A shower of bastardry

After many New Zealanders admitted to feeling spied upon when I asked if they ever talk to or shout at their television sets when the Prime Minister Christopher Luxon is on the news, it became clear that I am not alone - about this anti caring, anti people and anti-planet government.

The Neoliberal Hijack we are experiencing has taken us from feeling fairly proud of our distinctive, fresh, increasingly progressive, young little country - to feeling alarm, being under siege, the need to join together - like the children left to defend this place in the darkness ...asking each other - what can we do to stop this?

Fresh worry fills the newspapers day after day - the latest from Thomas the turd polisher at the NZ Herald - who describes how the Atlas Network stooges, Luxon and Willis ( a former Director of the NZ Initiative ) have been licking their lips over forming a giant holding company to put all of our state owned assets in and then - ping - sell the parts we don't think we need - off to - crony mates who are standing by rubbing their eager hands.

That means TVNZ, part of Air NZ, KiwiBank, Transpower...you know just like Roger Douglas in the 1980s - but wait - it's more fundamentalist and high level.

Luxon, like all NZ Initiative stooges is quick to say we should be more like Switzerland, Estonia, Ireland and now Singapore - not like Aotearoa - nah copy someone else.

Singapore has this kind of "holding company" and it has grown it's portfolio so in a fundamentalist simple CE mindset divorced from the "why we own these assets" - dollar signs beckon above all other values - and Luxon licks his greedy lips...

By doing this - could we build "better public services" and corporatise and privatise?

That's like pure ecstasy to Luxon's ears and Winston is a fan too - let's copy Singapore and think about cash...maybe sell TVNZ to Murdoch, Kiwibank to ANZ ( Sir John ) ...and what about those energy Gentailers?

Well Barbara Chapman ( Atlas Network ) won't want to lose her gig chairing Genesis and burning that coal - but according to Thomas the turd polisher - only one of the four can be flicked off.

Yes I know - this stuff is just around the corner and you did not vote for it and there is no mandate for it. Same with repealing smokefree legislation - while Seymour wails selectively about liberal democracy and how the Waitangi Tribunal thinks it is a parallel government.

I'll get back to that later - but right now we are seeing a few things coming out of the woodwork thanks to OIA detective work.

Thomas and the Herald send out a volley of OIA's before any Budget to try and generate headlines and guess what will be in the Budget before it is announced - while Government stand around saying "You'll have to wait, just a small number of sleeps".

Beside his article is the usual attack on a Green Party female - in the Herald ( NZME chaired by Barbara Chapman ) - yesterday it was Darleen - today it is JAG. The message is - that progressive Greens are not to be trusted - specially the females - who need to undertake corrections unlike Mr Plod who is "doing an exceptional job" or Matt Doocey who just presided over the gutting of the Suicide Prevention Office of full time staff.

Chlöe once described the Platform as a weapon - well the Herald is not far behind these days.

Speaking of the Greens, James Shaw told Guyon Espiner that he thought New Zealand still has a bright future and that this dark period is made up of temporary problems - like we know inflation will return to normal soon - and growth will come back etc, it's just that climate emissions targets will be harder.

I hope he is correct and this is just a shower of bastardry - not an irreversible tipping point in our political climate.

The gaps are closing in the polls and there is hope that a big reactionary wave of "we are sick of these clowns " will eclipse this neoliberal hijack in the 2026 election - and all the damage done repaired.

Some of it may be too late - for example for those waiting on any of the 13 promised cancer drugs that National has not delivered while Dr Cigareti makes excuses and Luxon evades the point.

Worse Cigareti is undermining Sir Ash's efforts in Geneva to negotiate a "Pandemic Treaty" where countries sign up to prevent and mitigate future public health events.

The Neoliberals like Dr Cigareti want to priotize sovereignty over Pandemic Security - opting out of international health rules, and Helen Clark says - they are ruining New Zealand's reputation.

Luxon talked a big game before the election but has spent much of the past six months on the run, working "incredibly hard" at not being held accountable - setting up his own easy dumb measures of successful delivery ( raising the energy and making decisions ) and repeating talking points to the point where - we shout at the TV.

I said I would talk about the Waitangi Tribunal - which we have heard is all about settlements and how they are stepping over their mandate which is reported as being limited to be - all about settlements for historical claims.

But urgent claims are being made all the time. Inquiries into these claims are part of an ongoing role - along with examining legislation that is furnished to the Tribunal by government.

There are no headlines that capture the fact that experts keep telling media - no - the Waitangi Tribunal is doing exactly what it was set up to do. Instead the headline always goes to Seymour's soundbite because the first rule of media headlines is - what will grab eyes and ears.

"The Waitangi Tribunal - it's an unelected parallel government", said the Act voter just like they taught ya in the headlines captured by the small bandwidth brain of ideological libertarians.

Come on media - spell the role out and make it clear to the readers. Seymour is counting on you leaving that buried in the fine print half way down Dominion Road.

There is much more to the bastardry as you know, but that is enough for a Friday morning.

Let's hope it's just a passing shower.

A shower of bastardry

Morena

G