The Sunday News Roast

On the Sunday News Roast tonight at 7pm, Sky Digital 65, Alt Tvs News and weekend newspaper critique show that is Unfair & Unbalanced, THE SPIN STARTS HERE with the best political news team on television with your host, head of Current Affairs at Alt Tv, Bomber, the last man to be convicted of sedition in NZ, Tim Selwyn, and Political Editor of the NBR, Ben Thomas

News that caught my eye this week
1: Coverage of this young woman who has made a complaint about being sexually assaulted by 4 players of the English Rugby team. I was fascinated by the guru sports commentators who all dutifully rolled up and warned us all about ‘Honeytraps’ – I found the whole concept that it was the one woman in the hotel and she managed to manipulate and victimize the 4 male rugby players with her ‘Honeytrap’ bordering on the ludicrous and now we find out that the woman wasn’t a pole dancer, it wasn’t her boyfriend who complained, the medical staff who treated her contacted the Police and she is terrified by the follow up rape via the media she would be forced to endure. Kinda puts the whole story into a little bit of perspective and also manages to highlight some of the ‘she’s asking for it’ mentality that still passes as public discourse on sexual assault in this country.


2: On the issue of Crosby/Texter, many right wing commentators argued that Hagar was naive and there are no surprises that National should use Crosby/Texter, however I think our very own Phoebe Fletcher on Tumeke nailed it…

The issue of political spin should be a defining one this election: rather than dragging public debate away from the policies that define our nation, as some have argued, interrogating the source of where these policies come from is a crucial process to an informed vote. The refusal of John Key to confirm his party's use of Crosby/Textor as public relations consultants is disturbing, as it signals a degradation of the democratic processes through which a party should be elected.

The danger with this marriage of public relations and politics is that the desire to pull voters ends up superseding the desire to establish firm, reasoned policies that benefit New Zealanders.

This is a strategy that Crosby/Textor are renowned for in their campaigns: using sensitive issues to polarise voters into voting on emotive reasons rather than a critical rationale.

…she is right of course, why isn’t National telling us what they actually intend to do? With John Key’s former employer, Merrill Lynch, breathlessly gossiping the privatization of ACC, and the private contractor National intend to employ to build and run their new prison, it is becoming stark that National have a very different interpretation of privatization than most NZers have and the recent converts to National from Labour will be most shocked at how far to the right National intend to go, and John Key is hiding the true consequences of his policies with on message scripted comments fed to him by Crosbt/Texter! Quote of the week from John Roughan, NZ Herald deputy editor... "feigned horror at the fact that people running for public office hire consultants who try to conceal some of their intentions during an election campaign”…ummmm, yeah John, I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say yes, yes we are horrified that a party would hire a consultancy team to hide a parties true intentions, how is that so hard for you to comprehend and yet denigrate the horror at the same time? Oh and today we find out from Hagar’s latest story that National, who have attacked Labour for using public funds for campaigning, are paying Crosby/Texter out of Key’s parliamentary office.

3: Simon Oosterman winning $5000 from Police over their misuse of pepper spray after they were found to have breached their own procedures three times when pepper spraying him at a GE protest.

4: The Truckies and their inane support really shows how cooked Labour goose is when Truckies with little real claim to outrage break the law and shut down motorways with mass clapping from the media and the public. Two fee increases in 18 years is hardly a reason to protest, and many of those Truck companies have driven through picket lines in the past so to now have the former National cabinet minister and Truck industry spokesperson, Tony Friedlander, espouse solidarity and protest for ones rights makes me gag a little. Trucks cause damage to the road, they pay for that damage and the reason why there was no warning like there was last time is because in the 3 day warning last time large truck operators managed to stock pile fuel to the cost of $17million from the Government, so a 30 day warning would have allowed the possibility of many millions more, but none of that matters to an electorate who are writhing in pain over soaring food and oil prices.

5: Asian Vigilante movement? Raybon Kahn accusses the media of playing up the vigilante tag the media have given the AAG in his SST column today and while he makes a few good points I think he let’s the founder Peter Low well off the hook when Peter tells the media that “"We are a vigilante group and are training now, we are training people in hand-to-hand combat and how to handle situations”, and he will get the Triads to offer protection if the Police force his vigilante group to stop. Why would we want this ex-singaporean trying to import harsh semi-fascist law and order policy from his homeland? The second political show this year of migrant muscle on the streets, and they will be a major factor in this years election.


In the Weekend Newspapers
STORY 1 – Agencies seek help to treat teen sex offenders – Weekend Herald
New Zealand's world-leading sex offender treatment programmes say they are being asked to perform miracles without enough back-up at home. The three treatment providers _ Safe Network in Auckland, WellStop in Wellington and Stop in Christchurch _ claim one of the world's lowest youth reoffending rates. Only 2 per cent of the 216 adolescents who completed their treatment between 1996 and 2004 committed sexual offences again by October 2004.
So often we don’t believe rehabilitation can work so we don’t bother and just bray for harsher punishments, yet this course has only a 2% re-offence rate for a crime most people perceive as impossible to rehabilitate, how much of our perception has been warped by hate that has been whipped up by lynch mob talback rhetoric?


STORY 2 – End of the road for Clark? – SST
Political Editor Ruth Laugeson asks if the rallying support Truckers received is hinting at a ‘mood for change’ – but last election Colmar Brunton predicted National 44 and Labour 38, the actual vote was Labour 41 and National 39, Chris Trotter pushes the argument that bronze plus silver will beat gold in this years election – prediction time, let’s thrash it out.


STORY 3 – Exclusive: Police face new probe into Wallace shooting – Weekend Herald
On April 30, 2000, Steven Wallace walked down the main street of Waitara in Taranaki, smashing shop windows with a golf club and a baseball bat. He was shot dead by Senior Constable Keith Abbott who was acquitted of murder but later criticised in a coroner's inquiry. Now - eight years after the shooting - a new independent body in charge of police conduct is investigating the killing. A new inquiry into the 2000 shooting of Steven Wallace has started. The Independent Police Conduct Authority is investigating possible misconduct or neglect of duty by the officers involved.
Could the IPCA be trying to show that they are truly independent with this move?


STORY 4 - PM says Key weakest link - hos
Prime Minister Helen Clark says Don Brash had presence and authority. She also speaks warmly of former National leaders Bill English ("never take him lightly, he's a clever man"), Jenny Shipley and Jim Bolger. When it comes to John Key, Clark stops short of Winston Churchill's famous quote on Britain's first Labour Prime Minister Ramsay McDonald: "He has more than any other man the gift of compressing the largest number of words into the smallest amount of thought." She also deliberately avoids the word lightweight, but it is clear she is taking cold, calculated aim at the man who leads her in the polls and the empty spaces she thinks she can see in his leadership profile.
Interesting interview and a coup for Stephen Cook, it was noted in the SST that no one from National will front for interviews and it’s only John Key who is allowed to talk, so Helen has stepped up the interviews.


STORY 5: DIA to probe pokies link to racing – SST
Millions of dollars of pokie money is flooding into the accounts of four small trotting clubs which don’t even have their own race-standard tracks.
Turns out that pokie charity money that is supposed to go back into the community is really going to the fleece the pockets of those forced to hand the money over in the first place to mates of theirs. Why isn’t pokie money going back to the communities that churn through them the most?

FINAL WORD – Season two of Let’s be Frank is up an running, Haarmeet Sooden tonight at 10pm in this weeks replay, Tuesday 8.30pm Oliver Driver interviews Michael Bassett over his Yoko Ono complex with his accusations Margaret Pope was the reason Lange and Douglas split up, looking at the papers, Bill Ralstons column this week in the HOS and this weeks HOS editorial was written by Crosby/Texter, Michele Hewitson’s interview with Jim Bolger is very good