*At least, that’s what my liberal Nat/ex-ACT afternoon cafe friends tell me, and I trust their judgement, even if we disagree on most matters of economic policy.

I have children and grandchildren here. No one is perfect but I have to worry that anyone will find out I was a paedophile. If you want to start making or strongly inferring things like you post of February 26th, 2013 at 1:20 pm use your full real name James.

It is a shame that some ACT members who are sympathetic to Peron were not sympathetic to David. I got into an argument with one high profile ACT candidate who put down David but is a supporter of Peron. I am sure he got his back at me.

Hove you read Unbound? I have and while he has not been convicted of any crime against boys here or elsewhere I think he would be an danger to adolescent boys.

If someone as an adult views child porn or publishes what was in Unbound I do not change their desire.

Also a supporter of NAMBLA – the North American Marlon Brando Look-alikes Association. All power to them.

As for Peron, my view was then, and still is now, that whatever views he held in the early 1980s, he either doesn’t hold those views now, or does not propagate them. Running a libertarian bookstore and being in a childless gay relationship? well I can’t imagine any lifestyle choice that would be less likely to bring someone into contact with children, so he was certainly no predator of any type. That the NZ government refused to renew his visa is a great shame – it was essentially for political views that there was no proof he even held. No purpose was served in hounding him out, other than removing someone who was a strong activist for less government and greater freedom in New Zealand. The whole thing was a witchhunt Chuck, and I think it’s a shame that people like yourself and the Flanagans continue to pile onto him without good reason.

There is no way I could be involved with a party where senior officials continued to support such a person as Peron because he is a libertarian despite other well known libertarians distancing themselves from him.

There’s a lot of silly twats out there who were never prepared to roll up their sleeves and help out anyway, now being armchair critics. But politics is not some university lecture theatre where you can debate ideologies and your place on a cartesian grid and still get votes. It’s about winning and getting practical policies implemented.

The facts are that John Banks is the Leader of ACT. He won Epsom and he is implementing Charter Schools. That makes him the most successful ACT Leader ever, since he is the first leader to have a core ACT policy implemented.

Why you would dump your most successful leader ever, a former Mayor of Auckland who, yes, has won ten elections, is beyond me. It makes no sense, and I am sure it makes no sense to even the Board of ACT.

You win elections on hope and fear, and John Boscawen, to his credit, understands this. You also win by having strong and unambiguous policy that casts a vision. Hopefully ACT will do that as well. As long as they remember they are only trying to get 10% of the population, not 51%, they will be okay.

Half the time I agree with your more reasoned posts…..but the other half of the time ….mmmmmm

You’re a typical progressive, with a mind completely out of sync with reality. The thing about the butt pipe smear was that it is a prominent example of what unscrupulous amoral cowards and authoritarians the self-professed liberals who support ACT and the Libertarians are.

You don’t even know me, but you want to destroy me because of what I say. It is so typical of you fake liberals. Anyone bringing a POV to the debate that disagrees with your own is not confronted with logic or reason, but attacked personally as a means of discrediting their message.

Its also proof of what I have always said, and that is that self professed “liberals” are frequently really progressives in disguise. Liars and frauds who advocate tolerance but who are actually intolerant. Amoral cowards who advocate reverence for principle but have none themselves. In other words, just the same old repugnant left wing totalitarians who have been crippling political debate in the west for the last five decades.

You stink of the disease of progressivism, and you have killed ACT, you can’t get any traction as Libertarians and you will never be anything but an insignificant bunch of hate filled amoral and cowardly zealots.

What bullshit- It was The Association of Consumers and Taxpayers, and it had 9 MPs on the basis of that name, and none of those original MPs was any kind of publicly advocating libertarian. Not that you are either, you’re one of those clueless posturing fake liberals that destroyed ACT, in reality a doctrinal authoritarian with your bitching and moaning about a political philosophy you preach but can’t practice. And now you ponce about Kiwiblog showing ignorance of history and demonstrating what a disgusting coward and hypocrite you are. Its no wonder ACT died if such a squalid tiny minded POS as you typified its more recent membership.

ACT’s founding was on classical Liberal/Libertarian principles…its founding document (which was shamefully removed from the ACT website and hidden by the power-Cons before the last election,before Perigo found it and reinstated it) was written by Libertarianz founder Ian Fraser, who had left in disgust when it became apparent what backsliding neo-statist BS was going to be expoused by the party. Perigo was there at the start too…and left for the same reason…so quit the shit Baiter….facts are facts.

And it seems that buttpipe quip really rankled you huh…? Truth hurt you does it freedom hater…? Picks and chooses what libertys he agrees with and what he will deny others……Hollowman.

I agree entirely. You’re actually much more of a secular progressive dickhead. Because all ACT ever had to say was that we will cut debt and government spending, and explain how they were going to do that and the job would have been done and the message would have been clear.

Instead we got “the Liberal party” and a lot of internalising over what ACT really stood for and that was what muddied the message and led to the party’s descent into factionalised disagreements, lack of purpose and unity, and eventual demise.

All that really needed to happen was that the Libertarians who had infiltrated should have been told to piss off back to their own party.

We’ve had decades of creeping socialism, and with it an increasing proportion of NZers who’s expectation of government is that it is there to provide cradle-to-grave everything. Against that backdrop, messages on the importance of small government, enterprise, effort, and personal risk-reward simply fall on deaf ears.

They key to overcoming this is a ultra clear message, good leadership and a good team. Sadly for NZ, ACT haven’t been up to it, so the march towards becoming irrelevant socialist backwater continues unabated.

You are wrong about Banks to a degree. He is a political pragmatist. He figured out after campaigning in Epsom for a day or two after Don’s musings, that 51% of the voters didn’t like what Don said. He went with the 51% to win the seat. It’s called politics.

People like you who sit here on a website and write swear words under a pseudonym don’t understand it.

Yes, they are Nostalgia-NZ. And as I explained earlier, the voters in Epsom were listening and they were thinking very hard about telling Banks & ACT to go take a jump if decriminalisng cannabis was part of the party’s policy. That’s why Banks had to dismiss it, unfortunately.

What a lot of god dam rubbish.
You are telling us that the Remmer’s set doesn’t partake in the use of cannabis? Really, and you think they actually want to be considered criminals for smoking a herb that’s been around for about a million years.

You born again Christian dickheads of the Banks ilk are brain fucking dead. The truth is that Banks couldn’t stomach actually allowing that thought to progess thru his wee head. He is not about personal freedom, never has been (unless its himself of course), and personal freedom is and has been what ACT has been all along.
That’s why Banks should just fuck off and join his mates at the conservative party. That’s where he rightly belongs, but he wouldn’t be able to get along there either.