We love having you comment here at Pure Poison but it’s a little bit difficult for discussion to continue uninterrupted on specific posts when off-topic comments land in the middle of them. So each day we’ll launch an open thread where you can leave comments that don’t quite fit on one of the other posts. Remember that tip-offs can be made here.
Have at it!
27 Comments
great! news of Fielding’s antics reach the US.
correction: the ETS bill isn’t dead yet, nor is its delay anything to do with the growing number of Australian politicians becoming denialists. It will be passed when it gets voted on in mid-August, if only because the coalition is desperate not to give the government any triggers for a DD. As for fielding, please don’t assume all australian pollies are as ignorant or as embarrassing as him.
Fielding is the most embarrassing politician in the House at the moment. He’s even more embarrassing than Big Mal, and that’s saying something.
Go Bombers.
I speculated in these pages that Joe Hockey’s meaty paw-marks might be found on the fake email…The Evidence Mounts….
This week has seen a new term emerge in the Austrailian variation of English, I will call it “Ruddiculous”.
It applies to any story that emerges about the PM with very poor links to some sort of percived misdeeds or suspect behaviour in a poor attempt at smear. The latest piece of Ruddiculous journalism comes from Natasha Bita at the Oz in an article that takes you up more dead ends and dry gullies on road to nowhere.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25697090-601,00.html
Anything written by Piers Akerman concerning Heiner or Utegate is also worthy of the term Ruddiculous. In fact Piers could be described as totally Ruddiculous.
The perfromance of the Federal opposition over the past two weeks was also Ruddiculous, a much better term than inept.
I am also sure that we can look forward to some particularly Ruddiculous offerings from Bolt when he returns next week.
Hopefully the rest of the weekend will be Ruddiculously free, but I doubt it.
“I speculated in these pages that Joe Hockey’s”
I hope Hockey does get to be leader…… So he can be chewed up and spat out. I dislike him imensley, his avuncular outward personality is just a facade.
****I can’t stand Peter Garrett – the only reason I’m saying this is so I don’t get erroneously accused of being partisan, I realise it has nothing to do with the topic at hand. (I don’t like Rudd either – he’s a conservative wowser!)
Here is an article on a US right wing commentator called Bill O’Reilly. I thought people might find it interesting.
http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2009/06/the_oreilly_procedure.html
In particular I like the bit about the different techniques cited in the Indiana study especially the Name Calling technique. How many of these techniques are used by conservative commentator here? and how often?
There’s a good reason why I don’t read the Oz anymore. I just checked in, the first time in a long time to see if they had anything of interest and read the news on the grocery choice initiative.
Now seriously, doesn’t it bother someone, anyone at the Oz that they manage to blur the lines between a news article and opinion to steer every single article according to their ideology?
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25697095-601,00.html
How does quoting the opposition spokesman like this
Opposition competition policy spokesman Luke Hartsuyker said the government moves showed the campaign had been a “charade” and Grocery Choice was “an animal that needed to be put down”.
add anything to the news article?
and who the hell is Frank Zumbo? why does he matter in the slightest? his comments seem to be partisan commentary and nothing of factual note
Grocery Choice was a gross waste of taxpayers’ money,” Professor Zumbo said. “The website delivered no meaningful information to consumers and was simply political window dressing. (It) has failed … and has now been rightly killed off by an embarrassed federal government.”
I think this idea was an ill conceived idea by the government but I want facts in a news article. I think I’ll check back with the Oz in about 6 months to see if they start magically reporting the news properly (but I’m not holding my breath)
Of course no mention of the big Supermarket Chains hands in destroying any sort of on-line viable price checking system by refusing to make prices and price movements available.
Read up on it
Tamino has a great post up demolishing Bob Carter’s answers to the questions Fielding posed
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2009/06/26/embarrassing-questions/
Hegemony, you’d never heard of O’Reilly? Probably the best news analysis America can offer up. You should watch.
But you lose me…
“How many of these techniques are used by conservative commentator here? and how often?”
Why the need to add “conservative”? I’d say the techniques Ebert highlights are used equally by BOTH sides.
From Monkeywrench’s linked article, “Evidence Mounts,” the Mad Monk had this to say about the fake email affair: “I believe out of a cock-up and conspiracy, this is a cock-up.” (Nice language there, Tony.) I think Tony knows more about what the Liberals knew about the Grinch than what he’s letting on, so when he says what he “believes”, he’s planting a false trail, just as when he and Turnbull allude to the Grinch as a “whistleblower” or “source”. My interpretation is – this is not a cock-up, this is a conspiracy, and the conspiracy is that the Grinch is the deep mole who has been feeding the Libs information for years. However, this “information” is really disinformation, and Talcum and the rest of the Libs know it. The Grinch is suspected of being the “leaker” behind Fuelwatch and the govt loans guarantee (in which the “information” was an email about split between Treasury and the RBA, which was later found not to be the case). The Fuelwatch leak may have been disinformation also. If Talcum and the Libs had any concern for the veracity of the leaks, they would have recognized that the “leaks” were fake, hence they should have suspected that the current email from Dr Charlton was fake. The fact that they are reluctant to acknowledge that the Grinch’s “information” is really disinformation strongly suggests their guilt may go much deeper, namely that the Libs themselves have been conspiring with the Grinch in the fake leaks for years. Roll on the police enquiry!
Bill O’Reilly – isn’t he the guy who called on Al Qaeda to launch an attack on San Francisco?
Hey Pedro, I’ve definitely heard more about Bill O’Reilly over the last few years than I would like. He is like fairy floss, both in substance and the way he will rot parts of your body if you watch him too much.
I agree though, it can be applied to both sides.
However conservative commentators seem to be overwhelmingly represented in the usage of these techniques in the major newspapers here. Can you name some left wing commentators in any of the major newspapers here who use Name Calling to the degree that the conservative commentators do?
or in fact even if not comparing, then just an example of a left wing commentator who uses these techniques to such a high degree of volume and frequency?
“you’d never heard of O’Reilly? Probably the best news analysis America can offer up. You should watch.”
Oh Pedro. Not again. Bill O’Reilly? He’s a joke. I mean seriously. He had to eat his words about single mothers when Sarah Palin came along. He’s been shown to be a laughing stock when his autocue screwed up. But mostly I remember him monstering Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman in an interview.
Seriously. What has the Right got left other than violence, ignorance and abuse?
isn’t he the guy who called on Al Qaeda to launch an attack on San Francisco?
he’s also the guy who defended torture, <a href=”http://thinkprogress.org/2009/06/11/oreilly-holocaust-shooting/”.ignored the holocaust museum shooting, and <a href=”http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2009/05/31/tiller/”.conducted a campaign of hatred against murdered doctor George Tiller. And there is much, much more fuckwittery to laugh at where o’reilly is concerned.
Only a blind fool would declare him the best news analysis the US can serve up.
oh no! link FAIL!
I can’t believe O’Reilly shut off Jeremy Glick’s microphone and spews so much bile over Cindy Sheehan. They’ve actually lost people in this stupid war.
and he reckons he’s an american patriot *shakes head*
Sorry, Pedro, old mate, I just had to laugh when you wrote that he offers the best news analysis.
Bill O’Reilly is balanced out by Keith Olberman…
Face it, if you have a particular belief system you will naturally gravitate to those sources of information that support your belief structure and nit-pick the opposite belief structure. Its natural and very human.
HegemonyOrBust@13 – Catherine Deveny has done this many times. Less though as of late as she has had something of a demotion at the age to the entertainment pages.
HegemonyOrBust@7:
“Opposition competition policy spokesman Luke Hartsuyker said the government moves showed the campaign had been a “charade” and Grocery Choice was “an animal that needed to be put down”.”
If thats the oppositions policy then it IS a fact being reported.
Tim Blair on Insiders saying the Winter break will be great for Turnbull as it will be all gone by the time parliament comes back whilst the government will still be in trouble.
Methinks the government will be ensuring that the people don’t forget Turnbull’s stuff up for a long time to come, right up until the next polling day.
“Less though as of late as she has had something of a demotion at the age to the entertainment pages.”
There are non-entertainment pages at The Age?
“Bill O’Reilly is balanced out by Keith Olberman…”
except they are on different networks, and not even olberman could ‘balance out’ the far-right kooks like Glen Beck, fox and friends, sean hannity etc.
So Hedge wanted to know how much the “conservatives” on this blog call people names.
Here’s the names the “liberals” – in just one quick thread – used as soon as I elaborated on O’Reilly:
“joke”, “laughing stock”, “rots parts of your body”, “fuckwittry”, “blind fool”. “far-right kook”.
Get my point about name-calling now, Hedge?
Can the government really think that the price watch website was unpractical? Don’t forget both Woolies and Coles send prices to their many thousands of stores everyweek. Surely they could send a copy to the price-watch website at the same time.
Remember the free market works best when there are a large number of competitors and the buyers are well informed. Niether of which we have in Australia anymore
Baldrick,
What out of that statement was actually opposition policy? there are NO facts there.
And Olbermann does not balance out Bill O’Reilly at all. If you watch his show, he has a lot of news segments where he has a very balanced outlook. Then he has the worst person in the world etc where he shows his political leaning. Bill O’Reilly has NO (none!) break from spin. His spin is even more extreme in the “no-spin” zone!
and the guy is crazy unlike Keith, who just looks angry
Has anybody seen the video of Glenn Beck crying? YouTube it if you can, it’s scary and amusing at the same time.
HegemonyOrBust,
If the opposition opposes something then that is newsworthy – just as if it would be if they supported something.
I have also seen some cringeworthy segments from Keithy’s show where he was just being a mean human being. And his political leanings come through in just about all of his segments if you analyse them objectively. As do Bill O’Reilly’s. Make no mistake, they are both nasty pieces of work from opposite ends of the political spectrum.
At the end of the day, they are two privately owned media companies and if they are still in business then someone is watching them. One finds news where one likes. Let the market run free!!!!