If people want reactionary swill they can change over to the commercial stations. ABC is not doing itself any favours by pandering to extremists and parrotting political spin from the Coalition in the name of false ''balance''. It's just a race to the bottom where the people who support the ABC stop watching it and the extremists they are pandering don't watch it anymore than they used to and continue their accusations of bias. A truly self defeating exercise.


Quote:

Something is missing on week nights at 7.30pm on the ABC and it's not just the word "report". The retooled 7.30 is misfiring: the public broadcaster's current affairs flagship is suffering the effects of a belated and blotchy start to the year as it comes to grips with the generational change invoked by the departure of Kerry O'Brien. Shortening the name has become a motif for the show's failings. Something is missing. For many, many years there has been a simple, implied promise — watch the ABC for an hour from 7pm and, between the state news broadcast and The 7.30 Report, you would get both the day's events and an understanding of their significance. Currently, the pledge is only half fulfilled and the problems for 7.30 already appear worryingly entrenched. ... There are nights now when 7.30 looks and feels akin to a weekly news magazine review. The segments are tied to the news but they're neither drawn from the latest headlines nor likely to generate their own the next day. Leigh Sales opens the first segment of the relaunched program earlier this year. The five slots on a recent half hour were given over, in order, to the issue of fathers who unfathomably punish their former partners by harming their children; the varying impacts of the Australian dollar's appreciation; the breakdown of talks between logging and environmental groups in Tasmania; an interview with a leading science and technology writer about the startling pace of technological change; and the story of a HIV-positive cycling enthusiast from Sydney about to compete in a taxing American race. The result was considered, workmanlike television. Unless your benchmark is the parallel universe of Today Tonight — dole cheats, speed cameras, electricity bills, repeat endlessly — that's just not good enough. Part of the malaise rests with the bet-hedging decision to replace O'Brien with the Sydney-based Leigh Sales and Canberra-based political editor Chris Uhlmann. The reality is that Sales hosts the show but does very little besides studio links. She has rarely been used as an interviewer recently, with a reporter speaking exclusively to Qantas boss Alan Joyce, for example, on the day the airline's pilots moved decisively towards industrial action. Her main source of interaction is with the teleprompter. Uhlmann, despite his habit of muttering "sure, sure" as he waits for guests to finish an answer, delivers sharper interviews, although he's prone to prosecuting a single, at times insignificant, point if he senses there's a victory to be had. Neither is being given an opportunity to shine, let alone stamp their authority on 7.30. Nor do they collaborate. In one Monday-to-Thursday block two weeks ago, they were on air together once and it was hardly a dialogue. It's not as if they're taking a back seat to essential content. One recent, baffling piece marked the Queen's first visit as monarch to Ireland by merely excerpting three minutes of her generic, inoffensive speech. The story that should have gone with it didn't eventuate. Since its belated start to the year, when it missed crucial stories such as the Queensland floods because of the wait to construct a new set (the result was totally worth it, if you're still missing Battlestar Galactica), 7.30 has been falling away. Audience numbers that began in excess of 700,000 nationally were last week barely above 500,000. In television, shows come and go but The 7.30 Report was held to a higher standard, one that 7.30 is sadly falling short of. Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment/tv-and-radio/not-all-news-is-good-news-20110602-1fhyc.html#ixzz1O6vDNKVt

If it bothers you so much, why don`t you just record all the tardy spin jobs, and simply replay them?   You`ll be just as well informed as you are now, and you`ll be happier.

I thought we all supported ABC through our taxes. Why should we pay thus support a leftard TV station.

progressiveslol wrote on Jun 2^nd, 2011 at 8:27pm:

I thought we all supported ABC through our taxes. Why should we pay thus support a leftard TV station.

Way to prove my point! ;D Why pander to front bottoms like you when you're just going to attack them as biased no matter WHAT they say or do?!

astro_surf wrote on Jun 2^nd, 2011 at 8:36pm:

progressiveslol wrote on Jun 2nd, 2011 at 8:27pm: I thought we all supported ABC through our taxes. Why should we pay thus support a leftard TV station. Way to prove my point! ;D Why pander to nasty people like you when you're just going to attack them as biased no matter WHAT they say or do?!

My point exactly. You are upset it could be less leftardian.

mavisdavis wrote on Jun 2^nd, 2011 at 8:15pm:

If it bothers you so much, why don`t you just record all the tardy spin jobs, and simply replay them?   You`ll be just as well informed as you are now, and you`ll be happier.

no they want re runs of Kerry...

they cant handle the real world.. like.. alls fair in love and war..

just goes to show how the poor didums from the left were so use to Kerrys bias they cant cope with someone who isnt quite so far left..shame I am crying fro them...lol..

fancy lowering yourself to write a column on bias that isnt going your way...grooooooan how immature

progressiveslol wrote on Jun 2^nd, 2011 at 8:27pm:

I thought we all supported ABC through our taxes. Why should we pay thus support a leftard TV station.

I'd probably agree with you, if it was.

But I don't see that it is. I've seen lefties cop it
as well as the right.

I'd argue that, by and large, it is far more
balanced and less biased to right OR left
than any of its commercial rivals.

Kat wrote on Jun 2^nd, 2011 at 8:41pm:

progressiveslol wrote on Jun 2nd, 2011 at 8:27pm: I thought we all supported ABC through our taxes. Why should we pay thus support a leftard TV station. I'd probably agree with you, if it was. But I don't see that it is. I've seen lefties cop it as well as the right. I'd argue that, by and large, it is far more balanced and less biased to right OR left than any of its commercial rivals.

Problem for the conservatives is that anything that is not the extremist right murdock point of view is seen as some kind of communist plot.
The seven thirty report died for me years ago, it simply was sliding to the poor qualities of most post news current affairs. I do think the ABC has done a better job than most through a variety of its current affairs programming but the 7:30 report isn't one of them.

nairbe wrote on Jun 2^nd, 2011 at 8:57pm:

Kat wrote on Jun 2nd, 2011 at 8:41pm: progressiveslol wrote on Jun 2nd, 2011 at 8:27pm: I thought we all supported ABC through our taxes. Why should we pay thus support a leftard TV station. I'd probably agree with you, if it was. But I don't see that it is. I've seen lefties cop it as well as the right. I'd argue that, by and large, it is far more balanced and less biased to right OR left than any of its commercial rivals. Problem for the conservatives is that anything that is not the extremist right murdock point of view is seen as some kind of communist plot. The seven thirty report died for me years ago, it simply was sliding to the poor qualities of most post news current affairs. I do think the ABC has done a better job than most through a variety of its current affairs programming but the 7:30 report isn't one of them.

like most things.. you only like them when they agree with your point of view... facinating way to get an all round view of the world of politics.

all I have seen on here is lefties saying they have given up on the 7.30 report show.. lol... its only the lefties mind you.

shows how immature they are cant handle the heat so they critise it..

Quote:

Problem for the conservatives is that anything that is not the extremist right murdock point of view is seen as some kind of communist plot

Valid point. But it's also a problem for "lefties" that anybody even slightly to the right of them are see as some kind of far right extremists.

But as for the ABC, yeah, they seem to be trying to over compensate these days for the perception (amongst some) that they're left biased.

Not surprising when you consider who's on the board and in management there these days.