No smoking gun
It turns out the Herald’s story about John Key’s H-fee involvement is a bust. Aside from Key not being straight with the dates […]
Politics
Posts on government and governence at national and local level, political parties,politicians, and political participation
The H-fee explained
A little more detail to flesh out Tane’s post. The core of the H-fee story is this: In 1987, head of Equiticorp Allan Hawkins […]
This looks big
It looks like the Herald has as a scoop on John Key’s possible involvement in the H-fee scandal. According to the article: John […]
English pulls a Lockwood
Oh dear. In the same week Lockwood Smith made his racist remarks and Maurice Williamson committed the gaffe of talking openly about National […]
Vote Smart: Wellington
In Wellington Central and Ohariu-Belmont, left-wing voters have the opportunity to use their candidate votes wisely to help good left-wing candidates to victory, […]
Gone Flippin’
Slippery John’s flip-flops keep on coming. Here he is just three weeks ago in the Listener: “you either have a conflict of interest […]
A clear choice on ACC
If you vote National, United Future, or ACT, you will be voting for the ACC system to be privatised. Consequences of this include: […]
Chain gang
The Nats’ private prison scheme just gets worse. As No Right Turn points out prisons would be used to do contract work and […]
Prisons for profit
National’s announcement that it plans to privatise the prison system says a lot about the party’s underlying values. Say what you like about […]
Update on Brownlee
There are substantive policy issues such as National’s privatisation plans for the prisons that need to be covered but, first, an update on […]
A pattern of (mis)behaviour
Over this year, we’ve seen John Key caught out lying on a number of occasions – the excuses for his “we would love […]
Standard scoop: Another senior Nat failed to disclose conflicts
Last month, Key lied when he was asked whether he had more Tranzrail shares, over which he had failed to declare his conflict […]
You’re too kind
Audrey Young is now acknowledging Key’s reflexive tendency to lie, but she is incredibly soft on it: I was intrigued at Key’s suggestion […]
Horse racing
Here are the results of the last four polls, released over the past four days. I’ve presented them in number of seats won […]
Labour’s labour policy good for labourers
Labour has unveiled its work rights policy, and it’s a good one: – minimum wage increases at least at the rate of inflation […]
Key – Undisclosed conflict of interest
National’s response to my revelation on The Standard that John Key owned shares had undisclosed conflicts of interest with Fletcher Challenge Forests is […]
Standard Scoop: Key exposed again on secret shares and Tranzrail
When the Tranzrail shares came to light, Key was asked whether he had any other undisclosed shares entailing a conflict of interest. He […]
Polling Biases
This is from the discussion area of the wikipedia page on opinion polls. It is an analysis of biases between the polling companies […]
On moral mandates
So, let me get this straight. The Right says that the minor parties have to support a National-led government if National gets more […]
Here be dragons
So, we can all make up dumb pictures and say ‘beware of many-headed monsters’. Let’s, instead, ask if National’s attack makes sense. First, […]
Poll Trends – National is soft
Rather than argue about individual polls, it is more interesting to look at the overall trends. A number of people have put an […]
Fact checkin’ – five-headed monsters
The New Zealand Herald is, as usual, uncritically repeating John Key’s latest lines on the front page of its website. This time Key’s […]
Roy Morgan poll
And the polls keep coming. Today’s Roy Morgan poll has Labour down 5.5% and National up slightly, while the Greens rise to an […]
The Standard line: Kiwisaver
So, you’re talking with someone about politics and they say something really dumb and wrong and you know it’s wrong but you don’t […]
The Standard line: Photoshop
So, you’re talking with someone about politics and they say something really dumb and wrong and you know it’s wrong but you don’t […]
Herald Digipoll
The latest Herald Digipoll presents quite a different picture to last night’s 3 News poll. While TV3 had the Left and Right blocs […]
Caught in the ACT
The Dom Post reports that ACT will have to file amended returns after failing to declare $20,000 of donated office space. Luckily for […]
3 News poll
Tonight’s 3 News poll has the election wide open with two weeks to go, putting the Left on 59 seats to the Right’s […]
Don’t dream, it’s over
I’ve always regarded the possibility of a National-Maori Party governing arrangement as absurd, even grotesque. The interests of the Maori people, who are […]
A missing NZ Herald poll?
Now I’m not one to gossip (well, not too much) but in the last few days I’ve heard from several people that the […]
National’s ‘redneck element’
In the heat of the Lockwood Smith controversy yesterday, some of our right-wing readers had a go at John A for posting a […]
Green laffs
Russel Norman at Drinking Liberally – Auckland last night on Lockwood Smith: Lockwood may think all Asians have small hands but what we […]
Video: Election campaign, 22 Oct
Observations of the campaign trails from TV3’s Ali Ikram…. Not sure what I think of those “bleeps” on the John Key excerpt…
Wait, what’s the RSE?
OK, we’ve reported on, given historical context to, and mocked Lockwood Smith’s racist comments about seasonal migrant workers. Now, to the substance of […]
Clark winning in the style stakes
And now for something fluffy. That’s right, the fashion stakes count in the election as well. According to one stylist National leader John […]
Nats: instilling the work ethic early
Lockwood Smith has unveiled more National workforce innovations. In addition to favouring Asian seasonal migrants over Polynesians because their hands are smaller, Smith […]