Posts by Craig Ranapia
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Hard News: Some Lines for Labour, in reply to Kumara Republic,
Once again, policy is on his side. Now all it needs is a slick publicity machine.
No, Red, while I'll concur with Idiot Savant that it was a pretty good exercise in "high level framing", it doesn't matter how nice the frame is if the picture is rubbish.
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to Bart Janssen,
you say that like it’s a bad thing
Nothing wrong with being high-minded. I'm also damn glad that human beings are delightfully inconsistent, otherwise I'd have died of boredom long ago. I'm just rather amused at the way Labour and National will say ramping up excise taxes on tobacco not only reduces use, but offsets the public cost of tobacco-related disease... but alcohol? As far as I'm aware, neither party was terribly keen on the Law Commission's recommendation of a 50% across-the-board increase in alcohol excise (which is pretty modest by international standards). So why don't we tax alcohol on exactly the same basis as tobacco, again?
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Hard News: Some Lines for Labour, in reply to webweaver,
Not to mention the fact that in an entirely unscientific (but still rather interesting) poll on Campbell Live last week, 60% of responders answered “yes” to the question:
Do you have a link that leads to the actual poll with the question and statement of the sample and methodology? Sorry for being a little cynical about these things, but I keep seeing polls with similar questions, similar results and when push comes to shove... we still don't have a Green majority government that would deliver all of the above and unicorn rides for all. The nice thing about a secret ballot is that you can vote for all your worse instincts and nobody ever had to know. :)
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Hard News: Some Lines for Labour, in reply to Alex Coleman,
Cullen then had to go out say that actually, the surpluses are a lot more fragile than the headlines look. And got mocked for his trouble.
No, Alex, I've criticised Cullen for many things (YMMV, whether I've been just or not in every case) but I won't damn anyone for stating the bleeding obvious -- just that it's necessary in the first place. But I think you would grant it's hardly a bad day at the office for any Finance Minister when it turns out Treasury lowballed their surplus estimates rather than overestimated growth projections.-- fair call?
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to Bart Janssen,
The problem with that approach is that there will be some who do themselves harm. In the society I want to live in we will care for them within the public health system. Personally I’d like some of the cost of that care paid for by the user in the form of taxes or duties. Tax and duty also allows a reasonably easy way of moderating use – again for tobacco increasing the cost to the user is the single most effective way of reducing use.
But strangely enough, you try replacing “tobacco” with “butter and sugar” in that delightfully high minded statement and you get looked at like you’ve suggested giving schoolchildren free milk… laced with angel dust. When will we shake off the malign profiteers off human misery that are Big Dairy?
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to Sofie Bribiesca,
Cigarettes are commonly used by the weak
Liked this bit in that link ;)
Yeah, because being told you're a moral weakling who just needs to pull his socks up is soooo helpful...
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180 Seconds with Craig Ranapia – 8th May, in reply to Public Address Radio,
If I actually bothered sending through my blurbs on recording day, and not being prompted on Monday morning about ten minutes before you post the podcast these typos wouldn't get through. Probably.
Nah...
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Hard News: Some Lines for Labour, in reply to Sacha,
The Standard have a post that references Keith Ng’s fisking of the previous Budget, and quotes Bernard Hickey on the latest forecasting chicanery.
But unlike the Standard, Hickey was asking some rather prickly questions about the quality of of information (and poor reporting and analysis of the dubious assumptions behind them) coming out of the Treasury even when it was politically convenient for Labour – which headlines like “surplus higher than forecast, again” certainly were.
To say I don't always agree with Hickey's conclusions is the mother of all understatements. But he's admirably consistent for a curmudgeon. :)
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to Leopold,
Ol’ “Me too!!” again…
Ugh. It’s not even that – I’m actually pretty easy if National and Labour aren’t really that far off the middle-line, and substantively agree on a hell of a lot. But what grinds my gears about Phil Goff and John Key is that I think my Gran had a point when she said this – When you try to be all things to all people, you just end up being nothing to nobody. There’s a real and worthy distinction between being pragmatic and not knowing when it’s time to lead.
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to Russell Brown,
The statement doesn’t really mean anything. Which was doubtless pretty much the aim in making it.
Damn. I was really hoping I'd missed something. Retract benefit of the doubt, put it back in its box and try again later...
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