Gerard Henderson – Crikey should be able to do better than this:

Gerard Henderson writes: Re. “The Middle Eastern Gerard Henderson” (yesterday, item 19). If Eric Beecher and the Crikey team are going to continue lecturing others about media standards they should improve their own standards. On Wednesday I was phoned by Ifran Yusuf concerning my booklet titled Islam in Australia – Democratic bipartisanship in action – which was launched in London on Tuesday by the Labour MPs Khalid Mahmood and John Spellar, the Conservative MP David Maclean, the Liberal Democrat Fiyaz Mughal and Haras Rafiq, executive director of the Sufi Muslim Council. This group plus some others wrote an all-Party statement on what they called the Australian model for dealing with radical Islamism which seems to have upset Crikey’s reporter. During our conversation, Mr Yusuf was agitated and aggressive. He started off by asking questions but started arguing when he did not like the answers. Mr Yusuf even engaged in feigned laughter in order to express his distaste. It was as unprofessional as that. Since Mr Yusuf claimed he was a reporter for Crikey, the Crikey management should insist that he should catch up with a discourse by, say, Eric Beecher or Margaret Simons about proper journalistic standards. As those who read Islam in Australia will know, the purpose of the booklet is to report how Australia has handled national security since the attacks of 9/11 and the Bali homicide/suicide murders of October 2002. Irfan Yusuf’s report for Crikey is intellectually dishonest. During my phone conversation with Mr Yusuf, I obtained the impression that he had not read the full document. If he had done so, he would have known I used and quoted from the works of many Muslim Australians in my booklet. As I tried to explain to Mr Yusuf, through his many interruptions, the purpose of the interviews was to report the views of senior intelligence official, police and politicians for an essentially British readership. So I interviewed Paul O’Sullivan, Dennis Richardson, Nick Kaldas, Philip Ruddock, Tony Burke, Andrew Robb and Bob Carr. Mr Yusuf did not report my comments in this instance because he had made up his mind on this and other matters before he called me. Crikey should be able to do better than this.

A fantasy story:

Lyn Petrie writes: Re. “Tips and rumours” (yesterday, item 7). I don’t know where to start with yesterday’s tip on the SA Liberal Party — it is such a fantasy story. Your “Tipster” would not even have been there. So is not talking from first hand experience. No doubt his “Boss” gave him the version according to those so hell bent on factional games above all else. I did notice one thing that was correct though. My name is spelt right. I have been a party member for over 30 years. I am acknowledged as a hard worker and I am currently a branch president, an SEC President, Chair of a Regional Convention, on the Hindmarsh campaign committee and recently elected as a Vice President of the Division. As a VP, I and the other 3 VPs take a position on each of the Committees and sub committees. This VP position has nothing to do with the Chairman position and I was not even nominated for that position. The successful nominee was a highly respected lawyer who has formerly been the Chair of this same committee. As for me being an unemployed housewife, their disdain for females and the important role they play whether working or not is written all over this comment. Just for the record, I am not only employed on a full time basis as an accountant in the public sector, I also co-manage my husband’s importing business. Some people have to learn to build a bridge, although I don’t think there are enough nails for some!

The last days of John Howard?:

Brefney Ruhl writes: Re. “The last days of John Howard?” (Yesterday, item 1). I wish everyone including Crikey would stop hinting for Howard to step down. If ever a leader of this country deserved to be thrown out on his ear it is this one. Not counting all the obvious — the war in Iraq, locking up children for years on end, 10 years of ignoring climate change, the botched aboriginal intervention, the utter lack of nation building — now he’s delivered the ultimate insult… a five kilometre, 3 metre wall to protect himself and his main buddy Bush from us, the Australian public. No other western nation has thought they needed this level of security. Obviously other governments trust their people enough to know that however loud their protests, the vast majority will not condone or take part in violence and the 0.0001% that do can be handled. This wall, the water cannon, the über-macho talk from politicians, police and tame journos seem more designed to exacerbate than ameliorate the chance of violence. Either the ludicrous security measures are a show of strength for political purposes or this government really does fear and distrust the very people it is supposed to represent. Either way, I reckon it really is goodbye this time Johnny and frankly, good riddance.

Gary Price writes: There is a problem that all long-term, one-man band leaders ultimately confront, and it brings them down: failure of succession planning. Such leaders do their best to nobble any possible serious challenger. They surround themselves with people who are happy to be at most number 2, happy to be directed, and happy to have come further than they might otherwise have come. They are people who owe the leader a favour for their unexpected elevation. Meanwhile the leader is destroying the careers of possible challengers or buying them off with more immediate gains than the long political slog allows. Alas this means that at the end the leader is at best poorly advised, and probably essentially alone. No-one actually likes the strongman at the end. So here is a question for Crikey reader: who are the possible alternative Liberal prime ministers of the future who have fallen away during Prime Minister John Howard’s long tenure? And who are the real contenders, if any, remaining?

Ivars Avens writes: Should the headline have been: Johnny does APEC? The bard’s words are so apropos that surely he had John Howard and APEC in mind when Macbeth bemoaned the “…. poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” Indeed there are so many comparisons between the last days of Howard and his good lady, and Macbeth and Mrs Macbeth, as to be quite eerie. On second thoughts that is probably a tad unkind to Macbeth, for whatever else could be said of him, one would probably not describe Macbeth as a mediocrity.

Jenny Macklin, what about the real issues?

David Coles writes: Re. “Indigenous Affairs: questions for Jenny Macklin” (yesterday, item 10). Thomas Hunter’s questions for Jenny Macklin assume that the only issues in Indigenous Affairs relate to the Federal Intervention in the NT. What about the real issues? The ones that have been there for the last 11 years rather than the one developed for the election campaign. What will Labor do about the massive underspend in provision of housing for those in need? How will Labor collaborate with the States and Territories to deal with the issues of poor education and continuing low health indicators? Will Labor deal with Indigenous leaders with respect and will they treat Indigenous people with the dignity they deserve? Will some real progress be made to ensure that Indigenous people have the opportunity to select from options for their future rather than simply being told what to do by their betters? How will this be done? The current questions just continue the use of Indigenous people as pawns in the political game.

Brough was an Army Captain?

Steve Martin writes: Re. “The Brough draught of the Intervention, from 2006” (yesterday, item 5). Maybe I am being unkind, but it surprises me that Mal Brough managed to make Captain in the Australian Army. Maybe standards are slipping.

No irony in the Australia-Canada comparison:

Peter Hill writes: Re. Yesterday’s editorial. In describing the parliamentary honour about to be afforded to the Canadian PM as ironic, Crikey’s Editorial yesterday noted that the Conservatives in Canada managed to famously lose in their 1993 election 149 of the 151 seats they had won in 1988. But what you didn’t note was that on 1 January 1991 the Conservatives had introduced a 7% GST (now 6%). The Canadians were not, subsequently, happy campers. This carried over to the 1993 election. There was, apparently, a promise made during the election campaign to repeal it (sound familiar?). But when it came time to deliver that promise, the new Government did something else. Initially proposing a Blended Sales Tax instead (which I read became known as the “BS Tax”), it settled on a Harmonised Sales Tax alongside the GST (simple, really) which most provinces have chosen to ignore. Fast forward to 1998 in Australia and you would have seen the Canadian “experience” dissected to the nth degree in the various halls of power in Canberra. The lessons from that political nightmare were learnt and applied, as history now shows. Even our (then) Commissioner of Taxation couldn’t help but make the Canadian comparison in trumpeting how well they were applied. No irony there.

Brian Jowett writes: The Commonwealth Constitution allows only one circumstance in which a joint sitting of both houses of parliament can occur and that is section 57. An address by a visiting head of state or visiting head of government does not fall within the circumstances described in section 57. During the last visit of the President of the United States and the President of China to these shores, during which they addressed the parliament, the Howard government (on the motion of the Member for Warringah) successfully sought to abuse the standing orders of both houses of parliament by purporting to expel Senator Brown, Tasmania, Australian Greens from the next day’s sitting by improperly using its majority in the combined houses to effect the expulsion. The event you are trying to describe is a simultaneous, but not joint, meeting of both houses of parliament.

Greg Hughes writes: The government is definitely ratsh-t when people start talking about the parallels with Canada. It is terminal. End of story.

George Orwell:

Tony Barrell writes: Re. “George Orwell: a riddle wrapped in a mythology” (yesterday, item 17). Guy Rundle’s got a cheek thinking he can debunk George Orwell in brief bit of blah for Crikey! Consisting of a few ill-argued squibs and one misinterpreted quote. So, in the same spirit, instead of replying with academic reason, footnotes and deep knowledge, I’ll just say that I think he missed the point, probably deliberately. Orwell was talking about what communists thought, not what he did. Orwell’s views on communism were sharpened some time before the Second World War broke out – in Spain – and, whether you like it or not, come from his observations of the way the anarchist movement POUM was persecuted by their Big Brothers on the Left. Orwell was not perfect, nor always consistent. So? 

Foxtel:

Neil Summers writes: Re. “Fox Sports spin avoids NRL screw job” (yesterday, item 23). Glenn Dyer wrote: “A move that saw Fox Sports push NRL games to the newly established and not so well known Fox Sports 3 channel.” Probably more importantly, Fox Sports is not on the basic package for Foxtel so the punters have to pay extra to get it. It’s a lovely rip off of the NRL isn’t it to the benefit of the AFL. Can never understand why one part of News Ltd would disadvantage another part, ie. NRL partly owned by News; Foxtel partly owned by News. Very odd.

Clarification:

Cam Smith writes: This line was inserted into the Arterial Bloc para of my article (yesterday Item 9): “but appear to have reformed for this special occasion.” I was trying to make it very clear that Arterial Bloc no longer exists and hasn’t existed for nearly a year.

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