WhaleOil points out a column by Liz Gordon. It was so good, that I thought I’d fisk it a bit.

You probably haven’t heard of them, but they are working for you. They are called People Power New Zealand. Incensed and enraged that there are now limits on what can be spent on political advertising in an election year, they are gearing up for a campaign of civil disobedience.

They want you to join them. Their favourite activity so far is throwing bricks through the windows of electorate offices. They have already targeted Labour and the Greens, and they warn that New Zealand First’s Auckland office will be next, on February 28.

So far, so good.

In their most recent press release, they say: “We now wish to establish as to whether there are any NZers left in this country (apart from us) who have the courage and determination to stand up for what they believe in, and to actively fight against the growing Government-sanctioned totalitarianism that now permeates our nation.”

Appallingly written, but stirring stuff nevertheless. But when you start to look below the surface, this and similar organisations are not merely fringe loonies out to throw a few bricks, but part of a much more organised campaign.

Oooh. There’s a conspiracy!!!

The aim is to persuade you to elect a National-led government this year.

Really. Not exactly a hard sell at the moment.

Why? Well, the activist groups congregate around two main issues: the passing of the anti-smacking law and the limitations on spending by third parties introduced in the Electoral Finance Act.

Hm, sounds like her focus has started to change. There are now “groups”, and they “congregate”. That doesn’t sound like “People Power”.

Interestingly, neither of these pieces of legislation will be repealed if there is, in fact, a National-led government after the election, and these activists must well know that.

Clearly Liz doesn’t keep up with the news – National has committed to repealing the EFA as it’s first priority(correct me if I’m wrong, maybe I’m the one not with the times). True, they’re not that great with the smacking thing, but we’re hardly going to get anywhere with Labour now, are we?

Therefore, campaigns like People Power and “Don’t Vote Labour” are not what they seem.

Wait a second. Since when has “People Power” and “Don’t Vote Labour” been connected? I’m quite certain that they are not. (Disclosure for those not keeping track: Andy Moore, the nice fellow behind the “Don’t Vote Labour” site has been known to blog here.)

What they are is part of a strategy by various Right-wing factions to use laws that many people don’t like, in order to get votes for their side.

Good grief, telling people to vote for National to change the law? What an outrageous abuse of the rights Helen so graciously grants us! This “open society” must be stopped at all costs!

That the people might like the next government less is never, of course, discussed.

By “people” one assumes that’s not the “people” in “People Power”. I’m guessing that means “Liz Gordon and friends”.

They have whipped themselves up into a foaming feverish frenzy. The leaders are extremists like John Boscawen and Stephen Franks,

Woa! John Boscawen and Stephen Franks are extremists?!?

John Boscawen organised some protests – I heard both speaches he gave in Auckland, and they seemed more that reasonable to me. No sign of foam anywhere. Most of what he said was that the Government should not change electoral law to it’s own advangage, which is something that pretty much all media outlets have agreed with.

As for Stephen Franks, if you think he’s an extremist you need fitted for a nice white jacket. You’re talking easily one of the the most respected guys in the last parliament – sadly he’s not in the current one.

What’s more, these guys have nothing – zilch - to do with the brick chuckers. Sure, they agree with some of the basic positions, but then so do 80% of the population – the smacking thing hasn’t exactly been popular, and the EFA is only just behind in the popularity stakes.

who both got chucked out of Parliament this week for sitting in the public gallery and gagging themselves with packing tape.

I assume they were protesting against the EFA. Is that now illegal? If it is, we’ve got much bigger problems than brick chuckers.

Who let them out of kindergarten?

Ho ho. Let’s cut off this particular descent into lunacy, and cut over to a group that Liz actually likes. Terrorists.

I think the 1980s was the main time for wishing death and destruction on politicians. Now Muldoon – there was a bully. He was a wonderful hate figure. Many was the time when I wished for his head on a spike, that ghastly caricature of a countenance frozen forever. I mean, not wishing to speak ill of the dead, but there is no doubt we spoke very ill of him when he was still alive.

Probably the biggest hate figure of modern times was Margaret Thatcher, because she was so profoundly and deliberately destructive, and appeared to revel in it. Was I the only person in New Zealand to think that, when the IRA tried to blow her up at Brighton, I wish that they had succeeded?

And this George W. Bush, whose favourite hobby seems to be entering into unwinnable wars. I could see myself over a few wines thinking up many ways for him to die, having great and entertaining conversations on the subject.

But just like the Ruatoki boys, and even despite the fact that they had been buying guns on Trade Me and tossing molotov cocktails around in the bush, talk is just talk.

…It is true, from what was revealed in Wednesday’s Press, that these young men appeared to do quite a lot of this kind of talk. There is always the possibility that this can turn into something worse. We hope these boys’ mothers were telling them not to be so silly.

So if John Boscawen and Stephen Franks speak against the EFA and/or smacking bill, they are extremists, and can be linked with idiots who chuck bricks in the middle of the night.

But if a group of people talk about killing politicans and buy guns to do it, that’s just peachy.

Welcome to the wonderful world of the left. A world where someone who reveals the identity of vandals (and has his children threatened by them) is actually on the side of said vandals, but where plotting to carry out mass murder is something everyone does.

Welcome to election year.