"It's hard to get too much enthusiasm for the Tamaki Makaurau by-election"

"It's hard to get too much enthusiasm for the Tamaki Makaurau by-election. ... [W]hat we actually have is a spectre of Peeni Henare, Labour list MP, trying to win back 'his' seat by pandering to the far-left student activist nationalist rhetoric touted by the rather clueless Marxist nationalist Oriini Kaipara ...

"[B]oth major candidates hold a view of the country, economy and Maori that is led by a philosophy of nationalist Marxist collectivism ... They offer nothing to Maori who are entrepreneurs, who don't want to be tethered to the State or Iwi ...

"So on we go. I hope Henare wins, as it denies Te Pāti Māori one more seat and reduces the overhang in Parliament ... From the looks of it, neither are deserving."

~ Liberty Scott from his post 'The by-election without much choice'

Matua Kahurangi reckons there's one candidate who is less deserving: Te Pāti Māori's Orini Kaipara who, he reckons, "has been a walking disaster."

Her interviews over the past fortnight have been nothing short of a waka wreck. If voters in Tāmaki Makaurau decide to elect her after this performance, it would suggest they’re as dumb as a bucket of dead muttonbirds.

Yesterday was another low point. Instead of fronting the media, Kaipara let John Tamihere and Rawiri Waititi speak on her behalf. It’s no surprise after she admitted, “Peeni would be a formidable leader for the Labour Party ... I think that's more important than Tāmaki Makaurau. Who should be the leader of our nation as the first Māori Prime Minister? I want to give that back to Peeni Henare.”

That statement says it all. She is effectively campaigning for her opponent.

When Te Pāti Māori first announced Kaipara as their candidate, they claimed she would “champion” the party’s mana motuhake package, including a policy giving mana whenua the first right of refusal over culturally significant private land. When Tame asked her on Q+A how that would actually work, she fumbled. She admitted she didn’t have the details and would need to go back and consult with others. At one point she even reached for her phone, unable to respond when pressed on whether Te Pāti Māori had achieved anything tangible for Māori in the last two terms.

That’s the heart of the problem. For all its hoha attitude, Te Pāti Māori has very little to show. 

Their one big act was a hikoi against ACT’s Treaty Principles Bill, which wasn’t going to pass in the first place. 

Beyond that, their most successful project might be their merchandising arm. The Toitū Te Tiriti online store, directed by Kiri Tamihere-Waititi, sells pro-Māori propaganda gear under the promise that “all proceeds” fund the movement. It has become a branding exercise, complete with MPs regularly parading around Parliament in their own merch.

It's a bit like the bolsheviks themselves. Outside their famines, disasters and purges, the only thing at which they succeeded was producing decent propaganda posters.

Must be some decent marketing advice in Marx's old Manifesto.