Comments on: The Big Lie

By: Fae

Fae — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 01:54:56 +0000

@insider (#36) some how I don’t think that’d work the way I intend

By: insider

insider — Tue, 11 Sep 2012 02:27:36 +0000

@ steve

could happen. I mean, if a skyscraper can fall in in its own footprint at greater than freefall speeds…

By: Clunking Fist

Clunking Fist — Tue, 11 Sep 2012 01:25:01 +0000

“10.CF I did reply to you but wordpress ate it and I can’t be bothered retyping ”
Yes, I usually type in wordpad and then cut n paste for this reason.

By: Steve (@nza1)

Steve (@nza1) — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 11:46:02 +0000

I’m wondering if David Shearer is John Kerry of NZ politics. Supposedly an alternative…..but not really…..and the reason he was engineered into the job was actually to prevent Labour from tipping National out. It may sound incredible…..but it accounts for what we’re seeing just as well as the idea that Shearer was chosen by the Labour caucus to do…..what. Help National by aping their policies in a dumb way?

In a way, I don’t care. More and more Labour activists will throw their hands in the air and support the Greens….who are rapidly becoming the real opposition anyway.

By: insider

insider — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 09:30:24 +0000

@nommo -how much did they throw at them? Only Todd Corp gave anything recordable. The unions gave far more to labour, as did some individuals to act and the greens. Gallagher group gave a whack to national. Should we fear the power of the electric fence industry?

By: nommopilot

nommopilot — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 09:04:38 +0000

CF I did reply to you but wordpress ate it and I can’t be bothered retyping

I’ll just agree to disagree

By: nommopilot

nommopilot — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 06:11:25 +0000

@insider

“Mostly that power is in the minds of the fearful.”

nope, mostly it’s in the thousands of dollars they have to throw at politicians.

By: insider

insider — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 05:15:57 +0000

@ nommo- “I am not a Labour supporter and am fully aware that the fossil industries have a great deal of political power”

It’s overstated IME. Mostly that power is in the minds of the fearful. If the fossil fuel industry were truly that powerful, the West Coast would be like the surface of the moon and Taranaki like Ogoniland, and there would be no tax on petrol, no emission standard and fuel economy targets. Voters are much more powerful, and they tend not to like big oil, big coal, and big gas, even though they rely on their products. If there is a political scrap between consumers/voters and big oilgascoal, the former usually wins.

@ Fae – feel free. The IRD happily accept donations .

By: Fae

Fae — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 02:50:09 +0000

I’m so tired of politicians pandering to those who want everything without having to contribute anything, but only for themselves and people like them, no one else.

Welfare is to support those who unable to support themselves for whatever reason.

It’s a social contract people!! You pay tax so the government can look after everyone, so there’s infrastructure, emergency services, public health care and schooling, and welfare. It’s like a form of insurance really.

I, for one, wouldn’t have any issue with paying more tax for the betterment of society as a whole.

By: Clunking Fist

Clunking Fist — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 01:45:00 +0000

Nommo @ 26 “My ideals are a happy and free life with a lot of time to spend with those I love.”
What the…? Those are MY ideals too! But perhaps the difference is that I recognise that we have to have economic activity with which to pay for it.
Granting of mining/exploration permits, granting of building consents, all these result in quite well paid jobs. Those nasal-pierced tattooed hipsters who serve your organic fair-trade coffee in trendy Cuba Street cafes don’t earn much more than minimum wage.
Sure the govt could “solve” the housing crisis, but they need tax revenue with which to do it. And where does tax revenue come from? Bingo: the privarte sector.
It’s not only classical economists and baby-eating Randian businessmen who want to see real GDP growth; it is big-government bleeding heart liberals who have projects and causes to fund.
“I am not a Labour supporter and am fully aware that the fossil industries have a great deal of political power”
Nommo, how do you fund your lifestyle? In general terms: are you in the public sector, or are you in the private sector?
How exactly do you think an economy will run without oil? Even if you don’t use plastic (and you’re using a computer so of course you use plastics in your everyday life) those glass bottles are made in furnaces which require affordable energy sources. The raw material has to be collected.it has to be transported. The produce has to be transported (in the jars) to a market or shop near you. The recycled glass has to be melted down, etc.
Or are you self-sufficient (including the electricty your computer runs on)?

“The degradation I have seen in the ecology of the entire planet during my brief 3 and a half decades on the planet is mind-boggling.”
Sure, but in the FIRST world, what is it like? Quite nice really. If only the third world was a rich as us (with first world birth rates!) and thus had the wherewithal to choose, in the manner that we presently enjoy, the cleanliness of their environment over a bit of extra wealth, because they are comfortably over the poverty line and can afford the choice.
At the moment, we kid ourselves a bit. We regulate to make it difficult to manufacture in the first world, so industry says “sod this” and take off to China, where hooman rites (and concern for the environment) are pretty piss poor. So manufacturing jobs are lost to the less-well educated in the first world, leaving them with fewer choices: mining, forestry (both far more dangerous than manufacturing) cleaning. (Oops, but not mining: too dirty for those who feel guilty for not toiling all day in the mud like our ancestors, hunting species to extinction due to our inability to transfer food surpluses from one part of the world to those in need in another)

“arctic sea-ice levels” rather than simply parrot left-wing blinkered green bullshit, have a play with these interactive graphs and see if you can find the disaster in the ice:
http://www.natice.noaa.gov/products/ice_extent_graphs/arctic_daily_ice_extent.html

We prosecute farmers who spill effluent. Is that not progress? I can no longer settle a score with a duel at dawn, nor beat (give syphilis to) my slaves. And if I can’t pay my debts, I am no longer imprisoned (unless those are tax debts or speeding fines of course!). Sure, I can still run over the legs of a non-pink immigrant, but at least I get fucked over like the piece of shit I am in the press.