Time to kick Winston out, and call the Election

I think that Idiot/Savant is right; Winston Peters must be sacked.

This will likely result in the dissolution of government, but that would;

  1. Show voters that Labour does have a spine and care about corruption
  2. Not really change much, after all they were going to have to call it soon anyway.
  3. Probably throw away NZ First as a coalition partner... that is, if they were able to make it back into parliament... but as 08wire points out, they're still well in for teh win.
  4. Probably catch National off-guard, would they be able to deal with the lack of policy portfolio?

Dammit, how did I turn into a Politics wonk.

Update: and wow, this speech from Winnie is bizarre. I think he is counting on his voter base being too senile to remember he was caught out being corrupt, and he promises to lie:

But let’s make no mistake. What we know points to the dirtiest campaign New Zealand has ever seen, full of smears, allegations and lies.

But it’s a compliment that we are the target.

Our enemies know that if they can’t get rid of Winston Peters and New Zealand First, then their intended conspiracy against the public will fail.

So we will make our enemies a pact. If they stop telling lies about us, we will stop telling the truth about them.

Update: well, seems I was suckered into the media storm about all this. I found this summary interesting and this cynical take on it from Gordon Campbell summarises it nicely. In short: Winston didn't necessarily break the house rules, but he sure has a lot of egg on his face. Just like everyone else at the time he was laundering his donations.