Wisdom calls aloud in the street
She raises her voice in the public squares
At the noisy streets she cries out
In the gateways of the city she makes her speechHow long will you simple ones
love your simple ways?
How long will mockers boast
and fools hate knowledge?I would have poured out my heart to you
And made my thoughts known to youSeek me while you can
Or it will be too late
Then you will call to me
But I will not answerSince you rejected me when I called
Since you ignored all my advice
And would not accept my rebuke
I in turn will laugh at your disasterHow long will you simple ones
love your simple ways?
How long will mockers boast
and fools hate knowledge?I would have poured out my heart to you
And made my thoughts known to youSeek me while you can!
They will call to me
But I will not answer
They will look for me
But they will not find meThey will call to me
But I will not answer
They will look for me
But they will not find meSince they hated knowledge
And did not choose to fear the Lord
They will eat the fruit of their ways
And be filled with the fruit of their schemesThe waywardness of the simple will kill them
The complacency of fools will destroy them
Whoever listens to me will live in safety
And be at ease without fear of harmHow long will you simple ones
love your simple ways?
How long will mockers boast
and fools hate knowledge?
Monthly Archives: September 2014
Cannibalising the cannabis vote (Part 2)
The Aotearoa Legalise Cannabis Party‘s electorate candidates did well in last Saturday’s general election. (See Part 1.) But the ALCP’s share of the party vote was down.
The 2014 GENERAL ELECTION – PRELIMINARY RESULT gives us 0.41% of the party vote. That’s roughly 20% down on 2011’s final result of 0.52%, and pretty much back to where we were in 2008. (But we’re projected to be 0.45% after special votes are counted.)
With cannabis law reform happening in many jurisdictions around the world (e.g., Jamaica, Uruguary, Colorado, Washington) and the “synthetic cannabis” industry derailing itself this year here in New Zealand, cannabis law reform was supposed to have been much more of an election issue. But it wasn’t. So what happened?
Before we get to that, let’s take a look at our party vote performance in previous MMP elections. The ALCP first contested the general election in 1996, which was New Zealands first under the Mixed-Member Proportional system. (See NEW ZEALAND ELECTION RESULTS.)
Year | 1996 | 1999 | 2002 | 2005 | 2008 | 2011 | 2014 |
Percent | 1.66 | 1.10 | 0.64 | 0.25 | 0.41 | 0.52 | 0.41 |
The 1996 general election saw the ALCP’s best party vote result. Subsequently, its vote share steadily declined to an all-time low of 0.25% three elections later in 2005. It’s risen since then, to 0.52% of the party vote in 2011. Last Saturday’s result is a slight dip, but as much as 20% down on 2011’s result nonetheless. How to explain all this?
I think a big part of the explanation is obvious. After 1996 and again after 1999, cannabis law reform voters came to the realisation that a vote for the ALCP was a “wasted” vote. Wasted in the sense that it was extremely unlikely that the ALCP would ever reach the 5% threshold and have MPs enter Parliament. Nonetheless, a vote for the ALCP is worthwhile as a protest vote, worthwhile because protesting is worthwhile and it’s absolutely clear what AlCP voters are protesting about: cannabis prohibition.
But cannabis law reformers want more than just to protest, they also want to effect change. And I think another part of the explanation of the decline in the ALCP’s party vote share in 2002 and 2005 is that the cannabis vote was cannibalised by the Green Party. In 1996 Nandor Tanczos and Metiria Turei were candidates on the ALCP’s list. In 1999 Nandor Tanczos was on the Green Party’s list and entered Parliament. By 2002 it was obvious to cannabis law reform voters that in the dreadlocked skateboarding Rastafarian MP the CLR cause had a champion in Parliament, and in 2002 Nandor Tanczos was joined by Metiria Turei (after her 1999 stint with the McGillicuddy Serious Party). (Nandor Tanczos has since left the toxic hellhole that is New Zealand’s Parliament. Metiria Turei remains and is now the Green Party’s co-leader with Russel Norman.)
I confess that I party voted Green once (I’m pretty sure it was in 2002) and for exactly the reason just outlined. I’m sorry. š
Giving my CLR vote to the Greens turned out to be a mistake. (Even though in my book Nandor Tanczos was, and still is, cool.) It was a mistake for two reasons. Because, beyond legalising a couple of strains of industrial hemp, the Greens have done nothing for cannabis law reform despite having had Parliamentary representation for 18 years now. And my vote for the watermelons (green on the outside, red on the inside) no doubt helped further their far-left agenda. Fortunately, in 2003 I saw the light of liberty, identified as a libertarian, and joined the Libertarianz Party. š
Fast forward to 2014 and the cannabis vote was again cannibalised. This time by the Internet Party who basically copied the ALCP’s cannabis policy (stopping only just short of full, Colorado-style legalisation) and announced it barely two weeks out from the election. With much song and dance, since Internet Party leader Laila Harre’s partner in crime, the Mana Movement’s leader Hone Harawira, balked and gave the Internet Party’s policy pronouncement a great deal of extra publicity. (See, e.g., Internet Mana leaders fall out over weed and Mana leader angry at cannabis plan.)
It’s hard to tell how many party votes went to the Internet Mana Party that would otherwise have gone to the ALCP, given that the IMPs gained only 1.26% of the party vote (although projected to rise to 1.37% after special votes are counted). I’d like to think it was at least as many party votes as we lost compared to our 2011 election result.
This time I wasn’t anywhere near stupid or unprincipled enough to give my party vote to the IMPs. But those who were and did also made an electoral mistake. We witnessed InternetMana self-destructing over cannabis policy. Hone Harawira lost his (inaptly named) Te Tai Tokerau seat to Labour’s Kelvin Davis, and so all those CLR voters who voted IMPs flushed their party votes straight down the toilet. They should have protested instead! Then at least we’d know that they voted for cannabis law reform.
Regardless, perhaps John Key will hear the CLR message and legalise cannabis in the Fifth National Government’s third Parliamentary term.
What’s The Likelihood of Cannabis Law Reform in John Key’s Third Term?
Vinny’s back! Scumbags in High places BEWARE!
From Facebook…
“Please Help Vinny Eastwood rebuild his YouTube Subscriber base!
His Channel With 16,000+ Subs (NZ’s Most Subscribed News Channel) Was Deleted Without Warning 2 Weeks Before The New Zealand Election!
This link will take you to the new channel http://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-kt7gUEoTqWj1qMrT8td6w?sub_confirmation=1
Please Subscribe and SHARE THIS POST EVERYWHERE!
Help Vinny get back on his feet!”
*****
Now Vinny is a Door in an abandoned shack being blown back and forth by a Hurricane!… and that’s a frightening thing!…. yet to my mind what is more frightening is that the powers that be and their little demonic minions busy themselves manipulating companies like Youtube, and facebook into shutting down Vocal dissenters and Critics like Vinny.
Thus it is in the name of Free Speech that I am doing my bit to help Vinny recover from the grievous injustice he suffered loosing his Youtube Channel.
Tim Wikiriwhi.
Christian Libertarian.
Your options are faith, delusion or nihilism. Take your pick.
Good evening. Today is Wednesday, September the 24th, and this is my last broadcast. Yesterday I announced on this program that I was going to commit public suicide, admittedly an act of madness. Well, I’ll tell you what happened: I just ran out of bullshit. Am I still on the air? I really don’t know any other way to say it other than I just ran out of bullshit. Bullshit is all the reasons we give for living. And if we can’t think up any reasons of our own, we always have the God bullshit. We don’t know why we’re going through all this pointless pain, humiliation, decays, so there better be someone somewhere who does know. That’s the God bullshit. And then, there’s the noble man bullshit; that man is a noble creature that can order his own world; who needs God? Well, if there’s anybody out there that can look around this demented slaughterhouse of a world we live in and tell me that man is a noble creature, believe me: That man is full of bullshit. I don’t have anything going for me. I haven’t got any kids. And I was married for thirty-three years of shrill, shrieking fraud. So I don’t have any bullshit left. I just ran out of it, you see.
Orange goblins
Cannibalising the cannabis vote (Part 1)
The Aotearoa Legalise Cannabis Party took a big hit in Saturday’s general election. I don’t mind saying that I’m somewhat disappointed. (It’s my party – I’m the Vice President – and I’ll cry if I want to.)
The 2014 GENERAL ELECTION – PRELIMINARY RESULT gives us 0.41% of the party vote. That’s roughly 20% down on 2011’s final result of 0.52%, and pretty much back to where we were in 2008.
This time around was supposed to have been our election. With many jurisdictions around the world decriminalising (e.g., Jamaica) and some countries (Uruguay) and US states (Colorado, Washington) outright legalising, globally the tide has turned on cannabis prohibition. Consciousnesses were supposed to have been raised and cannabis law reform was supposed to have been much more of an election issue. But it wasn’t.
I was optimistic that we’d double our vote and achieve 1%. I never doubted that we’d stay safely above 0.5%. But we didn’t. So what went wrong?
Before we get to that, let’s take some big bong hits. All our candidates did well in their electorates, and their individual successes are worth celebrating.
Preliminary vote counts are highlighted in the table below, with some comparable figures from the NEW ZEALAND ELECTION RESULTS from the previous two general elections in 2011 and 2008. (Figures in brackets may not be the same candidate, the same electorate or the same party. Two out of the three.)
Candidate | 2014 | 2011 | 2008 | Electorate |
KINGI, Emma-Jane Mihaere | 838 | 703 | – | Te Tai Tonga |
DOMBROSKI, Jamie | 608 | 439 | – | New Plymouth |
GRAY, Abe | 466 | (398) | (483) | Dunedin North |
CRAWFORD, Julian | 395 | (398) | (483) | Dunedin South |
WILKINSON, Robert | 373 | (254) | (487) | Christchurch Central |
GOODE, Richard | 332 | 332 | (64) | Mana |
MANNING, Romana Marnz | 307 | 352 | – | Tukituki |
McDERMOTT, Adrian | 267 | (319) | – | Te Atatu |
GREGORY, Alistair | 258 | (404) | (407) | Wellington Central |
LYE, Jeff | 221 | (331) | – | Kelston |
– | (559) | (788) | Te Tai Tokerau | |
WILKINSON, Steven | (203) | 450 | 623 | West Coast-Tasman |
MACDONALD, Fred | (107) | 253 | – | Otaki |
Clear star of the show is Emma-Jane Kingi harvesting 838 votes in the southernmost Maori electorate of Te Tai Tonga. EJ, you rock! Also a very strong showing from Jamie Dombroski harvesting 608 votes in the New Plymouth electorate. Solid numbers too from the ALCP’s Leader Julian Crawford and Deputy Leader Abe Gray in the Dunedin South and Dunedin North electorates respectively. (The numbers in brackets are Julian’s results from 2011 and 2008 when he ran in the Dunedin North electorate.) And well done to budding newcomer Robert Wilkinson representing the party in the Christchurch Central electorate.
I’m happy enough with my own preliminary result of 332 votes in the Mana electorate. I expect a few more votes when the special votes are counted and the Electoral Commission announces the final results early next month. But my tally right now is exactly the same as last time. It’s significant that I got over 5 times as many votes standing under the ALCP banner this time and in 2011 as I did in 2008 when I was a Libertarianz Party candidate. Whose mast you nail your own colours to matters a great deal. I’ve included a couple of candidates in the table above who stood as ALCP candidates in previous elections, but who went their own ways this time. Both Steven Wilkinson and Fred Macdonald stood as Independents, and both more than halved their yields.
Satisfying results from our other candidates too, albeit slightly down on previous figures at this stage. I’d anticipated a few more votes for rising star Alistair Gregory who ran a stellar campaign in Wellington Central. In fact, the not quite comparable numbers in brackets are votes won in previous elections by Michael Appleby, the ALCP’s locally well-known leader and brand-recognised figurehead since the party’s inception in 1996 until he stood aside late last year. Suffice it to say, Ali had big shoes to fill.
But I think there’s another reason that Ali’s (and Jeff’s and Adrian’s) vote counts were down a little on previously (and also why Julian’s and Abe’s vote counts were steady despite Dunsterdam being this election’s ALCP campaign headquarters). They all had competition in their electorates from Internet Party candidates. Which brings me to what I think accounts for the significant drop in the ALCP’s party vote.
The Internet-Mana Party cannibalised the cannabis law reform vote. Read more in Part 2.
Still slaves on Monday. The Tyranny of Tool ‘The Rock 1000’. 2014.
One thing is certain. No matter who gets elected tomorrow, we will still be getting ‘Stink fisted’ on Monday!
Democracy really is a government of Mediocrity.
It would not matter nearly so much if we Limited Government power to the defence of Individual Rights and liberties, yet it is a complete disaster when The Sheep accept a Totalitarian State which attempts to micro-manage every aspect of our lives, and helps itself to our wages.
*That 90% of Western Civilisation thinks this insanity is normal… and Best* makes me shake my head.
For Libertarians who refuse to surrender to the Bullshit… It will be business as usual.
“I want to Fly like an Eagle….”
Good Luck ye Minor parties ALCP, Act, 1Law4all, Conservatives.
A vote for a minor Party tells Labour and National that we are sick of their Bullshit.
Tim Wikiriwhi.
Election 14 Eve.
The Rock 1000>>> here <<< Read more... Tool Kicks Arse! The Rock 1000 2013.
Racism,Violence, and Misery. Why Iām missing my favourite band. Tool!
Spineless Betrayal and Evil Prevail. Voting Idiots, Cowards, and Traitors.
Cannabis Manifesto
Am I evil? Yes I am.
I’ve been honoured once again to have received Liberty Scott’s endorsement of my candidacy in his 2014 New Zealand voting guide for lovers of liberty.
Mana – Safe Labour – Richard Goode Kris Faafoi or Hekia Parata? To hell with them both, vote for libertarian Richard Goode standing under the ALCP banner. He believes in more than just legalising weed, he believes in a smaller state and so your vote will be principled.
It’s true. I do believe in a smaller state and I am principled. Well, mostly.
I had intended to post my own series of Eternal Vigilance electorate candidate endorsements. In the end, I posted only two, one for Grant Keinzley and one for Alistair Gregory. Why only two?
I ran out of time, as I so often do. More exactly, I ran out of time to do a proper job. I’m a bit of a perfectionist, you see. And that brings me to the other reason I posted only two endorsements in the end. The paucity of perfect candidates, indeed the paucity of anywhere-near-perfect candidates. As far as candidates worthy of a Christian libertarian’s endorsement go, Alistair Gregory is about as good as it gets. But I have since had serious qualms about my other candidate endorsement and I resile from it.
Here at Eternal Vigilance we champion principle over pragmatism. Two of us (me and Tim) are former Libertarianz activists, candidates and spokesmen. Libertarianz was New Zealand’s only Party of Principle, and Tim and I actively carry on its proud tradition of promoting more freedom and less government. As do some other former Libz members, two of whom are running as candidates for the pseudo-libertarian ACT Party this election. (Although at least one former Libz activist is beyond giving a shit.)
To its great credit, and the credit of all in the party at the time, Libertarianz never compromised. Even to the point of promoting the practically unworkable Tracinski’s ratchet. The Libz recognised that the greater good is never a moral defence of government action, and voting for the lesser evil is always morally indefensible. (Are you ratcheting evil?)
Sensing the Libertarianz Party’s impending demise, I jumped waka and joined the Aotearoa Legalise Cannabis Party. Legalising cannabis is a libertarian policy, and it was the policy of the Libertarianz Party for which I was the Spokesman on Drugs, so there was no cognitive dissonance for me and no ill-feeling from any of my fellow libertarians who all wished me well with my open infiltration of the ALCP. (Check out the ALCP’s ten principles and tell me if you see a libertarian influence.)
But the devil is in the details. While I steadfastly stand by my party’s policy of regulating cannabis Colorado-style, I recognise regulation for what it is.
Regulations are actually prohibitive ā if government defines the one way they will allow something they are really prohibiting all other ways.
Thus I fail any libertarian purity test.
1. Is there a positive candidate to endorse?
But so does Liberty Scott. As a libertarian, does he really have any business asking questions 2 and 3?
2. Is there a likely winner worthy of tactically voting to eject because he or she is so odious??
3. Is there a tolerable “least worst” candidate?
It’s no secret that I consider Peter Dunne to be New Zealand’s most evil Member of Parliament. Evil in an utterly banal way, like Adolf Eichmann. Dunne now faces the very real risk that he will lose his Ohariu electorate seat to Labour Party challenger Virginia Andersen. So I hope and pray that Virginia Andersen is Ohariu’s new MP when the votes are counted tomorrow night!
I admit I was even tempted to get out on the streets and help Andersen with her electorate campaign. But I didn’t, and in the end I couldn’t even bring myself to endorse her candidacy explicitly when I spoke at a recent Meet the Candidates evening in the Ohariu electorate. Compared to Dunne, Andersen is the lesser evil. But what about the even lesser evil on the Ohariu voter’s ballot paper, fellow libertarian Sean Fitzpatrick? He’s explicitly stated he’s seeking only the party vote for the pseudo-libertarian ACT Party. Perhaps he, too, secretly hopes that Ohariu voters will give their electorate vote to Andersen? But aside from that, Fitzpatrick’s party has no cannabis policy. That’s why I call it pseudo-libertarian. Drug legalisation is the litmus test for being a libertarian. The ACT Party fails on that count. What’s more, post-election the ACT Party may enter into a coalition agreement (to provide confidence and supply) with the National Party. How evil is that?
Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial? (ESV)
Jamie Whyte & co. are believers in individual freedom and personal responsibility at least.
They’re lesser evils. But what about my own candidacy? Am I evil? Yes I am!
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (ESV)
but some fall shorter than others. I’ve come to the reluctant conclusion that I’m a lesser evil just like all the candidates in the list below. I’m standing to give Mana voters the choice to vote for a lesser evil. Am I evil? I’m your man!
Without further ado, here are my candidate endorsements. I’ll spare you the details.
Christchurch East Robert Wilkinson (ALCP)
Dunedin North Abe Gray (ALCP)
Dunedin South Julian Crawford (ALCP)
Epsom Adam Holland (Independent)
Kelston Jeff Lye (ALCP)
Mana Richard Goode (ALCP)
New Plymouth Jamie Dombroski (ALCP)
Ohariu Virginia Andersen (Labour)
Palmerston North Iain Lees-Galloway (Labour)
Te Atatu Adrian McDermott (ALCP)
Te Tai Tokerau Kelvin Davis (Labour)
Te Tai Tonga Emma-Jane Mihaere Kingi (ALCP)
Tukituki Romana Marnz Manning (ALCP)
Upper Harbour Stephen Berry (ACT)
Wellington Central Alistair Gregory (ALCP)
Politics is a dirty, worldly business and we know who is god of this world. Should Christians, who are in this world but not supposed to be of it, even get involved in politics?
Let every person be subject to the governing authorities.
Being Two Faced
Something I’ve noticed is that people sometimes have a different expression on one side of their face than they do on the other. Being “two faced” is how I refer to this phenomenon. I noticed this picture of Colin Craig’s press secretary isĀ two faced.Ā I won’t say yet what I see in these pictures because I’d rather hear if people make the same observation as me.
In the comments please describe the expressions you see in the left side and right side pictures.