helen clark

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A tale of two valedictory speeches

Written By: - Date published: 7:28 am, March 23rd, 2017 - 32 comments

Compare and contrast Helen Clark’s and John Key’s valedictory speeches.

Kiwi Treason

Written By: - Date published: 8:08 am, August 4th, 2016 - 181 comments

Vegemite and marmite taste the same, rugby is naff, John Clarke’s an Australian. What?

Vote for Helen!

Written By: - Date published: 7:04 am, July 14th, 2016 - 55 comments

Yesterday 10 of the candidates for the UN’s top job faced off in debate. For the first time this was a public event, hosted and broadcast by Al Jazeera.

H1 and H2

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, June 10th, 2016 - 191 comments

In a few months, the two most important leadership roles on the planet could be held by women. How cool is that? We’ve come a long way, world!

It must have been on Planet Key

Written By: - Date published: 8:50 pm, May 12th, 2016 - 59 comments

John Key thinks that he was thrown out of Parliament straight after Helen Clark a few years ago.  The only problem is that Hansard thinks it was Don Brash.

Garner on Key vs Clark

Written By: - Date published: 11:44 am, March 26th, 2016 - 124 comments

Attracting a fair bit of comment this morning – Duncan Garner on Key, Clark, and the nature of their legacies.

Rudd v Clark

Written By: - Date published: 9:04 am, December 28th, 2015 - 99 comments

Helen Clark is considered to be to be a front runner for the position of next United Nations Secretary General.  But Kevin Rudd is also being talked about as a candidate.  And if his previous behaviour is repeated it could be an interesting contest.

Helen Clark on A Zero-Carbon Future

Written By: - Date published: 8:10 am, December 5th, 2015 - 48 comments

Good piece by Helen Clark on Huff Post: “Paris must be a catalyst for stepped up climate action. The world must move towards a zero-carbon future. There is no room for short-sightedness or a lack of ambition.”

An R-101 Post

Written By: - Date published: 12:08 pm, October 2nd, 2015 - 89 comments

Someone once made an art-work of a brick with some ‘guy ropes’ attached to represent the ill fated R-101 airship…

Key is relaxed about widespread refugee crisis

Written By: - Date published: 9:02 am, September 1st, 2015 - 58 comments

John Key has ruled out an emergency intake of refugees and claims that New Zealand is doing its bit and that bit is enough.

Helen Clark in the news

Written By: - Date published: 11:30 am, August 2nd, 2015 - 20 comments

A couple of good pieces on Helen Clark recently, on global challenges and on UN leadership.

Helen Clark’s statement on International Women’s Day

Written By: - Date published: 7:45 am, March 8th, 2015 - 64 comments

“International Women’s Day (8 March) is a global day celebrating the economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future.”

Who was the better economic manager – Helen Clark or John Key?

Written By: - Date published: 6:59 pm, January 20th, 2015 - 150 comments

Sometimes a simple graph is much more eloquent and powerful than a whole lot of words …

Helen

Written By: - Date published: 11:08 pm, May 24th, 2014 - 14 comments

Just been watching the documentary “Helen” about Helen Clark past and present. Pretty damn good. For me it was a bit of a blast from the past. I started volunteering for her in Mt Albert in 1989. But I suspect that the same will be true for most people who have been aware of politics in NZ over the last 3 decades. Those images of Muldoon and Douglas were kind of creepy.

Tony Astle does not want progressive customers

Written By: - Date published: 9:00 am, May 24th, 2014 - 100 comments

Tony Astle apparently wants to ban some left wing politicians from his restaurant Antoines. He should get a life. Because the idea is stupid and reinforces the impression that National is a party insisting on the retention of privilege for the few.

NRT: “A wish, a target, and a dream”

Written By: - Date published: 6:47 pm, May 12th, 2014 - 58 comments

No Right Turn shows that John Key has no real understanding of the economic and political history of this country. Probably because the last time another economic illiterate from National said that the prospect of reducing unemployment in NZ to below 6% was “a hoax”, John Key wasn’t here. He probably heard it from that illiterate, who once again is our minister of finance. Unemployment under Labour was as low as 3.3%

LocalBodies: John Key Aspires to Mediocrity

Written By: - Date published: 10:20 am, April 24th, 2014 - 26 comments

Local Bodies provides this interesting comparison on John Key compared to some of the more ethical leaders of our past. Suffice it to say that the ever forgetful John Key doesn’t measure up to past standards. He is really only distinguished the his sustained level of  pathetic mediocrity.

IF: A day in the life of Matthew Hooton

Written By: - Date published: 7:39 am, March 25th, 2014 - 32 comments

[Satire]  I has a dream… Winston retired from politics and went on to set up a bird rescue centre in a remote spot in the Raukumura Range, but the centre was burned down after two teenagers high on glue broke in and set it alight. The delicious smells of hundreds of roasted native birds attracted the attentions of the poor for miles around… desperate and hungry people tore at each other to get into the still-burning sanctuary…  I awoke in a fever and ran to my computer, and in seconds flat I had my NBR column finished.

Your Brighter Future: Burn.

Written By: - Date published: 1:13 pm, October 2nd, 2013 - 15 comments

“I just utter one fear…”

Remember that?

US Embassy: Political Objectivity of NZ Media Questioned

Written By: - Date published: 7:20 am, May 5th, 2011 - 9 comments

Here’s an interesting Wikileaks cable on the ‘objectivity’ of the New Zealand msm, particularly the Herald. The cable relates to the period leading up to the last election. Most of it seems like a pretty fair appraisal to me, despite it perhaps being a little optimistic about the influences ideology and profit motive have on […]

Leaked cables window into Superpower

Written By: - Date published: 8:45 am, November 30th, 2010 - 49 comments

Wikileaks latest coup is the release of a database of more than 250,000 diplomatic cables between American embassies, up to and including the highest security level “Top Secret”.  The cables provide a full, detailed and explicit account of many of America’s diplomatic secrets and the attitudes behind them.  It is a good long look through a window in to the mind of a Superpower.

The leadership vacuum

Written By: - Date published: 1:32 pm, October 5th, 2010 - 41 comments

Paul Henry has a racist rant to the Prime Minister and what does John Key do? He laughs along and tries to make a joke. A PM that is afraid to be a leader. A Leader of the Opposition who is afraid of ticking off racists. A Green Party that is afraid of making a claim for the Left vote when Labour fails. Come back, Helen, all is forgiven.

Ex leaders

Written By: - Date published: 10:58 am, March 3rd, 2010 - 27 comments

Comparing the post-leadership careers of Clark and Brash is quite a study in contrasts. Clark’s has been stellar, Brash’s an embarrassment. But the world of difference between these two leaders is much clearer with the perfect hindsight of 2010 than it was when they were locked in a tight electoral battle in 2005.

How will history look back at the leadership of John Key?

Clark on RNZ

Written By: - Date published: 11:40 am, February 18th, 2010 - 35 comments

Have a listen to today’s interview of Helen Clark by RNZ’s Kathryn Ryan on the UNDP and aid strategies during times of international recession. Such a pleasure to hear a PM who’s clearly completely on top of their game, who speaks with credibility, a solid grasp of English and the diction of an educated adult.

Well deserved

Written By: - Date published: 1:08 pm, April 23rd, 2009 - 17 comments

Helen Clark has been awarded an honorary doctorate, a Doctor of Laws, by Auckland University. Chancellor Roger France said in a written statement that the degree recognised Helen Clark’s “enormous contribution to New Zealand and on the international stage”. “Helen Clark had made a mark nationally and internationally in a way that few leaders can […]

Thanks, Helen

Written By: - Date published: 11:20 pm, April 8th, 2009 - 46 comments

There goes the best leader we’ve had in a life-time. Was she perfect? No, far from it. There are many things she might have done differently but she led governments that made New Zealand a better place in so many ways. We’ve heard her government’s achievements so many times I won’t try to list them all. They have […]

Sanctimonious tall poppy cutter.

Written By: - Date published: 3:38 pm, February 7th, 2009 - 32 comments

There is no doubt that the Granny crew were hurt when their own ‘poll’ showed that people considered Helen Clark was the greatest living kiwi. It says a lot about the mean-spirited attitudes at the Herald that they didn’t consider that politicians were possibilities for the greatest living Kiwi. You get the impression that they’d […]

Helen Clark greatest living NZer – Herald

Written By: - Date published: 6:04 am, January 24th, 2009 - 54 comments

I wonder if someone at the Herald is going to get sack for letting this happen? The NZ Herald’s week long poll to find out who the greatest living New Zealander is, has yielded Helen Clark as the victor (with Willie Apiata coming in second). And that despite Helen Clark not even being included on […]

Homegrown

Written By: - Date published: 12:09 pm, December 26th, 2008 - 11 comments

At the end of my post a couple of days ago I touched on the notion of a new Zealand identity and a Left nationalism. Since then I’ve been thinking about the value of the last government’s moves to foster national identity and their remarkable success in doing so and concluded that this is quite […]

Farewell

Written By: - Date published: 12:40 pm, November 19th, 2008 - 96 comments

A crowd several hundred strong turned out this morning to farewell Helen Clark as she left Parliament as Prime Minister for the last time to present her Government’s official resignation to the Governor-General. Even though I’m a Greenie, I always find Labour events amazingly heart-warming – such a huge variety of people young and old […]

What should Clark do?

Written By: - Date published: 11:10 am, November 18th, 2008 - 28 comments

There’s a lot of talk about Helen Clark leaving Parliament in a year or so to head for an international role. While Clark would obviously be more than capable of performing well at that level, I would prefer to see her do something completely different. Labour needs to build its membership and its connections with […]

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