by frog
Someone who is feeling a bit disenfranchised that he is too young to vote decided to create a billboard instead, based on some of his own images and some off our website. And then he sent it to us here. Thanks mate.
Politics is not just being able to vote
Published: November 7, 2008
on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
Great billboard, what a pity you guys do not stand for any of it.
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Showing once again that no lie is too big for big bro to peddle.
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Most of BB’s posts are at least slightly arguable, but this?
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# big bro Says:
November 7th, 2008 at 2:40 pm
> Great billboard, what a pity you guys do not stand for any of it.
you’re saying that:
1. the Green Party doesn’t stand for cleaner power?
2. the green party does not stand for cleaner food?
3. the Green Party does not stand for cleaner transport?
4. the Green Party does not stand for cleaner water?
can you justify any of those claims?
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All that stuff is a front for their Neo-Anarcho-Syndicalism
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big bruv – is this the ‘politics of envy’ that we’ve been hearing about?
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In his usual simplistic way, I imagine big bro is trying to say he doesn’t like the Greens social justice policies once again. He’s very black and white, so if you stand for something he doesn’t like, it negates everything else by definition.
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Big bruvver – take a look behind the Green billboards and your find a huge green groundswell.
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“huge green groundswell”
No more than 6%-7% Greenfly.
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I wasn’t talking about the vote big bruv, I mean the sea-change that’s been occuring over the past year or so. Beware the Green Groundswell, bruvver!
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Greenfly, it’s a trend. Just like it was in the 70s. Remember “The Good Life”?
Then most people grew up….
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the 70′s wave was just a precursor, Blue Peter, to the real thing and that’s what we are looking at now. If the ‘Good Life’ encapsulates your view of events, you need to change channels.
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The 70s wave mimicked the 60s wave before it. Same old, same old.
As a political movement, it’s just got more sophisticated. But it will pass again, especially when the AGW sham bores everyone to tears. Happening already, methinks….
Else you’d have a lot bigger share of the vote….
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That’s how waves work, Blue Peter, they keep coming, coming, til they break, all over you
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It’s more cyclic, like fashion.
Once the alt-power stuff arrives en masse, the “Green” political arm will become redundant. As far as the public will be concerned, the warming problem will have been addressed.
You’ll then have to think up some new scare stories for your “movement”….
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While “at least 30 scientific societies and academies of science, including all of the national academies of science of the major industrialized countries” ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming ) believe in Anthropogenic global warming, some people still have their head in the sand.
The Green party has policy to deal with this, and other global problems. People are turning to us. Just as progressive movements in the past have won support and made historic and revolutionary advances, while the knockers are always there.
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“The “Green” political arm”, Blue Peter, will become the Green political body at the rate it’s growing now
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The financial crisis send that growth into reverse.
People will be more concerned about their immediate future, rather than worrying about what will happen in 100 years time. I suspect we’ll see a rebirth of socialism, and your fair-weather MPs will be off like a shot.
That is their true calling…
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Blue Peter – why waste your time on the blogs – you should be in a fortune teller’s tent at the circus, in your ‘Madam Futuro’ outfit, peering myopically into your clouded crystal ball, pontificating in a raspy, smoke-strained voice about dark strangers and silver crossing your palm. You’re a natural.
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What makes you think I’m not
This tend rocks!
BTW:
http://quikflik.wordpress.com/2008/11/06/election-night-drinking-game/
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tent
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Blue Peter – you’re two tents – relax and enjoy tomorrows show.
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You, too
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Does Peter Dunne remind anyone of the “Old Maid’ card?
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Seen that game already – for what is basically a tv programme ad, it’s solid fried gold.
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>Does Peter Dunne remind anyone of the “Old Maid’ card?
Yah. You need to watch out if his hair moves, then have a drink.
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Blue Peter said :
“The 70s wave mimicked the 60s wave before it. Same old, same old.” and
” Then most people grew up … ”
Speak for yourself! (You do appear to be a very slow learner!)
The “70′s wave” was different from the 60′s … With a new and different emphasis and recognition of urgency appearing, developing and now spreading World wide.
Fortunately for you (and us all), this happened because a lot of us understood what was happening and refused to “grow up” and “accept the status quo”.
The Values Party was formed. It later morphed into the current “Green Party” … which now is part of this World Wide movement.
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Remind us what percentage of the vote the Values Party got? 5.2%? So your vote has barely moved, especially given MMP provides you with greater relevance.
Love this bit:
“the Values Party contested the 1978 general election with a considerable following, but again failed to win seats in parliament. Most probably this was mainly because voters at that time were more concerned about rapidly rising unemployment than anything else. The idea of an ecological “zero-growth” society envisaged by Values Party members had met with the economic reality of near-zero GDP growth, high price inflation, and an investment strike by business. ”
See what happens in an economic down turn?
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At the risk of drifting on topic… I voted today in Melbourne. Looked like a steady stream of people coming through (about 10 in the 5 minutes I spent there) but the process was fast and professional. The main hiccup was the Ozzie polling people struggling with NZ placenames (they’re often Maori). Also interesting was the voting info poster in about 15 languages which I thought was kinda amusing.
Such a contrast to what we’ve seen in the US… the anglonesian systems are so smooth and professional that it makes me think we should tender to run the US elections.
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BP
It doesn’t matter what we Greens do, you are going to be seeing one HELL of an economic down-turn anyway. Anything at all that allows us to add sustainable growth will be a positive by the end of next year, and if National is in it will be working hard to pump the economy back up with government money… because that is the only money that will be available. Just as though they were socialists. It won’t matter a bit.
There’s only one game in town now. It’s sustainability. You can come quietly or we can wear earplugs. It won’t be us pushing you into it either.. it will be the broken economic model that is debt-based fractional-reserve fiat currency. You will be assimilated.
BJ
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>>You will be assimilated.
I think deep down BP (and , for that matter, BB) know that their game is up. Their parties’ likely victory tomorrow will be pyrrhic. It will be a (has to be!) a mere blimp in the political move that is global verdue
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Unfortunately *I* am the one who feels irrelevant at the moment.
At 6.7% and having even LESS power to change things than we had for the last 3 years. The “nanny-state” label stuck and S59 was the glue.
I shudder for the future of the country, as the instincts of the financiers and businessmen who run National are exactly wrong for a period of global depression. They are still worrying about preventing us migrating to higher wages. Not that they had the right answer to that particular conundrum “…I’d like to see lower wages” – Key. … the problem for the economy NOW is how to manage our survival.
Having been locked out of power for 2 elections now, are we ready to learn or will we stubbornly persist in putting people near the top of the list who NEVER discuss the environment?
respectfully
BJ
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Greenfly….could BB have been more right? The question is: how to significantly grow the green vote, and thereby improve the planet.
I think BP said it here:
The challenge is to ensure that green technologies are good enough to be increasingly accepted by a wider audience.
The “green” political/social stuff is actually hampering wider uptake of a truly green future.
I think BJ’s lament is something that should now be in the forefront of discussion.
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Oh… and by the way….the youngster who made the billboard ad above should be congratulated. Simple and effective. Nice work.
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The Greens would be wise to listen to BJ. You should have got a lot more of the disaffected Labour vote, and you would have, had you put the environment first.
The red faction has landed you deep in opposition.
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BP, it wasn’t JUST us. Labour had to scroo the pooch significantly to lose as heavily as they did, and they DID do that. No way the voters were about to forget Cullen reneging on the slightest adjustment in taxes to favour the middle classes and non-home-owners after the last election. Chewing gum or not…. a promise is something that gets kept.
He didn’t. Cause it was a couple of months after the last election and he figured we wouldn’t remember. Arrogance, tying itself to Winston First, acceding to the demands of Peter Overdone…. Labour made so many mistakes at the start that this was almost inevitable.
However, the thing that nailed this election was the impression from S59 that stayed with every voter. The “nanny-state” impression that stayed with every voter. They took it out on Labour AND Greens.
BJ
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BJ,
You’re correct about s59, but there is more to it than that.
Look to history for you answer. As I pointed out here:
http://blog.greens.org.nz/2008/11/07/politics-is-not-just-being-able-to-vote/#comment-64117
New Zealanders are worried about their jobs and the economy. New Zealanders weren’t voting for tax cuts, they were voting for keeping bread on their tables.
Secondly, MMP.
Had the Greens positioned themselves to work with either party, they would have got a lot more of the vote.
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BJ… I was involved with counting votes, and was struck by the number of voters who split their vote in favour of John Key as electorate MP, and Greens as their party vote.
What does that show? There are plenty of people smart enough to identify who is the best candidate for PM, and yet still be smart enough to care about the planet.
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I just don’t get the obsession with s59. To me its very simple – before the repeal of s59 everyone had protection (under the law) from assault – except children. Now they get that protection too. It should not have been labeled the “anti smacking” bill, but rather the “basic human rights for children bill”.
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james…one of the responsibilities of a parent is to keep their children safe.
When confronted with a non-listening child it is sometimes necessary to inflict pain to keep that child safe, either now and/or in the future.
One of the ugly realities of parenthood unfortunately.
It is a huge mistake to imbue children with the rights of adults.
They have to be treated differently.
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New Zealanders are worried about their jobs and the economy. New Zealanders weren’t voting for tax cuts, they were voting for keeping bread on their tables
Unfortunate then that they elected the representative of the very bankers who created the CDS mess and the US led Seinfeld economy. He’s part of the mob that created the collapse. He profits from the abomination of fractional-reserve debt-based fiat currencies.
Understandable as the alternative labour presented was Cullen, no less in the thrall of the banking elite.
BJ
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James.Amos – The fact is that the S59 bill was HUGELY unpopular. Most parents know the difference between a spanking and a beating. Most courts can be counted on to recognize it as well. There were plenty of opportunities to amend it to make EXPLICIT law, which would have ended the abuse just as well but would have been acceptable to everyone. The proponents of the law as it eventually was presented however, insisted on the whole thing, insisted that the police were to determine what was actually prohibited, insisted that no parent could EVER know what they were doing by administering a corporal punishment.
The unpopularity of the bill should have given its proponents pause, should have caused them to adjust it to meet the electorate but they did not do so. Not one millimeter in the direction it NEEDED to go.
Overreaching is not limited to the right-wing.
BJ
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Bj…your point about EXPLICIT law is a good one.
If a law can’t be made explicit then it has probably not been discussed for long enough.
As our society continues to increase in diversity it increases the need to thrash out good law, yet at the same time making it harder to do so.
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>>will we stubbornly persist in putting people near the top of the list who NEVER discuss the environment?
And in view of Jeanette’s likely imminent retirement from the leadership I feel that the Green Party needs to very soon internally reposition itself for her replacement. She will be a VERY hard act to follow as she has been the undisputed backbone of the political voice of this country’s environmental movement for decades. Please may due consideration be accorded to the very competent Metiria
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Greengeek, the law that needs to be made explicit is the one that defines assault, not one that defines the degree to which children are allowed to be assaulted. Its as simple as that.
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James.Amos – perhaps that is a reasonable point. If complete strangers were to be permitted to administer spankings and to slap other’s hands when admonishing them. However, the ENTIRE reason that this exception exists in the first place, is that children are NOT the same as full grown adults. The parents have a powerful responsibility.
Forty million years of evolution have given this species and others a powerful tool for learning. Proponents of S59 would have it discarded completely. This is simply wrong. As modified by S59 it is still available… sort of… except that it is impossible to work out what the law really limits. Just that if you give your boy a whack on the bottom when he desperately needs it, and someone else finds out, you can wind up in court.
Which is a stupid way to tell people what they can and cannot do. Writing a plain law is a LOT cheaper.
BJ
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>>Unfortunate then that they elected the representative of the very bankers who created the CDS mess and the US led Seinfeld economy. He’s part of the mob that created the collapse.
He is not. You may as well argue that I caused the collapse of Russia because I visited there once.
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I’m saying that strangers should be able push, pull or smack each other to prevent imminent danger (say someone was about to walk out in front of a bus). Spanking as a corrective measure is not permitted between anybody (child or adult), nor should it be. 40 million years of evolution have seen us surpass that in favor of more effective techniques (personally one technique that I employ is the aboriginal method of spanking the child’s shadow).
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