Posts by Steve Barnes
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Hard News: Not yet standing upright, in reply to Evan Yates,
.or is it a mutant kangaroo? ...or a T-Rex?
It looks more like a Kangaroo to me but it seems to have a horn on its head so not a T Rex but that could be an ear so...
I am good at these things, I used to do the same thing with the patterns on the backs of the school bus seats, thought it was just me.
Anyway, as Ian says the file is Dino.jpg so the artist meant it to be a dinosaur but isn't that good at drawing them. ;-) -
Hard News: To have a home, in reply to Deep Blue,
Perhaps we're looking at it through different eyes.
Mine may be considerably older.
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Meanwhile, over at the Herald....
a little girl writes
Smally's article on this subject is quite enlightening in it comments. The usual suspects spew their vile hatred and blame the lefties for spending their "hard earned money" on those despicable refugees that just want to invade our perfect country.
Comments are now closed on that debate, must have gone the wrong way for those that like to pretend NZ is still a good and caring country. -
Hard News: To have a home, in reply to TracyMac,
And if you think this site is vehemently anti-Labour
It never was but over the past few years it has moved in that direction.
Pointing out that Labour wasn't perfect adds nothing to the situation other than diluting the disgust at National and John Key in particular.
What it tells me is that the constant cries of "Labour did it" from the Right are beginning to become the normal response to anything negative, it is becoming a meme and it is hurting our democracy. -
Good grief, I knew it was getting bad here but this takes the cake.
the less savoury elements of the Labour government's Immigration Act
Using this situation to put down Labour is the lowest this blog has got.
Why you even felt it was worth going there is beyond me.
You are preaching to the choir here, we are the compassionate ones, yet you use the occasion to attack the Party with more humanity. -
Making people aware of the "damage" being done to the country by National would increase the number of people voting, whether the damage was real or imagined would not make any difference to this. Telling people how much "damage" would be done by Labour and the Greens would not make much difference to voting numbers.
Reasoning for this is that doing nothing, in the latter case, allows people to think doing nothing means no change, whereas the former instils a desire for change therefore a desire to vote.
I would submit that most elections are lost rather than won... if you see my point.
I am sure any of you could come up with numbers for this, I just use inspired guesswork and an unfailing knowledge in all things, in my mind's eye, thus I am rarely wrong, apart from that time I thought I had made a mistake, I was wrong then. -
Hard News: Not yet standing upright, in reply to daleaway,
I believe the ghost of what's left of the Government Printer (which subsequently became GP Print, part of Blue Star) was sold to Australians in 2012.
I couldn't find that yesterday but yes I remember now, cheers.
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Hard News: Not yet standing upright, in reply to ,
Piggy Muldoon made people so angry that they eventually voted for the next best thing.
Now you are spoiling for a fight.
Muldoon left the country virtually bankrupt.
The "Next Best Thing" as you put it, was the Lange government, the 4th Labour Government. They gave us our Nuclear Free legislation before being hijacked by Roger Douglas, a secret right wing monetarist who's stint as fundraiser for the Party sold us out to the "Free Marketeers" Fay, Richwhite and the Devil himself. (not to be confused with the "Three Musketeers" Athos, Porthos, and Aramis or Huey, Duey and Louie for the Warner Bros. version).
Then the shit hit the fan and we had to pay off Muldoon's Debt...
And this happened...
Asset Sales
The floodgates opened and the Rich and the White got richer and whiter.
Is it any surprise that a National Government wants to change the branding?. -
Hard News: Not yet standing upright, in reply to Ian Dalziel,
The Rank Organisation?
Would you like a gong with that?Govt Printer or whoever owns that...
Funny you should mention that....
Rank's next big move was the purchase of the Government Printing Office for $23 million.
The acquisition was due to be settled on January 31, 1990, but payment was delayed five months.
This had a positive impact on Rank because it had control of Government Printing for five months before it had to pay for the company.
The sale attracted considerable controversy.
Fay Richwhite valued the company at $71 million and it had a book value of $44 million, $21 million above Rank's purchase price.
A select committee inquiry into the sale concluded it had been poorly handled. A Herald editorial said "taxpayers are entitled to feel aggrieved about the way this asset sale was handled".
Hart took advantage of the botched process.
He isn't the only businessman to have benefited from the Government's poorly conceived and badly run asset sales programme.
Government Printing had a huge impact on Rank's earnings and share price. Net profit rose from just $1.1 million in the 1989 year to $10.4 million in 1991 and Rank became one of the sharemarket's best performers.
It should be noted that a "J.Arthur" was rhyming slang at the time.
ETA..
A little disingenuous of me really because it wasn't that Rnk, it was This one -
Hard News: Not yet standing upright, in reply to Joe Wylie,
The initial shortlist of 20c piece designs for NZ's first decimal currency.
I quite like the one with the woman doing the washing. So apt for the time.
