Brothers & Sisters, the fate of Aotearoa is now all in your hands. We here at the Daily Blog have thrown everything we can at this bloody Government and have spent every waking hour of this campaign trying to highlight the outrageous abuses of power National have committed against a back drop of a self interested mainstream media who have been contaminated by their association with Dirty Politics.
I won’t tell you who to vote for, that choice is one of the rare freedoms allowed in our democracy. You get to choose who you wish to represent your views in that ballot booth and that’s the sanctity of our anonymous voting process. What I will do is ask you to consider what I think are the 3 most important issues facing our nation right now when you cast your vote.
1 – The 250 000-285 000 children in poverty and the 800 000 NZers living in poverty deserve more from egalitarianism than cold houses and hungry stomachs. Their plight is our failure. I implore you to consider their poverty stricken lives when you vote.
2 – The Economy. Currently it is set to reward those who already have. The vast majority will never benefit from the current rules, and beyond rebuilding from a natural disaster, crony capitalism and milk powder, there has been no real leadership. We need economic stewardship that goes beyond benefitting the rich, we need economic justice. I ask you to consider that when you vote.
3 – Our environment is in crisis. Global warming caused by human pollution is a reality that we are in total denial of. Beyond clean rivers and water, we need a fundamental shift of the market dynamics that reward polluters while balancing the need to generate the money that pays for our social infrastructure. I ask you to consider the environment when casting your vote.
The Daily Blog will be closed for Election day as this should be a day of celebration, not ongoing debate. Harsh words and anger have separated and divided us as a country for the last month of campaigning, let us put aside our bitter arguments and rejoice that we are blessed to live in a country where the transfer of power can occur without violence, without intimidation, without the gun. Few places on earth are so lucky.
Whoever has the privilege of leading our country has a great responsibility to seriously tackle the many complex issues we face, not as individuals, but as a whanau.
Kia kaha Aoteara. Vote now.
You can follow me for updates past 7pm on Twitter.
well played Martyn et al…… well played
Perhaps the best of many excellent articles Martyn – well done TDB and all its supporters.
You can be justly proud of the Daily Blog Bomber. You and your fellow bloggers even before they were all assembled at this site , are the people who have kept me from total despair over the fate of our beautiful country these last 6 years. There have been times since 1984 with the introduction of Rogernomics that I have felt as if I had gone back in time as so many kiwi kids are living a life similar to that of John A. Lee in Children of the Poor.
I am disgusted by the meanness of spirit, smallness of minds and coldness of hearts that now pervades our soiled and thoroughly dysfunctional society. Much of which is down to that mongrel piece of filth , John Key. Kia Kaha! Never surrender to these bastards.
Unfortunately this country will always be a divided by those who wish to supress the less fortunate in our society.
No it won’t always be! that is why class conscious Mana Movement leaders need to be in parliament to present the class struggle analysis no others can or will.
So that ultimately a strong movement of the people can be built outside of parliament to put pressure on and eventually remove the big corporates and their system.
How I feel about today, tomorrow..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2_zzNwGaTw
Just want to say a big thanks to the team at TDB, your coverage has been fantastic and has had articles of real substance.
Regardless of what happens tomorrow I think this campaign has highlighted a number of important issues and has made people aware of these issues.
Roll on tomorrow night!
Thanks Bomber, to you and your team at TDB for all your hard work and effort! You are heroes in my book – maintaining a bastion of defiance in the growing shadow of dirty politics, traitors & tyranny – where journalism really does speak TRUTH to power in our fragile Democracy.
As a Citizen I appreciate that very much – keep up the good fight!
Peace.
Thank you so much Bomber and team for your incredibly hard work.
I am privileged to have received the information that I can base my decision on.
Celebrate indeed.
I hugely appreciate your efforts Bomber, and all of you who write on The Daily Blog from your different perspectives. It is where I am comforted to find like minded people, and have my ideas challenged. Thank you, and may tomorrow be an enjoyable well earned day of rest.
>I ask you to consider the environment when casting your vote.<
Get real Martyn
None of the politicians are offering anything to reduce CO2/CH4/ etc.
We will never – fully employ, fair wage, warm home, feed starving kids/people, bla bla our way out of 400 PPM C02 and maybe 600ppm CO2e(?)
It is a physical impossibility.
Please drop the bullshit about 'voting for the environment'
We can't consume and continue to exploit the environment out of climate change, so not sure what all those fully employed people are going to do in the growth based future?
And a compulsory Kiwi Saving society must destroy the environment.
There are about only 2 things we can do to reduce suffering, ban 1080 😉 and stop having children.
There again they have worked out a doubling rate for Ebola, it might be lights out for most of us inside of a year.
Read some of Gareth's stuff.
Fine words, ‘Bomber’… (I use that nickname deliberately. It must drive our cuzzies at the GCSB and NSA nuts when their computers pick up that key-word!! 😀 )
And thank YOU, for allowing me the rare privilege of contributing my words to this fantastic enterprise.
What a ride!
Thanks for all your efforts Bomber!
Tena koutou TDB,
Great commentary thanks, well done and yes looking forward to celebrating the election tomorrow with friends, family and MANA supporters in Rotorua with Annette Sykes!
Mauri Ora!
This is it , Lads and Lad-esses !!! … fix those bayonets , the whistles blown , prepare to go over the top and charge towards those ballot boxes !!!
This is our fight for freedom !!!
Thank you for this site , Bomber , and to all these people who have contributed . Its been heartening to find others of a like mind ..and as importantly , – the huge amount of research and analysis that has been presented. Data that should have been reported by the useless MSM.
And with every accolade I give the Daily Blog only serves as an indictment against the MSM and corruption of this gNatsi govt.
Mucho grassy arse, Señor Bomber and the TDB team.
Sho’ preciate sharing on this site Martyn et al.
Thanks Kim Dotcom for delivering us a landslide to National, now we have no effective opposition, the Maori representation is hammered and KDC can take the lion’s share of the blame for this.
Hate to have to say it, but I told you so.
Best I can hope for is a few more seats for the Greens via the specials
The election was a testament to the intelligence of Kiwis. In spite of the dirt that the toxic left threw at the Government the electorate saw through it, valued the job John Key was doing and asked him to do more of the same.
All the media this morning is focussing on the personalities. If Labour & the Greens want a chance to rebuild they need to focus on their policies. The electorate knows a CGT will not change anything, they know that a fund that picks winners will become a political bribe fund & they know Labour cannot build 10,000 houses a year. Labour, the Greens & Mana should note that the electorate does not believe that most parents can’t & don’t feed their kids.
The electorate also knows that a widening gap is a sign of a strong growing economy where the winners are making plenty of $ which get reinvested in businesses and improve everybody’s standard of living. The electorate knows that the most equal economies are generally equality of poverty & misery and we do not want it here.
Cunliffe was on hiding to nothing with the nutcase policies he had to sell. Until this changes whoever is the leader of Labour will not succeed.
Yes the Left have taken a drubbing, but never mind, time to pick ourselves up off the floor, patch up our wound pride, dust ourselves off, cast around for our friends and allies, and re-enter the fray.
Lots of work for us to do, no more time for the factional fighting that has proven so destructive for the Left.
In the spirit of new badly needed Left Unity…..
The Left opposition needs to start setting the agenda
First up: Hone Harawira’s ‘Feed The Kids’ bill. This bill to address childhood poverty is still live on the floor of parliament and is likely to be one of the first things on the order paper.
With the departure of Harawira from parliament, this bill will have to be lobbied and fought for by the other parties of the Left and Centre, NZ First, Labour, The Green and Maori Party, and if possible United Future.
The government will counter that there is no money for such a program, however within a short time will announce New Zealand’s support for the endless war in the Middle East. The link needs to be made between the fact that there is never any shortage of money and treasure for war, but never any money to feed hungry children, or lift them out of poverty. On behalf of the 100,000 children that struggle to learn on an empty stomach, it is incumbent on Te Ururoa Flavell to pick up this dropped Taiaha, and spearhead this campaign in parliament.
Second up:
For the second time the government is again bailing out the technically insolvent Solid Energy, this week the government announced another $103million bail out \on top of the $150million the government gave them last year.
It is not often I agree with the Taxpayer’s Union, but I find myself agreeing with them this time, when the Executive Director of the TU, Jordan Williams says that all parties need to commit to abolishing New Zealand’s culture of corporate “Corporate Welfare”.
But more than just being an act of corporate welfare this is also a chilling climate crime.
Despite the huge continual endless bailing out of Solid Energy, the continuing stream of heartless redundancies of mine workers with little compensation, show that the time has well past for the government hear the call made by Gareth Hughes last year, that this money would be better spent paying for a just transition to jobs that don’t fry the planet.
And on Thursday the government announced another $8million of the public’s money will be given to help make it easier for people to invest in oil and gas exploration. No doubt this other piece of corporate welfare will have been written at the behest of the fossil fuel industry, worried at the growing international fossil fuel divestment movement.
This subsidy of the oil company investors using tax payers money is an open slap in the face to the international divestment campaign.
Business As Usual needs to be opposed
As John Key declares, “Business As Usual”.
In response, the combined Left need to make a big showing at the march for the climate in Auckland today. The New Zealand March For Climate is held being in conjunction with similar marches being held in 88 other countries.
Details Here
On Monday, the world leaders conference on climate change is being held in New York, unfortunately for us, New Zealand will be embarrassed before the world by being represented at this conference by the National Government.
The point needs to be made, (here and in New York), that by massively subsidising the coal industry and actively opposing the international divestment movement, New Zealand, from being a world leader on environmental and peace issues, has on climate change, become a world scab for the fossil fuel industry.
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