Ralston not a rightie
September 10th, 2008 at 8:30 am by David FarrarBill Ralston blogs:
Trotter takes the view that The Listener has rushed out and deliberately “retained a stable of journalists and columnists whose published material places them firmly on the right of the political spectrum”. He fingers as the key culprits writers Jane Clifton, Joanne Black, David Young, myself and Deborah Hill-Cone.
He notes:
The sad fact is when it comes to the political spectrum I tend to sit somewhere in the wishy washy liberal middle.
I’ve never voted National or Act and throw up at the thought of going Green or, worse, Progressive – so I suspect you can guess where my ballot has usually been cast.
So Bill has never ever voted National (or ACT) yet because he dares to sometimes criticise the current Government, people assume he must be a right winger.
This time I might consider National, mainly because I get that “time for a change” feeling and the Nats really are “Labour-lite” – Labour minus the hand-wringing political correctness that annoys the hell out of me.
I don’t know. Like many New Zealanders, I haven’t made my mind up yet.
Clark is certainly the most effective Prime Minister we’ve had in my lifetime, although she and her government appear to have run out of ideas and now cling to power for the sake of being there.
It’s a government that got sidetracked. Because so many in cabinet are academics or teachers the emphasis went on to process rather than delivery. Huge amounts of money have been thrown at social policy areas to little real effect other than stimulating a huge growth in bureaucracy and providing policy analysts with a mother-load of work.
I also think the government let blind ideology get in the way and it should have bought in tax cuts three years ago.
Does that sound right wing? Maybe.
I am not sure voting National once in thirty years qualifies as right wing, let alone membership of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy.
In identifying a rabid right wing conspiracy in the media Chris is just following the government’s paranoid lead. The fiercely tribal Left are collectivist in nature, it tolerates no deviation, no independent thought and demands all toe the party line at all times.
Sounds like the Borg!
Chris Trotter and the Ninth Floor need to remember it is the media’s job to be critical, look for fault and expose government blunders. That’s our job.
I can proudly say I have infuriated every Prime Minister from Sir Robert Muldoon through to Helen Clark. I’ll put money on it that, if he takes power in November, I will have thoroughly annoyed John Key by Christmas. That’s not very right wing, is it?
I suspect Bill will prove himself right!
Anyway, I have to go now and polish the portrait of Sir Roger Douglas that hangs over the fireplace and get ready for tonight’s meeting of the cabal.
Welcome to the dark side Bill!
Tags: Bill Ralston, Chris Trotter, media bias
September 10th, 2008 at 8:38 am
Ralston joins a raft of other jornos in trying to show off some spine. Please pass me a microscope!
Like every other jorno, he knows that his ‘questions’ to Clark have to be submitted in advance, approved and no deviation from that script is permitted … otherwise interview ‘privileges’ are cut.
I can only assume that any such infuriation was due to poor gramma or spelling.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 8:41 am
Come on to Trotter anyone who isn’t a card carrying communist is an extremist right wing colf playing exclusive bank manager.
That people pay him to spout his socialist failed agenda is the most damning aspect of the New Zealand medias many many failings.
Keep your “nobel corruption” Trotter, we’re only interested in half of that description.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 8:47 am
what a load of twaddle from ralston..
of course the corporatist/rightwing view dominates our media..
..it has always been thus..
..(and my ongoing anger/frustration at the lies/ideologically-slanted-bullshit being fed to the new zealand public..(dressed up as ‘news’..)
..was one of my main motivations for starting whoar..(cos’ i had nothing to read..!..except their/the m.s.m. crap..!..)
at a time when economically..and environmentally..it is coming close to time to kiss our arses goodbye..
..our ‘news-media’ continues their shallow circus/excuse for ‘news-gathering/dissemination..)
and yes..tho’ i still read it..but with nothing like the urgency/attention of former years..the listener is also ..all in all..
..pretty irrelevant..
mind you..with his green/vegetarian-hating/reactionary views on so many subjects..
..it is a tad rich of trotter to present/promote himself as some kinda ‘solution’..
..eh..?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 8:48 am
“..I can only assume that any such infuriation was due to poor gramma or spelling..”
involuntary..?..was it..?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 8:52 am
philu: please – I implore you – use normal spacing, punctuation, and sentence structures in your comments. I find it incredibly difficult to understand you often because of the style you use. It would really help you get your point across if you used standard English style rules.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 8:59 am
try reading like you would poetry..wraith..
(cos’ that’s what it is..
also..i learnt to write for radio…so all my stuff is written to be read out loud..
..so has those cadences/rythms..
..just lie back..!..wraith..!..and ‘go with it’..
..read out loud..!..if you like..
phil(whoar.co.nz)
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 9:02 am
WraithX
Give it up and skip his comments
You’re number n to the nth power who have pleaded thus, all of us to no avail. PhilU sees things from a perspective that can only be described as clouded Imagine an halucination in book form and you’ve got it.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 9:07 am
This is the part that made me choke-
“it is the media’s job to be critical, look for fault and expose government blunders. That’s our job.”
The guys got no shame at all. “That’s our job”. For chrissakes, if there’s ever been a lame bunch of Labour / left wing/ liberal / sycophants its NZ’s media, who have enthusiastically and faithfully pushed every progressive idea out there at the expense of truth and light.
The most salient example of their slackness have been their failure to ask questions of Helen Klark on what she knew of the $100,000 Glenn donation to NZ First, when it was obvious (IMHO) right from the start that the whole deal was cooked up between Glenn, Winston and the Labour Party.
Another example is their abject failure to subject the United Nations Climate Change scheme to real scrutiny. They’ve been partisan advocates. Not critics. Or their partisan prosecution of Don Brash. As stark a demonstration of their arrogant left wing sympathies as you could ask for.
Journalists once did ask questions. Not today though. Advocates for every progressive big government idea out there, they are so besotted with left wing political advocacy they are a constant threat to our liberty and our property rights and our democracy. Look at their scandalous and arrogant partisan reporting in the US, cheering for Obama and smearing Sarah Palin. Without a milligram of shame.
The media doing their job.. pffft, what bullshit. One of the few journalists in NZ who actually does do his job (Ian Wishart) is sneered at and treated as a professional outcast. (and Trotter calling Ralston right wing is like Mount Everest saying Mt. Cook is short.) Bunch of useless contemptible lamers.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 9:11 am
“..PhilU sees things from a perspective that can only be described as clouded Imagine an halucination in book form and you’ve got it..”
wow..!..quite the master of the beauties/intricacies of the english language there..!..eh strings..?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 9:13 am
Clark is certainly the most effective Prime Minister we’ve had in my lifetime,
What a load of bollocks. Sorry Ralston, your last-minute attempt to convert to conservatism is to be viewed like a rat leaving a sinking ship, but I might have had a glimmer of sympathy if you hadn’t tried to hedge your bets with this blatant LIE and pander to the leftists. Go to hell.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 9:25 am
“I haven’t made my mind up yet.”
Says it all really.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 9:27 am
Joanne Black is a rightie? Yeah right.
Whenever the DomPost editorial says something nice about Labour, it’s because she’s writing it that day.
It’s good of Bill to say he supports Labour. John Campbell has said he voted Alliance.
I think it would be healthy to know where every journalist stands politically. The right seem very well served by talkback hosts, and the left by reporters. Columnists seem split about 50/50.
This surely gives the left an edge in influencing the floaters.
I’d love to know how Bill can justify Helen having been the most effective PM in his lifetime – except perhaps for the lack of any other effective PMs.
Being an effective scheming politician is not the same thing as making your country (and therefore most of your people) stronger. How has Clark done this?
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 9:30 am
Actually, I think it is well past time now to revisit the whole Right/Left labelling process. These ‘wing’ concepts were formed a long time ago, when the social, political and economic landscape was vastly different to what it is now and I just don’t think Left/Right is an adequate description to use any more. Just one glaring example is that the true ‘workers’ are now the self employed and small business people, not underpaid slaves down mines shafts….. and that’s not even getting started on the fact that tens of thousands of ordinary people, many of whom probably hold so-called ‘right’ views, have been slotted into the vile benefit system by virtue of the WFF bribery scam. And then there’s the question of the disaffected section of the indigenous people together with the the whites who pretend to be indigenous because speaking with a certain accent and wearing bones around their necks is cool. Left/Right labels just don’t begin to apply any more in any meaningful way.
I think it is would probably more helpful now to revisit this whole thing and try to come up with descriptions which match the landscape of our times… a kind of stratification of opinions which would actually serve to describe people in a more meaningful way, because at the moment two political parties are said to be ‘vying for the middle’. Well, that represents about 80-85% of the population judging by the latest polls, and to blandly classify them all as centre left or centre right doesn’t seem to make any sense any more. They are more likely to be (in typical market research descriptive terms) groups like ‘concerned strugglers’, ‘potential emigrators’, ‘state rulz’, ‘tribal drummers’, ‘brown lattes’, ‘fat cats’ etc etc etc than simply ‘left’ or ‘right’.
Lets get into the 21st century, shall we?
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 9:35 am
There are no “righties” in the media.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 9:35 am
I don’t think Jo Black has written an editorial for the Dompost for some years now …
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 9:37 am
wot dave mann said..
..my concerns are around the fact the environmental movement/urgencies are being bogged down by such (now-facile) labelling..
phil(whoar.co.nz
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 9:38 am
I’d love to know how Bill can justify Helen having been the most effective PM in his lifetime – except perhaps for the lack of any other effective PMs.
What about Shipley? Or Bolger? Or for that matter Marshall? Or Holyoake?
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 9:49 am
Yep, Norman Kirk was a total waste of time, as Bill implies by his comment that Our Dear Leader “is certainly the most effective Prime Minister” in his lifetime. Can Sir Keith Holyoake also be considered less effective than Our dear Leader? Essentially the second National Party government sought to preserve the economic prosperity and general social stability of the early 1960s; one of New Zealand’s longest-serving governments, the very length of it makes for a strong claim to effectiveness. The only people that I have heard criticise “Kiwi Keith” have done so on the basis that he didn’t take decisions about restructuring the economy that he should have done.
Vote:One significant measure of a politician’s success is how many of their policies survive their career. On that basis, I’d suggest that Ruth Richardson will in a few years time be considered more successful than Our Dear Leader.
September 10th, 2008 at 9:50 am
Chainsaws are effective. Bulldozers are effective. [GodwinsLawShield] Hitler [/GodwinsLawShield] was effective.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 9:52 am
I actually believe there is a left and a right.
Left is state control. Right is self-control.
But there’s also an up and a down.
Up is for more change. Down is for less change. Otherwise called socially liberal and conservative.
I’m for self-control and more change – the ACT position.
National is for self-control and less change. (Which is why I get bagged here for wanting to change the flag and suggesting the Sensing Murder psychics may be legit.)
Labour is for state control and more change. (Which is why so many Labour people convert to ACT when they realise state control doesn’t work.)
The Greens are for state control and total upheaval.
A simpler way of looking at it is:
Get rich quick = ACT
Vote:Get rich slow = National
Get poor slow = Labour
Get poor quick = Green
September 10th, 2008 at 9:57 am
get swamped by the environmental/economic mess/morass we have created..=..all of them..
phil(whoar.co.nz)
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 10:00 am
I certainly think Clark has been an efficient manager of a process. So too was Winston, Annette King, Stalin, the Nazis and so on. I’m not comparing good and evil here, just pointing out that efficiency can be common to both.
And if you have a look at the process we’ve been through and see if it’s been any good.. that’s a whole ‘nother story.
JC
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 10:08 am
The people the left like to call “right wing” are really only the working middle class, at last speaking out after a decade or so of being buried in leftist bullshit.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 10:15 am
Well said, John Ansell. I won’t try to improve on that assessment.
Regarding biases of Journalists, here is a very relevant quote from Hayek; “The Intellectuals And Socialism”, one of the most important assessments you can read. (He wrote this in the 1940′s):
“……Even where the direction of policy is in the hands of men of affairs of different views, the execution of policy will in general be in the hands of intellectuals, and it is frequently the decision on the detail which determines the net effect. We find this illustrated in almost all fields of contemporary society. Newspapers in “capitalist” ownership, universities presided over by “reactionary” governing bodies, broadcasting systems owned by conservative governments, have all been known to influence public opinion in the direction of socialism, because this was the conviction of the personnel. This has often happened not only in spite of, but perhaps even because of, the attempts of those at the top to control opinion and to impose principles of orthodoxy…..”
I recommend the whole thing to Redbaiter, Kimble, and others like them:
http://www.mises.org/etexts/hayekintellectuals.pdf
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 10:23 am
“..The people the left like to call “right wing” are really only the working middle class..”
are you talking about those who have benefited most from working for families..?
cos’..c’mon..!..there is no way national would have introduced a w.f.f..eh..?
uou’d have just sold a lot of stuff off..cut a whole lot of social services..
(unleashed that years’ models of secret-agendae on us..)
..and sent our young men to their deaths in iraq/bushs’ end-of-empire paroxyms..
(woo hoo..!..what a deal..!.eh..?
..are we gonna get fooled again..?..)
..these are all facts punters should consider..
..before casting their vote..
phil(whoar.co.nz)
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 10:26 am
Has Ralston been writing for long? Would’ve imagined it wouldn’t be shock to older folk that he isn’t a rightie if he’s been writing for a while…poor old me has only seen politics and journalism through the lens of Clark’s government, so wouldn’t have a clue.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 10:29 am
John, re “Get rich quick/slow”. The problem is that NZers have been conditioned to believe that it’s easier to envy the wealthy (and take perverse pleasure from cutting down ANY tall poppies) than it is to take control and become wealthy(*) oneself.
Witness the hand-wringing, spiteful ‘rich pricks’ crusades lead by Cullen and Clark. It has to stop. As a nation we have to begin to value enterprise, effort & risk and applaud the results whatever they may be. We must deplore laziness and complacency and the choice of state dependency.
(*) Wealthy isn’t only financial either. It is having options, empowerment, prosperity and being satisfied.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 10:29 am
Re Trotter’s assessment of who is “right wing”, you need to understand that from where he stands, the “centre” is represented by Leon Trotsky, who was a “moderate” compared to his comrades Lenin, Stalin, and Co. I’m not joking, these people really DO think that way.
Re journalists waking up late in the piece, this is history repeating itself. “Soft” socialism tends to develop into “hard” socialism, with the acquiescence of the media most of the time; they can’t help themselves, things have to get really bad before they actually start to criticise and wake the public up to what is going on, but even then, have you noticed that virtually no journalist ever “sees the light” regarding the value of freedom, full stop; it is just that they want socialism without the more obviously nasty things, like the risk to THEM of getting locked up…….Note Ralston’s admission of who he votes for.
John Ansell is right, a few wiser “lefties” do see the light, like Roger Douglas and many of his colleagues, but it is obvious that no such epiphany ever takes effect in the media; the newsroom is probably one of the most totalitarian institutions in terms of requiring adherence to the approved line. Look at the vilification of Ian Wishart.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 10:32 am
I’m saddened, but not surprised, by the pathetic state of affairs in today’s NZ.
On the left of the potical spectrum, we have a growing number of losers in life, people born-bred-raised on welfare benefits – the name Whoar comes to mind immediately, a true underclass unable/unwilling to contribute to NZ, all of them in unholy alliance with academics, do-gooders and the liberal media.
On the centre, resides a mass of apathetic voters and people ready to sell their vote to the highest bidder, without any consideration to principles or ideas.
On the right, we have a bunch of bumbling idiots, appeasers and wimps, incapable of confronting Clar’s lies and fabrications. The very same people that when elected to power will continue on this downhill road Labour has taken us.
NZ is doomed, indeed.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 10:53 am
it must be encouraging..philbest..
..that some 2% of the population agree with you/act..
..eh..?
..phil(whoar.co.nz)
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 11:01 am
Well said, Manolo.
Will NZ in 3 years, be like THIS?:
“Republic of Fear”
By MALTE LEHMING – WALL STREET JOURNAL
March 3, 2008
Berlin, Germany
“Your heart rate sinks, muscles stiffen, you lose control of bodily functions: You’re frozen with fear. This primal reflex to danger is a familiar phenomenon in nature but it’s less common for it to strike nearly all of a political class in a democracy.
Welcome to Germany.
Barely 20 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall — an event that was celebrated at the time as a triumph of freedom and hope over despair — the united country today is frozen with fear. It’s as if the East Germans have exacted a delayed revenge on their brothers and sisters in the West: Your political model may have won, but we’ll infect your society by reviving militant antimilitarism, a yearning for security at all cost, and a craze for distributive justice — until the whole country is paralyzed……..
“Then came the Bundestag elections in 2005. This time, a resounding victory for the Christian Democrats, led by Angela Merkel, was practically assured. But Mrs. Merkel made the mistake of overestimating her countrymen’s sense of reality. She announced economic reforms, which were urgently necessary, but was consequently accused of neo-liberalism. On the German scale of negatives, that one comes right after fascism. For no matter how bad the Germans have it, they may want energetic action, but no change. “Two souls live in my chest,” Goethe’s Faust complained about the two-sided nature of his personality. Mrs. Merkel’s comfortable lead melted away. Instead of a reform-minded coalition with the Free Democratic Party, she was forced into a “grand” standstill coalition with the Social Democrats. So the preliminary result of these two electoral shocks: No more war. No more reforms.
The third dramatic election happened at the state level in late January of this year. In Hesse, the incumbent governor Roland Koch ran as the Christian Democrats’ last prominent conservative: strongly principled, polarizing, rough in speech. He ran his campaign accordingly. He fulminated about the high crime rate among immigrant youth and revived the old conservative slogan: freedom not socialism. The result? Mr. Koch’s campaign collapsed and he lost 12 percentage points compared with his showing in 2003. So the third lesson: No more freedom. Anyone who asks Germans to choose between freedom and socialism risks their choosing the latter.
Which brings us to the fourth and final electoral shock that’s paralyzing the German political class. It’s actually a number of smaller shocks. Next to the Christian Democrats, Social Democrats, Greens and the Free Democrats, a fifth party is establishing itself in Germany, apparently inexorably: the Left Party. Various forces cavort in this party — communists, socialists, pacifists, protest voters, disappointed Social Democrats. In East Germany, the Left Party has been firmly established since 1990, and surveys even show it to be the strongest party there today. Now they have also entered every regional parliament in the last four elections in West Germany.
In other European countries, radical leftist parties are nothing special. In Germany, however, their representatives inherit the traditions of East Germany: the Wall, shoot-to-kill orders, dictatorship. This makes a coalition with them particularly distasteful. Should yesterday’s victims once again be governed by their former tormentors? On the other hand, the Left Party’s slogans are extremely popular: Out of Afghanistan! More justice! Better protection from layoffs! Across-the-board minimum wages! No university fees! No privatization of state-owned companies! On all these points, surveys show the ultraleft in sync with a majority of Germans.
What to do? Frozen in fear, the Social Democrats are helpless. They stare at the radical left like a rabbit at a snake. No recipe seems to work. Give the Left responsibility, in order to take the shine off its demagogy? A mistake, as can be seen in Berlin’s city hall. In the German capital, the Left Party has for years now unabashedly shared local government powers with the Social Democrats, without reducing their national attractiveness.
Isolate the Left Party and reject coalitions with it? Also a mistake, as its recent successes in West Germany prove. So the Social Democrats hem and haw and swing back and forth between the two strategies. In the meantime, they are taking on the Left’s themes, becoming more similar in substance. Germany’s Social Democrats are abandoning any sort of “Third Way.” They have broken with the Schröder legacy. But because the original is always more authentic than the copy, this doesn’t do them any electoral good, either.
This will not be without consequences for the federal government. The more the Social Democrats drift to the left, the more quickly the Christian Democrats push into the now wide-open center. There they act demonstratively unconservative, cuddly, impartial. In order to be identified with any content at all, Chancellor Merkel has fled into the ideologically safe subject of climate change. Germans and environmental protection: That always works. And it is the only gap left in the ultraleft’s program.
It’s been said that grand coalitions strengthen the margins. This rule also applies to Germany, though as a paradox. Although the government follows leftist policies (from a three-percentage-point increase in the value added tax to minimum wages for postal workers), it is the ultraleft that has become stronger.
Germany’s political class is stunned by this effect. Those who become rigid with fear hope they won’t be discovered by their predators. But this instinct designed to ensure survival can quickly spell their doom. Once discovered, motionless as they are, they become very easy prey……..”
DEPRESSING…….
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 11:04 am
Two deciding factors in election ’08 will be how many traditional Labour voters refuse to vote, and how many undecided voters will go over to National. I think the latter will make the single greatest difference to National’s success or Labour’s failure. Labour have already detected this, and are working on a ‘You can’t trust National’ campaign to win the day. (Why else was the VDS created?) National are working on a ‘Don’t frighten the Horses’ type of campaign. Of the two approaches, i think that Labour’s is gaining more traction. It is as if National’s approach is too subtle for the average voter, and translates as vacillating and covert.
One of Nationals’ great strengths and achilles heels is their leader, John Key. He has presented an easy target for the jibes of the Labour smear-campaign. however, the came is true of Labour and Helen Clark. The recent Owen Glenn fiasco has shown her up as having feet of clay.
As an experiment, try to objectively gauge, how, on any given issue you would vote, if you were a ‘floating or undecided’ voter. That is the only proper way to get a handle on how this election might translate into poll success or failure. Truly this election will not be about which tribe wins, there are always tribal voters ready to die for their causes. Rather it will be about how many new converts to its tribe it can persuade.
Ask yourself, of these new converts, is it Labour or National that is winning the most hearts and minds? Then ask yourself, is the timid approach necessarily the wisest?
Vote:lee.monkeywithtypewriter.clark@gmail.com
September 10th, 2008 at 11:19 am
>>I think it would be healthy to know where every journalist stands politically. The right seem very well served by talkback hosts, and the left by reporters. Columnists seem split about 50/50.
Someone should make a website/page and list all reporters/columnists or talkback hosts and estimate how they vote.
Vote:Then invite the people to come to the site/page and correct it if they believe it is incorrect
Then we could build up a true record of media bias
September 10th, 2008 at 11:28 am
God no. All National have to do is grow a spine on all these policy releases, and then point out that at the moment Labour has no vision for the future of NZ, which is the reason for all the slagging!, then point to their own ‘totally awesome’ policies. Bang
edit: simplistic?
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 12:01 pm
“I think it would be healthy to know where every journalist stands politically.”
I couldn’t give a damn really. All I ask is they report objectively as possible. They don’t of course. They unashamedly advocate for the left. After observing certain events occurring in New Zealand and the US right now I’m starting to think that the leadership of the left wing political movement has been slowly taken over by a gang of thugs and crooks, and so has the mainstream media.
The media’s failure to scrutinize the left is a disgraceful attack on democracy. Here in NZ, they’ve failed completely to shine any light on the Klark government. In the US, brazenly partisan for Barack Obama, they have hidden a host of cronyist deals and his work as a soldier of communist radicals and terrorists, yet have flown a huge team of “operatives” into Alaska to research every detail they can on Sarah Palin.
This is not democracy. This is gangsterism and Bolshevism. The media well has been poisoned.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
John Ansell…. yes, I like it! Thats a very good way to categorise political viewpoints, I think. Maybe a bit more fleshing out could be useful, but it certainly leads to a much more descriptive four categories (ie 2 axes) instead of the present two categories on only one axis. Maybe also some description of whether we are talking about economics, social policy or the environment would be helpful too, if that could be done without muddying the waters too much.
What would we call these basic four categories? I would suggest North, South, East and West. That would make you (“I’m for self-control and more change – the ACT position”) a NorthWest.
This descriptive model would allow perfectly for almost all shades of the political spectrum. There must be a recognisable type of people, for example, who would fall into the SouthWest camp – ie for more self control but without wanting radical change – and the categories could even include a ‘Due’ description. DueSouth would be people who want NO change at all at any price and are only concerned with this. DueEasters would be those who think that the state should look after EVERYTHING for them regardless of the amount of change involved.
I think that a 2-axis descriptive model like this would be a much more useful way of looking at politics.
p.s. I’m a NorthWester too!
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 12:09 pm
Left wing, collectivist and tribal?
How is it that there are more political parties which claim to represent “the left” in NZ? How is it that NZ’s largest political blog attracts mainly right wingers who sit around bitching about socialism as if “the left” were a unified actor? Out of a sense of collectivism, perhaps?
Face it dudes, it is the right that is tribal.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 12:17 pm
Dave, you haven’t seen this then??
Vote:http://www.politicalcompass.org/
It’s the other way round to how you describe it, but same thing.
‘Region Specific’ in the bottom left.
September 10th, 2008 at 12:19 pm
It’s fair to say that there are tribal elements on both sides, Charlie. Ralston was trying to indicate tath just becasue he does not agree with everything one tribe says, means he is a member of the opposing tribe. Me too.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 12:25 pm
… Or maybe if the West/East were made to align more with the Right/Left hands it would be even better still. That makes you and me NorthEasters (for change and self-control) and John Key probably a NorthWester (for change but with state control).
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 12:28 pm
No, I hadn’t seen your link, Stephen. Thanks.. I’ll check it out
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 12:30 pm
ZenTiger said this somewhere:
needless to say, he’s a man
needless to say, he’s a muslim
needless to say, he’s a leftie
needless to say, he’s Irish
needless to say, he’s a liberal
needless to say, he’s National
needless to say, he’s white middle class male
needless to say, he’s an immigrant
needless to say, he’s homophobic
needless to say, he’s christian
and he is no doubt representative of all of them.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 1:02 pm
I wonder if Ralston actually read his article before hitting the sbmit button – most effective PM ever in his lifetime (which I guess means anyone since about Muldoon) then goes on the list the shortcomings of her performance – grossly ineffective spending leading, poor provision of services, no tax cuts, spending taxpayer money telling them what to do – if he thinks this is as good as it gets, I’d hate to see his analysis of every other PM.
I can only assume he is being paid based on quality not quantity.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 1:08 pm
Stephen, thanks for the link. I did the test and I came out more or less exactly where I thought I would, except of course that my axes were diferent in my model to theirs. Seeing as how they have put a lot of work and thought into it though, I’m OK with using their axes (hahaha – joke).
Another really good thing about this political compass is that the dot on one’s graph gives a reading of how strongly one is aligned to one’s compass point. It would probably be splitting hairs too much to divide this into more than two grades, but moderately/very would serve.
The only thing the political compass lacks is a logical description of the up/down axis which serves as well as the left/right axis and I think North/South would be much more easily graspable and usable as descriptive terms than their Authoritarian/Libertarian axis.
Well, thats that question sorted out. Now, to find a political party to vote for…. hmm…. am I a weight-losing aspirant dancer with a funny taste in clothes or a laissez faire capitalist with a(yn) rand(y) fetish…..?
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 1:27 pm
Always happy to help people to discover their true essence. There’s a few subjective ratings of politicians and bloggers there too: http://norightturn.blogspot.com/search?q=political+compass just gotta scroll down a bit.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 2:06 pm
Well the thing about being Randy is that it’d be great party conversation to say you engage in idolatry in your spare time
Also if you’re a mischevious type of atheist, but that’s your call.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 2:07 pm
Dave Mann: I didn’t invent the quadrant idea, which you seem to have just discovered.
But I do like to boil things down to a form that the most people can understand. To that extent, I don’t think the traditional political terms quite cut the mustard.
I might be able to improve on my earlier version by substituting Bold and Safe for More Change and Less Change.
So my quadrant would look like this (sorry, you’ll have to imagine the vertical axis centred as I can’t get the thing to indent):
Bold
|
|
|
State ——— ——— Self
|
|
|
Safe
The horizontal axis measures control. The vertical axis measures attitude.
Everyone can plot their position without having to wrestle with jargon like Left and Right the catch-all word Liberal.
My only question is: where would you put the Greens?
Their policies could be called Bold – in the sense of a bold policy on climate change. They could also be called Safe – in the sense of playing safe with nature.
Maybe it should be more of a bicycle wheel with more ‘spokes’. That’s me for now though.
New Zealanders traditionally play safeBy looking at the way
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 2:16 pm
Sorry, that last line shouldn’t be there.
I was going to say that our usual preference for Safe/State governments shows the truth of Bob Jones’ assertion that NZers rate security higher than prosperity.
Bit of a dull, shortsighted attitude in my view.
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 2:37 pm
Very bold of you only to use half a horizontal axes John? What do you think of the system I linked Dave to? The Greens are bold-ish on tax too i’d say (the eco-tax concept which no one seems to like).
Vote:September 10th, 2008 at 4:46 pm
As I said, I couldn’t reproduce the proper ‘+’ shape in the final version. You’ll have to imagine the vertical axis centred.
I like the simplicity of the words on my version, but the words on the vertical axis probably need tweaking to capture all situations.
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