A naive senator becomes media savvy

Nor is it always a matter of campaigning overtly for one side of politics. It can be just as effective to leave out viewpoints and information, to marginalise critics and their positions, or worse - in a world "where publicity is oxygen" - to ignore them.

Fielding said that he asked ordinary Australians what they thought about the changes and they weren't too concerned about who owns the media. We can't be sure whom he asked or how many, but when the Australian Survey of Social Attitudes asked more than 4,000 Australians, 81 per cent said they thought media ownership was too concentrated and 70 per cent agreed that media should have less power.

There was one important change from Fielding's brief speech in the Senate about why he supported the law change and the article he wrote in The Age. In the Senate, on October 11, Fielding argued that: "The Murdoch empire thinks these changes are against News Ltd's commercial interests, while the Packer empire thinks they are in PBL's commercial interests - all for reasons Family First does not fully understand."

It was a frank admission of naivety but in his Age article on October 26 - eight days after the Packer-owned PBL had made $4.5 million on the back of the law changes - Fielding changed that statement to: "The Murdoch empire thinks the changes are against its commercial interests while the Packer empire thinks they are in PBL's commercial interests. It appears James Packer is right."

Fielding is obviously learning fast about how the media system in Australia works. The fact that he uses the term "empire" to describe these businesses shows that he knows that this isn't just about commerce and the media isn't just another business.