Posts by Margaret B
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Hunter is definitely from Glenfield.
As for Shortie St stars in Browns Bay cafes, they have long decamped to the West, not sure exactly where, but all the filming is done out that way now - I think the shift happened when MacKenzie drove a truck into the hospital for the Xmas cliffhanger?
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Kowhai, I agree, especially with your last sentence, but I'm giving up on continuing to argue about it in the other thread :-(
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Thanks for all the answers Graeme, very interesting.
Rich, on the issue of jury summons in NZ, my understanding is that a random pool of potential jurors is picked from the electoral role every three (?) years and then they use that pool to pick who to summon. As a result you can often get no summons for 20 years and then several in quick succession, especially if a lot of people in your pool are getting excused.
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Are we really seriously considering that NZ's anarchists, who from my experience are at worst politically incompetent and confused (not to mention very angry with someone) and at best really lovely human beings who have some good ideas about how we can live together better (in peace I should point out), are somehow in the same abhorrent political category as neo-Nazis?
Anarchists are a convenient whipping group for those of a more mainstream political bent. I don't share their views. I do respect some of them (as I respect some in Labour, even a few in National) for living their values. I could never ever say the same about neo-Nazis.
(And as an aside, has this thread now been Godwin-ed?)
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"Professional protesting class"? Puhlease. I've been written off with that tag in my time and let me tell you there is no payment involved! No one even offers you product endorsements so that you can pretend to maintain your amateur status to compete at the Protesting Olympics and win the gold at effigy burning ;-)
Rich, don't even start me on Greg O'Connor. I believe he is a major barrier to addressing any issues about police culture and structure. Some right this off as a typical union approach, however other professional groups like teachers, doctors, accountants, lawyers, nurses, real estate agents (oh hang on, maybe not that last one), have all accepted that there need to be professional standards, codes of conduct and ethics. Those professions have said they want a say in the processes, preferably control of them, but their unions have not blocked the development of accountability processes in the way that the Police Association systematically has. The good eggs have an interest in getting rid of the bad eggs. Mr O'Connor doesn't seem to get this. I point to his recent comment on Morning Report that the Bazley Report showed there were basically no problems in the police force.
(and apologies to Deborah that this paragraph largely rehashes a comment I made on her excellent blog last week).
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I really question the "right" anyone has to own one of these - fun as they might be.
Well, I question the need for anyone who isn't in the business of killing people to own a gun that is clearly just for killing people (ie not suitable for hunting, like say a Luger). But apparently there are people out there, and I am related to some of them, who like to "collect" these things. Seems like a strange strange hobby to me, but then maybe they think whittering away in the comment forums of a website is bizarre too. ;-)
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Thanks for this Graeme, it is very useful indeed.
I do have a further question, what might happen if they aren't bailed and continue in custody for a significant period of time and the police cases fall apart when tested in court? I don't just mean found not guilty, reasonable doubt and all that, but actually thrown out by a judge, or the police drop charges before trial. Would those remanded in custody be able to argue for compensation?
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I can't help thinking that the refusal by the courts to grant bail to many of those arrested indicates that the Police have at least a stronger case than has been made public to date.
I can't help thinking it may have a little more to do with the district court judge dealing with the applications last week. I'm not sure how much I can say in terms of suppression orders and so on (although that clearly isn't bothering some on this thread - I have learnt a lot this morning!). But suffice to say if your main argument for denying someone bail is that they say "revolutionary" a lot in surveilled conversation, well, I'm not sure I buy that as one of the three grounds to deny bail which Graeme has outlined in his excellent post on Speaker. I have heard from a friend who was in court this last week (in the gallery) that there was a lot of laughter from those present when police and the judge were reading out the allegedly damning sections of the surveillance.
As to the nature of protests and protesters. Yes some are very very angry people who feel powerless and frustrated and use protests as an opportunity to express that in ways I find bizarre and at times unconscionable. And yes there is a very real anti-Labour (note big L) bent in some who are to the left-of-Labour, some of whom are also chronic protesters. Anything Ovens (and for that matter Richards) went out to say was always going to be shouted down by those people, even though Ovens was going out to express her solidarity. Throwing around the word "scab" is often inflammatory in union circles, no one of a leftward persuasion likes being called a "scab" (and similarly I have seen Richards inflamed by someone unreasonably calling him a "racist" on another occasion). Words can be weapons too.
But it doesn't mean that those on the protest are always wrong. From the pictures I saw of the crowd I noticed people who I know have stood up for many worthy causes in my time of observing political activism (the last decade or so). I haven't always liked their methods, but they care passionately about many of the issues that I suspect many Public Address System readers support too - Burma, justice in Palestine, GE labelling, tino rangatiratanga (to various degrees), publicly provided health and education, all sorts of general left stuff (much of which would receive wide support from the Labour Party delegates too).
I am particularly struck that many of them have been staunch supporters of Louise Nicholas, and I seriously do think that the background of that situation cannot be ignored when looking at the current problems between police and activists. Let's not forget that the police raided the Maori Women's Refuge in Taupo recently, on a spurious and unlikely tip-off that it was a P lab. The Wellington activists currently in prison in Auckland seem to me incredibly unlikely people to have been caught up on the wrong side of a paramilitary operation.
Grenade launchers do sound rather, well, illegal. I've suspected from the start of this that there are a few bad eggs and the rest have been caught up through association and will be found to have done nothing but be in contact with the bad eggs and possibly have had a joke about guns in the vicinity of a cellphone that was bugged. Time will tell, and I accept that.
Ok, I have to learn some discipline about writing shorter comments!
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Thanks to Deborah for the support, and pointing out that I was looking for explanations, not excuses. I'm a bit flummoxed that Russell has so quickly jumped to a less charitable interpretation of my comment.
I do find it a bit twee that the "one incident" of Richards hitting protesters with a megaphone is not sufficient to justify the later actions of the protesters (and in part I agree), yet you haven't addressed the actual crux of my argument Russell, which was about the broader context of the relationship here between activists and police at the moment. Yesterday's protest has not come out of a vaccum (vacuum? I can never spell that word). Yes some of the protesters are "the usual suspects". It doesn't mean that they don't have a point when they express their concerns about the recent actions of police towards political activists. I don't agree with them about everything, and I don't always agree with their methods for raising grievances, but discounting the message because you don't like the messengers is disappointing.
I wonder if we would have seen the same discussions here on Public Address System if this had happened outside the National conference...
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Thanks Russell, much appreciated.