KEY POINTS:
Former Labour Party leader Mike Moore has let fire with a searing criticism of Helen Clark, comparing the Prime Minister's "politics of personal destruction" with the highly divisive premiership of Sir Robert Muldoon.
Writing in today's Herald in an opinion piece entitled "A Return to Muldoonism?" Mr Moore says he expects to see cartoons of Helen Clark showing her morphing into the former National leader, who was prime minister from 1975 until 1984.
Muldoon had perfected the "nasty technique" of personally destroying opponents, intimidating the media and using the levers of Government to create stunts and diversions while buying votes in marginal seats.
"Aspirational politics, an inclusive economy and social mobility was once Labour's strongest economic and social policy credential. This politics of personal destruction is fearful ... Helen Clark is superb at it. She's destroyed more National leaders than any other Labour leader."
Helen Clark yesterday laughed off being labelled a Muldoonist by the man she ousted from the Labour leadership in 1993. "That's Mike," she said through a spokesman.
However, coming from a former leader, the attack and its intensity are most unhelpful as Labour endeavours to regain the initiative and close the big gap between itself and National in the polls.
Apart from the Muldoonist tag, Labour MPs will be annoyed with Mr Moore for gifting National a string of embarrassing quotes to fire at the Government benches in Parliament.
In his piece, Mr Moore said Labour was trying to "to put a blowtorch down National leader John Key's Y-fronts". However, it was a bit much to call him a "rich guy" when many Labour MPs went to exclusive schools and enjoyed a comfortable upbringing.
Even the "normally sensible" Phil Goff had joined the chorus, hoping to ingratiate himself with left-wing MPs "for later" - a reference by Mr Moore to the Mt Roskill MP's latent leadership ambitions.
The attacks on "possible, probable enemies of the state" had even gone overseas, with the PM criticising Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer for speaking at National's conference, despite Labour regularly inviting foreign politicians to speak to its troops.
With Helen Clark expected to undertake a pre-election reshuffle of her Cabinet, Mr Moore said if she could replace half of her ministers and keep the show together, it would mark her out as one of the greatest political managers ever.
"It's very hard. Muldoon's circle of close mates got smaller and weaker as he got older too."
The PM and Mr Goff are not the only politicians Mr Moore singled out. He questioned what "consort" Judith Tizard and other ministers outside Cabinet actually do.
"Perhaps it's good they don't do much. They manage the remarkable feat of being self-important, expensive, trivial and irrelevant at the same time."
