Humble servant of the Nation

TV news ain’t news.

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Many years ago, an acquaintance of mine opined that the reality program, Survivor, was the best television show ever made. I didn’t share her excitement and replied, “I saw a man walk on the moon on television. I thought that was pretty good.”

Needless to say we are no longer on speaking terms but it’s reasonable to conclude that what occurred on Sentosa Island Singapore yesterday lies somewhere between the two.

While my memory of Neil Armstrong placing his right foot on the Sea of Tranquillity may be a little hazy, I distinctly recall the coverage of what remains the most outstanding event in human history, was not appended by almost endless commentary and addle-headed speculation from journos and other so-called experts.

The reporting of momentous events has changed considerably, and I think for the worse.

Yesterday I spent the day watching the coverage of the summit on Sky News and a range of US cable news channels on my iPad while ABC 24 was on the television in the background. The ABC’s dedicated news channel was hard pressed. During the many long moments of waiting for anything of any significance to occur, news presenters various sought comment from reporters on the ground in Sydney, Singapore or Seoul.

The fact is the reporters knew almost as little about what was happening than I did. They were forced to stretch as they say in the biz, waffling on about what may or may not be happening and how an outcome they could not possibly know might affect the world in the short and long terms.

It was filler, plain and simple. Most of it worthless commentary or pointless speculation.

The US and North Korean delegations were behind closed doors. The photo-op of President Trump and Chairman Kim shaking hands for the first time had come and gone. Cameras rolled revealing a closed door where Trump and Kim would emerge eventually. They were late as the subjects of press conferences or photo ops often are, leading to even more panicked cutaways to more reporters adding their eight cents’ worth.

For once I would like to see a reporter under questioning from a news presenter offer the succinct three-word reply, “I don’t know.” It might not make for great television but at least it would be honest. The reporters did not know. Not one reporter, commentator or talking head present in Singapore or indeed anywhere else in the world, did. They did not know what had been agreed to by the two delegations or indeed if anything had been.

Even after the two leaders had signed a memorandum of understanding, no one was quite sure what they had signed up to. On ABC 24, the questions put to reporters were of the tedious “Is it good that Trump and Kim have met?” variety. The answers from the reporters on the ground invariably were yes with a but or no with an if, often played over the top of a lot of file footage of missiles being launched, possibly from North Korea but they could have been from anywhere.

Is it good that Trump and Kim have met? Unequivocally yes. The fact that the two nations were on the verge of a nuclear exchange just three months ago and now the two leaders were shaking hands and generally glad handing each other is very good news. It takes the temperature out of arguably the world’s most dangerous hot spot at least in the short term. Beyond that, who knows?

See, I could have answered that question and many others like it promptly and I was four and a half thousand kilometres away at the time.

When something unusual did happen, it was overlooked. After Trump and Kim did finally emerge for the signing ceremony photo-op, a North Korean guard wearing rubber gloves stepped forward to examine Chairman Kim’s pen, presumably to determine if it was some lethal CIA gimmickry, some ghastly tool of assassination. Satisfied it was merely a harmless writing implement, he placed it back on the table and Kim commenced scribbling his ornate autograph.

This was barely discernible on ABC 24 where the camera operator had opted for tight shots on the two leaders but elsewhere it was more obvious. It raised the question, were the North Koreans so paranoid they thought their supreme leader could be knocked off by a poison pen while the rest of the world looked on?

Call me old fashioned but I pine for the days when a network would cut from regular programming to a major news event and then once reported, the scheduled program would resume. I noticed SBS did this yesterday. They ran some old repeats of Nigella Lawson whipping up some scrumptious offerings in the kitchen and interrupted only when something important was happening in Singapore.

But ABC 24 can’t do this. During quiet moments the channel can and does revert to other news which essentially is news that is four hours old or older and therefore not news. The same could be said for scheduled bulletins elsewhere on the ABC like the corporation’s flagship 7.00pm bulletin.

If you spent the afternoon watching ABC 24 as I did yesterday (albeit with a bit of bored flipping to a bit of Nigella on SBS) by the time the seven o’clock bulletin came on, you’d have already seen everything, even some of the lightweight magazine guff that runs between the sport and weather that we in the news caper like to refer to as “cat that does the ironing” segments.

Do yourself a favour and examine the lag between television reporting of an event and what appears through trusted news sites on the web like this one. You’ll find what comes up on the web is at least an hour faster. Worse, once that news is reported on television, it will be reheated and rehashed, almost always without revision sometimes for a day or more.

While the debate rages over the diplomatic and geopolitical consequences of the summit, one question was answered: television news is often not news at all.

555 Comments

  • Tracy says:

    Thunderstorms and heavy rain in Sydney today, it’s a comfort food day. Turned the sound on Nigella down on the tv, summer food doesn’t quite cut it today.
    Nothing in the NSW budget worth a damn for our neck of the woods, extra buses, light rail…….anything! to stop Warringah road looking like a car park everyday.

  • BASSMAN says:

    Morrison caught out lying for the SECOND time on Labor’s costings. Supposedly $10billion out. He has been corrected by The Parliamentary Budget Office and Treasury. The Belgian Robot was in deep poo trying defend Morrison this morning on radio and was all over the shop. Considering this bloke got his pre-selection on dubious grounds (a mate from my old school THRASHED him in the pre-selection ballot after Howard saved him) I amazed Morrison has not been shunted out of politics forever. The lies just keep coming and he still goes to church-I hope he attends confession regularly.

    Well no doubt Jack is cured and will be around for a LOOOOONG time going on today’s fiery posts. He has done well. A mate had exactly the same operation in the same hospital as Jack and did not make it. He was my boss. The complicated surgery was a complete success but he contracted an infection within the hospital that he just could not fight off. But we know jack is made of very strong stuff!

  • Perentie says:

    First they want to privatise the ABC, now they’re punching on outside a Sydney cafe. One report said that a certain person wanted to take over the local branch of the Liberal Party, causing the fracas. I suspect they put the boot in because he voted against the cull on welfare recipients.

  • Henry Donald J Blofeld says:

    Beam me up Scotty, Mr Insider. POTUS Trump says he is ordering the establishment of a sixth branch of the military to clear the way for American dominance in space. Mr Trump said the US will “be the leader by far” in space and that he wants to revive the nation’s flagging space program. My Resume is on NASA’s desk as we speak and I am ready to serve as we go beyond the Moon to new exciting places. Thank you, Neil Armstrong, for leading the way in ’69 when you landed on the Moon!
    https://tinyurl.com/ycejbcvg

    • Jean Baptiste says:

      NASA wants to send robotic explorers to the moon prepatory to sending humans back there?

      What the hell were those blokes doing up there Henry, taking photos of each other and playing canasta?

      • Henry Donald J Blofeld says:

        NASA testing Robots for the MARS mission and where better to do it than on the Moon. All cleared up dear fellow? Cheers

        • Jean Baptiste says:

          Not so. Read the article again Henry.
          My point is, having been there on the moon, apparently with no casualties, if there is anything left to learn, why not send humans back there?

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Exploration_Rover

          Why would you send robots to the moon to practice for Mars when you already have robots skittling around Mars.

          Now stop making things up.

    • Trivalve says:

      My Space (!) is bigger than Your Space

    • Milton says:

      I hope you mentioned that you can reverse a trailer on your resume, HDJB. They regard that highly at NASA i’m told.

    • Dwight says:

      This will upset the zoomies in the Air Force as they will lose Space Command, but it’s a good move.
      I’m too old to be a space cadet, but maybe the Space Academy needs a Dean.

  • The Bow-Legged Swantoon says:

    Anyone got a big can of ‘Clive Off’?

    • Jean Baptiste says:

      Those commentators, like me, had no idea that that so many Americans had become dumbed down and gullible enough to vote for the buffoon.

  • Razor says:

    As for commenting on something I know nothing about, if your talking about your book launch I agree. If you’re talking about the investigation and prosecution of peds then you’ve got to be kidding!

    • Jack The Insider says:

      I’m talking about the Special Commission of Inquiry. I was in Newcastle for three days of public hearings and I also received regular updates and information from counsel appearing before the inquiry, including from one source who is now a judge. There was a sense that Fox had made errors of judgment but he was far from Robinson Crusoe in that regard. Like Ballarat, Maitland-Newcastle became a hotspot of clerical child sex offending. We know now the Catholic Church and the Anglican Church conspired to create a paedophile ring in the greater Newcastle area in the mid 1980s. It beggars belief that no one in the community, including police, had an inkling of was was going on.

      • Not Finished Yet says:

        Do you have a take on the Maria James murder, JTI? Are we talking about police incompetence or, given the suggestion of priestly involvement, may we be talking of very dark forces indeed at work? Don’t comment if it would be indiscreet at the moment.

  • Razor says:

    JTI @ 11.12pm

    My information regarding Fox is NOT from reading a couple of newspaper articles but from those who worked with him before during and after. Also the Special Inquiry final report and its transcripts. Having him launch the book was a bad call doesn’t reflect on the book, you or Dinny. You weren’t to know at the time.

    • Jack The Insider says:

      Here’s something we need to say. The two most outrageous peds in Maitland-Newcastle were Fr James Fletcher and Fr Denis McAlinden. Fox arrested Fletcher and he was subsequently prosecuted. Fletcher died in jail. McAlinden on the other hand was never charged despite his victims numbering in the 100s and the fact that a warrant was issued for his arrest in 1999. He died in WA in 2005. Extradition was sought earlier that year but it was determined McAlinden was too ill by this time. Six years had transpired with no concerted attempt to determine his whereabouts. Prior to his death, McAlinden regularly travelled between Australia and Ireland and this was known or should have been known by NSW Police but no instruction was issued to the AFP to stop him at the border. A further victim statement was sent to the wrong police station and never acted upon. This was, at best, a catalogue of mistakes and we are entitled to be a good deal more suspicious about them than the commission of inquiry appeared to be. Further the inquiry’s findings in relation to Fox’s assertions of church cover-up regarding the ultimately successful prosecution of Fletcher, appeared naive. We know now that Archbishop Philip Wilson has been convicted of concealing child sex abuse in Maitland-Newcastle. He may consider himself unlucky as there were three other church officials in the diocese, two more senior than Wilson at the time, including a former diocesan bishop, of whom findings of misconduct were made but no prosecutions recommended. In one case, a church official tipped off Fletcher that he was under police investigation but he got no more than a slap on the wrist from the commission.

      • Razor says:

        JTI,
        I don’t doubt what you say about clerical abuse in Newcastle. I don’t doubt your commitment to the subject nor the unprecedented results you have achieved. I think two or more days of backwards and forwards, some of it in terms flattering to neither of us, comes down to a disagreement in the motivation and tactics utilised by one person involved. If, over the years, you have interpreted my comments regarding that person to be disparaging against Denis Ryan or your book then I again apologise, they weren’t meant to be.

        That’s it on the subject for me I hope some sort of understanding between us has been reached.

      • BASSMAN says:

        Wot a blast!

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