DR MUMBO: SMH’s Barrack bollocks, News Ltd fails the flag test

Tim Burrowes

January 27, 2009 8:49

obama-tshirt So here’s an excellent idea brought to you from those bright sparks in the Fairfax marketing department: a T-shirt of the historic Sydney Morning Herald front page that was published on the day of Obama’s inauguration. And all for a bargain price of $34.95 plus postage and handling.

Buit what does that tiny caption on the bottom of the picture say? “Barrack Obama speaks at a dinner in Washington”.

Shame deadlines meant that the entire “historic” front page was put together long before he actually took the oath of office, and the photo wasn’t even from the day, isn’t it? And it must have seemed such a good bet sticking the oath of office on it ahead of time as a quote – after all, it wasn’t like he was going to get that wrong, was he?

Otherwise, it’s a historic T-shirt indeed.

Subscribe to keep reading

Join Mumbrella Pro to access the Mumbrella archive and read our premium analysis of everything under the media and marketing umbrella.

Tim Burrowes

Tim Burrowes is the publisher of Mumbrella and Unmade. He co-founded Mumbrella in 2008 and sister title Unmade in 2021. He's worked in the UK, Middle East, Asia & Australia and has specialised in writing about the communications world for the last 25 years. He wrote the book Media Unmade, published in 2021, and became the presenter of MediaLand on ABC Radio National in 2025.