Anderton, Bradford and Sharples let off lightly

Not PC has pointed out that the mainstream media continues to be on the Winston Peters feeding frenzy:

"while Helen Clark campaigns on "trust" that she's already demonstrated she's lost ,and John Key promises to "change" New Zealand when he's already promised not to make any change that will in any way make a difference -- while all this happens, New Zealand's media is still fiddling around with Winston Peters, his dancing monkey, and the question of which dog ate whose homework, and in which motel Brian Henry might have been when it all happened".

Meanwhile, the paid "professionals" known as journalists have completely let it slip by that the leader of one party supporting Labour, a co-leader of a party that may support either Labour or National, and the MP of another party have all publicly backed a group of Cuban spies convicted of conspiracy to murder.

Yes, Jim Anderton, Pita Sharples and Sue Bradford have declared their credentials to be blood red. They repeat the nonsense that Cuban dissidents are "terrorists" and that these Cuban spies were fighting terrorism when they dobbed Cuban refugees into the Cuban police state. THAT should be a small scandal, it SHOULD be getting scrutiny that a senior Cabinet Minister has aligned himself to a police state.

However, for the cherubs who are reporters in the mainstream media, that is too complicated - you see they would have to explain how Cuba is a police state, how Cuban dissidents help Cubans flee and spread propaganda to encourage Cubans to rise up against their dictators, and then explain the judicial process faced by the Cuban Five.

Not as interesting as Winston though is it? Three MPs (and by implication three political parties) are sympathisers to those aligned with a communist dictatorship and nobody gives a damn.

Imagine voting for National

To do that I'd have to accept either this:
- Centralised bureaucratically funded and directed education, with central bargaining for teachers and no performance pay, with no funding following students, and no tax refund fior buying your kids' education is ok;
- Centralised bureaucratically funded and directed health care, with central bargaining for nurses and doctors, and no performance pay, with a virtual lottery on getting surgery and no accountability for poor performance and no refund for providing for your own healthcare, is ok;
- Property rights remain under the control of local government with the RMA, except that central government can fasttrack its projects whether they be by energy SOEs, transport agencies or local government;
- All the current bureaucracies should remain and not face any real cuts in funding or roles;
- Government spending should still grow, just less than 9% per annum;
- Local government should retain its current wide ranging powers to use ratepayers money for any purpose it deems as promoting the economic, social, environmental and cultural wellbeing of "communities";
- The government should hold onto unprofitable and poorly performing SOEs and not seek private capital;
- Some minor tightening of the welfare state is all that is needed, but state housing stock should continue to grow, and people should still be able to have state houses with income related rents AND accommodation supplements;
- The Maori seats are not to be questioned, nor are laws that grant any ethnic or racial group different rights from others;
- The ETS and the Kyoto Treaty commitments are not to be questioned, but ETS should be tweaked;
- The top tax rate should remain higher than most major trading partners (outside the EU).

OR National has a secret agenda, which ala Ruth Richardson in 1990, will bring tears to my eyes and make me smile.

I want Labour out of power. I wont be voting for Labour. Voting for a party that will not grant Labour confidence and supply is not supporting Labour being in power.

However to vote National is a positive endorsement of either a wholesale capitulation to almost all Labour policies since 1999 or wishful thinking that it is a lying deceitful bunch of confidence tricksters who will play a one trick game of liberalising the New Zealand economy, education, health and welfare systems. I say a one trick game because it will revive the political fortunes of Winston Peters in one foul swoop if that IS true.

If I had voted National in 1996, I would have had to swallow the deal with NZ First, the deal with Alamein Kopu, Tuariki Delamere and the rest of them, the continued abomination of the RMA, the lack of any constructive change in education, health or welfare. However EVEN then, National still privatised, still was seeking to restrict local government's role and deregulated postal services, abolished tariffs on imported motor vehicles. National said it would do these things. Now? Nothing.

What is it I am voting FOR if I choose National? All I can see is that it gets rid of Clark, and Co. A fine goal indeed, but on day two I get to be governed pretty much to the same extent to the same degree in similar ways by people who apparently don't have the courage of their convictions in doing it. Labour believes it is good to govern the country, National believes it has to, almost grudgingly.

Maybe that's it?

Vote Labour if you want big government and to be governed by people who believe they should be governing you.

Vote National if you want big government and to be governed by people who believe they have to be governing you.

So who do you vote for when you don't want to be governed, but want government to protect you?

Leftwing economic illiteracy and hypocrisy

Well The Standard obviously thinks tolls are a bad idea, having posted on this several times, even though:

- Labour introduced and passed legislation to allow toll roads to be introduced by Order in Council under recommendation by the Minister of Transport. The ALPURT B2 Orewa motorway bypass will be the first. Tauranga Harbourlink would've been the second if Winston hadn't made removing the toll a condition of his confidence and supply agreement. Penlink in Rodney District may be the next one;

- Transit New Zealand under Labour undertook a study following the passage of that legislation to investigation what other new highways could be part funded through tolls. It concluded that several Auckland projects (Waterview connection being one), parts of the Waikato expressway, an expressway in the Bay of Plenty and a handful of other projects could be tolled.

- The Labour led government commissioned a study into introducing road pricing in Auckland to reduce congestion and raise revenue called the Auckland Road Pricing Evaluation Study (ARPES). It considered a daily charge which was $6 a day, so that means $30 a week for a commuter.

And the Standard got this hatred for tolls from a Green blog - when commonsense says that charging vehicles for road use is bound to be better for the environment that subsidising roads from general taxes.

but apparently the Standard opposes Labour policy. How odd.

Black Power's treaty claim

Yes, seriously according to Stuff. You see it claims that gangs exist because of colonisation. Remember when the UK invaded NZ during the lifetime of those gang members, and they had to club together to fight the oppression of the imperialist invaders who took their property, denied them education and stopped them expressing their culture?

"It's the story of our lives really and the way we're treated. From our perspective there have been multiple Treaty breaches, every article has been broken. The way we've dealt with the different breaches is to get together with other like-minded people" says spokesman Eugene Ryder.

Yes, poor you, hasn't "society" dished you a raw deal? Shouldn't everyone be forced to bail you out of your lives? Hardly surprising that Marxist Maori nationalist lawyer Moana Jackson is talking favourably about the claim.

This is the consequence of a culture, and government that supports a culture that individuals are not responsible for their lives and not responsible for improving their own lot. A culture that doesn't blame individuals, whether themselves or their families, but blames "structural" issues, blames the whole collective of society - so it can then claim that everyone be forced to pay to make their lives better.

A simple answer is to disband the Waitangi Tribunal, and redirect the sort of claims that have gone to it before to being a matter of property rights claims when the state has historically stolen from citizens (Maori and others). So which political party will advocate that then? It doesn't begin with the letter "N".

United Future's tinge of less government

Now I'm not getting excited, but check out these policies on the United Future website:

"support the continuation of the 'no-fault' regime and mandatory workplace accident insurance, but support competition in the provision of accident compensation services” This is ACT policy. Open up all of ACC to competition.

“retain the Ministry of Economic Development, but re-focus key elements of their work away from 'picking winners' and towards removing impediments to business especially exporting” Mild, but a small step forward.

“cut taxes to 10% up to $12,000, 20% between $12,001 and $38,000, 30% above $38,000” bigger tax cuts than National, including getting rid of the 39% top rate.

“UnitedFuture will promote "no regrets" policies to address climate change – i.e. measures that will provide both environmental and economic benefits.” Not too shabby, but it also supports ETS.

“Task the Local Government Commission with a review of the size and shape of all local government areas in order to reduce local government activity to a pre-1995 level” Again more adventurous than National.

“Hold an early referendum on the future of the Maori seats in Parliament, as UnitedFuture believes that no ethnicity should have special privilege above others in our proportional electoral system.” Whereas the Nats would do a deal with the Maori Party.

"Introduce tax concessions to recognise the savings created by those who choose to take out private health insurance, or pay for private treatment, prioritising those aged over 65. Investigate the feasibility of a national health insurance scheme for non-trauma based disability, in particular elective surgery for the elderly.” Steps beyond what National would suggest.

However, remember this only looks interesting because National policy is so bland, and before you think about giving Dunne a tick remember, not only has he kept Labour in power over TWO terms, set up a new bureaucracy called the Families Commission, but also has some weirder policies.

“Introduce a Multicultural Act, similar to Canada, for the preservation and enhancement of multiculturalism in New Zealand.” Whatever that means.

Steps backward like “convert Transpower NZ Ltd to a public utility with the sole objective of transporting power through the National Grid at the lowest possible long-term cost to the consumer” instead of being able to be profit oriented and invest in the infrastructure.

More tax funding to “Establish overseas aid at 0.5% of GNI immediately and reach the accepted international millennium goal of 0.7% by 2015.”

and far too much on a wide range of policies, with endless interventions in a wide range of areas.

Peter Dunne has dabbled with ex. National MPs, with the Christian right, with hunters and fishermen, and is now dabbling with a little less government and tax. I don't doubt he actually has a more libertarian set of policies in many ways than National - but sadly that says more about National than it does about Dunne. It's a sad day when a vote for Peter Dunne looks like a more radical option for change than a vote for National, but you can't really be sure that he wont support Labour.

You see he's been supporting Labour every single day since the last two elections.