It’s a bad time for soporific narcissists in office. Just weeks after the self-indulgent grandstanding of Nicola Sturgeon’s farewell press conference, Jacinda Ardern has today followed suit. The New Zealand premier treated her long-suffering public to one last display of egotistical over-excitement. Swathed, bizarrely, in a traditional Maori cloak and fighting back tears, the world leader whose pronouns are me/me/me gave her final speech as Prime Minister in parliament. She told legislators in Wellington’s House of Representatives that:
I do hope that I’ve demonstrated something else entirely. That you can be anxious, sensitive, kind, and wear your heart on your sleeve. You can be a mother or not. You can be an ex-Mormon or not. You can be a nerd, a crier, a hugger. You can be all of these things. And not only can you be here, you can lead just like me.
Who on earth would want to be “just like me”
She also thinks she was an effective leader.
Division is the opposite of leadership.