VIDEO:FREAKY FRIDAY FUNNY-Aunty Helen hits out!!

Its time to introduce a new feature to the Political Animal Blog, Freaky Friday Funnies.

I will dredge the depths of the internet to come up with priceless and hilarious parodies of our dear Prime Minister, Helen Clark.

You are thinking to yourself, that politicians have become parodies of themselves?

Well yeah, there will be some of those.

Without further ado I will introduce the first Freaky Friday Funny.

This primitive Priministerial parody has a bloke dressed up as the aforementioned punching her screen co-actors in the face.

It is very funny and looks like a Uni production from somewhere made by ACT supporters.

It probably breaks the Electoral Finance Act, but fuck it, it deserves to be seen.

It looks at the Emissions tax scam, truckers, families, smacking! farmers and Helen's push for a position at the United Nations.

c Political Animal 2008

Man faces trial for flick of child's ear

Another failure of Helen Clark's anti smacking brigade.

The Christchurch man accused of assaulting his two young sons will face trial.

In January, Jimmy Mason claimed he was harassed by the police when he was spotted publicly disciplining his four-year-old son. As reported he flicked his sons ear when one of his sons put another in physical danger and was subsequently injured. Mason was surrounded by six police officers minutes after a teacher, witnessing the flick of the ear by the father informed an off duty female cop.

Police initially issued the man with a warning but will now prosecute him.

Those who supported the removal of section 59 to allow decent parents to discipline children said this sort of prosecution would not happen.

There have been many other parents similarly hounded and harassed by PC PCs since the section's removal, for lightly smacking their children.

The shame just continues.

In a related story, the petition for a referendum to repeal the new anti smacking law has officially succeeded, with 310,000 votes collected.

A referendum on the issue must now be held but well known anti democracy campaigner, Prime Minister Helen Clark asserts that there is no time to have it before the 2008 election.

Clark wants the referendum done separately.

It will cost around $10,000,000 extra to have a separate referendum.


Related Political Animal Reading

Sascha Cobern's letter a smack in the face for Deborah Morris-Travers
Sascha Cobern's letter to the Editor of the NZ Herald
Anti-smacking petition a slap in the face for out of touch Politicians
Cindy Kiro gets violent
Sue Bradford strikes out: Again
Anti smacking law puts young boy at risk

c Political Animal 2008

NZ HERALD: Police called in as toddler fights for life

Yet another child is injured. Just as many, if not more children have been hurt or killed since the anti smacking legislation was introduced over one year ago.

This is an indictment of failure for this legislation and common sense suggested before it was passed that the bill was about restricting parents rights and increasing State influence rather than caring about our kids.

Cindy Kiro, Susie Bradford and Especially Ms Clark should hang their heads in a collectivist shame.

What they will do while our kids are being bashed like the one below though is wring their hands as they always do, and tell New Zealanders that it is "everyone's fault", not the bad parents fed by Labour's Welfare State that are responsible.

5:00AM Wednesday July 02, 2008
By Elizabeth Binning

A child abuse team was alerted after the toddler's injuries raised suspicion. Photo / Martin Sykes

An Auckland toddler is fighting for his life after being taken to hospital with serious injuries that are now being investigated by police.

It is understood the 3-year-old Avondale boy suffered the injuries while in the care of his family early this week.

The family are believed to have sought advice from relatives in Glen Innes before the boy was taken to Starship hospital on Monday afternoon.

Police were alerted to the possible case of child abuse by medical authorities at 4.30pm.

The Herald understands the boy has several injuries, including serious head injuries. continued

Related Political Animal Reading

Sascha Cobern's letter to the Editor of the NZ Herald
Anti-smacking petition a slap in the face for out of touch Politicians
Sign the Anti Anti smacking petition
Cindy Kiro gets violent

c Political Animal 2008

Helen Clark kicks democracy below the belt

By Rod Emmerson

Helen "Mugabe" Clark and her stance to deny a referendum during the 2008 Election to the nearly 10% of Kiwis who voted in a petition to overturn the anti smacking bill is yet another full smack in the face with a closed fist, for democracy in New Zealand.

We shouldn't be surprised. I signaled her current stance last week when the petition came back to the house, but it is just another crime against democracy that Clark and her government have been infamous for over the last 9 years.

Labour and all who sail in her, and vote for her hate freedom with a passion and have done everything they could to stifle it.

Related Political Animal Reading

Labour's State Control out of control
Electoral Finance Bill Vote
NZ loses democratic freedom

Sacha Cobern's letter to NZ Herald Editor
Electoral Finance Bill Protest 2007

If it isn't the anti democratic Electoral Finance Act, where individuals and groups fear legal reprisals for speaking out against the government in election year, it is Clark and Winston Peters threatening the media with "correction" when they don't like what they are saying.

Removing legal freedoms by removing the Privy Council without indication or consultation before an election has constrained full and fair legal process in New Zealand.

The freedom to eat, smoke, say and do as individuals have a right to has been diluted to such an extent that most individuals and families live in fear of some government agency, or in the case of the EFA or anti smacking law, the police, knocking on the door to take citizens away for questioning.

While that sort of political correctness has reined supreme, the freedom for innocent Kiwi citizens to roam their neighbourhood safely has been suppressed because of rampant welfare bred violence and lack of consequences from the Justice Department and slack politically correct policing directed from the top floor of the Beehive.

Government's exist not to constrain freedom but to champion it. It is their job to make sure we all live our lives, as much as possible, without fear of consequences if we dare to voice an opinion or have a view that differs from our fellow citizens. Even this blog has been threaten by mentally deranged Labour voters plotting to illegally use photo-shopped pictures of my good self.

In Helen Clark and her government we have an administration clearly willing to remove our democratic freedoms in the vein hope they can hold on to power long enough to continue to remove the last vestiges of democracy that we currently cling on a steep cliff face to.

To most enlightened individuals, except Helen Clark herself, the irony of her speech yesterday in Parliament about one Robert Mugabe from Zimbabwe and his current murderous rampage-his first one in the early 1980s supported by Clark- will not be lost.

In Mr Mugabe we have a tyrant who clings to power by removing democratic freedoms by bad law,threats,violence,torture and murder. In Ms Clark we have a dictator who clings to power by removing democratic freedoms with bad law and threats.

How long will it be before the relatively thick line between the two gets thinner?

I fear for the future of our democracy and the safety of its people if Labour are voted back in in 2008.

c Political Animal 2008

Sue Bradford strikes out (Again)

The comely Ms Bradford, in her element.

Given that the repeal of section 59 has been voted down by over 350,000 voters(almost 3 times more people that voted for Bradford's Green Party) in the petition for a referendum to allow good parents to discipline their children, in an appropriate way, and it will be held during the 2008 Election ,it is time for the latest Stan Blanch cartoon.

Stan can be quite a vicious bastard, at times extremely pithy, but he is often on the money and at at times much more, than mainstream political cartoonists.

c Political Animal 2008

FAMILY FIRST PRESS RELEASE: Anti Smacking Referendum to go ahead

Monday, 16 June 2008, 9:56 am
Press Release: Family First

Sports and Field days Crowds Give Anti-Smacking Petition Huge Boost

Family First NZ says that the numbers of signatures on the petition against the anti-smacking law and demanding a Referendum at the upcoming Election has been hugely boosted by a number of large events over the past 2 weekends.

“Over 12,000 signatures have been collected at the two recent All Blacks tests, a Warriors game, the Waikato Field days, and other sporting and community events,” says Bob McCoskrie, National Director of Family First NZ.

“The signature count from the Fielddays alone was a whopping 8,700. It has certainly reinforced to us the strong feeling against this unpopular and ineffective law by typical NZ’ers who are attending these events. There is no shortage of people wanting to sign the petition.”

The organisers originally had a shortfall of 18,027 signatures after the audit of the original 324,216 signatures submitted in April. However, since then, more than 50,000 signatures have been collected. These will be submitted before the deadline of the end of the month.

“This confirms that a Referendum will be held on the anti-smacking law at the same time as the Election, it confirms that a huge proportion of NZ’ers want the law changed to protect good parents, and it sends a very clear and loud message to the politicians that they should listen to the views of the voters who will be making a choice at the upcoming Election.”

“It’s time to tackle the real causes of child abuse, violence and crime without criminalising the efforts of good parents raising productive and law-abiding citizens of the future,” says Mr McCoskrie.

“There is good reason that only 23 of the almost 200 countries have adopted this law. NZ can lead the world by being the first country to reverse this flawed law before its effects are fully felt by families and the community.”

Political Animal Note: Contrary to the rather loopy Sue Bradford, who has a representation of less than 120,000 Green voters, the more than 350,000 who voted against the repeal of section 59 are a huge number, perhaps one of the biggest petitions ever seen and unless there is more of the same skulduggery from Helen Clark and the feminist Junta in the Labour Party to stop it there will be a petition during the 2008 general election.

Well done McCoskrie and Family First, while I dont agree with everything the movement stands for Political Animal salutes you now.

Related Political Animal Reading

Sascha Cobern's letter to the Editor of the NZ Herald

Anti-smacking petition a slap in the face for out of touch Politicians

Sign the Anti Anti smacking petition

Cindy Kiro gets violent

c Political Animal 2008

NZ HERALD: Poll reveals we're still smacking our children

In the wake of the acquittal of Chris Kahui for murdering his 2 young children and not a thing said in the media by Sue Bradford, she is out again today trying to make good parents who give their children a corrective smack criminals and normalise that-Political Animal

5:00AM Monday May 26, 2008
By Angela Gregory

NZ HERALD : Almost half of parents with children under 12 have smacked them in the past year, a survey has found.

The Family First lobby group commissioned a market research company to poll New Zealanders on their attitudes to parental discipline since the anti-smacking law came into effect in June last year.

It found that 48 per cent of respondents with children under 12 had smacked their child after the law change.

The changes to the Crimes Act outlawed the use of parental force against children for purposes of correction.

The issue polarised New Zealanders.

The law change was led by Green MP Sue Bradford, whose private member's bill removed from the Crimes Act the statutory defence of reasonable force to correct a child.

But it was passed only after last-minute changes, approved by a large majority in Parliament, which directed the police not to prosecute inconsequential offences.

Family First's national director, Bob McCoskrie, said he was surprised the polling found so many parents admitting they had flouted the law.

He said 51 per cent of mothers had admitted continuing to smack.

Related reading

Anti Anti-smacking petition a slap in the face for out of touch Politicians
Sign the anti smacking petition
Sacha Cobern's letter to NZ Herald Editor
Cindy Kiro gets violent
Anti-smacking law puts young boy at risk

"For a new law to be ignored by so many people who are willing to risk a police or [Child, Youth and Family] investigation indicates just how out of step with reality this law is."

The nationwide poll surveyed 1018 randomly selected respondents, with a fairly even spread of men and women aged from 18.

About a quarter of the respondents had children under 12.

Mr McCoskrie said the poll followed a similar one done in June last year, just after the new law came into effect.

In that survey, 78 per cent of parents said they would smack their child to correct their behaviour if they believed it was reasonable to do so.

Ms Bradford said yesterday that the new poll indicated an improvement in attitudes, as a year on only 48 per cent admitted having done so.

"We are well on the way; that is a great result," she said.

But Mr McCoskrie said the new poll showed the percentage opposed to the anti-smacking law had risen to 73 per cent from 62 per cent last year.

Men, people aged more than 60 and those from rural areas opposed it most strongly.

He said only 19 per cent strongly or somewhat agreed with the new law despite the police discretion clause, down from 29 per cent last year.

Almost half of those surveyed - 47 per cent - strongly disagreed with the ban on smacking.

Mr McCoskrie said 85 per cent of those polled - up from 82 per cent a year ago - agreed the new law should be changed to state that parents who gave their children a smack that was reasonable and for the purpose of correction were not breaking the law.

He said the polling sent a clear message to political parties seeking support for this year's election.

When asked whether their support for a party would be affected if it promised to change the law, 37 per cent said they would be more likely to vote for that party. This was up from 31 per cent last year.

The number of people whose vote would be unaffected by a policy to change the law fell from 59 per cent last year to 53 per cent this year.

Mr McCoskrie said the results showed New Zealanders had not been fooled by the anti-smacking lobby's claim that smacking was child abuse.

"They haven't been duped by arguments that children are damaged by reasonable smacking, and they have understood that our unacceptable rate of child abuse has far deeper root causes than a loving parent who corrects their child with a smack on the bottom," he said.

Asked if they thought the new law was likely to help reduce child abuse, 79 per cent said it was not at all likely. This figure was up from 77 per cent last year.

Organisers of a petition to reverse the anti-smacking law change have until the end of next month to gain the number of signatures needed to force a non-binding referendum at this year's election.

Children's Commissioner Cindy Kiro said yesterday that she had not seen the survey.

But she urged people to move on and learn better parenting skills.

"The key message is, 'For goodness sake, can't we move on?' So much energy has been wasted debating this."

Dr Kiro said people needed to learn and be encouraged in positive parenting.

She believed there was a trend away from physical punishment.* The poll was conducted during the week beginning May 12 and has a margin of error of 3.1 per cent.

Sign the anti smacking referendum(UPDATE)

The "anti smacking bill", or repeal of section 59 last year has lead to a petition for a referendum.The referendum has 280,000 signatures and needs 20000 more for a referendum to be held at this years election at the end of 2008. Give Sue Bradford, Helen Clark and her mates a slap in the face!!

Footnote: As of last week this petition fell short of the 280000 signatures by 15000.
There are another 7 weeks or so for those signatures to be collected.

Download and sign the petition here

C Political Animal 2008

Sacha Cobern's column a slap in the face for Deborah Morris-Travers

Sacha Cobern has this week sparked debate from those sensible people with commonsense, who believe smacking a child should be a valuable tool in a parents toolbox and that government have no business putting their sticky beak noses in our business. The fear that parents now have over the anti smacking law, has already led to many parents labeled as abusers for lightly smacking their kids and has undermined the authority of good parents all around the country.

I am aware myself of two cases of children telling on their parents and these two accounts haven't hit the media like others have, probably because parents want to keep things secret for fear of being labeled abusers by do gooder socialists. There are bound to be more of these undisclosed cases.

Sacha's piece has sparked a violent, incoherent, high minded and intellectually offensive outburst by a former minister of Parliament, Debra Morris-Travers, an employee of the State backed Barnardos, a former advocate for children but now an extension of the Labour Party propaganda machine.

"If anything, that side of the debate has been too earnest and intellectually-based and that's why so few people seem to understand what has driven the law change.

The media's refusal to give coverage to the evidence and research supporting the law change is the only reasonable argument for a lack of intellectual rigour in the debate".

Morris-Travers contends that she practices what she calls "positive parenting" so by exclusion labels parents who smack negative and clearly criminal for "assaulting" their children by lightly smacking them.

In another poke at the average Kiwi she labels them as too stupid to understand the "intellectual debate" over the repeal of section 59, when it is clearly very simple, parents need to be able to correct their children's behaviour with every reasonable tool possible. Nothing complicated about that.

Like Helen Clark she blames the media for it not revealing the facts supporting her case. The reason none have been forthcoming is that those "facts" do not exist.

Read both and then decide for yourself who is talking garbage and deserves a smack on the behind.


c Political Animal 2008

Sacha Coburn: Smack on the hand worth time in jail

5:00AM Tuesday February 26, 2008, NZ Herald
By Sacha Coburn

The Smacking Debate

• Deborah Morris-Travers: Lead by example, not with violence
• Garth George: Full up and fit to burst on a gutsful of Govt ideology

I agree with Bob McCoskrie and Larry Baldock. Eight words which churn my stomach as I write them. When left-leaning, social liberals like me are forced to align with the fundies speaking in tongues and organising petitions, you know our little country at the bottom of the world has gone mad.

I want to smack my daughter. At least twice today I'm likely to threaten it and may even make meaningful preparations to carry it out. Send her to her room. Get the wooden spoon out of the drawer. Enough to be arrested for an attempted smack, I'd have thought. Is it wrong to fantasise about a night in the lock-up?

"You mean that in solitary I'd be by myself for 23 hours in a row?"

Smacking my son was a parenting strategy of last resort and was immediately effective when dealing with defiance and dangerous situations. I've never smacked in anger and never without issuing a final warning first. I'm a text-book smacker. Pin-up girl has a certain ring to it.

But now, with my precious Portia, aged 2 years 8 months, my tool box is looking a little empty.

"No," she says. "I won't put my seat belt back on." Try reasoning, Aunty Sue B suggests. "If we crash, you'll get hurt."

"No, I didn't."

Try praising the good behaviour, says Aunty Cindy K.

"Mummy loves it when you wear your seatbelt."

"No! I love Daddy!"

Wait out the bad behaviour, advises Aunty Dianne L.

Good idea until my phone rings: "Hello Sacha, are you coming to get your son from school today? It's 5.30pm and the cleaners are going home."

"Not yet," I reply. "Just wearing Portia down, should be there by midnight."

Scare her, suggests my guardian demon.

"If you don't put it back on, tonight I'll close your bedroom door and leave the light off." Cue screaming, but still no seat belt. What kind of parental monster uses fear of the dark as a legitimate tool?

The problem for me is that I love the law and the democratic process. As a lawyer, I understand the benefits of obeying the law and the potential consequences of disregarding it. I want to parent within the law and I want to be able to use smacking as one of many parenting tools.

I'm a bloody good parent; well-read, patient, on the Board of Trustees even. I know that clothes driers are for clothes only and that I shouldn't leave my child with the man next door who's on bail awaiting trial for manslaughter. I understand the food pyramid and surely I get brownie points with the Greens for breastfeeding both babies past 12 months.

I don't believe smacking is for every parent or every child. I don't believe that it's an effective tool once children get beyond four or five. I wouldn't insist that you smack your child, but I don't believe Parliament fixes anything by taking away my right to smack mine.

Sue Bradford told us that we had to stop treating our children as property. They are people too, with their own minds and their own rights. Illuminating stuff. But the police officer who pulled me over and asked why my child was wandering willy-nilly around the backseat didn't buy it. I am apparently totally responsible for her well-being and behaviour, but not to be trusted when it comes to making parenting decisions about how to develop her sense of right and wrong.

Perhaps the most frustrating aspect of the whole smacking debate is the lack of intellectual rigour evident on both sides of the issue. To continue the rhetoric about child abuse and smacking having any casual link is absurd - as all of us who were smacked-not-beaten as children can attest. And to suggest on the other hand that God gave us the right to smack is equally offensive - he also okayed some other pretty dodgy ideas.

The obvious victims remain. Children who are violently abused in their homes are no more protected than they were before the law change. But my own daughter is undoubtedly a victim too and our whole family suffers the consequences of her strong sense of self-above-all-else.

She has, in the past six months, learned that there are few sanctions I can impose on her that are meaningful enough to deter her from her intended course of action. She knows that if she screams loudly and for long enough she might not get her way but, by golly, there'll be a flurry of action around her. In short, she has learnt that behaving badly works.

How ironic if, in years to come, the lack of corrective smacking in childhood is raised in mitigation of criminal offending.

* Sacha Coburn is a Christchurch businesswoman, lawyer and mother.

Cindy Kiro gets violent

c Blanch 2008



Cindy Kiro, the Children's Commissar, has gone feral over the weekend and it looks like a violent reaction to the truth about child rearing has smacked her in the face and waken her from her slumber in her deep welfare dependent taxpayer funded black leather chair.

In the wake of the anti anti-smacking petition getting the required amount of signatures, Kiro's mouth continues to cash cheques that she cant back up with any real currency.

She calls those who voted for the petition"extreme" and I guess by definition and inclusion the majority of New Zealanders, who would like to be able to use a small smack on the hand or a safe part of the body, as a part of good and loving parenting, without going to prison or being told on by their children, other parents or teachers.

She calls the petition organisers "misleading" regarding how they got so much support for their petition. The mirror would be a good place to start when little Cindy utters this kind of clap trap.

I have been told a story about 2 young boys who discussed among themselves about whether they should tell their teacher about one of them being smacked lightly for being a horrible little child. The children didn't tell because the one who wasn't smacked told his father and both families got together and discussed it. The boys came to the conclusion that it would have been wrong to tell on the parent, and rightly so.

Kiro and the lefty lot who push their poisonous legislation on us want to undermine parents authority, that is clear in the example I explained above and it would have led to that parent being interrogated by the police, just for being a Father.

The fact is the majority of good parents in this country disagree with Kiro and would also share the view, that it is she with the problem and not those of us who know that a little smack is not child abuse and is good for the child when done with love.


Related reading

Commissioner Insults Generations of Parents
Kids Commissioner out of touch with reality

Related Political Animal reading

Anti Anti-smacking petition a slap in the face for out of touch Politicians
Sign the Anti Anti smacking petition

c Political Animal 2008

Anti Anti-Smacking Petition slap in the face for out of touch Parliament

The anti, anti-smackers group have succeeded in their quest to get 300,000 kiwis to vote for their petition.

Congrats from Political Animal and congrats to those who cast their vote.

A real smack in the face for Bradford and the lemon suckers from Labour and other supporting players; Greens, Maori Party and the dopey National Party.

If there is a referendum this election, any elected party will be even dopier to ignore it.


c Political Animal 2008

Petition aiming to revoke smacking bill passes 300,000

NZPA | Friday, 22 February 2008

A group aiming to overturn the so-called anti-smacking legislation say they have enough signatures to force a referendum.

One of the organisers, Kiwi Party leader Larry Baldock, told a news conference today the petition had gone past the 300,000 target.

"The actual target to force a referendum is 285,019, which is 10 per cent of the electoral roll, but we aimed at 300,000 to be safe," Mr Baldock said.

"As of today we have 322,252 signatures."

The petition asks: "Should a smack as part of good parental correction be a criminal offence in New Zealand?"

Mr Baldock said nearly as many people had signed a second petition question, "Should the Government give urgent priority to understanding and addressing the wider causes of family breakdown, family violence and child abuse in New Zealand".

The petition follows the passing into law of Sue Bradford's bill last year outlawing the defence of reasonable parental correction in assault cases.

It was passed 113-8 after a last-minute amendment put forward by National stating police did not have to pursue inconsequential smacking.

Mr Baldock said the petition would be handed into Parliament at the end of next week, where parliamentary clerks would check on the number of duplicate signatures.

"We think some it impossible some people won't have signed twice - 12 months is a long time - but we are hoping it will be no more than 10 to 15 per cent."

If the petition reaches the official target Mr Baldock said there was a good chance a referendum would be put to voters on election day.

The referendum would not be binding.

Mr Baldock said politicians should not ignore the referendum if it was passed.

"It's not just about pro-smacking or anti-smacking, it's about our democracy. The most recent poll said 74 per cent of New Zealanders were opposed to the bill," he said.

Co-organiser Christine Rankin said Ms Bradford's bill would do nothing to stop child abuse.

Sign the anti smacking petition

The "anti smacking bill", or repeal of section 59 last year has lead to a petition for a referendum.
The referendum has 280,000 signatures and needs 20000 more for a referendum to be held at this years election at the end of 2008.

Give Sue Bradford, Helen Clark and her mates a slap in the face!!

Download and sign the petition here

C Political Animal 2008

Anti smacking law puts young boy at risk

The New Zealand Labour Party's chickens have finally come home to roost in a monumental way. The removal of section 59 or the "anti smacking bill", as it has become commonly known, midway through last year, has had another casualty, perhaps the worst one so far.

A Christchurch father who disciplined his 3 year old son who put his younger brother at risk, and was subsequently injured, was surrounded by six police officers minutes after a teacher(who would have guessed) witnessing the flick of the ear by the father informed an off duty female cop.

The father has been left with a warning by officers and a "black mark" noted on police records for attempting to keep his children safe from harm.

Apart from the obvious overkill by the six police attending and the stupidity of the off duty officer and teacher, the trauma that the 2 kids must have gone through seeing their father subject to extreme police harassment cannot be overstated.

The father's children will be getting a lesson from the whole incident that their dad has done something wrong, and that the lessons that he is trying to teach them are not to be believed.

When you undermine a parents authority in such a public way you risk that parents ability to bring up children in an appropriate way and ultimately keep them safe from harm, be it physical, psychological or emotional.

The politicians who trumpeted this sleazy law, Sue Bradford, Helen Clark and the various state bureaucratic heads and b grade celebrities, with the moronic support of the National Party are embarrassingly silent about this latest turn of events.

Those in support of the bill said that nothing like this would happen, it has, and after all, the sensible and intelligent amongst us we know it was designed to stop what this father did.

Those that supported this law change unflaggingly, should be voted against in the 2008 Election.

Labour, NZ First, The Maori Party, Progressives and Peter Dunne's Motley Crew do not deserve your vote on this law change alone.

John Key must be true to his word and repeal this change to sensible parenting and put the control of parenting back where it belongs.

In parents hands.


Related reading on Political Animal:

Trevor Mallard's Anti Violence Advert


C Political Aminal 2008