Posts by Bart Janssen
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
Hard News: Fox News: I know, right?, in reply to Graeme Edgeler,
Taxing someone at 15% instead of 35% is not a subsidy.
As a lawyer I would expect you to be technically accurate and of course you are.
But functionally for the purposes of what most folks see in the bank account after payday then arranging the tax code so that very rich people can pay less tax as a percentage runs counter to the idea of a progressive tax code where each pay according to their means.
No it is technically not a subsidy. But it is most definitely unfair.
The argument has always been that those rich create jobs and the wealth tickles down. Which was a fine theory in it's day but now stinks of rationalisation for a system that has simply not worked.
Defending such a system does you no credit.
-
It's not just CHCH. Everything this government does in centred around the idea that managers can do thigs better than anyone or everyone else. Why use democracy when there are perfectly good managers who can make the change process much more efficient. Which might even be true if there really were good managers on deck.
But it is CHCH that is suffering the brunt of it. Precisely because so much change really does need to happen. Perhaps a different leadership might have allowed the people to guide the change in a direction that they wanted, or not. But this leadership most definitely believes the change should be managed for you and you do not need to be consulted.
-
back in 2011
Had to laugh, said with such a deep sense of that was sooooo long ago.
-
The Bastion tracks make me think of FireFly/Serenity
-
The thing that is most poignant is that the very people Romney is discarding as irrelevant to his campaign are the very people who will vote for him regardless of what he says.
Satire highlights the medium but it is the people who suffer from the Romney policies who deserve better representation.
-
Up Front: Submission Pun Goes Here, in reply to BenWilson,
there must be an upper limit to improving equality
But they thought that in the 1600s, and the 1700s, and the 1800s, and the 1900s.
And we laugh at how foolish they were.
It's partly, as Craig says, about recognising just how hard the fight was for those people who changed the past.
It's partly about recognising that there is a hard fight still going on today.
But it's also about being open to the idea that the things I think are normal and right and fair today might just be shown to be ... well ... evil, someday in the future. What is really scary about that thought is that the future might be only a few years away. How will I adjust?
That may be a fanciful pointless thought exercise but it helps to understand the opposition to things like this so very obviously good bill.
-
Up Front: Submission Pun Goes Here, in reply to Russell Brown,
bank made you get married before it would grant a mortgage
We happened to be married at the time but I distinctly remember thinking "so married people don't default on loans?"
In the interests of not pissing off the person who could stop us being able to buy a house I kept my thoughts to myself.
This bill, when it passes, will be a step closer to having a society where all people are treated equally.
But as an aside I find it interesting that equality is such an evolving issue. It is only as we deal with one inequality that we realise there is another to which we have all been blind. I wonder how future generations will view the things we simply take for granted and think of as normal, in the same way that past generations would have been shocked at the idea that having indentured servants was something wrong.
-
Up Front: Submission Pun Goes Here, in reply to Emma Hart,
oversomes
because they are over some of her
-
Cracker: Bloggers: Pr*cks, Ars*holes,…, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
serious and nuanced
To be serious. The correct response to this problem is to come out and declare that your employer (The Herald) is failing to provide the resources to the the job properley. It would have been to correct to respond to the criticism by saying ...
"you are absolutely right, what I produced at APEC was below the standard expected of a journalist of my experience, unfortunately I was simply unable to do the job required of me by the New Zealand public because my employer failed"Instead we got "bloggers are mean to me and it's not fair because my job is so hard ...."
So I will stand by my opinion that failing to accept and understand criticism is a fatal flaw and Armstrong should never have written the piece nor should it have been published.
The nuance is that understanding how to learn from criticism, even when it is poorly delivered (which this was not) is an essential skill if you wish to become good at whatever task you attempt.
The nuance is that the failure is almost certainly at the hands of The Herald which is not applying the journalistic resources necessary to do a good job, but I can hardly blame Armstrong for not highlighting that.
-
Cracker: Bloggers: Pr*cks, Ars*holes,…, in reply to Sofie Bribiesca,
... have them out in Stadiums in the fresh air!
Heh, Queenstown in winter might be a bit of an ask.
And yes the conference is quite deliberately in ski season so we can attract overseas speakers.