During this year’s Queens Birthday weekend (30 May to 1 June in Wellington) a remarkable event took place – Tribute08, a reunion and commemoration for Vietnam veterans and their families.  I was fortunate enough to be closely involved as the communications director for the event, but it is as an ordinary citizen of this country that there is much to note and appreciate. 

I’ve left my website alone for months. I’ve been telling anyone who might be faintly interested that the pause was due to other distractions and the fact that I’ve wanted to prepare properly for the day I commit to making postings on a regular basis.

But this morning’s article in the Dominion Post ‘outing’ me as a strategist for the Labour Party’s election campaign kicks me in the pants to get blogging.

This announcement by the Prime Minister has no doubt been prompted by the Sunday Star Times story on Crosby Textor, the infamous Australian team. This outfit operates with a bag of dirty tricks and appears to impose a strategy on their political pay-masters so that the campaign operates as a ‘construct’. Clearly this has worked for John Key to date, but an election campaign is not the same. A little substance and, dare I say it, policy may be required from National to hold an electorate that’s very softly, but numerically in support of a change of government.

No doubt the coming general election will be more than interesting. Although ironically enough, it may be notable for the way the least interested of voters behave. That’s certainly going to be one of Labour’s major challenges; how to engage those voters who appear to be not at all interested – these are the people who will either not vote or who may simply say “we’re voting this government out”, even if they don’t understand a thing about the opposition.

So keep coming back because I promise to post regular comments. It won’t often be about politics or the campaign, but about my broader interests in life, our communities and marketing. In the coming week I’ll talk about an important issue – the emergence of new ethnic communities and my role as Chairman of the Advisory Board for the Centre for Applied Cross Cultural Research. Also, I’ll talk about FRESCO’s recent involvement in Tribute08, the commemoration and reunion for Vietnam Veterans.