Posts by Craig Ranapia
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Hard News: The First Draft, in reply to linger,
The really ironic thing is that back in the day, Brian himself was accused of being a “rude” interviewer of foreign celebrities such as Dr Christian Barnard (as described in Edwards’ autobiography The Public Eye).
You want an irony overdose, here's Brian Edwards’ rather less enraged and more usefully nuanced take on Simon Walker’s infamously tetchy 1975 interview with Muldoon.
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The audio of the Power interivew on Nine to Noon is now live.
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Hard News: What Now?, in reply to Sacha,
It’s a fair question. Unless you know something we don’t.
Nope – Power’s just been on Nat Radio and I’ve got to say his reasons and his explanation of the timing (the Rangatiki electorate AGM is next week and he didn’t think it fair to “lead them up the garden path”) sounds perfectly reasonable to me. Won’t stop the usual suspect cooking up knife fights in the Cabinet Room and drunken porn-watching marathons in ministerial hotel rooms though.. :)
Oh, and the equivalent (knowing you love those) would be more Maharey than Laban.
That actually is a better analogy, up to a point. Maharey was obvious really hit hard by the death of his partner, and who’d blame him for thinking a great job and getting home for dinner every night was more attractive? (But just for the record, Simon Power and his family are all in perfect health AFAIK. If I knew otherwise, wouldn’t be gossiping about it.)
I knew Simon casually back in my Young Nats days, and while he took his politics seriously he never struck me as the kind of person for whom a political career was the be all and end all of his life. See no reason to change my initial view of the man.
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Hard News: The First Draft, in reply to Martin Lindberg,
(Just to tie this up with the Almighty Johnsons.)
I so want to have your rationally impossible babies right now.
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Hard News: What Now?, in reply to giovanni tiso,
Meanwhile, Simon Power signs off. That’s a big loss for National.
Whatever disagreements I’ve had with the man here and elsewhere, he’s certainly more of an asset that one or two (dozen) seat-warming oxygen thieves I could – but won’t – name looking around the chamber.
OTOH, as Michelle Shocked puts it: The secret to a long life is knowing when it’s time to go. An OK song, but great advice more people (not just politicians) should follow.
And what does Power’s resignation at the upcoming election tell us about the politics of the senior cabinet?
It may tell us to buy oven mitts when Simon’s tell-all memoir hits the shelves. OTOH, it may tell us as much as Winnie Laban’s equally sudden resignation did about the state of the Parliamentary Labour Party. Who needs tiresome facts when the speculation is infinitely more entertaining? :)
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Hard News: What Now?, in reply to recordari,
There’s a couch in the corner with your name on it. The plush lounger of sanctimony.
No, it’s the bitter experience of being on the receiving end of racist and homophobic abuse from both those sewers. If David Farrar and Lynne Prentice want my respect, they can earn it like everyone else.
Then again, I don’t delude myself either gentleman gives a figgy fart what I think of them.
Fran O’Sullivan provides a more in-depth list of options for government to fund Christchurch earthquake recovery. Pretty balanced list; includes bonds, a low-tax zone for businesses in the Chch cbd, and reinstating an Auckland regional fuel tax.
Her colleagues Adam Bennett and Matthew Dearnaley focus on the government’s infrastructure projects and in particular the Auckland region’s transport ones.
Whatever they’re putting in the water at the Herald, I hope there’s a lot more of it in the basement. :) Though, I would cynically note the royal we in today’s editorial doesn’t seem to extend to calling on English to cancel the April 1 cuts in business tax, which I assume APN would benefit from.
Still, credit where credit is due.
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Hard News: What Now?, in reply to Tom Semmens,
The Craig bot strikes again.
@Tom: Do you actually disagree that if Cullen was still finance minister today the Kiwibog would have been throwing out enough methane to speed up global warming by a couple of decades? If so, +10,000 points for endearing naivete, but I don’t see any evidence to change my view that Kiwibog and the Sub-Standard are now, and ever shall be, substantial net contributors to anthropogenic global stupidity.
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Hard News: What Now?, in reply to stever@cs.waikato.ac.nz,
First, since I was one of the people who asked Russell to open this thread so we could get political without insensitively treading over other more reflective threads, I obviously think there is a time and place for politics. But we're also not pretending we're not doing it.
I’d say that when the deputy PM says that everything is on the table for discussion, though makes it clear some things are more on the table than others
Really? This is a lot less "clear' to me than it obviously is to you:
Mr English said in terms of income support the Government would continue to "protect the vulnerable" – a likely signal that cuts to Working for Families would be limited to those on high incomes. A highly placed Government source said advice from the Treasury included the option of a higher abatement rate on Working for Families payments, meaning those on higher incomes would receive less.
It could also tighten the eligibility criteria and examine ways to make the student loan scheme "more affordable", though this would not see an end to interest-free loans.
"Will there be radical changes? No," the source said.
And despite what some people are claiming, I've seen no evidence that English has explicitly ruled out deferring the April 1 business tax cut. Please correct me if I'm wrong., 'cause we're #biasedtoreality around here.
If we were in some Fringe-style alter-verse where Michael Cullen was still Finance Minister/Deputy PM, I'm sure he could say exactly the same thing as English and the Kiwibog would seething with assumptions that the God-damned Liarbore Dykeocracy was softening up the plebs for more envy tax. I'd still say that it might be worth rtaking a deep breath until there was something solid to argue about. IMO and YMMV, of course.
FWIW, I broadly agree with Bernard Hickey here. I'd even go a bit further and cynically (if, perhaps counterintuitively) argue that a small increase in the top personal tax rate and company tax, with a clear sunset clause and all income clearly ring-fenced for quake recovery, would not only be fair but good politics. It not only would drive the Kiwiboggers fucking insane, but while Labour and the Greens would argue it doesn't go far enough, they wouldn't vote against it.
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Oh dear, I think The Standard just made a funny:
I’m really pissed off that politics has come into the Christchurch earthquake so quickly.
Ah, yes… because there’s nothing “ideological” and “political” about deciding you already know what the evil Tories are going to do before they do it. Of course, it would have been just as “political” – and without an electoral mandate, which seems to be furrowing Peter Dunne’s brow this morning – if English had announced that every tax cut passed over the last decade was being reversed, in conjunction with increases in company and personal tax, but I guess it ain’t “political” or “ideological” if you agree with it.
FFS, I’ve come to accept that the Kiwibog-Standardista Axis of Hackery is what it is, but I wish they were a little less prone to projection. Or at the very least, if you're going to play politics own your shit.
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Hard News: Mind Blending, in reply to Megan Wegan,
That accent?
The whole bloody thing -- it's an epic masterclass in how not to make a romantic-thriller. Oh well, at least Depp and Jolie got a working holiday in Venice out of it.
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