Hard News by Russell Brown

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Hard News: Essay Question

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  • Russell Brown,

    He discussed that issue in a recent post in his blog at stuff. As he sees it, he himself has nothing to do with the National Party, but his wife, Janet Wilson, her company does work for Key, so technically he only has a connection through her is his argument.
    That's the gist of it - read his post for further elaboration.

    It's not actually her company, it's theirs. But Key is her client, not his.

    For me the issue is more the quality of Ralston's arguments.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • Craig Ranapia,

    Janet Wilson, not MacIntyre. One's married to Bill, the other to Keith Slater. Work for different channels as well.

    And bloody good luck telling either woman they should stay home and do something uncontentious like non-partisan baking. I understand anyone foolish enough to try would be served their arse on a bed of stylish shoe leather. :)

    North Shore, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 12370 posts Report Reply

  • Paul Robeson,

    I'm quite late on this but 'compare and contrast' is a nice friendly sentence on an exam paper.

    It has a bit of similarity, as both words are two syllables and start with 'c'. Gives a nice bit of alliteration (though that's vowels only, damn, what) and also a very reassuring symmetry. Symmetry is something we expect and it sets us at ease.

    There are though subtle differences with '..m-pare and ...n-trast' giving a kind of upbeat to the phrase. When you read 'compare' it is like going down to the bottom of a rollercoaster (in voice tone) and 'contrast' is a slingshot off into what is hoped to be a wildly successful exam.

    Since Feb 2008 • 87 posts Report Reply

  • simon g,

    Key's media trainer Janet Wilson was also the producer of the Sky / Prime interview programmes featuring the party leaders in the election campaign, presented by, er, Bill Ralston.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 1333 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown,

    I'm slightly regretting the form of this morning's post, constructed thus because I didn't have the time to go through and excerpt and comment on (with appropriate hyperlinks) key passages from the arguments listed.

    Oh well. It's nearly Christmas ...

    I see Jon Johansson is of much the same mind as me:

    And speaking of the Herald, come on Mr. Editor, I’m dying to hear what you make of National’s use of urgency last week. Let us know. Will you contemplate publishing the faces of all the MPs who voted for it? Will you do it every month up until the next election? How outraged do feel about the government not letting any opposition MPs (including one of the government’s own support party’s) even view these bills before being able to debate them? Wasn’t that an Attack on our Democracy?

    The contrast between the Herald's stentorian denunciations of the last government and its vague, weaselly commentary on this one does the paper no credit at all.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown,

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • Emma Hart,

    Gives a nice bit of alliteration (though that's vowels only, damn, what)

    <geek>
    Alliteration is either. Consonance is specific to consonants (compare and contrast). When it's vowels it's called assonance.

    </geek>

    Christchurch • Since Nov 2006 • 4651 posts Report Reply

  • giovanni tiso,

    Assonance is "getting the rhyme wrong", actually.

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report Reply

  • Tom Beard,

    Assonance is "getting the rhyme wrong", actually.

    Thank you, Rita.

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 1040 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown,

    This just in on the police spying case ...

    Rochelle Hume, deceived partner of police informer Rob Gilchrist, totally pwned him after she realised what was going on -- gathered evidence by tapping his phone and installing a script on his computer that forwarded his emails to her.

    The righties in The Standard's comment are making much of the fact that she may have breached the law. I would submit that that would be a spectacularly messy prosecution to bring. You could put a price on the movie rights.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • Paul Robeson,

    <poet>
    Alliteration is either. Consonance is specific to consonants (compare and contrast). When it's vowels it's called assonance.

    </poet>

    <crawler>

    just had to amend the self deprication. but this is the important stuff surely...

    </crawler>

    Since Feb 2008 • 87 posts Report Reply

  • Chris Diack,

    Mr Brown please don't assume that I would do a "once more over the top boys" for that Grand old Tory lady that is the Herald or her editorial writers. She is like a slightly batty maiden aunt, mostly sensible but not always.

    Armstrong is compulsory reading as is O'Sullivan. Ralston is amusing you're being far too tough. That broken down old Rad Rudman can occasionally amuse. And at least Orsman consistantly dislikes everyone. Roughan can on a rare occasion really shine but only rarely.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2008 • 9 posts Report Reply

  • Craig Ranapia,

    Speaker stumbles, anoints Goff as PM

    Oh... could everyone just fuck off on holiday and stop pretending they're even marginally relevant?

    The righties in The Standard's comment are making much of the fact that she may have breached the law. I would submit that that would be a spectacularly messy prosecution to bring. You could put a price on the movie rights.

    A little creative justice might be in order -- strand the pair of them on an island after a shotgun civil unification (and contraceptive implants to avoid any pissing in the gene pool) with nought but a camera crew for their comfort. They both sound like the kind of idiots who pretty much put me off politics as anything other than a spectator sport.

    North Shore, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 12370 posts Report Reply

  • Craig Ranapia,

    Speaker stumbles, anoints Goff as PM

    Oh... and a modest suggestion for whoever is pretending to sub the DomPost nowadays if you're going to be a smart arse, at least try not to be a pretentious one. Anoints? Darling, he's the Speaker not the frigging Archbishop of Canterbury.

    North Shore, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 12370 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown,

    Mr Brown please don't assume that I would do a "once more over the top boys" for that Grand old Tory lady that is the Herald or her editorial writers. She is like a slightly batty maiden aunt, mostly sensible but not always.

    It's a bit like your aunt discovered P two years ago though ...

    Armstrong is compulsory reading

    Audrey Young is still the sharpest, but yes, I'll always read Armstrong.

    as is O'Sullivan.

    Peerless when she's been working the phones with her establishment sources, sometimes awful when she's like, read stuff off the internet.

    Ralston is amusing you're being far too tough.

    He can certainly have his moments on some topics, but on politics and economics he's been dreadful, and not witty at all. Still: better than Jim Hopkins.

    That broken down old Rad Rudman can occasionally amuse.

    I did a count: the Herald writer who most used the word "bureaucrat" -- by miles -- was Rudman. But on his beat, it's probably a word that fits the purpose ...

    And at least Orsman consistantly dislikes everyone. Roughan can on a rare occasion really shine but only rarely.

    I'll always like him because he writes with real heart, but I reckon Roughan has intellectual crises. He goes off down blind alleys, can't justify what he's feeling and starts qualifying his arguments in ways that make you wonder why he wrote them in the first place.

    Tapu Misa is bloody good this week.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • Christopher Dempsey,

    A little creative justice might be in order -- strand the pair of them on an island after a shotgun civil unification (and contraceptive implants to avoid any pissing in the gene pool) with nought but a camera crew for their comfort. They both sound like the kind of idiots who pretty much put me off politics as anything other than a spectator sport.

    And I'm picturing you as the fabulous drama queen wearing oh, something stylee (Dior! Donna Karen! Ralph Lauren! Yves St Laurent!) providing a blow by blow commentary, live from said island.

    Parnell / Tamaki-Auckland… • Since Sep 2008 • 659 posts Report Reply

  • Matthew Poole,

    Rochelle Hume, deceived partner of police informer Rob Gilchrist, totally pwned him after she realised what was going on -- gathered evidence by tapping his phone and installing a script on his computer that forwarded his emails to her.

    The righties in The Standard's comment are making much of the fact that she may have breached the law. I would submit that that would be a spectacularly messy prosecution to bring. You could put a price on the movie rights.

    That's a pretty clear breach of the bit in the Crimes Act about illegally interfering with a computer. The "colour of right" bit doesn't extend to vigilante justice that intercepts communications. She's probably safe against "illegally accessing a computer system", since the law provides that misuse of a system to which one has been granted proper access - and one assumes that he explicitly asked her to fix his computer, and probably allowed her to use it, too - cannot then become misuse if it's used for some other purpose.

    It would be messy, though, and I can't see the Police pursuing it with any real vigour unless he complains loudly, and then goes public when they do a half-arse job and don't really push the matter.

    Auckland • Since Mar 2007 • 4097 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown,

    It would be messy, though, and I can't see the Police pursuing it with any real vigour unless he complains loudly, and then goes public when they do a half-arse job and don't really push the matter.

    And given his recent mea culpa, I doubt Gilchrist would want to go that way either.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • giovanni tiso,

    Still: better than Jim Hopkins.

    The least ambiguous insult I've heard in a while.

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report Reply

  • Graeme Edgeler,

    It's more that the Herald was thundering away editorially about the proper practice of Parliament a week ago, but seems fidgety and diffident about criticising National's extraordinary use of urgency.

    "National's extraordinary use of urgency" makes sense, but what the Herald was actually talking about today today was how:

    John Key has put disparate bills through Parliament under extra-ordinary urgency.

    Unfortunately, while the use of urgency may be extra-ordinary, John Key hasn't used extra-ordinary urgency (a mechanism to which the Speaker must independently assent, and which doesn't see Parliament rise at midnight but sit around the clock).

    Wellington, New Zealand • Since Nov 2006 • 3215 posts Report Reply

  • Craig Ranapia,

    And I'm picturing you as the fabulous drama queen wearing oh, something stylee (Dior! Donna Karen! Ralph Lauren! Yves St Laurent!) providing a blow by blow commentary, live from said island.

    Well, Christopher, good on Simon Cowell becoming a rather wealthy chap playing ringmaster to a three ring freak show. I'd rather stick to keeping losers and wasters at a distance. Rob Gilchrist and Rochelle Hume deserve each other, because nobody else should care.

    North Shore, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 12370 posts Report Reply

  • Craig Ranapia,

    Rob Gilchrist and Rochelle Hume deserve each other, because nobody else should care.

    Sorry, I should partially retract that and say we should care enough to point and laugh at the pair of them. A lot.

    Still, it going to be good black fun watching Gilchrist being used as a human Twinkie defence by the likes of Valerie Morse. I don't think you've got to be some Trevor Loudon-level comspiracy nut to think Morse is one of the so-called "Urewea 17" it's rather hard to feel much sympathy for.

    North Shore, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 12370 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha,

    fabulous drama queen .. blow by blow commentary, live from said island

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Joe Wylie,

    "Urewea 17"

    Taking the piss.

    flat earth • Since Jan 2007 • 4593 posts Report Reply

  • Kerry Weston,

    I've blogged about it here if anyone cares.

    Simon: that link from Felix in yr blog of john Key as Tourism Minister talking up NZ as a wonderful holiday destination - come on down, folks! - is pretty bloody stunning:-b I wonder where it's running? Indonesian tv?

    Interesting read about Indonesia - i confess I know SFA about it - and, yeah, it looks a mingey (mingy?) offer from us. i wonder why we try so hard for the FTA with the US when other possibilities might be better?

    Manawatu • Since Jan 2008 • 494 posts Report Reply

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