Stuff reports:
The Government’s income tax changes will be legislated before Christmas and come into force on April 1 next year.
Labour campaigned on creating a new tax bracket for income earned over $180,000. The party proposed to tax income earned above $180,000 at 39 per cent.
New Zealand is still in a recession and Labour’s priority is to increase taxes.
Radio NZ reports:
Ministry of Education staff who subverted communications with a school principal after he raised safety concerns about a proposed bus stop, acted “inappropriately” and their behaviour is “extremely disappointing,” the Ministry says.
So what will the Ministry do?
Emails obtained under the Official Information Act show the staff pretended to get in touch with Elsthorpe School principal Sandy Crawford, who had repeatedly invited the Ministry to a public meeting on 9 October, 2019 to explain their proposal to cut the bus service and install a new stop, without success.
In the days leading up to the meeting, the Ministry’s national operations manager of transport Steve Guiney wrote to regional transport advisor Janice Kennerley and another official Lucy Jackson asking Kennerley to give the appearance of trying to get in touch with Crawford about the meeting, while actually trying to avoid him.
This is not a junior official.
He then asked his staff member to prove they had attempted to make genuine attempts to talk to Crawford.
“You must try to reach the Principal/Board … show me a trail of attempts to talk via official means with this principal. I am not at all in favour of you or anyone fronting to discuss policy with people who are ineligible to receive the benefits of at policy,” he wrote.
Kennerley responded she had done just that, by calling Crawford when she knew he was not there.
“As below, I did try Elsthorpe School at 2.13pm but no reply. As per Lucys email, the principal is away at the principals conference so not unexpected.”
So they called the principal when they knew he was away at a conference, so they could claim they had tried to contact him.
Documents obtained by RNZ under the Official Information Act show a dramatic cut to bus services was floated as a way to reduce roll pressures in Taumarunui, where the “majority of students are not attending their closest school”.
In 2015, the Ministry proposed closing or merging several primary schools in the area because they were under-populated, but a community backlash resulted in the plan being quashed.
In July 2019, a Ministry staffer noted that many of the primary schools were still empty because students “are currently supported by the buses to attend their school of choice”.
He proposed reducing the 11 bus services to four or six in order to redirect students to their closest schools which were under-populated.
“Any reduction in bus services will terminate student choice, and will result in students no longer having a way to get to their school of choice.”
“This will be an opportunity to better align the school network in Taumarunui.”
This is equally disturbing. Officials proposing eliminating school bus routes as a way of eliminating student choice!
I’ve been contacted by the family of someone who was in the same row as the positive Covid-19 contact on Air NZ flight 457 on Thursday.
They have been given different isolation instructions from every agency they have interacted with. They are so alarmed as the lack of coherent and consistent advice, that they want people to be aware that we still have systematic failures in our Covid-19 response, as we saw with the lack of front line worker testing.
The sequence of events is:
This is beyond mickey mouse. If someone in the same row as a positive Covid-19 case gets told six different things from different parts of the health system, then something is very wrong.
The family also say that they were never asked any of the following:
This mismanagement has been very upsetting to the family, as well as the risk to public health. They have young kids who were told they would have to be isolated from their Dad for 14 days, and were really upset.
I also find it hard to understand why even casual contacts are told they don’t need to get a Covid-19 test. Why on earth don’t they just arrange for all casual contacts to be tested asap?
So again in summary they were told five different things from four different health agencies, all within one day. That shows systematic problems remain with our Covid-19 response.
NB: The family member who gave me this information voted Labour. This is not about politics. It is about concern that the health system is not working as it should.
Something you will hear a lot of is that Trump has been defeated but not Trumpism. What this means is that the Republican Party overall did well enough that it will not treat Trump as a pariah. In fact he may remain the most powerful Republican for the next four years. There is talk he may set up his own TV network or show, or even run again. Of course that may all change as his legal problems grow once he leaves office.
Let’s look at the overall results:
So it appears unlikely the GOP as a whole will turn its back on Trump and Trumpism. They have a decent chance of winning the House in 2022. The Senate may be more challenging for them as they will be defending 20 seats and the Democrats 12.
So what do we mean by Trumpism. It is hard to define but I’d divide it up into three areas – policies, style and authoritarism.
Policies
Trumpist policies which differ from traditional GOP ones are anti free trade, anti military intervention and no concern about deficits or debt.
It is unlikely that the GOP will revert back to its former policy stances, even though some individual politicians will.
Style
It is likely aspiring 2024 candidates will try and follow the Trump style to some degree. By style I mean the highly combative take no prisoners approach where you demonise your opponents and work at getting out your base rather than persuading centrist voters. I expect more prominent GOP politicians will attack the media relentlessly and continue populist rhetoric where all the problems of society are blamed on identifiable groups (illegal immigrants, Antifa, media, etc). I expect the GOP will especially fully fight a culture war against identity politics on the left. This is what most motivates their base.
Authoritarianism
Trump broke numerous democratic values and norms. He sacked the FBI Director for not dropping an investigation. He blackmailed Ukraine to try and smear his opponents. He publicly demanded charges be dropped against his friends and laid against his opponents. He has spent months undermining the legitimacy of elections.
This is the area least likely to be taken up by others in the GOP. They don’t share Trump’s psychological disorders and it is hard to see what Trump did here working for anyone else.
So overall I suspect the GOP will reject authoritarianism but continue to embrace Trumpist policies and a Trumpian combative style to the culture war.
Whether this works will depend partly on how well Biden governs as President and also the final results of the Senate elections. Personally I expect the GOp to win at least one of the Georgia run offs as I can’t see Georgia wanting to hand over both chambers of Congress to the Democrats.
It is interesting to look at which Labour MPs have not been made Ministers, despite having been in Parliament for three or more terms. This suggests they may never become a Minister.
As we have seen a first term MP and several second term MPs becomes Ministers, it is safe to conclude the three above probably never will.
How about the 2017 intake. Let’s look at what has happened to them:
The ones in bold are those who have not got a role in the executive, or are a whip or presiding officer. If Labour gets a third term, some may get there. But there are a lot of 2020 intake MPs who will be keen to get there also.
Stuff reports:
A property management company that got in trouble for a “tone deaf” email to renters at the beginning of the lockdown is under fire again after a letter drop “inviting neighbours to snitch” on tenants.
The letter from Quinovic advised neighbours new tenants had moved into their area and encouraged them to contact the company with “any concerns about the property and its management”. …
The letter drew harsh criticism after it was shared on Twitter on Tuesday.
“We got a letter from slumlord scumbags Quinovic saying that they rented out one of the houses on our street inviting us to snitch on the tenants. More b……. that should be illegal,” the original post said.
I am not a fan of Quinovic. I have heard many horror stories myself, and they are not a company I would ever use as if I was a landlord.
But I’m not sure in this case they have done anything wrong. I think it is useful for neighbours to know who owns or is responsible for a property.
The fact someone on Twitter is outraged about something is now newsworthy. Many people on Twitter are perpetually outraged about pretty much everything.
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. has clearly won the 2020 presidential election and will be the 46th President of the United States.
Biden has an almost 3% lead in the popular vote and has 279 confirmed electoral college votes. He is on track to win 306 electoral college votes, the same as Trump got in 2016 which Trump described as a landslide.
The key states are:
Trump will of course never concede. His psychological disorders make it impossible to do so. In his universe or mind he is always a winner and always the best at everything. Not conceding isn’t a strategy, it is a psychological necessity.
What will be interesting is who will be first to charge Trump after 20th of January. The three most likely are:
If Trump pardons himself that will only affect the US Attorney for SDNY.
The focus is now going to go on Biden, as we have a clear result. The remaining lawsuits affect a trivial number of votes and can’t impact the overall result.
It will be interesting to see if Biden names Cabinet appointments now, or waits for the results of the Georgia Senate runoffs. The sort of nominees he can get confirmed will vary if the GOP or Democrats control the Senate.
Stuff reports:
New Zealand’s highest earners will pay almost 25 per cent of all income tax received by the Government under Labour’s proposed top tax rate.
Labour campaigned on a new top tax rate of 39 per cent for people earning more than $180,000. It said that this would raise an extra $550 million a year and affect only the top 2 per cent of earners.
At present, the 3 per cent of earners who receive more than $150,000 a year in income pay 23.5 per cent of all income tax, or $8.67 billion of $36.85b.
NZ Initiative chief economist Eric Crampton said that would increase to 24.7 per cent if the Government was able to claim the full $550m in extra tax.
Some won’t be happy until the 3% have been taxed so heavily they leave.
If this eventuates, then Biden will have won the Electoral College by the exact same margin Trump won in 2016 (which Trump of course called the greatest landslide ever etc).
Let’s look at the four main uncalled states:
It is important to note the vote counts showing Biden ahead in states like Pennsylvania are all from votes received on or before election day. The ballots received after election day have not yet been included so Trump’s lawsuit in Pennsylvania won’t affect the outcome.
Also worth reflecting that the talk of candidates being ahead, and falling behind etc is a bit misleading. The actual number of votes has not changed in the past three days – just which ones have been counted so far. Some states count advance votes first (as we do in NZ) and some states count them last. If Pennsylvania had counted the advance votes first, then the vote count would have shown Biden leading the entire time.
It is not unusual for advance votes and on the day votes to vary. Take NZ for example. National got 30% of election day votes but only 25% of advance votes and 20% of special votes.
So there is no real chance Joseph Biden will not be the 46th President of the United States. It is just a matter of when those last four states are called. Biden wins with Arizona and Nevada alone.
A guest post by Bob McCoskrie of Family First:
Despite starting the campaign with a 36-point lead two years ago (according to Horizon Polling), the YES campaign lost the cannabis debate by 2.3 points (an incredible 38-point turnaround).
This was despite an avalanche of favourable media support which even experienced broadcasters observed as very bias – (“the prominence of the pro-campaigners in mainstream media, the lack of balance”, and “The media in general has featured, to my eye, favourable coverage of why we should be legalising the stuff, as opposed to why we shouldn’t”).
There was also a strong campaign by the Electoral Commission to enrol young voters using the enticement of being able to vote in the dope referendum – a group of voters more likely to vote yes.
And there were accusations of bias by the government. In a paper in the NZ Medical Journal, the academics described the claims in the government pamphlet delivered to all voters as “inflated”, “unrealistic”, and “unlikely to be achievable”. The BERL report – which the government tried to hide – revealed that pot shops will be as noticeable in number as fast food outlets, and that usage will increase by almost 30%. And government advice – which the government also tried to hide and was forced to release by the Ombudsman – said that “there would almost certainly be unintended and unanticipated consequences of legalising cannabis for personal use”, and that “there is insufficient data to understand the medium- to long-term impacts”
So, with all the inertia behind the YES campaign, why did they still so spectacularly fail?
The one thing the YES campaign did get right?
They used medicinal marijuana as a smokescreen – which fooled a lot of people into voting yes. Exit polling showed that 60% of Yes voters voted in order to make cannabis available for medicinal purposes such as pain relief. This is despite the fact that medicinal cannabis has already been legalised, and the Government clearly spelt out on the official referendum website that “Medicinal cannabis is not included in the proposed law that will be voted on in the referendum.” The silence by the media and YES campaigners around the private members bill of Dr Shane Reti which was drawn just before the election confirms that the YES campaign was keen to use the medicinal aspect to increase the yes vote.
But overall, the YES campaign still blew it.
Some big changes:
UPDATE:Gerry Brownlee has announced he is stepping down as Deputy Leader of the National Party. So caucus will elect a new Deputy Leader on Tuesday.
Stuff reported:
High-profile runner Anthony Van Dyck has been euthanised after failing to complete the course in the Melbourne Cup.
One of the favourites to give trainer Aidan O’Brien his first Melbourne Cup victory, Anthony Van Dyck was injured during the race.
“It is with sadness that we confirm that Anthony Van Dyck had to be humanely euthanised after sustaining a fractured fetlock during the running of the Melbourne Cup at Flemington,” Racing Victoria’s Jamie Steir said.
In the last eight Melbourne Cups, seven horses have died. Is this humane?
Stuff reports:
Liquidator Damien Grant has been given another chance to make his case to be allowed to continue his insolvency career. …
In a judgment released on Tuesday, the High Court in Auckland overturned the Ritanz decision and required it to be reconsidered.
Grant has credit card convictions from the late 1980s and a fraud conviction from when he was 26 in 1994, for his part in a share-dealing scam. He was sentenced to 30 months in prison and served 16. …
Muir said the Ritanz panel had applied an incorrect test when “weighing up” the past convictions against his present career.
All of its significant doubts had a retrospective focus, Muir said.
“At no stage did the panel say that it had significant, or even any, doubts Mr Grant has truly moved on from his criminal past…. The danger, as I see it, in the panel’s approach is that in the case of serious dishonesty offending … a balancing approach may leave the scales permanently weighted against admission. That is not to say that the nature of the offending is not important. Conspicuously it is.
“[If] the door cannot be considered permanently closed to Grant and he is free to apply again in the future, the question must inevitably arise, if not now, when? Is 35 or 40 years of honest commercial and media endeavour really any different in this sense to 27 years?”
I’m very pleased Grant got the decision over-turned. It was an appaling decision.
The court ruling is here, and worth a read. A key point the Judge made is RITANZ seemed to ignore that Grant wasn’t someone trying to become a liquidator, but he had been a highly successful one for the last 12 years. He has been appointed to over 800 insolvencies, and has a staff of 20.
The Judge also pointed out that RITANZ focused hugely on whether having a member with a 27 year old fraud conviction would lower the reputation of the profession, and ignored the possibility having Grant as a member would heighten their reputation, by showing how people can turn their lives around.
RITANZ now has to consider a new application by Grant. I hope they do the right thing this time around.
One of my all time favourite actors died this week, Sir Sean Connery. Hard to believe he was 90.
Not only was he the iconic James Bond, but I loved him in The Untouchables, The Hunt for Red October, Robin Hood etc. He had such presence.
My ranking of the James Bond actors is:
Unemployment is up to 5.3%. This is lower than many expected, but of course still very hard on the families who have lost their income from work.
Some key data:
In my post of the ten best things about Trump, I said the most powerful was his standing up as a cultural warrior against the woke cancel culture etc.
It would be interesting to try and get data to look into Tabarrok’s theory.
The Herald reports:
Transport experts did not believe a new road connection to ease congestion on the ageing Harbour Bridge would be needed until mid to late 2040 – 10 years after the rail tunnel.
So at least 20 more years of massive congestion.
Biden now has a lead in some key states, but it remains very close. He is now at 70% to win in the betting markets.
Fox News has Biden at 238 and Trump at 213. The uncalled states are:
If the leader of each state goes on to win it, then you have Biden 274 and Trump 266.
But states like Georgia and Pennsylvania may still change. The votes remaining to be counted come from areas which heavily favour Biden. How much they favour Biden will determine the outcome in those states. If it is just say 2:1 he won’t pull back the lead by if it is 3:1 he will.
Also note the estimated of uncounted votes are estimates. In Wisconsin it is suggested there are actually only two small towns with 600 population to report.
UPDATE: Biden now at 77% in betting markets. GOP hold on Senate looks likely with Collins winning. Dems have held House. Some outlets have called Wisconsin for Biden. Trump has picked up Maine’s 2nd District.
UPDATE2: Biden now at 264 in called states. Just needs one of Nevada, Georgia or Pennsylvania. If he gets them all he gets 306 EVs.
Biden now at 86% in betting markets.
The winner won’t be known for at least a day or more, but it is clear it is a far tighter race than projected as once again Trump has exceeded the polls in at least some states. It is unclear if this is due to local issues (large increase in support from Cuban Americans in Florida) or is more across the board.
I thought it would be useful to look at the states declared, and see how these have impacted the projected chance of victory for Trump in the 538 model.
Trump was well ahead in Georgia and North Carolina. But it has tightened The NYT has Trump at 82% to win North Carolina and only 36% for Georgia.
If Trump wins North Carolina his odds move to 19% and Georgia to 21%.
If he wins Michigan his odds hit 89%. Or Wisconsin takes him to 83%. Or Pennsylvania to 54%.
Biden has three paths to victory:
A lot of the votes not yet counted are early votes, and are thought to favour Biden. So just because Trump leads in the four states above at present, it doesn’t mean he is sure to win them because the votes counted to date are not representative of all votes. He may, but we simply won’t know until all the votes are counted.
Trump, as expected, is claiming it is stealing the election to count votes after tonight. That is mad. These are votes cast and received before the polls closed. There is a legitimate debate about whether votes that get received after election day should or should not be counted (some states say they have to arrive by election day, others that they must be postmarked by election day) but you don’t throw out early or advance votes just because they take longer to count and tabulate.
The chance of an electoral college tie is non trivial. It is as high as 6% based on states won to date. If that happens, then the election would go to the new Congress.
The House would elect the President and the Senate the Vice-President. It is possibly you could end up with a Biden-Pence or Trump-Harris administration which would be sort of hilarious.
The Senate is looking quite good for the GOP to retain control. Not certain, but fairly good. If the Senate is tied 50-50, the VP Pence would be the deciding vote if they have to elect a VP.
The House will overall be controlled by Democrats again but in the event of electing a President they vote by congressional delegation. All 50 delegations get a vote, and you need a majority to win.
The current House is:
So Trump would be elected by the current House but if just two delegations flip then Biden would win in the House.
Anyway unlikely the House decides, but one worth keeping an eye on.
We’ll see where the key remaining states go tomorrow, or later this week.