Written By: - Date published: 10:58 am, May 6th, 2023 - 50 comments
We are mature enough to have our own leader. Own our own shit.
Written By: - Date published: 12:00 pm, April 28th, 2023 - 78 comments
I’ve worked my way through two books recently, both on extremist sects, one about New Zealand groups and one about those in the United States of America. It’s startling.
Written By: - Date published: 10:41 am, April 28th, 2023 - 37 comments
This government has within its power the ability to alter the crippling cost of living increases we now face. If they don’t do the political job they can do with prices, they will lose power at the election.
Written By: - Date published: 12:58 pm, April 23rd, 2023 - 16 comments
The Murdoch family’s decision to pay record damages to Dominion Voting Systems and to capitulate in its defamation case against Cricky Media suggest that they have had a very bad and a very expensive week.
Written By: - Date published: 7:50 pm, April 20th, 2023 - 10 comments
We didn’t need the Russian invasion of Ukraine to tell us that great power competition is back, since China and the United States and Russia had been going at it well before even COVID temporarily messed up the multilateral trade system upon which we had built our little country. But it’s made it worse, and so we’re picking a side, and that side is NATO.
Written By: - Date published: 10:48 am, April 2nd, 2023 - 36 comments
As we adjust to the advent of civilisation threatening climate change there is a new threat that is emerging, the unregulated development of artificial intelligence.
Written By: - Date published: 12:21 pm, February 19th, 2023 - 37 comments
Newstalk ZB hosts have rightfully been criticised for minimising the danger posed by Cyclone Gabrielle. Which funnily is that they have been doing about climate change for the past few decades.
Written By: - Date published: 10:28 am, February 18th, 2023 - 27 comments
I thought that I would get Chat GPT to write 500 words on the Standard and this is what it came up with.
Written By: - Date published: 9:54 am, January 15th, 2023 - 37 comments
Wayne Brown’s campaign techniques used in the Auckland Mayoral election are likely to be used by National in the election campaign this year.
Written By: - Date published: 12:01 pm, December 30th, 2022 - 39 comments
It is that time of year again where the events of the year are reviewed and what was notable, noteworthy and notorious.
Written By: - Date published: 9:19 am, December 26th, 2022 - 116 comments
Even on the one day of the year that is meant to be a day of peace and calm and family some people get triggered by the use of Te Reo.
Written By: - Date published: 9:03 am, December 18th, 2022 - 134 comments
Mawkish sentiment running up to Christmas perhaps, but imagine Luxon or Willis speaking hours after the Christchurch massacre. Only Ardern of the entire Parliament has the ability to govern for calm in the name of the calm we all need.
Written By: - Date published: 7:57 am, November 28th, 2022 - 35 comments
It is time to set out succinctly and without recourse to abstract nouns exactly what this Labour government has intended, is doing, and how it seeks to alter the country.
Written By: - Date published: 7:48 am, November 20th, 2022 - 69 comments
2023 is going to hit New Zealanders hard. Since the 2011 Christchurch earthquakes New Zealand has been beset by a new major crisis about once every two years. 2022 was our year off and get ready we are in for a strange and hard recession.
Written By: - Date published: 7:00 am, November 13th, 2022 - 19 comments
If 2020 was the worst year in my lifetime how does 2022 compare?
Written By: - Date published: 9:44 am, October 15th, 2022 - 19 comments
The political question is whether Kiwis currently losing money on paper can remember this: all investment involves risk and it’s entirely fair for our government to only manage so much of that risk and for the rest to fall on us the investor. Will irrational anxiety beat rational risk in our upcoming politics?
Written By: - Date published: 12:00 pm, October 13th, 2022 - 37 comments
Can you be too old to represent your people? New Zealand’s oldest person to first get elected was William Cargill at 71. Australia’ s John Howard was 68 when he retired, and Robert Menzies was 72 when he retired as Prime Minister. The previous US president is now 76 and will likely run again in […]
Written By: - Date published: 6:05 am, October 2nd, 2022 - 7 comments
Written By: - Date published: 8:04 pm, September 27th, 2022 - 16 comments
Interesting to see how the Russian protest plays out over conscription. Odd things happen in gatherings with tyrants. Jan 6 was one. But Romania 1989 was one Putin will know well.
Written By: - Date published: 8:26 am, September 20th, 2022 - 41 comments
She’s in the ground and it’s time.
Written By: - Date published: 6:58 am, September 15th, 2022 - 52 comments
When Queen Elizabeth is buried it will be the last time we say goodbye to her. More than her.
Written By: - Date published: 7:00 am, September 7th, 2022 - 39 comments
Many European governments now face a perfect storm of threatened energy security, rising inflation, war-propelled refugee crisis, and climate objectives. New Zealand be warned.
Written By: - Date published: 11:17 am, August 24th, 2022 - 5 comments
Australian news site Crikey has taken on Murdoch’s News Corp by reposting an article accusing the Murdoch family of being “Donald Trump’s unindicted co-conspirator” and then taking out advertisements in the New York Times inviting Lachlan Murdoch to sue them.
Written By: - Date published: 8:15 am, August 18th, 2022 - 28 comments
You can be the most moral nation on earth and have no reward for it.
Written By: - Date published: 1:07 pm, August 9th, 2022 - 11 comments
Crises that profoundly test a small developed state like New Zealand have required huge growth in state strength and policy power. But was it the change we needed?
Written By: - Date published: 12:31 pm, June 14th, 2022 - 69 comments
The past couple of years has seen a significant increase in far right activity and rapidly increasing racism.
Written By: - Date published: 6:08 pm, June 12th, 2022 - 16 comments
We are about to have a proper gang control policy contest. It’s about time.
Written By: - Date published: 9:05 am, June 12th, 2022 - 20 comments
The Russian war of aggression against the Ukraine is now three months old. Prepare for a very long grind.
Written By: - Date published: 10:09 am, June 10th, 2022 - 53 comments
The world is too complex and hostile, so why bother trying to learn and understand.
Written By: - Date published: 6:28 pm, April 26th, 2022 - 9 comments
With RNZ and TVNZ now in full merger mode, we have yet another untested state megalith upon us. But where is the power that will hold it to account?
Written By: - Date published: 8:30 am, April 20th, 2022 - 93 comments
RNZ’s recent shock horror reporting on a memo from November 2021 proposing a wind back of MIQ is severely deficient. The framing is one sided and ignores the subsequent emergence of Omicron as a variant of concern.
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