Gay marriage – what is wrong with us
Gay marriage looks set to become a “key election issue” in the Obama vs Romney presidential contest. How utterly depressing.
$2 billion borrowed for tax cuts, so far
Remember National’s ‘fiscally neutral’ tax cuts? Turns out they’ve cost $2 billion in their first 18 months. Now, the Right’s story changes, of course. Without those reckless tax cuts, we wouldn’t be facing zero budgets. They were never meant to be fiscally neutral, they were stimulus spending – right, cause this economy is so stimulated.
The zero growth agenda
I chuckled to read Fran O’Shillivan on Sunday: “John Key has made a strategic decision to burn some political capital and front-foot major Government decisions” – yeah, all those major decisions: $1m for contraception, ‘tackling cyber-bullying’, a petty pokies for convention centre deal, even their centrepiece policy – asset sales – won’t benefit the economy a jot.
Open mike 14/05/2012
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to […]
Warming to Shearer
Labour has gambled on Shearer’s broad real-world experience and appeal to the electorate. Over time the contrast with Key, who is now well and truly just “another bloody politician”, will be more and more pronounced.
Open mike 13/05/2012
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to […]
Compulsory vaccination for shareholders’ children
In a shock new announcement the Prime Minister has confirmed recipients of corporate welfare will be forced to vaccinate their children.
Compulsory vaccination
It is the Nats’ belief that those on a benefit have fewer human rights than the rest of us. They can simply be told what to do. So now we have a compulsory vaccination debate.
Saveloy Soup! Anyone?
Seems as though Dicken’s Oliver character was an ungrateful little ingrate who actually had it pretty good, all things considered. Gruel has to beat left over savaloy water, no?
Open mike 12/05/2012
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to […]
Another broken promise from our con-man PM
Key looked the Pike River families in the eye and promised to get their mens bodies out. It was a promise he never should have made. But he did to make people like him. He wouldn’t even talk about it today. Coward. And what of his promise to make things right for Christchurch? Or his promise of an aggressive recovery? Or his promise to help the underclass? Or that brighter future?
Caption competition
Weekend social 11/05/2012
Weekend social is for non political chat. What’s on for the weekend, gigs, film or book reviews, sports, or whatever. No politics, no […]
AFFCO appeal
The CTU have launched an appeal for donations towards the food and essential bills of AFFCO workers.
Please Donate to NZCTU DISPUTES FUND, 38 9007 0894028 08. Money will go direct to workers.
Rock and a hard place
We’re in a second mini-recession/stall since the Great Recession began in 2008. As in 2010, oil prices ramped up and growth petered out. Now, oil prices have dropped back a little. But the moment the economy shows mild signs of life, they’ll be back up again. Short periods of weak growth, oil price shocks, recessions – sounds like the cycle peak oil economists have predicted for years.
Worst Spin Ever
According to John Key voters rejecting austerity is good news for the government, high unemployment is a sign of confidence in the economy, ignorance is strength, black is white, and he has a bridge to sell you.
Save TVNZ7 Meeting
When: Tuesday 15 May, 7 – 9pm
Where: Freemans Bay Community Centre, 52 Hepburn St, Freemans Bay, Auckland
Come along to this public meeting to show your support for TVNZ7!
Tea ladies to be drug tested
Minister of Labour Kate Wilkinson seems to be living in an alternative universe, with her comment on Checkpoint yesterday that tea ladies in the adventure tourism industry […]
Stop press!
Bet there’s some last minute changes to the Budget happening. A few mil to reverse the bio-security cuts now the fruit fly’s in. A few mil for monitoring MSD contracts – Bennett’s ‘high trust’ (ie too lazy/cheap) model clearly isn’t working. They could find savings by not giving money to fronts for gangs and other corrupt groups, predictably, sucking on the Whanau Ora teat.
The real reason for the secret ballot law
The tories are all puffed up about finally getting their secret ballot law passed. It’s about freedom they say, they’re on the side of the working man.
Thing is it’s not. And they most certainly aren’t.
Open mike 11/05/2012
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to […]
ImperatorFish: Wellington Health Officials Struggle To Cope With Contagion
A moan at 3 News
Hey 3 News – I know there’s a lot of pressure to churn stuff out and so on. But, even so, surely you can do better than this.
Green and you have kids? Really?
Here’s a quick way to reduce your carbon footprint: don’t have kids and save 80 years worth of human greenhouse gas output per child… This is my Voluntary Human Extinction Movement post.
Nats eye up Chch assets for sale
Remember when John Key said that rebuilding Christchurch wasn’t just that city’s challenge, it was New Zealand’s challenge? Yeah, well, now Gerry Brownlee and Bill English are pressuring the council to sell off its assets to pay for the rebuild. Green figures show the madness of that. This is a 20-year rebuild. The dividends over that period are more valuable than one-off sale revenue.
Teenage dreams
With the debate raging about free contraception for women and their teenage daughters, inevitably the conclusion is that irresponsible teenager girls are making poor decisions. Why do they get pregnant? That’s the easy part – teens not using contraception, of course. Why teenage pregnancy is an intractable problem is a much more complex question.
Seriously extreme and nutty
Amongst all the topical chatter about the Conservative Party there was one comment that I think we should get on record for future reference.
Roads to nowhere paved with your gold
You know how the government’s short of cash, eh? Well, the guy spending $14 billion on highways that don’t make sense on the government’s rosy numbers, isn’t even going to consider whether they’re still a good idea now the IMF says petrol is heading to $5 a litre. Nor is he concerned about the $6 billion shortfall because that’s in ‘the future’ – because he’ll be out of office by then (seriously)
Key has a whinge
Key’s playing the pity angle, telling schoolkids who want to be PM: “Frankly, the way it’s going at the moment you can have the job” and sighing that “it’s going to be a long two and a half years”. Comments that suggest the Banks.com affair is more concerning to him than he pretends. Then, he whinged about the “grief” he is getting for preparing to sell our gambling law to SkyCity.
Open mike 10/05/2012
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to […]
Clean, Green & Clever: NZ Institute’s last prescription
Ever since I went to his Fabian lecture in February, I’ve been meaning to write about Rick Boven’s last major work before leaving […]
Sinking homicide rate justifies murder spree – PM
The Government’s ‘sinking lid’ on homicides means that John Key can personally garotte 3-5 enemies and the overall number of killings will still decrease, a smiling Prime Minister told journalists today. “On current trends, the number of murders is dropping by half a dozen a year. Which means no-one should mind if I bump off a few annoying arseholes” said Mr Key
All in the game
Everyone’s leaped on the Nats’ contraceptives for benies bid to distract from banks.com. Guess I’ll jump in too. Capitalist morality goes: the world/God rewards the good, which is why capitalists are rich – so, the poor, like beneficiaries, must be morally bad – the world would be better without bad people. Eugenics has been and remains a logical endpoint of capitalist morality.
Austerity = low tax take “surprise”
The government has a $1.8 billion income shortfall. But it’s alright, it’s not their fault… Their policies don’t affect the economy. Unless they need to take credit. 6.7% unemployment? Nothing to do with us, and nothing to do with our tax shortfall…
Nat Civil War: ceasefire breached
Well, that didn’t take long. A couple of weeks of quiet (probably thanks to some good polls more than anything) and, now, the National Party Civil War has re-erupted as the Collins and Joyce factions fight over the post-Key future. The leaking of National Party board minutes shows how serious the fighting is and reveals strong opposition to Slater/Lusk’s tactics.
Open mike 09/05/2012
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the link to […]