Kiwiblog

I like a lot Rodney Hide’s speech to Local Government NZ.

I have to say, ladies and gentlemen, that I don’t regard myself the Minister of Local Government – I consider myself the Minister for Ratepayers.

I don’t represent councils.

I represent the people whose hard work and savings pay the rates.

And provide councils with their income.

That sums up the way I approach to my job.

I’ve waited a long time to hear a Minister say that.

I was pleased to see Labour’s Clare Curran ask a question in Parliament yesterday on S92A. While Labour are still being somewhat non commital on what they would do, it is encouraging that they understand the concern enough to start asking questions about it. I am hoping their edging away from S92A will cotinue!

Also kudos to Peter Dunne who accepted the petition today at Parliament. I understand ACT regard S92A as a huge compliance cost on business and are also unsupportive of it. And the Greens have admirably always opposed it.

The more I think about S92A, the more it reminds me of the Electoral Finance Act. They have certain things in common:

1. Both were appallingly unclear
2. Both generated significant opposition from the public, due to concerns over their rights being infringed
3. Both did not and will not be as bad as people fear, but will still have a “chilling effect” due to the lack of clarity, and the severity of the potential penalty (termination of Internet access)
4. Both have pissed off enough people, that they will engender a culture of complaints to test the law

What I mean by No 3 is worth elaborating on. In reality S92A is not going to leads to scores of NZers having their Internet access cut off. Just as the EFA did not lead to dozens of NZers going to prison for advocating against the Government. So yes the opposition (including me) does tend to focus on a worst case scenario for dramatic effect.

But just because the worst case scenario is unlikely, does not mean there are no negative consequences. MPs would do well to recall the words of the Electoral Commission on how the EFA had a “chilling effect” on political dialogue. Stuff such as doing parodies of political party billboards could end up with you getting infringment notices against your Internet account. Is an ISP going to decide whether or not a parody is fair dealing or not?

The other danger is the culture of complaints that it will engender. I am hearing all sorts of stories that people will be filing copyright complaints against Government websites, political parties, even blogs.

A lot of the best satire and parody on You Tube involves using something that is copyrighted. Whether or not it is “fair use” or “fair dealing” as allowed for under the law is not always an easy call.

Anyway Juha Saarinen at Geekzone has blogged an e-mail by lawyer Rick Shera on how the NZ law is significantly worse than even the law in the United States.

So far 12,000 people have signed the CFF petition against S92A. Many of those signing are artists themselves.

Brian Fallow writes how scrapping tax cuts would be bad:

Just for a moment there it sounded as if the Government might be preparing to renege on its promise of income tax cuts over the next three years.

Now that would seriously piss me off if that ever happened.

At a conference on tax policy at Victoria University last week, Finance Minister Bill English was laying out some home truths about how utterly the fiscal backdrop for such discussions has changed – Budget deficits and relentlessly mounting Government debt as far ahead as the eye can see.

The inherited decade of deficits and debt.

“The opportunities to reduce tax rates further will be fairly minimal,” he said.

But when asked if in saying that he was signalling something about the string of income tax cuts National had campaigned on, the answer was a curt “No”.

While I suspect if Labour had got back in, all the tax cuts would have been cancelled by now – and in fact we may have had tax increases.

There are structural problems as well, and the tax system is one of them.

It is, as PricewaterhouseCoopers chairman John Shewan told the conference, not sustainable. “We rely too much on too few taxpayers.”

The left see this as a good thing, If 40% of the country funds 60% of the country, then that 60% will vote for parties that support higher taxes on the 40% to fund the majority.

Nearly half of the tax take is personal income tax and nearly half of that, in turn, is from people in the top tax bracket ($70,000 plus since October).

Meanwhile, for the bottom half of households, ranked by income, net taxes (taxes less transfers received) are negligible or negative, according to the Treasury’s briefing to its incoming minister. And many of those on middling incomes have very high effective marginal tax rates as Working for Families tax credits abate. The IRD reckons over 500,000 taxpayers face marginal rates of more the 40 per cent.

Combine that with the income gap which has opened up between New Zealand and Australia (or indeed most of the rest of the OECD) and “probably the most internationally mobile labour force in the OECD” and you have a situation where a large part of the tax base is globally contestable. It is vulnerable. It is at risk.

In other words if you tax people too much, they leave.

It is not just that the tax base resembles an iceberg heading towards the equator. It looks as if the taxes we rely on most are the ones which are more damaging to economic growth.

An OECD study last year, entitled Tax and Economic Growth, looked at the relative impact of four kinds of taxes on GDP per capita.

Worst in terms of impact on GDP per capita, it found, are corporate taxes, followed by personal income tax. The least distortionary thing to tax is immovable property.

I find that fascinating. I must try and get a copy of the report.

“Particularly recurrent taxes on residential property,” Christopher Heady, one of the report’s authors, told the conference. “But that frightens politicians.”

In the more demure language of the report, such taxes are “very unpopular in many countries” and tend to be the preserve of local rather than central government. But property taxes do not affect decisions to work, or to acquire skills and education, or to produce, invest and innovate, to the same extent as other taxes.

There is a degree of fairness to consider in taxing an asset, as people who are asset rich and income poor may have to sell them. But having said that, it is important to get the incentives right for working, education, investment etc.

I hope the Government looks seriously at how to improve the structure of our tax system.

The Herald reports:

ORCHARD PARK, New York – The crime drips with brutal irony: a woman decapitated, allegedly by her estranged husband, in the offices of the television network the couple founded with the hope of countering Muslim stereotypes.

Muzzammil “Mo” Hassan is accused of beheading his wife last week, days after she filed for divorce. Authorities have not discussed the role religion or culture might have played, but the slaying gave rise to speculation that it was the sort of “honor killing” more common in countries half a world away, including the couple’s native Pakistan.

Sadly stereotypes exist because there is usually an element of truth to them. The problem is when people apply a stereotype to all individuas in a group, rather than treat people as individuals.

Former Otago DHB Chair has responded to the debate over his removal, commenting in the thread.

Its one of the things I like about blogs, is that people can respond or argue their viewpoint in their own words.

TV3 poll just out:

• National 60%
• Labour 27%
• Greens 7%

TV3 have never ever had a party so high before – it is unprecedented in recent decades. And remember this is the poll Labour claims is the most accurate. Now of course there is a honeymoon period, but this is like having a honeymoon with Angelia Jolie instead of Rosie O’Donnell.

A Parliament on this poll would have the Government with 80 seats and the Opposition with just 43.

Phil Goff refused to be interviewed for TV3 about the poll – something no other leader has done in the past decade. But here’s why – Preferred PM:

• John Key 52%
• Helen Clark 14%
• Phil Goff 4%

Key is obviously having a honeymoon also, but it is a stronger honeymoon than any other Prime Minister has ever had. 64% rate his performance as strong and only 4% as weak! Considering the deep economic crisis we are in, that is astonishing.

His personal attributes have also shot up – 85% now rate Key as a capable leader.

Now a week is a long time in politics, and the next election is 33 months away. Goff is under no threat for now. But if he doesn’t make some traction towards the end of the year, he may find the summer of 2010 is BBQ at Dave’s place

NBR has a story on the ongoing saga of Tasman Capital and Progressive Deputy Leader Matt Robson:

Former MP Matt Robson and Tasman Capital are forging ahead with plans to list WSD Global Markets on the NZX, despite a Serious Fraud Office investigation into alleged money laundering operations by WSD’s related company in the Cook Islands.

SFO director Grant Liddell last night confirmed to NBR that the Cook Islands-based WSBC and “associated entities” were under investigation. WSBC out-sources its margin trading operations to WSD Global Markets. …

Accusations of connections between WSD director Riaz Patel and illegal activity around the globe have been made public this week, with journalist Ian Wishart also linking the alleged laundered money with international terrorism.

It is all rather murky. NBR reports Robson is suing Wishart:

Mr Robson says defamation proceedings against Mr Wishart have now been launched and he rubbishes the connection Mr Wishart had made between Mr Patel’s businesses and international terrorism.

The original article from TGIF is here. And Wishart also blogs that Robson tried and failed to get an ex parte injunction against the story.

I would suggest people be cautious with any comments they make, noting this appears to be heading to the courts.  All I’ll comment is to say it seems unwise to try and get listed on the NZX while the SFO is investigating you.

Over at Pundit, Nicky Hager reveals:

Leaked Cabinet plans list the government’s infrastructure projects and show that even facing the worst economic crisis in half a century, the government intends to restrain its spending

Oh my God, the Government is going to be restrained with its spending. Shock, horror.

Personally, I regard it as an entirely laudable thing that the Government is restrained when spending my money.

Air NZ is doing well out of me this week.

I flew up to Auckland on Friday (for Foo Camp in Warkworth – will blog on soonish) and back to Wellington on Sunday. Then up to Auckland this morning for a couple of InternetNZ meetings with DIA and a members consultation meeting.

On the 7 am flight Thursday back to Auckland for a company board meeting, and then flying back to Auckland on Friday morning, staying up until Wednesday for various events.

Three flights within seven days is silly, but no avoiding it as have had to be back in Wellington between each trip.

At least I should keep my air points status!

Fran O’Sullivan seems quite impressed with John Key’s willingness to consider bailing out F&P:

Key’s activist approach is a far cry from the prime ministerial style used by some of his predecessors like David Lange (Labour) and Jim Bolger (National) when they were confronted with the prospect of major Government hand-holding operations and bailouts during the fag-end of the 1980s and early 1990s.

It would be hard to imagine either Lange or Bolger lapsing into banker-speak as Key did at his press conference when he precisely defined the impact of mark-to-market rules which had resulted in F&P’s recorded debt blowing out to 43 per cent in January in response to exchange rate movements. Net debt is now forecast to reach $570 million.

It’s true Key is very smart on issues of finance, but any intervention will set a precedent that we might regret one day.

I tend to agree with the Dominion Post editorial:

Prime Minister John Key should think very carefully before he acts on his inclination to use taxpayers’ money to help Fisher & Paykel Appliances, The Dominion Post writes. There is a real risk it would be the first step on a very slippery slope.

And Fisher & Paykel executives should, if the offer is made, think very carefully about accepting it taking the Government’s shilling inevitably means allowing politicians into your business.

And this is a real issue for F&P. What if you accept some Govt money, but you still need to cut some jobs. However you know cutting jobs will make the Govt look bad, and they did bail you out. So then you don’t cut any jobs and you need a further bailout, or you go broke. Govt money always come with strings. Do you want the Govt (as in the US) telling you how much you can pay your top management?

Fisher & Paykel has not gone to the Government for help, but Mr Key is clearly contemplating using public money to help it out as a last resort. The advantage of that is it stops the company being held to ransom by financiers taking advantage of the recession to offer unreasonable terms. The danger is in deciding where to draw the line. If it is justified to use public money to save 1600 jobs, what about 1000 jobs, or 100?

And think of the protests from any company you decide not to bailout.

Mr Key should not close off any options, but picking which firms deserve taxpayers’ money should be very low on his list. He should look first at further moves that would make life easier for all New Zealand businesses by reducing their costs, and removing red-tape barriers.

New Zealand politicians have a sorry record when it comes to picking winners. There is no reason to suspect they would do any better at picking survivors.

Very well said.

In the Herald, they report support for a bailout from EPMU’s Andrew Little and opposition from the NZ Manufacturers and Exporters Association.

Will the EPMU now seek to join the new National Party?

A lot of people are noticing that NZ is about to implement a deeply flawed piece of law.

Boing Boing has picked up the story. They are one of the most widely read blogs in the world.

The popular (and Qantas Award winning) Read Write Web also covers the story, and its editor joines the protest. They point out that the Twitter page of Stephen Fry, who has joined the protest, is the third most popular in the world behind Barack Obama and CNN.

The Guardian covers the protest, as does the NZ Herald.

The Creative Freedom Foundation which is hosting the main protest page has also had local artists release a “Copywrong” song.

Some people regard this as bad news:

The Ministry of Social Development aims to cut its staff of 9500 by 5 per cent (475) over the next four years by automating some processes and allowing people to apply for some benefits online.

I regard that as very good news.

If we want to lift wages for everyone, then you do it through productivity gains, and online automated processes are one of those ways. And a 5% reduction over four years is pretty modest – I doubt anyone will lose their job – just that some vacancies do not get filled.

The Auditor General’s report into how the Corrections Department manages parole is a shocker:

My staff looked at how the Department managed offenders released on parole. We chose 100 offender case files in the four areas we visited to assess whether probation officers and other staff were managing offenders in keeping with the Department’s requirements. We deliberately included 52 offenders considered to pose a high risk to the public.

In most of those 100 case files, the Department had not followed one or more of its own sentence management requirements. Five of the requirements that my staff checked are the most important, in my view, for keeping the public safe, and one or more of these five requirements had not been followed in most of the 100 cases. There were several cases, some of which I have included in my report, where the Department had not completed important sentence management requirements at each stage of an offender’s parole, and we concluded that the Department was not managing these cases adequately.

They are damning words, coming from the Auditor-General. Equally damning was the response of Minister Judith Collins:

Corrections Minister Judith Collins today asked the State Services Commissioner to establish who is accountable for serious failings identified by the Auditor-General’s report into the management of offenders on parole. …

“I have today asked the State Services Commissioner to work with Corrections Chief Executive Barry Matthews to establish who is accountable for the deficiencies identified in the report and what should be done to restore public confidence.”

Ms Collins has asked the Commissioner to report back within 10 working days.

This is about as subtle as John Cleese. I mean you do not need to run a competition to guess who the State Services Commissioner will find is responsible for management failings in the Department. This must qualify as the most unsubtle ever request to SSC to remove a CEO. But not wihout considerable merit – the OAG report is damning, and the mistakes in this area do and have cost lives.

The Herald reports that Corrections CEO faces the axe:

Barry Matthews’ future as head of Corrections is in serious question, after his Minister Judith Collins pointedly refused to express confidence in him yesterday. …

Ms Collins would say only: “I have confidence Mr Matthews understands exactly just how seriously I am viewing this issue.”

Again, you don’t exactly need a PhD in Politics to read between the lines here.

John Armstrong comments:

Wielding a calculated, but ruthless combination of raw power and tactical guile, Corrections Minister Judith “Crusher” Collins has torn up the public service rulebook and effectively engineered the sacking of her departmental chief executive.

Technically, she cannot fire Barry Matthews, the long-suffering head of the problem-plagued Corrections Department. But “technically” is not a word in this Collins’ dictionary.

Indeed.

But regardless of this, Matthews’ resignation letter should have been on the desk of State Services Commissioner Iain Rennie yesterday, so damning was the Auditor-General’s report on Corrections’ management of its parole responsibilities. …

The report shows the department failing to follow its own procedures in monitoring potentially dangerous prisoners on parole – procedures tightened after the murder of Lower Hutt father-of-two Karl Kuchenbecker by Graeme Burton in January 2007.

This is the scary thing. The audit was done after the Burton fiasco, and was meant to measure the new improved processes in place.

Peter M has commented that it seems Parliament is going to conclude the third reading of the Electoral Finance Act Repeal tonight.

I will post an update once I hear it has been repealed.

Technically that won’t happen until the GG signs the law, but I’m happy to drive out to Vogel House tonight so there is no delay

UPDATE: And the NZ House of Representatives consigned this law to the dustbin of history at around 7.45 pm. The vote was 112-9 in favour.

As widely expected Tony Ryall has replaced the Chair of the Otago DHB. His PR said:

This afternoon Mr Ryall announced he has removed Richard Thomson from the position of appointed Chair of the Otago District Health Board.

“During Mr Thomson’s chairmanship, the largest fraud in New Zealand State Services history was taking place at Otago DHB. $17 million was defrauded over 6 years,” said Mr Ryall. …

Mr Ryall also announced that Mr Errol Millar, an appointed member of the Otago District Health Board will take up the role of Chair immediately.

Mr Millar was appointed to the Otago DHB in 2007, having been appointed to the Southland DHB in 2002 and 2004. He was also Chair of the Airways Corporation 2001-2004, and is currently Deputy Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority. …

Mr Thomson remains an elected member of the Otago District Health Board.

This isn’t about blame or responsibility for the fraud – but accountability.

As I blogged a few weeks ago, the Board does have some accountability for this. Their goverance was sub-standard in my opinion. They should have had policies around competitive tenders etc.

Dom Post Political Editor Tracy Watkin blogs:

It takes a lot to shock the hardened hacks around the press gallery – but news of the pay rates awarded to the new intake of press secretaries has caused quite a stir.

Heh guaranteed to do so. What I found interesting was the range:

Eight media staff were employed under Labour on salaries of $100,000-or-more, seven in the $10,000 band below. And that was in November 2008; as a general rule, the closer to an election, the higher the pay rates – salary demands tend to be ratcheted up when an election is looming, particularly when it looks like a government is on its last legs and the vacancies come thick and fast as longer-serving press secs desert for positions with more job security. …

Meanwhile, you have to feel sorry for the three unnamed National press secretaries who signed up for less than $60,000.

I don’t think it is a problem that some press secretaries are on under $60,000 and some over $100,000.

The most senior Ministers need highly experienced people as press secretaries. They will have people with sometimes decades of experience, and need to pay to recognise that. These are the officers where almost every day is a crisis day – as in there is some sensitive issue they have to deal with.

Some of the more junior Ministers have an easier ride. For example Consumer Affairs doesn’t normally create too many issues, so that Minister may only need someone who has been a journalist for a few years – with their skills being more on good written communication skills, rather than on devising “key lines” etc.

So the salary range isn’t that unusual to my eyes. I will say I was a bit surprised that 18 press secretaries are on over $100,000 as my gut reaction is probably only the front bench (10 or so) need someone that experienced. But I’m no expert on what the market rates are.

I remember my own pay negotiation when I was in the PM’s Office in the late 90s. I got screwed over and settled for far too low a salary. The problem was the bastards knew I’d probably work there for almost free, and exploited that

Bill Ralston has a job advertisement:

Are you an up-and-coming, energised self-starter who enjoys working in a close and happy team?

• Are you a confident communicator with a strong social conscience?

• Are you looking for a job with more responsibility, good salary and a secure employment contract for up to the next three years? …

• The ideal skill set consists of you having been either a teacher or active in the union movement and being capable of holding a safe seat in a by-election.

• Having no experience is not necessarily a bar to this position but it will help if you are an out of work former cabinet minister or current List MP who is being groomed for stardom.

Heh.

Currently it looks like a split fight for the job between old hand Judith Tizard, who hasn’t had a lot to do since losing Auckland Central, and new List MP Phil Twyford, a nice enough bloke who used to run Oxfam, but he’s not exactly going to set the world on fire.

Actually I think Twyford will go quite far – probably be a front bench Minister in the next Labour Government.

It wouldn’t be all bad to be the party’s candidate for Mt Albert. It is one of Labour’s safest seats. You would have be proven failed finance company director with paedophilia convictions to actually lose the by-election.

I like how it is “and” not “or”

Take Foreign Affairs Minister Murray McCully. Around Parliament people call him Charlie Wilson, after the movie Charlie Wilson’s War. It could be because he could start a war if he wanted to but I suspect it’s because Murray does like to party and his office staff looks like they were recruited by Hugh Hefner.

I don’t think Murray would trust Hugh with such an important job

MacDoctor has an excellent response to the analysis done on Pundit over the $9 billion fiscal stimulus. Tim Watkin on Pundit says most of the stimulus is “old money” not new.

MacDoctor reponds:

Tim gets understandably offended by the fact that fully half of the fiscal stimulus is new spending already earmarked by Labour, including, amusingly enough, the purchase of Kiwirail.

I should point out that Tim’s problem is due to the fact that he is interpreting the words Fiscal Stimulus in the very socialist fashion used by Rudd, Brown and Obama – all died-in-the-wool Tax-and-Spend socialists. Fiscal Stimulus in this sense of the word means “Invent large sums of money from nowhere, then spend it like there’s no tomorrow”.

Bill’s answer is straight from Treasury – who are about as socialist as Roger Douglas. To them, Fiscal Stimulus means “amount of extra money being put into the economy” – nothing more, nothing less. Labour’s committed spending counts towards a fiscal stimulus just as much as National’s new spending. This is normal accounting practice and is not some strange plot by National to impress the media.

There is a big difference between “spending” and “stimulus”.

Tim’s objection to the inclusion of Labour’s extra spending appears to rest on the groounds that it occurred well before the economic crisis. This is meaningless in terms of the stimulatory effect it will have on the economy. Had it not been for the economic crisis and fact that New Zealand was moving in to a recession, Labour’s spending may well have kept inflation above the 5% mark, so stimulatory was it. The economy does not care where the spending was approved by Labour or National, it will still react to it in definable ways.

Tim also seems to object to the inclusion of spending on schools and roads on the understanding that these were already approved by Labour, but just moved forward. It seems to have escaped him that that is exactly what is required – an increase in current expenditure rather than later spending. Almost certainly, Labour would be doing the same thing, if it was still in power.

Those from the left want “extra” spending because that is what the left believe in – higher taxes and more government spending. But that is not the only way to increase the fiscal stimulus and bringing spending foward is, as MD says, an excelletn way to do that.

We are going to face a horrendous deficit and debt problem for at least a decade. If the Government is playing smart by having a large stimulus, without incurring ongoing expenditure that we have to borrow to pay for, good on it.

Having said all that, there is a fundamental mistaken assumption that Tim and the guys at Tumeke! and the Standard have made. It has also been made by the media and by Messrs. Rudd, Obama and Brown. It is the assumption that it is the amount of money being spent that is important. This is entirely false. It is actually how and where the money is spent that is vital.

Rudd has injected money directly into peoples pockets. This is a very popular move, but one that provides only a very short lived stimulus. Obama has huge swathes of useless “pork” in his package. Brown appears obsessed with owning banks.

Key, on the other hand, is spending frugally and carefully in the places he thinks he will do the most good for the economy in the long run. He has little money to play with (thanks, in large part, to Labour) and is making the best use of it he can. Arguing about the actual size of the stimulus is like arguing about the colour of the bus that is about to run you down.

I can only say I agree,

That was the question I asked when I saw the headline in the Dominion Post that “Key may stop Black Caps’ Zimbabwe tour”.

In fact not even Muldoon tried to stop a NZ team from travelling overseas.

But as I read the full article, I realised that it is not as bad as I thought. Basically NZ Cricket doesn’t want to tour Zimbabwe (understandably) but if they refuse they get fined massively by the ICC.

However if the Govt declares they are “ordering” the team not to tour, then they escape the ICC fine.

So I can understand that any such “order” would be to actually help NZ Cricket out. But nevertheless I think one needs to be very careful about the notion that the Government can order any private sporting body what to do.

Whale Oil notes that thousands of users have blacked out their facebook and twitter pages in protest against S92A.

What surpises me is two of the blackouts on Twitter – TVNZ News and TV3 News.

Netguide also reports:

British humourist, broadcaster, author and technofreak Stephen Fry has added his support to online campaigns against New Zealand’s new copyright legislation, which would require ISPs to disconnect customers accused of downloading copyright material.

Go Stephen Fry.

Russell Brown also makes many great points today:

It is not only that this law denies the accused any due process, it is that it stipulates a penalty that no court would impose in adjudicating a copyright complaint even if infringement were proven. Remarkably, someone convicted in a court of law of handling child pornography via the internet would not suffer such a penalty.

It is quite proper to seek efficient ways of adjudicating legal disputes, but the problem with Section 92(A) is that it places the adjudication of a legal dispute either in the hands of parties who are not competent to make such decisions (ISPs and telecommunications companies), or (in the approach endorsed by RIANZ’ Campbell Smith) in the hands of one party to the dispute. To say this isn’t ideal is putting it mildly.

I actually think a dispute resolution service is the kry to solving this argument.  The system used for .nz domain name disputes (which is basically an intellectural property dispute resolution process) could be used as a basis for a online copyrightdispute resolution service.

Germany and the EU have both rejected the idea as a breach of civil rights, with the German Secretary of Justice observing in a statement that:

I don’t think that (Three Strikes) is a fitting model for Germany or even Europe. Preventing someone from accessing the Internet seems like a completely unreasonable punishment to me. It would be highly problematic due to both constitutional and political aspects.

The UK has rejected it also.

One argument in favour of 92(A) is that the doom is exaggerated, and that rights holders will be visible and responsible, and would not make frivolous complaints. One would hope this would be the case, because a penalty for frivolous accusations was removed from the amendment bill.

Yes they removed the penalty for false complaints.

I had great fun on National Radio yesterday. One topic was the ranking of Abe Lincoln as the all time best President by Historians.

I pointed out that Lincoln was very unpopular with many at the time he was President. He invaded the independent Southern states as they were a security threat. He went far beyond the Patriot Act by suspending habeas corpus. He acted unconstitutionally in many ways, justifying it by the ends justify the means. He imprisoned 10,000 Americans without trial and spent money before Congress had appropriated it.

Yet despite all that, 150 years later he is ranked the greatest ever President.

Therefore is it not possible, I postulated, that in 2150, historians will rank George W Bush as the greatest President of all time

No I wasn’t being serious, but according to the producer I suceeded in lighting the lines and text messages up.

Another topic discussed was the story of the German woman who had the Armed Offenders Squad rescue her from an Internet romance gone bad. Now that is what you call a bad date!

The Herald reports:

Auckland’s prospects of bidding to host the 2018 Commonwealth Games have come under threat from the Government’s cost-cutting.

Minister for Economic Development Gerry Brownlee has withdrawn $500,000 earmarked by the previous Government for a study into whether Auckland could stage the event in nine years.

Thank God. Hosting the Games is the best way to lose tens of millions of dollars.

In a letter to the New Zealand Olympic Committee, the Ministry of Economic Development’s industry and regional development deputy secretary, Mark Steel, said the money promised by Labour had been conditional on city councils agreeing to put in money.

“After due consideration, and now that it is clear most cities that were initially approached will not be participating, the minister has indicated he is not convinced that the case has been established for allocating government resources,” said Mr Steel in the letter.

That tells you something if you don’t even have the local bodies on board.

Take from here. If you don’t know what a FWB (or FB) is, don’t ask!

Click on it, to see it full size.