If Botany is a victory, Charlie Sheen is a quiet chap who enjoys flax weaving and pan flutes

Botany was supposed to be National stomping their authority on this election with their supposed 50% plus public support, in the end it turned into what Mana was for Labour, the kind of nil all victory only Soccer fans cheer ecstatically for.

That the former National Party candidate had to leave under a cloud of corruption may have explained the nihilistic voter apathy but Labour reduced their margin of loss from 28% to 21%, a slim silver lining perhaps, but the bigger shock to National was how well the New Citizens Party did, as John Armstrong points out....

Of some worry to National will be the bleeding of its votes to the New Citizen Party, which picked up 10.5 per cent of the total candidate vote and pushed Act into fourth place.

If replicated in electorates across Auckland with large populations of New Zealand Chinese, such splintering of centre-right support could see large piles of wasted votes if the new party fails to reach the 5 per cent threshold.

That could diminish the centre-right's representation in Parliament by one or two seats - seats which may well be crucial for National to retain power.

Cameron Slater and Chris Trotter on Citizen A two weeks ago predicted the New Citizens Party would not get over 800 votes, their near doubling of that number should have political pundits across the spectrum scrambling for a rethink.

Yes a thick necked first 15 wannabe thug who merely lip synchs Party lines won Botany but the deeper issues for National are the emergence of a Party with unlimited Beijing funding who will eat into their majority across the board.

Perhaps China's attempt at domestic politics in NZ might explain any American financial backing of NZ First?