Open mike 08/11/2012

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, November 8th, 2012 - 77 comments
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Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose.

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Step right up to the mike…

77 comments on “Open mike 08/11/2012 ”

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  1. Red Rosa 1
    8 November 2012 at 7:20 am

    Why Wilkinson should resign as Minister of Conservation as well.

    http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/7920646/Wilkinson-shuns-farm-runoff-control-appeal

    Could then become the Minister for Federated Farmers

    http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/4569111/Ministers-step-in-on-DOC-lease

    Worst Minister of Labour ever? Worst Minister of Conservation ever? Would have to run both close.

  2. Te Reo Putake 2
    8 November 2012 at 9:29 am

    Crisis, what crisis?

    Another 60 jobs go in manufacturing as kiwi company Dynamic Controls closes its Chch plant. This announcement comes two days after high tech company Rakon also laid off a similar number of workers and adds to the 40,000 jobs lost in manufacturing under this dismal Government. It almost makes me pine for the days when the National Party weren’t just anti-worker but were actively pro-business.

    Just who do the Nats represent these days?

    • Draco T Bastard 2.1
      8 November 2012 at 11:10 am

      And unemployment to 7.3%

      “New Zealand manufacturing is collapsing, and just this morning we learned unemployment hit a horrific 7.3% in September.

      • David H 2.1.1
        8 November 2012 at 12:50 pm

        And it’s Keys own favorite The Labour Household Survey. The one he uses as a club to beat all other claims down with. Now that’s been turned into Fish… Sorry No Tequila

      • mike e 2.1.2
        8 November 2012 at 10:47 pm

        Worst in 13 years when bungling bill english was last finance minister.
        175,000 unemployed!
        175,000
        new jobs promised!
        Difference 350,000
        Bennetts promise of 40,000 fewer on benifits into jobs
        Hollow promises from hollw shallow party!

    • muzza 2.2
      8 November 2012 at 11:56 am

      Who do Labour represent is a better question!

      Its always been clear who the Nats represent, at least they are somewhat honest about it!

      Imagine if the real figures were published!

  3. marsman 3
    8 November 2012 at 9:31 am

    A truck with two (!) trailers crashed on the Desert Road. Another truck crashed near Dunedin.
    Oh lets have more trucks on our roads AND lets also let trucking companies write their own Warrants of Fitness.

    http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/7921868/Search-for-driver-after-truck-crash

    • vto 3.1
      8 November 2012 at 9:35 am

      And bigger trucks too don’t forget. Recently on some roads the weight limit has risen, I think, from 45 tonnes to 60 tonnes, and the length gone out.

      Yeah, this lot are clever there’s no doubt ………………….

      Unfortunately people will get killed because of their cleverness with these trucking industry changes. Killed dead. Dead. Killed. Like Pike River. Dead.

      • Bill 3.1.1
        8 November 2012 at 9:45 am

        Is that an increase in tonnage and length over and above those allowed for by the last Labour led government?

        • vto 3.1.1.1
          8 November 2012 at 9:53 am

          Don’t know all detail but increasing weight was brought up early in this government’s term and is now in place as I understand. I seem to recall there had been some changes prior to that too, under labour I guess.

          I don’t really care who did it – the political philosophy behind these trucking industry changes has been a proven deadly failure at Pike River, as well as being behind finance company debacle and the leaky home monster. The philosophy needs amending quicksmart because these changes will lead to people being killed dead. It might be you. It might be me. If such an eventuality comes close to our bones then consequences will be brought to bear very personally to the politicians making these changes. I don’t know how the Pike River families keep themselves so calm. I would be knocking on Bill Birch’s door and Gerry Brownlee’s door. They did things which allowed these men to be killed dead. It is direct and personal.

          • Bill 3.1.1.1.1
            8 November 2012 at 10:10 am

            Yeah, my comment wasn’t meant to infer any finger pointing. I’m just curious as to whether weight and length limits have been pushed out even further is all. And for the same reasons as yourself…it’s crap, dangerous and stupid and reflects a ‘de-human’ aspect of neoliberal market thinking.

            • Draco T Bastard 3.1.1.1.1.1
              8 November 2012 at 11:42 am

              Gerry Brownlee was talking about allowing for larger trucks to help with Chch but there was, IIRC, some discussion about allowing for bigger trucks in general. The Chch bit that Brownlee mentioned would, effectively, have become a trial period.

        • mike e 3.1.1.2
          8 November 2012 at 11:41 am

          National brought in the legislation bill!

          • Jim Nald 3.1.1.2.1
            8 November 2012 at 7:38 pm

            And Labour can build a strong case for reversing the changes.
            And being well-prepared to counter-respond to any stupid trucking protest that tried to block up the main streets of the cities.

            umm aahh yeahh … w… a… i … t… i… n… g…

      • mike e 3.1.2
        8 November 2012 at 11:40 am

        Yeah and the damage to roads is increasing with these heavy trucks and the cost of repair is continuing to go up as the rest of us road users have to put up with huge dips and more broken surfaces making the roads even more unsafe especially at night and in bad weather conditions when you can’t see those huge dips that lurch cars sideways out the lanes!

  4. rosy 4
    8 November 2012 at 10:04 am

    Nice work Jacinda Adern

    Papers obtained under the Official Information Act show that Ms Bennett was told by Ministry of Health officials that it did not support parents having their benefits cut if they didn’t stay up to date with Well Child checks.

    “The Ministry was clear in its advice that introducing mandatory checks risked ‘undermining the effectiveness of the programme’ and that using sanctions in the way proposed by Ms Bennett ‘would have a negative impact on the health of sanctioned beneficiaries and their families’.

    “The Ministry of Health also highlighted the fact that enrolments in the Well Child programme currently exceeds 95 per cent of the birth cohort each year and that the onus was actually on them to ‘do better to reach the families not currently receiving the full entitlement to well child checks by improving programme delivery’.

    It makes sense that organisations responsible for delivering programmes should make those programmes accessible to the 95% of the target population enrolled in them.

    • prism 4.1
      8 November 2012 at 10:15 am

      5% not enrolled in the Well Child check programme. That means that those people are likely to be in a difficult position in their lives and could be offered a helping hand with transport, a mentor that assists but isn’t authoritarian and in your face. Encourage autonomy, that is a given but let the service be there when needed with an offer to cope with say monthly checks for the child and a social chat with the parents.

    • David H 4.2
      8 November 2012 at 1:00 pm

      Yep Bennet don’t care. None of them give a rats arse for you, me, your or my children.

      And you can probably imagine when there’s a disaster, the rich pricks who owns it only want to know one thing, How much is it going to cost us. they don’t care how many of us are killed as long as they make their money.

  5. prism 5
    8 November 2012 at 10:05 am

    I have been sent an email by a relative with Australian connections. This tells in an outraged tone about a Middle East mall owner who refused to allow the Anzac badges to be sold on his property. We don’t know the facts and it seems an example of trying to build prejudice over the internet. I guess this is how the anti feelings to any group that has been designated as contemptible can be spread. Half-truths, rumours, factual but isolated examples of behaviour deemed unacceptable. When did the sender stop beating his wife I wonder? Anyone can make up or magnify stuff and make trouble.

    • Bill 5.1
      8 November 2012 at 10:48 am

      Didn’t know you could buy Anzac badges in the first place. And anyway – any retail outlet has a right to stock whatever the hell they want (within legal bounds). What if the guy was a pink coloured Australian who felt Anzac badges signified something of a glorification of war riding on supposed sentiments of remembrance?

      That’s not denying your point about the internet promulgating bullshit and prejudice. Facebook is particularily pernicious in that respect (photo that could be from any context accompanied by an unverifiable text designed to get people all up in arms over whatever cause).

      And the MSM does the same shit. youtube footage overlaid with ‘fitting’ commentary, for example all those reports pertaining to Syria where youtube images lacking identifying features reinforced somewhat spurious or dubioous ‘news’ claims being made in the voice overs.

  6. Jackal 6
    8 November 2012 at 10:37 am

    Karl du Fresne bigot

    Another favourite thing that right wing propagandist’s love to promote is elitism. They do this by trying to ensure the class structure of capitalism, which is characterized by the conflict between the haves and the have nots, does not change. Without the poor, the rich simply cannot stroke their egos and feel superior about their wealth. And as usual, the bigots believe thet best way to achieve this is to attack the poor…

    • Uturn 6.1
      8 November 2012 at 12:08 pm

      Through some inexplicable lapse of sensiblity yesterday, I clicked a link through to Kiwiblog, where they were talking about the US election results as they came in. The theme in the comments was that the working class are a drain on our tax dollars. I’m not sure what kind of education you need to join that elite club, but I’m pretty sure that charter schools won’t fix the problem.

  7. karol 7
    8 November 2012 at 11:15 am

    Life in NZ just goes from one depressing statistic to another. Especially when i am attending to twitter. David Cunliffe has just tweeted:

    Unemployment up to 7.3%! While other countries look to better days ahead there’s no hope in NZ with National.http://cunliffe.co.nz/no-hope-for-nz-manufacturing-with-national/

    And Bomber has tweeted just a short while ago:

    Unemployment jumps to 7.3% – when will NZers accept that a PM in the top wealth class just doesn’t give a damn about their job security?

    When will we get an opposition with traction amongst more ordinary Kiwis?

    And Scoop tweeted the link to the Press Release with the latest depressing stats:
    http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/BU1211/S00308/household-labour-force-survey-september-2012-qtr-key-facts.htm

    • Jackal 7.1
      8 November 2012 at 11:42 am

      Bill English again tried to blame the global recession on the $500 million blowout yesterday, even though many other countries that were impacted the most are doing a hell of a lot better than New Zealand. National will no doubt try to duck and cover about the unemployment statistics as well, although their usual meme is that “it’s all Labours fault” is a more likely excuse to be given in the house today. Or perhaps they will simply deny there’s a problem, and resort to their “National has created jobs” blather. Personally I don’t think their outright lies and obfuscations are going to fix the problem of growing unemployment in New Zealand though… Only a competent government that has the interests of the people in mind when formulating policy could do that.

      • karol 7.1.1
        8 November 2012 at 11:45 am

        Well, whatever he says, it will be damage-control spin in the House today from English – there’s an indication in qu 2 for today’s Question Time:

        TODD McCLAY to the Minister of Finance: What steps is the Government taking to support jobs as part of its programme to build a more productive and competitive economy?

        • David H 7.1.1.1
          8 November 2012 at 1:20 pm

          It’s Thursday Karol, so as usual Key, English, Bennett, and a couple of others with sticky questions will not be there as usual. And as usual there will be No hold over of questions and it will be either Joyce or Brownlee’s bullshit as usual.

      • muzza 7.1.2
        8 November 2012 at 12:02 pm

        Yeah, nah, until people start asking questions like:

        Who really runs NZ, and just how corrupted is this place, then waiting for the fallout of the question, can people begin to wrap their heads around whats going on!

        Until then keep scratching around wondering why the theatrics decend into deeper problems for our country!

        • Dr Terry 7.1.2.1
          8 November 2012 at 6:47 pm

          Oh, if only the people would start demanding answers to the current hard questions! Will apathy continue still? Some responses I have so far seen to the latest slump in the economy and the terrible unemployment news, make it sound as though these matters are actually good news for the country!!

          • Dr Terry 7.1.2.1.1
            8 November 2012 at 8:07 pm

            One would expect Mr Joyce to be up on his Shakespeare! If so, how has he overlooked the words “”comparisons are odorous”?

      • Draco T Bastard 7.1.3
        8 November 2012 at 12:16 pm

        Of course he’ll blame that. He certainly won’t be taking responsibility for the fact that the blow-out is a direct consequence of his government cutting taxes for the rich.

        • Jackal 7.1.3.1
          8 November 2012 at 12:22 pm

          Yeah! There’s also the fact that National has borrowed New Zealand into a huge financial hole, and as a result of ratings agencies Fitch and Standard & Poor’s downgrading New Zealand’s credit ratings last year, we started paying more interest on those extensive government debts.

          There’s been complete and utter financial incompetence from National on many levels.

          Great link btw DTB, well worth reading.

    • Draco T Bastard 7.2
      8 November 2012 at 12:09 pm

      Hah, snap :mrgreen:

      And the NZHerald version:

      New Zealand’s unemployment rate unexpectedly rose to a 13-year high as the pool of jobs shrank for a second straight quarter with a flat labour market in Auckland and fewer full-time workers. The kiwi dollar tumbled about half a US cent.

      The unemployment rate rose half a percentage point to 7.3 per cent in the September quarter, the highest level since June 1999, according to Statistics New Zealand’s household labour force survey.

      Economists surveyed by Reuters were picking a 0.1 percentage point fall to 6.7 per cent.

      The economists prove themselves wrong – again. Wonder if this will get them to start questioning the theory that they hold so close to their hearts? NAH, not going to happen.

      • Treetop 7.2.1
        8 November 2012 at 2:08 pm

        Not good and uni is winding down and school leavers; unemployment will rise further.

        • Colonial Viper 7.2.1.1
          8 November 2012 at 5:21 pm

          It’ll be ok they can get jobs in Australia. Well, for a little while longer.

          • Jim Nald 7.2.1.1.1
            8 November 2012 at 7:42 pm

            The 1% mums and dads don’t care because they have already got their kids summer jobs stitched up at their own or their mates’ workplaces.

    • David H 7.3
      8 November 2012 at 1:15 pm

      After they are completely decimated in 2014 and then in 2018 there will be nothing left to govern so that will be when they get back in. AND thats all they deserve. They are nothing but a bunch of self serving, wallet watching, bottom feeders. And that is the LABOUR FRONT bench except one. All blindly following Captain Stutterbum.

    • Draco T Bastard 7.4
      8 November 2012 at 4:37 pm

      Key dismisses unemployment concerns

      The Prime Minister is blaming Auckland for skewing a national survey which puts unemployment at its highest in 13 years.

      Statistics New Zealand released the results of their Household Labour Force Survey this morning, showing 13,000 more unemployed people than three months ago and a total of 175,000 without jobs.

      But John Key says the data is at odds with the Government’s own “anecdotal” evidence and says the Government has created 57,000 new jobs over the last 12-18 months.

      So, Key’s gut feeling is that the numbers are wrong and that it’s all Auckland’s fault anyway.

      Seriously, how the fuck does he think he can get away with BatBullShit?

      • muzza 7.4.1
        8 November 2012 at 4:57 pm

        “They are just very much at odds with everything else that we see,” he says.

        “In the end it’s one survey and like a lot of surveys, from time to time, it can produce unusual data.

        “It is focussed on Auckland and that runs a little counter to what we’ve actually anecdotally seen in Auckland.”

        Mr Key didn’t go so far as to say the numbers were wrong, but said he’d wait until the December statistics are released.

        Its difficult to be surprised given what comes out his mouth, but this quotes should see him moved on!

        Oh and perhaps a little fiddle with the numbers in time for December!

        • Bill 7.4.1.1
          8 November 2012 at 8:13 pm

          If the survey was focussed on Auckland, then hey…isn’t Auckland the economic ‘powerhouse’ of NZ? And so if Auckaland is in the shit, then what about elsewhere? Oh, that’s right. Anecdotally overhearing people on the bus saying they will find out next week if they still have a job (printer) and knowing damned full well that early childhood is being gutted of qualified staff to make way for min. wage entrants. And as I sit here thinking it through, is it worth mentioning that I’m struggling to think of anyone I know from around here who has a full time job?

      • Dr Terry 7.4.2
        8 November 2012 at 7:02 pm

        Draco – the problem is that he goes on and on getting away with it! Now Key talks about “anecdotal” evidence. What the hell is that supposed to mean? Do people really buy into statements like that? Look up the meaning of “anecdote” – my dictionary defines it as “short usually amusing account of an incident” (in the Greek “unpublished” – meaning what we hear is only the sick scrambling within Key’s own mind) Well, he was short alright and amusing only in a highly bizarre kind of way. Fancy selecting this word, “anecdotes” in responding to the facts of unemployment!

  8. Draco T Bastard 8
    8 November 2012 at 12:49 pm

    The Great Reset

    If you haven’t seen those posts then a quick recap, all across the developed world we have seen stats showing that traffic and total distances travelled by people have not only stalled but fallen.

    So, traffic volumes are falling across the world including NZ and

    So I was looking through some other numbers yesterday and noticed a similar trend. In this case the numbers were the annual registration of new cars. These record the new registration of vehicles including those which are used imports. The numbers peaked in about 2005 and since have plummeted back to ~1995 levels.

    Now it appears that we’re even buying less cars. National, of course, keep building new roads. Considering this data the question that comes to mind is: Who are they building them for?

    • vto 8.1
      8 November 2012 at 1:13 pm

      “Who are they building them for?”

      For John Key to drive to his Omaha Beach beach house. And for all those John Key wannabe’s to drive their boats and flash cars to all them beaches and catch snappers. And for the ladies to drive to the country beach cafe and read the local real estate mag.

      Who are they building these roads for? Well, Northland’s permanent population hasn’t grown in about the last twenty years so it isn’t for them. And Northland’s economy certainly hasn’t grown like that either so it isn’t for the economic activity. So that leaves all of that extra traffic basically coming out of Auckland for purposes other than either the people who live in Northland or the economic activity. Which leaves beaches.

      It’s for the beaches Draco.

  9. weka 9
    8 November 2012 at 3:38 pm

    Anyone know how to turn off sound on a single webpage? (it’s an online game that I want to leave open). Safari.

  10. Rosie 10
    8 November 2012 at 4:03 pm

    Today is the anniversary of Rod Donald’s death.

    The video below made my eyes leak a little. He is speaking with a panel on an American politcal show, dicussing among other things our MMP system and NZ’s view of American foreign policy at the time (Iraq war, East Timor)To hear him speak in such a wise, warm and down to earth way at this very point in time when it feels like we have shit raining down us really sums in my mind how much we have lost.

    http://blog.greens.org.nz/?p=25863

    • weka 10.1
      8 November 2012 at 9:00 pm

      Donald was a massive loss for NZ. Thinking about what he might have brought to NZ politics in the last 7 years, very sad.

  11. Chris 11
    8 November 2012 at 5:19 pm

    We are all drowning in keyshit.

  12. Rhinocrates 12
    8 November 2012 at 7:20 pm

    Unemployment reaches a thirteen-year record and Labour’s spokespotato on employment, the utterly, utterly useless Su’a William Sio, has nothing to say relating to his portfolio. Is he leaving it up to Shearer to issue another flimsy and banal “e-newsletter” to allow him to feel that his job has been done, albeit by another hopeless inadequate… or has he genuinely not even been aware that he should be DOING HIS FUCKING JOB?

    That man should be making headlines, he should be embarrassing his opponent, he should be in the television studios, but no, he’s not. If he can stir himself out of bed, he’s campaigning to restrict basic human rights.

    When the Hell is it going to get through to these guys?

    Now assuming for the sake of argument that Shearer is a “nice guy” (which I doubt), he shouldn’t be. Since he hasn’t inspired any loyalty and verve in his front bench, they should damn well fear him and more specifically, they should fear his disapproval… but they don’t. He’s useless as a leader of a political party and they’re troughers, seeing the party as something that serves them, not something that serves the people with them as representatives.

    • Bill 12.1
      8 November 2012 at 7:26 pm

      Yup. Welcome to somewhere we’d all rather not be.

    • Red Rosa 12.2
      8 November 2012 at 7:50 pm

      Got it in one. We are paying these guys $150k+ per year- for what?

      Just possibly, some fresh ideas on how to engage the unemployed thousands on useful community work…. you know, like FDR and the CCC in the New Deal?

      DoC are having budgets cut all over the country – a good place to start?

      • Colonial Viper 12.2.1
        8 November 2012 at 8:49 pm

        you know, like FDR and the CCC in the New Deal?

        forget the US New Deal.

        Macmillan, Davidson and Nordemeyer figured it out for ourselves, right here in NZ, and the Savage Govt delivered it, starting with a Christmas bonus for every unemployed and poverty stricken person in NZ.

      • just saying 12.2.2
        8 November 2012 at 9:12 pm

        http://nzagainstthecurrent.blogspot.co.nz/2012/11/an-election-day-history-lesson.html

        A brief reminder of the history of the ‘new deal’ by Trish Kahle and a stark reminder of what we are up against, and how much nastier things are set to become for the working class. If the above link doesn’t work, it’s from Steve Cowan’s “Against the Current” blog.

        One of the disadvantages this time around is the ever burgeoning surveillance industry which will be a major weapon in the arsenal of the elite and their enforcers. The prisons are already being built to “house” those able to organise effective disssent. And thanks in part to the welfare state the government already has a mountain of personal information to use against anyone putting their head above the parapet.

        ….”After a decade of right-wing reaction and working class retreat, crisis led to an explosion–but I’m not talking about the revolutionary explosion of the Arab Spring, or the occupation of the Wisconsin state capitol by union members and their allies, or Occupy Wall Street. I’m talking about 1930.

        A reporter for the New York World described March 6, a day that began with President Hoover claiming employment would rise and ended with more than 500,000 people in the streets of 25 US cities, like this: “Women struck in the face with blackjacks, boys beaten by gangs of seven and eight policemen, and an old man backed into a doorway and knocked down time after time…. One of [the women] fought savagely howling curses…. A detective ran up and while the policemen held her crashed his blackjack into her face three times before a man dragged her away.“………..

        …….Much like the people who formed unemployed councils in the early years of the 1930s, the American working class finds itself in a barely contained free-fall. Living standards, which had been in decline since the 1970s, took a nose dive after the 2008 economic crash. Around the world, poor and working people have been blamed for a crisis they didn’t cause. And instead of making the banks and multinational corporations that caused the crisis pay for it, the ruling class–the 1%, as it were–are ramming through austerity packages around the globe, causing their profits to spike while wages, benefits, and real employment numbers continue to drop. Now, to add insult to injury, American politicians, Democrat and Republican, have put the social welfare policies on which millions of American rely on the block to receive the budget axe. The same policies for which women were beaten by policemen in the streets of New York, for which tenants defied eviction orders, for which unemployed people and workers were shot at by gun thugs are being stripped away. Critically, not only will these austerity measures not fix the financial crisis, they will create a social catastrophe.

        But if there’s one lesson we can learn from the struggles of the 1930s that culminated in, among other things, Social Security, the cornerstone of the too-meager American social safety net, it’s this: FDR might have signed the SSA into law, but it was the people like us–the workers, the farmers, the unemployed–who created it….”

    • David H 12.3
      8 November 2012 at 8:10 pm

      As I said before they will need to be voted out in the biggest bloodletting ever. Then Maybe in 2018 they can rebuild, and try to pay for all the fuck ups and money pouring overseas. Because everything has been sold. And The fact that national sold the assets is not the biggest obscenity here, it’s the fact that Labour didn’t even lift a finger to stop them.

    • Jim in Tokyo 12.4
      8 November 2012 at 9:48 pm

      With these shock unemployment stats, Labour have just been handed a loaded political shotgun, yet the whole front bench seems to be content to sit and watch as Shearer peers down the barrel and tries to remove specks of dust with his tongue.

  13. Anne 13
    8 November 2012 at 7:37 pm

    English actor/comedian, Clive Dunn has died aged 92. Most famous for his role as Corporal Jones in that classic of classics “Dad’s Army”. His most famous line “don’t panic”, at which point he always panicked. I think he was the last one of that wonderful 1970s TV comedy left alive. Apparently also a great Labour stalwart. RIP Clive Dunn.

    http://tvnz.co.nz/entertainment-news/dad-s-army-star-clive-dunn-dies-video-5204921

    • Rhinocrates 13.1
      8 November 2012 at 8:18 pm

      Must be the last of the Dad’s Army crew too. Sad. I recommend that everyone try to track down at least an episode of that. The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp would be worth one’s while too. Here’s to bumbling decency that actually makes its way through!

  14. weka 14
    8 November 2012 at 7:57 pm

    Key’s slip of the tongue for today, on Checkpoint, with regards to the increased unemployment rate and NACT’s economic plan: “we not going to change tact”.