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No more Rudd on Rove, please

The PM makes his third and dullest appearance on TEN's variety show but leaves variety at the door.

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ruddyMemo to Kevin Rudd’s minders, and Rove‘s producers too:

If he’s going to appear on the show again can we please ban the political agenda? There are plenty of other television programmes for this kind of content: The 7:3o Report, Lateline, Meet the Press even Sunday Night, A Current Affair and Today Tonight are all supposed to have current affairs in them.

Rove is pitched as variety / light entertainment. There was very little of it in this exchange. Rudd enthralled us with the wonders of ‘ute-gate’ fake emails, climate change, education, global recession, jobs, schools and assorted dry talking points. Sure he was answering Rove‘s question, but it was a laboured, pardon the pun, reply.

An appearance on Rove is a chance to communicate with a wide, young audience. It would have been a great chance to showcase the PM’s personal side. Instead his third appearance was his dullest so far.

At one point our intrepid host had to ask of one of Rudd’s anecdotes: “is this going to be a long story?”

Sure sounded like it.

Dave Hughes tried to jump in and save another moment.

We even missed out on any hope of Rudd appearing on set with Bruno, though there were reportedly joint pics posed backstage. Which is more than John Howard would have ever agreed to.

65 Responses

  2. I fully agree with David. The fact that Rudd is “too busy” to go and answer potentially hard questions on Lateline, Insiders, Meet the press etc. – but he has enough time to parade himself this way – is something I found worrying.

  3. You gotta be joking David.I think it’s great that Kevin Rudd makes apperances on the show,good on him,remember John Howard always refused to be on.Just gives you a lighter side to him,as he enjoys coming on and having a laugh,which the show is all about.I know people that don’t like him but have enjoyed his previous appearences,i think that says it all.I think you can come up with a better story lol

  4. I found him boring as well, but what do you expect he is a millionaire politician trying to be “your everyday guy”. Obviously not fooling anyone else either..

  5. Apparently, the Katie Holmes’ reference was removed so that Rove could interview her during her current visit with Tom. Current Affair did the same thing last night (or was it Richard Wilkins yesterday morning?). And, yes, Bruno has been recycling the same few gags.

  6. I agree with the person who says people should chill out and stop indulging in negative ranting on blog spots.
    I think it’s great we live in a country where an interview with a Prime Minister begins with “dude!” and one of his answers is interrupted with the question “is this going to be a long answer?”.
    Sure K Rudd is a media manipulator par excellence but I would have thought that was a necessity in his job and who says only the media gets to do the manipulating?
    Rove is often an astute and entertaining interviewer and the K Rudd interview was obviously not pre-scripted. The whole K Rudd – Bruno set up provided out of the ordinary and fun entertainment.
    Oh yeah, and if you disagree with me … You Suck.

  7. David why are you surprised by this? At the end of every interview there is “A Plug”. This was just Ruddy plugging himself. Rudd was asked a question by Rove on a topic which has been headline news all week, sepcifically “What is Utegate all about?” Rudd answered it as best he could without getting bogged down, infact making the point that he wants to focus on the big issues, not small minded political point scoring. You make it sound like he gave a policy speech.

    Just be thankful we have a leader who has a sense of humour, scripted or not, rather than John Howard butt kissing George W and Ricky Ponting!!!!!

  8. On the American talk shows like Leno and Letterman etc, when they have political guests on they make the interviews very serious and political. But then Leno and Letterman take themselves more seriously than Rove.

    A good thing on Rove this week was the 5 minutes or so when they were showing news clips and taking the piss out of Richard Wilkins ala the Daily Show. Good work. I wish there was a show like that, Media Watch but with a comedian. The 7pm Project might go there.

  9. Kevin rudd only went on Rove (which was a last minute addition), so he could be sent up by Brüno, as after The Chasers tried to take him up on his offer of “Anytime Anywhere” and could not get into a Rudd Press Conference … it was done as PR too say “See I don not mind being sent up.”

    And yes I am that cynical.

  10. ok, first of all, like many people have said, Kevin Rudd is not a comedian, he’s the PM of Australia, he isn’t paid to be funny. Second of all, of course he is trying to reach out to the younger generations, they vote too you know.

    Kevin Rudd spoke about politics because it’s what he does, not to mention he was asked about politically related topics. He has to watch out for what he says because it’s all about stretching the truth to the other scavengers of parliment house. You know, i think Rudd likes appearing on rove, it’s something different for him, and it looks like he has fun.

    And my god Bruno was funny, i couldn’t stop laughing about the whole knitted body costume for a long time.

    I think some people need to look at the positive side of things and stop jumping on the computer as soon as they feel like whinging about why the world isn’t good enough!

    and now the bad replies start because the negative people want the last word. please…go on with your droning

  11. “Which is more than John Howard would have ever agreed to.” Yes because John Howard was a professional.

    Ever since his first appearance this has been highly unprofessional. It was a different circumstance in the states in the last election as it became such a popularity contest and so little to do with policy but it was also alarming foreshadowing of the future of Australian politics.

    It isn’t appropriate.

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