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Gordon Campbell - Latest News [Page 38]
On Level One, And Living With Predatory Markets
Tuesday, 9 June 2020, 9:59 am | Gordon Campbell
Welcome to Level One, earthlings. This is the new normality while the virus still roams beyond the border walls. Those borders will remain closed and guarded by quarantine for any entrants from outside, and while the Transtasman bubble remains an idea that ... More >>
On The Politics Of Using The Word “Fascist”
Thursday, 4 June 2020, 11:57 am | Gordon Campbell
“Fascist” is one of those labels with the ability to capsize any debate. Call your opponents “fascists” – or “agitators” or “terrorists” or “scum” and you’ve taken the option of mutual respect and compromise off the table. Interesting ... More >>
Gordon Campbell On The George Floyd Protests
Tuesday, 2 June 2020, 2:51 pm | Gordon Campbell
Poverty, discrimination and repeated acts of police brutality all help to explain the rage being expressed on the streets of American cities right now after the death of George Floyd but there is a more immediate cause as well : Decades of research ... More >>
On The Twitter Wars, And The Muller Muddles
Friday, 29 May 2020, 12:27 pm | Gordon Campbell
Whatever the failings of our own politicians, spare a kind thought for the majority of Americans who did not vote for Donald Trump. Sure, it was depressing this week to watch Todd Muller clinging for dear life to his talking points on Q&A, ... More >>
On Why Welfare Reform Has No Champions In Parliament
Wednesday, 27 May 2020, 11:36 am | Gordon Campbell
Ever since Victorian times, the unemployed have been a problem for those more fortunate, wealthy and powerful. Down the ages, society has been torn between providing for them as victims of misfortune, or dealing to them as the shiftless agents of their ... More >>
On Not Buying What Todd Muller Is Selling
Monday, 25 May 2020, 2:07 pm | Gordon Campbell
Chloe Swarbrick is number three in the Greens Parry list released this morning. Todd Muller has released his new party line-up today, which will excite everyone who still wants to know what Gerry Brownlee and Judith Collins will be up to in future. ... More >>
On National’s Day Of Reckoning
Thursday, 21 May 2020, 9:43 am | Gordon Campbell
Congratulations. You are one of the 55 members of the National caucus being called together tomorrow to choose who will lead you to either (a) catastrophic or (b) honourable defeat on September 19, thereby saving some (but not all) of the jobs currently on ... More >>
On The (lack Of) Alternatives To Simon Bridges
Wednesday, 20 May 2020, 11:09 am | Gordon Campbell
Spin the roulette wheel. The suggestion that tomorrow’s headline poll numbers will decide the fate of Simon Bridges is a fairly extreme example of poll-driven politics. Still, we are where we are. On past evidence, the Colmar Brunton poll is ... More >>
On The Government’s Attempts At Poaching The Soft Centre-right Vote
Monday, 18 May 2020, 10:37 am | Gordon Campbell
More than once in the past few days Finance Minister Grant Robertson has been at pains to thank both his predecessors - Michael Cullen and Bill English - for the way they paid down government debt. As a result of the Cullen/English double act, ... More >>
Gordon Campbell On Budget 2020
Friday, 15 May 2020, 9:17 am | Gordon Campbell
Welcome to the breadline. Treasury’s best case scenario sees unemployment reaching 9.8% by September and yet… the coalition government seems to have decided it can afford the blowout in welfare numbers only by paying out those benefits at their More >>
On Why We Should Legally Protect The Right To Work From Home
Tuesday, 12 May 2020, 1:02 pm | Gordon Campbell
For understandable reasons, the media messaging around Level Two has been all about “freedom” and “celebration”, but this is not necessarily going to be a universal experience. When it comes to workplace relations, Level Two is just as likely to ... More >>
On Level Two, And Little Richard
Monday, 11 May 2020, 1:30 pm | Gordon Campbell
Level Two will be life Jim, but not as we’ve known it. At 4pm today, PM Jacinda Ardern will announce the Cabinet decision on when the shift out of Level Three will occur, along with – presumably – a bit of finessing as to what its final details ... More >>
On One Of The Shadows Over Level Two
Friday, 8 May 2020, 12:58 pm | Gordon Campbell
For many New Zealanders, the imminent shift to Level Two is going to be a momentous occasion. Here’s another looming landmark likely to be just as important : the moment when our 12 weeks of access to the wage subsidy scheme finally runs out. That ... More >>
On The Hype Around The TransTasman Bubble, And Microsoft
Thursday, 7 May 2020, 11:00 am | Gordon Campbell
Arguably, one of the more irresponsible things the government could do right now would be to throw the doors wide open to non-essential travel next week at Level Two – as the tourism industry is demanding. Such a decision could easily crash ... More >>
On The Trans-Tasman Bubble, And The Future Of Airlines
Tuesday, 5 May 2020, 11:08 am | Gordon Campbell
As the epidemiologists keep on saying, a trans-Tasman bubble will require having in place beforehand a robust form of contact tracing, of tourists and locals alike - aided by some kind of phone app along the lines of Singapore’s TraceTogether ... More >>
On The Dodgy Politics Of Easing Level Three
Monday, 4 May 2020, 11:41 am | Gordon Campbell
As countries around the world tentatively emerge from lockdown, a lot of political noise is being generated by politically-driven arguments that (a) the safeguards need to be lifted faster and (b) the lockdown itself was an over-reaction likely ... More >>
On Exceptions For Tourism, And On The Quest For A Covid-19 Vaccine
Friday, 1 May 2020, 11:51 am | Gordon Campbell
As David Foster Wallace famously pointed out, each of us regard our own precious selves as the realest, most vivid and important persons in the universe : We rarely talk about this sort of natural, basic self-centeredness, because it's so socially ... More >>
On The “ Where’s Winston?” Question
Thursday, 30 April 2020, 10:20 am | Gordon Campbell
Deputy PM Winston Peters has kept a low profile over the last month or so, partly because he belongs in the category of people most at risk from Covid-19. Peters turned 75 earlier this month, and towards the end of last year he was reportedly, laid low ... More >>
On Living At Level Three With Residual Anxiety
Tuesday, 28 April 2020, 1:00 pm | Gordon Campbell
Two weeks. That’s roughly the length of time the government has given itself between moving to Level Three, and making a decision on May 11 about how the virus has reacted, with a view then to a wider re-opening. No doubt, the political and economic pressures ... More >>
On Why Governments Are In Effect, Printing Cash To Defeat Covid-19
Thursday, 23 April 2020, 12:57 pm | Gordon Campbell
Part of the psychology of moving to Level Three is the sense of people heading back to work – at least 400,000 more of them – thereby fostering some semblance of normal life returning to the economy. Indeed, National Party Simon Bridges has been ... More >>
