Posts by Chris Waugh
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
And trying to get myself back on topic: I heard about Oravida long, long before it showed up in the NZ media because I read Chinese. I knew more about Judith Collins visiting China by reading the Chinese media than by reading the NZ media. I've seen stories like this appear in Chinese then I've gone looking for anything in English and I've found lots of information, even press releases sitting un-copied-and-pasted on the Beehive website, but none in NZ's mainstream media. I understand pressure and deadlines and the time needed to get stories right, but I still can't help but feel Dirty Politics had so little an effect on the election because it was all too little, too late. There's plenty NZ's mainstream media could be doing to fulfill its old "speak truth to power" mission, but just isn't.
-
OnPoint: Sunlight Resistance, in reply to Andrew Geddis,
if you don’t vote, you can’t complain.
Oh, bollocks. Many of us are not allowed to vote. And not just us expats who don't get back to NZ often enough. Prisoners and under 18s and probably a few others, too. If you need an address to enrol, how do homeless people vote?
So, I didn't vote, like many, but you're not going to stop me complaining.
Oh, and what Bart said about numbers. 48% of the votes is considerably less than half the population.
-
China has negotiated supply agreements directly with European suppliers.
Suprise, surprise. During Fonterra's DCD and botulism scandals the Chinese media pointed out just how big a share of China's imported milk comes from NZ, and how big Fonterra is, and Sanlu...
All the comments to that article are very interesting.
-
Hard News: Five further thoughts, in reply to Farmer Green,
Synlait warns
Thanks. Interesting times.
-
Hard News: Five further thoughts, in reply to Farmer Green,
Behold ! I bring you tidings of great joy (sort of)
For subscribers only. I think the headline may be enough of a hint, though: Synlait profit up 70%, to take 25% stake in New Hope Nutritional, is that the one?
-
I see our sole party of government is sticking to the Big, Important Issues. Keep 'em doped with house prices and flags and TV...
-
Hard News: The sole party of government, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
But not everyone thought that voting should be secret. To many, the vote was not an individual right but an important ‘public trust’ granted to certain citizens to exercise on behalf of their community. Open (public) voting ensured that the holders of this trust were accountable to those who were excluded from the franchise – including, for example, women.
Interesting argument. No longer applicable, of course, unless under-18s want to hold their parents/guardians to account.
In 1858 Parliament introduced a new verbal voting system. Each elector was required to state the name of the candidate he wished to vote for out loud to the polling official. The official would then record the vote in a poll book, and the elector would sign his name alongside the entry.
This method, its supporters claimed, would at least require the elector to be sober enough to speak.
Now that's setting a high standard! Geez, if you're too drunk to speak, how could you handle a paper ballot?
-
Hard News: Five further thoughts, in reply to mark taslov,
Heh, at least moving from The Peoples Republic of China, your family aren’t going to have to make any an adjustment for things like media bias, corruption, unaccountability, mass surveillance, police brutality etc
Yeah, the way things are going, I'm wondering if we'll even notice the difference.
-
Not strictly relevant, but racism and xenophobia are an issue.
-