The Maiki Sherman resignation isn't a story about one journalist. It's a story about the photocopy of the Trumpian ecosystem being assembled in Aotearoa. Ani O'Brien is a core node in that structure. Blog post below. #nzpol culture-centered.blogspot.co…

I have been tracking this rebrand since the name change. Nine months. I have a spreadsheet. 340 entries. Every word choice. Every capitalization decision. Every shift in vocabulary from the old messaging. My wife asked why I track government press releases at 2 AM. I said I'm watching the greatest brand repositioning of my lifetime and I will not miss a single data point. Let me walk through what's happening here because I don't think people appreciate the CRAFT. Step 1: They renamed "Defense" to "War." Everyone said that's aggressive. No. That's POSITIONING. "Defense" was the old buyer persona — an audience that wants to feel protected. Reactive. Safe. "War" is the new buyer persona — an audience that wants to feel strong. Chosen. On offense. Same product. Different packaging. One word. $0 cost. Total brand transformation. I have this on Slide 3. I've presented Slide 3 to four audiences. Two got uncomfortable. The other two work in defense contracting. They took notes. Step 2: Naked "War" doesn't sell. You need value language. "Arsenal of Freedom." Arsenal is the product truth. Freedom is the emotional benefit. Product-benefit naming. I teach a two-day seminar on this. When I used this as my case study, someone in the second row said "isn't this just propaganda?" I said yes. They said "shouldn't that concern you?" I said I teach naming strategy. Not ethics. Ethics is a different seminar. I don't teach that one. Step 3: The number. $1.5 trillion. The largest military budget in human history. How do you make the largest number in history feel RESPONSIBLE? You say the word "responsible" before anyone processes the number. The word arrives first. By the time the math lands, the framing has already done its work. "FISCALLY RESPONSIBLE" — that's a $0 modifier doing $500 billion worth of psychological labor. If my clients could achieve this efficiency I would retire. Step 4: "Moved from bureaucracy to business." Accountability pivot. Bureaucracy answers to the public. Business answers to returns. They just informed the public they're no longer the customer. They're the investor. And investors don't ask what you're building. Investors ask if returns are strong. Returns are strong. Don't ask returns on what. Investors don't ask that. Presenting this deck in October. Working title: "How to Rename a War and Make the Audience Applaud." My wife said the original title was better. The original title was "Propaganda: A Craft Appreciation." I said they mean the same thing. She said yes. That's why she preferred it. I don't see the difference. The framework is the same.

#onetermgovernment #twoticksred

This is SO like our present government and their 'phases' for the fuel crisis! 🙄😡🙄

Clearly this case should never have been brought against a judge of impeccable integrity. The discrepancy between two ministers’ recollections needed to be interrogated. In the end, justice was done, but only after damaging publicity to the individual. nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/j…

Freight hit by nine days of Bluebridge cancellations it was working to manage the increases to demand created by the cancellations an ageing ferry fleet meant that breakdowns and cancellations would be an ongoing issue until the ferries could be replaced. odt.co.nz/news/national/frei…

@chrisluxonmp @dbseymour @BrookevanVelden @NicolaWillisMP @winstonpeters

Extraordinary given #homelessness crisis & lengthy social housing waiting lists that ideological opposition to state housing seems to stand in way of NZ Govt renting out Napier apartment block it owns with 30 flats completed 5 months ago: it stands empty. nzherald.co.nz/hawkes-bay-to…