I emailed Russell Brown about this and suggested he offer a hearty f*** you to the editorial staff at the National Business Review for this column.
He was circumspect – and he’s right… looking for liberal bias and politically intimidating metanarrative has become a meme for the right. Critiquing individual events and policies on their own merits is way too far removed from the black and white global belief system required of the right to be trusted by the NBR.
Here’s the piece:
Hard choice, mediaphiles
A local commentator who has withstood the ire of the anti-GM brigade is Russell Brown, whose weblog, Hard News, identifies a shoddy piece of work by the New Zealand Herald in beating up a GM angle on some pine tree seeds. You can save yourself the trouble of ploughing through Russell’s other topics by going straight to the Life Sciences Network. Incidentally, Russell also runs the Media Watch site and the eponymous programme on National Radio (Sundays, 9.06am and 10.10pm). This is essential listening for mediaphiles, though it is guilty of some of the sins identified by Otago University law professor and NBR contributor James Allan in his piece last week on bias.
Radio New Zealand is about to get a new boss and a better online presence is sorely needed.
Unlike its commercial rivals, and its overseas equivalents such as the ABC, BBC and CBC, it lacks even a news presence, apart from Radio New Zealand International. A more up-to-date Media Watch web site could well provide a greater variety of perspectives than those currently in favour.
Yeah – ’cause a weekly updated website for a weekly radio programme is just not well-rounded enough. I wrote more on this a couple of days ago. If you missed it, scroll down…
