Posts by Mikaere Curtis
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
I don't think National has a secret, un-published, agenda. Not as a party. But I do think that there are National MPs, and lobby groups such as the BRT, who will be more than ready to leap into the policy vacuum should they have sufficient power after Nov 8th.
Good point Julie. I thought for a while that National have an intentional policy vaccum so they can make it up as they go along.
Take, for instance, Tim Grosser at a candidates panel in Titirangi last night. He was asked by a teacher, what is their plan for education once they have implemented their national assessment i.e. once you figure out who needs assistance, what's the next step, what's their plan for the future ?
His answer boiled down to: "We're fighting this election, not the next one."
National's decision to have thin policy is a strategic choice, and I don't like it one bit.
-
Four heads good, five heads bad?
Heh. Given the Siamese quality of the Labour/Progressive relationship, does it even count as a head ?
-
Well, I've had a bottle of Bombay Saphire riding on Labour forming the next government since January last year when I made a bet with my wife's conservative uncle.
Back then National had a healthy lead, but not enough to govern alone.
I haven't started cutting the lime slices yet, but I do feel a G'n'T coming on...
-
And I also suspect he has received an assurance as to the future of the Families Commission. I've got no problem with that at all.
Not everyone thinks National intends to keep the status quo on the Families Commission.
FTA:
Speaking to a gathering organised by anti-gay Family First, National party leader John Key said he would abolish the Commission, and instead fund faith-based and other services.
The article was published on the 23rd, so is perhaps out of date. One possibility is that Key has flipflopped, another is that they did a deal, resulting in Dunne's support. Russell, as you said in post when Dunne got his families commission, as long as United Future don't get to define what a family is, then the commission will be a Good Thing.
I'm concerned that, in the light Key's apparent desire to devolve the FC to less-than-liberal groups, perhaps this means that the definition of "family" will mean nuclear only. That would be very unfortunate.
As for the Maori Party, here's how a deal with National could work:
1. MP has the balance of power
2. The drive a hard bargain with both Labour and National and in the end, National will do "whatever it takes" to gain the treasury benches
3. MP get serious concessions, a number of Ministerial positions and support for entrenchment of the seats, plus a number of ringfences around important policies that National won't touch.
4. They go back to the people and do an excellent job of selling the benefits vs whatever paltry goodies Labour offered
5. The hui see a chance for some serious policy gains, so sign up
6. MP can then claim a mandate for their post-election negotiations via the hui process.The interesting thing is that the hui are open to anyone on the Maori roll, not just MP members.
-
Key reiterated today that he still has not trust in Winston Peters. From that position, he can't credibly enter into coalition with NZF.
Then again, perhaps he's prepared to burn credibility if that's what takes to be PM.
-
Duncan Garner: SHOCK NEWS, LEADING GREENS CANDIDATE REVERSES COALITION POSITION. FILM AT 11!
Heh. Whoops. Yeah, I meant "have ruled out support of National" as Mark surmised.
Given the way they've also explicitly politicised the Super Fund, I'd think some National voters might be concerned too
It depends how they structure it. If it's something like "Your target is x% investment in NZ, and if you have a choice between NZ vs overseas investment with similar risk/return profiles, then choose the NZ or be prepared to explain why not", where the fund was basically told to invest in NZ where it makes sense, but still remained independent, I'd be pretty happy.
But if this is a way for the government to fund pet projects then, yeah, we can do without this kind of politicisation.
-
It might just be me, but I find the Herceptin comment the most distasteful and cynical ploy National has pulled this election.
Yeah, it struck me as naked votegrabbing. Even the oncologist on morning report called it "the right decision, made for the wrong reasons". And I got the impression they were going to fund it outside the Pharmac model.
If this is an example of how they are going to govern, then I'm even happier that the Greens have come out in support of National.
-
So one day I arrive at work and I'm informed that our UK customer desperately needs a production support person for 6 weeks, and when can I leave.
I purchased a round-the-world travelling AirNZ and Lufthansa on the way there then Lufthansa and Thai on the way back. The flight to LA was a dream, and I had a 6 hour stopover. Yay, I'd just relax in the Lufthansa Business Class lounge. But when I checked in, they kindly informed me that they didn't have a lounge, and here's a $15 voucher.
$15 dollars bought exactly one beer and a plate of chips.
On my way back, Lufthansa contrived to lose my luggage, so I got to go shopping in Bangkok for clothes and other personal items with Lufthansa picking up half the tab, and they also delivered my luggage to my hotel. Good on ya, Lufthansa.
When I checked in for my Thai flight back to Auckland, I thought to myself: "This is likely my only chance to get an upgrade to first class. Better milk it !".
I duly delivered a sob story about how hard things were for me without my luggage, and would it be possible to get an upgrade for my troubles ?
The young man behind the said "Certainly sir..." and began the upgrade process.
After a few seconds he looked up and informed me that my flight didn't have a first class section.
Defeated by reality, but Thai's customer service was impeccable.
-
I propose that lowering the $ cost of a legal download to something like $1 per album would make it more advantageous (i.e. less total cost) to legally download than illegally download.
At $1 an album, though, it's not worth collecting the money. eMusic is the closed I've come to the ideal download service. It has a great community and the MP3s will play on anything.
I would argue that marginal income is important, and that punters would be more likely to wager $1 that they might like an album, vs having to go through the cost of researching (via HypeM, bfm or whatever) whether an album seems to match their preferences - especially if that album is priced at $15+.
In the end it's about finding the right carrot so we can all put away the stick. I'm arguing for a big carrot, "the industry" wants a big stick. I'd say that the stick is doomed, but we'll see ...
-
the trick is, as you say, monetising the activity an entire generation of internet users takes for granted.
I suspect there is some inertia in the recording/music industry relevant to how it has been historically monetised. Back in the day, every single copy of every single album or single represented a discrete unit of income. I suspect that "the industry" view monetisation via this historical lens.
They had total control of distribution, and could clip the ticket on each sale. Not so in the age of perfect personal data copying and transmission.
Although illegally downloading an album may cost $0, this does not make it cost-free. I envisage that time spent finding the album, slow download speeds, low quality encoding, incomplete album art and album metadata, all contribute to the "cost" of the download.
I propose that lowering the $ cost of a legal download to something like $1 per album would make it more advantageous (i.e. less total cost) to legally download than illegally download.
Elasticity of demand is higher for luxuries, so conventional economic theory would support this proposal.