tweed we have seen corflutes at only six locations. One was for the Fishing Shooting Party and the rest were LNP.

Yet the Gold Coast's only daily newspaper report [20/8/10]:

Signs displaying the smiling faces of campaigning pollies have cropped up all over town, and they are annoying Gold Coast traders. ...

See? It's false. Not true. "Lies", if you like.

It's typical Murdoch fabricated bullshit in the place of news.

Murdoch is Biased. The Rest of The Media Seem OK with This.

Anyone with their critical faculties intact is aware of the Murdoch bias on a range of topics.

The bogus staged 'town hall' events recently are quite obviously nothing more than Murdoch trying to privatise the democratic process (and take it within his realm as a virtual monopoly).

The fact that these bogus events enter the 'news cycle' and are uncritically reported by the rest of the media enables that goal and gives it legitimacy. Bad for democracy, bad for journalism.

In June he donated $1 million to the US Republican Party. It is as if he has made a deliberate effort to formalise News Ltd's institutional bias. If you have ever had the misfortune to engage with a Murdoch hack, you would have heard them trying to claim that they are somehow virtuous independent voices despite their owner's obvious bias and hatred of objectivity.

Time to wheel out this old piece about an Australian 'journalist':

Anguished Shill Wrestles With Inner Hypocrite

Gee, it must be so hard for you poor dears out there in shameless-shill land. We never realised your inner torment while we pure types sit about on our high moral horses atop the high moral ground, hurling hatred and abuse at your glass houses without ever a concern for how you must suffer.

Let us explain: http://www.medialens.org is an excellent website. They are UK based but their "media alerts" are well argued, of universal relevance and supported by links and references and they seem to avoid getting shrill, hyperbolic or hysterical. A true example of reason and logic used against the "MSM" spin and rhetoric in the service of "true journalism", it is hard to fault this team of media observers.

One of the founders, David Edwards, has a dusty old blog. We had a look, and it seems that they did a piece a few years ago disagreeing with the thrust of an article by Robert Fisk. As a result they received a fiery response (which was lacking in reason and heavy on emotion, such as accusing them of 'Stalinism'!) from an Australian going by the name of "Comrade Jack". Edwards reproduced the exchange on the blog and, as we read it, the following was an enlightening revelation into the mind of Murdoch-Type employees:

"…I don't know if you're old enough to remember The Pop Group's song 'We Are All Prostitutes' but that's what most of us wage-earners are.

I'm a journalist working for a crappy, rightwing corporate Australian newspaper. I do what I do because I cannot do anything else. Nothing I do makes one iota of a difference but there are millions of people like me in the world who need the money and will do whatever it takes to
support our families.

We aren't bad people -- even though I suspect you think we lack your ideological purity and revolutionary zeal and have, therefore, sided with the "dark side" and probably deserve to die the death capitalism has invented for us.

Let's face it, man, most of us humans live in a f*cked world and we get f*cked every day. Whingeing about it has never worked to our advantage. In fact, it's made matters worse.

People like me don't like the "dark side" anymore than we like the "right side" -- simply because both sides can be found on the same coin.

Yours Comrade Jack"

[From: http://www.medialens.org/blogs/david-edwards-blog.php 18 January, 2006]

News for "Comrade Jack": you ARE bad people. Who is "Comrade Jack"? Is he real? "Millions of people like me in the world who need the money and will do whatever it takes…", maybe he is Graham Richardson? Is he Glen Milne? Probably not, too much insight and angst about being a "disgrace" as Milne eloquently puts it.

Ditto? Rupert's Rooty Hill Meets Brisbane Gets Sideswiped?

Apparently Julia Gillard has agreed to debate Tony Abbott in Brisbane this Wednesday...

on a special episode of the ABC's Q&A!

Oh dear, David and Madonna and Rupert will not be pleased.

Remember that guy "Muldoon" from 'Jurassic Park' who got killed by that giant killer reptile, the velociraptor? We've looked it up for you:

Muldoon: They show extraordinary intelligence, even problem-solving. Especially the big one. We bred eight originally, but when she came in she took over the pride and killed all but two of the others. That one... when she looks at you, you can tell she's working things out.

And then later...

Muldoon: They should all be destroyed.

Muldoon: Shoot her! Shoot her!

[Just before he gets attacked by a raptor]



Muldoon: Clever girl.

Rupert Murdoch summons Gillard and Abbott to Rooty Hill

If you live in Western Sydney and think this debate is about you. You're wrong.

You didn't know that the whole fabricated "debate" at Rooty Hill RSL on Wednesday was a Murdoch construct? Why didn't you know that?

Surely it wouldn't be because the ABC has failed to tell you that it is a charade invented by the discredited crooks at News Ltd. The ABC must have been too busy to point out that it is nothing more than a crude and ugly exercise in Murdochracy, that must be it.

The 'Daily Telegraph' is not a newspaper. It looks like one, but it is simply an instrument of Murdoch neo-con propaganda.

Ask your local candidates when they will prohibit old Americans from owning 70% of Australia's news media and controlling close to 100% of the news agenda.

Dogwhistling II

The Hon. Warren Truss MP addressed the National Press Club today [4/8/10]

What would you ask if you were a journalist attending Nationals Leader Warren Truss' address at the National Press Club today?

You might ask about the Mining Tax, the CPRS, the Murray Darling, mining vs agriculture, parental leave or other policies.

Perhaps. But if you were writing for News Ltd., your priority would be to dogwhistle:

"Do you find burkas confronting?"

Truss responded by asserting that people should be able to wear what they choose.

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.