Most academic research into psychology tells us that human beings, in moments of crisis, regardless of being right or left, become immediately altruistic.
It’s like a switch goes on in our brains, a reset, where we reach out and help one another.
The reason no one in NZ punditry appreciated the power of this solidarity from the universal unique event of the lockdown is because the 35 year neoliberal experiment in individual uber allas culture (fractured a billion more times by identity politics and the grim wheel of intersectionist grief) made us forget what solidarity actually felt like.
The self sacrifice many felt by the lockdown played out differently. For the vulnerable, it was the first time the State had reached out to actually help them and for the middle classes they felt that vulnerability for the first time ever.
The vulnerable welcomed the housing, the wage subsidy and public kindness while the middle classes marvelled at their own courage as akin to storming the beaches of Gallipoli.
This solidarity has forged a loyalty with Jacinda that has reset the psychology of the electorate in a tectonic fashion.
If you ask the average Kiwi who is voting Labour this year to name just one Labour Party policy, I would put money down on the vast majority of them answering with, ‘Jacinda saved NZ?’
When your policy platform is seen by the vast majority of people as ‘saving our lives’, you have built an emotional 20 lane multi level motorway suspension bridge towards a mandate that demands use.
The structural reforms that need to be embarked upon within the neoliberal State will face immediate and toxic resistance, the next Government must over run that resistance by dramatically expanding the size of the State and drowning out toxic public service workers with a huge influx of a new culture.
NZ currently employs around 300 000 public servants, maybe that needs to be 600 000?
Much of the neoliberal free market hegemonic structure is a threat to us now, not just a false promise. This first wave of pandemic is a startling insight to the climate crisis future of instability we face, Labour are about to be rewarded with a mandate that they have no choice but to build from.
The Greens and Labour need to have a summit after the election with the Māori Party if elected and thrash out a 100 day plan that will see a raft of reforms and upgrades that are passed immediately to begin building that new future.
This is a once in a generation event, we must have a once in a generation response.
Anything less is a vile betrayal of that political loyalty.
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Yes Martyn Labour will win; and will then need to set the goal to carry forward their promises made to us back in 2017.
The list is large.
Hi Jacinda.
Now you have the whole country supporting you to do what you think best, you must do as Martyn says!
D J S
Great idea @ DS.
It was after all Martyn Bradbury who brought us all together. It was Martyn Bradbury whom I heard mention that dreaded, filthy little thirteen letter word; neoliberalism on rnz, the all bought and paid for Natzo playing. And for that and other things Martyn Bradbury was given a life time ban from rnz so fuck rnz. You’re only good for pointing out what’s wrong with our MSM.
It was Martyn Bradbury and Tim Selwyn of Tumeke who gave me the pressure valve I needed to vent my spleen. It was Martyn Bradbury who’s tireless work’s rattled the rats and startled the criminals.
If Jacinda Adern listened to Martyn Bradbury she’d have wise council with a big heart and a sharp mind and could definitely do worse.
Shine on , you crazy diamond !!!
Pink Floyd – Shine On You Crazy Diamond
https://youtu.be/cWGE9Gi0bB0?t=2
I’ll wait till the numbers are in on Saturday really, but the poll trends for months have not had Labour under 47% and Nats closer to, or even under 30% than 35%! so the indications are hopeful for a re-elected Labour led Govt.
How the Great Leap Forward to burying the toxic legacy of neo liberal hegemony and Parliamentary consensus is actually achieved will be another matter. Blairism runs deep in the Labour Caucus and the unelected Wellington “tops” of Labour–who so covet “one Labour to rule them all” in their class collaborationist dreams.
A lot could of course be done at the stroke of a pen in the first 100 days, but I maintain it will not actually happen without deep community organisation and direct action. This would have to include a class left leadership takeover of the NZCTU by affiliated unions, and a hell of a lot of autonomy granted to Māori communities to run their own affairs. Climate action needs to become mainstream and properly resourced and supported by schools and workplaces.
I think it will actually take a 3 three year activist campaign including both confrontational and inclusive strategies to get the required shift to mass state house/apartment builds, a restored Ministry of Works, top echelon of public servants to reapply for their jobs etc. Such a three year campaign would be aimed at the 2023 election and the boomers replacement generations–it would be the ultimate expression of the old leftist saying “work with and struggle against”. Accept and welcome the useful reforms a Labour, Labour/Green, or Labour/Green/Māori Govt. would deliver, but simultaneously push and organise for a whole lot more at the same time.
Yes Tiger Mountain. The Unions are the start place for revolution. Oh, I wish.
” Anything less is a vile betrayal of that political loyalty ”
Yes but that approach has always been the neo liberal excuse in times of crisis namely debt which will be used overtime to undermine the current public love and solidarity for the PM.
Neoliberalism is deeply entrenched and no more so than in the two main parties which does not bode well for any real transformational change.
I hope we get a coalition after the vote where the Labour party to govern needs the Greens to govern not a stand alone majority.
If we aren’t moving away from the market then we need a progressive accelerator to help move the vehicle in a ( left ) not right direction.
‘This is a once in a generation event, we must have a once in a generation response.
Anything less is a vile betrayal of that political loyalty.’
Expect to be severely disappointed. Expect to be betrayed, Martyn.
Other than the above-average response to Covid-19, everything the incumbents (and their opponents) have said in their campaigning is absolute bollocks -more road construction, more population overshoot, more dependence on fossil fuels, more pollution, more squandering of energy and resources on so-called infrastructure [that will have no utility in the very near future], and more energy and resources squandered on corportised sport etc.
All of it is based on the desperate desire to try to keep local branch of the global banksters’ Ponzi scheme going, and to placate the consumption-based business sector, and pander to the wants of the trained-to-be-stupid portion of the general populace that thinks is has a right to gross overconsumption of resources and gross overproduction of pollution: the whole ‘We must get international air travel up and running again’ narrative says it all.
All of what we see is based on neoliberal lies and fatally-flawed economic theories that have got us into this inescapable [at this late stage of the game] predicament.
It’s a loot-and-pollute economic system, so assuming the Adern government does get a mandate, it will keep facilitating looting and polluting, whatever the dire consequences. Uninhabitable planet! “So be it; we have to protect and preserve banking and consumption, whatever the cost.” I can hear the words, even if they are never spoken.
It is, of course, the mindset of people like Jacinda Adern and Grant Robertson that is the problem, and nothing is going to change that mindset in the short term, I’m afraid.
It can be argued that they are too young to know any better, since they have never known anything other than the bollocks of loot-and-pollute and never experienced the kind of frugality and cohesiveness that existed immediately after the Second World War, and which the consumption-driven banksters and industrialists worked hard to demolish via mind-control systems developed by Bernays and his accomplices in crime. And they are certainly not trained in ecology or fundamental chemistry, we know that for a fact.
Indeed, Jacinda and Grant, and the entire echelon of scientifically-and-financially illiterate, born-into-privilege politicians and hangers on will keep doing what they do till they can’t, and ignore every warning of impending catastrophe.
‘This is my message to the western world – your civilisation is killing life on Earth
We Indigenous people are fighting to save the Amazon, but the whole planet is in trouble because you do not respect it’
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/oct/12/western-worldyour-civilisation-killing-life-on-earth-indigenous-amazon-planet
Schooled in Tony Blair’s office, the cult of the third way is the only religion this Blairite knows. The third way – taking the worst of the right and the worst of the left and creating the political and economic diarrhea since 1990.
Frank the Tank,
It must be really exhausting being you.
Sympathies to the family.
Get well soon.
Much love.
Terry Tibbs.
I always get an immediate lift whenever you reply to my posts.
Correct (don’t tell Terry, they might cry)
Tony Blair is now a recognised war criminal
Third of British people want to see Tony Blair tried as a war criminal over Iraq, finds YouGov poll
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/tony-blair-war-criminal-iraq-trial-convicted-yougov-british-people-uk-prme-minister-wmds-dossier-george-w-bush-a7870341.html
Yet he still gets kickback gigs from the EU and all his globalist buddies long after the original neoliberal celebrity Prime Minister left office. Outside of the above is there anything lasting he did? Sound familiar?
P.S. He did beat the UK’s worst PM in living memory. But then again a pot plant could have defeated John Major.
Tick, Frank.
100% in agreement that placing the maori party in the ‘progressive’ tent is tipping one’s cap to the reality of post truth politics.
Considering how both other parties in question are subliminally neo-liberal by evidence of their mp’s attitude and complete lack of hands-on ability , the likelihood of a First 100 days reform blitz actually a/ occurring and b/ resulting in in any meaningful long-term structural change to Aotearoa ,are minimal .
IMO, the measure of Arden as a progressive leader will be in her post-election cabinet.
Her current crew are remarkable only for their lack of accomplishment and their combined ability to to apportion blame on NZ First for matters unresolved.
I agree ,Post Covid/Climate change reality needs a radical response and to that end a ministerial advisory/policy group drawn from all sectors and heavy on proven track records of engineering and technical achievement needs to be conscripted.
Politically the primary aim should be to permanently disrupt the intergenerational support of the rural vote for National , who long ago ceased to give a stuff about anything beyond the machinations within suburban Auckland.
Good call. We’re in a position to potentially move towards something resembling a technocracy. Getting the experts & the scientists into positions where they can effect the change they’ve been craving that improves everyone’s lifestyle. I’m hopeful that TOP can be a part of that at some stage, because they’re the really strong policy incubator right now.. I actually have a feeling that their result this election may turn some heads.
Martyn may well be correct in his description of the emotions at play with the popularity of Jacinda Ardern but he knows that her empathetic, charitable niceness is the book cover not the book. The book cover attracts the reader but the contents is what is important. those who have read the book covering the last three years had to skim through it, and must be still believing that the next book in the series will satisfy them. Most don’t even read the book and are happy to have it sit on the coffee table cover up, so they can idealise who is on the cover. The other question for Martyn I don’t quite get how we pay for this expanded public service. I know to run the ship properly we need more good people but we can’t pay for what we have at present. The new Government struggled before and nothings changed except our grandkids will have to pay for the rising debt.
Rolling back neo liberalism in my book means deleting SOEs, Reserve Bank Act, State Sector Act, for profit education etc. ending the approach whereby just about any human activity can be reduced to a transaction.
Public sectors should deliver necessary services not generate profits and mimic the worst excesses of capitalism. The model does not deliver and creates inequality and extends poverty–the OECD, IMF and World Bank have all admitted that austerity and trickle down do not work for the majority of citizens.
Power Generation and supply could be restored to full public ownership, so could NZ Refinining, Land Corp and all the others that have resulted in artificial markets allowing penetration of public assets by private capital.
Fare free public transport and free Wifi nationwide could be “paid for” by people working in their communities on all sorts of projects and micro plot farming, restoring waterways and hundreds of other tasks.
The corporate world and international finance capital are not going to save us–they have had their chance and the filthy 0.1%ers that have bought this planet to the edge of Climate disaster should all be banished to Richard Branson’s Island.
new view,
Oh ok….so according to a vested interest very old and tired view, Ardern is not genuine. She’s a fake.
Her personality that was on show for the world to see during the aftermath of the Christchurch massacre and Covid-19 pandemic response was just a fraud. 93% of New Zealanders are ignorant morons.
You know best.
As you were.
Jacindafan that’s what you said not me. I didn’t say she was fake. But she’s only one person, and in reality most likely doesn’t write policy or much else. she’s a front person who will have ideas on what she would like but in my opinion has to end up parroting the agenda of cabinet. And that’s how it should be. It’s only the general public that compare personalities of leaders and disregard much of what else actually happens. You may be right and she’s the leader to take us into the future but the team ability looks thin to me. And don’t compare them to National because they won’t be the Government.
“Her personality that was on show for the world to see”
I think she coined the term ” they are us” whilst tacitly supporting Blairs murderous rampage, through Iraq didn’t she, as I’m sure the lives of all those Iraqis mattered surely?
“I didn’t want to work for Tony Blair”
a fucking war criminal
Such high moral standards.
Incompetent me could have done both crises Jacindafan, while also taking my luxuriously desired afternoon naps. More importantly, ANY fkn National leader could have done them.
While Grant goes off asking in ads for former John Key voters to support the continuance of the 84 status quo.
Your Grandkids are paying for saving your life, and the oldies that have betrayed them and their planet.
I am old at 76 and take an offence at our generation for being blamed for this mess so get a life GreenBus as we were born during the second world war when our parents were better than us at looking after the world then as they fought the NAZI terrorists taking over the world.
My generation born in 1944 is called the “silent generation”. its time we taught you the truth.
I grew up in the shadow of the world what was struggling to make a way forward so we learned to keep everything for a long time and repaired things and didn’t do what your generations did as you throw things away when they stop working so do you think that is good for the plant by junking up throw-outs?
Just think more kindly of our generation as we do not consume things like you do, as we keep things much longer to keep the plant sustainable while your generation preaches ‘buy buy buy things’ to keep the economy going eh? I own a car that my son left behind as he went on his OE in 2005 at still drive that car today. Proof is in the pudding.
I hope to see you marching as we do down the city streets along with the school kids as elders, on the next climate rally.
I am 57 and I appreciate your perspective, CLEANGREEN. When I read history or when I see films, particularly the fictional film Saving Private Ryan which was close to reality ,… and I see what those people went through, when I watch documentary’s,…of the Great Generation,…whether they be Russians or Americans or Aussies or New Zealanders, Indian or English,… I am humbled.
My Father and Mother who grew up so poor during the Great Depression…and learning of the small gifts from others that made it bearable, how people pitched in together…
I am angered and brought to tears most often when I see those old black and white film clips of the slaughter of WW1…and I am reminded of what a self centered generation we can be. Extrapolate that to the American civil war,.. to what happened here with the Maori’s, to the Native Americans,… working ones way back through history…brutal humanity…
It would be nice to think we had more continuity among the generations… to think more like a tribe, – in that everyone matters, rather than let current trends divide us…
Wild Katipo. Thank you for mentioning our parents and their’s. We learned so much about real life skills from that selfless generation of between the wars, and post wars, who were not boastful, as old soldiers and bruised survivors rarely are. They are why I could have wept when young Chloe told Victoria University students that experience doesn’t count.
Their values were possibly a complete antithesis to the absurd consumerism possibly best exemplified by vulgarians like a Key and a Hosking, but will stand us in good stead as the planet melts, and money becomes an irrelevancy. But apart from that, many of their lives were quietly and humbly heroic, and we are fortunate to have them as role models and inspiration to draw upon when the going gets tough. They worked hard.
Trashing them for the trash world which we live in now is wrong, and achieves zilch.
….” vulgarians like Key and Hosking ”…
Well said,… vulgarians. As that is exactly what they are, I would say they are emissaries of the consumer culture that has so permeated modern western values.
A filthy, cowardly, disloyal and self serving globalist emissary of the ‘greed is good ‘ dogma,… the dogma of the disgusting neo liberal.
However that said and for practical reasons,… I will still party vote Green to help ensure Labour have a working partner. Obviously, my electorate vote will be Labour. I just have that sneaking suspicion that Labour will need the Greens.
The day this country returns to the outlook of Michael Joseph Savage is the day I will consider the war is won.
Bullshit. I blame the oldies for just about everything, including the Housing Crisis, Child Poverty, Inequality, Pollution, Racism, Child Abuse etc, etc.
Somebody is responsible for this mess. It is man made. Our planet and our kids are not at fault here. We are, the oldies. Us, our parents, their parents and probably their parents too. Who’s fault is this mess? It’s ours, you, me, up to and including David Attenborough who is one of the best humans on earth.
Why won’t successive Govt’s tackle a CGT or the Farmers just for example.
These are a couple of things that must be addressed to help reign in the continuing damage to our environment and the ridiculous house prices.
Simple, the oldies. The huge ‘middle NZ’ our gutless politicians are too scared to take on. Why? Because were greedy, selfish and entitled, just to name a few of our qualities. If anybody dares criticize this group they are absolutely pilloried by this lot. The they go and vote for a party, any party that will protect there wealth and privilege. At the expense of the planet and those who are going to inherit it when were gone.
But that’s alright is it? Don’t like being included in this lot? Don’t be, I’m not including you personally Cleangreen or any of the fine people on this blog who obviously care a great deal about these issues. But the fact is the young people haven’t been around long enough to do this level of damage. They by and large don’t run everything, don’t make the decisions that effect society and the environment etc. They are on the receiving end which is mostly bad news for them. Yes they might play with their cells phones too much, but who developed them, targeted them, sold them and keeps them addicted to them?
Adults did this. That’s us mate, we did it. Shame on us. We are handing over a terrible mess to the young people and I feel really sorry about that.
Green Bus….you did not factor in massive Asian ( male)immigration into New Zealand over the nine years of Jonkey Nact Government ….which bought up scarce housing, inflated housing prices ….overloaded the delicate inter-generational social welfare and education and health and transport systems
….I can only presume you are a part of this immigration because New Zealanders have traditionally supported their elders
Born and bred in Putaruru. And guess what? Most of the Asians that have brought up NZ are boomers too.
Cleangreen You might have hit the nail on the head referring to our generation as the silent generation. I was aware decades ago how much more articulate North American adolescents were than ours are, and how empowering this is. Teaching in the UK, in a Comprehensive second-choice school, the kids were probably better talkers than ours, but not on a par with the interestingly articulate Americans. They changed post-Vietnam, but still seem pretty good.
About ten years ago an MSD manager spoke to me of his frustration at the unwillingness of workers to speak in meetings. A fellow colleague in my brief disillusioning time as a public servant moaned that “they” should have done something, and I answered that it’s not “they”, it’s “us.” I asked her why she and others stayed silent on one specific issue, and she said they were too shocked by it to say anything. I was shocked too, and for that reason, I did speak up, but where I did speak up it got me into more trouble with fellow workers than
management- but that was only ever in the public service – where there are still some good and decent people.
We need to get the kids talking, and encouraged to talk, and teachers who love children as I do, enjoy it. It doesn’t matter if they see things in black and white if they can initiate and sustain dialogue, and learn to discuss.
Part of Ardern’s appeal is that she comes across as clean and wholesome, which we’re unused to in the recent local political arena. Her adolescent years working in a fish’n’chipper may have afforded an insight which some never gain, and keeps them imprisoned in little boxes.
My kids worked at MacDonalds at college. I’d sooner they hadn’t, or hadn’t had to, but it helped them develop a good work ethic. I was damn fruit picking at primary school, which I was too young to be doing, but developed a useful drone world view.
Destructive morons like Bill English labelling our young guys useless and so on, make it clear that we need to nourish them, and each other more, and stand up to mindless clobberers when we probably all know unsung heroes/heroines who have bettered others’ lives in so many quiet sorts of ways, while too many well-paid pollies continue to do little more than waste tax-payers’ hard- earned money. They need to change, and to change right now.
green bus. Fair enough but the grandkids are paying for the wage subsidy to keep people in jobs also. Hardly saving anyones life with that . next thing it will be the oldies fault covid is here. my generation didn’t have the benefit of the information technology yours has, so don’t be so judgmental and smug. Every generation does the best it can with what it knows and what it has at it’s disposal. That’s something the younger generation will learn as it gets older and realises how they have done things is outdated and could be environmentally improved. seems to me you’ve got a big chip on your shoulder.
Greenbus has already pointed out that your/our grandkids are already paying for so much of what currently happens but to reply to your point specifically, the current bureaucracy is grossly overloaded with utterly incompetent seat-warmers and sociopaths who have gamed the system to the point of being paid absolutely extraordinary salaries for either doing very little or for stuffing up practically everything they touch. CEOs of city/district/regional councils on $300,000, $400,000, $500,000 per annum, along with dozens within each organisation and tens of thousands nationally on $100,000 plus, again for doing very little or for stuffing up practically everything they touch.
A good clean-out of top management and middle management would free-up tens of millions of dollars and generate better outcomes for the nation.
100%
Trying to compare the last 3 years to the previous 9 years of atrocities is easier if you open both eyes. However if you read the contents of Dirty Politics instead of just the cover, you’d know this
Remember back to Winston’s comments when he put Labour in. He was anticipating a global financial meltdown within the last term that hasn’t quite happened yet. That was long before covid and covid is disguising the implosion that was already happening then. It is always timing that is hardest to predict, exacerbated by not knowing what actions will be taken by authorities and how effective or destructive they will be. But the fact of the matter is that neoliberal economics in as much as it defines a market led global economy ended in 2008 with the GFC.
Since then it has been a zombie economy kept in suspended animation by ever increasing infusions of QE fait money being fed into the banking and finance system. The market no longer has any function at all except to distribute that QE money among the zombie corporations and banks to keep the necessary products for society’s immediate needs moving for as long as possible. By keeping the QE infusions out of the hands of the population and using them only for keeping the corporations and finance alive the advent of galloping inflation has been temporarily averted except in the futures, bond and sharemarkets with i spillover into house prices.
One important thing that this is doing is to draw everyone’s attention to the nature of money. The way it is being created now even here in NZ is being disguised as a massive loan in order I believe ,to avoid having to
provide the public with a clear picture of what is being done. The point being that if money can be created so easily then why the hell are people allowed to go without what they need in ordinary times? Borrowing money from our own reserve bank which we own ; money that is created on the spot specifically to make it available specifically for that purpose is just a conjuring trick. It is nothing like a loan from the IMF which does have to be paid back (even though it was originally created by exactly the same process but by someone else).
For the concept of money to work for society, society has to believe in it’s value, that they will be able to exchange what they get paid for their efforts to society with what the need from society for themselves . I’m sure it has been long resolved by the people who control it that we will better retain that faith if we do not think too much about how insubstantial it actually is, and how simply and painlessly it can be manufactured by those vested with the exclusive right to manufacture it for their own gain and society’s use.
The process that is under way now is demonstrating this aspect of the nature of money to everyone taking an interest.
I’m pretty sure that eventually it will all reach a point where the separation of the QE recipients being the international corporations banks and financiers and the rest and vast majority of society will become unsustainable. If sufficient of QE which will be in ever greater quantities filters into the working physical economy to forestall almost universal destitution, then inflation in the traditional sense of applying to the food and goods and services we all live by will explode.
So what the end result will be is impossible to say because it will depend again on what people in power in other countries as well as our own do as things develop.
But the point of all this conjecture is that the Labour party is right to be saying as little as possible about how they will proceed through the next 3 years. If they have taken Winston’s words to heart as I suspect they have as they see the world shaping up as he predicted, they will have to react to international developments as they happen. A transformation will best be implemented when the rest of the world is in an uncontroled state of flux rather than to try to row against the tide.
D J S
https://time.com/5897240/new-zealand-elections-ardern/
There’s a good deal of insight in what you say, DJS. The international waters are going to be a wee bit choppy and the ride a bit rough in the coming years. Current tools and levers, or whatever, will become useless and only further exaccerbate the meltdown. A really big challenge ahead, globally and locally. Against this backdrop we in NZ have a national election … as much as it captures our attention it pales in comparison for what is about to happen. Oh, and to add to the backdrop we have the political farce in the US of A. And the unfolding dynamics around the PRC.
Labour only needs to reach out to the farmer. That is all.
Farmers crave safety and security because farming is a perilous enterprise at the best of times.
The weather, the value of their produce being thrown at their feet, take it or leave it by manipulative arse holes. The lack of a quality work force, the crushing horror of bankster tyranny, the demonising manipulations of cynical, greedy politicians to divide to remain in control to line their pockets.
If Labour welds farmers to their down stream service industries then AO/NZ will flourish more than one could imagine.
Farmers = money.
Unions = strength in numbers.
Farmers money plus strength in numbers= good bye scum bags.
But not forgotten. I’ll not forget you, you scum bags. You know who you are. Aye Boys?
re “Labour only needs to reach out to the farmer. That is all.”
YUP ….and farmers just love the idea of a Green School which Jacinda is supporting the Green Party on….makes farmers laugh like drains
….and farmers just love the idea of a Green Party ‘Land Tax’ as they struggle to make ends meet….makes them froth at the mouth
I recognize your positivity everyone but the veil is lifted for me.
Ardern is a Blairite, the worst kind of politician, because ideologically they are as harmful neoliberal and globalist as the Nats but will bullshit you with a kind a face that they will make meaningful change.
They are fundamentally dishonest because of this.
They will govern for the (UN) scoreboard not for ALL NewZealanders as demonstrated by everything they have done so far.
The bullshit of kiwi build, child poverty inaction, climate change etc etc
The best, the only predictor of future behavior is past behavior.
We will be here, very soon, disappointed in what the incoming Labour or Labour/green govt gave us.
Covid is the only reason this government is getting re elected, it’s that simple and that shallow.
Stockholm syndrome.
+100 Keepcalmcarryon …well said!..and I am not even sure it is going to be a shoo-in for Labour or the Greens.
…re “the veil is lifted for me” … the veil has been lifted for a lot of other New Zealanders too eg. those disillusioned pissed off voters who are now voting ACT .
Wokie virtue signalling, is recognised as an attack on other NZers and their rights (and it is done by pretenders who have absolutely no understanding of class politics and nor do they come from the working class)
+100 Keepcalmcarryon
Keep CarryOn. It may just be a little bit rich blaming P M Ardern for not having yet remedied all the National Govt’s systemic cock-ups.
The world doesn’t run on pixie dust, my dear, or the waving Harry Potter wands or the fantasy of children’s books and waiting for Christmas.
“… the only predictor of future behavior is past behaviour” is the stultifying world of Al and algorithms choking govt departments and needing to be tossed out to make way for the original thinkers and problem solvers we’ve been pretty good at producing in the past, and need to make way for now. Defeatism achieves little.
Ardern’s pre-Covid response to the evil of the Muslim massacres, probably helped message us and prepare us about the necessity and desirability of community togetherness ; if there is anyone else who could have achieved that, then it is they who still wear a veil of invisibility.
If your assertion re past behaviour as a predication of future behaviour were, however, to hold true, then the future would not be looking too bad at all. Unfortunately, things are rarely that simple – but don’t give up yet, there’s too much at stake.
“Covid is the only reason this government is getting re elected, it’s that simple and that shallow.”
That may well have been the case until the mongrel came out in Collins. No sane minded person would vote a party whom has that appalling lying vile creature in charge. You want bullshit, vote National. Collins is Trumpite.
Have you seen Grant’s recent utube ad appealing to former supporters of John Key?! Vote Green or Maori or TOP.
Good article . Adern is our ‘Churchill’. It just goes to show what being open and ‘human’ during crisis can achieve. It will be nice to see Labour, the Greens and the Maori party as a team. It would be more than nice to see a backlash against the neo liberal agenda. And it will be excellent to see the neo liberal framework dismantled.
We don’t need it around here anyhow’s.
Never asked for it. Never wanted it, and never needed it.
Yes, and we need Jacinda to now take this on board as her future ‘Covid moment’ as she has now been reminded by her peers ‘the UN’ as Wild Katipo correctly said.
UN: Earth on course to become ‘uninhabitable hell for millions’
2020|05:52
That’s what the planet is becoming due to the lack of action on climate change – according to a strongly worded United Nations report.
https://play.stuff.co.nz/details/_6199932699001
Jacinda _ “LETS DO THIS” (Courtesy of Jacinda Adern PM of NZ.).
I agree with every word Martyn, however…
The election hasn’t been won yet, and I sincerely believe that there are more “shy” National voters out there, than the polls would leave you to believe. Lets get through the election first, and pray to any higher powers, that it doesn’t all go sideways right.
Keepcalmcarryontalkingshit,
Could fill the townhall with what you don’t know.
Kiwibuild has been a fail so far but a failure that has been hindered significantly by other epic situations. That aside, most people would prefer ambitious goals to indifference and denial.
How absurd to state “child poverty inaction”. Clearly, you haven’t been paying attention to the progress made under diabolical circumstances while attending to an extremely long to-do list where every group is demanding their issue be resolved immediately.
Unfortunately, Ardern doesn’t have a magic wand. Do you really think Ardern could do give full attention to climate change under the circumstances?
Yes, you will be here bleating long into the future about the Ardern Government. Shit happens.
It staggers me that we live among eggplants who genuinely believe Covid-19 is the only reason Ardern will be re-elected. Her handling of multiple epic situations has increased her popularity but how is that a negative? Ardern has a personality people gravitate toward. She’s extremely intelligent, inclusive, and progressive. She’s a caring person who’s displayed great leadership. Only a simple and shallow moron would be so ignorant to emphatically state a deadly virus is the only reason Ardern is getting a second term.
Take Covid-19 out of the picture, Ardern still has a landslide victory.
Jacinda has a lot of disciples it would seem…say no more
Red Buzzard,
Surely you can do better than that? I feel like I’ve just been mauled by a newborn lamb.
I’d assumed you could spot the difference between a supporter / admirer / fan and a …….disciple. It appears I’ve given you too much credit. Any creature that has lizards, rodents, and termites as their main dietary content could hardly be expected to count to 10 or know the difference between a fan and a disciple.
Indeed Red Buzzard.
Those prone to excesses of emotion are easily conned.
Look! Shiny things!
I’ve dealt with my disappointment with our current politics, theirs is yet to come it seems.
Personality cultists for Jacinda are every bit as self stimulatory as Keys fawning idiots.
The light shineth in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend.
No need to talk dirty though.
Well at least with Aderns supposed ‘third way’ politics we can work with that. With Keys divisive politics only a small group benefited. The rich.
” Personality cultists for Jacinda are every bit as self stimulatory as Keys fawning idiots ”
YES !!! As Churchill observed The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.” …
How many people voting could tell you what policies any of the parties including Labour are going to implement when they are in government ?
Jacindafan.
“Kiwibuild has been a fail so far but a failure that has been hindered significantly by other epic situations. That aside, most people would prefer ambitious goals to indifference and denial.” Your quote.
What the fuck does that mean. Anybody can pull a number out of thin air and without any clue in the world spout bullshit like that amongst a list as long as your arm of unattainable goals and all to tell people what they want to hear and to win the last election. Hate National as much as you like but they didn’t try to out bid Labour with promises that would never materialise. What labour did at the last election was to suck people like you in and they still are. Albeit with niceness.
Aw well my condolences, as your going to be bitterly disappointed, and deep down you know it to be true. As disappointed as I am every election, whatever cretins inhabit the Dronehive.
But hey if I’m proven wrong, I’ll be here cap n hand to admit my misguided ignorance, and gladly embrace the brave new Aotearoa that Labour is about to unleash upon the nation.
Or the alternative is to unleash the beast, that of the arrogant National party. But hey at least Oravida will have a win!
While I agree with most of what you have written I don’t think 600 000 public servants is the answer to the 300 000 some who are useless employees now. I would like to see a politics free public service where the best ideas are acted on & they focus on helping New Zealanders & not themself.
Meanwhile CO2 at 417ppm, the atmosphere and climate obey their own physical laws and we take the consequences.
Clearly time for more meaningful bickering.
A funny thing for Labour to die in a ditch over
This from No right turn
Over the weekend, National unveiled its latest desperate effort to try and gain some attention: campaigning hard against a wealth tax. Its a Green Party policy, so its a funny thing for national to campaign against (alternatively, I guess it shows who their true opponents are). But even funnier is Labour’s response, with Jacinda Ardern saying that it would not even be discussed in coalition negotiations. Yes, the “worker’s party” is ruling out even having a conversation on taxing the unearned wealth of the ultra-rich. Obviously, that’s not how MMP works – as James Shaw has pointed out, the Greens expect to negotiate in good faith, and that will include discussing taxing wealth. But if we take this seriously, Ardern is effectively saying that Labour would rather not be in government, or would rather not have Green support for its policies and would instead prefer to negotiate everything on a case-by-case basis (with all the delay that entails), than even talk about taxing wealth. Which seems like a pretty funny thing for a “Labour” party to want to die in a ditch over.
Meanwhile, the message is clear: Labour is only going to enact this policy if they are forced to by a strong Green Party. So if you want a wealth tax, vote Green.
In my view Labour are just National with red bunting these days. I’m at a loss to understand how people claiming to be on the left could even consider voting for them. Hell they have no even been clear on their policies although as the last 3 years have shown us its been very much neo liberal business as usual.
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