GERARD HENDERSON’S MEDIA WATCH DOG – ISSUE NO. 251
14 NOVEMBER 2014
The inaugural issue of “Gerard Henderson’s Media Watch” was published in April 1988 – over a year before the first edition of the ABC TV Media Watch program went to air. Since November 1997 “Gerard Henderson’s Media Watch” has been published as part of The Sydney Institute Quarterly. In 2009 Gerard Henderson’s Media Watch Dog blog commenced publication.
● LATELINE OR LEFT LINE?
Nancy’s (male) co-owner has had a lot of late nights this week – with Lateline sounding in the distance. There appears to be have been a resonance of left wing thought on the program. Last night Ross Garnaut was banging on at inordinate length about climate change. He seemed to believe that President Obama can get legislation through the Congress in the next two years and that China will really and truly commence to reduce its emissions within a mere 16 years time. On Wednesday Paul Keating was banging on again – the way he invariably does. Then on Tuesday it was a sober Robert Fisk banging on as he usually does. No alternative view to Professor Garnaut, or Mr Keating or Mr Fisk was heard.
On Monday there was a kind of debate with a group of luvvies – the independent MP Cathy McGowan, Our Say founder Matthew Gordon and Simon Longstaff of the St James Ethics Centre on why voters are unhappy with their elected representatives – except, of course, Cathy McGowan. In this particular Lateline “debate” Cathy essentially agreed with Matthew, who essentially agreed with Simon, who essentially agreed with Cathy, who essentially agreed with herself and who seemed to have the agreement of the ever agreeable Emma Alberici. [Whatever happened to the feisty Ms Alberici – was she on her best behaviour due to the presence of the oh-so-ethical Dr Longstaff? – Ed]
And yet there are people in and outside of politics who fear that Lateline may be junked. Really. [That seals it – you won’t be on for another six years – Ed].
● MR ALY ON WHY EVERYONE IS HOPELESS EXCEPT MR ALY
Waleed Aly has had an obvious progression. From an academic at the leftist Monash University to a columnist on the leftist Age and to a leftist presenter on the Conservative-Free-Zone which is the contemporary ABC. Come to think of it, he currently combines all of these positions.
In The Age this morning Waleed (“terrorism is just an irritant”) Aly was banging on about Australia and the MH17 tragedy. True to form your man Aly criticised both Tony Abbott and Bill Shorten from the left. They are both idiots you see who have no idea how the world or Australia works. Aly suggested that “most” of the bodies from the Ukraine crash-site have not been returned – ignoring the fact that most of the remains were taken to the Netherlands. Aly accused the Prime Minister and the Opposition leader of “ridiculous posing”, exhibiting “ritual anger” and engaging in “gesture politics”. The only person who emerged unscathed from Aly’s Age column today was Russian president Vladimir Putin – who was presented as a real man who neither poses nor engages in gestures. The way your man Aly is going he seems destined to present yet more programs on the ABC – since he fits the profile of a presenter who criticises both the Coalition and Labor in a Green-Left kind of way.
NICE MR SCOTT TWEETS AS THE ABC BURNS
Last Wednesday ABC managing director and editor-in-chief Mark Scott saw fit to issue this tweet concerning the installation of Anthony Fisher as the new Catholic Archbishop of Sydney:
Mark ScottVerified account @mscott : New Archbishop of Sydney today. Changing of guard or Pell’s man? : http://ab.co/1u8BhK5
So Mark Scott on Wednesday was busy making comments on the Pope’s decision as to who should head the Archdiocese of Sydney. However, Mark Scott had nothing to say about the decision of 7.30 to run a so-called comedy sketch by Kirsten Drysdale on 7.30 the night before.
As ABC spinners have conceded, 7.30 was aware of the conversation between Prime Minister Tony Abbott and President Vladimir Putin concerning the downing of MH17 over Ukraine some 40 minutes before the program went to air. But, ABC producers decided to run Ms Drysdale’s attempt at Abbott ridicule for a longer time – and ahead of – the real news which came out of the APEC meeting in Beijing concerning Australia and Russia.
Kirsten Drysdale is a product of such leftist programs as Hungry Beast, The Chaser Boys’ (average age 381/2)The Hamster Wheel and has written for such leftist publications as Crikey and The Global Mail.
This was a huge misjudgement of news and comedy by ABC producers. According to the available evidence, 7.30 presenter Leigh Sales did not support the sketch going to air. Mark Scott earns as much income as the Treasurer and the Opposition Leader combined. Yet whenever controversy breaks, he invariably goes into “no-comment” mode and refuses to act in his role as ABC editor-in-chief.
In view of Mark Scott’s apparent race for ratings among younger viewers, it’s no longer clear whether 7.30 is a current affairs program or yet another sneering leftist comedy program of which there are many on the taxpayer funded public broadcaster.
When he took the position as ABC managing director in 2006, Mark Scott made it very clear that he intended to act as the public broadcaster’s editor-in-chief. This was an entirely appropriate decision. Yet, not long after taking over as ABC managing director, Mark Scott virtually welshed on any editorial and appointment decisions made by ABC producers. This has led to the situation where the public broadcaster has not one conservative presenter, producer or editor in any prominent television, radio or online outlets. Moreover, Mark Scott walks away from any situation which would require supervising and instructing ABC staff as to proper editorial standards. Hence his silence on the 7.30 sketch this week which even senior figures at the ABC recognise was a disaster. This is all the more so in the current climate when the Commonwealth Government is considering future funding for the public broadcaster.
So Mark Scott is prepared to spend time tweeting on the Catholic Church – which is not his job. But Mark Scott refrains from making key assessments concerning ABC programming – which is his job. And no one on the ABC Board shows any inclination to insist that the managing director and editor-in-chief should do the job for which he is well remunerated.
Due to enormous work pressure [do you mean stress? – Ed], some material scheduled for this week’s MWD has been held-over until next week. Including the announced coverage of the catastrophist Paul Ehrlich in his recent Down Under mode. No doubt this will disappoint MWD’s hundreds of thousands of avid readers. But there you go.
● BRIAN COSTAR’S CONDESCENDING LECTURE TO JOHN HOWARD
Fairfax Media rolled out Brian Costar to review John Howard’s The Menzies Era (HarperCollins) in last weekend’s newspapers. It was a fair to average review by the fair to average professor of political science at Swinburne Institute of Technology in Melbourne.
However, Professor Costar could not resist the temptation of giving readers his view of the Robert Menzies government between December 1949 and January 1966. For example – Costar claimed that Menzies was “internationally humiliated” at the time of the 1956 Suez crisis and that his decision to commit both military advisers (in 1962) and combat troops (in 1965) in support of South Vietnam was “disastrous”. Costar does not say how or why – he just wants us all to know what he thinks. The review concluded as follows:
At 707 pages this is a big book. Howard has been well served by his researchers and advisers, but he would have benefited from a more ruthless editor. The decision to continue the story to 1972 detracts from what should have been the book’s main focus, and a little too much Australian Political History 101 clutters the text. Nevertheless this book is a cut above most of the political apologiae that are currently filling the nation’s bookstores.
How condescending can you get? Professor Costar has criticised John Howard for writing a book that is “a little too much Australian Political History 101”. Could this be the very same Professor Brian Costar who, according to Malcolm Fraser, read “the entire manuscript” of Malcolm Fraser: The Political Memoirs and also provided “enormously helpful…suggestions and perspectives”? Sure is.
Malcolm Fraser: The Political Memoirs was co-authored by Malcolm Fraser and Melbourne University academic Margaret Simons. Simons received a research fellowship from the taxpayer per courtesy of the Australian Prime Minister’s Centre.
Your man Costar is dismissive of Australian Politics 101. It’s a pity, really. Because Malcolm Fraser: The Political Memoirs really needed a dose of Australian Politics 101. Such an input might have eliminated the howlers which Dr Simons (for a doctor she is) and Dr Costar (for a doctor he is too) did not discover in Malcolm Fraser: The Political Memoirs. Here are some of them:
▪ The claim that Britain in the early 1950s “inspired George Orwell’s 1984 – a place where government control was total”. False. It was communist Eastern Europe in the late 1940s which inspired Orwell’s book. 1984 was published in 1949. This is European History 101.
▪ The claim that Harold Holt was the prime minister who “announced the despatch of Australian troops to South Vietnam” in the mid-1960s. False. It was Robert Menzies.
▪ The claim that China, under the leadership of Mao Zedong, “invaded North Korea” circa 1950. False. China sent troops to Korea to assist its communist ally North Korea.
▪ The claim that the Fraser government “retained Medibank as a universal taxpayer funded means of health insurance”. False. By 1981 Medibank had disappeared – while Malcolm Fraser was prime minister.
▪ The claim that “by 1990 Bob Hawke had now won four elections – the same number as Fraser”. False. Fraser won three elections (1975, 1977 and 1980). Bob Hawke won four (1983, 1984, 1987 and 1990) and so did John Howard (1996, 1998, 2001 and 2004). Menzies led the Liberal Party to seven victories between 1949 and 1963.
▪ The claim that Malcolm Fraser saved NATO by encouraging the United States (through Vice President George H.W. Bush) to support Britain in the war with Argentina over the Falklands. False. No meeting of the National Security Council was held during the period in which Bush’s alleged intervention – allegedly inspired by Fraser – took place.
In fact, Malcolm Fraser: The Political Memoirs is littered with howlers – despite your man Costar’s “suggestions” and “perspectives forwarded to the co-authors” and Dr Simons’ fact-checking.
And now Professor Costar has told John Howard that The Menzies Era is too much Australian Politics 101 – that is, too much based on facts. Yet the likes of Dr Costar, Dr Simons and Mr Fraser could benefit from such a course. Can you bear it?
● YET ANOTHER STACKED Q&A DECK
ABC types just love discussing the taxpayer funded public broadcaster. So it came as no surprise last Monday when Q&A presenter Tony Jones announced next week’s panel:
Next week, on Q&A, with the Government’s decision on ABC funding imminent, we’re joined by the Minister for Communications Malcolm Turnbull; the Deputy Opposition Leader Tanya Plibersek; former Media Watch host Jonathan Holmes, Daily Telegraph opinion editor Sarrah Le Marquand; and comedian and author Ben Elton. So, until next week’s Q&A, good night.
Yes, folks, it’s another 4-2 stack with not one established ABC critic on the program. Presenter Tony Jones and Jonathan Holmes have received most of their income in recent years from the ABC. When Holmes was presenter of the ABC1 Media Watch program, he declined to call on the likes of Mr Jones to declare all income they received from non-ABC sources. Yet Holmes declared that panellists on ABC programs should declare details of the organisations which fund them – even though, unlike Tony Jones, they did not receive money direct from businesses. It’s called an unpleasant double standard designed by an ABC comrade to protect other ABC comrades.
Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull believes that the ABC should be more efficient but he is not generally critical of the ABC’s political culture – unlike many of his Cabinet colleagues. Sarrah Le Marquand is not a leftist but nor is she an established ABC critic. Indeed, Ms Marquand supports same sex marriage – one of ABC personnel’s favourite causes. Tanya Plibersek is a leader of the ALP Parliamentary Left and a strong supporter of the ABC. Ben Elton is a British leftie.
So there you have it. Next Monday Q&A will discuss the ABC with many ABC supporters – but without one considered critic of the ABC on the panel. Can you bear it?
● MATTHEW BENNS ON BEN CHIFLEY’S (ALLEGED) MISTRESS
Nancy’s (male) co-owner has yet to read Mistress: The True Stories of Mistresses and Their Men (Ebury Press) by Matthew Benns and Terry Smyth. He is saving up this particular reading pleasure for the holidays – or what journalists invariably term a Well-Earned-Break. Or WEB.
However, Hendo did read an excerpt of the Benns/Smyth tome in the Daily Telegraph on 1 November 2014 – and was particularly struck by the following comment:
Prime Minister Ben Chifley, who was married to loyal wife Elizabeth, spent his time in Canberra living away from the Lodge at the Hotel Kurrajong, where his private secretary Phyllis Donnelly also happened to live. It turned out the busy PM, who died of a heart attack with Phyllis in the Kurrajong in 1951, was also seeing his mistress’s sister, Nell, who he had set up in a house in Bathurst.
Interesting. According to David Day, and passed on by the authors of Mistress, busy Ben Chifley was having it off not only with Miss Phyllis Donnelly but also with her sister Miss Nell Donnelly. How do we know this?
Er, we don’t – actually. It seems that the source for this assertion is in David Day’s biography Chifley (HarperCollins, 2001). Day had no evidence of any kind that Chif had a sexual relationship with Nell Donnelly beyond that ubiquitous source. You know, Mr and Mrs Rumour.
Here are some examples of Dr Day’s evidence on these matters:
As for Chifley, his schedule during early January included a rushed trip to Melbourne to attend the swearing-in of the acting governor-general and visits to Bathurst, Canberra and Sydney. He may have taken the opportunity while in Sydney to spend some time with Nell, which in turn may have prompted Phyllis’s sudden and ultimately short-lived marriage.
Well he may have. Or he may not have. The truth is that David Day doesn’t have a clue.
…on 29 November [1950], the National Advocate reported that Chifley sustained the first [heart] attack while on his way home after a visit to his office in William Street…. Another newspaper report had him spending four hours in the car waiting to regain his strength. The differing reports may have been an attempt to cover the fact that he was really visiting Nell Donnelly, in which company he was frequently to be found on these weekends back in Bathurst.
Well, this may have been the case. Or perhaps not. David Day does not have any evidence of any kind to support his assertion. In short, David Day has no evidence that Ben Chifley had an affair with anyone. He just reported rumour. Can you bear it?
While on the topic of Dr Day, as avid MWD readers will be aware, Dr Day declared on 7 August 2014 that he was “flat out like a lizard drinking”. Too busy, apparently, to provide evidence to support the claim in his 1986 book Menzies & Churchill at War that in 1941 there was a serious move in Britain to replace Winston Churchill as prime minister with Australia’s very own Robert Menzies. Moreover, Day asserted that Menzies wanted to become British prime minister and went along with the proposal in the hope of taking over at 10 Downing Street.
David Day made his academic reputation on the basis of Menzies & Churchill at War. The only problem is that there is no evidence for this assertion about Menzies and Churchill.
On 4 August 2014, Gerard Henderson wrote to David Day asking him to provide the name of one biographer of Churchill or one serious historian of Britain in the 20th Century who wrote or said that there was a move to replace Churchill with Menzies in 1941. Hendo also asked Dr Day to provide any source to support his claim that Menzies encouraged such a proposal.
Alas, David Day declared that he was too busy to provide even one source for each of his assertions. Even though he has been banging on about this issue for nearly three decades.
Here’s the “Waiting for David” Scoreboard
[table id=22 /]
We’ll keep you posted. But don’t hold your breath. David Day had no evidence to support his assertion that Ben Chifley was in a sexual relationship with Nell Donnelly in the 1940s. Likewise David Day has no evidence that there was a serious proposal to junk the oh-so-British Winston Churchill in 1941 and replace him with a chap from the colonies named Menzies. But your man Day is an historian who can get by without such tedious matters as facts and evidence.
In the meantime here’s a helpful illustration of the Hendo v Day historical context:
And here’s a reminder of David (“I’m just too busy to provide evidence”) Day in Flat-Out-Like-A-Lizard-Drinking mode.
● PROFESSOR TRIGGS’ KOO WEE RUP DETOUR CONTINUES
In the Herald-Sun early this month, John Masanauskas reported that the Australian Human Rights Commission has rejected a kind offer from the Koo Wee Rup township committee in rural Victoria to host this year’s taxpayer subsidised HRC Christmas knees-up.
Last year, in defending the decision to hold its end of year party at Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art, AHRC president Professor Gillian Triggs declared that she did not “do things in some sort of shabby way”. The learned professor added: “We don’t want to be in a village hall in Koo Wee Rup just because we haven’t got a lot of money”.
Quite so. Why should the likes of Professor Triggs and Dr Tim (“I write books free of evidence”) Soutphommasane have to mix with the hoi polloi at Koo We Rup when they can clink champagne glasses on the edge of Sydney Harbour while expressing concern for the down-and-out? But it’s good to hear that the Herald-Sun has reported the HRC’s disinclination to party as the masses do.
John Masanauskas – Five Paws
● LONDON DAILY TELEGRAPH NAILS EDWARD SNOWDEN TREACHERY
In the London Daily Telegraph on 11 October 2014, Charles Moore and Tom Whitehead reported on the first print interview given by Sir Iain Lobban – the outgoing director of Britain’s Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ). The GCHQ is the heir of the Bletchley Park codebreakers. Lobban spoke to Moore at the GCHQ office in Cheltenham.
In their story, the Daily Telegraph journalists reported:
Britain’s spies now take three times as long to crack terrorist communications thanks to the Edward Snowden leaks of GCHQ techniques. Experts at the intelligence agency need up to six weeks to “deliver the magic” when tasked with tracking and monitoring targets, the Telegraph can disclose.
The scale of the damage caused by the leaks from the former CIA contractor, and published in The Guardian, was revealed as GCHQ Director Sir Iain Lobban gave his first print interview….Mr Snowden stole tens of thousands of files from systems at the US National Security Agency last year from which the techniques and methods of it and GCHQ were exposed in a series of articles.
The leaks sparked widespread criticism including warnings from David Cameron, the Prime Minister, and Theresa May, the Home Secretary, that they had made the country less safe. In the wake of the scandal, Sir John Sawers, Chief of MI6, said Britain’s enemies would be “rubbing their hands with glee” while Sir Iain warned there was already evidence that terrorists had reacted to the disclosures and begun changing their tactics.
One of the men responsible for helping develop the technology to crack terrorist communications at GCHQ’s Cheltenham base revealed their work has now got harder. The expert, known only as Simon, said before Snowden it took him a fortnight to ‘deliver the magic’. Now it takes six weeks. Another said it had “made my job 1000 times more difficult”.
Charles Moore & Tom Whitehead: Five Paws
This overwhelmingly popular segment of Media Watch Dog usually works like this. Someone or other thinks it would be a you-beaut idea to write to Nancy’s (male) co-owner about something or other. And Hendo, being a courteous and well-brought up kind of guy, replies. Then, hey presto, the correspondence is published in MWD – much to the delight of its hundreds of thousands of readers.
There are occasions, however, when Nancy’s (male) co-owner decides to write a polite note to someone or other – who, in turn, believes that a reply is in order. Publication in MWD invariably follows. There are, alas, some occasions where Hendo sends a polite missive but does not receive the courtesy of a reply. Nevertheless, publication of this one-sided correspondence still takes place. For the record, of course.
As hundreds of thousands of avid readers are aware, The Guardian Australia’s deputy editor Katharine Murphy put out the following tweet on 6 June 2014 at 4.33 pm – when that issue of MWD was “hot off the press”. Here is Ms Murphy’s tweet: “Without in any way wanting to breach anyone’s human rights or free speech – why do people write emails to Gerard Henderson?” It’s a very good question. Thankfully, not everyone follows Katharine Murphy’s wise counsel.
KRISTINA KENEALLY – ON WHY IT’S OKAY TO BOORISHLY BOO TONY ABBOTT BUT NOT OKAY TO COURTEOUSLY CRITICISE THE LATE GOUGH WHITLAM
Gerard Henderson to Kristina Keneally – 13 November 2014
Dear Kristina
I watched Keneally & Cameron last Friday. Wouldn’t miss it for quids. It’s the best (faux) Irish versus (faux) Scottish match-up since Celtic last played Rangers.
At the start of the 4 pm program, I noticed that you bagged me – and one other – for criticising Gough Whitlam at the time of his death. You made the following comment in the context of a discussion on the booing of Tony Abbott as he entered the State Memorial Service at the Sydney Town Hall on 5 November 2014, viz:..
Can I say this Ross? There’s also a category of people who include the likes of Gerard Henderson and Andrew Bolt – who decided within hours of Mr Whitlam’s death that they would take to the airwaves to describe all of his failures and all of his shortcomings, never mind the fact that there was a family and indeed friends in mourning. So you know, not everyone on the left [and] not everyone on the right is sinless on this one.
Certainly I made some criticisms of Gough Whitlam when he died – but only about his government’s policies. I made no personal criticisms. My approach was no different from when B.A. Santamaria died in February 1998. I made some policy criticisms of the late Bob Santamaria but proffered no personal criticisms.
I fail to see what is wrong about talking frankly about the recently departed. After all, Mr Whitlam was a public figure who did not flinch from criticising others, including the dead.
In fact, I said very little. I responded to an invitation from ABC Radio in Brisbane to comment on Gough Whitlam’s government. As I recall, I described the Whitlam Government as “dysfunctional”. An identical criticism was made by former Hawke government minister Gareth Evans on ABC Radio 702’s “Mornings with Linda Mottram” the same morning. It seems you are disturbed about what I said of the late Gough Whitlam in Brisbane – but not about what Gareth Evans said about the late Gough Whitlam in Sydney. Fancy that.
On the day after Mr Whitlam’s death, I put out a special issue of my Media Watch Dog blog. This was aimed at documenting some of the howlers which were running without correction – particularly on the ABC. Including the ridiculous comment that Gough Whitlam gave women the vote in Australia.
I seem to recall that some Labor figures criticised former governor-general Sir John Kerr when he died in 1991. Likewise when Bob Santamaria died in 1998. Moreover, Paul Keating launched a vitriolic personal attack when Paddy McGuinness died in January 2008. I do not recall anyone associated with the Labor Party – yourself included – suggesting that Paul Keating should not have said what he in fact said about Paddy McGuinness.
I note that on Sky News last Friday you supported the booing of the Prime Minister at the Whitlam Memorial Service – you declared that it was “a spectacle, an event”. I doubt that you would have held this position if right-wing types booed Labor luminaries who attended the Neville Wran Memorial Service earlier this year. Fortunately, no such “spectacle” occurred.
Keep morale high.
Best wishes
Gerard Henderson
[MWD will keep its avid readers informed if Ms Keneally responds to this correspondence. I certainly hope so. Otherwise it might appear that Katharine Murphy’s advice is being heeded. That, surely, would be a shame – Ed].
Until next time – keep morale high.
“Oh Gerard. You total clown.”
– Jonathan (“Proudly the ABC’s Sneerer-in-Chief”) Green on Twitter, Friday 3 October 2014, 4.31 pm [Mr Green must be an obsessive avid reader to respond so soon. – Ed]
“Good morning. All the gooder for being attacked (for thousandth time) by silly Gerard in the Oz”
– Phillip Adams via Twitter, 27 September 2014
“What troubles me most is that he [Gerard Henderson] shows such low journalistic standards, yet he is politically quite influential. He is often on Insiders. It’s hard to see why: he comes across as a crank.”
– Kate Durham as told to Crikey, 16 September 2014
“The unhinged but well spoken Gerard Henderson….”
– Bob Ellis, Table Talk blog, 10 August 2014
“Gerard Henderson and Nancy are awful human beings.”
– Alexander White, Twitter, 25 July 2014
“This is my regularly scheduled “Oh Gerard” tweet for every time he appears on #insiders”
– Josh Taylor, senior journalist for ZDNet, Twitter, 20 July 2014
“…that fu-kwitted Gerard “Gollum” Henderson….”
– Mike (“I’ll pour the gin”) Carlton, via Twitter, 12 July 2014
“[Gerard Henderson is a] silly prick”
– Mike (“I’ll pour the gin”) Carlton – tweeted Saturday 27 June 2014 at 4.15 pm, i.e. after lunch
“If Gerard Henderson had run Beria’s public relations Stalin’s death would have been hidden for a year and Nikita [Khrushchev] and co would have been shot”
– Laurie Ferguson via Twitter – 22 June 2014 [By-line: Mr Ferguson is a member of the House of Representatives who speaks in riddles.]
“[Gerard Henderson] is the Eeyore of Australian public life”
– Mike Seccombe in The [Boring] Saturday Paper – 21 June 2014
“Without in any way wanting to breach anyone’s human rights or free speech – why do people write emails to Gerard Henderson?”
– Katharine Murphy, Twitter, Friday 6 June 2014
“[Gerard Henderson is] an unhinged prick”
– Mike Carlton, Twitter, Thursday 12 June 2014
“There’s no sense that Gerard Henderson has any literary credentials at all.”
– Anonymous comment quoted, highlighted and presumably endorsed by Jason (“I’m a left-leaning luvvie”) Steger, The Age, 31 May 2014
On boyfriend’s insistence, watching the notorious Gerard Henderson/@Kate_McClymont Lateline segment. GH: What an odd, angry gnome of a man.
– Benjamin Law, via Twitter, Thursday 17 Apr 2014, 11:21 pm
Can’t believe I just spent my Thursday evening with a video recap of Gerard Henderson. I’m a f-cking moron.
– Benjamin Law, via Twitter, Thursday 17 Apr 2014, 11:23 pm
“[Gerard Henderson is an] unhinged crank”
– Mike Carlton, via Twitter, Saturday 29 March 2014, 4.34 pm
Complete stranger comes up to me: that Gerard Henderson’s a xxxxxx.
– Jonathan Green via Twitter, 8 February 2014
“[Gerard Henderson is] a sclerotic warhorse, unhelpful to debate, unwilling to think…a wonderful study in delusion…ideologically-constipated.”
– Erik Jensen, editor of Morry Schwartz’s The Saturday Paper [forthcoming], 23 November 2013
“The last time Gerard Henderson smiled was in 1978, when he saw a university student being mauled by a pitbull.”
– Ben Pobjie, via Twitter, 13 October 2013 [Editor’s Note: Mr “Why Can’t I Score an
Invite on Q&A?” Pobjie is wrong. In fact, the year was 1977 and the dog was a blue-heeler – like Nancy]
“I think Henderson is seriously ill. There’s enough there for an entire convention of psychiatrists.”
– Mike (“I’ll pour the gin”) Carlton (after Pre-Dinner Drinks tweet to Jeff Sparrow), 8 October 2013
“Wrong, you got caught out, off to Gerard Henderson’s Media Watch Dog for you!”
– Tim Wilson tweet to Jonathan Green and Virginia Trioli, 8 October 2013.
“Nancy as ever will be the judge”
– Jonathan Green to Tim Wilson and Virginia Trioli (conceding to the arbitral authority of Nancy), 8 October 2013
[Gerard Henderson’s analysis of the ABC] is absolutely simplistic.”
– ABC managing director Mark Scott talking to ABC presenter Jonathan Green on ABC Radio National Drive, 2 May 2013.
“Oh my God; you’re as bad as Gerard Henderson.”
– Dr Peter Van Onselen (for a doctor he is), The Contrarians, Sky News, 20 September 2013.
“The nation mourns Gerard Henderson. He’s in perfect health.”
– Phillip Adams, via Twitter, 2 July 2013 (favourited by Virginia Trioli)
“Old Australian saying. ‘He wouldn’t know a tram was up him unless the bell rang’. Wholly appropriate to Gerard Henderson”
– Phillip Adams, via Twitter, 7 May 2013
“I said publicly once that I thought that Gerard’s views on the ABC came not from his brain but from his spinal cord”
– Tim Bowden as told to Phillip (“I was a teenage Stalinist”) Adams, Late Night Live, 11 June 2013 – Queen’s Birthday Public Holiday.
“Gerard Henderson is a crank”
– David Marr at the 2013 Sydney Writers’ Festival (as reported by Mike Carlton)
“The great Australian media nutter Gerard [Henderson is an] ungrateful bastard”.
– Mark Latham, Q&A, 10 June 2013.
“[Gerard Henderson] is a moral dwarf …Gerard, pull your head in”
– Professor Sinclair Davidson, 24 April 2013.
“[Henderson] You are mad. In the 18th century you would have been caged, with the mob invited to poke you with sticks.”
– Mike Carlton, 5.23 pm (Gin & Tonic Time) 25 March 2013
“I like to think of Gerard [Henderson] as the Inspector Clouseau of forensic journalism”
– David Marr, ABC News 24 The Drum, 21 March 2013.
“[Media Watch Dog is] not a moan, more of a miserable dribble”
– Peter Munro, 21 March 2013
“You are a fool, Henderson, a malicious and mendacious piece of shit… Now F_ck off”
– Mike Carlton, 11 March 2013 (Hangover Time).
“[Gerard Henderson is] an internet pest”
– Dr (for a doctor he is) Jeff Sparrow, 26 February 2013.
Jonathan Green: “Nancy, will be taking notes, I suspect”
Michael Rowland: “Nancy…yes. We’ll get a nice write-up on Friday. Good morning as well, Gerard. Thanks for watching, by the way.”
– ABC 1 News Breakfast, 18 October 2012
“Gerard [Henderson] is a complete f-ckwit”
– Malcolm Farr, via Twitter, 29 June 2012 (circa pre-dinner drinks)
“What a haughty flapping half-arsed buffoon he [Henderson] is”
– Bob Ellis on his Table Talk blog, 8 May 2012 (before breakfast)
“We’d better be careful what we say, just in case Gerard’s offsider pooch Nancy is keeping an eye on us for his delightfully earnest Media Watch Dog”
– Tom Cowie of The Power Index, Crikey 20 January 2012
“Henderson…What a pompous, pretentious turd you are.”
– Mike Carlton, Saturday 13 August 2011 (after lunch)
“Go to the Sydney Institute Media Watch Dog website to marvel at [its] work”
– Mark Latham The Spectator Australia 11 June 2011.
Media Watch Dog – “disgraceful”, “sick”
– Professor Robert Manne, April Fool’s Day 2011.
“Before going further can you write to confirm that these emails are private correspondence and not for publication”
– ABC News Radio’s Marius Benson, 11 March 2011. He did go further – see MWD Issue 86.
“I realise this makes me practically retarded, but until five minutes ago I thought Nancy was Gerard Henderson’s wife, not his dog.”
– Byronbache via Twitter, Monday 7 February 2011
“Gerard Henderson is big enough to take care of himself, but that doesn’t stop us worrying about him from time to time. Lately it’s Hendo’s tendency to self-harm that has us losing sleep. For example, peruse the correspondence he’s published in his latest Media Watch Dog blog… There’s a part of us that just wants to ask: “Hendo, are you OK?”
– James Jeffrey’s “Strewth!” column, The Australian, 8 November 2010.
“Media Watch Dog on Fridays…is a sort of popular read in the Crikey office”
– Crikey’s Andrew Crook on ABC 2 News Breakfast, 24 September 2010.