Do I spot a contradiction here?
“Blue Elephant: The…

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11193679

Just a few things off the top of my head, particular to America:

-Women got the vote
-Blacks got the vote
-Homosexuality is allowed
-Education is near universal
-There is a welfare state

These are pretty big things to the people who got…

Plus the whole 2 wrongs don't make a right and why should the ugly gutter politics manipulation have to win .MMP doesn't…

Also, would it have caused an anti-Lab/Greens backlash that loses them a seat on the party vote? Because if so it's not a win.

(And of course there's the ongoing damage to the…

Don't count on that. Craig would rather campaign to limit a Labour/Green government to a single term than campaign for another term of a National/Winston government. I don't think he's too…

This Election will, of course, be very tight indeed and there are a number of scenarios (like the one above) where Right Bloc support slightly eclipses the…

The Political Compass answers many of those questions:

__On the standard left-right scale, how do you distinguish leftists like Stalin and Gandhi? It's not sufficient to say that…

Only if he'd been invited by Stalin.

Now, had Michael Joseph Savage managed to squeeze in a game of golf on said holiday, would that be a holiday? ;)

Not what I said- I said their political instincts were far-right. Really would expect better of Public Address. ( edit- actually I said they were far right, but having to temper their ambitions to what they thought would retain them power.)

In their own terms- they are…

When did going after the Maori Party stop being a fashionable blood sport in the Labour Party, and has anyone c.c.’d Shane Jones in on that memo?…

Dr Sharples said some of the process of building closer links with Labour had begun, and he believed it was time to consider Labour as an alternative.

Nw Zealand First leader Winston Peters has described Maori Party policies as akin to apartheid.

Mr Peters, speaking at celebrations at Ratana Pa, said his party would never support separatist Maori Party policies such as having separate Maori units in prison and the separate Maori…

That's very kind, and flattering, but I assure you I can be spectacularly unfriendly and unreasonable with no prompting whatsoever. :)

And also, that we need all to think about the way we think, as shown in this old, yet very fantastic RSA animate... and anything from the RSA about EMPATHY.

I've not dived too deeply into their methodology, but the chart at the bottom of the analysis page shows that relative to other parties globally, they're fairly central. However, relative to the central vertical axis, they're pretty far rightwards. Compared to where…

My impression is there is a huge gap between what The National Party sees as the way to make NZ better and what this caucus is happy to do. It is one of the issues with…

I dunno, Craig. All I know of you is what you post here, and for the whole time John Key has been PM, I've spent all of 10 days in NZ, but I certainly get the impression you're a much friendlier, more reasonable kind of…

Yep, and that worries me because we're hoping to get back to NZ in time for such a government. But the opinion polls I've been reading about have me hoping there's a chance…

Um, yes, as am I? But if that consititues "far-right" in any sense other than the kind of hyperbole where, according to DPF's resident trolls, the New Zealand Labour Party is downright Stalinist (even…

OK, martin, I guess it all depends on where your political center of gravity is but if you think this government is "far-right" I'd sincerely recommend you get out of the house more and check your premises.

And Dubbyah, of all people, signed off on an efficiency standard for light-bulbs in the US market.

And I disagree with your disagreement. Seriously The National party are not really very right wing in world terms. Somewhat right leaning for NZ but in Texas they would be considered raving communist/socialist/looney left wing nutjobs.

But what this particular group in power do…

.

The correct incantation is: 'on my command, unleash hell', not 'flame war: commence.'

Yes. Respec.

So far. It would seem fairly clear that the government is keen to dismantle as much of that as they can get away with. NZ isn't crazy right wing, but the political centre has definitely been…

They have been tacking to the right in lots of little small chunks, removing rights here and…

I have to disagree with a few commenters who think National have "drifted" to the right. Key is fairly centrist. English is small c Conservative. We still have a welfare state. We still…

They are business people. All of Epsom and no other electorate in the country!They are hallowed. They have amazing decision making abilities. They could even vote for Winston if necessary! These are not your weak-willed, morally hog-tied professionals, your doctors, lawyers, nurses, teachers, policemen, firemen and other lily livered…

FTFY.
The practice of churnalism, aka press-release-as-reportage, is not something confined to uncritical repetition of National's releases. It just so happens, though, that National are the ones implementing policy so it's their releases that are…

It’d be interesting to ask those people a follow up question along the lines of what makes the Greens far left.

Another anecdote- I had a conversation with a young voter…

That's such BS, though. Labour slid towards the right in the…

I know a few people in Epsom who feel kinda dirty now. Not so sure they would sully themselves again.

And I already know of three areas a Cunliffe-led Govt can start cutting back:
– replacing the Puhoi-Wellsford Holiday Highway with Operation Lifesaver, which achieves the same purpose at a fraction…

And, with apologies to a French electoral predicament from a few years back, how many Epsomites would think it "better to vote for a crook than a socialist"?

When Winnie retires, there’s the possibility of Richard Prosser taking…

True dat, how many are from Epsom is the question.

For a moment there, he was the only person capable of stopping asset sales. So much for that. But what manner of hell does "the merry…

They absolutely have "learned", they just don't care. Winston in government, even in coalition, is a moderately competent, quiet minister with few overt demands on…

That only matters if they're in Epsom.

Will be an interesting aspect of the election, I'm not so sure, I'm aware of a lot of Auckland based conservative voters who hate the…

It wouldn't require much squinting. To paraphrase Winston Churchill, if Winston Peters stood to become the MP for Hell I would at least make a complimentary reference to Satan here. Anyone who would put that man's feet back under the Cabinet…

It may not be a popular view here, but a lot of people in NZ share this perception, and to a huge number of the business…

Dude, it is election year.

Imagine all our politicians as being in a political St. Patricks day parade, with a particularly drunk crowd of Orangemen and Irish Catholics watching from either side of the street.

And I doubt my dear friend Tom is the only Labour type who’d flip that and make me equally want to take a long holiday in the Slough of…

Labour has finally dumped two flagship tax policies of former leader Phil Goff that would have taken GST off fresh fruit and vegetables and set a tax-free band on income below $5000.

Leader David Cunliffe said the changes, signalled as likely by David Shearer when he was…

Oh god.

Flame war: commence.