Managing expectations

I’m finding the desperate spin of the Opposition Organ Op-Ed Orchestra rather amusing at the moment. Spot the difference:

1. If Kevin07 fails to bring peace to Zimbabwe, cut world petrol prices and give all working families a pony, then he is an embarrassing excuse for a leader whose backbenchers will revolt in an expression of long-withheld disgust at his patheticness.
2. If the Coalition manages to hang on to the safe seat of Gippsland in the upcoming by-election then Brendan Nelson’s leadership will have been given a resounding huzzah by Mr and Mrs Voter, and he will be crowned the King of Lollipop-Land.

Regarding (2), Glenn Milne says that the Coalition is “cautiously optimistic” about retaining a seat which has never ever been held by Labor and which experienced only the slightest of swings towards Labor in the last election. Fancy that.

As the bastard son so succinctly notes:

Glenn Milne and Piers Ackerman are helping their masters by playing the game of expectations. It goes like this, you raise the bar so high for Labor by saying they will fail if they don’t achieve near impossible tasks, but also that the Liberals are successful by achieving insignificant, easy tasks.

They’re trying very very hard to manage those expectations, but it doesn’t seem to be doing much good. Poor pundits. Why won’t the public listen and send the polls in the direction the OO wants them to go?

There are actual substantive criticisms that can be made about the Rudd government’s policy initiatives and implementation in various areas. Why do these OO people do so little of that and so much trivial whingeing?

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Tagged as: ackerman, backbenchers, bastard son, brendan nelson, disgust, gippsland, glenn milne, impossible tasks, last election, liberals, mr and mrs, piers, playing the game, policy initiatives, pundits, revolt, rudd, spot the difference, working families, world petrol prices