Hard News: Rationalisation is at hand!
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I've seen [the PAS Women's First XV] mentioned and have been intrigued as to what it would involve. I'm sure I'd enjoy being included
Actually, I'm not sure what it involves either, other than being a member... I think Danielle's captain. I'm a prop. I can't even recall when it started now... 'though a quick search suggests this comment and this one and the next two following it. On a Tze Ming Mok thread, of course.
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Re: The US, the Palin and the crazy.
Two posts from the very reasonable Hilzoy.
Firstly , the Corner, in-as-much as it is representative of movement conservatism, shows that Obama is driving them crazy. And not really in the metaphor sense. They is gettin their Birch on. woot. etc.
Secondly, Obama sure is a new kind of Democrat, campaigning wise. Remember how Democrats used to all get a feared when the big bad Republicans questioned their patriotism, and either ignored it (and looked weak), or rolled over (and signed up for whatever GOP programme was on offer, like Iraq AUMF etc). Obama is mocking them, and calling them cowards without looking like anything less than pure class. Goading them into unleashing the full screaming wingnut id on primetime.I don't have any great anticipation that Obama will be President Awesome, but I sure am liking the change.
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I/S, I agree. I have long thought our voting age needs to be lowered. It was a Labour Govt that lowered the voting age to 18 over 30 years ago. Like other policies it could be brought in progressively - eg 16 years by 2010 (for local body elections) and 14 by 2015 and 12 by 2020. That would give schools, the media and the govt time to increase resourcing in civics type education, plain language policies and get their heads around what being accountable to young people would really mean. Would be great for building an inclusive society too.
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New Link : Now with extra sense.
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Charles E Wilson may very well have believed that what was good for General Motors was good for the country (or, to be strictly accurate, "What’s good for the country is good for General Motors, and vice versa"). That doesn't make it any more excusable.
But it does, unless motivations are completely irrelevant. Demonising your opponents as inexcusable no matter what is a step down the road to civil war.
Also, as a high income earner, I consistently vote against my financial best interests, as do many other "rich pricks", because I believe in voting with everyone's interests in mind, and I find your persistent rhetorical conflation of people who earn a lot with wanna-be aristocrats intensely annoying. You ought to know that class and income are not the same. While I will not be voting National specifically to spite you, it crosses my mind in my worser moments.
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That Iceland thing is interesting. I wonder if the deal with the Russians will be that Iceland gets bailed out in return for letting Russia base subs and aircraft there.
That should wind the Americans (and British) up.
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"John Key's rich mates" does not imply that anyone rich is John Key's mate.
I/S deserves better than today's responses.
I think the rest of us deserve a little better than Idiot's bourgois class war bullshit. And just for the record, not that it's actually anyone else's bloody business, any tax cuts coming into this household are being shunted into savings. Once we've swallowed hard and repaired the water feature that only appears when it rains.
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The 'authorities'* here in the UK can use 'anti-terrorism' legislation in all sorts of ways many people in NZ would find appalling. Down South of the Border a member of Her Majesty's Constabulary can arrest you, just because. If you ask them for the time or directions, beware, you could be arrested for interfering with a police officer in the execution of his duties (you distracted him from spotting terrorists).
Be very careful of carrying any more photographic gear than a small digital camera as well. There are increasing reports of people carrying camera bags being detained by the police for questioning. As someone who not infrequently totes such an item (I am still resolutely using slide film in my manual focus Canon A1 (yes, it DOES have a battery, for the shutter/metering) this concerns me.
Beware.
*pretty much any public body and private companies contracted to deliver services to or on behalf of public bodies. Both info to be put on the biometric ID cards and ALL your medical records from the soon to be centralised NHS database will also be available to all of the above. Boy do I want to come home after writing all that.
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Actually Matthew Poole if the world economy crashes then being a producer of foodstuffs and NOT consumer electronics will turn out to be a good thing to be. Provided we can afford to ship them to market that is. How good is Pinus radiata at being turned into tea clipper style ships?
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The other thing to remember about Iceland here wrt govt guarantees is that Iceland has a population of 300,000 (Christchurch). Which is not much of a tax base on which to reimburse UK public bodies playing fast and loose with council taxpayer's money.
A bit like if I took on John Key's entire fortune and invested in the stock market and now he wants his money back...
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Firstly, the Corner, in-as-much as it is representative of movement conservatism, shows that Obama is driving them crazy. And not really in the metaphor sense. They is gettin their Birch on. woot. etc.
Jaysus. They certainly are.
Still, at least we get to use the phrase fear and loathing on the campaign trai literally.
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One the main post: Whoever has been writing the Herald editorials appears to most often be yearning for a National win and chiding the Nats for not being radical enough. The theme that voters must be lied to and mislead for their own good is a persistent one. With that in mind, it is no surprise that the Herald loves the National Party and devoted last week to a series that was little more than a pamphlet / day for the Nats.......starting with "Swing to the Right" Saturday before last, while reporting what was, until then, the lowest poll for the Nats in months. But together with the Morgan poll and the TV3 poll today, perhaps the Herald's 43.5% for the Nats was the early indication of a shift being bedded.
But the Herald made excuses for that poor showng and described the swing to the left as a swing to the right.
Par for the course at the Herald these days.
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Kyle: Charles E Wilson may very well have believed that what was good for General Motors was good for the country (or, to be strictly accurate, "What’s good for the country is good for General Motors, and vice versa"). That doesn't make it any more excusable.
Umm. What Stephen said above. Except I'm not higher income. And I wouldn't consider voting National for any reason.
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I'm really rather pissed off at this R&D move. What exactly is the justification for making it harder for technology businesses to stay in NZ?
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I'm really rather pissed off at this R&D move. What exactly is the justification for making it harder for technology businesses to stay in NZ?
The Kaths and the Kims, I wager.
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What exactly is the justification for making it harder for technology businesses to stay in NZ?
Tax cuts are the healing crystals economies need to calm their troubled chakras. They don't pay for themselves you know.
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if the world economy crashes then being a producer of foodstuffs and NOT consumer electronics will turn out to be a good thing to be. Provided we can afford to ship them to market that is. How good is Pinus radiata at being turned into tea clipper style ships?
And, pray tell, how much food will we actually be able to produce for export? As good as we are at producing primary products, we've a very small land area with an even smaller percentage that actually produces for export.
Yes, if the world thoroughly self-destructs and we're all back to wearing natural fibres that we wove ourselves, we're in a good position to be self-sufficient in basic foodstuffs. But at that point we may well find ourselves invaded by China, or Indonesia, or some other country that's incapable of self-sufficient production. So what's the benefit?
Ignoring that distinctly dire prediction, which I discount almost out of hand because the fall would have to be so far, and so fast, as to likely result in a nuclear war, we're better off trying to drag ourselves out of the primary products reliance that's been cultivated for so long. Hocking value-added products from primary produce, sure. But milk and cheese aren't a great long-term strategy, because there are plenty of countries out there with much more land, quite prepared to dedicate some of it to their own dairy herds.
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In a sinking economy ....
I wonder how much John Key spends on household help .... -
I have long thought our voting age needs to be lowered. It was a Labour Govt that lowered the voting age to 18 over 30 years ago. Like other policies it could be brought in progressively - eg 16 years by 2010 (for local body elections) and 14 by 2015 and 12 by 2020.
**OMFG!!**
(Sorry, do I need to say more? You think 12 year old's should be allowed to vote?)
That would give schools, the media and the govt time to increase resourcing in civics type education, plain language policies and get their heads around what being accountable to young people would really mean. Would be great for building an inclusive society too.
What a scary prospect. Are you serious? You must be taking the proverbial, right? You think 12 year old's should be allowed to vote?
I'll spare us all the wise-ass responses about what type of Party Political promises we'll get from polly's pandering to teens, and merely state the obvious:
Isn't it a fact that their brains aren't fully formed at that age? Aren't they hormonally confused at that age?
My 14 year old niece just wants the latest cell-phone ... I'm not sure if she's ready to select the next government.
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@Matthew Poole (about two pages late, but what the hell): Tait is actually one of the very few companies that *can't* send it's R&D overseas; it's run by a trust whose charter states that it is required to remain locally based and in local hands, and that around 90% of its profits must be ploughed back into R&D and company development, with the other 10% going to the founder's family, or something like that. It's a highly unusual and far-sighted company structure, aimed at employing as many people as possible while being as good in their field as possible. I'd say it works.
Places like Allied Telesyn or Jade, though, they'd bugger off overseas if it suited them better. And they employ a lot of very-highly paid experts in their field.
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John, you be right there.
I teach teenagers and many of them simply do not have a critical thinking component operating in their brain.
I could basically tell most of them who to vote for and they'd take my word for it and do it. While that might be true of a large section of adult society it's very true for a lot of these lads and ladesses.
Even the smart 13 and 14 year olds I teach just simply do not have enough life experience under their belt to get how the mickey mouse club should be run let alone the country.
Not to mention how they would be manipulated by scumbag politicians.
Keep it at 18. Voters should have to be either on their way out of high school or been out for a few months at least.
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Some more alarming bigotry and knuckle-dragging stupidity on the McCain-Palin campaign trail:
This seems to be the character of every rally at the moment. These people are almost incoherent.
It occurred to me that I wouldn't want to be black around this sort of gathering.
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Lucy, that's very interesting. Good on Angus (it was Angus, wasn't it?) for that kind of foresight. Shame we don't see that kind of thinking from more industry leaders.
That aside, though, we should be encouraging more companies that do the kinds of things that Tait do. Losing the Motorola facility should've been a big wakeup call on all kinds of things (tertiary science and engineering, R&D funding...), but it seems to have been ignored in the hollus bollus of BAU for the pollie tubbies. Especially National, it appears.
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Yeah it was Angus - the whole Tait trust thing is just weird though and more a result of family politics and paranoia as far as i can tell - it's certainly not going to be the norm for any other NZ companies
We have to face facts - our companies grow up an leave just like our kids do - it's the way our world works - just like with kids we have to keep making more companies - what we need for that is smart people (check, got that covered), a risk capital market ie VCs (not really all our money's tied up in real estate - Kiwisaver looks like it will help with this in the long run, if it stays around) and a big enough pool so that people will make some money (ie lots of startups to spread the risk over - most will fail, some will be spectacular - VC investments are risky, you make money by doing enough of them)
We do have some real structural problems compared to other countries - in the US for example there's the lure of long term capital gains - you pay a lower tax rate if you invest money for the long haul (other wise it's just normal income) - here because there's no capital gains tax at all it's pretty hard to build that incentive into the economy - all investments are the same - the quick buying a house and flipping it and investing thru the ups and downs of creating real wealth. You have to think of capital gains taxes as a way to encourage productive investment, not just as a way to soak the rich - it's how we get real gains in our standard of living, not by moving real estate around.
We also don't really have a tradition of people getting rich through stock options - not founders, but the guy who joined Apple/Sun/Google as employee number 10, earned that 'fuck you' million at 28 and retired at 30 - Silicon Valley, where I lived for 20 years, has all that - everyone knows someone who knows someone (even I know some people who've retired at 30 and are terminally bored) - here we laud the founders of companies in the media but there aren't those 'folk tales' that inspire people to go work for startups with dreams of making it big (hopefully we can change that).
R&D credits are a small part of what you need to make it easy to make lots of real companies - they're just a start
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Actually, I'm not sure what it involves either, other than being a member... I think Danielle's captain. I'm a prop. I can't even recall when it started now... 'though a quick search suggests this comment and this one and the next two following it. On a Tze Ming Mok thread, of course.
If you need someone to do that dramatic finish where you tear down the field with the ball in your mouth and slam it down between the posts, I'm your creature. (Actually I'm a bitch with only a little bit missing.)
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