First rule of Cabinet Club – Trolls and Bottom Feeders get in free
When the mouthpieces of the corporate media establishment panic because their team start to lose, that’s when their narrative structure becomes more fantasy than considered opinion.
John Armstrong’s bullshit analysis of the debate in Parliament on Wednesday has to be read to be believed. It comes across more like Whaleoil critiquing a play featuring Judith Collins than a political reporter writing about politics…
When David Cunliffe suggested that National was willing to give millions of dollars to big business interests but felt no obligation to help the Pike River Mine families, Key displayed rare anger, saying the Labour leader’s willingness to play political games with those families showed just how low Cunliffe was willing to go.
…Key didn’t even consider forcing the parent companies of Pike River to pay compensation and seeing as the 29 men died because of the dangerous deregulation his Party champions, chastising Cunliffe shows a defensive and delusional Prime Minister. Not in Armstrong’s eyes, the PM was “red hot” with his “withering style”.
Armstrong continues…
When Cunliffe raised the subject of National’s cash-for-access to ministers’ fundraisers, Key noted Labour had set up a stand at its annual conference where delegates could pay up to $1250 for a one-on-one meeting with an MP of their choice.
…the difference of course is that Cabinet Club is charging $10 000 per person for access to Ministers. Labour’s meet an MP of your choice for $1250 isn’t even in the same ballpark of conflict of interest.
As eye rolling as Armstrong was in his coverage this week, Claire Trevett was far worse. On the same day Roy Morgan publish a poll showing a collapse in National Party vote, with Cabinet Club allegations flying, with Maurice forced to stand down for his attempt to heavy the Police over a domestic violence case for a donor and with the Oravida milk scandal in full flight, what did Claire decide to write about? A farcical joke that Labour had leadership coup problems because of low internal polling.
Yawn.
We here at TDB had the same nonsense lie shopped around to us that Labour’s internal polling had dropped as low as Claire claimed. We heard it 2 weeks ago, it was via Collins supporters. We looked into it and saw no truth to the rumour. Claire Trevett however turned it into the main focus of her column.
Another sad example of how out of touch and irrelevant the Press Gallery have become.
Then there is the beige voice of the establishment, John Roughan and his claim today that he sees nothing wrong with Collins involvement in Oravida because he astoundingly argues that when the personal interest aligns with the national interest then there can be no conflict of interest????
WTF?
The heavily censored documents to date show MFAT diplomats were extremely concerned about Collins’ dinner with a mysterious senior border official and the bosses of Oravida. The fact the NZ Ambassador wouldn’t attend the dinner highlights everyones concern that this was unacceptable. A Minister dining with a senior border official and the bosses of a company that employ her husband that none of the NZ officials wanted to touch is not what John Roughan describes as ‘national interest’. The national interest was not served by Collins involving herself directly on behalf of a company she has interests in, that was a conflict of interest. Ministers should be negotiating on behalf of all NZ business into China, not the ones their husbands are employed by. That’s cronyism, and the fact Roughan can’t seem to see that speaks volumes.
The ultimate irony is that Collins was in China giving an anti-corruption speech…
Fighting corruption is not easy, it is a complex offence that is difficult to detect.
Three tools are needed to fight corruption: Prevention, detection, and prosecution.
The New Zealand model provides an excellent example of international best practice in using these tools.
…The NZ model shows how open it is to abuse when sleepy hobbits allow born to rule Tories and their media proxies to present crony capitalism as what’s best for us all in the national interest.
The fact that this entire Collins affair is more to do with the invisible power machinations within the National Party is still missing from most of these analysis. If National lose, Key is vulnerable to a challenge from Judith and those rump voters who want an obviously nasty right wing agenda presented, but if Key wins then Judith will be demoted.
If the polls keep suggesting a change against National, watch for Judith to return to twitter for increasingly outrageous right wing dog whistles for her rump electorate support base, also watch for Slater’s continued attacks against the other pretender for the throne, Simon Bridges.
As more and more dirt about Cabinet Club gets revealed, citizens should start demanding a debate on public funding of political parties. The fact public funding scares the bore of babylon, David Farrar so much should be an indicator that debate is due and righteous.
Which would be great for NZ as National would be unelectable for 20+ years. Of course, the more intelligent psychopaths in National realise this and are trying to prevent that.
Indeed, Draco. Which is why a part of me wants Collins to stay on and become the next National Party Leader. It would be a “gift” to the Left beyond measure.
Imagine if Jenny shipley had stayed on and on and on… National would be stuck at the same level it achieved in 2002: 20.93%
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_general_election,_2002
“If National lose, Key is vulnerable to a challenge from Judith and those rump voters who want an obviously nasty right wing agenda presented, but if Key wins then Judith will be demoted.”
If National lose, Key won’t need to be challenged. He’s on record as saying he doesn’t want to be Leader of the Opposition and, like Helen, he’ll have bigger fish to fry.
Taking away any partisanship, I agree with you about Claire Trevett’s polling numbers. People always claim they know this and that about internal polling, whether it’s WhaleOil or MSM wannabees, but it’s all BS in my opinion.
This election will be close, because of the combined vote of the Labour Greens, and because I’m certain Cunliffe won’t take Labour any further to the left. Parker’s ‘big tool’ showed just how much of their left wing principles Labour are prepared to give away for electoral advantage.
“He’s on record as saying” a lot of things.
He’s enjoyed being PM, as anyone would with the media generally playing nice where he’s concerned. Tony Blair found he didn’t want to let go of the power, and we might find Key is similarly inclined.
It won’t be close either – the grand media illusion the Gnats worked so hard to sustain has burst spectacularly. It will be hard to dig their way out of this hole – they’re not even sorry about the cabinet club yet – that’s a dead fish the public won’t be swallowing for them.
Not sure about Judith’s chance to challenge, she’s lost a lot of ground.
The leftness of David Cunliffe will probably have a lot to do with the make up of the coalition – a stronger Green/Mana vote will incline him further left. I imagine the IP will benefit from disenchanment with the corruption scandals, as will Winston.
“It won’t be close either – the grand media illusion the Gnats worked so hard to sustain has burst spectacularly.”
No, I don’t think so. “Overall, the poll indicated voters seemed to be focused on issues other than the National Party’s ministerial woes. Three in four of those surveyed said Ms Collins’ Oravida conflict-of-interest affair and the debacle resulting in Pakuranga MP Maurice Williamson’s abrupt resignation from the party would not have much influence on their voting choice.”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11253156
The public are waking up to Labour’s hypocrisy on this, with their long list of cash contributions from unions and assorted hangers on, rich and otherwise.
The cabinet club is probably more disturbing to most.
But think about your statement – 75% say it won’t influence their voting decisions – I’ll be quite satisfied with a 25% swing against National – it will put them below the Greens.
Cash for access deals run with help of PM’s office
The Green Party can reveal details of an exclusive Wellington dinner where a select group paid about $3000 each to the National Party to dine with and lobby the Prime Minister in a cash-for-access deal involving the Prime Minister’s own staff.
The Green Party has been told the Prime Minister’s chief of staff Wayne Eagleson was with him at the September 2011 dinner at the Museum Hotel which suggests John Key was there in his capacity as the Prime Minister, not just a member of the party or an MP.
“This crosses the line drawn by the Prime Minister himself: that Ministers were free to attend pricey Cabinet Club style fundraisers for the National Party in their capacity as members of the party or an MP,” Green Party Co-leader Russel Norman said.
“This $3000 a head dinner with John Key shows how enough money can buy access, not just to Government Ministers, but to the Prime Minister himself.
“It is concerning that the Prime Minister’s chief of staff accompanied him to the event, which would suggest John Key was there in his official capacity as Prime Minister. It is completely inappropriate for people to pay to access the Prime Minister and the fact that the National Party benefits from this raises serious questions over a possible conflict of interest.
The dinner, on September 13 2011, was organised by hotel owner Chris Parkin, who invited a select group of Wellington’s business elite to attend.
“The Prime Minister himself has confirmed he’s attended 53 Cabinet Club events where private donors paid thousands to the National Party in order to meet him. The Wellington dinner was run on a similar basis.
“I think ordinary New Zealanders would be shocked to learn this is how the National Government goes about its business.
“These cash for access deals are a dangerous corrosion of our democracy.
“The Maurice Williamson and Judith Collins sagas prove the National Party treats more seriously the concerns of people who give them money.
“Lots of ordinary New Zealanders would love to have dinner with the Prime Minister and talk to him about the issues they want him to follow up. But they can’t afford to go to one of his exclusive dinners.
“Ministers have special powers that other MPs don’t. They have an obligation to avoid the risk they could use those powers to their own benefit, or to benefit those who give their party lots of money. These dinners are a blatant breach of that obligation.
“New Zealand needs a ministerial disclosure regime, like that proposed by the Greens, which would mean the Prime Minister would have to say who he met that night and what they lobbied him about.
“A $3000 dinner with the Prime Minister is worlds away from the $25 ticket to a quiz night, or movie night or other types of fundraisers everyday New Zealanders are used to. And its completely different from the normal voluntary political donations that parties rely on to survive.
“Though John Key may insist these cash for access fundraisers are technically legal, that does not mean they are right,” Dr Norman said
So? People want to pay money to meet the PM. So what? Can you show me a law that has been broken.
Did you know the Greens do this? Or Labour? Oh they can’t command the same money, but that’s because no-one wants to pay god money to talk to muppets.
Interesting.
Despite your pseudonym, you seem not to understand the intrinsic value of political integrity.
Only an ACT supporter could be so devoid of ethics.
What is wrong with people donating to the national party Frank? Are you so antidemocratic you favour large unions spending other peoples money over private individuals spending theirs? No laws are being broken, legal, moral or ethical. It’s a beat up, and the public are seeing it for what it is.
Yep, they are – the total and utter corruption of the National Party.
” No laws are being broken, legal, moral or ethical”
they are actually – its against rules to fundraise as a sitting minister. What exactly do you think is being sold at a “cabinet club” where senior sitting cabinet ministers attend for one on one time?
its funny how the extreme right are totes cool with a different set of rules for themselves
Roughans article was deeply concerning and one of his most sycophantic. He is a sounding board for the National Party so it’s a disturbing insight into what the National Party think.
The not so veiled inference he gave is that we are dealing with a corrupt country so we have to get on board and get corrupt.
God knows what he was thinking but one of the doozies was to rewrite the cabinet manual to allow ministers to claim it’s in New Zealand’s interest whilst they line their pockets on personal projects just like Oravida. Seriously John, seriously??
But the Pièce de résistance was stating “the Government’s open embrace of foreign connections would be a point of difference with the restrictive policies likely to be heard from Labour, Greens and New Zealand First at the coming election”.
Dude I’ve seen this governments embrace, it’s not open. it happens at golf games, dinners and piss ups and behind many closed doors, it involves payments and subterfuge and its as crooked as a dog hind leg.
Please Mr Roughan, keep your version of open embraces for the Mafia.
So the heirs-apparent are Judge Judy (Chucky) Collins or Simple Simon (I’m wearing my big-boy) Britches.
Oh Yay – the brains trust waiting in the wings.
I think National are a bit stuck now. Collins has to go but Key can’t do it because it will look bad, and appearances are very important at the moment. Key has tried to have his cake and eat it once too often. Winston must be getting happier each week the election gets closer, and who knows if that’s a good thing.
Indeed, BEATINGTHEBOKS. And if the scandal deepens, or Collins becomes mired in another mess – especially as we draw nearer to the election – Key will be stymied.
It will be interesting to see the next Roy Morgan poll. Was the fall in the last poll a “blip”? Or a sign that the electorate have become weary of National’s pratfalls…?
Collins (and Key) are already embroiled in another mess.
Being called to task by the UN.
To answer questions about the poor, and people with disabilites not having full rights of access to justice.
Surely this is the biggest scandal of them all – being called to account by the UN!!
Simon has been VERY quiet lately ! I think that’s going to change next week now that a deceased forestry worker’s family have won the right to take out a case against the forestry contractor, despite workplace safety’s attempt at a cover up ! I can picture him now getting all flustered and screechy as he inevitably tries to pass the buck !
@IV – you’re quite right – I’d pay good money to get access to cabinet ministers like Bridges ! 😉
National have a larger problem looming; the Herald reports that it will pay wall its site within three months. If it does so National will lose its cheerleaders like Armstrong, Roughan, Young, Trevett, O’Sullivan….I can’t imagine anyone paying to read their soft nonsense. Entertaining enough to visit for free, but pay? And from the regular offers to have the print version clog up my letterbox free for a month if only I would agree to subscribe I guess that version isn’t selling well? Shall we run a sweepstake? That the Herald will delay pay walling until after September?
“Invisible power machinations of the government…..”
A very interesting 2012 article, showing maybe the forgotten agenda with Oravida, and the Chinese, and Northland, and our government, and corruption:
Hunt on for hidden kauri
By Mike Barrington
11:00 AM Monday Jan 23, 2012
http://www.nzherald….jectid=11052197
A gold rush is under way in Northland with valuable kauri trees being dug from peat soils that have preserved the wood for many thousands of years.
The forest giants toppled by unknown causes millennia ago have beautiful timber that finds a ready market in China, Italy, Australia, North America and Germany.
Ancientwood Ltd in the United States offers website sales of the old kauri for up to US$100 ($124) a superfoot, which is a section of timber one foot (30.48cm) square and one inch (2.54cm) thick.
The manager of the Oravida Kauri Ltd yard at Ruakaka, Mike Moodie, scoffed at that pricing and indicated returns could be better in China. But if swamp kauri averaged half that price on the market – US$50 ($62) a superfoot – an average kauri tree containing up to 5000 superfeet, or 11.8cu m, would be worth US$250,000 ($310,000).
If a swamp kauri as big as Tane Mahuta at an estimated 244.5cu m was found it could sell for more than US$5million ($6.2 million).
And the 2800 tonnes of swamp kauri Mr Moodie plans to have piled in the Oravida yard by the end of summer could have an eventual sales value of US$50million ($62million).
Armed with diggers, teams of men are toiling around Northland, extracting kauri stumps and logs close to the surface in swamps and on farmland.
Unlike Oravida, some of them are cowboys, ignoring the law in their eagerness to cash in. The Northland Regional Council last year took five parties to the Environment Court because they had refused to follow an abatement notice to stop digging up Kaimaumau swamp kauri.
But as long as extracting logs Hunt on for kauri as Chinese eye North icon
There is no justification or necessity to prop up the art with the mana of kauri.Stephen King, Waipoua
Forest Trust member from wetlands does not involve more than 5000cu m of earthworks or lower the water table, the NRC says kauri can be dug up as of right. Environmentalists and people interested in heritage protection claim that within a decade the ancient kauri will have gone the same way as most of the estimated 1.2 million hectares of live kauri that covered much of the northern North Island when Europeans first came to New Zealand.
Today barely 4000ha of original forest remains, much of it in Northland. And those live trees are not totally safe from predatory millers either. Some broke through a locked gate to get a portable sawmill into the Department of Conservation-controlled Warawara Forest south of Pawarenga in the Far North in 2009. They cut and milled a kauri, and were not caught.
The Warawara theft came to light after the controversy late last year over $700,000 worth of kauri being used to build the ceiling of the new Auckland Art Gallery.
Andrew Davy, of Kauri Warehouse, and Arthur Bergman, of Northland Kauri Timber, said they obtained the timber from privately owned bush where logs had been blown over in storms. Milling of standing kauri stopped in state forests in the 1970s and there are also rules for ancient kauri saying:
Swamp kauri can be exported without Ministry of Forestry (MAF) approval if it is a finished or manufactured product; or a personal effect.
Whole or sawn salvaged swamp kauri stumps or roots can be exported with a MAF milling statement and export approval.
Swamp kauri logs may not be exported, either whole or sawn.
The MAF acting director of sustainable programmes, Rob Miller, said in a reply to an Official Information Act request that 450cu m of whole or sawn swamp kauri stumps had been exported since September 2009. However, Northland Environmental Protection Society member Fiona Furrell of Whangarei had copies of MAF notice of intention to export forms showing more than 730cu m of swamp kauri was lined up for export between October 2010 and November last year.
Ms Furrell suspected the difference in export volumes reflected the ministry’s inability to regulate the swamp kauri business.
But Mr Miller said some of the products listed on the export forms, such as “table tops” and “temple poles”, could have been produced from swamp kauri logs so they would not have been included in the swamp kauri stump timber exports.
Isn’t there a ban on exporting logs, either whole or sawn? Yes, but if the “table tops” and “temple poles” produced were finished products, it was okay. Mr Miller said there might be cases where swamp kauri products approved for export could be turned into something else.
“We look at it on a case-by-case basis,” he said, describing the classification of export swamp kauri as a “a grey area” with confusion over the definition of the Forest Act. Later, Mr Miller told the Advocate an error had been made in the 450cu m assessment, which should have been 520cu m. He also pointed out that two of the export applications totalling 185cu m that MAF had provided to the Northland Environmental Protection Society had not been approved, reducing the volume of kauri lined up for export between October 2010 and November last year to 545cu m.
MAF has two permanent staff in Northland and a third forestry officer contracted to inspect timber intended for export. The ministry typically investigates up to 20 cases annually relating to breaches of the Forests Act, but there have been no prosecutions in relation to indigenous timber in Northland in recent years.
Meanwhile, at the Oravida Kauri Ltd yard at Ruakaka, manager Mike Moodie had about 800 tonnes of swamp kauri stumps and logs stacked up last month and he was expecting another 2000 tonnes by the end of summer. The pile would provide sufficient kauri for three years’ milling, starting in April, he said.
Oravida Kauri Ltd has a million one-cent shares and its Chinese directors are Jing Huang and Deyi Shi, both of Auckland, and Julia Yu of New York. The firm sent five ancient kauri stumps from Kaihu to the Oravida Food Company in Shanghai in May last year and will process the timber it has at Ruakaka before resuming exporting. Mr Moodie said the kauri would be cut into slabs 75-120mm thick and sanded both sides. The slabs could then be exported as table tops. MAF told the Advocate legs did not have to be fitted.
Some root plates would be water and sand-blasted to get them clean before they were exported intact to China, where people would value them displayed like sculptures, Mr Moodie said. It took three days to pull a big root plate from the dirt in a Waipu farm paddock that had lots of shallow-buried swamp kauri.
Mr Moodie said Oravida paid farmers $50-plus a tonne for the extracted timber, filled in holes and reseeded grass. Swamp kauri created jobs, he said, pointing to Oravida’s extraction crews, trucking companies, a sawmill firm, drying facilities and other expenses.
However, tree ring scientist Jonathan Palmer fears the extraction of swamp – or, as he calls it, sub-fossil – kauri is depleting a unique resource invaluable to paleoscientists investigating climate change.
Some sub-fossil kauri found near Auckland Airport at Mangere had been dated at 225,000 years old, yet it “could still be cut with a chainsaw – it’s wood was still good”, he said.
In Northland, there were “immense capsules of time buried in bogs”, with some sites showing preservation of kauri in layers of logs ranging from 5000-30,000 years old.
Mr Palmer is carrying out research for universities in New Zealand and Britain into the Younger Dryas period 12,000 years ago, when there was an abrupt climate change with the Northern Hemisphere suddenly cooling for decades. He is working at the Kauri Museum at Matakohe, cataloguing samples of sub-fossil kauri so the reference material for his British university research is kept in this country.
Waipoua Forest Trust member Stephen King said swamp kauri was a finite resource that should be kept for New Zealanders and for scientific research.
He also said there was no need to “throw” kauri at the Auckland Art Gallery, where use of the timber indicated “misplaced values”.
“It’s a mediocre building and there is no justification or necessity to prop up the art with the mana of kauri,” Mr King said.
– NORTHERN ADVOCATE
By Mike Barrington
Opinion and belief.
Just further proof of how self serving this country has become. For me, this is just as big a scandal as Collins and her goings on.
What are we doing, allowing such a spectacular and unreplacable resource to be dug up and flogged off, without virtually no value add.
And that is just for starters, what are we doing allowing more and more wetland to be drained in the first place.I think it is time for us to stop and have a cup of tea and do a solid re-evaluate of what is going on in this country with regards foreign input into a lot of things, from farm and strategic business ownership through to houses and we need to look at how the country’s resource are being dealt with.
For me, this is just an example of how we will be ripped off where mining and drilling is concerned as well.
And this stupid govt will just sit back and let it happen
I have never seen John Key as “slim” as on that photo, between two overly “blown up” and physically imposing persons, who seem to have diet and/or weight issues. That forgiven, especially since the one on the left has replaced eating addiction with hiking addiction, I am starting to see, why Key considers himself to be a guy from the “centre” (like in this photo).
He is “centrist” between moderate and far right, for sure, that is “honest”, I must say. Farrar, the “liberal” or rather “libertarian” “moderate”, and the other “specimen” not far from the extreme right.
Why don’t we have an alternative media awards contest with categories like worst news coverage, worst blog, worst editor, worst national daily newspaper, worst television presenter, etc? Would certainly be a lot of fun wouldn’t it? We could call it the Specsavers Media Awards. Those who won could have a free check up at Specsavers to test their lack of vision.
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