Open mike 29/05/2010

18 comments on “Open mike 29/05/2010 ”

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1. starboard 1

   29 May 2010 at 6:25 am

   When is Phil Goff gona stand down ?
   • Dave 1.1

     29 May 2010 at 8:02 am

     Possibly when the combined NACT front bench shows a little humanity and their combined IQ lifts above a sort of room temperature level?
     • just saying 1.1.1

       29 May 2010 at 8:39 am

       I’ll take that as a ‘never’.

       What about a fresh new deputy leader then?
   • gingercrush 1.2

     29 May 2010 at 12:28 pm

     I don’t think Goff is a good leader but right now it doesn’t matter whatsoever who Labour have as their leader. Because I still believe one-on-one against John Key they’re going to go unstuck.

     What Labour needs is coherent policy. They’re far better than National at it. But that would require them to not focus overly on tax which for many of them they’re still stuck on it. They can’t beat National on tax so why go there. They Labour in government did very well for five years without ever mentioning tax other than raising the highest tax threshold when first in office. By talking tax it allowed National far too much leeway and makes the conversation around tax.

     But if they Labour concentrate fully on policy that is where they’ll see support gain. How much is debatable. But far better than concentrating on leadership.
     • just saying 1.2.1

       29 May 2010 at 4:15 pm

       Hallielujah GC!!!!

       (Even looked up the spelling cos I’ve never written the word before)

       If and when Labour gets back in power it will have to raise taxes, and not just on the 100000+ bracket. The public has consistently said it prefers public services to tax cuts. Our essential services are already underfunded. Taxpayers already subsidise employers and landlords (amongst other non-needy sectors). Tax payers are already topping up for low-wage employers. It’s time for Labour to demand higher pay for workers from employers instead of licking their backsides for them.

       Hence my comment about a new (fresh) deputy leader. It would be nice to have someone who has actually lived in the real world in the last two decades in a leadership role. I’ve given up on the old guard.
2. mach1 2

   29 May 2010 at 8:41 am

   Washington okays medical marijuana and Oakland to license, tax indoor marijuana growers.
   • ianmac 2.1

     29 May 2010 at 11:31 am

     I’ve never used but am all for decriminalising marijuana. Think of the use police could use instead for proper police work. Mind you it would deny the police the pleasure of dangling from helicopters and from standing downwind from the bonfires.
3. ianmac 3

   29 May 2010 at 10:04 am

   The lawyer for Winston Peters was not allowed to speak for him at the Parliamentary Privileges Committee Enquiry. I imagine that Key having to front up and answer questions for himself would be very interesting indeed, (should it ever happen.)
4. vto 4

   29 May 2010 at 10:27 am

   Bit of a pet topic which I keep banging on about but it has arisen again..

   Andy Haden’s reference to maximum quotas for polynesians in the Crusaders rugby team garners great headlines across the media. Yet when Bill Bush advocated for minimum Maori quotas in various rugby grades barely a murmur was heard.

   Proof yet again that what is acceptable commentary on race relations in NZ depends on the race of the commentator. Racist in itself. ha ha ha ha ha ha. It makes so very many people laugh at this entire issue. Out here in Averageland people simply laugh at and ignore cries of “racist!” today. It is a joke.

   Mind you – Haden will be gone as a so-called rugby ambassador. Not a good look under current PC parameters around public people.
   • gingercrush 4.1

     29 May 2010 at 12:24 pm

     The more important question to me is why the hell was Andy Haden an ambassador in the first place. He’s not the best regarded person amongst rugby circles. Indeed, for many he’s rather a plonker.
     • Mac1 4.1.1

       29 May 2010 at 2:54 pm

       Agreed, GC. I don’t like people’s dodging away from rude and ill-mannered behaviour by calling criticism of it ‘being PC’. He came across as a plonker on RNZ yesterday.

       But I had lost respect for him a long time ago when he did the dive from the line-out as an All Black.

       One is supposed to die for one’s country, not dive for it.
5. gingercrush 5

   29 May 2010 at 12:46 pm

   Hmm watched “The Nation”. Nick Smith still sounds rather incoherent on the ETS but the left need to give him some prop. The man must be facing all types of abuse within National and yet he’s still prepared to sell it. Did make good points in regard to Australia. Though for my mind, I’d far prefer green investment to the ETS, a carbon tax or any other policy to combat climate change.

   Cunliffe is arrogant. But he got away with basically telling the panel to keep their mouth shut which I thought was hilarious. Supposedly has an independent report saying there is a 9 billion hole in the budget. Yet still has not said who is doing the report. Also still faces the question that he wants to lift government spending while cutting government spending while increasing savings for New Zealand and having tax cuts for low and middle income earners. And he still believes that will all somehow be affordable. That seems to be Labour’s biggest problem. Is they still talk tax which will not help low income earners much. Only thing they can do is that area is have a tax-free threshold. But still low income earners will not be that much better off. And considering electricity prices skyrocketed during their last term and house inflation skyrocketed as well. Those things hurt those on low and middle incomes.

   Finally they had a piece on the speaker. And who props up? Why Jonathan bloody Hunt who thought Lockward wasn’t very impressive as speaker. Yet what were the two criticisms Hunt had of Lockward Smith? The ceremonial piece where the speaker walks through parliament to his chair and the fact when questions are asked the house is noisy.

   Yes we can all agree Lockward Smith walking through parliament to the speaker’s chair is well rather silly and pompous. But if Smith wishes to indulge his fantasies of being King then let him. As for the other claim. The house was very loud when you were Chair Jonathon Hunt. It just shows that Hunt completely misses the point. Blind to his rulings that allowed any government minister to answer a question and practically no matter what they said they answered the question. Secondly, the house during his time was well noisy. It was noisy before questions were asked, noisy during them and certainly noisy when the ministers were asking the questions.

   Fact is Lockward Smith makes ministers answer questions. Not nearly enough and like any other speaker we’ve had his bias does show through. But nowhere near what we experienced under Hunt and then Wilson. And the rules the speaker has to go on are rather poor rules and should be frankly thrown out the window and new rules made. Those rules as they stand limit the amount of accountability we have in the house. But lets remember its under this speaker we know about MP’s expenses. Its under this speaker, the opposition has a better chance at having their questions answered properly and the behaviour of all MPs is far better than we’ve seen previously.
   • frustrated 5.1

     29 May 2010 at 12:55 pm

     Jonathon Hunt – trougher extraodinaire.
   • ianmac 5.2

     29 May 2010 at 2:24 pm

     Gingercrush. Good summation. Largely non-political.
     Interesting suggestion about Labour should prop up the ETS. I think that Labour thought ETS was too little. Sadly given the obstruction by Nact when Labour was struggling didn’t help. As for the Smith/Hyde association with ECan it doesn’t breed cooperation.
6. Bill 6

   29 May 2010 at 2:54 pm

   The Leak that’s not the Leak

   Both links from EXILED…. it turns out that the leaky pipe apparently has a circumference of just over 21 inches. Which means that it simply isn’t possible that the oil in the Gulf is spilling from there…not the overwhelming bulk of it anyway…which is flooding out into the sea from somewhere ‘much bigger’ else and nobody is bothering to look for it let alone stop it.

   And then it turns out that the booming is simply not being done properly which means that all the oil that comes to shore will wash ashore.
   • ianmac 6.1

     29 May 2010 at 3:17 pm

     Bill on the top left corner at your linked “much bigger” is a reprt on a possible huge failure this morning NZ time? :
     “Either the BP Oil Gusher Has Just Completely Blown Out, or BP is Implementing LMRP RIGHT NOW
     Posted by: George Washington
     Post date: 05/28/2010 – 19:33 “
7. Draco T Bastard 7

   29 May 2010 at 2:55 pm

   http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=10648209&pnum=0

   In fact in turbulent times steady-as-she-goes infrastructure assets become very popular with institutional investors. And it would also be right in the hunt for a big share of the Government’s $1.5 billion broadband spend-up, so in the short term it could have some expansion potential.

   That would be the $1.5 billion that we, as taxpayers, shouldn’t be paying out because Telecom should have maintained and updated their network from the fees that they charged. They didn’t and there’s no indication that they would do so again but there is indication that they would continue looking for government handouts. This structural separation of Telecom is proof of that.

   privatisation = theft.

   There have always been arguments that it holds its strong position in broadband because of advantages from its network ownership. If that is true, then those would be gone.

   But it could also be argued that the regulatory regime, designed to ensure it doesn’t have an unfair advantage, has done a lot more harm than good – at least in the past couple of years.

   What happened in the last couple of years was that Telecom lost it’s network monopoly. It hasn’t done any harm as what it has done is prove that the telecommunications network is uneconomical as a competitive industry. It’s a pity that NZ had to pay so much to relearn that lesson (the politicians that set up the monopoly network in the first place understood that).

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1. Dirk Wolbers: posted on 29 May 2010 at 1:53 pm

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