New Ideas & Other Stuff

With the New Zealand General Election just around the corner the minority parties are doing every thing they can to raise their public profile. One of the minor party leaders even going as far as wearing a yellow sports coat. The same party leader has been vigorously attacking and probing at every session. If one tries to look beyond the obvious you have to wonder what the real story is. There seems no doubt the yellow jacketed leader had been in the in the public eye both for the yellow jacket and for his attacks on the other minor party that has been singled out for not declaring donations and gifts. I don’t have any evidence at this time on which to base a personal opinion and have not formed one. There are two inquiries under way one of which is the SFO who I am sure have some very qualified and experienced staff to undertake such an inquiry.
Some questions that need to be considered are- Is MMP achieving the lofty ideals it is intended for? Are we ever likely to know all the facts or just what the powers that be want us to know? Is there some grand master plan which is now starting to evolve?
There is certainly a serious political situation/crisis that needs to be rectified and perhaps this will happen sooner then we all expect.

The Beijing Olympics are over and the Chinese need to be complemented for their effort, planning and resources put into the event. The wonderful and unforgettable opening and closing ceremonies will set a standard for all future Olympics to strive for. The quality of the venues the provision of all that was required for competitors and spectators was amazing. I am sure that every one involved must have gained a great deal from their experiences. The money spent on the venues will be a great asset to the city and to the country. The money spent will have long term benefits for China and for all associated with the event.
Will those who seemed to be hell bent on raising every obstacle they could and predicting a doom and gloom games now stand up and apologize or perhaps even admit they were wrong? The marathons which many said could not run successfully were both great events with the men’s marathon setting a new Olympic record. No sign of any runners suffering adverse effects of pollution. The Beijing Olympics have clearly demonstrated that China has come of age and although there a still some issues that need to be worked on I am sure that China will work to see these will be resolved.

With Tom Ashley’s gold medal win New Zealand now moves into second on the medals per head table. “Per-capita medals" is the table that puts medal hauls in proportion to population size. This is a very good thing for New Zealand and other countries which do not have the benefit of hundreds of millions of people to pick Olympic athletes from.

Read more http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10528184

After many days New Zealand finally tastes success at Beijing. Two gold medals a silver and two bronze. The most medals New Zealand has ever won at the Olympics on single day. Perhaps even more exciting is that they were across three different sporting events rowing, cycling and shot put. When you consider that there are only four million people in the country and it is difficult and expensive for New Zealand sports people to get international competition “it is no mean feat “ and the athletes are to be commended for their sacrifice dedication and achievements.
read more http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/4/story.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=10527486
Our day did not stop there the All Blacks beat South Africa and the Warriors our NRL team won their game. So there were many happy people and now doubt some very happy punters

The opposition are saying that if they become the government there will be an active programme to force people on benefits into paid work. The government has a scheme titled working for families where people with young families are paying reduced levels of tax. What people need to decide is……. do people respond better to incentive or to threat. The withdrawal of the benefits was advocated by the governments in the 90’s and had limited success and yet the opposition would see this “tried and failed” option as viable in the year 2009. The same opposition is suggesting that the public service needs to be reduced. An “off benefits and into paid work” would seem to be a very people intensive measure, and may in fact mean more public servants need to be employed. Other considerations might be if people have their benefits withdrawn because the fail to move into paid work what do they do?.... Turn to crime… We need to think carefully about our next votes and consider the big picture not just what is best for ourselves. Is that too much to ask?

For some time now oil prices have been trending down rather than up. It make a difference and with the grocery voucher worth between 6 cents and 10 cents per litre it seems too good to be true. Filling the car is still expensive but not as bad as it was. The question is will it stay down? The present conflict in Russia does not look good and could cause supply problems. Lets hope for the sake of the people who live in the conflict zone some solution can be found quickly and no more loss of life will result. We then may also benefit with continuity of supply to the European areas and consequently to the world.

As the New Zealand election campaign hots up it seems that the opposition may not be revealing all that they intend to do if they are elected to government. Over the last week end the opposition held their annual conference. Some IT savvy individuals recorded parts of conservations that took place during the conference. The audio was made available to the main TV news links.
The audio was played on the news. Listening to the audio which was also captioned it was not difficult to infer that
• There will be major asset sales
• The opposition is not as unified as it purports to be
• Some of the present legislation currently in place may well be repealed.
All this despite giving many reassurances to the contrary in recent weeks. The spin doctors have been busy trying to counter the “damage”. The incident must leave a lot of doubt in the voters mind.

The New Zealand general election is now only about 14 weeks away. The main parties are talking tax cuts. The government having already revealed their policy and the opposition inferring they will up the offer by the government. However the opposition states they will be borrowing money for infrastructure. It seems to me that they are “trying to hood wink the voters” there also seems to be a strong possibility they will sell Kiwi Bank one of only two New Zealand owned banks in the country. The voters of New Zealand will need to carefully consider how they will vote as this election may well be more important than most people realise. Will tax cuts give us more spending power or just be a way of getting us to pay more insidious forms of indirect tax

The last thing an already stretched economy needed
read more
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10524882

Insurance claims have continued to rise to more than $25,000,000 after this week's storms, Arborists in the North Island have had to emloy extra people to meet the demand created by thousands of trees felled by high winds.
From Horowhenua to Upper Hutt dozens of trees fell on houses and other buildings and thousands of others are blocking roads and access to homes