journalists

Rodney Hide carries on with his column explaining the stupidity of journalists when it comes to policy:

[R]eporters are a different kettle of fish.

They spend their lives reporting politics. It’s their job. You would think they would have a basic grasp of the difference between good policy and bad policy and some understanding of how policies impact society.  They talk and write as if they do. Turns out they don’t.

They don’t have a clue.

I vividly remember the first hour or two of my first end-of-year Parliamentary Press Gallery party.

A senior and respected political reporter bowled up to me. She was puzzled, she slurred. Why was the ACT Party so against Maori?

I was nonplussed.  I had just walked in. I naively explained that nothing could be further from the truth.

I realise now that my reply would have just proved for her that I was both a liar and a fake.

“Of course, you are,” she blurted.  “You guys don’t want Maori Doctors!”

I was more confused than ever — I still hadn’t got a drink.  I declared confidently that no one from ACT had ever said such a thing.

Oh but she said, you are against quotas for Maori getting into medical school.

I realised then that I had led a sheltered life before Parliament. I had never before come face-to-face with such mind-numbing stupidity.

I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know how to begin to discuss affirmative action with someone adult and so manifestly stupid.

I explained why quotas don’t work, why they don’t address the problem of underachievement, why they are counter-productive and why, actually, anyone supporting quotas was racist.

The ACT party, I said, was gloriously the only party in Parliament that wasn’t racist and fervently believed that the law should be applied fairly and equally to all.

It was only the ACT Party that demonstrably believed that Maori were every bit as capable as everyone else. She clearly did not.

But her eyes had glazed completely over and her mind had left the party as soon as I started to reason and to explain.  It was too tough for her.