THE SYDNEY INSTITUTE ANNUAL DINNER LECTURE PLEASE NOTE IT IS ESSENTIAL to RSVP for FUNCTIONS and That BOOKINGS SHOULD BE MADE 2 WEEKS in ADVANCE, NO EARLIER
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The Sydney Institute Quarterly Issue 27, Vol. 9, No. 4, January, 2006 THE SYDNEY INSTITUTE ANNUAL DINNER LECTURE PLEASE NOTE IT IS ESSENTIAL TO RSVP FOR FUNCTIONS and that BOOKINGS SHOULD BE MADE 2 WEEKS IN ADVANCE, NO EARLIER. Thank you for your cooperation! SPEAKERS: JOHN BELL AM (Artistic Director, Bell Shakespeare) & KATHY BAIL (Editor, The Bulletin) & GERARD HENDERSON (Executive Director, The Sydney Institute) TOPIC: A Mate for Head of State? Why Australia Needs One DATE: Wednesday 18 January 2006 TIME: 5 for 5.30 pm VENUE: Museum of Sydney Theatrette, cnr Phillip and Bridge Streets, Sydney SPEAKER: ANUERIN HUGHES (Author, Billy Hughes: Prime Minister and Controversial Founding Father of the Australian Labor Party [Wiley 2005]; former European Union Ambassador to Australia 1997-2002). TOPIC: Remembering Billy Hughes DATE: Tuesday 24 January 2006 TIME: 5.30 for 6 pm VENUE: 41 Phillip Street, Sydney LIGHT REFRESHMENTS SPEAKERS: MATT PRICE (The Australian, Parliamentary Press Gallery) & MARGARET SIMONS (Journalist & author) & STEPHEN MATCHETT (Columnist, The Australian) TOPIC: The Gallery: Insular, Intrusive or Indispensable? DATE: Wednesday 1 February 2006 TIME: 5 for 5.30 pm VENUE: Mallesons Conference Room, Level 60, Governor Phillip Tower, 1 Farrer Place, Sydney SPEAKER: PROF. JUDY LUMBY (Nurse Educator & author The Gift [Pluto Press]) TOPIC: That was Then; This is Now - Grandmothers and Grandchildren Today DATE: Tuesday 7 February 2006 TIME: 5.30 for 6 pm VENUE: 41 Phillip Street, Sydney LIGHT REFRESHMENTS SPEAKER: STEVE EMERSON (Correspondent & Author American Jihad: The Terrorists Living Among Us [Free Press]; Internationally recognised expert on terrorism and national security) TOPIC: Jihadism: Where Is It At? DATE: Wednesday 15 February 2006 TIME: 5.30 for 6 pm VENUE: 41 Phillip Street, Sydney SPEAKER: PROF. GLYN DAVIS AC (Vice-Chancellor, University of Melbourne) TOPIC: What is the Future for Australia’s Public Universities? DATE: Tuesday 28 February 2006 TIME: 5.30 for 6 pm VENUE: Clayton Utz Conference Room (Level 34), 1 O’Connell Street, Sydney SPEAKER: JULIA GILLARD MP (Shadow Minister for Health, Federal Member for Lalor) TOPIC: to be advised DATE: Tuesday 7 March 2006 TIME: 5.30 for 6 pm VENUE: Mallesons Conference Room, Level 60, Governor Phillip Tower, 1 Farrer Place, Sydney SPEAKER: DR JANE CONNORS (Cultural Historian - PhD on the Royal Tour of 1954; Program Manager, ABC Radio National) TOPIC: Royal Tours: Then and Now DATE: Monday 13 March 2006 TIME: 5.30 for 6 pm VENUE: 41 Phillip Street, Sydney LIGHT REFRESHMENTS FREE TO ASSOCIATES & ASSOCIATES’ PARTNERS / $5 STUDENTS / $10 OTHERS RSVP - PH: (02) 9252 3366 OR FAX: (02) 9252 3360 OR EMAIL: [email protected] WEBSITE: www.thesydneyinstitute.com.au <http://www.thesydneyinstitute.com.au/> ISSUE 27, VOL. 9, NO. 4, JANUARY 2006 MAO The Dismissal & what really happened - from The Untold Story DAVID SMITH TED RULE analyses Jung Chang’s Mao The Voyager Disaster - new insights from TOM FRAME Motherhood myths, Anne Manne and the professors - with ANNE HENDERSON STEPHEN MATCHETT on the Latham legacy and its record Black Inc’s unprofessionalism documented What’s happening at The Age? JOHN McCONNELL on Muslims in Australia and Harold Holt MEDIA WATCH tackles Guy Rundle, Mungo MacCallum, John Hewson and Frank Moorhousee Published by The Sydney Institute with Gerard Henderson’s 41 Phillip St. Sydney 2000 Ph: (02) 9252 3366 MEDIA WATCH Fax: (02) 9252 3360 The Sydney Institute Quarterly Issue 27, Vol. 9, No. 4, January, 2006 CONTENTS THE ABC AND 1975 Writing in the Weekend Australian Magazine in December 2002, the normally considered Paul Kelly declared his Editorial 2 "love" for one-time Labor leader Gough Whitlam. It was an embarrassing example of how some intelligent and Mao’s Story - as told by Jung Chang normally sceptical commentators have been affected by and Jon Halliday the very phenomenon of Gough Whitlam. This was evident again in the lead-up to 11 November 2005, the - Ted Rule 3 thirtieth anniversary of the dismissal of the Whitlam Government by the Governor-General Sir John Kerr. The Breaking Ranks or Distorting constitutional deadlock of late 1975 was caused by Opposition leader Malcolm Fraser’s determination to the Record block supply and by Gough Whitlam’s determination to - Tom Frame 8 govern without supply. Both were very stubborn men and the Governor-General decided to end the deadlock by Documentation dismissing the prime minister and appointing Mr Fraser as caretaker prime minister on the understanding that he Black Inc’s Unprofessionalism 11 would call an election for 13 December 1975. For this, John Kerr has not been forgiven by some – especially Mummy, Mummy - Look What the among journalists at the publicly funded ABC. Government’s Done On Monday 7 November the ABC kicked off its coverage - Anne Henderson 17 of The Dismissal’s anniversary. On the ABC AM program, presenter Tony Eastley asked Mr Whitlam the following Sir David Smith, Dale Budd soft question: "As you say in your book, the Constitution was subverted; when it comes to that time, what hurt you and the Dismissal 21 the most?" Then Catherine McGrath put it to Malcolm Fraser that some impropriety was involved in The Book Reviews Dismissal because his "shadow attorney general Bob Ellicott" and the Chief Justice Sir Garfield Barwick "were - John McConnell 23 cousins". How about that? What neither Tony Eastley nor Catherine McGrath mentioned was that John Kerr’s Review of the Reviewers decision to dismiss the Whitlam Government was - Stephen Matchett 26 regarded as constitutionally proper at the time by not only the (then) Chief Justice Garfield Barwick but also by the What the Leaders Said - (then) Justice Sir Anthony Mason. Also, the current Chief Justice Murray Gleeson, who was then a QC, wrote an Ngyun Tuong Van opinion which was consistent with the action taken by the - Stephen Matchett 34 Governor-General. In other words, the Governor-General did not subvert the Constitution in 1975. Not unless you The Age and the National maintain that neither Garfield Barwick, nor Anthony Mason nor Murray Gleeson know anything about the Security (Non) Debate 36 Constitution. When he interviewed Gough Whitlam on the 7.30 Report (10 November 2005) Kerry O’Brien neglected Gerard Henderson’s to put it to Mr Whitlam that Anthony Mason, whom Whitlam much admires, supported John Kerr’s decision at Media Watch 37 the time. Cover Design by D T Graphics The influential ABC TV Lateline program also got into the act. On 8 November 2005, Michael Edwards concluded a The Sydney Institute Quarterly is edited by piece-to-camera with the comment: "Sir John Kerr died a Anne Henderson and Gerard Henderson. bitter and broken man". It turned out that the youngish Editorial Office: 41 Phillip Street, Sydney 2000 Mr Edwards came to this conclusion without consulting any of John Kerr’s family or any of his surviving friends. Tel: (02) 9252 3366 Fax: (02) 9252 3360 Rather, the matter was workshopped in the Lateline office. Email: [email protected] One senior Lateline producer approved the analysis before it went to air – based on his recollection of conversations Website: www.thesydneyinstitute.com.au with a well connected relative. It turned out that the Layout and typesetting by DT Graphics Pty Ltd, relative in question was an octogenarian at the time of The 202A Lyons Road, Drummoyne 2047. Dismissal and that John Kerr outlived him by over 15 Tel: (02) 9719 1424 Fax: (02) 9719 1415 years. So the said relative was not an authority concerning Website: www.dtgraphics.com.au John Kerr in any sense of the term. The views expressed in The Sydney Institute Quarterly are For the record, John Kerr was neither bitter nor broken at those of the designated authors. They do not necessarily the time of his death. Rather, he was proud of the fact that reflect the views of The Sydney Institute or of its governors. he had acted decisively in 1975. It is understandable why members of the Whitlam Fan Club, who still inhabit the Registered Print Post No : PP255003/02934 ABC, want to present John Kerr as someone who acted For a complete list of our forthcoming functions, unconstitutionally in 1975 and who died, bitter and broken, visit our Website: www.thesydneyinstitute.com.au in 1991. But it is (yet more) publicly funded mythology. Editorial 2 The Sydney Institute Quarterly Issue 27, Vol. 9, No. 4, January, 2006 and later splittist, anti-Leninist and putschist; Lin Biao’s daughter, the vacuous Dodo; Liu Shaoqi’s wife, MAO’S STORY Wang Guangmei who was paraded in her pearls before the Red Guards; the son of Wang Ming, Mao’s – AS TOLD BY nemesis and the author while in exile in the Soviet Union of some of the most interesting anti-Mao work. The list seems endless. From Taiwan there is Zhang JUNG CHANG Xueliang, the “Young Marshal” who kidnapped Chiang Kai-shek in they so-called Xi’an Incident of AND JON 1936 (they must have just caught him in time before his death a couple of years ago at the age of 102). HALLIDAY As in so many other books on modern Chinese history, Russian archives play an important part in this book. We need only name a couple; the Archive Ted Rule of Foreign Policy of the Russian Federation and the Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History. No more making up details of conversations between he Economist didn’t like this book. It said that Stalin and his Chinese counterparts, so long a staple T Jung Chang and Jon Halliday had been too of commentary on Chinese politics and history. The extreme in their judgment of Mao and hadn’t given him references and transcripts are all there.