Bitcoin - A Glimpse At Our (Grim) Economic Future

There's been quite a lot of mainstream media attention on the Bitcoin phenomenon recently. And while any amount of prognostication about whether its runaway increases in value represent a bubble can be found pretty much wherever one cares to look, there's one aspect of the present Bitcoin boom that I think's been somewhat under-discussed.

Namely, the way in which what we're seeing right now is arguably a 'glimpse into the future'.

And I don't mean that in the simple sense of currency being decoupled from states [not least because recent developments in both Venezuela and Russia appear to suggest that you can perfectly viably run cryptocurrencies *as* a state .. and potentially have them actually 'worth' something, so to speak], nor the Cyberpunkishness of Darknet-denizens paying for elaborately staged murders or exceedingly cheap-for-quality hard-drug procurations.

Instead, if we take a look at how Bitcoin is actually produced - 'mined' - these days, it basically features a relatively small number of people and operations using pretty excessively large 'mining rigs' of linked computers with super-massive processing power and power-requirements, solving largely pointless [except insofar as they generate more precious bitcoin] mathematical equations, with virtually nil human input required beyond the setting up of the rigs and the paying of the powerbill.

Or, in other words, this is *exactly* how a pretty broad swathe of economic activity is going to go down over the next few decades. Human "operators" - capitalists, entrepreneurs, bourgeoiCPU, whatever ... presiding over effectively automated workforces ... who do ever more 'stuff' to generate a nominal economic return, that's probably functionally pointless except insofar as it leads to some electrons indicating nominal value flowing around an increasingly digitized economy.

While, at the same time, draining ever further quotients of *real* resources out here in the non-cyber world [in this case, power-inputs - but no doubt all manner of other things, too, with time], to turn into largely imaginary [except for its somewhat subjectively agreed upon worth by an investor clade] 'output'.

And meanwhile, you'll have this ever-expanding class of regular ol' Humans who're basically 'locked out' of the whole thing, because they have neither the investment capital necessary to set up an operation of their own inside an increasingly hard-to-get-into market [I mean seriously - the level of coin, bit or otherwise, required to buy the hardware necessary to run a commercially viable mining rig is *ridiculous*, let alone the power-bills] , nor the technological skills to viably participate in this cyber-economy in other ways that'll effectively allow them to make ends meet without assistance.

Personally, I think this whole setup is pretty fundamentally wasteful. Of a whole lot of things. Of the aforementioned physical resources, for a start [because seriously - you're not producing anything tangible via bitcoin-mining except an ongoing arguable "bubble"]; but also of a huge swathe of yet-living human potential. Who are now, after all, just straight-up "surplus to requirements" in so many senses of the term.

But at the same time, it's interesting to consider the way in which Bitcoin and its generation shows that straight-up a lot of the way in which wealth is derived in our economic system [whether present or [near-]future] doesn't actually involve any real effort on the part of the presumptive main beneficiaries of same, other than the initial set-up of capital goods and *maybe* some wrangling of finance here and there.

It's then 'distributed' out by the owners & employers of capital to various beneficiaries from same - whether investors, perhaps, or whatever workforce they've got under them in their operation, or whomever's selling the next round of hardware, software, and other resource-inputs [like POWER! UNLIMITED POWER!] which might be needed to keep the whole thing operational in the short-to-medium-to-long term.

OF course, to bring this back to those aforementioned 'surplus' humans who aren't capable of supporting this whole venture ... that's where things start to get a bit messy. Because these people have no share of the wealth that's thusly generated, whilst it's quite plausible that the rest of the economy which they might otherwise be employed in, is steadily atrophying and dying.

The impacts of having an ever larger swathe of your population with ever less money to spend is pretty obvious - both in economic terms; but also, dependent upon what welfare/redistributive apparatoi look like in your society, quite probably in human/humanitarian terms as well.

Where am I going with this?

Well, one of the main arguments people often have against a UBI, is that it entails giving people money for nothing. And that isn't necessarily true imo , on grounds that a lot of people perform a helluvalot of unpaid and unrecognized labour *anyway* [think caregivers and homemakers], with a UBI arguably forming a partial recognition & remuneration for that. But I digress.

This misses the point that increasingly, on into the future, the way that income is derived for *just about everybody* outside of an ever-narrowing field of occupations, is going o be precisely that - income that is handed to them not through any actual hard work or effort on their part [again, barring initial set-up bist and pieces, for the most part] ... but instead simply as a result of property rights [i.e. a return on increasingly entirely automated capital].

Phrased in these terms, then, when we talk about a UBI we are not simply suggesting that it's one serious way by which an economy might avoid straight-up crash as a result of greater automation being a thing.

But rather, we are making the case that in a vaguely similar manner to the investor/'miner' class, one's right as a stakeholder in the Nation effectively entitles one to a comparable income-stream as a result of this and this potentially alone. [Whether one wishes to get into the extent to which individuals-as-citizens actually play a role in 'investing' in the Nation and supporting its existence through their ongoing civic behavior, or whathaveyou]

Or, to say it another way ... if it is necessary for ongoing economic activity for people to be able to spend money, and we have effectively 'decoupled' the main source of income for a pretty important [economically] portion of society from actual effort [although 'risk' is perhaps another matter], then why do we not look more favourably upon continuing this 'decoupling' for the rest of society at large with a view to *ensuring* that people actually *do* have the ability to spend such money as may be necessary to keep the economy as a whole ticking over.

And I would rather suspect that the power-inputs and other such things hat would go into supporting a UBI scheme would be far an away less wasteful all-up than what we're presently seeing with Bitcoin.

"It's Not Hypocrisy When We Do It" - The National Party's All-Out Attack On Michael Cullen Chairing Labour's Tax Working Group

Now here's a curious thing ... right now the National Party is going absolutely hammer-and-tong attempting to attack the Labour Party's Tax Working Group - for, among other things, the fact it's set to be chaired by former Labour Finance Minister Sir Michael Cullen.
On the face of it, I suppose some might agree with the notion that appointing a well-respected linchpin of the previous Labour government might seem a *little* less than strictly impartial. But from where I'm sitting, Cullen's record as Finance Minister [which, let's remember, was sufficiently glowing that even *National* were singing his praises a few years ago - to the point of awarding him a Knighthood for "services to the state" in this role in 2012] probably means that the competency he brings to the role outweighs concerns he might be "partisan".

Certainly, National seemed to harbour no such concerns when they appointed him to head the review of our intelligence agencies two years ago. 
And yet, such a potentially "bipartisan" approach from National is pretty inconsistent with their own previous record when it comes to Working Groups, Task Forces, and other such beasts of political-policy-oversight burden. I've literally lost count of the number of consultative bodies and even straight-up Inquiries that the National Party quite pointedly staffed the chairing of with their own people over the last nine years. 
I mean, as an example of this - their placing of John Shewan at the head of the group convened to look into slash "dispel" the perception of New Zealand as a tax-haven, for instance, was quite directly a case of placing a fox in charge of a hen-house [Shewan's private sector activities including quite a spate of tax-"consultancy" and linkages to a series of potentially dodgy international firms in this regard].
Or, worse, the series of appointments of [now Dame - guess why she got the gong, eh?] Paula Rebstock to head Inquiries into everything from Peter Dunne's 'alleged' leaking of materials around the GCSB's illegal conduct through to the 'Leask' affair concerning MFAT information being anonymously passed to the Labour Party.
In both of these above-cited cases, Rebstock basically managed to produce the "correct" outcome from the perspective of the Government of the day .... and was subsequently castigated by other authority-figures who wound up having to review her efforts for getting things wrong, or even presiding over outright illegal conduct.
Clearly, there is a bit of a risk when a Government appoints its own people to what's supposed to be an impartial body - although I would respectfully contend that there's quite a gulf of difference of both degree and kind between empowering a well-regarded former Finance Minister to preside over a taxation working group [which is, after all, an advisory organization set up entirely at the Government's behest to provide potential detail and projections on its own policy] .... versus a Government 'slotting in' its own pugnaciously-construed "enforcer" to Inquiries into Government (mis)actions that are supposed to, by their very nature, be above the petty politics of the day.
As we can see ... the results of National's perfidy were for those aforementioned Inquiries to wind up repeatedly warred-over and iniquitously conducted bun-fights rather than august and impartially-regarded efforts at discerning the truth of important matters

Further, if I recall correctly, the previous National Government's "2025 Taskforce" on pensions and the like was convened to be chaired by none other than arch-neoliberal [and former National Party Leader] Don Brash. I don't seem to recall the National Party raising any issue with "politically tied" appointments to policy working-group style arrangements THEN...?
What's different about Cullen on the Tax Working Group, I wonder...?
I am sure there are a litany of other examples - but that's just a few off the top of my head.
It appears at this point that the National Party knows they can't meaningfully criticize the Tax Working Group on substance [after all - rightly or wrongly, the only thing we know at this stage about their prospective output are a list of the things the Labour Party have pre-emptively ruled *out* of consideration] ... and so are instead resorting to that old favourite of theirs, going for the man - the personality - instead.

And, as is frequently the case where National is concerned, criticizing the hell out of Labour et co for doing something that, arguably, they themselves regularly and relentlessly engaged in when in Government.

Although I maintain as I said at the outset of this piece, that it is difficult indeed to draw a meaningful comparison between the appointment of Sir Michael Cullen to the chairmanship of this Tax Working Group, and any of the previously-cited instances of National staffing legal proceedings or advisory panels with its own bully-boys and flunkies.

After all ... given Sir Michael Cullen literally wound up being knighted in no small part for his sound economic management as the previous Labour Government's Finance Minister, it would appear rather unquestionable - even by National, who knighted him, one presumes - that when it comes to these sorts of matters, Cullen (still) has a meaningful and informed contribution to make.

Why New Zealand Is REALLY Under Pressure Over Russian Trade From Atlanticists With An Agenda

Well this is interesting, isn't it. No sooner does New Zealand start talking openly about pursuing a trade policy that is more independent of the Atlanticist E.U.-American block, than the threats start being issued unto us by their diplomats and local mouthpieces; with pliant domestic (yet invariably foreign-owned) media haplessly buying into the hysteria.

Take a look at this recent article from one of our leading newspapers - the New Zealand Herald - on the prospect of the New Zealand Government honouring a promise to the nationalist New Zealand First party, to thaw trade-relations with Russia.

If this were your only source of information on the subject, you could be forgiven for presuming that New Zealand's push for closer economic relations with the Russian Federation was some sort of conspiratorial effort that had been a closely guarded secret - the result of clandestine influence-peddling by a Russian ambassador meeting with the man who's now NZ's Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister earlier this year.

And which is seemingly set to usher in a serious crisis for little old New Zealand as our more 'traditional' trade "partners" and "allies" gear up to turn their backs upon us as we shun their incipient "good-will".

But all of this is so completely and utterly fictional I'm almost surprised it wasn't accompanied by a breathless set of claims that Putin somehow *personally* hacked our recent Election. It's simply that  far fetched.

Let us examine the allegations being made here one by one - and in so doing help to shine a light on what's REALLY going on here.

The first 'odd contention' in this article is that the trade-push is somehow an "unheralded policy" which was not talked about prior to the Election, and was largely unknown even as recently as last week - being sprung out in such a manner as to suggest something untoward or unpalatable was afoot.

This is manifestly false. New Zealand First has been continuously raising the serious issue of our country being locked out of one of the largest beef and dairy markets on Earth [heading for second largest and already second largest, respectively] over a pretty substantial swathe of the previous Parliamentary Term; issuing numerous press releases, asking Questions of the Government in Parliament, and engaging in other political efforts to try and get some traction of the issue for much of the last three years.

Indeed, I even wrote an article on exactly this matter some weeks ago - openly posing the question before the results of coalition negotiations were even a blip on the horizon, as to whether New Zealand First regardless of their choice of coalition partner [the more globalist-neoliberalist inclined National Party; or the somewhat better social-democratic-with-neoliberalist-characteristics Labour Party] might be able to effectively secure progress on this long-standing area of concern.

Or, in other words - if New Zealand "journalists" truly believe that this is an "unheralded policy", it can only be because they have neglected to pay anything even loosely resembling proper attention to the course of Parliamentary politics in this country for the last three years and longer.

The second 'big' claim made in the article - on both an implicit and outright explicit level - is that the further pursuit of warmer economic relations with the Russian Federation will somehow be disastrous, as it risks imperiling our extant trade with the European Union.

And, to be sure, the figure of some twenty billion dollars per year in NZ-EU trade does sound mighty impressive as compared to the $417 million we did in 2016 with Russia.

Except let's take a closer look at those figures. The first, of course, being that it's hardly fair  to compare our trade with a country we have foolishly been subjecting to substantial trade-sanctions for some years now [i.e. Russia] with a trading-bloc we've poured every possible effort into securing stronger economic interchange with pretty much for as long as I've been alive. If we HADN'T had Russia under sanction over this period, and had instead been more amicable to the aforementioned 2nd largest importer of dairy products [our key export, apparently] ... I do not feel at all questionable in outright stating, we would most certainly be trading billions of dollars more in their direction.

But the second point - and the one that really shows the paltry paper-mache of the pro-E.U. voices' stance - is that a very sizeable portion of that twenty billion dollars of trade with the E.U. ... is actually comprised of the $5.3 billion dollars worth of exchange we undertake with the United Kingdom specifically.

You know, that United Kingdom which recently voted to *leave* the European Union; which has endlessly been constrained in just how much of our produce it's been able to take *because* it was part of the European Union; and which we're presently even now [and with much less fan-fare and objection] pursuing a free trade deal with.

Or, in other words - regardless of what the European Union thinks, we are very shortly set to deal directly with our largest constituent market over there WITHOUT the ongoing interference of Brussels or French farmers ... and do so in such a manner that we will once again be gaining billions of dollars worth of trade in addition to what we already have in that direction.

Meanwhile, while the European Union can huff and puff and threaten all it likes that it will continue to defer New Zealand's hoped-for Free Trade Deal with the E.U. - the plain fact of the matter is that they have done exactly this pantomime act of dragging their heals in response to New Zealand's ongoing efforts to gain better access to their market for some decades now. And with 'good' [from their perspective, at least] reason.

Our agricultural produce is simply of such quality and low relative price that the extant suppliers of the domestic market they seek to protect from our superior output will NEVER concede to 'going quietly' on allowing our exports in unmolested. In exactly the same manner that America almost invariably balks at including agricultural produce in the various Free Trade instruments that it occasionally feigns interest in such as the T.P.P.A.

To be fair, the E.U. HAS recently shifted its position on this somewhat with regard to us - upgrading the timescale for a hypothetical NZ-EU FTA from "when Hell freezes over" to "Magic Eight-Ball Says: Answer Unclear - Try Again Later". Although as far as I can tell, the main reasoning for offering to perhaps, maybe, possibly, if we feel like it begin the opening round of talks for such a deal in the indeterminate future has less to do with a sudden thawing of French Farmer or Brussels Bureaucrat sentiment to Anchor Butter ... and much more to do with the imminent prospect of the British beating them to the punch and securing a Free Trade Agreement with New Zealand [i.e. a rather drastic shift of the British away from buying from Europe through to buying from Aotearoa] within the next two years.

Or, phrased another way - the European Union had no interest in 'playing nice' with New Zealand on trade policy up until they became worried that they'd lose out due to both us and a key trading partner of everybody involved going elsewhere first.

I therefore take these posturing European Union diplomat statements about how they'll view our efforts with Russia in a "very negative" light as the tantrums of a toddler-state conglomerate rather than a serious commentary about likely future prospects.

If the European Union never intended to give us a fair Free Trade Agreement, and particularly in a reasonable timescale - then we have lost absolutely nothing by pursuing better associations with other markets in possession of vastly more growth potential for us, in the mean-time.

And if they WERE serious about suddenly caving to inevitability as applies greater economic interchange with New Zealand - then this is a position they have had to be browbeaten into by a combination of one of their largest constituent markets going elsewhere, and New Zealand looking to join it.

Which means that our own movements toward warmer economic interplay with Russia will have a positive and spurring effect upon our trade relations with Europe as they bend over backwards to attempt to entice us 'back' into "their" sphere of influence/suzerainty with promises of shiny export-dollars.

To state it plainly - despite the rather undiplomatic rhetoric from E.U. Ambassador Bernard Savage [which was judged a sufficient faux-pas as to be being backed away from by the E.U. Embassy here later in the week], we here in New Zealand have almost certainly lost nothing as applies the E.U. from pursuing better relations with Russia - and instead, may yet gain, as a result, capaciously from them in this area through our subtle and canny approach to realpolitik on trade.

The third prong of this bizarre [yet in retrospect, entirely expectable] full-frontal fact-free assault upon New Zealand pursuing an independent foreign policy on the global, geopolitical stage comes from none other than the loudest NeoCon mouth-piece presently given air-time in our media and academic spheres today. A professor of International Relations at Auckland University by the name of Stephen Hoadley, whom I've formerly had the displeasure of being lectured by back when I was an UnderGrad at the same institution [as an aside, another of my former International Relations lecturers - Dr Jian Yang - is presently *also* coming to prominence as the 'potential' agent of a foreign power within our politics ... leading me to question whether there's a puppet-string hidden under seemingly every moss-encrusted rock one cares to turn over on the economic right of our politics these days].

Now, to give you an idea of just how Neo-Conservative Hoadley is ... this is a man who was still defending the American invasion of Iraq as a fundamentally principled and correct action to his classes right up, presumably, to the present (he still point-blank refuses to acknowledge the way this created the present disastrous situation with ISIS etc.). To give perhaps better feeling for the way in which he uses his prominent position within our politico-academic ecosystem here in NZ, one of his more recent works attempted to stop academics writing about American foreign policy from using terms and phrases like "hegemonic", "militaristic", "exploitative", "provocative of terrorism", "destructive of international order" [on that score, i partially agree - at present, unipolar hegemony IS the 'international order' - hence the lack of desire on the part of some actors to change it], and "imperial".

He further absolutely recoils from the thought of anybody using the term "imperialism" to describe the modus operandi and ultimate goals of American actions on the international stage; instead insisting that "analysts" basically polymorph into (geo-)political PR spinners for the latter-day American Empire; lest people speaking frankly and accurately about the ambit of American policy trigger serious resistance to same.

Or, in other words, when it comes to the worth of Associate Professor Hoadley's opinion on a matter of a country choosing to act in its own interest rather than towing the Atlanticist 'party-line' ... anyone acquainted with the corpus of his work can immediately see that it is best understood as being printed on two-ply - and for the American sphincter.

His 'concerns' about us not standing in absolutely slavish 'solidarity' with "like minded Western countries" are pretty much exactly the same as the ones he (and others like him) put forward to attempt to push New Zealand into getting involved with various American military adventurism in the Middle East over the course of the last decade and a half. Their arguments have always been that it is apparently impossible for us to remain on amicable terms with other countries if we offer even the slightest bit of actual substantial criticism of their respective foreign policies; or refuse to "pay the price" of "friendship" by putting New Zealand bodies on the line in THEIR fights overseas.

And to be fair, as we can see from both the American dropping of a prospective Free Trade Deal with NZ in the aftermath of our refusal to fight in Iraq in 2003 - as well as the subsequent exchange of lucrative milk contracts for Kiwi troops - this certainly does appear to be exactly how the Atlanticist block views our relationship.

There's a term for the sort of sustained interaction wherein continued good-treatment is conditional upon the exchange of bodies and money ... and it CERTAINLY isn't "friendship".

But did any of these 'bleeding heart Neocons' protest about New Zealand seeking closer economic relations with America at the very same time as the latter was engaged carrying out an illegal invasion of a sovereign nation?

Of course they didn't!

Because their sentiments on these matters - in this case, their apparent trenchant objections to New Zealand chartering an independent course on matters economic - are not actually "ethically" based. Nor are they even, really, "economic". 

Rather, they are solely concerned with the great dance of Geopolitics. And in service of that agenda, men like Hoadley or this European Union Ambassador will deploy almost any form of rhetoric or other inducements in order to keep 'their' puppet-countries and client-states sitting on the "right" side of the table.

Still, it's not like the forces arrayed against New Zealand pursuing an independent foreign policy and lucrative trade opportunities are exclusively external, either. As we can see from the article, our very own [Inter] National Party has also lined up to take pot-shots at our new Government's incipient new direction.

Although I must confess it a bit rich that this criticism is coming from, once again, the same organization which was gearing up to trade away our long-standing anti-nuclear policy to the Americans in clandestine meetings, and whose present Leader was previously adamant that New Zealand ought to have gone to Iraq in 2003 at the behest of the Atlanticist 'Coalition of the Willing'.

To put it bluntly, there is simply no equivalency to be made between the NZF-Labour Government seeking a trade-deal with Russia ... and the National Party who formed our previous Government outright baying to partake of an illegal war alongside the Americans - even if, as it now turns out, there was the potential inducement of a trade deal with the Americans on the table at the time.

Meanwhile, the statement from Winston's predecessor as Foreign Minister - the National MP Gerry Brownlee - that Winston had met with the Russian Ambassador far more frequently than Brownlee over the latter's tenure, does not reveal anything untoward. Unless Brownlee genuinely thinks (no doubt as a result of reading too many James Bond novels) that the Russians have developed mind-control pheromones or something, it does not seem plausible that simply meeting with a diplomat is cause for alarm. [This despite the Herald's journalist deliberately invoking the shadowy specter of alleged Russian "hacking" of the recent US General Election and supposed improper influence over US President Donald Trump. I am genuinely surprised at this point that no serious media outlet has yet stooped so low as to outright allege that Russia has hacked Winston!]

Indeed, I read the situation entirely differently. Namely, that Winston - as arguably our best Foreign Minister in decades, during his previous tenure in the role - was keeping an ear to the ground and diligently fact-finding for his efforts in Parliament on trade policy, particularly as pertains Russia ... whilst Brownlee, by not meeting on even a single occasion with the Russian Ambassador over the entire course of his time as Foreign Minister, was engaged in a SERIOUS dereliction of duty!

With that in mind, it is a shameful thing indeed that Brownlee has attempted to turn his laziness into an assumed "virtue" in this regard .

To sum up, then - it does indeed appear that there is something of a 'shift in the wind' in both New Zealand's foreign policy, as well as the Geopolitical 'game' more generally. The trade winds are now blowing to the East, whilst naught but 'hot air' and the whiff of sulfur appears to emanate from the 'Old Empires' on either side of the Atlantic.

New Zealand has, for the longest time, attempted to maintain cordial relations with the European Union and America in the vaguest, vainest hopes that we might one day be able to be treated with fairness and dignity by either economic unit on matters of foreign and trade policy.

Thus far, our hopes have largely proven futile - and after some decades of waiting upon an improvement in either situation, it now appears that our national patience has worn seriously thin.

At the same time, we have found ourselves confronted with a serious opportunity in the form of a resurgently prominent Russia; and it would appear on the face of it that there are no onerous demands for our militarized loyalty or diplomatic posturing being placed upon us by this Great Power in exchange for trade. This is, obviously, in rather direct contrast to both the E.U. and the US - and *especially* the pair of them together.

The absolute furore from a number of quarters over the prospect that New Zealand might once again take back control of our own economic and geopolitical destiny ... rather than endlessly sitting on the sidelines hoping against hope to be picked for fair play ... is thus absolutely terrifying to the mandarins and the mouthpieces in each of the Atlanticist centers of power.

Because, put quite simply, it represents the tangible new reality that they are no longer in control of events and other places.

And that their time as would-be charlatan Chakravartins is rather swiftly drawing to a close.

Good Riddance. And disregard the shamelessly perfidious 'talking heads' who dare to say otherwise.

As we enter into the incoming Age of Multipolarity, New Zealand is already set to do very well by remaining *well* ahead of the curve.

Long may we prosper as a result.

"Inflammatory Remarks"

You know, it is a peculiar thing to wake up to various people demanding the expulsion of an Iranian diplomat for remarks he made at a private gathering about the state of Israel.

I mean, correct me if I'm wrong about this ... but it was not Iran which boldly threatened a state of war with our country only a few months ago, now, was it.

I have not viewed Secretary Ghahremani's speech in its entirity, and am running off the quotes which have been extracted therefrom to bedeck the sensationalist Sunday newspapers all breathlessly seeking to cover this story.

But going off these, I can only ask where, exactly, it was that he erred?

Was it with the contention that Israel has been 'fuelling terrorism' in order to advance its geopolitical objectives? Surely not. After all, the Israelis themselves admitted to actively assisting Al-Nusra [better known as the local franchisee of Al-Qaeda operating in Syria]. Perhaps it was his comment that the state in question frequently attempts to "deceive the world" with the ever-widening gulf between its rhetoric of enthusiasm for peace and diplomacy ... and a litany of transgressions even in recent times I hardly need to list for their familiarity.

Maybe there is objection to the Israeli state's policy and impetus being designated "anti-human" ... and yet it seems pretty plainly apparent that on everything from the [now thankfully officially discontinued] involuntary sterilization of its black citizenry through to the ongoing illegal blockades, incursions, detentions, airstrikes, etc. etc. etc. that it is rather avowedly anti *some* humans at the very least.

It is true that Secretary Ghahremani's remarks may, in their now public disclosure, be regarded as "inflammatory". But unless there is something significantly salacious in the rest of his speech that has as-yet gone unreported, I am not entirely sure I would suggest that anything he has said is manifestly counter-factual.

And we do enter into a rather .. odd situation if historical truths and contemporary realities are unable to be voiced because they may potentially be deemed "inflammatory".

I mean, the pathway that takes us down, I might find myself subject to censure & vilification for simply pointing out that the pattern of Israeli-Kiwi relations over the past two decades has been characterized by an ever-escalating series of incidences more befitting outright foes than nominal 'friends'.

Or is it "inflammatory" to mention such things as the Israeli passport-harvesting for overseas espionage at the expense of people such as a profoundly disabled tetraplegic New Zealander; the alleged activities of similar personnel in Christchurch in 2011 with the target of our national policing computer-system; or even the not-quite-Declaration-of-War from the Netanyahu Government late last year.

In any case, I do not seek to support nor exculpate the remarks uttered by some of the other speakers Secretary Ghahrameni shared a stage with back in June. Those can be considered on their own relative merits [or lack thereof].

But it is not the accountant from Mt Albert, nor the visiting Cleric whom I am seeing the loudest calls for expulsion from our country in reference to.

Instead, these are being foisted in the direction of a diplomat clearly articulating the long-held position of his Government, on the occasion of a solemn commemoration and solidarity-extension to an oppressed and marginalized people.

With that in mind, I can only wonder whether the opprobium presently being heaped in Secretary Ghahremani's direction has less to do with what he said .. and more to do with some people being profoundly uneasy with the progressive normalization of both our relations with Iran - as well as the escalatingly positive role that the Iranians have found themselves playing with regard to the broader security situation in the Middle East these past few years.

Who knows. "Haters", as they say, "gonna hate".

Although it would be a pretty unctuous & unfortunate situation if this man WERE to be banished from our country for speaking in support of a people we have previously pledged to help, his only 'crime' that's thus far been made out in any detail, the remarks of some of those who happened to be in the room with him at the time.

Some might even call such a move ... "inflammatory"....

The Golden Path Mk.II: NZ First's Quantum Superposition Of Solitude

Many moons ago - back when the notion of replacing Andrew Little with Jacinda Ardern was the sort of pie-in-the-sky idea dismissed by almost all serious commentators as almost assuredly fatal to both her party and her person, rather than some form of titanic/cthonic masterstroke capable of apparently singlehandedly reshaping the political landscape upon a whim - I sat down to pen a piece entitled "The Golden Path".

The focus of this article was to be what I, and a number of others inside NZF, viewed as the 'best' course of action for the Party if we genuinely wished to survive the 2017 and 2020 General Elections and make it on to that mythical and much-hypothesized Life After Winston ... without going the way of pretty much every other 'smaller' party over the course of the MMP age.

Foremost among the insights amidst said invective was the concept that in fairly direct contravention of what seemingly everybody else both inside the Party and out was saying about how to ensure NZF's long-term survivability [i.e. shack up in coalition with one or other of the 'major' parties, pick up a few Ministerial portfolios, show the electorate how good we could do in Government, and then hope against all available evidence that this would somehow NOT lead to us collapsing towards either the end of the Term or the Government], if New Zealand First genuinely wished to maintain its existence - and, perhaps rather more aspirationally, its then-seeming-inexorable ascent towards displacing Labour for 'major party' status - that it absolutely HAD to avoid the temptations of the 'baubles of office', and REFRAIN from forming a coalition, confidence & supply deal, or other such arrangement with ANYBODY.

Be 'Sinn Fein', in other words - "For Ourselves Alone".

Now, for a number of reasons, the original "Golden Path" article lies both unfinished and unpublished. And in any event, this is not necessarily a great tragedy. Events, as they often do in politics, wound up first overtaking and then considerably outpacing my own prognostications, rendering the strategem advanced within said document functionally moot.

After all, with the results of last month's General Election as they are, except in the most plausibly impossible scenario of the Green Party choosing to support National into a 4th term or the much-vaunted "Grand Coalition" of Labour and National finally coming to fruition in eerie echo of 1996's torrid possibilities ... there is literally no way we get a Government here in New Zealand without New Zealand First's say-so and involvement. Whether direct or otherwise.

Attempting to 'abstain' from proceedings in order to bide our time and build our strength, in other words ... would most likely be a rather non-viable option.

Or would it ...

You see, there's this interesting concept which half the country seems freshly to have heard of and yet to properly get their collective head around.

That of the 'cross-benches'.

Wherein, to put it bluntly, if it's being done *properly* [i.e. not really what NZF did in 2005], it entails the cross-bencher MPs *abstaining* on Confidence & Supply rather than entering into a C&S Agreement, and voting issue-by-issue - including, potentially, on C&S matters like particular tax increases or whathaveyou.

There are some serious risks, to be sure, inherent in such a position.

For one thing, you lose much of your 'bargaining power' with the larger party forming the hypothetical bedrock of the next Government [in this case, almost certainly National]. After all, all you're effectively in a position to do is state that you're allowing them a 'free run' [more or less] at being Government - and are rather limited in your ability to demand policy concessions, as well as ruling yourself almost definitely right out of contention for anything Ministerial [as while being a Minister Outside Cabinet is one thing ... being a Minister Outside *Government* would uh ... possibly be taking Winston's known penchant for constitutional innovation straight out into the reality-bending. 'Quantum', you might say].

For another, it also carries with it many of the same foibles of actually opting to just outright support a Government of the blue stripe. In that many voters will nevertheless choose to blame you for making the government they DIDN'T want happen, regardless of the fact that you're not *actively* supporting it in Parliament.

And for a third - presuming you elect *not* to abstain on C&S in a particular motion, in order to halt something you're vehemently opposed to [say, the privatization of a major asset, for instance] ... well, there is a very real risk, dependent upon the whims and whimsey of the Governor General of the day, that this might bring the entire Government down and force a new Election. [This literally happened in Australia in living memory]. At which point, most likely, your party finds itself broadsided from every direction as being responsible for the aforementioned early Election, and decimated at the polls both due to this reasoning and voters getting in behind the 'big two' to attempt to make sure that there's more 'sureity' and no 'hold-us-all-to-ransom' 'third party' required for Government formation.

In other words, there runs a very real risk that such an arrangement's likely and natural consequence would be to fundamentally damage MMP. More so than, arguably, our present four-party slash three-and-a-half-parties model suggests has happened already.

Yet at the same time, one might very feasibly argue that the risks inherent in actually SUPPORTING a Government on C&S or actively joining one in Coalition are not entirely dissimilar. NZF will still be blamed by a reasonable proportion of voters no matter WHICH way the Party sides; and runs the risk of looking even less independent and more slavishly devoted to bad ideas if it finds itself compelled by the terms of a C&S agreement to vote in favour of measures with which they fundamentally disagree [see, for instance, Winston's support for the privatization of Auckland Airport in 1998], or if it alternatively winds up actively bringing down the Government rather than continue to support same.

With these facts in mind, it is perhaps arguable that the 'wild card' element opened up by not being bound to a C&S agreement's terms - but instead having far greater freedom to stand and vote 'issue by issue' - affords a greater deterrent to the National Party [or whomever it might be] against their natural penchant towards putting forward avowedly neoliberal bad policy which NZF may both votally disagree with and actively vote against.

Perhaps.

Orrrrrrr, National takes the long view, effectively runs an inverse of something that happened in 2008 [wherein Winston did the full-on Dirty Harry "do you feel lucky, punk?" monologue at the Nats], sees NZF's pistol-to-the-head-of-the-Prime Minister, and basically dares NZF to go through with it - on the implicit assumption that in the impending next early Election, they'll be rid of that pesky Winston Peters bloke for good as his party is punished by voters for creating the entire situation through being principled. This, i suppose, we could call "taking the long view" - one of instead of fighting a raging forest-fire directly, simply waiting for it to naturally 'burn itself out'.

An incredibly novel spin on all of this would be for NZF to agree to abstain on C&S in order to allow Labour to govern [i.e. pointedly refuse to give their backing to National via abstension or otherwise if they attempted to form a Government]... but alone, with the Greens supporting them on C&S yet remaining outside of a Coalition. It would be unlikely to work for any number of reasons, although remains a minorly intriguing thought-experiment.

Now as for why any of this matters ... I still tend to believe that New Zealand First has an important and meaningful contribution to make to the future of our politics. That, in the words of that old song Winston kept quoting in earlier years - "the best is yet to come". It is no coincidence that for a pretty broad swathe of our recent political history, NZF have been the sine qua non standard-bearers for the economic nationalism and emphasis upon self-determination which we are vitally going to need if we want to remain a viable nation-state on into the intermediate-distant future.

It is therefore arguably kinda important that NZ First not do what literally every other 'minor' party that has EVER gone into a coalition governance arrangement with one of the 'big two' [and National in particular, come to think of it] has done ... and basically wind up imploding slash deliberately undermined and salami-tactics'd into the very edge of electoral oblivion very shortly forthwith.

I mean, if we look at the record - it's pretty undeniable. How did New Zealand First faire in each of the 1999 and 2008 Elections? [Although admittedly 2008 was following a C&S agreement rather than a formal Coalition, and was arguably also the result of other confounding factors bearing the initials "OGG"] Or, for that matter, ACT in 2011, 2014, and 2017 following their 2008-2011 arrangement. Or the Maori Party in 2011, 2014, and 2017 after the same term working with National. Or United Future, whether as the United Party in 1999 after supporting National [not that there was to far for them to possibly decline - although their share of the list vote nearly halved, and it's quite possible Dunne would not have managed to re-enter Parliament at that year's Election had National not stood aside for him in  Ohariu]; or as United Future in 2008 after supporting Labour, and again in a progressive slide unto the Abyss in pretty much every election since thanks at least partially to their support of National.

Oh, and for that matter - The Alliance party both imploding AND collapsing as a result of its relationship with Labour and the 'gravitational' pressures being exerted upon and within it due to the proximity of power (as well as *ahem* personality); with a similar, albeit slightly more drawn-out effect befalling its successor-party, the Progressive Coalition. One can even make the claim that the Green Party's MoU support arrangement with the Labour Party has played a partial role in the former's decline in this year's General Election [albeit, as with NZF in 2008 - subject to an array of other confounding factors which may ameliorate and obscure this trend].

The long and the short of it is ... yes, sure, the "Cross-Benches" option is HELLA risky.

But then, as far as I can see, so is getting 'too close' to either of the 'major' parties. And by "too close", I perhaps mean "directly proximate to them at all". I'm not sure that there is too much of a meaningful distinction in the minds of voters between "Coalition" and "Confidence & Supply Agreement Only", after all, when it comes to psephological punishment, after all.

The choice between "Cross-Benches" and a more direct relationship, then, appears to be between something that's yet to be really given a proper go [although one can argue that the Green Party's choice to tacitly support Labour-NZ First in the first part of the 2005-2008 Parliamentary Term in this way means that there is both SOME precedence, as well as a pre-standing example of the party doing the abstention-supporting *not* then suffering in the polls at the next impending election for so doing - in fact, quite the opposite. They went *up*] ... and something that's been tried now well over a dozen times with the same - seemingly inevitable- result in literally each and EVERY occurrence upon which it's been attempted.

Or, in other words ... even though I'm basically propounding a completely hypothetical scenario here that I have little  doubt Winston is not seriously considering for the reasons blatantly aforementioned [less power, less influence, less Office] ... when stacked up against the potential [i.e. likely] alternatives and their ultimate eventual outcomes, it's not *nearly* as irrational celestial-pastry as it might first have perhaps appeared.

Who knows how things will actually go down later this week. In a previous [never likely to see the light of day] draft of this article, I suggested that the best way to understand Winston and New Zealand First's coalition positions was the skillful application of quantum physics. In specia, Winston as a sort of Schrodinger's Cheshire Cat - leaving the external observer entirely unsure of what's actually going on inside the box. [Although to quote the Cheshire Cat from the Disney production, if you're not sure where you're going, then it probably doesn't matter which of the left path or the right you ultimately take...] And, for that matter, running a sort of Winstonberg Uncertainty Principle wherein one can know *either* his position on an affair or the general direction he's taking but not both at once.

All of which, together, may already have lead to a situation wherein the regular understandings of 'gravity' [i.e. the relative strength of attraction between two objects - say political parties] find themselves subject to all manner of other considerations which render it no longer applicable. [Even 'Entanglement' perhaps being insufficient as a tool]

And which leaves us, to continue plumbing the absolute depths of what I remember from a youthful interest in certain fields of science, to a "Superposition" - that is to say, half-way between two other, otherwise arguably irreconcilable positions - as the most logical way to progress.

Will it work? Who knows.

Honestly? Who cares.

The course of New Zealand politics at this stage, is tantamount to a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury and quite potentially signifying nothing.

And I'm not just meaning my writing here.

Will The New Zealand Election Outcome Mean A Fair Go For Russia?

Late last month, New Zealanders went to the polls for our most recent General Election. The final results have just a few days ago been announced, and they place the nationalist New Zealand First party of Winston Peters in arguably the most powerful position - able to demand their price from either of the other 'big two' parties in exchange for their support in allowing a Government to be formed.

But what does this mean for Russia? And why should a mighty, slowly resurrecting Great Power be interested in the humdrum, run-of-the-mill conclusion to our most recent democratic process.

Well, for a start, New Zealand First has a solid record in recent years of advocating for closer economic links between our country and Russia. This may not sound like much given our relative size - but as pretty much the world's leading producer of dairy products, and a foremost producer of other agricultural foodstuffs like beef, New Zealand is in a prime position to help fill the void left by the trade sanctions levied on Russia in recent years by Western governments.

Unfortunately, the previous [and now possibly outgoing, pending the result of coalition talks] National-led Government saw things differently; and was slavish in its adherence to both European Union embargos (despite not being anywhere near Europe either geographically or in terms of interests), as well as its preference for pursuing 'white elephant' economic engagement with the Americans and their cronies via mechanisms such as the TPPA rather than looking seriously at trade deals with Russia.

New Zealand First has criticized all of the above; calling specifically for New Zealand to ignore EU sanctions, look into the possibility of securing a mutually beneficial trade treaty, and continually dared to tell the truth about Russia's strong economy in the face of lies and bluster designed to denigrate same.

And, further, has vigorously opposed the National-led Government's efforts to tie us to the military and foreign policy adventurism of the Americans in other areas such as Iraq.

There is thus a strong potential that New Zealand First holding many if not all of the cards in this week's Coalition negotiations to form our next Government might lead to a better and more pro-Russia fronting from New Zealand going forward; presuming that NZ First Leader Winston Peters continues to press these issues and others like them that he has rigorously campaigned on for the past few years.

Given Russia's freshly renewed rise on the international stage, as well as her strong position as both a global 'good citizen' [as seen in, for instance, Syria], along with the strong potential for mutually beneficial economic links between our two countries - this is surely a development which ought be welcomed by all sides.

The days of the mutually-reinforcing Anglo-American dominance of New Zealand's geopolitical positioning and economic destiny are coming to a close.

We can but hope that as applies trade and foreign policy, New Zealand's incoming next Government adapts accordingly and in-line with New Zealand First's previously announced thinking in this area.

Does Labour's Man In The Wairarapa Have A Gaping Gulf Betwixt Rhetoric And Reality?

Earlier in the week, Wairarapa Labour candidate Kieran McAnulty made some pretty stirling remarks about the problems of social housing and housing affordability at a local Meet The Candidates event. He's quoted by the Wairarapa Times-Age as stating an intent to "prioritise" sorting the present situation wherein denizens of the local Trust House social housing scheme have to "spend a huge amount of their income just to pay the rent bill".

Now on the face of it, that's a pretty admirable commitment. And he's absolutely right in his follow-up remarks about how the high cost of living in what's supposed to be "affordable" housing for the less well-off has significant flow-on effects for the kids of tenants, and the wider community as well.

But, as ever in politics ... we campaign in poetry, and we govern in prose.

And as applies McAnulty, it's his conduct as a Director on the Board of the trust which owns and runs the housing program - a position which gives him a say in the rates that are charged in rent to the Trust's tenants - which gives me pause to question just how genuine he is in what he's been saying.

After all - how can you trust a man who so righteously decries the overlevying of rents from those who can least afford it one minute ... yet who's serving on the Board of the very same entity he now claims is overcharging its tenants.

Surely the decent think to do would have been to front up, explain both yourself and your position on the corporate decision-making body responsible for the issue you're now up in arms about, and then take it from there. Rather than grandstanding on the issue in a candidates' meeting in a manner which appears deliberately calculated to make it seem like the whole thing's the result of somebody else's wrongdoing that McAnulty had no part in or accountability for.

Now if you've just joined us from somewhere outside the Wairarapa, a brief explanation is probably called for as to just what this trust is and why it's supposed to exist in the first place.

We'll leave aside the whole history of the thing for reasons of space. But suffice to say, the organization McAnulty is on the Board of is the direct result of an ordinary liquor licensing trust finding itself transformed rather rapidly into an organization dedicated to 'picking up the pieces' of National's moronic bout of neoliberal economic "reform" in the mid-late 1990s.

One way by which it did that, was through moving to acquire the social housing stock in the area that National was attempting to fire-sale privatize in advance of the 1999 General Election. The idea was to minimize much of the harm associated with the Government's flogging off these properties to their mates in the private sector, through having a local organization set up and run in the public interest take over the ownership of same and responsibility for renting them out to those in need.

That's a pretty noble objective, if you ask me - and part of me would like to think that the absolutely bargain basement the Nats asked of the Trust for the (then) 541 houses in question [some 10.5 million dollars all up - an average price of about $19,408.50 apiece] was motivated by this consideration.

According to the Trust's own history document, for the first few years after they took ownership of the houses, they roundly met this objective. They charged well below market-rate rents, and even managed to lower rents in some areas below where they'd been before the  Trust took ownership.

However, in the last few years, something's evidently changed; and despite the Trust's assurances on their website that they're still very much in the "affordable housing" business, it appears that they've now moved towards a somewhat different model of 'service provision'. Indeed, McAnulty's own campaign speech from two years ago - when he was running for a seat on a coterminous organization, from whence he's made the leap to where he is today - makes it pretty clear that by 2015 at least, a profit was being turned from the Trust's supposedly "social" housing stock. Interestingly, at that point McAnulty didn't appear to have issue with the trust making money off the most vulnerable in his community, provided that the resultant cash was put back into other philanthropic ventures elsewhere.

Which brings us back to the present day - a situation wherein the Trust doing what McAnulty seemingly suggested was right and proper when he was running for a *different* office, has now thanks to his efforts [in possibly more than one sense of the word] become a minor election issue at local candidate forae.

To be fair to the Trust, it IS investing in new "affordable housing" to go alongside its extant stock of presently presumably less-affordable properties, with conversion efforts already underway to replace a larger three-bedroom house with a number of smaller one or two bedroom units, at a cost of $1.2 million. Money which may very well have come from the over-charged rents to other tenants that McAnulty has taken issue with recently.

So maybe, at some point in the next Parliamentary term, some eight lucky tenants will be able to enjoy [for the moment, anyway] low-rent accommodation in exactly the manner that Trust House was theoretically set up to provide.

That's great, as a small start.

But in the mean-time, I really do think it's on Kieran McAnulty to step up and explain to his neighbours and those considering a vote for him just what it is that he's been doing prior to last Tuesday to try and lower rents for those living in his organization's housing. If anything.

Or is the reason I can't seem to find him discussing this issue in any of his many and various capacities and candidacies over the last few years before September because he only 'discovered' it was a problem when he found himself sharing a stage with folk who'd taken a much more substantial interest in it for a much greater period of time.

A "Rumour" For Ron Shows The Race Is On In The Wairarapa

Well this is interesting, isn't it. A few weeks back, I penned a piece setting out why I believed Ron Mark would be the best hope for those wishing to take on National's Alaistar Scott in the Wairarapa.

The reaction to this article was surprisingly positive. People seemed to see sense in the arguments put forward; and even if they were ordinarily supporters of other parties, many folk appeared to straight-up agree that the only way to ouster National's Alaistar Scott from the seat would be uniting behind Ron.

And then something interesting happened.

I got a lead on a major party poll that had just been done in the Wairarapa, and which basically confirmed what I'd been saying. It ranked the contenders for the seat both in terms of their support out there in the electorate (i.e. how many folk were likely to vote for them) - but also in terms of their 'likeability', relatability, recognizability and such.

The results showed Ron Mark clearly beating National's Alaistar Scott - the incumbent - for likeability and recognizability. Which is entirely unsurprising, given one usually has to actually be out there in the electorate doing things for voters to get an idea of who you are - as Ron has been for awhile now. And, perhaps more to the point, the fact that Scott just plainly isn't. In fact, he's widely derided in beltway circles for preferring to spend his time inspecting the greens of the Lower Hutt Golf Course rather than attending to issues on his own patch of the Wairarapa. A handicap, so to speak, in both areas.

Perhaps a little more unexpected, however, were the figures for the more direct question about whom those surveyed were intending to vote for. In these, Scott was still ahead of Ron Mark -  but only by a rather bare, skin-of-the-teeth margin. Which, given the traditionally strongly Blue nature of the seat, Scott's advantage of incumbency, and National's absolute earnestness to roll out the decidedly non-kosher long-term wooden wine-receptacle politics in the Regions this year, is quite remarkable.

After all - prior to this year's Election, we have to go back to 2005 to find another instance of anybody being even vaguely close to beating the Nat candidate in the Wairarapa. And that was not long after the absolute nadir of National's support nation-wide in 2002 (also the last time a non-National MP actually held the seat - fellow former Mayor of Carterton, Georgina Byer).

And while I'd certainly predicted Ron Mark would be in a position to take the seat by 2020, his acceleration to almost pole-position three years ahead of my own favourable predictions is a most welcome turn of events.

The 2017 electoral season, in other words, keeps throwing up surprises!

Now at this point, it's probably worth putting forward a word on the provenance of this poll. In the best of journalistic tradition, I'm afraid I'm not at liberty to say which of the major parties commissioned it - nor how its results wound up in my hands. To do so would be to likely give away my sources.

However, one reason why there's been a bit of a delay in me publishing this piece is because I carried out appropriate 'due-diligence' on what I was given - and had its results independently confirmed via a number of other avenues. I therefore have no doubt that this is genuine. And by way of corroboration, would also point towards other outlets such as Newsroom making mention of private polls of the Wairarapa Electorate which they're aware of that may even have Ron Mark AHEAD of Alaistar Scott outright.

So suffice to say, at least one Major Party has every reason to be very, very scared right now down there in the Wairarapa.

And as for the other one ... well, it is a sad reality that as nice a person as I'm sure he is, Labour's Kieran McAnulty is simply not making a meaningful dent on National's Alaistar Scott. In both of the areas of this poll - likeability/recognizability and electoral support - McAnulty was trailing a rather distant third behind both Ron Mark and Alaistar Scott.

It therefore seems quite clear to me that folk who wish to see the backside of Alaistar Scott in the Wairarapa - and here, I mean as it walks off into the middle distance, rather than being firmly fixed in a sedentary position when it comes to local issues - really do have only one option to vote for this Election. And that's Ron Mark.

Because regardless of where you are on the political spectrum or whom you ordinarily support with your party vote, with the numbers stacking up the way they are now a vote for Ron Mark is a vote against National's Alaistar Scott - while a vote for Labour's Kieran McAnulty rather than Ron, is effectively a vote for National.

It might seem like a bit of an odd thing, insisting that a vote for the Labour candidate is in fact implicit support for the National incumbent, given our MMP electoral system. But MMP only means that you have a party vote which counts at the nation-wide level, in addition  to your electorate vote.

It doesn't somehow magically transmogrify the actual electorate contests themselves into a 'proportional' representation system. They remain, as they always have, an FPP competition.

That means that there's one winner on the night - and often, they only get there as a result of 'vote-splitting' between the parties who are nominally opposed to that candidate. Consider Ohariu[/Belmont] for the last three elections. If the Greens hadn't stood a candidate there, or if their supporters had decided to vote for the Labour candidate, then Peter Dunne would have been toast.

But up until this year, they didn't - so Dunne managed to desperately cling on, despite consistently receiving less of the vote there than Labour and the Greens put together. A similar pattern has transpired for the last three elections in Auckland Central - wherein the Labour candidate would have easily trounced National's Nikki Kaye were it not for a surprising number of Greens voters deciding to back Denise Roche in a pointless display of partisan loyalty rather than voting for Jacinda Ardern [or, in 2008, Judith Tizard].

Don't let that situation play out in the Wairarapa!

Now, I criticize Greens supporters in these electorates choosing to vote for people like Gareth Hughes or Denise Roche as "pointless displays of partisan loyalty" not due to any intrinsic animosity towards the Green Party. Quite the contrary. It's just that in both cases, Greens voters *kept* voting for  them with their candidate votes DESPITE the fact that i) they were never going to win the seat, ii) their votes could have easily stopped the local Nat; and iii) more to the point, in several of these elections these candidates were virtually assured entry into Parliament *anyway* due to relatively high list placings.

There was thus literally nothing to be gained by these Greens voters other than the decidedly cosmetic "benefit" of their preferred party having a non-zero candidate vote in these electorates when you go and look up the results on wikipedia some years later. And is that REALLY the sort of thing that's worth sacrificing a chance at blocking or turfing out an objectionable local MP over?

In any case, according to the 'effective list' rankings done by Kiwiblog [i.e. who gets brought in as a List MP for each party, once their [likely] electorate seat wins are taken into consideration - as these are removed from the number of list MPs a party gets to ensure proportionality in Parliament], on present polling Kieran McAnulty would be easily assured of a List Seat anyway, regardless of how well he does in the Wairarapa. In fact, off the back of the Colmar-Brunton results from mid-way through last month, McAnulty would be the sixteenth List MP that Labour would get - with another six List MPs after him as a 'buffer'. Since then, Labour's support has gone UP by a further six percent according to the same poll, making McAnulty a virtually assured prospect for Parliament regardless of whether Wairarapians vote for him or not.

So therefore - if, for some reason, you're part of the minority of Wairarapa voters who really like Kieran McAnulty and want to see him as an MP ... then the most plausible way to make that happen is by giving Labour your Party Vote. NOT by voting for him with your candidate vote.

And if you're somebody who wants National's incumbent inflatable-arm man gone, then there really is only one choice. Vote Ron. Choosing to support any other candidate is pretty much tantamount to consciously voting for the status quo of ongoing National neglect of the seat by Alaistar Scott.

Because - as history shows us - a split vote only helps the Nat incumbent. And because, for a whole host of reasons explored in my previous piece, it is virtually impossible in this election for the Labour candidate to actually draw enough support to seriously take on Alaistar Scott.

Meanwhile, Ron's already out there working hard and closing the gap. Give him the tools he needs to help finish the job!

WTF - [W]inston's Pension; [T]he #MotherOfAllScandals; and [F]ilthy Politics in 2017

These days, possibly due to one or perhaps both of us having grown, I don't see eye-to-eye with Winston quite as much as I used to. But if there's one thing I've always absolutely hated in politics, it's an unvarnished and quite undeserved brouhaha-bandwagon-beatup.

And from where I'm sitting, that's EXACTLY what certain figures on the right and in the media (but then, I repeat myself) are attempting to do to Winston over his superannuation overpayment non-starter of a non-scandal.

Let's be clear about this. Yes, Winston received more money than he was entitled to. Nobody denies this - least of all Winston. And yes, Winston was notified about this by MSD with the story eventually being 'broken' by Newshub [who were presumably 'scooping' Newsroom for reasons we'll go into a bit later], rather than "coming clean" of his own admission like Turei did.

But within twenty four hours of the Ministry of Social Development hitting up Winston about his seven years of overpayments, he'd arranged to sort it out with them and pay back the money. Exactly what Turei probably should have done *long* before she chose to go public with her own circumstances - although personally, I'm not quite sure how much of a reasonable comparison there is between an unemployed solo mother struggling to put food on the table and Winston's personal circumstances circa 2010.

So why is this a story at all, then? What possible angle is there to hook leading political journalists up and down the country into devoting so many acres of celluloid and lakes of newsprint (as well as, presumably, the Chinese-owned paper-pulp forestry to print it upon) into covering an older New Zealander drawing his state-guaranteed pension, as is his right - but with a bit extra due to a paperwork snafu, that's since been paid back.

Well, one explanation is - as the old Indian proverb goes - "the monkeys only shake the tree with the good mangoes". Winston is ALWAYS news, with almost everything he does, particularly the more seemingly 'controversial'  bits. And after some decades as a leading campaigner for 'transparency' in just about everybody else's dealings, any whiff of a 'cover-up' [even if there is, pretty emphatically, no such thing actually occurring] is going to send the nation's commentariat into an unholy frenzy that resembles nothing so much as airport sniffer-dogs who've suddenly developed an avowed cocaine problem.

And, as it happens, due to Winston's long-standing championing of superannuation, its rates, and its accessibility, the fact that there is now a superannuation story STARRING the 'king of super' - rather than casting him as a noble champion for the Silver Horde [Cohen the Barbarian notwithstanding] - was also, always going to pique media interest. I remember the time he first used his Gold Card in 2010 [because I was there along for the ride to Waiheke and back as part of the stunt] and how much media attention THAT attracted, as a comparative example.

With this in mind, it would almost have been more intriguing had various breathless faux-"journalists" NOT seized upon this story to relentlessly parade about like a guy on a bogey around November 5th and on fire.

But there is another one. A better one.

Look "behind the curtain", if you will.

The timing of events is, in politics, almost never coincidental.

Winston's superannuation overpayment was picked up at some point in mid-late July - about the same time that Turei's disclosure came out. It's possible, albeit unlikely, that these two events are connected - and if I were a paranoid man (as opposed to actually having a number of folk out to get me), I'd have been wondering if the Nats had decided to go 'trawling' (or, perhaps in deference to Winston's preferred hobbies, "fishing") for data on various Opposition MPs which might be useful from MSD's voluminous records, in light of Turei's circumstances being such a goldmine. [Seriously - an "own-goal-mine" is probably the most charitable way to describe it. As compassionate as we might feel about her disclosure and its reasoning, it's rather difficult ot argue that your poll numbers being halved and a pressurized resignation is a victory for National rather than the Greens]

However, the chain of events we now have to hand suggests a somewhat more 'innocent' path by which the National Party came into contact with the information in question - an MSD staffer informing Anne Tolley about the issue toward the end of the month under the 'no surprises' policy governing the public service. (It also appears, according to the same timeline, that Tolley probed Winston's case again fifteen days later - perhaps 'checking' to see if there was an exploit in it for National)

And that's where it gets INTERESTING.

Late last week, highly placed Beltway contacts of mine hit me up to ask if I knew anything about an impending scandal that was supposedly about to hit New Zealand First. I'm rather out of the loop when it comes to NZ First, so I had to confess that I did not.

I did, however, have the presence of mind to ask my associates just why they thought NZF was about to be in the gun. They bluntly stated that there was about to be a rather 'large' scandal concerning National due to come out early the next week, and that National was looking about to find something to 'defuse' the situation pre-emptively by putting out a DISTRACTION SCANDAL that would harm their adversaries and minimize the damage to their own side.

Some time after this, I found myself on to Twitter [because apparently, that's where all the meaningful opinion-shaping in this country takes place], and saw Newsroom editor Tim Murphy's series of tweets in relation to the "#MotherOfAllScandals" which his organization was due to break on Monday. A quick bit of digging identified what this was likely to be; meaning when folk started posting material about Winston's superannuation situation on Sunday, I didn't think that this was the "MOAS" being breathlessly referred to. And, interestingly, Sunday Star Times editor Jonathan Milne was also of the opinion that the Winston story was not the aforementioned Maternal Super-Scandal.

(no word as yet about what he might have thought of the suggestion from one scurrilous wag over on Twitter that the #MotherOfAllScandals concerned Winston working as a dominatrix to illicitly supplement his state-provided MSD income)

It did, however, fit the profile for the aforementioned distraction-defusion story which National would want out in preparation for Big Things hitting the fan on Monday.

Adding potential complication to the chain of events is that Newsroom appeared ready to break the story on Monday (and we can tell this via the rather more detailed writeup which appeared there, replete with things like an eighteen thousand dollar figure for the repayment etc.), yet Newshub's Lloyd Burr was all over the story as early as Saturday night - which would have been mere hours after the Beltway/Commentariat/Self-Important-People-Of-NZ-Politics were all collectively set aflutter by Murphy's comments on an impending "Mother Of All Scandals".

So here's what I think happened - National freaked about what was about to come out about them (nothing yet has - officially, at least - with speculation that this is due to some rather high-powered lawyers), and then decided to play their *ahem* trump card by 'leaking' the information on Winston's circumstances to Burr et co in a desperate bid to get the nation's news media heading off in another direction to the one they were then sniffing upon. And, at the same time, hopefully diminish NZ First's (again rising) vote ... whilst also perhaps drawing in voters who'd switched over to Labour back to NZ First [the 'battler-sympathy demographic' - as my rather wise former NZ Politics lecturer, Patrick Hine suggested when promulgating this theory].

Although with that theory now out there ... there are still some other questions. Like just why Lloyd Burr was so desperate to present Winston as engaged in some sort of supremely dodgy "cover-up" over this issue. Take a listen to what he had to say on Newshub Monday night, for instance. He is at pains to present Winston's story as demonstrably changing between Saturday night and Monday.

And to be fair, it sort-of does. Winston basically goes from saying [paraphrased] "I'm not dignifying that with a response" through to "I'm not dignifying that with a response, you absolute idiot". I could perhaps tell you more about what Winston says in Monday's Newshub outing ... except Newshub have conveniently chosen to have Burr literally talking over in voiceover form whatever it is Winston says by way of explanation during their "interview" with him on that evening's program. What on earth IS this? Make somebody appear dodgy by claiming they're not responding to your requests for explanation ... and then literally show them explaining the situation but don't allow viewers to judge for themselves the merits of that explanation by ensuring they can't hear it for the voice of a so-called "journalist" endlessly repeating "HE'S DODGY! HE'S DODGY! HE'S DODGY!"

It's literally a situation wherein we might as well have had Burr's contribution to the coverage being "On Saturday, Winston said it was Saturday. On Sunday he said it was Sunday! WHICH IS IT, MISTER PETERS?!"

Like I said - there is an actual beat-up going on here from certain quarters, and I won't stand for it.

And while it's probably not new for errant press-fiends to be attacking and haranguing Winston about just about everything ... it's some of the other points of criticism he's been getting - and, indeed, which the superannuation system at large has been getting - particularly from folk who at least nominally self-identify as being on the 'left wing' or in the center of our nation's politics.

Apparently, this error justifies completely shifting the way we do pensions in this country - whether increasing the age to 67 (or further), shifting to means-testing superannuation, putting pensioners through the same demeaning, debilitating, and denigrating set of hoop-jumping we regularly subject our beneficiaries to, or just about anything else to subtly chip away at one of the last remaining bastions of our pre-Ruthanasia broad-base and equitable Welfare State.

Most peculiarly, it's folk on the to-the-left-of-ACT end of politics who are getting seriously vociferous about all of this. And I can't quite work out whether it's simple animosity towards Winston or more insidious desire to carry out some sort of 'intergenerational political war' against the older generations of New Zealanders ... by targeting some of the least well off in our society (pensioners) except pretending you're somehow taking on the high and mighty (one particular not entirely poverty-stricken MP).

To be fair, Winston is not on a bad salary at the moment as leader of the New Zealand First Party. He's worked hard for that, though; and it's probably important to note that when he applied for superannuation upon hitting 65, he wasn't thusly employed or renumerated. In point of fact, he didn't actually HAVE a stable income of his own - and was frantically shovelling money into desperately attempting to keep New Zealand First ticking over til we got back into Parliament.

So insisting he shouldn't have applied for a pension in the first place is just a complete, woeful misunderstanding of his circumstances at the time. And in any case, it's entirely legal and moral for an older New Zealander to receive the pension that they've spent pretty much all their working life paying into the tax system to fund in the first place. Indeed, one might argue that drawing a pension like that may even help to keep them more 'in touch' with some of the circumstances of those of their constituents who are also similarly funded.

It's a matter of genuine anger for me, reading lines like these in Duncan Grieve's Spinoff editorial from earlier in the week - which attempt to make out that Winston is somehow personally responsible via his pension for "studiously [taking] care to deny [our] children" an appropriate level of state support.

Because even a cursory look over New Zealand First's record in office (where the party was responsible for securing free healthcare for under 6's, for a start) and policy in the manifesto, suggests that if anything NZ First has been leading the charge in direct OPPOSITION to the undeniable trend towards underresourcing our kids which Grieve comments upon.

The unearned vitriol towards Winston is also not simply to be found from the benches of the commentariat, either - an absolute minority of whom, if any, presumably have to get by on an ordinary, unvarnished superannuation cheque per week.

I've seen a reasonable number of much younger, hipper [rather than hip-replacement] "lefties" deciding to take it upon themselves to do National's dirty work for it and take Winston to task for something that pretty much everybody outright agrees probably wasn't his fault.

Amongsts the worst of these was somebody whom I usually have a bit of time for castigating both Winston for allegedly "committing fraud", and pretty much the entire political and media establishment for letting him off scot-free for the aforementioned criminal conduct whilst crucifying Metiria Turei a month earlier.

And to be fair, I think many readers of this site will agree that what happened to Turei was needless at best if not outright horrifying. But there's simply no easy comparison to be had between Turei's circumstances and Winston's. Not least because to commit "fraud" - even the noblest of intentioned fraud as in the case of Turei - requires "intent". Something which even Lloyd Burr was at pains to mention there was no evidence for Winston having possessed as applied his pension overpayments.

And yes, there an array of very unfair reasons why Winston's experience in this regard has been and will continue to be different to that of Turei. For starters, there's the "realpolitik" calculation - both National and Labour are going to need New Zealand First to form a Government next month. Neither party was ever especially wild about dealing with the Greens (except during the brief, halcyon days of the Memorandum of Understanding, I suppose). Winston's circumstances are therefore referred to as "a private matter for Mr Peters" by both Bill English and Jacinda Ardern - in marked contrast to Ardern ruling Turei out of Cabinet.

For further, there's the general disparagement with which beneficiaries are regarded by much of the voting population of New Zealand - the perennial "acceptable targets" of all manner of political (or policy-economic) abuse. Retirees, by contrast [or, more properly in this instance, folk who are 65+ but still working], get a much smoother ride from everybody other than ACT, the extreme right wing of the National Party, and occasionally Labour when it's wishing to appear "fiscally responsible" at the expense of others whom it doesn't think will be voting for it anyway.

And beyond that, well .. to put it bluntly, it's Winston. Even leaving aside the issues of gender, class, and solo-motherishness (race, for obvious reasons, is a bit difficult to sketch a duality on here), Winston is always going to at this stage in his career, get less bludgeoned about the head due to a 'scandal' than another politician in even exactly the same situation - let alone a loosely comparable one. Part of that, no doubt, is because he's become this endearing grandfatherly figure for the nation at large; and another part is due to that ancient Pratchettian maxim [*also* voiced by a man running a Silver Horde as it happens] ... "don't get into an arse-kicking contest with a porcupine".

But like I said. That definitely doesn't mean that Turei's situation was "fair". It also doesn't mean that Winston's situation is "fair" - on grounds that it's very difficult to conceive of a universe in which MSD being used as a political weapon by the Government *is* fair. Not least because this definitely isn't the first time National's done this - recall all those instances of Paula Bennett disclosing information about folk criticizing her and her Ministry? National refused to apologize then, too...

Yet absolutely NONE of this justifies folk going around attacking or outright defaming Winston over this situation, in some sort of mistaken belief that if they just slander him hard enough or take the belt-sander to him vigorously enough ... that this will somehow make the Turei resignation *un-happen*, or ensure "fair" treatment for both of them via the typical gold standard of applying liberally unfair treatment to the one who's perceived as having gotten off 'easier' in both political stakes as well as the court of public opinion.

As a great man once said ... "two wrongs don't make a right". I'm pretty sure that's how that proverb's supposed to go, isn't it?

So let's be clear about this, shall we?

Once more, from the top.

Yes, it appears that Winston was overpaid a state pension for a period of seven years.

Yes, it appears that somebody stuffed up to make this happen - albeit in a non-malicious/intentionally-fraudulent way.

Yes, it appears that the situation was resolved to MSD's satisfaction at some point prior to the National Party's high-ups becoming aware of it.

Yes, it appears some seriously improper things have happened between there and Saturday Night to lead to what should have been a humdrum administrative matter becoming front-page news for what's probably going to be a dominant portion of this year's Election.

And Yes, Metiria did get a lot more of a harsh reception over her issue than Winston has had on his.

Not least, presumably, due to them not actually being the same issue at all - despite attempts to present them to the contrary - and because it's now rather swiftly become National's issue rather than Winston's.

But No, Winston's situation does NOT make the case for seriously monkeying with the superannuation system this country presently has in place. Although it's quite probable that the "No Surprises" policy is going to get some at least strenuously cosmetic adjustment going forward.

And No, no social justice interests are meaningfully advanced - from ANY side - by attempting to lay into Winston because you don't think he's being hacked at aggressively enough.

The only people who benefit from folk seeking to do that, are the Nats and some of the Media - because that's exactly what they wanted to have happen right from the get-go. Why give it to them.

So in summary ... if you REALLY WANT a serious scandal to look into - it's not Winston's overpaid pension. It's not even the outrage from the right and their partisan plants in our commentariat.

Instead, it's the fact that we've got a Third Term government who've evidently chosen to WEAPONIZE the petty tyranny of state apparatii and surveillance/oversight in a bid to try and significantly impact the outcome of this year's General Election. (and yup, again, this is something which ordinary beneficiaries and other welfare recipients have to put up with on a daily basis - it's just that they don't usually get to decide the Government)

I'm almost tempted to get my popcorn out of the pantry that was hitherto being saved for the ACTUAL Mother Of All Scandals to tide me over while this one plays out.

Whether you're of the Left, the Right, or that mythical tfwtoointelligent political alignment, the "center" ... you DESERVE to be ABSOLUTELY OUTRAGED at the way this whole thing has unfolded.

When it comes to this ongoing imbroglio's narrative subject ... Nobody (other than Winston, and yes this is actually in Hansard) has ever declared him to be without fault.

But it's one HELL of a Crosby-Textor Deceased Feline And/Or Monty Python Post-Mortem Parrot that we now find ourselves in a situation wherein people nominally on the progressive side of politics - and everywhere else for that matter - are more interested in attacking the victim of some seriously dodgy practices by the state (or for that matter, beating allegedly "told you so" hobby-horse longstanding matters of policy), than they are in calling out the deplorable Government conduct which has been exposed in its course.

In fact, for the minds of some, it's virtually a bloody albino pachyderm presently domiciled in or about one's cranial lounge.

DON'T lose sight of the real issue here.

If you're angry about Metiria, or angry about Paula Bennett, or angry about welfare, or angry about pensions, or angry about journalists, or angry about (perhaps even if just "at") Winston ... well, I'd like to think there's one thing we can ALL agree on.

What's happened to Winston is deplorable, disgusting, and actually outright dangerous for our democracy.

If you've ever found yourself subject to the state improperly exercising its powers over you and your personal information, then you presumably know where I'm going with this. Particularly if it was for some barely concealed political gain - and especially if it was actually a politician or political party who sought to use privileged information against you.

We need a hashtag. #IAmWinston

But more than that - we need real change.

If you're a Nat reading this (unlikely, I know - but hey, stranger things have happened) ... then please, next month, remember all the hatred you had for the "nanny state" or whatever it was back under Helen Clark, and vote AGAINST the same craven crew who seemingly have no issue finding out whatever it is they like about you, and then leaking it to the press should you even start to look like a threat.

And if you're an anti-Nat reading this ... well, take some solace in the fact that given Winston famously blocked the Green Party out of Government in 2005 as a direct response to, inter alia, Rod Donald basically calling him Hitler - just imagine how cold he'll be on the possibility of supporting a National-led government after all this has blown up.

Hopefully, anyway.

Gosh, all this excitement and there's still 24 days to go! Following on from her odd comments to the media about putting on a different voice down a phone-line, has anybody checked on Paula Bennett recently...?

Tick, tick, tick...