Australian Broadcasting Corporation leaked stolen national security docs to undermine PM Tony Abbott

Sack @mscott releasing stolen documents placing Australians at risk #Auspol pic.twitter.com/xea7gu4gWg #TheBoltReport #MTP10 @abc730

— Taxed Enuff Already (@AxeCo2Tax) November 25, 2013

Edward Snowden is like Wikileaks – a double-edged sword.

Here our MSM has used one of Snowden’s leaks to undermine the government and our relationship to Indonesia.

This is an ongoing thing and the ABC has breached its rules. The whole country is in danger because of this and they should be called out, fired even for treason.

Writes Michael Smith:

Janet Albrechtsen, former director of the ABC Board who appointed Mark Scott calls for his resignation

Janet Albrechtsen was a director of the board of the ABC between 2005 and 2010. Mark Scott’s appointment was announced by then Chairman of the Board Donald MacDonald in May 2006.

Janet’s called on Scott to resign in her column in today’s The Australian newspaper. But Janet has more to say about the board than Scott:

The seriousness of the ABC’s decision to publish criminally obtained information that involved such profoundly damaging and entirely foreseeable risks also raises questions about the ABC board.

Did Scott raise the issue with the board, to whom he is responsible? If not, why not? What about ABC chairman Jim Spigelman? Was he included in the decision? If not, why not? If yes, did he consider the ramifications for the public interest?

What is Spigelman’s view about Scott’s response to questions in senate estimates last week that it was in the public interest to reveal information about Australian intelligence gathering in Indonesia even though he knew that it would “cause some difficulties with the Australian-Indonesian relationship in the short term”. Or did Spigelman do what former ABC chairmen lacking spine have too often done – let the MD and therefore the staff – run the show without prudent board oversight?

So far, the only public comment Spigelman has made has been a letter to The Australian about the “considerable personal distress” this newspaper caused to his executive assistant by publishing an incorrect salary figure. Compared with the breach of national security perpetrated by the ABC, his focus on a matter of staff welfare is a disappointing demonstration of where the chairman’s priorities lie. A responsible board must surely have concerns about Scott’s stewardship of the ABC on this matter. Scott is appointed by and subject to removal by the board.

As section 13 of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Act sets out, the managing director holds office subject to terms and conditions determined by the board. The reckless publication of criminally obtained information with the predictable and escalating consequences now unfolding make his position untenable. In short, the ABC board needs to look at its responsibilities here – and its culpability in this matter.

As a member of the ABC board for five years between 2005 and 2010, I can attest to the fact that it has a disappointing history of being ineffective. I can attest to the fact that information that ought to have been provided to the board was not.

And I can attest to the fact that, unlike commercial boards that work together, the ABC board is too often a numbers game. If you don’t have the board numbers then the status quo at the ABC becomes untouchable. Moreover, if the chairman’s main aim is to be loved by staff, then the MD is untouchable.

Instead of providing genuine oversight and counsel to management, the board gets bogged down drafting policies, codes of conduct and other fine-sounding documents. It’s a management driven make-work gig for board members to make them feel important. It justifies them jumping on planes, travelling business class, checking into nice hotels and turning up for a fine lunch at Ultimo – all at taxpayer expense. Meanwhile the focus is taken off what really matters – the output of the ABC. The output this past week by the ABC has let taxpayers down. Badly.

How can this simply pass by without further comment? If it were a corporate CEO who was dealing with criminally obtained material, there’d be no further questions.

Andrew Bolt has more:

The ABC still hasn’t said why their damage was worth it

Nicely put by Paul Sheehan:

There’s not much point in calling into question the judgment of the Prime Minister, and his chief pollster, without calling into question the judgment of the people who started this conflagration [with Indonesia], Katharine Viner, the editor The Guardian Australia, and Mark Scott, the managing director of the ABC.

They made their decision to publish in the ‘public interest’, in the full knowledge that it would poison the relationship between Indonesia and Australia, damage Australia’s intelligence gathering, humiliate Yudhoyono and his wife, reinvigorate the people-smuggling trade, goad Indonesian nationalists, give fodder to Islamist xenophobia, and compromise Australia’s trade with Indonesia…

The arguments in favour of publishing the spying leaks are obvious: that the truth will prevent government security agencies from excessive zeal, and the public has a right to know what is being done in its name. It is a strong argument, and I respect it.

But the public interest test can be rigorously contested in this case. The truth is something we all navigate every day, so as not to give offence or create enmity. Governments do the same. Yet neither Viner nor Scott has bothered to enunciate how, in the ‘public interest’, the positives outweigh the negatives. They have, with Abbott and the spooks, joint ownership of the toxins flowing through the relationship. And neither has come close to justifying their actions.

Gerard Henderson made the same argument yesterday…

More here.

I am furious with the ABC – the propaganda arm of of the Labor Party. I blame them more than Snowden – that’s only fair. And the man is now safe in Russia. The ABC has shown no remorse and have used this to destabilize PM Abbott’s government which the Left here cannot accept. He won handsomely.

This spying was done under the Rudd/Gillard/Rudd governments. The left seem blind to this. “It’s Abbott’s fault!” Reminds me of the “Blame everything on Bush” group in your country.

But of course everyone spies on everyone, and after the Bali bombing and the bombing of our embassy in Djakarta, why wouldn’t we want to know what they are up to?

The only part that is amusing about all this is the fact that someone leaked the pay scales of all ABC presenters. This is a tax-payer funded entity and the ABC are furious that someone leaked this. “It’s not in the public interest” they wailed…poor babies! Well…we have a right to know their pay after all.

PM Abbott is not as yet going to defund the ABC even though they are a fifth column here. And he had better get tough with Indonesia before we are swamped with more illegals.

One lefty journalist tweeted that the Indonesians should send 50,000 boats here!

This is all to make PM Abbott look a failure.

Like the Roman Empire the Anglosphere will be destroyed from within.

If Snowden has helped the US I am glad of it.