By Ben Vidgen

“Oh, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive!”– Sir Walter Scott.

Comments have being made Jacinda is so “nice” as some wish to giver a pass on what she did and did not know following The Spinoff website’s account of a 19-year-old Labour Party volunteer’s struggle to get the party’s hierarchy to take her complaint of alleged sexual assault seriously.

I had problem with this rosey glass concept of Jacinda from day one, in fact before she was elected PM, with those willing to give her a free pass, based on an image largely contrived with a sophisticated pr campaign an the idea creating a cult of personality which surrounded her predecessor John Key ‘the smiling assassin’.

Those to whom this approach worled just refused to take her to task over her governments betrayal of the very things that got them elected in the firt place. Not in fact Jacinda’s legendary winning smile but the promise to dump the TPPA as Labour (in a warning sign of their insincerity regarding their election time made promise to walkaway) insisted the trade deal was not a constituional issue – an idea promptly slain by the indigenous Indians of Canada. Labour was meant to stand for democracy but under Jacinda that talk of walking away …well it walked away.

This is withstanding “nice” works with kindergarten teachers and fluffy teddy bears not your elected head of state. Then there was the out right deleting of her status in Tony Blairs neoliberal selfie (spin driven) dominated government as a public relation expert or as they are also known spin doctors.

Jacinda says she barly met the man who spun Britain into a war based on a lie packaged well she claims was just a low level minion. Labour offical website on wikipedia stated pre election she was a “senior policy adviser”. The wording was later deleted when it drew public flack and today the entry on wikapedia (written by Labour aparatchiks), does not even match with the version now given on Labour’s website. So many versions have being told even Labour party hack can’t gets their story straight. Some one at some point was telling porkies, either way, so not a good start.

Then there was her employment fiasco of the countries Chief Technology Officer Derek Hadley (a man not loved inthe IT industry), where the issue of documented texts showed what Jacinda claimed had occured simply did not match with what was said on Hadley phone.

This was glossed over by her visit to NY in relation to the UN sustainability plan Agenda 2030. Touted as the most important conference of the century we got few actual deals of a plan heavily driven by the same pro TPPA corporate fractions Jacinda clearly runs with. Instead we got baby photos, tax paid for selfies, and a lot international press driven by the same professional PR parties who had got John Key on the Late Show which of course Jacinda also appeared on.

Similar liberties with the truth took place over the Karl Soubrek affair and it was never quite explained why Soubrek’s partner had Jacinda’s number in her phone. While Ardern said she never engaged with the text of another Soubrek support Richie Hardcore (photo below) but again refused to release her private communications to confirm this hearsay allegation. She has not explained the context of a 2015 photograph taken in parliament with Hard Core.

At the time National leader Simon Bridge, in a rare momment of resembling somthing akin to an opposition party (and not just Labour partners in the TPPA/Five Eyes smiling assassination of New Zealand’s democracy) stated “Richie Hardcore and Jacinda Ardern are good friends, they are not just acquaintances, you can look through and see the pictures, they have known each other for years. I know that Richie Hardcore knows Karel Sroubek well, that’s also clear and we understand in the National Party, it’s clear Hardcore has made representations on Sroubek’s behalf on these matters“.

The 1080 protest killing native birds was equally sleazy when autopsy reports did not match the claims of her cabinet minister Trevor Mallard who had also used the privliges of the house to accused a parlimentary staffer falsely of rape. As simultaneously Labour neoliberal pretorian guard (who surround Jacinda and guide from behind), tried to put the lid on sexual abuse and alcohol plighed youth camp as we now know other abuse complaints were also being pushed to the side by Labour.

But what bugs me the most is what the caring endearing Jacinda has not talked about the issue of agents of influence (both American Chinese and corporate), meddling in our politics. This includes an inquiry chaired by Labour MP Raymod Hu who has links to Chinese intelligence (to be fair Nationals as bad on this front as well), who stood down from the chair of the inquiry when the matter got a brief spotlight before the Jacinda cult of personality rode in and saved the day with some well timed selfies and flashy smiles.

The cult of personality is an irrating reoccurence in NZ politics as it has got both Winston Peters and John Key’s elected when the image, finished off with of course winning chrasmatic smiles, is more important than the actual historic record of the contenders on issues such as ethics, what their professional backgrounds are and who are their politifal patrons and financial backers.

Not spoken of the imprisonment of Julian Assange or Chelsea Manning hero of democracy but not this Labour government. Who instead invite American B52’s, built to drop nuclear bombs, to an air show in the Wairarapa and thus basically killing the spirit of NZ nuclear free policy in one go. Jacinda just like National under John Key has spat on that legacy of nuclear free as they both drive New Zealand deeper into the military industrial complex and the corporate controlled Five Eyes spying alliance. Which as Christchurch shootings showed proves the War on Terror is just like Jacinda’s former boss Tony Blair, the poster oy of neoliberalism, claims that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction an utter sham. To Key’s credit he at least was not trying to gain popularity on a policy he plan to promptly slaughter which has being the mark of Adern’s administration through out.

Not spoken of the bombing of civilians in Yemen by drones assited by global targeting system which includes Waihopai spy base in New Zealand or the morality of our role in Afghanistan and Iraq much like the war drums of Iran based on dubious intelligence.

Not spoken of the shutdown of Dunedin University in 2015 following attempted live stream of mass shooting in Orlando, on the same social media forums used by the shooter, demonstrating when Adern she there were no indication such threat existed that was simply not true.

The former Race reconcillator Jorris Des Bres Relations Commissioner is boycotting the official inquiry into the Christchurch mosque attacks because of excessive secrecy and a lack of help for Muslim communities. Joris de Bres, who held the role from 2002 to 2013, said the majority of evidence to the Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Attack on Christchurch Mosques on 15 March 2019 should be made public, rather than suppressed. Des Bres said state agencies were “forbidden from publishing their evidence and submissions to the commission”.

Jacinda’s administration remains silent on the missing six years of the Christchurch shooter we much like the sex scandal now surrounding Labour Jacinda rushed into deal with the victims of the shooting who had being left high and dry by social serivces and ACC (the state ageny who invest arms companies killing civilian in wars overseas) once she knew we knew but not before.

Not spoken how the issue of Chch included failure of police to carry out proper checks or act on numerous intelligence warnings of toxic gun culture at the pistol and rifle ranges in habit of using target with human figures on then (or posing with rifles fitted with bayonets) and attended by Dunedin police officers and were more than 20,000 rounds of ammunitions and fire arms were stolen in 2017.

Jacinda has a way with words but the share and simple fact is his her talk has rarely matched Labour’s actual walk.

That winning smile, three years on is begining to look really jaded.