From today's NZ Herald
Politics in New Zealand, despicable as it has been for decades, has reached a new low with the secret taping of private conversations at last weekend's National Party conference.
And what I want to know is what sort of scumbag would do such a thing, then spill his or her guts to the media.
And why the media, including this newspaper, would deign to use word for word such questionable material, and in addition do their damnedest to attribute to the victims, deputy leader Bill English and party veteran Lockwood Smith, some hidden and sinister political programme.
As far as I'm concerned, the whole thing stinks. And it is further evidence, if any were needed, that this nation has not only lost its moral compass, we have smashed it.
What we we have done if presented with these tapes? Run a story on how someone had been bugging conversations. Would we have reported what had been said? Only with the permission of the politician concerned. There is a world of difference between Winston Peters explaining the meaning of a "lying gripper"after he had known that he was on tape, and an apparently private conversation being taped.
