NOTE: This entry, the only one for this date, may be tinkered with by me. (Scroll down for MEDIA 9-26-26.) — MCM

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Most Americans, when we think about Australia at all, know it as a continent-sized English-speaking nation surrounded by ocean, with kangaroos and kuala bears, where humans have more interest in soccer (which they call football) than we have. And that it has a free press. Some of us know that Julian Assange is from there.

Assange is back home after having served five years in London’s Belmarsh prison after he was holed up for seven years in Ecuador’s embassy in London until the government in Ecuador changed hands and booted him out.

A year ago he won Integrity Media’s first Courage in Journalism award, and a news release about it is HERE. It includes a panel discussion starring journalist Melissa Fyfe of the Age, Member of Parliament Andrew Wylie, and barrister Greg Barns. Comedian Tom Ballard was moderator.

I found the discussion fascinating — refreshing and salubrious — while not understanding much of what they were talking about except that Australian journalists face the same kind of censorship as ours do in the United States and engage in similar self-censorship. And that Australian media ownership is undergoing the same consolidation that is going on in the United States and in much of the world, meaning that consumers of what newspapers and broadcasters turn out are getting a much more constricted view of what is really happening here and there.

I didn’t find Ballard funny at all, but then the topics under discussion are not funny. He may have been chosen to moderate because of some popularity. See his website.

Assange was not spoken of much, possibly because the . . .