Getting your priorities right

In 1986 I flew on my own from a remote airport in Amazonia to Miami in a recklessly-maintained aeroplane. I was keen to get to an English-speaking country after struggling conversation-wise in Portuguese-speaking Brazil where I had just spent six weeks on a sponsored study tour.

I was therefore bitterly disappointed to discover that most people I encountered in Miami spoke Spanish. Tens of thousands had fled Cuba after the revolution and had stuck to their culture and their language.

I suspect nothing will have changed much in the intervening 30 years except there will be more Spanish-speaking citizens all over America thanks to the porous Mexican border.

These people are rapidly absorbed into the American economy, often working for less pay than their American counterparts causing angst in areas like the “rust-belt” where angry voters were largely responsible for Donald Trump taking up residence in the White House

Mr Trump wants to build a wall to stem the tide. Previous administrations had already started this wall; to date around one-third has been completed. The remaining two-thirds however will encounter difficult terrain including mountain ranges and rivers and will cost a small fortune.

No, make that a large fortune.

I suspect the Australians have the same distaste for us as many Americans have for the “illegal aliens” who pour over their border. The Tasman Sea hasn’t stopped tens of thousands of kiwis fleeing to the lucky country seeking fame and fortune with the vast majority finding neither.

The Aussies are not happy and so there is retribution. First off, despite the Kiwis paying taxes like everybody else, they are denied welfare of any kind. And then last week Prime Minister Turnbull said no more subsidising of New Zealanders who study at their tertiary institutes.

To some extent we only have ourselves to blame. We gave them “Mr Asia” and Joh Bjelke-Petersen and are constantly thrashing their hapless rugby teams. Claiming dubious ownership of Phar Lap, Pavlovas and Russell Crowe will hardly have endeared us to the mainstream Australian and I’ll bet they think ill of us for having the temerity to rename Chinese gooseberries, kiwi fruit.

On a per-capita basis our ex-pats apparently commit more crimes than any other nationality in Australia and once sentences have been served they’re thrown in to a detention centre on some remote island surrounded by sharks and eventually deported back to the land from whence they had once fled.

Game, set and match to Mr Turnbull and the Ockers are laughing all the way to their barbecues.

Mild-mannered Kiwis take all this in their stride. In America the rent-a-protest crowd are constantly rioting in the streets, but no one here, with the possible exception of Labour’s Kelvin Davis, could give a tinkers cuss.

From Miami I flew to Los Angeles where the nervous man behind the airport counter told me that President Reagan had bombed Gaddafi’s compound in Libya and accidentally killed Gaddafi’s daughter, Hana. Gaddafi had threatened to retaliate with a terror attack on one of America’s major airports.

Suddenly recklessly maintained aeroplanes and foreign languages didn’t seem all that important.

“I like terra firma. The more firma, the less terra.” - George S. Kaufman

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Meat lovers of the world unite

Seven Sharp’s roving reporter Tim Wilson ventured out on to the Auckland streets last week offering passers-by a taste of a meat patty that wasn’t made with meat. The responses were mixed, but for those who farm animals for the table it looked ominous. There is even an international school of thought that believes within our lifetime eating meat will disappear altogether and a synthetic substitute will be accepted and may even be compulsory.

Worldwide the number of animals killed each year to satisfy our hunger pangs is about 60 billion chickens,1.5 billion pigs, a billion sheep and goats and 300 million cattle-beasts.

Our pastoral farmers may have to look for new ways to use their arable land; perhaps even now some are thinking of planting Manuka to satisfy the insatiable demands of beekeepers. We might need to encourage the workers in Fiji who cleared all the Manuka and Kanuka to come back and replant it.

And dairy farmers had better watch their P’s and Q’s as well. A Californian company called Perfect Day is marketing “milk” made from fermented yeast to which it adds plant-based sugars, fats and minerals.

The company swears it tastes like cow’s milk.

I can imagine the Greens will be pleading for Perfect Day to open a branch in New Zealand imagining our waterways will return to their once pristine condition.

So will vegetarianism have its day? It’s interesting to note that Adolf Hitler was a vegetarian and when his Nazi party came into power in Germany in 1933 it passed and enforced unprecedented laws against cruelty to animals, while actively promoting vegetarianism, conservation and respect for nature.

This was the same regime that practiced unthinkable deeds of cruelty on humans.

So societal trends can ebb and flow over time.

Provocative British journalist Matt Ridley made this salient point in a recent blog. “The computer pioneer and mathematician Alan Turing committed suicide in 1954 after being prosecuted and chemically treated for his illegal (at the time) homosexuality. About a year later Vladimir Nabokov published a book about a middle-aged man’s unusual lust for a very young girl. He shot to fame, wealth and literacy celebrity. Today, paedophilia is even more of a crime and a sin than it was then, homosexuality not at all.”

His point was that one has evolved towards tolerance; the other towards intolerance. He approved of both trends, but wondered if they were inevitable or fortuitous.

There is an aggressive animal welfare lobby in this country concerned at how we treat livestock that are eventually going to be killed and eaten or consume the eggs they lay. There is a growing disapproval of factory farming and opposition to hunting and more emphasis of the ethical treatment of farm animals. Ridley even writes of an organisation in Britain called Crustacean Compassion who is campaigning to add lobsters and crabs to the list of species protected under the Animal Welfare Act 2006.

Meanwhile I was pleased to see that most of Auckland’s footpath tasters were unimpressed with the meatless patty.

I closed our butcher’s shop in 1993; terrific foresight, eh?

“I am not a vegetarian because I love animals; I’m a vegetarian because I hate plants.” - A. Whitney Brown

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Are we failing our mentally impaired?

When I was a youngster I had my appendix taken out, and then my tonsils and my adenoids. My sister satirically mocked that I was “not all there.” Not being “all there” was a euphemism for insanity. Another crude expression was “not being the full quid.” After decimal currency was introduced not being the “full dollar” didn’t have the same impact so this expression was mercifully discontinued.

Back then local people considered to be “not of sound mind” were generally sent to Porirua Hospital. Those severely impaired might be sent to Lake Alice Hospital in the Rangitikei which had a maximum security unit.

There is strong evidence to suggest that the standard of care in these hospitals left a lot to be desired.

In 1992 the government of the day resolved to progressively close these establishments due at least in part to their clinical techniques being out of step with modern medical practices.

This was a western-worldwide trend at the time, probably bolstered by the Academy-award-winning film One flew over the cuckoo’s nest which exposed conditions in these sanatoriums at their very worst. An unfortunate American expression for a family member who had mental health problems was to suggest the stork delivering the baby must have flown over a cuckoo’s nest en route to the expectant mother.

However in a submission to the Parliamentary Select Committee on NZ Mental Healthcare, 80-year-old Andy Espersen from Nelson, a psychiatric nurse who has worked in our mental hospitals, questioned the 1992 decision suggesting that these institutions ought to be re-established, particularly for those suffering from schizophrenia.

He wrote: “For 150 years prior to 1992 every person duly diagnosed with schizophrenia would in effect become a ward of the state, simply because it was recognised that the sufferers from this illness would find it difficult to cater for themselves. For charitable reason asylums were built throughout our nation. The relevant legislation also ensured that crimes committed by them would be excused because of their illness.”

Mr Espersen believes that of the 10,000 men and women contained in our prisons at least 2000 of them will be suffering from schizophrenia. Instead of building more prisons, he said, we should be re-establishing modern secure hospitals that could care for these people humanely instead of punishing them unrelentingly.

The president of the NZ Bar Association, Tony Bouchier, obviously agrees. In an interview on “Nine to noon” recently he said this: “One of the main reasons the prison muster is so high is that our prisons are our proxy for the mental institutions we don’t have. And everybody in criminal law will tell you this, from judges through to defence council. If there was another way to deal with these people through proper mental health facilities our muster would be a lot smaller.”

The problem for me is if Mr Espersen’s submission is seriously considered and mental institutions are rebuilt the old lexicons might also come back into vogue. I might therefore have to seek surgery to have my appendix, tonsils and adenoids refitted to convince the authorities that I really am in fact “all there.”

“Men will always be mad and those who think they can cure them are the maddest of all.” - Voltaire

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Year one standard economics

I was looking at a two dollar coin the other day and remembered that it was once a pound note. As a pound note it was much coveted, held in high regard and usually spent wisely. It bought a huge array of goods when it was in vogue. Today, organisations staging events will often ask for a gold coin donation and we’ll throw a two dollar coin into a plastic bucket without so much as a by your leave.

It’s the same with the term ‘a million dollars.’ Once a figure we could barely contemplate, now thrown around with gay abandon - and it rolls off our tongue with ease. We talk about budget deficits in the billions in this country, and in America the term is trillions.

To get a handle on just how big a million is, it’s worth recalling that a million days have not yet passed since the birth of Christ.

Inflation was once an abomination; back in 1980 it was at 17 per cent. Fortunately successive governments have managed to get it under control. Conventional wisdom says the cause of inflation is too much money chasing too few goods. We currently have the exact opposite situation in this country; hence inflation is at an all-time low.

However last week the scaremongering media announced that inflation was creeping upwardly and to demoralise us even further went on to suggest that the Governor of the Reserve bank would likely have to raise the official cash rate triggering a rise in interest rates.

Unnerving information for those struggling to pay off mortgages.

The news item cited rising house prices, rental increases and petrol price-hikes, but did concede that inflation was still below the rate that triggers Reserve Bank action.

I was surprised that petrol was in the mix; not long ago it was well over $2 a litre, but is now hovering around $1.89.

But then the beleaguered government added fuel to the fire when it agreed to increase the hourly rate of health care workers in its employ from $15.75 to $23. This was said to be going to cost two billion dollars which will dramatically reduce any surpluses Mr Joyce might have hoped to announce in next month’s budget.

I would imagine tax cuts are also now off the menu.

No one would deny that these health-care workers deserve to be well-remunerated, though I’m not aware that was any shortage of candidates for the jobs. However the flow-on effect is likely to be swift and inflationary with the lower-paid all queuing up. I’m sure most employers will want to pay their staff more, but in a competitive environment this is not always achievable.

Anecdotal evidence would suggest that many of the institutions caring for the elderly are struggling financially and wage increases for staff, no matter how well-deserved, will no doubt mean that those families already paying a high price for elderly relatives to be looked after will be asked to contribute even more.

Oops, I just dropped a two dollar coin down behind my computer. I don’t think I’ll even bother looking for it.

“I started out with nothing and I’ve still got most of it left.” - Groucho Marx

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The great mysteries of Easter

Easter came and went and was preceded by the important questions of our time: should shops be allowed to open on religious holidays, can Sonny Bill Williams play footy sans the bank logos and did Jesus really rise from the dead?

And sadly, probably in that order.

The three Wairarapa district councils debated the shop trading issue with great fervour and despite overwhelming submissions to the contrary decided that shops could indeed be allowed to open. Good Friday remained sacred, but we managed to find a superette open for business allowing us to replenish food stocks for unexpected visitors.

The Sonny Bill issue was more complex. The rugby super-hero suddenly decided that the logos of the Australian-owned Bank of New Zealand and the Jewish investment bank Investec did not sit comfortably on his jersey. Muslims, unbeknown to many of us, don’t believe in paying interest which they regard as usury. I fully expected a large majority of mortgage-paying Aucklander’s to apply to convert to Islam, but at the time of writing this hasn’t happened.

And so to the vexed question, did Jesus rise from the dead? (Incidentally Jesus had no problem with interest. In fact he was highly critical of the faithful servant entrusted with his master’s silver coins while he was away and dug a hole in the ground to hide the money for safe keeping. In sharp contrast two other servants invested their share of the coinage wisely and earned interest for their grateful employer. This allegory is graphically told in the Gospels of both Matthew and Luke.)

But the Easter story holds no credibility unless Jesus rose from the dead and so we have to trust the biblical narrative. Some do of course, and some don’t.

1 Corinthians 15:32 raises an important question. If Christ did not rise from the dead, then neither will we, so we have nothing to gain from Christianity. We might as well eat and drink in the evils of the world, for tomorrow we die and it’s all over. 15:19 goes even further “If our hope in Christ is good for this world only and no more, then we are to be the most pitied of people.”

I’m always reading claims that Christianity is waning in popularity, yet I would calculate that there are more churches in Masterton today than there have ever been. Last Sunday I suspect most of them were full. Not everyone is going to take up the Cross; in fact in the parable of the sower Jesus tells his disciples that only one in four who hears the message will go on to believe.

In a pre-Easter interview Bill English was asked: “What role does your Catholic faith play in your political life?”

“My faith is a significant part of who I am so it can’t help but affect my personal decision making. It’s part of my conscience. I go to church most Sundays. I like sitting down the back as just another congregation member. You hear ideas around humility, forgiveness and mercy which are not part of the general political round. I find it very balancing.”

Good answer.

“When men cease to believe in God, they will not believe in nothing, they will believe in anything.” -  G. K. Chesterton 

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Freedom comes, freedom goes

Last week Professor Paul Moon penned an “open letter” rejecting the forceful silencing of dissenting or unpopular views on university campuses. He managed to get 27 prominent New Zealanders to sign the document and these included Sir Geoffrey Palmer, Sir Bob Jones, Dr Brian Edwards the late Sir Douglas Myers and even two unlikely bedfellows, Dame Tariana Turia and Don Brash. This glittering array of luminaries certainly gave the epistle clout and generated widespread interest.

Moon cited the case of the European Student Club at the University of Auckland which withdrew its application to affiliate with the University after criticism and fears that it was a thinly veiled white nationalist group, but the petition was also in response to Human Rights Commissioner Susan Devoy’s call for a review of “hate speech law” which the police are looking into as a specific crime.

The letter was timely, just last week Ayaan Hirsi Ali cancelled her New Zealand speaking tour due to “security concerns”. Ms Ali is a Somali-born champion of women’s rights who suffered genital mutilation, escaped an arranged marriage by seeking asylum in Holland, left Islam and became a Dutch MP. She is calling for Islamic reformation and said there is no principle that demeans, degrades and dehumanises women more than Sharia law.

Sharia law defender Linda Sarsour, a hijab-wearing Muslim who was one of the organisers of the Women’s March after Trump’s inauguration, said she wished she could take away Ms Hirsi Ali’s vagina.

Free speech is now being denied in universities world-wide particularly if the speaker is of a right-wing persuasion or is anti-Islamist. The University of California at Berkeley was the site for student protests in 1964 calling for free speech at its campus and demanding the university hierarchy lift a ban on political activities. And yet a couple of months ago the same university witnessed violent and destructive protests to prevent a flamboyantly gay British-born pro-Trump conservative Milo Yiannopoulos from speaking; in fact he fled the campus not long after arriving, fearing for his life.

As a result his book Dangerous immediately climbed the best seller list having been all but ignored prior to the well-publicised riot.

I watched his YouTube diatribes in an effort to comprehend why he is so controversial. I have to concede that he is incredibly articulate, but is discourteous to feminists and highly critical of Islam and the left.

An example of his rhetoric: “You guys have been lying about Republicans, calling them racist, sexist, homophobic and all manner of other ludicrous allegations for thirty years and you deserve some of it back once in a while. Given the fact that you run academia, you run the media and you run with the entertainment industry, if the worst you have to deal with is some British fag calling you a butch dyke, deal with it.”

Mr Trump’s disputed travel ban may have encouraged what can only be described as an unholy alliance between the feminist left and Islam. The unease is growing, but surprisingly so too are the audiences for the likes of Mr Yiannopoulos.

“My definition of a free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular.” - Adlai Stevenson

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Life in the land of the free

The American civil war of 1861 to 1865 could loosely be described as a conflict between America’s liberals and conservatives. The conservative slave owners in the south wanted their privileged lifestyles to be maintained whereas the liberals in the North sought to abolish slavery.

The liberal north were led by their president Abraham Lincoln who was a Republican. In American politics the Republicans are the conservatives and the Democrats the liberals. This apparent about-face must have infuriated the confederate slave-owners.

The topsy-turvy world of politics seems to be occurring in America again. Donald Trump leads the conservative party, but his appeal seems to come largely from the blue collar working class and small business owners, despite being a billionaire himself.

President Trump embraces a whole new brand of politics known as populism. Populism is spreading its tentacles all over the western world and saw the Brits vote underwhelmingly for Brexit.

In Europe populist candidate Geert Wilders came within a hairs-breadth of upsetting the Dutch elections and Marine Le-Pen is the front runner for the upcoming Presidential elections in France. Meanwhile Nigel Farage and Pauline Hansen are making waves in England and Australia respectively.

Populists want to have a rethink about free trade agreements and unrestricted immigration and perhaps to a lesser extent, the virtues or otherwise of political correctness. Winston Peters has been championing these causes to his greying constituents for years. Even the name of his party - New Zealand First - fits the mould perfectly, but to the best of my knowledge no one has ever got round to calling him a populist.

Populism is perhaps a misnomer; it’s not all that popular as Mr Trump is finding out to his peril. Women mass against him in droves, furious among other things at his anti-Muslim immigration policy, despite the fact that Islam generally regards women as second-class citizens.

Meanwhile his own party is divided. Some think he is more of a Democrat than a Republican and have even reinstated within their party an ultra-conservative wing known as The House Freedom Caucus to stymie what they see as Mr Trump’s liberal policies.

The president must now regard himself as being in no man’s land and to regain his confidence he rushes south to the old confederate territories and holds rally’s in Florida and Nashville where tens of thousands of devotees turn up to cheer him on.

By their very attendance they endorse his actions.

So then it’s back to Washington where he is about as popular as a butcher at a vegetarian conference and continues to sign execrated executive orders to advance populism.

Abraham Lincoln never got to enjoy the accolades of victory. Not long after the war was over and the North had won he was assassinated by an actor named John Wilkes Booth while he was watching a play.

Some toxic twitterers and frightful Facebook users are constantly calling for someone to assassinate Mr. Trump.

Given the loathsome rants by various film stars and celebrities at recent award ceremonies I would advise the president to stay well clear of the theatre.

“Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.”- Douglas Adams

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