Archive for August, 2008

Kiwisaver cuts to fund Nats’ tax cuts?

Written By: - Date published: 4:54 pm, August 5th, 2008 - 16 comments

So, the rumour is that Kiwisaver will be slashed to fund National’s tax cut policy. Currently, the Government spends up to the following on each Kiwisaver member: – $1000 on sign-up – Up to $1040 a year in matching contributions – Up to $1040 a year in tax credit to employers – 30% tax deduction […]

Clown princes

Written By: - Date published: 3:28 pm, August 5th, 2008 - 27 comments

The ‘Key-English secret recording followed by denial followed by excuse followed by apology’ debacle is, well, an utter debacle. If these clowns ever win an election – which has to be questionable after this sort of political mismanagement – similar antics will make opposition rather more pleasant than it otherwise is for Labour. There are […]

Key’s shell-game wears thin

Written By: - Date published: 12:40 pm, August 5th, 2008 - 20 comments

On National Radio’s Morning Report and Nine to Noon yesterday, Key ran the ‘not telling’ line once again and it was once too often. Asked a simple question: ‘What projects are you going to spend the extra money you plan to borrow on?’ Key refused to answer. You could hear the self-satisfaction in his voice […]

News coverage of English revelations

Written By: - Date published: 11:59 am, August 5th, 2008 - 9 comments

Here’s the segment on the English meltdown from TV One last night. [I wanted to put up TV3’s as well – it’s good coverage, including interviews with KiwiBank customers – but I just can’t seem to deal with their flaky video stream (anyone else have problems with it?)]

Sarcophagus

Written By: - Date published: 11:29 am, August 5th, 2008 - 9 comments

After a stunning attack on John Key last night, Bill English is now reverting to more standard National techniques for handling ‘accidental frankness’. Initially, deny. When played a recording, claim not to remember it. When that doesn’t kill the story, claim to have ‘mis-spoken’. Finally, attack the source. It’s the same pattern we saw with […]

Meltdown

Written By: - Date published: 10:36 pm, August 4th, 2008 - 90 comments

The English tape has exploded into a massive scandal. You’ll be familiar with the content of the recording: – English mocks voters as greedy simpletons taken in by a flashy con-man “they’re saying that nice Mr Key, he’s pretty smart, he will get me some more” – He claims Key doesn’t understand basic trade-offs in […]

Employment, wages up

Written By: - Date published: 3:27 pm, August 4th, 2008 - 43 comments

Despite the economic slowdown, the labour market is holding up well and wages are up at the record rate. The average hourly wage is now $24, up from $21.90 an hour 2 years ago. That’s a 9.6% increase. Take away 6.1% inflation and the average Kiwi worker is still 3.5% better off than two years […]

Hilarious

Written By: - Date published: 11:20 am, August 4th, 2008 - 56 comments

Greens on National’s plan to borrow to build more roads: “Lonely dinosaur seeks white elephant“

Spin-busting: ‘A growth problem, not a debt problem’

Written By: - Date published: 10:42 am, August 4th, 2008 - 28 comments

To justify borrowing for tax cuts, National’s new line is that New Zealand has ‘a growth problem, not a debt problem’. Untrue. (source) New Zealand’s growth has been faster in recent years than trend, faster than it was under National, and faster than growth in our major trade partners. We are in a shallow recession […]

Behind closed doors

Written By: - Date published: 7:55 am, August 4th, 2008 - 69 comments

The scandal over Bill English’s comments at the National Party conference has not only overshadowed Key’s purposely vague conference announcements, it has derailed National’s entire election strategy. The audio is damning. Clearly and unequivocally, we have National’s Deputy Leader saying National will ‘eventually’ (possibly within a first term) sell Kiwibank. English not only says National […]

Pathetic

Written By: - Date published: 8:39 pm, August 3rd, 2008 - 37 comments

Rather than discussing the quote from Bill English that he would sell Kiwibank, David Farrar is whining that the protest outside the National Party conference today breached the EFA because it did not contain authorisation. Once again, Farrar would rather try to attack on technicalities than deal in substantive issues, and once again he is […]

Key’s vision: tax cuts for rich, more debt for youse

Written By: - Date published: 3:39 pm, August 3rd, 2008 - 71 comments

In a speech described by attendees as ‘more bullet points’, John Key announced to the National Party conference today that National would borrow $5 billion more over 6 years to finance infrastructure – specifically roads and the broadband ‘plan’. The money-man has dressed it up cleverly, of course. A fancy new class of ‘investment vehicle’ will be […]

A quick Brethren reference

Written By: - Date published: 10:56 pm, August 2nd, 2008 - 121 comments

At last an upfront acknowledgement of the Exclusive Brethren’s support for National during the 2005 election campaign. According to Colin Espiner: Day One of National’s annual conference is nearly over and so far the biggest clanger has been departing Tauranga MP Bob Clarkson’s thank-you to the Exclusive Brethren during his departing remarks to delegates. There was […]

Spinbusting: Nats’ borrowing not for tax cuts

Written By: - Date published: 10:58 am, August 2nd, 2008 - 75 comments

Today, Bill English is outlining National’s plan to undo the work of the past fifteen years and take this country further into debt. He will argue that National would not be borrowing for its programme of tax cuts for the wealthy, rather it would borrow for investment. That is a lie. We already borrow for […]

No Right Turn temporarily off air

Written By: - Date published: 4:40 pm, August 1st, 2008 - 29 comments

A tale of woe from Idiot/Savant: Sometime this afternoon, Blogger, in its infinite wisdom, decided that No Right Turn was a “spam blog” and locked it. I have naturally asked for a review, and sometime in the next two business days (yeah right) someone at blogger “customer service” will be looking at it and manually […]

Workers stand up for their rights, Nats still evasive

Written By: - Date published: 4:04 pm, August 1st, 2008 - 48 comments

The EPMU launched its ‘Work Rights Wage Drive’ today with a rally in Christchurch. Despite the rain, over 1500 Kiwi workers turned out to stand up for their work rights and wages. This is just the first of 25 rallies the EPMU will be undertaking this month, in what will easily be the biggest series […]

The Standard Week: 25 July-1 August

Written By: - Date published: 3:02 pm, August 1st, 2008 - 19 comments

Another week of gonzo journalism and you can understand why people get turned off politics. While the press gallery concentrated on which of them was most offended by Winston Peters, we had a look behind some of the policies on offer and ran a series of posts on the impact of the work rights policies of National and the […]

TV3 promoting a National/NZF government?

Written By: - Date published: 2:23 pm, August 1st, 2008 - 12 comments

It seems TV3 has decided to promote a marriage between John Key and Winston Peters this week.   They appear to be paying for ads on Google that come up when you search for “John Key” or for “Winston Peters“, but not for other leaders like Helen Clark or Jeanette Fitzsimons. What’s more, when you […]

Multiple orgasms

Written By: - Date published: 12:31 pm, August 1st, 2008 - 28 comments

If John Key’s feeling a little nervous about repeating his “under a Labour Government I lead” gaffe at this weekend’s National Party conference, perhaps he should spare a thought for Aussie Liberal MP Jason Wood…

Old boys’ club

Written By: - Date published: 12:13 pm, August 1st, 2008 - 46 comments

John Key: “We don’t have enough women in our caucus, so we’ve had to start cross-dressing” (Press, June 9, 2007) He’s not wrong there:

Trust me

Written By: - Date published: 10:30 am, August 1st, 2008 - 16 comments

David Farrar says of a scene in Dark Knight ‘I would have voted ‘yes”. Without giving away any of the plot, that means Farrar would choose to hurt many others as long as he would not be hurt himself. But in making that decision he would be relying on the word of a liar known […]

Effervescent stylist slams politicians

Written By: - Date published: 7:53 am, August 1st, 2008 - 22 comments

New Zealand stylist Stephanie Rumble – best known for her fallout with Addington race officials after claiming that a giant bottle of Lindaur was her “date” in an attempt to avoid a newly introduced ban on BYO alcohol at the event – says that Helen Clark is too inhibited, John Key needs some contrast, Gerry […]

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