A comparison of statements made by John Key with those of others, largely the Gwyn report (Gwyn quotes can all be found there). Key: "In fact, the report does not show that my office was deeply involved. There were a series of claims made and…
Open mike is your post. The Standard is not a conspiracy – just a welcome outlet for the expression of views. Leaders that command respect will not be undermined by this. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy). Step up to the…
It may just be the quality of John Key's analysis, but apparently the Gwyn report has done something impressive in scientific circles and proved a negative. It comprehensively shows that John Key never knew about the Goff SIS OIA release. Or not. JK: but at…
Reposted from No Right Turn One of the things to emerge from the "dirty politics" report is that the SIS pissed all over the OIA: The NZSIS also made a significant error in considering information requests by the news media. Such requests were, from 25…
Just as almost everyone predicted, the enquiry into Collins (dumped today to confuse coverage of the Gwyn enquiry) delivered a nice big bucket of whitewash. Labour's Megan Woods: Key’s vile smear machine questions left unanswered ... “This report has deliberately narrow terms of reference and…
Goff: Goff calls on PM to apologise or resign "The Prime Minister should resign, everybody else has ... look I think it's a very serious matter, if he can't own up to it , if he can't apologise, if he can't give the guarantee then…
The full Gwyn report (pdf) is here. The Media release (currently at the top of this page) reads: Inspector-General publishes report on inquiry into release of NZSIS information to Cameron Slater - 25 November 2014, 10:00am The Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security, Cheryl Gwyn, published her report…
On the weekend John Key apologised to Cameron Slater for breaching his privacy by releasing a private email. That Slater would even seek an apology is incredible given what he gets up to. Publishing private emails is something Slater does all the time. Just check out Matt…
Open mike is your post. The Standard is not a conspiracy – just a welcome outlet for the expression of views. Leaders that command respect will not be undermined by this. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy). Step up to the…
Looks like the Gwyn report, due tomorrow, will confirm the Key government's abuse of power / dirty politics. From The Herald. PM's office pushed Slater to dig up dirt on Goff - report A report by New Zealand's intelligence watchdog Cheryl Gwyn has found attack…
Reposted from Polity As readers will have seen, Andrew Little has announced Labour's new lineup. Overall, I think this is a pretty shrewd list, seeking to build a united caucus team after the very close leadership election. It is not exactly what I might have…
After a delay caused by a fire alarm going off Labour's new lineup has been announced by Andrew Little. Annette King is to be Little's recommended Deputy Leader and this will be confirmed presumably by Caucus at its meeting tomorrow and Grant Robertson picks up…
I missed it at the time, but about a week ago the Waitangi Tribunal released a major report. The excellent Andrew Geddis was quick off the mark with a useful and challenging summary: ...the real money passage comes at pages 525-526: Our essential conclusion, therefore,…
Open mike is your post. The Standard is not a conspiracy – just a welcome outlet for the expression of views. Leaders that command respect will not be undermined by this. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy). Step up to the…
There is one thing that you can say about the National party and their media sycophants is that they are routinely wrong about Auckland city. Auckland really can't go wrong by simply implementing whatever plan they are currently railing against. For instance this classically wrong cartoon accurately expresses…
Looks like exploiting petrol station workers by docking their pay for circumstances beyond their control was just the tip of the iceberg of this kind of behaviour. Today: Checkout girls made to pay for theft Checkout "girls"?? A supermarket boss told teenage checkout girls to…
Open mike is your post. The Standard is not a conspiracy – just a welcome outlet for the expression of views. Leaders that command respect will not be undermined by this. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy). Step up to the…
John Key's election as chair of the International Democratic Union, decided at its Leaders' meeting in Seoul this week, is a significant event, not just a compliment. Key succeeds John Howard, who has led this organisation of 80 right-wing parties for the past 12 years.…
I didn't have a strong preference in the recently completed Labour caucus leadership contest. I marginally favoured Andrew Little, but also didn't know very much about him. Now the media are looking to find out more about him. Andrea Vance has an informative article about…
Open mike is your post. The Standard is not a conspiracy – just a welcome outlet for the expression of views. Leaders that command respect will not be undermined by this. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy). Step up to the…
Weekend social is for non political chat. What's on for the weekend, gigs, film or book reviews, sports, or whatever. No politics, no aggro, why can't we all just get along?
Reposted from Polity. Recently Treasury has published a paper showing that most people do not stay at the same point on the income scale for an extended period. That is assuredly true, and is also a good thing in as far as it goes. DPF…
We all know that Child Poverty is one of New Zealand's major problems. In an attempt to finally get a response from the National government to the problem ex-Family Court judge Graeme MacCormick has issued a "Children's Plea" to get the government to do something…
Recently I wrote a post on the Nats' economic "genius" in our property market. Yesterday a report from the NZ Super Fund (Cullen fund) provided further evidence of their incompetence. The highlights: Fund size: NZ$27.11 billion Fund return: 1.47% during October Total return of 9.92%…
Open mike is your post. The Standard is not a conspiracy – just a welcome outlet for the expression of views. Leaders that command respect will not be undermined by this. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy). Step up to the…
I was just having a look through the connections between this site and others (and contemplating how to increase it). I thought others might also be interested. This is from wordpress stats, which is moderately accurate but does rely on javascript reporting, so some of…
Reposted from No Right Turn Community groups have a vital role in New Zealand. In addition to speaking out on social problems such as poverty, mental illness and addiction, they also often have a direct role in fixing them via government funding. Unfortunately there's an…
Twitter today is finding its own way to express exasperation with John Key declaring that Aotearoa was peacefully settled. Apparently the New Zealand Wars were just another Rugby analogy to John Key. Parihaka was a Herbs song. Gate Pa? Well he probably hasn't heard of…