For a start Working for Families can be right sized to…….. oh NZ$0.00 government expenditure in perpetuity.

Also you are ignorant if you think most of the debt occured under National in the 1990s. Go check a history book. National was the first Govt ever to start repaying debt after it shot up to mammoth proportions before 1991]

Let me rephrase in Internet l33t speak for you RRM:

wtf omg lmao you just got p0wned

Craig Craig Craig – take the valium and calm down. [...] I don’t want the hospital system to be overcome with a rush of attempted suicides, anyurisms and heart seizures on election night when Helen puts together another left wing coalition.

Tom Tom Tom — if you really can’t help being a tin-earned, patronising dork, can you? I know it’s old fashioned, but I’ve seen ample reason to take polls (and the clairvoyant certainties of blog commentators) with many many grains of salt.

The mobile phone household probably is a red herring (ha ha ha) as that transient segment of the population are likley to be the least likely to turn out on election day.

Redbaiter does drag in a lot of feral Standard commenters though, thats good for traffic count.

Will Hulun and Mikhael go early to the polls? I reckon they will, and have done for some time, the suns going down and the rational strategy is to maximise party vote to keep a decent power block for labour, else that swinging voter will go right.

Paul: My view is most polls are commissioned with an eye on generating a headline rather than accuracy, with the current meme being on various doomsday headlines for Labour. Whilst I know they argue their methodologies make their polling accurate on thing stands out like dogs balls to me – 40% of households on Auckland North Shore don’t have landlines, and in South Auckland the figure is 60%, whilst the refusal rate is huge for polling. You’ve got ask how accurate they are given they’ve become so self-selecting even within the bounds of the polling comapnies attempts to be accurate.

[DPF: You really should not just invent figures. Some people call that lying. The 2006 Census shows North Shore City has landlines in 93.5% of households - not the 60% you claimed. And in Manukau City 85.4% of households have landlines - more than double the 40% you claim]

Heh heh, I’m loving it!

Of course, depending on which area of the political spectrum you inhabit, the final Cullen Budget was either a disaster or faintly adequate.
Those who assert it is a disaster suggest it is ‘too little, too late.’ and those who defend it are tending to suggest it should be defended because it delivers the precious tax-cuts that National have been calling for, so now they should all just shut up and be grateful.
In my opinion (and that is why I’m here, after all), It was in fact another fast-food, Mac-Budget from Cullen. It will do little to feed a family long-term, and was the economic equivalent of a burger, fast, convenient, facile and over-powered by its own marketing to disguise the fact that it will be toxic for the consumer and the environment, in turns.
If we are a Fast-Food Nation, then this budget will suffice to stave off the voters’ immediate appetite for change. But nowadays, people are hungry for a proper meal, and come lunchtime, and when it’s time to vote, they will once more be hungry. On the basis of this Budget –

Labour, and Mac-Cullen – Gone by Lunchtime.

Lee – MWT

Will Hulun go to the polls early? If the focus groups and polsters show a surge of support after the budget you’ve got to say yes as there is no reason to hang on for grim death given the global economy is teetering one way and thats downwards into a commodity inflation lead recession. 3 buck 91 by xmas, Meeeerrry Christmas…yeah right.

Can John Inc. do much when they get elected to correct the global economic situation? No.

What they can do is correct the local command economy that Mikhael has weaseled onto us. T

he economy of no choice but MotherState.

MotherState taketh and giveth back less a handling fee.

MotherState spendeth unwisely and without measurable productivity in mind.

So if John Inc. can give the taxpayer their own cash back and focus on core infrastructure and services and prune the excessive non-productive spending of MotherState, New Zealand will be in a better place.

Its a shame Mikhael and Hulun have taken the opportunity to stick it to the country when the chips are down for all of us.

That is how he will be remembered by future generations of New Zealanders if the country still exists. Labour coasted on a successful economy not of their making. Now the hard times have hit and the economy is tanking. Labour has no answers and continues to waste others peoples money for no benefit to the New Zealand economy. The time for talk is over. Now is the time for action. Lets vote Labour out this November.

The Clinton/Bush experience in the States is similar. Clinton the evil reckless democrat paid off debt and got the economy running.

Well, MickeySavage, it’s open to question whether the “evil Democrat” would have followed a course of fiscal conservatism, welfare reform and not hiking federal taxes if the Democrats hadn’t lost control of Congress in the ‘94 mid-terms, or the groundwork laid by George H. Bush which might have increased taxes but also controlled spending. Great argument for why it’s not necessarily healthy for one party to have a firm grip on both the executive and legislative branches of the federal government in the US; and I’m also all for giving Clinton credit where credit’s due. But, as Tom Stoppard once wrote everyone is entitled to their own opinions. Nobody is entitled to their own facts.

Shady property developers? I THINK NOT!

Cullen preferred to impose high marginal tax rates on middle income earners for window dressing and not fix other holes in tax system that left many (probably including Labour Ministers) buying rental properties in attempt to lower their tax liability. Now the party is over, the hang over will last for years – and you can’t blame that one on international events.

I agree with Kimble – all this talk of investment in health, education, etc is rubbish. Spending large amounts of extra money to little effect is not investment! Investment by definition is capital expenditure that is expected to generate a future return.

Real Republicans endorsed Clintons welfare reforms and decried Bush’s absurd spending increases. I would be interested to hear what Clinton DID to get the economy running, and how Bush’s tax reform didn’t help the US bounce back after the tech crash (which came from Clinton’s era) and 911 (ditto).

“If people have jobs then social ills go down.”

Violent crime has been on the increase for years. Violent crime is worse than property crime.

“Labour has poured huge amounts into infrastructure and paid off debt.”

Name the infrastructure investment Labour has funded.

Labour continued to pay off debt because that is the least they could do. ANY government over that time would have done the same.

“And let’s be clear. The downturn is because of overseas events.”

Lets be clear, the previous economic prosperity has more to do with overseas than the current downturn. Labour presided over an economy that benefited from liberalisation in previous decades and a world economic boom. This doesnt take any special skill.

As for environmental issues, well Clark and Labour hav been a huge failure in that too. When they rush through their ETS in desperation just in time for the election, with zero regard for the long term problems caused by their inept law-making, they will cap an environmental career with fewer accomplishments than Judith Tizzard.

George W. Bush achieved more to help the environment than Helen Clark ever did.

Oh and productivity does not stall because of full employment, in fact, it is aided by it.

“This is why for example I have said many times on this blog I think Bush is the worst US President in history and I have also said many times that Clinton is just as bad. ”

Ummm, anyone else see a logical error here?

mickysavage

From memory, Korea and the US also have very low unemployment rates, and Australia is not that far behind. Yet our productivity growth trails theirs by a huge margin. Care to explain?

Paul W (5.19) made the entirely unsupported claim that “productivity is improved also”, which flies in the face of all the published statistics I have seen. In fact, NZ productivity has declined since 2000, and is now back around the abysmal levels of the 70’s. This, rather than full employment, is what I would consider the most important economic statistic. Anyone can hide unemplyment by creating unproductive make-work jobs – look at the pre-1984 NZ Railways with its 22,000 staff doing approximately bugger-all. In the long term, productivity is the thing that gets a nation ahead, and this government seems not to even notice that ours is sliding.

Sort of flows better that Key’s “Two blocks of cheese” and reflects Cullen’s ability to spend large amounts of money, yet still screw us all over.

Productivity has only gone up modestly, full employment does that. Full employment is probably the most important economic statistic there is for a community. If people have jobs then social ills go down. Despite the braying by some crime rates are decreasing for the first time in decades. And birth rates are a very strong indicator. When people feel more comfortable they breed. They have been breeding lately.

I disagree with the claims about coasting. Labour has poured huge amounts into infrastructure and paid off debt. Ideal things to do in preparation for when a country is facing a downturn.

And let’s be clear. The downturn is because of overseas events. Cullen has no responsibility for peak oil.

The ideal leadership will be one focussed on dealing with the environmental crises that we face. Clark and Fitzsimons are the only two who can do this.

Happy to expand anytime offline but out of politeness sticking to the thread, I think that Liarbore has coasted over the last 8 years upon conditions not of its own making: i.e. it has taken advantage of others to its own benefit, by pandering to its own electoral interests to the extreme, whilst ignoring the fact that the revenue has largely come from its ideological enemies. Liarbore’s regime has produced little in terms of increased productivity that didn’t come from the global economic climate, yet it has given back very little to the productive sectors, and indeed in various ways it has discouraged them. At the same time, Liarbore has claimed credit for the largesse it has distributed to its own electoral base. That’s why I call them Liarbore, and that’s why IMO, they are scum. They don’t deserve to be in Parliament, let alone be in power.

Cheese on toast

Ingredients
85g/3oz stilton
dash of Dijon mustard
dash of Tabasco sauce
dash of Worcestershire sauce
salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 slice of ciabatta, toasted

Method
1. Preheat the grill to high.
2. Place the stilton into a bowl and mash until smooth. Mix in the mustard, Tabasco and Worcestershire sauce and season to taste.
3. Spread the cheese mix onto the ciabatta slice and then grill for 1-2 minutes, or until melted and bubbling. Serve.