Posts by Kerry Weston
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It's like you can have whatever version you want of a person these days - guess that's postmodernism for you, every version is valid for someone.
I agree that it's a cheap version of Maggie, designed to titillate the audience rather than shine a light on something more substantial. It gets very tedious, our Helen being judged on looks and femininity rather than her performance as PM, too. I'd really hoped we'd all advanced somewhat further in our thinking than that. I think the more neanderthal among us really do still find intelligence scary, especially in women.
Looking forward to seeing what Lindsay Duncan does with the role - excellent actor.
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I see the latest Listener trumpets its rise in readership, by 19,000 in the last year to 297,000 each week - fastest growth in current affairs category, according to Neilsen survey.
Sad to see RB go from it - horrified at -26% pay from start of tenure till end. You'd think with good growth figures, the pay rates would follow suit??
BTW, did anyone else see John Key on Moon TV last night - quite bizarre! Indulgent smile (I'm not really a speedo cop!) and missed the great opportunity to say something truly witty. Lange would have been in like Flynn.
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For me, as a mother, some of each POV rings true. It seems obvious, but bears repeating - life doesn't go according to plan. I did use contraception right up until I wanted a baby. I believed in one's right to choose abortion. Had a miscarriage, second wanted pregnancy was spina bifida. I was given the choice to have an abortion. It should have been an easy decision - knowing he would be paralysed from the neck down and other problems. It's never easy. The maternal drive kicks in bigtime. My baby died in utero and saved me the decision.
Do I still believe in the right to choose? Yes.
I have two fine sons now. And divorced. As Shep points out - society has little time for single parents. As half of all kiwi women will be single parents at some stage in their lives, this is not a small issue. That's alot of blokes being single dads as well.
The govt taxes child support payments from liable parents twice. The liable parent's income is taxed, then the child support payment is classed as taxable income for the recipient parent, so they get less WFF.
If two income families are struggling - how does anyone think single parent families are doing? To do the right thing and stand by your kids and bring them up well isn't actually supported. I often think that if I had dumped them on their father and gone to Aussie, my quality of life would be so much better - harsh but true. We're living in very judgmental, selfish times and children are suffering for it.
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ditto for the Guardian article. I heard some squawking on natradio yesterday about the Greens' notion to diversify away from mega-dairy. So, when the commodity price drops and transport cost rockets and Chinese dairy industry booms, where will we be?
I've got this terrible vision of a land dotted with cows and windfarms and scored with rivers of milk and sludge. -
Bassett's book will have to be viewed with a dose of scepticism because of his well-known allegiances, however, at least we know that in advance. The more interesting questions to me about the 4th labour government and , for that matter, the Muldoon years, are what did the other influential party members DO, or not do, about both situations? We snigger and roll our eyes about Muldoon, but he was allowed, or enabled, to continue.
Funny thing about anti-nukes - it's remembered with pride rather than actively touted these days.
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I'm late reading this, but hope you get my reply. This writing comp might be more your cup of tea:
The Royal Society of NZ Manhire Prize for Creative Science Writing, supported by the NZ Listener and Institute of Modern Letters at Victoria. There's an ad for it in the Listener, may 24-30, p. 45.
The theme is 'evolution', 2000-3000 words. Closes August 15.
those mysterious birds, the Strait. Stewart Island, it all reeks of primeval - jottings at the tea rooms? Go for it!
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Labour's had nine years to redress the Richardson Bludge a Beneficiary Budget - it chose not to. Blind to the lobbying from Child Poverty Action Group and many others about the consequences of poverty (and I define poverty as the inability to partake meaningfully in society becoz you simply can't afford to), Labour have abandoned the bottom tiers of society. I prefer to think of them as the foundation. We all know what happens to buildings with shaky foundations.
The Maori Party are the only ones who've addressed what the Budget failed to deliver to the Real Strugglers and the only ones talking sense about life in the suburbs everyone prefers to ignore. I wonder how many disillusioned voters, like me, vote for Maori Party candidates if they run in general seats?
As for the pinko-lesbo taunts flung at HC & co - I always laugh, with an edge of despair. The wimmin have presided over a regime that has seen working class women loaded down with ever more paid & unpaid work and responsibility. Their reward is a lifestyle no better than my mother enjoyed, in mid 20thC in a state house as a stay at home mum. At least she had some time to call her own.
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As to how long it would take to lay underground fibre/cost over-runs...I heard a chap on natradio talking about China - they have built a 32km bridge from Shanghai to an island in just 18 months.
Where there's a will there's a way and all that. I dunno what it is about this country that we piss around so much over infrastructure, meanwhile the costs escalate - Transmission Gully, a better Harbour Bridge.
Maybe those 1800 Chinese workers we're getting can get on with the job.
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For one glorious moment i thought I had a hallucinogen in my garden....
Been collecting & growing salvias for ages, but no...apparently s. divinorum rarely produces viable seed & has to be grown from cuttings or layering. bugger. I'm betting some collectors will have it tho.Cracks me up how folks on here never claim they didn't inhale.
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I think the elected mayor concept just encourages egotripping assholes (it's just the same in the UK)
the horrifying Boris....should i read his first novel "Seventy two Virgins" I wonder??
I can't fathom how he won. Surely it isn't just becoz he's a famous dickhead. Hope it's not becoz voters are so disillusioned they vote in any old prat.