Get over it!
The Left are still tilting at windmills
PRIVACY Minister Brendan O’Connor says there is a “public expectation” that privacy laws be re-examined in Australia in light of the UK phone hacking scandal, but concedes there is no suggestion of similar journalistic misconduct here.Rubbish! There is no “public expectation” whatsoever. All we have is a Left wing desire to cripple Murdoch. There is, however, a “public expectation” that government should get on with governing and stop pursuing stupid Left wing agendas.
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Kev, when this all broke I wondered if my local Murdoch owned paper has been operating in an appropriate manner. I beleive it is a grubby tabloid and in a one paper town I have to live with that. Generally, I don’t purchase it as I think Rupert has enough money and does not need any more.
Having said that my concern was and still remains, “Is there a culture of within the Murdoch media empire, which promotes unethical practices?”
Mr Murdoch is the head of a hugh media empire and as the CEO the buck stops with him. I certainly hope there is not such a culture, but in a modern world I am not so silly as to think it has not happened else where, nor restricted ot the UK.
Yes governments need to govern in an open and accountable manner. But unethical methods which invade privacy should not be tolerated.
Beside all the hype in England I don’t think this is a Murdoch issue only. I think that the biggest problem is that Murdoch is so hated by the left that it has become a “get Murdoch” witch hunt. There are a lot of tabloids involved other than News International but I haven’t heard or read much about the local press being involved in nefarious deeds – maybe it does go on but its not apparent. I certainly would or wouldn’t buy a paper because Rupert did or didn’t need the money. But then your local might be a tabloid whereas mine is The Australian and I choose not to bother with the Courier Mail. I figure I can read behind the lines and sort out bias, but by and large I think the Oz gets it right.
It is a bit over the top to blame Rupert for what is clearly a part of Brit tabloid culture.
British police have reopened investigations into the client list of a private investigator hired by News of the World – a list including 300 journalists from 31 publications, including the non-Murdoch Daily Mail and the Left-leaning Daily Mirror.
Those journalists reportedly lodged some 4000 requests for confidential information; much obtained illegally.
Murdoch’s “journalists” have crippled his empire – he doesn’t need anyone else to do that for him.
The problem in this country isn’t bias, it’s concentration of ownership.
When the ownership of media is shared by one or two organisations in any country or locality, there needs to be consideration to breaking them up. Without this consideration, we are marching towards a form of corporate totalitarianism which is just as dangerous as a totalitarian government.
The other problem is polemic masquerading as journalism. It involves starting with a slant or bias, and writing the story from that viewpoint.
The most recent example of this was yesterday’s Daily Mirror headline about the shooting in Norway. It shouted “Norway’s 9/11”, jumping to the conclusion that Islamic militants were responsible.
Journalists are entitled to express opinions, but they need to do so with a clear and up front declaration that the piece is opinion, not fact.
You just hate Murdock because he provided people with alternatives to the left leaning mass media. and what really stings is he made a lot of money doing it because people preferred it.
The left always want to control the media.
“You just hate Murdoch”
Really – I’ve never met him.
“The left always want to control the media”.
If you really believe this, you need to read a few hard-Right blogs.
They have a major problem with reporting the truth. Recent events in Norway provide a good example. There are pages and pages of crap bleating because the killer identifies himself as a right leaning christian fundamentalist. The weirder posts claim it’s all a conspiracy.
The debate is about corrupt journalism, not bias.
Murdoch comes across as an old man who has lost it in terms of his capacity to manage his people.
having never met him doesn’t change the obvious hate, you hate that he allows people to choose not to listen to the leftist crap that is so important to you.
Major problem reporting the truth? no, just not reporting the lefts version of the truth.
I can certainly see the value in pointing out the difference in reporting standards when a non muslim commits an atrocity V the many times when muslims do, much of the media jumps through hoops to avoid mentioning islam when the perps are muslim. not so in Norway.
Corrupt journalism? again, just not forcing your worldview on people.
Re Murdoch not being in charge, a company that comprised less than 1% of his organisation in employee numbers (and far less in revenue) broke the law (as many seem to have in the UK and the Age has here), he closed that company. Sounds managed, and looks to me like you envy his ability and success.
“he allows people to choose not to listen to the leftist crap that is so important to you”
That’s your opinion.
He makes a lot of money employing journalists who have scant regard for the law or ethics.
That’s a fact.
“avoid mentioning Islam”
That is simply bizarre. I suggest you go back to the archives of any media organisation that published an account of the events of 9th September 2001, and count the number of times the words “Islamic terrorists” were used.
“Corrupt journalism? again, just not forcing your worldview on people”
So when Bolt and the Sun jump to the conclusion that the massacre in Norway was an Al Qaeda operation, they’re not “forcing their worldview on people”.
The fact remains – they published the fiction that Islamic extremists were responsible. Either they were inept, or they deliberately distorted the facts.
I favour the second explanation, although watching Bolt’s furious spinning since, I have my doubts. They’re just very poor excuses for journalists. That’s fact, unless I follow your line of thinking and called it a Right wing conspiracy.
“The stupidity here is blinding.”
Absolutely, if you’re referring to your conspiracy theory about the mainstream media.
People choose to buy Murdoch’s papers.
If you don’t like what his papers produce, don’t buy them.
It’s as simple as that.
Let the market decide.
I’d much rather the market dictating the future of newsprint in Australia than Brown telling me which papers I can read.
Cav
Problem is, that if a monoply (or for that matter, a dupoly) exists, the market is irrelevant.
In Brisbane, for example, there is no competition in the local print media.
The stupidity here is blinding. you are actually complaining via the internet that the Brisbane print media lacks competition. If only some system existed that would allow you to access news and information from other sources.
So if only the Australian was available in your home town you would buy it 1725099?
Cav
I don’t buy newspapers. I get my news via iPad. There are many Apps available that allow free trials. Everything is syndicated, so it makes little difference which paper you follow. When one runs out, I simply download another.
BTW, it’s 1735099 not 1725099. Your typing’s about as accurate as your advice on rodent removal.
“The stupidity here is blinding. you are actually complaining via the internet that the Brisbane print media lacks competition”
You observe correctly that I’m taking about the print media – the medium I’m using to point that out doesn’t alter the fact. If I had written it in the sand at Bondi beach it would still be true.
Tell me what is stupid about stating a fact.
Tell me what is stupid about pointing out the media monoply in Brisbane.
Tell me what is stupid about pointing out the lies published (for example) on the front page of the Sun yesterday.
Because the only way your comment could be anything but blindingly stupid would be if you had no other source of information. everyone else realises that there are plenty of varied sources available to them.
The fact that you were so stupid as to actually post it via the internet and still seem oblivious to the sheer stupidity of doing so is more telling than anything you could possibly say.
I notice you haven’t denied the fact but attempted to distract on the basis that I used one medium to state a fact about another.
I’ll take that as agreement.
Of course you’ll pretend that was ‘agreement’, you are trying to avoid being shown to be a fool yet again, and yet again you’ll grab anything you can and pretend it supports your idiotic position. but you are the only one who thinks that. and deep down, you don’t even believe it.
I’ll get you back 134761234872137698483!
On 25/7 1735099 wrote a comment which included the following:
“He [Murdoch] makes a lot of money employing journalists who have scant regard for the law or ethics. That’s a fact.”
I reckon I have had enough of this leftist drivel from you 1735099. My son is a senior journalist with The Australian and one of my sons-in-law is the editor of The Daily Telegraph.
Proof of your allegations right now please.
It’ll never happen HRT, it never does, just more unicorns and red-herrings.
“Proof of your allegations right now please.”
Here’s three for starters – Andy Coulson , Clive Goodman, and Neil Wallis.
You initially claimed: “He [Murdoch] makes a lot of money employing journalists who have scant regard for the law or ethics. That’s a fact.”
In your reply to my request for proof of your allegations, you gave the names of Coulsen, Goodman and Wallis. They are all ex-employees.
A history lesson is not wanted. Give the names of those journalists Murdoch is employing who have scant regard for for law or ethics.
Ex-employees? I guess that has something to do with the fact that a number of them are in jail.
Then of course, on 17 July 2011, Rebekah Brooks was arrested by police for conspiring to intercept communications and corruption. Recent enough for you?
“…because the killer identifies himself as a right leaning Christian fundamentalist.”
No he doesn’t – as usual 17 Bobby red-herring runs into a debate with his dissolute left-wing feet firmly jammed into his fact-challenged mouth.
Anders Behring Breivik claims an “Odinist orientation” in his manifesto. He boasts that he adopted a cloak of Christianity as a ruse to gain credibility and ready access to an established organisation to which he could preach his version of “European nationalism” with its strange warped anarcho-syndicalism.
Breivik incorporated the Unabomber’s socialist manifesto into his own weird 1500 pages of self-delusion almost verbatim – his only alterations were to substitute words like “multiculturalism” in the Unabomber’s original self denigrating rants regarding the inherent weakness of his “leftism.”
To describe Breivik as ‘right wing’ is to ignore the totalitarianism characteristic of the left. A Marxist philosophy revealed as dear to his heart when he describes his “civilizational objectives” as “we should strive to become a civilisation where the individual’s acquisition of wealth would no longer be the driving force in our lives…”
One thing is clear Breivik is not a poor disenfranchised bunny. He amassed considerable funds for his “project” through the shrewd operation of a successful business. He spent five years carefully and quietly gaining credibility as a ‘hunter’ and member of a pistol club in order to acquire shooting licenses so could legally purchase a semi-automatic rifle and pistol. He also carefully and quietly managed to legally acquire quantities of controlled substances in order to construct a very powerful bomb. One can only hope the descriptions in his manifesto of an organisation of likeminded and well-funded folk across Europe are just figments of his imagination.
“So when Bolt and the Sun jump to the conclusion that the massacre in Norway was an Al Qaeda operation…”
This is yet another example of ‘jump to conclusion’ 17 Bobby red-herring loose with the truth fact challenged lefty dickwad prejudices. Bolt linked to the headline stories from the left wing non-Murdoch Guardian, non-Murdoch New York Times, non-Murdoch Washington Post and non-Murdoch BBC which published claims by the jihadist group Ansar al-Jihad al-Alami that they were responsible for the attacks in revenge for Norway’s Afghanistan commitment.
As the non-Murdoch Post’s Jennifer Rubin wrote:
“We don’t know if al Qaeda was directly responsible for today’s events, but in all likelihood the attack was launched by part of the jihadist hydra. Prominent jihadists have already claimed online that the attack is payback for Norway’s involvement in the war in Afghanistan.”
The left-wing non-Murdoch Atlantic defends her shocking left-wing non-Murdoch prejudiced error of fact, or as 17 Bobby red-herring would put it, her LIE:
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2011/07/on-suspecting-al-qaeda-in-the-norway-attacks/242416/
As soon as reports to the contrary were available Andrew Bolt updated his blog and has continued to update his posts with new information as the story unfolds. Contrast his evil Murdoch ways with the glee with which The non-Murdoch Age, Sidneee non-Murdoch Moaning Herald and non-Murdoch ABC pronounce, as ignorantly as 17 Bobby red-herring, that Breivik is a “a right leaning Christian fundamentalist.” That lie will be extant on their websites for eternity.
It’s clear 17 Bobby red-herring’s attack on Murdoch is merely the sad bombastic harangue of a bitter old lefty who despises the Murdoch family’s success – as Anne Michaels wrote: “The best teacher lodges an intent not in the mind but in the heart.” But in 17 Bobby’s case it’s not from his heart but his arse.
By the way the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon were attacked on the 11th of September 2001 not “9th September 2001” – perhaps 17 Bobby red-herring fact challenged should employ a fact checker to minimise his fact challenges.
I am no longer prepared to debate an individual who harbours so much hate that he cannot post without abuse.
This is the same kind of hate that is responsible for the deaths of scores of innocents in Norway.
You ignore me, but I thought you thrived on these love/hate relationships, Bobby. I thought you were just throwing out the bait to get reactions, and then sitting back to have a giggle.
“This is the same kind of hate that is responsible for the deaths of scores of innocents in Norway.”
Ha ha ha ha… Pitiful 17 Bobby red-herring. Absolutely pitiful.
Would you like that in German?
Much obliged 1735099. Your deflection is a joy.
I asked: “Give the names of those journalists Murdoch is employing who have scant regard for the law or ethics”. You responded with another history lesson, along with the puzzling question: “Recent enough for you?”
Not what I’m after and you know it. Who are the ones Murdoch is employing? Or, are you going to argue “is” has a tense known only to you? Do these employees include for example: Hartigan, Mitchell, Whittaker, Fagan and Thomas?
Don’t be shy about it. You made the claim – support it. Lest you have forgotten here is the question again: “Give the names of those journalists Murdoch is employing who have scant regard for the law or ethics”.
“Not what I’m after and you know it.”
What you’re after is anybody’s guess. The law and basic ethics does not respect tense. There is a clear and obvious stench of corruption around Murdoch’s operation in the UK. Whether it exists here is up for grabs, but
If I were employed by News Limited, I’d be watching the bloke at the next work station very carefully.
The other point worth making about the “squeaky clean” Australian operation is that it had no problem in the past with publishing News of the World scoops in the Daily Telegraph and the Herald Sun. I wonder how stories such as James Blunt stepping out with Jessica Sutta, gossip from sources about Kylie Minogue’s chemotherapy, Jude Law’s threesomes, Justin Timberlake’s cheating (that turned out to be total nonsense) were sourced? These juicy pieces were all earners for Australian News Limited tabloids, and were happily published by their local editors. Jude Law is now suing News Limited over hacking allegations.
Given the gutter journalism displayed in both the sourcing and publication of these stories, if the Australian operation were as pure as claimed by Harto, he would have refused to publish them.
Meanwhile, for your edification, here’s a select list of past and present employees of multinational News Limited – Andy Coulson, Clive Goodman, Neil Wallis, Rebekah Brooks, John Hartigan, Chris Mitchell, Paul Whittaker, David Fagan and Hedley Thomas.
The Australian employees must feel a little uncomfortable to be grouped with their colleagues in the Old Dart, but they’ve all worked for News Limited.
I was delighted with the names you provided particularly, as I had earlier given you five of them. I was however, puzzled as to why you repeated those five.
Nevertheless, among the five I recognised my son’s name and one of my sons-in law. Much obliged 1735099 – without your help I may well have forgotten them.
I can’t see any point in continuing this exchange as it reminds me of my student attempts to corner mercury.
Please feel free to have the last say.
http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/breaking-news/journalist-at-uk-newspaper-the-guardian-admits-phone-hacking/story-e6frea73-1226109494535
Wow, it’s looking more and more like a UK journalistic cultural problem and less like it is entirely Ruperts fault. how can that be?