I always wondered why Miranda Devine was employed at the Sydney Morning Herald. She seems far more suited to a crap newspaper like The Daily Telegraph or some other News Ltd rag. And now it’s happened … Miranda the Devine has become a permanent opinion writer for The Daily Telegraph with her own blog.
Miranda Devine is a hard-hitting journalist who writes for Sydney’s Daily Telegraph
--The Daily Telegraph
What a lineup. Tim Blair, Piers Akerman and Miranda the Devine all gracing the pages of Australia’s worst newspaper.
She is the latest addition to our powerful stable of opinion writers who set the local and national agenda
--Garry Linnell: Daily Telegraph Editor
To kick off her new job, Miranda felt it was a good idea to drag out her favourite subject … drugs. Who would of thought? And I must admit, it’s just as bad as her usual rants, showing how little she really knows about the subject. MD is notorious for seemingly just making stuff up about drugs and has even attempted to take on respected doctors with decades of experience. It can be really embarrassing.
In her “hard hitting” article, MD complains that MSIC has, “done nothing demonstrable to reduce heroin use, or cause drug addicts to abstain from the substance that is ruining their lives”. Not surprisingly, she omits the successes and actual objectives of MSIC like it has saved thousands of overdoses, cleaned up Kings Cross and reduced ambulance callouts. MSIC was never meant to reduce heroin use or cause addicts to abstain. MSIC adds to the current strategies and targets a certain group of users in a special situation. It is not meant to replace treatment or replace other programs. If we follow MD’s logic, Ventolin inhalers don’t cure asthma so they are ineffective and should be scrapped or seat belts don’t stop drink-driving deaths so they are useless also. You get the idea.
I really love MD’s reference to anti-drug warrior, Darren Marton. You see, Marton is a “former heroin addict and (an) aspiring politician”. What MD doesn’t tell us is that he has as much credibility as MD herself … none. Probably why she spelt his name wrong. The article also quotes Tim Blair for some reason and profoundly states that, “you can't smoke a cigarette in the heroin-injecting room but you can shoot smack you bought illegally on the street into your arm”. They just can’t seem to grasp that MSIC is a medical facility.
But to get some idea about the depth of MD’s article, you need not go past the opening paragraph.
Just when you think commonsense has prevailed, when the weight of evidence and experience has put the final stake into the heart of a bad idea, someone comes along and breathes new life into it.
--Miranda Devine
The weight of what evidence? What experience? Does she mean the 4th scientific report which contradicts every criticism she has ever made? The report that once again, proves MSIC is a good idea? There has only been one official report that challenges all the other quantified research and that was led by fundamentalist, Gary Christian from Drug Free Australia (DFA). DFA are an extremist, right wing, evangelist organisation who are well known in the AOD industry for regularly trying to push junk science into the medical community. This is the same group that MD’s workmate, Piers Akerman refers to when he desperately tries to argue against MSIC.
In summary, the article titled, A Dangerous Idea That Stubbornly Refuses To Die is a good read if you love comics like Mad Magazine. They both have the same level of importance to the community and they both make you chuckle.
A Dangerous Idea That Stubbornly Refuses To Die
Miranda Devine
October 2010
LIKE Dracula, there are some ideas that keep coming back as the undead. Just when you think commonsense has prevailed, when the weight of evidence and experience has put the final stake into the heart of a bad idea, someone comes along and breathes new life into it.
Take legalising drugs. We have a hard enough time dealing with binge drinking and late-night violence and all the other consequences of the legalised drug of alcohol, that you would think no one would seriously propose adding more harmful substances to the mix.
But no, the drug legalisation lobby - under the cover of harm minimisation - is gathering strength for new campaigns. They have their international meetings. They have their high-profile boosters, such as billionaire financier George Soros, who has just pledged $1 million to finance America's pro-pot force's battle over marijuana legalisation, the so-called Proposition 19.
They have their high priests - Dr Alex Wodak, long-term director of St Vincent's Hospital's drug and alcohol service, who has been trying to get marijuana legalised and sold in packets at the post office. They have their churches, such as the heroin-injecting room in Kings Cross, installed on a trial basis four years ago.
And, having done nothing demonstrable to reduce heroin use, or cause drug addicts to abstain from the substance that is ruining their lives, it was made permanent this week.
Legislation was passed in the NSW Upper House with the aid of the limp-wristed NSW Opposition, which fails to realise that a conservative party that turns its back on conservative policies never fares well at the polls.
As colleague Tim Blair points out, you can't smoke a cigarette in the heroin-injecting room but you can shoot smack you bought illegally on the street into your arm.
Former heroin addict and aspiring politician Darron Martin says: "The people of NSW should be very concerned indeed about the permanency of the Medically Supervised Injecting Centre in Kings Cross.
"Dr Alex Wodak, Australia's most prominent proponent of harm-minimisation ... and responsible for introducing it to Australia in 1985, now says more injecting rooms are needed in NSW. Look out for one near you."
Spending a few minutes reading a bunch of her other articles and oh god it's painful.
ReplyDeleteI feel your pain!
ReplyDeletehehehe Miranda Devine is now part of that loopy wingnut group at the Daily Terrorgraph. Aussie Teabaggers will be delighted to have all these nuts in one place. I can picture the offices filled with posters of Glenn Beck and Bill O'Reilly.
ReplyDelete