Open mike 08/05/2013
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to […]
Asset sales petition has more work to do
Breaking – The asset sales referendum petition has collected 292,000 valid signatures. It needs 16,500 more (about another 5%) to reach the threshold. The Keep Our Assets Coalition has 2 months to get the remainder – and says it will get them…
NRT: The spy bill
The new GCSB spy bill is out. For the short version, as @lyndonhood commented: “Admittedly it will be easier for the GCSB to act within their legal boundaries if they don’t have any”. For the long version see the excellent I/S at No Right Turn…
RIP Wellington
John Key says that Wellington is dying and “we don’t know how to turn it around”. Coupled with Brownlee’s slow suffocation of Christchurch and the Nats’ refusal to unblock Auckland’s transport arteries, its not good news for the major cities. But if Wellington is dying, who killed it? The guy who sacked all the public servants? The guy who killed manufacturing?
We’re leaving & we’re taking the dams
Following the Labour and Greens’ rejection of their demand that the parties drop their NZ Power policy to lower power prices, the business elite has announced capital flight. ‘If Origin Energy loses its rentier profits, who’s next? said Phil O’Reilly, close to tears, ‘The banks? The Telecoms duopoly? The petrol companies?* The construction materials oligopoly? The ports and airports?
The cost of a US Harvard education: global land exploitation
US universities’ budgets partly rely on endowment funds. Harvard University investment activities in poor countries exploit people and lax regulations, damaging communities, the environment & economies. They are one of the biggest foreign owners of NZ land.
Open mike 07/05/2013
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to […]
The oxymoronic “responsible Minister”
Spying on Kiwis is ok if “the responsible Minister” says so – this was how the Herald described today’s announcement from John Key regarding the GCSB clean-up Bill. Responsible Minister? Yeah right -that’s an oxymoron when applied to John Key.
Supporting NZ Power
The chief executive of the New Zealand Manufacturers and Exporters Association supports the Labour / Green electricity proposals.
Family first deregistered
Family First have been deregistered as a charity, and they are pushing the line that it is because of their “traditional view of marriage”.
Take “a long short walk”
It’s UN Global Road Safety Week, with a focus on pedestrian safety. NZ statistics for pedestrian injuries and deaths are sobering. Children are especially vulnerable to careless driving practices. In the interests of our people and environment, walking and cycling need to be less dangerous, and more fun.
Surplus 2014/15: an excuse for not doing what needs doing
John Key’s excuse for the planned veto of the extension of paid parental leave is that it would put the 2014/15 surplus at risk. There’s several reasons that’s bullshit, the main one being: why is going just under or just over some arbitrary line in the Crown’s books the Nats’ one aim for the economy? The truth is, Key’s using the surplus as an excuse for not doing the right thing.
Open mike 06/05/2013
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to […]
A poorer world
The Great Barrier Reef is dying. We are leaving the next generations a poorer world.
Someone is lying about MRP float
The “market specialists” say that the loony left have scared of all the Mum and Dad investors. The “investment sources” say the Mums and Dads are signing up in droves. I’m so confused! Why oh why would those nice “market specialists” be lying to us about the effects of the Labour / Green electricity policy? I just can’t work it out…
John Key’s NZ: the nasty side of the “brighter future”
John Key promised a “brighter future” – “wave good-bye to higher taxes not your loved ones”; a higher standard of his MPs, and honesty for the PM. John Key’s NZ is actually one of callous entitlement of the elite, and dis-entitlement and Struggle Street for battling Kiwis.
Hager: Uncomfortable truths
Phil Twyford on Nicky Hager’s Capt Jack Lyon Memorial Lecture Uncomfortable truths, NZ foreign policy in the ‘war on terror’. As Phil notes: “I think it is a cautionary tale for any future Labour-led government with a progressive, independent foreign policy”.
Open mike 05/05/2013
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to […]
It’s all in the “game”
Supporters of the sale of the powercos, portray the Labour-Green NZ Power policy in terms of political strategy and game-play. They focus on the “market”, risk, profits & “fat cat hatred”. They avoid dealing with the guts of the issue: fuel poverty, income inequality & damaged lives.
Poverty Watch 29
Welcome to Poverty Watch, a weekly update on National’s lack of response to the urgent and growing issue of poverty in NZ. This week we continue with the 2012 report from the Office of the Children’s Commissioner. We also take a look at Mana’s Feed the Kids campaign, and the difference between the Nats’ glib promises in opposition and their actions in government.
Open mike 04/05/2013
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to […]
Giving the game away
Aaron Gilmore, eh? He’s clearly finished in the National Party. Not for the view he expressed when he threatened to get a young waiter sacked, but because by doing so he’s lifted the veil on the carefully covered elitism that drives the national party’s agenda.
Weekend social 03/05/2013
Weekend social is for non political chat. What’s on for the weekend, gigs, film or book reviews, sports, or whatever. No politics, no […]
Political vision?
Today’s NZ Herald editorial on Auckland’s up-coming mayoral election campaign, says Brown has vision, but Minto and Williamson lack it. What sort of vision should the left provide in the up-coming local authority elections around NZ, and in NZ’s parliamentary elections in 2014?
Epsom by election?
John Banks is in court to answer allegations over his Dotcom donations and electoral returns. If convicted he loses his seat. How would an Epsom by election play out?
Why Phil O’Reilly wants you to keep paying too much for power
Yesterday, Phil O’Reilly’s Business New Zealand basically declared war on Labour and the Greens. Their ‘open letter’ demanded opposition parties to withdraw the NZ Power policy or risk a capital strike. Unprecedented in modern NZ history. It was a boots and all attempt by the capitalist elite to try to monster the Left. It proves that they think NZ Power is both practical and popular.
Open mike 03/05/2013
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to […]
Caption contest
NRT: National’s future coalition options
No Right Turn points out the inherent flaw in National’s election campaign (and Vernon Small’s analysis of it). A future National government has no good coalition partners. Even the mythic (and likely to be epic if it happened) National/NZ First coalition faces the problem of three parties competing for the same group of economically nationalist and socially conservative voters from slightly different directions.
Networks of influence: Key & Anadarko Petroleum
John Key’s networks of influence include the bosses and directors of Anadarko Petroleum, which is doing some oil exploration in NZ. Gordon Campbell’s excellent piece of investigative journalism shows Anadarko and it’s bosses are not to be trusted.
Key goes negative
John Key has gone hard negative, with his rants about North Korea and communism, and now an attack on the Greens. Negative is where you go when you don’t have a positive story to tell the electorate. I wonder if the Nats’ internal polling has got Key spooked…
Why Brian Gaynor wants you to keep paying too much for power
To say Brian Gaynor is excited about the Mighty River sale is an understatement. Of his last five Herald columns, two have been about how great it will be, and two have been about how awful NZ Power is. His other media appearances have been in a similar vein: Mighty River = good, NZ Power = bad. It’s in his financial interests that investors aren’t scared off Mighty River.
Open mike 02/05/2013
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to […]
The NZ Herald – advancing Auckland backwards
To the Herald the Fourth Estate must be a greenfield development on the outer margins of Auckland: a Dickensian space, hiding the poor from the upper middle-classes. The Herald lacks critical balance & equal weighting for diverse views: it scaremongers about the Akl Unitary Plan & undermines public transport.
Happy International Workers’ Day – have a pay cut
The Nats have chosen International Workers’ Day as the day that legislation allowing employers to slash youth wages takes effect. According to the Same Work Same Pay campaign “Youth rates failed to create jobs in 1990 when youth unemployment reached an all time high” and “the burden of the Government’s failure to drive job growth is now being put on young people”. Protest action is planned.
Why First NZ Capital wants you to keep paying too much for power
A couple of people have questioned this series of posts outing the financial interests of supposedly ‘independent’ commentators who are coming out against the Green/Labour plan to lower power prices. ‘Everyone has links to everyone in New Zealand’. Maybe so, but not everyone is paid by the people whose interests they’re protecting while pretending to be independent in the msm.