He is the one reason to watch Newsnight on BBC2 when he is the presenter.
Can I only wish that TVNZ or TV3 could have someone who could interview politicians like he can:
Try this (BBC not allowing embedding of this) of Michael Howard. Go for 2.40 onwards. The evasion is blatant, and Paxman does not relent.
Or Paxman confronting Sinn Fein MP Martin McGuinness over his denial of involvement in the IRA
Resisting the dumbing down of news here:
Confronting the vile fan of brutal dictators George Galloway:
A collection of him not getting straight answers from politicians and persisting:
And finally a portion from "Have I Got News for you" showing Paxman presenting the weather grudgingly and brilliantly:
Imagine anyone on NZ TV today who would dare be half this adventurous and confrontational.
10 September 2008
National to axe Families Commission?
Yes yes, I'm in raptures, one bureaucracy to go. Yes one, at least something to grapple onto that is a positive change of National compared to Labour. Lindsay Mitchell was getting excited too, until...
Key decided to rebalance it.
Peter Dunne, who should hopefully be back to being the sole MP for his party once more after the election (after all voting United Future has twice meant supporting Labour in power), said it only cost $9 million (of other people's money) over four years. He says its work would "still need to be done by other agencies" if it was abolished.
Bullshit.
Peter, YOU damned well pay for it.
Again National disappoints. Is it just Labour's so bad we are all to put up with more Labour policy tweaking than any real steps forward? Why can't the newest most asinine bureaucracies be wound up?
Why is my tag "National party disappoints", growing weekly?
Key decided to rebalance it.
Peter Dunne, who should hopefully be back to being the sole MP for his party once more after the election (after all voting United Future has twice meant supporting Labour in power), said it only cost $9 million (of other people's money) over four years. He says its work would "still need to be done by other agencies" if it was abolished.
Bullshit.
Peter, YOU damned well pay for it.
Again National disappoints. Is it just Labour's so bad we are all to put up with more Labour policy tweaking than any real steps forward? Why can't the newest most asinine bureaucracies be wound up?
Why is my tag "National party disappoints", growing weekly?
Honour among thieves?
Thieves being Labour and NZ First politicians of course (not that they have a monopoly on this).
Owen Glenn's evidence is damning.
How utterly determined are these suckers from people's bank accounts to remain in power? How little self esteem do they have when they don't have power? What better reason is there to throw them in the dustbin of history?
Why do the good people of Mt Albert think that woman is worthy of representing them?
NZ First and Labour have acted inappropriately, in ways that would have outraged either party had National done the same.
Not PC has it part right. Clark will need to call an election anyway. However, serious questions need to be answered. Winston's credibility now resides only in his geriatric personality cult, and this should ensure his political oblivion. Mike Williams must go to save what's left of the Labour Party's honour, he is the sacrificial lamb Clark must demand. She must apologise, call the election and answer the questions as to why the Labour Party has retained power through sheer hypocrisy.
Meanwhile, maybe Nicky Hagar will write a book about it? Oh no, wouldn't be convenient now would it?
Owen Glenn's evidence is damning.
How utterly determined are these suckers from people's bank accounts to remain in power? How little self esteem do they have when they don't have power? What better reason is there to throw them in the dustbin of history?
Why do the good people of Mt Albert think that woman is worthy of representing them?
NZ First and Labour have acted inappropriately, in ways that would have outraged either party had National done the same.
Not PC has it part right. Clark will need to call an election anyway. However, serious questions need to be answered. Winston's credibility now resides only in his geriatric personality cult, and this should ensure his political oblivion. Mike Williams must go to save what's left of the Labour Party's honour, he is the sacrificial lamb Clark must demand. She must apologise, call the election and answer the questions as to why the Labour Party has retained power through sheer hypocrisy.
Meanwhile, maybe Nicky Hagar will write a book about it? Oh no, wouldn't be convenient now would it?
09 September 2008
Environmentalists impoverishing Africa
Mark Henderson in The Times writes about how Africa is being kept poor by environmental activists from wealthy countries promoting traditional agriculture rather than the latest technology in agriculture. Sir David King, the former scientific advisor to the UK government, says of Africa:
Why has that continent not joined Asia in the big green revolutions that have taken place over the past few decades? The suffering within that continent, I believe, is largely driven by attitudes developed in the West which are somewhat anti-science, anti-technology - attitudes that lead towards organic farming, for example, attitudes that lead against the use of genetic technology for crops that could deal with increased salinity in the water, that can deal with flooding for rice crops, that can deal with drought resistance.
Of course anti-reason is the hallmark of the Greens - a philosophy of hysteria scaremongering, that is a quasi-religious worshipping of the "natural and traditional" against the scientific and technologically advanced.
He calls organic food "a lifestyle choice for a community with surplus food", not to say it is wrong for people to choose it, but that it has driven messages to those communities without surplus food, who simply can't afford to ignore the latest that agricultural science has to offer.
He talks of how hundreds of individual farmers taking produce to market is an inefficient activity from the past, because after all most food in developed countries is not sold by those producing it, because if they spent their effort doing that they would sell a fraction of what they do otherwise.
It's time to engage in the philosophical debate at question here. Should public policy be driven by well intentioned zealots who don't let evidence, science and results get in the way of their ideology, or should it be based on rational analysis of options? Should we continue to listen to the GE scaremongerers, the organic food advocates and those who spread scepticism about science, when they offer no solid evidence for their faith like beliefs?
When Professor King cites the example that "Friends of the Earth in 1999 worried that drought-tolerant crops may have the potential to grow in habitats unavailable' to conventional crops" then you know Friends of the Earth have become enemies of humanity.
It's about time the benign contradiction infested, irrational, quasi religious and pro-state violence philosophy of the Greens was challenged openly - it disgustingly taints the policies of most other political parties, and the mainstream media has neglected to confront what it is really about.
Why has that continent not joined Asia in the big green revolutions that have taken place over the past few decades? The suffering within that continent, I believe, is largely driven by attitudes developed in the West which are somewhat anti-science, anti-technology - attitudes that lead towards organic farming, for example, attitudes that lead against the use of genetic technology for crops that could deal with increased salinity in the water, that can deal with flooding for rice crops, that can deal with drought resistance.
Of course anti-reason is the hallmark of the Greens - a philosophy of hysteria scaremongering, that is a quasi-religious worshipping of the "natural and traditional" against the scientific and technologically advanced.
He calls organic food "a lifestyle choice for a community with surplus food", not to say it is wrong for people to choose it, but that it has driven messages to those communities without surplus food, who simply can't afford to ignore the latest that agricultural science has to offer.
He talks of how hundreds of individual farmers taking produce to market is an inefficient activity from the past, because after all most food in developed countries is not sold by those producing it, because if they spent their effort doing that they would sell a fraction of what they do otherwise.
It's time to engage in the philosophical debate at question here. Should public policy be driven by well intentioned zealots who don't let evidence, science and results get in the way of their ideology, or should it be based on rational analysis of options? Should we continue to listen to the GE scaremongerers, the organic food advocates and those who spread scepticism about science, when they offer no solid evidence for their faith like beliefs?
When Professor King cites the example that "Friends of the Earth in 1999 worried that drought-tolerant crops may have the potential to grow in habitats unavailable' to conventional crops" then you know Friends of the Earth have become enemies of humanity.
It's about time the benign contradiction infested, irrational, quasi religious and pro-state violence philosophy of the Greens was challenged openly - it disgustingly taints the policies of most other political parties, and the mainstream media has neglected to confront what it is really about.
08 September 2008
ACT voted with Labour?
Well so says Brian Rudman. Apparently ACT voted for the Public Transport Management Bill, which Rudman thoroughly approves - instantly sending alarm bells off in my head. ACT with Labour and the Greens?
What IS that Bill about? Well it is quite simple. The Auckland Regional Council has long been upset that so many of Auckland's bus services were commercially provided by the private sector. In others words, people paid fares, companies ran buses and they were all happy - except the ARC of course, which has long wanted to regulate fares, frequencies and plan Auckland public transport endlessly (and shut down commercial bus services competing with its own highly loss making rail services).
The ARC has long missed owning and operating Auckland's buses, ignoring that it did such an abysmal job at it. When the ARC and its ARA predecessor ran most of the buses in Auckland, patronage had its longest continuous decline in patronage from the late 1960s through to the late 1990s. At the same time, the bus fleet progressively aged, services were planned endlessly and Aucklanders continued to drive, and subsidies increased. After forced privatisation (which by the way helped create the assets of what is now Auckland Regional Holdings (formerly Infrastructure Auckland)), Stagecoach Auckland invested heavily in new buses and commercial services thrived, and patronage grew.
However it wasn't trains.
You see the bus companies would sometimes drop routes and frequencies of services operating commercially, upsetting the ARC which believed it needed to subsidise services to plug such gaps. This happened more frequently after millions of dollars were poured into rail services, as subsidised trains undermined unsubsidised bus services.
The ARC is not forced to subsidise any bus services. When it chooses to do so it is required to competitively tender them, so like any business seeking a contractor, it faces choices. It can also set terms and conditions for those tendering. Rudman's claim that "As the law stands, despite these huge subsidies, ARTA cannot inspect operators' books to check whether they are gouging the system" is only true if you think ARTA's contracting processes are robust and it seeks the best value for money.
ARTA could deny increases in subsidies, but it wants to deny increases in fares and to increase services beyond those commercially sustainable. Reality is that fuel prices put up the price of providing services, subsidising rail services undermines the fare revenue of certain bus services, so subsidies rise if fares don't rise.
This bill aims to dodge reality. It means that commercially provided services can now be more heavily regulated - services that get no subsidies may be forced to integrate with a ticketing system specified by ARTA, and which may not deliver any benefits to the companies, because it wont attract enough passengers to pay for the cost of the system. It means that regional councils can contract over commercial services, so that instead of a mix of subsidised and unsubsidised services by different companies, you get subsidised services by a single one.
Rodney Hide has made a mistake. He has voted for local government control over private enterprise and central planning of public transport over entrepreneurship, and incentives to minimise subsidies. National voted against it, it would be nice if it promised to repeal this legislation which would only increase what ratepayers pay to subsidise public transport.
What IS that Bill about? Well it is quite simple. The Auckland Regional Council has long been upset that so many of Auckland's bus services were commercially provided by the private sector. In others words, people paid fares, companies ran buses and they were all happy - except the ARC of course, which has long wanted to regulate fares, frequencies and plan Auckland public transport endlessly (and shut down commercial bus services competing with its own highly loss making rail services).
The ARC has long missed owning and operating Auckland's buses, ignoring that it did such an abysmal job at it. When the ARC and its ARA predecessor ran most of the buses in Auckland, patronage had its longest continuous decline in patronage from the late 1960s through to the late 1990s. At the same time, the bus fleet progressively aged, services were planned endlessly and Aucklanders continued to drive, and subsidies increased. After forced privatisation (which by the way helped create the assets of what is now Auckland Regional Holdings (formerly Infrastructure Auckland)), Stagecoach Auckland invested heavily in new buses and commercial services thrived, and patronage grew.
However it wasn't trains.
You see the bus companies would sometimes drop routes and frequencies of services operating commercially, upsetting the ARC which believed it needed to subsidise services to plug such gaps. This happened more frequently after millions of dollars were poured into rail services, as subsidised trains undermined unsubsidised bus services.
The ARC is not forced to subsidise any bus services. When it chooses to do so it is required to competitively tender them, so like any business seeking a contractor, it faces choices. It can also set terms and conditions for those tendering. Rudman's claim that "As the law stands, despite these huge subsidies, ARTA cannot inspect operators' books to check whether they are gouging the system" is only true if you think ARTA's contracting processes are robust and it seeks the best value for money.
ARTA could deny increases in subsidies, but it wants to deny increases in fares and to increase services beyond those commercially sustainable. Reality is that fuel prices put up the price of providing services, subsidising rail services undermines the fare revenue of certain bus services, so subsidies rise if fares don't rise.
This bill aims to dodge reality. It means that commercially provided services can now be more heavily regulated - services that get no subsidies may be forced to integrate with a ticketing system specified by ARTA, and which may not deliver any benefits to the companies, because it wont attract enough passengers to pay for the cost of the system. It means that regional councils can contract over commercial services, so that instead of a mix of subsidised and unsubsidised services by different companies, you get subsidised services by a single one.
Rodney Hide has made a mistake. He has voted for local government control over private enterprise and central planning of public transport over entrepreneurship, and incentives to minimise subsidies. National voted against it, it would be nice if it promised to repeal this legislation which would only increase what ratepayers pay to subsidise public transport.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)