The Grumpies are great - their Christmas therapy of that rare thing called open conversation, something to cheer here for .Infact there are some great vieweing things on ABC TV this month ,including those powerful ARdmann clay characters.

SCHOOLS SPECTACULAR
Great entertainmenta and talent, so next year lets hear the storytelling . We taped and watched this great show as there is so little on sunday nights ABC. Was very busy. Hope you can capture a bit more light and shade next time

MDA tonight. Great stuff. We are winning when the ABC lets the public tell its story and you are doing it very well .
Who did you think was the real villian in the Valley?. . My dance around the fruit stall tommorow will be marred a little by the demonising of ministers and our failure to NAME the slippery curves of the last twenty years .

The storytellers could still do alot to to avoid crashes for those ministers and media people who continue to get drawn into very costly cyclones and cul desacs because they want something better than what was handed down to them to look after .

I wonder how many thousands of ABC viewers FOUND something else to do while the ageing lefties indulged in a bit of projection and denial with MARK LATHAM tonight. Low point Andrew

re 730 report on TELSTRA . Yes it was bit like days of our drearies . Switch back on after 15 min and still the same stuff going on . Back to the cricket--- well done SBS !

7:30 retorts -we now switch off or over. 7:30 retorts -its mostly chanting. A classic last week was when the presenter made himself the foil and let the PM preach . Its not reporting - where was the opposition argument on TELSTRA ( whole country wanted to know) put by someone who KNOWS how to respond- chanting may suit many, but it doesn't answer the questions and let us get beyond old reactionary retorts and blatant rhetoric .

THE BILL -- what a mess - its just not worth watching .so much lead you round by the neck soap. as if anyone would believe the leadup and the event ts in the marriage ceremony by the riverside construct is anything more than wishfull thinking by the author. No wonder the ABC have finally pulled it, and the good actors refuse to cooperate "with expression". . The writers are confused about what real life and real enemies are .

Everyone in the building has such big issues, its no wonder the focus never really gets out of it anymore .
Its now so much a reflection of the self centred navel gazing worldview thats killing rather than building communities. thats drag down .

What a contrast was FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT on AFGANISTAN . Reprting at its very best . While we weren't spoon fed solutions the producers did an outstanding job of putting the deep challenges in perspective .Jung said the problem was man made and by implicaion solvable but not with ham fisted quick fix. More on carrots and sticks in Agcommunities

The church was in full voice when Barnaby walked through the door . How can any good thing come from northern Queensland? Dear me, the cringe factor is back!
Time to have a good look at the facts Boys ---by those who chant business and flat earth economists to make themselves feel comfortable .

What would a country person know???
The truth , from experience, about complex risk and long term investment matters perhaps ?
The chanters are, under the noisy surface , worried about what works in the bush. Its obviously too complex a risk environment for them and their advisers . After all it wasn't just telephones that went down in the cold snap ! and shareholders know lots --or is it just that they have a lot of influence and ..........goodwill ?

The ISSUE this week was simple ---Just the price of Telstra.
And Barnaby won over the carping
Both sides of politics once knew the tragedy of those who know the price of everything but can't discern the value of anything.

Maybe the bush has something worth knowing about ?

Spicks, specks and problems with your vision
ABC TV We enjoy it, mostly !
Those of you who are worshipers of all that is better in the future in your team need to realize the futures closing in on them . Why? Because mature adults maintaining childish reactionary profiles is denying our children the past (Too much of ABC evening entertainment is about ridiculing the past and those who DO things )

Sorry fellows , you got it wrong. You can't switch the Light off. You all know very well if you are going to play historian, or wise with words( because most of you know better) that people just ignore the Light. After all, whose music is selling on your ad breaks.
The Soweto gospel choir . Is it Good words, good music, new songs or old songs, or on the wholistic front- just wonder material ? tell us next week what you think ? Can’t you say what Bob Carr said ?
Ignoring the light is the norm, and switching it off is anthropomorphic driven myth- the driver of that irrational fanatical power that prevents reality therapy and sustainable change at the good old ABC. Nostalgia is fine as long as it doesn't reflect a childish mentality.

There are none so blind as those who will not see, or those who quench the interest of the young in alternatives. ( via ridicule)
The light is still on and young people are increasingly choosing to ignore the ABC and its stuffy old approach to songs worth singing .Psalms 96:1 tells the story very well.

On the whole I really like your program, but like many evenings "home" , I switch off when the ABC fail to value what's truly valuable (a very childish thing) and "dumb up " parts of the past that are imaginary, immature and blinkered in vision . ABC is very much the poorer for its monoculture of tired old blinkered and branded stuff .Grow up ABC?

4 Corners on City -Country Divide. Chris masters has done some great work on behalf of the very complex issues of water and resource management . If only policy groups would do it more and better with greater objectivity so we don't get more quick fix .

But even Chris Masters must be wondering why the silence . The country has been in no talk mode for a while .

A Challenge to the superficial and myopic paradigms of the city -- test the deep water--- our friends in the city - too much apparent care is patronising and unwilling deafness in cocontenation with alophobia etc.

"Farmers get too much already " 4 corners ABC tonight
The way governments throw money carelessly at problems would have given this excellent portrait real bite .
Conserving tax resources to store hay and keep professionals in the bush is not rocket science- it just needs to happen .Country people are absolutely on the mark right to call for understanding, not sympathy. That understanding will continue to diminish while experts leave or burn rubber to listen! Its all practical stuff but it has to happen .
Its plain silly to expect producers to solve the eco nonsense that both parties wisper in comfortable and dismissive chant.
After all if country people stimulate the innovation , independance and glass half full attitudes this country needs , our "let it all happen" polys need to look a bit closer .
Country people don't waste resources. Its bureaucrats, quangos and ignorant politicians who tow the simple lines of high risk and high exhaustion , who don't know what they are talking about on the environment ( peter andrews story on austory) and who change direction to keep manageing faddish funding schemes.

Will Media be banned from AFL Clubrooms -as from Today !

What a scoop (a great point of High political juggularity )if some non conformist in sleepy hollow woke up to WHY we waste so much money on the environment . Simililarrly it would be a great waste if all the noise about that fantastic story on Peter Andrews ( Australain story ABCTV this week) got no further than a slanging match about " who knows best " .

I am not going to spell it out here except to say that a common phobia ( often held in denial by persons affected ) is rife and a s result environmental health care is a complete cot case in traditional health care terms (This condition is well known to practicioners of any competence.A few clues will be handedout on cuttingedge conservation

CANBERRA VS THE STATES Farmers VS the Academics

Wouldn't it be great if the ABC dug a bit deeper and found someone other that a poly who knew something about "erosion water quality and biodiversity ". Sure to liven up the tired old ABC and give it some credibility - just like that great story on Aust story did last week - enviroemnatl matters are too complex to be massaged into simplicity by either side of politics , the food chain and the increasingly uncontrollable nimby knowalls .

Clue: heritage listing is a distraction !

Foriegn Correspondent - again excellent stories both esp Jane Hutchison on the Zimbabwe situtaion through the eyes of an author . . Your professional reporting is a welcome weekly change from the arrogant authorship and interference too common across public broadcasting services.

Its easy to be critical but the ABC is still our favourite switch on and has had some beauties . Mind you Frost dramas are very competitive. - the americans in africa series (powerful look in the mirror culture stuff , the CBC doco "The Year of the Hunter" -outstanding TV . Liked the war series too . More please at that time slot. Foreign Correspondent is generally outstanding and not an option time for the video switch .

The glass house leaders are stale; indulging in predictable ways their own 30 year fanatisies on sex politics and religion ( views about as deep as they were when they were children) . The young girl on the program can read the script without half a brain - anti authority , big on sex . Dave is certainly an asset but i won't tell you why - time to give someone else a go .

All very well for the Treasurer to give the impreesion of Father Christmas . Are Sundays Insiders and the ABC commentators doing more than barking at his heels and drinking in his favourite recipes for growth . The exploitation machine is not obviuos to many of you who to trust that government is business. The confusion explains the complacency .

Compass special on FF .Considering most journos hardly know whats happening in churches I thought the producer and his team did a good job of reporting what they saw and heard. About time . after all there is more to Dibley than the reactionaries leftists playing some ineffective and discredited old political games.

the egalitarian spirit?

Thanks the ABCTV for reporting the situation in the Sudan on Lateline tonight .
It’s great when fellow Australians have the courage to report these incidents-
What great things could happen to Australia’s diminishing sense of the egalitarian spirit if we saw beyond this shallow fanatical nonsense that our wealth is created by “everyman for himself’”
What if we grabbed a bit of courage and faith, took the bull by the horns again and said true wealth - by “everyman for ever other man”. Keep up the good work.

Geraldine Brooks came as close as anyone I know in recent times to challenging the tired old reactionaries doctrines about good writing. While I enjoyed Andrew Denton's engagement with her, I feel , as a succesesful outsider, she still had much more to give to shock us out of our complacency over the doldrums in reality dramas.
Andrew is good, but he could be better at upsetting his audience . I won't bore you with more details, except to say that the ABC overpromotion of what was once popular reality TV ( The Bill) is a good example of some of its producers living in the past and focusing on the frame instead of the substance in such matters.

ABC are giving me back time I never thought I had . Time to not watch it anymore .Thames talkback need to be told - The Bill is supersoap and we don't want to get sucked in ,.Have you researched it ABC? - Us limpet like ABC fans must have been dropping off for years!

I'm not fascinated by grumpy old men but I do like the idea of women who learn to cope with them . By the way, the ABc in its attempt to onedimensionalize one elizabeth the first, ( the virgin queen )have left us all wonedring if the ABC is worthwatching.
Both women were wonderful, but you would not know it by watching the ABC .

Reality therapy with no therapy .

We have no need to dig deep into the many tragedies from "doing what you feel like " paradigms fixes that plague abcchurch "Feel better by seeing someone else in a worse mess" .Not therapy - maybe its voyerism? Arts are in a desperate mood with close look at the crash/entrails/outcomes as the objects of interest . bit late mate .
Your viewers will need more than the token dose of stephanie dowrick before they get something good to encourage families to work together. Cutting Edge,top end of town , marriage acts

Lateline Friday
Nick Minchin was no match for Julia and company.Well done girls
Minchin and his comfortable cows watching traffic on the highway better get back to governing before they get run off the road.

Nick's obvious fascination with the fast car drivers is not shared by many Australains who know the quickfiz's get often get their fuel from exploiting the energy of others. Traffic and tax needs governing and minchins careless babbling over the price of property emptied his whole talk of any credibility over the value of anything he was saying.

Wake up you sycophantic liberals and nationals -Govisnotbusiness .

Too many flashes in the pan- ideas that get blown away

Many Australians are great inventors (The New Inventors)but, to put the lack of momentum to capitalise on this in the last 30yrs, many others have a bad habit of gambling away the opportunities the quiet achievers gain. The ABC, by using a old format, are reflecting our lack of a sea change to help challenge our indifference the finance sectors easy picking mentality - we are prone to working the willing horse to death. Creative aussies need more than tokenism in the real world . There is no point in talking their jobs up when the finance sector STILL moves on a different plane and are encouraged to do so, by the lack of critiscsm of them within the ABC and the myopic "market knows best merchants". Read ellul on quickfix or quikfiz on the way we fail to recognise the nature of quick fix in the financial sector.
“ Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness …. Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it “. From George Santayana (1863-1952)

What's wrong with the BBC and ABC compulsion to use its half baked stuff?

take the the Bill ratings as an example of how aussies are cutting their umbilical cord to the old country and some of its great traditions.
-eg half baked revisionist piece on queen elizabeth recently

( as if we can't tell how they slot in junk in between good stuff esp on sunday nights where its so predictably an ABCchurch affair that's it guaranteed to be video night!

What's wrong with the BBC and ABC compulsion to use its half baked stuff?

take the the Bill ratings as an example of how aussies are cutting their umbilical cord to the old country and some of its great traditions.
-eg half baked revisionist piece on queen elizabeth recently

( as if we can't tell how they slot in junk in between good stuff esp on sunday nights where its so predictably an ABCchurch affair that's it guaranteed to be video night!