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1:11 pm, July 31st, 2026 - 37 comments
Categories: Christopher Luxon, Culture wars, Donald Trump, nz first, Politics, Te Reo Māori, uncategorized, winston peters -
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We are less than 100 days to the next election and the signs are showing.
Politicians are beginning to misbehave, big time.
The trouble with MMP, and I am a keen fan of the system, is that a minor party like NZ First does not have to seek to persuade the hearts and minds of the majority. They can rark up and make a minority of the population permanently angry and then enjoy the baubles of office for ever.
The past few weeks have shown how far NZ First is prepared and willing to push things.
Yesterday Parliament debated the NZ First Bill recognising English as an official language. Hitherto it has not been recognised in the statute book as being official essentially because no one was that bonkers that they thought it had to be recognised, so hard wired into cultural norms has it been.
But it gets NZ First supporters, who hate the thought that Te Reo may be ranked higher than English, and fear that its use may become compulsory, worried.
Hate and fear are powerful political weapons, particularly in the hands of those who will use them without any sense of morality.
And wouldn’t you guess it but Donald Trump has engaged in the same sort of culture war stunt with the promulgation of his Designating English as the Official Language of the United States Presidential Order.
Green MP Tamatha Paul summed up perfectly the usefullness of the change when she said:
When I went home last night, my taxi driver asked me, “What were you guys just debating in the House just now?” I said, “Whether the English language should be an official language or not.” And he said, “Man, is that really what you guys are talking about in there? We are struggling to pay our bills. We can’t afford food. We can’t pay our power. People are losing their jobs by the thousands in the city; the inner city is derelict and we’re sitting here wondering whether English should be an official language? That is such a pathetic waste of the responsibility of this House to pass legislation that matters.”
But wait there is more.
NZ First wants to legislatively define what a woman is.
In its Legislation (Definition of Woman and Man) Amendment Bill a “female” is defined as “a human biological female” and a male is defined as defined as a “human biological male”.
And whaddayaknow but Trump wanted to do the same.
His Presidential Executive order Restoring Biological Truth to the Government stated that “”Sex” shall refer to an individual’s immutable biological classification as either male or female.”
But all this was overshadowed by Peters behaviour in the house this week when he launched into a racist tirade against Green MP Lawrence Xu-Nan.
In a response to a question by Xu-Nan asking if Peters was vaccinated he said:
I noticed you came here five minutes ago. Go back to your own country—that’s where they lie like a flatfish, but they don’t lie like that here, all right? This is called a democracy—this is called a democracy, unlike what you’re used to. Go back to where you’ve come from, you loudmouth, and maybe you’ll learn something about the political system of New Zealand in time before you go streaming out of here in three months’ time.
This was outlandish. Apart from using his fingers to stretch and adjust the appearance of his eyes I cannot imagine what Peters could have done to make it worse.
He then chose to double down on his comments and claimed that Xu-Nan can’t even speak the language properly. Xu-Nan has a doctoral degree in the arts and humanities, and spent more than a decade of his life analysing and using linguistics, narratological, and etymological methodologies to analyse ancient texts, as well as modern texts. I think he can speak English fine, far better than Peters can.
And Shane Jones joined in stating that NZ First would campaign on a policy that migrants should be New Zealand citizens “and be here in our country for a long time” before becoming politicians. Xu-Nan has lived in Aotearoa for the past 34 years.
As noted by Mike Smith the Chinese Government has noticed.
The question has to be asked, how can Luxon tolerate a Foreign Minister having such racist views about the country’s major trading partner?
He will rule out working with a party because he does not like their tax policy. He will not rule out working with a party whose leader is clearly racist and whose comments are damaging the country’s relationship with arguably the preeminant super power in the world today.
This underlines Luxon’s weakness and what a mess the current Government is in. I can’t believe anyone thinks they can form a functioning viable Government after the election.
Rarking up not just a regional superpower, but our Number 1 trading partner – all for racist votes?
This has stripped away whatever veneer has been applied to Peters as an "elder statesman".
And the really dangerous thing? Our other major trading partner – the US – is busily levying high tariffs against us.
Essentially, he's screwing us with China, even as our American "cuzzies" are busy screwing us.
Congratulations, Mr Peters; damaging our trading prospects to win a few more votes from the racist camp.
Don’t get him started on India!
After he alienates all our trading partners, who's left? Pitcairn Island?
Peters doesn’t give a shit about our trading partners or the people who emigrated from there to NZ. The groups and people that he really wants to alienate are his Coalition partners, the Opposition, and the people who voted for those others, so that he can score extra votes and extract his pound of flesh again after 7 Nov.
Apart from voting in a PM that has a spine, is there anything within the MMP rules that can be done to prevent this sort of outcome happeneing again??
nope. We get what we vote for.
political funding reform would go a long way to addressing the bigger issues.
Winston's slurring.
apparently half the voters do.
Yup.
https://newsroom.co.nz/2026/07/31/as-coalition-troubles-brew-national-loses-its-economic-shield-to-labour/
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/race-relations-commissioner-says-winston-peters-comments-in-parliament-racist/ZXIUZ6J27JHYZOUTNY2OYWMV2A/
Peters should be sacked. It presents National with a dilemma. They can't form government again without him. I hope their trading ethics for votes does deep harm to the party. It's fucking the country and democracy.
National's official position is, in effect, that NZ First have very bad economic policies but are acceptable in Cabinet, while Opportunity have very bad economic policies but are completely unacceptable, even for a post-election phone call.
Go figure.
National’s selectivity (aka hypocrisy) was nicely laid out here with some helpful clarifying verdicts: https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/31-07-2026/the-things-that-are-and-arent-compatible-with-nationals-values
I don't know why Xu-Nan was asking Peters if he is vaccinated, but I can guess. The Greens are doing really well, they need to stop this culture war bullshit, especially if they want to be taken seriously on their 'For all of us' slogan. Same with Paul's jibe about English being a bastard language. It was a strong, powerful speech in parliament, but that kind of rhetoric is inherently divisive. The right are better at the culture wars, we need to take the higher ground.
It was quite funny.
Peters was ranting about the response to the Covid inquiry and claiming four leading Labour Party Ministers refused to turn up to the inquiry and Hipkins and Verrall knew about advice that highlighted the possibility of myocarditis.
All cheap attacks trying to put him onside with the anti vaccination movement.
Xu-Nan's question I thought neatly showed up the hypocrisy of Peters's claims.
I'm sure it was very funny.
It's inappropriate to ask about people's personal health choices in that context and it plays right into the culture war. We can’t complain about the culture war if we are going to engage in it.
If the Greens want to run 'for all of us' they need to walk the talk.
That explains it. If there's one thing Peters can't take, it is someone beating him at his own game. He lost the plot and lily-livered Luxon has let him off the hook.
Three cheers for Xu-Nan.
Peters has never been in a two term coalition government (1996-1998, less than a term)(2005-2008)(2020-2023).
His strategy is to say he will not go with Labour, yet seek distance from NACT by campaigning as a nationalist/populist – a bit like 1996 (campaigned as part of the opposition but kept the government in for a third term), but more honest.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/politics/849602/winston-peters-inviting-a-sacking-with-attack-on-chinese-born-mp-helen-clark-says
He will note that Labour leads in 5 categories over National, so he may be concerned about his last 3 years being in Opposition.
So might National and ACT, so this will get darker.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/politics/848032/labour-considered-most-capable-of-managing-new-zealanders-top-five-concerns-survey
When some people in a majority culture feel like the dominance of their culture's under threat, some politicians will try to exploit that fear – it's just a given. Making English an official language is about the most trivial and harmless way that fear could be exploited, so we should count our blessings.
Given that it makes absolutely no difference whether English is an official language of NZ or the USA or not, it costs nothing to deprive the exploitative politicians of their culture war by just shrugging your shoulders and letting them have their way. What you wouldn't want to do is make a big fuss during the debate, generate a media feeding frenzy and ensure the exploitative politicians get the culture war they were hoping for. So, naturally NZ's liberal left politicians make a big fuss during the debate and the culture war is on. Well done, guys.
yep. And small victories in the House aside, the left aren’t as good at the culture wars as the right, and not should we be.
from an election year strategy pov, I guess the idea is to make NACTF look foolish. Peters might be overplaying his hand and he's definitly more bluster bullshit than substance than he used to be and swing voters might just get sick of it.
I think it's less about making them look foolish than making them look out of touch: more interested in symbolic culture-war fights than the day-to-day issues facing ordinary New Zealanders.
The political argument isn't that they're stupid. It's that they're a group of well-paid politicians using their time and power to pursue an ideological agenda that most voters don't see as a priority, while issues like the cost of living, housing, healthcare, and the economy remain front of mind.
Ignoring culture-war politics entirely hands them control of the narrative. But focusing exclusively on the culture war plays into their hands as well. The better approach is to make them wear the political consequences of their choices by constantly bringing the conversation back to competence, priorities, and whether they're making people's lives better.
I agree with your critique, but could be there's more to the situation. Try this amateur depth-psychologist view:
The chances of Winston identifying with 4 other rightist leaders simultaneously are feasible, but too slim. I reckon his inner narcissist would reject the scenario.
Ironically, you pose as a depth-psychologist and diagnose Peters’ inner narcissist. It takes one to know one.
Ooh a blow to DF.
… “He [Peters] may think he’s Nigel Farage, Marine Le Pen, Pauline Hanson, and Donald Trump,” Luxon said.
I find Luxon's choice of characters in the plitical scene interesting that they all are hard rights, and those come to mind first?
And funding tightening and limits on tv? Is that possible? What about facebook and all those behind?
Peters is a populist, but not hard-Right, IMO.
I have no insight into Luxon’s mind or minders.
IDK what’s possible, when, and where, except about this site, but that would be utterly irrelevant – I think the TOPpers top Peters here by a margin.
Not sure what you’re after, silencing or cancelling Peters?
Just trying to work out what I should be stewing about first – Peters, Luxon, political donation control, spending on screen promotion? Or a mind holiday with none of the above.
Luxon is campaigning in the centre for votes (tokenism to stop women voting for Labour), so he poses ACT (in economics) and NZF (social conservative populist) as to his right.
It is hard to be humble and you make the barb, despite the deprecation (self-awareness)
Is there a lapse into bad moderator mode syndrome?
You seem to have strayed into the same realm as DF.
Is that a parsnip?
More a surprising turnup.
ditto
For me, that is one of the critical reforms we need in this country. Before we go to a 4 or 5 or whatever term of Parliament, we need to "fix the basics".
Otherwise we're handing our elected representatives longer time to exercise their power – with little to no over-sight. (Even the Supreme Court is being neutered in this respect.)
Reforming political funding to remove capture by corporate power is essential, lest we end up like the US. Their democracy is the best that money can buy.
I would still like to know the answer to the question that triggered the cat throwing by Winston. Did he get vaccinated? So far Winnie has very effectively thrown the cat amongst the pigeons and everyone is talking about the cat – as intended.
One for our brave media to take up /sarc.
A good story in general really with the money the coalition have blown playing politics with their multiple covid witch hunts.
Remind NZ about the world class response, borrowings in line with all other nations and other findings we've paid to have reviewed again and again.
Did any of them campaign on having these covid Inquiries ? I can't recall.
Spinoff gets the view from pointyheads: https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/01-08-2026/how-do-you-solve-a-problem-like-winston-peters-fine-political-minds-offer-luxon-advice
HC's insider view of protocol is helpful here. It is based upon a pentad described by the wiki here: https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/01-08-2026/how-do-you-solve-a-problem-like-winston-peters-fine-political-minds-offer-luxon-advice
Farrar gets into a darwinian stance, due to instinct prevailing over self-control:
Janet Wilson has a pointed take on the PM's performance as airhead: "if I was in that office I’d be calling for stronger language from Luxon rather than ‘blah blah blah’”. Ben Thomas: "believes Peters’ comments about Xu-Nan were a strategic error."