Steven Joyce’s piece on Tuesday was a transparent and hypocritical attempt to frame political opponents negatively, and soften us up for more asset sales, mining, deep sea drilling and the like. Thing is, it’s the Nats with their misguided austerity cuts who are the real nay-sayers holding the country back.
Mana, NZF, the Greens, and even the Maori Party, are suddenly grabbing the asset sales issue from Labour, just when it actually started to be a really valuable issue to lead on. Shearer should stop playing pundit on whether the Maori Party will go and how ‘unstable’ that makes the government. Instead, realise the broad base of opposition to asset sales and build a coalition to stop them.
The superannuation problem isn’t going away. The Nats will be fuming that Treasury have just dropped in their laps again.
While Key was away on his 4-week holiday in Hawaii, the world economy deteriorated, reports on the dire state of poverty in our country came out, and access to strategic resources became a pressing issue – both with our farmland being bought and Iran threatening to close off the globe’s oil supply. But Key was working on a plan – to stoke up racial dissent at home.
Scott at Imperator Fish has kindly given us permission to syndicate posts from his blog – the original of this post is here
Labour Party MPs are said to be red-faced, after discovering that prominent blogger David Farrar is not the Prime Minister of New Zealand.
The Maori Party is threatening to leave the government over the asset sales legislation removing the companies’ Treaty obligations. Key knows their threat is hollow. He just got away for 3 years of insulting Maori and worsening Maori statistics. Why would Sharples and Turia take a pay cut and lose their limos for their last few months working before retirement?
News in on the Herald says the Maori party are talking the talk over National’s latest insult to Maori.
Will they quit the Government? Or will the smell of those limo seats mean another backdown in a couple of weeks?
The tea tapes contain a pivotal exchange where John Banks and John Key talk about “restructuring” ACT – including Banks confirming his orders from Key to make Catherine Isaac the new leader. We also learn that National advisors called Key in a panic during the Brash coup calling on him to stage a snap election. It’s an insight into the cynicism of National and Key, and also Key’s poor political judgement.
The Teapot Tapes have leaked on to the internet.
You can torrent it and listen past all of the noise.
Headline – PM to Ratana: National has made a difference
Are Maori looking forward to another three years of Key’s ‘difference’?
Labour’s contrition is starting to look like weakness.
Rather than reinforcing their opponents’ framing of issues they need to articulate their own progressive values with authority.
If they fail to do this the momentum gained by their new leader will be lost.
There are a couple of nice pieces in the Herald today on upstanding ACT MP John Banks – on his advising arrested Kim Dotcom on residency and the Overseas Investment Commission, and on his “National” billboards…
Some have compared the Port of Auckland dispute to the 1890 waterfront dispute, 1913 general strike, and 1951 lockout. They want Labour and the Greens to get involved. Actually, this is no 1951 redux. The POA fight is just about one company trying to undercut another. The net effect on New Zealand is zero. The last thing the workers need is Labour creating an excuse for National to attack them.
Scott at ImperatorFish is worried. A National Party MP’s colleagues have become increasingly concerned about his wellbeing, after he failed for two consecutive days to make a fool of himself on Twitter. Concerns were raised when colleagues of Tau Henare realised that they had not noticed a single social media brainfart from the list MP for over 48 hours.
Under cover of Christmas, the Nats are following in their long tradition of intimidating journalists, by going after the teapot tape reporter for “costs”.
“Once in office, you’ve got to do something. That is why having a plan matters.” – Simon Power, 2011, valedictory speech to parliament
Labour’s new leader promised a fresh approach. He’s delivered already in his speech in reply today. Gone is the ritual opening denunciation of the government’s programme – Shearer begins with where a new Labour government would start.
The new Labour line-up is announced. Parker Finance, Ardern Social Development, Cunliffe Economic Development (plus Assoc Finance) round out the top five.
“British philosopher Edmund Burke termed two different modes of viewing representation as the trustee and delegate models. ” Guest poster Pointy looks at this related to the recent Labour leadership selection debate.
Brian Fellow wrote a piece in the Herald yesterday on how NZ has too many ministers. Hard not to agree. 28 ministers. Nearly half of the governing parties’ MPs. 90+ portfolios. Ministerial warrants are clearly being used to keep backbenchers and minor parties in line. Too many do nothing ministers on big salaries while the rest of us have to cut back.
Now that Labour’s new leaders are settling in, I think we should all take a moment to thank the outgoing leaders, Phil Goff and Annette King.
One of David Shearer’s campaign volunteers organised this video as a surprise for David on the night of the Mt Albert By-Election in […]
micky savage writes about Labour’s results in Auckland. There were some stunning results, particularly in South Auckland where Labour’s share of the vote increased by 10.2% in Mangere, 7.3% in Manukau East and 5.2% in Manurewa. And in Phil Goff’s Mount Roskill it increased by 1%. These were very good results in an election where the tide was going out.
Scott at Imperator Fish has kindly given us permission to syndicate posts from his blog – the original of this post is here
Richard Prosser: Satirists need have nothing to fear from the new Parliament, even if Muslim women now do.
There’s talk Shearer might hand Cunliffe the poisoned chalice of foreign affairs. As Clark did her main rival, Goff. That’s no job for a man with a young family. Anyway, Goff’ll want it back ahead of taking the Chinese ambassadorship. Instead, let Cunliffe swap with Parker, who was invisible in economic development and energy, and take on Joyce.
Congratulations David Shearer, you’re leader of the Left now, and the prime target for the Right’s smear machine. The Right’s strategy is obvious: bait and switch. Having proclaimed Shearer’s virtues to high heaven, they (and their useful idiots) will now say ‘who is this man?’, try to frame unreasonable expectations, and try to beat up leadership rumours.
Here is David Shearer’s first speech as Labour party leader.
I’ve now seen David Shearer in three Labour selection contests – I was on the panel in Waitakere in 2002 and Mt Albert in 2009, and I was in Wesley Church last Wednesday in Wellington. He’s won two out of three, and been most impressive every time. Had I been a caucus member today, he would have had my vote. This is why.
Scott at Imperator Fish has kindly given us permission to syndicate posts from his blog – the original of this post is here
The King of the Gods, Zeus, yesterday announced a reshuffle of his pantheon, in an effort to freshen up his front bench. Getting the pantheon lineup right was always going to be one of the trickier tasks facing the Father of Gods and Men, and he will have had to manage some bruised egos during the process…
Labour have come out of their caucus after their vote on who should succeed Phil Goff as leader. The new leadership team is David Shearer and Grant Robertson.
To Cunliffe and Shearer, good luck. To the 34 people choosing the next Labour leader, remember your task is to choose the person who can represent a million+ centre and left voters. The man to take the centre-left to victory in 2014. Don’t you dare let petty personal issues cloud your judgement. We, whom you are privileged to represent, deserve better.
David Lange was a good man with a sharp mind, he was quick as a cat thinking on his feet – especially debating – he was an excellent communicator. With only six years’ parliamentary experience before becoming leader of the NZLP he was also the least experienced of all Labour’s twelve leaders to date. David Lange got eaten alive.
I believe that a strong platform of investment in education, skills and training makes all the difference for many hard working families.
We need to be relevant to aspirations in the provinces, this means that we need to support our provincial candidates more effectively so that they are not having to fight an election on a single issue and not without the resources and support of the party.
Scott at Imperator Fish has kindly given us permission to syndicate posts from his blog – the original of this post is here
The Labour leadership contest is not a left-right battle, but a tough call between an Obama-like orator and a down-to-earth guy who lives his values. Both talented and want to reform the party: but hard to chose who’s best to lead the fight to National.
The new cabinet is out, and the Biggest Loser is Anne Tolley.
