Alex Hawke

WHEN Abraham Lincoln famously said that a house divided against itself cannot stand, he didn’t have the Liberal Party in mind. But had he been born 250 years later, he may well have.

Although, in the case of the Libs it’s more of a church than a house. Tony Abbott and Barry O’Farrell may be breathing a sigh of relief after the party’s NSW upper house preselection vote on Friday which saw David Clarke, the so called head of the party’s “religious right” fend off a challenge from the less religious right.

But what will concern them is that Clarke won by only 14 votes, which means in real terms that 7 more people voted for him than David Elliot, the former Australian Hotels Association executive being backed by Clarke’s former staffer Alex Hawke.

Continue reading "Backroom politics crash the party" »

This week YouTube claimed the scalp of Malcolm Turnbull staffer Thomas Tudehope after he allegedly helped disseminate a Hitler parody video in which Federal MP Alex Hawke is portrayed as an irate Adolf Hitler.

It didn’t take long for the supposedly anonymous Downfall meme to catch the media’s attention, and by then it was only a matter of time before the creative talent behind it was exposed. Not helped in any way by a comprehensive email chain leaked to the media linking Tudehope and another Liberal staffer Charles Perrottet to the short film.

But with revelations that Tudehope had to resign over the issue, maybe it’s time for a little lesson for young staffers, press secretaries and politico wannabes out there who seem to think Web 2.0 is all fun and no responsibility. Sure it’s all a bit of a lark now and then, but when pre-selections, votes and political cred are at stake, there’s nowhere to hide. And seriously, who wants to lose their job in this economic climate?

Continue reading "Five tips to avoid downfall by social media" »