Surely the problem that Possum alludes to is the "sound bite-ese" which is used in all political reporting, but particularly at election time. That elevates an exaggerated bit of rhetoric into an unqualified claim, and both sides of politics both use it, and are victims of it, all the time. (Even Malcolm Turnbull, who has been happy to repeat a claimed $90 billion plus estimate for the NBN many times, completely without running through the questionable assumptions.) But this time, an out of context Rudd made some public servants worry that people might think they had been used inappropriately, and they made it clear they hadn't.
Meanwhile, the fact that the Coalition is playing silly buggers with paper that is already in their hands gets ignored in headlines.
you have made it Steve
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