
Issue No 32		24 September 1999

Piers Watch

Conspiracy Theory: Piers is a Plant

We have to admit it, Piers almost had us fooled. Week in week out he runs the rabid anti-union line in his familiar public role as Australia's last surviving Cold War warrior.

He was at it again this week, seizing on a snippet we had planted in a recent Pierswatch column about the fact that several Labor Council officials were once members of more hardline Left organisations.

We raised the information in the context of wondering how a senior columnist could dedicate a full page to beating up on a fringe Leftist group while people were being hacked to death with machetes on our doorstep.

Piers refused to answer this question in his reply - instead using it as the launching pad for another more virulent attack on Resistance - likening it to "the Hitler Youth, the Young Pioneers, Komosol and a host of other brainwashed youngsters". We're not sure if he was also referring to his boss, the Big Rupe, who boasted of having a bust of Lenin as a youngster.

Whatever. His increasingly hysterical attacks on political activism amongst the young, has got us thinking. If Piers was really interested in convincing people of his arguments would he employ such heavy handed methods? Wouldn't his insulting and belittling merely push people further apart, polarising views until they were in a state of conflict?

There's a pattern here with most of the issues Piers covers. By the time he's finished his attack even those who might have started off in agreement are looking for a reason to support his target.

Victims of drug addiction, school teachers, trade unionists, Labor politicians - they all get the same heavy-handed treatment. Kick them until they're down - and then kick harder.

Looking at his modus operandi objectively we can come to only one conclusion. Piers is himself an enterist, a Resistance operative planted within the mainstream media to expose the paucity of conservative thought.

What appear to be tired and hollow rantings are actually masterful and subversive. They seize the right-wing agenda and take it way beyond the bonds of credibility until it lies destitute on a sea of ridicule.

Just as the Republican think tanks turned the world upside down when they invented "political correctness" to undermine liberalism, the Left have now come up with their own form of PC - "Pier's Crap" - to turn reactionary politics on its head.

Watch the Tory leaders like John Howard, and Kathryn Greiner seek his counsel, kidding themselves that they are feeding Piers a line - when in fact it is the puppet who is pulling the strings.

I mean, look at the City Council elections - how could a columnist who openly supported Frank have had such a definitive impact? Yet by purporting to oppose, Piers actually casts Sartor as the hero - the victim of a spiteful ideologue. As we say - masterful and subversive.

Having uncovered your true purpose, we bow to your deft brilliance, Piers, offer you the secret handshake and promise to keep your secret as long as you continue to fight the powers. Viva la Resistance!

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Issue 32 contents

Interview: His Daily Fix
Graham Richardson talks of his transition from national politics to talkback radio and his ongoing jobs as a fixer.

Politics: Requiem to the Third Way
The swing to Labor in Victoria shows clearly that once again Australian voters have rejected economic rationalism. The result, and the reasons for it, should worry John Howard.

International: A Common Struggle for Freedom
It may not get the headlines, but Western Sahara has some chilling similarities with East Timor.

Unions: Woolscour Workers say No to Peter Reith
Workers at Canobolas Wooltopping - a woolscour plant near Orange, in central west New South Wales, have just sent a message to Workplace Relations Minister Peter Reith: thanks, but no thanks.

Legal: Outlawed Acts of Consicence
The recent boycotts in support of East Timorese indepndence highlights the extremism of Reith's second wave.

History: Was Manning Clark A True Believer
A Canberra history conference shines the spotlight on Australia's most famous historian.

Review: Paranoid Echoes
The calls to examine the Australianďż˝Soviet documents in the Moscow Literary archives have grown in volume over the past year.

Labour Review: What's New at the Information Centre
The latest issue of Labour Review - a resource for officals and students.

Satire: Kennett Boosts Chances: Two More Independents Dead
Caretaker Premier Jeff Kennett today admitted that voters perceived him as arrogant and out of touch, but insisted that they were wrong.

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