letters to the editor

Edition 8

I wanted to collate all of the letters I had published in the Sydney Morning Herald over the years. I found 11. Some I had completely forgotten about. 6 of the letters were about sport; 2 were about political/social issues and other 3 were about random inconsequential events. Most are very short (I have found the shorter the letter, the more chance it has of being published).

I know there are others, at last 4 more, that I couldn't find when I searched.

I'm sure the first letter I had published was one I sent in when I was extremely bored one day. I asked why did gymnasts at the Olympics raise their right hand in the air like they were giving a Nazi salute? Was it because Olympics supremo and ex-Franco minister Juan Antonio Samaranch went and watched them every night? I was shocked it was published. I was even more surprised that a stranger rang me to talk about the letter.

There used to be a letters section in the Guide. Somebody wrote in about the South Park episode where the school nurse has a dead fetus attached to her face. The locals went over the top for her, including having a week for the condition she suffers from. The nurse just wants to live her life and when she tells them this, Jimbo (I think) calls her an 'ungrateful bitch'. It was pretty obvious what the point of the episode was (South Park is hardly subtle) and yet somebody wrote in about how the nurse was subjected to ridicule including the 'ungrateful bitch' comment. I wrote in the next week about how it was the locals who were being made fun of. I have a feeling I was a bit narky about the person who wrote the original letter.

The Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles went through a period where they had financial troubles and were having trouble keeping their best players. Rex Mossop complained about this and how the Rugby League body needed to do something about this. I think anybody who follows Rugby League could guess my letter pointed out that I'd never heard Rex complain when Manly plundered South Sydney and Western Suburbs during the 1970's and 1980's.

Shane Warne dropped a catch that would have given Damien Fleming another test hat trick. I wrote in to say that criticism of Warnie was unfair, and that that it was actually Joe the Cameraman who grassed the chance. This is the letter I've been most chuffed about having published because Ron Tandberg drew a cartoon for it. Somebody who is in the know on these things has told me that it was Joe and not Warne who made the sledge about Scott Muller. Just on the sledge of 'Can't bowl, can't throw' I think Muller might have got off easy, considering he was batting at number 11, behind Glenn McGrath. Might have been lucky not to have 'and can't bat either' added to the sledge.

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The letters I could find

It's hard to properly describe how bad the Sultana Bran ad was that had a 'family' destroying 'I Heard It Through The Grapevine'. Anyway this was letter about it tying it with 2004 Federal election. Re the 2004 election, the ALP were never going to win that election when Mark Latham was their leader. In my more paranoid days I wondered if Latham was a CIA/Liberal Party plant in the ALP because surely nobody could cause that much damage unless they were trying to deliberately undermine the ALP. After he lost the leadership I realised that rather than being a plant he was just a jerk with some serious mental health issues.

Cereal killer (15 Sep 04)

I'll give my vote to any party that promises to ban those Kellogs ads where they destroy I Heard it Through the Grapevine.

Alan Lambert, Burwood

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This might have been to letters to the weekend sports section. Channel 9 loves showing the Brisbane Broncos most Friday nights. Often it is the second game shown in Sydney. The commentary of Ben Ikin and Kevin Walters just proved too much for me. I did like the heading the SMH used.

Take a proper gander (07 Apr 07)

Would Channel Nine please ensure the commentary team of Tokyo Rose and Lord Haw-Haw (aka Ben Ikin and Kevin Walters) always does the late game on Friday night?

Alan Lambert, Burwood

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I used to love the Tour de France. I started following during Pedro Delgado's win in 1988. I loved watching it during the 1990's first with Big Mig winning 5 in a row and the watching the Pirate, Marco Pantani including his win in 1998. The came the rise of Lance Armstrong. Now drugs and the Tour have always gone hand in hand. The great Jacques Anquetil, who won 5 Tours, was open about his drug use. But there was something so systematic about Lance's drug taking and his threats of legal action against people who commented on it, that was truly off putting. Lance was gone by the 2006 Tour. Floyd Landis was one of the real favourites that year. He had got into the yellow jersey and was now a clear favourite to win. On a late mountain stage he cracked and lost about 8 minutes to the leaders. Any chance of a podium finish was gone. Then on the next stage, again in the mountains, he destroyed the field, winning the stage by over 7 minutes. It was one of the most exhilarating pieces of sport I had ever seen. To beat the best cyclists in the world so easily, after the events of the previous day was truly remarkable. Landis did well in the time trial the next day and was back in yellow. Then it was announced he had failed drug test following his great stage win. Nowadays I still watch the Tour, but nowhere near to the same extent. The next year Alexander Vinokourov failed a drug test. It inspired this effort.

(Part of) Tour de Farce (27 Jul 07)

What is more predictable? Drug scandals during the Tour de France or a drug scandal involving Lindsay Lohan ("Tour in crisis as Vinokourov fails dope test" and "Oh Lord, Lohan's in a hell of a mess", July 26)?

Alan Lambert Burwood

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 Australia were playing India in 2007/08. India had some wonderful players who I really liked, such as Sachin Tendulkar, VVS Laxman, Rahul Dravid & Anil Kumble. However they also had some players whose on field behaviour was deplorable such as Sreesanth and Harbhajan Singh. Andrew Symonds was part of the Australian team. Symonds had a West Indian background and on a tour of India he was the victim of monkey chants. In the Sydney test match there were a host of bad decisions that seemed to against India. With the atmosphere not good between the teams, Singh had some friendly by play with Brett Lee or maybe it was Glenn McGrath. Symonds said something to Singh about how nobody liked him which included calling him a bastard. Then Singh, according to the Australian players, called Symonds a monkey. Singh was originally penalised for making a racist comment. Then India threatened to go home, and the penalty was reduced. I'm not a fan of the Australian cricket team. I've always found their level of sledging really nasty. But there is no excuse for racism. In the end cricket authorities really let down Andrew Symonds. My letter really made none of these points.

(Part of) Wherever And Whatever The Game, Racism Cannot Be Pardoned (12 Jan 08)

So Sir Edmund Hillary's comment to fellow climbers was: "We knocked the bastard off." Lucky for him Mt Everest is not in India.

Alan Lambert Burwood

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A friend of mine sends in a lot of letters to the SMH that never seem to get published. After he sent in another effort, I wanted to show I could letter published. There was nothing going in I was passionate about. A musical on Shane Warne had just announced it was closing. I knew from past experiences that letters re Shane Warne were a chance of being published.

Joe and mum are spared (22 May 09)

So Shane Warne The Musical is ending its Sydney run early ("Play abandoned: Warnie the musical in off a short run", May 21) thanks to the economic crisis. Others must be relieved they have avoided blame: Joe the cameraman; the Kiwi kid who took the photo of Shane having a ciggie; Shane's mum; and countless women with mobile phones and/or answering machines.

Alan Lambert Burwood

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I avoided managed to avoid all news reports of the Oscar winners. I got home to watch a replay of the Awards on Channel 9, and what do channel 9 do? They show the winners in the ads for their late news. Thanks.

An Oscar spoiler that really hurt (10 Mar 10)

Rather than lambasting the NRL over Channel Seven's new rugby league show, maybe David Gyngell could spare some time to teach his staff about the importance of not spoiling the end of events they are showing. Having successfully avoided finding out the winners of the Academy Awards during the day, I realised The Hurt Locker had won Best Picture when Channel Nine showed the cast celebrating in the ads for their late-night news program.

Alan Lambert Burwood

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I used to work for Centrelink. They really were the epitome of an organisation who were great at paying attention to trivial issues, such as the dress code, with much less emphasis given to training, stress levels, workloads etc. Cityrail (or Sydney Trains) has never been known for their customer service. The Liberal government seemed to think that the customer service problems could be solved by bring in a stricter dress code including punishing staff who didn't shave.

(part of) Grooming shunt on right track (04 Aug 12)

Thank you, CityRail, for a wonderful travelling experience yesterday.

Sure my morning train was late. Again. And then as I waited for my train home at Town Hall station I was bombarded with announcements about using other doors on the train, when the platform was so crowded it was hard to find a space to stand in let alone find space to move anywhere else.

But as I stood there on the train on the way home, I had the warm inner glow that comes from knowing that my train driver didn't have stubble.

Alan Lambert Burwood

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If there's one thing that gets me fired up, it's people taking digs at my beloved Bulldogs. In 2008 the Bulldogs were maybe the second worst team of the modern era, behind only the 1982 Raiders team. The Bulldogs were certainly the worst team of the NRL era (well they were until the truly dreadful 2013 Eels team), winning just 5 of 24 games, conceding 782 points (-349 differential). The Bulldogs got one game away from the Grand Final in 2009. In a preseason guide, Glen Munsie said the Bulldogs had underachieved in 2009...

Played strong (13 Mar 10)

In the preview of the NRL season (''Your club's prospects'', March 8), TAB Sportsbet's Glenn Munsie states that the Bulldogs underachieved last year. This was a side that finished last in 2008 - and not an honourable last, as they were one of the worst sides of the modern era. In 2009 they finished second (it would have been first if not for a diabolical video ref's decision against St George Illawarra and their own stupidity in fielding 14 players for part of the game against Penrith).

The Bulldogs won their first semi, against Newcastle. They then played for a spot in the grand final against the red-hot Eels, and in this game lost their fullback, Luke Patten to injury in the second minute. Bryson Goodwin, also injured, was a passenger for most of the game. They were still within four points of the Eels with less than 10 minutes to go, before going down by 10 points.

Underachieved? It makes me wonder why Munsie and TAB Sportsbet had the Bulldogs at big odds to win the NRL when the season started, rather than as one of the favourites.

Alan Lambert, Burwood

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During a great Ashes test Stuart Broad clearly nicked a ball that was caught. Somehow the umpire missed it. Australia were out of reviews so Broad survived and he went to score some handy runs. England went onto narrowly win the test. The level of complaining by Australians, mainly Australian sports journalists, was amazing. It was continually bought up (and other writers to the SMH made the point) that Broad's action in not walking was the direct opposite of the former Australian wicket keeper Adam Gilchrist. My point is try to name another Australian player who walked? Indeed there were stories that other Australian players hated Gilchrist for doing so, because it made them look bad. Oh and to top the story off, the final out of the match was the Australian wicket keeper Brad Haddin who edged a ball but didn't walk, and was given out on appeal. Australian's complaining about another team not walking is like the French complaining about another country being arrogant,  or the Germans complaining about another country's lack of a sense of humour, or Americans complaining about how other people don't understand irony...

(Part of) Great clashes live on, but it's not cricket as we knew it (16 Jul 13)

During the first Ashes Test there was hand wringing from the Herald's sports journalists about the poor sportsmanship of Stuart Broad in refusing to walk after edging a ball that was caught by Michael Clarke. On the last ball of this magnificent match Brad Haddin got an inside edge to a ball that was caught by Matt Prior. Haddin stood his ground and was initially given not out by a mistaken umpire. I have not read one word criticising Haddin for not walking.

Alan Lambert Burwood

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If you sent in a letter every time that Roy Masters was wrong, you'd be a busy person. In 2013 the perennial semi-final victims the North Queensland Cowboys conceded a 7 tackle try to the Cronulla Sharks. Roy said this was the first time this had happened in a semi-final since 1978. Roy somehow forgot about a 7 tackle try in the 1995 grand final.

Bulldogs had their day (18 Sep 13)

Roy Masters wrote we have to go back to 1978 for the last seventh-tackle tries (''Refs don't know R's from their elbows'', September 16). In fact, Glen Hughes from the Bulldogs scored a try on the seventh tackle in the 1995 grand final. Still it was against Manly so nobody, rightly, cared about that.

Alan Lambert Burwood

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When weekend retail trading was introduced staff received penalty rates for giving up their weekend. Employers like to cut wages of staff. It's probably the easiest way to get a short term boost in profits. In the long term cutting wages for workers is a terrible idea, as the more money people have the more they can spend. I found the proposal to cut weekend penalty rates because weekend trading because it had been successful, just staggering.

(Part of) Abolishing penalty rates may create greater poverty and increased social isolation (05 Jan 15)

So let me get this right. Businesses wanted longer opening hours on the weekend, but the tradeoff was that they had to pay their staff more for having to give up their weekend. Now it's been a success, they want to reduce the pay of their staff because fewer people stay home on the weekend. Brilliant!

Alan Lambert Burwood