You have to chuckle at the ludicrous three-way ping-pong being played between Channel Nine, News Limited and Gordon Ramsay. No greater triumvarite of self-promoters ever crossed swords, yet since the weekend they seemed to have captured the attention of the gullible masses. We’ve had parental complaints about Ramsay’s bad language in front of their children at his live Melbourne show (a bit like going to Perisher and complaining about the snow). We’ve heard to-and-fro-ing between Ramsay and Tracy Grimshaw, the mournful talking-head who is the ‘victim’ of Ramsay’s ‘attacks’. We’ve seen the ubiquitous Youtube footage and tut-tutting from just about every rent-a-quote in Melbourne.

It’s my contention that this whole thing is an American wrestling-style beat-up, dreamed up on-the-wire by Ramsay’s agents, PR suits and Channel Nine. It is all geared at whipping up publicity for Ramsay and his programmes, once hot property for Nine but since flagging in the ratings. Others with a working knowledge of the media concur. Ramsay’s public persona is that of a crass, boorish and foul-mouth yobbo, but he is nobody’s fool. Grimshaw, once a real journalist, is now little more than a network puppet. If she was truly aggrieved by Ramsay’s ‘attack’ then she should raise the question of why her employer ran two hours of his TV shows last night – after, of course, yet another ACA re-hash of Tracy vs. Gordon – when Nine might instead support her by suspending them Chaser-style.

Today the Herald Sun went even further with a gutter-delving implication that Ramsay might well be gay. The ‘evidence’ of this, says the Spun, is a 15-year-old caution stemming from drunken nakedness and tomfoolery in a Tube station toilet – because as we all know, every canned-up young bloke who gets his kit off or flops out his shrivelled manhood must “bat for the other team”.  For additional confirmation of Ramsay’s dubious sexuality they went to his embittered, press-savvy former lover – who is, wait for it, female. Further comment was also sought from two of Ramsay’s arch-rivals, who had nothing of note to add other than that noting that Ramsay “looks like a cross between Patrick Swayze and a ventriloquist’s dummy”. A very shaky house-of-cards indeed and one that would, on any other day, never get past Murdoch’s in-house lawyers.

None of this concerns me too much: commercial TV and its stars will always play contrived games of cross-promotion and draw in the celebrity-obsessed masses when they do. What bothers me is the completely inappropriate involvement of our political leaders. Kevin Rudd, now so populist that he comments on just about every non-political matter raised at pressers, referred to Ramsay as “low life”. Julia Gillard more pithily advised him to ”stay in the kitchen” and make “nice things for people to eat” - good advice that Jules and Kev might want to follow themselves by confining themselves to matters of government. Their attempt to extract votes by tapping into a public ‘issue’ that is, at best, wildly exaggerated and, at worst, fabricated cheapens politics and insults those whose concerns run deeper than a foul-mouthed chef and a nondescript TV host.

For the first time ever in the history of the tabloidverse, a world news story about foreign people and politics has topped the most-viewed list on the Herald Sun website, despite being buried on page 60 of the physical newspaper behind the deaths notices.

GrodsCorp can confirm that the coach of the Richmond Tigers AFL club, Terry Wallace, is safe and unhurt. GrodsCorp can also confirm that seven out of ten Herald Sun readers still can’t find Sri Lanka on a map.

(Thanks to reader Dam Buster of Preston.)

Melbournians – couldn’t sleep a wink last night because of the heat? The Herald Sun’s graphos show you why:

Apparently it was 41.2 degrees Celsius at midnight!!1! God knows what it’ll be when we’re all in bed at noon tonight.

Or is it?

(From today’s Hun.)

UPDATE: And the ABC’s clearly pretty happy with this headline: “Alleged dildo-wielding dog-killer in court“. What a story!

I was at the pub after work with a mate this afternoon when Craig called up to see what was going on, before deciding to come down and join us. And then John Surname called up and came down to join us at the pub. And then Jeremy Sear (of An Onymous Lefty and occasional GrodsCorp fame) called up on the way home from court (working, not being sentenced this time) and dropped in to join us. It was a very pleasant and unplanned evening of beery fun.

We were having a merry old time talking about this and that when, all of a sudden, Jeremy grabbed a newspaper from the table behind him and started reading it. Thanks be to Ceiling Cat for Craig’s lightening iPhone reflexes because we’ve now got photographic proof that Jeremy reads — shock! — the Herald Sun.

Yes, that is a lemon in Jeremy’s beer

You know it’s going to be a rough day when you’re walking to the train station along a suburban street in the icy pre-dawn darkness and you’re suddenly hit by a flying rolled-up newspaper.

Damn you to the fiery bowels of hell, The Age, The Australian, the Herald Sun or whatever the fuck you were!

Oh, and paperboy — you just made The List.

The Herald Sun today ran something of a non-story about a Melbourne Catholic primary-school teacher’s participation in Channel 7’s Make Me a Supermodel program.

The usual “family groups” are up in arms about the damage 24-year-old PE teacher Rhys Uhlich’s involvement in such a program could do to the school’s pupils, and children in general.

But the school — Sacred Heart Primary — and its students have reportedly thrown their support behind the teacher.

Not to be outdone, the Herald Sun — in what seems a blatant attempt to cook up some moral outrage among its readers and ensure a follow-up story with which it can bash the teacher, the program and “community standards” as a whole — has devised an online poll.

There are several honest ways such a poll question might be worded to ascertain readers’ views on the “controversy” — “Do you think a teacher’s participation in a modelling contest sends the wrong message to children?” is one.

But here’s the Herald Sun’s not-in-any-way-loaded question:

I urge everyone to head over there and vote “yes”, just to bugger up the online editor’s news schedule for tomorrow.

There’s a big story in the news at the moment about drink driving players who belong to a football team commonly referred to as the “Pies”. It’s a sub-editor’s wet dream. Match the headlines…

* Club bans porky pies
* Eddie chucks pies on sauce
* Collingwood drink drive debacle — out for season

…to the newspapers:

* The Herald Sun
* The Age
* The Australian

Just get a load of those puns. Answers over the fold.

Read the rest of this entry »

Oh dear. Andrew Bolt has gone into martyr overdrive today in celebrating the ten year anniversary of his column in the Herald Sun.

Here’s yet another page or more of me telling you what I think. Such arrogance.

And the worst is that this has been going on for a decade. In fact, it was this week 10 years ago that I was given this twice-weekly column.

Bolta reckons he’s learned a few lessons in those ten years. Let’s have a look at them one-by-one.

Lesson 1: Don’t be shy. If I don’t fill this column space, it’s sure to be filled by an even greater idiot.

Proof?

For instance, if I hadn’t filled this space with columns warning that then Labor leader Mark Latham had character flaws that could “completely destroy not just Latham, but Labor”, you’d almost certainly have had to read the exact opposite, given almost every other columnist supported him.

Truth be told, I didn’t realise that Bolta was single handedly responsible for Mark Latham losing the 2004 election. I was under the impression that Latham was single handedly responsible for Latham losing the election.

Lesson 2: Toot your own triumphs.

As shown. After all, when you start criticising fellow journalists, you’re up for pack-payback, and it’s wise to give readers some reason to think you’re not as advertised: a “village idiot”, “extremist”, “lap-dog”, “mad professor”, and, of course, “racist”.

Of course, Andy. You talk yourself up only to defend yourself. Nothing to do with being full of yourself.

Lesson 3: Facts seem barely to count against a moral crusade.

So Bolta has made it his stock in trade to counter with carefully selected facts that support his own moral crusade.

Lesson 4: The more moral the campaign, the less likely journalists are to tell the truth.

[...]

Here, for instance, are some of the facts which I found the more fashionable journalists refusing to report for fear the truth would destroy their Truth.

– The world stopped warming in 1998.

– No one can name even 10 Aboriginal children stolen from their parents just because they were black.

[...]

– Several people “helped” by euthanasia guru Philip Nitschke were not dying, or even in pain.

Name just three, Andrew. Just three. (Also, do you like the way he uses a capital ‘T’ for the other journalists’ “Truth”?)

Lesson 5: Reporting facts that others won’t will make you seem mad.

Oops.

Your seeming mad has to do with other things, Andy.

Lesson 6. But being wrong hurts more than being mocked.

At first that wasn’t so. Who wants to be thought evil or dumb?

But keep your job and your cool long enough, and the truth will quietly out.

If there’s one thing that Bolta has never been able to keep, it’s his cool. A shriller, more grumpy “journalist” the world has never seen.

Lesson 7: When facts alone don’t count, naming and shaming might.

[...]

I started to call Prof Robert Manne, the leading theorist of the “stolen generations”, its leading “propagandist” instead, and I challenged him: “Name just 10 truly ‘stolen’ children.”

Personalising it like this invites revenge, that’s true, and can seem too nasty. But it can also hotly prod a response when cold facts don’t.

Manne, enraged, decided to take our debate public – to the Melbourne Writers’ Festival – and the rest is history, Manne and his list included. Just name 10, Robert.

Oh, I see. All that shrill stuff is just a journalistic tool to out Truth (sic). Makes perfect sense.

Lesson 8 – There is no “everyone”.

When someone says “everyone agrees”, they usually mean everyone like them – and that is especially true when “everyone” is the teacher-preacher class that hogs microphones, pulpits and newspaper keyboards, drowning out debate.

And Bolta sure does have a hard time getting heard. He has a twice weekly, full page column in Australia’s best selling newspaper, he appears regularly on several radio stations, he is a panelist on Insiders, and next week he’s following in Timmeh Blair’s underwhelming footsteps and appearing on Q & A. Those damn lefties and their debate-stifling ways.

On the set of Insiders I had to be given the lone chair on the far right of the screen. This, because I had the nerve to share the judgment of most Australians over four elections.

Hearts fucking bleed, Bolta.

But what is the moral of Bolta’s tale of self-love?

And that brings me to the ultimate lesson I’ve learned over these 10 years: that it’s best to write for your readers, not your peers.

Some may think you a fool or a bighead and too often wrong. But if most figure you’re just trying your best to describe things as they are, you might just have a job for a decade.

And may you bring us regular doses of “journalistic” hilarity for another ten years to come, Andy. Happy birthday.

The subjects of a Hun story… not Hun commenters

You can tell as much as you need to know about the Herald Sun from the online commenting habits of its readers. One day someone will write a thesis or commission a study on it but from general observation, any story involving politics, international issues, poverty, global warming, etc. struggles to reach double figures in comments … but mention Wayne Carey, Shane Warne, any other current or ex-sportsperson, sex, death, sharks, stingrays, mortgages, petrol prices… and whooooosh! the posts they come like a stream-of-consciousness torrent. And something like an unholy incest yarn – weird sex and all that – attracts 42 boganisms and rising in about three hours, ranging from ‘SICK! DISGUSTING!’ tub-thumping to the thinly veiled gags:

All this story needs is Banjo music in the background!!
Posted by: A. Thompson of Melbourne

it was chad morgan who pend and sung the song “im my own grandpa” talk about life imitating art!
Posted by: dimitri of mildura

First a pregnant man now this?! Celeste ay? She will probably be called Cest for short.
Posted by: Steve of Wagga NSW

further evidence that south australia truly are better off for not having any convict settlement…
Posted by: John of Ball

I think it’s fantastic. People should leave them alone – they obviously found true happiness despite the obstacles. Alana – how can you talk? You’re from Narre Warren of all places – you must see this kind of thing everywhere.
Posted by: johnny of Melbourne

All the Hun needs now is for Wayne Carey to commit incest with a stingray while urinating on the windows of Crown Casino and their commenting system may implode.

The Editor, John Surname, Ant Rogenous, Jeremy Sear, Wah and Craig discuss the following:

* Blogging
* Kevin Rudd’s first 100 days
* The Liberal Party
* Brendan Nelson
* Interest rates
* Cricket
* The Herald Sun
* David Hicks
* Dick Smith
* Osama Bin Laden
* Prince Harry
* Connex
* Lynne Kosky
* Public transport
* Victorian Labor Party
* Fleshlight
* What is the plural of “penis”?
* Liberal leadership future

** I don’t know why but that bloody “Play now” link is still serving up episode four. I have no solution yet. Something to do with the intertubes broken or something. Just to be safe, use the “Play in popup” link or the “Download” link. **

[display_podcast]

 GrodsThink RSS feed

Sally Morrell writes the most bland, vacant guff, full of motherhood statements and celeb-obs, yet the Herald Sun sees fit to give her a weekly column (probably because she’s Mrs Bolta). She’s also trying to break new ground on paragraph size, some formed from just three or four words. To relieve my abject boredom I skimmed through the last five of her columns, harvested all paras of <12 words, and jumbled ‘em up to make my own Sally (TM) poem. It reads like something from Wallace Stevens, or Ern Malley-meets-Richard Wilkins:

Madonna became a mother at 38 and had her second child at 42.
So congratulations, Nicole.
After all, she’ll be representing Australia on the world stage.
Give the woman a break. Didn’t someone tell these guys superwoman is dead?
Go girl.

Take Germaine Greer.
It was easy to think it was just a publicity stunt.
They’d better do something sweaty soon.
They only make us wonder why they bothered opening their mouth.
But I think Terri genuinely does crave a message from Steve.

I don’t believe in John Edward.
But why does John Laws want us to know his secrets?
Deep down he just wants us to like him.
And knowing you, we’re not necessarily liking you.

Maybe that’s why we still like them.
Or, rather, by the blokes hanging off them.
Ignore them, Therese.
Why must your love die with their body?
Think Jeannie Little on a bad day.

An extreme makeover was urgently needed, he said.
Trust me, Therese. You won’t be looking at Armani.
Go work on your putting or pasting.
Usually there’s a look-at-me reason behind all the revelations.
Oh, and yes, she has a new album coming out.

Well if anything it’s just as meaningful as the original source.

Brazen hypocrisy going on over at Andrew Bolt’s blog-of-shame. This is Andrew getting all grumpy and sanctimonious about the rigging of a Herald Sun online poll yesterday:

The question put by the Herald Sun: ”Should gay couples have the same rights as married couples?”

The answer? Mailouts are good for a few hundred votes:

From: Sally Goldner
Date: Dec 5, 2007 9:55 AM
Subject: [appetitefordeconstruction] Opinion poll – relationships
To: Appetitefordeconstruction Yahoogroup, Bi-Victoria Yahoogroup , Queergreen Yahoogroup

I note the following opinion poll on the Herald Sun website this morning.

Time to vote!! http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/opinion

Cheers

Neil

Didn’t these activists trust the public to choose right?

And here’s Andrew today ordering his readers to go and rig a Greenpeace online poll:

Reader Dave needs your help for a worthy cause:

Greenpeace are running this promo thing where they’re choosing a name for a humpback whale, to increase awareness etc. etc.

At the moment the name that is topping the votes is Mr Splashy Pants.

But the hippies are starting to get angry, and pushing for crap names that have deep and symbolic meaning…like Nurani , Veikko and Aurora.

So please get behind “Mr Splashy Pants” and cast your vote today!!

Please. Although it’s odd that Greenpeace thinks “humpback whale” won’t do. Shouldn’t it be more tolerant of the differently abled?

Doesn’t this hypocritical columnist trust the public to choose right?

UPDATE: As John Surname points out in comments, Bolta has posted a pathetic defence of his hypocrisy:

I am utterly consistent. Yesterday I revealed the Herald Sun poll on gay rights was being rigged, and today I announce the Greenpeace poll on whales is being rigged. It’s all about disclosure.

Is that supposed to be funny?

Like The Editor, I happened to read the Herald Sun today. There was a spare one on the train seat. Although I didn’t notice any advertisements from the latest in whacko I’ve-got-a-business-therefore-I-know-what’s-best-for-the-country political parties, I did notice that the very moral Herald Sun helped out it’s readers who obviously don’t know what a stripper looks like.

They did this by illustrating almost every article or opinion piece about Kevin’s indiscretion with a scantily clad stripper, six in total. One piece was deemed so worthy it had four strippers in it’s heading alone. The letters page was illustrated with another stripper, as if everybody needed to be reminded what they were indignant about.

“Golly Moses!” they will splutter into their tea “Kevin Rudd saw BREASTS!”

Maybe they’re jealous. I sure wish I was looking at breasts right now.

I’m not sure what to make of this – the joke of an editorial condemns Rudd, yet they appeal to the lowest common denominator by printing numerous images of half-naked women.

Pathetic tabloid journalism, but I guess I should stop expecting better of the Sun.

There’s been a whole lotta hubbub about the Daily Telegraph’s abandoned baby headline yesterday: “How Could She”. Beyond Blue spokesperson Jeff Kennett slammed the tabloid for such sensationalist and uninformed stupidity while The Man Of Steel got in on the action pretty quick to give it his big ol’ Rodent tick of approval, saying: “In defence of the Tele, that’s what most people say. I feel for the mother, I feel for the baby, I feel for the woman’s family, but fair go to the Tele — after all, that is the natural reaction. How could you abandon a little baby?”

I took a look at the Daily Telegraph’s sister newspaper, the Herald Sun, at work this morning and it is curious to note how keen the Hun is to distance itself from its stablemate’s stance. In its front page story the paper doesn’t mention the Tele’s headline at all, simply noting that Kennett and Howard “locked horns” over “criticism of the mother.” Even Howard’s tick-of-approval comment was twice doctored to remove any mention of the Tele:

Above headline
“But, fair go… How could you abandon a little baby?”

In story
“I feel for the mother, I feel for the baby, I feel for the woman’s family, but, fair go . . . that is the natural reaction,” [Howard] said. “How could you abandon a little baby?”

The Herald Sun, fearless as always: won’t agree with the Tele’s views but won’t criticise them either.