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Michael's blog about life in Mt Roskill, Labour Party activism, and progressive Christianity.
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33 comments:
Says who? Michael? Helen?
Spooks, how do people react when you tell them in person that you think those who believe that child-rearing is hard work have their "head up the bum of political correctness"?
Have you told anyone that in person?
Child-rearers - mothers usually -'make', 'grow' and 'teach' at the very least and yet apparently you think their work is worthless.
Are you actually as ill-adjusted, resentful, uncaring and socially completely inept as you sound on this blog?
What do you know about people? Do you have any meaningful relationships or friendships with them? If not what are you doing about it, if you wanted to?
Or is it that there is a vast difference between the real spooks and the non/anti-social version we are exposed to here, a difference which is the result either of dishonesty or dysfunction?
So, you say that child-rearing is not hard work but also say you don't think it is worthless?
Or, as it appears, is it only economic attainment that you think is valuable in anyone?
why all these ridiculous and nasty attacks purely on the basis of Wood's job? trade unionists do do actual work - what do you imagine they do all day?
Amazing just how easy it is to union bait the hard right.
Instead of attacking me for working for an organisation that is voluntarily funded by it's members (I'm not aware of the receiving any tax payer bribes), why don't you actually address the points raised in the cartoon.
Firstly, why is it OK for Brash to believe in taking away basic working entitlements that everyone else in the developed world enjoys? Secondly (and presuming that you think that the entitlements should be removed), why isn't Brash campaigning openly and honestly on such policies?
maybe it's more than one anon? i don't know.
but i do know that it's not michael's mother. or his wife. or either of his sisters.
spooks, you've obviously such a low opinion of the members that you believe that they would not call him to account for the standard of his work..
and by the way, your expressed feelings about New Zealand's supposed increasing resentment of success has lead me to wonder whether you think there was less resentment of success when the marginal tax rate was 66 cents in the dollar......
When other parties agree to maintain Labour's ongoing inflation-linked indexation of tax thresholds, then they might be able to talk....
Read the Budget!
starts in three years and keeps on going......ie, income tax thresholds adjusted upwards every three years with inflation....
..never been done before. Good stuff.
Again, you're stealing Winston's press releases....
so, you don't agree with the ongoing indexation of income tax thresholds then...?
my word spooks you get awfully wound up. i hope that you have seen your doctor recently as i suspect you get high blood pressure whenever you read this blog.
what did you mean by your crack about the members of the union thinking they are voluntarily in it? (if that is what you meant) it has me perplexed. it has been many many years since we had compulsory unionism in NZ, in fact i can't remember it at all (although i'm possibly younger than you)
But spooks, I am talking about the ongoing indexation of the income tax thresholds, term after term, decade after decade.
Fiscal drag is unfair - more unfair in times of high inflation like the 1970's, when people's earnings were quickly dragged into the higher (and then very much than higher than now) tax brackets.
But this government has said - let's put a stop to it for good, regardless of what the tax rates are, which is your bone of contention actually. This government is the first to do something about this.
So you don't agree with the ongoing indexation of the income tax thresholds, then!
I'm surprised at you!
So, do you agree with the Government's ongoing indexation of income tax thresholds?
Come on, you claim to know your own mind - spit it out!
well spooksie you tend to exaggerate the concentration on yourself by responding to questions about you but not about your views, eg my statement about your blood pressure got a response, but not my question about unions.
So, you do support it to an extent, and do you also concede that whilst it is starting in 2008 - for the three years dating back to 2005 - that this is the first Government ever to prevent the tax increase by stealth that is fiscal drag?
It was not meant to be a tax cut -it is designed to prevent tax increases by stealth.
National could come in and showily lift the highest threshold from $60 000 to $70 000 in one hit, say, but would they also agree to see that figure automatically indexed up in line with inflation? Or would they be happy to quietly see the value of the resultant 'tax cut' steadily eroded by fiscal drag?
They need to be asked, don't you think?
Yes, you've bowed out of this argument, haven't you?
that's interesting spooks, seeing as you have shut off comments on your own blog, even though there is nothing there to critique. don't like scrutiny much do you?
i merely asked you to explain your comment about union members not being voluntary members as it didn't make much sense to me. if you'd like to enlighten me i am genuinely interested in your pov.
Blimey, I came in late on this one... almost glad I did! Spooksy got a bit pre-menstrual there, didn't she lads?
Oops, sorry, I'm not allowed to mention her nanymore, so it seems...
I'd better 'piss off' :-p
spooks - it is quite natural for me to ask you to explain a comment that you have made (re union membership) that i do not understand. part of the wonder of blogs is that you can actually debate, seek explanations, have a dialogue. you seem to have no problem with Whaleoil or yourself posting off the original nature of the post Wood has made, but when I question you regarding anything you get very defensive. Which only leads me to conclude that you have no answers.
dear spooks,
i humbly apologise if you have taken any of my comments as rude, towards you. i merely meant them to be in vehement disagreement to your arguments, and questioning of your style of posting.
however have you considered that you may in fact have a persecution complex? i only point this out in the hope that it will be helpful to you, not to be rude. when someone is paranoid they are often the last to know.
i really do try hard not to be rude. in fact many people have commented in the past, including that luminary of the NZ blogosphere DPF, on my "niceness".
even when i tried to be rude about Act's billboards it was misconstrued by those on the right and Rodney Hide ended up linking to my pisstake. i am quite stunned that you now think i am rude when all my previous attempts to tarnish my reputation have failed.
but i would genuinely, sincerely, like to know why you think that union members are not voluntary members. i really really would.
is there any way i can convince you to impart with your wisdom in this area? (NB: sexual favours will not be considered due to my intrinsic hideousness which makes them not favours at all)
kind regards
span
well i only counted one paragraph about you, three about me, and two about the question i was asking you. guess i am never going to get an answer to your intriguing statement. oh well.
Voluntary unionism it is then, I feel. Thought so.
why is it not voluntary? Members choose whether or not to pay fees. They don't even have to opt out, they have to opt in.
So there are advantages to joining a union then, Spooks? Yes, I kinda thought that was always the point of them...
You can opt not to take advantage of being in a union though, and opt out. That's where that 'volutary' bit comes in.
Hahaha! Nice one, Spooksy... I don't know what I liked more...
Was it (a) Your "I don't like flaming" comment - when we only have to scroll upwards to peruse some of your 'greatest hits' from earlier in the thread...
"God you're stupid."
"Open you ears for once."
"I think you are having enough trouble with what is in your own head."
"Piss off."
"Get stuffed."
Hmmm. Or was it (b) Still trying to maintain that "the word
"voluntary" was not mine" as if you hadn't tried to get away with saying NZ doesn't have voluntary unionism - Again, this from earlier in the thread-
Cheezy: "Voluntary unionism it is then, I feel. Thought so."
Spooks: "No it is decidedly not voluntary."
I'm not sure... I kinda like them both! Don Brash clearly has a kindred flip-flopping spirit here!
Gadzooks! Wow! You sure got us there!
(cheezy skulks away in shame and not a little awe at how he's been taken in by spooksy's massive intellect!...)
hmmmm spooks your a b c d to the evilness of unions seems v reminiscent of that other union hater (and baiter) tim barclay, over on Jordan's blog - the other Labour blog that gets constantly flamed by right wingers trying to shut down lefties (although i tend to think that Labour people are in general not that left actually). perhaps you are somehow related?
in regard to accusation d, as i only have time to reply to one of them now, i worked on one of the projects funded by the CONTESTABLE (thought you'd like that) fund that I think you are referring to, and let me tell you that the reporting requirements, both in terms of doing the work and in terms of the budget and spending money on what you said you would spend it on, were very arduous and rigorous. i had to produce regular, many paged, reports on both areas, for two projects, for most of last year. it was definitely not a doddle and any money not spent at the end had to be given back (and was).
the contestable fund for union education projects is the only way unions receive any money from the Govt. that's why i assumed that was what you meant by d. it is a scheme run by the Department of Labour and after the disaster of CEG they are very very rigorous about auditing unions who receive money from it.
that doesn't match your accusation at all. the money can only be spent on what you put in for. for example the projects i worked on were to provide courses to a set number of participants in particular areas, and to produce delegate education materials. no electioneering involved. there was actually a bit of dosh left over so we gave it back. quite a different picture from the one you paint.
Wood is right to deny any direct payments from Govt to unions for supporting Labour. there aren't any.
actually most unions didn't spend much on education in the past - it's quite a new approach (ie last five years probably) for them to do much around developing delegates. so the education fund isn't really "saving" them much money, which they are then spending elsewhere. it means that they are actually able to have education resources in the first place.
don't know where you got $2M from, for union spending on election stuff. but i can guarantee that the two figures are not related.
the $2M contestable fund for education is also open for businesses and other organisations to apply to, which they do and are often successful i understand - the board who make the funding decisions and approve the courses and resources includes business reps.
i really do fail to see how it is "feathering your nest" to spend all the given money on something you probably wouldn't have spent much money on without the grant. yes Labour has been relatively good to union members, but i hardly think that's a big surprise. union members are much more likely to vote left.
mind you that might be because National craps all over them every chance it gets.
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