The ABCs of Treason

Almost all my friends with daughters have convinced me that girls need never go to drama college, as acting is already deeply embedded in their DNA.

So it was no surprise to see an ABC female reporter telling the millions of television viewers with a straight face that the ship aground behind her on a Newcastle beach, the “Pasha Bulker”, was indeed a tanker.

She was dramatising the possibility of oil pollution on the beaches for hundreds of miles.

I yelled at my TV, “It’s a bulk carrier, you dizzy dope, look at the ship’s name!”. Of course, my TV (pardon the pun) flatly refused to respond.

Wouldn’t it be nice if “Our ABC” copied the mission statement of the Scotsman Newspaper?

The current tag line ….. repeating what appeared in the Prospectus of the Scotsman from 1816 …. and currently, the only statement on editorial intention is:

"The Conductors pledge themselves for impartiality, firmness and independence …their first desire is to be honest, the second is to be useful … the great requisites for the task are only good sense, courage and industry."