Higher calling as Stan Grant and Greg Sheridan unite on faith

3 months ago 26

Two years after departing the ABC following a torrent of racist abuse, star journalist and former Q&A host Stan Grant has turned his mind to matters spiritual and found a new bromance your columnists did not see coming.

When Grant stepped down as Q&A host in 2023, triggering a firestorm over the public broadcaster’s treatment of culturally diverse staff, ABC managers accused News Corp of running a campaign against the Wiradjuri man.

Former Q+A host Stan Grant says it wasn’t racism that prompted him to quit the ABC.

Now, Grant, who writes a column at progressive weekly The Saturday Paper, is teaming up with News Corp veteran Greg Sheridan to launch The Australian foreign editor’s latest book, How Christians Can Succeed Today, at the Hayden Orpheum in Cremorne this month.

It’s nice to see genuine cross-factional friendship blossoming in the media. Sheridan, who has eight books under his belt, told CBD he was honoured and grateful Grant agreed to the launch.

“I’m a great admirer of Stan’s and have been for many years”.

Grant, who quietly polished off a PhD in theology last year, told us that as Christians, both he and Sheridan had been brought together by their discussions about faith, including on a panel at this year’s Sorrento Writers Festival. He also had a few choice words for his old profession.

“One of the problems with journalism is that it’s theologically illiterate. It’s frankly scornful, disdainful and mocking of people’s faiths,” he said.

“Any opportunity to have a really informed discussion with people about faith in public life is really, really important”.

We’d say “amen” to that, but fear that might be proving Grant’s rather fair point.

Life on Mars?

All the feels after the incredible news that Rupert Murdoch, the old crocodile, as columnist Tina Brown refers to him, is launching a new newspaper in California.

The California Post will thud onto the front lawns of state residents from early next year as they prepare for the gubernatorial race and the Los Angeles Olympics in 2028. It’s modelled on the legendary New York Post, you see.

Back in Oz, there were equal parts astonishment and jubilation the tabloid would be headed up by “News Corp veteran” Nick Papps, who has been helming the weekend Herald Sun papers in Melbourne. He’s a former West Coast correspondent for the company.

News Corp chief executive Robert Thomson, who hailed from Victoria, once complained to one of your columnists that Americans fail to understand irony. But then the global news boss proceeded to serve up some doozies himself.

“Los Angeles and California surely need a daily dose of The Post as an antidote to the jaundiced, jaded journalism that has sadly proliferated. We are at a pivotal moment for the city and the state, and there is no doubt that The Post will play a crucial role in engaging and enlightening readers, who are starved of serious reporting and puckish wit,” Thomson said in a press release.

But his next remarks, referencing the editor-in-chief of the New York Post, were reported by almost no-one.

“I am also pleased that Keith Poole’s remit is expanding, as he will now be responsible for covering not just New York, but California, the US, the world and, perhaps, Mars.”

News Corp expanding to Mars? Wouldn’t put it past them.

Teeing off

We turn now to our good friends the NSW Liberals, who even when trying their best to listen to the community, still manage to come across just a little tone-deaf.

On Monday, Opposition Leader Mark Speakman was joined by a posse of frontbenchers for a community shadow cabinet event on the northern beaches, where they met with a smattering of the kind of grey-haired voters with the means to turn up at a golf course on a weekday afternoon.

It wasn’t just any old course, but Cromer Golf Club, which describes itself as “a welcoming and exclusive private club” and “a private golfing oasis”. Out on the greens at a club where playing membership can cost north of $10,000 a year, Speakman spoke about hot-button issues such as the “escalating cost of living,” as well as housing and hospital wait times.

The potential optics of that presser clearly didn’t cross the mind of whoever was responsible for Speakman’s advancing. But where professional smirkers like us see content, the Liberals see a venue chosen purely out of convenience.

“Cromer is a regular community venue that regularly hosts community events. It is centrally located and accessible and that’s why [it was chosen],” a staffer told us.

So an opportunity to meet your average voter north of the bridge who can afford lavish golf club membership fees but have still abandoned the Liberal Party.