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WALK NOT QUITE SO LONG

The ABC celebrates Michael Long’s new career and his famous 2004 walk:

KERRY O’BRIEN: Michael Long’s musical career is one of the more unusual consequences of his long walk to Canberra in 2004 to highlight problems in Indigenous communities ...

LISA WHITEHEAD: The lyrics were inspired by Michael Long’s walk from Melbourne to Canberra in late 2004 ... The song has become an anthem of sorts for the Long Walk Foundation, set up by Michael Long to continue the work he started with the walk to Canberra.

Small problem: Long never walked to Canberra.

(Via Denis M)

UPDATE. Mrs Pickles: “Long seems a genuine bloke from Bathurst Island who has achieved much and walking from Melbourne to Albury is a big effort anyway. Why do Long and his efforts need to be tainted by easily checkable ABC bullshit?” Speaking of which ...

Posted by Tim B. on 03/12/2008 at 01:23 AM
  1. Ultimately forcing a meeting with then Prime Minister John Howard.

    BS - I love how they re-write history.  Howard met him BEFORE the walk (at the afl grand final) and had invited him on to the ab advisory council, and also said afterwards, that Long didn’t need to “Walk” and could meet with him anytime.

    Typical ABC bias.

    Posted by peter m on 2008 03 12 at 01:38 AM • permalink

  2. To be fair, a walk from Melbourne to Albury doesn’t have quite the same pizzazz.

    Posted by blandwagon on 2008 03 12 at 01:45 AM • permalink

  3. Stolen Generations is now entrenched despite no generations actually being stolen.  It will be a doddle to have the Long walk to Canberra accepted into lefty folklore.

    Was the Plastic Turkey walking with him?

    Posted by Razor on 2008 03 12 at 01:46 AM • permalink

  4. No, but he did swim along the Yangtse.

    Posted by cuckoo on 2008 03 12 at 01:53 AM • permalink

  5. Damn you evil John Howard for stopping Michael Long.
    Damn you for ignoring indigenous people by meeting with them.

    Posted by lotocoti on 2008 03 12 at 01:53 AM • permalink

  6. Self and The Minister for Finance, Entertainament and War watched this last night.

    Her view of it was: “Long seems a genuine bloke from Bathurst Island who has achieved much and walking from Melbourne to Albury is a big effort anyway. Why do Long and his efforts need to be tainted by easily checkable ABC bullshit ?”

    Posted by Pickles on 2008 03 12 at 01:54 AM • permalink

  7. It’s a metaphor. Can any of us ever really walk to Canberra?

    Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2008 03 12 at 01:54 AM • permalink

  8. Yes but he could have if he’d really wanted to and made a really big effort and - “Say, is that a bandwagon I could hitch on?”

    Posted by carpefraise on 2008 03 12 at 01:55 AM • permalink

  9. I recall the disgraceful interview the 7.30 Report did with Long during this walk.  He was clearly unwell, or exhausted, and babbling paranoid nonsense about being murdered for what he was doing.  The ABC of course ran this as just another day in Howard’s redneck racist Australia:

    MICHAEL LONG: I wrote my will out this morning, you know.

    GEOFF HUTCHISON: Tell me why you think you wrote your will out this morning.

    MICHAEL LONG: Well, there’s been -

    GEOFF HUTCHISON: What’s the most fearful aspect of this journey for you?

    MICHAEL LONG: Well, that I will be shot, you know, doing what I believed in.

    GEOFF HUTCHISON: Really?

    MICHAEL LONG: Mm.

    GEOFF HUTCHISON: Have you had any reason to believe that?

    MICHAEL LONG: Well, it’s the uncertainty, fear.  It’s been done before.

    Posted by cuckoo on 2008 03 12 at 02:01 AM • permalink

  10. Hmm, nope that didn’t come out right at all…*gets ou the big eraser*

    *erase erase erase*

    Posted by carpefraise on 2008 03 12 at 02:03 AM • permalink

  11. Well Latham was in Canberra on a visit.
    Now all we need is a sap-ling from Labor’s sacred tree to hold the concert under.
    His parents ‘grew up on a Catholic mission’. Now what if his parents had not been rescued, to be part of the ‘stolen’?
    End of story before it began.

    Posted by stackja1945 on 2008 03 12 at 02:07 AM • permalink

  12. Symbolic symbolism shambolically and shoddily shown stifling sincerity on ABC.

    Posted by kae on 2008 03 12 at 02:13 AM • permalink

  13. It seems to be a hobby of the popular media the world over to celebrate nihilistic symbolism.

    Let’s all “raise awareness”...

    Posted by Spiny Norman on 2008 03 12 at 02:40 AM • permalink

  14. The ABC is no different to any other organisation pumping out propaganda. It is all about demonising your enemies and lionising your heroes. Facts are a nuisance best ignored.

    What makes it worse in this case is the ABC is building a myth that the man himself would reject. Long never attempted to conceal the fact he stopped at Albury.  But thanks to the ABC he will forever be fending off accusations that it is he who is lying about walking all the way to Canberra.

    Posted by Contrail on 2008 03 12 at 02:40 AM • permalink

  15. Don’t the majority of Australians object to having their money stolen for Andrew Bartlewheat’s proposed $tolen Generations* Fund ...

    *Now it’s now plural, hmmm ...?

    Posted by egg_ on 2008 03 12 at 02:41 AM • permalink

  16. I have a long cock.

    Posted by damo on 2008 03 12 at 02:50 AM • permalink

  17. # 14
    You are a “facist”.

    Facts are a nuisance best ignored.

    Posted by stackja1945 on 2008 03 12 at 02:54 AM • permalink

  18. I heard the reason he stopped in Albury was he ran out of petrol…..drum roll, boom tish.

    Posted by damo on 2008 03 12 at 02:56 AM • permalink

  19. #18 - Oh dear. If that is an attempt at humour, it is much like your father’s penis - should have been withdrawn.

    Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2008 03 12 at 03:15 AM • permalink

  20. He always said I should have ended up at the back of my Mums throat.

    Posted by damo on 2008 03 12 at 03:24 AM • permalink

  21. #20 He was right too. Do you actually have anything of importance to say?

    Posted by Ash_ on 2008 03 12 at 03:32 AM • permalink

  22. I have a long cock.
    Maybe so, but you’re still an annoying little prick.

    Posted by SwinishCapitalist on 2008 03 12 at 03:36 AM • permalink

  23. “easily checkable ABC bullshit” is the mantra, methodology and modis operandi of that bullshit organisation.

    #20; I don’t get it; are you saying you’re a tonsil?

    Posted by cohenite on 2008 03 12 at 03:36 AM • permalink

  24. #16
    Damo  there are a some words  you use a lot. One is cock.

    Posted by Contrail on 2008 03 12 at 03:49 AM • permalink

  25. When reason is chucked out the back door(MOTIONS WITH THUMB OVER SHOULDER) when will working families get a fair go?


    Ask Kevni.

    Posted by gubbaboy on 2008 03 12 at 03:51 AM • permalink

  26. The worst part for Long was having the Dodgie
    Brothers waiting to “escort him to Howard’s office”

    Posted by watty on 2008 03 12 at 04:23 AM • permalink

  27. #16 How “controversial”. Are you trying to get yourself banned and become martyr to stupidity?

    Tell your story walking. Don’t stop at Canberra, try 300 metres off the Australian eastern shoreline. Anywhere will do.

    Posted by CB on 2008 03 12 at 04:37 AM • permalink

  28. The OzDemocrats continue to show why they are a diminishing scintilla in the political landscape.
    Bolt has covered it.

    Posted by blogstrop on 2008 03 12 at 05:06 AM • permalink

  29. Damo and his long… friend will now have plenty of time to get to know each other better, as I have banned him. If he was an innocent merely making a joke that didn’t come off, he is welcome to email me: twistedspinster-at-gmail-dot-com.

    Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2008 03 12 at 06:57 AM • permalink

  30. Wipe the spear and move on, Andrea.

    Posted by blogstrop on 2008 03 12 at 03:47 PM • permalink

  31. I suspect that damo has spent way too much time getting to know his long friend already, AHA.
    Nothing so tediously unfunny as a one-joke comedian.

    Posted by SwinishCapitalist on 2008 03 12 at 05:37 PM • permalink

  32. ABC official explanation: Due to positive discrimination, Michael Long only had to walk towards Canberra. This is quite consistent with hundreds of aborigines thinking they were stolen.

    Posted by Barrie on 2008 03 12 at 05:37 PM • permalink

  33. #7, you can walk to Canberra if you forget to pack a spare tube in your backpack when cycling to work.  Murphy’s Law states that you will get a puncture exactly halfway between Queanbeyan and Canberra.

    Posted by craigo on 2008 03 12 at 05:44 PM • permalink

  34. #33
    Craigo - cycling between Queanbeyan and Canberra?
    What of the risk of kangaroo strike?

    Dicing with death!

    Posted by kae on 2008 03 12 at 05:50 PM • permalink

  35. I walked from Melbourne to Canberra on my hands once, to force Howard to negotiate a free trade agreement with the US. No, really.

    ~mental note, shelve the penis jokes~

    Posted by Penguin on 2008 03 12 at 06:34 PM • permalink

  36. Sorry, he walked from Darwin to Canberra

    Posted by Pickles on 2008 03 12 at 08:31 PM • permalink

  37. #34, It’s not the roos I have to worry about, although I did have a close encounter with one near the lawn cemetery one day. It’s the drivers in cars with number plates starting with ‘Y’, I try and stay on bike paths as much as possible because of them.

    Posted by craigo on 2008 03 13 at 02:18 AM • permalink

  38. Sorry Craigo, “Y”? You’ll (someone will) have to refresh my memory there.

    We’re up to K up here.

    Posted by kae on 2008 03 13 at 02:25 AM • permalink

  39. Sorry kae, I was being a bit too obtuse.  All ACT registered vehicles have plates starting with ‘Y’

    Posted by craigo on 2008 03 13 at 03:59 AM • permalink

  40. #39
    Oh. Do you think it’s the territory?

    I always thought Victorians drove madly - you know the lines on the road down there? It’s to line up the bonnet mascot.
    Or you just line the bonnet mascot up with the tram tracks - either side.
    If you’ve got no bonnet mascot, fake it.

    A lot of Qlders drive by zen. No indicator necessary.

    Roundabouts? Clueless.
    Put the right hand indicator on when travelling directly through the roundabout, and indicate left when your’e leaving (if fellow motorists are lucky… and if there’s any indicator used at all!).

    Posted by kae on 2008 03 13 at 04:13 AM • permalink

  41. #40, Overall Canberrans aren’t too bad but they are very aggressive towards cyclists.  When I ride to work I take a 2.5km detour through West Queanbeyan to pick up a cycle path and minimise my road time - the more direct route along the Monaro Highway is too dangerous.  My life is worth more than the 5 minutes each way that route would save.

    I know what Queenslanders are like having lived in Toowoomba and Amberley. Zen is a good way of describing it!

    You’re right about Pricktorians too.  What is it about Melbourne that makes the drivers soooo agro?

    Posted by craigo on 2008 03 13 at 04:28 AM • permalink

  42. #41 Lygon St. Italian drivers, such as myself, are aggressive.

    Or uni students.

    Or both.

    Posted by Ash_ on 2008 03 13 at 10:09 AM • permalink

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