Lefter | Left wing politics & New Zealand

Lefter 43 ~ By the balls

August 31, 2011 by emweb

“A moral collapse over generations …” That’s the UK’s Prime Minister’s excuse for the recent English riots. David Cameron calls his country a “broken society” and to accentuate what, to him, is essentially a class war, he keeps using the word ‘fight’, as in “We must fight back …”

It’s always the easiest response of somebody of his position. Rather than try and understand, it’s easier to demonise. He couldn’t be further, in every way, from the typical ‘shopping rioter’ he’s so afraid of. It’s also a very easy way to gain support with the other fearful members of the British middle and upper classes. It’s so obvious.

Myself, I find it deeply ironic that while the West trumpeted the Arab Spring and the way it was co-ordinated by Twitter, Facebook and Blackberry messaging, suddenly, in London – Effendi! – the shoe was on the other foot, and the government is now considering ways to limit these social network communications systems.

I found it disturbing but emblematic that England’s politicians were coaxed back with visible reluctance from their luxury holidays abroad to deal with angry looters trapped back home in the summer heat.

It could happen here – the gulf between the haves and have-nots has widened considerably. While cutting benefits and services, at the same time modern life means the spoils of wealth are continually dangled in front of everyone’s eyes. iPods, BMWs, bling, designer clothing … But New Zealand has a Rugby World Cup to distract everyone.

But will it?

I don’t like rugby. At my Auckland school, it was an emblem of the bully culture perpetrated by both students and staff. Then the 1981 Springbok Tour sealed a profound dislike of the game and all that it signifies in New Zealand culture.

In England, they differentiate the two codes, soccer and rugby, as ‘a sport of thugs, played by gentlemen and the sport of gentleman’, played by thugs.’ In New Zealand, it’s just a thugs’ game played by thugs. And the game here is run by thugs.

It’s the same old story, though: the wealthy making money out of working class pursuits, in the process becoming so greedy as to make those pursuits unaffordable. At the same time, it represents an escape to a very tiny proportion of the underclass – a path to glory and money, however temporary, as a rugby star.

After decades of corporate sponsorship, monster salaries and Rugby Union greed, no one should be surprised at rorts on tickets, hotel prices going up dramatically, pubs charging admission for the duration, the crazy prices of supporter shirts – and wait till you hear of the profits made in some quarters from Rugby World Cup-related construction and infrastructure. Meanwhile, the country will most likely post a considerable loss.

Will it be good for the country? Almost definitely not – that’s not the experience of other countries, anyway, hosting similar events. But a win might make National’s race to govern with a full majority an even stronger possibility. Shudder.

In England, some working people even take out mortgages to pay for their soccer season tickets. All the profits go to the super rich, who have the fans literally by the balls (pun exercised in full cognisance).

Here in New Zealand, we could be heading for the same situation as England – ‘shopping riots’ by the angry dispossessed. Would John Key bother coming back from his luxury pad in Hawaii for that?

Except that support for rugby has been waning for years. It’s just that no one’s admitting it. Even a few years ago, there were 160,000 New Zealanders signed up to play soccer but only 110,000 signed up to play rugby, yet the dumb and virtually single-sex sport is still considered the national game.

By contrast, despite the numbers actually playing, there were three times as many ACC claims for rugby injuries. So it’s already costing the country plenty.

In Auckland, every weekend there is constriction on every soccer field while there are often two or three rugby fields standing empty right beside them. Yet the council still prioritises rugby.

And I’m supposed to appreciate thugs travelling to my city to enjoy their thugs’ game.

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Lefter 42 ~ Here comes dystopia

August 22, 2011 by emweb

Apart from my revulsion at the fact that so many New Zealanders actually profess to like John Key, I honestly thought Labour could win the next election. Or at least, I did think that, a month ago. But it seems Labour just can’t mobilise itself to do … anything much.

Despite being continuously handed ammunition on a platter, Labour has fundamentally failed to capitalise on any of it. We’ve seen some sporadic sniping, but it has all proved ineffectual against National.

One has to wonder why Labour has failed to capitalise. To me, the two major parties seem two empty shells. Except one has a leader.

As for Labour, Goff has stated he will go when he’s ready, and you can only assume he will be ‘ready’ after a crushing election defeat. And that seems to be the consensus in the ranks – that the forthcoming election failure is the only real way to replace Goff.

As for his successor, there’s … nobody.

For who would replace Goff? There’s a colourless bunch to draw on. If there was a successor in the wings, they should now be trying to show some life, but so far, we haven’t seen anything like that. Even Shane Jones seems to have had the life sucked out of him. Goff must have some kind of hold on the ministers that we can’t discern.

Why has their been no cohesive resistance to National? Labour’s just not ready. Labour gave itself a moral and social mandate with the capital gains tax, and actually stole headlines from Key and left National floundering, then … what? Nothing. I maintain that Labour doesn’t know what it stands for anymore. If Labour doesn’t know, how can we?

National has become so emboldened by Labour’s patent inability to engage that it’s even been announcing punitive measures against New Zealand’s poor and disenfranchised, for next year, and still, there has been very little reaction.

While this once again demonstrates a fundamental difference between left and right (the left looks for the good in people, the right assumes people are bad so need punitive measures and strictures to keep them in line), the measures also offer something worth resisting. Not only that, National has handily helped define the constituency Labour needs to engage with.

And Labour has done … nothing.

National has even announced it won’t be campaigning till after the Rugby World Cup. Labour has reacted by doing … nothing. It’s so worried at looking unseemly in public, as with the Christchurch situation, Labour has gone for ‘pathetic’ instead of unleashing … anything.

You have to wonder why. To me, it looks like the principal Labour members are failing to support Goff in any effective political way (not that he’s giving them much to support) because they are too intent on lining up their personal ducks for a Labour comeback in three years time. Which would mean personal ambition is trumping collective aspiration. For, and I hate to say this, while you might be a suffering beneficiary who’s going to find life really difficult until at least 2015, those Labour ministers are receiving bloody good wages for themselves. What do they care about you? Not much, by the looks of it. And we need to think they do care.

If this cynicism is true, how does it make you feel about Labour? It makes me feel sick. If true, it’s malicious, and to the detriment of the classes that are supposed to be Labour’s core constituency.

I hope I’m wrong.

I suspect I’m not.

So we will get inflicted with another three years of National because of one man’s vanity combined with the inability of Labour members to rise above their own personal ambitions for the good of their electorates, condemning us to another term of an increasingly oppressive dystopia that is using a recession and an earthquake to justify anti-humanistic, culture-quashing policies.

What are the alternatives for us? Mana looks like a left-wing party, but it’s seemingly not for the general New Zealand left-winger. Much as I like Hone Harawira’s gumption and honesty, when he talks about his constituency, he can’t even bring himself to mention Pakeha. He has Sue Bradford on side, and I think she has some credibility, but John Minto? He has unfortunately become the rent-a-protestor he was unfairly accused of being in 1981. He might be there as a sop to the Pakeha left, but many of us on the Pakeha left just find him embarrassing.

Makes you want to vote Green, doesn’t it?

[You can follow lefter on Twitter: look for ‘lefterNZ’ . Note the initial ‘l’ is lower case.]

Category Commentary, Government, Left, New Zealand, Politics, Thought | Tags: , Maori | No Comments
Lefter 41 ~ Labour, get labouring!

July 29, 2011 by emweb

Labour struck a blow by announcing the Capitol Gains Tax, but it has to work hard, and now, to maintain the momentum before the Rugby World Cup takes everyone’s attention.

It’s clear to all that food price rises are making it increasingly difficult for people to manage. It’s clear that Capitol Gains Tax is a good idea. And it’s clear that the government has mismanaged the economy, lined the pockets of the wealthy and mismanaged Christchurch.

So how come people still think National has a plan for the economy? What plan?

Labour finally has a real shot at winning this election, despite appearances. The only poll I’ve seen looks like it was done in Remuera only and may be insignificant, apart from the fact it was widely quoted in the press, but other polls are coming, so Labour has to sell the message.

For the first time in decades the battle lines are clearly drawn. It should be easy (anyway, easier) for Labour to pick up its support in its traditional base of workers and, increasingly, the unemployed and those disenfranchised by benefit cuts. People must be yearning for representation.

Even the press is steadily ramping up critique of the the way National is handling (or not) things – but I’m still not hearing enough response from Labour.

The Salvation Army has reported an 8% rise in the price of food over a year and a more dramatic rise in people using food banks. It’s calling the current situation ‘the new face of poverty’: a group that is outside the usual pool of beneficiaries – people who have jobs but can’t make headway against low wages and rising expenses.

Remember when National let slip that low wages in New Zealand is an advantage in keeping us ‘competitive’?

The Herald – not exactly a champion of the left – reported (July 27th) that 17% of NZ children go to school without breakfast, sometimes or always, and that 22% of households with children run out of food due to lack of money, and that 10% of households use foodbanks.

Good lord, is this really New Zealand? That should be a scandal. It is a scandal. It should also be reported in the world press. The shame!

Meanwhile, New Zealand’s 150 rich listers enjoyed a 20% increase in wealth. Just to prove their greed, lister and ‘jeweller’ Michael Hill and others on the list whinged that the government should relax restrictions on wealth creation!

If National gets back in, that’s probably what will happen.

Meanwhile Prime Minister John Key slipped three places on the list. What, he’s not making armloads of cash from trading currency? New Zealand’s dollar is rather high …

If people in the poorer sector of New Zealand society can still genuinely believe National, which has largely created this crisis, has the better economic plan, the battle is lost. Here is your constituency, Labour.

We need to see a cohesive plan to challenge this situation, and to get the message across to those who need the hope that a New Zealand government can actually do something worthwhile. And if that’s happening, we actually need to see it happening.

For all of us.

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Lefter 40 ~ Cracks appearing

July 13, 2011 by emweb

Do you think Labour’s announcement of a Capitol Gains Tax has rattled National?

I do.

For the first time in … goodness, too many years! Labour has actually led the debate instead of reacting to it. The Capitol Gains Tax left PM John Key floundering to the point where he panicked.

That was clear from his almost insane reaction to a very distant boat filled with clearly needy Sri Lankan refugees, about which he declared they weren’t welcome here. Any declaration on the subject was actually irrelevant, since they had no real hope of getting here, but I figure Key decided he needed to up the ante and do something right wing after Act’s newspaper ads proclaiming we should be sick of Māori ‘taking everything’.

Right. That’s why Remuera is full of Māori while Brash and his ignorant, mono-culture acolytes live hand-to-mouth in Struggle Street. I did wonder about that.

And hey, it might have been a stupid and grossly unimaginative thing to say, but the refugee card worked for Australia’s John Howard for a while, right?

Duh.

Crete was a defeat

Wayne Mapp’s stand-down on the Crete Veterans has been interesting too – he effectively placed the blame on John Key with an admission (whether it’s true or not) that that he tried to get a better deal before the event but that ultimately it came down to the Prime Minister, and his efforts were to no avail.

Which is a bit disloyal, don’t you think?

Minister Mapp, who mangles his words as much as John Key does, attended the event on a junket costing NZ taxpayers $26,000 while veterans – the youngest are in their late 80s – got a paltry $2000 each towards their costs. British and Australian veterans got all-expenses-paid trips, not to mention carers and other services provided by their governments.

I think their governments were genuinely thankful for the sacrifice. Ours didn’t give a shit.

Veterans’ families have since declared they tried every avenue to get the government’s attention on this subject, but pleas fell on deaf ears. In fact, the only reason the government reacted at all is because an Australian pointed out the disparity between the countries’ representations.

The shame.

And what a missed opportunity for John Key, who so loves any chance to look like a good guy on TV. Now he just looks like a prick. Which is more accurate.

Sure, New Zealanders had the furthest to go, but one suspects the NZ government would have happily carried on with this kind of high-handed and privileged approach if the press hadn’t rumbled the shameful treatment of those who ‘risked they’re all for the country’ (to use the time honoured terminology).

Essentially, Key loves being Prime Minister because he gets to be on TV and imagine that people actually like him. Unfortunately for the collective intelligence of New Zealand, people actually do. This may be embarrassing and gauche, but there you go.

And poor Mr Key, it’s probably the first time in his life people have liked him – I mean good lord, who likes traders? So you can hardly blame him. Meanwhile, he’s fronting for some right wingers who are just itching to raise unemployment even more to make hiring ‘more competitive’. In other words, the more desperate people are, the lower wages they’ll accept and the more money the rich can make.

As anti-humane and frankly *larcenous as this world view is, that’s National’s view – keep a lower class down so the wealthy can have ever better lives. Like they need them, or deserve them. But that’s conservatism for you – it’s all about keeping the world order as it is, or was.

The National Government is probably the only group in the country that is secretly thanking their lucky stars for this recession. Next term, they’ll also flog off our assets and worse.

You get what you vote for. Finally, Labour is looking like a creditable party again.

Something we can believe in. Please, please keep it up.

*Larceny because a policy like this effectively steals from the poor and gives to the rich. The Sheriff of Nottingham would be proud.

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Lefter 39 ~ Capitol Gains

July 8, 2011 by emweb

Here’s my take on the Te Tai Tokerau byelection.

Mana won – this is a good thing if only because Hone Harawira deserved to win. As I have noted previously, all he did to get railroaded out of the Māori Party was to tell some, albeit hurtful, truths about it. They should have been heeded.

I could say the Māori Party’s showed a lack of political acumen and experience, but to be fair it’s no more than the sort of behaviour their supposedly much more experienced peers in the two major parties regularly stoop to. Only the Greens seem to be able to rise above it, generally.

But there is lots to learn from Mana’s win. Labour’s strong showing pointed out something very clearly: not just a Māori hankering for a Māori Party that is not National’s patsy, but also a clear indication that northern Māori, at least, is still pro Labour in principal.

And although that’s surprising, after some categorically awful gaffes in that regard by Labour over the last few years, it’s an important point that should not be left begging.

Of the Te Tai Tokerau result, Key said the byelection was a waste of money. He should know: he’s an expert at wasting money.

But how many votes did National get, in this election? None – unless you count the few votes for the Māori Party, since they have become National’s project to nullify Māori aspirations. National didn’t, officially, contest the election but its coalition partner did. And it all failed miserably by anyone’s measure.

All in all, we have seen a realignment in the north that might spread throughout the country: Māori want a strong party that truly, honestly represents Māori aspirations – and since this is a fundamental part of New Zealand’s sovereign and cultural identity, we should all understand and laud this.

But the other realignment is a Māori yearning for a party that has a social conscience – and this used to be Labour.

Labour could be due for renaissance with Māori and it has some genuinely admirable Māori MPs. But the future is not, currently, separate from the fundamental concerns of Māori as a people. The policies Labour creates and the alliances it’s open to could not be more important. So act advisedly in this regard.

But if Labour starts courting the Māori Party now, look forward to more dissolution and another term of National (which must be champing at the bit and hating having to be cautious) to really do some damage to ordinary New Zealanders.

Oh, and Pita? Your seats are not safe. From your partners or from the rest of the country.

Christchurch is a challenge that good government would rise to anywhere in the world, but National has not managed this well and disquiet swelled while John Key hid in India. (How insulting and naive to call India ‘the new China’!)

From where I sit, Labour – for the first time in ages – has a shot at winning the election. National has been passing the ammunition across No Man’s Land. This has, for the most part, been squandered. Is it going into an arsenal for future use? One can only hope so, but good lord, don’t wait too long.

But a shot has been fired – and it was a more like a fusillade! Thank goodness for the (‘leaked’?) announcement on plans for a Capitol Gains Tax! Finally, a point of difference that’s left even John Key gasping like a landed fish.

And finally, we have something worth fighting for – as I have written here before, everyone knows it’s the right thing to do, whether they like it or not. This makes it hard to front a valid resistance to without looking like an ingrate.

Nice one, Phil Goff. Whoever, ever (if anyone did) told you to act like a big man … well, they should be fired. New Zealand doesn’t need another dumb Kiwi bloke in these difficult times. A smarmy liar and concealer. We have a surfeit of those, with the prime chump at the tiller.

We need an academic. Please, Mr Goff, keep doing what you know.

We like it.

Category Commentary, Government, Left, New Zealand, Politics, Thought | Tags: , Maori | No Comments
Lefter 38 ~ Waiting for Good-Oh

June 26, 2011 by emweb

Do you remember a time when New Zealand had loads of jobs, good welfare, affordable education, and when everyone had a fair crack at achieving – well, pretty much anything?

I barely do. But it was like that once.

I have recently been travelling – I hadn’t been in Holland for 26 years. When I left there in the mid 1980s, the most common forms of transport were bikes and trains. People in big cities like Amsterdam and Rotterdam often didn’t own cars at all, and didn’t aspire to car ownership, or at least went years without owning them. Trains were frequent, on time, affordable and efficient, and covered almost every corner of that small, densely populated country.

The national train service employed people, gave them skills and they were a part of the fabric of the country, keeping it humming and connected.

Last month I found myself on a Dutch motorway comprising five lanes in both directions, all stopped or moving at snail’s pace.

Why? They privatised the railways in Holland. Train travel almost immediately became more expensive, less efficient and, in short order, much less used. So people started buying cars.

In response, the government started pumping up the motorway networks, adding lanes on lanes, even though space is always at a premium, and despite a dense rail network.

Dutch people buy cars to the detriment of … almost everything. Parking is a nightmare, motorways are clogged (ha ha), it’s bad for the environment — and it was all completely unnecessary.

Should anyone be surprised?

When you sell a state owned enterprise to a private concern, is it any surprise it’s bought as a cash cow, then milked for every cent possible?

When it’s no longer viable and everyone is complaining enough, the state will have to buy it back anyway to get the freight (or whatever) and the country moving again – another great revenue jump for that private concern.

These entrepreneurs must really think we’re idiots. Unfortunately, again and again, they’re proved right.

Because people don’t set up businesses for the benefit of other people. They don’t build a company to create jobs, education, services and other benefits for a populace. They create businesses for power, profit and position. Any workers employed simply add to all of the above.

Do you want to know who does set up businesses for the greater good? To create jobs, futures, build skills and, in the best examples, as beneficial and thoughtful future-proofing for a population’s best interest, and the country’s?

Governments.

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Lefter 37 ~ The Road Ahead

April 24, 2011 by emweb

I appear to have created some disquiet with my last Lefter.

For which I don’t apologise. Sincerely.

But a couple of criticisms deserve addressing. One is that people working in the Labour Party are finding it hard enough, thank you very much, without my criticisms.

The other is that it’s easy to criticise; what alternatives do I offer?

OK, the first one: I have a fundamental problem with any party that has one voice that everyone has to agree with. This is not democratic. It’s what sunk the Alliance Party as Anderton degenerated into He Who Must Be Obeyed, and it’s what led to the Maori Party completely mishandling Hone Harawera when it should have honoured him for the gift he offered (the truth).

Personally, I refuse to hew to any party line I don’t agree with, in life or work. It’s got me into trouble before and that’s OK – it’s a principle worth fighting for.

I don’t think anybody should be expected to go along with a pronouncement made by some figurehead. Members should be able to say: So and so said this, and I don’t agree with it. And we are working together towards a solution we can all believe in.

Coalitions group together different interests. That’s what a coalition is. A party is essentially a coalition of interests that share a similar general principle. They should all be represented as different interests, working towards a common goal. Since Labour no longer has a clear stance or manifesto, the ground keeps shifting anyway. If Labour can’t enunciate what it means, how do you expect anyone to act unified? Yet Labour does. The cracks are appearing, and the wall paper being applied to hide them is not a good look.

In World War Two, it was pretty damn clear that Russia and England and the US didn’t agree on everything. Well, on much at all. But they didn’t demand each be the same to fight Hitler, did they? That would have been ridiculous. The losers, of course, did do this. Nazism had an archaic structure based on feudalistic ‘figurehead knows best’. This can be spectacularly successful, but only for a short time, and it always ends in bloodshed and disaster. It’s the same in business (perhaps without the bloodshed). The Third Reich had a dramatic rise, a dramatic (and revoltingly destructive) impact, but if you look at it from a distance, it was all gone in 12 years,wrecking most of Europe, Asia, the Pacific and North Africa in the process.

However, some business leaders and geographic despots still see fascism as an excellent model, for in that potentially truncated time frame, they can be incredibly powerful. Why would a left wing (albeit increasingly nominally) even begin to look like it’s following the strictures of anything even faintly resembling Nazism?

Labour’s archaic structure demands that whatever the leaders says is ‘agreed to’ by everyone else. This is the sham of ‘caucus unity’.

Why pretend? Encourage dissent. Encourage freedom of speech. It’s laudable and it makes you look like a group worth supporting. Goff pronounces things that Labour’s caucus doesn’t always sanction, to the surprise of some, and yet Labour then has to act, in public, as if it’s unified. Since very few have any genuine faith in Phil Goff any more, we all suspect there’s a storm gathering to displace him, to the detriment of the next election and to the country. This turns off voters even more.

So here’s some advice to you, Mr Goff: Stop acting like the know-it-all leader. You are not. Nobody (but you, apparently) thinks you are. Look around. The majority overrules you. It’s time you saw it. Open your eyes. If you really want to become a good leader, marshall a flock instead of ramrodding it into the breech. This is heading for a misfire and you risk losing even your most faithful supporters.

Instead, become a wise leader guiding an unruly flock to a result worth waiting for. We like unruly flocks. We also like Border Collies. We note they are clever. This is New Zealand.

You can gather the supporters who are getting turned off because they don’t agree with you personally by giving their figureheads voices within the party.

And Labour, for god’s sake rewrite your operating procedures!

Look progressive. Act progressive. Be progressive. It’s bloody obvious, if you don’t mind my saying so. As I keep saying, we all want something to believe in.

Meanwhile, The Greens are looking like the displaced lefties’ alternative to Labour by doing just this. The Greens have social policies, they can enunciate their beliefs, and they do seem to embrace different voices within the ranks without acrimonious fallouts and the public spectacles they engender. In a nutshell, their structure is more modern and more flexible.

The Greens would make an eco-friendly New Zealand as a cornerstone of both looking after its people and economic gain. It’s a clear, laudable, achievable and easy-to-understand platform with lots to like.

There’s nothing at all like this coming from Labour. (And if there is, as I’ve said before, why don’t we know about it? The election is just a few months away.)

Ok, second criticism. Here’s how to sort the country out, from an uneducated commentator. I can’t believe Labour, with its specialists, economists, unionists, business leaders etc, can’t make these work or come up with even better solutions – but we have yet to see any real evidence of this. So here you go:

1/ Use Christchurch. It needs rebuilding. New Zealand did it with Napier in 1932, and the whole country got behind it. Rebuilding Christchurch rebuilds New Zealand. It gives us something to believe in, it gives us something to be proud of, it gives us work and sacrifice for a good cause and it internalises the economy to an extent. Plus it’s something that desperately needs doing, and doing properly. Everyone likes a rebirth story. This is ours. Labour should be taking the lead, unlike National’s Minister for Disaster.

2/ Tell everyone right now that you’ll tax the rich more. You’ll lose a few rich voters. You’ll gain back a lot – a lot! – of poorer voters. You want the Maori vote back? You want the working class suburbs back? Announce it.

The rich don’t need tax breaks, and they’re doing sweet fa for the country anyway. Besides, they vote National and worse. Make a stand, nail your colours to the mast and get over it. People out here on the street don’t care one jot for the wealthy you’re trying to placate. Many of the middle classes know they didn’t need that last tax break – they’re looking for direction from the Left and they’re not getting it. They, too, need something to believe in. Their taxes will go up for the good of Christchurch, the economy and the country. Big cheer.

3/ Capital Gains Tax. We all know we need this to rein in house prices. We all know owning three properties is bad for the country and stops people getting into houses, keeping the prices high for speculators. But Labour’s too scared. What, Labour, you’re going to lose voters? What voters? Look at the polls, for goodness sake. Make a stand. It’s easy to convince everyone that a Capitol Gains Tax is needed, because it is clear that it is needed. Have the balls to campaign on it. In the long run, it’s a winner. Take the stand of righteousness.

4/ Point out all the crap National has foisted on us. Many still don’t know. Examples are legion. Go for the jugular. Set an attack dog like Mallard onto it – but this only works if you do the above at the same time. One doesn’t work without the other.

5/ Finally, this has been unsaid until now, so I’ll say it: Patriotism. We want something to believe in, something to brag about when we’re overseas. Like we did when we stood up to America’s nuclear ships. Like when we were the first country in the world to give women the vote. The first with a proper welfare system.

Some New Zealanders lament the lack of patriotism we show, and that’s because we’re ashamed of what we have done to our own country, and of the fact we let wankers like John Key, Gerry Brownlee, Bill English and even Rodney Hide walk all over us. We deserve this shame. We’ve been stupid patsies.

It’s time for a change, because these figureheads are not good New Zealanders. They’re obsessed with money and personal power and they don’t care about the general population except as a cash cow.

It’s time to displace this regime. Prove them wrong.

That’s my two cents worth. It’s hardly rocket science, and plenty of people have said it before me, so I honestly don’t get why Labour is still faffing about.

And if you don’t like commenting and want to talk to me personally, email my alias: [email protected] (no, it’s not my real name).

Category Commentary, Government, Left, New Zealand, Pacific, Politics, Thought | Tags: , Maori | No Comments
Lefter 36 ~ here we go, here we go, here we go …

April 13, 2011 by emweb

Here we go to nowhere.

I wrote it months ago, and I feel I must write it again: If Goff was a clever man, he would have set up a succession plan and enacted it. Instead he’s continued with his delusion that he’s Prime Minister material, and unfortunately the party has gone along with this. At least in public – it’s quite possible that the angry pronouncements from first Chris Carter, then from Damian O’Connor are the tip of an iceberg. (It’s ironic that Carter would have been part of O’Connor’s ‘gaggle of gays’.)

And that’s just two men who succumbed to rage after getting their noses out of joint. There are many Labour incumbents who are much better at keeping their heads down. Having had lots of practice.

Much more troubling is that one of Labour’s top financial advisors announced Labour was in trouble, and also laying the problem at Goff’s door.

This, if nothing else, should have galvanised the party but instead, it seems to have made the internal blocs into even more isolated silos struggling to maintain their nebulous positions in a Labour Party that, to all intents and purposes, is dissolving into an amorphous blob.

But this stupidity has continued for so long, Labour has pretty much guaranteed that a party that has reneged on every single promise it has made can nevertheless easily coast back into power. (Yes, that’s National.) Labour had a platform in February, but let it go …. ensuring that from now, National literally needs do nothing to stay in power. It doesn’t need policies, it doesn’t need to make progress, and it doesn’t need to stop cutting benefits while pumping money into financial disasters, even despite the fact some are clearly of its own making.

Because financial disasters are presided over by New Zealanders National does understand. Rich white people.

For it’s plain to see: National will put money after money, but keep cutting it for the poor and workers while making their lives harder in every way possible: instant dismissals, tougher sick leave and growing constraints on opportunity and education.

The stupidity of all this is mind boggling. It’s what you’d expect from a Third World country – but hey, that’s what we’re rapidly becoming. It’s so obvious that New Zealand is failing that our Finance Minister is even touting NZ’s low wages as if it’s a good point; a feature that’s making us competitive. This is ignoring the fact National promised to solve the wage gap (now 30%) with Australia.

Hah.

There is more than one stupidity at work, of course. While Goff flounders from one unseemly crisis to the next, looking ever more ineffectual, the New Zealand public still thinks Key is doing a good job. This is stupid because he patently is not. Yet just because he shows up on TV every five minutes, grinning his imbecilic grin and mangling his way through even the most innocuous of sentences, the New Zealand public still thinks he’s a good guy.

Good Lord!

Either way, I have no faith in either of them. I never had any in Key, but I did hope Goff had some vision. He clearly, by this juncture, does not. He also appears to listen to, then enact, only the most execrable advice.

Meanwhile, his party faffs about, lacking the cohesion to do anything, lacking the gumption to put an alternative forward, and now having left it far too late anyway.

This is a gift – to National, which does not need gifts.

Now National can literally forget Labour while it concentrates on the dissolution of the Maori Party and Act, thinking this will lead to National having a clear majority after the next election.

Meanwhile, Labour presides over its own shabby and unseemly public decline.

Fellow citizens, when National gets its second term, you will see what damage an unfettered National Party can really do.

For believe me, National has evil plans for you aplenty.

Meanwhile, we simply don’t have a left wing party.

Category Commentary, Government, Left, New Zealand, Pacific, Politics, Thought | Tags: | 1 Comment
Lefter 35 ~ cuts that hurt

March 3, 2011 by emweb

Was anyone else embarrassed when John Key went on international TV asking for donations for the Christchurch quake? New Zealand is still one of the wealthier countries in the world, despite National’s mismanagement. We should not need any help. (Michelle A’Court raised this issue at a Grey Lynn Locally Left this week – good point.)

Everyone’s trying to find money to send to Christchurch. How far do you think NZ$6,800,000 or more would go to help the Christchurch quake disaster? A fair way, I hazard to guess. A good drop in the massive bucket required.

Oh, but wait – that’s the amount the National government just blew on 34 luxury, exclusive BMWs we don’t, in any conscience and for any reason, need.

But wait – Key is a ‘money expert’, right? This is why people feel safe with him at the helm, merrily squandering the nation’s revenue to please his cronies. This must have been a very wise business decision … yeah, right. Finger on the pulse Mr Key said: “I can’t take responsibility for a contract that was entered into by the previous Labour Government, that wasn’t bought to my attention or to my ministers attention”.

Key said “Internal Affairs did understand sensitivities about spending but felt they got a good deal.”

Demonstrably.

Do you feel sick? You should.

Meanwhile, it looks like this government is borrowing $1.5 billion a year to pay for the tax cuts that it put in place a few months ago.

Tax cuts for the rich.

Christchurch’s citizens can get $50 flights out to other NZ centres, and some arrive with just a few clothes. The Canterbury rich, meanwhile, are probably buggering off to Hawaii instead, thanks to their tax breaks. Tax that a prudent government would be collecting for … you know, acts of God and that. Like the Christchurch quake.

Stuff reported that a Treasury spokesman said new tax forecasts had yet to be finalised; “However, the loss of revenue could be in the order of $5 billion over the next four years,” he said.

This is mind bogglingly stupid by anyone’s reasoning.

Meanwhile, Key is trying to spread the responsibility, instead of making the hard choice of deleting those ill-advised tax cuts. He is considering involving other political parties in decisions about Christchurch as well as locals and the city council.

The decision should be: get rid of this farcical government!

His excuse is “I don’t think this is a political event, I think it’s actually a national event and we need to reflect that.”

I reflect that a prudent government would have had a surplus and wouldn’t need to go cap in hand to the world like Haiti (understandably) had to.

The richest New Zealanders have had three rounds of income tax cuts in two years. Meanwhile, the minimum wage got an insultingly tiny boost, welfare cuts are hurting, preschool care has been cut, and we’re all paying more for food, services (OK, everything) with the GST hike.

And we wonder why people in Christchurch are looting.

Category Commentary, Government, Left, New Zealand, Pacific, Politics, Thought | Tags: | 1 Comment

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