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Chip, chip, chipping away.....

Two pieces in today's SMH highlight where things are headed in Australia.

As Mike Carleton writes in relation to the recently announced new ABC Guidelines:

"The right-wing war on the ABC is not over yet, not by a long shot. Chortling at the tangled, almost certainly unworkable new editorial policies devised by the Government's hand-picked stooges on the ABC board and announced this week, the usual ratbags are queueing to sink the boot in still deeper."

Read the excellent piece here - including a reflection on the stupidity of some of our Federal Minister's recent pronouncements - and whilst doing so, consider yet another assault on our so-called open society and right to know.

Matthew Moore, the SMH's freedom-of -information editor, writes:

"Hardly a week passes when there's not another reason to get depressed about the failure of Australia's freedom-of-information laws."

Moore cites a most interesting survey comparing FOI in a number of countries. And where does Oz come? Read the piece here to find out.

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