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OldMork t1_j1u04hh wrote

NZ and australia are places where politicians do weird stuff, I believe one aussie minister got some world record in beer drinking(?) another went for a swim and never came back.

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The_Thunder_Child t1_j1u7e59 wrote

It was the Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke who held the record for drinking a yard glass of beer the fastest. He achieved this decades before being PM though.

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brkh47 t1_j1uehmr wrote

Bob Hawke looked like a guy, who loved a drink. Ruddy skin, with a shade of braggadocio.

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RJWolfe t1_j1vja17 wrote

Plus he was the Union leader during the country-wide strike on Frank Sinatra.

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DharmaCub t1_j1vuzct wrote

Why was their a countrywide strike on Frank Sinatra?

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RJWolfe t1_j1vvwnq wrote

He was just being Frank Sinatra, baby. Mid-way through a show, he started calling Australian journalists whores and all kinds of stuff.

I've been an asshole in my life, but I've never been a whole-country-hates-me asshole. So that's some solace, at least.

Edit: I should submit that, actually. You better not beat me to the punch!

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twobit78 t1_j1wi3mw wrote

Pick up your game buddy. Get on some watchlists

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RJWolfe t1_j1wicyq wrote

Hard pass. Can't sing worth shit.

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monoped2 t1_j1udjia wrote

>another went for a swim and never came back.

And then they named a swimming pool after him.

Doing a Holt, or pulling a Harry Holt is also rhyming slang for bolting and leaving unannounced.

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InertiaCreeping t1_j1w4wlk wrote

ā€œDazza pulled the old Harold Holt and bailed on the missusā€

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RaideNbeyaz t1_j1uid01 wrote

Another shat himself in McDonald's

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EvilioMTE t1_j1uyxv3 wrote

And didn't even deny it. Laughed about it, even.

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Anthro_DragonFerrite t1_j1vhru7 wrote

An American one?

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acallamhoftheocean t1_j1vle5m wrote

How could Australia have an American prime minister?

Even if you didnā€™t know, now you do know that Australians who hold dual citizenship are automatically disqualified from being elected into any federal seat in parliament.

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Libtinard t1_j1vzg8h wrote

Thatā€™s only a recent thing. Australian politics used to be dominated by British ex pats. And Chinese people

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twobit78 t1_j1wicdy wrote

Not that recent. Only the huge fight over it was recent.

Also ex pats are allowed, you don't need to be born here you just can't be duel citizen.

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acallamhoftheocean t1_j1xv0bz wrote

How can you be this wrong? If youā€™ve lived in Australia your whole life this comment should embarrass you. Know your nation.

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Libtinard t1_j1y939b wrote

Iā€™m sorry I was misinformed. Only been to Australia once. Not Australian I mis remembered the news when the big row took place as the time they changed it. Sorry dude

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FionaTheGreen t1_j1u3uac wrote

>another went for a swim and never came back

Not the weirdest way to quit a job, to be honest.

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ZanyDelaney t1_j1vy67g wrote

Before becoming Prime Minister Bob Hawke was active in the Trade Union area and in that era drank a lot. While at university (in the UK) he had set a "world record" by skolling two-and-a-half pints of beer in 11 seconds. This was University College, Oxford and Hawke was a Rhodes Scholar. Pretty sure calling it a world record was a student joke.

Hawke gave up drinking when he went into politics in 1980 and did not drink while he was PM. He started drinking again after leaving politics in 1993.

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Hegar t1_j1v2hsl wrote

A west australian state treasurer used to sniff the chairs of female parliamentarians after they stood up. In the early 2000s iirc.

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Ythio t1_j1uviln wrote

>another went for a swim and never came back.

Understandable, also happened to a triple king of Germany, Italy and Burgundy during a crusade.

Then again there are always overachiever like that one English duke that was sentenced to death by drowning in wine.

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AdminsAreLazyID10TS t1_j1vzg14 wrote

That's called the Holy Roman Emperor my guy

Literally the most famous one, too, the definition of BDE Frederick Barbarossa himself, more or less the German King Arthur, once and future king, uniter of Germany type stuff.

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MrSpecialjonny t1_j1vwxd3 wrote

Harold Holt was the PM that went for a little swim and decided to disappear, ironically they named a swimming pool after him

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TheFightingImp t1_j1wzowb wrote

Then we have Kevin Rudd, who went to a strip club in NYC with some mates, before he became PM in '07. Hes now our ambassador to the U.S.

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the908bus t1_j1w82nh wrote

Do I get to choose between drinking records vs armed insurrection in my world leaders?

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IllegalTree t1_j1uqf0c wrote

> His party lost 10 seats.

But he couldn't remember what happened to them.

"I was very, very drunk," he was later quoted as saying.

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VhenRa t1_j1ueick wrote

The schnapps election.

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dom65659 t1_j1ug11g wrote

Someone get Rishi Sunak a drink!

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KingGalahadThe1st t1_j1wj199 wrote

He can get me one, with him and his wife having a combined net worth of over 1 billion pounds, whilst his country starves, struggles and freezes to death. Fuck Rishi.

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spicynicho t1_j1wmu56 wrote

He came up with the great line that a Kiwi moving to Australia raises the intelligence levels of both nations.

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raytaylor t1_j1tx5p4 wrote

Good old piggy

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Partly_Dave t1_j1wgyko wrote

He spoke at our school, while he was a Minister. I was probably 11 or 12 and knew nothing about politics but afterwards thought why would anyone vote for this guy. They did though.

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raytaylor t1_j1xcm7y wrote

Honestly, he had some good ideas and wasnt trying to make bad decisions. He just couldnt modernize like labour did with the rogernomics.

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Things103 t1_j1yai37 wrote

I don't quite think that was it.

Neo-liberalism was still only starting to get a foothold in the UK/USA with Thatcher and Reagan. It just wasn't really a thing when he was in power.

He had some massive ideas - but also worked the government to give himself as much control as possible; being both Prime Minister and Minister of Finance (usually two rather separate positions) - This was bad when he started putting in price freezes, and massive policies that basically bankrupted the country... But also largely hid it from the public. Lange the incoming prime minister later stated that it was kept from the public how close we came from just defaulting on all loans - the selling of assets came from a necessity to get investment into the country.

The other thing that cost him was infighting in his party - particularly the younger MPs with more liberal ideas (such as Nuclear free NZ) and his decision to not have a position on it. - Whereas the incoming stamped themselves as 'Nuclear Free' which was a fairly popular movement. He just didn't seem to believe in those more social policies where the public did, He had a similar reaction to the Springbok tour in 1981.

There is an fantastic series on the Neo-liberalism change in New Zealand called revolution - the first episode deals a lot with Muldoon and what New Zealand looked like under him "Fortress New Zealand" (and why there was a change afterwards)

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raytaylor t1_j1ygz78 wrote

I have watched that documentary a couple of times and I absolutely love it.

The think big projects are what I mean by good ideas. Especially the dams, steel and aluminuim facilities (that provided employment and cheaper goods for many years).

But the tinkering with the economy and fucking over the balance of payments wasnt helpful. Though I think he genuinely was trying to help the working people in the short term but couldnt handle the decisions that needed to be made for the long term solution.

Now New Zealand is seen as a champion of economic shift where we went from one of the richest in the 1950's
to almost bankrupt in the 80's because muldoon and co. were still thinking with ideas from the 50's
and now to one of the best performing economies in the world again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INyMYy-QjxM
This video is also a good watch

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bruzie t1_j1wnc55 wrote

Here's the drunken announcement

Edit: Election night result - Muldoon announcing that they'd win the next one [in 1987] by a landslide. They didn't - in fact it was the first time Labour had back-to-back terms.

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Illum503 t1_j1xw17o wrote

> in fact it was the first time Labour had back-to-back terms.

They formed a government 4 elections in a row from 1935 - 1949

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bruzie t1_j1y2lu2 wrote

Shows me what I know - I'm sure I read a fact years ago stating that was the case, but obviously incorrect.

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-B0B- t1_j1u04v3 wrote

I don't think politicians ever make decisions while sober

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goteamnick t1_j1w5s3r wrote

I love watching the press conference announcing the election. He looks like he could topple over at any moment.

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atomicxblue t1_j1wl1gi wrote

Guess drinking on the job will get you fired.

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No-Air3090 t1_j1x8pfj wrote

being the worst minister of finance NZ has ever had probably helped..

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tombot776 t1_j277wfe wrote

I think you mean former prime minister. The current one is much, much smarter.

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Super_Bong_2 t1_j1unfbd wrote

Someone get Joe Biden a drink!

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ElfMage83 t1_j1v0f4y wrote

USA doesn't have snap elections. The closest is if someone dies while in office, and even then it mostly applies to legislators.

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Void_0000 t1_j1wkpg7 wrote

Exactly! What do you think would happen if he got drunk, I mean have you seen the guy?

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OneBlueHopeUTFT t1_j1vjn7u wrote

There was just a round of elections and the Republicans did far worse than people expected. Iā€™m not sure you want that.

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