“Do they land in Gaza? Ha!” The laughs just keep coming on The Panel (Aug. 4, 2014)

5 August 2014 at 9:37 pm

“Do they land in Gaza? Ha!”
The laughs just keep coming on The Panel

Radio NZ National, Monday 4 August 2014

Jim Mora, Virginia Larson, Tainui Stephens, Zara Potts

Consider the following selection of gruesome twosomes. Barry Corbett and Ali Jones. Chris Wikaira and Linda Clark. Christine Spankin’ Rankin and Jock Anderson. Dita Di Boni and Sam Pease. Lindsey Dawson and Stephen Franks. And last but not least, the nastiest, smuggest, gruesomest twosome of all—Boag and Edwards. I could, but for the sake of readers’ sensibilities will not, go on.

Long time sufferers of Jim Mora’s godawful, moribund radio light chat show The Panel will have recognized these dreadful duos immediately—they are regular guests, recycled every few weeks, carefully selected to pretty much agree with one another and to pass comment on various matters in a manner that will not piss off anyone that matters. So criticism of the prime minister—someone who matters—has been pretty much kiboshed. So has criticism of racist juries in the Deep South, at least when someone like Chris Trotter is on the program to learnedly admonish those foolish enough to speak out against the jury who acquitted the vigilante who killed Trayvon Martin.

But criticism of, or more accurately, rancorous denunciation of and sneering at, people who do not matter—like political dissidents and fugitives of state vengeance, or the victims of knife attacks in South Auckland or mass murder in Gaza—is quite acceptable. All of these outcast groups have been ridiculed, joked about and pompously denounced on The Panel.

Clearly the producers of The Panel think seriousness is boring, compassion is an irritation and knowledge is intolerable. So it’s out with the likes of Anna Chinn, Gordon Campbell and Bomber Bradbury, and in with the likes of Graham Bell, Jeremy Elwood and Rosemary McLeod.

And, as noted above, clearly the producers of The Panel make a point of getting two really shallow, reactionary people on the show whenever possible. Today, however, they only got it half right. Someone slipped up and made the mistake of inviting Tainui Stephens, who is NOT a moral imbecile, onto the show. The pre-show segment started at 3:45 p.m. ….

JIM MORA: Zara Potts with what the world’s talking about. Qantas changes its flight path at last?
ZARA POTTS: Yes, Qantas has announced it’s not going to fly over Iraqi air space any more. However, the extra time is only ten minutes.
MORA: Is the extra time only ten minutes?
ZARA POTTS: Yes it is.

A little later….

MORA: And what’s this about a secret Qatari airline?                                                             ZARA POTTS: The airline’s full name is Qatar Amiri Flight. It’s an airline for both the royal family and high ranked government staff of Qatar. Its fleet is reportedly eleven to thirteen strong and consists of Airbus planes, except for a few 747s. It staffs about a hundred cabin crew and only hires Captains. First Officers need not apply.

MORA: Do they land in Gaza? Ha!
ZARA POTTS: Ha ha. No they don’t.
MORA: There’s a lot of money in Qatar. ….

After the 4 o’clock news, it was time for the introductions of today’s Panelists. Usually this is a dire, teeth-grindingly dull seven or eight minutes of inane breezy nothingness. Not today, however. Tainui Stephens talked about his eleven-year-old daughter, who has been deeply affected by the suffering of the people of Gaza during the latest ramping up of Israel’s violence. She and her friends accompanied him on the recent protest march in Wellington, and Tainui expressed how he was deeply moved by these young people, and everyone else at the march. Of course, Jim Mora could not leave alone a provocation as brazen as that statement of solidarity with the Palestinians. He felt it incumbent on himself to play Devil’s Advocate….

MORA: Ahhhh. We hear from a lot of people who say that there is killing in Ukraine, on both sides probably, and killing in Syria, and killing in Egypt, ahhh, but we don’t hear much or anything about them. Ahhhh. But we hear about Gaza, don’t we….

I’m sure Tainui Stephens replied to that, but if so, I missed it as my friend B_______ screamed for a considerable amount of time about the wretched state of radio commentary in this country.

A little later, Mora was back at his tricks, fishing for bigoted right wing comments….

MORA: Now what do we make of THIS? The Labour Party wants a Ministry of Disarmament.

Virginia Larson scoffed at the idea, which she reckons is a luxury: “After all, we haven’t got two hundred and fifty million Indonesians on our doorstep.” After that rather mystifying remark, she embarked on a wandery rant against Vladimir Putin, calling him a “sabre-rattler” and an aggressor.

MORA: [speaking very slowly, with exaggerated enunciation, to emphasize deep seriousness] I was reading about the bright young people in Gaza who are just as bright as the young people in Israel. But they haven’t been able to stop what’s going on there, have they? Can we EVER stop war?

Tainui Stephens, who is clearly a serious and intelligent person, must have felt like walking out of the studio. But he somehow found it in himself to respond to this idiocy by fobbing him off with a Mora-style bromide…..

TAINUI STEPHENS: I guess we have to appeal to the better angels of our nature.
MORA: [sighs deeply, then speaks with reverent intensity] Here’s to the better angels of our nature.