spin

Categories under spin

No more Mr Nice Guy

Written By: - Date published: 3:04 pm, June 30th, 2009 - 23 comments

John Key has a carefully constructed image as a “nice guy”, with a self professed “sunny nature” no less. There is ample reason to believe that the image is far from the reality. In his previous work Key appeared proud of his ability to fire, without emotion, hundreds of people (earning himself the nickname of […]

Rhetoric & Reality 4: Tertiary Education

Written By: - Date published: 11:30 am, June 23rd, 2009 - 5 comments

National sure does talk a good game before an election. This time we’re looking at their rhetoric on education, especially tertiary education: Key: I’m passionate about ensuring today’s young people get the education they need to succeed. Education is a liberator.. It’s what makes it possible for a kid from even the most challenging background […]

Pulling up the ladder behind her

Written By: - Date published: 12:00 pm, June 19th, 2009 - 115 comments

Paula Bennett’s image as a Westie solo mum who’s been on the DPB has been an important part of National’s centrist branding. By putting her in charge of the Ministry of Social Development, despite any relevant experience or discernable talent, National gave a clear signal that in their government image would trump substance. Fair enough […]

Hooton’s bizarro world strikes again

Written By: - Date published: 4:16 pm, June 15th, 2009 - 52 comments

I think it’s fair to say that David Shearer’s thumping victory in Mt Albert has been widely viewed as securing Phil Goff’s leadership over the Labour Party. Any sane observer will recognise that Goff’s position has been strengthened by the victory, that the party has gained a huge boost in confidence and that Shearer will […]

Ralston vs Ralston

Written By: - Date published: 12:16 pm, June 14th, 2009 - 16 comments

Two of New Zealand’s top political commentators (it pains me to write that) have gone head to head over the Mt Albert result: April Bill Ralston: Some who voted Labour might now feel that National has not turned out to be as bad as they expected and either withhold their vote or actively support the […]

Get ready for the spin

Written By: - Date published: 7:24 am, June 14th, 2009 - 64 comments

63% to 17%. That’s not a defeat. That’s a slaughter. An utter humiliation for the Tories. How will the Tories and their fanboys (Armstrong, Ralston, Laws, Farrar etc) spin it? Pretty obvious: It was Lee’s fault for the gaffes. It was Worth’s fault for the past fortnight. Mt Albert people are dole-bludging darkies (see Kiwiblog […]

Political Chicanery

Written By: - Date published: 10:20 am, June 9th, 2009 - 11 comments

The Irascible Curmudgeon writes some really good posts. So without apology we republish this little gem on spin and the art of re-writing history. John Key follows the same style – as evidenced by his shifty stories on when he knew about complaints against Richard Worth last week. The sort of political spin we can […]

I wish to complain…

Written By: - Date published: 10:42 pm, June 3rd, 2009 - 31 comments

It turns out that Phil Goff was aware of an allegation about Richard Worth weeks ago that may relate to the current investigation. Labour leader Phil Goff took an allegation of Richard Worth’s inappropriate behaviour towards a woman to Prime Minister John Key about a month ago, it emerged tonight. This was apparently not the […]

Worth stands down

Written By: - Date published: 9:53 am, June 3rd, 2009 - 11 comments

Richard Worth has stood down for “personal reasons”. Of course he will have been pushed. My guess is that the PM will say some nice things about him on the record while off the record Kevin Taylor will be making it very clear this is a decisive move from a strong Prime Minister who of […]

Tip of the spear

Written By: - Date published: 12:32 pm, June 2nd, 2009 - 16 comments

You’ve done your job as a spin doctor when journalists start repeating your spin sub-consciously. The credit downgrade ‘issue’ is a great example. There was never any threat of a downgrade, as long as the tax cuts were dropped. The journalists all acted like there was a huge threat. They parroted the government’s line that […]

Rhetoric and reality

Written By: - Date published: 11:58 am, June 2nd, 2009 - 45 comments

Tax cuts are the right wing’s favourite answer to every question. Before the election, National were promising us that tax cuts were the key to economic growth: Key: “National will deliver an ongoing programme of personal tax cuts. Fundamentally, National believes in the growth-enhancing power of tax cuts. Labour does not.” English: “… all the […]

Quote competition

Written By: - Date published: 1:15 pm, May 29th, 2009 - 19 comments

So, in the light of yesterday’s budget, I propose a quote competition. Post your favourite Nat quotes! We could start with two categories. First, foolish tax cut promises. Here’s some starters: Key, quoted here: “Under National, personal tax cuts are a priority. New Zealanders will be able to believe in our tax cuts, they will […]

No super contributions = worse net debt

Written By: - Date published: 7:08 pm, May 28th, 2009 - 114 comments

I’ve had a dig into Treasury’s numbers and worked out that they expect the Superannuation Fund will make a 13% return next year, falling to 11% a year by 2012. Those figures seem pretty good, not too optimistic. It’s what the Fund made in ordinary years before the crunch and bear in mind the Fund […]

Carter’s attack on SAFE a diversion

Written By: - Date published: 2:00 pm, May 19th, 2009 - 22 comments

So, Agriculture Minister David Carter finally creaks into action on the brutal and inhumane treatment of factory farmed pigs, then spends most of the press release attacking the animal rights group that brought the issue into the public light. He’s obviously covering for his abysmal performance on Sunday, where he had to admit he didn’t […]

Greens go grey

Written By: - Date published: 3:00 pm, May 4th, 2009 - 62 comments

I see Russel Norman is now describing Labour’s Mt Albert Candidate, David Shearer, as the “grey” man. Now I haven’t been around as long as I have without being able to spot a “line” and that is certainly a line, and one of the attack variety. Thing is, the Greens don’t do lines. And they […]

Meeting Joe Overton

Written By: - Date published: 12:03 pm, April 4th, 2009 - 17 comments

A little while ago we had some discussion here about the Sensible Sentencing Trust and their status as a charity. That’s not what this post is about. Rather, I’m going to write a little bit about the functional role groups like the SST play in the political process and how they are successful. The SST, […]

The spun praising the spinner

Written By: - Date published: 9:58 am, April 4th, 2009 - 6 comments

Falling for a politician’s tricks – that’s gullibility Seeing those tricks for what they are – that’s nous Seeing them for what they are but falling for them anyway and praising the politician – what’s that? colin espiner  1 April – …the PM was overjoyed by the success of the Twitter story. It may have boomeranged, […]

Regurgitating rubbish

Written By: - Date published: 9:04 am, April 2nd, 2009 - 10 comments

On his blog Colin Espiner rejects the argument that National’s tax cuts are “unfair because they give more to those who earn more” saying “I’m afraid that’s the nature of progressive taxation”. That’s what National politicians say too. It’s wrong. There are infinite tax cuts one could devise that don’t give more to the well off. Cut the […]

“Monitoring”

Written By: - Date published: 3:00 pm, April 1st, 2009 - 14 comments

No Right Turn exposes ineffectual government spin on the fire at will act. The select committee procedure would have improved the bill. Perhaps to the point that it at least lived up to the spin. Earlier in the month, Minister of Labour Kate Wilkinson warned employers not to abuse their new 90-day fire at will […]

Ralston’s hackery continues

Written By: - Date published: 10:45 am, March 29th, 2009 - 12 comments

Earlier this week we pointed out that John Key has started running a new line. Now instead of calling touchy-feely liberal policies on things like climate change and public health ‘PC gone mad’ (too Don Brash), National is referring to them as ‘hug a polar bear’ programmes. Right on cue, Key cheerleader Bill Ralston is […]

Stink line

Written By: - Date published: 7:55 am, March 26th, 2009 - 10 comments

Now “PC gone mad” has been used to the point where even people who think mimicking Tui’s “yeah right” slogan is cutting edge irony wouldn’t be seen dead using the phrase, National has needed to come up with something else to do the job. Because let’s face it, you need to keep creating the impression […]

The government gets a headline, we get potholes

Written By: - Date published: 8:09 am, March 25th, 2009 - 9 comments

No Right Turn puts the farce of the governments spin into perspective in Public relations replaces policy II. I’m just going to quote it… Earlier in the month the government announced that they were spending $1 billion on state highways. It was apparent from the original press release that this was purely an exercise in […]

Out of her depth

Written By: - Date published: 11:03 am, March 20th, 2009 - 41 comments

Paula Bennett’s performance on Morning Report today didn’t just bring home how completely out of her depth she is as a Minister, it also exposed the limits of National’s strategy of government-by-PR. If you haven’t heard the interview yet, download it now. You won’t be disappointed. What’s clearly happened here is Bennett was sent into […]

Four wheels good, two wheels bad

Written By: - Date published: 10:08 am, March 20th, 2009 - 34 comments

The Government is taking nearly half a billion dollars out of public transport, cycling, walking, road maintance, and traffic policing to pay for more state highways. Transport Minister Steven Joyce’s reasoning for this – ‘86% of people go to work by car’. Doesn’t he get that people have to go by car because there aren’t […]

Espiner on National’s use of the crisis

Written By: - Date published: 7:03 pm, March 16th, 2009 - 29 comments

Sadly, I couldn’t find Colin Espiner’s excellent piece in The Press today online. It’s good. Colin’s thoughtful observations derail the government’s PR spin about That Nice Man Mr Key and his commonsense centrist approach. He wonders whether the National government is taking advantage of the economic crisis to push through hard-right reforms Kiwis didn’t vote […]

CTU busts ACC spin

Written By: - Date published: 2:25 pm, March 13th, 2009 - 7 comments

Over the last week or so the Government, and Nick Smith in particular, have run a dishonest PR campaign to undermine ACC and soften up the public for cuts and eventual privatisation. In response, the Council of Trade Unions has put together a helpful fact sheet to set the record straight and bust some of […]

Cutting through the spin on ACC

Written By: - Date published: 6:30 am, March 13th, 2009 - 37 comments

We’ve heard a lot of panicky comments in the last few weeks about a ‘cost blowout’ at ACC. We’re told there is $22 billion in liabilities with $12 billion unfunded. That sounds bad, but what does it actually mean and what’s really happened? ACC used to be a ‘pay-as-you-go’ scheme. No money was put aside […]

Experts: National lying over ACC

Written By: - Date published: 11:27 am, March 12th, 2009 - 46 comments

The wheels are starting to come off National’s PR campaign to undermine ACC as more and more people notice the gap between their spin and the reality. This morning’s Dom Post has an interesting article [offline*] where the managing director of actuaries Eriksen & Associates refutes Nick Smith’s lies about the “cost blowout” and the […]

Espiner nails it

Written By: - Date published: 11:49 am, March 11th, 2009 - 15 comments

In his blog today Colin Espiner points out how National has quickly moved a lot further to the right than they portrayed themselves as pre-election: After following the script for the First 100 Days to the letter, National is now branching out into things that, um, weren’t in the script. Labour Lite? Not any more. […]

Job growth in the public sector!

Written By: - Date published: 11:24 am, March 11th, 2009 - 8 comments

There is one job area where it’s no expense spared for the taxpayer – public relations in the Beehive. Michelle Boag tells the story here. Michelle has now joined the PR firm Momentum, where Jenny Shipley is a director. There’ll be enough moolah in that rolling maul to take the sharp edges off the recession. […]

Softening up

Written By: - Date published: 2:22 pm, March 5th, 2009 - 26 comments

A few points on the ACC issue and one on Kiwirail. Nick Smith says that, with assets of $10 and liabilities of $21 billion, if ACC were an insurance company it would have gone under years ago. But it’s not an insurance company. Because its costs can be met by the sovereign revenue raising power […]