(Update: I've linked to some better blogs than mine below, and there are some relevant post scripts included for your amusement.)
The story looked juicy, and the mainstream media took the bait. While their tone has relaxed, today's cycle continues the spin.
And boy has their tone relaxed. Yesterday's "top secret political information" has become today's "inside information", a much less alluring descriptor, perhaps reflective of the genuine tone of what was leaked - - or stolen, depending on who you believe - - essentially comprised of the e-mail addresses of donors and supporters.
Labour should have done a better job of protecting this information, and in that respect can be accused of woeful mismanagement. But part of me also thinks the bloggers responsible have overplayed their hand by deliberately trying to tease this story out.
It turns out yesterday's leaked minutes were accidentally e-mailed to National MP Aaron Gilmour, who, recognising them to be newsworthy, deliberately circulated them among his networks. In other words, the minutes didn't come from what the Herald implied was the leak of the century.
Today at 2pm one of the bloggers will post more information, presumably the names and certain particulars of donors to the Labour party. This is hardly earth shattering stuff.
UPDATE 15 June 2011:
A quick check of one of the more prominent blogger's website and there's still no leaked data. According to his update of two days ago, the blogger concerned is waiting for a legal opinion before the names and contact e-mails of Labour donors are released. All of this reinforces the relatively flat nature of the alleged scoop.
There's no denying that Labour failed to secure the information. I'm not sure I'd associate what would have been a genuine mistake by a well-meaning party supporter with their competence to lead a government, but it's embarrassing for Labour nonetheless. And the fact this information isn't quite as "top secret" as we were promised doesn't absolve Labour of taking basic steps to secure it in the first place.
But it does make the blogger's efforts a little inane.
Phil Quin over at the New Tasman has quite a bit to say on the matter. Here he called for the resignation of Labour's general secretary, and here he refined the story (thus far) to something like a twelve step recovery programme.
His analysis is intelligent and easy to read. A true example of the reach of the global communications network.... He lives and works in New York.
John Pagani's blogging response was one of the first from the Left. It's also worth a read.
PS 10 July 2011:
WhaleOil, the blogger I referred to above, has now moved on from the scandal leaving it to the littered ruins of other sensational-but-empty news bites. The mainstream media really has a lot to answer for.
He's now pursuing another theme with his same legendary enthusiasm, that of Labour, the party unfit to govern. He has a small chorus of supporters, all appropriately placed as either overtly partisan commentators or supposedly independent journalists, who echo away quietly in the background spreading his bile.
In his own little way, he actually affects our political system. And for someone like him, that's an achievement however it occurs.
