Tomo

This flag will BRING money to Aotearoa - possibly BILLIONS in trade…

It’s NOT a waste of money - it’ll EARN more money to spend on feeding kids, new housing, schools, health, cycle paths,paying off national debt to reduce interest payments, etc. It’ll pay for those things  AND a free ice cream for everyone as well!

It’s an high-payoff investment - it will (a) initially draw lots of attention to NZ, which always increases trade and income and the value of our dollar (b) ongoing increase our stature, especially after recently being admitted to the UN Security Council as an honoured guest.

Conversely, staying with our old 1902 flag will starve our poor because our exports etc. will be seen as coming from an out-of-date, technologically primitive old English colony.

The $15 million invested in carefully designing a flag that’ll suit all known uses and situations, and voted in by our public, will be earned back many times over, probably BILLIONS, in the coming years….

The new snazzy, elegant flag will immediately become global news, attracting international attention to Aotearoa, triggering more sales of tourism and our agricultural and other produce.

It’ll similarly raise our pride (think motivation, productivity) within the country, as well as our reputation internationally.

The new flag will unshackle us from out-of-date assumptions that we are still a has-been servant of Mother England (the Union Jack cross on our current flag). The British empire is long gone, and we’re not Americans either. We have our own identity now, yeah, nah, ‘sweet as, mate, ‘choice, ayee, ‘bro?

Nostalgia for past veterans etc? Let’s dump the flag-related memories of how we followed dumb English military commands at Gallipoli and got slaughtered, and ‘same in Vietnam following dumb American commands. Let’s BE OUR OWN PEOPLE NOW!  How come NZ First isn’t JUMPING ONTO THIS!!!

**AND IT’S NOT A POLITICAL DISTRACTION! **We can still tell the Government to dump the TPPA, and to not send our troops into the Iraq quagmire, BUT at the same time we can say, okay, yes, get us a great new flag and let’s keep on trucking. (That shows we’re not just mechanically opposed to EVERYTHING the Government does, which gives us credibility, and keeps us all happier Kiwis together.)

**IT’S NOT JUST JOHN KEY’S! **It’s a Government idea supported by hundreds of thousands of people. He doesn’t own it. WE WILL ALL OWN IT!

Who cares anyway - even if he claims it? If he’s happy with the flag he might give up the TPPA more easily and not send our troops to Iraq.

The ‘red peak’ flag is best, I think…  (Petition for it is at http://tinyurl.com/omurdaj)

• It’s superbly elegant and eye-catching by simplicity and choice of colours.
• It has our snowy mountain ridges, blue for our sky and sea, respect for England and the old flag, our shared redness of blood, life, love, fire.
• Kids and everyone else can draw it easily and cheaply.
• It’s even better than the French and German flags (both excellent).
• It’s FAR better than both the old flag and the four offered by the panel.
• Because it’s abstract, it can’t become boring or 'corny’ like a fern or a koru (or even a lovely Canadian maple leaf).
• It has its own majestic new honour, carried from the past, flying to us from the future.

Bruce Thomson  Palmerston North