John MacDonald: Voters see and hear what they want to see and hear

If you want proof that people will see what they want to see and hear what they want to hear, I’ve got it for you.

And it’s to do with last night’s leaders’ debate on TV3. Which, by the way, blew last week’s debate on TV1 out of the water, didn't it?

Not just because Chris Hipkins appeared to be awake this time. But also because it had a much better structure and didn’t waste time on pointless questions about what book the two leaders are reading at the moment.

Yes, there was quite a bit of Chris Hipkins and Christpher Luxon talking over eachother. Especially at the start. But Paddy Gower didn’t let them get away with not answering questions.

Although there were a couple of times when he realised he wasn’t going to get an answer. But that spoke volumes and so he let it be. In fact, someone texted me afterwards saying they thought Paddy was the winner on the night.

But, right from the start, Chris Hipkins showed that he had obviously listened to Helen Clark who, apparently, called him up after last week’s debate and said he’d been as weak as tea and needed to harden up.

I made that bit up about her saying he was as weak as tea last week. But it is being reported today that Helen Clark was so unimpressed last week that she got on the blower and gave Hipkins a bit of a talking to.

And he listened. And he was much stronger last night. Much stronger.

And, as always happens, people are asked who they thought won the thing. Which I’ll get to.

But first, I’ve got to say that aside from beating TV1 with the debate itself, TV3 also beat TV1 hands-down when it came to the panel they put together to provide analysis afterwards.

You’ll remember last week how we had Tau Henare and David Cunliffe going into overdrive with the sporting analogies, which was just cringe-material, wasn’t it?

Last night, TV3 had Josie Pagani, Julian Wilcox and Janet Wilson. And there were zero sporting analogies. Which was brilliant in itself.

And, as I say, the inevitable question was asked: who did they think won? And they all pretty much said Hipkins was the winner. I agreed with them, though, when they said that Hipkins performed more like an Opposition leader and Luxon performed more like a Prime Minister.

But, overall, they thought Hipkins was the winner.

And then you read all the analysis by all the other political commentators. And they’re saying the same thing. Luxon wasn’t necessarily bad, but Hipkins upped his game big time from last week and they’re all saying he was definitely the winner on the night.

Which brings me to what I was saying earlier about people —especially voters— seeing what they want to see and hearing what they want to hear. And the evidence today that that is definitely what happens.

There’s an online poll running on the NZ Herald website, asking people who they think won last night’s debate.

And the results, so far, are the complete opposite of what all the commentators are saying.

When I last checked, 62% of people were saying that they thought Christopher Luxon won the debate, and 32% were saying Chris Hipkins was the winner.

Which I think says a lot about how effective these debates are when it comes to informing voters. I know they’re promoted as being the big chance to find out which leader sings from your songsheet, but I don’t think they are at all.

Wherever you are on the political spectrum, how could anyone think that —based just on what we saw last night— how could anyone think that Chris Hipkins wasn’t the winner on the night?

Yes, I’m just as tired of Labour as the next person. I’m just as cynical as you are of all the about-turns Labour has done in the last few weeks, desperately trying to stay in government.

And, like most people, I think Labour’s GST off fruit and veggie policy is just lame. It’s sudden interest in having more cops - I think that’s rich coming from a party that’s been in government for the past six years.

In fact, I’ll go as far as saying that I don’t think Labour even deserves another shot.

But, even then, I can still see Chris Hipkins’ performance last night for what it was and acknowledge that, yes, he was definitely the winner on the night.

But it seems —going by this poll on the Herald website— that the majority of voters can’t do that. And that the majority of voters watch things like these televised debates and see what they want to see and hear what they want to hear.

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