Labor Calls for Youtube Election Debate
Labor Calls for Youtube Election Debate
Month Date, 2007: The internet is fast becoming the battleground of choice for politicians, Labor’s call for a series of election debates, one of which to be broadcast on Youtube is the latest in its push to force an election date.
Labor has intensified its pressure on the Liberal government to announce an election date by calling for a series of Election Debates, one of which it wants broadcast over the internet on video sharing site, Youtube. Whilst traditional media such as print and television still play a massive role in an electoral campaign, the use of the internet in election campaigns is rising. The internet is such a major part of how people communicate, view media and share ideas that politicians place more importance on their online image then ever before.
The call comes in the midst of a high pressure week for the Liberal Party as Prime Minister, John Howard’s retirement announcement added to further rumours of a leadership challenge from Treasuer Peter Costello or Environmental Minister, Malcom Turnbull which has raised eyebrows about the stability amongst the upper ranks of the Liberal Party.
"John Howard asked me to go to this election with him as his deputy leader and his Treasurer; last year I said I would. I will, and that's it. The position today is the same as it was last week, the same as it was the year before," Costello told Channel Nine.
Last week’s announcement of the Google ‘e-election site’ has received endorsements from both sides and now boasts channels from Labor, Liberal, The Nationals, Family First, The Deomcrats and The Greens. These channels link to Youtube video sites for each of the parties and are lathered in election materials. Considering Google bought Youtube for $US 1.65 Billion, it’s no great surprise that its main election coverage site acts as a hub to direct users towards Youtube sites.
“This will be, probably, a Google election” said Peter Garret, Shadow Minister for the Environment, the Arts & Climate Change.
The Liberal Party site greets you with a rolling tape of Howard reassuring voters that everything is peachy, whilst the Labor site rolls footage of a very confused looking Howard. The Labor Party site already has 49,876 views, whereas the Liberal Party is lagging behind with only 6,856 views, notably the Labor site was up and running in June while Liberal’s came online in August. Both sites are merely an addition to the online arsenal of the major parties, with official sites, fan sites, social networking sites such as Facebook and Myspace all being commonplace for the candidates.
Headshots of candidates with clever one-liners are nothing new, but instead of seeing them taped to power polls and chain fences, get used to seeing virtual John’s and Kevin’s as the election campaign is only just getting started. Despite the fact the Liberal government has been burning dollars on telling us how great things are, and the Labor party on telling us how great they aren’t the election itself is still uncalled. The Liberal government has the ability to hold off on calling it until January and until the polls start to improve we may have to consider this as a possibility.
While the Australian federal election has yet to be officially called, it’s obvious to everyone that the campaign is in full swing from both sides. Neither candidate should worry about having a support network to commiserate an election loss, as according to their official Myspace websites, Howard has 15,996 friends and Rudd has 16,447 of his own.