Hard News: Don't bother voting
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And could someone remind me what the Greens "bottom lines" are again? It seems to me that assuming the Greens are Labour's reliable allies are as ill-founded wishful thinking as that equally fatuous Herald editorial.
I really can't grasp what you're saying. The Greens have:
(a) Ruled out a coalition with National, or supporting National on confidence and apply.
(b) Expressed a desire to form a coalition government with Labour.
They did so by way of a formal announcement, in which they explained the process by which they reached their decisions. They haven't so far as I can see, stipulated any bottom lines, but will want to negotiate "a policy agreement that advanced green policies on a number of fronts".
I suppose it could all go horribly wrong, but it is quite reasonable to regard the two parties as very likely indeed to work together if the opportunity arises.
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Their editorial writers really are channelling David Farrar far to much these days.
The fake Labour billboard that takes up half the front page of today's feature section is very weird too. You really have to look for the tiny line of text that says it's a "digitally altered image", and I suspect most people won't do that.
Personally, I think they're really pushing the line, and not in a good way.
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But you're really telling me that if Don Brash has somehow cooked up a National-ACT-United Future-New Zealand First harem of inconvenience, it would have taken with perfect equaminity in these parts? Tui billboard time.
Don't presume upon my thoughts, Craig. On the basis of their undertakings going into the 2005 election, I don't think any of the parties would have committed a breach of faith by going into such a coalition: ie, they couldn't be said to have duped their voters.
The Herald editorial says a "majority" of New Zealanders wouldn't want such a coalition government -- ignoring the fact that by definition a majority has voted for the parties in the coalition, and presumably with their party of choice to be in government.
You can argue that such a coalition would not be suited to troubled times, but you cannot decently say that there's some failure of justice in it happening.
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The fake Labour billboard that takes up half the front page of today's feature section is very weird too. You really have to look for the tiny line of text that says it's a "digitally altered image", and I suspect most people won't do that.
Was it this one?
Personally, I think they're really pushing the line, and not in a good way.
Recapping a previous post by Rich of Obz, I'd be interested to find out how far such a line can be pushed, before they find themselves at the wrong end of a Weapon of Mass Trustbusting?
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Would it be possible for me to have a word with the Italian expert in your department? Or you could slap him or her on the thighs very hard on my behalf, I'm really not that fussed.
Oh he desperately loves Italy, goes there every year and has a wonderful time. He just says that Italians are (to stereotype I guess) very passionate people, and sometimes that comes out in ways that wouldn't make sense to NZers.
We had another lecturer, for example, who came here from (Northern I think) Italy for a semester. He was flying out of an airport which had been shut down for three days because of a strike, and the government sent the army in to evacuate all the travellers to another airport. I asked him why they didn't just leave of their accord on buses and he just shrugged and said that was the way things were done there.
Here's the thing: imagine you have National in power for the next forty-six years. (Stopped shivering yet?) Never, or seldom, alone, most often in coalition with bits and pieces parties, two or three or even four at a time. Only at the end, for a period of a little over ten years, does one of these partners exceed 10 per cent of the vote, at which point National throws them the bone of the occasional prime ministership. Would you call this "unstable"? It's the closest I can think of to one party rule in a Western democracy.
Yeah, that was my understanding of the situation too. I guess I wouldn't call a government stable if it failed to make it through to the election, and that did happen sometimes in Italy. Consistently lead by one party, yes.
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From the Herald editorial:
It is no coincidence that all post-election negotiations under MMP have produced Governments led by the first past the post.
The article notes below that we have had, a couple of times, the government formed by the party that got less of the popular vote. Now they're arguing that under MMP this shouldn't happen, even if the coalition of parties got the majority of the vote?
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Was it this one?
The photo of Rochelle holding a laptop is priceless ("See, I used one of these...").
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I think part of it is that there's a common assumption that whoever gets the most seats gets first try at forming a govt - doesn't help you much if say Labour and the Greens are pretty close and you made the tactical mistake of already telling Winnie to piss off
So what happens if no one can twist enough arms and two blocks approach the GG wanting form a minority govt? first come first served? largest block? the GG makes a call on stability? or whim? ("but you've got Winston do you really think this will work?" - "If I let this go a head will you promise I'll never see him ballroom dancing again?")
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Personally, I think they're really pushing the line, and not in a good way.
Personally, Russell, I think you should lay a complaint with the Press Council and argue that the Herald's readers are fucking morons. Otherwise, why do I think there's a lot of ground being laid here for a great fit of "APN stole the election" sulking if (horrors of horrors) the Government does actually change. And before you get that upset, Russell, I'm not looking at you while I'm saying that.
I suppose it could all go horribly wrong, but it is quite reasonable to regard the two parties as very likely indeed to work together if the opportunity arises.
And it's also reasonable to suggest that the Greens could form a constructive relationship on a case-by-case basis with a National-lead minority government. I don't actually know for sure. Neither do you. And I don't think anyone else does either, but it's hardly prevently over-confident prognostications before.
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Recapping a previous post by Rich of Obz, I'd be interested to find out how far such a line can be pushed, before they find themselves at the wrong end of a Weapon of Mass Trustbusting?
Of course, Red, it's always a good look when governments decide to cluster fuck media outlets that don't play nice. And when Rich decided to spin out that hypothetical, he didn't answer my question: Does he think the government should start using hundreds of millions of dollars to buy and/or establish newspapers just to flick the middle finger to those nasty foreign media barons? Or are there other things we should be focusing on?
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Otherwise, why do I think there's a lot of ground being laid here for a great fit of "APN stole the election" sulking if (horrors of horrors) the Government does actually change. And before you get that upset, Russell, I'm not looking at you while I'm saying that.
I should hope not. I do think the Herald's editorial voice is a mess, and that the paper's new practice of digitally altering news photographs and acknowledging the practice in such a modest way is questionable. I think it should leave such satire to the bloggers and try and concentrate on reporting news.
And this is a paper that hasn't left readers guessing in the past. They refused to continue to run Graham Reid's columns unless he agreed to a prominent strapline saying "satire".
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Or are there other things we should be focusing on?
The Herald's problem is that it has focused for most of the year on things that are now looking relatively trivial.
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So what happens if no one can twist enough arms and two blocks approach the GG wanting form a minority govt? first come first served? largest block? the GG makes a call on stability? or whim?
Well a minority government has to have the confidence of the house, which requires a majority through ayes and abstentions. So it's unlikely that there could be two blocks that fulfil that, unless a party agreed to abstain on confidence for both sides.
The GG would annoint the first there who didn't look like idiots. Once the house sat someone in the opposition could call for a no confidence vote, and that would decide it real quick.
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it's unlikely that there could be two blocks that fulfil that, unless a party agreed to abstain on confidence for both sides.
No - someone would have to agree to support both sides for that to happen.
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Meanwhile: is Alan Greenspan losing his religion?
Hardly. It reminds me totally of Robert McNamara's Mea Culpa in Fog of War in which he totally misses the point at every turn and the most guilt he can possibly concede over Vietnam was that it was handled badly. The idea that he as Secretary of State could have actually opposed the war before it began, and at every escalation point, and every sick order he executed, seems not to have occurred to him at all.
Similarly Greenspan is in shocked disbelief that his steady and consistent policy of trying to maximize the amount of money being lent by holding rates down forever and opposing regulation of a lot of risky instruments could have had any bearing on the 'once in a century credit tsunami' that he talks about. Instead he tries to micro-analyze some of the contributing factors, and blame the Fed's inability to perfectly foresee the direction of the economy on a monthly basis.
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As for coalition wrangling, the one partnership that is always ruled out seems to me one of the most natural - Labour and National. Then there would be centrist government with absolutely no influence from minor parties required, and the will of 80%-odd of the people would be represented. But as a nation we're too stuck in our memory of the Westminster system to even think of that possibility, and instead squeal in an insane way about how crazybad it is that minor parties could hold the balance of power. The ONLY reason they even CAN hold the balance of power is because we insist that they do.
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"If I let this go ahead will you promise I'll never see him ballroom dancing again?"
Heh. :)
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opposing regulation of a lot of risky instruments
Worse - wasn't he a cheerleader of stripping regulation that had been put in place to stop the same entirely predictable corruption after the 1930s Depression?
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No - someone would have to agree to support both sides for that to happen.
Hmm. Yes true. Which makes me wonder what happens when parliament is tied in a vote. The speaker doesn't vote do they?
Or, support one side, abstain on the other could work. (ie, support a block with 57, abstain for a block with 59).
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Sacha, the man has made so many totally crazy conclusions over the years I lose track. One of the ones that always blew my mind was him heralding the internet as the success of private enterprise and the free market, when we all know it was a government funded military project.
He reminds me of the sort of memory deficient madness I'd hear when I worked in a stockbroker, where they would praise a technology one day and damn it the next, entirely on account of the stock prices of the major vendors. As if the viability of the technology had changed in that interval at all. The weirdest part was how incredibly confident and plausible they sounded, set against a backdrop of the incredible sums of money they were throwing around.
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Which makes me wonder what happens when parliament is tied in a vote. The speaker doesn't vote do they?
Not any more. They used to not vote on stuff, and then cast a casting vote. Now they vote on everything, and don't get a casting vote.
Since MMP, and the changes to standing orders that followed, a tied vote is a lost vote.
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Hardly. It reminds me totally of Robert McNamara's Mea Culpa in Fog of War in which he totally misses the point at every turn and the most guilt he can possibly concede over Vietnam was that it was handled badly. The idea that he as Secretary of State could have actually opposed the war before it began, and at every escalation point, and every sick order he executed, seems not to have occurred to him at all.
Off topic here, but that's a fascinating film isn't it? Errol Morris is one of my favourites, and the Fog of War shows why, because although yes, its subject engages a strange form of denial, there's a part of him which seems to all to willingly acknowledge that denial.
More to the point, it's astonishing someone who could be so clear-headed about much of the current geopolitical situation (and there seem to be a myriad of indirect cirticisms laid at Gulf War II throughout although it is never mentioned explicitly), could, as you say, be caught up so badly in virtually every wrong decision in the mid-part of the Vietnam War.
There's that really bizarre juxtaposition of archival recordings where he agrees with Kennedy that operations should be cut back, and then seems to capitulate to opposite demands when Johnson comes in.
It's an incredible film- put together with a real sense of care, and possessing a really intense, noirish quality throughout. The whole Bay of Pigs segment was just gobsmacking.
As for coalition wrangling, the one partnership that is always ruled out seems to me one of the most natural - Labour and National. Then there would be centrist government with absolutely no influence from minor parties required, and the will of 80%-odd of the people would be represented. But as a nation we're too stuck in our memory of the Westminster system to even think of that possibility, and instead squeal in an insane way about how crazybad it is that minor parties could hold the balance of power. The ONLY reason they even CAN hold the balance of power is because we insist that they do.
Not sure if you were already aware of this, but such a deal was struck in the last German elections (who also have a form of MMP). The two leading parties SPD and CDU, didn't have a significant "minor party" voting bloc to stave off the other, so they ultimately ended up forming some sort of bizarre, compromised "grand coalition" between oneanother.
As for the Herald's singleminded and rather cynical anti-MMP editorialising, does there seem to be any real feeling for change of the electoral system amongst the general public? Maybe I'm not on the pulse, but I don't seem to feel it.
As long as STV never becomes the preferred method for electoral voting. God, what a disasterous system that is-especially for minor parties. There is some sense in mayoral elections, where it's all about getting the "top candidate", however.
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Not any more. They used to not vote on stuff, and then cast a casting vote. Now they vote on everything, and don't get a casting vote.
Since MMP, and the changes to standing orders that followed, a tied vote is a lost vote.
OK, thanks Graeme. I do remember the short term circus about giving the speakership to the opposition after the... 1993 election? In order to free up one more vote. That stopped being talked about after one electorate changed with special votes and National didn't need it anymore.
The size of the overhand could potentially be quite important. If it finishes up on an even number - 122, 124, then the government will need one more seat than if it had been 121, 123 etc.
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Matthew, I was aware, and am also aware that the NZ MMP system was very largely based on the German model. I don't see a grand coalition as bizarre. What is bizarre is the refusal to accept the idea, to insist on party politics unto the death. Particularly now when what looks like the biggest political challenge during my lifetime is unfolding simultaneously. A strong bipartisan and centrist leadership is actually vitally needed now, not the pissly wrangling with the likes of Peter Dunne, Winston Peters and Rodney Hide that we are going to get.
If blame for this lack of commonsense must be leveled, it unfortunately finds it's way to most of us. We're the ones who insist on the quite arbitrary splitting of massive blocks of votes into parties, when the intention of representative democracy is actually that you have human beings with individual discretion in Parliament, not blind followers of party whips. The insistence on partisan arguments over everything from the trivial to the colossally important is stupidity that we only find it hard to see because it's at such a high level.
Yes it was a fascinating film. Not for insights into history, since McNamara doesn't seem to understand any of it. The insight is into HIM and how such an obviously clever person can be so damned wrong. It's an insight into power and technocracy.
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The size of the overhand
what a lovely eggcorn. An overhang is like an overhand - the punch that everyone sees coming but few can ever stop.
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