Author Archive

Public Tertiary Education

Written By: - Date published: 12:20 pm, January 18th, 2011 - 13 comments

The Tertiary Education Union’s new National President, Sandra Grey, joins us for a guest post on the challenges facing tertiary education as the government cuts funding and institutions are ‘rationalised’ to focus on economic values alone. Tertiary education can be so much more than that.

New Zealand’s Electoral Wild Card

Written By: - Date published: 10:34 am, January 18th, 2011 - 26 comments

Will New Zealand First get back into Parliament after the election? If they do, it changes everything. A range of new governing coalitions become possible – both National and Labour-led. Can the Left trust Winston Peters to side with Labour over National? Could a Left+NZF government work? Jenny looks at the issues.

Will 2011 be a rerun of 2008?

Written By: - Date published: 12:20 pm, January 12th, 2011 - 22 comments

This post from the Oil Drum looks at how peak oil and the economy interact. From 2004 to 2008 oil prices rose and rose with demand. But high prices bought nearly no new oil to the market because it isn’t there. The prices broke the global economy, destroying demand. Now, prices are rising again and the weakened economies will topple much easier.

The Two Nations: or, Why Won’t They Bail Me Out?

Written By: - Date published: 11:47 pm, January 11th, 2011 - 38 comments

Under the supposed rules of capitalism, investors take a “haircut” if an investment goes bad – no reward without risk. It’s also Economics 101 that giving relief to the ‘little people’ will have a more stimulating effect on the economy than if you bail out the wealthiest interests in society. But the powers that be are breaking the rules to aid the rich.

Newtering the rhetoric on crime

Written By: - Date published: 1:33 pm, January 11th, 2011 - 37 comments

As has been amply demonstrated by comments on The Standard in recent days, there are many who believe that the answer to an ineffective deterrent is more deterrent; that leaving in place the likelihood that fleeing from a police car will result in your death is somehow discouraging an unknown number of drivers from fleeing. Increasingly, though, people who respond with their critical faculties as opposed to their knees are realising that the present model of law enforcement and incarceration is a failure.

Herald editing letters to make them pro-Nat

Written By: - Date published: 10:57 am, January 10th, 2011 - 35 comments

Our guest poster writes about a letter he had published in the Herald recently. A clever wee missive, it started ‘helpful’ in tone but had a sting in the tail on the inaction of Key’s do nothing government in the face of recession, unemployment, and peak oil. The Herald cut off the sting leaving a ‘pro-Key’ letter. What are they up to?

The Carnival of Revolt

Written By: - Date published: 1:30 pm, January 6th, 2011 - 5 comments

It’s not just about fees, or cuts, but about the essential corruption of the current system; so it replays the confrontation between the great British radical movements of the past and the landed-gentry “Old Corruption” that they fought to tame. Compared to 1968, the student movement is now much larger and more broadly based, with deeper roots into the working class and society in general, and so the revolt is, if anything, more profound.

The Wrath of the Sea

Written By: - Date published: 1:59 pm, January 5th, 2011 - 28 comments

Our guest poster looks at the “Warm Arctic / Cool Continents” idea about why Europe and North America have been cold and the Arctic has been so warm over recent years. Quoting Conrad, our guest then skewers ‘skeptics’ with the statement “Or to put it another way: you might not be interested in global warming, but global warming is interested in you.”

Institute for New Economic Thinking

Written By: - Date published: 10:30 am, December 23rd, 2010 - 3 comments

All those who think Keynes is dead (and those who merely wondered what happened to him) should check out the website of George Soros’s Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET). A remarkable range of economic luminaries are presented on video and powerpoint, most or all of them arguing for a radical Keynesian solution to the financial crisis.

State asset for sale

Written By: - Date published: 8:30 am, December 21st, 2010 - 39 comments

Energy Minister Gerry Brownlee has waited, until after the year-end press gallery drinks, to announce that the state owned Whirinaki power plant will be sold by tender process.  The Government talks about having our interests at heart, but the truth is that it is selling off the family silver again.  And slippery John Key is doing it while we’re focussed on Christmas.

Sykes on neoliberalism & the iwi elite

Written By: - Date published: 12:10 pm, December 15th, 2010 - 18 comments

Annette Sykes recently delivered the annual Bruce Jesson Lecture concerning ‘The Politics of the Brown Table’. Much of her address is a harsh critique of the so called ‘iwi elite’ and their neo liberal agenda. In my opinion her assessments are true and justified. Without doubt neo liberalism undermines Maori efforts for self determination

Winning the game

Written By: - Date published: 1:20 pm, December 12th, 2010 - 6 comments

John Key deserves the award for Politician of the Year. But it’s not quite the honour Armstrong thinks it is.  The Left wants a government to deliver results for the people’s health, wealth, family, safety, education, employment prospects etc. That’s why the Left is so critical of Key. He plays the ‘politician’ game well but does nothing meaningful.

I beg your pardon, Mr Key

Written By: - Date published: 2:40 pm, December 7th, 2010 - 17 comments

A reader responds, pretty curtly, to John Key’s wholly inadequate explanation for why the select committee hearings on extending the SIS’s already broad powers will be secret. “It won’t be in the public interest to have it open, for a whole bunch of reasons I don’t want to go into,” Just doesn’t cut it.

Welcome to the 21st Century!

Written By: - Date published: 9:11 am, December 3rd, 2010 - 14 comments

Sometimes I find it hard to believe how the leaders of this world fail to comprehend what appears so obvious to me. In the Information Age, how do they think secrecy is viable? What is happening with Wikileaks, or more appropriately, what is about to happen, appears to be playing out along the same lines as the rise and fall of Napster.

What really rankles about National’s Standards

Written By: - Date published: 5:17 pm, November 22nd, 2010 - 34 comments

Kids Can get it.
“Kids Can is dedicated to removing barriers preventing less fortunate children from getting the most out of education.”

Anne Tolley prefers instead to concentrate on the diversion that is National’s Standards. It must be easier implementing a political slogan than actually doing her job.

Can the Left save the world?

Written By: - Date published: 7:37 am, November 22nd, 2010 - 196 comments

It takes many people working together to achieve anything really worthwhile. This also applies to our biggest project yet. Saving a planet. So why can’t we get started? Because human society based around the market can not do it. The answers will only com from the Left. The Left parties, Labour in particular, need to get serious and move Leftward.

Another reason why National should not be permitted a 2nd term

Written By: - Date published: 1:25 pm, November 19th, 2010 - 39 comments

CERRA, Ecan Abolition, the Supercity Acts, the Hobbit Enabling Act, Water Privatisation, Fire at Will, the Murray McCully Empowering Act… the list of laws, all passed under Urgency, that take rights off New Zealanders and give more powers to the government is endless. Now, the Police are being empowered to take DNA from anyone they arrest.

OMG! ING! WTF?

Written By: - Date published: 1:33 pm, November 18th, 2010 - 60 comments

Last year, over 13,000 New Zealanders got some measure of satisfaction from ANZ’s part-owned ING in New Zealand. For over a year, half a billion dollars in investors’ funds had been locked up, during a nasty dispute between ING/ANZ and their investors. How has ANZ made things right for everyone who was hurt? They’ve renamed ING as ‘One Path’

Framing the argument

Written By: - Date published: 12:00 pm, November 18th, 2010 - 16 comments

Bill English and brother Conner, CEO of Federated Farmers, share a vision for the world. It’s one where the environment and workers are exploited to the hilt in the name of ‘growth’ and the fruits of that ‘growth’ flow to a privileged elite (like the Englishes). Yesterday rich-boy Conner chided the rest of us with a speech titled “There is no free lunch”

Tolley ignores mistreatment of kids at private schools

Written By: - Date published: 10:58 am, November 18th, 2010 - 17 comments

Anne Tolley has ignored the advice of the Law Commission and the desire of parents that private schools be required to provide a “safe and supportive” environment for children. She says there’s no problem to fix. Unfortunately that’s not true. Rather than make them accountable, Tolley is opening the public purse strings for private schools.

Neo-liberalism at work

Written By: - Date published: 5:16 pm, November 16th, 2010 - 15 comments

So people get sick and become less productive. I would have thought that that was pretty much stating the obvious.

Spending tax payers money trying to quantify how much imaginary wealth these sick people could have created for their employers if they had been perfectly well, seems to me to be bordering on lunacy.

Trading away our rights

Written By: - Date published: 3:38 pm, November 15th, 2010 - 34 comments

The dark side of the current much-heralded free trade talks is that New Zealand could end up letting foreign firms dictate how the country is run, from quarantine rules to local content laws, unless it learns the lessons of previous trade deals. A new book edited by Auckland academic Jane Kelsey, No Ordinary Deal, points out that free trade deals are now about far more than just tariffs.

If you’re political, your opinion doesn’t count

Written By: - Date published: 9:31 am, November 14th, 2010 - 57 comments

It’s disconcerting to see National and its blogging lackies running smear campaigns against anyone who has what they deem to be “political connections”. The government’s current strategy to deal to individual opposition is find a link to Labour or the Greens and dismiss the outspoken person on the basis of political bias. This tactic is […]

SAS inspires money-making scheme

Written By: - Date published: 9:30 am, November 9th, 2010 - 23 comments

I’m a nurse at a public hospital. Our social fund is looking a bit thin this year so we thought would invite school groups to come along to the hospital, charge $25 a head, and let them play around with the equipment like X-ray machines and bandages to get a sense of how we work as a team. I’m sure Mr Key will say it’s a “good idea“.

Q&A on The Hobbit – Part 2

Written By: - Date published: 1:30 pm, November 3rd, 2010 - 52 comments

In a highly-charged debate like the Hobbit fiasco, it’s easy to lose sight of the real issue amongst the claims and counter-claims over petty details. In a second post that strips things back to what matters, Blue asks the big question: ‘how exactly did NZ taxpayers end up handing over tens of millions of dollars to Warner Brothers?’

Tolley pushes ‘choice’ in private schools over child welfare

Written By: - Date published: 9:45 am, November 2nd, 2010 - 116 comments

Anne Tolley’s Education Amendment Bill 2, due out of Select Committee next week, ignores the Law Commission’s call for “light-handed” legislation to deal with 100 year old gaps that leave children at private schools in a legal vacuum regarding their welfare.   Instead the Nats will hand unspecified sums of public money to private schools.

Felix on the Mana debate

Written By: - Date published: 1:30 pm, November 1st, 2010 - 24 comments

Q+A held a debate between the Mana by-election candidates yesterday. Felix has done a very nice summary of how the candidates came across. Fa’afoi is a good guy but we aren’t seeing his values coming through very strongly. Parata is a nasty piece of work. She continually interrupts others when they speak then gets angry at the slightest questioning.

Q&A on The Hobbit

Written By: - Date published: 11:30 am, October 28th, 2010 - 84 comments

The Right argues that an already settled labour dispute involving a small union somehow scared a multi-billion film company enough to make them consider abandoning the $100 million already invested in NZ. Blue has gone beyond the slogans and done some excellent research to answers our questions on what really happened.

Universal Income & the Minimum Wage

Written By: - Date published: 12:50 pm, October 26th, 2010 - 101 comments

There is no need to tolerate the existence of poverty. It is an economic and social drag on our country that wastes human potential. The minimum wage, super, and benefits help, yet 15% of Kiwis, and 20% of kids, live in households with incomes below 60% of the average income. A universal income is the best way to eliminate the blight of poverty.

A time of trouble, a time for action

Written By: - Date published: 2:15 pm, October 25th, 2010 - 5 comments

The release of 400,000 classified documents on the Iraq war today highlights a much broader issue for New Zealand. As the world moves into uncertainty, some commentators call it a ‘new new world order’, New Zealand must establish itself definitively, cementing the values we wish to hold true for the coming century.

Tolley – the reverse Rumpelstiltskin

Written By: - Date published: 10:10 am, October 25th, 2010 - 5 comments

Rumplestiltskin spun hay into gold. It stikes me Anne Tolley is quickly becoming a “reverse Rumplestiltskin”. Taking a very successful Early Childhood Education sector and stripping out millions, putting the primary sector through the national standards debacle, forcing secondary teachers to strike – Tolley is turning gold into hay.

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