Idiocy, Opportunity

Illustration credit: Jonathan McHugh (New Statesman)

The other day, a subscriber said they were unsubscribing because they needed “some good news”.

I empathised.

Don’t we all.

I skimmed a NZME article about the impacts of tariffs this morning with analysis from Kiwibank’s Jarrod Kerr. Kerr, their Chief Economist, suggested another recession is the “least likely” scenario after Trump’s liberation day trade tariffs.

And beating the same drum that Kiwibank always does - cut interest rates further, he advised. (And NZ Herald therefore ‘educated’ its readers)

Wait.

The least likely scenario?

Is Kiwibank on another planet?

Every other expert on Planet Earth, including Nobel Prize economists, world banks, billionaires, hedge fund owners, investment bank CEOs, etc. has said this scenario is the most likely.

There will be opportunities for us - there always are. But in a tariff driven world trade system, nearly all costs inevitably increase. What Trump is doing is taking the world trade system back 80 years, and once his threatened higher rates come into effect, that will be taking the world back to the days of the Great Depression.

Cost increases = inflation in an already heavily inflated post-Covid environment.

Remember, inflation only measures cost increases from the present - they don’t factor in taking it back to the ‘norm’.

And the traditional role of monetary policy is to counter inflation. One of the most damaging effects to an economy possible¹.

Has Kerr not read the brief? Or is he looking out for his employer again?

Fortunately, I then turned to RNZ and read a different article. That one quoted Infometrics’ Brad Olsen who stated,

Talk of lower interest rates [is] "wrong and borders on irresponsible".

"We take the view that tariffs will act as a supply shock, and with higher prices set to occur, there's a better chance that interest rate cuts will be limited or halted sooner rather than later.

At the very least, calls for larger interest rate cuts in response to tariffs are premature at this stage."

And other bank economists were circumspect, agreeing the key here is no-one really knows, but interest rates may rise if inflation does.

Take that, Kerr.

It’s called objective economics.

The reason why this annoys me so much is I am tired of vested interests pushing an agenda and pretending it’s education or analysis or fact.

It’s what politicians, especially on the populist side, excel at, and all that ever does - irrespective of whether they win power or not - is make everything worse.

Rupert Murdoch built a media empire mis-educating, cultivating grievance and anger, manipulating emotions, misdirecting people on the understanding between what is wrong versus root causes etc.

And the end result is all around us.

The more uneducated and misguided a populace becomes, and the more certain they are within that level of knowledge, with reinforcing believers among them, the harder it is for any well meaning politician to make real, positive changes.

It’s easy to spread a lie or myth. It’s very hard to unpick it - especially when the answers are nuanced - as reality usually is.

Readers of Mountain Tūī may be wondering why I focus less on topical issues these days, and hone attention towards corruption, culture, themes and agenda - and that’s because character is king, values are primary, motivation is everything.

If our system and values don’t change, nothing will change - no matter who is in power.

The Coalition confidently continues to make laws that harm (read

Dr Gary Payinda

’s recent piece about privatisation or

Ryan Ward

’s piece about banks) because they know that when the time comes and they are in opposition, their attack machines will be at the ready.

When you employ someone, you generally want them to have integrity, teamwork and good judgement because those soft attributes are often more important than the technical side.

The intrinsic, the invisible, the unseen drives it all. Intellect can be harnessed, technical analysis is easy to come by. But you want leaders and workers with courage, intelligence, integrity and values because most decisions are made in real time, and while those elements cannot be easily measured, their effect is incalculable and determinant.

I once had a spat or few with Natalia Albert, a former TOP candidate who likes to suggest she is “cultivating uncertainty” as a positive, while pushing confidently that the policies on the right are less harmful than those on the left, whom she calls “idealistic”.²

She once told me that David Seymour never lied about Atlas Network (wrong - refer Drummond’s article) and when I pointed out he did, she pivoted to, well it’s more important to debate his policies than his agenda and links.

I thought that was pretty weak, mainly because character and values lead. This is why we have an Associate Education Minister that, to boast about supposedly saving ~$100mn, is serving kids school lunches that explode and burn, are commonly frozen, mis-marked, unpalatable, and by his own favourite measure, is wasting more money and time than we have ever seen - all to stick it to poorer children who should have been born with a silver spoon in their mouth.

And so he could claim ‘private market excellence in the public sector’ and ‘doing it more efficiently than Labour’.

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Deceptive. I say supposed because estimates from schools on how much MORE the new program is costing them ranges from $5,000 for small schools to $20,000 to 30,000 for larger schools per annum.

Extrapolating that out, that could be tens of millions of dollars a year hidden from taxpayers, pushed onto schools and staff, for a program where waste rates remain high, lunches provide less than half the energy kids require, and vegetarian meals are still arriving with beef. And absenteeism is increasing in some schools, as reported by TVNZ last week, correlating with it all³ - more cost again.

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Why would I spend hours debating Seymour’s policy about saving money on school lunches, riddled with corporate PR talk, when the analysis shows us his words never match up to the reality, and his example of ‘public-private’ partnership is not worth the school lunches he’s been delivering?

School lunch waste rates are so high, and unpalatable, some schools are feeding them to pigss.

And all over the airwaves too, Trump mania continues to rise.

Will he or won’t he? What will he say and do?

What’s going to happen next?! -

New temporary tariff exemptions (this time the automobile industry), they are floating the idea of deporting US citizens overseas (which means it will happen soon), Harvard had over US$2 billion withheld after refusing to comply with Trump Administration ransom demands - much of that grant impact is going to hit health and science research (Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, ALS, cancer, and infectious disease), more Palestinian activists and legal residents are being deported, the American man they “accidentally” deported to a mega prison won’t be returned to the US despite multiple Court orders…..and so it goes.

A doffer boy is seen in Globe Cotton Mills, Augusta, Georgia, circa 1909. (Getty/HUM Images/Universal Images Group)

We all need good news, but I won’t turn away.

My last set of personal complaints today is the role of media in the face of this new alt-right populist creed.

Last Friday, Chris Finlayson, former National Party Minister and AG, penned a good op-ed for the Guardian which he ended with:

Much of the work that was done in the treaty settlement space was spearheaded by the National party governments of the 1990s and 2010s. In those days the National party was a liberal conservative party, the heir to both the liberal and the conservative traditions of politics.

Unfortunately, throughout the world, centre right parties like the misnamed Liberals in Australia, the Conservatives in the United Kingdom and the Republicans in the United States, have ceased to be liberal conservative parties, and have leaned in a more populist direction.

In doing so, they have betrayed their traditions and encouraged discourse which is at best counter-productive.

The National party has so far avoided that pitfall, and one can only hope it will start asserting itself over its populist smaller partners in the lead-up to the 2026 general election.

And last year Finlayson hinted at elements of the now National Party who are self-serving and no longer served the national interests.

The point is this - Finlayson is right, but all the ‘breaking news’ and ‘rolling developments’ about Trump or this National Party are also tiring and tiresome.

National is already a populist party with the group they have, and I suspect Finlayson knows it.

And nearly everything Trump is doing was clear before the US election - in Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 manual - from the new world order, to making Trump King, to sacking military who aren’t blindly loyal, to ignoring and taking over courts, to abolishing any and all environmental duty, to allowing child labour in dangerous environments, to letting endangered animals be killed, to upending the world order, to destroying dissent, to destroying liberal free thought in universities, etc.

Nothing he is doing is new.

Nothing he is doing wasn’t foreshadowed.

There were plenty of credible witnesses, many from his first term who spoke up about his character and agenda and links, including his admiration of Hitler and other dictators.

No-one who paid attention should be surprised by any of this.

No-one. And there are very real consequences for too many.

The media’s standards of treating the un-ordinary as ordinary, and regarding those with poor character and a history of deception the same as ‘the other side’ allowed Trump’s denials on Project 2025 to kill that news cycle, and for many voters to accept it as sufficient proof it didn’t need to be taken seriously.

And that’s also why in my view, Natalia Albert’s ‘calm sounding’, ‘balanced’ ‘be uncertain’ advice is, in my opinion, misleading and misguided too.

There is no such thing in this new order - nor is character, affiliation, vested interest irrelevant at all. Analysis and intertwining that with journalism is invaluable - and where we should be all focused. Set within the history that made a pivotal turn to what is now our collective destiny.

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The Root Causes

What we want to do away with is the nefarious, self-driven interests that drive people to division based on deceit, and ugly, dirty politics. We need transparency on donations and money links. We need public service journalism - and to protect it.

We need a society that says no to people like Nicky Hagar’s Dirty Politics featured characters such as Jordan William and David Farrar. The latter who ran ‘princess parties’ for people who see women as “dirty girls who flip it up”.

We don’t want a "I’ll rub your back if you rub mine” system and media. We want to speak up so the systems hear. We need to know a second term Coalition is just as dangerous for us here. We need to join the present Australia and Canada in rejecting the right wing that appears infected with self interests.

We need analysis to return and for people to understand cause and effect clearly. We need the numbers shown and people educated. We want politicians and leaders who are there to share information and help people understand the truth of circumstances, not stay forever mired in your fault or mine. We need genuine courage in our political leaders matched with intelligence and resources - that means the willingness to lose on your values.

We need to lead with every step we take on our own - not because someone else should do it first but because we didn’t get into this mess alone, and we won’t get out of it without one link at a time either.

It means we don’t judge by affiliation, labels or colour - but values and who someone is by their character and personhood.

Australia's right wing Indigenous Minister - seeking to win in Australia with the Liberal Party

I’ve always said that the size of Aotearoa New Zealand should be a strategic advantage.

It means that word of mouth counts. It means your networks and friends and family matter. It means your help on Facebook counts. And your example leads.

Shine on, fellow Kiwis, the enemy is not Luxon, Seymour or whoever you may not like - the enemy has always been ignorance, lies, anger and fear. It’s in each of us. Fight that and don’t let your shine dim, even if it gets dark.

Yes, it matters.

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EXTRAS

Money

Reddit appeared to like today’s edition of ‘Leopards Ate My Face’.

Mowbray is an ACT and National Party supporter in New Zealand and has railed against school lunches, “woke” and beneficiaries.

So many billionaires…

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Video of Peace

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Freshening Up

Kawarau River

Lake Pukaki featuring Mount Cook

Milford Sound

1. Some economists are whispering the s word - stagflation. Low growth, high inflation again.

2.

3. The old program reduced absenteeism