A Septimanae Horribilis For Tony Abbott

 australia  No Responses »
Aug 252012
 

Tony Abbott has just endured what Queen Elizabeth II might describe as a septimanae horribilis, or a horrible week. It began on Monday, the 20th of August when he was ordered to leave Parliament for one hour under Standing Order 94a. He was ordered by the Deputy Speaker, Anna Burke, to withdraw comments he made about the Prime Minister’s honesty – without qualifications. He then withdrew his comments, and added a qualification, leaving the Deputy Speaker with no choice but to turf him out of the chamber. Let’s relive that glorious moment again: That was just a sampler for the real self inflicted damage he was about to achieve though. On Wednesday, the 22nd of August, he appeared on the ABC’s 730 program totally unprepared

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Debunking The Thomson Allegations

 australia  2 Responses »
May 242012
 

Once again Australia’s major media outlets have been caught out sleeping. Thankfully though, the independent media is on the job reporting everything the main stream media (MSM) can’t be bothered doing, in other words, investigative journalism. In a three part series, Independent Australia (IA), has a detailed analysis which, while not proving Craig Thomson is innocent, proves there is serious element of doubt about the whole story. In part one of IA’s report, the tangled web of involvement between self-proclaimed Health Services Union (HSU) whistleblower, Fair Work Australia (FWA) Vice-President, Michael Lawler, and prime ministerial wannabe, Tony Abbott. Read the full article here: How Jackson, Lawler And Abbott Tangled Thomson with the HSU. Part two of the series goes further into the relationship between Jackson

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Chris Uhlmann Has Made 730 A Joke

 televison  No Responses »
May 182012
 

In a previous article The Derp made note of the decline of the ABC’s flagship current affairs program 730 (Bring On The Dodgy Plumbers). When Leigh Sales left the show to go on maternity leave, sidekick Chris Uhlmann took over as host. Since then the show has gone even further downhill. All the blame for this decline is solely attributable to Uhlmann’s “interview” style. Rather than let the conversation evolve, Uhlmann seems to have a set list of questions to ask, and races through them, often talking over his guests in order to make sure every question gets asked. This makes the interviews very stilted, and often veer from one topic to another without any sense of coherence. When interviewing members of the Government, Uhlmann

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Bring On The Dodgy Plumbers

 televison  2 Responses »
Feb 222012
 

“And no stories about dodgy plumbers” said a straight faced Leigh Sales in promotions for the “new look” 730 Report. This was coupled with promises to bring us stories that matter in the hard hitting style that Kerry O’Brien made the show famous with. In other words, the only change was going to be that O’Brien’s role was going to be jointly handled by Sales and Chris Uhlmann. So how did it go so horribly wrong? Well first off the flash new set delayed the launch of 730, the new name for what we all knew and loved as The 730 Report. From that inauspicious start, things went rapidly downhill. It is no secret that ratings for 730 are a fraction of the old 730

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