Written By: - Date published: 3:30 pm, October 11th, 2011 - 62 comments
Key’s staff spun to media that his Radio Live show was ok if he didn’t discuss politics, saying the station had received advice from the Electoral Commission that “political content’ could breach rules. That didn’t sound right to me, so I asked the Commission what they actually said.
Written By: - Date published: 11:01 am, October 10th, 2011 - 31 comments
Buried in Friday’s Herald’s media section was a big political story. After John “Moonbeam” Key had his hour of talking about his cat while the country was being downgraded, Radio Live responded to the complaints of this blatant and illegal political favouritism by offering to host a Leaders’ debate. It was canned, though, when Moonbeam was to afraid to front up.
Written By: - Date published: 8:30 am, October 10th, 2011 - 50 comments
Looks like John Key has been caught in yet another lie.
Written By: - Date published: 10:40 am, October 3rd, 2011 - 37 comments
The Nats have released no substantial policy since the Budget and look unlikely to do so. Their election strategy was clearly to keep attention away from a comparison of their policy vs Labour’s, and keep it on Brand Key. The exploding economic crisis has caught the Nats’ flat-footed. Now, they need economic ideas urgently but have none to offer.
Written By: - Date published: 10:37 am, September 26th, 2011 - 28 comments
John Hartevelt – “Key is massively over-exposed on any number of fronts, but nowhere more so than at Pike River.” Key routinely promises big: close the wage gap, roaring out of recession, national cycleway, no equity loss for redzoners, Pike River bodies out, no GST hike, whaling solved, brighter future. He NEVER delivers. How does …
Written By: - Date published: 9:19 am, September 12th, 2011 - 30 comments
The Stuff interview of John Key in the weekend was better than your average puff piece. Interesting that Key doesn’t even try to defend his record on its merits.
Written By: - Date published: 7:32 am, August 24th, 2011 - 73 comments
A couple of polls have now confirmed that on key issues voters prefer Labour policy over National. When push comes to shove in November, will Kiwis vote for the style that they like, or the substance that they want?
Written By: - Date published: 7:31 am, July 17th, 2011 - 49 comments
More nice work from Greg Salmond… Better add ACC to that list.
Hey, where is Key lately?
Written By: - Date published: 4:15 pm, July 16th, 2011 - 113 comments
After two weeks of contradictory, panicked lines from National, the Right’s official critique of Labour’s CGT is “it’s a hodge-podge”. The Right, including Bill English and Don Brash, aren’t saying CGT is bad, they’re saying Labour’s CGT isn’t comprehensive enough. Why, then, don’t they campaign on a more comprehensive one? Maybe they were going to.
Written By: - Date published: 1:51 pm, July 13th, 2011 - 57 comments
Russel Norman put a dagger into John Key yesterday in question time asking whether a series of national and international economic authorities really wanted to “put a dagger through the heart of growth” with a CGT. Key can waffle and whine all he likes, but he can’t avoid the truth of Australia’s enviable growth record with CGT.
Written By: - Date published: 1:17 pm, July 6th, 2011 - 10 comments
What keeps John Key & Bill English too busy to comment on their own government’s dismal performance, but not so busy that they can’t comment on absolutely anything to do with Labour?
Written By: - Date published: 9:21 am, June 24th, 2011 - 56 comments
What about: ‘see ya, I’m off to India’?
Written By: - Date published: 9:07 pm, June 22nd, 2011 - 41 comments
Key is due to fly in to help announce the bad news in Christchurch tomorrow only to fly straight out to India the next day.
It’s seems the timing is all about keeping Key’s brand away from the bad news – he’ll do the sombre announcement and then leave others to deal with the fall out.
Gutless.
Written By: - Date published: 10:21 am, May 28th, 2011 - 23 comments
Ever noticed the big political journos will do a scathing attack on one major party then, the next day, one on the other major party? It’s about maintaining access. If you only run attacks on one party, you’ll stop getting stories from them (nearly all political stories come from the opposing party). After this, it was Labour’s turn in Armstrong’s sights today, or was it?
Written By: - Date published: 4:37 pm, May 18th, 2011 - 19 comments
Speaking to Audrey Young in today’s Herald, Prime Minister John Key stated “the one thing I’ve come to learn is that the single biggest driving factor in Kiwisaver is inertia”. This confirms what many in the community have been thinking, and a few in the business world have been saying, that inertia is also the single biggest driving factor in the National/ACT/Maori Party government’s economic policy.
Written By: - Date published: 9:08 pm, May 6th, 2011 - 44 comments
Turns out John Key quite likes making jokes about his DPS entourage.
I wonder if he finds it even funnier that we’re the ones picking up the $800k bill for them.
Written By: - Date published: 6:44 am, May 6th, 2011 - 129 comments
Judith Collins has broken protocol to defend John Key’s overuse of the DPS.
Looks to me like the threats they’re most concerned about are the threats to brand Key.
And they’ll pick and chose the rules they want to defend it.
Written By: - Date published: 5:16 pm, May 3rd, 2011 - 29 comments
Stephen Harper’s Conservatives have won majority government in the Canadian election with under 40% of the vote on a turnout of just over 58%. We will be able to get an idea of what a second term John Key government would be like as Harper is cut from the same cloth as Key and Cameron. …
Written By: - Date published: 12:23 pm, March 20th, 2011 - 34 comments
Key was full of excuses and vague promises for Christchurch on Q+A. He ruled out a levy and indicated the rebuilding would be funded out of savage cuts to our public services. He stuck to his script. Maybe the earpiece he was wearing helped. What was being whispered in his ear? And who was telling our PM what words to mouth?
Written By: - Date published: 7:03 am, March 16th, 2011 - 65 comments
I don’t think that anyone who has been paying attention to events in Christchurch could seriously have expected the city to host a major sporting event like the RWC within a few short months. So why is John Key the last person left in the country who is denying the obvious?
Written By: - Date published: 7:40 am, March 7th, 2011 - 61 comments
The government has a fair bit on its plate right now, like the Christchurch quake, and the hammering that ordinary folk are getting from the cost of living. So its reassuring to know that the PM’s office has its eye on the ball. It’s all over the “important issues”…
Written By: - Date published: 5:42 pm, February 21st, 2011 - 21 comments
This really should be Friday Fun, but maybe your Monday needs a smile too. Today on Kiwiblog an ex ACT MP David Garrett complains about telling off an Asian-but-I’m-not-racist woman in the supermarket for sniffing fruit. Apparently it’s just not done here. Isn’t it? Someone should tell John Key…
Written By: - Date published: 10:52 am, February 20th, 2011 - 64 comments
Hunger and malnutrition are stalking New Zealand families. Hundreds of thousands are just one shock – whether an illness, or a large bill – from not being able to afford basic food. This is not good enough in our land of plenty. Multi-millionaire John Key doesn’t empathise. To him poverty is a moral failing but he’s seriously out of touch.
Written By: - Date published: 9:37 am, February 19th, 2011 - 41 comments
Over at Dimpost, Danyl wrote an interesting piece after seeing the video of John Key in the House saying that if Kiwi families find themselves needing to go to foodbanks it is their fault. That nasty moment, Danyl thought, explained the disconnect between how the political Left and the general public perceives Key. Actually, it’s just the surface.
Written By: - Date published: 10:59 am, February 18th, 2011 - 55 comments
Yesterday, the Nats panicked. Under fire for failing to deliver jobs, for planning to sell assets to pay for tax cuts for the rich, and the gross hypocrisy of the BMW debacle, they put out 5 press releases less than 2 hours trying to spin their way out of trouble. It didn’t work. Nor does smile and wave anymore. The NBR calls this John Key’s ‘Wile E Coyote moment’.
Written By: - Date published: 10:30 am, February 9th, 2011 - 7 comments
The PM has obviously been stung by the surge of negative publicity generated by the TV3 piece on the residents of McGehan Close. The revival of this particular piece of exploitative hypocrisy risks tarnishing the sacred Key brand. Can’t have that. So Key is trying to convince us that the Nats have done “as much as possible” for the underclass…
Written By: - Date published: 12:00 pm, February 7th, 2011 - 25 comments
Tomorrow is the first day of Parliament for the year, so I’m picking we’ll see John Key’s annual passing mention of the ‘underclass’. You remember Key’s promise to make lifting the underclass his priority, eh? Well, Key doesn’t. He has abandoned Aroha Nathan after using her for PR and now says he can’t do anything for the poor.
Written By: - Date published: 9:36 am, February 6th, 2011 - 58 comments
More and more often Key is being reported as a product of spin – a man carefully cultivating his celebrity.
For now that means the political class will heap praise on him for “doing politics” well.
But as time goes on and the economy worsens and the only hard policy that comes out is about looking after the rich few at the expense of the many, this “everyman” schtick will wear very thin.
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