Gareth Morgan writes from Utah

(Couldn't resist this photo from the NZ Herald):

Right in this town where we are today, Moab, Utah, the local school has surrendered its right to refuse some Christian mystic running his "Good News" club for students in the classroom right after school ends, since he threatened to use a Christian activist lobby, the American Centre of Law and Justice, to fight for the right.

As the school president commented, "We're a very small district. We don't have the funds to go all the way to the Supreme Court."

It's pathetic, really. If you take the libertarian view - as I do - that religion is your own business, don't ram it down the throats of us that think it's just another human frailty. It's another sign that the US is on a slide back toward the intolerant conservatism that its founding fathers escaped.

That El Presidente, reformed drunkard and born-again George Dubya, can declare he is doing God's work as he blunders around Iraq totally out of his depth, could only happen in a democracy that excuses it because the Christian God is on their leader's side. Nuts!

Who said this?

“"Don't buy a single vote more than necessary. I'll be damned if I'm going to pay for a landslide.”"

(Clue; It wasn't Helen Clark to Michael Cullen. Her instruction was, buy every vote you can. We're going to need every last one.)

Abuse hysteria

During the week I saw this headline; "Abused kids should be taken from parents, claims US professor".

Dr Schmitt was brought to NZ by the Plunket Society as an expert on child abuse. He recommended more stringent intervention. In the US there was a mandatory reporting system where anyone who had anything to do with a child - a teacher, doctor, nurse - was required under the law to report any signs of abuse to social welfare, which then fully investigated the case. He said, "Termination of parental rights has been common in our country for some time. It gives judges the option to remove the child permanently from a family and put him or her up for adoption...people should be suspicious if there was more than one bruise, or bruises in different areas. When a child fell, they usually received only one bruise."

The professor was brought to New Zealand in 1982.

Question; Those of you who have youngsters, do they have any bruises on their legs? My seven year-old does. And she generally gets them at school where she is at her most active, swinging from bars, jumping from climbing frames, tripping over shoelaces, missing a step. Like many her age, she goes at everything full tilt and sometimes comes a cropper.

Anyway, coincidentally I came across a story in the LA Times today. Now, if you want to read about the real and tragic consequences of the hysteria surrounding child abuse, physical and sexual, that peaked in the eighties read on....

Ageing = happiness

The NZ Herald has a piece about the myth of ageing bringing unhappiness. Apparently many people expect to get unhappier as they age. Not me. I look forward to having more time, travelling more, grand children, tomorrow's test match, lots of things. And I am happier now than ever before (despite all the grizzling on my blog). The following made absolute sense to me;

There are a number of theories about why people may get happier as they get older, Lacey noted. For one, people may focus less on achievement and more on personal relationships and enjoying life, and also get better at managing their own moods.

Reason for rocketing invalid benefit numbers

Here James Bartholomew briefly puts his theory about the reason so many people are on an invalidity benefit in the UK. NZ has the same problem. My reckoning is that the higher payment rate is a factor but there are others.

If it isn't the govt nagging you.....

Not content to bitch about their own lives, some women have to bitch about men's lives as well. You are not doing enough housework. It's official. I read it in the Herald. Which is licence for me to nag you about it all weekend.

Never mind that you went to work for 6 out of 7 days which meant I didn't have to. Never mind that when you are at work you get nagged by your boss and for one day a week you'd like a bit of space. Never mind that I have oodles more free time and choice about what to do with it. Forget it. I want you doing your share of the housework so you can get fit and healthy and stick around for a few more years.

Otherwise, who would I have to nag?

Medicinal cannabis back on the table

Green MP Metiria Turei has had a private member's bill to introduce medicinal cannabis pulled from the ballot. It might stand a chance of being passed if a few National MPs keep an open mind. United Future will fight it tooth and nail but there's only three of them. NZ First will probably oppose it but the Maori Party shouldn't.

11 - 14 year-old abortions

Statistics New Zealand has just released the 2005 abortion statistics which show a drop in the overall rate. One thing noticeable in the tables was the 11 - 14 year-old rate has reached 0.8 per 1000 females or 92 abortions. The rate has doubled what it was in the early nineties.

Abortions performed at 12 weeks made up;

1995 29 percent
1996 25.8
1997 22.8
1998 23.9
1999 24.1
2000 24
2001 26.7
2002 28.1
2003 29
2004 25.6
2005 28.1

I did these calculations to prove or disprove what we have been hearing from abortion practitioners - that the delay was getting longer. The figures don't support that BUT if late abortions are being performed in Australia they would be registered in Australia. Which then begs the question, is our rate really down or is the drop, 680 in absolute terms, due to abortions being performed off shore? It seems unlikely that number would have travelled to Australia.

The ethnic breakdown is;
European 51.6
Maori 20.6
Pacific 10.9
Asian 15.7
Other 1.2

Compared to thirteen other "selected low fertility" countries only the US has a higher rate (which may now be around the same as ours as it is dropping but no stats are given for the last two years.)

(Don't call me ageist. A "mature" friend sent this to me.)

Maori and abortion

Oh Crikey has a post about abortion and his outrage at the government funding overseas Family Planning agencies which provide abortions. Somehow this develops into a strong objection to white feminists killing Maori babies.

For those who strongly oppose abortion, having to fund it just adds injury to insult. They shouldn't have to but there are a hundred and one things taxpayers object to paying for on moral grounds.

Women are not forced to have abortions. Some make the decision lightly, for others, it is agonising. Oh Crikey has framed it as both killing (Maori babies) and suicide (non-Maori). Which isn't unlike the Maori Smokefree Coalition describing smoking, another voluntary action, as genocide of Maori.

Oh Crikey and the Maori Smokefree Coalition openly and admittedly care more about the race they belong to. In my work this would be unthinkable. 'Sorry, I only want to help non-Maori people'. In fact, based on my limited experience, I should prefer to work with Maori and Pacific people because their need is genuine and they are more appreciative of help.

Then again, I wouldn't want to be Maori or Pacific because there are too many people like Oh Crikey's author telling me I am a victim, that I am not capable of making or responsible for my own decisions, that they are made for me by "psychotic white feticidal women". How patronising.

The merits of hypocrisy

An interesting interview with Jeremy Lott, the author of a new book, "Defending Hypocrisy".


After interviewing a number of people about it and thinking the issue through, I decided that we should defend hypocrisy for a couple of reasons.

One, it usually forces us to hide and restrain some of our darker impulses in order to keep up appearances.

Two, it creates moral wiggle room for people to acknowledge the right thing—or speculate about what the right thing might be—even if they don't always do that thing.

Governments et al; take note

The NCPA summarises the evidence;

An absent father is something that money can't replace.....

Released on bail

TV3 had some pretty awful stats tonight about the number of people awaiting trial who are realeased on bail. In the past year just under 10,000. A quarter were awaiting trials for violent crimes. Rick Barker came on and expressed a touching faith in the judges decisions. Ex-cop, National MP Chester Burrows was less impressed, saying many were ticking time bombs - the accused that is.

Dropped off waiting lists

1,800 Wellingtonians (or around 1.8 percent of the local population) are being dropped from specialist waiting lists.

Waiting lists have been with us for a long time. The situation has now deteriorated to having waiting lists to get on waiting lists.

Back in 1970 the Medical Association of New Zealand warned that medical graduates working abroad would not return to New Zealand because of the government's attitude to doctor pay and working conditions.



Not much chance of them returning now either.

The antagonism between doctors and the government is a permanent feature of New Zealand's public health system. It looks to be escalating.

Becoming more cultured

I always fancied myself as a highly cultured person. Now I have proof, thanks to Statistics NZ. But even more cultured than me are all those people with satellite dishes on their roofs and Aucklanders!!!

Information sharing

The Housing Restructuring and Tenancy Matters (Information Matching) Amendment Bill is going through Parliament currently. Maori Party co-leader Tariana Turia has spoken to it, describing it as "big brother snooping around" and "ganging up on beneficiaries". The Greens are opposing it on the following basis;

The Green Party opposes this bill because we are concerned by the proliferation of information-matching programmes operating between Government agencies and the intrusion this represents into the personal lives of New Zealanders and the fact that this bill sets Housing New Zealand Corporation tenants apart from other tenants - only they will be subject to data matching with Work and Income.

Now I am no fan of government. Not snooping or sharing information. But these parties have only themselves to blame. They are desperate for government to provide assistance in the form of housing and benefits but when the government wants to put parameters and conditions on the recipients they cry, intrusion, intrusion.

They can't have it both ways.

I remember when Green MP Metiria Turei entered Parliament calling herself an anarchist! If she's an anarchist, I'm the next New Zealand Idol.

Irish DPB

Ireland are planning reforms to their welfare assistance for one parent families.

There are currently some 80,000 lone parents - almost 98% of them women - in receipt of One Parent Family Payments at a cost in 2005 of €770 million. When other supports and entitlements are taken into account, including Child Benefit, Rent Supplement and Family Income Supplement, total expenditure is over €1.3 billion. Despite the unprecedented growth of the Irish economy over the last decade and record spending on social welfare, lone parents remain one of the groups who are particularly vulnerable to poverty.

Ireland has virtually the same population as New Zealand. We have 110,000 single parents on benefit - 37.5 percent more.

"Inspirational"

The NCPA reports on Sweden's "cradle to the grave" welfare system;

* Sweden's slope became most slippery from 1960 to 1980, when public spending increased from 31 percent of the economy to 60 percent in order to keep the Swedes rolling in government payments and to fund the bloated public sector.
* Sweden today ranks about equal with the fifth-poorest U.S. state in per capita income.
* Likewise, among the wealthy nations that make up the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), it slipped from fifth in income in 1970 to 15th in 2004.

This is the country Steve Maharey describes as "inspirational".
Perhaps when we are sitting at twentieth on the gdp per capita table, 15th does look pretty inspirational.

What's Trevor's beef?

Don't know what my electorate MP is up to today. During a snap debate over Auckland's power problem he repeatedly addressed the deputy speaker, Ross Robertson, as "Madame" speaker. When the speaker eventually asked him to use the word "Mister" Mallard refused and began using the terms "acting" and "deputy". His attitude to the chair was derisory and defiant. What's going on there? Any ideas?

Australian govt disallows civil unions

As best as I can make out, the Australian federal (central) government has overturned the Australian Central Territory government's civil union legislation. The federal government maintains it contravenes the Marriage Act. The Civil Union 2006 Act would become invalid from midnight tonight.