Friday, September 22, 2006

Where there's smoke ...

Speculation has been mounting about where Michael Laws may seek further fame and fortune after he gets the big thumbs down by Wanganui’s increasingly disgusted voters next year, and gets the flick from his various media slush funds.

As one Watcher has pointed out, Touchdown bossette Julie Christie, who controls the purse strings for great big dollops of Creative New Zealand money - and hasn’t been slow to funnel lots of it Mickey’s way - isn’t going to be at all happy with his poisoning of the Pacific well that she draws on for her trashy Treasure Island ventures.

No one gave a toss while Michael Laws was boring the people of Wanganui with complaints of how he’d picked up hives during his short-lived visit to Tonga in February 2005 with Christie’s ill-fated Celebrity Treasure Island expedition (though his fellow celebs had decided with alacrity that Laws himself was a source of intense irritation and put him on the boat at the first opportunity).

But now that he’s well and truly bitten the hands that feed him, Christie and her crew, with or without Mickey, will be about as welcome on any Pacific island as David Irving would be at a Passover in Jerusalem.

Over at Radio Slide, desperate Mickey still has three weeks of the current radio ratings survey period to go and that means more of the same offensive racist ageist diatribes in hopes of rescuing himself from death by ratings. No sooner had the media started to lose interest in his war on Tonga than he opened up a new front by proposing extermination of dementia sufferers in hopes of provoking sufficient outrage to get him back in the New Zealand Herald.

Just another step, apparently, in the eugenics and cleansing policies he’s cribbed from his study of Germany circa 1944.

Interestingly, the current six-week survey period ends on Friday October 13 and we’re predicting that will indeed be a Black Friday for Mickey. By the unhappiest of coincidences that’s also exactly one year ... 12 months ... 365 days till the voters of Wanganui get to tick the only box that matters.

Which brings us, back, dear Watchers to idle speculation about life after Wanganui for Michael Brian Laws. We wouldn’t be the first to wonder if he’s spent the last year cultivating the National Front and other bottom-feeders as a prelude to launching a new political party in the mad hope of making his way back to Wellington and completing his unfinished business at the heart of the body politic. But that wouldn’t come cheap and at the very least he’d need a filthy rich backer with a penchant for Mickey’s style and his politics.

Coincidentally, the fax machine at The Cave chugged to life and out popped a copy of the love letter from the master of the offensive bon mot, Sir Bob Jones, that was excerpted in the Chron at Mickey’s urging. While the Chron was happy to quote Jones’s views on where Wanganui’s flag should fly, it apparently was rightly squeamish about what followed. In deference to the sensibilities of Watchers everywhere we’ll just say that Jones’s speculation on the predilections of Tonga’s new king would not have been appropriate for the front page of a family newspaper.

Reminded about the way Jones bankrolled the short-lived New Zealand Party in an attempt to oust Muldoon in 1984, The Cave's resident francophiles wondered if Jones’s billet doux to his man in Wanganui could be the start of a new roman politique.

Given Jones is now enjoying a minor bout of television celebrity of his own, on Touchdown’s home-grown version of Dragon’s Den, we even wondered if Mickey might be preparing to line up before the dragons to make a pitch for some of Jones’s millions:

MICHAEL LAWS: I’m not going to waste my time introducing myself, Dragons, because you all know what an absolute fascist bastard I am. I just want money, loads of it ... millions in fact, for another assault on Wellington. In return you’ll receive absolutely nothing but I’ll get my rocks off sticking it to Clark and her PC nancy boys and girls in the dirtiest erection election campaign the world has seen.

BOB JONES: This one is mine, Dragons, all mine. Michael, you are absolutely right in showing clear-thinking on this matter (reaches for huge wad of cash). Dragons, this boy and I are going to make sweet music together. (unaware of the irony, they embrace in a clinch that would make Ian Wishart’s day - and Investigate’s front page - and stroll off the set hand in hand).

Update (6 pm): Over at Mirage Media, a certain irony has been noted:

Laws - who I heard say earlier this year on his Radio Live talkback show that Tonga is a nation of inbreds - believes King Tupou is a despot and for that reason has ordered his city council staff not to lower the New Zealand flag to half-mast to mark his death. A despot - isn't that a man in power whose rulings, no matter how arcane, are permitted on the strength of his celebrity and the fear he invokes in his subordinates?
Mirage also notes several examples of incompetence and foolishness at Radio Slide. Can they be long for this world?

55 comments:

Bearhunter said...

Now I think you're being a bit harsh on Bob here. They might have some things in common, but Bob can write...

Anonymous said...

Hear hear. Leave Bob out of this. Laws is making enough of a tool out of himself and the city.

I expect some quality stuff on the Heart of Wanganui project in the near future, lads.

Also, my band may come to Wanganui and play an anti-Laws benefit concert before year's end. Keep an eye out for 'Breaking the Laws'.

Anonymous said...

This is a very entertaining site!

As someone with no love for Wanganui I drift between gloating that the city has the mayor it deserves and truly commiserating that such a fuckwit is in charge. As someone who had to leave Auckland when Banks was elected (by choice, not run out on a rail) I think I am tending towards the latter.

Commiserations indeed.

Anonymous said...

I have read the letter from Jones to laws regarding the King and his succesor. It was not nice. Very poor taste.
But then Jones and Laws are both failed polititions and seem to be tared with the same brush.

Anonymous said...

Friday the 13th it is then !!!!gathering at chambers
Dancing is such great therapy - the frustrated Whanganui public need opportunities to off load in a wholesome way...
think of the fat boy slim clip "praise you like I should"

so lets do it -come and praise him like you should

mystified said...

wot'd da nashunal frumt do 2 ya"
mickey'd neva kop; wers ma t shirk/

Bearhunter said...

YEs let's start the setlist now. First song: the Byrds' (Feel a whole lot better) When You're Gone.
Followed by Carly Simon's You're So Vain.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...

Friday the 13th it is then !!!!gathering at chambers
Dancing is such great therapy - the frustrated Whanganui public need opportunities to off load in a wholesome way...
think of the fat boy slim clip "praise you like I should"

so lets do it -come and praise him like you should

6:18 PM, September 22, 2006
___________________________

You lost me..just after Friday the 13th.
I don't have a cryptic mind. :-)

Anonymous said...

oops ...gathering at chambers on 13th will be at 12.15 lunch time as that fits in with workers and students...and his divaness may just arrive clad in lycra with runny mascara after a run

Anonymous said...

At least Bob Jones presumably wrote his own letter, unlike his fellow Wellingtonian in this morning's paper who just signs her name to Mickey's tripe. Pity the Chron didn't give her locale like it does for other letter writers.

Anonymous said...

Sorry to anyone who tried to tune in to the 95bfm soundfile I pointed to in a comment on the earlier post. Hope it works this time.


Listen up, folks. Now Mad Mickey, loathed student apartheid cheerleader, is lecturing student radio bfm on the liberal traditions of universities, amongst other hypocritical and offensive crap:

95bfm Kim and Michael Laws

Anonymous said...

Laws will win the next election in wanganui because his Tongan remarks pissed off none of his supporters. If you look at the issue realistically it might have polarised people but it did not alienate the mayor from his support base. The same support base that gave him the by-election wins and his way on the referendums.
Cr Pepperell's letter to the editor this morning (and some of the other pro-Laws letters including from Tongans!) illustrates that thesis.
If Wanganui is a breeding ground of redneck conservatives then the mayor won not lost votes last week which explains his reason for keeping to crank the issue up.

Anonymous said...

Whose this loser??

"Also, my band may come to Wanganui and play an anti-Laws benefit concert before year's end. Keep an eye out for 'Breaking the Laws'.

3:55 PM, September 22, 2006"


Is that Mrs Palmer and her 4 daughters band??

Anonymous said...

Well done to the Chronicle bod who wrote the headline ‘Backbone needed’ on Michael’s … sorry 'Pep’s letter' today. Don’t you think they were sending a subliminal message to our most cowardly, cowering councillor that she needs to get a bit of backbone and refuse to sign her boss’s letters for him.

But she may not see it because she probably doesn’t get the Chron delivered in Thorndon and the chances of her actually honouring Wanganui with her presence are very slim as shown in the record of attendance at committee meetings his month.

Anonymous said...

NOt exactly top of the rap parade but ..

Oh the old gray mayor, she ain't what she used to be
Ain't what she used to be, ain't what she used to be.
The old gray mayor, she ain't what she used to be
Many long years ago.

Anonymous said...

RELAVANCE of friday 13th for gathering
marks last 365 days of ML as mayor-last 12months as written in post that accompanys these comments
if we cant have him removed lets use some humour to vent or frustration

Anonymous said...

"As for ML: he told everyone at WDC when he arrived he was only going to do one term and that makes him "immune", he said."

"Laws will win the next election in wanganui because his Tongan remarks pissed off none of his supporters."

Can't you morons start singing from the same songbook? It's bad enough that you're so dumb you swallow Mickey's steaming plop, but you could at least decide which pile is the right one.

Anonymous said...

anon said ..Can't you morons start singing from the same songbook?

*********

Trouble is, anon, we're dealing with the Many Faces of Michael here, ie Michael in the Morning forgets what Michael said the night before, and by the time he's chundered all over the airwaves and gets to his council computer at 12:15 he's forgotten what he said at 7:40 etc.

It's not an unusual symptom of psychosis.

Anonymous said...

That's an unfortunate remark at 4.14pm because I think the poster was making some sort of political analysis, and not arguing whether they believed the mayor was right or wrong.

If we're going to share thoughts in here can we keep it seemly. This last week in NZ politics should not set the 'standard' for the rest of us.

Anonymous said...

I heard that his staff are saying he will stand again just to "piss off the arties". If he's been accumulating that mayoral salary over 3 years then thats a lot of campaign warchest. The total amopunt of campaign Money will decide 2007 just as it did 2004.
What ever we think the vision lot will have an expensive professional campaign that doesnt rely on numbers of people. Thats how they won in 2004.

Anonymous said...

PabloR said...

This is a very entertaining site!

As someone with no love for Wanganui I drift between gloating that the city has the mayor it deserves and truly commiserating that such a fuckwit is in charge.

Thanks (I think) for your concern Paplor. But you need to know that Wanganui is a great place and probably much changed since you lived there. As someone who has spent some time in the last week in a provincial town not far from Wanganui I can say it's streets ahead for all sorts of reasons .. there's a huge selection of classy cafes and good pubs, a truly beautiful mainstreat, the river is looking great, the people are terrific ... and I could go on.

But all this happened before Michael Laws and his idiot followers started their war on us and it will continue long after they've been consigned to the dog-shit bin of history.

Believe me, the protest at the council chambers was the tip of the ice-berg as is the idea that the problem with Laws is to do with his offensive public personna. There's a lot going on behind the scenes and it won't be long before his little Antoinette Beck follie is eclipsed by the dirty business he's doing in Wanganui.

Anonymous said...

Laws will win the next election in wanganui because his Tongan remarks pissed off none of his supporters.
------------------------------
How wrong can you be!!!!
Two of my family voted for laws but after the Tongan insult have said they would never vote for him again.

That's I feel just the tip of the wedge.

Anonymous said...

" If he's been accumulating that mayoral salary over 3 years then thats a lot of campaign warchest"

He doesn't take the salary remember.? He uses it for the public good. In fact he is so genorous he has used his annual salary many many times in each year! If you add up all the things he has used his salary for then he is probably on a better income than the entire management team combined!

Anonymous said...

"There's a lot going on behind the scenes "

such as?

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...

Well done to the Chronicle bod who wrote the headline ‘Backbone needed’ on Michael’s … sorry 'Pep’s letter' today. Don’t you think they were sending a subliminal message to our most cowardly, cowering councillor that she needs to get a bit of backbone and refuse to sign her boss’s letters for him.

_____________

So after seeing Pepperell signing letters supporting Mickey's racist attacks, can we perhaps look forward next week to Higgie doing the same for his attacks on obesity.

What next? Cr Hughes helping him put the boot into the folically challenged?

Anonymous said...

I visit this site from time to time but still waiting for some real meat. Laws not doing too badly from what I can gather.

Anonymous said...

Like blowflies to a fresh cowpat they come, first Jones now one S Berry. Berry’s got one thing right though, his campaign slogan is:
IF YOU'RE MAD - VOTE BERRY

This could be the start of something big for Mickey, if only his mate in Auckland will let him share the brand….

Berry Supports Laws
Auckland Mayoral candidate Stephen Berry has given his full support to Michael Laws following controversy over the Wanganui Mayor's comments about the late Tongan monarch King Topou IV. …..
"In the absence of a libertarian candidate in the 2007 Wanganui mayoral election, I call upon Wanganui voters to re-elect Laws as Mayor of Wanganui."

Anonymous said...

He doesn't take the salary remember.? He uses it for the public good. In fact he is so genorous he has used his annual salary many many times in each year! If you add up all the things he has used his salary for then he is probably on a better income than the entire management team combined!

7:54 AM, September 24, 2006
___________________________________
The mayor is paid his salary, then he is able to do what he choses with it.

I would need the facts and figures before I belived all the above.

Yes I know he has donated some.

Anonymous said...

The mayor is paid his salary, then he is able to do what he choses with it.

Yes I know he has donated some.

__________________________________

Dear anon @ 1.20

It works a bit like Helen's pledge card, ie the ratepayers money goes to Mickey as "salary" then he uses it for election bribes to chosen targets like the bowling club, etc.

It's the sort of thing that helped bring down the crooked prime minister of Thailand and his cronies.

Anonymous said...

On his salary, he puts out a yearly budget of what he's spent. It was on the Community Link page so is probably still on their website. There's no question he gives it all away so its hard to see how it wopuld be there for a campaign although he is wealthy and money was no object last time.

Anonymous said...

There's no question he gives it all away so its hard to see how it wopuld be there for a campaign although he is wealthy and money was no object last time.
________________

Don't play your bullshit games here, Mickey. The point is that the ratepayers through their elective representatives (albeit you division lackeys) have no say in what organisations/individuals are chosen to be the beneficiaries of your politician's largesse. Christ, not even your mates at Wanganui Inc have any say. It's purely and simply a tool for you to win friends and influence voters.

END OF STORY!

Anonymous said...

On his salary, he puts out a yearly budget of what he's spent. It was on the Community Link page so is probably still on their website. There's no question he gives it all away so its hard to see how it wopuld be there for a campaign although he is wealthy and money was no object last time.
----------------
Based on what you have read I can understand you're trusting him on this one. However what is not published is the internal decisions he makes on what "other costs" his salary will cover. Shiny things for the Mayoral chambers "accesories" (like spoilers etc) for the Mayoral car, glossies to fill our letter boxes with. Speaking of glossies, my Neice tells me that ML insists that NZ Post deliver Council junk mail and not the local people who deliver the usual RCPs etc as they are "all unemployed mental patients"

Anonymous said...

But all this happened before Michael Laws and his idiot followers started their war on us
-----------------------------------

Who started a war on who? Lawswatch you started simply to denigrate ML. You sail close to the wind at times, but never any real meat and never any proof of your claims. There's some real hate in you isn't there. Why don't you tell us what he has done to p**s you off because like him or not he is doing a great job for Wanganui

Anonymous said...

Michael's new mugshot in the SST is a great photographic portrait, capturing the man's character completely. He looks deranged.

Bearhunter said...

Nice to see Mickey engaging in a bit of forked-tonguery again. From his e-coli:
" this is a personal opinion. It doesn't represent the policy of Wanganui or its council. But as with the corruption and calumny that is the royal family of Tonga … the facts are self-evident and I won't apologise for pointing them out."

Fine. Personal opinion, under the banner of a mayoral column. Either use the "mayoral" column for "mayoral" remarks, or admit that you couldn't give a rat's arse about what anyone thinks and just insult everyone, but FFS stop with this "I am/am not (delete as applicable) speaking as mayor of Wanganui" becuase it's getting hard to follow for us poor little people out here unblessed by your towering intellect.

Anonymous said...

Poor old Mickey can’t figure it out so he has to ask:

'Why don't medical specialists want to either settle, or stay, in Wanganui?'

Could it be anything to do with the fact that they pick up their newspapers or turn on their radios or go to the net most weeks and see/hear Wanganui being portrayed as a redneck racist paradise with a population stupid enough to vote for an exposed fraud and cheap publicity seeker? Of course it could.

That, Mickey, is what those "leading citizens" of yours is thinking. And no doubt it's what they're saying behind your back.

Anonymous said...

So the real truth is finally exposed by the so-called anonymous poster @ 12.32pm - you have never got over the fact that ML won the election fair & square and keeps winning (democratically).
2007 he will win again and you'll still be as bitter and negative as this blog.
Why don't the people who compose this blog be honest? It's personal and it always was.

Anonymous said...

"There's some real hate in you isn't there. Why don't you tell us what he has done to p**s you off ..."

__________________________________

This is rich. We're criticising Michael for, among other things, habitually referring to anyone who disagrees with him, or with whom he disagrees, in the foulest abusive terms. Your response is to say that we are full of hate.

Have you an irony deficiency, or are you just corrupt and dishonest?

Anonymous said...

so sick of people with no faith in this community who continue to claim all the great changes in Whanganui are created by ML as mayor .....so fckn not true
the people have done well during his reign of terror in SPITE of him not because of him
thats because we do have cool people here -they wont give the loser ML a second chance

Anonymous said...

So Mickey's now jumping on the Brethren bandwagon and making unsupported allegations against unnamed persons, thus attempting to smear all candidates "who stood against the Vision team".

If anyone was wondering how low he could stoop we seem to have reached a new low-tide mark but it's not even "spring tide" ie election campaign time yet.

Anonymous said...

the people have done well during his reign of terror in SPITE of him not because of him
__________________________________

Reign of terror? Reign of incompetence and lies, don't you mean? Hissy fits and make-up? Ratings within the margin of error and blinding vanity?

Reign of shit?

Anonymous said...

Why don't the people who compose this blog be honest? It's personal and it always was.

How can it be 'personal', I for one, do not know this little man or want to. But I do read and hear what he is doing to this city which I care about ... and for the future it's not looking good

Anonymous said...

Anonymous 3:20 PM said

"....I do read and hear what he is doing to this city which I care about ... and for the future it's not looking good"

Anon would you expand on what you mean by " not looking good" ?

thanks
HL

Anonymous said...

You posters are the ones full of shit. Let's review what the mayor has actually done since elected - these are just some of the credits.
1. Sorted out the council's finances and got rid of the incompetents that were previously there
2. Stopped the Sarjeant extension after discovering the promoters lied about the external funding
3. Given everyone who lives here the chance to sort out what our money gets spent on and we chose Splash over Sarjeant. That's democracy so get over it
4. Set up new events that give us national coverage like the Boxing Day Concert and Mayoral Mile and established the world premiere for River queen
5. Established the riverfront development
6. Kept our rates at the lowest level in NZ
7. Given me and everone else who lives here equal opportunity to say what my money gets spent on. I like his 'direct democracy' because it is both those things
8. Put Wanganui on the map.

There are probably plenty more but no-one has left here despite all the arty claims. He has stuck it to them because they have tried to impose their pet projects on the rest of us. Good on him!
As for Tonga and the Exclusive Brethren - he was proven right wasn't he?

Anonymous said...

It's not looking good for Wanganui as we're now seen ( well have been since the election) as a little town that was prepared to give ML another chance in main stream politics. But he has use the town at every opportunity to promote himself rather than the town.
Yes Wanagnui is 'on the map' as the city that voted in the 'mouth'.
Yes, some of us come out OK with the rates but others didn't . Delayed maintenance is the bye word around council and the borrowing is just getting out of control ...
We need to attract people from out of town, not put on a racist spokes person on TV and radio.
Plus ( and I am a supporter of the project! ) no one moves to town for a swimming pool .. that's just a feel good fix, that will cost our future kids more money than we can afford..
The Splash, river-front plans and Boxing Day gigs were all pre-vision, BUT they have just taken them and run with them ... and that's not bad!
The 'mile' was a dog last year but it should be better with the masters games this year ...

Anonymous said...

You could have added cleaning out a layer of useless management at the council and setting up new youth and heritage committees. He's also doing well on the child health and maternity issue and embarrassed the WDHB into so long overdue action.

Anonymous said...

The refrendums would be his major achievement. No future council will step back from them because so many people took part, something like 55%.
If it had been 20 or 30% then it could be discounted but if only 65% vote at the last local body election then obviously Wanganui likes the idea.

Low rates, that's his other one.
And cleaning all the deadwood out of council.

Anonymous said...

The Splash project would never have happened without Laws, and that's the word from john unsworth who is no mayoral fan. Nor the riverfront development because it was a Rotary idea and then they bailed out when it got too complicated (and too expensive).
that's crap about the debt. I picked up my copy of the LTCCP and there is the debt and still the 3% rate increases over the next decade. why not stick to the facts, instead of making them up?

Anonymous said...

1. Sorted out the council's finances and got rid of the incompetents that were previously there.
________________________________
Are you sure? the following is from the Manakau City council web site.

Director of Finance Dave Foster. Dave Foster has a wealth of experience in financial management in local government. He joins Manukau City Council from the Officer of the Auditor General where he was the Sector Manager, Local Government.Earlier in his career Mr Foster was with Wanganui District Council, as Manager of the Information and Finance Group. More recently, he held the position of Finance Manager at Palmerston North City Council.With a total of 21 years involvement with the sector Mr Foster has been involved nationally with the Society of Local Government Managers financial management working party and has been involved in national initiatives such as the local Government Know-how manual for Rates, and training on the Long Term Council Community plans for 2006-2016.Mr Foster has strategic and implementation experience in Information and Systems as well as experience in auditing local government and other public sector organizations.

Anonymous said...

You posters are the ones full of shit. Let's review what the mayor has actually done since elected - these are just some of the credits.
-----------
1. Who says they are sorted, do you like debt. Who says they were incompetents, Your idol?
2.Wouldn't know.
3.Blind fool
4.He merely rode on the back of others.
5.Established? Is it next door to the mayoral office in the ave?
6.At our peril
7.Blind fool
8. Yeah but for all the wrong reasons.

Anonymous said...

Either there are men in black cars outside my house or there is a Pro-Vision "letter writing campaign" happening in this blog tonight!

Anonymous said...

Well I'm rapt about my rates, the city seems more go-ahead now than ever before, there is building going on and businesses starting/thriving. Wangas has a real good 'feel' about it over the past couple of years. So what if one Tongan princess doesn't come back to live - he was right about that too but no-one else had the balls to do it. He's helping get the WDHB into action and they needed a shakeup. ML is doing well and has a lot of support in Wangas from the ordinary working person, like me, bringing up a family.

Anonymous said...

"that's crap about the debt. I picked up my copy of the LTCCP and there is the debt and still the 3% rate increases over the next decade. why not stick to the facts, instead of making them up?"

If you honestly believe that the LTCCP is "fact" then you probably still believe in fairies at the end of your garden. They are projections, not facts. Check the annual financial reports each year and stack them up against the LTCCP to keep track of whether debt is growing or declining. And also keep an eye on how much interest is being paid, especially if interest rates rise in this financial year, which is all too likely.

Anonymous said...

anonymickey said:
Let's review what the mayor has actually done since elected - these are just some of the credits.

It was kind of you, Mickey, to give us a sneak preview of Dotty's version of the 20 (plus) Remarkable Lies of your council, before it even appeared on the council website.

Anonymous said...

Hey, everyone, the little tosser's on a charm offensive. Gone are the personal attacks on commenters, the Serbian sniper attitude.

Instead he's actually trying out a tissue of lies presented convincingly.

Eg: if referenda are so democratic how come WDC doesn't call for submissions as to what questions we want to answer?

Why the sudden about face? We're the only people listening to Mr. Margin of Error any more.