Posts by Paul Williams
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...her nomination was the highlight of a convention that ABC News has credited with a 20% shift from Obama to McCain amoung white woman voters.
And far be it for me to query the judgment of the sisterhood but as VP, she's still less experienced than Kerry Prendergast and I'd not vote for her either.
Angus, if your argument is that Palin's popular, I'll not disagree. If you however, argue that her candidacy represents a high point for feminism then I do. She's not a credible candidate, and her gender doesn't change that.
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There is no higher level of office and therefore her pro-life choices cause no drag* on her ambitions.
Excuse the lack of methodological rigour, but the mums I hang out with along with my wife would beg to differ. So too would a number of my colleagues who've taken many years off to be the primary care giver for their family's kids.
Besides which, Palin's complete and utter lack of experience negates your argument. If she had half the experience of any of the other candidates, you might have had a point, but she doesn't - she was selected last minute, is grossly under-qualified and appears to be entirely unsuited to a job that requires judgment and discretion. The only element of her candidacy that suits your thesis is that she's got a fair number of kids - now if you'd nominated her for hocky-mom of the year...
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Maybe I should apologise to those ACT MPs that are not engaged in criminal activity? (In the Parliament Coddington was an MP in, that was 11%, or about 12 times the rate of criminality amongst Asian New Zealanders).
Score! At present, that's higher than NZF rate!
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How, exactly, does this one person negate an entire political movement?
'Cause it's convenient I suspect.
I do think Palin's gender would inform her performance as VP, just as I think McCain's gender would his as President. That being the case, I can understand why women, but not just women, would see advantage in having a different gendered-perspective in the White House. But her gender isn't the sole or even determinative factor, for me at least - and I understand this could be a variation on your point Danielle. I know just as many women as I do men with whom I disagree and who I would not support for high office.
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I vaguely recall Jack Elder briefly being Minister for Racing too... Jack was a horses-ar*e, so that makes sense (even if it's not confirmed by Jack's wiki entry)
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The job is to be an advocate for racing.
You mean like the Minister for Courts? I thought that was just 'cause judges are wankers?
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Really? According to the 2005 Briefing to the Incoming Minister it was responsible for $424 million of GDP, or about 0.37%. $130 million of that is export sales, but that's nothing large.
I'm clearly out of touch... compared with racing in NSW, which claims to be responsible for 40,000 FTE jobs and gross direct economic benefits worth $4.2b (direct, not GSP)... now I've got questions about the methodology of this 2003 study, particularly about externalised costs, but it's the basis for a claim on a Ministerial position.
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I know it has been asked before, but why do we have a Minister of Racing?
'Cause it is a hugely significant economic activity... and many other industries effectively do have their own Ministries e.g. Fisheries. Plus it's also because it's pretty heavily regulated. I don't know the figures in NZ, however in NSW (the second largest centre for thoroughbred racing in the southern hemisphere), the industry is struggling to compete with new forms of sports-betting and entertainment and there's a lot of employment linked to racing that's increasingly perlious...
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...he was lazy and often badly prepared (which was ably covered up by officials), had a vindictive streak toward anyone who had the gall to disagree with him, and a sense of entitlement that meant he never actually had to bother doing the grunt work of actually convincing anyone else of his position.
Heard that too, but that could describe a lot of Ministers hey - on both sides of the spectrum? Perhaps not lazy but, lazy Ministers tend to f**k-up.
...And more prepared to believe that Winston finally hit the tipping point where his squee squad in the Press Gallery couldn't explain his bullshit away as that loveable rogue Winston just being himself.
I'll not disagree with that either Craig; but he's talent for them and they equally love and loathe him. He's guaranteed column-inches. I think he's finally going to fall ingraciously to the bottom of the heap here and potentially face prosecution. If half of the allegations are true, he should be sacked and charges laid. And, I'll not lament his demise. I well recall the impact of his hateful dog-whistling about race; it was contemptable and possibly for that alone, I'd be happy he was not in Parliament.
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Peters seems like he is both an irredeemable politician as well as a half decent Minister. I know a number of people who still see Ka Awatea as a high point in Maori policy. I also know people who were in his office when he was first Treasurer to Bolger/Birch/Shipley and who spoke well of him. And while it is no longer possible to indulge him further, I'm prepared to believe there's a degree of co-ordinated attack by a 'wronged-media'. But it no longer matters, politically speaking. Unless he can somehow produce a series of killer facts proving all the allegations wrong, he's a liability to this and any future government.