Garth George’s column this week has the nauseating title “We Should All Salute Our Wonderful PM“, and it goes downhill from there. It’s what is known as a hagiography, a biography of a saint.
Go and fetch a bucket, then read this extract:
He is a man of the people, as yet unspoiled by the poisonous atmosphere of power politics, and in spite of his position and spectacular wealth remains one of us.
He is every bit at home in the company of a class of primary schoolkids as he is with the man and woman in the street, or in the company of the world’s high and mighty. He is amiable, engaging, good-natured, highly intelligent, humorous and, most of all, unaffected.
Now for a dose of reality. Recently we had a referendum where 87.4% of a representative sample of the population showed their opposition to the anti-smacking law. As I said in my earlier post, John Key’s response was thus:
I don’t care how amiable, engaging, good-natured, highly intelligent, humorous and unaffected John Key appears to be: what I do care about are his actions, and his actions show that he is not a man of the people. His actions show that he is a man who wants to rule the people.
Sociopaths are some of the most dangerous people around, and they can be engaging, good-natured, unaffected, and humorous when they want to be – that’s part of what makes them so dangerous. I’m not saying that John Key is a sociopath, but I am saying don’t judge a book by its cover.
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Kiwi Polemicist 
The guy is pure slime.
Comment by notadothead — November 8, 2009 @ 6:10 pm
notadothead: I can understand why you’d think that John Key is slime.
Comment by Kiwi Polemicist — November 10, 2009 @ 8:20 am
“Now for a dose of reality. Recently we had a referendum where 87.4% of a representative sample of the population showed their opposition to the anti-smacking law. As I said in my earlier post, John Key’s response was thus: *middle finger*”
Not really. The referendum asked if people thought a smack should be a criminal offense. You probably remember the referendum stated “Should a smack as part of good parental correction be a criminal offence in New Zealand?” It didn’t say what kind of smack. A smack in the head, a smack in the stomach, a smack with a cane? Section 59A allowed these kinds of smacks to be ruled out by the law when they weren’t previously. 59.2 says you can use light butt smacking for control. 59.4 means light smacking could be considered not worth proescuting by the police. Unless someones version of “light smacking” involves breaking a childs legs. The coffee I drink might seem strong to me but weak to you. This can happen in child discipline too unfortunately.
Don’t judge a book by it’s cover or in this case, the medias crude cover for the act. Plunket, Barnardos, unicef, Save the children and many others have supported the law change.
Comment by Passer By — July 25, 2010 @ 11:47 pm
Passer By: I give no consideration to the fact that a bunch of the state’s lackeys (Plunket etc) supported a law change. Their support is no more surprising than an alcoholic saying that he likes booze.
The key word in the referendum question was ‘correction’, which is specifically outlawed by the current section 59.
With all due respect, the rest of your comment is simply a red herring.
Comment by Kiwi Polemicist — July 26, 2010 @ 11:47 am