Fourth term Key?

Written By: - Date published: 1:47 pm, January 23rd, 2016 - 122 comments
Categories: election 2017, john key - Tags: ,

No real surprise – Key sets eyes on a fourth term

The Prime Minister is launching into 2016 with plans to stand for an historic fourth term.

In a wide-ranging interview with the Weekend Herald about the year ahead, John Key confirmed his intention to fight another election and remain in office. “My stock standard position has been that I intend to stay for as long as I think I can add value and the party wants me,” he said.

Not sure why Key wants a fourth term, he doesn’t seem to know what to do with his third one (other than change the flag of course).

He said he wanted this year to be similar to other years in which he tried to deliver results “to keep earning the right to be there”.

What results? Is it the slow economic recovery? The high unemployment? Growing poverty? Growing inequality? Growing gender wage gap? Failing the world on climate change? Increasingly polluted waterways? Dodging the hard issues? The housing crisis? The international acclaim that comes from pulling ponytails? Key’s only result is to remain popular by performing like a monkey for soft media and pretending he doesn’t understand prison rape jokes.

Key might get his fourth term. The polls are turning far too slowly. Good luck NZ.

122 comments on “Fourth term Key? ”

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  1. TeWhareWhero 1
    23 January 2016 at 1:53 pm

    “Not sure why Key wants a fourth term” –

    Simple, pure ego. If he gets it I’ll lay odds he won’t go the full term but will resign to take up whatever ego boosting position on the world stage is on offer.

    • marty mars 1.1
      23 January 2016 at 5:33 pm

      + 1 – yep ego and I also agree about the semi term and world stage

    • mpledger 1.2
      24 January 2016 at 6:15 pm

      I think anyone with brains in National knows that anyone other than Key is unelectable.

      • mpledger 1.2.1
        25 January 2016 at 3:07 pm

        And that the divisions caused by a contested leadership would destroy the Nats.

        Key probably means to win and then handover leadership smoothly… which means sidelining Judith Collins. If Judith Collins wants it then she had to go pretty soon… she needs at least 6-12 months to bed in before the election.

  2. cogito 2
    23 January 2016 at 2:04 pm

    Key the liar
    Key the manipulator
    Key the deceiver
    Key the traitor.

    Poor little ol’ NZ, you’ve been well and truly had.

  3. sabine 3
    23 January 2016 at 2:17 pm

    Alfred Ngaro’s election started in early December. He is still wishing everyone a merry christmas and a happy new year. I guess he is just a bit early for this year.

  4. Stuart Munro 4
    23 January 2016 at 2:21 pm

    Why doesn’t he just embrace the pathology & say he wants to be pm for life.

    • Magisterium 4.1
      24 January 2016 at 4:53 pm

      No, the rules of the game are that he has to reject being PM for life and be reluctantly forced into it by the people’s representatives in Parliament.

  5. Tautuhi 5
    23 January 2016 at 2:27 pm

    It will be a home run unless “the missing million voters” get off their a**** and vote

    • maui 5.1
      23 January 2016 at 3:29 pm

      I can’t see them coming out to vote for the current options, so someone or something is going to have to go out and get them.

    • Keith 5.2
      23 January 2016 at 5:14 pm

      That is THE absolute truth Tautuhi! They can kick this bunch of crooks, liars and cheats out on their arse’s!

      • Colonial Viper 5.2.1
        23 January 2016 at 6:30 pm

        What? To vote in a Labour Party which still wants to cut NZ Super back, which kept benefits at poverty levels and who brought in massive new means testing/health testing hurdles to the social welfare and ACC systems?

    • Peter 5.3
      26 January 2016 at 12:40 pm

      ….. exactly!

  6. Murray Simmonds 6
    23 January 2016 at 2:39 pm

    “Not sure why Key wants a fourth term, he doesn’t seem to know what to do with his third one (other than change the flag of course). ”

    Great line, NATWATCH. And thanks for the info in the post. It is certainly (bad) news to me. My guess, (and I posted it as such, some time ago) was that he’d bail out before the end of this term.

    As for why?

    Well I can only assume that Key’s a masochist.

    Still, post TPPA, there is a lot of water to go under the bridge. And nine or so months is a long time in politics.

  7. dv 7
    23 January 2016 at 2:42 pm

    “He said he wanted this year to be similar to other years in which he tried to deliver results “to keep earning the right to be there”.

    So debt will be about 200billion then. (120 billion now)

    • Scott M 7.1
      23 January 2016 at 5:47 pm

      + 1

      A case in point. His supporters think hes a great economic manager. Those same supporters are unaware how much debt has gone up under his watch. Are they too dumb, or are Nats too clever?

      • Tautuhi 7.1.1
        23 January 2016 at 6:53 pm

        National have done nothing for three terms apart from rearranging the deck chairs, we are swimming in a mountain of debt which doesn’t even get a mention from MSM, however we are supposedly a Rockstar Economy according to the HSBC Bank.

        Am I missing something?

  8. Millsy 8
    23 January 2016 at 2:43 pm

    Don’t rule him out getting a third term.

  9. Millsy 9
    23 January 2016 at 2:43 pm

    I mean fourth.

    • Colonial Viper 9.1
      23 January 2016 at 5:20 pm

      The Left still hasn’t figured it out. If Key is so shit, how does he keep winning over the smarter, more intelligent, better educated Left?

      In truth, this isn’t about John Key. This is about Labour and Greens being unable to offer a convincing, real alternative to:

      What results? Is it the slow economic recovery? The high unemployment? Growing poverty? Growing inequality? Growing gender wage gap? Failing the world on climate change? Increasingly polluted waterways? Dodging the hard issues? The housing crisis? The international acclaim that comes from pulling ponytails? Key’s only result is to remain popular by performing like a monkey for soft media and pretending he doesn’t understand prison rape jokes.

      And despite this backdrop Labour is sitting on what – 27.5%?

      • marty mars 9.1.1
        23 January 2016 at 5:40 pm

        ” If Key is so shit, how does he keep winning over the smarter, more intelligent, better educated Left?”

        I think that’s the issue – are they? and even if so, does it matter

        I probably go with – more ethical (generally), more concerned (mostly), more compassionate (a lot of the time) – not smarter, more intelligent or better educated those are not the playing field.

        • Colonial Viper 9.1.1.1
          23 January 2016 at 6:32 pm

          The mainstream political left is also way more out of touch with the cultural and social pulse of the country.

  10. mikesh 10
    23 January 2016 at 3:10 pm

    We still own 51% of each of the two electricity companies. He will need at least another term before he completes his goal.

    • Richard Christie 10.1
      23 January 2016 at 8:05 pm

      +1

      Not finished yet, still a way to go.
      Health, education, housing (underway), social welfare.

  11. Ffloyd 11
    23 January 2016 at 3:19 pm

    If he’s not a pm of somewhere then he’s nothing. He would be totally irrelevant.

    • Stuff the Politicians 11.1
      23 January 2016 at 3:57 pm

      J Key is only equal to a small city Mayor on the world scene.

      He is just about a nobody who, with his own ego thinks he is a world leader.
      He is far to big for his little boots.

    • Colonial Viper 11.2
      23 January 2016 at 6:38 pm

      Huh? That’s the fate of most former Labour Party MPs and Ministers. Key will be going straight into a senior job in Goldman Sachs or JP Morgan.

  12. Mosa 12
    23 January 2016 at 3:36 pm

    Right wing takeover completed by 2018 without one bullet fired media and population all wrapped up this so called 47% need to stop counting their wealth and wake up Jacinda save us.

    • Colonial Viper 12.1
      23 January 2016 at 5:21 pm

      Jacinda Ardern? LOLWUT.

      • Scott M 12.1.1
        23 January 2016 at 5:53 pm

        Face it Viper many voters are pretty thick and vote based on the looks of the leaders involved. How about Labour being just as cunning and putting Jacinda in the top job. She has the looks AND the smarts. Win win!

        • Colonial Viper 12.1.1.1
          23 January 2016 at 6:16 pm

          Dude, she’s a B/B- grade all the way through. Nikki Kaye is more on to it on almost every count.

          Also, the majority of Kiwis are smart enough to know when Labour is not fit to govern. Like in 2014, when it took Labour a full 12 hours after the election loss to totally fall apart in backstabbing acrimony.

  13. Anne 13
    23 January 2016 at 4:13 pm

    Right wing takeover completed by 2018….

    Yep. All assets sold to the highest off-shore bidder including NZ’s sovereignty. Instructions complete. Key will be offered a high powered CEO job at a ginormous global corporate for delivering NZ lock, stock and barrell into their welcoming arms.

    A new logo will be flying from the masts and a new corporate brand name for the land once known as New Zealand.

  14. fisiani 14
    23 January 2016 at 4:31 pm

    Fourth Term Key

    Fixed the headline for you.
    The Left simply fail to grasp how popular John Key is with the New Zealand public in a way that no other PM worldwide or in history has.
    I concede that one day he will retire, job well done, leaving New Zealand a far better place than he found it in 2008. His governments have turned the economy from collapse and deficits into recovery. Employment is at an alltime high. Incomes are rising faster than inflation. Manufacturing (crisis what crisis?) is booming. Free trade deals, the oxygen of NZ are being signed. Confidence is high and record numbers of consents for building approved. Opportunities abound and Whanau Ora is enriching Maori lives daily.
    Key is the great leader, English is the steady hand at the tiller and Joyce is stoking the boiler room. Watch for senior ministers being shouldertapped to stand aside to make room for the abundance of talent in the 2014 intake.
    Labour will no doubt try to bribe some voters with other voters money, but the public are not stupid. They know that National are steadily growing the economy and are the safest hands at the wheel if the world economy falters.
    I can foresee Key winning in 2017 with an even bigger majority than in 2014. He could well repeat that in 2020 and 2023. I would imagine that he would retire before 2026 and then all bets are off.
    By then most people will have forgotten how truly awful a modern Labour Goverment is for life and might take a gamble on a charismatic leader not yet in Parliament.
    The big question for me however is whether the Greens are prepared to wait till 2026 for a chance in Government. I reckon the odds of there one day being a National Government that contains Green members is greater than 50/50.

    • mickysavage 14.1
      23 January 2016 at 4:47 pm

      You are boring Fisi. It does not seem to matter how often we point out to you that you are wrong but you keep repeating the same mistruths.

      Labour posted nine surpluses, National one only and that was through taking money from the Canterbury rebuild, unemployment is significantly higher than it was in the last year of Labour’s reign, Whanau Ora is enriching very few, and we have a crisis of poverty.

      You are New Zealand’s very own version of Comical Ali.

      • fisiani 14.1.1
        23 January 2016 at 4:58 pm

        MS your understanding of history 1999-2008 is akin to a man falling off the 9th floor of a building shouting out as he plummets past each floor I’m still fine!” Technically you are of course correct. The man was still in good physical shape from floors 9-1. Why do you choose to ignore the scorched earth glee as Michael Cullen was kicked out of office (20 cms above the ground) cackling that the cupboard was bare and watch out for the impact folks. Even that was a lie because at the back of the cupboard was a huge pile of unpaid debts. The economic vandalism never showed up during ” best trading terms ever” but the pain was to be inflicted at change of office.
        That’s historical fact

        • Stuart Munro 14.1.1.1
          23 January 2016 at 5:15 pm

          Your pitiful lies do no service to us, to you, to New Zealaland or to the great thief and betrayer to whom you have sold your soul.

          The historical fact is that fisi loves everything John Key does to the point of fictionalising it. Unless you’re looking for a job at the Herald, this is not a useful skill.

        • Scott M 14.1.1.2
          23 January 2016 at 6:29 pm

          What “unpaid debts” were there?

      • Colonial Viper 14.1.2
        23 January 2016 at 5:24 pm

        MS?

        Labour posted nine surpluses

        Labour took more money out of Kiwi households and Kiwi businesses than it spent into the country, even as private sector debt and student debt spiralled up and up. Cullen made his own books look good even as Kiwi households went further and further into the red.

        I don’t see why you think this is a good thing. It set Labour up to lose 2008 and give all the spending power to National.

        In terms of strategy, surely a colossal mistake and evidence that Labour buys lock stock and barrel into orthodox economic values.

    • Mike Bond 14.2
      23 January 2016 at 4:49 pm

      Great comment fisiani. The only place Labour are winning is on social media. The general voting population is tired of Labour spending other peoples money. Labour appeal to those that want handouts and if someone can explain to me how a person can think they are entitled to my hard earned money, I might change me view point. Recently the news that 62 people held more wealth than the entire worlds poor, brought out comments from the left about how these people should give their money away. Why?

      • Tautuhi 14.2.1
        23 January 2016 at 5:00 pm

        National have grown the country’s debt from $10 Billion to $105 Billion in 6-7 years, don’t know where they have spent it, the cycleway I don’t think is finished yet?

      • cogito 14.2.2
        23 January 2016 at 5:09 pm

        LOL, mate. 62 people are only 62 people. When the poor dispossessed hordes start invading their nice suburbs with their demands, diseases and screaming kids or ISIS send their hyped up militants to find them, where are your 62 scrooges going to hide? Under Angela Merkel’s skirts? There’s an old saying, bond boy, and it goes like this: No man is an island…. and that’s a saying that is getting truer by the day.

      • Stuart Munro 14.2.3
        23 January 2016 at 5:10 pm

        I don’t think anyone is suggesting that they give it away – we intend to take it off them.

      • reason 14.2.4
        23 January 2016 at 6:31 pm

        How rich will we be when ALL of our rivers are polluted and unsafe to swim in ?

        We”ll be national party rich …………………………….

      • mikesh 14.2.5
        24 January 2016 at 9:18 am

        Labour has never spent “other people’s money”. They have spent monies received through taxation, but all regimes, both right and left, have done that.

    • Tautuhi 14.3
      23 January 2016 at 4:58 pm

      Fisi are you sure you and I are both in New Zealand?

    • fender 14.4
      23 January 2016 at 5:15 pm

      “The big question for me however is whether the Greens are prepared to wait till 2026 for a chance in Government.”

      This little gem undermines your whole propaganda piece, fizz-bum. National desperately require someone like the GP or NZF in order to fulfil their ambition to rule forever. It’s not gunna happen numbnuts.

    • Paul 14.5
      23 January 2016 at 5:21 pm

      Dull.
      Very dull.

    • weka 14.6
      23 January 2016 at 5:47 pm

      “The Left simply fail to grasp how popular John Key is with the New Zealand public in a way that no other PM worldwide or in history has.”

      Was I the only one who felt a bit sick hearing fisi’s blinded adoration?

      • fender 14.6.1
        23 January 2016 at 6:36 pm

        No, I tend to get that feeling just seeing that “noble African name” in the comments list!

      • Doogs 14.6.2
        25 January 2016 at 10:49 pm

        No weka, I could hear the chunder being delivered into dunnies for miles around. Look, just leave him to wallow in his sea of delusions because that post was a gauntlet, pure and simple, and it was thrown down with a large dose of tongue in cheek. He is fisi-ing, looking for big fish. Don’t even give him a minnow. Remember what ‘reason’ said to us – he and his ilk are trolling for bites. Ignore him or annoy him with facts.

    • reason 14.7
      23 January 2016 at 6:27 pm

      The greens will go into Govt with National when the greens accept filling our streams, rivers and lakes with shit and degrading the environment ………………….

      Fisi, BM and other low grade dishonest trolls always lie about the greens ….. I suppose that’s the essence of being right wing.

      John Key and the Nats have taken us from 7th in the world down to 23rd in education rankings ……………..

      Is making the population stupid part of their long term electioneering plan ?

      • Tautuhi 14.7.1
        23 January 2016 at 7:24 pm

        National have done nothing for three terms apart from rearranging the deck chairs, we are swimming in a mountain of debt which doesn’t even get a mention from MSM, however we are supposedly a Rockstar Economy according to the HSBC Bank.

        Am I missing something?

  15. rod 15
    23 January 2016 at 4:42 pm

    Key will do whatever the US administration tells him to do.Nothing to see here.

    • Colonial Viper 15.1
      23 January 2016 at 5:26 pm

      Have either Labour or the Greens say that they will push for withdrawal from the TPPA? Or are they both fully under the sway of transnational corporates as well?

  16. rod 16
    23 January 2016 at 4:54 pm

    Unfortunately fisi doesn’t know the difference between popular and populist.

  17. acrophobic 17
    23 January 2016 at 5:27 pm

    Key will win a fourth term because he is what most kiwi’s are…a moderate, and so are most of his caucus. Politically, Key has captured the centre in NZ, and left the scraps to Labour. It’s a lesson the extremes on both sides of him seem incapable of learning. Along with that, National are rightly seen as a safe pair of hands. They have successfully stewarded the country through Labour’s recession and the GFC, they have returned the country to surplus, all without slashing welfare.

    • Colonial Viper 17.1
      23 January 2016 at 5:29 pm

      Interestingly, I agree with about 75% of your comment. Labour is structurally and organisationally incapable of victory at this point, and don’t even realise it, even though the electorate has been telling them over and over and over again.

      • BM 17.1.1
        23 January 2016 at 5:39 pm

        Ego, can’t admit they’re wrong or don’t even realize they’re wrong.

        They’re trying to sell wodgets when everyone wants widgets, but they think the customer is wrong and should be buying wodgets instead of widgets.

        Sticks out like dog nuts that none of them have any sort of marketing or business experience at all, not the sort of people you want running a export driven country.

        Personally I think it’s insane that people with so little skill, connections and talent could actually end up running a country of 4 million + people.

        Madness.

        • Scott M 17.1.1.1
          23 January 2016 at 6:42 pm

          BM – the government doesnt run the economy. Primarily their role is to set up the legal framework in which business operates. So why would business experience matter? That is not their role. Business SHOULD just be another stakeholder.

          All Nats are good at is the old boys club and back room deals. None of that is in the interests of the average NZer.

          • marty mars 17.1.1.1.1
            23 January 2016 at 6:52 pm

            yes it is a basic error to think a politician should have business or marketing experience – different roles different responsibilities and different mindset but typical from gnat supporters that business bullshit is seen as the ‘high point’ of knowledge.

          • BM 17.1.1.1.2
            23 January 2016 at 7:02 pm

            Government is managerial not political these days.

            Running a country like a dictatorship is not how it’s done anymore, you’ve got to be more flexible and know how to adapt to changing situations, this is where Labour fails and John Key wins.

            • greywarshark 17.1.1.1.2.1
              23 January 2016 at 8:37 pm

              BM
              I can’t help but agree with you. The flexibility allows control to be maintained and the train to stay on the rails, so to speak, we are moving, can’t get off and are not going to a destination we have chosen, in fact we don’t know where we should go.

          • Colonial Viper 17.1.1.1.3
            23 January 2016 at 8:32 pm

            BM – the government doesnt run the economy. Primarily their role is to set up the legal framework in which business operates.

            Nope – that’s the neoliberal conception of what government does.

            The first Labour Government planted massive forests, built hundreds of thousands of state houses, built and ran rail, operated postal, banking and insurance services, and pursued policies to establish import substitution.

        • Tautuhi 17.1.1.2
          23 January 2016 at 7:28 pm

          Governments don’t do the exporting they create the environment, framework etc for an economy to grow, National have done nothing in the last 6-7 years, and Labour did very little prior to National, so stop promoting Key as some sort of guru, all he has done is grow the debt and flog off some assets apart from that nada.

          • righty right 17.1.1.2.1
            24 January 2016 at 8:47 am

            john key has saved new zealand problem we have is there are far to many poor people only those who count should be allowed to vote those surplus to the economy should be marginalized

            • greywarshark 17.1.1.2.1.1
              25 January 2016 at 11:45 am

              The poor are marginalised righty right, right now. Should they be separated out and sent away like to a leper colony away from self-satisfied boof heads like you, whose interests must be preserved and whose type and genes kept pure?

              Perhaps you think the poor belong in concentration camps, with smoking chimneys for those who don’t work hard enough in the fields.

      • Scott M 17.1.2
        23 January 2016 at 6:44 pm

        What would you say Labour need to do to achieve said victory?

        • Colonial Viper 17.1.2.1
          23 January 2016 at 8:36 pm

          Labour is history. Their formation and foundation was based on early 20th century solutions to early 20th century problems.

          Labour achieved everything it was founded for by the mid 1960s and 1970s. Since then they have been grasping around undoing their historic legacy to the nation.

          For the Left to win Labour need to end.

          • marty mars 17.1.2.1.1
            23 January 2016 at 9:11 pm

            “For the Left to win Labour need to end.”

            That is a pretty hardcore view.

            • Colonial Viper 17.1.2.1.1.1
              23 January 2016 at 9:48 pm

              Labour is the rump political bureaucracy of a 20th century mass movement that today no longer exists (and that the politicians themselves helped to kill off in the 1980s).

              Consequently, Labour has been the walking wounded for many years now, stumbling further and further away from its founding principles and founding mission.

              For Labour it’s actually already all over, it just hasn’t stopped moving yet.

              • fisiani …
                24 January 2016 at 9:12 am

                I used to be a Labour voter. I was brought up to be a Labour voter. Labour values and my values were one and the same. My values are still the same. Labour now is just a ragbag of sector interest activists pleading for power. I have lost respect for Labour. I have found that National best fits with my personal values
                The National Party seeks a safe, prosperous, and successful New Zealand that creates opportunities for all New Zealanders to reach their personal goals and dreams.
                We believe this will be achieved by building a society based on the following values:
                • Loyalty to our country, its democratic principles, and our Sovereign as Head of State
                • National and personal security
                • Equal citizenship and equal opportunity
                • Individual freedom and choice
                • Personal responsibility
                • Competitive enterprise and reward for achievement
                • Limited government
                • Strong families and caring communities
                • Sustainable development of our environment

                • fender …
                  24 January 2016 at 12:48 pm

                  When you say:

                  “Labour values and my values were one and the same. My values are still the same.”

                  Then say:

                  “I have found that National best fits with my personal values”

                  I’m unsure whether you are naïve, disingenuous, or delusional. Perhaps you are a mix of all three.

                  • Scott M …
                    24 January 2016 at 6:05 pm

                    Fisi used to be working class and then obviously did well for himself.

                    Then he lifted the ladder. Its the National Party way.

                • Rich …
                  26 January 2016 at 1:07 pm

                  It would help if the left stopped giving a platform to Tories to spout their bollox.

                  (Hopefully, the standard is just doing this to build up a collection of IPs and timings that can be crossed with a nicked ISP database and used to find out home addresses for a bit of physical force socialism).

          • sabine 17.1.2.1.2
            23 January 2016 at 9:15 pm

            “The left” can do without labour.

            they have Mana, they have the Greens and they can create their new party.

            and anyone else can vote for National, NZ First, Labour and what ever other party there is. This is the beauty of MMP.

            Your hatred of Labour is taking the best of you. You start to sound like a broken record.
            But on the other hand lets have a few more years of National, we still have a few assets to sell, a few state houses that can fall into disrepear, a few businesses to close. Everything is better then Labour, n’est pas?

            • Colonial Viper 17.1.2.1.2.1
              23 January 2016 at 9:52 pm

              Your hatred of Labour is taking the best of you. You start to sound like a broken record.

              Not quite; I’m developing additional variations on a theme, partly to introduce some new ideas to readers of The Standard.

              But on the other hand lets have a few more years of National, we still have a few assets to sell, a few state houses that can fall into disrepear, a few businesses to close. Everything is better then Labour, n’est pas?

              Just remember one thing: I’m not the one virtually guaranteeing more years of National rule.

              The Labour Party caucus, which receives millions of dollars of taxpayer funding every year, is doing that.

              GR2020.

              • sabine …
                23 January 2016 at 9:58 pm

                I hope you have fun, developing alternative ways of saying the same.

                there is an old saying, if you can’t say something nice say nothing, or at least don’t become part of the problem.

                What is sad about this is that you could actually find yourself a party that suits you, create your own party, and be a force of change. Now you are becoming a troll like fisiani and his mates.

                • Scott M …
                  23 January 2016 at 10:45 pm

                  You have a narrow definition of left. There are those who are left wing economically, but socially conservative. E.g your typical NZ First voter.

                  When it comes to economic issues NZ First is therefore an ally.

                • Colonial Viper …
                  24 January 2016 at 9:04 pm

                  there is an old saying, if you can’t say something nice say nothing, or at least don’t become part of the problem.

                  Out of interest, what is your definition of “the problem”?

                  My definition is clearly different from yours and I am acting accordingly.

                  Go on being nice to Labour and making excuses for them, but their track record speaks for itself.

                  They can’t even bring themselves to say that they will leave the TPPA. All they can do is mouth weak objections to a few parts of it. The reason for this? Labour as a political party believes in free trade and believes in being alongside the anglosaxon free trade neoliberal globalisation trend.

                  • sabine …
                    25 January 2016 at 4:55 pm

                    the problem are splinter groups, very similar to the Weimarer Republic.

                    I am not being nice to Labour, nor do I make excuses for them, I am simply a different generation than yourself, so what was betrayal for you, was business as usual for my generation.
                    Secondly, in NZ the opposition (not the left btw. i think there is a big difference) needs Labour, it needs the Greens, and it needs NZ First.
                    At the moment I am planing on voting the Cannabis Crowd, mainly because they stand for something. That or NZ First. Heck, we might not vote altogether and then there will be a 4th term for National. Or cancel the election altogether if the outcome is so predictable cause no one wants to vote for Labour, but no one really wants to vote for the Greens to and also NZ First….heck can’t trust that guy.

                    So maybe we have a problem, or maybe we don?t.

                    How ever, as a country we might have to ask ourselfs where we will be in 4 years time, with a US Persnit Trump (USA! USA!) and a PM Key (land of the white surrender feather).

                    I don’t know, maybe we don’t have a problem and we can all go back to baking a cake and singing kumbaha while we wait for the one who is pure enough to lead us to nirvana.

                    • Colonial Viper …
                      25 January 2016 at 5:18 pm

                      How ever, as a country we might have to ask ourselfs where we will be in 4 years time, with a US Persnit Trump (USA! USA!) and a PM Key (land of the white surrender feather).

                      With Goff, Shearer, Parker, David Clark all pro-TPPA and Grant Robertson going with whatever works for his future career plans, what does it matter whether its Trump or warmongering Clinton as President of the USA? And Key in charge of NZ?

        • Stuart Munro 17.1.2.2
          23 January 2016 at 8:52 pm

          It’s easy – they need to rediscover their mongrel.

          Purge the PC crowd and deliver what put MJS on mantelpieces around the country like icons in Russia. Jobs and houses.

          And promise to punish the guilty Gnats – humans recognise fairness and demonstrate punitive responses to cheats from 18 months.

          http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-7687.2011.01048.x/abstract;jsessionid=22161DE103BA9DC13248AB254CAA4A1D.f01t02?userIsAuthenticated=false&deniedAccessCustomisedMessage=

    • cogito 17.2
      23 January 2016 at 5:47 pm

      Oh yes, definitely a moderate.

      Just shame about middle NZ struggling to meet increasing housing, schooling, retirement etc costs on stagnating incomes, zero hour contracts etc…

      and shame about the poor who are routinely treated like cattle…

      and shame about the ageing whose health services have been cut and are made to feel like a liability…

      Oh yes, it’s all good in Herr Key’s Natzi land. Three more years, oh yes please.

      • acrophobic 17.2.1
        24 January 2016 at 8:30 pm

        Middle NZ is enjoying low interest rates, low inflation, increasing real wages and lowering crime.

        • Colonial Viper 17.2.1.1
          25 January 2016 at 6:11 pm

          Now you sound like advertising for the comfortable middle class; the top 10% in NZ.

    • Tautuhi 17.3
      23 January 2016 at 7:33 pm

      Acro does the $105 Billion Debt count in the Big Picture?

  18. mickysavage 18
    23 January 2016 at 6:18 pm

    Hey RL this comment should be converted into a post!

    RL:OKI’ll delete it and start again

  19. marty mars 19
    23 January 2016 at 6:31 pm

    A thoughtful list red

    2 – if they leave and go to oz where the same neogame is on then what? Is it just the money? and if so what does that say about those that leave (not personal I know you are there I’m just trying to understand).

    a lot of your other points are true imo and they have produced kickback and still do and this process of opposing the lines and memes they push will continue.

    I cannot really get my head around the shorttermism though – shit didn’t labour run the show for 3 terms??? now after 3 gnat terms he’s emperor for life??? You guys need to take a leaf out of indigenous struggles which last until they are sorted – that is commitment and truth not some quick fix or skyalien solution.

    everything can turn on a dime (ironic I know) and it often does – as soon as we think we know what the story is nature and the universe are apt to drop a wee stick in the spokes – the sticks are already in there imo

    edit – where you gone red???

    • Colonial Viper 19.1
      23 January 2016 at 8:29 pm

      Labour did run the show for 3 terms and day after day Auckland home owners and the salaried middle class (and their uni studying kids) got more and more benefits.

      • marty mars 19.1.1
        23 January 2016 at 8:40 pm

        hmmm the salaried class will be assessed and measured – JMG has been thoughtful and direct about this (you may already have read it)

        “The only way for the salary class to maintain its lifestyle in the teeth of those transformations was to force down the cost of goods and services relative to the average buying power of the salary class. Because the salary class exercised (and still exercises) a degree of economic and political influence disproportionate to its size, this became the order of the day in the 1970s, and it remains the locked-in political consensus in American public life to this day. The destruction of the wage class was only one consequence of that project—the spectacular decline in quality of the whole range of manufactured goods for sale in America, and the wholesale gutting of the national infrastructure, are other results—but it’s the consequence that matters in terms of today’s politics.”

        http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.co.nz/2016/01/donald-trump-and-politics-of-resentment.html

        • Colonial Viper 19.1.1.1
          23 January 2016 at 8:48 pm

          Exactly. What negative impact does the Fisher and Paykel factory closure outside Dunedin have on an academic, public servant or bank manager on a six figure salary?

          Zero. But they do get the cost reduction benefits of cheaper made in Mexico shit.

  20. Anne 20
    23 January 2016 at 6:41 pm

    Hey RL this comment should be converted into a post!

    Indeed it should. So much meat. I want RL to be proven wrong but I have too much respect for his political instincts to take a bet on it.

    You’re right. It’s not about Key. Although we use him as a punch ball, I think our far greater concern is a fair and just society where everyone is appreciated and properly rewarded for the work they do. The reason we spend so much time slagging Key is because he epitomises everything that stands in the way of that kind of society.

    If Andrew Little is able to turn around the current myopia of the masses and gets them thinking about that elusive fair and just society then he’s in with a chance. The only problem… god knows how he could do it.

    ooops Red has gone. Going to be a new post I think m.m.

    • Colonial Viper 20.2
      23 January 2016 at 9:56 pm

      If Andrew Little is able to turn around the current myopia of the masses and gets them thinking about that elusive fair and just society then he’s in with a chance. The only problem… god knows how he could do it.

      He has no interest in that; the Labour caucus strategy is to win over the votes of the comfortable middle class by appearing at all costs to be the next ‘credible government in waiting.’

  21. Robert Atack 21
    23 January 2016 at 8:24 pm

    The shit is going to hit the fan big time soon, if not already, but definitely in the next 2-3 years .
    At least we will have a reasonable idea where the people who did the last lot of lying are located, it would be great to have the last 15 – 20 years worth of politicians lined up for the ‘reckoning’. Not that I would be getting involved, but I’m sure the masses are going to want to blame someone )
    The climate is imploding, global trade is supposedly next to nonexistent?, GFC2 has begun. In 12 months we would vote for Adolf Hitler if he promised we could return to now )
    That was the good old days.

  22. Wainwright 22
    23 January 2016 at 8:46 pm

    Of course he’ll go for a fourth term. Key is a political master but he has fuckall likely successors. Three more years to get one of those young snobs like Bridgers or Kaye up to speed, only way to keep them in power.

    Helps that Labour keep being a bunch of uninspiring muppets though.

    • fisiani 22.1
      24 January 2016 at 12:20 pm

      Your time frame is all wrong and you are thinking in terms of current ministers. If I look out to 2026 I predict PM C Bishop. Deputy Amy Adams. Finance A Scott. Foreign Paul FosterBell. Just as labour have morphed from a social justice party to a special interest collective so to has National changed to a collection of highly competant individuals with great experience and skill to run NZInc like an efficient company. National s main problem is an abundance of talent in the reserves. Key knows this and several ministers will be passed over. He has the diplmatic skills to handle the bruised egos that will result. Of course there will be storms in a teacup but nothing cataclysmic.

  23. Pat 23
    23 January 2016 at 9:26 pm

    if the events of recent weeks continue on and in any way approach their natural conclusion Key will be gone….the election is 18 months away.

  24. Neil 24
    23 January 2016 at 11:09 pm

    Time to take a large dose of valium, to make life a little more bearable

  25. Tautuhi 25
    24 January 2016 at 12:39 pm

    I am packing by bags if National get in for a 4th Term, head back down the East Coast with my tent and fishing rod, either that or get a double prescription of Prozac.

  26. Smilin 26
    24 January 2016 at 10:03 pm

    Over the next two years till the next election I think with the way the last one went with Dirty Politics, journalism on the left, to keep itself a force in game, would do to have a look at the movie “Truth” as a reminder of how much the corporate media are going to keep the pressure up to “protect the President “as it were in their already established axing of high profile left personalities and investigative reporting from our screens and put the squeeze on the blog and other forms of criticism of the govt on the web, so that everyone dont get to hear the same story on the same day
    Hopefully the opposition are truly onto it, but seeing how Key corp weaseled out of Dirty politics, the opposition is going to have to up its game if that kind of shutdown isn’t going to happen again starting with this TPPA monster

  27. TheBlackKitten 27
    24 January 2016 at 10:56 pm

    What the real shame is that Key will get that fourth term and maybe a fifth could also be on the horizon. This is a PM who has let Auckland become unaffordable for the average Kiwi. This is the PM that has created a situation where you can get a job in Auckland but can’t afford to buy a home or you can afford to buy one in the regions but you can’t get a job yet he is looking at a very strong possibility of winning a fourth term. A fourth term which has not been achieved since Holyoake back in 69.
    What we should be looking at is why? Key has not done a spectacular job, he is not overly charismatic and is a bit of a dork so why is he looking getting a fourth term? The reason is obvious. The opposition is hopeless, does not relate to middle NZ and does not address their economic concerns. Wages are going down and the cost of living is going up. This had been going on since the 80s despite the fact that we had a ruling labour government during that period for 9 years. Helen was very right wing economically, remember she did have a good teacher in Douglas whom she sat with in cabinet for years without one whimper of protest.
    Middle NZ do not like political correctness, affirmative discrimination and pandering to minorities. They dislike university educated academics who are arrogant and believe that an education will automatically grant you common sense, the ability to relate to all types of people and is far superior to the good old practical life experience that was the foundation of the likes of Kirk. They do not like a party that find it too hard to tax the rich more and instead put a punitive tax rate on middle NZ of 39 percent to fund many socialist policies that they they never seem entitled to. They especially dislike punitive measures that are forced on them in the way of high company tax and acc if they dare to aspire to and start up a small business.
    What they would like is a party that is prepared to address the low wages vs cost of living issues, the Auckland housing crisis and incentives for small businesses. They would also like to see a safety net provided to those in genuine need only. When they voice this, the current opposition sneers at them and labels them with labels like rich prick or filthy pig capitalist or selfish or too stupid. The opposition is failing to listen to its voters and instead is hostile and makes demeaning remarks about them for daring to reject their current policies.
    And the reason why Key will get his forth and his fifth term if he wants it is basically because labour are too dam arrogant to listen to what the people want. There are no missing million, what’s missing is the labour parties ears in listening to middle NZ.

  28. sabine 28
    25 January 2016 at 5:30 pm

    no reply button on this reply to Colonial Viper

    “Colonial Viper …
    25 January 2016 at 5:18 pm
    How ever, as a country we might have to ask ourselfs where we will be in 4 years time, with a US Persnit Trump (USA! USA!) and a PM Key (land of the white surrender feather).

    With Goff, Shearer, Parker, David Clark all pro-TPPA and Grant Robertson going with whatever works for his future career plans, what does it matter whether its Trump or warmongering Clinton as President of the USA? And Key in charge of NZ?”

    I will answer this with my preferred herione Dorothy Parker:

    “Résumé
    Razors pain you,
    Rivers are damp,
    Acids stain you,
    And drugs cause cramp.
    Guns aren’t lawful,
    Nooses give,
    Gas smells awful.
    You might as well live.”

    http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/62502-r-sum-razors-pain-you-rivers-are-damp-acids-stain-you

    Because we must live an can not give up. If your sentiment about the situation is as thus, we can all go to bed and stay there. And that would bore me endlessly. So even with these geezers it would not be as bad as it will be under the current status quo.

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