Corporate Engagement

Warning Obama off the soft, swinging centre

In recent decades, as ideology and party partisanship have declined, major political parties in Australia, UK and the USA have tended to focus their attention on that growing group of notoriously fickle voters that are socially conservative, change resistant, uninterested in international news and ask only 'what can you do for me'?

These people have many descriptions: swinging voters, aspirationals, battlers, working families and more.

More grandly, we have had Clinton's 'triangulation' and Blair's 'third way' with their Australian equivalents like Howard's wedge on immigration and refugees and Rudd's New Leadership (which seems to be adding up to Howard lite with a few symbols and lower petrol and grocery prices).

Obama in the primaries seemed to hark back to a more idealistic time, i.e. the 1960s, the last time the world seemed 'fresh and bright', with his speeches which resonated with the echoes of Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King.

Now that he has the nomination wrapped up, there is growing concern that he will seek the safe harbour of business campaigning as usual. Two articles particularly caught my attention from Arianna Huffington and Paul Krugman.

Huffington wrote on 2 July:

But, as we've seen, Barack Obama is not immune to the seductive call of the Conventional Wisdom sirens. And it's a call that's only going to get louder. He'll hear it from the chorus of pundits standing outside his window -- folks like The New Republic's Noam Scheiber, who today counseled Obama that being labeled a "typical politician" is a very good thing for him because it will assure wary voters that he won't do anything rash.

While a few days Krugman was warning about the re-emergence of some typical Republican tactics and urges Obama to hang tough against them:

The willingness of the McCain campaign to engage in these tactics, employing such tainted spokesmen, tells us that the campaign has decided to go negative — specifically, to apply the strategy Karl Rove used so effectively in 2002 and 2004 (but not so effectively in 2006), that of portraying Democrats as unpatriotic.

It would, of course, be absurd for Obama to abandon his real strengths (the capacity to inspire people in particular) and play some second rate game. What's more, he will win, as Krugman suggests, by focusing on two big issues. The republicans, including John McCain own an economy headed towards recession and a war that has been the biggest international relations disaster by the US since Vietnam. That's why even if McCain gets up, the republicans will still get wiped in the House and the Senate. In addition, I would say that Obama is on a real winner talking about universal health care, rising inequality and a middle-class that has been under consistent attack throughout the Bush years.

If Obama gets diverted by conventional political wisdom, or by the republicans' politics of diversion, he will sag in the polls. He needs to keep the momentum rolling, and believe in the change.

Largest lobbyists linked to Labor

The Australian:

"TWO companies with strong links to the Rudd Government have emerged as the biggest lobbyists on the federal political scene, dwarfing most other players in terms of staff numbers and client lists. Labor campaign adviser Hawker Britton and government-linked Government Relations Australia are the big two in thelobbying world, each representing companies with billions of dollars in turnover in the corridors of power. The level of their interests has been revealed for the first time in the Register of Lobbyists, created by Kevin Rudd to increase transparency in the political process. It reveals the previously shadowy world of lobbying includes 132 companies employing 370 individuals who make their living attempting to influence government decisions. They work on behalf of 983 clients ranging from small industry associations to multinational mining giants.

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Don't write Rudd off just yet

Unleashed.

A first term in government is never easy, writes Trevor Cook.

"Commentators are not only suggesting that the Kevin Rudd honeymoon over but that his government might have already started down a path to ruination. A quick look at history, especially John Howard's first term, might give them reason to be a little more circumspect.

More...

Serena Williams won't vote on religious grounds

Serena Williams Supports Obama, But Won’t Vote.

Don’t expect to see Serena Williams lining up at a polling place November 4 because even though the tennis star has expressed support for Democrat Barack Obama, she says her religion prevents her from voting. “I’m a Jehovah’s Witness, so I don’t get involved in politics. We stay neutral. We don’t vote,” she commented recently when asked about the election. “So I’m not going to necessarily go out and vote for him (Obama). I would if it wasn’t for my religion.”

I don't get how it's not political to publicly support a candidate?

Obama ahead in race for electoral college votes

At dinner on Saturday night a Canberra political lobbyist told me that Obama can't win because he just won't win enough states to get there, a view I strongly disagreed with, so earlier this week I did up a state-of-play using the excellent pollster.com site. At about the same time, one of my other favourite sites, RealClearPolitics, put up its own analysis (presumably using the same poll reults).

That is Obama 238 (146 solid, 92 leaning), McCain 163 (93 solid, 70 leaning) and toss-up 137 (the magic number is 270). I had 3 less for Obama. The toss-up states are:

• Nevada (5 electoral college votes) - McCain +3 in latest poll, trend favours McCain
• Colorado (9) - Obama +2, trend favours McCain
• New Mexico (5) - Obama +8 (other recent polls are closer), trend favours Obama slightly
• Missouri (11) - McCain +7 (other recent polls are closer), trend favours Obama
  
• Minnesota (17) - Obama +1 (other recent polls are stronger for Obama), trend favours Obama
• Indiana (11) - Obama +1, trend is flatlining
• Ohio (20) - McCain +1, trend line favours Obama
• New Hampshire (4) - Obama +8, trend strongly favours Obama
  
• Virginia (13) - Obama +2, trend favours Obama
• North Carolina (15) - McCain +4, trend favours Obama slightly
• Florida (27) - McCain +8, trend favours Obama

Stand by folks, it's going to be an interesting time for election geeks, for people like us it's the biggest and best show on earth.

Update (Sat. 28/6) - here are two good articles on strategy and maths

• Mapping a win
• No, McCain isn't "Doomed'

The abuse of polls by the media

Pressuring politicians and populist terrorism - On Line Opinion - 26/6/2008.

Coverage without courage: the failure of the Canberra press gallery

The last few days have brought a lot more insights into the operations of the Rudd Government, and the failings of its media management in particular, neatly summed up on Crikey this morning:

Scrutiny of the way the Prime Minister's office operates continues in The Australian this morning with Crikey's dear departed Christian Kerr giving a version of dealings with Japanese journalists before and during the recent visit of Kevin Rudd to Tokyo. Rudd TV snub irks Japan it is headlined with the refusal to grant an interview to Japan's public broadcaster NHK linked with "disquiet in the top ranks of the Government and bureaucracy at the conduct of the Prime Minister's senior advisers." That disquiet was the basis of stories by John Lyons for the Weekend Australian -- Hostile approach to the media, Anger builds around Kevin Rudd as chaos reigns at the top and Captain Chaos and the workings of inner circle -- that are worth catching up on if you missed them.

This stuff is extraordinary but you wouldn't know it by following the Canberra Press Gallery, who have been studiously ignoring it. As Richard Farmer of Crikey noted:

Quite apart from the intriguing insights into the way the Rudd Government works, they (the stories) make you wonder about the cosy relationship between press and politicians in Canberra that makes it necessary to bring in an outsider (John Lyons, the Australian) to write stories like these.

Perhaps this excerpt from one of Lyons' pieces explains the nervousness of the press gallery:

The aggression has been experienced by many. One journalist said she felt highly intimidated by a conversation with Harris. He was unhappy with a story she'd written based on a leak from a Labor frontbencher. Harris wanted a meeting; they met in Aussie's cafe in Parliament House. She says he rarely made eye contact but what threw her off balance was that he almost whispered as he made it clear she would pay a price for writing the story.

"You know it's over for you," she says he told her. "Nobody's going to deal with you. We're not going to forget this." After regaining her composure, she told him: "Don't bully me. You're trying to bully me and I'm not going to take it."

All very melodramatic and Lachlan Harris (Rudd's media adviser) has obviously watching the West Wing too attentively, if not the Godfather. Does Harris put cotton wool in his cheeks when he has these little chats?

Still perhaps it works. The team on the ABC's Insiders yesterday managed to completely ignore this story. Too hot too touch? Perhaps the program should be re-named "the co-opted" or "the embedded".

In fact, most of the journalists Lyons interviewed for his Saturday stories didn't want to be named. The only noble exceptions were Chris Ulmann (ABC) and Kerry-anne Walsh (Sun-Herald). The rest ought to be ashamed of themselves. But it does show just how dependent the gallery is on the government of the day.

UPDATE: Andrew Bolt (Herald-Sun) one of the Insiders' panelists blogged about the issue yesterday afternoon.

Oh, and let’s not forget Harris’s own contribition to “reconciliation” that day - a typical bit of clever-dick hate-mongering of the sort you might expect from a 28-year-old who is too young, exciteable, tribal and intoxicated with a power gained far too early. Like this PM’s spokesman, perhaps?

UPDATE 2: Alex Mitchell writing in Crikey (subscription) reckons the Australian was too tough on Rudd's staff. Oh dear, pass the tissues.

Australia's parliament is representative, well, more or less

PM - Despite Neal attack, Hockey defends Parliament behviour. Here's Joe Hockey's summation last night:

But look I think you know everyone thinks a politician is an unfortunate creature unless they know that person and then they find that person's a pretty good person.

That's part of the burden of being a representative of the people.

I might add you know in politics you have a real cross section of society. So if Australian's are upset with the quality of their politicians then they should look at the people that they're electing and look at themselves.

Because quite frankly I think apart from a gender imbalance and probably an ethnic imbalance, the Parliament is actually a pretty true representative sample of the Australian people.

Well, quite frankly Joe, that's a pretty ridiculous thing to say.

Obama and the Internet

Unit Structurest:

"With all due respect to the other candidates, Obama has emerged as the brand of 2008. His message, youth and pan-cultural appeal have created a perfect storm, and now he's bigger than Apple, Google, Nike and Vitamin Water all put together. So lets get back to technology and directionality. In January I wrote a piece for TP called Social Networks and Youth Voter Activation. Rejecting the game-changer model, I argued that social networks act as harnesses for activated interest. If you've got a population that is activated by a brand, they'll turn to the information tools at hand to further that interest - through information seeking, friend-finding, volunteering, donating, etc. Therefore, the first part of Obama's success wasn't the tools he developed, but rather the tools that were at hand, that we all knew how to use - Facebook, YouTube, etc."

Interesting points.

Unleashed: Stuck in a climate change Rudd

Unleashed: Stuck in a climate change Rudd.

The then Opposition Leader, Kevin Rudd told his National Climate Change Summit in March 2007 that "climate change is the great moral challenge of our generation" but, in office, his approach has been both equivocal and confusing.

The personal cost of public service dissent

Seeking Asylum Down Under.

The risks inherent to dissent from the policies of any particular government are a conundrum faced by any public servant whose integrity and ethics are compromised by official policies and/or actions. However, failure to be true to one's self can have have bleak consequences for the dark nights of the soul.

Career damage and mental illness are just two possible scenarios faced by the disaffected officer. A severe loss of morale and a sense of guiding purpose are less tangible but equally debilitating outcomes. Someone thoroughly committed to their career can suddenly find themselves less than enthusiastic to carry out their duties and inclined toward a path of covert resistance to the dominant paradigm.

We need more dissenters.

Other things to read:

Asking awkward questions: the uncomfortable terrain of moral dissent

When the government changed, I inquired, perhaps naively, about possibilities to resume government work in my former areas of expertise, foreign policy and national security. A former professional colleague gave me good private advice. He said that while nobody doubted my integrity or moral passion, I needed to know that my SIEV X activity had aroused intense negative feelings against me in some senior official areas. Some saw my efforts to open up SIEV X to public scrutiny as a betrayal of trust. I had broken unwritten public service codes of conduct. The fear would be that I might do something like this again. A few things fell into place for me after that good advice. I did not apply for any government jobs.

LeakWatch

Iguanagate will cripple Iemma and his moribund government

This bizarre episode (see earlier post for disclaimers, background etc) now looks like becoming like pulling a single thread to unravel a whole garment.

Morris Iemma is a hopeless Premier leading a hopeless government (poor economic performance, hopeless public transport, a collapsing health system and so on). He has once again revealed that he has no leadership ability. His government is already wracked with division over energy privatisation and it is only going to get worse. Hitherto, only the breathtaking incompetence of the conservatives have kept it in office.

As I said previously, Della Bosca and Neal should have apologised immediately and effusively for any offence even if they are innocent. The reason is that the media and your political enemies always take the side of those throwing mud wherever and whenever they possibly can. They have a vested interest in seeing the scandal escalate and stay front page.

But not even Della Bosca could have anticipated the stupidity with which his own side of politic has dealt with this issue. First, Rudd played the 'counselling' card in an absurd (and obviously hypocritical) move. Neal is not a Ben Cousins or a Sam Newman. What's the point of counselling for an MP? She is either guilty of something or not. If she is guilty, she should be disendorsed. Though I suspect that Rudd will move against her on that front over the next year or so and she won't be the candidate for Robertson at the next election.

"Backdown" Rudd's ham-fisted approach is as nothing when compared with Iemma's effort yesterday.

As Paul Pearce (ALP member for Coogee) pointed out:

"I think the whole situation with Della could have been handled very differently," he said.

"My personal view is it's one hell of a beat-up. I, for the life of me, can't see what Della's alleged to have done wrong and to that extent I can't for the life of me see why he should be required to stand aside."

According to the Daily Telegraph decided to stand Della Bosca aside because his staff 'panicked'. Can you believe that?

Mr Della Bosca took Mr Iemma at his word (that he wouldn't be stood down) and went on Radio 2GB to defend himself. However when Mr Iemma arrived at work his panicked staff demanded action.

The proximate reason for acting against Della Bosca, that he failed to tell the Premier that he wrote the apology, is extremely offensive. It is common practice for someone seeking an apology, when they think they have been defamed, to write a draft of what they want. The fact that Della Bosca wrote a draft is not a substantive point.

Iemma 's leadership has been weakened further, and probably fatally, by his behaviour. It is difficult to see from this point how he can survive.

His enemies in caucus will use this affair to undermine him and Della Bosca's supporters won't feel an obligation to stay loyal.

In politics, small incidents can spark very big consequences.

"Backdown" Rudd at it again

Two equals one in Labor's classroom | theage.com.au.

THE Federal Government appears to be backing away from its election promise to provide a computer for every senior secondary student, with Education Minister Julia Gillard now conceding the plan is a "long-term vision" that might not be achieved in Labor's first term.

It looks like Howard's core and non-core promises approach has found its new incarnation under Rudd as 'short-term' and 'long-term' goals.

Rudd has also conceded defeat on whaling:

Now, six months after promising to take up the fight against whaling in the Southern Ocean with a vigour unseen in decades, Rudd left Tokyo yesterday with no visible diplomatic gain.

It's another example that Rudd vastly over-estimates his diplomatic skills.

Rudd makes it to the Huffington Post by denying sexism

Colleague accuses Australia PM of sexism - World on The Huffington Post.

CANBERRA, Australia — Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was accused by a government colleague Thursday of applying a sexist double standard by insisting that a woman lawmaker seek anger management counseling when male politicians' similar behavior has been overlooked.

Rudd took the extraordinary step Wednesday after the lawmaker Belinda Neal became the focus of a series of media reports alleging threatening or violent behavior.

Now it's an international story, just shows how out-of-control the whole thing has become.

The Belinda Neal frenzy has gone too far

First, a disclaimer, I have known John Della Bosca for 34 years and his wife Belinda Neal for 25 years. I am on friendly terms with both of them and always have been. Second, I'm not going to link to stuff. If you want to read the background, the reportage and the commentary from all the usual columnists you can easily google it. (I should also say that I often take my mum to Iguana's for lunch on Sundays, I've always found it very pleasant.)

If Belinda has behaved badly she should be criticised and censured for it, and as a public person she has to expect public criticism and censure but I believe that as this saga drags on it is becoming ugly villification and little more than a witchhunt.

In retrospect, John and Belinda would have probably done better to have used a classic crisis management tactic of simply admitting some fault, apologising for any offence and moving on. It's hard to do if you don't think you are in the wrong, or that the blame should be shared, but it takes the heat out of the situation.

In particular, and relevant in this case, the quick apology denies your enemies the opportunity to keep feeding  the media that just wants this stuff to keep providing headlines.

All the gossip that has come out has been contradicted by others but it is always the person making the allegations that gets the prime position in the coverage.

I also think the intervention of the Prime Minister yesterday was utterly foolish and unhelpful and just kept the whole thing going for a few more days.

It is also hypocritical. Rudd afterall has some anger management and relationship building issues of his own. After all, why has he had six appointment secretaries in six months?  And does he think that giving the whole public service a flea in the ear, as he did at a recent media conference, really the way to handle relationship difficulties? Perhaps, Kevin 24/7 could get some counselling himself?

Let's criticise bad behaviour but let's keep some perspective on it.

Update. Rudd's over-reaction has prompted Iemma to outdo the PM's overreaction by standing Della Bosca aside on spurious grounds. Again, Della Bosca and Neal should have apologised on Sunday. This is a classic case of how an issue can spin crazily out of control and become a vertiginous nightmare.

Saturday morning update: Iemma crippled by Iguanagate