Posts by Russell Brown
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If we don't allow commercial entities to protect what they develop, or what they have paid others to develop, there won't be a lot of R&D other than a little bit of "public good" stuff which some organisations currently do.
Agreed -- and it's worth noting that our public research agencies already register new plant varieties developed through conventional breeding (or, as in the case of the Braeburn apple, served up as one of Mother Nature's glorious mutants).
Where I draw the line is trying to register patents on plant varieties that are already widely used merely by virtue of having isolated and described their genomes.
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I don't think anyone has posted the campaign video at the centre of the fuss.
Pansy Wong's good in it:
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Adding to the general atmosphere of fun and derangement, Whaleoil claims his "highly placed Labour sources" tell him that Labour paid to fly Guruanathan to Wellington and she met with Trevor Mallard in his office before doing her Campbell Live interviews.
Mallard says he's never met the woman and she has never been in his office. There's also the small matter of her interviews having been done in Auckland.
I suspect Slater's "highly-placed Labour sources" might have been more in the nature of an anonymous email from <labourparty@yahoo.com>.
The richest part of Slater's frothing is surely this:
This is simply a smear attack against a woman of colour because Labour's gray candidate Davod "Blackwater" Shearer is failing to make an impact. The irony is that Labour by making this attack has ensured that Melissa Lee's name recognition will go sky high.
Okay, maximum points for looking on the bright side. But given Slater's history of racist, misogynist blather ... well, let's just say he has no discernible sense of irony.
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Hum... and apparently her employment issues with Lee are totally irrelevant.
So she's lying?
Look, I'm mindful that Campbell Live says its story (specifically the part about inappropriate editorial oversight) is backed by other staff members, and I'm just struggling to believe that Lee's staff were going during the working day and making a campaign video for "fun" and on a wholly volunteer basis.
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From Not PC's report of last night's candidates meeting:
Most of what every mainstream candidate had to say on the night was both instantly forgettable and intended only for short-term political advantage. But there was one thing one candidate said that is now going to dog her through the rest of the campaign. Maybe longer. It will probably be the meeting’s headline tomorrow morning. I say “her” because the foot in the mouth belonged to Melissa Lee.
Asked to explain how the new motorway would most help the good people of Mt Albert, she expained that it would stop the bad people of South Auckland driving to Mt Albert to burgle people’s homes. Asked to clarify by a questioner, she repeated the claim. Showing she’s truly not one to stop digging when she creates a big hole for herself — a hole as big as the number of open mouths in the room — she insisted that the local police commander had told her this very morning that the biggest issue with which he has to deal is the number of South Aucklanders driving to Mt Albert to burgle people’s homes.
I swear I am not making this up. It’s true that the likely winner of the by-election, David Shearer, grew up in South Auckland . . . and in being Labour’s “machine candidate” he could be said to be burgling the seat . . . but what the hell she was talking about, only Melissa Lee herself would know. Probably.
It was as incongruous and frankly ludicrous as Jenny Shipley’s comment in Parliament several years ago (apropos of nothing relevant) that Polynesians tend “to climb in the windows of other New Zealanders at night.” And it deserves to be treated with equal contempt.
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Well, Russell, why don't you just decloak and tell us who you think is lying and why?
Why Craig, how could I say when even Ms Lee is having memory issues about the whole thing?
Lee on Checkpoint yesterday:
LEE: Well we were doing a launch, you know, for the Asian campaign and I thought it might be a good, fun thing to actually have a video to put onto Youtube or Facebook, I can’t actually remember exactly how it happened and I needed some assistance with the camera and I asked my staff if they wanted to help me and, you know, told them they are certainly allowed to say no, you know. It’s not like I forced them to do it.
Jesse Gunarathan, on the other hand, seems to recall events more clearly.
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The explanation is that the staff members who made the campaign video did so on their own time, which is mighty charitable of them.
But doesn't it make it messy that Lee is now being spoken for by her campaign manager, who actually is the Minister of Broadcasting?
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Morning Report is a hoot today. Lee told a public meeting last night that the new overground route in Mt Albert would be good for the area because it would provide a barrier that would keep South Auckland criminals out of the area.
She's awesome.
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What about Owen McShane ...
Hilary ... don't .
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Yeah, and Helen Clark should have had a sit down with Ian Wishart and explained how wrong all his little conspiracy theories are... because she's a fraking moron who can't smell a set up.
For goodness sake Craig, it was relevant and she's answerable both as an MP and as someone whose company receives a million dollars a year of public money -- which is alleged to have been questionably used. She made an appointment to be interviewed -- and without explanation cancelled it.
Like I said, I have some sympathy with her, and the mere fact that her company makes an NZOA-funded programme is no big deal. But, even given the 3 vs One dimension, there were entirely reasonable questions she could and should have answered.
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