Last week there were a series of body blows for Luxon.

In The Spinoff Anna Rawhiti-Connell points to polls, David Bleedin’ Seymour and being mocked by Derek The Menswear Guy on X.

“Despite Luxon saying “growth” at a rate of repetition that outpaces Daft Punk on ‘Around the World’, 50% of respondents stubbornly refuse to believe the prime mojo-minister when he tells them the government is getting the country back on track. Annoyingly, they instead want some evidence.”

And this week he’s hellbent on growth. Um, hellbent? So stubbornly and recklessly determined? Sounds about right.

The fact that no one in National, who was privy to the "Everyone must go" tagline for their Aussie tourist campaign, saw it as a massive own goal tells you everything.

Not only did Luxon’s lazy speechwriter plagiarise the most iconic Aussie tourism campaign ever (Where the Bloody Hell are You? from 2006) they dumbed down our cultural differences into braindead sound bites.

"My message to Australians is it's time to swap thongs for jandals. It's time to swap the Hunter Valley for the Hawke's Bay and get the bloody hell over here," he blathered. “It would be totally and utterly tragic if those Australians don’t get here before they do die,” he said.

Everyone must go. . . wees before you leave the house.

Everyone must go . . . cause it’s a NZ fire sale!!!

“It sounds more like an ethnic cleansing slogan than a tourism promotion,” quips @westie4eva

Or were they meaning the engineers?

This is not the line to use when migrant departures are up 28% (that’s a record number) with 56% going to Australia, many of them the under 30s.

As a copywriter I find most of the government’s verbal schtick offensive.

He minces his words through a middle management meat-grinder.

“Money in your back pocket” like its 1965 when your wages came in a small brown envelope, destined to be spent down the pisser at Six O’clock Swill. Patronising as fuck.

“Nice to haves” — like healthcare and school lunches the kids will eat.

As for Luxon, he must “get it”. He get’s everything. It’s one of his key messages. And it feels like the National Party are standing at the decision gates, wanting to chunk it down and work out if they can take this until 2026.

The rolling chatter has begun.

Simon Wilson sees the emperor in the nude. “The angry populism of Act and NZ First turns out to have a different impact from, say, the fear-mongering of Nigel Farage’s Reform Party in Britain or Donald Trump’s triumphalism in America: it’s not building either Act nor NZ First a bigger voter base. They’re stuck in the polls too. But it is destroying the credibility of the Prime Minister.”

Authenticity Over Spin

One of the most moving New Zealand ads. From 1990.

Comforting stats

1. In December 2024, the news website with the most monthly visits in the United States was nytimes.com, with a total of 463.07 million monthly visits. In second place was cnn.com with close to 357 million visits, followed by foxnews.com with just over a quarter of a million.

2. According to the US women's clothing catalogue sizes system: in 1958 a size 8 was = to a 1970 size 6, and = to a 2001 size 2, and = to a 2011 size 0.

3. Economic uncertainty is at an all time high more than in Covid ravaged times, which is not a comforting stat.

   

WTF is going on in Merica?

I really want to stay informed, but also not spiral into despair.

Game on for Māoritanga

While the international streaming services may not feature much of our culture, the gaming industry is looking mighty progressive. Tom Clancy's online shooter game Rainbow Six Siege has introduced a Māori character, and the future is female. Rauora has a moko kauae and is described as being a “lifelong practitioner of kaupapa Māori”.

Discrimination looms large

The cynicism, the dehumanisation.

Patients with a BMI of more than 35 are being declined specialist appointments at Wellington Hospital and their GP’s suspect it’s because of pressure from the government to reduce waiting lists.

One of the Government’s five health targets is for 95% of patients get seen by a specialist within 4 months. Less referrals, less in the line, right?

Three Porirua GPs told The Post Their patients had been rejected for general and orthopaedic surgeries based on BMI.

Given the BMI scale was designed in the 1800s after taking measurements from white, European men, there is ongoing debate on whether there should be different cutoffs for non-white people, including Māori and Pasifika - who make up about half of Porirua’s population.

Dr Luke Bradford, medical director of the Royal NZ College of GPs said: “The suitability of any given patient for any given operation should absolutely lay with the surgical team, arbitrary cut-offs without even meeting with the patient is discriminatory.”

Bubble and Squeak

Sons & Daughters: I spent my teenage years watching this Australian soap about the wealthy Hamiltons and the working-class Palmers. It ran from 1982 to 1987, which included one of the most complex character arcs in Australian TV. Rowena Wallace, who plays Pat 'the rat' Hamilton/Morrell/Palmer leaves Sons and Daughters in 1985 to take another acting role. Her character goes on the run in Rio for murdering Luke Carlyle, has plastic surgery and returns as 'Alison Carr', played by Belinda Giblin. Then, Rowena Wallace then returned as Pat's identical twin sister Pamela. Mind blown. If you want to be reminder of the opening titles, go here.

Cold Comfort Farm

The days when openeing credits for TV shows were wild…

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