Posts by Stephen Judd
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'The Money River, where the wealth of the nation flows. We were born on the banks of it -- and so were most of the mediocre people we grew up with, went to private schools with, sailed and played tennis with. We can slurp from that mighty river to our hearts' content. And we can even take slurping lessons so that we can slurp more efficiently.'
'Slurping lessons?'
'From lawyers! From tax consultants! From customs men! We're born close enough to the river to drown ourselves and the next ten generations in wealth, simply using dippers, and buckets. But we still hire the experts to teach us the use of aqueducts, dams, reservoirs, siphons, bucket brigades, and the Archimedes' screw. And our teachers in turn become rich, and their children become buyers of lessons in slurping.'
'I wasn't aware that I slurped.'
Eliot was fleetingly heartless, for he was thinking angrily in the abstract. 'Born slurpers never are. And they can't imagine what the poor people are talking about when they say they hear somebody slurping. They don't even know what it means when somebody mentions the Money River.When one of us claims that there si no such thing as the Money River I think to myself, "My gosh, but that's a dishonest and tasteless thing to say."'
-- God Bless You Mr Rosewater, Kurt Vonnegut
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When a very canny businessman pays $20 million for something, you can be sure it was because it was a good deal.
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The irritation isn't the content per se, but the conflict between the content and the packaging - broadcasters provide entertainment (gossip / sensationalism / garbage) but try to frame it as important, or informative, or newsworthy or In The Public Interest.
Sing it, sister. If they stopped claiming it was news, it wouldn't piss me off so much. Talk about your bait and switch.
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I'd want to investigate the relationship between being a prominent link on the front page and being the most clicked. I mean, the Herald features "Family devastated by Millie's drug charges: Holmes (+photos)" as the number one National story, and lo, it is most clicked. Surprise!
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Well, actually I was if not outraged then mildly vexed last weekend when Louise Nicholas' baby was on the front page of the SST. Where was the news in that?
Can't find the Chris Jack Baby Shock! story on the main page of the Herald site, come to that.
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I'd love that irony, Michael, but I don't think it's the same "oy". Yer genuine Yiddish Oy is a heartfelt cry of lamentation and distress. I think it's a phonetic coincidence.
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Does anyone remember the rage for hyperventilating (on purpose) until passing out at intermediate age?
Yup. This was 1980. You had to have a helper behind you to squeeze your diaphragm in a kind of Heimlich manoeuvre after you'd huffed and puffed for a minute, in order to bring it on.
We were discovered in a corner of the school playing field, told that one of us had a heart condition AND MIGHT DIE, and forbidden ever to do it again.
I'm glad you brought that up. I was wondering where that came from myself.
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How did you feel when your step daughter was arrested, Paul?
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Craig, do you know that "Japanese housewives" are a long-standing and not inaccurate shorthand for Japanese retail investors? It's not Yellow Peril at all. Although I wonder what happened to the Belgian dentists.
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My understanding is that they do exist Craig, although I can't speak as to their ocular configuration. They (and their evil partners, the Belgian Dentists) are not necessarily consciously speculating in the currency. They buy local bonds that "wrap" NZ fixed interest bonds, and the detail is all in the fine print as far as they know. Neither Mrs Suzuki nor Dr Huygens are consciously trying to root the NZ economy - they just want a better return than they can get at home. As we all do.
It's a consumer-level form of carry trade.
I don't believe there is any racist animus in the term Japanese Housewife. Traditionally, Japanese women do control the household finances, and it is a fact that Japanese retail investors are (indirectly) buying our bonds, so personifying that business as Mrs Suzuki and her mates is a convenient shorthand for a real phenomenon rather than an alarmist dig.