Hubris: excessive pride towards or defiance, leading to nemesis.

It’s a total 6th form essay thing to do, to start a post with a definition like that. But I’m setting context. Overnight, the Feed the Kids Bill was voted on. It failed to get past its first reading by 59-61. Just so you know, first readings only proceed the bill to Select Committee stage where people can whine and bitch and complain and then kill the bill at the second reading. But no, this Government saw fit to nip it in the bud.

Also, and you may not have known this, yesterday in the house, in response to repeated questioning from Greens co-leader Metiria Turei about how many kids go to school without lunch, the Prime Minister had his Education Minister – Hekia Parata – call three – THREE – schools that were low-decile. And then he rattled off the very low numbers of students that didn’t have lunch that day. This is now how we set policy apparently. This is how we use the time of Education Ministers, who are paid hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. They make phone-calls for the Prime Minister. So he can anecdotally prove that New Zealand doesn’t have hungry kids despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary (fun fact, KidsCan is sponsored by the Ministry for Social Development….a Government Department). This despite the fact that 3 days into the new term we were treated to articles in the media about John Key looking for ways to solve child-poverty. Well dipshit, you were presented with one.

It almost seems like food policy is being set by the following:

Dinner time at the Key household: John: "Hey Max, are you hungry?"

Max: "Nope, I'm good dad"

John: "That's what I thought. Fuck them." — The Ruminator (@RuminatorNZ) March 18, 2015

But the reason I call this post hubris is because that’s what this Government seems to be showing. The Helen Clark regime was turfed out after people perceived the Labour Government as becoming arrogant and out of touch. Lightbulbs! Showers! etc. At the beginning of this electoral cycle, Key said repeatedly that he was going to be mindful that his Government didn’t suffer the same fate. But holy shit, this National Government is just balls-out going for it with regards to giving zero fucks.

After my denunciation of the Labour Party yesterday due to the travel perks issue, I just wanted to run through the bullshit that this National Government has done since the most recent election.

So goddamn. Fuck this Government. I am hoping that Hubris meets Nemesis in the most spectacular way. But we’re some time off a General Election so I guess we’re just stuck with them.