The New Look Herald: Can We Hope For Better?

So the NZ Herald is going all tabloid. I can't say I will notice. It's been months since I bought a newspaper of any description, since I prefer to do my news reading online, where there is a greater choice of product.

I used to get the Herald delivered, and it did come in handy for wrapping stuff or dealing with particularly icky messes. But the papers would just end up cluttering the house until recycling day. I don't miss the hard copy version.

APN is promising that the new look Herald will have a reinforced focus on investigative journalism. If that happens I'll be pleased, but I'll also be surprised. Let's hope that those new Herald investigative journos investigate more than just the Twitter accounts of minor celebrities.

The paper is also promising more columnists, which could be an opportunity to get a bit more diversity into the opinion pages. However, I fear we may just end up with even more opinion from ageing white male curmudgeons.

I can understand the desire to change things, because the newspaper game is a tough one. The print media industry is slowly dying, and no large newspaper has yet worked out a profitable business model for the online delivery of news.

But will this move do anything more than delay the end? Let's hope the changes lead to something better, rather than a renewed focus on trivia and trash.

It's fashionable to attack the traditional news media, and Lord knows I've been guilty of it on numerous occasions. But I don't want the Herald to fail: I just don't want to pay for my daily news. That probably makes me part of the problem.

Bigger Than Watergate

In all the history of this country, has there ever been a scandal as great as this one?

The Herald once again exercises excellent editorial judgement in its choice of front page headline. They could have led with yesterday's dire economic news, or the ongoing concern over the death of a second SAS man.

But I'm sure you'll agree that the drinking of a bottle of wine by hardworking SFO staff is of greater concern.

John Key was given his own radio show yesterday afternoon, and he managed to make it a politics-free zone. Probably a wise move, considering the rotten credit-downgrade news of the day.

It was good of the Herald too to give Key a chance to edit the paper for a day.

Saturday Celebrity Fluff

Anna Leask of the Herald has discovered where the gold is: tabloid journalism. We like to know all the grubby details of our celebrities, and she delivers with style. Her previous sojourn into the world of bad boy celebrities was an expose of the shocking behaviour of that "household name" Martin Devlin.

This morning she's taking the horse out for another gallop. But this time Devlin's friends are along for the ride.

Convictions, addictions and disorderly conduct all par for the course for these big egos, says one television industry insider

They were applauded for being "laddish" and outrageous on screen - but no one is laughing after a fifth panel member of the sports show Game of Two Halves got himself into trouble.

The article then rehashes the various offences that the Game of Two Halves boofhead set have been charged with.

It's just a pity that, with one very notable exception (Tony Veitch), it's small beer. Sitting on a car, possession of a few tablets of a mostly harmless drug, driving while disqualified. 

And how is Mike King's struggle with addiction newsworthy? Leave the poor man alone.

If further proof is needed that this is a piece of tabloid celebrity fluff Leask also finds an "industry insider" to dish the dirt.

And now (shock horror!) one of the said boofheads has written in support of sacked UK Sky TV commentator Andy Gray.

If newspaper editors want to know why people are turned off by their product, here's a clue: don't print this celebrity tittle-tattle and pretend it's news.

John Armstrong's Cartoon Labour

The New Zealand Herald has named John Key Politician of the Year.

John Armstrong's piece about Key explains the decision. Armstrong paints a damning picture of the Labour Party, but so distorted is the picture that it more closely represents a cartoon than real life.

Within the deep recesses of the Labour Party and elsewhere on the left, there is a lingering arrogance saturated with an intellectual snobbery which blinds and deludes its sufferers.

The second anniversary of John Key becoming Prime Minister has been and gone. But the self-satisfied superiority and smugness exhibited by his critics continues unabated.

I'd be surprised if anyone senior within Labour is feeling self-satisfied or smug right now. Why would they, given the uninspiring polling?

They cannot bring themselves to accept that Key's occupation of Premier House follows anything but a terrible mistake on the part of voters who will come to their senses in time for next year's election.

Only the most optimistic Labour supporter believe the public will suddenly flock back to them come election time. There's an understanding that Labour has a chance in 2011, but only if ACT fails, and if National runs out of coalition partners. The equation may also require the return of Winston to Parliament. None but the most deluded in Labour believe National can be overtaken as most popular party in 2011.

The left dismisses the most popular Prime Minister in New Zealand's recent political history as Smile and Wave John Key, Do Nothing John Key and Lucky John Key.

The left's fatal error has been to constantly underrate Key in terms of ability and the fact that though he is of centre-right disposition, he is firmly at the moderate end of that broad spectrum.

Well, sure, some at the hard end of the left believe that anyone who leads National must be at the hard end of the right. However, it's pretty clear to most on the left that Key's political instincts are moderate conservative.

Key does not fit the left's mould, which assumes or even dictates that someone as wealthy as him must be an acolyte of the old New Right.

Maybe Armstrong should actually communicate with some on the left. I can't believe that moderate lefties see Key in that light.

In short, Key's critics on the left still don't get it. Maybe the Mana byelection will remove a few scales from a few eyes. It should. That result was a gruesome preview of the slaughter that may well be inflicted on Labour at the end of next year.

Pardon me, but that's bollocks. In Mana an untried and junior politician was up against someone who was well known in the electorate. He still won relatively comfortably. I fail to see the need to panic.

I'm picking that, barring a scandal, Labour probably won't drop much further in the polls. It's National that will be feeling nervous. They will unquestionably be the biggest party (again, barring a scandal) after the election, but if they don't have any coalition partners they could be in trouble. How is this not clear to someone as seasoned as Armstrong?

National's stunning performance in the byelection and stellar showings in the polls are reasons enough for according Key the title of Politician of the Year.

Ah, so it is a popularity contest. Note how Armstrong hasn't mentioned any of Key's actual achievements. I don't count winning elections as an achievement. I mean, what has he done to make the country a better place, or to make our economy sounder?

Armstrong continues:

Critics from the right bemoan Key's refusal to exploit this surplus of support and implement more radical, right-wing policies.

But his priority has been to build trust with voters so that in a second parliamentary term he can carry them with him as National tackles big-ticket items like welfare reform, the recommendations of the savings working group and possible part-privatisation of some state-owned enterprises.

Key is immovable on this. His pre-election pledge to resign if he alters the age of eligibility or the formula for paying state-funded super meant rejection of this week's moderate proposal by the Retirement Commission to raise the age of qualification to 67 by two months a year from 2020 onwards.

But even if Key privately thought the idea had merit, no way was he going back on his word.

This paints a picture of Key being a political manager, rather than a doer. It doesn't matter that the ship of state is sailing towards a bloody great iceberg, so long as the band keeps playing.

So we just have to wait until Key's second term, according to Armstrong. You would have thought that with a clear mandate from the masses in 2008 he'd have just got on with things. Why should we suddenly expect action in 2011? If Key had any political courage he might have done something bold in the first term, other than subvert our democratic processes. His refusal to budge on superannuation shows he has his head in the sand.

But nothing is taken for granted. Key's front-footedness in his handling of two national crises, the aftermath of the Christchurch earthquake and the Pike River mine explosion, flowed from ensuring sufficient back-up from Government departments.

The margin for error on such occasions is small. Helen Clark was once a day late turning up to inspect some North Island floods - too late to appease the gripes and cries of "where is the Government?".

The crises that overwhelmed Christchurch and Pike River cannot be compared with the North Island floods Armstrong is referring to. In times of great trial people rally to a leader, any leader. Look how popular George Bush was in the days after 9/11.

Armstrong then relates all of the bad things that happened to Labour this year. Yes, there's no doubt they have had a poor year. 

But things could have been worse:

Yet, if anyone comes anywhere close to Key's showing, it was Brownlee. He achieved one of the most rapid recoveries of a politician's image, first, by his adept on-the-spot handling of the aftermath of the Christchurch earthquake and then to a smaller extent by being the Government's presence on the West Coast after Pike River.

If obnoxious arrogance is a political strength then, certainly, I'd have voted for Gerry Brownlee too.

******

But who would I have chosen as Politician of the Year? It's hard to think of anyone in Parliament who deserves the title, because none of the leading political figures have inspired this year. But there are a few local body candidates: Len Brown for briefly uniting a traditionally divided region to become the first Supercity mayor, even though he was outspent almost two to one by his opponent. And for fortitude during a time of crisis either Tony Kokshoorn or Bob Parker could have been chosen.

Another politician who has had a strong year is Andrew Little. The Labour president and EPMU head doesn't present as the stereotypical "angry unionist", but instead looks to be moderate and centrist. He's been in the news a lot, firstly with the Chris Carter debacle and then over Pike River, and hasn't put a foot wrong. He looks to be future PM material, and may be in the running to be Labour leader in 2011/2012 when (as I suspect) Phil Goff steps down.

Do you have a pick?

"Tits On Page Three"

I'm usually fairly happy when I get to work on a Friday morning, because, well, it's Friday. Not only that, but my firm does a staff morning tea on Fridays and (yes, this will sound tragic) I get to stuff my face with loads of those nice pastries that will probably one day stop my heart from beating.

But today things started out bad. I got the Herald from the letterbox (don't worry - I wouldn't pay for it, it's a work perk) and almost immediately threw up on the front page. And then I got mad. So I had a cup of tea and was still mad.

I drove to work and stayed mad. I'm not quite as mad as I was an hour or so ago, and the prospect of consuming an enormous number of mini mince pies in a couple of hours has cheered me somewhat.

So what's the big deal? I was fuming over the headline.

If you don't actually read the article below it (which is reasonably fair and balanced), you immediately get the impression that our politicians are taking the piss, are robbing us, and are just out to loot the public purse.

That's not why I was mad. I've learned never to trust a Herald headline, so I wasn't fuming at our politicians. What angered me was the blatant and deliberate attempt by our largest newspaper to mislead its readers.

The measure proposed actually sounds sensible. Work out what the approximate cash value of MPs' perks are and, instead of allowing them to claim the perks, just give them the cash instead. It's simpler, easier to understand and involves less administration. Some MPs will be winners (those who don't travel much on personal business), and others will be losers.

But that's not the story the Herald chose to run. And why the picture of Key looking like a dopey clown?

The tabloidisation of the Herald continues to gather pace. Soon they'll be reducing the page size.

Why Is This News?

For two days in a row the Herald has had a story on its front page about the death of Kings College student James Webster.

Today's lead story has the parents interviewed by the paper. As tragic as the death of their son is, this kind of human interest story doesn't belong on the front page of a major newspaper. In fact, it is better left to the women's mags. It's not news. People die all the time in tragic circumstances.

So why does the Herald keep leading with stories about this death?

Would it be news if the boy had been from a decile 1 school? Or from a poor family? Or brown?

Apparently There Was Some Sort Of Protest?

Someone told me there was some kind of march on Saturday.

Various estimates put the numbers on the march at between 20,000-50,000, depending on whose account you read (bear in mind that protestors always inflate the numbers when asked how many attended their march).

Either way, it must have been one of the biggest protests in years. I am struggling to remember a bigger march.

Oh well, I'm sure the Herald will be all over it, just like they were in November. Remember all the "March for Democracy" headlines splashed all over the front page?

Let's see...

So a car bomb in another part of the world that didn't actually go off (I guess the ones that go off regularly in other parts of the world aren't newsworthy), and another of those "Facebook Will Eat Your Babies" stories.

You can find a story about the march in the paper, but it's not top news. Why not? Many people don't look beyond the first page of the paper.

Is Facebook really bigger news than a mass protest?

Lawyers Lament - Why Does Nobody Like Us?

I’ve been told that up to 80% of journalists working at the Herald could be deeply corrupt.

That’s an outrageous statement – and of course it’s complete nonsense. But had I written a report on the news media that included that statement, the Herald’s Patrick Gower and his colleagues would have been loud and furious in their condemnation of me and my work.

But apparently when lawyers are the subject of a vicious slur we ought to sit back and take it. That’s certainly Gower’s view.

You may recall that the Bazley Report had this shocker in it:

I have also been told that up to 80% of the lawyers practising in the Manukau District Court could be gaming the legal aid system.

Gower thinks lawyers are being unreasonable and obstructive towards the Bazley report, and that they have to accept responsibility for the failings of the legal aid system:

Sometimes it is worth pleading guilty and getting it over. Then you can move on and make amends.

Lawyers should know this better than anyone.

What are they pleading guilty to? Being corrupt? Why doesn’t Gower just say so?

He doesn’t think it’s a big deal that Bazley tarnished the reputations of a large number of Manukau practitioners:

Bazley’s Dame Margaret may have been loose on a couple of points and extra sharp with some of her criticism

So it doesn’t really matter that she accused a large number of legal aid lawyers of being dishonest. Get over it, lawyers. It’s no big deal, guys. So you’re corrupt. Move on.

Bazley’s “loose” language was of course seized upon by the news media, who were more than happy to stick the boot into the legal profession.

The Law Society then inevitably stepped in to defend its members from the outrageous slur. This unavoidably drew some of the public focus from other aspects of the report. But what else could the Law Society have done? Allow a public servant to issue a report accusing large chunks of the profession of corruption, and not bite back?

Gower clearly believes lawyers have no right to defend themselves when they’re accused of corruption. That is an attitude I have a problem with.

And, for the record, the Law Society has welcomed a number of Bazley’s recommendations.

So what is Gower on about?