Open mike 19/12/2010

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, December 19th, 2010 - 60 comments
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60 comments on “Open mike 19/12/2010 ”

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  1. LynW 1
    19 December 2010 at 6:58 am

    Looking forward to the comments and discussion re the latest Wikileaks! The Dalai Lama info is very enlightening! Glad to read the Wong debacle is having an effect on people’s views of specific politicians. Honesty really is the best policy….and it is reassuring to see most New Zealanders believe this.

    • Carol 1.1
      19 December 2010 at 7:03 am

      Glad to read the Wong debacle is having an effect on peoples views of politicians.

      Actually, it seems to be having an effect on people’s views of John Key, including National supporters, who think Wong and Key have tried to hide something, and that Key handled the issue badly:

      http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/4473965/National-voters-turn-on-Key

      Worryingly for Key, more than half of those who wanted an investigation voted National at the 2008 election.

      Key blocked attempts by Labour MP Pete Hodgson to table more documents in parliament regarding Wong last week.

      It’s a move that could cost him in election year, with voters thinking he has handled the investigation poorly, with only 16% thinking he has been totally honest on the issue.

      Just over 40% thought he managed the issue in the best interests of the National Party, while only 10% said his handling of the affair had been in New Zealand’s best interests.

      • LynW 1.1.1
        19 December 2010 at 7:15 am

        Yes, that is the article I was referring to. Great how you can reference it like that! The Wikileaks info re the Dalai Lama also appears to show intentional misleading and dishonesty to Parliament and the New Zealand public.

        • Tigger 1.1.1.1
          19 December 2010 at 10:22 am

          I wonder if Pike River has helped colour that impression. Key has acting very dishonourably over the fate of the workers/contractors. The mask truly slipped and I hope some Kiwis noticed.

          • Treetop 1.1.1.1.1
            19 December 2010 at 1:00 pm

            Tigger the public mask slipped when Key did not reveal why Worth resigned.

            • mcflock 1.1.1.1.1.1
              19 December 2010 at 2:58 pm

              only for those people who were already peeking behind the mask.

              I think an awful lot of them are still looking at him front on, though. But some of them lived on the West Coast, and now know it’s bull. Some of them are also being laid off when the world is slowly recovering, and now know it’s bull. And there’ll be many a slip between now and Election 2011.

              • Treetop …
                19 December 2010 at 5:32 pm

                The smile and wave character, eventually their luck runs out. Still on a lucky streak for now as the Christmas holiday break prevents hard questions being raised in the house.

      • vipers revenge 1.1.2
        19 December 2010 at 7:38 pm

        Yep its having a bit affect in the latest Collmar Brunton poll, great to see the loony greens won’t be in parliament next year if these polls continue. The Gooffather at 7%,what a waste of space.
        http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/4474816/National-leads-Labour-by-22-points-poll

  2. Carol 2
    19 December 2010 at 6:59 am

    The UK Uncut anti-austerity protests continue, successfully using assymmetrical tactics and social media and targetting corporate retail stores. It attracts protesters of all age groups, from young students to elderly pensioners.

    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/retail-giants-face-taxing-day-of-uncut-action-2163614.html

    But one thing about UK Uncut is certain: it is fast becoming one of Britain’s most effective and unpredictable protest movements…

    The epidemic of students and grandmothers lying on pavements to bar access to global brands is just the latest example of the way in which Twitter and other social media websites are being used to mobilise loose coalitions of ordinary but angry citizens…

    UK Uncut, which has more than 30,000 followers on Twitter, has tripled the number of towns where it is demonstrating from 17 in October to today’s total of 53. Its “asymmetric” tactics have included protesters super-gluing their fingers to store windows, mass in-store demonstrations, and the hijacking of a Twitter viral marketing initiative by Vodafone which this week resulted in the phone giant posting critical Tweets on its own website.

    • LynW 2.1
      19 December 2010 at 7:29 am

      Knowledge is power. Social media provide the info. It is one thing to sit at home and feel angst but powerless…quite another to know others feel the same way and also wish to do something about it. It helps to have a tipping point, even better to have several that affect many….what will it take for NZ’rs to openly protest in significant numbers?

  3. Mac1 3
    19 December 2010 at 9:32 am

    Wikileaks cables say that drug companies tried to have Helen Clark removed as Health Minister in 1990, that they tried to have NZ Free Trade agreement stymied and tried to ‘educate the public’ by agitating people with stories about drugs they could not access.

    http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz-government/news/article.cfm?c_id=144&objectid=10695239

    In another NZ Herald article, Dr Bryce Edwards writes “These cables paint the embassies in quite a different colour – that they’re here to further the interests of their own countries, to promote big business interests and often play a role of subterfuge or dishonest interventions in our national affairs.”

    http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz-government/news/article.cfm?c_id=144&objectid=10695269

    Interestingly, Medicines NZ chief executive officer Denise Wood said yesterday “new personalities” in government had reduced tension. I wonder what that actually means.

    • prism 3.1
      19 December 2010 at 12:51 pm

      Some nice tension reducing lunches (healthy eating with salads etc) plus a few glasses of cholesterol-controlling red wine? Followed by the phrase “I’m sure we can work something out that is mutually beneficial.” Smile, show white teeth in well groomed visage.

    • ianmac from Prague 3.2
      19 December 2010 at 8:41 pm

      Wonder if the USA pharmacuticals had any influence when Key over-rode the Pharmac decision over Herceptum?

    • jcuknz 3.3
      19 December 2010 at 9:01 pm

      Helen Clark brought us to “Very Very Good Friends” status back in July 2008 ..[So long ago! But I thought it was a man who said that .. have I got the wrong reference at Stuff?].

      “United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s reference to New Zealand as a friend “and ally” of the US following talks with Prime Minister Helen Clark and Foreign Minister Winston Peters.”

      But I guess having a right wing Government helps even though some say it equates to the American Democrats which was the ruling party until the last election upset…

      I don’t think Dr Bryce Edwards was telling us anything new .. that has been a business of embassies since the year dot.

  4. joe90 4
    19 December 2010 at 9:57 am

    Sad news for aging hippies, Captain Beefheart, aka Don Van Vliet has died.

    • Pascal's bookie 4.1
      19 December 2010 at 10:18 am

    • Bored 4.2
      19 December 2010 at 10:19 am

      Never really thought of Beefheart as a hippy, he and Zappa had far too much hard edge for any hippy drippy dippy shit. Nothing much wishy washy and peaceful around those gents.

      • joe90 4.2.1
        19 December 2010 at 11:19 am

        Hippy or not having Happiness Stan from The Small Faces Ogdens’ Nut Gone Flake as a long time favourite goes some way in explaining what was actually going on at the time…..

        Small Faces
        Which were in the studios
        Hallowed by thy name
        Thy music come
        Thy songs be sung
        On this album as they came from your heads
        We give you this day our daily bread
        Give us thy album in a round cover as we give thee 37/9d.,
        Lead us into the record stores.
        And deliver us Ogdens’ Nut Gone Flake
        For nice is the music
        The sleeve and the story
        For ever and ever, Immediate

      • Bill 4.2.2
        19 December 2010 at 10:01 pm

        Bored.
        You do know that Zappa espoused some pretty weird fucked up neo-liberal politics? Not a reflection on his music, but, yeah…he wunt no leftie, never mind ‘no hippy’.

        Fucking catchpa be ‘clarify’. I guess it’s just well, seeing I’ve come to terms with my paranoia 🙂

  5. burt 5
    19 December 2010 at 10:11 am

    From stuff: Forced house sale numbers fall

    The number of forced home sales is falling for the first time since 2008, and experts say the economy’s fundamentals are improving.

    Well that’s good news.

    • jcuknz 5.1
      19 December 2010 at 10:38 am

      I hope that they are correct but there must be the point when there are no more over-committed whatever the economy is doing. Another good bit of news is that more Christmas sales are being paid for by debit cards/cash than credit cards if I heard correctly on TV. [Or at least the proportion is increasing].

      • prism 5.1.1
        19 December 2010 at 12:47 pm

        Let’s all look for good news. It’s raining over much of the country and filling up the reservoirs and irrigation dams. That’s good. Pike River may be able to progress as something there is under control or nearly.

    • Lindsey 5.2
      19 December 2010 at 11:57 am

      And it also said that the property speculators had been worked through the system and that the forced sales these days were mostly of “Mom and Dad” owners loosing their homes. Also that the number of forced house sales is still 5 times ahead of that before the global financial meltdown. Whose good news is that?

      • Colonial Viper 5.2.1
        19 December 2010 at 1:10 pm

        Further am i correct in speculating that the number of building consents across several regions is still at rubbish low levels?

  6. Logie97 6
    19 December 2010 at 10:36 am

    Elmer Fudd: I’m a wed-hot sportsman after wild game. Heh-heh-heh-heh.
    (in his endless pursuit of Bugs Bunny)

    Looks as though he will have to settle for a shotgun wedding.

    http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/4474020/Beach-bliss-for-Rodney-Hide-and-his-bride/

    • Descendant Of Smith 6.1
      19 December 2010 at 3:55 pm

      I’m waiting for jbanks to enlighten us all as to whether:
      A. this is an example of survival of the fittest breeding or
      B: this reinforces his view that the absence of evolutionary pressures means that anyone can and does breed.

      • Logie97 6.1.1
        19 December 2010 at 6:27 pm

        I’m sure someone out there has something that can be added about Crome and Dome.

        Incidentally, when he gets back from honeymoon he will resume the mantel of Voldemort as he gets his teeth into Special Education.

  7. Lanthanide 7
    19 December 2010 at 10:57 am

    Someone commented a while ago about an apparent rort where landlords could lease their properties to HNZ for 10-15 years with the guarantee that they’d always have tenants.

    It seems private industry does a much better job at this:
    “We’d all be much better off using a commercial letting agent to manage our properties. They would charge us 7.5%, they would deal with all damage and repair issues for us at cost, and would automatically act in our interest [not automatically the tenant’s]. After all we are paying!”

    http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/4473837/Landlords-livid-over-Housing-NZ-treatment

    • Vicky32 7.1
      19 December 2010 at 3:36 pm

      I have just started a rubbish telemarketing job, (which won’t last – I am not making enough sales) and at lunch on day 3, I walked into the break room to hear a mananger boasting about what a good deal she and hubby have, having leased their investment property house to Housing NZ…
      The things she was saying made my skin crawl!
      Deb

  8. Descendant Of Smith 8
    19 December 2010 at 12:12 pm

    Yep invested for the capital gain and went with the soft option of guaranteed rent – now the capital gains are not there they are moaning .

    A few friends of mine looked at this who were long term investors and quickly worked out that they could make more income by not singing up. Of course they weren’t directly after the capital gain as they have always invested long-term for the rental income – the capital gain tends to be the icing on the cake.

  9. Pascal's bookie 9
    19 December 2010 at 12:29 pm

    Been checkin out narcocorrido vids on youtube.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fM51aPTQs1Q

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K82nN0UBoSQ

    lot’s of crazy shit man.

  10. Logie97 10
    19 December 2010 at 1:00 pm

    Wasn’t that long ago they were arguing for Taser introduction as the answer to our policing problems. Would stop assaults on the police. Essential they have them on their hip at all times…

    December 14, 2007
    …Greg O’Connor has made a plea for the adoption of the “less than lethal” device.
    “Opponents to police being issued with Tasers are ignoring the realities of modern policing,” Mr O’Connor said.
    http://www.nzherald.co.nz/campaign-against-the-taser/news/article.cfm?o_id=600630&objectid=10482166

    December 14 2010
    Police Association president Greg O’Connor said the time had come for police officers, especially those in remote areas, to have a firearm on their hip.
    “The majority of frontline officers now want to be armed,” O’Connor said.
    “We have had nine police officers shot in the last two years on top of all these serious assaults.
    The only weapon that is any good against a machete is a firearm.”
    http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/4450047/I-thought-I-would-die-attacked-officer/

    Machete versus taser or firearm.
    Do rural officers not have access to the taser yet?

    By the 70’s M.A.D. (Mutually Assured Destruction) had become the product of the Arms Race. One has to ask the question with New Zealand’s mini arms race, if there is just possibly a better way to addressing society’s problems

    • Colonial Viper 10.1
      19 December 2010 at 1:11 pm

      Giving police MP5’s and AR-15’s is the only answer to our crime problem.

    • felix 10.2
      19 December 2010 at 6:26 pm

      O’Connor is a nasty little corrupt fascist and has been since his undercover days in the Otago drug trade.

      When he called for tasers many correctly identified it as a stepping stone to full arming of the police which has long been O’Connor’s pet project.

      Of course those voices were shouted down by the usual apologists for authority who described such observations as paranoid and stupid.

  11. Colonial Viper 11
    19 December 2010 at 1:51 pm

    High end residential building spend up continues

    http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10694997

    It seems like a few still have money to burn.

    • Draco T Bastard 11.1
      19 December 2010 at 4:36 pm

      The financial “collapse” did what such collapses have always done – put huge amounts of money into the hands of the few.

  12. Deadly_NZ 12
    19 December 2010 at 5:25 pm

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/dec/19/nhs-salary-increments-job-losses

    Now this makes me wonder when the Nats will start to implement stuff like this
    it’s a simple do as we say or your MATES will lose thier jobs by the look of it.

    • Vicky32 12.1
      19 December 2010 at 6:27 pm

      That’s terrible.. I just sent it to my son who’s a nurse and who was planning to go to the UK to work next year..
      Deb

      • Logie97 12.1.1
        19 December 2010 at 9:36 pm

        Already have – during negotiations with NZEI, they suggested teachers forego a pay rise to fund support staff in schools.

        The support staff budget has been reduced 2011, and guess who is to blame.

  13. Deadly_NZ 13
    19 December 2010 at 5:39 pm

    http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/4473837/Landlords-livid-over-Housing-NZ-treatment

    Maybe the landlords should say HNZ you have broken the contract therefore it’s Null and Void now get these people out of MY house.

    Then maybe government will have to BUY the houses, not sublet them and just let the tennants destroy them, and rip them off for the rent..
    BUT this IS another case of the government not caring and just taking any advantage it can.. And if we don’t support the landlords then we are the ones that pay those of us who rent.

  14. Colonial Viper 14
    19 December 2010 at 5:41 pm

    Hexavalent chromium, probable carcinogen, found in water supplies of 35 US cities

    A pollutant made famous by activist Erin Brokovich.

    An environmental group that analyzed the drinking water in 35 cities across the United States, including Bethesda and Washington, found that most contained hexavalent chromium, a probable carcinogen that was made famous by the film “Erin Brockovich.”

    The study, which will be released Monday by the Environmental Working Group, is the first nationwide analysis of hexavalent chromium in drinking water to be made public.

    • jcuknz 14.1
      19 December 2010 at 9:19 pm

      After being used to NZ Grade A water it was a distasteful experience to drink water in the States, even when I made a cup of coffee with it by mistake it was horrible, but fortunately the fridge-freezer where I was staying had an ice-maker/ water purifier. Don’t know what was in the water apart from the excessive chlorine taste. Every time I went into the city I had to pass the local sewage works which stank to high heaven…. built and owned by the local brewery one third of its contents came from the town and two thirds from making beer etc. Yes, as ‘black vest’ said “We don’t know how lucky we are.” That is not to say we shouldn’t watch things like a hawk, and regret that much of our water is unsafe to drink until it has been treated..

  15. millsy 15
    19 December 2010 at 8:00 pm

    Lastest poll out bad reading for Laboutr

    Its simple really.

    Goff must go.

    That is the reality that the Labour caucus is refusing to face.

    • Salsy 15.1
      19 December 2010 at 8:42 pm

      Im beginning to wonder if there is such a thing as the Key effect. Perhaps its more the Goff Defect.. 🙁 Even sadder, people have lost faith in the greens since Pike River.. hopefully things change when the truth starts to seep out.Have no answers for Goff except to say, he’s had a go, time to switch to a new look Labour.. fast!

    • ak 15.2
      19 December 2010 at 10:46 pm

      mmmmm…..anyone else starting to smell a big fat rat in these polls? Specially the crucial pre-hols ones….from memory Edwards proved conclusively that online polls were heavily manipulated pro-Right prior the last erection, and Brolmar is consistently pro-Right….it is a science brothers and sisters, so how can N-L-G of 48-35-7 in the Morgan taken at the same time, suddenly and so very conveniently become 55-33-4.5 in the Brolmar?

      Anyone can take a poll, and no law against manipulating them…..

      • Salsy 15.2.1
        19 December 2010 at 11:00 pm

        Edwards proved conclusively that online polls were heavily manipulated pro-Right prior the last erection

        Prior to which erection ? 🙂

      • mcflock 15.2.2
        20 December 2010 at 12:38 am

        Apparently it’s phone interviews – which is another issue entirely.

        What I find interesting is that the results are always around 100% (rounding errors being what they are).

        So either they aren’t reporting undecideds, or they are insisting that respondents name a political party. In which case it could well be that the governing party is closest to mind.

        Of course, it really is “all or nothing” for national – they need as close to an outright majority as they can get, otherwise they don’t have many friends to call on. If MP choose to hang with them for a second term they might be in with a shot.

      • Interesting 15.2.3
        20 December 2010 at 12:54 am

        The 3News Poll out last week had almost identical numbers as this colmar poll.

        3News Poll is traditionally considered as being pro-Left.

        • Vicky32 15.2.3.1
          20 December 2010 at 8:08 pm

          3 News poll pro-left? How is that possible when they’re NZ’s answer to Faux News? Ma dai!
          Deb

  16. Salsy 16
    19 December 2010 at 8:46 pm

    Howcome The Standard only has one friend on facebook…

  17. jcuknz 17
    19 December 2010 at 9:24 pm

    The ‘edit’ function has gone again.

  18. Draco T Bastard 18
    19 December 2010 at 10:58 pm

    The lies exposed behind ‘that’ DB ad…

    The creators of this ad would have a place in George Orwell’s Ministry of Truth where lies are truth and truth are lies”.

    I’ve seen it once and wondered but the only thing I was sure of was that they weren’t producing Export Gold in 1958.

    BTW, Export Gold is a nats pis of a beer that’s just not worth drinking.

    • Vicky32 18.1
      20 December 2010 at 8:02 pm

      That is a brilliant article! That advert has always annoyed me from the moment I first saw it in Welly in October..
      Deb

  19. AB 19
    20 December 2010 at 12:08 pm

    When are the expert political commentators going to ask the polling companies, like Colmar Brunton, to give the full results to their surveys: As Colmar Brunton says on its we site it gives results only for poll respondents who have decided how they will vote and are likely to vote.
    It does NOT give results for the don’t knows and won’t says.
    So we are probably seeing results for about 650 respondents expressed as if they were 100%.
    So National got 33% of the eliible voting population last election, Labour 25%.

    It is very important to know where the OTHER 45% of the eligible voters are going, or what they’re thinking of doing!

    For example, how do the don’t knows think they will vote?

    The best example I’ve seen of this lately is from HorizonPoll which gives the total results, and also shows National was up about 1% on its 2008 election result, but at 34% of all people 18+. It’s a good result for National, but it’s far from 55%.

    http://www.horizonpoll.co.nz/page/77/new-zealand-first-may-decide-who-go…

    The maximum margins of error would need to be applied to get the Horizon and Clmar and other polls to match.

    With a 3% or so margin of error, the Colmar poll risks seriously under rating the minor parties, specially NZ First and the Greens.

    What is the margin of error on the minor parties’ votes within the latest Colmar survey? Must be massive.

    Yet tragically, the electoral commission uses these polls to decide party support – the the amount of taxpayer funded campaign support the parties get! What a rort!

    Meantime, the political commentators and media who buy the polls don’t seem to want to knpow the whole picture?

    Even if the politicians would rather be known for having 55%, not 35%?

    Time for some real analysis by the journalists please
    .

    • mcflock 19.1
      20 December 2010 at 7:16 pm

      Actually, I think we can have a guess as to the population of “unknowns” for Colmar Brunton, and therefore the actual count.

      We know the sample population is 1000, so if 250 said A then that’s 25%.
      We also know that if A is 25% out of a population of a thousand, then that’s 250 people.

      United Future polled at 0.3%. A population of a thousand (with rounding error) gives a maximum count of 3 people.

      Each polled vote would have to be a whol person, so we then get a mid range of 666 (2 UF voters) and a minimum count of 1 person out of 333 respondents.

      Given that 100% is unlikely unless they’re demanding a response (which would probably inflated the votes of the party with the most name recognition, i.e. the govt), that leaves Key with an actual count of either 366 or 183. Horizon report a dk/won’t say rate of 16%, as opposed to CB’s 33%, but then if the Horizon poll is internet only you’ll have the names of the parties in front of you, rather than just answering without prompting.

      666 respondents brings Colmar Brunton, with nat on 36% all participants, into the rough vote distribution of the Horizon poll, with labour on 21.9% all participants (low, but within 7% of the CB poll).

      And the 2008 election had a participation rate of somethink like 80%, so this poll really needs to mind-read what another 135 respondents would have said. And if the respondents weren’t prompted, they’d also have to factor in recall bias.

      But all this “oooo they can govern alone if our poll was the general election” makes the media happy even if almost a year out it’s just staring at entrails.