Trump rants for an hour on TV after ‘total acquittal’
Politics is an expensive business. If nothing else, the recent debate and delving into the murky world of political donations has certainly shown us this.
Every year money flows into our political parties from people or corporations, political campaigns are planned and launched, and votes are won from the masses. Leaders are elected and for most of us the country continues to trundle along more or less, as it always has. It seems we’ve never really asked too many questions of this process. That is, until now.
NZ First, the National Party and now even our own Mayor, Paula Southgate, are facing questions about political donations. The problem is presented as being one of anonymous donors. People who have gifted significant sums but played within the current rules, meaning they can remain anonymous.
Under our Electoral Act that rule applies to donations under $15,001 for political parties, and $1500 for local government candidates.
But let’s be frank. As we debate and delve deeper into the issue, are we really suggesting that, provided political donors are identified, we’re happy for this process to continue? That provided we know the names of the businesses or individuals making donations, they can continue to pump large amounts of money towards our political leaders with no questions asked?
These are not paltry sums.
A quick scan of Electoral Commission party donations and loans returns shows in 2018 Labour filed more than $104,000 of political donations under the $15,001 threshold. They received $173,343.06 all up. And when Labour came to power in 2017, the cash was flooding in. In the first 24 hours, they claimed $270,000 had been donated, and that figure reportedly hit $500,000 the following week.
In 2018, the Greens amassed $603,730.70, their own party members donating significant sums to the cause. Of that, $555,304.60 was from identified donations over the threshold. The only party that received more than them was National with $741,915.15, although just $95,409 of that was said to be from donations over the $15,001 threshold. And as we all now know, NZ First received $546,253.77 in 2017 and $87,689.60 in donations in 2018, but donors were not identified.
Delving deeper has led to some of the names. Horse racing figures, food magnates, and property juggernauts. Noone is suggesting any wrongdoing on their part, but Waikato Stud owner Gary Chittick, who donated $5000, probably summed it up best when he spoke to Stuff last year.
He said NZ First’s leader Winston
Peters was an advocate for racing, and he felt the donation would support his industry. Although he had no idea it was going to the NZ First Foundation which sits outside the NZ First party but appeared to be paying the party’s bills. He also seemed a bit miffed that NZ First hadn’t gone with National post-election as they had the 46 per cent margin. I have a feeling he wasn’t the only one.
But that’s the crux of it. Foundation or not. A donation is something you give and expect nothing in return for, but when business and politics mix we all know the interest and stakes are far too high for that to be so. We say transparency in politics is vital for democracy but under the current electoral rules the New Zealand public might as well be blind.
Of course, we’d also be a bit naive to think we could separate politics and business. Our economy and our livelihoods rely on Government passing legislation that will support and enable businesses to thrive. But the political donation side of our electoral rules is only one side of the story in what seems to be an industry with very blurred lines.
There is some distinction. There will of course be those who make political donations and genuinely never seek to influence Government. But there are also certainly others who are constantly in the business of influencing our political leaders. And while academics and others call for changes to our electoral rules in the wake of the donation debate, at least we have a shred of transparency around that process.
What I find more interesting is we have no transparency at all governing political lobbying in NZ, or Government relations as it’s called. We make much of political donations and big business backing political parties, yet we have absolutely no regulations or transparency around how political ears are being bent through the practice of lobbying in Wellington.
Remember the story about Gordon Jon Thompson, the lobbyist who left his lobbying firm to be Jacinda Ardern’s chief of staff while she set up her Government and then went right back to lobbying. Or the recent case of Barry Ebert who was said to be taking on contracts for non-government clients through his lobbying firm while employed as Phil Twyford’s special adviser.Of course, no rules were broken and absolutely no wrongdoing is suggested there either, but it’s intriguing NZ has no rules at all offering transparency around the lobbying process. We don’t know who, how much or how often it’s happening, or often even what issues are being lobbied on. It’s fair to assume though, those with the deepest pockets would have the most to invest in the exercise.
I’m not suggesting lobbying is inherently a bad thing. We need Government to formulate policy to help our country prosper and business is often far better placed to advise on policy development or legislation than MPs themselves. But when we talk about the expensive business of politics and political donations should we not also be looking at what businesses and individuals are also running lobbying campaigns and how much they’re spending on them and what exactly is being done to influence our political leaders in what can be a much more subtle way?
Politics certainly is an expensive business and rules are fine, provided we all play by them.
In this age of sensitivity, with its unbridled appetite for the deconstruction of language and righting of past wrongs, the spotlight has fallen upon our national anthem.
For reasons beyond the brief or indeed the knowledge base of this correspondent, a Hobsonville women’s opinion of God Defend New Zealand has been much in the news of late.
Fiona Downes felt so strongly about the ‘‘arcane’’ nature of its verse that a letter was penned to Jacinda Ardern.
Those believed to be particularly disadvantaged by the song are ‘‘migrants with limited English’’ and ‘‘most New Zealanders under the age of 30’’.
Given the passages that Downes cites include such phrases as ‘‘triple star’’, ‘‘shafts of war’’ and ‘‘entreat’’, one wonders at her capacity to underestimate human intelligence.
It can be safely assumed that both youngsters and folk not born on these shores can count beyond two and grasp how many principal islands make up the country.
Our newest citizens are in many instances too well acquainted with war.
If they struggle with the concept of metaphor, or have no previous acquaintance with words such as ‘‘entreat’’, might not basic education be in order?
Rather than dumb down our language to accommodate ignorance, let’s upskill those who don’t understand. Or don’t they teach Shakespeare anymore in our high schools? Would Ms Downes presume to re-write the Bard, too? But let’s not get carried away.
Thomas Bracken was no Shakespeare.
God Defend New Zealand is a dirge, if no better or worse than most other dirges that serve as national anthems.
Only the French have a truly great song at their disposal. To listen to La Marseillaise is to forgive the French everything.
No matter the capitulation of 1940, untold colonial atrocities, nuclear testing in the Pacific or the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior.
La Marseillaise washes away sins: to be in its grip is to truly believe in the ideals of the revolution, that Napoleon could conquer the world and that JeanLuc Godard is a half decent filmmaker. But I digress.
If we want to critique Bracken’s work we need look no further than its title and opening line. Exactly who – or what – is the ‘‘God of Nations’’?
An allusion to world government, perhaps? If a deity, then whose deity, exactly?
A Christian god, a Muslim god, a Jewish god? An amalgam of Hindu or Maori gods?
Don’t tell me they are all one and the same.
If so, why has religion underpinned all the wars and conflict that have plagued the planet since our species first burdened itself with metaphysical thought?
We really only need one anthem for the planet and that’s John Lennon’s Imagine, with it’s clear headed second verse: ‘‘Imagine there’s no countries/It isn’t hard to do/Nothing to kill or die for/ And no religion, too’’. According to the 2018 census, 48 per cent of New Zealanders have no religious affiliation whatsoever. That’s 2,083,107 of us that can have no intellectual investment or connection with Bracken’s pieties.
If we tolerate the anthem at all, it’s in same way we do Christmas. It’s a cultural thing, a practice we’ve grown up with. We might be sentimentally attached to the words, as a non-believer renders a Yuletide hymn, but their literal meaning is irrelevant. In certain circumstances God Defend New Zealand can still work its magic.
On the fourth afternoon of the Boxing Day Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground last year, with their team heading for certain and humiliating defeat, an enclave of New Zealanders gathered, at least one hundred strong.
Surrounded on all sides by the facistically inclined Victoria police force, they responded with both humour and grace, taunting the utterly dominant hosts with chants about captaincy and sandpaper.
On three separate occasions, they also sang the New Zealand national anthem, albeit sans the Maori opening, belting it out with defiance.
Even if a portion of the choir were three sheets to the wind, even if the intent was partially ironic, even if there is no God, of nations or anywhere else, I have never felt prouder of my country. Of course there is room for improvement.
In same sense that Waltzing Matilda would better serve our neighbours than Advance Australia Fair and the English could well embrace either Land of Hope and Glory or Jerusalem over the default setting of God Save the Queen.
I would suggest we adopt the Fred Dagg classic We Don’t Know How Lucky We Are.
Better wit and humility than blind faith and patriotism.
Donald Trump delivered a defiant and free-wheeling response to his impeachment acquittal, showing no contrition while blaming ‘‘vicious’’ political opponents for the ordeal and declaring: ‘‘We went through hell.’’
In a remarkable White House address, the US president veered from claiming victory to settling scores as he spoke for more than an hour before an audience of supportive politicians and the media.
‘‘This is not a news conference, this is not a speech . . . this is a celebration,’’ Trump said, talking without notes in a broadcast carried live across cable news channels.
Trump said he had been treated ‘‘unbelievably unfairly’’, blamed ‘‘crooked politics’’, called Democrats who led the impeachment push ‘‘horrible’’ and lavished praise on loyal congressmen. ‘‘It was evil, it was corrupt, it was dirty cops, it was leakers and liars. This should never ever
‘‘It was evil, it was corrupt, it was dirty cops, it was leakers and liars. This should never ever happen to another president ever.’’
President Donald Trump
happen to another president ever.’’
At one point, the president held aloft The Washington Post ,a newspaper he has frequently attacked, whose front page headline read ‘‘Trump acquitted’’.
There was no mea culpa moment, a stark contrast to Bill Clinton, the last US president impeached, who gave a press conference apologising to the nation and Congress over his behaviour.
Trump offered only one apology. ‘‘I want to apologise to my family for having them have to go through a phony, rotten deal by some very evil and sick people,’’ he said.
On Wednesday, local time, the Senate voted ‘‘not guilty’’ to both articles of impeachment passed by the House of Representatives – abuse of power and obstruction of justice – which means Trump remains in office and is free to seek re-election in November.
Some Republican senators who voted for acquittal but admonished Trump’s attempt to get Ukraine to investigate Democrat Joe Biden expressed hope the impeachment would chasten the president.
That was not on display yesterday morning when Trump fired a shot at Mitt Romney, the only Republican senator to vote for his removal, and Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic House speaker.
Trump went further in the White House, repeatedly saying he had done ‘‘nothing wrong’’. At one point he said: ‘‘They [the Democrats] took nothing and brought me to a final vote of impeachment. That’s a very ugly word to me; that’s a dark word.’’
But, he added, it had been followed by ‘‘that gorgeous word, I never thought a word could sound so good. It’s called total acquittal.’’ – Telegraph Group