Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy). Step right up to the mike…
It hasn’t taken long for the MSM to start their whisperings about David Cunliffe.
John Armstrong in the Herald yesterday about his speech to the CTU Conference “It seemed as if two David Cunliffes had turned up’….One passionate and stirring message for the workers; one politically sanitised version of the same message for everyone else'”.
Claire Trevett suggests Cunliffe gave himself “wiggle-room” in his commitments to the unionists.
No acknowledgement that a responsible Party Leader has to be careful in what they say before they’ve seen the state of the “books” the Nats leave behind.
Despite that, Cunliffe was very clear to the unions – an immediate rise to $15phr for the minimum wage, the first budget will have a living wage to people working in the core public service, scrapping the Nats unfair employment law changes, bringing in more parental leave.
He’s a numbers man, he knows his stuff, he will have worked out what Labour can afford to promise before the election. There’s nothing two-faced about what he is saying. But the MSM and the WhaleOils will search through everything he says to find ways to trip him up.
Makes me think of the old dressing table mirrors with one flat, and two wings. Stand in one place, turn your head and see three different visions or versions of whoever. Perhaps these jonolists need to move around a bit. It sounds as if they have been so rroted to their spot that they’ll start sprouting cutty grass and thorns soon.
Cunliffe is enjoying an honeymoon, however, I think it is becoming clear that we will almost certainly have a Labour-led government next year.
I listen to what you all say very carefully. So, I am interested in what it is you want this government to do.
Give me your dream list. Tax hikes? GST off fruit and vegetables? Buying back all of the shares in Meridian (and perhaps some other generators not already publicly-owned)? Employment law changes? Increase in benefits? Banning foreign ownership? Out of the TPPA? Nationalisation of Trade Me? Think Big? Government control of the exchange rate? Berm mowing?
Stating the contradiction within your kind invitation is not a smack down. It’s simply casting doubt on either your motive or your comprehension, a failure in either of which might lead to a waste of everyone’s time.
The Gormless Fool formerly known as Oleolebiscuitbarrell 5.1.1.1.1
I would be surprised if you believed that I felt compelled to answer your question.
Besides NZ being a free country (albeit for a given value of “free”), if you did indeed carefully listen to what each of us said, the information is already at your fingertips.
If you’re serious, and from that list:
Employment law changes – seriously detrimental to social cohesion and a decent life for the most vulnerable with NActs changes
Buying back all of the shares – should be on the table
Restricting foreign ownership – unless we have reciprocal rights
Out of the TPPA – as it stands now
1. Considerable Tax hikes at the higher levels – along the lines of the top tax rate in the UK or Australia.
2. Investment in green tech
3. Widening of land based and marine reserves and national parks
3. Restrictions on foreign ownership
4. Capital gains tax on property
5. Reversal of the Employment law changes
Lolz, Gormless, the third one of the wing-nuts that appear here at the Standard to admit this far out from November 2014 that National are going to lose,
Keep up the defeatism it will spread like swine flu through the ranks of National Party supporters, i am starting to firm up in my pick of 39% for National in 2014,
Besides what Labour leader David Cunliffe has already announced, my little wish list, dependent entirely in what state the incoming Labour/Green Government finds the Government accounts in would be sufficient for the first term,
(1), the reversal of ALL changes made to the benefit system by the current Government within the first 100 days,
(2), Subject to the 500 million dollar estimated cost being available the transition of the Working for Families tax credit scheme into a functional child benefit payment which is also paid to ALL benefit dependent children,(or a definite promise of a starting date for such a scheme),
(3), A State House building program focused mainly upon the cities of Auckland and Christchurch,
(4), At the direction of the relevant Ministers both the Superfund and the ACC fund tasked to buy back shares in recently sold State Owned Assets…
“dependent entirely in what state the incoming Labour/Green Government finds the Government accounts in ”
Probably an empty cupboard with a little bill n john wuz here.
[lprent: with connotations of “tool”? As in blind unthinking inanimate object doing someone else’s bidding. I suppose I could look at context but who has the time? ]
– savage any mono/duopoly/shonkey business practices.
– give the SFO/FMA the teeth required to deal effectively with serial shysters.
– dispute resolution with the onus on respondents to prove matters are indeed civil.
– a serious look at the limited liability scam
Housing:
– CGT on property transactions – no exceptions.
– all speculators are developers who will pay the relevant tax.
– initiate a capitalisation scheme to assist new builds for first home owners only.
– remove subsidies on rental accommodation state transfers to rental owners.
– increase social housing availability for low income CBD workers.
– increase social housing availability for the elderly/infirm.
– improve all existing housing stock using the healthy home model.
Education:
– follow the science – anec-data doesn’t count.
– 4 -16 compulsory attendance.
– expansion of special education services.
– 16-21 compulsory tertiary education/trade training fully funded
– funding continuing education – attendance – a priority.
Health:
– health care is universal.
– pre-natal – post-natal a priority.
– continuation and improvement of well child initiatives.
– universal dental care.
– expansion of public health initiatives – step away from that pie fella – image of cleaved sternum.
– elder care – stop the gaming of the taxpayer by those who hide or transfer resources.
Crime and punishment:
– remove the greatest barrier to our Peelian policing model – cannabis prohibition.
– criminal sanctions tied to education – community service is as either a student or an educator.
– prison is punishment – not a place to be punished.
– prison is punishment – not a place to be disenfranchised.
– prison is punishment – not a place where universal health care is denied.
– prison is a work place and education facility- literacy, numeracy, transferable skills are the goals.
– separate the bad from the mad.
– the truly mad are treated.
– the truly bad run out of chances.
Work to significantly lower energy prices for both domestic and commercial users.
Go all Keynesian on transport.
Go all Keynesian on employment.
Robust regional development policies.
Governance – start by cleaning up your own parliament – the collective lack of ethics on display daily is disgusting.
Wow joe 90 – a concise and exciting set of dynamic ideas, and we’ll need more than the Dynamic Duo to move them. But what a greatprospect it would be. rrection – it will be!
Thanks Rogue for that interesting link. It’s time to look at what China is doing – if it can only supply some quality thinking to sustainable futures for us all, it will be a worthy world leader unlike the rubber chicken we have at present. Unfortunately I heard a radio report recently saying that China is at present supplying subsidies for shipping to fishers to go out into the high seas and will smash the tuna stocks as part of their expansion in all directions plan. It apparently is the Great Cosmic Plan in space, but we can’t do that on earth. I thought China was smart enough to realise that.
1. Guaranteed real ice-cream made from milk
This would mean dissociation from the Australia New Zealand Food Standards Authority and the re-establishment of the NZ Food Standards Authority. Then we wouldn’t have to put up with the Australian definition of ice-cream which lets manufacturers use a proportion of animal fat from any source (eg rendered chicken fat), as well as milk fat in ice cream manufacture
2. Reworking of the Overseas Investment Office so that it’s default stance is that land sales should not be permitted to foreigners. This is a reverse of it’s current MO which is to permit land sales unless someone comes up with a damn good reason why a sale shouldn’t be permitted.
richard Australian definition of ice-cream which lets manufacturers use a proportion of animal fat from any source (eg rendered chicken fat), as well as milk fat in ice cream manufacture
I hadn’t caught up with that. I wondered why some of the ice cream didn’t taste good. I looked at the labels but reading through all the information in small print didn’t enlighten me. And I had a supermarket cream freeze and thought it was greasy rather than milky. The above could be the reason.
sorry GW didn’t see you right away.
In the first bowl beat 4 egg yolks with electric mixer whilst slowly adding 1 cup of castor sugar until thick and sugar has melted. Then beat in a quarter cup of your favourite liqueur (I use khalua mainly for the special occasions) (but a dash of vanilla essence or other flavouring does just as well.).
In the next bowl whip 750ml of cream adding another cup of castor sugar to this.
Fold the two mixtures together and freeze. I beat until the cream peaks are stiff as this helps the mixture not to separate whilst it is freezing. I usually wind up making a double quatity and I freeze it in an enamel roasting dish. Xmas day plus family means its gone by nightfall.
Prob not on the healthy heart list though, cookingnever seems to go wrongwhen loaded with fats, sugars and booze.
Nationalisation without compensation of strategic industries. Dismantling of the police force and its replacement by a neighbourhood militia, answerable to district soviets. Restarting of the Trekka factory, with engines run on methane gas from the dairy herds. Confiscation of anything beyond the family residence. Life sentence without parole for right wing bloggers. All businesses with more than 4 employees to be set up as worker cooperatives. Compulsory basket weaving classes. No TPPA, with its promoters to be tried for treason.
Or you could read what people have been writing for years and sort it out for yourself.
Your answer(s) more than likely lay in the history of posts that occur daily on this site.
I’m simply an intermittent visitor and occasional poster – but from what I can see, your expectation is that everyone should now kowtow, and do your work for you to satisfy an answer to your question posed – God’s gift to mankind and the Universe that you are.
No no – get off your arse and do it yourself.
“I listen to what you all say very carefully. So, I am interested in what it is you want this government to do.” Why that sudden iterest? Are you now all of a sudden coming to realise a tide is turning?
…. “give me” (gimme gimme gimee)
You probably have ‘people’ to do the work for you anyway.
Here’s a hint though Gormless, I wouldn’t begin by looking for the responses to the posts you’ve made in the past – since most of them are in response to your ideologically driven diversionary tactics.
I’m often not sure why people even give you the oxygen you seek by replying to half the crap you post – perhaps it’s just a response to their picking their jaws off the ground when striking utter idiocy.
Go have a look yourself – as I usually have to do.
Tim
And Others. When you put a reply in to someone in particular why don’t you put their name at top. Then they and everyone else knows who you refer to. It makes the remarks meaningful and worth reading. Otherwise it’s what’s this about?
Well for a start we need to have all irrigation and water storage taken schemes into public ownership. Fortunately this government has set up the Crown Irrigation Investment Company. This can be easily turned into a Petrobas for water with a few penstrokes. Water is a public resourse which should be managed by public entities.
The revenue earned from this national water company can then be ring fenced to clean our rivers, fund rainwater storage tanks for HNZ houses, schools, and other public buildings, and run water conservation education programmes and campaigns.
Its a smaller wishlist compared to the usual chestnuts, but control of water is a sleeper issue in this country, and Labour need to act accordingly — I would even suggest we sell Solid Energy to fund it. Control of water schemes is probably more important than the government owning a few coal mines.
I’m very pleased to hear that the great Canadian writer Alice Munro has ben awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. Not that you would know it if you relied on the 4 main NZ news sites (stuff, nzherald, tvnz and tv3) for your news and information.
i would have preferred Te Wai Pounamu, (the name of one of my nieces), to have become Te Waka a Maui, so as to fit within the Maori creationist myth? from whence we get Te Ika a Maui,
I completely agree, Te Wai Pounamu is, and should remain the name for the West Coast (where the Pounamu was sourced) I would have preferred Te Waka a Maui also.
“i would have preferred Te Wai Pounamu, (the name of one of my nieces), to have become Te Waka a Maui, so as to fit within the Maori creationist myth? from whence we get Te Ika a Maui,”
I would like Aotearoa as an alternative name for New Zealand. I heard that the original guy putting forward these names thought it should be the name for the South Island.
And we can still call ourselves New Zealand as that is how we are known generally. Aotearoa could be our own private name that we people who are in the know about it and love the land use in our own special country. And these names must be protected names at every level of use.
Not just commercial fodder for some $-eyed entrepreneur.
And I don’t see why we should not be able to continue using North and South Island as well as having the Maori name as we wish, as in Mount Taranaki or Egmont. North and South are useful directional words, but for real names they have just been waiting for Maori to decide and agree on what is best and not too long for other language speakers.
Had the chance to meet and talk to David last night and I am so pleased that his speaking and answering questions is just spot on. It’s hard to separate the public figure from the private person when all we have to go on is MSM. So I am confident that we can look forward to a change for the better under a Labour Government. Finally after almost 30 years of playing with the far right and the so called centre right and the various other shades of right wing politics we are finally getting back to where the party should be.
Roll on election
In light of the US stalemate and the approaching default date I thought I’d dig up a Dutch Doco about what would happen if the dollar collapsed. The scenario given is that it happens withing 24 hours. It is an interesting “what if” doco and while most of it is in English some of the parts in Dutch are subtitled in English so enjoy!
Yeah sure there’s no housing crisis in Auckland Nick Smith, not while we have ‘private developers’ only too willing to provide right, bringing to the city of sails their version of a Mumbai Slum,
From the Herald online, a Auckland ‘property developer’ has been fined 60 grand and ordered to deconstruct 12 flats he had illegally constructed in 3 Auckland properties,
2 of the flats were constructed as part of existing garages already at the properties, one even featuring the existing roller door…
I remember an interesting Radionz doco on a Christchurch woman landlord/ developer back post WW2 I think. She used to get into trouble converting rooms into two etc. On the one hand she was creating sub-standard accommodation. On the other, housing was so tight that students and others were grateful to her, and reckoned that she was not too bad. Not much else was being done to deal with what was a tight housing market, or even a housing crisis. It depends what people are charged, and what is their alternative, and does it give some warmth, cleanliness and security and reasonable access to facilities.
Yes i suppose any four walls with a roof over them is a giant step up from the alternative, however, that hardly absolves a series of Governments from the failure to build up the required numbers of social housing at a time of high population growth,
The only reason a slum-lord can thrive and/or survive is if there is a unmet demand for low cost housing…
Agreed. But a port in the storm is better than being drenched. And just because the place wouldn’t feature in Home Design, doesn’t mean it’s no good. If it provides basic amenities and warm and secure and cheap, it shouldn’t be dismissed as disgraceful.
The accommodation this guy provided sounded dire when reported. Then I remembered the Christchurch woman landlord remembered kindly. It’s a matter of judging on reasonable criteria and price, and middle class people in homes better not make those criteria too high.
Actually the places sounded like the Ritz when described on RadioNZ National news tonight, washing and showering facilities in among the kitchen with apparently no separation,
Market rents apparently charged, yeah your right we all should become Slum-lords,
Apparently the particular individual/company we talk of here owns more property across Auckland, the City Council for all it’s billions of dollars of budgeted high salaries has a see no evil approach to Slum-lords and the housing they provide,
Asked whether any of the many other property’s owned were in the same state of illegal alteration the Spokesperson for the Auckland City Council said She didn’t know coz they apparently have better things to do with their time than track down Slum-lords Slum-housing,
Why would any of them, from Central Government to the Local variety they have all sat on their arse’s for 20 years while this ugly problem has developed, more than one or two having helped the problem along by playing ‘in the market’…
1. Stop all new motorway contracts and use the funding for rail and cycling public transport projects
2. All Crown super and investment funds including Kiwisaver providers required to have 50% nz ownership weighting, and are required to start immediate buy back of electricity utility shares. And Kiwibank becomes the Crown’s sole bank.
3. State and city governments all form property development companies to roll out Kiwibuild really fast.
4. Decrease income tax for the lowest quarter of income owners and impose Capital Gains Tax. Just as soon as I’ve offloaded one of the rentals. 😉
5. Complete Treaty of Waitangi settlements
6. Merge Maori Television and Radio NZ into a new Internet-based public broadcasting company
7. Roll out increased minimum wage to whole public sector, with contractors next
8. Establish a single national park the length of the South Island using existing DoC estate.
9. Pump money into the arts and other identity-drivers like sports. Gradual increase in patriotism and identity like Clark.
10. Establish a multi-billion research fund for job-rich innovation, where private business must partner with Crown Research Institutes, universities, and local government in joint ventures.
nothing new there really, just collectively would feel like reasonable and populist progress.
What price do we pay for ‘free trade’, from RadioNZ National News, 200 fish processing jobs are set to disappear from Christchurch’s Independent Fishery’s,
Citing competition from ‘cheap imports’ the company is set to close it’s fish crumbing plant in November with the loss of 200 jobs,
With Slippery the Prime Minister whipping along the TPPA where New Zealand’s access to the other signatory’s markets will be in a decade or longer, just how many more jobs in the New Zealand economy is the little Shyster prepared to give away…
To all the taxers above .
The smartest tax would be a land tax.
This would solve many of the problems NZ has.
As high value overcrowded areas with not enough infrastructure would pay higher taxes while under populated areas with underutilized infrastructure would pay lower taxes people would move to lower taxed areas or make better use of land in high taxed areas income tax would have to be lowered to make the idea work.
Just saying you want tax the well off and rich to much is feeding keys spin that the left are extreme!
We on the left don’t need to give Key and co a free ride to the next election.
Be reasonable the majority of New Zealands middle classes have aspirations of being rich one day that’s why they vote National,Even though most NZers will never get to the top tax rate.
We on the left need to cooperate
Just as those on the right all sing from the same song sheet .
Capital gains tax is good if it is broad spectrum.
If it only focuses on one area not so good.
But If Capital gains managef to get over the line the money brought in should gone into building affordable houses and that would have a double whammy reducing the risk of a housing bubble.
From my reading, it would pretty well destroy the pastoral farming industry in NZ as it adversely affects those with a variable income and those with a high land value to income generated from that land. A land tax would be a double whammy for farmers.
Youll have every cow-cocky in the country firing up their tractor and riding it down to Wellington. If I have learned something, it is never to take on the farmers. You will not win.
I thought that this BBC article on what would happen if America defaulted was a good introduction to the matter, namely because it is brief and easy to understand(!) and also interesting that they admitted to not knowing all the consequences a number of times throughout the article.
A small amount of historically similar occurrences are provided and also a good graph on the debt accumulation since 1980.
Tricldown. We already have a sort of Land Tax, I grow grapes and make wine , the Govt gets $2.82 a litre ( which I pay when I sell it locally ) I get $1.50 a litre and then I pay GST on the total. How much more tax should I pay ? I am not complaining, I think consumption taxes are a good idea but there is bugger all left for me.
Dasein must be considered as a ‘whole’, and this, my friends, requires an account of death. Dasein can only be genuinely authentic only in it’s ‘being towards death’, wherein it accepts it’s finitude. Dasein is individualized by death: for we all die alone, and no-one else can die in our place. Death, therefore, is a criterion of authenticity: We must recognize that we die, and not simply that ‘one’ dies. Heidegger suggests, along with others (Kierkegaard and Tolstoy for instance) that there is a pervasive tendency to conceal the inevitability of one’s own death: “All men are mortal, Caius is a man, so Caius is mortal” in the abstract, mused Ivan Ilyich, is perfectly correct, but we are not Caius, an abstract person, but creatures quite distinct from all others. Authentic being towards death (Feat, don’t fail me now) is related to ‘resoluteness’ ( Entschlossenheit ): it is only if we are aware of our finitude that we have reason to act now, rather than procrastinate, and it is the crucial decision, made with a view to the course of our future lives that gives them unity and shape.
The future becomes thus the primary aspect or ‘ecstasis’ of time, however, decisions are also constrained by situations inherited from the past; the more important decisions are, the more they will be considered in view of the past. The third ecstasis, the present (which many do not see 😉 ) is now the ‘moment’ of decision ( The Power of Now etc): “In resoluteness, the present is not only brought back from distraction with objects of one’s closest concern, but gets held in the future and in having been. That present which is held in authentic temporality and which thus is authentic itself, we call the ‘moment of vision’ ( der Augenblick ).
Several central features of time have been generally overlooked by traditional accounts deriving from Aristotle. Time is significant (just ask the White Rabbit 😉 ): It is time to do this and that. Time is datable by events, when , for example, David Cunliffe became Leader of the NZLP. Time is spanned; now is not an instant (the blinking of an eye) without duration, but now, during .Time is public: we can all indicate the same time by ‘now’ or ‘then’, even if we date it by different, relevent, events. Time is finite : (our) time will not continue forever, but is running out- “See how it runs”. History is to be understood in terms of these accounts of time and of the ‘historicality’ of Dasein . Dasein’s understanding of itself and the world depends on an interpretation inherited from the past. This interpretation regulates and disclose the possibilities open to it. Inauthentic Dasein accepts tradition unthinkingly (or lazily) and fulfils the possibilities shaped by it; authentic Dasein probes tradition (see neo-orthodoxy) and therefore opens up new and weightier possibilities. Heidegger, for example, does not simply contribute to contemporary philosophical controversy, but by ‘repeating’ and ‘de(con)structing’ crucial elements and episodes in the development of the philosophical tradition endeavours to change the whole course of philosophical enquiry.
Adrian I did say we should reduce income tax if their is to be a land tax..
Alcohol tax is what you are paying alcohol is the second most damaging drug thi country allows to be sold that’s why you pay so much.
What is Metaphysics (1929) expands upon the nothing , which made a brief, cameo, appearance in Being and Time , and which is disclosed in the Angst that reveals to Dasein , in it’s freedom and finitude, the ultimate groundlessness of itself, it’s world and it’s projects. (these are times when the terms existential and crisis are frequently uttered , together, by sane and sound people, yet on the denial goes). Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics (1929; tr. Bloomington, Ind. 1962) argues that the first Critique is not a theory of knowledge or of the sciences (as such neo-Kantians as Cohen, Natorp??? and Cassirer held) (made ya’ look ya’ dirty chook), but lays the foundation for meta-physics: Kant saw that reason, knowledge and man in general are finite, and thus, made the transcendental imagination the basis of synthetic a priori knowledge (hence Revelation, and, think of the fertility of memes) :-D. However, (could be a but) , since this threatens the primacy of reason and the foundations of ‘Western metaphysics’, Kant recoiled from the ‘abyss’ , unlike some we could mention, no names please, in the second edition of the Critique and made the imagination ‘a function of understanding’. Attacked by most Kant scholars, Heidegger implicitly retracted some of his interpretations in later essays on Kant.(sadly).
Despite Heidegger’s denials, being ( Sein resembles God. It is not at man’s disposal, rather, it disposes of man. Whatever happens comes from being. Man, the ‘shepherd of being’, must respond to it’s directions (like genes get throwing themselves forward, tended wisely).It is is above history, or before, but since the time of Plato it has been hidden, yet the ‘history of being’ can be reconstructed from the texts of philosophers,poets (and political pundits) :-D. Sadly, forgetfulness of being, or nihilism, has culminated in the domination of the world by technology. Whether or not man can return to genuine thinking of being will determine the future of the planet. “But where there is danger, the remedy grows too”. H_
The appropriate response to being is thinking. Thinking is our obedient answer to the call of being, yet some of it’s practice may have been forgotten.Thinking contrasts with assertion, logic, science (science does not think ), metaphysics, philosophy itself and especially technology, which is merely an instrument, a ‘strool’ for the calculation and domination of entities. Language, which, like thinking, played a subordinate role in Being and Time becomes central to Heidegger’s later philosophy, though not language as an instrument of manipulation- into which it has degenerated (under the sway of metaphysics) -but language as an ‘abode of being’. Language speaks, not man.Man only speaks when he fatefully responds to language. Gotta love fate, m8! 😀
Bain, Macdonald and Lundy apparantly not guilty of murder…there must be a really clever serial killer running around NZ. Must give hope to Tamihere and Watson to being freed.
Tamihere is already out, released with strict conditions in November 2010. Luckily we have a system however flawed that decides such things rather than what the idiocracy ‘finks’.
Partly it’s a problem with the “prime suspect” approach to policing: make your scenario based on gut instinct, then fit the data to that pattern. The problem is that unless you gather enough data (including data on the chain of custody of that data) it becomes easier for the defence to connect those same dots into another picture. Especially as time passes and it becomes easier to forget that common procedure now was disproportionately time-consuming and expensive then. Regardless of whether the “prime suspect” is innocent or whether the assumption of investigators led them to believe short-cuts hadn’t been taken, the model is flawed.
Couple that with juries that are only slowly coming out of a culture of believing everything a cop says (and the fact that almost everyone can be painted as either criminal or weird), it’s not particularly surprising that a number of high profile cases have been kicked back.
Funny you mention Tamihere – straight after the verdict TV1 played a documentary on how our brave police caught the man wot dun it. A comment made by the lead investigator has stuck with me ever since: “we had found our suspect, and we proceeded to build a case around him”.
I always had my doubts about both Tamiheres. In David’s case, I strongly suspect the evidence was found or fabricated to make a bad guy look guilty. In John’s case, hmmmm, what can you say? Incriminates himself and still gets votes.
Do you have evidence that all these murders were done by the same person? Not presenting it to the police makes you an accessory after the fact. Do your civic duty.
about time? – for what, you know BM money isn’t as important as, you know, fucken fresh air and water. These ‘millions’ of oil wells are a foul and suicidal legacy we leave for our grandchildren – what a disgusting stupid bunch of weaklings we have become!!!
Beaches are not necessarily the place to look. Didn’t they put something on the oil to make it sink to the seabed? Perhaps, that is where they should look before they start congratulating themselves.
Now I have a bone to pick about the local body elections. Went down this morning to drop my vote in- didn’t post it as I didn’t want it to get lost in the mail. The house only received two thirds of the voting papers it should have so it might be worth asking councils how many papers never made it and have been returned.
I knew where to go fortunately because the lack of signage was appalling and inside are all these great posters about voting, done by the wellington region’s councils but I have only seen all the drab ones up around town and not too many of those.I’m sure a lot of businesses etc would have been happy to have one to display.
But my main point is why don’t all the council places where you can drop off votes also have somebody that can issue replacement papers and even more importantly those orange pavement boards outside saying election stuff available here – just like general election polling booths are marked.
One size doesn’t fit all and visual reminders all over the “burbs at libraries etc might give people a bit more of a push.
I noticed how hard it was to find out information about candidates that wasn’t in the booklet that came with the voting papers. I’m pretty motivated, but the effort involved in finding out was too much. I can see why so many don’t bother voting.
No, it gives me what someone has chosen to put in there, often it’s just the blurb from the booklet. I want to know details about where the candidates stand on things, not generic blather that’s designed to make voters feel good but doesn’t tell them anything substantial.
I used to be a hide-bound Tory simply for traditional and antiquarian reasons—and because I had never done any real thinking on civics and industry and the future. The depression—and its concomitant publicisation of industrial, financial, and governmental problems—jolted me out of my lethargy and led me to reëxamine the facts of history in the light of unsentimental scientific analysis; and it was not long before I realised what an ass I had been. The liberals at whom I used to laugh were the ones who were right—for they were living in the present while I had been living in the past. They had been using science while I had been using romantic antiquarianism. At last I began to recognise something of the way in which capitalism works—always piling up concentrated wealth and impoverishing the bulk of the population until the strain becomes so intolerable as to force artificial reform.
[…]
As for the Republicans — how can one regard seriously a frightened, greedy, nostalgic huddle of tradesmen and lucky idlers who shut their eyes to history and science, steel their emotions against decent human sympathy, cling to sordid and provincial ideals exalting sheer acquisitiveness and condoning artificial hardship for the non-materially-shrewd, dwell smugly and sentimentally in a distorted dream-cosmos of outmoded phrases and principles and attitudes based on the bygone agricultural-handicraft world, and revel in (consciously or unconsciously) mendacious assumptions (such as the notion that real liberty is synonymous with the single detail of unrestricted economic license or that a rational planning of resource-distribution would contravene some vague and mystical ‘American heritage’…) utterly contrary to fact and without the slightest foundation in human experience? Intellectually, the Republican idea deserves the tolerance and respect one gives to the dead.
Cunliff!s 100 day promise is a easy given.The more costly and some would say radical idea!s of central control of the electricity and gas industry,the housing and rents issue,the cost of health and education will all be managed as he has said,given the fiscal situation.One thing is for certain, if he does get the treasury benches in 2014,he will be inheriting massive debt, and that will slow down his road to a more egalatarian N.Z.that all Labour Party supporters yearn for.
My picks for local elections tomorrow (As far as I am concerned my two week banned applies from when I made that post that got me banned):
Auckland: Len Brown to hold on. Palino will run him close with Minto in third. Centre-right to have control of council.
Wellington: John Morrison beats CWB. Celia kinda screwed up, completely out of her depth as mayor. Folding on spending cuts, and underestimating the pro-road rednecks didnt do her any good. Finding that keeping her promises on light rail would be impossible also counts against her.
Christchurch: Lianne Dalziel by a country mile, though Bob Parker may have given her a good run.
Dunedin: Cull all the way, given that there appears to be no challengers.
Meanwhile, New Plymouth looks set to elect a bunch of Tea Party slash and burn ACToids to its district council. We probably wont have a library for that long. Shame.
HATCHET DOCTORS – used by WINZ, this is a must read post and comment thread on ACC Forum, that exposes how they work and try to manipulate the system to “off load” sick and disabled off benefits. It is based on a true story:
I most strongly suggest others that have stories to share, to do so on that thread, and perhaps here also, if you wish to be discrete about your privacy, just make sure your true name and details are concealed.
But for the benefit of ALL others, please dare to NAME and SHAME those damned doctors that tried to kick you off benefits, while your own doctor and possibly other specialists said the opposite was needed!!!
Hitler and the Nazis learned in early years from the AMERICAN ADVERTISING INDUSTRY, how to manipulate the population. We have that mind bending power highly active in New Zealand right now!
That does of course not equate to advertising industry supporting NAZI idelogy, but they promote the neo liberal, right wing, capitalist ideology, and system. That is why in NZ we have NO true democracy, it is a total farce and LIE!
We are being manipulated at an immense scale to consume, to focus on nothing but consumerism, on fake freedom (largely individualistic) and on capitalist ideals, none else.
Now I am being corrupted and attacked by The Standard, I cannot believe this, NZ is truly Fucked, there is NO left and alternative force, you are traitors to the idea!
Sorry I sign off and will never be back you are EVIL!
In all honesty I am struggling to be convinced that suicide is not the best solution to persons like me, give present regimes and economic conditions. Why are people stigmatising us who want a decent “exit” from a SHIT SOCIETY and SHIT WORLD? Let us go, pleaase, I am totally sick off you all and your SHIT society, I hate living, I hate being, I rather be dead right now, that is me, in full confession!!!
This video includes conclusions of the creator climate scientist Dr. Simon Clark. It is presented to our readers as an informed perspective. Please see video description for references (if any). This year you will be lied to! Simon Clark helps prebunk some misleading statements you'll hear about climate. The video includes ...
It is all very well cutting the backrooms of public agencies but it may compromise the frontlines. One of the frustrations of the Productivity Commission’s 2017 review of universities is that while it observed that their non-academic staff were increasing faster than their academic staff, it did not bother to ...
Buzz from the Beehive Two speeches delivered by Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters at Anzac Day ceremonies in Turkey are the only new posts on the government’s official website since the PM announced his Cabinet shake-up. In one of the speeches, Peters stated the obvious: we live in a troubled ...
1. Which of these would you not expect to read in The Waikato Invader?a. Luxon is here to do business, don’t you worry about thatb. Mr KPI expects results, and you better believe itc. This decisive man of action is getting me all hot and excitedd. Melissa Lee is how ...
…it has a restricted jurisdiction which must not be abused: it is not an inquisitionNOTE – this article was published before the High Court ruled that Karen Chhour does not have to appear before the Waitangi Tribunal Gary Judd writes – The High Court ...
Lindsay Mitchell writes – One of reasons Oranga Tamariki exists is to prevent child neglect. But could the organisation itself be guilty of the same?Oranga Tamariki’s statistics show a decrease in the number and age of children in care. “There are less children ...
David Farrar writes: Graeme Edgeler wrote in 2017: In the first five years after three strikes came into effect 5248 offenders received a ‘first strike’ (that is, a “stage-1 conviction” under the three strikes sentencing regime), and 68 offenders received a ‘second strike’. In the five years prior to ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has surprised everyone with his ruthlessness in sacking two of his ministers from their crucial portfolios. Removing ministers for poor performance after only five months in the job just doesn’t normally happen in politics. That’s refreshing and will be extremely ...
TL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the two days to 6:06am on Thursday, April 25:Politics: PM Christopher Luxon has set up a dual standard for ministerial competence by demoting two National Cabinet ministers while leaving also-struggling ...
Hi,Today I mainly want to share some of your thoughts about the recent piece I wrote about success and failure, and the forces that seemingly guide our lives. But first, a quick bit of housekeeping: I am doing a Webworm popup in Los Angeles on Saturday May 11 at 2pm. ...
It is hard to see what Melissa Lee might have done to “save” the media. National went into the election with no public media policy and appears not to have developed one subsequently. Lee claimed that she had prepared a policy paper before the election but it had been decided ...
Open access notablesIce acceleration and rotation in the Greenland Ice Sheet interior in recent decades, Løkkegaard et al., Communications Earth & Environment:In the past two decades, mass loss from the Greenland ice sheet has accelerated, partly due to the speedup of glaciers. However, uncertainty in speed derived from satellite products ...
Buzz from the Beehive A statement from Children’s Minister Karen Chhour – yet to be posted on the Government’s official website – arrived in Point of Order’s email in-tray last night. It welcomes the High Court ruling on whether the Waitangi Tribunal can demand she appear before it. It does ...
Mr Bombastic:Ironically, the media the academic experts wanted is, in many ways, the media they got. In place of the tyrannical editors of yesteryear, advancing without fear or favour the interests of the ruling class; the New Zealand news media of today boasts a troop of enlightened journalists dedicated to ...
It's hard times try to make a livingYou wake up every morning in the unforgivingOut there somewhere in the cityThere's people living lives without mercy or pityI feel good, yeah I'm feeling fineI feel better then I have for the longest timeI think these pills have been good for meI ...
In 1974, the US Supreme Court issued its decision in United States v. Nixon, finding that the President was not a King, but was subject to the law and was required to turn over the evidence of his wrongdoing to the courts. It was a landmark decision for the rule ...
Every day now just seems to bring in more fresh meat for the grinder.In their relentlessly ideological drive to cut back on the “excessive bloat” (as they see it) of the previous Labour-led government, on the mountains of evidence accumulated in such a short period of time do not ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Megan Valére SosouMarket gardening site of the Itchèléré de Itagui agricultural cooperative in Dassa-Zoumè (Image credit: Megan Valère Sossou) For the residents of Dassa-Zoumè, a city in the West African country of Benin, choosing between drinking water and having enough ...
Buzz from the Beehive Melissa Lee – as may be discerned from the screenshot above – has not been demoted for doing something seriously wrong as Minister of ...
Morning in London Mother hugs beloved daughter outside the converted shoe factory in which she is living.Afternoon in London Travelling writer takes himself and his wrist down to A&E, just to be sure. Read more ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – The recent announcement of the University Advisory Group, chaired by Sir Peter Gluckman, makes very clear where the Government’s focus and priorities lie. The remit of the Advisory Group is that Group members will consider challenges and opportunities for improvement in the university sector including: ...
Eric Crampton writes – The Reserve Bank of New Zealand desperately wants to find reasons to have workstreams in climate change. It makes little sense. They’ve run another stress test on the banks looking to see if they could find a prudential regulation case. They couldn’t. They ...
Rob MacCullough writes – Pundits from the left and the right are arguing that National’s Fast Track Bill that is designed to speed up infrastructure decisions could end up becoming mired in a cesspool of corruption. Political commentator ...
Looking at the headlines this morning it’s hard to feel anything other than pessimistic about the future of humanity.Note that I’m not speaking about the future of mankind, but the survival of our humanity. The values that we believe in seem to be ebbing away, by the day.Perhaps every generation ...
Swabbing mixed breed baby chicks to test for avian influenzaUh oh. Bird flu – often deadly to humans – is not only being transmitted from infected birds to dairy cows, but is now travelling between dairy cows. As of last Friday, Bloomberg News reports, there were 32 American dairy herds ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
What is it with the mining industry? Its not enough for them to pillage the earth - they apparently can't even be bothered getting resource consent to do so: The proponent behind a major mine near the Clutha River had already been undertaking activity in the area without a ...
Photo # 1 I am a huge fan of Singapore’s approach to housing, as described here two years ago by copying and pasting from The ConversationWhat Singapore has that Australia does not is a public housing developer, the Housing Development Board, which puts new dwellings on public and reclaimed land, ...
Buzz from the Beehive Reactions to news of the government’s readiness to make urgent changes to “the resource management system” through a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) suggest a balanced approach is being taken. The Taxpayers’ Union says the proposed changes don’t go far enough. Greenpeace says ...
I’m starting to wonder if Anna Burns-Francis might be the best political interviewer we’ve got. That might sound unlikely to you, it came as a bit of a surprise to me.Jack Tame can be excellent, but has some pretty average days. I like Rebecca Wright on Newshub, she asks good ...
Chris Trotter writes – Willie Jackson is said to be planning a “media summit” to discuss “the state of the media and how to protect Fourth Estate Journalism”. Not only does the Editor of The Daily Blog, Martyn Bradbury, think this is a good idea, but he has also ...
Graeme Edgeler writes – This morning [April 21], the Wellington High Court is hearing a judicial review brought by Hon. Karen Chhour, the Minister for Children, against a decision of the Waitangi Tribunal. This is unusual, judicial reviews are much more likely to brought against ministers, rather than ...
Both of Parliament’s watchdogs have now ripped into the Government’s Fast-track Approvals Bill. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāMy pick of the six newsey things to know from Aotearoa’s political economy and beyond on the morning of Tuesday, April 23 are:The Lead: The Auditor General,John Ryan, has joined the ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Sarah SpengemanPeople wait to board an electric bus in Pune, India. (Image credit: courtesy of ITDP) Public transportation riders in Pune, India, love the city’s new electric buses so much they will actually skip an older diesel bus that ...
The infrastructure industry yesterday issued a “hurry up” message to the Government, telling it to get cracking on developing a pipeline of infrastructure projects.The hiatus around the change of Government has seen some major projects cancelled and others delayed, and there is uncertainty about what will happen with the new ...
Hi,Over the weekend I revisited a podcast I really adore, Dead Eyes. It’s about a guy who got fired from Band of Brothers over two decades ago because Tom Hanks said he had “dead eyes”.If you don’t recall — 2001’s Band of Brothers was part of the emerging trend of ...
Buzz from the Beehive The 180 or so recipients of letters from the Government telling them how to submit infrastructure projects for “fast track” consideration includes some whose project applications previously have been rejected by the courts. News media were quick to feature these in their reports after RMA Reform Minister Chris ...
It would not be a desirable way to start your holiday by breaking your back, your head, or your wrist, but on our first hour in Singapore I gave it a try.We were chatting, last week, before we started a meeting of Hazel’s Enviro Trust, about the things that can ...
Calling all journalists, academics, planners, lawyers, political activists, environmentalists, and other members of the public who believe that the relationships between vested interests and politicians need to be scrutinised. We need to work together to make sure that the new Fast-Track Approvals Bill – currently being pushed through by the ...
Feel worried. Shane Jones and a couple of his Cabinet colleagues are about to be granted the power to override any and all objections to projects like dams, mines, roads etc even if: said projects will harm biodiversity, increase global warming and cause other environmental harms, and even if ...
Bryce Edwards writes- The ability of the private sector to quickly establish major new projects making use of the urban and natural environment is to be supercharged by the new National-led Government. Yesterday it introduced to Parliament one of its most significant reforms, the Fast Track Approvals Bill. ...
Michael Bassett writes – If you think there is a move afoot by the radical Maori fringe of New Zealand society to create a parallel system of government to the one that we elect at our triennial elections, you aren’t wrong. Over the last few days we have ...
Without a corresponding drop in interest rates, it’s doubtful any changes to the CCCFA will unleash a massive rush of home buyers. Photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: The six things that stood out to me in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Monday, April 22 included:The Government making a ...
Sunday was a lazy day. I started watching Jack Tame on Q&A, the interviews are usually good for something to write about. Saying the things that the politicians won’t, but are quite possibly thinking. Things that are true and need to be extracted from between the lines.As you might know ...
In our Weekly Roundup last week we covered news from Auckland Transport that the WX1 Western Express is going to get an upgrade next year with double decker electric buses. As part of the announcement, AT also said “Since we introduced the WX1 Western Express last November we have seen ...
TL;DR: The six key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 29 include:PM Christopher Luxon is scheduled to hold a post-Cabinet news conference at 4 pm today. Stats NZ releases its statutory report on Census 2023 tomorrow.Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivers a pre-Budget speech at ...
A listing of 29 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, April 14, 2024 thru Sat, April 20, 2024. Story of the week Our story of the week hinges on these words from the abstract of a fresh academic ...
The ability of the private sector to quickly establish major new projects making use of the urban and natural environment is to be supercharged by the new National-led Government. Yesterday it introduced to Parliament one of its most significant reforms, the Fast Track Approvals Bill. The Government says this will ...
This is a column to say thank you. So many of have been in touch since Mum died to say so many kind and thoughtful things. You’re wonderful, all of you. You’ve asked how we’re doing, how Dad’s doing. A little more realisation each day, of the irretrievable finality of ...
Identifying the engine type in your car is crucial for various reasons, including maintenance, repairs, and performance upgrades. Knowing the specific engine model allows you to access detailed technical information, locate compatible parts, and make informed decisions about modifications. This comprehensive guide will provide you with a step-by-step approach to ...
Introduction: The allure of racing is undeniable. The thrill of speed, the roar of engines, and the exhilaration of competition all contribute to the allure of this adrenaline-driven sport. For those who yearn to experience the pinnacle of racing, becoming a race car driver is the ultimate dream. However, the ...
Introduction Automobiles have become ubiquitous in modern society, serving as a primary mode of transportation and a symbol of economic growth and personal mobility. With countless vehicles traversing roads and highways worldwide, it begs the question: how many cars are there in the world? Determining the precise number is a ...
Maintaining a safe and reliable vehicle requires regular inspections. Whether it’s a routine maintenance checkup or a safety inspection, knowing how long the process will take can help you plan your day accordingly. This article delves into the factors that influence the duration of a car inspection and provides an ...
Mazda Motor Corporation, commonly known as Mazda, is a Japanese multinational automaker headquartered in Fuchu, Aki District, Hiroshima Prefecture, Japan. The company was founded in 1920 as the Toyo Cork Kogyo Co., Ltd., and began producing vehicles in 1931. Mazda is primarily known for its production of passenger cars, but ...
Your car battery is an essential component that provides power to start your engine, operate your electrical systems, and store energy. Over time, batteries can weaken and lose their ability to hold a charge, which can lead to starting problems, power failures, and other issues. Replacing your battery before it ...
In most states, you cannot register a car without a valid driver’s license. However, there are a few exceptions to this rule. Exceptions to the RuleIf you are under 18 years old: In some states, you can register a car in your name even if you do not ...
Mazda, a Japanese automotive manufacturer with a rich history of innovation and engineering excellence, has emerged as a formidable player in the global car market. Known for its reputation of producing high-quality, fuel-efficient, and driver-oriented vehicles, Mazda has consistently garnered praise from industry experts and consumers alike. In this article, ...
Struts are an essential part of a car’s suspension system. They are responsible for supporting the weight of the car and damping the oscillations of the springs. Struts are typically made of steel or aluminum and are filled with hydraulic fluid. How Do Struts Work? Struts work by transferring the ...
Car registration is a mandatory process that all vehicle owners must complete annually. This process involves registering your car with the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) and paying an associated fee. The registration process ensures that your vehicle is properly licensed and insured, and helps law enforcement and other authorities ...
Zoom is a video conferencing service that allows you to share your screen, webcam, and audio with other participants. In addition to sharing your own audio, you can also share the audio from your computer with other participants. This can be useful for playing music, sharing presentations with audio, or ...
Building your own computer can be a rewarding and cost-effective way to get a high-performance machine tailored to your specific needs. However, it also requires careful planning and execution, and one of the most important factors to consider is the time it will take. The exact time it takes to ...
Sleep mode is a power-saving state that allows your computer to quickly resume operation without having to boot up from scratch. This can be useful if you need to step away from your computer for a short period of time but don’t want to shut it down completely. There are ...
Introduction Computer-Assisted Translation (CAT) has revolutionized the field of translation by harnessing the power of technology to assist human translators in their work. This innovative approach combines specialized software with human expertise to improve the efficiency, accuracy, and consistency of translations. In this comprehensive article, we will delve into the ...
In today’s digital age, mobile devices have become an indispensable part of our daily lives. Among the vast array of portable computing options available, iPads and tablet computers stand out as two prominent contenders. While both offer similar functionalities, there are subtle yet significant differences between these two devices. This ...
A computer is an electronic device that can be programmed to carry out a set of instructions. The basic components of a computer are the processor, memory, storage, input devices, and output devices. The Processor The processor, also known as the central processing unit (CPU), is the brain of the ...
Voice Memos is a convenient app on your iPhone that allows you to quickly record and store audio snippets. These recordings can be useful for a variety of purposes, such as taking notes, capturing ideas, or recording interviews. While you can listen to your voice memos on your iPhone, you ...
Laptop screens are essential for interacting with our devices and accessing information. However, when lines appear on the screen, it can be frustrating and disrupt productivity. Understanding the underlying causes of these lines is crucial for finding effective solutions. Types of Screen Lines Horizontal lines: Also known as scan ...
Right-clicking is a common and essential computer operation that allows users to access additional options and settings. While most desktop computers have dedicated right-click buttons on their mice, laptops often do not have these buttons due to space limitations. This article will provide a comprehensive guide on how to right-click ...
Powering up and shutting down your ASUS laptop is an essential task for any laptop user. Locating the power button can sometimes be a hassle, especially if you’re new to ASUS laptops. This article will provide a comprehensive guide on where to find the power button on different ASUS laptop ...
Te Pāti Māori are demanding the New Zealand Government support an international independent investigation into mass graves that have been uncovered at two hospitals on the Gaza strip, following weeks of assault by Israeli troops. Among the 392 bodies that have been recovered, are children and elderly civilians. Many of ...
Our two-tiered system for veterans’ support is out of step with our closest partners, and all parties in Parliament should work together to fix it, Labour veterans’ affairs spokesperson Greg O’Connor said. ...
Stripping two Ministers of their portfolios just six months into the job shows Christopher Luxon’s management style is lacking, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said. ...
Tonight’s court decision to overturn the summons of the Children’s Minister has enabled the Crown to continue making decisions about Māori without evidence, says Te Pāti Māori spokesperson for Children, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “The judicial system has this evening told the nation that this government can do whatever they want when ...
It appears Nicola Willis is about to pull the rug out from under the feet of local communities still dealing with the aftermath of last year’s severe weather, and local councils relying on funding to build back from these disasters. ...
The Government is making short-sighted changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that will take away environmental protection in favour of short-term profits, Labour’s environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
Labour welcomes the release of the report into the North Island weather events and looks forward to working with the Government to ensure that New Zealand is as prepared as it can be for the next natural disaster. ...
The Labour Party has called for the New Zealand Government to recognise Palestine, as a material step towards progressing the two-State solution needed to achieve a lasting peace in the region. ...
Some of our country’s most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a ‘get out of jail free’ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
The government's decision to reintroduce Three Strikes is a destructive and ineffective piece of law-making that will only exacerbate an inherently biased and racist criminal justice system, said Te Pāti Māori Justice Spokesperson, Tākuta Ferris, today. During the time Three Strikes was in place in Aotearoa, Māori and Pasifika received ...
Cuts to frontline hospital staff are not only a broken election promise, it shows the reckless tax cuts have well and truly hit the frontline of the health system, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
Te Pāti Māori is disgusted at the confirmation that hundreds are set to lose their jobs at Oranga Tamariki, and the disestablishment of the Treaty Response Unit. “This act of absolute carelessness and out of touch decision making is committing tamariki to state abuse.” Said Te Pāti Māori Oranga Tamariki ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi, and Mema Paremata mō Tāmaki-Makaurau, Takutai Tarsh Kemp, will travel to the Gold Coast to strengthen ties with Māori in Australia next week (15-21 April). The visit, in the lead-up to the 9th Australian National Kapa haka Festival, will be an opportunity for both ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Government’s democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
The National Government’s proposed changes to the Residential Tenancies Act will mean tenants can be turfed from their homes by landlords with little notice, Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said. ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson is calling on all parties to support a common-sense change that’s great for the planet and great for consumers after her member’s bill was drawn from the ballot today. ...
A significant milestone has been reached in the fight to strike an anti-Pasifika and unfair law from the country’s books after Teanau Tuiono’s members’ bill passed its first reading. ...
New Zealand has today missed the opportunity to uphold the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, says James Shaw after his member’s bill was voted down in its first reading. ...
Today’s advice from the Climate Change Commission paints a sobering reality of the challenge we face in combating climate change, especially in light of recent Government policy announcements. ...
Minister for Disability Issues Penny Simmonds appears to have delayed a report back to Cabinet on the progress New Zealand is making against international obligations for disabled New Zealanders. ...
Ambassador Millar, Burgemeester, Vandepitte, Excellencies, military representatives, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen – good morning and welcome to this sacred Anzac Day dawn service. It is an honour to be here on behalf of the Government and people of New Zealand at Buttes New British Cemetery, Polygon Wood – a deeply ...
Distinguished guests - It is an honour to return once again to this site which, as the resting place for so many of our war-dead, has become a sacred place for generations of New Zealanders. Our presence here and at the other special spaces of Gallipoli is made ...
Mai ia tawhiti pamamao, te moana nui a Kiwa, kua tae whakaiti mai matou, ki to koutou papa whenua. No koutou te tapuwae, no matou te tapuwae, kua honoa pumautia. Ko nga toa kua hinga nei, o te Waipounamu, o te Ika a Maui, he okioki tahi me o ...
Paul Goldsmith will take on responsibility for the Media and Communications portfolio, while Louise Upston will pick up the Disability Issues portfolio, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon announced today. “Our Government is relentlessly focused on getting New Zealand back on track. As issues change in prominence, I plan to adjust Ministerial ...
Recreational catch limits will be reduced in areas of Fiordland and the Chatham Islands to help keep those fisheries healthy and sustainable, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The lower recreational daily catch limits for a range of finfish and shellfish species caught in the Fiordland Marine Area and ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed an important milestone in New Zealand’s hydrogen future, with the opening of the country’s first network of hydrogen refuelling stations in Wiri. “I want to congratulate the team at Hiringa Energy and its partners K one W one (K1W1), Mitsui & Co New Zealand ...
The coalition Government is delivering on its commitment to improve resource management laws and give greater certainty to consent applicants, with a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) expected to be introduced to Parliament next month. RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop has today outlined the first RMA Amendment ...
Overseas models for regulating the oil and gas sector, including their decommissioning regimes, are being carefully scrutinised as a potential template for New Zealand’s own sector, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. The Coalition Government is focused on rebuilding investor confidence in New Zealand’s energy sector as it looks to strengthen ...
Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell has today released the Report of the Government Inquiry into the response to the North Island Severe Weather Events. “The report shows that New Zealand’s emergency management system is not fit-for-purpose and there are some significant gaps we need to address,” Mr Mitchell ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith is today travelling to Europe where he’ll update the United Nations Human Rights Council on the Government’s work to restore law and order. “Attending the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva provides us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while ...
Associate Agriculture Minister, Mark Patterson, formally reopened the world’s largest wool processing facility today in Awatoto, Napier, following a $50 million rebuild and refurbishment project. “The reopening of this facility will significantly lift the economic opportunities available to New Zealand’s wool sector, which already accounts for 20 per cent of ...
Hon Andrew Bayly, Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing At the Southland Otago Regional Engineering Collective (SOREC) Summit, 18 April, Dunedin Ngā mihi nui, Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Ko Whanganui aho Good Afternoon and thank you for inviting me to open your summit today. I am delighted ...
The Government is delivering on its commitment to bring back the Three Strikes legislation, Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee announced today. “Our Government is committed to restoring law and order and enforcing appropriate consequences on criminals. We are making it clear that repeat serious violent or sexual offending is not ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has today announced four new diplomatic appointments for New Zealand’s overseas missions. “Our diplomats have a vital role in maintaining and protecting New Zealand’s interests around the world,” Mr Peters says. “I am pleased to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the ...
New Zealand is contributing NZ$7 million to support communities affected by severe food insecurity and other urgent humanitarian needs in Ethiopia and Somalia, Foreign Minister Rt Hon Winston Peters announced today. “Over 21 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance across Ethiopia, with a further 6.9 million people ...
Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Paul Goldsmith is congratulating Mataaho Collective for winning the Golden Lion for best participant in the main exhibition at the Venice Biennale. "Congratulations to the Mataaho Collective for winning one of the world's most prestigious art prizes at the Venice Biennale. “It is good ...
The Government is reforming financial services to improve access to home loans and other lending, and strengthen customer protections, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly and Housing Minister Chris Bishop announced today. “Our coalition Government is committed to rebuilding the economy and making life simpler by cutting red tape. We are ...
“China remains a strong commercial opportunity for Kiwi exporters as Chinese businesses and consumers continue to value our high-quality safe produce,” Trade and Agriculture Minister Todd McClay says. Mr McClay has returned to New Zealand following visits to Beijing, Harbin and Shanghai where he met ministers, governors and mayors and engaged in trade and agricultural events with the New ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has completed a successful trip to Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, deepening relationships and capitalising on opportunities. Mr Luxon was accompanied by a business delegation and says the choice of countries represents the priority the New Zealand Government places on South East Asia, and our relationships in ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. “Recently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
A stopbank upgrade project in Tairawhiti partly funded by the Government has increased flood resilience for around 7000ha of residential and horticultural land so far, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones today attended a dawn service in Gisborne to mark the end of the first stage of the ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters will represent the Government at Anzac Day commemorations on the Gallipoli Peninsula next week and engage with senior representatives of the Turkish government in Istanbul. “The Gallipoli campaign is a defining event in our history. It will be a privilege to share the occasion ...
Science, Innovation and Technology and Defence Minister Judith Collins will next week attend the OECD Science and Technology Ministerial conference in Paris and Anzac Day commemorations in Belgium. “Science, innovation and technology have a major role to play in rebuilding our economy and achieving better health, environmental and social outcomes ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with the President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The Prime Minister was accompanied by MP Paulo Garcia, the first Filipino to be elected to a legislature outside the Philippines. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon and President Marcos Jr discussed opportunities to ...
The Government has announced that $20 million in funding will be made available to Westport to fund much needed flood protection around the town. This measure will significantly improve the resilience of the community, says Local Government Minister Simeon Brown. “The Westport community has already been allocated almost $3 million ...
The Government is proud to support the first ever Repco Supercars Championship event in Taupō as up to 70,000 motorsport fans attend the Taupō International Motorsport Park this weekend, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. “Anticipation for the ITM Taupō Super400 is huge, with tickets and accommodation selling out weeks ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced an increase to the Rates Rebate Scheme, putting money back into the pockets of low-income homeowners. “The coalition Government is committed to bringing down the cost of living for New Zealanders. That includes targeted support for those Kiwis who are doing things tough, such ...
The Coalition Government is investing in a project to boost survival rates of New Zealand mussels and grow the industry, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones has announced. “This project seeks to increase the resilience of our mussels and significantly boost the sector’s productivity,” Mr Jones says. “The project - ...
Benefit figures released today underscore the importance of the Government’s plan to rebuild the economy and have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker Support, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “Benefit numbers are still significantly higher than when National was last in government, when there was about 70,000 fewer ...
The Government’s commitment to doubling New Zealand’s renewable energy capacity is backed by new data showing that clean energy has helped the country reach its lowest annual gross emissions since 1999, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand’s latest Greenhouse Gas Inventory (1990-2022) published today, shows gross emissions fell ...
The Government is bringing the earthquake-prone building review forward, with work to start immediately, and extending the deadline for remediations by four years, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “Our Government is focused on rebuilding the economy. A key part of our plan is to cut red tape that ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and his Thai counterpart, Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, have today agreed that New Zealand and the Kingdom of Thailand will upgrade the bilateral relationship to a Strategic Partnership by 2026. “New Zealand and Thailand have a lot to offer each other. We have a strong mutual desire to build ...
RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Transport Minister Simeon Brown have today announced the Coalition Government’s intention to extend port coastal permits for a further 20 years, providing port operators with certainty to continue their operations. “The introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991 required ports to obtain coastal ...
Today’s announcement that inflation is down to 4 per cent is encouraging news for Kiwis, but there is more work to be done - underlining the importance of the Government’s plan to get the economy back on track, acting Finance Minister Chris Bishop says. “Inflation is now at 4 per ...
Refreshed health guidance released today will help parents and schools make informed decisions about whether their child needs to be in school, addressing one of the key issues affecting school attendance, says Associate Education Minister David Seymour. In recent years, consistently across all school terms, short-term illness or medical reasons ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is streamlining high-level oceans management while maintaining a focus on supporting the sector’s role in the export-led recovery of the economy. “I am working to realise the untapped potential of our fishing and aquaculture sector. To achieve that we need to be smarter with ...
I was initially resistant to the idea often suggested to me that the Government should deliver an arts strategy. The whole point of the arts and creativity is that people should do whatever the hell they want, unbound by the dictates of politicians in Wellington. Peter Jackson, Kiri Te Kanawa, Eleanor ...
Pacific Media Watch Palestine solidarity protesters today demonstrated at the Auckland headquarters of Television New Zealand, accusing the country’s major TV network of broadcasting “propaganda” backing Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. About 50 protesters targeted the main entrance to the TVNZ building near Sky Tower and also picketed a side ...
Opinion by Lynley Hood. Forty years on from my 1985 Fulbright Grant, my disquiet over the war in Gaza evoked some troubling questions. The answer to my first question – What is the primary purpose of the Fulbright Programme? – was on the Fulbright NZ website. It says: US Senator, ...
The ministers responsible for green-lighting major projects need to be open about potential conflicts of interest, says Transparency International. ...
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A brief round-up of submissions on the controversial proposed law. This is an excerpt from our weekly environmental newsletter Future Proof. Sign up here. Last week, submissions on the controversial Fast-track Approvals Bill closed just hours after the government released a list of stakeholder organisations who were sent letters advising how they could ...
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The Commissioner's decision validates the longstanding efforts of the local community and ensures that Awataha Marae will be managed to serve the needs of the local community, particularly for hosting tangihanga. ...
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Analysis - Two ministers were stripped of portfolios in a warning to Cabinet, drama broke out at the Waitangi Tribunal, and the gang patch ban bill ran into opposition. ...
Tara Ward makes an impassioned plea for some vital pop culture merch. In April 1999, I became obsessed with a new reality television show called Popstars. Every Tuesday night, five strangers transformed into music royalty before my very eyes as Joe, Keri, Carly, Erika and Megan were chosen to form ...
PNG Post-Courier In the early hours of ANZAC Day, aerial photographs captured an impressive gathering of Australians and Papua New Guineans at Isurava in the Northern (Oro) Province. The solemn dawn service yesterday was held at a site steeped in history, where some of the fiercest battles of World War ...
The PSA is shocked that Oranga Tamariki has used the cost cutting drive to downgrade its commitment to Te Ao Māori and remove many specialist Māori roles. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Kemish, Adjunct Professor, School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry, The University of Queensland There can be no more powerful symbol of the relationship between Australia and Papua New Guinea than the prime ministers of these neighbouring countries walking together on the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sharon Robinson, Distinguished Professor and Deputy Director of ARC Securing Antarctica’s Environmental Future (SAEF), University of Wollongong, University of Wollongong Andrew Netherwood Over the last 25 years, the ozone hole which forming over Antarctica each spring has started to shrink. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Viktoria Kahui, Senior Lecturer in Environmental Economics, University of Otago Getty Images/Amy Toensing Biodiversity is declining at rates unprecedented in human history. This suggests the ways we currently use to manage our natural environment are failing. One emerging concept focuses on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Timothy Colin Bednall, Associate Professor in Management, Swinburne University of Technology marvent/Shutterstock Finding the best person to fill a position can be tough, from drafting a job ad to producing a shortlist of top interview candidates. Employers typically consider information from ...
Wondering where to host your next BYO? Whether its a small gathering or a massive party, we’ve got some recommendations. I was first introduced to the concept of BYOs at Dunedin’s India Gardens, a legendary but sadly defunct establishment, which purveyed enormous quantities of mango chicken to Aotearoa’s drunkest future ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Julien Cooper, Honorary Lecturer, Department of History and Archaeology, Macquarie University Julien Cooper The hyper-arid desert of Eastern Sudan, the Atbai Desert, seems like an unlikely place to find evidence of ancient cattle herders. But in this dry environment, my new ...
The sector says it’s hopeful her replacement Paul Goldsmith will be able to throw it a lifeline, after six months with a minister deemed missing in action, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign ...
The government can't just rely on axing public sector jobs and has to do more to cut spending, says the chief economist at a free market think tank. ...
Rock The Vote NZ, known for its advocacy for minor party unity and its role within the Freedoms NZ Coalition during the 2023 General Election, celebrates this merger as a strategic enhancement of its operational strength and outreach. ...
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Loading…(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){var ql=document.querySelectorAll('A[quiz],DIV[quiz],A[data-quiz],DIV[data-quiz]'); if(ql){if(ql.length){for(var k=0;k<ql.length;k++){ql[k].id='quiz-embed-'+k;ql[k].href="javascript:var i=document.getElementById('quiz-embed-"+k+"');try{qz.startQuiz(i)}catch(e){i.start=1;i.style.cursor='wait';i.style.opacity='0.5'};void(0);"}}};i['QP']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)})(window,document,'script','https://take.quiz-maker.com/3012/CDN/quiz-embed-v1.js','qp'); Got a good quiz question?Send Newsroom your questions. The post Newsroom daily quiz, Friday 26 April appeared first on Newsroom. ...
You can’t have missed the Gallipoli story as the movies, documentaries, essays and books capture what it was like for New Zealand troops in their eight-month campaign on the Peninsula. But this Anzac Day the Auckland War Memorial Museum has published a book that sheds light on a little-known aspect of the ...
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Good morning!
http://postimg.org/image/kebq47won/
+1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7gzBoVh1rI
Please share this ^^^ re signing petition TPPA
And….good morning to you too!
It hasn’t taken long for the MSM to start their whisperings about David Cunliffe.
John Armstrong in the Herald yesterday about his speech to the CTU Conference “It seemed as if two David Cunliffes had turned up’….One passionate and stirring message for the workers; one politically sanitised version of the same message for everyone else'”.
Claire Trevett suggests Cunliffe gave himself “wiggle-room” in his commitments to the unionists.
No acknowledgement that a responsible Party Leader has to be careful in what they say before they’ve seen the state of the “books” the Nats leave behind.
Despite that, Cunliffe was very clear to the unions – an immediate rise to $15phr for the minimum wage, the first budget will have a living wage to people working in the core public service, scrapping the Nats unfair employment law changes, bringing in more parental leave.
He’s a numbers man, he knows his stuff, he will have worked out what Labour can afford to promise before the election. There’s nothing two-faced about what he is saying. But the MSM and the WhaleOils will search through everything he says to find ways to trip him up.
Labour : A Credible Government in Waiting
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=11138194
-Bryan Gould
A very good synopsis, but then I’ve never known Bryan Gould produce anything that isn’t…
consistent
Makes me think of the old dressing table mirrors with one flat, and two wings. Stand in one place, turn your head and see three different visions or versions of whoever. Perhaps these jonolists need to move around a bit. It sounds as if they have been so rroted to their spot that they’ll start sprouting cutty grass and thorns soon.
Are all the pm’s reassurances to business interests done publically
Hey Standardistas,
Cunliffe is enjoying an honeymoon, however, I think it is becoming clear that we will almost certainly have a Labour-led government next year.
I listen to what you all say very carefully. So, I am interested in what it is you want this government to do.
Give me your dream list. Tax hikes? GST off fruit and vegetables? Buying back all of the shares in Meridian (and perhaps some other generators not already publicly-owned)? Employment law changes? Increase in benefits? Banning foreign ownership? Out of the TPPA? Nationalisation of Trade Me? Think Big? Government control of the exchange rate? Berm mowing?
if you listen very carefully then you surely already know
You are right. Inviting your views clearly called for me to be smacked down. Sorry.
Stating the contradiction within your kind invitation is not a smack down. It’s simply casting doubt on either your motive or your comprehension, a failure in either of which might lead to a waste of everyone’s time.
Feel free to not answer. It’s a free country.
I would be surprised if you believed that I felt compelled to answer your question.
Besides NZ being a free country (albeit for a given value of “free”), if you did indeed carefully listen to what each of us said, the information is already at your fingertips.
No, no, inviting our views isn’t what clearly calls for you to be smacked down, your very existence does that…
K.
I think he should campaign on “Gulags for Gormless”
*sigh* You are such a tiresome troll
If you’re serious, and from that list:
Employment law changes – seriously detrimental to social cohesion and a decent life for the most vulnerable with NActs changes
Buying back all of the shares – should be on the table
Restricting foreign ownership – unless we have reciprocal rights
Out of the TPPA – as it stands now
1. Considerable Tax hikes at the higher levels – along the lines of the top tax rate in the UK or Australia.
2. Investment in green tech
3. Widening of land based and marine reserves and national parks
3. Restrictions on foreign ownership
4. Capital gains tax on property
5. Reversal of the Employment law changes
…. for a start
Inheritance tax
Lolz, Gormless, the third one of the wing-nuts that appear here at the Standard to admit this far out from November 2014 that National are going to lose,
Keep up the defeatism it will spread like swine flu through the ranks of National Party supporters, i am starting to firm up in my pick of 39% for National in 2014,
Besides what Labour leader David Cunliffe has already announced, my little wish list, dependent entirely in what state the incoming Labour/Green Government finds the Government accounts in would be sufficient for the first term,
(1), the reversal of ALL changes made to the benefit system by the current Government within the first 100 days,
(2), Subject to the 500 million dollar estimated cost being available the transition of the Working for Families tax credit scheme into a functional child benefit payment which is also paid to ALL benefit dependent children,(or a definite promise of a starting date for such a scheme),
(3), A State House building program focused mainly upon the cities of Auckland and Christchurch,
(4), At the direction of the relevant Ministers both the Superfund and the ACC fund tasked to buy back shares in recently sold State Owned Assets…
“dependent entirely in what state the incoming Labour/Green Government finds the Government accounts in ”
Probably an empty cupboard with a little bill n john wuz here.
What goes arounf comes around or have you forgotten “a decade of deficits”
The “decade of deficits” that was pure imagination on the part of the RWNJs. In reality, it wasn’t going to happen.
Have we forgotten that treasury predictions can be out by 200% within a six month timeframe? Nope.
Your propagandist mates are pucking morons.
Top of my wishlist is sterilisation of obvious trools.
What is a “trool”?
Combination of “troll” and “fool”? Like it.
[lprent: with connotations of “tool”? As in blind unthinking inanimate object doing someone else’s bidding. I suppose I could look at context but who has the time? ]
that’s a ticking off 😀
yeah, I always use it as a portmanteau of “tro11” and “tool” (in any sense of the word).
Always pays to double-grok the queen’s, my droogs.
So you’ll be first in line?
There was once a rumour that Oscar Wilde coined the retort “I know you are, but what am I”.
You, sir, are no Oscar Wilde.
You speaking to a mirror?
that is funny. 😀
Dear Dave,
Commerce:
– savage any mono/duopoly/shonkey business practices.
– give the SFO/FMA the teeth required to deal effectively with serial shysters.
– dispute resolution with the onus on respondents to prove matters are indeed civil.
– a serious look at the limited liability scam
Housing:
– CGT on property transactions – no exceptions.
– all speculators are developers who will pay the relevant tax.
– initiate a capitalisation scheme to assist new builds for first home owners only.
– remove
subsidies on rental accommodationstate transfers to rental owners.– increase social housing availability for low income CBD workers.
– increase social housing availability for the elderly/infirm.
– improve all existing housing stock using the healthy home model.
Education:
– follow the science – anec-data doesn’t count.
– 4 -16 compulsory attendance.
– expansion of special education services.
– 16-21 compulsory tertiary education/trade training fully funded
– funding continuing education – attendance – a priority.
Health:
– health care is universal.
– pre-natal – post-natal a priority.
– continuation and improvement of well child initiatives.
– universal dental care.
– expansion of public health initiatives – step away from that pie fella – image of cleaved sternum.
– elder care – stop the gaming of the taxpayer by those who hide or transfer resources.
Crime and punishment:
– remove the greatest barrier to our Peelian policing model – cannabis prohibition.
– criminal sanctions tied to education – community service is as either a student or an educator.
– prison is punishment – not a place to be punished.
– prison is punishment – not a place to be disenfranchised.
– prison is punishment – not a place where universal health care is denied.
– prison is a work place and education facility- literacy, numeracy, transferable skills are the goals.
– separate the bad from the mad.
– the truly mad are treated.
– the truly bad run out of chances.
Work to significantly lower energy prices for both domestic and commercial users.
Go all Keynesian on transport.
Go all Keynesian on employment.
Robust regional development policies.
Governance – start by cleaning up your own parliament – the collective lack of ethics on display daily is disgusting.
Revenue:
– tax wealth – not work.
Lottsa love, Me.
well! Three represents (not the destroyer, frigate and supply ship arriving). 😀
Wow joe 90 – a concise and exciting set of dynamic ideas, and we’ll need more than the Dynamic Duo to move them. But what a greatprospect it would be. rrection – it will be!
Thanks Rogue for that interesting link. It’s time to look at what China is doing – if it can only supply some quality thinking to sustainable futures for us all, it will be a worthy world leader unlike the rubber chicken we have at present. Unfortunately I heard a radio report recently saying that China is at present supplying subsidies for shipping to fishers to go out into the high seas and will smash the tuna stocks as part of their expansion in all directions plan. It apparently is the Great Cosmic Plan in space, but we can’t do that on earth. I thought China was smart enough to realise that.
1. Guaranteed real ice-cream made from milk
This would mean dissociation from the Australia New Zealand Food Standards Authority and the re-establishment of the NZ Food Standards Authority. Then we wouldn’t have to put up with the Australian definition of ice-cream which lets manufacturers use a proportion of animal fat from any source (eg rendered chicken fat), as well as milk fat in ice cream manufacture
2. Reworking of the Overseas Investment Office so that it’s default stance is that land sales should not be permitted to foreigners. This is a reverse of it’s current MO which is to permit land sales unless someone comes up with a damn good reason why a sale shouldn’t be permitted.
Edit: 3. “Oh, and peace on earth, Jim”
richard
Australian definition of ice-cream which lets manufacturers use a proportion of animal fat from any source (eg rendered chicken fat), as well as milk fat in ice cream manufacture
I hadn’t caught up with that. I wondered why some of the ice cream didn’t taste good. I looked at the labels but reading through all the information in small print didn’t enlighten me. And I had a supermarket cream freeze and thought it was greasy rather than milky. The above could be the reason.
I’ve gotta good ice cream recipe if you need it. Trouble is the stuff doesn’t stay in the freezer
RedBaronCV
If you have time that ice cream recipe is right for this time of year. So it would be welcome.
sorry GW didn’t see you right away.
In the first bowl beat 4 egg yolks with electric mixer whilst slowly adding 1 cup of castor sugar until thick and sugar has melted. Then beat in a quarter cup of your favourite liqueur (I use khalua mainly for the special occasions) (but a dash of vanilla essence or other flavouring does just as well.).
In the next bowl whip 750ml of cream adding another cup of castor sugar to this.
Fold the two mixtures together and freeze. I beat until the cream peaks are stiff as this helps the mixture not to separate whilst it is freezing. I usually wind up making a double quatity and I freeze it in an enamel roasting dish. Xmas day plus family means its gone by nightfall.
Prob not on the healthy heart list though, cookingnever seems to go wrongwhen loaded with fats, sugars and booze.
Nationalisation without compensation of strategic industries. Dismantling of the police force and its replacement by a neighbourhood militia, answerable to district soviets. Restarting of the Trekka factory, with engines run on methane gas from the dairy herds. Confiscation of anything beyond the family residence. Life sentence without parole for right wing bloggers. All businesses with more than 4 employees to be set up as worker cooperatives. Compulsory basket weaving classes. No TPPA, with its promoters to be tried for treason.
Or you could read what people have been writing for years and sort it out for yourself.
Your answer(s) more than likely lay in the history of posts that occur daily on this site.
I’m simply an intermittent visitor and occasional poster – but from what I can see, your expectation is that everyone should now kowtow, and do your work for you to satisfy an answer to your question posed – God’s gift to mankind and the Universe that you are.
No no – get off your arse and do it yourself.
“I listen to what you all say very carefully. So, I am interested in what it is you want this government to do.” Why that sudden iterest? Are you now all of a sudden coming to realise a tide is turning?
…. “give me” (gimme gimme gimee)
You probably have ‘people’ to do the work for you anyway.
Here’s a hint though Gormless, I wouldn’t begin by looking for the responses to the posts you’ve made in the past – since most of them are in response to your ideologically driven diversionary tactics.
I’m often not sure why people even give you the oxygen you seek by replying to half the crap you post – perhaps it’s just a response to their picking their jaws off the ground when striking utter idiocy.
Go have a look yourself – as I usually have to do.
Tim
And Others. When you put a reply in to someone in particular why don’t you put their name at top. Then they and everyone else knows who you refer to. It makes the remarks meaningful and worth reading. Otherwise it’s what’s this about?
Well for a start we need to have all irrigation and water storage taken schemes into public ownership. Fortunately this government has set up the Crown Irrigation Investment Company. This can be easily turned into a Petrobas for water with a few penstrokes. Water is a public resourse which should be managed by public entities.
The revenue earned from this national water company can then be ring fenced to clean our rivers, fund rainwater storage tanks for HNZ houses, schools, and other public buildings, and run water conservation education programmes and campaigns.
Its a smaller wishlist compared to the usual chestnuts, but control of water is a sleeper issue in this country, and Labour need to act accordingly — I would even suggest we sell Solid Energy to fund it. Control of water schemes is probably more important than the government owning a few coal mines.
I’m very pleased to hear that the great Canadian writer Alice Munro has ben awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. Not that you would know it if you relied on the 4 main NZ news sites (stuff, nzherald, tvnz and tv3) for your news and information.
The four official names for our two main islands announced yesterday are superb…
North Island (bland but part of us now)
South Island (same)
Te Ika-a-Maui (perfect)
Te Waipounamu (beautiful)
i would have preferred Te Wai Pounamu, (the name of one of my nieces), to have become Te Waka a Maui, so as to fit within the Maori creationist myth? from whence we get Te Ika a Maui,
Still,like the stone Pounamu is a beautiful name…
I completely agree, Te Wai Pounamu is, and should remain the name for the West Coast (where the Pounamu was sourced) I would have preferred Te Waka a Maui also.
Actually, the name for the west coast is Te Wahi Pounamu
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Te_Wahipounamu
“i would have preferred Te Wai Pounamu, (the name of one of my nieces), to have become Te Waka a Maui, so as to fit within the Maori creationist myth? from whence we get Te Ika a Maui,”
Cut the cable! 😉
I’m just disappointed I’ll have to stop saying THE North Island and THE South Island, seeing as the are officially North Island and South Island.
Otherwise, yeah.
Is it Te Waipounamu as one word?
I would like Aotearoa as an alternative name for New Zealand. I heard that the original guy putting forward these names thought it should be the name for the South Island.
And we can still call ourselves New Zealand as that is how we are known generally. Aotearoa could be our own private name that we people who are in the know about it and love the land use in our own special country. And these names must be protected names at every level of use.
Not just commercial fodder for some $-eyed entrepreneur.
And I don’t see why we should not be able to continue using North and South Island as well as having the Maori name as we wish, as in Mount Taranaki or Egmont. North and South are useful directional words, but for real names they have just been waiting for Maori to decide and agree on what is best and not too long for other language speakers.
I’ve had a passport officer admire our passport and I explained that it a history of Aotearoa – it’s beautiful
Had the chance to meet and talk to David last night and I am so pleased that his speaking and answering questions is just spot on. It’s hard to separate the public figure from the private person when all we have to go on is MSM. So I am confident that we can look forward to a change for the better under a Labour Government. Finally after almost 30 years of playing with the far right and the so called centre right and the various other shades of right wing politics we are finally getting back to where the party should be.
Roll on election
In light of the US stalemate and the approaching default date I thought I’d dig up a Dutch Doco about what would happen if the dollar collapsed. The scenario given is that it happens withing 24 hours. It is an interesting “what if” doco and while most of it is in English some of the parts in Dutch are subtitled in English so enjoy!
That should have been: Some of the parts are in Dutch but they have been subtitled in English
dont get yur hopes up Ev. Doncha know its always business as usual and humans are adventitious not necessary.
Great names for the north and south island.
why do you hate america so much brett? 🙂
lol
But the wonderful thing is we are all talking about Cunliffe as though he will be next PM-self fulfilling.
Yeah sure there’s no housing crisis in Auckland Nick Smith, not while we have ‘private developers’ only too willing to provide right, bringing to the city of sails their version of a Mumbai Slum,
From the Herald online, a Auckland ‘property developer’ has been fined 60 grand and ordered to deconstruct 12 flats he had illegally constructed in 3 Auckland properties,
2 of the flats were constructed as part of existing garages already at the properties, one even featuring the existing roller door…
I remember an interesting Radionz doco on a Christchurch woman landlord/ developer back post WW2 I think. She used to get into trouble converting rooms into two etc. On the one hand she was creating sub-standard accommodation. On the other, housing was so tight that students and others were grateful to her, and reckoned that she was not too bad. Not much else was being done to deal with what was a tight housing market, or even a housing crisis. It depends what people are charged, and what is their alternative, and does it give some warmth, cleanliness and security and reasonable access to facilities.
Yes i suppose any four walls with a roof over them is a giant step up from the alternative, however, that hardly absolves a series of Governments from the failure to build up the required numbers of social housing at a time of high population growth,
The only reason a slum-lord can thrive and/or survive is if there is a unmet demand for low cost housing…
Agreed. But a port in the storm is better than being drenched. And just because the place wouldn’t feature in Home Design, doesn’t mean it’s no good. If it provides basic amenities and warm and secure and cheap, it shouldn’t be dismissed as disgraceful.
The accommodation this guy provided sounded dire when reported. Then I remembered the Christchurch woman landlord remembered kindly. It’s a matter of judging on reasonable criteria and price, and middle class people in homes better not make those criteria too high.
Actually the places sounded like the Ritz when described on RadioNZ National news tonight, washing and showering facilities in among the kitchen with apparently no separation,
Market rents apparently charged, yeah your right we all should become Slum-lords,
Apparently the particular individual/company we talk of here owns more property across Auckland, the City Council for all it’s billions of dollars of budgeted high salaries has a see no evil approach to Slum-lords and the housing they provide,
Asked whether any of the many other property’s owned were in the same state of illegal alteration the Spokesperson for the Auckland City Council said She didn’t know coz they apparently have better things to do with their time than track down Slum-lords Slum-housing,
Why would any of them, from Central Government to the Local variety they have all sat on their arse’s for 20 years while this ugly problem has developed, more than one or two having helped the problem along by playing ‘in the market’…
This.
Photo at the link.
My place is a conversion of an extension – a bit of a step up from the ones reported on though. Quite reasonable, but a bit strange.
I noticed in the report yesterday about a car driving into a house that a working person can’t find an affordable safe home with a separate room for a 5-year-old.
New Zealand – building a brighter future
OK here’s my top ten wishlist, not ranked:
1. Stop all new motorway contracts and use the funding for rail and cycling public transport projects
2. All Crown super and investment funds including Kiwisaver providers required to have 50% nz ownership weighting, and are required to start immediate buy back of electricity utility shares. And Kiwibank becomes the Crown’s sole bank.
3. State and city governments all form property development companies to roll out Kiwibuild really fast.
4. Decrease income tax for the lowest quarter of income owners and impose Capital Gains Tax. Just as soon as I’ve offloaded one of the rentals. 😉
5. Complete Treaty of Waitangi settlements
6. Merge Maori Television and Radio NZ into a new Internet-based public broadcasting company
7. Roll out increased minimum wage to whole public sector, with contractors next
8. Establish a single national park the length of the South Island using existing DoC estate.
9. Pump money into the arts and other identity-drivers like sports. Gradual increase in patriotism and identity like Clark.
10. Establish a multi-billion research fund for job-rich innovation, where private business must partner with Crown Research Institutes, universities, and local government in joint ventures.
nothing new there really, just collectively would feel like reasonable and populist progress.
What price do we pay for ‘free trade’, from RadioNZ National News, 200 fish processing jobs are set to disappear from Christchurch’s Independent Fishery’s,
Citing competition from ‘cheap imports’ the company is set to close it’s fish crumbing plant in November with the loss of 200 jobs,
With Slippery the Prime Minister whipping along the TPPA where New Zealand’s access to the other signatory’s markets will be in a decade or longer, just how many more jobs in the New Zealand economy is the little Shyster prepared to give away…
Depends how much he’s offered, a bankster is as a bankster does.
To all the taxers above .
The smartest tax would be a land tax.
This would solve many of the problems NZ has.
As high value overcrowded areas with not enough infrastructure would pay higher taxes while under populated areas with underutilized infrastructure would pay lower taxes people would move to lower taxed areas or make better use of land in high taxed areas income tax would have to be lowered to make the idea work.
Just saying you want tax the well off and rich to much is feeding keys spin that the left are extreme!
We on the left don’t need to give Key and co a free ride to the next election.
Be reasonable the majority of New Zealands middle classes have aspirations of being rich one day that’s why they vote National,Even though most NZers will never get to the top tax rate.
We on the left need to cooperate
Just as those on the right all sing from the same song sheet .
Capital gains tax is good if it is broad spectrum.
If it only focuses on one area not so good.
But If Capital gains managef to get over the line the money brought in should gone into building affordable houses and that would have a double whammy reducing the risk of a housing bubble.
I really don’t think a land tax is an answer.
From my reading, it would pretty well destroy the pastoral farming industry in NZ as it adversely affects those with a variable income and those with a high land value to income generated from that land. A land tax would be a double whammy for farmers.
Land tax?
Youll have every cow-cocky in the country firing up their tractor and riding it down to Wellington. If I have learned something, it is never to take on the farmers. You will not win.
I thought that this BBC article on what would happen if America defaulted was a good introduction to the matter, namely because it is brief and easy to understand(!) and also interesting that they admitted to not knowing all the consequences a number of times throughout the article.
A small amount of historically similar occurrences are provided and also a good graph on the debt accumulation since 1980.
Tricldown. We already have a sort of Land Tax, I grow grapes and make wine , the Govt gets $2.82 a litre ( which I pay when I sell it locally ) I get $1.50 a litre and then I pay GST on the total. How much more tax should I pay ? I am not complaining, I think consumption taxes are a good idea but there is bugger all left for me.
Dasein must be considered as a ‘whole’, and this, my friends, requires an account of death. Dasein can only be genuinely authentic only in it’s ‘being towards death’, wherein it accepts it’s finitude. Dasein is individualized by death: for we all die alone, and no-one else can die in our place. Death, therefore, is a criterion of authenticity: We must recognize that we die, and not simply that ‘one’ dies. Heidegger suggests, along with others (Kierkegaard and Tolstoy for instance) that there is a pervasive tendency to conceal the inevitability of one’s own death: “All men are mortal, Caius is a man, so Caius is mortal” in the abstract, mused Ivan Ilyich, is perfectly correct, but we are not Caius, an abstract person, but creatures quite distinct from all others. Authentic being towards death (Feat, don’t fail me now) is related to ‘resoluteness’ ( Entschlossenheit ): it is only if we are aware of our finitude that we have reason to act now, rather than procrastinate, and it is the crucial decision, made with a view to the course of our future lives that gives them unity and shape.
The future becomes thus the primary aspect or ‘ecstasis’ of time, however, decisions are also constrained by situations inherited from the past; the more important decisions are, the more they will be considered in view of the past. The third ecstasis, the present (which many do not see 😉 ) is now the ‘moment’ of decision ( The Power of Now etc): “In resoluteness, the present is not only brought back from distraction with objects of one’s closest concern, but gets held in the future and in having been. That present which is held in authentic temporality and which thus is authentic itself, we call the ‘moment of vision’ ( der Augenblick ).
Several central features of time have been generally overlooked by traditional accounts deriving from Aristotle. Time is significant (just ask the White Rabbit 😉 ): It is time to do this and that. Time is datable by events, when , for example, David Cunliffe became Leader of the NZLP. Time is spanned; now is not an instant (the blinking of an eye) without duration, but now, during .Time is public: we can all indicate the same time by ‘now’ or ‘then’, even if we date it by different, relevent, events. Time is finite : (our) time will not continue forever, but is running out- “See how it runs”. History is to be understood in terms of these accounts of time and of the ‘historicality’ of Dasein . Dasein’s understanding of itself and the world depends on an interpretation inherited from the past. This interpretation regulates and disclose the possibilities open to it. Inauthentic Dasein accepts tradition unthinkingly (or lazily) and fulfils the possibilities shaped by it; authentic Dasein probes tradition (see neo-orthodoxy) and therefore opens up new and weightier possibilities. Heidegger, for example, does not simply contribute to contemporary philosophical controversy, but by ‘repeating’ and ‘de(con)structing’ crucial elements and episodes in the development of the philosophical tradition endeavours to change the whole course of philosophical enquiry.
Adrian I did say we should reduce income tax if their is to be a land tax..
Alcohol tax is what you are paying alcohol is the second most damaging drug thi country allows to be sold that’s why you pay so much.
What is Metaphysics (1929) expands upon the nothing , which made a brief, cameo, appearance in Being and Time , and which is disclosed in the Angst that reveals to Dasein , in it’s freedom and finitude, the ultimate groundlessness of itself, it’s world and it’s projects. (these are times when the terms existential and crisis are frequently uttered , together, by sane and sound people, yet on the denial goes).
Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics (1929; tr. Bloomington, Ind. 1962) argues that the first Critique is not a theory of knowledge or of the sciences (as such neo-Kantians as Cohen, Natorp??? and Cassirer held) (made ya’ look ya’ dirty chook), but lays the foundation for meta-physics: Kant saw that reason, knowledge and man in general are finite, and thus, made the transcendental imagination the basis of synthetic a priori knowledge (hence Revelation, and, think of the fertility of memes) :-D. However, (could be a but) , since this threatens the primacy of reason and the foundations of ‘Western metaphysics’, Kant recoiled from the ‘abyss’ , unlike some we could mention, no names please, in the second edition of the Critique and made the imagination ‘a function of understanding’. Attacked by most Kant scholars, Heidegger implicitly retracted some of his interpretations in later essays on Kant.(sadly).
Despite Heidegger’s denials, being ( Sein resembles God. It is not at man’s disposal, rather, it disposes of man. Whatever happens comes from being. Man, the ‘shepherd of being’, must respond to it’s directions (like genes get throwing themselves forward, tended wisely).It is is above history, or before, but since the time of Plato it has been hidden, yet the ‘history of being’ can be reconstructed from the texts of philosophers,poets (and political pundits) :-D. Sadly, forgetfulness of being, or nihilism, has culminated in the domination of the world by technology. Whether or not man can return to genuine thinking of being will determine the future of the planet. “But where there is danger, the remedy grows too”. H_
The appropriate response to being is thinking. Thinking is our obedient answer to the call of being, yet some of it’s practice may have been forgotten.Thinking contrasts with assertion, logic, science (science does not think ), metaphysics, philosophy itself and especially technology, which is merely an instrument, a ‘strool’ for the calculation and domination of entities. Language, which, like thinking, played a subordinate role in Being and Time becomes central to Heidegger’s later philosophy, though not language as an instrument of manipulation- into which it has degenerated (under the sway of metaphysics) -but language as an ‘abode of being’. Language speaks, not man.Man only speaks when he fatefully responds to language. Gotta love fate, m8! 😀
Richard rural land would attract a very small tax as well a reduced income tax would reward productivity.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/9272758/Mark-Lundy-free-after-12-years-behind-bars
– Bain, Macdonald and Lundy apparantly not guilty of murder…there must be a really clever serial killer running around NZ
– Must give hope to Tamihere and Watson to being freed
Bain, Macdonald and Lundy apparantly not guilty of murder…there must be a really clever serial killer running around NZ. Must give hope to Tamihere and Watson to being freed.
And O.J. Simpson?
Tamihere is already out, released with strict conditions in November 2010. Luckily we have a system however flawed that decides such things rather than what the idiocracy ‘finks’.
Nah.
Partly it’s a problem with the “prime suspect” approach to policing: make your scenario based on gut instinct, then fit the data to that pattern. The problem is that unless you gather enough data (including data on the chain of custody of that data) it becomes easier for the defence to connect those same dots into another picture. Especially as time passes and it becomes easier to forget that common procedure now was disproportionately time-consuming and expensive then. Regardless of whether the “prime suspect” is innocent or whether the assumption of investigators led them to believe short-cuts hadn’t been taken, the model is flawed.
Couple that with juries that are only slowly coming out of a culture of believing everything a cop says (and the fact that almost everyone can be painted as either criminal or weird), it’s not particularly surprising that a number of high profile cases have been kicked back.
Funny you mention Tamihere – straight after the verdict TV1 played a documentary on how our brave police caught the man wot dun it. A comment made by the lead investigator has stuck with me ever since: “we had found our suspect, and we proceeded to build a case around him”.
I always had my doubts about both Tamiheres. In David’s case, I strongly suspect the evidence was found or fabricated to make a bad guy look guilty. In John’s case, hmmmm, what can you say? Incriminates himself and still gets votes.
Do you have evidence that all these murders were done by the same person? Not presenting it to the police makes you an accessory after the fact. Do your civic duty.
there are some really clever thieves running NZ. (you’re welcome 😀 )
Or not so clever cops!
In Bains case they threw out the evidence after the privy council turned down bains first appeal.
Barlow is another one.
The Herald
“Two years since Rena: No signs of oil on beaches.”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11138756
Are the Herald suggesting let’s go with oil drilling???
Wouldn’t be a bad idea to pay for Cunliffes promises
Absolutely.
There’s going to be millions of oil wells popping up every where.
And about time too.
millions? – settle down
about time? – for what, you know BM money isn’t as important as, you know, fucken fresh air and water. These ‘millions’ of oil wells are a foul and suicidal legacy we leave for our grandchildren – what a disgusting stupid bunch of weaklings we have become!!!
Civilization needs the black stuff.
Until something else comes along to take it’s place, it’s drill, baby, drill.
You guys are so cute how you keep on with the derp lines from the GOP. By this time next year you’ll be banging on ‘unskewing the polls’.
Nope, civilisation needs to be sustainable and using fossil oil prevents that.
Nothing’s going to come along. There is, quite literally, nothing with the energy density of oil and even that’s petering out as the EROEI drops.
+ 1 Very good point.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrahQpIWD08
Big lols
Beaches are not necessarily the place to look. Didn’t they put something on the oil to make it sink to the seabed? Perhaps, that is where they should look before they start congratulating themselves.
” No signs of oil on beaches.
Out of sight so out of mind – but would you eat the shellfish?
Now I have a bone to pick about the local body elections. Went down this morning to drop my vote in- didn’t post it as I didn’t want it to get lost in the mail. The house only received two thirds of the voting papers it should have so it might be worth asking councils how many papers never made it and have been returned.
I knew where to go fortunately because the lack of signage was appalling and inside are all these great posters about voting, done by the wellington region’s councils but I have only seen all the drab ones up around town and not too many of those.I’m sure a lot of businesses etc would have been happy to have one to display.
But my main point is why don’t all the council places where you can drop off votes also have somebody that can issue replacement papers and even more importantly those orange pavement boards outside saying election stuff available here – just like general election polling booths are marked.
One size doesn’t fit all and visual reminders all over the “burbs at libraries etc might give people a bit more of a push.
I noticed how hard it was to find out information about candidates that wasn’t in the booklet that came with the voting papers. I’m pretty motivated, but the effort involved in finding out was too much. I can see why so many don’t bother voting.
Vote. Co.nz
Put your address in and it gives you all your voting choices with full details
No, it gives me what someone has chosen to put in there, often it’s just the blurb from the booklet. I want to know details about where the candidates stand on things, not generic blather that’s designed to make voters feel good but doesn’t tell them anything substantial.
H.P.was quite a guy.
I used to be a hide-bound Tory simply for traditional and antiquarian reasons—and because I had never done any real thinking on civics and industry and the future. The depression—and its concomitant publicisation of industrial, financial, and governmental problems—jolted me out of my lethargy and led me to reëxamine the facts of history in the light of unsentimental scientific analysis; and it was not long before I realised what an ass I had been. The liberals at whom I used to laugh were the ones who were right—for they were living in the present while I had been living in the past. They had been using science while I had been using romantic antiquarianism. At last I began to recognise something of the way in which capitalism works—always piling up concentrated wealth and impoverishing the bulk of the population until the strain becomes so intolerable as to force artificial reform.
[…]
As for the Republicans — how can one regard seriously a frightened, greedy, nostalgic huddle of tradesmen and lucky idlers who shut their eyes to history and science, steel their emotions against decent human sympathy, cling to sordid and provincial ideals exalting sheer acquisitiveness and condoning artificial hardship for the non-materially-shrewd, dwell smugly and sentimentally in a distorted dream-cosmos of outmoded phrases and principles and attitudes based on the bygone agricultural-handicraft world, and revel in (consciously or unconsciously) mendacious assumptions (such as the notion that real liberty is synonymous with the single detail of unrestricted economic license or that a rational planning of resource-distribution would contravene some vague and mystical ‘American heritage’…) utterly contrary to fact and without the slightest foundation in human experience? Intellectually, the Republican idea deserves the tolerance and respect one gives to the dead.
– H. P. Lovecraft
understandable
sauce for a gander
LBIAFC !
Cunliff!s 100 day promise is a easy given.The more costly and some would say radical idea!s of central control of the electricity and gas industry,the housing and rents issue,the cost of health and education will all be managed as he has said,given the fiscal situation.One thing is for certain, if he does get the treasury benches in 2014,he will be inheriting massive debt, and that will slow down his road to a more egalatarian N.Z.that all Labour Party supporters yearn for.
My picks for local elections tomorrow (As far as I am concerned my two week banned applies from when I made that post that got me banned):
Auckland: Len Brown to hold on. Palino will run him close with Minto in third. Centre-right to have control of council.
Wellington: John Morrison beats CWB. Celia kinda screwed up, completely out of her depth as mayor. Folding on spending cuts, and underestimating the pro-road rednecks didnt do her any good. Finding that keeping her promises on light rail would be impossible also counts against her.
Christchurch: Lianne Dalziel by a country mile, though Bob Parker may have given her a good run.
Dunedin: Cull all the way, given that there appears to be no challengers.
Meanwhile, New Plymouth looks set to elect a bunch of Tea Party slash and burn ACToids to its district council. We probably wont have a library for that long. Shame.
HATCHET DOCTORS – used by WINZ, this is a must read post and comment thread on ACC Forum, that exposes how they work and try to manipulate the system to “off load” sick and disabled off benefits. It is based on a true story:
http://accforum.org/forums/index.php?/topic/15326-hatchet-doctor-exposed-winz-acc-alert-hdc-office-do-cop-out/
I most strongly suggest others that have stories to share, to do so on that thread, and perhaps here also, if you wish to be discrete about your privacy, just make sure your true name and details are concealed.
But for the benefit of ALL others, please dare to NAME and SHAME those damned doctors that tried to kick you off benefits, while your own doctor and possibly other specialists said the opposite was needed!!!
Hitler REVEALED:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlSb4KnxD7Q
This is most interesting historic revelation!
All%20records%20that%20exist%20are%3A%0A%0AHitler%20and%20the%20Nazis%20learned%20in%20early%20years%20from%20the%20AMERICAN%20ADVERTISING%20INDUSTRY%2C%20how%20to%20manipulate%20the%20population.%20We%20have%20that%20mind%20bending%20power%20highly%20active%20in%20New%20Zealand%20right%20now!%0A%0AThat%20does%20of%20course%20not%20equate%20to%20advertising%20industry%20supporting%20NAZI%20idelogy%2C%20but%20they%20promote%20the%20neo%20liberal%2C%20right%20wing%2C%20capitalist%20ideology%2C%20and%20system.%20That%20is%20why%20in%20NZ%20we%20have%20NO%20true%20democracy%2C%20it%20is%20a%20total%20farce%20and%20LIE!%0A%0AWe%20are%20being%20manipulated%20at%20an%20immense%20scale%20to%20consume%2C%20to%20focus%20on%20nothing%20but%20consumerism%2C%20on%20fake%20freedom%20(largely%20individualistic)%20and%20on%20capitalist%20ideals%2C%20none%20else.
[translated]
All records that exist are:
Hitler and the Nazis learned in early years from the AMERICAN ADVERTISING INDUSTRY, how to manipulate the population. We have that mind bending power highly active in New Zealand right now!
That does of course not equate to advertising industry supporting NAZI idelogy, but they promote the neo liberal, right wing, capitalist ideology, and system. That is why in NZ we have NO true democracy, it is a total farce and LIE!
We are being manipulated at an immense scale to consume, to focus on nothing but consumerism, on fake freedom (largely individualistic) and on capitalist ideals, none else.
Now I am being corrupted and attacked by The Standard, I cannot believe this, NZ is truly Fucked, there is NO left and alternative force, you are traitors to the idea!
Sorry I sign off and will never be back you are EVIL!
Settle down xtasy 🙂 There is a bug in the edit function, it’s happening to others randomly too.
In all honesty I am struggling to be convinced that suicide is not the best solution to persons like me, give present regimes and economic conditions. Why are people stigmatising us who want a decent “exit” from a SHIT SOCIETY and SHIT WORLD? Let us go, pleaase, I am totally sick off you all and your SHIT society, I hate living, I hate being, I rather be dead right now, that is me, in full confession!!!
Hey xtasy. Sorry last night, the early hours, was bad for you. Hope you are feeling a bit better today.
You still have much to offer, keeping us infomred about developments with social security/benefit issues.
Take care.
Yes, it is definitely time for a longer “mental health break”, away from the internet and computer. Take care and keep up the good work, karol.
Maybe I’ll be back some time further down the future time-line, when mind and body feel a bit better again.
I am going “insane” again, but Dr Bratt will think I am “fit for work”, the insanity lies in the system, and this song reveals more:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8ZFi0MvGf0
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11138933
National is GONE, even their No1 cheerleader has swapped sides.
The best article I have red from Armstrong in living memory!