Posts by Keir Leslie
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Jones is a joke candidate. He's like, I don't know, when you run in the Presidential primary in order to score Secretary of State. (Or possibly, when you run in the Presidential primary in order to score a cabinet post in the other party's cabinet.) He's also got very little to lose.
I don't think it's true that this is a contest aimed at the Labour Party membership. It's a contest decided by the Party, but it's also a consciously designed exercise in political theatre. One of the most frustrating/hilarious things has been watching political journalists appear surprised that a set of rules carefully designed to produce exactly this outcome have done so.
Generally it's been hilarious watching pundits/journalists who have no clue at all about the Labour Party (and I include most left-wing commentators here as well) opine about the relative political positions of the candidates, the way the process will work, who's "winning" etc. They just don't have a clue!
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Eh I think on own never fatal (although am just relying on Farley here.)
Has the US demonstrated capability of exerting air superiority against maintained modern fighters without allied support over hostile territory using carrier based forces? I don't think they have, not since Korea/Vietnam, at best.
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Also there's an asymmetry --- Syrian regime doesn't need to achieve or even attempt air superiority, just needs to make US attempts to do so costly. Not to mention, loss of air superiority is fatal to like, no government ever. That's a much easier role, and presumably one that Syria has prioritized.
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I think that people should be able to work with governments on time frames longer than three years. Obviously I'm not a fan of the SkyCity deal, and we need to take firm regulatory action on pokies etc (hi Tony!), but we also have to make sure that the government acts in a predictable, fair, transparent way. (Which are precisely the things the SkyCity deal screwed with.)
On a similar note, as far as asset sales go, it's not Labour's job to run around trying to put things back exactly as they were in 2008. Labour's going to have to make decisions about where to allocate scarce resources, and it's not a great idea to prioritise simply by "what was the most recent bad decision and how can we undo it".
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You can't ban props! Mabel Howard's angry ghost will hunt you down!
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Matthew, I sat on the Labour Policy Council when we were drafting the current Platform. Grant Robertson was the chair. He's not a neo-liberal.
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Yes --- but the CGT's already policy. It's a bit clever to reply to a question about raising taxes on the rich with "you betcha" and then carefully dodge every question on income tax, and keep mentioning the thing that's already party policy.
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I am sure the tax system is complicated. I’m also very wary of politicians saying they’ll raise taxes when talking to a very left-wing audience but being unwilling to substantiate beyond that. It has too much potential for the traditional run to the left in the primary and then back to the middle for the general election.
[I must admit, so speaks the hyper-suspicious Labour left party member, with bitter hereditary memories of the gulf between rhetoric and reality going back a century.]
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Hard News: So long, and thanks for all…, in reply to Sofie Bribiesca,
Yes, I think it’s really good there’s a contest.
And it was good to see how solid and passionate Cunliffe was. I was slightly skeptical of Cunliffe’s swift announcement he’d up taxes on the rich, followed by the careful shuffle to make it clear he meant he was keeping the CGT and wasn’t making any commitments beyond that. It came across a little too pandering.
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Hard News: So long, and thanks for all…, in reply to Rob Stowell,
Well, look, Grant was the chair of the Policy Council when it wrote the new platform. Obviously it's not a direct reflection of his beliefs, but it does give a suggestion about what kind of space he's operating within.
It is also very much the case that Grant's not been in a position to take distinct political stances, because he's been a loyal deputy and front-bencher for the past few years.