Category: Questions

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Many Supporters Now Disenchanted

One of the groups who were most supportive of the National parties bid for election are now “luke  warm” or left cold after John Key spoke at the NZ Forum on the Family. Some of those present had worked arduously for months to get a referendum on the “the anti-smacking laws”. When John Key stated “If I can see compelling evidence that the legislation is not working, I will change it,” ……. “To this day I haven’t seen this evidence.” He left large numbers of people “gob smacked” and astounded with his statements, and this fall out has continued with those who were not present at the forum expressing their dismay and disbelief on “talk back” radio and in newspapers and on blogs.

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New Zealand Medal at the Beijing Paralympics

New Zealand cyclist Paula Tesoriero has won the gold medal in the 500m time trial at the Beijing Paralympics, and she has broken the world record. Her time of 43.281s helped her to finish ahead of  riders from Germany and Australia. News reports stated that she was overjoyed with the victory, and hoped to go on and win other medals. Her next race is on Wednesday.

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Is the recession over or just on hold?

The economists, who comment for the news media, today stated that “there are indications that the current down turn in the economy is over”. They predict the New Zealand economy will move in a positive direction from now, on gradually recovering in the medium to long term. The more stable price of oil, the expected change in the weather, and the pending tax cuts all being contributing factors. Perhaps the main factor that is holding things back, is the imminent general election. Polls to date have suggested that a new right government will be elected. The recent lack of political acumen on the part of opposition members and their new leader have tended to shadow this inevitability. MMP means that unless the governing party gains a very large portion of the vote they can not govern alone. For the right to form a coalition may be difficult particularly now the leader has ruled out one of the more significant minority parties…..

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Is all Publicity Good Publicity?

With the New Zealand General Election just around the corner the minority parties are doing every thing they can to raise their public profile. One of the minor party leaders even going as far as wearing a yellow sports coat. The same party leader has been vigorously attacking and probing at every session. If one tries to look beyond the obvious you have to wonder what the real story is. There seems no doubt the yellow jacketed leader had been in the in the public eye both for the yellow jacket and for his attacks on the other minor party that has been singled out for not declaring donations and gifts. I don’t have any evidence at this time on which to base a personal opinion and have not formed one. There are two inquiries under way one of which is the SFO who I am sure have some very qualified and experienced staff to undertake such an inquiry.

Some questions that need to be considered are- Is MMP achieving the lofty ideals it is intended for? Are we ever likely to know all the facts of just what the powers that be want us to know? Is there some grand master plan which is now starting to evolve?

There is certainly a serious political situation/crisis that needs to be rectified and perhaps this will happen sooner then we all expect.

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Is that too much to ask?

The opposition are saying that if they become the government there will be an active programme to force people on benefits into paid work. The government has a scheme titled working for families where people with young families are paying reduced levels of tax. What people need to decide is……. do people respond better to incentive or to threat. The withdrawal of the benefits was advocated by the governments in the 90’s and had limited success and yet the opposition would see this “tried and failed” option as viable in the year 2009. The same opposition is suggesting that the public service needs to be reduced.  An  “off benefits and into paid work” would seem to be a very people intensive measure, and may in fact mean more public servants need to be employed. Other considerations might be if people have their benefits withdrawn because the fail to move into paid work what do they do?…. Turn to crime… We need to think carefully about our next votes and consider the big picture not just what is best for ourselves. Is that too much to ask?

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Oil Prices Trend Down

For some time now oil prices have been trending down rather than up. It make a difference and with the grocery voucher between 6cents and 10 cents it seems too good to be true. Filling the car is still expensive but not as bad as it was. The question is will it stay down? The present conflict in Russia does not look good and could cause supply problems. Lets hope for the sake of the people who live in the conflict zone some solution can be found quickly and no more loss of life will result. We then may also benefit with continuity of supply to the European areas  and consequently to the world.

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Is there a Secret Agenda?

As the New Zealand election campaign hots up it seems that the opposition may not be revealing all that they intend to do if they are elected to government. Over the last week ent the opposition held their annual conference. Some IT savvy individuals recorded parts of conservations that took place during the conference. The audio was made available to the main TV news links.

The audio was played in the news listening to the audio which was also captioned it was not difficult to infer that

·        There will be major asset sales at some stage

·        The opposition is not as unified as it purports to be

·        Some of the present legislation currently in place may well be repealed.

All this despite giving many reassurances to the contrary in recent weeks. The spin doctors have been busy trying to counter the “damage”. The incident must leave a lot of doubt in the voters mind.

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Time

Some say time is in your hands… Others say I don’t have the time… Time waits for no man….One thing I know for sure is that time is finite you realise this as you get older. The other thing that you learn is things that must be done should be done there and then ….if delayed…. they are still there and tasks are often compounded. It also seems that routine makes time drag while variety does the opposite. I believe that there is all the time we need to do the things we need to do…. and there is sometimes time to do the things we want to do. The delimar we face is spending more time doing the things we want to do…… and less time doing things we have to do although sometime we enjoy doing the have to things. Perhaps the answer is to see time as the most precious thing we have and not waste a minute.

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Should You Ask Why?

Well sometimes…
There are however times when there is no purpose in asking why as there is no reason or answer to the why question. For example why did it rain or why did the earthquake strike? One can speculate or propose some fantasy type explanation but not produce facts or anything of substance. Words such as luck, chance and oportunity come to mind in this situation and perhaps would be useful in trying to reason why.
When it comes to man made products events or services then it is a different “ball game” you should and must ask why. Much of the progress we have made in history has come about by asking why and intensively searching for facts and explanations.

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Our health safety systems do this and much valuable knowledge and expertise has been gained in these fields. The black box on an aeroplane helps investigators answer the why question and consequently many safety features and improvements have been developed. Governments use commisions of inquiry and again the purpose is to further the greater good.
Well ask why when it serves some purpose. But do not ask why when there is no answer to be found. Perhaps the best we can do is be wise in hindsight.

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