RAWDON CHRISTIE IS A SCHMUCK - AND WE'VE GOT THE VIDEO TO PROVE IT !

The  TVNZ Breakfast host gets his comeuppance.

ONLY A FEW DAYS after the Prime Minister had snidely suggested that Kim Dotcom was Laila Harre's 'sugar daddy', Harre was in no  mood to politely  brush  aside  John Key's new allegation that Internet Mana  were responsible  for the  effigy burning video.

The Internet Party leader was invited on to TVNZ's Breakfast to respond to the allegation as if it might possibly be...true. No wonder Harre was exasperated.

A proper journalist  should  have been able to work out  for himself that the allegation was without merit. After all the claim was first  made on  Cameron Slater's sleazy Whaleoil website - a notorious attack dog for the National Party.

But we're talking Rawdon Christie here.

Christie admitted he took the video from Whaleoil. But he never bothered to check out its credentials. Perhaps he had other more important things to do - like droning on again about his skiing adventures or cracking jokes with  Sam the maniacal weather guy.

Laila Harre took him to task for his ineptitude.

"The Prime Minister cast a slur and told a lie on your programme yesterday," she told the increasingly rattled Breakfast host . "You presented that video to the Prime Minister and you knew from your research, or should have known from your research, that it had no relationship with the Internet Party."

Christie's pathetic defence was  'I didn't tell the PM that this was Dotcom's doing.'

No, having handed John Key the ammunition, you  just sat  there like a  schmuck and  allowed the Prime Minister to make the allegation unchallenged.

Of course none of this comes as any surprise. Christie doesn't interview Key in a proper journalistic sense - he chats to him in a 'I think you're great' sense.

After copping an earful from Harre, Rawdon tried to salvage something  from the wreckage. It was pathetic - but strangely gripping - television. If I freeze frame the picture I can clearly see Rawdon's credibility disappearing out of the studio.

He talked about 'balance' and how 'the election wasn't about him'. Unfortunately for Christie he dug a deeper hole for himself when he read out a text that accused Breakfast of 'spinning the feedback its way'.  Great stuff.