Gruen Nation: Sept 4

It’s the final Gruen Nation tonight, but then Gruen Planet returns next week, looking more broadly at advertising.

Wil Anderson, Todd Sampson and Russel Howcroft are joined by Dr John Hewson, Lachlan Harris and Annabel Crabb.

In tonight’s show, among many other things, we note that Tony Abbott still has a way with the ladies. We translate Labor’s Hong Kong billboards from Mandarin back to English. We ask whether Clive Palmer has finally found his real constituency. And we marvel at Christopher Pyne’s ball skills. We also show two political ads featuring zombies. And there is singing. Terrible singing.

In tonight’s episode, the Gruen team examines:
· You’re Soaking In It … We look at Labor’s “Spotlight” ads. Is the scare tactic effective? Is suggesting that Tony Abbott might take recorders away from schoolkids actually a vote winner for the Libs? Why do so many Liberal ads look like they were made in Powerpoint? Do they really want us to pay attention? Oh, and we also show our favourite attack ad.
· What Would Poland Do?: What do Poland’s political savants do when they want to make a candidate look like a hero? They just do it, throwing in a bit of gratuitous sexism. Because they can.
· The Small Picture: It’s Silly Season, that time of the campaign when candidates hang out with FM radio crews and television comedians, desperately trying to make themselves look cool and authentic. What are the pitfalls?
· The Pitch: Simon Veksner from Naked versus Ron Mather from It’s The Thought That Counts. The challenge? To create ads that will make us all happy about voting this weekend, that will get us out of bed with a spring in our step.
· On The Trail: Why have there been so few streetwalks on this campaign? What’s the smartest way to handle a heckler? Do the jibes hurt? Are fans even more dangerous? And And just what kind of toll does campaigning take on a person?

8:30pm tonight on ABC1.