Toxic II

Chris Trotter has turned from the toxic to the outright threatening:

The Maori Party needs to understand this, and understand it well: If it denies Labour a fourth term by negotiating a coalition agreement with National, that will amount to - and will be taken as - a declaration of war on the whole labour movement - brown as well as white.

And then, if I may paraphrase Gough Whitlam: “You may well say God save the Treaty, because NOTHING will save the Maori Seats.”

You can feel the outrage; he's like some medieval overlord whose peasants refuse to love him. How dare they! They must be punished!

Trotter needs to get it through his head: no-one owes anyone else their loyalty, let alone their obediance. The sole purpose of a political party is to advance the interests of its supporters. And if the Maori Party decides that those interests are better advanced through National than Labour, we (and they) just have to live with it.