Julia Gillard has used her first major speech of the year to focus on what she has called "a new Australian economy", citing some of the Labor Government's key policies including the mining tax and the carbon pricing scheme.

The Prime Minister also restated the Government's promise to deliver a surplus in this year's budget.

Ms Gillard was addressing the Australia-Israel Chamber of Commerce in Melbourne a day after Opposition Leader Tony Abbott also delivered a major speech on the economy.

The two speeches have signalled the intention of both leaders to make the economy the key battleground for the political year ahead.

Ms Gillard says the current period of economic transition has created an opportunity to build a "high-skill, high-tech, fast-broadband, clean-energy economy".

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-02-01/gillard-speech/3805314

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The Australian is of course not interested in the vast majority of the authors who receive grants from the ARC and publish commercial books - those who write for example on literature or military history or Australian 19th century gardens. It is exclusively interested in harassing those it regards as left-wing intellectuals and, a fortiori, the critics of the Murdoch Empire against which it wishes to use its vast resources and influence to intimidate and to wound and if possible to discredit. In cases like this, it can often seem that an editor whistles, and the well-trained team of attack dogs - Andrew Bolt, Piers Akerman, Miranda Devine, Tim Blair et hoc genus emerge from their various kennels, teeth bared, snarling, moving in for the kill. This is the kind of culture that now prevails in the media corporation that dominates between 65 per cent and 70 per cent of the Australian newspaper market.

The Finkelstein inquiry into media ethics in contemporary Australia was sorely needed. This little incident underlines why.

It is time for fellow democrats in Australia to stand up to the bullying tactics of the Murdoch press in general and in particular to the bullying tactics of its most important general staff - Chris Mitchell's editorial team at the Australian.

Robert Manne is Professor of Politics at La Trobe University.

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/3871300.html?WT.svl=theDrum

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As mentioned before and in relation to the Byzantine equation, the media in Australia is biased against Labor in a ratio of 70/30. On average the merde-och press is biased 85/15 against Labor — that 15 per cent being a very thin cover to "give it" an air of fairness. The ABC is about 55/45 against Labor and tends to be quite lenient when the little Abbott poops... The tricks are subtle and often first hidden in the loading of headlines, while the tone of articles also show that dirt politics prevail ahead of good science. It is a war of disinformation waged against truth by very skilled sellers of crap. See toon at top.