(Above: in a recent poll conducted at Loon Pond, there were a thousand votes for more photos of Vanessa Hudgens, while nobody voted for Gerard Henderson. Well Mr. Nobody from Nowhere, keenly aware of your interest in conspiracies in Australian media, here's a couple of snaps of Gerard Henderson and an anonymous nonentity directing a camera at herself. Now remind me again who you'd prefer to look at).
Now I know a few hard core punters thought that this was the week that the fix would be in, and that Gerard Henderson, nobbled by a mysterious, desperate syndicate wouldn't mention John Howard in his column, and all bets would be off.
And it wasn't just Bill Clinton! Chairman Rudd has been standing on the shoulders of real giants:
Rudd's achievements in Pittsburgh are real enough, but they build on what had gone before. Politicians are entitled to exaggerate achievements; journalists are expected to throw the switch to reality.
Howard tended to be respected by the media during the early and mid-term of his government. But, unlike Hawke and Keating, he did not have a journalistic fan club. Rudd is enjoying the media plaudits that initially befell Hawke and Keating. It is possible that, like his immediate Labor predecessors, Rudd will be increasingly criticised from the left on issues such as climate change and Afghanistan. Yet he is having a dream run in most of the media.
A dream run amongst dreamers.
(Below: Supertramp's devastating expose of the lickspittle ways of the Australian media, likely as not the crime of the century).
How feeble were these doubting Thomases. It took a bold punter to score this week, as the choice between nodding off and getting all the way through Rudd changed the world order, says Rudd - and compliant media became really burdensome.
But first to the scoring, so bets can be settled quickly:
First mention of John Howard in the column: second paragraph.
Number of mentions of John Howard in the column: 4
Those punters who like a side bet on the number of times Peter Costello is mentioned will be pleased with the four the outsider picked up, but we personally refuse to allow a book on how many times Henderson mentions bias in the media because it's an unrelenting refrain, so predictable you simply can't offer decent odds.
Golly if we had a dollar for every time the automated ghost writing keyboard was pressed to churn out this line, as Henderson writes about hubris and political success going together:
... problems emerge when sections of the media get caught up in the political hype. This is more likely to be the case when assessments are made of Labor leaders - if only because most journalists prefer Labor or the Greens to the Coalition.
Yes, I too am astonished every time I read The Australian and The Daily Telegraph at the way Chairman Rupert allows deviant deep rooted perverted Greens to provide coverage for his rags in a way that makes them more problematic than reading City Hub (insert your own local free ratbag newspaper of choice here). As for Fairfax, I remain appalled at the way it allows its Green correspondents to dominate the "opinion" section of the paper - isn't it time for us all to stand up and overthrow those notorious Greenies Miranda the Devine, Paul Sheehan, and yes, Gerard Henderson himself.
But apart from the splendid, quite unique (or as we like to say here uniquely unique) insight that leading politicians and hubris go together, what, you might ask, is Henderson rabbiting on about this week?
And as usual the rely has to be 'nothing much', because with any prattling Polonius it's not so much what's being said as the sheer pleasure of hearing one's very own voice punctuating the ether.
Last week Henderson seems to have got upset with Lisa Millar - she of the Joker lips, and the ABC's North American correspondent - for describing Rudd's involvement in replacing the G8 with the G20 as amazing and brilliant - when it was another liberal dandy who did the deed:
Certainly Rudd played a leading role in promulgating Australia's case that the G20 should be strengthened. However, the expansion of the G20's role was consistent with the interests of the likes of China, India, Brazil, Mexico and South Korea - which are not members of the G8. Some journalists have given the impression the G20 is new. In fact, it was an initiative of the Clinton administration, after what was widely regarded as a poor response by the International Monetary Fund to the Asian economic downturn in 1997.
And it wasn't just Bill Clinton! Chairman Rudd has been standing on the shoulders of real giants:
As a long-standing treasurer, Peter Costello played an important role in building up the influence of the G20 as a meeting place for finance ministers and central bank governors. He tells the story in The Costello Memoirs.
Let's get real people, especially you Lisa Millar, with your quirky leftie leaning smile:
Rudd's achievements in Pittsburgh are real enough, but they build on what had gone before. Politicians are entitled to exaggerate achievements; journalists are expected to throw the switch to reality.
Because after all people you had a Christ figure in your midst for a long time, and you didn't pay attention or deliver homages as were respectful and needful and right and just. And now only Gerard Henderson, a lonely, forlorn figure, tends the shrine and burnishes the image - of that giant of giants, John Howard:
Howard tended to be respected by the media during the early and mid-term of his government. But, unlike Hawke and Keating, he did not have a journalistic fan club. Rudd is enjoying the media plaudits that initially befell Hawke and Keating. It is possible that, like his immediate Labor predecessors, Rudd will be increasingly criticised from the left on issues such as climate change and Afghanistan. Yet he is having a dream run in most of the media.
A dream run amongst dreamers.
And it's not just the childish tendency to hero worship John Howard. Oops, sorry, that should have read it's not just the childish tendency to hero worship Chairman Rudd while ignoring the issues. The media is ignoring everyone:
The widespread, albeit not universal, journalistic support for Rudd is accompanied by a reluctance to report criticism of the front bench.
You know ex-leader Mark Latham is now an embittered hack for Fairfax, and so totally unreliable, which is why it's important to draw attention to what he's written and note how his embittered scuttlebutt and cheap sordid gossip deserve to be on the front page of every indecent rag in the country:
You know ex-leader Mark Latham is now an embittered hack for Fairfax, and so totally unreliable, which is why it's important to draw attention to what he's written and note how his embittered scuttlebutt and cheap sordid gossip deserve to be on the front page of every indecent rag in the country:
The former Labor leader Mark Latham is embittered and, consequently, not a reliable source of uncorroborated information about his former colleagues. But in his column in The Australian Financial Review on September 17 he quoted from a 2005 email to him from Julia Gillard in which she criticised Rudd. This received scant media attention. Imagine the coverage if, two years into Howard's prime ministership, written evidence was produced of Costello bagging his leader.
Oh yes, it's shocking, and even more shocking is the way the media fails to campaign on a daily basis on the flaws of Lindsay Tanner and Julia Gillard, and their deep animosity.
Oh yes, it's shocking, and even more shocking is the way the media fails to campaign on a daily basis on the flaws of Lindsay Tanner and Julia Gillard, and their deep animosity.
It's much the same with Gillard. In The Making of Julia Gillard the author Jacqueline Kent details the animosity between Gillard and the Finance Minister, Lindsay Tanner, in their younger days. Once again, this has ignited little interest in the media. Imagine what would have occurred had a book on Tony Abbott revealed considerable tension with Costello.
The Rudd Government looks sure of a re-election, irrespective of the media. But journalists would be well advised not to get caught up in Labor's spin and to cover the ALP as they would the Liberal Party.
Yes, the media should be slamming Chairman Rudd and his neophyte party for hubris day in day out, every minute of the waking hours. It's the only way that Gerard Henderson will be able to get a sound night's sleep ...
Oh yes, imagine. Imagine there's no heaven, it's easy if you try, imagine there's no countries, it isn't hard to do, imagine a world without possessions, John Howard or Peter Costello ... I wonder if you can, no need for greed or hunger, a brotherhood of man.
Stop that, stop it now. But at least you can see why news coverage should constantly be slanted the way Gerard Henderson, prattling Polonius, prescribes. Because what's the alternative? Sob. The re-election of Chairman Rudd's government for another four years, and Gerard Henderson having to endure his hubris, without even a satisfying snakes and ladders fall (unless, wait, unless Julia Gillard mends her fences with Lindsay Tanner, and we only have to endure her hubris).
Yes, the media should be slamming Chairman Rudd and his neophyte party for hubris day in day out, every minute of the waking hours. It's the only way that Gerard Henderson will be able to get a sound night's sleep ...
Hang on, that doesn't sound so bad. Go media bias, go, as the deviant overlords even now must surely be plotting to remove Henderson, the Devine and Sheehan from that Fairfax rag, and introduce toadies and lick spittle sycophants so that the world can be made safe for Chairman Rudd ...
I wonder if there'll ever come a day when a Gerard Henderson column simply says: I love John Howard, I hate Chairman Rudd, and the socialistic ABC. Now over to you ... tell me of your love of John Howard (and think of the score: mention of John Howard in the first and only para, and top and tail cappers mentioning JH for a solid knock of two not out).
Sure it's just a dream, but we surely should have a dream. Take it away Supertramp ...
Dreamer, you know you are a dreamer
Well can you put your hands in your head, oh no!
I said dreamer, youre nothing but a dreamer
Well can you put your hands in your head, oh no!
I said far out, - what a day, a year, a laugh it is!
You know, - well you know you had it comin to you,
Now theres not a lot I can do
Dreamer, you stupid little dreamer;
So now you put your head in your hands, oh no!
I said far out, - what a day, a year, a laugh it is!
You know, - well you know you had it comin to you,
Now theres not a lot I can do.
Well can you put your hands in your head, oh no!
I said dreamer, youre nothing but a dreamer
Well can you put your hands in your head, oh no!
I said far out, - what a day, a year, a laugh it is!
You know, - well you know you had it comin to you,
Now theres not a lot I can do
Dreamer, you stupid little dreamer;
So now you put your head in your hands, oh no!
I said far out, - what a day, a year, a laugh it is!
You know, - well you know you had it comin to you,
Now theres not a lot I can do.
(Below: Supertramp's devastating expose of the lickspittle ways of the Australian media, likely as not the crime of the century).
(And as for the actual crime of the century? Well I think this email says it all).
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