I hope Josh and Morgan are right about NZ First, but I don’t think they are
Comrades Morgan & Josh have penned insightful contributions as to why Winston won’t trigger honky no more and NZ First won’t breach the 5% threshold riding a wave of anti-Māori backlash.
It’s a mighty optimistic position to take and I salute them for seeing the best in their fellow Kiwis, after all, barely a dozen of the outed 200 feral anti-vaxx lunatic fringe highlighted in the middle class docudrama Fire + Fury got elected so maybe we are a better people now and that anti-Māori, anti-woke rhetoric won’t catch light in an ocean of dry weeds desperately gasping for the purifying incandescent rage of flame.
Look how quickly the cancelling of Shakespeare shook the Government into immediate back down if you doubt there is a political punch in the face waiting to happen by a voting block very alienated by middle class virtue signals.
Comrades Mogan and Josh seem to think we will all calmly navigate the waters by singing ‘Michael row the boat ashore’ with Josh on guitar and Morgan on vocals.
I want to believe the better angels of our nature will prevail, however my dark splinter of a black and cynical heart tells me buckle up, she’s gonna get bumpy.
With all due respect to Comrades Morgan and Josh, the extreme economic anxieties driven by social media hate algorithms and a cultural backlash against elites are all going to combine to give crazy old Winston a barn storming redneck jamboree.
Sure, Winston won’t actually do any of the crazy bullshit stuff he’ll tell his banjo twanging cultural introverts, but he will tell them what they want to hear, and he can bash Māori nationalism in a way white people only wish they could.
That resentment is ripe for exploitation, and no one plays that game better than Winnie.
I see NZ First as a safety pressure gauge going off to release the pent up frustrations of the frightened and angry. The entire country has gone through a shock, Winston is a regularity, and familiar face at times of extreme fear and economic dislocation.
I think the country is hurting and the politicians are providing no security, no vision, no leadership. An exhausted Labour Party that has spent all its energy on fighting Covid are only now starting to psychologically decompress from lockdown! Many backbenchers face losing their seats come Election Day.
Labour are exhausted.
The Greens are missing in action.
National want to implement un-costed tax cuts while slashing 14 000 state sector jobs and is so weak they will be dependent on hard right ACT who has a razor list of 5 ministries plus the Human Rights Commission.
I think NZ First will tap into a deep insecurity about identity in this country and the question won’t be ‘will NZ First get over 5%’, I think the question will be ‘How much will NZ First get over 5%”.
I hope I’m wrong, but there is weird stuff happening out there in the primordial swamp that is the NZ political subconscious right now, and it ain’t pretty.
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I begin to think that it could be 10/10/10. Greens keep their die hard 10% support. Winston chews into the disgruntled voters section that form part of Acts support to go 10 and 10. It will come down to who runs the best campaign. Peters and Seymour are both masters of that art and every percentage point will be vital. Aderns smile is beginning to resemble a death mask and Luxon will look like a CEO who didn’t get off the elevator soon enough and is now lost in a sub basement he didn’t know existed listening to a cleaner complaining about blocked toilets.
2023 is already looking like a magnificent shit show.
I begin to think that it could be 10/10/10. Greens keep their die hard 10% support. Winston chews into the disgruntled voters section that form part of Acts support to go 10 and 10. It will come down to who runs the best campaign. Peters and Seymour are both masters of that art and every percentage point will be vital. Aderns smile is beginning to resemble a death mask and Luxon will look like a CEO who didn’t get off the elevator soon enough and is now lost in a sub basement he didn’t know existed listening to a cleaner complaining about blocked toilets.
2023 is already looking like a magnificent shit show.
I begin to think that it could be 10/10/10. Greens keep their die hard 10% support. Winston chews into the disgruntled voters section that form part of Acts support to go 10 and 10. It will come down to who runs the best campaign. Peters and Seymour are both masters of that art and every percentage point will be vital. Aderns smile is beginning to resemble a death mask and Luxon will look like a CEO who didn’t get off the elevator soon enough and is now lost in a sub basement he didn’t know existed listening to a cleaner complaining about blocked toilets.
2023 is already looking like a magnificent shit show.
“He is targeting the ABA (anyone but Ardern) vote”
Anyone but Trump worked a treat for the fumbling, bumbling, stumbling Chocolate Teapot Joe Biden.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5Mwc12LtRY
but…..please Winston. Well past time to put your cue back in the rack and leave it there.
Yes it is working well recently for Biden…actually
I like this idea for bringing people together politically.
Comrades Mogan and Josh seem to think we will all calmly navigate the waters by singing ‘Michael row the boat ashore’ with Josh on guitar and Morgan on vocals.
I have been going to a relaxing singing session – it’s good. And is a way for getting ‘everyone singing from the same songsheet’. Maybe the Finns etc and the hip hop group can develop some songs of immediacy that we could have as political rallies and meet the people. As we don’t get much joy from listening to promises from wannabes and The Elected, it might result in an uprising of hopeful interest from the lumpen… A Dalvanius memorial with us being coached and recorded in a vibrant vocalising like Patea Maori Club’s ‘Poi e’ (1984) could be a positive outcome for democracy in NZ/Aotearoa!
Winstone has had his time and it was good while it lasted, he has lost many of his team although he still has Jones and Tabuteau with the latter losing his bid for Rotorua Mayoralty. Frankly he can play the race card and bash Maori as much as he likes but I tend to agree with Josh and Morgan, he will be lucky to get over the 5% threshold. He will of course be fighting for the same voting base as Luxon and Seemore so hopefully this will split the centrist right votes. Add to this many of his voting base wanted him to go with National and they probably don’t trust him anymore. It is going to be a very nasty divisive election battle let us hope NZers can rise above all the bullshit. My advice is we should look what is happening overseas we are much better off than many others and many seem to be ungrateful.
Hes saying Labour are already down the road if your centre left you better put a handbrake on Act. New Zealand, The Way You Wanted It.
Winstone has had his time and it was good while it lasted, he has lost many of his team although he still has Jones and Tabuteau with the latter losing his bid for Rotorua Mayoralty. Frankly he can play the race card and bash Maori as much as he likes but I tend to agree with Josh and Morgan, he will be lucky to get over the 5% threshold. He will of course be fighting for the same voting base as Luxon and Seemore so hopefully this will split the centrist right votes. Add to this many of his voting base wanted him to go with National and they probably don’t trust him anymore. It is going to be a very nasty divisive election battle let us hope NZers can rise above all the bullshit. My advice is we should look what is happening overseas we are much better off than many others and many seem to be ungrateful.
To an extent but thinking about it more widely. NZF is centre left, maybe TOP too? If you are a lifetime Labour/ Green voter are you going to vote centre left even if it is only NZF or are you going to vote Right (your natural enemy). I think this factor will be bigger than the Maori Governance debate.
Pfft… Winston is going to piss in, get out and talk to people.. he’s easily back in, look at the other options a huge amount of traditional labour voters can’t bring themselves to stomach a Nat/Act package, and he’ll pick up protest votes too (as in protestors)