Talking the Town: John Pilger receives the Sydney Peace Prize
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Poor old Sam Cooke. Shot dead in 1964, he lives on in his most famous song, Change is Gonna Come; the anthem of the American civil rights movement in the 1960s. It’s a song of hope, used to inspire those fighting to end segregation and discrimination. So why did the Sydney Peace Foundation used it at the beginning and the end of last night’s speech by the winner of the Sydney Peace Prize, journalist John Pilger? His speech was anything but hopeful, containing a long list of the crimes of the US, Israeli and Australian governments, indigenous leaders who “tell us what we want to hear,” the NT intervention, the media and Barack Obama and so on. “We dutifully celebrate the illusion of Obama, the global celebrity, the marketing dream. Like Calvin Klein, brand Obama offers the risque thrill of a new image attractive to liberal sensibilities, if not to the Afghan children he bombs.” Pilger, 70, has always positioned himself as outside the mainstream media. But his age and location — he hasn’t lived in Australia since the early 1960s — mean that his criticisms of the local media are outdated. “Today, most of the Australian media speaks for power, not people. Turn the pages of the major newspapers, look at the news on TV. Like border protection, we have mind protection. There’s a consensus on what we read, see and hear; on how we should define our politics and view the rest of the world. Invisible boundaries keep out facts and opinions that are unacceptable. “It’s actually a brilliant system, requiring no instructions, no self-censorship. Almost instinctively, journalists know not what to do,” he said. What invisible boundaries — doesn’t he read blog sites? Or look at the independent media? Pilger at his best is an excellent journalist with an international reputation for uncovering corruption and injustice. But does that mean we can let him get away with this statement (made about the NT intervention)? “Billions of dollars have been spent — not on paving roads and building houses, but on a war of legal attrition waged against black communities.” What billions of dollars? What war of legal attrition? If I want information about the intervention, I’ll read David Marr and Nicolas Rothwell, two journalists who spend weeks in the Territory researching and writing stories which contain eye-witness accounts and facts. Nowhere in the speech, or in any of the articles about Australia which appear on his website, does it say that he has been to the NT since the intervention and actually witnessed the events on which he is opining. Is that good enough? Listening to the speech reminded me of Auberon Waugh’s coining of the verb “to Pilger”, which is to “present information sensationally in support of a particular conclusion.” Last night Pilger concluded that we “need to make haste. An historic shift is taking place. The major western democracies are moving towards a corporatism. Democracy has become a business plan, with a bottom line for every human activity, every dream, every decency, every hope. “The main parliamentary parties are now devoted to the same economic policies — socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor — and the same foreign policy of servility to endless war.” And the evidence for that is…? Actually, there’s no point in analysing a Pilger lecture; like Scientologists, the audience is there to have their belief systems reinforced and receive the word of the prophet. Last night’s audience, a mixture of my Birkenstock-wearing Balmain neighbours and UTS media students, loved it of course, and gave him several standing ovations. But I wanted to hear something new, and I was irritated by the misuse of Sam Cooke’s song. And the next time I go to a Pilger lecture, I’m not taking the Prius. While John was eating his supper at Guillaume, I was still in the car park, trying to find my car. |
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25 Comments
Couldn’t agree more. Pilger leaves out what doesn’t suit his view of a situation. Journalism or comment? For an acclaimed journalist there is too much commentary for my liking.
I don’t know whether the inervention price tag has hit the billion dollar mark yet margot, but the ‘war of legal attrition’ has been a big part of it. The Rudd government has simply advanced dispossession - sometimes with the figleaf of 40 year leases - as a take it or leave it condition of getting houses built and other services. when people in such communities object and get legal representation, the govt then lawyers up - and blames the plaintiffs for ‘bogging down’ service delivery. The object is to simply to wear the plaintiffs down, which is attrition in my dictionary
Ther have actually been half a dozen stories about this on Crikey, so it hasn’t actually been shrouded in obscurity.
I was a bit taken aback by this intepretation of last night’s events at the Opera House. Why was the bit about the attempted shouting down of Pilger’s assessment of the Israeli/Palestinian situation omitted? Surely a highlight for those inside Pilger’s innercity party?
I resent being likened to a Scientologist - yes I was there - and I question whether Margot has been to visit those towns and communities in the Northern Territory to inform her own critical views. Not enough canapes to make the trip worthwhile perhaps?
The front row was filled with the people most affected by indigenous policies in Australia, and they were the first to stand. It was enough to suggest he had felt and expressed the frustrations of those ‘intervened’ upon. The National Indigenous Times should be heard on this too - http://www.nit.com.au/
I don’t live in Balmain or attend UTS ,and I don’t wear Birkenstocks. But I do recommend next time Margot takes the ferry. Maybe it will blow away all those unfortunate cobwebs and she’ll be better able to find her way back home.
Averil Bones
Great stuff Margot. While Pilger is occasionally a great voice for the downtrodden, he has a long track record as a professional knocker of Australia, and often loose with the facts.
I agree with John Pilger. I agree with him about the overwhelming majority of the media in this country. It wasn’t that long ago, that the media in Australia was rated very poorly as far as reporting facts as opposed to ‘looking at everything from the perspective of the real rulers of the world’. The US and Britain and Israel??
These are just two articles I received today via Information Clearing House. I can say without fear of contradiction, that I won’t be hearing about them or reading them in any form by Australian journalists!
Former UK Ambassador: CIA Sent People to be ‘Raped with Broken Bottles’
By Daniel Tencer http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article23906.htm
EXCLUSIVE: Convicted CIA Spy Says “We Broke the Law”
By MATTHEW COLE, AVNI PATEL, and BRIAN ROSS
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article23902.htm
All we get via the news(with a few remarkable differences) are the political reports from the perspective of ‘our alies’ - not the facts. Journalists didn’t question Howard/Bush/Blair re Iraq or Afghanistan. I found out about ‘The Downing Street Memo’ via the internet. I watched the videos about the Bush Administration on SBS - not put together by Australian journalists. I read about the questions being raised re 9/11 from books or AlterNet or Information Clearing House or John Pilger. - The news, current affairs etc with the exception of Frontline or Robert Greenwald or Robert Fisk and others did not cover the neo-con’s goal of global domination. Read, Project for a New American Century, and I still haven’t heard the truth about Afghanistan & Iraq re the quest for oil in Iraq, and a pipeline through Afghanistan for the $16 Trillions worth in the Caspian Sea. I didn’t hear or read via our media, that the Bush Administration told the Taliban and Pakistan that they intended bombing Afghanistan in October 2001- this was decreed in July 2001, prior to 9/11. I had to read and hear these things in a selection of newspapers, articles, essays or books initiated outside this country. There’s one major remarkable exception - GreenLeft - and articles from John Pilger! Alan Ramsay questioned Howard regularly in his weekly articles, but sadly, he’s retired!
I read articles in the National Indigenous Times, which are the realities of the aboriginal people themselves, not white journalists. I have a great deal of admiration for David Marr(who incidently wrote the truth about the Tampa via Dark Victory - I still haven’t read any indepth reports from any other journalists - they were in Howard’s ‘pocket’ the bloody lot of them - if not, he cast them aside?). He’s one of a few journalists with integrity. I’ve also read both of Margo Kingston’s “Not Happy John” and “Still not happy John”. Not many others, and I certainly won’t even read a hint of this in any Murdoch paper?
The intervention is 2 yrs old, and the Rudd govt is still operating with the same patronising, paternalistic and racist attitudes of Howard/Brough & Co!. There’s too much emphasis on what Noel Pearson has to say as opposed to the aboriginal people who insist on being heard, or who won’t comply with racist dogma - the quarantine of incomes has not helped the majority - it’s just caused more ‘trouble’ for those in remote areas, who have to pay huge amounts in taxi fares to do their shopping. The people living in houses in the camps that Jenny Macklin wants them out of were ‘notified’ by notices pinned to fences, front doors or posts? These people have been forced into the courts in order to receive justice that non-indigenous people would demand - and the media would support them. Even though history has shown, that if you don’t involve people in decision making processes, the whole thing is a flop. So what is the Rudd govt doing? Imposing laws and policies on them from above!
Tell me what part of this behaviour is new?
Why is almost every TV news item about the intervention accompanied by the same old footage - aboriginal people in parks who are drunk? Aboriginal people in remote communities that have been forgotten by successive govts for decades? You watch from today on and see for yourself? Where are all the paedophiles and rapists Howard and Brough alluded to? How many arrests have there been? They almost accused every aboriginal man of being an abuser. The alleged white perpetrators of sexual assaults of 20-30 yrs ago (at a school in NSW) who’ve recently been arrested and charged, have not lost their homes? They’ve not had their incomes cut in half? Why the different treatment in the Northern Territory? If you think it’s OK, then you’re part of the problem; certainly not part of the solution. There’s lots of new Toyota’s being driven around by public servants and other paid government people - not much has changed on the ground!
If non-aboriginal kids were suffering from Rheumatic Fever as the result of poor sanitation, inadequate housing etc, there’d be an outcry, and rightly so. This disease was almost wiped out after WW2 in non-indigenous areas with better housing and sanitation. The health of indigenous people has been a national disgrace for too many decades. Being an apologist for successive govts is a disgrace! Sadly, too many journalists have been complicit in either ignoring this, or permeating racism that turned the masses off, or caused even more antagonism between black and white! With all due respect to David Marr and the other journalist, it’s patronising to assert, that a couple of white folk who spend a few days, weeks or even months visiting up north, represent the reality of sadly, too many aboriginal peoples’ neglected and repressed lives! I think it’s a damned cheek on your part!
Whether it’s been El Salvador, Chile, Diego Garcia, Venezuela, indigenous Australians; the horrors of Gaza or Vietnam, John Pilger presented these and many other shameful parts of history passionately, accurately and with integrity. He earned his Sydney Peace Prize and the many other awards he’s received over the years! How many can you boast of?
Your words have just epitomised everything that is wrong with Australian journalists. You’ve just reinforced John Pilger’s just and accurate criticisms!
I haven’t been to Northern Territory. But some years ago I was spending my holidays in Coffin Bay, SA where I met a social worker from Alice Springs. She told us interesting stories about ‘petrol sniffing projects’ (outrageous) and other interesting programs for Aboriginal communities. Her main problem was that white bureaucracy mainly benefited from all those government funded projects. Then I met an eye doctor who was working in NT among Aboriginal communities. Stories to tell about bureacratic vagaries of some services.
We all remember the Royal Commission re: women’s business and the Hindmarsh Island bridge. That must have cost a fortune. Cui bono? Then, there could have been some reasons the ATSIC was disbanded.
The Northeren Territory intervention project has also been controversial. It depends who do you talk to. Our independent media very often (not always) present ‘happy faces’ and government achievements. But we all know that bureaucracy is very costly.
What I would like to know is this: How much money was spent on NT Intervention and how much of this money directly benefited Aboriginal communities?.
I know that our governments have been trying to help. I personally know families who are being well looked after. It is not that ‘nothing has been done’ or our governments are not willing to assist the communities.
But we all know that not everybody is happy with the Intervention outcome.
And, perhaps Pilger knows something, like the social worker we met in Coffin Bay or a doctor, about the costs and efficiency of buraucracy in general and NT in particular.
Perhaps he knows something we do not want to hear. In any case, I would have asked him where he got his info from.
Thank you Margaret Saville for a critique on John Pilger’s journalism that explains to me why I have grown increasingly irritated by his stale and lazy spin on complex issues that are so easy to wrap into heart-rending clichés.
Thank you Margot Saville for a critique on John Pilger’s journalism that explains to me why I have grown increasingly irritated by his stale and lazy spin on complex issues that are so easy to wrap into heart-rending clichés.
Pilger is in my view an welcome return to Politic
debate in Australia, hope to see and hear of him more
SUZANNE - And how many of John Pilger’s books have you read, and how many documentaries have you watched? Try War on Democracy; The New Rulers of the World; Breaking the Silence; and read Freedom Next Time. Anyone who’s read about Diego Garcia surely can’t be unaffected by the trauma caused to those people.
Are you saying you support what the US did and continues in Latin America? Chile? El Salvador? It was John Pilger’s documentary that made me aware of Cambodia and Diego Garcia? I had no idea!
Would these tellings, using “lazy spin” be more heart rending if they were happening to people or famiy members close to you? Should we all look for the justifications of successive US Presidents for invading, interfering with and killing innocent people - hundreds of thousands of them???
Well said John. How many awards is it now, Margot?
strange you don’t have anything to say about pilger’s point of view on the afghan adventure margot - that it has been a bloodbath for the locals who our great allies illogically determined to punish for 9-11 - or is it maybe about the ‘great game’ of central asian oil & gas domination perhaps?
i was in the audience and particularly appreciated pilger’s attack on the foolish flag-wrapped nationalism and celebration of ‘blood sacrifice’ which has become cool for youth since howard’s era
let’s end the war - and use the tax revenue we save to fund health and education training and facilities in aboriginal communities in regional australia
or am i being too ‘simplistic’ and ‘cliched’ in making a suggestion like that?
and paul pearce, pilger has plenty of australian heroes, so what is it he ‘knocks’?
BRUCE- There’s a very good article on AlterNet - From Afghanistan to Iraq-Connecting the dots with OIL. This article sets out very carefully and in great detail the sequence of events that connect the horrific invasions of both of these countries. The US tore up the Iraq Constitution; protected the oil wells; placed military guards around the Ministry of Oil immediately upon arriving there; have built many bases(permanent ones, with roads and STOP signs etc) the most expensive and biggest US Embassy in the green zone, which will be totally self sufficient. I wonder why they’ve spent all that money? I wonder why they didn’t abide by the Geneva Conventions re the rules and responsibilities of occupation - to wit - essential services like clean water, sewerage and electricity? I wonder why we’ve not read this in our newspapers?
I wonder why both Condaleeza Rice and Colin Powell announced in (April?)2001, that Saddam Hussain was no threat to his neighbours, let alone the rest of us. I wonder why both the Clinton Administration and the Bush Administration had meetings with the Taliban, where they were ‘entertained’ by those high up in both Administrations, re the wealth in their region. It was due to the Taliban’s refusal to agree to their demands re a pipeline from the Caspian Sea through Afghanistan for the $16 billion of oil and gas reserves, that in July they were threatened with a ‘carpet of gold’ via bombs lateer in the year? I wonder why there was only a couple of paragraphs in the SMH about the possible several thousand (alleged)Taliban who were killed by some of those who are now in the Afghan Parliament? Those survivors insisted, that people in US Military uniform were observing? Watch ‘Afghan Massacre’? Another journalist won an award for this documentary, which can be seen on the Internet. What made that US Military person, who’s also a Psychiatrist go crazy with 2 others with guns today - apparently, he was to go back to Iraq or Afghanistan, and didn’t want to go? I wonder why?
Put http://www.freedocumentaries.org into Google and watch others! Most enlightening! Some of John Pilgers are there too!
Actually Margot Saville’s article reinforces the points that Pilger has been making for many years. It is typical of the Australian media to pick up on one point, in this case the reference to “billions” when he may well have meant simply “millions” and use that as the focus of the argument rather than the substantive points Pilger was making.
Pilger has written several books, made a number of documentaries, and written countless articles raising issues of universal concern. Most of which is ignored by the mainstream media. The criticisms which Saville offers are the same tired cliches that appear every time Pilger visits this country and makes a speech.
Why not look at the issues Pilger raises, including the relentless march of American imperialism, the deaths of millions of people in Asia, Africa and Latin America sacrificed to American capitalism and imperialism, the on-going illegal invasions and occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.
Saville’s article represents the worst kind of Australian journalism, focusing on the trivial and ignoring the major issues. Whether or not one agrees with Pilger (and a lot of people obviously do) he represents an alternative voice that is almost totally lacking from Australian mainstream media.
Look back over his career and the issues he has highlighted. Can one honestly argue that Fairfax media or the Murdoch press have anything remotely approaching his track record in exposing abuses? Of course not. When the Australian media have the same courage and independence that Pilger has consistently shown throughout his career carping criticisms of the kind Saville makes will have more plausibility. I am not likely to live long enought to see that day.
John Pilger may be a high priest of hyperbole on a number of subjects, but Margot if you yearn for something new you are invariably bound to be disappointed. Most of the problems all have very much the same genesis- the self interest of one group asserting its desires over others.
The pilger quote you mention on” modern democracies becoming Corporatised’ is In my view the current face of self-interest writ large, something John ralston Saul talked about here in the mid-90’s , again not new but quite terrifying if you care to think about it; which I think is desperately needed: think Financial Crisis.
I don’t know how long you have been exploring the issues that Pilger is so passionate about but as someone who is a only a little younger than Pilger’s 70 you really get impatient seeing variations on the same disaster theme, the drift to hyperbole is more understandable.
For all he has contributed he does not deserve the cheap shots like ‘he does not live here ! what would he know? How ridiculous a statement in 2009.
JAMES and AVERILL - Good on you! As I’ve mentioned earlier, I’ve followed John’s educational and passionate exposes for some years now.
“The criticisms which Saville offers are the same tired cliches that appear every time Pilger visits this country and makes a speech.” Hear! Hear!
I recall one time not that long ago, and John Pilger was on Lateline. I was disgusted with Tony Jone’s rudeness. I rarely watch him now. Between this episode; the hype he stirred up over the ‘need’ for the intervention in the NT, and too many others, I felt disgusted.
I also remember hearing about media bias, poor journalism etc and Australia was in the bottom 35%?
I’ve a mate who’s been following the media’s reporting of workers’ battles for example, for more years than I, and he’s pointed out, with physical evidence, that the media at best was guilty of gross misinformation, and in too many cases, blatant lies? Now why would that be? Could it be, that the media supports corporate greed over and above anything resembling decency and justice re incomes and equality?
As for the intervention. I have respect for David Marr, and I believe him to be a man of integrity, decency and compassion, but that doesn’t mean, that a couple of weeks or even months in the NT is sufficient for his opinion to be of more importance for example, than the women who live near Uluru, and without much money or support, have taken care of their community and particularly the women and children. These senior aboriginal women have been treated with indifference, rudeness and open discrimination, including losing funding for their domestic violence program. This is not the only community treated thus!
I don’t know of any man in the rest of the country, for example, who upon being arrested and charged on serious charges of sexual assault have lost their homes, their incomes and their human rights. Thanks to Howard/Brough and now Rudd and Macklin, every man in the NT has had his reputation sullied. Very few arrests let alone convictions have come to light. Where are they? Instead of fighting the causes of the ‘age gap’ they continue along the destructive path of blame, injustice and neglect. The media, to their eternal shame, have peddled this same nonsense. If you have to remove a group of peoples’ basic human rights, in order to achieve some ‘good’, you lose all respect. They haven’t convinced me! This is not the way to act when you utter, that ‘Little Children Are Sacred’! Good on John Pilger for telling it how it really is!
Avril Bones: who was the shouting down Pilger over his Israel comments?
Margot Saville: yep..this piece illustrates the reason you’re just another single issue Aussie hack…
Give Pilger his due - this quote alone is resonant, trenchant and worthy of the man and the prize : “The main parliamentary parties are now devoted to the same economic policies — socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor — and the same foreign policy of servility to endless war.”
Actually Margot, you are correct in examining Pilger’s involvement with the ‘new media’ - but is it fair to revanche on his challenge to mainstream journalists - and there are some good ones - who are less and less engaged with the values of good journalism?
Pilger has been a good journalist. I think it is only fair to give him the space to comment on where hethinks good journalism is ‘at’ just now. (Which is not necessarily a critique of those journalists who did, and are engaging with on the ground coverage of what is happening in aboriginal communities right now).
Pilger, like Noam Chomsky, has the broader vision that may be tiresome because it is so obvious, and still so many avert their gaze.
Just so people don’t think I’m suffering from some form of dementia - repeating myself. My first post wasn’t accepted until a couple of hours after I uploaded. I didn’t think it was going to be approved, so I repeated a couple of things that I said then on later ones! I thought I was being censored????No, wouldn’t happen here would it?
“What invisible boundaries? Doesn’t he read blog sites?”
I’d guess not only John Pilger but an awful lot of Australians don’t have much time to trawl through blog sites.
And for those that do the trawling, how many people do you really think go through the more heavy, detailed ones? Check out those lovely newspaper websites and it’s mostly light, frothy, celeb, “funny old world” and sport stories.
The times you might read a piece from a genuine, fresh and alternate viewpoint in the daily papers are very rare.
I think Margot Saville’s fallen for the old “he doesn’t live in Australia, how dare he criticise it/us/me!!” line.
Liz45
[Edit - the issues, not other commenters please]
“The women who live near Uluru” have not lost “funding for their domestic violence program”: in fact funding for the NPY Women’s Council’s DV Program, which operates at Mutitjulu and many other Western Desert communites, has been greatly expanded in the last couple of years. As a result it has been able to employ its own lawyer as well as its manager, case managers and field officers. But as you point out, “This is not the only community treated thus!”
PS I am not aware that David Marr has been writing on the NTER, let alone visiting the NT, so I don’t understand why he has become a whipping boy in this discussion.
I stand corrected on Mutitjulu! I’ve made a mistake with the name and area, but I’ve seen aboriginal women speaking of their concerns in many areas, looking after the aged for a start - horrific environments - not enough food or money or staff! Look at the media’s role when indigenous people suggested that they’d close Uluru to climbers - who poo, wee and leave it in a mess? Imagine if that occurred in St Mary’s Cathedral in Sydney?Imagine the shock jocks then? sacred area, blah blah blah!
There are many who have lost their rights and funding and provisions, including those on CDEP - growing food was stopped due to this. Where’s all the men who are supposed to be abusing kids, and how many have been arrested, charged and convicted. According to Howard etc, it sounded like one in every house? Why did Jenny Macklin ignore that area that had raw sewerage around for weeks - could still be? Wouldn’t happen where I live- there’d be outrage and rightly so!
However, as someone has already commented, you are like Margot and pick on one aspect to nitpick on while avoiding the overall context. There are many individuals and communities in the NT who are outraged, hurt, angry, disappointed etc with the Rudd Govt’s continuing Howard and Brough’s paternalistic behaviour. You mention nothing of removing the Racial Discrimination Act; the quarantining of incomes(including people who are on a Veteran’s Pension, Aged Pensions etc. You didn’t repond to the ridiculous situation, of people having to pool their money and catch taxis to the nearest town/city to buy their groceries and other vitals at designated (by the govt that is) retail outlets, at the expense of closing down ‘corner stores’ closer to home, where they could buy some essentials in bulk! No, you’d rather pick on me or one aspect to rave about!
Margot mentioned, that if she wants to read of the Intervention she’d read David Marr and Nicholas Rothwell. No women I notice! I can’t see how you could get real stories if you don’t speak to the women in depth! They like me, would be more comfortable with women asking personal questions I should imagine! Didn’t you even read what Margot had to say?
I’m sick to death of pontificating people like you alleging that these ‘things’ are not simple; that they’re complex blah blah.(those comments were removed here, but they arrived at my email address?) The inference is clear ; ‘you’re not smart enough to be able to comprehend’ etc. The reasons for what’s going on in the NT is pretty simple - it was simple in 1788, 1888, 1988 and now - it’s called racism, neglect, paternalistic views, and corporate greed. Why are the aboriginal people in remote areas the most impoverished people in the country, when so much of the wealth has been on and under their land, and will continue to be so! When has the electronic media anyway, canvassed the issues in a constructive way? I mean without the background pictures and inferences that only perpetuate ingrained racist views, like those I described above?
As for what John’s reported in the rest of the world/ How many people do you know from Chile or El Salvador or ??? What the US has done and continues to do is appalling - all caused for corporate greed, particularly resources!
You failed to provide any discourse of your own. You’re also part of the problem - petty and nitpicking! I’ve been interested in indigenous issues for years. I’ve read reports, listened to people who know more than I - real people who are indigenous, not patronising whites! How many reports, individual’s experiences have you read? History?
I voted in the 1967 Referendum - I voted ‘yes’ and I try to reaffirm that every day since! How about you?
I’ve lost count of the awards that John Pilger has received over the years. How many have you won? Do you think you’ll ever be nominated for the Sydney Peace Prize, and if not, why not? Perhaps Margot could answer this question too?
I’ve just finished reading all of John Pilger’s speech. Bob, you might like to read it!
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article23912.htm
You furnish the evidence that there’s amazing good things going on in the NT via the Intervention. And provide the facts, that John Pilger was wrong in his speech. Show me where all the countries he’s written about, made documentaries of and revealed horrific abuses about, including those of the US administration/s are all flourishing and rich countries, where the peoples are able to live a full life. Show me! And I include the approximately 500,000 aboriginal people in this country. You show me where the monies obtained from billions of dollars of recources have flowed or more importantly have been paid to them, and not multinational companies, and a pittance in comparison to govt/s. Show me!
Din’t know John Pilger had a big influNSE today. but i’m delighted.to to find out he is still being listning .in my op. whatever political party, it is good to have some one to start? and from memory who better than J. P
Maybe Margot, you better not go next time. those of us who are absolutely sick of the cruel hypocrisy of Australia/American capitalism will go and cheer him on. We may even join in and start a grassroots revolution.
MICHAEL CROOK - Count me in!