Posts by Nat Torkington
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{REMOVED} is very definitely *not* a guy.
I want to hear the recording of Damian being outfoxed by a tricksie Winston ...
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Eric: My apologies your Majesterial Honour. Since your lads nobbled our lamb exports a few decades ago (and offed some of our boys in a WW I strategy that was just too brilliant for us down-under peasants to quite follow) we've stopped teaching the monarchy in New Zealand. Used to be that you could stop any New Zealander on the street and ask them who preceded James II to the throne and you'd get back, quick as a flash, "Charles II, mate, who died in 1685. God Bless The Queen". In fact, the Dairy Board had roving squads (Inspectors of the Dominion) who would quiz Kiwis in just such a fashion. Those who failed were deported to Australia, already known to have welcomed the ugly blight of Republicanism to its bosom.
Nowadays, stop people on the street and you're likely to be told to fuck off and snotted one, pardon my French your Ultimate Highness and Imperial Blessedness.
I remain your humble servant and tireless diligant in the labour of Her Majesty's Empirical Dominions of New Zealand and God Bless Great Britain and the United Kingdom whose awesome might shows the way to the rest of the world except France who just stand around with their cocks in their hands wittering on about Napoleon as though he hadn't been sent packing at Waterloo and fielding piss-weak rugby teams that the Dargaville Under 15s could rattle off on a weekday, may they see the sight of our backs receding towards their goal line come the World Cup as we teach them to eat the word "chokers" or whatever it is in French probably "les choquers",
N J Torkington, Esq. (Citizen of the Dominion)
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If you also had read the memos, Jeremy, you'd know that Keys was given the idea by an American policy "advisor". It's yet another case of New Zealand jumping on the American bandwagon without stopping to think about our unique cultural position. Namely, we're not as fat as Americans. There's just not enough burnable lard on the average Kiwi as there is on the average Yank, and this lowers the yield and thus changes the payoff point. For this reason, Keys will target the recent Labour party reforms of school cafeterias in his first term. It's a matter of national security: the energy future of this great nation will never be secured in the hands of the nanny state.
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Ian: I have a book of emails from John Key revealing his alien agenda. Expect publication 2Q 2008, just in time for the election.
I'll also have an entire chapter on his unique economic, transportation, and energy plans. The tax system will have only two tax brackets: HAVEs and HAVE NOTs. The HAVEs will be issued mandatory SUVs powered by biofuel produced from the rendered bodies of the HAVE NOTs. Dr Sir The Honorable St Key will have perfect fine-grained control over the environment, energy markets, economic situation, and labour market by adjusting the tax bracket cutoff. Running out of proles (or "labour shortage" as it's known in economics circles)? Push the bracket up $10k and suddenly a few HAVEs become HAVE NOTs (or, as they will be known, "92 Unleaded").
But I have already said too much ...
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Why do we see TV3 claiming prayer is in danger? Because we're racing to the bottom here in New Zealand news. The only news that captures attention is that which has immediate consequence, one where there's a clear crime and obviously there's a lot of tut-tuting that can be done.
I think of it as "spot the cunt" reporting--when you get a story, you look for the villain and do a beat up on them. Good against evil is a wonderful old story that resonates well and we can use it again and again simply by varying the characters. Talkback radio loves this.
Case in point: KiwiSaver. On budget day the news stories were all about that villain Cullen dipping into our pocketbooks and how business would have to screw the employees more because of something Cullen cooked up on vacation.
The real story only slowly emerged later--that Australia's buying up our companies using the capital from compulsory savings schemes and if we want a hope in hell of reversing that trend then we'd better get our own domestic cash pile. Employment relations and the power of Governments are great good v evil makers--everyone knows that employers are cunts, just as politicians are.
Now we have Mercury Energy. Morning Report was full of "someone came to turn off the power, must have seen her on the life support and ..." melodrama. That's got the cuntometer redlining! Run with it! There's a bit of social justice there, too--not just poor people but poor Islanders too! So the guy turning off the power was a proxy for BIG WHITE CAPITALIST CUNTS. Oh it just gets better!
And so to Jesus. Lately (and Tamaki of the Destiny Church Mad-As-a-Loon Tamakis, here I'm looking at you) fuckwits have realized that Faith is another great polarizer into good vs evil. Shit, they INVENTED evil! God is good, obviously. He says so Himself. So, just as obviously, anyone opposed to Jesus is evil. A cunt, you might say.
So now the "X will fuck with your Jesus" story is becoming the fast-rising variation on "X will take money from your pocket"/"X doesn't care about the little guy" stories we're used to. I have to give credit to Morning Report on this one, though. Sean Plunket was delightfully incredulous in his conversation with Brian Tamaki, describing "Destiny Church protesting religious tolerance". 10/10 for spotting the story Tamaki was trying to push as just as story.
For the record, I see both sides of the employer and employees employment contract/wage issue, I think nobody should die because they can't pay their power bills, and I think Brian Tamaki's a dildo. If you're a Muslim MP, you should swear your oath of allegiance on the Koran. As an atheist, I could happily swear on a Bible in the name of God that I was Rufus Q Monkeyballs, 418 years old, with a rightful claim to the title of King Bigdick of the Pendulous. Make me swear on a bottle of Speights Old Dark in the name of me Mum, though, and I'll have a much harder job of it.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled cunt-spotting daily news cycle. Nothing to see here, move along.
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This prison survival guide is bloody scary stuff. I wouldn't wish it on my enemies.
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David:
I represent the "Michael Laws Does Not Look Like A Vagina" society. We are highly offended that your article continues to promote the myth that Wanganui's Mayor bears any resemblance to a certain organ of female anatomy.
We demand an apology, and have taken the liberty of drafting one on your behalf, as follows:
To the "Michael Laws Is Not A Vagina" society members, elected officials, and dignitaries:
I wholeheartedly apologize for my ill-informed comparison between the face of the illustrious former-Member, current mayor of Whanganui, and one-time mediocre-selling novelist, Michael Laws, and a trimmed vagina. Having spent literally hours investigating the matter online, through educational DVDs, and for two memorable hours in a local expert vagina facility, I realize and admit I was wrong and retract all such comparisons. Michael Laws's face looks nothing like a vagina, and you may quote me on that. If anything, it's like a strategically shaved scrotum and I say that not just because every time I see him on TV I scream "balls!". Many thanks for taking the time (and that of your estimable lawyers) to write and correct my misapprehension of this critical issue.
Sincerely,
David Haywood (PhD)
Commentatore extraordinarius et cunni comparator a les celebrites
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Russell says that the comparisons between music and art are limited, because art sales are of originals whereas music sales are of reproductions. There's a lot of art reproductions sold--would they also be subject to the royalty? But, more importantly, the Commerce Select Committee don't seem at all receptive to the idea that digital should be treated differently from analog except to the extent that digital makes infringement easier therefore control needs to be tighter and penalties higher. Brownlee actually asked me flat out, "why should we treat online any different?"
I can't argue against the "resale right" for artists--it's nearly impossible to make money creating art these days, whether physical art, dance, music, or movies. I worry, however, that these rights are digging into the doctrine of first sale--the idea that your ability to control what I do with something stops when you sell it to me. Without the doctrine of first sale (or it's NZ equivalent) we end up with everything subject to an infinite complexity of utility-limiting clickwrap-license-like EULAs governing our interactions with the objects we "own".
I find it hard to see how the government could avoid RIANZ arguing "hey, artists have a resale royalty--where's ours?" Then movies, books, clothes, furniture, ... there's a long list of possible hands to come out here.
At some point you balance fairness for the artist against an onerous burden on the marketplace. I'd be more comfortable with the art resale royalty if I felt Government would stand in the way of further hands shooting out. But they won't. My brief glimpse into the legal process when I made a submission to the Commerce Select Committee on the Copyright Bill was enough to show me that they don't give a fuck about what's right, they don't care about what's just, they don't even care about the artists or the consumers. They just care about being elected. So they'll do whatever they're asked, so long as it won't piss a big group of organized people off. That suggests we'll see a lot of rights creep.
No point, just a whole lot of curmudgeonly grump :)
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DVD? When does it hit YouTube? :)
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Short shameful confession: during the learned scholar's discussion of Leviticus and homosexuality I snickered when he said, "in the end."
Signed,
Beavis in Leigh