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| A menagerie of voices. Image by Webdiary artist Martin Davies. www.davies.art.com |
G’Day. Noticed the preposterous split in the media over whether Abbott’s slush fund is a story or not? In this entry, Webdiary’s media commentator Jack Robertson names Mr Abbott’s media defenders and explains why they don’t get it.
I rang Abbott’s office yesterday and left a message asking him to call. I also spoke to his spin doctor Andrew Simpson:
Mr Abbott today maintained his refusal to reveal his donors voluntarily. His spokesman, Mr Andrew Simpson, said “he’s been pretty consistent on that right through.”
Asked why Mr Abbott did not want the Australian people to know who donated to the honest politics trust, he said he would ask Mr Abbott.
The Herald asked Mr Simpson if Mr Abbott had received written legal advice that the trust structure successfully avoided laws requiring transparency of political donations. Mr Simpson said he did not know.
The Herald also asked why Mr Abbott would not name the lawyer who verbally advised him that he was in the clear. Mr Simpson said he would refer this question to Mr Abbott. (AEC chief intervenes in Abbott slush fund secrets)
Mr Abbott left this message on my answering machine today:
Margo, it’s Tony Abbott here, the object of your derision and ridicule. I’m returning the call that you put into Andrew Simpson yesterday.
I returned the call and left a message. I’ve just spoken to him and will report to you later tonight.
The United States Supreme Court has just blocked George Bush’s plan to deliver more media power to Rupert Murdoch. The Bush plan would have delivered Murdoch less dominance of America’s media than he ALREADY HAS in Australia’s media. Howard and Alston plan to deliver a media stranglehold to Murdoch and Packer by forcing their cross media laws through the Senate next month. The New York Times report is published at the end of this entry. (See Webdiary’s cross media archive.)
Over to Jack.
Hi Margo. I can’t believe how wilfully blinkered much of the mainstream print coverage of the Abbott matter has been. Most supposedly responsible commentators STILL seem to think that Hansonism was all about Pauline Hanson and One Nation, and that now that she herself is history, everything in Australian politics can get back to ‘mainstream normal’ if only we ‘hysterical conspiracists’ would stop giving her oxygen. They just don’t get it, do they?
Apart from ignoring completely the fact that Howard’s government has adopted so many of Hanson’s specific policies and general stances on social issues that it is now effectively Hanson Lite – and the attempts, by the way, to pretend that Abbott was being a good ‘respectable conservative’ all along in this are laughable – what is more dangerous is that these pundits don’t grasp that the underhand, Big Party business-as-usual way Abbott & Co went about ‘doing’ her is part of the long-term PROBLEM, not the solution, when it comes to the rise of populist-protest movements like hers.
The fact that Howard has taken popularity hits over this, even AFTER so many policy shifts designed to appease her supporters on symptomatic gripes (refugees, land rights, the elites), ought to demonstrate to the press that the REAL Hanson-driving factors lie elsewhere, and are bipartisanly created: by the excluding, bipartisan main party economics; by the excluding, bipartisan main party suffocating of true democratic franchise; by the excluding focus of the press on the main parties alone, and by the excluding arrogance of the Canberra ‘main money-main party-main media’ triumvirate.
Sure, Abbott-ungate might have some standard beat-up elements and ALP hypocrisies, but beyond this, it’s a supreme example of how these three Mainstreamism factors, NOT we supposed ‘flame-fanners on the fringe’, gave birth to Hansonism, and will CONTINUE to do likewise in the future, in whatever other guises may eventuate. Big bucks. Big Party backroom machinations. Big media absolution when they’re caught by the (ABC) public. (And we can’t even find out from OUR AEC who was truly involved.)
They just don’t get it, but they’d better soon, because Hanson may be gone, but the impulses behind Hansonism – and sundry Greens, Independents, global democracy movements, grass-roots groups, non-mainstream ‘antis’ of all stripes – most definitely have not.
Permission to lie from the print press quislings
by Jack Robertson
ABC 7.30 Report, August 27
TONY JONES: So there was never any question of any party funds –
TONY ABBOTT: Absolutely not.
TONY JONES: Or other funds from any other source –
TONY ABBOTT: Absolutely not.
TONY JONES: Being offered to Terry Sharples?
TONY ABBOTT: Absolutely not.
KERRY O’BRIEN: And you’re saying now that wasn’t a lie – not just Liberal Party funds but any other funds?
TONY ABBOTT: I had promised that he wouldn’t be out of pocket, but there’s a difference between telling someone he won’t be out of pocket and telling someone that you’re going to have to pay him money.
***
‘Crying foul at Minister makes ALP look chicken”, Matt Price in the Murdoch-owned Australian, August 28
On September 1, 1998, Brisbane’s Courier-Mail newspaper carried a story about Abbott “admitting having actively raised funds to support two separate legal attempts to shut down the One Nation party”. Abbott declared it his duty “to do everything I can to stop One Nation”. He conceded not everyone supported his new trust fund, Australians For Honest Politics, and that some Liberals had advised him to “pull my head in”. There is no record at the time of Opposition outrage over Abbott’s actions. There are a couple of reasons to be wary about Abbott. The normally pugnacious and assertive minister has these past few days seemed coy about his anti-One Nation crusade. But for Labor to now hack into the minister for nailing One Nation beggars belief. Abbott is accused of “shedding crocodile tears” over Hanson’s jailing. Yet it’s not inconsistent to lambast One Nation as an undemocratic shambles while sympathising with Hanson’s tough three-year sentence…
***
‘With steel in his eye and fire in his belly’, Piers Akerman in the Murdoch-owned Daily Telegraph, August 28
Arsonists are part and parcel of Australian life today, and no less so in the political sphere. Mr Abbott has had opponents trying to light flames under him since he was elected to represent Warringah at a by-election in 1994The Queensland Electoral Commission and Premier Beattie – who now seems to be obscenely and hypocritically trailing his coat in the hope of collecting preference votes from befuddled One Nation supporters – have a lot of questions to answer. Those attempting to demonise Mr Abbott however would be better employed arguing for an overhaul of the nation’s electoral laws to ensure that all political parties are forced to operate with greater transparency.
***
‘Fanning the Flames of Hatred’, Dennis Shanahan in the Murdoch-owned Australian, August 29
The ‘story’ of Abbott plotting against One Nation has taken on a life of its own. And despite the flimsy base upon which it rests the Workplace Relations Minister and the Prime Minister must take it seriously. After all, within this confected whirlwind of opportunism, there could be a bitter harvest of sympathy and support for the rich but defunct One Nation Party… For various reasons, some of the most vociferous critics of One Nation in the past – Queensland Labor Premier Peter Beattie, Simon Crean, Queensland Labor frontbencher Craig Emerson, Hanson’s love-hate biographer and journalist Margot Kingston, and a wounded ABC – are putting Abbott in the dock and fuelling One Nation sympathies
***
‘Protective Custody: coda to a hysterical hate campaign’, Frank Devine in the Murdoch-owned Australian, 29 August
Hanson’s situation is a logical culmination of a near-hysterical hate campaign, reaching its peak between 1996 and 1998, that was mounted against her. The mob (which doubtless contained some mean sheilas) was activated by a nod from patio crusaders in the leafy suburbs of Australia (not entirely free of mean sheilas), and was further inflamed, I regret to say, by the support of media ideologues and opportunists.
***
‘Five years on Labor finally decides to utter a weak boo’, Alan Ramsey in the Fairfax-owned Sydney Morning Herald, August 30
As Wilkinson wrote in her story: “Abbott is supporting Pauline Hanson’s former personal secretary in a new legal move to deregister One Nation in Queensland. If successful the move will block almost $500,000 in public funding from … going into One Nation’s coffers. A new trust, which Abbott has helped establish, called Australians for Honest Politics, will totally indemnify costs in the action. Two other prominent political figures will sit with Abbott on the trust. Abbott told the Herald he was acting as ‘a citizen and a democrat because One Nation is a fraud on taxpayers and must be exposed’.” Abbott was right. Labor thought so, too, at the time. Five years later, in a slow news week, he is still right, despite Labor’s noisy hypocrisy.
***
‘Flawed crusade for good’, by Paul Kelly, the Murdoch-owned Weekend Australian, 30-31 August
How should one judge Abbott? He made some blunders along the way, but his strategic judgment was correct and validated. From what is known of Hanson’s demise, Abbott is more hero than villain. As for much of the media, its recent performance recalls its ignominious efforts over 1996-98 that gave Hanson such a boost, at home and abroad.
***
‘Libs losing their security blanket’, Glenn Milne, the Murdoch-owned Australian, 1 September
…And finally Abbott. The Workplace Relations Minister has been the most forthright player in this episode. He disagreed with Hanson and her policies and went after her. His methods were legal. His guidingprinciple, the maintenance of the integrity of the electoral system, sound. Where Abbott got himself into trouble was some historical economy with the truth about exactly when he set up his trust to bring Hanson down through the courts. And some opportunistic reporting by The Sydney Morning Herald that led to the impression Abbott had hushed up his efforts…
***
‘Pilloried for an act of decency’, Greg Sheridan in the Murdoch-owned Australian, 4 September
Just as Tony Abbott buries the One Nation demon, Labor and much of the press try to resuscitate Hansonism… In this unpleasant but enlightening episode, while he has been viciously attacked by almost every progressive with access to a word processor or a cartoonist’s brush, Abbott has shown the kind of grit, determination, equanimity and, above all, concern for a purpose larger than himself, that marks out a future Prime Minister. The rest of them look decidedly dusty.
***
IN OTHER NEWS, JESUS CHRIST, MP, HAS RETURNED
CANBERRA, ALL MAINSTREAM PUNDITS, AD NAUSEUM: GLOBAL CHRISTENDOM WAS ROCKED TODAY BY REVELATIONS that Jesus Christ Almighty had returned to earth over five years ago, and had since been preaching feverishly in Canberra in a desperate bid to quell the rise and rise of Pauline Hanson’s diabolical One Nation juggernaut.
The presence of the Son of God in the national capital, only now revealed after an exhaustive rewriting of the historical record, has rocked Australia’s Parliament and is sparking calls for a full and public disclosure of Christ’s other political activities in the intervening period since his Second Coming.
“The Australian people have a right to know exactly what His Moral Perfection has been doing all this time, apart from single-handedly slaying the Hansonite Dragon,” complained Labor front-bencher Craig Emerson.
I mean, it’s all very well for Jesus to focus quietly on Pauline, but surely it’s a question of Him getting His global priorities right? What’s He been doing about cancer all this time? What about world hunger, or global warming, or the Iraq War? If this Son of God bloke is the good Catholic lad he’s being cracked up to be, where was He when His Holiness The Pope was condemning as a ‘threat to Humanity’ the pre-emptive invasion in which Christ’s own adopted government played a leading role?
Another Labor MP, speaking on condition of anonymity, was more blunt about what he called Minister Christ’s ‘abject failure to set Himself more relevant, and indeed more achievable, performance parameters’.
Resurrecting Honesty in Australian Politics? I mean, pull the other one, mate. It’s one thing for Jesus Himself to rise from the dead, but it’ll take a f**k of a lot more than Omnipotent Divinity to pull that kind of miracle off. And there’s a stack of more appropriate and realistic goals he could have been using His Divine Powers to achieve all this time, anyway. Peace in the Middle East, unlocking the key to Human immortality, getting a straight answer from the PM in public, making Creany electable. So what does He pick instead? He wastes five long years nobbling Hanson silently and quietly via the courts! Hell, why didn’t He just zap her with a bolt of lightning right at the start and then get on with explaining the meaning of life, or saving the Murray, or something else with a slightly higher degree of civic difficulty? Better still, why not just argue her out of existence in healthy public debate, like those Lib mere mortals Costello and Kennett wanted to do from the start? Seems to me like Jesus went about ‘anti-crucifying’ Pauline in a very convoluted, inefficient and distinctly un-Godly manner.
Supporters of Christ’s tactics argue, however, that Jesus had a ‘higher purpose’ in mind when he set up the Australians for Honest Politics Trust to nobble Hanson: to dramatically and publicly (at least in retrospective description) highlight the ‘pro-immigration, pro-refugee, pro-reconciliation, multicultural, small-l, bleeding-heart image of the Federal Liberal Party and respectable conservatives everywhere, in the wake of the unsettling One Nation triumph in Queensland. Not to mention defending the integrity and health of Australian democracy and civic life as a whole!’
It was such noble aims, according to His financial backers, that inspired them to lob money at the Sharples slush fund, not grubby corporate self-interest or the desire for continued Liberal government access and patronage. Swore one anonymous millionaire donor who refused to be identified in the public interest:
We were absolutely sure that the anti-Hanson Trust had only the most honourable of public interest purposes. And why wouldn’t we? When Jesus Christ Himself comes banging on your door rattling His Liberal Party tin cup while agreeing you’d best keep your name out of the papers, why, one doesn’t need to stop and ponder whether there might be anything cynical, hypocritical, strategically self-defeating or fishy about his preferred mode of taking Pauline on. If sliding the old legal stiletto into Hanson’s back in private, while kissing her policy arse in public was Christian enough for the Son of God, then by golly, it was Christian enough for a son-of-a-bitch like me. Do others before they do you – that’s how the Politics of God goes, right?
A Divine Spokesman said late today that neither the AEC nor Jesus Christ Himself would be commenting further on His lately-revealed key role in Australia’s seven year battle with the Pagan Forces of One Nation, since – despite recent opinion poll evidence to the contrary – Jesus firmly believed that thanks to His good works, Hansonism ‘is now as thoroughly-banished from the Australian political realm as superstitious polytheist worship’.
The spokesman added that the Son of God, who in his current earthly manifestation is also known as Saint Lord King Sir Anthony Abbott, MP, VC, KCMG, and anti-PHON, was resting up in preparation for His next and perhaps most difficult Miraculous Crusade: the struggle to resurrect His own Prime Ministerial prospects. His spokesman said:
Rising from the dead once is a piece of piss, because of course you’ve got the element of surprise. The second time is a little harder, but do-able if you choose a human guise that absolutely no-one is remotely expecting, like a Minister in the Howard government, say. But to come back from the dead a third time? Well, I can assure you that Jesus is praying with all His might that Rupert Murdoch doesn’t ever forsake him. Even the Lord God, after all, can only push a man of clay so far in Australian politics once he’s been publicly-fingered as a rank bloody liar.
***
New York Times, September 4, 2003
U.S. Court Blocks Plan to Ease Rule on Media Owners
By STEPHEN LABATON
WASHINGTON, Sept. 3 – A federal appeals court issued a surprise order today blocking the Federal Communications Commission from imposing new rules that would make it easier for the nation’s largest media conglomerates to add new markets and areas of business.
The decision came a day before the new rules, considered among the most significant efforts at deregulation adopted during the Bush administration, were scheduled to take effect. It followed two hours of oral arguments at an emergency hearing this morning by a three-judge panel in Philadelphia and was a sharp setback for the largest media companies and for the commission’s chairman, Michael K. Powell.
Mr. Powell, the architect of the new rules, has emphasized that the commission was compelled to rewrite the old regulations because of a string of federal court decisions in cases brought in Washington by the media companies. Those decisions ordered the agency to reconsider some of the rules.
But today the appeals court voted unamimously to prevent media companies from moving forward with plans to take advantage of the new rules. The court also raised tough questions for the commission and its industry supporters about their efforts to reshape the regulatory landscape. The new regulations are already facing a challenge in Congress, where legislators have taken steps to repeal some of them.
The new rules have been opposed by a broad coalition of groups, ranging from Consumers Union and the National Organization for Women to the National Rifle Association and the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Both the House and the Senate have begun the process to repeal at least one of the new rules, the one that makes it possible for the largest television networks to buy enough stations to reach 45 percent of the nation’s viewers, up from 35 percent.
The court’s order, however, blocks all of the new rules from taking effect, at least until the outcome of the litigation, which could be many months away. The order also raises questions about whether the rules will ever be allowed to take effect.
The rules that were blocked by the court include one that would permit the same company to own newspapers and broadcast stations in the same city and another that would allow a company to own as many as three television stations and eight radio stations in the same market.
In the meantime, the commission must use the older more restrictive rules, even though a different federal appeals court, in Washington, ordered the commission to reconsider those earlier rules after a challenge from the television networks.
Officials at the commission said they were surprised by the order. “While we are disappointed by the decision by the court to stay the new rules, we will continue to vigorously defend them and look forward to a decision by the court on the merits,” said David Fiske, the agency’s top spokesman.
The order also came as a surprise to the critics of the new rules, including the plaintiffs in the case, who said before this morning’s hearing that their motion to stay the rules was a long shot. They said courts typically do not issue such injunctions without a finding that the plaintiffs are likely to prevail on the overall merits of a case.
The chief lawyer for the critics who brought the case said after the order that he hoped Congress would act before the court reached a decision on the merits of the rules.
“This action gives us the opportunity to convince Congress and, if necessary, the courts, that the F.C.C.’s decision is bad for democracy, and bad for broadcast localism,” said the lawyer, Andrew Jay Schwartzman, who persuaded the court to issue the order. “Perhaps it will embolden Congress to overturn the new rules in their entirety. That would save everyone a lot of time and effort fighting it out in the court to obtain the same result.”
The court today hedged on the overall merits of the case but strongly suggested through its actions that the critics had a good chance of succeeding.
“I think this is great news,” said Senator Byron Dorgan, Democrat of North Dakota, who is helping to lead an effort to repeal the rules in Congress. “It stops the process dead in its tracks for now. I think the court must have understood what we know: the F.C.C. embarked on these dramatic rule changes without the benefit of national hearings and thoughtful analysis.”
In a three-page order, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit initially said that it was legally obliged to consider the likelihood of success by the plaintiffs, a group of small radio stations, journalist organizations and the National Council of Churches. The group filed its lawsuit against the F.C.C. and four television networks joined the case in support of the new rules.
The judges refused to handicap the outcome of the case, but reasoned that preserving the old rules, at least for the time being, would give the judges time to consider the arguments before the industry landscape had been changed. “While it is difficult to predict the likelihood of success on the merits at this stage of the proceedings, these harms could outweigh the effect of a stay on respondent and relevant third parties,” said the panel, which consisted of Chief Judge Anthony J. Scirica, who was appointed by President Ronald Reagan, and Judges Thomas L. Ambro and Julio M. Fuentes, who were appointed by President Bill Clinton.
“Given the magnitude of this matter and the public’s interest in reaching the proper resolution, a stay is warranted pending thorough and efficient judicial review,” the court concluded in the case, Prometheus Radio Project v. Federal Communications Commission.
The groups that brought the case argued that they were likely to prevail in the end because Congress would probably overturn some of the new rules, and because the rules themselves are “arbitrary and capricious.”
For Mr. Powell, the decision could hardly come at a worse time. On Thursday, the Senate Appropriations Committee is expected to approve legislation that Congressional officials said today would include provisions to roll back some of the new rules already stayed by the court. The Senate Commerce Committee has adopted a similar measure.
And six weeks ago the House, by a vote of 400 to 21, approved a spending measure that would block one of the more important new rules that would permit the nation’s largest television networks to own more stations. The White House has threatened to veto that measure, prompting the prospect of a highly unusual showdown between the president and the Republican-controlled Congress.
The new rules were adopted in June by a bitterly divided commission on a party-line vote. The Republican-controlled agency relaxed many of the most significant restrictions on the ability of broadcast and newspaper conglomerates to both expand into new markets and to extend their reach in the cities where they already have a presence.
The rules would have made it easier for the nation’s largest television networks to buy enough stations to reach up to 45 percent of the nation’s viewers. Two networks, Fox, a unit of the News Corporation