This will be the last newswithmorenews post. Any article which I write regarding politics, current affairs and other things can be found on getfrank.co.nz.
The last days of jovial John
Whoever is still aboard the John Key gravy train must accept that their saint and savior is betraying them. Many big priorities have been abandoned. New Zealanders leaving for Australia is higher than ever, yet somehow it's good for both nations. The GSCB fiasco has put the spotlight straight on Mr. Key. Mutilating the natural landscape for more ugly roads is more important than improving the embarrassing public transport system currently in place.
I grow tired of people who say that he has the best interests of New Zealanders at heart. If that were so, maybe he wouldn't have instilled a disastrous tax system in which only the top 10% of income earners benefit. Surely he wouldn't have encouraged Gerry Brownlee to shove up petrol prices 3c a year (though Labour would have done the same). Most of all, he would have put a heart back into the National party but he hasn't. Rather than stand for anything beforehand, he sits on the fence. Like a dog to a bone, he'll morph his views to remain the cool kid. This sense of phony patriotism is what has driven away what were once National voters to minor parties and others to the Labour party.
For anyone who has signed up to or looking to buy Mighty River Power shares, please think twice. The more you buy into the idea of owning SOE shares, the more fuel is added to the fire. "Look at the response" Mr. Slippery beams, "it must be a good idea then."
In celebration of the 21st century gullibility
April Fool's has always been a rather enjoyable day. At the Mystery Creek Camp, I'll admit I was conned into saying "mine" several times, with ten push-ups being the consequence of saying it. On April 1, I managed to convince the youth I lead into believing that April fools was actually on March 31st.
Youtube had a phony shutdown video, twitter removed the vowels from its tweets and Google had user pressing their noses onto computer screens.
Sometimes its funny to see what people are tricked into believing.
'For the most part though, its rude and offensive and disrespectful to people.' Ah gotcha, April FOOLS.
The starving, hungry, underfunded nation
North Korea poses no serious threat to anyone other than themselves. Desperately underfunded, there is not much the army can do, other than sit and hope their southern brother will throw some scraps over the fence. Much of what remains in this destitute country has proved to be frugal. Electricity is almost non-existent.
Yet mainstream media are managing to talk them up to be more powerful than they could ever hope to be. Secretly though, Russia, China and India know better than to launch an invasion on them. It wouldn't be fair on the destitute population to have their lives taken. After all, their head of state has been dead for almost twenty years. His grandson is mad to believe nuclear weapons can be launched on the enemy. There won't be enough funds to complete a workable one.
The hardest words for anyone to say these days is "I need help." Hopefully soon, Kim Jon Un can utter those words.
G.I Joe Retaliation
The second movie is a huge step up from the awful piece of work which came out in 2009. The action scenes are fantastic. Even so, that is not enough to rescue the movie from a rather average plot line, which depends entirely on fantastic visual scenery and wicked action scenes to keep audiences glued to the seat. An assembly of A-list actors give it their all. Overall, it's a solid 5/10. Better than the original but not great enough to recommend to everyone; only those who enjoy action films.
The Wacky Westboro Baptist Church
One of my upcoming book reviews will be for Lauren Drain's memoir "Banished: Surviving my years in the Westboro Baptist Church." The church not only gives Christianity a bad name, it allows a terrible group of loud mouthed self appointed preachers of God to heartlessly picket near dead soldiers funerals, lambaste Barack Obama as the Antichrist and chastise everyone as a "fag" or a "fag enabler," except for members in their church. "Only in America" as they say.
I laughed when statistics said that crime is the lowest it has been in 24 years. National loves to talk tough about crime. Yet if a person were to have access to those crime statistics, they'd probably see that petty crime has remained pretty consistent. National voters have criticised me for not giving National more credit in their efforts to reduce crime. Why should I? The Police continue to obsess over minor speeding infringements, whizzing by in cars and sitting in remote stations doing paperwork. Until they start patrolling the streets on foot again, enforcing the law and deterring people from committing so called petty crime, I'll remain skeptical about this supposed drop in crime.
Nobody should be panicking about water shortages in New Zealand being long lasting affairs. Anybody with a memory stretching back to 2008 will know about how dry that summer was. There about also happened to be the moment in time when it rained 90% of days in winter. No matter how dry it gets, you can always be guaranteed the rain will come back in full force. Rest easy farmers. Winter rain isn't too far away.
*******Thank you to everyone who has read my blog. It has been fascinating to write on so many different topics and lots of fun arguing with you. I've learned a lot and I hope you have too. Thanks for reading
Stuart.*******
