The Standard » spin

Selling asset sales to [insert region here]

Eddie — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 22:09:56 +0000

Not everyone in the Beehive is thrilled that National is throwing away its chance at a third term for the sake of asset sales which make no sense, economically or politically. The Standard has obtained a copy of the generic column that National MPs are meant to add some 'local flavour' to and have published in their regional papers. It shows how cynical and shallow their position really is.

A reply to Steven Joyce

Anthony R0bins — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 19:00:38 +0000

Steven Joyce's piece on Tuesday was a transparent and hypocritical attempt to frame political opponents negatively, and soften us up for more asset sales, mining, deep sea drilling and the like. Thing is, it's the Nats with their misguided austerity cuts who are the real nay-sayers holding the country back.

Steven Joyce and the ‘can’ts’

Zetetic — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 20:57:14 +0000

Steven Joyce reckons that the 'can'ts' are holding us back. I agree, just look at these facts:

National can't create growth
National can't create jobs
National can't grow wages
National can't get people to live here
National can't get debt under control
National can't reduce poverty

You’ve got to be kidding me

Zetetic — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 09:38:25 +0000

Pike River boss Peter Whittall, the guy facing charges after 29 of his employees died working in his unsafe, 'profit-over-people' mine, has set up a mining safety consulting company. What's next? A Minister of Tourism who always holidays overseas? A Finance Minister who wants to sell highly profitable assets in a down market? ... oh ... This country is nuts.

Port’s paid propagandist says cut workers’ pay

James Henderson — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 18:24:10 +0000

They say that the nice thing about Cameron Slater is he'll believe whatever he's paid to believe. Yesterday, I asked whether Slater is being paid to run dirt stories for Ports of Auckland. He didn't deny it. So what is the Port's propagandist up to? Yesterday, he was calling for the workers' pay to be slashed while defending the directors' massive fees.
Update: Ports of Auckland denies paying Slater anything.

ImperatorFish: A Plea To Jim Hopkins

The Standard — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 06:32:40 +0000

Scott at Imperator Fish has kindly given us permission to syndicate posts from his blog – the original of this post is here

Did you realise Jim Hopkins abolished Climate Change last Friday? It was awfully good of him and his craaaaaaaazy red-rimmed glasses.

Countering the Tories’ bait & switch

Eddie — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 20:00:44 +0000

Congratulations David Shearer, you're leader of the Left now, and the prime target for the Right's smear machine. The Right's strategy is obvious: bait and switch. Having proclaimed Shearer's virtues to high heaven, they (and their useful idiots) will now say 'who is this man?', try to frame unreasonable expectations, and try to beat up leadership rumours.

Bugger the polls

Anthony R0bins — Sun, 27 Nov 2011 20:48:08 +0000

Pundit's poll of polls tracked 57 individual polls this year, four of them appearing just a day or so before the election. Every single poll predicted National with the seats to govern alone. Didn't happen. The polls over estimate Nat support to the tune of about 4%. They need to rethink their methods.

[insert tea-related pun here]

Eddie — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 20:08:16 +0000

The teapot tapes story (seems that's the name that's been settled on, despite the story involving neither teapots nor tapes) has evolved two distinct strands: the contents of the Key-Banks conversation, which is gradually coming out through the media, and the very aggressive, poorly conceived response of National which is making it worse for them.

Update: According to Fairfax reporter Danya Levy on Twitter, Key has just "stormed out" of a press conference after further questioning on the tapes. He's losing it. Now The Herald has the story.

Three lies in one

the sprout — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 18:38:16 +0000

Wave goodbye to higher taxes. Not your loved ones.

Choose a Brighter Future. Derp de derp.

This is what John Key was promising last election - before he came to power, raised GST, and record numbers of kiwis left New Zealand permanently for a brighter future in Australia.

John Key puts truth on 90 day term deposit

the sprout — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 18:50:44 +0000

hattip William Joyce

That sinking feeling

Eddie — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 21:07:47 +0000

More protests in Tauranga. Simon Bridges blames "out of towners".

Nats’ Rena spin all at sea

Eddie — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 00:19:23 +0000

The Nats are clearly at panic stations. They're trying to minimise the Rena disaster by comparing the number of dead animals to those killed by other means. As one emailer put it: "it's like saying the Christchurch earthquake was no big deal because more people die of cancer". Meanwhile, Key visits oiled birds and says they're the price of economic 'progress'.

Petard, meet hoist

the sprout — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 02:02:03 +0000

Attentive readers may recall some time back, when talk about illegal police video surveillance was to the fore, that there was also mention of the existence of video surveillance of a politician having an affair with a P user. Now of course having an affair isn’t particularly dreadful by today’s standards, even if the person ...

You couldn’t make this sh*t up

IrishBill — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 09:22:14 +0000

I missed it at the time but apparently John Key's big plan for Christchurch was to have a yarn to Oprah.

What kind of weird fantasy world does this guy live in?