Posts by Rich of Observationz
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
Unless, of course, the money is actually going to people running complex frauds involving fake invoices and stuff
Or, as I heard of one prominent Auckland politician and publican doing, simply making the benefiting charity be his political organisation. I guess that could be called taking a cavalier attitude to the rules?
-
Got kids?
Oh why won't somebody think of the children! (TM)
-
I think the original article in the Herald was more than somewhat biased, as techinage points out here.
They didn't clearly distinguish between one company behaving unethically and others (e.g. Stargate) who were much more sensible.
Something I pointed out in my submission on the BZP bill is that there has been amost no attempt by the government to implement any kind of regulation on the production and sale of party pills.
Of course, the other point is that there is already a perfectly good stimulant/empathogenic drug available that has known effects, is regularly taken by millions and is no more harmful than alcohol and tobacco. It's called MDMA.
If that was legal (or even just tolerated) people wouldn't feel the need to play with exotic alternative chemicals.
-
...drunken munters seldom lasted past 1am down at the top 40 nightclub, now these pests hang around at clubs all night, fall over, getting in the way and generally disturbing the more refined psychoactive experiences of an aghast dedicated late night crew.
Change the club you go to? Or move to a more civilised city, if that doesn't work. I don't notice excess of drunken munters in the clubs I go to in Auckland/Wellington, but then I try and avoid the mainstream clubs in the Viaduct/Courtney Place.
Is there any demonstrable community benefit to either?
Why does there need to be? I think those pokie bars full of braindead morons suck, but there's a simple answer - don't go to them. People should be free to do what they want without there having to be a "community benefit".
She was worried that young people wouldn't come to Queenstown if there wasn't anything to do. Eh?
So they're not coming to ski? They're coming to party?Correct. Or, if they're like me, to do both. Why shouldn't they?
-
Your honour, my client submits participation in terrorism is not the same as being an ally of terrorists
It isn't. One is reasonably a crime (depending on what you consider terrorism, of course). The other is thoughtcrime, and shouldn't be an offence in a democratic country.
To use Northern Ireland as a (weak) analogy, the British didn't see fit to try and jail the 80,000 or so people who voted Sinn Fein at most elections - they were "allies of terrorists" as opposed to the few hundred who actually picked up a gun for the IRA.
-
More questions: how does the NZ system decide which court hears a case?
In the UK (AFAIK) minor offences are only heard by magistrates, more serious offences can be heard by magistrates or a judge & jury and the most serious cases have to go to jury trial. Magistrates have a limit on what sentence they can impose but can send a case to Crown Court for sentencing.
How does it work here? (also, I wonder why I never had a single jury summons in 23 years in the UK but have had two in the four years since I moved to NZ).
-
Graeme: what are the constraints on the police investigation of a case after charges have been laid (and where are these codified)?
Can they interview the accused? Can they add to the charges?
-
(A massive digression from the topic - sorry Russell :-)
I think Churchill's prime achievement in WW2 was to lead a government that delivered total mobilisation to win the war. Like the North in the American Civil War, the allies didn't win because they had clever generals and braver troops - they won through application of a preponderance in men and material. Plus, equally, the immense sacrifice made by the people of the Soviet Union.
The problem with criticism of strategic bombing is that it generally doesn't consider what would have happened if there had been no such activity:
- the Luftwaffe would not have been required to retaliate by bombing Britain and would have been able to concentrate on support for ground operations- German war production would have undoubtedly been greater without the damage and disruption caused by bombing
- British civilian morale would not have had the consolation that we were at least retaliating against Germany in one sphere of operations
Plus, although Churchill's peripheralist strategies have been widely criticised, the North African/Italian campaign, which one could regard as another example of peripheralism, was a success both in taking German controlled territory and in providing Stalin with a concrete piece of allied combat involvement.
-
More or less, except that I wouldn't ever call Churchill a wanker. Misguided (often, especially on India), a complex character (always) but mostly on the right side.
(typical Churchill incident - in 1913, when the original UVF were threatening insurrection in Northern Ireland, his chosen weapon to deal with this was the Dreadnought battleship. He was all set to send a battle fleet to shell shit out of them when saner counsels prevailed).
You have to judge people by the standards of their time, as well.
-
That sort of parallel with the government of New Zealand is frankly offensive
Why is it that a big chunk of 20th century history has cones and tape round it and you can't go there without offending people? I wasn't saying that the NZ government is in any way comparable to the Nazis (Tama Iti isn't Stalin either, he hasn't even got a moustache). I was simply suggesting that in politics, people often grab allies where they can.
(Besides, if you want to attack the Left on choice of allies, what about the Labour party and Winston Peters?)