Is the Green Party the Communist Party in disguise?

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#1043036 13-May-2014 14:13

KiwiNZ: Communist? .... No

I wouldnt put it to that. I would just say some of their ideas are shaped after such.

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Ragnor

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#1043037 13-May-2014 14:13

NZtechfreak: People just have no clue what really constitutes left and right these days do they?

Right and left have always been useless generalisations... people are more complex.

Consider a person could be pro free maket on economics but not for public good/natural monopolies (infrastructure), libertarian on social issues like gay marriage, yet authoritarian on other ones like tough on crime (3 strikes etc), conservative on some issues like the welfare incentives for solo women to breed outside of stable relationships (DPB).

Generally people vote for who they perceive to be the least worst options or the party that has the most benefits for them personally.

MikeB4

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#1043039 13-May-2014 14:20

I have not seen policies that would meet the definition of Communist, I may very well be wrong so if there are I would love to see references here. Now there policies are similar to which our main stream parties have held at some time as NZ historically is a Center left nation with socialist ideals. Not a bad thing at all and served us well in the past.

I am not sure I would like to see the NZ Green Party as the main Government Party yet they still have some growing to do, they will make (and given climate issues needed) a good coalition partner or a strong opposition.

NZtechfreak

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#1043042 13-May-2014 14:21

Ragnor: Generally people vote for who they perceive to be the least worst options or the party that has the most benefits for them personally.

They also often vote for the party with the leader they most like, or what their parents voted for/they have always voted for.

What they unfortunately do not vote for in many instances, is actual policy.

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Fred99

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#1043044 13-May-2014 14:22

Ragnor:
NZtechfreak: People just have no clue what really constitutes left and right these days do they?

Right and left have always been useless generalisations... people are more complex.

Consider a person could be pro free maket on economics but not for public good/natural monopolies (infrastructure), libertarian on social issues like gay marriage, yet authoritarian on other ones like tough on crime (3 strikes etc), conservative on some issues like the welfare incentives for solo women to breed outside of stable relationships (DPB).

Generally people vote for who they perceive to be the least worst options or the party that has the most benefits for them personally.

I agree.
People should take the test to see where they stand on the political compass.

Personally I think that strong social conservatism (authoritarianism) combined with liberal laissez-faire economics is as much a recipe for disaster as "hard line" totalitarian communism ever was.

MikeB4

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#1043045 13-May-2014 14:23

NZtechfreak:
Ragnor: Generally people vote for who they perceive to be the least worst options or the party that has the most benefits for them personally.

They also often vote for the party with the leader they most like, or what their parents voted for/they have always voted for.

What they unfortunately do not vote for in many instances, is actual policy.

I tend to agree with this, and it is the mass media influence that make personalities bigger than substance.

cr250bromo

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#1043048 13-May-2014 14:25

I like driving my WRX but I had to stop driving in January this year for medical reasons. Going from a car back to walking and public transport makes you realise how poor the service is in Auckland and if you can't drive you effectively become a second class citizen. Not everyone can drive everywhere in their "fuel efficient private car". A trip to visit a friend that used to take me 35 minutes to drive now takes me 2hours by public transport including a transfer, waiting and a 1.5km walk at one end.

So yes I do support better public transport - you should too, after all it will clear the roads for more fuel efficient private cars ;)

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ajobbins

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#1043075 13-May-2014 14:59

- Community transport, e.g. buses over fuel efficient private vehicles
Public transport on the whole is vastly more efficient that people sitting in (even efficient) cars. This is particularly true in larger cites where traffic congestion becomes a problem, as even a Hybrid sitting in traffic going nowhere isn't very efficient. Public transport reduces the burden on our roads (less maintenance etc) and the less people who park in cities means the relatively scarce space in our CBDs can be used more productively than car parks. The issue is usually about how GOOD the public transport is. How reliable is it, how frequent is it, how congested is it and how far to you have to travel from home and the office to get on it.

- Community vege gardens
I don't think the Greens are proposing banning you from having your own Vege garden or continuing to buy your veges from the supermarket or whatever as you do now. This is more of a 'community initiative' where people who might choose to can participate. It has it's benefits, but it's not for everyone. If you don't want to participate, what's the harm?

- No anti state asset sales
Asset sales generally provide a short term revenue injection at the cost of future gains. It's a hard business case to make, because you have to take that money and invest it in other things that will produce higher returns in order to be better off by it in the long term. As we have been with National's asset sales, they have cost far more and delivered far less than promised, and the economics simply don't stack up. As someone else pointed out, it's usually only the high performing assets that are worth selling anyway - and they usually have to be sold off cheap (as we have seen)

- Funny money policies, remember their print money scheme
AKA quantitative easing. Don't agree with this type of policy. We've seen it in the US and it has worked for them in some ways, and hurt in others. The advantage for the US (That no one else has) is that quantitative easing puts downward pressure on the value of the US dollar. As the US typically has their own foreign debts in USD, devaluing their own currency reduces their own debt burden to overseas lenders.

- High density living = faceless uniform apartments
In some areas (like Auckland), we need to change the mix to include more 'high density' housing in order to balance population grown and urban sprawl. It's wrong to assume High density living means faceless uniform apartments, as they certainly don't have to be and I can't see anything in Green's manifesto suggesting this.

- State subsidies of all kinds
Every government has these. National has subsides their asset sales mentioned above, among many, many others.

None of these policy event remotely smell like communism to me. They are socialist leaning polices sure - but communist? Not even close.

Greens still have a 'weed smoking hippies' perception problem, but from what I have seen they have a lot more balanced policy these days, and in some cases more sensible economic policy than National or Labour. They also have a better grasp on the Internet world we live in and the role of government in that world.

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dafman

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#1043080 13-May-2014 15:08

D1023319: Is Green the new Red

It occurred to me, most of the Green Party policies are very communist in nature.
They promote:
- Community transport, e.g. buses over fuel efficient private vehicles
- Community vege gardens
- No anti state asset sales
- Funny money policies, remember their print money scheme
- High density living = faceless uniform apartments
- State subsidies of all kinds

https://www.greens.org.nz/policy/full

What do you think?

I'd prefer they focused on policies such as:
- reduced packaging for goods
- encourage holidays in NZ and not overseas, etc

- Community transport, e.g. buses over fuel efficient private vehicles
The efficiency of Melbourne's or Adelaide's trams for example, or Auckland's motorway at peak. Know what I'd prefer.

- Community vege gardens
Fresh vegetables locally grown. What's the world coming to?

- No anti state asset sales
We wouldn't have a kiwi-owned bank if it wasn't for the state. Come to think of it, we wouldn't have a railway or airline either after the private sector trashed both of those.

- Funny money policies, remember their print money scheme
If it's the US, it's sensible fiscal management. If it's the Greens, it's wacky. Go figure.

- High density living = faceless uniform apartments
Hasn't this been tried before. Oh, yes, right, it's called Europe.

- State subsidies of all kinds
A terrible evil, unless of course you need it. A lot of 'red zone' householders in ChCh not previously considered 'communist' or 'green' demanded all manner of these from central government after the quakes.

geekiegeek

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#1043082 13-May-2014 15:10

The new Greens-Labour communist proletariat flag :-)

MikeB4

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#1043084 13-May-2014 15:14

geekiegeek:

The new Greens-Labour communist proletariat flag :-)

Why would they cling to the Imperialistic past? that goes against the ethos :P

NZtechfreak

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#1043123 13-May-2014 16:09

Fred99: People should take the test to see where they stand on the political compass.

+1 for this, I tend to post it to Facebook every election year.

Last time I did that one chap, a lifelong National voter "just because" actually realised his values were more or less entirely opposed to Nationals and decided to change his vote to something more idealogically aligned. I thought it was interesting that he had never ever examined policy before then, but the test producing a very different result than he expected prompted him to.

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