George Negus - it just gets weirder

I recently posted on the alpha male of Australian current affairs, George Negus. So when I went for breakfast with some friends the other day, it was really interesting to find that they were talking about the Ron Burgundy of Australian TV too. Now my friends were not discussing George's recent bagging of 60 minutes.

They were talking about the recent US election episode of Dateline , in which George and a panel of 3 commentators were dissecting the election of Barrack Obama. Specifically, my friends were wondering if George had, in the heat of the moment, got really excited and made that fatal Australian faux pas of calling an african american, "boy". Or as one of them put it.

"Doing a Bert". This refers to an incident on the Australian television awards show, The Logies, back in the 1970's, when the compare Bert Newton inadvertently referred to Muhammad Ali as a boy, while standing within punching range. My immediate reaction was to say that it sounded dubious.

I mean George produces such "superior" current affairs and packs “more real current affairs in one hour than 60 Minutes and Channel Seven combined”. Plus, as he says here : "I've had the advantage of being a professional globetrotter and political observer for a long time, so I wouldn't make that kind of statement without any sort of thought about it first," Given the above. It really shocked me to think that a professional commentator like the Negus, could fall into a verbal trap like that.

But, I reserved judgement till I could get home and investigoogle the whole story. Firstly I did a google news search. I thought that if people were talking about it at Belconnen Markets then the media must have picked up on it.

But there was nothing, well actually there was this very weird piece in the Fashion & Style section of the New York Times .(I kid you not) A 60-something man in cream-colored corduroys came up to introduce himself. “George Negus,” he said, shaking hands all around. “I sort of do what you do, Chris, but in Australia.” Mr.

Negus is to be the host of an election night show for his Australian television audience at the Newseum here. “If you pick the wrong president the world is in deep trouble,” he said. Ms.

Matthews switched to anchor mode. “Who is the wrong president?” she asked. Mr.

Negus offered his opinion. “I never met an Aussie I didn’t like,” Mr. Matthews said warmly.

WTF? - George is stalking journalists in bars, in cream-coloured corduroy? Anyway, apart from that weird tangent in the news cycle, there was nothing about George calling Barack a boy. So I headed for the Dateline site and searched the text of the transcript for the term "boy". Sure enough, down the end, I find this.

It quotes George as saying. "I think the boy's will be a bit busy." Now it's a transcription, so it's not going to be the most accurate of records. But the way I read the above, George is talking about more than one boy.

But when you read it in context with what George was saying in the lead up, it doesn't make sense. He's focusing on the individual and the challenges that individual, Obama will face and then George finishes by referring to some collective group who will be busy. So I went and had a look at the actual podcastable thingamee.

Which you can access at the Dateline site. It took awhile to download, but it is a great episode that is well worth watching. If for nothing more than it features the perfectly sculptured nose of Megan Ortegas, Republican Strategist.

Of course, it also features George clearly saying. "I think the boy's gunna be a bit busy." As is occasionally the case I found it almost impossible to capture the relevant part of the podcast to replay for the reader's pleasure, however, with the aid of a Fleshlight, a webcam and some gaffer tape I was able to produce the following crappy piece of vidage of George doing the Bert.. Sun Nov 2008 05:11 (2 months ago)