Gordon Campbell - Latest News [Page 2]
On Adrian Orr’s Lending Scheme, The Collins Reshuffle And The Trump Coup
Friday, 13 November 2020, 9:40 am | Gordon Campbell
Does anyone under 50 know why “Muldoonist” is a bad word? David Seymour was one year old when Robert Muldoon lost the 1984 snap election. With that in mind, Seymour’s calling out of Reserve Bank governor Adrian Orr’s recent stimulatory ... More >>
On National’s Reshuffle, Pfizer’s Vaccine & Trump’s Non-exit Strategy
Wednesday, 11 November 2020, 10:06 am | Gordon Campbell
Good to hear there is at least one Covid vaccine in the pipeline, and that Pfizer is claiming a 90% level of efficacy for it. In National Party circles, there is an even higher level of certainty that Judith Collins will not be leading National into More >>
22 Short Takes On The US Election
Monday, 9 November 2020, 10:54 am | Gordon Campbell
Finally, the long night of Donald Trump’s presidency is over. To date, the courts have been given no cause to conclude that the exhaustively lengthy counts of those mountains of mail ballots was anything other than legal. Stacking the US Supreme ... More >>
On The Results(so Far) From The US Election
Thursday, 5 November 2020, 9:12 am | Gordon Campbell
Let’s be clear about what US President Donald Trump is doing. Last night’s declaration of victory before all the valid votes had been counted is an ongoing attempt at a presidential coup d’etat. It is a coup that he expects to be rubberstamped by a ... More >>
On The When And Where Of Election Results, Vote Suppression, Reasons To Panic Etc
Tuesday, 3 November 2020, 11:53 am | Gordon Campbell
In the final hours before polls close at 1pm tomorrow (NZ time) in the US election, at least four major question marks remain: Namely, the outcomes in Florida and Pennsylvania, and how a conservative federal court judge will rule later today on a Republican ... More >>
On What Lessons The Greens Should Take From The Demise Of Winston Peters
Friday, 30 October 2020, 9:32 am | Gordon Campbell
Wondering about “if only" is one of those political games we all indulge in from time to time. For example: episode one of the latest season of The Good Fight TV series dropped us into a world where Hillary Clinton is the US President and Elizabeth ... More >>
On How The US Supreme Court Is Undermining American Democracy
Wednesday, 28 October 2020, 9:20 am | Gordon Campbell
If Joe Biden is elected President next week, here comes the bad news. If Biden tries to defend Obamacare, combat climate change (via say, a variant of the Green New Deal) or tries to improve the access of US women to abortion services , he will run afoul ... More >>
On Why Herd Immunity Isn’t A Valid Option, And What’s With Our Reluctance To Wear Masks ?
Friday, 23 October 2020, 10:58 am | Gordon Campbell
Herd immunity has recently bounced back into the headlines as a tool for managing Covid-19, and as a supposed alternative to lockdowns. In the US, a group of scientists was recently brought together in the town of Great Barrington, Massachusetts by a ... More >>
On National Being Shafted By Its Own Creation
Wednesday, 21 October 2020, 11:10 am | Gordon Campbell
As it licks its wounds, let’s hope the National Party can still find time to look back with some pride at what it has achieved in Epsom. The Act Party’s nationwide success on Saturday night has been a tribute to National’s foresight, and to its ... More >>
On Why The Greens Shouldn’t Join The Government
Monday, 19 October 2020, 9:49 am | Gordon Campbell
We know she’s a miracle worker, but can Jacinda Ardern really find a cure for capitalism? Tough job. Especially when Ardern is being expected to fix the effects of capitalism – child poverty, unaffordable housing, social inequality – without ... More >>
On Some Electorates To Watch On Saturday Night
Friday, 16 October 2020, 11:54 am | Gordon Campbell
On the eve of Election Day, Judith Collins can claim that she has done exactly what she was chosen to do: namely, she looks like she’ll save some of National’s caucus furniture. The party may currently be polling in the low 30s, but under Simon Bridges ... More >>
On National Going Rogue, And US Militia Madness
Wednesday, 14 October 2020, 10:26 am | Gordon Campbell
In the wake of Judith Collins descent into negative politicking, the real question has to be – did she slip, or did she jump? Was it tiredness, or desperation, or both? As Werewolf has been arguing from the outset, Collins’ campaign has been ... More >>
On Flirting With Act, And On The Euthanasia/cannabis Measures
Tuesday, 13 October 2020, 11:05 am | Gordon Campbell
Less than convincingly, Judith Collins says that if elected to govern, she would not be enacting any of the austerity measures and welfare cuts advocated by her Act Party partner. Yeah, sure. Because the National Party that hand-wrapped and gifted ... More >>
On Why Sport Just Doesn’t Seem To Be So Important During A Pandemic
Friday, 9 October 2020, 10:56 am | Gordon Campbell
During a pandemic, what role does sport play? That question suddently looks more complicated than it had first seemed. Back during the first lockdown an audience starved for sport had seemed willing to watch any game anywhere featuring a ball ... More >>
On Last Night’s Debate, And Beyond
Wednesday, 7 October 2020, 10:47 am | Gordon Campbell
It really hasn’t been a good week for Judith Collins to be wheeling out her Little Me impression of Donald Trump, yet the similarities have been striking. There’s been (a) the need to project an image of strength above all else (b) the interruption ... More >>
On Four-year Terms Of Parliament, And On How The US Courts Are Dismantling Democracy
Monday, 5 October 2020, 12:58 pm | Gordon Campbell
Last week, the issue of four-year parliamentary terms surfaced again. Infuriatingly, it is being discussed purely in terms of its convenience for political parties. They’d get so much more time to enact their policies, free of scrutiny or sanction by voters ... More >>
On Debates As Game-shows, And Why Mixing Politics And Religion Is A Bad Idea
Friday, 2 October 2020, 11:58 am | Gordon Campbell
Political debates have dominated the week’s campaign cycle, here and elsewhere. Routinely, leaders’ debates ( and polls) are the roadside diners and comfort stops on the otherwise featureless landscape of an election campaign. They’re useful ... More >>
On The SFO’s Investigation Of New Zealand First
Wednesday, 30 September 2020, 10:55 am | Gordon Campbell
On one level. New Zealand First has been the agent of its own misfortune. The New Zealand First Foundation handling the donations at the centre of the Serious Fraud Office investigation was reportedly (a) authorised by the NZF party’s board More >>
On Whether This Election Is Already A Foregone Conclusion
Monday, 28 September 2020, 11:21 am | Gordon Campbell
Currently, this election looks like being a no contest. The weekend’s Newshub poll has the centre left enjoying a roughly 57-36% lead over the centre right. Labour is on 50.1% and the Greens 6.5%, while National remains in the dreaded 20s at 29.6% More >>
On National’s Rampant Pandering To The Farming Vote
Friday, 25 September 2020, 11:26 am | Gordon Campbell
What on earth has happened to the political parties n the centre-right? Once upon a time in the US, the party of Lincoln was a respectable political party before it devolved into the cult of Trump. Here at home, the National Parry used to be able ... More >>
