Island Life: Key and the 'nesians
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any takers for - The lesson of the Great Depression is
Every time I look at the writing on 1929 there seems to be about 4 theories on what the lessons were depending on your taste in economics.
I understand lessons and causes are different but if there is no sign we are even close to any agreement.
The causes of the Great Depression are still a matter of active debate among economists
WTF
causes of the Great Depression
I like the debt deflation theory the best.
Lesson - there is no such thing as a free lunch / debt sucks.
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i was just glad to make it past the guards loading public servants into railcars...
See you behind the wire.
On the hands up theme I copied a picture of Key and had the caption ‘I’m not a crook, I’m not a crook!’ In a nod to one of his probable heroes and put it up at work. In a sea of gNat and ACT supporters I expect to see some fitting and foaming at the mouth sometime soon.
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i was just glad to make it past the guards loading public servants into railcars...
See you behind the wire.
Sigh... Why don't you take some stress leave, and spend some time on the couch with a couple of DVDs. They might remind you why there are some things you just don't trivially invoke for rhetorical poo flinging.
On the hands up theme I copied a picture of Key and had the caption ‘I’m not a crook, I’m not a crook!’ In a nod to one of his probable heroes and put it up at work. In a sea of gNat and ACT supporters I expect to see some fitting and foaming at the mouth sometime soon.
Ms. W., I say this with no love whatsoever, but I hope if you're a civil servant all you get is a chat with a supervisor and a reminder of the relevant public sector code of conduct. It's all you're worth, really.
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a reminder of the relevant public sector code of conduct.
We used to have a dartboard with a smiling picture of Muriel Newman on it. (She was the waster of public servants' time par excellence with her ludicrous parliamentary questions).
Did wonders for the aim.
Maybe no one minded becaue it wasn't around election time.
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easy up craig.one in 10 is called a decimation.
there are more than a few stressed individuals here on the inside.
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easy up craig.one in 10 is called a decimation.
Pardon me if I don't, Che. Been pink-slipped (more than once), and while it was a pretty ghastly experience every time it was not even in the same galaxy as being "loaded into railcars". Even on the level of stress-relieving hyperbole, pretty crass.
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as i say craig, easy up before you godwin the thread good and proper.
i'm sitting in a room looking at a group of people. some of them worry they'll soon be out of work, at the cusp of a nascent depression. a little humour helps. sanctimony does not.
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Craig
No love expected just a bit of humour in times that must worry most everyone, perhaps even yourself.
The Jews have always been a prime example of how to survive using dark humour during the most nightmarish of times and I appreciate that brand and make no apology for it.
I don't work in the public service but in an area that's suseptible to a downturn like so many others.
I thought it was the righties who held that people should be able to express their views and it was the left that suppressed freedom of expression - maybe they've been lying to me all this time.
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Uh, yeah, it's black humour; something I dare say a lot of people are using to get through at the moment. And it does reflect some of the more brutal and anti-intellectual aspects of the OMG bureaucrats and pointy-headed smart people suck! mood National have fomented over the last year or so.
Listening to the NatRad broadcast was also interesting. So job losses can only be referred to euphemistically as 'savings' and 'prunings', huh? How reassuringly Gradgrindian. I still maintain that there's basically something wrong with someone, spiritually, who campaigns to put people out of work, and something shrivelled and sick inside those who vote them in on that basis.
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sanctimony does not.
And neither does a pretty fucked up sense of humour. And please get the hell off the pity pot -- not so sure either of us in this house are still going to have a job in six months, but I can resist the cattle car analogies. Thanks.
The Jews have always been a prime example of how to survive using dark humour during the most nightmarish of times and I appreciate that brand and make no apology for it.
Oy vey...
I thought it was the righties who held that people should be able to express their views and it was the left that suppressed freedom of expression - maybe they've been lying to me all this time.
Mary: I respect the freedoms of expression of all kinds of people -- even when I find their views crass, ignorant, distasteful or downright creepy. You know, like those right-wing dingbats who see no difference between Helen Clark and a despotic thug like Robert Mugabe? I'm happy she's been downsized but even on the level of hyperbole that's plain crazy talk.
I don't own this site, or have moderation privileges. Russell does, and he can keep house perfectly well without my assistance.
But I also have the right, within the same limits you do, to argue with, criticise or plain laugh at those views. So don't insult my intelligence further by trying to present yourself as a martyr to my horrible right-wing dissent crushing.
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<sigh>
how about a revision then?
on the way in to work this morning i narrowly avoided the guard shooting public servants in the back of the head
or
on the way home from work last night i narrowly avoided the bureaucrat protection board round-up
either of these two examples demand umbrage? in case i need to amend them?
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Let's see if we can re-orient this discussion by invoking some different WWII imagery.
Bernard Darnton has a good line here:
The siege of Helengrad is over although, oddly, it was the besiegers who were the ones swallowing the dead rats.
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Bad Che. Naughty Che. Che needs to be taken out the back and shot!
Oh shit, sorry Craig, my bad.
(Talk about making a mountain out of a small depression in the ground where a molehill never was)
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afaik they're contracted on the proviso they could be laid off at any time. reallocation of portfolios for example.
tenuous and high-flying existance that ministerial staffing.
Yep. our contracts are explicit that we're employed up until the point our Minister loses his / her warrant (i.e. resigns, is sacked etc.) Or they decide they don't like you. At that point, employment is terminated immediately.
And we don't get redundancy per se, but a notice period from the day of termination. Ministerial Services (DIA) can require us to work during that notice period (e.g. at a job in DIA) although this would be unlikely.
i think you'll find that "political advisers" held by minsters are actually *extremely* powerful gatekeepers in relation to their typical age and experience.
It depends on the Minister and the relationship they have with their advisor. Some are, some aren't.
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It's a really bad analogy. In real life, the siege of Stalingrad was ended because it failed. The besiegers had their supply lines cut, and the 6th Army basically starved once they were trapped against the city, and ate a lot worse than rats - there are reports of cannibalism. Whereas the Russians could keep resupplying over the Volga, when it wasn't running with icebergs. </history nerd>
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It depends on the Minister and the relationship they have with their advisor. Some are, some aren't.
thanks for clarifying. i've been lucky to experience (at a distance removed) reasonable advisors. i've colleagues who have not. :)
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thanks for clarifying. i've been lucky to experience (at a distance removed) reasonable advisors. i've colleagues who have not. :)
no worries. there is an interesting range of personality types in our role, that's for sure.
and i guess it does sometimes depend on the officials with whom you're dealing :)
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I keep picturing the Wellington of 2009 as a kind of Lovecraftian wasteland populated only by the insane, the deformed, and the ACT staffer.
Somewhat like this?
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We'll all be laughing on the other side of our faces when the Old Ones start swarming again off Barrett's Reef ...
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"The secret priests would take great Cthulhu from his tomb to revive His subjects and resume his rule of earth....Then mankind would have become as the Great Old Ones; free and wild and beyond good and evil, with laws and morals thrown aside and all men shouting and killing and revelling in joy. Then the liberated Old Ones would teach them new ways to shout and kill and revel and enjoy themselves, and all the earth would flame with a holocaust of ecstasy and freedom."
Roger Douglas did just get re-elected.....
Expect to see the following questions as part of referenda shortly:
Referendum question 1: Should a smack as part of good parental correction be a criminal offence in New Zealand, and should Wellington be renamed as R'lyeh?
Referendum question 2: Do you support the removal of MMP and its replacement by a purely FPP system, and should the Beehive be reconstructed using purely non-euclidean geometry?
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the worse things about the old ones is the drooling on the briefing paper...
not to mention the selective deafness.
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The Old Ones - We're talking about NZ 1st supporters aren't we?
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Amanda Binns reminds me of a Seagull manager, her role is to fly in, make a lot of noise, shit on everyone, then fly out. Leaving the flock to worry about the pecking order.
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Amanda Binns reminds me of a Seagull manager
To be fair to Amanda, her job & the manner in which she executes it are nothing like that.
Her job is to answer any & all requests for information whether it be from the public, the media, the politicians or (when I knew her) the tenants.
And she's pretty good & even handed about it. Remember she was (and maybe still is) Communications manager for an organisation committed to adequate housing for all NZers, whose direction was set by the outgoing administration.
I don't think it's fair to dump on her just because she was amusingly photographed at a Nat victory party.
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It's fine to lightly mock her though :)
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