July 27, 2008
Scandal Abatement
In case you hadn't put it together, the PLP have decided to restart election antics, aka The Silly Season (party website hysteria, restarting the UBP and 8,000 new Bermudians lie, two defensive op-eds (here and here) in The Great Satan The Royal Gazette in two days, rolling out Julian Hall in the Mid Ocean News); all in an effort to repel the elitism label (psst, it isn't the UBP and the "UBP friendly media" giving you that label, it's labour and your own MPs).
Presumably the Premier is taking a page from his foreign consulting friends and reusing his work from the 2007 election campaign with the window for a party leadership challenge approaching.
I'm not sure who the audience is here, presumably party delegates and reporters looking to fill column inches with internal party battle stories during the long dog days of a Parliament-less summer.
Somehow I don't see the "Oh my God the UBP are out to get you" meme being as successful. The Opposition are apparently in an extended session of navel gazing while the PLP fire Bermudians by the dozen for those more capable American consultants.
I was going to dissect the media strategy, which is so painfully contrived that it can literally be turned on overnight, going from zero to 200 MPH in 24 hours, but a reader decided to demonstrate it graphically for us (click on the image for a full size link):
