After plague and pestilence, the righteous crimson tsunami has swept all before it with the vengeance of low level socialism.
The meek have inherited the provinces and the grateful have sacrificed livestock.
Comets fill the sky, eclipses augur providence, virgin births and small scale miracles are yielded.
History has flinched and oracles have fainted.
It was a hell of an election and the greatest result politically for Labour in half a century.
The Mother of Dragons has prevailed with the most timid dragons ever seen.
Let’s get ready to grumble.
WINNERS
Chloe winning Auckland Central
Despite coming 3rd in both polls, she championed to victory because she is a unique candidate who can articulate real vision to the challenges we face. She must now replace Marama as co-leader of the Greens and she must be given the space to stamp her own leadership on the Party by refusing point blank to join Labour and immediately transition into an Opposition Party because 2023 will see the electorate demographics change to ones that support the Greens, not Labour and the spike in climate change events alongside Labour’s cautious foot dragging will set the Greens in a position where they can double their current votes as the electorate gets more and more impatient with Jacinda’s neokindess. What’s the point of kindness if it can’t stop climate change and suffering? Chloe’s genuine transformative vision is the Jacinda we wish we had. Chloe is a future leader of the UN.
Jacinda winning an unprecedented Labour victory
Her extraordinary emotional intelligence touched people at their most frightened and she reset leadership from male characteristics to unapologetically female ones without losing any power. Every woman who matters to me stands taller because of her example. She made kindness a political strength, not a weakness and she showed courage under crisis. This result was a gratitude win, her tepid domestic policy has to become something vastly more meaningful if the next 3 years aren’t to be squandered. She spent 3 years redefining ‘transformative’ to mean ‘whatever Winston will let me get away with’, we all hope she doesn’t bastardise the meaning of ‘mandate’ to ‘managing expectations’. She is a political phenomenon and she is setting up a 4 term legacy.
Actual Green Party Caucus meeting
The Left save the Greens – again
A mere month ago, James Shaw was fretting the Greens would crash beneath the 5% threshold! The Green Party result doesn’t show support for the Greens, it shows Labour voters appalled at how timid Labour policy actually was! The Left, knowing that Labour were cruising to victory, put aside the Greens alienating woke middle class identity politics shtick and brought the Greens back from political oblivion because Labour supporters saw how tepid Labour’s policies really were. The politically active Left KNOW that Labour’s last 3 years have been mediocre at best. There’s only so many ‘Good first step’ press releases from Wellington Unions before you have to acknowledge you’re just jogging on the spot. The Left backed the Greens because the wider policy platform was far more radical than Labour’s. Does the current Leadership team have the tactical smarts to make the next strategic moves? Oh fuck no, totally expect them to goose this up. Nothing progresses until Chloe is the new co-leader.
John Tamihere and the Maori Party
Tamihere had a blinder of a campaign. He clearly won every debate he was in, including the multi-party debates. When mainstream Pakeha media are praising a Māori politician, you know he’s either done well or just called on the Treaty to be pruned. By bringing in 1 MP for the Māori Party, he has reset their political legacy and re-established his own. Expect him to cut a deal with Labour which excludes the Greens.
Neoliberalism
The Wellington Neoliberal Bureaucratic Elite stops transformative change in NZ, not Winston Peters, and they see nothing to fear in Jacinda or Labour. A Democracy changes the Government, A Revolution changes the State.
Evangelical Right
The Evangelical Right inside National have a new messiah in the form of Luxon and they await his leadership with the same impatience as they await the second coming.
Maori Media
Māori media this year provided a depth of coverage, a realness of debate and a genuine respect for all those participating that eclipsed any of the other mainstream media. Why is it when Facebook is spawning conspiracy theorists that Māori media who have provided the best journalism get bugger all money? Can’t Willie Jackson be the new Broadcasting Minister?
Labour Māori Caucus
Now the largest and most powerful faction inside Labour. The Deputy Leader shouldn’t be Kelvin after that dreadful speech, but the Deputy does have to be Māori.
Diversity
More Māori, Woman, Rainbow and Pacific MPs. Our Parliament looks like the actual people it represents. This is what a healthy functioning democracy look like and we should collectively feel pride and strength in that diversity.
Vegan Humble Pie
The one thing worse than eating humble pie, is eating vegan humble pie.
Simon Bridges – Vindicated
The ONLY National Party MP who comes out of National’s implosion with their mana intact and enhanced is Simon Bridges. The treachery and cowardice of his backbench who turned on him and sparked National’s death spiral with Muller’s coup showed their character under pressure where as Bridges has been all class. He would be mad to take the leadership back from such treacherous scum and they would be mad to not beg him.
LOSERS
TVNZ Election night coverage – A Spinoff Dinner Party from Hell
What the fuck happened to TVNZs election night coverage? Were they saving money or something? Simon Dallow barely appeared, they did a couple of crosses but most of it was one locked off shot of a panel that resembled a Spinoff dinner party where those deemed worthy to appear competed over who recycled best and who hated white men most. Mediaworks on the night was extraordinary. The panelists were heavy hitters, Gower was on another planet, the hosting was incisive, the crosses were hilarious – it was a political telethon on TV3 and Sunday morning worthy religious programming on TVNZ. MediaWorks owned TVNZ on election night.
OWNED.
Give me an O. Give me a W. Give me an N. Give me an E. Give me a D.
What do you get?
OWNED.
That was a lot of effort for one joke, but the level of effort was in recognition of aforementioned owning.
Pollsters – Bugger them
The pollsters were all wrong! Labour was soaring while National was crashing. The vast sum of advance votes meant the pollsters were fishing in an ever decreasing pool and it warped the results in ways that didn’t reflect anything other than the need to get a TV poll out.
Hooton – Machiavellian Prince who flew too close to the Sun
What the fuck was he doing? He went sober and adopted this pious warrior philosopher poet schtick as his promise for personal development post all the Dirty Politics Machiavellian stuff, and he almost did it.
He had bewilderingly been allowed back into the media as a commentator no questions asked after Hager’s book and he went back to Uni for his philosophers stone and he dodged the defamation implosion at the NBR for the prized straddling of the NZ Herald + RNZ platforms.
His columns were infuriatingly incisive, destructive and declaring the end of Jacinda’s Government every month.
He had mana, he had fear and he had respect.
Then he pimped for Todd Muller in a coup fuelled on the false confidence of a tall man and the cowardice of backbench MPs and set National into a death spiral it couldn’t pull out of.
Was the bloodlust for one more power-roid chance to grasp at the precious too much for sober Gollum?
Is that what happened?
Because fuck that entire Muller fiasco was unbelievably destabilising.
What does Hooton do for an encore after that? Amputate his own leg with a can opener?
Kelvin Davis – Sit down, be humble
His poem was so embarrassing. Normally you can’t get Kelvin to talk, on election night you couldn’t shut him up. You don’t kick someone once you’ve knocked them down. If NZ beats some minnow at the Rugby World Cup, we show humility in that win and talk up our competitor, we don’t go take a creamy dump on their chest in the middle of the pitch over their exhausted bodies, which is exactly what Kelvin did for almost quarter of an hour. Take a great big creamy dump on the National Party when we should have been showing some grace. Why is he the Deputy?
Ben Thomas – sad pundit for the Right
As he got sadder and sadder with National imploding, Ben ‘Ratings Killer’ Thomas gloomed the Q+A studio down from a bright platform for the examination of the issues of the nation to a dark sad chamber of grief.
Flowers on set wilted. Can we get him an emotional support peacock please.
Helen White – Auckland Central Labour Candidate who imploded
What was it exactly that managed to make Helen White so awful as a candidate for Labour in Auckland Central? Was it the condescending attitude? The sense that she felt journalists and the dumb voters were beneath her? The Ok Karen snide put downs of Chloe? It was difficult to actually place wasn’t it? But it was totally there. She’s such a bad candidate. She cut a 15.7% lead down to a mere 5% in the space of 6 weeks! What a shambles.
Mainstream Media
How is it that we have radio and newspaper stations full of right wing opinion makers, yet every electorate in the South Island Party voted Labour? Those media platforms are completely out of whack with their actual audiences.
Boomers & Farming Lobby
The collapse of National is the end of a political dynasty and shows we as a country have finally hit the upper limit of boomer influence and farming political power. From here on in, National will decline as a political force and the Boomers and Farming Lobby don’t realise it yet.
Woke cancel culture activism against Free Speech
Just imagine, for one second, if the woke hadn’t started their deplatform anti-free speech jihad and hadn’t given David Seymour the gift of standing up for free speech. The fucking Left should be championing free speech, NOT THE FUCKING FAR RIGHT YOU FUCKING MORONS! The Woke handed ACT the ammunition they would use against us, they are now a Right Wing Values Party and we fucking gifted them free speech. Can the woke please go back to sleep?
The Fishing industry and racing industry – capitalism with no cronies
Without Winston’s crony capitalism, what will the corrupt fishing and racing industry do now?
The National Party
The National Party campaign was a train-wreck dumpster fire that collided with a school bus that exploded next to a pet store.
Simon Bridges fell foul of the sudden solidarity created by Covid and National were caught flat footed by a crisis that only became worse by more free market deregulation.
No one wanted to hear about the State being cut back when everyone was running to the State for safety.
It highlighted the utter vacancy of National Party ideology, all they kept coming up with was privatisation!
Their position on the border was farcical…
…and that’s after you had to accept a former President of the Party leaking privileged information to a National MP who then leaked it to the media, another MP sending sext texts, another Party Offical smearing their own candidate, and the Todd Muller coup ignited by cowardice.
I’ve seen mass cult suicides with better discipline than this. How the hell you expect people who feel deceived and betrayed to play happy families with those who betrayed and deceived you is beyond me.
New Conservatives – The Life of Leighton
Turns out no one wants to burn books, make clits illegal and drive Muslims into the sea. God has forsaken these clowns. Rejoice brothers and sisters! The New Conservatives with their platform of spite and malice only getting 1.5% proves there IS a God!
Beijing – Unhappy customer
They have just lost all that investment into National, they will NOT be happy.
There must be some kind of way outta here Said the joker to the thief.
Alt-Right Qanon Conspiracy Theorists
It’s last days in the bunker time for Billy TK and JLR. Their conspiracy theory laden madness is upon them, the time of the 5G Apocalypse and rise of the Anti-Christ UN is here and it’s less Rapture as it is Rupture. The power of Facebook to project fear over reason and allow snake oil merchants like these two to manipulate people and warp the very structures of our Democracy really does need a jolly good looking into whenever Broadcasting Minister Kris Faafoi can find a minute to not be useless.
The climate, the poor, prisoners, the mentally ill & Renters
For them, they lose. The tepid nothingness of Labour Policy means their existence is pushed further and further to the edges.
CONCLUSION:
Ultimately, none of this really matters. In the words of the greatest living NZ Unionist, Robert Reid…
…THIS is the real issues in NZ.
We think the masquerade of representative democracy puts us the people in control – it doesn’t! The Wellington Neoliberal Bureaucratic Elite stops transformative change.
A Democracy changes the Government.
A Revolution changes the State.
We need a revolution from an election.
The foundations of the 35 year neoliberal experiment in NZ have been exposed and found to be cracked to their core, with the climate crisis demanding a radical change, this pandemic is the perfect time to challenge the religious orthodoxy of free market dogma.
This is a unique challenge for the NZ Left ever since Identity Politics over took class politics as the dominant theory on our side of the political divide. It means currently that the Left in NZ are intellectually better prepared to organise a WoC Mommy Blogger Trans Ally free the nipple petition on Action Station than they are to debate the hegemonic structure of neoliberalism.
This has left the Left intellectually ill prepared to debate the failures of the free market economy and the solutions we must adopt to get out of this.
Labour are notoriously timid when it comes to challenging the neoliberal hegemonic structure because they were the Party that unleashed this far right experiment upon us and the scars of that debate are still raw in Labour’s psyche, luckily for us the economic depression alongside the meltdown of the climate crisis will be so deep and damaging that even Cautious Jacinda and Extra Cautious Grant have no choice but to reform and rebuild.
History is watching.
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This says it all Martyn. Your last sentance rols it all into one tight ball for Jacinda.
“luckily for us the economic depression alongside the meltdown of the climate crisis will be so deep and damaging that even Cautious Jacinda and Extra Cautious Grant have no choice but to reform and rebuild.- History is watching”.
We hope for all our sakes Jacinda takes the bull by the horns here.
Show us what – “transformational” reallly is”
This also says it all, Miss Collins statement about ACT, ” maybe National voters went to ACT because we veered too much to the center ”
By her own admission.
There is a very strong Maori MP with mana, who imo would make a great deputy PM. She’s been there all the time … Nanaia Mahuta.
Nanaia knows her stuff. She is respected, a very good speaker, while also having the ability to answer questions with dignity and class.
100% correct Mary-a;
Nanaia Mahuta is one fine lady for sure with lots of Mana.
Wasnt Nania Mahuta the loyal supporter of David Cunliffe?
Yes I agree…and Nanaia Mahuta was a loyal supporter of David Cunliffe ( David Cunliffe, a socialist in the inclusive pro NZ Norm Kirk mould )….so this may rule her out
Indeed, I advocated Nanaia Mahuta a few years back, but as some explained several years ago, she had a child and is possibly in a juggling act. Yet there she is, quietly working away, and would make a good deputy PM. I think its time she should be recognized for her inherent ability’s. It is always a wonder to me, that these woman of the Left, who are instinctively more aligned with the household budget and thus also the national housekeeping , more often times make better leaders than the men.
It makes one wonder then, whatever on earth happened to the likes of Judith Collins, Ruth Richardson, Jenny Shipley and co?. Even Helen Clarke , I must admit….
Great summary.
My simplistic suggestions today are…
1. Fill this nation with state houses and apartments and tiny houses for homeless, all with community gardens and facilities like free Wifi. This will give a lift to skills training, employment, suppliers and producers and within a decade drive out the speculators and overpriced dump renters.
2. Unite all who can be united to run a massive community organising campaign to make 2023 the year we retire and extinguish neo liberalism for good–Reserve Bank Act, SOEs, State Sector Act, free in and out flow of capital–GONE. Neo liberal traitors in the public service–GONE. WINZ/MSD–GONE with Basic Income payments run by IRD. Transition from industrial scale dairying to horticulture and plant based exports and diet. Restart the Union movement from the base Fair Pay Agreements will provide, restore a class left world view to unions and their members.
I agree Chloe’s a big winner but I think I’d place Jacinda far, far, above Chloe on the winners list. Chloe won a liberal urban electorate seat, Jacinda won the bluest electorates in NZ, destroyed the most efficient political machine that national had became for 15 years and won the largest labour result in about 80 years won Ilam, Timaru wanganui , party vote in Northland, Judith’s electorate, northshore, kaikorua every southland electorate and all but two electorates and won 2023 as well She’s now up there with Savage and Fraser in terms of electoral wins. Politics aside that’s astonishing, nothing that happened on Saturday will go down in the history books quite like that and kudos to the greens for hanging on and increasing their vote astounding. I think a confidence agreement and green environmental ministers to make use of the largest majority climate reforms ever had is a must, we can’t waste this moment and confidence gives them distance to criticize.
One thing that bugs me a lot is Paddy and Shaw are wrong when they sat it’s the only time it’s ever happened without a deal, Peters won Tauranga without a deal in 96-05, Hyde won Epsom in 2005 without a deal, Anderton won without a deal Dunne didn’t get a deal in 1999 or 02 I wish nz journos knew enough about nz policitical history to correct that falsehood.
Either way , wow.
Yes , aside from the humourous takes on various groups and attitudes, the fact remains that ‘the neoliberal hegemonic structure’ and ‘ever since Identity Politics over took class politics as the dominant theory’ ,… are the needed changes.
It really gets back to changing those two things. And until that is done, particularly the former, expect not a lot of change. Full marks , Mr Bradbury. You have analyzed it well. This is not communism, it is not rampant socialism, … it is KEYNESIANISM!!!
Similar to what we used to have and what the Scandinavians practice now! When we were , in 1968, the 6th wealthiest nation on earth per capita and second only to Denmark !!!
Under neo liberalism , a few years ago , we were 32nd in the OECD, – behind MEXICO !!! The 36 year old neo liberal experiment, – in which NZ WAS the global Guinea pig,- must end!!! It has created so much poverty and destabilizing of the nation state of NZ it must go. For any who care about their nations sovereignty , it must GO !!!
For those who support neo liberalism , they must be deemed globalist and anti the STATE of NZ . They must also be deemed to support the homelessness, crushing poverty, the importation of cheap labour from Asia that displaces our own population particularly of our high youth unemployment as the callous cynics that they are. The pollution of our rivers, the sell off of our lands to foreigners,- especially large tracts of land that are strategic and prime ‘ growing lands’, and of our natural resources, to name a few,… these are the things these individuals advocate.
What is that but rabid globalism justified under the philosophy of neo liberalism?.
It has nothing to do at all with enhancing NZ , as does the support among them for de unionization and minimum wages , but EVERYTHING TO DO with economic takeover, ‘publicizing’ private losses via corporate welfare ( TTPA ) , creating a working poor wage slave population, in dismantling legislation that protects the working populace all to the benefit of Bill English’s beloved ‘foreign investors’.
It is all there for everyone to see now. People have had 36 years to see what the elite wealthy have been up to right under our very noses while we pontificated and took SO LONG to act. Evil devours evil. And in time it is exposed for what it is.
I am glad I party voted Green, and I am overjoyed for them and Chloe Swarbrick . For it seems, the Greens are the leading light – despite some ‘goofiness’ among them , despite many cock ups,- that they are, and such as they are, – still the conscience of this country. Yet even they fall short of the work to be done needed to restore this nations national sovereignty and economic prosperity. The latter being not economic prosperity for any foreign interest , but for the well being, sense of nation hood and economic prosperity that we once enjoyed prior to when Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan and Roger Douglas , fueled by the Mont Pelerin society, – decided to rip us all off and in particular, – Roger Douglas and the 4th Labour govt starting in 1984.
I believe our small island nation can do better. We are a great little nation and we are a wonderful , moderate and peaceful peoples. I believe we can expel neo liberalism as the malignant ideology it is. I believe that is a primary to escape globalistic political tentacles, and despite certain sectors offering the excuses that we are ‘a nation wholly dependent on trade’, – that we can do trade on OUR TERMS, – NOT THEIRS. We do not need to sell our souls in order to do this. And still make a good profit.
We do not need Bill English’s ‘minimum wage economy’, nor do we need to sell off our core assets, nor do we need cheap immigrant labour when we have the wherewithal to train up our own young people to fill those jobs.
The lazy manipulative and profit greedy motive of the globalist is not needed here. They can go elsewhere. Scandinavia and NZ in the late 1960’s is ample example of what can be done. And what we can also do now in 2020.
And s a parent, like tens of thousands of others, express this sentiment: OUR SONS AND DAUGHTERS AND OUR GRAND CHILDREN DESREVE BETTER!!!
And for that reason , and that reason alone, I am proud and glad I party voted Green and I was overjoyed to see the dynamic Chloe Swarbrick win Auckland Central. I am also proud and glad Jacinda’s Labour party won in a landslide. I do believe indeed that Swarbrick should be co leader of the Greens. However like Winston Peters of the NZ First party ,… I will not crap all over Marama Davidson or Metiria Turei as those two have been possibly flawed but instrumental in giving us the current Green party of today.
I would recommend the removal of James Shaw.
I can see nothing in that man that bolsters up his so called alignment with Green policy. Nothing but timid words and occasional outburst’s. I think he walks far too close to the corporate lines.
The winners on the night for me were Jacinda Adern and Chloe Swarbrick. And their respective party’s. Now the job is to analyze who they are, what they said, what they did, what they believe in, to work out precisely what it is that people saw in them and why they voted for them.
And I would suggest this : the rejection, fury and ager against 36 years of a political and economic ideology that only favours the exploitative rich.
Low level socialism? Is that what they are calling center right cold hard capitalism these days?
I’ve always admired John Campbell but his debate and election night presenting was not his greatest. TVNZ in general was pretty hoo hum this election. I’m not sure why Hilary was co-hosting as she seems to have a shallow knowledge of politics and offered little insight. Jack Tame should have had a bigger role. Liam Hehir and Emma Espiner were fine but do we need them on for hours repeating the same talking points? Newshub put more effort into the debates and the tv shows on marijuana and euthanasia, as well as obtaining all the National Party leaks.
Media works are far ahead of TVNZ, they leave them in the dust.
TV3 on Saturday night made for great viewing indeed.
Don”t know what Paddy Gower was on, but he was on fire and it showed him in a different light.
He has a great sense of humour.
I couldnt watch mediaworks. Matthew Hooten and Paul Henry at the same time – where was the balance? Mind, you, for a while it was funny watching Hoots squirming and trying to spin something from it, but yeah nah, I switched to TVNZ after 45 minutes.
Perhaps Paddy was reading the same conclusion from the Party vote results as I do. The anti-cannabis parties got caned by the rural rump . Cannabis Yes vote should exceed 60% IMO.
His investigation/documentary series was excellent and and he covered a lot of NZ physically and in doing so will have come to understand that consumption and acceptance is endemic in Rural NZ.
I would not write National off, they’re like a cockroach infestation in a tenement slum. You might fumigate most of them out but they’ll be back.
Yes Xray, Brownlee and Smith are back.
“Mother of Dragons” – GoT reference you use in many of your articles when referring to Jacinda. Hope life doesn’t imitate art since things didn’t work out so well for the tv show version
One of the best suggestions I’ve seen in a long time by a commentator on one of your blogs
Restrict property investors to new build houses, NOT existing housing stock!
Should be promoted at every opportunity .This would be a genius move if they would implement it.
Restrict property investors to new build houses, NOT existing housing stock!
Yes, that jumped out at me too, I think it was Polly T. who first put it out there. It’s so basic.
There’s a good write up on some of Chloe’s immediate goals and concerns, in Stuff today.
Excerpt: The scale of Auckland’s homelessness problem was one reason another of Swarbrick’s key recent meetings was with Auckland City Mission chief executive Chris Farrelly.
He said Swarbrick had volunteered at the mission without making a big deal about it.
“She comes into our organisations and quietly volunteers. Not as a photo-op,” Farrelly said.
“She sits down and listens with these people. Listens to them, listens to their stories.”
Farrelly said Auckland Central had some of the wealthiest and poorest people in New Zealand.
“She’s not landing on a parachute here. She’s been on the ground, so to speak. She’s very tuned into the needs of the community.” Chloe, Time for Action on Auckands Homeless
Chloe also hopes to see more urban farms, such as this one: For the Love of Bees.
Have to agree with your comments on two of the best and worst you pointed out, and both in the same electorate.
Chloe was awesome. She is really hardworking. I watched some of the debates she was in and you can tell she does her homework, and can articulate this well and with energy and passion. I saw the city mission gave her the thumbs up also, saying she hellps out behind the scenes and out of the limelight.
Impressive.
The flipside, Helen White who came across as arrogant and entitled. “I’m a lawyer blah blah blah”, like it’s a selling point, when Parliament is full of them..
‘Wodney’ ,.. living the big free market dream all the way from ‘Uddersfield,…is this what we are in for more off ?
“The Wellington Neoliberal Bureaucratic Elite stops transformative change”
Indeed it does!
And unfortunately many politicians don’t have adequate bullshit detectors, and don’t realise the relationship they have with senior/muddle management bureaucrats is quite different from the relationship the public have with policy implementation and risk averse public servants anxious to protect their own arses.
Aaron Smale has just provided us with yet another example (on Newsroom) as has “The Detail”. Funny (not as in funny haha) how many of the protagonists involved are still doing the rounds in the administration – being shuffled from one gig to the next with their taint.
So too are some of the so-called public servants that thought it perfectly ok to use T&C to spy on the public they’re there to serve, or the ones whose career ambitions take precedence over service – the demographic profilers firmly ensconced at looking at the next opportunity for promotion.
And then there’s the useless procrastinating rythym politician that gets captured by it all.
(f-f-f-f-FaFoi, for example, who’s almost been missing in action when it comes to transformation and kindness: 100% interest on payday loans is somehow OK; ummmm-igration; m-m-m-m-media, and his nice bloke mid-life crisis boss before him)
I think we might be faced with having to wait for them to fuck themselves up, as is often the case, but in the meantime the thing that challenges these masters of the universe most is media scrutiny and the possibility they’ll end up severely embarrassed. (At which time the spin doctors usually trot out various rehearsed platitudes – in this space, going forward).
Let’s hope Labour get with the programme between now and 2023, or I’ll be breaking the habit of a lifetime of a Labour Party vote
To their credit Labour still campaigned hard even with the likelihood of a solid win they didn’t take it for granted, good on on them. That’s as far as my appreciation for them goes.
They are no longer the workers party.
They are the bureaucrats, managerialist party
I’m wondering if the previously Nat swing vote to Labour is actually more solid than it appears: I’m surmising the female vote for Jacinda was big (appears to be in the stats ive seen), and I’d also bet a big chunk of the wealthy propertied boomer vote also went her way – those all too happy to have their aging lives safeguarded at their children and grandchildren’s expense.
As such so long as the sacred cow of CGT isn’t slaughtered or similar, these purely selfish individuals will continue to vote Labour.
Prepare for 3 years of beige platitudes, political correct stupidity and worsening problems.
Don’t pretend to be surprised.
“To their credit Labour still campaigned hard even with the likelihood of a solid win they didn’t take it for granted, good on on them”
/agreed. The reason they got my party vote this time round. That and the fact they have quite a few half decent candidates that have the capacity, intelligence and ability to take up the slack from the loafers who’ve caused the 6 or 7 or 8 or 9 Ministers that have held it all together during the past 3 years.
Sorry to say though this could really be the last dance – unless of course we’ve MISinterpreted, MIS-spoke, MIS-read and Mis understood what Labour professes to stand for.
As you can see ….. I’m “pivoting” (to use a bit of neoliberalese lingo) while busy trying to figure out how I can do that while going forward in this space – unless of course we subscribe to an ever-increasing space that goes forward, carrying the pivot with it. I should have realised (I probably MIS-thought, or spent too much time worrying about an Honours in Media.)
Pivot pivot ribbit ribbit
Stupidity got 27 % of the vote. Idiot National supporters still think corrupt practices are still okay in this environment.
That’s not very kind or inclusive bert.
Do you treat everyone this way?
I gather that’s a yes from you, corruption rules?
Have never voted Nat in my life FYI (value judgement noted) but I’m not arrogant or small minded enough to think them all stupid, however much I might disagree with them.
I find the best way to highlight what’s wrong is point out the irony (hypocrisy) in someone’s position, a bit like the “kind” lefties thing eh bert.
But your arrogant enough and small minded to take Jacinda,s value of ” being kind to one another” and continue to throw it back in left leaning people’s faces!
Oh the irony of your own hypocrisy. Eh keepcalm and whatever.
I thought you were educated?
It’s the left claiming the politics of kindness, not me, do you see the difference?
It’s pretty obvious.
Neither is it arrogant to point out a contradiction.
Hint: disliking something someone says or stands for doesn’t make them stupid or your position correct necessarily.
Increasingly university fails to produce open minded critical thinkers.
Hint: disliking something someone says or stands for doesn’t make them stupid or your position correct necessarily.
Perhaps you take good hard look in the mirror for the definition of hypocrisy, clearly, like National you fail to get a grasp of how the country feel . The” Left” you have labelled with a massive generalization but as you say critical thinking eludes you.
We aren’t getting anywhere here are we.
At least you didn’t threaten to kill me like kindly old mate Jacindafan.
Small mercies 🙂
Have a good weekend.
Ditto!
I think a clear line needs to be drawn between owner operators and corporate farms. Federated Farmers are as far from Rural NZ as wall street is from main street.
Labour Māori Caucus
This says it all Martyn. Your last sentance rols it all into one tight ball for Jacinda.
“luckily for us the economic depression alongside the meltdown of the climate crisis will be so deep and damaging that even Cautious Jacinda and Extra Cautious Grant have no choice but to reform and rebuild.- History is watching”.
We hope for all our sakes Jacinda takes the bull by the horns here.
Show us what – “transformational” reallly is”
This also says it all, Miss Collins statement about ACT, ” maybe National voters went to ACT because we veered too much to the center ”
By her own admission.
There is a very strong Maori MP with mana, who imo would make a great deputy PM. She’s been there all the time … Nanaia Mahuta.
Nanaia knows her stuff. She is respected, a very good speaker, while also having the ability to answer questions with dignity and class.
100% correct Mary-a;
Nanaia Mahuta is one fine lady for sure with lots of Mana.
Wasnt Nania Mahuta the loyal supporter of David Cunliffe?
Yes I agree…and Nanaia Mahuta was a loyal supporter of David Cunliffe ( David Cunliffe, a socialist in the inclusive pro NZ Norm Kirk mould )….so this may rule her out
Indeed, I advocated Nanaia Mahuta a few years back, but as some explained several years ago, she had a child and is possibly in a juggling act. Yet there she is, quietly working away, and would make a good deputy PM. I think its time she should be recognized for her inherent ability’s. It is always a wonder to me, that these woman of the Left, who are instinctively more aligned with the household budget and thus also the national housekeeping , more often times make better leaders than the men.
It makes one wonder then, whatever on earth happened to the likes of Judith Collins, Ruth Richardson, Jenny Shipley and co?. Even Helen Clarke , I must admit….
Great summary.
My simplistic suggestions today are…
1. Fill this nation with state houses and apartments and tiny houses for homeless, all with community gardens and facilities like free Wifi. This will give a lift to skills training, employment, suppliers and producers and within a decade drive out the speculators and overpriced dump renters.
2. Unite all who can be united to run a massive community organising campaign to make 2023 the year we retire and extinguish neo liberalism for good–Reserve Bank Act, SOEs, State Sector Act, free in and out flow of capital–GONE. Neo liberal traitors in the public service–GONE. WINZ/MSD–GONE with Basic Income payments run by IRD. Transition from industrial scale dairying to horticulture and plant based exports and diet. Restart the Union movement from the base Fair Pay Agreements will provide, restore a class left world view to unions and their members.
I agree Chloe’s a big winner but I think I’d place Jacinda far, far, above Chloe on the winners list. Chloe won a liberal urban electorate seat, Jacinda won the bluest electorates in NZ, destroyed the most efficient political machine that national had became for 15 years and won the largest labour result in about 80 years won Ilam, Timaru wanganui , party vote in Northland, Judith’s electorate, northshore, kaikorua every southland electorate and all but two electorates and won 2023 as well She’s now up there with Savage and Fraser in terms of electoral wins. Politics aside that’s astonishing, nothing that happened on Saturday will go down in the history books quite like that and kudos to the greens for hanging on and increasing their vote astounding. I think a confidence agreement and green environmental ministers to make use of the largest majority climate reforms ever had is a must, we can’t waste this moment and confidence gives them distance to criticize.
One thing that bugs me a lot is Paddy and Shaw are wrong when they sat it’s the only time it’s ever happened without a deal, Peters won Tauranga without a deal in 96-05, Hyde won Epsom in 2005 without a deal, Anderton won without a deal Dunne didn’t get a deal in 1999 or 02 I wish nz journos knew enough about nz policitical history to correct that falsehood.
Either way , wow.
Yes , aside from the humourous takes on various groups and attitudes, the fact remains that ‘the neoliberal hegemonic structure’ and ‘ever since Identity Politics over took class politics as the dominant theory’ ,… are the needed changes.
It really gets back to changing those two things. And until that is done, particularly the former, expect not a lot of change. Full marks , Mr Bradbury. You have analyzed it well. This is not communism, it is not rampant socialism, … it is KEYNESIANISM!!!
Similar to what we used to have and what the Scandinavians practice now! When we were , in 1968, the 6th wealthiest nation on earth per capita and second only to Denmark !!!
Under neo liberalism , a few years ago , we were 32nd in the OECD, – behind MEXICO !!! The 36 year old neo liberal experiment, – in which NZ WAS the global Guinea pig,- must end!!! It has created so much poverty and destabilizing of the nation state of NZ it must go. For any who care about their nations sovereignty , it must GO !!!
For those who support neo liberalism , they must be deemed globalist and anti the STATE of NZ . They must also be deemed to support the homelessness, crushing poverty, the importation of cheap labour from Asia that displaces our own population particularly of our high youth unemployment as the callous cynics that they are. The pollution of our rivers, the sell off of our lands to foreigners,- especially large tracts of land that are strategic and prime ‘ growing lands’, and of our natural resources, to name a few,… these are the things these individuals advocate.
What is that but rabid globalism justified under the philosophy of neo liberalism?.
It has nothing to do at all with enhancing NZ , as does the support among them for de unionization and minimum wages , but EVERYTHING TO DO with economic takeover, ‘publicizing’ private losses via corporate welfare ( TTPA ) , creating a working poor wage slave population, in dismantling legislation that protects the working populace all to the benefit of Bill English’s beloved ‘foreign investors’.
It is all there for everyone to see now. People have had 36 years to see what the elite wealthy have been up to right under our very noses while we pontificated and took SO LONG to act. Evil devours evil. And in time it is exposed for what it is.
I am glad I party voted Green, and I am overjoyed for them and Chloe Swarbrick . For it seems, the Greens are the leading light – despite some ‘goofiness’ among them , despite many cock ups,- that they are, and such as they are, – still the conscience of this country. Yet even they fall short of the work to be done needed to restore this nations national sovereignty and economic prosperity. The latter being not economic prosperity for any foreign interest , but for the well being, sense of nation hood and economic prosperity that we once enjoyed prior to when Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan and Roger Douglas , fueled by the Mont Pelerin society, – decided to rip us all off and in particular, – Roger Douglas and the 4th Labour govt starting in 1984.
I believe our small island nation can do better. We are a great little nation and we are a wonderful , moderate and peaceful peoples. I believe we can expel neo liberalism as the malignant ideology it is. I believe that is a primary to escape globalistic political tentacles, and despite certain sectors offering the excuses that we are ‘a nation wholly dependent on trade’, – that we can do trade on OUR TERMS, – NOT THEIRS. We do not need to sell our souls in order to do this. And still make a good profit.
We do not need Bill English’s ‘minimum wage economy’, nor do we need to sell off our core assets, nor do we need cheap immigrant labour when we have the wherewithal to train up our own young people to fill those jobs.
The lazy manipulative and profit greedy motive of the globalist is not needed here. They can go elsewhere. Scandinavia and NZ in the late 1960’s is ample example of what can be done. And what we can also do now in 2020.
And s a parent, like tens of thousands of others, express this sentiment: OUR SONS AND DAUGHTERS AND OUR GRAND CHILDREN DESREVE BETTER!!!
And for that reason , and that reason alone, I am proud and glad I party voted Green and I was overjoyed to see the dynamic Chloe Swarbrick win Auckland Central. I am also proud and glad Jacinda’s Labour party won in a landslide. I do believe indeed that Swarbrick should be co leader of the Greens. However like Winston Peters of the NZ First party ,… I will not crap all over Marama Davidson or Metiria Turei as those two have been possibly flawed but instrumental in giving us the current Green party of today.
I would recommend the removal of James Shaw.
I can see nothing in that man that bolsters up his so called alignment with Green policy. Nothing but timid words and occasional outburst’s. I think he walks far too close to the corporate lines.
The winners on the night for me were Jacinda Adern and Chloe Swarbrick. And their respective party’s. Now the job is to analyze who they are, what they said, what they did, what they believe in, to work out precisely what it is that people saw in them and why they voted for them.
And I would suggest this : the rejection, fury and ager against 36 years of a political and economic ideology that only favours the exploitative rich.
Low level socialism? Is that what they are calling center right cold hard capitalism these days?
I’ve always admired John Campbell but his debate and election night presenting was not his greatest. TVNZ in general was pretty hoo hum this election. I’m not sure why Hilary was co-hosting as she seems to have a shallow knowledge of politics and offered little insight. Jack Tame should have had a bigger role. Liam Hehir and Emma Espiner were fine but do we need them on for hours repeating the same talking points? Newshub put more effort into the debates and the tv shows on marijuana and euthanasia, as well as obtaining all the National Party leaks.
Media works are far ahead of TVNZ, they leave them in the dust.
TV3 on Saturday night made for great viewing indeed.
Don”t know what Paddy Gower was on, but he was on fire and it showed him in a different light.
He has a great sense of humour.
I couldnt watch mediaworks. Matthew Hooten and Paul Henry at the same time – where was the balance? Mind, you, for a while it was funny watching Hoots squirming and trying to spin something from it, but yeah nah, I switched to TVNZ after 45 minutes.
Perhaps Paddy was reading the same conclusion from the Party vote results as I do. The anti-cannabis parties got caned by the rural rump . Cannabis Yes vote should exceed 60% IMO.
His investigation/documentary series was excellent and and he covered a lot of NZ physically and in doing so will have come to understand that consumption and acceptance is endemic in Rural NZ.
I would not write National off, they’re like a cockroach infestation in a tenement slum. You might fumigate most of them out but they’ll be back.
Yes Xray, Brownlee and Smith are back.
“Mother of Dragons” – GoT reference you use in many of your articles when referring to Jacinda. Hope life doesn’t imitate art since things didn’t work out so well for the tv show version
One of the best suggestions I’ve seen in a long time by a commentator on one of your blogs
Restrict property investors to new build houses, NOT existing housing stock!
Should be promoted at every opportunity .This would be a genius move if they would implement it.
Restrict property investors to new build houses, NOT existing housing stock!
Yes, that jumped out at me too, I think it was Polly T. who first put it out there. It’s so basic.
There’s a good write up on some of Chloe’s immediate goals and concerns, in Stuff today.
Excerpt:
The scale of Auckland’s homelessness problem was one reason another of Swarbrick’s key recent meetings was with Auckland City Mission chief executive Chris Farrelly.
He said Swarbrick had volunteered at the mission without making a big deal about it.
“She comes into our organisations and quietly volunteers. Not as a photo-op,” Farrelly said.
“She sits down and listens with these people. Listens to them, listens to their stories.”
Farrelly said Auckland Central had some of the wealthiest and poorest people in New Zealand.
“She’s not landing on a parachute here. She’s been on the ground, so to speak. She’s very tuned into the needs of the community.” Chloe, Time for Action on Auckands Homeless
Chloe also hopes to see more urban farms, such as this one: For the Love of Bees.
Have to agree with your comments on two of the best and worst you pointed out, and both in the same electorate.
Chloe was awesome. She is really hardworking. I watched some of the debates she was in and you can tell she does her homework, and can articulate this well and with energy and passion. I saw the city mission gave her the thumbs up also, saying she hellps out behind the scenes and out of the limelight.
Impressive.
The flipside, Helen White who came across as arrogant and entitled. “I’m a lawyer blah blah blah”, like it’s a selling point, when Parliament is full of them..
‘Wodney’ ,.. living the big free market dream all the way from ‘Uddersfield,…is this what we are in for more off ?
Sheriff Of Huddersfield
https://youtu.be/TO5sCTn3bR4?t=2
“The Wellington Neoliberal Bureaucratic Elite stops transformative change”
Indeed it does!
And unfortunately many politicians don’t have adequate bullshit detectors, and don’t realise the relationship they have with senior/muddle management bureaucrats is quite different from the relationship the public have with policy implementation and risk averse public servants anxious to protect their own arses.
Aaron Smale has just provided us with yet another example (on Newsroom) as has “The Detail”. Funny (not as in funny haha) how many of the protagonists involved are still doing the rounds in the administration – being shuffled from one gig to the next with their taint.
So too are some of the so-called public servants that thought it perfectly ok to use T&C to spy on the public they’re there to serve, or the ones whose career ambitions take precedence over service – the demographic profilers firmly ensconced at looking at the next opportunity for promotion.
And then there’s the useless procrastinating rythym politician that gets captured by it all.
(f-f-f-f-FaFoi, for example, who’s almost been missing in action when it comes to transformation and kindness: 100% interest on payday loans is somehow OK; ummmm-igration; m-m-m-m-media, and his nice bloke mid-life crisis boss before him)
I think we might be faced with having to wait for them to fuck themselves up, as is often the case, but in the meantime the thing that challenges these masters of the universe most is media scrutiny and the possibility they’ll end up severely embarrassed. (At which time the spin doctors usually trot out various rehearsed platitudes – in this space, going forward).
Let’s hope Labour get with the programme between now and 2023, or I’ll be breaking the habit of a lifetime of a Labour Party vote
To their credit Labour still campaigned hard even with the likelihood of a solid win they didn’t take it for granted, good on on them. That’s as far as my appreciation for them goes.
They are no longer the workers party.
They are the bureaucrats, managerialist party
I’m wondering if the previously Nat swing vote to Labour is actually more solid than it appears: I’m surmising the female vote for Jacinda was big (appears to be in the stats ive seen), and I’d also bet a big chunk of the wealthy propertied boomer vote also went her way – those all too happy to have their aging lives safeguarded at their children and grandchildren’s expense.
As such so long as the sacred cow of CGT isn’t slaughtered or similar, these purely selfish individuals will continue to vote Labour.
Prepare for 3 years of beige platitudes, political correct stupidity and worsening problems.
Don’t pretend to be surprised.
“To their credit Labour still campaigned hard even with the likelihood of a solid win they didn’t take it for granted, good on on them”
/agreed. The reason they got my party vote this time round. That and the fact they have quite a few half decent candidates that have the capacity, intelligence and ability to take up the slack from the loafers who’ve caused the 6 or 7 or 8 or 9 Ministers that have held it all together during the past 3 years.
Sorry to say though this could really be the last dance – unless of course we’ve MISinterpreted, MIS-spoke, MIS-read and Mis understood what Labour professes to stand for.
As you can see ….. I’m “pivoting” (to use a bit of neoliberalese lingo) while busy trying to figure out how I can do that while going forward in this space – unless of course we subscribe to an ever-increasing space that goes forward, carrying the pivot with it. I should have realised (I probably MIS-thought, or spent too much time worrying about an Honours in Media.)
Pivot pivot ribbit ribbit
Stupidity got 27 % of the vote. Idiot National supporters still think corrupt practices are still okay in this environment.
That’s not very kind or inclusive bert.
Do you treat everyone this way?
I gather that’s a yes from you, corruption rules?
Have never voted Nat in my life FYI (value judgement noted) but I’m not arrogant or small minded enough to think them all stupid, however much I might disagree with them.
I find the best way to highlight what’s wrong is point out the irony (hypocrisy) in someone’s position, a bit like the “kind” lefties thing eh bert.
But your arrogant enough and small minded to take Jacinda,s value of ” being kind to one another” and continue to throw it back in left leaning people’s faces!
Oh the irony of your own hypocrisy. Eh keepcalm and whatever.
I thought you were educated?
It’s the left claiming the politics of kindness, not me, do you see the difference?
It’s pretty obvious.
Neither is it arrogant to point out a contradiction.
Hint: disliking something someone says or stands for doesn’t make them stupid or your position correct necessarily.
Increasingly university fails to produce open minded critical thinkers.
Hint: disliking something someone says or stands for doesn’t make them stupid or your position correct necessarily.
Perhaps you take good hard look in the mirror for the definition of hypocrisy, clearly, like National you fail to get a grasp of how the country feel . The” Left” you have labelled with a massive generalization but as you say critical thinking eludes you.
We aren’t getting anywhere here are we.
At least you didn’t threaten to kill me like kindly old mate Jacindafan.
Small mercies 🙂
Have a good weekend.
Ditto!
I think a clear line needs to be drawn between owner operators and corporate farms. Federated Farmers are as far from Rural NZ as wall street is from main street.