A bit of free media advice to Todd Muller and Nikki Kaye
(and I’d happily offer the same advice to Labour politicians): don’t allow
yourself to be manipulated into playing the media’s game.
There are journalists in the parliamentary press gallery (and I’m sorry,
but the name Tova O’Brien springs to mind again) whose modus operandi is to
probe constantly for any sign of weakness, conflict or contradiction, and to
pounce triumphantly when they uncover anything that looks remotely capable of
being blown into a scandal. They then sanctimoniously editorialise about it to
an audience that often can’t see what the fuss is about and probably couldn’t care
less.
Their mission is to make mischief. Paddy Gower was another
master of this game. As I wrote in a profile of Paddy years ago for The Listener (remember The Listener?), political journalism in
the 21st century has become essentially a form of sport.
Exposing hypocrisy, inconsistency and double standards is a
legitimate function of journalism, but something’s out of kilter when catching
politicians out begins to look like its raison d’etre.
O’Brien – and possibly other reporters too, although I got
the impression she was the principal provocateur – sprang a trap for the new
National leadership team and they obligingly walked straight into it.
If they deserve ridicule for anything, it’s not that Muller
failed to include a Maori in his shadow cabinet; that’s just another confected
outrage stirred up to produce a lead item for the 6 o’clock news bulletin, like the
MAGA cap. No, the reason they should
feel embarrassed – and why questions should be asked about their judgment – is that
Muller and Kaye (and even more astonishingly, their media advisers) apparently
failed to see this coming. Did it not occur to them that in an era obsessed
with identify politics and minority grievances, someone would demand to know why
they had an all-white front row?
As an aside, Muller could have easily avoided this by promoting
one of the party’s capable Maori MPs to the front bench; perhaps Shane Reti, who seems an
impressive performer. It needn’t have been seen as tokenism, since
Labour appears unembarrassed by having Kelvin Davis as its deputy leader – a status
presumably acquired on the basis of his Maori roots rather than through ability
and achievement.
By this morning, Muller seemed to have regained his equilibrium
and was saying what he should have said yesterday: namely, that he chose his
front-bench line-up on the basis of ability and merit, and with a focus on
broad issues. End of story. Voters can show at the ballot box whether they
agree with his choices; isn’t that how democracy is supposed to work?
Advancing transparently absurd pleas in mitigation – such as
citing Paula Bennett at No 13 in the rankings, and even more comically identifying
the palpably Pakeha Paul Goldsmith as Ngati Porou – was playing the media’s
game. It looked desperate and pathetic – but worse, it looked weak.
Muller should have taken a lesson from Boris Johnson,
another conservative politician with his feet to the fire, and stood his ground.
The public would have respected him more for it. He should at least give the
impression of having faith in his own judgment even when he doesn’t.
