Sucking up to Banksie

Written By: - Date published: 9:38 am, July 31st, 2010 - 17 comments
Categories: auckland supercity, newspapers - Tags: , ,

I know that The Herald likes to campaign for the Right, but surely this overdose of sucking up to “Banksie” sets new records?

On the (online) version of The Herald’s National news page, at time of writing, we have five count them five puff pieces on “Banksie” in a row. That Banksie eh – what a swell guy!

If you hunt around you can find a mention of Len Brown too, and the tiny little detail that he intends to restore some measure of local democracy in Auckland. You know – something that actually matters. It’s there if you hunt for it, so I guess that’s “fair and balanced”.

And just so this post isn’t a complete and utter whinge, let’s talk about a different Banksy for a moment. This Banksy here. If you have nothing better to do on a damp Saturday morning you could go check out some of his work for an interesting take on the world…

17 comments on “Sucking up to Banksie ”

  • Comments are now closed

    • lprent 1.1
      31 July 2010 at 11:55 am

      Ummm a month ago. I thought a week was a long time in politics.

    • r0b 1.2
      31 July 2010 at 12:11 pm

      Could you be anymore pathetic?

      Teach me Oh Master!

      I never noticed all that last month, buried away under “Supercity”. And the comments on Brown are decidedly mixed. Some of it is part of the right wing’s anti-Brown campaign – “The rise and stall of Len Brown”, and references in two other articles to the “credit card controversy”.

      In contrast the current Banks suck-up fest is a lot more prominent under “National” news and a lot more positive about its subject.

      The placing of the articles applies to the online version of course, I don’t have access to the printed copy. Be interested to see how the relative emphasis is reflected there.

      • Lanthanide 1.2.1
        31 July 2010 at 1:03 pm

        “National” news, seriously? I bet Jim Anderton won’t get coverage in the “National” section. Damn JAFA news reporters.

    • jbanks 1.3
      1 August 2010 at 9:47 am

      The word you are looking for is ‘dishonest’.

  2. ghostwhowalksnz 2
    31 July 2010 at 10:53 am

    Could it be just a major article on ‘Banks’ which has a few reruns of old as sidebars to fill out the printed version. Which then is done automatically as a whole series on the online version. Plus come Monday they get to rehash the’ great debate’ on TV Sunday morning.

    The online software seems to run unattended most of the time, a bit like e a freeware version of Google news, matching awkward headlines to a bit of journalism and strangely irrelevant pics

  3. Sanctuary 3
    31 July 2010 at 11:02 am

    If you want to see how well the left’s campaign is doing in Auckland, don’t read all the rather sad puffery for Banks – check out John Roughan’s resentful, surly and rather bizarre opinion piece in today’s Herald.

    They know they’ve lost with Banks, they know their attempts to smear Len Brown were seen through, they’ve discovered that trying to denigrate both candidates in favour of a “saviour” from the right has gained no traction – now Mr. Roughan seems to be trying McCarthyism.

    • Pascal's bookie 3.1
      31 July 2010 at 11:16 am

      But it scared me. If a major party decides to buy the Auckland election with a promise of some uneconomic pork, it probably could. We have created a monster.

      heh. I can’t recall his horror at right wing parties winning elections with promises of tax cutz funded out of pixie shit.

  4. ghostwhowalksnz 4
    31 July 2010 at 11:09 am

    Yeah , a railway tunnel, is so … Bolshevik. From someone who hasnt used public transport since high school.

    Back in Banks ‘revelations’ this was interesting
    “And despite Banks’ efforts to change, Northey says he retains some traits which disturb him.”
    “There are occasional bits of what I find really strange behaviour, like the constant hand-washing after shaking hands with people, and the going out into the night to feed stray cats.”

    • Mako 4.1
      31 July 2010 at 1:07 pm

      and the going out into the night to feed stray cats

      Now there’s a headline: “Mayor’s Midnight Madness! Banks Seeks Stray Pussy While City Sleeps” etc.

  5. BLiP 5
    31 July 2010 at 1:28 pm

    Here’s all you need to know about John Banks. If he doesn’t have a clue about his own company’s handling of other people’s money, how’s he going to know what’s happening with the money sloshing around in Auckland City?

    Minister of Magic – and his fabulous disappearing act – watch as mighty icons of the isthmus vanish right before your eyes!!

    • Draco T Bastard 5.1
      31 July 2010 at 2:33 pm

      He’s typical of the right – has the charisma, likes the power and has NFI how it all works.

  6. Jeremy 6
    31 July 2010 at 2:35 pm

    I read the print version, well skimmed alot of the first few articles becaused it was a bunch of rubbish filler. I must say the spread on Len Brown was alot more prominent and did not have whole page adds seperating the articles. Len Browns spread on the Herald also has more photos than what is shown online.

  7. Zaphod Beeblebrox 7
    31 July 2010 at 3:06 pm

    The Herald editor must be a genius. How do you fill that many pages of paper without mentioning anything to do with policy or proposals or even how he intends administering the new council.

    Know lots about his family but bugger all about anything else.

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