CAPITAL PUNISHMENT: There's been a few ructions in the parliamentary sandpit and a time-out is needed.
Did you hear what's been happening in the Sandpit on Molesworth St?
The political children have been misbehaving again. When it comes to accepting a pay rise they are all there playing happily together and then, suddenly, it's back to firing up the "blameshifter", jumpstarting the tantrums, the furious finger
pointing and throwing out the toys so no one else can play with them.
One of them has been found to have spent a huge sum of Mum's and Dad's money in a shady set up shifting sheep across the sand to a sheik. Like a toddler when asked "who done it", the response has been to blame someone else rather than "axtually" answer the questions. If our kids did this, we would tell them to take responsibility for their actions rather than blaming other people for their mistakes. Simply saying it was the fault of another kid in the sandpit is a lame excuse and not the answer we would expect from an adult responsible for leading the country.
The group currently with the most toys in the sandpit are not the only ones looking for someone to blame. Other "kids" have tried to make a mountain out of a sand-hill by insinuating that some of the other kids, who want to play in the big playground that is Auckland real estate, must be foreigners because of their names. Suggesting that anyone called Smith or Jones, wanting to buy a place in "our" playground, must be of Celtic origin and therefore a foreigner, was mischievous and very silly. This attempt to blame others rather than offer some meaningful solutions makes the sandpit a sadpit.
In the same vein, the name-calling, describing political opponents as "party poopers" for questioning New Zealanders' rights to be able to drink while watching the All Blacks was daft. A more appropriate question should be what sets the game of rugby over and above any other event involving a New Zealand team or sportsperson competing internationally? Where was the debate about loosening licensing laws to allow us to watch international netball games held overseas in the early hours of the morning? That is the party that is getting pooped here, not the boys from the Black stuff.
