This is from another page but in reading it I felt it hinted at the long term involvement of women in politics since they achieved voting rights.

Their involvement in the protest movement, the anti-war movement, left wing causes, and now in this age climate change and particularly in the international arena has been a more singular global voice.

There’s also an element of fantasy, celebrity status that women bring to the political stage which I think is influencing the behavior of men.

Anyway it’s current and topical and relevant to men now as much as it might be in the historical perspective.

Happy Anzac weekend too.

On the Edge of Anzac – 2021 – Our Nuclear Moment.

Climate Change would be Ardern’s ‘Nuclear Moment’, it was loudly proclaimed and we’ve seen as recently as this week Ardern and Thunberg, competing for what might be seen as a world crown to adorn the head of the saviour of our endangered world.

Oh, the political beauty of that parade and I don’t even have to make it up!

Looking back to last century though, superficially we know the story of David Lange and the Oxford Union Debate;

David Lange: “And I’m going to give it to you if you hold your breath just for a moment … I can smell the uranium on it as you lean towards me!”

Well, I’m certainly holding my breath over what Ardern might give birth to while she is in office … because I can smell ‘trouble’.

In 1984 Prime Minister David Lange banned nuclear vessels from New Zealand ports and waters. This was as a result of pressure from the biggest international protest to affect New Zealand since the women’s suffrage campaign and culminated in the New Zealand Nuclear Free Zone, Disarmament, and Arms Control Act, that has remained part of New Zealand’s foreign policy and legislation ever since.

Although this legislation was passed by the Lange-Labour government, it had always been the stated intention of the international protest movement as far back as the 1960s to disrupt the ANZUS Alliance and this was achieved when the United States government suspended its ANZUS
obligations to New Zealand at that time, although It did NOT however dismiss New Zealand as a strategic military asset.

The nuclear legislation is seen by many people as a milestone in New Zealand’s cultural identity much like the women’s vote and likewise the process of climate-change legislation would then be the third significant international event to make its way into our legislation, and if that could be progressed under Ardern’s Ministry, it may well be seen as a trifecta of achievement in the history of international protest, New Zealand politics, and possibly the pinnacle of Ardern’s career.

Perhaps not everyone would see it this way but that’s my view, and in part, as to why our government has been so distracted from events at home and why we’ve seen such an obstinate attempt to make Ardern the darling of international politics.

Amid this distraction and the growing list of failed policy outcomes, irregularities and mismanagement, up has popped a more explosive nuclear moment this week in the form of Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta.

The country’s departure from its 5-Eyes relationship with Britain in particular and its preference for China as a favored international partner had the Australian Foreign Minister Down Under quicker than you could sing Waltzing Matilda even if that is what welcomed her when she arrived to no doubt confront our administration as to exactly where we now stand – coincidentally in the week leading up to Anzac weekend.

I’ll be watching too, to see what politics infests the occasion apart from ‘the celebration of women’ that has already been announced. You really get the feeling someone is pulling out a raw prawn and we could easily see a further determination in the current tense Trans-Tasman relationship and a weakening of the Anzac cooperation.

If you take away Australia we’re a long way from anywhere and they are our second biggest trading partner behind China.

I could launch into a dialogue of ifs and buts and I would certainly expect that over the weekend from observant media. We don’t have any choice now that we’ve been put in this position, one that was overtly and officially sanctioned by Chinese support at the highest level during the week when Nanaia Mahuta became the centre of Chinese attention and affection.

But that aside I would prefer that the management of our country was not driven by hysteria and narcissism of all things, which has now conflicted our international position, threatened our trading position, and left our domestic politics to continue to deteriorate in an Apartheid centered nightmare.

Good government?