ABSTRACT
The last ten days of February 1992 witnessed, through the eyes of the Australian mass media, the boiling-over of a potent brew of economic argument, political point-scoring and the rekindling of ancient outrages, the temperature of which had been raised dangerously by a royal visit punctuated by lapses of protocol (or at least of traditional etiquette) and the fiftieth anniversary of a wartime bombing raid.
