Federal Government

PROVEN: How Barack Obama’s golf game proved Peter Phelps right

Playing golf a lot is a good way for any US President to be mocked for taking a rather too leisurely approach to their responsibilities.

President George W. Bush and other Presidents before him were lampooned for it.

BIG O’s GOT GAME
But the younger and hipper President Barack Obama has played a lot more golf than his predecessor with CBS reporting:

President Barack Obama has only been in office for just over nine months, but he’s already hit the links as much as President Bush did in over two years.

SO DOES PHELPS
That’s particularly interesting after highly regarded Liberal Senator Michael Ronaldson staffer Peter Phelps has been attacked for writing in a memo to colleagues on their media strategy:

You don’t get news stories by trying to change perceptions, you get them by reinforcing stereotypes…

The meeja is outraged mainly because Phelps is so vulgar as to tell it how it is. He then outlines in a private memo a range of stories that could help the Opposition connect with voters on issues that matter to them.

The Obama as slacker and golf-bludger story doesn’t fit with our stereotype of a young, athletic and energetic President he most certainly appears to be. So that story gets no traction at all.

But President Bush, characterised as stupid despite his Ivy League university degrees, indolent despite a gruelling work schedule, was repeatedly pinged for playing golf and spending time at his ranch in Texas.

PHELPS IS RIGHT
Definitely a different standard is applied. And that proves Phelps right. Prejudices are hard to shift, so a perfectly legitimate, perhaps the only sensible, media strategy is to run with them to make your point.

Not all stereotypes are bad or even wrong. Phelps talks about public service “fat cats”. Certainly it’s a stereotype and certainly not universally true. But try entering the Victorian Government dominated Southern Cross building at 5pm on a weekday and you’ll confront a human tsunami so great that it will convince you that public service clock-watching is alive and well for some. And that it’s better to attempt entry after 5.30pm for reasons of public safety. Anyway, for the Libs, bad-intentioned, big, lazy government is not a bad preconceived notion to tap into, even if there are a thousand obvious exceptions to the rule.

Phelps is identifying a big part of the Liberals’ trouble. They’re not in government anymore in Canberra. And they need to start acting as if they are. They’re not nimble enough, subversive enough, cheeky enough, tough enough. Making the fatal mistake on the Godwin Grech issue might mean they’ll over-compensate by being too careful.

Anyway, that’s what Liberal staffers tell VEXNEWS is increasingly an issue. They enviously look at the serious trouble the US Republicans have been able to cause a very popular new President and wonder how they can get in the same game. They’re not even close just yet.

There’s nothing wrong with holding your opponents accountable as long as your facts are straight.

Malcolm Turnbull’s office would be better off listening to Phelps than singing to the Gallery’s disapproving tune. Phelps seems to be cursed with the frustrating ailment of being right but ignored at exactly the wrong time for the Federal Opposition.

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