(Image: Private Media)

Vale Peter Cundall We note with sadness the death of Peter Cundall at the age of 94. The Mancunian was a beloved and reassuring presence through the 1990s and 2000s as host of Gardening Australia during its first 18 years. He was a committed environmentalist who, having served in World War II and Korea, became a pacifist who marched against the Iraq War in 2003. He was chairman of the Tasmanian Wilderness Society in the 1970s battle against the Franklin Dam, and was arrested in 2009 for refusing a move on order while protesting the Gunns’ Bell Bay Pulp Mill. He was 82.

To consider what leaves with Cundall and his near century on earth would occupy a lot more space than we have here — by all accounts his was a remarkable life. But to pick one example: can we imagine someone who once ran as a Senate candidate for the Communist Party of Australia (back in 1961 — he proudly claimed to have received the lowest number of votes of any federal candidate), with three volumes of ASIO files still managing to have a long career at the ABC in any capacity now?

Devine intervention We do so love keeping up with the doings of Miranda Devine, still in the US doing us “proud” with her “journalism” for the New York Post. Following her book about Hunter Biden’s sodden laptop (which may have become an actual story since we last checked), Devine is applying her rigorous standards to other publications’ work, whoever the hell they actually are. She incredulously tweeted that “Over at The New York Times — which won a Pulitzer for pushing the Russia hoax — they’re genuinely claiming that Biden is getting tougher treatment from the media than Trump did. They have charts and all.”

And to be fair to Devine, that doesn’t sound exactly right to us either. Trump was inspiring serious talk of impeachment from the US media before he’d even stepped foot in the Oval Office. The one issue with Devine’s critique: it’s aimed at the wrong publication. It was The Washington Post that provided this analysis, as the NYT’s Maggie Haberman pointed out. Rather that back down, Devine decided the facts were getting in the way of her story and insisted: “You’ve only been debating it all day, Maggie”. This was attached to a Haberman tweet which is pretty clearly critical of the original WashPo piece. Ah, Miranda, don’t ever change.

Just Joshing Treasurer Josh Frydenberg clearly didn’t enjoy this Crikey piece about the “kiss of Josh” in recent Liberal Party preselections. Josh got to address yesterday’s Victorian Liberal Party state council meeting and took the opportunity to tee off at a long list of media outlets that supposedly got the 2019 election wrong, including The Age and the ABC. When it came to Crikey (just as an aside, we’d raise some objections to any suggestion we didn’t see 2019 coming) he sarcastically described us as “that right-wing think tank”. Glad you like our work, Josh!

Could do with an edit With the appointment of Shevan Bevan Shields as editor of The Sydney Morning Herald there’s been a fair bit of activity at Nine, so I guess we can forgive them a bit of confusion. Check this email that went around to subscribers on Friday inviting us to “Meet the Editor, Lisa Davies”, before giving us a note from acting editor Cosima Marriner.

Milkshake Tudge A detail lost in last week’s accusation from former staffer Rachelle Miller that her relationship with Education Minister Alan Tudge was emotionally and once physically abusive (Tudge categorically denies this). It was Tudge’s department that approved this year’s profoundly bizarre “milkshake” video, a cross between Christian camp values, a clear and palpable discomfort with the subjects they were talking about (or actively not talking about) and a wooden, uncanny quality straight out of a David Lynch nightmare. We sincerely hope no members of the government have been relying on that material for direction.