Open mike 16/03/2016

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, March 16th, 2016 - 65 comments
Categories: open mike - Tags:

openmikeOpen mike is your post.

For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy).

Step up to the mike …

65 comments on “Open mike 16/03/2016 ”

  • Comments are now closed

  1. Paul 1
    16 March 2016 at 6:43 am

    February breaks global temperature records by ‘shocking’ amounthttps://www.theguardian.com/science/2016/mar/14/february-breaks-global-temperature-records-by-shocking-amount

    Milk continues its slide
    http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/rural/299027/global-dairy-prices-drop-overnight

    And the Herald thinks the goings on in the Bachelor are more important
    http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=11606103

    • vto 1.1
      16 March 2016 at 7:02 am

      Well, you know, we came marching out of Africa just not that long ago and spread around the globe, wiping out fellow species of human and Neanderthal on the way, reaching the farthest reaches like NZ in just the last millennium and ever since then we have just thickened up and thickened up until the current point where the natural environment is beginning to creak and break up, while we continue to thicken until, well, the natural environment is on the way to being in zoos only and we are as thick as ants crawling all over the entire place. This is the history and this is the future surely until some catastrophe wreaks havoc on the populace and the planet.

      what else can there be?

      • Paul 1.1.1
        16 March 2016 at 7:05 am

        I don’t know, but I think we can be better as a species than the trivial, ignorant, self-centred, vacuous, unthinking and reactive model encouraged by the Herald.

  2. amirite 2
    16 March 2016 at 7:08 am

    The NZ Wood Council says the free trade agreement with China is not working, they’ve been hit with multiple tariffs which make it hard to compete with China’s domestic wood product.

    So much for free trade. Looking forward to TPP, anyone?

    http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/299028/china-accused-of-unfair-play-on-forestry

    • saveNZ 2.1
      16 March 2016 at 9:13 am

      +1 amirite

    • Draco T Bastard 2.2
      16 March 2016 at 9:46 am

      Oh, good – means that we can save our forests, use the wood to build houses in NZ instead and rebuild our saw-milling industry.

      • TC 2.2.1
        16 March 2016 at 12:53 pm

        Yup however its a japanese company doing a fair amount of the extraction currently from mills in kaitaia, masterton and gisborne.

  3. Paul 3
    16 March 2016 at 7:09 am

    New Zealand will never solve its problems until it abandons neoliberalism and globalism.
    Free trade deals are killing this country.

    • Colonial Viper 3.1
      16 March 2016 at 8:38 am

      The political and business elite who work against the long term interests of their own people are killing this country.

      • Jones 3.1.1
        16 March 2016 at 8:50 am

        Because the political and business elite do not think in terms on nationality, unless it serves their purposes to do so. The non-elite have more in common with their equivalents in other countries than they do the rich and powerful from their own countries.

      • saveNZ 3.1.2
        16 March 2016 at 10:20 am

        @ CV They are not even political or business elite – they are often just dumbo opportunists, un convicted white collar crims, or people with psychological disorders who just happened to have stumbled onto being able to control a country like some sort of public school, bully boy fiefdom with no rules having paid the MSM off.

        I mean can we call Slater, Key, Brownlee, Bennett, Collins, English – political and business elite???

        If they win another election, it will be like Lord of the Flies.

        I actually blame the opposition too, if you can’t defeat these people and actually join forces against bullies for your own self presevation and get a few policies going that are reasonable and benefit most people and are relevant, what the F is going on?

        Just copy Bernie Sanders, not only his policies but how to write and articulate them.

        The opposition need to stop going on about pet issues, but start to articulate a bigger picture.

        https://berniesanders.com/issues/

    • saveNZ 3.2
      16 March 2016 at 9:27 am

      +1 Paul

      Free trade is really just turning into litegatious trade, where bigger and more wealthy parties win and stall all fights so that the little partners have to back down or spend all their time and money trying to fight. In short, it will just stall trade and innovation for NZ.

      None of it bodes well.

      With any agreement the detail is the most important. We all know ‘details’ or ‘potential consequences’ have never been a strong point with this government.

      They can’t even get a convention centre or a supercity working or even public transport going. Lordy keep them away from exports.

      They are like babes in the woods (but not so innocent) with economy and trade.

      Would you let a bunch of 7 year olds loose with your ATM card, unlimited power to screw up a country and casks of wine? Pretty much Groser on the free trade trail with Fed farmers in tow. All being championed along by a currency speculator with zero scruples known as the smiling assassin, who gets off on making people redundant.

    • Draco T Bastard 3.3
      16 March 2016 at 9:47 am

      The Free-trade deals are killing the world.

  4. Morrissey 4
    16 March 2016 at 7:13 am

    “A SHOCK JOCK who is politically WAY out of his depth.”
    Did Toni Street take advice from Janet Wilson before she executed
    Monday’s exquisite live-on-air attack on Mike “Contra” Hosking?
    Seven Sharp, Television One, Monday 14 March 2016

    The glib little homilies scheduled for the end of each episode of Television One’s godawful Seven Sharp are usually not worth the wait. If it’s not thirty seconds of something banal, it’s something infuriating, like Mike “Contra” Hosking boasting, contrary to all evidence, how he gave Nicky Hager a “hard time”. [1] Anyone who actually makes a point of listening to them is either (a) bored, (b) stupid, ( c) bewildered, or (d) an aficionado of the dismal.

    Tonight, however, the closing homilies followed an item that was actually interesting—about a dive bomb competition in Taupo. That’s why I was still watching when it came time for the sub-Father Ted routines. After the item was finished, Hosking’s offsider Toni Street stared at the camera, pausing just a little longer than would be comfortable. Then she delivered something she had clearly been planning for a long time: she let Hosking—and the viewers—know exactly what she thought of him.

    But she could not afford to criticize him directly, of course; instead, she followed the time-honored tradition of criticizing someone who exhibits identical characteristics to the actual object of her scorn. [2] So to have a go at Hosking, she had to find a substitute target to attack. Who could be out there with a level of arrogance, pomposity, shallowness and overbearing conceitedness that approaches that of Mike Hosking?

    After that tense extended pause at the end of the dive-bombing item, Toni Street launched her remarkable little insurrection. She began by talking about Megan Kelly, the Fox News broadcaster who suffered a nasty public attack by Donald Trump last year. Noting with satisfaction that Megan Kelly was now more popular than she had ever been, Street paused again, and then said this….

    TONI STREET: The increase in her ratings indicates the support for someone who can out Donald Trump for what he is: a shock jock who is politically way out of his depth. …..

    At the end of that remarkable little hatchet job, its victim immediately began thirty seconds of pedestrian and ill-informed comment about something else. He showed no apparent signs of appreciating he’d just been (metaphorically) tarred, feathered and kicked in the arse by someone who really despises him.

    [1] http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-15032015/#comment-985614

    [2] What made it so effective was that Toni Street maintained her composure throughout. She wielded the hatchet with exemplary coolness. Media junkies will no doubt remember Janet Wilson’s far more hysterical hatchet job on her husband three years ago….
    http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-22032013/#comment-607420

  5. adam 5
    16 March 2016 at 8:27 am

    So you support Hillary

  6. One Anonymous Bloke 6
    16 March 2016 at 8:32 am

    I see Paula Bennett has figured out how to respond to the dairy crisis.

    …single mums…

    • Sabine 6.1
      16 March 2016 at 9:04 am

      single mums, the worlds most dangerous being

      and then there is this – but I am sure the rock star economy will provide with well paying jobs for these soon to be unemployed people.

      I wonder what happened to the 700+ people that lost their jobs with Fonterra a few month back, wonder if they are back into work?

      http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=11606127

      Quote: “Unfortunately for the majority of the 3300 staff who were employed by Dick Smith, there’s probably zero chance of Kogan reviving any of the 393 physical stores in Australia and New Zealand. The deal was for the online stores only, plus the Dick Smith brand and its associated intellectual property.

      Which is not to say that Kogan won’t open any stores. The retail entrepreneur was originally vehemently opposed to physical stores in favour of online shopping, but admitted in December last year that that absolute stance was wrong, and opened a pop-up shop in Melbourne’s posh Prahran. Kogan might just have to work out how to create a profitable physical presence to bring in the cash, as the online Dick Smith will be just a fraction of the size of the old company.” Quote end

    • Draco T Bastard 6.2
      16 March 2016 at 9:56 am

      In Christchurch alone there were 426 people on the social housing register – the millions of dollars spent on testing and treating P houses could have bought an extra 15 properties.

      Then the government should probably stop taking a hundred million dollar dividend from HNZ every year.

  7. Mike C 7
    16 March 2016 at 9:30 am

    OH MY GOD !!!

    Just saw a post that George wrote about me last night … with people like Rachinger chiming in with their opinions about me.

    It’s mostly bull-shit and it is a very carefully manipulated piece of text.

    I said last week that I thought Pete George was losing it … and I still think it.

    As for Rachinger … everybody will see soon enough who he really is.

    The stats on YourNZ have dropped recently … so George won’t be happy about that.

    Good to know that in my absence … I am still useful to him as “Click-Bait” fodder. LOL.

    • Mike C 7.1
      16 March 2016 at 12:36 pm

      That post of Georges just gets better and better … because Rachinger has accused me of being an alcoholic and Kitty Catkin has basically said that I suffer from Multiple Personality Disorder … and George and others believe that I am in cahoots with their mortal enemy. LOL.

      http://yournz.org/2016/03/15/mike-c-and-lf/

  8. ianmac 8
    16 March 2016 at 9:53 am

    Audrey writes another anti-Little piece. Poorly written and ambiguous really.
    Except for this quote,
    “But a tweet by Labour MP Iain Lees-Galloway summed up Labour’s view of Key as “a complete and utter banker”.
    Naughty Iain!

    • Crashcart 8.1
      16 March 2016 at 10:58 am

      What got me was her assertion that Labour have lost on the TPP front because of all the tariffs it drops. Really? we got a list of this amazing tariff smashing TPP does? cause from what I remember it was incredibly limited.

      • North 8.1.1
        16 March 2016 at 9:35 pm

        Audrey is a moll troll. Can’t be said any other way sorry. The National Party is in her bones and everything. And fittingly given that she is the Political Editor of The Harold.

  9. Chooky 9
    16 March 2016 at 10:10 am

    Good cooperative Left Opposition work in Parliament yesterday..despite the noise and heckling:

    Winston Peters in parliament asks John Key:

    Why Is the government blocking a free trade deal with Russia?

    Why is the government pouring massive taxpayer support into the Hollywood film industry, Skycity Casino, Rio Tinto and now the TPPA campaign ?

    (…when the Democratic and Republican campaign leadership in the United States think it is a REAL DOG…and a big corporate protection racket against the interests of their workers and farmers)

    Andrew Little asks John Key:

    Whose side is the PM on?… the dairy farmers?… or the banks?

    http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/inparliament/audio/201793289/today-in-parliament-for-15-march-2016-evening-edition

    “Scrappy start to the week with John Key and Winston Peters having a right honourable stoush, each accusing the other of misleading the House and demanding an apology. The Speaker, David Carter, was having none of that and was repeatedly back on his feet restoring order. Questions for the prime minister were dominated by the pressure on dairy farmers from lower milk prices and servicing bank loans.”

    • ianmac 9.1
      16 March 2016 at 11:37 am

      Notice that Winston did not say it was Key who spoke of the $5billion. He asked about the reported comments of two Ministers re the $5billion. Key deflected all that by accusing Winston of “misleading the House.” Carter refused Winston the right to re-read his question which would have defeated Key’s deflection. Funny that!

  10. vto 10
    16 March 2016 at 10:40 am

    Michael Hill want the Queenstown basin all for himself and other rich people, nobody else.

    That other wanker Sam Neill wanted pretty much the same a few years ago.

    They want to stop all the huge development that has taken place already to accommodate them and their silly big houses, and have no more happen. They want to very selfishly pull up the ladder – quelle surprise…

    http://www.stuff.co.nz/travel/news/77806483/cap-tourists-and-development-to-keep-arrowtown-special–sir-michael-hill

    Well I suggest one way to do this is to require, in fact, a reversal of development to make the place like it was, with even less people than now. That would improve the place even more, according to Michael Hill’s logic.

    So legislate and regulate to require that every time one of these wankers wishes to sell their silly big homes, or passes on to the afterlife, their property is required to be sold solely for farming and other non-residential type activities… that should see it right ….

    Seriously, what planet do these rich bastards live on? They are actually divorced from reality

    • greywarshark 10.1
      16 March 2016 at 11:56 am

      Queenstown provides a centre for investment and tourism in southern NZ and is a blessing to some extent to preserve the region when Dairy goes down, till Sheep fight their way up more, Beef can perhaps keep going, and Bluff doesn’t have oysters killed by that disease.

      No more housing for the wealthy in Queenstown as suggested by Sam Neill would be good. But attractive small apartments for the workers at reasonable rents close to Queenstown, with shuttle buses at very reasonable cost, would be of value. That is what is needed and if they have a council that isn’t run by Mini-Cooper type people, then that will be what is presently being planned and implemented. Bets anyone?

  11. Grim 11
    16 March 2016 at 10:55 am

    Thinking out loud….Big lies and flawed models:

    Money Supply:
    Currency isn’t expanded to account for growth, debt is expanded to match demand.

    Banks do not expand money supply, they extend temporary credit based on demand to enable transactions.

    Once the transaction has been completed and credit repaid the supplied credit zeros out and creases to exist.

    Banks have been positioned to supply virtually all currency to enable all financial transactions, this basically means they take a percentage cut off the top of all production. This is the cost of doing business, and is inflation.

    The current system relies on all wealth created being a result of work done.
    Wealth created outside of production; non productive wealth creation can only be payed for by destroying wealth for another sector of the economy.

    Instead of the pie getting bigger, the pie gets cut into smaller slices, borrowers and those without appreciating assets effected the most.

    The pie did actually increase, that increase remaining with the wealthy and being the difference between the government stated inflation and true inflation.

    And that is how it works, the government, the elite and the banks working together to transfer wealth from production to the lords and masters, the banks facilitating the theft and government either to stupid or corrupt to care.

    Additionally:
    In a consumer society where the consumers only product is their time, as technology improves and populations increase the consumer has less to trade, thus less demand/ ability to consume, which means less credit supplied by the banks, which kills businesses and eventually threatens the wealthy, hence the need for a UBI.

  12. johnm 12
    16 March 2016 at 11:34 am

    Some time ago I said Putin was a great man! I was mocked as having a wet dream! 🙁

    But events have born me out:

    1. He’s restored Russia’s sovereignty and self respect after the neoliberal trashing under Yeltsin.

    2. His military intervention in Syria has produced the beginnings of peace with most of the actors willing to talk with each other for the first time compared to the U$ and Anglo and Turkish behaviour of pouring gasoline onto a raging fire.

    3. He has exposed the Neocon Warshington war criminals for all who can be bothered to notice. And the western presstitute media that has relentlessly demonised and slandered him.

    4. We may,it’s hoped get peace in the Ukraine eventually.

    • Stuart Munro 12.1
      16 March 2016 at 11:52 am

      Don’t omit the murders of Politkovskaya, Litvinenko and Nemtsov, or of the civilian passengers of MH17, the civilians in the Moscow Theatre gassing, and many many more. Putin is a scumbag of epic proportions.

      • johnm 12.1.1
        16 March 2016 at 12:03 pm

        Hi Stuart

        MH17 has conclusively been shown to have been caused by the U$ backed Ukrainians, that Putin had anything to do with this atrocity is another slander of the western presstitute media.http://www.globalresearch.ca/meet-the-pilot-who-shot-down-malaysian-boeing-mh-17-vladislav-voloshin-the-plane-was-in-the-wrong-place-at-the-wrong-time/5421363

      • greywarshark 12.1.2
        16 March 2016 at 12:30 pm

        Stuart M
        Scumbags of a determined character rise to the top when a nation’s systems of governance break down. They also can ooze through when there are pauses in the regular flow of society such as happens in USA. What caused Ronald Reagan to get up there, followed by Margaret Thatcher etc.? I forget. But they ooze upwards at cracks at pressure points like Christchurch liquefaction.

        Putin might be the right person to be where he is with his KGB knowledge and ability to outmaneouvre others at home and those sly ones abroad. It’s considered that the Middle East scumbags removed by the USA scumbags, were preferable to the new ones. These days it is a time for pragmatism, go for the best scumbags available now, and work for 80% improvement, knowing that getting even 40% would be thankfully welcomed.

        Perhaps we should have a popular vote on greatest scumbags since WW2.
        Pot Pot and gang must be up there. Then who gassed people in their homes in the Middle East with one that would flow to the lowest point and be effective in cellars where women and children would be hiding?

    • Chooky 12.2
      16 March 2016 at 12:36 pm

      +100 johnm

    • adam 12.3
      16 March 2016 at 3:48 pm

      johnm, here is Pussy Riot to sing to you, why you are wrong.

  13. joe90 13
    16 March 2016 at 12:42 pm

    A black man goes to a Trump rally.

    “The worst part was when their venom turned toward me,” Troup wrote. “There were protestors around me who got ushered out, and then people started pointing at me, motioning for the Secret Service to ‘get him out of there.’ Now mind you, I hadn’t uttered a single word the entire rally, but people still said things like ‘Well what about this one? He needs to go too!’”

    Ultimately, Troup left the event feeling as if he’d witnessed something darker and more insidious than a simple political rally.

    “At that rally, I saw the scary underbelly of America I saw unadulterated hate, fueled by intentional misinformation,” Troup said. “These people who, just 2 hours ago, seemed like good and kind people, were now cheering for blood.”

    http://fusion.net/story/280795/donald-trump-dayton-rally/

  14. Chooky 14
    16 March 2016 at 1:01 pm

    It will be interesting if Anonymous can find anything incriminating on Trump …more than what we already know…(eg are there any hidden emails and secret associations and agendas like Hillary Clinton had in her closet)

    ‘Anonymous declares ‘total war’ on Trump, plans April attack (VIDEO)’

    https://www.rt.com/usa/335725-anonymous-total-war-trump/

  15. joe90 15
    16 March 2016 at 1:30 pm

    Today is a BFD – 691 Democrat delegates and 358 Republican delegates are up for grabs.

    AP Eastern U.S. Verified account
    ‏@APEastRegion

    As the polls begin to close, a quick reminder of what’s at stake in tonight’s primary elections. #Elections2016

    https://twitter.com/APEastRegion/status/709880203661746180

    edit: forgot the results/tracker

    http://www.politico.com/2016-election/results/map/president

    http://www.politico.com/2016-election/results/delegate-count-tracker

  16. greywarshark 16
    16 March 2016 at 1:54 pm

    Interesting how spelling can get confused these days with all our aids. I see two ways to spell Sir Tipene O’Reagan/ O’Regan. Willie Jackson should know how to spell Sir Douglas Graham’s name after all the Maori Treaty negotiations yet it is Graeme in this article.
    http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/local-blogs/willie-jackson/8338152/Different-rules-for-Maori-and-Pakeha
    But the article is interesting itself, worth a read. Sounds factual as might be expected from someone of the Jackson family, with a high position in Maori matters.
    He writes about the tribe that have control of Lake Taupo wanting a fee of $58,000 from the Ironman contest for using it. He points out that the Ironman contest is an $800,000 event.

    And this next quote is one of the angry, dismissive, racist comments at the end of the article. With all the efforts that NZ has made to get a better understanding of the unpleasant start of this colony, and the shameful behaviour adopted by businessmen/land speculators with an armed gang to back them, this reaction is more frequent than we thought possible. I went on to background the late Louis Crimp who was a Maori hater, and to read about him gives insight into the type of person that befouls good attempts to provide some reparation and set NZ up as a country of justice, fairness and equality.

    What a shame the Ironman New Zealand organisers lack the mettle of their competitors.
    What a shame they agreed to bribe the tribe.
    What a shame they did not reply to the Tuwharetoa extortion demand of $58,000 thus:
    “Dear tribe,
    “Get stuffed.
    “We refuse to pay you so much as a bent cent to swim in our largest lake.
    “And it is our lake. Not your lake. It belongs to us. All of us.
    “All the people of New Zealand.

    In the item Jackson refers to John Ansell, who was connected with ACT. (But the Louis Crimp item below says Ansell left ACT – Advertising guru John Ansell quit the party after adverts he designed asking Kiwis if they were “Fed up with the Maorification of Everything” were cancelled.)

    Willie Jackson commented on him:
    He’s running the Treaty Gate project where he accuses all and sundry of telling lies over New Zealand’s history and relationship with Maori.
    He clearly puts little value on Maori culture and his main financial backer has been Invercargill millionaire Louis Crimp, who last year claimed most Pakeha despise Maori.

    Louis Crimp was a multi millionaire, now dead. He was one of a group of old white men whose blood has turned to vinegar, and who appear to have little left in life but to hold onto all their money, and their little energy goes to putting the Maori in his or her lower place than their high chairs. I saw them in full flow during the Constitution Conversations a year or so ago.

    About Louis Crimp ACT supporter to John Ansell:
    http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10806938
    The biggest donor to the Act Party says he gave the money to Don Brash and John Banks so they could stop special treatment for Maori who were “either in jail or on welfare”.
    In an extraordinary interview with the Weekend Herald, Louis Crimp said he believed he had the support of Brash, Banks and other “white New Zealanders”.
    Mr Crimp made the largest financial contribution to the Act Party for the 2011 election with a $125,520 donation.

    Crimp said in another interview:
    http://www.nbr.co.nz/article/two-hours-louis-crimp-ck-126301
    “I can’t smile properly because my face is petrified, it doesn’t move, it’s paralysed because I had cancer. I can only smile with one side. So I’ve just got a grimace.”
    Mr Crimp has made millions through his various property ventures, and has gained many supporters in Invercargill for his charitable donations, including more than $1 million each to the SPCA and the St John Ambulance Service….
    Mr Crimp says that from an early age he has was forced to “watch [his] pennies. I was the oldest boy in Southland who had a paper run, at the age of 16, because we were poor, my family”.

    His income? Derived from housing – rented to Maori gang and then evicted them.
    Derived from pokies, which he could rail against or utilise takings of at random:
    Mr Crimp is in no position to rail, with any integrity, against the foundation’s use of pokie proceeds. He has, himself, been one of the grandfathers of the pokies industry in Invercargill, albeit in rivalry with the trust. So his contempt can hardly stem from holding the machines themselves to be an intolerable social harm. Far from overbrimming with sympathy for the problems of pokie addiction, he wrote to our public opinion column in April referring witheringly to “the suckers who addict themselves to poker machines”…

    it is Mr Crimp who has been caught up in notorious and inglorious misuses of pokie funds. This was in the 1990s, and involved decisions so imperious that they offended rules that were less strict than they are now. The Southland Pool Players’ Club, upon whose executive Mr Crimp had been a member, dispensed the money from pokies at one of Mr Crimp’s most high-profile establishments, Players’ pool hall, for a team of nine members, including Mr Crimp, to attend a pool competition in Australia. This was just part of what Internal Affairs inspectors described as “gross misapplication of proceeds”.
    Undaunted, as he so often is, by official disapproval, Mr Crimp had then stuck his hand out for Players’ pokie profits to help pay the 1998 election expenses of Southland Action, a group of candidates which he led into the Invercargill City Council election race.
    So unprincipled himself, but cunning as a shithouse rat, to shamelessly accuse others.
    http://fundypost.blogspot.co.nz/2012/05/louis-crimp-man-of-actions.html

    Casino and share deals:
    http://shareinvestornz.blogspot.co.nz/2010/11/sky-city-entertainment-group-ltd.html
    The Christchurch Casino was purchased by SKC in June 2004, off Aspinall (NZ) Limited, which held a 40.5% shareholding in Christchurch Casinos Limited. The purchase price was NZ$93.75 million and in October 2010 SKC bought an 8.6 % stake held by Invercargill businessman Louis Crimp’s Southern Equities, to take their holding to near 50%. In 2008 SKC bought a 5.2% stake off their then business partner the Crowne Plaza Hotel, taking their ownership interest in Christchurch Casino to 45.7%. With the 8.6% stake then SKC control the company with a 54.3% stake.

    Coarse in his speech, nastily prejudiced and as braindead and disgusting as a gutter drunk Crimp prompted Brian Rudman to comment on his backing ACT and Don Brash who Crimp hoped would pursue anti Maori policies:
    http://m.nzherald.co.nz/brian-rudman-on-auckland/news/article.cfm?c_id=1502866&objectid=11280946
    Mr Crimp, you may recall, donated the money after Don Brash seized control of Act. Recalling Dr Brash’s notorious 2004 Orewa speech as National Party leader, Mr Crimp was hopeful his cash would ensure his anti-Maori views would be pursued. But in a follow-up interview on TV, the eccentric Mr Crimp soon went off subject and asked interviewer Jane Luscombe whether she’d ever had sex against a tree!

    His Southland Times obituary says:
    Crimp, an Invercargill businessman, philanthropist, former city councillor, character and longstanding critic of the Invercargill Licensing Trust, died at his home at 9.20pm last night.
    Memorial – He knew what he was agin.
    edited

    • Brian 16.1
      16 March 2016 at 6:13 pm

      Crimp was a nasty man. A favourite of Fair Go. His Southland Times obituary was disgusting – he was an evil character with no grace.

      • greywarshark 16.1.1
        17 March 2016 at 1:49 pm

        @Brian
        Yes he seemed evil and venal. You notice that the Southland Times obit was short, not unkind, and called him eccentric. ( And I noted what his memorial could be.)

        I think he had so much money that he managed to suck in a fair few amoral buddies, such as the ones he gathered together to have a go at the Council. But to sweeten the report that he had been dipping his fingers in the pokie till, I think he felt it would be good PR to donate large to St Johns and the SPCA. He would have won some kudos there for helping these perennially cash strapped groups.

        I was amazed at how despicable he was, and only his money meant that he couldn’t be ignored. And how low ACT was and is, is exemplified by them taking from him. Though it was only $125,000 or so, not millions. I think he was careful that his ‘philanthropy’-investments were sure to bring him advantage.

        How many, I wonder, of our political parties are being funded by people who are such misanthropists like him. He seemed to despise everyone really.

  17. weka 17
    16 March 2016 at 4:59 pm

    Speaking of tin foil, the real economic crisis is happening in the daily lives of ordinary NZers.

    A gram and a half for 100 bucks!? It’s daylight robbery: five times the average price for a gram and, at something like $300 per ounce wholesale (likely cheaper in larger, commercial amounts), a profit of $90 untaxed and straight into the black market.

    http://thespinoff.co.nz/16-03-2016/a-nation-in-crisis-new-zealands-catastrophic-marijuana-shortage/

  18. alwyn 18
    16 March 2016 at 5:03 pm

    Has Phil Goff really come out in favour of building a waterfront stadium in Auckland?
    Be very afraid Auckland ratepayers.
    The favoured candidate for the Mayoralty appears to be choosing a campaign slogan which starts “We’ve got to waste a billion or two, we’ve got to waste a billion or two”.
    Even Len’s choo-choo isn’t as stupid.

    • Ad 18.1
      16 March 2016 at 6:33 pm

      Clearly you’re ignorant of your own one Wellingtonian.

      • alwyn 18.1.1
        16 March 2016 at 7:00 pm

        “ignorant of your own one”
        Like hell I am. It doesn’t mean Auckland have to repeat mistakes do they?

        That was one of those things where the main proponent, Fran Wilde, managed to get a “loan” out of the local bodies that was promised to be repaid. It never was of course because you never do make money out of such things.
        Melbourne is an exception but they have about 50 AFL games a year at the MCG and another 50 at Etihad stadium. The crowds probably range from 25,000 to 90,000 for the club games and 100,000 for the finals.

        The Wellington cost $130 million I believe. However it is sunk money and we certainly can’t sell it. After all, who would buy it? At least they didn’t consider putting a roof on it.

        Could be worse of course. The Olympic Stadium in Sydney went broke and ended up being owned by the ANZ I believe. They were silly enough to make a loan on the thing.

  19. Chooky 19
    16 March 2016 at 10:54 pm

    ‘How the West Got It Wrong as the Syrian Civil War Developed’ by Robert Fisk

    Five years ago, we were high on Arab revolutions, and journalists were growing used to ‘liberating’ Arab capitals

    http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/03/15/how-west-got-it-wrong-syrian-civil-war-developed