Were you aware that 84% of people without a regular sexual partner masturbate?
Well, I’m not actually certain of the exact percentage, but it’s got to be up there somewhere in that vicinity. And for many of them, it isn’t their preferred form of sexual activity – just that they don’t have other options available to them.
Which brings me to Transport Minister Stephen Joyce. His public justification for slashing public transport funding while increasing funding for roads was:
But 84 per cent of New Zealanders go to work by truck, car or motorcycle.
Joyce is using the effect of the problem (high percentage of commutes being by road) to justify the problem (lack of public transport) continuing, or actually to justify making it worse. He conveniently ignores the fact that many of the people who go to work by car or motorcycle have no other option, and would use public transport if there were public transport between where they live and where they work and it operated with a frequency and reliability that suited them.
So getting back to the masturbation analogy, it occurs to me that it is people like Stephen Joyce who give wankers a bad name.
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I wonder if statistics can generate autoerotic behaviour in susceptible individuals, toad?!
Talk about manipulating the field… I think it’s time I quit the double-entendre’s while I’m ahead 🙂
That’s just brilliant! Excellent analogy there 😉
What’s wrong with wanking toad and anarkatie? Were all wankers arnt we.
I do it most mornings because my husband semes to have lost interest in sex. Its not my problem. Its his.
Nice.
Joyce is a complete fuckward.
I am a staunch ACT supporter.
We are in Act because National are fuckheads
Oooh, didn’t realise we would get this response.
Um, Lady Penelope, I wasn’t meaning to put down or trivialise masturbation. It’s great fun, and I do it often myself. I was just trying to have a dig at Stephen Joyce’s expense – not put down peoples’ sexuality. Check the line again: “…it is people like Stephen Joyce who give wankers a bad name.”
Oh, and Anthony Blomfield, if you actually are an ACT supporter, you might do them a service by putting up some substantive argument, rather than just abusing Joyce and National as “fuckheads”.
I don’t agree with their politics either, but abuse does not win political arguments.
Lady Penelope –
Belatedly, I’ll chime in after toad – I was being cheeky, not denigrating a perfectly enjoyable passtime.
Actually, ditching an inadequate husband was how I got to the understanding of multiple orgasms, satisfactory masturbation technique, and a host of other fun things, which are quite a tangent from this thread. 😉
Toad –
the transport side of this post has attracted so little comment that I shall have to focus for a moment to say something pertinent; perhaps Joyce needs a compulsory commute across Auckland in public transport to give him an idea what the fuss is all about.
Perhaps with added input from schoolchildren and teens about how their school commute looks without adequately funded public transport infrastructure.
I’m spoilt by living close to where I do most of my daily activities, and having reasonably good public transport networks ferrying my children from home to school and back again. But not everyone can have the pleasure of that serendipitous alignment.
Yeah, always a problem when we use sexual references in posts Anarkaytie. They get people to find and read the thread, but often move the comments off in a tangential direction.
Having said that, I’m afraid I’ve done it again tonight!
But joyce isn’t slashing public transport funding while increasing funding for roads. He is slashing funding for roads too. And increasing the petrol tax by twice the rate of inflation instead of only at the rate of inflation as Labour intended to. At least the State Highways that are going to recieve all this money aren’t in Auckland. Transit’s Puhoi-Warkworth investigation is almost twenty years old so this project isn’t even ‘on the drawing boards’ let alone shovel ready. It’s only on the list to give the impression that Auckland hasn’t missed out.
Kevyn,
Can you explain to me, what would be of more value to Auckland commuters, a Puhoi-Warkworth four laning project, or expansion of the Auckland public transport network?
Thanks jarbury for the support.
And Joyce is still playing a silly game, except this time he has inflated the figure of those who drive to work from 84% to 86%.
Anyway, who gives a toss – if you have not other practical options, you’ve gotta drive!
Joyce put the figure at 86% last Tuesday in Parliamentary questions. Guess 2% doesn’t matter when you are playing politics.
But I stand by my original post – the reason being that the vast majority of those who travel by private transport don’t see a viable alternative without spending over an hour getting to work.
Sort the public transport, and put the motorways on hold, and problem fixed.
“Sort the public transport, and put the motorways on hold, and problem fixed.” What problem’s that? Congestion? Good luck – it hasn’t worked anywhere else in the world. London and New York stopped building major highways decades ago and congestion has kept growing, Sydney went for public transport first for decades but finally relented and allowed the private sector to build toll motorways.
The biggest gain from this decision is lives, as much of the road construction now will be on projects that reduce serious accidents. The Waikato Expressway benefits are mostly from this.
It’s worth noting that in provincial centres the only people using public transport are those without cars, when people have cars and parking is free or cheap, and there is no severe congestion, people will drive – it is a more convenient, cleaner, more comfortable and faster option for almost all commutes. That is never going to change.
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