Electoral law reform

So can anyone tell me, plain and simple, what is wrong with letting free people decide how the express their views in campaigning in election year, as long as it isn't defamatory?

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Is your vote bought by someone's elaborate political campaigning? Or do you think before you vote?

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Or do you think that the vast majority of voters are stupid, and that spending lots of money on electoral advertising influences them in ways you don't like - and that there aren't enough people on your side of the argument willing to spend money to counter that?

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You see my political views are almost always only represented by one party, which is small, has no Parliamentary funding and only modest levels of fundraising itself. I don't whinge and moan that most donations go to the main two parties.

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So why would anyone want to establish rules on this, unless they were simply envious of those political parties and perspectives that they don't agree with? Labour supporters couldn't possibly be envious of National supporters being wealthier could they? Never!

Winston in North Korea

The Korean Central News Agency, which has a complete monopoly on all news publishing in North Korea has finally reported on Winston's trip. You'll be astounded at how little it says:

"Pyongyang, November 14 (KCNA) -- DPRK Foreign Minister Pak Ui Chun met and had a friendly conversation with Foreign Minister of New Zealand Winston Raymond Peters and his party at the Mansudae Assembly Hall Wednesday when they paid a courtesy call on him. "

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The very same bulletin of news had such interesting points such as:

"New books came off the press recently. They tell that the Japanese imperialists are the sworn enemy of the Korean people and the aggressive nature of the Japanese reactionaries will never change."

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Very peace loving.

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or..."Capitalism was restored in some socialist countries in the 1990s. The US-led imperialists took the opportunity to focus the arrow of attack on the DPRK. The Korean people were compelled to undergo the "Arduous March" and forced march due to the unprecedented moves of the imperialists to isolate and stifle the DPRK and the natural disasters for successive years. "

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oh it wasn't because Soviet aid dried up, the entire socialist system is bankrupt and stifling the population, and the refusal of the regime to let aid agencies to operate freely?

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Maybe Winston will tell us what he really thinks of the place when he returns? He can tell us about how he gave honour to Kim Il Sung by visiting his Mausoleum as he is planned to do.

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Yes, the New Zealand Minister of Foreign Affairs is going to pay respects to the tomb of one of the most Orwellian dictators of the 20th century. How can Peters ever look RSA veterans of the Korean War in the face again? Kim Il Sung's record is one of being an elaborate liar about his revolutionary past, of ruthlessly suppressing all dissent, of running Stalinist gulags which exist to this day and placing half of the Korean peninsula in virtual imprisonment. Then HE led an attack on South Korea, sparking the Korean War.

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Nice one Winston. I know you can't refuse the visit to the mausoleum if you go to North Korea, but why did you have to go? Is the nuclear moral fetish of the government that important that you have to bow to murderers, operators of gulags with children in them and visit the tomb of one of the most bloodthirsty warmongering dictators of the 20th century?

Those disgusted by sex are fascinated by it

It started with David Farrar's largely agreeable post about the Department of Internal Affairs supplying lists of known child porn websites to NZ ISPs so they can block access to them. In and of itself this is fine, although the law as it is makes it illegal for anyone to check what this covers - as you risk prosecution yourself. Indeed, censorship laws are strict liability - you can break them without even intending to do so, but I digress.

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The Society for the Promotion of Community Standards (it even has a blog) has for many many years been at the forefront of advocating the prohibition of any form of publications that depict sexuality or nudity. It is dominated by fundamentalist Christians, has a clear anti-homosexual bent (having waged a campaign against Chief Censor Bill Hastings because of his sexuality showing not the slightest respect for his privacy), and responded to the Kiwiblog post. Not only does it want all "objectionable" content blocked on the internet (which given that NZ bans content which is legal in the USA, most of Europe and Japan, would be an enormous and almost futile task), but it called for:

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"all New Zealand ISPs (Internet Service Providers) to block ALL overseas based websites that host child pornography AND hard core pornography (NZ-based websites containing “objectionable content” including child porn are illegal under NZ censorship laws)."

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Hardcore pornography is more than that of course. Material depicting BDSM, groupsex and all sorts of adult consensual fetishes is clearly hardcore. However, objectionable content includes urophilia under the law - which is not an illegal practice. It is not a crime to use urine for sexual purposes, but inexplicably it is a crime to photograph or own a photograph of people doing so.

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Of course SPCS has a curious view of those who reject this. We're all perverts, but check out the language used - it's almost rabid in a certain obsession about homosexuality:

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"Gay rights activists, paedophiles, homosexuals wanting to ‘hook up’ with underage school boys or view ‘bare-backing’ films, those addicted to hardcore pornography and all those who make a living from marketing such moral filth, have rubbished the Society’s call for the implementation of such controls to prevent injury to the “public good”."

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I'm none of those.

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Libertarianz presented a submission on the censorship laws calling for, at the very least, the laws to only prohibit material which was produced through the commission of a criminal act. In other words, if someone was being murdered, raped, sexually abused and being filmed in the act, then it would be an objectionable publication. However, if people were engaging in consentual legal acts, it is absolutely absurd for it to be a crime to film them or even write an account of what they were doing.

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You see, it is crime to even possess an erotic story about watersports in New Zealand. It is not in the USA, and it would take little for anyone to find hundreds of such stories. I don't care for watersports myself, but there is something inherently vile about people risking police action because they read a story about something they can legally do!

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So I responded to the SPCS response with my own concern that proposing child porn sites to be banned is one thing, but extending to all objectionable categories is another - and that SPCS has another agenda. It frankly finds any depictions of nudity and sexuality to be offensive. I simply believe that it is absurd that NZ censorship law bans publications of acts that are legal for adults to participate in. That's my point pure and simple.

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So SPCS went on its long tirade, talking about "rimming" and "So-called “sexual fetish material” (DVDs, videos etc) involving urination (referred to as “water sports in hardcore porn publications) is imported into New Zealand by homosexuals and other sexual pervets (many heterosexual) via the internet." SPCS knows a lot about pornography, odd for a group which hates it so much. Check out the descriptions in this post. SPCS wondered at my motivation, implying that i might sell porn or get off on watersports. Sorry to disappoint guys, I'm not as obsessed with it as you are - I don't sell porn, and watersports aren't my thing, and I'm not gay. I believe in freedom - you know, leaving peaceful adults to get on with their lives, and not having a psychotic obsession with what other people do with their bodies?

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SPCS, with some cheerleading from NZ First, would probably imprison homosexuals, would probably cheerlead on the banning of all erotic material visual and written, and would encourage the spread of their own bigotry against those who have a different view of how they want to use their own bodies sexually. I simply want consenting adults to have freedom.

French turn against the unionists

Nicolas Sarkozy is having what some have called his "Thatcher" moment, when confronting the old fashioned privileges of socialist France he is standing steady. As the first high speed Eurostar train from St. Pancras arrived at Gare du Nord - almost the entire French national rail network, and the Paris Metro were strikebound, along with bus services and cuts in gas and power due to energy worker strikes. Add in postal workers, teachers and judges, and you're in for the typical French socialist union attitude - go on strike if anyone dares suggest you get something less than the generous terms and conditions currently offered. There will be weeks of strikes in France, it is the final showdown between liberalism and socialism.

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However, something has changed in France. You see, the trains aren't running because the government is demanding that locomotive drivers retire later than 50. 50 was the retirement age when driving a locomotive meant shovelling coal - now it means sitting and moving a throttle. Similar ridiculous feather bedding has cost France, and the vast majority of French people who are NOT in such industries or the state sector are sick of it all. They are fighting back. With state debt at 70% of GDP, calls to keep this bloated public sector are looking unsustainable, and calls by unions to increase taxes to pay for it are not kidding most people.

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You see, while the trains are on strike, there were hundreds of commuters handing out anti-strike leaflets opposing the unions, confronting them. After all, Sarkozy won the last election - something the left kind of forgets, and no doubt thinks he somehow cheated his way there, but the reality is this - the majority of French voters chose Sarkozy over Royale the socialist candidate. He has a popular mandate to change France, and the public are standing beside him,

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84% of those polled say the government will not surrender to the unions, but more importantly 71% think it should NOT surrender. Something for John Key and David Cameron to think about - Sarkozy has a pair of what neither of these men seem to display. May he hold firm, because we are all better off if France's economy can be saved, freed and allow to grow.

St. Pancras to Europe

Today a new era in travel between the UK and Europe has begun with the shifting of the Eurostar rail service from Waterloo Station to St. Pancras. This change is the culmination of two integrated projects, the refurbishment and upgrade of St.Pancras station into an international rail terminal, and the completion of the fastest high speed rail link in the UK, allowing 186mph rail journeys from the Channel Tunnel to St. Pancras.

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The upgrade knocks around 20 minutes off of the rail trip from London to Paris. Frankly, air travel between London and Paris, and Brussels has become increasingly pointless. Not least because the need to check in, the tightening of security at airports (not that security is absent on Eurostar), and the distance of Heathrow and Charles De Gaulle airports from London and Paris city centres - means rail travel is simply faster and more pleasant than being boxed in on a short flight, that may be delayed for ages at either airport due to congestion. The cost of this line is an incredible £5.2 billion - astronomical, not least because it involves a 19km tunnel under east London.

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However, today was not the day to debate the questionable value of this investment, only undertaken through convaluted financial arrangements with essentially the British taxpayer supporting it - and today was not the day to remind people that the line is expected only to be used to one-quarter of its capacity, and only half the trains are actually needed. Today was the day of St. Pancras.

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St. Pancras is now, once again, London's premier station. Built by the Midland Railway Company back when Britain's railways were being built and run by the unfettered private sector, it was designed to be (and succeeded in being) grander than the Kings Cross and Euston stations of the competing railway companies of the age - Great Northern Railway and London and North Western Railway. Following the demolition of the original Euston for functional yet uninspiring current terminal, St. Pancras was saved from demolition under British Rail (after nationalisation by the Atlee Labour Government) by the efforts of John Betjemen the poet.

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So now the Gothic wonder of grand old St. Pancras has been painstakingly restored, and I have yet to see it for myself. However, it promises to be grander, and a far more alluring gateway than the overcrowded Waterloo. In a few months time I hope to be able to test this. Meanwhile, judge for yourselves from the website or Eurostar's website.