Woman sues ABC over Media Watch comments on her trip to United States
by RACHEL OLDING, Sydney Morning Herald, Monday 16 March 2015
A Sydney woman of American heritage is suing the ABC’s Media Watch for depicting her as a backer of, and a PR mouthpiece for, the brutal regime of President Barack Obama.
In a politically-sensitive case that will test alleged bias in media coverage of….
Media watch is an opinionated hosted critique by an established senior legal or journalist figure.
It has a history of controversy and I await some background on the piece, the woman and SMH angle as it may be more about getting at that pesky ABC than actual bias.
L Randall Wray – the evolution and instability of financialised money manager capitalism
Approx 21 mins. Wray is also an exponent of ‘Modern Monetary Theory’ which describes how governments can deficit spend to create money into an economy for households to use and save, quite independent of taxes and borrowing.
Why do people in NZ love to hate the middle class?
Why do those on the left in particular make such snide comments about middle class people?
Why do normally tolerant people who are all for liberal thinking and ethnic tolerance simply turn to shit when they see a bunch of middle class people?
I see it is Tahu Potiki’s turn to act in a prejudiced and bigoted manner against people based solely on photos of them appearing to be middle class, in having a crack at the kauri tree protestors. Tahu Potiki of course is maori and a some-time commentator from Dunedin-ways. He has likely experienced bigotry and prejudice and the like, yet he simple-headedly does the same himself. In his column this morning (no link yet sorry) he, on several occasions, ranted against these people on the basis of their middle classness alone. Tahu’s rant exposes in himself the same faults in humans that he has likely been subjected to himself – namely bigotry and prejudice.
Leave the middle class alone ffs. It is a failure in so very many ways to reference things to them in ways like Tahu Potiki has done.
The middle class want to save that kauri, or a kākāpō, or that mountain from having a windfarm put on it, but they don’t want to give up the affluence that threatens those things in the first place. They’re not alone in this of course (it seems to apply across all classes), but I think the idea is that the middle classes have more choice than the working class and underclass because of their assets and income and more sensibility for what’s right than the wealth class. Stuck in the middle.
Sure I can imagine how that might be imagined, however it is all conjecture and assumption on the part of the likes of Potiki. There is never any good argument put forward or evidnce provided for anything he intimated, not those matters you have highlighted above. Nothing. Just assumption.
It would actually be a good issue to dive into and evaluate properly – you know, comfortable in their jobs, nice 4wd, huge mortgage, provisional tax, pilloried and plied, ignorant and shallow, unknowing of anything but materiality, the list goes on …..
I can’t comment on Potiki until I read his article, and unfortunately you have a history of misrepresenting people’s word in situations like this.
I was more commenting on why some lefties in general have a downer on the middle class and from my perspective (others will tell it differently). I don’t think it’s what people imagine, it’s an analysis based on knowledge and experience (sure my comment was shorthanded and generalised).
“ignorant and shallow, unknowing of anything but materiality”
I’m less worried about those ones, than the ones that can think, who appreciate values other than possessions and consumption, who should know better but still aren’t willing to do what is needed to redress their privilege.
I would like to comment but need to read Tahu’s own words first rather than rely on your interpretation of what he may have written or have been quoted as saying.
It should turn up here eventually. I don’t know how long they take to put them up on the web though. Otherwise try the Press in hardcopy (was that today vto?)
Bought the Press, read the article, don’t entirely support vto’s perception of what the article in its entirety was saying.
That said, I don’t necessarily agree with his take on the Titirangi ‘save the trees’ event. My views are shaped from active involvement in resource management processes in the past and what I see as a flawed process that allowed a non-notified consent in the first place.
I took the article as a whole to reflect on the clashes of culture around resource use, management and preservation, conservation, restoration and how different groups place more or less emphasis on one idealised part.
Leaving out the ‘middle class’ references, what I read reminded me of my childhood experiences of going to catch whitebait with my father, uncle and grandparents and seeing hundred of very large eels rotting on the riverbank because the Acclimatisation Society wanted the trout to be predator free. It was horrific to see (and smell) but was an example to me of the lengths that the settler society would go to prioritise what was important to them.
One point that the article made, I thought, was that there is an element of hypocrisy in those who live on sections that were clear felled in the past, to deny to others the right to remove trees in order to enjoy their own section. I can see that viewpoint even if I disagree with it.
Suffice it to say, I neither agree nor disagree with the article in its totality and I found it an interesting read.
It is too long for me to type as a whole and, at the time of writing, is not up on the Press website but it is provocatively titled ‘A Grand Win for the Busybodies’.
hi vto,
what sticks in my craw with the middle class is the aspirations.
the idea of getting ahead.
i watched a ricardo semler ted talk (thanx felix) yesty.
he said if you get to a point in your life where you want to give back then you took too much in the first place.
had an interesting conversation with a self made man. he was ranting about the poor and how they should be saving to get their first property, leverage that to get a rental…(you get the picture), he could not see that for there to be a landlord there must be a tenant.
so as weka says below (or above), about an unwillingness to give up some affluence so all have enough.
its the ‘i’m alright jack’ or ‘blow the bridge i’m over’
I have yet to read Potiki’s opinion piece, but I take it from vto’s comment that he is attacking the middle class for the kind of safe activism that does not challenge the status quo – for engaging in their own little “rose revolutions” and congratulating themselves on “making a difference.”
As to the cry of “Why does NZ love to hate the middle class?” quite a few middle class people are either indifferent to the suffering of others or despise them for having gotten into that position in the first place. People you despise tend to despise you in turn. It is an aspect of what Stiglitz was talking about in an article RedLogix put up a few days ago, about the erosion of social trust.
Or you could see the middle class thinking of assets and income as being like lollies in a lolly scramble. They were out there and the people with the most were the hardest working and most motivated. Of course lolly scrambles have recently led to images of large young men scooping up the most amongst children that only came to their knees. Not cricket old man!
he could not see that for there to be a landlord there must be a tenant.
It’s more accurate to say that for there to be a landlord there must be many tenants. It is a question of support. Each landlord requires many tenants to support them.
While I haven’t read the article you’re referring to vto, I think you you make an interesting point:
“Why do normally tolerant people who are all for liberal thinking and ethnic tolerance simply turn to shit when they see a bunch of middle class people?”
I’ve seen this happen in conversations here at TS and heard it plenty in real life too. I find it a bit puzzling. It raises more questions for me than I have theories for as to why there is a dividing line where tolerance ends and spite begins
I wonder if it is hatred and mistrust that is intergenerational and so ingrained as if it has been handed down from our colonial past when we were Little Britain with it’s clear cut class groups (as much as settlers said they wanted to escape that but failed to do so).
Who are the middle class these days? We have shifting sands beneath the feet of society. Once people could be more upwardly mobile (and whether betraying/abandoning your class was scorned or applauded is another aside) but in very general terms, the effects of a Nat govt has bumped many once financially comfortable people harshly down the ladder whilst those below landed in a heap beneath them, finding themselves in an even more precarious living situation.
It’s often talked about, while many are being left behind the elite have increased their power control and wealth. So where are the middle classes in that? Are they the survivors?
Is middle class defined by wealth? Is it defined by the display of that wealth? Is it defined by the expression of taste? Lols, if taste comes into it then I wonder what my neighbours north of me in the higher priced houses end think they are achieving by trying to out do one another with the purchase of the latest shiniest largest luxury range SUV money can by. Are they trying to express their middle class-ness or are they just pathetic try hards?
So who are the middle class that folks criticise?
Or is it related to wealth and being rightly critical of the self serving behaviour of the wealthy who trample over others to get a bigger slice. for example, maybe an employer who has built a profitable business on the back of low paid, poorly treated workers?
In that case is the class group the employer belongs to seen as the oppressor, where in fact it is the boss being oppressive and who should be the focus of criticism? Is it wealth or class that oppresses in the case of the employer?
Should we not judge a person on their actions and behaviour rather than their class, what ever that is?
Gee Rosie, you are carrying this PC thing too far saying that the middle class should not be pointed at or criticised because they have feelings.
The middle class have willingly separated themselves off from struggling NZ as if that group were lepers. The women have got jobs where they often administer to the poorer class, rather patronisingly. And they feel entitled to their superior position and consequently don’t pay much attention to the structural side of the downward trend, aggravated by enabling policy.
The upper class live in a different planet and most rarely come down from the Ramtops to attempt to suss out what mayhem they are causing or enabling to the rest of NZ.
The middle class are still living the dream that they were brought up with and fully expect that their superior standards will be maintained for ever. All this talk about environment and climate is exaggerated and technology will deal with it. At present their task is to maintain their lovely home, educate their children to
ensure a well paid and fulfilling position, and keep their minds on higher things, such as art, healthy food. maintaining their looks and overseas holidays.
Is there any wonder that people who have the wide vision to take in all the classes, the whole range of NZers, get pissed off with the dopey, self-satisfied middle class who want it all without accepting citizen responsibility also.
Warbs, lols, please, I am not “carrying a PC thing”. You should know me better than that by now.
And I am definitely not saying they should not be criticised because they have feelings. I have never once mentioned the words feelings or expressed any sympathy for their feelings.
I am mainly asking who they are. How do we identify them? By their wealth, their taste, their level of wankiness?
The group you are referring to above are displaying attitudes and behaviours that are isolationist and excluding, anti the collective good and self promoting, potentially at the cost of the well being of others. I know these types and dislike them intensely for their selfish and cruel ways. (In fact I have had a run in with one of these sorts in recent days. The level of hatred for the concept of equality expressed by this person was truly gobsmacking).
So would you say middle class is defined by a set of behaviours and attitudes? (which comes back to wankiness)
The above behaviours you mention, I see belonging to the group within society that holds right wing views. I’m not sure that the entire spectrum of the middle classes is exclusively right wing, who ever this middle class are.
Hi Rosie
Middle class is a broad target. Which ones to shoot? I am thoroughly middle class myself without the necessary assets and liquidity to ponce about. So let’s keep on criticising the middle class as it’s a bit like throwing balls at a stall with moving faces in the fairground.
And it is hard to dent a middle class person’s self esteem. That’s how you know them. They just look at you with their eyebrows raised and either patronisingly smile or just turn away bored. There’s one of those rent-a-crowd rabble they say, just too too boring and repetitive. Always doing nothing and saying not fair. Of course they don’t like people who act vigorously to even up the fiscal balance either.
.
I usually mean what most people call “upper middle class” when I say “middle class” Which can lead to misunderstandings because it seems others mean a majority or large minority rather than this minority.
A particular cultural group rather than amount of money. Things that spring to mind are – highly socially connected; people who have influence, who have contacts, who have contacts who have contacts, which can cover a huge range of influence in a society, formally educated and qualified, use language very precisely but usually use effective subtext and nuance to express aggression, rank etc., who have particular social behaviours and understandings, who as a group are often unaware that their own behaviours and language can have very different meanings to those from other class cultures, people who tend to define, by their choices, what is considered “good taste” “good manners” “good ideas” etc.,
And heaps more but I don’t have time right now. People don’t control what class they are born into and it doesn’t determine goodness or badness, but middle-class is a variety of privilege. Like most privilege it is often either unrecognised or underrecognised and it is this that is often the source of most of the misunderstandings and occasional outright animosity imho.
Thank you just saying. I find that a very helpful beginning to understanding who the middle class are. I can envision this ‘class’ more clearly now as I know of people that belong to this particular grouping.
The people that I know that fit your definition I don’t find particularly offensive, and while there is an unspoken knowing between these folk and myself that a different level of privilege is enjoyed by them it doesn’t cause a tension.
On the hand, there are others I know of, like the person who I had a run in with, who fit some aspects of your definition, influential, with contacts / connections and formally educated and qualified, privileged in several ways but whose social skills are under developed, whose emotional intelligence is low and who are focused on the acquisition of wealth and property as a symbol of their success.
So if class doesn’t determine goodness or badness as you say perhaps it comes down to personality and behaviour, as to the source of division?
I’m just grappling and my head isn’t in the best place today.
I’m saying they are a a minority which has a big vested interest in the status quo. Some admit this and work hard to make their communities fairer anyway. Many don’t.
This might be a good place to mention a new book reviewed on Radionz this morning. It shows the nefarious ways that cunning pakeha managed to wangle land out of Maori hands. We ought to know this because it is behind Maori grievances which the Treaty of Waitangi is partly recompensing and the reason that it should not be too hurried and that Maori should be able to tell their histories.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player/20171204
Book review – At the Margin of Empire ( 6′ 16″ )
10:38 Paul Diamond reviews ‘At the Margin of Empire: John Webster and the Hokianga, 1842-1900’ by Jennifer Ashton. Published by Auckland University Press.
Tahu Potiki, by virtue of his whakapapa alone, was born a member of the iwi aristocracy if looked at through Eurocentric eyes. That he has worked hard to make himself a 21st century leader of his whanau, hapu and iwi is all his own doing and nothing at all to do with Treaty settlement processes.
As for his political views, I only know what he has published. If you see him as hard right you have either read things I haven’t or read into what was published what I didn’t. We are each entitled to our own views and perhaps mine are shaped by knowing the person and thus seeing an entirety, or as much as anyone may know another without being them!
Chur all comments above. Unfortunately as often seems to be the case I must away and have no time today to respond. Fwiw I see no difference in tolerance, willingness to protest the wrong, or anything like that, based on class. I do not see the lower classes doing more of this stuff (if anything I see them doing less and it aint because we have less). I do not see the upper classes doing more of this stuff at all either – they are too busy with the planning of their mid-winter escape-NZ hols looming now summer is at an end. I actually see most of the protesting of things wrong being carried out by so-called middle-class types.
Middle class types protested the kauris apparently. Good. It is they who protest the environment damagers mostly. It is the middle class who do most of the heavy lifting. That is what I see.
So in actual fact Mr Potiki has it completely arse-about. The reason he saw middle class people protesting at the kauris was because it is the middle class who do most of this stuff. They do the grunt. They get out on the street. They write to MPs.
The middle class should be supported in its efforts not vilified.
So in actual fact Mr Potiki has it completely arse-about. The reason he saw middle class people protesting at the kauris was because it is the middle class who do most of this stuff. They do the grunt. They get out on the street. They write to MPs.
The Waipoua Forest in Northland is a remnant Kauri Forest whose most famous inhabitant is Tāne Mahuta. Tāne is about 2,500 years old. The forest is riddled with Kauri Die-back Disease which is lethal to Kauri. The people trying to save the massive and ancient trees in this forest come from all walks of life.
People from all over Northland (hardly a bastion of middle-classness) consistently maintain a presence at the entrance to Waipoua to ensure people wash their footwear before entering the forest. This has been going on for a number of years. This is grunt work in action.
Was driving my old hot rod truck to work today, and noticed a couple of cyclists out in the Chch cold wearing their hi-viz gears and their helmets.
At the lights I pondered the general lack of cyclists on the road this morning, and the debate on cycle helmets, cyclist numbers and societal obesity aided by folk travelling to work in their old hot rod trucks instead of biking. (You can ponder these things if you dont turn the wireless on in the morning)
I have also seen the massive carnage of head injuries, but the simple truth is that most of those are alcohol related – auto accidents and assaults rather than bike accidents. And politicians have demonstrated over and over (regardless of who is in power) that they will not address our alcohol issues.
So should adults have the option of travelling helmetless if they are wearing hi-viz gear? More folk biking is good for the health of the nation
Im saying that that there may be some public health gains if adults didnt have to wear helmets, but wore safety vests instead.
The argument is out there saying that helmets put the vain of biking, (cant mess your hair up aye)
So any reduction in head injuries is the result of less adults biking, not in a similar number of cyclists having fewer serious head injuries due to wearing the helmets.
My take is that kids should wear the helmets because they arent necessarily as spatially aware as the average adult on a bike. I thought the vests I saw today stood out like dog nuts and gave us drivers fair warning of the cyclists ahead.
That makes sense, although from a public health or accident prevention perspective it might be a bit complex. We need to change the culture, and things like building every road with cyclists in mind would help.
Absolutely! For commuting, shopping and recreation it’s a pleasure to cycle in Europe in the sunshine, safely, with just a sunhat on.
Cycling for sport might still be a problem though.
It’s too difficult to cycle in relative safety in NZ and some of the cycleways that are being put in don’t meet cyclists needs. My favourite example is Karo Drive in Wellington where the planners had decided the cycleway on a brand new road should be built to end on one side of Karo Drive and start again on the other at the Cuba Street intersection. To swap sides they’ve put a diagonal cycle crossing on an intersection between two very busy pedestrian crossings. Chaos ensues.
Also the cycleway on the SH1 Taupo bypass – I do wonder how many tourists want to bypass Taupo. Or how many Taupo residents would use it.
Wiki summarises the cycle helmet debate quite well, I think, although this article doesn’t extend road design issues.
Do what I did, wake up in the middle of the road confused and combative with an ambulance officer standing over you, my thanks once again to Colin Slaughter, telling you you’ve had an accident and because you’ve been unconscious for quite some time he couldn’t just take you straight home so best he takes you to base hospital.
Thirty something stitches to sew an ear back on, another dozen to sew up scalp lacerations, an overnight stay to observe a serious concussion, cognitive impairments lasting several months and headaches that persist thirty years on and I reckon you’ll gladly wear a helmet.
Thanks for that joe 90. Your answer is what I have felt was needed to counter this drop your helmet macho stuff. They are a nuisance but the harm to the individual from head injuries can result in differing levels of loss of function but all of much concern.
In advanced cases of damage there is also the destruction of family life and happy relationships because of the need for lifelong care for the person who is not wholely well, perhaps with violent mood swings, and the cost in health care and rehabilitation to the nation is a good reason for everybody wearing a hemet. We block out how fragile we are on bikes on roads with metal tanks zooming at our side, and the bigger vehicles that have been foisted on the country are like tanks, and in my normal car I hate their great big wide backsides blocking my horizontal view and the high back window meaning I can’t see beyond them. Cyclists can’t either.
Mine is not a call to “drop your helmet” macho stuff as you so eloquently put it.
You could say I have a vested interest” in this subject, but regardless of this, what we are dealing with is the societal cost of serious brain injury (ACC, a few years back indicated it was a $2m per accident cost).
Beyond the societal financial costs, theres the massive mess it makes for the victims life, the victims family and the victims friends. Greywarshark is on the money with his/her comments. $2m per accident is about $0.50 per person, so at a Government fiscal level, not a big deal. (Especially since we pay levies to ACC so its not directly out of the tax war chest). But its a massive deal for the family of the victim.
We also have an obesity epidemic on the horizon. And that comes out of the health budget and is out of the tax war chest, so how to we make progress on that? Putting sugary foods back into school tuck shops as the Nats did as soon as they got back into power was one of the dopiest moves I have ever seen.
In terms of societal changes to health across the population, obesity isn’t a problem so much as diabetes and other Syndrome X diseases are. Obesity itself is not a disease (it’s possible to be fat and healthy, or thin and unhealthy).
Lots of really good reasons to get more people biking, and your point about whether helmets are a disincentive is worth considering.
I grew up next to a family (the parents, kids and quite a few of the cousins) who were fanatically mad-keen competitive cyclists – both road and track. It was the local “headquarters” of the cycling club at their place so there were cyclists everywhere on weekends. Talk to anyone of them and they were 100% behind helmets for all cyclists – they experienced the roads and traffic (and crappy NZ driving), they saw the consequences of being hit by motor vehicles.
So I say suck it up NZ and keep wearing your helmets – and get alongside the road planners and as OAB says get some decent separation for cyclists, pedestrians & motorists.
Used to cycle to work. When I didn’t wear a helmet, cars definitely gave me more room when overtaking etc. Never wore a helmet as a kid. Smashed my face up once by going straight over the handlebars, (know of others who have similar tales) wrecked knees and hands etc over and again, but never, ever landed on my head coming off a bike and don’t know anyone who did.
I’d actually be interested if cyclists head injuries are caused primarily by car impacts (likely given body trajectories and vehicle shape) and then have some info on what impact those helmets take. To overstate, if the impact is going to cause you serious injury or death, do the helmets actually offer any protection? I get that they will likely lessen the injuries caused by ‘moderate’ impacts, but at what speed of impact do they become pointless? I can’t really see them doing much to protect against a head being slammed by a hunk of metal moving at 50km/h…or should that be 70km/h…30km/h?
Yes, as I understand it, most of the serious injuries are when a car or other vehicle is involved. I don’t know what the optimal speed to injury ratio is but I would think that any protection is better than none when being hit by a car no matter what the speed. I’m thinking about the effect of not just the head being hit, but the body being hit and the force afterwards when the person bounces and hits their head on something. Don’t want to go into the grisly detail particularly, but I assume there are different ways that head injuries happen not just direct car to head trauma.
I do recall a coroner’s report in the paper about a cyclist who rode into the back of a stopped truck and died (in a unique twist on the “cyclist vs truck” story that almost always ends very badly).
Basically, the calculated speed at impact was I think in excess of 50km/hr (long downhill run). The coroner noted that at those speeds a bike helmet isn’t a lot of use, and really a full motorcycle helmet would have been needed to give the guy a chance.
But then I also saw a cyclist do a somersault over a car bonnet, when the driver had obviously been looking for oncoming cars, not bikes. Even though the speed was relatively low, I’m glad he was wearing a helmet – I suspect it seriously reduced the paperwork associated with the incident (I think the driver was in more shock than the cyclist – the first thing she said was “this is a new car” in a tone that strongly suggested concern over scratched paintwork. But the fact she was pale and shaking and took a minute or two to get with it made me put it down to “funny shit people say in extremis”).
Yeah, Bill, I whacked the top of my head against a gutter when I came off as an unprotected lad.
Later at Uni in the late sixties, a fellow student wore a pudding basin motorcycle helmet when cycling- when asked why, he said his father was a brain surgeon. I got that message.
And later, when teaching health at secondary, I’d ask the boys whether they’d like to run flat out head first into a concrete lamp post. They got that message.
Please fix the RSS feed. It was much better when it had the full story in it. Part of my day is spent outside of network access but if I cache the RSS feed I can keep up to date with the site. With it as excerpts I am behind and miss things.
One of the economic discussions now in NZ is about deflation. English is claiming the low to zero rate of inflation means that pay rises of 2% are really good pay rises.
Of course, if you’re one of the large number of low-paid living in the greater Auckland area paying rent and/or trying to save to buy a house, or paying a mortgage, that isn’t the case.
Deflation also presents problems of its own.
There always seems to be something going wrong in capitalism. Inflation is too high or too low. The dollar is too high or too low. We have a rock star economy, yet a mass of low-paid casualised workers and a chunk of workers who have zero-hour contracts. And still substantial levels of poverty.
Our primary production, our lifeblood keeping the nation ticking so we can have elections and afford a government. http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player/20171199
Latest on our once thriving sheep and beef farming from Radionz.
Crunch time for sheep and beef farms: report ( 28′ 56″ )
09:08 Farmers say the 8 billion dollar sheep and beef industry is approaching crisis point, and a single cooperative business model similar to Fonterra is the only way forward. Meat Industry Excellence group chairman, John McCarthy and Murray Taggart is Chair of the Alliance Group.
That was an interesting discussion. What I’d be interested to know though is whether or not farmers felt better off when we had the old ‘meat producer’s’ board, before the dereg mantra kicked in during the 80’s, etc.
I’m thinking that at present, Alliance and ?? are merely gigantic ticket clippers and that a more co-op system would be better.
I’m no expert on this issue but it troubles me that the actual producers seem to be getting little return, and the NZ public generally are being ripped (with shit meat sold thru’ supermarkets, pumped with water, etc.)
What are your thoughts?
A sideline – an interesting thing is that the butchers in supermarkets in Nelson get most of their meat precutup in Christchurch. Just another way that food is being prepared using factory processes and trucked a long way.
I wonder too about the advantages of a co-op. It was tried a while ago, to have more synergy with companies but failed to get the big tick. I think it may be that some of the sheep farmers are doing all right and don’t give a rats arse about any other producers. Now that rudeness might be undeserved but that sort of thing happens. The magnetic attraction to one’s own interests entirely is often irresistible.
IMO the best way is probably to have two companies, one a farmer-owned co-operative, and the other a privately owned/listed company. Two competing systems.
NORTHLAND BY-ELECTION WATCH: [or is it BI/BRIBE/BUY/BYE election watch?]
Winston is trying to win this by-election ALL BY HIMSELF and his bus, while a bridgeload of mustered Nats have been continuously descending on Northland day after day at tax payer’s expense of travel and time to beat the wise old man.
It would be interesting to see how many Nat Cabinet ministers, MPs and others have been here or will be here in pathetic panic state to pump up their own O for awesome candidate and beat Winny.
Here is my list so far. Please add to this list if you know of others:
How many Nats does it take to beat an old man?
1. John Key
2. M Osborne
3. Steven Joyce
4. Simon Bridges
5. Maggie Barry.
6. ?
I know the PM was a big successful money trader and is super clever with numbers and knows this stuff better than I do, but I thought 15% of $1.29 was 20c not 2c 😕
“If you think about iTunes, you download a song and it’s $1.29, there’s no reason why GST shouldn’t apply to that.
“In reality, GST would be 2 cents. But actually, 2 cents over a massive number of transactions still add up.”
you will note from his second comment, it was not a typo by the reporter
What a shock! They have since edited the article. It now says this:
“While the GST on some online goods and services would be very small, such as on a $1.29 iTunes song download, it could still be worth pursuing because of the scale of such purchases, Mr Key said.”
(Forgot to do a screengrab of the original)
CR
I like this author of books about policy and procedure and colleges and skulduggery. She often writes about Ireland and comes up with good fiction. And in the way of the saying that ‘you couldn’t make this shit up’ about reality, she probably is very good with reality too.
I liked this from rawsharkyeshe No.15 article from The Guardian 16 March 2015 –
– Ed Miliband called Cameron the “Prime minister for Benson and Hedge funds”. –
This Crosby is a devious machine. And the comment on the hardness of Australian politics probably explains why Crosby and Mark Textor are both Australians.
Background to their start in Oz: Still in his 30s, Crosby was promoted to deputy director and then director of the national party. There he worked with another rising and aggressive Liberal player, Mark Textor. Textor had taken Rod Cameron’s innovations with voter data and focus groups further, creating two archetypal swing voters, an imaginary middle-income couple called Phil and Jenny. The concept became so influential that during the 1996 national election, Liberal candidates would be asked by the campaign managers: “Have you spoken to Phil and Jenny lately?”
After 13 years out of power, the Liberals won. They won again in 1998, in 2001, and 2004. Significantly for the current British election, the Liberals often attracted fewer votes than Labor, usually not much more than 35% of the total, but these were decisively concentrated in marginal seats. “At its absolute simplest, a campaign is finding out who will decide the outcome,” Crosby said in a rare public masterclass he gave for charity in London in 2013, “where are they, what matters to them and how do you reach them?”
He played a central role in all four Liberal victories. The Liberal leader, John Howard, was uncharismatic but shrewd, and listened closely to Crosby. “Elsewhere in the party,” says Mills, Crosby became “somewhat feared and disliked”….
In Britain:
The Australian’s energy and attention to detail, his air of conviction, and his emphasis on the traditional rightwing issues of crime and immigration all won him rave reviews in the Tory press…..
The item relates how he cut and hacked at Livintone ending by Boris Johnson winning as Mayor for London. It finishes by saying that Crosby has to prove himself in the coming British elections. For the sake of his business standing it seems more important for his own standing that David Cameron wins for the Tories.
The British general election is on May 7, 2015.
Is it possible sometime to have a discussion about the lamentable habit of some posters to The Standard bastardising other commenters noms de plume.
I don’t personally care how much I personally disagree with a commenter, I have to respect their right to comment and to reflect their chosen ‘nick’ in my comments. I do admit to using abbreviations from time to time.
This is just the latest comment to raise my ire and, I admit, I am perhaps being unfair to single this out but here is a response to Te Reo Putake
‘Another crap article from Pistake. The Standard eh well if this is supposed to be “the standard” of articles the that the standard will put up with then it might be time to instigate a new standard, actually that kinda has a ring to it, “The New Standard” Great diversion tactic Pistake and if you happen to read this and I’m sure you will as your MO seems to dictate such YOU know exactly what I mean.’
If I am old fashioned and out of step, so be it, but can’t we disagree courteously?
I’m with you on that Hateatea. Some, eg those aimed at Fisiani, get pretty tedious and just distract from what is being said (I also think denigrating people via certain body parts adds to our culture’s body hatred but that’s another conversation).
I haven’t noticed whether people do this with real life names or if it’s only the pseudonyms (I suspect the latter). I take people’s names (ID or pseudonym) as extentions of the person so being mean via bastardisation is just a low form of wit that takes us into macho shithead territory pretty fast. I’m sure the defense is that Fisi and others deserve it because of their politics, but I think it will be putting other people off from commenting here and just adds to the culture of meanness unnecessarily.
(the irony of the Pistake commenter was that their comment was almost completely devoid of anything useful).
Yes, the fisiani example is particularly unpleasant, IMO. Not that I am pretending to be prudish. I can be both coarse and vulgar but seldom in public and never, I hope, in print!
I think that some of the verbal put downs do detract from discussion and probably do put people off. I did have to think seriously before I returned to commenting here again because of some of the discussions I read while lurking.
I am glad you have returned. The place will only change if enough people practice communicating well, but I get that sometimes it’s just not worth it.
I know it’s a challenge for me, I find it easy to get into the rude bordering on mean stuff. One of the reasons I like being here at the moment is I get to practice being more tolerant in the face of sometimes extreme provocation 😉
I did however notice recently that in real life I am more likely to argue with people like I do on ts. I’m not sure what I think about this yet. Am steering away from the overly challenging, but am liking my increased capacity to be staunch.
It is similar to the electoral process : you have to participate and vote in order to be able to comment on the outcome, in my opinion. Likewise a person needs to articulate their viewpoint to the best of their ability and hope to receive affirmation or negation from a reasoned response. Sadly, sometimes we all of us post in haste and repent at leisure 😉
I am glad if you are finding your input here is helping you in the real world. I may not always see things the way you do but I respect the manner in which you articulate your thoughts.
@ hateatea
You are unlikely to get brash rudeness here because you are thoughtful about your subjects and you are not repeating provocative comments that cut across the heart of what most of us feel fervently about.
Some people don’t realise that this is a lively forum for people with progressive viewpoints which does not take kindly to them dissing all that the Standardistas believe. Those who do it are sooner or later going to be villified, insulted and unfortunately, not sent to Coventry. People get annoyed and write something to match, or they feel forced to try and present a reasonable argument to the BS they are reading.
Reasonable politeness is received usually but sometimes the comments can be challenging. It’s not a gentle, quiet, meditative retreat. President Putin wouldn’t have come here to relax. But if you want to be safe from the over-excited, the Friday post of the Weekend doings is nice. People talk about the soothing personally useful things they are doing, and smile.
Things have improved recently but I agree with you Hateatea that discussions should be respectful although I have perhaps in the past not lived up to that standard 😀
come on micky, you’d be one of the leading examples of tolerance and reasonable discussion 😛 I can’t imagine you doing rude or mean (although I feel you could cut a certain beigity less slack).
David Fisher is brave and an excellent journalist:
“Analysis: The questions the Government must answer about the Snowden revelations……Can we tell the public what the British public now know to be true about their own security agencies? asks David Fisher?”
And here is the foreign news – a small but important bit: http://rt.com/news/241069-putin-rumours-back-alive/
Dated 16 March 2015
‘It’s boring without rumors’: Putin appears in public after week of MSM hysteria
Lots of questions regarding where the heck he “disappeared” to. One which made sense to me said that he had decided to do a few days religious retreat and put matters of state on hold while he recharged and reviewed.
Are you sure you would describe it as a “religious retreat”?
It really is absurd when you think about it. He had a 10 day break. So bloody what? It isn’t a crime to decide you need a break unless of course you are the Russian president…
then you have to do it in secret because your opponents – particularly in the West – will have a collective heart attack and go into a hyperactive state of hysteria.
That Putin was on the way out, either feet first or by a coup of inner circle generals, was probably wishful thinking on the part of a few western opinion makers…
Green Party mail out for members on how the leadership selection process works (no online link, so a long cut and paste sorry).
We are getting a lot of interest in how the leadership elections work with
recent announcements from four Green Party members that they intend to put
their hat in the ring for the male Co-leadership of the Party.
In fact the election process has not yet started – the announcements are
that these men intend to seek nomination. Nominations do not open until the
20th of March, and will close on the 17th April. When Russel announced that
he would not seek re-election as Male Co-leader, it was thankfully early
and in good time so that other talented men could step up.
Importantly, the party elects/re-elects all of our leadership positions at
our Annual General Meeting (AGM) every year. This includes both male and
female Co-leaders, Co-convenors of the Party and Policy Co-convenors.
Georgina Morrison (female Party Co-convenor) has also announced that she
will not be seeking re-election, and so we enter this AGM with at least two
vacant positions.
Information about the leadership contest [2] and the AGM [3] will be kept
up to date on the membership section of the website (go to http://www.greens.org.nz and click log in in the top right corner). We will be
providing on-line forums on that website for you to ask the candidates
questions. There will also be provincial meetings held so members have a
chance to engage with the candidates. And we will link to videos of this,
so you can view wherever you are.
The Party is proud of our internal democracy and consensus-based
decision-making. This is demonstrated in our Co-leadership/Co-convenor
model, our annual election of all leadership roles by the party at large,
and the consensus process we use to conduct that election.
The consensus process of election involves a series of local meetings. The
Provincial meetings and on-line forums are to inform members. In May each
branch will host a meeting at which they will decide how they want their
electorate votes to be cast. The discussion at the branch level is
instrumental in members hearing each other’s opinions about why they think
a particular candidate is the best option for the party. This discussion is
useful in forming an appreciation of the value the contendors bring to the
party and an understanding of viewpoints that are different from yours.
Each electorate has a set number of votes allocated depending on the number
of current members they have. Those votes are ‘carried’ by delegates to the
conference. The delegates are current members selected at a
formally-advertised meeting, and are instructed as to how the electorate
members would like them to vote. An STV-like voting system is used at the
AGM.
The same branch-level and AGM process is followed for all leadership
positions.
In Question Time today Key lead a reply to Russell’s question with a smart list of the fiscal facts that the Green contenders messed up on. (He had to read the list though.) Okay then. He had a second swipe a little later. OK smarty pants.
But wait. When Key was questioned by reporters tonight about GST on imported goods he said that as an example it would be silly to claim GST off an ITune download costing $1.79 because GST would only be—–wait for it—- about 2 cents.
What!!! Expert smarty pants. It would be about 26cents!
Hope Question Time gets a dig at Key tomorrow re his slip up in view of his Green digs, and to ask about Osbourne deciding the 10 one way bridges for about $70million but unable to name them, though he knew the name of the one near his house.
What goes around comes around.
If slippery has his way on the TPP we’ll be in the same boat.
The U.S. economy is picking up steam but most Americans aren’t feeling it. By contrast, most European economies are still in bad shape, but most Europeans are doing relatively well.
What’s behind this? Two big facts.
First, American corporations exert far more political influence in the United States than their counterparts exert in their own countries.
In fact, most Americans have no influence at all. That’s the conclusion of Professors Martin Gilens of Princeton and Benjamin Page of Northwestern University, who analyzed 1,799 policy issues — and found that “the preferences of the average American appear to have only a miniscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.”
Instead, American lawmakers respond to the demands of wealthy individuals (typically corporate executives and Wall Street moguls) and of big corporations – those with the most lobbying prowess and deepest pockets to bankroll campaigns.
The second fact is most big American corporations have no particular allegiance to America. They don’t want Americans to have better wages. Their only allegiance and responsibility to their shareholders — which often requires lower wages to fuel larger profits and higher share prices.
I’ve just caught up with Wilson’s emerging Kiwi Regional Airlines which will be hatching soonish.
Here’s a link about small airlines and this one, and has an intereting shot of a small plane coming into land in front of high rise housing fairly dense. http://3rdlevelnz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/01/kiwi-regional-airlines.html
Anyone got an opinion as to whether this housing would be good to live in, seem close? Is it the type of housing that should be available for small families and singles near town and small manufacturing hubs with public transport running near, just one, two streets away.?
I think the quality of life experienced in housing (that is well built and healthy, rather than shoddy and damp) does not rely solely on density, but includes the strength of connections to others, services, amenities and vibrant community spaces (and in NZ, access to natural environments if possible).
An interesting programme to watch is Kevin McCloud’s Slumming It. He visits the slum of Dharavi in Mumbai, as it has recently been cited as a “model community” even though it is built on waste ground including dump sites, and raw sewage ponds.
Those that live there have created an amazingly diverse and resilient community in such a small area – according to Wikipedia, the most densely populated area in the world.
Yes Molly they might enjoy it and do well with it. But we come from a different culture and have different expectations. It is interesting to store the knowledge of the ability of providing necessities in dense communities and the residents can maintain basic standards and stability. They have shown resilience in their place. We need to design one that allows us to manage our lives in our country and culture.
There have been thoughts that have probably not been well developed by government about how we could manage our living conditions better. I remember Dr Morgan Williams when he was Commissioner for the Environment talking about the way that a South American city Curitiba had acted to keep their city a good livable place. http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/ED0207/S00050/master-plan-urged-for-urban-sustainability.htm
Curitiba improved the conditions in their slums by working with the people. If they collected garbage and handed it in, they were rewarded with food such as eggs not money. It made a big difference to the place, helped the nutrition of the poor and raised community concern for better, more pleasant surroundings. http://www.rnzih.org.nz/pages/AbstractMorganWilliams.htm
There are programmes in the Auckland Council re giving communities a say in how their locales are developed, but not every Local Board has adopted them.
Thriving Communities is one, a village planning programme is another.
I suspect that I am agreeing with you, that local knowledge and input creates a more resilient and connected community. Unless specific commitments to encouraging this happen in NZ, we will continue to have a patchwork approach to housing and community building.
I’d quite happily live in one of those. They look like they even have room for a garden, and there’s bush nearby. I really prefer to sharing communal space with others to having a huge private yard.
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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. ...
Hundreds of New Zealand families affected by Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD) will benefit from a new Government focus on prevention and treatment, says Health Minister Dr Shane Reti. “We know FASD is a leading cause of preventable intellectual and neurodevelopmental disability in New Zealand,” Dr Reti says. “Every day, ...
Regional Development Minister Shane Jones today attended the official opening of Kaikohe’s new $14.7 million sports complex. “The completion of the Kaikohe Multi Sports Complex is a fantastic achievement for the Far North,” Mr Jones says. “This facility not only fulfils a long-held dream for local athletes, but also creates ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters’ engagements in Türkiye this week underlined the importance of diplomacy to meet growing global challenges. “Returning to the Gallipoli Peninsula to represent New Zealand at Anzac commemorations was a sombre reminder of the critical importance of diplomacy for de-escalating conflicts and easing tensions,” Mr Peters ...
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 ...
The pair opened their first fully collaborative exhibition, Nina for Flowers, last Saturday. Gabi Lardies visited their studio to find out who Nina is and what working together was like.‘It didn’t start out like, ‘This is a show about Nina,’” says Josephine Jelicich, gripping a thermos of peppermint tea. ...
Thank you, Dr Maximilian Oskar Bircher-Benner, for your brilliant invention. I’m another mid-20s Kiwi who had an OE last year. I hopped on my bicycle where France meets the Atlantic and cycled east. I pedalled through the Loire Valley, down rivers lined with willows and ancient wisteria-draped chateaus. I relished ...
Asia Pacific Report From France to Australia, university pro-Palestine protests in the United States have now spread to several countries with students pitching on-campus camps. And students at Columbia and other US universities remain defiant as campuses have witnessed the biggest protests since the anti-Vietnam war and anti-apartheid eras in ...
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards, Democracy Project (https://democracyproject.nz)New Zealand Government’s Fast Track legislation. Many criticisms are being made of the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill, including by this writer. But as with everything in politics, every story has two sides, and both deserve attention. It’s important to understand what the Government ...
Tara Ward talks to presenter Naomi Toilalo about the new TV show that turns food waste into a three course feast. Naomi Toilalo is standing in the warehouse at Good Neighbour Tauranga, helping unpack the two-and-a-half tonnes of rejected food that will arrive at the community support hub that day. ...
Scout is our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Scout’s human, Avril, for her support. Dog name: Scout (named after the little girl in To Kill a Mockingbird – she inherited the independent spirit ...
Megan Alatini takes us through her life in TV, including ‘terrible’ daytime TV, the class of Carol Hirschfeld and her most embarrassing TrueBliss moment. When she responded to a vague newspaper ad asking “do you have what it takes to be a popstar?” 25 years ago, Megan Alatini never guessed ...
A new exhibition in Wellington showcases the faces behind your local goods and services. Back in 1977, when I was a fine arts student at the University of Canterbury, I took a series of photographs of Christchurch shopkeepers. The photos were for a calendar – a project for my end ...
Toomaj and his resistance to tyranny through his songs have become an icon for the youth of Iran, so his sentence has hit the nation hard. Toomaj Salehi is not the first artist to pay the price for standing with the people. ...
My cousin Dylan and I spotted these big eels under the bridge that summer. We watched them lounging under the dark weed, facing into the flow of water, their mouths frozen open. Dylan and I couldn’t stop thinking about those eels. The night we went down to the creek, we ...
Newsroom, home of satire. My long-running weekly satirical series The Secret Diary has moved to Newsroom and will appear every Saturday, with Victor Billot’s wildly popular satirical Odes continuing to appear every Sunday. Diaries, Odes – while serious political columnists toil at meaningful opinions and stroke their chins to an ...
Tara Ward unravels the many nuanced layers of a cartoon about talking dogs.This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. It’s not often an episode of a children’s cartoon has adults sobbing into their sleeves, but that’s exactly what happened this week when ...
Working as a doctor in developing countries to help communities achieve better health outcomes is nothing short of a life goal for Jessica Tater. The University of Otago medical student has her sights firmly set on joining the international humanitarian organisation Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) when she qualifies ...
There’s an island in the far reaches of Auckland’s territory, sitting off the tip of the Coromandel Peninsula, 30 minutes by air from the city or four hours on the slow boat. Aotea Great Barrier is off-grid, it has a population of fewer than a thousand people … and most ...
Asia Pacific Report An Australian author and advocate, Jim Aubrey, today led a national symbolic one minute’s silence to mark the “blood debt” owed to Papuan allies during the Second World War indigenous resistance against the invading Japanese forces. “A promise to most people is a promise,” Aubrey said in ...
Asia Pacific Report The Freedom Flotilla is ready to sail to Gaza, reports Kia Ora Gaza. All the required paperwork has been submitted to the port authority, and the cargo has been loaded and prepared for the humanitarian trip to the besieged enclave. However, organisers received word of an “administrative ...
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. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anastasia Powell, Professor, Family and Sexual Violence, RMIT University It has been a particularly distressing start to the year. There is little that can ease the current grief of individuals, families and communities who have needlessly lost a loved one to men’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gregory Moore, Senior Research Associate, School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences, The University of Melbourne Lichen, the first described example of symbiosis.AdeJ Artventure/Shutterstock Once known only to those studying biology, the word symbiosis is now widely used. Symbiosis is the intimate ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kim Hemsley, Head, Childhood Dementia Research Group, Flinders Health and Medical Research Institute, College of Medicine and Public Health, Flinders University Olena Ivanova/Shutterstock “Childhood” and “dementia” are two words we wish we didn’t have to use together. But sadly, around 1,400 ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Whiteford, Professor, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University The government’s Economic Inclusion Advisory Committee has just published its second report. It was set up by Treasurer Jim Chalmers and Minister for Social Services Amanda Rishworth in 2022 to provide: ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne The Queensland state election will be held in October. A YouGov poll for The Courier Mail, conducted April 9–17 from a sample ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Naeni, PhD candidate at Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University There’s been much talk in recent months about what a possible second Donald Trump presidency in the United States could mean for Europe, Russia’s war in Ukraine, the ...
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 ...
A poem from Robin Peace’s new collection Detritus of Empire: feather / grass / rock. Cereal giving I see a woman’s hands, see her curious hands break a stalk as she walks through the tall prairie, the savannah, the steppe, wherever it was. See her idly bite the grass that ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Hemingway’s Goblet by Dermot Ross (Mary Egan Publishing, $38)A handsomely produced (debossed cover, lovely ...
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. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tristan Salles, Associate professor, University of Sydney Examples of Australian landscapes.Unsplash Seventy thousand years ago, the sea level was much lower than today. Australia, along with New Guinea and Tasmania, formed a connected landmass known as Sahul. Around this time – ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Felicity Castagna, Lecturer, Creative Writing, Western Sydney University Day Day Market, ParramattaPhoto: Garry Trinh I live on the edge of Parramatta, Australia’s fastest-growing city, on the kind of old-fashioned suburban street that has 1950s fibros constructed in the post-war housing boom, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Ryan, Teaching Fellow in Economics, University of Waikato GettyImagesfatido/Getty Images There is an ongoing global debate over whether the high inflation seen in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic can be lowered without a recession. New Zealand is not ...
The ‘Wicked Game’ heartthrob is in his late 60s now. That didn’t stop him putting on a lively, goofy and very sparkly show. Apart from ‘Wicked Game’, which graces a sultry playlist of mine simply called 💋, my last sustained Chris Isaak listening session took place when I was about ...
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. ...
Nearly everyone has experienced the frustration of something you use breaking and being difficult or expensive to fix. Proposed legislation could change that. It’s been raining on and off all Sunday afternoon but people are lining up outside a building in a corner of Gribblehirst Park in Sandringham, Auckland. In ...
What does a forever relationship look like when you don’t believe in marriage? And how do you celebrate it? This essay is part of our Sunday Essay series, made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.I’m going to do it, right now. I’m going to say ...
The Prime Minister has committed to resuming direct flights to Thailand. But it’s not a promise he will be able to deliver on anytime soon. The post Prime Minister jumps the gun in Thailand appeared first on Newsroom. ...
It’s not that long ago Eliza McCartney was seriously wondering if the Paris Olympics would be her pole vaulting swansong. After years of being hounded by injury after injury, the Rio Olympics bronze medallist was still confident she would compete at her second Olympics in Paris in July, unless something ...
FICTION 1 Take Two by Danielle Hawkins (Allen & Unwin, $36.99) There’s commercial fiction, like this book, and then there’s quality fiction, quality writers, quality literature; the forthcoming Auckland Writers Festival is full of quality, and ReadingRoom has two tickets to give away to the following events: Paul Lynch (Dublin ...
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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 ...
Woman sues ABC over Media Watch comments on her trip to United States
by RACHEL OLDING, Sydney Morning Herald, Monday 16 March 2015
A Sydney woman of American heritage is suing the ABC’s Media Watch for depicting her as a backer of, and a PR mouthpiece for, the brutal regime of President Barack Obama.
In a politically-sensitive case that will test alleged bias in media coverage of….
Read more…
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/woman-sues-abc-over-media-watch-comments-on-her-trip-to-syria-20150315-1420yg.html
Media watch is an opinionated hosted critique by an established senior legal or journalist figure.
It has a history of controversy and I await some background on the piece, the woman and SMH angle as it may be more about getting at that pesky ABC than actual bias.
Looks like the Insurance industry is gearing up to turn disaster insurance into a public private partnership. I would appreciate an informed, independent analysis of this topic and the press release from the Insurance Council of NZ.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1503/S00161/insurance-council-signs-un-statement-on-disaster-resilience.htm
Widen that analysis to the entire corporate sector and govts who turn chaos and mayhem into opportunity and plunder.
Naomi Klein’s ‘The Shock Doctrine’ covers what she calls ‘disaster capitalism’ quite well.
There’s certainly no human tragedy which can’t be turned into a chance to make a buck or two – well, billions actually.
Ain’t capitalism great?
Phil F
L Randall Wray – the evolution and instability of financialised money manager capitalism
Approx 21 mins. Wray is also an exponent of ‘Modern Monetary Theory’ which describes how governments can deficit spend to create money into an economy for households to use and save, quite independent of taxes and borrowing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uo2XzWsniqM
Why do people in NZ love to hate the middle class?
Why do those on the left in particular make such snide comments about middle class people?
Why do normally tolerant people who are all for liberal thinking and ethnic tolerance simply turn to shit when they see a bunch of middle class people?
I see it is Tahu Potiki’s turn to act in a prejudiced and bigoted manner against people based solely on photos of them appearing to be middle class, in having a crack at the kauri tree protestors. Tahu Potiki of course is maori and a some-time commentator from Dunedin-ways. He has likely experienced bigotry and prejudice and the like, yet he simple-headedly does the same himself. In his column this morning (no link yet sorry) he, on several occasions, ranted against these people on the basis of their middle classness alone. Tahu’s rant exposes in himself the same faults in humans that he has likely been subjected to himself – namely bigotry and prejudice.
Leave the middle class alone ffs. It is a failure in so very many ways to reference things to them in ways like Tahu Potiki has done.
The middle class want to save that kauri, or a kākāpō, or that mountain from having a windfarm put on it, but they don’t want to give up the affluence that threatens those things in the first place. They’re not alone in this of course (it seems to apply across all classes), but I think the idea is that the middle classes have more choice than the working class and underclass because of their assets and income and more sensibility for what’s right than the wealth class. Stuck in the middle.
Sure I can imagine how that might be imagined, however it is all conjecture and assumption on the part of the likes of Potiki. There is never any good argument put forward or evidnce provided for anything he intimated, not those matters you have highlighted above. Nothing. Just assumption.
It would actually be a good issue to dive into and evaluate properly – you know, comfortable in their jobs, nice 4wd, huge mortgage, provisional tax, pilloried and plied, ignorant and shallow, unknowing of anything but materiality, the list goes on …..
I can’t comment on Potiki until I read his article, and unfortunately you have a history of misrepresenting people’s word in situations like this.
I was more commenting on why some lefties in general have a downer on the middle class and from my perspective (others will tell it differently). I don’t think it’s what people imagine, it’s an analysis based on knowledge and experience (sure my comment was shorthanded and generalised).
“ignorant and shallow, unknowing of anything but materiality”
I’m less worried about those ones, than the ones that can think, who appreciate values other than possessions and consumption, who should know better but still aren’t willing to do what is needed to redress their privilege.
It is my neighbourhood. It is very middle class. But god bless every single one of them they were all motivated to save that ancient Kauri.
Probably a bit of NIMBYism going on as well. Nicer for the Titirangi locals to have a few trees about rather than infill housing.
+tahi. I’m grateful too, both for the trees saved, and for the inspiration and flow on effects.
Where did you read the article in question, vto?
I would like to comment but need to read Tahu’s own words first rather than rely on your interpretation of what he may have written or have been quoted as saying.
It should turn up here eventually. I don’t know how long they take to put them up on the web though. Otherwise try the Press in hardcopy (was that today vto?)
http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/opinion/columnists/tahu-potiki/
Myself, I find Potiki’s articles thought-provoking even where I disagree with him.
Looks as if I may have to toddle down the street in search of the Press unless, perish the thought, it was in the ODT!
I did a search of the Press website and failed to find it thus far.
vto is in Chch or thereabouts so I’m guessing this one is in the Press. I’m interested to read it now too.
Bought the Press, read the article, don’t entirely support vto’s perception of what the article in its entirety was saying.
That said, I don’t necessarily agree with his take on the Titirangi ‘save the trees’ event. My views are shaped from active involvement in resource management processes in the past and what I see as a flawed process that allowed a non-notified consent in the first place.
I took the article as a whole to reflect on the clashes of culture around resource use, management and preservation, conservation, restoration and how different groups place more or less emphasis on one idealised part.
Leaving out the ‘middle class’ references, what I read reminded me of my childhood experiences of going to catch whitebait with my father, uncle and grandparents and seeing hundred of very large eels rotting on the riverbank because the Acclimatisation Society wanted the trout to be predator free. It was horrific to see (and smell) but was an example to me of the lengths that the settler society would go to prioritise what was important to them.
One point that the article made, I thought, was that there is an element of hypocrisy in those who live on sections that were clear felled in the past, to deny to others the right to remove trees in order to enjoy their own section. I can see that viewpoint even if I disagree with it.
Suffice it to say, I neither agree nor disagree with the article in its totality and I found it an interesting read.
It is too long for me to type as a whole and, at the time of writing, is not up on the Press website but it is provocatively titled ‘A Grand Win for the Busybodies’.
hi vto,
what sticks in my craw with the middle class is the aspirations.
the idea of getting ahead.
i watched a ricardo semler ted talk (thanx felix) yesty.
he said if you get to a point in your life where you want to give back then you took too much in the first place.
had an interesting conversation with a self made man. he was ranting about the poor and how they should be saving to get their first property, leverage that to get a rental…(you get the picture), he could not see that for there to be a landlord there must be a tenant.
so as weka says below (or above), about an unwillingness to give up some affluence so all have enough.
its the ‘i’m alright jack’ or ‘blow the bridge i’m over’
I have yet to read Potiki’s opinion piece, but I take it from vto’s comment that he is attacking the middle class for the kind of safe activism that does not challenge the status quo – for engaging in their own little “rose revolutions” and congratulating themselves on “making a difference.”
As to the cry of “Why does NZ love to hate the middle class?” quite a few middle class people are either indifferent to the suffering of others or despise them for having gotten into that position in the first place. People you despise tend to despise you in turn. It is an aspect of what Stiglitz was talking about in an article RedLogix put up a few days ago, about the erosion of social trust.
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/21/in-no-one-we-trust/?_r=0
Or you could see the middle class thinking of assets and income as being like lollies in a lolly scramble. They were out there and the people with the most were the hardest working and most motivated. Of course lolly scrambles have recently led to images of large young men scooping up the most amongst children that only came to their knees. Not cricket old man!
upon reflection i need to give myself an uppercut.
i see myself (socially) to the far left. by that we are all one.
bill hicks says it best: we are all one consciousness expressing itself subjectively.
with that in mind, i am criticizing myself with my words above.
if i grew up in their shoes (the middle class) and had thir experiences i would behave the same.
just need to express a bit more tolerance or as my nana said- if you cant say something nice dont say anything at all.
It’s more accurate to say that for there to be a landlord there must be many tenants. It is a question of support. Each landlord requires many tenants to support them.
While I haven’t read the article you’re referring to vto, I think you you make an interesting point:
“Why do normally tolerant people who are all for liberal thinking and ethnic tolerance simply turn to shit when they see a bunch of middle class people?”
I’ve seen this happen in conversations here at TS and heard it plenty in real life too. I find it a bit puzzling. It raises more questions for me than I have theories for as to why there is a dividing line where tolerance ends and spite begins
I wonder if it is hatred and mistrust that is intergenerational and so ingrained as if it has been handed down from our colonial past when we were Little Britain with it’s clear cut class groups (as much as settlers said they wanted to escape that but failed to do so).
Who are the middle class these days? We have shifting sands beneath the feet of society. Once people could be more upwardly mobile (and whether betraying/abandoning your class was scorned or applauded is another aside) but in very general terms, the effects of a Nat govt has bumped many once financially comfortable people harshly down the ladder whilst those below landed in a heap beneath them, finding themselves in an even more precarious living situation.
It’s often talked about, while many are being left behind the elite have increased their power control and wealth. So where are the middle classes in that? Are they the survivors?
Is middle class defined by wealth? Is it defined by the display of that wealth? Is it defined by the expression of taste? Lols, if taste comes into it then I wonder what my neighbours north of me in the higher priced houses end think they are achieving by trying to out do one another with the purchase of the latest shiniest largest luxury range SUV money can by. Are they trying to express their middle class-ness or are they just pathetic try hards?
So who are the middle class that folks criticise?
Or is it related to wealth and being rightly critical of the self serving behaviour of the wealthy who trample over others to get a bigger slice. for example, maybe an employer who has built a profitable business on the back of low paid, poorly treated workers?
In that case is the class group the employer belongs to seen as the oppressor, where in fact it is the boss being oppressive and who should be the focus of criticism? Is it wealth or class that oppresses in the case of the employer?
Should we not judge a person on their actions and behaviour rather than their class, what ever that is?
Gee Rosie, you are carrying this PC thing too far saying that the middle class should not be pointed at or criticised because they have feelings.
The middle class have willingly separated themselves off from struggling NZ as if that group were lepers. The women have got jobs where they often administer to the poorer class, rather patronisingly. And they feel entitled to their superior position and consequently don’t pay much attention to the structural side of the downward trend, aggravated by enabling policy.
The upper class live in a different planet and most rarely come down from the Ramtops to attempt to suss out what mayhem they are causing or enabling to the rest of NZ.
The middle class are still living the dream that they were brought up with and fully expect that their superior standards will be maintained for ever. All this talk about environment and climate is exaggerated and technology will deal with it. At present their task is to maintain their lovely home, educate their children to
ensure a well paid and fulfilling position, and keep their minds on higher things, such as art, healthy food. maintaining their looks and overseas holidays.
Is there any wonder that people who have the wide vision to take in all the classes, the whole range of NZers, get pissed off with the dopey, self-satisfied middle class who want it all without accepting citizen responsibility also.
Warbs, lols, please, I am not “carrying a PC thing”. You should know me better than that by now.
And I am definitely not saying they should not be criticised because they have feelings. I have never once mentioned the words feelings or expressed any sympathy for their feelings.
I am mainly asking who they are. How do we identify them? By their wealth, their taste, their level of wankiness?
The group you are referring to above are displaying attitudes and behaviours that are isolationist and excluding, anti the collective good and self promoting, potentially at the cost of the well being of others. I know these types and dislike them intensely for their selfish and cruel ways. (In fact I have had a run in with one of these sorts in recent days. The level of hatred for the concept of equality expressed by this person was truly gobsmacking).
So would you say middle class is defined by a set of behaviours and attitudes? (which comes back to wankiness)
The above behaviours you mention, I see belonging to the group within society that holds right wing views. I’m not sure that the entire spectrum of the middle classes is exclusively right wing, who ever this middle class are.
Hi Rosie
Middle class is a broad target. Which ones to shoot? I am thoroughly middle class myself without the necessary assets and liquidity to ponce about. So let’s keep on criticising the middle class as it’s a bit like throwing balls at a stall with moving faces in the fairground.
And it is hard to dent a middle class person’s self esteem. That’s how you know them. They just look at you with their eyebrows raised and either patronisingly smile or just turn away bored. There’s one of those rent-a-crowd rabble they say, just too too boring and repetitive. Always doing nothing and saying not fair. Of course they don’t like people who act vigorously to even up the fiscal balance either.
.
I usually mean what most people call “upper middle class” when I say “middle class” Which can lead to misunderstandings because it seems others mean a majority or large minority rather than this minority.
A particular cultural group rather than amount of money. Things that spring to mind are – highly socially connected; people who have influence, who have contacts, who have contacts who have contacts, which can cover a huge range of influence in a society, formally educated and qualified, use language very precisely but usually use effective subtext and nuance to express aggression, rank etc., who have particular social behaviours and understandings, who as a group are often unaware that their own behaviours and language can have very different meanings to those from other class cultures, people who tend to define, by their choices, what is considered “good taste” “good manners” “good ideas” etc.,
And heaps more but I don’t have time right now. People don’t control what class they are born into and it doesn’t determine goodness or badness, but middle-class is a variety of privilege. Like most privilege it is often either unrecognised or underrecognised and it is this that is often the source of most of the misunderstandings and occasional outright animosity imho.
Thank you just saying. I find that a very helpful beginning to understanding who the middle class are. I can envision this ‘class’ more clearly now as I know of people that belong to this particular grouping.
The people that I know that fit your definition I don’t find particularly offensive, and while there is an unspoken knowing between these folk and myself that a different level of privilege is enjoyed by them it doesn’t cause a tension.
On the hand, there are others I know of, like the person who I had a run in with, who fit some aspects of your definition, influential, with contacts / connections and formally educated and qualified, privileged in several ways but whose social skills are under developed, whose emotional intelligence is low and who are focused on the acquisition of wealth and property as a symbol of their success.
So if class doesn’t determine goodness or badness as you say perhaps it comes down to personality and behaviour, as to the source of division?
I’m just grappling and my head isn’t in the best place today.
I’m saying they are a a minority which has a big vested interest in the status quo. Some admit this and work hard to make their communities fairer anyway. Many don’t.
Ok, thanks js. Appreciate your input. It’s making sense to me.
It’s a fascinating sociological topic.
I found that a useful sub thread too, thanks.
I would add that a sense of entitlement exists within the middle class that I don’t see so much in the working or underclass.
Pitoki is a hard right tribal elitist who thinks the middle class should stick to worrying about property values.
He is part of the iwi aristocracy that the treaty settlement process has created.
This might be a good place to mention a new book reviewed on Radionz this morning. It shows the nefarious ways that cunning pakeha managed to wangle land out of Maori hands. We ought to know this because it is behind Maori grievances which the Treaty of Waitangi is partly recompensing and the reason that it should not be too hurried and that Maori should be able to tell their histories.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player/20171204
Book review – At the Margin of Empire ( 6′ 16″ )
10:38 Paul Diamond reviews ‘At the Margin of Empire: John Webster and the Hokianga, 1842-1900’ by Jennifer Ashton. Published by Auckland University Press.
Another book to buy! Thanks, greywarshark. 😀
And you base your opinion on what, exactly, Millsy. Citing references would be really good, if possible.
BTW, you spell his last name POTIKI.
Tahu Potiki, by virtue of his whakapapa alone, was born a member of the iwi aristocracy if looked at through Eurocentric eyes. That he has worked hard to make himself a 21st century leader of his whanau, hapu and iwi is all his own doing and nothing at all to do with Treaty settlement processes.
As for his political views, I only know what he has published. If you see him as hard right you have either read things I haven’t or read into what was published what I didn’t. We are each entitled to our own views and perhaps mine are shaped by knowing the person and thus seeing an entirety, or as much as anyone may know another without being them!
Hi articles have a right wing slant. Plus he is on the charter schools advisory committee.
Chur all comments above. Unfortunately as often seems to be the case I must away and have no time today to respond. Fwiw I see no difference in tolerance, willingness to protest the wrong, or anything like that, based on class. I do not see the lower classes doing more of this stuff (if anything I see them doing less and it aint because we have less). I do not see the upper classes doing more of this stuff at all either – they are too busy with the planning of their mid-winter escape-NZ hols looming now summer is at an end. I actually see most of the protesting of things wrong being carried out by so-called middle-class types.
Middle class types protested the kauris apparently. Good. It is they who protest the environment damagers mostly. It is the middle class who do most of the heavy lifting. That is what I see.
So in actual fact Mr Potiki has it completely arse-about. The reason he saw middle class people protesting at the kauris was because it is the middle class who do most of this stuff. They do the grunt. They get out on the street. They write to MPs.
The middle class should be supported in its efforts not vilified.
Kiaora vto
So in actual fact Mr Potiki has it completely arse-about. The reason he saw middle class people protesting at the kauris was because it is the middle class who do most of this stuff. They do the grunt. They get out on the street. They write to MPs.
The Waipoua Forest in Northland is a remnant Kauri Forest whose most famous inhabitant is Tāne Mahuta. Tāne is about 2,500 years old. The forest is riddled with Kauri Die-back Disease which is lethal to Kauri. The people trying to save the massive and ancient trees in this forest come from all walks of life.
People from all over Northland (hardly a bastion of middle-classness) consistently maintain a presence at the entrance to Waipoua to ensure people wash their footwear before entering the forest. This has been going on for a number of years. This is grunt work in action.
I can’t find that one, but I saw another column saying Maori should vote National. I’m glad the tree’s still there.
Was driving my old hot rod truck to work today, and noticed a couple of cyclists out in the Chch cold wearing their hi-viz gears and their helmets.
At the lights I pondered the general lack of cyclists on the road this morning, and the debate on cycle helmets, cyclist numbers and societal obesity aided by folk travelling to work in their old hot rod trucks instead of biking. (You can ponder these things if you dont turn the wireless on in the morning)
I have also seen the massive carnage of head injuries, but the simple truth is that most of those are alcohol related – auto accidents and assaults rather than bike accidents. And politicians have demonstrated over and over (regardless of who is in power) that they will not address our alcohol issues.
So should adults have the option of travelling helmetless if they are wearing hi-viz gear? More folk biking is good for the health of the nation
Do you mean that having to wear a helmet puts people off biking?
I think the stats to compare are % of head injuries in bike accidents from before helmets were compulsory and after.
Im saying that that there may be some public health gains if adults didnt have to wear helmets, but wore safety vests instead.
The argument is out there saying that helmets put the vain of biking, (cant mess your hair up aye)
So any reduction in head injuries is the result of less adults biking, not in a similar number of cyclists having fewer serious head injuries due to wearing the helmets.
My take is that kids should wear the helmets because they arent necessarily as spatially aware as the average adult on a bike. I thought the vests I saw today stood out like dog nuts and gave us drivers fair warning of the cyclists ahead.
That makes sense, although from a public health or accident prevention perspective it might be a bit complex. We need to change the culture, and things like building every road with cyclists in mind would help.
Plan and build separately for cyclists, pedestrians, and motorists.
Absolutely! For commuting, shopping and recreation it’s a pleasure to cycle in Europe in the sunshine, safely, with just a sunhat on.
Cycling for sport might still be a problem though.
It’s too difficult to cycle in relative safety in NZ and some of the cycleways that are being put in don’t meet cyclists needs. My favourite example is Karo Drive in Wellington where the planners had decided the cycleway on a brand new road should be built to end on one side of Karo Drive and start again on the other at the Cuba Street intersection. To swap sides they’ve put a diagonal cycle crossing on an intersection between two very busy pedestrian crossings. Chaos ensues.
Also the cycleway on the SH1 Taupo bypass – I do wonder how many tourists want to bypass Taupo. Or how many Taupo residents would use it.
Wiki summarises the cycle helmet debate quite well, I think, although this article doesn’t extend road design issues.
Do the stats show a significant improvement post helmet? I wear my helmet but reluctantly.
Do what I did, wake up in the middle of the road confused and combative with an ambulance officer standing over you, my thanks once again to Colin Slaughter, telling you you’ve had an accident and because you’ve been unconscious for quite some time he couldn’t just take you straight home so best he takes you to base hospital.
Thirty something stitches to sew an ear back on, another dozen to sew up scalp lacerations, an overnight stay to observe a serious concussion, cognitive impairments lasting several months and headaches that persist thirty years on and I reckon you’ll gladly wear a helmet.
Thanks for that joe 90. Your answer is what I have felt was needed to counter this drop your helmet macho stuff. They are a nuisance but the harm to the individual from head injuries can result in differing levels of loss of function but all of much concern.
In advanced cases of damage there is also the destruction of family life and happy relationships because of the need for lifelong care for the person who is not wholely well, perhaps with violent mood swings, and the cost in health care and rehabilitation to the nation is a good reason for everybody wearing a hemet. We block out how fragile we are on bikes on roads with metal tanks zooming at our side, and the bigger vehicles that have been foisted on the country are like tanks, and in my normal car I hate their great big wide backsides blocking my horizontal view and the high back window meaning I can’t see beyond them. Cyclists can’t either.
Mine is not a call to “drop your helmet” macho stuff as you so eloquently put it.
You could say I have a vested interest” in this subject, but regardless of this, what we are dealing with is the societal cost of serious brain injury (ACC, a few years back indicated it was a $2m per accident cost).
Beyond the societal financial costs, theres the massive mess it makes for the victims life, the victims family and the victims friends. Greywarshark is on the money with his/her comments. $2m per accident is about $0.50 per person, so at a Government fiscal level, not a big deal. (Especially since we pay levies to ACC so its not directly out of the tax war chest). But its a massive deal for the family of the victim.
We also have an obesity epidemic on the horizon. And that comes out of the health budget and is out of the tax war chest, so how to we make progress on that? Putting sugary foods back into school tuck shops as the Nats did as soon as they got back into power was one of the dopiest moves I have ever seen.
In terms of societal changes to health across the population, obesity isn’t a problem so much as diabetes and other Syndrome X diseases are. Obesity itself is not a disease (it’s possible to be fat and healthy, or thin and unhealthy).
Lots of really good reasons to get more people biking, and your point about whether helmets are a disincentive is worth considering.
Good call joe90.
I grew up next to a family (the parents, kids and quite a few of the cousins) who were fanatically mad-keen competitive cyclists – both road and track. It was the local “headquarters” of the cycling club at their place so there were cyclists everywhere on weekends. Talk to anyone of them and they were 100% behind helmets for all cyclists – they experienced the roads and traffic (and crappy NZ driving), they saw the consequences of being hit by motor vehicles.
So I say suck it up NZ and keep wearing your helmets – and get alongside the road planners and as OAB says get some decent separation for cyclists, pedestrians & motorists.
Used to cycle to work. When I didn’t wear a helmet, cars definitely gave me more room when overtaking etc. Never wore a helmet as a kid. Smashed my face up once by going straight over the handlebars, (know of others who have similar tales) wrecked knees and hands etc over and again, but never, ever landed on my head coming off a bike and don’t know anyone who did.
I’d actually be interested if cyclists head injuries are caused primarily by car impacts (likely given body trajectories and vehicle shape) and then have some info on what impact those helmets take. To overstate, if the impact is going to cause you serious injury or death, do the helmets actually offer any protection? I get that they will likely lessen the injuries caused by ‘moderate’ impacts, but at what speed of impact do they become pointless? I can’t really see them doing much to protect against a head being slammed by a hunk of metal moving at 50km/h…or should that be 70km/h…30km/h?
Yes, as I understand it, most of the serious injuries are when a car or other vehicle is involved. I don’t know what the optimal speed to injury ratio is but I would think that any protection is better than none when being hit by a car no matter what the speed. I’m thinking about the effect of not just the head being hit, but the body being hit and the force afterwards when the person bounces and hits their head on something. Don’t want to go into the grisly detail particularly, but I assume there are different ways that head injuries happen not just direct car to head trauma.
There are far too many stories like this one to make me even contemplate going without a helmet.
I do recall a coroner’s report in the paper about a cyclist who rode into the back of a stopped truck and died (in a unique twist on the “cyclist vs truck” story that almost always ends very badly).
Basically, the calculated speed at impact was I think in excess of 50km/hr (long downhill run). The coroner noted that at those speeds a bike helmet isn’t a lot of use, and really a full motorcycle helmet would have been needed to give the guy a chance.
But then I also saw a cyclist do a somersault over a car bonnet, when the driver had obviously been looking for oncoming cars, not bikes. Even though the speed was relatively low, I’m glad he was wearing a helmet – I suspect it seriously reduced the paperwork associated with the incident (I think the driver was in more shock than the cyclist – the first thing she said was “this is a new car” in a tone that strongly suggested concern over scratched paintwork. But the fact she was pale and shaking and took a minute or two to get with it made me put it down to “funny shit people say in extremis”).
Yeah, Bill, I whacked the top of my head against a gutter when I came off as an unprotected lad.
Later at Uni in the late sixties, a fellow student wore a pudding basin motorcycle helmet when cycling- when asked why, he said his father was a brain surgeon. I got that message.
And later, when teaching health at secondary, I’d ask the boys whether they’d like to run flat out head first into a concrete lamp post. They got that message.
That does appear to be the case.
http://i.stuff.co.nz/national/health/10154986/Bicycle-helmet-debate-reignited
http://helmetfreedom.org/888/2-4-million-australians-put-off-their-bikes-by-helmet-laws/
Please fix the RSS feed. It was much better when it had the full story in it. Part of my day is spent outside of network access but if I cache the RSS feed I can keep up to date with the site. With it as excerpts I am behind and miss things.
One of the economic discussions now in NZ is about deflation. English is claiming the low to zero rate of inflation means that pay rises of 2% are really good pay rises.
Of course, if you’re one of the large number of low-paid living in the greater Auckland area paying rent and/or trying to save to buy a house, or paying a mortgage, that isn’t the case.
Deflation also presents problems of its own.
There always seems to be something going wrong in capitalism. Inflation is too high or too low. The dollar is too high or too low. We have a rock star economy, yet a mass of low-paid casualised workers and a chunk of workers who have zero-hour contracts. And still substantial levels of poverty.
Anyway, here’s the always-excellent Michael Roberts on the problems of deflation in economies:
https://rdln.wordpress.com/2015/01/24/what-does-deflation-mean-for-economies/
Phil
As for how capitalism works and why, ultimately it doesn’t, here’s my little contribution:
https://rdln.wordpress.com/2011/07/21/how-capitalism-works-%E2%80%93-and-doesn%E2%80%99t-work/
Here’s something I did some years ago on capitalism’s currency craziness: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2011/08/03/420/
And excellent video of Michael Roberts on Marx’s crisis theory and the world economy today: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2014/08/18/marxism-2014-michael-roberts-on-world-economy-plus-discussion-session/
Phil
Our primary production, our lifeblood keeping the nation ticking so we can have elections and afford a government. http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player/20171199
Latest on our once thriving sheep and beef farming from Radionz.
Crunch time for sheep and beef farms: report ( 28′ 56″ )
09:08 Farmers say the 8 billion dollar sheep and beef industry is approaching crisis point, and a single cooperative business model similar to Fonterra is the only way forward. Meat Industry Excellence group chairman, John McCarthy and Murray Taggart is Chair of the Alliance Group.
That was an interesting discussion. What I’d be interested to know though is whether or not farmers felt better off when we had the old ‘meat producer’s’ board, before the dereg mantra kicked in during the 80’s, etc.
I’m thinking that at present, Alliance and ?? are merely gigantic ticket clippers and that a more co-op system would be better.
I’m no expert on this issue but it troubles me that the actual producers seem to be getting little return, and the NZ public generally are being ripped (with shit meat sold thru’ supermarkets, pumped with water, etc.)
What are your thoughts?
A sideline – an interesting thing is that the butchers in supermarkets in Nelson get most of their meat precutup in Christchurch. Just another way that food is being prepared using factory processes and trucked a long way.
I wonder too about the advantages of a co-op. It was tried a while ago, to have more synergy with companies but failed to get the big tick. I think it may be that some of the sheep farmers are doing all right and don’t give a rats arse about any other producers. Now that rudeness might be undeserved but that sort of thing happens. The magnetic attraction to one’s own interests entirely is often irresistible.
IMO the best way is probably to have two companies, one a farmer-owned co-operative, and the other a privately owned/listed company. Two competing systems.
NORTHLAND BY-ELECTION WATCH: [or is it BI/BRIBE/BUY/BYE election watch?]
Winston is trying to win this by-election ALL BY HIMSELF and his bus, while a bridgeload of mustered Nats have been continuously descending on Northland day after day at tax payer’s expense of travel and time to beat the wise old man.
It would be interesting to see how many Nat Cabinet ministers, MPs and others have been here or will be here in pathetic panic state to pump up their own O for awesome candidate and beat Winny.
Here is my list so far. Please add to this list if you know of others:
How many Nats does it take to beat an old man?
1. John Key
2. M Osborne
3. Steven Joyce
4. Simon Bridges
5. Maggie Barry.
6. ?
I have just re-posted/transferred this comment to the new post below :
http://thestandard.org.nz/how-much-is-nationals-northland-panic-costing-the-taxpayer/
Saturday morning at Kaitaia Market with Maggie Barry were (6) Nikki Kaye and (7) Alfred Ngaro, all flanking Osbourne.
Supported by Ministers free accommodation and travel All on the taxpayers teet.
National digging a deeper hole by the day.
@Clem
When you look at that list Winston may as well stop campaigning now-it’s in the bag!
You can add Bill English to that list. Apparently he’s dropped everything to make a hurried visit.
Bureaucrats everywhere: http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/9741839/Parker-criticises-Dalziel-over-staff-spending
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2015/03/16/the-melting-of-antarctica-was-already-really-bad-it-just-got-worse/
What it means to discover that warmer ocean currents actually flow beneath Antarctica’s ice shelves and are melting them from beneath …. sigh.
Someone has been giving Chris Trotter the good Bikkies.
Two fine pieces from Chris I must say.
Enjoy
http://bowalleyroad.blogspot.co.nz/2015/03/inflation-is-defeated-but-at-whose.html
http://bowalleyroad.blogspot.co.nz/2015/03/empire-games-how-nicky-hagers.html
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11418586
I know the PM was a big successful money trader and is super clever with numbers and knows this stuff better than I do, but I thought 15% of $1.29 was 20c not 2c 😕
“If you think about iTunes, you download a song and it’s $1.29, there’s no reason why GST shouldn’t apply to that.
“In reality, GST would be 2 cents. But actually, 2 cents over a massive number of transactions still add up.”
you will note from his second comment, it was not a typo by the reporter
explains a lot about our current economy then !!!
What a shock! They have since edited the article. It now says this:
“While the GST on some online goods and services would be very small, such as on a $1.29 iTunes song download, it could still be worth pursuing because of the scale of such purchases, Mr Key said.”
(Forgot to do a screengrab of the original)
they protect him down to his undies, don’t they !!!
If a member of the opposition had said it, can you imagine what the NZH front page would look like right now 🙂
Instead of “Key Cocks Up Calculations” it would be “Labour Minister Fails Simple Math Tests and Costs Country Millions in Tax Take”.
oh dear, freedom .. wish this were not true !
lol, ok, but Key’s cockups and undies protection in close proximity is probably a bit much at this time of day. Or any time really.
@Freedom — but TV3 has just broadcast the full thing on 6 pm news .. and pointing out Key’s mistake !@!
Backgrounder in Guardian about Lynton Crosby .. The Lizard of Oz !
Seems for all his hard and dubious ( or do I mean odious?) work, Cameron is not a shoo in after all … shades of NZ …
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/mar/16/lynton-crosby-win-election-conservatives-tories-political-strategist
good luck to the Scottish National Party. UK Labour, not so much.
CR
I like this author of books about policy and procedure and colleges and skulduggery. She often writes about Ireland and comes up with good fiction. And in the way of the saying that ‘you couldn’t make this shit up’ about reality, she probably is very good with reality too.
Ruth Dudley Edwards writes on the possibility if Scottish Nationalism wins of them going through a blue period as it sorts out allegiances and over-reacts to opposition.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/scottish-independence/11084603/Scotland-should-heed-a-harsh-lesson-from-across-the-Irish-Sea.html
Ahhh thanks for the link
and this .. he is owner of a Maltese tax haven company !!!
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/oct/03/tory-lynton-crosby-linked-tax-haven
I liked this from rawsharkyeshe No.15 article from The Guardian 16 March 2015 –
– Ed Miliband called Cameron the “Prime minister for Benson and Hedge funds”. –
This Crosby is a devious machine. And the comment on the hardness of Australian politics probably explains why Crosby and Mark Textor are both Australians.
Background to their start in Oz:
Still in his 30s, Crosby was promoted to deputy director and then director of the national party. There he worked with another rising and aggressive Liberal player, Mark Textor. Textor had taken Rod Cameron’s innovations with voter data and focus groups further, creating two archetypal swing voters, an imaginary middle-income couple called Phil and Jenny. The concept became so influential that during the 1996 national election, Liberal candidates would be asked by the campaign managers: “Have you spoken to Phil and Jenny lately?”
After 13 years out of power, the Liberals won. They won again in 1998, in 2001, and 2004. Significantly for the current British election, the Liberals often attracted fewer votes than Labor, usually not much more than 35% of the total, but these were decisively concentrated in marginal seats. “At its absolute simplest, a campaign is finding out who will decide the outcome,” Crosby said in a rare public masterclass he gave for charity in London in 2013, “where are they, what matters to them and how do you reach them?”
He played a central role in all four Liberal victories. The Liberal leader, John Howard, was uncharismatic but shrewd, and listened closely to Crosby. “Elsewhere in the party,” says Mills, Crosby became “somewhat feared and disliked”….
In Britain:
The Australian’s energy and attention to detail, his air of conviction, and his emphasis on the traditional rightwing issues of crime and immigration all won him rave reviews in the Tory press…..
The item relates how he cut and hacked at Livintone ending by Boris Johnson winning as Mayor for London. It finishes by saying that Crosby has to prove himself in the coming British elections. For the sake of his business standing it seems more important for his own standing that David Cameron wins for the Tories.
The British general election is on May 7, 2015.
It also explains why we have the tobacco industry candidates here, doesn’t it ?
Some “left wing” politicians in NZ would be quite tempted to get campaign advice from these right wing spiders. Some already appear to have.
Is it possible sometime to have a discussion about the lamentable habit of some posters to The Standard bastardising other commenters noms de plume.
I don’t personally care how much I personally disagree with a commenter, I have to respect their right to comment and to reflect their chosen ‘nick’ in my comments. I do admit to using abbreviations from time to time.
This is just the latest comment to raise my ire and, I admit, I am perhaps being unfair to single this out but here is a response to Te Reo Putake
‘Another crap article from Pistake. The Standard eh well if this is supposed to be “the standard” of articles the that the standard will put up with then it might be time to instigate a new standard, actually that kinda has a ring to it, “The New Standard” Great diversion tactic Pistake and if you happen to read this and I’m sure you will as your MO seems to dictate such YOU know exactly what I mean.’
If I am old fashioned and out of step, so be it, but can’t we disagree courteously?
I’m with you on that Hateatea. Some, eg those aimed at Fisiani, get pretty tedious and just distract from what is being said (I also think denigrating people via certain body parts adds to our culture’s body hatred but that’s another conversation).
I haven’t noticed whether people do this with real life names or if it’s only the pseudonyms (I suspect the latter). I take people’s names (ID or pseudonym) as extentions of the person so being mean via bastardisation is just a low form of wit that takes us into macho shithead territory pretty fast. I’m sure the defense is that Fisi and others deserve it because of their politics, but I think it will be putting other people off from commenting here and just adds to the culture of meanness unnecessarily.
(the irony of the Pistake commenter was that their comment was almost completely devoid of anything useful).
Yes, the fisiani example is particularly unpleasant, IMO. Not that I am pretending to be prudish. I can be both coarse and vulgar but seldom in public and never, I hope, in print!
I think that some of the verbal put downs do detract from discussion and probably do put people off. I did have to think seriously before I returned to commenting here again because of some of the discussions I read while lurking.
I am glad you have returned. The place will only change if enough people practice communicating well, but I get that sometimes it’s just not worth it.
I know it’s a challenge for me, I find it easy to get into the rude bordering on mean stuff. One of the reasons I like being here at the moment is I get to practice being more tolerant in the face of sometimes extreme provocation 😉
I did however notice recently that in real life I am more likely to argue with people like I do on ts. I’m not sure what I think about this yet. Am steering away from the overly challenging, but am liking my increased capacity to be staunch.
It is similar to the electoral process : you have to participate and vote in order to be able to comment on the outcome, in my opinion. Likewise a person needs to articulate their viewpoint to the best of their ability and hope to receive affirmation or negation from a reasoned response. Sadly, sometimes we all of us post in haste and repent at leisure 😉
I am glad if you are finding your input here is helping you in the real world. I may not always see things the way you do but I respect the manner in which you articulate your thoughts.
@ hateatea
You are unlikely to get brash rudeness here because you are thoughtful about your subjects and you are not repeating provocative comments that cut across the heart of what most of us feel fervently about.
Some people don’t realise that this is a lively forum for people with progressive viewpoints which does not take kindly to them dissing all that the Standardistas believe. Those who do it are sooner or later going to be villified, insulted and unfortunately, not sent to Coventry. People get annoyed and write something to match, or they feel forced to try and present a reasonable argument to the BS they are reading.
Reasonable politeness is received usually but sometimes the comments can be challenging. It’s not a gentle, quiet, meditative retreat. President Putin wouldn’t have come here to relax. But if you want to be safe from the over-excited, the Friday post of the Weekend doings is nice. People talk about the soothing personally useful things they are doing, and smile.
Things have improved recently but I agree with you Hateatea that discussions should be respectful although I have perhaps in the past not lived up to that standard 😀
We are none of us perfect, mickey 😀
come on micky, you’d be one of the leading examples of tolerance and reasonable discussion 😛 I can’t imagine you doing rude or mean (although I feel you could cut a certain beigity less slack).
The problem for me Hateatea is some on the right just attack, or argue in a very disingenuous manner.
Those little epigone to the slug and his mate the lick-spittle propagandist from kiwiblog – have done nothing on this site to earn my respect.
Personally I do deteriorate to a personal attack. Especially in the face of fatuous individuals.
Also, Tory scum, need to reminded the left have a backbone and won’t tolerate – hate, racism, sexism and the sickening devotion to cupidity.
David Fisher is brave and an excellent journalist:
“Analysis: The questions the Government must answer about the Snowden revelations……Can we tell the public what the British public now know to be true about their own security agencies? asks David Fisher?”
If only!
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11418653
“Fish” is one of NZ’s leading journalists on this subject matter, no doubt about that.
Yep and he did the mea culpa about Slater very early on. His stuff is always worth a read.
And here is the foreign news – a small but important bit:
http://rt.com/news/241069-putin-rumours-back-alive/
Dated 16 March 2015
‘It’s boring without rumors’: Putin appears in public after week of MSM hysteria
Lots of questions regarding where the heck he “disappeared” to. One which made sense to me said that he had decided to do a few days religious retreat and put matters of state on hold while he recharged and reviewed.
Are you sure you would describe it as a “religious retreat”?
It really is absurd when you think about it. He had a 10 day break. So bloody what? It isn’t a crime to decide you need a break unless of course you are the Russian president…
then you have to do it in secret because your opponents – particularly in the West – will have a collective heart attack and go into a hyperactive state of hysteria.
That Putin was on the way out, either feet first or by a coup of inner circle generals, was probably wishful thinking on the part of a few western opinion makers…
Green Party mail out for members on how the leadership selection process works (no online link, so a long cut and paste sorry).
Very informative thanks Weka for getting that together.
You’re welcome. I’m please to see the GP upping their game on transparency and process 🙂
Yes good to see. A Party to be proud of.
In Question Time today Key lead a reply to Russell’s question with a smart list of the fiscal facts that the Green contenders messed up on. (He had to read the list though.) Okay then. He had a second swipe a little later. OK smarty pants.
But wait. When Key was questioned by reporters tonight about GST on imported goods he said that as an example it would be silly to claim GST off an ITune download costing $1.79 because GST would only be—–wait for it—- about 2 cents.
What!!! Expert smarty pants. It would be about 26cents!
Hope Question Time gets a dig at Key tomorrow re his slip up in view of his Green digs, and to ask about Osbourne deciding the 10 one way bridges for about $70million but unable to name them, though he knew the name of the one near his house.
What goes around comes around.
If slippery has his way on the TPP we’ll be in the same boat.
The U.S. economy is picking up steam but most Americans aren’t feeling it. By contrast, most European economies are still in bad shape, but most Europeans are doing relatively well.
What’s behind this? Two big facts.
First, American corporations exert far more political influence in the United States than their counterparts exert in their own countries.
In fact, most Americans have no influence at all. That’s the conclusion of Professors Martin Gilens of Princeton and Benjamin Page of Northwestern University, who analyzed 1,799 policy issues — and found that “the preferences of the average American appear to have only a miniscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.”
Instead, American lawmakers respond to the demands of wealthy individuals (typically corporate executives and Wall Street moguls) and of big corporations – those with the most lobbying prowess and deepest pockets to bankroll campaigns.
The second fact is most big American corporations have no particular allegiance to America. They don’t want Americans to have better wages. Their only allegiance and responsibility to their shareholders — which often requires lower wages to fuel larger profits and higher share prices.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2015/03/robert-reich-why-americans-are-screwed-and-europeans-are-not/
That would be a hilarious statement, if it wasn’t so tragic.
I’ve just caught up with Wilson’s emerging Kiwi Regional Airlines which will be hatching soonish.
Here’s a link about small airlines and this one, and has an intereting shot of a small plane coming into land in front of high rise housing fairly dense.
http://3rdlevelnz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/01/kiwi-regional-airlines.html
Anyone got an opinion as to whether this housing would be good to live in, seem close? Is it the type of housing that should be available for small families and singles near town and small manufacturing hubs with public transport running near, just one, two streets away.?
I think the quality of life experienced in housing (that is well built and healthy, rather than shoddy and damp) does not rely solely on density, but includes the strength of connections to others, services, amenities and vibrant community spaces (and in NZ, access to natural environments if possible).
An interesting programme to watch is Kevin McCloud’s Slumming It. He visits the slum of Dharavi in Mumbai, as it has recently been cited as a “model community” even though it is built on waste ground including dump sites, and raw sewage ponds.
Those that live there have created an amazingly diverse and resilient community in such a small area – according to Wikipedia, the most densely populated area in the world.
Yes Molly they might enjoy it and do well with it. But we come from a different culture and have different expectations. It is interesting to store the knowledge of the ability of providing necessities in dense communities and the residents can maintain basic standards and stability. They have shown resilience in their place. We need to design one that allows us to manage our lives in our country and culture.
There have been thoughts that have probably not been well developed by government about how we could manage our living conditions better. I remember Dr Morgan Williams when he was Commissioner for the Environment talking about the way that a South American city Curitiba had acted to keep their city a good livable place.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/ED0207/S00050/master-plan-urged-for-urban-sustainability.htm
Curitiba improved the conditions in their slums by working with the people. If they collected garbage and handed it in, they were rewarded with food such as eggs not money. It made a big difference to the place, helped the nutrition of the poor and raised community concern for better, more pleasant surroundings.
http://www.rnzih.org.nz/pages/AbstractMorganWilliams.htm
This is a very interesting range of Bills in Parliament today.
http://www.parliament.nz/resource/en-nz/00HOHOrderPaper_20150318/46bded522d1e4699f0448e89d8141b257533723a
There are programmes in the Auckland Council re giving communities a say in how their locales are developed, but not every Local Board has adopted them.
Thriving Communities is one, a village planning programme is another.
I suspect that I am agreeing with you, that local knowledge and input creates a more resilient and connected community. Unless specific commitments to encouraging this happen in NZ, we will continue to have a patchwork approach to housing and community building.
I’d quite happily live in one of those. They look like they even have room for a garden, and there’s bush nearby. I really prefer to sharing communal space with others to having a huge private yard.
https://twitter.com/UNICEFNZ/status/577674978595733505
Thought that this talk by Robert Reich on why the tax cuts for the rich and austerity economics is bad for society would be of interest to the Standard readers.
http://www.socialeurope.eu/2015/03/the-3-biggest-economic-myths/
Well spotted – I reckon you should repost on today’s open mike.
Very relevant and sadly so true irascible. Yes worth a wider audience.