Our cozying up to the military regime in Burma
If the military regime in Fiji deserves smart sanctions against its officials, relatives, supporters and sports teams – and it does – then you’d think […]
Gordon Campbell
The SAS going Dutch – or Canadian – in Afghanistan
Now that our SAS troops are heading back into combat in Afghanistan the key question becomes – who are they going to replace? The answer […]
Bill English’s Homing Instincts, for the Money
Clearly, the first item on the review of ministerial expenses is going to be to create a clear definition of what constitutes ‘home’ – because […]
Taxpayer support for Bill English’s home and happiness
In recent days, there has been an odd symmetry between Graham Henry’s response to the All Blacks defeat in Durban and John Key’s rationale for […]
Gordon Campbell on the travel expenses of MPs
The issue of MPs’ travel expenses – and its disreputable cousin, government spending – have thrown up a pretty interesting moral distinction. Government spending, which provides services to the general public, is seen to be an intrinsically bad thing that must be rationed. MPs’ travel spending on the other hand, is seen as an intrinsically good thing that does not even need to be justified. It just is – here’s the amount we spent, don’t ask to know the purpose. The worth is assumed, and is beyond challenge.
Putting the SAS back into Afghanistan
Who has stolen John Key’s brain? The Prime Minister who only a couple of months ago was demanding to see a viable exit strategy before […]
Foreign ownership rules, and California’s support for Chief Justice Sian Elias
To its critics, the government’s response to the recession has looked like an Eighties Revival. Psychologically speaking, that’s not so surprising, When in trouble, politicians […]
Treasury and the Don Brash revival
People are just so suspicious. When you have Treasury touting the virtues of contracting out public services and Don Brash – clearly, our best and […]
Gordon Campbell: The Sian Elias speech about crime
The recent speech by Chief Justice Sian Elias may have been greeted with some – sensational headlines – “Top Judge Suggests Prison Amnesty” – and […]
The Winston Peters Comeback
Only Winston Peters could say the hardest word in the political lexicon – “Sorry” – by implying that his mistakes were really due to his […]
The bogus benefits of PPPs
Occasionally, someone in business lets the cat out of the bag in a way that is impossible to satirise. Thus in the NZ Herald this […]
The Greens’ new peace initiative
Click to enlarge Non aggression pacts tend to get a bad press, both in real life and in fiction. Hitler and Stalin, two of the […]
The Erosion Of Justice
As the civil rights we enjoy get whittled away, the pattern is becoming very familiar. Initially, fresh powers of search, detention, use of secret evidence […]
Paula Bennett’s welfare abuse
To date, the government’s response to the recession has been faulted on the demand side – for not giving sufficient stimulus to the economy, as […]
National Education Tests, And Michael Jackson
The current struggle between school principals and Education Minister Anne Tolley over national standards has the hallmarks of a rushed and insuffiently funded process. No […]
The Government’s failure to cope with unemployment
There was a quite telling difference of emphasis on Radio Waatea this morning. While Greens MP Sue Bradford was calling on the government to make […]
Iraq, And Its Foreign Oil Deals
Remember how, when the US invaded Iraq in 2003, critics said it was all about oil? Next week, political events in Iraq – and the […]
David Garrett’s lewdness, and the incredible Christine Rankin
Rodney Hide’s excuses for the lewd comment by his Act party colleague David Garrett – that he is new to Parliament, that he may be […]
Gordon Campbell on Peter Jackson’s review of the Film Commission
The selection of Peter Jackson to lead the ministerial review of the New Zealand Film Commission guarantees the review a prominence that no-one else in […]
John Key’s Zen press conference, and Iran’s stolen election
Faced with the dying embers of the Richard Worth scandal at his press conference yesterday (audio & report, video), John Key reached for gasoline, not […]
On censorship – bring back Worth!
Click to enlarge One downside of Richard Worth’s exit from his ministerial post at Internal Affairs will be to further postpone any fix of the […]
Rodney Hide’s latest plan for gutting local democracy
Rodney Hide’s agenda for local government involves – as Scoop reported six months ago – the importation of an American model that has resulted in […]
The Tiananmen Massacre, and Richard Worth
Today is the 20th anniversary of the massacre in Tiananmen Square. In the early morning hours of June 4th 1989, thousands of unarmed students and […]
Gordon Campbell On The Greens Leadership Change
Talk about the bleedingly obvious. In the aftermath of the last election, the Green Party moved a few floors upwards into more spacious digs in […]
The Budget’s tightening noose
Judging by the Budget, the good news is that Finance Minister Bill English is not the beady eyed ‘lets take this theory and see if […]
Budget to push the “P” button?
The tone of the Budget is almost as important as its content, and while everyone – for good reason – is expecting a grim Budget […]
On the power company rip-offs
Spot the difference. A Rotorua couple get $10 million overpaid by Westpac into their bank account and hive off with it, with Interpol and the […]
The need to control loan sharks
As jobs vanish and incomes shrink during the recession, loan sharks can be expected to prey more avidly on poor and vulnerable communities. After all, […]
Campbell on the Christine Rankin appointment
For all his considerable media skills, Prime Minister John Key has a tendency to wing it on the details in ways that must be terrifying […]
The Melissa Lee Factor
Click to enlarge Melissa Lee’s emergence as the poster child of the Key government is so apt, it makes the process of politics seem karmically […]