Time for a change
Sorry for the long post. This is my transcript of John Key’s interview with Mary Wilson on Checkpoint last night. It’s just incredible. […]
Politics
Posts on government and governence at national and local level, political parties,politicians, and political participation
Slippery
Mary Wilson interviews John Key on Checkpoint. Brilliant. Sean Plunket interviews Richard Prebble and Richard Griffin on Morning Report. Grubby old men. Time […]
Quandary
This evening, Labour tabled in the House, with her permission, a statement from the woman that Richard Worth harrassed with his corrupt ‘jobs […]
Get a shave mate, you’re the PM
If you saw last night’s One News piece on the Worth fiasco, you might have noticed Key looking particularly haggard. This photo doesn’t […]
Rhetoric & Reality 2: Jobs
Before the election National’s “Employment & Workplace Relations” policy set out the principle of “building opportunity for all”, and the need to “Expand […]
Breakfast covers the Worth investigation
First it was Paul Henry and Guyon Espiner. Both agree Key needs to “come clean with the country and give us more detail […]
General Election in 2010?
National promised to do a lot of things in their first term such as: Not selling state assets. Keeping WFF and other entitlements […]
Worse and worse
This just gets worse for Key. It has emerged that Worth was offering ‘jobs for favours’ for a young woman. Goff passed her […]
Question time
John Key’s making a real hash of this latest Worth scandal. There was the secretive way he went about things yesterday, which is […]
Iz satisfard
hattip: Maia, Anthony Karinski
I wish to complain…
It turns out that Phil Goff was aware of an allegation about Richard Worth weeks ago that may relate to the current investigation. […]
Update on Worth
From the fuzz: Police confirm that a complaint was made in Auckland two weeks ago and related to a recent alleged incident. Preliminary […]
Nat discovers the virtues of listening
Here’s an exert from Nick Smith’s speech to the 2009 New Zealand Planning Institute Conference: I acknowledge, that while the bulk of submissions […]
Cullen’s two cents
Quite rightly, Michael Cullen has avoided getting involved in the debate over National’s starvation diet for the New Zealand Superannuation Fund, known as […]
Sprinters
David Farrar has a post on Kiwiblog listing the fastest risers to become Prime Minister. They are: John Key – 6 years David […]
If you’re gonna cut, make it clean
How titillating. Worth has resigned and he won’t say why. ‘Personal reasons’ eh? Heard that one before. Key’s not talking either. He describes […]
More on Worth?
Just out from the police: An allegation has been made against a sitting member of Parliament. Wellington police are conducting a preliminary investigation […]
Three down
Six months in and John Key has broken three of his eleven “personal guarantees”. Impressive. Click on the image for full size.
Transparency
Strange isn’t it that Key can support transparency yesterday but not today. Political expediency at its worst.
Worth’s gone
Link on Stuff. UPDATE: The “personal reasons” we know about so far: He personally profited from his trip to India to discuss aviation training. […]
Submit!
Over at No Right Turn, Idiot/Savant writes:- The Auckland Governance Committee has called for submissions on the Local Government (Auckland Council) Bill. Two […]
Tip of the spear
You’ve done your job as a spin doctor when journalists start repeating your spin sub-consciously. The credit downgrade ‘issue’ is a great example. […]
Journalists not falling for Nats’ $8 billion con-job
This part of Vernon Small’s article today deserves an extended quote: “The numbers are stark. If full payments resume in 2020, contributions will […]
Sweet rides
A few weeks back, in the best traditions of tabloid TV, Q+A took time to mention Lockwood’s ride, the macho muscle car Ford […]
The $8 billion robbery
On Q+A this morning Guyon Espiner interviewed Bill English. Guyon had received papers from a treasury official that apparently show the cost of […]
Turei new greens leader
Metiria Turei has been elected at the Green Party National conference to replace Jeanette Fitzsimons are female co-leader. Her election is no real […]
Future shock
Yesterday, my comrade Zetetic wrote that despite all the bad stuff in the Budget there was still a “meta-victory” for the Left because […]
Caption Competition
The man in the mirror
The Budget is already costing jobs. AirNZ has announced that it will be cutting flights. 80 jobs will go. The EPMU has […]
Government waste
There was much wailing and gnashing of teeth from the right when Labour and the Greens filibustered the other week to draw the […]
The Dishonest Budget
Thanks to a reader, here’s Phil Goff’s speech in reply to the Budget. Looks like they’ve ripped the Herald’s version, so for the […]
Mission accomplished
John Key famously said “we would love to see wages drop“. It sure didn’t take him long in government to see his ambition achieved. […]
Here we go again
In the 1990’s the National government of the day dealt with recession by cutting spending. The tragic result was to suck cash out […]
Broken promises
National have already broken lots of pre-election promises and policies. Their policy to consult on local government and Auckland has been contemptuously ignored. […]
English and Key uncertain of Budget’s focus
If there was ever a phrase that this Government keeps reminding me of, it’s “couldn’t organize a piss-up in a brewery”. Today, on […]
History repeats for Mark Thomas
The irony is that Melissa Lee’s campaign manager, Mark Thomas, is no stranger to campaigns that start off with a hiss and a […]