Open Mike 02/11/13

Written By: - Date published: 7:35 am, November 2nd, 2013 - 53 comments
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53 comments on “Open Mike 02/11/13 ”

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  1. North 1
    2 November 2013 at 7:43 am

    Already posted this morning on “The test” –

    Get this incoherent opining from Old Wanker Armstrong in the Herald this morning:

    http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=11150241

    Sniffy pejorative from the author of “John Key has gravitas”.

    Subtext – “Hmmm………Cunliffe’s run away somewhat…….we’d better set about pegging him back…….all together now 1-2-3……”

    So many on TS have anticipated the ramping up of the corporate media attack. Here it is.

    As for TS contributor Wayne – ignore the pompous prick and his mock reasonableness. He’s here to obfuscate not to educate. Just like Old Wanker Armstrong.

    • karol 1.1
      2 November 2013 at 7:57 am

      My response here. Edited version:

      Well, Armstrong accuses Cunliffe of being out of touch on key issues. Yet if anyone appears out of touch in Armstrong’s latest piece it is him. He has focused on some issues that he marks as marginal, and ignores others – where is mention of the superannuation issue?

      His main compliant about Cunliffe and Labour is this, as in the caption under the Cunliffe photo:

      Marching leftwards is neither in Cunliffe’s best interests nor Labour’s, as a mainstream party.

      Armstrong just woke up to the smell of his own fear – looking everywhere, in every nook and cranny – to find something to say it ain’t so….. change is coming.

      • Jim Nald 1.1.1
        2 November 2013 at 9:21 am

        Yeah. It would actually be quite troubling if the Armstaunch neolib were to offer up false praises.
        It is more assuring when, with this crooked reporter, what you see is what you really get with a biased pro-bankster scribe.

      • David H 1.1.2
        2 November 2013 at 10:01 am

        I don’t expect to get my comment to that load of right wing scare mongering, printed.

    • Rogue Trooper 1.2
      2 November 2013 at 10:37 am

      certainly some mis-direction at play in that piece by Armstrong.

  2. Morrissey 2
    2 November 2013 at 7:44 am

    On leaving the Guardian
    Reporting the NSA story hasn’t been easy, but it’s always been fulfilling. It’s what journalism at its crux is about, and we must protect that.
    by GLENN GREENWALD, Thursday 31 October 2013

    As many of you know, I’m leaving the Guardian in order to work with Pierre Omidyar, Laura Poitras, Jeremy Scahill and soon-to-be-identified others on building a new media organization. As I said when this news was reported a couple of weeks ago, leaving the Guardian was not an easy choice, but this was a dream opportunity that was impossible to decline.

    We do not yet have an exact launch date for the new outlet, but rest assured: I’m not going to disappear for months or anything like that. The new site will be up and running reasonably soon.

    In the meantime, I’ll continue reporting in partnership with foreign media outlets (stories on mass NSA surveillance in France began last week in Le Monde, and stories on bulk surveillance of Spanish citizens and NSA’s cooperation with Spanish intelligence have appeared this week in Spain’s El Mundo), as well as in partnership with US outlets. As I did yesterday when responding to NSA claims about these stories, I’ll also periodically post on my personal blog – here – with an active comment section, as well as on our pre-launch temporary blog. Until launch of the new media outlet, the best way to learn of new stories, new posts, and other activity is my Twitter feed, @ggreenwald. My new email address and PGP key are here.

    I’m gratified by my 14-month partnership with theGuardian and am particularly proud of what we achieved together over the last five months. Reporting the NSA story has never been easy, but it’s always been invigorating and fulfilling. It’s exactly why one goes into journalism and, in my view, is what journalism at its crux is about. That doesn’t mean that the journalists and editors who have worked on this story have instantly agreed on every last choice we faced, but it does mean that, on the whole, I leave with high regard for the courage and integrity of the people with whom I’ve worked and pride in the way we’ve reported this story.

    As I leave, I really urge everyone to take note of, and stand against, what I and others have written about for years, but which is becoming….

    Read more…
    http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/31/glenn-greenwald-leaving-guardian

    See also….
    http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/14/independent-epitaph-establishment-journalism

  3. phillip ure 3
    2 November 2013 at 7:46 am

    it’s ok..!..the cows will be ok..!

    http://whoar.co.nz/2013/comment-bill-english-to-abandon-dipton-diptonites-sob-in-streets/

    (excerpt..)

    “….local identity ‘gussy’..and others..were reported as being in tears at the news..

    ..gussy was inconsolable – saying:..’it’s been so long since we’ve seen him..we’ve forgotten what he looks like..

    ..and now this..!..”

    phillip ure..

    • ianmac 3.1
      2 November 2013 at 9:48 am

      I wonder if it it is a precaution that when National loses the next Election, Mr English can just resign without causing an embarrassing by-election?

  4. North 4
    2 November 2013 at 8:16 am

    Wonder what the tack will be when the LP conference doesn’t deliver implosion ?

    “Cunliffe papers over the cracks……” (Armstrong).

    “Sunday media ban scoffs at transparency……denies use of toilets.” (Potty Gower).

    “Humphh……what can I say…….where’s the PM’s number ?” (Billy Boy Ralston).

    “As we were saying at dinner the other night Michelle……” (Brian Edwards).

    “In an unmistakably micro-managed annual conference…….” (The Nicest Man On Earth Mora).

    “Fuck off and mind your own business, scribblers !” (joint communique QoT and Felix).

    “Hear hear !” to the last one.

  5. Tim 5
    2 November 2013 at 8:49 am

    Congratulations to RNZ and the team at “The Wireless” for getting something up and running in the new media landscape. I’d prefer to see it multi-platform (simulcasts on the radio spectrum) to cater for those (often in poverty) who don’t have access. Take back one of Joyce’s mates commercial delivery channels to deliver it maybe.
    Let’s hope the Natzies don’t develop the same attitude to it as they did TVNZ6 & 7.

  6. vto 6
    2 November 2013 at 9:37 am

    I am astounded that John Key has opened up the honours system to crims, provided their criminal acts have nothing to do with the good deeds to be knighted for.

    ffs

    Doug Graham, man of most poor judgment in New Zealand.
    Poor judgment in getting involved with flawed business Lombard.
    Poor judgment in not recognising problems with finance company business model.
    Poor judgment is signing inaccurate documents.
    Poor judgment in proclaiming innocence.
    Poor judgment in appealing various aspects of his criminal conviction
    Poor judgment in not relinquishing his knighthood.

    • Jim Nald 6.1
      2 November 2013 at 9:44 am

      It is all quite self-serving with this John the Con. He is softening up the country and establishing a precedent for his own retention of knighthood in a similar situation further down the track 🙂

    • ianmac 6.2
      2 November 2013 at 9:53 am

      Fran O’Sullivan has a surprisingly scathing column re Sir Doug’s fall from grace. She sees it as a sort of poetic justice given his lack of action way back when the BNZ was in trouble. Unusual to agree with Fran but…
      http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=11150302

      • vto 6.2.1
        2 November 2013 at 10:04 am

        Agreed.

        Fancy trying to claim that because it is a strict liability offence where no intent is required then the failure is somehow less grave ?.?? ..? …!

        ffs

        Strict liability offences are that way because of the very fact that the acts involved are more grave! That is the entire point.

        John Key is once again either completely bullshitting or completely ignorant. In this instance I suggest ignorance. What a shameful PM.

    • muzza 6.3
      2 November 2013 at 1:41 pm

      VTO, this is no real surprise.

      There was no chance that Graham was losing his knighthood, it would mean that others would end up under the microscope for past and present criminal escapades.

      The higher the position or title awarded, the bigger the crimes, the more accomplished the criminal!

      That’s all there is to it…

      • Rhinocrates 6.3.1
        2 November 2013 at 6:09 pm

        Well it’s who you are and the scale on which you do it. If you’re a little person, you get the hammer for your little crimes, but if you’re a big person, then the big crimes somehow become diffuse, like an aura… and like an aura, some become admirable.

        Here’s one I’ve heard before:

        Kill one and you’re a murderer.
        Kill ten and you’re a celebrity.
        Kill a hundred and you get a medal.
        Kill a thousand and you’re a war hero.
        Kill a million and you’re a statesman.

        Now:

        Steal a dollar and you’re a naughty child.
        Steal ten and you’re a delinquent.
        Steal a hundred and you’re a criminal.
        Steal a thousand, you’re a menace to society (especially if you’re brown).
        Steal a million and you’re a celebrity.
        Steal millions and you’re too big to fail/suffered enough already, blah blah blah…
        Steal billions and you’re a God of Wall Street.

        Now if you wear a blue uniform:

        Commit one rape, break one neck and… well that’s even better. Who says that the pigs are dumb? They know that they don’t have to climb a long ladder to get immunity.

  7. joe90 7
    2 November 2013 at 10:42 am

    It’s that time of year again.

  8. phil 8
    2 November 2013 at 10:47 am

    Due credit to Fran for the history of some of the financial shenanigans that went on, and still go on. I do enjoy when tories express distaste when their own elite lose money, by dodgy dealings.

  9. Matthew 9
    2 November 2013 at 12:07 pm

    Most voters would prefer Labour to work with the Greens than with New Zealand First

    http://tvnz.co.nz/national-news/cunliffe-takes-charge-his-first-labour-conference-video-5666779

    • Jim Nald 9.1
      2 November 2013 at 12:28 pm

      Appreciate that link, cheers.

      We hear from John Key there at 1’57” that “… they [Labour] are wrong to be raising to age 67, New Zealand can afford it.”

      Pending a really compelling argument yet to be heard from Labour about raising the entitlement age, the vote from me on this goes to John Key.

      • felix 9.1.1
        3 November 2013 at 8:10 pm

        Yep Labour are on the wrong side of this one and need to sort it out quicksmart.

        It’s an utter disgrace.

    • QoT 9.2
      2 November 2013 at 11:15 pm

      That was a fascinating poll. I’m a Labour/Greens fan myself but I would never have thought it was that high across all voters.

  10. Draco T Bastard 10
    2 November 2013 at 12:38 pm

    An interesting take on keeping the British Monarchy as our Head of State.

    Mr Hamilton recalled being invited during his time in Berlin by the British ambassador to an official dinner during Queen Elizabeth’s state visit to Germany.

    “It was a grand occasion, but it came as a shock to me to realise that here was my head of state in Berlin and she was completely unable to fulfil a key part of the role required of her – to represent in this case New Zealand’s interests in Germany.

    Of course she wouldn’t be able to do any such thing as she’s, first and foremost, the head of the UK.

  11. chris73 11
    2 November 2013 at 12:43 pm

    http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/9355250/Goff-signals-compromise-over-TPP

    http://www.gisborneherald.co.nz/article/?id=34628

    http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11149067

    The medias finally starting to report whats actually happening and not just re-printing Labour/Green press realeases

    All the potential ramifications will make this next election very interesting

  12. aerobubble 12
    2 November 2013 at 1:11 pm

    Guilty of making misleading statements, no reflection
    on the services he won his knighthood for, i.e politics.

    A noted politician, to accomplish their art, must know
    a misleading statement when they see one.

    I would have thought quite the contrary, even more,
    a politician knighted could argue they wouldn’t know
    a misleading statement.

    But Key’s doctrine is one rule for them, another for us.

    A knighted sportmans, found to selling sports drugs?
    A knighted charity worker, found pocketing charity funds?
    A knighted politician, found guilty of misleading statements?
    A knighted police officer, found guilty of perjury?

    Clearly, Key believes, as he said as much, that he would have to manage all
    those honored; if he gave in and asked for the knighted back this once.

    That’s so insulting to those most honored by our society!

    So misleading too.

    So few have to given them back, arguably then, a good reason for
    time to time one to be made to do so. Unless we let Politicians go
    on making illegal misleading statements that leave investors shortchanged.

  13. amirite 13
    2 November 2013 at 1:52 pm

    Gawd, you have to be of strong stomach and a blind worshipper of His Shonkiness to enjoy this piece of sycophantic arselickery from (JK’s)Staff’s main Shonkey cheerleader:

    http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/opinion/9352874/Five-key-points-for-Nationals-popularity

  14. Tim 14
    2 November 2013 at 2:10 pm

    and just a message to David Shearer – so things are kept in perspective at the Conference:

    I wish to dob in my dirty filthy bennie neighbour (an Invalid on account of ongoing heart problems, amongst other things – the most severe attack of which left him with 30% damage to his life sustaining organ).
    I just caught him up a ladder trying to seal the leaks in his humble abode having had an entire 5 litre bucket of water accumulate in the roof space.
    I thought:
    “mmmm, you dirty dirty dirty filthy bennie ripping off the system – if you can climb up a ladder, then you can fucking well go and work at McDonald’s for minimum wage. If you’d done that, then you could bloody well have afforded to go get yaself a builder or plumber!. You could probably have arranged a ‘cashie’ under the table job too!!!. FFS! What’s the matter with you!”

    I was going to go have a piece of him, except he appears to be having a lay down – PATHETIC ole cnut! Christ! he’s only climbed up a ladder half a dozen times after all with a few loads of sealing compound!

  15. Rodel 15
    2 November 2013 at 2:17 pm

    Yay! Sir Paul Henry is returning from his successful stint in which he enthralled Australians.
    I shall carefully note all those companies that advertise in and around his TV3 programme to avoid purchasing their products.

    • Tim 15.1
      2 November 2013 at 2:28 pm

      Indeed!. Me too – the crass, self-indulgent little specimen. If ever there was a mid-life crisis trying to prove it’s ‘togetherness’, it’s a Henry personified.
      @ Rodel – while you’re at boycotting anything advertised that’s associated with the little wood gnome with an ego the size of a bus – do what I do: When attending either of the supermarket chains (desperately trying to get it over with) – wherever possible, JUST purchase the loss-leader items.
      Of course there are other items that come from the same source as the twee brandings all wrapped up as budget (everything from noodles to noddles to coffee – fuck the labels!

      One day – when we get a change of gubba gubba – we might get an enquiry into the antics of the vertically integrated, supply-side mono/duopolistic chains squeezing the little out of bizz.

      The harder the rise – the harder they fall!

    • greywarbler 15.2
      2 November 2013 at 7:48 pm

      Rodel
      You’re being ironic right? Sir Paul Henry – did Paul Holmes will his gong to the other Paul as he didn’t need it anymore.

      Or perhaps you are mixing Paul H with the Governor-General Sir Anand Satyanand.
      Oct 4, 2010 – TVNZ is standing by Breakfast host Paul Henry saying he vocalises … Mr Key whether Governor-General Sir Anand Satyanand was a New … Sir Anand is New Zealand’s first Governor-General of Indian and Pacific ancestry.

      He doesn’t seem to have been gone a day and you say he is coming back!
      But the cat came back the very next day.
      Yes, the cat came back. They thought he was goner
      But the cat came back. He just wouldn’t stay away

      Old Mr. Johnson had problems of his own.
      He had a little cat that just wouldn’t leave his home.
      He tried and he tried to give the cat away.
      He gave it to a little man going far far away…
      But the cat came back the very next day.

  16. Huginn 16
    2 November 2013 at 2:58 pm

    From the Guardian: This interactive rundown of NSA spying revelationsis beautiful and very, very, very thorough.

    http://www.theguardian.com/world/interactive/2013/nov/01/snowden-nsa-files-surveillance-revelations-decoded#section/1

  17. Tracey 17
    2 November 2013 at 3:14 pm

    That the right are so agitated and sone outright angry, is a good sign for new zealand.

  18. Pascal's bookie 18
    2 November 2013 at 7:07 pm

    So I’m guessing that guy who shot up LA airport, with notes in his bag about the ‘conspiracy to form a world government’ and suchlike, was a blag flag event right?

    • QoT 18.1
      2 November 2013 at 11:18 pm

      Well called; I refer you to comment 20. But then, it is muzza, so it may just be part of his Personal Research Project and not a genuine assertion of conspiracy.

  19. greywarbler 19
    2 November 2013 at 7:24 pm

    I came across the name Ian Martin Brit comedy writer for The Thick of It. He’s quite a lively fellow and here is an item he wrote 25 March 2012 warning of the doomful time in Brit now.
    http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/mar/25/tory-nightmare-dont-say-werent-warned

    We’re living in some nightmarish Harry Potter spinoff featuring Slytherin overlords and magical Lib Dem owls. And some of us saw it coming – but it doesn’t have to be this way

    The anxiety of living under a Tory government is that you’re only ever a few days from the next national bad luck lottery draw. You know something spectacularly horrible will be announced next week. You just don’t know whose unlucky balls they’ll be holding.

    Don’t say you weren’t warned. We told you what the Tories were like, we of the wilted generation, two years ago. We’d seen it all before. We were struggling young parents ourselves in the 80s when Thatcher’s deregulation of the market led to class war, video nasties and Bananarama. We told you. You wouldn’t listen…

    This is why we warned you about the Tories. We knew it would be easier for them to deconstruct the welfare state this time round as they spent much of their last time in office loosening the bolts. The print unions and the miners were defeated early on. The rest of the Tory era was spent dismantling a working class power base it had taken a century and a half to build. They had plenty of time. My son was born in 1979, the year Thatcher became prime minister. He was 18 before the Tories were turfed out again.

    Local authorities were humiliated, their stock of affordable housing sold in a right-to-buy fire sale, their powers gradually whittled down to bins and dog waste. The Public Finance Initiative, greatly expanded under the auspices of Blair, was originally introduced as a buccaneering Tory programme, an innovative way of “synergising” public and private sectors. In much the same way that partnerships are forged between a desperately broke family and a loan shark….

    I’m a member of two writers unions. One here, and one in the US I had to join for an American gig last year. I had to join. It’s a closed shop. If you’re not a member of the union, you can’t write TV comedy over there. The union takes a cut of your earnings in return for protecting your interests and bumping your fee up to a decent minimum. Every time I get an email from them it’s like a message from some 1970s socialist utopia. In Los Angeles.

  20. muzza 20
    2 November 2013 at 9:01 pm

    Latest false flag event at LA Airport, they are coming thick and fast now, or is that fast and furious.

    The obligatory staged event, complete with exact drill/training being carried out in the lead up to the real event.

    All rather predictable, the freshest patsy with the three part name – Paul Anthony CianCia, is alleged to be anti government (read, conspiracy theorist), who toted an assault rifle into the terminal. Best get all those who speak out against the government, rounded up, on no fly lists, or better yet, just use the extended patriot act and the more recent NDAA to disappear them.

    So far the agencies appear to be claiming that CianCia, was not on any watch lists, no fly lists etc, which is rather convenient, and telling on many fronts.

    The stories are getting more ridiculous each time, it’s as if the script writers are now blatantly seeking to expose to the increasingly cynical, and false flag aware public what is going on, as the scenarios and actors become ever more wildly fabricated.

    • Murray Olsen 20.1
      3 November 2013 at 7:23 pm

      A friend of mine’s younger brother was living with the shooter, and was held as a material witness. While his family and friends were hoping and praying that my friend would see his brother again, you were making up this shit. This is why you conspiracy nutjobs make me sick to my stomach.

  21. Sanctuary 21
    4 November 2013 at 4:33 pm

    Josie Pagani has just been on Mora’s show absolutely spitting the dummy at the female MP quota policy. Shows how completely isolated her views are now.