NZ Prime Minister John Key
Wonder how much cash he has stashed offshore?
John Key was repeatedly standing up and talking before the Speaker addressed him. Rude!
Amateurs! 'Merican politicos skip the dead cats (or send them on to the Cheney residence for ādisposalā) and jump straight to demeaning their opponents.
Question: How can one have oral question time (with the prime minister) if the Prime minister isnāt present in the chamber?
FTFA: āDeputy Prime Minister Bill English, who was left to field a question to the PM from NZ Firstās Ron Markā¦ā
Deputy Prime Minister Bill English, who was left to field a question to the PM from NZ Firstās Ron Mark, defended Mr Key, saying his lapse was āaccidentalā.
āHe was simply addressing the Greens vigorously and he just didnāt see the Speaker stand up. If he had seen it, he would have sat down because he was warned about it yesterday.ā
So itās an infraction that heās been previously (and recently!) warned about. And this means that itās something he wouldnāt have done intentionally.
Riiiiiiight.
āHeās on the back foot on this issue, so his point of attack now is to distract, throw various dead cats on the tableā
What great language! Where can I read more like this?
Why did the speaker cut him off? He seemed to be answering the question posed him.
Surely it isnāt fair or reasonable to expect the nobility to retain their cool even as they can hear peasants grovelling filthily through their affairs? Honor demands a certain level of anger!
Worth a read even if youāre not a kiwi, in my opinion. A good study of how contemporary right wing US/UK political techniques have been applied in NZ. Interesting because weāre not as good at it, so itās easier to study. Our conservatives have a way of mimicking the worst parts of conservative politics in the rest of the western world; red-scare McCarthyism lingered here long after the man himself had been discredited.
Or if you just want to enjoy the style of colloquialism without the politics, thereās this guy:
Every time something bad happens to him I think of this. Canāt help it.
Well many think this was the goal - to leave so that he didnāt have to answer the questions.
Remember Key used to be a currency trader for Goldman Sachs, he ran the Irish operation for a while ā¦ he well understands the machinations that people and companies go to to move money to avoid taxes in their home countries ā¦ his government pushed the current laws on trusts through parliament under urgency, avoiding the usual opposition scrutiny.
At least enough to retire comfortably in a country that does not have an extradition treaty with New Zealand?
a great question - we know heās worth tens of millions of dollars from his days as a currency trader - but itās all supposedly in a blind trust managed by his lawyer ā¦ who as this scandal has evolved, weāve learned is no longer a lawyer because heās gone off to run a firm that manages these international tax haven trusts ā¦ and who has been lobbying the IRD in Keyās name to make sure that thereās been no review of NZās tax haven status.
Key claims itās all chance and he has nothing to do with it all, but itās all a bit too cozy to be that innocent ā¦ you can see why heās running away from questions
Thatās a matter of opinion. Iād maybe offer 50p for the tie.
I very much think this was the case given how quickly the Speaker threw him out. Heās usually quite content to let both sides yell at each other for much longer and then drop the hammer on the Opposition for crossing the line, but as soon as Key started to deviate into what sounded like an embarrassing attack ramble (the kind that gets in the newspapers the next day) his mic was cut and he gets banned only for the duration of Question Time rather than the remainder of the day.
I thought it was because he used a memberās proper name āJohnā rather than the correct form of address.
The nicest and friendliest population Iāve ever encountered sure managed to elect quite the asshole in Key.
Ahh, okay, that would make sense. Thanks.
