A most exciting week that was

What a week this has been. The select committee hearing public submissions on the GCSB bill got underway. On day one the chairperson John Key was so laid back that most thought he was asleep [He was]. On day two he called Kim Dotcom a liar, Dotcom in turn called the PM a liar, the PM asked Dotcom why he was sweating, and Dotcom asked the PM why he was acting like a clown with a red nose. On day three the Chairperson [Key] never bothered to turn up which showed that he was totally uninterested in what the public thought about the changes being made to allow the GCSB to spy on NZ Citizens and then pass that information on the US, UK, Australia and Canada. He was possibly attending a victory lunch with the Sky City bosses or was flying off to his real home in Hawaii.

 

Later in the week Nationals largest supporter in Parliament, when the Maori Party imploded and its male co-leader Pita Sharples announced his resignation as co-leader and a member of parliament and National Party Minister outside of cabinet. It was not unexpected after the defeat in the by-election in Ikaroa-Rawhiti where the Maori Party came third. According to Pita this defeat had nothing to do with the Maori Party being in bed with National or the leadership confrontation between himself and Te Ururoa Flavell. Of course the elephant in the room when Pita was falling on his sword was the Mana Movement and its leader Hone Harawira whose highly active team drove the Maori Party into third place in the by-election and while this is a good omen for them it is a dark cloud for others.

 

Now this was a week for labour to build on its lucky win in Ikaroa-Rawhiti, and the disclosure of heaps of possible lies from the PM and his buddies, but alas as usual they strategically failed yet again, to capitalize by announcing their upcoming equality of gender for labour party candidates debate at this very moment. I can only think that there must be a GCSB spy in their ranks, who has the power to release emails when ever possible and at key moments. Maybe that was why John Key gave the job to his old school chum.
David Shearer in his usual stuttering style was forced to say that he was opposed to gender equal opportunity amongst labour party candidates. And the main-stream media and all the right wing bloggers had a field day. This was a great opportunity to play down the PM’s name calling spat with Kim Dotcom or the boot licking of Sky City and its overseas owners.

Then lastly we had the news that the Christchurch Mayor Bob Parker was standing down and not contesting the local body election later in the year. He quickly claimed it was because he was worn out, overworked and had political enemies spreading lies and other forms of untruths and that the mayoral campaign would be very dirty. In the end though, he finally conceded that it was the failure of his oversight of the council that led him to resign. TV3’s John Campbell rushed to his aid and by implication suggested that the mayor was a heroic figure worthy of great respect, even a knighthood. And in many respects that may be true, but let us not forget that if it wasn’t for the first earthquake three and a half years ago he most likely wouldn’t have won that election.

All in all it was an interesting week, because in the end it simply proved that fact is stranger than fiction. But it also proves ‘The triumph of fiction over reality’, is very much a political tool.