Media

JONATHAN HOLMES: No porn star, ABC Media Watch’s haughty honcho makes a big boner

The ABC’s Media Watch’s Jonathan Holmes is very good at pointing out splinters in the eyes of others, how will he manage the big log coming from his own? Yesterday, he falsely claimed VEXNEWS has been promoting the mad conspiracy theory attacking PM Gillard as an embezzler. Not even vaguely true. Can we report him to Media Watch?

Jonathan Holmes, the sweetly pompous yet mostly entertaining host of the ABC’s Media Watch, plays the role of judge, jury and reputation-executioner for the country’s media. He has a team of researchers to assist him in that effort.

When our dealings with journalists first became extensive in the glory days of our rollicking blog The Other Cheek, we were really surprised how they’d all get so anxious about the show, which we usually enjoyed, except when one of the student newspaper editors I’d got elected was busted for copying articles from, of all things, Dolly. As the show’s slogan goes, everyone loves it, til they’re on it. I remember one mate at a big newspaper seeming to be more concerned about being done over on Media Watch than a court case in which he was involved.

Certainly, back then, and possibly still, being lashed by Media Watch over plagiarism or some other malpractice was considered far more career-limiting than adverse Press Council findings or even a defamation debacle. The Press Council has certainly got tougher, which was the subject of an article from Mr Holmes, the media’s high priest of sanctimony and supposed standards.

So, it came as something of a surprise given his asserted commitment to those high standards to be lashed by Media Watch’s host for something we definitely didn’t do.

And could easily prove we didn’t. As we will below.

Holmes could have accused us of many things, for example, intruding on an ABC after-party following the Logies one year at Hotel Lindrum at the invitation of a prominent ABC identity who thought it would be good for a laugh. Holmes was smoking in the outside front area, an activity I patriotically attempted to record on my iPhone although drunkenness and poor lighting didn’t give us much love. In the cold light of day, we recognise that what goes on in the after-party should stay in the after-party. Prince Harry concurs.

HOLMES IS NO SHERLOCK
Regular VEXNEWS readers will find this startlingly silly but many, sadly, on the state-sponsored opinion site The Drum will take Jonathan Holmes’ not so bon mot words for it:

It would certainly include such feisty and controversial websites as Andrew Landeryou’s Vexnews, Shane Dowling’s Kangaroo Court of Australia, and Larry Pickering’s The Pickering Post.

I mention those three in particular because, at various times and to varying degrees, they have led the charge in pursuing the Julia Gillard-Bruce Wilson affair. They have been able to pursue that alleged scandal with far more freedom than the mainstream media, to produce, as I put it in Monday’s Media Watch, “a mixture of fact, allegation, rumour and fantasy”, secure in the knowledge that they are to all intents and purposes operating outside the sanction of the Defamation Act.

I’ve got no doubt that Julia Gillard would love to sue all of them – or rather, she would love to be able to use the threat of a defamation suit to silence them. But, as I’m sure she and her advisers are astute enough to realise, the risk is that attempting to do so would make matters far worse for her.

Of course, as regular readers would know, despite being fed the Bob Kernohan stat dec (and declining to publish it or make reference to it because it seemed sincere but based on a false premise) by someone close to him long before it became public and viral, our position on what we have called the Gillard embezzlement conspiracy theory is that it’s just wrong.

And, of course, we speak to far more advisers on both sides of politics than Holmes would have ever met. The VEXNEWS thing requires real investigation, not just opinion-ista-ing. Sure, our best work has plenty of opinion but it has also contains news you haven’t and won’t see elsewhere.

Media Watch researchers have in the past pursued VEXNEWS for comments on all sorts of things, principally about the phenomenon of traditional media journalists copying the work of online reporters and presenting stories as their own.

Our view about the PM embezzlement conspiracy theory is that it was wrong because it’s essentially a guilt-by-association story, with an insistence that a lawyer or lover be accountable for every action of their client or companion and a presumption of knowledge of wrongdoing not only unsupported by the facts but highly improbable for all those familiar with her reputation as a highly ambitious person desperate then to get to Club Fed but forever being blocked by the Left faction at that time. It’s ultimately also wrong because it deems someone involved in drafting incorporation documents with everything that happened in the entity thereafter. The absurdity of it – at times – has seemed boundless. Where there’s smoke, sometimes there’s just someone blowing smoke.

So, we’ve loudly opposed it as uncorroborated, incredible and dubious nonsense. It’s become clearer that what actually happened in Ms Gillard’s time at Slater & Gordon was that some big lefty legal egos clashed over a whole range of things, with Bernard Murphy, now a Federal Court judge, and ally Julia Gillard, departing on negotiated terms. The issues affecting the partnership at that time were financial, governance and ego related, sources have told VEXNEWS repeatedly, and nothing at all to do with Bruce Wilson other than as another reason why Murphy’s foes wanted his loyal underling Gillard gone. That’s our view, and it’s not the first time we’ve written it here or tweeted it, taking on many who present alternate views.

TAKING ON EXTREMISTS
We’ve called those who’ve peddled it the political equivalent of the 9/11 terrorists, the Taliban, and so on, (Newsroom viewers will know where we got our inspiration) in our typically robust way. While they are intending to help Tony Abbott, they are almost certainly not. The smears produced the strongest Gillard press conference ever, where she shocked and awed the Canberra Press Gallery and left those watching the whole thing amazed at her strength, wit and poise.

These are not just convenient words now, we wrote them then.

We wrote this:

DISGRACE: The Australian’s false implication of embezzlement at PM shames our great newspaper

We’ve revealed one of the sources behind the anti-Gillard claims, a sleazy mutt called Ralph Blewitt, as a sex predator and misogynist, with documentary evidence of his misconduct. We’ve criticised a newspaper we usually really like, The Australian, for relying on such sources.

Indeed, we are currently still investigating the life and slimes of another accuser, the forenamed Larry Pickering, whose organised criminal activities have only been partly drawn to public attention. He belongs in custody not on the internet. Because there’s much research to do, and because we (unlike Holmes’ implication to the contrary) cherish getting it right. Being wrong is unacceptable to us. It’s not good for the ego. When we are wrong, we not only lavishly apologise, as a matter of principle, we make the apology just as prominent as the original story. We have not once been sued in defamation because of this record. A record Holmes, without proof, disrespects as something other than what it is, something lower than, say, Andrew Fowler at the ABC’s Four Corners, an apologist for fugitive alleged rapists and defender of the indefensible in the Middle East.

And, this week, in a very rare event, we took time to write on another website, as part of our truth and accountability campaign against the increasingly lunar conspiracy theorist and Greensparty ally, Stephen Mayne, the ABC’s Media Watch website where we set out our views two days prior to Holmes misrepresenting them:

Andrew Landeryou – vexnews :
28 Aug 2012 8:19:16am
Interesting report from Media Watch, as ever.

I was offered this story three years ago when Bob Kernohan’s statutory declaration was sent to me. It made allegations that didn’t stack up, which eventually went viral despite the refusal of many to publish them.

While new elements of the story have since emerged, mostly due to The Australian, what hasn’t changed is 1) the false assumption that union officials having an election fund is unusual or inherently dodgy and 2) deeming PM Gillard responsible for all the activities of her client/ex-boyfriend from nearly 20 years is extremely harsh and in my opinion is unsustainable.

The reason why Mr Mayne’s article might not have been welcomed at any publication is that he has been repeatedly asserting unspecified impropriety in relation to the appointment of a Federal Court judge, whose only connection with these matters was that he was also a partner at Gillard’s firm.

There’s nothing wrong with reporting on the PM’s past when it is fact-based. The Australian has had some good sources (former partners of her firm) and some highly questionable ones (former union officials saying they’ll tell the whole story in return for “immunity” which they won’t get).

So Holmes’s hatchet was either a deliberate smear or very sloppy, lazy, unscrutinised work by the paragon of virtue in matters journalism. He goes on to argue that bloggers are not accountable for their errors. That’s a complex debate about all that we won’t go into because it’s clear that in Dr Holmes’s case, the physician needs to heal himself, first.

And while we’ve learned to take all criticism in our stride (even online death threats and such), the factually incorrect and unpleasant nature of being associated with those with which I strongly disagree on an important issue in public life is quite serious and reputation damaging.

Hours before the offensive article was brought to our attention, the honourable gentleman from Perth, Poll Bludger William Bowe alerted the ABC site of the error. They did nothing.

We asked Mr Holmes to correct the record via Twitter.

 

He, so far, hasn’t. We even threatened him with the ultimate sanction, reporting him to Media Watch.

None of it has worked so far.

One VEXNEWS Investigations Unit militant has even demanded we sue, and has offered to fund the litigation. It would be a delicious irony and might be the only way to extract an apology for Holmes’s clear falsehood. Of course, we’d pick an appropriate charity to donate the proceeds, perhaps to One Family Together which helps the families of terrorist victims in Israel.

11AM UPDATE: To demonstrate our seriousness about seeking a correction and apology, we rang Jonathan Holmes on his direct line this morning. He was polite, unflappable, conceded his error and said he would consider an apology. Prior to that, we made complaint in the appropriate authorities at the ABC, who occasionally ensure some level of accountability with obviously erroneous broadcasts or publications from Aunty. I told Holmes we’d consider the matter resolved if there was an appropriate correction and apology. He seemed unconvinced of the need to apologise, somewhat undermining his position that traditional media dinosaurs like him are ultra-accountable while “nasty bloggers” are not at all.  Sorry seems to be the hardest word. Hopefully, he’ll disprove my long-held assumptions about the lack of real and genuine accountability at the ABC and shut us up by doing what we would say is his duty. If not, watch this space.

3PM UPDATE: He might not like VEXNEWS much but Jonathan Holmes proved himself to be bigger about all of this than we expected. He apologised, in circumstances where he probably didn’t want to and certainly didn’t have to do so. A victory for peace and freedom and we will, of course, not be proceeding with our complaint against him. Although we note that in his clarification, he misspelt the name of one of the PM’s accusers. Which, in its small way, proves our point: the pretension that traditional media is a shining city on a hill of responsibility, rigour and righteousness is false. Online outlets such as VEXNEWS are not without sin and some would find our light-hearted connection of an ABC presenter with a porn star to be evidence of that in itself. Fair enough, we are guilty of not taking any of this as seriously as those who would wish us dead (hopefully figuratively).

There’s got to be joy, vigour, passion, belief and – to go all Ann Romney for a moment – love in this. I love VEXNEWS, but I know it won’t and can’t be forever. I know I make more enemies than I really want with it. But, despite the envy of some, the cultural opposition of others and the double standards of many, we’ll continue to try to do our best to bring you news and commentary about public life in Australia that informs you, provokes you, entertains you, for as long as we can. This project – possibly the least likely thing I ever could have imagined doing – has been a source of incredible joy for me. For all those who contribute, for all those who write for VEX and send us comments, tips and praise and even criticism, a big thank you. If I could give all of you a fine feast of KFC, I would.

© 2012 VEXNEWS © 2013.