The column that has fun with the smaller mistakes and missteps of Australia’s mainstream mediocre; that pays homage to those sweet little fishes that individually don’t amount to a full meal but collectively can cause a tummy upset over the overall state of the once great and noble craft of journalism in this country.

We’ve had a lot of fun over the years with the overuse, underuse and misuse of “alleged” and “allegedly” in mainstream mediocre crime and court reporting.

We used to like to think this alleged (sorry!) overuse, underuse and misuse is from tyros with their journalism training wheels still on but sadly that’s far from the case.

Anywho, without further ado, we present this example (at top and below) from The Sydney Morning Herald online on Tuesday morning!

The washed-up, bitter, old hacks who compile this column hope that police do catch this poor chap’s killer. There was no weapon at the crime scene so the cops have clearly ruled out suicide. Rogers has clearly been shot in the chest and left for dead and there’s no need to allege he’s been killed. He has, in fact, been killed by a killer. Throwing in an “alleged” doesn’t bring this poor bugger back to life.

And when and if the cops arrest and charge someone, let’s all hope our brave reporters out there – most likely self-trained in the modern era – will all use “alleged” and “allegedly” in the right place and at the right time. Well, that’s allegedly what we’d like to see happen.

***

Did the compilers of this column hear yesterday morning a classic example of how important the ABC thinks it is to be politically fair and balanced, especially the need to give the LNP opposition a fair shake of the sauce bottle over the past two-and-a-half years?

Sally Sara, the new presenter of Radio National, declared on Tuesday morning that the Australian government “for years” had applied diplomatic pressure to have the remaining Bali Nine brought home.

Look, we’re running this one up the flagpole with bugger-all research and Sara could be right with her choice of words that imply that at the very least the LNP government of Scott Morrison, the caring, ministerial sharing, god-fearing man that he was, tried his very best along with kind and thoughtful people such as senior colleague Peter “Let the Biloela Four rot!” Dutton to get those five men brought home.

But our cynical side suggests there’s a very good chance Sara would have been perfectly in her rights to use the words “over the last two-and-a-half years”.

Still, if she had given only the Labor government since May 2022 credit, Aunty probably would have thought a couple of grabs from Dutton would have been needed for balance. Balance for the ABC seems to have been far, far, more important than in pre-May 2022. Balance for the ABC in recent times means that a presser with an Albanese government minister has to be cut short to hear what Peter Dutton says.

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