Comments on: Leadership long haul: can journos last three weeks? You bet

By: Jimmy

Jimmy — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 22:05:46 +0000

Klewso - Yes The average punter is probably “too tied up making ends meet or in protecting what they’ve got” but if they were half smart they would realise being interested and informed about politics helps this situation.
How is voting for a party that is cutting payments to lower income earners (generally the average punter) in rder to reward higher income earners in the average punters best interest?

By: Hamis Hill

Hamis Hill — Sat, 23 Feb 2013 00:15:39 +0000

Yes, the average punter sees it as a one horse race with the present government being nobbled by the media.
The Labor party must by-pass this with a campaign to see the spirit of competition of the sporting world re-infuse the sphere of politics.
The Fair Go! Missing from politics.

By: klewso

klewso — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 21:23:10 +0000

Jimmy (@ 56) I reckon your average punter is pretty disinterested in politics, either too tied up making ends meet or in protecting what they’ve got - and being predisposed to the party that promises that they’ll look after their interests.
Leaving it up to the media (dependent on market share) to use their position to promote politics as they see fit - a position so easy to abuse, when vested self-interest is a priority, over society’s.

By: Hamis Hill

Hamis Hill — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 04:23:57 +0000

How is your sense of smell there, David?

By: Hamis Hill

Hamis Hill — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 04:22:17 +0000

The “hyperbowl” in the parliamentary press gallery is seriously blocked up but the atmosphere has been so seriously toxic for so long that the residents can no longer notice.
They need to be evicted for their own benefit, it cannot be good for you!

By: David Hand

David Hand — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 23:51:16 +0000

Hey Mike,
I watched the Youtube clip.
“Look over there! Over there, you fools! Not here! Nooooooo! Definitely not here! Nothing to see here!!”

By: Hamis Hill

Hamis Hill — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 23:08:08 +0000

Unblock the political sewer: Vote Labor!

By: Hamis Hill

Hamis Hill — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 22:59:26 +0000

Can the journo’s last three weeks?
Will the sewer never stop overflowing?
When the voting public, not an unreprentative smidgin, go to the real poll after a real election campaign, then the sewer overflow from journalists for the last three years will become very clear from the difference between the overflow and real reporting.
Well one can only hope.
The public is already noticing the broken pipes, come September they will know who is poisoning the political environment, they will know the source of the stench,
and they will not be blaming Gillard.

By: Michael Hilliard

Michael Hilliard — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 04:58:22 +0000

If you haven’t seen it yet go to youtube and check out Julie Owens at Westmead Millennium Institute (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqek48WWpRk) It’s a fine example of how important issues are of no concern to (most of) the media. Does anyone know whose asking the questions?

By: David Hand

David Hand — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 03:59:55 +0000

Yes Jimmy,
There is a consistent narrative in the Gillard government policy theme.

They announce large big picture hand-outs to Labor voters with scant regard for how the money to pay for them will be found. They tell their followers that greedy billionaires and high income corporations will offer up the bounty.

The greedy billionaires escape being squeezed.
The greedy corporations don’t actually pay any more.
Treasury changes its numbers by tens of billions of dollars every 2 months.
The deficit keeps growing.
Voters salivate ofer 14 September.

Yep, a consistent narrative.

By: Liamj

Liamj — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 03:41:19 +0000

Leadership speculation is all that the under-educated and overstretched print churnalists can manage. Nobody should pretend that the public gives a damn.

Prediction - Gillard leads ALP to another minority win, but another 4 Independants (2 in Senate, 2 in Reps) make her life a comparative breeze. Abbott & Pyne elope to NZ, and Gina & Clive on-sell the LNP to a Chinese superannuation fund.

By: Stephen

Stephen — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 03:03:05 +0000

Are you seriously suggesting that this Prime Minister’s problem is mainly a Fairfax problem?

Fairfax is factually reporting on the electoral millions’ demonstrable problem with the PM, as it has a duty to do.

By: puddleduck

puddleduck — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 01:52:45 +0000

Bernard writes, “leadership spills are one of the few remaining guaranteed ways to engage consumers and at least temporarily lift circulation and clicks”

Really? I don’t read any of that stuff. For all the reasons set out in your piece.

So who IS engaging with it? Or have the papers got it really wrong?

By: Jimmy

Jimmy — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 23:51:09 +0000

Klewso - “Then when I vote for Abbott and he won - and things didn’t get better, they actually got worse, my circumstances suffered - I could blame “politicians in general” too?”
I remember after 2004 talking to a mate down the pub saying I couldn’t believe after all Howard did, all the non core promises and the other fibs he could win in such a landslide, this bloke said yeah but all politicians L i* e.
The same attitude is taken when Abbott admits you can only trust what he has written down, yet Gillard doesn’t really even no tell the truth when speaking of the price on carbon and is damned forever more.

By: klewso

klewso — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 23:40:45 +0000

David’s entitled to his opinion of course.
Personally I reckon that if I was “Dave the (wage) Slave” (no relation), your average punter, not particularly interested in politics (who couldn’t tell a Brown for a Green; a Brandis from a Bandt; a Crook from a Perrett; or Ken Wyatt from a Wyatt Roy), just struggling to get the family by. If I was being constantly bombarded by negative “news” from a media with stories about “how bad things are”/”how it was all the fault of this divided, leadership-tension-riven government”, I’d be looking at the other side too? And then when I read all the uncritical things being written about them (as if there was nothing to be critical about from those usually so cynical journalists), what they were going to do, without any questions worth asking, I’d probably be persuaded to vote “Rupert’s Right way” too?
Then when I vote for Abbott and he won - and things didn’t get better, they actually got worse, my circumstances suffered - I could blame “politicians in general” too?

By: Jimmy

Jimmy — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 23:17:53 +0000

Gavin - In Gillards govt, as BK has pointed out, there is actually a consistent story/theme in the policies which reasonably reflect labor values which seemed to be lacking for Rudd’s.

By: Gavin Moodie

Gavin Moodie — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 23:12:17 +0000

Rudd as prime minister couldn’t maintain a consistent policy and couldn’t manage his temper, time, office nor decision making. In contrast Gillard as prime minister has got much important legislation passed.

By: Jimmy

Jimmy — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 22:52:37 +0000

Quigley Joseph - “But then most Australians don’t want such an exposition. They want a political stoush. A scandal. A titillation.” It is for this reason people think Gillard didn’t tell the truth when she said “There will be no Carbon Tax” and have failed to hear the part where she said “but I am determined to put a price on carbon”. Anyone who voted for the ALP thinking they weren’t going to put a price on carbon is an idiot, but most voters have very little knowledge of what they are voting for.

Even now most people want Gillard out, not Abbott in, this means that after 3 years of outrage that “This is the worst govt in history” within a couple of years of an Abbott govt and him actually implementing the disaster that is his current policy platform the same people will start whinging and want him out.
The difference is that the Libs will have a sympathetic media rather than a hostile one.

By: klewso

klewso — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 22:42:49 +0000

Moderator - you can drop the first “draft”?

By: klewso

klewso — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 22:41:06 +0000

Funny watching Foreign Correspondent last night - here’s Berlusconi (head of the “Bunga Bunga Party(?)” - what does that translate too? “Bread and Circuses”?), armed with 80% of the Italian media in his back pocket to reshape history to reflect better of him. Despite all his corruption, there are still voters longing to be back when he was running the country. It’s as if they don’t remember what he and his government were like, as if any such memory had been written over - all they’re being reminded of, in that bent viewsmedia, he controls, is the “good times”?
So what happens if he does regain power and things went on their predictable way, downhill? They’d blame “the politicians”? The politicians his media empire would paint and blame?
Would they blame themselves for their wilful blindness in wanting to be gulled into voting for such a state of affairs - so they could blame politicians for their circumstances later? Probably not?

Meanwhile, here, under he watchful gaze of “Circus Oz” and the rest of the franchise, we have Murdoch owning 70% of our hard copy “viewspapers”, with family [“tentacles” (of course, sorry)] extended into our electronic media (including pay and FTA TV) - and the influential control of perception that “renders unto Caesar”?
How’s that been used, in comparison for PMs? Howard (“Johnny Whopper” - with such “PBs” as “non-core promises”, his “Never-ever-land GST”; “ministerial codes of conduct” - that were like pulling teeth when it came to actual compliance, and still let a few big ones through; “Iraq”; “Patricks”; “Children Overboard”; “AWB” off the top of the scone), was many more times the liar that Gillard is, but compare how they’re remembered in his “image shaping catalogues”? When it was Howard they acted as apologists, assuagers and pardoners, indulging his “idiosyncrasies”, even playing up his “clever politics”.
Compare that to the treatment they mete out to Gillard? For her it’s wall-to-wall ordure, cynicism and sniggering, pointing out her faults, using selected “facts” and “expert” opinion to justify their crucifixion.

By: klewso

klewso — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 22:35:47 +0000

Meanwhile, here, under he watchful gaze of “Circus Oz” and the rest of the franchise, we have Murdoch owning 70% of our hard copy media, with family testicles extended into our electronic media (including pay and FTA TV) - and the control of perception that “renders unto Caesar”?
How’s that been used, in comparison for PMs? Howard (“Johnny Whopper” - with such “PBs” as “non-core promises”, his “Never-ever-land GST”; “ministerial codes of conduct” - that were like pulling teeth when it came to actual compliance, and still let a few big ones through; “Iraq”; “Patricks”; “Children Overboard”; “AWB” off the top of the scone), was many more times the liar that Gillard is, but compare how they’re remembered in his “image shaping catalogues”? When it was Howard they acted as apologists, assuagers and pardoners, indulging his “idiosyncrasies”, even playing up his “clever politics”.
Compare that to the treatment they mete out to Gillard? For her it’s wall-to-wall ordure, cynicism and sniggering, pointing out her faults, using selected “facts” and “expert” opinion to justify their crucifixion.

By: Hamis Hill

Hamis Hill — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 22:10:10 +0000

Well done, David.
Many a true paragraph written in satire.
May we quote you out of context?

By: Malcolm Street

Malcolm Street — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 21:09:14 +0000

Once again, bring on the Grauniad! Show ‘em what political coverage should be about. Hopefully it will be running and a substantial force well before the election. It will also finally give us a non-Murdoch national general daily to take on the Oz.

By: yeah, eh

yeah, eh — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 20:33:29 +0000

Let ‘em have their head. Like 2 year olds throwing a tantrum, they’ve got to need a rest eventually. And besides which, they won’t have a job within a few months, such are their employers’ scruples.
Damien, I am questioning your allegiance.

By: pedro

pedro — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 14:16:30 +0000

Bernard, this is such an eloquent article. You are one of the few with a voice, but don’t actually do much to help what is actually a pretty good government,acting for the interests of Australians, but is getting remodelled to fit the ageing Murdoch’s Kingmaker model.

Wait for the old media to die you say? With your power and influence as a well-respected political journalist (to me for one), aren’t you copping out on this issue? Politics aside

Politeness intended and a reply hoped for!