I no longer get the Herald at Marmite soldier time and my reading of this waste of trees is now somewhat erratic. Didn't glance at it at all yesterday. Or so I thought when I picked up what I thought was today's edition only to find myself wading through Monday stuff. The cunning ratbags have stopped colouring the Green Pages and so I tripped unwarned over an item about an American Walking evangelist.
This has every ingredient a looney left weird beard story could hope for - you couldn't have made it up better. This nutter (a walking guru, no less) is pictured striding down Auckland's streets clad in one of those jackets that has a million external pockets telling the world you are either a wannabe fly fisher or a very keen photographer. To be fair I think he was the latter in an earlier life. He is accompanied by his wife who looks very earnest and tofu powered shod in sensible shoes. Fruitloop has been bought to NZ by Land Transport New Zealand to lead seminars and address the national Walking Conference in Auckland next week. We have a national Walking Conference? I bet that's a thrill a minute. Seminars on the relative merits of starting a stroll with the left or the right foot. Breakout session on blisters. The trade exhibition with vast selections of shoelaces. Can't wait.
I'll quote a few things this bloke has already said mainly when speaking to the Waitakere Council - what a surprise. They are in no particular order and I don't know which of them is the most stupid.
"I personally am delighted with the price of oil - I couldn't be happier." I fail to see how anyone can say that. Oil (and all forms of power come to think of it) should be free for God's sake.
"Cars made things so easy in the early days that we didn't focus on rebuilding our cities, so only now are we beginning to realise how important that focus is." Now that doesn't even make any sense from a grammatical point of view let alone being totally unfathomable. First motor car was built in about 1905 or so and I'm pretty sure man had some pretty sizable conurbations by then.
"I think we are going to have Victory gardens, and people saying: I'll start with one day a week without the car, within a month go to two days without it and then, by the third month, I'll figure out some shift in my lifestyle where the car is now the luxury - it's not the necessity."
So he's really lost it. Victory gardnes? My Dad used to tell me about these. Featured in the same stories were gas masks an Anderton Shelters. A day a week without a car? Well you can sod off, sunshine. If you think I am walking from Dairy Flat to Takapuna once a week you can think again. And regarding a 390 bhp supercharged 4 litre V8 as anything less than one of life's essentials is the sort of thinking that gets you taken away by the men in the white coats.
Anyway there is loads more of this tosh but the general thrust is that we should all give up our cars, walk everywhere, become healthier, happier and the planet will be saved as a by product. This is coming from an American for heaven's sake. Have you been to America? You could no more use a pair of stout boots as your primary mode of transport than he could have walked from Seattle to Auckland - there's the small matter of the Pacific Ocean in the way if you care to consult a map. All American shopping now happens in malls about twenty miles out of the towns and these shopping paradises are surrounded by car parks the size of a small country. In case you hadn't noticed, Mr American Fruitloop, your mob lives in their cars.
So we have to put up with being lectured by some Septic who has been flown here in a gas guzzling 747 at my expense (he's being bankrolled by tax payer money) on how we should start walking everywhere. I don't think so.
I would suggest Mr Looney Walkalot walks to Cape Reinga and just keeps going.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Sunday, July 27, 2008
The ETS - an Aussie view
John Clarke is a very funny man. He has done a whole swag of 'interviews' with Bryan Dawe taking the piss out of many things and top of his hit list is Australian politics. There are many when he was interviewed as John Howard. This, of course, no longer cuts it and he now has to be Kevin Rudd.
This is Kevin explaining the Emissions Trading Scheme. Not a bad effort for a subject that struggles to attain the heights of being a crock.
Clarke and Dawe talk about the carbon scheme
This is Kevin explaining the Emissions Trading Scheme. Not a bad effort for a subject that struggles to attain the heights of being a crock.
Clarke and Dawe talk about the carbon scheme
Saturday, July 26, 2008
As long as three rainy days
Blogs are repositories of opinion and one (read me) has to be careful not to regard them as surrogate newspapers. However on such a dire morning as today has offered up I have found myself persuing indoor pursuits instead of my normal habit at this time of the week, that of ruining a good walk by taking along a set of golf clubs.
Spent a couple of hours finishing off a couple of DVDs a good mate lent me for the weekend. These, I will admit, are an acquired taste being video transcripts of the 25th European Therapeutic Endoscopy Symposium held in Brussels last year. All the megastars were performing making the very difficult look absurdly easy although I was a little disappointed that Horst Neuhaus didn't make the editor's cut. I reckon he is the Renaldo of the endoscopy world at the moment. It is interesting how the megastars whose mastery of skills one aspired to get even close to are no longer invited to these meetings. You become yesterday's man in this field as in any other. John Snow supplants F S Truman, Richie McCAw moves into Michael Jones place and Sergio Garcia replaces Greg Norman. So Paul Fockens gets the invite in front of Nib Soehendra, and a bloke you've never met from Milan sits up the front the plane instead of Jerry Waye. However that is the way of life and even if you are yesterday's man form is temporary and class is permanent. Greg Norman came perilously close to winning the British Open last week and I would still be more than happy having Soehendra fiddling around in my common bile duct.
Having had enough of mainlining therapeutic endoscopy I wasted a wee while in the Blogosphere. I am a regular visitor to Kiwiblog for an acceptable right wing view of the world (David Farrar used to be a Bolger staffer after all) and there is a reasonable synopsis of opinion regarding the farce that is the Peters scandal (and it is no less than that) from newspapaers up and down the land. I think it is just a matter of waiting now as there cannot be much life left in the corpse of Peters' political career surely. He is acting true to form with bluster, aggressive name calling and ridicule but I can't see it washing this time. Picking a fight with Bob Jones was not a good move. Sir Robert has this morning accused Winston of blatant lying. Hard to come back from that and I can't see Peters using the courts to sue him as a tactic this time.
OK the next place to go for a bit of right wing bile and vitriol is Whaleoil's place. Cultured and civilsed this blog is not. Slater will punch your lights out and then ask questions of the remains. Good enjoyable stuff and I go back on a regular basis because his dislike of the left borders on rabid hatred even more than mine does - just. Mr W is very good with the little pisstake videos and has been known to turn his hand to using one of Adobe's products. I am grateful to the large marine mammal for the following picture. Not his best Photoshop effort from a technical point of view but it is brilliant.
If you don't understand it you are far too young.
Spent a couple of hours finishing off a couple of DVDs a good mate lent me for the weekend. These, I will admit, are an acquired taste being video transcripts of the 25th European Therapeutic Endoscopy Symposium held in Brussels last year. All the megastars were performing making the very difficult look absurdly easy although I was a little disappointed that Horst Neuhaus didn't make the editor's cut. I reckon he is the Renaldo of the endoscopy world at the moment. It is interesting how the megastars whose mastery of skills one aspired to get even close to are no longer invited to these meetings. You become yesterday's man in this field as in any other. John Snow supplants F S Truman, Richie McCAw moves into Michael Jones place and Sergio Garcia replaces Greg Norman. So Paul Fockens gets the invite in front of Nib Soehendra, and a bloke you've never met from Milan sits up the front the plane instead of Jerry Waye. However that is the way of life and even if you are yesterday's man form is temporary and class is permanent. Greg Norman came perilously close to winning the British Open last week and I would still be more than happy having Soehendra fiddling around in my common bile duct.
Having had enough of mainlining therapeutic endoscopy I wasted a wee while in the Blogosphere. I am a regular visitor to Kiwiblog for an acceptable right wing view of the world (David Farrar used to be a Bolger staffer after all) and there is a reasonable synopsis of opinion regarding the farce that is the Peters scandal (and it is no less than that) from newspapaers up and down the land. I think it is just a matter of waiting now as there cannot be much life left in the corpse of Peters' political career surely. He is acting true to form with bluster, aggressive name calling and ridicule but I can't see it washing this time. Picking a fight with Bob Jones was not a good move. Sir Robert has this morning accused Winston of blatant lying. Hard to come back from that and I can't see Peters using the courts to sue him as a tactic this time.
OK the next place to go for a bit of right wing bile and vitriol is Whaleoil's place. Cultured and civilsed this blog is not. Slater will punch your lights out and then ask questions of the remains. Good enjoyable stuff and I go back on a regular basis because his dislike of the left borders on rabid hatred even more than mine does - just. Mr W is very good with the little pisstake videos and has been known to turn his hand to using one of Adobe's products. I am grateful to the large marine mammal for the following picture. Not his best Photoshop effort from a technical point of view but it is brilliant.
If you don't understand it you are far too young.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
This is starting to annoy me
This damned Peters stuff.
He is defiant in the face of all the evidence. He is still calling for Audrey Young and the Editor of the Herald to resign. He is still saying that he will hold the balance of power after the next election. He is still standing up in front of the sycophantic faithful at his party conference celebrating fifteen glorious years of his joke political party.
Why is he still around? Why are there no calls for his resignation so bloody loud that they will penetrate even his thick hide. The man has no conscience at all. It is totally untenable that he is still doing what he is doing. As for holding the balance of power in the government of a sovereign country - well you have to be joking.
New Zealand must be the only country in the world that would tolerate this sort of joker. He must go. We as the great unwashed cannot allow him to remain in office or allow him to remain in a position where he may get some more of the same. I am not sure how we are to go about this. The main stream media could grow a backbone for starters and really put the heat on him. Sod this 'Mum has just died' crap. He chose to bring this into the forefront right now, he chose to attend his party conference. He has made his bed let him lie in it and it is our duty to make sure he falls out of it toute de suite. The whole thing is rotten to the bloody core.
Grrrrrrr.
He is defiant in the face of all the evidence. He is still calling for Audrey Young and the Editor of the Herald to resign. He is still saying that he will hold the balance of power after the next election. He is still standing up in front of the sycophantic faithful at his party conference celebrating fifteen glorious years of his joke political party.
Why is he still around? Why are there no calls for his resignation so bloody loud that they will penetrate even his thick hide. The man has no conscience at all. It is totally untenable that he is still doing what he is doing. As for holding the balance of power in the government of a sovereign country - well you have to be joking.
New Zealand must be the only country in the world that would tolerate this sort of joker. He must go. We as the great unwashed cannot allow him to remain in office or allow him to remain in a position where he may get some more of the same. I am not sure how we are to go about this. The main stream media could grow a backbone for starters and really put the heat on him. Sod this 'Mum has just died' crap. He chose to bring this into the forefront right now, he chose to attend his party conference. He has made his bed let him lie in it and it is our duty to make sure he falls out of it toute de suite. The whole thing is rotten to the bloody core.
Grrrrrrr.
Saturday, July 19, 2008
Beyond belief
Winston Peters is standing up at the trotting track and telling the world that he has not told any untruths, he has not misled anyone and he only knew about the small sum of $100,000 falling into an account a little bit connected to him yesterday evening an hour or so after his Mum died.
I don't think you will ever be able to prove that he is telling anything but the truth but I don't believe him. I think he is lying at such a rate of knots that you wouldn't be able to keep up with him in a DB9.
To believe him you would have to believe not one but all of the statements so eloquently laid out by David Farrar in Kiwiblog this afternoon. I can do no better than him and reproduce the sixteen statements he set out in their entirety:
If that wasn't bad enough the stance Dear Leader is taking over it is, if anything, worse. She of transparency in government, she who forced the Electoral Finance Act upon us to keep secret money out of politics, she who demoted another of her Ministers (Pond Scum) for biffing Tau, she who told yet another Minister (Ruth Dyson) to stand on the naughty mat when she was caught DIC, she who dealt to Benson Dope for lying like a flat fish is saying this Winston stuff has nothing to do with her. Her be-baubled Foreign Minister, for God's sake, is caught behaving in the most deplorable way imaginable and it is nothing to do with her?
The whole affair is so sordid it is quite beyond belief that it is happening. There should be a swag of resignations and a general election smartish.
There will be neither of course.
I don't think you will ever be able to prove that he is telling anything but the truth but I don't believe him. I think he is lying at such a rate of knots that you wouldn't be able to keep up with him in a DB9.
To believe him you would have to believe not one but all of the statements so eloquently laid out by David Farrar in Kiwiblog this afternoon. I can do no better than him and reproduce the sixteen statements he set out in their entirety:
- Owen Glenn found out about the “Legal Expenses Fund” from someone other than Winston Peters.
- Glenn found this out despite almost no one who actually lives in New Zealand knowing about it.
- Glenn chose on his own whim to donate to the Legal Expenses Fund rather than NZ First.
- Glenn never ever mentioned to Winston Peters he had donated or intended to donate to his legal expenses fund. Glenn is of course known as the soul of discretion.
- Glenn managed to get contact details for Brian Henry from someone who is not Winston Peters.
- The fund which has been running since 1991 has raised a total of $200,000 of which the $100,000 donation constitutes half in one swoop, and he never asked nor suspected who the donor was.
- When the media reported Owen Glenn in February 2008 as having donated to another party, Brian Henry never clicked that he was referring to the $100,000 Glenn gave Henry for Peters’ legal fees.
- Winston Peters never thought to check if the large $100,000 donation his lawyer had received could be the donation being referred to by Owen Glenn in February.
- Brian Henry let Winston go into a press conference and deny that NZ First had received any money at all from Owen Glenn - not even a dollar, and did not feel he had an ethical, moral or professional duty to tell him of the personal donation to Peters’ legal expenses
- That Brian Henry was aware the Winston Peters was considering appointing Owen Glenn as Consul to Monaco, and did not think the fact Glenn had donated $100,000 to Peters’ legal expenses was something that should be disclosed.
- After the NZ Herald on 12 July printed the e-mail from Owen Glenn, Brian Henry still said nothing to Peters despite it being glaringly obvious what he was referring to.
- There was some legitimate reason Winston Peters did not do the obvious when the e-mail was printed and contact Owen Glenn to ask him if the e-mail was real, and what the hell he was on about?
- That Winston Peters never wondered why Steve Fisher was so desperate to make sure Owen Glenn did not contradict what Peters said?
- Even after Brian Henry saw Winston denying everything, claiming the e-mail is fabricated and calling Audrey Young a liar, he still didn’t think he needed to urgently inform Winston that the e-mail was correct (from Glenn’s perspective)
- That during all this time, Winston Peters never wondered if the mystery $100,000 donation for his legal fees could be from Owen Glenn, and that it all came as a total surprise.
- It took Brian Henry seven days to manage to talk to his close personal friend and long standing client, to let him know that he had information which verified the e-mail in the Herald.
If that wasn't bad enough the stance Dear Leader is taking over it is, if anything, worse. She of transparency in government, she who forced the Electoral Finance Act upon us to keep secret money out of politics, she who demoted another of her Ministers (Pond Scum) for biffing Tau, she who told yet another Minister (Ruth Dyson) to stand on the naughty mat when she was caught DIC, she who dealt to Benson Dope for lying like a flat fish is saying this Winston stuff has nothing to do with her. Her be-baubled Foreign Minister, for God's sake, is caught behaving in the most deplorable way imaginable and it is nothing to do with her?
The whole affair is so sordid it is quite beyond belief that it is happening. There should be a swag of resignations and a general election smartish.
There will be neither of course.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Columbine Aoteoroa
I am not making this up.
I was listening to the electric wireless this evening and Plod was being interviewed about his advising schools as to how they should be drawing up risk management plans for, wait for it, attacks from people with automatic weapons. I checked the date. April 1st was months ago. This idiot appeared to be serious. There were two parts to this lunacy. The risk management bit and the planning for the grief counseling that had to attend the aftermath of this fictional armageddon.
This is absolutely typical of the route this increasingly daft country seems bent on taking. Think of any scenario, the more unlikely but catastrophic the better, and then construct a 543 page Policy Manual that details how to deal with it. Compliance with this bureaucratic tome is then mandatory and all minions have to go to annual workshops to ensure they are familiar with correct procedure. The workshops will be run by earnest types wearing bone pendants who will be drawing a salary out of my taxes.
Ask yourself; what are the chances of someone running amuck with an AK47 in New Zealand? Well, they are not zero but they are as close as makes no difference. We no more need contingency plans for this than we do for an attack by Martians, mass fatalities from inhaling small fish or schools being overrun by plagues of locusts.
By complete coincidence (and this is true, I promise you) Random Selection on iTunes is playing Jeff Wayne's 'War of the Worlds' as I type.
Maybe I am wrong.
I was listening to the electric wireless this evening and Plod was being interviewed about his advising schools as to how they should be drawing up risk management plans for, wait for it, attacks from people with automatic weapons. I checked the date. April 1st was months ago. This idiot appeared to be serious. There were two parts to this lunacy. The risk management bit and the planning for the grief counseling that had to attend the aftermath of this fictional armageddon.
This is absolutely typical of the route this increasingly daft country seems bent on taking. Think of any scenario, the more unlikely but catastrophic the better, and then construct a 543 page Policy Manual that details how to deal with it. Compliance with this bureaucratic tome is then mandatory and all minions have to go to annual workshops to ensure they are familiar with correct procedure. The workshops will be run by earnest types wearing bone pendants who will be drawing a salary out of my taxes.
Ask yourself; what are the chances of someone running amuck with an AK47 in New Zealand? Well, they are not zero but they are as close as makes no difference. We no more need contingency plans for this than we do for an attack by Martians, mass fatalities from inhaling small fish or schools being overrun by plagues of locusts.
By complete coincidence (and this is true, I promise you) Random Selection on iTunes is playing Jeff Wayne's 'War of the Worlds' as I type.
Maybe I am wrong.
Dead animals
Lion Nathan has been forced to pull a beer advert because it showed a real live dead deer (if you get my drift) being barbecued. Apparently they went to a deer farm (smart these advertising johnnies) and got a time expired deer that was destined for the works anyway and hijacked it. They then shoved a metal pole up its jacksie (as is required) and cooked it on camera. The ad was destined for Orstralia to promote Tooheys New whose logo is a stag. All good. Some blokes standing round a barbie supping a few coldies, talking BS and ensuring bambi is cooked to perfection prior to eating it. That's what you do. If you want to sell beer to men who might like a gobful of venison hot off the grill now and then I would think the above plot for an advert would have sales going through the roof. Spice it up with half a dozen scantily clad maidens handing out the knives and forks, get a few power tools lying around on the ground, a couple of fishing rods leaning up against the shed, a red V8 in the drive, the footy on a big screen telly and Robert is your aunty's husband.
Not so fast. Some interfering dick head got hold of this and complained. What did Lion Nathan do? Tell the complainant to leave the building and help himself to some sexual gratification on the way out? No, the lilly livered wet blankets instigated an 'internal investigation' which found that its production company had 'failed to source the deer correctly'. How the hell else do you correctly source a piece of meat for a barbie other than go to a deer farm and buy an old stag which has 'Go to the knackers yard, do not pass go, do not collect $200' stamped on it? Perhaps they would have preferred they hired an Apache attack helicopter and shot it it with automatic cannon fire? Perhaps torpedo it as it forded a river? Nuke it with an ICBM? No I'm sure they would have preferred the advertisers went to Woolworth's and bought some barbecue fare there. And all the meat in the supermarket wasn't once alive I suppose.
What they would really like, of course, would be for the blokes around the barbie to look up from their crochet to see if their nut cutlets were done el dente. Pillocks.
Lion Nathan then complete their totally spineless display by issuing a statement saying their actions were 'insensitive and inconsistent with company guidelines on the treatment of animals'. What a load of bollocks. Who believes a brewing company has a set of 'company guidelines on the treatment of animals' in the first place? Does Telecom have company guidelines on the treatment of amphibians? Does Ford expect its employees to follow company guidelines on the treatment of yellow eyed penguins? Does Cunard have regular disciplinary hearings for matelots who disregard the company rules covering the treatment of foie gras?
If I drank beer I would instantly boycott all Lion Nathan products because they are a bunch of molluscs who have caved in to a bunch of stupid weird beards. Men drink beer and eat dead animals - what the hell is the problem with that?
Not so fast. Some interfering dick head got hold of this and complained. What did Lion Nathan do? Tell the complainant to leave the building and help himself to some sexual gratification on the way out? No, the lilly livered wet blankets instigated an 'internal investigation' which found that its production company had 'failed to source the deer correctly'. How the hell else do you correctly source a piece of meat for a barbie other than go to a deer farm and buy an old stag which has 'Go to the knackers yard, do not pass go, do not collect $200' stamped on it? Perhaps they would have preferred they hired an Apache attack helicopter and shot it it with automatic cannon fire? Perhaps torpedo it as it forded a river? Nuke it with an ICBM? No I'm sure they would have preferred the advertisers went to Woolworth's and bought some barbecue fare there. And all the meat in the supermarket wasn't once alive I suppose.
What they would really like, of course, would be for the blokes around the barbie to look up from their crochet to see if their nut cutlets were done el dente. Pillocks.
Lion Nathan then complete their totally spineless display by issuing a statement saying their actions were 'insensitive and inconsistent with company guidelines on the treatment of animals'. What a load of bollocks. Who believes a brewing company has a set of 'company guidelines on the treatment of animals' in the first place? Does Telecom have company guidelines on the treatment of amphibians? Does Ford expect its employees to follow company guidelines on the treatment of yellow eyed penguins? Does Cunard have regular disciplinary hearings for matelots who disregard the company rules covering the treatment of foie gras?
If I drank beer I would instantly boycott all Lion Nathan products because they are a bunch of molluscs who have caved in to a bunch of stupid weird beards. Men drink beer and eat dead animals - what the hell is the problem with that?
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
The Jacket
It is almost beyond belief that Rodney's jacket is getting the press it is and Rodney must be loving every minute of it. I think the vestment looks pretty sharp especially now that Mr Hide is sporting his new athletic persona. He would have looked totally absurd in it had he been in 2005 mode.
There are two attacks on the the jacket. One from the head of the Newmarket Traders or something who says it is hideous and is wrecking Newmarket's reputation as fashion capital of New Zealand. This is absurd on two fronts. New Zealand doesn't have a fashion capital although Te Awamutu could put in a claim as it probably has the largest concentration of Swanndris in the land. And who the hell is a Fashion Nazi in Newmarket to tell the rest of us what is hideous and what is not. And if something looks hideous just ignore it - don't ban it. If Rodney wants to walk around looking like a banana, who cares?
Even more absurd than some bloke in Newmarket getting nasally dislocated on fashion grounds is the idea that the jacket breaches the Electoral Finance Act. All this because he has an ACT logo on the breast pocket. All good in some ways I suppose as it demonstrates to even the terminally slow that the EFA is just the most absurd law ever foisted upon this country. The paranoid denizens of the ninth floor have cobbled together a vindictive, vicious, nasty bill to protect their own sorry backsides and it is being shown to be the absurdity it really is by the day. I'm sure even they never intended the mendacious legislation to cover sports coats but this is what you get when you get incompetent legislation drafters to do their work with unbecoming haste.
And the beneficiary of all this unexpected publicity is of course Rodney - who is laudably one of the Act's most vocal detractors.
There are two attacks on the the jacket. One from the head of the Newmarket Traders or something who says it is hideous and is wrecking Newmarket's reputation as fashion capital of New Zealand. This is absurd on two fronts. New Zealand doesn't have a fashion capital although Te Awamutu could put in a claim as it probably has the largest concentration of Swanndris in the land. And who the hell is a Fashion Nazi in Newmarket to tell the rest of us what is hideous and what is not. And if something looks hideous just ignore it - don't ban it. If Rodney wants to walk around looking like a banana, who cares?
Even more absurd than some bloke in Newmarket getting nasally dislocated on fashion grounds is the idea that the jacket breaches the Electoral Finance Act. All this because he has an ACT logo on the breast pocket. All good in some ways I suppose as it demonstrates to even the terminally slow that the EFA is just the most absurd law ever foisted upon this country. The paranoid denizens of the ninth floor have cobbled together a vindictive, vicious, nasty bill to protect their own sorry backsides and it is being shown to be the absurdity it really is by the day. I'm sure even they never intended the mendacious legislation to cover sports coats but this is what you get when you get incompetent legislation drafters to do their work with unbecoming haste.
And the beneficiary of all this unexpected publicity is of course Rodney - who is laudably one of the Act's most vocal detractors.
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Pathetic
If it wasn't so pathetic you could regard it as amusing. Dear Leader summonsed all the lickspittles to an all day caucus meeting yesterday to discuss where they might go from here. Waste of time really as the only place they are going is down the dunnie and good riddance to the lot of them. The last one they had of these the media made great play of their all arriving in the new flash 7 series BMWs that you and I bought them. SWMBO deemed this not a good look and they were all told to walk to the meeting yesterday.
So we are treated to a charade as they troop into the meeting. One by one when they were asked why they were walking (or in Mallard's case cycling) to work they lied like flat fish. 'It's such a nice day (in Wellington?) that I thought I might go for a stroll'. 'It's time to get a bit more exercise'. 'I always walk short distances up hill whenever I get the opportunity' and other such tosh. Not one was up front and honest and admitted through gritted teeth on the brink of left ventricular failure 'I'm bloody walking up a sodding hill in a Wellington southerly in full view of the nation's press because that damned woman told me if I dared set foot in the beemer she would break my legs.'
So we are treated to a charade as they troop into the meeting. One by one when they were asked why they were walking (or in Mallard's case cycling) to work they lied like flat fish. 'It's such a nice day (in Wellington?) that I thought I might go for a stroll'. 'It's time to get a bit more exercise'. 'I always walk short distances up hill whenever I get the opportunity' and other such tosh. Not one was up front and honest and admitted through gritted teeth on the brink of left ventricular failure 'I'm bloody walking up a sodding hill in a Wellington southerly in full view of the nation's press because that damned woman told me if I dared set foot in the beemer she would break my legs.'
Thursday, July 3, 2008
They just don't get it, do they?
Or maybe they do. Maybe they have had enough of being the Government and want out as they certainly seem to be behaving as the Government with a death wish.
The Dental Nurse showed us all yesterday her 'Graduation with Honours' certificate from the Michael Cullen Arrogant Ratbag Academy. Her behaviour is beyond belief until you realise from what base this comes. She is a person who has no relevant training at all for the jobs she does and is in position only because of her slavish adherence to a flawed ideology. Anyone with an ounce of commonsense (and don't forget she is the patron saint of this commodity so lacking in her own behaviour) could have worked out that now was not such a flash time to increase the cost of running a truck. So we are off to a good start. Now how can we make this less palatable? I know we'll announce it is coming into force in eight hours time - that'll really piss people off. So far so good. She has the truckies in Gallic mood with plans to park the semi trailers all over the major conurbations tomorrow. If I had a big rig I would be right there with them.
Then this morning we see how she managed to get the oak leaf clusters on her Arrogance Medal. She is 'outraged' that the truckies would have the temerity to even contemplate such action. How dare they argue with her? She is a Government Minister. She can do what she likes, when she likes and with accountability to no one. She had the fact that she is supposed to be an elected representative beaten out of her with the Clark stick long ago. According to training she starts of with typical politician's weasel words. She did not promise to give the industry a month's warning of any future increase she only said she would introduce (not pass) legislation that would allow her to give a month's notice. Unfortunately (Tui ad) this increase came along before she had the opportunity so to do. Had the trucking firms had such notice they would have all gone out and bought their mileage at the cheaper rate - and that would never do would it?
She amplifies and explains her 'outrage' with these words "If trucking companies disrupt the travel plans of motorists and other commuters on Friday morning, as they threaten, the only people who suffer will be all those New Zealanders who pay their fair share of roading costs through petrol excise duty." If there is any truck driver who drives his vehicle tax free would he please make him self known to the class. She also glosses over the small matter of the massive increases in GST the gummint has garnered in recently due to the price of fuel going through the roof. If she needs more dosh she can have that.
As an aside have you noted how the phrase 'New Zealander' is used by the wastrels in Wellington. It is slipped into a statement when the user wants to identify with the man in the street in a sympathetic way. 'Ordinary New Zealanders' is a slightly more refined and more meritorious sub species. The Mongrel Mob are never referred to as a group of New Zealanders (which they are) are they? Nor yet boy racers, serial rapists or fraudsters.
Hell, Amalgam Girl is hideous - but I suppose no more so than the rest of her colleagues who are currently wrecking this country.
The Dental Nurse showed us all yesterday her 'Graduation with Honours' certificate from the Michael Cullen Arrogant Ratbag Academy. Her behaviour is beyond belief until you realise from what base this comes. She is a person who has no relevant training at all for the jobs she does and is in position only because of her slavish adherence to a flawed ideology. Anyone with an ounce of commonsense (and don't forget she is the patron saint of this commodity so lacking in her own behaviour) could have worked out that now was not such a flash time to increase the cost of running a truck. So we are off to a good start. Now how can we make this less palatable? I know we'll announce it is coming into force in eight hours time - that'll really piss people off. So far so good. She has the truckies in Gallic mood with plans to park the semi trailers all over the major conurbations tomorrow. If I had a big rig I would be right there with them.
Then this morning we see how she managed to get the oak leaf clusters on her Arrogance Medal. She is 'outraged' that the truckies would have the temerity to even contemplate such action. How dare they argue with her? She is a Government Minister. She can do what she likes, when she likes and with accountability to no one. She had the fact that she is supposed to be an elected representative beaten out of her with the Clark stick long ago. According to training she starts of with typical politician's weasel words. She did not promise to give the industry a month's warning of any future increase she only said she would introduce (not pass) legislation that would allow her to give a month's notice. Unfortunately (Tui ad) this increase came along before she had the opportunity so to do. Had the trucking firms had such notice they would have all gone out and bought their mileage at the cheaper rate - and that would never do would it?
She amplifies and explains her 'outrage' with these words "If trucking companies disrupt the travel plans of motorists and other commuters on Friday morning, as they threaten, the only people who suffer will be all those New Zealanders who pay their fair share of roading costs through petrol excise duty." If there is any truck driver who drives his vehicle tax free would he please make him self known to the class. She also glosses over the small matter of the massive increases in GST the gummint has garnered in recently due to the price of fuel going through the roof. If she needs more dosh she can have that.
As an aside have you noted how the phrase 'New Zealander' is used by the wastrels in Wellington. It is slipped into a statement when the user wants to identify with the man in the street in a sympathetic way. 'Ordinary New Zealanders' is a slightly more refined and more meritorious sub species. The Mongrel Mob are never referred to as a group of New Zealanders (which they are) are they? Nor yet boy racers, serial rapists or fraudsters.
Hell, Amalgam Girl is hideous - but I suppose no more so than the rest of her colleagues who are currently wrecking this country.
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
Lunatics in charge of the asylum
Now I know that we are but a piece of spindrift caught up in the maelstrom of global financial woes (just heard a very, and I mean very, scary report on matters money from the US on the radio driving in just now) but we must make an effort surely. There is ample new evidence, if it were needed, that this country is being run by people who shouldn't be in charge of a corner dairy.
Where shall we start. Sue Kedgely is as bad a place as any. The food Nazis have told school tuck shops that they must stock tofuburgers, nut cutlets and carrots because they are healthy and the gummint can only allow kids to eat healthy food. The students at a school in Wellington have not surprisingly voted with their feet and are buying their pies and coke at a local dairy. Economic reality check for the communist ratbags coming up so pay attention. Tuck shop closes and local dairy owner orders an expensive German motor car. Kedgley gets the hand wringing into overdrive and says this is all wrong and isn't it terrible that tuck shops are being driven by profit and not the good of the nation. Well, get over it lady that is how the world goes round. The real world that is, not the looney tunes planet you inhabit.
Jim Bolger. How the hell does he pretend that he was once a National Prime Minister? Maybe the bloke who ran the ninth floor ten years ago was his as yet unmasked identical twin. Maybe the bloke who sold the railways isn't the same bloke who was watching Dear Leader cut the ribbon yesterday prior to announcing that Jim was to be new Chairman of KiwiRail. This after he accepted chairmanship of KiwiBank some years back. Presumably he will further feather his unprincipled nest in the future by becoming chairman of KiwiRoad, KiwiMilk and KiwiSheep in quick succession. OK, so the chap is a Richard Cranium and it is timely that we are reminded of the dog of a bargain History Boy has given him to run. The railways were worth about $400 mil and we paid $600 mil for them remember. To add to this folly we are now told that Jim will be overseeing the spending of near double this to make sure the purchase is viable. Meanwhile Dear Leader slips in the little gem that the Government 'had to' buy the railways back because they could not have survived without government money input. Economic reality check number two coming up. If a financial undertaking is shunned by real people spending real money that they actually have responsibility for does that not tell you something about the wisdom of getting involved in it? In other words, you stupid woman, you don't touch it. You especially don't touch it with my money. I don't want a railway system. I will never use it for my own personal transport and I have no desire to watch a senile old duffer waste my money so that other people don't use it either.
Amalgam Girl. On the back of all this '19th century railway technology is marvellous' crap the Dental Nurse was standing up and announcing that more money was to be spent on roads. These would also enhance 'opportunities for cycling and walking'. Opportunities are great things to provide as if nothing actually happens it is not the providers fault. 'You were given (note the impression of a free gift here) the opportunity and it is your fault (ungrateful toad) that you didn't take it and walk from Dairy Flat to Takapuna to go to work'. It is therefore your fault that the world is a hotter place and there is not a godwit to be seen. This cornucopia of opportunity is made possible by a) taking more money off us in previously unannounced road user charges increases (the road hauliers are over the moon about this) and b) ensuring that this dosh is ring fenced for 'transport' projects. Superficial reading of this would read 'more roads' but the devil is in the detail so look out for it all being diverted to cycle ways. Reality check number three coming up. Don't treat the great unwashed like complete idiots and expect to be able to still be doing so in six months' time.
This country is being run by idiots. They make uncoordinated decisions seemingly on the hoof and couldn't organise a nun shoot in a convent. Thank god they are not long for this planet
Where shall we start. Sue Kedgely is as bad a place as any. The food Nazis have told school tuck shops that they must stock tofuburgers, nut cutlets and carrots because they are healthy and the gummint can only allow kids to eat healthy food. The students at a school in Wellington have not surprisingly voted with their feet and are buying their pies and coke at a local dairy. Economic reality check for the communist ratbags coming up so pay attention. Tuck shop closes and local dairy owner orders an expensive German motor car. Kedgley gets the hand wringing into overdrive and says this is all wrong and isn't it terrible that tuck shops are being driven by profit and not the good of the nation. Well, get over it lady that is how the world goes round. The real world that is, not the looney tunes planet you inhabit.
Jim Bolger. How the hell does he pretend that he was once a National Prime Minister? Maybe the bloke who ran the ninth floor ten years ago was his as yet unmasked identical twin. Maybe the bloke who sold the railways isn't the same bloke who was watching Dear Leader cut the ribbon yesterday prior to announcing that Jim was to be new Chairman of KiwiRail. This after he accepted chairmanship of KiwiBank some years back. Presumably he will further feather his unprincipled nest in the future by becoming chairman of KiwiRoad, KiwiMilk and KiwiSheep in quick succession. OK, so the chap is a Richard Cranium and it is timely that we are reminded of the dog of a bargain History Boy has given him to run. The railways were worth about $400 mil and we paid $600 mil for them remember. To add to this folly we are now told that Jim will be overseeing the spending of near double this to make sure the purchase is viable. Meanwhile Dear Leader slips in the little gem that the Government 'had to' buy the railways back because they could not have survived without government money input. Economic reality check number two coming up. If a financial undertaking is shunned by real people spending real money that they actually have responsibility for does that not tell you something about the wisdom of getting involved in it? In other words, you stupid woman, you don't touch it. You especially don't touch it with my money. I don't want a railway system. I will never use it for my own personal transport and I have no desire to watch a senile old duffer waste my money so that other people don't use it either.
Amalgam Girl. On the back of all this '19th century railway technology is marvellous' crap the Dental Nurse was standing up and announcing that more money was to be spent on roads. These would also enhance 'opportunities for cycling and walking'. Opportunities are great things to provide as if nothing actually happens it is not the providers fault. 'You were given (note the impression of a free gift here) the opportunity and it is your fault (ungrateful toad) that you didn't take it and walk from Dairy Flat to Takapuna to go to work'. It is therefore your fault that the world is a hotter place and there is not a godwit to be seen. This cornucopia of opportunity is made possible by a) taking more money off us in previously unannounced road user charges increases (the road hauliers are over the moon about this) and b) ensuring that this dosh is ring fenced for 'transport' projects. Superficial reading of this would read 'more roads' but the devil is in the detail so look out for it all being diverted to cycle ways. Reality check number three coming up. Don't treat the great unwashed like complete idiots and expect to be able to still be doing so in six months' time.
This country is being run by idiots. They make uncoordinated decisions seemingly on the hoof and couldn't organise a nun shoot in a convent. Thank god they are not long for this planet
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