Open mike 27/08/2010

44 comments on “Open mike 27/08/2010 ”

• Comments are now closed

1. vto 1

   27 August 2010 at 7:33 am

   So Christchurch National MP Nicky Wagner thinks the noise in Canterbury over her govts facsist sacking of the Ecan councillors so that more dairy farms can be built is from a “noisy minority” and the point of Key’s pamphlet is so they can hear from the “silent majority” implying the silent majority supports the sacking.

   Nicky Wagner is both delusional and very very average. It will be seen very very shortly when Parker gets the boot, followed by her and cohorts next year.

   She also spouts on and on and on, at various meetings etc, that sorting out water in Canterbury is all about, get this, balance.

   “Balance” is the most bullshit word used in policy setting in the world today. If you ever hear it used then shout it down for the crock of shit it is.

   “Balance” was used when the Water Conservation Orders were put in place. Balance up the competing interests and set them in place. That is what happenned. Balance has already been dealth with. You don’t go back every now and again keep asking for more balance. The resultof that is complete unbalance.

   But no, not for the moron that is Wagner, “balance” is something you raise to give a sense that you are playing fair and that you use every decade or so for the next attack on the environment.

   “Balance” has already been attended to Wagner. Your farming voters need to learn to live within their means. The means provided by the one half of the balance put in place in the past.

   Never ever let “balance” be raised as a justification. It is a crock.
   • Carol 1.1

     27 August 2010 at 8:42 am

     Yes, yesterday in the House, English kept repeating the word “balance”, along with “re-balancing” the economy after (according to English) Labour had spent years creating an unbalanced economy. It seems that, according to Blinglish’s wonky stats, Labour put to much focus on housing ownership, causing an imbalance, and the country’s economy needs to be “re-balanced” by stimulating the export sector, and cutting back on the “non-tradable”, public sector. This apprently with create the “growth” that our country, allegedly, desperately needs

     All these NACT, neoliberal buzz words make my head spin – they just sound to me like empty rhetoric to me. This belief in the power of perpetual “growth’ sounds like an empty mantra. What the hell does it mean? And why is this important for the country, rather than, say, just developing business and public services that provide sustainable living and quality of life for all the population?

     And as for the idea that all countries freely trading with each other “creates wealth’ and promotes “growth’ .. [for NZ]? Isn’t that just going to continually circulate the wealth amongst the top businesses in each country, and partly by draining much needed resources from the public sector? The result will be the voluntary sector trying to fill the gap with services once provided by the public sector, and for little or no pay. So people provide services that the country needs for businesses to operate successfully on the cheap.

     It all sounds like “funny money’, shonky stats, & empty buzz words to me.

     “balance”….. “growth”….. empty words providing a smoke screen & diversion from what NACT is actually doing.
   • Draco T Bastard 1.2

     27 August 2010 at 11:42 am

     “Balance” is something that our politicians (and the rest of them around the world) don’t understand. If we want to balance the economy then we need to balance it within the ecological cycles. This means having it so that nature can clean up after us so that our streams are safe to swim in again and out GHG emissions are absorbed into the carbon cycle. To do this would mean cutting the number of farms in NZ down by quite a considerable amount. It’s obvious that Canterbury can’t support the farms that it has never mind more of the filthy things.

     It also means living within the renewable resource base. Using resources in such a way so that their effective use is zero. Our present ways use resources up. This is partly because we just throw away resources after we’ve used them without recycling and partly, and possibly mostly, because we keep growing the population without any effort at population control.
2. The Chairman 2

   27 August 2010 at 8:04 am

   Save the Farms campaign builds momentum

   http://tvnz.co.nz/close-up/farm-sales-stir-controversy-3742789
   • vto 2.1

     27 August 2010 at 8:17 am

     I don’t think the promoters of it expressed the idea at all well last night.

     They missed the fundamental concept, namely that it is essential for the health of a community. It has nothing to do with being anti-foreigner or anti-Chinese. The promoter should have jumped right on that and said \”it is about the health of the community and I think the Chinese, and every community on the planet in actual fact, should have the same rules. And in fact the Chinese already do Mr Sainsbury!\”

     And similarly it is not abouyt foreign investment in business – that can still happen. It is more fundamental than that.

     It applies to all land sales too, not just farm sales. The community must own the land on wich it lives. It cannot be owned by somebody living on the other side of the world to whom the people pay a rent. That just leads to a weak community.

     Imagine if a bunch of us kiwis owned the bulk of the land in a town in China and the local industry which supports that town? What sort of community would develop in that town over time? thinking thinking ……….

     Ownership of the land under a community is essential no matter if it is an African village, a Chinese mining town, Darfield, Wanganui (um, maybe the odd exception), or an entire country.
     • The Chairman 2.1.1

       27 August 2010 at 8:42 am

       New Zealand must own its own future to successfully move forward.
     • The Chairman 2.1.2

       27 August 2010 at 9:03 am

       Bernard Hickey raised the question why just farming? And Crafar went on about the role of the foreign owned banks. Both are right.

       We shouldn’t stop at farming. We need to take a diagnostic approach and correct all the detrimental imbalances in our economy.

       This debate is huge and could potentially develop into a major turning point in our nations history.
       • vto 2.1.2.1

         27 August 2010 at 9:15 am

         Yes absolutely a turning point. For the better. Imo the politics of the public has already moved in favour of such a change.

         There would be some short term pain though – as the market for property will reduce from 4 billion people to just 4 million people. Which is of course as it should be. Bad luck for Queenstown properties.

         And that fool from Bayleys who said they only market “trophy” properties overseas because NZers can’t afford them will be out of a job – good riddance.
         • KJT 2.1.2.1.1

           27 August 2010 at 11:17 am

           As i want my property to live in or have a business on I do not care if prices go down overall.
           I may then be able to afford a better property on retirement and someone starting out can buy our family home.
           • Draco T Bastard 2.1.2.1.1.1

             27 August 2010 at 11:48 am

             As it should be.
       • KJT 2.1.2.2

         27 August 2010 at 10:48 am

         How about democracy and our control of our financial system. We should nationalise finance. The private sector have proven to be incompetent and detrimental to society.
         Self appointed power seeking politicians are just as detrimental. We should be discussing democracy also. Not a change of dictatorship every 3 years.
         http://direct-democracy.geschichte-schweiz.ch/

         For us to gain back control of our country.
     • prism 2.1.3

       27 August 2010 at 10:01 am

       Also the access to a piece of land by any economically capable NZ is the tenet that NZ was founded on (after the land was honestly bought, finagled, wrested or confiscated from Maori that is). Landowners with extensive holdings, or foreign owners being absent landlords is not what colonials travelled here for either in waka or sailing ships.

       The colonial government deliberately broke up large holdings in early days. We don’t want to move further to a plethora of aristocratic-thinking types that underpin autocratic governments.
3. mickysavage 3

   27 August 2010 at 9:00 am

   So Act persuaded National to extend the 90 day fire at will provision against the recommendation of Minister Kate Wilkinson.

   Talk about the tail wagging the dog …

   And how about this for a proper decision making process.

   The Government also ignored Labour Department advice to leave rules on union access to the workplace unchanged, as there was no widespread evidence that the system was being abused.

   It is a shame when prejudice replaces informed decision making.
   • Tigger 3.1

     27 August 2010 at 9:06 am

     Useful for the left this shows how weak Key can be…

     What on earth is the appeal of ACT and Hide? Do they drug the Nats or something…the Cabinet has let Hide pork them relentlessly…
     • Draco T Bastard 3.1.1

       27 August 2010 at 11:53 am

       No they haven’t, National actually wants these policies as well but they had to appear to be centre right rather than the radical, authoritarian right that they are otherwise they wouldn’t have been elected.
   • Draco T Bastard 3.2

     27 August 2010 at 11:50 am

     More ideological decisions from a bunch of delusional psychopaths – who’d have thunk it.
     • ZB 3.2.1

       27 August 2010 at 10:07 pm

       if only.

       The problem is oil. Since Thatcher oil has been gushing out of the ground and governments
       have had to loosen finance to propel business to grab as much of the business spoils from
       this high energy fuel.

       The reality today. Is the finance, and so the wealth accumulated, is mismatched to a
       the end of cheap oil, and so cheap finance.

       Key, like many on the right hope the free market will save them some how, so they
       are biding their time, taking small steps to push further ideological, but essentially
       a scared position of weakness.

       And as time passes and the world does not recover, for this to happen it would be
       need a fundamental shift in wealth creation back to the middle classes, the dithering
       right will not see the writing on the wall.

       Since Thatcher we’ve expanded finance and grow big fat cats, now from here on we
       have to shrink finance and cull fat cats (share out the wealth creation in the economy
       to as many as possible – or fund them with welfare less they rebel).

       Let them eat cake, say National. The gullitine of history it will be for them.
       • Draco T Bastard 3.2.1.1

         28 August 2010 at 12:01 am

         Yes, you can only borrow from the future when the future has more wealth. With declining oil supply the future will have less wealth.
4. Carol 4

   27 August 2010 at 9:59 am

   There was some interesting points made at the end of Kathryn Ryan’s interview with Professor Roger Steare – corporate philosopher (just finished on Nine-to-Noon, Nat Rad). He said beyond getting the “average wage”, more money doesn’t make people any happier. He said when millionaires keep trying to increase their wealth, it’s not really the money that has value for them, but the “score on the door”. So he said, instead of encouraging those types to earn more money, just give them a medal.

   So, can we give Mr Key his medal now, please, and send him on his way?

   Also, he said it was a myth that anyone actually “owns” a business, and really, for it to work well. Aiming to work towards “owning” your own business, really won’t achieve (ermm.., I think) satisfaction or well-being. It’s better to think of a business as a community, working together.
   • prism 4.1

     27 August 2010 at 10:31 am

     About the wage chat this morning. I thought the union (National Distribution?)
     made a witty thrust at the government by saying that through the wage rises that
     unions had obtained they were advancing government’s stated aim to close the gap with Australia. Then the business spokesperson had to disagree with the union of course. He said that the sample was too slanted. Which seemed to indicate that business was not in agreement with the government’s slogan on wage rises and underline that NZ was not catching up with Australia in wages!

     Stats reveal that more tradespeople are going to Oz than professionals. Soon NZ will be hollowed out of people with practical skills, who can make and repair actual things. It could become like the community organisation I was in, now closed. People there offered skills in a barter system. There were never enough people with useful practical skills, but no shortage of those with abilities at the self-realisation peak of Maslow’s ladder.
   • Draco T Bastard 4.2

     27 August 2010 at 11:55 am

     Working together cooperatively will achieve more than the competitive, dog-eat-dog, society that we live in now.
     • ZB 4.2.1

       27 August 2010 at 10:26 pm

       Cooperation is competition from another vantage point.

       Two brothers may fight it out competively only to stand by each others side.

       Similarly, two species lock in competion for resource act together cooperatively
       to keep out new entrants.

       The left and right are two such brothers, the left bleed treasuries, the right
       grow business welfare and favor the few, both fight over spoils, both unite to
       keep moderate well balanced government from taking hold. The left and
       right unite over neo-liberal economics, and shifting taxcuts gifts around as
       each wins power increasing uncertainty for the people, looking like they
       are different but only like a color on a wall is different, its the same wall.

       Dog-eat-dog societies are not viable. Two parties will invariable
       breed behavior that supports the few at the top. Three party politics,
       the chaos of unpredictable outcomes, so recently seen in the UK and
       OZ, show that the voter population is deperate for the few to be unravelled.
5. prism 5

   27 August 2010 at 10:17 am

   Interview on RadioNZ this am with Canadian professional on police pursuit practices. Terrible, triple p’s. Canadian and USA police have noticed how they often escalated a situation with a suspected criminal or one with minor law-breaking to one that ended in death or injury to innocent public. I wonder if the police can reflect and learn from that information for a fast change, or will they keep rabbiting on about how people should stop when asked? After all, if human beings always did what they Should we would need only one policeman per city to handle the honest accidental problems.

   And how can an appointment to a position requiring ethically high standards and honesty be given to a policeman who looked up records on rapes in which colleagues had been implicated and passed info to them? This is an indication of how the police will at the end of the day, have two parallel standards – one for the public and one for themselves.
6. The Chairman 6

   27 August 2010 at 10:19 am

   Jane Kelsey: The folly of using private companies for public services

   Highlights:
   Public Private Partnerships – more properly, but less attractively, called Private Finance Initiatives or Build Operate and Transfer schemes – are the current fashion in privatisation.

   The real policy impact of private finance initiatives is quite simple – they are creative accounting exercises that disguise a massive transfer of wealth to private consortia that receive guaranteed returns with minimal accountability.

   Because both sets of contracts are commercially sensitive, most of their terms and assessment of performance remain secret, even from Parliament.

   The contract is almost always with a “special purpose vehicle” – a shell company with minimal capitalisation that is owned by a consortium of a construction company, a facilities management company and a finance arm, whose investors are usually highly leveraged investment banks, private equity firms, pension funds and insurance companies.

   The scope for profiteering can be staggering. Contracts routinely include rights to profit from third party use of facilities like schools, and from the sale of surplus assets, including land.

   Companies claim tax losses by generating massive income against which they offset equally massive operating expenditure, described as a “management fee” paid to the parent company.

   The original contracts are increasingly traded on secondary markets to investors that demand an even higher and faster return from a government-guaranteed investment.

   There is a second objection to this form of privatisation. The private finance model reduces public services to a purely commercial venture that is detached from their social purpose.

   Far from transferring risk, private finance initiative contractors with their shell companies know that the government retains the political or reputational risk as provider of last resort.

   Full article here: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10668821
   • prism 6.1

     27 August 2010 at 10:36 am

     This stuff is a must-read Chairman. Put very clearly for those of us trying to understand the potentialities of this economic change.
     • The Chairman 6.1.1

       27 August 2010 at 12:15 pm

       Indeed. I thought it was one the Standard would’ve picked up on. It must of slipped through the cracks.
       • Draco T Bastard 6.1.1.1

         27 August 2010 at 1:23 pm

         Guest post time?
   • Draco T Bastard 6.2

     27 August 2010 at 12:11 pm

     I just wish Labour, and every other left party, would declare that such contracts would be annulled with no compensation when they get in power again. That would stop this rort of the taxpayers by NACT cold.
7. Pascal's bookie 7

   27 August 2010 at 1:15 pm

   Creeping surveillance

   http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2010/08/where-at-least-we-know-were-free-part.html

   Nothing to see here folks. The founders never said that the government couldn’t randomly x-ray your car — and you — without a warrant. And if they didn’t say it, then there can be no law against it. Let’s move along.
8. carlyh 8

   27 August 2010 at 6:04 pm

   Hey everyone,

   If you’re interested, please take my survey on a Burqa ban in New Zealand…

   http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/56NHMZ3

   Or tell me your opinions here:

   What would your opinion be if New Zealand enforced a public Burqa ban??
   Do you agree with the French Burqa ban?
   • Vicky32 8.1

     27 August 2010 at 7:26 pm

     I don’t think it’s a big enough issue here, carlyh… I have had a language student who wore the fill kit, which was a pain, as I couldn’t hear anything she said unless I almost sat on her! Aside from that, it’s really not an issue, especially as few women in New Zealand wear the full kit. Right now, I just envy them that they are warm!
     Deb
   • Pascal's bookie 8.2

     27 August 2010 at 7:46 pm

     I reckon people should be allowed to wear whatever the fuck they want.
     • Armchair Critic 8.2.1

       27 August 2010 at 8:07 pm

       Even in Whanganui. The authoritarian bully-boys we have for a government think otherwise.
     • The Voice of Reason 8.2.2

       27 August 2010 at 8:15 pm

       Whatever they want? Or whatever their paternalistic authority figure tells them they want?
       • Vicky32 8.2.2.1

         27 August 2010 at 10:31 pm

         If you talk to Muslim women, you find they very often want to wear the burqa, because they find it liberating! Not a point of view Western men are likely to understand, but I get it, although I wouldn’t want to wear the burqa, even if it is warm..
         Deb
   • Daveosaurus 8.3

     27 August 2010 at 8:38 pm

     The best description I have seen of the current phobia of Islam is that it’s “metastasised anti-Semitism”. It’s the same disease, it’s just moved on to a different target.

     Sixty-five years ago, the world said “never again”. It’s now time for actions that match those words.
   • prism 8.4

     27 August 2010 at 10:08 pm

     Please define what is a burqa for those of us not fully informed on this. Is it the nun-type head covering showing the face but the back of the head hidden in a large scarf? What is the full personal tent called?
     • Draco T Bastard 8.4.1

       28 August 2010 at 12:11 am

       Nun type head covering is the Niqab
       The personal tent is the Burqa
   • NickS 8.5

     27 August 2010 at 10:14 pm

     Nyet, and I think the French ban was utterly stupid.

     Also, from my hazy memories of political science + a little bit of fact checking on wikipedia, the burqa and the niqab are not a direct product of the sura’s in the Qur’an (well, there’s interpretations for them in the hadith), but rather a cultural tradition that pre-dates Islam, and seems to have been picked up and spread much more widely in more recent times by the Wahhabi and similar schools of Islamic fundamentalism.

     Though as with other religions, teh douchebags will “interpret” as they see fit, and the political situation allows them to thrive (hello Gaza and Pakistan) cements the niqab and burka into muslim cultures that never had them, often by force.
9. joe90 9

   27 August 2010 at 7:27 pm

   That bastion of libertarian wet dreams, Somalia, has released its Annual Financial Report for 2009, government spending was just over $11million.
10. BLiP 10

    27 August 2010 at 11:10 pm

    Testing cell phone abilities – yes, again. Think I might have got it right this time.
    • BLiP 10.1

      27 August 2010 at 11:45 pm

      RESULT!
11. John 11

    28 August 2010 at 12:37 am

    http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/johann-hari-how-much-proof-do-the-global-warming-deniers-need-2063077.html

    A really excellent article about climate change and climate change denial. Gives us the viewpoint of Tim Flannery Australian climate scientist.

Links to post

1. The Standard: posted on 26 August 2010 at 6:00 pm

• Comments are now closed

• Log in
• Donate
• Contribute post

• Articles RSS