In a fairly comprehensive article in the SMH regarding electoral advertising for the upcoming NSW elections, we are informed that the ALP plans to target Debnam by playing the Howard card. Is the PM really so electorally toxic that he can be used as a bogeyman for NSW voters?
The Libs are planning to keep on undermining the ALP ads talking up Iemma’s homespun virtues thusly:
So far the Coalition has been content to attack the unpopular ministers Michael Costa, Joe Tripodi and Frank Sartor.
“Labor are not talking about their team so we are talking about it for them,” Mr Jaeschke said.
Federal Minister Joe Hockey is planning to get in on the NSW election action as well, criticising some ads aired by nursing and teachers’ unions.
Will anybody care?
My inner nabob of negativity would be please to see less Iemma-praising and more Howard-baiting in the ALP ads, simply because the Iemma ads are so excruciatingly dull. And long. And poorly produced. And overly long. Did I mention dull? They’re really, really dull. An appealingly aspirational family history is not what wins voters over, it’s really not, no matter how pleasant a person that family history might make one appear. Dull, dull, dull.
There’s also a nasty flavour of the presidential about them, for those of us who care about the strengths of the Westminster system. Me, me, me, dull, dull, dull. Iemma seems to be unproud of his ministerial team, to say the least. The Libs’s tactic to concentrate on the ministers that the Iemma ads so pointedly overlook may be quite sound.
Still, are any of these advertising dollars bringing a good return for the outlay? Are they generating impassioned discussions in the tea-rooms and around the water-coolers? Or are they merely providing a momentary shrug and grunt?
The only ‘Howardish’ one I’ve seen and heard is that Debenham plans to hand over IR control to Canberra if elected. But there is still a week to go, so who knows.
I think these ads (both the Labor and the union ads) targeting Debnam on industrial relations are a pretty impressive effort – they’re amongst the best attack ads I’ve ever seen. I don’t think the Howard ad is so much using him as a bogeyman as trying to further tie Debnam to WorkChoices and IR. I haven’t seen the Iemma ads getting much airplay here (I only saw the first one this morning), and while they’re dull, it does try to give some spin to Iemma’s own unpopular image, and in moderation probably aren’t a bad idea in combination with the others.
I find it interesting that I’ve only seen one Coalition ad here. It’s hardly as if the material isn’t there – if they had the sense and resources, they’d be crucifying the likes of Sartor, Tripodi and Costa. Costa has a truly amazing ability to make people hate him – the Libs really should be playing off this a lot more.
Agreed that framing the Debnam-Howard connection in the IR context will probably be effective. It’s the area where the Federal Govt is weakest, and the Libs in the States will have to wear that too.
Rebecca, I would love to have seen one of these attack ads so I could judge, but the only one I see, over and over again, is Iemma’s This Is My Life job. And it’s so loooong, it must be taking up way more than its fair share of the advertising budget, funds that could be better used on the attack ads, surely?
I totally agree, Rebecca, that the Libs could be capitalising more on public dislike of Costa, Tripodi and Sartor – Sartor in particular, given the planning mayhem in Sydney and community/local council decisions being overruled by the State Government.
I find it very interesting too that Labor are using John Howard as a way to put people off voting Liberal (not that there seem to be many more people to put off, if the polls are to be believed). Perhaps this would not have worked last time around, and it shows Labor capitalising on the apparent trend of increased Federal Coalition unpopularity. Debnam may indeed have not even wanted to bring Howard into his campaign, but could he really have had a choice in that? If he didn’t have Howard openly in his corner, he would have been criticised for not having his Federal leader’s support. But by featuring Howard, it brings into focus a politician against whom the tide looks to be turning.
And one more point – I don’t have time to watch much TV, but I’ve seen far more ALP ads than Liberal ones. Are they running more, or is that just me?
You can be sure that the ALP is spending more money than the coalition, because they have more.
That’s because business doesn’t think the coalition can win, and there is plenty of money in the kitty from people that like to back winners who deliver. The NSW Libs have always been hopeless. If they had stuck with Brogden, or installed Fatty O’Barrell, Iemma would be toast. But they prefer to back mad fundies, run with shockjock jihads against muslims, and rattle the laura norder can even worse than the government. They know they are going to lose. Just listen to Jonesy.