Posts by BenWilson
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I can't afford to go to the movies. I haven't been to any this year. It's an outrageous luxury that isn't even luxurious.
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Hard News: Democracy Night, in reply to Clint Fern,
The best I'm hoping for is for the specials to deliver a result that will put a brake on the asset sales, but Key will be PM for the next 3 years.
I don't think a brake will happen. I hate to say this, but in a wide enough sense of a mandate, Key does have one for asset sales because it was so hotly contested, such a major part of the campaign, indeed it was Labour's main policy plank. If there is a Key government, and there probably will be, they will forge ahead with this unless there is literally violent opposition. Which there could be.
The Waitakere Man I spent my election night with, who voted Labour+Green, had an interesting forecast. He actually thought Key himself was going to be the only moderating influence that could prevent asset sales, because he is deeply populist, and if asset sales do suddenly erupt into a shitstorm of demonstrations, activist direct methods, etc, he might back down to keep National in and grant himself election equal success to the Clark government, out of sheer vanity.
I was not so sure, because I have read The Hollow Men and I sincerely think this has been Key's master plan all along. Asset sales have always been what it's all about, and not out of ideological vision. It's much more naked than that - asset sales are going to be an absolute bonanza for the merchant banking industry, which is his tribe. There are some absolutely obscene fortunes that are going to be made over the next 3 years.
Populist leaders in their last terms are always the most dangerous of all, as their popularity departs. They burn bridges with impunity. I see this in Key, a ruthlessness that bides its time for the perfect moment. Having suffered a structural defeat to the Left, but building a massive singleton party for the right, now is the time. They won't get another shot - MMP will be returned, and will crush the political right in the next election, I am sure of this.
NZ, prepare to be reaped. What are you going to do about it?
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Hard News: Democracy Night, in reply to Rich Lock,
I'm mildly troubled by the papers unequivocally calling it for Key two days in a row (HoS, SST, today's Herald) - it seems like once the specials are in, there's some room for an upset in the negotiations. Or have I missed something.
Me too, I thought it was actually for the politicians themselves to call it. Goff never conceded on the night. Nor should he, he does not speak for the Maori Party, who hold the balance of power and find themselves in an extremely awkward place.
They may well face electoral oblivion this time, if they continue to support National - if there was a clear message delivered in the Maori electorates it was a massive swing away from the Maori party. Sharples own electorate was actually close, and they don't get enough party vote to slip through their elders if they lose.
The Herald openly calling the election for Key is quite bizarre. For 4 weeks, I thought they had finally actually decided to opt for a bit of balance, as they finally gave Goff some air time, and discussed the actual merits of some policy proposals. But I realize now that was only to sell more papers by sparking a bit of controversy around the election they really feel was/is in the bag. They're back to their craven editorials singing the praises of the leadership, desperately hoping that their jobs won't be torn away by their corporate masters. Which they will - their entire business is one of the greatest victims of modern capitalism. Their opinion staff movements are like a last-one-standing zombie movie, where only most violent and desperate and lucky make it to the end of the movie, and every casualty rises from the dead to suck the life out of them by joining the internet news revolution.
Ironically, the Herald has opted to give me their paper for free for a month. First deliver, this morning. I'm happy for their gift of free mulch for my garden, most eco-friendly of them.
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Hard News: Democracy Night, in reply to DexterX,
It is also what happened in Waitakere this time and almost worked in removing Paula Bennett, if it had worked would that have been a perversion?.
You probably need to go into some more detail to show me how this is even vaguely similar. Labour stood a strong candidate who almost won on the night, and the special votes do actually need to be counted before there is any certainty in Bennett's hold. Are you referring to the fact that my Westie cousins told Chris Trotter to go fuck himself, delivering a Green/Labour party vote majority, with a great many splitting Labour/Green as 90% of the commentators on this thread said they were doing?
That kind of vote splitting is the exact opposite of what I was suggesting. Unless you are suggesting that Green/Labour are like National/ACT, with Green being the "big" party, and Labour being the one being gifted the seat by its donor. You must see that can't work, because Labour, being the big party, simply loses list seats for every electorate seat it gains.
So, no, it's not the same kind of perversion at all.
I have realized my post may have been confusing, because I differentiated the two Labours in the thought experiment using the number zero in place of the letter "o". It looked fine in the posting field, and preview, but seems that the fonts used on the posted comments are nearly identical. I should have perhaps said that I'm suggesting Labour makes a Laybour party that stands in seats but doesn't aim for party vote at all (although it wouldn't really matter if they did get party vote, because they would get seats, so the threshold would not exert its vicious influence). Then Labour voters would be told to vote Labour/Laybor for Party/Electorate. That would have the effect that is being used in Epsom, at least this time around. ACT no longer stands for anything Roger Douglas invented it for, nothing could be more evident about that than John Banks refusing outright to even hear that his own party leader supported a decriminalization debate for dope, because he, being not the least bit canny, actually took the whole "ACT is for liberals" at face value. Instead, ACT is now entirely about a racist, homophobic law-and-order nut, an ex Nat high-ranker who never defected, but was instead openly and obviously supported by National in his bid to be gifted Epsom, and secretly supported, as the teapot tapes will eventually show, in his bid to oust the "principled" ACT leader.
I'm pretty damned sad that Epsomites think that's choice. I've always known that the East side of Auckland is pretty damned racist, because I went to school there and had to put up with many jibes from the kids about all the "boongers" who apparently infested the suburb that I commuted from. But I had not thought homophobia to be something they would stomach quite so easily. I guess I should have known, of course, the school I went to was in Kohi, which returned that staunch homophobe Muldoon right up until he died.
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Hard News: Democracy Night, in reply to Steve Parks,
The situation with ACT now is pretty messed-up.
My understanding is that the ACT support-base is mostly aligned with classical liberal/Libertarian positions represented by the likes of Stephen Whittington.
Meanwhile, their one representative in parliament is John Banks, homophobe.ACT supporters have become irrelevant, because their representative is elected by Nats in Epsom.
However fucked up this is, I do have to say that the comeback to it is so damned obvious that it's not clear why Labour haven't done it yet. They should do the exact same thing in a relatively safe Labour seat. Mt Albert, for instance, could stand some old faithful Labourite, perhaps some old guard with a big name and a history of being typical of the party in every way, running for the Lab0ur party, a completely different party to Labour in the register, and then either instruct voters to install that person, or not even run against them. They would be tied completely to Labour. Not a defector, but perhaps a retiree, with a well known name.
Yes, it's a perversion of the intent of the system, but so is what's happening in Epsom, time after time.
There would, in fact, be nothing to stop them doing this in many safe seats. In fact, they could stand in no electorate seats at all, leaving them entirely to the Lab0ur party, thus picking up an overhang as big as their entire electorate membership. Every single Labour voter could split their vote Lab0ur/Labour and get twice the voting power.
I pose this strategy as a simple thought experiment to show what I think is most fucked about MMP - the electorates are still FPP. Only the Epsom voters get it, and the rest of the country complains about how unfair it is. The complaints might get a lot more attention if Labour started playing the game too. Obviously the Nats would play it too, they would have no scruples, indeed they have been playing it with ACT for some time now.
Then, it might finally make it clear to the dickheads running this country that MMP does need to be reformed, and it should be done in a way that is fair. Thresholds should be removed, and electorate seats should be proportional (I'd go for an STV type system, ideally). That is the only way that these bullshit tricks can be stopped.
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Hard News: Democracy Night, in reply to Steve Parks,
Although apparently the iPredict one got it right.
It's the only indicator I've paid much heed to during the campaign. The reason it's more accurate is pretty obvious - it takes considerably more information into account than polls do. It uses all the polls, and all of the news, and every other little tidbit that can give a tiny trading advantage to people who actually have money at stake, rather than more nebulous stuff like reputations.
because I think that getting rid of Nikki Kaye would have sent a really important message to National about a certain rail project.
I am a bit dubious about the advantages of improved rail to Auckland Central residents. Most of them either live within a painless walk, bike ride, bus ride or car trip from the city, or actually live in the city itself. Or they live on Waiheke, which will never ever be connected by rail to the city. It's one of the only electorates that doesn't really have much to gain. Even the North Shore suburbs would gain from the pressure that rail would take off the road infrastructure they rely on.
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Hard News: Democracy Night, in reply to Russell Brown,
It's just wrong that Darien Fenton is safe and Carmel Sepuloni is gone.
Oy, wait for them specials before you call it. It's damned close.
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I'm still reeling in shock at the voter turnout. My guess is that it's not going to be so much the poor in South Auckland, as kids all around the country, who have not shown up. They're unemployed, face an extremely expensive country with low wages, are indebted if they want to train, and have to deal with the fact that there are no socially liberal parties on offer any more.
I spent the evening with my family, and an old friend of theirs, a pure-blood Waitakere Man. Small business owner, making bags, but since retired. Initially I was a bit worried he was going to turn out to be a Nat with a stonk for Pullya Benefit, but no, turned out he'd voted Labour+Green+MMP+abstain. We kept checking Sepuloni all night and the brief blaze late in the piece where she was ahead looked sweet. Specials might help her...349 is not much of a lead.
This shit is still close, people. It is a bumout, of course, but suddenly Key really does look like he's leading the legion of the damned. No way is he going to fix the economy - his three pledges in his premature victory speech, more jobs, better wages, less debt, would need to be the precise reverse of what he has achieved to date. How those can credibly be achieved by lowering the minimum wage, dropping taxes, and selling off productive assets, whilst doing nothing at all about the baby boomer bulge hitting retirement, and an impending property crash, is utterly beyond me. His only true ally, ACT, has been destroyed, leaving only that Prime Fuckwit Banks to pretend that there was once a party there. He mentioned that he'd spoken to the leader of the ACT party already that evening, without realizing that Brash had already resigned. Sharples must be a bit shocked too, and wondering if cozying up to the Nats really was worth the fleas that have bitten him - 746 majority is not a happy position to be in as one of the top guys.
I'm thinking a Nat minority government might be the smartest move that every party other than ACT could make. They can then actually represent as representatives should, on each and every issue attempting to forge consensus. If National won't play ball, they'll be the ones seen as uncooperative fools. Only 2 people outside of the National party were elected just because they support the National party - Banks and Dunne. Dunne might even swing with the numbers, that's just how he rolls.
If Key truly did suggest putting the assets into the super fund it's about the only sensible thing the guy has said all year. It's a new idea, something his party has been short on for 15 years.
For the real humor of the night, to see Horan has entered Parliament actually cracks me up. I used to play in the same team as him. He's the perfect understudy for Winston, many was the night I recall him pissing on, making sexist and racist jokes, pressuring me into tipping a waitress so he could get into her panties, etc. I also remember the odd psychotic tantrum he'd have, usually at women or kids, which was no joke coming from someone who looked like they either spent a lot of time at the gym, or supplemented a small time spent there chemically. I felt sorry for him, after I'd left the club primarily because I couldn't stand him, when on New Year's night rambling around Christchurch after a tournament, he trailed my group like a lost puppy, as his own team had ditched him at the first opportunity. Last seen cornering some drunk girl. The only line of his I can clearly remember was when one of the older guys told me a girl in the women's team fancied me, he laughed and said "yeah, well, Ben, she's a nice girl. But I fucken can't stand fat chicks". All class, Brendan, you've made it to the bigtime now.
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Waterpolo in-joke: Brendan Horan will do a backhand at the speaker from the other end of the house at some point in the next 3 years.
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Waitakere slipped away :-(. Over 5 mins it went from 92 to Sepuloni to over 900 for Bennett.
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