Posts Tagged ‘Politics’

1. Never mind policy, what’s on the tape?

   Published on Tuesday, November 15th, 2011
   

   It is hard not to feel that that the 2011 General Election has descended into farce.  We’re now ten days out from the Election, and for nigh on three days our politicians aided and abetted by the national media have given us a diet of irrelevancy about a tape of a private conversation.

   The PM raised a matter of principle about being secretly recorded in conversation over a cup of tea with the aspiring MP for Epsom, but before long our media are excusing the blatancy of this illegality and claiming the PM has something to hide if he’s not prepared to reveal what’s on the tape.  In climbing into this matter,  two of the other main parties, while tut-tutting at the secret recording, have been lavishly proffering public relations advice about what the PM should do because it “doesn’t look good” to have a private conversation and keep it that way.

   It is a sign that politicians are now more interested in doing what “looks good” than explaining the social and economic measures that will advance our wellbeing over the next years.  Is this because they judge us to be totally facile?  Are they right, and is this what we want?  Is it also a sign of the media is more interested in feeding us a diet of gossip and innuendo because they understand  people are so disinterested in policy unless it is to directly affect them?

   Surely it’s time to drop this nonsense of the tape and get back to debating the issues that matter so that we can have some substance on which to cast our votes.  This goes for the lot of them.

2. Fair Play or Out Of Bounds

   Published on Thursday, January 28th, 2010
   The ability of the media to ‘spark’ a controversy, and that of social media to ‘fuel it’ has rarely been better illustrated than the histrionics raging in Australian over the comments made by the new Leader of the Opposition, Tony Abbott, when asked the question:  what advice would you give your daughters about sex before marriage.

   The question was posed by The Australian Women’s Weekly when doing a personality piece on Abbott. His response [not to give away their virginity lightly] is, I would have thought on face value, acceptable enough fatherly wisdom.

   However, when you are a politician, nothing is taken on face value.

   As would be anticipated, the reaction to his comments has been as diverse as ‘a brilliant answer’ to ‘yet another self-acknowledged one-time drug-taking, Vatican roulette-playing, shagabout, white, middle-aged male telling young women not to do what he did when he was their age’ (an Australian comedian).

   Now Abbott is an experienced politician, and his media minders are hardly likely to be lightweights, so it’s not unreasonable to assume he knew what sort of reaction he was likely to generate. The decision to answer the question the way he did had to be deliberate, and was designed to achieve a specific result.

   Post coverage analysis will tell him whether he obtained what he set out to achieve.

   By and large, New Zealand politicians have steadfastly refused to allow or inject their families into media coverage to raise their profile. In Australia, some at least are obviously not so reticent.

   I think the Kiwi approach is the wiser.

   What is of real interest to those of us who work in the media world is the power social media has to take the initial story, and fragment it into stories about politics, parenting, morality, religion, feminism, manipulation (of the media), hypocrisy and personal choice, to name a few.

   For those who have doubts about the power of social media, have a read.

   One only hopes that the media does not seek to prolong the controversy by asking Mrs Abbott and her three daughters as to their views on Mr Abbott’s musing. Enough is enough!

3. Just how can Phil Goff win the hearts and minds of Labour voters?

   Published on Thursday, September 17th, 2009
   Phil Goff has surely got the worst job in New Zealand politics right now?  Taking over the leadership of a party that was soundly trumped in an election is bad enough. But inheriting this role from St Helen, whose new position in the UN only serves to entrench her legacy as PM, makes his situation even more difficult.  

   The magnanimous way he was appointed as leader makes it even harder to use a new broom, and clean house. This was evident in his somewhat half-hearted speech during the party conference when he apologised for his then-government appearing to be distracted by small matters such as light-bulbs, smacking and Electoral Finance Acts. 

   The position he finds himself in now is potentially tainting how he goes about developing his own brand as leader of the opposition, and I am wondering if it is part of the reason for his somewhat lack lustre performance in media interviews. 

   It looks to me like he is saying what he thinks people want to hear and how they want to hear it.  The result is a Mr Goff who looks more like a friendly and polite church vicar than a political party leader. 

   Unfortunately in politics today, the brand of the leader reflects on the popularity of the party, and for Mr Goff that brand is yet to be revealed. Or is what we are seeing now all we are going to get? 

   Where is the man who was Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade? In this role he was one of the most interviewed politicians of his day, and I was always impressed with those media performances where he came across as passionate and committed. He was forceful and dynamic in his responses, and you really did feel he was representing our interests on the world stage. 

   Mr Goff now needs to set about showing that same passion and commitment in his new role and demonstrate that he is the real deal. It remains to be seen if he will prove the neigh sayers wrong, and establish his own legacy as leader of the opposition. Or will he simply be the temporary custodian that many say he is?