Posts by Russell Brown
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Polity: Meet the middle, in reply to Alex Coleman,
I get that the Q itself is a proxy for whole bunch of other things, but doesn’t the data (which we are using for a proxy) suggest that slightly over half of the centre, and slightly under half of the right, agree with the left here?
One thing to note here is that there's a lot in the framing of that question. I recall one poll while Labour in government which had a surprisingly high number of self-professed Green voters taking a pretty harsh stance on beneficiaries – more than Labour voters, from memory.
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Polity: Meet the middle, in reply to Danyl Mclauchlan,
2. I think there’s often a gap between what people are thinking when they identify themselves as ‘centrist’ ie ‘I am a moderate and sensible person’, and what politicians and political analysts hear
Like Trotter hearing it as "I believe in nothing".
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- Centrists think more like lefties on economic protections and public investment
- But they think more like right-wingers on new taxes and welfare
That’s helpful to know. You’re more likely to win centrists’ votes if you emphasize the issues where you agree with them, and downplay the issues where you don’t.
My impression, unsupported by data, is that centrists – or at least people without pronounced ideological positions – place a lot of value on perceived competence.
A lot of that is about narrative. And it seems to me that despite a growing array of government shitshows, that’s a narrative Labour, as a party, is still struggling with. I sat and listened to a conversation at a party (a party party, not a political party) a couple of weeks ago that was all “yeah, but look at the other guys”.
Managerial government gets a bad press, but my sense is that people quite like it.
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Hard News: The Sky Trench, in reply to Sacha,
possibly the legal requirements vary if one is considering an existing structure or a new build
but only one leg of the new cycleway route is overengineered for barrier height.
And the Upper Queen Street overbridge (with a much bigger drop) and the St Lukes Road bridge (an entirely new structure) both have new shared paths – but not the giant walls. It is not easily explicable.
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Hard News: The Sky Trench, in reply to Rich of Observationz,
Sez here there were 27 incidents in one three month period:
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/regional/52460/fences-to-stop-objects-being-thrown-on-motorways
and hence fences are now a standard.In 2009, apparently. And not just high:
But bridges are now being built with high fences that curve inwards, he says.
Not so as I've been able to see, they're not. I can't actually think of one.
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Hard News: The Sky Trench, in reply to James Littlewood*,
The justification for the rush is a ribbon cutting deadline set by the PM’s office.
Good grief.
On one hand, I'm all for such projects getting a fast track, for whatever reason. On the other, it's like "Sorry, no time to listen to the people we're ostensibly designing this project for! Prime Minister is coming!"
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Hard News: Baboom: it's serious, in reply to Mikee Loop,
On Friday EDM.COM signed up with 10,000 artists and 8.8 million followers and have started putting hundreds of releases live on their page
Nice work. That's a biggie.
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Polity: In defence of the centre, in reply to Sacha,
That’s a two way street, not helped by this sort of thing.
Was that from before or after Labour rejected Green approaches to work closer during the last election campaign?
To be fair, it was a bit more than "approaches to work closer", it was a bid to commit to an campaign coalition that had limited strategic appeal for Labour – a story Russel Norman gave to the press after Labour declined.
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Hey! Look what arrived o the internet this morning!
Headless Chickens playing 'Monkey Jar' in 1987, from a 95bFM live-to-air:
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Hard News: Friday Music: Play Versions, in reply to Robyn Gallagher,
Inspired by the Randa video, here's another one that was set at the Point Erin Pool, "The Pool" by the Reduction Agents. The Parnell Baths are a more popular location for music videos, but the Pt Erin videos tend to be weirder.
Robyn, you are the video wizard.
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