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| Matthew Hooton - Propagandist |
We all agree that politics in New Zealand is generally very polarising. Although many commentators can appear reasonable at face value, their opinions usually belie entrenched and often dysfunctional belief systems. This is partly due to our isolation as a microcosm in the South Pacific, which makes Aotearoa the perfect controlled environment for political experimentation. That isolation also unfortunately means that politicians and their propagandists are usually the ones to determine the success or failure of their attempts at social engineering in Gods own.
That’s what makes independent commentary that challenges the status quo so important.
Yesterday, the Daily Blog reported:
Omicron in NZ – Political Winners & Losers
Look at Hooton’s Omicron spread this month using the Hootonian equation of 33% Omicron increase…
Of course Hooton is fear mongering with flawed data, so I'm unsure why Bradbury is taking old Hoots seriously here. However what Bradbury goes on to say in his Omicron in NZ – Political Winners & Losers post is for the most part accurate.
WINNERS:
Taliban – After Charlotte Bellis’s glowing reference, the Taliban are now woke as fuck and would like us to all know their pronouns are He-Him.
David Seymour – His line that Labour are subcontracting maternity leave to the Taliban was so hilarious, it hides the far right race war mongering of ACTs policies.
Death Cult Capitalists – They have finally won the day by demanding the borders open so that hyper tourism, migrant worker exploitation, International Student scams and death can re-enter NZ because nothing matters as much as the travelling class getting back to their winter holidays in Thailand.
Globalists at Stuff – The globalists at Stuff have won with their never ending sob stories to ensure their own global skill set can always travel.
LOSERS:
Luxon – He is screaming for MIQ to be closed and will have those words force fed back to him if Hooton’s numbers explode.
Labour – They are incapable of moving on the real issues their voters elected them for, Housing, Inequality, Poverty and meaningful climate change. Keeping us safe from Covid is yesterdays story, what have you done for me lately Labour? Where’s the vision? Their face masks have blinded them.
MIQ – It has served to protect us and is now more hated than Hitler. It has kept us safe and yet it has been denigrated, wait for the scream from Kiwis to shut it if Hooton’s numbers eventuate.
Domestic Kiwis – The hyper tourism market that exist to sell red bull to tourists are laughing. The industries that benefit from migrant worker exploitation laugh. All those kiwis stupid enough to travel during a pandemic are gleeful. The international student scam are dancing with joy. Welcome back exploited migrant workers and Students and tourists who will block our public transport, who will place rent pressures on domestic renters, who will crowd our groaning infrastructure! Expect house prices to explode. Weep dear Kiwi at the plague seeping in, weep at our Fortress NZ protection ripped away from us at a time when external shockwaves become the norm, weep that our quality of life plunges again.
There is however a pronounced difference between the current and previous raft of political experimenters, which provides perceivable and measurable results for the public to base their voting decisions on. For instance, the difference between John Key and Jacinda Ardern’s governance is entirely discernible, even to those who don’t really follow politics.
In fact the contrast couldn't be greater. Instead of numerous stories about homeless people living in cars or dying on park benches towards the end of Key's nine long years in power, during Ardern's tenure the mainstream media has instead concerned themselves with rich people who’ve been slightly inconvenienced by MIQ. Far from being a left wing conspiracy, this improvement is simply because there are less homeless people under this Labour led government. We all know Kiwis have died from Covid-19 in New Zealand, but the MSM is rightly having a difficult time blaming Labour for these deaths, which they would do so if they could.
Housing and inequality are clearly still pressing matters, but it will be difficult to raise much concern with middle New Zealand when their paper wealth has increased, their lives have improved and the Labour administration has stopped them from dying en masse during a pandemic that is still decimating many parts of the world. Covid-19 is anything but yesterday's news and voters have generally understood that it could be a lot worse and probably would have been if a right wing government were in charge.
The outcome to Labour's Covid-19 response has been so great that a majority will side with Labour again rather than risk their lives with a return to a National led government. The right-wing would evidently prefer to let people die rather than have any supposed reduction in economic activity from saving lives. What the public understands and the right wing stupidly fails to comprehend is that preventing people from becoming unwell and saving lives provides better economic returns than simply letting the virus run rampant.
However that won’t be the main reason Labour governs again after the next election. The Maori vote will be pivotal in determining who leads us, and much like Winston Peters did in 2017, it's likely their party will effectively decide who holds the reigns of power. In fact if Maori voters split their votes between Labour and the Maori Party, the next coalition would also have a clear majority to govern.
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| Maori Party's Rawiri Waititi and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer |
Likewise, the Greens could hold considerable sway within the next Labour led government, including Cabinet positions. The right wing might claim that an administration involving these three centre or left wing parties is unworkable, but we only have to look at Jacinda Ardern's remarkable skill set and grasp of complexities across numerous issues to understand that she's the right person for the job to ensure unity of purpose in any future government she leads.
The divisive right wing invariably has a majority of the mainstream media on their side, but this is doing little to promote any alternative vision to what is or has already been tried. In fact being entirely negative and constantly flip-flopping on any given issue will only encourage intelligent wealthy voters, who’ve also done well during the last few years, to not rock the boat.
This all makes Hooton’s flawed reasoning in his (Pay-walled) Herald article entirely ridiculous!
Can Christopher Luxon become PM - and mend a divided NZ?
All the major polls are narrowing, with National and Act tracking towards parity with Labour and the Greens.
While Jacinda Ardern remains comfortably ahead as preferred Prime Minister, she is increasingly polarising. When both their positive and negative ratings are taken into account, the 1News-Kantar poll showed Ardern's all-important net approval rating below Christopher Luxon's.
…
The divisions are not just economic. Māori aspirations to exercise full sovereignty or at least share power in 50:50 co-governance models are well beyond what tauiwi will accept.
Unless narrowed in one or the other direction, or preferably both, that gap will lead to political violence. Rural and provincial New Zealanders think those in the cities undervalue both their economic contribution and the environmental improvements they have made.
Obviously Hooton is ignoring the facts again. For starters he’s promoting an incorrect belief that Aotearoa is badly divided along rural and city lines, which simply isn’t the case. He’s also overstating the number of racists (approximately 5%) who, like himself, cannot accept that Maori have been in co-governance within political parties since 1868.
In my opinion, the Maori Party's expectation for increased representation within central and local government is politically expedient for them as well as being highly achievable.
Biggest load of bullshit I couldn't read on the Herald today. pic.twitter.com/US2jIEDFwH
— Melanie D. (@melulater) February 4, 2022
Likewise, the number of farmers concerned with vast swathes of productive land being converted into forestry, which is entirely incorrect, is being badly overstated by a deluded propagandist whose opinions invariably render him obsolete as a political commentator.
Hooton is clearly letting his own prejudices govern his belief that National already has the numbers. These are not touchstone issues that have relevance for a majority of voters. Instead they’re the concerns of a fool grasping at the right wings’ failed propaganda campaigns against the government, campaigns that have already fallen over because they don't align with the facts.
With the long four-month lockdown, Aucklanders have had a different experience of Covid than the rest of the country and think their sacrifices were taken for granted by the rest.
The Wellington bureaucracy has never been more out of touch from the people it is meant to serve.
The ever-fictitious Hooton thankfully doesn't speak for all of Auckland. He's also forgotten the numerous times that Key would take off to Hawaii to avoid scrutiny here in New Zealand. Remember when over 67% of the public didn't want National to sell our assets, but they went ahead and did it anyway?
To claim that the current Labour led government comes anywhere near that level of arrogance and obfuscation, which is still being displayed by the blue team, is incredibly obnoxious!
I mean nobody is arguing that Hooton shouldn’t be allowed to peddle his pro National Party propaganda, but the NZ Herald should at the very least attempt to help him make his inane blathering somewhat believable.
