Tau Henare: “I don’t doubt her sincereness.” Has The Panel reached its nadir today? (Oct. 10, 2014)

10 October 2014 at 6:46 pm

“I don’t doubt her sincereness.”
Has The Panel reached its nadir today?
Radio NZ National, Friday 10 October 2014
Jim Mora, Tau Henare, Bernard Hickey, Julie Moffett

Move over Garth George—you’re not the most useless guest ever. Since he first appeared in parliament as Winston Peters’ No. 2 man, Tau Henare has never looked like anything other than a vacuous chancer, a thug who adds no value to any discussion. In an utterly undistinguished parliamentary career, Henare came to public attention only twice—first, when Trevor Mallard thumped him, and second when he brutally mocked and reduced to tears a parliamentary cleaner who was appearing before a parliamentary committee.

Tau Henare is the epitome of uselessness, in other words. Yet he is now regularly being used as a commentator on Television One, TV3 and Māori Television. And today he made his debut on Jim Mora’s light chat show. He is, I suppose, just right for it. He has little of interest to say, not only because he clearly reads nothing, but also because he spends his time polishing up his cheeky Westie act. His Twitter handle is “West Side Tory”. He obviously thinks that’s quite clever.

Sadly, the other guest today is Bernard Hickey, who so far has gone out of his way to agree with everything Henare has said.

JIM MORA: So what else is going on in the world?
JULIE MOFFETT: A beach in Hawaii was going to be renamed in honor of President Obama, but there is apparently a great deal of public opposition to this happening.
JIM MORA: He’s had—you’ve got to feel sorry for what’s happened to Obama in the Middle East, don’t you.
TAU HENARE: Yeah, he came on the scene at the wrong time. He’s a great speaker.
JIM MORA: Great speaker!

4:27 p.m.: Hilariously, Henare has just pronounced on Penny Bright’s refusal to pay her rates. “I don’t doubt her sincereness,” he intoned, speaking very slowly to underline how deeply he was thinking.

4:34 p.m.: Mora turned down Penny Bright’s voice as she was speaking, because (so he claimed) she did not have evidence to back up some claims she was making about the Auckland Council. “I’ve just turned you down,” he said. Bernard Hickey snorted approvingly.

A little later, the following exchange occurred….

JIM MORA: Celia Wade Brown is sleeping rough on the streets of Wellington tonight.
TAU HENARE: Why?
JIM MORA: Doesn’t it give her a degree of empathy with the poor?
TAU HENARE: Ahhhh, BOLLOCKS!

And a little later, this one….

TAU HENARE: Hey wouldn’t you want to go to sleep in Finland?
JIM MORA: Finland?
TAU HENARE: It’s not a very exciting place, is it?

I sent Jim a quick email in regard to his sympathy for poor old Obomba….

We should “feel sorry for what’s happened to Obama in the Middle East”?

Dear Jim,

You said that we “have to feel sorry for what’s happened to Obama in the Middle East.” I think most fair-minded people would feel sorry for what Obama has done in the Middle East. He has rhetorically encouraged, diplomatically supported and armed the bloody Al Qaeda/ISIS insurrection in Syria, and he was quick to support the brutal overthrow of the elected government of Egypt and support the bloodthirsty Sisi regime. The people of Gaza and the Occupied West Bank are sorry about what he has allowed Israel to do to them.

Yet, in spite of all this, you claim “we” should feel sorry for what’s happened “to Obama”.

You’re lucky you have Tau Henare sitting next to you in the studio. Anyone a bit quicker on the uptake would have taken you to task.

Yours sincerely,

Morrissey Breen
Northcote Point

• Paul21.1

  10 October 2014 at 9:13 pm

  The blatant censoring of Penny Bright was the nadir.
  • Morrissey21.1.1

    11 October 2014 at 9:04 am

    Even worse than that was Hickey’s sniggering at it.
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