It is a very good question John.When the journos both in the corp media and the ABC going to do their job?

John Swinton the Chief of staff of the NY times in 1952 said;" There is no such thing.at this date of the world's histroy,in America as an independant press.You know it and I know it.There is not one of you who dare write your honest opinions,and if you did,you know beforehand that it would never appear in print.......

The business of the journalists is to destroy the truth,to lie outright,to pervert,to vilify to fawn at the feet of mammon,and sell his country and race for his daily bread.You know it and I know it,and the folly is this toasting an independant press.

We are the tools and vassals of rich men behind the scenes.We are the jumping jacks,they pull the strings and we dance.Our talents,our possibilities and our lives are all the property of other men.We are intellectual prositutes." How much more powerful must these rich men be now?

It has now become apparent that Obama comes also wth quite a few strings attached.His puppet masters are seeming all powerful, so all pervasive and so subtle,that no one dare mention the possibility of totally dysfunctional,corrupt Govt/Corporate USA,for fear of being labelled a lunatic conspiracy theorist.

This is completely the wrong topic on which to criticise the ABC, Arjay. Auntie-bashing has always been a popular sport for conservatives, but it's been extra-trendy since the Iraq scare campaign, when the ABC was caught out telling the truth about Iraq's WMD.

Remember when every commercial newspaper, TV and radio station was reporting Saddam's mountains of WMD as uncontested fact? At the same time, the ABC got dobbed by Liberal Senator Richard Alston for bias, because its reporters dared to suggest that the case might not be watertight. We now know that the ABC was on top of the story the whole way, while the others were parroting the line of corporate convenience.

The ABC has demonstrated that it is the only media outlet in this country that is not beholden to conservative politicians and their bagmen.

"When will those paid to keep the record straight do their job?" - good question, but how does that relate to our Australian media, who seem to believe their job is to pursue anyone the ALP directs it too? (I mean the ABC of course, and the other news outlets are hardly conservative, the AGE conservative(?), it's an Greenie Eco liberal rag now)

The "objective and independent" ABC any night of the week is aggressive attacks on conservatives (non ALP) and lovely chummy fireside chats(ALP) Truth does not come into it.

I'm sure they all think they're doing a good job and are are very fair and open minded, it's just that the ALP happen to be correct.

The newspaper media is much the same - the whole concept of honest reporting is secondary to the personal whims and opinions of the journalists involved.

Sancho - Senator Alston asked the ACMA to investigate the ABC for anti American bias, not because of WMD's. Do you remember that the ALP, and (now) PM Rudd completely supported the war in Iraq?

David Marr at the time of the report, accused the ACMA of not understanding journalism when (because) it UPHELD at least a third of Senator Alston's complaints .. it's in the Media Watch transcript.

It is appropriate to attack the ABC because that's exactly the kind of behavior John Pilger is talking about - instead of reporting the truth objectively, they tend to attack those they do not like on ideological grounds.

If there is any political side to any story, you can bet the ABC, Age etc will come down on an anti conservative side, not the middle, but the liberal side and truth goes out the window.

Is this what people want? Really? No conservatives at all, just a one opinion country (whether it is truthful or not), then we might as well have a dictatorship, stop elections and just have the ALP rule.

John, there are rational thinking people in this world. Such people do not need to be told what propaganda is, they recognize immediately, whether it is from the political, media, marketing or entertainment industries. Realists take on board all the issues you raise, strike a balance in their own minds and accept it for what it is, propaganda.

There are those however, who are fearful, vulnerable and not so well balanced. Such people are your target audience and you share that audience with politics, entertainment and marketing. You are all looking to find a “buyer”.

You will no doubt find your buyers, there are plenty out there within your target market. Sadly you will never find buyers in the rationalist sector until and unless you are able to acheive some balance and to objectively examine and present other perspectives, otherwise you will remain just another activist.

When (or if) you can do this you will probably lose all interest in the emotionally charged rehash of the not so recent propaganda you have just trotted out. Its time you realised that propaganda can’t give you answers. It clearly upsets you that there is no resolution, there never is, stop taking it all so damn seriously and move on.

rpg. i can find no left opinion in the australian media...anywhere. certainly the ABC is desperately right wing, and the commercial media further to the right. no left columnists, no left editors, no left slant anywhere. nothing. the conservatives have all the media in australia locked up, everyone i have met who visits australia from elsewhere is amazed how right wing our media is. individual blogs are the only exception, if you want unbiased news about australia then the good international media cover us honestly and regularly far better and with more depth than anything we can serve up ourselves.

Sancho and others ,this is not about left or right politics,it is about freedom of speech and having a media not controlled by Govt or the Corporates.In April this yr this, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_tf25lx_3o was shown on national Danish TV but our Govt will not permit the ABC to screen it.

Now Kevin Rudd wants to censor the internet.How much more ignorant will we be then?