The first one kicks in at about 0.41%, second at about 1.21% (depending on the size of the wasted vote).

Hey, I was right with my *2 surprises from the south* eh?

Tho' I must admit to being totalled by the abstaining phuqing voters…

The government doesn't recover anything when its a working parent, only when it's on the DPB.

divide that by 121 to get: 18,655

You don't divide each…

and tripartite wage bargaining

Not nearly that many. More than the 99 we had, certainly, but under 120.

another measure of the right's success in pushing over many years the notion that government is a problem

If we had stuck with FPP in 1996, the formula which determines the number of electorates (based on a South Island quota) would have meant more than 130…

UF: 13,443 party votes

total party votes counted: 2,257,336

divide that by 121 to get: 18,655

Act got exactly what they deserved this time, from a proportionality point…

There's a few solutions, although an obvious one even without reform is for the left to simply do the same damned thing. Endorse an ex-Labour candidate in a…

Most people I've spoken to who voted this way did so because they wanted MMP and it wasn't one of the options. It did rather annoy me how bloody minded these people were, given that there was a small chance that…

Labour received 171,944 less votes than in 2008
Labour+Greens+NZF received 40,000 votes less than in 2008.

Quite. Voters managed to find a 'no confidence' option

Bit misleading, given 748,000 informal votes!

National loses a seat and falls to 59, the Green Party gains a seat and will have 14 MPs. In the two tight electoral races, Labour's Brendon Burns has lost Christchurch Central to National's Nicky Wagner by 45 votes and Labour's Carmel…

Also significant migrant families from less pale parts of Europe, without whom our wine industry would be somewhat different.

Yes, lets hope it goes a lot higher! Otherwise there's sure to be a recount. But even to be highest on first full count is a major symbolic victory out west.

The booth division has been stark, which accounts for the…

Under Supplementary Member – using the results from the night and assuming that the electorate seats would have split roughly in proportion to how they fell on Saturday…

Of course they do, they just have to eat up the entirety of Mana, the Greens, NZF, the Maori Party, United Future, and then bite a small piece out of National, and…

I don’t see why Labour would want that, though. You don’t seriously think Labour have any chance of governing in three years without the Greens, do you? Surely the last thing Labour want is for the…

No they don't. Off the top of my head, you have to earn over $100K as a paying…

They could stay outside of government but give confidence and supply then. There are many deals that could be cut.

If any of…

This is the last thing I would like to see happen and I doubt that the Greens would, in the end,…

That's easy. Because they get all those voters in their coalition without having to…

So, using the same arithmetic, is 19% the low tide for Labour?

IMO…

__I watch the cars go back and forth
Sometimes south and sometimes north
I watch the cars
I hear them stopping down the street
I hear the sound of stocking feet
I wonder who they’re going to meet
I’m…

You play the cars the electorate deals you, don't you think?

True.

Why should Labour give votes to a party that is frankly middle class and therefore implicitly hostile to the political imperatives of the poor and working poor that the Labour party was founded to represent?

Labour's current review will…

Yup. In Waitakere, Labour + Green beat National on party vote. Let alone the Waitakere men who aren't in the Waitakeres. National are keen to push…

The rationale of Tony Blair's Third Way and Bill Clinton was to magnetise the…

One thing I have noticed amongst my (what I like to think well informed) friends is that for those who…

I have great faith in people if they're properly informed and have purpose to work around together. Building and channelling that…

Labour should cede its left flank to the Greens and move its message to the centre in order to maximise the two parties' combined share of the vote. Labour should…

Not to mention classist-rankist.

Yes... and not by pandering to `Reagan Democrat' sentiments. JK did have one thing partly right: Winston and NZF is going to be a…

Labour's priority should be to focus on those who, in principle, broadly supported many…

yep

In respect of which of these policies is that true? It would be a useful starting point to clarify this if there is ever to be any kind of accomodation between these two parties i.e. Greens and…

I know, repeat the…

And I'll keep saying any political party that thinks voters are just…

I'm not sure it was so direct, actually. I've said it before, and admittedly repetition is merely truthiness, not truth, but while Winston First may have picked up a chink of the Waitakere Man vote, I think that it picked up…

Yeah, and lobing insults at the Greens is the way to get those…

I think heck yes good housing is important and can save significantly on healthcare costs.

No, I'm not. It would be a complex arrangement, sure, representing many interests, the way democracy is meant to.

Or “Tax evasion doesn’t pay.” – mirror-flipping the infamous "Benefit Fraud. It's a crime" adverts. Cue pictures of Al Capone.

One trick that probably works is to give the unconverted some food for thought and to make them ask themselves the hard…

I think of him as the Vicar of Bray, Geoff.
And this is law, I will maintain
Unto my Dying Day, Sir.
That whatsoever King may reign,
I will be the Vicar of Bray, Sir!

A viable coalition from Mana, Greens,…

It strikes me that what Labour really needs is a slogan that brings out empathy in people, that gets to the idea that we provide social services and a welfare system and all the rest of it…

Possibly with some minor or multiple tweaking on the theme

Taxes pay for your [insert desirable thing here]

Taxes pay for this (picture of hospital)

Taxes pay for her (picture of doctor)

__Taxes pay for…

Good health, good homes, good jobs.?

Thinking of Dionysus, perhaps Good life, good times, good memories?

I tend to agree with you Islander that health is more important than housing.

The point I'd make is that sometimes the best solution for health is better and more housing. For the south Auckland DHB, the…

Yes, and I've seen many ideas that are housing and are not a "norm" but are perfectly acceptable.Good ventilation on t'other hand is important Without our health system I'd be dead and…

health depends on more than that

Lots of "having dealt with him in business..." with the rest left out, one assumes due to not…

Maybe they dislike how much mail he sends them?... he's the only one of the Ohariu MPs who…

+1
The last thing Labour should be doing is bagging those. amongst others, it ought to be talking with and listening to.

Interesting, and a little unusual, that they would be willing to say that they hate him but not why. Or is it the case…

And this is the guy who was…

I've talked to a fair few people in his electorate to try and figure that one out – common thread seems to be hatred of Chauvel. No-one has explained what he did to make them…

I have listened to this t and don't here anything about `the Germans'. Am I looking in wrong place?

It's false electoral maths too. Because the Maori Party might switch sides if a viable coalition could be formed. Peter Dunne can always be relied upon to switch…

Jobs is…

National +2 is the government, 62 v 59, everyone else (the Māori party, Greens, Labour on trade) is just there to avoid tantrums within National costing them supply & confidence.

If they lose 2 seats it's 60 v…

That's the typical home-owner's bias speaking. 8]

Plenty of labour people bring their kids up in cheap rentals between trips to school, and…

That's just inexplicably amazing! Do you know who else had a stable government? The NAZIS!

They don't "know" that. It's simply likely. But with 10% of the vote still to count, and a large proportion of that coming from the one group of people who represent the average sentiment in NZ least – people who…

That is…

The same reasons likely drove Rob Muldoon…

And if it’s really that big an issue for people vote for someone else. I could be bitchy and note that the electors of what are now Rongotai and…

But isn't consultation / negotiation the fundamental…

Also that we just had a free and fair democratic referendum on this particular matter, and it looks like The People (remember them, John?) like it…

Pity the journalist (snort) didn’t point out that Germany is one of the richest countries in the world and there might be some connection.

While it's not for me to criticise the internal selection criteria of a party I'll never vote for, much less be a member of, there is something about the way __that bloody gardening…

Bit more info for those of us at work?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkiix0aveRk&feature=related

You is my wife now?

Is Kaye going to toe Prostetnic Vogon Joyce’s line, or will she grow a pair and stick to her principles on transit?

Do to who??

That’s it. I’m upping the ante. What would Nikki Kaye do?

You mean go to Australia?

Are they in and counted??

no

I almost forgot – being a target for gob.

Glad I got that off my chest.

Goff's Hare Kari may be premature – a Labour Govt or left coalition could result from special votes – unless of course special votes are presently being shredded.

I feel National's most cunning election ploy…

Being a wanker – excuse the French..

Yes indeed – Google "Speech Banana" images. For my last word recognition test they cranked the volume up so loud it was almost painful but it was still…

the first part of what I said is important:

we await strong counter-statements from all opposition leaders and in Labour's case its several courting contenders. Or we really do have the government we deserve.

If there is *still* no viable opposition to shit like this, then…

A pity that it has to something predictably swinoidic.

Or we really do have the government we deserve. No, it’s someone else who has the government they deserve. It’s always someone else. Like those smegheads who voted Green, instead of Labour, who made a big…

1) Wet behind ears Nat MP and gardener Maggie Barry declares that Auckland's mayor should respect her authoritah over Joyce's fixation on building roads over public transport or fixing potholes.

The morning after National's resounding victory she sent a strong message to…

And often it’s a way of saying “I don’t have the time or the energy to waste on a pointless…

It's pretty long though. ACT is so much easier. Join the fun in helping them rebrand. My favorite on #actnames so far is "Reserve Banks ACT", but there's other goodies too.

You need to go back to my last comment (e.g. if it wasnt for the bloody shonkey
revision of the law, we’d never have had leaky house syndrome.) But – without positive government legislation,…

of course, good government legislation is paramount and underlies them all...

Good work.

I very much doubt that.

Now, if that spit ball…

This.

Too often I get frustrated by most NZers fear of conflict leading to no decisions being made, no change…

Thank you for your support of your country.

For every $10 of taxes you got....

That post is by Judy, not Brian.

People who [...] “agree to disagree” [...] when whatever-it-is has no actual impact on them personally.

No problem with that in particular, since I do it often enough myself. I interpret (and intend) it as "I won't/can't myself, but I acknowledge that I…

One of the Greens’ slogans for 2011 was ’no environment, no economy’.

How about an upbeat variant of that –…

That would be where a caretaker government follows well-established constitutional norms (no declaring war on Australia, Johnny!) while the specials are counted and the final results declared? Yup, works for me too – but not for three…

And here I was thinking that concern trolls were simply disingenuous bastards trying to derail the opposition. Thanks for that. It’s the “norm” as subtext, as well as the more obvious derailling that I should be looking out for. Thanks (also without…

On tiptoes? Falsetto?

Billy Connelly does this great routine mocking people who use finger gestures to imitate quote marks, extending it to all other punctuation such as commas and full stops – and Victor Borge came up with a way of vocalising punctuation…

Because the signal-to-noise ratio isn’t particularly high, it’s increasingly difficult to sort out the genuine turncoats from…

That is Red Alert…

I'm inclined to counter-argue, but I realise in forming it that my argument, like civilisations and empires, sows the seeds of it's own destruction in it's creation.…

I not too unhappy with how its looks for the next week-and-a-half, myself.

I've always understood it to indicate a certain amount of insincerity, or at a minimum a lack of caring about their…

Just between us, Ben, apart from some mild mischief from the Prime Minister (in response to a…

But that is a problem with who is spending the taxes and not with taxation itself.

For what it's worth my view on taxes is as follows.
If I could afford a…

While the term can most definitely be about insincerity and sophism, it can also be about people who quite genuinely…

Labour should be good houses, good education, good health, good jobs.

National says too many taxes? Reply "but we need good education and health, that's where it all goes, that keeps people right…

I would strongly suspect that Peters has never posted anything on the web in his long and chequered life. I'd even suspect that he hasn't actually touched the keys on a computer.

Do you just mean that he's being insincere or using sophism…

"But you butch lesbians look like men! Aren't you worried about losing respect from other [read, "normal"] people due to your grooming?"

Thanks anyway, I don't look like a man, I look like butch-of-centre woman.…

I mostly meant the US. But there are many other instances of governments around the world using taxes to the detriment of civilisation.

Me neither. If this was the USA, I'd presume he meant money spent on the military. But this country spends the least it can possibly…

You might have to expand on that one a bit, Graeme. In this case I'm not willing to assume I know what you're driving at.

I find myself concentrating more on enunciation because I figure the usual kiwi mumble is probably harder to lip read, also trying to position myself so the hearing impaired person in the discussion can…

My union sent me a pamphlet from the CTU telling me how to vote – Labour/Greens, MMP.

Few things are more likely to make me vote some other way.…

I don't even understand what it means.

Hi Chris, this is interesting... is there a pattern to the types of words or syllables that are the most difficult for you…

They also pay for the destruction of civilisation.

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose, I guess.

Whereas for other deaf/hard of hearing people I've met, it is. Prevailing discourses ignore the wide range of experience, needs and strengths disabled people bring. Such an opportunity for everyone when it's tackled.

you may be over-rating people's understanding of what 'civilisation' means after several decades of neoliberalism

Yes, I've stuck up for the latter in some contexts

Images of Somalia, Bolivia, Peru and Joburg might help. On the other hand, a select few of the target audience might believe that taxes are useless because civilisation is beyond repair. Probably best to let such people rot in their fallout bunkers.

Not so harsh if you remember the book, and film, My Left Foot from high school English study.

As I rather snarkily observed…

Peters is first horse to bolt outta the box
Maori interest expressed as they go around the first corner and…
Mr smile…

I have a friend in a wheelchair who said he’s tempted to have a sign made up: MY SPINE IS DAMAGED NOT MY BRAIN. WHAT’S YOUR EXCUSE?

That’s harsh, but I…

I don't know if "spin" is fair – which carries a connotation of being deliberately misleading. In the end, it's something more…

And slowly, don't forget slowly. Deaf (or deaf) people are like non-English speakers – you magically become comprehensible if you speak very slowly and incredibly LOUD. :)