Archive for October, 2008

Greens set their standards for coalition partners

Written By: - Date published: 11:34 am, October 9th, 2008 - 43 comments

The Greens have announced that they will choose their preferred coalition partner based on their commitment to 12 criteria. I’ll just look at 5 (not that the others are less important, just space): reduce New Zealand’s oil dependence and climate change emissions; – senior Nats don’t even think climate change is happening and the Party […]

Speak no evil

Written By: - Date published: 10:32 am, October 9th, 2008 - 27 comments

Word around the traps is that this week Key and English have added veteran financial reporter Rod Oram to their list of journos they won’t speak to and Key has canceled his weekly chat with Wammo on Kiwi FM until after the election. This adds to Key striking Duncan Garner off his interview list after […]

Small change

Written By: - Date published: 1:32 am, October 9th, 2008 - 56 comments

That was going to be the title of my first post on National’s tax-cut plan but then it turned out National’s plan would actually make about 1 million taxpayers worse off compared to Labour’s cuts (all figures derived from the Budget and National’s tax policy). That 1 million comprises approx 650,000, including nearly all super-annuitants, […]

Reviews of Nats’ tax cut/Kiwisaver cut/R&D cut policy

Written By: - Date published: 7:27 pm, October 8th, 2008 - 37 comments

Just a quick note at the start for our press gallery friends who live in central Wellington on high incomes. 50% of New Zealanders have an income below $27,000 and 50% of workers earn less than $37,000 a year (all of which is heaps higher than it was under National). The point is this: National’s […]

Nats break into your piggy-bank

Written By: - Date published: 3:42 pm, October 8th, 2008 - 61 comments

John Key has announced that Kiwisaver would be slashed along with National’s tax cuts for the rich (and they are tax cuts for the rich, while most people would get less than under Labour’s plan, under National’s plan by 2011 around half a billion a year more than under Labour’s plan would be going to […]

No tax cut for most from Nats

Written By: - Date published: 1:40 pm, October 8th, 2008 - 91 comments

As predicted on The Standard, National has announced it would abolish the increases in the bottom threshold to pay for tax cuts for the rich. Here’s a break down of what would happen: April 1 2009: Lift 33 cent thresold from $40K to $48K, reduce 39 cent rate to 38 cents. April 1 2010: Lift […]

Tax cuts for the rich

Written By: - Date published: 1:12 pm, October 8th, 2008 - 29 comments

National has released its tax policy. At first glance it appears the top rate will be reduced to 37% by 2011, giving the rich thousands of dollars in tax cuts. People earning $24-50k who aren’t getting Working for Families will get $15 a week rebate by 2011. Working families will basically get nothing, except for […]

No one likes McCain

Written By: - Date published: 11:00 am, October 8th, 2008 - 19 comments

Ever wondered what would happen if the whole world could vote for the President of the United States? According to The Economist’s online poll, which divvies up electoral college votes to each country based on population, it’s Obama by 8,471 to 16. Only belligerent wee Georgia is leaning strongly to McCain. It’d be interesting to […]

The test

Written By: - Date published: 8:40 am, October 8th, 2008 - 84 comments

After building a political career that has consisted of little more than calling for tax cuts and attacking those that were delivered, John Key will finally present his party’s tax cut package today. Already, they have had to reduce its size but they will still make it the central part of their mystical economic platform […]

Farce

Written By: - Date published: 10:01 pm, October 7th, 2008 - 18 comments

It was with wry amusement I read Bill Ralston’s revisionist history of New Zealand superannuation today. According to Bill it was Muldoon who created an “unsupportable” super scheme as an election bribe in 1975. Of course anyone who remembers the situation (as Bill certainly should) knows full well that the real story was big Norm’s […]

Power to attack Nats’ new prison policy?

Written By: - Date published: 2:55 pm, October 7th, 2008 - 30 comments

If he stands true to his principles, National justice spokesman Simon Power will soon be criticising the cost of their proposed new prison. You’ll note in this story that National proposes to build a prison (for their new reactionary justice policy) at a cost of $314 million. That is $548,951 per bed. Or not far […]

Note to self – Mr Key will say what you want to hear

Written By: - Date published: 2:39 pm, October 7th, 2008 - 18 comments

Mr Key will tell you what you want to hear. That’s the message that Pita Sharples has taken from his encounter with Mr Key over the future of the Maori seats: Dr Sharples told Sky TV on Sunday night Mr Key had assured him the seven Maori seats would not be abolished till Maori agreed […]

Changing the subject

Written By: - Date published: 2:05 pm, October 7th, 2008 - 15 comments

Former National advisor Richard Long has let the cat out of the bag. The day before National’s much-hyped, cure-all tax cut package is to be announced, he is desperately trying to change the subject. National has nothing but tax cuts to offer, it has been their one consistent answer for every problem but, now, tax cuts are […]

Will Labour back $15 minimum wage?

Written By: - Date published: 12:30 pm, October 7th, 2008 - 45 comments

The unions want the minimum wage lifted to $15 an hour, two thirds of the average hourly rate, restoring the historic ratio. The Greens, New Zealand First, The Progressives (I think), the Maori Party* and, oddly, the Kiwi Party are also calling for $15 an hour. Will Labour join them? Labour has an excellent record on the […]

Key still hopping on Hobsonville

Written By: - Date published: 10:27 am, October 7th, 2008 - 22 comments

At the first Helensville candidates’ debate last night, John Key reversed his position on state housing once again. Despite using the years he lived in a state house as “a great marketing ploy”, Key called the plan to build state houses along with more up-market homes on the site of Hobsonville airbase “economic vandalism”.  Then he […]

Spray and hope

Written By: - Date published: 9:19 pm, October 6th, 2008 - 27 comments

This is so funny. Click on image for full zoom.                      

The rainy day cometh

Written By: - Date published: 3:50 pm, October 6th, 2008 - 117 comments

The Pre-election Fiscal Update projects that gross debt will rise from 17.4% today to 24.3% of GDP in five years. Fortunately, we are facing these tough economic times starting from a solid position due the the Government’s policy of running surpluses and paying down debt, rather than slashing taxes. 24.3% debt is right at the […]

Spin-busting: Govt could have used surpluses for tax cuts

Written By: - Date published: 2:37 pm, October 6th, 2008 - 28 comments

With the economic situation deteriorating the surpluses the Government has run for the first eight years have turned to a deficit. National’s line now is that the Government ‘suquendered’ these surpluses when it could have been cutting taxes. As if when the Government runs a surplus it takes the extra money out and burns it. […]

Party like it’s 1946

Written By: - Date published: 1:24 pm, October 6th, 2008 - 27 comments

Reverting to type

Written By: - Date published: 11:23 am, October 6th, 2008 - 48 comments

Fearing a PR disaster over their tax-cut package announcement later this week, National has reverted to type, shedding the moderate facade and proposing a good old fashioned ‘get tough’ crime policy. National would abolish parole for people convicted of murder who have previously been convicted of a serious violent crime. In the last six years, […]

Depressing

Written By: - Date published: 10:14 am, October 6th, 2008 - 29 comments

I see National has released a knee-jerk reactionary crime policy this morning, and it’s been reported largely uncritically by a news media that’s made a fortune fostering public fear of crime at a time when crime rates are falling and resolution rates are on the rise. It’s frankly depressing that our level of public debate […]

We’re popular – but with the wrong people

Written By: - Date published: 2:25 pm, October 5th, 2008 - 10 comments

After a lot of work both by a few e-mails from people here and by the good services of some people on nz.comp (google seems to be a little behind on the messages) I finally found the link to the malware site that was attached itself to the site footer. The material that it was […]

Previewing the Prefu

Written By: - Date published: 12:49 pm, October 5th, 2008 - 9 comments

Tomorrow the government’s books will be opened up. It is not expected to be a pretty picture. Oil prices and the credit crunch have forced the economy into recession. The debt to GDP ratio will be higher than was modelled in the Budget for three reasons (at this point, I just want to remind our excitable righties that […]

Fighting the moral fight

Written By: - Date published: 11:16 am, October 5th, 2008 - 34 comments

There are two core strains to left-wing thought. Both of them can be seen as rooted in the evolution of the scientific method during the 18th and 19th centuries, although the essential ideas, of course, existed long before. The first is liberalism. Liberalism holds that we must always keep an element of self-doubt and criticism […]

Drawing your attention

Written By: - Date published: 1:00 pm, October 4th, 2008 - 18 comments

Malcolm Evans, award-winning former Herald cartoonist, is bloody good at what he does – insightful, well-drawn, concerned with the big issues, and always on the side of the underdog. His leftwing views made for a difficult relationship with the Herald’s editors. In 2005, they ‘accidentally’ published a cartoon in which he criticised the Israeli occupation of Palestine. The resulting uproar […]

The Standard Week: 26 September – 3 October

Written By: - Date published: 8:07 pm, October 3rd, 2008 - 31 comments

So, there’s no articles on Key in this edition of the Standard Week. I know! Hardly believable. But there’s a reason for that. After his dodgy Tranzrail dealings came to light last week, Key has been trying to keep himself out of the media except for the most soft-news photo ops (item: ‘Key feels sorry for sick child’, item: […]

CTU on closing the wage gap

Written By: - Date published: 4:20 pm, October 3rd, 2008 - 4 comments

The Council of Trade Unions has done a lot of work on why wages are low for many workers in New Zealand and how they can be increased to close the wage gap with Australia. They offer six proposals: Increase the minimum wage to at least $15 per/hour We know from the painful experience of […]

Trivialising the electoral process

Written By: - Date published: 3:48 pm, October 3rd, 2008 - 29 comments

I don’t have a lot of time for Winston Peters’ politics or his dodgy electoral practices, but sometimes the man just hits the nail on the head: Rt Hon Winston Peters has accused a number of media outlets of trivialising general election coverage to the point of mindless banality. This follows a request from a […]

Video: Why vote? Watch this

Written By: - Date published: 3:15 pm, October 3rd, 2008 - 3 comments

We’ve seen the work of Declare Yourself before. Their message is aimed at voters in the US but the call to engage and get involved resonates just as strongly for us here. This time some big names are promoting the message to get involved including Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Aniston and Ellen DeGeneres (others whose faces […]

Wage gap decreasing thanks to pro-worker policies

Written By: - Date published: 12:05 pm, October 3rd, 2008 - 36 comments

  As The Standard first reported on April 1 and Radio New Zealand picked up today, Treasury figures show that the wage gap between Australia and New Zealand increased 50% under National in the 1990s and has decreased moderately under Labour since then. Now, a lot of our readers simply won’t want to believe that […]

Good on youse

Written By: - Date published: 10:38 am, October 3rd, 2008 - 49 comments

Yesterday, I printed and cut 6500 A6 leaflets from the designs on the Campaign Hub and took them along to Drinking Liberally. They were all gone in minutes. The Right wins and keeps power by dis-empowering and disenfranchising, by taking away our voice. So, it was great to see so many people take it on themselves […]