I don’t watch a great of television. I have a few programs that I make sure I see like “Myth Busters”, “Top Gear” and “House” but aside from these and the news (ABC and SBS) I have better things to do. Sure that sometimes includes watching things on DVD but I don’t count that as watching [...]]]>

I don’t watch a great of television. I have a few programs that I make sure I see like “Myth Busters”, “Top Gear” and “House” but aside from these and the news (ABC and SBS) I have better things to do. Sure that sometimes includes watching things on DVD but I don’t count that as watching television per se as I am actually choosing what to view and when and I am not boosting the ratings of the abhorrent Australian commercial networks.

There is one time, however, that I really enjoy TV and that is while I am eating my breakfast. I like those 10 sleepy minutes while I munch through my muesli and see what might have happened over night in the world.

Originally I watched Sharon Gidella on the “National Nine Early Morning News”. She was a lovely breakfast companion. Later I switched to “Sunrise” hosted by David Koch. He struck me as an unlikely breakfast television host since he had been the finance guy on Channel Seven’s early morning news, but he proved entertaining. It seemed unlikely too that Seven’s upstart “Sunrise” would displace Nine’s behemoth “Today” with its entrenched audience, Steve Leibman and Tracy Grimshaw, but it did.

So I watched “Sunrise” pretty much everyday for years until I started to look at it critically. Sunrise postures itself, in much the same manner as programs like “Today Tonight” and “A Current Affair” as looking our for the “Aussie Battler”. David Koch’s feigned outrage combined with Melissa Doyle’s ill-informed naiveté begin to wear thin. Koch’s conservative politics and middle class ideals are revealed time and again as he postulates another knee-jerk solution to whatever carefully culled and selected news item has been passed his way.

Devices like the “Ros Wall”, where viewers can post questions, provide another platform for Koch to go into bat for the “Aussie Bleeders”. In keeping with its synthetically proletarian position Sunrise is also horribly nationalistic perpetuating the Australian myth that we live in a country different somehow from the rest of the Western world and superior in its culture and traditions. No better demonstration of this can be found around Australia Day and Anzac Day where the true meaning of both of these is subverted to grunts of “Aussie, Aussie, Aussie – Oi, Oi, Oi” and flag wearing promoted by “Sunrise” and other programs of its ilk. Australia is a wonderful country but to those around the world this display does nothing to elevate us.

Pete Blasina – known on Sunrise as “The Gadget Guy” – knows as much about technology as my mother. His pieces are obviously straight from the mouth of the PR people of whatever company manufactures the products he is so blatantly advertising. This piece from Media Watch is revealing to say the least. The rest of the crew are equally bland do nothing to improve the program at all.

I want facts, not fluff with my cereal. Luckily the ABC, that bastion of Australian broadcasting, have created a breakfast news program for their digital only channel ABC 2. ABC News Breakfast is exactly what is says on the box. Hosted by Virginia Trioli and Barrie Cassidy it is informative, not opinionated, sticks to the news, has a truly national focus and represents some solid journalism. Streaming live on the Internet news items can also be viewed on the News Breakfast website.

So why not join me for breakfast ABC 2, 6 a.m. I’ll be the one with the muesli.