'WHEN I read that Nick Cater, a senior editor at the Australian, was writing a book about “the rise of an Australian ruling class” I was a little puzzled. The only people I knew who still talked and wrote about “an Australian ruling class” were a few irrepressible Marxist friends and colleagues. And although I was unfamiliar with Cater, it seemed implausible that Rupert Murdoch would permit one of that small band of true believers to exercise any influence over the flagship of his Australian fleet.' (Introduction)