Trotter on Labour

Chris Trotter has blogged a scathing column on Labour called Labour’s nightmarish road trip: From “Broad Church” to “Shopping Mall”:

WHAT’S the matter with Labour? Why is it making so little impression on even its hard-core supporters? And can anyone explain why Labour’s strategists still believe it’s intelligent politics to have their MPs recorded, singing songs, on a bus, in the Tory-blue heart of Taranaki?

I don’t know whose strategy it was, but I’d like to buy them a drink 🙂

Even so, you would think that any political party planning a “Regional Road-Trip” might do just a little bit of “advance” work. Like sending someone to have a chat with Davey Hughes, the telegenic proprietor of the Swazi clothing factory in Levin. It’s really quite important to know how someone like Hughes is going to respond before your Leader, in front of a pack of amused reporters, asks him what he would like Labour to do for small business – and discovers it involves ripping the guts out of the Employment Relations Act.

That’s funny enough, and then the killer blow.

After all, how hard would it have been for the Labour Whip, Darren Hughes, to quietly sound out his Uncle Davey on the subject?

Ouch.

And while the newly-elected MP for Mt Albert, David Shearer, plays a mean guitar, what on earth were his colleagues thinking of singing Take Me Home, Country Roads and Hotel California? I mean – John Denver and The Eagles! Could they have possibly screamed “Hey everybody – we come from the 1970s!” any louder?

It could have been worse, I suppose. They could have been recorded singing Kumbaya and If I had a Hammer.