Posts by Don Christie
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Well, I think that's precisely the perception the advisers have been seeking to propagate.
Yes, every time I hear Clark described as "smug" or people start by saying the "feel" something I know that Labour is not going to be judged on actual facts but in something from the Crosby / Textor play book.
Their presence here and the UK has been blatantly obvious for a while. Quite frankly I was surprised that this was a little known fact.
The reason they are described as "evil", is the Karl Rovian nature of their interventions. They have no interest in building something "good" simply in creating enough descent and dissatisfaction to win an election.
Whatever your politics, that approach stinks.
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"we are all Keyensians now"
That would be the voters canvassed in the latest Colmar poll...
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Sorry, Don
Craig, I am not particularly bothered with this "incident" one way or another. It was your claim that "real journalism" was taking place when in fact, it wasn't.
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I don't think it's really fair to shit on Claire Trevett for (gasp!) apparently doing some real, live reporting.
Quite so. Nice to see how a real journalist works, apparently.
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For me the last nine years has represented:
1. Stable economy
2. Low unemployment (real jobs)
3. Stable economy1 and 3 might seem straight forward but the genious Brash and his economic fundy pals were never able to produce it, anywhere. Nor were socialist governments of the past.
I see we "only" had 3% growth for the year ending March 2008. The current "crisis" is likely to reduce that to just between 1% and 2% this year. This stability takes so much stress out of business and society that many more good things are able to flow, as others have pointed out.
If Key & English do get in after the election I really hope they learn the lessons Cullen has taught them.
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So, who's up for repealing the Citizen Initiated Referenda Act
Me. Tools of dictators (and other would be controllers) to give a veneer of credibility to otherwise outrageous positions. They have no place in a democracy.
Now, where do I sign?
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Ironic, then, that an administration so derided for their profligacy in spin has turned so much thread to so little gold.
9 years in Government is reasonable gold, I would have thought. Interesting snippet from the latest Fairfax poll, Labour ahead in Christchurch and Wellington but far behind in Auckland. Hard for any political party to outspend the Herald.
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but would you care to mount a similar defence of Mbeki?
No. But I don't see his actions or inactions as much different from leaders in most of the rest of the world. Your attack was less on one person and more on a whole sub-continent. Re-colonization is just round the corner as a conclusion to your position. c.f. the letter in The Press referred to above, not the first time I have heard that view expressed in this country recently.
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Craig, you said:
might just have made a difference if Mandela and Mbeki had opened their mouths
IOW, you specifically mentioned Mandela as being culpable. Further back you make the claim that Zimbabwe's neighbours were effectively doing nothing.
**Monday, May 8, 2000** - Web posted at 8:30:01 GMT
Mandela expresses anger at Mugabe
CAPE TOWN - Former South African President Nelson Mandela has slammed Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, labelling him a tyrant who has held on to power for too long.
Mandela, who launched the global partnership for Children of the United Nation's Children Fund with his wife Graca Machel in Johannesburg on Saturday, said some African leaders had liberated their countries, but had then overstayed their welcome.
"They want to die in power because they have committed crimes. The tyrant of the day can be destroyed by you and I," he said.
He said leaders like Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Pompeii, and Adolf Hitler had also been brought down by the ordinary masses.So, neighbours are certainly not silent. If Mandela was saying that in public his private fury must have been immense. Regardless Mugabe ignored him and others.
So, by all means keep condemning the guy and applying pressure, seeking solution, but trying to make out that this is all the fault of black folk who happen to live in the vicinity is a completely screwed thesis.
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Craig, Mandela has been condemning of Mugabe for some time, as have many others in Africa. You are running pretty close to the "white man's" burden line. Your assumption that some of the poorest nations on the world should just go in and "sort it out" is pretty ignorant, to be honest.
When is NZ going to invade our neighbour Fiji, BTW? Beatings, arrests and torture going on there, aren't there? Plus for many years we supported an apartheid constitution in Fiji under the dubious pretense that it was "democratic". How long did it take "leaders" in Europe to stop the carnage on their doorstep in Yugoslavia?