Rule One: Follow the 1960s Arpege ads. Promise them anything but give 'em ... In 2008, Key promised not to raise the GST or the debt to pay for the tax cuts on the top earners. Once elected, he increased the GST 25 per cent, increased the debt to offset tax cuts and sprayed himself with Arpege-coated Teflon to offset both. BTW, Bill, you can still buy an original Arpege ad on eBay for 10 bucks or you could use $10 to buy a couple of "keylos" of healthy veges, inclusive of GST, of course.
English, who didn't get the Arpege memo, has signalled both tax cuts from a healthy economy and a rise in the age of retirement.
I'm pretty sure his Maori Party coalition partners won't mind, even though the present age of 65 already disfavours their constituents who live five years less than Pakeha.
The whole National team will miss John Key, because no matter how silly his mincing on the runway, how awkward his handshakes, how embarrassing his ponytail pulling, how politically disastrous his tea-towel flag campaign, John Key could look straight into the camera and tell a big one with a smiling face.
The rest of them, well ... not so much. Trade Minister Todd McClay was a deer in headlights while touting the non-existent virtues of TPP, claiming it would bring us $2.7 billion in GDP and cost us only $90 million. Imagine that. Because it was imaginary. We were saved the $4 billion Pharmac blowout by Donald Trump.
Nick Smith definitely needs a sunhat. Only an overheated brain pan would invent his claims of our rivers' cleanliness, by lowering of standards, doubling the faecal bacteria count. Smith claims that's international standards, yeah right. Maybe Kolkata. He'd have us keep the foul water and give away the clean.
The list of embarrassments goes on ... Nikki Kaye's going Trump on Jacinda Ardern ... Paula Bennett on a good day.
Labour, though, ought not to become complacent. Its desperation is showing, cuddling up to Willie Jackson, a guy who doesn't know who to aim his racism at now he's found his Jewish roots. Being National Lite ain't gonna cut it with the voters.
Unless Little plus Greens and Co. address the real issues of our country -- global warming, widening economic and social inequality, the 25 per cent child poverty rate, the disproportionate resources of two major cities, the balance between agriculture and environmental impact -- and come up with credible policies to address them, the September elections could be the change that wasn't.
Labour and Greens could still end up neglecting the needs and the dignity of average working Kiwis.
Jay Kuten is an American-trained forensic psychiatrist who emigrated to New Zealand for the fly fishing. He spent 40 years comforting the afflicted and intends to spend the rest afflicting the comfortable.
