THE COMMENTARIAT CONTINUE THE WAR AGAINST METIRIA TUREI AND THE GREEN PARTY

The Commentariat continue to trample on Metiria Turei- even after she has resigned as Green Party co-leader and will be leaving Parliament.

Chris Trotter: No friend of the left.

ON TV3's TABLOID news show The Project resident comedian Josh Thomson, not particularly funny at the best of times, tried to make a joke at the expense of the Green Party and former co-leader Metiria Turei.

Said Thomson to Green's leader James Shaw : "While the Greens are getting everything out in the open, this could be your chance. Have you done any benefit fraud you want to tell us about?"

Not surprisingly, Shaw didn't find this funny. "No, and I think that's a little soon Josh", was his grim response. Given the provocation, he was remarkably restrained.

Thomson's joke fell flat and so did the atmosphere in the studio. Co-presenters Jesse Mulligan and Kanoa Lloyd looked visibly uncomfortable. Oh dear.

However the IQ level had been dramatically lowered in the studio with the appearance of hack journalist Patrick Gower on the show. Gower, a man not known for either his political insight or sensitivity, wanted to know if Shaw thought the poll result had led to Turei's resignation. Shaw said it had not and that it was an unacceptable level of media intrusion into her private life and the lives of family members that had prompted her resignation

As one of the members of the media who have been trampling around in Turei's private life, this wasn't the answer that Gower wanted to hear. So he asked the same question again - and got the same reply again.

After over three weeks of bad press its not altogether uncoincidental that the Green's  have suffered in the polls. But given the unprecedented level of hostility directed at Turei and the Green Party, it would not have been surprising if the poll slump had been far worse.

But there's a new agenda at work here. Not satisfied with trampling Turei into the ground, the media are seeking to deny that Turei has any significant degree of support within the community. That was what Matthew Hooton (yes, him again) was suggesting on The AM Show this morning. He claimed that the widespread amount of support for Turei in the social media was not evidence of widespread community support.

This was a totally fatuous argument and one that deserved to be shot down in flames. But it wasn't shot down in flames because sitting next to Hooton was the conservative Chris Trotter. Indeed he joined Matthew Hooton and Duncan Garner in doubting the ability of the Green's making a political comeback. Trotter even went as far as to claim that the Green's might suffer the same fate as the now-defunct Values Party.

With loaded observations like this is it any wonder that Trotter is widely reviled on the left?

Trotter was never comfortable with the Green's left turn. So he is now embracing the cause of Jacinda Ardern - despite the fact she is running the same centrist policies and strategy as former Labour leader Andrew Little, who Trotter initially supported and then turned on.

If you would like to experience the political incoherency of Trotter first hand he'll be on Radio Live tonight at 10pm with his old mate Rodney Hide. Expect Trotter to join Hide in putting the boot into the Green's.

But time for some sanity. One of New Zealand's better journalists, RNZ's Mihingarangi Forbes, went out into the streets of Manurewa to talk to some ordinary people about life on the economic fringes and about Metiria Turei. See the video above. Despite what Hooton and Trotter think, there is a lot of support for Turei out there- the Green's need to build on that support.