Progress: Free Trade Deals

Progress: Security Services

Neoliberal Chickens Come Home to Roost in a Coup

Spurred on by Mr Chris Finlayson's diatribe about the relative backstabbyness of Labour ... (which seemed rather curious coming from a member of the party in possession of the 2nd-most-pockmarked-set-of-collective-shoulder-blades in Kiwi politics after ACT) ... it occurred that there seems to be a pretty axiomatic correlation between how right-wing/neoliberal a party is and its relative level of internal disunity/coup-preponderance/outright civil war.

So, ACT is clearly at the extreme neoliberal/unstable end of this spectrum - both politically/economically and in terms of internal turmoil (the precise details of this clusterfuck from about 2002 onward being pretty well known, but memorably featuring the Nat-backed ouster of Hide by Brash, the earlier Roy-attempt at Hide, the full-blown civil war which accompanied that, ongoing (and very public) criticism from Roger Douglas of Hide's vibe, various rumblings against Richard Prebble ... and so on and so forth), these guys really are the apex and eminent case-study of the linkage between neoliberal vibes and flawed/tumultuous internal structures.

Then there's the Nats. Won't go into the details (there's seven decades' worth to countenance, with it getting particularly bad following the end of Muldoon), but it seems like the Born to Rule party is in an almost perpetual state of squabble about who, exactly, was born to rule whom. Memorable examples include attempted uprisings against Muldoon, the neoliberal plot against Jim Bolger which produced Shipley, the ouster of first Shipley and then her successor, English; and then in a fit of revenge, English leaking a whole lot of emails in order to torpedo Brash, thus leading to Key. And from Key unto either Collins or Joyce but they haven't finished duking that out yet.
What the National Party's vicissitudinal internal fortunes betray is that the more neoliberal a party gets, the more volatile its internal situation becomes.

Following on from this is the Maori Party. A Caucus of 3 MPs of which 2 are Leaders doesn't leave much scope for leadership squabbles I would ahve thought ... but apparently not. Again. They furthered a neoliberal agenda in concert with the Nats, and found themselves with first a Hone- and then a more generalized leadership problem.

Somewhere in the middle, we have the Labour Party. Mr Finlayson is correct to note that there do seem to be quite a few white ants in amidst the red ones, with specific dishonourable mentions including everybody subsequent to David Lange (seriously - how many leaders did they have between Lange and Clark, and for how long?), and a humourous side-note for Phil Goff's attempted "Chicken-Coup" of Helen Clark in the mid-1990s. Once again, there is a clear pattern. As teh party found itself becoming one of the underpinnings of our neoliberal paradigmatic consensus, its internal volatility increased. Up till the Clark years, at any rate. Quasi-social-democracy and winning elections is apparently something of a salve in this regard 

Now at the complete opposite anti-Neoliberal/relatively stable end of the spectrum, we have The Greens and NZ First.

I'm going to chuck the Greens down first, for two main reasons: Mike Ward (former Co-Leader of the forerunner Values Party) and Nandor Tanczos. Admittedly it wasn't a traditional sort of leadership squabble, as the previous incumbent had quite literally died in office, but either way there was a contest, somebody wound up having to stand aside, and in addition to losing two well-recognized Parliamentarians, Mr Ward had to be lent on in order to be made to give up his entitlement to enter Parliament as next on their List. Clearly, "sustainable" economics is not negatively correlated with a sustainable interior position.

Anyway. I know I'm frenetically biased as all hell, but I'm chucking down NZ First last. As both the most stable (for the last decade and a half, at least) and arguably the most anti-neoliberal of the main parties. The only time we've had a leadership coup ... it was back in 1998, and was an arguable result of getting *much too close* to the whole neoliberalist vibe. And never was Tau Henare to darken our doorstep again. (The resultant Mauri-Pacific party failed even harder than the present Maori Party combined with Taito Philip Field's NZ Pacific party) Ever since then, we've been remarkably stable. *quickly runs to check history of Yugoslavia*

So yeah. There's my response to Chris Finalyson's "Unauthorized History of the Labour Party". All six main parties ranked on a spectrum from most-volatile/neoliberalist down to least-volatile/neoliberalist. It's pretty telling that it's the same spectrum, don'tchathink?

On National's Defence Cuts

Kipling's Tommy

"I went into a public-'ouse to get a pint o' beer,
The publican 'e up an' sez, "We serve no red-coats here."
The girls be'ind the bar they laughed an' giggled fit to die,
I outs into the street again an' to myself sez I:
O it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, go away";
But it's "Thank you, Mister Atkins", when the band begins to play,
The band begins to play, my boys, the band begins to play,
O it's "Thank you, Mister Atkins", when the band begins to play.

I went into a theatre as sober as could be,
They gave a drunk civilian room, but 'adn't none for me;
They sent me to the gallery or round the music-'alls,
But when it comes to fightin', Lord! they'll shove me in the stalls!
For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, wait outside";
But it's "Special train for Atkins" when the trooper's on the tide,
The troopship's on the tide, my boys, the troopship's on the tide,
O it's "Special train for Atkins" when the trooper's on the tide.

Yes, makin' mock o' uniforms that guard you while you sleep
Is cheaper than them uniforms, an' they're starvation cheap;
An' hustlin' drunken soldiers when they're goin' large a bit
Is five times better business than paradin' in full kit.
Then it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, 'ow's yer soul?"
But it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll,
The drums begin to roll, my boys, the drums begin to roll,
O it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll.

We aren't no thin red 'eroes, nor we aren't no blackguards too,
But single men in barricks, most remarkable like you;
An' if sometimes our conduck isn't all your fancy paints,
Why, single men in barricks don't grow into plaster saints;
While it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, fall be'ind",
But it's "Please to walk in front, sir", when there's trouble in the wind,
There's trouble in the wind, my boys, there's trouble in the wind,
O it's "Please to walk in front, sir", when there's trouble in the wind.

You talk o' better food for us, an' schools, an' fires, an' all:
We'll wait for extry rations if you treat us rational.
Don't mess about the cook-room slops, but prove it to our face
The Widow's Uniform is not the soldier-man's disgrace.
For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Chuck him out, the brute!"
But it's "Saviour of 'is country" when the guns begin to shoot;
An' it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' anything you please;
An' Tommy ain't a bloomin' fool -- you bet that Tommy sees!"

National's Nick Knacks

“Evil begins when you begin to treat people as things.” - Terry Pratchet.

What we have in New Zealand at the moment is a government that doesn’t see you as a human being, a person, a soul. We have a government that sees you as a consumer, a tax payer, a beneficiary, an immigrant, a net gain or a net cost. The problem with this is that instead of a government that is looking out for your needs and issues is you get a government that looks after the books and (depending on the year) treats you as a vote and a burden.

This has become apparent with recent moves by the government, namely welfare reform, benefit bashing with a John Key style “Smile and Wave” mask.

What we are seeing with the latest bout of welfare reform is the same ol’ same ol’ blame the parents: punish the children. As society has seen time and time again in the past this simply does not work. If a solo mother has more children on the DPB she is penalised, if she agrees to courses and further education she is rewarded. So instead of helping this poor woman, who surely has her individual problems, we treat her like an ingrate, a burden of society and we make sure to let the rest of society see her for the demon she is. Never mind that this policy takes more from the children this poor woman is trying to raise. It purposefully and unashamedly makes it harder for her to feed her children and labels it just punishment.

This is where, as Winston Peters put it in his last campaign, the welfare state has lost its dignity. Instead of using our resources to up skill and support people who desperately need state intervention. They treat New Zealanders as demons and ingrates, and if you treat people like trash for long enough you can’t be upset when thats what they become. How will the children of mothers who are constantly told they are worthless grow up?

The National government will have you believe that these people enjoy being on the DPB, that they are laughing at the hard working kiwis who go out of their way to starve their children in order to earn their below average income. The truth is these people have fallen through the cracks, and yes of course there are those that use these safety nets to their advantage, but punishing those who generally need your help is no way to stop the more opportunistic among us.

"When you sup with the Neoliberal ... use a long-handled spoon"

Much has been made this week of NZF's surge in the polls. We thank the media for finally deciding to sit up and take note of what's sure to be one of the more interesting stories this election - our comeback.

However, a surge in Peters-popularity inevitably causes all manner of spurious allegations to come out of the woodwork from the man and the party's detractors. We've already seen the re-hashing of hackneyed versions of the Owen G Glenn saga which omit to mention the police report finding in Winston's favour. Others have sought to raise the specter of Winston the Kingmaker, calling him a reason to vote against MMP due to his deftness at post-election negotiation.

Certain elements in the media (chiefly in my mind this morning's Sunday Herald editorial) are now attempting to undermine our post-election coalition position by spinning the hell out of our two previous Near-Government Experiences (rather like a near-Death experience except with more bureaucracy).

The customary opening claim runs "in 1996 Winston campaigned on destroying National and then went into government with them."

This is then followed with disparaging remarks about the 2005 arrangement, which usually attempts to seriously mis-characterise NZF's interaction with the then-Labour government.

What they're saying is that NZF can't be trusted to *remain* in opposition once we return to Parliament.

Their general thrust is plain - "you shouldn't trust Winston to keep the Government honest in 2011".

Which is ridiculous. Here's why. John Key has ruled Winston out. Winston has ruled John Key out. John Key has ruled out not selling assets. Winston has *very emphatically* ruled selling assets out. There is thus prima facie no reason to assume NZF will go into government with National in 2011.

The counter-factual narrative then usually ripostes by suggesting that New Zealand First had ruled National out in 1996. This is severely misinterpreting Winston's remark that "the price of a coalition agreement ought to be Jim Bolger's head". And, as it turned out, the price of a coalition agreement was more to the tune of ending asset sales, keeping ACT out of government, free doctor's visits for under-6s and moves toward compulsory national savings and a universal student allowance.
Or, in other words, New Zealand First hadn't ruled out National, and made substantial gains and unquestionable gains for New Zealand by going into coalition.

This contrasts markedly with 2011, wherein Winston has very definitely ruled out National; although I suppose it torments the Business Round Table no end to speculate whether he might reverse this position and entertain negotiations ... if he were to re-take his old Treasurer role and once again end the neoliberal agenda of a wayward National party.

Interestingly, it also contrasts rather markedly with the post-election stance adopted by The Greens, who consistently refuse to rule out National.
This despite its highly publicised recent use of Robyn Malcolm to castigate the Prime Minister and its seemingly-now-abandoned taxation egalitarianism.

Our logic, in effect, was this. We cannot in good conscience go into government with a major party that plans to destroy and to cheapen the nation that we love. National's second term agenda is precisely this.
They have declared they will not countenance any party which won't aid and abet them in this.
The Maori Party voting to raise GST to 15% and make our tax system more unfair as the price of its confidence & supply votes is a prime example.

National have said they will stake their second term on partial asset sales. They're hell-bent on it.
They've supped tea with the Neoliberals in Epsom to try and bring their partners in crime ACT back to help them. The record of both parties in office also suggests frank economic incompetence. Under this three-ring political circus, we've seen a massive increase in the number of Kiwis seeking a Brighter Future in Australia.
We've seen rampant inflation, rampant public debt to pay for unfair tax cuts, and rampant spending cuts to both the public purse and our own wallets. We've seen all manner of shadowy constitutional and economic posturing. We've seen the Foreshore & Seabed and aspects of our economic sovereignty quite literally given away. The record of the last three years suggests the Key-lead government might well have resembled the bridge of the Rena.

Foreign Owned.

Any party which is not prepared to rule out coalition with National is, in effect, refusing to rule out assisting National in the despoilment of the country which we hold so dear.
Any party which is not prepared to be honest with voters about its post-election posturing has something to hide.

There would have to be some seismic shifts in heaven, earth, and National Party ethos before coalition with them became an idea which any party genuinely committed to social justice and national sovereignty could support.

How Are YOU Voting This Year?

Improvements Made to NZ by Our National Government 2008-2011

Achievements of our National Government 2008-2011 pt 1

A while ago me and a few mates were sitting around talking about how to evaluate the performance of a government. What criteria could we use to measure the success, competency, and - ultimately - whether it'd be worthwile to re-elect it.

We noted that the simplest - totally partisan - way to look at the issue would be to go on a government's self-reported achievements, and the self-described competency of its ministe
rs and MPs.

This would be manifestly ridiculous.

According to this view, we are gently watched over by a competent managerial team led by a former finance sector wizard and a present-day economic savant who have responded to every challenge in a way we're all "comfortable" with, and created 170,000 jobs a year into the bargain.

A slightly more externally objective view - is that of its constituency considering voting for them (at this stage apparently almost half the nation) - who would perhaps consider such things as campaign promises delivered upon, crises handled competently (or at least, responded to adequately), the improvement of its own material circumstances, or the fulfilment & enactment of its 'narrative' for New Zealand. Do we feel safer today than we did three years ago? Are we finding it easier to get by now than we did three years ago. Have our power bills and our council rates and our weekly groceries come down? Are we earning more? Are we being taxed less?

Are our healthcare and education services better? Are our kids employed? Are they employed in New Zealand? Are we going to retire at 65 and how will we fund that? Are we taking as good a care of our old people as we used to? Are we leaving our children the country in a better condition than we found it?

Then we decided to think about it from the perspective of the country at large, using external, 'bigger picture', and general goals. Things that the OECD measures. Things like economic growth, unemployment, investment funding, wages, improvements in education, child poverty, an HDI.
Have the signs of our economic health and wealth improved over the last three years? How well was the global economic crisis handled? Are we laying the foundations for a prudent and prosperous future? How are we investing in making that happen? Are our people more educated now than they were three years ago? Has child poverty gotten better or worse? Has foreign ownership of our economy lessened? Are the profits and the graduates staying in New Zealand?

Ultimately, we began to think about this from the perspective of people like us. Young adults facing dismal employment prospects, probably with significant debt. We are not Waitakere Man, we're his grandkids. Do we feel as confident of getting a job when we leave school or when we graduate? If we'd been born 10 years earlier and entered the workforce when things were easy, would we have been better off? Are our meager service-industry paychecks enough for us to get by, fund study, or live independently? Are we going to inherit a country better than the way our parents' generation (0r, heaven forbid, our grandparents' generation) found it?

We're also relatively liberal in the old sense of the term. We believe in a private sphere. We believe in the importance of our legal rights - we believe we should enjoy the same rights to jury trial and legal aid that the generation before us did; and we're not amused by the Armed Offender Squad raiding harmless Kauri Snail environmentalists.

Are we as protected now as we were five years ago? When Martyn Bradbury is given a lifetime ban from a state broadcaster for criticising the Prime Minister ... is our press as free as it was less than two generations ago - before we allowed it to be sold offshore.
Is our foreign policy in alignment with the interests and opinion of New Zealanders?
Do we know what we're doing in Afghanistan?
Will I get a lawyer?

And we're Nationalists. We believe that, to (do the trite philosophy thing and) paraphrase Voltaire ... "if the Kiwi Nation doesn't already exist then it's necessary to create it."
Or, to paraphrase John Ralston Saul, "New Zealand is either an id

ea or it does not exist. It is either an intellectual undertaking or it is little more than a small chain of tourist attractions lying in the pacific just offshore from a successful economy."

Now that might sound a bit arcane (and that part of the discussion was toward the more inebriated depths of the evening), but what we mean by this is that we're proud of being Kiwis and having a strong, distinctive shared identity as part of that. With this in mind, we got to asking questions as to whether the Treaty Partnership was working better for all New Zealanders now than it was three years ago. Whether the government was articulating our values. Whether traditional Kiwi beliefs about the "fair go", egalitarianism and equality, and our own gregarious sense of community were being furthered. Whether this was the kind of country we wished to raise our children in and leave to our grandkids.

Are We Better Off?


I think you'll agree that's quite a few questions.

But we feel that to most of them, there's one simple answer.

"This Government is Pro-Choice"

Not wishing to be outdone by Tony Ryall's curious views on children's nutrition, that well-known Mubarakian John Key decided to use the same 'other people's choices' line when asked why exactly his government was buying a new fleet of luxury limousines. Betraying his irritating lack of originality, he then did it again when queried about the increasing number of families reliant upon food parcels.

Ryall stated that children's nutrition was "an issue for parents and families" rather than the government. In other words, an issue of choice for which the Government could not be held responsible.

Key argued that he "[couldn't] take responsibility" for the behavior of his Internal Affairs ministry, blamed the exercise of a rollover option in 2011 on the previous Labour government, and then refused to rule out whether he'd have ok'd the sale if he'd known about it. Other people's choices, other people's fault.

He then responded to a question about our rising use of and dependence upon food parcels by attempting to answer a different question altogether - why were more Kiwis out of work and on benefits. This was blamed upon the global recession rather than any indigenous failure of policy; and topped off with a supposition that the only reason one would be reliant upon food parcels would be as the result of "poor choices". Like this government?

Given the cap-handedness of these responses, I can only assume some keen journalist managed the rare feat of capturing senior National ministers outside the protective range of their spin-doctors. Caught off-guard by having to think up an excuse for themselves for a change, they've reverted to type and started spouting what passes for Nat philosophy these days.

Put in terms rather more articulate than the Ministers themselves, their thinking appears to run thus:

'Some problems are beyond the ambit of government to solve. Impersonal quasi-natural forces govern unemployment, and bad things only happen to people who make bad budgeting choices. When things go wrong it's someone else's fault - whether parents, workers, the hungry, or Labour. And since it's someone else's fault, government doesn't have to fix it. So we won't.'

This misses the point on several levels.

As a far greater National Prime Minister (the Right Hon. Sir Robert Muldoon) once put it - "The whole concept of government is based on intervention." Even if Key's flawed economic management were not responsible for lost jobs, higher prices, and some seriously debatable growth in wages, I'd still prefer a government with the gumption to get involved in giving long-suffering Kiwis a leg-up - rather than writing off difficult situations as being the poor outcomes of 'other people's choices'.

That's an excuse, not an answer.

Know this, Key. Votes are 'other people's choices' too.

"Let Them Drink Milk"

Earlier this evening, 3 news ran a story about the rising cost and reduced consumption of milk by our Nation's youth. Noting the vital role the substance in question plays as a source of calcium for Kiwi kids, and in a rare feat of critical journalism, they asked the Health Minister Tony Ryall what he thought of the issue. His response?

"What children eat and drink is an issue for their parents and families."

Now I could have some fun with this axiom and take it to its logical conclusion - that beer and malnourishment are apparently acceptable parts of a Kiwi upbringing ... but I won't. The health of our kids is far too serious a matter for the frivolity habitual of the Minister of Silly Ties. What I will note is that it's rather odd to see a Health Minister taking such a hands-off approach to the nutrition of our youth. Effectively, Ryall has decided to cast this as an issue of choice and pass the buck on to families. What he ignores is that the prohibitive cost of milk renders this an issue of choice only for those who can afford it.

With this in mind, I'm reminded of another bold axiom delivered by a failed public figure on her way out. When informed that her people were starving, Marie Antoinette allegedly proposed to "Let them eat cake!"

It genuinely saddens me to see a Kiwi staple (and, after all, what's more Kiwi than milk?) priced out of reach of ordinary consumers. There have been calls from some quarters to rectify the nutritional issue by bringing back milk in schools. It needn't be so complex. Why don't we start by taking GST off Milk. And continue by finding a Health Minister less prone to 'bovine scatology' who actually gives a damn about the health of some of his most vulnerable charges.

An Issue that should get every Kiwi steaming mad

Rodney Hide's privatisation agenda is well known, and to be fair he has never denied he wants to hock off New Zealand's family silver, or what is left of it anyway.

But if National in any way leans towards Hide's plans to privatise water services it will be their second term that goes gurgling down the drain.

Water is the single most important resource in life and there should be no commercial incentives surrounding its supply. Both from the point of view of the consumer, who wants to know that the water they are drinking and using around the house and business is clean and safe, and from the environmental standpoint as our water resources need to be carefully managed, taking into account their long term viability and the relationship kiwis have with rivers and lakes. Making the responsibility for managing this precious resouce yet one more step removed from the voters is a ridiculous idea.