Posts by Craig Ranapia
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Good point. Interestingly, nothing much about mortgage-belt poverty (ie: dangerously over-committed homeowners, resentful as hell), which I've been hearing is coming through in polling.
Well, can you imagine a reality-based double act from Clark and Key (or English and Cullen) directed at the 'mortgage-belt' that wouldn't result in a political throat-slitting orgy straight out of Sweeney Todd? I can't, and very much doubt the merry little spin-elves of Wellywood can either ...
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Clark also said she'd be promoting "the role of our creative people in expressing what is unique and special about New Zealand".
Oh God, sorry for banging on about this but am I the only person who really wishes Clark would dump this applause line? Because it's really getting dated when some of the most remarkable work coming from New Zealand artists last year has moved past the cultural cringe (both inverted and original recipies). PR-puff cultural nationalism is so last millennium, Helen.
Hmmm, seems a bit much for Clark to be blaming the 'yoof crime wave' on the 1991 budget.
Sure does - especially when John Key would set eyes rolling like Jaffas down a stairwell if he started pointing out that the term of the Fourth Labour Government wasn't exactly all white shoes and Bolly.
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Craig, the answer is clearly to cut taxes.
Apologies to Kiwiblogblog/The Standard etc
They should be apologising to you, but that's a whole other argument. There's a reason why I spend a lot more time around here than the Kiwiblog-Kiwiblogblog/The Standard Axis of Crazy.
Things can get a bit intense around here (the various threads around the Urewera raids for example), but I come away from PAS having learned a thing or two (and been exposed to some intelligent debate) rather than having the sense I've been watching -- and too often getting sucked into -- the on-line equivalent of piranha fish gnawing their way through a crowded swimming pool.
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Lovely.
Yeah, and here's the bit that really turns my stomach.
After the meeting, he said he did not know the full facts of the case, but he stood by his remarks.
"Everyone is feeling sorry for the kid and his family, but if the kid was not tagging, he would still be alive."
You're quite right, Cr. Corbett. And if rape victims wouldn't insist on 'provoking' their attackers, they wouldn't get raped. And anyone who lives in the Spreydon-Heathcote Ward (which Corbett represents) whose house is burgled or car stolen -- I've no sympathy. Where do you get off having nice shit in the first place?
You see, Councillor, blaming the victims of violent crime rather the perpetrators takes on a very sour note when there's no cheap political points to be scored.
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Against this background, Key spends all his time talking about ..... taggers?!
No he didn't, and with all due respect unless Key has been doing some serious moonlighting in Washington I rather doubt his fix for the U.S. economy is of much utility. Somehow, I suspect we're going to be thoroughly sick of economic policy arguments before E-Day rolls around.
I'd also like to offer a little advice I got in high school English -- engage with the text on the page, not what you think the author should have written.
I think Key's falls into this category not least of all because the training is not likely to lead anywhere i.e. a qualification.
Well, Paul, I feel the same about raising the school leaving age -- and I think it's fair comment to ask "where is the work on the additional funding, resources and staff that will be required? And how is this going to lead to more students leaving school with meaningful qualifications, as opposed to just 'warehousing' folks to keep the welfare and unemployment rolls artificially depressed?"
If this really has been on the drawing board for months, if not years, I'm confident Miss Clark can give straight answers and some straight questions.
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hillary
hoodwinkWell, that's on the shortlist for my new drag name. I've come to the sad conclusion that one is far too nelly to pull off Mrs. T. :)
And according to NatRadio, Clark's big new idea is... raising the school leaving age. But the details are, according to the reporter whose name I didn't catch, the details are all going to be worked out in a 'work pro gramme' with the Education Ministry as 'project leaders'.
Thanks, NatRadio, for entries one and two in my Bullshit Bingo database. Any further suggestions eagerly received, and a virtual chocolate fish to the folks who guess the gems I extracted from Mr. Key's effort yesterday. (Though serious demerits to Key for not making an effort. The merely banal and blandly inoffensive doesn't make the cut. You've got to go for the utterly meaningless verbiage.) Let's hope the Prime Minister raises the bar!
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Do we want the worst of our community to be fitter & stronger when they're turned out onto the streets?
Oy... Do you want me to give you an answer that assumes you're being half-way serious, or the Social Darwinian/Eugenic snark that the best thing to do with the scum of the earth is to castrate 'em (so they can't breed) then isolate 'em from decent folks until their stave in their own filth?
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I wasn't being ironic, just to be clear - or at least, not then. I don't find anyone, male or female, attractive if there's nothing going on behind their eyes.
Perfectly true -- has anyone else been watching Life on Monday nights. Lead Damien Lewis isn't exactly my idea of hunk o' spunk, but he acts with his eyes (if that makes any sense of all) which I find enchanting.
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Ack, I'm weak. Did pop by Kiwiblog and came across this gem from a Roger Nome:
No it’s a poverty issue, one which National is set to deepen. It will then punish the victims of its policies with boot camp, and have a chuckle about it over a pinot gris at the local country club. Don’t you just love National?
Gee, I'd love to live on Mr. Nome's planet full stop. A Thursday night cheap and cheerful at the Westfield Albany foodhall (with an impertinent but zesty styrofoam cup of miso soup to wash it down), and a bit of window shopping to follow, is about as high life as I get nowadays.
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I must say, I'm greatly enjoying reading the usual suspects at Kiwiblog hailing an expensive social policy they'd have been screaming blue murder about if it came from the Evil Liabour Dykeocracy.
There's more dignified ways to indulge your masochistic urges - like asking Fiona to strap on a pair of stilettos and walk up and down your spine. Anyway, are you going to break it to 'em that according to Annette King it's all being done by the Evil Liarbore Dykeocracy already?
I would, but my life insurance isn't up to date.
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