Posts by Steve Withers
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Can't resist sharing "SXEPHIL"...Phil Defranco, a 22yo YouTube personality of note.
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OK...so you can't just post the embed code....Hmm. Preview was correct.
Let's try the naked URL.
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One of my favourites on YouTube is (somewhat profane and irreverent) Melbourne Comedian: Sean Bedlam.
He's currently featured on YT in response to the Rachael Ray farce. Rupert Murdoch even gets a mention!
[Code removed, see below for video –Ed.]
Also worthy of note was this blog post including a photo of John McCain's daughter also dressed like a terrorist.
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MikeE: You can do what you like with substances and your body.
But if you have kids or other dependents, I'd expect you to think about more than just what you want. If you're single, alone and no one cares what happens to you - yeah, go for it. Do whatever you want. No one cares and no one is depending on you for anything.
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I heard Sabin on Morning Report this morning. It seemed to me to be good knee-jerk stuff, akin to methods tried and failed decades ago. Sure to appeal to people "concerned" about the issue, but not concerned enough to take the time to be adequately informed. It's one more play to those who presume more and better coercive power is the answer to every concern.
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One last comment. I've worked in Corrections, on the floor in a prison. I've seen a lot of sensational un-information about Corrections over the years from both the media and - sadly - cynical polititians.
The way the media - especially editorial writers and columnists - have cover the state sector is often simply poor. Cynical politicians of any stripe often talk rubbish about "bureaucrats" by the column-foot and it is often left unaddressed by anything resembling reality.
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Craig: The biggest waste I see in the public service is the apathy and disillusion that creeps in after years of being publicly kicked around like a football. Peopel begin to feel it doesn't matter what sort of job they do, some politician is going to crap on them anyway...and too often from a position of willful ignorance for political advantage.
That is a serious cost to taxpayers and it is directly caused by media and politicans' beatups. Even there, there would be a lot of good and reliable hard working people who have been tainted by association.
The number of genuine scandals like in Immigration is small compared to the number of beatups like this HNCZ conference thing.
There is a real cost to denigrating public servants. You risk having them turn up for work but not actually motivated to do any......I wish National actually understood what makes people tick. They prove over and over that they don't. Not really.
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Any HR person in a national organisation will tell you how important it is to keep the key people in the organisation on the same page and working together. People get to know each other. Skills and knowledge are shared and everyone wins. The result in smoother operation and greater efficiencies more than pays for itself.
White at IBM and AT&T, I used to attend conferences all over NZ, in Australia, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan. I never once heard a shareholder carping about the cost or the media highlighting waste. I was able to make contacts within the organisation that aided me hugely in my work inside a big, complex orgnisation.
What we are seeing here is one of the standard tools in the media's election year bag of tricks. It's a waste of print.
National has just told every Kiwi who knows the how and why of these things that it either doesn't understand investing in your people or it doesn't care and will use them as pawns in a political game.
Put it this way. Where does national stand on investing in the people of New Zealand? Let's look at the list:
They made tertiary education a private asset, leaving students in professional courses with mortgage-sized debts, forcing many to go overseas as debt-refugees. Labour has not fixed this.
They wiped apprenticeships. Cheaper to import skills than train our own people.
They opened up markets and allowed industries to be destroyed without spending $1 on aiding the retraining displaced workers.
With a track record like that its fairly clear that National sees NO value in investing in the people of New Zealand, or this history would be a very different one.
The bitching about this conference is just tip of the iceberg.
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I first heard about fiscal drag in the early 1970s in Canada. It isn't an ideological issue. Every government either allows it to happen or plans on it. The answer would be to index tax brackets based on some independent assessment of wage rises over time. Can't use price inflation as wages may not be keeping up.
Does anyone know any a government anywhere, of any political stripe that DOES automatically adjust income tax rates?
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Kyle: I can agree with you on one level. The mechanics of daily life do eat up a lot of time and energy and that is how the world works for most people. But from another perspective, it is a 'hedgehog' view of the world, plodding along on the path in front of you while things you aren't aware of approach and threaten to make you roadkill on the highway of life. On THAT level, most people don't understand the how, what and why of things like local councils or national governments making changes that can turn their lives inside out ultimately.....and they didn't know about it. They don't read the Public Notices. They have no idea what is swirling around them everyday as they go about the life you describe.
If what I am saying is wrong in your town, tell me where it is and I'll move there. :-)Angus: It's a self-serving referendum. National would be the primary beneficiary of any resulting change. We have democracy now and they don't like it. As for the EFA, I can say anything I like and plan to. I have no fear whatever of being prosecuted. What I can't do is amplify my speech in favour of any party with a million dollars. That undermines fairness. Democracy is about votes, not money. or should be.
If you want to be exempt from the EFA, just buy or start a newspaper, radio or TV station. You can say what you like all day long and no one can stop you. Give away free copies on Thursdays - or every day - (with partisan editorials and copy) as a marketing ploy to improve circulation. Put one in every letterbox in New Zealand. No restrictions. EFA is irrelevant. Fill it with good news about the parties you like and bad news about the rest. You're the media. You have a free pass. No law to stop you. Unfortunately, at present, the only people who enjoy this exemption from the EFA are small number of foreign billionaires and overseas banks who own almost all the daily newspapers, commercial radio and commercial TV in NZ.
If you want "freedom of speech" for the already wealthy and powerful so they can drown out your own voice, pass them this tip. I'm assuming you don't have the money to do this yourself. :-)