Bye-bye Jacinda

[tubeswell]

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politi ... february-7

I predict a cycle of Labour Party infighting leading to a change in NZ Government in October 2023

[Lianachan]

Over here she is portrayed, and I think generally perceived, as a capable, progressive and popular leader. Is it the same for those of you with direct experience of her?

[Мастер]

Over here she is portrayed, and I think generally perceived, as a capable, progressive and popular leader. Is it the same for those of you with direct experience of her?

News coverage of her that I have seen falls into two categories - (1) fawning sycophancy, she's a young woman who supports progressive causes so if she says two plus two is five, then that's proof positive that two plus two really does equal five, and (2) she's a radical left-wing communist and part of the conspiracy to impose socialism, atheism, mandatory homosexuality, and the metric system on the world.

I'm assuming neither of those viewpoints are entirely accurate. Of course, we've had a few political leaders in various countries in the last few years who have rather lowered the bar. "Don't do anything stupid" all by itself seems to put one pretty high up in the rankings.

[Arneb]

I tend to think that the end of tenure is the ultimate test of a top politician's mettle: Do you leave proudly, on your own terms, while people are still sad to see you go. Or do you cling to power and try to do it one more penultimate time because what with all the idiots around you, there is really only one who is up to the task, yaddah, yaddah. Jacinda Ardern, in my book, has passed the test.

From what I read, it seemed plausible she would not be re-elected next spring. Housing, problems with poverty, these things. She presided over Covid, imposing a very peculiar, very harsh, yet ultimately, it seems, quite successful regime. She comforted the nation after the worst terror attack in its history - maybe she isn't just making it up, maybe sehe really does have enough. Maybe her fiancé saying, on behalf of himself and the daughter, "them or us", helped her along.

[wring]

I, too, was curious about tubeswells take on it. I assume all of you would have known that Enzo and I would have been leaping (well, as well as we could) for joy had Trump resigned.

[g-one]

Leaving on her own terms and young enough to raise her family and later still have a 'second coming' if she wants.

[tubeswell]

She has been the most popular leader in NZ for most of the time she has been PM, and certainly ranks among the highest profile PMs NZ has ever had. She was the reason the Labour Govt got elected with an overall majority in the last (2020) election. Considering NZ adopted a proportional voting system (MMP) in 1996 and all NZ Governments since that time have been formed from various combinations of multi-party coalition (to form a majority voting block in Parliament), the fact that the 2020 Labour Government was the first Government since 1996 to be able to Govern alone without needing coalition partners was quite remarkable, and tells you how much sway Jacinda-mania had on voters. (Note - she was the leader of a multi-party coalition Government from 2017 to 2020, but the current triennial term of Government starting from 2020 has seen Labour able to govern alone).

She has been far more charismatic than any other leaders NZ (or the Labour Party) have had to offer in recent years, and her popularity is basically the reason Labour are in still power. She's been the face of Government for the last 5 years with prominent matter that have impacted dramatically on everyone's lives (Covid'n'all), and their big opportunity to push things through has been this (2020-2023) term while they have an absolute majority. However, they haven't really capitalised on that opportunity for various reasons, but largely due to a lack of capability in the rest of the Government caucus to be bold and actually 'do stuff'.

And of course, as has happened to many political leaders sooner or later, when the tide of popularity swings away from them, it tends to be a more intense swing if the leader was once really popular. Jacinda made quite a few promises to achieve changes in the quality of life of it's traditional left wing voting constituency (e.g. in reducing child poverty and improving affordable housing supply), and these haven't materialised. The fact that the Labour Government have had to manipulate child poverty and housing supply statistical indicators to make it look like they met their goals, has make a lot of people cynical about the virtuousness of the Party Leader.

Her ability to think on her feet and be articulate with in responding to media reporters etc contributes to her being the darling of the media. But simmering undercurrents of discontent in the last year or so have grown. Various intentions the Government has made (that she was the spokesperson for) have not materialised or have become stalled, and the Govt has partly resiled from other intentions (e.g. reducing Agricultural methane GHG emissions, in part due to their ineffectiveness of that policy globally in actual GHG reduction compared to the local economic costs. Which also points to badly thought out policy (as a result of an incompetent government policy making machine, which she had had the unfortunate challenge of having to be uncharge of). No wonder she was worn-down

Of course, its quite a bit more complicated than that, but that's the nub of it as I see the situation.

Now she has resigned, the talk about town is instantly on Labour losing the next election (because their success has largely been based on Jacinda's charisma - as opposed to policies).

[Heid the Ba]

Thanks Tubes.

[Мастер]

and certainly ranks among the highest profile PMs NZ has ever had.

I can't even name that many of them.

The one and only time in my life I've been in NZ, included the day that Helen Clarke became PM. She was running against a Jenny someone, I think?

I also remember a David Lange . . .

[Heid the Ba]

Muldoon?

[Lianachan]

I can count the NZ PMs I can recall, in fact the NZ politicians, on the thumbs of one hand. And she’s had enough.

[tubeswell]

FWIW, the standout ones for me would be Jacinda Ardern, Helen Clarke, David Lange, Robert Muldoon, Norman Kirk, Keith Holyoake, Peter Fraser, Michael Joseph Savage, William Massey, Richard Seddon, Julius Vogel and George Grey, who were all notable for different reasons, some good, some bad. (Muldoon, for example, would be at the tyrannical end of the scale, although, having served in a tank regiment in the Italian campaign in WWII, he was probably inured to the harshnesses of life. But his financial mismanagement of the country with extreme protectionism during his wage and price freeze from 1981-1984 was the height of his arrogance and pushed the country into bankruptcy, leading to the David Lange Government and sweeping Thatcher/style free market reforms in the mid-1980’s).

[g-one]

Seems a several of our countries here are in cahoots or something. At least according to this guy who was pretty bent out of shape over covid mandates.
Apparently I need to pull my head out of the sand and acknowledge living under and authoritarian regime, along with several other forum members.

"Indeed, she has also become a figurehead of a ‘liberal’, ‘respectable’ authoritarianism that has essentially taken over the Western world, from Canada to Scotland to the United States"
Good riddance to Saint Jacinda

[Heid the Ba]

I didn’t know Muldoon was a tanker. Doesn’t give him a pass though.

[tubeswell]

Seems a several of our countries here are in cahoots or something. At least according to this guy who was pretty bent out of shape over covid mandates.
Apparently I need to pull my head out of the sand and acknowledge living under and authoritarian regime, along with several other forum members.

"Indeed, she has also become a figurehead of a ‘liberal’, ‘respectable’ authoritarianism that has essentially taken over the Western world, from Canada to Scotland to the United States"
Good riddance to Saint Jacinda

Yep she’s copped some nasty stuff from the haters, which grates more because she’s so virtuous. But then, lots of political leaders have their derogatory critics. I guess at some fundamental level she wasn’t cut out for the realities of the job. I mean, she was PM of a single Party Government that had an absolute majority in Parliament- she had another 9 months to do pretty much whatever they wanted in terms of reforms. Seems a bit like she lost the plot or something. Oh well.

[Richard A]

Lost the plot or just, as she claims, ran out of gas. She certainly, during her time, put NZ on the world stage and in a good way. Although I take tubeswell's comments as from one who lived under her policies, for good or ill.

My favourite story of her is when she met Donald Trump at a dinner. Trump of course has never been shy of saying what he thinks of other leaders (remember him saying Brexit would have worked out a lot better if Theresa May had done as he told her, but she didn't listen so there it is?) To Jacinda, the Don remarked, "I hear you have a lot of problems in New Zealand." To which she replied, "No one took to the streets when I was elected." Nice!

Let's see whether the global heiress apparent turns out to be Sanna Marin. Someone else I like.

[Мастер]

Let's see whether the global heiress apparent turns out to be Sanna Marin. Someone else I like.

Stand with Sanna!