foetusboy

'Tree' by Sebadoh... ahhhhh....

I love these rdor rants, get me every time... ;-)

It's like some kind of secret handshake we have, or something- it was funny watching the penny drop though, I recognised Jo first...
'I know you from somewhere?'
'Yeah, I think it's via the web, on NZM.com'
'Oh, right... OH, RIGHT!'

There's definitely something to be said for doing what you know. Rehearse, write, play, go to gigs, meet other muso types, meet other punters... don't worry too much about getting 'staff' (managers, lawyers, etc) unless it's for something you don't know, can't learn or don't have the time/patience for. Even then, one of your mates is probably a great graphic designer, maybe your sister is a photographer... y'get me?

Cool as. Nice working with you, BTW ;-)

Hey man-

You know cigars taste much better when you have had a few bottles of red from that little french place in Soho... I remember a few days later, tracking the scent down to a half-smoked cigar I must've stashed in my coat pocket for safe keeping. It wasn't the same, man- I needed the bar, the atmosphere, the conversation, presence of alcohol in my bloodstream clouding my better judgement...

I've been meaning to give you a catch-up phonecall one NZ evening/UK morning this week. When are you at the desk?

//I have to pose a question to NZ producers then.....what does production mean to you, and who is your customer? From what I have seen, there seems to be a fair bit of a "less is more" approach to alot of mixes I have heard from NZ, not to mention some songs that just don't have the "hook"!! With the talent I have spotted in NZ, I think it only fair to offer these artists and their record companies quality mixes - sometimes more is more remember, and comments from within the circles in Los Angeles resonate the same tune when talking about NZ artists......."great tune, pity about that jangly guitar bit....".

Well, that's obviously a dig for a response, and people far more qualified than I have responded- but while we're busy painting the music of eachother's countries in homogenous broadstrokes, are we not forgetting the obvious? No indie scene in the states, huh? No lo-fi, less-is-more movement there? Everything gets the treatment?

I'd say you'll find a fair bit more 'underproduced' material per capita in the states than you'll find in New Zealand. But this involves a broad, sweeping generalisation on my part ;-)

/'his would get rid of all the people who live off welfare as a lifestyle and give them an incentive to start looking for work. they can't argue there is a shortage of jobs because that's simply untrue. ACT would also reintroduce the work for the dole scheme, where in order to get your unemployment benefit you either have to be in a training programme or doing community work - again this is not the sickness/invalids benefit but people who live off the taxpayer without having any obligations. only then will the cycle of povery be reduced where families with their children are being raised on the State

Again with the babble... provide me something, anything to show that the ministry of social development is interested in giving out free money. As long as it's a provable fact.

So continuing with a point-by-point refutal...

/'..the reason there are poor people is a result of the welfare system,

I don't really want to touch on your first sentence, but I'm going to anyway. You seem to be aserting that poverty is created by welfare systems.
Stop and think about that for a minute.
Pull it apart, and look at it closely-
'...the reason' as in, the sole contributing factor
'...there are poor people', people with trouble earning enough to provide for themselves or their families exist at all...
'...is a result,' a product,
'...of the welfare system' the taxpayer funded system whose founding philosophy is to provide support those who have trouble earning enough to provide for themselves or their families. No poor people before then, huh?

You won't be able to find a scrap of evidence to say the number of poor New Zealanders per capita since the introduction of the welfare of the system has increased. Or that per capita, the number of people fraudulently claiming the benefit, is on the up. Or anything to back up the idea that removing access to income support will 'empower' New Zealand's poorest communities and spark some kind of economic renaissance. That's because it's simply not there.
An unfortunate fact is that in some parts of NZ, poverty is a way of life, and tax cuts are pretty damn meaningless to people who can't even afford a freakin' loaf of bread... matching demonstrable need with real world support, that's all it's about dude. It's no free ride.

JC, spewing these gigantic slabs of babble didn't address any of my points.

I showed you a link to some WHO data of New Zealand. If you wanted to spend a little time on their website, you'd see data that shows kiwis have longer life expectancies than Brits or Yanks. That's something very simple, very easy to find, but not something you're able to refute, is it? Keeping things simple- what do we have to learn from countries where you can expect to die earlier?

Of course, this is an oversimplification, much like all the key policy points on ACT's health page. There are many measures of how 'efficient' health systems are- even within the limited scope that WHO's 06 report restricted themselves to you, will see vast differences between countries like the UK and the US, for example, in how they fare in 'responsiveness', or 'fairness of contribution'.
EG, WHO themselves acknowledge that a big part of how 'responsive' a country is will depend on "...the availability of resources," which naturally favours heavily industrialised countries such as the US.

Criticisms of the WHO's measures of healthcare efficiency certainly aren't limited to this paragraph- try the link below for far more detailed analysis. Or continue to content yourself with the ACT party's interpretation of the facts:

[ external link ]

WHO seems to think NZ's health is better than USA and UK anyway.

[ external link ]

'Empowering' is an interesting turn of phrase, JC- How do you define 'empowering', in relation to ACTs policies on health, for example? ACT's big plans for 'empowerment' include cutting taxes so that 'more New Zealanders can afford private health care', shifting the balance of funding away from 'administration and beaurocrasy' (evidence? stats?) and promoting the idea 'taking better care of yourself in the first place' Get off the grass. Empowerment? That's absolute bollocks, man. Empowerment reads as forcing people who genuinely need assistance to beg on street corners.

Even in the discussion section of Act's health policy page, they compare NZ's '...centrally controlled state system' to the 'higher(?) standard' of health in 'Australia, the United States, or even the United Kingdom', ignoring the chronic obesity rates in both Oz and the US and their associated illnesses, plus the fact that low income earners unable to afford health insurance are basically 'patched up & sent home'. Not to mention the fact that the UK's National Health Service is CENTRALLY CONTROLLED and despite many failings I became aware of while working with them for 2 years, they manage to provide effective, community focussed health to the people who need it the most without worrying about profit margins or who's going to pay for it. That's EMPOWERMENT.

It's suprising what people are able to live without...

[ external link ]

I mean, either way, people are raising money by chopping their hair off. The only difference is ... there is NO difference.

JC asserts that 'headshaving for charity is lame' i.e. something that people should avoid doing.

In the next breath, he criticises the women who avoided shaving their heads for charity.

That's a completely cyclic argument; the second clause undoes the first. What does JC actually think?

LAX- try and fill out all your immigration documentation on the plane. If you don't have it all ready for them, they'll send you down to the far end of customs to some obscure booth where the correct forms are kept. When it's filled out you'll have to walk back, and re-cue. Not very nice when you're jetlagged at 3.30am.

I think MAYBE you're trying to draw some kind of reference from this about how image focussed society has become. Talk about your 'strawman arguments'.

...where you basically restate your original post:

/"...that it's silly to have the concept of shaving your head for money to be donated..."

Again, that you believe 'head-shaving for charity' is silly. No misreading there.

/"...but since $100 would have gone to the charity to have a woman's head shaved, why aren't the women lining up to do this?"

Again, that you don't understand women who don't shave their heads for charity. You've restated a cyclic argument, JC- can't you see this?

You claim that people aren't listening to what you're actually saying, so I though I'd spend a minute reading what you've posted on the topic so that there can be no misunderstanding:

/”...my friend is doing some sort of cancer campaign where she gets people to sponsor her to shave her head and gives the money to kids with cancer. i think it's kinda silly and that she should just go around asking people to donate money if they wish“

Correct me if I have misread your post JC, but here you're stating fairly clearly that the idea of shaving one's head for charity is silly, because you could keep all your hair and just ask people for money. That's basically what you've written, I don't think that I've misrepresented you there.

/“...back when i was in Nelson a barber was shaving people's head for it and if a woman was willing to shave her head $100 would go to the charity - but no woman in town on that Saturday afternoon who walked past the Cathedral was willing to. sorry to be so "i wouldn't understand 'cos i'm not a woman" but hey girls that's pretty pathetic.”

Again, correct me if I'm reading this wrong, JC- but in your very next breath you're calling women who don't shave their heads for charity 'pathetic'.

I don't think there can be any misunderstanding there JC. You said people who shave their heads are silly, and then that women who don't are pathetic. I haven't tried to attack you personally, I'm just reading your post back to you. Do you still think it still makes any sense?