As Mencken would have it we are getting it good and hard. People who waste the publics money keeping them healthy are getting fired or "redeployed", university places are being restricted and industrial R+D is getting all of the lollies (candies).
Now, of course, any money going exclusively to science is GOOD. But, also of course, this is the National Party we are talking about so it replaces the tax break that was in place for R+D, that they scrapped in 2008. Well, replaces about 1/2 of it.
Meanwhile Universities who do quite a lot of that R+D stuff are closing design schools , slashing staff numbers, getting rid of pesky librarians while Public Servants in general take a good whacking.
They really are a bunch of arseholes. I did not like them before they got voted in but I could understand how people might have been sick of the Labour government. Is our collective memory so short that we needed to experience these wreckers again?
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
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16 comments:
I have no recollection of any tapes...
plogingl, policism speak.
Especially tapes about things that didn't happen.
There are Grants(tm) available for these didn't happenism tapes.
dendoy, an expletive suggesting termination.
Now that we are all workers for New Zealand Inc. rather than citizens, it can only be a matter of time before the title of Prime Minister is replaced with 'CEO'.
I had the dubious fortune to be listening to the radios yesterday arvo, where some business-group lobbyist was holding forth about the gubblement's new research policy.
Said policy being "Large enough businesses will choose the topics of research that will most immediately benefit them, and will direct government agencies and universities to conduct the research, paid for out of taxes". No place for pure research in this model!
Anyway, the lobbyist was explaining how this model was better than the Labour policy of tax credits (which had the defect, apparently, of motivating small companies as well as large ones to conduct research, which would be a waste of money -- I suspect that this particular business lobby is a Large Corporations Only club), and clearly he saw it as his job (rather than the gubblement's job) to defend govt. policy. He was even using the same ministerial slogans and talking points ("close the gap with Australia!").
They're not even bothering to pretend any more that there's a gap between the gubblement and the business-directorate stratum.
"close the gap with Australia!"
viz
(of course that should be viz)
Now that we are all workers for New Zealand Inc. rather than citizens, it can only be a matter of time before the title of Prime Minister is replaced with 'CEO'.
It's only a matter of time before the CEO realizes off-shoring the citizenry is cheaper.
And have airfares gone down???? I think not.
I also heard a bloke this morning blathering on about how it would stop "pie in the sky" research. Like pies from the sky is a bad thing.
The point seems to be that now that wasteful and inefficient science will not be done, only "outcome directed" science will be done. Thank Jebus these people weren't around when Penicillin was being discovered.
"It's just a mouldy plate throw it out and get on to phlogiston experiments"
Is our collective memory so short that we needed to experience these wreckers again?
I am chagrined to read that the experience (aka the epic failure) of a similar regime in the USA has not provided a cautionary fable.
WtF? indeed.
~
I'm simply awed and a little humbled as to why gubbermints bother to even cover-up the obvious...obey.
buctog, unspeakable briefs MP's wear when the cover-ups overload.
I hadn't thought of it that way, Merc. Indeed it is a compliment that they think we would notice
They love us but their love is bad for us...
ditypois, them crazy singing peas.
Pie in the [fucking] sky:
Lasers
Computers
Airliners
Magnetic Fucking Resonance Imaging, Bitches!
Fuel Cells
Thin Film Coating Technologies
Gee Goddam Pee Ess, fer cryin out loud
Synthetic Aperature Radar
Fly by Wire
Real time communications
Come on, if these idiots can't see the benefits of basic research maybe you can take them on some kind of a tour or something....
Woodhill Forest out our way has a nice line in one way carboot journeys...
ressay, revised gummermint essay detailing what real R&D is all about.
close the gap with Australia!
Obviously if the public sector couldn't come up with the requisite pulley technology the private sector should give it a shot.
Obsessi!
Now, of course, any money going exclusively to science is GOOD.
Money going to Insane Clown Posses is even better.
F-in' magnets, how do they work?
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