From The People Of Australia :

Dear Johnny, It's Time To Go

News.com.au has posted a fascinating open letter forum to Prime Minister John Howard, inviting readers to tell him why they think he should stay in office, why they think he should go, why they think he should step aside for someone younger, why they admire him, why they hate him, why the think he has saved Australia, why they think he has destroyed Australia and, more often than not, why they think he...well, why they think he sucks.

More than 710 people have posted their thoughts in the Dear Johnny forum, as of this posting.

That's more than 700 chunks of precious information and opinion straight from the Australian people, particularly Australians under 45, and all of it will be absolutely devoured by the PM's team of more than 60 advisers, who are desperately searching for anything, a scrap of inspiration, a mind-rocking explosion of clarity, anything, that can help them to reshape Howard's message on a variety of essential issues, and knock the more disagreeable edges off his public image. Before it's too late. If it's not too late already. And it probably is.

It's a remarkably feisty, honest and eye-opening collection of opinions, statements, accusations, insults and direct pleas that will probably tell you more about what the younger generations of Australians are thinking and feeling about their country, and its leader, than a hundred pontificating editorials from uninspired, burnt-out columnists and bloggers...well, some bloggers.

News.com.au has posted a summary of sorts of the commentary from the public, providing a general overview, though the selection of comments used are clearly tilted heavily in favour of Howard staying on, and the summary highlights comments that attack those who think it's time for Kevin Rudd to lead the country. Presumably this overview was written only a few dozen comments into the massive outpouring of Australian views and opinion.

But flipping through the 14 plus of pages of comments, it's clear the majority of younger Australians are in favour of tossing Howard out of office, despite how good a job he may done with the economy. However, many facing mortgage and debt pressures find it hard to see how the "sterling economy" is benefiting them.

There is much talk of barely being able to get by despite working long hours, of disgust with Howard's whiplash changes in policy depending on the polls and lingering distrust and bitterness over the lies that led to the War On Iraq, the Truth Overboard scandal, the AWB scandal, the introduction of the GST, the attacks on the rights of gun owners, the divisive nature of Howard's dealing with immigrant and gay rights issues and the David Hicks fiasco.

There are dozens of comments attacking Howard for allowing himself to be seen on the world stage as "Bush's puppet" and for allowing Australian to be presented as a war-mongering appendage of the American military machine.

Generally, the 710 comments are not a good look for the prime minister. Some people like him, but they don't want him to still be the PM come 2008. They may think he's done a good job, but every one has to pack it in eventually. The desire for generational change amongst the commenters chimes like a dozen belltowers over a midnight country town, loud and impossible to ignore.

Don't take it personally, prime minister, but the younger generations of Australians just want you to go away.

Some comments of interest :

"If you have to ask the question, you already know the aswer. Howard has had a pretty good run, and we now need to see what the future of the party will be. I’ll bet the trump card lies with Malcom Turnbull."

"There’s only so many lies you can tell before people stop paying attention. I suspect people believe that many of the accomodations made by the PM in response to the poor polling will be reversed as soon as he reclaims office, just like last time."

"don’t think anything is wrong with John Howard. I love his laugh. I love his smile. I love his confidence.I love his eyebrows"

"you are still here and contaminate the very air i breathe"

"Howard needs to wake up to the fact that the gay population has rights as Asutralians. I agree he has done some good for the country but as a gay man he has let me down big time. Why can’t he allow basic human rights?"

"Australia use to be the world leader in solar tech before Howard cut funding in 1996."

"howard is out of touch with the common person , he is living in a dream world ,where as we have to cope with rising petrol costs, food & general day to day living expenses , he has none of that because its all paid for by the government"

"Howard only takes action when the polls begin to suffer, as demonstrated recently by his sudden sympathy for David Hicks and his knee-jerk climate change announcement. The public are beginning to see through the lies..."

"He did some good work tackling hard issues. But it’s time for Australia to become more decent, tolerant and less divided. He is no longer what people want."

"I can’t respect someone who blatantly lies about things."I can’t respect someone who changes his policies on such important issues, simply for the votes. I can’t respect a leader, who actually only leads for the people he deems are fit to be led."

"The damage is done. You’re great for the economy, but we’ve finally got an opponent who will be as well. There’s no reason to keep you. You had a good run, but the bad is now starting to out-weigh the good"

"I hope that when you lose office you will take the time to reflect on how you let down the people of Australia. Also, I hope you address your deficiencies in character and realise the damage these have caused.Unfortunately any attempts to try and redeem yourself before the election will fail as you have lost credibility. The people have been lied to on too many occaisons and this will not be forgiven or forgotten."

"The cost of living is surreal despite announcing the economy is all time high and the unemployment rate is all time low."

"How about the fact that you don’t care about anyone who earns under 60k a year? As a father and sole money earner on less than 40k, your government does everything it can to keep people like me from getting ahead in life. Instead, you spend offensive amounts of money on yourself and your other silverspooned cohorts."

"Dear John, Liberal Party is only worried about making sure a few hundred people in the biggest businesses are happy. You use the Governments Purse as if it was your own personal petty cash tin. The mere fact you don’t know why people hate the Liberals so much, just means you are so out of touch with the very people who voted for you it’s not even funny anymore. The problem with Howard is the fact that he thinks all Australians are stupid, and unfortunately it seems some people of this board give him this notion"

"Because he’s a compulsive liar who is destroying the middle class in Australia and only cares about public opinion when election time rolls around."

"Mr Howard, You lost me when you called me “un-Australian” for marching in protest against your decision to send Australian troops to war in Iraq. How dare you. I think you are un-Australian when you leave people in detention centres, fail to protect the elderly in nursing home debacles, and allow oil companies free reign on my tight household budget."

Having read through all the comments, we've pulled together a list of twelve repeating issues and clarion calls for change that we think will see some obvious and swift rethinks in the way Howard goes about his electioneering.

We'll tick them off as we move closer, and then into, the election.

If Howard hasn't taken a few hours out of his evening to go through the majority of these comments, instead of waiting for "a report" from his advisers, or yet another "briefing", he doesn't deserve to even run for re-election.

News.com.au has given Howard a remarkably honest, unfiltered insight into how Australians are feeling today. It would be amazing to think that Howard & Co might learn nothing from all this.

It's Not You, It's...Umm...Errr...Them!

The Coalition government is but a few months away from one of the most devastating federal election defeats in Australian history. These are desperate times for once extremely confident men.

The supposedly brilliant political attack dog, Tony Abbott, is still claiming in media interviews that he just doesn't understand how the public can be so keen to see the back of him and John Howard and Alexander Downer and the rest of the crew when they've been so perfect and wonderful and performed so brilliantly in every respect.

He keeps coming up with only one explanation : most Australians are actually pretty stupid and a bunch of ungrateful bastards.

Not exactly the best attitude to show to the public you're trying to win back to your side there, Tony.

Trying to get to the bottom of why the coalition government stinks like a nine day old prawn salad in the polls, and as made clear via a stream of 'leaks', the power people of the coalition gathered for an emergency meeting in Canberra. PM Howard opened the floor to hardcore criticism, asking those gathered variations of "Is it me?" "Am I the problem?"

You'd think the room would have been filled with cries of "Oh God, yes!" and "Well, Duh!"

But no :

...his colleagues were silent.

Another version of the same Howard question to his colleagues goes :

"If you have a problem with how I'm doing my job, don't be afraid to say so."

Same response. Nothing. Not a word of dissent.

Yes. They all know the election will be a massacre, but it's going to be Howard's massacre, not theirs.

It seems all but a given that there will be no leadership challenge now. But there's always the likelihood that Howard will be given the option to go quietly, and the election delayed into the New Year to give Peter Costello, or Malcolm Turnbull or Alexander Downer (pffft!hahahaha!) time to settle in and work out a new way to brainwash the Australian public into voting for them.

The best bet for a Howard departure pre-election? Something medical.


Dennis Shanahan in The Australian uses the story to continue his Surprise Spruiker-quality pitch that the 'preferred prime minister' poll results are the only ones that really matter...because they're the only ones that show Howard making any ground, and only in the Newspoll rankings. And even then it's hardly a jaw-dropping comeback.

It's hard to find any pollwatchers other than Shanahan who think the 'preferred prime minister' vote counts for anything more than warm cat's piss when it comes to determining who is likely to take control of the country come election time.

Alan Ramsey supplies some clarity :

...six months of the Government's worst opinion polls since it gained office in March 1996. Alternatively, six months of Labor's most sustained ratings since the first year after Bob Hawke's sweep to victory in March 1983.

All those panicked Government promises of billions for water and climate change. The rush of instant policy. The hysterical union bashing and fear-mongering about Labor economic management. The ramping up of the terrorist threat. The sudden crusade in the name of abused Aboriginal children. And all for, what?

After 11 years the iceberg looms.

Indeed. The reason why Abbott and Downer and Joe Hockey are all looking a little bulkier of recent is because they've already strapped on their life vests, under their suits, just in case the ship goes down even faster than they already think it will.

John Howard will have to achieve the political equivalent of raising Princess Diana, Jesus Christ and Steve Irwin from the dead to win the election from here.

That hearing problem of his could always be a sign of something far more serious.

If it needs to be.

If he decides to bow out with most of his dignity intact.


Labor Maintains Its "Crushing Lead"

Too Many Horrible Home Truths For Howard

The Wizard Keeps Pulling The Levers, But Nothing Works

The Government Gazette Maintains The Rage - A PM Theorem

Mumble : More Excellent News For Howard : 58 To 42

"Doomsday Predictions Were Wrong" - When Howard Said The Iraq War Was Won

Crikey has dug up a remarkable piece of all-too-typical Howard hubris from May, 2003, back when the War On Iraq was won. Remember those couple of optimistic months before the explosive truth could no longer be buried beneath lies, spin and media manipulation?

When prime minister John Howard made the following statement to Parliament House, on May 21, 2003, he had already been thoroughly briefed to the reality on the ground in Iraq, and knew that the war was anything but won. Howard also knew that former Saddam Hussein loyalists, and Iraqi nationalists, were not contained or disarmed.

This is only one example of how much Howard gloated in the months after the downfall of the Saddam Hussein regime, and how little truth he was prepared to share with the Australian public :

JOHN HOWARD: "Not only was the military operation completed quickly and successfully but it is also worth recording that all of the doomsday predictions, particularly the many that came from those who sit opposite (the Labor opposition), were not realised.

"The oilwells were not set on fire; there were not millions of refugees; the dams on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers were not breached to bring on catastrophic flooding; and there was no long, drawn out, bloody, Stalingrad style street-to-street fighting in Baghdad.

"...it is a reminder of the hysteria and the doomsday predictions that often accompany operations of this kind....the predictions on this occasion have been proved wrong.

"The decisive victory of the American led coalition reflects enormous credit on the strength and the determination of the leadership of President Bush. Again I remind the House of the way in which his role was vilified and traduced by many of those who sit opposite and of the way in which speaker after speaker from the Australian Labor Party impugned his integrity, assaulted his judgment and called into question his ability to lead the United States in this very difficult conflict. History has proved them wrong.

"The performance of the President has illustrated how infantile their protests were, and the leadership that he has given on this occasion, I believe, will bring about a permanent change in attitudes in the Middle East."

When Howard made this arrogance-soaked speech, car bombs were already killing Iraqis and American soldiers, the insurgency was massing its ranks, ammunition and weapons dumps and storehouses were being raided by insurgents, oil pipelines were being destroyed and oil industry infrastructure was already being targeted, American forces had faced fierce and deadly opposition when they had entered Baghdad, leaving dozens dead and wounded and the exodus of Iraqis into Jordan, Egypt, Syria and Iran had already begun.

Howard claimed there had not been millions of refugees by May, 2003, which was true enough, but nobody said millions would leave within weeks of the war beginning. Refugee crises usually unfold over many months after a war commences, and Iraq was no different. An estimated 3 million people have now been forced to flee their homes, and their homeland, since the invasion and occupation of Iraq began.

As for Howard's claim that "there was no long, drawn out, bloody, Stalingrad style street-to-street fighting in Baghdad," this was then, and is now, a complete lie. Howard knew that the first American vehicles that entered Baghdad were met, in some streets, by gunfire from virtually every single window. Some of the very first roadside bombings of American military vehicles occurred in the outer suburbs of Baghdad during those days.

Street fighting has continued in Baghdad since late April of 2003 with more days of brutal fighting than less. Tens of thousands of Iraqis have been killed and wounded in street battles, kidnappings, massacres, car bombings and suicide attacks in the suburbs of Baghdad.

Of Bush, Howard said, "the leadership that he has given on this occasion, I believe, will bring about a permanent change in attitudes in the Middle East."

Hmm, Howard was right there, too. The permanent change in attitudes in the Middle East, resulting from Bush's "leadership" in the invasion and occupation of Iraq, has been to trust the Americans even less than they were trusted before the war began.

The nervousness and distrust shown by most of the world towards President Bush, and his decision to launch an illegal war on Iraq, has now proven to have been totally justified.

Howard's effusive praise and idolising of President Bush, meanwhile, was ignorant, bizarre, and for more than half a million dead and wounded Iraqis, and more than 60,000 dead and wounded American soldiers, horrifically sad, tragic, and ultimately wrong.

More than 75% of Australians opposed our involvement in the Iraq War in February, 2003, and latest polls show that more than 6 out of 10 Australians now want the troops withdrawn :

The growing outrage against the war in the US is also playing into the domestic scene, given the close personal ties between the Prime Minister, John Howard, and the US President, George Bush, who is being deserted by Republicans over the conflict.

The Foreign Affairs Minister, Alexander Downer, insisted yesterday that withdrawing US troops would be a victory for terrorism. Despite a CIA assessment showing al-Qaeda was not the main problem in Iraq, Mr Downer said the terrorist outfit was helping foment sectarian violence.

Two Australian Security Contractors Killed In Iraq By Roadside Bombs

Dolphins To Mellow Your Sunday



Absolutely glorious.

20 bottle-nosed dolphins catch the waves off the West Australian coast.

Mmmm, Silky

Howard Just Can't Stop Spending Your Money On "Life's Luxuries"

When more than a million Australian families are struggling to make their mortgage payments, when massive debts and interest rate rises are crippling the lifestyles of millions more, and when everyday expenses like food, petrol and electricity costs are on the rise, causing even more financial hardship, it's not a real good look for the prime minister to be exposed, yet again, lavishing luxuries on himself under the guise of professional expenses.

John Howard is facing yet another storm of controversy and heavy criticism over his kingly ways with the taxpayers money.

A storm has erupted over a $100,000 refurbishment of his prime ministerial jet. Does silk wallpaper at $9000 a roll sound outrageous to you?

It's also been revealed the PM spent more than $600,000 flying between his Sydney home and Parliament House in Canberra. Prime ministers traditionally live in the supplied Canberra residence, close to Parliament. That old house in Canberra wasn't good enough for Howard and his "I deserve better" brainspace, so he seized control of one of Australia's most beautiful properties, Kirribilli, directly across Sydney Harbour from the Opera House. He has occupied the publicly owned building for almost 11 years and hosted numerous, expensive dinners and cocktail parties for his friends and colleagues there.

A few months ago, Howard faced a climate of outrage when it was revealed he was spending another $170 million on propaganda to make his government look good.

And then there was the $540,000 Howard tried to spend on renovations to a private dining room, before he was publicly embarrassed into pulling the plug on that waste of money.

A spokesperson for the opposition government's Accountability department said :

“Nobody begrudges John Howard his personal taste for life's luxuries, but when public money is involved, he ought to exercise restraint...”

Ouch.

Whether the PM is blowing truckloads of taxpayers money on luxuriating his own lifestyle is not a debate that ever looks good for Howard. And it looks particularly bad only a few months out from a federal election when his government is doing so very poorly in the polls.

An all in comment brawl has broken out here. Spot the Howard advisers and spin controllers trying to pretend to be just ordinary punters, who see no problems with the prime minister giving himself the best of the best, time and time again. There's quite a few to be found.


LP : Gummo Trotsky provides a lovely picture of John Howard in all his silky finery.

From Minor Scuffles To A Mainstream Death Match...

'The Australian' Vs The Blogstream War Has Begun

The shift from back-alley sniper and tripwire insurgency to full blown street fighting in the war between 'The Australian' newspaper online and the thin ranks of the local political blogstream began yesterday with this post from Peter Brent at Mumble, talking about a call he got from The Australian newspaper :

A courtesy call from Editor-in-Chief Chris Mitchell this morning informed me that the paper is going to “go” Charles Richardson (from Crikey) and me tomorrow. Chris said by all means criticise the paper, but my “personal” attacks on Dennis had gone too far, and the paper will now go me “personally”.

No, I’m not making this up.

All very strange. And - I’d be lying if I didn’t admit - a little stomach-churning.

Why would Christ Mitchell choose to "go" Peter Brent "personally", along with Richardson from Crikey?

Because Brent and Richardson, and Crikey in general, dared to critique the way the editorial team of The Australian newspaper interprets the results of Newspoll, and last Monday's Newspoll in particular:

The latest Newspoll shows Mr Howard has closed the gap on Opposition Leader Kevin Rudd, who is now ahead by just one point, 43 per cent to 42, as preferred prime minister.

However, the opposition leader still holds a greater satisfaction rating, 60 per cent to Mr Howard's 46 per cent, and Labor retains an election-winning lead.

A fleet of opinionists from The Australian openly cheered the polls as showing Howard firmly on the comeback trail, whereas the real truth is that he is still flat-lining. The majority of .Australians don't trust Howard, and they don't want to vote for him or his government again. The Australian newspaper did not reflect, or headline, those very simple facts.

There was the usual barrage of blog posts bagging The Australian. Nothing unusual about that kind of criticism from the political blogstream.

Here was Crikey's take on July 10 :

The front page of today's Australian newspaper and its reporting of the latest Newspoll has prompted a range of reactions, from shock at the sheer mendacity of its main headline ''Howard checks Rudd's march'' to muffled awe at the paper's continuing ability to pluck some shred of glass-half-full optimism from the ongoing cataclysm of the Liberal Party's federal polling. All of which is no more or less than one might expect from the country's unofficial conservative organ.

The Australian shows a clear and undeniable bias towards the Howard government in the opinions, but most particularly in the headlines, which is what most people see and read. Most in the Australian political blogstream accept this. No big deal. Another Newspoll, another bad result for Howard Corp. polished to a dull glow of hope by The Australian's front page and headline writers. Life goes on.

But Chris Mitchell thought the wave of criticism was a very big deal indeed.

This time, for reasons still unclear, the editor in chief of 'The Australian' decided to try a shock and awe attack, decapitation strike on the still-below-the-mainstream-radar political blogstream.

Peter Brent, from Mumble, is a respected commenter of political polling for most political bloggers and dozens of poll addicts, and it is hard to see why Mitchell would see him as some kind of threat worthy of such a response, where at best Brent might be seen as a mild stainer of the newspaper's credibility. Brent's readership online is small, less than a thousand per day.

Well, Brent's readership was small, until Chris Mitchell went into meltdown mode :

Online prejudice no substitute for real work

THE measure of good journalism is objectivity and a fearless regard for truth. Bias, nonetheless, is in the eye of the beholder and some people will always see conspiracy when the facts don't suit their view of the world. This is the affliction that has gripped, to a large measure, Australia's online news commentariat that has found passing endless comment on other people's work preferable to breaking real stories and adding to society's pool of knowledge.

Stunning, and hilarious. Welcome to the blogstream, Mr Mitchell.

Mitchell stayed true to his 'threat' over the phone to Brent. His editorial did get personal :

"woolly-headed critics", "the one-eyed anti-Howard cheer squad", "masquerading as serious online political commentary" "smug" "self-assured" "delusional swagger".

No bias, and clearly cooler heads at The Australian, right?

Well, what about this :

As a newspaper we don't know who we will support at the federal election.

Why, if you are an unbiased newspaper, are you going to support either party? Or any politician, for that matter, running for a seat, or the big seat?

Of course, this editorial is in The Australian, and Mitchell, like so many other opionists in The Australian are still fighting the sort of 'Left Vs Right' battles most adults dispensed with once university was over.

Mitchell can't seem to comprehend that the vast majority of Australians now live in a world where they will vote, and voice their support, for the political party that most often voices their concerns and most actively appears to be looking after their future, and the future of Australia for their children. Labor and Liberal generational votes are all but dead. Left Vs Right? Irrelevant today, as it has been for good decade.

Mitchell should have just called his editorial "Those Bloody Lefties!"

The self appointed experts online come instead from the extreme Left, populated as many sites are by sheltered academics and failed journalists who would not get a job on a real newspaper. We fully expect that if anything goes wrong for Mr Rudd in the campaign this year we will be blamed for Labor's misfortune.

It reflects how out of touch with ordinary views so many on-line commentators are.

...they should not kid themselves they are engaged in proper journalism and real reporting.

That is probably the strangest comment of all. How many bloggers in Australian regard themselves as "proper" journalists anyway? Not many, I would presume.

Most bloggers don't have the time or resources to practice journalism, by whatever standard Mitchell thinks applies here. He misses one of the key missions, and American success stories, of independent political and news blogging - to keep a check on the mainstream media, and to inform the readers of the news they might have missed, or issues they believe their readers should be aware of. It's not complicated, and it's certainly not the big conspiracy that Mitchell appears to believe it is.

Here's Mitchell again :

On almost every issue it is difficult not to conclude that most of the electronic offerings that feed off the work of The Australian to create their own content are a waste of time.

So why go on and on about them, then? Because he's worried.

Why does Mitchell feel so threatened? And if he's right about them being such a waste of time, why are so many of the "electronic offerings" experiencing signs of real growth in readership?

Because Australians, like Americans last year, are bored with the mainstream media and no longer believe that most of what they read in the newspapers is truth. The blogstream allows news followers to see other sides to dominant opinion threads, like those so often found in The Australian, and to pick up links to other news resources, or other blogs, that will expand their knowledge on the issues that interest them.

Plus, bloggers can cut loose in ways that still seem unacceptable or too over-the-top for staid, tired newspapers.

Not to forget, of course, that the blogstream allows readers to instantly voice their own views on a subject, or news story, and to engage in exchange with other readers of the blogs they visit.

Mitchell must have known that by devoting his entire lead editorial to trying to bitchslap the blogstream into behaving itself that he would instead give it new life, new readership, new focus and fresh attention from the mainstream of Australia.

You've got to love the irony, too, of Mitchell complaining about the blogstream calling The Australian a biased media institution. His own newspaper has devoted literally hundreds of editorials in the past seven or eight years to endless whining about the 'bias' on show at the ABC.

Of course, when The Australian is accused of letting its bias towards the conservative government show far too often, Mitchell goes fullcore berko.


But it's all a bit too late for Mitchell to start claiming The Australian does not have a politically-motivated bias towards the Howard government.

John Howard clearly thinks The Australian is biased in favour of his government and its generally unpopular policies. Here's Howard on the ABC in March, 2006 :

"I think back over the last 10 years that this government has been in office and I think of the positions taken by The Australian newspaper. It has been broadly supportive, generously so, of the government's economic reform agenda. And it has been a strong supporter, consistently... of industrial relations reform. Its only criticism of the government is that it might not have gone far enough."

And here's Chris Mitchell himself keelhauling his own 'We're Not Biased' editorial on The Media Report :

I think editorially and on the Op Ed page, we are right-of-centre. I don't think it's particularly far right, I think some people say that, but I think on a world kind of view you'd say we're probably pretty much where The Wall Street Journal, or The Telegraph in London are. So, you know, centre-right. I think that's a good position for us to be....

Well, not if you want to write editorials claiming to be unbiased.


A lot of the anger and venting in the blogstream over The Australian's twisting and reframing of the Newspoll results was stirred up by this column from Dennis O'Shanahan in the The Australian yesterday.

Somebody didn't like the scale of the comments that post attracted, because it was closed down yesterday, by 11.32am, with this abrupt message :

Commenting for this article is no longer available, try one of the articles below for more from the Dennis Shanahan blog.

16 comments appeared on the blog in less than one hour. Most were negative, hammering Shanahan for spinning the Newspoll results to create the impression that Howard and his government were making a comeback.

Today's 'shock and awe' editorial from Mitchell was trailered yesterday in Shanahan's column :

Academics at arm’s length from the political and journalistic worlds can huff and puff about polls and poll reporting but they can’t deny the real world influence of those polls and the real interest politicians take in them.

Journalistic worlds? What does that mean? That journalists from The Australian dwell in a world, a reality, that is removed from the everyday Australian world they are supposed to be reporting on? His defence became his own indictment.

More Shanahan self-defence :

The Australian and Newspoll (and I) have been right about election result after election result. It’s all the vindication we need. Just spare us the amateur and jaundiced analysis that can’t accept the numbers going in the opposite direction.

He ended his column with this :

Cheers to all those who engage in the great, democratic and political exercise of freedom of speech.

Ironic indeed considering they only took 55 minutes worth of comments and then pulled the plug on Shanahan's 'blog'.

You have to wonder why they chose to shut it down.

Too much freedom of speech from the punters?


When Mitchell's badly aimed firebombing of the local blogstream hit online this morning, Tim Dunlop at Blogocracy was one of the first out of the gate :

They defend themselves in the strongest possible terms and attack, specifically and generally, just about anyone who disagrees with them, particularly “Australia’s online news commentariat that has found passing endless comment on other people’s work preferable to breaking real stories and adding to society’s pool of knowledge.”

Dunlop blogs via news.com.au, the corporate homeland for 'The Australian'. For reasons unexplained so far, Dunlop's critique of fellow Murdochians at The Australian disappeared from the net early this morning. It briefly reappeared and has now disappeared completely. So much for freedom of speech, and The Australian being ready to accept criticism.

AB at The Road To Surfdom manned the mortars a short time after Dunlop :

Do these guys at News think their reading public has had a collective frontal lobotomy? Do they expect their customers to just swallow their biased, looney manipulations whole, without even chewing? Do they really despise their blog contributors as much as Shanahan makes out? Are they really so afraid of criticism that they’re prepared to “go” the humble Mumble?

The answer, it seems, is sadly “Yes”. What a pathetic bunch of losers. Their condescending and now outright feral attitude is the best evidence yet that their pet government is going out big time next election. Shanahan should be especially fearful, as it was him who took the credit for getting rid of Beazley and having Rudd installed as leader. That one’s come back to bite you on the arse, hasn’t it Dennis?

The Poll Bludger, one of the blogs that appears to be getting under the skin of Chris Mitchell, built an IED and buried it by the roadside, asking one of the most relevant, potent questions of the day :

The Australian – sober and experienced voice of reason, or craven mouthpiece of the crony capitalist military-industrial complex?

The comments from Poll Bludger's readers on Mitchell's shitfit are well worth a look.

Bryan at Oz Politics asks : "Is it just me, or does this seem just a touch too precious?"

Simon Jackman, another poll analyst and political scientist, comments : "Frankly, I’m surprised that the mainstream media are paying that much attention."

Exactly.

With Crikey, Mumble, Blogocracy, and a dozen other blogs putting in the boot since the beginning of the week, Chris Mitchell must have felt besieged. He was clearly rattled. He didn't write that editorial today for fun. He was trying to undermine any credibility given to the political blogstream, before too many people started paying attention. Like we said, it has already backfired, and badly.


Larvatus Prodeo went for a grind on The Australian's editorial interpretations of Newspoll results yesterday.

LP has been busy popularising the moniker 'Government Gazzette' for 'The Australian,' which is now being used by Crikey as well. That sort of branding clearly annoys Chris Mitchell.

LP commenter Youie noticed an interesting bleed of government spin and editorial echo at The Australian earlier this week :

I couldn’t help but note this remarkable coincidence. Alexander Downer’s opinion piece in yesterday’s [Monday’s] Australian said of Rudd: “He used his trip merely as a media opportunity - all sizzle, no sausage.”

Today [Tuesday], three sentences into his piece, Shanahan says: “But voters drawn to the Rudd barbecue by the sizzle and smell of onions may now be looking for the sausage.”

The howls of 'Government Gazette' only increased after that effort.

For Mitchell, that should have been beyond embarrassing. Perhaps that echo chambering of government ministers also inspired his attack today.


Chris Mitchell made a serious tactical error, by running his rant as the main editorial. American newspaper editors learned all too late never to show your throat to the political blogstream. Now we now how rattled he is, we're not going to forget it.

Through the hundreds of comments up at various Aussie blogs today, it's clear the blog readers believe some serious blows have been landed in recent months against the credibility of how The Australian's editorial team interprets and billboards Newspoll results. Mitchell's throbbing forehead reaction proves it.

But, as pointed out above, there is an underlying theme to the comments : Why does Chris Mitchell give a shit what Mumble or Crikey or LP contributors think about how The Australian interprets the polls? The collective daily online readership of all the main political blogs, including Crikey, would barely crack 40,000. But those numbers are rising every week.

Has Mitchell seen the writing on the wall? That more and more Australians are turning to non-newspaper blogs to get some perspective, or 'alternative views'?

The Australian readerships of Australian blogs are rising, with Crikey and LP probably doing better than most, and it's likely Australian blog readership will blossom during the coming federal election, when the mainstream media begin seriously hyping the power of blogs and the internet to impact on the outcome of the elections. It remains to be seen whether the blogstream will have an impact on the elections, but the media is going to run with this story anyway. It's now part of the election coverage cycle, as set down by the American news channels.

Mitchell gave the rest of the media its starting point today. Is the Australian political blogstream worth being listened to, or not? Mitchell did the blogstream a huge favour by claiming that, for the most part, they're not worthy of your attention. When people read such warnings, the usual response is to think 'Well, why aren't they? Why is this guy telling me not to pay attention them? Am I missing out on something?'


As a multitude of blog comments, on the various blogs linked above, point out, Mitchell allowed himself to come over as "wussy", "petty", sensitive", "sooky" and so on. It was one of the weaker editorials from Mitchell, who can usually frame his arguments with clarity and perspective. He raised an argument against the political blogstream in Australia and failed to make enough relevant points to impact negatively.

He panicked and went on the defensive, and on the attack. And he failed mightily on both fronts.

Again, why does Mitchell even care about a bunch of blogs pulling a few thousand readers a day?


Mitchell not only showed his paranoia and his fears about how the Australian media landscape will be impacted by the political blogstream, he exposed his throat and he sparked a debate he has all but no chance of winning, and in turn, he's given some truth to the widespread belief that the editorial team of The Australian (with the except of Matt Price) simply do not like blogs. More so, they don't like the fact that Rupert Murdoch forced them to shift most of the daily editorials and opinion pieces into a blog format, from which Murdoch knows he will see increased online ad revenue. The more people who comment, the more fiery the arguments and debates under the columns get, the more ad revenue hitting the News Limited bank accounts.

In the past few months, with some of The Australian's columns and editorials ratcheting up 300 and 400+ comments, the actual opinions of the columnist tend to take a backseat to what the commenters are saying to each other. Matt Price gets involved in the ruckus below his own words more than anyone else from The Australian editorial team, and appears to enjoy the exchanges. But most of the rest don't return get involved at all, letting the commenters rock around in a free-for-all.

Digital democracy has come hard and fast to The Australian, and they don't like the fact that on an average Newspoll day more than 80% (my rough estimate) of the comments aired on the boards portray a highly opinionated, often venomous, sprawl of Australian readers who simply do not agree with the way The Australian editorial team interprets the Newspoll results, and regularly claim that the writers are spinning for Howard Corp.

It'll be interesting to watch the mainstream media and blogstream reactions to all this in the next few days.

One thing is now certain.

The Blogstream Vs The Mainstream Media wars in Australia have begun.

Photo ID To Buy Three Slabs Of Beer

Under the umbrella of prime minister John Howard's plan to seize control of more than 60 Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory, as part of a military-backed operation to confront alcoholism and child sexual abuse in remote communities, bottle shops across the Northern Territory will be legally bound to demand photo ID and record the names and addresses of anyone buying more than three cartons of beer.

Federal Indigenous Affairs Minister Mal Brough said the laws are designed to "strike a balance which does not disrupt normal people" who are consuming alcohol responsibly.

"So, if you're getting a pallet of booze and it sounds a bit suss, we can obviously follow up that sort of thing and find out whether or not it's going where you would expect it to be," he said.

The new laws are aimed at stopping 'grog runs' into Aboriginal communities, an extremely profitable bootlegging enterprise, but Howard is expected to stick to his promise to impose these new restrictions on alcohol sales to the majority-white mining communities as well.

That should go down a storm.

Strict controls on alcohol sales, bans on pornography? It's all starting to sound a wee bit Talibanesque.

Howard : "Racist Bastard"

New Zealand MP Scours Howard Over Aboriginal Intervention

Sacred Arnhem Could Become Backpackers Paradise

A New Zealand member of parliament has cut loose on Australian prime minister John Howard over his logistically, ideologically challenged plan to seize control of more than 60 Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory.

Hone Harawira, of the New Zealand Maori Party, claims that comments by John Howard, his ministers, and the one-sided media blitz over shocking child abuse, alcoholism and societal breakdown in Northern Territory Aboriginal communities has defamed and ostracised indigenous men :

"If I was an Aboriginal man in the Northern Territory I would feel like absolute s**t right now," the Maori Party MP said today.

"I would have the leader of my country saying I am an alcoholic, I am into pornography, I am into sexual abuse. All I would want to do is go out and smash someone."

Howard last month announced radical measures to tackle problems including abuse against children and women, and poverty in remote Aboriginal communities.

They include bans on alcohol and pornography, quarantining welfare payments, abolishing a permit system that limits access to remote communities, and mobilising extra police and troops to help address abuse and other problems.

"All Howard has done is generate more anger and bitterness in the Aboriginal community, a lot of which is going to be internalised," Mr Harawira said.

"I said John Howard is a racist bastard trying to impose racist policies on a people who can't fight back," he said, adding that he stood by those comments to air tonight.

Mr Harawira slammed Howard for ignoring reports issued ten years ago that revealed similar problems in Aboriginal towns and camps. Harawira, like the majority of Australians, views the intervention as an insidious publicity stunt related to the forthcoming federal election, which current polls show the Howard government is expected to lose.

The report into child sexual abuse in the Northern Territory that John Howard used to launch his intervention claimed that many of the sexual assaults on Aboriginal children were by white miners, a fact Howard himself acknowledged in an interview on Lateline, announcing the intervention.

That fact that so many white men are involved in the abuse of Aboriginal children barely surfaced amongst the hammerhard media coverage of indigenous communities in the Northern Territory in the past few weeks.

Only a few days ago, a report was published on how white men were buying sex from young Aboriginal girls in Darwin in exchange for cigarettes and beer. It received minimal media coverage.

Aboriginal men from all over Australia have been heard on talk back radio in the past two weeks talking of the glaring looks and verbal abuse they are now getting from white Australians since the child sexual assault report, championed by Howard, hit the headlines.

While government ministers and officials have been seen entering at least ten Aboriginal towns and camps in the past two weeks, we are yet to see any of them turn up in white mining camps, awash with alcohol and hard core pornography, to tell them to leave the Aboriginal children alone.


Meanwhile, the Northern Territory government has announced it will back the Northern Land Council in a legal challenge to Howard's intervention :

The Chief Minister, Clare Martin, led growing criticism of the intervention yesterday, saying seizing control of townships and scrapping the permit system did not make sense and would not stop child sexual abuse.

"So while we're working broadly with the Federal Government on the important issues of health, of tackling alcohol abuse, of tackling pornography, we will not support the removal of permits," Ms Martin said.

"It does not make sense, it is not supported by this Government and by Aboriginal Territorians, and we do not support five-year leases."

The Federal Government will seize control of 73 remote indigenous communities and introduce the most radical measures in decades to end indigenous neglect.

The Northern Land Council's chief executive, Norman Fry, said the compulsory acquisition of private property without consultation was discriminatory and could not be justified. He predicted that removing the permit system would subject tribal Aborigines to rampant tourism or rampant journalism.

"Removing the permit system will mean a free-for-all, with Arnhem Land instantly becoming the world's most sought-after backpacker destination, an exotic must, with busloads of tourists leaving Darwin for remote communities every day."

White Men Buy Sex From Teenage Aboriginal Girls For A Beer At 'Lollipop Corner'

Local Northern Territory Police Claim The Permit System Is Essential

Census Shows Indigenous Populations On The Rise

Indigenous Fears Over 'Military Occupation'

Canberra Ready To Seize Town Camps

Aboriginal Poverty And Neglect Is Rife In Sydney's Backyard

The Last (Online) Stand Of Piers Akerman

By Darryl Mason

For the benefit of our thousands of regular international readers, Piers Akerman is a newspaper columnist for Sydney's 'Daily Telegraph' and 'Sunday Telegraph'. Akerman was once an immensely popular opinion maker, in the days when there were only a handful of journalists making most of the published opinions in Sydney. Of course, the online revolution has leveled that playing field.

Akerman is also famous as a near full-time propagandist for the Howard government, who spent years watching Howard lock away four and five year old children in detention centres in the middle of the Australian desert, leaving them in those brutally hot camps until the children beat their heads against concrete walls in frustration, and then blamed their parents for daring to seek refugee status on Australian shores. Howard never did anything wrong in Akerman's world. He was a prime minister who shat pure gold and then gave it to the poor, who Akerman would claim never really appreciated the gift.

American readers will recognise the likes of Akerman from their own mainstream media's stable of aged opinion makers, who still have jobs despite being wrong about WMDs in Iraq, wrong about leaving Afghanistan in 2002, wrong about the strength of the Iraqi insurgency, wrong about post-invasion Iraq, wrong about the global threat of terror and wrong about the reality of climate change.

Akerman's speciality is smearing people who are trying to create new energy industries, through solar power and other renewable energies, and baiting Muslims by defaming their heritage and mocking their beliefs, be they fundamentalist or moderate.

Akerman is a spectacularly cliched old school anti-Green, anti-environmentalist, campaigner who still clings to his increasingly eccentric and bizarre belief that fighting the effects of climate change, by reducing pollution and increasing energy efficiency, is a vast left-wing conspiracy designed to destroy the Australian economy.

Akerman, of course, loves conspiracy theories. You can usually find a good one in nearly ever column he writes.

There's the global warming conspiracy. The gay conspiracy. The Caliphate conspiracy. The anti-white Australia conspiracy. The 'Aboriginal Industry' conspiracy. The Hitler-Stalin-Mao Imitating Union conspiracy. And let's not forget the all purpose Greenie conspiracy, which he actually believes is connected back through the decades to...Hitler. But of course.

Akerman has served, and served well, as the Daily Telegraph's hitman on all things Islam and Green for more than a decade. He's even devoted occasional column space attempting to draw his Muslim and Green conspiracy theories into a joint Greenie-Jihadi conspiracy. It's been fun to watch.

But as the readership of the Daily Telegraph drops, as it circulation shrinks, and as Sydneysiders become increasingly ready to sue newspapers for defamation and libel, Akerman is finding it harder and harder to use his anti-Islam hammer on people with real names.

To get around this, he now employs a particularly absurd and credibility-defying methodology of using variations of the Fox News trademarked "Some people say..." mantra.

His column 'Magnet For Madmen' on July 4 was absolutely chockers with the stuff. Clearly the News Limited lawyers have been working Akerman over. How much veracity can you place in any of his claims when he has been forced to place the word "alleged" in a sentence like this?

The detention of a Gold Coast doctor shows the alleged sweeping extent of the global links of international terrorism.

But there was plenty more in a column that contains the name of no-one bar the new British PM Gordon Brown : "alleged activities...possible risks...apparently fanatically shouting..it has been suggested...by all accounts... alleged actions... alleged wannabe terrorists...it may be wise...alleged connection..."

Is Akerman now afraid of being sued for defamation by the Global Jihad Conspiracy?

No, he's just too lazy to supply links to back up his claims in his blog and to gutless to stand by his words.

Repeated use of words like "alleged" and "suggested" and "apparently" and "possible" doesn't exactly make Akerman sound like he either know what's he jabbering about, or that he even holds the strength of his "alleged" convictions.

Although Akerman's increasingly vague, misinformed, hilariously cliched columns are syndicated through the rest of the Murdoch owned state capital newspapers, his spiels are often cut down, or censored, by local editors who are clearly becoming frustrated by Akerman's inability to do what a columnist is supposed to do - inform, opine and make clarity-rich arguments supporting his/her position - and his increasingly, potentially, libelous and defamatory bile.

Reading Akerman's columns today is like leafing through the pages of some old yellowed Australian newspaper from the 1950s. Substitute Italian for Muslim and Communist for Greenie and there's little difference to be found in the rhetoric. You end up thinking, who is this guy trying to convince? Himself? His bosses? His mates?

Akerman is becoming a liability for the Rupert Murdoch media in Australia. In the past few years, News Limited has had to pay, by some estimates, more than $1 million in out of court settlements, and court-awarded damages, for people he has told lies about in his columns, or just blatantly defamed and smeared, not caring who will pay the bill in the end.

In awarding a successful defamation payout in October, 2006, a NSW judge said this to say about Akerman's journalistic standards of accuracy :

"The inaccuracies of fact by the defendant... are gross... so extreme a misstatement of fact as to vitiate any defence of comment for any imputation based on it."

It didn't used to matter so much to the Murdoch tabloid media. These were the old rules of the tabloid game, following the well established British tabloid model : defame whoever you want, because in the end it will only cost a few hundred grand, at the most, if it even gets to court, and the extra sales and controversy generated by all the lawsuits will boost circulation and market brand prominence.

While Akerman was once a popular columnist in the Daily Telegraph (and its former incarnations) and the Sunday Telegraph, some journalist-circle rumours claim that he is nearing the end of his long run of low-to-medium six figure salary years at News Limited.

Not only because he is such a costly columnist as far as the legal bills go, but because he refuses to engage his readers enough on his blog. Akerman hates his blog. He despises the idea of having to answer to, or interact, with anyone who can be bothered typing a few comments into the box below his online blurtings. He was disgusted at even the idea of allowing someone, anyone, to write a comment that would be published below his own words. Akerman resisted moving his columns into the News Limited blogs, but only for so long.

His boss, Rupert Murdoch, loves blogs. Rupert Murdoch believes the future of the news is blogging, and blogs. So much cheaper than having to pay bloated old wind bags like Piers Akerman a few hundred grand a year to toss off two or maybe three short columns a week to
an increasingly disinterested readership.

What amazed Rupert Murdoch when he first took a serious look at the sprawl of blogs is that these people were writing all this stuff for free. For free! An idea began to form in Murdoch's mind of a day when he could dump expensive journos, or columnists, like Akerman and fill the space around the ads with any number of blogs written by freelancers, or non-professionals, who were happy just to take a cut of the ad revenue their blogs generated.

Rupert Murdoch announced a few months back that News Limited was going Green, and that he would restructure its global operations to become a carbon neutral corporation. Murdoch made a commitment to his shareholders that he would use his newspapers, online media, magazines and television channels to educate the public to the reality of climate change, and that initiatives to fight climate change would become a regular feature in his media outlets.

Akerman continues to pump his Great Global Warming Conspiracy guff, even though his own boss has apparently been taken in by it. Of course, Akerman, like his counterpart at the Herald Sun in Melbourne, Andrew Bolt, attacks those advocating measures to limit the effects of climate change, but would never dream of attacking Rupert Murdoch, who by his own admission, will become the world's most influential peddler of what Akerman and Bolt still refer to as a "myth".

To Akerman, like many millions around the world, Al Gore is an idiot, and a liar. But Rupert? Well, the silence from Akerman, and Bolt, is deafening.

Rupert Murdoch keeps a close eye on his Australian newspapers, particularly the online versions. He gets the data on how much traffic each of the News Limited blogs are generating, how many people are commenting, which issues are stirring controversy and how much ad revenue is generated through each blog via the the ads now peppered liberally through the comments pages.

When the Sydney Morning Herald and the Melbourne Age newspapers move to tabloid size, Murdoch knows the sales of the Sydney Daily Telegraph and the Melbourne Herald Sun will go drop. The Telegraph and the Herald Sun will have to share the shrinking tabloid newspaper marketplace with the Herald and the Age. Murdoch's Sydney and Melbourne newspapers will still make money, but as classified advertising, the backbone of newsprint, continues its exodus to the online media, his newspapers will thin and revenue will continue to decrease.

Murdoch sees the future of news, and New Limited, in the online world, particularly in Australia. He will keep the Telegraph and the Herald Sun in newsprint for years to come, but the high-cost columnists like Akerman will find they are not so highly-prized, particularly if their main beat is denying climate change reality (thereby making their own boss as much of an idiot and a liar as Al Gore), and baiting Muslims, who are more often choosing to sue for defamation and libel, even if they are not targeted by name.

Akerman will soon have to prove he is worth hundreds of thousands of dollars a year online, in his blog, or take a big pay cut. He will have to deliver the audience, and the ad revenue, primarily through his blog. That blog he hates and despises so very, very much, mostly because it allows the public to near instantly respond to his bizarre conspiracies and absurd generalisations.

But if online defamation and libel laws, including News Limited taking responsibility for the comments made on an Akerman blog, continue to tighten the noose of opinion making freedom around his neck, Akerman's diatribes will become more general, more vague, less genuinely offensive and therefore less biting and less controversial.

That Akerman had to censor himself, and throw in "alleged" every few sentences in his 'Magnet For Madman', even when mentioning the now well established linkages of global terrorism, shows just how constrained he now is. But that's just the beginning.

The more Akerman's rantings are contained and toned down, the less people will visit his blog and bother to leave comments, which, as we mentioned above, will eventually be the major source of the ad revenue that will pay Akerman's salary.

If all that wasn't bad enough, Akerman's key platforms of outrage - Islam in Australia and climate change - are already losing their power to generate waves of comments at his blog. He can still pull 100+ comments for a column like 'Magnet For Madmen', but for how much longer?

The more the media hysteria over the threat of terror turns out to be massively overblown, like the Doctors Of Terror workout last week (five were released without charge after questioning, one may, or may not, be charged), the less such stories will generate controversy and, in turn, comment. The less comment, the less ad revenue generated by Akerman's blog.

Most Australians understand that Islam will not spell the ruin of Australia, as they understand that taking part in a measured and responsible global fight against climate change will not reduce the nation to candle-powered ruin.

And when the Howard government loses office at the end of the year, Akerman will find himself, and his views, even more isolated from the mainstream media, increasingly dominated by less conservative, more open-minded, and far less judgmental, young people.

The worst thing that can ever happen to a columnist is to wear out his chief issues, or to cease finding anything new to say about the society on which he is handsomely paid to opine. Akerman is a loser on both fronts. The adoption of climate change by Rupert Murdoch, the appalling degradation and loss of life of the Iraq are only two issues that have completely shot Akerman's remaining slivers of credibility to dust.

It must have a black day indeed in the festering hellpit of Akerman's mind when he learned that the majority of Australians were more concerned about how climate change might affect their children's future than they were about the threat of terrorism.

The reason why most Australians are more concerned about the effects of climate change than terrorism is a simple one : they keep hearing from friends or relatives about flooding, savage storms, furious winds, decaying beach fronts and spreading drought, or they are experiencing the destruction of such events for themselves, plus their insurance bills are going up and up. But they aren't getting blown up by, in Akerman's pulp-horror speak, "panting, hot-eyed fanatics".

Wow. Hot-eyed fanatics?

"Mohammed? Why are you panting?"

"My eyes are hot."

Fantastic stuff. No wonder Akerman gets the big money. For now.

Should he stick around long enough, Akerman is likely to find himself battling for an audience share in the Australian blog world, happily dumped by the daily newspapers that once carried his hastily written, poorly sourced, screeds, because he is too expensive and no longer pulls a huge ad revenue generating crowd.

Akerman will be forced to compete in a media to which he has been vehemently opposed and barely understands. Like the rest of us, Akerman will eventually be just another voice in a media filled with unique, funny, brilliant, opinionated, well-informed, well-researched voices, many of whom have plenty of relevant and interesting things to say about the world and the city and the society we live in. Without having to resort to a blunted arsenal of decades old cliches and comic-book pap like "hot-eyed fanatics".

Of course, Akerman wouldn't stick around for that humiliation. His enormous ego couldn't take it.

But you must wonder how he feels, this former king of opinion, how lost and out of sorts he must be, when he discovers that news.com.au online polls pull thousands more participants, and generate far more ad revenue, than his online writings. The online polls are almost pure profit because they are mostly automated and people find it nearly irrisitable not to cast their vote on the more contentious issues of the day.

Akerman's time in the sun is almost over. Will he be missed? Hardly. The online world is full of mad ranters, loose with the truth, brimming over with bile and prejudice and unwilling to put sources to their wild and bizarre accusations.

Sometimes you can even find them right here.


Daily And Sunday Telegraph Forced To Issue Online Apology For Readers Comments

Akerman Busted Passing Off Hundreds Of Words From An Israel Defence Force Press Release As His Own

Blast From The Past : The "Hot-Eyed" 2001 Sunday Age Profile Of Piers Akerman

Climate Change Believers Are "Running Around With Their Petticoats Pulled Firmly Over Their Heads"...But Not Rupert

When The Unions Host A BBQ For Hitler, Stalin And Mao...Who Brings The Snags?

Howard Hits Iraq Oil Slick As Truth Becomes A WMD

Murdoch's Media Rewrites Stories After Furious Calls From Prime Minister's Office

Howard : I Didn't Say What I Just Said

By Darryl Mason

The phone calls from John Howard's office to the head office of Rupert Murdoch's News Limited in Sydney yesterday were less than pleasant.

The News.com.au website, the main portal for Murdoch's network of Australian newspaper websites, reaching some more than 1.5 million Australian readers per day, ran a number of headlines claiming John Howard had said that oil was now a key reason to stay in Iraq. Some of the headlines said the Iraq War was a war for oil. Just like all those protesters back in early 2003 claimed it would be.

By the time Howard moved to deny he said anything such thing, it was too late. The story was out, columns and articles had been written and sent to the printers for today's news racks, and there was no going back.

The furore started early yesterday morning when online news stories began appearing claiming that John Howard was going to unveil a new defence strategy for Australia, and mention would be made that we had to secure oil supplies in Iraq, as part of that strategy.

Yesterday morning, before flying out for a visit to Indonesia, defence minister Brendan Nelson did a radio interview where he reacted to the headlines hitting news stands :

"...obviously the Middle East itself, not only Iraq but the entire region, is an important supplier of energy, oil in particular, to the rest of the world, and Australians and all of us need to think well what would happen if there were a premature withdrawal from Iraq."

The two words "oil" and "Iraq" in the same sentence were enough for Nelson's few words to become the main, and most controversial, story of the day.

By the time John Howard delivered his speech, shortly after Nelson's interview, the thrust of the story for most of the media, including the Murdoch media, was already fixed.

Howard's speech only added to the furore :

Addressing an Australian Strategic Policy Institute conference, Mr Howard said events in the Middle East had long been important to Australia's security and its broader interests.

"Many of the key strategic trends I have mentioned, including terrorism and extremism, challenging demographics, WMD aspirations, energy demand and great power competition, converge in the Middle East," he said.

"Our major ally and our most important economic partners have crucial interests there."

It was on for young and old. First Nelson, then Howard, had admitted that Australia was in Iraq for the oil.

Most Australian newspapers are still written in the late afternoon, early evening, of the day before they're published. The front pages, the editorials, the letters, were all set down before Howard's retraction of his own words, and Nelson's words, could impact. No doubt some editors chose to ignore Howard's ridiculous quibbling and denials that he said what he said, barely a few hours before.

After all, when it comes to the Middle East, "energy" is "oil" and everybody knows it.

Howard tried to roll back the unexpected emergence of some hot truth about the Iraq War late yesterday afternoon, but it was pointless. Clearly the word "energy" had disappeared from his vocabulary, now he had become obsessed with the word "oil" :

“We are not there because of oil and we didn’t go there because of oil,” Howard protested. “We don’t remain there because of oil. Oil is not the reason.”

And then it was on to defending America :

“Are people seriously suggesting that it won’t matter to Australia if America is humiliated?” asked Howard.

It's sad, indeed it's horrifying, to think that the prime minister of Australia doesn't grasp that the US has been steadily humiliated in Iraq, month in, month out, for at least two years, if not longer. There are few military analysts or historians of any credibility who would even think of trying to deny the very clear fact that an insurgency that didn't exist, according to Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, has all but laid waste to the most powerful military machine in the world.

The United States is now spending an estimated $20 billion on a program to replace all their armoured Humvees with the new, supposedly bomb proof, MRAP vehicles, because the Iraqi insurgency has been so effective at using World War 2 guerilla technology - IEDs, or improvised explosive devices - to disable, literally, thousands of Humvees and trucks in the past three years. 17,770 MRAP vehicles are on order to fight the Iraq War for the next decade.

John Howard's office knew there was little point trying to get Fairfax newspapers to retract their stories, in print or online. Howard Admits War For Iraq's Oil was the story many journos for the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age had been waiting more than four years to write.

But Howard knew the Murdoch media were likely to play ball. If not in print, then at least online, where news.com.au now reaches more Australians than the same company's newspapers do, in print.

But even until the early afternoon today, almost 24 hours later, some of the Murdoch websites were still carrying 'Howard Says Iraq War For Oil' headlines and stories, even though the main news.com.au site had rewritten headlines and stories, inside its own archive, and published the following correction....oh sorry, clarification :

An earlier version of this story from the Australian Associated Press incorrectly reported the Prime Minister as saying oil was a reason for Australia's continued military presence in Iraq.

He said "energy", but as we all know, "energy" is "oil" when it comes to the Middle East, unless Howard is thinking about cutting natural gas deals with Iran sometime soon.

The phone calls from Howard's office to News Limited HQ clearly worked.

News.com.au chose to blame Australian Associated Press for supplying the wire news story that claimed Howard had admitted to a war for oil in Iraq.

Here's the pre-furious phone calls from Howard's office Uncorrected Version as it appeared online yesterday :

And here's the spiffy new Corrected Version :

Note that the sub headlines now put the words relating to 'Iraq War For Oil' squarely in the mouth of defence minister Brendan Nelson, when it was also Howard who publicly talked of needing to "secure" energy resources in Iraq and the Middle East.

The sub headlines were also edited to remove the dead giveaway line 'Another Reason Is To Uphold Prestige Of US, UK', to be replaced with the far more Freedom And Democracy Agenda-friendly 'We'll Stay Until Iraq No Longer Needs Us, Says PM'.

But perhaps more importantly, note that on both the 'corrected' and 'uncorrected' stories above, the byline clearly reads "By Staff Writers And Wires".

AAP may have supplied a story that claimed Howard said Australia had an interest in staying in Iraq to secure future oil supplies, which is, of course, exactly what he said, but unless the byline is a total lie, more than one journo rewrote or added to the text and headline and sub headlines before it went online. Hence "by staff writers and wires".

But to Howard's utter horror, that correction, sorry clarification, only made it onto the story on the main news.com.au site.

The calls for clarifications to the story must not have gotten through to other city newspaper editors and staff in Murdoch's network. Unless, of course, they chose to ignore the clarifications because the story didn't need any clarifying at all. It was true.

And if that was the case, then good on them for not following directions from head office, via the Howard office.

story continues below....
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From other blogs by Darryl Mason :

Go Here For The Latest Stories From 'Your New Reality'

Go Here For The Latest Stories From 'The Last Days Of President Bush'

Go Here For The Latest Stories From 'The Fourth World War'
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story continues....


The below pages were all still online through the Murdoch online stable at 10-11am today, and later.

You will notice that the headlines and intros are almost riotously scathing for the Murdoch media's notoriously pro-Iraq and pro-Howard coverage, especially considering the absolutely vile smears these very same newspapers spewed onto the more than 600,000 Australians who marched in opposition to the Iraq War, many of whom, including thousands of World War 2, Korea and Vietnam veterans, claimed it was going to be a "War For Oil."

From the Adelaide Advertiser :



Australia's biggest selling daily newspaper, The Herald Sun, ran the following editorial today, hitting the presses before it could be pulled, and staying online, unchanged, well into the late morning :



The Tasmania Mercury still had this up on their site at midday :


And the Murdoch site in Perth still had this posted after midday today :



Even though the story of Howard's Iraq Oil Slick was running up hundreds of comments an hour on websites around Australia, any mention of it was gone from the news.com.au front page by 10.30am this morning.

Over at Murdoch's flagship 'The Australian' newspaper website, at least three key columnists weighed in supporting Howard's claim that he didn't say what he said, and it really didn't matter even if the prime minister and the defence minister did say what they said. Which they did.

Columnist Matt Price even went so far as to write that Nelson was wrong, dead wrong :

"I don’t think oil plays any remotely significant role in the government’s Iraq strategy."

Hell, clearly a newspaper columnist would know more about Australia's reasons for staying in Iraq than the defence minister. Right?

By 9am, more than a hundred people had hit Price's blog to castigate him for spinning on behalf of the government, and most of the commenters mocked him soundly.

Just to jog your memory, here's a reminder of what John Howard had to say about claims that the, then still coming, war on Iraq was about something other than WMDs and deposing Saddam Hussein back in February, 2003 :

"No criticism is more outrageous than the claim that US behaviour is driven by a wish to take control of Iraq's oil reserves."

And here's what the Murdoch media's favourite political whipping post, Greens Leader Bob Brown had to say in that same week, in 2003 :

This is not Australia's war. This is an oil war. This is the US recognising that, as the economic empire of the age, it needs oil to maintain its pre-eminence.

Back then, 76 percent of Australians were opposed to a War On Iraq.


By midday today, the Australia In Iraq For The Oil scandal was making international news, in a big way.

And the hundreds of headlines from around the world were immune to Howard's attempt to reframe his own comments, and those of his defence minister. They went in hard, using Howard as the first leader of a Coalition Of The Drilling country to finally admit the truth about a war so blackened and poisoned with so many lies :

Herald Sun, Melbourne : PM's war for oil

Daily Times, Pakistan - Oil key motive for Iraq involvement: Australia

The Scotsman, Scotland - Oil keeps Australia in Iraq

The Independent, UK : Australian troops 'in Iraq because of oil'

RTE, Ireland : Mideast oil priority for Australia

The BBC : Australians 'are in Iraq for oil'

Turkish Press, Middle East : Oil a factor in Australian role in Iraq: minister

Voice Of America : Australia Says Oil Key Motive for Involvement in Iraq

The Guardian, UK : Oil a factor in Iraq conflict, says Australian MP

Xinhau, China : PM: Australian troops to stay in Iraq for oil

Aljazeera : Australia admits Iraq war about oil

Forbes : Australia says securing oil supply means no Iraq withdrawal

Press TV, Iran : Aussies in Iraq for Oil

Gulf News, United Arab Emirates : Oil 'key factor for Australia's role in Iraq'

Stratfor (key military intel site) : Australia: Oil A Reason For Iraq Presence

Alsumaria, Iraq : Oil supply is an essential factor

Zee Tv, India : Mid-east oil crucial to our future: Australian PM

Alalalam News Network, Iran : Australia: Oil Means no Iraq Pullout


Some of those same news sites ran Howard's attempts to deny that he said what he said, but his retraction was given mostly backwater coverage. Those international editors knew, like some editors of Murdoch's Australian newspapers knew, that Howard was trying to scam them.

Like he scammed the entire back in late 2002 when he said he hadn't decided whether or not he would send troops to Iraq, when they were already in the Gulf. And in early March, 2003, when he said he hadn't decided yet whether or not commit troops to the coming war, when some of those already deployed troops had already written letters to their children in case they died during their war.

Howard's complete failure to keep the 'Iraq War For Oil' controversy in check couldn't have come at a worse political time for him. Today and tomorrow, the dreaded Newspoll surveys are taken, and Howard was counting on the poll, published early next week, to show the Liberal Party that is still a viable, respected, trusted and popular party leader and prime minister.

The rumours a few months back were if Howard didn't snap the polls back up in his favour by late July, his career was over. He would be rolled, and the federal election would be delayed until early 2008 to give time for a new leader to try and make his mark, and chase away some of the foul stench of the Howard years. If that's at all possible.

After 11 years as prime minister of Australia, John Howard stands today a doomed man. And he knows it.

And early next week, terrible poll numbers, and sweeping rumours of a leadership challenge, will confirm it for the entire nation.

Prime Minister Finally Admits Iraq Was A War For Oil

Blogocracy : Oils Ain't Oils, Apparently

Matt Price : Howard Didn't Say What He Said, And Neither Did Nelson

Howard Denies Linking Oil To Iraq

Rudd : Iraq Oil Claim Conradicts Goverment's Story

Government Admits Oil Behind Iraq Stay

Ninemsn Your Say : PM Links Oil To Iraq War

PM And Minister At Odds Over Iraq's Reasons

More Fury, More Outrage In Comments At The Courier Mail

Nelson's Iraq War For Oil Claim Spreads Around The World

"I Can't Believe I Voted For Him" - West Australians Rip And Shred Howard