After the failure of the Internet Party in the 2014 election – and their dragging down of the Mana Party with them – Kim Dotcom acknowledged that his brand was toxic.
So why has he floated the idea of another tilt at political ego?
That vote is meaningless – if Andrew Little asked his Twitter followers if he should stand next year he’d get a few positive votes as well. So would John Key, probably far more than Dotcom and Little combined.
It’s hard to know what sort of game Dotcom is playing here.
He is unlikely to get Mana or any other party wanting him to piggy back off their electorate chances.
He would have to find a high profile person to lead the party, and Laila Harre is unlikely to do it again, she recently said she wanted to stand for Labour.
Perhaps Dotcom thinks he could emulate Donald Trump’s success.
Like millions of people wanting to be the Nek Minit in social media, it seems that many people are trying to emulate Trump’s success. Winston Peters fancies his chances despite being the opposite of Trump in political experience, and even Little has dabbled.
But New Zealand politics is very different to US politics.
I would be very surprised if Internet Party 2.0 could become a serious contender next year – especially if Dotcom was prominent, and it’s hard to see him not being prominent if he tries to reboot his political ambitions.
But this could be just game playing by Dotcom. Is he trying to leverage his influence with another party?
Labour would love the sort of financial support he could provide, but any Dotcom association would be higher risk than the Memorandum of Understanding with Greens, which has so far been unsuccessful.
Just before Christmas Dotcom tweeted:
Perhaps he sees an opportunity from that. Earlier in December:
Perhaps he is just trying to stir things up.
Your NZ 
George Black
/ 28th December 2016It’s time to move the fat one on to the US.
Enough of the legal niceties.
Others more deserving of citizenship have been deported within days..
traveller
/ 28th December 2016Bring it on.
No doubt, it’ll fall on even deafer ears than did Dirty Politics, the “Moment of Truth” that wasn’t and that unprecedented and abysmal failure The Internet Party was. Nothing KDC could say about anyone on NZ’s political scene could come close to the affront he is to law-abiding Kiwis or the most un-Kiwi and cowardly manner he continues to manipulate our system to avoid facing the US courts for the crimes he’s accused of.
Let the fettleibig,eingebildet Angeber have his day. He’ll have enough time to fulminate behind bars.
Kitty Catkin
/ 28th December 2016Who else will put $100 towards his fare ? It wouldn’t take too many of us.
Pete George
/ 28th December 2016Alan Wilkinson
/ 28th December 2016How on earth he thought that was compatible Leila Harre and her loony Lefties is near incomprehensible. I can only presume he was looking for people who hated Key the most. Dumb.
Kitty Catkin
/ 28th December 2016Dotcom ist ein Dummkopf, nein ?
Kitty Catkin
/ 28th December 2016My dog would have more chance of being an MP with the Free Dog Treats Party.
patupaiarehe
/ 28th December 2016My dog would vote for yours Kitty, if he stood under that banner… 😉
Kitty Catkin
/ 28th December 2016I think that this might be a winner. My dog for PM !
patupaiarehe
/ 28th December 2016Kitty Catkin
/ 29th December 2016Oh, I love that; it’s brilliant ! 😀
Blazer
/ 29th December 2016does your derg….bite?
Kitty Catkin
/ 29th December 2016He’s a dog, not a derg, and he doesn’t bite…often.