LB: Government Spin and Hidden Secrets

34 comments on “LB: Government Spin and Hidden Secrets ”

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1. geoff 1

   8 March 2014 at 4:46 pm

   Great post, clearly covers most of the big failings of National.
   • Chooky 1.1

     9 March 2014 at 9:26 am

     +100…great points

     Labour needs to be punching these points home where ever and when ever possible

     David Cunliffe needs to be seen with Shane Jones together punching these points home…Jones puts the Maori/Polynesian face on the Labour Party …and he is a King Batsman…together Cunliffe and Jones could be a formidable duo!

     (cf the new Mayor Tommy Carcetti and his right hand man Norman Wilson in the fourth season of ‘The Wire’….this TV series set in Baltimore which apart from a very graphic illustration of USA education( and what we should and should not do here in NZ) ….is also a very astute portrayal of how to operate in a difficult and divided political environment and win!)

     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy_Carcetti

     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Wilson_(fictional_character)
     • Chooky 1.1.1

       9 March 2014 at 9:39 am

       oops havent seen the following series ….but this duo works very well initially

       …one thing Labour does need is a strong Maori face in the leadership/spokespeople ranks… and there are plenty of very able Maori waiting in the wings…as yet unused

       ….cf. National which is doing everything it can to up its attractiveness to the very people it is screwing
2. karol 2

   8 March 2014 at 4:48 pm

   Yes, this is an excellent post. It also focuses on the issues. The left had been making inroads on many of these issues, such as on child poverty, the inequality gap, power prices, TPP, the invasive surveillance state, youth unemployment, house unaffordability, the need for fair employment practices and wages, etc – plus a little bit on the shallowness of the “rockstar economy” concept.

   So the right has unleashed a barrage of diversions onto MPs clothes, houses, etc., and beating up minor slips into something major. Team Key doesn’t want to talk too much about these significant issues.
3. Jimmie 3

   8 March 2014 at 5:01 pm

   A great essay on leftist rhetoric. A sad pity that voters don’t seem to share the author’s sentiments.

   If John Key is the devil incarnate and has mismanaged NZ inc for the last 5 years don’t you think that National would be sitting on 30% in the polls and Labour would be knocking on 45%?

   This hasn’t happened so there is something wrong with the scenario as painted above – it could be that NZ inc is doing quite well and John Key looks set to hit a 3rd term later this year.
   • lprent 3.1

     8 March 2014 at 5:07 pm

     You did miss the bit about “spin” right? Do you need a wikipedia link about what it is used for? Basically the author is saying that National is masking the reality from the public using spin.

     /sarc

     Shorter version – are you are a mindless dork?
     • Old Tony 3.1.1

       8 March 2014 at 5:28 pm

       Prefers Jimmies version to the untruths and distortions of this item:
       1. Government austerity in 2008 courtesy of Labour spraying money around like confetti so any impact like GFC left no room to manoeuvre.
       2. Mother of all housing booms caused in part by Labour’s envy tax increase in 2001 or thereabouts which Westpac did some research on and noted had caused a significant part of total price increases as higher earners used the differential between personal and other tax rates to their advantage in buying property.
       3. Economy has been one of the most successful in the world post GFC as any comparison of growth rates will show.
       4. Fall in comparative education achievement primarily attributable to Labour’s period in office given the lag in these things.
       5. Earthquake did have some minor impact believe it or not but clearly the Greens haven’t noticed.
       6 Unemployment great compared to many other economies.
       7. Expenditure on health and education continued to grow post GFC unlike places like Ireland and even Canada where real cuts occurred.

       And so we could go on.
       • Pasupial 3.1.1.1

         8 March 2014 at 6:36 pm

         Old fool

         Do you have any evidence, or are you just spewing untruths and distortions randomly?

         1. “Labour spraying money around like confetti”; a strange turn of phrase for paying off debt rather than borrowing to pay for tax-cuts like NAct.
         2. “Labour’s envy tax increase in 2001 or thereabouts”; check your facts, yes 39% for $60000 was higher than 33% (1988-2000), but lower than any rate from 1935 through 1988. A targeted progressive tax for those who profited most from social infrastructure, compare with the current regressive GST hike that takes from those who can least afford it.
         3. GDP is not the economy, the GINI has really come out of the bottle since NAct took office.
         4. I don’t trust your assertion that education disparities are “primarily attributable to Labour’s period in office given the lag in these things”; evidence please.
         5. LB noted “activity generated from the Christchurch rebuild” if you’d bothered to read the post.
         6. Our unemployment rates have indeed increased greatly compared to many other economies.
         7. Evidence please (for public rather than private education and health-care).

         And so we could go on.
         • David H 3.1.1.1.1

           8 March 2014 at 6:57 pm

           Spraying money around? 9 years of Surplusses whilst paying for the folly of the previous Nat government.

           National
           Borrows and spends like there’s no tomorrow if you are rich enough to join in the largess.
           So when Labour wins the next election, the state of Nationals 6 years of books will tell a nasty story of mismanagement, upon incompetence, right up-to ministerial level and higher!
       • One Anonymous Bloke 3.1.1.2

         8 March 2014 at 8:36 pm

         “Left no room for manouvre”. Lying asshole Old Tony

         “This is the rainy day the government has been saving up for”. Bill English.

         So, who to believe, the lying asshole or Bill English? The lying asshole would say believe Bill English. Go figure.
         • Old Tony 3.1.1.2.1

           8 March 2014 at 10:40 pm

           Abuse aside that is not a bad riposte. I don’t think the two things are inconsistent. Labour paid down debt, set up Cullen fund etc and those things were great aids to the Nats in grappling with the GFC. However they also entrenched huge increases in Government spending through no-interest student loans, working for families etc which could not readily be unwound post GFC and did markedly cramp the new government’s ability to act.

           I think the last Labour government did some good things, but the hopelessly lopsided commentary of this item deserves an equally one-sided response.
           • One Anonymous Bloke 3.1.1.2.1.1

             9 March 2014 at 5:11 am

             More bullshit. In 1999, government spending was 35% of gdp. In 2008, government spending was 35% of gdp.

             Shall we just assume that everything you believe is wrong?
           • felix 3.1.1.2.1.2

             9 March 2014 at 7:32 am

             When talking about the interest on student loans I think we should go back a bit further. The loans aren’t some naturally occurring phenomenon which has to exist while we only quibble over who pays the interest.

             The introduction of the loans represented the end of “free” education, prior to that the state paid nearly the full cost. This system was only demolished so right-wing govts could cut taxes and there is no reason we can’t go back to sharing the cost of education more widely as a public good.

             This is where the discussion should centre. Interest on student loans is a cost to the state but the loan itself is proportionally a far greater burden to the individual citizen.
     • Jimmie 3.1.2

       8 March 2014 at 7:28 pm

       Putting aside your childish name calling lprent, believing an alternative reality that NZ is turning into a third world country that will only be fixed by the election of Labour/Greens this year is laughable and chasing a fantasy.

       This is the same mindset that caused the left to lose in 2011. Basically the hypothesis that NZ is going down the toilet, the Nats are using evil spin doctors to hypnotize the electorate, and the government will change as soon as enough voters awake from their stupour is what is driving the left heading towards the election this year.

       Is it because the reality that unemployment/crime are going down, the economy is growing strongly, and consistent popular support for John Key is just too painful for the left to accept?

       Or is it because the Opposition consists of a hopelessly divided Labour party who don’t know what or who they stand for and a Green party with the economic literacy on par with a 5 year old?

       After 6 years in the political wilderness and steering another 3 in the face the paradigm of the evil spinning Nats conveniently sidesteps the necessary surgery and reality check required by Labour of getting their house in order. (A change in leader has done nothing to change this)
       • geoff 3.1.2.1

         8 March 2014 at 8:16 pm

         Hopefully your side keeps believing that bullshit, Jimmie, because you won’t even see it coming when reality rolls in and knocks you flat on your arse.
         • Jimmie 3.1.2.1.1

           8 March 2014 at 8:22 pm

           Well I suggest you book mark that comment and maybe we can revisit the subject the day after the election lol?
           • instauration 3.1.2.1.1.1

             8 March 2014 at 9:27 pm

             Jimmie
             Can you suggest a colour or season to ascribe the next election ?
       • Sosoo 3.1.2.2

         9 March 2014 at 7:58 am

         In times of recession, people tend to become more conservative as they look to hang on to what they have. Of course, while individually rational, it’s collectively self-defeating behaviour, and that’s why we have been in this general malaise for so many years now.

         National is disproportionately gaining votes from older people who pigged out on the welfare state while things were good, and now don’t want to pay their fair share. It’s annoying, but putting up with periods of conservative stupidity is the cross that intelligent people everywhere must bear.
         • Clubconnecter 3.1.2.2.1

           9 March 2014 at 5:31 pm

           It’s also fair to say that Nact and Blinglish created a ‘false’ recession by digging an enormous hole with their 2008 tax cuts, which in turn, they used as justification for the asset theft (still on going) in term 2. Just for the RWNJ’s – Yes I am in the top tax bracket and would happily pay 39% again.

           “National is disproportionately gaining votes from older people who pigged out on the welfare state while things were good, and now don’t want to pay their fair share. It’s annoying, but putting up with periods of conservative stupidity is the cross that intelligent people everywhere must bear.”

           Excellent point. It can’t be emphasised enough. NZ Super recipients account for the largest proportion of ‘beneficiaries’ by a wide margin – the ‘boomers’ who are more than happy to accept ‘welfare’ but don’t want to pay for it.

           Suffices to say I think that many NZ’er’s are selfish, having been manipulated into the current paradigm by 30 years of NeoLib ideology, policy, propaganda and media.
   • Peter 3.2

     9 March 2014 at 5:07 am

     So none of these criticisms are valid because Kiwis’ love seeing John Keys photo on the cover of the Woman’s Weekly? There are none so blind as those who do not want to see.
     • Sosoo 3.2.1

       9 March 2014 at 7:59 am

       The Woman’s Weekly is pitched at conservatives: it’s their version of the New York Review of Books.
4. Lanthanide 4

   8 March 2014 at 9:45 pm

   We do have a rock star economy.

   It’s Justin Beiber, rather than Mick Jagger, though.

   A flash-in-the-pan sugar-hit with no underlying quality or staying power.
5. Stuart Munro 5

   9 March 2014 at 6:38 am

   There has been no real productivity growth during this government’s term. The financial numbers are epiphenomena of a real economy that is stagnant or in a morbid decline. Were the economy genuinely growing employment numbers and tax receipts would be much better. What have had, and what we have is the kind of robber government associated with South American military juntas. They will say anything, but they are here to steal. Nothing they do works, and they don’t care. If we want the kind of New Zealand we grew up in we are going to have to have these buggers out. It really doesn’t matter how, the pretence of democracy is so broken it has not constrained them at all.
6. Stuart Munro 6

   9 March 2014 at 6:42 am

   NZ is not alone in having a pretend government http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/feb/24/recovery-bubble-crash-uk-us-investors
7. Psycho Milt 7

   9 March 2014 at 8:52 am

   The section on child poverty is, much as I hate to say it, unfair to the government.

   The ‘facade’ part isn’t actually a facade – the ‘getting people into work’ bit certainly is, but poverty genuinely has pretty much flatlined, with only a slight increase under the current government, and that attributable to the GFC. And they have subsidised housing insulation, even if it was the Greens’ idea.

   The ‘reality’ part was mostly also a reality under the last Labour government and will be a reality under the next one. It will continue to be a reality as long as we have upwards of 20% of children being raised on a benefit at or soon after birth, and it will continue to be a lot worse for Maori as long as they have upwards of 40% of children in that category. The government that has a useful idea what can be done about that would be a very unusual one, and it’s a bit rich to blame the current one for not being that government.

   The ‘what the government is doing’ part is, again, largely what a Labour government would do, with the difference that the current government aims to see pay and employment conditions worsen (which is really the only sense in which they are genuinely doing something that increases child poverty, and is covered elsewhere in your post). Any sane government will expect and if possible require that the income spent on raising children is income earned by the children’s parents working for a living – National is in no sense unusual in this. And, as you point out, they are encouraging the growth of childcare centres – your quibbling about proportion of ‘qualified’ staff required is just that. Childcare centres don’t actually need 100% qualified staff, and this push to make them 100% qualified is yet another example of how the takeover of Labour by the tertiary-educated public-sector middle class is strongly against the interests of the working class Labour is supposedly meant to represent.
   • RedBaronCV 7.1

     9 March 2014 at 11:14 am

     There wouldn’t be so many children raised on a benefit if:
     – jobs paid decent wages
     – wealthy males paid decent child support instead of dumping their kids on the state.
     • Psycho Milt 7.1.1

       9 March 2014 at 2:37 pm

       I’m afraid going easy on deadbeat dads isn’t unique to the current government either.

       A Labour government may do something to drive up wages (don’t assume it though – the last one decided it was easier just to top up low wages with welfare payments), but the cultural shift towards beneficiary parenting proved resistant to the last jobs boom and will likely prove resistant to the next one. As long as we all pretend that sole parenthood is a perfectly good family type, rather than an unfortunate circumstance to be avoided if possible, there’s little the government’s going to be able to do about child poverty.
       • JanM 7.1.1.1

         9 March 2014 at 10:15 pm

         Maybe if there was more genuine help to support relationships in trouble there would be fewer solo families, but at present even the little support available seems to be being eroded by a lack of funding – penny wise and pound foolish, eh?
         It’s cheaper in the short term to vilify the people who aren’t coping than to give them a hand-up when they are in vulnerable circumstances, but the long term consequences can be anything but inexpensive to deal with.
         Solo parenthood will continue to be a significant part of our society until we work out how to be the fence at the top rather than the ambulance at the bottom.
         • Psycho Milt 7.1.1.1.1

           10 March 2014 at 6:26 am

           Oh, please – I’ve met plenty of supposedly “vulnerable people who aren’t coping” who are actually just too self-centred to make the necessary compromises for a marriage to work. And a lot of that 20+% who are on a benefit at the birth of the child or shortly after aren’t in anything you could describe as a “relationship.”
       • RedBaronCV 7.1.1.2

         10 March 2014 at 7:41 am

         The issue PsychoM isn’t the single parent who does the work and pays the money for the children – the reponsible one , it’s the parent who can’t be bothered being a parent and does the runner without paying. Very prevalent in the high income group.

         It’s interesting psychology that so many state resources are put into hounding the responsible parent and none into hounding the parent who doesn’t bother.
   • JanM 7.2

     9 March 2014 at 10:18 pm

     And your knowledge base for making statements against all ece teachers being qualified is???????????
     • Psycho Milt 7.2.1

       10 March 2014 at 6:18 am

       The lack of any evidence for its necessity.
       The fact that childcare centres have functioned perfectly well without 100% qualified staff in the past.
       Having personally witnessed the value of practical expertise and depth of experience some of these “unqualified” childcare workers bring to the job, particularly to care of the under-2s, when my own kids were attending one.
       Having personally witnessed the resentment some of these “unqualified” staff felt at the prospect of being forced to either take up unnecessary and expensive tertiary education they didn’t want, find another line of work, or retire early.
8. mickmarvel 8

   9 March 2014 at 9:47 pm

   Key has got this one in the bag. We are stuffed. That stupid anden talks that much shit she is chasing people away.
9. mickmarvel 9

   9 March 2014 at 10:46 pm

   Solo parents are a large block of our voting base. we must not be seen to vilify them. They must believe we have their welfare at heart.

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