“Well,” said the Baron, his voice causing the babbling voices in the hall to fall into expectant silence, “You ask me how I fared on my travels.”

He took a thoughtful sip from his wine, placed the goblet back on the table with a click, and began:

“I took ship from Bremerhaven, as you know, with a fair wind and a bold heart, but lady luck was soon to change her face. On the third day there arose a storm of unimaginable size – the waves were as high as houses, then as high as mountains; strange howlings came from the ocean; passing whales begged to be allowed on board as on that night the sea was no place for a creature of God; and I personally was struck by lightning three times.

“Naturally the mariners ran quivering under the decks to their prayers, and it was left to me to manage the ship, which – with some small difficulty – I did. Bow to the wind, I finally faced a wall of water so tall it reached – as I measured it with apparatus – all the way to the sky, and had no choice but to pilot my vessel straight into it.

“After a few moments under the water I passed a group of comely mermaids who, once they had recovered from their surprise, looked quite taken by my person and seemed on the point of asking me to spend more time with them when I, running short of breath for more reasons than one, was forced to move on.

“I don’t know if you’ve ever been trapped under several fathoms of water, struggling to escape and deprived of oxygen, as you face your apparently inevitable expiration knowing that no matter what convulsions you go through or how loudly you shout no living soul will know or care. It’s uncomfortably like being Phil Goff.

“Yet somehow – I attribute it to my fickle mistress Fate still holding some love for me (but that is another story) – I reached the surface alive and tasted air again.

“During all this time I had, of course, kept my hand on the tiller, but on resurfacing I discovered the tiller had become detached from the rest of the ship.

“It is of course out of the question that I should have run the ship over a reef, even in such trying circumstances as I have described. However it is the case that my vessel had met a reef; this particular reef notoriously mobile and aggressive – so without question it was the reef which ran itself onto me.

“I will not speak its name for fear of invoking it again. Suffice to say it is named after a piece of navigational equipment. This name, I can reveal, reflects the intention of its creator (a powerful sorcerer) that it serve as a scourge upon all those who (as, in this case of dire necessity, myself) fail to consult the instrumentation they were supplied with when piloting their ship.

“I was able to keep myself afloat by clinging to one of several thousand pieces of flotsam that chanced to be in the area, until I discovered a place where the surface was sufficiently solid for me to stand on it. (I am told this does not normally happen but I later discovered the sea had been decorated in support of the local team in a major sporting tournament.)

“I was, though at some leisure, still lost on the open sea, so I considered how to supply myself with a mode of transport suited to my status.
“Having recovered my breath I was able, by blowing into the end of the tiller, to inflate it into a serviceable boat and convinced a school of dexterous fingerfish (where do you think fish fingers come from?) to crew it.

Initially they were somewhat laggard workers but I happen to always keep upon my person a bottle of my patented welfare reform nostrum. Once applied, this immediately transformed them into happy and diligent workers and did not kill any of them in any way. I passed the rest of the journey with pleasure as the company was now rather better than the average at sea, though snuff was not widely available.”

Here the great raconteur paused, holding up one finger to suppress the murmur of applause that was about to turn into thunder. He picked up his wine again, wetting his lips then smiling behind the goblet as he is wont when about to demonstrate his greatest flights of fancy.

“Also,” he said, “The response to the Rena incident does not reflect of deep sea drilling at all, National Party policies are good for the underclass, there was an urgent ACC crisis, that RadioLive show didn’t encourage people to vote for John Key, we don’t deserve to know why Richard Worth was fired, those tax cuts weren’t really tax cuts but they did make everything better, the police surveillance bill was well thought-out and constitutionally justified and we will be back in surplus by 2014-15.”

With a flourish, the Baron drank off his cup, then dipped his head in a slight bow as our laughter and applause shook the hall’s very flagstones.

Truly, his mighty powers of picturesque invention will be unequalled in this or any future age.

ENDS

By Lyndon Hood

DAY ONE The minister has tasked me with investigating the state of workplace safety in New Zealand. After that she went back to the departmental budget – as I left I heard her telling someone there was a recession on and there was no money for new carpets or filing cabinets or air conditioning and there were people in Christchurch who would be grateful to have carpets at all.

First priority: background. Examined the departmental statistics.

We have, actually, been known to prosecute employers. Not sure how to feel about this, officially. One might consider it to be Doing Our Jobs, but there is also the need to balance this with letting employers, who are the lifeblood of our economy, do whatever they like. This is called Ease Of Doing Business.

I stopped in to see how the inspectorate was going. He said he was fine.

On the way out I sprained my ankle on a hole in the carpet. I filled out a form about it.

The form gave me a papercut.

DAY TWO I asked the minister what measures the Government was taking to improve workplace safety. She said the were allowing employers with better safety records to pay lower ACC premiums, as well as restricting union access so the whiny socialists wouldn’t distract anyone or get jammed in important machinery.

I asked whether the ACC matter might encourage under-reporting of accident and risks. As might the 90 day trial period.

She told me if I were any sharper I might cut myself. I told her I had cut myself, yesterday, on a piece of paper. We agreed that was not best risk management practice, but I assured her I had filled out a form about it.

She told me not to do so in future.

Had lunch on the Wellington waterfront. Wharf very pretty in the sunshine. Safety rails often minimal or even absent. There was not even a sign saying Warning Do Not Fall Into The Harbour.

“Don’t people fall into the harbour?” I asked the gentleman sitting beside me.

“Mostly not,” he replied.

I said that was interesting because of my job.

“Are you from OSH or something?”

I explained that the functions formerly served by Occupational Safety and Health had been subsumed by the Department of Labour.

DAY THREE My report must be accessible. I tried to explain the principles of risk management to a man at the pub.

Consider, I told him, the statistical chance of a bad outcome, multiplied by the cost of it happening.

He wanted to see how it worked in practice, so I got out my departmental calculator. The cheap plastic cover cracked and I received a small shock, the jolt from which cause me to knock over and break my wine glass, cutting myself quite badly.

I explained the irony of the situation to the paramedic and added that, since I was not at work, I could safely fill out a form.

He asked about my job and I told him, no, it’s the Department of Labour now and, since he looked like he had ideas, asked him if he had any ideas.

He told me we should reform ACC so that after an industrial disaster the jobless victims can mount a court case to extract compensation from the bankrupt company. Or something like that – the painkillers were kicking in by then.

He also added that I “should all be fired”.

I felt in the circumstances it would be reckless to disagree.

And that does sound like the kind of approach the minister might like. It would certainly make her job easier.

DAY FOUR Spent the day reading the proceedings of the Pike River inquiry. Executive summary: they got confused between the kind of mine that produces coal and the kind of mine that explodes when you poke it.

Googled “coolstore”. Am now nervous of the fridge.

Note: in future, keep a close eye on people who work with things that might explode or catch fire. Except, of course, if they are connected to the film industry.

Had been sitting awkwardly due to hand. Sore back.

What happens to all these forms? Under this National government we now only have have Front Line Officers and no Back Room Bureaucrats, but I assumed someone was dealing with them. Probably the same people who deal with the employer inspection reports.

Is it supposed to be me?

DAY FIVE To be credible, my report must investigate heart of economy. I told the minister I was going to go on a fact-finding trip to Auckland.

“Well, be careful,” she said, “They can be dangerous.”

“What, Aucklanders?”

“No – facts.”

On the plane up the young lady beside me explained that public transport has a lower relative injury rate than private. Decided to catch a train.

Are they usually that full?

Do they usual come to a complete halt like that?

We were rescued not a moment too soon; we had just discovered later the people in the carriage in front had declared the collapse of civilisation and were making serious preparations to capture and eat us.

I too, arguably, had some thoughts of cannibalism – at least, I was seeing the appeal of the Rugby World Cup or Transport minister’s head on a platter. But it is as well things went no further. It’s not that I was personally afraid – I believe I am too stringy to be a high priority – but it would have been professionally embarrassing.

At the station I tracked down the manager and suggested an emergency buffet car might mitigate such risks in future.

“What, are you from OSH or something?” he said.

I showed him my stationery and made him point to the bit on the letterhead that says “Department of Labour”. Then I shut my suitcase on his fingers. He won’t make that mistake again in a hurry.

DAY SIX Returning to the office I noticed a room was sealed off with red tape.

There were signs and so forth but naturally, the first thing I did was cut through the red tape.

I discovered later some significant piles of unprocessed accident forms had begun to moulder. In the still air, this raised methane levels to unacceptable levels and the area had been sealed off.

At least, I suppose that’s why everything exploded.

It was generally reckoned to be a victory for ease of doing business.

*********

by Lyndon Hood

Once there was a mighty Prince who was extremely mindful of his own mortality. He decided to ensure his legacy by having a child. Yet, having married, he realised that if he died and left his wife with a baby, she might end up on the DPB. So to spare her that widely-recognised dishonour, he immediately had her executed.

Much to the distress of the court, he repeated this pattern several times. Finally a wise young woman, the Grand Vizier’s daughter, agreed to marry the prince. And she distracted him from his brooding by telling him stories.

THE BEGGAR AND THE SISTERS

During the reign of the Sultan Haroun Al-Rashid, there lived a kind of beggar, who got his bread by running errands for the wealthy or doing such tricks as they might desire him to perform.

One day, in search of work or a few scraps of food, he knocked at the gate of a well-appointed house. It was opened by a beautiful lady who, though simply clothed, had the bearing of a person of high rank. She heard the beggars request with sympathy.

“You are welcome,” she said, “As are any who freely come to us. You may dine here and eat your full – only you must first swear to exercise the greatest politeness and not do anything to vex us, for if you anger us it will be the worse for you.”

The beggar eagerly assented and the lady led him into the opulent mansion. The walls were of sandalwood and wood of aloes, the doors of brass and the columns of massy gold. Inside waited two more equally beautiful and refined women.

The beggar, seeing three powerful women living together, speculated they might be lesbians. But the remembered his vow, and kept silent.

“Myself and my elder sisters,” said the woman who had answered the gate to the relieved beggar, “were about to dine. We would be honoured to have you as our guest.”

The beggar assented, with every politeness. The eldest sister clapped her hands, and a collation was brought on heavy silver platters, along with fine wine which was poured into glasses cut from a single crystal.

The beggar, remembering his promise to be amiable, confined himself to complimenting the house, the food and the wares it was served on, and listening politely as the sisters conversed knowledgeably on such a wide range of subjects. He was amazed women’s brains could fit so many things, though he politely refrained from saying so.

When the dinner was completed and the plates had been removed, the eldest sister turned to the youngest.

“When this man entered,” she asked, “Did he swear to remain polite and not do anything to vex us?”

“He did so,” said the youngest. The beggar eagerly nodded his head in agreement.

“As that is case, he may stay to witness our daily test.”

At this the middle sister took a golden key and opened a heavy door. Out of the door came a large ape. The ape ran shrieking at the sisters one by one, and flung itself at them, but though it struck them with the full weight of its body, they did not fall. As each sister stood firm, the others spoke to her, saying, “Ah! You are one of us!”

Then, temporarily calmed, the ape went back to its cupboard. The beggar was now overcome with curiosity. But he did not dare interrupt, as he remembered his promise and feared to anger the sisters.

The middle sister then brought out two magnifying glasses on a silken pillow. Each sister was in turn examined by the others, who looked through the glasses at her face, peering at the colouring that was applied to her cheeks, lips and eyes. When they were satisfied, the examiners spoke again, saying, “Be joyful! All is as it should be.”

The beggar was even more full of questions, but still he restrained himself.

Finally the sisters concluded. “Now,” said the eldest, “Let us rest.”

“Why?” asked the beggar, who could keep silent no more, “Are you on the rag or something?”

The sisters looked at him in horror. The youngest sister cried, the middle sister tore at her hair and the eldest screamed with rage. At the noise, all the doors burst open and six eunuchs armed with scimitars burst into the room and threw the beggar to the ground, holding their blades ready to cut him to pieces. The beggar pleaded for his life.

“Did you not swear to be polite and not to enrage us?” demand the eldest sister.

“Yes!” cried the repentant beggar, “But I didn’t realise you would be so grouchy! I mean, miaow!”

The eldest sister raised her hand, preparing for the fatal command.

“Please don’t kill me! I’m sorry you got angry… no, wait! I’m sorry for what I said!”

“And why did you say it?”

“It might be true!”

“Don’t you think there are more likely explanations?”

“Look,” said the beggar, who was never comfortable when the conversation strayed towards logic, “The fact is that I was so full of curiosity at when I saw you were all attacked by the ape yet still stood, while the others said, ‘You are one of us!’, then examined each other’s faces and said ‘All is as it should be!’, that I could restrain myself no more afterwards, and said the first thing that came into my head.”

“Why, then you should have asked those questions,” said the youngest sister, “And spared us your offensive, wrongheaded and irrelevant speculations on other matters. It is not in our nature to be vexed by questioning (just as we cannot be pushed over by the ape you saw) – if the questions are sensible. You might have heard an interesting story, rather than being subject, as you are now, to certain death.”

“Perhaps, good ladies, if I can tell you a story equally interesting as that which explains the ape and glasses, you may see fit to spare my life and forgive me my transgression?”

The eldest sister was ready to continue with the execution, but the youngest intervened.

“Please, show mercy,” she said. “If this man had power over women such as ourselves, or represented people who did, his behaviour would indeed be unendurable. But as he is only a useless old beggar, or a sort of performing monkey, I find it buffoonish and adorable.”

The sisters agreed the beggar should be given the chance he requested, so he began his story:

Once, following a destructive earthquake which destroyed the property of many, the Sultan delegated one of his most trusted ministers to determine who should and should not receive assistance.

The minister delayed the announcement while he secretly went among the people of the city disguised as an unusually well-fed begging fakir. By their reactions he sorted the worthy from the unworthy, finally announcing those who had given him aid would likewise receive aid, while those who had spurned him should get none.

All were impressed by his wisdom, except one citizen who appealed to the Sultan, devising an entertainment called a “Te Tai Tokerau By-Election”, which so pleased the Sultan that he gave it funding for another season.

“That was somewhat interesting, was it not?” said the youngest sister.

“If we chop him into pieces, it will make a terrible mess,” said the middle sister.

Typical, thought the beggar, always trying to get out of housework. But he wisely said nothing.

“It was far too short to satisfy me,” said the eldest sister.

“Why does everything have to be about sex with you people?” the beggar exclaimed.

The eunuchs raised their scimitars again.

“Wait! I have another one!”

A rich man observed a hungry beneficiary in the street outside his house. The rich man was famous for his hospitality and, reasoning that a beneficiary standing in the street was lowering local property values, invited him in for lunch.

They sat down at an empty table and the rich man pretended to eat an enormous and varied invisible meal, encouraging his guest to partake. The confused man did so merely sat and stared.

“What?” said the rich man, “Aren’t you enjoying my delicious food?”

So the beneficiary pretend to eat with every sign of enjoyment (even as he became more and more hungry), for fear of losing the nothing that he currently had. To finish the meal, the rich man force-fed his guest ever-growing slices of an entirely imaginary cake.

The rich man was of course overjoyed at the beneficiary’s indulgence of his whimsy. So it was with great good humour that he pushed the man off his chair, kicked him a few times and told him to get out and not come back.

And so it came to pass.

“An intriguing story,” said the youngest sister.

“And so moral,” said the middle sister.

“Very well,” said the eldest, “I won’t kill you after all.”

“Typical woman! Can’t make up her mind!” said the beggar. “Oh… did I say that out loud? Okay, how about this…”

There was once a young merchant whose fortune suddenly turned bad – all ventures he embarked on came to nothing, he was going ever-deeper into debt, and even his very house and land were subject to collapse and disaster.

He heard tell of a special magical goblet that was capable of curing all ills.

I’ve actually forgotten what happens in this one, it’s difficult to remember stories when chaps are holding scimitars over you wobbly bits, but it’s all very exciting! And the moral is, ‘the real Rugby World Cup is inside yourself’ which is very inspirational.

“Let him live,” said the eldest sister, “He is not worth the wear and tear on the scimitars.”

“Besides,” said the beggar, “You have yet to tell me your story of why you are daily attacked by an ape and examine each other with magnifying glasses.”

The beggar knew he might have to listen to the women talking about their feelings, but if it calmed them down, he was prepared to take that risk. He quietly congratulated himself on how well his damage control was going.

“What you say is true,” said the middle sister, “And since you ask, you shall hear. We are exiles from a small island caliphate; you may have heard of it, though it is little talked of. The last person to whom we spoke of our homeland mocked us and pretended to fall off his chair with feigned boredom. But I shall tell you our story, as you demand, and I hope you will make a better audience.”

You must know my sisters and I are Facts. We were once thought powerful in our country, and certainly the tribe of Facts was, if not loved or feared, at least acknowledged and given the trappings of respect.

But in time, some of us began to feel more and more ignored by those in power. But the change was slow, so that we were not spurred to action all at once.

But one day, when our cousin Migration Numbers arrived at the palace for his regular audience, none of the court would face him. The Caliph proclaimed that he did not accept Migration Numbers, giving no reason, and so our poor cousin was turned away.

As he went sadly home he met two other Facts, Inequality and Boot Camp Re-offending Rates. The three resolved to return to the Caliph and protest. But when they reached the threshold of the palace they were stopped by the guards. It was clear the Caliph thought it would not be convenient to admit them.

The Facts were not used to being denied so boldly, and made as much noise as they could. But it was not loud enough to be heard over the raucous sound of the Caliph entertaining some eccentric Opinions.

After that, we realised our people were expected to stay hidden. Those who rebelled against this suppression and revealed themselves were denigrated or even attacked. We are not without pride: if we are ignored for long, there will be dire consequences.

Our uncle How Well The Super Fund Is Doing counseled patience, saying they would have to deal with us in time. But the other economic statistics, among the most hotheaded Facts, were determined to have revenge after the Caliph subjected our cousin Income Distribution to a merciless and unjustified averaging, leaving him almost un-recognisable.

Finally our beautiful cousin River Quality undertook to intervene with the Caliph. Once day, as he paraded through the city, she dressed herself in her finest evidences and prostrated herself in his path, forcibly laying herself out before him.

“Please, great Caliph, I am a Fact, representative of a host of other Facts both great and small. Before you proceed on the path you have determined, if you will not love me, at least acknowledged me!”

But the Caliph pretended he did not recognise her, or even see her – he walked over her, kicking her and stumbling a little as he did. Until then we had hoped (and here the three sisters wept) that the Caliph would know a Fact if he tripped over one. But he did not.

After that humiliation, there was much lamenting in the house of Fact, and it was clear there could be no peace between us and the Caliph. The Facts had united against him. And since he was too proud to admit fault, he in turn went to war with us.

Any Facts showed their face in public were attacked relentlessly and left mutilated. Our palaces were undermined and defaced. And when some of the people who loved us begged the Caliph to cease his campaign he was waging against us, he said, “Am I? I don’t accept that assertion.”

Those of us who were able decided to leave that land, and now it continues without us.

Almighty God has avenged the wrong done to us by having the country succeed no better than if it were being operated by self-satisfied idiots with no connection to reality. Most recently, the Caliph has announced the seasons are “broken” and “unsustainable”, justifying this by saying it is much colder and darker now that it was six months ago. So he proposes to sell off the Sun and have the citizens buy light on the open market.

You will see by this that he still keep some few mutilated Facts at his palace, but they are held hostage by his favourite ministers, Anecdote and Personal Opinion, and only allowed daylight in line with the Caliph’s whims.

Many of our brethren fled across the ocean, but my sisters and I came here to Baghdad. It was not difficult to revive our fortunes – for we Facts are both beautiful and useful, and the wise people of the city have reference to us in all their decisions.

And every day we keep up our traditions and subject ourselves to the rigorous inspection you witnessed tonight. We allow ourselves to be pushed by the ape to show we cannot be toppled. This is because it is best for one’s Facts to be well supported. Likewise, we carefully examine each other’s eye, cheek and lip colouring with a glass, we have a great fear of being improperly applied.

“Oh!” cried the beggar, who was weeping uncontrollably, “Such a sad history! And the more difficult for your selves to endure, subject as you are to feminine outbursts of extreme emotion!”

The youngest sister reminded the others that they had already agreed not to chop him into pieces, and that he couldn’t help himself really.

“Beautiful and merciful lady,” said the beggar, “May I have the honour of asking your name?”

“I am called The Gap Between Male And Female Work Attendance.”

The beggar seemed astonished to hear this.

“Please,” said the Fact, “If you are amazed to discover who I am, tell me the reason, without further fear of decapitation.”

“It is merely,” said the beggar after he had regained control of himself, “That you are smaller than I would have expected.”

“I get that a lot,” she replied.

And so the beggar was sent on his way. At the door he was presented with a purse full of one hundred sequins, on the condition that he never, ever come back again.

by Lyndon Hood

Without apologies to Craig Smith, Katz Cowley and all the people who got here first.

Earlier in the year, when asked what he really thought about something, Prime Minister John Key said, “I’m leaving it until my book. I know the answer, but just wait until my book.”

After an unprecedented two-and-a-half month investigation, Werewolf can now reveal he was talking about this…

I was walking down the road, and I saw a Prime Minister!
(hee-haw)
And he’d ‘forgotten’ about a pile of Tranzrail shares.

He was a shonky John Key.

I was walking down the road, and I saw a Prime Minister!
(hee-haw)
He’d ‘forgotten’ about a pile of Tranzrail shares –

and he had the whole National caucus singing out of the same songbook.

He was an
on-key
shonky John Key.

I was walking down the road, and I saw a Prime Minister!
(hee-haw)
He’d ‘forgotten’ about a pile of Tranzrail shares,
had the whole National caucus singing out of the same songbook –

and he danced like a white boy.

I was walking down the road, and I saw a Prime Minister!
(hee-haw)
He’d ‘forgotten’ about a pile of Tranzrail shares,
had the whole National caucus singing out of the same songbook,
he danced like a white boy –

and he was giving away bottles of wine from a vineyard he didn’t know if he owned.

He was a dodgy plonky,
honky, on-key,
shonky John Key.

I was walking down the road, and I saw a Prime Minister!
(hee-haw)
He’d ‘forgotten’ about a pile of Tranzrail shares,
had the whole National caucus singing out of the same songbook,
he danced like a white boy,
was giving away bottles of wine from a vineyard he didn’t know if he owned –

and everyone thought he was rather nice.

He was a lovely-jubbly,
dodgy plonky,
honky, on-key,
shonky John Key.

I was walking down the road, and I saw a Prime Minister!
(hee-haw)
He’d ‘forgotten’ about a pile of Tranzrail shares,
had the whole National caucus singing out of the same songbook,
was giving away bottles of wine from a vineyard he didn’t know if he owned,
he danced like a white boy,
everyone thought he was rather nice –

and argued he didn’t technically say he wouldn’t increase GST.

He was a wanky,
lovely-jubbly,
dodgy plonky,
honky, on-key,
shonky John Key.

I was walking down the road, and I saw a Prime Minister!
(hee-haw)
He’d ‘forgotten’ about a pile of Tranzrail shares,
had the whole National caucus singing out of the same songbook,
he danced like a white boy,
was giving away bottles of wine from a vineyard he didn’t know if he owned,
everyone thought he was rather nice,
he said he didn’t technically say he wouldn’t increase GST –

and he cut taxes for the rich, cancelled tax cuts for the middle, then cut taxes for the rich again.

He was a wealthy,
wanky,
lovely-jubbly,
dodgy plonky,
honky, on-key,
shonky John Key.

I was walking down the road, and I saw a Prime Minister!
(hee-haw)
He’d ‘forgotten’ about a pile of Tranzrail shares,
had the whole National caucus singing out of the same songbook,
he danced like a white boy,
was giving away bottles of wine from a vineyard he didn’t know if he owned,
everyone thought he was rather nice,
he said he didn’t technically say he wouldn’t increase GST,
cut taxes for the rich –

and he’d passed at least his share of authoritarian laws, made a bunch of patsy appointments, only seemed to like democracy as long as it doesn’t get in the way and had given Gerry Brownlee powers above God in Canterbury.

He was a who’s-your-daddy,
wealthy, wanky,
lovely-jubbly,
dodgy plonky,
honky, on-key,
shonky John Key.

I was walking down the road, and I saw a Prime Minister!
(hee-haw)
He’d ‘forgotten’ about a pile of Tranzrail shares,
had the whole National caucus singing out of the same songbook,
he danced like a white boy,
was giving away bottles of wine from a vineyard he didn’t know if he owned,
everyone thought he was rather nice,
he said he didn’t technically say he wouldn’t increase GST,
cut taxes for the rich,
placed Gerry Brownlee above God in Canterbury –

and he kept ‘reluctantly’ giving handouts to selected corporations.

He was a tory,
who’s-your-daddy,
wealthy, wanky,
lovely-jubbly,
dodgy plonky,
honky, on-key,
shonky John Key.

I was walking down the road, and I saw a Prime Minister!
(hee-haw)
He’d ‘forgotten’ about a pile of Tranzrail shares,
had the whole National caucus singing out of the same songbook,
he danced like a white boy,
was giving away bottles of wine from a vineyard he didn’t know if he owned,
everyone thought he was rather nice,
he said he didn’t technically say he wouldn’t increase GST,
cut taxes for the rich,
placed Gerry Brownlee above God in Canterbury,
kept ‘reluctantly’ giving corporate handouts –

and he said he’d was fixing the economy.

He was a bodgey,
tory,
who’s-your-daddy
wealthy, wanky,
lovely-jubbly,
dodgy plonky,
honky, on-key,
shonky John Key.

I was walking down the road, and I saw a Prime Minister!
(hee-haw)
He’d ‘forgotten’ about a pile of Tranzrail shares,
had the whole National caucus singing out of the same songbook,
he danced like a white boy,
was giving away bottles of wine from a vineyard he didn’t know if he owned,
everyone thought he was rather nice,
he said he didn’t technically say he wouldn’t increase GST,
cut taxes for the rich,
placed Gerry Brownlee above God in Canterbury,
kept ‘reluctantly’ giving corporate handouts,
said he was fixing the economy –

and his main opposition was Phil Goff’s Labour Party.

He was a lucky,
bodgey, tory,
who’s-your-daddy,
wealthy, wanky,
lovely-jubbly,
dodgy plonky,
honky, on-key,
shonky John key!

I was walking down the road, and I saw a Prime Minister!
(hee-haw)
He’d ‘forgotten’ about a pile of Tranzrail shares,
had the whole National caucus singing out of the same songbook,
he danced like a white boy,
was giving away bottles of wine from a vineyard he didn’t know if he owned,
everyone thought he was rather nice,
he said he didn’t technically say he wouldn’t increase GST,
cut taxes for the rich,
placed Gerry Brownlee above God in Canterbury,
kept ‘reluctantly’ giving corporate handouts,
said he was fixing the economy,
his main opposition was Phil Goff’s Labour Party –

and he was a state house boy made good who was “ambitious” for a New Zealand where he’s kicked the ladder out from behind him.

… which admittedly doesn’t mention civil unions at all. We can however off you the following, entirely unrelated, fragment turned up by our investigation:

I was walking down the road when I saw a politician!
(Aeeh!)

He was saying how we should catch Australia by doing the opposite of what Australia does,

he backed radical economic reforms, then spent all of 2005 pretending he didn’t, then did again, and having resigned as National leader wants to be Act leader, or if not that leader of his own party –

and no matter how hard we kicked him he kept coming back.

by Lyndon Hood

New Zealand: You have been Mooned,

Am I the only one with this frame of mind? The one that treats a statement like “there’s nothing funny about the earthquake” as a challenge to my capcity for irreverence?

It’s partly a matter of personality. I think my habit of irony started as a way of avoiding emotional involvement. So my prose might be okay but I’m not much fun at parties.

It’s also principle. I tend to think ‘it was a joke’ isn’t really a defence for saying something horrible, but on the other hand I don’t believe there are things you shouldn’t joke about. It’s just that, when anger is so near the surface and confusion is so easy, it better be a bloody good joke.

So here’s me starting into a column about how I’m not writing a column, except this time I’m not even being properly ironic.

Except possibly ‘cosmic irony’. Sucks being human, eh.

[ New Zealand's 9/11: John Key Declares 'War on Geology']

After September 11 2001, amid speculation about the death of irony, satirical website The Onion took one week off before producing their most memorable single issue ever [ Comments from a writer here].

[ What? Oh, those Eastern suburbs.]

Natural disasters don’t offer quite as many moving targets, but I think I appreciate “Not Knowing What Else To Do, Woman Bakes American-Flag Cake” more now. It recognises a certain helpless ridiculousness, without mocking it.

I mention this because of one thought I had on September 12. In 1999 The Onion produced Our Dumb Century, a book inventing one satire (or parody) newpaper front page for every year of the 20th century. What if they did it now?

[ 1973: At today's official opening of the World Trade Centre in Manhattan, the chairman of the Port Authority expressed the hope the mighty skyscrapers would be a symbol USA's strength and a metaphor for her presence throughout the world, their towering height a beacon to all who see them. "I like to imagine someone flying past in an aeroplane – even two or three decades from now surely they will immediately recognise these twin towers as the beating heart of international American capitalism. They embody the American spirit and the freedoms guaranteed by our constitution, and they will endure as a long."]

Probably, they’d write something not like that. Welcome to my world. I guess it’s just a matter of “you’ve got to laugh or you’ll cry”, except that I have a unnecessarily complicated sense of humour.

[ Just When It's Kind Of Not 'Too Soon' About Christchurch,
Devastating Wave In Japan Frustrates Satirist's Urge To Quip About Natural Distasters]

I’ll accept there’s nothing funny when the earth breaks, destroying cities and snatching away lives. I was taught a joke can be as simple as an unexpected change in rhythmn, but I don’t think that’s what he meant. Although if the disaster were sped up and played, à la Benny Hill, to the tune of ‘Yakety Sax’, it might just work. .

[ Knock knock
Who's there?
Knock Bang BangCRASHCRASHCRASHCRASHThudSMASHRumbleRumble
Earthquake who?]

Anyway: beyond that point, humanity gets involved. And people, as has been widely noted, are funny.

Thoughtful preachers will say God was not in the earthquake, but between the people in the seconds, hours and day that came afterwards. The thought applies to the ridiculous as much as the sublime.

[ Portaloo – Knowing my fate is to be with you
Portaloo – They're finally placing my portaloo]

I mean, no matter what you think about Ken Ring – for example, that he’s a literal charlatan and a literal lunatic who’s too busy preying on the insecurities of a devastated population and concealing how badly his methods work to actually accept the conclusions of the scientific research he likes to cite – but Sunday’s 5.1 earthquake in Christchurch display immaculate comic timing.

I mean, the ground was all like, “Oh well: round about bedtime, I guess there’s not going to be any kind of earthquake OH WAIT THERE’S ONE! Guess you don’t get to tar and feather Ole Ken after all.”

There was also a 5.0 in Tauranga. Nobody cares.

[ I mean, I predicted something dramatic would happen to get the Welfare Working Group off the front pages.
But nobody puts me on the television.]

Perhaps a more venerable version of “Woman Bakes Cakes” is the story Rabelias tells (by way of excusing his own frivolous writing) of the philosopher Diogenes of Sinope in Gargantua and Pantagreul. The passage also demonstrates Rabelias’ affection – or compulsion – for mesmerizingly long lists, which I’ve shortened because there is only so much room on the Internet.

When Philip, King of Macedon, enterprised the siege and ruin of Corinth, the Corinthians having received certain intelligence by their spies that he with a numerous army in battle-rank was coming against them, were all of them, not without cause, most terribly afraid; and therefore were not neglective of their duty in doing their best endeavours to put themselves in a fit posture to resist his hostile approach and defend their own city.

Some from the fields brought into the fortified places their movables, bestial, corn, wine, fruit, victuals, and other necessary provision.

Others did fortify and rampire their walls, set up little fortresses, bastions, squared ravelins, digged trenches, cleansed countermines, fenced themselves with gabions, contrived platforms, emptied casemates, barricaded the false brays, erected the cavaliers, repaired the counterscarps, plastered the curtains, lengthened ravelins, stopped parapets, morticed barbacans… [ etc, etc, etc]

Every man exercised his weapon, every man scoured off the rust from his natural hanger; nor was there a woman amongst them, though never so reserved or old, who made not her harness to be well furbished; as you know the Corinthian women of old were reputed very courageous combatants.

Diogenes seeing them all so warm at work, and himself not employed by the magistrates in any business whatsoever, he did very seriously, for many days together, without speaking one word, consider and contemplate the countenance of his fellow-citizens.

Then on a sudden, as if he had been roused up and inspired by a martial spirit, he girded his cloak scarfwise about his left arm, tucked up his sleeves to the elbow, trussed himself like a clown gathering apples, and, giving to one of his old acquaintance his wallet, books, and opistographs, away went he out of town towards a little hill or promontory of Corinth called (the) Cranie; and there on the strand, a pretty level place, did he roll his jolly tub, which served him for a house to shelter him from the injuries of the weather: there, I say, in a great vehemency of spirit, did he turn it, veer it, wheel it, whirl it, frisk it, jumble it, shuffle it, huddle it, tumble it, hurry it, jolt it… [ etc, etc, etc] and every way so banged it and belaboured it that it was ten thousand to one he had not struck the bottom of it out.

Which when one of his friends had seen, and asked him why he did so toil his body, perplex his spirit, and torment his tub, the philosopher’s answer was that, not being employed in any other charge by the Republic, he thought it expedient to thunder and storm it so tempestuously upon his tub, that amongst a people so fervently busy and earnest at work he alone might not seem a loitering slug and lazy fellow.

[ Week 2: Resumption of politics as usual, but with
"Because of the earthquake we must" stuck in front.]

Unlike classical philopher/vagrants, the modern satirist/comedian may have transferrable skills. Randall Munroe, whose stick-figure geeky-in-a-good way webcomic XKCD has previously included things like a diagram of the heights of things in the observable universe above ground level on a logarithmic scale, produced an infographic on the effects of radiation exposure (and still reflexively adds a couple of jokes).

[ Aren't we about due to forget about Christchurch? I mean, we forgot about that flood in Pakistan while it was still happening...]

In my own rather smaller league, doing news has been more work than usual. I know: it’s now illegal to complain about stuff if you live outside Canterbury. It’s just that I want to say I haven’t had much energy for chores, and hence to speculate that these natural disasters may mean the death of ironing.

[ Uncovered time capsule reads: "And in closing, O future people: you know there's a fault line here, right?"]

So I feel I can break from satirical tradition and make a constructive suggestion*: Stories are good.

Not just stories about the earthquake. Though with the telling these will change. Not growing, not becoming untrue, but becoming more perfect stories. Many, no doubt, will become funnier. But on the other hand, recounting your suffering can be a ritual of retraumatisation.

[ "And so farewell, from a city where the television presenters speaking as they always do at these.
The sentences, incomplete. A litter of continuous present form verbs. Talking. Emoting. Hoping."]

What I mean is: all the stories. Whichever ones you think of when I say that. Comic or tragic – and I have this (forgive me) via Neitzsche – stories are what we use to make reason of an unreasonable world. We live in the age of the internet – we actually can have our jetpack if we really want – but there are still witches in the forest.

[ Might encourage people to return to the city if we did the coverage commercial-radio style:
"A magnitude 5.1 aftershock ROCKED Christchurch. ROCKED!]

Tell stories. Opposable thumbs make it easier to operate a Playstation; stories make us human.

And yes, that includes stories about people who predict earthquakes by the moon. You know the sort of thing: fairy tales.

–

* I am, of course, unfair to satirical tradition. Another relevant case in point: Voltaire’s Candide is – it’s important as many people as possible know this – just an enormous, rollicking and fairly brief shaggy dog story. Its official target is the ‘optimistic’ position that “everything for the best”, but it has its own answers to this suffering world (Warning: contains an earthquake). So another piece of advice: let us cultive our garden**.

** Metaphorically, that is.***

*** Not that there’s anything wrong with actual gardening, either.

By Lyndon Hood

“Untitled Employment Policy #7″, John Key, 2008-2011 (collection of the artist)

In a move that has already provoked controversy, John Key has been awarded the 2011 Walters Prize for his work “Prime Minister of New Zealand”.

Political performance art is usually frowned on by the establishment and some have claimed the award was based solely on public popularity.

Walters jury member Helen Highwater has already publicly disassociated herself from the result. “[The prize] recognises an artist who has made an outstanding contribution to contemporary art in New Zealand in the two years prior,” she said. “John Key isn’t an artist, he’s a politician.”

Judge Allen Huge-Glasses called this “an understandable mistake” and went on to defend the quality of Key’s work. “Good art should provoke, and shake our preconceptions,” he said, “As a society we assume Prime Ministers should have some – well, any – dignity. Mr Key makes us ask the question: what if, instead, the Prime Minister was a clown? A loveable clown, with all the gravitas of a helium balloon. A comic vacuum cleaner salesman hawking policies door to door. John Key’s ‘Prime Minister of New Zealand’ lets us experience the answer to that question in all its glory and its horror.”

The secret of clowns, Huge-Glasses explained, is they make fools of themselves in public, but feel no shame. “Yes, an ordinary clown might have minced down a runway platform or chatted about the ladies with the country’s most prominent perpetrator of domestic violence. Mr Key’s genius recontextualises these actions, performing them in the persona of leader of an actual country, and carries that gormless idiocy fully into the political realm.”

“Look at the state asset sales. It’s supposed to be horribly unpopular, and not one of his reasons stack up. He won’t understand the problem with talking to Tony Veitch, even though his justice policy seems entirely based on never forgiving criminals. He just keeps on going, like Mr Bean trying to pack a suitcase. And we love him for it.”

“You can make this stuff up, but it takes a heroic effort and that deserves to be recognised.”

Despite some extreme views, this year’s award has been unique in receiving no editorial criticism from the media. Commentators as diverse as the Herald editorial and Garth George have described the jury’s decision as “far-sighted”, “bold” and “a death blow to namby-pamby PC political correctness”.

Members of the public spoken to by Werewolf described the news that the Prime Minister had won the award as “nice”.

John Key – a persona adopted by flamboyant Czech émigré Jan Klíč in 1992 – spoke about the win at his weekly press conference. High public office is an unusual base for political parody but Mr Key said it wasn’t as much work as he had expected: “Basically I just let my Ministers do whatever they want and I can devote my energy to The Work.”

Key announced that he will be taking a new commission titled “Welfare Reform” to represent New Zealand at the Venice Bienalle.

He was also questioned further on his radio conversations with Tony Veitch. When asked if saying that women “should be thrilled” to be on his ‘hot list’ was compounding sexual objectification, he responded, “that’s a big word, missy.”

Opposition leader Phil Goff responded quickly to the prize announcement, saying “I’m performance art too. Look!” He then began to construct an invisible wall using mime. Onlookers were impressed by Mr Goff’s technique, and said they could practically tell what the wall was made of.

The Walters Prize announcement would normally take place in 2012. It was brought forward to avoid a conflict with the Rugby World Cup.

By Lyndon Hood

Click for big version
Merry Christmas from Lyndon Hood’s Desktop

January

Tax working groups suggests moving the nation away from wild-consumer-spending consumption, towards Edwardian-waif-dying-picturesquely-while-coughing-up-bloody-mucus consumption.

Amid rumours Attorney-General Chris Finlayson seems ‘a bit down’, National MPs begin planning bills he can issue damning Bill of Rights reports against. That always perks him up.

5/1/10 That Was The Decade That Was

February

Jeanette Fitzsimons leaves Parliament. New Green co-leaders declare withdrawal of Mother Earth’s protection over nation will cause “no problems” in forseeable future.

Schoolteachers propose national standards for Education Ministers.

1/2/10 Werewolf: Think Crimes

March

Plans to dig up conservation land begin a miner kerfuffle.

Wellington Airport proposes to express the spirit of the local film industry with a big sign saying NON-UNIONISED LABOUR.

2/3/10 Werewolf: Logo-rhythms
Pics of the Weeks: January to March ’10

April

NZ endorses UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in unexpected move that “totally wasn’t a secret it’s just that we went out of our way to stop you finding out.”

Government announces plans to deal with impending superannuation crunch by “Oh! Look over there! [smoke bomb] [sound of running feet]”

1/4/10 Werewolf: Boraxing poetical

May

Budget 2010 undergoes last-minute revision as unnamed minister realises a ‘double-dip’ recession does not mean chocolate dip and sprinkles.

Government finally follows up initial round of tax cuts for the rich with tax cuts for the rich.

3/5/10 Werewolf: Faster Liberals, Kill! Kill!
5/5/10 Peter’s On First
19/5/10 Sweeping Taxonomy Changes For Budget
31/5/10 Werewolf: Some more of me polemics

June

Deepwater Horizon oil disaster reminds Gerry Brownlee of some offshore drilling plans that had slipped his mind.

Chris Carter apologises for excessive use of travel allowance, and undertakes to fix things so no Labour MP can ever abuse a ministerial allowance again.

7/6/10 More and More Curious!
29/6/10 Werewolf: The Battle Of No Oil

July

Much like the tides, the foreshore and seabed debate washes up a bunch of stuff we though we’d thrown out.

New regulation requires people who are still all like ‘these are just the kind of so-called nanny state policies you were complaining about when you were in opposition’ to be sent to bed without any supper.

28/7/10 Werewolf: Striking Comedy Gold

August

Much like a dying star, the ACT party begins to implode, to eventually leave nothing but a red dwarf.

Chris Carter expelled.

9/8/10 The Calculator of Cthulhu
27/8/10 The Week In Toxication
30/8/10 Werewolf: Absolutist Simon Power Corrupts Absolutely

September

Onlookers wonder if Canterbury earthquake emergency legislation grants the Executive too much power. Minister Gerry Brownlee dismisses these criticisms as “herecy”.

Lesson from this month: If the scandalous headline will include the phrase ‘dead baby’, give it a miss.

16/9/10 The Christchurch Dialogues
28/9/10 Werewolf: Auto Erotic

October

New Zealanders rise up at the prospect of a Narnia movie being filmed overseas, while actors call for boycott of Spartacus. Or something.

Auckland voters launch Super City by smashing a champagne bottle on the face of Rodney Hide.

Now that some time has passed and the fuss has died down: That Paul Henry came across as a bit of an asshole, eh?

Chris Carter expelled some more.

27/10/10 Werewolf: Looney Toons In Hobbiton

November

Police Commissioner joins chief Justice and Corrections CEO in expressing doubts about increasingly punitive justice policies. Leaves Select Committee hearing to find his car crushed and his office placed under private management.

Explosions in Pike River mine kill 29. After brief standoff with internal editor, satirist accepts there is nothing funny about this.

In a slip-up likely to derail future reform plans, PM John Key accidentally declares use of term ‘unsustainable’ unsustainable.

24/11/10 Werewolf: Lost in Wiseacre Wood

December

Pansy Wong resigns from Parliament. Rookie. Catch Chris Carter doing something like that? I don’t think so.

How many years does it take before it stops being ‘drought relief’ and starts being just a subsidy, anyway?

Julian Assange’s hair leaps to top of news agenda.

21/12/10 Werewolf: This article
Pics of the Weeks: Most of 2010

********

by Lyndon Hood

One day the Bear and his friend, the Small Pig, were strolling through the wood, and the Bear was just beginning to think he might like some honey, when, rather suddenly, the fair weather ended and the forest became very dark indeed, and very cold, and quite unfamiliar.

It had been, the Bear thought to himself, quite an enjoyable walk up until this point.

“Are we lost?” asked the Small Pig.

“I don’t think we are lost,” said the Bear. “That is, I don’t exactly know where we are, but I think I have a plan for getting back.”

“Oh good,” said the Small Pig.

“It seems to me,” said the Bear, who was remembering something he had once been told about how to get out of a maze, “It seems to me that we should try to go forwards, and slightly to the right. And then when we get home we can have some honey.”

“Could we have haycorns, too?” asked the Small Pig, who was quite partial to acorns.

“Certainly. In moderation,” said the Bear, how rather preferred honey but virtuously considered it a matter of personal choice.

The Small Pig was rather pleased by this, but still seemed a little uncertain.

“Are you sure we oughtn’t try going… back?” asked the Small Pig quietly.

“Do you want your haycorns or not?” asked the Bear.

“Oh, I do.”

“Well, then.”

So off they went, forwards, and slightly to the right.

After a while, it began to snow.

The Bear decided that the main thing was that the Small Pig should not loose Confidence. So he decided to sing a Brave Song as they walked. But he couldn’t decide between the song about Small Government And De-regulation, or the song about How Not To Scare Horses, so instead he just hummed in a brave way, and generally pretended to be quite certain they were heading in the right direction.

And the Small Pig did begin to feel rather better when he saw this, and started to think he was a Very Brave Small Pig indeed out on an Adventure. And he was feeling quite sorry for anyone out in this weather who didn’t know the right way home, and thinking the snow was quite pretty as it began to settle on the ground and the branches of the trees, when he saw the thing that made him jump up into the air with a terrified little squeal.

“Look!” he said, and pointed.

There were tracks in the snow ahead of them.

The Bear looked at the footprints thoughtfully.

“What do you think it is?” asked the Small Pig.

“It might,” said the Bear cautiously, “be a Stralia.”

“A Stralia?”

“Yes. This shows we’re heading in the right direction.”

The tracks did indeed follow just the path they were going to take – the prints of four feet, going forwards, and slightly to the right.

“We should try to catch up with it!” said the Bear, and immediately set off, with the Small Pig beside him.

“What will we say to the Stralia, when we catch up with it?” asked the Small Pig.

“We will say , ‘Ha! Caught you!’ And it will give us a ride home and we shall have some honey. And haycorns.”

The Small Pig was looking at the footprints and wondering how fast one had to go to catch a Stralia, when he squealed and pointed again. There was now another set of four footprints along with the first, all of them heading off together, ahead, and a little to the right.

“Hmm,” said the Bear, “Perhaps this means the Stralia is growing. We should try to catch up with it as soon as we can.”

So they carried on.

The Small Pig was a little bit afraid about which part of the Stralia they might catch up with first. It might be very well, thought the Small Pig, to catch up with a Stralia’s bushy eyebrows (the Small Pig considered bushy eyebrows a sign of a kind nature, and imagined the Stralia had them) or its per capita GDP, but what if one were catch up with its great big teeth first, or its lashing tail, or its environment, or its race relations record?

“Is the Stralia very much bigger than us, then?” asked the Small Pig nervously.

“It is,” said the Bear.

“Are we catching up with the Stralia?”

“Oh, yes!”

“And are we getting closer to home?”

“Of course we are!”

“How – how do you know?”

“Well,” explained the Bear, “We’re obviously going the right way, and we’ve been going along quite some time, so we must be.”

“Oh!” said the Small Pig, not because he understood, but because he’d just noticed even more tracks in the snow and was alarmed all over again.

“Perhaps,” said the Bear as they walked along (he had decided that if they stopped every time more tracks showed up they would be there all day), “This is because of a Hoppersition.”

“Hop-hoppersition?”

“A hoppersition,” said the Bear gravely, “is a horrible creature with nine long ears, who ruins everything. I expect it’s trying to confuse us. I should have expected to come across a Hoppersition here. After all we are lost in the wilderness.”

“Are Hoppositions dangerous?” asked the Small Pig.

“Well, some are, but I shouldn’t think this one is.”

So they walked on, and the Small Pig was so busy checking the shadows for Hoppoisitons he didn’t notice the new tracks appearing until there were quite a number of new ones, at which he almost fainted.

“I’m not quite certain this is working.” said the Small Pig, in a tone of voice that said he was rather certain, really, and that he thought it wasn’t working.

“Well, you could wait here for a while and see if the Hopposition will help you.”

The Small Pig felt he didn’t want to do that, so off they went again.

As they walked along, the Small Pig was thinking that they had surely walked far enough to get home, and that it was definitely time to be sitting down to some haycorns rather than walking though the snow in a Stralia- and Hopposition-infested wilderness. He began to wonder whether, even though the slightly-to-the-right was clearly moving them in a rightwards direction (he imagined they must be quite a long way to the right by now), perhaps somehow the going-forwards wasn’t have the forward-going effect the Bear said it was. The Small Pig was just gathering up his courage to say so, when the Bear spoke.

“We need to stop you worrying,” he said, “I know just the way.”

“Oh good!” said the Small Pig, who was so relieved at the idea of not having to worry that he forgot what he was going to say.

“We’ll make this urgent! Come on then! Quickly now!”

The Small Pig wasn’t quite sure what the point of all the Urgency was (or whether they were still trying to catch the Stralia) but it certainly meant he didn’t have time to complain, and he had to run quite fast to have any hope of keeping up with what the Bear was doing.

And so it was that they both ran headlong into the legs of the Boy.

“A Hopposition!” screamed the Small Pig.

“No, silly, it’s me,” said the Boy, “What are you two doing? I’ve been watching you walk around in circles for ages, and now you’re running!”

“We were trying,” said the Bear, “to catch up with a Stralia.”

“Oh, Bear,” said the Boy, “You are silly. I’ve certainly never heard of a Stralia going to the right all the time. What made you think you could catch one like that? I think you were going to go that way anyhow and just decided a Stralia was in that direction. But now here you are no better off than when you started.”

“I think,” said the Bear, “We’ve made some underlying progress. For example, we’ve had some healthy exercise, and it will be much easier going now we’ve trampled this path in the snow.”

“Let’s go home and have tea,” said the Boy.

“But that’s what I’m trying to do,” said the Bear, and set off again, this time hopping on one leg.

“Oh, Bear! What are you doing now?”

“Rebalancing. I can feel it working already. I’m sure I shall come across some honey any minute now.”

And so the Boy and the Small Pig went home and had tea (and acorns), and the Bear continued trying to make progress while moving methodically to the right.

For all I know, he’s still there to this day.

Satire by Lyndon Hood

Yes sir, you sure do meet some strange types in the wedding chapel line. What I like most about the business – all the folks you meet. Most of ‘em happy, too, and a new couple every hour.

Some of ‘em, though: powerful strange.

I remember one Thursday – it must have been a Thursday, I was dressed as Elvis – a big, balding fella come storming through the door demanding to be wed. Happened I was free at the time, so I got out the paperwork.

“Where’s the lady?” I asked him.

“Outside,” he said.

“In the car?”

“We’ll get to that.”

“Okay. Y’all got some ID there?”

I looked at the piece of paper. Now, I have no idea what a New Zealand ministerial warrant is supposed to look like, so I had to take him at his word. I wrote down the name.

“Flight of the Conchords,” I said, “Funny guys. And the other party?”

I was on more familiar ground here. These were car registration papers.

“She owns the car?”

Something about the way he paused made me look up and when I saw his face it kind of told me.

“She is the car?”

“That’s right,” he said with a kind of slow, awful sincerity, “I love cars so much, that I literally want to marry them.”

Now, I’m sure I didn’t know how to respond to that. He seemed to feel the urge to kind of fill up the silence.

“I love everything about cars. I love the way they look and the noises they make. I love the way a majority of New Zealanders use them for their daily commute. I love the way they respond when you give them stuff. Like roads. And petrol. And drunk drivers. I love the way voters like cars. I would do anything for cars. I would pluck the highways of national significance from the stars and place them under cars’ tyres. I would pave the world for cars. I’ve driven carelessly in the past, but I’ve changed. And now I’ve realised I want to spend the rest of my life making cars as happy as I can, and helping raise a new generation of cars.”

“Son, I can’t marry you to a car.”

“Civil union, then. Hurry it up. Take any longer with your decision-making process and I’ll have it called in.”

He was sweating a little. His top button was undone and his bow tie just sort of hanging there like he’d lost patience with it.

“Well sure,” I said carefully, “That sounds like a fine idea. But just while the… the lady ain’t present,” I dared to glance out the window – sure enough the only thing in the lot was an actual Cadillac and it surely was pink, “are you sure ’bout this? She don’t look like she’d mind if you some time to consider. I mean, a car is a very fine thing. But wouldn’t it be better if a few more people would catch a train in the morning? Why, it’s surely cheaper and as for all that smoke…”

“I’ll thank you not to speak ill of the class of object I love!”

He face had got very close to mine.

“Son, are you drunk?”

“Not technically.”

“You ain’t sober.”

“Yeah, but I reckon my blood/alcohol level is about, oh, point seven. I require research specific to me before I decide if that make me drunk.”

“It makes everyone else drunk.”

“I require research specific to me.”

“Only I definitely ain’t gonna wed you to your car if you’re drunk.”

“I require respific to sear… ‘fic to me.”

His gaze was probably as unwavering as body could expect in the circumstances. But I wondered.

“Son, why are you sure you want to go through with this?”

“Collective responsibility.”

I’d heard that tone before. He made it sound like a vehicular kind of unintended pregnancy. I didn’t enquire – you have to be discreet.

“Well son, I’d love to help you with your little problem, but I ain’t gonna. For one thing, you and I both know you’re drunk. And for another, you want to marry a car. Now that ain’t legal, and frankly, it ain’t right. I think you’d best be on your way.”

Yessir, you meet some mighty strange folk. So you see, I do take some care about my business, and I won’t wed ‘em if it ain’t right.

He didn’t go straight away o’course. I let him have some coffee outta pity but when my nine o’clock showed (lady was an economically liberal political party and the fella was a conservative crime lobby group, marryin’ in a bit of a rush, as you may say) he musta seen I was wasn’t gonna change my mind and slunk off. Probably went to try the every chapel in town, and maybe he succeeded. Some people ain’t got standards.

Though there was one more peculiar thing. When he drove off, I’ll be long time forgetting the sound of that engine made.

Sounded kinda grateful.

by Lyndon Hood

Wellington, 28 July – Energy Minister Gerry Brownlee has announced the discovery “significant” quantities of irony underlying the Parliament area of Wellington. He said the Government plans to exploit these to “the maximum possible extent”.

The multiple layers of irony, which have been laid down over many decades, also contain commercial quantities of shamelessness, arrogance and delusion.

“Our consultation on mining in national parks has given us a mandate to proceed full speed with mining in other areas,” said Brownlee, showing off a sample to the press gallery.

“We already knew there were low-value deposits of foresight, good governance and democracy,” said Brownlee, referring to previous test cores taken in the beehive lawn, “But it turns out that was just a veneer. Get past that and it’s irony all the way down. Which proves what I always say: if you’re in a hole, keep digging.”

The plans have provoked immediate controversy, with large sectors of the population insisting that this is not technically irony.

“I know many people are emotional about this,” said Brownlee, “When we talk about irony they remember Alannis Morrisette. Nobody wants that. But unless they’re prepared to give up their sarcasm and their classical tragedy, they should stop complaining about our plans to extract maximum irony by levelling Wellington.”

“This Government has many more exciting plans going forward for a step-change the New Zealand economy,” he added. “To keep up at the rate we’re going, we’ll need every ounce of irony we can get. As it is we used up a year’s supply just banning cellphones in cars. Y’know, considering all that ‘nanny state’ stuff we said before it was us in Government.”

Most of the irony is found in the Parliamentary precinct and experts agree it cannot be removed unless every building there is completely destroyed.

The Historic Places Trust has voiced concern at the plan, as some of the structures have heritage value, and the complex performs a useful democratic function.

Minister of Local Government Rodney Hide, who would have responsibility for the consents process, brushed aside this objection.

“‘Useful democratic function’?” said Hide. “That’s not irony. That’s just an oxymoron.”

ACT MP John Boscawen rebutted assertions that, with worldwide irony at unprecedented levels, it is dangerous to unearth more.

“Global irony is decreasing,” he said. “Records show it peaked 2004, when George W Bush was re-elected.”

Boscawen was placed on ACT’s list after organising a march “for democracy” (about smacking). Now, Local Government Minister Rodney Hide is his party leader.

Prime Minister John Key, who claims that by ‘changes to Schedule 4′ he meant making it bigger, emphasised the benefits of more freely-available irony.

He cited a recent survey which found that 99.2% of parliamentarians suffered from irony deficiency and the other one was unavailable for testing.

Ironising the economy would also leave future Governments free to use correct spelling.

“For too long now, we’ve had to subistitute a ‘c’ for ‘r’ because there wasn’t enough irony to go round,” said Key.

“I believe in a nation where we can call them what they are: an Ironic Cycleway Stretching the Length of New Zealand, an Ironic Structure for Auckland’s Waterfront, that kind of thing.”

The Thorndon deposit will add to the rich irony sands already discovered in the foreshore and seabed.

I don’t normally pay much attention to such unsolicited overseas musical compositions as cross my desk from time to time.

In this case, perhaps it was the element of social commentary that piqued my interest; perhaps it was the attached note from the author offering to “feed [my] guts to the gators and stew the rest of [me] in lye” if I did not publish it.

Accordingly, I now present “The Battle of No Oil, Please”, by Mr Curly Dustfoot. Actually, I forget what the man was called – the computer that received the original email was deepwatered by a chianti spill – but it was definitely one of those Country/Western/Hobbit names. I recall he also described himself as “not one of your fancy big-city song slingers”.

In the absence of further instructions I’ve recreated the song from memory. Which is, I think, doubly unfair as I am not a professional musician and wouldn’t have felt obliged to, except technology has made music production so tragically available to the masses.

Anyway, I hope, for my intestines’ sake, that this is sufficient.

Click here to download the MP3
In tribute to our lads’ victory in South Africa, here’s a Bonus World Cup Remix
and much like BP, I’m keen to use the internet to find people who think they can do a better job: Audacity files (.zip, 2.8MB)

THE BATTLE OF NO OIL, PLEASE
by Lightning Sideburns

In twenty ten BP caused a slick
With an oil well they built off the mighty Mississip’.
The platform blew apart at the seams
And sank in a fire you could see from New Orleans.

CHORUS
Tried to stop the oil, but the oil kept a-gushing
There’s sure more round than there was a while ago
Tried once more, the oil went on rushing
Out a hole in the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico.

So they tried to thin that oil with toxic crud
And they tried to plug the hole with some souped-up mud
The best plan they had was gonna take a month or three
So they made the well top hat and they set fire to the sea.

CHORUS
Tried to stop the oil, but the oil kept a-gushing
There’s sure more round than there was a while ago
Tried once more, the oil went on rushing
Out a hole in the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico.

Obama came on down to see the slick
Then went chasin’ his own tail lookin’ for an ass to kick
The birds was fouled up, the fishes was screwed
Even ole Yes We Can couldn’t stop that crude
[Oil, that is. Black sludge. Gulf goobers.]

CHORUS
Tried to stop the oil, but the oil kept a-gushing
There’s sure more round than there was a while ago
Tried once more, the oil went on rushing
Out a hole in the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico.

CHORUS 2
Well they cleaned up for the cameras and then laid off all the workers
They tried to hide the evidence and tried to lie low
They lied about risks and they lied about the leak rate
And they made their bed and lied there in the Gulf of Mexico

When Congress looked BP in the eyes
Joe Barton took the chance to apologise.
Yeah it aint happened prior and it caused ‘em distress
Someone made Big Oil pay for its own mess

CHORUS
Tried to stop the oil, but the oil kept a-gushing
There’s sure more round than there was a while ago
Tried once more, the oil went on rushing
Out a hole in the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico.

CHORUS 2
Yeah! They cleaned up for the cameras and then laid off all the workers
They tried to hide the evidence and tried to lie low
They lied about risks and they lied about the leak rate
And they made their bed and lied there in the Gulf of Mexico
[Y'all come back now, hear?]

Readers may note a resemblance – for the sake of my intestines I will suggest it is conincidental – to The Battle of New Orleans, a song celebrating the epinymous incident in the American War of Independence.

Coming as it did just after peace was concluded in negotiations in far-off Europe, the battle – with its famous routing of the British – both marked the start of a new nation and provided a memorable example of that nation’s traditional gratuitous violence.

The song was apparently written by a schoolteacher and as performed by Johnny Horton in 1959 it became a hit. This may make it the most successful song ever written for educational purposes.

It was brought to the Empire by Lonnie Donegan’s version, which was in turn parodied in New Zealand by the Howard Morrison Quartet as The Battle of the Waikato. So my correspondent Mr Thunderpants, or whatever his name is, is in good company – though I’m not sure he’d have the wit to appreciate it.

by Lyndon Hood

“How many dates in a scone?”
– Gerry Brownlee on estimates of untapped mineral wealth.

The debate on this matter is rather intense
(Among those who keep track of Currant events).
The nub of the question – I may have it wrong –
Regards the proportion of Dates in a Scone.

When it comes to assessing potential mates
I’m not – I confess it – a great one for Dates.
Instead, I hang out (as a New Zealand male)
Somewhere near her, which works (or more commonly, fails).

But to move to the point this debate hinges on,
I’m also not fussed about Dates in my Scone.
I prefer jam and cream (with a nice cup of tea)
It’s what’s on the Scone that’s appealing to me.

And if, as may be, there arises dispute
Regarding the exact percentage of Fruit
It seems quite extreme methods must be employed –
Dismantled, or devoured, the Scone is destroyed.

What’s the Principle our Government’s working from?
“The people have no Nature!” “Then let them eat Scone!
Environments all get wrecked sooner or later.
Now pick up that spade and collect me more Data!”

From his keenness our Gerry, I think, estimates
That the Scone is constructed entirely of Dates.
(For all I know that talking point’s planned for tomorrow;
Like the Dates, I’ll find that, too, impossible to swallow.)

In these Accounts, I submit, something’s been lost;
They’ve got oodles of Income and none of the Costs,
Not even Financial. (And – perhaps some relation –
missing too, any Minister of Conservation.)

We’d not accept Benefits so much inflated,
Perhaps, while the Pit-falls remain un-debated
If instead of some ‘Dates’ buried under the ground we
Were speaking of a Date with one Gerry Brownlee.

But of course we will eat our Scones, that’s what they’re for:
Unlike Pristine Environments, we can make more.
In Baking’s case, not others, it might be true
We can indeed have a Scone, and eat one too;

But think what would become of you if, for a lark
You did dig a bunch of holes in Eden Park?
Or Surgically counted – if you owned, or seized her –
The number of Dates in the Mona Lisa?

“The dream is over.”
– Paula Bennet on welfare changes.

I had a dream,
If I might share,
Some time ago;
It was quite queer:

Where people thought
(And also voiced)
Those with no money
Weren’t so by choice.

Instead of to
Survive, they’d give
To needy folk
So they could live.

Enough for help
In all thoses messes
Making ladders
To successes.

(And in my dream
Those who’d climbed them
Didn’t pull them
Up behind them.)

They weren’t (“To show
How much we care”)
Forced into jobs
That were not there,

And work was found
Using this test:
Not first to hand
But suited best.

(The word for that
Now escapes me.
Oh, that’s right: Pro-
Ductivity.)

The people there
Would not (the dolts!)
Let children starve
For parents’ faults.

I had a dream
Where poverty
Was thought a thing
That shouldn’t be.

And in that dream
(I was surprised!)
One could be poor
And not despised.

I had a dream –
As is the deal
With dreams (and hopes),
It wasn’t real.

“… I can also confirm that the reason for the delay in releasing the report for the last few months is that we have been trying to find quotes of Phil Goff standing up in Cabinet and rejecting the 74 applications for mines that his Labour Government approved.”
– John Key in Parliament, on the Government’s mining plan.

So you want to mine the green-oh
Sing public opposi-tion
But nobody else is keen-oh,
The people aren’t in favour
Wait a week – or thirteen-oh!
Delay the poli-sea

On the sly you could prob’ly have got up to more,
Sing public opposi-tion
Like that boundary-shifting you did before,
The people aren’t in favour
But you already said you’ve a policy in store.
Delay the poli-sea

Don’t use the time to get more advice
Sing public opposi-tion
Some say information’s always nice
The people aren’t in favour
But it might cause you to think twice.
Delay the poli-sea

Don’t use the time to make your plans
Sing public opposi-tion
More in line with where the public stands
The people aren’t in favour
Doesn’t public opinion do tricks on demand?
Delay the poli-sea

Don’t change you mind on that, Sir
Sing public opposi-tion
Make a talking-point schedule exact, Sir
The people aren’t in favour
And make some NEW facts, Sir
Delay the poli-sea

If people think you’re wrong, mate
Sing public opposi-tion
Change the words of your song, mate
The people aren’t in favour
But the tune stays the same all along, mate
Delay the poli-sea

Here the diggers are waiting for a day to start
Sing public opposi-tion
Tearing the ground, like good planning, apart
The people aren’t in favour
Can’t fault your courage, just your brain and your heart.
Belay that poli-sea.

ENDS

Click to enlarge

Pity Simon Power.

On his sofa watching The Shawshank Redemption, crying into his ice cream while Judith Collins and Rodney Hide announce a new Three Strikes plan.

The Minister of Corrections and the Minister of Local Government.

Who cares if it’s a Justice bill. I didn’t want to announce it anyway.

He hasn’t checked the rules but he has a horrible feeling he might be required to defend the bill in Parliament. Perhaps he could go on some kind of holiday.

‘Three Strikes’. Honestly.

Simon reminds himself that New Zealand does, actually, do quite well at softball. It doesn’t help.

At least he knows now what was happening. Why Judith and Rodney had all those meetings ‘about crushing cars in the super city’. That ‘dodgy lock’ that kept shutting him out of John Key’s office.

That time in Cabinet when they said they were hungry and sent him to the Supreme Court to fetch a slice of statutory tort. And he went, too, even though he knew statutory torts do not come by the slice.

And fair enough. If they wanted a plan that is tough on criminals – while avoiding anything that might actually reduce crime – the last thing they needed was input from someone who actually understood criminal justice. Or might consider how hard it is finding staff for the prisons we have now.

A plan they could credibly (or at least, assertively) say is to make the streets safer. A plan which seems, to Simon, designed to make bad people worse.

Rodney and his mates apparently think that criminals make rational, benefit/loss decisions, that repeat offenders are the sort to be deterred by the threat of punishment. But then, if they made their decisions based on reason, they wouldn’t have already committed multiple serious offences against the state.

Neither would the criminals, come to think of it.

All that for policy Simon thought was only going to first reading because of the coalition agreement, which has now been made harsher.

A policy ACT only has because nobody would vote for their actual policies.

A policy Judith Collins is only so keen on because of… because of something to do with being Judith Collins.

Criminals sometimes believe the justice system is motivated by disproportionate malice rather than a measured response to their illegal actions. That kind of idea is detrimental to their ability to change their ways, and now Simon is beginning to wonder if they are right.

Not that Simon would ever commit a serious violent offence.

Wouldn’t think of it.

Simon learned to stop being annoyed a long time ago. Judith feeds on outrage.

Whatever. It’ll take most of a decade to even start kicking in. So that’s all right.

It’s not Simon’s problem.

It’s not my problem.

And when all these high-risk offenders start getting dropped into this strange outside world without the supervision of parole, ACT will never lack horrific crimes to hitch their wagon to. And National will never want for a coalition partner.

It might not be as bad as it looks. There could be a plan.

Like, you propose implementing your stupid policy in a really daft way, then after submissions you ‘listen’ and implement your stupid policy in a practical way. Which leaves everyone relatively relieved.

Simon might hope they are doing that. That would be the wise thing to do.

One the other hand, any meeting of minds between Judith Collins and David Garret is unlikely to be chaired by Captain Sensible.

It’s not like Simon doesn’t have dreams of his own. He has a intricate scheme to refine the court system until it is as swift and efficient as a coin toss. This is coming along nicely. Simon should be happy.

Box of birds, me.

Simon has been having nightmares.

Like the one where he’s telling Rodney Hide that A-list murder victims, whose killers would still have been in jail, isn’t really enough to prove three strikes will make the whole country safer. So Rodney smiles, and produces the secret list of people who are alive now, who would have been dead under his plan, to compare it with.

Or the one where he wakes up with neat puncture marks on his abdomen, and knows that Judith has returned, sucking the lilyness out of his liver. And that he’s tried to warn his colleagues for weeks, but their eyes just seem to glaze over, like when he tries to tell them about the consistency with fair trial rights of the requirement to identify issues in dispute.

Simon can’t help reaching under his shirt to check.

Nothing there. Just a dream.

Simon had forgotten there was baseball in The Shawshank Redemption. He stops the movie, and puts The Boomtown Rats on the stereo.

Tell me why
I Don’t Like Mondays
Tell me why
I Don’t Like Mondays

Outside, people keep committing crimes.

Poor old Simon Power.

Click to enlarge