It's punitive welfare that's pointless, not protest
On Sunday afternoon I spent three hours on the picket line outside National’s ‘Summer Party’ at the Royal Akarana Yacht Club.read more
View ArticleThe alternatives to war: What if we did nothing?
The decision to send 143 Kiwi soldiers to Iraq to help train the Iraq army has exposed the left/right divide on foreign policy more graphically than any other issue in recent years.read more
View ArticleAussie foreign minister says NZ's Iraq strategy plays into terrorists' hands
John Key and Tony Abbott were putting a brave face on it today, with talk of the countries'"long, strong and intimate partnership", but on Iraq the cracks are showing.read more
View ArticleA fight with limits: The right choice against Islamic State
Watching the news with my five year-old last week, he was asking about sending soldiers to Iraq. He listened to my school-boy appropriate summation and said, "weeeelll, I don't like to shoot people,...
View ArticleThe opposite of intervention isn’t peace
The fight against Islamic State is not the fight of the oppressor against the disposed and the poor. Its leaders and disciples are mostly educated and middle class, if not wealthy. It’s the victims in...
View ArticleOh go up to the king, and the sky is falling in
There is an old Chinese curse that goes something along the lines of "may you live in an electorate which becomes important to the Government's ease of legislating in the House".read more
View ArticleHow National is gift-wrapping Northland for Winston
Try as they might, National seems to be turning every Northland fencepost into a losing one at the moment. For a party with such a strong campaigning record, it seems to be playing into Winston Peters'...
View ArticleProcess, not pork the problem for National
Simon Bridges is a card carrying porker from way back.Here’s what Matthew Hooton said this week in his NBR column:read more
View ArticleA post-Northland mea culpa
OK - so three weeks or so ago I put up a post confidently saying:read more
View ArticleAfter the rain has fallen: What does Northland mean?
So what does it all mean? Maybe something, maybe nothing. While we know the result in Northland and the unique weather patterns that merged to create Cyclone Winston, it's impossible to yet know...
View ArticleFortune cookies for all parties in Northland
After the 2008 election Key’s government kept Labour’s Working for Families tax break and interest-free student loans. After 2011 it introduced free doctors visits for kids under the age of thirteen...
View ArticleHe's not the Messiah, he's a very naughty boy
National's "ten bridges for your votes!" gambit at the Northland by-election is shaping up as one of the worst election policy offerings that a political party has made in recent times. I mean that in...
View ArticleThree signs that National knows Simon Bridges did wrong
Three fairly clear signs emerged today that the National Party knows Simon Bridges stuffed up in getting his officials to give him all the information needed for National to put together its...
View ArticleThough ye flourish more arms than the giant Briareus, ye have to reckon with me
As predicted here, Arthur Taylor's election petition challenge to John Key's victory in the Helensville electorate has failed. The court found that Arthur Taylor was:read more
View ArticleHas John Key tugged off more than he realises?
John Key's pony-tail-gate controversy seems to have divided people into two camps. The vast bulk of New Zealanders (to purloin a Key-ism) can agree on the fact that it's weird... and out of order. But...
View ArticleHuffing and puffing at houses: Third term straw
"So where's the good bit?" Guyon Espiner asked a RNZ guest this morning in relation to National's not-new non-capital gains tax reforms announced over the weekend. The answer is hard to pin down, not...
View ArticleIwi and Auckland housing - the tune is changing
Otto Von Bismark is widely attributed with the remark "Laws are like sausages — it is best not to see them being made." Turns out he never said it, but that doesn't stop the sentiment being any less...
View ArticleCure for third-termitis? A dose of the polls
How deliciously fitting that National should celebrate the first birthday of its third term with the decision to turn down Shanghai Pengxin's bid to buy Lochinver Station from the Stevenson Group, even...
View ArticleRed Peak, red faces - flag turns into a farce
So, listening or politicking? When it comes to Red Peak's inclusion in the flag referendum, I'm thinking the latter. While the Greens and National are trying to reflect public opinion by adding Red...
View ArticleComes the rule with no exception
As mentioned in the media yesterday, Jane Kelsey and a rag tag fugitive fleet of civil society groups were (mostly) successful in their court challenge to MFAT/Tim Groser's refusal toread more
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