“If you had read the link properly you would have discovered that the chart was based on figures produced by the OECD. Doesn’t come much more reputable than that.”

If you’d care to read the chart you linked to, you’d find that NZ was one of the countries to the higher end of the corporate tax rate.

Sorry. Just calling you out on your own stupidity, as you say.

“But perhaps Dean was thinking of something else ”

No, that was pretty much it. Roger seems to have a rather short memory when it comes to his own posts.

I’m not at all sure that my interpretation is correct Burt, I’m not a lawyer, and its a complicated document. But all new laws require interpretation and testing. And plenty of people are prepared to “test the limits” – it’s started already.

We do however seem to agree that aj has it wrong.

Again, I’m not at all convinced. The interpretation that you want to push relies on somewhat bizarre interpretations of certain clauses, as above.

You’re hypothetical question related to either side of a numerically posted limit and appears to have no purpose but divert the issue

Well there was a point, but it gets rather lost in your wordy answer. My point was that evading the intent of the law (while technically keeping the letter) is to all intents and purposes breaking the law. And that’s what National did at the last election:

http://norightturn.blogspot.com/2006_11_01_archive.html

The Hollow Men alleges that National failed to maintain a proper separation between donors and politicians, and allowed big donors to remain anonymous despite knowing their identities:

Hager names top New Zealand businessmen and women as the principal donors to National’s 2005 election campaign, including Alan Gibbs, Barry Coleman, Craig Heatley, David Richwhite, Diane Foreman, Doug Myers, Michael Friedlander, Peter Shirtcliffe, Rod Deane, Colin Giltrap, and Michael Horton.

According to the book, donations were made anonymously through the Waitemata Trust, one of a series of secret trusts that gave substantial sums to National at the last election.

Hager’s book alleges that Brash and his key advisors were in regular contact with the donors and regularly sought their advice on policy and strategy as well as soliciting funding from them.

There’s a name for this: it’s called a corrupt electoral practice. Section 214G of the Electoral Act 1993 requires party secretaries to file an annual return of donations, including the name and address of each person donating over $10,000 a year, or just the amount if the donation is anonymous. In order to be considered “anonymous” for the purposes of the Act, both candidates and party administrators must be unaware of the donor’s identity (s3(1)). Knowingly making a false return is a corrupt electoral practice and carries a penalty of one year’s imprisonment and a $20,000 fine. And from the above, it seems that people in National have been knowingly making false statements, falsely claiming their donors are anonymous while knowing full well who they are and what they want, and using the trusts essentially to launder donations to hide this fact from the public.

To all intents and purposes, in 2005 National broke the law governing electoral practice. They followed a similar “keep the letter but evade the intent” policy with the Exclusive Brethren and their 1.2 million dollar advertising campaign. There’s little point in denying this, because when it all became public, the public outcry cost Don Brash his political life. To try and limit the chances of such things happening again the law has been tightened up. The new law will need interpreting and settling in. That’s really about all there is to it.

Do you know you are BREAKING THE LAW every time you drive at 50.5 kph in a 50 kph zone? You can play this silly reductio ad absurdum game with any law.

Not any law rOb, with the EFB it’s currently sitting somewhere between a bumper sticker and a billboard and nobody is prepared to take a guess where the law of common sense sets the threshold.

You’re hypothetical question related to either side of a numerically posted limit and appears to have no purpose but divert the issue away from my original questioning of ‘aj’ over the statement “There is no restriction at all on free speech”.

We do however seem to agree that aj has it wrong.

However knowingly traveling at 51 kph against expected zero tolerance enforcement of the limit would not be following the intent of the law. Dangerous driving below the speed limit is still captured by laws regarding dangerous driving, careless driving, vehicular manslaughter etc. So you wouldn’t be given a speeding ticket (IE a limit infringement) traveling at 49 kph in a 50 zone, but you could still incur other driving related charges/fines. What makes 49 vs 51 better or worse… the outcome of the incident under investigation.

What could be more Nanny State or authoritarian than telling academics what they can and can’t research?

I’m not sure that’s a well-grounded foundation for a discussion about nanny state politics. You’re talking here about “scholarships awarded for doctoral research by the Tertiary Education Commission”. That’s a two-step process: an aspiring student submits a research proposal, and makes a sufficiently compelling case for scholarship support. By necessity, the TEC must make a judgement call about the academic merits of a research proposal, otherwise it’d be obliged to award scholarships for all doctoral-level research.

On your more substantive point, I’m not sure “nanny state” has a universal (or even widely accepted) meaning – a bit like how political correctness has become cliche these days. In some cases it’s just a label, and a lazy form of argument. Perhaps the closest one can get is to say the person complaining about nanny state feels a particular measure is an unwarranted intrusion into their private life. That’s a subjective concept, and it’s clearly not automatically going to apply to every regulation or ban.

You invited Dean to substantiate his claim. It’s possible that Dean had this thread in mind:
http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2007/10/how_has_the_average_worker_done_under_labour.html#comment-354896

I’d particularly refer you to this exchange:

“# roger nome Says:
October 18th, 2007 at 4:26 pm

Maybe you should scrap your last analysis and replace it with median wage increase, inclusive of penal rates – bloody slimy little man this deceptive BS pisses me off.

[DPF: No what pisses you off is that you can never again on this blog post about how awful the 1990s were for workers without scores of people jumping in and challenging you. You misleading use of gross nominal wages instead of net real wages has been exposed]“.

And you probably haven’t forgotten your mistake about the top personal tax rate in Australia:

“roger, at what income level does the 59% [tax rate in Australia] come into play?

I don’t care mate – john howard is all about the politics of communistic envy. When I was milking the cows this morning I was think about my $200,000 Fontera payout, then I about how lucky I am to live In New Zealand, where the struggling cow cocky can avoid nasty commie suckholes like John Howard who tax people like me at 59%. Then I thought “how great it is that we have hard working salt of the earth people like the good Doctor Cullen who leaves more dollars in my pocket’.

But perhaps Dean was thinking of something else…

Remember how the Kiwiblog right claimed that we would be inundated with prosecutions of innocent parents after the repeal of Section 59? Did it happen? No. These silly games are just more of the same nonsense.

Anyway Burt, hypothetical question for you. Which do you think is worse:

(1) violating the intent of the law while staying technically within its letter (eg driving at 49 kph in a 50 kph zone when current conditions actually make it unsafe to be travelling at that speed), or

(2) being in violation of the letter of the law while clearly keeping its intent (eg driving at 51 kph in a 50kph zone when conditions are typical and it is safe to drive).

Which is worse Burt?

So following on from the law of common sense approach “(because it falls well below the threshold of things considered by the act)”, how do you think a full size billboard approaching the Wellington Airport?

If you think that exceeds the common sense threshold can you please explain to me where the line is between “not going to get you prosecuted. So go crazy.” and where the act starts being enforced. Common sense is a bit troublesome in the application of law, what bunch of idiots passed this nonsense bill?

1) Not being able to smack kids (is unjust to be able to smack kids, but not adults)
2) Paying ‘youth’ the same as adults for the same job (is unjust to pay different wages for the same job based on age)
3) (maybe) Is unjust to have marijuana and party pills outlawed while alcohol wrecks all sorts of havoc every day of the year.

Obviously Green issues. So my guess is that it is simply justice, or what is ‘fair’ when applied to social issues…

“Anything along the lines of the cartoon you linked to is just gross stupidity, we both agree. But I still contend that Roger is determined to discover outrage where there is none.”

Have you seen whaleoil’s photoshoped image entitled “nanny state”? It involves peter dunne and winston peters sucking on a porn-star’s nipples. Of course helen clark’s head has been photo shopped onto the pornographic image. Nuff said.

“for example Roger’s failure to understand income levels after tax”

Really? Care to show me a link to back up that petty little jibe?

“or Steve’s incredible lapse in posting a wikipedia chart and claiming tax rates were low in New Zealand.”

If you had read the link properly you would have discovered that the chart was based on figures produced by the OECD. Doesn’t come much more reputable than that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Income_Taxes_By_Country.svg

http://www.oecd.org/document/60/0,2340,en_2649_34533_1942460_1_1_1_1,00.html

Just calling you on your stupidity….

OK Burt, I Am Not A Lawyer, but I think I can see how it is possible to construct that interpretation of the Act. It requires:
* a very strict reading of the definition of “publish” (Part 1 Clause 4),
* a very narrow reading of the exceptions (Part 1 Clause 5(2)) which allows editorials, books, publications of organisations to their members, blogs and so on,
* and (to be fair here) what looks like a poorly drafted Part 2 Subpart 6 Clause 65 which uses the term “promoter” where I believe that “third party” would have been more appropriate.

But it’s clearly a pernicious interpretation of the Bill Burt. Just like players don’t get prosecuted for technical violence on a Rugby field, just like the repeal of Section 59 has not resulted in a flood of parents being prosecuted for smacking, in the same way your bumper sticker (because it falls well below the threshold of things considered by the act) is not going to get you prosecuted. So go crazy.

BTW Have you heard any more about the EPMU registering as a third party?

Nope.