Tim Blair

I wonder how Adele would react if even a fraction of the skepticism she defends were pointed in the opposite direction. For example, what if Max Uechtritz had called environmentalists "lying bastards"...

State-funded "news" networks have always been havens for those who couldn't survive in a competitive marketplace.

More proof that the ABC has a small audience. Intellectual climate, what a joke.

There are 12 private cable channels in the US that enhance our nation’s "intellectual climate". These channels are available all over America. All are much better than our public station-PBS.

What a pretentious, adolscent twat!

If she thinks none of our channels are enhancing the intellectual climate, she obviously hasn't watched the Cartoon Network...

Intellectual Climate Forecast: Overcast all day, with a 95% chance of hot, dry, blustery winds blowing from some kook.

I'd write more, but SpongeBob Squarepants is on.

Your pal,

bob

So little timmie thinks we'd be better off without the ABC .For starters it's the training gound for most of the Australian media .It sets standards which the rest of the media can't completely ignore.
Yes like the banking system will be better with the COmmonwealth bank privatised .

C'mon Peter Weatherall ,

is he really saying that ? I live in hong kong and I rely on the Sattelite feed of the ABC's news reports to keep up to date with what is happening in Australia and the asian region.

I need the news to be reported. I dont need any 'slant' put on the story. In short if I want to hear what the chattering classes think , I'll read the SMH.

Jeez Peter Weatherall, maybe it was your training gound .

"It sets standards which [sic] the rest of the media can't completely ignore."

Gee, maybe that's the problem. If the ABC were private, the rest of the media *could* ignore it's bias and mediocrity.

Mr. Weatherall does not seem to have had his intellect sufficiently enhanced, if his, er, "creative" punctuation and grammar are any indication. It makes me glad I don't have to suffer that sort of "intellectual enhancement."

By the way, we do have access to the BBC here, or a version of it called "BBC America," which is offered through a lot of cable companies. It mostly seems to offer reruns of British tv series (such as that one where they redo a hideously-decorated house, rendering it hideously but differently redecorated, and that old Father Ted show) interspersed with news reports that we already caught on the internet the day before. It's stimulating, though not of the intellect.

It's plain to see that those who whinge and complain about the ABC are those who don't watch/listen to it's content. Their intelligence quotients are so severely lacking, a good dose of Aunty might be just the ticket ;)

And those who DO watch/listen to the ABC don't know the purpose of a possessive apostrophe.

I used to defend the ABC against accusations of bias - not any more.
Their reporting of GW II caused me to have a temporary nervous breakdown, everything they said was wrong, misleading or grotesquely inappropriate.
If the ABC had reported WW II, Hitler and Tojo would have won in a canter.
Horin forgot to mention NPR, which has some guy with a golden voice on it and actually treats right wing intellectuals with non-contempt.
Personally I prefer monster truck derbies.

Tim, you must know Norman Hanscombe :) One arsehole to another.

Your point Andrea ? ,apart from how not to write a very long sentence

Multiculturalism is not a sign of intelligence, any more than Marxism is. People who fashion themselves intellectuals often proclaim multiculturalism (and Marxism), but self-proclaimed intellectuals frequently turn out to be as intellectual as Iranian clergy (and significantly less tolerant of conflicting opinions).

Her point, Peter, is that it is rather amusing for someone who can't construct a standard Enlgish sentence to lecture the rest of us on our substandard "intellectual climate."

Many thanks for the chuckle I got when you botched your punctuation and grammar in your second post as well.

There are a lot of qualities that come to mind when I think of Australia and Australians -- outgoing, friendly, optimistic. Oddly "intellectual" isn't generally one of them.

Professor Bunyip excepted, of course.

To: T. Hartin and Andrea , both of your have botched grammar and you , T.Martin , have botched logic .
I personally don't worry too much about grammar as should be evident, I am more worried about people's logic . Where in my previous statement have I lectured about the ( unneccesary quotes ) " intellectual climate " ? I am concerned about gratuitous attacks on the ABC The ABC is one of the sources of relatively unbiased opinion in Australia
Sometimes I don't agree with them .. but I don't run squealing off to some half-assed politician

One of the best news and current affairs programmes screened in Australia is the business funded Jim Leherer News Hours , screened on SBS Monday to Fraday 5.00p.m.

What makes it so good: it brings in often men and women with high level expereince in various fields and in bringing rigour to comment an debate, also runs reasonably good debates: participants have to defend their statements against participants who disagree, even espouse a contrary position.It is afr more effective and illuminating than the crap ABC spews out each night.

Next, 3mbs is a classical fm Melbourne music station: entirely sponsored by businesses and wage and salary earners. It runs on a shoe string yet, for the consideration, provides good listening.

What does the ABC provide for $780 m all of it taken from taxpayers:
2 am radio stations which are nothing but 48 hours a day non-stop talking on pet themes for twitt socialists and ratbags like greens and other yobbos.If one wished to listen to disc-jock(ettes) one would tune into a commercial station.
ABC t.v 48 hours of crap every day every year.

That leaves FM radio, classical music, on that score, the ABC manages to run something worth listening. But, $780 millions is a lot of money just to produce a fraction of its total out put which is passable.The ABC is a sump.

I'm adding Adele Horin to my first eleven of great Australian pretentious bores. The captain is William ("let me share your pain") Deane.

Next to the bias of that haven fro communards, ABC, the other thing which appals is precisely, absence of content - much of ABC output is round the clock drivel.with apologies to Alexander Pope But: tune into ABC and dull thy wits.

Well that's clear enough : a straw poll of one calling the ABC and BBC intellectual, Adele Horin, a super, just super majority.