Most likely waking up to the fact that the Labour Party is nothing but a political vehicle for unionised state-sector employees to plunder everyone else.

For a worker in the cooperative sector to vote Labour is like a turkey voting for Christmas.

Just a sobering thought – years ago a National MP told a meeting not to get complacent when the ‘other side’ is in turmoil, since they can patch up and pull together remarkably quickly in the run-up to an election.

Absolutely.

Never underestimate the desire of a politician for power. Once these guys realise that the public is watching and deciding their vote, there’s potential for them to change their tune very quickly.

helen taught them well.

Their ideologies are completely different. Labour believes that it takes 51,275 unionists dancing on the corpse of a capitalist to change a light bulb. Evil scum! The pure and true believers like Trotter know that it takes 51,276 unionists dancing on the corpse of a capitalist to change a light bulb. The hertics must be purged!

Chris – the ideology of the left is all about imposing your thoughts into and into others because they dont know whats good for them, and those of the left KNOW whats right for everyone else and by God theyll learn to like it……

What are you talking about, you loon? You’re the equivalent of left wing people calling the National Party fascists. The NZ left is pretty much social democratic, favouring a mixed economy with a slightly more egalitarian distribution of wealth than we now have (and that’s the truth – there will still be very rich people and somewhat poor people, even if the Labour party got all its wishes, which it won’t).

Trotter supports Labour the movement, not Labour the political party. It seems to me that he comes across as what might be cordially described as an old-fashioned Trotskyite. He actually has beliefs and principles, whether you agree with them or not. In comparison I have no idea what the NZ Labour Party of the 21st century stands for, because it’s dominated by old hacks from the 20th. As far as I can tell the Labour Party’s core principles are “get power” and “keep power”.

Chris – the ideology of the left is all about imposing your thoughts into and into others because they dont know whats good for them, and those of the left KNOW whats right for everyone else and by God theyll learn to like it……even if it means digging out the counter revolutionaries in their own party…….

and – as we saw in Cambodia and the soviet union – if needed they have to be removed from society to make things better…..

Labour is going from a broad-based party that once commanded 40% of the vote to a union-based party that will gain at most 25% of the vote. So what you have is like a sort of Labour Party musical chairs – too many sitting MPs and aspiring MPs, squabbling over a shrinking number of seats. Just watch the fighting when the Labour Party has to rank its MPs before the election!

What, you have a different point of view? Oh do be quiet and vote how you’ve been instructed to, thanks very much.”

The above differs from a Stalinist apporach only in terms of extremety! We all know how he used to silence dissidents, some 20 million of them as I recall!

There is no way this current crop of raving socialists should be allowed anywhere near the treasury benches, but the frightening thing is that this is precisely what MMP has the potential to deliver.

Can all sane people please remember, two ticks for National!

And they wonder why they are losing votes to the Greens.

What concerns me is that there are enough people out there ignorant enough to make this a possibility.

I know Fenton & Curran are toxic but who is this Wood person thats being fast tracked. I saw her on TV once and its very obvious that she has a very high opinion of herself plus a very nasty tongue. Looks as if she could benefit from a jog around the park.

What is more frightening is that there is every possibility that we will have a Labour led ?, Greenpeace led ?, Winston Government in 2014.

That seems very unlikely.

What seems to be happening is that disaffected Labour voters are increasingly withholding their votes. My guess is that a lot of them will move over to the non-voter column next year. There really isn’t any alternative for left leaning working class people that isn’t tainted by conservatism (NZF), granola munching (Greens), or race-based politics (Mana). My guess is that they would rather punish Labour than see the present Labour caucus in government.