Dutton spent years perfecting his hard-man, free-speech warrior character – once noting that criticisms were like ‘water off a duck’s back’. But in an impressive display of his range, he was able to quickly pivot to a thin-skinned, hypersensitive litigant, when he was told someone wrote a five-word mean tweet about him. Utterly convincing.
Christian Porter, on Thursday (14/7/22), lost his appeal in a unanimous decision against Jo Dyer in relation to having his barrister Sue Chrysanthou SC restrained from representing him at his 2021 defamation case against the ABC and journalist Louise Milligan.
Just imagine for one moment that the identity of Christian Porter was transformed into that of a Labor Minister. How do you think the Murdoch media would react? Well, let me tell you. The Australian, Sky News, The Herald Sun and other news outlets (where the truth goes to die) are completely ignoring the issue of where the money come from to pay Porter’s bills, and that parliamentary standards are worsening under this Government. It is like they take delight in the destruction of those things necessary to make our democracy work.
Acting prime minister Barnaby Joyce has endorsed Christian Porter to return to the ministry in future, just one day after the former industry minister resigned over his legal fees being paid by a trust with money from unknown donors.
So, to recap: the former chief legal officer of Australia took unspecified amounts of money in donations from unknown sources in order to pay the legal fees for his abandoned defamation suit in a court over which he until recently had authority. Over, let’s not forget, unresolved rape allegations. Say what you will about the circumstances of Porter’s plummet from grace — for a man with nothing to hide, he certainly goes to extraordinary lengths to keep things hidden.
He’s trying to change the front pages of the Australian media away from his failure on Covid and justify his turning on Gladys.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has just overseen Christian Porter’s assuming of the role of acting leader of the House of Representatives. Amid a burgeoning, pre-eminent mass awakening to the endemic issue of sexual abuse, this decision marks a proverbial slap in the face of our entire nation.
Unexplained legal judgments raise questions that deserve a hearing.
What makes it so scandalous is court case has dealt with suppressed evidence and applications to remove and redact documents in court file where there has been extensive argument to justify it. But when it came to my affidavit and written submissions there was no argument and/or application to have the affidavit and written submissions removed. What does “apparently” mean in her reason where she says, “given they contain apparently scandalous and scurrilous material about third parties”? “Apparently” means she was told by someone else. Who was it? Justice Jagot’s abuse of the law is obvious because even it was true and my documents did contain “scandalous and scurrilous material about third parties” those parts could have been redacted, like numerous other documents in this matter have been when challenged, and put back in the court’s online file. And who is this “third party” and what did I say about them?
Christian Porter just doesn’t know when to leave sleeping dogs lie – he just has to have another twist of the tail, another kick in the guts. After agreeing during mediation to withdraw his expensive defamation action against the ABC and their investigative journalist, Louise Milligan, to wear his own legal costs, not to insist that the ABC report in question be taken down and not to receive any of the damages he had been hoping for. He took these body blows like the Black Knight in Monty Python and the Holy Grail responding that this was just a scratch, a mere flesh wound, and that the ABC had been forced into a “humiliating backdown”.
Why should Christian Porter be given the benefit of silence when Australians aren’t. Why shouldn’t MP’s practice what they preach and their pasts remembered. The ABC informs us Morrison wants it shut down. So does Rupert.
The Australian’s editor-at-large, Paul Kelly, said on Q&A that Porter was “trashed” by the program, adding
olddogthoughts 
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