"Only the federal government has the resources necessary..."
That's called a lie. It doesn't have it, it is printing it, borrowing it from future childrens' taxes.
You see that's the problem. Mortgaging future taxpayers now, and NO accountability for it.
11 February 2009
Maiden Speech 3: Kevin Hague: Green and confused
In my ongoing series catching up with the new MPs, there is Kevin Hague. A new Green list MP. My hopes weren't high, but he was CEO of the West Coast District Health Board - you would hope someone of that position, responsible for a region's healthcare, would be clever.
His maiden speech is here.
So:
- He is keen on the Treaty of Waitangi (whatever rocks your boat, funny how the Green party does so badly in Maori seats).
- He doesn't believe in objective reality instead "a new economics that values intrinsic natural characteristics and recreational use". Presumably if different people value things differently, Kevin will sort them out?
- He doesn't believe that you can change your health by your eating, drinking, exercise, smoking, drinking and drug taking because "the health of a population group is largely a reflection of the power it has over its own circumstances, and the environment surrounding it, and that good health improvement can only result from political will". Yep, only politics can make you healthier. Idiot.
- You can only be happy once? "Growth achieved through the bubble economics of speculation is exploitation of another sort, where the non-renewable resource is human dignity and happiness". Happiness isn't renewable?
- Yet he is an atheist and proud of it. Wonderful stuff "I absolutely reject the idea that ethical or moral behaviour has its source in religious faith." I absolutely agree that it need NOT have such a source.
Then he goes off beam:
- "In the absence of such external power then the responsibility for determining how we should live together, and for acting to achieve that state, is solely, but collectively, ours". See no objective basis for it, people vote for how they should live together. Like some tribe.
- "Only two coherent philosophies are possible: survival of the fittest, with no regard to the effect on any other person, or a world in which we recognise our interdependence and respect for the equal and inalienable rights of every person. I have a passionate allegiance to the second of these belief system" Bollocks, there are other philosophies. People are not interdependent, but they can enhance their lives by trade and exchange and being social.
- Now we know what he means, he likes Marxism "It has echoes in ‘to each according to their need; from each according to their means’ or in my personal motivator "If not me, then who? If not now, then when?"
So it's Darwinism or Marxism - nice!
He goes on, he even thinks we should iron out everyone's opportunities to be the same "What are these inalienable rights that each person is entitled to? Eleanor Roosevelt (driving force behind the UN Declaration of Universal Human Rights, which we celebrated yesterday) referred to equal justice, equal dignity, and equal opportunity." How do you guarantee equal opportunity or equal dignity unless children are raised collectively in some Orwellian nightmare? I doubt he understands that though.
Yet then he just, for a few sentences appears to get it "I think another valuable right to conceptualise is autonomy, provided that the exercise of that autonomy does not reduce that of another person. For me the opportunity to make decisions affecting one’s own life, tempered only by the effect of those decisions on others, is driven directly from this central idea and is exactly the idea captured by the Charter principles of appropriate decision-making, and non-violence."
I'd like to hear him talk about that. The effects of the decisions on others though is not the same as not infringing on the rights of others. After all, if I decide not to spend money, or not to take a job or not to go out with a friend, it affects another - but I should have that right. Why should anyone else make such a decision?
Then we get into the envirovangelism: "My personal principle is to take only what resources I need from the natural world and to harm the natural world to the least extent possible." He wont be driving, flying or eating more than subsistence then. Look forward to Mr Ascetic's principle actually being proven wrong.
He remembers the death of Bobby Kennedy (sad but yawn).
So really, he's a bit confused. How the people of the West Coast coped when he was Chief Executive of the West Coast District Health Board is beyond me. He's a Marxist, a believer in armageddon and has many bizarre ideas (maybe he just doesn't pick his words well, which is particularly bad in a legislator).
His maiden speech is here.
So:
- He is keen on the Treaty of Waitangi (whatever rocks your boat, funny how the Green party does so badly in Maori seats).
- He doesn't believe in objective reality instead "a new economics that values intrinsic natural characteristics and recreational use". Presumably if different people value things differently, Kevin will sort them out?
- He doesn't believe that you can change your health by your eating, drinking, exercise, smoking, drinking and drug taking because "the health of a population group is largely a reflection of the power it has over its own circumstances, and the environment surrounding it, and that good health improvement can only result from political will". Yep, only politics can make you healthier. Idiot.
- You can only be happy once? "Growth achieved through the bubble economics of speculation is exploitation of another sort, where the non-renewable resource is human dignity and happiness". Happiness isn't renewable?
- Yet he is an atheist and proud of it. Wonderful stuff "I absolutely reject the idea that ethical or moral behaviour has its source in religious faith." I absolutely agree that it need NOT have such a source.
Then he goes off beam:
- "In the absence of such external power then the responsibility for determining how we should live together, and for acting to achieve that state, is solely, but collectively, ours". See no objective basis for it, people vote for how they should live together. Like some tribe.
- "Only two coherent philosophies are possible: survival of the fittest, with no regard to the effect on any other person, or a world in which we recognise our interdependence and respect for the equal and inalienable rights of every person. I have a passionate allegiance to the second of these belief system" Bollocks, there are other philosophies. People are not interdependent, but they can enhance their lives by trade and exchange and being social.
- Now we know what he means, he likes Marxism "It has echoes in ‘to each according to their need; from each according to their means’ or in my personal motivator "If not me, then who? If not now, then when?"
So it's Darwinism or Marxism - nice!
He goes on, he even thinks we should iron out everyone's opportunities to be the same "What are these inalienable rights that each person is entitled to? Eleanor Roosevelt (driving force behind the UN Declaration of Universal Human Rights, which we celebrated yesterday) referred to equal justice, equal dignity, and equal opportunity." How do you guarantee equal opportunity or equal dignity unless children are raised collectively in some Orwellian nightmare? I doubt he understands that though.
Yet then he just, for a few sentences appears to get it "I think another valuable right to conceptualise is autonomy, provided that the exercise of that autonomy does not reduce that of another person. For me the opportunity to make decisions affecting one’s own life, tempered only by the effect of those decisions on others, is driven directly from this central idea and is exactly the idea captured by the Charter principles of appropriate decision-making, and non-violence."
I'd like to hear him talk about that. The effects of the decisions on others though is not the same as not infringing on the rights of others. After all, if I decide not to spend money, or not to take a job or not to go out with a friend, it affects another - but I should have that right. Why should anyone else make such a decision?
Then we get into the envirovangelism: "My personal principle is to take only what resources I need from the natural world and to harm the natural world to the least extent possible." He wont be driving, flying or eating more than subsistence then. Look forward to Mr Ascetic's principle actually being proven wrong.
He remembers the death of Bobby Kennedy (sad but yawn).
So really, he's a bit confused. How the people of the West Coast coped when he was Chief Executive of the West Coast District Health Board is beyond me. He's a Marxist, a believer in armageddon and has many bizarre ideas (maybe he just doesn't pick his words well, which is particularly bad in a legislator).
Nick Smith gives trolley buses free run?
Government genius Nick Smith has been reported in the NZ Herald saying the government planned to waive road user charges on electric vehicles.
Odd that, given that road user charges are set to recover the costs of road maintenance from vehicles that don't pay petrol tax. Electric vehicles aren't weightless.
However, Smith may learn that opening his mouth before he understands something can cost. You see there have been electric vehicles paying road user charges for years - Wellington's trolley bus fleet being the notable ones. Not many indeed, but these are heavy vehicles that do tear up Wellington streets, and not charging them for doing so (but charging diesel buses) would make Wellington Bus and its owner, Infratil, rather happy.
So Nick, giving trolley buses a free ride on the roads too now? How many more electric cars will be encouraged because they wont be paying 4.5c/km?
Odd that, given that road user charges are set to recover the costs of road maintenance from vehicles that don't pay petrol tax. Electric vehicles aren't weightless.
However, Smith may learn that opening his mouth before he understands something can cost. You see there have been electric vehicles paying road user charges for years - Wellington's trolley bus fleet being the notable ones. Not many indeed, but these are heavy vehicles that do tear up Wellington streets, and not charging them for doing so (but charging diesel buses) would make Wellington Bus and its owner, Infratil, rather happy.
So Nick, giving trolley buses a free ride on the roads too now? How many more electric cars will be encouraged because they wont be paying 4.5c/km?
A politician who understands
Sir Roger Douglas is showing his value as an MP, by opposing the government's economic "package" in words, although he is unlikely to vote against supply in the House. At the very least he isn't following the sheeple Keynesians who think there is one solution, when that medicine may prove to simply delay the inevitable economic realignment.
Stuff reports Douglas saying:
Stuff reports Douglas saying:
"When international credit is particularly tight, the Government has announced plans to borrow and spend on infrastructure projects.
"We have now been put on notice that our credit rating may be downgraded."
Sir Roger said New Zealand needed lower spending and lower taxes.
Unless both measures are adopted our children will have to pay back the borrowed money, and interest, in the future, he said.
"The Government is now mortgaging our children for the next round of spending increases."
Citizens have become more concerned with "dividing the pie rather than growing it" and politicians "merely mirror the sentiment" of voters.
He's right of course, but then he shows Bill English up so easily.
Douglas has a far more useful solution than spending your childrens' taxes:
Douglas has a far more useful solution than spending your childrens' taxes:
He wants a tax system where an individual's first $30,000 would be tax-free, above that they would be taxed at a flat rate.
The flat rate, and company tax, would be reduced to 15 percent over the next 15 years.
Families with children would receive their first $50,000 tax-free with an increased tax-free threshold based on the number of children.
Families would be guaranteed a minimum income boosted by tax credits if they earned below the threshold.
The flip-side is that individuals would have to foot the bill for their own retirement, healthcare and insurance.
Yes amazing, low flat tax and you'd have to pay for healthcare and your retirement. Sadly though, most New Zealanders are too lazy, too scared and too much like children to want to actually be responsible for themselves.
The report shows a lack of understanding by the reporter, as Douglas says it would be optional to either go for his choice or pay taxes at the moment. THAT is where the real policy revolution should be.
Imagine that - pay the current taxes to access state health, education and promises of pensions OR opt out, get most of your income tax back and don't go crying to Nanny if you stuffed up.
You wont get it voting National.
The report shows a lack of understanding by the reporter, as Douglas says it would be optional to either go for his choice or pay taxes at the moment. THAT is where the real policy revolution should be.
Imagine that - pay the current taxes to access state health, education and promises of pensions OR opt out, get most of your income tax back and don't go crying to Nanny if you stuffed up.
You wont get it voting National.
Obama's big spendup
You’ll hear a lot about Obama’s print money package to stimulate the US economy by mortgaging on the taxes of people’s children. Curious how the left, which goes on endlessly about the suffering children and grandchildren will bear from the environment, doesn’t give a damn about subsidising the follies of imprudent borrowers and lenders with future taxes stolen from the unborn.
So what IS Obama offering? Well let’s start with the, apparent, good. Tax cuts. According to the Washington Post these are 22% of the package, although the Obama Administration claims it is 33%. Why the difference? Well because some of the cuts are tax credits given to people who pay no net taxes at all. That isn’t a tax cut, it’s welfare! I’ll be generous and say that the 22% is a good thing, it is good for the US Federal Government to take less money from people, but the rest? Well it is complicated, but who am I not to try to summarise it all:
The biggest lump is spending called “health, education and labor”. US$91.3 billion worth. It includes money to “renovate schools”, which I’d say the federal government shouldn’t own anyway. It also is money to the Department of Health and Human Services. This means subsidised healthcare, welfare programmes and a large number of other government “public health” initiatives. You might wonder how much of that is sucked into this huge bureaucracy, and indeed how much of the education spending isn’t just going to be absorbed by Obama’s unionised friends.
US$89.7 billion is boosting Medicaid temporarily, the socialised healthcare scheme for children of poor families, the disabled and other categories of low income people. Again, unlikely to stimulate the economy.
US$79 billion for the state fiscal stabilisation fund, essentially bails out states so they can keep spending money on education primarily. Again, unlikely to stimulate the economy.
US$62.3 billion for transportation, housing and urban development. Half is to build roads, but the US has an appalling system for deciding how to build roads. Politicians set priorities, so again this could be money down the plughole if unnecessary roads are built. The rest is public transport and housing assistance, again more money down the drain. The best housing assistance is the one provided by the deflating market.
US$48.9 billion for energy efficiency and renewable energy systems, including subsidising electricity infrastructure. You might think there would be more efforts by individuals at energy efficiency if they paid themselves for the cost of core electricity infrastructure. Again another fundamental failing in how the US does infrastructure.
US$45.7 billion Essentially a boost to unemployment benefits.
US$40.8 billion Welfare so the unemployed can buy health insurance (don’t laugh, they’ll get better care than New Zealand or UK unemployed people using socialised medicine).
US$26.9 billion. Agriculture, nutrition and rural. More money for foodstamps (welfare) and subsidising broadband to rural areas. US$4.1 billion included for “rural development” whatever that means.
The rest are smaller (!) sums for all sorts of pork like:
- Improving national parks
- Improving water infrastructure (couldn’t just privatise it or run it commercially so users pay? No this is the United Socialist States of America)
- Science and technology grants.
All in all, change? Hardly, it’s just throwing money at bureaucracies to spend money like they always have done. No confrontation of why the Federal government thinks it should pay for water or electricity or education. No change to how transport is funded, just throw money at the bureaucracies that spend money where politicians think, while bridges collapse because there aren’t votes in maintenance.
Oh and investment? Yep there will be jobs, bureaucratic unproductive ones. They wont be jobs that are better than those created by people spending that money themselves. They wont be better than setting free the government regulated (and in most cases owned) power, water and road systems, which are America’s tribute to socialism in how badly they are all run.
Obama is just trying to kick the recession into the future again. His soundbite moment of capping chief executive pay for subsidised banks will be popular, and understandable, but he's pouring money down the fat pig laden hides of congressmen and women, state governors and others who leech off of the productive, and by and large show little interest in changing the USA to fix the most badly run parts of the economy.
Never mind that he never had any great new ideas for reform, his personality cult lives.
So what IS Obama offering? Well let’s start with the, apparent, good. Tax cuts. According to the Washington Post these are 22% of the package, although the Obama Administration claims it is 33%. Why the difference? Well because some of the cuts are tax credits given to people who pay no net taxes at all. That isn’t a tax cut, it’s welfare! I’ll be generous and say that the 22% is a good thing, it is good for the US Federal Government to take less money from people, but the rest? Well it is complicated, but who am I not to try to summarise it all:
The biggest lump is spending called “health, education and labor”. US$91.3 billion worth. It includes money to “renovate schools”, which I’d say the federal government shouldn’t own anyway. It also is money to the Department of Health and Human Services. This means subsidised healthcare, welfare programmes and a large number of other government “public health” initiatives. You might wonder how much of that is sucked into this huge bureaucracy, and indeed how much of the education spending isn’t just going to be absorbed by Obama’s unionised friends.
US$89.7 billion is boosting Medicaid temporarily, the socialised healthcare scheme for children of poor families, the disabled and other categories of low income people. Again, unlikely to stimulate the economy.
US$79 billion for the state fiscal stabilisation fund, essentially bails out states so they can keep spending money on education primarily. Again, unlikely to stimulate the economy.
US$62.3 billion for transportation, housing and urban development. Half is to build roads, but the US has an appalling system for deciding how to build roads. Politicians set priorities, so again this could be money down the plughole if unnecessary roads are built. The rest is public transport and housing assistance, again more money down the drain. The best housing assistance is the one provided by the deflating market.
US$48.9 billion for energy efficiency and renewable energy systems, including subsidising electricity infrastructure. You might think there would be more efforts by individuals at energy efficiency if they paid themselves for the cost of core electricity infrastructure. Again another fundamental failing in how the US does infrastructure.
US$45.7 billion Essentially a boost to unemployment benefits.
US$40.8 billion Welfare so the unemployed can buy health insurance (don’t laugh, they’ll get better care than New Zealand or UK unemployed people using socialised medicine).
US$26.9 billion. Agriculture, nutrition and rural. More money for foodstamps (welfare) and subsidising broadband to rural areas. US$4.1 billion included for “rural development” whatever that means.
The rest are smaller (!) sums for all sorts of pork like:
- Improving national parks
- Improving water infrastructure (couldn’t just privatise it or run it commercially so users pay? No this is the United Socialist States of America)
- Science and technology grants.
All in all, change? Hardly, it’s just throwing money at bureaucracies to spend money like they always have done. No confrontation of why the Federal government thinks it should pay for water or electricity or education. No change to how transport is funded, just throw money at the bureaucracies that spend money where politicians think, while bridges collapse because there aren’t votes in maintenance.
Oh and investment? Yep there will be jobs, bureaucratic unproductive ones. They wont be jobs that are better than those created by people spending that money themselves. They wont be better than setting free the government regulated (and in most cases owned) power, water and road systems, which are America’s tribute to socialism in how badly they are all run.
Obama is just trying to kick the recession into the future again. His soundbite moment of capping chief executive pay for subsidised banks will be popular, and understandable, but he's pouring money down the fat pig laden hides of congressmen and women, state governors and others who leech off of the productive, and by and large show little interest in changing the USA to fix the most badly run parts of the economy.
Never mind that he never had any great new ideas for reform, his personality cult lives.
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