A half denial
Whale Oil has a scan of a letter to a newspaper from one of the Standard authors. It is a classic case of denying something one has not been accused of and refusing to comment on what actually was alleged. He says that The Standard is not funded or directed by the Labour Party. But that is not what I claimed a few weeks ago. What I claimed was that two of the bloggers there are Beehive staffers, a third is a Labour Party Head Office manager and one or two others are employees of Labour’s largest union affilitate.
What is interesting is that on five occasions the Prime Minister’s chief press secretary has been asked by media to deny that Beehive staff blog at The Standard, and on every occasion they have chosen not to comment rather than deny it. I guess there is a reason they passed up the opportunity to say “Farrar fucked up and has it all wrong, none of our staff are involved”.
Amusingly the letter to the editor claims The Standard is the most read political website in New Zealand. That is also as amusing as the claim that they ensure comments from readers are civil, as the author of the letter repeatedly makes references in the comments there to my weight and girth. And he is one of the moderators!!
I have no particular desire to get consumed in a flame war with The Standard. My issues are not with the authors (I have had perfectly civil conversations with Clinton, think “Eddie” is a lovely person and many of my friends who know “All your base” speak highly of him) but over the decision not to be transparent over the involvement of ministerial staff in the blog.
This will probably come off as patronising, but I offer it as sincere advice. Their biggest weakness at the moment is their shrillness, and aggressiveness. And this is often a function of mainly being anonymous. One of the good things about blogging under either your name, or with your associations known, is it moderates what you say. But each to their own – my unsolicited advice to them is probably as welcome as pork chops at a synagogue 🙂
Danyl (who is definitely on the left) at the Dim-Post did a scathing post on The Standard last week. I will resist quoting large segments of it here. Rather than flame him for his comments (and they were well very very robust), it might be worth considering what motivated him to make them, and the fact he is far from the only person on the left who thinks that way.
On a more positive note, I am enjoying the new gblog for Green Party members. Not that I agree with much said there, but I do think it is good value. Oh, and talking of the Greens, if you really want to be scared, read on Frog Blog about the first time Metira Turei had sex. I hope this won’t be a precedent for other MPs to detail their first time 🙂