Posts by Russell Brown
-
Hard News: This Is Not A Complicated Issue, in reply to nzlemming,
Yeah, nah. Technically speaking, the Speaker is not a minister, as he is the head of Parliament, not of the executive arm of government.
I do not doubt you. But I did actually check the parliament.nz website before I typed that:
The Departmental Forecast Report sets out the financial statements and service output performance levels that have been agreed with the Speaker, who is the Responsible Minister.
And:
The Statement of Intent is divided into two sections: the first provides information on the Parliamentary Service's strategic situation and plans for the coming year and beyond while the second section provides financial information and statements of service performance for services as agreed with the Speaker as responsible Minister for Vote Parliamentary Service.
Etc.
So you can imagine my confusion ...
-
Hard News: NZ On Screen: The…, in reply to Hebe,
Beloved and I went and danced a little at Mollett Street not long ago. Even though the building was gone, the vibe was there.
You know, hardly anyone will understand how cool that is, but that's so, so cool .
That Media 7 was great; thanks I missed it on tv
Makes it all worthwhile getting it cleared then :-)
-
Hard News: This Is Not A Complicated Issue, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
And both could have made the time if it actually mattered to them.
No. Smith is the responsible minister. He convenes the meeting. And he was the one in a position to recognise an issue. I don’t for a moment think that either Brownlee or Shearer would have refused to make time for a meeting in these circumstances, but they weren’t asked and they quite probably hadn’t been privy to the discussion.
The Speaker is the responsible minister and Lockwood Smith is the minister.
-
Hard News: This Is Not A Complicated Issue, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
Aw Craig, you made me comment on Kiwiblog ...
The nurses are lovely here.
-
Also, just a note that we had planned to have a 10 minute excerpt of When A City Falls in the collection, but there’ll be a delay there. I’m hopeful it will be added in due course.
I'm very pleased I managed to get permission for our Media7 special to be there in full too.
-
Up Front: A Real Character, in reply to Chris Waugh,
Unfortunately that insultmonger link now gets me a 404. Looks like it's just so old it's fallen off the internet, doesn't look like the usual GFW block.
Yup. 404 for me too.
-
Speaker: Properly Public: It's our information, in reply to papango,
It absolutley wouldn’t. A lot of OIAs are made by students and the interested public.
Case in point: this exercise by student Matthew Taylor. A must-read if you haven't already.
-
Up Front: A Real Character, in reply to Chris Waugh,
Really? Not one I’ve heard. The most common swear words around Beijing involve somebody’s mother and an intimate part of her anatomy.
Tze Ming covered that in a post here once:
Obvious outlet: learn how to tell warmongers and dictators to f*ck their mother’s stinky c*nts in FOUR Chinese dialects!
I happened upon this invaluable resource just yesterday, while overloaded with historical tragedy. Much of the Mandarin I was already familiar with – but good lord, is Mandarin swearing totally pussy compared with those gutter-dialects of the Southeast or what. Comparing the vocabulary, it reminds me of the time I studied kung fu but could only shout my ‘counting-to-ten’ drills in Mandarin for the first few weeks, projecting the fearsome impression that I was inviting my opponent to a tea-garden to listen to some light opera, rather than threatening to pummel their face in. Now I know that the implications of saying ‘you have a pretty green hat’ to an adult man in Mandarin are utterly deadly.
Meanwhile, those Cantos and Hokks trade pretty hats and cursing families unto the 18th generation for good old infinite variation on: 1) things that can be fucked and 2) grades of unpleasant pussy. Now I can enter Hong Kong with my head held high.
The post contains links to some really filthy insults.
-
Actors, writers, and the show translator talking about Firefly's "Chinese". (Espenson calls it Mandarin.)
I always thought it was Cantonese, which I gather is much better for swearing and cussing.
-
Up Front: A Real Character, in reply to Heather Gaye,
That’s a fair point, but no, Homeland doesn’t go there. I could rephrase by saying that the mental illness is as much a part of her as the skills that make her good at her job – no judgement or novelty, just.. it is what it is.
I think that's a better way of describing it, yes.