Posts by Phil Wallington
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This is a great piece from Keith and an incisive dissection of our problem. Those who follow the investigative journalistic dredging of the swamp of NSW corruption would know of SMH journalist, Kate McClymont and her work exposing the Obeid family's decades of dodgy political dealings. Would that we has someone doing a similar job here and being backed by the financial and legal resources of Fairfax Media. Phil Kitchin (our last print journo dedicated to investigative work) has left the building and gone over to Ministerial PR for Paula Bennett. I was having a discussion with some old colleagues last evening and we were pondering the dearth of defamation writs against journalists, particularly those covering politics. Muldoon was always quick to sue and the Forth Labour Government turned it into a collective art form. The writs fell like autumn leaves in the wake of the questions raised in "For the Public Good". Nowadays none of the politicians need the defamation laws to stifle probing inquiry. It simply isn't happening. The investigative specialists and the passionate diggers and delvers have gone. There is now no money or appetite to fund and sustain such work. So journalists are mostly just churning out sausages and PR people are dictating the quantities, the flavours required and the recipes for making them. It will only get worse as attention spans shorten and collective memory forgets what good investigative work could do.
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Kills and Moon... was it a full moon that brought out the killer instinct?
Whatever... the show is a steaming pile of crap and even the most gullible must find it hard to discover anything good, i.e. a star might be born from the process.
X Factor time is time to reach for a good book... even if you still do move your lips when you read it. -
Key increasingly resembles one of Uri Geller's spoons. Joyce is more closely identified with a box of loose bedsprings.
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Hard News: CWC 2015: Contains graphic horror, in reply to Rob Stowell,
NZ freelance technicians.. camera, sound, floor managers, technical producers and directors etcetera have been sidelined. Our crews are cheap as almost every freelancer is still working on decade old rates and sucking it up to stay in the industry. A decade or so ago we were undercutting other countries e.g. Australia and our crews were being referred to as talented "white Mexicans", willing to work long hours for meagre wages.
It is a pity these is no strong union to speak out... and a greater pity that almost no one in Parliament gives a rat's arse. -
Speaker: Sex with the office lights on:…, in reply to Sacha,
There were physical scars... carpet-burn... but no pictures.
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I blame technology. This would never have happened if all that was available was a public pay phone. Then again I am sure that the occasional phone box was used for "immoral purposes".
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Access: Review: Where is Autism?, in reply to Hilary Stace,
Isn't is disgusting and disgraceful that school libraries are an optional extra... something Bill English likes to describe as "nice to have but not essential". Aotearoa is a rich country which can afford bloated salaries for politicians and their ilk and obscene rewards for money-shufflers, corporate criminals (yet to be detected), millionaire yachties and movie moguls. That list could become very long. Perhaps a little of our money realised through the underhand privatization of state houses could be used to help poorer kids get something good to read
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Hard News: Word of the Year 2014: #dirtypolitics, in reply to Raymond A Francis,
He has taken the complete case of piss... 12 bottles, no less. Turkeys like these fear ridicule more than Christmas.
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Barfoot & Thompson CEO, Paul Thompson, as quoted in NZ Herald…
’Thompson encouraged first-home buyers to “forgo something if you really want to progress”.
“They still want to go out on a Friday and Saturday night and have a good life as well as most probably have Sky TV,” he said..
OK than… just keep on sucking up the pathetic wages, tax your taxes and GST on fuel, food and everything else. Keep paying the student loans, try living without a car in a city where public transport is spotty at best. Suck up the shit offerings on Freeview and if you still have a B&W TV, watch that (it is good for the reinforcement of self discipline). Oh and pay the rent to some latter Peter Rachman who probably manages his portfolio through the aforesaid Barfoot & Thompson.
If you listen to Key, English, Nick Smith and Paula you must know that poverty is a simple lifestyle choice. Don’t have kids until you can afford them… blah… blah… blah.
The fact is this is what New Zealanders opted for when Sir Roger, Richard Prebble and the rest of the carpet-baggers came to town. You voted for this again at the last election folks. As long as money is the measure of all things – including individual human worth – it will only get worse.
Welfare is for rich folks. so Hollywood, the America’s Cup Team, Greedy Banks and former utility companies benefit from state largesse. The last state houses will be sold and soon. . Merry Christmas to all and God Bless Tiny Tim.
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“No more sleaze. No more cash for questions. No more lies. No more broken promises. I say to the Tories: enough is enough! Be done, be gone!”
Tony Blair 1996.
That's what Labour needs to say... and, of course, to live up to the rhetoric -- unlike Mr. Blair.