National promises incentive to make voluntary loan repayments
National has announced two major policies today on the student loans scheme. They are:
- No repeal of interest free loans
- To provide an incentive for voluntary repayments, with a 10% bonus on any repayment over $500
These are linked because I am pretty sure you would not do (2) if it wasn’t for (1). Let’s take them in turn.
The interest free loans policy announced by Labour is a bad policy. If you wanted to spend a few hundred million on helping tertiary students it would have been far better to have spent it on student allowances or lowering tertiary fees. The policy is a bad one because it provides bad incentives – specifically the incentive to borrow money unnecessairly (as one can profit from it at taxpayers expense) and the incentive never to make voluntary repayments (as it is zero interest).
But there is a world of difference between introducing a policy, and not repealing something already in place. National has judged that campaigning on a policy of reintroducing interest on student loans would be electoral poison. Also as John Key points out people have made decisions on taking out loans based on the policy.
This does not mean they are endorsing the original policy. If you employ that logic, then you have to claim Labour endorses the 1991 benefit cuts because they have never reversed them. The reality in politics is relatively few policies get reversed with a change of government. Expecting National to reverse the interest free loans policy would be like expecting Labour in 1999 to reverse the 1997 tax cuts.
So you have National having to agree not to reverse the policy. But you still have the problem of the bad incentives it provides. That is when the voluntary repayment rebate comes in. Sure you can’t reverse the policy, but by providing the voluntary repayment rebate, you provide an incentive for people to pay off their debt quicker. And have no doubt many graduates can pay it off quicker – the level of repayments has dropped massively in the last couple of years.
Now it isn’t all good incentives though. While National’s policy does help correct the repayment incentive, it may make worse the incentive to borrow unnecessarily. Because sure as hell if I was a student I would borrow the maximum, and then repay it the next year and bang I am 10% better off. But this is not a new problem. Zero interest already provides the incentive for people to borrow money they don’t need and invest it. But it does exacerbate the problem somewhat.
So the policy gets a tick on the repayment incentive but a cross on the borrowing incentive. It also gets a tick I suspect on the vote for us incentive!
UPDATE: Colin Espiner has a good piece on the policy change. I like this part:
In all honesty, National couldn’t enter an election campaign promising to raise interest rates on student loans. That would have gone down like an empty keg at a student union orientation.
A nice comparison.
January 31st, 2008 at 4:54 pm
Labour will probably try to better it.
What do you think they will do?
January 31st, 2008 at 5:02 pm
Labour will be kicking themselves that they didn’t think of this first! Bugger!
January 31st, 2008 at 5:05 pm
Meeee tooooo Says Labour (and Damn you to hell you theiving Tories) How dare National not only adopt this policy – but better it with a great proposal. Labour will now need to offer 11% discount to beat this – standby for the announcement.
Poor labour – outflanked by a smarter and more co-hesive National Party yetrt again (also note National are still setting the agenda leftards?)
January 31st, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Yes. Good, commonsense stuff, no votes to be lost by it. 10 to 1 Labour will do it anyway.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:08 pm
“Meeee tooooo Says Labour ”
um Monty…… the basis of this policy is Labour’s remember
I’m not saying National are meee tooo for adding to it
but your comment makes no sense
January 31st, 2008 at 5:10 pm
how can it work,its commonsense,you know something thought of by a real working person with brains , not a liarbor committe or something dragged away from liarbor UK
January 31st, 2008 at 5:11 pm
To provide an incentive for voluntary repayments, with a 10% bonus on any repayment over $500
That’s a winner for most people with a (large) student loan.
As for the reasons for not repealing the interest write-off policy (interest is still charged, but written off if you stay in the country), the blogger doth protest too much, methinks.
I’d be happy to for them to set interest at inflation. However, for a while, the interest charged on my student loan was higher than the rate on my mortgage. That was just farked.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:13 pm
This strikes me as (a) a good policy and (b) something you would be very critical of if it were bought in by Labour. As you say, it’s possible to borrow $10,000, stick it in the back at 9% interest for a year then pay back ~$9100 and you’ve made a nice little profit.
Very few people will do so of course, but that was exactly the same logic you used to attack Labours policy 3 years ago.
[DPF: Perhaps you missed the paragraph where I criticised it for exactly that problem]
January 31st, 2008 at 5:18 pm
I wonder if the percentage is too low to make people want to pay the loan back quicker.
The key point is that loans are interest free
so 3 years of high inflation (Ie. 3.333%) means that paying the extra and not paying the extra are the same
and inflation at around 3% is likely for a while isnt it?
January 31st, 2008 at 5:19 pm
NZ Labour Party newsflash – “heh, we were going to announce that policy tomorrow! National must have planted a mole in our camp.”
January 31st, 2008 at 5:19 pm
This strikes me as (a) a good policy and (b) something you would be very critical of if it were bought in by Labour
and
Very few people will do so of course, but that was exactly the same logic you used to attack Labours policy 3 years ago.
My thoughts exactly. I love how the right are applauding this.
As you say, it’s possible to borrow $10,000, stick it in the back at 9% interest for a year then pay back ~$9100 and you’ve made a nice little profit.
Not quite. You can’t borrow a $10,000 lump-sum for 1 year. Instead you get it at $150 a week.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:23 pm
I don’t think anyone is surprised National has adopted the student loan policy. But their repayment incentive is clever.
Take that Sonic, one less thing for you to bang on about.
I reckon Labour’s next bribe will be something ridiculously irresponsible like ‘interest free home loans’.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:24 pm
SO WHY was the no-interest scheme worth REEEEEAAAALLY ripping into when Labour proposed it, but not worth repealing???!!
It’s a good move regardless, but seems far from principled.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:25 pm
Jordan’s all in a blather saying it’s unfair because rich pricks can afford to scoop the maximum discount….
Ahhh the left – they just don’t get economics do they. Well maybe they get it – but it’s just not fair that someone can rack up a massive debt on a useless degree and not be able to afford to pay it back quickly. Yawn…
January 31st, 2008 at 5:26 pm
This is a disgrace. How can National have a more generous student subsidy (yes, a subsidy!) than Labour?!!!!
Not only will every taxpayer still be paying the usury on my indulgent BA in Philosophy, but John Key will rob them even further. Thanks guys for coughing up so willingly to fund my five years of partying and downing bottles of riesling in Shadows!
January 31st, 2008 at 5:32 pm
Jesus H. Christ.
Can we have an opposition that promises to undo some of the damage, please?
This is just lumping more bureaucratic bullshit incentives on what is already a very large pile of bullshit.
If you feel like assisting students, this is a particularly roundabout way to do it. Is National’s goal to employ all of NZ in the public sector?
Not happy.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:37 pm
Not only will every taxpayer still be paying the usury on my indulgent BA in Philosophy, but John Key will rob them even further. Thanks guys for coughing up so willingly to fund my five years of partying and downing bottles of riesling in Shadows!
Sigh … having been in the workforce since I was 18, I wrote off my hard-earned tax investment in tax-is-theft-but-I-won’t-leave-university types years ago …
January 31st, 2008 at 5:39 pm
Not happy.
Oh, there’ll be lots more of this. The only question is whether the “Key is a filthy socialist!” screeching reaches a crescendo before or after the election.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:40 pm
John Key is turning this into a bidding war, and Helen will violate none of her principles by meeting him and then raising his bet. What is so galling is that my fellow countrymen actually vote for this, apparently. Two politicians going for your vote by promising to spend ever more of other people’s money. I can hardly imagine anything less inspiring or heroic.
Show me where Key has announced policy that is not trying to outflank Labour’s on the left.
And I’m apparently surrounded by people who will vote for this shit. What a great country.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:41 pm
Fuck! Maybe the trading banks could adopt similar policies, except their shareholders aren’t 50%+ idiots.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:41 pm
<i>But there is a world of difference between introducing a policy, and not repealing something already in place.</i>
Less so if you’ve repeatedly <i>promised</i> to repeal it, but hey, I’ll be charitable …
[DPF: I agree. And Labour promised many times to repeal the benefit cuts. I can't recall National ever ever promising to repeal interest free loans]
January 31st, 2008 at 5:42 pm
He’s a populist, isn’t he Russell? Just works out what the median voter will go for and serves it up.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:42 pm
Here is an idea:
Charge interest on the student loan (say 7%), but write off the interest for each year that a voluntary repayment of at least 5% (for example) is made.
Any thoughts?
January 31st, 2008 at 5:45 pm
The only question is whether the “Key is a filthy socialist!” screeching reaches a crescendo before or after the election.
Yeah, I can’t wait to hear that. It’ll be fun.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:48 pm
Hell, i wouldnt give interest free loans,you would have to go to a bank and get a debit card at 21% interest for your loan,now that would get the loan payed back fast. pay it back fast while you learn or have RICH parents. There shouldnt be free meals in this world.I earned crap while i learned to be a tradesman not a paper shuffler. Heck you get loans for literarly studing crap , with NO chance of a job at the end of the course,but hell300000, people have loans studying whatever, and paying back even less
January 31st, 2008 at 5:50 pm
“The only question is whether the “Key is a filthy socialist!” screeching reaches a crescendo before or after the election.”
It’s buying votes with public money, that sounds like socialism to me.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:50 pm
Charge interest on the student loan (say 7%), but write off the interest for each year that a voluntary repayment of at least 5% (for example) is made.
Great idea.
In addition, maybe you could make interest on the first $10,000 fully tax deductible and then 50% deductible after that when mortgage rates are over 9% provided you don’t earn more than $60,000 and don’t not own a first home or a second car and contributed at least 10% of your income to Kiwisaver, excluding any contribution to your first home of course.
Or you could just cut fees.
Or you could ask students to accept that fact that taxpayers already pay 75% of the cost of their education and to live with it. NZ is not short of tertiary students.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:59 pm
Key is a Marxist. Not Karl, but Groucho:
“Those are my principles, and if you don’t like them… well, I have others.”
January 31st, 2008 at 6:01 pm
I thought santas couldn’t throw lollies anymore as they can hit children in the eyes. We had better hand out safety glasses.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:02 pm
Training our best young people that bitching is more profitable than working.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:03 pm
Heck you get loans for literarly studing crap
Off cause you might, learn’s how to write proper?
January 31st, 2008 at 6:06 pm
Good politics and bad policy. Not particularly happy with the bad policy, but very happy that National finally got some political nous.
Andrew B, don’t see that many people on the right applauding, just a bunch holding their nose and saying “ah well, can’t do everything in one term.” You know, like Helen not repealing the reserve bank act despite wanting too.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:07 pm
Or you could ask students to accept that fact that taxpayers already pay 75% of the cost of their education and to live with it.
Ben, “students” and “taxpayers” aren’t mutually exclusive groups.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:08 pm
Interest free tertiary loans was and is an incentive to retain and encourage the return of graduate workers. It was the best option, just as targeting tax cut credits to families was the right policy in 2005.
Of the two options lowering fees and increasing studnt allowance – the latter is obviously essential because of rising food and power costs. These are moving faster than inflation.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:08 pm
Andrew Bannister
Excellent idea. But I can hear the lefties screaming that it punishes people who can’t manage to pay 5% each year….
Rich pricks get it interest free – everyone else pays 7%…..
January 31st, 2008 at 6:09 pm
Seems like a policy brought out simply to have a policy.
I agree that they can’t repeal the interest free policy of Labour for the reasons they supply. Once a few thousand people borrowed a few million more on an expectation of no interest, you cant pull the rug out from underneath them by reinstating interest.
But I dont think spending tax payers funds to create an incentive for student to pay the money back is the way to go. They have out-Laboured Labour, and I hope that this admittedly minor policy isn’t an example of what is to come.
Labour fully-fucked us all with that policy, at least Nationals policy will be easier to peel back if needed.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:09 pm
one of the andrews said..
“..Not quite. You can’t borrow a $10,000 lump-sum for 1 year. Instead you get it at $150 a week..”
maths degree..?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
January 31st, 2008 at 6:11 pm
philu
Get that vapouriser warmed up – I’m heading to your place with some fine Wanganui buds…..
January 31st, 2008 at 6:14 pm
“Interest free tertiary loans was and is an incentive to retain and encourage the return of graduate workers.”
So why not lower all income tax? That would be a hell of an incentive.
Why only provide the incentive to people that have moved overseas and still have a student loan?
Because it wasnt about that. It was about gaining the votes of students and their parents.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:19 pm
Phil, someone else mentioned investing $10,000 for a year at 9%. The point is that you don’t get $10,000 cash as a lump-sum.
Back in the early days of student loans people used to enrol, get a loan for their fees, then withdraw from their courses and have the fees “reimbursed” into their own bank accounts. Loans for living costs were paid out quarterly. Gosh, just can’t remember who the government was back then…
January 31st, 2008 at 6:21 pm
Kimble
The government can effect an incentive between staying here or working overseas – it cannot do anything about the higher wages.
People vote for policy in support of our economy and it’s workers – rather than those choosing to live overseas in another’s.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:22 pm
Andrew Bannister
We know all about the failed policies of the past, it’s what caused my cat to die at age 16 a few weeks back. Bloody Ruth R. She should have know it would have that effect.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:23 pm
Kimble
Exactly – and along with an extra $800K spent on advertising – it worked.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:23 pm
Burt, but I am a lefty and I came up with the idea. Oh no, have I become a righty?
January 31st, 2008 at 6:28 pm
Oh, there’ll be lots more of this. The only question is whether the “Key is a filthy socialist!” screeching reaches a crescendo before or after the election.
Well, Russell, I love Idiot/Savant’s take on the perennial glass half-full/half-empty question: Who gives a fuck, ‘case we all know that prick Key is going to hide it after the election.
*sigh*…. Really, I think the only way he’s going to make some people happy is by wiping his arse on the Treaty in a live broadcast from the National Archives, declaring war on Iran, forcing children to eat GM whale-burgers, and selling the whole country (and contents) to Rupert Murdoch.
Meanwhile, back in the real world you pick you battles and focus on what you can achieve. Then again, it really doesn’t fit the meme of Key as a wide-eyed crypto-fascist ideologue. Well, get over it.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:29 pm
“The government can effect an incentive between staying here or working overseas – it cannot do anything about the higher wages.”
Yes it can. It can increase take home pay directly by lowering tax rates.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:33 pm
Kimble
New Zealand would be the only country in the world trying to make it’s low wage economy attractive to workers overseas by adopting a third world level of public services and infrastructure.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:34 pm
RIP
January 31st, 2008 at 6:36 pm
Sorry to go OT DPF, but I can’t lets this quote from you passwithout comment:
I think it is reasonable to claim that Labour endorses the 1991 benefit cuts because it has never reversed them. Unlike National cancelling interest-free student loans or Labour reversing the 1997 tax cuts, a reverse of the benefit cuts would have given something back to people, not taken away an (albeit undeserved) perk.
Now back OT… Andrew Bannister’s “charge ‘em interest but write it off if a minimum repayment is made” seems perfectly in keeping with the rational “carrot and stick” approach Key took to youth crime and education only yesterday and is probably the only way to undo this mess without rorting the long-suffering taxpayer or crippling graduates with debt.
As ben says, I’d have expected at least the kind of innovative thinking Andrew’s managed to come up with, if not an all-out attempt to reverse the damage, not a lame attempt to hand out a bigger bag of lollies.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:37 pm
“Not only will every taxpayer still be paying the usury on my indulgent BA in Philosophy, but John Key will rob them even further. Thanks guys for coughing up so willingly to fund my five years of partying and downing bottles of riesling in Shadows!”
Well at least that BA in Philosophy lead to an appreciation of riesling if not to any great skills in politcial argument. So the usury wasn’t completely wasted.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:38 pm
Sorry Mr Bannister , 6.07pm, must use spell check (im a dumby), but this subjects got you going, umm i can speeeell when i take the time and use a dictionary. but i would still hammer the students with HIGH interest rates AND A LEGAL BINDING BOND ,.You have to work and live in NZ for 5 years after graduating and pay your loan back at 20%of your gross salary. Its only fair to the rest of the plebes who have carried the loan takers. tough
January 31st, 2008 at 6:38 pm
Oh, and if Key causes mass cranial implosions among the loony left and the rabid right, he’ll have performed a great public service as far as I’m concerned.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:38 pm
“Because it wasnt about that. It was about gaining the votes of students and their parents.”
Exactly.
I haven’t seen anything lately that suggests that the record number of people leaving our shores are leaving because of their interest free student loans.
Why bother to offer more bribes for the student vote? As a student it is almost obligatory to vote labour. Then you leave and either work for a living or grow a brain and vote National – simple really.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:39 pm
OPPS GROSS YEARLY SALARY ,Mr Bannister
January 31st, 2008 at 6:50 pm
“by adopting a third world level of public services and infrastructure”
Yeah, tell me again about all the infrastructure spending going on.
January 31st, 2008 at 6:55 pm
“if Key causes mass cranial implosions among the loony left and the rabid right”
the rabid right won that race (the rapid right?), the loony left were a bit slow off the mark but they did get there –
http://kiwiblogblog.wordpress.com/2008/01/31/loan-shark/
January 31st, 2008 at 6:57 pm
If you follow the link that DPF kindly provided to Colin Espiner’s blog, you’ll learn that: __”Key was honest today when we asked him why the U-turn: “Because we lost the election.”__
It’s pragmatic politics, not ideology. I’d rather have my preferred party in power, not perpetually pure and stranded in opposition.
January 31st, 2008 at 7:08 pm
i would still hammer the students with HIGH interest rates AND A LEGAL BINDING BOND ,.You have to work and live in NZ for 5 years after graduating and pay your loan back at 20%of your gross salary.
John, I’m pleased you are not running the country (or my kid’s english class).
January 31st, 2008 at 7:09 pm
Ooops, English class.
January 31st, 2008 at 7:10 pm
There are only two o’s in Oops, Andrew.
January 31st, 2008 at 7:13 pm
Oops.
January 31st, 2008 at 7:14 pm
but there’s three o’s in Ooops.
January 31st, 2008 at 7:16 pm
Oh for fark’s sake.
Ooops!
January 31st, 2008 at 7:22 pm
Is ooops the only word which doesnt start with a capital letter at the start of a sentence but does if used within a sentence?
January 31st, 2008 at 7:23 pm
Nope! The word Quivvel does as well.
January 31st, 2008 at 7:24 pm
no, Oops is, but ooops isn’t.
January 31st, 2008 at 7:32 pm
Ooooops what are you guys doing??
January 31st, 2008 at 7:45 pm
The 10% is a bit mean. Basically it costs the Crown money to have this unpaid liability left unpaid. There should be a generous rebate scheme if people pay the thing off early being the discounted present value of the lump sum. When you look at it like that the rebate for early repayment could be as much as 50% if it is paid off in a lump sum.
January 31st, 2008 at 7:48 pm
It’s pragmatic politics, not ideology
And this is what makes the far right and left froth. You can almost smell the fear as Key moves deep into Labour’s territory.
The idea that Key is one of the “I’m in the lifeboat now, so give me a paddle and I’ll beat the people in the water” crowd is dead, and conservatives who think he has betrayed them are authoritarians who simply don’t understand the value of a free exchange of ideas.
January 31st, 2008 at 7:54 pm
Well what can one say.
National going the don’t upset the apple cart route.
I think i hear a FLIP FLOP, FLIP FLOP, FLIP FLOP IN THE WIND.
wHAT A SPINLESS BUNCH OF WANKERS.
January 31st, 2008 at 7:55 pm
I would like to see that one has to get an average of B or better in the previous year in order to get the interest free loan. Obvious this would not apply to first year students.
That should cut out most of the free riders.
January 31st, 2008 at 7:58 pm
Which party is your preffered party of Government?
Have you voted in the poll at http://www.nzdebate.blogspot.com
January 31st, 2008 at 7:59 pm
I must say I am liking Mr. Key more and more.
First the social engineering policy that was almost exactly the same as what the Labour party intends to do. Now practically ripping off Labour’s 2005 policy and giving students a little bit more to pretend his policy is original, despite the National Party’s insistence at the last election that interest free student loans constituted a “lolly scramble”.
Yes, I must say I like Mr Key. He is reminding me more and more of Helen Clark every day.
What’s next? A “tax credit” for working families? He certainly won’t be able to afford a full blown tax cut once he hires all those bureaucrats – sorry boot camp administrators and tax accountants.
January 31st, 2008 at 8:01 pm
Ruth
I think you have it in one and I do love the Key in the lifeboat image
January 31st, 2008 at 8:09 pm
What a load of bollocks, so what was morally wrong when labour introduced it, is now politically astute.
Glad to see you have your morals set in such strong terms there folks.
Also the 10% is bullshit, it rewards the rich kids of Key etc and further penalizes those whom are going to take the rest of their lives to pay it back.
Nice, keep bringing this rubbish on and it’s an easy walk back in for Helen.
January 31st, 2008 at 8:12 pm
If the past three years has taught me anything, it would have to be the value of politicians who listen, consult, confer, and think through a policy before they put it to the popular vote.
I have been a vocal critic of Key’s apparent lack of leadership over the past year, and I have implied taht he is the ‘lightweight’ that Clark has accused him of.
But in the last four days, he has fired off two torpedoes and each one has hit the Labour battleship mid-ships, and we have been regaled with the splash of lifeboats and frantic jocketing for a place in them from Helen and King to name but two.
In the (if I may use another maritime analogy) wake of retrospective laws, EFA Terrorism Suppression cock-ups, Green ‘anti-smacking’ reforms, Winston and starship all cooked up behind closed doors and foisted on us whether we liked it or not, it is refreshing to see policy which has been thought out, with the dots joined, and presented for debate.
Yes – ‘debate’ – remember that old idea?
At f**n last.
But don’t worry labour, you can still get in, here are some of the ways:
Vote Green = Vote labour
Vote First = Vote labour
Vote Progressive = Vote Labour
it will be interesting to see, after national have laid out a series of properly thought out alternatives to the present f**d-up abuses, if the great kiwi electorate fall for it again….
January 31st, 2008 at 8:13 pm
The paper shuffling left are rattled, when they abuse a looong time union member of the EPMU. RATTLED, by MR Key HAHAHAHAHA. whats that saying sticks and stones, will not stop MR KEY kicking ms davis butt in all the editorials, opps any bad speeeelling.I see Mr Key is a rich prick,he dosnt need to wear jandles (flip flop)in our LOW wage society, helens getting us ready for the chinese takeover
January 31st, 2008 at 8:20 pm
Because most people inhabit the centre-ground i one way or another.
It follows that the ‘loony left’ and the ‘rabid right’ must inhabit the fringes.
In my opinion, the Clark Administration has courted some ‘loony left’ policies as their desire to hold power has waned. Frankly Labour are tired and out of ideas.
i think that the Labour party want to be rid of Helen. the only way to do that is to lose the election. Taht is why they ain’t gonna fight it.
Key is working, because he is working with the majority. Despite those who say he ‘doesn’t understand MMP’ they are wrong. What he is doing is appealing to the centre – the majority.
If you want to make a radical protest vote this election – vote Maori Party/National. Make history twice in one day – and kick out the lunatic fringes..
January 31st, 2008 at 8:37 pm
Ben, “students” and “taxpayers” aren’t mutually exclusive groups.
What a retarded statement. So what?
January 31st, 2008 at 8:55 pm
John Dalley said “Well what can one say.
National going the don’t upset the apple cart route.
I think i hear a FLIP FLOP, FLIP FLOP, FLIP FLOP IN THE WIND.
wHAT A SPINLESS BUNCH OF WANKERS.”
No JD, I think National is going the “win this election” route. Lee C is right on the money – two Key torpedoes; two direct hits on the SS Labour.
January 31st, 2008 at 9:10 pm
So adopting a Labour policy is a torpedo?
Why not fire the whole lot, and sink Clark with socialism?
January 31st, 2008 at 9:23 pm
David, what a truly remarkable about face. Essentially the same policy was roundly criticised by you only three years ago and although many of your readers were then in high school, I well recall your outrage. Your purported independence is seriously jeopardised when you so rapidly transmogrify from lion to lamb.
[DPF: Paul - either you have forgotten how to read English, or you are distorting what I have said. In the post above I clearly state that interest free loans are bad policy, and I also point out a negative aspect to the voluntary repayment policy. ]
January 31st, 2008 at 9:34 pm
Meh… I guess DPF’s failing is he’ll pick simple political reality over ideological purity any day of the week. And sorry to wound our host’s ego, but he doesn’t dictate National Party policy any more than Helen Clark does.
January 31st, 2008 at 9:39 pm
Perhaps so Craig but he’s very noisy about it in the process yeah? Awkward as it may be, I all-to-well recall the chorus of the cheer-squad.
[DPF: Paul is just sulking because National are not complete morons and decided not to hand the next election over to Helen Clark on a plate. Only a total political ignoramus would be surprised with National's decision today. It was inevitable from the moment Helen Clark got sworn in for a third term.]
January 31st, 2008 at 9:39 pm
I must say that I thoroughly enjoyed listening to Pete Hodgson vent his spleen tonight.
He was ranting and raving on about a hidden agenda to raise interest rates on student loans at some time in the future, and claiming that it is a policy for the rich.
Perhaps the full moon has affected him as well……..
Dog tucker…….excellent!
January 31st, 2008 at 9:43 pm
Under the Accruals regime debt forgiven is taxable income.
Will the John Key student debt write off be treated as taxable income?
Will the sum written off be treated as income for “Working For Families” abatement purposes?
As usual, the devil is in the detail, and the detail is the fascinating part.
January 31st, 2008 at 9:46 pm
Paul W – I all-to-well recall the chorus of the cheer-squad.
It’s called Politics.
Sheeesh.
January 31st, 2008 at 9:48 pm
Anyway, kudos to THE KIWIBLOG LEFT (c) for the spectacle of a full-throated tangi because the National Party isn’t being a big enough pack of evil baby-seaters for your liking. You folks must really be fun to go shopping for.
As a public service, I’ve found footage of a KDS (Key Derangement Syndrome) case in its final stages.
http://craigmranapia.blogspot.com/2008/01/john-key-is-evil-scanner.html
(WARNING: Post contains a brief video clip that many distress and offend. DEFINITELY NOT SAFE FOR WORK OR PUBLIC/SEMI-PUBLIC VIEWING)
January 31st, 2008 at 9:49 pm
Anyway, kudos to THE KIWIBLOG LEFT (c) for the spectacle of a full-throated tangi because the National Party isn’t being a big enough pack of evil baby-eaters for your liking. You folks must really be fun to go shopping for.
As a public service, I’ve found footage of a KDS (Key Derrangement Syndrome) case in its final stages.
http://craigmranapia.blogspot.com/2008/01/john-key-is-evil-scanner.html
(WARNING: Post contains a brief video clip that many distress and offend. DEFINITELY NOT SAFE FOR WORK OR PUBLIC/SEMI-PUBLIC VIEWING)
January 31st, 2008 at 9:53 pm
NeilM: “but there’s three o’s in Ooops.”
I think that should be: “there’re three o’s in Ooops.” The problems is that there are two.
January 31st, 2008 at 9:56 pm
John Dalley, when you called National a ‘Spinless Bunch’, you probably didn’t realise how accurate you were.
I suspect that you meant ‘Spineless’. But ‘Spinless’ is quite correct.
Of course, the general public seem to like that. You see, they can now see through the Spinning that comes from the thieving, lying, fraudulent shitbags who make up the current Government.
January 31st, 2008 at 9:56 pm
Seems to be defending it no matter what though? Granted he makes some concessions like “a cross on the borrowing incentive”. This is great ammo for when anyone talks about ‘principals’ now.
As gee90 said (or rather Groucho Marx):
Hilarious. Also, Craig Ranapaia’s talk of the Treaty.
January 31st, 2008 at 9:58 pm
Awkward as it may be, I all-to-well recall the chorus of the cheer-squad.
Yes, Paul, and I generally try to avoid folks who still haven’t gotten through their grieving process for FPP, crank up the heresy trail every time DPF has the gall to opine that the Government might actually have a point, and on and on and on…
And, I’ve got to wonder where DPF actually said he agreed with interest-free student loans as opposed to recognizing that there are some pragmatic (and blindingly obvious to me) pragmatic realities involved here.
Here’s some good things to learn if you’re interested in governing rather than ideological pure irrelevance:
1) Learn how to count.
2) Pick your battles (and make sure they’re really worth taking hits for), rather than flailing ineffectually.
3) And remember that there are one or two people out there you’re going to have to win over.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:09 pm
The philosophy of adapting policy to fit your perception of what will win votes seems a little gutless to me, what’s wrong with being pro-active and trying to change popular opinion?
You think politicians can’t change peoples opinions? Plenty of great leaders have worked successfully to move public opinion in the past.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:18 pm
Points that aren’t up for debate
- the student loan scheme is one of the most fiscally irresponsible things Labour has introduced (if you forget WFF etc)
- bringing back interest on student loans no matter how principled would be electoral suicide
- the country will be better off with National in power and the good they will do will outweigh this policy
- encouraging students to pay back the loans quicker is in the best interest of the country and fiscally prudent
- 10% repayment bonus’s will mean that no weekly payment from PAYE will be higher than the $500 minimum and the rate is higher than what students can get in the bank
Also if some lefty claims again that no students are making gains from the student loan scheme it just goes to prove why you are incapable of running a country.
If a commerce student does not try and make an easy return from no cost money then they should be kicked out of university or at least transfered to the arts department!
January 31st, 2008 at 10:21 pm
“- bringing back interest on student loans no matter how principled would be electoral suicide”
Prove it.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:24 pm
I’m beginning to wonder what principles National isn’t willing to sell.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:29 pm
# Craig Ranapia Says:
July 27th, 2005 at 8:46 am
Rowan:
I’ve been active in politics for fifteen years, so I don’t need any schooling from you thanks. And I don’t pretend to be “neutral” on anything – I’ll make my arguments, and you can accept them or not. But why not accept that I sincerely believe what I say, rather than constantly accusing me of lying?
This might be hard to understand, but just because I’m a National voter doesn’t mean I say “my party right or wrong” or even find it hard to give Labour credit when I think credit is due. This policy is spectacularly good politics, but very bad public policy that is socially and fiscally irresponsible. Despite what you keep asserting, I WOULD NOT SUPPORT THIS POLICY IF IT HAD BEEN ANNOUNCED BY BILL ENGLISH INSTEAD OF TREVOR MALLARD! GET IT? HAVE I MADE MYSELF PERFECTLY, CRYSTAL CLEAR?
The one thing I don’t want to see National do is get into a “bidding war’ (as Rodney puts it) because, you know something, they’re not playing with their own money. People like you and me have to EARN the money we pay in tax – and I think I have the absolute right to say when it’s being squandered for short-term partisan advantage.
You also describe National’s view of tax cuts as “a bribe”. Well, once more, your arrogance annoys me. I have profound differences with my left-wing friends on the nature, scope and proper powers of the state
You are a fraud Ranipia. Nothing more than a nasty little lickspittle like Key. You lot take all your talking points from the polls and the socialist media and will squirm your way out of anything if it fits the party line.
I had hoped DPF would do better than to validate this weak capitulation to Liarbours thieving policy. I’m disappointed. Right-thinking people in this country want the truth.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:31 pm
Andrew this one policy is the only thing that pushed Labour ahead at the last election. You talk about National being unprincipled what about the 500,000 voters looking at their back pocket when they have to start paying interest. Labour would have a field day on this and drag it out until the election. Yes I agree its a stupid policy (the interest free loans part), but its better to put it to bed now and concentrate on the real stuff.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:33 pm
You think politicians can’t change peoples opinions? Plenty of great leaders have worked successfully to move public opinion in the past.
Andrew: One of my great political heroes, Winston Churchill, certainly did — and had some miserable failures. (He also went to his grave despised by many in the Conservative Party as an egomanical party-hopping opporunist whose main love was WSC — and there was more than a grain of truth in all those charges.)
Churchill could change public opinion, because he was shrewd enough (and even “unprincipled”) to grasp the highest principles are worthless in a Parliamentary democracy when nobody else will follow you.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:33 pm
The thing is, the Students Loans thing was ideologically right-wing at its inception. As I have pointed out in the past, it was a sop to the middle-classes, and would have have very little positive effects for the working classes, who would simply over-extend on their borrowings, compare to the middle class who would simply invest the interest-free lucre as a future-nest-egg. In fact, if a National Government had introduced it, some on the left would have been springing around like prawns on a hot-plate.
http://monkeyswithtypewriter.blogspot.com/
January 31st, 2008 at 10:36 pm
Lolly scramble, lolly scramble.
This is actually a boon for Labour. Helen can maintain that even the National party has now conceded that they were right in 2005 despite their earlier wingeing. No doubt that she has something up her sleeve for students anyway – probably allowances – as they are her base.
I think it would be quite appropriate for Clint Heine to post a picture with John Key’s head photoshopped onto Helen Clark’s body about now.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:40 pm
God forbid if this country can’t tell the difference between bad policy maintained for pragmatism, and support for bad policy.
Helen Clark can spin all she likes – but her government has introduced a lot of policy that is very hard (politically) to remove. Doesn’t make it good policy.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:45 pm
Roark:
Oh for fuck’s sake, I’ve been burnt at the stake before — and by a better class of wingnut. At the very least, could you work up some new material.
Here’s what I said on my blog at 9.08pm this evening:
I remain to be convinced its sound and fiscally prudent policy, but it’s sure smart politics — of the Kevin Rudd-ish ‘present as small a target as humanly possible’ variety — and (even better) pissing off all the right people.
[Source: http://craigmranapia.blogspot.com/2008/01/john-key-is-evil-scanner.html ]
Yeah, that really sounding like I was giving Key’s arsehole a good eating out you fucking cretinous troll. Seriously, the likes of you and John Dalley should leave politics to the mentally stable grown-ups and start a commune where you can burn heretics and infidels in effigy to your hearts content.
Even better, just hurry up and have the damn coronary you’re so obviously working up to.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:46 pm
“The thing is, the Students Loans thing was ideologically right-wing at its inception.”
Hahahahahahaahaahahahahahahaahahaaahhahhahhahahahhahahah
That’s why National were so keen to support it last time. Face it Lee, your much vaunted party of principle has sold out. Stop trying to spin, spin, spin. I find myself cultivating a newfound respect for Craig Ranapia.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:49 pm
This is actually a boon for Labour. Helen can maintain that even the National party has now conceded that they were right in 2005 despite their earlier wingeing.
Bring it on, Charlie Boy – then John Key can ask when Helen Clark’s finally going to get around to reversing the benefit cuts of ‘91. I’m pretty sure the Greens would like to know too.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:49 pm
Charlie – you are seriously confused, mate, I’m guessing now, but just as a long-shot, (feel free to tell me if I’m wrong) you are actually a bit of a Labour supporter, aren’t you?
Are you positing that a ‘lolly scramble’ as if it was intigated by National in ther first place, must be ‘bad’, (tactfully ignoring the fact that student loans were introduced by Labour to save their asses at the last election) but then console yourself with the idea that Labour will be ok because they will be able to offer bigger, sweeter lollies…
Then you propose the idea that there is no difference between Key and Clark, as if that is a reason to stick with the old style….
Is that why ‘Tan’ = ‘Nat’ backwards?
January 31st, 2008 at 10:53 pm
Charlie: gloat all you like. Yes, John Key is a big fat sellout for deciding not to repeal the interest free loans. That isn’t going to help you any in the election though? Perhaps the screaming from the left is a) concern, and b) hope that they can pressure Key into promising some unclever things instead?
January 31st, 2008 at 10:54 pm
Interesting when a self-professsed ‘left-winger’ is confronted with the idea that their party of choice is actually quite right-wing – they label the information as ’spin’ – this is like covering your ears and going ‘lalalala’ because the truth is too uncomfortable?
January 31st, 2008 at 10:55 pm
Pronounce it in French, mate. Or maybe it’s a not so subtle play on words related to a peanuts character. Or maybe it’s my real name.
The “lolly scramble, lolly scramble” comment refered to an earlier comment I made (see above). The lolly scramble comment was rife at the last election, coming from the Nats. I was being sarcastic.
I suppose John Key wants to fight this election of personality. At this rate, in any case, all his policies will be the same as the government’s by the time of the election.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:58 pm
“on personality”
January 31st, 2008 at 11:00 pm
Yeah Charlie. The youth policies were the same. That’s what I heard everyone saying. Key is choosing his battles – and picking the ones he can win. The things that aren’t important, he’s choosing not to have a difference on. Personality isn’t where he’s fighting it at all.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:03 pm
National isn’t going to win by having the same policies as Labour, they will win by offering appealing policies that are different, perhaps more NZers are prepared to vote for fiscal responsibility than is recognised, at least if someone is prepared to offer and explain such policies.
Every dollar given to a student is a dollar taken from a tax-payer.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:03 pm
“Interesting when a self-professsed ‘left-winger’ is confronted with the idea that their party of choice is actually quite right-wing…blah blah blah doesn’t want to listen”
Or maybe it’s how a self-professed left winger reacts when he hears a self professed right winger try to explain how a self professed right wing party sells out completely and adopts a self professed left wing party’s policies wholescale.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:05 pm
Tan, Brown, Marron, Brun, it’s all the same – I can smell the fear from here, Charles.
So if all his policies are the same as Helen’s but he evidently has a more loveable personality, I guess you are saying he will get your vote?
See it’s working already.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:07 pm
Ahhhh, Lee, but I’m a New Zealander. I like my leaders tough. John Key is a marshmallow.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:07 pm
To really help students, the government should do the following, in my opinion:
1. Give interest free studetn loans to university students.
2. When these students graduate and start working, they do not need to pay any income tax for the first 3 years. This will help them pay off their loan without any additional burden of having to pay income tax.
3. This will also serve as an incentive to ALL our students to stay and work in NZ after graduation and will beneift the employment market here in NZ with fresh blood from our own…instead of what’s happening now- most of our graduates move over to Australia to work!! and we are left as a country with all our good, quality young, energetic resources all leaving this country and going over to Australia.
What has this government done to keep them here? What have they provided to our students to help them settle and work here in their own country?
Another incetive should be that after th student loan is paid off in the 3 years – and for all students who did this properly – they should be given another incentive towards owning their first property. This should be encouraged and a real important consideration for our young to help them own homes and this will then certainly make them stay put in NZ and not even want to go any where else to work.
How difficult is that? How much would it cost our government that have got such big surplus of funds?
Univeristy students should be appreciated and helped by this nation and given all opportunities to excel in their field of studies. They are the fresh blood of the nation and deserves simple assistance like the ones I have suggested. Any comments?
January 31st, 2008 at 11:07 pm
3 more years might toughen him up a bit though.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:09 pm
But Charlie – I never professed myself a ‘left or right’ winger – in fact it was I who brought up the accusation that Labour is a right wing party in the first place. but you are so blinded by the branding you actually have deluded yourself that you are ‘doin’ it for the people’ or something.
Face it Labour have been “National Lite’ for the last six years ask any union member.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:10 pm
In fact, that’s why I would prefer John Key’s face on Helen’s body rather than the other way around. It’s not that I don’t like Helen’s face, that can be photoshopped. But John Key’s tits? Oh dear.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:11 pm
Well, Lee C., I suspect there would be a aneurysm epidemic if Bill English and Michael Cullen adopted my ideologically purist tax policy: every penny of personal and corporate tax cuts to be matched by a penny of cut government spending, and lobbyists with their bowls out for corporate welfare given the same two word answer “Fuck off.”
Something else: One of my first priorities as Finance Minister would be to introduce a bill abolishing so-called ’sin taxes’ on alcohol and tobacco, immediately followed by a Liquor and Tobacco Prohibition Bill in the name of the Health Minister. If tobacco is such an evil and sucking leech on the public purse, then treat it exactly like P or heroin. At the very least, damn the profitable hypocrisy of profiteering off the tobacco and alcohol industries (and users) to the tune of hundreds of millions every year. There’s a word for that, and its not a nice one.
Seriously, bitches, don’t get into an ideological purity pissing match with me. You’re only going to go home wet and embarrased.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:12 pm
’scardey-nat, scardey nat’ na na ne nar de nar….
January 31st, 2008 at 11:16 pm
Well, is there any other way to go home?
January 31st, 2008 at 11:17 pm
Oh Craig,
You are my new hero.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:18 pm
Just when you thought the typos couldn’t get any more Freudian…
January 31st, 2008 at 11:19 pm
So let me understand this correctly.
Interest free loans is a bad idea, very very bad.
But Interest free loans with a 10%write off is an excellent idea.
4 legs good, 2 legs bad.
So what is to stop someone borrowing say 10 000 dollars as a student (rich daddy pays the fees and gives our little young nat a generous allowance), little young nat invests said 10 000 dollars at 6% interest over 4 years study. No loan repayments required.
And then at end of study, little young nat takes a high paying job with Merril Lynch, withdraws term investment. Say around 12,5000 and pays back 9000 dollars to the government.
??????????????????
Seems like the incentive to borrow unneeded funds has just got a 10% boost!
[DPF: This is one of you better posts. You are only half wrong. That is probably the best you have ever managed. You are wrong when you claim that anyone is claiming that interest free loans with a 10% write off is an excellent idea. Try not to invent thing. You are correct though in concluding the policy does provide an incentive to borrow unneeded funds. Of course I made the same point in the main post, but I assume you didn't read that]
January 31st, 2008 at 11:19 pm
“’scardey-nat, scardey nat’ na na ne nar de nar….”
“Well, is there any other way to go home?”
Huh? Was that aimed at me? Spell it out man. I sit on the left of the spectrum. You have to speak slowly.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:19 pm
or at least type slowly!
January 31st, 2008 at 11:22 pm
“Seriously, bitches, don’t get into an ideological purity pissing match with me.”
If people want to kill themselves with booze or smokes that’s their problem, no need to get all authoritanian and pass laws to stop them.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:22 pm
Actually more like a 40% boost on these back of an envelope calculations.
Profit of 3500 dollars instead of 2500.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:22 pm
and lobbyists with their bowls out for corporate welfare given the same two word answer “Fuck off.”
Wasn’t that what the EFB was about?
January 31st, 2008 at 11:25 pm
Fair comments DPF and excellent rebuttals Craig.
The next big one that is going to be tough to grapple with will be WFF – I suspect (and hope) that this will be a post budget announcement involving some cuts and tax reductions.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:27 pm
Paul W – I all-to-well recall the chorus of the cheer-squad.
It’s called Politics.
Sheeesh.
Yeah right. It’s called opportunism and it’s no less valid when it’s your team than when it’s mine.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:29 pm
NPG, I think you’ve pointed out something those of us opposed to rampant socialism have known for years, any government subsidy will be abused, so the county’s better off without them.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:31 pm
There were supposed to be some italics in the post above, I’m sure you can work out where.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:31 pm
Andrew, I am just waiting for John Key and DPF to do a Michael Cullen and assure us that no one would abuse the system in such a horrific way.
[DPF: And once again you confirm your stupidity. If you go enrol at remedial reading classes and then go and read what I blogged, you will see I have criticised the policy exactly because of the greater incentive to borrow when not needed]
January 31st, 2008 at 11:41 pm
I love the way this was presented on the news today. John Key rocking up to the cameras with the hardworking Nats in the background, all in conference mode, everybody pretending that this had just been decided after long consultation. John Key fronting up to the cameras as if to say “The National Party cannot win this one. We have to grit our teeth and bear it so that we can win and get on with more pressing issues. This is the nature of politics. It’s win some, lose some. We’ve lost this one, but other things are important.” And then John-oh presents students with a whole load more free money. Priceless. What a bunch of wankers.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:49 pm
It seems to have gone quite quiet in here now.
Craig and Lee must have gone to bed.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:01 am
There’s some truth that Labour has been National lite since 2002. Tax credit support for families and interest free debt for tertiary students would have been the bread and butter of 1949-84 National.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:13 am
Craig. Mentally stable, i guess that leave you and most of the bloggers here out.
I expect no more from the National/Right Wing lemmings that to follow el leader over the cliff, but when does going with Labour policy and sugar coating it sound like anything original from National.
As i have said before and will say again, National is too frightened to come up with any controversial policy. That would require them to get of the fence, stick their necks out state what they really want to do.
that might lose them some votes, though it may also win them more from right of centre.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:16 am
Even better, just hurry up and have the damn coronary you’re so obviously working up to.
Craig. Your fancy talk doesn’t hide the fact you are a fool. If I was as “clever” as you I would respond with a witty riposte. But I don’t need to: your slithering around the truth and your own hypocrisy is clear for all to see. You have no worth.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:17 am
Wasn’t that what the EFB was about?
I don’t think so, otherwise Labour would have banned all anonymous donations — something that shouldn’t have been any surprise, but bewildered everyone regardless.
If corporates want to donate money to political parties, I don’t really care as long as they so in full accordance with the law – though SOEs are a no-brainer exception, IMO.
If corporates want to make an appointment with a Minister of the Crown, or lobby MPs to lobby on matters of interest – again perfectly fine, within acceptable limits.
But I’m one of these neo-liberal cranks who doesn’t think ‘a business-friendly environment’ should include corporate welfare to protect companies from the effects of a free market they don’t much like. (That includes the NZRFU, but that’s a whole other rant and I don’t have enough blood pressure meds to hand.)
February 1st, 2008 at 12:21 am
“Tax credit support for families and interest free debt for tertiary students would have been the bread and butter of 1949-84 National.”
Spin-spin-spin spinnity spin-spin-spin.
You guys *just* *cannot* *swallow* the fact that this is such a cynical move by your much vaunted party of principle, can you? So what you are saying is that National is so hungry for power that they are attempting to become the party of Holyoake and Muldoon once more. Am I hearing things? National is becoming its former self?
February 1st, 2008 at 12:23 am
Tax credit support for families will probably be next, of course.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:36 am
I vote “Green” Charlie.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:40 am
Roark and John Dalley:
The contempt of the contemptible? Hum… Thanks, chaps!
February 1st, 2008 at 12:42 am
The capitulation of the National party today is nowhere more evident than in the mindless head-nodding of Kiwiblog readers.
Fools who railed against this policy in ‘05 are now championing it. Where are your principles?
While politics often demands compromise and equivocation; principle, truth, reason, logic and steadfastness are equally, if not more admired. The policies betrayed are those which saw Don Brash ahead in polls one week before the 2005 election. Principle matters. Morals matter. Good policy matters.
The man who asked what policy DOES matter to National raises a good point. To be sure, a return to uncorrupted Government would be enough. But the point of gaining power IS TO CHANGE THINGS. If you’re not changing things, why waste your time? Go into the private sector, make money, and leave governing to the losers who spent all their time in the UofA Politics Department.
National need to tell us what they will change, not what they will keep the same. They need to give us a reason to tick the Blue Team.
Meanwhile, I paraphrase Thatcher in saying to those syncophants who would support a fart if John Key broke wind “You turn if you want to; the gentleman’s not for turning”.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:52 am
Charlie there is much abour centrist politics which National has condemned for the past 20 years as they moved further to the right, in accepting the works of the 1999-2002 Labour government) re-correcting the political balance from the 1990’s) and the 2002-2007 Labour National lite regime is simply sane politics.
There used to be a left wing of the Labour party in the UK which kept it unelectable – they removed it in the late 80’s/early 90’s and won office. Our National party is going through the same process. The question is whether they can restore trust or not.
They may simply take advantage of Labour’s unpopularity and their friendly media and put on the appearance of a moderated party returning to their conservative roots.
I guess everyone will be looking for breadth, depth and detail in the manifesto and a committment to not departing from it. This would settle the sincerity question. Of course this involves giving the public ample time to see the finalised policy.
February 1st, 2008 at 1:35 am
National adopts yet another labour policy!
One starts to wonder if their secret agenda is to continue things exactly as they are.
Good news for our Tory chums?
Sadly, no.
February 1st, 2008 at 2:06 am
“You are correct though in concluding the policy does provide an incentive to borrow unneeded funds. Of course I made the same point in the main post, but I assume you didn’t read that”
Its unlikely that I did. I admit I dont always give your prose the close attention it deserves.
This scheme makes Kiwisaver look positively miserly. Parents should invest in their children’s student loans and forget about kiwisaver.
Tax free (or possibly at the lowest tax bracket), 10% up front government subsidy + bank guaranteed interest rates.
February 1st, 2008 at 7:22 am
Face it it is just the most sensible thing to do, ideology or not.
February 1st, 2008 at 7:23 am
my goodness, what a lot of angry raving from our usual socialist chums. Another policy that looks to be a winner eh?
Of course its crap, but key was on the money, you don’t want people planning on being jerked around every time there is a change of government – don’t like the policy, but what about the 1/2 million NZers with student loans it affects. Thats 1/2 million students and ex-students who while they may not like national, have one more reason not to dislike them.
So Key is into realpolitics. He also understands what a statesman sounds like. Who knew?
Also hugely amusing that “me-too” peter dunne is now claiming he supported rebates all the time…
February 1st, 2008 at 7:31 am
it also runs in the face of the ‘Far Right Secret Agenda’ http://monkeyswithtypewriter.blogspot.com/2008/01/wheres-teh-conspiracy-helen.html
that Helen and Winston have been attempting to peddle – in the absence of any rational policy announcements.
Yes, I like that; National = Rational! It could be a big hit!
February 1st, 2008 at 7:53 am
Fools who championed this policy in ‘05 are now railing against it. Where are your principles?
February 1st, 2008 at 8:05 am
I don’t think anybody is railing against this policy. We are just savouring the irony. I would be quite happy if Labour matched National’s offer before the election.
February 1st, 2008 at 8:09 am
Shit, if the current rate of new policies keep up, then its going to be a very interesting year – and not the least exhausting.
Seems to me that Key thinks that as the year goes on things internal will get bad for labour – theyve got the filip Field trial to run, the anti smaking situation, the problems over the EFB, and no doubt more. These are all things that National will have to do nothing about – just sit and watch the torture – and throw in a few ‘helpful’ comments.
I expect Key will look more powerful and in control as the year proceeds while Helen will get rattled. Then the internal knives will come out – and then it will get really nasty.
February 1st, 2008 at 8:12 am
‘There used to be a left wing of the Labour party in the UK which kept it unelectable…’
Yes, but I signed up to being a solid Labour supporter AFTER it had made its pragmatic turn. I doubt many on this blog can claim that of National, given that their turn back to pragmatism seems to have taken place in the last few days. I wonder what their excuse for going along with their party of principle is now.
Much as I’ve had my little spats with them in the past, Blair and Craig deserve a little respect here.
February 1st, 2008 at 8:15 am
Both parties, socialist Labour and malleable National, appear to be trying to outdo each other in giving money away.
I’m afraid NZ has lost all sense of direction when this sort of policies are seen as “advancing” the cause of education of the younger generations.
Sooner or later, we’ll realise nothing is free. The day of reckoning is yet to come.
February 1st, 2008 at 8:31 am
“given that their turn back to pragmatism seems to have taken place in the last few days”
Nationals lead in the polls is more than a few days old so National seems to have had pragmatic policies without needing to go quite so overboard with their generousity with tax-payers money.
February 1st, 2008 at 8:32 am
such convoluted justifications dpf..?
doing pretzel-impersonations..are we..?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
February 1st, 2008 at 8:37 am
I suppose that at least we can take heart in that, in their rush to take the middle ground National will be shedding votes to Act.
February 1st, 2008 at 8:44 am
Ah, politicians and principles , no matter the
cost to the country, we need to be in power.
So when do we horis get the foreshore
handed back ?
February 1st, 2008 at 8:52 am
It is disingenuous for Labour supporters to cry “flip,flop,lack of integrity”, when dear Helen and the Paymaster General have embraced tax cuts to their bosom.
Wasn’t it Helen Clark who said…………..
“Tax cuts are a path to inequality. They are the promises of a visionless and intellectually bankrupt people.”
and more recently that Michael Cullen said………
“My view is that tax cuts are largely offered as a political bribe, not because of beneficial economic or social effects.”
As for the spectacle of Labourites clambering to the moral high ground, watch out for self induced rock fall.
Crunch!
February 1st, 2008 at 8:57 am
dead rat – every party has some but few will swallow them publicly before an election. Seems like a bit of honesty to me, and I would like to think that there won’t be any hidden agendas that are later wheeled out with “we have a mandate” signs plastered all over them
Agendas like replacement of the Privy Council as our highest Court of Final Appeal
Agendas like scrapping the fighter wing
Agendas like civil unions
and others
You know, agendas that were hidden before the election and claimed as policy after.
At least we will have an opportunity to see how Key & Co. compare over the next 3-9 years and not have the spurious and hysterical doomsayers from the left making their crystal ball predictions about the end of civilisation as we know it.
February 1st, 2008 at 8:58 am
Could we be seeing, in recent days, some political nous from national on a par with earlier labour party skills?
With the gazump by key on the youth thingy, and then a snooker the day after clark’s ’speech’ again by key on the student loans, I would suggest yes. Good political skills, with nary a thing from labour in reply.
Fancy that! Bloody choice. Maybe, with some equal political skills from each of the major parties we can concentrate on policy rather than who has the best political skills.
February 1st, 2008 at 8:59 am
What is the cost of an average student loan? And what would the normal minimum payments on that be?
I’m no economic genius, but it seems to me that what John Key has provided here with the 10% incentive bonus is a means for the government to actually recuperate what it has spent faster, making those funds available for other areas of policy. Yes, there is a cost associated with it but it seems to me that the cost will be lower than watching somebody languish on minimum repayments until their mid thirties. Opportunity cost?
I can’t say that I’m overly thrilled with the whole idea – offering people money so they pay back their loans seems a bit off. My dad taught me that you pay your debts.
But National has to deal with the hand of cards that Labour has dealt New Zealand. On the face of it it looks as if they’re heading the right direction at least. Is there a more substantial document detailing their costings, apart from the press release?
February 1st, 2008 at 9:00 am
its a bit like watching the americas cup
February 1st, 2008 at 9:00 am
Joining the student handouts.
Hey why fight it, I will be joining the student
interest free rort.
After all we students are owed are we
not ?
February 1st, 2008 at 9:01 am
“National need to tell us what they will change, not what they will keep the same. They need to give us a reason to tick the Blue Team.”
I’m sure bigger announcements are going to come as the year goes on. This to me looks like they are shacking things up for Labour at the moment. Almost trying to unsettle them. It would be quite stupid to let out everything right now eh? Months out from the election…
February 1st, 2008 at 9:02 am
Peter Dunne said lamely that the Government has been working on this for some time. I think this reveals that decision making under coalition arrangements take a very very long time. Peters will not be rushed on anything. This is a weakness that National could exploit. I am sure John Key with his lightening brain could trump Labour time and time again now that the policy work is almost done.
February 1st, 2008 at 9:02 am
david: and not have the spurious and hysterical doomsayers from the left making their crystal ball predictions about the end of civilisation as we know it
You know what, despite the similarities in policy that we’ve seen so far I suspect that even if all their policies were exactly the same the usual suspects would be up there chanting the end is nigh. Some of them can’t get over their “National bad, Labour good” mindset.
February 1st, 2008 at 9:05 am
The repayment incentive is a second best attempt to partly fix one aspect of a third rate policy. Better to have gotten rid of the policy itself as part of a wider review of tertiary education financing.
http://www.educationforum.org.nz/documents/mediareleases/Loans_Jan08.htm
[DPF: I like that quote. Sadly interest free loans are first rate popular!]
February 1st, 2008 at 9:10 am
yes, not good policy.
It severely annoys me that they are referred to as “free student loans”.
They are in fact “taxpayer paid student loans”.
February 1st, 2008 at 9:14 am
“I think this reveals that decision making under coalition arrangements take a very very long time… This is a weakness that National could exploit.”
Great. So John Key will plan his party’s policies according to what the government is planning. Well done. I see the reason you vote National is that you like the colour of their bumper stickers. Nothing to do with integrity at all. I love it how all you fucktards spent the last three years telling Sonic et al that their party was the party that considered elections a mass auction of stolen goods and now you all just think National should become that party.
It’s rather sickening how you are all willing to pull your pants down and bend over when John announces that he has no choice but to adopt policies counter to party philosophy that will nevertheless win him the election, but I guess power is the best aphrodisiac.
February 1st, 2008 at 9:19 am
just one thing to put in. when u take out a loan, “you” as a person dont receive the money, it is sent to the university/polytech that u are studying at and pays off ur fee balance. if u decide to withdraw from a course then that fee is simply returned back to studylink (the group tht handles student loans) so simply you cant really get out say $10,000 and then invest it.
what u can do is get a “living cost” loan. this is any amount up to $150 which is deposited into ur bank on a weekly basis. this is only available for i think 37 weeks i n a year. so the only investing you can do is from a weekly gain of $150. i know quite a few people who have done this.
For me as a student taking out a loan the 10% is an incentive to pay it back as soon as possible if the policy gets implemented before the next govenrment possibly removes it.
February 1st, 2008 at 9:19 am
The next step is make the subsidy more focused to courses of benefit to society who is providing the free finance. I would dump it for most arts subjects except for the gifted students. There are far too many losers drifting though University getting pass grade degrees of little vocational value and getting subsidised by the taxpayer to do so. If they are a gifted student (i.e. straight As) different story. I would also force every Arts student to do stage 1 maths and pass it. That should clean out most of them.
February 1st, 2008 at 9:21 am
Ha ha charlie tan, the best and only worthwhile thing in your statement is…
“… elections are a mass auction of stolen goods”.
Spot on.
Actually, what you say has some ring of truth to it. However there is a need to be pragmatic and if the electorate has changed its way of thinking over the last 9 years then so be it.
I dont know whether the policies are necessarilty “couter to party philosphy”. I suspect that national’s policies have changed very considerably over its very long history in response to a changing world and population.
February 1st, 2008 at 9:22 am
“The thing is, the Students Loans thing was ideologically right-wing at its inception.”
Sorry to be blunt, but that’s bullshit. Students loans are in most if not every western country. Taht makes student loans ideological only in the sense that they are not what a hardline socialist state would do.
February 1st, 2008 at 9:28 am
hmmm is there any reasons why my posts never seem to show up….
February 1st, 2008 at 9:31 am
“… elections are a mass auction of stolen goods”.
Actually, that was Mencken.
February 1st, 2008 at 9:32 am
“I suspect that national’s policies have changed very considerably over its very long history in response to a changing world and population.”
Long history? You mean since 2005 when this very policy was being compared by John Key to drug dealing?
February 1st, 2008 at 9:47 am
Charlie, face reality. National could repeal interest free student loans but that would be electoral suicide. And they have a vision for New Zealand that they are hoping the electorate shares with them and they can only help us build that vision if they are in government.
So, without the option to repeal the interest free loans they have chosen to try and recover from that disaster. I can’t see how this is a change of face – what else can they do? Ignore the problem and hope it goes away? Promise to repeal it and slaughter themselves?
Be realistic. But as you are a man of such principle, would you care to share your thoughts on the Labour party offering tax cuts as part of their election year lolly scramble? Again?
February 1st, 2008 at 9:53 am
Actually, I am not a man of unshakable principle and never have claimed that I was. That’s why I vote for the party of centre-left pragmatism.
What I am not is a hypocrite. What I find so funny is that after three years of being told my preferences enable mere opportunism and how principled National is, the chickens are coming home to roost.
National, as Davey pointed out, were between 9 and 19 points ahead in the polls before they offered this policy. Surely if they were the party of principle they could have convinced their supporters that their agenda was worthwhile.
But no. They cut John Key’s head off and stuck it onto Helen Clark’s body.
Oh well, at least they don’t have to deal with the sweaty hairy man breasts any more.
[DPF: The more the left whine about this u-turn, the happier I feel]
February 1st, 2008 at 9:56 am
“Taht makes student loans ideological only in the sense that they are not what a hardline socialist state would do.”
Sweden uses a system of school vouchers, to allow all parents to have a private/public choice for their childs education. School vouchers are considered to be too right-wing to be adopted as policy by the Republican Party of the USA. Swedish politicians are not more right-wing than the GOP.
Practice like this is based on politicians catering to local populations to give them what they want within the the context of their party platform AND the existing laws. Key’s suggestion is a right-wing modification to an existing policy.
February 1st, 2008 at 9:59 am
“Key’s suggestion [stealing a "socialist" policy outright] is a right-wing modification to an existing policy.”
And white is the new black.
Spin spin spin spinnity spin spin spin.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:01 am
DPF: “The interest free loans policy announced by Labour is a bad policy. ”
So whatever party gets in after the next election continues with “bad policy”?
It should have been nipped in the bud. At the time the media, cartoonists and Hansard referred to the student free loan as a bribe, but all those mentioned below thought otherwise. What are your thoughts?
Copy of the allegation 08 08 2005 (Only part copied below) was emailed to Members of Parliament, Media, Auditor-General, Serious Fraud Office and Electoral Commission”
“Police Commissioner R Robinson
ALLEGED SCAM: A PLEDGE TO STUDENTS CONTRACTED TO A STUDENT LOAN
I allege the Labour Government’s announced Labour Party Policy second key election pledge:
“No further interest will be charged for those with student loans who reside in New Zealand” constitutes breaches of Sections of the Crimes Act 1961.
This public pledge by a political party organisation to use taxpayer money to seek to advantage a section of the community over other sections of the community, is conditional on that organisation’s nominated representatives being elected to Parliament and becoming the Government. Thus it seeks support from students and intending students, their parents and grandparents by pledging monetary gain, in return for their vote in order to bring this pledge to fruition. This promised action constitutes Bribery, as a Bribe promises, offers or gives something esp money to (a person) to procure services or gain influence in return. It is a reward, such as money given or offered for this purpose. In this case it is in the form of an interest free loan. It also advantages the Labour Party to the disadvantage of other Political Parties. At present Members of Parliament in the Service of the Crown and paid by the Crown are extolling the merits of the scheme and thus by this massive bribe of Crown money, are seeking to return to Parliament. The outcome of the election is affected by this alleged , Illegal fraudulent proposal.
Pertinent to the above allegation are the following:
Members of Parliament, Police, Auditor- General’s Office, Serious Fraud Office, Electoral Committee are all in the Service of the Crown, and as such their behaviour is governed by applicable Sections of the Crimes Act 1961.
Policy: A plan of action adopted by an individual, government, party or business.
Loans are a contract and hence require a consideration, specified interest rate, repayment schedule and term. Without these ingredients they are not a loan…….”
All the more reason why the last election requires a Royal Commission of Inquiry into it
A couple of days ago Helen was ranting about transparency. She is transparent. One can see right through her.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:03 am
How silly. If anyone can become a student then it is not a bribe to a particular group of people, is it.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:13 am
This is right-wing modification to existing policy as it incentivises people to make more money quicker so they can pay off their student loan, rewarding those who exhibit the greater work ethic to make more money is the right-wing ethos.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:21 am
Seems a lot of people are missing the financial realities here, but Tim Barclay (at 7:45pm) and Pascal (at 8:59am) are on to it …
From the taxpayers point-of-view there’s a massive cost in holding a huge amount of interest-free student loans that are only being repaid at the minimum possible rate. Although the loans are free to the student they’re a real cost to the loan provider … which is all us taxpayers.
National’s proposal is rational economics … it’s cheaper to provide some form of incentive and get the loans repaid quickly, than it is to keep incurring the interest charges on that debt and be unable to sheet those costs home to the person holding the loan.
Now, I don’t know whether a 10% discount is a “profitable” level of incentive for the taxpayer to provide … here’s hoping National have done some rigourous analysis to support 10% and not, say, 8%. But fundamentally it’s rational to pay some amount to get the loan repaid fast, rather than bleed the interest costs for 20-30 years.
That said, I’m totally in agreement with DPF that Labour’s interest-free student loan policy at the last politics was fiscally irresponsible election buying. It’s an ugly pig of a policy, and National putting some lipstick on it now still doesn’t make it right.
But National applying the lipstick is great politics, without adding more fiscal insults to the current situation.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:24 am
Yes, it’s also a right wing modification to an existing policy because students who can’t afford to pay more than $500 per week (because they did social work degrees and now earn $35,000pa running bootcamps) can’t take advantage of the system. Students who drop out of university and go to work for daddy’s friends in the currency speculation business, on the other hand…
As JK said the other year, “irresponsible”.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:28 am
National adopts yet another labour policy!
One starts to wonder if their secret agenda is to continue things exactly as they are.
Good news for our Tory chums?
Sadly, no.
By that reasoning, Labour is at fault for the Employment Contracts Act, the benefit cuts of the nineties……
Oh dear sonic, you didnt think that line of reasoning through did you?
February 1st, 2008 at 10:30 am
Nice cartoon-ish examples Charlie, but I’d be surprised if you could find *one* graduate in NZ who’s had a free ride into “daddy’s friends currency speculation business”.
My experience has been that graduates working in high-paying jobs got there by stint of sheer hard work and focus. Suggesting they got there because of some soft hand-up from the old boys club says more about the left-wing’s misunderstanding and mistrust of personal achievement than about reality.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:35 am
No, virtual, you didn’t read my comment properly. My right-wing “cartoon characters” don’t actually graduate. They don’t need to. And yes, I do know of quite a few real world examples who couldn’t hack it at uni and so took an easy ride on Dad’s coat tails. But of course this is all anecdotal and, in any case, I was being facetious. Pull the carrot out, mate.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:42 am
virtualmark: It’s an ugly pig of a policy, and National putting some lipstick on it now still doesn’t make it right.
Thank you for some confirmation on the financial aspect there. I thought my mind was playing tricks on me for a while. But I do not see a realistic alternative for National to what they are currently doing to this pig.
They could repeal it – costing a fair number of students and potential future tax payers and voters a great deal. That would destroy their chances of election and contribute to another three years of slapdash Labour party policy.
Or they could take the opportunity to get that money repaid as quickly as possible and offer future incentives for people to repay that money as fast as possible. Freeing a chunk of debt and allowing it to be ploughed into other areas needing attention, returning it to the taxpayer, keeping the cycle going or whatever else it is needed for for the betterment of New Zealand as a whole.
What is the net gain for us at the end of that? A higher educated nation, funded partially by tax payers with a reasonably rapid recirculation of that debt. We begin to get the “Knowledge” economy that Labour prattled on about but never achieved. Combine this with their youth trade policy and it seems to me that they’re taking a shitty situation and turning it into a good one.
Yeah, I suspect this will be expensive to the taxpayers and yes, I would love to see the actual costings of this if only for my own curiosity. But we all know that undoing the damage Labour has done will be expensive and that there will need to be some pleasant and some unpleasant choices made.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:44 am
There you are Charlie, proving the point.
Now that you are criticising this on its own merit, you can see that this really is not National adopting Labours policy is it? This policy is a reward for making more money, through hard work and effort and by the same token disadvantaging “slackers”. Think of it as a tax rebate for higher income graduates.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:48 am
I have concern with the comments of two cabinet ministers on this subject.
1. Peter (I am the voice of reason – watch the worm) Dunne who now tells us that it is policy that government was already looking at. Oh yeah really so why does,
2. Peter (which portfolio do I have today – oh yes tertiary education) Hodgson who says it is a silly unworkable idea. I would have thought that the two Peters may just have had some sort of snc on the subject. Also Pete H is the minister who must have some responsibility for getting our loan money back from those who have borrowed it. He is sending out messages that not paying back is stupid and even more stupid if the loan is discounted effectively for the borrower.
What a bloody mess.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:48 am
I think it is ironic that labour supporters (ie Charlie) are having a go at National for showing a similarity with Labour, but at the same time trying to run a campaign based on National’s ’secret right wing agenda’ It must really piss them off when the ’secret agenda’ is highlighted as the fiction it is, because now, well, there goes Labour’s election strategy…..
What next? Quickly! Announce some popular new policies.
Oh shit. We don’t have any, we were too busy ramming the EFA through parliament….
February 1st, 2008 at 10:49 am
You may consider social workers, ward nurses and prison guards “slackers” unaha. But I don’t let the market decide for me the worth of a human being or profession.
But no, as virtual pointed out, a pig wearing lipstick is still a pig.
I’m sure Labour will match this policy, but there will no doubt be some tinkering around the edges to make it fair.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:50 am
I don’t think I ever said National had a secret right wing agenda. I think they are all a bit too inept for that.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:50 am
I like pigs, by the way.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:54 am
Charlie Tan: I like pigs, by the way
Don’t say that too close to Robinsod. You might inadvertently become a member of the VRWC.
February 1st, 2008 at 11:17 am
Helen thinks they do, Charlie she suggested as much on radiolive the other day: Don’t you agree with Helen?
February 1st, 2008 at 11:22 am
Unfortunately, unlike those here who change their views based on what their leader says, I do not believe my views must correspond to Helen’s all the time.
I wonder how long it willl take JK, seeing as he takes his cues from Labour these days, to start talking about ACT’s giant right-wing conspiracy.
February 1st, 2008 at 11:23 am
You may consider social workers, ward nurses and prison guards “slackers” unaha. But I don’t let the market decide for me the worth of a human being or profession.
There is some irony in providing 3 catergories of employees of state run monopolies as examples of being “unfairly” underpaid and then saying that your principles are to never let the market decide their worth.
But hey enough said, you are criticising the policy on the basis of its own merit and no longer saying it to be a copy of Labours.
February 1st, 2008 at 11:29 am
Nurses do not all work for state-run monopolies. Nor do social workers. And I think you’ll find that those ward nurses who work for private companies are often paid less than their brothers and sisters in the public system.
February 1st, 2008 at 11:34 am
Funny, because I keep hearing public sector unions making awfully right-wing, market based arguments that if you pay peanuts and offer appalling condition, you shouldn’t be surprised if you get monkeys. Welcome to a tight labour market where demand exceeds supply by a considerable margin.
February 1st, 2008 at 11:40 am
They also make horribly left wing arguments about how the public (and private) sector exploit the people who already work for them. Any hook will do, I guess.
In any case, this is a sidetrack. It may assuage most of your friends’ guilt in following their leader as turns greek*, but I’m sure they’ll be crying into their pillows tonight.
*That is, all Helenistic.
February 1st, 2008 at 11:43 am
February 1st, 2008 at 11:46 am
FFS, I’m a little new to html…
February 1st, 2008 at 11:50 am
Charlie – so what exactly do you have against JK – are you are that he is less hypocrical and deluded tha Helen or the opposite?
February 1st, 2008 at 11:51 am
sorry are = arguing
February 1st, 2008 at 12:01 pm
I think that arguments against the Student Loan situation still hold water. But what are you going to do, seriously as a responsible politician? Scrap them and leave all those who signed up for it f**d? Same with kiwisaver. No best you can so is makje the best of a bad policy. One of my gripes about the interest free loans was that ie would be a sop to the middle classes at the expense of the poorer ones, therefore hypocritical coming from Labour. The other was that debt would rise because it would be easy to get into therefore bad for poor kids. Finally it would not disincentivise the flights from NZ to higher wage economies.
At least Key’s proposals offers some comfort to those who wish to repay their debt and an incentive to stay in NZ. There are examples of Labour not scrapping National Policy, or at least keeping and adapting them. This is rule by the majority and centre politics. All those griping about the ‘flip-flop’ and getting offended because Key has pitched a sensible policy to middle NZ really need to grow up.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:01 pm
ps Kat if you are reading this I’m on my coffee break and eill be going back to work about now. XXX
February 1st, 2008 at 12:25 pm
“To provide an incentive for voluntary repayments, with a 10% bonus on any repayment over $500 ‘
Let’s look at this closely.
Is it a “bribe”, in that John Key is proposing to use Taxpayer Money to induce student loan borrowers to vote for him, seeing he is not now going to scrap their interest free loans?
They may as well have a second bite at the same tax payer provided cherry . A bribe on a bribe? Electioeering has started. Or as has been said fittingly elsewhere. The Great Auction of Taxpayer’s Money/
February 1st, 2008 at 12:30 pm
Sorry, PaulW, but what the fuck are you going on about? I’ll swallow a lot of dead rats around these parts — since our host seems willing to put up with them — but when the cream of the wingnutterari call me a liar and sycophantic arse-sucker without any basis in fact, then I’m going to respond. Often in a way that wouldn’t win the Emily Post Seal of Approval.
Deal with it.
I also stand by my comment that striking ideologically purist postures in blog comments is all well and good (done it myself enough times), but the pragmatic realities of political life aren’t the same thing. And no amount of blog-bile is going to change it.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:32 pm
Craig, good god man, settle down… who on earth used these words? Certainly not me. My comments, incidentally, were an addition to your list, which I thought was quite good, and if they related to anyone, then it was David.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:44 pm
“when the cream of the wingnutterari call me a liar and sycophantic arse-sucker without any basis in fact, then I’m going to respond.”
Ahhh now that the division has begun, we can work on the conquering. Maybe I’ll think about it over the weekend while I:m sitting on my island in the sun. Later, dudes.
February 1st, 2008 at 1:47 pm
PaulW:
Fair cop — sorry for getting snippy but there’s been some, shall we say, rather peculiar correspondence coming through the electro-mail. Sorry, but did I black out and call someone’s mother a crack whore?
Ahhh now that the division has begun
Don’t trot out the Dr. Evil cackle quite yet, Charlie, because I’m not too fond of the left-wingnuts either.
February 1st, 2008 at 1:51 pm
“I’ll think about it over the weekend while I’m sitting on my island in the sun. ”
Charlie Tan, are you a resident of Alcatraz?
February 1st, 2008 at 1:53 pm
Craig, no harm done – my mum’s strictly vino blanco per favore.
February 1st, 2008 at 2:15 pm
Nah… the power of the bitch must be used for good (against arseholes who deserve) not collateral damage when freaked out ’cause some odd soul sent my a very strange picture with the suggestion that I “suck Helen Clark’s cock”. (Forget it Jake. It’s Crazytown.)
So, yes, I really am sorry for giving you an out of line bitching.
As for my lovely correspondent (who may be lurking here): Sick fuck. Professional help. NOW.
February 1st, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Yes, that was a rather disturbing picture, wasn’t it? Randomly clicking through blogs and coming across that abberation was … well … ugh. Very very low class.
February 1st, 2008 at 3:11 pm
I wasn’t even aware Helen Clark kept livestock, let alone chickens. Still., live and learn.
February 1st, 2008 at 4:36 pm
Wackos are everywhere!