New Zealand Conservative

As the women was wheeled into the operating theatre the nurse efficiently strapped the patients arms down and taped a padded wire that lead to an impressive looking machine with various indicators flicking across the central display. "Is that a heart machine?" gasped the women, twisting her head to look. She was momentarily blinded as an overhead light was switched on, seemingly focused on her face. She was dimly away of a masked figure standing behind it, snapping on rubber gloves. "Just answer the questions please", said the shadowy figure. " Have you been asked to do anything sexual that you didn't wat to do?" " Has anybody hurt or threatened you? " Have you ever felt controlled or always criticised?" " Would you like us to remove your children for their own safety" "What do you mean?" asked the women. "What's this machine?" "Why aren't you treating me?" "It's a lie detect...

Firefox add-ons, to be exact. Zen posted about the Interclue Firefox add-on earlier which I downloaded and am trying, so I thought I'd post a few of my favourite Firefox add-ons. I really don't know what I'd do without them now - I couldn't go back to using Internet Explorer. There are add-ons for just about anything you can imagine but here are some good ones. 1. Nightly Tester Tools : Sometimes you'll upgrade Firefox, only to find (horror!) that your add-ons don't work with the newer version. Nightly Tester Tools has a handy option that ignores the Firefox version and forces the add-on to try to work with your newer version. I don't really know what else it does (it's really for those testing add-ons and Firefox versions). Invaluable. 2. Scrapbook : I don't know what I'd do without this either. It's the best way of saving webpages that you want to go look at later. You just click a button and a pane opens to the left and you drag the page ...

A treat for all those with ZenTigerish tastes. William Blake's masterpiece "Tyger Tyger" combines with a rather restrained Tangerine Dream guiding the powerful vocals of Jocelyn B. Smith for a haunting rendition. And if that's not enough, then follow on with a 4 minute concept video of Tyger by a Brazilian animator that is simply fantastico. The music that accompanies this video is totally funky, and the combination is unbeatable. Read the poem and experience two different yet compelling renditions of Tyger... Tyger! Tyger! burning bright In the forests of the night What immortal hand or eye Could frame thy fearful symmetry? In what distant deeps or skies Burnt the fire of thine eyes? On what wings dare he aspire? What the hand dare seize the fire? And What shoulder, and what art, Could twist the sinews of thy heart? And when thy heart began to beat, What dread hand? and what dread feet? What the hammer? what the chain? In what furnace was thy ...

Crusader Rabbit has posted a rant by a guy that is sick of being emasculated in a culture that laughs at men. While I can certainly understand the frustration that this man is feeling, the solution is not to become a brute, the only viable option of manhood that this guy is aware of. But fear not! I have an alternative vision for men like him. Look to the firemen of 911 for your model of self-sacrificing, heroic manhood. And beyond them, look to Christ. Related Link: The Firemen of Sept. 11 and the Meaning of Masculinity What’s a real man? He's not a bully or a wimp. He transcends his own ego, his own fears, his own selfishness, and sacrifices himself as a gift to those he's called to protect.[...] Let me give an example of heroism. On 9-11, we had countless examples. The radical feminists stopped talking for three months. Everyone saw. I counseled some New York City firemen, policemen, and rescue workers who were in the World Trade Center towers on that day. One young man...

I'm not suggesting life in prison is a picnic. But the latest figures released show that the nightly rate of $253 ($92,000 per prisoner per year) matches a decent hotel. This is ridiculous. For low risk and non-violent prisoners, you should be able to put them up in army barrack style accommodation. They could be cooking their own meals and doing their own dishes. For those that don't toe the line, the next level of prison could make them work very hard to earn the privilege of getting back to level one. And what's the deal with getting play stations and x-boxes paid for by tax payer money? Give them access to a library and reading lessons. Not violent mindless games like " Grand Theft Auto " as part of their rehabilitation. Something needs to be done. rest here - remember to check HTML code! Related Link: More bureaucratic ineptitude costs tax payers millions

Polish writer Nina Witoszek warns that people who have lived under Communist regimes are struck by a strange feeling of dejá vu regarding the censorship autopilot in Western Europe: “Soon we shall all write in a decaffeinated language: We shall obediently repeat all the benign mantras such as ‘dialogue,’ ‘pluralism,’ ‘reconciliation’ and ‘equality.’ […] We prefer safety above freedom. This is the first step towards a voluntary bondage.” ... At the end of the day, the cause matters less than the result: The state is now an enemy. Giving more money to the state isn’t going to solve any problems since it’s is no longer willing or able to serve you. It is merely interested in extracting more money from you for doing less and less, and for sustaining its bureaucratic machinery through projecting the illusion that it is still there to protect the interests of its citizens. How are we going to deal with this culture of lies and a hostile state? I don’t know. But Western Europeans will have to...

Uncertainty, confusion and just plain apathy are being blamed for an apparently slower than expected uptake of the new retirement saving scheme, KiwiSaver. Uncertainty, apathy, or just another tax on our income? The Government hasn't even had the legislation voted in, the employee contributions don't start until April 2008, people have issues over disclosure of fees, lack of guaranteed return and an expectation the government will change the rules at any time in the next 20 years. It's not apathy, it is a deep and unabiding distrust of the Labour government, and the way they go about conducting business. They could always front a 15 million dollar tax payer funded TV advertising scheme in an election year announcing "You're better off with Labour". Hang-on, that's what they pulled last election. and the joke was their 15 million government (tax payer) funded propaganda was *threatened* by the Exclusive Brethren's $500,000 one page pamphlet on Green...

I've just come across an interesting add-on for Firefox by a Christchurch based company. Kiwi ingenuity has done it again. I'm keen to try it out, as it has been garnering good reviews, and this one does a fairly good summation for me: Interclue is a Firefox extension that adds more information about a link when you hover over it. It's not that annoying as the famous Snap tooltip and it certainly provides much more information about the page....the most impressive thing is that all this data loads almost instantly and it's actually useful, especially when you want to judge the quality of a search result (including if it returns a server error) ....a brilliant tool. - Google Operating System Blog If you use Firefox, you might want to give it a try. Related Link: Interclue

I suspect I ripped the council off to the tune of $400 the other day. And because they haven't got my DNA on file (AFAIK) they aint gonna catch me. Heh. It was on the day of rubbish collection. As I walked to the bus stop early that morning, I came across a rubbish bag lying on the curb, split open and contents spewed out across the edge of the road. It was windy and the lighter bits of refuse looked like they were about to take flight. Luckily, a sturdy green bin was near. It was a bin from a private company. I always thought it annoying that we have to pay rates towards rubbish collection, and still people resort to the superior services of a private company. There's a lesson there for socialists. Anyway, that's when my lawbreaking commenced. I picked up the rubbish from the road and placed it in the sturdy bin. I also picked up the newspaper recycling that had been soaked with some liquid by-product of said rubbish spill and added that to the bin. I tidied up ...

The sickening story of the young child being tortured a few days ago is obviously going to see people trying to make sense of the travesty by fitting it into their world view. And of course, if that view ends up being attack on another's view then we get a long blog thread that seems to end up way off topic. So I see over on the Kiwiblog thread of this that the inevitable claim from the left is that the right are sick bastards for seeing links to welfare dependency and a whole host of other issues and making political hay from this. That might be a fair comment if it weren't for the fact that many on the left were guilty of much worse - equating a smack with child abuse and using no end of similar stories to 'prove' that smacking needed to be outlawed. If people are going to map the above story to welfare dependency, race, lack of Christian values, neighbourly disinterest, declining morals, the education system, liberalization or whatever, I think they are entitled to,...

Now if my internet connection goes down, at least this post is up! Just as a conversation starter, does good science fiction still exist? I remember reading a lot of it when I was young, but it seems that recently sci-fi has been taken over the the fantasy genre. The picture is from the NASA image of the day. Scientists have made the first conclusive discovery of water vapor in the atmosphere of a planet beyond our solar system, or exoplanet. This artist's rendering shows a gas-giant exoplanet transiting across the face of its star. Infrared analysis by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope of this type of system provided the breakthrough. The planet, HD 189733b, lies 63 light-years away in the constellation Vulpecula. It was discovered in 2005 as it transited its parent star.

In the news lately, quite a few experts have been pointing the finger at Government spending as one of the reasons for high interest rates and the high dollar. Well, we got this 'soap box' (click picture to see larger version) at work in the mail a few days ago. It's part of a ' buy kiwi made' campaign put together by Sue Bradford and costing 6.3 Million dollars. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm all for buying kiwi-made, but why the soap-box? In the soap-box were 4 postcards (is someone really going to post those?) and a poster. I gave it to the boss but he didn't want it; he said he'd already read about it in the newspaper. The boss gave the poster to the foreman who took one look at it and screwed it up and threw it in the bin (that's why it's missing in the picture). Seems like a huge waste of money to me.

I read the story in the paper this morning over breakfast of the 3 year old girl whom neighbours reported being spun on a washing line until she fell off, being stuck on to a roof while the adults laughed at her and being put into a tumble drier. What is it with people that can watch that sort of thing and do nothing? Related Link: NZ Herald

In a recent Vatican statement, non-Catholic "Churches" have been called "wounded". At least that is how the Latin has been translated into English. However, "wounded" is an inadequate word for the Latin defectus which was used in the official Latin version of the document. Significantly, the official Latin version refers to the defectus which they suffer, and defectus is not Latin for “wound.” That would be vulnus , a word the Vatican chose not to employ. The Latin text is the official text for a reason. The Latin term defectus has a unique precision that no single English term can capture. True, we get the English word “defect” from it. But this signification of “deficiency” does not capture the Latin term's full meaning, which is twofold. In the Latin, the one term (from the verb deficio ) connotes both a “revolt” and a “lack.” The Latin dictionary describes the verbal action: “to do less than one might; to fail.” Remember this is Latin, so call t...

I was reading in The Poisoned Stream that a war was started in order to distract the German population from the scandals besieging the government of time. It is at this point that we can be grateful that the NZ military capacity has been run down to such an extent that any such scheme would not even be contemplated. Related Link: NZ Herald - Benson-Pope speaks out on sacking case

Today's Dominion Post on page 3 has a picture of a girl diving through the air holding a rugby ball, with the story that the St Catherine's rugby team is embarking on a 5 match tour to Lens, France. I can't quite make out what they are actually over there to do. Maybe, watch the World Cup it looks like and be the opening attraction for one of the games by playing as well? All of the above is not the point. I sit here thinking, what has happened to St Catherine's!!! Back in my day, no girl would be seen dead playing rugby. What are they doing? And why? It just makes no sense.

Benson-Pope is a great believer in Ministerial Responsibility. That's where his staff fall on his sword in the finest NZ Labour tradition. Related Link: Benson-Pope refutes all knowledge

"Protestants are concerned about how to get you to heaven. Catholics are more concerned about getting heaven into you." ~ Dr Francis Beckwith Related Link: Ignatius Insight

Sorry for the confusing thread title :) Some of this may sound a bit weird, but I'm just going to post about what I've been thinking about and watching and reading over the past couple of days. First of all GOD TV. My folks get the satellite TV with lots of Christian stations, including EWTN the Catholic TV station. It's well worth getting if you consider that there is nothing else to watch on secular TV. The stations are free to get, once you have bought the satellite dish and it's been tuned in etc. Anyway, back to GOD TV. I was watching this the other day and it had a segment with a man and a woman who turned out to be Wendy and Rory who started the station. Wendy was praying especially for Britain on this segment as she felt that it was under attack, and that the weather was somehow connected to the occult and Harry Potter. Yes, you can scoff, but I wondered.... Of course, this weekend is the launch of the new Harry book and it has seen some of the worst weather Bri...

Especially on the primacy of the Pope and the Eucharist being Christ's Body. The quotes are from AD 80 to 400: The Early Church Fathers I Never Saw

As our regulars may have noticed, our Friday Night Free For All chat fell by the wayside last night. Around 5pm or so, I tried to comment on my Homer post and from that point on my broadband Telstra Clear internet connection was kaput. It didn't come back until after 11pm, by which point I was ready for bed. So, if people are up for it, maybe tonight? I won't feel slighted if no one turns up.

Spotted at Jimmy Akin's site .

I'm not Catholic, but I do feel sorry for the RCC as an institution, and the damage pedophiles have wrought by slipping into the priesthood. Obviously, the victims are the ones to feel the most compassion for, and there are people in the Church who should have exposed the evil they uncovered as quickly and as much as possible. Institutional abuse has affected many organisations though, not just the RCC and I suspect we will see more of this in the future. Although, politically, some organisations are getting quicker to settle quietly to minimise the outrage we should all feel when we discover very little was done even as this happens around us. This is what I am seeing now with our own Government, and a growing number of abuse cases back logged in the courts. We need to hear of these cases to understand the depth of the corruption. Interestingly, after the recent high profile Police sex cases, Investigate Magazine released damning evidence of corruption from a small cadre of...

Not an unintended consequence, says Stephen Franks on WhaleOils's blog. Stephen Franks was on the select committee of the Prostitution Law Reform Bill. This outcome was neither unforeseen, nor (in my opinion) unintended. As Chair of the Select Committee that considered tim Barnett's Bill on prostitution I can assure you that the possibilities were well explored by the committee, at my insistence. I wanted a provision to ensure that the removal of illegality did not convert prostitution into an activity benefitting from the State's positive discrimination or patronage. I drafted amendments to provide that absence of criminality did not interfere with the freedom of people and organisations to criticise prostitution and to discourage it. The Prostitutes Collective hostility to that kind of provision was strongly supported by Sue Bradford. She did not even want officials to advise on the risks of mandatory positive discrimination. She said it was scaremongerinig when we as...

The massive payout to the victims of priestly sexual abuse in Los Angeles seems to be the story of the week, so if anyone wants to comment, comment here. If you comment on any other threads about this topic, your comments will be deleted. For a more indepth discussion on a RCC blog, go have a look at Being Frank . Apologies for the hard line on this, but I've just had my very interesting discussion on other issues closed down for this very reason . I'll most likely start off a thread on this blog continuing the discussion in the near future.

As of this week I have officially started home-schooling my two boys. They seem to be enjoying it. I get them up at the normal time (before 8am), we do a mad breakfast rush which is now a little more sedate now that I don't have to make lunches and then are out of the door by 8:45 for a 9 am Mass. We get back by 10 am, the kids have a snack and then it's straight into handwriting practise, followed by reading and then maths before lunch. Over the short term, as we settle into our routine better, I'll be adding grammar, spelling and comprehension for my older child. While mentally I feel perfectly fine, physically I seem to be a little stressed. If my left eyelid could stop twitching, which it seems to do as it gets closer to lunchtime, I'm sure I could say that I'm not stressed at all. Once I get over the initial change to my daily routine, normal posting from me should resume. Or at least more frequent posting than at present. I'll probably even blog abo...

The EMA have a new website up called 'Fix Auckland', where you can have your say on what needs to be done to fix the Auckland region. The Picture to the left is a diagram showing 'the plethora of interminable interconnections (try saying that fast 10 times - Fletch) our council must undertake every time they do anything'. Click HERE to see the diagram up close. To me it looks more complicated than the London Underground rail network. Anyway, you can leave messages or suggestions on the messageboard on the site and cast a vote as to what you think of the EMA's plan to straighten things out.

Do you think the Greens would be spewing? I read an amazing story in the DomPost on Friday - with the speculation running rife of oil and gas finds off the South Island (the Great South Basin), was the observation that big oil finds would drive the NZ dollar up amazing heights. I realise this is pure speculation, but it does make for interesting conjecture. Can you imagine the huge impact having the NZ dollar jump so high, we could get US$2 for every NZ$1?? Our export markets would be devastated; the Greens would be spewing; we'd have to juggle Maori land claims with foreign investment gobbling up property, resources, and people. Immigration would be under pressure as we needed to bring in more people to support growing industry around oil production. NZ would have no debt, but the economy would likely be in a huge mess as we tried to adjust to a completely new paradigm. Fascinating stuff. Did I mention the Greens would be spewing? Well, maybe they wouldn't be, although ...

Al Gore wants to reduce CO2 emissions by 90%. Seriously, what steps do you think we need to take to achieve these results? On a scale of “turn the lights off when you leave the room” right up to “kill 90% of the world’s population”

Adolf F . wrote: Which brings me back to this morning’s aberration. This morning, on the 0630 news I heard a breathless reference to “a report which concludes that human activity is damaging the world in which we live to such an extent that the world cannot be sustained for more than one generation. 30 to 40 percent of the world’s species are near extinction and within a short time there will be vast 'dead spots' on the face of the earth." Adolf couldn't believe this alarmist tripe. I had to set him straight, and deliver the facts... The story is very true Adolf. The human activity they were talking about was Political Correctness and Socialism. 30-40% of the worlds entrepreneurs, thinkers and inventors are now extinct. The middle class of the species is also threatened. There are vast desolate, politically ravaged areas completely devastated by communists, and the sub-species, socialists (although they have also been controversially classified as a type of parasite, ...

I don't know what's happened to our recent comments bar. It disappears, it reappears. Looks like technical difficulties. Won't matter to our Friday Night Free For All where everyone is invited to comment as long as they are not disgusting or blasphemous. Also, ignore the Read more. I don't know why it refuses to die.

Is anyone really surprised? The Vatican has come out and restated that the one true Church on earth subsists in the Catholic Church. Second Question: What is the meaning of the affirmation that the Church of Christ subsists in the Catholic Church? Response: Christ "established here on earth" only one Church and instituted it as a "visible and spiritual community" (5), that from its beginning and throughout the centuries has always existed and will always exist, and in which alone are found all the elements that Christ himself instituted. (6) "This one Church of Christ, which we confess in the Creed as one, holy, catholic and apostolic […]. This Church, constituted and organised in this world as a society, subsists in the Catholic Church, governed by the successor of Peter and the Bishops in communion with him" (7). In number 8 of the Dogmatic Constitution "Lumen Gentium" ‘subsistence’ means this perduring, historical continuity and the permanen...

Many blog sites, to prove you are human and not a web-bot of some sort, require you to type in random numbers or letters that they display, to make the post. To prove I'm human, I have to type in a number. That seems ironic. I suggest instead, the program links into a dictionary of nice words: Kindness, Duty, Chocolate, Please, Friendship, Cola-Cola, Google, Nike, Comrade, Vote Labour... Damn, the idea is 8 seconds old, and its already been hijacked by corporate sponsorship and the government. SH Archives - 04 Apr 2005

The Frogs are happily ribbiting on about Oil and Bush. Commenter Sapient has an "interesting" point of view. It's the tip of the iceberg. The end result is hardly perspicacious. When America is always the bad guy, cause and effect are so easy to deduce. By clicking the "read more" link you are acknowledging responsibility for the consequences of your own actions. i dont realy have much of a problem with radical islam, its a pity they choose to attack civilians but aside from that they are doing no diferent than any nations would do were they threatened with irradication by another who was stronger in both military and economy, they are mearly making use of what tools they have available with the funds they have available, not everyone can afford a few hundred tomahawk missiles, what are they? only about 1.3 mil each? or if someone started firering missiles at Britan would it just sit by and let them do it? america created this enemy and this enemy wont go a...

I'm removing one of the blogs on our blogroll because they have crossed the bounds of common decency .

The crucial thing is to change the default setting of our culture which tells people that all lifestyles are equally beneficial to everyone. The truth is that they are not. "At the very heart of this report, however, lies the issue of the fractured family which Mr Duncan Smith has correctly identified as the foundation of our social problems. It is family fragmentation which is fuelling crime, drug and alcohol abuse, educational failure, worklessness, mental and physical ill-health and teenage pregnancy. And at the core of this issue lies the progressive and systematic undermining of marriage. This is why the State must privilege married people over other types of household. It is not a question of 'moralising', or being beastly to lone parents. It is simply worse than absurd for the State to subsidise family fragmentation and the billions of pounds of social damage that it causes. It is also not enough to provide incentives for all two-parent households, since cohabiting...

OK, so I'm rehashing old posts from Sir Humphrey's. Still, it's often not the posts that are anything special. It's the weird conversations that follow. Am I the only sensible person in the world? 19 Oct 2005 - Minor Thoughts No posts from ZenTiger for a wee while. Work. Accounts. Feeble excuses. Meanwhile, have some randomly collected thoughts: * Which is worse: Ignorance or Apathy? Who knows? Who cares? * If God hadn't wanted us to eat animals, then why did he make them out of meat? * There's two theories to arguin' with a woman. Neither one works. * If men can run the world, why can't they stop wearing neckties? how intelligent is it to start the day by tying a little noose around your neck? (Linda Ellerbee) * If winners never quit, and quitters never win...then why do we say quit while you're ahead? * I couldn't live in Switzerland, They poke holes in my cheese. * All things considered, insanity may be the only reasonable alternative. ...

I've finally done it, I've managed to not watch Boston Legal tonight! I have to stay strong, though. It's still on TV. I'll be safe at 10:30pm. The thing with Boston Legal, is that I've enjoyed the story lines and the characters, but the amoralising was really, really getting to me. Especially all the innuendo between the two male leads. TV really is a propaganda medium.

I hardly ever watch TV, so it was unusual for me to suddenly decide to flick the switch and see what was on the LCD last night. And lo! behold! Facelift (I think that was the name). I'd never seen it before, and it was a nice surprise to see some NZ Political Satire on the box. Still, it was full on. It was hard to take in the H1 characterization. I was almost feeling sorry for our Right Honorable P.M. Then I recalled some of the satirical posts from my Sir Humphrey days. I was a bad person. 14 May 2005 - Sir Humphrey's Post Our glorious leader of the State of Helengrad, Miss Helen Clark, Dominatrix supreme, is affectionately known as H1. It's quicker to write, you see. Dr Michael Cullen, Economix, would possibly be H2 (although I think the title has gone to Heather Simpson). But no. That is what they want you to think. The success of recent cloning experiments (following Dolly the sheep) enabled our clever Kiwi Scientists to clone Helen Clark. With nothing more ...

Pope Benedict has been spending every spare moment writing about Jesus. He says : "The alleged findings of scholarly exegesis have been used to put together the most dreadful books that destroy the figure of Jesus and dismantle faith." -- Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth , 35. The article I've typed out in full below by Ian Harris, published in the Dominion Post last Saturday, shows clearly why Pope Benedict has felt he needed to write a book for the world on the real Jesus who was the Christ. Transformed Christ, an exemplar of the timeless mythical hero Christ a myth? Of course, says the atheist. Never, says the traditional Christian. Yet in coming to diametrically opposite conclusions, both rely on a basic misunderstanding of myth. Blame history for that. Christians have been too eager to read the Bible in a literal way , as though it was above and beyond the myths they readily recognise in other religions. Atheists have noses adept at sniffing out myths, which th...

Now that the Live Earth concerts are over, do the Greenies feel like they have created new awareness? Do they feel like they have ended the threat? Of course not. They just had a big party, slapped each other on the back and suggested Al Gore run for President of the World. What was Al Gore's suggestion? To cut carbon emissions by 90%. Ninety Percent. It's the HOW that we need to be asking. Let me be the first to confirm that to achieve 90% reductions concerts would be in amongst the huge list of things to be banned. And electrical instruments, sound equipment, flood lights, and those flying contraptions that get super stars from Country A to Country B. "We can help by doing something small" Not at ninety percent mate. Related Link: Live Dirt

The headline reads "War on drink driving failing". It's a nice way of announcing that something has just got to be done. Something serious. Drink driving rates are climbing despite a multi-million dollar advertising campaign. A plea to spend more money. After all, any decent war needs a trillion dollars thrown at it. War on drugs, war on terror, why should New Zealand's wars be any different? There's a serious solution. Spend more money on advertising. But wait, there's more. With drink-drive prosecutions going up, it's time to get really serious. The suggestion from National Road Policing Manager Dave Cliff: lower the alcohol limit so we can catch even more people. Obviously, we'd then be catching them for breaking the law, and not for being drunk. But they'd still be fined for "drunken driving". Maybe we should lobby for a generic offense against the state of "treason", since it would seem strange to be convicted ...

Yay! Tickets for Jeff Waynes musical version of War of the Worlds go on sale today . The show is going to be at the Vector Arena and will feature a giant 30 foot Martian firing rays at the audience, a hologram of Richard Burton as the reporter, 100 foot screens showing cutting edge CGI animation, and featuring original players on the album. The stellar cast, from England, includes “Moody Blues” Justin Hayward and Chris Thompson of “Manfred Mann”, both re-creating their roles from the original album and the recent sell-out UK tour. If you've never heard the album then where have you been hiding? A friend of mine turned me onto it in high school at age 15. It's a really great album.

Looks like the United Nations have ordered more paint, and applied the second undercoat. The UNDP (Development Program) has reportedly fired the whistle blower that noticed "irregularities" in the spending of millions of dollars of aid money in North Korea. That's what you get when the North Korean government appoints the people, manages the payments and insists on hard currency payments. The auditors backed these findings up, but noted that they couldn't detect the true extent of the corruption, because the North Korean government were refusing to cooperate, and the auditors were prevented from getting to key information. That still wasn't enough for them to find thinks looking dodgier than, say, the United Nations Oil for Food (Money for Saddam) program. So, a half-audit with fishy results is enough for the UNDP to deduce that this exonerates and vindicates them. In a BBC report : The UN carried out an audit in June and said that while there had been breaches...

Sorry I'm late. Got distracted looking for a picture and then time went by ...

How about conscription with active duty in Afghanistan, clearing mine fields where children play? For ever, or as long as forever can be doing such a job. Crusader Rabbit: 10 years max The Briefing Room: Does Evil Exist? Related Link: Stupidity and evil

Here's Richard's problem: He's saving himself for marriage. He's 28. Whenever he meets some-one nice, he mentions he's holding out until it all gets D&M. Blonde at the bar is "weirded out" by this. While women decry being sexualised and objectified, the fact is we have been socialised to expect men to want us and it can be somewhat disconcerting when they don't. We have grown up with sayings like: "men are the accelerator, women the brakes." We expect to be the ones saying "no". So, "no" job for a woman?

Bollard!

Back in October 2005 I noted that Cullen had threatened interest rate rises if National won the elections. As Labour swept in, I predicted Bollard would raise the rates anyway. The real culprit being Cullen's spending with no let up on the taxes. Here's the post from the SH archives. Was I right, or was I right? Somewhere, in the time before election 05, Dr Cullen stepped from his cave, located high on Mt Cook, and spake: "Yea who would cast a vote for National, to accept their bribe to take less money from your pay packet, I say to thee. Be wary. Indeed, Be ware. Be both wary and ware, for the evil of taking less money shall surely result in the bank demanding more of it. For every dollar the government taketh less, the banketh shall surely take more. As high is Mt Cook, so shall be the interest levied on your home. I have spake", and then he went back into his cave, and he felt good. So the people milled about in confusion, and when the votes were cast, Cul...

I saw an anti-racism kit on eBay for $9.99. It was made in China, so I'm a bit dubious as to its quality. On the plus side, they wouldn't have bothered to copyright it so I feel justified in coming up with a much better one. I am proud to offer a ZenTiger approved Anti-Racism System of Emancipation (A.R.S.E.). Yes, I have developed (in software development terms) a unique kit which combats racism. This is ground breaking stuff. I'm already writing my acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize. The basic kit is designed for the average, mainstream Kiwi, and for many people that fancy themselves as mainstream Kiwis. Americans may order the American Similar System (A.S.S.) kit which contains the required regional upgrade. It operates on several principles: 1. You should be able to employ your A.R.S.E. to prevent personal attacks of a racist nature from your garden variety red neck. 2. Your A.R.S.E. should prevent you from being mistaken for a race you do not actually ...

We've all been so worried about peak oil, it is not surprising we were caught unawares. But it's too late. We are adrift on a Cruel Sea, and it's too late to turn back. Scientists stand befuddled, their calculations awry. To be fair, no-one really saw it coming. Well, no-one in New Zealand. Well, bugger all. We've hit Peak Tax . Cullen was so busy collecting it, he forgot to check the reservoirs. From here, it’s all downhill. Sure, Labour might bring in some heavy duty extraction equipment for another term, but it will be their last. Tax will go the way of the Moa. In response, Cullen will push the extraction rates up, but the BOC (barrels of cash) per day will dry up as businesses downsize or move off-shore. The problem has really been one of conservation. There was plenty to go around, but it was guzzled by big government. Another 6,000 fat bureaucrat salaries in Wellington slurped up Dunedin's worthy contribution. Renting prime office space and buying ...