"The Government is slowly destroying New Zealand....."

The above from Don Brash who finally has knocked the hapless Bill English off his bar stool. He's correct, of course, but a few specific examples would have been nice.

How about the deliberate and systematic alienation of New Zealanders from all authority other than Nanny State? The family, the schools, the Crown, the churches, the workplace...in Labour's view all mere impediments to self esteem. How about the expansion of no-questions-asked benefit payments, in reality just thinly disguised vote-buying as Labour seeks to create an underclass constituency permanently dependent on the largess of the state? How about the abandonment of 4,000 years of Western civilisation in favour of a dying Stone Age culture? How about the deliberate dilution of New Zealand's national character into some kind of fuzzy multi-cultural milieu?

Say Goodnight, Bill

As much as I'd like to sit down with Bill English over a pint or three, or have him as a next door neighbor, he was a miserable failure as party leader and should have stepped down after leading the Nats down to defeat in the last election.

If a leader is not to be judged by the size of his party's caucus, or at least by its standing in the polls, then how should he be judged? It's not at all certain that Don Brash will do any better, but Mr. English failed to present any kind of plausible strategy for returning his party to power.

On the face of it, Labour should be an easy target. The breathtaking arrogance, the profound and obvious contempt for democracy, the transparent attempts to divide the nation by race and class, Margaret Wilson's judicial coup d'etat, Michael Cullen's rapacious tax policies, and the cheap anti-Americanism all fly in the face of New Zealanders' common sense and decency. Why has National failed to take the verbal fight to Helen Clark every day, why has it allowed the hypocrisy of the left to go unanswered?

A leader must be found on the center-right who can stop the Red Green Axis in it's anti-democratic tracks. Before it's too late.....

Helen's Chinese Pal

Read the Herald's account of Labour kissing Chinese President Hu Jintao's arse over Taiwan and Tibet. Bet the PM didn't raise any human rights issues at all. When the "President" of a vicious totalitarian state tells the New Zealand government how to conduct its foreign policy, the entire Cabinet sits up and begs for more; when the President of the United States modestly suggests that a way might be found around differences between the US and New Zealand, the Red-Green axis gets all breathless about US "bullying".

A free trade agreement with China? On the economic issues alone, the idea is monumental in its idiocy. There isn't a single important NZ manufactured product that can't be made or counterfeited in China at half the price. Does anyone really think Chinese consumers have the disposable income to pay for clean, green New Zealand agricultural products? Add to that the bleeding obvious fact that a free trade agreement with a country that doesn't have a convertible currency is a contradiction in terms and one wonders where the stupidity ends. Where are the labour unions on this? Not a word, even though a free trade agreement with China would shut every factory in this country.

The End Logic of the Left

The problem with socialism, other than its utter and unrelenting failure to deliver anywhere or at any time, either freedom or prosperity, is that followed to its logical conclusion it leads inexorably to the kind of horrors described in the Committee for Human Rights in North Korea's report on Kim Jong-il's gulag. Read this and weep, literally.

Don't Know Much Geography........

"We won't be becoming the 53rd state."--Green MP Rod Donald

Today's Herald has the left spin on US Ambassador Swindells' attempt to exercise free speech at Victoria University. The Ambassador, while going about his lawful business, was shouted down by a mob of green shirt thought police. Green MP Rod Donald notes helpfully that New Zealand will not be succumbing to "US bullying". Hmmm, been shouted down in the States lately, Rod?

Arnold

The mystery of this is not how Davis was given the bum's rush or how Arnold managed to become governor-elect. All that is explainable by reference to conventional American politics and the money that fuels it. What is beyond me is how Californians, sophisticated suntanned denizens of the Left Coast --at least the ones who aren't living in their car--tolerated for so long a Democratic machine that could elevate Gray Davis to the governorship. This ill tempered, foul mouthed, deeply corrupt incompetent became governor just by hanging around long enough and by being marginally less a loser than Cruz Bustamante or Willie Brown.

Taking It Home

I was wondering when this would happen. The Israelis have finally gotten around to delivering the package to the right address. Boy Assad must be wondering why that damned Arab street still won't rise.

More Palestinian Barbarism

I suppose even the latest outrage of blowing up a busload of nursery school children and babies will not dent the support of the left for Arafat's barbarian hordes. At least they didn't kill any whales. Still pals with Yasser, Mr. Goff?

It's A Religion After All

As much as I admire the warrior scribe Andrew Sullivan, I think it's time for him to lay off the Catholic Church on the same-gender marriage issue. I have my own philosophical reasons for opposing same-gender marriage, but that's not the point here. As Andrew is well aware, Catholicism is a religion, not a political party or a social club. The Church (or any other religion for that matter) is not obligated to change what it considers fundamental and immutable principles to match the often loony perturbations of society. These principles, however medievel or reactionary, are supposed to be the word of God after all. If the believers cannot reconcile the principles of the religion with their own, then it's on the head of the person to change, go, shut-up, or start his own church. Down any other road lies schism and dissolution. There are all sorts of squashy religions out there that let you believe anything you want, but something tells me they don't provide much spiritual comfort.

Hemlock Jokes

This bit was over the top Europhilia even for the Guardian. The hemlock jokes came fast and furious and rightly so. Giscard as Socrates? The sleazy French fixer and international arms dealer? Andrew Sullivan has him pinned to the wall and dissected like a cockroach.

The Scott Ritter School of Weapons Inspection

One News has the story of Steve Allinson, a former UN weapons inspector in Iraq. Mr. Allinson can't quite decide what he thinks. He says he doubts whether Saddam "ever had a banned weapons program", except that we know that he did because he admitted that he did, and all of it that the Iraqis couldn't hide was destroyed under UN supervision. He also thinks his team should have been allowed to work on, looking for the weapons program he thinks was never there. I find it odd that the Allies are supposed to have uncovered it all by now, given that the same bleating skeptics were adamant a year ago that the UN be given as much time as required to search for WMDs. Would it be asking too much to expect One News to ask the occasional hard question? Come on, guys, you're journalists. If I can see the inconsistencies from up here on Cold Mountain, surely you can see them even better up close and personal.

If the latest incidents of Palestinian savagery aren't enough to dent the iron skulls of Arafat's fellow travellers, ahem, that would be you, Mr. Goff, then nothing ever will be. There will be nothing like peace until Arafat, the Fatah Gang, Hamas and Islamic Jihad are gone, disappeared, sharing cave space with what's left of bin Laden. Do not waste time trying to ride a non-existent "cycle of violence" along the roadmap. The cycle is trotted out by journalists and academics who are too lazy to think.

The stated goal of the Palestinian thugocracy is the murder of every single Jew in the Middle East, the sacred duty of the Israeli government is to prevent that by any means necessary. Why do politicans persist in wishing that it were otherwise? Why do people who believe everything else that the Arafat clique says or, for that matter, everything the Israelis say, refuse to take either of them at their word on this point?

There is no more a cycle of violence than there is between the United States and al-Qaeda, or between police and criminals anywhere. Repeat after me, Arafat does not want peace. He wants his state, he wants it from the river to the sea, and he wants it born in fire and blood, not in compromise. The Israelis for their part will take peace if they can get it and still keep breathing, but will fight if they cannot.

One News has more on Georgia McCarten's death by vehicular homicide. The court didn't even bother to tell Georgia's mother that Zhao was appealing his sentence. Just an oversight, mind you. Let Phil Goff know what you think.

A Monkeypox on Your House

If you've ever doubted the great wisdom of New Zealand's biosecurity regime, then read this story on the monkeypox outbreak in the U.S. What kind of an idiot would import a giant Gambian rat as a pet? If you see a MAF officer at the pub, buy them a drink. In fact, buy several.

Read Tim Blair. Everyday. Without fail. Even if you have to miss lunch. It's The Truth from Oz.

And another thing. What earthly good is a suspension of driving privileges? When Zhao killed that little girl, he was already driving without a license. Was that part of the sentence considered at all by either judge?

Today's NZ Herald has Claire Trevett's account of the outrageous blood money trial and appeal of "student" Zhao Ding Yan, who ran over and killed 4 year old Georgia McCarten-Graham while driving unlicensed at double the speed limit. The judge in the original trial had handed down an already incredibly lenient sentence of 2 years imprisonment and a five year driving disqualification. Zhao's family had offered to pay as "compensation" $40,000. Think about that....$40,000 for a child's life and a wrecked family. On appeal, Justice Randerson said the sentencing judge failed to take into account the offer of compensation, and then he cut Zhao's sentence in half and dropped his driving disqualification to three years. Right. Would you trade a child's life for $40,000? Could Zhao have avoided jail completely for $80,000? It's simple payment of blood money; just like in that other judicial paradise, China.

$40,000. About the price of a new car for Mr. Zhao when he gets out of jail.

Has anyone else noted the emergence of the psychologist school of foreign policy analysis? Today's International Herald Tribune (the overseas voice of that paragon of journalistic integrity, the New York Times) carries a story on North Korea's nuclear weapons program that states, apparently in all seriousness, that the desire to be able to incinerate Tokyo is just a cry for attention. Well, I know I feel better now.

Andrew Gimson writing on the German welfare state in the May 10 London Spectator:
"They (the 1968 'rebels") found their livelihood thanks to Bismarck. He was he who saw
that welfare payments could be used to suppress conflict and keep millions in quiescent
dependency on the state.....The will to work has been eroded, in many individual cases
beyond hope of recovery, by a welfare state which by British standards is amazingly munificent."

Recognise anyone you know?