Sometimes the pond begins a Monday by yearning for yesterday ...
The reptiles had a ripper set of stories yesterday ... the Catholic archbishop, the shrinking Donald, the energy ultimatum ...
The pond could have relived the good old days with the Pellists, as the Fisher of men announced gravely that the sky was falling down ...
Oh sure the energy ultimatum carried over to today, and even forced the latest Newspoll down the tree-killer page ...
But yesterday a goodly burst of transphobia dominated the nation ...
Hmm, perhaps the tendency of politicians to indulge in social engineering will drive him out of politics ...
As for the digital edition this day, it carried on in much the same spirit, producing a shocking sense of déjà vu ... with tales of the suffering of Hadders (offscreen thanks to the digital rotation), the suffering of Xians, bill shock, and more old Malware sliding down to oblivion ...
And there at the bottom was a reminder of the pond's solemn Monday duty ...
The pond undertook the task of looking at the Major Mitchell with a deep, reluctant sigh.
What is it with the Major's obsession with the ABC?
What is it with the reptiles' obsession in general?
What is it with the reptiles' obsession in general?
Prattling Polonius is obsessed with the ABC, hating it and hurling fierce barbs at it whenever he gets a chance, yet there he was on The Insiders, as pleased as punch to sound very intelligent in his defence of the onion muncher as world famous climate scientist.
If he'd had the slightest shred of dignity, he'd have turned away, renounced and denounced the ABC ...
But he didn't, and so the pond could eavesdrop via NewsRadio while out and about ...
They're all obsessed and the pond knows the painful price of obsession. Each day it gets up to check the health of its lizards, and it's obsessively disturbing to see their obsessions on parade ...
Why on earth should the Major care about Lateline? The pond can't remember the last time it bothered to watch ...
Indeed, and more koans here ...
It was way past time for Lateline to resemble a cup ...
Say what? Suddenly Tony Jones is the bee's knees? Once upon a time the reptiles mocked Jones and his infatuation with Clive ...
It was, of course, great entertainment, as celebrated by Cut and Paste way back on 22nd June 2013, inter alia:
But there's a clue to the ABC's decline and fall, in the Major's talk of former Sky journalists and looking forward to the work of the lizard Oz's former associate editor ...
The reptiles constantly look across at the ABC, hoping for some sort of permanence and stability in their woeful, uncertain lives ...
Ah full to overflowing intertubes, it's all your fault ... and there's the Major lecturing the Chairman on the failures of his stable ...
Forget the mea culpa about having to rely on the ABC because Murdochian la la land is a waste of time, space and money ...
There you have it in a nutshell ... the Major's pure, undiluted contempt for the customer, or in his language, the mug punter ...
There you have it in a nutshell ... the Major's pure, undiluted contempt for the customer, or in his language, the mug punter ...
Roll it around on your tongue, feel the sublime flavour of condescension at work ...
"Yet as anyone who understands polling knows, many of the people who cite the ABC as trustworthy do so because they think it will make them seem intelligent news consumers. Very few actually watch ABC current affairs shows and most would have no real idea if they were trustworthy."
How far is it possible to disappear up your own fundament? Each week, the Major Mitchell shows that last week's effort was but a prelude to this week's record-breaking effort ...
If that's the Major's opinion of people who conduct polls and people who answer them, why do the reptiles waste their time with Newspoll?
If that's the Major's opinion of people who conduct polls and people who answer them, why do the reptiles waste their time with Newspoll?
And then came yet more jibber-jabber about the Green-left ABC types campaigning against lizard Oz values ...
In reality, the ABC is hamstrung, full of IPA types, and Polonius on a Sunday, and sundry reptiles with way too much time on their hands turning up every day of the week ...
The problem started with News 24, which needed to fill up space, and like the lizard Oz, turned to cheap opinion, people carrying on about everything and nothing, and with reptiles eager for a little TV exposure. It hasn't yet reached the wretched panels on American cable, but it's getting there ...
The trouble with the bizarre notion of balance is that instead of carrying on with independent reporting, the ABC has imported all sorts of Murdochians as a kind of fig life.
It doesn't stop the reptiles banging on about the ABC, it actually encourages them ...
The result is that crackpot reptiles of the half-baked, half-arsed Murdochian kind come along to defend the onion muncher as a climate scientist ... or sound off, in a reptile way, about all the other marvels under the sun ...
It's not nearly good enough, in fact it's a complete turn-off, and that's what the pond does, as the reptiles ruin a once proud institution, though they do it with a purpose, an intent which slips out in the Major's final gobbet ...
It doesn't stop the reptiles banging on about the ABC, it actually encourages them ...
The result is that crackpot reptiles of the half-baked, half-arsed Murdochian kind come along to defend the onion muncher as a climate scientist ... or sound off, in a reptile way, about all the other marvels under the sun ...
It's not nearly good enough, in fact it's a complete turn-off, and that's what the pond does, as the reptiles ruin a once proud institution, though they do it with a purpose, an intent which slips out in the Major's final gobbet ...
And there it is in one ... the real point of the entire reptile obsession with the ABC, laid bare by the Major for all to see ...
He doesn't see the rationale for having a $1 billion a year public broadcaster ...
Suddenly we go from fearing that we might need the ABC in the future, to not seeing any rationale for the ABC, all hung off the hook of a story about a TV program resembling a cup ...
Suddenly we go from fearing that we might need the ABC in the future, to not seeing any rationale for the ABC, all hung off the hook of a story about a TV program resembling a cup ...
At one time, the ABC wouldn't have minded. It might even have provided an alternative voice to the Murdochian monolith ... but now?
Look in through the window, and it's a dispiriting view ...
Look in through the window, and it's a dispiriting view ...
And so to a couple of their cartoons the pond saw yesterday on their ABC thanks to the intertubes ...
Maj Mitch: "[ABC] charter already requires the corporation to be "accurate and impartial." Yet there is no doubt management has been unable to challenge the inherent left biases of ABC journalism."
ReplyDeleteOh how terrible, and I do so wonder why, don't you ? Could it be - I'm just running things up the flagpole here - that "accurate and impartial" has a big 'Left' bias ? That's something a really experienced Lenin Medal hunter would understand, isn't it ?
But Mitch again: "At least half of the nation's "beholders" are conservatives and they pay for the ABC too."
So, no, he really doesn't get any of it, does he. As he continues:
"They should not feel ABC journalists are part of a Green-left campaign against their values."
But they don't, Mitch old mate; it's only the Rabid Abbotts and Barmy Bernadis who believe that. Most of Australia's "conservatives" believe in the ABC's accuracy and impartiality. Just ask 'em, mate. They aren't all just showing 'social desirability bias'.
The constant babble about bias is just a cover for the lack of any coherent values on the extreme right. The nut jobs like Cater & Henderson that the ABC are forced to run as "balance" appear as what they are - ill informed defenders of a largely discredited orthodoxies. If they cannot carry a rational argument themselves & the ABC continues to air something even remotely like informed discussion, the only alternative is to destroy the platform entirely (or maybe trivialise it).
ReplyDeleteI note that Bolt tried to set up in opposition to Insiders but only manages a tenth of the audience. The support isn't there in the ratings or the opinion polls, just in the febrile imagination of The Major.
It isn't just a lack of "coherent values" on The (alt-)Right, Bef, it's the complete lack of any honesty, truth and verifiable facts. When you're dealing with consistent liars and "alternate facts" retailers, mate, then being "accurate and impartial" means you have to interdict them on a continuous basis.
DeleteJust one example
Deletehttps://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/oct/16/world-going-slow-coal-misinformation-distorting-facts
The pond hit the funny bone with the observation that Major Mitchell and his (former?) coterie seem intent on buggering the ABC when an advance party of their Murdochian compatriots have already infiltrated the joint. Obviously the insurgency is far from complete.
ReplyDelete