Yep

No, Rich – but it might be helpful to be a little cautious about making straight line extrapolations between New Zealand and other countries that exist in their own specific contexts. They do matter – unless you really…

And NZ does have a debt problem all right – credit cards, mortgages and what-have-you – largely private. But the only guaranteed solutions are either nanny statist or Icelandic/Irish in nature.

I’d point out what I posted days ago – our government debt is the 7th lowest in the OECD. It’s lower than the US or UK – so, please explain how, if they don’t have a problem, why…

Whatever he's done to configure his site, the browser I'm stuck with at work (IE8 on XP) treats every page on his site as a file…

It's not even about priorities vs debt – it's about doing all the wrong things to assist the economy because you're not looking at the examples and experts all around you.

Debt’s a problem only if you can’t repay it.
If you reduce your capacity to pay, then you’re making it a problem.
Your capacity to pay is reduced if you…

Now, if you want to say that "debt does matter, but priorities matter even…

"By extension", Rich is bullshit. It's a very good polemic (and I haven't checked whether it actually stacks up), but I don't know whether it's a…

It’s as if tomorrow you became so panicked about your mortgage that you decided to pay it all off in one year, by ceasing to buy food and water. You get sick, and your house gets repossessed.

And references Paul Krugman who talks about 'The Confidence Fairy'.

Presently he only has to smile and wave such is the standard of the opposition who are no capable of w[ping the smeg look from his face.

Shane Jones, Darren Hughes leaving Labour with both…

I don't think he minds what type of cheese; it's the size that does it for him

That would be the $16 per Kilo block of cheese then, you remember? back in 2008 when John Chee was ambitious to be the big cheese.

NZRU doesn't own AMI stadium. It's…

Now, we have-

I figure he'd be more of an American cheese, the sort that comes in a can and smells sweet and sickly and has an orange tinge to its otherwise pallid complexion. The sort of cheese that is…

True

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3XtgQi0AON4

Maybe not, but mouldy and smelly isn't a bad description for most of his ideas.

I've never been a fan of blue cheese.

Actually, MIA would be a considerable improvement on what they're doing.

OH YES, this:
People in employment on low and middle incomes have as much to fear from the Welfare Working Group as beneficiaries as they will all be forced to compete for the McJobs these policies…

Maybe they have shareholdings in gated community developments?

And in the five years between December 2000 and December 2005 the number of people on working age benefits dropped by a whopping 90,000 (or 90% of the Welfare Working Group’s 10 year target) from 392,000…

You mean "embishus", in the manner of a Shon Key. Right?

There's Silicon Valley ambitious... and then there's Kath & Kim ambitious.

Clearly it's ambitious if we gut the public sector and expect a historically-unwilling private sector to step up and fill…

As is doing more with the same – thanks to better processes, partnerships, leadership or capital investment in technology and research.

Now, which of those approaches is 'ambitious'? Which sort produces a high value economy? What sort of country do we…

For sure. But didn't Australia manage to…

Ah, but what sort? Edam? Parmesan? Gouda? Feta? Gourmet voters want to know!

Where's a Wishartian expose when you need one?

That one's very definitely not National's fault. Labour signed that contract, and it's not the kind of thing that you can suddenly say "Yeah, sorry, we're a bit too broke" even 18 months out from the kick-off date,…

Doing the same with less is a productivity increase., which is what they'll be expecting of NIWA.

No, but he is made of the same stuff... cheese.

Probably for the same reasons that robbing a bank at gunpoint will earn a prison sentence, but doing the same thing by…

_"Cuts" are about to lead to 75 NIWA staff, including 17 scientists, being sacked.
_
Too right. Cuts for cuts sake, if you reduce the workforce, how does efficiency or productivity increase?

Bring on the Levy too, at least we…

In my household, he is known as Dunncula. It was the haircut he sported at the '08 election that did it really.

but you can’t shine a shit (as they say here).

Yes you can actually.

Ah so!

Dancing Cossacks 2.0, methinks?

you might like to look for those statues of the Conservation Minister someone here has been making.

otherwise, maybe that's the problem with all these politics. they're trying to make their job interesting, when what they should be doing is…

Hell yes, which is why you use cute phrases like Modern Apprenticeships to make it meaningful. I do a fair bit of policy "confectionary", as do all officials, but you can't shine a shit (as they say here).

problem: you ever see “George and Mildred”? show from the 70s?

those goals are george-unsexy.

it seems to be the outcome every time anyone stands up to talk about aspirational goals in any way relating to these areas?…

So long as I can recall, Labour's always done a fair bit of policy work but it is largely at the strategic level.

My own view is that a party needs to…

Which is why after Labour's time in office we all felt nine years younger.

i struggle with that. surely working out the details of public policy is the job of public service.

parties should devise *strategy*.

regards that report you link to, i think Cullen might have been all over it. he was…

+1

Che, I tend to agree and I understand there is a lot of policy work under way. I'd like to see policies that take a longer view than just this cycle/election…

She did used to write for Investigate though, but found out they were part of the big cover up.

Clare writes for Uncensored. Investigate is like the The New Yorker in comparison.

Investigative journalist Ben Vidgen

Working for Investigate magazine doesn't actually make you an investigative journalist.

The Military's Pandora's Box
by Dr. Nick Begich and Jeane Manning
http://haarp.net/

Quote:
Looking at ways to cause earthquakes, as well as to detect them, was part of the project named Prime Argus, decades ago. The money for…

saw that question in relation to the Indonesian quake in 2004.

apparently the nukula device required would have to be as big as an aircraft carrier.

not sure even the soviets made them that big.

The reports of sonic booms in Christchurch are indicators this technology is being used.

Zbigniew Brzezenski, the world’s foremost geopolitical director, wrote about using hidden weaponry to cause earthquakes over…

Don't be silly, in this thread it's all John Key's fault.

Thank you for that. It's about time somebody started to ask the truly stupid questions.

sad but true

MUST HEAR: Investigative Journalist Talks About Christchurch Earthquakes-HAARP Links Refer: http://chemtrailsnorthnz.wordpress.com/2011/03/11/must-hear-investigative-journalist-talks-about-haarp-in-relation-to-the-christchurch-earthquakes/

US Truther Girl talks about strange coincidences which indicate US authorities had prior knowledge of Feb 22nd Christchurch earthquake,…

I've got to admit I'm rather bemused at Darth Key's Jedi mind-powers: "These are not the droids you're looking for..." I'd respectfully suggest that if the bloody Opposition had a coherent and credible policy platform he couldn't do a…

Economic Senescence?

In fact Key has…

There are some things tax cuts can't buy. For everything else, there's MasterCuts.

Re Cunliffes' speech. Nice dig at the issues. But what about the $4m for fixing the grass of Lancaster Park,..er.. Jade Stadium.. er.. AMI…

Nothing like a little media deviation.
To be fair, Hughes has all his cards on the table – lots of…

Yes, but anyone think there’s a fiscal Bradley Effect in…

Turei is bloody good – Keith Locke? Shitodear, his mother is – no, let's not go there-

all I can say is -hope

and the South may prevail-

Metiria Turei is the co-leader of the Greens (you may be confusing her with Nanaia Mahuta of Labour) and, yes, I rate her highly too. Of the rest of the…

Bill to John: "Why yes Prime Minister"

Bingo

Nothing like a little media deviation.

There are alternatives to what they will do but they won’t be considered because there is an agenda they want to pursue regardless.

The govt as Keith has stated are taking the Christchurch Quake to…

Which is one of Goff's biggest problems. He doesn't know. He's closer-aligned to National than to traditional Labour, and isn't capable of truly changing his spots.

And what a smack it is! Cunliffe for PM!

Sorry, a short post to respond to just one element of your very thoughtful long post. Have you seen this cartoon variation on…

About bloody time. More of that all round, thanks.

I don't quite buy that. The basic problem is that if our population ages, we will produce less and consume the same (or more). I assume the theory is that if we've salted…

Bingo.

Seriously, I think that basically they stand for bingo.

oops sorry long post but kinda disturbed by this stuff given I have to figure out who to vote for this year.

Um but I can't see any party proposing increasing…

(Starts ~4 min in. Hat-tip Ben McNicoll; but I think he got it from The Standard)

So, we've completely given up asking for a capital gains tax, a Tobin tax, the reintroduction of progressive taxation, because the middle class won't stand for it and so screw the poor?

How about we make…

Yes. But what if half the voting population never accepts spending cuts and the other half never accepts tax hikes? Then we get exactly what we got for the past five years.

All I'm…

considering they're on a hiding to nothing at the next election, *now* is the time to air this stuff.

i don't know what their internal polling is telling them, but the…

Yes, the need to reduce our debt…

Absolutely. I think that's a productive way of engaging. I'd be quite happy…

I'm not attached to how it's done – just had enough of the hands-off neolib bollocks this nation has suffered under for decades.

We need smart and high-value enterprises and jobs to attract and keep good people, companies and investors. We need export…

There is.

Please explain how slashing state spending will fix private sector debt levels.

It won't.

We don't have a short-term debt crisis. But…

That's not fair – Labour's last few budgets were to blame as well. Nor is last-in, first-out a reasonable way to decide which policies…

(Add: so a bit more sympathy from me with those who think Key and English aren't on the same page here)

The problem with using taxes to incentivise certain sectors, is that it often ends up looking like the old Muldoon-style tariffs and subsidies in reverse: if you target particular sectors too closely, you risk skewing…

JOHN Well, I think we need to take a step back and, say, if you look at New Zealand, it has a number of structural issues it just simply has to front up…

Depends who you tax – poorer people spend more of their income; rich ones have other options. Taxes on other than income and consumption have been recommended by experts and ignored…

Colour me confused. If I read what you are saying correctly you are saying we don't get enough revenue to pay for government spending so we have to cut spending.

But pardon me for being simplistic here, but…

So, what’s left after all that locked in spending? And how does that compare to what the other areas of government spending need just to tread water? Yeah, it doesn’t. We’re talking $3.75 billion in real cuts (only a billion of which…

What amazes me is that otherwise intelligent people actually expected them to.
__"It's time for a change"
"Labour are corrupt because they made me put a name and address on an election poster"
"Helen Clark is a CRIMINAL. She didn't tell her…

Mr Key said the Christchurch earthquake had prompted the measures.
Liar.

Totally – it is a choice motivated by ideology and they need to be held accountable for that. "TINA" won't wash. As I said last night,…

"Cuts" are about to lead to 75 NIWA staff, including 17 scientists, being sacked.

Given the extent to which New Zealand's economic future depends on our ability to manage our natural environment and resources, hacking away at NIWA is potentially…

to play devils advocate, surely the intention was for this 'forgone revenue' to be transferred to the GST take?

a grand idea well and truly screwed by the GFC?…

I agree. The government has damaged its revenue base to the point where it can't govern as it purported it would. Which I think…

you say that like it's a bad thing. would be interesting to know what proportion have based their leverage on rorts like family trust + WFF, or LAQC.

We know we need to reduce our deficit

Why? We're 7th lowest in the OECD for government debt. We're in a recession. In a recession, the government should borrow to get out of it (and in a boom, it should pay down those borrowings, exactly as the last Labour government…

And if we're looking for large amounts of state spending to shift, how about the massive subsidies to ETS polluters, continued propping up of property speculators and top-skewed personal tax cuts that have produced totally predictable results.

Then don't. Make then stand up and explain their policies and convince us. Anything less is undemocratic, and makes those policies illegitimate.

We know the debt is overwhelmingly from the private sector, not the public sector. Ratings agencies have said this country's public spending is acceptable. They are also unconcerned about taking on…

If we accept that cuts are needed to reduce our long-term deficit, then we need to accept that some of them will fall on things that we consider to be worthwhile.

The necessity of cuts for deficit reduction is not a premise I accept. There's money around, it's just distributed…

The government has…