Investigate magazine, Nov 08 issue

INVESTIGATE November 2008: Key vs Clark • Behind the Crash • Can You Really Trust The Greens?

ELECTION SPECIAL 2008

Key VS Clark what they’re offering

The Economic Crisis

who caused it, who’ll fix it?

Issue 94

How MPs Voted

a scoresheet for voters

Can You Really Trust The Greens?

socialism’s hard left

$7.99 November 2008

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Contents 46 28 60

36 FEATURES

28 Behind The Crash

The world economy is in freefall, despite the occasional dead-cat-bounce, and it poses a threat to already fragile western democracy. IAN WISHART analyses the Crash, and its impact on the NZ and US election campaigns

36 The Leaders Debate

The full-text campaign launch speeches of JOHN KEY & HELEN CLARK. In the interests of giving voters a chance to avoid media spin and hear the leaders direct and uncut

a bunch of other laws you didn’t appreciate. But the NZ media have never taken a really deep look at who’s driving the Greens. TREVOR LOUDON uncovers the fundamentalist socialists who want to change your life

60 Scorecard: How They Voted

We don’t normally give an advertising feature this prominence, but Family First have very helpfully compiled the voting records of MPs. Read it and weep, before you vote

46 The Reds Inside The Greens

They’re the political party that could hold the balance of power in a few weeks – already responsible for banning smacking, legalising prostitution and

Cover: NZPA

Editorial and opinion 06 Focal Point

Volume 8, issue 94, ISSN 1175-1290

Editorial

08 Vox-Populi

The roar of the crowd

16 Simply Devine

16

Miranda Devine on the Crash

18 Mark Steyn on Sarah Palin

20 Eyes Right

Richard Prosser on self-defence

22 Line 1

Lifestyle

Art Direction Design & Layout

64 Money

Peter Hensley on financial turmoil

66 Education

Amy Brooke on leadership

68 Science Big Bang theory

70 Technology iPhone crushers

72 Sport

Chris Forster on the Warriors

74 Health

Claire Morrow on cancer

76 Alt.Health Varicose vein issues

78 Travel

To the edge of the ice

82 Food

James Morrow cooks Roo

72

84 Drive

Heidi Wishart Bozidar Jokanovic

Tel: +64 9 373 3676 Fax: +64 9 373 3667 Investigate Magazine PO Box 302188, North Harbour North Shore 0751, NEW ZEALAND AUSTRALIAN EDITION Editor Ian Wishart Customer Services Debbie Marcroft Advertising sales@investigatemagazine.com Tel/Fax: 1-800 123 983 SUBSCRIPTIONS Online: www.investigatemagazine.com

By Phone: Australia 1-800 123 983

NZ 09 373 3676

By Post: To the PO Box NZ Edition: $75 Au Edition: A$96 Email editorial@investigatemagazine.com ian@investigatemagazine.com australia@investigatemagazine.com sales@investigatemagazine.com debbie@investigatemagazine.com

92 Music

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We take no responsibility for unsolicited material sent to us. Please enclose a stamped, SAE envelope. Inquiries in the first instance should be made via email or fax.

94 Movies

Investigate magazine Australasia is published by HATM Magazines Ltd

Mercedes SLK 350

86 Toybox

The latest and greatest

88 Pages

Michael Morrissey’s spring picks Chris Philpott’s CD reviews Body of Lies, The Duchess

84

Richa Fuller Fuller Media 09 522 7062 021 03 74079 richa@fullermedia.co.nz

24 Tough Questions Richard Dawkins finds God

68

NZ EDITION Advertising Sales

Contributing Writers: Melody Towns, Selwyn Parker, Amy Brooke, Chris Forster, Peter Hensley, Chris Carter, Mark Steyn, Chris Philpott, Michael Morrissey, Miranda Devine, Richard Prosser, Claire Morrow, James Morrow, Len Restall, Laura Wilson, and the worldwide resources of MCTribune Group, UPI and Newscom

Chris Carter on police priorities

22

Chief Executive Officer Heidi Wishart Group Managing Editor Ian Wishart Customer Services Debbie Marcroft

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> focal point

Editorial

Political death by water torture

Y

ou’d think, with the world’s credit-based banking there are alternatives, like “instantaneous gas water heaters”.

Haven’t heard of those? No, neither had we. But a quick Google system heading swiftly to hell in a handcart, that Labour would have better things to do with its time than subject search took us to the site of the American Gas Association who, as New Zealanders to a winter of cold showers next year if the name suggests, have a dog in the ring when it comes to flogging off instantaneous gas water heaters. they’re re-elected.

However, unlike Labour, the AGA is honest about the limits You’d think.

This month’s revelations that Labour has altered the Building of the technology. They ran a test of their state of the art instant Code to force new homeowners to install low flow shower heads, gas heaters to gauge performance against a 150 litre standard gas or low flow hot water systems, or both, came as a frigid shock to hot water cylinder.

“The analysis showed that the lowest input instantaneous water most of the population.

Cutover date is February 1 next year, and from then it will be heaters (i.e., 40 kBtu/hr) were incapable of meeting typical single illegal for new homes, or those undergoing renovation, to con- usage demands such as one 10 minute shower, a 2.5 US gallon (9L) per minute faucet draw, a dishwater draw, or a washing machine tinue to have mains pressure hot water delivery.

The government in its Nanny State wisdom has decreed that show- draw on a setting of ‘warm’ or ‘hot’.”

OK, that’s the performance of their cheapest units, what about ers delivering water at 18 litres a minute are far too wasteful, and the top of the line instantaneous gas water heaters? new limit will be just one third of that – six litres a minute.

Forget the small print, cut forward to the biggest heater they I wouldn’t cross the road for a six litre shower, let alone invite tested, six times larger. Surely one into my home. And it could handle the needs we’ve made the environmen I wouldn’t cross the road for a six of an ordinary household, tal decision to go with our including two taps being own tank water. AND we litre shower, let alone invite one turned on at once? pay a stonking great price for “Only the 230 kBtu/ electricity that we use! What into my home hr instantaneous unit met right does the Labour/Green simultaneous draw requirecoalition have to tell me how we should use our paid-for power, and our own carefully roof- ments for cold climates. Even then, it could do so only for two of the five two-draw requirements. While this unit met two sceharvested water?

Obviously I got the title of my recent bestselling book utterly narios for three simultaneous draws that the storage water heater could not meet, it could not satisfy any three-draw requirements wrong. I should have called it “Absolute Shower”.

It didn’t take long after these revelations saw daylight for for the cold climate scenario.

“A general conclusion from this analysis is that, from a perspecBuilding Minister Shane Jones and his minions to start making mischief through the media. Jones, and other party hacks, tried tive of consumer, only the largest models of instantaneous gas to insist that it simply wasn’t fair for critics to talk about Labour water heaters provide the same consumer utility as the traditional “banning” mains pressure showers. No one would be “forced” to 40 gallon storage gas water heater. In other words, only the largest instantaneous models, or installation of multiple units, provide the purchase a low-flow shower head.

Well, they’re entirely correct. You won’t be “forced” to use a same capabilities to consumers without consumers having to alter mercury-filled toxic energy saving CFL light bulb in your chil- usage patterns to meet the limitations of the water heaters.”

Our message to voters: if you put this Labour/Green crowd back dren’s bedrooms either, except you’ll be lucky to find anything in, with their penchant for Soviet style fluorescent lights in your else on sale.

Likewise, those poor, tragic Ponsonby liberals doing their villa house and cold showers, don’t say you weren’t warned. renovations this summer who voted for Judith Tizard will suddenly find they can’t get a council code of compliance certificate for their renovations unless their hot water system meets Labour/Greens new standard. Shane Jones and his gaggle of left-wing hobgoblins won’t “force” you to use a low flow shower head, he says, because INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

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INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

> vox populi

Communiques The roar of the crowd A MATTER OF TRUST Our Labour government’s big deal is we must trust them. Trust a politician! They come in the same category as car salesmen. We can trust them to deceive us. Trust them to buy our votes with impressive promises they won’t keep. Trust them to fatten their own nest eggs and agendas at our expense, the taxpayer. Trust Labour, a socialist government, focused on power, creating multiple government departments to control every aspect of our lives. The past nine years are littered with deceit, botched business and unfulfilled promises.

Our railway system should never have been sold to a private corporation. When they bought it back they lied to us about the exorbitant price they paid. Last year’s $8 billion budget surplus frittered away on fat bureaucratic salaries and overseas trips with little regard to the future of our country as health and school budgets have run down. Trust Helen Clark, Michael Cullen and Labour to manage our money and our country? You’ve got to be kidding.

Denis Shuker, Stanmore Bay

60 Kiwis KIA? Where does Helen Clark get off saying that if New Zealand had sent troops to Iraq, based off US casualties of all things, we would have lost 60 soldiers by now?

Obviously the leader of the country doesn’t realise that we don’t operate in the same ways as the Americans. Though, that being said, it is doubly apparent that there are those who wish that we did and are going to great lengths to ensure that we do when you look at purchases like the NZLAV. There are clear cut reasons for our ways of doing things, not least of which are historical practices which have stood us in good stead, and our inherent limitations which make a different approach mandatory.

Second of all, had we lost that many soldiers it would have been primarily due to inept government spending, ill advice over the past two administration rounds, and not spending enough in so many other areas. The PM makes no comments on the 2007-8 NZDF Annual Report.

Thirdly, since the Aussies have sent more troops proportionally than we ever could, and have lost two* personnel to date, I am at a loss once more as to how on earth our Prime Minister comes to these conclusions. Her primary advisors in Defence, I fear, must be quite Green indeed.

To cap it all off, her statement demonstrates how much reality bites in relation to her, and her party, and how little faith they collectively possess in NZDF personnel, to do their job, despite difficult conditions, lack of essential equipment, critical manning INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

and having very stretched resources. Yet by the same government, all the same, they are expected to do so much.

It’s really quite an appalling attitude. Any lip service is exactly that, and particularly from your average left wing politician.

Leon Harrison, via email

A nuclear tradeoff I am writing this because I thought you maybe be able to inform the public of New Zealand about Labour’s two faced attitude to the nuclear issue.

I believe that the Labour Government, as part of International Atomic Energy Agency [IAEA], have acquiesced under pressure from the USA. [Condaleezza Rice’s recent visit] They have agreed, as almost the last member country to do so, to the exchange of nuclear material and knowledge from the USA to India. [prohibited under the IAEA treaty] I imagine that the reward for such acquiescence is the proposed FTA with the USA. Also the US Government has coincidently agreed to fast track the sale of the RNZAF mothballed Skyhawk fighters. I am neither for nor against the USA-India agreement nor the FTA. However if it was a National or National/coalition Government doing the same, all hell would break lose from the anti nuclear Labour opposition.

I am writing to you in the hope that you will be able to make what I call this deceit by omission, well known to the New Zealand public prior to November 8th.

The above I believe is true, from reading various world wide papers and putting two and two together.

I get around the world in my job.

Tony M, via email

Binding Referenda If elected, National’s John Key is promising voters a binding referendum on MMP by 2011. My election wish would be for him to add another question to the ballot. “Should all referendums be binding on the New Zealand government?” That way we can be assured all election promises will be kept.

Steve Baron, www.betterdemocracy.co.nz

GREEN HOGWASH Watching Ms Fitzsimons on TV on Thursday, 9 October just after 7.00 pm, I was reminded of my late aunt. She was also well groomed, well spoken and had the same concerned, convincing facial expression. My aunt used separate containers for waste tri-

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INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

age long before it became fashionable. She was a-political, but could have been described as being “green”.

Laudably, Ms Fitzsimons wants us to save energy. This can be facilitated by using less water for having a shower, and using CFL light bulbs. She suggests making it compulsory.

My old aunt `s sight started failing, so she read using a magnifying glass. The magnification allowed her to see only one or two words at a time. As the memory loss set in, she reached the end of a sentence and forgot how the sentence started; listening to our Green Leader brought back that memory too.

Has she forgotten the first part of the sentence? The first part says that I earn my money and pay my taxes. Milton Friedman, economic Nobel prize laureate, championed the concept of being free to choose.

The other end of the spectrum is a communistic dictatorship.

Let’s examine another type of energy under our magnifying glass: We could save about 8% fuel by only using manual gearbox cars.

We could go further and ban vehicles with powerful engines. We could even pass a law to use cars with registration plates ending in even numbers on even dates and uneven numbers on uneven dates. Just imagine the saving on fuel…… and the income the Government could reap off offenders! The possibilities are endless, and ridiculous.

I want to choose; I pay for that privilege. I would probably choose not to have my tax pay for goody-goody greenies to enforce their opinions on me. Our Green Leader has the right to proclaim her beliefs. She does not have the right to enforce them.

I can only hope that there are enough people who have enough vision not to require a magnifying glass.

Tony Harris, via email

NZ media not asking tough questions What is the NZ media playing at? In the USA, there is a political witch-hunt on in the run-up to a crucial election, to establish blame for a housing market inflation and blowout, dodgy lending practices, and finance companies crashing and being bailed out at huge taxpayer expense. We do not have their ambiguous situation of different parties having controlled 3 different levels of government through the timeline of the crisis. We have only one Prime Minister and her government to blame.

Our own housing market has also inflated way out of proportion with what most people can afford, from 1999 to last year, when it crashed, wiping out the equity of large numbers of unfortunate recent buyers, and our own finance companies have been collapsing left, right and centre. Many people who were trying to act responsibly and save money for a home were either priced out of the market or wiped out in the crash, but having a family without the means to support it has been rewarded with tens of thousands per year of taxpayers money in the form of benefits and housing and other subsidies.

Our economy went from a strong projected growth position in 1999 to an actual recession today (note that the US economy is still growing and attracting foreign investment); and our productivity growth rate went from a record high to a record low. Our Treasury’s projected taxation revenues have plummeted, and deficits loom for years if not decades, requiring us to borrow heavily just to sustain our current expectations for government spending, let alone for tax cuts and making up for neglect of infrastructure.

And our media response? We have been lucky to have had comparatively sound economic management but we are now unfortu10 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

nate victims of international events for which Wall Street greed is responsible? (As if Kiwis riding on our own property bubble were free of this vice). Endless speculation about the National Party’s “secret agenda” to reduce government spending and how they deserve to lose the election if the speculation is true? The answer to any crisis is for clever, experienced politicians like Michael Cullen to keep sucking taxes out of the economy and deciding where in the economy this money (or what is left of it) is best “re-invested”?

No candidate who dares to confront us with ugly realities, stands a chance of getting into government?

Talk about the blind leading the blind. We will have to come to our senses one day; evidently things need to get a lot worse before that will happen.

Philip G Hayward, Naenae

At least Maori might let you have a decent shower Councillor Christine Scott gave her thought for the week, 9.05 am 6/10/08, on ZB Talkback.

She spoke about using water frugally. Yes we are going to have to do that aren’t we, because the Waitangi Tribunal and Government has just given away – to one race, our Mohaka River, which should be owned by all New Zealanders under the third Principle and Te Tiriti O Waitangi.

I feel that the Government has been engineering a whole lot of animosity towards Maoridom by giving them billions of dollars, privileges, land, and rivers to take our attention away from what the Government has been doing against the needs and desires of the majority who require equality. Guess which are the next three rivers to go in Hawkes Bay ? Will anyone do anything to register a complaint, I am. See your MPs. J Porter , Napier

CRITIQUING THE DIVINITY CODE When I read Absolute Power I thought, I think rightly, you are not afraid of writing on difficult topics others with less courage would never touch. I did not think you were balanced enough but then your aim was an expose so your expressions worked.

I read The Divinity Code with interest and expectation. I found your arguments in the 1st few paragraphs compelling enough to think hard about Dawkins vs Intelligent Design. Some points you made are good and we have no answers to those yet.

But when I saw the chapter where you declare Hinduism to not know God as God should be known I began to feel worried.

My worries were right as I read on. Your comments on Hinduism appear to be based either on sensationalist media articles on child sacrifices or Ravi Zacharias’s views. Neither are Hindu scholars you know. You were condemning of Eastern Religions, declaring them ignorant of true enlightenment despite some very marginal research. You made bad comments on Hindus worshipping a goddess of destruction.

May I suggest that your research of Hinduism is appallingly poor in robust breadth and understanding? Just as neither Satanic rituals, exorcising evil spirits from children, burning witches at the stake alive etc are not part of mainstream Christianity in this age, nor supported by the biblical teachings of Yesu, neither are child sacrifices in Hinduism.

Crusades and mass murder in the name of Christianity and Islam, child sexual exploitation in polygamy sects in these religions all happen even today and child sacrifices in the name of

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 11

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EDITOR RESPONDS:

I fully appreciate the point you are making, and it is something I wrestled with in how to tackle when I wrote Divinity Code as I had limited space in which to cover the basics of the Eastern faiths.

The main point I was trying to make in those chapters was not to suggest for a moment that Hindus or Buddhists are inferior, but to address what I see as weaknesses in the belief systems themselves – weaknesses that the average Westerner hasn’t fully considered.

14 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

I have had many debates with followers of Eastern faiths on the issue of evil, and the pantheistic view of the universe being neither good nor bad in principle. There is a strong adherence to karmic destiny and karmic punishment built into these faiths, which is a little bit similar to the Bible’s warning about you reap what you sow, but taken much further.

Hinduism was vastly more complex to write about than Buddhism because strains of thought within Hinduism vary from concepts that are quite close to Christianity, to concepts that are identical to Buddhism, and others that are primarily polytheistic (Hinduism recognises millions of gods). The caste system that gripped Hinduism for thousands of years is an example of staying within your karmic class. Even today, those of the untouchables caste remain socially ostracised in many villages, even if not in law.

There are many basic areas of Hinduism and Buddhism that are similar to Christian values, and I think this reflects humanity’s search for truth. However, I didn’t have time to go into all those areas, nor was it really the point of the chapter.

The tolerance implicit in Buddhism and Hinduism, the belief that all paths to God are valid, by definition means that people who do things you and I would consider evil , in the name of their faith, cannot be logically condemned. If ALL paths are valid, then none must be invalid.

A belief system that permits child sacrifice, as detailed in The Divinity Code, is utterly abhorrent to you and I. But the “all paths are valid” doctrine takes the wind out of the sails of those who object. The Dalai Lama’s priests who brutally tortured Tibetan peasants and left them to die validated their actions under karmic doctrine – that the peasants were getting the punishment the universe had deemed they deserved.

My reason for documenting these things in the book was not to belittle believers themselves, but to illustrate the difficulty Buddhism and Hinduism have in confronting what Christians see as genuine Evil.

You write to me that Hinduism does recognise ‘evil’, “we just think of it as philosophically different concepts from yours”.

That’s my point. That’s the point of the whole chapter. I was trying to illustrate that Eastern and Western concepts of God, and evil, were different, and that in my view the Western philosophical understanding of evil is better for confronting it. There is clear Biblical authority that torture, or child sacrifices are crimes against God. Is there clear authority in Hinduism that condemns all these things, unconditionally? It is not enough to say these activities are not endorsed in the Vedas, where are the verses that condemn, across all the Hindu deities, such behaviours, and where is the philosophical underpinning that breaks the “all paths are valid” rule to say: “this path is not!”?

As I wrote in The Divinity Code while giving the examples I did, “None of this is to poke the borax at Buddhism or Hinduism just for the mere sake of it. The failings of individual humans do not necessarily negate the principles of the religions themselves…Christians, of course, have also committed their share of atrocities – but in clear conflict with their Scriptures. The Hindu and Buddhist faiths can get away with theirs, however, because their own scriptures are – at best – indifferent to suffering because of the doctrine of karmic destiny…”

You, sir, straddle two different cultures, so you have the benefit of seeing a Western perspective and an Eastern one. Increasingly, Eastern faiths are being influenced by Christianity in this regard in a syncretic sense. You see the evil I see, and like me you are appalled by it and recognise it for what it is. But do you recognise it primarily through your Hindu side, or your Christian side?

It’s almost worth a book of its own, this debate. I hope I have clarified, even if a little clumsily, the point I was trying to make.

Letters to the editor can be posted to: PO Box 302188, North Harbour, North Shore 0751, or emailed to: editorial@investigatemagazine.com

Hinduism happen because of evil, dirty people. There is not one single Hindu scripture that advocates such a diabolical thing, it is an evil conceived purely by an ugly and often psychopathic human mind, not sanctioned by any God, not yours, nor ours.

It is called bastardization of religion.

You know, I went to a Catholic Convent school; I learnt from wonderful nuns about Yesu; at home I learnt of the peace I could obtain for my soul thru real Hinduism. I never learnt of the bastardization of these religions nor intolerance from all who surrounded me.

I never doubted Yesu’s existence for one minute and I still do not. He was the son of God as far as I was concerned and he taught the people of Galilee a wonderful new way of spiritual life; he taught generosity, tolerance and acceptance. Hinduism also teaches all that for those who can and are listening. When people demanded Yesu act more aggressively or they behaved cruelly all ‘Yesu said ‘he knows not what he does’. When people acted violently he asked you to turn the other cheek. He asked everyone to love thy neighbour, always. He sacrificed his own blood and life for his beliefs in peace and gentle spirituality.

Our Goddess of destruction, as you call her is no such thing; that is an illiterate, poorly reflective translation by people who do not understand their religion at all. It is so terrible a translation in a foreign language that it is almost tragically funny.

These exist in every religion as you well know. This Goddess stands for the coalesced primordial power of all that is good and wonderful, strong and courageous within women and their souls collectively; all that is good within the feminine part of a man’s soul for we each have both. The good of this force is that stands for the ‘destruction of pure worldly evil’. That is her pledge to protect humanity from evil. Is that so wrong? To pray to a deity who challenges evil and enforces our own power to combat it through our worship of her and her power? She is called ‘Shakti’ ie the primordial force for good in humanity. You say we have no evil nor sin. We do indeed, we just think of it as philosophically different concepts from yours. To say we do not is silly Sir. No one in India’s mass of Hindu believers would agree that we do not know evil from good. Are you suggesting we are in some way lesser humans with lesser intellectual powers than your ‘side’?

I do not believe your research was robust enough nor your views reflective of your claimed and forceful belief in Yesu, son of God. He would ask you to accept and understand, be tolerant and kind to everyone, all sinners must be forgiven and all evil forsworn, even the evil thoughts against other people. You were none of these things in that chapter. Are you a true Christian Sir? Yesu went on the cross and he even forgave those who crucified him to kill him and torture him. How come you preach such intolerance and angry, unforgiving thought towards other religions?

I am neither fighting with you Sir nor intending to offend you with my letter. I respect your abilities. It is merely the thought and letter of another human being.

Dr Vasu Iyengar, via email

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> simply devine

Miranda Devine

The true financial cockroaches survived

I

t’s hard not to give in to a little schadenfreude about the California in late September, including $US23,380 on spa treatglobal financial crisis. The German word for pleasure derived ments. Talk about fiddling while Rome burns. from the misfortunes of others has been getting a good workThe communal glee in seeing fat cats get their comeuppance is out this month, as Masters of the Universe wobble and the visceral. Gloating new acronyms have sprung up overnight, such world indulges its hatred for Wall Street rich guys with nine-fig- as SWL, as in Sudden Wealth Loss syndrome, as experienced by ure salaries and Democrat wives. the former Bear Stearns chief Jimmy Cayne, whose net worth Yes, we know we are all going to suffer, but the pleasure of see- dropped by $US900 million in a year. Emails are flying around ing Henry Waxman, the Democratic chairman of the US House the world with black-humoured anti-trader themes, such as the of Representatives Oversight committee, eviscerate the former photographic montage “Sad Guys On Trading Floors”, and the Lehman Brothers CEO who earned $US485 million ($702 mil- image of a protest sign positioned right in front of the New York lion), is almost worth the pain of a recession. Well, not quite. But Stock Exchange: “Jump! You F...ers”. This was a reference to the as free entertainment goes, it held some malicious satisfaction. (exaggerated) spate of suicides in the Great Depression when failed “You’ve been able to pocket close to half a billion dollars,” Waxman businessmen leapt out of skyscrapers. scolded Richard “Gorilla” Fuld, the alpha male of the defunct Slate magazine even asked last month, “Why aren’t we seeing investment bank. “My question to you is … is that fair for the any suicides on Wall Street?” – as if the public had been cheated CEO of a company that’s now bankrupt to have made that kind of its human sacrifices. of money? You have a $US14 The rhinoceros hides of million ocean-front home in the objects of this derision They built mansions with indoor only serve to intensify mob Florida, you have a summer vacation home in Sun Valley, passions. Even with the and outdoor pools, basketball Idaho, you and your wife economy crashing, they have an art collection filled saw no need to curb their courts, skating rinks and Picassos with million-dollar paintings excesses. Lehman Brothers [in your $US15 million Park reportedly signed off on on the walls. Specialists in shortAvenue apartment], your for$US20 million packages for mer president, Joe Gregory, three former executives four selling, they were the cockroaches used to travel to work in his days before filing for bankown private helicopter … ruptcy, and executives were “Our economy is in a state of the financial holocaust, seemingly still flying to Washington of crisis, but you get to keep on the company jet rather indestructible $US480 million. I have a basic than catching the $US128 question. Is this fair?” At this Amtrak express train. point Waxman can almost feel his global audience leaping out of Unfortunately for gloaters seeking revenge, as Bill Clinton its seats, punching the air. Go Henry! pointed out this month, there is very little of Wall Street left to Fuld, 62, informed that his role was to play the “villain” of Wall scapegoat. “The Wall Street that we knew is gone. It vanished in Street, did his best during his televised grilling in Washington. two months.” Author Tom Wolfe, who coined the phrase “masters “I don’t expect you to feel sorry for me,” he told the committee. of the universe” in his 1987 book Bonfire Of The Vanities, wrote “I got no severance, I got no golden parachute … I never sold last month in the New York Times that the real risk-takers left Wall my shares …

Street six years ago to start private hedge funds, in Greenwich, “I wake up every single night thinking, ‘What could I have Connecticut, a leafy arcadia near Manhattan dubbed “Upper done differently? This is a pain that will stay with me the rest of Hedgistan”. That is where the real trouble started. my life.” Bring out the violins. Cry me a river. Boohoo.

The “hedgies” earned the kind of indecent money that makes Also berated by Waxman this month were executives from Fuld’s millions look paltry. They used private funds given to them American International Group, the world’s largest insurance com- by other wealthy people to play the stockmarket, without any of pany, who went on a $US440,000 spree at the St Regis resort in the restrictions ordinary brokers have, taking management fees 16 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

“Who, me?” Lehman CEO Richard S. Fuld Jr. testifies before the House Oversight and Government Reform panel on the collapse of Lehman Brothers Bank. (Photo by Ryan Kelly/ Congressional Quarterly)

and up to 40 per cent of profits. They built mansions with indoor and outdoor pools, basketball courts, skating rinks and Picassos on the walls. Specialists in short-selling, they were the cockroaches of the financial holocaust, seemingly indestructible.

“I hate to disappoint people gloating over the fate of the masters of the universe,” Wolfe told National Public Radio. “But [these guys] are very bright, much smarter than the people they left behind in the investment banks … [and a lot of them] have put away the necessary ‘nut’.” The nut, said Wolfe, is at least $US40 million in weatherproof investments that will yield enough interest to allow them to continue to live in the manner to which they are accustomed.

To be fair, there is more than enough blame for the current global woes to be shared around, from social engineering poli-

ticians who perverted the mortgage-lending market, to lax US regulators, but in our heart of hearts we know that capitalism and the free market are only as good as the morality of the people operating them.

As tempting as revenge fantasies are, we might look instead on the bright side. For too long, the best and the brightest students from the best universities have been drawn into lucrative careers in “financial origami”.

Maybe now, as visiting US physicist Lawrence Krauss said last month, bright students will again be interested in becoming scientists, engineers, teachers, and poets, where their intellects and creativity will be fully exercised, even though their wallets may not be. devinemiranda@hotmail.com

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 17

> straight talk

Mark Steyn

With a wink and a smile: A citizen-politician runs for veep

B

ack in February, several political lifetimes ago, I was ing in ANWR and she was hoping to bring him round on that. on the radio with Laura Ingraham and she played Stevie And then she grinned and gave a mischievous wink into the camWonder’s campaign song for Barack Obama, whose lyric, era, and to the nation. in its entirety, runs: “Don’t sell the American people short,” said Obama honcho Ba-rack O-ba-ma David Axelrod. “They need more than a wink and a smile.” Okay, Ba-a-rack O-ba-a-ma so how about this? Joe Biden mocked the McCain campaign’s Ba-ra-ack Obama-a... energy policy as “Drill, drill, drill”, and the governor came back (Repeat until coronation.) to correct the line: “It’s not ‘Drill, drill, drill’,” she grinned. “It’s And Laura and I had a good laugh about it, until it occurred ‘Drill, baby, drill!’” to me that, in politics as in pop, the tune is more important than To be sure, if you listened to the lyrics – the policy, the facts, the words. A guy can run for president with all the right lyrics the platform – they weren’t always what you wanted to hear.

– on the war, the economy, the social issues – but what matters is Governor Palin’s riff on education quickly descended into a rote whether people respond to the underlying music: not what he’s call for more spending, even though America already spends more saying, but how he’s saying it. At the time, I was reflecting on Mitt per pupil than any advanced nation other than Switzerland and Romney: The song looked great on paper, but when he stuck it on has less to show for it. And more than once you pined for a more the stand and started to warble it never quite soared. devastating putdown: The Obama “plan” to “end” the war was, That’s where Sarah Palin scored in the vice-presidential show- more precisely, a plan to lose the war, and in a healthy political culdown. A lot of the grandees ture would disqualify him in the post-debate analysis from serious contention. If Biden was doing his best to reviewed the lyrics and missed I’d been in charge of “coachthe music. Whereas, I would ing” Governor Palin, I’d turn in a decent karaoke version of take her out back, and set wager, a big chunk of uncommitted voters out in TV land up the various Obama polLloyd Bentsen, but, unfortunately, listened to Governor Palin, icy platforms as cardboard and liked the tune they were elk, lurking in the protective Governor Palin declined to play hearing. If you’re one of those undergrowth of the maincoastal feminists who despise stream media but still emiDan Quayle Alaska’s sweetheart as a chillnently hittable to a crack billy breeder whose knowledge shot. of foreign policy is as full of holes as the last moose to make the By contrast, Senator Biden was glib and fluent and in command mistake of strolling past her deck, this month’s folksy performance of the facts – if by “in command of the facts” you mean “talks isn’t going to change your view. But, if your contempt for her wasn’t complete blithering balderdash and hogwash.” He flatly declared already chiselled in granite, she came over as genuine, confident that Obama “never said” he would meet Ahmadinejad without …and different. Change you can believe in, to coin a phrase. preconditions. But, on Debate Night, the official Obama webI was a bit alarmed at first. I hadn’t seen her for awhile, not site was still boasting that he would meet Ahmadinejad “without since the halfwits at the McCain campaign walled her up in the preconditions”. He said America spends more in a month in Iraq witness protection program and permitted visitations only by than it’s spent in seven years in Afghanistan. Er, America has spent selected poobahs of the Metamucil networks. When she walked over $700 billion in Afghanistan since 2001. It’s spending about out on stage, her famous reach-for-the-skies up-do seemed a bit $10 billion a month in Iraq. But no matter. To demonstrate his subdued and earthbound, like a low-budget remake of the famous command of the “facts”, Senator Biden sportingly offered up his scene in There’s Something About Mary. Then she started speaking. own instant replays: The lyrics were workmanlike, but the music was effective. I have “My friend John McCain voted 422 times against tax cuts for a couple of favourite snapshots from the evening. One was when the middle classes. Let me repeat that so the American people are Governor Sarah Palin said that John McCain hadn’t required her clear on this. My friend John McCain voted 673 times against tax to check her principles at the door, and she still believed in drill- cuts for the middle classes.”

18 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

The problem was that it all sounded drearily senatorial. Mention any global crisis – civil war in Bosnia, genocide in Darfur, Russian aggression in Georgia, the lack of five-star restaurants in Wales – and Biden has been there, usually within the last two weeks, and always at public expense. What the American taxpayer gets for the Emir of Delaware’s frequent-flyer miles is harder to discern. Biden was doing his best to turn in a decent karaoke version of Lloyd Bentsen, but, unfortunately, Governor Palin declined to play Dan Quayle. That left Joe sounding like an ancient pol being generically vice-presidential. Sarah, at her best, sounded like the citizen-politician this country’s Founders intended.

She hasn’t voted 397 times against this or that in the U.S. Senate, because she’s been running a state, and a town, and a commercial fishing operation.

She’s a doer, not a talker, which is why so many of my fellow professional talkers disdain her.

When Regular Joe Six-Pack Bluecollar Biden tried to match her on the Main Street cred, it rang slightly wacky. “Look,” he said, “All you have to do is go down Union Street with me in Wilmington or go to Katie’s Restaurant or walk into Home Depot with me, where I spend a lot of time.”

Why? Is he moonlighting as a checkout clerk on the evening shift? Or is he stalking that nice lady in Lighting Fixtures? As for Katie’s Restaurant, ah, I’m sure it was grand but apparently it closed in 1990. In the Diner of the Mind, the refills are endless and Senator Joe is sitting shootin’ the breeze over a cuppa joe with a couple other regular joes on adjoining stools while Betty-Jo, the sassy waitress who’s tough as nails but with a heart of gold, says Ol’ Joe, the short-order cook who’s doing his Sloppy Joes just the way the Senator likes ‘em, really appreciates the way that, despite 78 years in Washington, Joe Biden is still just the same regular Joe Six-Pack he was when he and Norman Rockwell first came in for a sarsaparilla all those years ago. But, alas, while he was jetting off for one-to-one talks with the Deputy Tourism Minister of Waziristan, the old neighbourhood changed.

In a conventional presidential environment, Bidenesque fake authenticity would be enough. Up against Sarah Palin’s authentic authenticity, I’m not so sure. All I know is that the McCain campaign should have her out on the road and doing every interview she can over this final month. Oh, and send her snowmobiling hubby to Maine, which splits its electoral college votes. He’ll put their Second Congressional District back in the red camp, and the way things are looking that could be the 270th vote that saves McCain’s bacon.

UPI Photo/Brian Kersey

In a conventional presidential environment, Bidenesque fake authenticity would be enough. Up against Sarah Palin’s authentic authenticity, I’m not so sure.

All I know is that the McCain campaign should have her out on the road and doing every interview she can over this final month

© Mark Steyn, 2008

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 19

> eyes right

Richard Prosser

God defend New Zealanders

I

’m angry this month. Actually I’m disgusted and angry, the nation with the Fighting Quality, birthplace of the All Blacks, and I’m disgusted and angry with the New Zealand Police. inventor of the SAS, home of the Good Keen Man? I’ve had enough of the increasing ineffectiveness of the Police How and why, I wonder, did PC stop meaning Police Constable, Force, their changing priorities, the lies about what those pri- and start meaning Politically Correct? Whatever became of the orities are, the creeping politicisation of the command structure Red Squad? and the senior ranks, and the fact that good cops in the street are You wouldn’t have caught the Good Cops from the Old Days being tarred with a brush which should, by rights, only serve to telling people to act like pussies. By the Old Days I mean twenty smear the few who are responsible for the aforementioned lies and thirty years ago, and by Good Cops I mean the ones who and politics. were part of their communities, who played rugby and drank at But mostly I’m angry and disgusted by the tired and predict- the local pub, who administered summary justice and employed able bleating about citizens taking the law into their own hands, discretion, wisely and as it was needed. every time some innocent victim of crime is forced to defend They were the men who would quietly advise you that if you were themselves because the Police either can’t, or won’t, come to their going to shoot an intruder, shoot him through the head, and then fire assistance. Too often we are told not to approach escaped prison- a warning shot into the ceiling. That way, it was your word against ers or wanted felons. Too often we are advised to listen meekly his, and the neighbours had heard two shots, the first of which was to the demands of thugs and robbers, to lie down and be walked (obviously) your warning, and he was dead, which meant both a over, to give up the money and allow our rights and property to just outcome, and whole lot less paperwork for them, and everyone be violated. Walk away, we are was happy. told. Scurry off to a safe disThey were the men who Our own Police are all too often tance and hide under a rock. would chew your ear and Never mind that it’s three in then tell you to get home unable to intervene or respond in the morning, and you’re half quick, rather than drag the asleep and/or frightened and breathalyser out, when they anything like a timely or useful in shock. Behave calmly, ratioknew you only lived ten nally, and as if you had the minutes away, and a tellfashion, because their resources benefits of hindsight and safe ing off (with optional boot distance. Call the Police, who in the rear end, dependare otherwise committed; to the will attend promptly, either ing on your age) for speedwithin 24 hours, or when ing – at least the first time. important busywork of issuing they have finished writing trafThey were also the men who fic tickets, whichever comes would remember your helptraffic infringements first. If you’re hurt, you can ing hand when they were wait for the ambulance too – frogmarching some reprothey’ll let it in through the cordon just as soon as they are sure that bate out of the pub, and give you a wink and wave through, the Everything Is Safe. Just don’t bleed to death in the meantime. next week at the checkpoint. They were the men who would turn Well I say enough of this namby-pamby rubbish. If I want to a blind eye, when a bunch of cockies decided to lie in wait in a risk a beating by taking on some criminal, what business is that of darkened haybarn, armed with pick handles and lengths of alkthe Police Commissioner? How does he know whether I’m a Black athene pipe, for the scum who had been stealing fuel and machinBelt or not? Come to that, how does the criminal know? ery from local farms.

Perhaps this is indicative of institutional cowardice on the part of I don’t know where those men have gone, and this week I am the Police. Perhaps they don’t want their individual and collective outraged by their replacements. It’s bad enough that a farmer in impotence highlighted. Maybe they’re actually on the side of the Northland gets dragged through the Courts for shooting at the criminals, in some perverse way. Yes, I’m grasping at straws here; scum who were stealing his farm bike. It’s bad enough that a good but that’s because I’m struggling to understand what went wrong bloke in Taranaki gets charged for taking to the scum who were with the New Zealand Police, and when, and why. Are we not attacking his solo mother neighbour, dealing to their car with a 20 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

machete. It’s beyond ridiculous that when a decent law-abiding citizen shoots the tires out from under the scum who have been burgling homes in his small coastal town, the cops decide that he’s the bad guy, when they themselves were three-quarters of an hour away and were powerless to do anything at all. It’s incomprehensible that when some idiot scum tries to rob a gun shop with a machete, and gets shot for his trouble, that the gun shop owner is the one who finds himself in the gun. The list goes on. A farm couple in the Bay of Plenty are beaten and robbed because not only will the Police not do anything about it themselves, but they tie up the couple’s phone line so that the neighbours, who are close by and armed, can’t even be made aware of what is happening.

But this week it has gone from ridiculous to insane. A shop owner in Auckland, faced by a gang of thugs armed with knives, defends his life and property, and gets stabbed for his trouble, only to be arrested by the Police for using “excessive force”. What kind of madness is this? Only weeks beforehand, another store owner is murdered in his own shop, once again during an armed robbery; and the very next day, yet another is fighting for his life after being stabbed. Under these circumstances, how excessive can the use of force be? For God’s sake, is any use of force in self-defence now considered excessive by our Police if the victim is still alive afterwards, or if the perpetrator has been harmed in any way?

Now it would be easy, I know, to paint the Police as pawns in some greater game here; subject to the whims of Government, shackled by legislation, caught between the proverbial rock and hard place. But that, I think, tasteless pun intended, would be a cop-out. In all the cases mentioned above, it has been the Police who have, at their discretion – which remains considerable – chosen to prosecute. And in all cases where such has been applicable, juries have thrown those prosecutions out again. The same Police, however, regularly fail to bring charges against corrupt and fraudulent members of Government, ostensibly because they cannot see the public good being served by such action. Well, maybe they need to look a little more closely.

In Texas, a man shoots two robbers who are burgling his neighbour’s house. He shoots them dead, in the back, with a shotgun, all the while speaking by phone to a Police dispatcher, who is pleading with him to withdraw and wait. But the Police cannot compel the man to cease his vigilante action, because Texas law specifically allows the use of deadly force to protect oneself, and similarly extends those allowances to one’s neighbour, down to and including one’s neighbour’s property. We do not have such laws here, of course, though it is this writer’s firm opinion that we should; but we do have a similar sentiment, established and growing, and fertilised to no small degree by the public’s changing and ever more cynical perception of the Police, as a result of their actions and decisions in our own cases of this type.

Whilst the public suffer under the ever heavier yoke of criminal activity, our own Police are all too often unable to intervene or respond in anything like a timely or useful fashion, because their resources are otherwise committed; to the important busywork of issuing traffic infringements, for such heinous crimes as driving at 111 km/h on an empty road in good weather, or crossing the centreline of a badly shaped corner, on that same empty road, with visibility halfway to forever. Protesting that they are not, in fact, the roadside branch of the Inland Revenue Department, the Police regularly bore us with the tired old line that no, they don’t have ticket quotas for Highway Patrol officers; rather, they have enforcement guidelines.

There is, I believe, an even older line, which goes something like

“don’t piss on my leg and tell me it’s raining.”

The thing is, y’see, we know that they’re lying when they come out with stuff like that, and it annoys us to the point of losing respect, that they don’t have the balls to admit it. And then the next time they say something like “don’t take the law into your own hands”, well, we think to ourselves, it’s our law, and we’ll jolly well do what we like with it, thank you very much, especially if you’re not going to do it for us.

And it is the fault of the ordinary cops on the front line, because they’re the ones who are not standing up to their superiors and telling them all this. They’re not facing up to the Senior Officers, and the District Commanders, and the Commissioner, and the Minister, and saying “no, Sir, you will hear me out.”

And this is important, because if there’s very much more of it, the placid people of this peaceful country will come to regard the Police as being irrelevant.

Policing in a country such as New Zealand is carried out by a very small force (the entire NZ police force could be squeezed into the hall of one of our larger suburban high schools), on behalf of, and only with the willing complicity of, a people by whom they are impossibly outnumbered and hopelessly outgunned.

And it’s important because, regardless of any law, on any statute book, in any country, people do have a God-given right to defend themselves; and if – Government and the Courts having already failed us – the Police in New Zealand will not exercise their discretion and their common sense with regard to that right, then there will come a point where ordinary people, their patience expired, will simply stand up and take it by force, and if the Police get in their way, they will be run over.

And if that happens, then God help us all.

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www.stressless.co.nz INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 21

> line one

Chris Carter Dereliction of duty

B

y now I’m sure that most folk are well aware that amongst at head office along with say Rudy Giuliani, the guy who cleaned the Labour Government’s many abject failures, includes, up New York being appointed as Chief, our current Police offiright at the top of the list, in providing for the collective cers would have serious crime in this country on its knees douand personal safety of its citizens. The army, navy and ble quick. By the way, I wonder how many of you have noticed air force are now, to all intents and purposes, on their last legs. the difference in respect shown to Police in other countries that From a massive shortage of trained personnel due to appallingly you’ve visited. Like abuse a cop in the States and see what happens low wages, to recent equipment purchases, that certainly in the to you, or in Sydney for that matter. Our young crims treat our case of the Navy are far more likely to do harm to the crew than police with straight out contempt largely because our Department any potential adversary, through to the RNZAF, now little more of Justice is run and controlled by nit wits who won’t back the than a freight carrying outfit who are flying aircraft so old that Police up. This hapless department genuinely believe that crimilater models can now be found in museums world wide. Oh yes, nals are victims too, and that counselling and group hugs are the we do still own the Skyhawks, costing the Air force’s already nig- answer, rather than a good smack around the ear or even better gardly overall budget $12 million a year just to keep them in suf- seven days in an old fashioned cell. ficient order so that at every election Labour can lie yet again as to OK, where has all of this left us, the law abiding citizens of how they now have a buyer for them! The Army? Well let us pray this fine land when it comes to our expectation that our elected that Fiji doesn’t get sufficiently ticked off with the PM’s contin- Government will perform its prime duty towards us, and that ual bagging of their country or being to provide safety and they may very well successfully security for everyone. How Much better in my view to be the about feeling very nervous. invade us, just so that Frank Bainimarama can pop up to That despite the spin docthe Beehive and smack Dear accused rather than the latest of the toring of the elderly hippies Leader’s bottom! currently in Government, many victims that have gone Moving on to our other who lie and massage our major protection agency, the violent crime figures, until, before you Police. Well where does one if this lot were doing the job begin? To be fair, the police they would have made the certainly are right at the top of the tax gatherer’s prize list in that Jonestown Massacre look like a minor disagreement at a Bible the amount of coin the coppers manage to liberate from motorists Camp. The truly worrying factor is though, that this Government, is simply astounding and who knows might even have some effect perhaps because of only associating with the other elitist parliaon road safety as well. But from there on in when it comes to the mentary drones, seems completely unaware of what really is going Police performing their other much more important duties it’s all on and that is seriously affecting the lives of the people they are down hill. No point in trotting out some of the thousands of very meant to represent. well publicised problems the force is having regarding a chronic Take for instance the recent violent robberies taking place that lack of service, stupid decision making, and widely thought to be are turning the previously safe occupation of running a corner controlled by the PM’s office. We have a Police hierarchy so liberal dairy or suburban service station into being very dangerous. Who and politically correct that the real troops, the coppers out there is protecting these folk, either by increased police patrolling or by in the thick of things are so scared of being “beastly” to criminals the infliction of savage prison sentencing by way of deterrent? Even and the local thugs that even wearing the newly issued kid gloves worse is when it becomes patently obvious that the only person they frequently stop an official bollocking should they not measure who is going to protect you, your staff or family that helps out in every word and action against the limp wristed head office play the shop is you. So you quite sensibly stick a weapon under the book. Who would be a policeman indeed, although we should all counter to help even things up a bit. Comes the time that some be very grateful that despite the “Job” having largely moved away knife wielding robber tries it on and you help him on his way to from tough enforcement and swift justice, it still attracts a whole Casualty, guess who is almost guaranteed to end up before the lot of brave young Kiwi’s to its ranks. beak! Absolutely scandalous that Police Head Office policy now I’m sure that with a complete clean out of the sandal-wearers seems to be even denying the ordinary citizen the right to defend 22 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

him or her self. Actually that’s not strictly correct either because in the warped PC views of a prosecuting officer, if a woman shop owner brained a robber with a crow bar or something similar, being a chick, she’d be a hero, which of course she would be, but then so should anyone who takes on the ungodly.

Fortunately, we the would be victims of all this violence, should we react suitably and really deal to one of these scum bags and naturally we end up being charged for having done so, still have the Jury system to protect us, with the twelve members of same being most unlikely to convict you because they, unlike the criminal cuddlers, given the chance would have acted in exactly the same way. The Police in this apparent desire to stop people protecting themselves should consider the law’s original intention.

If, for instance, a large and powerful person enters your home or shop, armed with a knife, club, gun whatever and you quite reasonably believe that they mean you harm, then it appears to me that at that point in time you have every right in the world to take what ever action you deem necessary. No one else, after the fact can surely second guess your decision, because they weren’t there so are in no position to judge the actual circumstances that faced you. Bottom line, you are confronted by an armed person who may very well intend to kill you, the Police are nowhere close enough to help you. What do you do?

The American police have a great saying as their troops go out on patrol. “Do it to them before they do it to you”, and I have to say that as a normally peaceable person, my feelings always will be...Don’t hesitate, if you have an “equaliser” handy, for a single second. Much better in my view to be the accused rather than the latest of the many victims that have gone before you. Saw a copper on the television the other week who seriously suggested that

Abuse a cop in the States and see what happens to you, or in Sydney for that matter

a man who had been threatened with a knife by a ‘would be’ robber, that he should have dialled 111. Yeah right! He could then have had the choice of being well carved up or being stabbed to death, or dying of old age waiting for the Police to arrive eh! Meantime this dairy owner having apparently been stabbed in the leg by the young thug, took to him with a bat of some sort and was subsequently charged for having done so. Perhaps we should give the authorities a box of medals to dish out instead of arrest warrants.

This would do wonders in correcting the wide spread impression that some police appear to think that their main purpose is to protect and molly coddle armed robbers rather than to arrest them. Meantime, seeing neither Labour nor its various agencies seem inclined to effectively protect us, then our only option is to carry out this important function ourselves.

Be assured that if the authorities warped views on “fairness” end up with you ever being charged for dealing to the bad guys, that if I’m on the jury, you won’t even need a lawyer...you’ll be getting an automatic vote of not guilty.

Chris Carter appears in association with www.snitch.co.nz, a must-see site.

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> tough questions

Ian Wishart

Richard Dawkins believes in God

I

n their struggle to explain the apparent fine tuning of the He just doesn’t want that writing to be in Hebrew. universe for life, Dawkins, Richard Carrier and other atheists Perhaps the final proof needed for this chapter however comes would have us ignore the positive evidence, and instead reach from Richard Dawkins himself. It turns out he does believe in for any other possible theory, including that the universe itself God, he just hasn’t come out of the closet yet. Here’s the clue, “wished” these things into existence. At the end of the day, the best in his words: argument Carrier can muster on the Infidels website comes down “There is no limit to the explanatory purposes to which God’s to either that, or a variation on deism – a deceased god: infinite power is put. Is science having a little difficulty explain“In fact, it gets worse when we consider the possibility that the ing X? No problem. Don’t give X another glance. God’s infinite creator no longer exists – imagine a lonely god who has a choice, power is effortlessly wheeled in to explain X (along with everything to live alone, or to die, and in dying create a universe from his else), and it is always a supremely simple explanation.” [Dawkins’ exploding “corpse” which will have populations of people who emphasis] can then live the god’s lost dream of knowing love and never Now look at Dawkins as he invokes exactly the same simplicity being alone. Perhaps the god stays alive, so he can share in this to get himself out of a tight spot on the Big Bang: love, but is powerless, having given up his body for the creation “It is tempting to think (and many have succumbed) that to posof a universe. tulate a plethora of universes is a profligate luxury which should “This is plausible, coherent, logical, and actually better explains not be allowed. If we are going to permit the extravagance of a things – it perfectly explains multiverse, so the argument how god can be good and runs, we might as well be Dawkins believes in God. He can’t hung for a sheep as a lamb yet silent and inactive, how the universe can function so and allow a God. escape the scientific evidence for cold and mechanically and “Aren’t they both equally deterministically… unparsimonious ad hoc Creation staring him in the face.

“By all sense and reason, this hypotheses, and equally theory should be adopted by unsatisfactory? People who So he too, like Richard Carrier, has creationists – yet they adhere think that have not had to a weaker theory, oblivious their consciousness raised named his deity “Multiverse” to the self-refuting character by natural selection. The of declarations like that of Mr. key difference between the Walker when he writes “when I look at the wondrous universe genuinely extravagant God hypothesis and the apparently extravathat surrounds me, I have no problem in accepting a being that gant multiverse hypothesis is one of statistically improbability. The I can’t fully explain” and yet fails to see how the atheist, with just multiverse, for all that it is extravagant, is simple.” [my emphasis] as much right if not more, can and does say exactly the same Hey presto! Scientific atheist has big problem explaining away thing – but the “being” the atheist sees and can’t fully explain is X (Big Bang), wheels in natural selection’s alleged infinite power the universe itself. How much simpler this is – it requires add- (multiple universes exist, and we just happen to live in the one ing nothing to what we see or know. Instead, creationists refuse with life), and best of all, the explanation is supremely simple. to accept “a being that they can’t fully explain” (the universe) and Dawkins believes in God. He can’t escape the scientific evibecause of their refusal are compelled to invent a god to provide dence for Creation staring him in the face. So he too, like Richard the explanation that they insist is necessary. They don’t notice that Carrier, has named his deity “Multiverse”. they then do a complete about-face, and act in an exact opposite Now that even the world’s most vocal atheist fundamentalist manner when it comes time to explain their god. Inconsistency has been sprung endorsing a God argument and/or a “Sky Fairy” is the creationist’s hobgoblin.” named “Multiverse”, I think it is safe to declare that “a” God exists.

Not really; it appears to be an equal-opportunities hobgoblin. The question now turns to this: which God that might be…?

We’ve now discovered that the intellectual grunt behind one of the world’s main atheist websites lurks in boltholes named “deism” This Tough Questions is an extract from Ian Wishart’s book The Divinity Code, and “pantheism”, because even he can see the writing on the wall. available from all good booksellers or online at www.evesbite.com 24 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

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26 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

Behind Crash Why democracy is under threat in NZ, the US and the West in general

Labour claims it never saw the world financial crash coming, and then says “trust us”. But as IAN WISHART explains, the crash brings with it the possibility of draconian new government edicts under the guise of “medicine”, and heralds a very dark time for democracy

28 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 29

T

wo major election campaigns, half a world away from each other, have thrown fundamental issues of democracy into stark relief for voters, but there’s little indication that voters are taking any notice.

In the United States, Democrat presidential hopeful Barack Obama has been given an almost unchallenged glide path into the White House by the mainstream news media, despite massive doubts about his links to terrorists and possibly the Mafia.

In New Zealand, Labour’s Helen Clark is being given a similar easy ride by journalists, with none challenging her misdemeanours in interviews, or even her opinions in many cases.

One example in the first week of October was Clark’s reaction to National’s tax cuts policy. Clark told journalists New Zealanders would be worse off under National’s cuts yet – as bloggers soon picked up – not one journalist pointed out to Clark that National’s cuts left more money in the hands of all workers than Labour’s.

Then, on Labour’s campaign website, Prime Minister Helen Clark rips into National’s John Key over the economic collapse: “������������������������������������������������������������� The moment the US Subprime Crisis hit the rest of the world, the stakes in this election changed. Earlier this week, John Key came out and said that they’re taking the situation very seriously, and they’ve reined in their tax cut plans. But have they really?

“Key said, with a straight face, that his $6 billion worth of tax cuts were “self-funding”, spinning the $3 billion he cut out of Kiwisaver as simple “changes”. What’s more, these “changes” will discourage people from saving, so the final hit to Kiwisaver will be far larger than $3 billion.

“The economic thinking behind the plan doesn’t stack up. The Herald’s Brian Fallow wrote: “You can’t have your cake and eat it. Our dismal household and national savings rates and the associated build-up of debt show we have been over-fond of eating cake.“Have another slice, the bakers could do with the business,” is the message of this plan.”

“John Key’s response to a global crisis caused by too much spending and not enough saving is to save less, and spend even more.

It’s every bit as dumb as it sounds.”

Yet Labour’s response is shallow as well. Most of the Kiwisaver schemes are heavily exposed to shares and foreign investment markets. The entire premise they were built on – long term growth – is perched precariously on the never-never. The world financial crash has not only wiped 30 to 40% off the value of the sharemarkets around the world, but it’s likely to send many companies to the wall. Portfolios won’t be appreciating any time soon, and many commentators internationally are picking a recovery period of many years.

Twenty-somethings investing in Kiwisaver will probably be safe by the time of their retirement, but most of the other half-million or so Kiwisavers have just witnessed their savings being massively eroded. Baby-boomers and even Gen-Xers don’t have the luxury of waiting 40 years for a return on their money.

Whilst saving is a great idea, it is the destination of those savings that will ultimately determine the fate of New Zealand’s economy.

Money saved locally, and spent on locally manufactured goods, will strongly assist in any recovery. Money saved but invested offshore is not only at higher risk, but it also does nothing for the New Zealand economy.

If you’re looking for the canary down the mineshaft on this, you’d be hard-pressed to find a better candidate than Japan. In the mid 90s, the Japanese economy was tanking, banks were fail30 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

ing and consumer confidence was down. Their government reacted by printing more cash, which it used to prop up the banks and release liquidity into the market.

But the Japanese had what they thought was a cunning plan, as this report from 2006 notes: “�������������������������� Japan has been able avoid inflation through having high domestic savings and by investing heavily outside the country. This has kept the Yen from appreciating against the dollar, enabled Japan’s export sector to remain competitive, and kept interest rates at near zero. As much of Japan’s external investments have been in the USA, it has resulted in Japan holding assets worth trillions of US dollars, many of which are invested in US Treasury Bonds and Mutual Funds.

“Printing money to solve a nation’s economic problem can never be sustained.

Eventually, it will lead to the debasing of a nation’s currency and run-away inflation. Yet for a short period, it can create an artificial prosperity, deluding the masses into believing this new prosperity can be sustained. The long-term consequences of inflating their money supply will spell disaster for America and Japan, and have dire consequences for the global economy.”

Those words were written on one US website in 2006 and have come eerily true, with the Nikkei Index plunging 24% in just five days.

Japanese mums and dads, whose retirement savings funds had fuelled this recent boom, are watching their investment values plummet, raising serious questions about the wisdom of compulsory superannuation savings and where those savings are invested.

Investigate’s Selwyn Parker was one of the first journalists in New Zealand to predict a major financial crash if the Japanese got nervous. Instead of creating inflation in Japan, all those loose newlyprinted Japanese yen were being pumped into the US, Icelandic, NZ and Australian economies because of our high interest rates.

Japanese investors, given the option of a 1% interest rate at home, or 7% in New Zealand, plunged their spare cash into NZ and the others, creating liquidity and inflationary pressures in the West as banks rushed to lend out cheap Japanese money.

“Japanese investors, given the option of a 1% interest rate at home, or 7% in New Zealand, plunged their spare cash into NZ and the others, creating liquidity and inflationary pressures in the West as banks rushed to lend out cheap Japanese money” INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 31

Consumers, able to get low interest finance for cars, houses, holidays and the like spent up large across the West.

Up to NZ$40 billion worth of Japanese ‘uridashi’ bonds were pumped into the NZ economy as of early 2007.

“There’s hardly a single respected authority in The City or in the central banks who doesn’t think the yen carry trade will unwind sometime next year (during 2008),” wrote Selwyn Parker for Investigate in early 2007. “The question is when, and how violently. The big worry is that nobody knows the size of the yen carry trade and therefore the effects of a collapse are unpre­dictable.

Measured in US dollars, it’s certainly billions and pos­sibly trillions. Most authorities hope for an orderly phase-out but some fear the worst. ‘The entire global financial system is on the verge of disintegration, as a result of the imminent col­lapse of the yen carry trade’, predicted the Daily Telegraph, not normally a doomsaying newspaper, back in February.”

The lesson for all the world’s major economies from The Great Depression was the need to heavily invest locally, rather than to import goods and support someone else’s economic recovery. But the difference between ’29 and ’08 is simple: globalization.

Post world war two, the world’s industrialists have pushed 32 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

their political leaders to open up borders and encourage free movement of capital, people and influence. When one domino falls, the rest follow, writes Ugandan newspaper columnist �������� Timothy Kalyegira: “As the western media concentrates on the major markets in North America, Europe, and East Asia, an important region has been little reported on: the Middle East.

‘Stock markets in the Gulf and across much of the Arab world are in a swoon, after US and Asian markets plunged,’ reported the Voice of America in a 1600 GMT news bulletin on October 6. “ ‘Many large Gulf investors have money invested in US equities and real estate, while the steep recent drop in oil prices is also affecting their revenues…’

“Wednesday, October 8, saw the fourth consecutive day of losses on the Middle Eastern markets, with more than US$150 billion lost. And as we all know, when a financial crisis hits the Middle East, not far behind are forces that would take advantage and stir up young men into further resentment against the West. “ ‘I think it’s the end of an era in the United States,’ Professor Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University in New York told CNN on Wednesday, October 8.

“Well put. This is a world that is changing in ways we shall only start to grasp in 2009. Something dark and deadly will surely come out of the events of 2008,” warns the Africa-based commentator.

In her election campaign launch speech (see next story), Prime Minister Helen Clark denied any inkling of the possibility of a worldwide economic crash: “We know of no precedent for the scale of what is happening in international markets, nor for the scale of the responses being made in those world capitals where financial services make a significant contribution to the size of the economy.

“Who could have envisaged even six weeks ago the US Government would undertake a $US700 billion bail out – or Britain a part nationalisation of major banks?” asked Clark, quite disingenuously.

It was disingenuous because, for a start, many commentators, including Investigate’s own Peter Hensley, had been warning of exactly this major crash, for months, or in Hensley’s case, years: “In late 2005,” he wrote in July 06, “the number of hedge funds available to the investing public exceeded the number of managed funds that were around in late 2000. The difference is that the hedge funds operate in a zero sum game. In simple terms they are picking each others pockets. Sooner or later a pocket is picked so much there is nothing left, the manager has nothing left to trade with, he loses his job and the investors lose their money.

“Serious fund managers have gone way past the idea of trading currencies, orange juice contracts and pork bellies futures. That

market is for kindergarten novice traders. The big boys have actually created their own products (known as synthetic collateralised debt obligations – or CDO’s in the trade) which are so complicated it takes lawyers months to write prospectuses and investment statements for them.

“The derivative market is totally unregulated. A very small number of the millions of derivative contracts traded daily are actually traded on a futures exchange. The rest (read large majority) are Over The Counter (OTC) contracts which have no central register anywhere in the world. The uncontrolled nature of market has not only fostered creativity, it has actively promoted innovation.

There are CDO’s, CDO’s squared and CDO’s cubed with hedge fund managers actively trading these synthetic contracts daily.

“There is no gate keeper or controlling authority for the OTC derivative market and that this sector has grown exponentially over the past five years. It takes money to fuel such markets, sourced from mums and dads around the world. The offerings have been packaged for the masses under the banner of high yield hedge funds. The fortunate fund traders have been charging annual fees based on a combination of total funds under management plus a performance fee. Reuters reported last year that management fees for a single fund were in excess of $50 million.”

Hensley told Investigate readers the bottom line was simple:

“These are huge numbers by anyone’s standards. Warren Buffet (the second richest man in the USA) calls them financial weapons of mass destruction. Should something happen to trigger a meltdown in the derivative market place, one has to remember that the fall out would not be that bad, research suggests that because it is a zero sum game (ie for every winner, there is a corresponding loser) the market loss could be approximated to around 5% of the total. Come to think of it, 5% of $480 trillion is still a very large number.

“Market chatter in New Zealand suggests that 2007 will see some rationalisation of the finance company sector.”

By May 2008, market “chatter” was reaching crisis level: “A rumour is swirling around the Internet that an inglorious end to the U.S. economy is imminent,” reported one US website in May this year. “Unlike previous rumours to this effect, this one carries the weight of recent events in the financial realm and has many believing the rumour will come to pass:…Imminent collapse of the U.S. economy by September 2008; imminent collapse of the U.S. Government finances by February 2009; possibility of civil war within the U.S. resulting from the collapse; detainment of “insurgent U.S. citizens” in anticipation of their moving against the government; the potential for violent action taken by citizens against members of Congress due to the collapses; the merger of

“New Zealanders have even more reason to be suspicious.

Despite campaigning on “trust” and transparency, Labour has signalled it won’t be announcing its full economic response until an unscheduled mini-budget in December, if it is returned to power” “If you can’t explain the investment with a simple crayon drawing, don’t invest.”

By January 2007, Hensley was openly picking the collapse of finance companies in New Zealand, or as he called it, “rationalisation”, and an “inevitable correction” in the international markets: “…the inevitable correction that investment markets will suffer. When that correction will occur and what form it might take is anyone’s guess. There is no doubt that the combined actions of Central Banks around the world have certainly delayed the expected correction.

“The increase in liquidity has lifted markets and asset prices. It has also provided the necessary foundation for the expansion of the derivative market. Derivatives come in many forms and they could best be described as an insurance protection for investment portfolios and debts. As outlined in previous essays, they are either exchange traded (ETD) or over the counter (OTC) derivatives.

“As a rule of thumb our [Hensley’s clients’] portfolios are not exposed to any products that are based on OTC derivatives. They are certainly missing out on an exposure to a large market. Latest statistics suggest that the derivative market has reached a face value of $480 trillion, which is 30 times the size of the US economy and 12 times the size of the world economy.

the U.S. economy with those of Canada and Mexico as a solution to the collapse; the introduction of a new tri-national currency called the “AMERO” as another economic solution.”

Dramatic stuff, and probably wild fantasies. But nonetheless a collapse of the US economy in September was right on the money, so to speak.

So the question has to be asked, given all the warning signs and the “chatter” within the markets themselves, where was Treasury, where was the Reserve Bank, and more importantly, where were Helen Clark and Michael Cullen?

Cullen’s opening of the books in PREFU (pre-election fiscal update) this month will have been no surprise to Labour’s finance minister, who has most likely known about the state of the books since delivering the budget.

New Zealanders have even more reason to be suspicious. Despite campaigning on “trust” and transparency, Labour has signalled it won’t be announcing its full economic response until an unscheduled mini-budget in December, if it is returned to power. It won’t say before the election what its mini-budget might contain, but there’s a very good chance some of its election promises (including tax cuts) will be thrown out the window once Labour is voted back in, using the financial emergency as an excuse.

Rightly or wrongly, shouldn’t voters be told now?

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 33

Serious allegations about Obama’s links to organised crime in Chicago, favourable home loans from a Mafia family and Obama then sponsoring one of those family members into a government job – these allegations are largely ignored by the US media, or brushed off as “they’re in the past”

Unfortunately, the daily news media are failing in this election campaign, just as they did three years ago. Neither TV3 nor TV1 has been asking genuinely hard questions of Labour, yet both channels have been more than happy to query whether National has a ‘hidden agenda’ – Labour’s dogwhistle phrase for this election.

A similar phenomenon is happening in the US presidential campaign right now. Whilst the news media have turned virtually every gun they have on John McCain and his vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, they’ve done virtually nothing about Barack Obama.

Case in point, Troopergate. Palin has been excoriated by liberal US news channels over the sacking of an official who failed to sack her ex-brother-in-law, a state trooper. The media have painted it largely as an abuse of power by Palin. What they haven’t reported widely is that the state trooper was found guilty of using a police taser on his ten year old stepson, among other crimes, but was allowed to keep his job by the superior official, who happened to be a political rival to Palin. What kind of oik tasers a 10 year old boy and is allowed to remain on the force?

On the other hand, serious allegations about Obama’s links to organised crime in Chicago, favourable home loans from a Mafia family and Obama then sponsoring one of those family members into a government job – these allegations are largely ignored by the US media, or brushed off as “they’re in the past”.

In giving the allegations the brush-off, media commentators tell the public that “it’s merely dirty campaigning by the McCain 34 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

ticket”, reinforcing the idea that the public should pay no attention to the claims.

“Negative campaigning doesn’t work,” a Zogby pollster was quoted as saying.

But here’s the rub: it should. Once upon a time when voters were smarter and less easily fooled by journalistic spin, they would have realised that saying “they’re in the past” when it comes to criminal associates of a likely President is a silly response to the issue.

Today, democracy in NZ and the US appears to be dying because of stupidity – something commentator Mark Steyn has also noted: “But Obama is defined by his indefinability. When I pointed out to ... Vermont (Obama supporters) that he lives in a swank pad that was part of some shady real estate deal with a convicted fraudster (Tony Rezko), that he entrusted his daughters’ entire religious education to a neo-segregationist anti-American nut who preaches that the government created the AIDS virus to kill black people (Jeremiah Wright), that he attended fundraisers with a political patron who’s an unrepentant terrorist proud of plotting to blow up young ladies just like them at a dance at the Fort Dix military base (William Ayers), when I pointed all this out, they looked at me as if I’d brought a baseball bat to a croquet match.”

Of course. It’s in the past right?”

Elections matter. Character tests of leaders matter. And in a country with no checks and balances other than the ballot box once every three years, they matter more than anything else. n

She says this election will be fought on

TRUST...

Helen Clark is inviting you to test her record, so we’ve put it down in black and white...

ABSOLUTE POWER

By Ian Wishart

Get a copy at your nearest Whitcoulls, Borders, Dymocks, PaperPlus, Take Note or good independent bookstore.

w w w. h e l e n c l a r k b o o k . c o m

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 35

NZPA / David Rowland

LEADERS’ DEBATE National vs Labour

For the benefit of our readers, we’re reprinting the campaign launch speeches for National leader John Key and Labour leader Helen Clark. It is necessary to keep in mind that Clark’s announcement of a guarantee for bank deposits was made without the usual cross-party consultation. Both National and Labour support the guarantee.

36 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

JOHN KEY, NATIONAL It’s time for a change of Government. It’s time for a fresh start. I stand before you today full of confidence about New Zealand’s future and full of the determination needed to lead that future. Because I know you are looking for fresh leadership at this election and I am ready to step up and make sure you get it.

You are all rightly sick of political sideshows, bossy government, and yesterday’s fights. You’re sick to death of hearing about Winston Peters, and you’re sick of being told what to do. You are looking for a Government that will focus on the issues that matter to you – a Government with a plan for economic recovery, and a Government with fresh ideas and the energy to meet the challenges this country faces.

At this election National is offering exactly that.

I am campaigning on strengthening our economy, on rising to the challenge presented by tough global conditions, and on delivering greater prosperity to New Zealanders and their families – because Kiwis are sick of struggling to keep up with the cost of living, they’re sick of worrying about soaring interest rates, and they’re sick of high taxes. That’s what Labour has delivered for nine years and that’s what National is here to change.

I am campaigning on raising education standards, on running a crusade on literacy and numeracy, and on ensuring our schools are working for all students – because New Zealanders are sick of the long tail of underachievement in our schools, they’re sick of wondering how their children are really doing, and they’re sick of yesterday’s schools. That’s what Labour has delivered and that’s what National is here to change.

I’m campaigning on improving safety in our communities, on cracking down on criminal gangs, on going to war on P, and on getting dangerous criminals off our streets – because New Zealanders don’t want LA-style gang crime, they don’t want spiralling youth crime, and they don’t want dangerous criminals on our streets. That’s what Labour has delivered and that’s what National is here to change.

I’m campaigning on getting more out of our health system, on delivering shorter waiting times, on reducing bureaucracy, and on backing our doctors and nurses – because Labour has put in more of your money but they haven’t got the results, and that’s what National is here to change.

The Economic Context Ladies and Gentlemen, this is no ordinary election campaign.

Because this election comes at a time when the global economy is in turmoil and at a time when we are all concerned about what the future may contain.

Unlike Labour, I’m not prepared to mislead the New Zealand public about the situation this country finds itself in. I understand how tough times already are for many of you. I also understand that the events we’ve been seeing on our news bulletins each night – the diving sharemarkets, the bank bailouts, the collapsing firms – though seemingly far away, have and will continue to have real implications for many New Zealanders.

I won’t continue Helen Clark’s business-as-usual farce. A National Government will rise to these challenges. We have been monitoring the build-up in problems in the financial markets over

the past several months, and particularly in recent weeks, and the scale of intervention by other governments.

We have kept in close contact with the Reserve Bank, and I am satisfied that its current plans are sufficient at this stage to maintain confidence in the New Zealand financial system over the coming months. Should it become necessary, however, National is committed to working with the Reserve Bank to ensure financial stability. We will do what needs to be done to keep our financial system strong.

But I’m also here to tell you that something has to change.

Because Labour doesn’t have what it takes to get us through this one. They have ignored the evolving economic crisis and they have done so at your peril.

Getting through this storm will require an astute and economically focused Government.

Labour simply isn’t up to the task. They are fair-weather economic managers. They know how to spend your money and play with a surplus. But they don’t know how to boost economic growth and get value for your money.

Today, somewhere else in Auckland, they’re launching a campaign for re-election. They’ll be talking about economic transformation and listing a whole bunch of buzzwords.

Well you know what? Labour’s actions speak louder than their slogans. Because Labour had nine years of great global conditions.

Ask yourself this: Do you really feel better off?

You had nine years without a tax cut.

Interest rates doubled.

Inflation went through the roof.

The wage gap with Australia widened.

And more of your friends and family have left this country permanently.

It’s a shocking record, and Helen Clark and Michael Cullen should be judged by it.

Warren Buffett has a saying that, ‘You never know who’s swimming naked until the tide goes out’. Labour managed to disguise their loose economic management in the good times, but now that the tide is out they are awfully exposed.

When Michael Cullen opened the books last week, what was his news for struggling Kiwis? A decade of deficits. A decade of deficits and what’s he planning to change? Absolutely nothing.

Worse than that, he revealed almost 60 fiscal risks – extra spending promises to add to the red ink.

Well, I’m here to tell you that Michael Cullen’s number just came up. And he signed his valedictory in red ink. Because New Zealand can’t afford our fair-weather Finance Minister any longer.

Only National will show the discipline and resolve needed to ensure Kiwis can have financial security in the years ahead. Only National can make the most out of every taxpayer dollar. And only National can get New Zealand out of the red ink.

National’s economic management plan Earlier this week, while Helen Clark was announcing another business-as-usual purchase of a $40 million estate for DOC, I released National’s economic management plan.

It’s a plan to bring discipline to government spending, to reduce INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 37

red tape, to reduce personal taxes, to boost infrastructure investment, and to raise education standards.

It’s a recovery plan to ensure our country and our families get through these tough times.

Some say it has not done enough. Some say it does too much.

Some say we should have cancelled all tax cuts and battened down the hatches.

I’ve got a few points to make about it.

First, let me be clear: National’s tax reductions on April 1 next year will come right when our economy needs them.

It would be absolutely wrong to tighten the screws on the economy at this point. It would cost people jobs and it would grind our economic engine to a halt. What our country actually needs is a boost. Reducing taxes will stimulate the economy and that is what we will sorely need by April next year.

Second, National’s plan faces the fact that we must lift productivity in this country.

Labour has a dreadful record on productivity and National will do better. That starts by sorting out the Beehive’s own backyard and getting some productivity improvements in the public sector – reducing administration costs, cutting red tape, pushing money into frontline services.

We will do that, Labour won’t do that. End of story.

Third, National’s plan recognises that lifting productivity also means removing the bottlenecks in the economy – the roading problems and the creaky communications networks that are holding business back. That’s why National will fix the Resource Management Act and that’s why we’ll invest more in the infrastructure the economy needs to grow.

Fourth, lifting productivity also means encouraging businesses to invest.

The guys in red like to talk about this idea. But let me tell you something. I’ve had a bit more to do with business than them and it’s actually more straightforward than they think.

The number 1 reason that private companies invest is because they are profitable and feeling positive about the future. All the R&D credits in the world won’t cut it if companies aren’t making any money. We have to get the fundamentals right first.

Finally, a Government that cares about the future of our children and our grandchildren simply must have a plan for digging us out of deficit. That’s what National’s plan will do. It won’t be an easy task. So it’s no surprise that Labour has nothing to say on this one.

Only National has the backbone needed to deliver for our children and dig this country out of deficit. But there is no free lunch.

The road out of deficit involves making some hard choices. And we’ve done that.

We’ve been straight-up and said that in its current form, Labour’s gold-plated KiwiSaver scheme isn’t affordable. It’s not affordable for the three out of four working-aged Kiwis who haven’t joined, and it’s not affordable for the Kiwi taxpayer.

National’s plan will get us more quickly out of deficit, but not yet as quickly as I would like. If we’re to get New Zealand out of deficit before this year’s new entrants go to secondary school then we must grow our economy faster.

I know we can do it. You want to know why? Because I’ve actually worked in the world of finance and business. Helen Clark hasn’t. I’ve actually picked up a struggling business and made it grow. Helen Clark never has. And I’ve actually got stuck into a business, trimmed its sails, and delivered some profits to its shareholders. And that’s what I am determined to do for this country.

38 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

Key commitments In laying out our economic plan, National has been very clear about our priorities. We all know what will be the first to go under Labour, whether they want to admit it or not, and that is the rest of their tax-cut package.

Well, unlike Labour I’m going to be straight-up about my priorities. That’s why I’m sending a card to all of you. It’s called My Key Commitments to You and it will be delivered to every household in New Zealand over the next 10 days.

In it are 11 commitments that I make to you.

Some people might suggest it’s similar to the pledge card Helen Clark has previously released. Well, there are several differences, but let me tell you the really big difference. This one is not paid for by taxpayers. Our commitment card is proudly paid for by supporters of the National Party. Unlike Helen Clark, we’re not breaking the law to make someone else pay for it.

Let me tell you what it says.

If National is elected to lead the next Government, I personally guarantee we will deliver on the following 11 key commitments.

Number 1, we will strengthen the economy, increase aftertax incomes, and ensure Kiwis can get ahead under their own steam by reducing personal taxes on 1 April 2009, 1 April 2010 and 1 April 2011.

Under National you won’t have to wait nine years for tax reduction. We will deliver tax reduction five months from now, on 1 April 2009. And unlike Labour we won’t cancel our tax cuts. We’ll get New Zealand through this recession and on to a growth path.

Number 2, we will maintain and build New Zealand’s asset base by increasing investment in infrastructure such as roads, broadband, and public transport, and by not selling Kiwibank or any other state-owned company.

I’m not interested in selling assets – I’m all about building assets.

We need to unblock the bottlenecks in New Zealand’s economy.

We need to make sure there aren’t barriers in the way of productive growth. We need to invest in the breakthrough technology that will get us up to speed with the rest of the world.

Number 3, we will ensure government spending is focused on frontline services such as health and education by capping the number of bureaucrats and putting real discipline around government spending.

If I am elected Prime Minister of this country on November 8, I will bring the chief executives of government departments together and give them a simple message: Your mission is to facilitate the development of a more successful, prosperous nation – not to stand in the way of those who seek to create that prosperity.

And my message to government employees will be just as clear: You must focus taxpayers’ money on the frontline services that New Zealanders have a right to expect. And you must scrutinise every dollar to make sure it is money well spent.

Labour has been a fair-weather Government in rosy economic times. Labour is used to being awash with cash and being able to waste your money. Well, the surpluses are now all gone. It’s time for a National Government that will get the most out of every single dollar.

Number 4, we will make our communities safer by ensuring the worst repeat violent offenders are not eligible for parole.

This week, an editorial in the New Zealand Herald suggested National won’t follow through on this policy. Well, I’ve got news for them. I am 100% committed to this policy and I will see that it is delivered. Because parole is a privilege not a right.

Some people say that’s not fair on criminals. Well, on this question, as on all law and order questions, I’m prepared to take a side.

And that side is the side of law-abiding New Zealanders. You have had to put up with escalating violent crime for too long. I’m determined to get on top of it.

Number 5, we will confront failure in our school system by setting National Standards in literacy and numeracy, requiring every pupil’s progress to be assessed and the results reported to parents in plain English.

I was able to get where I am today because I received a good education. Today, one in five children is leaving school without the qualifications and skills they need to succeed. Those kids are New Zealand’s future.

We’re going to tackle their literacy and numeracy problems early. We’ll make sure parents know how their child is really doing. And we’ll make sure teachers work with struggling kids to get them up to standard.

It’s time to put the rungs back on the ladder of opportunity.

Number 6, we will tackle our health workforce crisis by introducing voluntary bonding for new doctors, nurses, and midwives, and by boosting the number of funded medical student places by 200 over five years.

Health professionals are leaving this country in droves. Labour has ignored this crisis. They’ve focused on the bureaucracy. We’ll focus on the front line. Simple as that.

Number 7, we will give families financial certainty by continuing all Working for Families payments at current levels, keeping 20 hours ECE, and keeping caps on doctors’ fees.

Mums and dads do some of the hardest work in the world. I salute the families who juggle so many pressures, who turn up in their thousands to school sport, who help look after each other’s kids, and who do all they can to raise their children well. They deserve our backing.

My Government will support them, it will back them, and it will trust them to make their own choices about what is best for their kids.

Number 8, we will give seniors financial certainty by keeping the age of eligibility of NZ Superannuation at 65 and steadily increasing the amount of Super paid each week as a result of our personal tax cuts.

I pledge to keep NZ Super at 66% of the average after-tax wage.

Labour hasn’t made that pledge. Labour hasn’t put aside the funds for that pledge. Labour is hoping our seniors won’t notice.

Well, I won’t play games with our senior citizens. They have given their working lives to this country. My Government will be straight with them and we will make sure their Super payments rise every single year.

Number 9, we will encourage people to save for their retirement, while making it fairer and more affordable for everyone in these tighter economic times, by retaining KiwiSaver, with contributions at the 2% plus 2% level.

We know that 4% is a lot to ask from some people worrying about their credit card debt, trying to pay down their mortgage, or struggling to make ends meet.

We want young New Zealanders to be able to join KiwiSaver and stay in it for their working lives. Not to have to put off joining because 4% is too much of a stretch. Not to have to drop in and out.

So we will make KiwiSaver more affordable and more enduring – for those in it to today and for those who might join tomorrow.

We’ll make KiwiSaver a 2 + 2 plan while preserving the right of

those who want to contribute at higher levels, to do so.

Number 10, we will provide a safety net for those who are unable to work, by passing a law to maintain and inflation-index all benefit payments, while encouraging those who can work to go back to work.

I believe in the welfare state. I personally benefited from it when I was growing up and I will never turn my back on it. So I will work hard to protect the vulnerable from the sharp edge of a recession.

But I also believe in people getting ahead under their own steam. So we will do what it takes to get those who can work back to work.

Number 11, we will encourage students to get rid of debt sooner by keeping interest-free student loans and offering a 10% bonus on early repayments.

Young New Zealanders who are furthering their education, who are working hard, and who are gaining the skills this country needs, should know: We back them in that choice. We applaud their aspiration. We want them to contribute to this country.

We will make it easier for them to get rid of their debt and we will make sure they can see a brighter future here in New Zealand.

Because right now one in four of our tertiary-trained people live overseas. They don’t live there because they didn’t get a student allowance. They live there because they could see a brighter future outside New Zealand.

So National will work hard to show our young people that they can have a real future in New Zealand where their aspiration and effort will be rewarded.

Ladies and gentlemen, those are my 11 key commitments. I have signed them and I will see them through. If I am Prime Minister I will deliver more than these 11 commitments. I am campaigning on a fresh set of policies across many areas of government.

And most importantly, I am campaigning on bringing muchneeded economic leadership to the Beehive.

Conclusion I have absolute confidence that New Zealand can look forward to a brighter economic future. My confidence in New Zealand’s future is based on my confidence in everyday New Zealanders.

Kiwis are resilient. You will do what you have to do to get through this recession and get through it well. You just need the confidence that things will improve and that your Government will deliver. I am here to give you that confidence.

Ladies and gentlemen, at this election, New Zealanders have a clear choice. When you wake up on Sunday the 9th of November what do you want to see? Do you want more of the same? The same directionless economy? The same political games and distractions?

The same loose management of your money? The same excuses, buck-passing, and the same failure to deliver real results?

Because that is what you will get from the Labour Party.

Or do you want fresh leadership focused on the issues that matter to you? Fresh leadership with a fresh focus on the economy and your financial prosperity. Fresh ideas, fresh solutions and fresh resolve. The will needed to turn this economy and this country around.

Because that is what you will get if you vote National.

So, for the next four weeks, I’ll be campaigning on New Zealand’s shared aspirations for the years ahead. Ladies and gentlemen, in 27 days New Zealanders can have a more ambitious future. A more successful future. A brighter future. A future they can believe in.

My friends, it’s time for a change. Let’s go out and deliver it.

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 39

HELEN CLARK, LABOUR I stand before you today to launch our campaign for a fourth term for our Labour-led Government. I do so because I truly believe that we in Labour have the vision, the leadership, the experience, the judgment, the commitment, the determination, and the plan which New Zealand needs at this time.

And these are challenging times – for our world. Our country, while resilient, is not immune to what is happening. Our world is experiencing the worst financial crisis seen since the 1930s. A curtain is being drawn on the era of the free wheeling unregulated money traders and financiers whose greed has shaken the international financial system to its very core.

Coordinated international action will be needed to ensure that the greed merchants don’t ever again get the chance to destroy the lives of ordinary people in real jobs trying to put food on the table for their families.

We know of no precedent for the scale of what is happening in international markets, nor for the scale of the responses being made in those world capitals where financial services make a significant contribution to the size of the economy.

Who could have envisaged even six weeks ago the US Government would undertake a $US700 billion bail out – or Britain a part nationalisation of major banks?

At present, New Zealand and Australia have escaped the worst of the storm, as the quality of the assets in our banking systems has been higher. The Reserve Bank has already been intervening in the market to ensure that liquidity is maintained, and the Government has agreed to implement a deposit guarantee scheme which will provide New Zealand depositors with additional confidence.

The Minister of Finance will be announcing the details this afternoon.

Both the Government and the Bank are committed to doing what needs to be done to keep the New Zealand system safe.

You can count on us to use sound judgment and to be resolute through these challenging times. Our great party, the oldest in New Zealand, responded effectively to the depression in the 1930s.

Our opponents then had failed dismally and must not be given the opportunity to let New Zealand down again.

At the international level the challenge now is to stop the financial market crisis turning into a full-blown economic crisis.

Projections of world economic growth have been trimmed. That includes forecasts for New Zealand in the near term.

Our country is coming off eight years of good growth by developed world standards – ours was still at 3.2 per cent in the year to last December. The latest forecasts are for a flat year in the year to March, and 1.8 per cent growth in the following year, before returning to growth of over three per cent. But these forecasts were completed before the last few extraordinary weeks on world financial markets.

At times like these, it is important to have a plan – not a kneejerk reaction, and it is certainly important not to panic. Nor is complacency an option. It is at times like these that we New Zealanders must ask who do we really trust with the future of our economy and our country. It is at times like these that we need a vision for growth and investment, and a plan to make it happen.

40 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

It is at times like these that we must have a plan which helps all our people move forward – and does not just abandon the poorest to the cool economic winds.

Labour has six priorities for building a strong, upmarket economy, driven by skills and innovation, underpinned by our savings and modern infrastructure, focused on growing our export trade, and committed to sustainability.

Our plan addresses these six critical areas for growth and investment in the short, medium, and long term, and I am focusing on them today. I’ll also be indicating the kind of new measures the government is prepared to take to ensure that the economy doesn’t stagnate and unemployment doesn’t take off as a result of this international crisis.

I make no apology for beginning with our commitment to education and skills training. He tangata, he tangata, he tangata – the development of our people must come first. All our people must have the opportunity to reach their full potential – and have the chance to fill the skilled job slots available in the economy. Even now employers are experiencing difficulty finding skilled labour.

We’ve set out a big vision for the future of secondary education to improve our young people’s chances of success. Under Schools Plus, we want our schools to be able to respond to the full range of abilities of our teenagers – and to make education relevant and personal to all our young people.

By 2011 we will have youth apprenticeships available in every high school in New Zealand for students from Year Nine on.

From 2011, every student from Year 9 on will have their personal education plan – agreed between them, their school and their family. From 2011 there will be an education or training leaving age of seventeen, and from 2014 of eighteen. Not all those students will be in school – but they will still be learning in work or in training.

We want those students to be able to move on to new opportunities in apprenticeships and industry training. By the end of this year we will have approximately 14,000 young people in Modern Apprenticeships training.

Our new target is that in each year, over the next three years we will add another 1000 – to reach 17,000 in Modern Apprenticeship training by the end of 2011.

As well, we are lifting our target for the numbers of Kiwis in industry training in the course of each year.

Last year, there were over 185,000.

Our new target is to lift those numbers in training to ten per cent of the work force. That means that by 2011 we aim to have 230,000 people in recognised training.

These new targets will help us achieve the goals of the New Zealand Skills Strategy – a visionary strategy for a highly skilled workforce, developed by government with Business New Zealand, the Council of Trade Unions, and the Industry Training Federation – and I thank them all for their co-operation.

But in the near term, the prospect of fall out from the international crisis requires us to have new plans for workers whose jobs might be affected. I am announcing today that Labour will introduce a new retraining allowance, on the same basis as a stu-

NZPA / Wayne Drought

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 41

Pictures of Helen Clark in military fatigues in the Middle East also undermine her election message

Clark’s claims about not getting involved in Iraq overlook New Zealand’s logistical support for the US effort in 2003, and of course last year’s revelations in Investigate that the government owned airline, Air New Zealand has been flying Australian combat troops up to tours of duty in Iraq, and US marines across the Pacific

dent allowance, but with no spousal income test, for workers who have been in the workforce for at least five years and have been made redundant.

An allowance will also be available to those who have been in the workforce for ten years and wish to upgrade their skills or retrain in a new area. These allowances will be available for up to a year for enrolment in a recognised full time course, including to those who have previously used up their full time student allowance entitlement.

My dream has always been to enable our young people – and mature students – to have the kind of support my generation had in full time, quality tertiary education. We have to keep investing in our people. This is critical to realising our goals for a knowledge led economy and society. I will address these issues in my speech at Otago University tomorrow. Skilled and educated people will drive the innovation needed for our economy to grow and develop.

Labour wants New Zealand to be a smart economy – not a dumb economy.

For years our companies cried out for a tax regime which would support them doing the research and development which is so critical to developing a high value economy. We responded in Budget 42 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

07 with a tax credit of fifteen per cent of allowable R and D expenditure. It came into effect on 1 April this year and is expected to increase private sector R & D significantly.

Our R & D tax credit is considered by many to be superior to Australia’s, and there are signs that it is beginning to attract R & D investment. Who, other than the most small minded plodding, short term-focused conservatives, would want to trash that and risk losing R & D investment and innovative companies to Australia? Labour is committed to working with our smart companies to grow this economy.

And we are committed to working with the big pastoral and food sectors to boost the value of what they export. We have put $700 million up for innovation there through the Fast Forward Fund – and industry have committed to match it.

This is the kind of vision we must have to transform our nation's future prospects and lift our people’s living standards. Labour backs innovation, and we back education and skills for the people who will drive it.

And that means driving our export trade forward too – the third element of our plan. On behalf of New Zealand, Phil Goff and I have been relentless in working to open up markets for Kiwi exporters.

The Free Trade Agreement with China was our biggest, boldest move. It is even more significant now as developed economies are in or near recession.

Growth in China, while clipped, is still significant. It is to our great benefit that we are well placed in their market of 1.2 billion people. We have just concluded negotiations on an FTA with all of ASEAN – a market of half a billion people. We are in FTA talks with the Gulf states, and in preparatory talks with Korea.

We have a foot in the door to study an FTA with Japan, and a study is underway with India.

But wait – there is more.

The National Party said that because we were "missing in action" in Iraq, we would never get an FTA with the United States. I would rather New Zealand was missing in action in Iraq than have our soldiers missing in action in a war when the cause was not right.

Our foreign policy has always been conducted on a principled basis and always will be. That means acting with integrity and

treating each issue on its merits.

Now the United States has agreed to negotiate with New Zealand and three other friends on a Trans-Pacific FTA. We have far more in common with the United States of America as a fellow Western nation than we have with most countries. It is recognition of that common interest, in the context of only relatively isolated differences, which has enabled us to move forward.

Closely linked to our plans for export trade is our plan for New Zealand to become more sustainable. – the fourth plank in our platform for advancing our economy.

Under Labour, New Zealand has risen to the sustainability challenge because it is the right thing to do for our planet – and because it is the smart thing to do for our economy. Climate change is one of the greatest challenges of our times – and it cries out for leadership from all nations. Labour in New Zealand provides that leadership.

It is not in our nature to be a fast follower. New Zealand is better than that. We did not wait for others to lead us on votes for women, social security, and being nuclear free. We proudly led the world on those, and we will lead on sustainability too. We now have a world leading emissions trading scheme. We have biofuels in our fuel mix. We are promoting renewable energy and reafforestation.

We have many measures for energy efficiency and conservation.

We are investing heavily in our public transport and rail systems.

In these and many other ways, we will get our greenhouse gas emissions down.

For the sake of our economy, we must show that we care and we will act. In our most affluent export markets, consumers are making ethical decisions about what goods and services they will buy. If New Zealand goods and services lack environmental integrity, we will suffer.

We have fantastic opportunities to capitalise on our clean and green brand – and with the commitment Labour has made to sustainability we will.

The fifth driver of growth is investment in infrastructure. This also has a role to play in navigating our economy through the effects of the current crisis. Over nine years, we have doubled annual funding in roading. Investment in public transport is fifteen times larger. We have put up half a billion dollars for investment in the rail track.

We have bought back both the track and the rail service – and the major shareholding in Air New Zealand. In Labour, we do not think public ownership is a sin! We believe there are many things which must be kept Kiwi, and that includes Kiwibank.

We have made huge commitments to invest in electricity transmission and generation. The next 3 – 4 years see plans overall for investment in renewable generation of $3.5 to $4 billion. We are implementing a half billion dollar plan for super fast broadband – in a five year down payment on our ten year plan to speed up internet access radically.

We have spent three times as much on public health infrastructure in the last nine years as there was in the previous nine.

And billions more dollars have gone into capital works across our schools, justice, policing and other infrastructure. Our budgets set out a big forward programme for physical infrastructure – at $5.4 billion this year alone – 180 per cent above 1999 levels.

Now, taking into account the international financial crisis, Labour is developing an additional stimulus package for investment in infrastructure should conditions not improve. It is incum-

bent on us to show leadership so that a financial crisis offshore does not lead to depression in New Zealand with widespread unemployment.

Labour is not prepared to stand by and see that happen. We will be prepared to bring forward spending on infrastructure and other initiatives to create real jobs and build the potential for future growth. When growth is slowing, it’s time to tune the growth engines, not slow them down or demolish them as our opponents are proposing.

So a key part of our plan to deal with downside risks to the economy is to develop a package which would : bring forward planned infrastructure spending fund new building and construction projects, and support local authorities to bring forward catchment management initiatives in hill country to fight erosion.

I am releasing details today of the kinds of projects which could be brought forward.

They could include key rail and road projects, – like work on the North South junction north of Wellington. At the moment, tunnels there are too small to allow new sized containers to be carried by rail, so they have to be transferred to the road. This has to be fixed. We could also bring forward the projected rail link to Marsden Point.

The projects could also include expanding our sewerage subsidy scheme to support currently unfunded local government proposals bringing forward school property proposals which are presently in the unfunded queue. further support for back country reafforestation.

Initiatives in all these areas are expected to be job rich and can be embarked on if New Zealand risks a hard landing from the present crises.

In addition to the kinds of projects I’ve already mentioned, in the next few days I will announce further proposals to stimulate the supply of affordable housing, both to help modest income earners buy their own home and to support greater continuity of employment in the house building sector.

Given the privilege of re-election, Labour in government will move to prepare a formal economic statement for release in December setting out the steps to be taken to reignite the economy, including steps along the lines I have indicated today.

While Labour will not be cutting overall public spending, we will reprioritise to ensure a focus on those areas which will be of the most assistance in the current economic and financial circumstances.

The sixth driver of our economic plan relates to boosting savings.

Over nine years in government, we have been building a substantial New Zealand Superannuation Fund, reintroduced a public service retirement savings scheme, and launched KiwiSaver.

More than 800,000 New Zealanders have chosen to invest in their future through KiwiSaver.

Under Labour, KiwiSaver will help Kiwis buy their first home and have a much more comfortable retirement. Under Labour, KiwiSaver will boost our savings and help deepen our capital markets.

It is widely acknowledged that two of the most pressing issues to address in the Kiwi economy are innovation and boosting savings.

Both are big investments in our future.

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 43

To trash those investments for inequitable and short term tax cuts, which do nothing for modest income families and make everyone in KiwiSaver worse off, would be a massive step backwards for New Zealand – and Labour in government will never let that happen.

In the 1970s a previous National Government destroyed Labour’s superannuation scheme, depriving our country of the chance to build up substantial savings. Muldoon’s mokopuna must not be allowed to do that again.

My focus today has been on the pathway we must follow to grow and invest in our economy during these very challenging international conditions. I have discussed our six drivers of growth, with significant new steps which can be taken should current conditions not improve.

There is of course another plan on the market – it has five points: tinkering with tax cuts – except at the upper end where people would get heaps, and at the lower end where people actually get less. introducing national testing in schools – for no educational benefit further deregulation – as if no lesson had been learned from offshore experience. a broadband plan which favours the largest telco and is anti-competitive cuts to public spending – except on prisons where they want to build them for geriatrics they will never release.

due in no small part to his work as steward of our economy.

Shortly I will release more policy initiatives for health and housing, and other policy will be released by ministers during the campaign.

But underpinning everything we will do is our focus on the future; on growth and investment; on opportunity, security, and fairness.

We will take strong and decisive action to guarantee our future – as we always have.

Our vision for New Zealand is an inclusive one.

We seek reconciliation over the wrongs of the past through the Treaty settlement process and we seek to work with Maori as Treaty partners.

We work hard for a 21st century New Zealand inclusive of all ethnicities, faiths, and beliefs.

We have a strong commitment to our nation’s natural heritage and we will act to protect and conserve it.

Last week’s Crown acquisition of the 78,000 hectare St James pastoral lease near Hamner Springs has been a highlight for me.

That incredible area is now preserved for the people of New Zealand and our visitors to enjoy for all time.

We will continue our work to promote New Zealand’s unique culture and historical heritage and the incredible talent of our creative people. As I speak new films are being made, music composed, and books written supported by the investments our Labour Government is prepared to make.

In government over nine years, people haven not always agreed

“I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge the phenomenal job Michael Cullen has done as both my deputy and as Minister of Finance these past nine years.

The fact that New Zealand is better placed than many nations during the current international crisis is due in no small part to his work as steward of our economy” Nobody could see that hopeless set of slogans as a road to recovery for New Zealand.

In contrast, Labour offers vision and substance, backed by nine years of experience which equips us to face the current international crisis.

Just as we have led New Zealand to respond to the challenge of terrorism – post September 11, and the challenge of climate change, Now we will apply all the knowledge, skills, and judgement we have to leading New Zealand back to robust growth and government finances of the kind we have enjoyed under Labour before the current international crises struck.

In the coming days, Michael Cullen will release more detail of our economic policy. He will focus primarily on the measures needed for long term growth, but will also address some of the short term issues associated with the current crisis, such as measures to reduce the risk to companies concerned about their provisional tax commitments.

I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge the phenomenal job Michael Cullen has done as both my deputy and as Minister of Finance these past nine years. The fact that New Zealand is better placed than many nations during the current international crisis is 44 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

with everything we have done.

But I believe we have earned respect: for getting things done for taking the tough decisions for sticking to our principles for not just saying whatever we think people want to hear That is why I have said this election is about trust.

Who do we trust the future of our family, our economy, our public services, and our country with?

Who has the experience, the judgment, the skills, and the contacts to lead New Zealand through challenging times?

Leadership is about long term vision and commitment.

Leadership is about an ability to stay the course; to be resolute, steadfast, and utterly determined.

Leadership is about love of country and dedication to the common good.

That is the kind of leadership I and the New Zealand Labour Party offer New Zealand – as we have in our past, as we do in the present, and as we will in the future.

With your support, with your commitment, we will continue to serve the people of New Zealand in government for a fourth term. n

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 45

Jeanette Fitzsimons was recently listed as the country’s most ‘trusted’ political leader, but what do New Zealanders really know of the party she runs, given the total lack of hard media scrutiny of the Greens?

TREVOR LOUDON reports Greens co-leader Russel Norman and Sue Bradford are poised to take the party to the extreme hard left when Fitzsimons retires after the election, and cold showers, smacking and mercury-filled light bulbs will be the least of your worries if the Greens hold the balance of power

The Reds Inside The Greens How former Soviet-aligned communists

are now pulling the strings inside the Greens

46 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

L

ike perennial bridesmaids forlornly waiting for their own glorious wedding day, the New Zealand Green Party has never really got its hands on the levers of power. Sidelined for the last three elections by Helen Clark, the Greens are desperate to gain places around the cabinet table after the next election.

While all eyes are on the Maori Party as potential king makers, if Labour closes the gap on National, it may well be the Greens who decide our next government.

Under MMP, the Green’s bronze and Labour’s silver medals combined could muster enough seats to beat National’s gold.

If that happens, we can expect Jeannette Fitzsimons, Russel Norman and even Sue Bradford to influence the next Helen Clark cabinet.

Is that a concern? Wouldn’t it be beneficial to have more green influence on New Zealand’s political direction? Maybe so, if the Greens were genuinely green, but are they?

Some Green History Back in the early 1970s, the Values Party burst onto the New Zealand political stage as one of the world’s first environmental parties. Values championed green causes and thousands of idealistic New Zealanders flocked to its ranks.

But even then, hard core Marxists and Maoists were pushing their own red agenda inside our first green political party.

A 1975 article in the party’s Turning Point magazine confessed “Values Party economic policies will lead towards community control and management of production, finance and distribution... we must be dedicated not to the reform of capitalism but to the eradication of capitalism.”

In another Turning Point article of the same year, Terry McDavitt, Wellington Values coordinator and future party general secretary, wrote “Militant revolution is part of what I seriously propose for the Values Party... But I have no doubt that any New Zealand revolution will go through a militant stage – and some blood will be shed...

“I’d rather blood wasn’t shed at all, that we could confine the miliINVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 47

tancy to providing stretchers for the wealthy once they realise they’re not going to be compensated... “The Values revolution is neither apocalyptic nor piecemeal; instead it involves both militant and cultural actions, deliberate intervention in history...

“The nearest contemporary example is the continuing Chinese revolution... “.

Stirring stuff, but under the old First Past the Post system, Values was never going to get the votes to even enter Parliament, let alone carry out the revolution.

Values peaked at 5.3% of the vote in 1975, but no gained no seats. It declined to 2% in 1978 when the left united behind Labour in a vain attempt to oust the reviled National Prime Minister Muldoon.

Values was not electorally relevant in the 1980s, but according to Green historian Christine Dann: “A substantial number of Values Party members came out of or were heavily involved in ‘movement’ politics – particularly the peace movement, the women’s movement, and the environment movement. Values made major contributions of personnel, money, time and effort to the anti-nuclear movement, in both its anti-war and anti-power branches. Both were successful – the nuclear power option for New Zealand has been rejected; New Zealand is also a nuclear free zone. Values members were organisers and leaders of some major environmental campaigns to stop excessive hydroelectric development and unnecessary, polluting industrial growth...In May 1990 the current Green Party of Aotearoa/New Zealand was formed from a merger of Values and some new Green groups. The new party contested the 1990 general election six months later, winning 7% of the total vote-but still no seats in parliament...”

To get into Parliament the Greens adopted two strategies.

According to Christine Dann, “Under First Past the Post it was still not possible to get into parliament. There were good reasons for making common cause with other parties which also wanted electoral reform and were opposed to the New Right direction of both the National and Labour parties, and in 1991 The Greens became foundational members of the five-party Alliance.”

The Greens contributed strongly to Alliance policy and in 1996 elected 3 MPs under the Alliance banner.

The 1996 success was made possible because the Greens had joined forces with the formerly pro-Soviet communist Socialist Unity Party, diehard Social Crediters and other fringe groups to push hard for proportional representation. Their vehicle was the Electoral Reform Coalition, which succeeded in securing a referendum at the 1993 general election which was won by advocates of Mixed Member Parliament (MMP) system of proportional representation.

The Australian Connection The 1991 formation of the Alliance Party was not strictly a New Zealand phenomenon. It was linked to events in Australia and further abroad. The backbone of the Alliance Party was Jim Anderton’s New Labour Party, which he formed in 1989 after splitting from Labour. In turn, the backbone of the New Labour Party was the Maoist leaning Workers Communist League, (which had joined Anderton’s party en masse) plus several former members of the Trotskyist Socialist Action League-including Paul Piesse, Matt Robson, his wife Petronella Townsend and Keith Locke.

Through the late 1980s the Workers Communist League had developed strong ties to Australia’s largest Marxist group, the Socialist Workers Party. Piesse, Robson, Townsend and Locke also developed their own independent links to the Aussie socialists.

48 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

In 1990 the Australian Socialist Workers Party changed its name to the more acceptable Democratic Socialist Party. Its newspaper Direct Action, was reborn as Green Left Weekly. This was part of a strategy to moderate the party’s image with the Australian public and other political groups – particularly the fledgling Australian Greens.

The DSP (now Democratic Socialist Perspective) was, and still is, very well connected to the international grouping of Trotskyist parties, the “4th International”, as well as many of the world’s leading traditional communist parties, an array of ex Maoist groups, environmentalists and “social movements”.

Many of these organizations were networking internationally.

All were inspired by the successful (and now ruling) Workers Party of Brazil. Their common aim was to emulate the Brazilian model by uniting communists, Trotskyists, greens, indigenous radicals, religious socialists and other marginalized groups into an effective third party to the left of the existing Labour or social democratic party.

The SWP/DSP had long dreamed building such a “third force” in Australia. To this end the SWP had, from 1987 to 1989, unsuccessfully attempted mergers with both the “moderate” Communist Party of Australia and the more openly Stalinist, Socialist Party of Australia.

According to Green Left Weekly, 18th of November 1992, DSP leader Jim Percy, was the initiator, “of the party’s analysis of the Australian Labor Party which has resulted in the Party seeking to build a third force in Australian politics similar to the New Zealand NLP”. The project stalled for a while when Jim Percy died of cancer in late 1992.

In November 1992, former Socialist Action League comrades Keith Locke, Paul Piesse, Petronella Townsend, Matt Robson and Lew Stribling wrote to Green Left Weekly, offering condolences on the death of Percy. “We have known Jim since 1970. Since that time we have shared the same socialist vision and supported the same struggles against oppression. Through two decades we kept in contact with Jim and benefited from sharing political ideas and experiences...

Jim was with us in our early political development as members of the SAL in NZ. “He was also alongside us when we formed the NLP. He contributed his political ideas and experience to the NLP in a comradely and supportive way. He saw the NLP as a progressive development which could revitalise socialism in NZ and have a positive effect in Australia...We cannot be with you at the funeral of our comrade.

However it is a Maori tradition to sing at a funeral. We therefore request that when the Internationale is sung that it be recognised that the voices of Jim’s comrades in NZ have also been raised as a final tribute to a respected fighter of the people”.

Then NLP president and Auckland Alliance party chairman Matt McCarten was even more explicit. He wrote “I valued my friendship and political collaboration with Jim. He gave me the theoretical base for my political work. I owe so much to him. “The impact Jim had on me over the last few years was enormous. Jim was one of the few left leaders who was able to bring Marxism-Leninism alive into today’s world. He made socialism relevant to those of us who seek a new society based on social justice. His socialism was inclusive, warm and exciting. He was the major political influence in my life”.

Through the early ‘90s the Alliance kept in close contact with their Australian comrades with regular trans-Tasman visits by party leaders including Jim Anderton, Matt McCarten, Matt Robson, Keith Locke and Green Party co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons. At one

stage Locke was Auckland correspondent for Green Left Weekly and wrote occasional articles for the paper till at least 1998, a year before entering parliament.

The Links Link In 1994 the DSP launched an important new international magazine Links.

According to an editorial in the first issue; “Links is a new international discussion magazine. It is a magazine for the post Cold War left... a magazine that is taking steps to unify and bring together the forces for socialism in the world today...”Links” hopes not only to bring together active socialists from different countries and different continents, but to unite socialists coming from different traditions-the tradition of the pro-Moscow communist parties, Trotskyite parties, Maoism, the left wing of national movements, left forces breaking with social democracy, and activists from social movements who have come to see the need for a party.”

Keith Locke contributed an article on the Alliance Party to the second issue of Links. He also represented the Alliance at the Easter 1994 Links planning and assessment meeting in Sydney, which was formally hosted by the Democratic Socialist Party.

Other delegates at this meeting came from the Brazilian Workers Party, the Italian Party of Communist Refoundation, the US Committees of Correspondence (a breakaway from the Communist Party USA), several Filipino Marxist organisations, the Sri Lankan Trotskyist Nava Sama Samaj Party, the Indonesian Peoples Committee, the Trotskyist Fourth International and the British Marxist group, Militant. The main discussion was on broadening the distribution of Links to promote the “widest possible unity of Marxists from different political traditions”.

“If socialism is to survive as a relevant political movement in the 21st century, it must develop a response to the ecological crisis and a socialist strategy to build a sustainable future” INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 49

Matt McCarten secured a position on the Links editorial board alongside four members of the DSP, two leaders of the South African Communist Party, several US based Trotskyists and the former Moscow correspondent for the Communist Party USA, Carl Bloice.

The Links launch was part of a wider Green/Left conference.

Hundreds of Marxist-Leninist, Trotskyist and green activists attended, from Australasia, Asia, Africa and North and South America.

According to Green Left Weekly 13th April 1994, “The International Green Left Conference, held over the Easter long weekend at the University of New South Wales, brought together a wide range of activists and concerned individuals to discuss and debate the ecological and social problems currently facing the world.

“The highly successful conference grew out of an initiative of the Democratic Socialist Party. It involved some 900 participants in conference sessions and/or public meetings. They came from all over Australia and around the world.

“The conference discussed how to further build and strengthen the movements for social change through panels, workshops and plenary sessions which explored new approaches to increasingly complex challenges. Major themes included socialism, feminism, environmental politics, labour struggles and international solidarity.

“International guests spoke of political developments in their countries and how they are organising in new parties and formations.

Jeanette Fitzsimons, Green Party member and deputy co-leader of the New Zealand Alliance, described the Alliance’s improved electoral chances under the new, more democratic, proportional representation system in that country...

“The panel... “How can we build a sustainable society”, was one of the best attended and included Jeanette Fitzsimons, Graham Mathews from the Democratic Socialist Party, and Dr Nguyen Khac Kinh, 50 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

deputy director of Vietnam’s National Environment Agency. The broad and open views discussed highlighted the importance of linking green and left perspectives in reaching common strategies and goals.

Other references claim that Peter Camejo from the US also spoke at this forum. Camejo, who recently died, was once described by then state governor Ronald Reagan as one the 10 most dangerous men in California. Camejo was, in 1976, a presidential candidate for the US Socialist Workers Party. In the early ‘90s he was a leader of the Communist Party USA off-shoot Committees of Correspondence and in 2002, stood for the Green Party against Arnold Schwarzenegger for the governorship of California.

Camejo openly described himself as a “watermelon”, “green on the outside, red on the inside”.

Jeanette Fitzsimons also spoke at another conference forum on women in politics.

According to Green Left Weekly 29th June 1994: “Four women from different countries and different political backgrounds discussed their experiences at the International Green Left Conference held in Sydney over Easter. The panel involved Greens (WA) Senator Christabel Chamarette; Luciana Castellina, a member of the Directorate of the Party of Communist Refoundation in Italy and of the European Parliament; Dulce Maria Pereira, a Workers Party (PT) alternate senator in the Sao Paulo State Assembly in Brazil, and Jeanette Fitzsimons, spokesperson for the New Zealand Green Party and co-deputy leader and of the New Zealand Alliance.

While Jeanette Fitzsimons never mentions the “S” word when speaking to the media in New Zealand, she was less guarded when among friends. Fitzsimons told Green Left Weekly number 147, June 1994 “If socialism is to survive as a relevant political movement in the 21st century, it must develop a response to the ecological crisis and a socialist strategy to build a sustainable future. Green Left Weekly provides the tools of information and analysis to make that possible.”

Red Russel Norman In 1997 Keith Locke left the Alliance Party for the Greens and in 1999 became a Green Party MP-making two Greens MPs with DSP links.

Now that Green Party co-leader Russel Norman has entered Parliament, the figure rises to three.

Norman is not merely connected to the DSP. For several years Brisbane born and raised Norman was a full-fledged party member.

Russel Norman’s Green Party bio states; “I was involved in many environmental and social justice campaigns in Australia eg. student fees, union issues, Aboriginal land rights, peace, and native forest logging.”

It doesn’t admit however that Norman’s involvement in these activities were all DSP related. Norman joined the then Socialist

Workers Party’s youth wing “Resistance” in about 1986 in Brisbane. He went on to become a SWP/DSP member and was active for several years in Brisbane and later Adelaide. Norman claims to have left the Democratic Socialist Party around 1991. He subsequently spent two years with the Australian Greens before moving to New Zealand in 1997.

Russel Norman’s politics should remain suspect for several reasons. The Democratic Socialist Party and its former incarnation, the Socialist Workers Party, are notorious in Australia for their relentless infiltration and manipulation of other organisations.

I quote from A History of the DSP by Alvaro Recoba: “Practicing the Trotskyist method of fusion or infiltration, the DSP has constantly moved its cadre force into and out of issues and movements as it judges the worth of that particular issue or movement to the benefit of the DSP. “There are numerous examples, one being their attempts to take over the Nuclear Disarmament Party of Australia (NDP) which, whilst being unsuccessful, lead to the complete loss of confidence in the NDP by the Australian people and its quick demise as a force for change. More recently they attempted to infiltrate the Greens Party, but again were unsuccessful and in response the Greens movement adopted a resolution banning members of the DSP from membership of the Greens.

DSP National Executive member, Lisa McDonald outlined DSP influence in the Australian Greens in an address to the January 1996 Socialist Activists and Educational Conference in Sydney.

“The DSP threw its resources and energies into building the local Green parties, played a key role in the formation of the Victorian Green Alliance, the South Australian Green Alliance, the Queensland Green Alliance, the ACT Green Democratic Alliance, the

“Russel Norman’s politics should remain suspect for several reasons. The Democratic Socialist Party and its former incarnation, the Socialist Workers Party, are notorious in Australia for their relentless infiltration and manipulation of other organisations” INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 51

David McKnight. PHOTO: ABC

NSW Green Alliance and around half a dozen local Green parties in NSW, including in the working-class areas of western Sydney where the Greens’ base was weakest.

“All of these groups, registered as separate parties with the federal and/or state electoral commissions (some in the name of DSP members), and operating with total autonomy in policy and campaigns, were united simply by an explicit commitment to the four principles of the German Greens.

Steve Painter was a DSP activist from the mid ‘80s until his resignation in 1989. He then moved into NSW green politics and was in a unique position to observe the DSP infiltration of and eventual expulsion from the Australian Greens in 1991.

Painter wrote on the Marxism Mailing List, 24th October 2002: “As the Greens organisation developed into more of a party and less of an alliance or coalition, the continued presence of the DSP became more problematic. Could a DSP member genuinely serve as an office-bearer or candidate for The Greens? Of those remaining actively involved, more began to think not. At this time, the DSP changed the name of its weekly newspaper from “Direct Action” to 52 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

“Green Left” and let it be known that they were prepared to “dissolve” their organisation and work through the Greens as their primary political vehicle.

“It is not clear to me how bona fide the intention to dissolve was.

Jim Percy (DSP leader), had a concept of joining ‘the swamp’ and then, over time, ‘draining the swamp’. It seemed quite reckless to gamble with the name of their newspaper in the way they did. To gamble with the organisation seemed hard to believe. There would have been some society or other organisational structure remaining that would influence ex-DSP members’ activities, I am sure.

“With pressure to exclude the DSP coming from some key figures, mostly from other states, a delegated national meeting was held at the Sydney Earth Exchange in mid-1991 to discuss a possible national organisation. Agreement with proscription of other political parties was a prerequisite for attendance, although some DSP turned up anyway. Whilst being an excruciating meeting, held in a hot, noisy room, the main outcome was that further national meetings would require participating organisations to implement proscription.

“Shortly afterwards was the infamous NSW Greens ‘stack, where 12

The Reds behind the Greens: direct links can be made between proSoviet communist groups of the sixties and seventies, and the softer faces of the Green Party today.

Digital composite image

DSP members turned up at a regular administrative meeting (when one or two, at best, might usually attend) and proceeded to decide organisational changes to their benefit, including shoring up their access to The Greens registration.

‘Ownership of the NSW Greens turned on the colour of the Registered Officer, the person recognised by the Electoral Act as the party representative able to endorse candidates. Previously, an election for RO had been tied, so it was held jointly between Murray Addison and Paul Fitzgerald. Addison, I believe, was a secret member of the DSP at this point. When the stack was played out and Addison revealed his allegiance, the non-DSP wrote to the Electoral Commission requesting that Addison be removed as RO since he served another party which was acting destructively. After a week or two of uncertainty, Addison was removed.

Such cloak and dagger political subterfuge would be laughable in a Get Smart episode, but deception was part and parcel of hard left political movements – the same parties that tell the media they can be trusted. And now, some of those same people are here in New Zealand.

Murray Addison was Secretary of the NSW Greens in 1991. He later moved to New Zealand, but in 2000 attended the DSP’s Marxism 2000 conference in Australia. By 2001 he was Treasurer for the Mt Albert branch (Auckland) of the Alliance Party.

Interestingly, Russel Norman followed a similar pattern-from the DSP to the Australian Greens, to the New Zealand Alliance.

Norman came to New Zealand in the mid ‘90s specifically to study the Alliance Party for his PhD. His interest was more than academic. He became active in the Alliance and at one point edited its Auckland newsletter, until leaving with the Greens when they went out on their own in 1997.

Norman continued to contribute occasional articles to Green Left Weekly right up to 1999, two years after joining the Green Party.

Jeanette and Russel’s Feint to the Right Russel Norman became Green co-leader at the Party’s conference in June 2006. While not then an MP, the party needed a new male co-leader to fill the gap left by the late Rod Donald. Under the Green Party’s PC constitution, the job had to go to a male to ensure INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 53

“While the Workers Communist League was no more and its successor Left Currents had also faded into the background, Bradford still worked closely with many of her old Maoist colleagues” gender balance, so Norman was able to leapfrog Green MPs Sue Kedgley, Metiria Turei and Sue Bradford into the top job.

The conference also made headlines for another reason.

At the time, Communist Workers Group activist Scott Hamilton wrote in his blog Reading the Maps: “The Greens also used the conference to make a determined effort 54 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

to rebrand themselves as a ‘centre’ party that could form a government with either National or Labour. In her speech to the conference, female co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons called left and right ‘old-fashioned political labels’, and said that her party had important things in common with National.

“Fitzsimons’ remarks were echoed by the conference’s keynote speaker,

Australian political commentator David McKnight. McKnight is an ex-Marxist who…insists that Green politics is ‘not about the rebirth of left’ but about ‘a new kind of conservatism’. In a book he published last year called Beyond Left and Right, McKnight pointed to the supposed ‘historical universalism of the market as a democratic force’ and claimed that ‘it makes environmental sense to use market mechanisms’.

“McKnight and Fitzsimons set the stage for Russel Norman’s first speech as co-leader of the Greens. Norman has always been regarded as one of the more left-wing members of the Greens, so many people were surprised when he spoke to the conference in tones that echoed Fitzsimons and McKnight. Praising the ‘undoubted power of the market’, Norman confirmed that the Greens were open to deal-making with National as well as Labour.

Fitzsimons and Norman were clearly trying to moderate the Green Party’s radical image. The tactic had several advantages.

Firstly it would make the Greens more acceptable to a wider pool of voters. Secondly it would make the Labour Party less likely to take the Greens for granted. Thirdly it might enable the Greens to wrest future concessions from a National government.

However a closer look at David McKnight puts his “ex Marxist” credentials in question. McKnight was from the mid ‘70s to 1991 a leader of the Communist Party of Australia – the organisation that Russel Norman’s old Socialist Workers Party once tried to amalgamate with. After the dissolution of the Communist Party in 1991 McKnight went on to oversee the activities of successor organisation, the Sydney based SEARCH foundation. SEARCH inherited all the Communist Party’s substantial assets and seeks to carry on the party’s work.

According to the SEARCH website: “The SEARCH Foundation seeks to contribute to efforts to develop a new collective and strategic set of values and ideas and a new collective political practice for a 21st Century alternative to capitalism.”

The bulk of the SEARCH Foundation board are former Communist Party members while a few are Australian Greens activists.

SEARCH’s philosophy revolves around using green policies and coalitions to advance socialist ideas. Reading David McKnight’s book in this light reveals that he is essentially advocating bringing conservative parties on board the socialist agenda through the green movement. In other words, Russel Norman and Jeanette Fitzsimons will only work with John Key, if National concedes ground to the Greens socialist programme.

So much for Russel Norman’s supposed “moderation.”

Red Sue Bradford Goes Green Number 3 ranked MP Sue Bradford leads a separate, but interrelated socialist power base inside the Green Party.

The same year that the Green Party was founded, New Zealand’s most secretive and militant radical organisation, the Workers Communist League, finally dissolved. The “weasels” as they were often called, had not given up on the revolution however, but were merely adapting to a new reality. A new organisation, called Left Currents was launched. Interestingly the move was partially attributed to change by WCL’s Australian sister organization the Socialist Workers Party to Democratic Socialist Party.

Leading Auckland “weasel”, Leonie Morris told the Communist Party’s Peoples Voice of April 1990 that Left Currents was “a re-launch of the Workers Communist League”. She described the main aim of Left Currents as building “a revolutionary alliance of women,

Maori and workers... Local branches of Left Currents have the tactical freedom to decide which parliamentary candidate to support in each electorate.”

Said Peoples Voice: “For instance, the Auckland branch of Left Currents has already made its support known for New Labour Party candidate Keith Locke in the Mt Eden electorate”. Leonie Morris added that, “More initiatives will be launched over the next couple of months, for example, the Greens coalition... Some Left Currents members are active in the Greens coalition.”

Sue Bradford was of course one of them.

Bradford’s path to the Greens however was far from straightforward.

In 1989, disgusted by the sale of the BNZ and after losing a contest for Labour’s presidency to Ruth Dyson, Jim Anderton finally quit Labour. Within days he announced the formation of the New Labour Party. The entire WCL joined the NLP as did the group of former Socialist Action League members involved with the Australian SWP. The NLP’s first National Council was dominated by this group (Matt Robson, Petronella Townsend, Keith Locke and Paul Piesse) The rest of the NLP council consisted of Francesca Holloway, a former SAL supporter and wife of political commentator Chris Trotter, several WCL associates and confirmed WCL member Sue Bradford.

In June 1989, Bradford was elected Vice-President of the NLP. According to the Nelson Evening Mail, 12 June 1989, Bradford said in her closing speech to the NLP conference that she “felt she was politically more left-wing than the body of the party, but was determined not to compromise on issues that were important to her. These were feminist issues, such as equal-gender representation, pay equity and abortion, as well as the concerns of the unemployed such as jobs for all at award rates.”

Things soon turned to custard however when Anderton expelled two tiny Trotskyist sects from the NLP, David Bedggood’s Communist Left and Bill Logan’s Permanent Revolution Group.

The Trots had embarrassed the NLP with their mad sloganeering at conferences, but Sue Bradford was appalled. She resigned from the NLP in April 1990 as she saw a “definite move to the right”.

Bradford joined the Green party through Left Currents, but stuck with the new party only four months. After missing out on selection as Greens candidate for Auckland Central, in the 1990 election she left the party and stood unsuccessfully as an independent.

Bradford Builds Her Power Base After spitting the dummy at the Green Party, Sue Bradford went back to networking and re-building her radical power base.

While the Workers Communist League was no more and its successor Left Currents had also faded into the background, Bradford still worked closely with many of her old Maoist comrades.

As head of the Auckland Peoples Centre, Bradford worked with several ex WCLers on the staff and with People’s Centres in other towns, most also run by former WCL supporters.

In 1993, Bradford stood for Parliament on an Auckland Unemployed Workers Rights Centre ticket. She told Metro in May 1993 “a parliamentary seat has long been a personal ambition.”

One of her fellow AUWRC candidates was Stan (Steve) Hieatt, a former member of both the Communist Party and the Workers Communist League.

In 1993, the Christchurch based Campaign for People’s Sovereignty, several former WCL members, some neo-Maoist INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 55

students and radical Catholics began working towards a new movement. This was inspired partly by a document written in 1991 by the Justice, Peace and Service Unit of the Conference of Churches of Aotearoa/NZ entitled “Let’s Build Our Own Future”.

In November 1993, Bradford attended the Wellington Peoples Assembly where she spoke about the new Peoples Charter Movement. This was part of the Building Our Own Futures Project (BOOF), a network of radical groups inspired by CPS, CAFCA, the People’s Select Committee, the 1993 Peace, Power and Politics Conference and the People’s Plan for the 21st Century (PP21).

PP21 was an Asia-wide network of radical groups, mainly Maoist orientated or infiltrated.

According to the BOOF introductory booklet “PP21 was the international inspiration for the Peoples Assembly and the ongoing activity and more than a dozen people from Aoteoroa have been involved in International PP21 activities”.

Former WCL International officer Robert Reid was member of the BOOF/People’s Assembly National Organising Group as was Sue Bradford. Other WCL linked activists on the National Organising Group included Reid’s partner Maxine Gay and Quentin Jukes.

By the mid ‘90s, Sue Bradford was firmly committed to a new project. This was the “People’s Network”, the culmination of her earlier “Building Our Own Futures” work.

Established in late 1994, the People’s Network linked a wide range of individuals and groups from all over the country and published a regular magazine “Common Ground”.

Individuals contributing to Common Ground included Aziz Choudry (an anarchist who sued the SIS for burgling his Christchurch home in 1996), Don Borrie (a pro North Korean clergyman from Porirua), Don Ross (leader of the pro-Beijing, Organisation for Marxist Unity), Paul Maunder (Marxist playwright and dramatist), Jim Delahunty (a former Communist Party member from Wellington), Ben Nathan (jailed for smashing the America’s Cup), Moana Cole ( a liberal Christian anarchist jailed in the USA for a protest at an Air Force base) and former WCL supporters Robert Reid, Maxine Gay and Sue and Bill Bradford.

The People’s Network endured until at least 1998. At this time, Sue Bradford rejoined the Green Party after its split from the Alliance.

In 1999, Sue Bradford was placed fourth on the Green Party list and was elected to Parliament. That did not end Bradford’s commitment to revolutionary socialism however.

On March 3rd 2001, Bradford spoke at the “Globalisation or Localisation” conference in Wellington. I quote an email about the conference from Bruce Dyer of the Proutist organization, sent: Monday, 21 May 2001 17:07 “150 people representing more than 40 NGOs attended the Saturday conference. Edward Goldsmith; director of the International Forum on Globalisation, and Sue Bradford long time activist and a Green MP, began with a strong attack on the phenomenon of economic globalisation. Their presentations espoused a positive note which was reflected in Sue declaring her “heartfelt belief that what we are sharing in here is possibly the beginnings of the next true Internationale, one which has the hope of achieving world-wide revolutionary change without going backwards into feudalism or totalitarianism.”

The Internationale, was of course the body of Communist Party representatives who met annually in the early years of the last century to try to realise their dream of a world without exploitation or poverty.

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The Kotare School Another lasting legacy of Sue Bradford’s Peoples Network is the Kotare Research and Educational Trust.

According to the Trust’s website: “Kotare Trust is an Incorporated Charitable Trust which organises workshop programmes and develops community research on social change issues. Our Trustees have backgrounds in social change activism, adult education, unemployed rights, womens issues, Te Tiriti issues, community development, union building and environmental perspectives.”

Based on Bradford’s property near Wellsford, north of Auckland, the trust runs the Kotare School. Funded by various charitable trusts and the ever generous taxpayer, Kotare has trained hundreds of unionists, “community workers”, socialists, Greens and anarchists in activist techniques.

According to “Common Ground”, March 1995: “For many years it has been apparent to people working in community in Aotearoa that there is a real lack of training available for people who want to improve their skills and analysis in the area of community organising.

“Over the last year or so a number of people have come together as a result of the Building Our Own Futures project to look again at actually getting such a school up and running in Aotearoa. Some of us have looked to the model of the Highlander School in Tennessee as an example of what we’d like to achieve here.

“Those of us seeking to establish a school like Highlander here in Aotearoa do not want to simply replicate their US experience.

Obviously whatever we do must be relevant to local conditions and have thought through our relations with our Treaty partners.

“At this early stage there are about 60 people involved from around the country. Some of the groups supporting the project include the Federation of Workers Educational Associations, Auckland Unemployed Workers Rights Centre/Peoples Centre, people involved in continuing and adult education at Auckland University and other trade union, youth, church and community education activists.

“The new initiative has also received added impetus with the purchase of land near Wellsford by a group based at the Auckland Peoples Centre. This group hopes to see the school built on a portion of this land, but retaining its own legal and financial autonomy and kaupapa.”

The article went on to state some of the organisation’s goals: “We aim to use participatory educational methods which acknowledge the worth of each person, as we seek to empower people to take democratic leadership towards fundamental change.

“To provide residential and outreach training for people who are already part of a group or community in struggle.

“To be actively involved in local and regional efforts to work towards de-colonisation, to build genuine political and economic democracy and to maintain and develop links with national and international organisations which share our kaupapa.

“To use cultural work to and participatory research to strengthen our programmes.

“To actively promote equity in our work and in society.”

What the article doesn’t say is that the famous Highlander School was notorious for its association with the Communist Party USA. Highlander has trained three generations of unionists, communists and “community activists” in the US and has been credited with bringing about widespread “social change”, particularly in the US South.

What Does Kotare Teach?

Kotare’s teaching methods are based on the methods of Brazillian Marxist Paolo Freire.

“Based on Bradford’s property near Wellsford, north of Auckland, the trust runs the Kotare School.

Funded by various charitable trusts and the ever generous taxpayer, Kotare has trained hundreds of unionists, “community workers”, socialists, Greens and anarchists in activist techniques” Below are excerpts from a speech made in Sydney by Kotare tutor Catherine Delahunty taken from Kotare’s website. The venue is not stated, nor is it dated, but my guess is sometime in late 2004 or early 2005.

“We Make the Road By Talking?”

“Kotare was established in the mid nineties by people from a range of political movements to be a centre for radical and liberating education for social change…

“Kotare was a response to the bloodless coup by far right neo-liberals in my country in the 1980’s. Since then we have never regained our humanity as a society (if indeed we ever had it) as we have been poisoned by corporate globalisation, and the wholesale commodification of every aspect of our national life.

“Since colonisation Aotearoa New Zealand was always a vigorously dishonest country. The comparative wealth of our Pakeha citizens has been built on a massive land theft and the use of “democratheid”. But now neo liberalism has taken us to a whole new level of economic and social polarisation.

“Education in this context has, as always, been the handmaiden of the oppressor. Hence the need for a school for social change. Radical educators worldwide also provided our inspiration, notably Paolo Freire and the Highlander Folk School, the Phillipino activist educators we have met, and particularly the indigenous sovereignty movement in Aotearoa which has always had a strong radical education component.

“Unemployed workers rights activists, radical Catholic nuns, femiINVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 57

nist adult educators, anti racism workers, unionists and community development workers, thus formed Kotare in 1995. Since then the Trust members have expanded to include environmental activists, gay liberationists, disability rights advocates and other bona fide troublemakers. Some come from the middle class left and some from the marginalised working class.

“Since 1999, when I was employed to coordinate the education programme, we have been running workshops on a wide range of social change themes. The themes are developed from an ongoing structural analysis of the current political, economic and social dynamics in our country, and from working with key people and groups for mutual liberation.

“Many of you will know Paolo Freire’s work, and probably understand it better than I do. Freire’s work has been a major influence upon Kotare because of his underlying analysis of power and his educational methods based upon a respect for people’s wisdom. Myles Horton from the Highlander Folk School and Freire were both practitioners of this approach who have particularly inspired us by their active involvement in campaigns for social justice as well as learning Freire’s literacy campaigns and Highlander Folk School’s work with workers rights, civil rights and opposition to strip mining in the Appalachian mountains, made sense to us as educators. We come from the unemployment street protests, the direct action campaigns against gold mining, and the fringe unions and from the Pakeha solidarity movement in support of honouring Te Tiriti o Waitangi “As activists of our time we also uphold the feminist values of women’s liberation as well as class struggle. The key themes change but at the moment the focus is on indigenous rights, corporate globalisation resistance and alternatives, radical community development, youth empowerment and welfare issues.

“Each year we work with 14-17 year old high school students on their issues of the day. Unsurprisingly these include loss of community, the search for identity in a globalised corporate framework, and the old favourite, and the need for an educational experience that treats them with respect. Youth wages, suicide, animal rights, racism and date rape as a part of their daily concerns. Using role-plays, artwork, song and drama we work with young people to name their issues and develop both visions and strategies towards a world they want to live in.

Fourteen to seventeen year olds! So here we have a partially taxpayer funded school, employing Marxist educational methods teaching young teens to change their world. The word brainwashing comes to mind.

There is a clear link between Kotare School and the group Radical Youth, who organised many of the 2006 “youth rates” demonstrations in Queen Street, Auckland. Several Kotare trainees are involved in the West Coast anti mining group, the Save Happy Valley Coalition. Others are involved in the Young Greens and some even had links to the anarchists arrested in the October 15th 2007 anti terror raids.

Who is Kotare?.

Trustees of Kotare in recent years have included: Tim Howard (Chairman). In the ‘90s Howard was a leader of the East Timor Independence Committee and the People’s Network and is currently very active in the Philippines Solidarity Network Aotearoa. In 2001 he was active in the Whangarei Coalition For Peace and was on the advisory board of ARENA, a Christchurch based, anarchist leaning activist group. Howard was also active 58 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

in Network Waitangi Whangarei and works for the Northland Urban Rural Mission who’s stated aim is “to create a society based on the Treaty of Waitangi. It strives to achieve this by working with community groups, churches, and individuals to respond to social and economic issues.”

Sue Bradford (Deputy chair).

Karen Davis (Treasurer). A long time associate of Sue Bradford in the Auckland Unemployed Workers Rights Centre and the Auckland People’s Centre. Davis was active in the Peoples Network and has visited the Highlander School in Tennessee. She is the author of a How-to Guide – “Campaigning and Advocacy Resources for Setting up and Running Community Organisations and Projects.” which “provides an introduction to the use of campaigns, advocacy and other democratic processes to advocate changes in or for communities”.

John Benseman. In 1998 Benseman wrote an impact assessment of Paolo Freire on New Zealand adult literacy for the New Zealand Journal of Adult Learning. In 1999, he presented a paper “Kotare: Building a Radical Alternative in New Zealand Adult Education” at the Australian Adult Learning Association “Crossing Thresholds” Conference at the University of Melbourne. Benseman was a Senior Lecturer in Education at Auckland University, coeditor of the New Zealand Journal of Adult Learning and Head of Adult Education and a Tertiary Education Advisory Commission working group member.

Bill Bradford. Formerly active in the Auckland People’s Centre, the Auckland Unemployed Worker’s Rights Centre, the People’s Network and the Commonwealth wide NGO, COMMACT. Irene de Haan. Active in the People’s Network, De Haan is now working part-time as a Senior Community Relations Advisor at the Families Commission.

Josie Dolan. A Catholic Sister of Mercy from Dunedin. Formerly active in the People’s Network. In 2002 Dolan was described as “involved in women’s worship, Restorative Justice, Network Waitangi, Budgetting Service and Projects of the Sisters of Mercy. Josie has a long standing interest in Womens issues, especially Eco-Feminism, Social Justice and community based activities. Works as Counselling Coordinator at the Presbyterian Support Cameron Centre.”

Josie Lander. In the late ‘80s, Lander was involved in the Auckland Catholic Church’s Evangelisation, Justice and Development Bi-Cultural Development Core Group. Lander was active in the People’s Network and has worked with John Benseman on tertiary education issues.

Katherine Peet. A former president of the Canterbury Workers Educational Association. Active on “Treaty” issues with Network Waitangi. In 1992 Peet was spokeswoman for the Justice and Peace Service Unit of the Conference of Churches of Aotearoa. Recently she has been a Tertiary Education Advisory Commission working group member. Peet has worked with the Adult Community Education Association and the Federation of Workers Educational Associations. She has chaired the NZ Council of Social Services.

Sue Berman. A research officer with the School of Midwifery at Auckland University of Technology.

Gordon Jackman. On the board of Greenpeace NZ and a long time leader of the environmental group, Coromandel Watchdog.

Quentin Jukes. A member of the Workers Communist League in the ‘80s. Active in the People’s Network and COMMACT. A long time associate of Sue and Bill Bradford, Jukes runs Homebuilders,

an NGO in Warkworth, near the Kotare school.

Tali Williams. In 1998 Williams was on the executive of the UNITE union. In 1999 she was active in the National Youth Network with Sue Bradford’s daughter, Katie. In September 2000 she was one of eight Wellington students arrested at an anti capitalism protest in Cuba St. Williams is an organisor with the Engineers Union in Wellington and a leader of the Youth Union Movement.

She has also recently been a member of the Action Plan for Human Rights, Children’s Rights Sector Advisory Group.

Several Kotare supporters are involved in the Greens, forming a strong power base within the party.

Bill Bradford has been Northern area executive networker for the Green Party, Sue Berman has been a leader of the West Auckland Greens, while Karen Davis has served as party co-convenor and has worked on party policy formation.

Kotare Board member Gordon Jackman serves as a link between the Green Party and Greenpeace.

His wife Catherine Delahunty is Kotare School’s Education co-ordinator.

In the role since 1999, Delahunty’s role involves teaching, running workshops and helping to arrange the many speakers, tutors and courses run regularly at Kotare.

According to Campaign Against Foreign Control of Aotearoa’s, “Foreign Control Watchdog” of December 2004 Catherine Delahunty is an activist on environmental, Te Tiriti and social justice issues living in Gisborne with her partner Gordon Jackman. She is the local candidate for the Green Party, works nationally as a radical community educator for Kotare Trust, and is a generic troublemaker (her own words).

The daughter of well known Wellington Communists Jim and June Delahunty young Catherine was an activist from her teens.

In 1968 to 1970 she helped establish and run the radical Secondary Schools Students Association a network linking Maoist, pro-Soviet and Trotskyist youth.

Later, Delahunty dropped out of urban activism and took up a semi hippy rural lifestyle in the Coromandel.

By the late ‘80s, she was an active anti mining campaigner with the Coromandel Watchdog group. With her husband Gordon Jackman she became active in Greenpeace and by 1995 she was the organisation’s community action liaison officer.

Delahunty joined the Green Party in 1999 and has held many senior positions including “Auckland Campaign Manager 1999 election, Auckland Co Convenor 2000-2002, East Coast candidate 2002, electorate contact East Coast 2002- 2004, Female National Co Convenor (2002- 2004), Convenor Strategic Plan group (2002-2004).

In 2005 she was number 9 on the Green Party list, one spot ahead of another red turned Green, Russel Norman.

When it came time for Norman to enter Parliament, Delahunty obligingly gave up her list spot so that Norman could take up his seat.

Never mind though, at number 8 on the new Green Party list she has a good chance of making it to Parliament.

Takeover Completed?

On May 20th 2006 Green Party blogger (since expelled) Phil U of “Phwoar” explained the consequences should Russel Norman take over the Green Party co-leadership.

Phil U’s punctuation and layout is very idiosyncratic, but his message is very clear: “Casual observers of the Green Party male co-leadership struggle

could well be asking themselves just who is this Russel Norman?… he who has appeared as a contender for this crucial role…and what does it all mean…?

“A victory for Norman..(which is looking likely/possible)…will mean the left wing of the party will have achieved one of their major goals….control of the Green party.. (just the mopping-up will need to be done..)

“Some history first…the Greens were once part of the Alliance Party…which made sense in first past the post days…the advent of MMP saw the move from within the party to hive off from the Alliance..a move that was opposed by some of the Greens..those who preferred to stay under the left-wing umbrella of Anderton/Alliance..

“Interestingly enough..current contender Russel Norman was one of those who opposed that breakaway from the alliance by the Greens….and Nandor was one of those who headed that drive to split…Nandor ably articulating/arguing the case for an independent Green party…one not tainted by the stains of the old ideologies..a party that could independently argue the conservation case…and could appeal to those of all ideological stripes… “(These concerns can only be heightened by the awareness Norman is a former member of the communist party..?…and has as his mentor within the party one Keith Locke..’ nuff said..?.)

“Now the Green party is..like the Labour party..a broad church… there are the deep green vegan/veggies/animal rights crew…there is the old-school values party people…there are those who only came on board over the g.e. issue..there are the cannabis reform people..and there is the left…

“Jeanette Fitzsimons is the public face of the Greens….but she will not be there forever….and the current front-runner for that role is…Sue Bradford….(which camp within the greens do you think she comes from..eh..?…)

“So..do you get my point? A Norman/Bradford leadership cabal would irrevocably lock the Green party into that far-left role…and would..in my opinion..doom the Greens to irrelevancy..and electoral oblivion….this reason..and this reason alone should be enough impetus for the Green party membership not of the leftwing camp to block Normans’ run for that position…eh..?

“I’d like to finish with what I think is a telling anecdote…I was present when Sue Bradford and Catherine Delahunty made their first appearance at a Green party meeting…

“The Green party at that time was a very low-key affair..meetings held in the low-roofed attic of a bookshop [probably Keith Locke’s – Ed.] on K’ road…

“At this meeting Bradford said to me out of the corner of her mouth…(I had known her for some years)..that “this party is ripe for taking over..”..and she wasn’t wrong…” concluded Phil.

The reds have indeed taken over the Greens.

Much of the public however has seen through the leftist influence in the Greens, which is why in a time of heightened environmental concerns, the party continues to poll only at around 5%.

The question is-will the Greens self destruct at this election, or will Russel Norman, Sue Bradford and their comrades be helping to run New Zealand in a few weeks time? n INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 59

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think life | money For centuries investment markets have faithfully followed a traditional cycle.

Boom times followed by tough times. The wealthiest man in the United States has always advised that the best time to buy into a market is when the news looks the worst. Over the past six months he has been steadily reducing his enormous cash reserve and his latest purchase, $5 billion US dollar of preference shares in Goldman Sachs on the surface looks a great deal.

Preference shares are not like an ordinary share, they entitle the owner to a regular dividend, in Warren Buffett’s case 10% pa.

In addition, Mr Buffett also bought $5 billion dollars worth of options to buy ordinary shares in Goldman’s at a fixed price of USD$110 per share. Not bad when the share price rose to $125 on the news of Buffett’s involvement.

But it is possible that Mr Buffett has fired his guns a little prematurely. It is possible that the global financial crisis has a while to run yet. The day of reckoning has been a long time coming and we now know that it won’t be fixed in a fortnight.

The problem facing our global village is huge. The past decade has been witness to financial alchemy practiced by investment bankers who thought they were investment geniuses. They not only created wealth from toxic waste, they created mountains of it and sold it to mums and dads across the world.

The authorities (chairmen of central banks around the world) contributed to the scam by making money so cheap (read low interest rates – 0% in Japan and 1% in the USA) punters queued up to borrow it and then used it to buy both shares and property. This forced prices to unprecedented levels, seducing people to believe that prices could only go up. There was so much surplus money, investment bankers created fancy new products and sold these as well.

Mortgages and debt in general were so plentiful, investment banks started buying them, repackaging and selling them to pension funds. This process freed up their cash reserves so they could make more loans and thus keep the party’s punch bowl full. Early in the new century, two young entrepreneurial bankers dreamed up the idea of selling loan insurance. Not only could they get paid for selling debt, they could then write an insurance policy on the loan and receive a premium for doing so. The beauty behind this idea was that there was no limit to the number of insur64 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

The last dance of the desperate Investigate’s long-suffering prophet of Wall Street’s doom, Peter Hensley, gets to say ‘I told you so’ ance policies that could be written over any one loan. In theory they could be paid numerous times for selling one loan and in reality they were. These insurance policies are known as structured products and go by the names of Collaterised Debt Obligations (CDO’s) or Credit Default Swaps (CDS’s).

Now the investment bankers who created these new products, did not want to retain ownership of these new styled policies and so they packaged these up as well and sold them to pension funds and trading banks around the world. Because these new policies did not fit into the regular system there was no requirement for them to be registered on any central exchange. They were totally unregulated. Large fund managers around the world hailed the introduction of a new investment era and sold these new styled structured products as

low risk mortgaged backed investments and emphasized the link back to real property with little chance of default. Little did they know.

The music started to slow in early 2007, the partygoers had had their fill and the punch bowl was nearly empty. The hangover had begun. The interest rate on some of the low interest loans was being reset at market rates and the guests started defaulting on their loans. They not only defaulted, they packed up and left, dropping the keys off to the bank on the way out of town.

Sub-Prime became the headlines on the 6 o’clock news and people started looking up the meaning of contagion in the dictionary. Many didn’t bother, they just knew it sounded bad.

Central banks in the UK, Europe and the US did the only thing they knew how to do and dropped interest rates again. They did

not want the party to stop and so they paid the band to keep playing. The party staggered on a little longer until some of the smaller US Banks started filing for bankruptcy.

The dominoes had started to fall.

In April 07, it was US sub-prime specialist New Century Financial, then in July, Bear Stearns first signaled distress by announcing two of its structured hedge funds were in trouble. In August, French investment bank BNP Paribas made a similar announcement. In September rumours started circulating about Northern Rock in the UK and depositors were quick to start queuing to withdraw their cash.

It took a while for the UK authorities to completely understand the situation. They could have quickly announced a takeover / merger of Northern Rock by another institution but they could still hear the party music and dropped interest rates again in December in an effort to top up the punch bowl.

Four months later (March 08) the US authorities knew exactly what to do when Bear Stearns fell over. They paid JP Morgan to take it over. But the dominoes continued to fall. Indy Mac, the seventh largest mortgage lender in the US was taken over by the US Federal Reserve and four months later (July 08) the two giants of

the US mortgage system Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac announced their insolvency to the market place.

They too were considered too big to fail and so the US government stepped in to rescue them as well.

About the same time the UK Government, learning from their previous mistake with Northern Rock, announced they had facilitated the takeover by Lloyds TSB of the Halifax Bank of Scotland (HBOS).

Readers should be suitably impressed with the lightning speed that these mergers and acquisitions have taken place on both sides of the Atlantic. Normally such deals would take years to complete – what with sourcing shareholder and numerous governmental agency approvals.

They have been done literally overnight because the authorities are fully aware of the consequences.

The US Government has now voted on a $700 billion buy out fund to provide liquidity to Wall Street and global financial markets. They are doing this because the internal alarm bells are ringing. They know the ship is sinking but they have stopped short of shouting “abandon ship”. If Wall Street gets the cash, then there is a hope that they can plug the holes which will give

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“Try as they might, the authorities could be realising that they were able to extend the boom part, but they could not eliminate the bust part of the cycle some much needed time to allow the bilge pumps to work and the crisis avoided for now. They will then pray that the enemy has run out of torpedoes.

If the bail out plan does not work then the party will be well and truly over. Try as they might, the authorities could be realising that they were able to extend the boom part, but they could not eliminate the bust part of the cycle.

It is impossible to foretell the future. It is possible that being out of debt, with a mortgage free home, and a reasonable cash reserve could be a sound strategy. A little gold exposure might just prove to be a profitable investment.

A copy of Peter Hensley’s disclosure statement is available on request and is free of charge. © Peter J Hensley, 2008.

EVE’S BITE

THE DIVINITY CODE

“…the most politically incorrect book” in New Zealand. He is absolutely right…Prepare to be surprised and shocked.

Wishart may ruffle a few feathers but his arguments are fair as his evidence proves. If you are looking for a stimulating mental challenge, or a cause to fight for, Eve’s Bite will definitely satisfy. – Wairarapa Times-Age

Wishart takes up the gauntlet laid down by Richard Dawkins in The God Delusion, and in fact, uses Dawkins own logic and methodology to launch a counter-attack against unbelief.

Challenging…thought provoking…compelling – keepingstock.blogspot.com

Discover the truth for yourself. Get these two books today from Whitcoulls, Borders, PaperPlus, Dymocks, Take Note, and all good independent booksellers, or online at

I’m having a cracking good read of another cracking good read – The Divinity Code by Ian Wishart, his follow-up book to Eve’s Bite which was also a cracking good read – comment on “Being Frank”

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think life | EDUCATION

Our Honourable Members – fit to oversee education?

Amy Brooke takes aim at the politicos over the state of education We’ve heard them publicly shouting and yelling at one another. Their crude, even vicious personal comments and snide remarks… Feedback from shocked spectators illustrates disgust at what they saw – deep embarrassment at the antics of political representatives that New Zealanders voted for, and a genuine disgust that groups of school pupils should have to witness such childish, thuggish behaviour in the House. The reminder comes repeatedly that we wouldn’t let unruly children behave like this. In short, parliament has become a disgrace, demonstrated in its pre-election closure.

Ironically, parliamentarians refer to themselves as “Honourable Members”. Yet what’s the slightest bit honourable about yobbish behaviour as par for the course, about MPs openly referred to as bovver boys? Where are the careful, courteous, deeply intelligent individuals prepared to give to issues of the day the scrupulous consideration needed, before inflicting on the public policies profoundly affecting the economic, social, and even moral climate of the country?

How many of them even bothered with the background reading that would have informed them that the carbon emissions bill is an utter swindle; the whole carbon trading scheme a typical emperor’s clothes rort; that, as usual, personal ambitions, job opportunities and the prospect of losing face and reputation have locked us into too many policies severely damaging to New Zealand? Where are the men and women we should take a pride in – well-educated, well-spoken, thoughtful individuals who repudiate the notion of being whipped into party votes to do as they’re told, regardless of real issues of conscience – behaving, in essence, like animals herded together?

It’s no surprise politicians are now among the most despised individuals in the country. So why have we too long left the enormously important issue of educating our young in their hands – this motley crew, now inhabiting a House which once featured, among the usual mavericks, men and 66 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

women rightly respected for their integrity and intelligence? How many of its present incumbents are fit for the job?

Our now overbearing State claims a monopoly on what will and won’t be taught in New Zealand schools. The result of this far-Left takeover has been a shocking decline in educational standards. Not only in this country, but throughout English-speaking, Western societies, state-schooled children have been calculatedly deprived of anything approaching quality education. The result of the long and destructive attack by neoMarxist infiltration of our institutions is Britain’s football yobbos, and the beer-swilling, binge-drinking, empty-minded schoolleavers who have nothing worthwhile to show in their shaven or tattooed heads for all those long, tedious classroom years.

Their destructive social impact has been growing, a time-bomb of violence and lawlessness, of drug-taking and making; of self-centred, anti-social behaviour belatedly acknowledged. What needs to be to be yanked out into the open is that they have been thoroughly cheated of anything remotely approaching a quality education.

They’ve been cheated of even basic literacy and numeracy standards. They’ve never even been taught to write well, to speak well, to respect themselves as individuals.

The offspring in many cases of drop-out parents with a perpetual grudge against society, they have cheated themselves as well, many youngsters nursing a grudge deliberately inculcated in them for the purpose of manipulation by others with their own agenda. Maori children here figure conspicuously.

It’s easy to tell people they have been cheated: however, it’s also dangerous. It breeds a climate of resentment, and the urge to strike back. The reminder still needing to be taken on board is that the dice are, and always will be, loaded against so many, in so many ways – yet there are no shortcuts to taking individual responsibility for one’s own actions to try to make the world a better, not a worse, place. The old

truths… So it is worth constantly reminding ourselves of G.K. Chesterton’s aphorism that it ought to be the oldest things that are taught to the youngest people.

This is not what our risibly-called education system, supervised by our Honourable Members, is imparting. It is not one based on a firm foundation of knowledge, underpinned by basic literacy and numeracy skills, and added to with well-planned, systematic instruction in all the other areas of knowledge essential for well-rounded individuals. Through this distilled knowledge of what our forebears thought worth preserving, our children would have the chance, themselves, to become knowledgeable, thoughtful and wise.

Not even remotely does this approach what’s on offer. Our classrooms have long been used by radicalized social engineers to brainwash children. Environmental terrorists have, since the sixties, frightened school children with the looming calamities of over-population (ironic, given that underpopulation is now one of the West’s greatest challenges); with nuclear catastrophes, global cooling, global warming, environmental doom-mongering – with pacifist, anti-war, anti-male, anti-Christian, proabortion–you-name-it propaganda.

School children as young as 9 write, from their classrooms, worried, dogmatic letters to the newspapers lecturing the adult community about using plastic bags, recycling, not littering, not smoking, whatever.

Moreover, parliament’s Rainbow-coalition activists have now managed to recruit, and have children heavily propagandized with regard to what was traditionally regarded as deviant behaviour. Sexual activities, arguably the private affair of adults involved, have been deliberately politicized and propagandised as publicized “rights”, sanctioned in what many consider perversions of marriage – although the thought-police have ruled that one may no longer say so.

Who gave them this right?

Instead of the old truths being taught to children – for example, that “it is living

It’s no surprise politicians are now among the most despised individuals in the country. So why have we too long left the enormously important issue of educating our young in their hands

rightly that it is important”, they are taught to regard themselves with a self-esteem that nobody has actually any right to – rather than the saner concept that self-respect can be legitimately acquired by making the hard choices.

The Labour Party’s present proposals to keep children in school until they are eighteen is, as we would expect, poorly thoughtout, essentially fascist, and will worsen the situation rather than improve it.

While the Left continues to use education as a means of social control, its present state-employed bureaucracy’s record demonstrates an unfitness to provide quality education. Not only do headlines routinely note scandals such as “Thousands

of NCEA papers wrongly graded”: even more thousands of children have ended up in reading recovery programmes because phonic reading was withheld from them.

More thousands of children are bored out of their minds in noisy schoolrooms where displacement and infotainment activities have replaced genuine learning. The substitution of haphazard computer access for the knowledgeable and enthusiastic teacher at the front of the class, actually teaching; the withholding from the young the wisdom and pleasure to be found in great poetry, treasured by our forebears; the schools fuelling the third-rate exhibitionism of the drug-taking, promiscuous, suicide-ridden pop rock scene – e.g.

the headlined: “Primary rockers stoke the fire …budding rock musicians perform for their primary-aged peers…” at a local school “Rockfest” for 10 and 11 year olds (!)

We should be doing better than this.

Much better. Some community groups, schools and parents are. It’s time in future issues to look at them, and what we could be actually doing about challenging the over-long monopoly of our thoroughly downgraded school system run by the State – i.e. by those we can no longer respect as Honourable Members. © Amy Brooke www.amybrooke.co.nz www.summersounds..co.nz http://www.livejournal.com/users/brookeonline/

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think life | SCIENCE

The creation debate Next year’s experiments with the Large Hadron Collider are set to reignite the creation debate, reports Robert Boyd

When the huge subatomic-particle smasher under the Swiss-French border starts running, it’s supposed to reveal what happened the instant after the big bang, the theoretical beginning of our universe 13.7 billion years ago.

The Large Hadron Collider, which suffered a temporary setback last month, might find some answers. But it will leave other questions on many people’s minds, such as what happened BEFORE the big bang, and even whether there was a “before.”

A scientific mini-industry has popped up as deep-thinking physicists and cosmologists bat around various guesses as to what may have happened in a “pre-big bang.”

68 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

Some of the top minds in this field gathered at Columbia University earlier this month to debate these questions.

“What banged? Where did it come from?” was the question raised by Laura MersiniHoughton, a cosmologist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

“Is ours the only universe? If so, how did it come to exist?” asked Paul Davies, a cosmologist and authority on science and religion at Arizona State University in Tempe.

Respected scientists have proposed a flock of theories to describe what might have happened before the birth of our familiar universe of space and time.

The concepts have fanciful names such as “the big bounce,” “the multiverse,” “the cyclic theory,” “parallel worlds,” even “soap bubbles.” Some propose the existence of multiple universes. Others hold that there’s one universe that recycles itself endlessly, rather as Buddhists believe. Judeo-Christian theologians may have difficulty accepting any of these notions.

Most of the hypotheses are variations on an older idea that the universe has no beginning and no end, contrary to the bigbang theory, which says that our universe originated at a specific point and will end sometime in the distant future.

“Neither time nor the universe has a begin-

ning or an end,” two leading cosmologists, Paul Steinhardt of Princeton University and Neil Turok of Oxford University, wrote in their 2007 book, Endless Universe: Beyond the Big Bang.

“The evolution of the universe is cyclic, with big bangs occurring once every trillion years or so, each one accompanied by the creation of new matter and radiation that forms new galaxies, stars, planets and presumably life,” they wrote. “Ours is only the most recent cycle.”

Some scientists contend that observational evidence may be found to back up the speculation. They say that no scientific theory can be considered valid until it’s been tested.

“It is becoming increasingly clear that multiverse models grounded in modern physics can be empirically testable,” Max Tegmark, a theoretical physicist at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, wrote in “Parallel Universes,” a chapter in the 2003 book “Science and Ultimate Reality.”

Some researchers hope that the Large Hadron Collider will provide evidence to support or refute these conjectures. They say the particle smasher might discover extra dimensions, beyond our familiar three spatial dimensions plus time. More dimensions are the basis of several pre-bigbang theories.

Michio Kaku, a professor of theoretical physics at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, proposes that gravity, unlike light and matter, could travel between parallel universes and cast a “shadow” that scientists might be able to detect.

The shadow might take the form of “gravitational waves,” faint ripples in the fabric of space and time caused by violent explosions such as the big bang. Detectors in the United States and Europe are seeking such waves, and in the future satellites will watch for evidence of them in space.

Turok says his cyclic theory predicts a “distinctive pattern of gravitational waves that is very different from the one expected in the big-bang theory ... and may prove or disprove our theory within the next few years.”

Last August, ground and satellite observations revealed what appeared to be an enormous “hole in the universe,” a mostly empty region of the sky, 900 million light-years wide – about 5 billion trillion miles – in the constellation Eridanus. Mersini-Houghton, a believer in multiple universes, interpreted the empty spot as the “footprint” of the gravitational tug of another, smaller universe parked at the edge of our own.

“The particle smasher might discover extra dimensions, beyond our familiar three spatial dimensions plus time. More dimensions are the basis of several pre-big-bang theories “It’s like someone took a giant scoop and scooped all the matter away,” she told the Columbia cosmology conference. “All these universes are interacting with each other.”

Mersini-Houghton’s interpretation of the “hole” is controversial and so far lacks independent confirmation.

The oldest and most popular of the prebig-bang theories is the multiverse. As outlined by Martin Rees, the British astronomer royal, in his 1997 book, “Before the Beginning: Our Universe and Others,” the theory declares that our universe is only one of many – perhaps an infinite number – of other worlds, each differing slightly from the others. These universes are continually forming new offspring, sprouting off from each other rather like soap bubbles.

The big bounce hypothesis – sometimes known as the big splat – contends that our universe was preceded by a twin that expanded to a certain limit, then contracted, collapsed and gave birth to our world. A leading proponent of this theory is Martin Bojowald, a theoretical physicist at Pennsylvania State University in University Park, who published it last year in the journal Nature.

In 2005, Kaku published a book titled

“Parallel Worlds” in which he hypothesized that there may be millions of different, parallel universes, some that look like our own.

They’re invisible to us because they lie outside our universe.

The big-bang theory found favour with the Roman Catholic Church because it implied that the world has a single beginning at a definite point in time, as portrayed in Genesis. At a Vatican conference in 1951, Pope Pius XII said the big bang was consistent with church doctrine.

“Creation took place in time, therefore there is a creator, therefore God exists!” the pope declared.

The Rev. John Haught, an authority on science and religion at Georgetown University in Washington, said the idea that there might be many worlds and many beginnings, not just a single big bang, wouldn’t undermine Christian theology.

“Even if the universe, or multiverse, were around forever, this would not challenge the theological explanation of the world’s existence,” Haught said. “The biblical doctrine of creation ... lies at a different level from scientific understanding. The world, theologians say, still gets its finite being from an infinite being.”

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 69

think life | TECHNOLOGY

iPhone crushers Ian Wishart previews the next two major releases on the smartphone market The two heavyweights in the smartphone market are both launching killer gadgets aimed squarely at Apple’s 3G iPhone.

Palm was first cab off the rank with the release in the US of its new 3G Palm Treo Pro, a slick evolution of the current flagships, the Treo 700WX (Telecom version) and Treo 750 (Vodafone).

Whilst the existing 700WX utilises Telecom’s mobile broadband EVDO network, the new Treo Pro will be a genuine quad-band worldphone, with portability on both Telecom’s new GSM network and Vodafone’s existing 3G GSM service, and backwards compatibility with 2G networks.

Key features: WiFi and GPS at a Touch: The onetouch Wi-Fi button provides a clean, fast Wi-Fi connection experience (802.11b/g) that gets users online rapidly at home, in the office or in Wi-Fi hotspots. With integrated GPS and Palm software enhancements, the Treo Pro Smartphone offers maps, point-to-point directions and pointof-interest (POI) searches for locations such as restaurants or stores.

Windows Mobile 6.1: With Palm shortcuts built on top of Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional, the Treo Pro Smartphone helps consumers improve navigability and responsiveness. One-touch Palm shortcuts increases mobility with quick access to the features people use most -- such as Wi-Fi, email, calendar, and on/off ringer switch.

Live in Color: Treo Pro has a flush, high-resolution colour touch screen, full QWERTY keyboard and one-touch shortcut buttons for easy-to-use mobility. Its blend of powerful capabilities in an uncomplicated design offers a surprisingly effortless mobile experience.

Aimed at business users, the Treo Pro includes encryption for onboard data, including information stored on expan70 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

sion cards, meaning that if you lose your phone your life won’t be hacked by a scumbag.

User memory space onboard has been upgraded to 100mb, out of a total 256mb – the balance of which is devoted to the Windows Mobile 6.1 operating system, but with the ability to take expansion cards of up to 32GB in size, space is unlikely to be a problem. The camera has been upgraded to 2mb, and in the words of Henry Ford, you can have any colour you like as long as it’s black (obsidian, in marketing speak). Much lighter and sleeker than the existing Treo’s, this one is only a smidgen larger than the iPhone.

The latest version of Windows Media Player Mobile allows YouTube videos to play on the 320 x 320 touchscreen.

However, being more of a corporate tool than a café accessory, the Treo does things easily that the iPhone either can’t, or can’t do without a lot of tweaking, as a reviewer for the Sydney Morning Herald has noted: “copy and paste, shoot video, send picture messages, search emails and stream stereo music via Bluetooth. It can also run in a tethered mode, which means you can use it as a 3G modem with a laptop using Bluetooth wireless or USB cable. Viewing and editing Word and Excel files is builtin. Battery life is brilliant, too.”

Palm’s New Zealand agents report a mid-2009 release of the model downunder (possibly coinciding with a new operating system release), so if you want a Treo Pro desperately you’ll need to buy it direct from the US, where the asking price is US$549 for an unlocked handset, or Australia where it went on sale last month at a shade over A$900.

The second offering is Blackberry’s Storm – the world’s first full touchscreen Blackberry. In this respect, Blackberry manufacturers RIM are gunning directly for the iPhone. Like the Apple model, the Storm’s screen automatically rotates between landscape and portrait, based on how you’re holding the phone.

Like the Palm, the Blackberry offers built in GPS navigation, although oddly it doesn’t have Wi-Fi. It’s a dual-mode phone, capable of operating on CDMA or GSM, although it doesn’t have the full GSM bands that the Treo offers.

Onboard memory is an impressive 1GB, with supported expansion up to 16GB. The Blackberry’s touch screen is unique, however, in the sense that it actually works as a clickable screen rather than merely touching it. This gives the user a tactile confirmation that the command has gone through, and conversely reduces the risk of screen commands being set off by an accidental brush.

A news release from RIM says the phone will go on sale through Vodafone in New Zealand and Australia in November.

This report first appeared in the October 10 TGIF Edition. We’re running it here as a reminder that every week now, the equivalent of a further 40 page Investigate magazine is published by us in our TGIF Edition – content that, for the most part, you will never see or even know about unless you subscribe to TGIF Edition and join our mailing list. It’s cheap – just $3 a month for a minimum four issues. See www.tgifedition.tv for more details

feel life | SPORT

NZPA / Action Photographics, Col Whelan

Warriors primed for the future The one-time media whipping boys became the people’s team in 2008. After being written off mid-season the Warriors delivered a hearty, barnstorming finish to become front page news. As the Rugby League World Cup swings into top gear across the Tasman, sports columnist Chris Forster finds the Auckland franchise in healthy shape One magic, and almost tragic, moment in Melbourne defined the Warriors season.

Forget the 34-6 shallacking by eventual champions Manly in the semi-finals. It was the stunning finale to the huge upset in the first weekend of the playoffs which is the stuff league legends are made of.

As eighth qualifiers the Warriors needed to topple the top seeds and defending champs Melbourne on their home patch, called appropriately “the Graveyard”. The commentators were writing them off trailing 15-14 with two minutes left. Jerome 72 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

Ropati launched a daring counter-attack from deep in his own half, fended off a defender and offloaded to rampaging winger Manu Vatuvei.

Big Manu scythed through a couple of tackles to the 30 metre mark and flipped a ball into Michael Witt, who had a clear run to the line for the match winning try. A moment of near madness almost overshadowed the triumphant finale. Witt dillydallied in putting the ball down over the line, and with Channel 9’s legendary Ray Warren screaming “put it down son”, he

just beat a lunging defender’s boot to seal the deal.

Witt later put his hesitation down to a near ill-fated attempt to tick a few seconds off the clock, not realising Cameron Smith was lingering so close. He could’ve been hero to zero, but lady luck was smiling on him. And the Warriors Their reward was a packed house at Mt Smart the following Friday. 24,500 fans yelling their lungs out as the Warriors cooked the Roosters 30-13, to steam into the last four and the penultimate weekend. Legendary

storm trooper Ruben Wiki extended his farewell season by another week, with a grimacing, menacing hit which flattened burly fellow Kiwi Iosia Soliola.

Eric Watson and the patient club owners had a nice bonus of a couple of hundred thousand dollars for the next salary cap.

Suddenly they were dark horse possibilities to go all the way.

History of course will show they were outclassed by Manly 34-6, after trailing 8nil at half-time.

But it was the Warriors who’d captured the imagination of fans on both sides of the Tasman.

It was the day after the Bledisloe Cup triumph in Brisbane, when the All Blacks retained the Bledisloe and Tri Nations trophies and Graham Henry silenced his army of critics.

But come Monday morning there was only one story. The stunning great escape, the battle of Witt’s and the unsettling of the Storm.

Provincial rugby’s showpiece the Air New Zealand Cup was a poor second cousin during their heroic three weeks in the national sporting spotlight. The so-called Battle of the Bridge between Auckland and North Harbour attracted less than 5,000 fans in Albany, and the traditional midweek breakfast luncheon was called off due to lack of interest.

The future’s pretty bright too.

Vatuvei’s unstoppable athleticism on the left wing has made him a household name.

It’s a far cry from the horrific spell during the 2007 season when the 22 year old winger suffered an extreme case of the butterfingers and his career could’ve been ruined.

It speaks volumes for the culture in the club that Manu rebounded from that, to become one of the most dangerous attacking weapons in the NRL. The Junior Warriors should’ve gone all the way in the inaugural Toyota Cup for under-20 players, unearthing genuine homegrown talents like Russell Packer, Sonny Fai and Ben Matulino, who became a team regular during their hot run of 8 wins in their last 10 matches.

They had control of their major semifinal against the baby Broncos only to concede a try with the last move of the game to lose 26-28, and surely would’ve gone onto win their version of the Grand Final.

There are also four savvy signings for next season including a flying winger and a versatile back from the Brisbane Broncos.

Ivan Cleary seems to be a coach in con-

trol of the Warriors destiny.

The recipe for success in Auckland is to blend the Polynesian flare and athleticism that dominates the working class sport in New Zealand, with the calming leadership of a few key imports and a good Ocker coach.

Daniel Anderson got the mix right in the early parts of this century, taking the Warriors to their first top eight finish in his first year in charge, famously the Grand Final in 2002, and then top four in 2003.

But the wheels fell off in 2004. Relations with some of the key Polynesian players soured and Anderson was chopped from his contract with a tasty $600,000 payout.

The promotion of former Warriors fullback and assistant coach Ivan Cleary in 2006 was one of the smartest business decisions Watson has made.

There are no flashy edges to Cleary. He’s unassuming, calculating and loyal to his players, and they respect that.

Midway through the 2008 season the Warriors looked dead and buried, tail-spinning a losing streak. Even iconic players like Ruben Wiki were out of form, and demoted to the reserves.

But a spirit deep inside the club provided the kia kaha. Captain fantastic Steve Price returned to the fold from his frustrating injury, and the momentum started to build.

Even a shock home defeat to the struggling Rabbitohs couldn’t destroy their resolve.

It’s that spirit and the settled leadership which bodes well for the Auckland club.

The Rugby League World Cup is often seen as a misnomer. It’s more like the “Tri Nations and a Few Others Cup”, given Australia, New Zealand and England are the only real forces at the 13-a-side code.

The last tournament in the UK was eight years ago was a financial disaster. The decision to expand it to 16 teams including New Zealand Maori and Lebanon was a misguided attempt to globalise the game.

They’ve sensibly trimmed the numbers to 10 for this event in Australia, including a Super Group with the big three and Papua New Guinea.

Three of those will make the semi-finals while the two other groups of so-called minnows sort out the fourth playoff slot.

It’s a much more realistic equation.

The Kiwis are near certainties to make one of the two semi-finals in mid-November, even without three frontline forwards in rugby defector Sonny Bill Williams and the injured pair Roy Asotasi and Frank Pritchard.

France and a talented Tonga outfit are the top picks in the shallower pools.

Sensibly organisers have steered clear of the cavernous 80 thousand seat Olympic Stadium at Homebush, which would’ve look embarrassingly empty even during the Australian games.

Rugby League bosses around the world are desperate to make this work. They have to prove the game can expand beyond its traditional bases and can compete with the juggernaut that the Rugby Union showpiece has become.

“The last tournament in the UK was eight years ago was a financial disaster.

The decision to expand it to 16 teams including New Zealand Maori and Lebanon was a misguided attempt to globalise the game.They’ve sensibly trimmed the numbers to 10 for this event in Australia

KEY WORLD CUP DATES Date

Game

Where

Sun 26 Oct

OPENING CEREMONY / KIWIS v KANGAROOS

Sydney

Sat 1 Nov

KIWIS v PNG

Gold Coast

Sat 2 Nov

KANGAROOS v ENGLAND

Melbourne

Sat 8 Nov

ENGLAND v NEW ZEALAND

Newcastle

Mon 10 Nov

SEMIFINAL Qualifier – Pool B v Pool C

Penrith

Sat 15 Nov

SEMIFINAL 1

Brisbane

Sun 16 Nov

SEMIFINAL 2

Sydney

Sat 22 Nov

WORLD CUP FINAL – Suncorp Stadium

Brisbane

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 73

feel life | HEALTH

The cancer myth industry Claire Morrow takes a swipe at the headlines from both sides Every now and then, I see my least favourite health related headline of all time and quietly seethe. Or rant, as the case may be.

It often goes something like “SCIENTISTS ANNOUNCE CURE FOR CANCER”.

Sounds harmless enough, right? Sounds like a good thing. Which it would be, if it were true. If it isn’t true – and it’s not – then what a headline like that does is foster false hope, and contribute to public misunderstanding about the process of the disease group we refer to as “cancer”. Which are the bits that make me cross.

Most of us will be affected by cancer during our lives, many of us will be aware of various cancer risks, have medical tests to check for certain cancers we might be at risk for, have friends and family members with cancer, or have cancer ourselves.

Cancer is – contrary to the occasional far 74 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

fetched claims of the more extreme alternative health movements – not a new phenomenon, or a product of the western lifestyle. Hippocrates was describing cancer in the ancient world long before we were paranoid about carcinogens. Non-human animals, also (even non-smoking vegetarian animals) get cancer.

Suggestions that some population groups (either racial or cultural) do not get cancers, also crop up from time to time and are misleading. There are two possible explanations, and they probably both apply in many situations. Different ethnic groups certainly have different disease profiles, as a result of genetics, and different cultural groups likewise experience disease differently. A culture where smoking is uncommon will have less lung cancer, of course.

They are unlikely however to have no lung

cancer at all, because not all lung cancers are caused by smoking – many are caused by natural occurring radon gas. A dubious study a few year ago showed that a group of peasant farmers who ate a mostly vegan diet did not have any recorded cancer deaths. Well, perhaps they had good genetic stock, you might think. Perhaps a vegan diet prevents cancer, you may consider. These things are both possible.

Perhaps having a low calorie diet increases longevity (there is reasonable evidence to suggest that this is so), and being peasants, they certainly did – maybe this explains the reported effect. Or it may be that living a rural life with little access to medical care leads one to die of things like tractor accidents before one is diagnosed with cancer, or to die of cancer without anyone calling it cancer. Who knows? I make no claim to

know which of these explanations is at play when such claims are made, but I am quite sure that cancer is a phenomenon of living things, and that it will occur when it can.

Because that is what it does.

Cancer is not one disease, but a large group of diseases technically known as “malignant neoplasms”. A neoplasm is any uncontrolled growth of cells, including benign growths. Some moles, fibroids, and other benign lumps are neoplasms, abnormal cells growths, but they do not always do anything nasty. A benign lump may be annoying, but it can usually be removed surgically if needed. It has no grand plan. A malignant neoplasm, however, has a grand design. It wants to grow and take over. So in addition to the uncontrolled growth of cells, it wants to invade the adjacent tissue or metastasize (spread to other parts of the body). A benign growth is usually a disorganized mess. Some cells have gone batty dividing and proliferating, and then they stop because they have no system to keep themselves going. A malignancy, however, sets up a system. All cells need energy, food, blood flow to survive. A malignancy organizes one for itself, grows itself a blood supply, sets up little arteries, sets out to take over the surrounding organ municipalities.

The cells do not have much appreciation that they need their host, they are focused on their takeover mission.

Cancers, however efficient, are not that

complex. Not compared to, say, the miracle of the human body taken as a whole.

The human body system has a number of energy pathways and systems of metabolism within cells. Protein kinases, chemical reactions that can produce energy for the body to carry out its functions, are varied and multiple – the body uses a large but finite number of kinases to run its systems.

Cancers will use one kinase, perhaps two in later stages, to run and grow. Chemistry research has a role in cancer research here.

Each kinase system is very specific so, at a molecular level, each one should be identifiable and – it follows – interruptible.

Current cancer research posits that if each cancer has only one energy system, then it can be identified and a kinase inhibitor can be developed. A kinase inhibitor is something which interrupts the kinase system, turning off cell growth. If a cancer has one kinase it relies on to grow, and you switch it off, then the cancer stops growing. You wouldn’t be killing the cancer, just freezing it in time. As long as you continued to take your theoretical kinase inhibitor medicine, your cancer would be absolutely stable, unable to progress any further. It wouldn’t matter what stage it was at, it would stop right there. The hope would be that the rest of the body would go on functioning more or less adequately – any processes within the body that relied on that kinase would also not work, but since

the body uses many systems, and the cancer only has one, you’d hope the body would cope. The theory there is not unlike that of chemotherapy in which the entire body is poisoned in the hope that a cancer is poisoned to death and the rest of the body is poisoned a bit, but survives and recovers.

Kinase inhibitors would mean that inoperable cancers could be switched off, that you could buy a potentially limitless amount of time, that you could live with cancer the way you can live with diabetes.

The other interesting thing about this research is that it is…clever. Medicine is still largely experimental in many ways; it always has been. We find a drug, and then we start trying to work out what it might do, or how it might work better, how it can be tweaked etc. Our understanding of how the human body works is still developing. The quit smoking medicine Zyban, for example, started out life as an antidepressant. It wasn’t an especially good antidepressant, but the human trial group appeared to lose interest in smoking.

That was a surprise. And that is one way for a drug to be born, through research and development trial and error. Actually working out at a molecular level what you want and designing a smart drug, a purpose built chemical, to do exactly what you want it to do, is new and exciting. And hopefully the way of the future. Better living, through chemistry, as the phrase goes.

HEALTHBRIEFS Hormone reduces heart attack damage u NEW YORK, – U.S. and Japanese medical scientists say they’ve found giving rats a certain hormone immediately after a heart attack significantly reduced coronary damage. The researchers from Kyoto University in Japan and the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Hospital in New York City induced heart attacks in two groups of rats by blocking arteries for 20 minutes. One group then received an intravenous injection of erythropoietin, or EPO, a naturally occurring hormone used to treat anaemia. The control group received an injection of a saline solution. Both groups were then injected with a radioactive tracer that binds to heart cells that have died. The scientists found the rats injected with EPO had a nearly three-fold reduction in heart damage, compared with rats in the control group. Researchers also found regional cardiac functioning was significantly better in the EPO-treated rats, suggesting a single dose of EPO might prevent long-term heart damage and dysfunction after a heart attack. Although other drugs ... have been studied, none appears nearly as effective as a single dose of EPO, said Dr. H. William Strauss of the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Centre, one of the study’s authors. The research is reported in The Journal of Nuclear Medicine.

Bacterial link to colon cancer studied u OKLAHOMA CITY, – U.S. researchers say they have discovered the human colon reacts to changes in a common bacterium in ways that might promote the growth of cancer. Researchers from the Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Centre in Oklahoma City and from the University of Oklahoma studied a bacterium called Enterococcus faecalis that’s commonly found in the human colon. The scientists said that bacterium can release a type of oxygen molecule called a superoxide, that damages DNA and might promote the growth of cancer cells in the colon.

“We wanted to investigate how colon cells respond to normal gut bacteria that can damage DNA, like E. faecalis,” said Professor Mark Huycke of the VA Medical Center. He added that the researchers found superoxide from E. faecalis led to strong signaling in immune cells called macrophages. It also altered the way some cells in the gut grew and divided and even increased the productivity of genes that are associated with cancer. Huycke said the findings are among the first to explore mechanisms by which normal gut bacteria damage DNA and alter gene regulation in the colon that might lead to cancer.

The study appears in the Journal of Medical Microbiology.

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 75

feel life | ALT.HEALTH

You’re so vein An extract of horse chestnut could provide benefits for varicose vein sufferers, reports Ian Wishart

You’ve seen the ads on TV, spruiking the latest expensive potions and lotions to cover up unsightly skin blemishes like spider or varicose veins. You might even have seen ads for clinics that offer laser surgery to “treat” the condition.

While in many cases, laser surgery can help, sometimes it makes the problem worse.

Women, and many men, would nonetheless spend a fortune if they could just find a product that actually worked.

76 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

Well, that’s the beauty of capitalism.

People keep on striving to produce something that does work, and the innovative team at Schwabe in Germany appear to have found at least one possible solution, a product called ‘Venotrex’.

Like their previous successes, Kaloba for colds, bronchitis and flu (based on a particular kind of geranium extract), and Cardiomax (based on a particular hawthorn blend), Venotrex is a natural prod-

uct based on horse chestnut.

Once again, the key is in the chemical extraction process and the particular mix of the 11 secret herbs and spices, so it isn’t as simple as whipping out to find a horse chestnut supplier. Given that horse chestnuts contain a toxin in their raw, unprocessed state, you probably wouldn’t want to eat any. However, by focusing tightly on a particular ingredient and testing it, Schwabe achieved some medically-documented success in double-blind trials that elevates Venotrex well above some of the snake oil remedies floating around.

A 1996 study published in Britain’s Lancet medical journal established that the horse chestnut extract involved was so good at reducing fluid retention and swelling (oedema) in patients with chronic venous insufficiency (CVI), that it was preferable to compression stockings in this area.1 Another study confirmed it, noting: “���� All the symptoms investigated (leg pain, leg tiredness, sensations of tension in the legs, swelling of the legs, itching and susceptibility to oedema) improved significantly or even disappeared entirely.”2 In fact, there are a string of medical journal reports, all with similar comments: “..is of clinical benefit in patients with conditions resulting in CVI, haemorrhoids or peripheral oedema formation.”

The extract works by combining an antiinflammatory effect with reducing plasma loss through blood vessel walls, in simple terms strengthening blood vessel action and reducing the symptoms of vascular disease.

1. DIEHM C., Trampisch H. J., Lange S. Schmidt C. Comparison leg compression stocking and oral horse chestnut seed extract therapy in patients with chronic venous insufficiency.

The Lancet 1996; 347: 229-94.

2. GREESKE K., Pohlmann B. & K. Horse chestnut seed extract: an effective therapeutic concept in general practice. Fortschr. Med. 114, number 15 (1996) 42-46.

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 77

taste life travel

On the edge of the ice Alan Solomon takes one route to the edge of the Antarctic

Ushuaia, in Argentina, population 65,000, is a place to eat and sleep and party a little while waiting to grab a ride on an Antarctica-bound excursion vessel or as a base for exploring semi-tamed chunks of Tierra del Fuego. Either plan is a valid reason to rush down here.

Punta Arenas, in Chile, population 115,000, has the closest decent airport to Torres del Paine, the mind-blowing national park a day’s drive away. That’s reason enough to get down here.

But as towns, well ...

Cruise ships sailing around Cape Horn stop at one or both, and they deserve that.

They would even be worth an extra day if the big boats weren’t in so much of a hurry.

That’s about it.

Both towns claim to be the world’s southernmost, which matters mainly to people who sell mugs and T-shirts and, this being South America, to passionate locals.

78 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

On local signage and souvenirs, Ushuaia declares itself fin del mundo – end of the world. And yes, Punta Arenas, speaking latitudinally, indeed is north of Ushuaia.

Ah, but there are technicalities.

“Ushuaia is on an island,” notes a veterinarian who happens to be Chilean, specifically Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego.

Punta Arenas, she further notes, is not. It’s on the mainland.

“If we allow islands,” she ultimately notes, “there is Puerto Williams.” Which is a modest (population 2,000) settlement south of Ushuaia, on a Beagle Channel island, in Chile.

So Chile’s Puerto Williams, strictly speaking (and not counting Antarctica, whose largest town is a few shacks with instruments), is at the fin del mundo.

But chances are you won’t go there, though you can. The “southernmost” vote here is for Ushuaia, but the restaurants are a little better

in Punta Arenas, which, in the fin, is all that matters – aside from both being surrounded

by Tierra del Fuego and the rest of Patagonia, which counts for something.

And one last point: Both Ushuaia and Punta Arenas have accessible penguins.

USHUAIA If you don’t mind how far it is from everything, the setting is nice. It’s on the Beagle Channel, which separates Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego (which is half in Chile, half in Argentina) from Isla Navarino (all Chile’s), and is framed most of the time by snow-dusted peaks.

In the era before regularly scheduled airline service, it was home to a prison – location, location, location – and was a lively port for exporting wool, timber and a little gold. The prison closed in 1947 and is a museum, the gold didn’t last, timber is scarce these days and the wool business

isn’t what it was, which leaves tourism as the primary local industry.

It shows.

The main drag, Avenida San Martin, looks like a hundred other tourist strips around the world, a concentration of souvenir shops, lodgings, restaurants, tour offices, photo processors, Internet cafes and places to quench thirst. Plus a casino.

What differentiates this one from, say, Jackson Hole, aside from the direction water swirls down toilets and the reality that Antarctica is the next major stop south, is the weather.

You know that thing about, “If you don’t like the weather, wait a minute”? They say it just about everyplace, but here, it’s absolutely true.

“We have the high pressure and the low pressure,” explains taxi driver Ignacio Rodriguez, “and all the time they are fighting, you know?”

So when you book a boat ride to see the penguins ...

“If you wake up in the morning and it’s raining, it doesn’t matter,” he says. “You take your things and you go. In a couple of hours, you can have sun.”

Which is exactly what happened when we did it: rain at the start, sunshine soon enough, rain that night.

Several dockside companies offer variations of the ride. Ours, sold by Rumbo Sur (about US$61; price subject to change; www.rumbosur.com.ar/ingles/indexeng. htm), took us through the channel and right alongside rocks populated by sea lions, gulls, cormorants, albatrosses and, most popularly, Magellanic penguins. It’s a knockout boat ride.

“It is a special place,” the boat’s guide, Maria Schroder, tells us. “The mountains, the sea, the penguins ... special.”

Penguins. Even before they became

movie stars, they were irresistible. They are irresistible here.

For a few dollars more, the boat tours include a stop at Estancia Harberton, once a thriving sheep ranch and now mainly a place where boat tours stop.

“We were isolated at first,” says biologist Natalie Goodall, who came here with her husband, Tom, in 1963 to run the place and stayed. “We didn’t have a road.” They had a small plane. “Tom would go to town once a month or once every two months ...”

And she tells tales of Tierra del Fuego ... Land of Fire ... this island at the End of the World.

“The natives built fires for their initiation ceremonies,” she says. “The Europeans were afraid of the fire.”

So the quaking Europeans – specifically, Ferdinand Magellan, the explorer – gave the place a name, eventually overcame their fear of fire and finally, as Europeans tended INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 79

“When the wind isn’t making your eyes water and whipping your hair to a frenzy, it’s actually a very pleasant place to be, even if it does only take a day or two to exhaust the possibilities to do, took the place from the natives.

Today, for a small fee, we’re allowed to poke around Tierra del Fuego National Park.

There are many ways to do it. There’s a train ride, for one – but really, this is a park that should be climbed, kayaked, mountain-biked or, minimum, walked.

My walk was a 6-miler along Lapataia Bay – a beauty – a mix of beach, rocky shoreline, forest, wildlife and fine mountain views, along with congenial fellow hikers from all over the world like Hollanders Anieka and Pieter. They came all the way here from Utrecht for ...

“The adventure,” says Anieka. “The name `Patagonia’ says `adventure.’ And it’s `the end of the world.’ People are drawn to the `end’ of things.”

Speaking of “ends”: We may be seeing the end of Ushuaia as we’ve known it. Many of the old corrugated metal and wood homes and commercial structures from the frontier days, some more than a century old, are threatened by deterioration, commercial expansion and other forces.

“We’re happy to be growing and to have new hotels and blah-blah-blah,” said a woman who works for the city, “but part of the charm is these old buildings.

“I think it happens all over the world.”

Even, regrettably, at fin del mundo ...

80 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

PUNTA ARENAS Let me tell you about the wind in Punta Arenas.

The guidebooks say the city sometimes puts ropes up around the city square – Munoz Gamero Square – for pedestrians to grab when the gales get silly, and those, I didn’t see.

But this one Saturday night, as I was returning from a late dinner, the wind was really something.

Other pedestrians seemed oblivious.

Stray dogs dealt with it. A few disco-bound female adolescents squealed a bit as they sensed all their primping was being violently unprimped, but they coped.

I don’t have the mph numbers, but I was clinging to the sides of buildings – and I’m from Chicago.

“Nice night,” I said, breathlessly, upon returning to my hotel. I was attempting irony.

“Si,” said the night clerk, who probably meant it.

That bit of meteorological local colour aside, this isn’t a bad little city.

For sure it’s got history. Like Ushuaia, they stashed prisoners here (location, etc.).

Antarctic explorers Roald Amundsen and Robert Scott spent some time here, though not in irons. So did Magellan, whose name

graces the strait upon which Punta Arenas sits as well as the region’s predominant penguin. He’s celebrated by a statue (c. 1920) in the square that’s both lovely (lots of greenery) and a favourite gathering spot for those stray dogs as well as locals who just like to sit in the park or chat.

It’s also a daily marketplace for clothing and artwork and, especially, souvenir penguins of every conceivable material.

As with Ushuaia, tour companies sell boat trips to a main penguin colony – here, Isla Magdalena, home of more than 100,000 of the little guys. Expect to pay about $42 for that five-hour excursion (try www.comapa. com, the town’s big tour company) on seas that might be a tad choppy (see reference to wind that’s really something, above).

For about half the price and in less time (about four hours total), your hotel will arrange a minivan tour that drives you to a much smaller beach colony (just a couple thousand) of the exact same penguins – at Seno Otway – without the risk of rough water.

I did the drive. Liked it. You make the call.

Tour companies can also set up quickie trips to Torres del Paine that give you a few hours in one of the most spectacular, and (speaking, yet again, meteorologically now) finicky environments on the planet.

By all means get to Torres del Paine – but not just for lunch, or there’s a good chance all you’ll see is horizontal rain.

And as with Ushuaia, there are Antarctica options here, though they’re less conventional (mainly fly-ins rather than boat trips) than the ones offered on the Argentina side.

OK, back to Punta Arenas, the city.

When the wind isn’t making your eyes water and whipping your hair to a frenzy, it’s actually a very pleasant place to be, even if it does only take a day or two to exhaust the possibilities.

The city cemetery, walkable from the center, is fascinating for the design and, sometimes, the extravagance of its memorials set among the cypress trees. There are a couple of museums and some fine eating places to try the local delicacy, congrio, a kind of eel (better than it sounds) best enjoyed either in soup (caldillo de congrio) or fried (congrio fritto). Nice people, just enough of whom speak English.

So. There you have it.

Ushuaia and Punta Arenas. Come visit.

And if the visit is short?

It’s not the end of the world.

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INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 81

taste life FOOD Worrying about the question “What can I do to prevent climate change” is a bit like worrying “When will Scarlett Johansson finally stop messing around and settle down with me”: Pondering the problem may give a fellow a warm inner glow and a righteous feeling of superiority, but too much time wasted on the matter only serves as a distraction from more achievable life goals.

Because the fact is none of us can do a thing about the weather, and anyone who says otherwise has succumbed to the primitive logic of the pagan for whom magical thinking reigns supreme and man is at the mercy of an angry earth god or goddess demanding we repent and abase ourselves for our sins and return to a “sustainable” arcadia that never was.

Nevertheless, just as Mussolini made the trains run on time, today’s green movement occasionally kicks out some good ideas of its own. Take Australian climate change guru Professor Ross Garnaut, himself something of a voice of reason on the economics and policy of Australia’s potential emissions trading scheme. The good professor recently suggested that, to lessen the greenhouse gas emissions that come from farming beef cattle, and to decrease agriculture’s footprint on his fragile continent more generally, Australians should eat more kangaroo.

Perhaps not surprisingly, the roof fell in on Professor Garnaut very quickly.

Sentimentalists shrieked about eating Skippy while patriots protested against putting one of the stars of the nation’s crest on their dinner plates. The five remaining Australians who have some vestigial memory of a day when the government did not direct every facet of their lives were offended at another Rudd Government bureaucrat nannying them. And the animal rightsers and the greens, Gaia bless them, managed to eke enough energy out from their diet of tofu and mung beans to issue a press release decrying the eating of anything tasty at all.

All of this presents people like me with a sort of sceptical omnivore’s dilemma. On the one hand, eating kangaroo and other animals from the phylum cuteus cuddulius has always been an agreeable pastime, and ‘roo done right is wonderfully tasty and lean to boot.

On the other, in the wake of Professor Garnaut’s suggestion, such a dinner choice may suddenly be seen part of an effort to “do one’s part”. And we can’t have that.

82 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

Are you game?

James Morrow examines a tasty solution to global warming None of this is to say ‘roo cannot be a very tasty meat. It can be, and it deserves a closer look around the world as something more than just pet food filler.

Once, early in my tenure in Australia, I was invited to a mate’s house to cook and was presented with a raw kangaroo roast to prepare. (Friends often set these little Ready-Steady-Cook challenges for me.)

The solution was to treat it very much like venison – another personal favourite – and success came through adapting a Rick Stein recipe involving red wine and morello cherries, with a good slug of vinegar to cut the funkiness of the meat.

But that was before kangaroo meat became a political matter. Now the question becomes, how to consume really tasty, and perhaps obscure or underrated, bits of fauna without being thought of as something of a longhair.

The key I think is to eat things that are both shocking and delicious, and to never lose the childhood glee that comes from taking pleasure in grossing other people out. Gonzo chef Anthony Bourdain, perhaps best known these days for starring in a television series in which he travels around the world to eat the poached, roasted, or deep-fried genitalia of national animals, says that he fell in love with food for its power to tweak grownup sensibilities. As a youth he spent at least a month each summer in France with his parents, and

he writes in his memoirs of shocking his family by eating freshly-shucked oysters straight out of the water – an exotic idea for Americans of they day.

Of course it is not just about shock; taste must always be the primary consideration. Any discussion of obscure game must quickly take us beyond the usual suspects like kangaroo, emu or rabbit. Pigeon is a highly under-rated bird in these parts – though it is very popular with the French and Italians – which deserves another look.

And given current economic circumstances, it may just become a dish of choice for sophisticated urbanites looking for a feed.

Except for their unavailability in these parts the cuddly grey squirrel should qualify as the ultimate shock-and-awe dish because of its associations with redneck America (one-time US presidential candidate Mike Huckabee famously boasted of cooking the things in popcorn poppers during his university days; presumably he had the good taste to dispatch them first). Yet in England specialty butchers claim they can’t keep them in stock after The Guardian called them the ultimate ethical food because apparently they make life tough for red squirrels. Meanwhile pheasant, quail, partridge, rabbit are all great eating, and most available if you know where to go.

Now all I need is to find a providore who can get me a nice joint of polar bear for my next dinner party.

Roast Pigeon With Wild Mushrooms, Asparagus And Toasted Walnuts For the pigeon You’ll need 1 tablespoon olive oil 15g Butter few sprigs of lemon thyme sea salt & freshly ground black pepper 8 boneless wood breasts of pigeons (about 75g each) 1 tablespoon sherry vinegar 1 tablespoon clear honey 100ml groundnut oil 50ml hazelnut oil juice of one lime 200g blanched and refreshed asparagus spears handful of chopped toasted walnuts Method 1. Heat the olive oil and butter together in a heavy-based frying pan with the lemon thyme. Season the pigeon breasts and cook, skin-side down, for about 3 minutes. Flip them over and cook the other side for 2-3 minutes. They should feel springy when pressed.

Transfer to a warm plate.

2. Deglaze the pan with the vinegar then stir in the honey, groundnut and hazelnut oil. Squeeze the lime juice into the pan, whisk together then check for seasoning. Pour half of the marinade over the resting pigeon breasts.

For the Mushrooms You’ll need: 200g mixture wild mushrooms (such as girolles, ceps, oyster and shitake, cleaned and sliced) few knobs of butter few sprigs of lemon thyme 2 cloves garlic (lightly crushed (with skins)) squeeze lemon juice Method 1. Meanwhile, sauté the mushrooms with some seasoning in a non-stick frying pan with the butter, thyme and garlic for about 5 minutes or until softened and lightly golden. Squeeze over a little lemon juice then discard the thyme and garlic.

2. Thinly slice the asparagus on the diagonal. Toss in some of the remaining warm marinade then pile in the centre of warm plates. Slice the pigeon breasts on the diagonal, or leave them whole, and sit them on top of the asparagus. Sprinkle the hazelnuts over the pigeon then scatter the sautéed wild mushrooms scattered around.

SPICY THAI KANGAROO SALAD You’ll Need 1 tablespoon oil 400g kangaroo fillet, sliced thinly 2 eschalots, chopped finely 1 green onion, chopped 2 tablespoons lime juice 2 tablespoons fish sauce 2-3 teaspoons ground red chilli 2 tablespoons lemon 2 teaspoons sugar, or to taste 1/3 cup mint leaves 1/3 cup Thai basil leaves Lettuce cups Steamed jasmine rice Khao koor 3 tablespoons uncooked jasmine rice Method Heat oil in a wok; cook kangaroo so that it seals but is still medium.

Remove from heat and place in a bowl with the onions, lime juice, fish sauce, chilli, lemon, sugar and herbs; toss to combine. Serve with lettuce cups or jasmine rice and sprinkle with khao koor (ground toasted rice). To make khao koor, heat a wok until fairly hot; add uncooked jasmine rice. Toss rice until it starts to turn golden brown. Remove from heat and allow to cool. Grind to a fairly coarse powder with a mortar and pestle or a blender.

Serves 2-4

Squirrel pasties (Adapted from The Guardian) You’ll need: 140g squirrel meat cut into 1cm cubes; 100g sliced potato; 100g sliced swede; 50g diced onion; 30g smoked bacon; 15g chopped hazelnuts; 75g butter; 5g chopped parsley; a good pinch of salt and pepper Method 1. Egg wash edges of pastry circles, and place the potato, swede, hazelnuts, parsley and seasoning on to each circle followed by the bacon, squirrel meat and, finally, the onion.

2. Place butter in each pasty, then fold over the pastry and crimp the edges.

3. Put the pasties on to a greaseproof baking tray, egg wash both pasties well, place in a pre-heated oven at 180C or gas mark 5 and bake for 45-50 minutes. The juices should start to boil and the pasties should be able to move on the tray with ease.

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 83

touch life > drive

A final note to a summer love: The SLK350 roadster Larry Printz has a ball, and a lukewarm cup of coffee

The 2009 Mercedes-Benz SLK350 is like one of those love-atfirst-sight summer moments. It’s true romance, but it’s wrapped in speed-swept lines and filled with cylinders, connecting rods and sex appeal.

Unlock the SLK350 and hop in the bucket seats. Twist the ignition fob. The 3.5-litre double-overhead cam springs to life. You hear its siren rumble with speed, menace and thrills.

You could have opted for the less expensive 228-horsepower SLK280 or the more powerful 355-horsepower SLK55. But something about this car is just right.

Hold the top button down and wait about 15 seconds for the roof to stow itself into the trunk. Of course, when the top goes down, it’s easy to become smitten with any car.

84 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

Snap the transmission, either the six-speed manual or sevenspeed automatic, into gear or the car responds like an autobahn storm trooper. Although it’s sportier this year than last, it’s still more of a grand-touring car than a true sports car.

But it’s still fun.

Mash the throttle. Waaaa-aaahhhhhh. Yup – 300 horsepower.

The wind tussles your hair artfully and works through the cabin without getting obtrusive. The SLK has the true roadster spirit – athletic, stylish, strong and sophisticated. Its petite size adds to its allure.

It’s just right, not a bit of wasted effort.

Before you know it, you’ll be creating excuses for weekend getaways.

“Snap the transmission, either the six-speed manual or seven-speed automatic, into gear or the car responds like an autobahn storm trooper. Although it’s sportier this year than last, it’s still more of a grandtouring car than a true sports car

Like anyone you’re smitten over, it’s easy to appreciate the smallest details: the turn signals in the mirrors that are visible only from the sides; the retractable hardtop that gives the car a solid structural feel when raised, or the air scarf, which blows warm air on the nape of your neck in chilly weather.

New love is always rapturous, but as the summer wears on, the love dims somewhat. You notice things you wish were different.

Yes, the controls are easy to use, but the cupholders seem like an afterthought. Set just below the air-conditioning vents, they’ll cool your coffee quickly on a warm day.

The trunk holds more than you might expect but make sure to pack flat items to maximize cargo space.

And then there are the rock-hard seats and the average audio system. I suggest trying the optional Sport Package on your favourite crater-choked road before you make a commitment. You’re welcome.

Life is not perfect, and neither are our loved ones. It’s easy to consider the car’s quirks character traits, not character flaws, because the SLK350 is so lovely and so expertly executed.

Like any summer love, the SLK 350’s good outweighs the bad.

Days pass, and the sun’s angle is slightly higher in the sky. The weather’s warming. This little roadster is a star, one that I will miss next week. My test drive is over, but for you, I hope, it has just begun.

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 85

touch life > toybox Stylus TX400 The Epson Stylus TX400 is a premium allpurpose multifunction printer with photo features that prints up to 34 A4 pages per minute, copies at up to 30 pages per minute, and produces a borderless 4x6 inch photo on Epson Premium Glossy Photo Paper in as little as 26 seconds. With a 2.5 inch colour LCD screen, multi-format card reader and PictBridge connectivity, the TX400 can be used PC free and is fast, cost-efficient and easy to use for a host of typical small office tasks. Its A4 flatbed scanner has an optical resolution of up to 2400 dpi. A USB cable is included for immediate out-of-box use and convenience for customers. The Epson Stylus TX400 is $179 RRP inc GST. These new printers will be available at consumer electronics retailers, computer superstores, mass merchants and office superstores in October and November. www.epson.co.nz

Sony Ericsson G705 This elegant slider phone, complete with large 2.4” screen, allows users to surf the internet at high speed with turbo 3G and its full HTML browser – just use the shortcut key and you’re straight through to Google search from the idle screen. Page a bit too small? Use the illuminated zoom web shortcut key or just tilt the phone and it automatically switches to landscape view. The G705 keeps you updated with the information most important to you via RSS feeds that are delivered straight to your phone’s desktop. Complete with 3.2 megapixel camera and video capabilities, upload your favourite and funny moments straight to the web for friends all over the world to see. On your way to an important meeting but can’t find your way? The inbuilt a GPS combined with Google Maps for Mobile and Wayfinder navigation means that you will never have to ask for directions again – and it will even help you find a restaurant or bar to relax with friends and family. www.sonyericsson.com

86 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

Canon PowerShot SX1 IS The powerful 20x wide-angle (28mm, f/2.8) optical zoom provides outstanding reach and composition flexibility. The PowerShot SX1 IS is the first Canon compact camera to incorporate a Canon CMOS sensor, which allows high resolution shooting in exceptionally rapid bursts. The sensor boasts 10 Megapixels for capturing the finest detail, allowing creative cropping and superb large-scale prints. Create smooth, high quality movies in full high definition (1080, 30p), then use HDMI connectivity for playback on HD widescreen TVs – complete with CD quality stereo sound. Incorporating the latest in image processing technology, DIGIC 4 delivers extraordinary noise reduction. The result is richly detailed, cleaner images, even when shooting at high ISO speeds. DIGIC 4 also drives exceptional processing speeds and responsive operation. With the Canon CMOS sensor, extra fast continuous shooting speeds (up to 4fps) at full resolution are achieved. Servo AF tracks moving subjects to ensure they remain in focus. Great people shots are assured with the latest Face Detection AF/AE/FE/WB – even faces at angles and far away. www.canon.co.uk

Benq MID s6 Internet device A truly standalone innovation, the S6 trumps all other mobile devices by being simply “more” – more powerful than a Smartphone (it operates like a PC and boasts a 4.8” screen), more mobile than a laptop (at just 6.2”x3.5”x0.9” and 370g), and more intuitive, stylish, and fun than any other device on the market. In fact, the S6 is an extension of its user, offering intuitive operation via touch and motion. Full HTTP support and high-speed 3.5G cellular and WLAN connectivity empower users with flawless anywhere, anytime Internet – browse, email, and enjoy online videos, images, and digital music. Powerful, fun, and chic, the S6 is the ultimate companion for the ultimate digital lifestyle. With notebook-grade web-surfing, e-mail, multimedia, and Office capabilities in a palmsized device, the BenQ MID is in step with today’s onthe-go, spontaneous lifestyle. www.benq.com

Coolpix P6000 Featuring 13.5 megapixels, a new, built-in global positioning system (GPS) unit, my Picturetown connectivity and the power of Nikon’s exclusive EXPEED image processing concept, the P6000 offers the perfect photographic tool for photo and camera enthusiasts seeking the creative control of a D-SLR in the compact body of a COOLPIX camera. With the added GPS function, P6000 users will be able to record “geotags” of the location where their images are captured based on latitudinal and longitudinal coordinates. The P6000 includes intuitive controls via dedicated command and mode dials, providing easy access to shooting controls and exposure mode settings. The new P6000 camera is compatible with new high-capacity SDHC cards, and utilizes a Nikon EN-EL5 rechargeable Li-ion battery. www.nikon.co.nz

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 87

see life / pages

Primitive men Michael Morrissey examines the origins of Man in Africa, and New Zealand’s dark secret AFRICA

By Alister Paterson Puriri Press, $36 Did mankind originally come out of Africa? The general anthropological consensus is yes. Though the contrary view – that people evolved in many parts of the world – is sometimes held.

Paterson has used the more generally accepted view as a backdrop for his excellent book- length poem.

Let it be said that a book-length poem – even a smallish book – is not a common occurrence today. It takes intellectual courage and outstanding poetic ability to tackle such an endeavour – and Paterson achieves admirable success with this demanding task. While not epic in word count, it is epic in scope. Africa is an excursion into world history and geography. The notion of sticking the entire world into a book is an impossible yet tantalising task that Paterson’s poem attempts. In a sense, the scope of Paterson’s ambitious poem equals that of Ezra Pound’s Cantos, but his references are less arcane, more accessible, and his phrasing at times reminiscent of William Carlos Williams, my favourite poet. This is a poetry that draws you in rather than pushes you out.

The poem was inspired by the serendipitous discovery of a book entitled The Broken String by Neil Bennon which explores the history and alas extinction of the Xam-ka !ei branch of the South African San people. The San people, called Bushmen by the southern African whites, speak the Khoisan language which is characterised by click sounds. Bennon’s book tells the story of the work of Wilhelm Bleek and Lucy Lloyd who had the close company of six members of the tribe who, over six years, taught them their language and beliefs. Like the cosmology of all ethnic peoples, their beliefs have a deeply poetic tinge: 88 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

when the sun was a man & they talked with it talked with the moon which was also a man Incidentally, Bleek had, as it were, a New Zealand connection – he was Governor George Grey’s official interpreter and cataloguer of his private library.

Paterson’s poem is richly textured, finely observed in local detail.

It is a restless shifting work – the poet’s mind is always in motion – moving from place to place and culture to culture. From New Zealand to Venice, from America to Africa and back to New Zealand, but always back to Africa -”where it starts from” – inhabited by mythic figures such as Kaggen or the Mantis, a mythical old man and trickster who can appear as an eland-like creature, or the Porcupine’s Daughter, his adopted child. Then there is the real Kabbo, Bleek’s principal teacher. The poem has a dynamic plasmic feel as the poet takes us effortlessly from thought to thought.

The casual yet precise inclusion of historic fact combined with short conversational or biographical quotes are comparable to Allen Curnow’s finest history-based poems. They weave a deft tapestry of detail that reinforce the feeling of cultural solidity that the poem amply possesses. This is accessible work, never abstract – a poetic re-creation of a vanished people’s myths and a poet’s personal history of travel and cultural exploration.

NATIVE WIT

By Hamish Keith Random House, $44.99 Is Hamish Keith a genuine home-grown Renaissance man or the smartest art politician in town? A case could be made for

either description. Either way, the younger Keith was astonishingly handsome, a snappy dresser and still scrubs up more than well in his seventies.

Over the fifty years he has been in business, Keith has been a painter (and, according to Clyde Scott in conversation, a damned good one), an arts and cuisine columnist, art curator, art historian and administrator, graphic designer, a social historian, TV script writer and presenter, radio interviewer, film script editor, chairman of the Arts Council and headed or been on – according to strong rumour probably supported by fact – enough committees to fill a small phone book. He even ran for the National stronghold seat of Remuera. Does Keith, one wonders, ever spend a quiet night at home in front of the television? Probably not – his relation to television is far too dynamic to permit such a passive role.

Though Keith has been in Auckland some 50 years, he was originally from Christchurch and the early pages of his biography outline a happy childhood. His mother occupied a palatial residence called Arcadia situated on Paradise Road, Glenorchy.

What a dazzling address! She is pictured, ala Scott Fitzgerald, driving a swishy 1926 Chrysler. Keith attended the Ilam School of Art making friends with other destined to be important painters such as Pat Hanly, Trevor Moffit and Quentin MacFarlane as well as coming into contact with older painters like Bill Sutton, Doris Lusk and Olivia Spencer-Bower.

Perhaps the most crucial decision of Keith’s professional career was to take up a job as art curator at Auckland Art Gallery – a decision whose amiable prompt came from his friend Tim Garrity who applied for the job on Keith’s behalf. This position made Keith a work colleague of Colin McCahon now commonly regarded as this country’s most eminent painter, as well as the highly professional Peter Tomory. McCahon had trenchant views on painters not to his aesthetic taste, but Keith maintains it was necessary for him as curator to have a wider and more Catholic taste than his more stern-minded colleague. It must be remembered that dur-

ing this time – the late 50s/ early 60s – there was little awareness of contemporary art in Auckland. The dealer galleries were few in number – Peter Webb’s, Don Wood’s Ikon Gallery, New Vision, Barry Lett’s and later RKS art were the role call. Now, as Keith notes, there are nearly 100 galleries in Auckland and art is (relatively) big business. There is even a modest “export” trade.

Another key event was a trip to America where Keith met Len Lye, arguably McCahon’s equal as an artist of note. Keith’s career is, if anything, notable for his adventurous adaptability. When his marriage with Sue Keith (nee Firth) broke up, he wrote a book about being single. With a tantalising mixture of confessional truth and tactful gallantry, Keith admits to being the least faithful of husbands but does not discuss his past paramours – though makes no secret of his love for Ngila Dickson, film costume designer of Lord of the Rings fame, to whom he is now married. To date, Keith has published 12 books, the dominant topic being naturally the history of New Zealand art – an impressive lineup that includes his recent The Big Picture, print sibling to the outstanding TV series – the duo arguably forming the twin gems of Keith’s variegated and versatile career. The only “blot” on Keith’s career was the accusation of his receiving a hefty backhander from arranging the purchase of two Goldies at $900,000 – an accusation spread by rumour which he vehemently denies but which sadly had the consequence of his falling out with his old friend painter Pat Hanly and a two year dirth of work offers. Keith, ever the survivor, lived on to triumph in the future.

I am at one – and what sensible person wouldn’t be? – with Keith’s caustic views on Auckland’s self-hating penchant for demolishing its architectural past, in particular, His Majesty’s Theatre.

One of the silliest justifications for this demolition was that it was “flea-ridden”. Keith, like many, is less than thrilled with the elephantine Te Papa which he sees as a “bizarre hybrid of mall and theme park”. This phrase shows off Keith’s considerable ability to turn a witty phrase. And indeed, back in school days, his report card read, “gets by on native wit unsupported by hard work” which gave him the title for his memoir. In the light of Keith’s industrious career, primarily in the business of art, plus extensive media presentation and book writing, his schoolmaster might be forced to eat his words. The book design by Keith’s son, Gideon Keith, with new Dick Frizzle chapter illustrations, is superb.

THIS HORRID PRACTICE : The Myth and Reality of Traditional Maori Cannibalism

By Paul Moon Penguin, $40 When I was a boy (how long ago that seems), a retired school teacher, Kenneth Maclaurin, father of Spanish civil war hero Griff Maclaurin, told me many stories of early New Zealand history. Of course, he mentioned Maori cannibalism – why shouldn’t he? In recent times, this dark stain on human history has been removed by politically correct omission. James Belich’s huge and authoritative Making Peoples doesn’t mention it. In turn, up until recently, there had been no history of the Musket Wars – a series of conflicts that resulted in far more deaths than the later New Zealand wars. Paul Moon has bravely, some might think foolhardily, tackled the now controversial topic.

Section two of the books contains the core material in the form of extensive quotations of eye witness sightings or evidence of cannibalism in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 89

– James Cook , Samuel Marsden, the Boyd massacre, Richard against in regard to less prevalent or less harmful drugs.

Pickersgill, Samuel Leigh, Joel Polack, William Yate, Augustus The Devils Are Here is a book that will strongly reinforce the Earle – the list goes on. There is even a darkly humourous men- point I am making. The gangs described here couldn’t care less. tion of one victim rejected because his flesh was too salty! The They are in the business of illegal activities and on-selling drugs amount and frequency of detail is surely proof beyond reason- – whether P or marijuana or cocaine or heroin doesn’t matter – able doubt. they’re always a profitable enterprise.

Not in some quarters – in the bland manner of Holocaust None of the psycho-vicious characters in this dark tableau is deniers, there are cannibal deniers – notably William Arens and anyone you would like to take home to mother though I guess Gananath Obeysekere. Moon goes to considerable lengths to everyone of these wrong side of the tracks guys has a mother who rebut these ostrich-headed academics. Whereas, in former times, may well – despite everything – love them. In this world, love it took a while for some preposterous muddle-headed theorist to plays no part, loyalty is what counts. Being staunch is everything. come up with dubious rebuttals of historic fact, it takes hardly The code of secrecy and fanatical loyalty is reminiscent of secret any time at all today. Hardly had the dust settled on the crashed societies, the Army, the Marines and just about any other macho World Trade Centre towers, then some pinheads were saying it male organisation you can think of. It puts the Gang above famwas not the filmed and witnessed terrorist-piloted planes that did ily, above country, and naturally, above the law. For guys who have the job but White House-authorised sabotage. no family, the Gang becomes their family. In a curious way, their Just as fascinating and even more provocative, are some of loyalty is the best thing about them though from any humane and Moon’s theories as to why cannibalism came into being and per- just point of view it is commitment to a rotten cause. petuated itself. Largely rejecting the hunger theory, he suggests paranoia, rage, revenge, approval “Being staunch is everything. The code of secrecy and of warrior aggression, on-going fanatical loyalty is reminiscent of secret societies, the tribal conflict, being on the battlefield surrounded by edi- Army, the Marines and just about any other macho male ble bodies when far from home organisation you can think of. It puts the Gang above and even borderline personality heightened by the continu- family, above country, and naturally, above the law. For ing threatened presence of war. guys who have no family, the Gang becomes their family Moon also refutes the notion that cannibalism was not about absorbing mana but more about annihilating it.

The hardest of hard-boiled thrillers seems soft in the centre As to why cannibalism had largely ceased by 1840 – though there compared to the dark world Stokes so expertly describes. As a was a brief outbreak in 1868 – Moon sees the Christian doctrine novel, too many of the characters are two-dimensional, and as of consuming the body of Christ in communion as a convenient you might expect, to a degree, similar. Yet even in this lineup of sublimation of the practice. It is well to remember that canni- thugs, some are nastier than others. Take Sawn-Off (they all have balism manifested in many other cultures beside Maori. Perhaps similarly attractive nick names) – he beats the shit out of Rotten other historians may now re-examine the practice in other parts for presuming to address him as brother when he’s a mere prosof the world. As for now, we have Moon’s thorough dissection pect. The Gang is very hard to join – it takes Rotten two and a of its morbid local history – which will undoubtedly generate half years of dedicated thuggery, drug dealing, and loyalty to be controversy. fully patched – and it is hard to leave. If a member leaves dishonourably, they must forfeit their precious Harley Davidson, take a THE DEVILS ARE HERE thrashing and if money is at stake, pay more back than they owe

By Cam Stokes – and not a word to the cops, no matter what.

Cape Catley Ltd, $27.99 Such is the power of Stokes’ narrative, you can’t help feeling for Rotten when he eventually achieves the goal he so soulfully wants, This unrelentingly grim novel begins with trouble and ends and feel for him yet again, when he botches it – thanks to P. Bad with trouble. Told in the first person by “Rotten”, a gang pros- as P is, if I were a parent, I would fear more for a son who joins a pect, it is not a tale for the faint-hearted. Seemingly nearly every gang such as Stokes details than if they took any drug. Of course, page has a violent incident, a string of curses, a dope deal – the in a sense, gang membership with its violence and its twisted loymain drug being P. alties is another kind of addiction. Throw in P on top of gang Some years ago, police and medical authorities feared the spread membership and you have a double whammy. Though Rotten is of heroin. As it turned out, smack never caught on in a big way alive at the novel’s end, I doubt if he will last long enough to colwith the public (for which read the young). The relatively harm- lect his superannuation. less marijuana became the country’s most popular drug after, of course, alcohol and nicotine. And both of these drugs continue to SASHENKA wreck more havoc than other drugs. However, P is growing into By Simon Montefiore the kind of menace that heroin was predicted to become. Whereas Bantam Press, $35.99 the heroin user becomes passive and subdued, the P user is liable to paranoia and violence. P then has become the horror that Simon Montefiore has become a prominent Stalinologist and the tabloids and mainstream media used to erroneously warn us Russian historian. His interest in these matters was sparked by 90 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

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his own ancestors fleeing from Tzarist Russia. While working as a foreign correspondent, he spent ten years studying in formerly off-limit archives (and the difficulties inherent are amusingly enxplored in the Sashenka’s ending section). Recently, Montefiore gave a talk in Auckland in which he described some of the odd encounters he had – incidents indicative of either lingering political paranoia or bureaucratic incompetence. The meticulous historian commented wryly that he could not always be sure which was the more accurate explanation.

Now Montefiore has turned novelist, drawing once again on his archival researches. It is both a successful and ambitious novel covering almost the entirety of the twentieth century. As the title clearly indicates, the heroine and central character is Sashenka, who at the novel’s beginning is a wide-eyed idealist, a highly intelligent but as it turns out highly impressionable young woman, just sixteen years old. Like all precocious adolescents, she is eager to be considered more adult than she is. This eagerness will be her undoing – it will compel her to become a spy and would-be revolutionary.

Montefiore skillfully engages emotional and political interest in Sashenka by giving her two potentially troubling relationships – the first with Mendel an elderly Machiavellian communist and second, a growing flirtation with the loyalist Captain Sagan. Sashenka gets a foretaste of what is to come by being briefly arrested at the tender age of sixteen. Like any would-be revolutionary, rather than being deterred, she is thrilled to be so “blooded.” Thus the stage is set for an enthralling political novel.

As the narrative moves forward in time, Comrade Stalin (and when was he anyone’s comrade?), enters the plot – seemingly benign – even singing in a “beautiful high tenor”- yet at once sinister because of his absolute power. Somehow there is something chilling about a ruthless tyrant being avuncular. Boorish yet manipulative Rasputin also puts in a guest appearance. Apart from lively and compelling dialogue, Montefiore has a wonderful power of description, that may remind readers of the delightful detail that characterised Tolstoy: “The feathery snow muffled the sounds of horse and engines but the burning cold made the smells sharper: petroleum, horse dung, the alcohol on the breath of the snoring postilions, the acrid cologne and cigarettes of chauffeurs in yellow and red-trimmed uniforms, and the flowery throats of the waiting women”. Agreeably lush stuff to make us delight in early twentieth century St Petersburg (as it was then and as it is now again named).

It’s not all carriages and cigarettes and illicit romance – political terror and horrible violence play a necessary part in the unfolding drama. But what about unlikely coincidence to further the plot?

This too is a nineteenth century device and I am wondering if Montefiore accepts it as an almost required deus ex machina in his reprise novel. Rather than bothering me, I enjoyed it. And it will certainly mesh in comfortably with any film version.

The last section may make some readers initially impatient – we are catapulted forward in time over fifty years and have to keep reading to find our way, as we patiently wait for links to appear.

At first, I thought not another lively intelligent beautiful heroine (Katinka Vinsky, determined historian) – wasn’t one enough? But Montefiore knows what he is about and all the loose ends are tied up, though perhaps a tad too neatly. Nonetheless, on balance, a satisfying if charmingly old-fashioned novel and a very impressive fictional debut for a diligent historian. Will Montefiore continue to write novels or return to historical works? – time will tell.

see life / music

A kiwi music summer Chris Philpott identifies some sounds for the season Nathan King The Crowd Nathan King returns from the wilderness this month with his debut album, The Crowd.

Some of you may remember King as the front man, and primary songwriter, for Kiwi pop-rockers Zed (the boys behind that catchy “Glorafilia” song) and his experience with his former group shines through on this debut solo effort, his treacly voice dripping over decidedly unobtrusive guitar lines and pop arrangements similar to Zed standards like “Renegade Fighter” and “Hard to Find Her”.

However, King is far from a one-trick pony, introducing some subtle, yet well placed keyboard movements, such as on highlight “Wake Up”, and proving unwavering in a commitment to giving his music real meaning, his noble message of redemption and hope coming through loud and clear on several tracks including catchy lead single “Never Too Late”.

All this is augmented by the experience of uber-producer Brady Blade, who also helmed recent work by fellow Kiwi singers Brooke Fraser and Annabel Fay – but while it is a decent pop record with a great sound, one can’t help but feel that, musically, The Crowd is extremely close to a third Zed album, and misses a great opportunity for King to separate himself from his past work.

The Mamaku Project Mal De Terre It was a mere 18 months ago that I was introduced to one of the most unique, quirky bands in this country – nay, the world – and The Mamaku Project are back yet again to redefine normal with their sophomore release Mal De Terre.

Again combining the influences of primary songwriters Tui Mamaki, whose local background gives the group a distinctly Kiwi flavour, and the mysterious Monsieur Escargot, his French sensibilities providing an ambient, old-time sound, Mal De Terre (which translates extremely loosely to ‘bad ground’ – needless to 92 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

say, I didn’t study French in high school) is the sound of two cultures meeting amicably and sharing a couple of brews.

Whether it be the French reggae feel of highlight “Plastic Castle”, the accordion-infused dub sound of “Bonfire”, the Gallic bounce of French-language track “Nomade”, or the laid-back café jazz groove of “Small Breath”, replete with some simply gorgeous vocal work from singer Mamaki, this is an album that is perhaps more experimental than its predecessor Karekare, yet offering familiar grooves for casual listeners to connect with.

Mal De Terre is something truly different at a time when everything seems to be a repeat of everything else. Make sure you check it out.

The Verve Forth As far as British bands of the 1990s go, The Verve are about as big as anyone – they had a string of hits following the release of their third, and last, album Urban Hymns, including “Lucky Man” and the well-known “Bittersweet Symphony”, as well as 2 successful former members in singer Richard Ashcroft and guitarist Simon Tong.

However, given their previous success, it’s unsurprising that the groups’ first album since reforming would be compared to their earlier work – an unfair comparison since Urban Hymns was released in 1997.

Yet the truth is, this latest release is a great album in its own right – kicking off with the wonderfully ambient yet grungy sound of “Sit and Wonder”, Forth combines some of the groups more experimental tendencies with singer Ashcroft’s natural leaning towards ballad-driven pop.

First single “Love is Noise” and its following track “Rather Be” perfectly demonstrate the balance between these two ends of the spectrum, and the group show their considerable talents on the progressive sound of “Numbness” and dirty rock of “Noise Epic”, putting Forth in good company with the newer contemporaries like Coldplay and Radiohead.

Sure, it’s not the next Urban Hymns, but in the end, it didn’t really need to be.

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see life / movies

Something to Crowe about Russell Crowe’s new movie puts him up against DiCaprio, and Carrie Rickey finds the match ‘fascinating’ Body of Lies Starring: Russell Crowe, Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Strong Directed by: Ridley Scott Rated: R (for violence & offensive language) 128 minutes In Body of Lies, Ridley Scott’s fascinating and flawed spy thriller about a soulless CIA technocrat (Russell Crowe) pulling the chains of field agents in the Middle East, Leonardo DiCaprio furnishes the soul.

For spymaster Ed Hoffman (Crowe) in Langley, informants are live bait to catch a slippery fish. For his man in Amman, Roger Ferris (DiCaprio), they are trusted allies in the war against Al Qaeda. One is a technocrat who trusts his surveillance tools, the other a humanist who trusts people.

Ferris, the one who earns the faith of Jordanian and Syrian sources that Hoffman discards once they have served their purpose, is horrified by his boss’s attitude. But is his chief so cynical that he would use Ferris to bait an Osama Bin Laden-type named Al-Saleem?

Scott is a deft filmmaker who shows us (as he did in Black Hawk Down) how counterterrorism is conducted. Here, the players are on the streets and in the cafes of Amman, the conductors in Langley, Va. – CIA surveillance agents sitting before panoramic displays of real-time reconaissance captured by Predator drones – who command the movements. The terrorist war plays out in widescreen with quadrophonic sound.

Scott elicits muscular performances from his actors, especially Crowe. Though the casting of him versus DiCaprio holds out the promise of a generational and ideological showdown, there is none because their most fraught ideological duels have their characters scream into cell phones six thousand miles apart.

Considerably more effective than the scenes between Ferris and 94 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

Hoffman are those between the rumpled Ferris who hides behind his beard and and crisply-tailored, clean-shaven Hani Salaam (British actor Mark Strong), chief of Jordanian intelligence, who owns every scene he is in. Using his blazing eyes as truth-seeking lamps, Hani is either Diogenes or a manipulator cleverer even than Hoffman.

Like Scott’s Kingdom of Heaven, likewise based on a Monahan script, Body of Lies has an unusually nuanced view of the history and politics of the Middle East. Often lost in the film’s erudition are the characters.

As is customary in a Scott movie, in every frame background events dynamically intrude on the action in the foreground. His film is full of compositional surprises that reward the attentive viewer. And, it must be said, it is also punctuated with unsparing, gut-wrenching, avert-the-eyes sequences of violence and torture.

In the end, Scott’s film is a casualty of the conflict it explores.

While its soul is with the tortured, culturally sensitive and ultimately honourable Ferris, its heart is with the cagy technocrat. Body of Lies is most alive while relishing the surveillance and communications tools abused by Hoffman, tools that supply him military intelligence, but not the smarts or scruples to effectively use it.

Reviewed by Carrie Rickey THE DUCHESS Starrring: Keira Knightley, Ralph Fiennes Directed by: Saul Dibb Rated: M (sexual contant, brief nudity) 110 minutes Why is it that the most aggressively art directed movies are so often the most artlessly directed?

The new period drama The Duchess unfolds in a series of painstaking appointed drawing rooms and bedchambers – not a doily is

out of place. The actresses, including Keira Knightley and Charlotte Rampling, are bedecked in shimmering taffeta and chemise.

Yet for all that’s ravishing about the movie, which recounts the true-life story of 18th century British aristocrat Georgiana Spencer (the great-great-great-great aunt of Princess Diana), it never comes alive. Director Saul Dibb (the British miniseries The Line of Beauty) takes a workmanlike approach to overly familiar material – and the result leaves a bunch of gifted performers cast adrift.

Based on the non-fiction book Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire

by Amanda Foreman (the screenplay is by Dibb, Anders Thomas Jensen and Jeffrey Hatcher), The Duchess opens with Georgiana aggressively flirting with a handsome young man named Charles Grey (Dominic Cooper). Her mother (Rampling), however, is busy arranging her marriage with the much older and wealthier Duke of Devonshire (Ralph Fiennes).

Georgiana enters into this union hopefully, but the Duke proves to be a cold fish, not to mention a bit of brute in bed. We settle in for what we hope will be a tale of aristocratic gamesmanship that turns violently sour, a la Dangerous Liaisons. Not quite. As played by Fiennes, who’s even more clammy and remote here than he was in Quiz Show and The Constant Gardener, the Duke never rises to the level of a villain we love to hate. He’s a drip when we meet him, and he only gets drippier.

The Duke soon takes a mistress, Lady Bess Foster (Hayley Atwell), at which point, Georgiana decides that she should be allowed to take a lover, as well. Charles Grey re-enters the proceedings and the two of them begin a heated and scandalous affair.

But, again, the casting is all off: Knightley doesn’t have the chops to convey to the sense of a woman rapidly losing control of her own desires. Cooper used his dimpled smile and lithe body to charm his way through The History Boys and Mamma Mia, but here he looks strangely bloated and sluggish – like Ryan O’Neal after he’s gone to seed in Barry Lyndon.

Speaking of Barry Lyndon, that Stanley Kubrick masterpiece

“The Duke soon takes a mistress, Lady Bess Foster (Hayley Atwell), at which point, Georgiana decides that she should be allowed to take a lover, as well. Charles Grey re-enters the proceedings and the two of them begin a heated and scandalous affair seems to have been Dibb’s sole visual inspiration for The Duchess.

Whole scenes of the earlier film are artfully reconstructed here, including an homage to the famous gambling table sequence, with Knightley doing her best Marisa Berenson impression. But Kubrick’s immaculate and ascetic style, which was crafted using all natural light, had a thematic purpose: He sought to bleed the lushness out of the costume drama and capture the raw and ruthless emotion at its core. In The Duchess, though, Dibb just seems to be copying Kubrick’s images solely because he thinks they look pretty.

Almost by accident, the director stumbles his way into one juicily entertaining sequence, in which Georgiana’s wig sets on fire – it’s the kind of over-the-top camp melodrama that the movie could have used much more of. Other than that, The Duchess is a belaboured slog. We’re clearly supposed to see parallels between Georgiana’s life and Princess Diana’s, but since we care so little about Georgiana, the metaphor never really flowers. The relationship between Georgiana and Bess, meanwhile, would seem to be an intriguing story of a pair of enemies who eventually become comrades-in-arms – but by the time the screenplay gets around to tackling this subject, we’ve long since ceased paying attention.

Reviewed by Christopher Kelly INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008 95

see life / dvds

Intelligently designed Top marks for Expelled, Mad Men EXPELLED Documentary Directed by: Nathan Frankowski Rated: PG 90 minutes It’s the blockbuster movie you never saw downunder. When Expelled hit US movie screens earlier this year, it set off a firestorm of controversy.

“The film’s success speaks for itself,” says a spokesman for distributors Premise Media. “It opened in the Top 10, achieving the number 5 position on a per-screen average. It has already made its place in history as the Number 12 Top Grossing Documentary of all time, and the Number 1 Conservative Documentary. The initial buzz about the film was so intense that it became the #1 most popular blog on the Internet (24/3/08), the #6 Top search on Yahoo (8/4/08), and received over 2 million web hits, more than any other movie’s website during this time. All this, while surrounded by not only controversial subject matter, but a lawsuit from Yoko Ono claiming unfair copyright use as the film uses and critiques the John Lennon song “Imagine.” A federal judge noted the filmmakers would probably win on the doctrine of “Fair Use” and denied the motion for a preliminary injunction which would have removed the film from theatres.”

Despite this buzz, the movie never made it onto cinema screens in our part of the world. Instead, people interested in seeing the movie have had to wait until its DVD release, which happens at the end of October.

So what’s it all about? In simple terms, its the cutting edge of the culture wars, the debate between Intelligent Design and Evolution. Actor Ben Stein goes behind closed doors in a Michael Moore-style documentary where the participants proceed to hang themselves – Stein merely provides the rope.

The central thesis of the movie is a revelation of just how tightly controlled the education and science institutions are by believers 96 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM November 2008

in evolutionary theory. So tightly controlled that, despite science supposedly welcoming debate, any scientist or teacher who dares to debate finds themselves sacked and blacklisted.

“Ben Stein, the highly recognizable television personality, actor and former White House presidential speech writer, is on a journey to answer one of the biggest questions ever asked: ‘Were we created, or are we the result of random chance – a mud puddle struck by lightning?’ Stein, who is also a lawyer, an economist, an author and social commentator, is stunned by what he finds on his journey. He discovers an elitist scientific establishment that has traded in its skepticism for dogma. But even worse, Stein uncovers a long line of biologists, astronomers, chemists and philosophers who have had their reputations destroyed and their careers ruined by a scientific establishment that allows absolutely no dissent from Charles Darwin’s theory of random mutation and natural selection.

“Big Science in this area has lost its way,” says Stein. “Scientists are supposed to be allowed to follow the evidence wherever it may lead, no matter what the implications are. Freedom of inquiry has been greatly compromised, and this is … anti-science.”

Despite what evolutionary fundamentalists like author Richard Dawkins would have you believe, there’s a growing number of scientists publicly questioning the validity of evolutionary theory these days.

Make your own mind up. Expelled is unmissable.

Reviewed by Ian Wishart Mad Men Starring: Jon Hamm, Elisabeth Moss, Vincent Kartheiser, January Jones, Christina Hendricks, Bryan Batt Created by: Matthew Weiner The odds of Prime’s Mad Men becoming a hit were about the same as Suzanne Paul winning “Dancing With the Stars.”

The cable series about the advertising world in the early ‘60s is set in a period when sexual harassment was an art form, not an infraction. Most of the cast members are so unknown that an ‘E’ channel crew would not hassle them at the airport. The clothing is dated, and the air is filled with cigarette smoke.

Despite all that, the series has earned high praise from television critics. The Television Critics Association gave it three of its top awards, including naming it the best show on television. It also earned 16 Emmy nominations. Only the HBO miniseries John Adams, with 23, and the NBC comedy 30 Rock, with 17, got more Emmy nods.

For those of you not familiar with the show, Draper (Jon Hamm) is a Madison Avenue whiz kid. While he is the darling of the ad agency, there is a darker side. He has secrets. These are complicated by a wife (January Jones) who seems to be teetering on the edge of emotional collapse.

The advertising agency is a hotbed of affairs. And if you listen to the suited ad executives, every secretary in the place is named either Hon or Babe.

Elisabeth Moss, who plays the feisty Peggy Olson, calls the relationships in that time period a huge part of the show.

And it isn’t just the sexual atmosphere of the office. If you have only three martinis at lunch, you are a wimp. It seems like a race to see whether lung cancer or liver damage will be the leading killer.

Reviewed by Rick Bentley