Posts by Russell Brown
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Hard News: Dirty Politics, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
I know this is probably going to be an unpopular thing to say, but if he did “ask” (whatever the hell that means) wouldn’t you be lining up to accuse him of political interference if the outcome wasn’t to your liking
No. I don't see how I'd come to that conclusion.
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Hard News: Dirty Politics, in reply to Conor Roberts,
Yeah, I didn't think that sounded like you, at all.
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Hard News: Dirty Politics, in reply to Alfie,
The ODT reports Key as saying that it’s “unlikely” he’ll ask Judith Collins if she’d shifted a prisoner at Slater’s request, or even whether she leaked information to Slater.
It's an allegation of a grievous abuse of ministerial power to help out a mate. And he declares he won't even ask?
If he's allowed to make this a last word, I really do despair.
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Hard News: Dirty Politics, in reply to Andre Alessi,
Only just catching up with this but I gather Key is accusing Hager of faking emails. Good grief.
I've read most of the book now and I am horrified -- especially by the paid attack campaigns on public health officials and lobbyists. It's just evil.
But it looks like they're having some success with their Kim Dotcom misdirection. So the system still works.
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Hard News: Dirty Politics, in reply to Alfie,
Sorry James George but you’re heading off on tangents. Let it go please.
I really don't need James landing in this thread and slagging off individuals and the site itself. He can stop that or be banned.
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Danyl's summary is much more useful -- and alarming -- than anything in the news media today. Well worth viewing.
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The trove of emails included hundreds between Slater and Ms Collins, including one in which she told the blogger: “If you can’t be loved, then best to be feared.” She urged him to pay back “double” any injury suffered, to which he replied: “I learned the rule from you.”
The book also claimed an email directly from Ms Collins was used almost word-for-word on the website, claiming it came from “the tipline”.
According to Hager, Ms Collins provided increasing amounts of material for the Whale Oil blog, including an attack on a ministerial staff member that prompted death threats against the man.
The Collins chapter seems pretty remarkable. It says Collins got a prisoner transferred at Slater's request, among other things.
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Hard News: Dirty Politics, in reply to Dylan Reeve,
Picking Finney as their speed reader was just insane really. I mean his entire livelihood is dependent on maintaining a good relationship with government – his interest could hardly be more conflicted unless he were actually named in the book.
Quite. He was even more dismissive of Campbell Live's Dotcom/GCSB story in Kiwiblog comments.
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Hard News: Dirty Politics, in reply to Michael Meyers,
I expect it is more complicated than that. Showing access won’t be enough. You would also need to show the mens rea, the guilty mind. This would be a lot more difficult than just showing some server logs. And how do you show that someone knows they are not authorised to view something.
Yeah, but the correspondence has Ede and Slater talking about not being caught, even though Labour is trying to track IP addresses. There seems to some mens rea in that. They clearly weren't just accidentally finding stuff.
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Hard News: Dirty Politics, in reply to Dylan Reeve,
I was particularly impressed by The Paul Henry Show’s choice of speed-reading reviewer… A lobbyist. An excellent choice for an impartial review…
Charles Finny? Seriously?