Trotter Apologises for the Left

Foreward: I don't usually go for "attack" blogging. I have a general belief that consensus is built on well reasoned argument and earnest discussion. Trying to hammer someones beliefs to mirror your own doesn't work and only inspires a more staunch position from your opponent. However, certain comments from other blogs have goaded me into coming off the sidelines. I don't feel good about it but I like the comments, tone and thoughtlessness even less.

I admire Chris Trotter. You only have to read his commentaries in a range of publications nation wide or his blog to understand that he is well educated, a historian and can argue his case really well. And he uses words that are really big. I mean, massive! When I put the words into the online dictionary, you can physically hear the internet groan with the effort of trying to remember what these words mean. So when Chris throws out an article entitled "Oh, for a Well Mannered Left", I take notice.

The essence of his article, if I understood the definitions of some of the heavier words correctly, is that the Right has the ability to be courteous, magnanimous and generous in places because the right has it all already. They are the ones who have the power, the money, the education and the wherewithal. The Left, by and large, is a product of it's history: aggressive, combative, sometimes rude and in your face and generally a great deal more unruly due to the proletariat nature of its uprising (I can use big words too). Chris and I have even debated the nature of this before here and here. Ah, the good times.

But sometimes the Left just pushes it too far.


I've been lucky enough to have been, by sheer coincidence, not among the rubble last Tuesday in Christchurch. The site that I was working on was shut down on the Monday due to concerns about it's stability. When I was in there on the Wednesday just after, the places was a mass of bricks and splintered wood about 2 feet high. I also choose to live on a farmlet just outside Christchurch that is solid, has it's own well and has missed the predication's of the Earthquake that has razed my city and left thousands displaced. For the immediate week afterward, I was working night shifts with Civil Defense shoring up buildings and removing hazards to allow the USAR teams to do their job. It's been rewarding to help with the skills I have available and awful in its scope to see first hand the results of the "Earth Fart". I've enjoyed blogging as a relief from that work but to see the medium twisted in such a way and when people start to use the the situation to further their own agenda, I get pretty steamed.

The Standard has led the way in this.Cactus Kate has called them on it here, Inventory 2  and David Farrar at Kiwiblog has similarly joined the fray. And they're right. Marty G has outdone himself in restraining the impulse to be quietly humanistic however the opportunity has got to him and his fellow commentators to put the boot in with no thought for whats happening on the ground. Normally this is the cry from the left - that the rich bastards in power with the neo-conservative agenda ignore the plight of the average man, woman and child on the street.

A great example of this was Marty's post Shock Doctrine. He can't resist the temptation to politicize the event to spew forth a bunch of assertions, guesses and plain fantasy based on no evidence whatsoever. They are the Ken Ring's of blogging - jumping around, arms waving, scaring people into agreeing with them (bully tactics when you think about it) with no evidence or logic to back it up at all! Christ, even the book from which his post is derived is not exactly known for its rationality, balance and well reasoned argument (MacDoctor takes the book to task in this piece).

Similarly, two days after the quake, the bully boys went to work with a post entitled "Rebuilding" that had no other purpose than to try and slay the bloke who has been gifted the lucky job of overseeing the work at a macro level. Well done, lads! What a way to get behind the guys on the ground. What a way to get behind the country.

And it's not just the Standard bloggers and commentators. The eponymous and unique Greenfly/Village Idiot/robertguyton can't resist a swipe from the sidelines either at Keeping Stock.  His own brand of logic and reason is some of the best examples from the blogosphere as to why the left struggles to hard.

This country was built with egalitarianism as one of its core values. When push came to shove, you could depend on your worst enemy to drop tools and give you a hand when you really needed it! The stories that have come out of the city in the hours and days after the event, the stories of ordinary people doing extraordinary things has been amazing. It didn't matter what colour collar you wore. It didn't matter what ideology you follow. We were in the shit and we were just people helping other people. And thats a truer socialism that the gents over at the Standard don't seem to understand.

I am not saying that all are like this. I'm not saying it has been constantly like this. Many over at the Standard have been the most strident in gifting help, support and information. Likewise, some wacky Righties have been upholding their reputations as complete morons. And I do believe that it's right to talk about things like how we are going to respond, rebuild and how to pay for it.

But to lash out when there are people's bodies not yet cold, to bark from the soapbox when people are trying to get a handle on the situation, to lacerate the leaders when no one has had a chance to give it a go yet - well, thats just cold. And disrespectful. And Chris is right to apologise on your behalf.

Chris ends his piece with the following:

"I can’t help thinking that the revolution would come a lot sooner if the Left set about achieving its own radical objectives with its conservative opponents’ infinitely better manners."

 I can't help but agree. If you've gotta problem with that boys, get down here, I'll put a shovel and a hammer in your hands and we'll have a yak about it.


Update: Now they've mad the Whale mad too. 

Labour's Leadership Crisis

The Labour caucus is still having trouble with deciding how to deal with this new government.

David Farrar over at Kiwiblog posts how inane the opposition's attacks are regarding the Governments planned fibre roll out strategy to better serve our broadband infrastructure. As was posted on Kiwiblog a wee while ago, they were having a little trouble deciding a)how to attack JK et al and b) how to be an effective opposition. This proves once again that they still have issues (aside from rampant socialism that is :-)).

In the past, all oppositions did just that: the opposite - sometimes whether they agreed with a policy or not. Now, with JK at the helm and a more open and results (rather than politics) orientated government that is bi-partisan in it's approach, the traditional rules no longer apply. As exhibited with Clare Curran's approach to s92a, there is a glimmer of hope. Unfortunately, you still have A King and P Goff at the helm who authorise these "attacks" because they know nothing else. Thats how they have been taught. In politics when you resort to blatant untruths, such as we have here, you can tell that the party is failing to get any traction. They tried this in the election campaign (remember Mike Williams' little side trip) and the strategy didn't work then and, in the face of a disciplined government, it won't work now. This is another great example of where leadership is being tested for Labour and is failing. Bring on the likes of Shane Jones who is far more credible, focused and able to adapt while bring the likes of Jacinda Adern up with him. While not being a Labour supporter, New Zealand still needs a credible opposition for things to function well. I hope Phil Goff can get past his own hubris, see this problem for what it is and act upon it or, god forbid, he may end up having to be moved involuntarily.

Make no mistake, Andrew Little, for all his conciliatory words on Q+A two weeks ago about supporting Phil and Annette, is just the bloke to enact change when needed and be prepared to step on toes if he thinks it is in the best interests of his party. He is cognizant of the fact that to achieve a result for your point of view, a conciliatory approach works a lot better than an adversarial one. You only need to look at his style of leadership in the EPMU for that. Many employers have a great respect for Andrew and give him credence where the likes of the old guard such as Ken Douglas, would never have achieved his levels of success for his people.

The whole Labour movement needs to smarten up in this new era. It's spokespeople are still living in the wrong century - or at least their politics are.

One just needs to go to Chris Trotters lament of the demise of that era to realise that they are still beholden to the past rather than to the future.

The Labour Party is in a crisis, no matter how much they deny it. The current leadership just can't get a grip on the reasons why people changed their vote in such numbers and why the National Party retains such support post election. People want results - no matter who initially thought up the idea. National is delivering this. Labour is still stuck in the mindset that if it isn't our idea then it isn't an idea at all.

Phil Goff should remember Plato's Repuplic - that in the absence of any leadership at all, a new leader will emerge - whether he wills it or not.

Hat Tip: DPF, Kiwiblog

Perception is Everything

Cactus Kate breaks a great story here about Diagnostic Medlab's attempt to pervert the law through the manipulation of the media and, therefore, us.

Not living in the mighty Auck would probably lead to some saying "well what do you care". And to a point they may be right. However it is a wonderful example of how corporations try to sway natural justice through artificial means to the point where what has actually occurred - what is real - is not the point. These people are trying for an outcome through duplicitous means. I.e they are bullshitting. Some might call it marketing.

The same goes for Real Estate agents. These people are the masters of perception over reality. "We paint pictures with words" you may hear them say or "We accentuate the positive". This is actually funny because this accentuation (if there is such a word and I guess there is now - I just made it up) can be so good that the current occupiers may not know how good it is. If in fact everything that the agent said was true about the house they are selling, 50% of vendors wouldn't shift at all! There would be delights to their section that they had never experienced.

For example:

"Wonderful Harbour Views" translates as "If I stand on tip-toes, I can see a square inch of the Harbour Bridge out the window of the back toilet".

or

"Gracious Family Living" translates as "A korean family with 6 kids , 2 dogs and an elderly relative once stayed here".

So while, in the most minutest way, the claims may be true, reality is dwarfed by perception. And this is it - the point of the post. A leading auction house and realty company has for it's slogan "Marketing is Everything".

These days the most trivial of things are marketed to us. Our news is tailored for us on the basis of demographic, whose got the most upright male anchor and which female anchor may be justly inheriting the title "Mother of a Nation" (though lets face it - no one could replace Judy Bailey). Even that most well worn of media cliches "If it bleeds, it leads" still holds true.

Even our government feels the need to be branded which is another form of marketing. Have you ever noticed that at the bottom of ads detailing public services, there is an icon (sorry - logo) that says New Zealand Government with a very swept up and groovy swoosh through the font. No doubt, armies of media consultants, visual artists and graphic designers were paid extraordinary amounts of money to come up with that wee pearler of originality. It's even an example of how perception becomes a self sustaining industry.

That same industry will argue that, in todays busy world, even the smallest and meekest of organisations need to fight for our attention and therefore marketing is needful. They may be right. However there is something oh so cynical at work when we need to be marketed to for even the basest of goods and services.

And when the marketing comes from a company, like Diagnostic Medlab, for the purposes of profit - not from a genuine commercial point of view, rather a "we cocked up and we are going to lose everything, Lets screw the New Zealand justice system" angle, well we live in troubled times then if we let perception become our reality.

Well done Kate for being the NZ blogosphere's version of Kevin Milne and Fair Go (although, I hazard to guess, a damn sight more attractive than Kevin).