Imagine.

Written By: - Date published: 2:30 pm, April 28th, 2009 - 6 comments
Categories: act, bill english, economy, john key, science, telecommunications - Tags:

Looks forward

Visionary

Inspired by a forwarded e-mail about Obama’s speech to the NAS with this line in it

Imagine Key committing to invest 3% of GDP in R&D

Obama 27th April 2009 at the National Academy of Science

I am here today to set this goal: we will devote more than three percent of our GDP to research and development. We will not just meet, but we will exceed the level achieved at the height of the Space Race, through policies that invest in basic and applied research, create new incentives for private innovation, promote breakthroughs in energy and medicine, and improve education in math and science.”

As President Kennedy said when he addressed the National Academy of Sciences more than 45 years ago: ‘The challenge, in short, may be our salvation.’
Thank you all for your past, present, and future discoveries.

key-9-march-2009-press-conference-4

Visions - yes

But no, what we have is Key irresponsibly making promises before an election that are just daft and which will be ‘responsibly’ dropped (because it was always too costly). Having ACT and its CCD’s (Climate Change Deniers) getting NIWA trying to muzzle our climate scientists so that they can kill the growing green industries while stifling discussion about the ‘review’ of the ETS. Cutting the rural R&D Fast Forward fund, so we can get out-competed in our main export sectors.

Visionary

Our future. Axeman

I suspect that Bill English in his Black Budget will cut our already pathetic 1.1% of GDP for science. After all it is too close to being half of the OECD average.

Imagine – all these things do not help to further fund tax-cuts for the affluent. They allow future generations to have a future. But of course having aspirations to a better future is less important than giving tax-cuts to affluent people who don’t really need them.

6 comments on “Imagine. ”

  1. BLiP 1

    Who was it that said:

    Key doesn’t so much have a” vision for the future” as much as “aspirations going forward?”

    Bang on!

  2. Stephen 2

    How useful is dictating ‘% of GDP’ when the government does not control GDP?

  3. Stephen 3

    So is it – ‘whatever GDP is, we’ll spend ‘x’ portion of that arbitrary number (whatever the hell it is) on science’?

  4. infused 4

    Yeah and watch Obama bankrupt the country.

  5. Zephirum 5

    infused:
    Conservatives promised to keep government budget down. So let’s look at America. Not only did the government grew bigger, agencies responsible for the benefits of the citizens got trimmed. Defence grew to become a behemoth.

    Now let’s see what brought American more wealth in the past. Is it war? or is it all the amazing scientific research? If you really think increase research means losing money on useless things, you probably should throw away your computers, and disconnect your internet, throw out the prescription pills you’ve been taking and go back and live in a cave.

    Obama won’t bankrupt the country, it’s utter stupidity by some “conservatives” that will. Because by “saving money” conservatives want to rip out important investments for the country and put them in their own pockets for the momentary satisfaction that they have more money at hand. After all, some believe the rapture is coming soon, some maybe some neocons don’t really care about the future of a country…

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