Category Archives: New Zealand

Manukau and Mogadishu

Posted on December 16, 2011 by Mark

I was struck by the following sentences from two different articles in today’s NZ Herald. First this – “There was a lot of disorder and domestic incidents across the district – more than usual for a Friday night. There was … Continue reading →

Posted in New Zealand, Society | Leave a comment

Good Ol’ Kiwi Optimism

Posted on November 28, 2011 by Mark

It is remarkable that on a day when major news outlets publish articles with the following headlines: Bloomberg: “Euro Era is Coming to an End” Financial Times: “Thinking the unthinkable on a euro breakup“ Financial Times (again): “The eurozone really … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics, Media, New Zealand | Leave a comment

Are We Really Just Animals?

Posted on June 15, 2011 by Mark

The NZ ACT Party’s Hillary Calvert generated some controversy last week during a discussion about battery hen cages. From TVNZ – We care about people ahead of silly little chickens,” Calvert said. Save Animals from Exploitation (SAFE) says the comments … Continue reading →

Posted in Ethics, New Zealand, Politics | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

NZ Greens Scapegoat Australian Banks

Posted on June 4, 2011 by Mark

The NZ Herald reports that the Green Party is criticizing Prime Minister John Key for lacking “the courage to tackle the big Australian banks which have saddled New Zealanders with billions of dollars of debt in pursuit of profits.” They … Continue reading →

Posted in New Zealand, Politics | Leave a comment

Strange Justice

Posted on February 2, 2011 by Mark

The NZ Herald reports that former National Party Member of Parliament Trevor Rogers has been jailed for failing to provide the court with design documents from a failed helicopter manufacturing company he used to own. The judge had this to … Continue reading →

Posted in Justice, New Zealand | Leave a comment

Len Brown Takes the Train – Or Not

Posted on January 30, 2011 by Mark

I guess this answers the question I posed earlier about whether Len Brown would take the train to work if he didn’t have a political motivation to do so: Even with a political motivation he doesn’t take the train. The … Continue reading →

Posted in New Zealand, Politics, Uncategorized, Urban Design | Tagged | Leave a comment

Socialized Swimming

Posted on January 14, 2011 by Mark

The NZ Herald reports that Auckland Mayor Len Brown wants to make entry to all City swimming pools free. Taxpayers (nationwide) are going into debt at a rate of NZ$300 million per week, city rates (property taxes) are projected to … Continue reading →

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Len Brown Takes the Train

Posted on January 14, 2011 by Mark

TVNZ reports: Auckland Mayor Len Brown says he will start to take the train to work on a regular basis to show his commitment to public transport. Does that mean that if he didn’t have a political motivation for taking … Continue reading →

Posted in New Zealand, Urban Design | Tagged | Leave a comment

Protectionism

Posted on January 5, 2011 by Mark

I’m still very absorbed in studying the Rails codebase, and that has been limiting the amount of time I’ve been able to spend in the past week thinking about blogging. However… TVNZ ran an item a few days ago about … Continue reading →

Posted in Industry Policy, Media, New Zealand | Tagged , | Leave a comment

St Lukes Vote Details

Posted on November 20, 2010 by Mark

I wondered a few days ago how many of the councillors who made the decision to approve the St Lukes mall expansion in Auckland live nearby. We now know: one – sort of. The minutes (pdf) of the November 17 … Continue reading →

Posted in New Zealand, Politics, Urban Design | Leave a comment