Archive for the 'media' Category

Anatomy of a honeymoon piece

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on November 30, 2008
in media and national/act government
. 31 Comments

Most of our political journalists are more than capable of producing informative, insightful pieces. For instance, Claire Trevett wrote an excellent series of pieces that confirmed John Key had stolen Coldplay’s ‘Clocks’ for his ‘Ambiguous for NZ’ DVD. She researched the legalities of the issue, consulted a musicologist on the tune, brought forward a confession from National, and asked Labour for comment. Solid.

Now, look at this article from Saturday, also by Trevett:

- Bill English repeats his campaign lines with no facts to support them. They are accepted without question. No details on the substantive policies National/ACT wants to implement are provided. There is not even any recognition of the fact that English is providing no substance, just spin. So, one has to wonder if substance was sought.

- no response from Labour is included (and it hasn’t been sought otherwise it would say Labour had no comment). Can you imagine Labour making significant comments and no response from National being sought? No, because it doesn’t happen, except when honeymoon-think undermines journalistic standards.

- no independent expert is quoted backing up or discrediting English’s line. No statistics or other context are provided.

All these things leave us with nothing more than a puff piece, the kind of thing you would get if you asked National’s spin doctors to write it. This a perfect example of how ‘honeymoon’ thinking afflicts the media and shows that it is a media phenomena, contrary to what John Armstrong says. The media thinks there is honeymoon and so they make it true by not carrying out normal journalistic practice, by giving National a baby-soft ride. As Rawdon Christie said on Agenda today, ‘the honeymoon continues’, and it will continue as long as the journos believe it does.

This vacuous honeymoon groupthink undercuts the performance of even our more able journalists. That’s a problem for anyone who wants an informed public.

The really weird and disappointing thing is that long after every honeymoon is over you see media looking back at it with a mixture of shame and confusion. ‘Why did that happen?’, the journos ask ‘it’s embarrassing to recall how we gave them such an easy ride’.

It’s time they faced up to the fact that it is a media problem and the journos’ responsibility to fix.

Act lied and gets away with it

Published
by
lprent
on November 30, 2008
in act, media and spin
. 11 Comments

At the Media Law Journal, Wellington based media lawyer Steven Price has been looking at the recent decisions of the Advertising Standards Complaint Board (a self-regulatory body) related to the election. There are a series of them and the decisions are weird. More importantly they are ineffectual in the great tradition of industry self-regulatory bodies. This can be seen clearly in the third decision - where there was clear lie from Act, but which they get no penalties for.

Wrong - ASC Appeal Board upheld a complaint against Labour that a YouTube video saying the National was planning to cut KiwiSaver in half. Steven thought that decision was wrong, and so do I. Everything I’ve seen says that the contributions from government will be dropped by more than half, and employer contributions by a lot. But it appears that the ASCAB have a problem with numbers.

Wrong again! - The ASCB upheld a complaint against Act that their advertising “ACT was the only party opposed to the Emissions Trading Scheme” was incorrect. The Kiwi Party also opposed the ETS. In this case we’re talking about a party that had virtually no chance of getting into politics. In fact they got less votes than the Bill & Ben party. Again the ASCB seems to have a problem distinguishing the numbers and reality.

Right - Act said “Safe” New Zealand is now almost three times more violent than the US.

Steven comments

As usual, the ASCB invited ACT to substantiate its claim. It seems from the decision that ACT, despite being given two opportunities, could not. The party merely talked generally about how it depends on how you compare statistics. It seems that ACT didn’t supply any actual source for its claim.

Pause here. How staggering that ACT was happy to garner votes with this claim, but not prepared to substantiate it  - even to a body whose self-regulatory nature ACT would presumably applaud.

Looking at how Act played with some incomparable statistics to get to this statement, it is completely unjustifiable, and in my opinion has to have been done deliberately. This is probably why they didn’t bother to mount a credible defense against the complaint. The question is what gets done about it?

Well nothing - the decision comes from a self-regulatory industry body with no teeth. From the ASCB judgment

In making its ruling the Complaints Board acknowledged that it had received advice from the Advertiser that the claim as it stood would not be used in any future advertising. This it said indicated the Advertiser’s commitment to the self-regulatory process.

Well of course not - the election is over. It doesn’t mean that they swear off using this type of dirty political tactic again, or that other parties will not follow the same path. After all there are no penalties. The lie has presumably helped Act get votes by screwing the political system. This is something that they rail against for everyone else - ask Winston. Act are hypocrites asking for penalties for others and avoiding it themselves.

Now what was Rodney put in charge of again? Something to do with government regulation that usually carries penalties. This from a party that wants to reduce government regulation and prefers self-regulation. So now we know the type of self-regulation that Act prefers - ineffectual.

The Mt Victoria Supplement

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on November 30, 2008
in media
. 15 Comments

We were emailed the Mount Victoria Supplement a while back but I forgot to post it. It’s, um, it’s extraordinary. A good Sunday read, download it.

Just wondering

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on November 29, 2008
in media and national/act government
. 8 Comments

“National’s honeymoon has to run its course. The public - not Labour or the media - will decide when that honeymoon is over” writes John Armstrong.

I’m just wondering: how does the public gather information on what the Government is up to, to decide if it wants the honeymoon to continue? And, how do we, the public, collectively decide and communicate that the honeymoon is over?

I’m guessing there is some kind of medium, or even media, via which information on what the Government is up to is communicated to us and public opinion is communicated or, rather, created. One would think that it is the people who operate and inform these media who, having the power to decide how they represent both the Government’s actions and the public’s response, actually decide whether or not there is a honeymoon and whether or not it is over.

Could one argue that by pretending the media is a mere conveyor of information, not a shaper of that information, Armstrong is attempting to excuse the failure of the fourth estate to fulfill its duty to ask the hard questions of those with power? I’m just wondering.

Brownlee’s blow-out

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on November 27, 2008
in climate change, flip-flop, media and national/act government
. 45 Comments

National/ACT has only been in power a week, but the flip-flops keep coming. Energy Minister Gerry Brownlee will not confirm that that National/ACT will reversing the new light-bulb standards. This after they campaigned hard against these standards and Key repeatedly promised that under a National government people would not be told which type of light-bulbs they can use. Brownlee hasn’t confirmed that the policy will be dropped, but he is no longer confirming his party’s policy stands and that says it all. 

Campaigning on reserving the standards was a typically hollow vote-grabbing move from National; the kind of politics that encourages you not to think too hard, just be outraged. ‘Don’t let the nanny state take away your lightbulbs’ - it’s enough to stir the brain-dead reactionary in all of us.

Just as predictable as National’s pre-election bluster is their post-election back-down. The fact is there was never anything extreme about the improvement in light-bulb standards that most incandescent bulbs can’t match: the Government sets standards for all kinds of consumer goods for safety and environmental reason among others (that’s why you can’t get CFCs in your refrigerator anymore). We are actually behind the rest of the world in raising our standards and will look positively Luddite if we lower them again. In fact, the choice to buy incandescent bulbs is going to be taken away from us soon enough because China produces 70% of the world’s supply and has already banned their use domestically. So, National will move quickly to get this inevitable flip-flop out of the way so the voters forget.

Now, we can’t blame National too much for cynically exploiting this issue then back-flipping any more than one can blame a polar bear for eating baby seals; it’s just what they do and they’ll do it as long as they can do it successfully. What is disappointing, though, is that they are allowed to get away with, first, the electioneering stunt and, soon, the back-flip.

Only one group has the power to effectively expose and disarm cynical electioneering. But the media’s ping-pong excuse for objectivity failed because it can’t point out that one side of the argument is complete bollocks. Worse, we had excitable columnists comparing the light-bulb standards to the third Labour Government’s public health regulations that (among a whole slew of other things) banned cats from dairies, which National used to whip up the knee-jerk conservatives. In a bizarre reading of history, they claimed banning cats from dairies had cost Labour re-election in 1975 and light-bulbs would do the same in 2008 - they failed to ask whether National’s promise was the right thing for New Zealand or likely to be kept by a National government. The fact that parties are permitted by the way the media reports politics to get away with this kind of dishonest crap is an indictment on the industry that is meant to perform a crucial role in informing us and protecting our democracy*. 

Well, that notwithstanding, it looks like those excitable columnists’ comparison between the incandescent ban and the cat ban was valid but in a way they perhaps didn’t foresee. After all, when was the last time you saw a cat in a dairy?

*[I wonder if the media bigwigs have realised that it is this failure of duty that is driving people away from the mainstream media to the blogs for their political analysis]

Why is there a media honeymoon?

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on November 25, 2008
in labour, media and national/act government
. 41 Comments

Why do new leaders get honeymoons? When you think about it, there’s no objective reason why a leader should get an easy run at first, not be asked the hard questions, be served lavish praise. So why does it happen?

Well, I asked around a few people who’d been there and done that, and the only credible answer I got was that it’s because the press gallery and the new leader are building relationships. It works like this: gallery journos need access, that means they have to get the new leader and his ministers to trust them, and that means no critical articles. To protect their ability to gain information for writing stories, the media have to only write nice stories. The new government has the power to shut them out, so they’ve got to protect their own arses. The new leaders are also building relationships. Flush with victory they are in an open, welcoming mood and with the media being so nice to them, they are minded to be even more open and friendly toward them. When you’re getting to be friends with people, and when your job prospects depend on good relations with them, it’s easy to have a honeymoon.

It’s not until one of the half-dozen people who essentially control our political discourse starts writing critical articles and others follow them that the honeymoon ends. That never really happened to Key during his time in opposition. Sure the political editors all got in their pro forma critical pieces but all were afraid of getting offside with someone they were certain would soon be PM. Moreover, some of them have a career change to consider. Watch over the next few weeks for at least one, possibly more, of the top political journos to join Key’s office.

Now, I know what you’re thinking - ‘this sucks, the people meant to hold our politicians to account are too busy trying to keep their jobs or get new ones’. Yeah, it does suck but there’s no changing the lay of the land. Instead, the Left, and Labour in particular, needs to do a much better job working with the media than they have done.

There is a tendency for the Left to view the media as an enemy to be fought, which is a big mistake. While the old media still control how the public perceives politics, Labour needs to work with them. In particular, they need to turn away from this paralysing ‘risk avoidance’ model and, instead, work on building personal relationships with the media.

The journos are just people, treat them with distrust and they’ll treat you badly back; be friendly and they’ll be nice back. And it’s not hard - they’re, most of them, genuinely nice people in person - just make friends. That’s something smiling John and National know all too well. It’s something Labour needs to learn, and quick.

TVNZ cancels Agenda

Published
by
Tane
on November 25, 2008
in broadcasting and media
. 27 Comments

No Right Turn reports that TVNZ has cancelled Agenda, New Zealand’s only in-depth political interview and analysis show:

According to Dennis Welch on Radio NZ this morning, TVNZ has cancelled Agenda, New Zealand’s top current affairs show. No word on what, if anything, they plan to replace it with, but it would be interesting to know their reason. Agenda is a successful show, which has been attracting record viewers in the leadup to the election. It is widely regarded as a vital part of our current affairs landscape, and its longer interview format provides a better way of holding our politicians to account than the traditional five-minute slot on Campbell Live. But I guess intelligent political discussion just doesn’t sell advertising; easier just to use recycled reality TV instead.

I have to second that - it’s an unforgivable move on TVNZ’s part and reflects just how far they’ve strayed from their public broadcasting obligations under the Charter. Ironically, the word around the traps is that the privately-owned TV3 is very interested in picking up Agenda if public funding becomes available. Let’s hope they do.

“NZ Herald Staff” dribble

Published
by
lprent
on November 20, 2008
in fuckwits, media and news
. 26 Comments

Bomber over at Tumeke has pointed out a stupid news story about the blogosphere from the Granny Herald. It either shows a selective bias, or someone reporting on something that they don’t understand at more than a superficial level.

From the Herald staff…

The Blogosphere has made much of the “popular Westie” Paula Bennett’s new job in its initial analysis of John Key’s cabinet announced yesterday.

From bomber..

I love this ‘story’ by the Herald, they do a story about the ‘blogosphere’ reaction to Paula Bennett – to my shock they didn’t look at Tumeke…

…instead the Herald goes to the two most right wing blogs on the blogosphere, the Fox news online Kiwiblogh and the appalling whale oil…

Ok, so I thought that bomber was probably over-reacting. But no he isn’t, the blogs looked at were Colin Espiners blog, Kiwiblog (yeah - dog-whistles for the nat’s), and Whaleoil (aka national’s smear unit). The latter two are so associated with National that it is difficult to see them as anything more than sock-puppets for National PR. You’d have thought that a balanced report on the blogosphere reaction would have included some reaction from a range of blogs. Like the lefty or green blogs for instance - just for a bit of balance.

I don’t have time to read many blogs, but the reaction on most blogs has not that favourable about the cabinet lineup. We haven’t done explicit posts on the details of the micro-fauna of NACT + MP cabinet. However there is a lot of comment both in the posts and inside the comments. For instance a lot of the 100+ comments on this post were not exactly complimentary about the cabinet choices. Bomber of course did Paula Bennett – the perfect patsy which probably accurately sums up the reaction of the left to putting a first time minister in charge of the social welfare budget. There are certainly enough links to it.

But hey, the “NZ Herald Staff” probably read Kiwiblog and watch Fox news. Fed exclusively on a PR drip-feed, they probably consider that ill-considered knee-jerk reactions are ‘analysis’. More likely they’re too damn lazy to read below the headlines of posts of the blogosphere.

Personally, I’d suggest that people simply stop buying the Herald. It is becoming a rag with low value news content and the reporters are starting to look like they’re dribbling on their bibs.

Credit where it’s due

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on November 19, 2008
in economy, media, national/act government and wages
. 29 Comments

It’s exam season for high school students. So, for 10 points explain how the following statement (in the ACT-National agreement and repeated uncritically by the media) can be true,

closing the income gap with Australia by 2025… will require a sustained lift in New Zealand’s productivity growth to 3 per cent a year.

given:
- productivity is just one factor in GDP (production = inputs x productivity, basically the amount produced depends on how much you put in times how much you get out per unit of what you put in)

-productivity growth tends to move in the opposite direction to the amount of labour and capital input growth - ie. productivity actually usually increases faster when GDP growth is slack or after a recession and productivity growth slows when GDP goes through a sustained period of rapid growth

- incomes (ie. wages and salaries, the price of labour) is a result of supply and demand for labour, not the productivity of labour. Indeed, wages usually increase fastest when there is a shortage of labour and rising demand while productivity increases fastest when there is an abundance of labour and falling demand (because only the ‘highest quality’ labour is used).

For extra credit: why is it that the supposedly economy-focused political parties and the business/political media seem to lack a fundamental understanding of economics?

[Update: I should add that I am not, of course, against productivity growth. I am just against people buying the idea it is some kind of panacea. There are very good reasons why the Right has chosen to focus on productivity: every other metric of economic performance has been too good. We have outgrown our trade partners, unemployment has ben at record lows, and wages risen have risen at record rates. Productivity growth is counter-cyclical, slow when the economy is at full tilt, so it has been a useful stick to hit a government in good times. It is also useful because it can be claimed, usually without evidence, that government regulation -ie work rights - is impeding productivity; if you wnat to remove work rights, first argue we need faster productivity growth]

A break from the honeymoon

Published
by
Tane
on November 18, 2008
in media, national/act government and spin
. 60 Comments

While most of the big media are giving John Key his criticism-free honeymoon (”OMG! A solo mum! An Asian! And a gay chap!”) the good old ODT has seen through the centrist spin:

Prime Minister-elect John Key showed a clear intention yesterday to move the National-led government more to the Right of the political spectrum than had previously been signalled.

His new Cabinet, which will be sworn in tomorrow, shows a bias to the Right despite moves during the election campaign to position National as a centrist party.

Meanwhile, over at Pundit.co.nz Tim Watkins has some hard questions about National’s coalition deals that you won’t see being asked anywhere else.

It’ll be interesting to see whether the media’s honeymoon continues through Key’s first 100 days, when he’s hoping to put through some pretty radical reform on issues like tax, superannuation, climate change, the RMA and workers’ rights. It’s times like these that we need a critical media the most.

The Game

Published
by
IrishBill
on November 18, 2008
in media and spin
. 52 Comments

The press gallery is ebullient at the moment and I can understand why. After years of having to analyse the same old government faces and drain the collective wisdom about political personalities to the point of seemingly-endless repetition they now have a new toy to play with.

No more do these journalists have to search their minds for some new take on Helen Clark or some fresh way to disguise their personal view of Michael Cullen into analysis. You can almost hear the sigh of relief in the articles about Paula Bennett or Steven Joyce. “Finally”, the gallery says, “we can show how much more we know about the game than the average punter. And we don’t even need to do any deep analysis!”

Let me be clear before I offend all of the gallery that I use the term generically. There are some very good minds in there and there are some hacks (I’ll leave you to decide which is which).

But disclaimers aside it needs to be said that the response by some gallery reporters is quite frankly giddy. Poneke has described their overuse of the term “bolter” quite nicely but I would add that the real issue is how clearly the rise of personality has come to dominate the political reportage.

There’s a reason for this. If you talk to anyone involved in the Herald online or Stuff they’ll tell you that political stories rank very low in the hit count. The big winners are entertainment and sex. Check out the “most read” of these sites (or “most viewed” in TV3) on any given day and the list is peppered with celebrity stories and stories with “boobs” in the title.

To compete with this, and with the cheap sensationalist copy that is the crime story, political journalists need a hook. That hook is personality. Issues that are too complicated are a turnoff to browsing readers but make politics a realm of celebrity and report on it as a soap opera of personality clashes and you’ve got something salable. Interesting, even.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think gallery journalists explicitly decide that is what works but I do think that it is a situation that the market has evolved toward and that is has come as a result of a news industry focused on profits at the expense of good information.

In the meantime it facilitates the sort of PR opportunities that Crosby Textor and outfits on the left are quick to take advantage of and I predict that over the next few years we will increasingly see politicians marketed like commodities in the style of the “brand Key” model.

Owns an ipod or hangs with King Kapisi? Or with a couple of ex-all blacks? Uses facebook or has a pretty wife/interesting husband? That’s good copy. And keep an eye out for greater use of social networking sites in the style of Barack Obama’s campaign as politicians are obliged spill more and more of their personal lives in order to “connect” with voters. What a game.

Undefeated

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on November 17, 2008
in activism, greens, labour, maori party, media and national/act government
. 41 Comments

Paul Holmes wrote yesterday: “While Labour moves to the Opposition benches, it does so weirdly unmolested by the election defeat, weirdly undefeated”

Damn right, the Left seems undefeated, and so it should. The Right has only won power by masquerading as the Left; Key’s mandate is only to maintain the legacy of the Fifth Labour Government (and, somehow, solve every problem going at the same time).

The Left was not rejected in a landslide - the Labour/Progressive/Green vote was 41.1% (will be 42% once specials are counted) compared to 47.2% in 2005. Those few percent who moved from Left to Right want a continuation of the policies of the last nine years, they just wanted a change of leadership for change’s sake.

It was a close race, a 2.5% shift from National to Labour (about what Labour lost in the closing two weeks of the campaign) would have been enough for a LPG+Maori government to be formed*. Despite nine years of government wearing away at support, despite a constant negative campaign for four years straight from National, despite a year-long campaign from the media, particularly the Herald, that recalls the vitriolic anti-Labour press of the 1930s, they only just got enough, the people did not abandon the Left in droves and they want to see the policies of the Left continued.

And, while many great policies are now on hold or under threat, we have a lot to look forward to. Being in opposition is a poor substitute for being in power, rather than racking up achievements the goal is to protect those that have been made form destruction, but at least now it will be Key and his mates having to answer the hard questions. Labour will be chomping at the bit, waiting for the first question time. For the activist too, having the Right in power is invigorating. In reality, we are always in opposition to the ruling capitalist class. Now that the capitalists’ parties are in power again, the heat comes back into the conflict. We can build and extend our networks as the Right’s policies increase consciousness and militancy in the Left.

Key has over-promised and simply has no policy plan which can deliver. Even though the media will continue to give him a free ride, the Left knows there will be plenty of opportunities to hammer his failures as time goes on.

Sure, the Left has lost the Treasury benches but they are just one tool with which we fight for what we believe in; we keep going without them. Yes we are undefeated, and we will soon start clocking up the victories again.

*(I know the Maori Party just went with National but the clear first preference of Maori Party voters and its membership was Labour - that’s the deal that would have been done if the Moari Party were kingmaker. Indeed, I’m hearing reports that many Maori Party supporters are fuming at Turia over the ‘consultation’ that took place before the deal with National was signed).

Careful of them monsters, John

Published
by
Tane
on November 13, 2008
in media and national/act government
. 75 Comments

It’s amazing to see how quickly John Key got over his fear of five-headed monsters once it came time to cobble together a government, and more amazing still how quickly the media chose to forgive and forget.

You’ll recall that just two weeks ago the media couldn’t get enough of John’s line that having a government composed of:

“all sorts of different parties” with “competing interests” would not be in the best interests of New Zealand during a period of “difficult economic times to manage”.

But, silly me, they bought that one when it was Helen Clark’s coalition options in question. Now that it’s John Key, it turns out what was irresponsible just two weeks ago was actually “smart” and “inclusive” all along.

They’re a funny bunch, our right-wing media.

He’ll make us ruch as well as thuck

Published
by
John A
on November 11, 2008
in election 2008 and media
. 77 Comments

One Aussie view of our election.

Where are the polls?

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on November 5, 2008
in election 2008, media and polls
. 36 Comments

I know, they’re inaccurate and out of date. And it’s only three days until the only poll that counts. But I’m curious!

It’s now been ten days since the last public poll, which strikes me as a bizarre gap at the high of the electoral campaign. I guess they’re all saving up their final poll until Friday. Apart from denying us the fun of knowing which way the momentum is going, this silence does have more material effects. If Labour or the Greens’ numbers are still rising, having polls showing that could further invigorate their campaigns. If people are turning off Key polls might help swing others. Potential New Zealand First voters are probably those with the most interest in seeing a number of polls; they need to know whether a vote for NZF would be wasted (as I suspect it would be) and whether they’re better off voting for their second preference.

Both sides’ internal polls are said to be good news for the Left - a Labour, Greens, Progressive, Maori Party government looks like the most viable outcome at the moment. Hence, Key’s continued whining directed at the Maori Party that they have to let him govern if National is the top polling party.

Advertising, getting it right and getting it wrong

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on November 3, 2008
in election 2008, labour and media
. 62 Comments

Labour’s new ad is one of the best political ads I’ve seen.

It’s just a really well written script: acknowledging the success of the Right’s ‘time for a change’ meme and undercutting it, getting in some positive points on Labour that are forward-looking, and getting in the sting on Key. ‘Mary’ is what National calls a ‘Labour plus’ voter(as was revealed in the secret agenda tapes). She says she had thought that ‘the new guy’ deserves a chance, a view that many Kiwis will have held or heard, but she has changed her mind because she can’t trust him to deliver for her family, whereas she knows Labour delivers. That will resonate with many voters.

In contrast, take a look at ACT’s latest ad (which, inexplicably, they were playing at quarter to nine in the morning).

Amateur hour. ACT used to be the most well-funded party for its size, now they can’t even afford a decent ad. Maybe the money-man has got them to give to National instead.

What a rag

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on November 1, 2008
in election 2008 and media
. 56 Comments

A week out from the election, Granny Herald has still yet to do any proper coverage of the effects on individuals and the economy of National’s four flagship policies: privatising ACC, gutting Kiwisaver, reducing work rights, and weakening the RMA and ETS. 

Yet, they can find the space to tell us which politicians would make the best Halloween character or could mentor according to their online polls (always biased towards the type of people who are sitting in front of computers all day [clue: it ain't the working class]).

Here we are, in the middle of the process of choosing the people who will have the most powerful jobs in the country, and the largest newspaper is engaging in inanities that tell us nothing more than the demographics of its online readers.

How my heart yearns for a decent media in this country.

Granny Herald yearns for good old days but democracy alive and well

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on October 31, 2008
in activism, election 2008, media and national
. 15 Comments

The Herald is once again trying to convince us that everyone is so scared of the EFA that there is no poltiical participation going on. Once again, they cite some rich right-wing organisations that don’t want to have to identify themselves when advertising, and so haven’t advertised at all. It seems the Right’s view is that democratic participation is rich organisations putting ads in the paper and trying to market to us.

It’s not. Real democracy is ordinary people, on the ground, talking, communicating, getting active. Maybe they’re helping a party or doing something off their own bat like putting up posters, making youtube vids, or pulling off clever political theatre. Here are a couple of examples that The Standard has been emailed just today:



check out more ‘John Key snake’ pics from Dunedin here

No smoking gun

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on October 30, 2008
in john key, labour and media
. 151 Comments

It turns out the Herald’s story about John Key’s H-fee involvement is a bust. Aside from Key not being straight with the dates he worked at Elders there isn’t anything firm to tie him to the actual fraud.

That’s not the story I expected given the Herald had decided to lead with this story on their website yesterday afternoon and hinted at a “smoking gun”. The reason it wasn’t the story I expected is because about a month ago we had material anonymously emailed to us that gave the background to the H-fee and included a series of posts outlining the issue. We ran the first of these posts but after trawling through the story and checking as much as we could we decided there simply wasn’t enough substance to run with. It now looks like we weren’t the only ones who were receiving this information.

There are still questions to be answered about this story, such as why did John get his dates wrong with the inoculation he took to the Herald in 2007 and why was the Herald promising audio of the 2007 interview yesterday and treating the story like a scoop when it knew there was no hard evidence?

But I expect these questions will be lost in the mishandling of the issue. My advice to Labour? Make sure you’ve got your ducks lined up before you go to the media, and when National is releasing stuff like their appalling prison policy don’t waste your time on blind alley stories like this one.

You’re too kind

Published
by
Steve Pierson
on October 28, 2008
in john key and media
. 15 Comments

Audrey Young is now acknowledging Key’s reflexive tendency to lie, but she is incredibly soft on it:

I was intrigued at Key’s suggestion that cutting Kiwisaver to fund tax cuts had been part of National’s response to the economic downturn because that has been the plan all along.

I was also intrigued by his reasoning for having ruled out Peters from a deal with National - he said Parliament had censured him - excepting Parliament censured him on September 22 and Key had ruled him out a month earlier.

He also talked about recruiting an extra 600 more cops - which is over-inflating National’s policy - to recruit an extra 224 officers over the 376 already planned by the end of 2011 - a total of 600.

That’s a little bit like saying - as he did - that National’s tax cuts would deliver about an extra $50 a week to the average worker - which it included Labour’s October 1 tax cuts, and the gains were worth much less to earners entitled to Working for Families.

I’m sure his head is swimming with facts at present and it would be easy to get confused.

Key is not confused. These are the same lies he repeats each time he speaks. It is a purposeful attempt to over-state his policies. One should not be intrigued, one should be outraged and ready to insist on the truth instead. Young goes on to say:

Clark was criticised for not pulling up John Key on things he got wrong on the One leaders’ debate. But after last night’s experience, of a fast moving live show, I have a bit more sympathy for her.

Well, I’m sorry, Audrey, but you and Clark are professionals in the political arena. You should have the facts at your fingertips and know a stock spin line when your hear it. It was entirely predictable Key would repeat the same lies he has been stating before. In letting him get away with it, you fail in your duty to inform the public.