KEY POINTS:
Hold the front page - Minister of Health caught eating inorganic meat pies in McDonald's corporate box! Fight Obesity Epidemic spokesman calls for minister's resignation. Opposition health spokesman says Prime Minister must have a cabinet reshuffle immediately! Spokeswoman for farmyard poultry says the sky is a-falling!
Proving that
the silly season is upon us, last weekend we were told that Dr Jonathan Coleman, National's associate spokesman for health, smoked a cigar in a corporate box belonging to British American Tobacco. So what? Was anyone truly shocked?
I suppose we can be grateful the first-term MP wasn't caught copying what former American President Bill Clinton did with a cigar. But, being a former doctor, Coleman probably wouldn't get the same jollies as the man dubbed America's hardest to keep on the porch. One orifice is the same as another to your average GP.
Critics hoped this shocking incident might have stemmed the meteoric rise of the Nats' new leader John Key. An anonymous (but nonetheless easily identifiable) quote in the Business Herald talked longingly of Key deserving a "whack". But the Energiser bunny will be difficult to destabilise. He brushed Coleman's antics aside, saying he's not going to play mummy to his MPs. Which is what Coleman should have done, instead of apologising if he caused offence, and saying he would no longer accept corporate-box hospitality from a tobacco company.
Last time I checked it was still legal to smoke cigarettes and cigars in this country. British American Tobacco is a legitimate company, free to carry on its affairs, complying with the same laws as every other company.
What is illegal, however, is punching someone in the face. One Bud Latham, from Latham Construction, told reporters he doesn't "normally go around thumping people", but made an exception this time because, he said, Coleman's behaviour was "totally inappropriate".
Next time Bud, or one of his employees, is swaggering around with his butt crack poking three inches above his stubbies, maybe some feisty woman will find this "totally inappropriate" and give biffo.
This behaviour comes hard on the heels of the white ribbon campaign, when New Zealand men were urged to condemn physical violence.
What is it with MPs and corporate boxes that gets the public in a lather? Is it a jealousy thing? That on the mere balance of votes, yesterday's nobody becomes an instant A-lister, invited to places ordinary chaps must work their guts out to pay for?
As an MP I enjoyed watching league, rugby, and cricket from the comfort of three corporate boxes - Sky Television, Fairfax Media, and Air New Zealand. I also went to Fiji for one night on Air New Zealand's inaugural Wellington to Nadi flight.
What's more, as Act's transport spokesman I got a speeding fine. I was education spokesman too, but my daughter gained Scholarship in English despite writing about Sylvia Plath, the well-known dyslexic poetess. I'm opposed to the legalisation of cannabis, P, Ecstasy and other mind-altering drugs, but I'd be a fool if I thought my own kids hadn't tried a few of these.
So take me out and shoot me.
MPs are human, something I repeat ad nauseam but which the public seems increasingly ignorant of. While they can they should take the few privileges on offer, because sure as fine weather follows a Wellington southerly, when you're no longer an MP you don't get invited anywhere.
Which, for some of us, is a blessing. No more enforced sobriety, guarded conversations, or pretending to be captivated by the slobbering bore who's donated squillions to your party but can't spend a cent on oral hygiene or anti-dandruff shampoo.
We elect people to Parliament because - rightly or wrongly - we believe they have the intelligence to make legislation. They sit in the highest court in the land.
Then when they do something totally innocuous like puff on a cigar in a designated smoking area, we read the riot act because we think it might affect their political values. We can't have it both ways.
Shame, instead, on the tittle-tattles who ran to the media to report Coleman. I remember this type from my primary-school days.
They were called suckers because they greased around the teachers and prefects. They had no friends, usually because they were dumb, fat, smelly or all three, so they made themselves important by snitching on anyone who was, in their envious eyes, having too much fun.
Which no doubt Coleman was, as he relaxed with one of Cuba's finest. Was it poor judgment? Absolutely not.
Then again, Coleman and his colleague Simon Power could well be guilty of poor judgment in going to a U2 concert. What self-respecting conservative male supports an ageing, pretentious rocker like Bono "Make Poverty History"? MPs have received knuckle sandwiches for less.
