Hansard

I've always wondered how much licence the Hansard reporters might be able to take. Do they record what parliamentarians meant to say? Do they repair grammatical errors? Can the speakers make special pleas to amend their legacy? What is the limit?

It looks like the RN transcription service manages to protect Stephen Crittenden from MediaWatch. Try listening to this audio, and your ears will tell you that the Anglican Primate in Australia is Peter Aspinall. But your eyes will tell you that his first name is Phillip. Maybe Stephen was thinking of the Jensens, where such a mistake is much easier to make. Some would say the Jensens are bigger or easier targets for the weak-kneed uber-tolerant humanistic cultural relativists at the ABC. But not me. One of my interests is trying to understand the origins of the differences between Sydney Anglicanism and other varieties.

And while we're on formative personal experiences, was there a single occurrence that led to my Bach addiction? Is there a certain age where such preferences become deep-seated? How vulnerable are these predilections to manipulation? Are they chaotic?