Just Left 2006

And so 2006 begins with sunny days and, apart from wind and sun-burn, no damage for me from the break.

2006 will see some changes on Just Left. I'll be leaving comments open only occasionally on posts, as opposed to by default. Those will be posts inviting discussion around issues or whatever I feel like at the time. If the tenor of comments improves then I might leave them open more often. If it dives I may close them off altogether. Your commenting future is in your collective hands.

Secondly, as it's a non-election year I hope to return to the posting style of 2004 and early 2005 - more discursive and a bit less shrill. Solid critique of the government - and complements, where deserved - is what it needs from its friends, and in walking that line I'll be a little less risk-averse than I was last year.

Thirdly, posts are likely to be less frequent. It is my habit the year after an election to pay less attention to politics - or at least to try and do so. My energy this year will be in internal Labour Party debates, as we learn the lessons of last year and lay the foundations for a fourth election victory in 2008. That audience demands my time more than this.

Reasoned, interested feedback is always welcome by email. Some of you did quite a lot of emailing last year - do feel free to carry on.

Happy New Year everyone, and let's get this show on the road.

Comments

[tim barclay]

Jordan I hope the entire Labour Party goes to sleep just like you. Politics does not end with an election especially with the Government constructed in the manner of this one. But the National Party will need to do more than hope the economy crashes, even though Cullen seems to think providing the Government books are in balance he need do no more as finance Minister. He is still very aware of spending pressures but he does not mind that providing taxes keep rolling in to pay for it.

[peter mck]

without the comments your blog will not really be worth reading - I am pleased to note you will critique the governement - however I fear it will be in much the same vain as the speaker of the house. (ie labour and its MPs are always right and never can do any wrong)

Well I am pleased there are plenty of very intelligent witty blogs from the blue team to read.

[TomS]

For reasons largely of National's making the 2005 election campaign was bitterly divisive and I think many New Zealanders welcome a chance to patch the wounds in our community caused by National with their reckless gamble for power in 2005.

I sense a feeeling of collective exhaustion and a slightly shaken nation as it dawns on us all how nasty the 2005 election campaign was. It reminds me of the collective pysche of exhaustion that followed the 1981 Springbok tour.

Having said that, in many ways the atmosphere of brooding resentment still apparent in the provincial rump and in white middle class neighbourhoods (ESPECIALLY amongst white males) at their defeat last September is deepening as they absorb for the first times in their lives what it means (in their own minds anyway) to be a disempowered minority.

So much lies ahead for Labour. Unlike the media, which has universally written off Labour for 2008 (the same media that wrote Labour off 6 weeks out from the 2005 election) I think can handily defeat the right basically forever. Labour has a powerful and remarkably stable voter base. National's result represents a high tide of discontent manufactured by a wholly negative campaign built around half-truths, urban myths, racism and the politics of small minded greed and envy. By the way - if anyone thinks I hold the National party in the lowest possible regard and as completely disqualified for government after their disgraceful display in the elction campaign then they are totally correct.

But Labour has a lot to do. It needs to re-invigorate itself in power, it needs to re-connect to the provinces and it needs to revitalise its policy agenda for a 2008 campaign. I hope this blog allows people who are interested in thoughfully contributing to the mainstream policy debate for Labour to put their views forward. I also hope this blog attracts a way lot less of the lunatic fringe from the right spoiling it with splenetic and deranged posts.

[span(ner in the works)]

how gracious of you both, tim and peter, to attack your host in his first post back after the break. remind me not to invite either of you around for dinner anytime soon.

Jordan is not going to sleep in 2006, although many of your ilk make it clear you would prefer that he did in fact, through your constant, frequently nasty, attacks. He has just said that he will be spending more of his time on internal Labour stuff, and that as a result he will be blogging less - it's a matter of time and priorities, folks. there are only so many hours in each day.

besides i would have thought you would be happy to see him blog less - less filthy posts from dirty lefties. isn't that what you both want?

TomS - good points about the healing that needs to take place - i'm not sure everyone is on board though...

[tim barclay]

I take issue with the campaign being bitterly divided. The National Party fought a clear campaign on its brand, if the Labour Party thinks that divides the country then they should by implication acknowledge that they have a very narrow mandate indeed for their vision of NZ.

[TomS]

Come on! Only a dunderhead would not realise that National tried to win the election by using divisions along race and class to great effect. The trouble is, you can't run a country that way. To quote Abraham Lincoln: "A house divided against itself cannot stand."

That is a simple fact that right wing blogger seem to simply fail to grasp.

Anyway, that was last year and this is 2006. The September election was a watershed. Those who see NZ as a place to live defeated those who see us as a place to make money. If the right wing bloggers choose to learn nothing and forget nothing from that then that is their funeral.

We all talked ourselves into a black hole last year, fuelled by a wholly negative self-serving business sectors failure of nerve and our deep seated lack of confidence that is a legacy of the branch-office cultural and economic vandals of the 90's.

To me, the next three years is about demonstrating the last six years of growth was no fluke and use that to build our confidence as a nation. I hope Labour re-grasps a program mild nationalism and leftish reform.

[tim barclay]

TomS the next 3 years will prove indeed the last 6 years was a fluke based on the hard work of previous Governments. This Labour Government has done very little indeed to strengthen the NZ economy except tax and spend and make it more costly to do business in NZ. They stood by and watched a speculative boom rip through our housing market, now they can pay the price as the market corrects. They are following a policy of overtaxing people just to balance the books while they spend and spend and waste money like a drunken sailor. The last election proved nothing for Labour exept on how to hold power in a booming economy against a freshman oppsition Leader. Pragmatism rules. There will be no such thing as Clarkism or Cullenomics in NZ political history.

[Jeff]

Tim, why would any New Zealander be hoping for our economy to crash? Talk about shoot yourself in the foot. Maybe you would be better off moving to Oz Tim where you can pay more tax than you would here.

[Rob Salmond]

Tim: "This Labour Government has done very little indeed to strengthen the NZ economy except tax and spend and make it more costly to do business in NZ."

Well then Tim, why is it that the World Bank very recently - in 2006 - rated New Zealand at the top of the world in their "ease of doing business" index? http://www.doingbusiness.org/EconomyRankings/Default.aspx

[Gooner]

Rob, I form companies daily. It takes a few minutes. Then my clients open bank accounts in the name of the new company. This takes a few minutes also. They then hook up a phone and a fax, and away they go. That is what the World Bank is talking about. And all that has got nothing to do with this current government.

This from Rodney's blog and is more relevant:

"We have taken a tumble on the Heritage Foundation’s annual Index of Economic Freedom from fifth to ninth equal.

New Zealand lost ground in the “capital flows and foreign investment” category because proposed legislation would toughen restrictions on foreign ownership of land.

We shared the ninth ranking with Australia and the United States.

But get a load of Hong Kong: decreased government spending as a percentage of gross domestic product to 20.7%.

And Singapore at second cut its corporate tax rate from 22% to 20%.

We should be aiming to top it—to be free and to be prosperous."

Welcome back Jordan.

[tincanman]

Only a dunderhead would not realise that National tried to win the election by using divisions along race and class to great effect.

Then I must be a dunderhead, because to me it seems that a party campaigning on needs based funding rather than race based funding is doing quite the opposite to being racist.

I'd contend that the party campaigning for race based funding is the one being racist.

But that's the PC-speak for you lot.

http://www.civitas.org.uk/pdf/cs47.pdf

That article will explain it quite clearly.

[M'lud]

Labour's introspection will probably tell it what we all know; that they've been in power for six years and people are getting as sick of them as they do of ANY party that's been in for six years. Surviving 2008 is a bigger task than Jordan seems to realise. The pendulum has not been dismantled.

[Rob Salmond]

Actually Gooner, the overall world bank index (where we are #1) takes much more into account than registering companies and opening bank accounts. Sorry to shatter your disillusion. Examples? It looks at ease of hiring / firing (where NZ is 4th in the world), it looks at protecting investors (1st in the world), it looks at enforcing contracts (4th in the world). Even when we are 16th in the world on their "ease of paying taxes" measure, only three other industrialised countries (Can, Aus, Swi) are ahead of us. Go look at the index before you dismiss it, Gooner. It looks at ten aspects of doing business in NZ and it rates us highly on all of them - even the ones that National were bleating about all through 2005.

[tim barclay]

The Labour Party goes on about the business community. But they have their hand in their pocket and have a nosey bureuacrat peeringmover their shoulder all the time. The last 6 years has seen more Government intrusion in people's lives than we have experienced for a very long time. But that is the Labour Party for you. They believe in the power of the government to solve everything and make people's lives more secure. But they confiscate wealth, make it harder for middle income earners to save, make it more risky to do business.

[Rob Salmond]

So Tim I take it you've decided to just ignore the World Bank's finding that New Zealand is - in 2006 - the easiest place to do business in the entire world. You, Tim Barclay, know much more about this than the World Bank. Is that what you've decided? Did you even glance at their index before deciding?

[Jordan]

Rob, don't even bother engaging with Barclay. It's not worth your time.

Tim S interesting points, will pick them up in a post later today.

[tim barclay]

It is relativel easy to get into busniess in NZ - you do not need liceses etc. But then. You have a plethora of rules and regulations with the risk of punative penalties if you getr something wrong. That is what I mean about it being more risky to do business. Think of the potential liabilities you are exposed to if you hire staff?? But that is the Labour Party for you they have utter contempt for those who pay provisional tax and run a business.

[span(ner in the works)]

yes i'm sure people like Stuart Nash and Shane Jones have absolutely no notions whatsoever about running businesses and in fact rant repeatedly in caucus about how essential it is that this Government beat businesses to a pulp with their tax laws.

(just in case) that was sarcasm.

Labour MPs do include people who have experience in business. Don't see any corresponding union experience on the other side of the House though...

[span(ner in the works)]

(although of course Nash is not in caucus, yet)

[tim barclay]

The Labour Party is dominated by people who have worked for a salary or belong to organisations that defend and expand the rights of people who merely work for someone (i.e. they are not prepared to run a business). The National Party does have people who are active in Federated Farmers so I guess that would count as a Union, but thankfully there are no union officials as such.

[Millsy]

whats wrong with "defending and expanding the rights of people who merely work for someone". I mean, those rights need to be defended - by gunpoint if required.

Of course tim, we all know you want to bring back slavery. Naturally, I will oppose any attempt by you to screw the workers, have a sweatshop economy with wages at 50c an hour and pretty much bring back slavery. And if that includes blowing things up, and street action, then so be it.

[Xavier]

Tim, your last comment makes about as much sense as the rest of yours. Read: none. Saying that the Labour party is just full of people wallowing at the public trough is as meaningful and accurate and constructive as me saying that no-one in the National Party has been a beneficiary, and that they're all white, exploitative capitalist middle age men. It's time to engage your brain and come up with something a little less stale, my friend. It's the new year! Diversify!

[tim barclay]

Xavier I like it white and middle class, just joking but I do not have much time in people who have this rose tinted view that a government gives a person sercurity and can solve problems. There is always a dark underside to government help - look at the DPB and analyse what that does.

[Millsy]

So Tim, I take it you want single mothers and their kids to starve or turn to prostitution..

[tim barclay]

Millsy I would be in favour of families solving the issue of a mother having a child that she cannot afford to support. And then I would consider adoption. The state is the last resort not the first port of call to provide a lifestyle choice.

[Millsy]

Youre a dickhead tim, I hope you get injured so you can fully realise the value of public hospitals.

[Mark]

I live in a small Far North town and there is HUGE resentment at Labour scraping back in due to their shameless Working for Families welfare and interest-free student loan bribes. If the left think that verbally attacking the provinces is going to somehow get them onside, they they are deluded. TomS, you seem to be gleeful that the whities are oppressed at last - great to see such tolerance from you.

[Aj]

Tim,

Regarding your comments in this thread.

Thank you for reminding myself, and many other voters, why we elected a Labour Government.

[Millsy]

So, Mark, I take it that the provinces want students crippled with loan interest, the poor to starve in the streets, wages to be slashed and our schools and hospitals sold off and people to die in emergency rooms. I should find that town and have it razed to the ground for their evil.

[JTF]

Anyone who regards Anthony Browne’s tract on “political correctness” as evidence of anything is suspending their critical thinking skills (assuming they have any). It is a textbook case of propaganda and fallacious reasoning, full of straw men, arguments from extremes, gross generalisations, innuendo, slander and hyperbole. Except for page 40 and some parts of Chapter 8, the book is itself a retreat from reason! Ironically, through its 90-odd pages of complaints about the “stifling” of conservative opinion, it smacks of the victimhood it purports to be challenging:

"Victim status is best achieved by tirelessly promoting the damage that 'society' does to you, while trying to silence those who would challenge you."

Indeed. Enter the Political Correctness Eradicator...

Here’s one British commentator’s view:

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/columnist/story/0,9321,1681793,00.html