{"id":4569,"date":"2019-07-05T15:40:30","date_gmt":"2019-07-05T05:40:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=4569"},"modified":"2023-06-20T14:42:08","modified_gmt":"2023-06-20T04:42:08","slug":"whatever-happened-to-the-abcs-story-of-the-century","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=4569","title":{"rendered":"Whatever happened to the ABC&#8217;s story of the century?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In the first three weeks of June last year, the ABC&#8217;s Sarah Ferguson presented <a href=\"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=4384\"><strong>a three-part saga<\/strong><\/a> on the channel&#8217;s Four Corners program, which the ABC claimed was the &#8220;story of the century&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>It was a rehashing of all the claims against US President Donald Trump, which the American TV stations had gone over with a fine-toothed comb but which Ferguson seemed convinced still had something hidden for her to uncover.<\/p>\n<p>At the time, a special counsel, former FBI chief Robert Mueller, was conducting an investigation into claims that Trump colluded with Russia to win the presidential election.<br \/>\n<!--more--><br \/>\nEarlier this year, Mueller announced the results of his probe: zilch. Zero. Nada. Nothing. A big cipher.<\/p>\n<p>Given that Ferguson echoed all the same claims by interviewing a number of rather dubious individuals, one would think that it was time for a <em>mea culpa<\/em> &#8211; that is, if one had even a semblance of integrity, a shred of honesty in one&#8217;s being.<\/p>\n<p>But Ferguson seems to have disappeared off the face of the earth. The ABC has been silent about it too. Given that she and her entourage spent the better part of six weeks traipsing the streets and corridors of power in the US and the UK, considerable funds would have been spent.<\/p>\n<p>This, by an organisation that is always weeping about its budget cuts. One would think that such a publicly-funded organisation would be a little more circumspect and not allow anyone to indulge in such an exercise of vanity.<\/p>\n<p>If Ferguson had unearthed even one morsel of truth, one tidbit of information that the American media had not found, then one would not be writing this. But she did nothing of the sort; she just raked over all the old bones.<\/p>\n<p>One hears Ferguson is now preparing a program on the antics that the government indulged in last year by dumping its leader, Malcolm Turnbull. This issue has also been done to death and there has already been a two-part investigation by the Sky News&#8217; presenter David Speers, a fine reporter. There has been one book published, by the former political aide Niki Savva, and more are due.<\/p>\n<p>It looks like Ferguson will again be acting in the manner of a dog that returns to its own vomit. She appears to have cultivated considerable skill in this art.<br \/>\n<!-- Start of StatCounter Code for Default Guide --><br \/>\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\">\nvar sc_project=2720500; \nvar sc_invisible=1; \nvar sc_security=\"d25d8712\"; \nvar scJsHost = ((\"https:\" == document.location.protocol) ?\n\"https:\/\/secure.\" : \"http:\/\/www.\");\ndocument.write(\"<sc\"+\"ript type='text\/javascript' src='\" + scJsHost+ \"statcounter.com\/counter\/counter.js'><\/\"+\"script>\");\n<\/script><br \/>\n<noscript><\/p>\n<div class=\"statcounter\"><a title=\"Web Analytics\" href=\"http:\/\/statcounter.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"statcounter\" src=\"\/\/c.statcounter.com\/2720500\/0\/d25d8712\/1\/\" alt=\"Web Analytics\"><\/a><\/div>\n<p><\/noscript><br \/>\n<!-- End of StatCounter Code for Default Guide --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the first three weeks of June last year, the ABC&#8217;s Sarah Ferguson presented a three-part saga on the channel&#8217;s Four Corners program, which the ABC claimed was the &#8220;story of the century&#8221;. It was a rehashing of all the claims against US President Donald Trump, which the American TV stations had gone over with &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=4569\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Whatever happened to the ABC&#8217;s story of the century?&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[16,3,27,18,28,57],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4569","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-abc","category-australia","category-government","category-media","category-politics","category-uk"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4801,"url":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=4801","url_meta":{"origin":4569,"position":0},"title":"ABC claims no funds, but sends Ferguson to the US to make worthless programs","date":"February 8, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"The ABC is always whinging about the funding cuts it has had to suffer, with the Federal Government having cut the public broadcaster's annual handout by a sizeable amount. But the corporation makes its case weaker by splurging out on cosmetic exercises to keep its big names happy, with a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;ABC&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4384,"url":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=4384","url_meta":{"origin":4569,"position":1},"title":"Recycling Trump: Old news passed off as investigative reporting","date":"June 22, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Over the last three weeks, viewers of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's Four Corners program have been treated to what is the ultimate waste of time: a recapping of all that has gone on in the United States during the investigation into alleged Russian collusion with the Trump campaign in the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;ABC&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4272,"url":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=4272","url_meta":{"origin":4569,"position":2},"title":"All your gods have feet of clay: Sarah Ferguson's fall from grace","date":"December 31, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"The year that ends today was remarkable for one thing on the media front that has gone largely unnoticed: the fall from grace of one of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's brightest stars who has long been a standard-setter at the country's national broadcaster. Sarah Ferguson was the journalist's journalist, seemingly\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;ABC&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/sams-blog.com\/wp-content\/sams-blog.com\/2021\/02\/ferguson.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5620,"url":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=5620","url_meta":{"origin":4569,"position":3},"title":"ABC and the AFR begin the rehabilitation of Mike Pezzullo","date":"May 15, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"Many politicians and public servants in Australia enjoy an incestuous relationship with journalists and have long done so. Such relationships often leave the journalist compromised when some hidden detail about an interview or story is exposed, but those in this category do not mind being outed as long as they\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;ABC&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sams-blog.com\/wp-content\/sams-blog.com\/2024\/05\/pezzullo_wide.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5476,"url":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=5476","url_meta":{"origin":4569,"position":4},"title":"ABC reduced to running American propaganda on Four Corners","date":"July 5, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"The level to which Australia's government-funded media corporation, the ABC, has sunk is illustrated by the fact that in a slot reserved for its main investigative stories, it ran an American propaganda documentary from the American publicly-funded outlet PBS on 3 July. Titled \"Putin and the Presidents\", the documentary made\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;ABC&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"Vladimir Putin.","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sams-blog.com\/wp-content\/sams-blog.com\/2023\/07\/putin2.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5750,"url":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=5750","url_meta":{"origin":4569,"position":5},"title":"ABC, the 'most trusted news source in Australia\u2019, airs Netanyahu\u2019s 30-year-old bogus Iran nuke claims","date":"April 8, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"For about 30 years, Benjamin Netanyahu, the current Prime Minister of Israel, has been making the claim that Iran is on the verge (one month, two weeks, a few weeks, not very far from or variations of that theme) of having a nuclear weapon. Thus far, there is no sign\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;ABC&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4569","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4569"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4569\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5435,"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4569\/revisions\/5435"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4569"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4569"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4569"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}