The Burj Khalifa, the 829-metre-tall skyscraper in Dubai, has been lit up with an image of Jacinda Ardern. OPINION: Halo aside, "Jacinda Ardern is ordinary", shrugged the conservative Australian news website The Australian in the wake of the frenzy surrounding the prime minister after Christchurch. Ardern was accused on one of that country's highest-rating current affairs shows of merely copying Australia with her swift crackdown on gun laws. Columnist Judith Sloan refers to the "deification" of Ardern in a piece for The Australian, and that is not much of an exaggeration. Once the realities of domestic politics intrude – and they have already, after a week-long political truce – those expectations may run far ahead of what Ardern can realistically deliver.

Source: Stuff March 26, 2019 03:22 UTC