The Greens Disgraced - Again!!

"From the river to the sea, I deserve expensive clothes for free"

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/506825/golriz-ghahraman-resigns-from-parliament-after-shoplifting-allegations

Greens Co-leader Degree or Not?

The New Zealand Greens co-leader, James Shaw was claiming to have a degree he did not complete. He has claimed to have a BA from Victoria University of Wellington, but yesterday he amended his LinkedIn to say he only studied at VUW, but did not finish it. 

This calls into question his MSc from the University of Bath in the UK. Entry criteria to their MSc is usually an undergraduate degree with a 2:1 or higher. NZ only attaches these awards to honours degrees, however for an ordinary bachelors, a 2:1 is equivalent to an average grade of A- or higher.

I found this resource on the degree James Shaw says he has:

https://www.peterreason.net/wp-content/uploads/MSc_resp_bus_prac_brochure.pdf

For this postgraduate level course, you will need to have the work experience, commitment and ability to tackle a demanding programme whilst continuing with your working life. This course is not for recent graduates who have no work experience. Participants will normally hold a first degree (not necessarily in a management discipline), or will meet the School of Management entry requirements by demonstrating appropriate intellectual and professional competence to undertake the programme. 

Shaw may have met alternative entry requirements "by demonstrating appropriate intellectual and professional competence" but I'd still like to see his degree certificate and transcripts. What about you? Anyone who says they have a degree when they do not can say anything, true or not. 

Readers can find references to Shaw all over the internet, here's AIESEC on their alumni:

https://aiesec-alumni.org/james-shaw-profile/

With a BA from Victoria University of Wellington and an MSc in Responsibility in Business Practice from the University of Bath’s School of Management, James Shaw spent five years in AIESEC, taking up roles such as Local Committee President of AIESEC Victoria, President of AIESEC New Zealand and acted as a Project Manager in AIESEC International. Armed with extensive experience in business sustainability and consulting, James eventually turned to Politics and joined the New Zealand Green Party in 2007. He is currently Member of Parliament in the New Zealand Parliament, having won a seat in the 2014 General Election, and is Co-leader of the New Zealand Green Party.

 

Getting Greens Below 5% Threshold

New Zealand is saddled with a political party that represents anachronistic political ideologies, a party of wreckers with their snouts in the trough. That party is The Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand (I'll just call them Greens). They offer nothing constructive.

How to get rid of these people? The task will not be an easy one but it is achievable. That's because as the decades have passed, voters have grown up and abandoned the Greens. These days they're perpetually below 10%, stuck close to the all-important 5% threshold which would see them exit parliament if absent an electorate. Currently, they have one electorate seat, that of Auckland Central plus nine other members of parliament off the party list.

Who or what are the Greens? They're communists re-branded; red becomes green. Politically, they like to position themselves as having a monopoly on all things environmental (they don't). In recent years they've started to misrepresent themselves to the public by saying they're in government. They're not in government and never have been. That makes them shameless liars too. 

Before I get to what can be done about the Greens, a little primer on how NZ's Mixed Member Proportional system or MMP works in effect. 

When NZ adopted its electoral system in the mid 1990's it was believed it would solve the recurring problem of minority governments. It didn't do that at all and minority governments became the norm just as they had before. But MMP turned out to be worse than its first-past-the-post predecessor. That's because any party making the 5% threshold could hold the whip hand. A party with tiny support got to dictate the direction of the country. This condition was particularly evident when in 2017, Labour and tiny NZ First formed a minority government that had a smaller proportion of the popular vote than the opposition National party. Labour and NZ First got to govern through the Greens offering their confidence and supply vote in the House of Representatives. What a shambles.

But wait, things are looking up. The Greens are now vulnerable. They're still in opposition but have an understanding with the ruling Labour government. This gives them a couple of ministerial positions outside cabinet, so long as they don't criticise. They're muzzled. Silenced but not in government. Neither Arthur nor Martha. 

The Greens won't see any benefit. Labour will claim credit for anything positive, while Greens won't be able to let rip as any opposition party is expected to do. They'll come across as neutered. Time then to take action against them.

I can imagine people thinking, that's not very nice. Well no, it isn't but that's the way MMP works. It is a negative system, learn how to use it. Yes, a negative system. I'll give you a theoretical example to illustrate.

Let's say one major party has 30% support while another much smaller party has 6% going into an election. Both are safely in parliament because they make the 5% threshold. To be the government, the much larger party must get to at least 40% and then look for a coalition partner to get itself into a winnable position. Why not 50%? That's because of wasted votes which can be as much as 10% of all votes cast (these are votes for parties which fail to make 5% or which cannot win an electorate seat). 

So that 30% party works its butt off and manages to achieve 43%. They then need the 6% party to get itself into government. That 6% party has just sat there and done nothing but it gets rewarded. That's what makes MMP a negative system.

It gets worse. What should the 30% party do knowing its efforts will be coat-tailed by the much smaller party? It is actually more effective to drive that smaller party below the 5% threshold, making votes for it wasted. Then all this large party needs to form a government is find a party with a lone seat or two, with a small voter base. This in effect is what has happened, with the Maori party and ACT both performing this role.

To remind the reader, MMP is a negative system.

How to get rid of these communists, given they offer nothing, coat-tail others efforts and are enemies of civilisation. Three broad approaches appeal:

1. Organise a band of fifth columnists and have them join the Greens to wreck the party from within. Do this by having them promote every wackadoodle and extreme viewpoint the party comes up with. Help elect extremist elements within the Greens to high position within the party, and see the party turned off by the electorate and thus become unelectable. This is quite achievable as the party harbours these extremist elements in any case. It wouldn't be hard to fan the flames.

These fifth columnist elements should operate in semi-autonomous cells and have regular virtual meetings with external controllers to keep them on track with the primary goal, and to ensure these infiltrators do not become seduced by the party they've joined.

2. Separately, establish an alternative party for young people. While the Greens desperately try to attract new first time voters, they are actually a party established by boomers that reeks of privilege. The Greens are hypocrites, selling utopia to gullible people. Of course when these voters get older and enter the workforce, they soon learn that life is not the way the Greens see it and they soon change their support to a more mainstream party. This new party established by and run by young people would cut off the oxygen supply for the Greens.

However, this approach would be expensive to set up, and young voters are unreliable. Think about this then and how to ensure they wouldn't later merge with the Greens. 

3. Harness the conservative conservationist vote. Some within Greens stay within the party even though they're not communists. That's because they do not see a viable environmental alternative. These people realise that capitalism allows for growth, that simply taxing and throttling enterprise won't work in protecting the environment. These voters want markets to work within a framework that protects, not exploits nature. They're somewhat more pragmatic and realise mining, industry and agriculture is necessary to maintain standards of living. 

This approach is workable and could be successful. It'd work better if this new party could win an electorate seat. Boomers would be its core support, along with later generations, it would be able to fund itself and stay focused on its goal of crushing the Greens and replacing them with a better brand. In time, once the Greens are out they could reverse merger and take over the whole environmental ground politically, within a market economic framework.

My approach is part destruction, part construction. Social media marketing needs to be effective, and it has to be said that environment parties have not been good in this area, including the Greens. To be successful the game has got to be played harder and smarter.

What are your ideas?

Planet of the Humans

An interesting watch this, reveals how full of it many Green claims are, and how corporate Green interests are taking over. At the 49 minute mark the documentary addresses issues I raised in Snob's Guide to New Zealand; that Green is a kind of new religion.

Climate Strikes: What Kind of Message?

Climate strikers are trying to save the planet. They're skipping school, work, and descending on houses of parliament and public spaces to demonstrate. Now it doesn't take a genius to work out their efforts will be for nought. But what I'm concerned about are two things: what is the end point for what is being proposed and who exactly is behind the giving of the message.

Imagine the strikes are successful and what is being asked for comes about. What kind of world would that be exactly. That would be a world I certainly wouldn't want to live in. Follow the logic; cars are bad, you can't use your car, you can't own a car, take your car away, the way you live is also bad, change how you live, tell you where to live, take your house away, all property is theft.

That's right, bloody communism, or whatever label you want to put on it. Look into the people behind organising these climate strikes, look at their politics. They can stuff off.

Sustainable New Zealand

The new centrist Green party in New Zealand is sending out membership forms this week. I suggest, if you're concerned about environmental issues, consider joining the party. The Greens currently in parliament in NZ are a firmly leftist party, and by refusing to deal with centre/right parties have effectively painted themselves into a corner. This new party promises to not do that, which is a good start.

To register interest contact them here: Sustainable New Zealand

IPCC Drivel

Why do we have to put up with this IPCC nonsense? Who in their right mind believes for one second that Global Climate Change can be reversed?

The solutions as described have the following effects; they hobble the western world and they amount to re-colonisation of the developing world. Just as they're about to enjoy prosperity, Africa and SE Asia are told to stay in their huts and suck it up. It's unworkable.

Labour Should Attack the Greens

Doing research for my latest Snob's Guide book, I have learned something about Labour that I'd forgotten. They're the biggest victim of MMP. First they were gutted by the Alliance. They got over that but then came the Greens on their own and they've also impacted. Since NZ introduced MMP, the highest percentage of the vote Labour received is 41.26% in 2002. The highest National received is 47.31% in 2011.

Labour has been slowly eroding. This explains their current position, being the only party at the polls in 2017 to receive a large swing to it, yet still having to kowtow to the Greens. Labour should attack the Greens, to reclaim the ground to their political left, and to put them on an even footing with National. If they don't do this, they will be condemned to forever putting together threesomes, and that doesn't work as easily as twosomes. Just saying.

Snob's Guide to New Zealand is now a book, available from Amazon in paperback or kindle

Paperback: www.amazon.com/gp/product/1727804147

Kindle: www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07J9XRCWK

AM Show aka National Party TV

The AM Show is a New Zealand weekday breakfast TV show. It's a lightweight attempt at current affairs, most of the guests are conservative and the views expressed are generally right-of-centre. That said, I think in the run up to the recent General Election and in the weeks after they've crossed the line and become an organ of the National Party. To recap, National are now in opposition as they lost the General Election and are out of office.

How I think the AM Show tried and still tries to support National is in the relentlessly favourable coverage they provide. This support extends to all levels, even right down to captions, with the National party leader Simon "Bill" English being described recently as 'National Leader' instead of Leader of the Opposition. With the former title one could be confused about his actual role.

So what I'm going to do is run a survey just to check if I'm right. I'll listen to three hours of the AM Show, each separate hour chosen randomly on any given day (also chosen randomly). What I'll be listening for is either National being mentioned or the government which could be Labour, NZ First or the Greens. How many times does the AM Show mention either and in what proportion?

Then I'll be listening for generally favourable comments. How I'll determine this will be going by how the commentator leaves the viewer or listener (the show is also simulcast on radio).

For example, imagine a new road is being announced. What I think the AM Show do is boost National but detract from Labour. What they'd say is something like this:

"Labour has announced a new road, 'bout time I'd say, where's the money coming from? (Labour spokesperson comes on and makes sense in pointing out National failed to build the road). Trust Labour to have not done their sums."

Then when National have their say (remember National had planned this road but never built it):

"The very capable Steven Joyce will be all over this, over to the money man, what about this then (Steven Joyce speaks with little interruption). Well that's the final word then, trust National to sort this mess out."

Clearly in such an exchange the intention is to create a generally favourable impression of National, wouldn't you say? I don't know why New Zealand puts up with it, there could be a good argument for having TV3's licence to broadcast suspended.

And a sidebar, the presenters are white and middle class. Duncan Garner is the so-called 'star' who wrote an offensive and deeply racist opinion piece for the Sunday Star Times awhile back, while the sports guy is a former cricket player for NZ. Cricket is largely white and who you know not how good you are largely determines selection. His name is Mark Richardson (you are not expected to recognise the name and few know what he has done despite his repeatedly reminding the audience he once played for NZ's biggest sporting chokers) and he openly endorsed National prior to the election.

When TV3 next goes bust, I suggest the frequencies be allocated to Radio New Zealand and let them run a TV news channel.