Thursday Morning Coffee
The dead end look on Poor Maiki Sherman’s face said it all – after the deputy TVNZ 1 news political editor had a very bad week and nobody inside the Greens would challenge James Shaw.
Maiki suggested her catalytic story about the comments of three youths on facebook may have been the real reason the Greens ran their conference online – not covid.
To Maiki’s mind it was a sinister plot devised to avoid her glorious unfolding story and moderate Greens might have been making up excuses about Covid to avoid her eagle eyed scrutiny.
Such is the self aggrandising mindsets of “celebrity” reporters.
If keeping her story alive was the real motivation – it all came crashing down like a bowl of porridge plopped upside down on Maiki’s head when Chlöe did not take the bait.
Yes Maiki probably counted on Chlöe stepping into contention for Co-leadership based on the way Maiki had last week sourced pictures of Chlöe standing beside Marama and paraded these before the nation in her TVNZ 1 News “news reports”.
It was all about – trying to help the public see this pair of new co-leaders as the new Greens – in the minds of all members and delegates.
Giving them something to vote for – a vision – to topple James Shaw.
But alas for Maiki – Chlöe had more political sense so Maiki lurched – and clutched at Plan B – Dr Elizabeth Kerekere – who also after some reflection ( lol ) realised it wasn’t going to work.
At that point I heard the mythical “Fat lady sing” and I said it was all over here on G News – which only resulted in Maiki claiming that her story was going to keep on going for at least another month because Mr Tuiono might put his hat ( literally ) into the ring.
Tuiono called the press together to make the stunning announcement that he had not yet made up his mind.
I laughed my flip top head off.
Maiki just stood there with that horrified look on her face as reality figuratively slapped her hard three times and porridge drizzled down her face.
So this morning I reflected upon how – if aggressive celebrity media in the TVNZ 1 News newsroom – decide to intervene and take an active part in rocking the boat – stirring up rebellion inside political parties – they really should have gotten better information about where it was all leading to sooner.
“Shoulda done it sooner”, said Chris Bishop.
“That’s not a better outcome”, said Christopher Luxon.
Maiki may have succeeded in making a normal democratic process look unstable to some people – but look how steady the Greens really are now.
Shining with democratic stars and stability.
Yes it was a waste of time for TVNZ 1 News to run about seven consecutive news stories on this dead-end topic over a week while all the time – keeping the Luxon holiday in Hawaii on the down low.
According to Luxon media knew where he was – but according to media like Jessica MuckInMYEye they did not have any idea and nobody has reported the actual flight manifest and hotel details or commented on who knew what – where and when.
So many facts remain unreported as Doubting Thomas pens that all of this was an unforced error in a series of unforced errors starting with the abortion muddle, the slanging off at New Zealand businesses and now – Te Puke Gate.
National party aligned media are now lamenting that Luxon is messing everything up on a regular basis and praying that as long as they keep giving Luxon “the agency of the narrative” and depicting him a strong heroic man of action in their headlines – all may still be well.
National Party aligned reporter Jane Patterson at RNZ wrote :
“Frustration is building with Labour, and Ardern and her ministers will have to work hard to take back the narrative, rather than stumble through the election dealing with a slew of political challenges. That’s always made more difficult when you have an opposition at the top of its game. Luxon has made a solid start and is making ground on Labour and Ardern, but that’s ground that can be quickly lost. “Nothing to see here” might have helped him wriggle out of today’s controversy, but it’s been a blow to his credibility and will give his opponents plenty of Hawaiian-themed ammunition to fire off as 2022 rolls on.”
Yes you may have spat your coffee over some of that – which only shows you are fair minded and have a good bullshit metre.
I imagined Jane with blinkers on and her hands over her ears living in a National Party echo chamber, willing Luxon to keep going – to triumph and stop making errors.
Gotta defund those industry decarbonising climate projects and transfer the money to tax cuts for the wealthy…something like that.
This was a massive blow to his credibility – and it’s not tall poppy – it’s about being out of touch, “refusing to accept”, pulling the wool, speaking from a misleading script, revisionist versions of events, smug wiggling and crocodile tears of sympathy for Kiwis doing it hard.
He’s pulling the wool.
It goes to the heart of being a trusting kiwi with a flooded street or lawn – only just making ends meet – and then hearing all that detached and insincere – Kiwis are doing it tough” messaging, mixed with “Aloha from Te Puke”, followed by “I worked hard” together with “it was not misleading” followed by “We made a mistake” so let’s quickly move on.
A type of underlying media bias infests their clickbait and content. It’s our media who keep on “handing the narrative” to the Opposition.
I notice the way most media dress up clickbait headlines ten times a day in favour of the Opposition – with nearly all headlines being about what National or Act said – using dramatic action verbs like slammed, tackled, lashes the Government hard, takes aim at, spars with, goes head to head, and of course “rebrands the National Party”.
Aloha – look at the brand damage now.
Same old train wreck.
It’s enough to make Audrey Young reach around – clutching at straws for her deflated National Party audience – and suggesting National might win the 2023 election right at the very nadir of Luxon’s bungling journey so far.
It’s like Audrey is saying – fear not at this low point my fellow National Party fans – for National may yet win and who will replace Jacinda?
Truth be told Audrey likely just wanted people to call Michael Wood names – like “Napoleon” because he’s very good at his job – and that’s a nickname she thought was funny – so her clickbait headline amplified that. The smell of old moth balls in Granny’s wardrobe – fill up my senses whenever Audrey tries to be clever.
Yesterday I noted that Cushla Norman finally published an article about fact checking the drivers of inflation at 1 News and in it – she got someone to say “Government Spending” is only a small driver of inflation.
The article was eight months late – and was never a lead story even when – Mr Luxon boasted in Hamilton that “the cost of living crisis will sweep National to victory in the 2023 election”.
This fake news National Party narrative “that Grant Robertson’s addiction to spending” was “a big driver of domestic inflation” propped up the rise in National Party polling over the past eight months and much of our media fanned that fake news.
It’s hard when media want a National Government and nothing Jacinda does or says barely gets a positive headline or mention.
For example all that content about school absenteeism – media scrubbed from the public consciousness yesterday shows what I am talking about.
Nobody talked about the June CPI of 6.1% in Australia in massive headlines and instead – uninformed opinion articles from the likes of Mike Hosking misled DumbTown again.
It will be interesting on 16 August when the RBNZ give a media conference about the latest Monetary Policy Committee report – and what the updated forecasts about inflation have to say.
No doubt TVNZ will put Katie Bradford in between the facts and TVNZ’s filtered version of reality – so nothing that damages National’s election narrative can accidentally slip out into the electorate.
It’s all quite a game really – and of course it will be wall to wall with elementary second hand reckons from – Brad from the Flat again – rather than Paul Conway.
What do you think?
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