The power & the pressure
We need a new green left direction, now and for the future. A future Labour-Green-Mana coalition government could provide such a direction. The original NZ Values Party Manifesto provides an important Blueprint.
Economy
Posts on the economy, work, business, income, and labour
Hickey on the living wage
Excellent piece by Bernard Hickey in The Herald this morning.
ANZ staff striking
All the best to the ANZ staff who are on strike today.
Noam Chomsky on Student debt
Have Student loans made current University Students less radical?
Cause of poverty and inequality found!
Good news citizens! The National government has revealed unto us today the cause of poverty and inequality.
The long reach of “5 Eyes”: re-post
With Chris Finlayson just announced as minister in charge of GCSB & SIS, I thought it appropriate to re-post something I published on The Standard back in July 2013: links 5 Eyes’ attorney generals, cyber-security, Dotcom, etc.
Boots Theory: Numbers are meaningless when families are living in cars
There’s something obscene about the way the economic story gets framed: the figures on a page, the points on an index, the number of dollars someone can swap for a number of different-coloured dollars, when people are suffering.
Unaffordable housing & the culture of greed
Rental housing remains unaffordable for many. The problem is the greed of investors & speculators, supported by a culture in which housing investment is seen as a way to individual prosperity.
First they sold Auckland, then the rest of NZ…?
A quiet shift in a dodgy Key govt-SkyCity deal: TVNZ land, sold to SkyCity for its convention centre, is to be used for a new hotel. Plus: non-mandated deal between Auckland Transport Authority & a US corporate – intense surveillance of Aucklanders’ diverse activities.
New Zealand’s brighter future
The early election has meant that National has avoided the bad news of the collapse in international milk prices during the campaign period. And the Reserve Bank has finally taken action to drive down the value of New Zealand’s currency. It may be that the brighter future promised by National is not going to be so bright.
The politics of poverty
Every election Key is confronted with the issue of poverty. His response is always pure politics with no effective action, and this election has been no different. We will be here again in 2017.
Hello National, bye bye breaks …
Our guest poster has a look at the Employment relations Amendment Bill that National will attempt to sneak through during Labour’s leadership primary. This bill is clearly targeted at those employees who are most vulnerable. It reinforces the Nat’s slow and steady but effective chipping away of employee’s rights and will really resonate with its core constituency
Pick up the ball
In the spirit of new badly needed Left Unity. The Left opposition needs to start setting the agenda. First “feed the kids” needs to be picked up. Second the corporate welfare for Solid Energy needs a lot of scrutiny. So does the the state funding of oil exploration.
Boots Theory: Creepy behaviour from David Farrar
David Farrar continues the Dirty Politics strategy of trying to intimidate critics of the government into silence.
Kumbaya
Musings from Captain Obvious
NRT: Will Key act on child poverty?
While the left lost the election, it looks like we’ve won another battle in the war of ideas, with John Key being forced to at least pretend he wants to do something about child poverty. Ideas long recommended from the Children’s Commissioner may finally be implemented.
WANTED: new ideas on child poverty
It’s great to see John Key taking a sudden interest in addressing child poverty in New Zealand. But why the change of heart?
The Election That Left One Third of Us Behind
No one should begrudge John Key and the National party the right to celebrate an impressive election victory. It is little consolation to […]
Idiots, Cowards and Bastards.
When they write about it at all, the media tends to produce a lot of smash on the issue of global warming, and I’ve had enough of the crap. I apologise for both the length of this post and the number of data chewing links (pdfs and video). I’m hoping to write a number of posts looking at global warming from a variety of perspectives, and hopefully, it’ll be possible to keep others somewhat briefer than this one.
The lurch to the right begins
Expect to see a lot of drastic rightwing policies this term as John Key redefines the term “centre ground.”
My morning thoughts on the night before
It will take a flax roots, bottom-up, community-based movement to rebuild democracy and a fair, caring and sustainable society.
The tweets are alive….
… with pre-election day fervour. It’s an election that’s going down to the wire. The energy is there for the left to keep talking to people, and to encourage as many as possible to get out and vote. It’s Suffrage Day – reporting via the telegraph in 1893 to the internet today. On-going updates
Greens buoyant
John Key & National’s empty facade – its lack of vision for NZ – has been exposed. Opposition parties have continued to campaign positively, focusing on people, fairness, & the environment. [Update] NZ Herald video
NZ Inc: Frightening the invisible horses of the market
The Herald is scathing of Labour’s NZ Inc policy, which defies all logic and reason by assuming that there are better ways to build our economy than flogging off profitable assets, built by New Zealanders, to foreign investors.
The cost of a bowl of Weet-Bix
One of the most dishonest arguments the right ever put forward on the subject of poverty is around one of the simplest things in life: a bowl of Weet-Bix.
The email
The email that alleges to show John key was in on a conspiracy, with Hollywood execs, to entrap Dotcom in NZ so they could extradite him to the US. Updated. Warners say the email is fake. But who was applying the “political pressure”? Updated: Cameron Slater is a techno idiot.
The enablers
Under pressure from Glenn Greenwald’s revelations, John Key, using various smoke screens, is starting to reveal his complicity in working with the GCSB & its 5 Eyes partners, to extend the scope of their spying. Could the Southern Cross Cable Network not have known their systems had been tapped? Update: Statement by Southern Cross Cables
NZ Inc
David Cunliffe has announced his final big policy. It’s called NZ Inc and it’s a bloody smart move.
The hairdressers of Levin and Foxton
John Key reckons increasing the minimum wage would hurt “the hairdressers in Levin or Foxton”. So Rob McCann, Labour’s candidate for Ōtaki, asked one how she felt about that.
Nat two track strategy – March to Sept
Nicky Hager has exposed the two track strategy of the Whale Oil, Kiwiblog, Nat smear machine. Why is it allowed to continue?
The working poor
National is not interested in doing anything about poverty in NZ. They won’t even officially measure poverty, because they don’t want to know.
The only way National know to grow the economy
On Firstline this morning, John Key tried to compare National’s and Labour’s policies by saying “You can’t grow the economy when you restrict labour laws.” It’s nonsense, and it’s scary.
Poverty a National disgrace
Advocacy groups are calling for action. People are marching for action. The parties of the left are ready to take action. Only National stands in the way.
No One’s Fault But Ours
Nothing so clearly demonstrates John Key’s contempt for the New Zealand voter as his confidence that we will believe whatever he tells us. […]
NRT: That empty void again
A bit over a week ago, I complained about the empty void at the heart of the election: Nationals refusal to release policy. And it has struck again today, in the form of Nationals fiscal “plan”. We actually have a government seeking re-election while offering no specifics about what it intends to do in office. But don’t they have a lovely picture of John Key?
Polity: Key waves hands, insipidly
Nationals hypothetical tax cut package has not gone down well. People do not appear to like the fact that it is small, hypothetical, and irresponsible, all at once.This is what you get when you have a prime minister so weakly desperate for public approval that they make up policy by accident and then push that poor decision through their cabinet and caucus.