NZ Election 2008: Leader's debate

An interesting premise, a political debate on YouTube.

In this TV One production YouTube users can put video questions to politicians to be answered in the debate which screens on TV One and YouTube on October 14 2008.

The debate is between John Key and Helen Clark and you can watch it here on Political Animal.

Here are a couple of questions from YouTube submitters:

 Why Should NZ trust you?

Welfare Dependancy

Labour, ignoring public opinion?

c Political Animal 2008

Johnny Rocks! Dude

Kudos to Johnny boy for supporting good Kiwi music, there is sadly some that is only played and taxpayer subsidised because the participant was born somewhere in godzone.  

The lobby at the Stamford Plaza hotel disappeared last night at the Juice TV awards...

The Opshop boys were a surprise to see, largely because they'd only jetted back into the country from London three hours earlier. National party leader John Key was another pleasantly surprising presence and the musos loved it. He posed for photos with some, like the gorgeous Hollie Smith. No other politician even bothered to show up, which screams volumes about how they view the Kiwi music scene in GodZone doesn't it? Though I suspect Key will be joined by other politicos next week at the Vodafone NZ Music Awards when the cameras are out and the election is right round the corner. Hels loves a red carpet entry.

The yoof vote is something that the Johnster needs and shame on our trout faced leader for not holding her end of the bar up.

Nice gossip blog too Rachel Glucina from the Herald.

c Political Animal 2008

Google Politics

There have been some interesting recent Google searches to reach the Political Animal Blog.

Here are a few:

www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=labour losing

A nice thought

www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=Phil Goff age of consent&btnG=Google Search&aq=f&oq=

Phil wanted to have sex between "consenting" 12 year olds made legal

www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en-us&q=%22My view is that tax cuts are largely offered as a political bribe, not because of beneficial economic or social effects%22&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

Michael Cullen, the taxman, must have been on his office computer that night

www.google.com/search?hl=en&rls=DAUS,DAUS:2006-08,DAUS:en&q=new zealand ETS bill impacts on transportation&start=10&sa=N

The Emissions Tax Scam will have a disastrous effect on New Zealand's economic well being

www.google.co.za/search?hl=en&q=Political meaning of alice in wonderland&btnG=Search&meta=

Winston Peters exploits have gone the world over

www.google.com/search?hl=en&rlz=1B3GGGL_enGB177GB222&q=nz labour party policies 2008&btnG=Search

I don't recall any Labour 2008 election policy that has thus far been released 

www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=THE PRICK WHO BANNED BULLRUSH&meta=

I agree with the "prick part", but Labours PPTA might have something to do with it

www.google.co.nz/search?hl=en&q=competitors for kiwirail&btnG=Google Search&meta=

In the wake of another $120 million taxpayer dollars down the tube for Labour's billion dollar trainset

www.google.co.nz/search?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=1G1GGLQ_ENNZ293&q=nz nuclear option&meta=

A solution to our politically engineered energy crises

www.google.com/ie?q=Winstone Peters Photo&hl=en&start=10&sa=N

Winnie looking for the latest photo of himself

www.google.co.nz/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4GFRC_enNZ205NZ205&q=pumphouse helen clark young lover

Does the googler know something we don't?

www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=safari&rls=en&q=finance bill voting 2008&btnG=Search

Kiwi voters want to know who voted against free speech last year

www.google.com/search?q=new zealand labour party blog&rls=com.microsoft:en-nz:IE-SearchBox&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7&rlz=1I7PCTA

Not here, this is Political Animal a semi-respectable organ of the internet press, the official Labour Party blog is The Standard

www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=smacking referendum numbers&btnG=Search

One of the most popular Google searches to reach this site

www.google.co.nz/search?client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&channel=s&hl=en&q=funny helen clarke sound&meta=&btnG=Google Search

Its about trust?

www.google.co.nz/search?hl=en&q=honesty in nz politics&meta=&btnG=Google Search&aq=t

That would be nice

www.google.com/search?q=south auckland unemployment&hl=en&sa=2

Its quite disproportionally higher than most other parts of the country

I think these little Googles show that New Zealand voters, at least those that are motivated to search and find out more about politics, want to be aware of what is going on politically and are not as stupid as politicians from the left think they are.

They want to find out the substance of the politician before they use their valuable vote and that really is important when these people are going to be reaching into your pockets for the next 3 years.

Your vote is important. 

Enrol to vote here

c Political Animal 2008

Senate will vote to pass $700 billion bailout on Oct 1

I just cant get enough of the political situation in regards to the US$700 billion bailout by the taxpayer of the US financial sector.

The vote for the bailout failed on Monday in the lower house with a disastrous consequence for world markets and then President Bush made multiple statements [1 2] to the American people to calm the nervous and mogadon the sheep participating in the stockmarket.

Wednesday evening there will be a vote in the Senate-bizarrely after a break for a Jewish holiday- for a "modified" version of the bailout Bill. 

I am sure this version will pass after much lobbying from Republican and Democratic whips in the interim.

It is dubious as to whether the bailout will have any affect at all on the financial sector they are trying to "fix" because as we know politicians don't usually possess the insight to solve problems that they have created in the first place.

Watch here for video and audio of the deal latter on Wednesday.

c Political Animal 2008