Election Thoughts

This is the week before voting opens. I decided quite a while back that my vote would not go to Labour. As I don’t have many votes left in the tank the vote has in a sense become more valuable. I had said to myself many times over the years that it would be a cold day in hell before I voted National. Well the cold day is almost here and the metaphorical temperature is falling. The choices are limited and many of us are not far out from having to front up with a decision.

My thoughts have been moving more in the direction of NZ First. National will almost certainly not reach the level required to govern alone and must take one or more partners. National and ACT have some unpalatable policies and may be harking back to the slash and burn policies of the early nineties along with doses of beneficiary and super annuitant bashing. Here we go again.

National? It has always been the party of hidden agendas and has like most governments often relied on voter apathy.  

My other theory is that some who cannot stomach National and ACT as a combined majority would want to have NZ First as a brake on National/ACT. We could see some ACT support and some reluctant National support swinging to NZ First. A letter this week in the NZ Herald supports that same theory of voter sentiment and tactical voting. Polling now might indicate ACT are slipping slightly and NZ First are moving past the 5% threshold. If ACT and NZ First ended up with equal or near equal percentages things could get very interesting in coalition talks.   

So I will be voting NZ First which is effectively a vote for National – in the hope NZ First will strike an honest bargain with National. Maybe October 14th will be a cold day for many. 

Why am I not wanting to go with Labour? Simple. I do not want to see a lopsided and racially structured governance system thrust upon us. All of that would have been followed by an inflexible constitution, again favouring a minority racial group i.e. Maori. For that was what Labour and their Maori MPs were expecting to achieve. To me this is the reason so many have turned against Labour but have not said so in plain words.

Don’t forget the perfidious Dame and her HePuapua nonsense. Put it this way: The silent majority will mark their ballot papers with minimal fuss and return home thinking of a job that had to be done. No apologies for using the term silent majority which originated somewhere way back in American politics. 

A change of government does not mean Labour’s mess disappears on the Sunday morning after the election. No guarantee a National led coalition will satisfy all of the ex Labour/Green voters. Many new governments carrying significant majorities will claim “mandates” for all sorts of new measures. As for trusting National I am not sure. Will Luxon last the distance? Who are his caucus enemies?

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