A religious fanatic, a crypto-fascist and a Dalek – these are our choices for Prime Minister of NZ?
You don’t appreciate the hole that Key has left in the National until you look at the cast of mutants who are now vying for his job. National without John Key is like a night out in Hamilton without alcohol or condoms – dull and terribly risky.
The cavalcade of political circus freaks vying for the top job speaks to the haste and secrecy of Key’s resignation. If English believed in September that Key was serious about stepping aside, he would have at least been certain of whether he was running, the shock of the resignation was a far larger surprise to National than Key’s cover story allows for.
While we still attempt to investigate the why of that resignation, let’s look at the beauty competition judged by lepers that the National Party leadership race is descending into.
Bill English – the religious welfare hating fanatic
What many always miss about English is that he is a fanatical Catholic. I wouldn’t be surprised if he whips himself to sleep nightly. English desperately needed Key because English has all the charm and personal warmth of a road accident. Key was the smiling vacant face while English spent time privatising state housing, expanding the neoliberal welfare state and pushing for mass surveillance of beneficiaries. For English, the greatest sin is state welfare which allows the poor to gravitate towards secular institutions as providers instead of fearing the lamb of Christ. His dull and tepid public statements are designed to calm markets, it isn’t to inspire voters. Those within the Party who just want to make it to the election without too much internal blood letting will back English.
The only reason English is running is to stop Judith from being the Leader. English is Bennett’s mentor, so if English wins, expect him to hold the reigns and then retire to give it to Bennett.
Jonathan Coleman – The Dalek
The Minister of Wheeze, Dr Croak has a voice honied by years of cigarettes and stepping on poor peoples dreams. Possibly the most hopeless Minister ever, he did a shit job with Broadcasting and he’s a joke in Health. He wouldn’t publicly eat the cheap slop he was forcing hospital patients to eat and had the audacity to privately eat it and tweet about how yummy it was. The entire fiasco was so carefully managed so that Coleman wouldn’t gag while eating it publicly.
He sounds like a dalek and has all the personality of a dalek. The least deserving individual in Cabinet, his running is to make it look like a competition of ideas when it really isn’t.
Judith Collins – the crypto-fascist
The majority within National fear Judith Collins because they believe she would use the power of the Office in terrible ways that would actually make NZ more Police state than functioning democracy. She has huge support in the backbenches and wants to implement the slater-lusk plan to enrage white voters to do a Trump here in NZ.
Dumped in 2014 for her role in helping Cameron Slater attempt to take out the Serious Fraud Office, her winning would empower Slater back into being her main attack dog.
Do we really want this back in Politics?
Watch who Maggie Barry and Simon Bridges back to glean where this will end. If English wins, expect Collins to run a guerrilla civil war against him for the next 10 months.
The only certainty is now the Key brand has stepped aside, NZers get to see the viciousness of the National factions in all their glory.
Love it – fantastic descriptions and anecdotes of the candidates! In particular…
“I wouldn’t be surprised if he whips himself to sleep nightly. English desperately needed Key because English has all the charm and personal warmth of a road accident. Key was the smiling vacant face while English spent time privatising state housing, expanding the neoliberal welfare state and pushing for mass surveillance of beneficiaries.”
“The Minister of Wheeze, Dr Croak has a voice honied by years of cigarettes and stepping on poor peoples dreams. Possibly the most hopeless Minister ever, he did a shit job with Broadcasting and he’s a joke in Health. He wouldn’t publicly eat the cheap slop he was forcing hospital patients to eat and had the audacity to privately eat it and tweet about how yummy it was.”
“Judith Collins – the crypto-fascist”
I know too much to choose from, but Collins is probably the scariest candidate for NZ. She’s Trump, Hitler, Imelda Marcos and Thatcher with the Enron accountants, rolled into one body. Horror is back!
Stop denigrating religion. Some of our best loved prime ministers on the left were devout Christians. Michael Joseph Savage was a principled Catholic and no doubt this led to his basic decency and his concern for social justice and his setting up of the Welfare State. Likewise Norman Kirk was a practising Salvationist and again his Christian principles made him who he was.
@ PETER CHRISTIE … It’s principle, more than the religious belief.
Is English any more a “religious fanatic” than Jim Bolger
The problem isn’t religion per se, it is Bill English’s nasty mix of social conservatism without social justice. Even the Pope condemned neoliberalism and its entrenchment of widespread inequality.
Very good descriptions of the present pathetic contenders for the crown.
Walking dead Blinglish is so boring and uninteresting, he’s become almost invisible … yawn … zzzzzzz ….
Coleman is just as bland and uninspiring, without the experience of Blinglish … ho hum …
And Collins … ye Gods … the incarnation of all that is hell in its full demonic fury! A vicious viper, spitting venom and toxin at every turn! And yes, she will be aiming the poison at Blinglish if he (most likely) wins the job! He will definitely need God on his side! Lets hope his piety to his church has paid off! With Collins scorned, spitting hellfire and brimstone, he will be needing it!
TRUE EVERY WORD MARTYN.
EARLY ELECTION JULY 2017 WE RECKON.
Please let it be Judith Collins. She would alienate mainstream NZ and make National unelectable, much like Don Brash did. The woman is the epitomy of right-wing nastiness. Can you imagine her mate, Cameron Slater as her Chief of Staff? Head of SIS? Or maybe a whole new governmental org, with a Brown Shirt as uniform??
As for Jonathan Coleman, he would be way out of his depth and the opposition would shred him.
A religious fanatic, a crypto-fascist and a Dalek walk into a bar…
Well, one things for certain, …anyone of these circus clowns means auto lose in future elections – if not 2017.
The fact that there are so many blatantly obvious factions and rivalry’s coupled with so many scandals, rorts, gaffes, and general baggage with each of them spell it all out.
Nationals a gone burger.
Keys gone.
1 more year left. If that.
This coming election will devolve into a fiasco with National , their PR machine not being able to cope with the workload because of the sheer number of skeletons in the closets – which are not even in the closet anymore because they are publicly well known.
David Farrars job will be like the proverbial trying to make a silk purse from a sows ear.
And if the Lusk / Slater camp try to influence things through Collins, the history of Dirty Politics will be haunting them at every step of the way.
And the public will see through it all simply because there is no longer any unknown Key type character that is to be flown in to be the dark horse without a history to build an image around.
I wish it were true. Coleman has no chance, it’s between English and Collins, and if it’s Collins there’s a very real chance that NZ will follow the USA and elect a sociopath. Labour is hopeless, their main selling point is that they’re not National, and that does not inspire voters.
It’s kind of like a choice between execution by firing squad;execution by hanging, or execution by electric chair. The point is EXECUTION, not the method, that is the fact.
It’s like watching Sauron summon the dark lord all over again. Not because it’s canon, just because there’s only a few ways to breath life into the dead corpse that use to be the kiwi dream. It’s just we’re moving further apart from each other
Even Toby (pot-kettle-black) Manhire thinks that Coleman’s voice is too croaky
Don’t underestimate Labour’s ability to seize defeat from the jaws of victory. I think Crusher = Trump in the machinations of the Lusk/Slater crew.
Let’s not get too excited about the idea of Collins being unelectably toxic. That’s what Clinton and her minions thought about Trump, and look where that got them?
The new National leader-elect is not that important. What’s important is vision and policy. Brand Key and his Crosby-Trextor gremlins were very effective at distracting people away from, and keeping the oppostion focused on shallow personality politics, leaving us looking grumpy spoilt children. It is this, more than any real popularity on Key’s part that kept National winning elections.