Simon Lusk

National President Peter Goodfellow has succeeded in introducing into National one of the worst traits of American political thinking – McCarthyism.

Those unfortunate enough to sign up for Candidate’s Fodder, excuse me, Candidates College, have been subjected to a small inquisition.

One would think that pertinent questions asked of future candidates should be ones which disqualify people from holding political office like “Are you subject to any name suppression orders?” or “Have you been charged with any crimes, particularly those involving physical violence?”, “Are any of your companies currently facing charges in any jurisdiction worldwide?”. Surely those same questions should be applied to those who wish to seek office at Regional or Board level…after all they seek to represent the party…albeit outside of parliament.

Instead, the supposedly broadchurch National Party is seeking to exclude people based on political affiliation and/or friendships.

“Are you, or have you ever been affiliated to Simon Lusk?” or “What are your connections to Whaleoil?”, for example.

It’s all very McCarthyist as per the Drunken Tailgunner’s campaign to smoke out imaginary communists from the US State Department.

While ferreting out  future-focused fiscal conservatives who take advice from others than Goodfellow and his stooges might be seen as important, delegates at their conference should ask the questions:

• Do we want homogenous candidates who slavishly follow the orders of the party president?
• Do we want a caucus of economic centrists who live for the moment instead of thinking three, five or ten years down the line?
• Should National descend into factional exclusion or should they accept that broadchurch parties need to tend to base as well as the centre?
• Is it really so wise to exclude people who are superior campaigners in favour of those who like to stand on street corners and pester motorists with signs?

Or will delegates merely clap enthusiastically for the media, having paid hundreds of dollars to fill up seats in an auditorium?

ᔥ Stuff.co.nz

Trevor Mallard and Andrew Little both claimed that this would never make it to court…they may of course be right, they could simply apologise and pay Judith Collin’s costs for defaming her:

Lawyers for Collins, Mallard and Little discussed the case’s future before Justice Geoffrey Venning in the High Court at Auckland today.

John Tizard, acting for Little and Mallard, applied to the Court for a stay of proceedings until a Privacy Commission report into the leaked email is complete.

Justice Venning declined the application, but agreed to schedule the next court date for November – two months after the report is due to be completed.

The judge noted the report’s findings would not necessarily affect the defamation proceedings, unless the parties agree to settle the case.

A trial date has been set for February next year, and it was expected to take between three and five days if it goes ahead.

Mallard bizzarely claimed that this was a victory for him and Andrew Little…the judge turned down their application…and this is a victory. He has been remonstrating with me on Twitter clearly forgetting that explaining is losing.

Strangely, Mallard also believes that the Privacy Commissioner’s report is going to help his case…I can;t fathom why a report issued long after he defamed Judith Collins is somehow going to exonerate him and Andrew Little for their ill-conceived, factually wrong defamation of Judith Collins. Mallard forgets too that he used parliamentary privilege to not only defame Judith Collins but also myself and Simon Lusk. He came close to repeating the defamation on Twitter.

Chris Hipkins has decided as Chief Whip for Labour to ask 259 written questions.

He asked three questions of every minister:

Has he or his representatives had any written communication with Simon Lusk within the last six months in his Ministerial capacity; if so, on which date or dates and what was the nature of the communication?

and;

Has he or his representatives had any oral discussions with Simon Lusk within the last six months in his Ministerial capacity; if so, on which date or dates and what was the nature of the discussion or discussions?

and;

Has he or his representatives met with Simon Lusk within the last six months in his Ministerial capacity; if so, on which date or dates and what was the nature of the discussion or discussions?

This of course is following up the line of questioning in the house of Judith Collins by Trevor Mallard where he accused Judith Collins firstly of leaking details of the Pullar case to Simon Lusk and then Andrew Little did the same except he accused Judith Collins of leaking to me. They then both repeated their claims outside of the house and this has resulted in a defamation action against them.

Trevor Mallard of course maintained his ongoing defamations against my good friend Simon Lusk and now he has used taxpayer resources and Chris Hipkins as Chief Whip to ask 259 written questions trying desperately to confirm Trevor Mallard’s defamation of Simon Lusk.

Well it has turned into a major embarrassment, both for Chris Hipkins and for Trevor Mallard because the reply to almost every question is a simple “No”…or referring to previous “No”. Some are not yet answered but I can well imagine that the answer is going to be the same. An emphatic “No”.

Chris Hipkins has single handedly destroyed Trevor Mallard’s defence in his defamation case as not a single minister has had contact with Simon Lusk and they have put that on the record in the responses to his 259 questions.

Simon Lusk can justifiably feel very aggrieved that he has been defamed in such a way by Trevor Mallard and now by the actions of Chris Hipkins.

The Labour party is covered in shame.

If I was Simon Lusk I would apply to The Speaker to have a personal statement recorded in the Hansard addressing this outrageous attack on him by Trevor Mallard and Chris Hipkins.

So much for David Shearer’s promise of avoiding gotcha politics, this time it is a person not even in parliament. It shows that once again that Trevor Mallard can do just whatever he wants without fear of consequences. Labour is now essentially run with Trevor Mallard pulling the strings.

David Shearer time as leader can now be measured in months.

iPredict has a series of stocks now on the ACC Scandal.

Yesterday The Standard gloatingly claimed “You know you’re in trouble when: The bookies open a contract on you“.

Whoopsy….look who is in trouble now:

Another interesting tock is the one on Simon Lusk as the leaker…Remember Trevor Mallard, Grant Robertson and Andrew Little have all suggested he was the leaker.

Well the wisdom of the crowds suggests that they are wrong. I wonder if they have the guts to apologise to the house and to Simon Lusk?

David Shearer has claimed he doesn’t like gotcha politics, yet yesterday senior MPs Trevor Mallard and Grant Robertson, along with aspiring senior MP and former party president Andrew Little launched a disgraceful, untrue attack on Judith Collins, Simon Lusk and me. They continued their disgraceful attacks in the House today.

This attack is typical of Mallard. Make shit up, throw it, see what sticks, and brazen it out afterwards. These attacks are all based on “an anonymous email from a reliable source”.

The problem for David Shearer is while Mallard and his thuggish henchmen are running this kind of stupid, baseless attack all it does is continue to frame the Labour Party as the Nasty Party. It also detracts from Shearer’s leadership, as he looks like Goff did, when Robertson stood up to him and told him to be soft on Maoris or else.

None of this is going to go well for Labour. Ministers do not threaten defamation action without good cause, and as I know all parties involved in this dispute there is no way there is any link between Judith Collins and Simon Lusk. So school yard bully Mallard will be forced to apologise or will lose a defamation case. In the mean time his nastiness continues to brand Labour as the Nasty Party.

David Shearer’s leadership and chance of being Prime Minister is under threat by this kind of stupid attack where there is no evidence at all of what Mallard is saying. Politicians lying never goes down well with the public, as Anna Bligh recently found out.  He should take Trevor aside and tell him to apologise in full immediately, or he will be stripped of his portfolios and returned to the back bench. In fact he should strip him of his portfolios and the Shadow Leader of the House anyway.

I don’t believe that David Shearer has anything to do with these attacks, but he is as much a victim as those Mallard has accused. Just as he was the victim when Mallard got busted scalping tickets on Trademe, and Goff was a victim when Mallard chose to indulge in an asymmetrical war against me where he couldn’t win and I had nothing to lose.

Mallard has a history of defamation, and a history of scurrilous anonymous smears.

A quick search of Google shows Mallard has form.

He defamed Erin Leigh.

He also defamed Amokura Panaho along with John Tamihere. They had to pay her $7500 each for that defamation.

Then there is the case of his defamation of Rosemary Bradford. This story is interesting as there’s a claim Labour asked officials to provide the dirt on MPs spouses.  A bit like the Erin Leigh issue.

Then of course there was the American Bagman smear that went nowhere. He still maintains he was right yet hasnpt produced a shred of evudence to back up his allegations.

Now has taken a step too far, together with Grant Robertson and Andrew Little they have defamed Judith Collins, for which she is suing them, and also Simon Lusk and myself. They ar too cowardly to step outside the house and repeat the smears against me and Simon and so I am left to defend myself via the blog.

David Shearer needs to discipline all three but mostly he needs to yank Mallard back into line. If he doesn’t then his leadership is finished and we will be talking sooner rather than alter about Grant Robertson’s ascendency to Labour’s leadership.

ᔥ NZ Herald

Judith Collins isn’t going to take Mallard’s lies lying down. Hse has announced that she is looking at suing him plus another MP as well as a media outlet. I think she should also look at suing Eddie at The Standard for the defamatory post they put up yesterday to sync with Mallard’s, Robertson’s and Little’s attack again me, Simon Lusk and Judith Collins in the house.

ACC Minister Judith Collins is planning legal action against two Labour Party politicians and a media outlet for alleged defamation.

It follows confirmation the Privacy Commission will investigate the email Ms Collins received from former National Party president Michelle Boag which helped end her colleague Nick Smith’s ministerial career.

Ms Collins told Radio Live this morning she was to see a lawyer this morning, regarding legal action for allegedly defamatory comments made outside the House by two Labour Party politicians, and also one media outlet.

She would not name who the MPs or the media outlet are.

Ms Collins denied the move was a ploy to close down debate on the issue, rather she takes her reputation “seriously” and would not allow herself to be defamed.

Confirmation that Privacy Commissioner Marie Shroff will investigate the email’s trail from Ms Boag to an eventual report in the Herald on Sundaycame as Labour claimed Ms Collins, National Party operative Simon Lusk and right-wing blogger Cameron Slater all played a part in the leak.

The Standard’s post is defamatory against me, and also Simon Lusk. I am considering my options. Trevor Mallard has a history of lying and making shit up, this time I feel he is going to regret it. He should just leave parliament. There will be no mercy from me.

Labour seem to have nicked National’s election playbook….from 2002. They are mounting attacks on anything that moves in utter desperation of their predicament. They simply can’t see the wood for the trees. Trevor Mallard is flailing away on Red Alert smearing Don Brash as though he is the enemy, he is then in the House smearing people who aren’t even politicians randomly in a desperate attempt to join some dots that don’t exist. It is hilarious to watch.

Labour are essentially trying to re-run The Hollow Men meme. It might have worked in 2005 with mentions of American bag-men and the Brethren boogey-men but it won’t run now. They are simply chasing their tails for relevance

Watch as Goff and Mallard get smashed up by the PM and by Lockwood in Question one today. labour just don’t get it that ACT isn’t the enemy, nor is Don Brash. They are simply playing into Brash’s hands by continually talking about him. Right now any air time is good air time.

Heh…John Key suggested they hire someone like my hunting mate Simon Lusk to roll Goff.

Then I got mentioned again in parliament by David Shearer, this time on his beat up of a months old issue chasing Murray McCully. Again I have to re-iterate that if I could have gone after Murray McCully I would have, with boots on.

Hehe…Wayne Mapp suggested I was “woefully mis-informed”. He doesn’t know who my sources are so was prob­a­bly ill-advised to say that. But then again he has spent his entire career being “woe­fully mis-informed” so he is National’s res­i­dent expert on the topic. He then denied ever reading my blog…to guffaws from both sides of the house.

Nice to know that Wayne Mapp isn’t responsible for whether or not I am correct.

This beat-up back-fired on Labour though because Wayne Mapp slapped them back with an example of Helen Clark’s use of a 757. Dumb, dumb, dumb…as I said before wood and trees is the issue.