So, what did the newspapers make of Cameron’s Big Speech? A brisk stroll through this morning’s coverage, and you’ll come across the whole gamut of responses: from wholehearted enthusiasm in the Sun, to wholehearted scepticism in the Independent. But the general tone is somewhere in between: the mitigated praise of, say, the Times or the Guardian. Which is, I think, fair enough. The speech struck me as effective, perhaps elegant, without ever quite hitting the heights.
But the Tories should only be concerned by the media response insofar as it’s a conduit for their own message. What bits of that message have cut through? Will that message resonate with voters? And so on.
For the time being, the answers to those questions are pretty uncertain. It seems to me that Cameron’s dread forecasts about another five years of Gordon Brown are getting more airtime than the positive prospectus he set out for voting Tory. That might be a good thing, if you’re of the view that Brown is the Tories’ best weapon. But, against that, the past couple of weeks suggest that voters are prepared to be more forgiving of the PM than many in Westminster would expect. So, who knows?
Really, it’s getting to the stage where only the election will sort between the different arguments and counteragruments, the whys and wherefores. As Arthur Seaton would have it: all the rest is propaganda.
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