Posts by simon g
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Given that they were men with known names and faces, whose future whereabouts would be public knowledge, and who had far more to lose than most, it's hard to see why an international rugby player would be a dangerous person to have consensual sex with. It doesn't take great detective work to read an international rugby schedule.
If a woman choosing to accompany such a man to a hotel room is taking an unnecessary risk, then she probably shouldn't be agreeing to have sex with anyone at all.
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Not sure what your point is, Shep. I would have thought the best outcome was that crimes should be prosecuted and non-criminals should be left alone.
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The reporters have been struggling with this one. In the absence of a formal complaint or charge, they're generally reluctant to say "alleged rape". So this, er, incident, has been described in various media over the past week as "high jinks", "hanky panky", "sex scandal", "off field distraction", etc.
I don't know what the best description is for something we don't know (hence my retreat behind the neutral "incident"), but the blurring between the language of crime and the language of fun has left me feeling pretty uncomfortable.
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Grant, your comparison with Key's DVD will be valid if the leaflet has to be recalled and the photo removed. Or if they used the photo without permission. Otherwise, there's no comparison at all.
Labour don't have to back-pedal. They just need to smile sweetly and say "How about the words?". Nobody I know reads these leaflets, but maybe they will now. It would be more useful to know if the claims stack up, but that requires more effort than playing with pictures.
If Labour choose to follow the agenda set by the Herald, more fool them. They can't win a race to the bottom.
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But, but ... Che, it's on the Herald website! Updated! Lead story! And soon the people shall speak, in "Your Views"! And there will be party press releases, and commentators will commentate, and it shall be Perception.
Policy? Laws? Things that actually affect people's lives? Bo-ring ...
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Ooh, political ads, great fun. Truth is for pedants, perception rules OK.
Let's pay tribute to the ultimate "false spoke true"
"We could not use the real unemployed. They might have objected to appearing in Tory publicity. We wanted people who would not object - which is why we used the Young Tories."
Real people are a minefield (remember the war of Jennifer's Ear in the UK?). Stick to cartoons (but check out the animators' CV, just in case).
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A bit like calling David Irving a 'historian', when he and Bassett and Wishart are writers of fantasy (not that history is all 'just the facts. m'am'!)
When 'The Hollow Men' was published, Bassett actually compared Nicky Hager to David Irving (on Radio NZ's 'Panel').
Hager exposed Bassett's "independent commentary" as a fraud (HM, Chapter 2) and the eminent historian reacted with all the dignity of a spoilt child caught telling porkies.
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By the way, what is National's current proposal for the wording?
Here it is:
"Are you satisfied with MMP as a system or would you prefer a change?"
That is self-evidently not a referendum question. It is a customer feedback survey. Graeme is right (in the first reply) to point to this. A referendum is worth discussing. National's proposal is not. It is a nonsense.
Whipping up anti-MMP sentiment is not difficult ("bloody politicians!"). Pointing out that bloody politicians are inevitable, and suggesting (or canvassing) alternative ways to elect them is not what John Key has in mind. Actually it's so transparent I don't know why anybody would take it seriously. It's really depressing that it was. I have visions of earnest citizens sitting around saying "Yes, yes, I can see that it is, but shouldn't we discuss what kind of straw?"
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"If they are going to continue to flog a dead horse with Iraq, what it shows is that they are not focusing on what has happened since I have been leader and they are so desperate, they have nothing else to debate."
John Key, August 16 2007.
I'd suggest that of the horses which died 5 years ago, invading Iraq was - and is - rather more offensive and consequential than an overpriced HNZ conference held between Hamilton and Auckland, but that's just my warped values.
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2003 wasn't an election year.
And if you believe John Key, any views held or actions taken back then are, in his own words, "fish and chip paper".