GERARD HENDERSON’S MEDIA WATCH DOG

ISSUE – NO. 709

29 November 2024

* * * *

* * * *

  • NEW ABC MEDIA WATCH  “CZAR” LINTON BESSER DECLINES TO CORRECT A COMRADE’S FAKE NEWS

Media Watch Dog is so excited (to use a cliché) about the fact that ABC journalist Linton Besser is to take over as presenter of ABC TV’s Media Watch in 2025. Ellie’s (male) co-owner can barely wait – to use another cliché.

To get an idea of what your man Besser is like, it’s worth checking out what he had to say on ABC Radio Sydney’s 702’s Drive program with Richard Glover as presenter. The panel comprised your man Besser, Kishor Napier-Raman (Nine Newspaper CBD column) and The Australian’s Sarah Ison.

The date was 7 November – just after the US presidential election. Ms Ison commented on Donald Trump’s victory without antagonism. But Comrades Besser and Napier-Raman weighed in on president-elect Trump and his likely administration.

Let’s go to the transcript when Napier-Raman responded to a gentle question from Besser. The former told the latter that Trump ran “an entirely unserious campaign saying unserious and slightly deranged things”. He then claimed:

The latest rumour coming out of the MAGA-verse is that Trump is considering using these obscure parts of the Constitution, with the collusion of the Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader, to essentially railroad Congress and appoint his picks. So that sort of coheres with his claim to want to be a dictator from day one. Good luck America, I guess.

Richard Glover: Okay, so the question is, will they find a spine? You say, well, they’ll, you know, they’ll, they’ve hidden it well up to now.

Kishor Napier-Raman: They haven’t showed much of one over the last four years.

What a load of absolute tosh – which next year’s ABC Media Watch presenter did not attempt to correct. Trump never said that he wanted to be a dictator from the first day of his administration. This is what the president-elect said at the Fox News Town Hall meeting on 5 December 2023:

Sean Hannity: Under no circumstances, you are promising America tonight, you would never abuse power as retribution against anybody.

Donald Trump: Except for day one.

Sean Hannity: Except for?

Donald Trump: Look he’s going crazy. Except for day one.

Sean Hannity: Meaning?

Donald Trump: I want to close the border. And I want to drill, drill, drill.

[audience begins to applaud]

Sean Hannity: That’s not retribution.

Donald Trump: No, no. I’m going to be, I’m going to be, you know, he keeps, love this guy. He says: “you’re not going to be a dictator are you?”. I said: “No, no no, other than day one”. [audience laughs] We’re closing the borderand we’re drilling, drilling, drilling. After that I’m not a dictator, okay.

Comrade Besser, who recently pledged to protect Australians “against bad behaviour by the press” said nothing to correct Napier-Raman’s fake news. He also refrained from correcting his colleague’s failure to state that JD Vance had taken back his previous critical comments about Trump. In fact, Besser said that he “loved hearing those Vance quotes” and added “they are brilliant and someone should frame them and put them on the wall somewhere”. Without reference to Vance’s correction.

The question is, will your man Besser do better when presenting Media Watch next year? Stay tuned.

  • POST-LUNCH WORD SALADS WITH SOME NAME-DROPPING ON THE SIDE AS KIM WILLIAMS, LA TINGLE AND SBS’s HENDO STAR AT THE NATIONAL PRESS CLUB

Gerard Henderson has written about the substance of ABC Chair Kim Williams’ address last Wednesday to the National Press Club (NPC) in his Weekend Australian column on 30 November.

However, in view of the attention given to Vice-President Kamala Harris’ various word salads in the recent US presidential election campaign, it is significant to note that she has something of a rival Down Under.

Media Watch Dog has mentioned in the past that your man Williams sometimes gives the impression that he has recently swallowed a copy of Roget’s International Thesaurus. You be the judge.

Anna Henderson (SBS) put it to Kim Williams, after quoting George Orwell, that if people do not want to hear news anymore because they are alienated – “what are you going to do about it?”.  The ABC chair replied, quoting H.L. Mencken, and said that he was sceptical “that there’s news avoidance abundantly evident in society”.

But Ms Henderson persisted about alienation and all that.  Your man Williams stuck to his position declaring: “We have been drawing from that reservoir [of human experience] very heavily without replenishing the core material – which is the intelligent and creative vigour of Australia”.  Well, that is clear then, surely? But NPC president Laura Tingle did not think so.  Let’s go to the transcript:

Laura Tingle: Kim, if I may? Does that mean, you know, gets to the point you were making, that Anna makes, about acknowledging that anger that can build up? Is that about acknowledging what has happened in Australia and the Australian economy in the last 30 or 40 years? The sorts of things that we are told have created the sort of resentment in the US which resulted in the election outcome there?

Kim Williams: Well, I think the Mark Mazower observation as to the absence of a single trusted source of information in America is a very significant contributing factor to America which has experienced much greater media fragmentation than any other modern democracy. But I do think it means that the ABC has a very real responsibility to give agency to community in effective ways that actually ensure that views and attitudes, concerns and preoccupations, are ventilated appropriately. Clearly in a sensible, moderated way. And in a way that is about respectful public engagement and conversation. But there are too many in Australia that feel they have no agency.

That’s all very well.  But what does it mean?  And how on God’s earth can there be a “single source of information” in any democratic society?  And how can the ABC give agency to community in effective ways that ensure that the views and attitudes, concerns and preoccupations are ventilated appropriately?  And do you reckon that most Australians would have a clue about what the Henderson/Tingle/Williams trio were on about?  And here’s another question: Can You Bear It?

  • DAVID SPEERS HEARS GREENS’ SENATOR SARAH HANSON-YOUNG’S CLAIM ABOUT MISINFORMATION/ DISINFORMATION WITHOUT ASKING FOR EVIDENCE

The ABC TV Insiders on 24 November was certainly worthy – with Clare Armstrong (The Daily Telegraph), Phil Coorey (Australian Financial Review) and Paul Sakkal (Nine Newspapers) all making sensible and informed comments.  Sure, the panel did lack spark and disagreement. But, then, it was Sunday morning.

Ellie’s (male) co-owner noticed this comment from Insiders presenter David Speers when he was interviewing the Greens Political Party’s Senator Sarah Hanson-Young. [I note that S H-Y is one of many Greens senators with a hyphenated name. – MWD Editor.]

David Speers: Now when it comes to misinformation and disinformation on social media, you’ve acknowledged this is creating serious harm to democracies, public health, public discourse and social cohesion.  Why aren’t you willing to back this bill to tackle misinformation and disinformation?

So, Speersy (as he likes to be called) stated that there is misinformation and disinformation on social media.  But he did not cite even one example of what he had in mind.  Not one.

Then, later on, Senator Hanson-Young declared:  “I don’t think it matters whether it’s Rupert Murdoch or Elon Musk. I don’t think they should be able to promote mis and disinformation.”

The Greens Political Party Senator did not provide any example of either Rupert Murdoch or Elon Musk promoting misinformation or disinformation. Not one. And Comrade Speers did not ask for even one example.  It’s called a soft interview. Which raises the question: Can You Bear It?

NEW SEGMENT: ELLIE’S FUN FACT

Due to enormous demand from avid MWD readers, this new segment has been introduced to cater for the insatiable demand for gossip that afflicts all of us – due to The Fall, of course.

  • THE BATTLE RAGES AT THE NATIONAL PRESS CLUB AS KIM WILLIAMS ACCUSES PHILLIP ADAMS OF ENGAGING IN FICTION

Here’s the exchange which took place between ABC journalist Jacob Greber and ABC chair Kim Williams (who does not get on with MWD fave Phillip Adams) at the National Press Club on Wednesday 27 November:

Jacob Greber: Phillip Adams (I read in The Monthly) backed you when you were just 28 to go for the managing director’s job [at the ABC]. Now that you’ve sort of had your chance to look back through the organisation in the chairman’s role, how do you feel about taking on that job yourself?

Kim Williams: Well Jacob, I’ll give you the first part of the response in the most irritating way for all journalists – what an interesting question [audience laughs]. Phillip Adams never backed me for the role of managing director of the ABC. This is part of the continuing fiction that is Phillip Adams [some audience laughter]. I certainly did apply for the job of managing director of the ABC when I was 30. And on the rebound from the application, when I was 30, I was appointed as the chief executive at the Australian Film Commission by Phillip Adams. And by Phillip Adams’ board at that time. [Kim Williams went on to deny he would now accept the job of ABC managing director.]

In fact, Martin McKenzie-Murray’s profile in the March 2024 issue of The Monthly does not state that Adams supported Williams’ application to become ABC managing director in the distant past.  Here’s what McKenzie-Murray [why do so many lefties have hyphenated names? that used to be the preserve of the upper-class. – MWD Editor] had to say in The Monthly:

At the age of just 28, Williams applied for the role of managing director of the ABC. Apparently, his interview was impressive, but the board felt his youth disqualified him. He was recommended to Phillip Adams, who had helped establish the Australian Film Commission. Adams hired Williams as its chief executive, but relations between the two men soured quickly. Adams thought him “extremely bright” but also devious and sycophantic. “I prefer Kim Jong Un to Kim Williams,” the veteran ABC broadcaster tells me. “He’s not a team builder, he’s a team wrecker.”

So, there you have it.  Kim Williams accused Phillip Adams of engaging in continuing fiction with respect to him and his ABC job application – but Comrade Adams had not made the claim. A fun-fact, to be sure.

A TIM MINCHIN MOMENT

  • IN WHICH DOCTOR (MULTIPLIED BY 3) MINCHIN RECYCLES THREE SPEECHES INTO A NON-BOOK BOOK PRICED AT ALMOST $40

It was at Gin & Tonic Time on Friday 22 November that Ellie’s (male) co-owner read the review in Private Eye of Tim Minchin’s most recent book You Don’t Have to Have a Dream (Ebury Press, £ 16.99).  Media Watch Dog  advises that the latest Minchin tome is published in Australia by Penguin and released recently at $36.99.  Gerard Henderson purchased a copy at Melbourne’s Hill of Content Bookshop on Saturday 23 November.  He read it at Gin & Tonic time the following day. It did not take long.

You Don’t Have to Have a Dream runs for 127 pages.  But only 103 pages contain text and some contain as few as 3 words invariably in large font.  Indeed only 88 pages contain more than 8 words.

In explaining the birth of this book, Private Eye’s anonymous reviewer put it this way:

“I used to take my morning thoughts far too seriously, but I’ve realised I just need to get coffee and breakfast inside me,” wrote Tim Minchin in his Sunday Times ‘Life in the Day’ [column]. In this new book there’s a risk that not only is he taking his thoughts too seriously, but so are his sycophantic publishers….

Ebury Press: “Give us something for the fans, Tim – anything.”

Tim Minchin: “I’ve got these three speeches I gave when I was awarded honorary degrees, which have been available free of charge on YouTube for up to 10 years. Would they do?”

Ebury Press: “Sure! £16.99, KERCHING.”

And, so it came to pass.  Dr Minchin (for a doctor he became – see page 6) provided his publisher with the text of three speeches he had given when presented with honorary doctorates at various tertiary institutions. In order of publication they are “Nine Life Lessons” (University of Western Australia, 2013), “The Trick” (The Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts, 2019) and “You’ve Always Wanted to be an Actor” (Mountain View Academy of Theatre Arts, London, 2015).

Each chapter contains an introduction and the text commences with a prologue.

Let’s look at Comrade Minchin’s view of Comrade Minchin – at the risk of giving narcissism a bad name (as the saying goes – or went).

Prologue

Early on, The Minch states that he is proud of what he terms his pseudoctorates: and declares:

In fact, I have accepted three of them, so – although both my father and his father before him were surgeons – I am indisputably the greatest Dr Minchin ever.  And because I understand that greatness comes with responsibility, I offer you this pledge: if we’re on a plane together and you have a heart attack and the crew call for a doctor, I shall leap to your aid. At the very least, I can pitch you a few options for whimsical dying words.

By the way, this is a “joke”.  The Prologue ends not with a bang but, rather, with a lavatory “joke”.  Here we go:

A part of me was concerned that these addresses wouldn’t work in text, stripped as they are of my carefully honed rhetorical flourishlessness. But so many people over the years have told me that they’ve printed bits of them out, or have phrases written on sticky notes above their desks or quote them in their classrooms and lecture halls.  So I’m thrilled there’s now an artefact:  a tightly bound version of me  you can keep by the loo.  Right where I belong.

Nine Life Lessons – 2013

The introduction commences with The Minch telling readers that he was 20 years of age when he “skulked out of” the University of Western Australia “with a lukewarm Bachelor of Arts”.  He continued:

I wrote a speech that came to be known as “Nine Life Lessons” in the forty-eight hours before I was to be presented with an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Letters at UWA in 2013. By then, I was thirty-eight, a full five years older than Jesus managed, so I felt more than qualified to mount the mount and sermonise a bit.  I can’t remember if I knew someone was taping it, but if I’d known it was going to be viewed a couple of hundred million times, I might have thought about it a bit more. Which is probably a pretty good argument for not thinking about shit too much.

So, there you are. Readers who get to Page 10 learn that The Minch is comparing himself with Jesus Christ. Jesus – as the saying goes. As to the claim that his speech has been viewed “a couple of hundred million times” – well this could be the Saviour Minchin’s Loaves & Fishes moment.

Comrade Minchin’s 2013 UWA address commences at page 14.  By Page 16, the author comments that he has “an inflated sense of self-importance”. You don’t say – as the saying goes.  Here are some of The Minch’s profound thoughts as told to UWA graduates a decade or so ago:

– “Happiness is like an orgasm: if you think about it too much it goes away.” [Thank you Dr M – MWD Editor.]

– “A famous bon mot asserts that opinions are like arseholes, in that everyone has one.” Quelle Surprise!

– “Life is meaningless.”

– “There is only one sensible thing to do with this empty existence, and that is fill it. (Not fillet. Fill. It.)”  Groan.

The Trick – 2019

In his introduction, The Minch  opines “it’s easy to be selfless and gregarious when things are going well, but…kindness is most valuable when the shit hits the fan.”

The learned (honorary) doctor’s obsession with human waste continues with this reflection: “We carry our shit.  And if we’re lucky enough to be artists, we can use our own shit as fertiliser. Maybe growing something beautiful”.  [Or maybe not.  MWD Editor.]

Here the musician Minchin confesses “I never learnt to read music.  I don’t know whose failure that is”. [Perhaps it’s The Minch’s own failure. – MWD  Editor.]

At Page 79, The Minch ‘fesses up to using platitudes and clichés. After this wisdom he tells readers (if readers there still are) that to be successful “you have to be really, really good at what you do”. Really.

Then there is more self-congratulation:

I am the best in the world at what I do without a doubt, and I can say that confidently because the number of people I am competing with is zero. The thing I am best in the world at is being a science-obsessed uber-rhymey polemicist pianist singer-satirist wanker. I am really, really good at that job.  I am the king of Minchinland, population: this idiot.  So be really, really good at what you do, and figuring out what that is also takes hours and hours and hours. I’m sorry.

Groan again. The Minch is “sorry”. For what?  He does not say.  Then he tells everyone to BE KIND.

You’ve Always Wanted To Be An Actor – 2015

In this introduction, The Minch declares “I remain a dyed-in-the-wool anti-romantic romantic”. Clever eh?  But what does it mean?

And then the speech ends with – wait for it – a “Lots of Love” message.  And that’s your $36.99 product.

What’s Missing from the Minch’s Non-Book Book

What’s interesting about Tim Minchin’s new book is what he didn’t write.  Here are a few reminders:

The Minchin speeches in You Don’t Have to Have a Dream were delivered in 2013, 2019 and 2015 respectively.  It is notable that the actor/writer/singer/songwriter makes no mention of his 2010 Pope Song. Which raises this issue.  Question: What do you call a singer/songwriter who drops the “F” bomb on 84 occasions in a 406-word song?  Answer:  An angry person with a limited vocabulary.

The Pope Song was a rant against Pope Benedict XVI who was born Joseph Ratzinger. Here’s how it commenced:

F**k the motherf**ker, f**k the

motherf**ker
F**k the motherf**ker, he’s a

f**king motherf**ker f**k the motherf**ker, f**k the

f**king f**ker

F**k the motherf**ker, he’s a total

f**king f**ker

F**k the motherf**ker, f**k the

motherf**ker

F**k the motherf**ker, f**king

f**k the motherf**ker

F**k the motherf**ker,

f**k the motherf**king pope

There is also reference to Benedict XVI as a “motherf**king papist” – which sounds like an anti-Catholic sectarian sneer, don’t you think?  By the way, in the Pope Song The Minch declares that his swearing was “forced” on him by the “motherf**ker” Benedict XVI. Convenient, eh?  By the way, Minchin’s back catalogue suggests that he believes that only the Catholic Church contains – or rather, contained – clerical pedophiles.

Nor does Minchin make reference in You Don’t Have to Have a Dream to his 2016 song Come Home (Cardinal Pell) which was taken up by Network Ten’s The Project and, shown on ABC TV programs and placed on the ABC website.  It included the following words:

I mean with all respect dude, I think you’re scum

And I reckon you should

Come home, Cardinal Pell

(Cardinal Pell)

I know you’re not feeling well….

The Minchin autobiography (of sorts) could have contained a footnote that, in a unanimous judgment, the High Court of Australia quashed Cardinal Pell’s five convictions for historical child sexual abuse – since it found that Pell could not have been at the scene of the alleged crime.  Nor does Minchin mention that the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse failed to produce any documentary or witness evidence that George Pell had covered up child sexual abuse.  Its hostile findings against Pell were not supported by evidence but, rather, based on assumptions.

As pointed out in Media Watch Dog on 20 September 2024, in the Good Weekend Talks  podcast on 14 September Minchin said that he had worked with people at the Royal Commission to write Come Home (Cardinal) Pell. He now conceded that “we should be very, very careful with public shaming as a rule”.

Moreover, at Page 38 of You Don’t Have to Have a Dream, Minchin lectures students in 2013 that they should “identify your biases, your prejudices, your privileges”. And at Page 48 he condemns “people whose whole idea of being part of a sub-culture is to hate”. Except for Cardinal Pell, it would seem, in 2016.

The Minchin Platitudes Do Not Work Well on the Written Page

Without question, Tim Minchin is a brilliant performer. So, his performances – when obtaining honorary degrees – were, no doubt, a work of art.  But they do not present so well on the page where platitudes have to stand alone without comedic performance – selling at $37 a pop.

As avid Media Watch Dog readers are aware, this occasional segment is inspired by the Irish humourist Brian O’Nolan (1911-1966) – nom de plume Flann O’Brien – and, in particular, his critique of the sometimes incoherent poet Ezra Pound. By the way, your man O’Brien also had the good sense not to take seriously Eamon de Valera (1882-1975), the Fianna Fail politician and dreadful bore who was prime minister and later president of Ireland for far too long.

The Flann O’Brien Gong for Literary or Verbal Sludge is devoted to outing bad writing or incomprehensible prose or incoherent oral expression or the use of pretentious words – or a combination of all of the above.

  • BRIONY SCOTT TALKS TO FITZ, ACTUALLY

Media Watch Dog fave Peter (“I wore a red rag on my head for a decade until it had to go to the dry cleaner where it was lost”) FitzSimons is still writing his “5 Minutes with Peter FitzSimons” column in Sydney’s Sun-Herald every Sunday.  As MWD recalls, the column was once called “5 Minutes with Fitz”.

The Red Bandannaed One’s style of interview is to suck-up to his interviewee in the hope that he can obtain enough material to fill his allocated words.  Thanks to the avid reader who drew MWD’s attention to the Sun-Herald on 17 November where Fitz interviewed Dr Briony Scott. The article was titled “The surprising sex talk given by Sydney’s most respected principal”. Here’s how the piece commenced:

Fitz: Dr Briony Scott will soon end a 14-year stint as principal of Wenona, one of Sydney’s best-known private schools for girls. I spoke to her on Thursday. Thanks so much for your time and trust, Briony.

Briony Scott: A pleasure, but can you tell me the point of why you want to talk to me?

Fitz: You are a famous educator in Sydney, who has played a part in raising 10,000 or so young people. And what I really want to try and capture, frankly – after also trying to work out why you’re suddenly leaving Wenona at the height of your powers – is your wisdom in educating and raising young ’uns.

BS [laughing]: That’s kind. I am not sure I can live up to what you’ve just said, but go on.

Fitz: So … “goodbye, Mrs Chips”. How are you feeling as you approach the end of a glorious 40-year career in education?

How’s that for a suck-up?  By the way,  Ellie’s (male) co-owner remembers when there were headmasters and headmistresses. In any event, Dr Scott (for a  doctor she is) soon threw the switch to verbal sludge. Let’s go to the transcript:

Fitz: Do you mean that in the age of Trump, we need all hands on the pump?

BS: No. We can’t blame it on one person. But yes, right now we need all adults on deck, the ones who aren’t going to swing punches either physically or metaphorically, the ones who are able to engage in complexity and talk without getting flamboyant and demonstrative and just rude, you know? It’s a time for all the adults in the room to go: actually, this is how we’re going to talk to each other, this is how we’re going to move forward. And so I’m not sure that now is the time for people to step back from that.

Terrific, eh?  Dr Scott’s response embraces such clichés as “all adults on the deck”, “swing punches”, “adults in the room”, “moving forward”, “step back”, “actually” and so on.  Which raises the point: How can one be both on the deck and in the room while not stepping back from moving forward?

LITERARY CRITICISM

By Flann O’Brien

of Ezra Pound

My grasp of what he wrote and meant

Was only five or six %

The rest was only words and sound –

My reference is to Ezra £

* * * *

LITERARY CRITICISM

By Ellie of Briony Scott

My grasp of what she said or meant

Was only four or five per cent

All that “adults in the room” rot

The reference is to Mistress Scott

DOCUMENTATION

  •  FROM “AUSTRALIA’S MOST TRUSTED DOCTOR” TO ONLY ONE OF THE SAME – NORMAN SWAN’s COVID JOURNEY ANALYSED

There was enormous interest in the revelation in last week’s Media Watch Dog that Dr Norman Swan (who has not practised medicine for around four decades) no longer presents as  “Australia’s most trusted doctor”.  Alas, he has now downgraded himself to the status of “one of Australia’s most trusted doctors”. What’s next? – Ellie’s (male) co-owner wonders.

As promised in last week’s issue, here is the evidence of MWD’s assertion that Norman Swan made lotsa howlers when reporting on COVID-19 for the ABC and in his various comments covered in the media.

While Norman Swan has been a fixture of the ABC for decades, he became particularly well-known during the COVID pandemic, as the ABC’s lead voice covering the disease. Prior to this, Swan was perhaps best known for his stint as the resident doctor on Network Ten’s controversial reality weight loss show The Biggest Loser Australia. While leading the ABC’s COVID coverage, Swan made several false predictions and errors, here is a brief history of some of his blunders:

  • One of Swan’s earliest missteps came on 21 March 2020, when he tweeted that Australia was 14-20 days behind Italy in terms of the spread of COVID. He used what he described as “primary school maths” to predict that Australia would have 7,000-8,000 total cases by the following weekend. In reality, the number of cases was much lower, closer to half of what he had predicted. When this error was raised with Swan later, he made excuses rather than own up to the mistake.
  • Later, in December 2020, Dr. Swan expressed strong concerns about the NSW Coalition government’s handling of the COVID outbreak on Sydney’s Northern Beaches. On 21 December, during a segment on ABC TV’s News Breakfast, he criticised the Berejiklian Coalition government for not imposing a mask mandate during the Northern Beaches lockdown and called for a citywide lockdown. Swan warned that, without strict measures, Christmas 2020 could become a super-spreader event. The Berejiklian government ignored his warnings – and the Northern Beaches lockdown ended on 9 January 2021 with only around 150 cases recorded.
  • On 30 December 2020, Swan suggested that the AstraZeneca vaccine might be a “second-rate” option. On 23 May 2021, he admitted in an interview with The Sydney Morning Herald that his reporting on AstraZeneca had likely played a role in fostering vaccine hesitancy. Nevertheless, on 17 June 2021, when he appeared on ABC Radio Melbourne, Swan expressed regret after a woman died from rare AstraZeneca complications, claiming that she may have been inspired to take the vaccine after seeing Swan receive it on ABC TV. He also speculated that AstraZeneca vaccine may have been taken off the market under normal circumstances.
  • On 3 July 2021, Swan warned on Twitter that, without vaccinating children under 12, COVID would soon become “a childhood disease” and “not a trivial one.” Just a month later, on 3 August, he claimed on News Breakfast that the residents of New South Wales were being used as “guinea pigs” in an untested strategy of vaccinating to slow the outbreak. Dr. Nick Coatsworth, former Deputy Chief Medical Officer, publicly corrected Swan, pointing out that the strategy of using vaccinations to control epidemics was a well-established approach.
  • Dr. Swan’s missteps continued into 2022. On 15 November, he appeared on News Breakfast and, without evidence, attributed the deaths of Labor Senator Kimberley Kitching and Australian cricketer Shane Warne to COVID. Both deaths had no connection to the virus. After facing backlash, he later apologised to the families of both individuals.

Say no more.  [I won’t. MWD Editor]

 

* * * *

Until Next Time.

* * * *