Posts by Rob Hosking
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Nah. He got asked.
Not sure if the Rudd thing has made such a splash for the reasons you suggest. It seems to be more that its seen as quite titillating, with an election on the way and it is easier to talk about than, say, fiscal policy.
The only people who seem shocked by it, though, seem to be Australian journalists, which simply feels wrong.
There was a very loaded poll on one newspaper web site which asked whether Rudd's strip club visit was "in the national interest". An incredibly loaded queston.
At time of writing, over 50% said yes it was.
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Found, online, Private Eye's priceless editorial that week:
IN recent weeks (not to mention the last ten years) we at the Daily Gnome, in common with all other newspapers, may have inadvertently conveyed the impression that the late Princess of Wales was in some way a neurotic, irresponsible and manipulative troublemaker who had repeatedly meddled in political matters that did not concern her and personally embarrassed Her Majesty The Queen by her Mediterranean love-romps with the son of a discredited Egyptian businessman.
We now realise as of Sunday morning that the Princess of Hearts was in fact the most saintly woman who has ever lived, who, with her charitable activities, brought hope and succour to hundreds and millions of people all over the world.
We would like to express our sincere and deepest hypocrisy to all our readers on this tragic day and hope and pray that they will carry on buying our paper notwithstanding.
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I was about to go for a run - this was in the days when I did things like that - and there was a news flash that she'd been in a car accident.
My black-hearted cynical journalist's response was 'Brilliant PR move - wonder who thought of it?' and went for my run.
Came back and flicked on the teev to find she'd karked it. I did feel a bit guilty about my earlier thoughts, only not all that much.
I'd never really got what all the fuss was about anyway. Then when I saw the infamous TV interview (or the bits that made it to the news) I thought "you manipulative little trollop". Can't say I was that keen on Charles - "whining drip" was my response to his interview. Someone once put it very aptly that the two had each hired a gutter on either side of Fleet St and had leaked strategically into it for years.
Went into the Gallery on the Monday and the place was dead. Caught one person from the TVNZ office heading off for a long lunch: "there's only going to be one item on the TV news tonight, and it won't be coming from this" he said.
There was a dark suspicion amongst a number of us that Bolger or one of his ministers would try to bury some bad news that week: funnily enough, they didn't.
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My wife's mum (who is a great lady: no ma in law jokes here)
visited us recently to help out: she's a Shortie Street fan, and Claudia (my other half) is now hooked.So I see it, a bit. Not that I'm defensive about this or anything.
That's by way of preamble: I have a bet with Claudia the killer is a woman.
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And what the exchange rate does to things like petrol prices.
Oh, and interest rates. They've already de-coupled from the Reserve Bank's official cash rate, and if liquidity really becomes an issue they could go quite high.
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I always read Trotter's work or at least take a look at it, despite coming from the other side of the political divide.
The occasions I only glance at it are when he gets right into his more melodramatic type of writing.
Melodrama is always inaccurate. It relies on shining white good guys and big bad bogeymen. It is the same kind of thinking as produces the drive on too many of our news shows (and I use the word "shows" rather than "programmes" deliberately) to have a clear good guy and a clear bad guy.
(Unlike many on the centre-right, for example, I don't see Helen Clark as head of a villainous Stalanist Satanist lesbian cabal. She is much too smart to be that)
When he isn't being melodramatic, Trotter is one of our most perceptive political writers. The excerpt printed above makes me a bit less keen than I was to get this book.
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I've blogged about my favourite bastard here. The guy has since been killed - drink driving. A bit grim, although the story about him is funny in a slightly creepy way.
Favourite good bastard: a mate of mine, a fellow journo from my early days on provincial newspapers. He was a fairly enthusiastic party animal, but would - usually - be in at work at 7.55am regardless. If he wasn't, we'd know he was running behind and we'd phone him up.
he'd answer the phone with the words "yeah, I know. Can someone come and pick me up?"
He came in once after a particulaly intense party and had to go and interview a bloke who had had his house trashed by vandals. He's sitting in this guy's wrecked lounge, looking and feeling completely wrecked himself, and the guy is ranting about how anyone could do this, and how they were just animals, when he stops in mid-rant, looks very concerned at my mate, and says "your eyes - what have you been doing?"
My mate now teaches journalism. A credit to the profession.
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Idiot Savant wrote:
Some departments do have ideological positions on what sort of policies are best. But at the end of the day, it is their job to knuckle under to the Minister and do as they are told. And they do. Despite the scaremongering (and I know Labour was concerned about Treasury when they were elected in 1999), our public service understands that its role is to serve (or at least not be seen to be leading :)
The system works so well primarily because the SSC has spent a huge amount of effort preserving proper public service values against the changes of the 1990's. I'd rather not see it undermined.
Hear bloody hear!
It seems to me that as well as other more ethical advantages, democracy has a number of utilitarian strengths, one of which is the right to tell those in power things they do not want to hear. This applies not only in public debate but to private advice from a neutral public service.
That is important on top of the concerns a politically neutral public service was aimed at changing - corruption and incompetence.
Ministers get plenty of advice they don't necessarily like. I've got filing drawers full of stuff I have OIA'ed out of the Treasury and a great deal of it is advice to Cullen he might not have liked.
Some of it, he followed, some he didn't (and on a couple of papers there are comments where he has argued back). But you get better outcomes, (no, not perfect ones) from this sort of thing than you do from political hacks, who will only say what ministers want to hear and will in any case be much less competent because they are appointed for political reasons, rather than due to their ability.
And aren't partners of people involved in the political process allowed their own lives? I did a story four years ago after talking to a senior partner at one of our biggest law firms: she was highly critical of the then RMA amendment bill. Turned out she was Cunliffe's other half.
I didn't put that in the story, simply because I believed the criticisms should have stood on their own merits, and also because I feel politicians families are entitled to their own lives, and that they get enough shit anyway.
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Moswt fun job was as a clown in Auckland's Queen St one December when I was at uiniversity.
It was for a gift shop called 'Box-It' based in CML Mall. I was dressed in a clown face, red tights, a box around the middle, and with a box lid as a hat with baloons and streamers on.
The important thing here is I look nothing like a clown. A friend of mine at the time described me in the course of a university festival debate as resembing a slightly demented accountant. More recently, I've been mistaken, during select committee meetings, for a Treasury official . (not a oncer, this: it's happened three times).
It was an odd combination but it worked. I used to walk along looking as depressed as possible and trying to channel the spirit of Tony Hancock. Handed out flyers to kids who were throwing wobblies - they loved it and I used to get such grateful looks from the Mums. The pay wans't bad either.
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A couple of points on the health and insurancen issues as they relate to NZ.
The new-born baby with a stroke is pretty irrelevant not only for the reasons someone subsequently gave but because insurance companies don't cover new-born babies anyway. In the US - or here - you'd be whipped into public care. Rightly so.
As for wider insurance coverage...there's currently a review of the Human Rights Act rules as they apply to insurance cover. It's being run out of the Human Rights Commission. I think submisisons have closed: not sure about that, but some here may be interested.