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Election
2| 9th September 2005
....................................GODZONE
ELECTION
Wow
! The surprises keep coming with this election. I decided last week
to make no mention of the bloody thing in this weeks post, but I just
can’t keep away. It’s too good. And I am forced to take
back what I said during the Lange post about it being boring, because
it is shaping up as the most interesting for a number of years. Possibly
because it is a contest, but also because of the complex manouveuring
and unexpected twists. Wily old Winston Peters now home alone. In Epsom,
National Voters advised to vote for ACT, Labour voters advised to vote
for National.
AND …we now have the creepy Exclusive Brethen figures emerging
from the shadows in pressed shirts.
Do you see them? They were like people from the X files or the Stepford
Wives. Stepford Husbands perhaps. Who would have thought, in this election,
we could have headline like:
Dr Brash " Creepy Christians shot me in my own foot!"
Which we don’t. But we could have, if we had someone as irresponsible,
flippant and bad at english as me was in charge of a newspaper.
I wondered if I was perhaps alone in my excited but spooked horror.
But then the day after their conference on TV, I went into Dizzengoff
for a coffee and a very well-to-do businessmen came in (you know the
type: car - audi, sunglasses – gucchi, Girlfriend - blonde, nose
– running) and he was holding up the Herald saying, to all and
sundry:
”look at these guys, freaky or what?”
and even Holmes (and his amazing personality) were on Newstalk ZB saying:
”they all look alike! Are they from space .. …
I think they came out of pods”
I loved the way the Brethren asked (when the connection between them
and the pamphlet first broke) that people - RESPECT THEIR PRIVACY.
This from a group whose propanganda is intruding into every home in
the damn country.
To compound the problems for National, and this really is a killer blow,
Don Brash has admitted that he knew of the pamphlet plans, after earlier
denying it. This change of mind for Brash or flip-flop, raises questions
about honesty and credibility. It’s the last thing they need.
The admission was obtained, in something of a scoop, on radio BFM. A
few weeks ago I said in a post
that Noelle McCarthy was a potential star, well now, in her interview
with Brash, she has out performed a legion of parliamentary lackeys
and potentially blown the election wide open. Yeah!
Gerry “Bruiser” Brownlee has featured more this week too,
out of the Blue corner, gloves on, whenever the going gets tough (Don
has another engagement, apparently meeting with a sinister religious
group who don’t even vote). After the Sunday night poll came out
Brownlee again had the sort arrogant swagger he displayed when the National
Party had the mega-boost after the Orewa speech. It’s an ugly
thing to watch and the thought of putting up with Bruiser for an entire
term, if they won, is daunting. But, New Zealanders do not like bullies
and I am sure he has set a few undecided voters swinging. Helen Clark
needs to watch herself as well. The incident on the plane was not her
fault but does her no good. It was basically a media beat up because
the press corp were on the plane as well. I can see it now: the journalists
sat on the plane waiting to take off, trying to think of an interesting
story, on a day without a compelling one, when a cliché in need
of a headline comes strolling down the aisle or out of the intercom.
Bossy Helen, control freak overacts with poor pilot etc etc.. The truth
is, most of the momentum for the story, the apology and the furore came
from others, not the Prime Minister or her office.
She needs to soften her image for the rest of the election and attempt
to engage with regular New Zealanders. I am sure of that. The main technique
she appears to uses is to regularly overuse the word “kiwis”.
“I don’t think Kiwis…”
”kiwis will understand”
”more kiwis are employed..”
”Kiwis have the biggest penis of any bird.... “ etc..
Thankfully in last nights debate Clark did not “go for the jugular”
or go “feral” as the press say. She doesn’t need to.
She needs to be kind, nice even.
Kumara News Observation: Drop the laugh while others are talking Helen,
it sounds eerily like a ghost from elections past : Muldoon.
The Labour campaign overall has been remarkably benign. The Labour message
– Lets go forward together – is a good one, but it is not
getting through with clarity. They need to point out that the opposite
is also true: If National wins. The country will be socially fractured
and that we will go backwards - to the bloody eighties. Market Rents,
work for the dole, padded shoulders, leg warmers. Lord help us all.
I imagine Labour have adopted this approach wait-and-see approach because
of Nationals remarkable ability to shit on their own campaign. Sure
they are setting the agenda, but more often than not in negative ways.
I expect the Labour Party can hardly believe their luck.
Nationals, slick advertising efforts I have regarded with grudging respect.
But are they effective or too nasty and smart for their own good? Take
the thank-you-very-much ad and song. Yes. Guys we get the message. In
fact we got the message very quickly - thanks very much.
Has there ever been a more irritating song?
Maybe – “The Warehouse – The Ware house” or
“ OOOOOO 800…”
Now when I hear the national ads on the TV or radio it just annoys the
hell out of me. And I’m certain I’m not the only one. I’m
sure a few people are out there are saying “if I hear that damn
ad again I will vote for the Greens”
It’s kinda hard to hate Don Brash and John Key and after yesterday
I find myself feeling sorry for the Don. He seems out of his depth.
It’s many of the peripheral figures on the right that really piss
me off. The sort wankers you hear on talkback and people like Matthew
Hooten and Deborah Hill Cone and her eyebrow. It would be silly to blame
her comprehensive ghastliness on jealousy of people with two of them.
But all that concentrated bile must come from somewhere. Does anyone
remember her seething, unhinged performance on the TV race debate show?
Such rabid hysteria surely warranted a slap in the face.
Also the Maxim Institute. Who the hell are THEY? Talk about faceless.
Mind you, I find it hard to take seriously an organisation that can
have a conference for an ENTIRE weekend talking about ‘Political
Correctness’ What a bunch of sad bastards.
Imagine the conversation on Friday night after a few beers:
“and then there was the bloody kid who wasn’t allowed to
wear a crucifix to that school”
”yeah. but it’s alright to wear one of those Maori things..”
”OH IT”S POLITICAL CORRECTNESS GONE MAD”
“Bloody Maoris”
”Pisses me off the bloody national anthem has to be in Maori as
well now”
”Bloody Hakas in maori too”
”OH IT”S POLITICAL CORRECTNESS GONE MAD”
“You cant even grab a chicks arse or put your hand down her bra
anymore without some bastard saying your bloody sexist”
”It’s crazy”
”You cant even yell out compliments to some chick who's askin
for it like -
‘ Hey @#$@$ want a @$#& come and &%^% with $@!@& later
&%$%@ "
without being called Misogynist"
“No sense of humour. Lesbians I expect"
”OH IT”S POLITICAL CORRECTNESS GONE MAD”
OK. Imagine this crap for the whole night.
Then, the WHOLE weekend. Tragic.
They even bring over speakers from overseas to bang on about what it’s
like in the States etc…
”OH IT”S POLITICAL CORRECTNESS GONE MAD” (In an American
accent)
“Bloody Negroes”
I have done my bit for the campaign by sending a few well aimed letters-to-the-editor.
The FUN FOR ALL THE FAMILY part is that I have being using the Maxim
Institute letters wizard.
You can basically write one letter and send it to every newspaper in
the country.
Many of my letters are published and my secret is to include humour.
The people who pour over the many tedious letters, are human after all
and if you can include a joke at the expense of some politician and
make the editors laugh you are half way there. I currently use the name
Ross Williams, remarkable because of it’s very ordinariness. A
virtual trojan horse of a name. In the past, as Craig Frost, I have
had ongoing stouches with the ACT party and Michelle Boag. One of my
Boag letters was remarkable because it illicited a vanity driven reply.
Michelle (I feel I can use her first name because of our special relationship)
was trying to get the Northern vote to gain nomination to National president.
I said (among other things) “she will barely have parked her BMW
in Parnell and poured herself a Chardonnay before she sells the farmers
out” I then went on to slag her ludicrous clothes – “When
power dressing goes wrong “ She looks like someone who is on her
way to appear in a pantomine – the mad hatters wife perhaps”
Now, I am sure it was the slagging bit that got it published AND caused
her to respond. I guarantee people who knew her or worked with her would
have laughed.
What she wrote in reply was:
“If Craig Frost wants to criticise me he needs to get his facts
straight. I do not drink. So I would not have had a glass of Chardonnay”
Very sniffy.
The reply was remarkable because obviously, I didn’t literally
mean, have a glass of chardonnay. I was stereotyping her as a “Parnell
Girl”.
As a famous PR person I would have thought she would have realised that,
and the fact she replied, gave my letter so much more power.
So get out there and start writing.
Finally my advice for a sucessful campaign by the Labour coalition:
- Don’t bang on too much more about the Brash/Brethren thing.
- It may be too late but, left leaning backers could help the campaign
by stopping large advertisements. They may prove counter-productive
in the light of all of the above..
- Be nice. take foot off throat. Kiss babies.
Finally, if Helen something goes insanely wrong and she wants to gaurantee
re-election I have some cynical advice which I can assure her will work..
Cry.
Simple, weep on telly.
”He…(sniff) called me a childless lesbo..” (blubberfest)
It worked for Hawke and Clinton - it would work for her too. . |
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