Author Archive
A nice description of the journalist’s conceit (as in fanciful notion, not pride)
From Jeff Himmelman’s NY Times review of Yours in Truth — A Personal Portrait of Ben Bradlee. Some journalists seem incapable of seeing flaws in themselves or their heroes. They suspend their professional skepticism as if they’re not bound by the usual rules of gravity. It’s a kind of self-important higher-calling disease that has made some […]
One of my favourite right wing vixens pulls the plug, citing her children
Oh noes! MP Louise Mensch resigns to move family to New York Louise Mensch, possibly the most well-known Conservative backbencher, has resigned as MP for Corby and East Northamptonshire, citing the difficulties of trying to balance her family life with political commitments. Mensch and her three children will move to New York to live with […]
Read this and tell me it doesn’t remind you (just a little bit) of John Key’s SkyCity Casinos convention centre deal for extra pokie machines
Dave Pell’s Next Draft recommended weekend read was Matt Taibbi’s The Scam Wall Street Learned From the Mafia in Rolling Stone magazine. I agree. It’s a fascinating read, but kind of sickening too. USA v. Carollo marks the first time we actually got incontrovertible evidence that Wall Street has moved into this cartel-type brand of criminality. […]
The dignity of the office
There are roles the political leader of a country plays that are non-political. They are a task of the office rather than the office-holder. A prime minister responding to a national emergency, for instance, or representing our country in times of grief or alarm. John Key does these well, in my opinion. His everyman, guy-next-door […]
Heart warming NYC cabbie story
I like New York. I’ve never felt unsafe there. – P via John Gruber
Good values, positively expressed
I briefly mentioned the challenges someone advocating for ‘better’ can face, with other ‘crabs in the bucket’ pulling them back as ‘sanctimonious and hypocritical’ (see Choking on one’s own sanctimony …) Here’s nice model from Bennetts Bookshops … pointing to their ‘Core Values‘. Bennetts exists to serve students and the campus communities of which they […]
What a strange coincidence [Updated]
Let’s just put a pin in this and come back to it later … Ms Boag, as well as all recipients of the email – including Ms Collins, ACC chief executive Ralph Stewart and Mr Judge – have denied leaking the email. But Ms Collins told the Herald last night that the email from Ms […]
How do you spell phishing? A scam targeting Dropbox users
Update: Looks like it’s a legitimate email from Dropbox. I’m wrong (won’t be the last time): From TUAW.com Dropbox sends password change notification to some users In the meantime, some Dropbox users who have never changed their password or who have an easily crackable password will be getting email reminders to change their password. These […]
John Banks ‘absolutely’ supports campaign donation law reform. With a straight face!
Following up on Laughing all the way to the Banks …
National MP Jami-Lee Ross is just left of Hell
I don’t know local National MP Jami-Lee Ross’s position on gay marriage or the Marriage (Definition of Marriage) Amendment Bill but I surely can’t be the first to notice that his taxpayer-funded electorate office shares a frontage (and what else???) with HELL … Hmmm. Not a good sign, d’ya think? 🙂 – P pic: Barfoot […]
Can we learn WITHOUT the experience?
A wee media brushfire was sparked by mother-of-one MP Maggie Barry’s silly interjection that MP Jacinda Ardern’s not having children somehow reduced her credibility when discussing laws aimed at supporting parents. The kerfuffle sparked a hilarious twitter trend #maggiebarrystandingorders which merrily mocked the dumb idea that MPs need direct experience of whatever it was they […]
Choking on one’s own sanctimony (I think Juana has ‘issues’ with me)
On harsh criticism “[A]t its worst, the show chokes on its own sanctimony,” Thus wrote a New York Times TV critic, Allesandra Stanley, responding (negatively) to The Newsroom, Aaron Sorkin’s latest TV series. The opening line of her review, ‘So Sayeth the Anchorman‘ reads: It’s not enough to be right; everyone else must be wrong. That’s […]
Attention to detail and credit where it’s due
Apparently some TV commentators made fools of themselves in the eyes of the geek community by not recognizing Tim Berners-Lee (who invented the hypertext transfer protocol, and with it the basis for hypertext markup language, thus the world wide web) when he appeared in the London Olympics opening ceremony. I grinned in recognition (he’s still […]
Loving the Olympics
Like millions of others, I eagerly watched the Olympics opening ceremony and enjoyed the spectacle. I love the Olympics, and revel in the celebration of elite sports men and women — the best in the world in their field — pushing boundaries and ‘going for gold’. Doping scandals and steroids aside, the Olympic spirit encapsulates […]
The Simon Lusk stigma?
In defence of the National Party’s right to determine WHO holds positions of influence in the Party, and to exclude those it sees as ‘negative’… It seems the judgement by those in the National Party higher echelons that Hawkes Bay’s Simon Lusk is a Danger To The Party persists. I mentioned earlier that leaked National […]
