Our Media Glass House researchers would like our reader to peruse the following statement and then answer a simple question.

Here is the statement: “The progressive left hates the American flag and the military, and disdains anyone who chooses to serve in it.”

Now the question: Who do you think said that?

Sounds like the type of broad-brush lie US President Donald Trump or one of his mad MAGA acolytes spew with increasing regularity, doesn’t it?

We’ve heard a lot of such lies since Trump re-infested the White House, haven’t we? It’s all part of the far-right playbook of sewing division and hate by telling and retelling lies often enough that enough gullible people start to believe them.

Exactly who is the progressive left? Anyone who doesn’t agree with you. It’s a simple but destructive way to spread lies and hatred and harvest votes from the division that ensues.

But wait, our MGH teams have an apology to make.

That statement was deliberately doctored by them. It actually reads: “The progressive left hates the Australian flag and the military, and disdains anyone who chooses to serve in it.”

It appeared in the far right-wing Murdoch media’s far-wing national broadshit The Australian (below) at the weekend in a column penned by one of its stable of external Righters, Gemma Trumpnini… sorry, Gemma Tognini. (main picture)

Gemma apparently runs a PR agency but her views, like many other would-be MAGA Righters, appear regularly in The Oz.

Unchallenged and unfounded assertions (aka: lies) like the one above fit the Trump hate-and-lie playbook perfectly.

Gemma’s column, naturally, belted Anthony Albanese. Why? Because he is there. And he’s a Labor PM.

That seems to be the criteria applied by The Oz, judging by the output of the regular Righters whose anti-Labor views are always given plenty of space in online and hard-copy versions of the boutique Murdoch family newsletter.

Our MGH teams were also taken by the unchallenged and unfounded assertions (aka: lies) Gemma inserted into her column which claimed the PM has been neglecting a string of Australian states in preference to appearing on the world stage. (below)

It didn’t take our MGH researchers much time at all to check Gemma’s assertions.

You won’t find the PM in WA, you say Gemma?

Our MGH teams dug up a transcript from a prime ministerial news conference in Perth back in June.

In it Albanese begins by saying: “It’s great to be back in Western Australia for my 35th visit as Prime Minister, my second visit since the election.”

Victoria? Ignored by the PM, according to Tognini despite the fact he was there just a few weeks ago to attend the 2025 Bush Summit – a pet project of News Crap Australia.

The PM doesn’t visit Queensland, says Tognini.

Once again, a quick look at a transcript from a prime ministerial news conference in Cairns in mid-September is instructive.

In it the local Labor MP for Leichhardt, Matt Smith, welcomes Albanese, adding that it is the PM’s fifth or sixth visit in little more than a year.

That’s five or six visits by Albanese to the far north of Queensland alone, leaving aside other destinations in the Sunshine State.

He’s rarely seen in Tassie, Gemma?

Yet again, a quick check of a transcript from late June shows the PM saying: “It’s great to be back here in Tasmania, my second visit in this term of government, having been here more than 20 times as Prime Minister during my first term.”

As we see in the USA every day, the Trump playbook doesn’t need facts. It is fuelled almost entirely by hate and lies. Here Down Under The Australian and its Righters like Gemma follow that playbook every day.

Want to be alerted immediately a new blog hits Australia’s longest running and most offensive satire site? Simply click on the Follow sign or the link below to be emailed new yarns the moment they are uploaded! The very second we go far too far – and trust us we will – you can then quickly unfollow via the three dots!

Follow The Bug Online on WordPress.com