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In his blog, Colin Espiner asked: "But my question is this: National has known for months it was going to torpedo the tunnels. It knew this decision would kill its chances of winning Mt Albert. So why did no one tell Lee? And why did…
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This, I swear, is a complete and unedited press release from Roger Douglas. A Recipe To Grow The Economic Cake -Hon Sir Roger Douglas Thursday, May 14 2009 Yield: An equitable serving for all Ingredients 2½ cup Productivity 1½ cup Fiscal Responsibility 1 cup Sound…
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Interesting comment on Melissa from Kiwiblog's Farrar: There is also the issue of the video produced by her before the election, placed on You Tube. I haven't covered that in detail yet because so far I can't see anywhere what Melissa has done wrong -…
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Did your company use NZ On Air money to produce a National Party promotional video? Look, I didn't keep records of who was working on what when and it doesn't work like that the only people who have a problem are disgruntled employees but they…
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John Key has overruled Bill English and got the money for his beloved cycleway (now a group of "Great Rides"), $50 million spread over three years. I won't waste too much time on the substance.The argument's the same as it always was. Cycle tracks are…
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A reader writes: This cracked me up. When I went to look at the press release about John Key's cycleway, this is what I got. Must be a not so subtle sign from Bill!
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Over at Public Address Keith Ng has a great post up on Labour and National's tax regimes. Pretty graphs, accessible analysis and a DPF slap-down - what more could you ask for?
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From the Herald's Your Views on Waterview: HammerHead (Wellington City): No they should replace it with a cycleway. This would prevent criminals coming from South Auckland, as most don't have bikes. This would also reduce the crime rate in the area. Have you ever tried…
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Over at Red Alert, the Labour MPs' blog, Trevor Mallard points out that nominations for the Mt Albert by-election don't close until next week. If John Key, as Mallard puts it, "has the balls" he can tell Melissa Lee to stand down and the National…
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Just in from the Wellington DL crew: For our next Drinking Liberally we are honoured to have Prof. Philippa Howden-Chapman speaking on "Healthy homes for a sustainable society". Philippa is a member of the NZ Heart Foundation Scientific and Population Health Committee and on the…
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Green MP Catherine Delahunty is running an e-card campaign to support public sector pay equity after National announced it would be cancelling pay equity reviews and sacking the team responsible for them. It's a stark reminder that nothing has really changed since National dumped pay…
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Labour's just launched an interactive Google map showing National's plans for the Waterview connection. Click the map below to check it out.
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Melissa Lee's recent interviews on Q+A, TV1, TV3 and RNZ proved once and for all that being able to read an autocue doesn't mean you're any good at handling the media. When Lee put her hand up to rob the hapless Ravi Musuku of any chance…
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And the ticking timebomb goes off. From Not PC on last night's Mt Albert candidates' debate: Most of what every mainstream candidate had to say on the night was both instantly forgettable and intended only for short-term political advantage. But there was one thing one candidate…
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National has released its Waterview plan. Basically a trench rather than a tunnel, and a few hundred more homes knocked down. They reckon it will cost $1.4 billion. What's missing from the costing? Financing costs were included in the cost of the tunnel to inflate it…
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Labour asked for an urgent debate in the House today on the Waterview announcement. Smith denied it because the announcement hadn't then taken place. A minute later Joyce made the announcement. Labour then asked leave of the House for an urgent question to Joyce, Brownlee…
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Here's Melissa Lee explaining on Checkpoint how her staff volunteered their time to produce a video for National Party list candidates: LEE: Well we were doing a launch, you know, for the Asian campaign and I thought it might be a good, fun thing to…
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I must say, TVNZ's belt tightening is certainly having an impact on their journalism, at least in the online presence. It was one thing for them to still think Richard Prebble is a Member of Parliament in a piece on Saturday (for the record, Richard…
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A recent piece in the New York Times highlights the absurdity of going backwards with the apparent reorganisation of the Families Commission around nuclear families. Gender involves a lot of gray area. And efforts to legislate a binary truth upon the wide spectrum of gender…
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I figure the very least the Nats could do after spending our money on their asian-voter campaign video is to share it with us. Strangely, I couldn't find it on the National Party website as referenced by last night's Campbell Live piece. Fortunately the YouTube…
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Most of us work for a living, and worry about money measured in tens, hundreds, or thousands of dollars. For myself, I find the numbers involved in the economic crash and the bailouts to be so insanely huge as to be meaningless. This article summarises…
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A mate put me onto the "story of stuff" the other day. It's an excellent Green-Left critique of our economic system pitched toward kids. After all, they're the ones who are going to have to deal with the mess. The youtube version is below or…
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An interesting story on TV3 last night about potential for conflict of interest relating to Asia Down Under, a broadcasting company owned by Melissa Lee which produced a political documentary during the last election. Even more interesting was what was revealed about a video about…
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Despite four days of strike action and growing public outrage over Air New Zealand's treatment of its Zeal320 flight attendants, CEO Rob Fyfe is still refusing to even start closing the glaring pay gap between these workers and those employed directly by AirNZ. Why is…
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Yesterday the long wait for a decision on the Waterview Connection somewhat ended. The full picture will become more obvious today, once NZTA release their prefered alignment for the route, and how much of it - if any - will be trenched or tunneled. For…
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Here's a trick you can all play at home. You'll need several different plans for a major motorway project produced by NZTA and a compliant Treasury ready and willing to alter figures to make your preferred option look better than it is. Now, you want…
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I don't know about you guys but when Family First says something is great I get worried. So when those reactionaries say NACT has strengthened the Families Commission with its new appointments it's worth having a second look at what's going on. The Families Commission is…
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Makes you wish we had some good political satire here.
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We got a guest post a fortnight ago that we keep meaning to put up with the title "Worth fails to cock-up for a week, apologises to PM". Lucky we didn't speak too soon. The background is this. Chris Hipkins, like any good MP does,…
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When I first started writing for The Standard way back in August 2007 I never envisaged it would become what it is today, nor that it would take up anywhere near as much of my time as it does. A year and half later, I've…