By Monica Showalter
You wouldn’t want to be a leftist, waking up to the morning’s election results in either Australia or New Zealand.
Both countries’ voters repudiated them and their agendas with pounding mercilessness. CNN used the word ‘punish’ in its headline:
New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins has conceded his Labour party lost Saturday’s election, as voters punished the government and took the country rightwards nine months after his predecessor Jacinda Ardern suddenly resigned.
The rising cost of living dominated campaigning with voters New Zealanders ending six years of Labour Party rule, the latter half of which was dominated by the country’s strict response to the coronavirus pandemic that successfully kept infections low but battered the economy.
With more than 98% of votes counted, the center-right National Party, led by former airline executive Christopher Luxon, had amassed around 40% of ballots, according to New Zealand’s Electoral Commission.
A dejected Hipkins told supporters that Labour did not have enough votes to form a government.
“The result tonight is not one that any of us wanted,” he said, according to RNZ. “I gave it my all to turn the tide of history but alas, it was not enough.”
Hipkins was a placeholder, the guy who got the thankless job of taking the helm after rabidly leftwing Jacinda Ardern jumped ship after wrecking the economy. Nobody even wanted the job but he ended up with it. As for Ardern, she landed herself a fancy gig at Harvard, supposedly to “teach” even though the only thing that can be learned from her is what not to do.
She expanded government. She printed money. She ushered in ferocious inflation. She let crime run free. And she was a big fan of the heavy-handed grip of government, imposing severe lockdowns, vaxx mandates, gun grabs, and the demonization of the right. She was a truly nasty piece of work who left office with a 29% approval rating that just kept going downhill. While the international left feted her, the Kiwi locals couldn’t stand her and they made their views known on this election, not just her but her entire party and the mess they made. I wrote about her good-riddance exit last January here.
Over in Australia, it was largely the same picture. They had a reparations referendum to vote on, a case of issuing special rights to the indigenous minority over the rest of the country’s citizens, and they said ‘no’ — very, very loudly.
According to the BBC:
Australia has overwhelmingly rejected a plan to give greater political rights to Indigenous people in a referendum.
All six states voted No to a proposal to amend the constitution to recognise First Nations people and create a body for them to advise the government.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said defeat was hard: “When you aim high, sometimes you fall short. We understand and respect that we have.”
Opposition leader Peter Dutton said the result was “good for our country”.
The referendum, dubbed “The Voice”, was Australia’s first in almost a quarter of a century. With the majority of ballots counted, the “No” vote led “Yes” 60% to 40%.
Its rejection followed a fraught and often acrid campaign.
Supporters said that entrenching the Indigenous peoples into the constitution would unite Australia and usher in a new era.
No leaders said that the idea was divisive, would create special “classes” of citizens where some were more equal than others, and the new advisory body would slow government decision-making.
Going for the Animal Farm stuff with some animals more equal than others. Our correspondent in Australia, Viv Forbes, wrote about that here, calling it “more about politics than justice.” Seems the entire country was on his page when he wrote that last Oct. 3 that granting special rights to one group over the others, even though huge numbers of Australians are native-born, is a road to perdition, explaining:
Many Australians distrust proposals supported by big government; big business; trade unions; and the state-owned broadcasting company, the ABC.
Ordinary Australians are continually insulted by being “welcomed” to events by people [presumably indigenous activists in costumers] stomping around in red nappies, blowing smoke, and making drainpipe noises. Most of these ceremonies are modern inventions. We do not need to be welcomed to our own country.
For these and many other reasons, I will be voting “NO.”
Pretty much everyone thought that.
And that is good news to hear, showing that change is possible, not just across the Pacific, but bubbling up here, too. The left may be bawling over these developments, but the rest of us are heartened. Let’s hope for a wave.