Good question posed in the Guardian. Should Californian police lives be risked capturing fugitive killer Christopher Dorner when a drone strike would be so much more efficient?
A facile argument…actually, any argument… seeking to justify extra judicial killings being carried out by the state, falls a long way short of “a good question (being) posed”.
Summary judgement and execution, enacted by remote control hellfire missle. What’s not to like about extra-judicial “efficiency”. I hear Afghan villagers have really got behind the concept as being “fair and balanced”.
Further in the US, it would save all that messy expensive bullshit to do with death row: lawyers, appeals, incarceration at tax payer expense for the next 15 years etc.
Reminds me of good old Chinese (or Russian) style justice. Very efficient. Get it done, move on, the only documentation left to do being an after-action report and some coroners paper work.
Also, bringing home military tactics, procedures and technology formerly developed and used against muslim terrorists for the purposes of actions against US citizens on US soil – what could possibly be unconstitutional about that?
It couldn’t be that the survivalist nut types in the US had a point all along about not being able to trust the motivations of the Feds, could it???
Looks like the killer has been cornered. Dorner’s apparently been found in a mountain cabin; so much for the assymetrical war etc. boasting he did on fb. Just another yank nutter with easy access to weapons.
– is it still possible to have one legal standard for summary justice operating across the world; can’t we just be a little loose for those people Richard Prosser describes?
– if you’re innocent, don’t you have nothing to worry about?
– wouldn’t this make leadership selections and country elections easier?
– which side were you on watching Terminator Salvation?
– when every country in the world with a significant defence capability operates fleets of them, can we do away with armed forces then?
Somehow I made it to the end.
@ 8mins Shearer gives Key a pat on the back for his punitive response to students who are in Australia.
WTF Shearer?.. this is a student radio station. You just failed big time.
Students have just been told quite clearly why its not worth getting out of bed on election day.
Is this it Labour? Is this your tertiary education policy? The student loan scam will continue under stumble-face?
FFS Labour…you are killing this county.
The only upside of this interview is that most students would have turned it off before Fozzie Bear mumbled on about treating our educated people as criminals.
And he was on TV3 this morning talk about stumbling over all his words, it got so bad that he gave up the line of conversation and stumbled over the next.
Really, Daveo, you’re being a bit desperate. Shearer was asked what he did on the weekend by the DJ, replies to that bit of fluff, then moves on to answer more relevant questions quite competently, before er, returning to the weather. Pretty normal stuff for this kind of interview.
Daveo. A bit odd talking to yourself???
I listened via your link. Sounded like a good interview to me. He answered the questions. Was unafraid to support the decision to get NZ students in Australia to repay their debts. I think that Mr Shearer was more informative than Mr Key in a similar scenario. And chatting about the weather was the DJ’s initiative, not Mr Shearer.
I didn’t think that Shearer did too badly. But the remarkable thing is that he conveys almost nothing in terms of substance or insight into the topics he is asked about. And certainly nothing about his own personal convictions on issues.
For instance. Why did he attend Big Gay Out? Response. Well, there are Gay Labour MPs who have worked really hard for gay rights, but in fact it was just down the road from home so I could take a stroll. WTF. An opportunity to espouse important principles and values of equality, equal rights, and unhindered participation in our society to tens of thousands of people, missed, in favour of “It was within walking distance”.
Tens of thousands? Listening to BFM? Maybe back when Graeme Hill did the morning show …
edit: just spotted the Daveo doppleganger comment. That was me. It appears that I’m using the same IP address as Daveo today. Not the first time that’s happened; my work takes me to a variety of workplaces and I log in to whatever broadband server is handiest. For what it’s worth, Daveo’s email address is a generic gmail account, so I don’t know who he or she is.
have you thought about changing back to ‘voice of reason’ – your te reo joke lacks ompf and the right wingers don’t get it anyway – might be a bit more honest voice.
Righties never saw the objectivist based humour in The Voice of Reason either, Marty. Come to think of it, not many lefties did either. I’ve been TRP since Waitangi Day last year and the change was both out of respect for that celebration and also to end the needless confusion TVoR seemed to bring. However, using the maori translation has allowed the occasional witless racist to riff on it, too. Hi, Pete!
The IP thing, and using multiple computers, is apparently why some of my comments also occasionally come up as TVoR. I’ll try to remember to check the ‘name and email’ boxes in future so it doesn’t happen again.
I just posted this on the site of the witless whiner… Pete George. Saw a linkback when I was clearing spam.
It is the classic (and slowly diminishing) cached page in a badly configured web proxy problem.
Because we allow anyone to leave messages without logging in, the details of what pseudonym and email address are stored on a cookie held on the client machine. This is sent to the server when a request for a page is made and is filled in on the page by the server in the appropriate fields. It means that people commenting without logging in don’t have to spend their time plugging in the fields all of the time.
Now this works almost everywhere because we have the settings for all of our *dynamic* pages set to not cache (and all of the static images, css, js, etc to cache). But it has problems when it runs into a web proxy that doesn’t obey the caching instructions in the http and html headers.
What happens then is that if there are two or more people are commenting at the same time, then the dumbarse web proxy is quite likely to serve up the wrong cached page. In practice this has happened only in few workplaces that I know of in the last 5 years. In both places it is a known technical issue. One hasn’t shown up for a couple of years. The other is obviously still an issue.
I have investigated alternatives to using the server side insertion of the cookie info. Javascript proved to be far to problematic for security reasons, a pretty extreme level of variation between browsers, and that a good number of readers have it turned off. The auto-fill on many browsers is just too flaky to rely on.
Of course I could just turn off the insertion of the name and e-mail fields, or force everyone to login or shift everything over to running on https (with all of the problems that has for dialup readers).
But doing this for the slowly diminishing numbers of poorly configured proxies that don’t obey caching instructions, it is simply excessive. Instead whenever it causes problem, I tell the participants that they should whine like you do to their techs.
And incidentally, your site will have exactly the same problem in those same workspaces
Cheers, LP, will do. But I will also check the boxes in the meantime as well.
Good ol’ PG, eh? I see he’s too dim to even work out which ‘daveo’ comment was the doppleganger. Wait till he gets to the line about racist commentaters; how long dya reckon it’ll take before he twigs which Pete I was referring to?
PS, PG, ya wally. I have nothing to do with the leadership of the LP, apart from badgering them at every reasonable opportunity to lift their game on social media. I don’t do their talking for them and never have. Didn’t LP explain this to you only a few weeks ago?
That was me. It appears that I’m using the same IP address as Daveo today. Not the first time that’s happened; my work takes me to a variety of workplaces and I log in to whatever broadband server is handiest….
I would have thought the chance of it happening once would be remote. You must be visiting some interesting workplaces.
I’m grateful to have a job that keeps me in touch with working Kiwis in a wide variety of industries accross rural, provincial and urban NZ, js. It certainly gives me access to a wide range of opinions and experiences which I hope adds a little authenticity to some of my comments at TS.
As for Daveo, the wee scamp, I’m pretty sure we both think we know who the other is online, but that’s Ok. Neither of us is telling. The bigger problem would be others on that server logging in to a TS comment box to try and suss both of us out.
Got a couple of STUNNING new banners which will be unfurled today – first outside the offices of Mighty River Power, then outside the offices of Mercury Energy!
Opposed to the sale of State Assets by this minority National Government (which only got 59 out of 121 MPs in the 2011 election?
Remember – the vote on the Mixed Ownership Model Act was 61 – 60.
National – who did campaign on asset sales – were dependent on the votes of dodgy John Banks – who arguably should NOT be an MP – let alone a Minister, and Peter Dunne – who DID NOT campaign on supporting State Asset sales.
Wednesday, February 13, 12-2pm, outside head office of Mighty River Power, 23-29 Albert St, Auckland CBD
PROTEST! Say No to Asset Sales 3:30 – 5:30 pm,
outside Mercury Energy Office, 602 Great South Road, Penrose.
…………………………………………………
Wednesday, February 13, 6pm, Frank Kitts Park in Wellington
Rally to oppose government asset sales.
The Rainbow Warrior will be in town and will drop a banner off her side in support. Join the crowd after work at Frank Kitts, bring the kids.
Hear interesting speakers (named below) and some of Wellington’s finest musicians and performers, Aroha Priest, Warren Pomana, Marama Te Kira, Skank Jigger, Lucky Ngatuere, Tribal Rizin and Brass Razoo.
Now’s the time to show you care, if you don’t like the idea of selling our assets. No other time will do. So, Wellington and anybody else, come on down and bring a couple of people with you.
Greenpeace is backing this event, so show your support for them when they’re here. Say No To Asset sales is a rally not a protest.
We all recognise the diversity of opinion in opposition to the government’s proposed sale of state assets.
We all know that we will have to fight hard to stop the sales, but that we can do it. Only by retaining 100% control of the power companies can we, the public, develop and enjoy a clean, affordable, NZ-owned energy system. Selling removes these opportunities and, crucially, replaces the chance to investigate historical and contemporary violations of the terms of the Treaty of Waitangi with mere promises that the issue of rights in water between Government and tangata whenua will somehow be unaffected by privatisation.
The following speakers at this Rally represent the diverse range of groups, organisations and factions and the vast majority of people in Aotearoa/NZ opposed to the sale of our state assets. Celia Wade-Brown, Major of Wellington City Council; Justin Duckworth, Anglican Bishop of Wellington; Nathan Argent, National Policy Adviser, Greenpeace; Dr Geoff Bertram. Senior Economics Lecturer, Victoria University; Dr Jane Kelsey, Professor Law, Auckland University; Maanu Paul, Chair, NZ Maori Council; Peter Love, Te Atiawa & Board Member Wellington Tenths Trust with mokopuna, Kaira Love, Te Atiawa; Frances Kuo, Spokesperson, Aotearoa is Not for Sale; Dr Ganesh Nana, Chief Economist, BERL; Roy Reid, National President, Grey Power; John Maynard & Steve Booth, Spokespeople, Peoples Power Ohariu.
_____________________________________________________________________________
Forwarded by Penny Bright
A Spokesperson for the Switch Off Mercury Energy community group.
Auckland rates due 20th of Feb, have you paid you rates arrears yet Penny? Are you allowed to vote if you are in rate arrears? Are you allowed to stand for mayor?
[RL: Penny has chosen to withhold paying her rates as a means of political protest; as distinct from avoiding an obligation to the Council. Your failure to mention this is of course a deliberate distortion. Virtually all protest involves some action which can be described as illegal at one level, while ethically justifiable at another. Your approach is here is not a discussion, it’s abuse. Don’t keep repeating it.]
RL: Penny also has a proud history of challenging established authority in other ways too. She was the first woman to become a licenced welding inspector back when it was an all male club. All power to her (no pun intended!).
After getting a bit carried away with comments over a week ago, which was due to honest frustrations and a level of built up anger, I wish to apologise to Irishbill for losing focus on the topic, in a thread he had launched with good intentions (http://thestandard.org.nz/on-engagement-with-the-labour-caucus/).
Retrospectively I thank IrishBill for giving me a week of a “break” or holiday, as it enabled me to have a closer look at some policy and plans that this present National led government is pushing through in the health areas.
Particularly mental health and addiction treatment and care should be of interest to all those that also are highly concerned about the welfare reforms presently before the Social Services Committee in the form of the Social Security (Benefit Categories and Work Focus) Amendment Bill. A high number of sick and invalids on benefits do have mental health issues, and some have addiction illnesses.
There has (from Bennett, English and Key) been talk about putting more resources into “helping” those that are on sickness and invalid’s benefits, to somehow get well and fit enough to return to work or training.
Well, by looking at the Ministry of Health’s “Rising to the Challenge: The Mental Health and Addiction Service Development Plan 2012–2017”, which Associate Minister for Health Peter Dunne (UF) presented without much notice by media and the public just about a week before Christmas last year, I have discovered, how hollow, false and misleading the statements by the government are once again.
It is full of high aspirations, “new” goals, ambiguous slogans, much talk about more responsibilities, efficiencies, effectiveness, mentions repeatedly KPIs (“key performance indicators”), but delivers very little of substance in regards to what will actually be done, what staff will be employed and trained, what resources will be made available, and how better outcomes are supposed to be achieved.
In short: It basically reveals that the mentally ill and addicted will first and foremost have to help themselves, and additional resources will NOT be made available, new resources for new focus and target areas will instead need to come from “less effective” areas in health care, which means taking money off some to help others (“re-allocation”). “Robbing Peter to pay Paul” comes to mind.
Also does it seem to be leading to a “mass medication” program that will be expected from GPs and other primary care deliverers, as what I have heard and experienced at the coal face is, that these low cost “solutions” are now the primary way of dealing with mental health and addiction.
Key stakeholders and professional health organisation appear to not have been consulted properly and sufficiently, so many have delivered damning criticism at this plan.
Now while all this is going on “discretely” in the background, I encourage all those interested to do a thorough read and study of all this. It appears – once again, that neither the media, nor politicians, are discussing and debating this highly important information in the open. I ask also, where is the opposition spokeswoman on health, whom I heard deliver yet another very mediocre speech in Parliament yesterday afternoon.
Maybe a Labour front bench re-shuffle will see to it that someone more dedicated will be looking at all relevant stuff that a spokesperson in such key area should be looking at???
As nobody in government seems to be able to rise to it, maybe someone there will soon “Rise to the Challenge”?
CV – more at peace with myself, kind of, but still committed to address issues that need attention, no matter what party affiliation or other orientations.
Yay xtasy (keep up the good work) I recommend a little extra-curricular reading and gardening myself. Oh, and listening to a little Bach, Elgar, Michael Nyman, Handel,
Vivaldi, Metallica!
RT – Yes, thanks, I have a fair bit of that in my collection, but I need to take more time out and play some of it. I have had a couple of years of pretty hard work, not for pay by the way, but just to take a stand, to defend justice, and to take on some real big players in the NZ admin system environment.
Heaps of stuff I and others learned, and more is to come, as a “mission” has been discovered and is being realised, to take things further.
Hey there – always good to welcome people back from their bans. I’ve been guilty of deserving a ban or two myself when the blood starts to boil and hit the Enter key before taking a deep breath. These days, I keep this pinned to the wall next to my monitor . . . it helps keep things in perspective.
No need for Joyce to front up … yet, … thanks to Prosser.
And whatever might, or might not, be Winston’s tactics, the stupid Prosser thing is taking attention away from Winston’s own questions being raised in the House about National’s appointment of Jenny Shipley to the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Review Panel, her directorship on Mainzeal, and questions about conflicted interests.
What appears to be a solid piece of helpful information with a warning to pay attention to.
Under radionz news – rural for today
Blind push for production brings risk – consultant
A Waikato agricultural consultant says the dairy industry’s focus on more cows, more milk and ever-more production does not equal more profit for all farmers, and in fact, it puts some at a lot more risk.
Like treasury reports provide the basis for great decisions. Another area the nats want to privatise.
We aren’t large enough to support a workable private health insurance system, Oz is, only just and it’s struggling as it’s a luxury most folk go without for the public system.
Ryall’s zero sum health budgets set a scene for this. Pay more tax have better health care, healthy population is the basis of growth and propserity.
Private insurance benefits mostly the private sector not the poeple.
English contends that the productive sector wants to pay their workers less by arguing for intervention to bring the dollar down. But as we know National hate looking at other aspects of the accountancy equation. Producers who pay more to their workers and less to pay down foreigner held debt (by not growing the debt in the first place) would give their employees more buying power and so increase the demand for foreign exchange which in turn would drive down the high doller.
So let’s make this clear, people are demanding NZ dollars because our assets are under valued, our workers are underpaid, and our government rig the tax system to reward capital gain at the expense of organic NZ economic growth, but worse, the global system is rigged to reward those who get to pay their taxes in a low tax haven, and grow capital gain in higher tax NZ.
But English doesn’t like to put meat on the argument, or emphasis that when NZ employers pay NZ employees more the economy will boom, when NZ companies go bust that have too much debt, and NZ owned companies take over and pay their workers more, the dollar will drop, when NZ companies vote for a capital gains tax on a second home (investment property) then the housing bubble won’t burst just the pressure will come off and builders can start building to the demands of the NZ market not the demands of the world foreign speculators who use NZ.
Its precisely because the NZ manager classes read the Herald that they keep having problems understanding why the dollar is so high and who (them) needs to change their nasty habits of debt, low wages and chronically deficient neo-liberal economic thinking. You don’t get healthy as
a person by eating junk food, we won’t as a nation get health economically by listening to the turd
way National and the Herald newspaper.
Mr English has some farm like clothes and ready-to-wear muddied boots that provide the right outfit and look for when he goes walky walky down South. But that is about it, ha ha ha!
Mr English’s hands have not seen much farming and outdoors work. Anyone who has a sharp eye or has shaken real farmers’ hands and his hand can tell the difference.
Interesting. On Rural Roundup 😉 the other day- China, by volume, largest importer of our lamb, yet returning only $4 / kilo, half that to UK which is still largest importer by value. dear oh dearie me.
Yahoo hacking cough; take some more medication.
Sooo , now we are struglling to maintain species from extinction, Y-E.P , species that our own lifestyles are exterminating. Exterminate! Exterminate!
The City! “…man’s greatest achievement ” -Ellul (not withstanding, the toilet-roll cathedral)
Northland farmers panhandle “…they’re cutting people like us out!”
when Sport becomes the fraud and drug-crime news. (shame on those hippies though, smokin’ dope and watchin’ sport on Sky)
watched Seven Sharp, before the accident and surveillance porn that followed, and is it just me or do the presenters seem ultra-scripted and adhered to the prompters before them; not very natural. And Winston Peters? Is he on drugs or just drunk most evenings?
Education?- “the gap between the poorest 3 deciles and the wealthiest 3 grew 31.6 % between 2010 – 2011, despite a fall in achievement at the top schools”- Metiria Turei
even at study group this morning, the consensus was that these cultural memes of self-reliance, self-made, independent blah blah, will be our undoing. (see this attitude of “tolerance” of kiwis in Oz by their citizens repeated in the MSM, dear oh dear, paybacks (for our disproportionate earlier successes and hubris) may be painful)
Sadly the private prosecution of ACT leader,(ACT leader that’s a hilarity),John Banks has had to be withdrawn as the original paperwork was incorrectly filled out,(wonder if they let all the minor crims off for the same excuse),
Leave has been sought from the Judge in the Wellington district Court to re-lay the charges…
”We would be out in a war zone armed only with a pea-shooter” so says the Member for Dipton Bill English who as Minister of Finance seems to be ‘out in a war zone armed only with a pea-brain’ when it comes to intervening in the NZ$ so as to save as many jobs in this country as possible,
Bill was talking about lowering the Kiwi$ as lowering the living standards of all New Zealander’s versus having another 10,000 or so Kiwi’s lose their jobs altogether and become a political football for Him and the Minister of overseas travel for employment Paula to kick around,
Bill’s actually saying that it’s great to have 10’s of 1000’s of New Zealand workers to throw on the scrap heap of unemployment so as to keep the prices of i pads’ flat-screen TV’s and other imported shit cheap to buy for those who vote for this abysmal Slippery lead National Government,
Maybe Bill hasn’t thought of it, but even if He has He wont tell us, that a lower NZ dollar will encourage people to make the stuff we need here in New Zealand instead of importing it all from the cheap labour countries thus creating jobs,
Bill’s just another liar who refuses to face the reality that in the future we all are going to have to get by on less,there is no grand recovery from the ‘smart economy, export lead or otherwise, and the sooner the politicians in the Parliament begin to address this particular FACT and how we are to better share around our monetary resources the sooner we can all get down to actually doing so…
Well, Bill’s just operating in the conventional, orthodox, neoliberal framework. If we were to print every tenth dollar the NZ government required instead of borrowing it from overseas, we’d find that the NZD would drop in value fairly significantly.
Yep and then use the monies to embark on a proper affordable housing program where the government builds the houses and either sells them or rents them to tenants at 25% of income thus becoming the mortgage holder,
The monies taken in by Government from those it was the mortgage holder too could then be ticked off the original ‘debt’ of having created the money in the first place and the actual cash brought into the coffers could be redistributed as social programs and welfare payments to those most in need,
Thus any price rises from having lowered the value of the NZ$ by printing the money in the first place would be negated by those paying lower rent costs and lower rates of mortgage to the Government as the lender,
It’s obvious from here that ‘this’ or a variation of this will have to occur within the next ten years or the whole s**t-pile will come to a grinding halt, which would be fun but not of any real benefit in societal terms…
Richard Prosser is appearing on TV1’s 7sharp tonight, hope they ask Him why He found it necessary to be attempting to board domestic flights in New Zealand armed with a pocket-knife,
that’s the sort of s**t that Terrorists get up to…
Think Labour+Green+Mana would give a simple majority on those numbers, polls should get better for labour next month again as the left wing of NZfirst abandon ship big-time,
If Roy was doing as i suspect, reading the National vote from the high side of the margin of error and Labour from the low side he appears to have rectified that,
Not party in the street material but looking good 20 month’s out from an election, wonder if this will provoke another fainting spell from Slippery…
Actually, I’m waiting for tomorrow’s post; something like …
Another Flatlining Roy Morgan Poll:
The latest Roy Morgan poll has National on 44%, Labour 34.5%, the Greens on 13.5%, and NZ First on 4%.
It just amazes me the government can still poll close to 45% after stuff up, after stuff up.
I’m sick of hearing from the Greens “just wait, it’ll get better”. Well it’s not. You’ve been stuck on 13.5 for 4 weeks. So stop making excuses.
Labour have done their bit.
Maybe it’s time the Greens started focusing on the important stuff rather than pulling silly stunts. Instead, take some risks and put yourselves on the line for the people who put you there.
Trying to enable a National victory in 2014 by attacking the Green Party in a fit of overblown egoism over a margin of error poll rise for the Labour Party isn’t very clever…
Over two hundred comments on that post attacking Labour only two weeks ago. Sauce for the goose etc. But point taken bad; we’re all in this together.
It’s been a good few days on the unity front actually. Signs of a rapproachment between the LP and TS and now the Roy Morgan result hint at good times to come.
Right, so why not get all the parties on the “left” together, to throw off their vanities and individual member’s personal ambitions, and hammer out ONE unified left party, so that all are in it for the same one cause, which will have synergy effects, as the entrepreneurial operators so often describe the growth effect of positive combinations.
I still cannot believe, how so many choose to be divided, and it is so, when really, much more should combine and join forces.
Is it not the “branding” crap, that led us to this, now we have “Labour”, “National”, “Greens” and the likes, the word “party” is not mentioned, as it is perceived as a negative word from the past.
We have individuals try to portray themselves as “leaders”, as “spokespersons”, as “members” and whatever, but they brand themselves too, so the unifying factor becomes less relevant.
It is a result of the “corporatisation” of politics, is it not? YOU do as MP or whatever politician No longer represent, you are a “brand” to “stand” for a kind of label “option”, and anything else, even personal involvement is not even considered anymore.
This stinks, as this thinking has totally corrupted politics and society as a whole. I want to deal with people, persons and meet and see people face to face. I want to know who represents me in person, not some glossed up web page, a Facebook facade, a poster or whatever crap they present now, but I do not get what I expect.
So politics is becoming too faked, like so bloody much, I am afraid. Who can I trust, relate to and even vote?
34.5%, that’s a Labour high not achieved since late 2010/mid 2011 under Goff. Not bad at all. 34.5% in the polls on E-day will likely win the Treasury benches for Labour, at the cost of having to give up a lot of relatively minor portfolios to support parties.
Lordy, just imagine the black ops posts on KB and WO in the weeks before Xmas about cabinet scenarios. All the ‘Greens To Get Treasury, Police and the Army’ Shock Horrors.
Indeed. Certainly not out of the woods. The high water mark pre-Nov 2011 was 36% or 37%. It didn’t hold to election day. A lot of work needs to be done.
However the wrong move would be for caucus to see this as vindication of the “tide coming in” strategy.
Parliament, assuming all electorate seats stay the same:
ACT New Zealand 1 1 1
Green Party 17 0 17
Labour Party 44 22 22
Mana 1 1 1
Māori Party 1 3 3
National Party 56 42 14
United Future 0 1 0
120 70 53 (123)
And if Labour pick up a couple from National and 1 from the MP:
ACT New Zealand 1 1 1
Green Party 17 0 17
Labour Party 44 25 19
Mana 1 1 0 1
Māori Party 1 2 2
National Party 56 40 16
United Future 0 1 1
Whoops, got caught out editing that data. If no electorate seats change (ie MP, UF and ACT are a combined 5 seats, Mana 1), the current Gov’t have 61 seats in a 123 seat Parliament. Lab/Green the same, so it’d be up to Hone! (well, more likely, Peter Dunne would rediscover his socialist roots).
However, with just a minimum of likely electorate seat changes (two off National, 1 from the MP) its Nats et al 50, Lab/Green 51 (plus Hone’s one on the side) in a 122 seat house.
Of course the latter is a conservative reading of what might happen to the electorate seats. If the MP lose 2 seats, not 1, or Dunne or Banks miss out, its curtains for the Nats.
LOL, that’s still not as bad as posting an angry comment on a 3 year old post over at Red Alert, as I did earlier today! That’s a classic.
But the good news is that the only man smiling tonight over in National towers is Steven Joyce. btw, if Joyce is Mr Fixit, does that make Key Mr Fuxit?
A quick calculation (oh how I love the Elections NZ Virtual Seat calculater!) and assuming Electorate seats stay the same (a stretch I know) the results would translate into a 122 seat House:
However if Nats were to stitch a deal with the Conservatives over an Electorate seat a National/MP/Conservative/ACT/UF coalition could grab 62 seats. Actually they could take back Epsom from ACT and still do it as long as they reach an accomodation with the Conservatives.
Fascinating!
Still work to be done on the left to secure the field though – there could still be much fancy footwork around NZ First and the Conservatives which could distort it unless some big chunks are taken out of the National vote that go to the Left.
My view is that the Maori Party are going to be left with 1 seat in 2014, i am now going to have to start practicing saying bye bye Slippery without going into mad bursts of laughter…
Actually to be honest I wonder whether they will end up with any representation – their political capital seems pretty much spent – unless there is a rapprochement with Mana of course (which might actually be the logical thing for the MP to do).
Ah man sailing on His ego trip, which is what politics consists of for many, i cannot see the Maori Party and Mana joining forces, can’t see it but they definitely should,(after Turia and Sharples have gone that is),
After what was said on the Marae at firstly Ratana Pa and secondly at Waitangi you are not far off on where the Maori Party now sit in relation to what was it’s support base,
The bulk of the ‘Whanau ora’ fund that just so happened to have been spent in the electorate of Tariana Turia might ensure a reasonable turnout of the vote for the Maori Party in that electorate if they stand someone like Rahui Katene as the candidate, Ken Mair’s chances should He stand i think are about zero,
I am picking that the Labour candidate while not winning Te Ureroa Flavell’s Waiariki seat will split the vote sufficiently so as to allow Mana’s Annette Sykes to win,
The reverse i believe will occur in Sharple’s seat where the Mana candidate will pick up enough votes for Labour’s Shane Jones to prevail…
Yes – the politics of the personal should not be underestimated – I always felt that it meant the MP and Labour missed an opportunity because of personal antipathies – the events and principles that lead to the formation of the MP were legitimate and after an understandable cooling down period (the emotions were running high) the 2 parties really should have looked at how to work together – in the end the MP got some IMO minimal gains from National at the expsense of selling their soul.
Okay this is dumb question of the week.
How does Roy Morgan poll treat the non voter. The “won’t say” is 3.5% but the poll assumes they will vote? That is tiny compared to the total electorate non vote. Does Roy Morgan simply assume that all the hang up’s, non answers and “go away it’s teatime” are the non voters?
Not a dumb question at all. There may be some breakdown of the process on the Roy Morgan site and I do know that most polling companies press for an answer even if the respondent says they haven’t made up their mind. Email Roy, I’m sure he’ll tell you how it works if you ask nice.
As I understand it, most polls completely ignore the hang-ups, non-answers, and go-away-it’s-teatimes in the results.
The reported percentages are of those who answer the poll, not those who were called. So if 1000 calls are made and 100 responses received and 44 of those support National, National is reported as 44%, not 4.4% (which, while technically correct, would also be slightly absurd.)
Does this mean that an ever increasing “I’m not going to vote”, [some days I feel like joining them] simply goes unrecorded? It means that increasing disillusionment isn’t recorded?
So eventually we may get down to say 10 voters and 4.4 of them say NACT – well 4 say NACT and .4 of Peter Dunne as he spreads his personal vote around?
We have done much the same as the USA when we adopted National Standards. We have put aside intellectual rigour applied in understanding our education problem and chosen a response pathetically lacking in self-determination and heavily skewed towards genuflecting to the big guy, the USA, and so finding an excuse for visiting there and having Important Discussions about Weighty Matters with people who are richer than we are (and therefore on the scale of simple commercial value we judge by, must be better than us.)
I didn’t make a submission on the Family Court even though I think it is important. I was too busy doing other things like having a go at Prosser the Tosser. I had the idea that it closed Friday but didn’t check.
When I went to the site I saw the date but no closing time. This is important as the Electoral Commission submissions closed at 5pm. It is strange to adopt post office hours when on-line submissions are given. I would have thought that 12 am would be the deadline.
Then if you follow the information to help with submissions you have to download a booklet from a PDF. How clunky and convoluted – a barrier in fact.
I guess its too late to make a submission though it doesn’t state closing time. And I don’t feel like reading a textbook on submission making. Isn’t there a Plain English movement that would also apply to making this sort of instruction clear and short?
Go ahead and make ‘a’ submission anyway if you wish. And copy the submission to relevant parliamentary spokespeople as well as the individual members of the appropriate select committee.
Is that a submission to a parliamentary select committee?
If so, for the information of readers here, generally –
Next time, just before the deadline, or as soon as the announcement comes out, put in a quick one- or two-line submission stating that you are putting in a submission, that you wish to be heard (you can decide later and write in that you don’t wish to be heard) and that the rest of your comments will be submitted asap.
That way, even if you miss the deadline by a few minutes or a day, you are still ‘in’.
And given that you have stated you wish to be heard, you will be contacted at some stage later. (You can indicate otherwise later if you change your mind.)
Recommended reading for Paula Bennett, the Principal Health Advisor David Bratt, senior employee at MSD and for Work and Income, and even for opposition welfare and health spokespersons:
So when getting GPs to make “assessments”, to diagnose and to refer clients to specialists, always bear in mind, there may well be a “mine field” in regards to actions not being the right ones to take, in many cases, or in at least some cases.
While having relied so heavily on even MSD “trained” general practitioners, to make decisions on health, disability and work incapacity, MSD and WINZ seem to have taken risks and possibly relied on “flawed” recommendations in quite high numbers.
Even on the so-called Medical Appeal Boards (appointed by the “Chief Executive” of MSD) do usually have about 2 GPs (being “designated doctors” trained or at least “selected” by MSD) sit on them, so they tend to have a two thirds majority.
A recent workshop held by MSD on 31 Jan. 2013 does though appear to be used now, by MSD, to select comments from disability participants, saying they do NOT want to be assessed about work capacity by their GPs. Now while that may seem reasonable and sensible for some, though, that is exactly what MSD want, as they are going to take over that job under the new welfare reforms themselves! I fear that some of these advocates and disabled spokespersons are not quite aware what they are asking for. Doctors – mostly GPs – may not be right all the time, but are WINZ health and disability advisors the ones you want to rely on?
There is a lot of shit happening, like the recent “survey” MSD conducted on suggestions by various affected groups, what may assist people with ill health or disabilities back into work. I fear this is all being abused and used as an “instrument” to pick the suggestions that suit them, to justify the introduction of UK style assessments, and to force sick and disabled into work, before they may even be asked themselves.
Now much more scrutiny must be put on all this. I appeal to all opposition spokespersons on welfare and health to pay serious attention to these matters and issues.
I am sure nobody wants to have the UK scenario, with many dying trying to do work they are not able to do, or committing suicide, seeing no hope, and being unable to be taken serious as sick and disabled.
Surely, a trusted doctor and GP will need to be listened to, same as proper specialists for the conditions people suffer, but a balanced and objective and fair, fact based approach is needed, before determining sick and disabled can do some work.
One intersting relevant article is this by the way:
…this despite an expected increase by 8% in half-year operating profits.
Apparently savings have to be made and late last year, CEO Barnes signalled returns to shareholders were likely to be “ramped up” once the company’s big investment programme ended in the current financial year…so the translation would be “shareholders need more profits so let’s cut some more jobs”. Obviously rorting the consumers just isn’t cutting it.
Message to PG: re: your question on YawnNZ about missing the login. You can see the comment box yourself. Like most posters (I guess) my eyes glaze over the ‘Name (required)’ and ‘Mail’ bits above it because they come up automatically. I go straight to the comment box and start typing the sparkling bon mots you’ve grown to love so well.
Anyway, nice to see this crushingly dull event has quadrupled your usual average daily comments. Up to four now, I see! Is this a record?
The responses to Farrar’s post on KB got me totally shocked and frozen to be honest. Even Farrar seems to be shocked by at least some comments on his post. Wow, this is showing how many sickoes there are in NZ society.
I have been against too liberal migration for various reasons, also am aware (as I know about it) of some abuse of migration, but hey, this is FUCKING SICK!
Heh!! I recognise a couple of lols tr0lls in there winding it all up and giving room for the bigots to show their colours. But, seriously, you’re surprised by that? C’mon, Farrar’s Sewer reflects the general conversation you will find at pretty much any gathering of employed, sporting, wanna-be middle-class Kiwi baldheads.
If its not the Muslims its the Greenies or women or bloody maaaari – they gotta have something to hate – its as much a social lubricant as their green bottle beer. A lot of the banter is just piss and wind designed to irritate the overly sensitive but, as you can see, what passes for discourse is driven by deliberate and beligerent ignorance.
God forbid that they should actually read a scholarly book or watch a 90-minute documentary about what they think they know all about. Even worse would be admitting to having done such a thing. Nah, much easier to get their religious instruction from Fox News and then reinforce the messages amongst themselves. Its a good way for them to judge if you’re wiv ’em or agin ’em.
Unfortunately, as more and more of our best and most able head overseas, this cohort of “sickoes” is growing by the day and forms a significant political bloc. They are the sort of people who turn their stove and oven on during Earth Hour and vote National Ltd™ only to keep Labour out. Study them well.
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The Government is delivering on its commitment to bring back the Three Strikes legislation, Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee announced today. “Our Government is committed to restoring law and order and enforcing appropriate consequences on criminals. We are making it clear that repeat serious violent or sexual offending is not ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has today announced four new diplomatic appointments for New Zealand’s overseas missions. “Our diplomats have a vital role in maintaining and protecting New Zealand’s interests around the world,” Mr Peters says. “I am pleased to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the ...
New Zealand is contributing NZ$7 million to support communities affected by severe food insecurity and other urgent humanitarian needs in Ethiopia and Somalia, Foreign Minister Rt Hon Winston Peters announced today. “Over 21 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance across Ethiopia, with a further 6.9 million people ...
Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Paul Goldsmith is congratulating Mataaho Collective for winning the Golden Lion for best participant in the main exhibition at the Venice Biennale. "Congratulations to the Mataaho Collective for winning one of the world's most prestigious art prizes at the Venice Biennale. “It is good ...
The Government is reforming financial services to improve access to home loans and other lending, and strengthen customer protections, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly and Housing Minister Chris Bishop announced today. “Our coalition Government is committed to rebuilding the economy and making life simpler by cutting red tape. We are ...
“China remains a strong commercial opportunity for Kiwi exporters as Chinese businesses and consumers continue to value our high-quality safe produce,” Trade and Agriculture Minister Todd McClay says. Mr McClay has returned to New Zealand following visits to Beijing, Harbin and Shanghai where he met ministers, governors and mayors and engaged in trade and agricultural events with the New ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has completed a successful trip to Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, deepening relationships and capitalising on opportunities. Mr Luxon was accompanied by a business delegation and says the choice of countries represents the priority the New Zealand Government places on South East Asia, and our relationships in ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. “Recently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
A stopbank upgrade project in Tairawhiti partly funded by the Government has increased flood resilience for around 7000ha of residential and horticultural land so far, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones today attended a dawn service in Gisborne to mark the end of the first stage of the ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters will represent the Government at Anzac Day commemorations on the Gallipoli Peninsula next week and engage with senior representatives of the Turkish government in Istanbul. “The Gallipoli campaign is a defining event in our history. It will be a privilege to share the occasion ...
Science, Innovation and Technology and Defence Minister Judith Collins will next week attend the OECD Science and Technology Ministerial conference in Paris and Anzac Day commemorations in Belgium. “Science, innovation and technology have a major role to play in rebuilding our economy and achieving better health, environmental and social outcomes ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with the President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The Prime Minister was accompanied by MP Paulo Garcia, the first Filipino to be elected to a legislature outside the Philippines. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon and President Marcos Jr discussed opportunities to ...
The Government has announced that $20 million in funding will be made available to Westport to fund much needed flood protection around the town. This measure will significantly improve the resilience of the community, says Local Government Minister Simeon Brown. “The Westport community has already been allocated almost $3 million ...
The Government is proud to support the first ever Repco Supercars Championship event in Taupō as up to 70,000 motorsport fans attend the Taupō International Motorsport Park this weekend, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. “Anticipation for the ITM Taupō Super400 is huge, with tickets and accommodation selling out weeks ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced an increase to the Rates Rebate Scheme, putting money back into the pockets of low-income homeowners. “The coalition Government is committed to bringing down the cost of living for New Zealanders. That includes targeted support for those Kiwis who are doing things tough, such ...
The Coalition Government is investing in a project to boost survival rates of New Zealand mussels and grow the industry, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones has announced. “This project seeks to increase the resilience of our mussels and significantly boost the sector’s productivity,” Mr Jones says. “The project - ...
Benefit figures released today underscore the importance of the Government’s plan to rebuild the economy and have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker Support, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “Benefit numbers are still significantly higher than when National was last in government, when there was about 70,000 fewer ...
The Government’s commitment to doubling New Zealand’s renewable energy capacity is backed by new data showing that clean energy has helped the country reach its lowest annual gross emissions since 1999, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand’s latest Greenhouse Gas Inventory (1990-2022) published today, shows gross emissions fell ...
The Government is bringing the earthquake-prone building review forward, with work to start immediately, and extending the deadline for remediations by four years, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “Our Government is focused on rebuilding the economy. A key part of our plan is to cut red tape that ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and his Thai counterpart, Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, have today agreed that New Zealand and the Kingdom of Thailand will upgrade the bilateral relationship to a Strategic Partnership by 2026. “New Zealand and Thailand have a lot to offer each other. We have a strong mutual desire to build ...
RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Transport Minister Simeon Brown have today announced the Coalition Government’s intention to extend port coastal permits for a further 20 years, providing port operators with certainty to continue their operations. “The introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991 required ports to obtain coastal ...
Today’s announcement that inflation is down to 4 per cent is encouraging news for Kiwis, but there is more work to be done - underlining the importance of the Government’s plan to get the economy back on track, acting Finance Minister Chris Bishop says. “Inflation is now at 4 per ...
Refreshed health guidance released today will help parents and schools make informed decisions about whether their child needs to be in school, addressing one of the key issues affecting school attendance, says Associate Education Minister David Seymour. In recent years, consistently across all school terms, short-term illness or medical reasons ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is streamlining high-level oceans management while maintaining a focus on supporting the sector’s role in the export-led recovery of the economy. “I am working to realise the untapped potential of our fishing and aquaculture sector. To achieve that we need to be smarter with ...
Associate Agriculture Minister Mark Patterson is speaking at the International Wool Textile Organisation Congress in Adelaide, promoting New Zealand wool, and outlining the coalition Government’s support for the revitalisation the sector. "New Zealand’s wool exports reached $400 million in the year to 30 June 2023, and the coalition Government ...
The Government is making legislative changes to make it easier for new early learning services to be established, and for existing services to operate, Associate Education Minister David Seymour says. The changes involve repealing the network approval provisions that apply when someone wants to establish a new early learning service, ...
Changes to the Resource Management Act will align consenting for coal mining to other forms of mining to reduce barriers that are holding back economic development, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. “The inconsistent treatment of coal mining compared with other extractive activities is burdensome red tape that fails to acknowledge ...
Trade, Agriculture and Forestry Minister Todd McClay has concluded productive discussions with ministerial counterparts in Beijing today, in support of the New Zealand-China trade and economic relationship. “My meeting with Commerce Minister Wang Wentao reaffirmed the complementary nature of the bilateral trade relationship, with our Free Trade Agreement at its ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon today paid tribute to Singapore’s outgoing Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. Meeting in Singapore today immediately before Prime Minister Lee announced he was stepping down, Prime Minister Luxon warmly acknowledged his counterpart’s almost twenty years as leader, and the enduring legacy he has left for Singapore and South East ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. While in Singapore as part of his visit to South East Asia this week, Prime Minister Luxon also met with Singapore President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and will meet with Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dan Jerker B. Svantesson, Professor specialising in Internet law, Bond University Do Australian courts have the right to decide what foreign citizens, located overseas, view online on a foreign-owned platform? Anyone inclined to answer “yes” to this question should perhaps also ask ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Giovanni E Ferreira, NHMRC Emerging Leader Research Fellow, Institute of Musculoskeletal Health, University of Sydney Last week in a post on X, owner of the platform Elon Musk recommended people look into disc replacement if they’re experiencing severe neck or back pain. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Hayward, Emeritus Professor of Public Policy, RMIT University anek.soowannaphoom/Shutterstock NSW Treasurer Daniel Mookhey caught the headlines yesterday, courtesy of a blistering speech condemning the latest GST carve-up. New South Wales, he claimed, would be A$11.9 billion worse off over the ...
While police are "broadly in favour", the government's proposed anti-gang laws are facing pushback from lawyers, rights groups and former gang members. ...
While police are "broadly in favour", the government's proposed anti-gang laws are facing pushback from lawyers, rights groups and former gang members. ...
By Miriam Zarriga in Port Moresby Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has arrived at Kokoda Station, Northern province, at the start of his state visit to Papua New Guinea. Both Albanese and Prime Minister James Marape will meet with the locals and the Northern Provincial government before they begin their ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Chris Wallace, Professor, School of Politics Economics & Society, Faculty of Business Government & Law, University of Canberra Shutterstock An important principle was invoked by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese last week in defence of the government’s Future Made in Australia industry ...
By Patrick Decloitre, RNZ Pacific correspondent French Pacific desk Security forces reinforcements were sent from France ahead of two rival marches in the capital Nouméa today, at the same time and only two streets away one from the other. One march, called by Union Calédonienne party (a component of the ...
A poll last August found that just 16% of New Zealanders oppose bringing back the ‘Three Strikes’ law. The nationwide poll of 1,000 New Zealanders was commissioned by Family First NZ and carried out by Curia Market Research. ...
The solo show from Ana Scotney is both sprawling and intimate, and a must-see, writes Mad Chapman. In the opening moments of Scattergun: After the Death of Rūaumoko, writer and performer Ana Scotney lays out the groundwork, literally. Silently moving around the square stage, Scotney is not so much dancing ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Burridge, Professor of Linguistics, Monash University Who makes the words? Why are trees called trees and why are shoes called shoes and who makes the names? – Elliot, age 5, Eltham, Victoria Good question Elliot! Let’s start with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephen Duckett, Honorary Enterprise Professor, School of Population and Global Health, and Department of General Practice and Primary Care, The University of Melbourne at amRawpixel.com/Shutterstock Roles of health professionals are still unfortunately often stuck in the past. That is, before the ...
COMMENTARY:By Malcolm Evans Last week’s leaked New York Times staff directive, as to what words can and cannot be used to describe the carnage Israel is raining on Palestinians, is proof positive, since those reports are published verbatim here in New Zealand, that our understanding of the conflict is ...
In the case of New Zealand, the results confirm that there is no popular support for the vicious austerity program being imposed by the National Party-led government, which is backed in all fundamental respects by the opposition Labour Party. ...
The ‘Vampire’ singer has never visited our part of the world, but that might all be about to change. We assess the evidence.Olivia Rodrigo’s Guts World Tour is pulling in massive crowds as it whips around the US and Europe, even helping to catapult regular supporting act Chappell Roan ...
Testing of drinking water in rural Canterbury over the weekend by Greenpeace revealed that several public town supplies were reaching levels of nitrate above 5 mg/L - the threshold which a growing body of scientific evidence has linked to increased ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rohan Fisher, Information Technology for Development Researcher, Charles Darwin University It may come as a surprise to hear 2023 was Australia’s biggest bushfire season in more than a decade. Fires burned across an area eight times as big as the 2019–20 Black ...
Responding to the Government’s announcement of changes to resource management laws, Taxpayers’ Union Executive Director, Jordan Williams, said: “These changes are a step in the right direction in terms of removing ideological and unworkable ...
More than two years after the Human Rights Council called for the establishment of a national human rights commission, such a body has yet to be formed. ...
Comment:An emergency management system with wide variations in performance, significant capability gaps, funding shortfalls and above all a setup that is not meeting the needs of New Zealanders at times of crisis. The Government’s inquiry into the response to Cyclone Gabrielle and other severe weather events in the North ...
Welcome to the whirring wonders of one brain trying to align its actions with its beliefs within a system it thinks is evil. My brain has been spiralling in a woke conundrum ever since I found out a bookshop I’ve never been to was shutting down. Good Books, a bookshop ...
We repeat our call for criminal justice policy to be based on evidence, something the three strikes regime neglects to recognise – with no evidence that it either reduces crime or assists with rehabilitation. ...
By Koroi Hawkins, RNZ Pacific editor in Honiara With only four more seats in the 50-member Parliament yet to be officially declared, there is no outright winner in the Solomon Islands elections. As of Monday, the two largest blocs in the winner’s circle, independents and the incumbent Prime Minister Manasseh ...
Two/fiftyseven is a multi-purpose space hidden in the heart of Wellington that is paving a way for sustainable building and responsible landlording in Aotearoa and beyond.By 2060 the world is predicted to double its entire building stock, which equates to building an entire New York City every 34 days, ...
Popstars wasn’t just a reality television revolution, it was also a huge moment for Y2K fashion.It’s 25 years since girl group TrueBliss was formed on New Zealand national television, breaking new ground for both the reality television industry and the shiny clothing industry. With the first episode on NZ ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Pepping, Associate Professor in Clinical Psychology, Griffith University Marvin / Shutterstock Are all single people insecure? When we think about people who have been single for a long time, we may assume it’s because single people have insecurities that make ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By William Geary, Lecturer in Quantitative Ecology & Biodiversity Conservation, The University of Melbourne Trismegist san, Shutterstock Landscapes that have escaped fire for decades or centuries tend to harbour vital structures for wildlife, such as tree hollows and large logs. But these ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Gladstone-Gallagher, Lecturer in Marine Science, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau Shutterstock/S Curtis Why are we crossing ecological boundaries that affect Earth’s fundamental life-supporting capacity? Is it because we don’t have enough information about how ecosystems respond to change? Or ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Matthew Crocker, PhD Student in Economics, Deakin University Here’s something for the board of the Reserve Bank of Australia to ponder as it meets next month to set interest rates. It has pushed up rates on 13 occasions since it began its ...
As part of our series exploring how New Zealanders live and our relationship with money, a charity director outlines how she’s saving for retirement and buying secondhand. Want to be part of The Cost of Being? Fill out the questionnaire here.Gender: Female Age: 45 Ethnicity: Pākehā Role: Charity director, mum of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sophie Yates, Research Fellow, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University Many Australians with disability feel on the edge of a precipice right now. Recommendations from the disability royal commission and the NDIS review were released late last year. Now a ...
It’s been called a failed experiment and a judicial straightjacket but the government says the revised three strikes law will be a more workable regime, writes Anna Rawhiti-Connell in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. Three ...
New Zealand’s Palestinian community and Palestinian Youth Aotearoa are voicing alarm and disappointment with the lack of factual rigour present during the Israeli Ambassador’s appearance as a guest on TVNZ’s Q+A With Jack Tame Sunday (21/04). ...
Both ACT leader David Seymour, who played a key role in drawing up the assisted dying law, and hospice leaders say it's time the legislation was changed. ...
Public submissions on proposed gang control laws are being heard today. Rising gang membership has been cited as rationale for a crackdown – but what do we actually know about how many people belong to gangs in New Zealand?What’s all this then?A rise in the number of gang ...
Climate activists are setting their sights on an unpopular target, and hoping to bring lots of the public with them. It’s hard to miss the Majestic Princess: the enormous cruise ship, docked at Auckland’s Prince’s Wharf, looms over the nearby buildings. The ship, which can fit nearly 6,000 people, ...
Black Ferns trailblazer Kendra Cocksedge was on the verge of tears when her young protégé, Hannah King, unassumingly broke the news. Three-time Rugby World Cup winner Cocksedge and Lincoln agriculture student King meet every few weeks over a hot chocolate, in an enduring mentorship that’s spanned years. “Before we even ...
Opinion: We’ve kicked the tyres on the perception NZ’s economy is in a parlous state compared to Australia. We take a quick tour of relative trends in GDP, housing markets, labour markets, trade, the fiscal situation, and the outlooks for inflation and interest rates. We find the cyclical positions of ...
Opinion: Making sure developers, local and central government, and landowners are all on the same page makes sense The post A new kind of city deal appeared first on Newsroom. ...
Loading…(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){var ql=document.querySelectorAll('A[quiz],DIV[quiz],A[data-quiz],DIV[data-quiz]'); if(ql){if(ql.length){for(var k=0;k<ql.length;k++){ql[k].id='quiz-embed-'+k;ql[k].href="javascript:var i=document.getElementById('quiz-embed-"+k+"');try{qz.startQuiz(i)}catch(e){i.start=1;i.style.cursor='wait';i.style.opacity='0.5'};void(0);"}}};i['QP']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)})(window,document,'script','https://take.quiz-maker.com/3012/CDN/quiz-embed-v1.js','qp'); Got a good quiz question?Send Newsroom your questions. The post Newsroom daily quiz, Tuesday 23 April appeared first on Newsroom. ...
The following korero between Ngāhuia te Awekōtuku, author of the newly published memoir Hine Toa, one of the year’s most important books, and Dale Husband from e-tangata, was first published in October. It traverses her involvement with the activist group Ngā Tamatoa at Auckland University in the early 1970s, her ...
In the 16 years since it was bought by the government for $690 million, KiwiRail has had several overhauls and turnaround plans worth billions of dollars. Its ambitions as a successful, profitable operator of tourism, freight and ferries have often been derailed by disasters from earthquakes to cyclones, mine explosions ...
By Russell Palmer, RNZ News digital political journalist New Zealand’s Foreign Minister Winston Peters is putting off recognition of Palestine as a state, despite opposition Labour’s formal request that he make the move. Peters said diplomatic recognition of Palestine was a matter of “when not if”, but doing so now ...
The opposition has laid into the government's plan to reintroduce a "three strikes" regime, saying it's inequitable and there's very little evidence it works. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rob Nicholls, Senior research associate, University of Sydney Australia’s eSafety Commissioner has ordered social media platform “X” (formerly known as Twitter) to remove graphic videos of the stabbing of Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel in Sydney last week from the site. The incident ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Turnbull, Postdoctoral Research Associate, University of Sydney John Turnbull, CC BY-NC-ND In past bleaching events on the Great Barrier Reef, the southern region has sometimes been spared worst of the bleaching. Not this time. This year’s intense underwater heat has ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sarah Austin, Lecturer in Theatre, The University of Melbourne Darren Gill/Mackey, Darling & Collaborators The relationship between witchcraft and teenage girls has been the subject of many books, films and television shows. Over time, the traditional image of witch as crone ...
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards, Democracy Project (https://democracyproject.nz)Political scientist, Dr Bryce Edwards. Calling all journalists, academics, planners, lawyers, political activists, environmentalists, and other members of the public who believe that the relationships between vested interests and politicians need to be scrutinised. We need to work together to make sure ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Becky Freeman, Associate Professor, School of Public Health, University of Sydney Andres Siimon/Unsplash There are no silver bullets, magic tricks or secret hacks to solving complex public health problems. Taking on the global tobacco industry and reducing the devastating consequences of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adam B. Watts, Research Associate in galaxy evolution, The University of Western Australia ESO/A. Watts et al., CC BY We breathe oxygen and nitrogen gas in our atmosphere every day, but did you know that these gases also float through space, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Suzanne Nielsen, Professor and Deputy Director, Monash Addiction Research Centre, Monash University Maxime Bhm/Unsplash A new group of drugs called nitazenes has been detected in Australia. They have been sold as heroin as well as other drugs like ketamine. Concerns ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anne Twomey, Professor emerita, University of Sydney Image from Bradlow + Bock campaign Can the job of being a federal member of parliament be shared by two or more persons? Two prospective candidates for the inner-Melbourne federal seat of Higgins, Lucy ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Zoe Rathus, Senior Lecturer in Law, Griffith University Shutterstock In October 2023, the federal parliament passed major changes to how children’s cases are decided under the Family Law Act, which kick in next month. Among other things, they repeal a ...
By Salwa Amor in Istanbul Palestine solidarity activists are preparing a flotilla to deliver urgently needed humanitarian aid to Gaza, vowing to break Israel’s blockade of the Palestinian territory on board the Akdeniz, a seven-deck passenger ship. Currently docked in Istanbul, the ship will carry 800 people from more than ...
The Government is putting at risk the defences of our land and sea borders against organised crime, and our online defences against child exploitation, terrorism and online crime with cuts to critical frontline roles at Customs and Internal Affairs. ...
We round up everything coming to streaming services this week, including Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+, Apple TV+, ThreeNow, Neon and TVNZ+. If you love a good cry: All of Us Strangers (Disney+)It’s the dreamlike, emotional film that had viewers running from the cinema in floods of tears, and ...
Top work by the Salvation Army this morning, launching its State of the Nation report.
Good question posed in the Guardian. Should Californian police lives be risked capturing fugitive killer Christopher Dorner when a drone strike would be so much more efficient?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/feb/11/chris-dorner-drones-lapd
A facile argument…actually, any argument… seeking to justify extra judicial killings being carried out by the state, falls a long way short of “a good question (being) posed”.
Summary judgement and execution, enacted by remote control hellfire missle. What’s not to like about extra-judicial “efficiency”. I hear Afghan villagers have really got behind the concept as being “fair and balanced”.
Further in the US, it would save all that messy expensive bullshit to do with death row: lawyers, appeals, incarceration at tax payer expense for the next 15 years etc.
Reminds me of good old Chinese (or Russian) style justice. Very efficient. Get it done, move on, the only documentation left to do being an after-action report and some coroners paper work.
Also, bringing home military tactics, procedures and technology formerly developed and used against muslim terrorists for the purposes of actions against US citizens on US soil – what could possibly be unconstitutional about that?
It couldn’t be that the survivalist nut types in the US had a point all along about not being able to trust the motivations of the Feds, could it???
Looks like the killer has been cornered. Dorner’s apparently been found in a mountain cabin; so much for the assymetrical war etc. boasting he did on fb. Just another yank nutter with easy access to weapons.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-21436588
– is it still possible to have one legal standard for summary justice operating across the world; can’t we just be a little loose for those people Richard Prosser describes?
– if you’re innocent, don’t you have nothing to worry about?
– wouldn’t this make leadership selections and country elections easier?
– which side were you on watching Terminator Salvation?
– when every country in the world with a significant defence capability operates fleets of them, can we do away with armed forces then?
– are we not entertained?
Shearer on bfm. Jesus Christ. http://www.95bfm.com/assets/sm/209858/3/shearerfeb11.mp3
He starts by talking about the weather and then can’t even keep that up.
Somehow I made it to the end.
@ 8mins Shearer gives Key a pat on the back for his punitive response to students who are in Australia.
WTF Shearer?.. this is a student radio station. You just failed big time.
Students have just been told quite clearly why its not worth getting out of bed on election day.
Is this it Labour? Is this your tertiary education policy? The student loan scam will continue under stumble-face?
FFS Labour…you are killing this county.
The only upside of this interview is that most students would have turned it off before Fozzie Bear mumbled on about treating our educated people as criminals.
And he was on TV3 this morning talk about stumbling over all his words, it got so bad that he gave up the line of conversation and stumbled over the next.
Link?
Really, Daveo, you’re being a bit desperate. Shearer was asked what he did on the weekend by the DJ, replies to that bit of fluff, then moves on to answer more relevant questions quite competently, before er, returning to the weather. Pretty normal stuff for this kind of interview.
BTW, where is it from? BFM?
Note comment 4 and comment 4.2 in this thread
It appears in 4.2 someone is using Daveo’s same email address and handle to question and criticise Daveo himself in comment 4.0
This is very weird.
[lprent: It is the badly configured client side web page caching issue that pops up in a few places. ]
Daveo. A bit odd talking to yourself???
I listened via your link. Sounded like a good interview to me. He answered the questions. Was unafraid to support the decision to get NZ students in Australia to repay their debts. I think that Mr Shearer was more informative than Mr Key in a similar scenario. And chatting about the weather was the DJ’s initiative, not Mr Shearer.
I didn’t think that Shearer did too badly. But the remarkable thing is that he conveys almost nothing in terms of substance or insight into the topics he is asked about. And certainly nothing about his own personal convictions on issues.
For instance. Why did he attend Big Gay Out? Response. Well, there are Gay Labour MPs who have worked really hard for gay rights, but in fact it was just down the road from home so I could take a stroll. WTF. An opportunity to espouse important principles and values of equality, equal rights, and unhindered participation in our society to tens of thousands of people, missed, in favour of “It was within walking distance”.
Tens of thousands? Listening to BFM? Maybe back when Graeme Hill did the morning show …
edit: just spotted the Daveo doppleganger comment. That was me. It appears that I’m using the same IP address as Daveo today. Not the first time that’s happened; my work takes me to a variety of workplaces and I log in to whatever broadband server is handiest. For what it’s worth, Daveo’s email address is a generic gmail account, so I don’t know who he or she is.
that sounds very weird
have you thought about changing back to ‘voice of reason’ – your te reo joke lacks ompf and the right wingers don’t get it anyway – might be a bit more honest voice.
Ahhh fascinating…
Righties never saw the objectivist based humour in The Voice of Reason either, Marty. Come to think of it, not many lefties did either. I’ve been TRP since Waitangi Day last year and the change was both out of respect for that celebration and also to end the needless confusion TVoR seemed to bring. However, using the maori translation has allowed the occasional witless racist to riff on it, too. Hi, Pete!
The IP thing, and using multiple computers, is apparently why some of my comments also occasionally come up as TVoR. I’ll try to remember to check the ‘name and email’ boxes in future so it doesn’t happen again.
I liked the voice of reason personally and it had a reasonable back story/comment history. But yes the new name has caused a few laughs for sure.
I just posted this on the site of the witless whiner… Pete George. Saw a linkback when I was clearing spam.
So TRP, and Daveo – irritate your techs (again)..
Cheers, LP, will do. But I will also check the boxes in the meantime as well.
Good ol’ PG, eh? I see he’s too dim to even work out which ‘daveo’ comment was the doppleganger. Wait till he gets to the line about racist commentaters; how long dya reckon it’ll take before he twigs which Pete I was referring to?
PS, PG, ya wally. I have nothing to do with the leadership of the LP, apart from badgering them at every reasonable opportunity to lift their game on social media. I don’t do their talking for them and never have. Didn’t LP explain this to you only a few weeks ago?
That was me. It appears that I’m using the same IP address as Daveo today. Not the first time that’s happened; my work takes me to a variety of workplaces and I log in to whatever broadband server is handiest….
I would have thought the chance of it happening once would be remote. You must be visiting some interesting workplaces.
ps, I bet Daveo knows who you are now
I’m grateful to have a job that keeps me in touch with working Kiwis in a wide variety of industries accross rural, provincial and urban NZ, js. It certainly gives me access to a wide range of opinions and experiences which I hope adds a little authenticity to some of my comments at TS.
As for Daveo, the wee scamp, I’m pretty sure we both think we know who the other is online, but that’s Ok. Neither of us is telling. The bigger problem would be others on that server logging in to a TS comment box to try and suss both of us out.
A FRIENDLY REMINDER FOLKS!
Got a couple of STUNNING new banners which will be unfurled today – first outside the offices of Mighty River Power, then outside the offices of Mercury Energy!
Opposed to the sale of State Assets by this minority National Government (which only got 59 out of 121 MPs in the 2011 election?
Remember – the vote on the Mixed Ownership Model Act was 61 – 60.
National – who did campaign on asset sales – were dependent on the votes of dodgy John Banks – who arguably should NOT be an MP – let alone a Minister, and Peter Dunne – who DID NOT campaign on supporting State Asset sales.
SO – WHERE’S THE ‘MANDATE’?
Do the maths!
NO MAJORITY – NO MANDATE!
(In my considered opinion 🙂
http://gpjanz.wordpress.com/2013/02/12/gpja-454-rally-against-assett-sales-6pm-tomorrow-in-wellington/
WHAT’S ON IN AOTEAROA/NEW ZEALAND
Wednesday, February 13, 12-2pm, outside head office of Mighty River Power, 23-29 Albert St, Auckland CBD
PROTEST! Say No to Asset Sales 3:30 – 5:30 pm,
outside Mercury Energy Office, 602 Great South Road, Penrose.
…………………………………………………
Wednesday, February 13, 6pm, Frank Kitts Park in Wellington
Rally to oppose government asset sales.
The Rainbow Warrior will be in town and will drop a banner off her side in support. Join the crowd after work at Frank Kitts, bring the kids.
Hear interesting speakers (named below) and some of Wellington’s finest musicians and performers, Aroha Priest, Warren Pomana, Marama Te Kira, Skank Jigger, Lucky Ngatuere, Tribal Rizin and Brass Razoo.
Now’s the time to show you care, if you don’t like the idea of selling our assets. No other time will do. So, Wellington and anybody else, come on down and bring a couple of people with you.
Greenpeace is backing this event, so show your support for them when they’re here. Say No To Asset sales is a rally not a protest.
We all recognise the diversity of opinion in opposition to the government’s proposed sale of state assets.
We all know that we will have to fight hard to stop the sales, but that we can do it. Only by retaining 100% control of the power companies can we, the public, develop and enjoy a clean, affordable, NZ-owned energy system. Selling removes these opportunities and, crucially, replaces the chance to investigate historical and contemporary violations of the terms of the Treaty of Waitangi with mere promises that the issue of rights in water between Government and tangata whenua will somehow be unaffected by privatisation.
The following speakers at this Rally represent the diverse range of groups, organisations and factions and the vast majority of people in Aotearoa/NZ opposed to the sale of our state assets. Celia Wade-Brown, Major of Wellington City Council; Justin Duckworth, Anglican Bishop of Wellington; Nathan Argent, National Policy Adviser, Greenpeace; Dr Geoff Bertram. Senior Economics Lecturer, Victoria University; Dr Jane Kelsey, Professor Law, Auckland University; Maanu Paul, Chair, NZ Maori Council; Peter Love, Te Atiawa & Board Member Wellington Tenths Trust with mokopuna, Kaira Love, Te Atiawa; Frances Kuo, Spokesperson, Aotearoa is Not for Sale; Dr Ganesh Nana, Chief Economist, BERL; Roy Reid, National President, Grey Power; John Maynard & Steve Booth, Spokespeople, Peoples Power Ohariu.
_____________________________________________________________________________
Forwarded by Penny Bright
A Spokesperson for the Switch Off Mercury Energy community group.
Auckland rates due 20th of Feb, have you paid you rates arrears yet Penny? Are you allowed to vote if you are in rate arrears? Are you allowed to stand for mayor?
[RL: Penny has chosen to withhold paying her rates as a means of political protest; as distinct from avoiding an obligation to the Council. Your failure to mention this is of course a deliberate distortion. Virtually all protest involves some action which can be described as illegal at one level, while ethically justifiable at another. Your approach is here is not a discussion, it’s abuse. Don’t keep repeating it.]
You keep asking that same stupid personal question, do you live under a bridge,stink worse than a goat but are not one….
RL: Penny also has a proud history of challenging established authority in other ways too. She was the first woman to become a licenced welding inspector back when it was an all male club. All power to her (no pun intended!).
so its ok not to pay taxes now?
Hi ALL –
After getting a bit carried away with comments over a week ago, which was due to honest frustrations and a level of built up anger, I wish to apologise to Irishbill for losing focus on the topic, in a thread he had launched with good intentions (http://thestandard.org.nz/on-engagement-with-the-labour-caucus/).
Retrospectively I thank IrishBill for giving me a week of a “break” or holiday, as it enabled me to have a closer look at some policy and plans that this present National led government is pushing through in the health areas.
Particularly mental health and addiction treatment and care should be of interest to all those that also are highly concerned about the welfare reforms presently before the Social Services Committee in the form of the Social Security (Benefit Categories and Work Focus) Amendment Bill. A high number of sick and invalids on benefits do have mental health issues, and some have addiction illnesses.
There has (from Bennett, English and Key) been talk about putting more resources into “helping” those that are on sickness and invalid’s benefits, to somehow get well and fit enough to return to work or training.
Well, by looking at the Ministry of Health’s “Rising to the Challenge: The Mental Health and Addiction Service Development Plan 2012–2017”, which Associate Minister for Health Peter Dunne (UF) presented without much notice by media and the public just about a week before Christmas last year, I have discovered, how hollow, false and misleading the statements by the government are once again.
The plan can be downloaded from this website:
http://www.health.govt.nz/publication/rising-challenge-mental-health-and-addiction-service-development-plan-2012-2017
It is full of high aspirations, “new” goals, ambiguous slogans, much talk about more responsibilities, efficiencies, effectiveness, mentions repeatedly KPIs (“key performance indicators”), but delivers very little of substance in regards to what will actually be done, what staff will be employed and trained, what resources will be made available, and how better outcomes are supposed to be achieved.
In short: It basically reveals that the mentally ill and addicted will first and foremost have to help themselves, and additional resources will NOT be made available, new resources for new focus and target areas will instead need to come from “less effective” areas in health care, which means taking money off some to help others (“re-allocation”). “Robbing Peter to pay Paul” comes to mind.
Also does it seem to be leading to a “mass medication” program that will be expected from GPs and other primary care deliverers, as what I have heard and experienced at the coal face is, that these low cost “solutions” are now the primary way of dealing with mental health and addiction.
Key stakeholders and professional health organisation appear to not have been consulted properly and sufficiently, so many have delivered damning criticism at this plan.
See some here:
http://www.nzno.org.nz/home/consultation/articletype/articleview/articleid/1350/rising-to-the-challenge–the-mental-health-and-addiction-service-development-plan-2012-2017
(see final draft consultation at bottom, PDF download)
http://www.nzma.org.nz/sites/all/files/NZMA%20Submission%20on%20the%20Mental%20Health%20%26%20Addiction%20Service%20Development%20Plan%202012-2017.pdf
http://www.psychology.org.nz/cms_show_download.php?id=1753
http://www.rnzcgp.org.nz/assets/documents/Standards–Policy/Submissions/2012.11.02-MoH-Rising-to-the-Challenge.pdf
http://anzasw.org.nz/social_work_practice/topics/show/426-release-of-rising-to-the-challenge-the-mental-health-and-addiction-service-development-plan-2012-2017
(download their submission in PDF by clicking the templet at the top right)
http://www.nzcmhn.org.nz/files/file/338/Rising%20to%20the%20Challenge%20Feedback%20form%204102012.pdf
Now while all this is going on “discretely” in the background, I encourage all those interested to do a thorough read and study of all this. It appears – once again, that neither the media, nor politicians, are discussing and debating this highly important information in the open. I ask also, where is the opposition spokeswoman on health, whom I heard deliver yet another very mediocre speech in Parliament yesterday afternoon.
Maybe a Labour front bench re-shuffle will see to it that someone more dedicated will be looking at all relevant stuff that a spokesperson in such key area should be looking at???
As nobody in government seems to be able to rise to it, maybe someone there will soon “Rise to the Challenge”?
a warm welcome back xtasy…glad to hear you are more at peace this week.
CV – more at peace with myself, kind of, but still committed to address issues that need attention, no matter what party affiliation or other orientations.
Thanks!
Yay xtasy (keep up the good work) I recommend a little extra-curricular reading and gardening myself. Oh, and listening to a little Bach, Elgar, Michael Nyman, Handel,
Vivaldi, Metallica!
RT – Yes, thanks, I have a fair bit of that in my collection, but I need to take more time out and play some of it. I have had a couple of years of pretty hard work, not for pay by the way, but just to take a stand, to defend justice, and to take on some real big players in the NZ admin system environment.
Heaps of stuff I and others learned, and more is to come, as a “mission” has been discovered and is being realised, to take things further.
.
Hey there – always good to welcome people back from their bans. I’ve been guilty of deserving a ban or two myself when the blood starts to boil and hit the Enter key before taking a deep breath. These days, I keep this pinned to the wall next to my monitor . . . it helps keep things in perspective.
Hahaha, yes it may help when you have someone wait for you in bed and reminds you!
Yay Cait Reilly.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/feb/12/in-praise-of-cait-reilly
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/feb/12/poundland-legal-challenge-cait-reilly-interview
Joyce will be live on TV3’s website at 12.45pm over the novapay debacle, I wonder what dog whistle he will try to spin this time.
Yeah right no sign of it he must have changed his mind
No need for Joyce to front up … yet, … thanks to Prosser.
And whatever might, or might not, be Winston’s tactics, the stupid Prosser thing is taking attention away from Winston’s own questions being raised in the House about National’s appointment of Jenny Shipley to the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Review Panel, her directorship on Mainzeal, and questions about conflicted interests.
And on the TV3 website here’s Key showing what an unprincipled prick he really is.
http://www.3news.co.nz/Opinion-Key-open-to-a-deal-with-Wogistan-Party/tabid/1382/articleID/286612/Default.aspx
Or it could just be Gower having a bad news day making shit up again.
What appears to be a solid piece of helpful information with a warning to pay attention to.
Under radionz news – rural for today
That’s just common sense but you won’t find either the economists or politicians accepting that.
Unhealthy budget
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10865118
No, just raise taxes – it’s far more efficient and cost effective than private insurance.
over to them, Over We Go
http://southasia.oneworld.net/news-you-can-use/media-partnerships/dsds-2013/articles/beyond-the-tipping-point-climate-change-consequences-will-be-difficult-uk-professor
http://www.rtcc.org/climate-change-science-irrefutable-ed-davey/
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/02/12/permafrost_releasing_co2_faster_than_previously_thought/
ciao
Like treasury reports provide the basis for great decisions. Another area the nats want to privatise.
We aren’t large enough to support a workable private health insurance system, Oz is, only just and it’s struggling as it’s a luxury most folk go without for the public system.
Ryall’s zero sum health budgets set a scene for this. Pay more tax have better health care, healthy population is the basis of growth and propserity.
Private insurance benefits mostly the private sector not the poeple.
English contends that the productive sector wants to pay their workers less by arguing for intervention to bring the dollar down. But as we know National hate looking at other aspects of the accountancy equation. Producers who pay more to their workers and less to pay down foreigner held debt (by not growing the debt in the first place) would give their employees more buying power and so increase the demand for foreign exchange which in turn would drive down the high doller.
So let’s make this clear, people are demanding NZ dollars because our assets are under valued, our workers are underpaid, and our government rig the tax system to reward capital gain at the expense of organic NZ economic growth, but worse, the global system is rigged to reward those who get to pay their taxes in a low tax haven, and grow capital gain in higher tax NZ.
But English doesn’t like to put meat on the argument, or emphasis that when NZ employers pay NZ employees more the economy will boom, when NZ companies go bust that have too much debt, and NZ owned companies take over and pay their workers more, the dollar will drop, when NZ companies vote for a capital gains tax on a second home (investment property) then the housing bubble won’t burst just the pressure will come off and builders can start building to the demands of the NZ market not the demands of the world foreign speculators who use NZ.
Its precisely because the NZ manager classes read the Herald that they keep having problems understanding why the dollar is so high and who (them) needs to change their nasty habits of debt, low wages and chronically deficient neo-liberal economic thinking. You don’t get healthy as
a person by eating junk food, we won’t as a nation get health economically by listening to the turd
way National and the Herald newspaper.
Mr English is a farmer, that should give the answer. He is only interested to have a return for his mates.
Mr English is most certainly NOT a farmer.
That is true.
Mr English has some farm like clothes and ready-to-wear muddied boots that provide the right outfit and look for when he goes walky walky down South. But that is about it, ha ha ha!
Mr English’s hands have not seen much farming and outdoors work. Anyone who has a sharp eye or has shaken real farmers’ hands and his hand can tell the difference.
What do you mean “much”?
The dude went straight from uni to treasury and then to parliament. He’s the archetypal career bureaucrat.
Okies!!!
Not much or any,
and definitely no mulch (except for his much decayed/decaying Cabinet colleagues).
Oh definitely no mulch. He has 4 state-funded servants who lie in his garden to keep the soil moist.
hmm, I wonder if that’s where all the shit from Planet Key goes too.
His Brother is the farming lobby uber leader.
Interesting. On Rural Roundup 😉 the other day- China, by volume, largest importer of our lamb, yet returning only $4 / kilo, half that to UK which is still largest importer by value. dear oh dearie me.
Yahoo hacking cough; take some more medication.
Sooo , now we are struglling to maintain species from extinction, Y-E.P , species that our own lifestyles are exterminating. Exterminate! Exterminate!
The City! “…man’s greatest achievement ” -Ellul (not withstanding, the toilet-roll cathedral)
Northland farmers panhandle “…they’re cutting people like us out!”
when Sport becomes the fraud and drug-crime news. (shame on those hippies though, smokin’ dope and watchin’ sport on Sky)
watched Seven Sharp, before the accident and surveillance porn that followed, and is it just me or do the presenters seem ultra-scripted and adhered to the prompters before them; not very natural. And Winston Peters? Is he on drugs or just drunk most evenings?
Education?- “the gap between the poorest 3 deciles and the wealthiest 3 grew 31.6 % between 2010 – 2011, despite a fall in achievement at the top schools”- Metiria Turei
even at study group this morning, the consensus was that these cultural memes of self-reliance, self-made, independent blah blah, will be our undoing. (see this attitude of “tolerance” of kiwis in Oz by their citizens repeated in the MSM, dear oh dear, paybacks (for our disproportionate earlier successes and hubris) may be painful)
on the Bohm, yet comes in for a lot of criticism. (“wat you lookin’ at Willis?”)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morphic_resonance#Morphic_resonance
Sadly the private prosecution of ACT leader,(ACT leader that’s a hilarity),John Banks has had to be withdrawn as the original paperwork was incorrectly filled out,(wonder if they let all the minor crims off for the same excuse),
Leave has been sought from the Judge in the Wellington district Court to re-lay the charges…
Chalk another one up to the brothers…
This slips off radar, as it was always going to do!
[lprent: Tomorrow is the end of the ban. But removing the block. Feel free to comment. ]
”We would be out in a war zone armed only with a pea-shooter” so says the Member for Dipton Bill English who as Minister of Finance seems to be ‘out in a war zone armed only with a pea-brain’ when it comes to intervening in the NZ$ so as to save as many jobs in this country as possible,
Bill was talking about lowering the Kiwi$ as lowering the living standards of all New Zealander’s versus having another 10,000 or so Kiwi’s lose their jobs altogether and become a political football for Him and the Minister of overseas travel for employment Paula to kick around,
Bill’s actually saying that it’s great to have 10’s of 1000’s of New Zealand workers to throw on the scrap heap of unemployment so as to keep the prices of i pads’ flat-screen TV’s and other imported shit cheap to buy for those who vote for this abysmal Slippery lead National Government,
Maybe Bill hasn’t thought of it, but even if He has He wont tell us, that a lower NZ dollar will encourage people to make the stuff we need here in New Zealand instead of importing it all from the cheap labour countries thus creating jobs,
Bill’s just another liar who refuses to face the reality that in the future we all are going to have to get by on less,there is no grand recovery from the ‘smart economy, export lead or otherwise, and the sooner the politicians in the Parliament begin to address this particular FACT and how we are to better share around our monetary resources the sooner we can all get down to actually doing so…
Well, Bill’s just operating in the conventional, orthodox, neoliberal framework. If we were to print every tenth dollar the NZ government required instead of borrowing it from overseas, we’d find that the NZD would drop in value fairly significantly.
Yep and then use the monies to embark on a proper affordable housing program where the government builds the houses and either sells them or rents them to tenants at 25% of income thus becoming the mortgage holder,
The monies taken in by Government from those it was the mortgage holder too could then be ticked off the original ‘debt’ of having created the money in the first place and the actual cash brought into the coffers could be redistributed as social programs and welfare payments to those most in need,
Thus any price rises from having lowered the value of the NZ$ by printing the money in the first place would be negated by those paying lower rent costs and lower rates of mortgage to the Government as the lender,
It’s obvious from here that ‘this’ or a variation of this will have to occur within the next ten years or the whole s**t-pile will come to a grinding halt, which would be fun but not of any real benefit in societal terms…
Richard Prosser is appearing on TV1’s 7sharp tonight, hope they ask Him why He found it necessary to be attempting to board domestic flights in New Zealand armed with a pocket-knife,
that’s the sort of s**t that Terrorists get up to…
Latest Roy Morgan out. Labour up 3 and National down 2 …
http://www.roymorgan.com/news/polls/2013/4865/
[lprent: better. But the GCR is a pain. ]
Shearer Out Now!
Love the headline:
NATIONAL (44%) LEAD DOWN OVER LABOUR (34.5%)
LABOUR, GREENS WITH MINOR PARTIES WOULD WIN ELECTION
Think Labour+Green+Mana would give a simple majority on those numbers, polls should get better for labour next month again as the left wing of NZfirst abandon ship big-time,
If Roy was doing as i suspect, reading the National vote from the high side of the margin of error and Labour from the low side he appears to have rectified that,
Not party in the street material but looking good 20 month’s out from an election, wonder if this will provoke another fainting spell from Slippery…
“Shearer Out Now!”
Now you’re getting it. 😆
At 34% he’s still Colonel Mumblefuck leading the charge of the slight brigade.
Actually, I’m waiting for tomorrow’s post; something like …
Another Flatlining Roy Morgan Poll:
The latest Roy Morgan poll has National on 44%, Labour 34.5%, the Greens on 13.5%, and NZ First on 4%.
It just amazes me the government can still poll close to 45% after stuff up, after stuff up.
I’m sick of hearing from the Greens “just wait, it’ll get better”. Well it’s not. You’ve been stuck on 13.5 for 4 weeks. So stop making excuses.
Labour have done their bit.
Maybe it’s time the Greens started focusing on the important stuff rather than pulling silly stunts. Instead, take some risks and put yourselves on the line for the people who put you there.
Because right now, it’s just sad.
Trying to enable a National victory in 2014 by attacking the Green Party in a fit of overblown egoism over a margin of error poll rise for the Labour Party isn’t very clever…
Over two hundred comments on that post attacking Labour only two weeks ago. Sauce for the goose etc. But point taken bad; we’re all in this together.
It’s been a good few days on the unity front actually. Signs of a rapproachment between the LP and TS and now the Roy Morgan result hint at good times to come.
TRP: “We’re all in it together”
Right, so why not get all the parties on the “left” together, to throw off their vanities and individual member’s personal ambitions, and hammer out ONE unified left party, so that all are in it for the same one cause, which will have synergy effects, as the entrepreneurial operators so often describe the growth effect of positive combinations.
I still cannot believe, how so many choose to be divided, and it is so, when really, much more should combine and join forces.
Is it not the “branding” crap, that led us to this, now we have “Labour”, “National”, “Greens” and the likes, the word “party” is not mentioned, as it is perceived as a negative word from the past.
We have individuals try to portray themselves as “leaders”, as “spokespersons”, as “members” and whatever, but they brand themselves too, so the unifying factor becomes less relevant.
It is a result of the “corporatisation” of politics, is it not? YOU do as MP or whatever politician No longer represent, you are a “brand” to “stand” for a kind of label “option”, and anything else, even personal involvement is not even considered anymore.
This stinks, as this thinking has totally corrupted politics and society as a whole. I want to deal with people, persons and meet and see people face to face. I want to know who represents me in person, not some glossed up web page, a Facebook facade, a poster or whatever crap they present now, but I do not get what I expect.
So politics is becoming too faked, like so bloody much, I am afraid. Who can I trust, relate to and even vote?
34.5%, that’s a Labour high not achieved since late 2010/mid 2011 under Goff. Not bad at all. 34.5% in the polls on E-day will likely win the Treasury benches for Labour, at the cost of having to give up a lot of relatively minor portfolios to support parties.
Lordy, just imagine the black ops posts on KB and WO in the weeks before Xmas about cabinet scenarios. All the ‘Greens To Get Treasury, Police and the Army’ Shock Horrors.
It’s close, but the next one will probably go down a touch. Progressing well, but still not out of the woods IMO.
[edit] lolfuck CV – we might be slowly swapping sides at this rate 🙂
The important poll will be in 6 months time. Goff got a bounce when he ditched Carter but it did not last for very long.
And Shearer will be far more articulate and much sharper than Goff when it comes to live debate – I am so looking forward to that!
Uh? Let’s not get too carried away, eh.
Hey CV, welcome to the big brave world of my real Labour Party!
Indeed. Certainly not out of the woods. The high water mark pre-Nov 2011 was 36% or 37%. It didn’t hold to election day. A lot of work needs to be done.
However the wrong move would be for caucus to see this as vindication of the “tide coming in” strategy.
aye – in 2014 I’d be looking to have at least a couple of 40%+ under the labour belt, just as breathing room for the campaign.
Parliament, assuming all electorate seats stay the same:
ACT New Zealand 1 1 1
Green Party 17 0 17
Labour Party 44 22 22
Mana 1 1 1
Māori Party 1 3 3
National Party 56 42 14
United Future 0 1 0
120 70 53 (123)
And if Labour pick up a couple from National and 1 from the MP:
ACT New Zealand 1 1 1
Green Party 17 0 17
Labour Party 44 25 19
Mana 1 1 0 1
Māori Party 1 2 2
National Party 56 40 16
United Future 0 1 1
Whoops, got caught out editing that data. If no electorate seats change (ie MP, UF and ACT are a combined 5 seats, Mana 1), the current Gov’t have 61 seats in a 123 seat Parliament. Lab/Green the same, so it’d be up to Hone! (well, more likely, Peter Dunne would rediscover his socialist roots).
However, with just a minimum of likely electorate seat changes (two off National, 1 from the MP) its Nats et al 50, Lab/Green 51 (plus Hone’s one on the side) in a 122 seat house.
Of course the latter is a conservative reading of what might happen to the electorate seats. If the MP lose 2 seats, not 1, or Dunne or Banks miss out, its curtains for the Nats.
Lolz, rifmatic not your strong suit then Te Reo, you mean Labour/Green 61 v National and assorted scum 60 right…
LOL, that’s still not as bad as posting an angry comment on a 3 year old post over at Red Alert, as I did earlier today! That’s a classic.
But the good news is that the only man smiling tonight over in National towers is Steven Joyce. btw, if Joyce is Mr Fixit, does that make Key Mr Fuxit?
i think Slippery might be considering more of an Asian persona next, Mr Legginit Soon, i believe is His preferred name…
A quick calculation (oh how I love the Elections NZ Virtual Seat calculater!) and assuming Electorate seats stay the same (a stretch I know) the results would translate into a 122 seat House:
Nats – 55
Labour – 44
Greens – 17
MP – 3
Mana – 1
ACT – 1
UF – 1
However if Nats were to stitch a deal with the Conservatives over an Electorate seat a National/MP/Conservative/ACT/UF coalition could grab 62 seats. Actually they could take back Epsom from ACT and still do it as long as they reach an accomodation with the Conservatives.
Fascinating!
Still work to be done on the left to secure the field though – there could still be much fancy footwork around NZ First and the Conservatives which could distort it unless some big chunks are taken out of the National vote that go to the Left.
My view is that the Maori Party are going to be left with 1 seat in 2014, i am now going to have to start practicing saying bye bye Slippery without going into mad bursts of laughter…
Actually to be honest I wonder whether they will end up with any representation – their political capital seems pretty much spent – unless there is a rapprochement with Mana of course (which might actually be the logical thing for the MP to do).
Ah man sailing on His ego trip, which is what politics consists of for many, i cannot see the Maori Party and Mana joining forces, can’t see it but they definitely should,(after Turia and Sharples have gone that is),
After what was said on the Marae at firstly Ratana Pa and secondly at Waitangi you are not far off on where the Maori Party now sit in relation to what was it’s support base,
The bulk of the ‘Whanau ora’ fund that just so happened to have been spent in the electorate of Tariana Turia might ensure a reasonable turnout of the vote for the Maori Party in that electorate if they stand someone like Rahui Katene as the candidate, Ken Mair’s chances should He stand i think are about zero,
I am picking that the Labour candidate while not winning Te Ureroa Flavell’s Waiariki seat will split the vote sufficiently so as to allow Mana’s Annette Sykes to win,
The reverse i believe will occur in Sharple’s seat where the Mana candidate will pick up enough votes for Labour’s Shane Jones to prevail…
Yes – the politics of the personal should not be underestimated – I always felt that it meant the MP and Labour missed an opportunity because of personal antipathies – the events and principles that lead to the formation of the MP were legitimate and after an understandable cooling down period (the emotions were running high) the 2 parties really should have looked at how to work together – in the end the MP got some IMO minimal gains from National at the expsense of selling their soul.
Bloody good news!
NZF are looking good.
Okay this is dumb question of the week.
How does Roy Morgan poll treat the non voter. The “won’t say” is 3.5% but the poll assumes they will vote? That is tiny compared to the total electorate non vote. Does Roy Morgan simply assume that all the hang up’s, non answers and “go away it’s teatime” are the non voters?
Not a dumb question at all. There may be some breakdown of the process on the Roy Morgan site and I do know that most polling companies press for an answer even if the respondent says they haven’t made up their mind. Email Roy, I’m sure he’ll tell you how it works if you ask nice.
As I understand it, most polls completely ignore the hang-ups, non-answers, and go-away-it’s-teatimes in the results.
The reported percentages are of those who answer the poll, not those who were called. So if 1000 calls are made and 100 responses received and 44 of those support National, National is reported as 44%, not 4.4% (which, while technically correct, would also be slightly absurd.)
Does this mean that an ever increasing “I’m not going to vote”, [some days I feel like joining them] simply goes unrecorded? It means that increasing disillusionment isn’t recorded?
So eventually we may get down to say 10 voters and 4.4 of them say NACT – well 4 say NACT and .4 of Peter Dunne as he spreads his personal vote around?
Would Roy Morgan answer?
Our edumacation. A serious comment from a US teacher about the ‘No Child Left Behind” rote learning system that the US adopted around 2002 and its results there.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/02/09/a-warning-to-college-profs-from-a-high-school-teacher/
(The Washington Post has a number of entries under the subject line I used – the washington post no child left behind. )
and
http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/study-graduation-rate-accountability-weakened-under-no-child-left-behind-waive
and – Business leaders urge Congress to rewrite No Child Left Behind (Why?)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/01/31/business-leaders-urge-congress-to-rewrite-no-child-left-behind/
We have done much the same as the USA when we adopted National Standards. We have put aside intellectual rigour applied in understanding our education problem and chosen a response pathetically lacking in self-determination and heavily skewed towards genuflecting to the big guy, the USA, and so finding an excuse for visiting there and having Important Discussions about Weighty Matters with people who are richer than we are (and therefore on the scale of simple commercial value we judge by, must be better than us.)
🙂
Something to go to in wellington:
http://t.co/yEsfFxL4
suspect all the cool kids are going to be there
heh
.lol…
@InvisibleObama
The most impressive feat was Marco Rubio turning water into whine.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/02/12/marco-rubios-long-drink-of-water-dominates-rebuttal-speech-coverage/
I didn’t make a submission on the Family Court even though I think it is important. I was too busy doing other things like having a go at Prosser the Tosser. I had the idea that it closed Friday but didn’t check.
When I went to the site I saw the date but no closing time. This is important as the Electoral Commission submissions closed at 5pm. It is strange to adopt post office hours when on-line submissions are given. I would have thought that 12 am would be the deadline.
Then if you follow the information to help with submissions you have to download a booklet from a PDF. How clunky and convoluted – a barrier in fact.
I guess its too late to make a submission though it doesn’t state closing time. And I don’t feel like reading a textbook on submission making. Isn’t there a Plain English movement that would also apply to making this sort of instruction clear and short?
Go ahead and make ‘a’ submission anyway if you wish. And copy the submission to relevant parliamentary spokespeople as well as the individual members of the appropriate select committee.
Is that a submission to a parliamentary select committee?
If so, for the information of readers here, generally –
Next time, just before the deadline, or as soon as the announcement comes out, put in a quick one- or two-line submission stating that you are putting in a submission, that you wish to be heard (you can decide later and write in that you don’t wish to be heard) and that the rest of your comments will be submitted asap.
That way, even if you miss the deadline by a few minutes or a day, you are still ‘in’.
And given that you have stated you wish to be heard, you will be contacted at some stage later. (You can indicate otherwise later if you change your mind.)
Have fun.
Johninsg
Thanx for advice.
Recommended reading for Paula Bennett, the Principal Health Advisor David Bratt, senior employee at MSD and for Work and Income, and even for opposition welfare and health spokespersons:
http://www.kingsfund.org.uk/sites/files/kf/field/field_document/quality-gp-diagnosis-referral-gq-inquiry-research-paper-mar11.pdf
I am sure this may well apply to NZ as well.
So when getting GPs to make “assessments”, to diagnose and to refer clients to specialists, always bear in mind, there may well be a “mine field” in regards to actions not being the right ones to take, in many cases, or in at least some cases.
While having relied so heavily on even MSD “trained” general practitioners, to make decisions on health, disability and work incapacity, MSD and WINZ seem to have taken risks and possibly relied on “flawed” recommendations in quite high numbers.
Even on the so-called Medical Appeal Boards (appointed by the “Chief Executive” of MSD) do usually have about 2 GPs (being “designated doctors” trained or at least “selected” by MSD) sit on them, so they tend to have a two thirds majority.
A recent workshop held by MSD on 31 Jan. 2013 does though appear to be used now, by MSD, to select comments from disability participants, saying they do NOT want to be assessed about work capacity by their GPs. Now while that may seem reasonable and sensible for some, though, that is exactly what MSD want, as they are going to take over that job under the new welfare reforms themselves! I fear that some of these advocates and disabled spokespersons are not quite aware what they are asking for. Doctors – mostly GPs – may not be right all the time, but are WINZ health and disability advisors the ones you want to rely on?
There is a lot of shit happening, like the recent “survey” MSD conducted on suggestions by various affected groups, what may assist people with ill health or disabilities back into work. I fear this is all being abused and used as an “instrument” to pick the suggestions that suit them, to justify the introduction of UK style assessments, and to force sick and disabled into work, before they may even be asked themselves.
Now much more scrutiny must be put on all this. I appeal to all opposition spokespersons on welfare and health to pay serious attention to these matters and issues.
I am sure nobody wants to have the UK scenario, with many dying trying to do work they are not able to do, or committing suicide, seeing no hope, and being unable to be taken serious as sick and disabled.
Surely, a trusted doctor and GP will need to be listened to, same as proper specialists for the conditions people suffer, but a balanced and objective and fair, fact based approach is needed, before determining sick and disabled can do some work.
One intersting relevant article is this by the way:
http://www.nzdoctor.co.nz/news/2013/january-2013/31/doubts-about-gps-assessing-work-fitness.aspx
If the link does not work, google “Doubts about GPs assessing work fitness” along NZ Doctor and 31 Jan. 2013.
And the good news continues to roll in for National…Contact to cut 100 jobs
…this despite an expected increase by 8% in half-year operating profits.
Apparently savings have to be made and late last year, CEO Barnes signalled returns to shareholders were likely to be “ramped up” once the company’s big investment programme ended in the current financial year…so the translation would be “shareholders need more profits so let’s cut some more jobs”. Obviously rorting the consumers just isn’t cutting it.
Capitalism and it’s mission to seek increased return on capital at any social cost, at it’s finest.
To be fair, contact are shit. Highest prices by far. Useless helpdesk. I did a merry go round, Genesis->Contact->Meridian->Power Shop
Contact by far the worst, the Meridian. Should have never changed from Genesis actually. Powershop is great.
Also, didn’t contact shed like 30k customers?
Time to re-nationalise. The private sector can’t deliver. Well, except to foreign shareholders.
Message to PG: re: your question on YawnNZ about missing the login. You can see the comment box yourself. Like most posters (I guess) my eyes glaze over the ‘Name (required)’ and ‘Mail’ bits above it because they come up automatically. I go straight to the comment box and start typing the sparkling bon mots you’ve grown to love so well.
Anyway, nice to see this crushingly dull event has quadrupled your usual average daily comments. Up to four now, I see! Is this a record?
Pip pip!
Don’t get carried away, TRP, two of the comments *are* just Pete himself demonstrating no practical knowledge of how web forms work.
Another success.
/
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/02/12/republican-backed-for-profit-school-caught-deleting-bad-student-grades/
The responses to Farrar’s post on KB got me totally shocked and frozen to be honest. Even Farrar seems to be shocked by at least some comments on his post. Wow, this is showing how many sickoes there are in NZ society.
I have been against too liberal migration for various reasons, also am aware (as I know about it) of some abuse of migration, but hey, this is FUCKING SICK!
http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2013/02/nz_first_mps.html#comments
.
Heh!! I recognise a couple of lols tr0lls in there winding it all up and giving room for the bigots to show their colours. But, seriously, you’re surprised by that? C’mon, Farrar’s Sewer reflects the general conversation you will find at pretty much any gathering of employed, sporting, wanna-be middle-class Kiwi baldheads.
If its not the Muslims its the Greenies or women or bloody maaaari – they gotta have something to hate – its as much a social lubricant as their green bottle beer. A lot of the banter is just piss and wind designed to irritate the overly sensitive but, as you can see, what passes for discourse is driven by deliberate and beligerent ignorance.
God forbid that they should actually read a scholarly book or watch a 90-minute documentary about what they think they know all about. Even worse would be admitting to having done such a thing. Nah, much easier to get their religious instruction from Fox News and then reinforce the messages amongst themselves. Its a good way for them to judge if you’re wiv ’em or agin ’em.
Unfortunately, as more and more of our best and most able head overseas, this cohort of “sickoes” is growing by the day and forms a significant political bloc. They are the sort of people who turn their stove and oven on during Earth Hour and vote National Ltd™ only to keep Labour out. Study them well.
WTF!!! Moderation!!! Moi???
[RL: Happens to the best of us.]