Jamie Whyte must learn (we are told) that the media feast on a good quote but scrap the context

A bloke called Dave Armstrong, who seems to fancy himself as a newspaper columnist for the Dom-Post, has done a splendid job of bringing the attention of we politicians to the shortcomings of the news media.

Especially its inclination to seize on a spicy quote then remove the context.

Armstrong has added his voice to the chorus of anguished Kiwis who deplore anything that hints of racism, especially if it happens to involve special arrangements for our indigenous persons.

Wall and the Warriors of Change go on the warpath – don’t laugh, folks – over a newspaper cartoon

People who were pissed off with cartoons published in The Press and the Marlborough Express last year did what we are all entitled to do and expressed their objections at the time.

They exercised something wonderful called their freedom of speech (as did the enterprising Toyota dealer who devised the advertisement shown here).

Soon there was a debate raging. Were the cartoons racially offensive – or were they not?

And then we were all huffed and puffed out. It was all over. Or should have been.

Alas, some sad bastards get their knickers in a serious twist and want to see heads roll if they have taken offence or otherwise been affronted.

Dame Susan shows Radio NZ she has a useful lob shot for dealing with provocative questions

And then there’s the kill shot…

Gotta say it was encouraging to get some idea of what Dame Susan Devoy has to say about Waitangi Day.

Or rather, what she has written about Waitangi Day.

Some tosser on Radio NZ’s Morning Report this morning (listen here) was obviously hoping she would expand on what she had written and tried teasing her into saying something untoward. She had the good sense to be circumspect. She should have hit him in the nuts with her squash racquet.

She was circumspect – or rather, considered about what she said as you will find here – because she has just been named Race Relations Commissioner.

Let’s see if Susan Devoy can make a better fist of it than Joris as our Race Relations Commissioner

Alf was hugely buoyed by news that Joris de Bres is moving on.

His good friend and colleague, the formidable Crusher Collins, has named Dame Susan Devoy to take over as Race Relations Commissioner.

She announced the news (here) today –