Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose
David Lange quoted in today's NZ Herald today on the Diva: "There is nothing likely to get you a bigger headline than attacking your own party." Mayor Laws attacks his own council
And as if by magic, the DominionPost offers this timely reminder of the Diva's modus operandi (we can't find a weblink):
Update: Apologies for omitting to make clear in the original post. We do not support rimu logging. The point of the post is not to support the logger, but to question the appropriateness of the Mayor returning from a lengthy and purely self-serving publicity-seeking hiatus and immediately leap into the newspaper and criticise his employees, rather than resolving the issue at Guyton Street and then making an announcement to that effect. Would you like your boss to return from holiday and tell the DominionPost he thought you'd done a crap job in his absence?
Saturday , 19 February 2005
By Bob Williams
He returned from a remote Tongan island with a bad case of hives. Now Wanganui Mayor Michael Laws has found out that his council has pulled out of a legal battle he was ready to fight. Mr Laws said yesterday he was not happy the council had withdrawn a second injunction against rimu logger Chris Bergman.
He called the Wanganui District Council decision a "stupid move". It was taken while he was in Tonga filming Celebrity Treasure Island.
"I'm not happy. It's a stupid move in my view," he said. "The matter will be discussed by the full council on Monday, so I really can't make any comment till then."
Comments on this post are now closed.
65 comments:
Yet again a case where our mayor called it right! What's the matter with you, LawsWatch?? Bergman was a f**king vandal logging priceless rimu trees and Laws had the balls to try & stop him. Interesting that DOC paid all the council legal fees in the end despite Bergmann logging DOC land. Also interesting that the manager who withdrew the injunction (Council didn't know) is no longer working for the council.
Have to concede that the mayor's outspokenness was worth it on this occasion.
What's the matter with you, LawsWatch??
Our point isn't the validity of Bergman's logging - we wholeheartedly support your viewpoint, as it happens. Excuse us if we haven't made that clear in the post - we thought it would be obvious but it wasn't. Our apologies.
Our point was the appropriateness of the Mayor berating his own Council in the newspaper, chasing a cheap headline, rather than dealing with the matter appropriately at the Council table.
Would you be happy if your boss returned from a publicity-seeking hiatus and immediately unloaded in the newspaper that he thought you'd done a crap job?
There are ways of handling things apppropriately. The Diva appears not to know this.
http://wdcwatch.blogspot.com/
I've just checked it out over on Council Watch. Seems to be pretty complimentary but tinged with disappointment, for the most part. Who (but a Spin Fairy and her boss) could argue that Dotty does look stupid when she prattles on about her husband being a lawyer, for instance? Or that she made the Code of Conduct circus into a long-running Monty Python series? or or ... We could go on.
BTW If you want to know more about "GK" you should ask the staff at Sport Wanganui what they think of him.
I seem to remember it was Ken Mair & others who actually stopped the logging. Laws just expressed his opinion about it.
It wasnt Ken Mair who insisted upon the injunctions. It was the other mayor. Laws did good on that issue. I liked him taking legal action agst the govt over the airport too. Suddenly $800K. Good stuff. Sometimes the mayor's aggression has its uses.
As for the council - theyre a rudderless ship without him. Whatebver your thoughts on Laws - good or bad - he gives this council a direction - for good or bad - that wouldnt be there without him.
Scuttlebutt time: (is that the way to spell it? Two 't's?)
The CGTB are organising a concert featuring an Oz rocker & want the council to underwrite. Shee-eet. That's not where I want my ratepayers money going.
Go Laws over Munneker and their lot selling out the forests.
Council is a rudderless ship now, according to Michael they do as they're told by us.
If CGTB can turn a profit getting Russell Crowe over here, let 'em (I made that up about Russell Crowe).
Not if ratepayers take the risk. If they loose money, that's MY money. No way.
Guyton Street flash:
2 weeks ago Laws ordered the flag flown at half mast to commemorate the passing of Kind Faud - king of Saudi Arabia. Caused a great fuss at council. What next? Robert Mugabe?
More please on the flag lowering.
Arent the Faud's good mates of Bush and the White House? (Mike Moore's 9/11 doco).
commemorate the passing of Kind Faud...
We truly don't mean to poke fun at your spelling error (we make enough of our own!) but the fact that it took us several seconds to work out that the error was in the first word and not an "r" missing from the second... in some bizarre tribute to "open government" as practised by the Diva... says a lot. Possibly about us, but it says a lot...
Never mind the fraud Moore - the BBC covered it much better in "The Power Of Nightmares" In depth 3 doco series on "Al Quaeda" and the neocons. Fascinating stuff.
LawsWatchers to the rescue.
The flag incident is worthy of investigation - who has the story?
The House of Fahd (not Faud) is one of the truly despotic. Why would the Mayor do that?
Fresh from the supermarket shelves:
The Diva stayed away tonight from the biggest event in town - the opening of Pak n Save. Phew, what a relief for Helen (and everyone else) who just had to suffer instead the fingernail-on-blackboard screeching of Dotty's inanities.
Oops Michael, pressed that darned wrong button on the old email, did you? All that LW pressure taking its toll, is it?
Still it's nice to have confirmation that the diVision caucus gets to conflab on the sly about stuff like GK's passing and what happens next at Cooks. And to think it was less than a week ago that you spun this particular porkie in the chron:
“I have said this from day one: in general policy terms this council is one ..."
Anonymous said...
Fresh from the supermarket shelves:
The Diva stayed away tonight from the biggest event in town - the opening of Pak n Save
"I apologize for the Mayor's absence, he was unable to make it tonite" said ( an embarrassed) Deputy Dot, knowing full well he was at his Council office only an hour earlier. Well, the PM arose from her sickbed and drove to Wanganui, yet Laws could'nt drive down from Brassey Rd. Dot used the same line at the Business Awards- the Mayors unable to be here tonite - and the prick was watching TV in the Oasis Motel in Gt North Rd. The Mayors job has expectations from the public, and attending a function with the PM to open this cities biggest capital investment in years, is one of them. What an ignorant snub to a couple of great Wanganui supporters, Nigel and Christine Jones.
"... said ( an embarrassed) Deputy Dot, knowing full well he was at his Council office only an hour earlier."
So you're saying that when the Diva doesn't turn up to tell his own lies, the Deputy Liar does it for him? Figures.
said ( an embarrassed) Deputy Dot, knowing full well he was at his Council office only an hour earlier."
Yep, I saw his car in his Council Carpark at 4.30.
DiVision devotees Marty Lyndsay , Sue Pepperell, Bob Walker( I presume others also, its a bloody huge place)were there to hear Deputy Dots barefaced porky.
Will they have the integrity to say to their chosen one " either front up or f'off"
Doubt it - they're called diVision, not disIntegrity.
At the Code of Conduct hearing, Laws answered this criticism by saying that he is only obliged to attend civic affairs, then defined civic affairs as those organised by Council. What a jobsworth.
While Michael the mayor runs and hides,
His popularity slides,
But what a position,
For Dotty McKinnon,
She's into him upto her eyes!
Troubled by Demons?
Political protest getting you down?
Try new! improved! Despo!
Simply add to your regime's water supply to ensure docility and order.
No mystery as to the mayor's non-appearance at the Pak n Save opening. He apologised weeks beforehand for having a previous engagement. Hardly his fault!
The Mayor was in Otago for the budsiness awards you tossers. Visiting his daughter.
What previous engagement? I don't believe him.
I'd expect the Vision team to get together regularly at council. They were elected as a team, with a common policy. I'd be surprised if they didn't.
On that - how many times would Bullock, Westwood, Dahya, Stevens etc get together, you think? I mean they're meant to be Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition aren't they? Not much evidence of organisation there.
Don't believe him all you like. The apology was received by Pak n Save weeks beforehand. There are OTHER places in Wanganui apart from supermarket openings, dumbo.
Anon said
I'd expect the Vision team to get together regularly at council. They were elected as a team, with a common policy. I'd be surprised if they didn't.
9:08 AM
They gather to be told how to vote. The Vision committee decides the policy.
anon: "The CGTB are organising a concert featuring an Oz rocker & want the council to underwrite"
Is it true that said rocker is none other than Johnnie Farnham, fresh from his defeat at Anzac Cove, and that he's working on a Cooks special rewrite of his classic Sadie, the Cleaning lady - for the Cooks singalong chorus:
Dottie, the cleaning lady
with trusty scrubing brush and pail of (fluoridated, softer) water,
worked her fingers to the bone,
to call the mayoral office home,
while Mickey sends her out into the slaughter.
CHORUS
Lie for Laws, be his whore,
dear old Dottie,
looks as though you'll always be his cleaning lady.
Can't afford to get out,
dear old Dottie,
looks as though you'll always be his cleaning lady.
Phew! Looks like Lawsmob just arrived at work.
So who's on the Vision committee?
And how do you know that it is this shadowy 'committee' who set policy and then the councillors are instructed how to vote?
Making it up again, are we??
This is rich. The "Council", whatever that means in a city hall and council room run by a bullying despot, apparently is going all sensitive about what's being said on this blog about Laws' deputy.
Can this be the same "council" that just a couple of months ago gave their leader carte blanche to abuse citizens, politicians et al in whatever forum he happened to find himself in on any given day.
Dottie actually presided over and directed this blow for free speech. And Colin Whitlock went on Checkpoint to defend his boss's right to use the council website to carry out that abuse.
Of course, the only "free speech" anyone is really likely to hear at 101 Guyton St is in a Vision caucus meeting that happens to fall on Laws-free Wednesday, and who knows, even wee Marty might venture an opinion during those big chunks of "debate" tucked away in the public-excluded sections of committee and council agendas.
I had an invite to the supermarket bash. Very good it was too. It was all a bit last minute because I understand they were trying to wangle the PM (which they did - good on them) and work around her.
Whatever faults the mayor has, he is horrendously busy and I know from trying to get him to a function his diary is booked weeks and even a couple of months beforehand.
Wake up! The "council" has been redefined as Michael Brian Laws and his Spin Fairy. Wasn't it her magic wand that got pointed in a threatening manner at the poor old RCP?
You got the PM and the mayor wrong in terms of relationships. She does a half hour interview on his radio show every Friday morning. They get on like a house on fire.
I think anonymously calling Dot McKinnon a "whore" on this blog is probably worthy of RCP withdrawing LawsWatch advertisements!
Perhaps Michael could become Helen's "adviser".
"Whatever faults the mayor has, he is horrendously busy and I know from trying to get him to a function his diary is booked weeks and even a couple of months beforehand. "
Did you actually get to hear just what it is that has his diary supposedly so chocka? Given that sightings of avian Lawsonia are rarer than Dodos at Pak n Save (sorry, there's probably more than a grain of truth in that) how do you KNOW that the bountiful diary engagements are what most of us would see as "official engagements" and not just celebrity time in Auckland, for instance, or nights watching tv or whatever else he does in lonely motel rooms?
Have you considered the possibility that what you're offering by way of official engagement just doesn't rate with him?
Yeah, whoever composed that little number went too far.
signed:
The Anonymous Poet Laureate of Lawswatch
Old Chinese proverb say:
"The longer two enemies fight, the closer they resemble one another."
Using Laws-style tactics against Dot is evidence of that, at least.
No, I didn't consider that. His secretary told me exactly what his previous engagement was - a speaking engagement at one of his community meetings.
If I might be so bold in my critcism of LawsWatch: we know you hate this man but hate is a very negative emotion and it sears the soul. Turn away from the Dark Side because you get burned too.
So was it a speaking engagement or was he in Otago visiting his daughter?
Back to the ISSUES (which is why I visit this place) ... the flag incident. Whats-the-story????
I understand there's some serious upset within council, but I've no idea other than that. Someone must know!!
Are you being silly? My invite was declined - I was offered another councillor and they deputised - because he was speaking at a community meeting.
What's this about "lonely in motel rooms'??? Not the separation rumour is it? Tut-tut.
Yes, its true that certain local body politicians have separated from their partners, but the mayor is not one of them.
That comment was intended to convey a sense of political whoredom as in Hunter S Thompson:
"Is it even vaguely possible that some New Age Republican whore-beast of a false president could actually make Richard Nixon look like a Liberal?"
Political whoredom is a is an obvious and well-used metaphor in places where media and commentators are robust and unafraid of retribution from the (political) pimps of said political whores.
It's a nasty form of abuse that Dot McKinnon did not deserve. The more you attack Laws for his rhetoric, the more you resemble.
I know from trying to get him to a function his diary is booked weeks and even a couple of months beforehand.
His secretary told me exactly what his previous engagement was - a speaking engagement at one of his community meetings.
You're not answering the question which is: How do you know his diary is booked up for weeks, even months with official engagements? The fact you may have struck a day/night with a community meeting is hardly evidence of wall to wall official engagements.
Yes, a flag for King Faud. Is this Laws "thinking" globally? Dump on the Japanese and honour the Saudis. Uh huh.
Anonymous said...
If I might be so bold in my critcism of LawsWatch: we know you hate this man but hate is a very negative emotion and it sears the soul. Turn away from the Dark Side because you get burned too.
10:02 AM
So what does that say about me? I don't hate Michael - I wish him well, but if he's going to abuse his talents the way he does, he can expect staunch opposition.
This is what I've read here - and it needs confirmation ..
Laws ordered the council flag flown at half mast because some illiberal Arab leader died. Is that what we're being told? And apparently its called a fuss at council.
Follow it up, Chron.
Anonymous said...
... but the mayor is not one of them.
10:06 AM
And so what if he is? Leave the guy's personal life alone. He does enough damage with his politics as it is.
Admittedly his secretary said his diary was full, but she was also good enough to say WHY he wasn't available that evening.
"Anonymous said...
If I might be so bold in my critcism of LawsWatch: we know you hate this man but hate is a very negative emotion and it sears the soul. Turn away from the Dark Side because you get burned too. "
Welcome back, Michael. Perhaps you'd like to clear up the Big Question: Just why weren't you at Pak n Save last night?
Straight from the mare's mouth, so to speak.
Loving your great blog !
visit mine at michaelsinamotelagain.blogspot.com
hope you can find time to drop by...
I dont think the Mayor would regard any Q posed by this blog as being worthy of reply. Good on him.
I dont think the Mayor would regard any Q posed by this blog as being worthy of reply. Good on him.
If it's sooo not his thing, what's he doing posting silly comments here and sending his Spin Fairy down to deknacker River City Press?
Where's the proof he's posting, LawsWatch?
Oh and answer to Pak n Save question: he supports his corner dairy.
What about THE F***ing Flag???
Re the poetry effort. As fans of Hunter S Thompson and PJ O'Rourke we immediately read the the remark in the same context as the Thompson quote above, and O'Rourke's book "Parliament of Whores", so let it past the censors.
The meaning, for those not familiar with its use in that sense, is explained very succinctly above, so we won't repeat it.
We wouldn't countenance it's use in the other sense, and are convinced that wasn't the way it was meant.
anon - "Oh and answer to Pak n Save question: he supports his corner dairy".
Are you trying to tell us he stayed away purely because he's a conscientious objector in the supermarket wars?
If so, was this made clear to those who invited him?
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