Brian Edwards

Brian Edwards has written about his thoughts on the “smart looking rapist” from Turangi:

I rarely find myself in agreement with Garth McVicar or his ‘Sensible Sentencing’ Trust. I’m a liberal in the area of law and order and not a great believer in the value of lengthy prison sentences. But on the issue of Judge Jocelyn Munro’s remark to the 16-year-old who attacked and raped a 5-year-old girl, that he ‘looked smart’ when he appeared before her in the Youth Court, I find myself in near-agreement with Mr McVicar. I wasn’t, as he declared himself, ‘disgusted’ by the judge’s remark, but I thought it displayed extraordinary lack of understanding or empathy towards the feelings of the little girl’s parents.

I hadn’t intended to deal with the issue on this site. The nation’s ‘outrage’ about the crime and the judge’s remark have been well canvassed in other forums. But the defences of the judge’s remarks by her colleagues in the law, published in the press this morning, struck me as so inadequate that I need to respond.

Manukau barrister Kate Leys informed us that, ‘There’s a statutory requirement upon the court to make sure the young person understands and participates in the proceedings’. I really can’t see the relevance of that to complimenting the rapist of a five-year-old girl on being neatly dressed.

Auckland barrister Maria Pecotic agreed with her Manukau colleague: ‘It is to encourage the young person to continue to take that care.’ That argument seems to me to suggest, ‘Well, he may have raped a 5-year-old girl, but at least he takes pride in his appearance.’ I come close to being ‘disgusted’ by that suggestion.

Youth advocate Megan Jenkins told us that a judge ‘might have seen the person three weeks earlier, and if there’s a difference, the judges will make comments on that.’  If I were the parent of a five-year-old girl, brutally assaulted and raped, would I find it appropriate for a judge to compliment the defendant on looking smarter at his second appearance than at his first? The question is rhetorical.

If Brian Edwards and Garth McVicar agree on something then it is something that should be noted with a bit more attention than a simple nod or a wink.

Criminal defence lawyer, the late Mike Bungay QC, with whom I co-authored a book on murder in New Zealand, not only instructed his clients (primarily murderers and rapists) on the importance of dressing well in court, but often drew a chalk mark on the dock for his clients to look down at while listening to the evidence against them. Their bowed heads were intended to convey shame and remorse.

I very much doubt that ‘looking smart’ was this defendant’s own idea. It will have been on his lawyer’s and his parents’ advice and they were right to give it. But it is a strategy to suggest that something has changed. It was intended, as the prayer was, to say, ‘I am not the same young man who raped a five-year-old girl a matter of weeks ago. Just look at me. You can see that I am someone else.’ No doubt without intending to, Judge Munro validated that impression by complimenting the 16-year-old defiler on his appearance.

Brian says it all so eloquently.

Judy Callingham is having a new year’s whinge. Yesterday she took an article about liberal elite foodstuffs (organic, free range, fairtrade, yadayadayada) and conflated that to a problem of the poor not bothering to feed their kids. Finishing off the entire post with another whinge demanding that someone do “something”.

Whenever Judy Callingham or Brian Edwards whinge about something it is usually because they think that someone else should pay or fix the problem. In this case she presents no solutions only demands for action….again which in their world of the Ponsonby liberal Elite usually means taxing someone.

However complaining about the price of organic, free-range, fair-trade, ethically grown food and the fact poor people can’t afford it  is that it is like complaining about housing affordability based on a survey of property prices in Paritai Drive. Next thing he will write a blog post about the horrific costs of transport for the poor based on the average price of cars on Coutts or Continental Cars lots. Worse, an epistle to the NZ Herald about the outrageous costs of public transport based on the fare for the Orient Express.

Judy Callingham is simply taking her Ponsonby liberal elite tainted world view and using it to tut-tutt the rest of us into a guilt trip. Well I’ll be having none of that.

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David Shearer has had a week to prepare for this big outing, announcing his new line up…. quick someone get Brian and Judy on the phone pronto, all is forgiven.

I mean, he bombs his new tag line for Labour inside 30 seconds. He was a shocker with notes and appalling without. No wonder Grant Robertson was smiling so much. I’ll give him 18 months then the knives will be out.

So David Shearer has supposedly won a mandate for big change with a few more than 18 votes.

What changes are planned?

Asked to name only two achievements during his time in Parliament – he could only name one – and it never happened.

And of course, this was rhetoric promoted by the same tired old guard that helped get him elected.

Sadly he couldn’t name the new guard and this is not a good start. The person he forgot is now out of parliament altogether.

Hopefully he’ll remember who is in his Caucus the next time he’s asked.

This will be the first of many jobs for John Pagani.. who’ll be taking over the media contract from Brian Edwards in quick time.

It is the Christmas season and traditionally in the UK, New Zealand, and Australia pantomime rules for entertainment.

And so we the Labour leadership challenge. John Pagani is having second thoughts about the challenge:

After being initially joyful about the open contest, I’m having my doubts. It’s true that a genuinely open mutual scrutiny, as democratic elections require, is not really possible because of the potential for lasting damage.

Of course his arch-nemesis Brian Edwards has followed Helen Clark’s orders to ditch the hapless Shearer. Remember that Edwards has enjoyed a long and profitable association with anything associated with Helen Clark, he has simply made a rational fiscal decision.

John Pagani is now talking about closing down the debate because he knows from the feedback he is getting that his candidate, Shearer is taking it in the chook every time he appears in public and in these meeting. Cunners is handing him his arse and he knows it.

Pagani is ever the wise political consultant and he knows when something needs to be be shut down and fast.

Quite apart from the fact that the NZ Herald thinks Helen Clark should be a finalist in New Zealander of the Year award there is this little gem buried in teh article:

From her New York base, Clark is never far from her Kiwi roots. She stays in touch using Skype, Facebook, Twitter, news websites, phones, and email.

“There’s not much I don’t hear about from family and friends,” she says.

Take it as read that she has more than a passing interest in the battle to succeed Phil Goff as Labour Party leader. Contender David Cunliffe has acknowledged that he had a discussion with Clark about the job, but she remains tight-lipped.

Asked if she had a pick, she replied: “Not for public consumption.”

No but the clues are there. Spoken with Cunners, orchestrated Brian Edwards flipflop, involvement of the Kabul office…

via the tipline:

Not often I agree with Scott Yorke:

Lefties will say Goff trounced Key, and those on the right will point to the viewers’ text poll and say it shows John Key won.

But who really won the leaders debate?

Tactically I think it was a draw. Neither leader managed to really nail the other. But in the broader scheme of things I suspect Key will be a happier man than Goff. Labour had to win this debate, and had to do something to damage the credibility and record of John Key.  However, Key held his ground.

What really annoyed me were the self-appointed experts opining part-way through the debate on who was winning and who was saying what. Have we become such imbeciles in this country, and has political discourse in this country been so dumbed down, that we need to be told what to think? I prefer to make my own mind up, rather than be spoon-fed an opinion by an “expert” whose analysis is utterly superficial.

Debates like this are all about personalities. We didn’t really learn much about either party or their policies. What we did learn is that Key still has a nice smile, and that his tie looked very smart. We also learned that Goff likes to point. He probably doesn’t want to point quite as much next time. His righteous anger is understandable, but it probably won’t play well with those who love Key.

If I was Phil Goff and Labour I would listen more to John Pagani (he did a post but has deleted it), than to Brian Edwards. Unfortunately Brian Edwards set Goff up for a fall and based on that performance fall he did. Unfortunately for Goff and Labour I don’t think John Pagani is too enamoured with the Goffice.

If Goff fan boys like John Hartevelt felt Goff won by a nose then the general public will think he got slaughtered:

Goff finished stronger and won by a nose. I bet quite a few ppl switched off before the end though. Neither nailed it. #votenz #onenews

October 31, 2011 8:30 pm via webReplyRetweetFavorite

@jhartevelt

John Hartevelt

Brian Edwards has a short comment about Adam Feeley in his brickbats post:

SFO Chief Executive Adam Feely, who appears to think that being sheriff allows him to play fast and loose with the very laws the local  townsfolk brought him in to enforce, to whoop and holler when he thinks he’s got his man, and to shoot first and ask questions afterwards. Might it just be time to get another sheriff?

Brian Edwards has had an epiphany, he has had his “road to Damascus”, he has converted and his argument is compelling.

Well, I’ve been having a bit of a rethink about this myself and it’s blindingly obvious to me, as it must be to any other reasonable person, that what the PM is saying just has to be right.

It’s just common sense that if an employer has a choice of employing someone on $12.50 an hour and someone else to do the same job for $15 an hour, he’s going to employ the first bloke. And if he can’t afford $12.50 an hour, he’s not going to employ either of them. That’s simple economics. We could call it ‘John’s Law’:The higher the hourly rate, the higher the number of unemployed.

The corollary of John’s Law – let’s call it ‘Bill’s Law’ – must then logically be: The lower the hourly rate, the lower the number of unemployed.

Now, unlike Ms Misa, I can quote several million ‘experts’ to support Bill’s Law. They’re all in highly productive work, none of them are on the bread line, they rarely complain about their lives or working conditions, their economy is knocking the rest of the world for six and almost every New Zealander benefits financially from their labour. They’re the Chinese of course and we could learn a lot from them.

Here are some of the things we could learn:

• If the minimum wage were set at $2 an hour instead of $12.50 an hour, a manufacturer could  take on six (and a quarter) workers instead of just one.
• In one fell swoop unemployment would be erased.
• With his now significantly  increased output the manufacturer  could greatly decrease the cost of his product, thus hugely increasing both his domestic and, more importantly, his export sales.
• At the same time, the $2 minimum wage would put pressure on all wages, increasing the manufacturer’s  margins and therefore his taxable income.
• By way of example, the clothing and shoe-making industries, both driven out of New Zealand because of high wages and an inability to compete in the international market, would be revived.
• Instead of buying clothes and shoes from China, we would be selling our clothes and shoes to the rest of the world, including China.
• And so it would be with everything, from plastic toys to Kiwi-built personal flying machines.

In summary, if the minimum wage were reduced rather than increased, we would become a mini China. Our $17 billion deficit would be gone by lunchtime.  The Government’s coffers would be full.

While it is certainly true that wages and salaries will fall dramatically under Bill’s Law, several compensatory factors must be borne in mind:

• Everyone in New Zealand who wants a job will have a job;
• Huge government surpluses will make it possible for governments to offer substantial across-the-board, flat-rate tax cuts every three years as a sort of Christmas bonus;.
• Blue jeans, most clothing and flat screen 3-D TVs will be cheap as chips;
• Charities, including public hospitals and schools,  can expect to receive much larger donations from the new super-rich;
• The job-market for gardeners, chauffeurs, nannies, maids, butlers, cooks, kitchen hands, cleaners, chimney sweeps and other ‘downstairs’ staff will  hugely increase;
• New Zealand’s 100% pure, clean/green environment, cheap labour and inexpensive retail goods will make it a tourist paradise and a Mecca for foreign investment;
• The trickle-down theory will become the trickle down law.

Ms Misa will of course reject Bill’s (and John’s)  Law. She will say that it will  create even greater divisions between the haves and have-nots in society. Of Labour’s policy of increasing rather than reducing the minimum wage, she writes:

‘There’s no doubt about the good it will do: it will put more money in the hands of the struggling low-paid, and lighten the load on Working for Families.’

To that, in the immortal words of Milton Friedman, I reply, ‘Yeah right!’

With that I welcome Brian Edwards to the dark side. He has written a concise, perfectly logical justification for the lowering of the minimum wage. I don’t think any treatise from the Round Table has ever so successfully explained the position.

Well done Brian.