With friends like this...

It's been traditionally quiet politically over the past month or so - but it is the end of the year and the annual commentators report cards are starting to come in. One of the earlies is Chris Trotski in The Independent - ye gods!

Disillusioned? Yup. Disenchanted? Understatement. Scathing? Hell yes!

He has basically devoted 800 words or so to slamming Labour for everything I have tried to convince Mum of for years! Put them in power for long enough and eventually their true colours form a rainbow (of the storm cloud variety). Basically I think the average Labour politician is well intentioned enough, typically from a young age. Blindly idealistic and driven to enforce their ideology on all and sundry. To do this they 'get involved' - become unionists, activists, lecturers, teachers and eventually politicians. Ultimately they become political dogs with a dogma.

That last rant is intended to intimate, oh so deftly, that I think that this group of 'power at all costs career politicians' have completely lost touch. And when one of the extreme left commentators is saying this about you - it may be time for a little critical introspection! From Trotter's column:

Labour politicians seemed incapable of displaying any form of empathy, or even sympathy, with the plight of grieving or angry citizens.
In fact, the Labour-led government gave every impression of being unfamiliar with the notion of personal accountability and seemed strangely reluctant to acknowledge the state agencies for which its ministers were responsible could even make mistakes.

Ouch! A special serve the President of Helengrad:

The Prime Minister, in particular, seemed to have broken her connection with the electorate.
The woman who appeared to have a secret hot-line to the hearts and minds of the New Zealand people and who, throughout Labour's first term, knew instinctively what was "on" and "not on" was now radically out of step with voter sentiment.

Ka-bloody-pow! And then a nice synopsis of the election campaign that emphasises the political cynicism that seems to evade that collective conciousness (or caring) of most New Zealanders:

The reaction of Labour's strategists was a peculiar combination of ideological bravado and the most cautious political pragmatism.
Boldly staring down the vociferous protests of the Christian Right, Labour's identity politicians rolled up the numbers to pass the socially divisive Civil Union Bill.
On matters pertaining to race, however, Labour was anything but bold. One by one, it picked up National's policies and made them their own. "Bishop" Brian Tamaki and his black T-shirted followers were fair game for Labour's trophy hunters - but not Maori-bashers.
This moral abdication left the field clear for the Maori Party, its legions of willing workers more than compensating for a chronic lack of funds.

It keeps going! Repeat - Chris Trotter is a far left commentator - nuf said.