Australasia – Page 4

The Future Dragon Queen of World Media or Much Maligned Mother of Two?

Published on August 2, 20072 Comments

I think it can safely be asserted that who owns the media is equally if not more important than who the politiciians are: indeed it can be argued that it’s the media that chooses the politicians.

In all, 16 of the top 30 media owners are from the US. The other countries with media owners in the top 30 are Japan (with four representatives), France and the UK (with three each), Germany (two) and Italy and Mexico (one each). Non-American companies on the top 30 list include Axel Springer, Bertelsmann, BSkyB, ITV plc., Fuji TV and Televisa.

The top 30 media owners in the report generated a total of $215bn in media revenue. Two online companies, Google and Yahoo made it into the top 30, ranked number 13 and 15 with revenues of $6bn and $5.2bn respectively

Mass media ownership transcends international borders and the polioy decisions and editorial influence of owners now has worldwide scope. Take Rupert Murdoch for example, whose overwhelming grip on American public discourse just tightened with his purchase of the hawkish, rightwing Wall Street Journal.

But is it even really Murdoch’s grip any more? Is he, to use a vulgar American phrase, pussy- whipped by a nubile young wife? Many western journalists would like us to think so.

Murdoch is in his seventies and has a much younger Chinese born wife, Wendi Deng, who’s causing much media paranoia over whether China, in addition to being one of the world’s largest creditor nations and buying up western banks, is planning to take a massive slice of worldwide media control with Deng as some sort of proxy.

Or it could be anti-Chinese racism and mysogyny, an occidental fear of the Yellow Peril, focused onto one woman, Deng. There’s plenty of evidence for that.

Private Eye has had fun for years with Wendy Deng, casting her in typical neocolonial style as a Dragon Lady who uses her sexy oriental (Did they say she’s oriental, by the way? And sexy?) ways and remorseless physical demands to shag her ageing husband to death and grab his billions for the seething communist hordes of China.

Here’s typical public schoolboy racism from Private Eye in 2003:

“Never Too Old”
by Dame Silvie Krin

The story so far: Multibillionaire media mogul Rupert Murdoch has married a fragrant young oriental beautyfrom the land odf birds-nestsoup.

Now read on…

“I got great news for you Lupert.” purred the lovely Wendy Deng as she entered the gymnnasium of their 48th storey Manhattan penthouse apartment.

“You mean you’re going to switch off this lousy rowing machine and give me an ice-cold tinnie?” puffed the sweating septuagenarian tycoon, as he tried to keep up with the machine’s remorseless demands,

“First guess wrong,” hissed his peach-skinned paramaour, as she turned up the machine to Olympic Standard (Bronze) Level.

You get the drift, and besides, I’m not copying the whole thing out.

As much as I enjoy and admire Private Eye (I’ve been a regular reader for over 20 years), let’s face it, in its attitudes to women and minorities it ican often be paternalistic, colonial and crass, the cuteness and likeability of Ian Hislop on HIGNFY notwithstanding. So if I didn’t absolutely dismiss the rumour (because leaving ethnicity aside she is young and he is old and it’s been known) I suspected the motivation behind it.

But then I started to google and to read stories about how recent Murdoch decisions have favoured Chinese state interests and how his media interests in China itself collude with state censorship; and how a meticulously researched and sourced profile of Deng was suppressed by the publisher that commissioned it when Murdoch sold his stake; and how a series of publications in their turn declined to publish, for no other apparent reason than they feared to offend Rupert.

Oddly enough the only place the profile is available in full online is China’s New Century Weekly – in Chionese – it’s come to something when China will publish something western journalists are too scared to.

Murdoch has attacked anyone who seeks to write about his wife on the grounds that Deng is a private person; which is a bit flimsy considering Deng is now Chief of Strategy at MySpace China, an arm of Murdoch’s empire, and they have two daughters who will potentially inherit a substantial slice of media control in their own right, aside from anything Deng herself inherits when her husband predeceases her, as he’s almost bound to do barring medical miracles. Even the Murdoch billions can’t cheat death.

Deng, with that amount of potential clout, is no private person. She makes decisions that affect millions:

Myspace China to Move Servers to China
Mon, Jul 23, 2007 Myspace | web 2.0

In a recent interview with local media, Luo Chuan, the CEO of Myspace China, which is part of News Corp, (Public, NYSE:NWS), said the company will move its servers to China. According to Luo, the server move will be enhance the site’s appeal to local audience while keeping the China site connected to Myspace’s global database. However, the process will be technically and financially challenging and there is no set schedule for the server move. Source: 163.com

This decision of course will give the Chinese government ultimate physical control of the servers should they so choose and a hell of a lot of leverage over MySpace in terms of censorship.

Deng would like more decision making power and the question of who will control News International on Murdoch’s death is a typically toxic dynastic stew of ex-wives, alimony, alowances, inheritances, jealousy, sibling rivalry and a gliimpse of parent/child conflict.

A simmering debate over the trust that owns the family’s 28.5 percent voting stake in the News Corporation surfaced with the resignation last week of Lachlan, Mr. Murdoch and Mrs. Mann’s elder son, from his job at the News Corporation, where he was seen as a potential successor to his father.

The precipitating reason for Lachlan’s departure, he has told several people, was his father’s undermining of his position within the company over a long period.

[…]

People close to both father and son have also acknowledged, however, that tensions over the trust were a factor, and those tensions stem from the conflicting maternal ambitions of Ms. Deng and Mrs. Mann.

Last year, Mr. Murdoch told his children that he wanted to change the trust to give his two daughters by Ms. Deng, Grace, 3, and Chloe, 2, a greater role in the trust, which currently has an interest in the News Corporation worth $6.1 billion.

But Mr. Murdoch’s four adult children – three with Mrs. Mann and one with his first wife – have a say in the trust and are its primary beneficiaries, and they must approve this change.

[..]

Mr. Murdoch raised the issue of including his youngest daughters in the trust last year at a family meeting in New York, where one person close to the family said the debate was lively.

Oh, I bet it was lively.

It certainly sounds as though Deng may be trying to gain control of News International for herself and her children by Murdoch. It’d all be great fun, like a bastard sitcom mashup of Dallas and Dynasty with Drop The Dead Donkey, if it weren’t future control of worldwide tv, radio, newspapers and the internet we were talking about.

But let’s come back to Rupert’s latest purchase of the Wall St. Journal and what motivated it. Was he really pushed into by Deng as proxy for Chinese interests or was the motivation much more human – embarassment and retaliation at Deng’s past being revealed?

1. Until the details were published in the Wall Street Journal, Murdoch apparently did not know much about Deng’s past, including the affair and marriage with Jake Cherry, which secured her a US visa. One WSJ journo describes Murdoch as “ashen-faced” at their next meeting. As Ellis writes, Murdoch got a rude taste of his own tabloid journalism medicine. I can’t help wondering if that has anything to do with his current bid for the Journal?

A past Deng apparently has, according to commenters at the Wendi Deng Watchers Club:

At the tender age of 18, she freely walked into Guangzhou hotel rooms to sleep with a 50-year old married American (Jake Cherry) who spoke a language she didn’t understand (English) and was introduced to her by his then-wife (Joyce Cherry). On top of that, she suckered Jake Cherry into persuading his then-wife (Joyce Cherry) into sponsoring her into the U.S., where she lived rent-free in their home with their children, ate their food (with them), went places with them, took everything the Cherrys gave her (and also things meant for their daughter), ALL THE WHILE CONTINUING ON WITH HER AFFAIR WITH JAKE CHERRY IN FRONT OF THEIR FACES!

Whatever the truth of thiose allegations Deng certainly has Murdoch wrapped around her finger; her influence in News International is profound and will only increase if she gets her way. But in this she is no different from the many other women worldwide (cough, Huffington, cough) who marry for power, whatever their nationality. It wouldn’t be the first time a young woman with a bit of a past snares a rich old man at an opportune moment, but I do think an enormous amount of the hoohah about Deng the Dragon Lady as a Chinese double agent in the heart of the western free-market system is exaggerated and inspired by a mixture of envy, stereotypical male ideas about Chinese and Asian women and a fear of China itself.

There is truth there in that Deng has given Murdoch access to Chinese markets but the non-Murdoch media depiction of her as an evil oriental genius I think is a projection of journalists’ own misogyny, ingrained racism and worries about the potential power she is likely to wield on the demise of her husband.

Given the shrewdness and alleged lack od scruples with with she’s operated to her own advantage so far, Deng should certainly not escape scrutiny – and the claim by her husband that she is a private person and not up for discussion or beyond criticism, when he has made her a public person, is completely risible.

Yes, scrutinise Deng with a big magnifying glass, but scrutinise what she does, not what she is.

“Is It Because They Is White?” Part Umpty-something.

Published on July 31, 2007

I don’t know about you, but i would really like to know why this man wasn’t charged and tried with terrorist offences’ let alone banged up indefinitely or put under a Control Order, as so many others have been:

Former BNP candidate is jailed

A former British National Party candidate who amassed a stash of explosive chemicals in anticipation of a future civil war has been jailed for two-and-a-half years.

Robert Cottage, 49, was cleared after two trials of conspiracy to cause explosions but earlier pleaded guilty to possession of the chemicals.

Police discovered a huge stockpile of chemicals and food at his home in Colne, Lancashire last September.

Officers mounted the operation after Cottage’s wife told a social worker she was concerned about the substances and her husband’s belief that immigrants were swamping Britain.

He feared the country was on the brink of civil war.

He appeared at Manchester’s Crown Square Court to be sentenced in relation to the charge of possession.

Cottage’s barrister Alistair Webster QC said his client accepted he had bought the potassium nitrate and sulphur planning to manufacture gunpowder, but said this would only be used to create “thunder flash” style bangers to scare off intruders.

Sentencing Cottage, Mrs Justice Swift said Cottage’s actions had been “criminal and potentially dangerous”.

She added a pre-sentence report said Cottage held “over valued ideas” but said there was a low risk of him committing further offences.

She said: “It is important to understand that Cottage’s intention was that if he ever had to use the thunder flashes it was only for the purpose of deterrents. I am satisfied it was Cottage’s views on how he put it, ‘the evils of uncontrolled immigration’, would lead to civil war which would be imminent and inevitable.”

Oh well that’s all right then, since he was paranoid. Every paranoid should be able to stockpile explosive, if it makes them feel more secure. He’s a low risk, they say, only a danger to non-whites; so what’s our problem?

Apparently it’s OK to be a virulent racist and plan explosions, but innocently pass on a sim card with some credit on it to a relative and you get banged up and then deported, your life and career ruined for ever.

Tick, Tick, Tick, Tick, BURMA

Published on July 26, 20075 Comments

How is regime change in Iraq connected to Burmese nukes?

While the world’s attention is elsewhere, the genocidal Burmese military dictatorship is alleged to be getting into the nuclear market and sidestepping IAEA oversight, courtesy of Moscow:

Last week Burma and the Russian company Rosatom announced a new contract. Rosatom would build Burma a nuclear power station. This news comes at the end of a period in which suspicions have been raised about the intentions of the Burmese regime. Over the last couple of years, both the universities of Rangoon and Mandalay have added nuclear physics departments to their faculties and 2,000 Burmese students have been sent to Moscow to study Nuclear technology. In April of this year Burma resumed relations with North Korea and dissidents have spotted shipments arriving from North Korea into Burma, with the US state department reminding the Burmese that under UN rules the United States is entitled to stop and search any North Korean ship going to Burma. Russian companies have discovered uranium in Northern Burma and it looks possible that the Burmese are delivering uranium to Pyongyang in return either for plutonium or for nuclear knowhow.

The Burmese government is not a nice regime.

Burma’s generals, known in state-controlled media as the State Peace and Development Council, routinely harass and imprison opposition activists. Citizens have been used as slave labor. The junta’s security police have been known to strafe demonstrators with gunfire. In December, an Asian human rights group issued a 124-page report on the Burmese government’s “brutal and systematic” torture of political prisoners.

To deepen the country’s isolation, last November the generals began to move Burma’s capital from the southern coastal city of Rangoon to the mountain stronghold of Pyinmana, deep in the country’s interior. Perhaps the regime’s oft-stated fear of a U.S. invasion prompted the retreat from the coast. That would explain press reports that the junta has surrounded its new capital with land mines. Perhaps the regime is even more afraid of the ethnically diverse and impoverished students of Rangoon. We can’t look for answers to the United Nations’ envoy to Burma. He resigned in January after failing for nearly two years to gain entry into the country.

There’s been a big natural gas discovery off the Burmese coast, so Burma is not short of energy. Why does it need nuclear technology? Is it for weapons? Who or what is it they are scared of, (Well, Danish artists for a start, but that’s a digression) if at all? If they’re not scared, why have they moved the capital?

Some think it is to remove themselves from the danger of a US invasion, since Bush placed Burma on a list of “outposts of tyranny” that includes North Korea, Cuba, Iran, Zimbabwe and Belarus, but the US is unlikely to invade, overextended as it is with its army broken and troops bogged down elsewhere.

Not only that the US has been very cosy with Burma in the past; US energy giant Unocal Corp. and its French partner Total SA built a $1.2 billion natural gas pipeline in the Burmese mountains using forced labour.

Unocal has since been sold to China, but past US collusion in Burma’s cruel, genocidal regime combined with a current need for gas lead one to think that no way the US government, run by energy industry types, would put their energy interests in SE Asia at risk by invading. So it can’t be a US attack the junta’s worried about.

Unlikely as it seems given the two countries’ history of dodgy dealings it could well be that Burma’s drive to acquire nuclear technology from Russia is a totally innocent commercial enterprise and not military at all, according to nuclear specialist John Large:

….Large also said it was possible that the Burmese government intended to use the facility to branch out into the highly lucrative radio-isotopic pharmaceutical market, and not for the production of weapons-grade nuclear components.

“There is a big commercial opportunity here because at the moment . . . what you have in the region . . . is a number of countries vying to establish their radio-isotopic foothold and of course countries like Burma could of course enter this market.”

It remains unclear when or where the facility will be built in Burma with analysts expecting further agreements on the deal to be signed in the near future.

It’s possible, but is it likely, given the regime’s history?

If indeed Burma is after weapons technology it looks as though there’s to be a another member of the new, eastern axis of nuclear powers; India, Pakistan, North Korea, China and now Burma, only 2 of which are even remotely politically stable.

Somehow I doubt this is the New World Order the neocons had in mind when they did their best to gut the International Atomic Energy Authority’s oversight capacity so they could invade Iraq.

Darth Chimpy On Tour: Silence, Peasants!

Published on May 19, 2007

You may remember this post a while back about the ridiculous security lengths Cheney forced his .au hosts to go to on his vice-imperial progress around Sydney. That was bad enough.

But of course big, brave Chimpy McFlightsuit, because of his ego, has to go that little bit further even than the batshit insane Cheney’s paranoid, arrogant ridiculousness. Chimpy’s not even going to risk accidentally hearing anything bad Sydneyians might have to say about him:

Mobile blocking helicopter to trail Bush in Sydney
Fighters, SAS on alert as ‘Blue Luminary’ goes Down Under
By Lewis Page Published Friday 18th May 2007 16:14 GMT

US President George Bush will be followed about by a helicopter which jams mobile phone signals during an upcoming visit to Australia, it has emerged.

According to reports in the Sydney Daily Telegraph, train stations will also be temporarily shut down and parts of the city will “become restricted areas”. The Age speculates that “heavily armed [Australian] SAS troops” could be deployed on the Sydney streets, with “expanded rights to shoot to kill”.

President Bush is to visit Sydney along with 20 other world leaders in September for the Asia Pacific Economic Co-operation (APEC) summit. The summit and President Bush have been seen as a likely target for terrorist attacks on previous occasions.

The rash of news reports into APEC security comes as New South Wales state premier Morris Iemma announces likely measures and proposes temporary legislation on security powers.

Conjecture around the phone-jamming helicopter has arisen as a result of its appearance in attendance on Mr Bush at the 2005 APEC summit in South Korea. Reporters covering the conference said that a Black Hawk chopper would shadow the presidential motorcade, and as it passed overhead mobile phones would lose touch with the local network.

“Whenever Mr Bush visits a foreign country local sovereignty is surrendered to US authorities as he moves around in heavily armoured vehicles that follow him around the globe,” said the Telegraph.

More…. ®

Ah, the old ‘hearts and minds’ strategy.

Sick Little Tosser Makes Va. Tech Shooting Game

Published on May 16, 2007

The .au Herald Sun:

A 21-year-old Sydney man has created the first known computer game based on the recent shooting spree at Virginia Tech university in the US, sparking a wave of criticism.

The game follows Cho Seung-hui’s killing spree at Virginia Tech in April, in which he killed 32 people before turning a gun on himself.

The game’s creator, Ryan Lambourn, who lives in Sydney’s west, says he won’t remove the game from his own website or seek to have it removed from amateur game sharing site Newgrounds.com.

Called V-Tech Rampage, the game can be freely downloaded from either site and has made headlines in Australia as well causing a stir on a number of blogs and online news sites around the world.

Mr Lambourn today backpedalled on previous demands for money in exchange for the game’s deletion, describing the ransom as a joke.

He had said on his website googumproduce.com that he would only remove V-Tech Rampage from the Newgrounds website if he received a $US1000 ($1,200) “donation”.

For $US2,000 ($2400) he would remove it from his own website and for $US3,000 ($3600) he would apologise for the stunt.

He said no one had taken him up on his offer.

Read More