National’s New Lynn candidate is not having a good campaign

Written By: - Date published: 7:01 am, September 2nd, 2017 - 24 comments
Categories: election 2017, national, Politics, you couldn't make this shit up - Tags: ,

With National’s party vote plummeting the prospects of new list MPs being elected is decreasing rapidly.  But the third new MP on the list, Paulo Garcia is an interesting choice.  And you have to wonder why he was selected.

I wrote about him earlier.  I was astounded that National thought that he would be the best candidate.  I personally thought that Ruby Manukia Shaumkell could have causes Labour all sorts of problems if she was National’s candidate.

Garcia was the Honorary Counsel for the Philippines in New Zealand.  I was worried because it appeared that the Philippine Ambassador seemed to be an over enthusiastic supporter of Paulo’s National Party candidacy.  He replied and explained that he attended meetings involving a number of different political parties and also supported the candidacy of Romy Udanga who is Labour’s candidate on the North Shore.  Good on him.

Garcia is a conservative Catholic.  I can understand what this has done to him because I am a lapsed Irish Catholic and still struggle with what it has done to my head.  Thankfully now I am mostly liberal left.  But I can understand the soul destroying effect that a strict adherence to conservative Catholicism can cause.

Garcia believes that abortion is wrong and that raising children is harder for same-sex couples.  He also does not believe in recreational fornication and says that intercourse should be about procreation.  Those views will go down well out west.

He is also confident that he will win the seat.  How he handles his inevitable loss once he does lose I do not know.  Perhaps he should question his completely uncompromising faith.

His birth control beliefs are the sorts of beliefs that conservative Republicans have.  He thinks that sense will overcome teenage hormones.  Can he let me know if this works because so far I have seen no evidence that it does.

He is also apparently in love with West Auckland and cannot wait to move closer.  Sorry Pablo if you really loved West Auckland you would already live here.  Waiting until you are elected is a real cop out.

What I am interested in is how he reconciles his pro life beliefs with his position as the honorary consul of a country whose leader, Rodrigo Duterte, has been accused of being responsible for the extra judicial deaths of thousands and thousands of Philippine citizens.  Their problem was that the Philippine Government thought they were drug pushers or drug addicts.  They were killed by police guns.  No need for an expensive trial or lawyers with this technique.

And the cases of extra judicial killing are showing up significant anomalies.  Like the shooting of Kian Loyd delos Santos a teenager aged 17 whose death is going to be investigated by the senate.  From the New York Times:

Kian Loyd delos Santos, 17, is just one of thousands of Filipinos shot and killed by the police since President Rodrigo Duterte began a sweeping crackdown on drugs last year.

But the youth’s death last week in Caloocan City, outside Manila, has had an effect that no other police killing has: The Senate, though dominated by allies of the president, has opened an investigation.

Mr. delos Santos, a high school student, was among 96 people killed in the Manila area last week in what the police called a “one-time, big-time” crackdown on drug dealers and addicts in the capital and several sprawling suburbs. It was the bloodiest week of the antidrug campaign that Mr. Duterte started after taking office last summer, promising to rid the country of corruption and crime.

The police said that Mr. delos Santos had been carrying a handgun when they encountered him on Aug. 16, and that they had shot him in self-defense after he “fought it out” with them. The police have a term for that, “nanlaban,” which has become associated in the Philippines with police killings.

But since the teenager’s death, surveillance camera footage has emerged of police officers forcefully leading him away — contradicting accounts of a spontaneous shootout. Witnesses said they had seen officers dragging Mr. delos Santos to a cul-de-sac near a community basketball court, handing him a gun and telling him to run — only to shoot him as he turned to do so.

An autopsy found that Mr. delos Santos had been shot at least twice in the head, at close range. At his wake, his father told reporters that a gun had been found in the youth’s left hand, though he was right-handed. He had wanted to be a police officer, the father added.

The police have killed more than 3,500 people since the beginning of Mr. Duterte’s crackdown, according to their own count, and they note that the vast majority resisted arrest. While many Filipinos have expressed doubts about that point, rarely if ever have there been surveillance camera images contradicting a police account of a shooting, as in Mr. delos Santos’s case.

Mr Garcia has met Mr Duterte.

There is also the question of competence and he recently gave a train wreck of an interview where he could not answer such basic questions as where was the closest marae, the names of the local secondary schools, when David Cunliffe became the local MP, or when the New Lynn electorate was established.

Watch it and cringe.

Having strange world views do not help if you want to be elected. But if you want to do the job you need to have at least a basic knowledge of the area and the history.

24 comments on “National’s New Lynn candidate is not having a good campaign ”

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  1. Pat 1
    2 September 2017 at 8:24 am

    which all leads one to seriously question National’s selection process…but then so does the Barclay affair.

    • tracey 1.1
      2 September 2017 at 11:40 am

      And National under Key wished more women would contest their selections. Tui Ad.

    • Seaweed 1.2
      2 September 2017 at 7:57 pm

      Ah yes, the Barclay illegal recordings matter..
      Bill English keeps trying to pass it off as an “employment dispute” but what it is , in fact, is a national party wide Conspiracy to Obstruct, Prevent, Pervert or Defeat Justice. Rotten to the core… These people must face a full investigation…
      We deserve to know just how corrupt the national party really is…

  2. greywarshark 2
    2 September 2017 at 11:38 am

    the soul destroying effect that a strict adherence to conservative Catholicism can cause.

    A telling phrase when used in a sentence involving religion. And one that my observations over decades leads to understanding. But to think more widely this would apply to all ‘conservative’ religious people. And the less conservative? They are where the soul can be nurtured, but not all of them.

    (I’m being a bit reflective hereon, possibly boring.) Being wary of those who are Bible-centred is important. The Bible is a gathering of people’s thoughts (mostly men’s) and historic recollections of happenings and pronouncements made decades after the event. It is open to interpretation, both because of the nature and experiences of the person who wrote the content, and because many things were different 2,000 years ago (if Christian writings). But we are still on a quest now for how to make a good life and community. Then and now we still have to think and not just follow.

    The person wanting to find a religious group with principles, love of the person, respect for the person, and wishing to follow the good principles in all religions and not hung up on rigid and inhuman rules has to look widely and think before committing to one group. Some may find that the church wants money and compliance from its adherents, and some can be unpleasant and harrassing if someone wants to leave. Further, some are so vindictive that they turn that person into a pariah and will interfere and threaten the job of that person decades later.

    Some of the non-traditional churches are more cults or they are businesses in the hungry money-making, everything that makes a profit is good present era. There is money to be made in starting a church or a charity, as the cold capitalism of today drives people into insecurity, confusion, and down to the precariat and past that.

    So the individual has to look clearly at the actions of the religious group trying to gather them into their fold, does what they say match what they do. Do they respect and enhance the lives of their adherents in a way that results in loving and kindness to others, and also to each person in the congregation. (It is my observation that often the strong and driven within the church are adept at playing on the needs for community and belonging and use this to advance their own plans, with no inclusion and little ‘give’ to the individual whose time and talents are being taken. Or they become mere objects of charity without being part of a team that has achievable valid goals that they can work together on, respecting and co-operating and ultimately having that sense of personal achievement and worth that is separate from a money reward. the worship of imposed lifestyle (hard work, cleanliness, restrained controlled behaviour in everything, groupthink about how much joy or thinking or whatever should be appropriate in everything)

    • Incognito 2.1
      2 September 2017 at 12:11 pm

      Hi greywarshark,

      Very good comment!

      It seemed to pop out of the blue and I had not seen it here in this thread!?

      • greywarshark 2.1.1
        2 September 2017 at 2:15 pm

        Incognito
        It was a full post so I should have given GPS on where I found it.
        This is near the top in reference to Mr Garcia.

        Garcia is a conservative Catholic. I can understand what this has done to him because I am a lapsed Irish Catholic and still struggle with what it has done to my head. Thankfully now I am mostly liberal left. But I can understand the soul destroying effect that a strict adherence to conservative Catholicism can cause.

        And Micky’s comment struck me also to write on what I have noticed.

        I have noticed recently how Catholics are cropping up and their rigid precepts. Mr and Mrs English both can be classified as conservative Catholics. Mr English has ushered in something called social investment. Which means taking on private entities to run some charity, notforprofit entity, of an aspect of the national culture. Which results in Mrs English being on a board receiving a contract to work with Pacifica youth. Which has a number of conservative Catholics and known anti-abortionists on it.

        Religions are becoming businesses because of the supposed good that they do in society (and objectively, most do), but they and charities have no or limited tax as a result of this supposed support of values of good and help for those needing it. So business and religion are becoming bedfellows, and because we have a government that scorns principles and runs on pragmatism, it finds it pragmatic to increasingly unload onto religion as business, their responsibility of running the state.

        The division between state and religion we thought in our democracy we had is in danger of being lost with the resultant loss of analysis (replaced by precepts and belief), moralistic crusades (instead of accepting, educating and treating to deal with destructive habits and immature behaviours). And there seems to be a tide coming in that could smother some of the rational efforts introduced after long lobbying for the right for individuals to handle life’s problems in a way that is thoughtful and as humane as possible.

        And as times get hard authoritarian types emerge, and present themselves as knowing and competent to judge others, and to help them. And people who have no idea of how to cope and are given no options, will turn to cults and domineering authority and give up their individuality without ever knowing they had alternatives for a meaningful and better life.

        No real kindness with respect for humanity in others, is seen already at the base of the so-called thinking and principles of many right now. This may lead to practices and attitudes as in The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood and stories from the gulags by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn –
        (One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich and The Gulag Archipelago.)
        Some of his quotes from Wikipedia:
        Quotes
        The battleline between good and evil runs through the heart of every man.

        Own only what you can always carry with you: know languages, know countries, know people. Let your memory be your travel bag.

        Hastiness and superficiality are the psychic diseases of the 20th century, and more than anywhere else this disease is reflected in the press.

        • Incognito 2.1.1.1
          3 September 2017 at 1:44 pm

          I am always cautious when discussing religion/faith and politics together.

          MickySavage talks from a (deeply) personal experience when he refers to Mr Garcia as “a conservative Catholic”. Mr Garcia will have his own personal interpretations. The point is that we all do and not necessarily based on direct first-hand experience with this or that particular religion or whatever.

          To call someone else “conservative”, “orthodox”, or “fundamental”, for example, raises enormous red flags with many people with often highly predictable reactions (e.g. stereotypes).

          I think it is an unhelpful distraction in political debate – it applies to racism, sexism and all sorts of ‘isms’. It positions people at opposite poles by emphasising their differences (idiosyncrasies) and over-exaggerating their ‘otherness’ from the outset. Thus we have much more ground to cover before we reach each other and properly listen and talk with rather than to each other.

  3. Incognito 3
    2 September 2017 at 12:07 pm

    I’d be interested whether and how Mr Garcia can reconcile his personal values & beliefs with the values of the party he stands for. He might struggle with at least two to three of those.

    https://www.national.org.nz/our-values

    In general, I don’t have a problem at all with a politician having strong values – an underappreciated trait IMO – but when it turns to advocating these at the expense of others or bordering on intolerance or worse such person should not hold public office.

    • Descendant Of Sssmith 3.1
      2 September 2017 at 2:18 pm

      The alignment between the right and the religious is predominantly a financial one rather than a moral one.

      No taxation, charity rather than welfare, funding for their schools (neutrally classed as private rather than what they are religious) are all financial considerations at their heart.

      Morals get put aside as churches take from the taxpayers whatever they can get their hands on without ever advocating that they themselves should pay tax and contribute. They get hundreds of millions dollars via government grants, contracting services, payments to their schools, and now for what were previously state responsibilities such as housing.

      Morals get put aside as pious priests latch onto any semblance of Catholicism in families to have white flight exacerbated by pretending the kids they have at their school are being raised as Catholic – legally they can only have 10% non-Catholics at a Catholic school.

      They know there’s little scrutiny of themselves – when have we seen an evaluation of the Family first parenting programs, any ERO report that actually checks schools aren’t in breach of the 10% rule, any assessment of how they put moralising slants on any of the programs they get funded to run, – from education, to social work, to drug addiction, to now housing.

      It just doesn’t happen. There’s too much money involved.

      • Incognito 3.1.1
        2 September 2017 at 3:12 pm

        I’d rather not go into a specific argument with you about Catholic schools and what they might or might not do.

        I think your general key point is that morals are subordinate to money and ‘values’ with having, making, and keeping money. This money would be at the expense of others [no pun] if it were a zero-sum situation – I don’t know that this applies to Government’s finances, technically speaking.

        I guess you’re right that there are indeed people with such a value system in which these align and not incongruent or at least are not inconsistent.

  4. Tanz 4
    2 September 2017 at 2:19 pm

    Conservative views gets my vote, yes, about time we had candidates with good old fashioned caring conservative views. New Lynn used to be a safe Labour seat, but not any more.

    • Cinny 4.1
      2 September 2017 at 8:49 pm

      Tanz you make me laugh so much some times. But hey whatever floats your boat.

      I don’t know about you but I don’t have sex just to be a baby making machine, I have sex/make love with my man for the intimate connection, very special moments beyond the simplicity of words.
      It’s the best, the best way to connect with your partner on every dimension all at the same time, mental health benefits of those moments of connection are incredible after all our brains are electric and if you are making love you are feeling love and loved. Why on earth anyone would want to have sex/make love just to breed is beyond my understanding.

      Others see their wives as baby making machines, sex with the wife is only for conception. It’s interesting that it’s just fine for Catholics to mass breed, but anyone who ends up on a benefit (ie may have lost their job) with lots of kids is slammed and scorned by conservatives (like Catholics) and told don’t have kids if you can’t afford them. I wonder why that is?

      A friend of mine ran a high-class brothel for some time, conservative men were the most typical clients and would come in droves, regularly. Caring conservatives…. not when they were paying strangers for sex behind their wives backs. JS

      • Tanz 4.1.1
        3 September 2017 at 10:01 am

        Not wanting to get into that argument, but Conservatives are caring: old fashioned, family and traditional values. Think back: conservative NZ in the fifties was better off than now; low crime, low unemployment, low divorce rates, united families, hardly any dysfunction, Christian values (yes, still around!). These days its anything goes, art is rubbish, lots of prisons, homeless, people seem to care about money and how many houses they own. We have lost something ever since the drug filled sixties. Big Bang Theory is a good example of a rubbishy TV show; everything now dumbed down, the brotherly values of yesterday long gone!! Progress? Not in my books. Old school values worked!

        • Descendant Of Sssmith 4.1.1.1
          3 September 2017 at 1:48 pm

          Nonsense.

          Those aspects you espouse as good values were working class socialist values. They were developed by the trade unionists, the socialists, the communists. The conservatives were dragged along kicking and screaming and forever opposing.

          Unemployment was low because the state paid people who could not compete for work in the private sector a job in the public service.

          A job in the public service was for many that generations welfare system. People with disabilities, with mental health issues, with Downs syndrome – many, many had jobs in the public service.

          Many others of course were hidden away in institutions.

          State housing for life ensured certainty of housing and enabled children to go to the same school and public health nurses and Plunket to help support families.

          With no real benefit system and laws that said it was OK to beat and rape your spouse it was difficult for many women to leave their marriages. Having to go to court and have your dirty linen outlined in public was also another restraint. Many could not do so until they got an old age pension. At that point quite a few took the opportunity leaving some quite bewildered men. I think it was Sonja Davies who at one point interviewed quite a number of those women who had quite horrific stories in abuse and violence behind those married doors.

          The largest multiple police killings were in 1941 (four policeman) and twice in 1963 (two times two policeman killed).

          When you see the stories behind people like Jules Mikus you see the impact of generations of familial abuse going back to that time and beyond.

          The population has of course doubled and a bit since the sixties as well so the volume of crime – all things being equal should double as well.

          So people haven’t changed – there’s still those who lie, cheat, drink, abuse and murder. Your generation was no different to this one, nor the one before.

          What’s changed is that the conservatives (who as part of the conservative mantra believe in as little taxation and small government and making money) have wrested control.

          The dismantling of the socialist policies and the diversion of that which supported the many to that which supports the few is the problem.

          It’s not the liberal attitudes that has caused this – it is the conservative resurgence.

        • Cinny 4.1.1.2
          3 September 2017 at 5:33 pm

          Tarnz,
          With pedophilia constantly being exposed in the Christian Catholic faith, I’m not sure I would want to be associated with Christian values. JS

          Just because Big Bang is not your flavour doesn’t mean it’s rubbish.

          Just because you think some art is rubbish, does not mean everyone does, maybe it’s just ignorance. If it evokes emotion then a piece of art works.

          Conservative NZ in the fifties was not a fun place for many woman.

          Low divorce rates were due to no help or support if a woman wanted to leave her abusive husband, add some stigma and gossipy whispering, maybe being turned away from the church as well.

          Dysfunction was well hidden, can’t have the neighbours talking long sleeves hide bruises.

          How about the kids…. it was legal to beat them into submission, the state care that some were placed in turned out to be the most horrific abusive experiences of their lives.

          How about the 6 o’clock swill, quick drink as much as you can boys, got to be out of here at 6, go home and beat the wife.

          Unemployment was down, so naturally so was the crime, and education was free, another reason crime was down.

          Our boys were sent to Korea and Mayla to die

          Waterfront dispute erupted biggest industrial confrontation in our history.

          Rock n Roll was attacking good family values.

          And they ripped up the railway line that went through to Nelson.

          But hey blame the state of today on the drug filled ’60’s if that’s what you need to do.

          Be the change you wish to world to see.

          There’s only one mantra around our home… Ye harm none do what ye will (includes harming ones self).

          Can’t time travel succesfully at the moment, so instead of wanting to be in another era, am looking forward to the future, and doing what I can to make it awesome. It’s complex yes, but the lessons from the past are plentiful enough, great change is coming and is needed

  5. Tricledrown 5
    2 September 2017 at 2:21 pm

    Don’t worry he won’t nor will Bill This is our teaparty take over of National by the Christian conservatives leading the way are the exclusive brethren they have learned to stay out of the limelight working behind the scenes funding anti left propaganda building huge financial reserves to keep right wing parties in power.
    Regular calling TalkBack shows and spreading cynicism on social media.

  6. Sabine 6
    2 September 2017 at 2:41 pm

    you say: But if you want to do the job you need to have at least a basic knowledge of the area and the history.

    nope, if you want the job, you need to have at least basic knowledge of how to please Bill English and other Party big wigs as that is all you need to do in order to be an MP for National. See Paula Bennett, Nick Smith, John Coleman, Ann Tolley, and all the others that have literally done nothing for their electorate but have rubberstamped any policy of cutting services and diverting money form the public to private interests.

    Or do you really think that Ann Tolley has been good for Kawerau? I was there about a week ago, her electoral office is in a block of shops of which most are for sale/lease, right next to a run down hairdressers and a large liquor shop. And these were the only shops occupied in a block of about 10 shops. National is not good for business and its not good for neighborhoods.

  7. Michael who failed Civics 7
    2 September 2017 at 3:54 pm

    “Having strange world views do not help if you want to be elected.” – Really? I think anyone who entertains the idea of seeking elected office in a society like ours must have strange world views. Of course, it is essential that candidates do not disclose these views publicly, as opposed to dissembling and lying about them (and other matters).

  8. WILD KATIPO 8
    2 September 2017 at 7:35 pm

    Hmmm…I don’t like using peoples faith as a point of leverage and all I see with a particular wing of Catholicism , – is not a fundamental belief in Jesus Christ , but the external trappings which use that for political advantage. I’m talking of course of the Jesuits ,… who are in fact , Christ deniers and who have wormed their way (unfortunately ) over the decades into the highest positions inside the Catholic faith.

    I am not Catholic, but I know there are many great and humble Catholic folk. I’ve had the privilege to meet many of them. Real salt of the earth types. The type that would give you the shirt off their backs and then take you in if you were homeless.

    Great people.

    Check out Leo Zagami to see what I mean about Jesuits , – and this is how you tell the imposter’s from the real deal.

    Illuminati Whistleblower – Leo Zagami
    https://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/esp_sociopol_illuminati_29.htm

    Leo Zagami
    leozagami.com/

    My mums family’s heritage is the Salvation Army , and that goes right back to Willy Booth and the first outposts in the Hawkes Bay thereof . And I’m proud of that as well, despite always being a bit of a harum-scarum bogan. I just reckon that people have a right to their opinion, harsh as that may seem , but that’s politics and free speech,… not that I’d want to defend the scumbag neo liberal National party by any chalk.

    New Right Fight – Who are the New Right?
    http://www.newrightfight.co.nz/pageA.html

    NAZI’s !!!

    I just reckon poor Paulo Garcia has chosen the wrong side for the time being . Give it a bit of time , and after 6-9 years of Labour ,… he’ ll see the light , bless him…

    So think of it this way ,… we get another adherent to social democracy when he does.

    🙂

    • Cinny 8.1
      2 September 2017 at 8:52 pm

      Nicely said Wild Katipo 😀

      • WILD KATIPO 8.1.1
        3 September 2017 at 1:57 am

        Lol !… I also like this one , … a fathers love never gives up !

        And tonight just booted out my son and his girlfriend for not pulling their weight…

        Old lions don’t take no garbage ! Cept I called them to sneak in at 3am and get warm. All forgiven. Couldnt handle them being sleeping in a car shivering. After that , well , … we take it from there.

        The Master’s Call – Marty Robbins – YouTube
        marty robbins return of the gunfighter the masters call playlist youtube▶ 3:32

  9. Descendant Of Sssmith 9
    3 September 2017 at 6:27 am

    Timely article from Rolling Stone.

    http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/joel-osteen-is-the-quintessential-pastor-of-the-trump-era-w500599

    “The prosperity gospel teaches that God will bless those who have faith, and that one’s health – and, particularly, wealth – are a manifestation of that blessing. Its proponents include the cheerful Osteen, who has said, “I don’t think it’s God’s best” to be poor. “Some people have this poverty mindset, and I’m a Christian, and I’m supposed to suffer,” he told CNN in 2012. “That’s just not how I see it.”

    Some purveyors of this teaching pressure their congregants with what’s known as seed-faith theology: Sow a seed – meaning, give money to your pastor or a televangelist – and you will receive a thousand-fold “harvest” in return. Often people are shamed into giving money, even money they can’t afford to give. And when they don’t magically get rewarded for their “faith” and “sowing the seed,” they are told it’s because they don’t have enough faith.”

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