Reserve Bank Predicts End Of The Economic Golden Weather

ACT New Zealand Finance Spokesman Rodney Hide today said that the Reserve Bank was picking what everyone had known: times are getting tough.

"The Bank is picking that growth will slow sharply halfway through this year. The projection for the year through to March 2006 has been revised downwards with the Bank forecasting only 1.75 percent GDP growth for that year.

"So much for the Clark Government's handling of the economy. Ms Clark inherited a good economy and squandered the opportunity to make it better and stronger.

"New Zealanders are now going to be hit with a double whammy: a downturn in economic conditions, plus the dopey wealth-sapping policies of the Labour Government," Mr Hide said.

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Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>