All posts tagged Greens

Opposition discover existing policies will solve manufacturing crisis

After a a several month long inquiry into manufacturing the opposition parties – Labour, Greens, NZ First and Mana – discovered that a collection of previously announced policies will solve the manufacturing crisis.

Major recommendations 

Recommendation 1: The government adopt macroeconomic settings that are supportive of manufacturing and exporting, including:

  • a fairer and less volatile exchange rate through reforms to monetary policy;
  • refocusing capital investment into the productive economy, rather than housing speculation;
  • and lowering structural costs in the economy, such as electricity prices.

http://manufacturinginquiry.org.nz/report/

After this success the parties are believed to be considering launching further inquiries. They hope that the same politicians running those inquiries will also discover that repackaging policies was much more efficient than coming up with new ones.

They are optimistic that NZ Power, NZ CGT and NZ Money will alsobe able to be packaged and sold as capable of addressinmg other crises and will:

  • Eliminate poverty
  • Reverse global warming
  • Cure cancer
  • Win them the next election

They are believe that at least one of those will be seen as a realistic goal.

1 Comment
by Pete George on June 17, 2013  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on June 17, 2013

http://yournz.org/2013/06/17/opposition-discover-existing-policies-will-solve-manufacturing-crisis/

Jane Clifton on leaks, and more tasty morsels

Bryce Edwards has tweeted a series of quotes by Jane Clifton on issues surrounding the recent leak and other political pointers.

Parliament is in a ‘sanctimony-fest about the propriety of leaks, leakers and leakees’.

None of the players seem to realise they are merely wrestling for the right to be considered the most blatantly hypocritical

Labour beats its chest about the impropriety of this one leak, it remains unrepentant about its own veritable irrigation scheme

it’s mendacious to hold the one set of leaks to be righteous and the other punishable by political death

Labour is on slippery slope: emails ‘should be compulsorily published if there’s a question of the politician’s conduct at issue’

Labour is relying/hoping on National to make its critique of the Greens

‘signs of quite belligerent muscularity from the Green leadership… concentrating more power in the hierarchy than the grass roots’

Peters is a vampire: ‘Winston is suspiciously ageless and of long-established nocturnal habit’

Peters ‘can be dormant for long periods, then explode into public scattering corpses and gore like a hand grenade’ = vampire

Peters ‘could be a political vampire, werewolf or zombie leader, or a hybrid of the three’

Norman ‘has become relentless and hectoring when contradicted’

Norman ‘can be found… brawling at length on Twitter with journalists and other individuals who have disagreed with him’.

Ahh, it’s from here:

Jane Clifton (Listener): The (self) importance of being Winston http://bit.ly/19s6G05  – paywalled must-read on unholy NZF-L-G alliance.

@bryce_edwards

 Just providing some tasty morsels from it!

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by Pete George on June 13, 2013  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on June 13, 2013

http://yournz.org/2013/06/13/jane-clifton-on-leaks-and-more-tasty-morsels/

Comment censored at The Daily Blog?

The Daily Blog had been good at letting comments go through moderation, but I just posted there this afternoon and a comment that initially seemed to be accepted has since disappeared.

My first experience of message control or blocking people they don’t want, or maybe The Daily Blog can explain? If not this doesn’t bode well for a blog that has ambitions of being a credible major blog.

I was responding to a comment by Frank Macskasy in the post A Dunne Drama: Let’s focus on the important bit – the policy as follows:

It might devolve to the Green and Mana Parties to lead a counter-revolution against our growing Surveillance Society.

Russel Norman is backing Peters’ call for a police prosecution of Peter Dunne for leaking the report. And more – he wants to force Dunne to give up all evidence and confess.

“Yesterday, Green Party co-leader Russel Norman said the inquiry into the leak to Fairfax Media does not confirm whether Mr Dunne in fact did it, and police need to investigate and force Mr Dunne to release his email exchange with Dominion Post journalist Andrea Vance.”

And Grant Robertson is suggesting similar.

Bryce Edwards warns:

“There’s always problems when the Police get involved in the political and media realm. It can have a very chilling affect on politics and journalism,” Dr Edwards says

The threat of prosecution for any political leaks or whistle blowing is indeed a chilling prospect.

So may you’ll have to rely on Mana without the Greens.

2 Comments
by Pete George on June 8, 2013  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on June 8, 2013

http://yournz.org/2013/06/08/comment-censored-at-the-daily-blog/

Ex Values leader slams mean Greens

Alan Wilkinson comments on Kiwiblog:

As a former co-leader of the Values Party I am sorry to say that the Greens under Norman and Turei are an intellectual and ethical disgrace to the original foundations of the movement. They are utterly unscrupulous fanatical Reds, not Greens. Their strategy and objectives are entirely Red – Green is just a useful tactic.

A lot of disappoinment at the new Green tactics has been expressed across the political spectrum.

And ‘kiwi in america’ (ex-Labour) points out:

The point is that the Greens including Norman traded for years heavily on the pure above the mucky fray of sledging politics – they can do longer do this.

Even in Green territory on Frogblog the new Norman/Turei approach has been criticised by a majority:
http://blog.greens.org.nz/2013/06/02/general-debate-june-2-2013/

And editorials add to the criticism:

The change in media attitude over the last two months (since the NZ Power anouncement) is quite significant.

2 Comments
by Pete George on June 5, 2013  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on June 5, 2013

http://yournz.org/2013/06/05/ex-values-leader-slams-new-mean-greens/

More Green 80s ignorance

Much has been said about Russel Norman’s attempt to depict John Key as another Robert Muldoon. Anyone with any experience of the Muldoon years knows that is a nonsense claim.

In the weekend there was another Green claim about the 1980s that is at odds with reality.

On The Nation on Saturday Metiria Turei was interviewed by Rachel Smalley. Turei was asked what Green’s priority would be if they got into Government.

Rachel           Okay let’s assume that there’s – you know you’re in power with Labour, what do you want to achieve in the first 100 days?

Metiria            Well we will put out our first 100 days’ programme closer to the election, but New Zealanders already have a clear indication.  We want every New Zealander to have a home for life, a home that they can afford that’s secure for their kids.

Rachel           Every New Zealander is that really feasible?

Metiria            Yeah, well of course it’s feasible, it certainly was in prior to the late 1980s and it certainly can be again, if we commit to housing as being part of our national infrastructure, that every New Zealand citizen is entitled to.  You know we don’t have to live with this old neoliberal ideas that the fatter your wallet the better life you should have.  In fact everybody’s entitled to a decent life and we can make sure that that’s the case, like fair power prices, like decent affordable housing.

I don’t believe a “home for life, a home that they can afford that’s secure for their kids” was available for everyone prior to the late 1980s.

In the 80s I owned a house and then had to sell it because I had to move towns to seek employment.

In the 80s I rented a house and then had to leave because the owner wanted to move back in. It would have been as ludicrous then as it is now to force that owner to keep renting their house out for life.

In the 80s I applied for a state house and was put in a queue. I was eventually allocated an awful house in an awful area. It didn’t feel secure for my kids, a neighbour was convicted of sexually assaulting children. I couldn’t get out of there fast enough.

So I bought a house with a first mortgage of 16.5% and a second mortgage of 18.5% – those where Muldoon’s rates.

Turei and Norman are either showing ignorance of what real life was and is like, or they are deliberately misrepresenting reality.

Everybody is not ‘entitled’ to a money and house of their dreams for all of their life. A political guarantee of a universal “decent life” is trying to sell what everyone knows is impossible.

The Green Party have become like sellers of elixirs of everlasting youth, they are like high priests promising heaven for those who will believe their fantasies.

Yeah, well, of course a Green nirvana is not feasible. We all know a politician cannot deliver on extravagant promises, we have been burned too often to buy claptrap.

The 1980s were nothing like what Norman and Turei have claimed. And the 2010s can be nothing like they promise.

7 Comments
by Pete George on June 4, 2013  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on June 4, 2013

http://yournz.org/2013/06/04/more-green-80s-ignorance/

The Norman enraging

Russel Norman’s launch into open political warfare – despite his personal attacks, dishonesties and hypocrisy being contrary to documented values of the Green Party – has generated a lot of discussion. The following comment by Dave Stringer was posted at FrogBlog and KiwiBlog:

—

An interested read for me was Russell Norman’s speech to the party conference this weekend.
Interesting because 80% of it was criticising what the current government is doing / has done. What I was looking for was what the Green Party would do if given power of government. I guess I found it here:

Greens believe that the special interest lobbyists should be exposed to the sterilising effect of sunlight.
And we will let the sun shine in.
Greens believe that ordinary people should be the decision makers in this country. Ordinary people should have the power.
And we will fight to restore that power.
Greens believe that collective dignity comes from working together to make the world a better place.
And we will fight to restore that dignity.
We believe that in spite of everything that is wrong in the world, in spite of the chaos and madness we see on the news every night, that in our little corner of the south west (sic) Pacific we live in a society which is far from perfect but where justice can prevail.
And we will fight to restore that justice and restore your right to your day in court.

It looked OK until I read it a second time and thought it through. For instance:
“special interest lobbyists should be exposed to the sterilising effect of sunlight. And we will let the sun shine in”.

This is good stuff. Let’s legislate that all lobbyists must be listed in a public register, that they must produce monthly statements of what lobbying they have done, and what they have spent/used in the course of that lobbying. To make this effective, legislation must be passed making the detailed diaries/appointment books of all MPs and senior civil servants freely available on-line.

“Greens believe that ordinary people should be the decision makers in this country, should have the power. We will fight to restore that power. “

This looks good, but somehow recent evidence suggests that this is not the Greens’ belief. For instance, while there was a clear majority of citizens against the “no smacking legislation”, the Party pushed ahead backing it, similarly, when a government that clearly stated its intent to sell one form of assets in order to create another, the Party did everything it could, at tax-payers’ expense, to try to have that mandate removed.

Greens believe that collective dignity comes from working together to make the world a better place. And we will fight to restore that dignity 

Again, looks good on the surface, but fails when looked at in light of recent evidence. For instance, when the government insisted on closing down a dangerous mine on the West Coast, the Party protested about the number of people put out of work; however, when a new mine that would employ people in the same area was proposed, the Party insisted that it should not be allowed to happen!

“We believe that in spite of everything that is wrong in the world, in spite of the chaos and madness we see on the news every night, that in our little corner of the south west Pacific we live in a society which is far from perfect but where justice can prevail. And we will fight to restore that justice and restore your right to your day in court.” 

Motherhood and apple pie is what I call this statement.

“And we will fight to restore that justice and restore your right to your day in court.” 

This suggests that I have somehow lost justice and the right to a day in court. I haven’t! Justice is the application of laws passed through proper process in Parliament, process that any government must follow, irrespective of position on a very limiting one-dimensional political spectrum. As long as laws, passed through proper process, govern us I have lost nothing. Yes, a future government could change the law, that’s what happens in a democracy.

There is no need to resort to violence, or “fight”, in order to change the statute books, you just have to win enough votes to do so, I’m sure when the day comes that the Green Party has sufficient elected members of the house of representatives to lead a government it will enact as many laws as it deems appropriate to put into effect the promises it made to the electorate to achieve that position. In the meantime, democracy is served by allowing the current government to do exactly that.
FINALLY, I have to say that the ad-hominem attack by the co-leader of the Green Party against the elected Prime Minister has destroyed any inclination I had to support the Green Part financially or with my vote. I cannot believe that the founders of the Party would condone such an attack, and cannot believe there is a long-term future in New Zealand for a Party with such leadership; a belief borne out by the dearth of attendees at the Annual Meeting this weekend.

—

Not surprisingly this comment is currently showing 27 likes and no dislikes at Kiwiblog.

Interestingly at Frogblog it is on 7 likes and no dislikes.

More comments and likes/dislikes in the Frogblog thread General debate, June 2, 2013 suggest that the Green camp is divided over the new hardball approach.

Perhaps it shouldn’t be surprising that many Green supporters (and ex supporters) take exception to the Norman enraging. Many of them still probably have principles and wish the Green party did too.

When Frogblog is divided – and more against than for the Norman enraging – then the Greens have a serious problem that can’t easily be wound back.

Sadly for loyal Greens it may be very hard to undo the effects of this speech. Now Norman has openly shown he’s prepared and launch personal attacks, over-embellish and lie he can’t just say “whoops, that didn’t work, I’ll try the honest, nice approach next time”.

By going this dirty Russel Norman is tainted, possibly to the extent of being toxic to the clean Green brand.

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by Pete George on June 3, 2013  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on June 3, 2013

http://yournz.org/2013/06/03/the-norman-enraging/

Russel Norman on banned protest at sea

In a Green Party conference speech today Russel Norman makes a highly questionable claim.

Stopping free speech at sea

Of course, as far as the environment is concerned, it doesn’t end there.

John Key has now banned protest at sea.

To ensure nothing stands in the way of the oil profits of other big foreign multinationals, the Government has passed new laws under urgency to ensure those who stand up to defend our oceans and beaches from a devastating oil spill will go to jail or face a heavy fine.

He did this after Steven Joyce met with Shell Oil and Shell complained about protesters.

Overnight, National took away our constitutional right to freedom of speech.

As far as I know this is blatantly false.

Protest is still allowed at sea, but the law was changed to enforce keeping a safe distance from vessels carrying out their lawful business.

This is unforgivable lying by Norman.

12 Comments
by Pete George on June 1, 2013  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on June 1, 2013

http://yournz.org/2013/06/01/russel-norman-on-banned-protest-at-sea/

Three polls

On Sunday One News and 3 News released polls, and today Fairfax have reported on their latest poll. All polling was done over a similar period, just after the budget.

One News
Colmar Brunton		 3 News
Reid Research		 Fairfax
Ipsos
17-23 May 17-23 May “days after
May 16″
National                      49                   47.1 49.1
Labour                     33                    33.1 31.9
Greens                   9             12.0 11.2
NZ First                     4                 2.2 3.2
Conservative                      2                     1.5 1.6
Maori                    1                 2.2 ?
Mana                         1                     0.5 ?
Act                      -                  0.2 ?
United Future                      1                     0.4 ?
  • One News/Colmar look to be rounded to the nearest whole number
  • Fairfax/Ipsos is from media reports that don’t give all the details
    - “UnitedFuture, ACT, Mana and the Maori Party 2.1% between them”

As usual this can’t be projected into a possible election result, we are mid term with a lot to happen before an election in November next year. And there are often late movements in support leading up to an election.

National will be happy with consistently high support hovering around them being able to rule alone (but voters have never yet obliged on that under MMP). It’s the economy and less risky stewardship of Finance, and that’s likely to be a significant factor in the election.

Labour should be worried that after major policy releases their support is drifting back. Fairfax lay much of the blame on David Shearer (see below) but associating closely with Greens must also be impacting.

Greens will be disappointed they are not gaining support.

Labour+Greens combined are struggling to compete with National:

  • Labour+Green – 42, 45.1, 43.1
  • National – 49, 47.1, 49.1

A Roy Morgan poll is also due this week but will cover a slightly later time period.

Vernon Small (Fairfax): National leaving Labour in its wake

Halfway through its second term, Prime Minister John Key’s National is riding high on 49.1 per cent support, up 4.5 percentage points since February, and would be able to govern alone.

Over the same period Labour had shed 4.4 per cent to 31.9 per cent, with respondents pointing to Mr Shearer as weak and negative, Ipsos pollster Duncan Stuart said.

It marks a sharp reversal from our February poll when the Left and Right were neck and neck.

The survey, taken in the days after the May 16 Budget, suggests an improving economic mood has lifted National’s poll ratings.

Tracey Watkins (Fairfax): Shearer’s invisible cloak thinning

If the results of today’s Fairfax Media-Ipsos poll are a precursor to the next election, the news is all bad for Labour – and not just because the poll has it shedding support, though that is bad enough.

But because it reverses a trend that had Labour slowly clawing into contention.

What changed? To lean on a cliche, the economy, stupid.

And with optimism on the rebound, National’s message at the election in 2014 looks like an increasingly potent one – we’ve taken our medicine, done the hard yards, and we’re starting to reap the gains. Why put that all at risk?

But something else may also be changing. Mr Shearer may be morphing from Mr Invisible to something worse in voters’ eyes. Mr Negative.

The overall poll results and trends conflict with Patrick Gower’s take at 3 News – Poll: Labour, Greens close gap on National – the 3 News results showed National and Labour+Greens closer than the others but the movements from their previous poll were within margins of error.

3 Comments
by Pete George on May 29, 2013  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on May 29, 2013

http://yournz.org/2013/05/29/three-polls/

Explaining MMP to Russel Norman

Yesterday National said that no changes would be made as a result of the MMP review because of party consensus.

Russel Norman complained on Twitter:

There was never going to be unanimity on MMP review as the Act and Dunne turkeys wont vote for an early xmas.

Referendum supported MMP. Electoral Commission inde review recc removing coat-tailing and reducing threshold to 4%. Nats want gerrymander

Legal/political guru Graeme Edgeler responded:

And you want a less representative parliament and a higher wasted vote. All in the Game.

Norman didn’t get that:

How does lowering the threshold produce a less representative parliament? It’s the opposite!

Edgeler explained:

Removing the one seat rule will increase disproportionality by more than lowering threshold to 4% will decrease it.

Norman seemed more interested in getting what suited him and the Greens, not better proportionality:

That was the Electoral Commission recc.Do you think we should oppose it?

Edgeler went on:

I think you should take account of it when reaching your view, based on what the Greens think is important.

If what the Greens think is important is proportionality, you should oppose it.

If the Greens think proportionality is properly sacrificed to gain greater equality between voters that support it.

But if you support removing the one-seat rule, you should say that you are happy for there to be a less proportional system.

No response to that from Norman.

The Greens were no better than any of the other parties – they wanted proportionality that suited them but opposed proportionality that favoured other parties.

That approach is why no consensus could be reached.

Getting political parties to choose the most proportional most representative democratic system is a bit like, using Norman’s metaphor, allowing turkeys to decide on a Christmas menu.

There was never going to be unanimity on MMP review as…

…all parties had selfish interests. I really think that Norman was not aware of this. This is a major flaw in Green thinking, they seem to convince themselves that what they believe is the best option, the most democratic, the best policy. They are blind to their own biases.

by Pete George on May 15, 2013  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on May 15, 2013

http://yournz.org/2013/05/15/explaining-mmp-to-russel-norman/

“Every capitalist out there is scum”

There are many extreme political views expressed on blogs. A regular hard leftie at The Standard, in  response to kiwi_prometheus

Great, if people save instead of consume and try to invest that capital to keep themselves out of poverty in old age they are according to Leftists like you “EVIL CAPITALIST SCUM WHO DESERVE TO GET FUCKED!!!”.

Sigh.

…commented today:

Um, that’s the whole basis of capitalism. What you’re actually demanding is that people don’t have to pay the costs of the risks that they take.

And, yes, every capitalist out there is scum who wants money for nothing. That too is part and parcel of capitalism.

That’s fairly standard comment from Draco T Bastard. Another Standard regular (who also has his own blog) is Jackal …

I wouldn’t say Draco T Bastard is hard left for thinking every capitalist is a scumbag! Most capitalists have attained their wealth from the suffering of the poor after all. If you recognize or have been a victim of a corrupted system, then viewing those who have benefited from that corruption as being scum is entirely justified.

It might not be strictly correct in terms of all rich people aren’t capitalist scum, but it is entirely justified to have formed such beliefs because of the failures inherent within capitalism, namely that it increases inequality.

Such a view as Draco has expressed is therefore not extreme at all, unless you’re arguing that inequality is somehow justified?

Jackal is a strong supporter of David Shearer and the Labour Party.

I don’t think Jackal’s view is representative of all Labour supporters, but there are certainly some who have strong socialist and very strong anti-capitalist views.

This makes Labour’s alliance with the Greens possi

by Pete George on May 11, 2013  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on May 11, 2013

http://yournz.org/2013/05/11/every-capitalist-out-there-is-scum/

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