ELLEN FANNING'S DISGRACEFUL INTERVIEW WITH THE NEW PRESIDENT OF THE ACTU MICHELE O'NEIL

I have seen and heard some interviews on the 7.30 pm ABC programme for many years, and one of the most disgraceful ever was the short - and extremely rude - interview of the new ACTU president Michele O'Neil on the 19 JULY 2018 programme.

It was so repulsive that I am wondering if I will ever be able to watch the programme again, no matter who is presenting it.

Where did Ellen Fanning learn her politics, her interview technique, her arrogance, and her intolerance and complete lack of understanding? Watch Fanning's "body language" during the whole of her brief interview - if you can bear it!

For those of us fighting for increased funding for the ABC and a removal of goverenment control over the so-called "independent" ABC, we have a long way to go to achieve anything with this sort of approach.

Does Fanning believe that her rudeness to the head of an organisation such as the large ACTU organisation won't go unnoticed by those many thousands of union members? Does Fanning think that she can take as her example a few of the CFMEU's members who are not role models and discount thousands of others?

Just because she is anti-union does not give her the right, on the national public broadcaster, to behave as if she is the controller of right-wing union organisations and assume that no one else has any rights.

It was such a disgusting display, so abruptly concluded, that is incumbent on the ABC to ensure that it never happens again.

I am not holding my breath for Michelle Guthrie to take action.

ABC - ABSOLUTE BLOODY CRAP!

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation under its new leadership is a disgrace and deserves censure in every way for so much rubbish it is producing on television and radio, so much so that it is difficult to know where to begin.

The easiest way of dealing with those matters of most concern to me is to number each item which is to be commented on.

1) ABC TV News has now become a stroboscope which for those of us who get affected by stroboscopic effects is disastrous to watch. Michelle Guthrie seems to think that jazzing everything up will bring in an audience of 15 to 50 year olds. I wish her luck.

2) Keys to Music - what has Graham Abbott done to deserve being given a graveyard shift for his programme, now having been moved from midday on Sundays - a marvellous time for such an interesting and informative and entertaining programme - to 7pm on Monday nights - in time for the infamous ABC TV news. How crass is that!!!

3) Don't get me started on ABC Classic FM - my name is Mannie De Saxe and I am no longer listening to ABC Classic FM!!!

We are told - now that Overnight has had presenters returned at midnight after ridiculously removing them to save sixpence! - that programmes are being presented by some of our favourite presenters! Yes??? try finding the names of presenters for overnight on any ABC Classic FM online site and see how lucky you don't get!

4) Listen to the numerous non-stop promos for ABC Classic FM programmes and try and hear what the person is saying over the accompanying music - or is it the person is trying to speak through the music and not the other way round. 

5) We keep being told about the ABC's left wing bias and all we get is right wing reactionary rubbish which has become unwatchable, and unlistenable to, and decide where the bias is coming from. 

6)Ms Michelle Guthrie, who will be paid $900,000 a year to steer the ABC as its first female managing director, received a traditional welcome by the conservative flank of the Liberal Party, with dumped minister Eric Abetz​ urging the new boss to "stop the lefty love-in". 

AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION

How much longer will one be able to listen to ABC radio and/or watch ABC television?

Day by day conditions deteriorate and the quality of service reaches almost rock bottom.

Where to start with listing all the problems?

Well of course the root of most of the difficulties arises because of the funding. Funding has been reduced by all governments for the ABC over many years until it has reached the stage that it will soon no longer be viable for what is left of the funding to run a national broadcaster.

The next part of the problem is the political control. This has now almost reached the level of dictatorship - what is or is not allowed and what is deemed acceptable or is politically beyond the pale.

The control by the board has become extreme for one side of politics only and gradually the horizons are shrinking.

The person who is the managing director or whatever her title is is a government appointee and if her politics don't measure up to the government's she wont be able to stay, so she ensures that conditions deteriorate day by day.

On top of everything bad is the new graphics for ABC's 7.00pm news. We now have stroboscopic images which, for older people such as us in this house of two over 90-year-olds, is almost blinding and the cause of migraines.

If this is the best ABC news can do, we will try alternatives or not at all.

So far we have only been on about television.

What about radio? What about the endless promotions? What about the fact that listeners have been complaining for at least the last 40 years - and it has got significantly worse recently - that the endless promos have always got some loud noise going by the misnomer of music over what some person or persons are saying as to make it unintelligible to be able to interpret any words? and the noise over is also intolerably loud.

Nobody at the ABC takes any notice of complaints - we are treated with contempt, and again as far as we are concerned - why waste time and effort trying to get things rectified when nothing is ever done?

"I am --------- and you are listening to ABC Classic FM" non stop throughout the day and night.

Promotions of programmes anounced by Julian Day (?) have the voice drowned out by music over - or the music is what we are intended to hear and the voice is drowned out.

Graham Abbott used to have a programme at midday each Sunday called "Keys to Music". For reasons known only to management and programmers, this has now been moved to something like 7pm on Monday nights - or elsewhere.

On top of all this demolition we now have the demolition of a young person expressing views about ANZAC day, and national hysteria audible from one end of Australia to the other because she dared to express views contrary to the nationalist psyche!

Which brings us to 18c about free speech and ability to insult people, but only if you are elderly, white, anglo and similar!

ABC classic FM - try and find out who is presenting the overnight music and you will look on the ABC classic fm pages and search them with no chance of success whatever. Is the ABC worried we might find out who the presenters are and they don't want us to know?? If this is so, why???

And the interruptions with promos go on and on and on and...................................!!!

This is Mannie De Saxe and he is ready to give up listening to ABC classic FM for ever!!!!!

AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION BEING DESTROYED BY THE GOVERNMENT

For as many years as one can remember, successive Australian governments and politicians on both sides of the political "non-divide" have criticised the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC)[or Commission as it was all those years ago] for being too left, too right, too biased, too ..........(fill in whatever words seem suitable) and have tried to reduce funding in the regular budgets and updates in order to bring the ABC to its knees.

So far no politicians have succeeded, but now, at last, at the end of JULY 2014, it seems as if Tony Abbott and his loyal band of morons may have done it at last.

ABC Classic FM has just been decimated, and it seems many other programmes are about to follow suit. Funding has been reduced and costs have to be cut and SBS is no doubt having similar operations as I type!

Is this the way this government is going in Australia - to ruin any pretensions of cultural icons which have lasted until now?

Having lived through the devastation of apartheid South Africa on the media for so many years, are we now going to witness apartheid Australia follow suit?

In the lod days in South Africa we used to use short-wave and tune in to the BBC and other overseas countries in order to find out what was happening in the outside world. It looks very much as if it is happening now in Australia.

There was recently a disaster when a plane was shot out of the sky over the Ukraine. 300 people were killed. In Gaza the Israelis have already killed over 1000 Palestinians and rising, but what do you get on the ABC? Constant bleating about the tragedy of the loss of 300 lives but not an awful lot about the tragedy of well over 1000 lives. Are any of all of these people more "guilty or innocent" than any others? What sort of distorted moralities do our politicians have, and are the citizens of this country so brainwashed that they are unable to do something about it all?

AUSTRALIAN ZIONISTS STILL ON STEEP LEARNING CURVE!

Australian zionists find it hard to learn and hard to understand - they are not adapting well to the 21st century - and the longer it takes them to move forward the more they slide backwards.

This post on Antony Loewenstein's blog on 10 APRIL 2013 says almost all there is to say on the topic.

April 10th, 2013 from Antony Loewenstein’s blog

Australian Zionist lobby media complaint rejected as a pest

Earlier in the year, after the ABC broke a massive story about an Australian man Ben Zygier spying for Mossad and dying in an Israeli jail, there was a great deal of media coverage that questioned the ways in which some Jews saw their relationship with the Israeli state. I was interviewed on ABC Radio AM and predictably elements within the Zionist lobby complained that I was invited and allowed to breath on the air.

The ABC has rejected the complaint and it’s posted below. The fact that the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, a supposedly serious organisation, thinks it’s appropriate to try and censor perspectives that challenge Israel and its policies indicates a profound arrogance and insecurity about its role in society and how it believes its key responsibility is dedication to the Israeli government. Media groups should be well aware of this and act accordingly:

A complaint to the ABC by The Executive Council of Australian Jewry following a radio interview with journalist Antony Loewenstein dealing with the activities of the late Ben Zygier has been dismissed by the national broadcaster.

In a statement released this week, the ECAJ said:

The ABC has dismissed a complaint made by the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) about an interview on ABC Radio’s ‘Saturday AM’ program on 13 February 2013 conducted by presenter, Elizabeth Jackson, with commentator Antony Loewenstein.

The ECAJ complained that false claims were made about the supposed ‘dual loyalties’ of Jewish Australians, and that the interviewee making those claims was doing so without evidence, qualifications, expertise or representative status in any part of the Jewish community.

According to ECAJ Executive Director, Peter Wertheim, “During the interview, without evidence or substantiation of any kind, the entirely baseless suggestion was made that there is a relationship between ‘the Jewish establishment in Australia’ and ‘the Mossad, and indeed Israeli intelligence’ which facilitates and encourages Jews from a young age to join up and fight with the IDF and the Mossad.”

Wertheim was especially critical of the Saturday AM program. “It is supposed to be a fact-based news program, not a chat show with entire segments devoted merely to uncontested expressions of opinion. Where were the tough questions, or any questions, asking Loewenstein to provide evidence for his completely unfounded assertions? Isn’t that what fact based program interviewers are supposed to do? Isn’t it their role to elicit the factual basis of opinions expressed by their guests, if any exist?”

“The ABC’s answers to our complaints are either not responsive to the specific matters we raised, or evaded the issue, or were disingenuous”, Wertheim said. “The answers consist for the most part of simple denials that anything untoward was being implied, and irrelevant assertions that Loewenstein has a right to express his opinions”.

Wertheim does not believe there would be any point in the ECAJ pursuing an appeal to the Australian Communications and Media Authority, but noted that this would not be the end of the matter. “The ABC launched a baseless attack on Australian Jews, with insinuations of disloyalty, by interviewing someone who the ABC itself describes as a ‘provocateur’. The ABC has now demonstrated that the process whereby one section of the ABC investigates another does not work”, he said.

The ABC response to the complaint as reported in J-Wire…

Thank you for your letter of 19 February 2013 regarding the recent AM interview with Antony Loewenstein. Your concerns have been investigated by Audience and Consumer Affairs, a unit which is separate to and independent of program making areas within the ABC. We have reviewed the broadcast and assessed it against the ABC’s editorial standards for accuracy, impartiality and harm and offence as well as considering information provided by the program.

The program has explained that this short interview with Antony Loewenstein was intended to provide a perspective on the highly newsworthy story cf the Australian man Ben Zygier's death in an Israeli prison, which had broken that week. As a commentator and opinion writer who is often critical of mainstream Israeli and Jewish organisations for their approach to issues of state security, military service and middle-eastern politics, Mr Loewenstein presented a relevant perspective on the case of the so-called “prisoner X”.

1. Given the context of the discussion was the mysterious and perplexing case of “prisoner X” and his secret detention in an Israeli prison for suspected espionage-related crimes while working for the Mossad, we believe it was reasonable that the report’s introduction referred to “the most secretive workings of the Jewish state”. Audience and Consumer Affairs note that the term “Jewish state” is frequently used to describe Israel, and the country’s Basic Laws refer to Israel as the Jewish State. We have concluded that the use of the term in this broadcast did not have sinister or subliminal intent as you suggest, and was in keeping with ABC editorial standards.

2. Having died in detention in Israel under mysterious circumstances and seemingly harsh conditions, Audience and Consumer Affairs are satisfied that it was relevant and a matter of public interest for the program to question why Ben Zygier’s family had remained silent on the matter.

We have concluded that the reference to the “silence from the Australian Jewish community” was in keeping with the accuracy standards in section 2 of the ABC Code of Practice.

ABC News management has advised that the program’s production team worked for several days seeking principal relevant perspectives from the Jewish community on this issue and even in the rare instances where comment was obtained, it was of a vague and non-committal nature. I have reviewed the interview with Philip Chester on Radio National Breakfast that you reference in your correspondence and note that he was unable, or unwilling, to engage with any of the issues put to him regarding this case. In virtually every instance, he clearly stated that he was not in a position, or did not have sufficient knowledge, of the issues to speak to them;

PHILIP CHESTER: “Everything that surrounds it, what actually happened to Ben,is just speculation that I can’t add to.”

Audience and Consumer Affairs are satisfied that AM’s description of the silence as “perplexing” accurately reflected the complexity and mystery of the case.

3. The program’s introduction of Mr Loewenstein as the “Co-founder of Independent Australian Jewish Voices” was accurate and provided sufficient context about his perspective. We are satisfied that this reference was not misleading to the program’s audience. As noted above, as a commentator and opinion writer who is often critical of mainstream Israeli and Jewish organisations for their approach to issues of state security, military service and middle-eastern politics, he presented a relevant perspective on the case of the so-called “prisoner X”. In regard to your statement that the ABC seeks Mr Loewenstein’s view “frequently as a commentator about Israel”, AM has provided the following statement;

“We could only find two previous uses of Mr Loewenstein in the AM program, one from 2010 when he was commenting on a book launched by the Opposition Leader Tony Abbott, and another from 2009 when he was involved in an international protest over Israel’s a blockade of Gaza.”

4. The claim that “the journalist says the case involving Ben Zygier should be a wake-up call to the community in Melbourne and Sydney to re-examine the way young Jewish youths are educated at religious schools in Australia” was clearly attributed as Mr Loewenstein’s personal opinion and was not presented as a statement cf fact that ls beyond dispute.

In response to your concerns, AM has provided the following comments:

“Although Antony Loewenstein did not attend a religious school, many of his friends and associates did. He grew up as part of the Australian Jewish community in Melbourne and through his associates, is familiar with what is taught in Jewish schools.

Mr Lowenstein mentioned Jewish schools in an attempt to illustrate his belief that Australian Jews are taught that to be “the best Jew they can, they should spend some time in Israel. lt is Mr Loewenstein’s belief that young Australian Jews are told this in religious schools. This is the only connection Mr Loewenstein drew between the Ben Zygier case and religious schools in Australia”.

Audience and Consumer Affairs are satisfied this was a suitably relevant issue for inclusion within the context of the broadcast and did not, as you suggest, “feed into the propagation of anti-Jewish stereotypes.”

5. Mr Loewenstein’s view that Australian Jews ‘need to rethink the wisdom of a culture which encourages young men and women to join the Israeli military” was clearly attributed as his opinion, based on his personal experience, and we are satisfied that he is entitled to express that view about a culture of which he was a part, growing up in the Jewish community in Melbourne.

6. Please refer to our response to point 2 above.

7. In the interview Loewenstein called for public discussion about “the relationship between the Jewish establishment in Australia and the Israeli government, and indeed Mossad, and indeed Israeli intelligence and the Israeli embassy.” He did not make any accusations or suggestions of improper dealings, he merely called for public debate, in light of the Ben Zygier case. An interviewee calling for public discussion does not breach the ABC’s Code of Practice.

8. Audience and Consumer Affairs note that in November last year, the ABC current affairs program 7.30 broadcast a report on young Jewish Australians who were following a long tradition of ‘making Aliyah’ and preparing to travel to Israel. The program’s research confirmed that in the past four years more than 400 Australian Jews had made the move and most had completed compulsory military service in the IDF. Those who featured in the report spoke passionately about their active support for Israel.

Audience and Consumer Affairs are satisfied that the issue of encouragement and facilitation of young Australian Jews travelling to, living in and serving Israel was suitably newsworthy and relevant for inclusion in the AM discussion and is in keeping with the accuracy standards in section 2 of the ABC Code of Practice.

9. Having asserted his view that Jewish institutions facilitated a certain culture, we are satisfied that it was relevant for the interviewer to follow up with a question asking for more detailed information, asking Mr Loewenstein whether he believed that the culture was perpetuated in synagogues, because they are important community gathering places. This question did not invite Mr Loewenstein to “denigrate observance in synagogues generally of the Jewish faith’ or to “invite uninformed speculation by Loewenstein” as you claim. Loewenstein responded by qualifying that ‘Now this sort of stuff I’m not saying is regularly discussed openly in synagogues in Sydney or Melbourne – it’s not. “We are satisfied that this relevant question and the response did not as you suggest “feed into the propagation of anti-Jewish stereotypes.”

10. We note your comment regarding Mr Loewenstein’s reference to Australian Jews being “sent” to Israel. We do not believe that Loewenstein was claiming that young Australia Jews are deliberately travelling to Israel with the intention of joining Mossad. He was suggesting that this is a possible outcome (as in the case of Ben Zygier) and the Australian Jewish community would do well to discuss it.

There was no editorial requirement for the interviewer to request the interviewee provide “supporting evidence” to substantiate the opinions he expressed on the issues raised in the broadcast. Mr Loewenstein’s perspective was not presented as factual content or the definitive, accepted position on the issues examined in the interview. He was introduced as the “Co-founder of Independent Australian Jewish Voices” and we believe it would be clear to the program’s audience that he was expressing a critical, counter view to the mainstream Jewish community in Australia. As you have noted, he is known as a provocateur who has published inflammatory material and he is renowned as a critic of many Israeli policies. We are satisfied that the program’s audience would not have taken his comments as established facts, but rather his own personal views.

We are satisfied there was a clear editorial context in which to raise the issues posed by the interviewer and we cannot agree that she engaged in “anti-Jewish speculation”.

ABC News management has explained that AM made attempts to contact a range of representatives from the Australian Jewish community, but none were willing to participate in an alternate interview. In light of this, the program believed it relevant and newsworthy to raise the issue of why people were not willing to speak publicly on the matter, with Mr Loewenstein. Audience and Consumer Affairs are satisfied that the program made reasonable efforts to seek and include a range of perspectives and and that the broadcast did not unduly favour any one view over another. The fact that others chose not to comment did not preclude the program from discussing the matter with Mr Loewenstein.

On review, we are satisfied that it was newsworthy and a matter of public interest to question why the Zygier family chose to remain silent on the matter. There was a clear editorial context for that issue; it was not raised gratuitously and it was not in breach of the editorial requirements of 7.1 of the ABC Code of Practice.

Audience and Consumer Affairs have concluded that this broadcast did not engage in the unjustified use of stereotypes or discriminatory content that could reasonably be interpreted as condoning or encouraging prejudice.

We are satisfied that it was in keeping with the requirements of clause 7.7 of the ABC Code of Practice.

I have enclosed a copy of the ABC Code of Practice for your reference.

AUSTRALIA'S MEDIA BECOMES "RUPERTISED"!

The current media politics in Australia have become mono-voiced and the mono-voice has taken its cue from the main monopolistic media broker in the country.

Have you noticed that with the one voice they are crying "GET GILLARD BY FAIR MEANS OR FOUL!"

I am not a Gillard fan - she and her ALP government have let down the Australian population and those who would hope to become part of that population, and they have failed us on many issues.

However, with one voice the media are trying to destroy a legally elected government and to prove that the natural government of the country is in the hands of the most conservative voices ever to shout from the rooftops ""WE SHALL GOVERN AND WE ALONE SHALL DECIDE WHO GOVERNS THE COUNTRY"!

The main voice has been the Murdoch-controlled media which is roughly 70 per cent of all media in Australia. But the other 30 per cent is more or less Fairfax media and the ABC which has thrown in its lot with the Murdoch gang to the extent that there is no possibility of ever obtaining fair and reasoned argument on that once august organisation.

From Keating onwards, all governments hve undermined and underfunded the ABC and of course the coup de grace was when Howard appointed Mark Scott as Managing Director of the organisation after he had already subverted journalism at Fairfax.

Journalists who might actually voice dissent and reason with sound arguments are on notice not to rock the media boats which give them their livelihoods - which are shrinking anyway, because alternative media are able to tell the truths which the main stream media (MSM) won't do - they are all supporting reactionary, right-wing, homophobic bigotry and worse.

Is this a media dictatorship taking over?

It certainly seems so!

Here is an interesting letter from The Age 0n 6 February 2013:

Media must pin down politicians

IT IS time the media accepted some responsibility for the contempt in which politicians seem to hold their constituents. Fatuous sound bites from doorstep interviews have become the basis for opinion pieces. When did fact checking and research go out of the journalistic kitbag?

The public has learnt to expect that politicians have difficulty with the truth, but it seems the media, caught up in the frenzy of being first with the news, are also losing credibility. Pinning politicians down to answer questions, and presenting in-depth analysis once were the basics of political journalists.

Policies and costings for every political party's platform should be demanded by the press and then properly scrutinised and reported by journalists. If journalists went back to basics, the freedom of the press would mean something. It would mean electors would be free to choose the government they want, knowing exactly what it is intending to do.

Greg Tuck, Warragul

AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION TURNS 80 AND STILL BEHAVES LIKE AN 8-YEAR-OLD!

Mark Scott was appointed to head the ABC by the Howard government. Scott came from Fairfax media and brought his right-wing reactionary views with him to the new job.

As with SBS the ABC has been sliding backwards for the last 10 to 15 years and has now reached almost rock-bottom with its political judgement so extremely on the right that Genghis Khan and others look positively liberal by comparison.

Apart from the dumbing-down politics of this once great organisation, other actions on a day-to-day basis show that the ABC ignores listener complaints learns nothing from past mistakes and continues to perpetuate them.

Take the introduction to the television news at 7pm every night when we have the introduction saying "ABC News - ABC News - ABC News" to ensure that those of us who are moronic enough not to understand what is about to take place that we are about to get to see a news bulletin! Really!

As if that isn't bad enough, some other programme promos tell us this is "ABC1 - ABC1 - ABC1" telling us that we really are too dumb to know if we only hear it once we won't know that the TV station is actually ABC1 - surprise, surprise!

One of the reasons people like me have taken to blogging is because over the years we have written to organisations such as the ABC complaining about things like the above, only to be totally ignored.

One of the other major sins about which people have been complaining for years - at least those whose letters actually get published - is the endless promos for various new programmes - such that by the time we get to see them we often feel that they represent an anti-climax - will they live up to the hype? Sometimes yes, mostly no!

Another major sin - and this too is on the list of complaints - endlessly - is the one about music-over accompanying speech for many programmes. The music drowns out the speech so one doesn't know what has been promoted. Many broadcasters who are well-spoken and articulate are drowned out totally - Marion Arnold is one whose announcements usually suffer, together with most others too.

One of the other major problems, apart from the right-wing bias so obvious in news and current affairs programmes is the creeping in of religious music on Classic FM and support for zionism and totally ignoring of Palestinians.

Unfortunately for many of us there is no alternative, but these days when it all becomes unbearable we turn to CDs and DVDs and thank goodness for them!

MICHELLE GRATTAN DOES MORE DAMAGE AND THEN SUDDENLY MOVES ON!

Michelle Grattan has worked for Fairfax media for many years and has slowly but inexorably moved from centre (?) to ultra right, becoming more and more extreme in the last 5 years since the Rudd/Gillard governments arrived in Canberra.

She has done her best to destabilise the present government and undermine Gillard at every turn.

She has done nothing to ensure investigation of the Slipper/Ashby/Thomson/Jackson scandals, she has done nothing to investigate the Oppositions's role in destablising the government and indeed she has done her level best to assist them - the Opposition - at every turn.

Grattan is reported as having accepted a post at the Australian National University where she will apparently be involved in media studies.

I pity her students - one-sided narrow prejudiced reporting does not academic freedom make as we are witnessing at the moment in the USA where - as in Australia - any criticism of Israel is taken to be anti-semitic, where the real anti-semites are the Israelis and zionists around the world!

The Gillard government may not be the best government ever seen in this or any other country, but in the country of the fair go - supposedly - every effort is being mounted by the media - Murdoch/Fairfax/ABC - you name it - they are all trying to cause the government to collapse.

We all make mistakes, some worse than others, but human beings are fallible creatures and it does not make them be condemned for all their efforts.

Gillard and Rudd have personally done me a great deal of harm, and their approaches to many aspects of government have been appalling, but do people like Grattan really believe that the Abbott-led team will be so much better than those who are in government at the moment?

If so, they are deluding themselves, and should the unthinkable occur at the election in September 2013 many of these people will be as shocked as the Queenslanders and News South Welshmen have been since electing Newman and O'Farrell.

AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION HAS LEARNT VERY LITTLE IN ITS 80 YEAR HISTORY

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation is 80 years old but it still has a great deal to learn.

It is now doing promos to death for each new show coming on, and despite complaints this ghastly process still continues.

To introduce its nightly news bulletin it tells its viewers "ABC NEWS! ABC NEWS! ABC NEWS!" - people who have turned it on for the news know the news is about to begin, but NO!!! - the ABC has to tell all us morons - "ABC NEWS! ABC NEWS! ABC NEWS!"

For years we have been telling the ABC that their radio promos are drowned out by background music, and it is now even happening with such people as Marion Arnold on ABC Classic FM but she is just one who is being drowned out by the music over!

There are many examples of how the ABC is run, but with someone like Mark Scott who came from print media to the ABC - the print media being that execrable stable the Fairfax media - we can't expect anything other than a backward political disaster created by federal governments of all hues some decades ago, and deteriorating ever since.

Since SBS has refused to stop its in-between advertising on all its shows, we were left with the ABC as the only so-called advert free free-to-air station, but it has been becoming more and more unwatchable, unlistenable, and so right-wing reactionary that it is appalling.

In addition, so many programmes are now repeats - what is the point of it all?

FAIRFAX MANAGEMENT AND JOURNALISTS HAVE ONLY THEMSELVES TO BLAME!

Mark Scott moved from Fairfax to the ABC, and the ABC has followed a downward path on a similar trajectory to that of Fairfax in the ensuing years.

Fairfax management agenda has been on a particularly right-wing reactionary path since the Howard years, following a political direction set since at least 1996 onwards.

Instead of responding to what many of the Fairfax readers have hoped for over the years, Sydney Morning Herald and The Age journalists have allowed themselves to forget about in-depth investigative journalism, and being seduced into the reactionary maelstrom of gutter journalism at its worst.

Where stories cried out for "deep and meaningful" investigation into allegations and counter-allegations of various breaking-news issues, most journalists have gone for the superficial, meaningless slurs and innuendos, the latest of which is the story about Peter Slipper, Craig Thomson, James Ashby and Kathy Jackson.

Why is it that independent journalist investigators, people who are not working for Fairfax, News Limited, the ABC and other like-minded media outlets, managed to get the factual information so lacking in those organisations' reporting of the important parts of the story?

Is it because they illustrated graphically their determination to bring down the Federal government and cast aspersions on all those who support it in the current parliament to the extent that most Fairfax journalists have worn their politics on their sleeves, and in the process shown what their mettles are like as journalists and reporters.

Some of the most senior reporters at the Fairfax newspapers have become so reactionary in their reporting of stories from the current federal parliament that they could easily be mistaken for members of the opposition parties without too many doubts about their interests and aspirations.

The only difference Rinehart would make to the editorial direction of Fairfax is to put the stories in her own image.

As things stand at the moment, they are not far off!

SBS article in the Green Guide 8 March 2012 by Debi Enker

Those of us who watched SBS during the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s watched it precisely because it provided the best news available on television in Australia and always superbly delivered by Mary Kosatakidis and Anton Enus.

The films they showed, the film reviews by David Stratton and Margaret Pomeranz provided entertainment that was unique in the Australian context.

The advertisements were never in the middle of programmes and one was able to put up with them precisely because they didn't affect one's viewing pleasure.

This all changed dramatically at the end of 2006 because the person who was the CEO at the time, Shawn Brown, destroyed the jewel in the crown of Australian television in a matter of days.

Mary Kostakidis was insulted and treated appallingly so that her position became untenable and she had to leave.

That was the beginning of the end, and that was followed soon afterwards by the departure of David Stratton and Margaret Pomeranz for the ABC. What was SBS's loss was in this instance, the ABC's gain.

SBS just went from one disaster to another and became literally unwatchable - a view obviously shared by many thousands of television watchers.

We are now watching with bated breath to see whether the management change will restore SBS to its former glory. It has a long way to go!!

Here is the SBS article in the Green Guide 8 March 2012 by Debi Enker

One of the dumbest decisions made by SBS in recent years was the introduction in late 2006 of advertising within its programs.

The desperate, short-sighted move by the cash-strapped network infuriated viewers, who were unanimous in their disapproval, and severely damaged the broadcaster’s standing, undermining its unique place in the media landscape.

Before 2006, ads on SBS appeared between programs, or during natural breaks in sporting events. The change in policy eroded precious goodwill and alienated viewers at a time when the free-to-air TV market was becoming increasingly competitive due to the proliferation of digital channels.

The intrusion of ads within programs made the multicultural broadcaster look like a cut-price commercial network.

Unsurprisingly, the initiative failed to provide the projected boost in revenue while also allowing governments that were not keenly committed to funding the broadcaster with a handy excuse to reduce their support.

Last week, a bill to phase out the disruptive breaks was introduced in the Senate by the Greens communications spokesman, Scott Ludlum.

This would be a good time to contact your local member of parliament, Communications Minister Stephen Conroy or shadow minister Malcolm Turnbull, urging them to fund the multicultural broadcaster properly, support moves to end a spectacularly unsuccessful initiative and bring to a close a bleak period that has succeeded only in driving SBS viewers to change channels.