Hard News: Congratulations, Mr Key
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There will be blood -
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I fancy words have already been said: Hide was far less cocky on Morning Report today, and Bill English just now described Act as "a small party that hasn't been in government before" in an amusingly patronising fashion.
I think Hyde tried to drink John Key's milkshake. But Key broke Hyde's straw.
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It'll be very interesting to see what happens with the Party.
Their mandate was to consult with the people after the elections.
Pre election polling indicated a overwhelming majority preferred to go with Labour if the option arose.
I wonder how they will get around that or if it will be a case of going in with the Nats despite that 'for the good of Maori'.It would not surprise me if Key is kicking himself at the moment in regard to having sided with ACT, pre-election.
I'm sure (it seems) he'd prefer to work with a center-minded party like the Maori Party rather than the rantings of ACT but he's no doubt wondering how to get around this issue.It has struck me that Rodney Hide has been actually like one of those little poodles that are owned by many of Epsom's residents and repeatedly humping Key's leg at ever opportunity...
Key probably tolerated it for a few days but now he's on to his tenth pair of Hugo Boss slacks and he is wondering maybe if he could have this little doggy put down.
Not only that but there is a 100 year old rottweiler with rabies by the name of Roger Douglas waiting to get out of his cage and get humping also (but not just Key's leg).So, what's a bet Key will minimise the influence of ACT if at all possible, by going with the Maori Party instead?
He look much more tolerant, forward thinking and 'embracing' while diffusing the extremist nut cases.... -
we simply never saw the likes of Stephen Joyce, the new list MP and (we are told) anointed Cabinet minister.
It was a 'presidential' campaign; we never really saw anyone from either party except the two leaders. (The exception being Smith and Williamson but its fairly safe to say that wasn't intentional.)
Joyce was on Agenda yesterday; he came across well and seemed both smart and humble which is not a claim you can often make about that shows interview subjects.
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Or Goff, the guy who introduced the nation to student debt in the first place?
Goff introduced the $1000 fee in 1989.
National introduced the student loan scheme in 1992.
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Rik,
Paul - thanks for the US tax rate info - the devil is always in the detail. Maybe our tax rates aren't so bad but it sure seems a lot harder to get by these days on what I would have thought was a reasonable income. But then again - one income + two kids might be the real issue for me.
James - actually I would support doubling GST and dropping the tax rate by 10 points. At least that way everyone ends up paying something - even those that earn an awful lot but have interesting ways of avoiding paying income tax.
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Craig, where did the 3,000 murdered line come into it?
Any party can have bigots - I agree.
And a zealot is a zealot, no matter which side they support, which can be very, er, annoying....However, from what I've seen the 'generalisations' actually add up to a reasonably large amount.
It would be indeed hard to tar everyone with the same brush, but where there is smoke.... -
It has struck me that Rodney Hide has been actually like one of those little poodles that are owned by many of Epsom's residents and repeatedly humping Key's leg at ever opportunity...
Ew.
Not only that but there is a 100 year old rottweiler with rabies by the name of Roger Douglas waiting to get out of his cage and get humping also (but not just Key's leg).
Umm, double... triple ew.
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National introduced the student loan scheme in 1992.
Coincidentally, the year I started university. I particularly enjoyed the four hour wait I had in the loan queue. Efficiency in government!
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(3) Anti-abortion referenda failures- South Dakota, California, Colorado (!)
I wouldn't be quite so surprised about the Colorado one - it was 100% crazy, and the vote (75% against) reflected that. Making any fertilised egg a person would basically be the first step to taking away women's rights to do *anything* that might hurt their potential precious cargo. Evidently most Coloradoans(?) were smart enough to realise this.
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One could be somewhat bitchy and point out that a good chunk of Labour's base couldn't afford a garden shed on the same street as Helen's "little driveway",
My in-laws live across the road from Helen, and have lived there about the same number of years. When they bought, like many of the inner suburbs, it was a why-the-hell-would-you-buy-there address.
The rateable rise of these burbs over the decades is hardly either surprising or something she can be held responsible for.
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...well "responsible for" when the times were 'good' and house prices went through the roof...
...or "responsible for" when times are not looking so good and house prices are tanking....
I guess it's the latter from what the polls say.
And besides, the global credit crisis was all Cullen's fault eh? -
National introduced the student loan scheme in 1992.
Hey, I looking forward to reminding the younglings what the presumed leader of the Opposition did when he was Education Minister.
It would be indeed hard to tar everyone with the same brush, but where there is smoke....
Trotter's firing up the inspiration for his next mouth-fart?
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A thought:
Anybody find it slightly ironic the Nat's had their election night party at Sky City? -
Moz,
The "any fertilised egg" thing was scary... especially since it didn't address liability for spontaneous abortions (20%-40% of fertilised eggs don't make it very far).
With the NZ election, I keep coming back to "but I'm politically engaged and so are most of my friends". The people I'm only vaguely friends with who aren't engaged tend not to talk about politics (really!) So it's a bit hard to tell by listening to what's happening around me.
I do hope that the Nats go with a centrist agenda and look for support from the Maori party (and Labour and The Greens when they can) rather than continuing their "mandate from heaven" all or nothing approach. I'd be both impressed and amused if they only went to ACT for their occasional outbursts of right wing monetarist fundamentalism. Partly because I'm sane, but after living through the 80's seeing Roger Douglas repeatedly kicked in the testicles would please me no end.
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LOL - I take it you don't like Trotter, Craig.
Maybe he should take a leaf out of Hootin's book and start using the C-word.
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I'm sorry to lose Helen, but it looks like Obama's victory was even more significant than we dared hope...
One group the Obama victory meant everything for is disabled people.
His disabilities policy is historic, not only in what it contains (among other things, it ratifies the UN convention on the rights of the disabled) but in the way it was crafted -- via direct meetings and conference calls with advocacy groups, and active and meaningful discussion forums on the Obama campaign website itself.
For a while there, there was a lot of fine talk about autism (and some not so fine: McCain's claim that Palin knows more than "almost any American that I know" about autism, because she has a baby with Down's Syndrome was just bizarre) but, as is so often the case, it seemed that autists are only ever five years old.
The Obama policy recognises autistic spectrum people -- and everyone else who's different like that -- as people who grow up and live lives. It's special.
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Rik: remember that nothing's ever equal - that's just a first level approximation (people comparing US federal tax rates with NZ's tax rates just gets up my nose - it never makes sense)
Lots of details are different, in the US you can income split (average your income with your spouse and pay on that) even given that - here it's a wacky Peter Dunne thing - in the US it's uncontroversial, largely a middle class tax perk (for those families where one partner earns much more than the other - families who can afford a stay-at-home or working-part-time parent). US tax payers also have MANY tax breaks available if they try - that why they fill out 100 page tax returns every year.
BTW the other issue that grates is when people talk about US ''capital gains taxes - there is a 25% capital gains tax - but it's not the alternative to the 0% we have here - it's an alternative to the 33-35% normal income tax rate - you only get to claim it if you hold the thing that's getting the capital gain (property, stock, whatever) for a minimum time (2-3 years from memory)
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Anybody find it slightly ironic the Nat's had their election night party at Sky City?
No. As I've already had to point out to David Slack, the Sky City Convention Centre isn't a bad venue if you want to hold a rather large function in the CBD. (And one much more agreeable and accessible than Ellerslie Racecourse.) I also suspect - given that the campaign launch and last year's conference was held there, a cost effective deal was struck.
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National's disability policy is scary: get the crippled kids out of the schools and put them away somewhere.On NatRad, One in Five ran a fascinating interview with Anne Tolley, in which she claimed that severely autistic children needed to be somewhere quiet. It is for their own good, you see.
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Yes, Craig - yadda yadda, it's the Convention Centre at Sky City, nothing to do with gambling.
lol
I was talking irony by name association - I guess you don't do that?
It was quite funny I thought, noting that the media did not use the word 'convention centre' when referring to the venue.
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the Sky City Convention Centre isn't a bad venue if you want to hold a rather large function in the CBD
Plus, the Sky Tower is John Key's favourite building.
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LOL - I take it you don't like Trotter, Craig.
Maybe he should take a leaf out of Hootin's book and start using the C-word.
Tomorrowpeople: And you've just scored an own-goal, given that my opinion of Hooten is only marginally higher than that of Trotter.
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The future under National will be like those Sky City advertisements, where everybody wins on the pokies and the tables, where everybody is happy and everybody is white.
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I was talking irony by name association - I guess you don't do that?
I tend to get jokes when they're funny. Kind of missed this one.
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Jesus Craig, calm down. Your side won. Chill out for a couple of days until the losers have got some stuff off their chests. Your blood pressure will thank you for it.
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