Archive for June, 2012

Lessons from Greece

Written By: - Date published: 4:21 pm, June 1st, 2012 - 229 comments

Update 6.45pm: One of lawyers acting for those arrested has just been told by police that everyone arrested will be released without charge in the next couple of hours. That excludes 4 people who have refused to cooperate, presumably by refusing to give their details to police.

Update 9:09pm: John Darroch’s photos from today.

ImperatorFish: Key’s Secret Super Plans

Written By: - Date published: 2:43 pm, June 1st, 2012 - 5 comments

Why does John Key appear so confident that we are not facing a future superannuation crisis? It seems unlikely that the government would allow a cull of the elderly, due to the usual complaints from liberal hand-wringers. So where are the solutions to the problems caused by an ageing population?

Weekend social 01/06/2012

Written By: - Date published: 2:00 pm, June 1st, 2012 - 4 comments

Weekend social is for non political chat. What’s on for the weekend, gigs, film or book reviews, sports, or whatever. No politics, no aggro, why can’t we all just get along?

The beam in your eye

Written By: - Date published: 11:39 am, June 1st, 2012 - 53 comments

A tattered few on the Right are attempting to stir up an issue over the Greens using a bit of their leaders’ office budget on the citizens’-initiated referendum petition. The use of the $78,000 is completely within the rules and approved by the Speaker. The Greens, and the coalition, are helping us to keep our assets. Meanwhile, the Nats have budgeted $120 million to sell them. Who’s in the wrong?

Electric cars will save us all

Written By: - Date published: 10:09 am, June 1st, 2012 - 53 comments

You know how, whenever someone points out that spending $12 billion on highways that make no economic sense makes even less sense when you consider that people are driving less because of the price of petrol and will only reduce their driving more in the face of even higher petrol prices, some idiot says ‘we’ll just invent alternatives, drive electric!’. Yeah, it ain’t happening.

Selective memory

Written By: - Date published: 8:59 am, June 1st, 2012 - 37 comments

Things Key can’t remember: Position on Springbok tour: subject of mass protests under his idol, Muldoon. Position on the anti-nuclear issue: cornerstone policy of 4th Labour government, also triggered the schnapps election that brought down his hero. Things Key can remember: Never claiming the child tax rebate for his paper-run. Which is true because the rebate wasn’t introduced until Key was 17.

Retail Deposit Guarantee: When’s the enquiry?

Written By: - Date published: 7:46 am, June 1st, 2012 - 14 comments

Labour are pushing for an enquiry into how Treasury oversight of the Retail Deposit Guarantee Scheme was so poor that it has cost us hundreds of millions of dollars. Bill English can’t be allowed to hide this under the plus Treasury carpet, so his lack of oversight of Treasury isn’t shown up.

Call off the education cuts

Written By: - Date published: 7:21 am, June 1st, 2012 - 17 comments

National has no choice but to call off the education cuts. The sooner they do it the sooner it will stop killing them in the court of public opinion.

Open mike 01/06/2012

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, June 1st, 2012 - 70 comments

Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to Policy in the banner). Step right up to the mike…

Polly Parata

Written By: - Date published: 12:11 am, June 1st, 2012 - 69 comments

Hekia Parata is demonstrating how political lines endlessly repeated can go horribly wrong if you have nothing else to say. Her Polly Parrot repetitions are wrongly-based, and the longer she and Key go on about how fewer teachers and larger classes  is going to improve the quality of teaching the worse its going to get for National. The hubristic Parata  has galvanised and united the education sector and more backdowns are likely, both in policy and politics.