Why Winston Peters deserves respect
RICHARD GRIFFIN
To venture down the rabbit hole into the realm of some political bloggers risks exposure to mind-bending inanities that should be prefaced with a public health warning. From any rational perspective, reports on proceedings at this week’s hearing in the High Court at Auckland should reflect the ‘‘fair and accurate’’ criteria required by law.
However, it seems that if Winston Peters is centre stage, a range of the demented and the illinformed believe they are entitled to distort and mock the proceedings, the evidence and the High Court judge involved with impunity.
And there is every reason to believe they probably can.
In their murky world, comment and conclusions need little rationale and even less responsibility. They answer to noone.
It is extraordinary that some of these commentators are prepared to lambast the litigant, mock the judge and analyse the case before the court. Then the garbage strangely materialises on mainstream outlets as what – examples of irrational irresponsibility?
It is disturbing enough that the deliberate leaking of the information around Peters’ pension overpayments was obviously an exercise in political chicanery just prior to an election. The fact that two former ministers of the Crown clearly played a part in the debacle is even more so.
It now seems fatuous for those involved to claim they regret the whole affair.
What is even more baffling is why public servants thought they should take the issue to the Beehive at all. The so-called ‘‘need to know’’ rationale, and the timing – one month out from an election – should have rung ear-piercing alarm bells right across the political and public service divide.
The court will no doubt come to conclusions, and life in the political fast lane will proceed accordingly. The outcome of the case will be decided on the basis of the law, and not the ranting of half-baked bloggers. But what is concerning is the suggestion that the legal action is some sort of taxpayer-funded vendetta.
That is neither the politician nor the man. Revenge, served cold or otherwise, is not Peters’ modus operandi.
Any number of present and past politicians who have been rolled by the leader of NZ First might claim he has been lucky, manipulative, cavalier, and just too well dressed for them to deal with. None would claim he is arbitrarily vindictive.
Peters is the longest-serving and most successful politician in the New Zealand House of Representatives. His manoeuvring in turbulence is the most complex and colourful in our political history. That doesn’t happen by accident.
And does anyone seriously believe that the politician who has spent more time at the centre of New Zealand governance than the speaker’s chair would knowingly put that history in jeopardy for a payment of less than $200 a month? But that is not the point. Over the decades, Peters has been the target of a range of plots and devious campaigns aimed at either crippling or destroying him. The fact that Frank Sinatra’s My Way has always been high on his late-night playlist probably contributes to the blind fury his political career has garnered in the psyche of some of his critics.
Any number of absurdly destructive plans to ‘‘have him taken out’’ – to quote a nowdeceased but at the time vindictive but wealthy antagonist – have been hatched by peripheral players outside the catchment of legitimate politics.
The range of vicious rumours that has been fed to an indiscriminate market by a generation and more of angry and frustrated individuals bent on trashing the Peters caravan is extraordinary.
It is not difficult to understand why the beaming smile and the throwaway lines rarely surface in public these days. There are only so many times you can shrug and walk away; only so many times you can be attacked by players who have never dived into a rolling maul; and only so many times you need to be patronised by punters who can barely spell politics.
In truth, Winston Peters is the antithesis of the vindictive amateurs who have resorted to lies and innuendo in an attempt to take him out of the game.
His so-called ‘‘obsessive secrecy’’ is just another self-defence mechanism in a contest that is regularly stacked against him. His determination to ensure privacy for those closest to him is a reflection of values that go back 40 years, and his occasional resort to litigation is an effort to focus on legal realities rather than political hype.
In essence, his platform is conservative, and his social mores, conceived in his Northland environment and largely shared by his successful extended family, reflect just that.
Thus his aversion to policies he considers unnecessarily liberal or politically fanciful. That may infuriate some in the ranks, but a pragmatic Jacinda Ardern appears relaxed about the reality of compromise in a trilateral government.
The spineless dwellers in the murky waters of the unnamed may have a problem with the legal process – but for those plagued by hostile adversaries, it is at least a sanctuary for sane debate.
That is not always an option in the political environment, and now even less so in a world where creatures from the black lagoon are regarded as legitimate contributors to political discussion.
Winston Peters is the antithesis of the vindictive amateurs who have resorted to lies and innuendo in an attempt to take him out of the game.