Archive for October, 2008

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  Wellington’s unpopular new tunnel still going ahead

  
  
  
  Wellingtonista quickly summarises the protest this morning about the City Council’s plans to go on a massively expensive road building spree from Ngauranga to Wellington airport. The plans include a Basin Reserve flyover and further car tunnels under Mount Victoria and The Terrace (just as we enter a financial crisis, peak oil and the need [...] read more
  October 31, 2008 3:57 pm - 13 Comments
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  Kevin Hague’s growing support on the Coast

  
  
  
  Toad at g.blog follows up on my post yesterday about the Greens’ strong Nelson poll with news from the West Coast-Tasman electorate: Well, now the Nelson Mail have published a poll for the West Coast – Tasman electorate. And the Greens are polling even better there – 13.7% (including 27% in Golden Bay). The Greens’ seventh [...] read more
  October 31, 2008 3:41 pm - 35 Comments
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  You’re free to pay

  
  
  
  Brian Rudman seems to have found a Labour Party candidate who agrees with Green policy All power to Viv Goldsmith, Labour’s candidate in East Coast Bays, for speaking out against the fiction that school fees are “donations”… Ms Goldsmith, a teacher herself, says she mails off her request for fees to the minister each time she gets [...] read more
  October 31, 2008 1:33 pm - 13 Comments
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  The missing name from the SPCA’s list of shame

  
  
  
  Despite this gruesome reading from the SPCA: A number of the animals had been hurt by slug gun pellets and other projectiles, and there were signs that children were being allowed to use animals for target practice. Cases of neglect included an Auckland dog discovered on Christmas Eve after surviving without food or water for at least [...] read more
  October 31, 2008 8:25 am - 20 Comments
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  Jeanette launches ambush in Paraparaumu

  
  
  
  We had been getting stories from the provinces that National MPs were telling voters that they wanted to pull out of Kyoto or that they wanted to exempt farmers from agriculture.  So Jeanette decided to find out for herself what the story was by leaping out from a coffee bar as John Key passed by [...] read more
  October 30, 2008 5:03 pm - 65 Comments
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  Peak phosphate

  
  
  
  I followed the link to Farmgeek’s blog this afternoon and came across this fascinating post on phosphate asking if we have time to mitigate before we run out. It’s a month old now but incredibly important to our food security: Graphic from The Oil Drum NZ currently uses about a million tonnes of phosphate fertiliser each year. [...] read more
  October 30, 2008 4:42 pm - 8 Comments
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  Ken Graham’s Green history

  
  
  
  Christchurch’s Ken Graham gets a good write up in this morning’s Herald as a potential new Green MP.  The article discusses his involvement in developing the intellectual framework behind New Zealand’s nuclear free policy in the 1980s: “I wrote an article that Carl Sagan picked up, basically saying it was a misperception that our nuclear policy [...] read more
  October 30, 2008 3:31 pm - 11 Comments
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  Nelson goes Green

  
  
  
  Spotted in Nelson this morning: Russel was also in Nelson this morning. Is that him under all that fur, taking a break from being the face of the campaign?  It looks like his satchel to the left of the photo, but I suspect he’s more likely in the caravan having a cuppa tea. Meanwhile the Greens are [...] read more
  October 30, 2008 3:27 pm - 8 Comments
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  Time for bigfoot to tread lightly

  
  
  
  Sadly the biggest news from WWF’s global footprint report was that a handful of other countries managed to perform even worse than New Zealand. United Arab Emirates, United States Of America, Kuwait and Australia were worthy opposition though for the title of least sustainable country with their superior commitment to consumption and oil burning. [...] read more
  October 30, 2008 11:41 am - 9 Comments
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  Herald declares National to be the party of CEOs

  
  
  
  I was going to comment on the Herald’s latest foray into unusually invalid polls (this time polling ‘the mood of the boardroom’) but it seems that 08wire has beaten me to it much more succinctly: What a tremendously unbiased sample the Herald has chosen for their survey about our political leaders. I’ll look forward to [...] read more
  October 30, 2008 10:45 am - 4 Comments