Why the Wikileaks Party visit to Syria was so delusional

My weekly Guardian column is published below: The sight of Australian citizens associated with the WikiLeaks party… sitting and chatting… with Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad… during their… recent… “solidarity… mission”, along with their comments about the regime, is a damning indictment on a party that ran a… dismal election campaign… in 2013 and has never bothered to explain… its subsequent collapse. For WikiLeaks supporters…

Why standing up for human rights, against the tide, matters

Salman Rushdie writes in the New York Times on 27 April: We… find it easier, in these confused times, to admire physical bravery than moral courage — the courage of the life of the mind, or of public figures. A man in a cowboy hat vaults a fence to help Boston bomb victims while others flee…

What mainstream media deliberately ignores over Hugo Chavez

Almost on queue, the mainstream press coverage of the passing of Hugo Chavez followed a predictable pattern. The underlying agenda is that any leader who seriously challenges US hegemony will receive abuse from less than independent thinking journalists and commentators. Medialens examines the record: Following the death of Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez on March 5,…

Will the real Hugo Chavez please stand up?

On the passing of Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, much of the Western corporate press has echoed the distortions that has been the irrational yet predictable pattern of hatred towards a man and leader that dared to challenge the Western economic consensus. Here’s Tariq Ali in the Guardian with a thorough examination of the Chavez legacy:…

How “liberal media” covers all those war-mongering Western leaders. Oh wait…

A typically astute Medialens analysis: Liberal journalism is balanced, neutral and objective, except when it’s not. A BBC news report on Hugo Chavez’s latest election triumph in Venezuela… commented: ‘Mr Chavez said Venezuela would continue its march towards socialism… butalso vowed he would be a “better president”.’ (Our emphasis. The article was subsequently amended, although the ‘but’…

A little taste of what kind of democracy Egypt deserves

My following analysis appears on ABC Unleashed/The Drum today: An Egyptian blogger displayed characteristic humour when news broke overnight that president Hosni Mubarak would not be stepping down: Mubarak (n.): a psychotic ex-girlfriend who fails 2 understand it’s over. If Mubarak and his new deputy Omar Suleiman thought their speeches would placate the protesters, they…

Sri Lanka must be condemned, without ifs or buts

An important editorial in today’s Sydney Morning Herald that undermines its argument by continuing the Western corporate press obsession with the supposed dictatorship of Hugo Chavez. Human rights abuses obviously occur in Venezuela but the nation isn’t a police state and attempts to paint it otherwise, or compare it to the brutal regime in Colombo,…

Journalists on the government drip-feed like to love their masters

The importance of independent journalism in a bought and sold world has never been more important. Being on the payroll of a government department – I was recently discussing with a prominent old-time reporter about the number of corporate journalists providing information to intelligence services – means that transparency is lacking. Example: US State Department…

Anti-Semitism is the least of problems in Venezuela

The global Jewish Diaspora loves to criticise Venezuela under Hugo Chavez for its supposed anti-Semitic attitudes and growing intolerance of Jewry. But this essay in the North American Congress on Latin America debunks many of the myths, highlighting the deliberate mis-information campaign run by Zionist groups in the US and the mainstream media. High-profile critics…

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