Posts Tagged ‘Business’
NEW ZEALAND … THE WAY YOU’VE GOT IT
A little while ago I suggested we were entering into dangerous territory when any criticism of the Government over their handing of the Covid-19 crisis was slammed as bordering on the irresponsible … that the ‘greater good’ was the overriding factor.
The last few days has seen that play out. Simon Bridges was taken to task by the media (with not so gentle prodding from Grant Robertson) for suggesting that extending the lock-down would most likely see further business closures. He was particularly scathing of Jacinda Ardern’s comment that extending the lock-down by five days meant only two days loss of business. That was fair comment … just which part of planet business does Labour occupy for Ardern to make such a stupid assertion. But no, Ardern knows best. Her vast business knowledge gained from wrapping fish & chips trumps rational debate.
Then we had the quite extraordinary outburst from one of Labour’s supposed bright young up and comers that really business had only itself to blame if they failed to weather the storm … meant they were undercapitalised and it was all their fault. Yep, Labour sure understands business … not.
Instructive too that Barely Sober, fresh from his drubbing by Mr Justice Venning who denied him expert witness status in Peters vs ‘Everyone’ and dismissed his assertions as opinion and not evidence has come out in support of the criticism leveled by Bridges. Many would have it that Soper is the mouthpiece for Peters and that makes for an interesting dynamic. Clearly there are tensions in cabinet. That goes with the territory when Ardern is able to function as a virtual dictator.
500,000 back to work on Tuesday. Who’s kidding who? Judith Collins has it about right. Level 3 is really Level 4 with KFC an optional extra. We need to get to Level 2 sooner rather than later. Right now it appears the government is intent on destroying the village in order to save it.
Filed under "big whoop."

Even so the MSM journalists are not even trying to hide their bias in favour of the public sector, likely because it’s so engrained in their thinking that it’s just unconscious now.
And naturally this is also why almost all other MSM reporting runs the same way on so many issues: Anderson Cooper is not an exception. It’s not thinking bias, which would be bad enough, but simple herd behaviour.
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And in other similar news, Bernie Sanders finally suspended his campaign a couple of days ago, so Biden will now be the Democrat Party nominee for President. It’s been obvious for over a month now that Bernie was just not going to make it and likely only his stubborness kept him going even this long. But the inability to campaign because of the virus was what finally stopped him cold.
The whole business of “suspension” rather than just quitting has more to do with campaign financing laws nowadays. The FEC doesn’t consider a campaign to be done and dusted until its debts are paid, cash dumped into other accounts and the whole thing tidied up, which usually means that some donating is still required. Of course it does also allow a campaign to roar back to life if something changes, but that’s not the primary reason.
The whole thing is a huge indictment of the quality of the other Democrat candidates, given Biden’s terrible weaknesses that I outlined last year here and here – and he’s got visibly worse since then as the following collection of video clips shows.
And all this in just about the most controlled environment that a politician can get. Sure, Biden got through the campaign debates so perhaps this is all just lowering expectations for the debates against Trump. Simply being his old, word-salad self could be regarded as a win. But there are surely limits on how low that bar can be set?
How on earth could the rest not do at least as well as Bernie in at even staying the distance? Sure, each one had weaknesses, but they also had strengths compared to both Biden and Sanders. It probably is similar to the 2016 GOP process, where the favoured candidates spent so much time beating on eachother that Trump could slip through, and in the final stages of this campaign Bernie showed he was unwilling to go for the throat, just as in 2016 against Hillary.
But it’s also an indictment of the entire Democrat “establishment” – the incestuous little world of activists, donors, party chiefs and seated politicians. They’re the ones who gave up on the other alternatives to Sanders and decided to pick up a flailing Biden and push him over the line on Super Tuesday. He won in states where he’d not even campaigned and where he’d spent almost no money, largely because his campaign was almost broke.
The hard line Leftists at the magazine Jacobin are not happy, as can be seen in this article, Voters Won’t Risk Their Lives for Joe Biden:
No one will fight for this man. No one will risk their lives for this man. In 2020, faced with a raging pandemic on one hand and the hopeless politics of the Democratic Party on the other, voters will once more decide, wisely, to stay at home.
Normally I would dismiss such anger because it’s the natural aftermath when a favoured candidate loses. Such people, after letting off steam, usually drift through the Kubler-Ross stages and vote for the Party’s nominee.
But one of the many problems the Democrats face is that having their voters staying home is exactly what happened in 2016 with Hillary Clinton. Granted Biden is not hated by many Democrats as Hillary was. On the contrary he’s quite beloved. But as the Jacobin article shows, that feeling is not the sort of enthusiastic belovedness attending Obama. It’s more that Democrats regard Biden as one might a silly old Uncle: “That’s just Joe” has been the refrain for years now.
Combine that attitude among many Democrat voters with the more hard-edged disdain of the Bernie Bros, Trump’s rising approval ratings thanks to the Wuhan Virus pandemic, the massive carpet bombing attacks the GOP will unleash on Biden, and Trump’s total willingness to rip into his opponent’s weakest spots, and it looks like a huge uphill struggle for Biden, and this time the DNC can’t get him across the line by itself.
As expected the Trump campaign was quick off the mark with the following video, which hits all the right marks, given what’s on people’s minds right now.
Not Many People Beat The Bank
Sub-title:- Stupid, Stupid ANZ
Sub sub-title:- Curry Munchers screw Fosters Guzzlers
Here’s an extraordinary story of a successful child bride.
She made the most of her arranged marriage to what appears to be a reasonably thick chap and after a six year battle with ANZ Banking Group, walked away with a cheque for $200 million.
(Paywall)
“They beat the bank and now they’re gone — perhaps never to return.Indian business couple Pankaj and Radhika Oswal left Australia last Thursday, immediately after settling a multi-billion-dollar legal stoush with the ANZ bank for $200 million, and are thinking of starting a new life in New York.
Ms Oswal said yesterday the couple would sell the land on which sits their unfinished Perth mansion, known as “Taj On Swan”. The ruin in up-market Peppermint Grove will be demolished next Monday by order of the local council.
Among options for “brighter futures”, Ms Oswal was “thinking about starting a not-for-profit organisation devoted to women’s empowerment, particularly for those living in countries like India where there are historic and cultural limitations on women achieving their potential”.
Ms Oswal said the couple had “great memories of our lives in Australia before the problems arose with ANZ and the receivers PPB Advisory, but the last six years have been very painful and emotionally draining, so it is time to start a new chapter in our lives”.The Victorian Supreme Court battle between the Oswals and ANZ, which played out over 11 weeks of hearings, revolved around the bank’s sale of the couple’s Burrup Fertiliser business in 2010.
The Oswals alleged that ANZ and PPB, which the bank appointed as receivers over Burrup, sold their stake in the business for less than it was worth after seizing it in a row over about $1 billion in debts they owed ANZ. In turn, ANZ accused the couple of misappropriating about $150m, spent on luxury cars, a boat, property including the Taj on Swan and Ms Oswal’s vegetarian restaurant chain Otarian.After a month of mediation before associate judge John Efthim, the two sides agreed to a confidential deal in which ANZ agreed to pay the Oswals more than $200m.
The talks came after dramatic evidence from Ms Oswal in which she accused her husband of forging documents and claimed that at a December 2009 meeting ANZ general counsel Bob Santamaria said that if she did not give the bank security over the shares in Burrup she owned, the couple would go to jail and their two daughters would be “orphans”. The Oswals also accused then chief risk officer Chis Page of putting Mr Oswal in a headlock at the meeting and sending a racist email to bank boss Mike Smith.
ANZ denies the allegations.
Of course the ANZ denied the allegations. Then they paid up.