Years ago, as an earnest young speechwriter, it was easy to become enchanted by the examples of elder Labor writers — not least because the party’s worship of men such as Graham Freudenberg and Don Watson meant the valourisation of my craft. To drink from the fountain of myth could make me feel better about abridging media releases on daylight savings.
The long ascent of pollsters and ad agencies, and the primacy of advisors versus mandarins, has helped estrange us from history, policy and articulacy. Curiously, in trying to automate the divination and leveraging of public opinion, it has estranged leaders from the public.It’s also been ruinous to the speechwriter. There’s no shortage of potential speechwriting talent in this country, but there’s a shortage of interest in empowering them.
Also memorable was Morrison’s “we are all Victorians”, a platitude that quickly curdled into a lie, when within days the PM did what no Victorian could do, which was to drink beer and wave a scarf at the footy . Let’s go, Sharks! Recent history is unflattering. Rudd’s speech was often a jambalaya of technocratic jargon and implausible slang — his national apology a famous exception — while Gillard’s speech was distinguished by a radical lack of ambition. Her language was fatally tormented by caution, like a kid who kills their pet bug by placing it in a jam jar, and it’s no coincidence that her most memorable speech was unprepared.
Poetry and rhetoric are about as useful as dance when it comes to governing. I understand that journalists like words, but their fetishes shouldn't be thrust upon us all.
The dream spell is broken.