Bricks
Bricks cost about 50c each on TradeMe, so the concerned citizens at People Power who have taken to hurling bricks at the offices of political parties that voted for the Electoral Finance Act are going to need to chuck over 24,000 bricks before they are affected by the Act’s requirement to register as an interested third party. I’m picking they’ll have very sore arms before the legislation comes anywhere close to applying to them. The Crimes Act on the other hand…
Bookmark to:
February 8th, 2008 at 8:58 pm
What about Clause 4(1)i of the act?
February 8th, 2008 at 9:17 pm
Which says what that is relevant?
February 8th, 2008 at 9:19 pm
$ whois peoplepower.org.nz
admin_contact_name: Nobilangelo Ceramalus
admin_contact_address1: ***
admin_contact_address2: ***
admin_contact_city: Waiheke Island
admin_contact_postalcode: ***
admin_contact_country: NZ (NEW ZEALAND)
admin_contact_phone: ***
admin_contact_fax: ***
admin_contact_email: nobilangelo@ceramalus.net
Just a coincidence, I’m sure.
February 8th, 2008 at 10:06 pm
Point taken, Will. Before MMP, when there was no opportunity for those who didn’t support Labour or National to have any representation in Parliament, I engaged in civil disobedience too.
It got me into the poo with the cops on a few occasions, but it wasn’t property damage - just refusing to leave premises when required to, and the likes.
But I can certainly understand the frustration of people who feel this is their only outlet of expression - try emailing a Green MP - they are not convinced by your arguments yet, but a rigorous intellectual debate is certainly a better option than bricks through windows.
Who knows, they might convince you the Electoral Finance Act is not as bad as you thought it was - the Green position is that while it is far from perfect, it is at least better than the open-slather that existed before 1 January, when wealthy individuals and organisations could spend megabucks supporting parties that supported their interests. That leads to plutocracy, rather than democracy.
February 8th, 2008 at 10:49 pm
If the slogans painted on the bricks are intended to influence people to vote against Labour, NZ First and the Greens, then they count as election advertisements, and as such they need an authorization statement. I think it is unlikely that People Power will have made their name and address public, so in fact they are breaching not only the Crimes Act but the Electoral Finance Act as well…
February 8th, 2008 at 10:55 pm
Parties should be left free to buy the next election with multi-billion dollar promises of other people’s money, carefully targetted at potential constituents. It cannot be permitted that what are, in this context, vanishingly tiny amounts of private money, be spent on attempts to influence this honourable and sacred process. For this reason, freedom of speech - which is an absolute right or it is nothing at all - has been abolished.
In short, the state has the right to pick your pockets, but you no longer have the right to complain about it.
February 8th, 2008 at 11:01 pm
We have (or had) one of the most functional democracies in the world. There is good evidence of this: our governing parties don’t enjoy large majorities (and this was true even before MMP), our two major parties have very similar policies because they actively pursue the consensus vote, and (importantly for the greens), small party policy gets adopted by the main parties as soon as it gains a significant share of the vote.
The EFB is wrong because it gives an enormous advantage to the incumbent party, it’s wrong because it draws an artificial distinction between “third parties” and political parties, and it’s wrong because it frightens ordinary people away from politics.
It seems strange that this all happened because a religious minority put one pamphlet in everyone’s letterbox. It’s baffling that the Greens helped make it happen.
February 8th, 2008 at 11:03 pm
I totally believe in your right to freedom of speech, Mouldy.
What I can’t understand, is that if I have only $10k to support my freedom of speech, and you have $10m, my views get submerged into insignificance and yours get the public attention.
Freedom of speech is freedom to speak, not freedom to buy advertising. Let the arguments stand on their intellectual merits, not on the amount of money that is backing them.
February 8th, 2008 at 11:11 pm
toad: somebody spent $10m? I must have missed that.
February 8th, 2008 at 11:15 pm
Unless you mean this?
February 8th, 2008 at 11:24 pm
Mouldwarp does not want them to lower our taxes!?
Sorry… just yanking the chain a bit.
A change to government policy isn’t “free speech”. It isn’t ANY kind of speech. It is either either an action or in the context of an election a promise to act.
What it is NOT is an advertisement. Something actually gets done. Some folks benefit from it. The most important change in policy mooted in this election so far appears to be reducing taxes.
However, I do take your meaning and it is a problem that all democracies have.
There is not a great deal that can be done to cure the power of the incumbency to make things better for the majority. That after all is one function of government. The balancing function is to protect the rights of the minority. As most Greens, I do have a certain fondness for maintaining the balance.
The alternatives to the EFB (except for my own modest proposal), were worse… and that is the most positive thing I can say about it, but I am no fool to abandon the protection of the law here in order to embrace the protection of the root of all evil.
BJ
February 8th, 2008 at 11:25 pm
Will, the estimate of what the EB spent trying to get National elected at the last election is $1.2m.
Hillary Clinton and her supporters have already spent about $40m on her campaign for the US Presidency. Without the EFA, flawed as it is, there is nothing to stop vested interests from supporting political parties here to that extent.
But no-one will front that sort of money to the Green Party, because they are perceived as a threat to unrestrained capitalism. National, or Labour for that matter (if they were to revert to Roger Douglas’ economic programme), could potentially get $10m of covert funding through “third party” campaigns.
That is why I reluctantly support the EFA, flawed as it may be in other respects.
February 8th, 2008 at 11:46 pm
Toad…
What did they get for their $1.2m? Anything more than the one pamphlet and a load of negative publicity?
February 9th, 2008 at 1:56 am
But for flawed execution they would have had the Greens out of parliament entirely.
They took a shot at swiftboating us on a budget. The real Swiftboaters took out Kerry in 2004 with 20 million….
“It takes a lot ‘o money just to get beat with”
BJ
February 9th, 2008 at 9:21 am
Crimes Act? You seriously think this falls into the category of criminal damage - with it’s seven year sentence?
Not Summary Offences Act and wilful damage? Max three months’ imprisonment, or a $2000 fine seems a little more realistic.
And if you’re accepting that bricks count as election advertisements (which I’m sure you don’t), then an offence has been committed, because as far as I know, none of the bricks came with a name and a home address.
But then, the Green Party website doesn’t come with a home address either…
February 9th, 2008 at 12:29 pm
Nice one edge. These utopian greens are masters at avoiding truthful hard hitting facts, because they are conniving Helengrad jellyfish that float around with in a deluded self importance state, oblivious to reality.
These fools are part of the so -called “me generation”, which is the product of a modern philosophy advocating a false mask type lifestyle that says,”if it feels good do it.” Unfortunately they lack dignity, mettle and integrity.
All and all they’re just another brick in the wall that will come tumbling down when Clarke is exposed as the fraudulent leader she is.
February 11th, 2008 at 12:44 pm
Were these NZ made bricks? I notice the Wellington City Council imports it’s bricks from Australia, which seems a bit of a kick in the teeth for local business, not to mention the environment.
February 11th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
Edge - yes, you’re right Summary Offences probably - depending on the size of the brick, I guess! But Frogblog does have an address on the ‘about’ page.
February 11th, 2008 at 5:35 pm
d4j said: … [Greens] are part of the so -called “me generationâ€?, which is the product of a modern philosophy advocating a false mask type lifestyle that says,â€?if it feels good do it.â€?
Exactly the opposite d4j. The â€?if it feels good do itâ€? approach is that of those who exhibit no responsibility to the environment or to society. I suspect most of those who live that lifestyle either don’t vote or vote for the ACT or Libertarianz parties.
Greens are much more responsible - “if it feels good, do it, but only if it doesn’t harm other people and the planet and its ecosystems” might better sum up the Green approach.
February 11th, 2008 at 5:54 pm
LOL D4J as uh, poetic as always
February 11th, 2008 at 7:02 pm
Why isn’t that brick for sale on Trademe yet? Beats a handbag. Funds to the green party, might even pay for the window repair.
February 11th, 2008 at 7:07 pm
Because the Police have seized it as evidence, Kazel. So we don’t know when, or even if, we will get it back.
While it was “delivered” to the Green Party office, I’m not even sure if it is our property. The deliverer, if s/he is ever identified, may dispute the Green Party’s claim to it.
February 11th, 2008 at 8:09 pm
toad,
- “Freedom of speech is freedom to speak, not freedom to buy advertising.”
It’s called a free press. You should look into it.
Let it be noted that toad deems “freedom of speech” to quite literally mean just the “freedom to speak” and not, as some of you crazy, romantic fools may have thought, the notion of the freedom to express your ideas unrestricted and uncensored by the state or anyone else.
It’s a relief to know that our precious freedom to open and close our mouths like guppies will be protected as long as there is a Green with breath left in his body.
bjchip,
Thomas Paine must be spinning in his grave at your ambivalence. How different the world would be today if George III had adopted the Green’s laws for the suppression of vexatious pamphleters.
February 11th, 2008 at 8:22 pm
Mouldy, if you:
a) spend $1.2m in the week before an election opposing a particular political party or parties; and
b) those parties have neither the time to run counter-advertising, nor the time to raise the money required to run it: -
don’t you think ther is something inherently unfair about that!
February 11th, 2008 at 8:25 pm
Mouldwarp said: It’s called a free press. You should look into it.
No, Mouldy, it is not “free”. What you are talking about is a press that costs money to get coverage.
Make your media release interesting, and maybe organise a stunt or event to accompany it, and it may be free.
But what you are talking about is paid advertising, which is far from free!
February 11th, 2008 at 8:37 pm
>>Make your media release interesting, and maybe organise a stunt or event to accompany it, and it may be free.
A bunch of unemployed full-time rent-a-mob, perhaps?
Vs
The hard working individual who throws a few spare dollars to a third-party organisation to speak on her behalf.
You know, because she’s working…..
February 11th, 2008 at 8:50 pm
- “No, Mouldy, it is not “freeâ€?. What you are talking about is a press that costs money to get coverage”
The “free” of course refers to the absence of the sort of censorship that you are imposing.
Imagine if someone like Putin passed such a law. Presumably that must be acceptable to you?
And tell me, are you concerned for *yourself* when you pass this law limiting our freedom to express our opinions? Do you think *you* might become confused somehow by seeing an opinion expressed lots of times?
Or is it for *others* that you are concerned? You know, the stupid little people. Us, the electorate. Do you imagine we are all less intelligent than you and need to have our sources of information restricted for our own good, so that we don’t become confused?
It’s hard to believe the contempt you must have for the electorate when you support censorship with such a condescending justification.
February 11th, 2008 at 10:02 pm
I Agree with alot of Mouldwrap’s perspective and so does DSC policy.
http://www.democrats.org.nz/Policy/Broadcasting.aspx
The democratic solution doesn’t lie with suppressing a legitimate self-determined level of a sector’s activity in society(warts and all), but with the empowering of other levels in society.
DSC 08.
Look, sumthings been forgotten if democratic input requires surveillance society as the other side of the coin, especially with trends in rest of the world. We’re better than that right?
February 11th, 2008 at 11:00 pm
Mouldwarp, it doesn’t restrict your freedom to express your opinions at all. All it does is restrict how much money you can spend promoting them if they are in support of a particular political party.
Go down your track, and you get the sort of plutocracy that happens in the US, when you can’t get elected President unless you can raise $100m, because it is all about the money, rather than the policy.
The result is the biggest drongo of a President the US has ever seen, and the corruption of Deadeye Dick pulling his strings in the interests of Halliburton and his other big business mates.
And whoever gets elected next time, while certainly more clever, because it would take a serious brain injury for any of McCain, Obama or Clinton to become as thick as Dubya, will still be hostage to those who funded their campaign.
February 12th, 2008 at 9:21 am
Mouldy, if spending millions of dollars on electioneering does not influence peoples opinions, as you seem to be claiming, then why do vested interests continue to do it. Are you claiming they are stupid?
And if the amount of funds spent on advertising has no influence on changing peoples’ opinions, then what’s the problem? The EFA is doing them a favour by preventing them from wasting their money.
February 12th, 2008 at 11:21 am
Mouldwarp
You appear to be confused by the fact that equitable democratic processes are damaged by both the power of the incumbency and free-for-all spending on elections, and this REQUIRES restrictions on those damaging influences in order to get fair elections,
That’s the goal. Fair elections. Not your individual personal freedom.
BJ
February 12th, 2008 at 11:49 am
“That’s the goal. Fair elections. Not your individual personal freedom.”
As i said above, something’s been forgotten.
DSC 08.
February 12th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
And in 2020, when President Jeb Bush is defeated in his bid for a second term in the West Wing by Senator Chelsea Clinton… are we starting to see a pattern emerging here?
February 12th, 2008 at 2:34 pm
http://peoplepowernz.wordpress.com/2008/02/08/press-release-7208-nz-fi rst-is-next-says-people-power-nz/
As I understand the NZ First Auckland office is on the 3rd floor, I suspect they will have very sore arms indeed getting a brick up that high. Unless they take a catapault, which would be rather obvious, given that I anticipate the Police will now be keeping a watchful eye on the NZ First office on and around 28 February.
June 11th, 2008 at 9:17 pm
Throwing bricks is not really a great idea. This reminds me of a farmer in the UK who got into a dispute with his local council over an issue with his land. He decided to show his appreciation by driving his muck spreader right past the council offices spreading “muck” all over the front of the building (I think he did about three passes and it was caked). Needless to say he was arrested and charged with criminal damage. I think he enjoyed it though.