Posts by Russell Brown
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I don’t want to broadcast this on Twitter, but the Lorde story in the New Yorker is bloody amazing. Here’s a screenshot of the full text. Click to embiggen.
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John Palino’s desperate “it’s okay everyone! Auckland’s hardly growing!” thing from last week has, inevitably, been undone by the release of the actual figures.
Just over half of New Zealand’s population growth since the last census occurred in Auckland.
Also, although Christchurch’s population fell, the population of the surrounding region has increased. That’ll be David Haywood moving to Dunsandel.
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Hard News: The non-binary council, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
Perhaps instead of worrying about online voting a simpler solution would be to survey every candidate before the next local elections and ask them ‘are you a current or former member of any political party, and if so, name them’.
“Are you now, or have you ever been a member of…” doesn’t have the most fortunate history there, Ethan. And you bet your arse I wouldn’t answer any such question.
I can see Ethan's point in the sense that depending on where you voted, there were whole slates of "Independent" candidates offering similar blandishments. But it seems that prior party allegiances aren't a great predictor in Auckland local body politics. Penny Webster, who works productively with the "Labour" mayor, is a former Act MP. (I did actually have to look that up and check it ...)
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Hard News: Sick with Anger, in reply to Kumara Republic,
In the case of Bryant, parents of Aspergians were reporting that they were being ostracised in case their kids “grew up to be mass murderers”.
That went down just before Jim was diagnosed. Thank fuck I had the internet by then, and could find my own information.
It's possible Bryant was autistic, but he had many other severe issues and much of his bheaviour growing up was not at all typical of an AS child.
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Here's the message that donors receive from the Snodgrasses:
We want to send you a personal note of thanks for your generosity in donating to our son's legal fund. We also appreciate your kind comment. You and your family have our best wishes.
Since his arrest in December, our entire family has endured some very dark times, and it would have been easy for us to become engulfed in cynicism. However, there have been numerous unexpected acts of kindness that have served as reminders that there are very good people in this world who care about what's right.
Most importantly though, we would like to make sure that you know this: For years, many people in the school district have told our son what's wrong with him, and this has been very hard on him. And when he was arrested, we didn't simply have to get him out of detention, we've faced enormous struggles in just getting him back. But since we've taken this story public, the real victory is that people like you, from all corners of the world have been telling him what is right with him, and he has responded so well to this. In fact, it's been vital to his continuing recovery from the incredible violations that he's suffered.
We, and our son appreciate you.
Catherine and Doug Snodgrass
It has made me cry.
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Hard News: Sick with Anger, in reply to Rob Stowell,
It’s such an odd press release.
Indeed. The reference to "Northcote over the Shore" is quite weird.
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Here's how City Vision are presenting it:
Strong result for City Vision and centre-left
"The 2013 Auckland Council elections have seen a strong performance from City Vision and progressive teams across the Auckland isthmus", says Gwen Shaw, Campaign Co-ordinator for City Vision.
"On the Auckland Isthmus City Vision achieved the following results:
• In the Waitemata & Gulf Islands Ward incumbent City Vision-endorsed Councillor Mike Lee was returned with a strong majority.
• In the Albert-Eden-Roskill Ward incumbent City Vision Councillor Cathy Casey was comfortably returned.
• On the Waitemata Local Board, City Vision retained five out of seven positions.
• On the Albert-Eden Local Board, City Vision retained five out of eight positions.
• On the Puketapapa Local Board, Roskill Community Voice increased representation to win four out of six positions."When taken together with the Whau Local Board result (five Labour members elected on a Board of seven) and Maungakiekie-Tamaki (four Labour members elected on a Board of seven), this means that all Local Boards on the Auckland isthmus, with the exception of Orakei, are controlled by progressive groupings. This is a major achievement and a huge change from the old Auckland City days of C&R domination.
"Regretfully, some high quality City Vision candidates were not successful this election. We also note with sadness the loss of Richard Northey as Maungakiekie-Tamaki Ward Councillor. City Vision has worked extensively with Richard over the years and we know him to be a person of great integrity and knowledge who has served his community faithfully. His contribution on Council will be greatly missed.
"With strong progressive representation across the Auckland Isthmus we will be working hard to engage our local communities over the coming term. We campaigned on public ownership of Auckland's assets, empowering local communities, treating people and our environment with respect, and building a congestion free network. We thank Aucklanders for their support this election and will work hard to advance the values and policies we were elected upon", says Gwen Shaw.
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Bryce Edwards has published a Simon Wilson post updating his Metro feature:
At the same time, the rightists on the outgoing council distinguished themselves for their complete failure to cohere around a platform, a leader or anything else. Of the leading members, Dick Quax is Act and too extreme; Christine Fletcher has a battiness to her that potential supporters find remarkably alienating; Cameron Brewer is an opportunist lightweight, constantly flailing this way and that to find an issue that might stick (and absurdly allowing his name to be used as running mate with the ingenue mayoral contender John Palino); and George Wood is now almost fully in Brown’s camp.
The people most opposed to Brown have not been the right, but the ideologues on both sides, especially Quax and Sandra Coney. As an example of that, it’s completely wrong to see the election in Waitakere of Linda Cooper, replacing Coney, as a blow to Brown. He was keen to see Cooper win. She’s in the National Party, sure, but she’s centrist and he’s got good channels to work through with her. Coney’s hand-picked successor, on the other hand, was Christine Rose, who actually put out a media release saying the super city was a complete failure. That was effectively a declaration of no confidence in Brown, and he was clearly horrified at the prospect of having to work with her.
He sees a strong majority of councillors with whom Brown can work productively, vs a rump of a half-dozen malcontents. The post seems to have been written on Saturday, because he still has Noeline Raffills elected, not Ross Clow. Clow’s election pretty clearly further aids Brown.
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Hard News: The non-binary council, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
I’d like to apologise on behalf of the Shore for tipping Hartley off council in favour of Chris Darby – who in a decent world would have made himself unelectable with this opportunistic race-based pandering in Devonport.
Ah, of course. I hadn't made that connection.
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Hard News: Squatting in the Square, in reply to Alistair Oldham,
There were quite a few bands that passed through or had contacts with Bonnington Square. I lived next door to no 68, where there was a whole bunch of New Zealanders, some of whom were in The Band of Holy Joy, some with connections to industrial metallists SPK2 ( see attached … the urban legend is that their chain saw / angle grinding antics once set light to the stage ),
Graham Revell – who now makes film soundtracks.
The Jesus and Mary Chain
Trying to remember the name of the guy – John? – who played drums for the J&MC for a short time. He also had a deal of his own, which included a generous reacord company wage but never seemed to come to anything.
Test Department and The Thompson Twins.
The Thompson Twins’ friend and publishing exec was Craig Taylor, who went on to become the Chills’ manager and the founder of Flying Nun UK. Marin Phillipps of the Chills was a visitor to No.70 and as I noted recently, The Clean stayed in the square..
My neighbour Karl also told me that William Burroughs once came round for a visit and also that most of the house turned up to be extras on Stanley Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket : I have never had any reason to disbelieve him !
Amazing!
Sadly, Karl/Karel passed away in Munich recently.
The real point is, that beyond just being a place to live, the squatting scene was also a valuable place for creative and social experimentation.
Yes.
