Posts by nzlemming
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Hard News: This is your government on drugs, in reply to Sacha,
Someone was saying the 2014 election date was earlier so the BIM release this time seems extra late by comparison.
BIMs are largely prepared ahead of the election. They may be tweaked slightly, depending on who wins (as an incumbent might not need as in-depth a briefing on an on-going matter as a new Minister), but portfolios often change around after elections even if the GotD retains power. It's now been 2 months since the election. They should have been available before now. My guess is that Labour et al wanted to make sure their new ministers had time to fully digest them and get clarification before the media started hitting them with questions. Not as transparent as they're boasting.
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Hard News: This is your government on drugs, in reply to Russell Brown,
Why? Because they were complete arseholes and it would have ruined their narrative of "punish the poor".
In other news, briefings to incoming ministers were finally made available yesterday. I don't think I have never known it to take this long to release them. But the usual link to previous iterations of the Beehive site is no longer available, so I can't check.
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Hard News: Abroad and Home, in reply to linger,
Much like "Make America Great Again"
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Hard News: Harkanwal Singh: What really…, in reply to David Hood,
you forgot:
mic drop
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Wahine, I think, followed by the moon landing, then Kirk taking office according to my recollections. I remember being very sad when Big Norm died. Another early TV memory is being transfixed by Alister Riddell's Space Waltz on whatever the talent show was at the time. I remember my brother and I looking at each other and saying (in essence) "this is allowed in NZ now?"
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Speaker: The Declaration of the…, in reply to Ian Dalziel,
Trust us...
Another in a long list of reasons not to use these fuckers.
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Not funny, because it's true. Well interpreted, Colin. I'm sure JPB would agree.
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Hard News: Friday Music: Deep cuts from Aotearoa, in reply to Paul Campbell,
yes well done that woman! boldly going .... (do we get her back at some point?)
They have to be pretty careful what they say and where so not in the immediate, I think.
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No-one involved in MMP thought that it would be perfect from day one. Vested interests were always going to be a problem. The FPP mentality persisted far too long, in Labour as well as National. But it's still really young. In 180 years, 21 is a blip. The older voters have never cottoned to it, but they're starting to fade. Voters under 60 generally understand how it should work, now.
The 2017 election was the first, in my opinion, that was actually an MMP-as-it-was-meant election. And that's not just because Labour won, because they almost didn't. But they did change their mindset and (mostly) stopped back-biting natural allies and potential coalition partners. Whereas National went full FPPtard and devoured their young.
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Speaker: The Government lost the election, in reply to izogi,
The Greens started in MMP with incumbent MPs, and support from Labour in Coromandel.
You miss the point. The Greens started as a party in 1990, well before the Clark/Anderton deal and before Fitzsimmons was elected. They were already a party when they joined with New Labour (and others) to form the Alliance. Social Credit were a party for a long time before they got a seat in the house in 1966, and their representation was spotty with only 4 MPs over 20 years.
If anything, MMP has reduced the time it takes for a party to achieve enough support to translate into votes. I believe the Greens have yet to win an electorate but, nationwide, have sufficient support to field 8 MPs in the house. If one of those MPs was allowed to jump waka, then the people who voted Green will have lost that level of influence that they voted for. That's unfair.
You're targeting the system because of the way it has been (ab)used, but that doesn't invalidate it. MMP is designed to split the House according to the percentage of support that a party has, not to allow dissidents to mask their intent until they're safely inside the tent before they announce their own party, which is a possible endpoint of what you're suggesting.