The NZ Labour Party and the NZ media are a bunch of children who need to get off Twitter and grow up.

It is no secret that I think the NZ media lacks credibility and it is no secret that I think that the black and white cat sitting in front of me would do a better job of reporting on news than those employed by the NZ media.  Don't ask me how a cat could report because I actually don't know, but I'm sure a cat would be more truthful and write with more integrity and credibility than the NZ journalists.

Since the NZ election was held on the 20th of September, so only 11 days ago there has been so much flak directed at the NZ Labour Party.  I'm a right wing voter having voted Act at this year's election, so anything I say about Labour is written objectively and not with my personal views in mind.

It's not just been the NZ Labour Party receiving flak.  In particular the former leader David Cunliffe who led the party to the election defeat has been.  The mainstream media has been very negative towards him, blaming him for the loss.  It would appear as if the journalists have not done their research and it is unreasonable to lump all the responsibility on one person.  Back in 2002 Finance Minister Bill English was leader of the National Party and he led them to their worst defeat scoring only 21% of the vote.  This was four years after NZ's first ever female Prime Minister Jenny Shipley had ousted Jim Bolger while he was overseas.  After that National lost their way and former Prime Minister Helen Clark was at the height of her popularity having led the party to a successful win in 1999.

The main point of going back to this era is that it shows that parties sometimes lose their way and under Bill English, following the Shipley coup, National had lost their way.  That wasn't a reflection on Bill English.  It was a reflection on where the party was at that particular moment in time.  The party had moved further to the centre under English and it wasn't until Don Brash's (he was leader for a time between 2002 and 2006) famous Orewa speech that National was able to find their way and connect with their core constituents again.  Since then National has been pretty untouchable having just won a third term under Prime Minister John Key's leadership.  Several commentators attribute National's success to John Key but really it was the fact the party went back to their core values that they were able to connect, and that's what Labour needs to do.  At the moment there is much of a muchness between the two major parties.

This said though, Labour's campaign was flawed and President Moira Coatesworth and Campaign Director Matt McCarten need to take some of the responsibility for the shocking defeat.  If the party was to go back to their core values and introduce a ground breaking policy like "interest free student loans for ALL graduates", or if they were to use a celebrity endorsement like Angela Bloomfield (Shortland Street's Rachel McKenna) they may gain some ground.  These are two things the party could do to reconnect, but they're getting it wrong by shifting the blame.  When National was down in the dumps they looked at the party as a whole.  Even Act is going through this right now, but the one thing that is for sure is this, a party cannot, and will not, succeed unless the party unifies, and blaming Cunliffe and talking about his wife's Twitter behaviour is not the way to go.  It's just plain childish

When the mainstream media carries on like a pack of wallies, is it any wonder people don't want to vote?