by frog
Yesterday’s final election debate was a pretty low-key affair. I only noticed two moments worthy of comment.
First: the anti-nuclear policy. Why is Dr Brash continuing with this strangely evasive line that National won’t get rid of the anti-nuclear legislation without a referendum? Why not simply say: “I am in favour of New Zealand retaining our anti-nuclear legislation, I am absolutely committed to it, and I have no intention whatsoever to change it.”? Full stop. Without adding “without a referendum”. This is a serious question. I simply don’t understand National’s bob-each-way stance. It seems to me to be dumb politics.
Second: the mainstream issue. It was a mistake for Dr Brash to talk about “mainstream” New Zealanders, because the media were always going to try and pin him on which Kiwis aren’t “mainstream”. However, when asked who is not “mainstream” in last night’s debate, Brash made a big error in saying that Clark and Labour supporters are not mainstream. This is insulting to the around 50% of New Zealanders who want Helen Clark to remain Prime Minister after Saturday. It’s also eerily reminiscent of those who claimed that Americans who didn’t support George Bush’s war on terrorism were treasonous, even anti-American. Brash was basically saying: Clark and her supporters are anti-Kiwi, anathema to Kiwi values. That’s a rather divisive way of describing your opponents, and an unhelpful addition to New Zealand’s political discourse. More to the point: surely, Brash could have come up with a better, safer answer while pushing all his supporters’ buttons at the same time?
Couldn’t he have said that “dole bludgers” (those who are capable of working but are content to bludge off the state) and criminals (those who have broken the law and thus ripped up the social contract all Kiwis sign) and Maori separatists (those who want separate Maori government) are not mainstream? He could then have said, “the difference between me and my opponent is that I reject these Kiwis while you embrace them”. That would have done the trick in terms of dog-whistling grubbily to his target voters, but would have avoided coming across as gratuitously divisive.
The debate probably wouldn’t have changed anybody’s minds anyway, but yet again Brash’s vulnerabilities were exposed for all to see. As yesterday’s Press editorial puts it: “His aloof, naive manner and the gaps in his knowledge will not serve him well if he does get the top job”.
Published in Campaign | Society & Culture by frog on Fri, September 16th, 2005
Tags: environment
on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
i think it will change some minds.
don brash claims to be the inclusive, uniting, one-law for all PM. asides from the other groups he has disenfranchised (eg maori), he’s now excluding everyone who supports labour.
national party supporters have family members who support labour, and seeing them denigrated like this is a bridge too far.
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Contrast Brash’s comments with Clark’s at Victoria University the other day – in her closing speech she stated (at least twice) that a New Zealand with a Don Brash-led Government would be one in which “people scratch each other’s eyes out.”
Given the large number of people who appear on the polls to be flitting between the major parties, and can find good in the plan of each for New Zealand, what on Earth was she thinking?
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Edge:
Don’t be silly, the left (by definition) cannot be divisive when it indulges in personal attacks on Don Brash or National Party members/supporters. After all the times folks like alig have spewed vitriol at National supporters on this blog, I frankly find his/her huffing and puffing above either disingenuously naive or flat out hypocritical.
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craig- who’s being disingenuously naive?- there’s a difference between extremely critical of don brash’s policies (as I am) and indulging in nasty bushian rhetoric against people for supporting labour. after all, all of us have friends and famiy on the other side…
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Don Brash did not say “Labour supporters”, he said “The Labour Party were not mainstream.”
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The first thing he replied when asked the question was basically mainstream NZers had to support his policies (tax cuts, Maori rights etc., can’t remember the precise details). John Campbell then asked “But who are these people?” and he said “Basically, members of the Labour party”. So although Labour/Green supporters might not be covered by the second statement, they were in the first. Wish I had a transcript, but from what he said it, I remember I wouldn’t have been mainstream (being left-leaning), and this is quite insulting.
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Campbell: Who is not a mainstream New Zealander?
Brash: People who are not mainstream New Zealanders are people who are content to see Labour’s welfare policy trap more and more people into welfare dependency, people who are content to see the Maori political correctness thing going on that requires different facilities for Maori from non-Maori in some polytechs, people that are content to see tax take a bigger and bigger bite of the average wage. Those are not mainstream New Zealanders
Campbell: Ok so who are they exactly? Who are those people?
Brash: The mainstream New Zealanders?
Campbell: No, no, the people who aren’t. The people you just identified.
Brash: Mostly members of the Labour party.
Campbell: So Helen Clarke’s not a mainstream New Zealander?
Brash: No, she’s not.
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That’s explicitly a nationalist message. Wagons in a circle. The good folks are with us. The others are against us. Are you pure enough to be one of us?
I like Nandor’s image : we’re a multi-braided river. Don’s branch is all silted up. If he wants to be mainstream like in the Good Old Days, he’s got some dredging to do.
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