Compare Luxon’s old testament ‘bottom feeders’ to Key’s ‘underclass’

By
Martyn Bradbury
-
104
1711
Let’s talk political leadership and compare Chris Luxon’s old testament spare the whip spoil the ram raider school and parent blame game to John Key’s Underclass, when he picked up 12 year old Aroha Ireland from Meghan Close and took her to Waitangi for Waitangi Day.
 
John Key displayed political leadership, Chris Luxon is playing a dog whistle on a trumpet.
 
Putting 10 year olds in ankle bracelets and forcing them into counter productive Military Boot camps isn’t social policy, it’s a revenge fantasy!
 
A true leader sees responsibility beyond blaming the ‘bottom feeders’.
 
Being lectured to by a multimillionaire CEO with 7 properties on how to raise troubled children shows how out of touch the NZ political culture has become.

 

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104 COMMENTS

  1. I looked up the meaning of ‘bottom feeders’. Turns out Luxon isn’t entirely right.
    Bottom feeders can mean ‘an opportunist who seeks quick profit usually at the expense of others or their misfortune’. Merriam Webster.
    Sound familiar?
    Sounds like someone who would support the idea of more liquor shops in poor suburbs.

    • Yep – an opportunist all right..

      Today’s 0.75% rise in the OCR, has made Chris Luxon have a “Truss”- epiphany.

      Tax cuts for the rich would add to inflation.

      So, surprise, surprise, National are “reconsidering” Luxon’s $18,000 income tax “windfall”.

      Never mind, he’ll make that back, and more, by reinstating landlord tax “deductions”.

      Sorted

    • Boy, Roge was, and presumably still is, a midget. Oz didn’t think a pure idea was worth turning your eyes away from your knees. Did so much better than us, those sophisticated people. Or, Irisher convicts with no trust in authority.

  4. It is a sad state of affairs when being successful in life and a christian is seen as a reason to rule out their opinion and advise . It is definately the tall poppy story . You seem happy to take the opinion of a career politican who has achieved not much outside of that arena and at the moment is achieving little in it.

    • Neither of the 2 pictured above would I describe as “successful in life”, nor do either exhibit anything remotely like “Christian” behaviour.

      Not chopping tall poppies, but avoiding the dog turds in the grass.

      • Ah, Jase, referencing “ Christian “ behaviour on a religion- challenged site, is nice example of freedom of speech and why we must keep it. Key however was never Christian, and used his Jewish family as an electioneering tool the way Bill English used his teenage acne and Samoan chiefdom, although John Key intimated that he wasn’t a practising Jew himself. Ironic, when Judaism like Islam and Christianity, teaches not just kindness, but a moral obligation to the poor, and I think tithing, in which case John Key being a millionaire could have been a really big help to those in need of it had he not left the family religion behind.

        But within the Christian context which shaped the so-called civilised western world, the poor were never ever seen as bottom-feeders in the way which Christopher ( Christ bearer) Luxon describes them, and in fact the Galilean himself said “Blessed be the poor”, so Luxon looks like a Judas here.

        Christ advised a would-be adherent to “ give all you have to the poor and come follow me,” and the likelihood of Mercedes-boy doing this is zilch, but it’s unclear whether Chris is a Christian, or a sect member, something weird, or nothing very much at all.

        • Nicely summed up Snow White.
          Both these gentlemen would struggle with the following bit of scripture.
          Matthew 19:24
          “And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.”

          • Jase Well the ‘Sermon on the Mount’ – the golden rule of all the great world religions – seems to have bypassed the carelessly named Christopher person, and as for the other one, he’s not worth wasting too much time on.

    • Your idea of success in life is your own, don’t conflate what others deem success. As people who made money in life through business, Key and Luxon were successful. As a human being Key has been far from successful. As a politician he made a success of his time but should never in my lifetime have been afforded a knighthood. Not one person can tell me why he was knighted? He was just doing his job.
      It is not tall poppy syndrome, that’s your biggest mistake.
      Lydia Ko is successful, she succeeds at her career and also has a foundation that encourages other young women to succeed. The ability to bring others with you is the definition of success. That is worthy of a gong.
      A career politician can be deemed a success given they devote their career to helping others. Trying to bring this person down is your own form of tall poppy syndrome.

      • Queeny. Trevor may be a bit of an irritating whinging Pom at times, but he has done more substantial volunteer work in the community than many ever will – flax roots sort of stuff largely alien to the bottom-warmers of Bowen Street.

    • Trevor. There’s different ways of being successful, and some of them much more useful and constructive than others. It’s interesting seeing Antonia Fraser today describing books as ‘saving lives’, and I’d agree with that, even if the New Zealand Arts Council doesn’t, and I suggest that the writers of uplifting words, and the composers of great music, are successful persons.

      The inventor of the jet boat, a Hamilton I think, was a successful man in my book, as are the neonatal nurses who nurture critically ill babes and monitor quite sophisticated electronic equipment in doing so, and the surgeons who save lives and lead lives of interrupted sleep themselves to do so, and the Kirks who build houses with their own hands, and the parents who lead self-sacrificing lives to do the best they can for their kids and often for other people’s children too, and the teachers who inspire kids to stay on at school, and the volunteers who working for charity shops helping support less fortunate people, and the chappie from Nelson who split the atom, are successful sort people, unmeasured by public status or dollars in the bank.

      • Thank you for your comments and I agree success comes in many forms .
        Everyone has a right to their opinions which are formed by life experience .I struggle to find the right words to convey my feelings but I do get annoyed with the lumping of National voters bad nasty people and Labour not so much . I do not agree with some of the actions of National but on balance I agree with far less of the solutions from this particular Labour government . The first 2 terms of Helen Clarks government were far more balanced with their policies and I felt she was leading the country. By the end of the 3rd term the direction was lost and it was time for a change

        • Trevor The thing is that in this country vulgar displays of wealth are equated with ‘success’, regardless of how the dosh was come by; much of the left regard all the rich as crooks, which isn’t necessarily so; it is is possible to be a National supporter and be an ok person; not all social justice supporters were enamoured of Helen bloody Clark; and not everybody agrees with me, that all extremes are basically bad news – they’re the zealots, with closed minds. We’re not the smartest bunch of people and the “ tall poppy syndrome” has been part of the anti-intellectualism, which, alas, differentiates us from eg the more cerebral Germans… We’ve drifted a lot from the idealism which did motivate many of our now-denigrated founding fathers, and the current ‘ divide and rule’ mentality of Labour and the Greens, is not in our best interests, and they know it. Kia kaha.

    • Trev but doesn’t Luxon want to be a career politician himself if not why the fuck has, he put his hand up to be our next PM.

    • it’s not the belife as such it’s the uncontrollable impulse to force it on others…something evangelical xtians share with their muslim nutter brothers.

      • gargarin. All extremists are usually negative news, not just the religion ones. Political, racial, sexist, gender-ist, age-ist, are all as bad as each other, and deliberately fostered for their own slippery purposes by the fools on the hill.

  6. Easy targets like our gangs they cherry picking low hanging fruit in the meantime both Acts and Nationals policies exacerbate poverty. Too much immigration can be detrimental to housing availability, wages, working conditions, hospitals, GP clinics, schools, more cars on our run-down roads. How come we want to lock up ram raiders, but we are rubbing shoulders up with the Saudi prince who disposed of Khashoggi. Us Western countries have double standards were pedophiles get of lightly, white collar criminals and tax evaders get fuck all, sick!

  7. Just been reading about the feral underclass whose rights to tenancy are being protected by Poto Williams as they go about making life hell for their neighbours seemingly with impunity. Maybe, just maybe John has a point.

    • Wow, Sylvian, Andrew, Trevor, Cameron!
      “Feral underclass”,
      You should get some counselling. Maybe you and Bob the First could share a counsellor, and claim half the cost from the gubmint.

    • Hey Sylvian, Poto Williams is the Minister of what? How does she protect the tenancy rights of the feral underclass.
      Please explain or piss off back to your miserable existence on top of the dung heap. People with views like yours deserve to be hit with hate speech laws. You are the feral underclass because you can’t go any lower.

      • You sound angry Mike. I see another member of the feral underclass has decided to take the till takings and the life of a hard working member of society. He’s probably a Tik Tok sensation as I write. The place is full of them. Go and sit in a park in Wesley or Owairaka around dusk and you’ll see what I mean. Or go and dodge the faeces on the new Mangere Bridge walkway left behind by the rabble that think it’s acceptable to gather, play loud music, and defecate where they like at any hour. Or go and talk to the elderly couple in my home town of Whangarei who are constantly being threatened by their gang affiliated neighbours. What is the government’s response. A jar of anti-deppresants and an offer to move the elderly couple on. The country is turning into a sick joke and you obviously have a problem with anyone pointing it out.

      • Sorry Mike. I see she is no longer the Associate Minister of Housing. Hard to keep up with the constant shuffling of the imcompetent within the Labour Party benches.

  8. And who help create the feral underclass, Sylvian? and whose policies exacerbate poverty that add to the so-called underclass you refer to ?

    • The whole political establishment is to blame for that one. Both sides are as guilty as each other.
      Exhibit A – last 24 months.

    • Poor parenting and role modeling is rampant which ever party is in power . Having children you cannot afford to feed or house properly carries on who ever is in power . Blaming politicians for ever itch is a cope out we need to firstly look at ourselves then see how we can turn the tide to let it be known action that nut others is just not on . Somehow some people just need to be persuaded to stop breeding.

      • Trevor, I tend to agree that you can’t blame the government for poor role modelling, the decision making of some parents, and the size of their families. I guess where the role modelling and parenting gets tricky is where both folks have to work their arses off to get by. Low wages and unaffordable housing make it challenging for some parents to be present full stop. I agree that if you are faced with those conditions then why would you have lots of kids, but for some one child might be a stretch. We also can’t have a situation where the birth rate lowers to the point where it can’t compensate for the death rate and people being too old to work. That’s something the government of whatever shade needs to be on top of.

        • The hard facts are: if we can’t afford to have children and take care of them, then maybe it’s better to have low birthrate. Parents are the 1st teachers, and if they are missing the kids will likely have bad outcomes, and cost the taxpayer instead of replacing one. Yes, there are always exceptions where bad parenting results in good children and vice versa.

          Second fact: life was hard before and has become harder still under labour. Labour splurged cash like confetti, people used easy access to cash to buy property. Yes, one might say people are stupid, but isn’t that what a reasonable govt foresees. Nope, they were too busy pointing fingers at evil property investors, passing nonsensical tax laws, instead of turning off the cheap money supply…the root cause. Let’s also not forget millions spent on achieving nothing…unless filling the consultants coffers is part of your achievement target.

          Forward planning is obviously not required if you are a minister in the current govt!

          • Is that you Paula Benefit? How goes the RE market these days? I bet it takes a lot of effort behind the scenes though, to rewrite RMA legislation, plan for our decrepit water infrastructure and honor TTOW, revamp the entire health system and steer us through covid. Credit where it’s due even though we are yet to see the results of this forward planning.

      • So Trevor.
        “Poor parenting and role modeling is rampant”
        Do you mean the likes of the Nat-Troll’s parental vacuum’s offspring called Jessee MacKenzie?
        https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/128230199/i-am-eggstein-young-nat-jessee-mackenzie-admits-trolling-female-politicians-resigns-from-national-party
        This piece of filth, aspiring National Party member “Jessee MacKenzie made the admission after the courts unmasked his Christchurch flatmate, fellow Young Nat Bryce Beattie, as the owner of the computer IP address linked to the harassment.

        The pair have since resigned from the National Party and Beattie is also no longer running for a seat on a Christchurch community board.”

        Pot – kettle – black Trevor! Thanks for pointing out the filthy deplorables in party politics Trevor!

        Enlightening! Another bunch of right-wing losers like Trump https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/national-party-argue-costs-for-eminem-lose-yourself-copyright-breach/ISQQ6JQJTM4KWKACSUN6BMSTE4/

        Go slap yourself Trevor, then lose yourself!

    • Well Covid. If you believe in self responsibility they did it to themselves. If you believe the government is responsible for everyone’s life outcomes then it’s governments past and present. I guess the answer lies somewhere in between these two polarising positions.

    • National promoted a “brighter future” and failed miserably. That is the underclass you talk of Covid.
      Key walked a young Mcgehan Close underclass girl for photo opportunities out in front of an adorning media, the brighter future, she lives in Australia…

      https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2016/12/mcgeehan-close-has-life-changed-for-residents-under-john-key.html

      So yes Covid unequivocally the National party despite pathetic attempts by others to lay blame at Labours feet.

    • I would place the blame mostly on their parents Covid. I know self responsibility is not popular these days but it’s probably worth revisiting. Making sure your kids get to school every day is probably a good place to start. If that means sacrificing your Sky subscription or getting a tattoo, they should consider it an investment in their future.

  9. Well, we’ve still got this situation where a lot of our young people are out of work and a significant portion of these young people have been unemployed for two years, three years, or longer.

    It’s not a very feasible social policy in this day and age to run boot camps. Not is it a very good social policy to reduce the funding of mental health services and rehabilitation services.

    This is the point I’ve been making for several months. Neither of our major political parties seems to have much of a vision. This places our young unemployed in an extremely precarious position.

    How prudent was it for Labour to increase benefits directly after the pandemic? Not very. An efficient economic stimulus package, in New Zealand especially, would most probably have incorporated a significant boost to small business instead.

    • Daniel Lang. “ Neither of our major political parties seems to have much of a vision”. I agree. But it is the Labour Party which is hell bent on kneecapping the independent Commissioner for Children, and if ever kids needed a Commissioner, ours do. What’s more, the other political parties, and numerous reputable NGO ‘s want that Commissioner kept, but Sepuloni and Ardern won’t listen to them. And even worse, the Commissioner is being “ replaced” by a committee of faceless public servants from the not eminently successful Department of Education. If I’d not already dumped Labour, I’d be doing so now for this reason alone.

  10. I thought Key’s stunt with that girl was a cringeworthy attempt at “everyman” status. Whilst I think he was genuine in his intentions, it just smacked of a patronizing and guilt ridden performance art.

    • Billid I agree. It was clearly a stunt for the cameras, he had no track record of being out and about helping the disadvantaged like Lange did at Toynbee Hall well before becoming a politician and which I think another Labour leader has tried to pretend having done similar.

    • Billid I agree. It looked a stunt for the cameras, he had no track record of being out and about helping the disadvantaged like Lange did at Toynbee Hall before becoming a politician and which I think another Labour leader has tried to pretend having done.

  11. Has anyone made the point that, at least to a certain extent, John Key created the ‘underclass’ which annoyed him so, while Luxon, if elected in 2023, which is quite doubtful, would be inheriting an ‘underclass’ which will be largely made up of remnants of the covid-19 pandemic?

    You see, it was John Key and National who made policy which created a divisive social structure in this country. Jacinda Ardern has been mending it amidst a global pandemic.

    • Daniel Lang I rather think that it was Roger Douglas, the stunted little state house Labourite installing neoliberalism and the self-serving myth of trickle-down into New Zealand politics, which deliberately created an underclass in New Zealand and put previously enlightened social policy into reverse gear. Popping out for photo-ops with the poor or with visiting disc jockeys, doesn’t produce homes for the homeless, or hospitals for the ill and ailing, or a decent education system, let alone affordable food.

  12. Loser me,fool kiwi,did you think,i was going out a loser,Bill,best ever deputy. Jenny Shipley, i always admired as a leader,and respect eh! john key,the lady led the national party to its biggest kicking ever prior to the latest,Robs mob,is back,the tuskers are back in town.

  14. BTW – When I try to comment using my Google signon I get the following message:
    Access blocked: This app’s request is invalid
    You can’t sign in because this app sent an invalid request. You can try again later, or contact the developer about this issue. Learn more about this error
    If you are a developer of this app, see error details.
    Error 400: redirect_uri_mismatch

    Although commentary approval here seems very haphazard: some get through, some don’t for no obvious reasons.

    • There are time lags for moderation purposes. TDB doesn’t get govt funding. You’ll find comment dumps seem to be done about first thing in the morning, midday ish and just before 6pm, I have noticed. We’re a patient lot most of the time

  15. Thank you for your comments and I agree success comes in many forms .
    Everyone has a right to their opinions which are formed by life experience .I struggle to find the right words to convey my feelings but I do get annoyed with the lumping of National voters bad nasty people and Labour not so much . I do not agree with some of the actions of National but on balance I agree with far less of the solutions from this particular Labour government . The first 2 terms of Helen Clarks government were far more balanced with their policies and I felt she was leading the country. By the end of the 3rd term the direction was lost and it was time for a change

  16. You’ve pointed out Luxon’s weakness and Key’s strength, which I’d forgotten a bit — his expressed concern was followed through with in some way.

    Luxon is just a rich man — which is an isolated position in NZ politics — see his poll numbers. So, disagree with this being a prob of NZ political culture. It’s Luxon’s prob — thank god for us, we sometimes come through. But virtually never for Maori, so not really.

  17. it appears, and I stress appears the guy who murdered the dairy worker was white, middle aged and dressed in black…I’m saying nowt, butttt… jumping to the kind of conclusions TDBs hang em high brigade usually tout I could make some unfounded assertions.

    it wasn’t a 14 yr old maori kid in a stolen car

  18. You are one of my favourite ‘mansplainers’, Martyn, but Key a Political leader? Whoa! Steady on there. John Key is just a self serving derivatives trader trading derivatives. All the time. It is all he does. He is a salesman. Luxon, on the other hand is a ‘wannabe’ – lightweight and not overly endowed with the smarts. What I call an ’empty suit’. He schmoozed his way into a job with Air New Zealand which gave him a false notion of importance. Well, he does own multiple investment houses, so there’s that. Also, he is a ‘Christian’ but he doesnt realise that Christians are good people and there are no ‘bottom feeders’ in the world of a true Christian. But, I owe both of them a huge favour, given they have both stirred the political activism within me. So, I know that I’m not dead yet.

    • evangelicals don’t rate jesus, bloody hippy, but blasphemously worship the angry old man with a white beard…christ is just a logo for them.

    • Clueless but not dead. We all started somewhere. FYI meth is not a good place to be. Hope you’re OK. Just, you know, get real soon. NZ needs ya n all…

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