Breakfast with Marie Antoinette

Is there a worse experience in the country than waking up to Paul Henry?

I mean, there you are, in your gown, a bit of toast, turn the TV on - and IT's on the screen.

Pure accident of course. And I know, everyone knows, it's scarcely worth mentioning. But he just happened to be leading a segment that perfectly captured everything that is so odious about him.

He was talking about the referendum on MMP.

John Key of course mumbled something not too loud about holding the referendum pre-election, and so Henry (ex National Party candidate) championed it as the inviolate virtue "keeping his promise to the NZ Public."

Honestly, the only policies I can remember from Key and National was cycleway and super-fast broadband. Everything else was maybes, mumbling and "we'll have that discussion when...".

Henry was interviewing the excellent electoral and constitutional expert Jonathan Boston from Victoria University (my alma mater), which was home to an MMP review working group when the electoral system came up for review in 2000.

I actually sat in on the session where Professor Boston made a submission for improvements that year - the discussion went very much as you'd expect between an expert with a PhD from Oxford and a dozen party politicians who don't know pol-sci from that thing where old people get shaky hands.
It is an indelible failing of our political system that the people voted to represent us have very little understanding of democracy or constitutional power. It makes them very vulnerable to persuasive "common-sense" and "pragmatism" from rich people promising to make us all richer. If we just make them even richer first.

Paul Henry is, of course, both: both wealthy and thinks a constitution is something you need for a good Friday night.

Actually, he gave Professor Boston a fairly good platform to say what he wanted, which was the least we can ask. Boston made it very clear that any problems with MMP can be fixed within MMP. I would add - it is crucial to add - that to see if MMP works, you have to compare and contrast with what it was fixing: that is First Past the Post (FPP). And on the balance, and by the standards set out by the Electoral Reform Commission, it has been a raging success.

At creating a more representative, more legitimate form of democratic government.

Regression to FPP or it's bastard nephew, Supplementary Member (SM), will result in less democracy. In our society, there is an undeniable and necessary conflict between democracy and capitalism. The Big Money in our country just want it even more their way.

That is why National are pushing for it. That is why wealthy lobbyists are building war-chests and PR campaigns for it.

That said, it is likely that there are many people who are not wealthy who have developed frustration with MMP. With the confusion. The threshold. The Maori seats. The number of well-paid MPs.

And I say to them: if you are struggling, in our society, with mortgages and rent, rising energy and phone and food costs, it is very easy to work out what is in your best interest: More democracy.

MMP is good democracy, but it can be made better. SM is less good. FPP is not good at all.

And if you still find it hard to work out what's in your best interest, remember Paul Henry. Because he is NOT a democrat. He is an autocrat - even an aristocrat, our own squealing, honking, wine-sipping Marie Antoinette. He and his pals live on the fat of our land, he pollutes our airwaves and gets paid for it and broadcasts his personal point of view as if only it makes sense.

"Because New Zealanders are stupid," he said this morning, "most of the people out there are stupid." And he believes that, because we go along and vote stupid and make our own lives harder.

2011 is plenty of time to show him who's stupid.