Hard News: Life Goes On
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Why do US newspapers come out and endorse candidates and ours do not?
All New Zealand newspapers, with the exception of, I think, the ODT, are owned by one of two large Australian companies - APN and Fairfax. Corporate New Zealand, on the whole, doesn't support Labour.
Sure, the US newspapers are also owned by large companies too, but it seems to me they have more independence.
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Interning for a tabloid in NY, I was asked, on more than one occasion, when I'd get around to speaking with an American accent.
"I'm only here for two months," I'd tell them.
"So? Speak like an American," one replied.
Did you reply "Only if you start writing in English!"?
Bloody Yanks! :P
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"So? Speak like an American," one replied.
reminds me of the outrage about obama saying "paak-is-staan" not "pack-iz-dan". you know, the way they say it over there.
If I could count the number of times I've had to correct a comment about Bali being in Thailand, or, once, Queensland.
dude... bali is in queensland. why else would there be so many aussies there?
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"Some of Bernard Hickey's analysis is a little hysterical for my tastes, but he's dead right when he asserts that it's a total no-brainer to invest in finance companies for a 10% return (vis the sub-8% return offered by banks), if that investment is just as secure as that low-return bank deposit. That's bad business. It's especially bad for the stock market, since you're in for the very long haul right now if you want a 10% return on a share investment, not to mention praying that the company will still be around in 18-months' time."
Oh, I think Bernard Hickey's great. He is the only journalist in NZ to have pciked up on Christopher Wood's dire analysis of NZ's banking system. If you think Bernard's "hysterical," you definitely wouldn't want to read too much of Wood.The problem I see is that company's such as South Canterbury Finance don't really promote NZ's future as an exporter. Perhaps they do indirectly through farm finance, etc.
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Yes - I had someone from the US of A ask me once how long the ferry ride from Auckland to Sydney was, and if he could hike from Auckland to Invercargill in a couple of days.
I retaliated by warning him not to go hiking alone in the bush in NZ, since lack of mammalian competition had led to rats growing to enormous size to fill the niche normally occupied by foxes and the like, and these enormous "bush rats" were known to attack lone trampers in packs. Warming to my tale, I enthusiastically embellished this with stories of the risky and terrible battles that ensued when we, fearless men of the soil, went looking for said ferocious packs of cunning and aggressive Bush rats. I think he was from Arkansas or somewhere like that, so I am pretty sure he believed me.
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Oh Tom - we have to get our stories straight - you have to talk about the giant keas, evolved without mammalian competition, that rip tents apart, the windscreens from parked cars, eat live sheep, attack trampers for their butter
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And just to join in the reverse 'we're kind of stupid as hell too' thing with Simon, the sheer numbers of people in New Zealand who put on what they think is a Texas accent when they hear my husband is from Texas? Yeah. Don't do that. Also, no, he doesn't wear a stetson, and he didn't vote for George Bush, and he doesn't own an oil well or any cowboy boots. Ho ho ho.
(I also do not handle the 'I normally don't like Americans, but I like you!' thing he gets particularly well. O RLY? Met 300 million people from vastly diverse backgrounds, have you, and disliked them all?)
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dude... bali is in queensland. why else would there be so many aussies there?
They're, I think 3rd or 4th in the list of visitors now, after Japan and China, and I think, South Korea, depending on which figures you see.
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Oh Tom - we have to get our stories straight - you have to talk about the giant keas, evolved without mammalian competition, that rip tents apart, the windscreens from parked cars, eat live sheep, attack trampers for their butter
Yeah, but the problem with that is that it's true. Tom's story at least had the benefit of being thoroughly bullshit, in keeping with the blind ignorance of the question.
I do wonder, though, what Americans would make of kea. They look so cute, until you find out just what vicious vandals they actually are! -
Someone in Britain asked me whether the Sydney Harbour Bridge connected Australia and New Zealand. Another was convinced that one could see NZ from the shores of New South Wales, on a clear day. Several others thought that NZ was like England in the 1950s.
And people wonder why I don't want to go back.
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I do wonder, though, what Americans would make of kea. They look so cute, until you find out just what vicious vandals they actually are!
I'd guess they probably map quite neatly onto raccoons in that sense.
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They're, I think 3rd or 4th in the list of visitors now, after Japan and China, and I think, South Korea, depending on which figures you see.
WTF!!! someone tell rudd that australia is being SWAMPED BY ASIANS!!!
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(I also do not handle the 'I normally don't like Americans, but I like you!' thing he gets particularly well. O RLY? Met 300 million people from vastly diverse backgrounds, have you, and disliked them all?)
Agreed, and your point is conversely aligned to the one that says if you criticise GWB or the Iraq War your are anti-American. I love loads of things about Anerica and consider San Francisco and New York two of my favourite places on the planet to visit but it doesn't mean I can't dislike certain things about America.
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Several others thought that NZ was like England in the 1950s.
I'm occasioanlly of the opinion that WWII was the last time that the US had to pay attention to the rest of the world, and once that was over, they no longer bothered, leaving their impressions of other countries out by several decades. That would explain the "surrender monkey" attitude to the French and the belief that British humour consists of people running around to the tune of "Yakkety Sax", despite Benny Hill having been dead for 16 years. (Seriously, of the many reasons one could choose for hating the Wachowski's adaptation of V for Vendetta, surely top of the list is the pathetic "comedy sketch" sequence they foisted on it. How they talked Stephen Fry into that I'll never know...)
It could also explain those Britons' belief that NZ hasn't progressed since the postwar period.
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I'd guess they probably map quite neatly onto raccoons in that sense.
On a recent drive from Pittsburgh to Cincinnati and back I saw many many dead raccoons on the side of the highway.
And whilst in Cincinnati I met an who knew a considerable amount about New Zealand's proportional representation system.
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I don't think that'll work, so there won't be any below-BB rated firms around. Maybe the higher rated ones will stick around, but like I say they'll be essentially banks.
Excellent analysis Rich. The scheme - in it's current evolved incarnation - won't be lending to Petricevic et al to fire it off to their property mates because they simply won't make the ratings grade with that sort of behaviour.
The finance companies that do make the rating grade are actually ones that we do want around - lending prudently to smaller businesses and developments around the country. As such the argument about the share market etc drying up are a bit weaker - that money you lend to properly rated finance companies gets invested somewhere, right?I think it still needs some locking down to avoid unintended consequences, and personally I'd maybe drop the "3% if you're under BB but above BBB-" and just make the cutoff at BB, but it's not as bad (any more) as some would make out...
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Re the robocall, it always reminds me of Homer's "Happy Dude" autodialler:
Homer: Now we just sit by the mailbox and watch the money roll in.
Marge: But you're going to annoy thousands of people just to make a few measly dollars. It's nothing but panhandling.
Homer: Tele-panhandling. -
but raccoons are so cute, especially the babies .... until they sneak thru the cat door after the catfood and can't get out, and mum gets really mad .... (but can't fit through the same cat door) ....
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There should be an 'American' somewhere in my last post. See if you can spot where!
I should also add that, upon telling people trying to register me to vote that I am not a US citizen, more than one has said 'that's unfortunate'. I politely told them that it's not.
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but raccoons are so cute, especially the babies .... until they sneak thru the cat door after the catfood and can't get out, and mum gets really mad .... (but can't fit through the same cat door) ....
I heard a tale of someone running the After Dark screensaver on their Mac, the one that emits cricket chirps while little critter eyes blink against a darkened background. The pesky 'coons tore the screens from the windows trying to get at the virtual bugs.
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Jake - next time remind them about the Boston Tea Party, "no taxation without representation", and that US citizens who live in NZ are allowed to vote - ask that you at least be allowed to vote for dog catcher
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Woo! More Bachmann!
The full interview where she denies having said Obama "may have anti-American views" and then goes on to dump a trailer load of campaign slime.
Funny thing, though. Bachmann sought a pardon this year for a gangster called Frank Vennes, after he'd donated tens of thousands to her campaign, finding Jesus along the way.
When he turned out to be up to his eyeballs on a Ponzi scheme, she threw him under the bus and moved on.
Like Palin, she has a rather good blog dedicated to covering her escapades.
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The story pointed out that by 2025 the 40% of the fund that National wants to force into local investment will by be $43.6 billion: bigger than the entire market cap of the NZX-50 plus the expected value of Fonterra were it to be floated and quotes a string of specialists pouring scorn on the policy.
You give full marks to Labour for quickly 'fixing' the shortcomings of their policy, but assume National's is set in stone?
Whilst I'd agree that National should have actually said so, I'm pretty sure that they didn't mean for the policy to run forever. Like Labour's bank deposit insurance scheme, these ideas are only for the short term to increase confidence.
I actually like the idea of our Super Fund investing in the NZ share market for the next few years. Gawd knows no-one else is going to. I always found it odd that Cullen was advocating for kiwis to get out of the property market a few years back and to start investing in the NZ sharemarket; and yet the Super Fund was sending most of its money offshore. And when kiwi investors started doing likewise, Cullen introduce a new tax regime to deter kiwi investors from buying foriegn (Aussie excluded) shares.
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You give full marks to Labour for quickly 'fixing' the shortcomings of their policy, but assume National's is set in stone?
Yes, actually. There's a huge step in principle there that can't just be tweaked -- no one's even bothering to suggest a tweak. Expanding a deposit guarantee scheme is hardly the same thing.
Whilst I'd agree that National should have actually said so, I'm pretty sure that they didn't mean for the policy to run forever.
Nope. It won't work at all in the short term, because it would be madness to require the fund managers to divest foreign holdings at the present time, so the local investment level will have to be built up with money coming into the fund. The idea of of it trying to dial back the NZX in a few years' time isn't very pretty either.
It is a critical long-term change to the purpose of the fund.
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it would be madness to require the fund managers to divest foreign holdings at the present time
Were they asking for divestment, or simply suggesting that 40% of all new funds should be dedicated to the NZ sharemarket?
I'm guessing you have no immediate plans to float PAS Enterprises, Russell?
: )
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John, the 40% has been reported as of the total fund, not of only new investment.
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