Phil Quin

The genie is out of the bottle. Unless we’re comfortable with future elections descending into duelling manipulation strategies, we need to change the law to preserve proportionality.

Most politicians try to disguise their contempt for voters on the campaign trail. Luxon’s making it his closing argument.

During Victoria’s 06 drought, I was hired to set up a lobby group for artificial-turf installers. Literally astroturf for AstroTurf. So I think that qualifies me to clear up confusion: of course the Parents Alliance is astroturf. I’d say “textbook”, but they'd try to censor it.

This soul crushing profile may have helped Luxon in '23 when his boring corporate ascent could still be mistaken for evidence he’d make a decent PM. But the relentless focus on his getting ahead lands poorly when the rest of us have fallen behind. thepost.co.nz/politics/36109…

The Nats’ strenuous daily efforts to make taxes, rather than costs, the defining issue of this election carry a whiff of desperation almost potent enough to overpower the stench of futility.

These are terrible people who think the rest of us are too.

The only way I can make sense of National's dreadful, almost other-worldly, campaign is that conventional political judgement has been swept aside by an aggresive unwillingness on the part of its leadership cohort to entertian unpleasant thoughts or hear unpleasant truths.

"Electorates are very difficult to poll well” is one of those canards that gains authority through repetition. In my experience, a good sized electorate sample gives good numbers if weighted well. If weighting is the problem, the fact it's an electorate poll is immaterial.

“Small target”, in that implies passivity & defensiveness, misleads I reckon. Labour’s strategy better seen in terms of territory: minimise the ground that favours National without surrendering that which favours Labour. Issue-based polling suggests they’ve mostly achieved this.

Chris Penk will own up to this shortly.

Sinclair Lewis wrote It Can’t Happen Here (1935) as a warning about American fascism. Its demagogue’s signature promise? $5,000 for every White American. Trump now promising $5,000 cheques if Republicans win. MAGA really seems to see the book as a how-to guide.

Like me, I'm sure you've been waiting to learn what the business lobby’s pre-election prescription for economic growth would be and -- make sure you're sitting down for this -- turns out it's lower company tax, more tax breaks, less regulation & easier firing. Visionary stuff.

Desperate, honestly quite pathetic - but also hilarious - culture-war thirst aside, my objection is just that calling a vessel destined for lifelong Cook Strait duties "Cook" is bad writing. Then again, islands called "North" & "South" aren't winning any creativity prizes either