Word of the day

01/04/2024

Gegg – a hoax or trick; to play a hoax or practical joke.

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Sowell says

01/04/2024

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Quotes of the week

01/04/2024

Cancer patients don’t expect the royal treatment, but many deserve better than what New Zealand is able to offer today. Their lives, in some cases, depend on it. – NZ Herald

Unfortunately, yesterday was another example of there being almost no balance in the decision making, another example of New Zealand being handcuffed by unprecedented layers of bureaucracy. – Russell Coutts

I chose to destroy our boat, essentially. I am just glad no-one was hurt, that’s the main thing. – Tom Slingsby

Can the Herald get it into its head that this government is not doing “austerity”? It was not voted in to do “austerity”. Austerity is tax increases or spending cuts, or both, to reduce the deficit. Instead the National-led coalition was voted in to kick-start growth by doing “supply side” economics which is about tax cuts & spending cuts to reduce the size of government and decrease the deficit over time to pay down public debt. This argument is not “circular”. One of the world’s great authorities on such matters, the late US-Italian economist, Alberto Alesina, argued that in times like NZ is suffering, the government should signal our future course is one of lower taxes, otherwise no-one will want to invest here & the economy will go down the tubes. Furthermore, the Coalition is promising another strand of classic supply side economics – cutting regulations, which ACT’s David Seymour is in charge of.

After years of mismanagement by NZ’s Worst Finance Minister & Reserve Bank Governor Ever, whereby tax rose, spending rose, inflation rose, unemployment is rising & regulation skyrocketed, without falls in inequality & better public services, it’s not unreasonable for Kiwis to have kicked out Labour & supported National-ACT-NZ First’s platform of smaller government. The public did not vote for austerity whereby taxes would be further increased, or even held at current levels, together with spending cuts. Why doesn’t our Big Media not respect the will of the people?

The Herald should wake up to one of the few agreed-upon facts in economics, “In the long-run, it is a country’s capacity to produce goods and services that determines the standard of living of its citizens”, where capacity depends on labor, capital & technology. The new Coalition is improving incentives to produce by letting private individuals hang onto more of our money due to lower taxes and by cutting red-tape. That is what center-right wing parties have done for centuries. Its time our Big Media stopped arguing against supply-side policies just because the biased journo in question didn’t vote for them. This government is not an austerity government, OK? – Robert MacCulloch

‘Katrina Biggs

 It is increasingly difficult in commercial establishments to avoid amplified popular music; I had hoped that a used-book shop might be a last bastion of silence, but I was disabused. I had heard the future, and it was noise.

Such compulsory noise is not the only manifestation of modern British culture that has become like the nitrogen and oxygen of the air: so has vulgarity (nothing is specifically Scottish about it). This vulgarity is not a mere absence of refinement, such as has always existed among a section of any public, nor is it a satirical commentary on the overrefinement of a self-appointed cultural elite. On the contrary, it is a conscious, positive ideology: vulgarity as political virtue.  –  Theodore Dalrymple

Vulgarity’s great advantage is that it is within the reach of all; no effort is necessary to achieve it. Everyone can be vulgar and therefore politically virtuous. – Theodore Dalrymple

This determination to make the worst of oneself is now a mass phenomenon, almost obligatory in some quarters. That nature does not favor everyone equally is true and unfair; but a lack of dignity is, in most cases, a choice. This person’s mode of dress was a challenge to the world: you must accept me as I am without remark; you must notice how I look and fail to notice at the same time. I therefore demand of you a psychological impossibility. By assaulting you with my appearance and demanding that you accept, notice, and ignore it at the same time, I exert my power over you. – Theodore Dalrymple

’m not someone who has come up through the ranks. I’m not the sort of person to whom anyone is going to say, ‘in you come, we’ll make you the next Poet Laureate’. And that’s fine because today we read, think and write differently. The poetry world had become stagnant, people were reading the same poems at funerals that they had 100 years ago. – Donna Ashworth

You can never criticise me by saying that I write simply, or that I write for the masses – because I’m absolutely delighted by these things. – Donna Ashworth

It’s in the eye of the beholder. All that matters is – did you like it? Did it bring out something in you? If so, well, that’s good poetry. Can it be judged [critically] as good poetry? Well, who’s in charge? – Donna Ashworth

I wrote this without the intention of sharing. Just to heal my hurt. But I would like to offer something to a parent grappling with the initial stage of diagnosis. I hope that by reading this you find comfort, in some very small part, knowing that I am walking this rough road with you. Although it seems unfathomable at the moment, I want you to know it does get slightly easier. Along the road, I hope you know you will have support. Many times, from people and places that you don’t expect. I hope you will find love and kindness in that support, that gives you strength, even on days when you feel completely empty. – Isobel Willison

The other day, my grown son visited the doctor for a minor concern and was surprised when they didn’t charge him. Despite his offer to pay, they refused to accept it. Interestingly, I also went to the doctor for a minor issue, but was charged $80 for the brief ten-minute visit. The reason for this discrepancy is clear: I am a retired white man, while my son is a working man with brown skin, just like his mother’s complexion. We are a family divided by privilege based on our skin colour (race, or tribe). So, also, increasingly, is the entire country. – Gary Moller

When citizens abdicate their democratic duty, when the media abandons its responsibilities, when judges become political activists, when academics are intolerant of open inquiry, and when governments are subverted by an ideology – that is when a corporate tribal elite emerges to encircle the commons, that is to privatise what belongs to the public, to us the people, and to govern not in our interests but for themselves. It is in this way wealth & power are merged. 

I support the activities of those in civil society who value & engage in Maori language and Maori culture. 

A liberal civil society is where we meet in all our differences – indeed society is at its most creative when diversity is practised & enjoyed by everyone. 

To conclude Politics arises from civil society – from the various conflicting interests of people.  – Paul Mulvaney

Tribalism and democracy are incompatible. We can’t have both. 

Tribalism is based on principles of inequality whilst democracy is based on equality. 

Kin status is what matters in the tribe; citizenship is the democratic status. 

Tribalism is exclusive. To belong you must have ancestors who were themselves born into the system. 

Democracy by contrast includes people from all backgrounds. 

The matter of who is included or who is excluded touches all areas of New Zealand life. 

Many New Zealand families have members who are Maori and members who are non-Maori. 

If we wish to keep NZ as a liberal democratic nation then, as we derive our citizen rights from the nationstate, so we have a duty to ensure that the nation-state which awards those rights, remains democratic and able to do so.  – Paul Mulvaney

Hipkins’ 2026 Election Strategy is Already Obvious – he wants NZ to fail so he can argue asset taxes are the only way out (which will make things worse).  – Robert MacCulloch

Hipkins cunning plan is to argue that the only way public services can be restored and infrastructure fixed is by hitting the rich with asset taxes. For it to work, the country must languish these next three years. Hipkins is betting on NZ to fail in order for him to gain power. – Robert MacCulloch

Maorification has to be wound back. We aren’t a country of two cultures, but many. Proselytizing the notion that Maori are more than first settlers, and therefore entitled to extra rights and respect, must stop. Education might be a good place to start. As Sir Apirana Ngata always said, it was the key to Maori advancement. And it has to be done in an orderly fashion. Last week’s report that Kiwi school students were amongst the worst-behaved kids in the OECD, and that behaviour has significantly worsened over the last two years, is scary. Pinching others’ property and inflicting serious physical harm on fellow students, must be punished. Just standing students down from school won’t fix anything. Parents need to be held to account, especially since we pay them via the benefits they receive to look after their children. Again, details from schools about young offenders need to be married to the welfare benefits register so that errant parents are made to realise there are material costs if they fail to perform their duties. – Michael Bassett

For far too long we have had our otherwise massive potential cut down by minority interest groups. People striving for publicity for the narrow little lens through which they see the world and people intent on protecting their own interests. These people are everywhere in this country.

These people claim to represent the birds, dolphins, trees, marginalised communities and ethnic minorities. They are champions of bureaucracy, compliance, red tape and health and safety. They are against everything that the rest of us, the great majority of us, see as desirable or necessary.

You see, none of the above contribute anything substantive to our economic success on the world stage. That is left to our farmers, tourism industry operators, our entrepreneurs and our sportspeople, the latter group which incidentally includes our yachties. – Bruce Cotterill

Event managers in this country have been hamstrung for some time. But these issues also impact our property developers, entrepreneurs, our once-thriving film industry, our farmers and our tourism operators too.

It’s not a new problem. But it has been getting worse for a long time. – Bruce Cotterill

Our wilful bureaucracy is crushing our ability to get things done and with it, our spirit.

New Zealand is overburdened by minority groups who shout louder than the majority. Those minorities seem to be singularly focused on stopping things from happening. We seem to be better at coming up with reasons why we can’t do things than we are at coming up with reasons why we can.

And so it seems that the minorities, the greenies, the environmentalists, the socialists, the compliance officers, the protesters and the woke university activists are the people who decide what we, the majority, can do. They make the noise and they get the airtime. Even though they are often disproportionately supported by their friends in the broadcast media, their causes would seldom gain support from 10 per cent of the population, if asked.

But they make the noise. They stop things from happening. They call the shots.

Sadly, we have become beholden to these minority groups and to rogue individuals in positions of power. We have democratically elected mayors who can’t do what they want to do or need to do for their cities. In their way are organisations and individuals claiming that they are the victims and seeking to protect the tiny pedestal on which they stand. – Bruce Cotterill

You see, it’s not about the dolphins. It was never about the dolphins. It’s about minority interest groups and how much noise they can make. It’s about headlines. It’s about stopping things that the majority of us want.

Those on the opposite sides of these debates seldom stand up to them. The reality is that we’re too busy working at our day jobs, raising our kids, volunteering for the school or the surf club, and perhaps hoping to take the family to a weekend sporting spectacular that otherwise would only be seen on a TV screen. – Bruce Cotterill

In the meantime, we can’t have Taylor Swift concerts because they make too much noise and there will never be car racing at Pukekohe again. Christchurch took 10 years to agree to replace their stadium and Auckland can’t even make a decision to build one. Traffic management plans prevent us from hosting a major sporting event and Auckland Council can’t give permission for a harbourside grandstand from which to watch a yacht race.

And of course, we might never again entertain the remarkable young men and women and the spectacular flying machines of SailGP.

Perhaps we could host a chess tournament. – Bruce CotterilL

But the real issue here is that using mob rule to determine what events can and can’t go ahead is terribly arbitrary, it’s not consistent with the rule of law, and it encourages other groups to use the same undemocratic tactics – perhaps to shut down speech you want to hear.

We need a more principled approach that respects the freedoms of left and right, conservative and progressive. – Todd Stephenson

If protestors on either side of politics believe current laws are inadequate at protecting the rights of the vulnerable, they need to propose specific law changes that can be scrutinised and discussed.

And we need greater assurance from police that strategies are in place to protect existing rights to free speech and association, and that these strategies are applied evenly for New Zealanders across the political spectrum. – Todd Stephenson

Pisa surveyed 15-year-olds about classroom behaviour and found Kiwi kids were more likely than any kids in the OECD to report noise, disorder, and students ignoring the teacher. The kids complaining about it, are also the kids learning less, Pisa noticed.

The biggest problem is probably that teachers have lost the power in classes. Kids have it. And they know it. Teachers can’t touch them. – Heather du Plessis-Allan

There are countless examples of teachers being punished when the pupil really should be.

Like most things in this world, the problem is simple. School kids are not afraid of their teachers, authority and consequences.

So the solution is simple too, bring in consequences. Set a standard of acceptable behaviour. Back the teachers to enforce it. Stop riding the teachers’ arses when they try to do it. Ride the kids’ arses for misbehaving.

That way, our kids will learn maths not bad behaviour. – Heather du Plessis-Allan

We all tend to believe some things ahead of others.

But when the people advising councils find themselves unable to provide fair, balanced and impartial advice it matters to our democracy. – Hilary Calvert

It always matters to a democracy that those chosen to lead are provided with good, fair, robust and impartial advice.

It is particularly important in New Zealand at the moment, because we have a government that is changing the rules at the top, and staff who have been trying to make a difference in another direction at senior levels in local government.

Follow the rules. Stay in your lane.

That would be the best advice you could give local authority staff while they navigate what will be a bit of a rocky ride. –Hilary Calvert

A line has indeed been crossed, but it was crossed a while ago. Protests by the militant wing of the LGBTQ+ community are fine, but those opposing the Rainbow agenda will not be tolerated. It is a hate crime to oppose the Rainbow crowd, but good old freedom of speech and protest to vilify conservative speakers and punch their elderly supporters. The latter people are the ‘far’ right. They are recalcitrant antediluvian purveyors of hate who should be silenced “in our diverse community”. British conservatives now speak regularly of “two-tier policing”. I did not realise it had travelled here so swiftly. – Rex Adar

So 60% of taxpayers receive more in income support and benefits that they pay in tax. That leaves 40% funding those 60% and the vast majority coming from the top 10%.

It is a useful reminder we have a tax and welfare system which is already highly redistributive. – David Farrar

The “diversity, equity, inclusion” (DEI) movement is the wokerati’s provisional wing, the vehicle by which critical race theory, trans extremism and other post-modern garbage is taking over our lives. Many companies, as well as the public sector, have embraced DEI, wrongly believing that it demonstrates their anti-racism, and have tasked HR departments with indoctrinating employees in its precepts. Their efforts were condemned by Kemi Badenoch in an excellent article this week. DEI has failed to achieve any tangible benefits, but the waste of money is the least of our problems. 

Like other far-Left political projects, DEI is at once staggeringly low-grade and deeply Orwellian, perverting the meaning of words to bamboozle. – Allister Heath

I crave a world where race is irrelevant, and enthusiastically subscribe to Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” vision, where he hoped that his children “will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character”. Such a nation – meritocratic, fair, peaceful, prosperous, democratic and colour-blind – is what every Western polity should aspire to become.

But it is not what the woke revolutionaries are working towards. They reject King’s vision as naive at best, or complicit at worst: for them, racism is inherent to Western society, intrinsic to a world of “patriarchal” families, private ownership, free enterprise, the rule of law and free speech. It cannot not exist. Facts demonstrating that we are becoming more tolerant, marrying people of different races at record rates, or that many ethnic minorities earn more, on average, than white people are brushed away: to the woke stormtroopers, racism is axiomatically omnipresent.  – Allister Heath

Woke campaigners believe such pathologies are intractable features of Western nations – but not of those in other parts of the world – even when nobody actively discriminates against anybody. Studying and working hard is deemed to be a new opiate of the masses: social mobility is impossible for members of “oppressed” groups. 

Racism, to these semantically challenged activists, is an invisible power structure that can only be smashed via total revolution, by overthrowing capitalism, the “imperialist” international system and by imposing a gender revolution. DEI is one tool to achieve that, by transforming institutions from within and brainwashing employees. 

DEI is only interested in racial or gender diversity. It doesn’t really care about poverty, class or geography. It loathes diversity of thought; it preaches an imbecilic groupthink that can never be questioned. It denies the scientific method. – Allister Heath

The woke demand performative adherence to dogma, even when it is evidently contrary to reality, hence “Gays for Palestine” chanting pro‑Hamas and pro-Houthi slogans, even though both terror organisations are brutally homophobic, whereas Tel Aviv celebrates gay pride. Eliminating objective reality is every tyrant’s dream: citizens can no longer judge the validity of what they are being told.

Woke ideology encourages vicious discrimination against groups it deems to be oppressors – white heterosexual “cis” men, gender-critical women and the “white adjacent”. – Allister Heath

Crucially, woke advocates believe in “equity”, not “equality”. They don’t think individuals should be treated equally before the law, don’t support equality of opportunity, fail to endorse the presumption of innocence and don’t truly believe in individual rights. – Allister Heath

Instead, DEI advocates group “justice” that is at once unjust and inequitable, based on confiscation and redistribution. People don’t matter, only aggregate statistics. Individual merit counts for nought: DEI judges people solely on their membership of a tribe based on racial or sexual characteristics. This is a reversal of centuries of Western progress towards individual dignity, a rejection of Enlightenment ideals and a readoption of pre-modern group politics.

DEI is horrifically exclusionary, seeking to cancel anybody who fails to pretend to agree: it embraces the permanent inquisition, the auto-da-fé, excommunication and (metaphorically) burning heretics at the stake. – Allister Heath

Companies are being turned into arms of the Left, no longer focused on the profit motive but on achieving politicised aims. The Civil Service, having jettisoned impartiality, promotes controversial ideas, spending a fortune on useless schemes. – Allister Heath

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