Whale interviews Trotter
January 23rd, 2011 at 11:42 am by David FarrarAn interesting interview with Chris Trotter by Whale Oil.
His thoughts on Labour are especially insightful:
On Labours “Get John Key” campaign:
“Completely mistaken, did not read the man at all well”
“One suspects that they despair of finding some other way through.”
On how modern Labour can become more appealing:
“It does very well when it plays to the best, in New Zealanders, when it booths articulates and asks people to respond to the bright side rather than the dark side of the NZ way of doing things.”
“When they find someone who can articulate them, as they did with Michael Joseph Savage as they did with Norman Kirk, as they certainly did with David Lange, then they are very hard to beat, but if those two things are lacking, if they lack someone who is able to articulate that appeal to New Zealand’s better angels, to borrow Abraham Lincoln’s famous phrase and if they aren’t driven in a sense by adverse economic winds then Labour does find it difficult historically to win.”
On Phil Goff:
“He hasn’t demonstrated to date, either the rhetorical skills necessary to make that appeal, and certainly to date he hasn’t been able to emote in a way that New Zealanders can believe.”
On Labour enticing better candidates:
[They need] “life experience which you certainly don’t get in any great breadth on the ninth floor of the beehive”
Related posts:
- Trotter on Cunliffe
- Trotter endorses Cunliffe
- Trotter joins the pay it back chorus
- Trotter on Labour Auslanders
January 23rd, 2011 at 11:46 am
In other words Labour is leaderless.
Vote:January 23rd, 2011 at 11:58 am
Clark’s legacy to Labour. Just brilliant. Her own insecurities have left Labour pining for her. They have been unable to move on (I love that irony) from her micro-management.
Labour have no policies that trigger the imagination or aspiration of New Zealander – made all the worse four them because the Nation continues their love affair with John Key and National. Reality is that Labour’s biggest problem is that they have no one now, or coming up through the ranks who could challenge and take on John Key at his own game.
NZ furthermore simply does not trust Labour to fix the economy.
Vote:January 23rd, 2011 at 12:06 pm
WTF is he talking about. NZ is going through a period of economic decline in certain sectors and no amount of flowery rhetoric is going to change that. The victims of the decline of manufacturing are generally detached from politics- most of whom don’t vote, understand or really care about public policy. The rest are doing ok though not flourishing.
Labour and National are locked into a battle for middle class voters whose chief interests are entirely about cost of living (fuel and food prices, taxes etc..)- so we see both sides looking for good dog whistle phrases and photo opportunities. Phil is simply not as adept at that sort of politics than the money changer from Parnell.
Don’t see much of our better angels in that.
Vote:January 23rd, 2011 at 12:25 pm
To win the hearts and minds of New Zealanders Labour needs to understand the people in the middle ground. But they recruit their MPs from a narrow clique of ninth-floor pollie-obssessionistsas, teachers, unionists and teacher-unionists who just don’t get it. Trotter is right about the need to get a broader view and a broader understanding in their ranks.
The problem is: they don’t want to. They much prefer to be pure, and regard anyone who understands concepts like “aspiration” and working for your bread and butter rather than just taking it from someone else, as traitors. They have their heads stuck in the sand, and like being there.
Essentially, if Labour did understand these things, it wouln’t be Labour. The best they can hope to grope for is enough understanding of these strange concepts to be able to present a convincing veneer.
Vote:January 23rd, 2011 at 12:28 pm
Chris Trotter is right: ideally Labour should have a leader who can emote.
Labour voters emote, rather than think, so a sensible leader is a turn-off for them. Goff, if anything, is too much like Key. A rabble-rouser would be ideal.
But they don’t need a new leader to win.
If Maori or the Maori Party go with Labour, and Winston crosses the threshhold and does likewise, then Goff could still be PM in November (as Bob Jones predicted he would two years ago).
National need to not only win, but win well.
And they need ACT.
Vote:January 23rd, 2011 at 12:51 pm
So National needs to get about 55% of the vote to be the Government next election and Labour only need 39% of the vote to be Government.
Vote:Gee MMP is a really good of voting system.
January 23rd, 2011 at 12:52 pm
But isn’t a National win also a win of sorts for socialist Labour?
What has fundamentally changed over the last two years to indicate we actually elected a new government in 2008?
National has built upon the pillars erected by its Labour predecessor, taxation continues to rise, nanny-statism has not diminished, racist policies go on unabated, expenditure on welfare is on track to bankrupt our country, etc.
Vote:January 23rd, 2011 at 12:53 pm
I agree with s.russell, Labour (and other parties are controlled by acitivists who are out of touch). Labour has linked worker with beneficiary (even during full employment); see how they squealed when Paula benet released details off what the fuller woman took home. Low paid worker is supposed to shut up and (just pay) tax. Then you have people like Jacinda saying objection to the foreshore and seabed process is (mistakenly) “fear based” etc
Vote:January 23rd, 2011 at 12:55 pm
On Reading the Maps, Keri Hulme calls Chris Trotter ayapping (…) dog due to his stance on Maori nationalism.
Vote:January 23rd, 2011 at 2:05 pm
Chris should be happy with that – she calls me a Nazi. (So much for the credibility of the Booker Prize.)
Talking of National Socialists, Manolo asks: “But isn’t a National win also a win of sorts for socialist Labour?”
Yes Manolo. We’re in the third year of the fourth term of the Clark government, with the boss on sabbatical in New York.
(I’m not saying she’s coming back, but what difference would it make if she did? Who’d have thought Michael Cullen would be only the Second-to last of the Big Spenders?)
Vote:January 23rd, 2011 at 2:43 pm
I can’t remember when but it was at least a year ago when I mentioned on Redablurt before my most recent self imposed exile, that the only way the Nats could lose the 2011 election would be because of it’s coalition partners, ACT and the racist Maori (sorry, no macron) parties. I still think that.
Vote:I also mentioned on numerous occasions that they must stop playing the person and focus on policy. They have ignored that free advise from their enemy (me) and I guess there are 2 reasons:
1/ they can’t help themselves .. Clark and Cullen relied on personal attacks and old boy daffy followed suit like the good lapduck that he is.
2/ they have no policy that makes sense in the current economic enviroment.
January 23rd, 2011 at 2:47 pm
HMM, well given Trotters correct statement ““When they find someone who can articulate them, as they did with Michael Joseph Savage as they did with Norman Kirk, as they certainly did with David Lange, then they are very hard to beat,” we should look at Keys performance both at Pike River and Christchurch and we can see exactly who Key models himself after. It is of course M.J.Savage.
This has been obvious for quite sometime for anyone watching with a sense of MJS.
So why would we expect the National Party to be different to the other Socialist party when its leader behaves in the same manner?
And don’t forget, English was full of praise for Cullen considering he did a good job while in Govt. so that also tells us that English is of the same philosophy.
Vote:Oh for a right wing leader that can articulate what’s needed.
January 23rd, 2011 at 3:41 pm
Labour in modern times does quite well when there is plenty of money to splash about and people do not mind higher taxes. But when things are tight the Labour Party is seen as rewarding the feckless and the indolent.
Vote:January 23rd, 2011 at 4:45 pm
^ that can only be expected when you simulate your rage – Phil Goff’s one trick.
Vote:January 23rd, 2011 at 5:17 pm
Where’s my cycleway Mr Key?
Vote:I wouldn’t mind Mr Goff being PM, if he implemented the 1984-1987 policies of the Labour Party. He voted for those policies in parliament and he was part of the Douglas-Prebble-Moore faction?
January 23rd, 2011 at 7:04 pm
What Mr runny arse and his lefty mates want to come up with is polices that actually work. Himself and his mates live some world devour of reality. Tosser, his concept of a fair and equitable society is a return to the bloated state and it’s mindless minnows and tit suckers. Runny arsed’s country is falling apart and his longing for the radical return to the old days when protest and high ideals paid the bills is simply stupid. And if he so happens to read this please tell me how you can lift the wealth of our country without destroying the very people that produce the wealth, I do not accept an answer. And why doesn’t he throw his name in the hat, after all you have all the answers?
Vote:January 24th, 2011 at 8:58 am
“…So National needs to get about 55% of the vote to be the Government next election and Labour only need 39% of the vote to be Government.
Gee MMP is a really good of voting system..”
yes..mmp is a good voting system…
..that grouping of labour/grns/maori party/peters/w.h.y…will represent the votes/wishes/desired political direction of the majority of the people in the country…
..how can f.p.p..where 39% of the vote imposes their will upon the majority…
…how can that be a ‘better’ voting system…?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
Vote:January 24th, 2011 at 9:03 am
Phool
Are you predicting a Labour/Green government?
And if so, what changes do you think they will make?
Vote:January 24th, 2011 at 9:15 am
What Labourites seem to be desperately trying to predict is any combination of seats that could get them in to power, regardless of who the party with the most seats is (probably by a significant margin).
They should be trying to promote themselves in the best way possible, instead they seem obsessed with promoting any bunch of rag tag that could conjure up a coalition in their favour.
What they seem to forget is that they have previously shunned the Maori Party, and they have shunned the Greens. Not only do they hope enough minority seats will add up to 60+ they also hope that miraculously all those minorities will be willing participants.
Vote:January 24th, 2011 at 9:50 am
reality-check for pete george..
most maori party voters ticked labour for their party vote..
..(can i just leave you with that..?..)
…and if norman and goff haven’t yet hopped into bed together for the full consummation…
…they are in serious eyebrow-batting/foreplay/hand-clutching roles…
(can i just leave you with that..?..)
so..as can be seen…yr 9.15 shouldn’t really have happened..eh..?
..now..about yr other 8,000 plus comments..?
(can i just leave you with that..?..)
phil(whoar.co.nz)
Vote:January 24th, 2011 at 10:01 am
Reality check for philu – since when have Labour cared about where their party votes have come from. Does “last cab off the rank” ring any bells? Or is that too far back for your memory?
Reality check for philu – how often have Labour been in coalition with the Greens?
Vote: