The Letter 1 September 2014 1 Sep 2014
ACT New ZealandThe Letter 1 September 2014
1 September, 2014
28 thousand reasons to tactically vote ACT
Last night’s TVNZ Colmar Brunton poll puts
the left and right 60 MPs each. United and the Maori Party
say they will go with the side that gets to 61 MPs. ACT
just needs just 1.3% or 28 thousand Party votes to get in
Jamie Whyte. National needs 62 thousand votes to get
another list MP. (It is a mad system because electorate
seats are deducted from number of list seats won). The
German is stealing the election. More Left voters are party
voting Internet/Mana. Right/center voters are blowing the
election by wasting their vote with the Conservatives.
Colin Craig says if he does get 5% he may support David
Cunliffe to be PM. (TV3).
This is the deciding
week
In MMP it is the minor parties who decide
the election outcome. This week the Minor Party Leaders
have three TV debates. TV3’s debate is on Wednesday, TVNZ
on Friday and tomorrow on Chinese station TV33 there is a
debate that may decide the election. There are over 120,000
Chinese voters. This Sunday 11 am Ellerslie Event Centre,
Ascot Ave, ACT has its campaign opening. The commentators
said Jamie Whyte won the first TV3 debate so this could be
ACT’s week.
The con in conservative is for
con.
Colin Craig’s campaign is dishonest. He
has stolen other parties’ policies but done no costing.
He is promising everything to everyone. He says he is in
favour of flat tax, smaller government and tough on crime.
His flat tax would have to be at 34 percent, a massive tax
increase for middle earners. He has not seen a spending
proposal he is not for. He has no new anti-crime ideas like
ACT’s 3 strikes for burglary. His list will elect no 5
Edward Saafi who claims young Tongans are committing suicide
because they are not being smacked. (Sunday Star Times).
ACT has fact checked the Conservatives glossy household
pamphlet and it is full of contractions see http://www.act.org.nz/conservatives-fact-check
Judith
Collins problem
The Letter thinks it is highly
unlikely Judith Collins was conspiring against her chief
executive. The last time a minister leaked against a Chief
executive was when John Key leaked to journalists to force
Peter Dunne to resign. But we agree with John Key that
Collins had to go. She has an incurable problem. Judith
Collins lacks a quality you need to be Minster of Justice
and that is judgment.
The media are stealing our
election
Green co leader Metiria Turei is being
uncritically reported calling for Judith Collins office to
be “locked down” to prevent destruction of evidence. A
scurrilous allegation, now typical of the Greens. The
destruction of any ministerial files is an offence under the
Archives Act. The media ought to know the claim is absurd.
All ministerial computers are automatically backed up to a
separate server under the control of government computer
services. It is impossible for a minister’s office to
destroy records.
Secret Commissions are
wrong
No one objects to bloggers having political
bias but if you are taking money to say things then you have
a duty to your readers to tell them. But bloggers lack of
ethics is not a government problem.
Bloggers are
still the future
We commend David Farrar’s
decision to sign up to the media code of ethics. The
mainstream media are so hostile to the bloggers because the
bloggers are winning. Discrediting one blogger will not
stop the trend. The media would be better off to ask why are
people going to blogs? Is it because the media’s coverage
of the election is so bad? You cannot find out the parties
policies from TV or the print media. You must go to the
blogs. If you want to know how much the parties are
promising you have to go to the Taxpayer’s Union blog. If
you want to know how MMP works in Epsom you need to go to
Kiwiblog. And people go to Whale Oil because he breaks more
stories.
Sunday Star Times $12 billion
mistake
An example of why newspaper sales are
falling. Adam Dudding said in yesterday’s Sunday Star
Times that ‘ACT’s policies would theoretically return
$12 billion to the government coffers – but don’t forget
that this would be done by slashing government services’.
He just made this up. ACT’s alternative budget, published
in May, proposes $4 billion of tax cuts. These are funded by
cuts in corporate welfare ($1.4 billion), cuts in
middle-class welfare ($1.65 billion), abolition of the
carbon trading system carbon trading system ($217 million)
and cuts in government waste ($763 million). No government
services are cut in ACT’s Alternative Budget. Dudding
just made up the slashing of government services and the $12
billion. No wonder people are turning to
blogs.
Correction
Last week we accused
the Electoral Commission for being responsible for the Party
Opening Broadcast being shown at the same time as the rugby
test. State Television made the decision. Why have a
government owned broadcaster when they put advertising
revenue ahead of covering the election? The Letter did hear
a good idea on Media Matters. The taxpayer owns another TV
channel that at present is broadcasting “Parliament TV.
The next sitting of the House of Representatives will be
after the General Election on a date to be notified”.
Taxpayers paid for the party broadcasts which almost no one
has seen. Why not show then on Parliamentary TV?
Parliament is now a TV studio with fixed cameras. Why not
hold Election Debates in the Chamber?
Who
won the leaders debate?
Every election the media says the Leader of the Opposition won the Leaders debate. The media used to say little Bill Rowling beat Muldoon. It is because the expectation is the PM will win and the media are so surprised the Leader of the Opposition is not knocked out. You cannot win a debate unless one party makes a mistake. We think Cunliffe made the mistake when John Key showed over Lochinver station that Labour’s policy is the same as National’s.
ends
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