Into the Anglosphere
Help Wanted
Sorry to see the demise of the partnership Rick. Even though I may not understand half of what you say, I do read what you write.
Considering it would be to the advantage of the NZ Labour Party to have their view out there, perhaps you should contact that party itself and offer to have them debate you on the site - they might even provide some dinero to help it along.
|
5/18/2006
Into the Anglosphere
I'm over here now.Come visit. Don't be afraid of the other Silent Running bloggers, they just act tough.
[click on pic to go to Silent Running homepage]
5/10/2006
Help Wanted
My Labourite absentee co-blogger, Dominic, seems to have moved on to other projects.
In a spectacular display of good faith (not) he has renounced his co-ownership of this blog, blocked my access to all the blog files on the server and even my ability to view the blog from my home ip address. After trying to reach him in several different ways his only communication has been the comments below. Classy.
We started NZB3 together to be a non-partisan group blog all about life, New Zealand society, and everything. At first we were writing our own php substructure but then gave in to using Blogger to power the site. This worked out well, until the start of last month while technical issues made it advantageous for Blogger to also host the site. Then we came home.
Seems to me the domain name is mine all mine now but I've no notion of going on alone. It could be argued that I already have been blogging alone but I have always taken Dominic at his word that he was in an almost perpetual state of getting around to it. As now he is not, the project has come to an end. I don't expect to find another Dominic.
So, NZB3 has now been a podcast and a blog. Could be due for yet another incarnation? Just have to see what comes along. Any bright ideas, please email me at the address at the foot of the page or you can IM me.
MSN rickenterprises, ICQ 106623013, and all the rest.
See you 'round the blogosphere!
In a spectacular display of good faith (not) he has renounced his co-ownership of this blog, blocked my access to all the blog files on the server and even my ability to view the blog from my home ip address. After trying to reach him in several different ways his only communication has been the comments below. Classy.
We started NZB3 together to be a non-partisan group blog all about life, New Zealand society, and everything. At first we were writing our own php substructure but then gave in to using Blogger to power the site. This worked out well, until the start of last month while technical issues made it advantageous for Blogger to also host the site. Then we came home.
Seems to me the domain name is mine all mine now but I've no notion of going on alone. It could be argued that I already have been blogging alone but I have always taken Dominic at his word that he was in an almost perpetual state of getting around to it. As now he is not, the project has come to an end. I don't expect to find another Dominic.
So, NZB3 has now been a podcast and a blog. Could be due for yet another incarnation? Just have to see what comes along. Any bright ideas, please email me at the address at the foot of the page or you can IM me.
MSN rickenterprises, ICQ 106623013, and all the rest.
See you 'round the blogosphere!
5/09/2006
hurt
Anonymous said...
Rick: Dom here. Got the email. You've noticed I'm not blogging anymore: well, that's not about to change. Thus me removing my ugly mug from the sidebar. I didn't feel right about ripping down the Labour logo that's so nicely arranged up the top, but you might like to.Yeah. The reasons? Who needs reasons when you've got heroin. That's right, I've taken up the scag. It's great. Also, you're a dick, but that didn't really come into my decision. Just busy I guess. It's hard to blog while desperately breaking into cars to finance your next fix.Anyway. I'm happy to keep the free hosting going if you're bandwidth usage doesn't grow any more than where it is now. I'll let you know if that happens: might be convenient to move to blogspot now. Whatever.Goodbye.
5/09/2006 12:49 AM
Anonymous said...
Oh, and with a nod to NZ artist John Reynolds, and his nod to Jonathan Rée, I'll leave you with this:What Kierkegaard said about God applies to politics too: whatever we think, we are bound, in the end, to be in the wrong.Although you, especially so. I kid.
5/09/2006 12:55 AM
Rick: Dom here. Got the email. You've noticed I'm not blogging anymore: well, that's not about to change. Thus me removing my ugly mug from the sidebar. I didn't feel right about ripping down the Labour logo that's so nicely arranged up the top, but you might like to.Yeah. The reasons? Who needs reasons when you've got heroin. That's right, I've taken up the scag. It's great. Also, you're a dick, but that didn't really come into my decision. Just busy I guess. It's hard to blog while desperately breaking into cars to finance your next fix.Anyway. I'm happy to keep the free hosting going if you're bandwidth usage doesn't grow any more than where it is now. I'll let you know if that happens: might be convenient to move to blogspot now. Whatever.Goodbye.
5/09/2006 12:49 AM
Anonymous said...
Oh, and with a nod to NZ artist John Reynolds, and his nod to Jonathan Rée, I'll leave you with this:What Kierkegaard said about God applies to politics too: whatever we think, we are bound, in the end, to be in the wrong.Although you, especially so. I kid.
5/09/2006 12:55 AM
Corruption
Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely
- Lord Acton, British historian
I have never agreed with that, and for various reasons. But it does have a grain of truth pertienent to this post.
Laurel leaves are the most potent of poisons
- Annon, as far as I know
When I showed the following cartoon to my Hamiltonian mate, Manda, she thought it was about my girlfriend "Laurel" leaving me. Manda's not too bright sometimes (I can say that, she'll never read this.)
A garland of laurel leaves were, in the ancient world, a crown of power. You'll see pictures of Julius Ceasar with such a crown, and it's probably where the saying 'to rest on one's laurels' comes from. Laurel leaves, power, poisons the barer.
This I agree with. Power is responsibility, is burden. It makes you a target. Cares and worries, the demands and jelousies of enemies and friends, are a major drag. They kill you quickly and violently at best, softly and slowly at worst. Even though this quote is almost the same as the first, I interpret it differently.
Poision can be contended with, it has an antidote. One can take preventative precautions, remain vigilent. A ruler can have a close friend to ground them and make sure they don't get too high and mighty or become depressed or disenchanted with their endevours. But Lord Acton's quote represents the idea that corruption metaphysically follows empowerment, as night must follow day. I reject such determinism, for various reasons.
Having explained that, for any other Hamiltonians reading this, here's a cartoon. It's from a short series I did about a young Prince. This one's about yet another sort of human corruption...
^^ Click to enlarge ^^
5/08/2006
Australian OE # 07
Australian OE # 07: Tasmanian Rollers
That's what I'm talking about. Makes the Victorian version look like a rogue snowball rolling out of a Chinese-checkers game hall.
This picture was taken out of the main cop shop in Launcestern. A few klicks up the road, and one klick under it, in Beaconsfield, a couple of miners have been waiting a week and a half to be rescued from the shaft they're in. I'm picking they'll be free around noon on Tuesday.
Never saw many cop cars in Tas. I only assume they all look like the ones I did see.
5/07/2006
Voted
I can't fairly vote for what I can't see but take this one for free, Mr Hide.
The commodificaiton of value
Lindsay Mitchell and Red Confectionery have both made mention of a US study reported on Stuff. I think they're lawyers, or something. They're seeking to put a dollar valuation on motherhood.
NEW YORK: A fulltime stay-at-home mother would earn $US134,121 ($NZ212,250) a year if paid for all her work, an amount similar to a top US ad executive, a marketing director or a judge, according to a study released on Wednesday.
Things like this are, in my mind, pretty stupid. A hypothetical second-guessing of the market value of a mother is next to meaningless. I say "next to" only because sticking dollar values on things like this does at least make you think about what we value.
As a fan of Adam Smith and Ayn Rand I naturally think that Motherhood, and love itself, is a commodity. And there is an appropriate currency for this. However, dollars ain't it.
In the philosophy of Ayn Rand every value, motherhood for example, has a set of corresponding virtues. Some values, by way of example, are honesty, pride, justice, rationality, independence. These sorts of things are the currency of motherhood. As well as leading people to a good life these virtues are distinct rewards, pleasures. By these qualities people can evaluate what's really giving value in each of our lives, what really makes motherhood (and just living itself) worth our while.
I once began writing a little 'book of virtues' that would match our many roles to the values and virtues that constituted them. Never quite got around to doing that yet though, but I was inspired by economist George Reisman who, in one of his books, offered such a list for the role of a scientist.
The values of a scientist- reason, observation, truth, honesty, integrity, freedom of inquiry.
Ayn Rand has done this for the values of man, ie of a human being, in her novel Atlas Shrugged...
Values for man- integrity, independence, rationality, justice, honesty, productivness, pride.
Being a mother, under this Aristotelian virtue ethic framework, is a happy and life-fulfilling mixture of values. Motherhood is a value itself, and the sum of lesser values that, together, constitute this role some women choose. What might they be, and why?
The right answer to these questions will show us the currency motherhood deals in. Just as the currency of the New Zealand dollar can buy and sell, so can motherhood be bought and sold. Children, friends, husbands, and other family don't pay with money though. They pay with their respect and their love and with the currency of family values- to the profit of all. If they did not it would hardly be worthwhile to be a mother, she should liquidate and move on. No amount of being tipped petty cash or put on a wage from her "client friends" and "client family" could possibly substitute. It's just the wrong currency.
This study's parameters completely missrepresent motherhood, and the stay-at-home mother, by attempting such monetary enumeration. All, I suspect, at the bidding of divorce lawyers in the service of homologous mothers.
NEW YORK: A fulltime stay-at-home mother would earn $US134,121 ($NZ212,250) a year if paid for all her work, an amount similar to a top US ad executive, a marketing director or a judge, according to a study released on Wednesday.
Things like this are, in my mind, pretty stupid. A hypothetical second-guessing of the market value of a mother is next to meaningless. I say "next to" only because sticking dollar values on things like this does at least make you think about what we value.
As a fan of Adam Smith and Ayn Rand I naturally think that Motherhood, and love itself, is a commodity. And there is an appropriate currency for this. However, dollars ain't it.
In the philosophy of Ayn Rand every value, motherhood for example, has a set of corresponding virtues. Some values, by way of example, are honesty, pride, justice, rationality, independence. These sorts of things are the currency of motherhood. As well as leading people to a good life these virtues are distinct rewards, pleasures. By these qualities people can evaluate what's really giving value in each of our lives, what really makes motherhood (and just living itself) worth our while.
I once began writing a little 'book of virtues' that would match our many roles to the values and virtues that constituted them. Never quite got around to doing that yet though, but I was inspired by economist George Reisman who, in one of his books, offered such a list for the role of a scientist.
The values of a scientist- reason, observation, truth, honesty, integrity, freedom of inquiry.
Ayn Rand has done this for the values of man, ie of a human being, in her novel Atlas Shrugged...
Values for man- integrity, independence, rationality, justice, honesty, productivness, pride.
Being a mother, under this Aristotelian virtue ethic framework, is a happy and life-fulfilling mixture of values. Motherhood is a value itself, and the sum of lesser values that, together, constitute this role some women choose. What might they be, and why?
The right answer to these questions will show us the currency motherhood deals in. Just as the currency of the New Zealand dollar can buy and sell, so can motherhood be bought and sold. Children, friends, husbands, and other family don't pay with money though. They pay with their respect and their love and with the currency of family values- to the profit of all. If they did not it would hardly be worthwhile to be a mother, she should liquidate and move on. No amount of being tipped petty cash or put on a wage from her "client friends" and "client family" could possibly substitute. It's just the wrong currency.
This study's parameters completely missrepresent motherhood, and the stay-at-home mother, by attempting such monetary enumeration. All, I suspect, at the bidding of divorce lawyers in the service of homologous mothers.
5/06/2006
Unbundled
The Chinese
I thought Trevor Loudon was being a bit over-cautious about letting the Chinese have part-owership in Port Lyttelton. But now it turns out he thinks any trade with China is a security risk to New Zealand! Now that's going way too far, Trevor.
The only Chinese I've ever known were a couple who used to run the cyber cafe on Broadway in Newmarket, where I used to live. Very polite, very spick-and-span, reserved and quiet folks. I used to run into them at computer flea markets too, like the Greenlane one, and say "hi." Polite and quiet as mice. Koreans, Japanese, and Vietnamese kinda look the same but, to generalise, you can tell the Chinese apart from them by their polite, humble, and withdrawn baring. Same deal with the seamstress down Osborne St who used to do my sewing. Such has been my experience with Chinese.
However, for the last few weeks I've been working for a company here in Melbourne that imports a modest amount of aluminium from China. A few times I've trucked a load to Smorgon Steel, which is a huge place. You have to report to an office and be kitted out with safety gear and papers just to get in. Chatting to a Smorgon guy I learned that, in the past two years or so, a huge proportion of their ally has come in from China that used to originate from here in Australia. He also said the Australian quality was far better but he would say that, being an Ozzie.
Apart from what I've learned this week I know that huge amounts of manufactured goods and raw materials are coming in from China. As a student of economics I know Ricardo's lesson of the mutual trade benefits of comparative advantage. We too, as well as the Chinese, are making out on these [most volumous] trade deals- else we would not do it.
The blokes I deliver ally to span the whole of Melbourne. Some of these firms on-sell or transport the packs and bundles to other states of Australia. Some of the regular local customers I have delivered to only this week, for example, make ramps of all sorts, roofs, flagpoles, shop and home interior fittings, window louvers, window frames, white boards, washrooms, and campervans. I love being nosy and seeing seeing what's being done. They think I'm working for money? Hah, I'm working so I can get paid to listen to rock and drive around Australia peeking in on everyone's business! And loving it.
I get to see a myriad, though a tiny proportion, of what's going on with Chinese aluminium in this city- the product, the businesses, the people employed. Production is keeping us all busy building Melbourne, materially, into a better and better city and increasing the standard of living. Ah, the grace of capitalism.
If all of this is also making the Chinese more wealthy and prosperous too what's the trouble, Mr Loudon? Even if we do end up going to war within 20 years I think we should keep trading in the mean time. While their might is nourished by us, so is ours by them. Perhaps your quarrel is really with what we are doing with that might, millitarily, as compared with them?
And if there is to be war then all that trade will mean is that both sides get to do it at a higher level of comfort than otherwise. We'll both have lots of guns, but we'll also both have lots of butter and soft pillows and warm clothing to go to war with. If battle is coming, why not fight it at a higher standard of living, ah?
In other N.Zeal news, Maia at Capitalism Bad is linking in as an exclaimation of how not-scared of him she is. :)
Australian OE # 06
Australian OE # 06: Accent
I know I already did accent. But the lesson does bare repeating.
I say again: Agggh!
5/05/2006
And, in podcast news....
The Watercooler podcast for the month of May (and the other great Voicebooth podcast, Roundup) is a money-spinner! I've just been listening to their latest podcast from May 4th.
Yip, those Christchurch buggers have found a way to make money out of their own radio show. Apart from being clever businessmen I suppose being professional broadcasters without any strong political colours makes them a bit more marketable than other podcasts I like to listen to. Cunning buggers!
Something else to look forward to, the Voicebooth Ltd have said that for every week of May [being New Zealand Music Month] they're recording a one-hour podcast-safe recording of a Kiwi pub band in Chch. That might work out rather well.
In other news Ben, a commenter to Kete Were, writes that libertarian blogger, The Whig, made his own podcast last year. Is that so? That'd be good. I'll have to see if I can find it.
5/04/2006
Australian OE # 05
Australian OE # 05: Rollers
Each state has their own police force in Australia. This is a Victorian cop car.
It's pretty gay isn't it? And I mean that in a bad way.
Doesn't exactly inspire fear and respect. After the Kiwi version it looks like you've got a checkered table cloth chasing you! (not that I'd know about that...)
See if I can find a Tasmanian cop car pic to blog soon. Their cars look like panthers.
5/02/2006
Doing the best they can
Sophia at Red Confectionary blog is taking cheap shots at Act Leader Rodney Hide.
They really shouldn't be doing that, especially not when their ugly masters are so vulnerable. But then, after recently having been delt a resounding blast for stupid feminist collectivism by the mighty forces of Right you can forgive the desperate lefties for resorting to such baseness.
Go ahead then Sophia. But don't think for a moment that we can't do it better. Checked out Gen XY lately??
