To ask the real questions, you have to know the details
Agenda this morning showed, in several ways, that if you want to ask difficult questions, you have to know your topic. Guyon Espiner […]
Steve Pierson
Negative vs dirty
There’s an important difference between negative campaigning and dirty tricks but it already seems the two are getting confused in the media. Negative […]
The Standard Week: September 5 – 12
The election date was announced as November the 8th. Everyone had worked that out based on the available dates. But that didn’t stop […]
On morality
The Catholic Church has called for politicans to take a ‘moral stand’ on abortion, adoption by same-sex couples, gambling, embryonic stem-cell research, and euthanasia. […]
National: for a more confused future
On Sunday, John Key, apparently off-the-cuff, announced he would dismantle the Families Commission and give the money to church groups, who just happened […]
Introducing Campaign Hub 2008
Helena Catt, head of the Electoral Commission, says the EFA has had a ‘chilling effect’ on democratic participation. I’m convinced that that is […]
Nats still getting money from trusts
One of the great things about the EFA is that donations over $20,000 must be declared within 10 working days. Because of that, […]
Fewer literacy?
Like John Key, I’m utterly bored with Peters. So, just a short, tangentially-related note. Tracy Watkins, like every other press gallery journo, thinks […]
Nats’ leaked health policy full of holes
Having just read the National health policy and background paper released by Labour, a few things stand out to me. 1) There is […]
Mr Slippery at it again
An interesting interview between John Key and Wammo today. He starts out saying Labour is spending all its time talking about Owen Glenn […]
Nat health policy: more money for rich, fewer for poor
Jim Anderton is releasing elements of National’s health policy at Question Time: – Pharmac’s independent decisions could be overruled by politicians. – Private […]
The truth behind the Shawn Tan affair
For the last several weeks the EPMU has had to weather an extraordinary series of attacks from ACT, ACT candidate and EPMU employee […]
End of the line for Peters
Winston Peters will be wondering why he has let his political legacy be destroyed by not simply declaring donations that came from legal […]
Which seems more likely?
Multiple spies, whom National has been unable to catch, and a series of ‘gaffes’ and accidents involving sensitive papers? Or a bitter faction […]
How many leaks to sink a ship?
This is really getting pretty serious now – a fourth National party policy has been leaked to Labour, who have made it public. […]
Spin-busting: ‘Labour has no policy, either’
John Key is running a line that first emerged in the rightwing blogs a few months ago: ‘Labour doesn’t have any policy, either’. […]
What I want from a 4th term Labour-led Govt
With the election fast approaching, here’s a non-exhaustive list of policies I would like to see from a 4th term Labour-led Government. Hopefully, […]
The polls and petrol prices
Updating a post from a few months ago, here’s how Labour’s Roy Morgan poll numbers are going compared to the price of petrol since the […]
The Standard Week: August 29 – September 5
As always at The Standard, we’re interested in the issues that affect people’s lives. So, rather than endless posts on who said what […]
The sincerest form of flattery
The Greens billboards have shown how it’s done – striking and simple without being dishonest or simplistic. Maybe National could imitate them: Maybe […]
Now, that’s better
Fewer bureaucrats
OK. They were laughably bad before but now they don’t even have the grammar correct. If you can count it, you use fewer: less […]
The hypocrisy of the Right
Today, we have National’s Judith Collins attacking the Government because the number of Kiwis on the unemployment benefit rose from 17,710 to 20,465 […]
Why didn’t NZF use Nats’ donations playbook?
This business with donations from the Spencer Trust going to New Zealand First but not being declared. I find it hard to credit […]
Why the rush?
We are, at a legal maximum, 72 days away from the election. The tradition is that the date is announced at least six weeks […]
Are you positive?
Talking about the Nat billboard campaign on Wammo’s show this morning, Key said it was going to positive and on message*. Umm, when’s […]
Metaphor (2)
So, the day after our post last week a couple of readers were in town and they came across Stephen Franks beside his […]
Dissection
OK, so there are limitless ways to mock the Nat’s ‘WW2 bombers flying to Chile’ billboard (send us yours to add to these […]
Russel Norman at Drinking Liberally Wgtn – tomorrow
The Drinking Liberally – Wellington email: By popular demand this Wednesday Drinking Liberally Wellington presents: Russel Norman – Co-leader of the Green Party. […]
Break open the trusts
As we’ve discussed earlier, it would be highly surprising if the investigations into NZF’s finances find any serious illegality. At worst, a failure to […]
Buy Kiwi online
As part of the Buy NZ Made programme that was part of the Government’s abstention deal with the Greens, the Get NZ Made […]
Key- you like Obama? OK.. I’m the white Obama!
“I’m a bit like (Barack) Obama,” – Key Of course, National has been trying to link Key to Obama because Obama is probably […]
New York Times praises NZ on nukes
‘Let’s hear it for New Zealand’ exclaims the New York Times editorial. Why? Because New Zealand is leading a group of countries that […]
ToryAid: Wastewatch (4)
Because National has abandoned its wastewatch website, we keep track of the ‘waste’ National has promised to cut to pay for those magical, […]
Just sayin’
The TV channel in Lebanon that relays Fox News is called ADD. I…I just think it’s funny.
Whom to believe? (3)
John Key tells us that National hasn’t decided yet what it would spend its extra borrowing on, what projects would be PPPs, what […]