A Blot on the campaign

Once again AussieRulesBlog addresses the Essendon supplement affair, but the reason and the direction will surprise.

In normal circumstances, we try extremely hard to divorce other parts of our existence from AussieRulesBlog. This site is about Aussie rules football.

The circumstances are not normal. Essendon’s favourite son, third-best player of all time and current coach, James Hird, is under attack in a way we can’t recall having been used in football before. If anyone has suggestions for similarly virulent and sustained public shaming, we’d be glad to reconsider.

You’d think then, that vocal support from a well-connected public figure without any allegiance to the Essendon Football Club or James Hird would be welcome. You’d be wrong. Dead wrong!

The Herald-Sun’s attack-dog “opinion” columnist and blogger, Andrew Blot, allowed the semi-trained monkeys who pen his drivel to write in support of Hird on Wednesday. Superficially, that support is welcomed by AussieRulesBlog, but the devil is in the detail.

The very tactics of the “pack” [Blot’s term] pursuing Hird that Blot decries so vehemently are the self-same tactics used by the “pack” [our term this time] led by Blot and others in dogged pursuit of Prime Minister Gillard.

Whatever your political stripe, on any assessment based on respectful and considered human discourse,Gillard has been shamefully treated by Blot and his mates. The similarities to the treatment meted out to Hird stand out like beacons on a dark night.

Blot ferociously lashes the malicious framing and prejudgement of Hird without evidence — and yet that’s precisely how he and his mates have treated the Prime Minister.

Tell him, Hirdy. Tell him to take his sanctimonious hypocritical support and shove it where the sun don’t shine.