I might be tempted to add to the general sense of leftie hysteria which seems to be pervading these responses that, the current government has been elected in a 4 successive general elections, that said, surely with a history of such success, it would seem pretty obvious, even to blind Pew as well as levery leftie and every other wannabe, that this government is fully capable, competent and appropriately representative to appoint who the tax paying benefactors of ABC see fit.

so aka "A democracy requires an independant media outlet.

I strongly object to the recent appointments of such neo-lib people like windschuttle."

Better Windschuttle than a left wing troll from the Beazley (nee Latham) camp, Windschuttle being a closer fit to overall national sentiment, regardless of how "objectionable" you find his appointment.

Bosk said:

"I think Mark's worry isn't bias so much as the wrong sort of bias"

Hooray for some clear thinking !

Exactly.

What I find remarkable is that when the 'right' sort of bias is present in the ABC (according to the left) they will triumphally declare:

"THE ABC IS NOT BIASED..POXY MITS OFFFF 'our' ABC"

But when contrary views are creeping in to management or board, or the elected government gets too close for comfort..'THE ABC IS BIASED'

For crying out loud, it will ALWAYS be biased one way or the other.

My biggest concern, is that the bias it receives from the Government will NOT be that which relfects the reasons we elected them, but instead will relfect the 'difficult' aspects of their agenda, which, in the absence of a more preferable alternative, we were stuck with when we elected them.

They may well use the ABC for the promotion of things like 'privatization' of many entities which the electorate that gave them power would find anathema.

Such is the weakness of parliamentary democracy I guess.

Only the politically naive would ever believe that even 'documentaries' or current affairs programs are politically neutral.

So, a documentary might show something of the Snowy Scheme, but do so in a way which sneakily promotes the view of it being privatized. They would carefully select the people interviewed, noting their position on the issue before hand, and stacking it all in a way that suits the desired outcome. Grrrr.

Re the structure of Telstra, most economists argued the case at the start of the debate in the 1980s for structural separation of infrastructure (probably publicly-owned) and services (with competing private suppliers). It's a bit more difficult now without compensating Telstra's private shareholders.

Re the ABC, see my response to Ari's piece, in which he sees the ABC as a response to market failure. In the modern world of global communications, where is the market failure? How important is it? How can it best be addressed? The answer might very well not be the ABC in its present form. There are more fundamental issues than board-stacking.

Is this the same Mark Banisch who lectured at the QUT in 2001 who most students walked out of due to extreme arrogance?

While the ABC is managed by the Government, the government of the day will decide who runs the show. When Labor was in power, the left ruled supreme and all we hear now, is the left throwing tantrums from suffering a loss of power mongering.

I am all for the ABC becoming a little less biased.

Unfortuntely though, judging from many of the far-Right posters on this forum (and John Howard), that for them would mean having the ABC become something similar to FOX News; where we are told nothing but lies and spin and not a word spoken even comes close to resembling the truth.

I think the simplest question to ask here is, "if it's 'our' ABC, why do so few people watch it?"

This seems to get right to the core of the matter. Could it be that the programming, for whatever reason, at the ABC really doesn't interest people out there? It seems incredibly out of step with what Australians like to watch on TV. Yet somehow, it's meant to exist almost because, like brussels sprouts, people need the ABC because it's "good for them", despite not liking the taste of it. Yet if there's a hint of the bogeyman agenda of the far right being pushed on people, it's somehow a direct attack on democracy. Yet isn't democracy meant to be of the masses? If that were the case, wouldn't more CSI, sitcoms and reality TV be the order of the day? Honestly ABC advocates, you're either of the people or you push an elitist, irrelevant agenda (ie. most of what's on the ABC). You can't do or be both.

Personally, I find most of what's on the commercial channels nonsense, so I don't watch such things. Likewise, I find Andrew Bolt, Neil Mitchell, etc. to be buffoons, so I don't pay attention to them. However, this doesn't form the basis for a justification of some opposite agenda simply because it's different. I can turn off both ABC and Channel 10 (indeed, I watch almost no television), but I still pay for the former but not the latter. I think that's what the "left" miss about the privatisation argument: some of us don't want to pay for anyone's agenda.