Since the government has been giving the Maori tribes loads of money why do the Maori not look after the poorer members of their tribes and counter the rapacious activities of banks foreclosing on poor Maori having trouble meeting mortgage payments due to inflation and escalating the outstanding payments with various fees and valuations.

In supporting their tribal members I would expect them to help also to keep them on a straight and narrow path to financial stability. Budgetry advice etc.

I am puzzled about Georgia ... as I understand it the Georgian military invaded the provinces thinking that Russia would hold back. They didn't and continue to maintain military presence to safeguard them from the Georgian forces.

Next Russia recognises them as new independant states. That is funny as Russia has usually been the 'take-over' power .... yet the countries which support freedom and self determination .. generally speaking the West .... are refusing to to recognise these new countries,

All very puzzling.

I think it is sad and amusing that fifty percent of our population believe the mis-information about secret agendas. Of course it isn't mis-information but the concept that only the National Party members have secret agendas.

Everybody politicians and joe muggins has views that are not party policy and/or politically acceptable.

Then there is the curfuffle about $50 tolls ... you pay that much if you use the road, and don't if you do not.

"The truly green solution is to close the loop between manufacturing and recycling: reusing the old we so quickly and happily toss away to make the new. "

which is a generalised modification of the New York Times editorial talking about the heralded as green, the new corn phones, plastic made out of corn, which said .....

The truly green solution for electronics makers is to close the loop between manufacturing and recycling: reusing the plastics we so quickly and happily toss away to make new cellphones.

As a sometime model engioneer I really enjoy the warm fuzzy feeling when I manage to re-use some of the mountain of junk I have accumualted "becuase it looked to be useful for something, too good to throw away"

Dope in sport?
An article in today's New York Time suggests that we should stop the silly and hypocratical testing for dope in atheletes which lets some get though and apparently punishes some of the innocent.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/12/science/12tier.html?th&emc=th

I have thought that the pursuit of excellence in sport is not for me but if they are allowed to wear special swim suits which minic the dolphin skin then why cannot they ingest substances to make themselves more efficient. I am cautious about taking aspirin let alone anything more serious but really if they want to endanger their health, or not, in the pursuit of silly records then be it on themselves so long as they has adequate resources so they do not become a burden on the taxpaper as a result of their activities.

The Lake Hayes Project, a windfarm for the Lammermaul Range [ or however it is spelt]

The extract of the Turner book in the Otago Daily Times doesn't sway me for one moment. What is needed for this country is a balanced supply of power from hydro, wind and sea.

It would be better also if he didn't call the Meridian heads nasty names, that is being childish and typical left wing style of attacking the person rather that the idea. I looked for sensible arguments and found nothing but wooly thinking, shades of the NIMBY attitude.

The New York Times today [11.8.8] has an interesting article contrasting Denmark with America which in recent years has made itself independent of imported oil to a large degree thanks to wind power and changing people's habits. We cannot rely on wind to provide a constant supply, but neither does hydro, and oil and gas is running out ... so the sensible solution is to have all three and hope that collectively they will meet our needs. Conservation comes from the increasing prices and replacing our housing stock with energy efficient dwellings.

The fate of the SUV ecconomics versus conservation
The NYT editorial ......
Editorial
A Future for S.U.V.’s
'Americans should consider selling their suddenly redundant S.U.V.’s to the scrap market or to a foreign country. If all else fails, there’s always art.');
We have heartily applauded Americans’ collective decision to recognize the finite nature of the world’s supply of fossil fuels and to start driving sensible vehicles. But we must also acknowledge that this abrupt change of heart is creating a new national challenge: what to do with the suddenly redundant S.U.V.?

The question is not only of pressing importance for Detroit’s automakers, which are losing unimaginable sums of money as they rush to replace a business model centered around multiton trucks with one based on cars. It is a growing problem for hundreds of thousands of Americans who can’t afford to drive a hulk that goes 13 miles on a gallon of gas when that gallon costs $4. Monthly sales of new S.U.V.’s fell 25 percent in July compared with the same month in 2007. One report suggested that in the first quarter of the year 17 percent of S.U.V. owners in the country were trying to get rid of them.
It won’t be easy. Thousands of secondhand S.U.V.’s sit unwanted and ignored in car dealerships across the land. On eBay, bids for 2008 Hummers are coming in at 50 percent of the sticker price. Car companies are not selling formerly leased S.U.V.’s for anywhere near the price they counted on.
Some drivers are facing a grim choice between trading in the Ford Expedition for less than what they owe on it and continuing to shell out more than 25 cents per mile for gas. Even donating unwanted S.U.V.’s has become less attractive since the Internal Revenue Service tightened rules on deductions for such contributions.
We suggest exploring foreign countries. The Russian market for cars, for instance, is booming — thanks to a fast-growing economy and generous government subsidies that are keeping a lid on the price of gas. The best part is that Russians prefer secondhand imports over domestic Ladas and Volgas.
Then there’s the scrap market. With demand for steel growing briskly in developing countries, prices of scrap steel have doubled over the past year. Exports in the first four months of 2008 rose 22 percent compared with the same period a year earlier. Demand is so strong that manhole covers are disappearing from city streets, reappearing at scrap yards outside town.
If all else fails, there’s always art.
The artist John Chamberlain made a name for himself making sculptures out of crushed automobile parts. Cadillac Ranch — an array of graffiti-covered Cadillacs protruding at an angle from a field near Amarillo, Tex. — has become one of the nation’s landmarks.
With a few adaptations, a Lincoln Navigator might make a nice streetlamp.

But the point is that while we all want to save on petrol, the ecconomics mean that it makes sense to continue to drive the large car for a reasonable period of time becuase the cost of petrol equals the loss on selling or trading in the SUV. I faced this problem and bought big a coupolle of decades ago when as a family man struggling to make ends meet, sort of anyway :-), I choose to buy the cheaper Holden 2600cc , and later a 3000cc, instead of the more ecconomically running four cylinder car ... that was just too expensive for my pocket book.

I'm glad I have a small one which takes me up the mountains occasionally ... rather than just driving around town ... which currently does 5km to the NZ dollar .... when I bought it three years ago the cost was 7km/dollar. Dunedin to Wanaka was $45, last trip $60. That is towing my baby camper trailer which saves me money when I stay at the motorcamp.

The biggest State with a big problem.

Texas must surely believe that out of sight, in jail, is out of mind. An editorial about the treatment/ neglect of dis-abled children by Texas

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/09/opinion/09sat3.html?th&emc=th

While here in New Zealand it is my impression that the right to vote is sabotaged by individual's own laziness to register it appears this is not so the United States where oprganisers of the voting system actively supress voting of people that might vote against their views.

Today's NYT editorial on the subject ....

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/09/opinion/09sat1.html?th&emc=th

111 Call goes to Manila ... from Yahoo News service
A Southland man says a 111 call he made early on Thursday morning reached the Philippine capital Manila.
But a Telecom spokesman says the glitch could not have happened and despite Telecom operating a call-centre in Manila, all 111 calls were answered within New Zealand .
Peter Mason, of Lumsden, told the Southland Times he dialled 111 about 2.15am after hearing noises behind shops in Diana St, where he has a flat and woodwork shop, about 2.15am.
Dialling the number from his cellphone, it was answered by a woman with what he described as having a "thick accent" which he found hard to understand.
While the woman knew he had dialled the emergency number, trying to explain where Lumsden was to her was proving difficult so he asked where she was, he said.
"It was definitely Manila. I asked her where she was and she said `Manila in the Philippines'."
Mr Mason said the woman then transferred him to the police communications centre in Christchurch.
Telecom spokesman Ian Bonnar told the newspaper the company traced the call and it had "absolutely, categorically" gone to the Christchurch call centre about 2.30am.
"If you dial 111 there's no way you can be routed through to Manila."
That was the case with both landlines and cellphones, he said.

Pull the other leg Telecom :-)