John Key got something wrong

No, I'm not talking about accidentally calling United States Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, "President Clinton." At least he apologised for that and the media made sure everyone knew about that mistake. There's something else he got wrong earlier that week in Vietnam. Something much else. Something that nobody seems to have picked up on. Something that could've been avoided with even the slightest bit of research. By now you're probably screaming for me to hurry up and tell you what he got wrong. Don't worry, I'll get to that in a second. But first, here is something he said at the East Asia Summit in Vietnam last week.

"If you think about the lunch we went to; the richest man in the world was there in the form of the Sultan Brunei, three of the largest most populated countries in the world were there in the form of India and China and the likes, and arguably the only super power that currently exists (the United States)."

Did you read that quote very carefully, especially the part in bold? You should've figured by now that the Sultan of Brunei is not the richest man in the world. In fact the Sultan of Brunei isn't even one of the top 24 richest people in the world. So how could our Prime Minister get something so simple so wrong and not have anyone even notice it? How could he not know that Bill Gates is the richest man in the world?

Or is he?

You'd think so, wouldn't you? If you asked a random person in the street who the richest person is they would most likely reply, "Bill Gates." Actually, even though Bill Gates had been the richest person in the world for most of the time since 1995 (except in 2008 when he was overtaken by Warren Buffett) this is no longer the case. Since March 2010 the richest person in the world, with a net worth of  $US 60.6 billion has been Carlos Slim Helu. Heard of him? Me either until I found out from Forbes earlier this year. Carlos Slim is actually a 70 year old Mexican telecom tycoon who owns heaps of companies based on telecommunications and other stuff. He's the Chairman and CEO of Telmex, America Movil and Grupo Carso (all telecom conglomerates) and $6.6 billion richer than Bill Gates, who's now the world's second richest. Find out more about him here .

Now that you've hopefully learned something new and shocking from the The Hamish Report keep reading this blog and make sure you vote in the poll on the right on another rich person, John Key, before 14 November, 11:20pm. Quick! Time's running out!!!

National Government's 2nd Birthday

It's been exactly 2 years since John Key was elected Prime Minister of New Zealand and The Hamish Report is giving you the chance to have your say on how you feel about his performance (or lack thereof). Don't miss your chance to express your view on National's first two years in the comments below or take the poll on the right. Whether you love him, loathe him or just don't care make a comment below or vote in the poll BEFORE 14 Novemenber 2010, 11:20PM New Zealand time. ANONYMITY GUARANTEED!!!

Twilight kills people - most likely with boredom

What do Twilight and that video from The Ring have in common? They both kill people. So if you're thinking about watching the new Twilight movie and you want to stay alive then you must read this PUBLIC HEALTH WARNING: This DANGEROUS MOVIE could KILL YOU WITH BOREDOM.

An unfortunate 23-year-old man in Wellington, New Zealand suffered the deadly consequences of not having this warning the hard way. It's no secret that you'll fall asleep from boredom but this guy who was watching Twilight: Eclipse at the Reading Cinema complex on Courtenay Place won't be waking up any time soon. A security guard found his dead body sitting in his seat after the 6pm screening on Sunday 4 July after being alerted by a cleaner who thought he was asleep (because obviously if he was alive he wouldn't be awake). Police say the death is not suspicious but remains a mystery. I say the cause of death is obvious: this guy was bored to death. He was found alone so we can rule out the possiblity of a girlfriend forcing him to watch it. This means he must've voluntarily put himself through this agony. Maybe he was a masochist and thought he could survive and wake up from the torturous boredom or maybe he was suicidal and deliberately killed himself with the boredom - I don't know. And I don't know the exact time of death. I just hope that if it was suicide that his death occured as quickly as possible while watching the movie because the later it occured the more painful it must've been. I'm not advocating suicide here but if you want a quick and painless way to top yourself then watching Twilight would be an agonizing way to do it. You might say that you can survive Twilight. Well you can survive Russian roulette too but that doesn't make it any less dangerous and at least Russian roulette would kill you faster and less painfully. To paraphrase an old saying: Twilight might not kill you but why take the chance? Take this as a serious warning. I'm not exaggerating when I say that if you watch Twilight you'll probably be quite literally bored to death.

Can't discriminate against unreliable workers

When writing up a job ad there are lots of people you can't discriminate against. You can't discriminate against blacks, women, gays or old people. But that's not as sinful as discriminating against another section of society - unreliable workers.

A recruitment firm boss in England, Nicole Mamo, learnt this lesson the hard way when she posted a job advertisement for a £5.80-an-hour domestic cleaner on her local Jobcentre Plus website. Like most other sensible job advertisements she made sure it didn't say things like "no blacks" or "gays need not apply." But there was something it did say at the end that got her in trouble with the local Jobcentre Plus office in Thetford, Nolfolk. The advertisement ended with the offending words, ''must be very reliable and hard-working''. Sounds pretty reasonable right? Not so for a certain Jobcentre Plus worker, who claimed that asking for reliable workers meant that they could be sued for discriminating against unreliable workers. As a result, they banned her ad from the Jobcentre Plus office itself. Understandably, the 48 year old mother-of-two felt this was ridiculous.

'I placed the advert on the website and when I phoned up to check I was told it hadn't been displayed in the job centre itself," she said. ''She said 'oh we can't put that advert on the job points'. She said it was because they could have cases against them for discriminating against unreliable people.

''I laughed because I thought that was crazy. We supply the NHS with staff so it's very important for the patients that we have reliable workers.

''We find jobs for hundreds of temporary staff every week and are proud of our workers but our reputation is at stake if they aren't reliable.

''We are taking people off the dole and finding them jobs so not displaying the advert just seems absolutely ridiculous to me.''

You can't make this stuff up. I wish I could say the above story was just a joke, but it's not. This is just another example of political correct madness taking over the world. Discriminating against blacks, women or gays is bad enough but how dare you discriminate against unreliable and lazy people. These anti-discrimination laws started off okay because no one can choose their race, sex or age. But now they're just crazy. Will unreliable workers now be considered a protected minority? Maybe for the sake of diversity they have to have a certain quota of lazy and unreliable people. I can just imagine a rejection letter saying, "We regret to inform you that your application for the position of politician has been declined due to your hard work and excessive reliability." If unreliability was a legal prerequisite for a job then unreliable people would be a shoe-in for political office. It's not like you need to be reliable and hardworking to be a politician. Seriously though, how many job ads say you need to be reliable? I challenge you to find a job ad that doesn't say you have to be reliable and hardworking. If I had a dollar for every job ad asking reliable workers I could  more than pay my student loan off. A ban on asking for reliable workers would mean that most job advertisements are illegal. Next time you see a job advertisement saying you have to reliable and hardworking and you're just a lazy pig I suggest you sue for discrimination.

When will this political correct nonsense stop? Will David Letterman have to change his name to David Letterperson to appear less sexist? Let's have your comments and your own stories of how political correctness has affected you. I'm sure this can't be the only PC gone mad story around.

Balanced policy for the minimum wage

On Wednesday the government announced the smallest increase in the minimum wage in ten years from $12.50 to $12.75 (yay 25 cents!). Minister of Labour, Kate Wilkinson, and Business NZ Chief Executive, Phil O'Reilly, claim this is in line with inflation and reasonable enough to not price unskilled workers out of the labour market. But, understandably, Labour and the unions are calling the increase "miserly" and want it raised to at least $15. Opponents of the minimum wage argue that would price unskilled workers of the labour market as employers would choose skilled workers at the same price. Increasing the minimum wage is something that has arguments for and against but I've got a policy that should satisfy everyone.

The minimum wage should be increased to $15 to keep up with the cost of living. But I also understand that this would make unskilled and inexperienced people who aren't worth that much unemployable. So I think businesses (or at least small businesses) should receive tax credits (or at least some other form of compensation) so they won't feel like they're taking too much of a risk in hiring people who aren't as skilled. There should be give and take from both sides. If businesses are going to be forced to pay more for hiring someone they should get something back to compensate. You can only get at least the minimum wage if you've got a job so, if you're competing for a minimum wage job with someone who's more skilled and got more experience, then the other person would probably get picked over you. Giving tax credits to offset the increase in the minimum wage should balance things out a bit. Workers should be paid enough to survive on and not be oppressed but this doesn't mean businesses should be punished. Not all rich people and businesses are huge mean corporations that oppress and stomp on workers just like not all poor people and beneficiaries are lazy dole bludgers that just want to stay on welfare. Small businesses don't have endless pits of money so they don't want costs increased for no reason. If they can't pay less than $15 an hour for someone then they wouldn't want to take a risk with someone who's not worth that much. It's all about balance!

Anyway, that's the main idea. So what do you guys think? I know I haven't figured out all the numbers and practical stuff yet but the main idea is about balance - if you're going to increase compliance costs in one area you should decrease compliance costs in another. Your feedback, comments and opinions below are always welcomed. Give me your suggestions as to how my policy can be implemented (if at all!).

Top Ten Tweets from Osama bin Laden - Your ideas

Remember Osama bin Laden? You know, everyone's favourite terrorist filmmaker  mastermind that everyone's supposed to be looking for in those caves? Well he's back with his latest vlog entry and letting us know what's up following the Christmas Day underpants bomber attack. Now what if he was on Twitter? Let's see who can come up with the:

Top Ten Tweets from Osama bin Laden

Comment below.

David Beckham victim of feminist hypocrisy

Throughout itstory personkind (yes I'm deliberately being PC) has been inundated with the feminazi propaganda that feminists only want equal rights for both men and women and that neither gender should be treated differently from the other. So everyone naively goes through life with that myth. But, while that may have been true back in the Victorian days, this latest incident over David Beckham has revealed the all-too uncommon hypocrisy that feminists are guilty of these days.

If you still don't know what I'm on about: basically David Beckham was doing an interview in Milan, Italy when a female reporter from a so-called comedy show grabs his...ahem...bits and pieces (you know..his package, private sector, whatever, you know what I mean). I'm not going to get into the graphic details. The point is feminists are such hypocrites. They go on about how women have been oppressed by men and get offended by even the slightest jokes about women so they want things to be "equal". Yet they don't say a word when David Beckham gets sexually assaulted. Apparently when a man gets that sort of treatment feminists feel vindicated and it's not such a big deal. Fairness and equality don't feature in their vocabulary. I'd bet America's national debt that if the genders were reversed and a male reporter was engaged in that sort of disgusting behaviour there would be lawsuits flying around the place and the media would have such a field day over a sportswoman getting sexually assaulted that Tiger Woods and Bill Clinton would look like eunuchs. They'd go on and on about it and there'd be a huge media brouhaha. The fact that the media has shoved this under carpet only proves the infiltration of the feminazi agenda and double standards. David Beckham did nothing to deserve this brutal treatment. He's never abused a woman (sexually or otherwise). So the vindictive argument that David Beckham was only getting what women have been subjected too throughout history won't wash with anyone. He's well within his rights to sue the proverbial out of that reporter for sexual assault at the very least.