There is no doubt that Helen Clark and the sisterhood in the New Zealand Labour Party are feeling the heat at present.
With Clark finally succumbing in the polls completely to National, if there was an election today John Key and his buddies would govern on their own. The majority of the country at present prefers Key as its leader.
Clark and co are facing a continuing slide in the economy, failing pillars of the state apparatus in health, education, policing and every other sector of government involvement in our lives are under pressure.
The only success Labour have had is increasing state dependence through record welfare recipients and bloating state employees to a level where we may see some pen pushing, clipboard carrying, pen protector wearing drones move to use up Auckland office space because Clarke and her mates have exhausted supply down in the unproductive caverns and dark bureaucratic holes in Wellington.
You better believe though that the sisterhood deep within Labour will not relinquish the control that they have had over New Zealand, the Land of the long trousers, short hair and hairy pits, for control is what this lot crave and they will do almost anything in their power, and they have it in spades, to hold on to it.
The recent proposed changes to electoral law to make it easier for the incumbent to stay in Government and stifle democratic debate has been widely canvassed in sensible media of late. The hand-wringing Chris Trotters and Russell Browns of this world largely see nothing wrong with stopping debate if you disagree with a point of view so haven't critically covered this as yet.
The grab main grab for power by Labour isn't going to be seen until mid next year when they go to the public for a forth term in office.
Labour and Micheal Cullen have been stockpiling stolen taxpayer funds to the tune of billions of dollars and have so-far refused to hand it back to those who earnt it in the first place because it will not earn votes so far away from an election.
The cynical grab for power by promising to spend billions of dollars of taxpayer dollars on you if they get in is reminiscent of Muldoon's lavish social driven election promises in the late 1970s/early 80s except it will go further in 2008.
Taxpayers, business and therefore the economy have been bled dry over the last 8 years by high taxes and lavish government spending and instead of cutting taxes for the self-imposed economic disaster that they helped create they are going to target special interest groups next year with welfare inspired tax credits, more handouts to students, elderly groups, low income earners and immigrant sectors and some but not much money, will go back to the middle classes that earnt this money in the first place.
Of course these kinds of handouts are designed to maintain the control that Labour and the left in general require and lust for but the horrible thing is that they may even placate those same middle-classes that will fund the 2008 power grab.
Are the middle classes that stupid?
Can they not see what has happened? To be sure the old give with one hand and take with the other has been reversed but is the process so hidden that the majority of New Zealanders wont see this 2008 power grab for what it is?
At least Robin Hood was honest, with Dear Mr Hood you knew were going to be robbed and the proceeds were going to go to the poor but for Ms Helen Hood the bluntness of her arrow is probably to her advantage because while the recipient is clear where the arrow came from and where it is going to, the translation of one from the other is muddied with bureaucratic and citizens blood.
The taxpayer funded power grab began at the 2005 election and was successful, just.
Billions of the middle classes taxes were used to buy the votes of the very people who supplied the funding and got Labour the seat of power by around 50000 votes.
To be fair $800,000 of taxpayer moola was also stolen by Labour to fund a pledge card and that kind of politicking cannot be understated in the light of electoral reform bills proposed to become law this year and used to cover off spending in the 2008 election.
In 2008 though we are likely to see the biggest push using taxpayer dollars to re elect a government that we have ever seen in our electoral history.
Cynical, dangerous and morally corrupt? Sure, but it is up to those middle classes to take back the power that they have let go that their taxes represent.
To do otherwise would be to ultimately let themselves and their country down.
c Darren Rickard 2007
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