Posts by mark taslov
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Hard News: Five further thoughts, in reply to Marc C,
You’re damn right Marc. I had to switch off Maori TV election coverage because one of the commentators insisted on referring to him only as “The German”. That’s a piss poor effort. I agree with everything you have said. It’s disgraceful. New Zealand is a nation of immigrants who usurped the indigenous people (who were also immigrants). 20th century bigotry has had it's time in the sun and it's time New Zealand grew the fuck up.
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Hard News: The sole party of government, in reply to Steve Parks,
What’s your take on why they lost it Steve, or why they didn’t win?
Currently 5,566 people have signed this petition declaring they think the election was rigged.
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Hard News: The sole party of government, in reply to Steve Parks,
Thanks Steve, I can feel how “they hadn’t determined” would be a bridge too far for most. During the campaign Cunliffe said ‘a month’ as I recall, but with that it’s still always going to favour those who can sell within the window: slow market-tax!
Another problem I have is as is the case with most tax that the rich find a way to avoid it while the poor aren’t capable and the more taxes the Government introduces, the more ways rich people can find to evade them. So I’d far rather see a more aggressive top income tax bracket that can’t be exploited by trusts than any new taxes that could be applied to the lowest rungs of society, because it’s always the lowest rungs who get dealt the shit hand, with any new tax introduced. Increase duty on European cars and you can guarantee that money is coming from the 1%.
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Hard News: The sole party of government, in reply to Katharine Moody,
36 hectares with livestock would be hard work, I don't know how I'd live with the whole animals as units thing, but I respect the work, it's the work of our ancestors, the work of humanity. One thing I didn't really take into account the other day, is that yes, if you have kids, then this whole surveillance revelation is obviously going to be far more cause for worry. But on that note, very little has or will change ever, at least change is so incremental that you'd never notice it anyway with the occasional skip, or in alternative histories the whole bar was shaken up as happened with the Maori. But in terms of these changes, for generations we've adapted, we lived in houses we built with our hands until as some point we were forced to sign the deed with the local authority, that's a form of surveillance. Or in the case of the heavy-handed enforcement of copyright legislation (KDC), in the past there was next to nothing to copy, music was what we played and sang amongst ourselves, we still have the freedom, but most people would rather flip on their isong or whatever it is the kids are buying.
And then there's communications technology like telephones and the radio, and of course people have been tapping phones for decades and who knows what's been happening to our phone calls since digital audio technology came of age in the 70s. We've been shunted through schools and universities, writing essays expressly for the NZQA, people have been transcribing and illustrating their whole lives onto websites owned by huge corporations. And in all this time, over the last however many thousands of years our standards of living have improved, we have access to great healthcare, education, technology, entertainment and really, for quite a long time now, it's hard to argue that all these luxuries we enjoy have been anything but sanctioned by the powers that be on the one proviso that we don't pull a Mao Zedong.
But things are less equal now than in the past century it seems, these new fortunes have arisen to keep the dynasties in Amani for centuries. And yet still, our problem is not that we are starving or thirsty, our problem is that we are bloated, and cynical and still ever fearful of change. Veges still grow in the soil, water falls from the sky and the sun still shines, but we'd rather sit online cruising cat pics and sipping milkshakes. I don't think we're heading into tyranny as much as we are heading towards idiocracy (check the movie if you haven't). That is if we haven't already arrived. -)
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Hard News: The sole party of government, in reply to Katharine Moody,
Yeah it’s not bad for disappearing in, outside the centres, off the strip, life hasn’t changed much in my lifetime. Sure people have got poorer, but in many ways it’s relative and more importantly in terms of the head space you get, well that remains quite a desirable attribute of New Zealand for me. Beyond the prospect of accumulating millions of dollars I never really got the whole urban migration thing, move to paradise and become an accountant or whatever in a city run by caucasian stiffs with a predilection for everything our ancestors left behind. Just give me a menial job, a vege garden, some fruit trees, a community to volunteer in and I’ll potter away to my hearts content. And believe it or not I feel much better about the place knowing that their spying than just suspecting it.
When I lived there, I felt a lot of negativity, people looking down on me for my haircut or my accent, the way I walk, my typos or my confounded +crocs+. That’s a race no one wins, but having been out of that conditioning for years I no longer give a fuck, and I feel I can see quite clearly the benefits from the bullshit. New Zealand; great place if you know how to get there.
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OnPoint: "Project SPEARGUN underway", in reply to krothville,
Yeah, and while the mood on this thread remains light and not inconveniently over-condescending, Keith, you've had a while to read through the articles, interviews etc, what are your thoughts?
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Hard News: The sole party of government, in reply to Michael Homer,
Yes, my issue there is purely the CGT’s lack of oversight with regards to liquid assets, the various workarounds that might enable, and the enhanced access the wealthy have to financial manipulation. Sorry I was doing a fair bit of editing as I was writing so things mightn’t have quite landed when you read them. And sorry I missed your first response earlier, I’m high on meth. Thank you for your assistance Michael. Thanks Ben.
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No. It was already paid (if applicable) when you sold whatever got you the cash
I am now comfortably dead. That was my family home you’re talking about, I moved into a rest home, there is no CGT on family homes, so I sold my family home before I died so the family member could inherit pure untaxed cash,
but if I had died before selling the home, then the CGT would have had to have been paid when my family sold my (their 2nd) home? So it’s a tax on me inopportunely dying before having liquidated the asset?
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Hard News: The sole party of government, in reply to Katharine Moody,
and more to do with FATCA and the TPP
Yep, on that note, I'm concerned to. I have friends who are dedicated to finding out what's going on and in no way does the future look bright.
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Hard News: The sole party of government, in reply to Michael Homer,
except in this actual case, because they only take it when you realise the gain, not when you die
No I got that much thanks, the issue is that some things seem to be exempt and some don’t, So what I’m having trouble understanding is; if a property is sold before death, are capital gains payable on the proceeds or other inheritance such as collections which may have been bought with the proceeds? If so how are Capital Gains calculated on money generated in a lifetime?
I do hope that is clear, I am here, no 3rd person necessary.