The only King that matters!
I think they should keep the monarchy, but just pick a new family. They could have a lottery.
Bigus dealus.
If you want to emulate the Americans, then you'll need to rethink the Parliamentary/Prime Minister system of government if you opt out of the Commonwealth/Monarchy.
Our ancesters had to devise a new system (in our Constitution) in order to compensate for what is lost when you depose a monarch. Our Presidency incorporates some of the functions of monarchy with safeguards against despotism.
For instance, what Prime Minister subject to votes of no confidence and the whims of public opinion could ever lead the country through difficult decisions where a period of tough times had to be endured before the rightness of the decision became clear?
Royalist or republican, I just cannot get it how one could agree on anything with that brainless idiot. He even didn't understand the simplest and most direct rebuke Prince "The Polite" Charles gave him when asked about a possibility to lose New Zealand, this Crown Jewel:
"Well, to be frank, I think it would come as a great relief to all of us," said Charles.
Which means, one pain in the a$$; less... And our "socialist" reads it as:
Perhaps he sees the writing on the wall already.
What a clown!
Seems like a good idea to me. What has the Monarchy done for New Zealand lately?
Monarchy is an anachronism, and is antithical to democracy. "Constitutional" monarchy is a useless and expensive symbol of a bygone age.
Eff 'em all.
Why in the world does New Zealand need to be 'ruled' by anyone, let alone a monarch half a world away? Times have changed. Democracies are made up of sentient people quite capable of making their own decisions.
Although Prince Charles is not my favorite person in the world, it is worth remembering that the monarchy is bigger than Prince Charlie. For me, New Zealand (or Australia, or Canada, or Britain etc) dropping the monarchy would be the same thing as the U.S. deciding that the Constitution is old and out of date, so just scrap it.
I love it when any politicians, particularly socialists, have to recognize someone else as being "higher" than they are and there's nothing they can do about it. I also like the fact that, on paper at least, sovereignty comes "by the grace of God".
Personally, I think that the English-speaking world (aka the British Empire) should be sticking together particularly now, having certainly much more in common that all of the groups like the UN, EU or ASEAN ever could. Countries that share a common culture should work together to preserve it, not buy into the liberal mentality of self-hatred.
If that is your position, then no matter how "conservative" you claim to be, you are joining with the forces of Leftism. There is nothing the Left hates more than Monarchy; that has been true since its inception at the French Revolution. The battle over the Crown in Australia and New Zealand is nothing less than the modern continuation of the historic battle between tradition and "progress," hierarchy and equality, monarchy and republicanism that began with the English Civil War in the 1640s. There was no "Left" then, but the evil Oliver Cromwell was its grandfather, and the ancestor of today's republicans.
Perhaps you imagine that becoming a republic would give New Zealand a chance to elect a conservative, Christian, Americanist president. But I doubt very much that this is what most New Zealanders have in mind.
If New Zealand were to abandon the monarchy, no one would see this as a "conservative" move. It would be universally interpreted, correctly, as a victory for the revolutionary forces of Change At All Costs that have been destroying the world since 1789. New Zealanders who are proud of their British heritage and look back fondly on the days of Empire would be cruelly deprived of their last surviving link with that identity.
New Zealand, Canada, and Australia have an obligation to accept the fact that they owe far more to Britain and its culture than to any other country. The monarchy is a living reminder of this and one of the last surviving obstacles to the total triumph of the pernicioius doctrine of multiculturalism which would declare all cultures equal.
It's too late for my country; Americans with my views (the Tories/Loyalists) lost, and fled to Canada, where their descendants remain staunch supporters of the monarchy. But Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, by retaining the Crown in their constitutions, continue to share in one of history's grandest and most colorful stories, that of the ancient and glorious British monarchy.
There are already far too many republics and far too few monarchies in the world already; currently the latter constitute only about 7% of the world' s population. Why tip the balance even further, abandoning the world's noblest form of government and most recognizable sovereign for a political hack, yet another holder of that tiresome, uninspiring, ubiquitous, and overrated title "president"? The French writer Anatole France wisely observed, "every monarchy abolished is a star fallen out of the sky. Republicanism is ugliness triumphant." God Save the Queen!
