THE RACE FOR THE REPUBLICAN NOMINATION

I have previously blogged that neither Romney nor Gingrich would be my preferred candidate to take on Obama in November.

Nevertheless the news that today, Donald Trump came out and endorsed Romney will be a huge boost to his campaign and more to the point will engender a sigh of relief among Republicans that Trump will not enter the fight as a third party candidate which he had threatened to do if the Republicans (in his view) looked like electing a candidate who could not beat Obama.

The Trump money will even up the campaign where it was looking like the Democrats were going to outspend the Republicans.

Meanwhile 'across the ditch' the chattering gets louder by the day.   Is Rudd really preparing to do a Peters and rise Lazarus like from the almost dead?    Strange beast Oz politics where the Qld Labor Premier fighting an uphill battle for re-election tells Gillard her support ain't needed nor wanted ..... and Rudd just keeps on smiling and honing knives.

Text Of The Day

From yesterdays Hawkes Bay Today.

`The high food prices are because of the rip off supermarkets. They don't mind ripping people off. They over charge families and don't mind one bit.' Unattributed.

Really?

Early today and had to use one from yesterdays Hawkes Bay Today. We are off in a few minutes to visit friends and mrs pdm's rellies in Waipawa.

Number of the day

0 (zero).

The number of people in Auckland expected to be "Rough Sleeping" (homelessness) by 2020, according to the draft Auckland Plan.

Text Of The Day

From todays Hawkes Bay Today.

`Waitangi Day should be renamed NZ Day as Waitangi causes division and we all live in NZ not Waitangi. What do other readers think. JT.

This reader is 100% in support of what he says.

Asking the wrong question

The PSA's national secretary, Brenda Pilott, said 50 jobs could go.

"The Government keeps asking public service departments to do more with less. It simply can't be done any more."

Maybe the question the government should really be asking is for the departments to do just less.

The days of rampant State sector growth are over.

Put these 50 people into productive jobs.

It simply can be done.

Number of the day

3,800

The approximate number of new dwellings built in Auckland in 2010.

Text Of The Day

From todays Hawkes Bay Today.

`Could someone please help with recipe for small savoury cases made with small irons screwed to handle placed in hot mixture then into oil to cook. Have irons but no recipe. Thanks DM.'

Late today having been at bowls since 9.30am. 2x4x2 pairs is hard work especially at about 30 degrees and when the opposition is out playing you as was the case for us today.

I know there is someone out there with a recipe to help DM - leave it in the comments and I will text it to HBToday.

Number of the day

11,000

The additional new dwellings needed in Auckland each year, over the next thirty years, to meet expected population growth.

I knew it!

I previously wrote how a book by New Zealand First MP, Richard Prosser, should be fun.  Exhibit A:

Because our society, New Zealand society, Western society in general, has been hijacked by a conspiracy of Silly Little Girls. They’re everywhere; in the schools, in the media, in the public service, in the judiciary, even in Cabinet. Everywhere we turn, the foundations of masculinity, the pillars of male-ness which have underpinned the construction and development of our very civilisation, are being undermined, by Silly Little Girls. And we are putting up with it.

 More here.  I like this one too: 

ON 'LIBERALS': "I mean if people want to be weak, stupid, effeminate, erectile dysfunctional, naïve, apologist, namby-pamby, thumb-sucking, lefty pinko fantasy-land morons, let them find their own word for themselves, and leave "liberal" for us genuine freedom-loving, gonad-equipped, libertarian go-getters".

I trust our MSM pay him as much attention as they did with David Garrett (and shamelessly continue to do).

Hat Tip: The Lady Garden

Text Of The Day

From todays Hawkes Bay Today:

`Stop moaning about the cellphone towers. You hardly notice the thing unless it's on your front lawn. From a distance it looks like Sky Tower or the wind wand. Take a look at the rubbish around town these days - that's an eysore. MJB.

Hear Hear!!!!

Number of the day

24,000.

The average number of new dwellings built in New Zealand each year.

Text Of The Day

From todays Hawkes Bay Today

`People who believe they need to hit/smack their children in order to discipline them and teach them to be responsible citizens need to take parenting classes! Unattributed.

I cannot let this go without comment. Smacking and sometimes the wooden spoon etc certainly did my generation no harm. When I look at the poorly disciplined `smart alec' kids around these days my fingures itch. mrs pdm and I smacked our children on occasions and still have no hesitation in - albeit rarely - delivering a smack to any of our 12 grandchildren.

Smacking remains an essential part of good parenting.

Far left academic blames Labour for Crafar farm purchase

Helen Clark attending a conference on Chinese farming in 2010 (in the centre)

From Stuff:

University of Auckland law professor Jane Kelsey said the Government could not treat applications from Chinese investors differently from similar applications from other countries' investors under what is known as the 'most-favoured-nation' rule.''


She agreed with Key that the Government could have faced an international law suit for breaching its free trade agreement with China if it declined the Shanghai Pengxin purchase.

''Shanghai Pengxin's application pointed to numerous purchases of farmland by investors of other nationalities, and claimed that rejection of its otherwise well-founded application would amount to anti-Chinese discrimination.

That would be the 650,000 hectares sold by Helen Clark between 1999-2008.

Then there's this from annointed leader, David Shearer:

Labour was not opposed to foreign investment, he said. 

''However we also believe no overseas purchaser has an automatic right to buy New Zealand land. That is a privilege and any purchase must provide some added value.'' 

Pathetic.  The OIO performs that exact task to ensure no overseas purchaser has an automatic right to buy New Zealand land - for sensitive land at least.  And "added value" (in a roundabout way) is almost always one of the OIO's criteria - you have to put a business case.

So essentially Shearer is arguing for status quo.   

It's very difficult analysing Shearer.

UPDATE: Farming is the apt topic because David Parker (ex partner in large law firm) has a bad dose of foot-in-mouth.

Meanwhile, the Government's being challenged over claims the free trade deal Labour struck with China meant the Crafar farm sale to Chinese interests had to be allowed.

Labour Finance spokesman David Parker says both the Prime Minister and the Land Information Minister have made the claim.

Mr Parker says the relevant clause in the free trade deal doesn't change New Zealand's ability to turn down applications for land purchases, and we still retain control of foreign investment in our country.

Mr Parker says assertions a most-favoured nation clause in the FTA prevents control of land sales is also wrong.

 Of course, it's not the first time Parker opens his mouth and gets things wrong.

He is welcome to debate Jane Kelsey on this.  I know who my money is on. 

SECOND UPDATE:  David Parker was just on Newstalk ZB stating Labour would have declined to give approval.  This does not seem consistent with his leader's position.

 

Some Cyclists Are Idiots

In recent times there have been many letters to the Editor and articles by feature writers in the Hawkes Bay Today about how motorists ignore cyclists and endanger their lives. Once in a while someone writes in and sticks up for motorists asI do so now with this post..

This morning I took mrs pdm to work - she starts at 6am - in Havelock North. As we entered the round-a-bout in the middle of Havelock North from Hastings Road at about 5.55am a cyclist without any visible lights and in mainly dark clothing came hurtling the wrong way through the round-a-bout off Te Mata Road and on to the Hastings Road across the front of me. Lucky for him (I think it was a male aged 35/40) I had almost come to a stop as I was about to enter the round-about or he could have been plastered over my bonnet.

When cyclists do stupid things like that it means they get little sympathy from me when they write letters of complaint about motorists to the paper and they tarnish all of the sensible cyclists..

Number of the day

1.5 million.

What Auckland's population will reach this week, during the week of its anniversary.

QUIZ RESULTS Jan 29th

Bit shortened exposure this week as Monday is a bit deranged already.

Johnno the winner with a very quick correct answer.

Others added more complete responses.

I was unaware the Birch file pic came from the Mt Erebus dedication.

Answers
1 Hon Sir William Birch, Muldoons go to man and the architect of Think Big in response to the "oil shocks" of the 1970s.
2 Moeraki Boulders. Sth of Oamaru .
3 The Otira Viaduct that allowes much more flexible user opportunities for the main East West Highway through the Southern Alps.
4 Mahia Peninsula beach.
5 Lighthouse at Nugget Point on the Otago Coast North of the Catlins

Women Can Be So Blind

A five year old granddaughter is taken to school daily by her grandfather.

When he had a bad cold his wife took the grandchild.

That night she told her parents that the ride to school with Granny was very different!!

"What made it different?" asked her parents:


"Gran and I didn't see a single tosser, blind bastard, dick-head, prick or wanker anywhere on the way to school today!'

Number of the day

17

The age of the alleged offender of a vicious Mt Roskill rape, where the injuries of the victim were described by one senior police officer as among the worst he had seen in 28 years of policing. 

New Zealand First position on land sales

I've been having a bit of a tete-a-tete with new NZ First MP Tracey Martin on Facebook regarding the Crafar farm sales.  I like Tracey.  She is good value, and she will be an excellent MP.  I would gladly have her as my local MP, because she is committed, works hard and is a fierce advocate for her community.  All that is good.  It's just her party's economic policies are dreadful. 

Here's a little titbit from our FB discussion:

Me:       I've pointed this out before, but will do so again. NZ First's position is *exactly* like China's - no foreigners to own *our* land. That is consistent with communism. And while I'm on the topic of *our* land, it is not *our* land; it is land owned by the person, persons or company registered on the title. It is *their* land. We have a concept of indefeasibility of title (if you own it, it's yours unless obtained by fraud) and are looked at across the world as having the best land registration model in the world. That is good in so many ways yet NZ First policy is apparently to undermine that.

Tracey:  Totally agree with Nick on that one - our position around land sales is exactly the same as the Chinese in that no foreigner (so therefore only New Zealanders) can own land. And funnily enough we have made this comment several times in press releases and speeches. I am going to assume here that the confusion is coming from the difference which is that China after the Cultural Revolution made all land the property of the state - and this is where Nick goes with his comment - trying to make this into the usual freedom or government communist servitude argument that ACT uses for its fear based policies e.g. you will have no choice if we do not sell our schools and hospitals. But even right now my relatives of Chinese descent are making trips to China to reclaim their family land that was taken from them by the state - can they sell it to another nation - no they can't - do they want to? No they don't because they too know what it is like to be landless. And in a way you are also right Nick that this is not "our" land except you once again take it down to individual rights in the here and now with no vision for the future. On this land, even if our name is on the title, we are merely practicing kaitiakitanga for our future generations.

Tracey:     Just another little aside - is it ok to trade with communist but you find there political system totally abhorant - so is that values when values suit you?

Me:          Do you go to Fiji for your holidays? Have you bought a flat screen TV from Harvey Norman, but probably made in Vietnam? For that matter, how about Nike or Adidas running/training shoes made in China? Have you had a taxi ride in Auckland driven by an Iraqi (pre Saddam). Have you travelled to Vietnam? North Korea? China?

Just trying to establish consistencies.

 Discuss.   

Of course it's all the governments fault

I see that the research, if you can call it that, is trying to sell us the spin that our increasing obesity as a society is all the fault of the food companies and of course the government.

And the sad thing is that people will buy into this crap.

Being fat is just a combination of two simple things- too much food intake and too little exercise.

My uncle who has made it well into his 80's in good shape has always said "you are what you eat"

Can't really get much simpler than that. Plus the fact that he walked everyday.

Interestingly, to me anyway, now that I have spent the past year sitting at a desk for work and only eating modest amounts of food, I am now finding that I must also exercise - ok walk the dog down the beach-to help stay in shape. When I worked on the farm for the prior 6 months I quickly became the lightest I had been for many years. Now I am always suspicious when I meet a fat farmer.

Personal responsibility and commonsense are the only two commodities you need to ingest to be fit and slim.

Having a lack of government intervention in our lives and unscrupulous food companies rammed down our throats as the reason for obesity has more to do with some interested parties looking for more funding for their research. Real life is much simpler.

Ratana is an exercise in cringe politics.

In about 8 days our political leaders and wannabes will go to The Treaty Grounds at the Bay Of Islands for what is becoming one day in a series of "be seen to be there" photo opportunities.

Last week it was the entirely cringeworthy attendance at Ratana on the occasion of the birthday of the long deceased T W Ratana, who many years ago started his cult, the followers of which were taken for granted by Micheal Savage's original Labour Govt and that pointless marriage of convenience continued for the next nearly 80 years with no apparent benefit for Maori but considerably benefit for Labour' albeit significantly diluted with current schisms in maori politics.

New MP for Te Tai Tonga, Rino Tirikatene, Southern Maori's very own Kim Family, is being lauded as the next great brown Ratana hope.

How long before some wannabe sets up a similar exercise in futility with a day out with Destiny. It will probably get started with the first day at Tamaki's University in Sth Auckland.

As a young man I recall the great anticipation with which the announcement was greeted in the daily papers, when the current editor of the official organ (periodocal) of the Catholic Church would publish the political preference of the sitting head of the Catholic Church in a direction to the flock as to who they were expected to vote for.

Sensibly the founding fathers of the US were very specific in their constitution on the separation of church and state.
I wonder how the Reverend Dean Peter Beck will cope with that principle if he is successful in winning the vacant seat in the Burwood Pegasus Ward of CHC.

In the decade around 1980 The Orewa Rotary Club on the North Shore used to promote a members night when The National Leader would give them an address that would effectively kick off the political year with a combination of state of the nation and possible programm for his political year.
It seemed to me to be a more fitting start to the new year of politics that the current fawning, patronising shallow political displays at Ratana and Waitangi we are now saddled with in current times.

By all means have the followers of Ratana celebrate the original cult founder's birthday but leave the rest of us out of it, it is an embarrassment to the Nation. As for Waitangi, make it more appropriate to the rest of us who have chosen to make this counry our homland whether by migration in times more recent than the ancestors of the so named Tangata Whenua or as a birthright from equally connected New Zealanders, sans the political gyrations of some of us claiming a special status by a hint of a blood connection, rarely proved, to those who came in a canoe.

We all got here by a migration of one sort or another and we are all allowed our own beliefs.

KNOW YOUR COUNTRY Sunday 29th Jan

A SAD DAY FOR AUSTRALIA

Australians have a right to be appalled at the antics of Aboriginal protesters venting their spleen at Prime Minister Gillard and Tony Abbott on Australia Day over the incorrectly reported comments that had Tony Abbott calling for the so called Aboriginal Embassy outside the old Parliament Buildings in Canberra to be shut down.

The mayhem that followed did the Aboriginal cause no good at all and probably set back attempts towards national reconciliation by years.   The graphic pictures of young Aboriginal children spitting on a burning  Australian Flag would serve only to alienate the 98% non indigenous Australian community from attempts to resolve legitimate grievances.   That has been acknowledged by responsible Aboriginal leadership who called for those responsible for the violence to be handed over to them for 'Aboriginal Justice' once they had been dealt with by the Courts.

And now comes the news that one of Gillard's Press Secretaries set the whole thing up by contacting an ALP activist at the 'Embassy' and suggesting that she might want to to have the people there confront Gillard and Abbott at the restaurant where they were honouring Emergency Service workers with medals .    It has just been announced the Press Secretary concerned has resigned.

All this among continued rumblings in the ALP and the media about the likelihood of a imminent leadership 'spill' coupled with the fact that  Labor MP Craig Thomson's past appears to be catching up with him with a rumoured damning report from Fair Work Australia on his stewardship as a Union Official about to be released together with the ongoing police investigation into allegations of credit card fraud by him and the Gillard Government appears close to collapse.

Australia Day, like Waitangi Day, is meant to be a day of celebration.   This one certainly wasn't.

Text Of The Day

From yesterdays Hawkes Bay Today

`What a shame the Queen won't be getting a new $120m dollar yacht. They could at least give her a new rowboat. Unattributed.

Because I will have left for bowls before todays Hawkes Bay Today arrives I had to pinch this from yesterdays paper. You never know I might use todays Hawkes Bay Today for a post tomorrow.

Number of the day

8,000

The hecterage of the Crafar Farms just sold (conditionally) to Chinese capitalists.

Crafar Farms Sale, Suplementary.

Many of the ill-informed have been very vocal and the total hypocrisy of much of that is so predictable if totally stupid.

Farrar at kiwiblog has a graphic up that puts the Crafar land as a small circle against the Melbourne Cricket ground oval representing the total land sold to overseas buyers in the 9 years of the last Labour administration that included many of those who are now seeing a problem with Shangai Pengxin's purchase.

Micheal Fay and Mr Jan Trotman are singing from the same song sheat????????

Mr Shearer has taken up the call of New Zealand for New Zealanders.!!!!!!!!!!

I wonder what they would all have to say if the ministers had "directed" the OIO to reject the bid in favour of Mr Fays bunch of opportunists and the government had then made good the shortfall to the receivers.

Many of the socialists are decrying the cost of land to young farmers as they attempt to mount the apparently impossible mountain of farm ownership. Helen Clark paid an over the top price for St James Station near Hanmer Springs, that had a greater upward impact on farm prices, because she liked the place and could indulge her megalomaniac desires via DOC expansionism.

How quickly the financially illiterate forget the major impediment the Government veto of Auckland Air Port Shares to the Canadian Pension Scheme, had on investor confidence.

Governments formulate policy and if they can, enact Legislation to bring it to fruition, then they should stay the hell out of the commercial decisions that follow.

Text Of The Day

From todays Hawkes Bay Today.

`I want drilling for oil and gas. I want a modern and wealthy Hawkes Bay. DMcC

My thoughts exactly.

Labour - When Will They Ever Learn?

David `Casper' Shearer appears to have had no initial impact at the Labour Caucus Retreat over the last few days as it looks like Mallard and his failed ways have continued to prevail in the way Labour will progress through 2012 and beyond.

This is evidenced by this post of Deputy Leader Grant Robertson's over at Red Alert:
http://blog.labour.org.nz/2012/01/27/the-sad-state-of-keys-nation/

There are not many comments so far but most of them are giving Grant a well deserved pasting. They just will not learn.

BTW why David `Casper' Shearer? Simple really. Since he has taken over as leader he has been invisible. Just like Casper, The Friendly Ghost.

Sanity Prevails in Crafar Farm Sales.

Apparently the shennanigans are over.

Minister,Maurice Williamson amd Dr Johnathon Coleman have announced the Government has accepted the OIO recommendation that the sale of the "Crafar Farms" to Shangai Pengxin interests of China be approved.

The Farms that were accumulated by Alan Crafar as a dairy farm conglomerate but fell into mortagage difficulties with Westpac Banking with the farms placed in the hands of Receivers.

A lesser offer, some estimate at 40 million dollars less, from a group headed by Micheal Fay and using Xenophobia and other spurious publicity tactics are branded the failure they always were.

Number of the day

309,000

The approximate number of dwellings needed in Auckland over the next 30 years (or so) to meet expected population growth.