Detective Clare at work
August 3rd, 2011 at 11:50 am by David FarrarClare Curran blogs:
The public relations firm paid $10,000 to broker John Key’s appearance on the Letterman Show was Hill & Knowlton, the PR firm that became notorious for its involvement in the Kuwaiti embassy’s lobbying of congress to provoke a military response to the Iraq invasion back in 1991.
This involved creating an artificial scandal over Iraq troops murdering Kuwaiti babies in incubators, using the Kuwaiti ambassador’s family as stooges claiming to have witnessed these atrocities.
Congress bought it, and Hill & Knowlton was rewarded handsomely for their assistance in facilitating a military response.
Even Crosby Textor looks tame compared with these guys.
Boy that John Key is a real evil bastard. As Tourism NZ engaged Hill & Knowlton to work for them in the US, John Key is complicit in falsely claiming the murder of Kuwaiti babies in incubators.
This strategy is only slightly more subtle than Labour MP Stuart Nash, who tweeted yesterday:
Key is such a smug prick
It looks like Labour are planning a repeat of their 2008 campaign.
Tags: Clare Curran, John Key, Stuart Nash
August 3rd, 2011 at 11:57 am
This is what it has come to. Devoid of decent policy, Labour has nothing else to offer but abuse and personal attacks. What an election winning strategy.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:01 pm
They seriously don’t get it. Labour – it’s not about you and what you think about John Key. It’s about us – the citizens of NZ – and more particularly the taxpayers who pay your salary. It’s about how much of the economy you think you should control. It’s about how much money you want to take control of, and what you want to spend it on.
Talk about that and maybe we’ll start listening.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:07 pm
Stuart Nash is obviously miffed that his leader Goff can’t get a spot on any show so perhaps we could help the Labour team in some way by suggesting they contact Julie Christie of Touchdown productions to organise a reality show for them.
Vote:A good name for that show could be “Desparate Islands” starring Trev Mallard where all Labour MP’s undergo survival training to determine wether they have the goods for the next three years. At the end of the show non performers get shown the door.
August 3rd, 2011 at 12:08 pm
It seems the H in H-Fee this year is going to stand for Herp Derp.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:09 pm
Labour are so out of ideas, they are now repeating bad ideas of old.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:11 pm
The point here being that they don’t even have a remotely plausible tie to John Key. Is there any suggestion that the agency has recently changed, that the National government even selected this group? Or are we going to find that Tourism NZ have been using the same company for the last 7 years, and Labour are going to look stupid again? I mean, really, have they done even basic research, and basic thinking about what the obvious responses to an attack like this are?
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:12 pm
What is it with Labour MPs and their obsession with male genetalia and comparing people to them?
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:14 pm
This would be the same Hill & Knowlton that has offices in every major city across the globe doing plain vanilla FMCG PR? I guess that’s just a front for the evil and nefarious parts of the business that pay the real dollars, eh Clare?
In fact, such is the reach of Hill & Knowlton, coupled with the fact that Clare is a PR veteran of HUGE standing in her profession, I bet she actually has friends that work for Hill & Knowlton.
Hill & Knowlton is massive – the numbers of New Zealanders that work for it, despite it not having an office in this country, would be in the hundreds. It might even top 1000. Are they all evil Clare? Shit you’re in idiot. Your own colleagues must roll their eyes at the mere mention of your latest scoop.
And you have the temerity to question the news judgment of the major broadcasters in this country! Pathetic. Just pathetic.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:17 pm
It looks like Labour are planning a repeat of their 2008 campaign
Understatement alert!!!
In light of the ongoing campaign of hate-postings on TheStranded and Red Alert it’s safe to assume that the 2008 campaign was never concluded. It’s segued into a continuous campaign of vilification and intolerance of any opinion that differs even slightly from leftist views.
As James Delingpole observed of the liberal-left a month ago:
To be on the liberal-left is not to trade in logic or reason or evidence-based argument. Essentially, it is about parading your own moral and socio-political virtue by being seen to express the “right” thoughts on any given subject – and by damning anyone who disagrees with you as a racist/homophobe/LittleEnglander/denier/fill-in-appropriate-noun-here.
One need look no further than the speed with which dissenting opinions are abused or moderated out of existence on leftist blogs right here in NZ.
I had to laugh at Annette King’s comments last week – bugger the polls…the feedback we’re getting doesn’t reflect the ratings. Well dur! Annette, the feedback you’re getting doesn’t reflect the wider opinion of the electorate either!
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:17 pm
Do you mean to say that Phillie Goffie has been reduced by Q+A to the level of Christopher Monckton (They will not unterview him!). Tell me when did Goffie last star in an Oxford Union debate????
Typical of LW entertainer (aka in TV/Radio speak, “journalists”) BS.
And in respect of Labour’s money guru, Nash, (My God, his grandfather, whom I met several times, would turn in his grave at his ineptitude), does he not know that for every dollar of tax collected only 75-80% is available to the Government after bureaucratic costs?
Bet they have not factored that in (Source: IRD + Treasury).
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:20 pm
Curran continues to behave like a Wally. Perhaps her next jersey worn in parliament could be the famous red and white hooped pattern worn by the titular character.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:22 pm
A good name for that show could be “Desparate Islands” starring Trev Mallard where all Labour MP’s undergo survival training to determine wether they have the goods for the next three years. At the end of the show non performers get shown the door.
Actually…at the end of the show non performers would get a high place on the list.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:23 pm
“This involved creating an artificial scandal over Iraq troops murdering Kuwaiti babies in incubators, using the Kuwaiti ambassador’s family as stooges claiming to have witnessed these atrocities.”
How dare they smear Saddam Hussein and his valiant army that liberated Kuwait!
Vote:After they gassed the Kurds and ‘eliminated’ the marsh Arabs and Shiites, they raped, tortured, pillaged and murdered to their hearts content in Kuwait.
That was all OK until the “artificial scandal over Iraq troops murdering Kuwaiti babies in incubators” came up.
Right, they needed a ‘artificial scandal’ to justify ‘liberating’ Kuwait.
August 3rd, 2011 at 12:25 pm
OMG! And these idiots would have us believe that they are fit to run the country.
Based on their collective performance to date, it’s obvious that they believe that, if they fling sufficient innuendo and lies around about the PM, then sooner or later some of the most gullible will start to believe it. Didn’t work last time – despite the best efforts of head grinch and Mike Williams. Won’t work this time either. Doh!
Trevor Mallard – Campaign Manager. What a total joke.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:27 pm
I posted this on the Red Alert thread here after WhaleOil had made a reference to Labour’s “stealing underpants” strategy. It seems to be the character from whom Trevor Mallard is taking inspiration:
To his credit, Nash has since admitted on Red Alert that calling Key a “prick” was ill-advised. But really; you have to wonder how far further Labour can sink.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:33 pm
Stuart Nash tweets: “Key is such a smug prick…”
Don’t you just love the stench of envy?
Newsflash Stuart: If you actually got off your arse and started to talk about alternate policy options, then maybe (just maybe) you could gain some traction and credibility. But based on this latest effort, I don’t think your own chances of survival are that flash at all.
What a prat.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 12:52 pm
Clare Curran is supposed to be one of their rising stars. But eventually the sheeple will vote them back in on the promise of $50 an hour and not having to work for it, or some similar policy.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 1:03 pm
I hope Labour carry on with their campaign. let their loss (and the greens) be devasting.
Vote:sad about the asset sales though.
August 3rd, 2011 at 1:39 pm
Stuart Nash tweets: “Key is such a smug prick…”
To paraphrase Sir Robert Menzies: Is it surprising considering the opposition that he has in parliament.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 1:47 pm
I don’t get it – is Clare stating that the invading Iraqi occupation forces were not in the wrong?
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 2:31 pm
Stuart Nash tweets: “Key is such a smug prick…” Translation he keeps telling the truth.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 2:31 pm
Clare,Clare, Clare – mind you what else would we expect from a woman who tells us that “If you control the language, you control the message. The media doesn’t create the message, they run with it”.
and
“This … is about Labour taking greater charge of the language of debate and discussion in New Zealand. It is called ‘re-framing’ and it means gaining (or regaining) the use of concepts and phrases that spark public and media interest. If you control the language, you control the message. The media doesn’t create the message, they run with it”.
and
“Labour’s ideas are the ones that should shape the nation’s future. One of Labour’s key goals should be to define the public debate in our terms”
Yep Clare, you’re trying girl, but as usual for the left you arrogantly assume the electorate are as thick as bricks. Your nasty “reframing” of the Letterman/NZ Tourism/John Key to baby murderer is just plain ignorant, and shows that post-Helen Labour have not moved on at all from the “cancerous, corrosive,last cab off the rank” days.
Keep it up girl.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 2:34 pm
Hold up, I know this may have been dealt with in a previous thread/time period; but wouldn’t tweeting that the Prime Minister of our country is a ‘smug prick’, while in the debating chamber, constitute misconduct or slander?
tweets are usually exempt but wouldn’t this be over the line a bit?
And Clare Curran is just another socialist dirt-digging, mud-slinging, waste of taxpayer money; to put it mildly. it would pay to ignore their red alert posts, it is merely a window into the inside of their minds……
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 2:44 pm
Holy shit!
And there I WAS a one-time employee of Hill & Knowlton not even realising the evil empire I was working for. My likeing for medium-rare steaks is obviously a hangover from the time that I was eating babies for a living, and that work I was doing that I thought involved promoting New Zealand business overseas was obviously a front for promoting global nuclear destruction. I really should have asked for a few extra million in addition to the “handsome rewards” I got for working with them.
@ Aubernon…. quite right. Clare is proof that those who can do, while those who can’t leech
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 2:45 pm
Yeah, it’s not exactly news that a large US PR firm has got up to dodgy tricks in the past. They probably have industry awards to show for it.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 2:50 pm
Batman – excellent point. I blogged about it immediately after Nash’s tweet yesterday. He was referring to Key’s replies to Phil Goff during Q1 of Question Time. Nash was in the House at the time. He was tweeting in OUR time, given that MP’s are paid by the taxpayer. In all probability, the phone or computer used to tweet was one provided by Parliamentary Services. Perhaps a complaint to Mr Speaker is in order, as IMHO he certainly used unparliamentary language, and brought the House, indirectly, into disrepute.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 3:10 pm
The more crap and smear tactics that Labour throws at John Key, their chances of surviving after the election is virtually nil.
This is scratch your eyes out – gutter politics and I expect better from an MP. Even a low life such as Curran.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 4:46 pm
I guess it could be worst, imagine you are a Melon and dream of finally enforcing your lunacy by way of the Liarbore party. Another four years in the political wilderness thanks to a totally inept coalition partner must be the stuff of their nightmares.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 5:09 pm
No doubt Labour will make a lot of HAY out of the coming whitewash in CHCH over the Collapse of the CTV building.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 5:33 pm
Oh dear, but I have it on good authority that the satellite that transferred the Letterman programme to New Zealand was placed in orbit by NASA, this is the same NASA that used German scientists who were found at the end of WW2. These scientists developed weapons for the Nazi’s that were used to bomb England!
How could John Key allow himself to be associated with these people!
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 5:58 pm
I wonder when the Hill and Knowlton contract was let?
Vote:Since it was a retainer rather than a one-off contract like Labour keep implying … wouldn’t it be cool of H&K were engaged on Labour’s watch!
Neil
August 3rd, 2011 at 7:24 pm
Yeah, and BMW built aircraft engines for the Luftwaffe.
So I expect Curran will hereby renounce any intention of having her arse driven about in one in the unlikely event these idiot tactics ever lands it on the Treasury benches.
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 8:32 pm
Oh dear, Clare. What a nasty little hypocrite you are. Shall we look at other portfolios? What might we find?
http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/PB/Business/QWA/5/6/8/568230b1cd16474abc01e568c80847c8.htm
Vote:August 3rd, 2011 at 8:44 pm
And it would seem that the villainy of Hill & Knowlton did not dissuade the last Labour government from appointing a former chair of that co to be NZ Ombusdman (see para 5)
Vote:http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/PB/Debates/Debates/Speeches/0/4/5/48HansS_20071011_00000921-Chauvel-Charles-Appointments-Ombudsman.htm
August 4th, 2011 at 12:24 am
she’s no good looking
(to be polite)
http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/5109781/Dunedin-MP-removed-from-Parliament-for-wearing-rugby-jersey
Vote: