Here’s a few links I’ve loaded up on my Twitter page in the last few days. Why not subscribe to the feed:
Ted Kennedy (1932-2009) “So passes a very influential man whose legacy will echo among the halls of the Senate.” Well that much is certainly true.
- Mark Steyn assembles a Mary Jo Kopechne death panel . . . and more comment on the Dead Kennedy. http://tinyurl.com/mb4ary
- "The New Zealand left is possibly at the lowest point that it’s been at for over a hundred years." That’s just so sad, isn’t it. http://tinyurl.com/kqgkxp
- A person in the pay of the government is not free to speak publicly about the most pressing issues he confronts. He sells his soul and gets a mess of pottage in return. http://tinyurl.com/mkyrdo
- 150 years of Oil: Most good things would either not exist or be far more expensive without oil, yet oil is labelled "a pollutant." http://tinyurl.com/mskvbr
- Ted Kennedy stood for everything that America is not . . . which is precisely the reason he is now lionized by the liberal media http://tinyurl.com/myvhjh
- Ted Kennedy has promoted govt expansion & the establishment of socialism in the US. Is this a what a true American hero looks like? http://tinyurl.com/l3omra
- Irony Alert: Weather supercomputer used to predict climate change is one of Britain's worst polluters http://tinyurl.com/nsz5yw
- A wonderful graphic summary of the rise and fall of the US dollar from 1800 until now. Dollar dilution is a cost to all dollar holders. http://blog.mises.org/archi...
- Tellingly, not one major Republican legislator has been able to mount a moral challenge to ObamCare. http://bit.ly/m0Sir
- British broadcasting is authoritarian, says Murdoch junior. http://bit.ly/15SElp
- A message for those want to "invest" in public transport . . . http://bit.ly/5hgy1
- 'To the living one owes consideration; to the dead only the truth.' The truth about Ted Kennedy just keeps getting worse http://tinyurl.com/m8yqvj
- You can't raise good kids if you don't have a clear sense of the good yourself. http://bit.ly/aTQ5Y
- Peak Oil? Not yet, Jeanette. http://tinyurl.com/l5h77z
- Knowing how to raise kids to become fine adults is much more important than talking past each other about the legality or otherwise of smacking. http://tinyurl.com/lzpe2r
- RT @Rational Jenn : The latest Objectivist Round Up is Live! http://tinyurl.com/roundup114 #AynRand
- Pythagoras’s Theorem needed only 24 words, the Ten Commandments just 138, US regulations on cabbages a massive 26000, and UK Education Dept guidelines contain over 1.3 million words! “So it takes 90 pages to cut down on bureaucracy?!!! I hate to think what it would take if they wanted to increase it!” http://tinyurl.com/lssxp5
Keep reading here.
And don’t forget to check out these two new blogs:
- Painter Michael Newberry’s Artist’s Voice. Keep up to date with this inspiring artist – and his incredible talent spotting – at his new blog. Why not start with his Manifesto, or his republished ‘Free Radical’ article on Terrorism and Postmodern Art.
- The Opinionated Mummy. Rantings and ravings by another local freedom lover. I don’t think she’s Egyptian – or ancient. :-)
7 comments:
•"The New Zealand left is possibly at the lowest point that it’s been at for over a hundred years." That’s just so sad, isn’t it.
Well, it would be if it were true. The article (well, the first part, I got bored) complains about the lack of left wing activists these days. The reason there aren't so many of those is twofold.
One, they've won already. The hearts and minds of the vast majority of the NZ public accepts their philosophies, and doesn't bat an eyelid when the supposedly right wing government describes profligate welfare payments as "entitlements".
Second, any further left wing theories are discredited and unpalatable even to most of the teat-suckers. You can take over some of the means of production by force (Air NZ, railways, banks, etc), but anyone espousing true Marxism is rightly viewed as a nutter.
So what are left wing groups needed for? Pretty much nothing. That's why the likes of the "workers party" are defunct.
"Well, it would be if it were true."
Yes, that's precisely what I thought when I read it. Michael Joseph Savage would be considered "too right wing" now.
Basic common sense propositions like privatisation, property rights and free speech have been all but destroyed, not by intellectual rigour but by little more than derision.
It's really an intellectual wasteland out there, isn't it -- there for the taking if you're organised.
The only good news is that, now the left has won, there are fewer of the left-wing loonies out on the fringes dragging the game even further their way. But they hardly need to, do they, when their supposed enemies are doing everything they would be.
Twr and PC - I can understand your disbelief of the idea that the left is dead or dying. After all, you are correct that much of the right has shifted away from principle and policy, and there's not much evidence of the neoliberal programme being pushed in NZ politics anymore. But this capitulation of the right is not actually a win for "the left" but a win for "the centre".
We are now in a new cycle of politics whereby radicalism of both the left and right is - for better or worse - discredit and not on the political agenda. A "new policy consensus" has been adopted by virtually all of the parliamentary parties, which is mainly economically liberal (with so-called "corrections" made under the last govt) and socially-liberal. Thus both National and Act have signed up to a very narrow new agenda. But this isn't the same thing as the left winning - instead its the victory of the centrists and pragmatists.
Bryce
"The New Zealand left is possibly at the lowest point that it’s been at for over a hundred years."
Oh really? Please explain how being in government, having 90% of the vote, having MMP, having the Dole, DPB, Socialist Schools, Socialist Hospitals, etc etc is in any way a low point?
The only good news is that, now the left has won, there are fewer of the left-wing loonies out on the fringes dragging the game even further their way.
Oh really? Nope, they're in government!
"No spending cuts in a recession" "Soften the edges" "No cuts to health"
Sorry - but even Gordon Brown is more rightwing than John Key.
And Obama is far to the right - of Rodney Hide and Roger Douglas!
I hope this blog remains your main focus Peter. I've not figured out Twitter yet, and suspect if I ever do I won't have time for it.
Michael Newberry's Artist Voice article was great. He can be a really good guy.
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