STOP THE PRESS: Yamba has an airport!

This is what happens when a regional newspaper fails to keep its journalists moving around the the area it circulates and, becomes locked into a city focus.

Its deputy-editor apparently decides that the relatively small coastal village of Yamba, bounded on three sides by ocean and river with one road into town, has an airport.

the people won't come when they can drive a relatively short distance to either Yamba or Coffs Harbour and get competitively priced flights with more convenient flight times. [The Daily Examiner, 5 April 2014, p. 11]

* Hat tip to the eagle-eyed Clarrie Rivers who spotted this blooper gem. 

Quote of the Week

"It’s Politics 101"

[Liberal Senator and former federal assistant treasurer Arthur Sinodinos, giving evidence before the NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption on the subject of the commercial use of his political connections, 3 April 2014]

Political Cartoon of the Week

From the pen of Ian Martin at laberal.blogspot.com.au

One of the sand flies inhabiting The Daily Examiner letters column gets swatted by Clarence Valley photographer Debrah Novak

Letter to the Editor in The Daily Examiner on 1 April 2014:

Editorialising

THE editorial by Deb Novak in Saturday's edition of DEX (29/03) gave food for thought.

In fact, it looked very much to me as though Ms Novak was making a pitch to the Clarence Valley electorate.

I am aware of a rumour that Ms Novak intends to contest a place in the next CVC elections.

If this is so, then Ms Novak should be required to declare her intentions and pay for any self-promoting material she produces for the local press.

Publishing such editorials in the local newspaper while employed by that newspaper is quite unacceptable.

Thomas Macindoe

Yamba

Note: Rumours are just rumours on this one. Debrah has declared she has no intention of running in the next Clarence Valley Council election. In her words: "As a proactive member of the CVC community for 30 years I have never needed politics to raise my voice or step up for my community."

The level of 'colour' in an Aboriginal person's skin is apparently a vexing social question if you are the Australian Attorney-General

In 2009 News Corp journalist Andrew Bolt wrote a series of articles which were published by The Herald And Weekly Times Pty Ltd.

These are some of the remarks that saw this journalist brought before the Federal Court under provisions of the Racial Discrimination Act 1975:

• "They are "white Aborigines" - people who out of their multi stranded but largely European genealogy, decide to identity with the thinnest of all those strands and the one that's contributed least to their looks"
• “Aboriginal artists as pale as a blank canvas”
• "despite looking almost as German as her name"
• "insisting on a racial identity you could not guess from her features"
• "white is the new black"
• “The new tribe of white blacks”"
• “Not yet convinced that for many of these fair Aborigines, the choice to be Aboriginal can seem almost arbitrary and intensely political, given how many of their ancestors are in fact Caucasian?"
•  “racial differences you cannot detect with a naked eye" [NyunggaBlack, 1 April 2014]

• “Meet the white face of a new black race -- the political Aborigine”
•  “ this self-identification as Aboriginal strikes me as self-obsessed, and driven more by politics than by any racial reality"
• “has also worked as a professional Aborigine ever since leaving Harvard Law School, despite looking almost as German as her father"
• “is often interviewed demanding special rights for "my people". But which people are "yours", exactly, mein liebchen? “ [Media Watch, 4 April 2011]

•        “pink in face” (McMillan) (2A-18);
•        “very pale” (Behrendt) (2A-20);
•        “blue-eyed and ginger-haired” (Mellor) (2A-21);
•         “white face” (Cole) (2A-24);
•         “pale as a blank canvas” (Sax) (2A-25);
•         “auburn-haired” (Winch) (2A-26);
•         “white university lecturer” (Mellor) (2A-37). [Eatock v Bolt [2011] FCA 1103 (28 September 2011)]

In its 2011 judgment summary the Federal Court clearly accepted that:

Collectively, eighteen individuals are named in the articles. Nine of those individuals gave evidence in this case. Each of them genuinely identifies as an Aboriginal person and has done so since their childhood. Each was raised to identify as an Aboriginal person and was enculturated as an Aboriginal person. None of them ‘chose’ to be Aboriginal. Nor have they used their Aboriginal identity inappropriately to advance their careers. Each is entitled to regard themselves and be regarded by others as an Aboriginal person within the conventional understanding of that description; and

I have concluded that from the perspective of fair-skinned Aboriginal people, the messages (or what lawyers call “the imputations”) conveyed by the newspaper articles which Mr Bolt wrote, included that:

•  There are fair-skinned people in Australia with essentially European ancestry but with some Aboriginal descent, of which the individuals identified in the articles are examples, who are not genuinely Aboriginal persons but who, motivated by career opportunities available to Aboriginal people or by political activism, have chosen to falsely identify as Aboriginal; and
• Fair skin colour indicates a person who is not sufficiently Aboriginal to be genuinely identifying as an Aboriginal person.

I am satisfied that fair-skinned Aboriginal people (or some of them) were reasonably likely, in all the circumstances, to have been offended, insulted, humiliated or intimidated by the imputations conveyed by the newspaper articles; and

I have not been satisfied that the offensive conduct that I have found occurred, is exempted from unlawfulness by section 18D. The reasons for that conclusion have to do with the manner in which the articles were written, including that they contained errors of fact, distortions of the truth and inflammatory and provocative language; and

Finally, in dealing with the formulation of the orders to be made by the Court, I have observed that it is important that nothing in the orders I make should suggest that it is unlawful for a publication to deal with racial identification, including by challenging the genuineness of the identification of a group of people. I have not found Mr Bolt and the Herald & Weekly Times to have contravened section 18C, simply because the newspaper articles dealt with subject matter of that kind. I have found a contravention of the Racial Discrimination Act because of the manner in which that subject matter was dealt with.

Yet, in a 3 April 2014 op ed piece Australian Attorney-General George Brandis submitted to The Australian Jewish News in support of the Abbott Government’s proposed changes to the Racial Discrimination Act (1975) he stated this:

The significance of the Bolt case was merely that it showed the reach of the section in its current form, and that it could be used to prohibit the expression of a point of view about a vexing social question.

A vexing social question? In Australia during the 21^st century?

Surely by now Australian society recognises that family, kinship and tribal grouping within and across indigenous communities do not rely on skin colour as a determinate of cultural identity.

Equally, it defies belief that ordinary reasonable people would find Mr. Bolt’s quoted remarks in their entirety acceptable – even if George Brandis apparently does.

Finally, I draw the reader's attention to the fact that the Attorney-General  also stated in the op ed that; Naturally, I also consulted with others who brought different perspectives to the debate, including Andrew Bolt himself.

Insults hurled in the 44th Australian Parliament

There are only two procedural digests published to date which cover the 44^th Australian Parliament, however recorded offensive words uttered by government, opposition and independent members of the House of Representatives are beginning to mount.

Perhaps it is time to consider a parliamentary version of the swear jar - $1,000 deducted from annual salary packages for each insult thrown across the chamber. 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES Procedural Digest No. 111, 12-21 November 2013

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES Procedural Digest No. 112, 2-12 December 2013

Metgasco Limited and News Corp journalist Miranda Devine distorting the truth about opposition tho the gas industry establishing itself in the Northern Rivers

Coal seam gas exploration and mining company Metgasco Limited had gone into overdrive in an attempt to negatively spin the blockade of its current drilling site at 1480 Bentley Road, Bentley.

News Corp journalist Miranda Devine took the bait and wrote about the virtual siege under which the family are allegedly living and the ‘hellish ’level of harassment being experienced.

However, the facts of the matter don’t really support the Metgasco-Devine dire version of events.

Neither Robert Graham nor Peter Graham and his wife and children live on the land in question – they live at Goolmangar - and apparently the level of personal harassment being experienced in practice is that Peter is being “barked at” as the protesters move their cars and open the gate so he can enter his land.

Excerpt from Miranda Devine’s article Fossil fuel fanatics make farm life hell posted on Metgasco Limited’s company website, 2 April 2014:

In the lush pastures of the northern rivers region, an unholy alliance of local anti-gas protesters and imported green extremists is making life hell for farmer Pete Graham and his family.

They have farmed near Casino for five generations, but their decision to allow gas company Metgasco to drill on their land for natural gas — not coal seam gas — has turned into a nightmare.

Hundreds of protesters have been camped around their property for weeks, blocking their driveways with cars and intimidating everyone going in and out. Peter’s wife, seven-year-old twins and parents are under virtual siege. His gates have been ­repeatedly padlocked and welded shut and a concrete trench with metal spikes dug into his driveway. If he takes cattle to market, he has to ask council for a security escort to get out his gate.

And in nearby Casino, business owners were harassed by anonymous letters last week, threatening a boycott of the town.

“It’s out of control,” Graham, 44, said yesterday of the campaign of intimidation.

“They’ve been told by police not to enter our property and they continually disobey the requests.”

This is the dark side of the campaign against coal seam gas. While apprehension about the impacts on prime agricultural land of gas exploration is real, extreme green fanatics have exploited those fears for their own ends.

Posing as farmer’s friends, professional vigilante activists are dangerous bedfellows for the grassroots anti-gas movement. Their criminal harassment of farmers and contractors and total opposition to all fossil fuels will, in the end, turn off the public and divide communities……

Echo NetDaily 1 April 2014:

Peter Graham has a pretty cattle stud in the valley, with a backdrop of Muckleewee Mountain Nature Reserve.

He has signed his land over to Metgasco for tight sands gas exploration and, perhaps, exploitation. Whether they are ‘successful’ or not, Mr Graham won’t have to deal with the consequences – he doesn’t live on the property.

His neighbours are not so well disposed to the idea of their green valley being turned into an industrialised gasfield: 84.5 per cent have registered their opposition to it.

The Northern Star 2 April 2014:

ROSELLA well landowner Peter Graham said protesters had now blockaded all the entrances on his cattle property and he could not enter any of the gates without harassment.

The official policy of protesters as publicised by Gasfields Free Northern Rivers is to not interfere with any farming activities on the land, but Mr Graham said the message wasn't filtering down to everyone.

Mr Graham said a few weeks ago most people would move their cars away and be "nice about it", while others would take several minutes to do so and were rude.

But recently, the tone of protesters had changed for the worse, he said.

"You drive through there and you get barked at," Mr Graham said. "We were told as we were going in - 'we know where you live - be warned'."

But one protester said that the Grahams had always been let in and they were even given photos of Robbie and Peter Graham to identify them with.

Mr Graham, who does not live at the property, said he would only visit when absolutely necessary.

NOTE: All read bolding is mine