It’s a dry old argument
Well, the election is over and we have a government and an opposition, a small crowd of independents of varied opinions, strengths and weaknesses, the sun still rises in the east and sets in the west, our rivers are still drying up, climate change deniers are still denying and, despite a monster turnout of voters, Australians are still jacked off with politics. Perhaps with good reason. That doesn’t stop the world from rolling on in its haphazard way, marking the times with both predictable and unusual events.
Wild geese have taken over Phillip Island in the Great Australian Bight. The population of Cape Barren geese has shot up to about 3,000 from the six which were introduced in 1984. They’ve become an unstoppable blitzkrieg chewing and pooing through the town, school oval and farmland. Tourists visiting the island to see penguins are having to settle for the larger, more aggressive birds. Farm manager Vanessa McGrath describes the geese as “sheep with wings”.
Donald “MAGA” Trump is still intent on building a wall in the south and engulfing the world in a trade war everywhere.
Science, which nine years ago warned that the moon was shrinking as its interior cooled has given the old girl a reprieve. Now Tom Watters of the Smithsonian Institute says the moon has somehow remained tectonically active over its
4.6 billion years. We think this means there is no immediate danger of the moon shrivelling up, like when a grape turns into a raisin, as was once predicted.
British PM Theresa May is still trying to negotiate a Brexit deal, while claiming she is ready to step down.
Celebrated philosopher Plato has been exposed as humourless curmudgeon who had a down on comedy because it was based on envy and malice. He even believed that laughing could impair rationality and lead to poor character. Our Curmudgeon is pleased that at last someone has outed the dour guru as
a sourpuss and points out he is not related to the Greek.
Clive Palmer, Pauline Hanson, Cory Bernardi, Fraser Anning, Steve Dickson and Malcolm Roberts are still Clive Palmer, Pauline Hanson, Cory Bernardi, Fraser Anning, Steve Dickson and Malcolm Roberts. Seems we can’t do anything about that.
NRL star winger Corey Oates and his wife Tegan have called their baby Monte, because Corey loves to munch on a Monte Carlo biscuit. They might have considered Cracker, because that’s what Corey is — a cracker at scoring
freakish tries.
The sun is still rising in the east, though getting hotter, our rivers are still drying up even faster, the climate change sceptics are becoming more shrill but the younger generations seem to have woken to a bad dream — they recognise we’re headed for a nightmare if we don’t do something about it.
And another reason to keep a rein on your hopes — Alabama has just banned abortion and introduced heavy penalties for transgressors, a decision almost certain to lead other states further into America’s medieval darkness.
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After a few weeks spent on the election trail, we now give you an insight into how it was to be a journalist when life was more relaxed …
Love, Lust & Madness
By Mick Barnes
One evening a journalist named Massey Stanley fell from the heavens onto the floor of Parliament House in Canberra. He tumbled gracefully, completing
a couple of turns that might have impressed the Olympic diving judges, had they been there, and landed spreadeagled in front of the Speaker. History hasn’t recorded what the Speaker had to say. Perhaps he was dumbfounded. Several Honourable Members were jolted from their sleep, one of whom asked: “What was that?” When told “it’s only Massey Stanley”, he went back
to sleep.
Massey shook himself, took in his surroundings, mumbled something and walked under his own steam from the House. Some say he broke his arm following his descent; others that he was too drunk to be seriously hurt.
“Onto the floor” might be misleading to those sensible souls who keep themselves at one remove from the grubby business of politics. In pollie-speak, “on the floor of the House” refers to matters that occur in the debating chamber, as distinct from places hidden from view in the real corridors of power, or from the public gallery or press galleries, whence Massey Stanley launched into free-fall. We’ll never know the full details of his flight. It happened in the old Parliament House in the 1930s. All eyewitnesses have moved on to eternity.
I mention Stanley’s swallow dive now only to make the point that it will never happen again. It took place in an era when there was a whiff of madness in
the air, a cloud of craziness that enveloped journalists in their everyday lives. The lunatic behaviour they applied to their professional activities also frequently spilt over into their love lives, though to be blunt, journos do lust better than love. This may be because of the transitory nature of the craft — even the hottest news stories rarely stay in the headlines more than a week — or, more likely, it’s the nature of the beast; lusty and lustful individuals are drawn to the business and their wanton ways are merely a reflection of
their temperament.
I spent 45 years in the game; most of my peers are now dead. The survivors, when I see them collectively at the odd wake, look like a montage in a tattered Bosch painting in which the characters have aged along with the picture — the Seven Deadly Sins on show in their dotage, the Picture of Dorian Grey as a crowd scene. Blokes who once breathed heavily at every passing maiden now just breathe heavily. Lustfulness has turned to listlessness, sloth to slob. Angry young men have become watchful old men, careful that any aberrant show of emotion will be their last. Their lust for alcohol too has gone down the plug-hole. These old warriors slip frequently out to the loo, not to check their vanity, but to check their colostomy bags.
So, why revive the memory of Massey’s spectacular tumble 80-something years on? To understand, we must look at journalism then and now and at the shifting moods of our society. Imagine if some throwback to earlier days took a swallow dive today in that underground bunker we now call Parliament House. More spin would be put on the event than Massey achieved through the air. There would be outrage across the nation: shock jocks would suffer apoplexy, hammering the airwaves, calling for the tumbler’s head, pompous MPs would publicly pillory the poor fellow, arraign him at the bar of the House, punish him severely; politicians of all stripes would blather on about the dignity of Parliament, newspapers would outdo each other in expressing their horror and despair. The miscreant would be sacked, he would be jailed, he would become an outcast of society. Nothing of the sort happened to Massey Stanley in real time 1930s. He caused not a ripple on the surface of civil society, except for a ripple of laughter.
We live in an age where earnestness frowns on humour and political correctness casts its prim eye over any form of innocent fun. More than a century ago John Norton, publisher of Truth newspaper, invented the word wowser to denote a puritanical moralist, a killjoy. Have we become a nation of killjoys? Have we lost the capacity to enjoy robust humour? Have we lost the plot? These are questions I’ve been asking myself more and more often towards the end of life’s journey, as I come in for landing. Would today’s sober and sombre journalism tolerate some of the individuals of the past whom we regarded as lively souls, but not in any way exceptional?
Take the Id for instance. The Id, an Englishman from the West Country who found his natural home in Australia, once arrived outside a Kings Cross whorehouse after the shutters had gone up very late at night. He was with two journo mates and all three were overtaken by an unmanageable lust following a drinking session at the Bourbon and Beefsteak. Somehow along the way the Id had become involved in a scuffle with a trellis and was covered in green vines. Not to be denied, they hammered on the door until the madam poked her head out of an upper window.
What do you want?
We want women!
Well, you can’t have them.
We’ve got to have them! We need them!
You can’t have them.
Why not?
(Madam pointing) Because you’re too fat, you’re too ugly and you’re dressed as
a plant.
Or how would Nick Brash fare in this straitlaced age? Brash — reporter, columnist, street-fighter, lover — was married four times in his brief, hectic 42 years. How he became such a repeat offender in such a short time is explained by the following…
Nick was given to lapses of memory, complete blanks, when he was on the grog. He woke up one morning startled to discover he was in bed in a New York hotel. The last Brash remembered was standing in a bar in Australia. Even more puzzling was his bedfellow, a woman of pleasant aspect who, from her affectionate approach, was a familiar.
Who are you? Nick asked, not unkindly.
Your wife, she replied.
Nick had no memory of where he met her, Australia or America, what her name was, how he (or they) had been transported from a continent half
a world away, or where they had wed. But there was no denying the
evidence — an authentic marriage certificate. Sad to say, it was a marriage
of brief duration.
The madness of journalism in those more relaxed times took many forms. Legendary reporter Frank O’Neill was crazy enough to ride a horse from Darwin to Adelaide as an assignment. When asked at the end what he had learned on his hazardous four-month journey, O’Neill replied: “I learned how to ride a horse.”
The Canberra press gallery in the 1970s had an unofficial award for whichever Canberra journo made the biggest idiot of himself (or herself) in any given year. It was called the J P Quirk Memorial Monstering Prize after Jim Quirk, who for years had set a high standard for aberrant and questionable behaviour. Once, at a diplomat’s lavish party, he jumped onto the official table and doused the candle-lit birthday cake in the most elemental manner. The competition was abandoned when fellow journalists realised they could never match the master, no matter what they dreamed up.
In Joh Bjelke-Petersen’s Brisbane in the 1970s, Frank Robson and Ken Edwards distinguished themselves one afternoon by turning into dust-coated officials in City Hall. With a few hours of pushing trollies they moved all the records, documents and furnishings of one department to another, and vice versa. An inquiry within the council could turn up no reason for the transformation.
And let’s not undersell Massey Stanley. He had already set the benchmark for flamboyant journalistic bravado before his spectacular parliamentary tumble. In 1930 the new Federal Parliament was the centre of a hostile debate. Its detractors branded it a ludicrous waste of money. Frank Packer, Stanley’s boss, was one of its harshest critics. Massey borrowed an elephant from a travelling circus and next day Packer’s Daily Telegraph in Sydney ran a big picture of the beast nosing its way into Parliament House. The caption read: “An elephant looks at a white elephant”.
I myself sometimes left my mark. I created havoc in a Brisbane newspaper’s holy of holys by chasing the editor and deputy editor around the large conference table threatening to dismember them. I had a red table napkin poking out of my right ear and was carrying a load of alcohol, both by hand and internally.
Now here’s the paradox. Like many old-timers I’ve spent wasted hours of pub time in fits of laughter over the latest journo outrage, while also blasting newspaper proprietors, just for being what they are. I’ve pilloried them as a race apart, distinguished by their moods and manners, or lack of manners, men (always men) of unnaturally inflated egos who used their power to foist their idiosyncratic ideas on a helpless public.
My argument went like this: despite differences in physique, temperament, IQ, learning and physical attraction, the behaviour of press barons has been totally uniform — to rule with ruthless efficiency, spreading their imperial influence in ever-widening circles so that it could make and break governments, and any other obstacle to their power and influence.
Although they frequently inflame the masses to a patriotic frenzy through campaigns of flag-waving jingoism and character assassination, these tyrants don’t fit naturally into any nationality. They are beyond such things. They are citizens of the world and the world needs to be shaped to their order.
Exercising this task has nothing to do with where they come from but to where they are going. Rupert Murdoch switched nationalities to become an American a while back, yet was voted the most influential Australian long after his voice had picked up an irritating American twang. In reality he is neither Yank nor Aussie, nor the citizen of any country. Media Baron should be stamped on his passport — a putative place of residence, and of birth
and allegiance.
The UN could do a lot worse than designating some unoccupied coral cay as “the Kingdom of Media Baron” and locating all members of the tribe there as a possible site for nuclear testing.
And yet, and yet, as I approach life’s exit door, I’m thankful that maniac media moguls were around when I was a journo. Without them there would have been no place for mad journos. They employed editorial staff almost as crazy as themselves, people who otherwise might have been unemployable.
Master and servant lived in a symbiotic distrustful relationship, each using the other for prosperity or survival. It was a mad, mad world and I count myself fortunate that I was there. Now as I see newspapers swallowed up by the technology revolution and the shaky survivors run by soulless equity companies, I grudgingly salute the media moguls in all their loony bastardry. Without them life would have been intolerably dull.
Let’s have a look, world-wide, at a few of the masters and their curious ways …
Horace Greeley, the 19th century luminary who rose from nowhere to become the influential founder, proprietor, editor and publisher of the New York Tribune, had the quaint view that “news” was a plural noun. It was no surprise, then, that having heard nothing for several weeks from his star reporter sent to cover “the troubles” in Cuba, he cabled: “Are there any news?” The reporter cabled back: “No, not a new.” History doesn’t record whether this bon mot caused Horace to throw a fit or throw the reporter out.
Throwing something, anything, has gone hand in hand with proprietorial eccentricities. Australian publisher Ezra Norton, in a fit of pique, once threw a large cream-cake into the face of his pet dog who squatted day by day in his office, a party to those conferences which shaped the news at Sydney’s Truth.
Not to be outdone, rival newspaper proprietor Frank Packer (him again) threw his great columnist Lennie Lower down the steps of the Hotel Australia after Lennie’s sense of humour got away from him. Packer had been hosting
a function to honour the visiting thespian Noel Coward, then at the height of his fame.
“Ah, the king of Australian humourists,” Coward said with jolly English condescension as he thrust out his hand.
“Ah, the queen of the English stage,” responded Lower with roughhouse Australian humour, only to find himself picked up and propelled by Packer’s hefty hand down the front steps onto the Castlereagh Street pavement.
Throwing was an annual event for journalists employed on News of the World long before Rupert Murdoch made it his first English acquisition. The Sunday paper was then in the hands of the landed gentry. His Lordship would make amends for 12 months of screwing his staff on England’s biggest selling newspaper by inviting them once a year to the manorial estate. There on the manicured lawn would be tables laden with bread rolls. M’lord would stand in penitent pose while the literary hacks worked out 12 months of humiliation by pelting him with bread rolls.
Media moguls of these earlier times were both imaginative and randy. The co-inventor of yellow journalism, William Randolph Hearst, had an absolute mania for opulent castles and shapely showgirls. When things were a little slow on the Cuban front, he is reputed to have cabled his foot-loose illustrator Frederic Remington: ’Please remain. You furnish the pictures, I’ll furnish the war.’ Hearst always denied this slur, but can you believe a man who a month into his long sojourn in manipulating journalism ran the following headline?
“HUNGRY FRANTIC FLAMES. They Leap Madly Upon the Splendid Pleasure Palace by the Bay of Monterey, Encircling Del Monte in their Ravenous Embrace from Pinnacle to Foundation, Leaping, Higher, Higher, Higher, With Desperate Desire. Running Madly Riotous Through Cornice, Archway and Façade. Rushing in Upon the Trembling Guests with Savage Fury. Appalled and Panic-Stricken the Breathless Fugitives Gaze Upon the Scene of Terror. The Magnificent Hotel and Its Rich Adornments Now a Smouldering heap of Ashes. The “Examiner” Sends a Special Train to Monterey to Gather Full Details of the Terrible Disaster. Arrival of the Unfortunate Victims on the Morning’s Train — A History of Hotel del Monte — The Plans for Rebuilding the Celebrated Hostelry — Particulars and Supposed Origin of the Fire.
All that was the headline. Space requirements preclude running even a short list of lurid adjectives used in the story.
Lord Beaverbrook, a Canadian who became one of the most powerful men
in war-time Britain, combined absolute ruthlessness with an irresistible charm. After cutting a swathe through English society beauties, the
Canadian cad advised: “Buy old masters. They fetch a much better price than old mistresses.”
A media empire is a parallel universe. What happens inside it affects the outside world but the outer world rarely penetrates the empire, where the Emperor is God and his editors little disposable gods
Like the Roman Empire and bubble-gum, these feudal kingdoms must keep expanding or they’ll collapse in on themselves. The common denominator is that power gives them the right to eccentricity, and thank god for that: generally they don’t have much else going for them. This applies no matter where they come from …
Let’s turn our attention once more, without apology, to Frank Packer. When speaking of proprietorial temperament and excess, why go past the master? To do so would be like ignoring Bradman’s impact on cricket, or gainsaying Tiger Wood’s contribution to golf. Kerry Packer, the son, certainly had his moments, but Packer père was the nonpareil.
Frank had a volatile relationship with his staff. He occasionally ordered mass dismissals when he stormed into his headquarters after dropping a bundle at the races. His senior editors would spirit the victims away in the rabbit warren of his empire, bring them back to life like bunnies out of a conjuror’s top hat once the master had cooled down.
Packer kept relations with his staff on a strictly master-servant level, although sometimes he had special interaction with certain individuals. One of these was a reporter named Gordon McGregor. Macca was a person who set off pangs of compassion when you first met him, which dissipated as soon as you realised that, whatever his physical handicaps, he made up for them with a cunning, crafty, wicked mind forever cooking up fresh schemes, sometimes for his own benefit, sometimes for the sheer hell of it.
Macca was born handicapped. He had a cleft pallet which affected his speech, a crippled right hand and arm which, among other drawbacks, affected his ability to type a hot news story quickly, and a pronounced limp, which slowed his retreat when facing a crisis.
Macca often faced crises — he played fast and loose with the facts. Sixty years before Donald Trump began trumpeting on about fake news, Gordon was the master. There were true facts and Macca facts.
Gordon would sometimes tell a story about his motherless childhood in the 1930s. He spent the Great Depression with his father, trekking from country town to country town, living on their wits, making their way as best they could. On arrival at a new town Big Macca would hire out the local snooker hall, which was closed because of hard times, and set it up as an impromptu dry-cleaning establishment.
Little Macca would trundle down to the garage with his billy cart and come back with a four- gallon drum full of petrol. Father and son would soak the dirty clothes in petrol, thump them up and down, dry them out and press them into shape with the big flat snooker table irons.
All went well for the McGregors until one evening when Chairman Jack, the shire boss, skidded his utility to the kerb outside Macca’s and climbed out looking bedraggled in a crumpled black evening suit. “Quick, Macca,” he said to the elder McGregor, “I need a rush job.” The chairman was late for an important ceremony in which he was to hand out awards. He needed his suit cleaned in a hurry.
The Maccas swung into action. Little Macca rushed with his billy cart to get more petrol. Big Macca told Chairman Jack to strip down to his jocks in the office and throw out his suit. Father and son worked frantically, thumping the suit up and down in the petrol, ironing it to near perfection on a billiard table, going as fast as they could, urged on by Jack.
Finally, he told them he’d have to go. He put on his suit. It was dry but a little whiffy from the petrol. Chairman Jack stepped onto the street looking resplendent. “Thanks, a million, Macca,” he said and struck a match to light his cigarette. The explosion was short but engulfing. Jack never made it to his ceremony. He was taken to hospital. By the time he got out, the Maccas had moved on to another town.
Great story, but is it true? Even if Gordon were still around we’d never find out. There are facts and then there are Macca facts.
Gordon was a young man when he went to work at Frank Packer’s Consolidated Press in the heart of Sydney’s CBD. He worked on the Daily and Sunday Telegraphs and on a bottom-feeding magazine named Everybody’s.
He quickly came under Frank Packer’s scrutiny and they developed an interesting master-serf relationship. On one occasion Packer, before he became a knight of the realm, sacked Gordon for some misdemeanour, leaving him to plead for his job.
But, Mr Packer, I’ve got a family to feed.
Packer showed no interest.
You wouldn’t want to see them starve, would you, Mr Packer?
Packer remained as unmoved as Mount Rushmore, inscrutable as the Sphinx.
I’ll do anything, Mr Packer, anything. I’ll even drive the lift.
All right.
McGregor did drive the lift for several days until Packer, going up one day, told him he had his old job back again.
A few years after this McGregor went to a meeting with Packer. Later in the day Packer found the reporter in the foyer and noticed Macca had had a haircut.
Packer scrutinised him intensely.
I see you’ve just had a haircut, McGregor.
Yes, Mr Packer.
In company time, McGregor.
Yes, Mr Packer, but it grew in company time.
Not all of it, McGregor.
No, Mr Packer, but half of it did and that’s the half I had cut.
This time McGregor didn’t get the sack. There may even have been a twitch of amusement in those terrifying proprietorial eyes. He got his marching orders a little later and waited till his final day to make his play. He haunted the master’s antechamber till he was grudgingly summoned to the presence.
Packer looked at him and said: “Well?”
Macca slowly poked out his crippled hand and said: “I know we’ve had our differences, Mr Packer, but I’d just like to shake your hand before I leave.”
What could the great man do?
“Get back to work, you silly bastard,” he said.
+ A book of memoir, short stories, silly poems and sad memories by Mick Barnes can be ordered from Amazon or the Book Depository. It’s entitled His Grace’s False Teeth, and other gritty tales.
