Hope defeats hate

By Chris Trotter*If Jacinda Ardern wasn’t congratulating Victorian Labor’s Dan Andrews on Saturday evening, then she bloody well should’ve been. With a third successive Labor victory under his belt, Andrews is set to become the state’s longest-serving Labor premier. As far as the Australian Right was concerned, Andrews and the Victorian Labor Party were dog-tucker. Andrews’ Victorian victory is of a piece with the general failure of the American Right to achieve the gains it was expecting in the recent mid-term elections. “Friends,” he reassured his fellow Victorians, “hope always defeats hate.”*Chris Trotter has been writing and commenting professionally about New Zealand politics for more than 30 years.