Bugger election day last Saturday in November. Thats no surprise.
All on then and a long campaign.
Balanced coverage should be good.
But no Taupo race for me this year. Nikki Kaye will have to wait till 2012, hope she gets a high list place to ensure she is still an MP.
Sorry to hear that Trevor, but I’m confident that you will be keeping in shape as best time allows.
I was hoping Nikki Kaye would get a go at Taupo this year after her injury in 2010.
And LabRat is right – [the now deleted (admin)] comment that he links to is over the line.
Or on the other hand you might get plenty of time to practise Trevor or maybe you will be in charge of Winston in which case…..
Press Gallery challenge:
Who will be the first journalist to work out why Key chose November 26?
Clues: APEC, date, and location …
So the election date has been called. The season of demagoguery is upon us. We can look forward to such things as the usual fear mongering from our politicians, the half truths and outright lies, the dirt digging and faux scandals, the politicians pretending to be the ‘everyman’, and the unedifying displays of mindless factionalism from the party partisans as they are whipped into a frenzy by their partyarchs. What joy.
Touche QtR.
Never mind, you can do K2 instead
So my training mate has just told me. Frying pan fire anyone.
You won’t get any balanced coverage in the NZ Herald, they have become nothing more than Donkey’s cheerleaders !
Trevor. How about setting a precedent by biking around the country while electioneering? Add a bike powered generator and be like the Kiwibank “orator.”
You seen any polls in auckland central trev? Jacinta will have to work really hard to knock Kaye off. And she will have to pull something out of her hat that her leader hasn’t managed lately.
Today’s announcement from Keys was interesting. Why choose today? I think it was to gazump the labour leader on his new line-up. It highlights that Labour’s front line hasn’t changed a single bit and they’ve now committed to the same people as last time, announcing it after the election was called.
Labour have to perform a whole lot better in parliament and everywhere else if Jacinta’s going to even hold on to her list spot let alone take on Kaye. Hope labour doesn’t go the same way as the Nats did in ’02 but it’s got a strange sense of familiarity about it.
Trev as some one occassional labeled RWNJ- if you completed the K2 I could almost sell my vote to Lab just on that basis. But I suppose quality of policies and ability to delivery on these for some is a better basis to vote on
@dominoes – yes. And it is because Jacinda works not only hard but effectively that she is doing so well. But as some people know I’ve known Nikki for a long time and think she has much more of a contribution to make than 90% of her caucus colleagues and that is why I hope they bump her up the list.
@herodotus – pretty sure I could do it. Question is whether It would be before election day.
As Old Sammy pointed out, the APEC Leaders and Finance Ministers meetings will be a fortnight before the election. In Honolulu of all places. (Did someone say ‘holiday home’?)
Key becomes the first NZ PM to call an election so APEC falls in the official campaign.
What will be the effect of having Key and English out of NZ at a critical point of the campaign?
Never mind Trev, winning the election will ease the pain.
Going from the bluegreens rather fail of a conference, I would very much expect Nikki is about to loose Auckland Central. So some very good advice from you Trev.
The Bluegreens even get pulled apart in homeground:
http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2011/02/how_to_make_good_news_sound_bad.html # Then a mere 25 seconds on this announcment, with the reporter introducing it by saying it was done to save face over the previous Akaroa decision
# They give 15 seconds for WWF to complain that the marine reserves should be larger
# Not content with that, then they tie into the story a 40 second piece on a change in air pollution standards. They have the Minister defending it, but no mention (for example) of the fact even the independent Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment supports the new standards (as the old ones were unachievable and unfair). A far more balanced take on the new standards comes from Claire Browning at Pundit.
# They then give Russel Norman a free swipe to say the Blue Greens are just abut “greenwash”
# Then for good measure the reporter adds her views that with National the economy will win out over the environment
# And finally just so there is not doubt left with viewers that National are evil planet destorying heatherns, they spend 35 seconds talking about how a few weeks ago the Minister let a farmer continue, against official advice, grazing by a polluted lake – without any balance at all about why (which is the officials fucked up by inviting the farmer to apply when they should have told him he was ineligible)
Epic fail PR from Kiwiblog on the following comments to:
The Lignite in Southland completely undermines national’s climate position, as the mining in national parks undermined its conservation credentials.
Really it is probably Brownlee and not Smith who calls a lot of the shots in the environment/climate department, and selling off Solid Energy to give them access to more capital so they can upscale to do large scale lignite coal mining in Bill English’s electorate is not a good look either.
I agree Shunda re the bluegreens choice of venue.
Maybe if National keeps up Brownlee policies, bluegreen Nikki Kaye may loose Auckland Central.
National needs solid policies if it wants people to take them seriously, large scale coal opencast strip mining and deep sea drilling undermines that ‘balance’ that is the bluegreens buzzword.
It backs moves to dig up six billions tonnes of the dirtiest form of energy in Southland http://www.greenpeace.org/new-zealand/en/news/blog/bluegreens-gave-me-the-blues/blog/32756
“See, at the heart of the Government’s thinking is an hypocrisy that undermines climate action. The Government talk about a clean economy, yet they invest millions in subsidising the fossil fuel industries of yesteryear.
It backs moves to dig up six billions tonnes of the dirtiest form of energy in Southland – which would amount to a climate crime of global significance – and have just declared open season on BP-style deepwater oil drilling in some of our most pristine environments.”
Also running in Auckland Central is a greens councilor from Waiheke Island, so it could be that Nikki is judged against her parties environment and transport record…
I think Jacinda would make a fine Auckland Central MP, and work well under the new Mayor and council, and could help Auckland on its transport issues and help with the new direction of a modern Auckland http://nz.news.yahoo.com/a/-/top-stories/8689251/len-brown-sets-green-initiatives/ Auckland mayor Len Brown wants to see a 40% reduction in carbon emissions in his city by 2025.
The mayor wants to roll out the Eco-City model adopted by the former Waitakere City Council, which would give the city a stronger environmental focus.
That is the kind of vision that Rodney and Hide and Brownlee et all lack.
@ Coal – Do you mean Denise Roche?
Yep
not true, trolling – warning ban next time. Trevor
It is good to see that you have your priorities right, Trevor. Here’s to a successful election year.
Oh well, you can just indulge in your other kind of spinning.