Some people have been shocked that the traditional right wing party in New Zealand politics is so deeply embedded with scum like the blogger Whale Oil.
We need not be so surprised.
It takes a certain type to support the growth in inequality in our society and champion the super rich as our natural leaders.
This type is happy to prostitute their skills to serve the wealthy and rationalise their interests as being “our” interests or “society’s” interests.
That is also why the tobacco lobbyists become National Party MP’s.
To a degree I must admit even I was a little shocked at just how venal and corrupt the gang around Whale Oil are.
But we must always remember they would have been nothing without being empowered by those in power. It was the rich and powerful who paid them for their services. It was the rich and powerful who supplied access to the information that could be packaged as news or blogging material. It was also often the mainstream media that ran with the “stories” made up in the fevered imaginations of the right wing blogosphere.
If the left get back into government they must clean all these scumbag out of the various positions they have been appointed to over the years. We must not have a repeat of the last Labour Government which left Don Brash in charge of the Reserve Bank. The right wing used the absurd cult of the central banker that operates in many countries to puff up this intellectual pip squeak into a figure that they then could impose as leader of the National Party. If it hadn’t been for Saint Nicky Hagar we could well have him as Prime Minister today. They also left the awful Act founder Ruth Richardson on the Reserve Bank board for three years after being elected government in 1999 despite her crimes against working people.
Some people will argue that you can’t sack these people and that is simply nonsense. All a government minister has to do is say publicly that they do not have confidence in this person to represent the best interests of New Zealand and they would have no choice but to resign. This is exactly what Mayor Brown should have done to the board of the Ports of Auckland when Cameron Slater leaked private details of a worker at the port that had been leaked to him by the board.
So-called “centre-left” governments have a propensity to leave all sorts of right wingers in charge of areas like finance, the military, security and the police. Too often they use these positions to inflate their own importance and when necessary undermine the government they are meant to be serving. Too often the hard questions are not asked.
Recently I was speaking at a public meeting discussing the GCSB, and security services in NZ. David Lange was praised for writing a foreword to Nicky Hagar’s book “Secret Power” on Waihopai and the GCSB. Lange wrote:
“In the mid-1980s we bucked the system. We may have been ahead of our time on matters nuclear, but we were out of step with what was called the ‘Western Alliance’. It took a break with the United States and Britain to make the people of New Zealand aware that we were part of an international intelligence organisation which had its roots in a different world order and which could command compliance from us while withholding from us the benefits of others’ intelligence.
Life at the time was full of unpleasant surprises. State-sponsored terrorism was a crime against humanity as long as it wasn’t being practised by the allies, when it was studiously ignored. In the national interest it became necessary
to say ‘ouch’ and frown and bear certain reprisals of our intelligence partners. We even went the length of building a satellite station at Waihopai. But it was not until I read this book that I had any idea that we had been committed
to an international integrated electronic network.”
When I read that I was simply appalled that a government could make a decision like that without asking why?
We have been part of an international “Five-Eyes” spy network since just after world war two. Governments were not told of its existence officially until the mid 1970s. This network has been part of the US-led empire’s war against progressive governments internationally. We were complicit in crimes against humanity that these agencies committed. NZ military forces took part in illegal, secret operations against the nationalist government of Indonesia in the early 1960s. That government was overthrown in 1966 in a right-wing military coup and half a million nationalists and leftists were murdered. You can imagine the celebrations in the spy agencies’ headquarters in the US, UK, and NZ. Less than 10 years later that same murderous right-wing military regime invaded East Timor to prevent a radical nationalist government coming to power there. At that time there were Labour governments in Australia and New Zealand. Both stayed silent. Meanwhile a half million Timorese were to die in the ensuing military occupation that wasn’t to end until 1999 with Timor’s independence.
The US-led empire to which we are allied has the same problem as the National Party in NZ. When it overthrows governments (some of which may be rotten to the core in one way of another) it has no one to replace them with other than corrupt businessmen, gangsters, drug runners, warlords and the like. Even in Europe, the only people they can find as allies in the Ukraine are fascists and plutocrats willing to slaughter their own people. That is also why the bombing of Libya or the actual invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq have turned to crap.
Mr. Treen. I appreciate your frank assessment and frank language.
Excellent piece of writing, Mike.
Thanks to Saint Nicky Hager, we should now be able to take back our country and regain independence from the US, as long as New Zealanders make the effort to get out there and vote this vile government out on S20.
Exciting times and great opportunities ahead to make Aotearoa the best and most progressive country in the world, methinks !
What do you mean “use scum”? The right wing filth are scum. Every last one of them. Great piece of writing though, and I agree that they need to be smoked out and purged from society come the 21st of September.
I think your ‘right wing filth’ is the better broad term – scum are only the frothy lightweight filth that float to the top – the turgid bottom-feeding filth associated with ratf**king blogs are technically sludge.
“So-called “centre-left” governments have a propensity to leave all sorts of right wingers in charge of areas like finance, the military, security and the police. Too often they use these positions to inflate their own importance and when necessary undermine the government they are meant to be serving. Too often the hard questions are not asked. ”
And that is why a lot of people don’t trust Labour…..
Hear! Hear! Jonl,
I would love someone to convince me Labour have cleared the right wingersout of their ranks but they haven’t.
I won’t be convinced Labour has changed its spots till it says it will make TV One an advert free public broadcaster fully funded by the government. It really is pussyfooting on this by talking about creating a TV channel around Radio New Zealand. At the moment I am wondering why it is so hard for Labour to accept this idea. It should of course kick out the heads of TVNZ and RNZ as well, but that can wait till after the election.
David Cunliffe on Public Broadcasting. FirstLine September 3, 2014.
“Well the proposal that we want to explore is to build a public broadcasting center of excellence around Radio NZ and have a new public broadcasting channel attached to that, potentially using things like the broadcasting of parliament and other things, are would build a true public broadcasting center of excellence.
Now I have never been more aware, especially with all this dirty politics and sleazy websites going on, the importance of professional, reputable, independent journalism. The labour party is not looking for any soft reporting, what we are looking for is independent journalism, that upholds the finest standards of that profession, and we think public broadcasting is essential for the nation’s good, its part of a healthy democracy, as they say, ‘sunlight is always the best disinfectant”
<a href="http://www.3news.co.nz/politics/key-leaders-debate-a-spirited-affair-2014090305?ref=video
Thanks Mike. Well said. Who pays these people? Is it the US govt? And who gives them the right to spy on, control, destroy and no doubt kill people? Would imagine there is more to the job than just gathering emails and listening to other people’s conversations, while working in conjunction with other agencies including the police. And can anything be done about it or is it ‘after the fact.’ SO we’ll never the know the lengths they go to or the strategies they have at hand to do their work? It’s the questions that can’t be answered that concern. Or should we be confident our government is fair, honest and will do their best to protect us? Ha
We pay these people. The US and A just gives them orders. Most of our politicians are so subservient that they think this is the natural order of things.
Keen points there Mike, there must be many graduates who have gone overseas who would be able to take some of those top jobs given the opportunity. The generation after those baby boomers, I mean.
about time these things are finally reacrhing the light of day of the corrupt usa uk and their bosses the federal reserve have been manipulating the system for 101yrs
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