Posts by Mikaere Curtis
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Indeed the framing of the question begs what I see as half the problem.
Very true. The first thing we need to do is to stop using the language of prohibition. To speak of “harm reduction” is to be colonised in the head by the War on Drugs. Nobody talks about “harm reduction” when discussing mountain-climbing, rugby or fishing (all potentially deadly past-times). Harm is not inevitable in these activities, and this is the same with recreational substance use.
We need to talk about promoting safety not “harm reduction”.
From an actual tactical perspective, here is what I think would work:
1. Get rid of National and Act and Dunne out of government, they are hopeless and have no grasp of science.
2. It has to be Labour / Greens who do this.
3. Legalise cannabis (NB: not decriminalise) and put some resources into researching the impacts on health, crime etc. Actual metrics, not doctrinaire opinion, will validate the case for legalised cannabis.
4. Once we have established that (like homosexual law reform, prostitution law reform, and same-sex marriage) the bloody sky has not, will not, and will never fall in, the next step is to decriminalise Ecstasy. The metrics from Ecstasy decriminalisation will likely include an massive reduction in alcohol-related crime (i.e. massive validation), at which point we can start to decriminalise psilocybin, LSD, mescalin et al.
5. As appropriate, transfer funding from law enforcement / healthcare related to War on Drugs policies into research and education initiatives (with a strong emphasis on metrics that measure the actual impact of the law reforms).
6. None of this is to say we should have an unregulated market. Freedom to use does not require an unfettered freedom of access to purchase, we need to be sensible about distribution and promotion. The nicotine model of availability in every dairy/supermarket/service station is a huge problem, and we can avoid this quite easily with proper regulation.
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Speaker: We don’t make the rules, we're…, in reply to Steve Barnes,
Enclosure is the real – and unmitigable – tragedy of the commons. Artificial geographic rights zones are another form of enclosure (in this case, from the market, as opposed to the customary owners).
The real question the content delivery industry needs to be asking themselves is: “how can we deliver the content *better* than teh torrentz ?” Things like high quality, fast delivery (local servers), and reasonable price spring to mind. Perpetuating monopolistic business models, while it might allow short-term gouging (which is what Telecom did), hardly seems to be the enduring way forward.
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I wanted to watch the cricket last night, but my wife wasn't having it (reality cooking shows on Food TV are her thing).
Then we heard the roar of the crowd at Eden Park - we live in Morningside - so we just had to switch over to see what the fuss was about. I was glued to the screen after that.
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In a putative Greens/Labour government, I'm not sure how things would pan out. I suspect that the nature of the deployment could be changed to humanitarian vs combat support (with a side-project of training). Or maybe the Greens would win the argument and the US would be told very politely "your mess, there's the mop, get to it".
Would the Greens pull the plug on a coalition agreement ? I really don't know. I want Green ministers to roll out Green policy, and you have to weigh up the opportunity cost presented by walking away from that vs what amounts to providing moral support for a fey US attempt at fixing an omnishambles they deliberately and arrogantly created.
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That’ll help the grassroots morale…
Actually, I think it will help National activist's morale. National is run like a business, with a hierarchical structure and a central cabal directing what happens. Signing up to National means doing what you are told by the hierarchy. They set the policy, the members toe the line and implement it. So when Key says that Aaron Gilmore - who is probably widely, if not universally, despised - has zero chance of getting back into parliament, then this is Key showing leadership against an unpopular person.
As for the perception of the Greens as being flaky and loony, Labour, National, NZ First, ACT and United Future have ALL knowingly maintained this false narrative because it suits them (Labour because they see us as rivals for "their" rightful votes), the others because we generally oppose their policy platforms.
Since Labour can not govern without the Green's assistance, I really hope that Labour sort themselves out over the next couple of years so the 2017 campaign can be conducted with a government-in-waiting approach.
The poor handling of the Cohen issue and the doctrinaire cosying-up with National over the ISC, however, have reinforced my opinion that Labour are trying for the National-style top-down autocracy, but are hindered by deep-seated chronic incompetence.
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Hard News: We can make things better here, in reply to Sacha,
I attended for the Pohutukawa-geddon part of the meeting, and it was a bloody farce. The bit where the AT PR rep said 55 submissions were not considered due to a "clerical error" was Vogonesque in it's officiousness.
Turns out the Pohutukawa 6 must be sacrificed for teh bikez lanez !
I noted that there was an engineer listed as one of the attending Project Representatives, and asked him to explain why we can have shared spaces in Federal St and other CBD roads, but we can't do it in the 54 space carpark behind the Pohutukawa 6. The PR rep responded that the engineer wasn't there to answer questions.
The good news is that AT still need resource consent and the Chair of the Local Board said the Board would actively manage the consent process and would take into consideration the views of the wider community. In the event that resource consent is denied, I hope AT will re-engineer the design rather lawyer up.
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Hard News: Works in progress, in reply to Marcus Turner,
The closest I have seen is a bicycle assembly station at Nelson airport. AFAIK it's only a stand, but it seems to be quite a good idea considering the good riding to be had in the Tasman district.
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I suppose twerking might be a better submission, since it was the one that appeared in the media.
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twerk
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Hard News: Park Life, in reply to Matt Pitt,
I ride along St Lukes regularly, and I'm not sure about this gamut to which you refer. You do mean the bit between Linwood Ave and the cycleway ? Where there is a cycle lane ? Or there's the footpath (I use the footpath on the eastern side of St Lukes Rd if I'm heading towards town on the cycleway).