I have previously castigated Dr Brian Edwards for being the unofficial mouthpiece of Helen Clark along with Dr Peter Davis.
This morning however he has written a fine letter to the editor of the NZ Herald. He obviously wrote it before David “Blackwater” Shearer’s little oops yesterday though.
Lee apology ‘shows character’ – A repentant Melissa Lee is battling to get her campaign for the Mt Albert byelection back on track after Prime Minister John Key was forced to intervene over comments she made at a public meeting. Ms Lee – a National List MP and… [NZ Herald Politics]
Good on Melissa Lee for apologising. It is certainly refreshing to have MP’s prepared to admit mistakes, something we never saw for nine long years under Helen Clark.
Not even once can I recall any minister or MP apologising. Helen Clark never apologises for calling Maori “haters and wreckers” or West Coasters “feral inbreds”. Trevor Mallard has never apologised for his “chinless scarf wearers” comment. Michael only sort of apologised for his “rich prick”, his apologose was that it was never meant to be heard.
You see when you look at what Melissa Lee said, which was about criminals from South Auckland it pales into insignificance against the utterings of Clark, Cullen and Mallard.
We will wait until hell freezes over before any of them apologise.
The Mount Albert by-election is very interesting right now.
Labour have gone dirty early and used their usual suspects like Trevor Mallard. This can mean only one thing, their internal polling shows that Labour is in danger of losing their stronghold. Why no attacks on Russel Norman? Only attacks on Melissa Lee. It is because Labour’s internal polling show that Lee has better name recognition than David “Blackwater” Shearer and is a whisker away from wresting the seat from Labour.
Labour also has very few of their own troops on the ground. This is despite the trucking in of the mercenary armies of the EPMU and SWFU people, resources and vehicles. Last night at the candidates meeting Labour flunkies were seriously out numbered by National and even the Greens had more people in attendence than Labour.
The vaunted electoral machine that Helen Clark was supposed to have is failing to fire. There are bitter divisions in Labour.
So Labour are losing the ground war in a pincer movement by National and The Greens. As a result we see that they have started the guerilla wars, and yesterday with their attacks in Melissa Lee through their proxies in the New Zealand media have started the air war.
As the Americans found out in Vietnam, air power alone cannot win the war. David “Blackwater” Shearer of all the Labour party should know that to win you need troops on the ground. The simple fact is though that Labour which Clark dragged left doesn’t like Phil Goff nor his mercenary loving flunkie parachuted in. It is only their dual general Andrew “Chicken” Little who has ordered in the union mercenaries that is keeping their prescence viable on the ground.
Remember who Owen Glenn is?
He is the patriot that told the truth over donations to Labour and NZ First when Helen Clark and Winston Peters refused to.
Now he has a suggestion to resolve the Fiji issue and it is a suggestion I believe has merit. As is usual with Owen Glenn he also has a sting.
Billionaire Owen Glenn says he would be happy to assist in mediating between New Zealand and Fiji, but New Zealand first needs to change its “holier than thou” attitude.
Mr Glenn – who owns a villa on the island of Malolo Lailai – told the Herald it would be up to the Government if he took any part, and would depend on the mandate he had.
“It’s pointless wasting the commodore’s time. My opinion, if I have one, is to talk to him, find out what he’s trying to achieve and why, and put aside the fact it is not a democratically elected Government.
“Neither is China, but you don’t see New Zealand breaking off its relationships with China. Holier than thou on Fiji, but it’s quite happy to trade when it makes sense.”
Right now our approach to Fiji has been to follow the path that Helen Clark decided upon and that has been spectacularly unsuccessful so far. We actually nothing to lose right now in trying different approaches.
From golden boy-wonder, inheriter of the Throne of Mt Albert to last cab off the rank, Phil Twyford has certainly got the message from Phil Goff that his is a face that isn’t wanted. He is now to be considered the weakest link.
Helen Clark anointed Twyford as the man to take over her seat and Goff spiked that ambition. He has now been placed right at the bottom of Labour’s rankings at number 42.
Even junkie Darien Fenton is higher than him as is other notable failures like George Hawkins and Mita Ririnui, even newcomer MP Damien O’Connor is higher placed.
It seems that Goff has eviscerated the Clarkists. Known Clarkist with the exception of the Ginga Boy Wonder Darren Hughes have been tossed aside. Former Clark staffer Grant Robertson has similarly been cast down the listing.
Goff is stamping his mark on the party in a most emphatic way. There will be plotting to be sure.
Goff’s mate flies in to grab Labour nomination – Labour is gambling on an international high flier holding on to Helen Clark’s Mt Albert seat as National’s prolonged honeymoon threatens an upset in the formerly safe seat. [Stuff Politics]
Pity the main stream media can’t get their basic facts right.
Labour intends to lean heavily on Mr Shearer’s international credentials but National has already singled him out for attention, dredging up an academic paper in which Mr Shearer suggested the UN should hire mercenaries in some war zones.
Labour claims it was the work of a National Party dirty-tricks brigade.
“I would pit David Shearer’s work on behalf of humanity, putting his life at risk, winning a medal for saving refugee kids, against [Prime Minister] John Key and any one of National’s dirty-tricks brigade,” Mr Goff said.
Right let’s get some ground rules operating for this by-election. Anyone not crediting the true source of stories will only get the most low budget cocktails in the blogmobile with the top shelf reserved for journalists that acknowledge sources properly. Michael Field and Tracy Watkins are now on the low budget plan.
Goff also misses the point, it can hardly be dirty tricks when a) it is all true and b) Mr Shearer stands by his comments.
Of course never mind that National had nothing to do with it in the first place.
Labour selecting candidate today – The Labour Party will this morning be selecting its candidate to fill the Mt Albert seat, vacated by former Prime Minister Helen Clark. The party is facing challenges from National, the Greens, ACT, the Kiwi Party and the Legalise… [NZ Herald Politics]
This is a heads-up, advance warning if you will, about breaking revelations concerning more revealing information about parachute candidate David Shearer.
Watch this space!
Helen Clark’s hagiographer and confidante has taken the divisive Mt Albert Labour candidate selection campaign online with a post about the machinations of the undemocratic Labour Party selection process and at the same time he re-writes a piece of history.
Norman Kirk was firmly opposed to my selection as Labour candidate for Miramar in 1972. I had committed the twin sins of being a television personality and an academic. The party hierarchy were well aware of the boss’s views and there was strong resistance from Head Office to my candidacy. The effect was merely to make the local electorate people more determined and I won the nomination.
[As it turned out, Kirk was right. The '72 election produced a Labour landslide, but the candidate for Miramar failed to win the seat.]
The Budget, according to Sir Roger – Like the Denny Crane of New Zealand politics, Sir Roger Douglas sits in his 11th-floor office and flicks between brazen, brilliant and off-beat. As with the Boston Legal character, Sir Roger’s high points are largely behind him,… [NZ Herald Politics]
Patrick Gower has two good articles in the Herald today, both about Sir Roger Douglas.
The more interesting is the one about Helen Clark begging Sir Roger to come back into cabinet. This is interesting because now the wicked witch is dead people seem no longer to be afraid of her and her revenge. The stories are starting to come out.
So, Sir Roger reckons that Clark came to his house to beg her forgiveness and have him back in cabinet. This is quite different from the story Clark has told over the years.
I wonder what else is bullshit from Clark’s re-writing of history.
The more I read about David Shearer the more I like him. I think he has a great deal to offer New Zealand especially with regard to our military and Police.
Today at lunch we discussed this at length and thought that perhaps the Police could be opened up to contestable funding based on results. If Privatising Protection is taken to its logical conclusion then why couldn’t we leverage this method to better fund outcomes in Policing?
If a murder is conducted, for instance, then competing policing organisations could bid to work on the solving of the crime with a large amount of the fee paid only upon success. Same for action against anti-social crimes in particular areas and so on saving us money and getting better results at the same time. Arguably we already have this system in place with security companies but those are funded by individuals and companies directly. I think the contestable funding model could really have merit.
We also got around to discussing how New Zealand could possibly replace the Air Force Strike Wing capability and then we realised that the solution was actually staring us in the face.
Once of the major reasons that Helen Clark gave for getting rid of the Strike Wing was the ongoing costs of maintaining such advanced technologies and upgrading them. With David Shearer’s brilliant work on outsourcing of military and security and his rightful questioning of the ability of sovereign nations to adequately defend themselves the solution surely is to simply outsource our air force.
I wondered if this was possible but a quick Google Search soon proved to me that indeed it could be.
In a cavernous airplane hangar in Quincy, Illinois, two hours south of Chicago a possible solution exists;
A decade ago, only sovereign nations could afford to buy and maintain sophisticated, high-performance fighters. But Kirlin’s unmarked hangars contain an air force more formidable than that of many countries. He has 30 jets in flying condition, 10 in line for maintenance, and dozens more to be delivered. His MiG-29 Fulcrums, designed in the late 1970s to go head-to-head with the hottest US planes, are the only privately owned Fulcrums in the world. Kirlin breaks into a big smile whenever he looks at them.
Right so, yes we can have an airforce and with a strike capability far in excess of anything we had before. The idea has much merit, so much so that USAID is considering building its own private airforce as well, using paid for contractors to deliver. I did wonder if we could just hire Blackwater.
Turns out we can and they do have exactly what we need;
August 27, 2007: Security company Blackwater U.S.A. is buying Super Tucano light combat aircraft from the Brazilian manufacturer Embraer. These five ton, single engine, single seat aircraft are built for pilot training, but also perform quite well for counter-insurgency work. Brazil. The Super Tucano is basically a prop driven trainer that is equipped for combat missions. The aircraft can carry up to 1.5 tons of weapons, including 12.7mm machine-guns, bombs and missiles. The aircraft cruises at about 500 kilometers an hour and can stay in the air for about 6.5 hours per sortie. One of the options is a FLIR (infrared radar that produces a photo realistic video image in any weather) and a fire control system for bombing. Colombia is using the Super Tucanos for counter-insurgency work (there are over 20,000 armed rebels and drug gang gunmen in the country). The aircraft is also used for border patrol. The U.S. Air Force is watching that quite closely. The Super Tucano costs $9 million each, and come in one or two seat versions. The bubble canopy provides excellent visibility. This, coupled with its slow speed (versus jets), makes it an excellent ground attack aircraft.
Blackwater already has a force of armed helicopters in Iraq, and apparently wants something a little faster, and more heavily armed, to fulfill its security contracts overseas. Initially, Blackwater is getting one two-seater, for pilot training in the United States.
Brilliant! David Shearer really needs to be selected urgently then John Key in the spirit of co-operation in this time of economic crisis needs to take David Shearer into cabinet as Defence Minister. He will easily be able to restore a Strike Wing capability and at a fraction of the cost simply by outsourcing to the likes of Blackwater.
Not only that but Blackwater now also has capability in several areas that could be extremely useful if we decided to outsource aspects of the Navy and Army including;
Blackwater K-9 – Training canines to work in patrol capacities as war dogs, explosives and drug detection, and various other roles for military and law enforcement duties.
Blackwater Airships, LLC – Blackwater Airships LLC was established in January 2006 to build a remotely piloted airship vehicle (RPAV).
Blackwater Armored Vehicle – Blackwater recently introduced its own armored personnel carrier, the Grizzly APC.
It comes in 4×2, 4×4, and 6×6 versions with three different Caterpillar diesel engines are available.
Its armor, called the “Blackwater High Threat Armor Protection System” is claimed to defeat .50 caliber rounds as well as IEDs. It is constructed of AR500 steel, and incorporates angled walls and a v-hull chassis to deflect the blast waves produced by explosives. It uses Fiber-Tek armor reinforced belly and lowers, with a fully enclosed drive train. ArmorThane tactical coating on the interior and exterior reduces spall probability.
There are two top-side egress hatches, five gun ports (two on each side and one in rear), and transparent armored windows, capable of NIJ level 3 protection. The Grizzly makes use of forward and rear 400,000+ candle power halogen searchlights, which can be operated remotely. It also has a ringmount roof turret, capable of mounting a 12.7mm machine gun, which may be operated from a remote weapon station.
Blackwater Maritime Solutions – Blackwater Maritime Security Services offers tactical training for maritime force protection units. In the past it has trained Greek security forces for the 2004 Olympics, Azerbaijan Naval Sea Commandos, and Afghanistan’s Ministry of Interior. Blackwater’s facilities include a manmade lake, with stacked containers simulating the hull and deck of a ship for maritime assaults. Blackwater received a contract to train United States Navy sailors following the attack on the USS Cole.
It has also recently purchased a 183ft vessel, the McArthur, which has been outfitted for disaster response and training. According to Blackwater USA, it features “state of the art navigation systems, full GMDSS communications, SEATEL Broadband, dedicated command and control bays, helicopter decks, hospital and multiple support vessel capabilities. The McArthur was built in 1966 by the Norfolk Shipbuilding & Drydock Co. and served as a research vessel for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration until its decommissioning in 2003. The ship will be home-ported in Norfolk, Virginia.
See, there are solutions for even the replacement of the expensive and under utilised LAV III’s whereby we only pay for what we use within the outsourcing model. I can certainly see merit especially with the Word Cup coming up for use of the K9 units and the Maritime forces for border, fisheries and smuggling control.
David Shearer must be slected for Mt Albert, fo the sake of the nation.
