ACT Angst
July 10th, 2011 at 9:27 am by David FarrarDavid Fisher at the Hos reports:
The marketing guru behind the Iwi/Kiwi billboards and the new Act Party adverts has attacked “white cowards” for not standing up against the “Maorification” of the country.
Act Party creative director John Ansell said Maori were taking advantage of New Zealand’s fear of appearing racist and he wanted the Act Party to speak out.
I agree with John that one should be able to say you think the Maori seats are a bad idea, and not be called racist. But likewise one should be able to say all teachers should know basic te reo, and also not be called racist.
He said: “These guys (Maori) have gone from the stone age to the space age in 150 years and haven’t said thanks. That’s the nature of the thing. In Maori world, if one tribe conquers another you eat the guys eyeballs. The Brits were pretty civilised by that standard.”
And Germany 70 years ago was trying to exterminate entire races. Not quite sure the relevance.
But last night, Brash distanced himself from Ansell’s “extreme statements”.
“I don’t want to associate myself with those kind of views at all,” he said.
Asked if Ansell would continue as an employee, Brash said a decision on that would be made today and “may already have been made”.
Sounds like it has been made indeed.
Brash and Ansell were supposed to be sharing a stage in Palmerston North yesterday but the creative director pulled out citing problems with the party.
Ansell said “white cowards” were scared to “tell the truth about this Maori issue”.
“If you don’t agree with the Maori radical perspective you’re branded a racist.”
Again, that is wrong, but so is calling people racist for saying teachers should have to learn te reo. Personally I think emotive terms such as racist should generally be reserved for those who clearly are – such as the National Front.
Ansell said Boscawen had interfered with the creative direction of the adverts because “John wants to be popular” and the polarising line was likely to attract the label “racist”.
“When push comes to shove I can’t do my job the way I want to do it. If you’ve got a creative director then the creative director should direct the creative. Not the fundraiser. Not the deputy. I’ve asked them to work out who decides these things.”
My experience with political parties are that politicians are very loath to surrender creative control of the campaign to staff, as it is the party’s brand and the politician’s brands that get associated with the advertisements – not the staff’s.
Ansell said Act should be polarising debate with 20 per cent of the public having the potential to vote for the party.
“It’s a men’s party. I can’t get them to agree to that but it’s a party for men and women who think like men.
I’d be fascinated to hear why ACT is not a party for women who think like women.
Tags: ACT, John Ansell
July 10th, 2011 at 9:36 am
A very extreme view indeed. Regrettably when you get promenint Maori political leaders making statements referring to white m*****-f******’s, and stating that he would be uncomfortable with his daughter dating a pakeha, the alternate point of view will also come to the fore.
It must be said though, that this statement is not being made by a member of ACT, but by a person from Marketing!
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:42 am
Personally I think emotive terms such as racist should generally be reserved for those who clearly are – such as the National Front.
Ansell’s comments aren’t any different from what you hear from the National Front. He talks about how Maori are ‘raping’ ‘white people’. The guys a textbook definition of a racist.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:43 am
I had assumed that Ansell was an ACT member when he was making his deranged posts on the other thread here yesterday. To find he was actually the author of the ads – priceless! Sounds like Ansell will have the opportunity from today to work for someone not as ‘cowardly’ as the ACT party.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:44 am
“Ansell’s comments aren’t any different from what you hear from the National Front. He talks about how Maori are ‘raping’ ‘white people’. The guys a textbook definition of a racist”
wanker…what about ya buddy whoreawira…white mo/fo’s etc…he aint racist? ppfftt. Trouble with you leftys..too selective.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:46 am
keep whistling milkymike..no ones listening.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:46 am
Ugh. ACT doesn’t have to be the loudest, most-attention seeking party in the room, and doing so won’t make it the best party.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:47 am
Ansell is a loose cannon that needs to be given the same treatment as Heather Roy, i.e. not letting the door hit him on the ass as he goes through it.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:51 am
Well Starboard sounds like your hero Johns got the arse.
Even the party thought he was a wanker
Parent to child.
“Just because someone does something that is stupid, it does not mean that you have to do it as well because that will make you an even bigger fuckwit”
This clown has potentially alienated every woman in Epsom you goose. IQ testing for sufferage please
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:51 am
Nothing wrong with voicing an opinion, ever. Just so long as you don’t expect everyone in the room (country) to agree with you. And if its dog whistle bullshit like this, then (a) no one who has half a brain will listen, (b) they will wonder why DB is stupid enough to give this dipshit enough rope to hang himself, and (c) why anyone other than a brain dead redneck would vote for stupidity like this.
Why not stick with the fundamentals, like dragging this country out of the mire, than trying to inhabit Winston’s (a)moral high-ground?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:53 am
If Ansell goes as ACT’s creative director, who will replace him? Kyle Chapman? That should complete ACT’s transition.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:56 am
“It’s a men’s party. I can’t get them to agree to that but it’s a party for men and women who think like men.”
Wonder what Cactus has to say on this?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:57 am
I back what he said all the way. Maori need to be pulled back into line before its too late. Pauleastbay..bite me.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:00 am
Starboard you miss the point. No one I have seen on this blog condones or supports the views of Hone Harawera. In fact his party has been parked in the category of fringe nutters who no one could sensibly vote for. To try to justify the ranting of this clown Ansell by referencing the behavior of Harawera is simply ludicrous.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:00 am
Act are Fuct. Everything they stand for has is pure fantasy based and now they having nothing left but to try and appeal to racists and the economically illiterate while praying for a threshold they will never reach or a national roll over in Epsom, which with stunts like this will not be as easy to engineer as they are used to
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:00 am
@Mark – toad supports what Hone says. That makes one, at least
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:03 am
John Ansell is correct. As Not PC has been campaigning over the years for One law for all. Everyone should be treated the same. There shouldn’t be any favor for one group in the society over another or the rest. Once you start having a system for preferential treatment then that is racist. The law should be colorblind exactly as Not PC is advocating for.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:05 am
@Falafulu @10.03
Bingo!
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:05 am
I said something very similar to this (I said “technologically gone from…” and used “information age”) in a letter to the editor some 6 or 7 years ago. The vitriol that ensued was remarkable…
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:06 am
Personally, I don’t see the point of teachers learning Maori. How many children going to school would know how to speak Maori but not English? Not many, if any.
I don’t have a problem with Maori wanting to keep their heritage and language alive, but I do have a problem with it being foisted on all of New Zealand. Wouldn’t there be more Islanders in NZ speaking Tongan or Samoan than there are Maori speaking ‘Te Reo’? In fact, there are probably more speakers of Klingon worldwide than of Maori.
I just don’t see the point, other than (as I said) keeping their heritage/culture alive, which is a noble thing to do, but I don’t see why the rest of the country be forced into learning it. It really doesn’t have much practical application.
The point of learning a language, really, is to communicate with people who do not speak yours; how often will that situation crop up here? If someone wants to learn it, go ahead. But it’s this compulsory thing that is wrong.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:06 am
That’s a sad link, Falafulu. I stopped reading it at the point where it claimed Maori didn’t really ‘own’ New Zealand in 1840.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:08 am
Fala,
as Ansell will no longer have a ad campaign to run he is entitled to his opinion as a citizen, the up side is that we will be spared those opinions in our newspapers.
It the messenger thats the problem and he has done ACT serious serious damage. Brash will not be able to talk publicly without this shit being bought up, it will dominate every interview and as he has trouble communicating at the best of times their campaign is in the toilet
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:09 am
If ACT want to compete with NZ First for the “angry white male” vote, so be it. It won’t do them much good.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:14 am
NZ has sunk to the point where any criticism against Maori, or any utterance against the myth they have constructed, is now considered racist and a crime thought.
The guilty liberals appear to have won the battle, aided by the corrupt establishment, well represented by feeble politicians.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:14 am
Mikemild said…
I stopped reading it at the point where it claimed Maori didn’t really ‘own’ New Zealand in 1840.
That is a fact Mike. Maori didn’t own NZ. I’ll put it to you in the context of property rights. Do you understand what this concept is? I thought not. WHY? Because you’re fuckn confused about the definition of rights. I have tried many times on this blog to educate you on the concept of rights based on objective philosophy and you still don’t get it.
Ok, explain to me the concept of ownership (or property rights) if you think that Not PC is talking nonsense? On what grounds you think that Maori owned NZ? They didn’t.
I suggest you read the fuckn excellent article by Not PC.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:15 am
Hang on a minute, mate!
Surely the leader and the board must have approved this advertisement before it went public?
Who does the good doctor think he’s kidding here?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:16 am
But the ad is still crap.
It starts off knocking Maori (and National) then ends with supporting Maori (aspiration).
Thus unfortunately for ACT, ACT’s positive aspirations for Maori are vastly overshadowed and simply drowned out. People then won’t or don’t get to associate ACT with improving Maori aspirations (to work and get off welfare etc), all people associate with ACT are more “attacks” on Maori. (Note that most people will turn off reading the ad and not realise ACT aren’t trying to knock Maori aspiration etc).
I’m starting to think John Ansell is a one-trick pony if this is the best that he can come up with – it’s merely a rehash of old ideas from about 8 years ago and nothing new.
What ACT or Ansell should do instead is, lead with positive messages for Maori aspiration (and gain Maori voters) not turn them off due to stereotypes.
The other thing John Ansell should do is get into Politics himself instead of whining about an issue like he has in today’s paper. Then again judging by the amount of half-truth’s, misleading and incorrect information in his ad, I wouldn’t have much faith in him being a trustworthy politician worth voting for ….
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:18 am
ACT are just embarrassing now. What is Don doing? He brings Banks in, and then this ridiculous pandering to rednecks. Nobody cares about that crap any more – they care about the economy. I hope they get eradicated this November.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:19 am
Falafulu
I don’t want Elaycee turning up and bagging me for getting off topic, so why don’t you hop over to the GD and make that case? Without the obscenities would be good, but I’ll leave that up to you.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:20 am
niggly
Ansell might find he has few political homes left after today – maybe NZ First?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:21 am
@mike – shouldn’t that read “political rest homes”
Vote:(NZ First would probably love to do similar ads attacking migrants, but they might not have the cash to fund it.)
July 10th, 2011 at 10:26 am
Toad
Why are you so quick to label Ansell as a racist when you are so quick to defend John Hatfield?
Or is this another example of Green party hypocrisy?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:27 am
Even AF, Key’s chief sycophant and cheerleader, doesn’t miss the opportunity to put the boot in his former leader. He is always a man of integrity.
Et tu, Brutus?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:28 am
Falafulu Fisi: Mikemild said…
” I stopped reading it at the point where it claimed Maori didn’t really ‘own’ New Zealand in 1840. ”
That is a fact Mike. Maori didn’t own NZ.
And anyway, which Maori ‘owned’ which parts, eh? The whole situation is absurd. And I mean that word, it’s absurd. Take the area in the North Hokianga around Kohukohu and Panguru as an example. Which Iwi ‘owned’ that in 1840? Well as it happens, it was a different one to the one that was there in 1810. But those who live there aren’t taught that, they are blissfully unaware that their forefathers got rid of those who’d been there earlier and as far as they’re concerned they think that “it’s always been our land bla bla”.
Please tell me this, Mikenmild, precisely how much compensation have the Ngapuhi (who as an Iwi now have $m’s) paid the Iwi that lived in the Auckland region before they killed – and ate – all those who couldn’t get away when they sacked the Pa’s there in the Musket Wars? How much, Mikenmild? How much?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:31 am
Spiritfree
Off topic. Go to GD and I’ll answer.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:32 am
We have read for years about the racism in various forms through this blog and as soon as someone spells it out you all get the shits.
Ansell is right. Act is for men and women who think like men and anyone who thinks Cactus is not one has never read much of what she writes.
Who cares about the rest of the limp wristed bearded weirdies that infest our institutions and news services whose world view is to promote socialism and beneficiaries.
If you didn’t watch Q+A this morning go watch it and see the kind of attitudes we should be encouraging as opposed to what we have.
Must be the best Q+A there has been. Inspiring and just what we need said instead of all this stoneage and socialist thinking that abounds in this country.
As one lady said”we need winners” not wingers. We need to learn to win.
Another young man said” The politicians have no plan for NZ” or words to that effect.
Well how many times have we read that on Kiwi blog?
I guess that Ansell will be like Thompson and be vilified for saying what many think. Consider that in a land of supposed free speech. Oh I know its for ACT but really ACT have to ACT and making nice noises ain’t gunna do it. Neither is Brash and I can imagine Banks having a fit and throwing his toys out of his cot. Its my money!!!! which only goews to prove that Cactus was correct when she said that Banks ain’t ACT. (which everyone but Brash could see).
Keep it up John.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:33 am
Adolf is spot on,
surely someone at least proofed the ad before it went out, or is the party in such total disarray that a “creative guru” (FFS)has carte blanche to spend the advertising dollar without any approval.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:35 am
DPF: Personally I think emotive terms such as racist should generally be reserved for those who clearly are – such as the National Front. This, in a nutshell, is why New Zealanders have allowed the political and societal situation which sits over their country like a mouldy blanket to develop as it has. Apparently, favouring one race over another isn’t racist, as long as those being favoured are Maori.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:40 am
Adolf is miles from being spot on Paul.
Adolf supports a party that stands for nothing, a party that has continued with the failed policies of the corrupt Helen Clark government, the same policies he pissed and moaned about for nine years. Adolf supports a party that continues to borrow over a billion dollars a month.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:42 am
The ‘maori issue’ is core for this countries future. “one law for all” is a phrase that best summerises my view.
Vote:Brash, (admittedly a very strange individual etc) did not create a movement when he made his Orewa speech. He simply dared to say what a big chunk of the population was already thinking.
It’s a nasty world and we need to get real. There are people out there now whose sole reason for their Government funded job is to remove you if you speak out of line. I work in the Health system and it’s brutal. Fear rules. A system of patronage that Daley of Chicago would be proud. Cowards will destroy you to save their skins.
We really need somebody who can articulate the benefits of ‘one rule for all” and the idea of justice that were not in this country until the arrival of european thought.
It’s not the racists who sometime spout on KB. Nor is it Brash (hasn’t he turned quaint in the last year or so). Hilary Calvert speaks sensibly and won’t be diverted (admittedly Hils is also quaint)
Who is it who is going to speak of justice, and equality, and will speak of the theft and intimidation if the ‘maori’ promoters get their way.
July 10th, 2011 at 10:44 am
Questions:
What is this generic term Maori?
Its not my wife who runs a successful business and employs several people.
Its not my kids who have fantastic asperations.
Its not my wifes family who run successful farms.
So what the fuck is this thing called Maori that so many are wound up about.?
We live in a society where there are individuals who do not deserve oxygen but to try and blanket many of those with a race based term is lacking in imagination at the very least.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:52 am
As much as I criticised this advert yesterday it should be pointed out to our left-wing brethren making the Kyle Chapman comparisons with John Ansell that we have a guy who was actually re-elected to our Parliament after talking about “white motherfuckers” and how he would not let his daughter date a pakeha. An elected Kyle Chapman who may well be part of a government in future despite all denials from people like Goff and Key.
And it’s not good enough for the Left to claim that they have already denounced Hone. The difference in volume, vitriol and the length of time it is directed at Hone vs. Ansell is what is telling – and I don’t think the post-modernistic rationalisation of differences in power is acceptable nowadays.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:57 am
Mikenmild do you understand what Not PC stated in his article?
Life in New Zealand before the advent of the rule of law recognised neither right, nor privilege, nor even the concept of ownership.
Is the statement above true or false? There was no rule of law in this land before the British arrived? The rule of the jungle was the way of life here. I come from the same culture exactly as the Maori, where land grab by savagery was the norm of the day. This practice stopped when some British Missionaries arrived in Tonga, where they encouraged the king of Tonga at the time to implement a constitutional monarchy system and that was the beginning of civilization. Cannibalism was still practiced at the time before British missionaries arrived. In fact, if you tour the main Island of Tongatapu, and you can go to the west (Fo’ui) there is a place there marked ‘Umu Tangata (human hangi), a reminder of the past savagery, where property rights was not recognized at all, because the rule of the jungle was the way of life as people saw it in those days. No one owned anything. To own something, you need to have laws to recognize it and also protect it. Such system never existed. That’s my whole point here. To own something is to be recognized by law. But there was no law existed. It was the law of the jungle.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:59 am
Falafulu
Off topic, see GD.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:04 am
tom
Hone is an isolated and ignorant fool. Perfect company for Mr Ansell I should have thought. It’s only natural, I guess to see criticism as unfair when one agrees with the message and to see criticism as insufficient when it is others’ views. There are lots of people who condemn extremism from wherever it appears.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:07 am
John Ansell has failed in Public relations 101. He is supposed to be winning people over to support ACT, he may be right is some of his statements, but this sort of rant puts voters off. I know there are many things that need to be done in Government at the moment that Key is avoiding, but being abusive does not help.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:09 am
Mike I’m responding to your post above, where you said that you stopped reading the Not PC article when got to the point where it claimed Maori didn’t really ‘own’ New Zealand in 1840.. It is not off topic. It is related to the topic of discussion here as I stated above, that John Ansell is quite correct.
Anyway, will you stop fuckn’ telling me what to do on this blog? Only David Farrar can tell me what to do here as it is his blog.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:10 am
“surely someone at least proofed the ad before it went out, or is the party in such total disarray that a “creative guru” (FFS)has carte blanche to spend the advertising dollar without any approval.”
The ad was approved. As an ACT member I am happy with it. I see far too many racist anti-Maori comments on this blog. What part of the ad is racist? I hope ACT has learned from this. Ansell is a fool. If he had half a brain he would have realised that not only would he be sacked but he has undermined the ACT policy in regard Maori seats that he claims he wants to promote.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:11 am
Falafulu
I’ve responded, on the GD, because it is off topic here and I don’t want Elaycee to tell me off again.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:14 am
@tom hunter 10:52 am
Now, just what was the ethnicity of the people who waged the wars and made the laws that alienated 63 million acres of Maori land and nationalised the foreshore and seabed without compensation, Tom?
Harawira’s historical analysis was correct, even if his language was offensive. Ansell, by contrast, is an out and out racist who ignores history.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:21 am
tom hunter (1,989) Says:
July 9th, 2011 at 11:29 am
Public education has failed Maori
Public Health has failed Maori.
In general, government and the state has failed Maori.
What bullshit.
Vote:Maori have failed themselves (well those that won’t be bothered or who choose a different way to go). We all have choices and most, Maori have a greater range of choices and subsidies than most other kiwi’s or immigrants. That they fail to capitalize on those choices because they are being reduced to morons and stoneage thinking by their cultural leaders is hardly the responsibility of others. Its always their choice.
Leadership and leadership aspirations for others are the issues.
July 10th, 2011 at 11:22 am
Hang on a second, Toad. You’re raging against Pakeha who ‘waged the wars’?
Er…precisely what were Maori doing before Pakeha arrived?
And what, precisely, did they do with their enemy after killing him or her?
Do you think that that state of affairs should have been allowed to continue?
Or do you think that for the greater good, an external force was required to come in and call a halt to it?
Falafulu, I really like your comments.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:25 am
you are a very strange individual mikenmild.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:36 am
Viking2 – Dave Mann made exactly the same point to me in that thread. I responded here and here. However I’ll repeat one bit specifically to see if I can get my point across:
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:38 am
Teachers should know te reo= bullshit. Epitomises new Nationalist thinking.
Ansell’s had it,upset the race / sexist cart and you’re history. No point believing in freedom any more is there?
Yesterday on te karaere. They want separate nurses for maori,they want to be treated by “their own”. Can ypou imagine the outcry if that came from a “white mofo”?
On TVNZ 7 weather today the towns are given in maori. This is thin edge of the wedge stuff. This is the start of a new week.
Beware Maori incrementalism. RNZ is full of this tokenism. And we’re paying for it.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:40 am
tom
I agree with your comments. In fact, I think there are areas where the Maori Party and ACT could potentially have seen eye to eye over responsibility, self-reliance and autonomy.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:43 am
@Toad – Chapman opposes trade agreements with China and India, just like the Greens. Chapman wants an expanded welfare state, just like the Greens. Chapman does not want free market policies, just like the Greens.
Just which party should he be a member of?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:48 am
Well, this is going well.
My intention was to bring the Maorification issue to a head (both within ACT and without).
It’s far from the only issue of the day, but the 81% Close Up poll suggests it’s the one that will produce the most agreement with the most Kiwis. (Which is very different from most political junkies.)
I had already asked to be released from my contract, and if my outburst has persuaded them to agree, great. I do not want to work for a party that cannot see the point in strongly championing 85% of New Zealanders in the most direct language possible.
It is pathetic that the worst thing you can do in today’s New Zealand is tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. I agree with my friends Paul Henry and Lindsay Perigo that free speech very much includes the right to cause offense.
On this issue, it is absolutely imperative that ACT causes offense. Offense to the enemy. And the enemy is not Maori – not most Maori anyway. The enemy is the Maori sovereignty movement’s useful idiots like Finlayson and Key and Graham and Cullen.
People who are stupid enough to be sucked in by latter-day Maori like Steve O’Regan and Peter Sharples (whose dad was born in Bolton and may well be related to Ena Sharples) and John Hatfield et al.
People like Sharples are no doubt absolutely genuine in their Maoridom, just like the Pope is genuine in his Catholicism.
But for purposes of extracting money from non-Maori, he is not a full, or even probably half-Maori. The same goes for most of these latter-day Maori. They say blood quantum doesn’t matter. Well they would, wouldn’t they?
Our governments think it’s fine to suppress knowledge of the Treaty of Waitangi. They don’t mention that the Treaty was the result of Nga Puhi chiefs not wishing to be eaten in retribution for their ethnic cleansing of southern tribes, who were at that time heading north with their new-found muskets to have them for dinner.
They don’t mention that Maori wanted the Treaty to protect them from their fellow Maori, from the French, and from the surge of incoming and not always civilised British settlers.
They wanted the Queen’s protection, and the Queen reluctantly agreed, as long as they gave her sovereignty over the land. In exchange for that, she would give them the same rights as her people in England. That was an extraordinarily good deal, which duly propelled Maori from the Stone Age to the Space Age in no time flat.
From all the Maori moaning about holocausts and the like, you’d think they’d got a bad deal. Oh sure, there were wrongs done by the settlers eager to get land. And where these wrongs can be proven to have occurred, compensation should be paid.
And it should be paid to people in proportion to the degree of their blood relationship with those wronged.
Our governments who brownwash our kids in social studies (really socialist studies) about the sacredness of things Maori do not mention the tribes who invaded the territories of other tribes (such as in Taranaki, Wellington and the Chatham Islands) and slaughtered and enslaved their enemies, and how they now have the temerity to demand that the government compensate them for being treated much less brutally by the British.
They do not mention the genuine Treaty – the Littlewood Treaty – the correct English translation that spells out the real deal much more clearly than the official bogus versions.
They suppress the Preamble to the Treaty.
They invent bogus concepts like partnership and principles, pure works of fiction by the likes of Geoffrey Palmer and Judge Robin Cook which have spawned a whole grievance industry based on fraud.
They particularly suppress knowledge of pre-Maori races in New Zealand, one of which Maori themselves referred to as ‘tangata whenua’.
All of these things are suppressed by the state, in order for their collaboration with modern Maori fraudsters to proceed.
And all the time, ordinary Maori get very little out of the settlements, and continue to live the life of dependent victims.
The Herald journalist who interviewed me stuffed up one quote in the online story when he quoted me as saying Maori were too lazy to listen to iwi leaders. Not true. The leaders I was talking about were the great Maori leaders of the early 20th century like Sir Apirana Ngata (the guy Brash put on the $50 note).
Ngata’s ambitions for his people were very similar to Don’s. ACT should say that loud and clear, because it’s true.
Ngata urged his people to stop mourning and moaning, get off their bums, respect their ancestors and their culture but also make the most of the opportunities presented by Western culture. He himself had done just that, becoming the first New Zealander of any kind to earn a double degree.
And for pointing all this out, I am called a racist.
What a stupid country.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:49 am
Pakeha and those Maori tribes who felt they’d been screwed over during the musket wars, not to mention earlier epochs.
Pakeha. The same ones who’ve agreed – however reluctantly – to engage in compensation 150 years later. But that does not count in your eyes or Hone’s and never will count – unless only the sainted Far-Left can get only the credit of course (no credit to the working class traitors of the Labour party either).
Back in the day when the likes of Hone’s Mum, Annette Sykes and a few others were regularly being “offensive” to Pakeha I was often informed by left-wingers like you that these people did not really count as they were not part of the power structure. This was all part of the you’re-not-really-a-racist-unless-you-have-power-as-well-as-bigotry rationalisation so beloved of post-modernism.
Hone is now far closer to power than John Ansell or Don Brash will be – let alone Kyle Chapman. Somehow I’m willing to bet that this will not change the focus, volume, frequency or pitch of your concerns about racism and racists.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:49 am
@Michael – to be fair to the Greens, they don’t peddle filth like this flyer –
Vote:http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/4532454.jpg
July 10th, 2011 at 11:50 am
niggly (332) Says:
“The other thing John Ansell should do is get into Politics himself instead of whining about an issue like he has in today’s paper. Then again judging by the amount of half-truth’s, misleading and incorrect information in his ad, I wouldn’t have much faith in him being a trustworthy politician worth voting for ….”
Not saying you are wrong but can you point out the half-truth’s and the misleading and incorrect information in the ad?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:54 am
@John Ansell – Quoting a Close Up poll as evidence. Are you for real?
Vote:Send your CV to info@nzfirst.org.nz
July 10th, 2011 at 11:54 am
Good question, Other_Andy.
And if you can’t, niggly, what was your complaint again?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:56 am
Rodders, any kind of poll is evidence. Not proof, but evidence. When 40,000 people pay with their own money to express a point of view, and when 81% of those people say that Maori do not deserve special priority, then I call that compelling evidence.
What do you call it?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:58 am
@John Ansell – I call it populism, the very thing I presumed that ACT was formed to be an alternative to. If ACT now want to compete with Winston, then they are doomed.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:00 pm
John Ansell, it’s a great shame that you’re not going to be the next Prime Minister of New Zealand.
I agree with everything you wrote. Every word.
What a stupid country. Indeed.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:01 pm
toad
Vote:Harawira is a racist whether or not you agreed with his “analysis”. I’m not defending Ansell, based on that ad and other comments he’s a fool and possibly racist (I don’t know). But at least he didn’t say he “wouldn’t be happy” if one of his children dated a Maori.
July 10th, 2011 at 12:02 pm
Rodders, I despise Winston Peters and would not work for him if he paid me a million bucks. He is a dishonest man who preys on the deluded.
But on the Maorification of Everything issue I probably agree with him 100%. I suggest he campaigns on that phrase, since ACT obviously don’t want it.
As for me, I’m planning to head in a totally different direction and leave political mud wrestling behind for good.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:02 pm
John Ansell said…
They invent bogus concepts like partnership and principles, pure works of fiction
John, that’s 100% correct. Peter Creswell in his article that I linked to above in my previous post, One Law For All, pointed out exactly that.
Somehow, pointing out the truth these days is something to be regarded as vile by some. I guess that those people are comfortable and love to hear about lies. Telling the truth is out of fashion, but telling lies is not.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:03 pm
@John Ansell – Well, we can agree completely on our view of Winston, as an individual then
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:04 pm
It’s not looking good for Act, and if this flies to bits it makes things a bit trickier for National. I’ve gone radical myself, I think this calls for a coalescing of a solid representative support party.
The country, and at the moment National, needs a United sensibility.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:13 pm
John do you think you ridiculous outburst will help or hinder ACT gaining votes?
I believe any votes ACT may have got from the ad will be countered by the votes lost by your grandstanding.
I hope you are not going to send an invoice for the ad.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:14 pm
Rodders, you misunderstand populism.
Populism is the automatic embracing of a popular issue for the sole reason that you think it will make you popular.
Key does this all the time, which is why I can’t stand his politics. He knows global warming is a hoax, but pretends to believe in it because his focus groups tell him (or used to tell him) that it’s popular. That’s pure treachery.
Brash’s embrace of the anti-Maorification position was popular, but not populist. He did so knowing that a great many people would condemn him as a racist. After his Orewa speech in 2004, the public supported him. But not before. Bill English had said much the same thing but got no traction at all.
So Don’s position was principled, not populist. His saying on Close Up that Maori were not special was similarly high-risk. He chose to be that blunt and not qualify the statement. That’s guts.
Don is mad as hell with me for making my public statements. I couldn’t care less. I encouraged him to become ACT leader. I wanted him to become prime minister or at least finance minister. I want that, not because it will be easy, but because New Zealand will not improve unless he does that.
It frustrates the hell out of me that Don prefers to call a spade a manually-leveraged soil displacement utensil. That’s not going to get him anywhere. In a five minute phone call with a journalist, I think I articulated the volcano of rage felt by most New Zealanders over the Maorification issue than any politician, ever.
It’s about telling the truth as boldly as you can. Why do politicians think this is wrong?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:15 pm
Happen to agree with you John. Problem is that too many Kiwi’s have no idea about our real history because so much has been rewritten or falsified or bent to others interpretations. Most can still be found in older text’s but again no one wants to bother just in case the truth gets out there.
Don’t give up on this as there are plenty out there who know this truth and many more who have left NZ for Aussie and other places for the very same reason. As most Maori in Aussie why they are there and they will tell opportunity and release from their kind and their kinds bludging. Ask white Kiwi’s why they are there and the answer is opportunity and relief from Maori bludging.
The big drift for maori reasons started way back in 1992-3 from my experience and accelerates every time we have National Govt.
There is no doubt from my conversations with my many customers that Maori and Maori handouts and Maori this and that is forefront in many peoples minds. Mostly they have Maori friends or workmates that they are fine with, its just the Maorification of everything at the expense of a world view that really irks them.
This mornings Q+A was what we should be doing, instead we are focused on the negative and soul destroying socialism and Triabalism that currently passes for politics in NZ.
Any publicity is better than none. This will raise lots of debate and will shift the stupid conversations about GST back into the bin where it belongs. Its a no goer, Labour and the Greens are the only ones that half heartedly support the idea.
Why discuss something that’s the leader for the opposition party? Take the initiative and rattle the cages. We are here to win. Not just to participate and if J.Boscowan and others feel threatened by this that’s sad, but never mind.
Adolfs rubbish about wages etc etc, is the usual mindless crap that comes from out of touch National supporters.
Lower taxes matter, work opportunities matter, (and go to Q+A to find the answer to that today), freedom of speech matter, freedom as an individual to takes responsibility for oneself matters and our state daily denies us the need or indeed the opportunity to do that.
Youth unemployment at 27.5% and the reaction, another study, another attempt at Govt.. training or subsidy.
We need much more challenging discussion on lots more of what proports to be good for Kiwi’s.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:15 pm
There is little doubt in my mind that the divisive and racist statements made by Hone Harawira were a deliberate attempt to solicit support from a disaffected Te Tai Tokerau electorate. His reduced majority would indicate that there may be fewer Maori than he anticipated willing to tolerate that kind of rhetoric. Whilst I wouldn’t call Mr Ansell’s marketing approach racist, it seems he has misjudged his target market.
On the other hand, he is an expert and I’m not, so perhaps his approach would get ACT over the threshhold. Maybe all those Epsom wives aren’t as liberal as we may think….
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:21 pm
John Ansell has said what the bulk of the country feel, while the lunitic left yell louder and louder trying to smother the man and divert the issue. You should be ashamed of yourselves..and you have the gall to call yourselves New Zealanders..I call you mongrels.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:22 pm
This could be settled very simply.
If NZ governments put their money where their mouths were and allow referenda on important legal and constitutional issues.
We are a democracy. Let the people have their say rather than be led by a Cabinet dictatorship that gives us perversities like the anti smacking law.
No no no ,that would be populist.
We the sheeple,baa baa baaa.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:24 pm
@John Ansell – Thanks for your response. IMHO, if the truth is told, then no “boldness” is required. It doesn’t need to be bellowed from rooftops. That is what NZ First try to do with immigration, and I detest them for it.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:26 pm
That well known Property Investor, (yeh I know they are scum to many of you but listen up), Dolf De Roos has said many times when teaching people about property investing, “go look at 100 houses” and by the time you have you will establish the merits of any buy and you will find the bargains”
What has that to do with this debate.
Well go into 100 houses at random and talk to the occupants, find out their views and then you will know what’s bothering them.
As a person who does this daily I can tell you that’s certainly about no. 3 on the list.
Focus groups are not reliable as people now see them coming and they are influenced by the daily news.
This is a big issue and its is not going away, well unless most of us leave for Aussie.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:50 pm
It’s about telling the truth as boldly as you can. Why do politicians think this is wrong?
Because you end up old and washed up like Roger Douglas with no-one listening to you and no chance at ever having those policies implemented.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 12:57 pm
@niggly
Now more than an hour later……..
For the sake of an honest and open discussion, based on the facts, are you;
1. Going to answer my question and point out the half-truth’s and the misleading and incorrect information in the ad?
2. Going to retract your statement?
Or was this just a ‘hit and run’ and you are going to play possum?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:04 pm
John Ansell, you’re everything that’s wrong with new zealand. Please, I beg you, move to Australia, leave the racism to them.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:04 pm
John Ansell has said what the bulk of the country feel
How are you sure about that? How you feel is not necessarily how “the rest of the country” feels.
And how John is addressing/attacking the issue is not likely to be how the rest of the country thinks it should be dealt with. Most of the rest of Act are probably cringing.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:07 pm
81%..Close Up PG. That represents are fair chunk of the country.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:13 pm
Might be time for a cup of tea and a lie down Mr Ansell.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:15 pm
John Ansell (761) Says:
July 10th, 2011 at 11:48 am
“People like Sharples are no doubt absolutely genuine in their Maoridom, just like the Pope is genuine in his Catholicism.”
Not sure what your point is here. We all have to wear masks from time to time, but does that mean we are all fakes? I like Sharples because he treads a very narrow line with consummate skill.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:17 pm
A Closeup poll doesn’t represent a fair chunk of the country. It represents a chunk of those that can be bothered to pay money to take part in a non-scientific poll – it’s a mercenary whim poll.
Anyway, I don’t think Close-up have polled on the Ansell approach to racial harmony and resolution of issues.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:21 pm
John, can you elaborate on just a few points? I’m wondering if there’s some specific event, policy or development that you think best represents the “maorification” and what you’d do differently?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:22 pm
Chuck, are you saying that as a result of my ‘grandstanding’, the ACT vote is going to collapse? What ACT vote??? Are they going to plummet in the polls from 2% to 1%?
As a member of the Hide party that specialised in getting hidings, you’re part of the problem. I’m trying to be part of the solution: to force the party to decide whether they want to be a party of truth-tellers or a party of cowards.
I say they should tell the truth about every issue, not just the easy economic ones.
Telling the truth includes wading into the unpleasant swamp of race relations. Roger Douglas (who shows great spine in other areas) doesn’t want to go there. Don Brash does, so I admire him for that.
John Boscawen prefers no-risk, no-reward. You can imagine why he and I were at loggerheads.
After my publicised insubordination, one faction ought to prevail and the other ought to gracefully withdraw. The president, if he had any ethics, should have left as soon as Don became leader.
If the bedwetters win, the party will get a few MPs if they’re lucky. If the brave approach wins, they could get a lot more.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:26 pm
Read the ad, Paul. There are too many to mention.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:26 pm
I have read the comments on this thread and the earlier one with interest…here’s my two cents worth.
One point everyone has missed is that to assume the Maori Party is the acceptable face of Maori politics, and that Hone was just a lone extremist racist, is completely wrong. In fact, Hone was simply the one member of the racist Maori Party caucus who said out loud what they all think.
Make no mistake, the entire MP – including that nice Dr Sharples all the ladies love, and Aunty Tari – want nothing less than total Maori control of Aotearoa – and if we don’t like it, we can all bugger off somewhere else. And they are prepared to play a very long game to get it. One example. When one of the appeasors on the Nat front bench (I cant remember which one) was making speech on the Bill which gave riverside iwi the control of the Waikato River, he referred several times to the Bill being a “one off”, and “not a precedent for other rivers.”
Every time he made such a statement, Sharples and Turia made it quite clear with sotto voce observations – not loud enough for anyone sitting much further away than we were to hear – that they thought quite differently. I recall when the speaker referred to the Bill not being a precedent, Aunty Tari smiled broadly and – not loud enough to be picked up by Hansard – said “Oh yes it is …and the Wanganui [pronounced as written, because ironically her iwi does not pronounce "wh" as "f"] will be next”
I agree with others that the ad is too wordy, and that John may have been better to keep some of this thoughts to himself, but the thrust of the ad is spot on. I will take a deep breath and wait for the inevitable accusations of racism…always amusing because Hone – for reasons best known to himself – always liked to say to me “Your wife’s blacker than me, eh bro.” My answer was always the same – she is Hone, but no-one gives a f….about her colour except people like you.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:26 pm
So when were you democratically elected to decide the future direction of the so called “Liberal” party, John? You’re a national joke, the most hilarious part is that you’re still oblivious to this fact,
I’ve said it before, IWI/KIWI was – while racist, dog-whistling and despicable – a good win from you. You haven’t had another one since. I’m really, really glad you’re still working for ACT though!
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:26 pm
John – it sounds like you’re trying to split Act in two and hope the surviving faction will not only recover but also increase support.
I guess you’ve nothing to lose by having a go, but it could take a lot of repairing if it works, internally and publicly.
People don’t usually respond positively to being called cowards.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:29 pm
Make no mistake, the entire MP – including that nice Dr Sharples all the ladies love, and Aunty Tari – want nothing less than total Maori control of Aotearoa
And John Ansell seems to want nothing less then total control of Act (or at least total compliance), and ultimately of government.
And probably won’t get much more party support than the Maori Party gets.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:30 pm
Paul Williams: the latter-day Maorification of the Treaty of Waitangi was probably the start of it all.
The decision by, I think, Robin Cook, that the Treaty was somehow a partnership, and the subsequent decision by Geoffrey Palmer that it contained principles.
Both total nonsense.
The grievance industry, as I understand it, was founded upon those two lies.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:38 pm
I am delighted to be despised by the despicable.
As I just told a journalist, I do not enjoy being called a racist. But I enjoy being a coward even less.
For years I was too scared to stick my head above the parapet. Now I recognise that was just cowardice.
Now I reckon if I’ve got the skills to crystallise a debate, I should use them – and to hell with what others think. My Inbox is full of ‘good on yas’ and that’ll do me.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:38 pm
Act are a joke, nothing but a pack of self serving capitalist extremists that would happily destroy this country for their pleasures, just the same as the extreme left would.
Act are no different to Mana, they should get a room.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:40 pm
Now I reckon if I’ve got the skills to crystallise a debate, I should use them – and to hell with what others think. My Inbox is full of ‘good on yas’ and that’ll do me.
So what John, that there are others in this country just as f@cked in the head as you is hardly a surprise.
You are nothing but a common racist, and you have no business having anything to do with running this country.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:44 pm
You still haven’t answered when you were democratically elected within act to become the master of their destiny?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:44 pm
somewhathickful 104
Move to Australia ,leave the racism to them.
Typical Aotearoan racism. The NZ myth. Not us ,we treat our natives nice,not like the ugly Australians.( I think Maoris would have a different take on that)
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 1:46 pm
John, you mean the NZMC case? I think you do, but what terrible things have been done since (incidentally the settlement precedes this decision albeit in a limited way)? Lands returned to people forcibly dispossessed of them? Governments, democratically elected, negotiating settlements? Your grievance seems to abstract to warrant this frustration. It seems designed to be broad enough that any curmudgeon can play along. I’m not reading your ad John, I’m asking you to explain what it means since you’ve come here (or were you thinking you’d get only claps on the back?)
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:10 pm
ACT need Mana and Mana need ACT. They both need to create a sense of crisis and an impending threat in order to hold onto their base and inflame opinon to try to grow their vote. Its classic politics and very ugly.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:13 pm
It’s not looking good for Act
It doesn’t make any difference Pete. They will still have Epsom after the election and that’s all they need. Their base doesn’t care about this.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:19 pm
Well said Mr Ansell! Finally some principled balls.The cowardly appeasers of racism are squealing big time like that Shunda whimp bitch…well keep squealing whimp bitch…..the war is on for a decent apartheid free NZ.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:20 pm
You don’t think this will impact on Epsom?
It’s impacted on someone – Act’s controversial marketing guru resigns
Vote:- probably the least controversial thing he’s done this weekend.
July 10th, 2011 at 2:23 pm
@reid,
“They will still have Epsom after the election and that’s all they need.”
Using that logic, they didn’t need to roll Hide then.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:25 pm
chunder barunda…explain what is racist about John Ansell..c’mon Im waiting..
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:29 pm
James, like I asked John, what specifically are you referring too? What appeasement? John claimed the Maori party are “raping” whites. That’s a hell of a statement that you support? Can you explain precisely why?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:37 pm
Should teachers learn te reo?
Do the people who agree they should learn it have credible research evidence (a lot of educational research is junk) that having te reo improves Maori students’ learning outcomes, and if so, by how much?
Back in the days when I taught in South Auckland, the largest ethnic group in my classes was usually Samoan. Does this mean that teachers in those schools should have known Samoan? And across the isthmus, Chinese or Korean?
I voluntarily learned, sort of, a Pacific Island language, and my limited knowledge might have contributed to the good relationships I had with many of these students, but I can’t say with any confidence that it was the language rather than the usual skills and attitudes expected of all teachers which was responsible; nor can I say how much if anything my knowledge of the language contributed to their educational results.
Snake-oil salesmen claim great results for this or that educational policy, but can’t back their claims with replicated, generally-applicable evidence of benefits attainable outside the narrow context in which they may have been observed; very often, the claimed benefits are just semi-plausible hypotheses.
Teachers willingly do things when we can see a pay-off for our students, but we don’t appreciate irrelevant burdens any more than other people.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:37 pm
No. go back and read my comment.
John are you a member of ACT. If so you should resign as you are bringing the party into disrepute.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:39 pm
Paul, I’m certainly not expecting claps on the back from people like you. I was expecting just what I’m getting: a firestorm response. From fire comes regeneration, which the ACT Party and NZ could sorely do with.
I was expecting a fiery debate and we’re having one. If 10% of New Zealanders agree with the ACT position (albeit more lily-livered than my personal position), they might be able to profit by it.
After all, there’s no end of parties falling over themselves to protect the so-called rights of so-called Maori, so why not have one to defend the rights of the other 85% (and the many aspirational Maori).
It’s pathetic that so many people seem prepared to label that racist.
At any rate, I’m not with ACT any longer, so there’s no need for my comments to embarrass them further. If they don’t agree with me, they should simply disown me and carry on their merry, lily-livered way. No hard feelings from me.
Paul: I suppose the most ludicrous Maorification event of recent times was the unelected Maori board member advising the Auckland Super City not to upset the taniwha Horotiu when tunnelling.
(The last grumpy taniwha, the one whose guardians insisted would cause trouble unless the Waikato Expressway was re-routed, was, of course, pacified by the payment of a bribe to a tribe.)
Another recent manifestation of Maorification was the Biodiversity report proposing to ban farmers from cutting their own scrub if that scrub was indigenous.
(This despite Maori being a long way from indigenous themselves, having discovered NZ only a few hundred years before the evil British.)
The Waitangi Tribunal showed uncharacteristic restraint by ruling out the claim by Maori to own (or have special guardianship of – I forget) all of our country’s plants and animals.
But why should we have to worry that they might have found differently?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:40 pm
So says Chuck Bird the bigoted homophobe…..pot,kettle…
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:41 pm
He’s done that Chuck, going down in a blaze of gory.
I guess he’s got something off his chest, but while he thought he was giving Act a boot up the bum he’s kicked the party in the guts.
“I was expecting a fiery debate and we’re having one.”
But it has become a debate about your tactics John, and their effect on Act. I’d rather have a less virulent version of Act playing a part in our politics rather than a dismembered corpse.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:42 pm
Shunda whimp bitch…well keep squealing whimp bitch…..the war is on for a decent apartheid free NZ.
Gee james, tell us what you really think! don’t hold back now!
Quite frankly, spineless is what I would call John, the easiest way to draw attention to yourself is through controversy and appealing to ‘residual racism’ it is hardly clever or “brave”.
Well done captain cliché.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:45 pm
Paul Williams…read what Johns said…..these rorts are coming at us from the media everyday.Do you sit in a dark hole somewhere with your eyes closed and your fingers in your ears? Its not everyday Maori people who are behind it either but an alliance of brown table troughers and sickly white guilt ridden honkys who feel ashamed at their own existence.You can tell them by the over sized bone carvings they haul about via their necks so as to appear down with the bros.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:46 pm
chunder barunda…explain what is racist about John Ansell..c’mon Im waiting..
I wonder how many ‘nigger’ jokes old John tells around other suitably “brave” and suitably white anti apartheid New Zealanders.
You buggers are the other side of the problem, and you know what? white mofo’s is probably about on the mark.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:50 pm
@ Other Andy 12:57
It might be an hour or two later but I don’t spend all day on KB hence the non-reply till now (and just finished playing catch up with all the comments etc). Anyway you wanted me to discuss John Ansell’s half-truths, misleading & incorrect info etc?
“Give us enough party votes and ACT will stop National trading away your country’s resources for Maori Party votes”.
Yeah right, tail wagging dog scenario with ACT’s votes likely to be in single figures and winning Epsom not guaranteed. So ACT’s influence to stop National will be diddly squat if they get back in.
Anyway I digress, so “trading away your country’s resources for Maori Party votes”. Other_Andy & John Ansell, please give me example(s) of what NZ resources have been traded away for Maori Party votes?
“Broken their promise to scrap the race-based Maori seats”.
Actually National’s “intention is to wind up the Maori seats at the conclusion of the settlement of historic Treaty claims”, according to http://www.national.org.nz/Article.aspx?articleId=28602 therefore Ansell’s ad is misleading.
“Passed the Marine and Coastal Area Act to makeit much easier for the Maori Party’s mates to claim our coastal riches”. Actually this is harder for Maori than it sounds as they need to be able to prove uninterupted ownership etc in court, so again Ansell’s ad is misleading.
“Ratified the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples that provides for separate development for Maori. (Even Helen Clark’sLabour Party wouldn’t go there.)” I think yesterday someone (here) pointed out there was no formal ratification, so again Ansell’s ad is misleading.
“Foisted on Aucklanders an unelected Maori Statutory Board that can hold the balance of power on council committees”. Did National do that? I think not.
“Forced upon the people of Wanganui a spelling of their city’s name that they’d loudly rejected”. Did National do that? I think not. Try the Geography Board or whatever they’re called. Anyway I thought the spelling wasn’t compulsory (it’s just that some, like the media for example, were early adopters of using the “h”. Hardly National’s doing? Or do National control the media do they?
And the rest talks up the Maori Party thoughts and ideas if they were to become Govt Policy. Sheesh.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:51 pm
thanks for that chunder..you’ve just confimed what I thought about you..carry on.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:55 pm
thanks for that chunder..you’ve just confimed what I thought about you..carry on.
The only thing worse than extreme left wing ideologues are these selfish, racist, sell the country down the garden path hyper capitalist pricks.
This latest round from the ACT party has only confirmed what decent Kiwi folk new all along.
Carry on.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:56 pm
James, are you still bitter that your good friend Jim Peron who supported NAMLIA (North American Man Boy Love Association) got booted out of New Zealand?
ACT does not need supporters of NAMBLA you good friend did not help ACT
If you are so clever James how come nobody in ACT or the Libertarians takes any notice of you.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 2:59 pm
Hmm, Maori are raping whites, so I take it you raving rednecks believe Maori are raping white women ?
Laws and property, what a load of shit, property laws only apply if they can be backed up with force. Example Krajina where Serbs had lived since 1580, they picked the wrong side in the civil war of the nineties and got tossed out of Krajina by the Croat army .
Vote:A lot of bloody good property laws did them.
July 10th, 2011 at 3:00 pm
Shunda barunda:
chunder barunda…explain what is racist about John Ansell..c’mon Im waiting..
I wonder how many ‘nigger’ jokes old John tells around other suitably “brave” and suitably white anti apartheid New Zealanders.
Well you can’t say that you didn’t have your chance, Shunda. But sadly for you, you’ve just proved that your accusation of John Ansell being racist is all in your own imagination.
[Good on you, Starboard!]
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 3:01 pm
Got any evidence that Jim supported NAMBLA at any time Chuck?
And how are your mates the Flannagans and their old mentor Graham Capill doing?
And you are still a bigoted phobe regardless.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 3:04 pm
Well you can’t say that you didn’t have your chance, Shunda. But sadly for you, you’ve just proved that your accusation of John Ansell being racist is all in your own imagination.
You have got to be friggin joking.
Perhaps if I had have said that last week on a GD thread you would have a valid point, but as it stands, I fear you may be a grade A moron.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 3:07 pm
grumpyoldyori: Laws and property, what a load of shit, property laws only apply if they can be backed up with force. Example Krajina where Serbs had lived since 1580, they picked the wrong side in the civil war of the nineties and got tossed out of Krajina by the Croat army .
A lot of bloody good property laws did them.
Not a good argument to make, grumpy. You see, while more or less everyone fighting in the wars in the former Yugoslavia did bad things, the Serbs were far better than the rest at ethnic cleansing and, well, basically, slaughtering the opposition. And so it was that the Serbs got the heavy fist. Quite fair, really.
However, in NZ, the Maori were far and away the best at slaughtering the opposition and they didn’t stop at mere killing, but when another group came along and put a stop to their disgraceful antics, the other group had to pay compensation and still are. Not fair at all.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 3:09 pm
I took the rape comment to mean that white taxpayers are being “raped” to fund an ever expanding Maori grievance industry …and that would be true.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 3:13 pm
Skunda Barunda: “Well you can’t say that you didn’t have your chance, Shunda. But sadly for you, you’ve just proved that your accusation of John Ansell being racist is all in your own imagination.”
You have got to be friggin joking.
No. Last time you merely said “I wonder how many ‘nigger’ jokes old John tells…” “Wonder” denotes imagination. So it was in your imagination.
So this time, explain, please, precisely, why you consider John Ansell to be racist. You have one more opportunity to back up your assertion.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 3:14 pm
However, in NZ, the Maori were far and away the best at slaughtering the opposition and they didn’t stop at mere killing, but when another group came along and put a stop to their disgraceful antics, the other group had to pay compensation and still are. Not fair at all.
Interestingly, while it may me true certain lefties would have us pay compensation for all eternity, certain righties would have us back to ‘killing’.
The Act party is of equal danger to this nations security as any other extremist group.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 3:17 pm
You have one more opportunity to back up your assertion.
Did you catch that tone folks? one more opportunity? doesn’t take much for brazen right wing authoritarianism to emerge does it!
Scary.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 3:19 pm
Breaking News:
John Key is going to call a special press conference on Monday to launch the National Party’s election year “Closing the Gaps” intiative to help Maori.
Two legs good, four legs bad.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 3:20 pm
Chuck Bird
I like Don Brash and I like his policies. However you will not, I repeat will not receive my vote for the following reasons.
Someone within the ACT Party and you know who they are set Heather Roy up as the person who leaked Garrett and you know she did not. She was a threat to Rodney. You have lost your most respected and hard working MP. She is respected by all sides of the House and that is something none of your other MP’s are.
You allowed John Boscawen to cut a deal with Rodney Hide in 2008 to pay $100,000 for his list placing so he could be an MP. This is a democracy, and to so blatantly disrepect NZ and the party like that is abhorrent. And again $50,000 waved around as the good and saving grace that he is so he can ask for donations is sickening.
To fill the party with wealthy baby boomers so they can feel important is not the panacea ACT needs and is not who you should be targeting in your quest. You are looking in the wrong place. For the love of God do the polls not tell you this. Yes Banks will win Epsom but until you change your strategy and Don finishes the job by getting rid of the ridiculousness that is still the Hide controlled Board you will never achieve any more than the 3 seats you are currently polling. Roger Douglas is ashamed of you all and so he should be. Wake the hell up and talk to real people, the voters you have lost. Many of them have gone because of Hide and many more now because Heather is going and you, yes you, are simply not helping one bit.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 3:25 pm
Breaking News:
John Key is going to call a special press conference on Monday to launch the National Party’s election year “Closing the Gaps” intiative to help Maori.
Breaking news!
“Don Brash has a called a special press conference on Monday to launch the ACT parties election year “uppity niggers” initiative to help the struggling wealthy white”.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 3:30 pm
Since when did politics become a creative field? It should be mostly simply say how you will do things and do them. The rest should be straight forward analysis, implementation and administration.
No one goes into politics and ends up saving the country or saving the world, good politicians mostly make incremental changes.
Being popular involves listening to as many people as possible and doing things they want done. That doesn’t sound all that terrible to me.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 3:52 pm
Total control? Isn’t that the goal though? Labour made that crystal clear…even in defeat when Helen still couldn’t take the voters hint!
As for Ansell, I wasn’t aware we had to give thanks. Fuck,….my apologies bwana!!
No wonder those of us who want to make a go of it are off, the perceived threat to the domination of the somewhat paranoid establishment baldheads and their horde of middle class noddies has bred Ansell’s, Brash’s & their idiot minions who balk at the mere mention of anything Maori unless it squares with their notions of our place in their little kingdom….obviously that place is still leaning on shovels.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:04 pm
The thing that you keep missing, John, is that you keep referring to it as “white cowards” against maori – not “kiwi cowards, asian cowards, samoan cowards, brown cowards etc”. You’re a garden variety racist and nothing more.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:09 pm
John and James, so what you’ve both pointed to is a handful of recent decisions you don’t agree with and you fell that justifies immoderate and ludicrously inflammatory language? I like what Bolger’s reported to have said on the eve of an election, “sure, we could play the race card, but we’d still have to govern if we won”.
If you don’t like the label racist, try being more constructive and reasonable and having more than a handful of largely irrelevant examples to back up your otherwise hyperbolic phrasing. John, you don’t speak for pakeha NZ and I very much doubt you or ACT will get near ten per cent. You’re a political vandal and incapable of playing a constructive role in the country’s future.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:09 pm
Shunda barunda hell don’t put them off, it would be great if they tried a red neck revolution on.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:10 pm
John Ansell (766) Says:
July 10th, 2011 at 1:38 pm…………………….My Inbox is full of ‘good on yas’ and that’ll do me.
………………….
Well John,wankers talking to wankers just makes a bigger bunch of wankers.
You are living a delusion if you believe anything other than you have made the most god awful fuck up. Brash has arse holed you and you have become an instant embarassment
A couple of congratulatory emails from fellow sheet wearers does not give you or your ideas any sort of national mandate.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:16 pm
I see Adolf Fiinkensein posited:
I’ve yet to encounter a party in which the leader wasn’t involved in the message creation process; and the smaller the party, the more involved. I see some are dismissing Adolf’s rhetorical as simply shilling for Key, so I – as someone on record as highly critical of Key – will re-ask it, in the hope John Ansell, having till now talked content, may now talk process.
Because I’m broadly in agreement with David Garrett, again – right sentiment (one law for all), wrong, shrill delivery. But I’d rather have politics filled with a dozen John Ansells and Hone Harawiras – people who aren’t afraid to say what they think, even if I disagree with it – than even one person who’s a political shape shifter.
So, John, could you perhaps enlighten us on the process which led to the creation of this advertisement, from concept to sign-off.
Because I for one think the more important issue isn’t whether your opinion is right or wrong, but whether the leader of a party which holds, and could potentially after the election continue to hold, the balance of power is honest or not.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:21 pm
Wrong V2. Those people are not our cultural leaders, just the loudest of the activist fringe.
The cultural leaders are those who are encouraging higher education, business & political participation AND language/cultural understanding. Ah, generalizations are a bitch!
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:22 pm
unpcnzcougar, I do not intend of speaking against any standing ACT MPs on a public forum. If you want to communicate with me my gmail address is chuckbirdnz@gmail.com
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:22 pm
And for pointing all this out, I am called a racist.
What a stupid country.
so fuck off then.
There was no rule of law in this land before the British arrived?
BULLSHIT !!!… There was rule of law just not british law. Exactly how do you think tribal boundaries were defined and exactly what iwi sovereignty/property rights is it that the treaty guaranteed if they according to you didn’t have any ?
just because you’re ignorant of pre european law or because it wasn’t written down doesn’t mean it never existed in your cannibalistic fantasy of early Pasifikan culture.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:23 pm
@John Ansell (766) Says:
July 10th, 2011 at 2:39 pm
“Paul, I’m certainly not expecting claps on the back from people like you. I was expecting just what I’m getting: a firestorm response. From fire comes regeneration, which the ACT Party and NZ could sorely do with.”
It’s funny how people always overestimate the importance of their role in any organisation. For better or worse, ACT is now about Brash, not the hired help.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:30 pm
Black said…
just because you’re ignorant of pre european law or because it wasn’t written down doesn’t mean it never existed in your cannibalistic fantasy of early Pasifikan culture.
It is called rule of the jungle. One tribe hold on to a territory until one tribe is strong enough to take it from you. That’s what happened. Do you want to go back to that unwritten law of those days?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:36 pm
“it would be great if they tried a red neck revolution on”
..and you’ll be the first one in my sights loser…
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:41 pm
Falafulu
And, according to Ansell, Maori should really say thank you for bringing in that rule of law.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:44 pm
It is called rule of the jungle.
Nah bro, thats what you and the colonists call it to justify the land raping.
I think you’ll find back in the day they had clearly delineated tribal areas claimed and marked out by ancestors and the plain and simple fact is, irrespective of what you think, there was rule of law, prpoerty rights and sovereignty associated with those lands.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:48 pm
There was nothing wrong with the ad that was placed, the ones that weren’t however don’t sound quite so right.
I can already see that some people are using the “R” word now to describe the people who want one law for all. Bunch of moronic imbeciles.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:48 pm
Black
Stop interrupting the rhetoric with troublesome facts.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 4:53 pm
“I’d be fascinated to hear why ACT is not a party for women who think like women.”
So, has John Ansell answered this yet?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 5:27 pm
So, has John Ansell answered this yet?
I think someone’s comment above to the effect Cactus Kate is your female ACT archtype and what do you think: do you think she thinks more like a man, or more like a woman, is the point Steve.
So JA probably doesn’t have to answer that, does he.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 5:33 pm
chunder barunda..you havent pointed out how J Ansell is a racist..you had many chances but you havent done it. You failed. You now look like a fool , fool.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 5:36 pm
John’s achieved his goal; he yelled fire and everyone ran about for no purpose. He’s done it before, he’ll do it again. One. Trick. Pony.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 5:37 pm
Ansell over rated
Vote:Brash not relevant
ACT a failure
July 10th, 2011 at 5:37 pm
DPF – you say:.. ‘But likewise one should be able to say all teachers should know basic te reo, and also not be called racist.’
Quite right. But when one says that such a programme is a total waste of time, money and all other resources until Maori ALL encompass the language – one should also not be called a racist.
Because we all know from places like wales and scotland that until the ‘natives’ of the language get on board – its a lost cause.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 5:47 pm
‘But likewise one should be able to say all teachers should know basic te reo, and also not be called racist.’
Yip – you label them the other “R” word – retard.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 5:50 pm
anyhoo..Party vote ACT. It is the way forward. It is the thinking persons party. Mana , Maori party et al.. be afraid..be very afraid , the gravy train is coming to an end.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 5:51 pm
Cactus Kate is your female ACT archetype
____________________________________________________
privileged, white, self centred and childless ?
evolutionary dead end, if you ask me.
You know how we role mikenmild. Never let the facts get in the way of a good story. Tell em what they want to hear and always leave ‘em wanting more
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 5:59 pm
Rex Widerstrom @ 4:16
Thanks.
I’m glad at least one person has stopped shouting long enough to wake up and ask the right questions.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:07 pm
@Adolf:
Yes, I appreciate that racial issues seem to push buttons for a lot of people, but I’d have thought that the honesty (or otherwise) of the Leader of an influential political party was at least as important.
Perhaps a journalist needs to ask Brash “Did you approve the content of that advertisement?” so he can hold up a big sign with “NO” on it before people will smell a rat?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:09 pm
Black with a Vengeance wrote: I think you’ll find back in the day they had clearly delineated tribal areas claimed and marked out by ancestors and the plain and simple fact is, irrespective of what you think, there was rule of law, prpoerty rights and sovereignty associated with those lands.
But *which* lands would that be?
The ones that the latest “I’m bigger than you are!” chief conquered?
What about the area around Panguru/Kohukohu, for example. which wasn’t Ngapuhi before the Musket Wars, but whose current inhabitants think, delusionally, “was always ours”. I’m not aware of Ngapuhi paying any compensation for that…
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:11 pm
Spiritfree
So land could be acquired by conquest. So what?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:17 pm
Mikenmild: So land could be acquired by conquest. So what?
You, Sir, are unbelievably, stunningly, breathtakingly hypocritical.
Presumably, you won’t be supporting any more claims for compensation from the Crown, by Maori, for anything.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:23 pm
@mikenmild (1,040) Says:
July 10th, 2011 at 4:48 pm
Black
“Stop interrupting the rhetoric with troublesome facts.”
Mike, I dispute your use of the word ‘Facts’ here. Whatever any oral history has to say about ‘fact’ has to be taken with a grain of salt. The Bible for example. FFF’s description ‘Law Of The Jungle’, despite its pejorative slant, seems more believable to me.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:24 pm
unpcnzcougar(1) July 10th, 2011 at 3:20 pm says: “You allowed John Boscawen to cut a deal with Rodney Hide in 2008 to pay $100,000 for his list placing so he could be an MP. This is a democracy, and to so blatantly disrepect NZ and the party like that is abhorrent. And again $50,000 waved around as the good and saving grace that he is so he can ask for donations is sickening.”
This comment deserves sunshine. And plenty of it. Where are you, Chuck Bird??
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:26 pm
Spiritfree
Um, not relevant. The British acquired sovereignty by dint of a treaty with the sovereign chiefs. The British were not able to conquer New Zealand, and did not try to do so. It has been held, quite rightly in my view, that the Crown’s breaches of a treaty it sought created grievances that needed settling.
This argument that Maori conquered Maori so therefore they have no rights and are owed nothing is simply specious. It’s similar to saying that a criminal deserves no protection against crime, except that ‘crimes’ by Maori against Maori prior to 1840 can only be viewed through the tikanga of the time.
The ‘rule of law’ is claimed to have arrived in NZ in 1840. We are still dealing with the consequences of that.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:31 pm
kingofthejuice
What Black said was quite factual. It’s pretty hard to argue that Maori didn’t have tikanga covering their ownership and occupation of the land.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:35 pm
Gasp! You’re not implying Don gave a yea to all of this! Heh.
A long bow scenario – Ansell may have been leaving anyway & decided to go out with a bit of a bang….giving Don an out to deny his involvement in the ad creation? Urrrkk =/
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:43 pm
You must be referring to the famous Te Ika a Ranganui case of 1825 in which Ngapuhi, led by the outstanding barrister Hongi Hika, won a ruling from the Aotearoa Supreme Court that reversed the earlier Moremonui ruling of 1808.
Landmarks in jurisprudence I tell you.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:46 pm
tom,
Genuine question … do you know what “tikanga” means?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:48 pm
Andrew
Genuine question … do you know what “above the law” means?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:51 pm
Mikenmild: except that ‘crimes’ by Maori against Maori prior to 1840 can only be viewed through the tikanga of the time. …which presumably makes all those crimes OK.
I have some common sense, a sense of what is right and wrong. And my common sense, along with – I guarantee it, the overwhelming majority of New Zealanders – tells me that the whole thing is hypocritical. If Maori did something to Maori, then, well OK bro, it happened, let’s forget about it. But if Pakeha did something to Maori, then there’s hell to pay. What gets me is that you’ll jump through fire in your continuing attempts to justify the current situation.
As Ansell very clearly laid out, the overwhelming majority of Maori wanted Crown protection – against each other. They were tired of endless wars and the constant fear of slavery or slaughter followed by being eaten, or both. Who wouldn’t be? But – even more bizarrely – we have Black with a Vengeance (and others) on here arguing that that was the rule of law and was OK.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 6:57 pm
Okay, okay – I was being sarcastic. Let me have another crack at it.
“We won. You lost. Eat that”?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:00 pm
Spiritfree
Maori did not seek Crown protection from other Maori. They were confident in their own strength and sought British involvement to improve trade opportunities ans control renegade pakeha. I sincerely recommend you seek other sources than John Ansell as you study our history.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:07 pm
mikenmild (1,049) Says:
July 10th, 2011 at 7:00 pm .
“Maori did not seek Crown protection from other Maori”
Yes they did milkymike…stop trying to re-write history.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:11 pm
starboard
Got a source for that?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:17 pm
tom,
So the answer would be “no”, then.
spiritfree,
If your (and Ansell’s) account of the Maori reasons for signing the Treaty is correct, then to what to you attribute the almost immediate Maori dissatisfaction with Crown actions post-1840? I mean, if Maori were happily saying to the Crown “you guys PLEASE take over and keep us safe from one-another!”, why exactly did the NZ Wars, etc happen?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:20 pm
sure milkymike ..see Genesis of Diversity Encyclopedia , have a good read son.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:26 pm
“see Genesis of Diversity Encyclopedia , have a good read son.”
Brilliant. ROTFLMAO
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:26 pm
starboard,
So the answer would be “no”, then.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:28 pm
AG
Don’t expect to get anywhere with starboard or Spiritfree. It is kind of fun though.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:39 pm
*sigh*..see 7.20pm comment..now run along.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:46 pm
@mikenmild (1,052) Says:
July 10th, 2011 at 6:31 pm
I freely admit that I’m out of my depth in matters of tikanga, but the impression I get from reading NZ history is that Maori didn’t seem to act as if they were constrained by any kind of pan tribal custom. For example, in 1835 some Ngāti Mutunga and Ngāti Tama people invaded the Chathams, enslaving the local population. Was this a violation of tikanga, and if so, to whom were they accountable?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:46 pm
@niggly
Thanks for your response.
Your statement: “….judging by the amount of half-truth’s, misleading and incorrect information in his ad…”
There seems to be one half-truth in the ad and a very small one at that (See the first one), so your statement seems to be exaggerated if not incorrect.
“Broken their promise to scrap the race-based Maori seats”.
Actually National’s “intention is to wind up the Maori seats at the conclusion of the settlement of historic Treaty claims”, according to http://www.national.org.nz/Article.aspx?articleId=28602 therefore Ansell’s ad is misleading.
You seem to be correct on this one. Wonder what John has to say about this.
National has been coy about this though.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz-election-2008/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501799&objectid=10537954
“Passed the Marine and Coastal Area Act to make it much easier for the Maori Party’s mates to claim our coastal riches”. Actually this is harder for Maori than it sounds as they need to be able to prove uninterrupted ownership etc in court, so again Ansell’s ad is misleading.
I don’t think this is misleading. The Marine and Coastal Area Act makes it easier to claim than before.
“Ratified the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples that provides for separate development for Maori. (Even Helen Clark’sLabour Party wouldn’t go there.)” I think yesterday someone (here) pointed out there was no formal ratification, so again Ansell’s ad is misleading.
In April 2010 Pita Sharples announced New Zealand’s support of the declaration at a speech in New York. On 19 April 2010 it was announced by Pita Sharples that New Zealand endorsed the UN declaration. John seems to be correct on this one.
http://indigenouspeoplesissues.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4850:new-zealand-statement-on-adoption-of-declaration-at-un-permanent-forum-on-indigenous-issues&catid=58:oceania-indigenous-peoples&Itemid=80
“Foisted on Aucklanders an unelected Maori Statutory Board that can hold the balance of power on council committees”. Did National do that? I think not.
I think the National government could have put a stop to this. Why did Peter Sharples get involved?
Why a Press Release from the New Zealand Government?
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1010/S00529/maori-statutory-board-members-announced.htm
“Forced upon the people of Wanganui a spelling of their city’s name that they’d loudly rejected”. Did National do that? I think not. Try the Geography Board or whatever they’re called. Anyway I thought the spelling wasn’t compulsory (it’s just that some, like the media for example, were early adopters of using the “h”. Hardly National’s doing? Or do National control the media do they?
The New Zealand Geographic Board only proposes the change. It has to be approved by Land Information Minister, who may confirm, modify or reject it. The minister approved it
Vote:http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10597886
July 10th, 2011 at 7:51 pm
As a typical party vote ACT/ electorate vote National voter I’m incredulous that ACT have started off like this. Sure there are issues in this area but it is not why the majority of us look to them. Why not start off with an anti ETS ad or something in the stupid welfare spending area?
Vote:ACT can’t take my vote for granted at this point.
July 10th, 2011 at 7:53 pm
From Dim-Posts quote of Ansell…
Isn’t this litany supposed to be expressed something like “Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer “?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:53 pm
Starboard: Yes they did milkymike…stop trying to re-write history.
Starboard – sadly, history is being re-written. It’s why NZ is in this mess.
Take ‘The NZ Historical Atlas’, for example. The book was launched by PM Jim Bolger in 1997 and has won awards. In it, the Musket Wars are described as Maori migrations.
Then there’s James Belich. Many say that he is the most highly-regarded NZ historian. However, he applies Shunda barunda sensibilities to the recording of history: (a) if you have no source, you make it up, and (b) if you come across something that doesn’t fit your agenda, you overlook it. http://tinyurl.com/3uo6qae This link is very revealing.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:55 pm
kingofthejuice
I’m not saying there was any pan-tribal rule of law. Warfare, slaughter and cannibalism certainly occurred. But some seems to feels that Maori ‘crimes’ against Maori results in some moral forfeiting of the right to justice after 1840. That’s just daft.
I’m not trying to paint a rosy picture of the past. The invasion of the Chathams was a terrible catastrophe for the inhabitants, who appear for have forsworn warfare completely. Some have tried to airbrush this event out of the story.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:55 pm
I wonder why people bother with questions like the one about “tikanga” in an online forum where Wikipedia and the other sources are available at the click of a few keys?
I’d have thought that someone who is confident of their definition would simply have stated what it is, like the Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi – though I’ll grant that Andrew would likely come to a grinding halt at the word “principle.”
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:57 pm
Tonight’s TV 3 Reid Research poll is not an indicator of good things to come for ACT or for Labour.
The Greens are gobbling up Labour and Dr Two and a Half just became Dr One Point Seven.
For God’s sake, Winston Peters, the unmitigated prick, polled 2.7%.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:59 pm
a very good link Spiritfree..the last paragraph says it all.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 7:59 pm
Spiritfree
I have a copy of the atlas in front of me. Plate 29 is certainly title Nga Hke: Maori migrations 1820-1840. In it, the taua, battles and results are shown quite well. It’s not glossed over at all.
For your criticisms of Belich, you might need to try harder than an Amazon review.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 8:04 pm
That has to be the best one today.
Vote:mikenmild, recommending that someone else seeks other sources as they study our history.
What a pompous, self important, pratt.
Oh, thats a beauty.
July 10th, 2011 at 8:08 pm
Courage Wolf brings us back on topic.
ACT condemned itself to populist irrelevancy some time ago. If Brash had set out to promote some kind of vision based on the 2020 taskforce, perhaps he would get some traction, but that now seems very unlikely. At least he seems welcome in Fiji!
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 8:23 pm
The weaker the economic right, the faster we go the way of Greece. Good bye economic sovereignty …
I’m a bit pissed with Act. Their economic remedies and PR capabilities are starkly at opposite ends of the wisdom spectrum.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 8:30 pm
now he has topped himself.
check out his effort @ 7.59
He has the truth in front of him.
Others need to try harder.
This stuff is priceless.
Can he top this puke.
Vote:C’mon mikenmild, show us your real stuff.
July 10th, 2011 at 8:31 pm
bereal
You are welcome to make an argument for alternative versions.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 8:38 pm
Mikenmild: ..but some seems to feels that Maori ‘crimes’ against Maori results in some moral forfeiting of the right to justice after 1840. That’s just daft.
Now it’s re-writing the history of these comments. I’m pointing out the hypocrisy of Maori not giving or being expected to give any compensation at all for the despicable things they did to other Maori pre-1840, which were clearly far, far worse than the treatment of Maori by the European colonisers, yet expecting never-ending compensation from Pakeha. And now the Chathams are being brought up – the Crown was forced to compensate for the slaughter there of the Moriori by Maori.
Mikenmild, whyever do you place an inverted comma around the word crimes when it refers to crimes by Maori against Maori? Oh, sorry, I forgot. Your blinkers are stapled on.
As evidence by: I have a copy of the atlas in front of me. Plate 29 is certainly title Nga Hke: Maori migrations 1820-1840. In it, the taua, battles and results are shown quite well. It’s not glossed over at all. You are being deliberately obtuse, as ever. It’s the use of the word “migration”, as I pointed out before. They weren’t so bad, really. Unjustifiable seemingly random invasions, slavery, slaughter, cannibalism. Just migrations.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 8:39 pm
How on earth could i presume to argue with the font of all knowledge.
Vote:In any case Spiritfree has already buried you.
Clown.
July 10th, 2011 at 8:45 pm
krazykiwi suggests:
Honest question, because I truly wonder myself… is a party which is so utterly, abysmally, woefully lacking in judgement as to the relatively simple fundamentals of political persuasion at the same time a fount of wisdom economically?
I mean, if a guy can’t handle putting up the sign outside his store, greet customers in a way that doesn’t alienate them, avoid the screaming rows in the stockroom being heard by people in the carpark and in fact only got to run the business because he ham-fistedly foreclosed on the previous owner, is this guy’s business also a safe bet in which to invest your money?
Can you be both totally inept and extremely wise, albeit about different things, simultaneously?
To continue the analogy, it seems to me (leaving aside Labour, which is what most people will do for some time to come) the choices are between a smooth, smiling, store owner who’s got the PR right but you’d want to make damned sure the guarantee on what he’s selling was valid, because it’ll break down before you get it home; versus a collection of owners who’re too busy hurling excrement round their own stores like monkeys to even get the advertising right.
Oh, and Peter Dunne, waiting in the car park to see who comes out and takes him home tonight.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 8:50 pm
Does anybody else get the feeling that the little prick Winston Hide might have something to do with unrest the ACT party finds itself in?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 8:53 pm
Spiritfree
You haven’t followed the argument at all. The musket wars saw much slaughter. Did that justify poor treatment of all Maori after 1840? Do you really think the British came in on a white horse to save the victims?
Treaty claims have nothing to do with what happened before 1840 and everything to do with the Crown being held to its promises made at Waitangi.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 8:56 pm
Does anybody else get the feeling that the little prick Winston Hide might have something to do with unrest the ACT party finds itself in?
No. Have you got any evidence at all? I think Rodney knew how much of a loose cannon Ansell is. In any case Rodney could not influence Ansell.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:01 pm
This is great. It gets better and betterer.
Vote:“the musket wars saw much slaughter. Did this justify the poor treatment of all Maori after 1840 ?”
Oh dear, i cant stand much more of this unimpeachable logic.
You gotta be the best mikenmild. Full marks.
How will you top this ?
July 10th, 2011 at 9:09 pm
DPF: “I’d be fascinated to hear why ACT is not a party for women who think like women.”
The evidence of history, David.
The women who support ACT are not squeamish about speaking bluntly about rational issues (including racial issues). I respect them very much.
In short, they’ve got guts.
More typical women are less rational and more emotional. They’d rather preserve relationships than rock the boat. Is that not true?
If it were not for the female vote, Don Brash would have become prime minister in 2005 and we’d be a much more prosperous country today.
But women, by a reasonable margin, preferred to cuddle the various minority groups and spend more of other people’s money on welfare that to take the hard economic decisions. These ‘soft mothers’ voted for short-term gain and long-term pain.
The ‘strong fathers’, also by a reasonable margin, voted for short-term pain and long-term gain. The rational (or should that be Brashional) approach.
Now of course I’ll be branded misogynist as well as racist. But again, I’m just pointing out the simple truth.
The soft mother model doesn’t seem to be universal. In Britain, women ‘got’ Margaret Thatcher’s bold approach (a woman who thought like a man if ever there was one).
But in New Zealand, when it comes to strong policies that actually allow the country to move forward, the girls let the side down. Three terms of Clarxism was not a rational answer to any rational question.
New Zealand is awash with parties that represent the female view of the world: Labour, the Greens, the latter-day Nats.
But only ACT represents rational women and rational men. The party should not be ashamed to say so. When they’re aiming for 100% and getting only 2%, niche marketing theory suggests they’d be better to go hard for the masculine 50% (men and women who think like men) and get 10%+.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:09 pm
@Chuck Bird – care to comment on my 6.24pm?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:10 pm
“You haven’t followed the argument at all”
pompus little tit…
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:19 pm
Well said starboard.
Vote:This little tit is pompous as well.
The joke is, he wont even understand what we are talking about.
July 10th, 2011 at 9:20 pm
John Ansell (767) Says:
July 10th, 2011 at 9:09 pm
“More typical women are less rational and more emotional”
Is Mr. Ansell adding fuel to his Brashfire? Alasdair Thompson, eat your heart out.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:20 pm
Saw Rodney on Friday.I don’t think he really cares any more and wants to move on to better things…can’t blame him after the dirty way he was ousted.If ACT falls down he can take some satisfaction in the fact it obviously wasn’t all his fault it bit the dust.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:22 pm
Chuck
At least Mr Ansell has ACT’s best interests at heart, Winston Hide has always been about looking after number one.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:25 pm
Ansell is right.ACT for too long has tried the soft mother approach…and it hasn’t delivered shit.It time to be true to the facts and principles and say things as they are.Some will get all offended but who cares a fuck about them,they are the problem after all.Go for the voters who will appreciate ACT telling it like it is…and there are many of them.
Be the alternative…and the people (who matter) will come.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:29 pm
Well said that man.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 9:41 pm
Of course you’re correct Mr Ansell that has never been the question. The question is: have you been wise these last few days.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:14 pm
Since you’ve popped back up, John A, I refer you to my 4.16 pm.
All debate about the rightness or wrongness of your position aside, the good doctor is now scrambling to distance himself from you, and the recent campaign, as though he’d just broken wind at a cocktail party and needed to get to the other side of the room.
So, to hark back to Woodward and Bernstein, what did Brash know and when did he know it?
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:28 pm
kingofthejuice (69) Says:
John Ansell (767) Says:
“More typical women are less rational and more emotional”
Is Mr. Ansell adding fuel to his Brashfire? Alasdair Thompson, eat your heart out.
Kingofthejuice – I believe that the statement about target markets “men, and women who think like men” was first suggested by a female ACT member and staffer. Yes, shock horror, a female! I am also told that it is pretty much supported by research.
I believe also that the woman who suggested it has not only spent many, many years working in a mans world but also many, many years living in the world of “women who don’t think like men”.
If a women had come out with this statement first on this blog, instead of John Ansell, would you also have attacked her for doing an “Alisdair Thompson?” I suspect not.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:31 pm
“More typical women are less rational and more emotional. They’d rather preserve relationships than rock the boat. Is that not true?”
Ever considered that preserving relationships might be rational? I guess not.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 10:53 pm
TSM, women who support ACT realise they are in the minority of women and would like to see themselves as more rational/like men than other women.
Sure privileged men are less likely to care what others think and see themselves as alpha males who deserve adoring acolytes (the “more rational” of women marrying money with their body or serving their money professionally with their rational mind) as they believe that god was made in their image. And they reward their loyal women with recognition that they too have discoverd the faith of the true religion.
On a point raised earlier on questions about whether John Ansell is racist, I will simply note he ascribes to the old idea of a test of Maori status based on pure bloodedness. He stated that while he supports compensation for stolen property it should be given based on the extent of pure blood. Thus suggesting that Maori who marry Pakeha are betraying their whakapapa. Inheritance of a claim usually goes to descendants (there is no race test), but Ansell is suggesting a specific race test to iwi settlement money. Yet iwi include all descendants of members of the iwi (they have no race test, just line of ancestry, not placing any distinction based on choice of marriage partners) and operates as a collective. His idea would either require state intervention in iwi affairs on their distribution of money from Treaty Settlement Assets based on the race/pure Maori bloodedness or a law denying membership of iwi to those with too low a level of Maori ancestry (Nga Tahu anyone).
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:12 pm
“I’d be fascinated to hear why ACT is not a party for women who think like women.”
The reason is simple, there are three of them already, National, Labour and the Greens. All lead by the biggest Grade-A idiots that ever drew breath.
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:18 pm
John, I think I follow your argument now: politics is for white men, manly ones. Everyone else is, well dark and/or soft. Classy.
Don Brash paid for that message!
Vote:July 10th, 2011 at 11:20 pm
The Silent Majority (72) Says:
July 10th, 2011 at 10:28 pm
True, but that’s just the nature of the game. The question I would ask is, does venting one’s spleen in public come across as a rational decision or an emotional one. Should John Ansell seek out some rational feminine advice perhaps?
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 12:02 am
I think someone’s comment above to the effect Cactus Kate is your female ACT archtype and what do you think: do you think she thinks more like a man, or more like a woman, is the point Steve.
So JA probably doesn’t have to answer that, does he.
Funny answer. Anyway, don’t be offended, but John Ansell felt compelled to answer the question, rather than relying on your proxy answer. Let’s look at what he said…
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 12:03 am
Early on in the comments on yesterday’s thread on this subject I wrote I know what will happen on this
blog thread. Brash will be cried down
for ‘playing the race card’ when what
he is actually doing is standing up to
and replying to the real racists in our
society. This is nu-think in action. Start a race-based political movement for
indigenous supremacy and then scream
“racist’ at anybody who has the balls to
confront what you are doing by
spelling out the truth.
Even so, I must admit that I have been staggered to read the sheer depth of bitterness and race hatred which sits like a pus filled sore just beneath the skin of this rather nasty little country.
We are in trouble. This is not just ‘healthy boisterous debate’ anymore.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 12:05 am
The women who support ACT are not squeamish about speaking bluntly about rational issues (including racial issues). I respect them very much.
In short, they’ve got guts.
So most women don’t have “guts” and he does not respect them. Is he really this blatantly sexist?
More typical women are less rational and more emotional.
…the girls let the side down.
Why yes, yes he is.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 12:39 am
That would be rather ugly. A decade ago when my niece – 1/16 Maori – applied for a Maori scholarship for university study, she was rejected. One of the people involved explained that there were only limited scholarships available and she was “too white”.
Perhaps that was a cultural rather than a bloodline argument being made, but either way I’d hate such a thing to be written into law.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 1:37 am
Elaycee, why don’t you comment on my post yousrself. Chuck won’t comment as he won’t say a negative thing about JB as he is is biggest groupie (said tongue in cheque). My question is why pay for a place on the list? He has been around in ACT for along time and was obviously not on the list. This is a democratic society and party lists are supposed to operate that way. It is waved around (the second donation as being altruistic), it isn’t. The first donation was a man wanting some power and obtaining it by paying for it and I feel that is disingenuous. It is unethical and immoral in most peoples value systems and undermines our political system and an example of why perhaps we should scrap MMP. He was instrumental in Roy’s sacking voting against Roger Douglas who had mentored him who I understand is incredibly disappointed. The man is power hungry with an ego possibly as big as Rodney’s and a couple of secret agenda’s I suspect. ACT does not need more clones, and he is prone to being chauvanistic. Ask around the House he is not well liked. Beware the wolf in sheep’s clothing.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 2:41 am
Cougar: Hello Simon…up late again? What’s your poison tonight? (my excuse is chronic insomnia)…your writing style – and late night messages full of typos – betrays you son….
[DPF: Please don't speculate about whom another commenter may be - especially when you are wrong]
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 6:15 am
Ye gods – how the lowliest pipsqueaks get to dominate the international perception of our nation – and where are our leaders on this? The Maori Party for one, should be walking out on this bunch of hypocrites.
In a week when the news could have been about Labour geting refered to the cops for electoral breaches, our headlines are dominated by this bullshit from ACT.
Frankly I’m sickened by Brash’s attitude. Talk about the tail wagging the dog. It makes me reconsider the integrity of the National/ACT alliance. This taints National by association in the same way that Harawira’s ‘white m*****’ issues did. National should be condemning this in the strongest terms not merely engaging in’to each his own’ platitudes – where is the moral fibre – the leadership? Of course it is missing there are so few breaches of common decency or morality that could seriously threaten this cosy little love-fest.
If a feeling of revulsion about these kinds of bucket-swilling makes me some kind of ‘race traitor’ in some arrogant moron’s opinion, then so fucking be it, it’s a badge I’d wear proudly in such low company.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 6:32 am
Pretty hard to wear your badge of pride when you don’t have the guts to use your own name..
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 6:46 am
Don’t be so fucking stupid David the ‘C’ stands for Clark. And I am stunned to see your moral outrage at teh use of names given your shameful example of how much sanctity you hold for such things.
You illustrate my point about the glib attitude towards morality perfectly.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 6:47 am
Ansell has elaborated further with his views on women. Effectively he is saying that Act represents REAL MEN and everyone else are sissies, and worse.
Ansell is only speaking for himself now. But what is it with Women and Act?
How much of this is an Ansell only view?
Vote:What is the wider Act view on women (and sissy men)?
What are Don Brash’s views on women’s place in politics?
July 11th, 2011 at 6:53 am
And of course thr true racists have had their say this morning. i.e. apart from attacking Brash they deny themselves and their motives.
Maori, Mana hit back over Act adverts
By Audrey Young
5:30 AM Monday Jul 11, 2011
The Maori and Mana Parties have hit out at Act’s newspaper campaign, saying it is deeply offensive and calling leader Don Brash a dinosaur who has no place in politics.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10737695
Hopefully they will all be retired come November.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 7:15 am
The ACT party vote may struggle to get to a level where Brash makes parliament. Banks my get Epsom and be left as the lone ranger in the house.
ACT is in serious trouble right now and the ad campaign is potentially going to destroy it. Rather than being a party of men it is looking more like a party of old somewhat racist men.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 7:32 am
Aaaaaah – is there any sound sweeter than that of the far-right disembowelling itself?
Phil Harmonia
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 8:01 am
@Tom Barker
Act far right?
Braa ha ha ha ha ha
Maybe by NZ standards where anything centrist is considered far right because everyone else is left or extreme left.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 8:08 am
But only ACT represents rational women and rational men. The party should not be ashamed to say so.
The first of many problems with your argument, John, is the unexamined assumption that your own behaviour is in any way rational.
Just sayin’.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 8:28 am
8:30 on Monday morning and we know this story is going to start shifting to the question of what John Key and National are going to do.
I suggest a thread titled “National Angst”?
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 8:34 am
Lee C : What were doing 27 years ago? Were you alive? I thought you lefties were all into forgiveness and giving crims 22nd chances?
Isnt it ironic Sharples bleating about “this guy [Brash] needing to be shut down” because he is divisive, when the whole ethos of the Maori Party is the antithesis of the “we are all one people” articulated by Hobson at Waitangi in 1840 and which is the message of the forgotten Article III of the Treaty ?
Brash did very well on Morning Report…had Mercep literally lost for words and gabbling, when his “trap” about Banks’ knowledge of the ad failed…
Although he maybe got a bit shrill, Ansell is a big loss for ACT…dont think he will be welcomed at Nat HQ any time soon though..
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 8:50 am
@unpcnzcougar / David Garrett
The first post suggested someone paid $100k to become an ACT MP – the ‘donation’ being offset against a high list position.
If true, it means cheque book politics is alive and well in ACT. Bugger trying to get the best people into the Party – selection as an MP may be influenced by the size of the ‘contribution’ to the Party coffers.
Yet when the name Owen Glenn was being bounced around as a possible diplomatic appointment to Monaco, all hell broke loose – suggestions this was directly linked to Glenn’s generosity toward Labour, abounded. These suggestions included comments in the House by [then] ACT leader Rodney Hide (link below).
It seems that hypocrisy is alive and well.
http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/PB/Business/QOA/5/c/0/48HansQ_20080221_00000071-2-Honorary-Consul-Monaco-Possible-Appointment.htm
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 9:05 am
Interesting David that you categorise me as ‘you lefties’ The last time I needed to post my full name (and address) was as a result of my argument with a certain Tane who actually was ‘a lefty’.
I certainly was alive twenty seven years – I was about twenty-one in fact. And I admit I did some pretty stupid things. But, were I exposed publically about them I certainly wouldn’t bring up an issue which might be in the same area and attempt to infer I occupy some kind of moral high-ground about it.
I did consider your case when I was originally posting about ‘morality’ but let the record show I have never attacked you for this personally here, because I don’t believe in kicking a man when he’s down etc. Having said that . . May I observe this?
I wish to suggest to you that the kind of egoism that got you into trouble all those years ago still exists in residual form – for example, you post under your own name – why? because you are showing courage? Perhaps. Or is it because you are determined to capitalise on your waning celebrity while you can in one of the few forums that will entertain you? Perhaps. Perhaps not.
But then to have a go at me for my repugnance at open racism because I posted (for the umpteenth time) under a name I chose some time ago is just duffer 101 stuff. All you did was ruin your Monday morning. For the record, I’m not ‘a leftie’ so you can take your ‘forgiving and 22nd chances’ and stick where the sun don’t shine, as indeed I believe you are on record as proposing. Curious double standard at work here, but let’s face it, you’ve displayed those in spades this bright Monday and it’s not even 9:15.
But back to the subject. In my opinion, ACT has not descended to the bottom of the barrel, they are under it and National are tainted with the stink. This is nothing to do with ‘courage’ it is opportunistic tub-thumping and it disgusts me.
yours sincerely Lee Clark
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 9:16 am
John Ansell says:
“Key does this all the time, which is why I can’t stand his politics. He knows global warming is a hoax, but pretends to believe in it because his focus groups tell him (or used to tell him) that it’s popular. That’s pure treachery.”
Gotcha! Looks like Ansell is yet another conspiracy theorist. He probably thinks that the CIA imploded the twin towers on 9/11/2001 and that the moon landing was a fake. Now we have a supposed conspiracy by Maori/the government/lefties/the big green-eyed monster that Maori are outstepping their position in society and trying to impose apartheid on us all.
Blinded by the recent publicity he is getting for his “boldly truthful” comments John thinks that he is saving ACT by destroying it. The impression that most people are getting, regardless of his current and very recent membership status with the party, is that he represents ACT. It makes the party look rudderless and Brash look weak. WTF!!
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 9:27 am
Nicely said DPF. Although you would think most of it should go without saying.
It’s going to take a real wordsmith to disconnect Act from these amazing statements of Ansell’s. Unfortunately, and in spite of his many other qualities, I don’t think Dr Brash is that man.
Bye-bye, ACT. It’s been nice knowing you…
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 10:04 am
As usual, the predictable people twist my words for their own purposes. Thank you, The Silent Majority (10.28) – a rational woman.
I generalise for effect – and because the generalisations are generally true. Got a problem with that? Get a life.
Come and abuse me on Paul Henry at 5.10 – will be a blessed relief to chat with an honest New Zealander.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 10:37 am
I’m pointing out the hypocrisy of Maori not giving or being expected to give any compensation at all for the despicable things they did to other Maori pre-1840, which were clearly far, far worse than the treatment of Maori by the European colonisers,
A big hold up in settling treaty claims is exactly because Maori are working towards negotiating iwi differences and settling historic grievances amongst themselves which were essentiallly frozen in time by the treaty.
Besides that, cultural and moral relativism can’t be held up as a measure by which to compare Maori and colonial eurocentric society. Any ill treatment perpetrated by Maori or colonist is, by any measure, equally as bad.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 10:39 am
“depth of bitterness and race hatred which sits like a pus filled sore just beneath the skin of this rather nasty little country.”
Ask yourself why. People are pissed off. They have had enough. I for one am sick of carrying maori. Raced base funding , preferential treatment based on your brown skin is wrong and anyone who disagrees with that statement is deluded.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 10:43 am
John Ansell: “As usual, the predictable people twist my words for their own purposes.”
Said by a person who makes his living out of twisting words to suit his purpose or those of his clients. In advertising, truth is relative.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 10:48 am
John this issue is not about whether you are right or wrong, or whether you are being misunderstood or misinterpreted. You were hired as a PR adviser to ACT you fucked it up. Not only is your proposed campaign damaging to the party you then get all precious when they wish to take a moderated view and start bagging them in the media. Nice job
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 11:11 am
I for one am sick of aquiescing to European NZers. Raced base opportunities, preferential treatment based on your white skin is wrong and anyone who disagrees with that statement is deluded.
FIFY
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 11:15 am
@John Ansell
Whatever happened to your so-called “teach-tank” you wanted to devise?
Not enough backers for your mentalist brainfarts?
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 11:20 am
Heard Don on National Radio this morning reiterating the “One Law for All” mantra and it kind of sounded flat, passed it’s used by date.
Vote:ACT’s campaign is not resonating out in the electorate and they must be desperately worried to entertain John Ansell’s idea’s.
Perhaps John Ansell should take a leaf out of Hone Harawira’s book, and take it to the people that he believes support him. I have a suggestion for such a party, the Nationalist Union of Treaty Specialist’s, or N.U.T.S for short.
July 11th, 2011 at 11:42 am
In John Ansell’s short history of NZ cited earlier in this thread, he missed the involvement of the missionaries in the delivery of the Treaty of Waitangi. Their role is as follows:
1. The missionaries more than any other wanted law and order because they were the first permanent settlers here. It wasn’t the Maori, for whom the concept and the true nature of British law and order was completely unknown.
2. The missionaries were the people who translated the treaty into a form that could be understood by the Maori.
3. The missionaries were the people who traveled around the country and had the various chiefs sign the treaty. Since Maori were 0% literate the treaty had to be read to them and they usually signed with a X.
4. Not relevant to the missionaries, but the British were keen to colonize NZ before the French did and to impose some order (and presumably taxes) on European acquisition of NZ land.
New Zealand is not unique in having a colonial treaty but we certainly have quite a different record from most European colonies. Some, like Ansell see the treaty as a bad thing. Others see it as a good thing. I see no problem in spending centuries interpreting the treaty and working out what it might or should mean. Certainly it is pointless trying to define it in 1840 terms. We have to define it in 2011 terms. It is much better to be fighting in blogposts and the media rather than in the streets. Armed civil war is still real in some countries.
Ansell believes he is right. He thinks his own spin is the absolute truth. We have the democratic right to disagree with him. I personally believe that our history of ethnic struggle is one of our strong points and will prove to be much greater economic gain than Brash and Ansell and the likes could ever imagine. It is one of our defining characteristics, something which even Australia does not have. It makes us unique and yet many do not understand how it has transformed us as a society and what that gives us that we can use to contribute back to the global society.
When Alexander Fleming stumbled upon penicillin, Ansell would have said “No, throw it out, it’s useless”.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 11:45 am
Good post Kent.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 12:10 pm
Brash challenges Sharples to tv debate
http://www.act.org.nz/news/brash-challenges-sharples-to-tv-debate
I wonder if Sharples will take the challenge.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 12:20 pm
I’m late to this thread but I must say that I’m not surprised at this turn of events. John Ansell means well but I believe two things happened here:
1 – The success of his iwi/kiwi billboards has become so fused in his DNA that he felt he could cause lightening to strike twice and achieve a killer knock out blow with this ad akin to Brash’s famous Orewa speak and catapult ACT to 10% on the backs of white middle NZ anxiety over race issues and
2 – A misreading of the political process, of the key issues that drive voters and of the centre of political gravity in New Zealand.
Even though the subject matter in the ad was true, its mere truthfulness does not make it an effective political strategy. Creeping poltically correct overreach – such as requiring teachers to learn Te Reo – has not yet reached critical mass for a major political backlash. Brash mined a vein of middle NZ angst over Maori issues with his one law for all Orewa speech however political prognosticators took from that speech what they wanted to. Middle NZ at the time (and still today) broadly supports an attempt to right prior Crown wrongs against Maori and thus the Treaty of Waitangi process has mainstream support. But Brash tapped into the sense back in 2004 that the process had become a runaway train without an end and with a myriad of mostly Maori snouts feeding off a whole new trough (the settlement process fueled by the tens of millions made available from the Crown Forestry Rental Trust). Brash’s meteoric rise in the polls had a profound affect on the process and in many ways his speech came to define key aspects of race relations policy in the aftermath. Labour panicked and put in place much needed time limits and by thus touching delicate thurd rail of NZ politics enabled National to be even tighter in its treaty claims filing policy without being deluged with the racist tag. With all claims now under a proper clock, this monster has been put to bed and many NZ voters are fas less anxious about Maori and treaty related issues.
Ditto the Foreshore and Seabed – Labour’s overreaction to the Court of Appeal’s ruling lead to the SFA that in turn spawned the Maori Party. National’s answer to this issue, its price for the Maori Party’s support, has not caused widespread Pakeha voter revolt. In some ACT circles, and certainly for John Ansell, there are a raft of concerning issues raised by the Marine and Coastal Area Act but the important point to make about the MCA is the point I made earlier and that is that this legislation has not caused an eruption of middle NZ anxiety. Whilst it is far from adequate from a purist’s point of view, as far as most voters are concerned, it is an adequate answer to what many saw as a storm in a tea cup. Now – if some iwi are able to persuade a court to grant full customary title to a beach and they then restrict public access to that beach, you most definitely will see a firestorm – and whoever government is in power, be it a Labour or National led coalition, will quickly legislate to make that political nightmare go away.
Politics is the art of the possible not the pursuit of unalloyed ideological purity. All western democracies have evolved electoral systems that elect legislatures that reflect mostly the diversity of political opinion within the country. In most democracies, the system prevents extremes of ideology and their implimentation. This forces the participants in the process to negotiate and moderate and the laws that eventuate from this process inevitably are a compromise with many of the true believers on either side of the political divide being unhappy because their side couldn’t win.
In MMP or proportional voting systems that enable the representation of smaller niche parties that invariably poll below 10%, their potential impact on the political scene is limited by their limited popularity. Thus ACT at say 3% (to be charitable given the latest polling) was only ever going to have a peripheral impact on the NZ body politic. When one views ACT’s contribution in terms of actual legislation passed in this current Parliament, by any objective analysis, it has made a considerable and IMO positive impact on a government that makes a virtue of its ideological blandness.
The mistake John made was to try elevate the race issue on a par with the big financial issues such as tax rates, unemployment and GDP growth or the management of the Chch Earthquakes or the Pike River Mine explosion when middle NZ voters dont rate race issues that highly. The second mistake was to assume that a party polling at best 3% can cause an issue that looms large in the minds of its activists (the excessive Maorification of NZ) to become front and centre in the election campaign just because his leader managed to achieve this feat in 2004. His hopes have become dashed on the rocks of political reality as to where the centre of NZ politics lies (saldly slightly to the left) and of what role a minor party can play in the real world of legisaltion that can pass Parliament.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 2:22 pm
John, I had a fairly rational discussion with you about New Zealand history on my blog a while back, so it’s disappointing to see you bringing out what can only be considered conspiracy theories here about a repressed pre-Maori civilisation and the so-called ‘Littlewood Treaty’. The man behind these theories is Martin Doutre, who has some pretty unsavoury connections, as you can see:
Vote:http://books.scoop.co.nz/2008/11/18/no-to-nazi-pseudo-history-an-open-letter/
July 11th, 2011 at 2:25 pm
Seeing as how everyones labelling everyone a racist these days. Let’s have a debate about ‘race’ as it applies specifically to NZ ?First we’ll define the terms of reference, then we’ll compare racial characteristics by a number of indicators to determine whether in fact some ‘races’ are indeed superior/inferior to others.
We’ll naturally include assimilated phenotypes, genetic markers, social norms, cultural values and ideals as indicators of any evolutionary oneupmanship with regards to adaptibility and natural selection/survival of the fittest.
…and then based on the outcome we’ll determine which ‘race’, if any, has the right to determine the “one rule of law, irrespective of race by which we as NZers should all live by”. and whether promoting any such rule of law is indeed racist.
yeah, nah…is that an idea whose time has come or are we still too chickenshit as a nation to truly confront our fears and prejudices ?
Take the money and the materialist capitalist indicators out of the equation and what are you left with ? What culture does euro NZ truly have that it can call its own ? What phenotypes have they truly assimilated ? Why is it in 2 generations we’ll be Pasifikan by identity and culture. What’s left that eurocentric NZ has to teach us compared to what we have to teach them ?
As far as i’m concerned i’m just stating a fact by saying Pasifikans are genetically and culturally superior to the average eurocentric white NZer. If the truth hurts and people cant handle it that’s their problem. Exactly where does this white superiority thing that Ansell, Brash, Odgers and Chapman espouse come from ? Some deep seated fear that they are in fact inferior and are in the process of becoming evolutionary dead ends.
This latest bunch of Maori bashing exhibits the fear white NZ has of Pasifikans reasserting our dominance over our own affairs, lands and resources by trying to claim NZ as purely a domain of white colonists under some bullshit one rule and one country crap.There has never been one rule and one country. There has always been one rule for the white ruling elite and one for everyone else. One country for the colonists and one for whatever was left over.
How come it’s expected of Pasifikans to turn the other cheek and be better than our detractors and not say what many believe to be true. To, in NZ’s case, always be the humble aquiescent loyal british subjects who use the rule of colonial law to air grievances and express our frustrations and supposedly be grateful for the opportunity ?
Where has that gotten us ?…It’s great that Brash and co want to race bait and fearmonger amongst the last vestiges of colonial oppressors. Bring it on !!! If it ever gets to taking it to the streets we can and will overthrow any muppet gov’t of whatever political leaning. Does anyone truly think a military force stacked with Pasifikans will bear arms against their own kind ? Nah not in this day and age. That didn’t get us anywhere back in the day and we’ve learnt that lesson.
So are Pasifikans genetically and culturally superior to the average eurocentric white NZer ?…I believe so.
Can i make a good case for arguing my position. You fucken betcha.
Does white NZ want to hear it ?…NO
Do Pasifikans need to hear it…HELL YES.
Why ?…to counter the bullshit the Brashs, Odgers, Ansells and Chapmans constantly spew forth in the media to all and sundry, who like flotsam and jetsam washed up on these shores looking to escape thier own fucked up native territories, and thinking they should be afforded equal rights under colonial law.
so uhhh…is that radical enough for ya ? BTW I’m not even Maori and i don’t buy into the race thing
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 2:26 pm
There’s been a good deal of talk about Maori slavery in this thread, and slavery certainly was an historical reality in Maori society, but nobody seems to have mentioned the involvement of Pakeha in the massive Pacific slave trade of the later decades of the nineteenth century:
Vote:http://readingthemaps.blogspot.com/2011/06/new-zealands-slaving-history.html
July 11th, 2011 at 2:42 pm
No, Pasifikans are adapted to live on small islands in the sun with low food availability, and no room for large economies. Maori, moving to larger islands had a big enough population for warfare to emerge – so adapted for this.
White people are adapted for low sunlit areas (maybe with interbreeding with neaderthals), but also can deal with excess calories easier. Because of large cooperative societies we maintained traits that helped successfully run economies, and we are more naturally suited for high resource environments. We also retained traits that dealt with contagious disease better, even if it could lead to downsides (for instance cystic fibrosis gene carried in 1/30 white people may improve survival from gastroenteritis, but having both genes is deadly).
So no-one is superior – unless you work out what superior means. If you mean intellectually, I guess you’d have to work out which populations had selection pressure for increased intelligence.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 2:56 pm
Yes, the Stone Age people, the cradle of civilisation……..yeah right.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 2:59 pm
Don Brash has challenged Sharples to a debate.
http://www.act.org.nz/news/brash-challenges-sharples-to-tv-debate#comment-18293
Peter Sharples has accepted the challenge. The debate will be on Maori TV at 8:30 tonight.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 3:01 pm
Good on Sharples, and good on Maori TV for being so responsive to topical issues.
It will be interesting.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 5:03 pm
A rational woman who works for Act I understand!! At least that is what my spies in the capital tell me!!
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 6:00 pm
And now, tristanb, that Pasifikans through interbreeding with most other ethnicities have assimilated phenotypes and adapted social norms that allow us to prosper in large societies and resist most western diseases, where to next for us and for white people ?
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 6:09 pm
(At 11.42 am above) “3. The missionaries were the people who traveled around the country and had the various chiefs sign the treaty. Since Maori were 0% literate the treaty had to be read to them and they usually signed with a X.”
Crap – Maori had an astonishingly high literacy rate from the 1830s due to missionary education. There is abundant historical of Maori taking to literacy with enormous avidity in that period, and writing with whatever materials they could lay their hands on. You are simply wrong on this point, sir.
And what’s with this constantly repeated claim by J. Ansell that Apirana Ngata was the first NZer of any race to take a double degree? According to the Dictionary of NZ Biography (a somewhat more reliable source):
[At Canterbury College, Ngata] “combined arts and law, completing a BA in political science in 1893 (an MA was added later). He shifted to Auckland, where he was articled to the solicitors Devore and Cooper, and completed his LLB in 1896. He was the first Maori to complete a degree at a New Zealand university.”
Nothing about being the first to take a double degree – if you can even call that a double degree. Has Ansell got any proof of this strange claim?
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 7:19 pm
Falafulu Fisi (1,096) Says:
July 10th, 2011 at 10:03 am
On the button, well said sir.
John Ansell (769) Says:
July 10th, 2011 at 11:48 am
and you sir, stick it to the bastards
niggly (333) Says:
July 10th, 2011 at 2:50 pm
and you sir!
Rex Widerstrom (4,453) Says:
July 10th, 2011 at 4:16 pm
And you Rex.
So has Don stuffed ACT’ up for National?
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 8:45 pm
That’s my main concern.
The last thing NZ needs is a return to a corrupt, fiscally incompetant Labour Govt, backed up in a coalition with a fringe-grouping of activists masquerading as an enviromentalist Party. Yee gads:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/politics/5267698/Goff-We-will-partner-with-Greens
ACT need to concentrate on economic issues and stop getting side tracked on Maori issues. That’s why I’ve put the boot in recently. I’m sure people want to hear ACT’s vision on the economy not get sidetracked into less important issues such as race etc. It might get them the votes they need.
Andrea Vance reports that since Brash’s leadership “Of five press releases issued since June, four were about race and one was a cheap shot at Labour over broadband.”
If ACT don’t sort out their shit and stick to the programe (and they’ve had 3 years in a coalition, and over the 3 years have been sniping at National), well fuck them, it’s about time National put them out of their misery.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 9:53 pm
“ACT need to concentrate on economic issues and stop getting side tracked on Maori issues.”
How much do you think the iron sands around the coast are worth?
The issues are interrelated. ACT does not put down Maori for the high unemployment rate – they propose a solution.
And National and the Maori Party rejects that solution.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 10:11 pm
So…what happened in that debate? I missed it.
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 10:42 pm
Tom Barker: your source may indeed be better than mine, which was as follows:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apirana_Ngata
Ngata attended primary school in Waiomatatini before moving on to Te Aute College, where he received a Pākehā-style education. Ngata performed well, and his academic results were enough to win him a scholarship to Canterbury University College (now the University of Canterbury), where he studied political science and law. He gained a BA in politics in 1893, the first Māori to complete a degree at a New Zealand university, then gained an LL.B. at the University of Auckland in 1896 (the first New Zealander, Maori or Pakeha, to gain a double degree).[2]
Vote:July 11th, 2011 at 11:41 pm
As usual, the predictable people twist my words for their own purposes.
I don’t know why anyone would bother, John, when they can just quote the clearly sexist statements you actually wrote.
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 12:01 am
Chuck, sure but then something must be going wrong with ACT’s (or Don Brash’s) messages if the media and ACT’s political critics keep coming back to racial issues? Case in point the weekend ad – the media and political critic frenzy concentrated on racial issues instead of ACT’s economic vision etc.
But in response to your comment above about Iron Sands. IMO where ACT goes wrong is this one rule for all catch-cry. The problem with issues such as iron sands, or surveying for mining, surveying for off-shore drilling etc, is that the activists have for a number of years now have associated themselves with indigenous rights and peoples (this is documented so I’m sure you’re aware etc). So NZ Govt’s now have to tread carefully around these issues of mining and surveying etc.
Now if ACT could stop being so idealistic themselves (but they won’t – in the same way the Greens etc can’t stop being idealistic), a shrewd ACT would support Maori representation (rather than oppose it) and that way the iwi leadership would have some say or share of the mineral development meaning over-riding these eco-activists running the tribes public agenda etc. Some share of the development ($$$) profits by iwi could be off-set by the Govt needing to spend less on welfare or whatever in that area etc i.e. if iwi want a cut of govt profit, then iwi can use some of that profit for infrastructure or service development/maintenance etc.
This might not be ideal in ACT’s world but it might be the circuit breaker to get NZ’s untapped resouces extracted. Of course the Greens (etc) and iwi would also have a stake in enviromental protection eg ensure there are much better safeguards to protect the environment (currently the activists are using the old scare tactic of the iwi’s food baskets being affected if there were to be a mishap etc).
Win-win for NZ and all sides of the political and ethnic spectrum IMO.
But hey, ACT are too bound by rigid idealism (like the Greens in their areas of interest) so alas I cannot see a pragmatic outcome. That’s why I’m open to both the Greens and ACT being kicked out at the next election because both party’s are too small to be effective in their own right, but are both arrogant enough to want to have control of important issues in their own way (against the mainstream of NZ’ers). Sorry if this offends you.
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 12:33 am
Steve…”sexist?”…..maybe….true? yep! The feminine weak streak is obvious in parties like Labour Greens etc…the ones who are enamoured of whims and wishes rather than facts and reality.The whole welfare state rests on the weak streak and its a massive failure…like all weak streak ideas because A is A… reality is what it is and you can’t fake it.
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 2:34 am
niggly
Vote:You sum up my feelings about ACT and John Ansell’s campaign precisely. Their idealism blinds them to political realities. You propose a practical win-win solution that sidesteps ideology and defuses the explosive race issue. I have a Maori business partner and have attempted to gain a deep understanding of their culture. Whilst I get John’s (and ACT activists’) anxieties over current policy, there are better ways to dealing with Maori than the methods they propose because they attack the problem from a baseline of some cultural ignorance and so its no wonder that, even when you strip away the usual lefty “you’re racist” kneejerk reaction, there is some basis to claiming that Brash and co just don’t get what makes Maoris tick – even the ones who can’t stand Hone Harawiri and reject welfare statism and treaty grievance mongering.
July 12th, 2011 at 3:26 am
Its this “Maori are a separate species “shit that’s the problem…why encourage it? They are as human as the rest of us…no more or less.
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 7:07 am
@Tom Barker: On the question of Maori literacy prior to the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, there is good reason to believe that the alacrity with which Maori took up reading was not so much overstated as misunderstood by missionaries. Don Mckenzie’s “The Sociology of a Text: Orality, Literacy and Print in early New Zealand” parses this question very nicely. It’s probably the most important and least read article on New Zealand history in this period. He basically argues that the ways in which the Maori understood the significance of the printed word were at odds with the British understanding of what it meant to be “literate,” and that, for Maori, the printed word was something that supplemented oral communication rather than displaced it. At Waitangi, Maori thought that what they were assenting to was the agreement that they had made amongst themselves after several days of debate, whereas for the British the force of law was borne by the text itself.
In terms of the evolutionary questions and how we might rank various ethnic groups based on their physical characteristics . . . well, given that Darwin concluded that there was no evolutionary or physical basis for distinguishing between “races,” and that more diversity exists within ethnic groups than between them, I think it’s fair to discount any such discussion as inherently “racist” in that it presupposes the existence of race as a scientifically definable attribute of the human. But surely any discussion of the polynesian adaption to island conditions, or the European adaption to urban ones, is ridiculous, given the relatively short period (in species terms, not human ones) that those conditions have been part of either groups’ lifestyle.
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 7:09 am
Great ain’t it.
ACT have had more publicity in the last two days than in the last 6 years.
The Maori Party and their followers have had their agenda aired for all who wish to see.
The National Party have been shown for the appeasers they are for all to see. And the various other racists and their followers have been running to denigrate the message, with little effect.
ACT need to run more of this stuff. Straight from Ansell and without the inevitable left,socialist committee type censorship that was apparent in the advert published.
Lets get all this shit out in the open and have some real debate about solving the problems.
We have too much comfortable socialism between political parties in NZ.
Oh and ACT ain’t right wing by any means.
Ownership of all the land and its assets by one group. What does that sound like???
Communism maybe.
Where’s the line between communism and Maori Ownership of NZ.
Anyone care to make the distinction.
And you could maybe throw in the Labour Party on the communist side as well.
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 7:15 am
Sharples was not talking about owning all the land, he talked of guardianship so it’s retained for the country.
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 7:20 am
KIA: there is some basis to claiming that Brash and co just don’t get what makes Maoris tick
I’d also claim they don’t understand how anyone ticks. Abusing and accusing and dividing and factionalising is a terrible way to gain support .
Ansell was using emotive ultimatums, like “back my line or you’re a coward!” I’ll stand up to that crap any day.
And if Act party disputes are anything to judge them by they don’t know how each other tick either.
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 8:12 am
Re assessments of Maori literacy levels in the pre-colonial period (see Mausie’s response at 7.07 am above):
even if you choose to go with Don McKenzie’s lower-than-others estimate, Dr McKenzie’s claims still refute the plain dumb ignorance of Kent Parker at 11.42 yesterday who stated, on the basis of nothing whatsoever, “Since Maori were 0% literate” [by 1840]. Talking out of his arse, in short.
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 10:44 am
Peter George
Vote:ACT’s political naivete is extensive and longstanding and shows no sign of abating. Brash is manifestly unable to understand his weaknesses and be properly advised as to how best to work around them and at the same time he clearly has an exaggerated sense of the popularity of his manifesto and his own electoral attractiveness. I’m a solid conservative but I’m a practical realist as to what can be achieved in New Zealand. A paradigm shift to the right of the country’s political centre of gravity can only be achieved by long term education about the merits of free market capitalism along with a Ronald Reagan or Margaret Thatcher type persona who can clearly articulate that vision. Brash is not that person – John Key could be but he wants to be the 21st Century Keith Holyoake not NZ’s version of Reagan. The best ACT can do is affect some meaningful legislative change in key areas as a minor coalition partner for National Governments that will only ever be up for incremental reform. Unless there is a return to First Past the Post (unlikely IMO), the prospect of a true reforming administration such as Lange/Douglas 84-87 and Bolger/Richardson 90 – 92 is extremely unlikely.
July 12th, 2011 at 1:31 pm
I think this will more than counter the stupid rant Ansell had to get his hour of fame.
Labour have ignored Maori and taken them for granted. that is why we have the Maori Party. National has ignored the farmers with their stupid ETS. Farmers not have an alternative.
Federated Farmers president Act’s new candidate?
Act Party leader Don Brash is set to announce a “new high-profile candidate” this afternoon.
There are strong rumours that former Federated Farmers president Don Nicolson will be announced.
Nicolson stood down as president of Federated Farmers earlier this month and there has been speculation he will put his name forward to stand for Act.
He has recently described his political views as “where the National Party used to be”.
Nicolson, a climate change sceptic, last week confirmed he had applied to join a political party, but he would not say which one.
The candidate announcement is set down for 3pm this afternoon at Turnbull House in Wellington.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/5271093/Federated-Farmers-president-Acts-new-candidate
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 1:37 pm
@Chuck Bird – given the recent revelations on KB, do you think that this new ‘high-profile candidate’ will have paid $100,000 to the ACT Party coffers as a pre-requisite of being selected?
Yes? No?
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 3:11 pm
No. ACT is very fortunate to get such a high quality candidate they would not have to ask him for money.
Labour took Maori for granted for years. Look at the result – the Maori Party.
National has taken the farmers for granted for decades. With Don Nicolson as an MP many farmers will vote ACT especially if National refuses to honour its pre-election promise of being a fast follower and not a world leaded in regard the ETS scam.
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 3:23 pm
Don Nicolson might be wondering what the hell he’s getting himself in to.
How long has this announcement been planned? It looks a bit like a “let’s change the subject” move.
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 7:23 pm
In defence of my comment regarding 0% literacy please note that Maori were not a literate society, they did not create their own written language, it was created by British missionaries, including the script used and its spelling. By 1840, Mission Stations were established at Paihia, Waimate, Kaitaia, Thames, Whangaroa, Waikato, Mamamata (although this was abandoned during tribal wars in 1836-37), Rotorua, Tauranga, Manukau and Poverty Bay. By 1840, over 20 Stations had been established, many of which were based in the North Island.
On the whole Maori leaders could not read nor had a habitual manner (and practice) of signing documents, either in Maori or English. Few if any chiefs signed with anything but a scribble. Check it out yourself: http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/media/interactive/waikato-manukau-treaty-copy . The names are recorded by a literate English writer and the chief signs with a virtual X.
I’m sorry to offend the arithmetic sensibilities of some posters but it would be a mistake to consider the Maori to be a literate society which was the purpose of the comment. The treaty settlement process has only happened in the 20th century as Maori truly became a literate society and began to understand the treaty that their forebears signed so long ago. The treaty grievance process is necessary in order to enforce the Maori side of the treaty which was not enforced during the latter stages of the 19th century largely due to Maori illiteracy of the meaning of the document they signed and its consequences in legal jurisdiction with which they had no knowledge (read literacy). The British settlers took advantage of Maori illiteracy.
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 10:43 pm
Well said John Ansell.
Vote:July 12th, 2011 at 10:52 pm
***John Ansell wrote: After all, there’s no end of parties falling over themselves to protect the so-called rights of so-called Maori, so why not have one to defend the rights of the other 85% (and the many aspirational Maori).
It’s pathetic that so many people seem prepared to label that racist.***
This is very true. If you are going to have ethnic advocates for Maori then I don’t see why people would be outraged at people advocating for other ethnicities and their interests.
Vote:July 13th, 2011 at 4:13 am
@Tom Barker, the point is not that Mckenzie’s estimates are lower than others, but that the idea that “literacy,” measured as a percentage of those who can read and write, is a concept that it a product of a particular historical moment — that is, the expansion of public education in the West in the later nineteenth century, and the subsequent development of sociological practices that would think about collecting this kind of statistic. Before that, even in Europe, the idea that reading and writing were connected practices, and that one needed to be able to do both to be “literate” did not exist. In New Zealand in the early nineteenth century, the idea that there was such a thing as “literacy” that could be measured as a percentage of, say, Maori who didn’t have to put an x on the treaty, and that this idea is a useful framework for understanding reading and writing in early New Zealand history is, according to Mckenzie, erroneous. Especially because even if there were Maori who could read and write and thus be said to be “literate”, they still were not invested in the legal force of the written word in the way that Europeans were, and are. And that, really, is the pertinent part, given that we’re talking about a treaty.
So, Kent Parker is quite right to suggest in his most recent comment that Maori engagement in the treaty process as a written practice only began in the twentieth century (although I would argue that, given that most of the treaty settlement claims that are currently before the tribunal have been in the courts since the 1880s and 1890s, Maori juridical literacy has to have begun earlier than that). Although the figure of 0% “literacy” is certainly wrong in a strictly numerical sense, the idea that “literacy” = cultural investment in the written word, let alone a full understanding of and investment in the legal dimensions of treaty making as a written practice, is anachronistic. And we wouldn’t want to be anachronistic.
Vote:July 13th, 2011 at 7:30 pm
Brilliant read John. I have espowsed views such as yours for 25 years and a goodly number of people now leave me off their must visit list which is completely OK as I did find it hard to politely endure their woolly headed views. Come to think of it a number of them were school teachers who you are no doubt aware have been responsible for forcing liberal socialism on our children with a view to robbing them of the thought processors required to be able to see the wood from the trees.
Vote:I think this leaves us in the poo
July 14th, 2011 at 12:22 am
”sexist?”…..maybe….
Heh. “Maybe”. What happened to ‘A is A’? Sexist is sexist. At least have the honesty to admit that.
The feminine weak streak is obvious in parties like Labour Greens etc…the ones who are enamoured of whims and wishes rather than facts and reality.
Wow. You and Ansell have some real problems with women, huh.
Vote:July 14th, 2011 at 1:30 am
Nope,love Women…Women are the bomb….Its just the illogical nonsense that seems to predominately come from their minds. Its a fact that the female mind works more on emotion that cold logic…which is a guy trait.Economics is maths in action and that tends to make it a male field.1 plus 1 =2…not whatever you feel like on the day.
Vote:July 14th, 2011 at 10:00 pm
hmm, don’t Libertarians value rationality above just about everything?
Do you think women are equal to men, or do you think ultimately women are an inferior group?
I suspect that people like you and John Ansell, if you could get away with it, would advocate that women not be allowed to vote.
Meanwhile, you’re too dogmatic to see it, but the irony is that John just gave a great demonstration of someone letting their emotions get the better of them, with his meltdown over this matter.
Vote:July 19th, 2011 at 11:17 pm
Libertarians value individual freedom and rights….and those are rational things…reality supports them.Sure Women as human beings are equal to Men…but not in everything….and that goes both ways.The sexes are different (shock horror!) and do certain things better or worse than the other depending on what it is.Women tend to give birth to children in a way that leaves Men floundering behind…you noticed that?
Nothing wrong with being emotional…if its backed by logic and objective principles….If Ansell was trying to set the country’s budget based on emotion and what seemed “fair and “just” depending on his mood at the time then that would be an issue.You can’t fake maths however…a dollar is a dollar.
Vote:July 21st, 2011 at 1:05 am
So Libertarians do value rationality above just about everything else. You derive your value for freedom and rights from rationality. And women, according to you, mostly have “illogical nonsense … predominately come from their minds”. I’m sure people in the past have thought that women were equal “as human beings”, but should not be able to vote because they were there to give birth, nurture, and be emotional. It was men’s role to run things. Your view seems not inconsistent with that.
As for John Ansell: http://tiny.cc/o3p8w
Vote:July 21st, 2011 at 2:15 am
No Steve….what I’m saying is that Men and Women think differently…its the way we are wired and not a fault….but there are situations where one mindset is more in tune with what’s required than the other.
Its reality and its unchangeable settings for Man’s nature that Lib’s derive their love of freedom from….one can still be irrational but not escape reality.
Re the vote….personally I would end the whole franchise asap….most people are uninformed idiots and their ticking a box does a lot of damage especially to the individual rights of others.So goodbye democracy…hello constitutional republic.
Vote:July 21st, 2011 at 2:18 am
As for your link Steve….I’ve seen it and agree with the gist of Johns comments….emotional claptrap is not what’s needed to deal with objective facts and the law of cause and effect.
Vote: