Advising the country about Covid19 is unfair to National

Written By: - Date published: 9:28 am, June 16th, 2020 - 30 comments
Categories: Gerry Brownlee, Media, national, Propaganda, same old national, social media lolz, the praiseworthy and the pitiful, twitter - Tags: , ,

National is upset.  Very upset.  Because the Government has been engaged in something that is very dastardly and very unfair.

What is this dastardly unfairness you ask?

Apparently a Government social media account, the unite for recovery instagram account, followed Jacinda Ardern.

From what I can see it has not put out any media featuring Jacinda.  It is used to pump out Covid19 related information.

But no Gerry Brownlee thought he was onto something.  He released this really important press release.

He also complained to the State Services Commission.

https://twitter.com/JGreenbrookHeld/status/1272455255746207745

Is it evidence of partisan political activity because someone follows an account?  Pfffft I follow a number of twitter accounts, including Gerry’s, for entertainment.  I even follow Hamish Price and Democracy Mum, just to work out what crazy ideas the right wing are having.  Instagram is something I go to occasionally to look at pictures.

And Brownlee should be careful with the implication that following a social media account suggests support because some twitter account holders follow the damnedest of things.

There is a completely innocent explanation.  It appears that the account was being used, at least for a while, to bolster National’s Blue Green follower numbers and presumably Brown followed it then.  Its current use is a predictable use but entirely unrelated to its former use of making National look more popular than it actually is.

https://twitter.com/benjavert/status/1272402384036102145

National cheerleader John Armstrong also thinks that something remiss has been happening and wants the provision of information relating to Covid 19 to stop so that we can have a proper election campaign, aka National then may have a chance.

From Television New Zealand:

That’s further reason why the notion that Unite for Recovery is somehow not political is a nonsense. The campaign’s website might serve a purpose of being a one-stop shop which details everything you need to know about the Ardern Administration’s response to the pandemic.

In particular, given the No 1 priority now facing the country is the tackling of the scourge of unemployment and the resulting slashing of incomes in many households, it is essential that people are aware of benefit entitlements, training and apprenticeship opportunities, the mortgage repayment deferral scheme, protection from sudden rent increases, and so forth.

You won’t find any mention on the website of National’s policies dealing with such matters, however.

You thus might conclude the Unite for Recovery information campaign serves as a surreptitious means to define and dictate the debate about how best to rebuild New Zealand’s ravaged economy.

He concludes by saying that for the regulated period before the election the site should be taken down.

To continue to run an information programme of the scale of Unite for Recovery during the regulated period is unacceptable. Doing so would make a mockery of those rules on spending.

Get that?  There should be no access to information on government entitlements, and health warnings and urgent announcements during a world wide pandemic because it is unfair to National.

Clearly National is convinced that the whole Government mechanism is behind Jacinda and think that she is doing a good job.  And they think it is unfair.  Ridding the country at least for now of Covid 19 is unfair to National as it is preventing them from retaining their god given right to rule.

All I can say is diddums.

30 comments on “Advising the country about Covid19 is unfair to National ”

  • Comments are now closed

  1. dv 1
    16 June 2020 at 9:56 am

    GEEZ, haven't they got anything better to do!!!!

  2. Tricledrown 2
    16 June 2020 at 10:13 am

    National crying Wolf again dumping of the spoilt brat was supposed to change things but no muddling copying Jacindas successful lines shows National are well out of touch.The born to rule mentality is showing through.

  3. dv 3
    16 June 2020 at 10:22 am

    Natz covid response returns 404

  4. Riffer 4
    16 June 2020 at 10:59 am

    Hmmm. It would appear that effective government is definitely detrimental to the opposition.

  5. Peter 5
    16 June 2020 at 11:05 am

    There is nothing more certain than Brownlee will come up with a parade of silly stunts. There is nothing more certain that the 'permanently left leaning media' will give his silliness attention.

  6. Tricledrown 6
    16 June 2020 at 11:19 am

    National would have preferred if the Coalition had mucked it up no doubt.

    National can't complain the Canterbury earthquakes gave National another 3 years especially with the $80 billion in reconstruction costs boosting the NZ economy after the GFC.

  7. Ed1 7
    16 June 2020 at 11:34 am

    I think you are all being very mean to Gerry Brownlee. He raised a legitimate concern, and it was appropriately and speedily dealt with as he requested. Gerry is a new Zealander; it is right that his concern was taken seriously, but he has also reminded a lot of people, through the publicity that he has given the exchange, of the importance of a fundamental principle of political neutrality of the public service. He was acting as a member of our loyal opposition, and I think we can take this as evidence that Gerry and his party have found at least this one thing where they have value to offer New Zealand.

  8. Morrissey 8
    16 June 2020 at 11:41 am

    It's a mystery that John Armstrong had the gall to write anything ever again, after his epic humiliation at the hands of Gordon Campbell some years ago. He was discredited, and anyone with a sense of shame or even the most rudimentary sense of dignity would have disappeared from public view.

    • te reo putake 8.1
      16 June 2020 at 12:05 pm

      Dunno, Morrissey. You've been discredited here at TS many, many times, particularly when you were regularly posting your notoriously unreliable transcrapts. I'm possibly in the minority here but it'd be a shame if you bowed to your own rudimentary sense of dignity and did one. Same for John Armstrong, who is at least reliable in presenting the right wing view of things.

    • tc 8.2
      16 June 2020 at 2:30 pm

      Thought he'd been put out to pasture. Bots will craft this type of stuff sooner or later so all you'll need is a figurehead.

  9. roblogic 9
    16 June 2020 at 12:33 pm

    Gerry has a selective memory. His cronies yelled "Key Derangement Syndrome" anytime we objected to Key's teflon PR campaigns and sycophantic media

  10. Jum 10
    16 June 2020 at 2:14 pm

    When will the public radio stop using RNZ NATIONAL ever five seconds every day when the word national is completely superfluous (NZ is the whole country!).

    Is National paying for this advertising of their party from their election funding? Why are they allowed to campaign 24/7 i.e. all 3 years without making some payment?

    When Radio New Zealand reduced itself to RNZ, supposedly to come into the digital 21stC advertising itself as radio plus, why didn't it just call itself RNZ PLUS?

    RNZ Concert is a specialist programme and is necessary.

    • Heather Grimwood 10.1
      16 June 2020 at 4:20 pm

      to Jum at 10 : The ‘NATIONAL’ tag on RNZ happened under a National govt I think before an election as I believed it then to be at least subliminal advertising, but I felt much more obvious. I felt that to draw attention in complaint would only emphasise any effect.

      • rod 10.1.1
        16 June 2020 at 4:31 pm

        It should be RNZ NATIONAL ( PARTY) imho, smiley

        • In Vino 10.1.1.1
          16 June 2020 at 9:16 pm

          Actual history: Until Rogernomics and the ridiculous corporatisation of everything, there were some radio stations that were semi-commercial and used advertising like 1ZB. There were the national radio chains like 1YA (now RNZ National, 2YA, 3YA 4YA ,all AM, scattered from North to South across the country) The Classical chain were 1YC (Auckland), 2YC (Wellington) and so on across the Nation. There was also a 1YD chain of stations that just went for light music, and occasionally but reluctantly played pop music, like the early Rolling Stones hits… About 1967, Radio Hauraki's pirate station was allowed to come ashore and exist totally privately!!

          The problem about National Party being associated with National Radio was never seen as serious – it was assumed that people were intelligent enough to know very well the difference between the two meanings of the one word.

          Under Rogernomics, with the silly pretence that State-owned enterprises would be more efficient, the ZB chains were set free to be totally commercial. The YA Chain was renamed 'National Radio'. The YC chain was renamed 'Concert FM'.

          This is because the new medium of FM made Classical Music so much better…

          (Typical that our later barbaric idiots would recommend taking Classical Music off FM…)

          Next, our stupid Enterprise Directors asked bloody marketers how to improve their market share, because that had suddenly become the one important factor.

          Quality of content no longer mattered – only the number of people listening mattered, according to commercial advertising morons who had by now been put in charge of everything.

          So they paid out heaps of money to moronic commercial consultants, who told them that they needed corporate culture and pride in their corporation. The Name of their Corporation was 'RADIO NEW ZEALAND' and that had to be repeated as loudly and as often as possible. So they paid out heaps for the dumb advice that 'National Radio' should be thenceforth called 'RADIO NEW ZEALAND – NATIONAL', and that 'Concert FM' should thenceforth be called 'RADIO NEW ZEALAND – CONCERT'

          These utterly dumb names had far too many syllables, were far too long, so recently our dumb enterprise paid out yet more of our tax-payers' money to get the obvious advice that the names were too long, and RNZ should replace the long mouthfuls.. So we now have 'RNZ- National', and 'RNZ – Concert'

          The whole thing is sickening, to my mind. The original names were shorter and better. A lot of money was wasted on brainless marketers.

          I would say that the National Party should be forced to change its name, not National Radio.

          I would also ban advertising on National Radio. No longer would we have to listen to National Radio mimicking its inferiors by advertising its own programmes after every news break. Nor would we have to suffer them needlessly advertising NZ On Air, as if that is also a Corporation that desperately needs its image boosted.

          When the Revolution comes, the dumb-arsed Marketers should be first to go up against the wall. After them, the dumb-arsed Corp Directors who marshalled the whole utter farce.

          • Jum 10.1.1.1.1
            17 June 2020 at 10:36 am

            Thank you all very much for your replies. I've seen the ads on tv pre election showing two utes one red, one blue with the voice over preferring the blue one, etc. It's so devious and surely diminishes trust in national.

          • Morrissey 10.1.1.1.2
            17 June 2020 at 10:56 am

            Very good summary, my friend. In Vino, veritas, indeed.

            The marketers who came up with the idea of tagging everything with "RNZ" were perhaps the same people who came up with the idea for Cadbury's to append the label "Dairy Milk" to as many of their chocolate bars as possible: Caramello becomes "Dairy Milk Caramello", etc.

            Perhaps the most egregious of the RNZ campaigns was the condescending and cringe-inducing "Radio New Zealand, Sounds Like Us" one of a decade ago. The public backlash to it was immense.

          • roblogic 10.1.1.1.3
            17 June 2020 at 11:25 am

            RNZ – a meaningless corporate logo

            Radio NZ – better, but stodgy, perhaps doesn't reflect the variety of media it offers

            NatRad – cool, military sounding, radical

            What about "Aotea Reo"? Too soon?

  11. Descendant Of Smith 11
    16 June 2020 at 4:15 pm

    lol Can't help but think of those headlines National introduced a program called "Building Blue" across the public service. Didn't see Jerry getting upset about that.

    "The Ministry of Social Development is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to change its workers from red to blue. It has hired consulting firm Human Synergistics to introduce a programme of culture change called Building Blue."

    https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/better-business/68494982/msd-spends-taxpayer-dollars-on-workplace-change

  12. peter sim 12
    16 June 2020 at 6:42 pm

    Gerry does not care how idiotic he sounds, (or looks, ( barging through airport security doors).

    Talk about arrogant self entitlement. does anyone remember his Finland knowledge.

    Long may brownlee remain the natz pr spokesclown.

  13. Richard@Down South 13
    16 June 2020 at 9:48 pm

    Do you think itd be worth using FYI to ask Bridges at what stage of the pandemic would have National looked at going into lock down, and what professional medical advice had they been given? I bet it’d be interesting

  14. Incognito 14
    16 June 2020 at 10:03 pm

    Mr Brownlee, I trade you this: https://www.national.org.nz/mandatory_quarantining_at_border

    I tried to follow you, but I got stopped by security settings.

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