New Zealand Last
One of the newspaper editorials last week lamented the fact that despite his party’s name, Winston shows he is unable to put New Zealand first, instead continuing to make him and us a bit of a laughing stock.
He had everything set up for him for the trip to be a success. All he had to do was act like a rational intelligent human being. But no he puts his personal feuds above all else.
Frankly it is not just his cutting off of McCain that was offensive. Just as offensive is his refusal to even give the media an itiernary. They are our check on the job he is doing, and to have them following his car in a taxi is a disgraceful attempt to avoid scrutiny. He is on our payroll.
Clark is talking nonsense also when she says the media need to stop themselves becoming the story. The media hate being the story. I know the first hand from the time I went through the press gallery with a camera on my last day at Parliament. God, I was treated like someone with the Ebola virus as journalists dived under desks to avoid being snapped.
The media did nothing wrong except do their jobs after being invited to do so by John McCain. And talking of McCain – did anyone see the full recording of his words last night on Close Up? My God he was praising NZ to the hilt. What sort of moron cuts him off doing that? I mean seriously at least wait until he has finished speaking.
Peters is not going to be taken seriously anyway after this. Every Embassy in NZ will have added this incident to their file of him, and the first thing every foreign minister he meets with will read is how he is an unstable joke.
Bring on the day we have a Government with a serious Foreign Minister such as Tim Groser. A Foreign Minister who puts NZ’s interests ahead of his petty vanity.
The NZ Herald has coverage of yesterday’s press conference while the Dom Post focuses on how he has ignored Clark’s calls for him to calm down. They also point out this is a repition of his behaviour at APEC. Basically he comes across as a blustering bully who will have public temper tantrums if he doesn’t like the media questions.