Gazumped

Today's Dominion Post features the front page headline "National plan for life to mean life - two strikes policy for violent crimes".

Ye Gods. Gazumped. ACT's policy is only three strikes.

Clever move by National. Makes ACT irrelevant on the very ground they chose to fight the election on.

Where ACT should have gone - publicly - is to the root of most crime and the best way to prevent it. Serious and radical welfare reform. National would never follow them there.

It's OK to lock up high risk violent offenders for life but what about the next generation of criminals being bred every day under our policy of paying people without the means - either material or emotional - to have babies? Under our obsessive state-backed anti-adoption stance? Under our 'the child is always best with its biological mother' policy? Under our 'if you have an addiction you can live off the taxpayer' policy? Under our 'being a victim of ongoing domestic violence but staying with the perpetrator qualifies you for the DPB' policy? Under our 'men are alienated and neutered by the anti-male bias of the welfare system but we don't give a shit' policy?

No. National wouldn't go there.