Friday, September 16, 2005



The "moral obligation to lie" again

One of the constant criticisms of National's policies has been lack of detail. In general, their policy is vague, lacking in specifics, and frequently uncosted. In health in particular there are serious unanswered questions about National's overall funding commitments, whether it will again pursue user pays or privatisation policies, and whether it will remain committed to ensuring competitive staff salaries. Don Brash's response to this has been to say that the details just haven't been worked out yet. That's worrying enough in a party which aspires to government, and raises serious questions about their competance (not to mention about what the hell they've been doing for the last three years) - but it's actually worse than that. According to an email sent by National's health spokesperson, Paul Hutchinson, to a Health pressure group,

The strategy team has preferred we do not publish a detailed policy.

Think about that for a moment. Rather than putting the details of their policy before the electorate, they've deliberately chosen to withhold them. And the only conceivable reason for doing so is because they know we won't like them, and would never vote for such policies if they were advocated openly.

Remind anyone of Brash's doctrine of the "moral obligation to lie"...?

3 comments:

This just in...

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA0509/S00451.htm

Posted by Anonymous : 9/16/2005 04:01:00 PM

Surely suggesting it's Brash's doctrine is putting words in his mouth.

He's identified a problem that he can find no happy solution to, and rather than provide the alternative he should opt for, you've held the conclusion he didn't like against him.

You're penalizing him for bringing the problem out for discussion, while contributing nothing.

Posted by Anonymous : 9/17/2005 01:30:00 AM

sorry, still Friday here, forgot the time zone.

Posted by Anonymous : 9/17/2005 01:32:00 AM