Michael Joseph Savage was perhaps the first NZ politician to form relational bonds with voters. He was charismatic and a great orator and inspired huge respect, indeed love. My father, a hard-headed mining engineer and not given to hyperbole, would have laid down his life for him. Unlike most of those who came later, his emotional appeal was backed up with solid and tangible policies and achievement, including the foundations of the modern welfare state. In comparison Ardern and her kindness mantra and the TPM rhetoric pale into insignificance, but as you rightly say this is the age of the social media influencer and you don't need to worry about actual reality when post-modernism holds sway and theatre is paramount.
Michael Joseph Savage was perhaps the first NZ politician to form relational bonds with voters. He was charismatic and a great orator and inspired huge respect, indeed love. My father, a hard-headed mining engineer and not given to hyperbole, would have laid down his life for him. Unlike most of those who came later, his emotional appeal was backed up with solid and tangible policies and achievement, including the foundations of the modern welfare state. In comparison Ardern and her kindness mantra and the TPM rhetoric pale into insignificance, but as you rightly say this is the age of the social media influencer and you don't need to worry about actual reality when post-modernism holds sway and theatre is paramount.