<< ARTISTS TRANSCENDED ~ MAIN ~ RELIGION SELECTIVELY MOCKED >>
FACTS, SPELLING CHECKED
Anne Summers, expert Australian observer of US politics, offers her keen insights in the Sydney Morning Herald:
[Hillary Clinton] infuriated many on her side when she gave a joint press conference with what Andersen described as “her two most appalling Christian-right colleagues”, Rick Santorem and Sam Brownback ... More upsetting was her consorting with Santorem ... So abhorrent is Santorem that ...
... that the author can’t bring herself to spell his name correctly. Hit the above link for more on Unne Summirs from Bilious Young Fogey. Meanwhile, another local expert on US politics puts it best:
It’s not hard to understand why an increasing number of citizens treat the political process with contempt.
Loewenstein has no idea. The 2004 presidential election saw the highest turnout in 36 years:
The final numbers are in—and turnout in the 2004 presidential election, it seems, was a bit more impressive than previously believed.
The Committee for the Study of the American Electorate reported yesterday that more than 122 million people voted in the November election, a number that translates into the highest turnout—60.7 percent—since 1968.
Is Antony brave enough to publish a correction?
UPDATE. The Age, which ran Summers’ piece with correct Santorum spelling, today publishes this:
An article on Saturday’s Opinion page by Anne Summers incorrectly claimed that Hillary Clinton, if she secured the Democratic Party nomination, would need an extra 34 electoral college votes to win the 2008 US presidential election. In fact, she would need 18 extra votes. The article also incorrectly said that the last presidential poll was in 2002, instead of 2004. The mistakes were made by the writer.
(No link; via Tony Thomas)
Speaking of Pilger, some years ago I was living in Melbourne I did an evening course on journalism. Just for fun, to meet new people when I was new to the city.
The teacher adoringly showed a snippet of a Pilger documentary – can’t remember the exact topic but it was something to do with nefarious business dealings in the UK. At the centre of the story was an accounting firm which Pilger kept calling ‘Delwar’. The penny didn’t drop, given there are probably plenty of British accounting firms whom I have never heard of.
Then the penny dropped – he was referring to ‘Deloitte’, one of the ‘Big 5’ with offices everywhere, and whose name is almost universally pronounced ‘Deloyt’. Pilger clearly had never heard of this huge firm, and certainly had not called them for the purpose of the story – otherwise he would have heard the correct pronunciation from the receptionist, at least.
When I suggested this to the teacher, steam started coming out of his ears, and he made contorted excuses (e.g. ‘maybe some people like to call them Delwar’ etc).
Before then I just thought Pilger was a joke. Now I know it.
Posted by Flying Giraffe on 2006 01 16 at 11:35 AM • permalinkThe largest number of people in 36 years turned out to vote just to piss off their neighbors.
And a better reason would be…?
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2006 01 16 at 11:42 AM • permalink“It’s not hard to understand why an increasing number of citizens treat the political process with contempt.”
By which he means the crazy minority who couldn’t get people to buy into their insane ideas and vote for them. It seems democracy and voting is all well and good if you get the outcome you want. If you don’t, the only conclusion to draw is that the system is flawed. It couldn’t possibly have anything to do with your positions on the issues.
Which brings to mind the oft quoted line from Pauline Kael wondering how Richard Nixon had been elected because “she didn’t know anyone who voted for him.”
#5: My dear old mum - an incorrigible lefty, it must be said (oh, the arguments) - loves to tell the tale about how she and her work colleagues sat around the tea room table the Monday after Keating’s election defeat, chattering dejectedly. Topic of conversation - who had voted for Howard? None of them had, or would admit to it. How on earth did he get elected??
You won’t be surprised to learn that she and her workmates were employed as teachers in a government high school.
Posted by James Waterton on 2006 01 16 at 12:18 PM • permalinkDoes that figure include extra votes cast by Democrats and by British lefties, who aren’t citizens, flying over to vote?
Posted by andycanuck on 2006 01 16 at 12:53 PM • permalink4: Pissing off one’s neighbors is a venerable American tradition, but I don’t think that was the prime mover in the election. Or if it was, it doesn’t mean the people are showing more contempt for the political process; on the contrary, maybe the political process has now taken its place alongside unrestrained dogs, noisy children and early-sunday-morning weed whacking in the arsenal of neighborly warfare.
Is Antony brave enough to publish a correction?
No.
Nor is he principled enough to leave Australia, a country that he is occupying with flagrant disregard for the original inhabitants.
Posted by Margos Maid on 2006 01 16 at 07:02 PM • permalinkIts not the the gift that counts but rather the lack of thought behind it. Besides aren’t spelling and grammar part of a fascist plot to destroy the creativity of the caring professionals.
Posted by Pat Patterson on 2006 01 16 at 08:41 PM • permalinkThe Age’s correction to Anne Summers creates an important precedent. Previously I believe they only corrected their own journalists’ errors (make that, a small minority of errors by their journalists), not those of their columnists. Here they officially correct a columnist. Therefore Terry Lane’s slandering in his column last Saturday of US VP Dick Cheney as a personal war profiteer via Halliburton options, should be corrected in the same way as the Summers piece, in next Sunday’s Age. I’ll send them the Cheney facts today.
Antony was hammered on his anti-Israel stance on ‘Speaking in Tongues’ last night by Austen Tayshus, a comedian no less.
In their own joke, the website of the show described Antony as a ‘journalist’.
Posted by Villeurbanne on 2006 01 17 at 01:58 AM • permalinkHaven’t occupiers never succeeded against an insurgency?
It’s hard to answer this question.
Posted by Stoop Davy Dave on 2006 01 18 at 11:25 AM • permalink
Page 1 of 1 pages
Members:
Login | Register
| Member List
“It’s not hard to understand why an increasing number of citizens treat the political process with contempt.”
Right. The largest number of people in 36 years turned out to vote just to piss off their neighbors.