OnPoint: Terra Firma
67 Responses
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First time post.
Was that Monday? Oh man. Thanks, too, for leaving the sombreness behind at Hunter S.
I need, however, to correct one minor point grasshopper.
Thompson wrote 'What Lured Hemingway To Ketchum? in 1964. Hunter strongly identified with Hemingway from the very beginning, even down to re-writing Hemingway's prose - just to get the feel of it - while still a teen. My 'Stella" point was, therefore, that it was no surprise to friends such Ralph Steadman and Jann Wenner that Hunter chose a similar end-game, and for similar reasons.
In my view Hunter's absolute peak was writing about Nixon - I still quote Hunter extensively in my U.S. politics course - and his long decline, as the Zeitgeist got further and further from his grasp, must have been been excruciating.
But, as Hunter would himself say, "And selah to all of that."
Can I just add that it's good to have you back and I don't believe you are imprudent to suggest your grasp of the Zeitgeist is superior to Grannies...so is my labrador's.
jon j.
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Contrary to appearances, the debate hasn't been getting more heated. It's been dying a slow, desperate death. Even as the voices grow more shrill and the words more angry, people are becoming more cynical about the debate itself and the institutions responsible for it.
Good point, lets hope we don't make a law that restricts our electoral process to a debate carried solely by these institutions of press and parliament which people are so cynical about.
Ooops, too late.
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I don't think Telecom has enough money to make people forget what a disaster it is as an ISP.
Um, dude, aren't they still New Zealand's largest ISP? And I've been away for a while, but do they still hold the title of New Zealand's Worst ISP? I would wager that they have the biggest advertising budget of all the ISPs in NZ.
Telecom's a slam dunk case, I'm afraid. It's Exhibit A for the argument that with enough money, all kinds of shit, regardless of smelliness, can be sold. Well friggin' done, Saatchi & Saatchi.
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Keith,
Gidday, met you briefly at that Nat end of year do... I was heading for the door at the time.
You've touched on something I wrote about in my end of year Trans Tasman column - the over inflated political language which has characterised this year.
I don't know if its because we've spent so much time on things like the anti-smacking bill, or the terrorist raids, or the general lowering of standards you tend to get as governments age, or the blogs, or what..
But it looks to me as if the laconic Kiwi understatement is dead, apart from when it is used self consciously in Speights ads and the like. there's a marked tendency towards rather melodramatic language which is downright unhealthy.
On another point - I was at the Treasury Secretary John Whitehead's address last night which made a few headlines this morning.
He had a great quote I hadn't heard before from Daniel Patrick Moynihan which went something like 'everyone is entitled to their own private opinion, but they're not entitled to their own private facts.'
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No, you do not give any benefit of doubt. Your position is that anybody who wishes to engage the debate in an election year must be a politician. That other voices can form no legitimate platform and any outside influence is inherently wrong.
Woah - I gave the benefit of the doubt to the question of "does money influence elections". That's not the same question as "should we allow money to influence elections" at all.
I'm just trying to put down the red herring argument that we don't need to control electoral finances because money doesn't make a difference.
We are arguing about the right of us citizens to publically object to policy. The EFB says me must do it quietly, so as not to "impinge" upon whatever mindless debate our politicians are engaged in.
So making it law so there is an entire year where only political parties can effectively be current in politics, is going to help?
The whole reason why I'm engaging with this topic is not because I support the EFB. I don't. Not just because it's bad law, not just because it's electoral law made without consensus, not just because it's conceived out of the bitterness of the 2005 campaign, but because I am philosophically dubious about some of its key aims.
But it is, for the reasons outlined in my post, tragically unhelpful to make outraged claims in broad and inaccurate terms.
It's not a wholesale limitation of rights, it's a limitation of the right to spend money on a certain kind of activity during a certain period of the electoral cycle. But as long as people try to pass it off as "ATTACK ON DEMOCRACY!", "POLITICIANS VS PEOPLE!", there's little room to address the actual debate, which is whether people or groups with substantial wealth should be allowed to use it for electioneering.
Everybody knows that Wellington is full of spinning, lying, manipulative, untrustworthy, useless, wasteful, self aggrandising politico insiders playing tricks of smoke & mirrors. People who should not be trusted to frame a picture, much less a year long election debate.
If that's really the case, then aren't we just talking about influencing the outcome of an event where we will inevitably end up voting for one of the spinning, lying, manipulative, untrustworthy, useless (etc.) pricks anyway? Surely, there must be some redeemable part of the political system, or else why bother?
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You've touched on something I wrote about in my end of year Trans Tasman column - the over inflated political language which has characterised this year.
Heh, Rob, perhaps we should get together and produce an inflation index for BS?
Back of a napkin blueprint:
Run weekly chunks of Hansard through a bot to get a wordlist (our "basket") of the top 20 non-mundane terms, score each of the words by grandiosity, then crunch a weighted index out of it with some kind of grandiosity x frequency formula. Then - graphs!
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Not a bad idea keith....have to get some recognition of Godwins Law in the index as well (an aside here - when I was involved in Uni debating in the late 80s some adjudicators would deduct 10 points if you compared you opponent's argument to Nazi Germany).
Its not so much about Hansard - the pollies have always said silly things in the House, but it usually doesn't matter that much because there's sort of a tacit acknowledgment its theatre, and besides, most of the time no-one's paying much attention anyway.
Its what's said in the media, I suppose, which seems to have gotten sillier and more over-dramatised. Maybe journos are more inclined to print silly things, maybe its the Oprah-isation of our culture, maybe its [insert pet unprovable sociological theory here]
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Um, dude, aren't they still New Zealand's largest ISP? And I've been away for a while, but do they still hold the title of New Zealand's Worst ISP? I would wager that they have the biggest advertising budget of all the ISPs in NZ.
I sooo set myself up for the preemptive migraine I get when trying to make sense of Telecom or the telecommunications/internet sector period. AFAIK, the answer is yes (but wonder how much of that is consumer intertia - like people who bitch about how bad One News is but they've always watched it so...), yes, and I wouldn't bet the house on saying you're wrong.
Anyone care to totally humiliate me, but quoting chapter and verse on just how wrong one really is? :)
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It's not a wholesale limitation of rights, it's a limitation of the right to spend money on a certain kind of activity during a certain period of the electoral cycle. But as long as people try to pass it off as "ATTACK ON DEMOCRACY!", "POLITICIANS VS PEOPLE!", there's little room to address the actual debate, which is whether people or groups with substantial wealth should be allowed to use it for electioneering.
Hear hear Keith. I didn't particularly care about the bill either way. But the frothing at the mouth that some people put out in the MSM about it being the worst attack on democracy in the Western World, ever, grated.
If people believe it's important, and should be looked at seriously, then it'd help if they called it a spade rather than a digger, otherwise all we get is arguments over how big a digger it is.
After all, spades need attention too.
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If that's really the case, then aren't we just talking about influencing the outcome of an event where we will inevitably end up voting for one of the spinning, lying, manipulative, untrustworthy, useless (etc.) pricks anyway? Surely, there must be some redeemable part of the political system, or else why bother?
The redeeming feature is that each 3 years the rest of the country (who are not so concerned with pursuing power that they must lie, manipulate, spin... to achieve it) gets to redistribute that power.
...there's little room to address the actual debate, which is whether people or groups with substantial wealth should be allowed to use it for electioneering.
Two part:
Yes, they should be able to "__electioneer__" for the purposes of furthering public debate. We need sources of information in an electoral cycle that are not state, media or political. If people feel strongly enough about an issue they should be able to inform as many people as they can, as effectively as they can. The EFB hobbles the amount of information distribution funds non-party & non-media can use.
No, they should not "__electioneer__" a "Wag the Dog" scenario. Which is something the EFB makes bugger all attempt to prevent. It says third party groups will be revealed after the election. Whilst not enough to sustain a wide ranging public campaign $120,000 could be used to in a more effective, subtle approach. Essentially anon small groups of wealthy individuals can act quasi-independently to mount sabotage. (Would have to be wealthy, because can you imagine 2000 less wealthy coordinating an effective campaign?).
Further nothing underhand, like robo-calls to associate annoyance with your opponents name, is made illegal by the EFB. Presumably because the politicians intend to have an unfettered election.
I do not like the bill.
"POLITICIANS VS PEOPLE!"
It is. Politicians (of Labour/Green/NZFirst) have decided that public debate shall be led by politicians alone. That private groups cannot independently engage the wider public.
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Once again, Newtown Ghetto Anger NAILS the real issue
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Too true Keith, the reason democracy works is because whenever a democratic power is allocated, a check or balance is created to restrict it (we all know the rhetoric of Lord Acton and the fate of Socrates). The EFB is a utilitarian equation of whether further checks are needed on election powers, not whether or not such checks should exist. The debate has been fucked. National and their friends did their job too well and managed to frame the argument.
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Too true Keith, the reason democracy works is because whenever a democratic power is allocated, a check or balance is created to restrict it (we all know the rhetoric of Lord Acton and the fate of Socrates).
Personally, I rather like the rhetoric of Edmund Burke's __Letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol, on the Affairs of America__, where he made this observation:
Civil freedom, Gentlemen, is not, as many have endeavored to persuade you, a thing that lies hid in the depth of abstruse science. It is a blessing and a benefit, not an abstract speculation; and all the just reasoning that can be upon it is of so coarse a texture as perfectly to suit the ordinary capacities of those who are to enjoy, and of those who are to defend it. Far from any resemblance to those propositions in geometry and metaphysics which admit no medium, but must be true or false in all their latitude, social and civil freedom, like all other things in common life, are variously mixed and modified, enjoyed in very different degrees, and shaped into an infinite diversity of forms, according to the temper and circumstances of every community. The extreme of liberty (which is its abstract perfection, but its real fault) obtains nowhere, nor ought to obtain anywhere; because extremes, as we all know, in every point which relates either to our duties or satisfactions in life, are destructive both to virtue and enjoyment. Liberty, too, must be limited in order to be possessed. The degree of restraint it is impossible in any case to settle precisely. But it ought to be the constant aim of every wise public counsel to find out by cautious experiments, and rational, cool endeavors, with how little, not how much, of this restraint the community can subsist: for liberty is a good to be improved, and not an evil to be lessened. It is not only a private blessing of the first order, but the vital spring and energy of the state itself, which has just so much life and vigor as there is liberty in it. But whether liberty be advantageous or not, (for I know it is a fashion to decry the very principle,) none will dispute that peace is a blessing; and peace must, in the course of human affairs, be frequently bought by some indulgence and toleration at least to liberty: for, as the Sabbath (though of divine institution) was made for man, not man for the Sabbath, government, which can claim no higher origin or authority, in its exercise at least, ought to conform to the exigencies of the time, and the temper and character of the people with whom it is concerned, and not always to attempt violently to bend the people to their theories of subjection. The bulk of mankind, on their part, are not excessively curious concerning any theories whilst they are really happy; and one sure symptom of an ill-conducted state is the propensity of the people to resort to them.
Sorry, I know it's a very long quote - but Burke wasn't a terse man, and lived in an age where people were assumed to have an attention span that wasn't measured in milliseconds, and the minds to handle extended discourse on complex ideas.
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Craig,
Quoting from the classics, I see.
I generally don't have personal heroes, but Burke comes about as close as possible.
The part about 'cautious experiments, and rational, cool endeavours' is the key bit. Should apply to every major policy change.
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Sorry, I know it's a very long quote
It's not the length ... it's the lack of paragraphing :-)
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WH,
People are losing faith in the currency of politics.
To paraphrase Hannah Arendt, politics exists because each of us have different ideas of how the world should be. It seems to me that a lot of ordinary people's frustration with politics arises from the fact that other people don't share their sense of how things should play out, which they often percieve as being "obvious" or "common sense". It might be said that politicians were not always well respected before the introduction of the EFB, but the task of harnessing divergent conceptions of the obvious into a single proposal is difficult and requires compromise. In this sense politics is a particularly complex and frustrating form of group decision making.
The EFB has constitutional implications. It touches on one of the major fault lines of the left-right economic dichotomy that organises our political spectrum, so its hardly surprising that it elicits strong reaction from people who are interested in politics.
How should we organise discussion in the public sphere? We would all agree that ideas should be carefully considered and that proposals should be chosen on merit. New Zealand is not particularly well served by its media (or the personalities therein) in this respect IMO. The public relies on its opinion leaders to digest complex information, exercise good judgment on its behalf, and help them form their own opinions. Most people don't have the time, the inclination or the knowledge required to read or understand bills that are put before Parliament. The media function as our intermediaries, and when they don't do their job properly, the public's understanding suffers.
The amount of time that josie public can or will devote to political issues is finite. For this reason, among others, effective mass-market communication can and does effect public opinion. However mass market communication campaigns are expensive. Most people would recognise that the marketplace of ideas should not be dominated by those with the greatest ability to pay. At the very least, the public should be able to identify the forces that seek to influence public decision making.
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It's not the length ... it's the lack of paragraphing :-)
That's what I was thinking. My 5th form history teacher, Mr Bailey, would have had something serious to say about that.
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It's not the length ... it's the lack of paragraphing :-)
Just be thankful that I quietly modernised some of Burke's 18th century spelling, punctuation and use of intitial capitals. I still have an essay with the terse annotation, "You've got a way to go before you're competent to start editing Burke." Ough...
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My 5th form history teacher, Mr Bailey, would have had something serious to say about that.
Mr Bailey was an excellent history teacher, but not infallible: he was totally wrong about that whole 'you are going to fail university miserably if you skip seventh form!' rant he gave me. Not that my MA (Hons) - in history! - and I are sitting over here being pathetically bitter about it fifteen years later at the mere mention of his name, or anything like that. Because, you know, that would be immature and lame. ;)
(Coincidentally, Edmund Burke is my great-grand-gobbledy-uncle. No, seriously, he is.)
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Mr Bailey was an excellent history teacher, but not infallible: he was totally wrong about that whole 'you are going to fail university miserably if you skip seventh form!' rant he gave me. Not that my MA (Hons) - in history! - and I are sitting over here being pathetically bitter about it fifteen years later at the mere mention of his name, or anything like that. Because, you know, that would be immature and lame. ;)
No 7th form history at least gave me nothing useful at all for university, not the least that they taught the Tudors and Stuarts option, as do most NZ 7th form history classes. Not Mr Bailey's fault though, he, I understand would prefer to switch to NZ history.
But 7th form was a good year of high school. And no PE at all! I think 7th form should be renamed 'the social year before you go... have another social year at university'.
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No 7th form history at least gave me nothing useful at all for university, not the least that they taught the Tudors and Stuarts option, as do most NZ 7th form history classes. Not Mr Bailey's fault though, he, I understand would prefer to switch to NZ history.
To be honest, I didn't find the half-baked gobbets of Belich and Orange of much utilitarian value either - unless being able to make vaguely right on noises at cocktail parties is one of the aims of a liberal education. :)
Anyway, in the world we live in I don't know if beginning to think about the nature of religious sectarianism, and how toxic the results can be when it becomes indistinguishable from politics, is a bad thing. And you get that in spades if you're taught the basics of Tudor and Early Stuart England.
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I'd second Craig's comments about the usefulness of 7th Form Tudors & Stuarts for understanding religious sectarianism. Although the topic was justified to us as an introduction into the virtues of democracy and constitutional limits on power, the religious angle was far more interesting. As you would expect when a devout Anglican was teaching a classroom of Catholic schoolboys, and regularly poked the borax at Mary-worshipping Papists for the sake of historical understanding (and light relief).
Side note: we had to write academic essays every second week, and the comments drilled us on the basic principles of paragraphing, quotation, use of sources and so on. It meant I was away safe in terms of essay style for at least the first three years of university, and thus had time to actually think about the historical issues.
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i don't know mr bailey, but our 7th form history teacher looked, and consequently acted like, john cleese. it was a hilarious year. part of the gems of english history he taught us was that james I had a habit of playing with his codpiece, "because no-one had told him that if he left it alone, it would grow by itself"...
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Poor old James, with his stammer and his enduring difficulties with maintaining a sustainable financial situation for the English Crown.
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Anyway, in the world we live in I don't know if beginning to think about the nature of religious sectarianism, and how toxic the results can be when it becomes indistinguishable from politics, is a bad thing. And you get that in spades if you're taught the basics of Tudor and Early Stuart England.
I suspect the tendency of schools to teach the tudor and stuarts option is a hangover from the days when European history was largely all that was taught in the NZ education system. It was a time of learning about 'home' - which isn't what many of us would call England these days.
The 7th form history curriculum was set a long time ago, and it's taking a long time for it to catch up to the idea that NZ history is worth studying, and much more useful for producing good NZers, than Elizabeth, James and Charles. It's difficult for schools to switch because a teacher might have spent two decades teaching it, and doesn't want to have to develop entirely new teaching plans, and schools often don't have money to just run out and buy new resources just because ideas change.
The university I work in has one first year course that covers the period of tudors and stuarts. And about a dozen courses that teach NZ history. For 7th form history, I think about 3/4 do tudor/stuarts, 1/4 do the nz option.
It's not that tudor stuarts england isn't useful as part of an education, but learning it at the expense of, say, the history of the treaty, the NZ wars, colonialism, land sales and confiscations, really is a shame, since quite a few of us on this site have bemoaned how little NZers know about their own past.
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