I have read many interesting articles written by journalist about  the Media and unskilled journolism, of late.
The most recent being today on crikey , This is but a very small part that I copy....

This is all your fault
by Bernard Keane

 The role of the media in relation to politics is best understood as akin to that of feeders, the parasites who encourage obese partners to grow larger to satisfy their psychological and fetishistic needs, creating a deeply unhealthy cycle of mutual dependence. The media exploits and encourages a flawed political culture, but they don’t create it or control it.
That’s not to say there isn’t much left to be desired in mainstream media political coverage (let’s leave aside for the moment News Ltd’s anti-Labor campaigning, which extends to smearing Julia Gillard over her appearance, relationships and childlessness). Most journalists indeed fail to cover policy properly, but not because they’re lazy or obsessed with trivia or think their readers and viewers are idiots — to pick three of the criticisms routinely thrown around — but because they lack the specialist skills and the time.


http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/08/02/this-is-all-your-fault/

Tony Abbott is offering Australia a faith-based economics policy - because there's such a lack of vital detail that it requires deep belief in Abbott and his team.

And that's hard, because none of the Coalition economics team has even one day's experience managing a national economy.

Together with national defence, managing the economy is one of the two great responsibilities that fall uniquely to the federal government.

Abbott chants a sacred daily mantra: "End the waste, pay back the debt, stop the big new taxes and stop the boats."

Yet when he was asked yesterday when he would return the budget to surplus, he had no answer. Pressed by a reporter - "You don't know when the country will be back in surplus under a Coalition government?" - he dodged.

Abbott told a news conference in Brisbane that he couldn't nominate a time because, "I don't know what I will inherit" from Labor.

Two problems. First, it's unconvincing. If he wins and discovers Labor has lied about the public accounts, he need only say so and he would be held blameless.

Second, his answer is very odd because on the same day, Joe Hockey told reporters in another part of Queensland: "It's the Coalition that will deliver a surplus in three years' time, a real surplus."

In fact, it's point one in Abbott's "Action Contract" with the Australian people: "Restore the budget surplus within three years".

So is Abbott abandoning his Action Contract? Or does he not know his own policy? Is "pay back the debt" not really a policy, just a slogan?

The relentless media attention on the Labor Party's woes has allowed the Opposition Leader to come within three weeks of winning power just skating on economic policy.

Abbott promises to "end the waste''. OK, but what policy framework would he impose? Where will the discipline come from?

The government has committed itself to a limit of 2 per cent annual growth in real spending as it restores the budget.

The opposition has not committed to match this, nor has it proposed any other fiscal rule. So "ending the waste" is just a slogan, too.

What about the third economic leg of the Abbott mantra, "stop the big new taxes?"

Abbott has promised to dump the government's proposed mining tax, projected to raise $10.5 billion in its first two years. But he is also promising a new tax on larger companies, a 1.5 per cent levy, raising $6.1 billion in the first two years, to help pay for his paid parental leave scheme. Isn't that a big new tax?

Ah, says Abbott, but it's only temporary: "Once the budget position has been restored, we will reduce the levy and eventually abolish it," says the Liberal policy published yesterday.

OK, and when will the budget position be restored? This takes us back to Abbott's first answer. If he won't say, we can't know.

Or if his Action Contract is really Liberal policy, it will be in 2013. Which is exactly when the corporate levy kicks in.

So in this case, the levy will be redundant even as it kicks in. Not only a big new tax, but an unnecessary one, according to the Liberals' own policy.

So Abbott is either renouncing his Action Contract, or he is proposing an unnecessary new $6.1 billion tax.

And even the faithful would have trouble believing that this mess is sound economic policy.