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Vagabundo posted:According to Selwyn Manning, the Labour front bench had set themselves a task to remove a National cabinet MP by June. They managed it before the end of March. So is this basically labour doing some puppetmaster style trolling or what the gently caress?
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| # ? Mar 23, 2012 02:11 |
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| # ? May 19, 2013 15:36 |
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I don't think the resignation of Smith is the endgame for the opposition. Labour and Green MPs as well as Peters had called for his resignation, but they're probably looking to make it blow up bigger than it already has. The Auditor-General is set to make a call on whether or not there'll be an inquiry and the opposition is already putting on the pressure with calls for an inquiry, pressing that point during question time.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2012 03:08 |
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Fran O'Sullivan wrote an editorial trying to put a positive spin on Judith Collins' role in this ACC privacy breach fiasco that's gobbled up Nick Smith's ministerial career so far. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/n...jectid=10794249 Posted a comment asking her if a National Party pats a colleague on the back for a job well done, does that mean that person is looking for a soft spot to stick the knife in later. Danyl posted a good, short piece on it on his blog, complete with an amusing chart. http://dimpost.wordpress.com/2012/0...enides-edition/
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| # ? Mar 24, 2012 00:41 |
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Dim Post used to be really great, I feel like it's gone back lately. More satire and Shelley Bridgeman pisstakes, less conspiracy theory please.
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| # ? Mar 24, 2012 07:43 |
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I think Stuff's hit a new low in journalism... look at this loving headline. http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/663...n-white-or-wong
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| # ? Mar 24, 2012 21:19 |
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Two Finger posted:I think Stuff's hit a new low in journalism... look at this loving headline. Stuff is getting worse, and the editor never acknowledges emails about things like that. No interest in decent journalism at all.
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| # ? Mar 25, 2012 00:16 |
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Two Finger posted:I think Stuff's hit a new low in journalism... look at this loving headline. While I agree that Stuff is poo poo, White or Wong is referred to in the story as the name of the organisation set up by young Chinese to tackle the issue. Doesn't make it less of a groaner though.
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| # ? Mar 25, 2012 01:30 |
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I only go there for the Sudoku and sports news.
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| # ? Mar 25, 2012 02:40 |
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Ratios and Tendency posted:That's pathetic, gently caress Labour. All they need to do is start nasty rumors about John Key's personal life and they'll have completed their apotheosis into the National Party of the early 2000s, who as we all know were elected by record majorities!
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| # ? Mar 25, 2012 03:19 |
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Because deliberately leaking personal information about their critics to the press is so much more ethical.
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| # ? Mar 25, 2012 03:25 |
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Vagabundo posted:Because deliberately leaking personal information about their critics to the press is so much more ethical. Except this isn't about National, it's about Labour, and one day you'll have to accept that they make mistakes and can't blame it on landlines.
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| # ? Mar 25, 2012 03:48 |
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Labour's position on this type of thing seems to be "it's not unethical if we pull it off and if we don't well we'll just try again til we do". The public HATES it though. Eugene Bingham wrote an expose during the 2008 election campaign on the H-Fee smear and blows apart all the insidery bullshit and smears that Labour tried to shop around to journalists in 2008 around about Key and compares all of Key's public statement with what wetn down in 1988 - it's a real thorough job that I haven't seen in the NZ media since. Labour worked for TWO YEARS on the H-Fee smear. It's a fantastic piece of political investigative journalism (RIP) and really worth reading. quote:Not long before Key took over from Don Brash as leader of the National Party, a senior Labour Cabinet minister approached Bill English and told him not to vote for Key, saying: "We've got a neutron bomb, we're going to blow him up. Ask him about the H-Fee." Anatomy of a $76m political smear http://www.nzherald.co.nz/eugene-bi...jectid=10540463 AND http://www.nzherald.co.nz/eugene-bi...jectid=10540101 miss_chaos fucked around with this message at Mar 25, 2012 around 07:52 |
| # ? Mar 25, 2012 06:37 |
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miss_chaos posted:
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| # ? Mar 25, 2012 09:16 |
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miss_chaos posted:
Wow, this was a really interesting read, I didn't think the Herald was capable of something like this at all. I think my favourite part was the way everyone was talking about H-fee as though it should mean something and then later in the article this quote "Even what the "H" in H-Fee stands for is a mystery"
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| # ? Mar 25, 2012 12:25 |
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dusty posted:I wasn't a party member at the time and I literally avoided reading or watching anything about this - my deep dissatisfaction with the Clark Regime meant that if I paid attention I'd be at increased risk of self harm. It's probably my favourite piece of New Zealand political journalism just because of the depth and craft to it - I reread it occasionally. I don't know what Eugene Bingham does now but he's a massive loss to the Herald. I wonder how long Labour was peddling him this stuff - it looks to have taken weeks to put together, and I'm betting they didn't plan on him following Williams to Melbourne. It cracks me up in story who "Batman" (believed to be Mike Williams) accused Bingham of not being thorough enough when tying the H-Fee to Key. Oh how the tide turned when he decided to dig deeper. I'm always shocked when Labour seems to be quite happy to continue down this road since if it means getting a shot in. If you don't learn a lesson form this type of expose then electoral thrashing, when do you? It really takes Mr Burns style motives to plot a massive smear for YEARS against a single person. I get that Labour despise Key and want to take him out, but their culture is to play the man not the ball - and that's not what wins elections and that's why their "take out a Cabinet Minister before June" goal seems so stupid to me when they don't really have any policy right now. miss_chaos fucked around with this message at Mar 25, 2012 around 13:10 |
| # ? Mar 25, 2012 12:55 |
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Keep in mind that a major factor in nationals popularity seems to be the John Key personality cult that has built around him. When you think about that, it makes sense why labour would be wanting to play the man and not the ball. Unfortunately this isn't working- Key is still popular and now labour are looking like desperate playground children calling names. It's been a total failure, and Labour need to realise that they can win by playing the ball- they can offer some good policies that would be popular when they feel like it, but they don't seem to stand a loving chance of fielding someone who will be as popular as Key, at least as long as they keep acting like their front bench is an old boys club.
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| # ? Mar 25, 2012 19:56 |
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It's also difficult for Labour when many of their policies have been projected to cost a poo poo-ton of money and the overall public mood is for one of public restraint - not to mention the deficit and current global economic situation where Standard and Poors has one eye on the spending situation at all times and threatens with a credit downgrade. Most recent Labour simply hasn't been able to win votes without doling out huge lumps of cash to its demographic core, and now it needs to win formulate vote-winning policy without the financial means to do that in the way it normally would. That's a lesson they failed to learn in the last term. Last year they tried to avoid hard numbers due to that public concern which ended up with Goff getting massacred by Key at the Press debate on his figures.
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| # ? Mar 25, 2012 23:27 |
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Everyone will be super psyched to know that bus fares are going up in Wellington again, I believe it's been 5 months since the last universal fare increases. http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-pos...r-outer-suburbs Sucks to be poor in Wellington when you can't afford $60 per week for the bus.
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| # ? Mar 26, 2012 00:13 |
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miss_chaos posted:It's also difficult for Labour when many of their policies have been projected to cost a poo poo-ton of money and the overall public mood is for one of public restraint - not to mention the deficit and current global economic situation where Standard and Poors has one eye on the spending situation at all times and threatens with a credit downgrade. Are you literally a member of AOC / Young nats? Im just waiting for you to flat out say something like "S & Poors threatened to downgrade NZ if Labour got elected".
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| # ? Mar 26, 2012 00:44 |
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Lemonus posted:Are you literally a member of AOC / Young nats? No, I literally googled 'standard and poors new zealand downgrade' on that known right-wing website, Google News Telegraph: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/...-and-Fitch.html WSJ: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100...1469975690.html AsiaOne: http://business.asiaone.com/Busines...930-302383.html Economic Times: http://economictimes.indiatimes.com...ow/10179578.cms miss_chaos fucked around with this message at Mar 26, 2012 around 10:51 |
| # ? Mar 26, 2012 10:32 |
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miss_chaos posted:No, I literally googled 'standard and poors new zealand downgrade' on that known right-wing website, Google News Labour reduced crown debt to zero in 2006-7, and you're worried about their wild spending promises? Labour have shown to be credible managers of public debt. That debt elimination included spending on WFF, Cullen Fund, Public Servants, ACC, super gold cards, MFAT, ECE, Adult night classes... It was a lot of spending. Notice how little of it has been cut however - the new mob haven't really touched the really expensive stuff yet. They have however cut taxes for the top, tried to offset this by increasing a regressive sales tax in a recession. I don't really think the last numbers that Labour used in the 11 election were robust (in the sense of robust credibility Cullen used to exude), but they are as robust as the main rivals imho. Key has no plan to afford superannuation, and has promised to resign if he changes it. Both sides are asking the electorate to suspend a bit of disbelief and trust whoever wins the treasury benches to wing it. So what is your actual problem with labour? dusty fucked around with this message at Mar 26, 2012 around 11:37 |
| # ? Mar 26, 2012 11:12 |
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There's room for Labour to differentiate with CGT and super, but I think Shearer has gone back on super although I could be wrong. As you say dusty that lack of robust numbers for their policies hurt Labour's rep on the most important voter issue. The reality is, National is currently winning on traditional Labour issues like welfare, education and public spending. People support their initiatives. When was the last time National had the upper-hand on those social issues? How does Labour win back momentum? Danyl at Dim Post wrote an interesting piece on this the other day. Like he said, everyone in politics wants a stronger smarter economy, better public services, fairness etc. Detail is important. Labour needs to figure out how to get back voters who care about those Labour-speciality issues, but against a backdrop of a public who are concerned about state spending which is quite a change from the mid-00s. The economic situation now is very different as well. This is their challenge - a strong vision so people know what Labour stands for. At the moment, just what that is is hard to ascertain. I'm not really saying anything that hasn't been pointed out by others more knowledgable than me, but hopefully the review process encourages them to make some tough decisions. While there's a whole of things the party itself has acknowledge need to change i.e: list selection, membership rights etc, winning back that 12-15% of voters to form government has to be #1. But that is going to take some time. It's hard not to feel jaded after watching Labour self-destruct toward the end of the last term and consume itself with fighting Whaleoil instead of things that actually matter. There are lessons to be learned from the Greens I think. Anyway here is the Dim Post thing which has some really good points http://dimpost.wordpress.com/2012/0...-david-shearer/ miss_chaos fucked around with this message at Mar 26, 2012 around 13:23 |
| # ? Mar 26, 2012 12:37 |
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And breaking away from politics, slightly. It looks like the SKA location is not settled yet and there is still a chance the Australia/NZ bid may win out over South Africa. http://www.techworld.com.au/article...ebate_continues Apparently when the science committee recomended SA a few weeks back it was not exactly a ringing endorsement. And may have had other, non-scientific factors behind it such as politics, cost of power/broadband to the sites etc. So the fight is still on with the committe meeting April 3 to discuss it. Originally the decsion was scheduled to be made/announce on April 4 but it looks like they are backing away from that deadline at the moment. And back to politics: One of the factors tipping the balance in South Africa's favour is that the governments in the region to host it are right behind it and offering full support. In Australia the governemnt is backing it but not as vigourously as in South Africa and ours has been very quiet. One thing may be that Australia already has a fairly well established radio astronomy research group who have been working very hard to make it happen and have been pushing their politicians on it. Where as in NZ most of the astronomy work is optical and people wanting to do radio go to Australia or at least work with them. Also the lack of people coming to wine and dine our MPs like movie studio execs probably doesn't help either. This is exactly the kind of project we need in NZ at the moment, it will provide a number of jobs in building the antenna stations and would also enhance our ability to work and showcase our work in a highly technical, high value field. Not to mention the flow on educational and research prospects of hosting part of this large project. Varkk fucked around with this message at Mar 26, 2012 around 19:59 |
| # ? Mar 26, 2012 19:39 |
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Varkk posted:This is exactly the kind of project we need in NZ at the moment, it will provide a number of jobs in building the antenna stations and would also enhance our ability to work and showcase our work in a highly technical, high value field. Not to mention the flow on educational and research prospects of hosting part of this large project. I wonder why this isn't being championed. It has been around for ages, and I'm incredulous that people in charge haven't had it cross their desk. Either something doesn't stack up, or some people are really bad at their jobs. Ironically I think we're entering a new phase of political debate about finding smart government initiatives to boost growth and innovation. Previously we've had a government cycle way and an insulation program, both over and the economy is flatlining and refusing to grow. So ask yourselves: what is the headline growth initiative for National at the moment? May I suggest: expanding Sky City Casino with a convention centre and 500 pokie machines. What a hopeless bloody solution - the Green's have done a nice piece of analysis on the direct costs of the increased gambling. Denise Roche posted:The additional 500 pokie machines SkyCity want would result in an increase of 2.35% on the current nationwide muster, and Problem Gambling Foundation research shows pokie machine problem gambling is directly proportional to the number of machines. So that’s an additional cost to the New Zealand economy of $5.9 million a year from problem gambling. Over 20 years, that’s an additional cost to our economy of $118 million – almost exactly the same as MED’s net estimated economic benefit of the convention centre over that time. What a lovely way to grow a country. A better government would go out and get us a space telescope. dusty fucked around with this message at Mar 26, 2012 around 21:59 |
| # ? Mar 26, 2012 21:56 |
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miss_chaos posted:The reality is, National is currently winning on traditional Labour issues like welfare, education and public spending. "Cut it, Cut it, Cut it." Yes that's the way you fix a recession! 
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| # ? Mar 26, 2012 22:14 |
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SATURNS SON EATER posted:"Cut it, Cut it, Cut it." My point is National is winning public opinion on how it's tackling those traditional Labour issues, so Labour either needs to a) change the way it approaches them, or b) sell their position better to win back those votes.
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| # ? Mar 26, 2012 22:40 |
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Uh, hasn't National's poll numbers been dropping every week since November?
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| # ? Mar 26, 2012 22:56 |
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miss_chaos posted:My point is National is winning public opinion on how it's tackling those traditional Labour issues, so Labour either needs to a) change the way it approaches them, or b) sell their position better to win back those votes. Public opinion with low information voters who don't even live here mayhap.
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| # ? Mar 26, 2012 23:09 |
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I think the tides have turned. The Government cuts are resulting in manifestly stupid outcomes. Last night Campbell Live had a segment about some disabled guy who was on ACC after having a stroke. He can't understand language at times, couldn't talk to people. He can't read and understand maps or verbal instructions anymore. And the left side of his body doesn't work and has no sensation. He is missing one leg. He isn't safe around machinery. ACC are insisting he return to work as a building labourer or a truck driver. His doctor was incredulous - but ACC are insisting and all appealls have been exhausted. When the system has been squeezed so tightly that the obiously disabled guy is being pushed off the safety net, then Government cutbacks are being palpably mismanaged. Thanks for a job done well Nick Smith. dusty fucked around with this message at Mar 26, 2012 around 23:14 |
| # ? Mar 26, 2012 23:10 |
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SATURNS SON EATER posted:Uh, hasn't National's poll numbers been dropping every week since November? Before that, actually. Since polls taken shortly after the Rugby World Cup final, not that I'm suggesting any connection between "troaty" and the awkward 3-way handshake involving McCaw, Lapasset and Key. There was a full 10-point drop between poll numbers released by Roy Morgan on the 26th of October last year and late February. The last one had a 3-point jump, but RM pollsters have put it down to temporary warm fuzzies surrounding the earthquake memorials (you know, "oooh, look at that John Key being all solemn.") and it's likely that the next one will show another drop from the ACC scandal.
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| # ? Mar 26, 2012 23:20 |
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miss_chaos posted:No, I literally googled 'standard and poors new zealand downgrade' on that known right-wing website, Google News You sarcastically refer to a "right-wing website" and your first two sources are the Torygraph and WSJ. Nice work, champ.
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| # ? Mar 27, 2012 00:21 |
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dusty posted:I think the tides have turned. The Government cuts are resulting in manifestly stupid outcomes. Can you link more to this story? I missed it completely. I work in the office of an ACC lawyer who might be interested.
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| # ? Mar 27, 2012 00:37 |
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Lemonus posted:Can you link more to this story? I missed it completely. TV3 puts up full episodes on their on-demand service. http://ondemand.tv3.co.nz/Campbell-...73/Default.aspx Here's the story specifically. http://www.3news.co.nz/One-mans-ACC...70/Default.aspx Vagabundo fucked around with this message at Mar 27, 2012 around 09:22 |
| # ? Mar 27, 2012 00:48 |
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Ratios and Tendency posted:Public opinion with low information voters who don't even live here mayhap. This made me laugh. I also just wanted to post that Brownlee is a disgusting sack of crap that has totally embarrassed us as a nation. Honestly, I'd see him resign over something like this before I'd see Nick Smith gone for what he's done. He's also totally botching the rebuild down here, community groups that have spent months producing plans for various suburbs have had all their work vetoed by Brownlee this week with no reasons given and no consultation. Members of eastern suburbs repeatedly repeatedly ask him for some kind of meeting or consultation process but are ignored again and again. Honestly there's more than a full time job down here in ChCh for him to be dealing with; he literally has no time for international scandals. His excuse for his comments was utterly pathetic too "Oh it was just a joke", it's exactly the same as this: http://www.colbertnation.com/the-co...tual-statements (Skip to about 1min in). Gerry Brownlee: Not intending to make a factual statement. What an embarrasment of an acting prime minister. This term just seems so full of embarrassment and indiscretion, it just feels more and more like Bolger/Shipley every single time I turn the news on (And yeah I know I posted that the other day but it just keeps being true).
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| # ? Mar 27, 2012 03:10 |
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Varkk posted:And breaking away from politics, slightly. Let's talk about this for a bit more. NZ has some fairly good optical telescopes, but really not much radio- I don't think we have ANY interferometry sites, which operate on the same principles as SKA. The hope is not lost however. The mathematics used in forming images from interferometers is drat fiddly stuff. Fortunately Auckland Uni, and I think a couple other unis around the country, has some extremely competent people who specialize in this field of mathematics. I know some of them to be working right now on refining the mathematics, both generally and specifically for radio interfereometric astronomy. This is an extremely good thing. From an equipment side, these people can handle the "hard part" of actually making an image. Once that's done it can be sent off to our already existing astronomy teams- optical, interferometric, they don't care how it gets there so long as they have something to look at. What I'm trying to get across here is we already have some core groups of people who could make great use of SKA were it to come here-more than enough to get the ball rolling and, shock horror, train more scientists, inside this country, in a field that will actually make them stay in this country. Australia already has fairly extensive interferometric and astronomical capabilities, so again SKA would build hugely on the expertise there too, albeit not as much as it would here. The fact we aren't trying harder to get the SKA shows how monumentally our government undervalues building science in this country. SKA would turn NZ from a place where some interesting stuff comes out sometimes, to a powerhouse of astronomy and mathematics. We are sooo close to achieving this already- the neccessary people to get this started are here already- but we need that extra investment to build some world class hardware, if we are to become a world class scientific nation. South Africa does have some advantages for the actual facility itself however. Proximity to Europe is always a plus, and also SA has less radio pollution basically by virtue of having lots of undeveloped countryside. At the same time however, SA recently hosed up the last astronomy project that got sent their way. http://www.salt.ac.za/ was plagued by problems for the longest drat time (I still don't think they've got it all working right) many of which stemmed from SA bidding artificially low and then having to construct it on the cheap- cutting some features which, honestly, are pretty loving important for a telescope i.e. the ability to tilt up and down (its at a fixed angle to the horizon, they made it just spin around because that's cheaper) Conventional wisdom would dictate that this would count against SA- what's to say they won't pull the same poo poo again? but so far as I can tell the selection committee are largely ignoring it (admittedly the way funding is handled for this is a bit different-more on that later) (actually gently caress it lets talk about funding now) It's important to remember that the funding for SKA doesn't exist yet. They've got "some"- they aren't saying exactly how much- but everyone agrees they need an absolute shitload more. This is why, even though rumour is it's going to SA, there is still hope for NZ/AUS. If our two countries get their poo poo together and promise to get some money together to help fund this thing, the selection committee will find it hard to refuse. That's what makes this all so annoying. We KNOW how to get this thing, we KNOW we can handle it, we KNOW we have the people to deal with it, and most importantly we KNOW its going to be a massive boon to our scientific endeavours, and will give scientists in this country a reason to loving stay here. But so long as our government has their collective thumbs in their collective asses, it's just not going to happen, and makes me seriously doubt that big science never will happen in this country- it's unlikely we will get another opportunity this big in any of our lifetimes. drat that's a lot of words.
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| # ? Mar 27, 2012 05:54 |
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Just out of interest: Has New Zealand paid attention to this? Because here in Finland it's been national news for days (of course, this being Finland, the biggest reactions have been "Oh my god, someone in a foreign country mentioned Finland!" and "He's right, we're poo poo  ")
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| # ? Mar 27, 2012 06:23 |
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We've been paying attention to it, mainly because it shows what a retard mr. Brownlee is. Quoting things that are outright incorrect, and then saying "It was just a joke guys!" Is almost hilarious levels of stupid. Finnland is cool. In fact some of the people I was talking about in my SKA  are Finnish, and they almost sent me to Finland for a course, but I couldn't because uni 
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| # ? Mar 27, 2012 06:51 |
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Not sure where Brownlee gets off criticising the Finnish education system, which pretty much leaves everyone else's in the dust.
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| # ? Mar 27, 2012 07:13 |
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dusty posted:So ask yourselves: what is the headline growth initiative for National at the moment? May I suggest: expanding Sky City Casino with a convention centre and 500 pokie machines. What a hopeless bloody solution - the Green's have done a nice piece of analysis on the direct costs of the increased gambling. The government should ban cigarettes, too. Those cost us more as a country than the revenue they produce. Also, booze.
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| # ? Mar 27, 2012 07:15 |
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| # ? May 19, 2013 15:36 |
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Vagabundo posted:Not sure where Brownlee gets off criticising the Finnish education system, which pretty much leaves everyone else's in the dust. It's rated equally with Australia, Denmark and New Zealand by the UN Human Development Index. I realise that this index doesn't solely measure education standards. I'm interested to know what makes their education system leave everyone else "in the dust"?
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| # ? Mar 27, 2012 07:20 |
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