As anyone who's followed my account for any length of time must know, I'm no fan of Chris Hipkins. I don't see how a policy vacuum in a man suit makes a good leader of a political party. Hipkins ought to have been gone by lunchtime after single-handedly losing the 2023 election.
IMHO this is why Labour aren't making hay off the rising public antipathy to NatACT First, and the sooner they replace Hipkins, the better it will be for the fortunes of the party, and the country.
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If Hipkins is going to be ditched as Labour leader, it ought to because of chronic professional failure as a political operator. For milquetoast, centre-right fence-sitting, and dopey Captain's Calls.
Not to mention being totally unsuitable to lead any party of the left. All those headscratchers suddenly made sense when I learned about Hipkins's background as a reputation launderer for the Industry Training Federation, and training manager for fossil fuel extraction barons Todd Energy.
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*But* ... the one thing Hipkins ought *not* to lose his leadership role over is stories about his personal life. His private business.
None of us are saints, especially in the eyes of puritan ultra-conservatives and crypto-conservative identi-Moonies. Every one of us has skeletons in the closet that scurrilous muckrakers could dig up as a basis to exclude us from political office.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=358d4088-5010-4c4c-91ba-ecd7538a2ebd
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#podcasts #RNZ #MediaWatch #privacy #MuckRaking #NZPolitics #ChrisHipkins
The rumormongering around Hipkins reminds me of the early stages of that around Bill Clinton's affair with Monica Lewinsky. Which was nobody's business but theirs and Hilary's;
https://www.ted.com/talks/monica_lewinsky_the_price_of_shame
I tore strips off Clinton's hide even more viciously than I do Hipkins, and in hindsight, not enough. But at the time I said the same thing I'm saying about Hipkins. The same thing I said about Benjamin Doyle. A politician's personal life - like anyone's - is their own private business.
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At least unless and until there is an overwhelming public interest in exposing aspects of a politician's personal life for public scrutiny. As there was for example when Graham Capill, leader of the NZ Christian Heritage party (the Brian Tamaki of the 1990s), was convicted of sexually assaulting a child. Or when Darleen Tana was exposed as being complicit in a modern slavery operation while serving as a Green MP.
If Hipkins has done anything that serious, news media will report it.
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Unless that happens the rumour mill is a distraction. If we feed it, we risk giving energy to a 'back the underdog' sympathy that could help the useless bag of wind hold onto the Labour leadership even longer. So not only is it unprincipled and scummy to do that, just because you're not a fan of Hipkins, it's not even strategic.
Again, let's keep our eyes on the ball; Hipkins' manyfold failings as a leader of a major, supposedly left-wing party. For those alone, gone by lunchtime please.
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As a perfect coda to my rant about Chris Hipkins, @norightturnnz just dropped another of their incisive blog posts, on the utter failure of Hipkins as the nominal leader of the Opposition. In the face of the worst energy crisis this country has faced since the 1970s Oil Shocks, which promoted the Think Big projects;
https://mastodon.social/@norightturnnz/116281382828272851
Hipkins is a tool of employers and fossil fuel barons, and perhaps the most unsuitable leader Labour has *ever* had, right up there with Moore and Goff.
Strypey