The “Ex(perience)” Factor

It was great to see The Herald finally engage in a bit of balanced journalism and put pressure on John Key over his week of blunders. Both Fran O’Sullivan and John Young featured Key’s gaffes in their Saturday pieces, as did the Herald On Sunday editorial. Of note was that all three honed in on Key’s lack of political experience, something which is sure to cause him many headaches in the months to come.

Fran O’Sullivan began hers without mincing any words:

“Memo: John Key. Get on top of policy quickly or you may follow Don Brash into oblivion. And stop blaming journalists for your verbal gaffes _ they’re not employed to be your mind-readers.”  

Indeed, a political leader in the throes of an election year, and a crucial one at that, should be at the top of his game. Sadly for Key, he isn’t.

John Young’s piece took a similar tone and raised a rather interesting issue:

“The parliamentary media’s fear is that once he has been sworn-in as Prime Minister, he will reveal his true self and start driving through a completely different agenda to the recipe of moderate conservatism he has cooked up in order to win power.”

Much has been made of Key’s hidden right-wing agenda, but it is certainly surprising that, given these fears, the media has left it so late in the piece to put some pressure on Key and write some critical journalism on him. Hopefully this is a sign of things to come.

Finally, Sunday’s editorial had the following to say:

“it may equally be that Key has exposed himself as a man who, in the heat of a hard-fought campaign, will be, like the last National leader, gaffe-prone. What is certain is that the time for rehearsal is past. The curtain is up and there is nowhere left to hide.”

I think this statement hits the nail squarely on the head, and it will interesting to see how Key performs now that the curtain has been lifted and the public’s gaze is fixed firmly on him.

 

Powered by Qumana