For truth be told, Cunliffe had this one in the bag from the start, the caucus ABC's be damned. The Labour cowmatua gave it a gamble with Shearer. That outsider didn't work out, and might have brought to a head the rank and file disgruntlement in the form of the new primary rules.
Cunliffe is a relatively safe bet in comparison to the Shearer gambit and, besides, it's his turn. That's Labour logic through and through.
Grant Robertson has done his next stab at the job no end of good, raising his visibility beyond the loyal Beltway. Jenny Michie did no foul to him, yet this loyal and hard working Labour Party stalwart's treatment at the hands of Cunliffe foreshadows future fickleness.
The Devil in Mr Jones has rehabilitated as much as he is ever going to. It's sad to see that Shane "Te Dude" Jones was the best option that the Pragmatic Labour caucus had to throw into the contest. Such is the debilitating effect Helen Clark had in sowing salt within their ranks.
It would be interesting to see what would happen if Helen Clark's name appeared on the voting ballot. I reckon she'd still be top of the pops with the base, five long years since the voters threw her out.
There's a lesson there, but whether Labour's rank and file grok that is another story. After all, no-one can accuse Chris Trotter of being a neo-Marxist. There's nothing new at all there. Yet he has no qualms about muddying the name of liberalism with a neo prefix.
This is what happens when you sow the Fourth Labour false narrative into the myth:
Here's Dangerous Minds with a balanced retrospective of Split Enz's Mr Philip Judd.
