I hope everyone had a great Christmas and Boxing Day. While I havent had much time to post on here in the past year, I have been still able to read some of insightful posts on this blog.
And of course..I hope this Christmas just gone is the last with John Key in power/office.
Its going to be one hell of an election campaign next year.
And David Cunliffe needs to set the agenda from the outset. I suggest an “Orewa” style speech, but without the Maori-bashing. It is coming up to 10 year since Don Brash delivered his speech, and it enabled National to set the political agenda from there on in (right up to the present day). He could have quite easily won in 2005
BBC hack has a go at Japan’s “passive reporters”
Humbug Corner No. 23: Rupert Wingfield-Hayes
Radio NZ National News, Friday 27 December 2013, 6 a.m.
At this time of year, Japanese prime ministers have traditionally visited the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo—an act of homage which, because the shrine holds the remains of twelve notorious war criminals, outrages people in China, Korea and many other countries.
Some of the loudest protests, however, have come from people who themselves are incorrigible apologists for state aggression. Noam Chomsky has written trenchantly about the hypocrisy of U.S. ideologues selectively condemning the gall of JAPANESE leaders….. http://www.chomsky.info/articles/199508–.htm
Yesterday, Shinzo Abe became the first Japanese prime minister for seven years to visit the Yasukuni shrine. This of course provided the perfect opportunity for critiquing not only the brazenness of Japanese politicians but also the uselessness of the Japanese media.
This is how the BBC’s Tokyo correspondent Rupert Wingfield-Hayes began his piece about the latest provocation:
Some of Rupert Wingfield-Hayes’s listeners no doubt have a more well developed sense of irony than he does, and will have shaken their heads in wonderment at the gall of a BBC reporter condemning Japanese reporters—-or indeed any reporters—for being passive.
Quelle mortification! This is what happens when one listens to the radio while half-asleep. I thought at the time that the formulation “confronted by passive reporters” didn’t quite make sense—but I went ahead and published anyway! And now comes the well deserved bollocking.
My apologies to Rupert Wingfield-Hayes, and to my loyal readers at the Standard. As they used to say in Greece: even Homer nods. Or as they still say in Japan: even monkeys fall from trees.
@ Moz…
RNZ is in holiday mode.
That means its a bit more like weekend mode.
The perfectly ‘work-life balanced’ lady with isssssssyous (that ‘incisive’, well-respected, hugely-experienced ex-parly arment gallery reporter – still down with, and in touch with the new breed – able to ‘get across’ all newz stories, unaffected by cronyism and nepotism with collegial appointments – INDEED, the perfect specimen any sort of public service radio host should try and model themselves on) ….. AND the nicest man on Earth are having their well-deserved break. Why the nicest man on Earth might even keep in touch with the people by serving in some fast food outlet somewhere, or perhaps repainting a Marae he once daubed with an horrific, and disliked colour scheme as atonement for participating in Public Service TV reality programming.
What it means though is its relatively safe to listen to Natrad ’24/7′
I wonder if the nicest man on Earth ever worries about whether Matinee Idle would be preferable to the stale, trite, hackneyed, mashed potato slop that gets dished up daily – equipped as it is with all its pre-programmed talking heads and audio pus.
I share your positive views about Matinee Idle, Tim. And I’m happy about most of the morning programme—except for one thing, and it’s a bit of a major obstacle, I’m afraid: I find Noelle McCarthy utterly insufferable. The fact that she was outed as a plagiarist a few years ago is the least of her sins.
I really enjoy and look forward to Matinee Idle – but heard (I think) today that their allotment of programmes has been cut back this year. Was only half listening at the time.
Going back to the vacuous Mora, I still have clearly stuck in my mind a remark he made about three years ago prior to Christmas. A remark to the effect that “But everyone has a ham at Christmas!”.
Sure, Mora, beneficiaries can really afford a ham at Christmas – only about the cost of two or more weeks’ total food bill for one ham?
Hate to be really prickish, but as a kid growing up, what most of us kids grew up with was mutton-hams. I think it would have been the early 70’s before hams as such became affordable to alot of kiwis. But with the price of lamb/mutton today, even that is probably unrealistic.
Why is it that New Zealand producers expect New Zealand consumers to pay a premium for goods produced here in New Zealand, while overseas customers get the benefit of all the tax advantages that the New Zealand Government can throw their way. It seems National takes great delight in screwing the New Zealand consumer regardless.
I really enjoy and look forward to Matinee Idle – but heard (I think) today that their allotment of programmes has been cut back this year. Was only half listening at the time.
As do I. I did think that the complete works of the Topp twins was a trivial over the top today. There is only so much nasal spray that I can stand whilst driving. The rest of the show was pretty damn hilarious.
and this is the preferred-destination for new zealand for the randite-neo-libs (from both national and labour) who have been systematically shredding the social net/contract..
Labour had the opportunity to have a good clean out in it’s 9 years in power, but they couldn’t achieve that. If Labour do win, there are some who will want to hang on for another 3 – 6 or 9 years, just because they think they can.
The problem facing Labour today, is Labour is full of too many middle class people, and too many academics. Poverty to them is an “exercise”, not something they actually relate too.
I’m not sure if all of them are the 1% – aren’t you trying to get in there? It seems to me that perhaps a small percentage of them are the 1%, like maybe 10% of them 🙂
Stoked by his Wall Street success, Lampert plunged headlong into the retail world. Undaunted by his lack of industry experience and hailed a genius, Lampert boldly pushed to merge Kmart and Sears with a layoff and cost-cutting strategy that would, he promised, send profits into the stratosphere. Meanwhile the hotshot threw cash around like an oil sheikh, buying a $40 million pad in Florida’s Biscayne Bay, a record even for that star-studded county.
Fast-forward to 2013: The fairy tale has become a nightmare.
Lampert is now known as one of the worst CEOs in America — the man who flushed Sears down the toilet with his demented management style and harebrained approach to retail. Sears stock is tanking. His hedge fun is down 40 percent, and the business press has turned from praising Lampert’s genius to watching gleefully as his ship sinks. Investors are running from “Crazy Eddie” like the plague.
Rand talks about success as if the successful were superhuman, but capitalism will find those necessary to meet market needs and if you not it, someone else will be, and its therefore backwards to talk about winners making them the essential initiators of wealth. Hitler did something similar with evolution. Religion also makes the same mistake, putting humanity on top. It requires merging ignorance and distortion of origins and then apply a intellectual argument that otherwise would hold.
She of course doesn’t represent all libertarians. In fact surely we are all libertarians when we believe in liberty, which I hope we all do. The civil libertarians defend, even for example, nazi’s right to free-speech, go figure. I’m wary of anyone who say libertarianism is wrong, just as wary as anyone who say every libertarian is right.
Its certainly true now, that having proponents of free market theory on your board is going to hurt shareholder value.
During the Spanish Revolution, the POUM referred to themselves as libertarian communists. Reading Homage to Catalonia was my first experience of the concept of libertarianism and it did my head in a bit later when I saw it hijacked by people like Brash, Hide, and Perigo. While the POUM believed in liberation of the human spirit through collective endeavour, and a few puffs on the electric puha if that turned you on, modern libertarians believe in liberation of their bank balances by way of a militarised police force and private prisons. I think of myself as reasonably libertarian, but I have nothing in common with any of the selfish wankers who have hijacked the term these days.
If that seems melodramatic, ask a libertarian/conservative this question: When will you know that your theory is wrong?
hah, love it because they’ll never accept that their “theory” is wrong. Unfortunately, the same can be said of most economists.
Lambert wanted Sears to teach the nation a lesson, and it did. Selfishness is one of the roads to dystopia.
The nation needs to be reminded of that as well from every left leaning political party. The RWNJs just don’t believe it though and so will keep rolling out the dystopia that their policies bring about.
Instead, the one consistent finding across all studies appears to be this: zones typically made money for one or more corporations, but the promised social benefit in jobs and income never materialized.
And that inevitably applies to deregulation across the board, The rich and the corporations do well but society is worse off.
The unaided needy. Selfishness run riot. A North America dotted with Third World colonies. And a blighted landscape where Others are subjugated to Owners.
Came to that conclusion about property rights years ago. Greater property rights will, inevitably, result in more oppression of the poor by the rich.
Just been reading through yesterday’s open mike discussion on education – very thought provoking discussion.
I put a lot of value on the importance of education in its broadest sense: formal and/or informal, in education institutions or community based; abstract or practical. I’ve experienced all of them. I learned a lot in unis, but most of my political education was begun in the women’s movement in London and was community and volunteer-based.
The latter were initiatives from a group of women who set up some workshops in low rent and basic community halls – seminars on things like Marxism and feminism, through which I first came into contact with the writings of Marx and the kinds of writing that followed, as well as learning about the long legacy of feminist politics.
I’ve also learned a lot form discussions in online forums such as on TS.
I’m all for following one’s own interests in reading (or listening or viewing) widely. However that requires access to written texts, either from public libraries or accessible digital technologies and internet connections (these days libraries also provide some of the latter).
Also in depth learning requires more than reading, listening, or viewing selected texts – it requires debate and discussion and having your learnings challenged. Saw quite a bit of that on yesterday’s open mike.
Thanks, phillip.
Interesting list. Each article looks worthy in it’s own right, showing some crucial, but limited aspects of feminism. But overall, the articles tend to talk back to celebrity culture, and promote a feminism that accepts a lot of the wider “neoliberal”/capitalist structure.
The only I article that stands out for me, going by the summary of each article, is the one by bell hooks: This is a must read for anyone wanting to understand what a left wing fminism is about.
hooks critiques a very opular book that she labels “faux feminism” – I would characterise that book as a kind of “liberal feminsm” that doesn’t want to change the status quo, but just seeks an equal place for (largely) middle to upper income women within that structure/culture.
An extract from hook’s piece:
In her book, she offers a simplistic description of the feminist movement based on women gaining equal rights with men. This construction of simple categories (women and men) was long ago challenged by visionary feminist thinkers, particularly individual black women/women of color. These thinkers insisted that everyone acknowledge and understand the myriad ways race, class, sexuality, and many other aspects of identity and difference made explicit that there was never and is no simple homogenous gendered identity that we could call “women” struggling to be equal with men. In fact, the reality was and is that privileged white women often experience a greater sense of solidarity with men of their same class than with poor white women or women of color.
Sandberg’s definition of feminism begins and ends with the notion that it’s all about gender equality within the existing social system. From this perspective, the structures of imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy need not be challenged. And she makes it seem that privileged white men will eagerly choose to extend the benefits of corporate capitalism to white women who have the courage to ‘lean in.’ It almost seems as if Sandberg sees women’s lack of perseverance as more the problem than systemic inequality. Sandberg effectively uses her race and class power and privilege to promote a narrow definition of feminism that obscures and undermines visionary feminist concerns.
Agreed Karol.
The only thing that spoils the Standard is the white noise created by all the right wingers, who only come here to disrupt intelligent debate and discussion.
Yup paul. The barkers bought a “do up” for 2.1 m. Poor things. The writer makes it sound like they will do it all themselves. Its the journalism of envy… to keep us all on the treadmill for the vain belief that if we keep working hard we can get that too… interesting how many of the owners dont have what we might call ordinary jobs.
Now that will be very interesting Tracey,Because there may not be too much tine left for those National rich dicks to get their snob gong. Two more chances and with luck the Nat’s will be out./So who do you think will become Sir or Dame ?
I would not be surprised if Phil. O’Grady is top of the list . Do you think Key will get his this year ?Don’t be surprised if he does , What is certain is that the majority will be very rich and most will be from the political right and far right. What a farce .
My wise old grand mother always said only one title maters Gentleman and Lady in the true sense of course ,
I particularly liked this Guardian article of 12 Dec about our PM , the “unidentified guest” and its summary of his ‘high’ moments on his various overseas trips!
An urgent ticker-tape from Hell
Pete George needs assistance
I have just received an email, ostensibly from Pete George, the well-known politico and ex- Standardista. I wonder if I should help out the poor fellow, who seems to be having rather a hard time of it….
NEED YOUR HELP
Good Morning,
Just hoping this email reaches you well, I’m sorry for this emergency and for not informing you about my urgent trip to lugansk (ukraine) but I just have to let you know my present predicament. Everything was fine until I was attacked on my way back to the hotel, I wasn’t hurt but I lost my money, bank cards, mobile phone and my bag in the course of this attack. I immediately contacted my bank in other to block my cards and also made a report at the nearest police station. I’m physically OK and fine but I’m urgently in need of some money to pay for my hotel bills and my flight ticket home, will pay back as soon as i get back home.Kindly let me know if you would be able to help me out
This disturbing letter was accompanied by a warning from the Gmail people: “Be careful with this message. It contains content that’s typically used to steal personal information.”
How much money should I send Pete George? A grand? Five grand? Any ideas?
I received this email as well. I had a similarly worded email from Bob Harvey not that long ago. He was apparently in Mumbai and someone had stolen his wallet and yadeyadeyada …
Don’t believe it….send PG an IOU…. but For emails like this, reply and ask a personal question that only the authentic person could answer.(Not birthday or grandma’s name)- say ‘what was the name of your second best friend..your 2nd pet? your teddy bear?’
LOL!
And I did not make the God email up – actually got it, despite very good spam block etc ….
But, seriously now, had a look at PG’s websiteYyourNZ and he can’t be overseas anyway as he had a post up yesterday, suggesting that Clare Curran’s postion as Labour rep for Dunedin South may be in doubt. Supposedly according to an article (unlinked) in the ODT.
That seems to be at odds with an email I got a few days ago from the Labour Party with a status report on selection of candidates for the 2014 election. This reported that both the Dunedin North and Dunedin South electorate candidate selections were currently uncontested with nominations closing on Feb 28.
Hello, there CV – and anyone else down Dunedin way. What is your understanding of the current position?
I’m aware that Pete has an unnatural fetish with me (as witnessed by his rants about almost anything that I have time to write). And on the odd occasion I have been known to see exactly how far I can twist him into a complete nutter state. However associating me with Theodore Roosevelt is a bit much…
Of course because of the work over the last few months, the shaving has become its usual irregular thing. But my young great-nieces and great-nephews appear to think that makes me santa claus rather the bushy dark thing that Theodore used..
(you do realise that the cadaver has no idea what I look like right?)
Works fine – about 35 seconds from failure to access a web server to dropping to the backup web server. Main constraint is that I don’t want to do it too fast as we do normally get some spiky load.
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This weekend, a friend pointed out someone who said they’d like to read my posts, but didn’t want to pay. And my first reaction was sympathy.I’ve already told folks that if they can’t comfortably subscribe, and would like to read, I’d be happy to offer free subscriptions. I don’t want ...
National: The Party of ‘Law and Order’ IntroductionThis weekend, the Government formally kicked off one of their flagship policy programs: a military style boot camp that New Zealand has experimented with over the past 50 years. Cartoon credit: Guy BodyIt’s very popular with the National Party’s Law and Orderimage, ...
Day one of the solo leg of my long journey home begins with my favourite sound: footfalls in an empty street. 5.00 am and it’s already light and already too warm, almost.If I can make the train that leaves Budapest later this hour I could be in Belgrade by nightfall; ...
Do you remember Y2K, the threat that hung over humanity in the closing days of the twentieth century? Horror scenarios of planes falling from the sky, electronic payments failing and ATMs refusing to dispense cash. As for your VCR following instructions and recording your favourite show - forget about it.All ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
Waiting In The Wings:For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSAannounced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
Te Rangi e tu nei (The sky above us) Te Papa e takoto nei (The land beneath us) Tatou katoa te hunga ora (To us all the living) Tena koutou katoa (Greetings) ...
A late change to charter school legislation will cheat educators out of fair pay and negotiating power proving charter schools are just a vehicle to make profit out of our education system. ...
In 2004 te iwi Māori rallied against the Crown’s attempt to confiscate our coastlines and moana with the Foreshore and Seabed Act. This led to the largest hīkoi of a generation and the birth of Te Pāti Māori. 20 years later, history is repeating itself. Today the government has announced ...
It has been five and a half years since the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care was established to investigate the abuse of children, young people, and vulnerable adults within state and faith-based institutions. Yesterday, the final report - Whanaketia through pain and trauma, from darkness to light ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to take action off the back of the International Court of Justice ruling on Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. ...
On Friday the International Court of Justice reaffirmed what Palestinian’s have been telling us for decades: that the occupation and colonisation of Palestinian lands by Israel is illegal and must end immediately. They also called for reparations for Palestinian’s who have lived under Israeli occupation since it began in 1967. ...
Labour calls on the Government to act after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories is illegal. ...
The 53.7 percent rise in benefit sanctions over the last year is more proof of this Government’s disdain for our communities most in need of support. ...
Aotearoa could be a country where every child grows up feeling safe, loved and with a sense of belonging in their whānau and community. But for some of our children, this is far from reality. Instead, they are trapped in a maze of intergenerational harm that they can’t escape on ...
Te Pāti Māori are calling for David Seymour to resign as Associate Health Minister in response to his call for Pharmac to ignore the Treaty of Waitangi. “This announcement is just another example of the government’s anti-Tiriti, anti-Māori agenda.” Said Co-leader and spokesperson for health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. “Seymour thinks it ...
The soaring price of renting is driving the rise of inflation in this country - with latest figures from Stats NZ showing rents are up 4.8 per cent on average while annual inflation is at 3.3 per cent. ...
National’s Emissions Reduction Plan will take New Zealand further from the economy we need to ensure the next generation has a stable climate and secure livelihoods. ...
Following consultation with named parties and thorough consideration of privacy interests, the Green Party is in a position to release the Executive Summary of the final report from the independent investigation into Darleen Tana. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon should be asking serious questions of his Minister for Resources Shane Jones now it’s been revealed he misled the public about a dinner with mining companies that he didn’t declare and said wasn’t pre-arranged. ...
Te Pāti Māori have submitted to the Justice Select Committee against the Sentencing (Reinstating Three Strikes) Amendment Bill. The bill will further entrench racism in our justice system and fails to focus on rehabilitation. “Reinstating Three Strikes will empower a systematically racist system and exacerbate the overrepresentation of Māori in ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee is set to make a determination on the Residential Tenancies Amendment (RTA) Bill in the coming weeks. “This legislation will give landlords the power to kick our whānau out onto the street for no reason” said Housing spokesperson, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “Their solution to the housing ...
“National’s campaign was about tackling crime and the best they can do is a two-year long Ministerial Advisory Group,” Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
“There are more examples of charter schools failing their students than there are success stories. The coalition Government is driving to dismantle our public school system and instead promote a privatised, competitive structure that puts profits before kids,” Jan Tinetti said. ...
“This government is choosing to deliberately mislead and withhold information, keeping our people in the dark about this government’s agenda and the future of our mokopuna,” said co-leader and spokesperson for Health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. The call comes after the demand from the Chief Ombudsman that Associate Minister of Health, Casey ...
“Today’s climate announcement by Simon Watts makes clear the National Government is simply paying lip service to meeting its climate change targets,” Megan Woods said. ...
National is choosing to make life harder for workers by taking away the rights our communities have fought hard for. Here's how they’re taking workers backwards. ...
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue. We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views. “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
Tēnā tātou katoa, Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts. “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet. “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks. “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. At the heart of this report are the ...
For the first time, the Government is formally acknowledging some children and young people at Lake Alice Psychiatric Hospital experienced torture. The final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament ...
The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 courageous survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care. The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through ...
With a week to go before hard-working New Zealanders see personal income tax relief for the first time in fourteen years, 513,000 people have used the Budget tax calculator to see how much they will benefit, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “Tax relief is long overdue. From next Wednesday, personal income ...
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden says a bill that has passed its first reading will improve parental leave settings and give non-biological parents more flexibility as primary carer for their child. The Regulatory Systems Amendment Bill (No3), passed its first reading this morning. “It includes a change ...
Two Bills designed to improve regulation and make it easier to do business have passed their first reading in Parliament, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. The Regulatory Systems (Economic Development) Amendment Bill and Regulatory Systems (Immigration and Workforce) Amendment Bill make key changes to legislation administered by the Ministry ...
New legislation paves the way for greater competition in sectors such as banking and electricity, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly says. “Competitive markets boost productivity, create employment opportunities and lift living standards. To support competition, we need good quality regulation but, unfortunately, a recent OECD report ranked New ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says lotteries for charitable purposes, such as those run by the Heart Foundation, Coastguard NZ, and local hospices, will soon be allowed to operate online permanently. “Under current laws, these fundraising lotteries are only allowed to operate online until October 2024, after which ...
The Coalition Government is accelerating work on the new four-lane expressway between Auckland and Whangārei as part of its Roads of National Significance programme, with an accelerated delivery model to deliver this project faster and more efficiently, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “For too long, the lack of resilient transport connections ...
Sir Don McKinnon will travel to Viet Nam this week as a Special Envoy of the Government, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “It is important that the Government give due recognition to the significant contributions that General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong made to New Zealand-Viet Nam relations,” Mr ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says newly appointed Commissioner, Grant Illingworth KC, will help deliver the report for the first phase of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into COVID-19 Lessons, due on 28 November 2024. “I am pleased to announce that Mr Illingworth will commence his appointment as ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters travels to Laos this week to participate in a series of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-led Ministerial meetings in Vientiane. “ASEAN plays an important role in supporting a peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” Mr Peters says. “This will be our third visit to ...
Construction of a new mental health facility at Te Nikau Grey Hospital in Greymouth is today one step closer, Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey says. “This $27 million facility shows this Government is delivering on its promise to boost mental health care and improve front line services,” Mr Doocey says. ...
New Zealand is committing nearly $50 million to a package supporting sustainable Pacific fisheries development over the next four years, Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones announced today. “This support consisting of a range of initiatives demonstrates New Zealand’s commitment to assisting our Pacific partners ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour says proposed changes to the Education and Training Amendment Bill will ensure charter schools have more flexibility to negotiate employment agreements and are equipped with the right teaching resources. “Cabinet has agreed to progress an amendment which means unions will not be able to initiate ...
In response to serious concerns around oversight, overspend and a significant deterioration in financial outlook, the Board of Health New Zealand will be replaced with a Commissioner, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti announced today. “The previous government’s botched health reforms have created significant financial challenges at Health NZ that, without ...
Minister for Space and Science, Innovation and Technology Judith Collins will travel to Adelaide tomorrow for space and science engagements, including speaking at the Australian Space Forum. While there she will also have meetings and visits with a focus on space, biotechnology and innovation. “New Zealand has a thriving space ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts will travel to China on Saturday to attend the Ministerial on Climate Action meeting held in Wuhan. “Attending the Ministerial on Climate Action is an opportunity to advocate for New Zealand climate priorities and engage with our key partners on climate action,” Mr Watts says. ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is travelling to the Solomon Islands tomorrow for meetings with his counterparts from around the Pacific supporting collective management of the region’s fisheries. The 23rd Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Committee and the 5th Regional Fisheries Ministers’ Meeting in Honiara from 23 to 26 July ...
The Government today launched the Military Style Academy Pilot at Te Au rere a te Tonga Youth Justice residence in Palmerston North, an important part of the Government’s plan to crackdown on youth crime and getting youth offenders back on track, Minister for Children, Karen Chhour said today. “On the ...
The Government has welcomed news the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has begun work to replace nine priority bridges across the country to ensure our state highway network remains resilient, reliable, and efficient for road users, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says.“Increasing productivity and economic growth is a key priority for the ...
Acting Prime Minister David Seymour has been in contact throughout the evening with senior officials who have coordinated a whole of government response to the global IT outage and can provide an update. The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has designated the National Emergency Management Agency as the ...
New Zealand and Japan will continue to step up their shared engagement with the Pacific, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “New Zealand and Japan have a strong, shared interest in a free, open and stable Pacific Islands region,” Mr Peters says. “We are pleased to be finding more ways ...
New developments in the heart of North Island forestry country will reinvigorate their communities and boost economic development, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones visited Kaingaroa and Kawerau in Bay of Plenty today to open a landmark community centre in the former and a new connecting road in ...
President Adeang, fellow Ministers, honourable Diet Member Horii, Ambassadors, distinguished guests. Minasama, konnichiwa, and good afternoon, everyone. Distinguished guests, it’s a pleasure to be here with you today to talk about New Zealand’s foreign policy reset, the reasons for it, the values that underpin it, and how it ...
Opinion: The Canadian short story writer Alice Munro – winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013 – died in May at the age of 92. Her work was about “the damage people inflict on one another in the name of love”, Deborah Treisman wrote in the New Yorker. ...
This month marks two years since the most powerful telescope ever built sent its first pictures back to earth. From its lofty vantage point, beyond the moon in orbit around the sun, the James Webb Space Telescope was tuned to observe the first stars and galaxies being born soon after ...
Comment: After Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ preview several weeks ago, I had some optimism about the Government’s emissions reduction plan. Now I’ve read the discussion document, that hope has been dashed. How can the Government propose a plan that wants to take New Zealand taxpayers’ hard-earned money, and spend ...
Christopher Luxon: hurdles The little man from National jumps hurdles in his sleep. He’s quite good at it in his dreams and even though the reality doesn’t quite match up you have to give him credit for getting up every morning and crashing into the very first hurdle of the ...
Comment: It was a good two hours into the conversation when Tyrone Marks raised the most basic of questions when I first spoke to him in 2017. “They didn’t explain the things they did to me. They never told me why. And they still haven’t. There’s no explanation for it. ...
Last summer when Matairangi burned, Ginny and Tom stood at the window of their lounge, watching kākā shoot skyward from the burning trees. From the distance, they looked to Ginny like pages torn from books and thrown into a bonfire. It was Tom, voice tight, who told her it was ...
Madeleine Chapman rounds out Death Week on The Spinoff with a final recommendation. You can read all of our Death Week coverage here. Nothing forces you to reflect on your life and relationships quite like proximity to death. For those whose nearest and dearest have died, there are reasonably obvious ...
Whitney Greene takes us through her life in television, including the TV character she’d like to plan a funeral for and her cow lung catastrophe on The Traitors NZ. “If the phone rings, I have to answer it,” Whitney Greene from The Traitors NZ warns as we begin our My ...
Maddie Ballard reviews the debut essay collection of Pōneke writer Flora Feltham.In ‘The Raw Material’, the longest essay in Flora Feltham’s dazzling debut collection, the author heads out for a run after hours of weaving and sees the world turn to textile. “Pounding along the Parade, I saw the ...
Andy Christiansen, one half of the experimental rock-pop duo TRiPS, shares the tunes inspiring the band’s perfect weekend and new release. “Good speakers, good food, good music, no distractions”: that’s all you need to enjoy the psychedelic stylings of TRiPS, a new band formed by Fly My Pretties’ Barnaby Weir ...
Celebrating our quadrennial opportunity to become experts in a bunch of sports we never normally watch.The games of the XXXIII Olympiad are upon us. Paris will host this year’s showcase of sporting and athletic prowess, which means some late-night and early-morning viewing for us in Aotearoa.But what sports ...
The photograph is striking and beautiful, but also disturbing – a reminder that my love for John was often entangled in shame.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.In the spring of 1980, in Dunedin, shortly before his death, someone took a photograph ...
Get to know Babushka, our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Babu’s humans, Jo and Isabel, for their support. Dog name: Babushka (Babu for short) Age: 2Breed: Border Collie X poodleIf rescued, ...
Pacific Media Watch A Lebanese photojournalist who was severely wounded during an Israeli air strike in south Lebanon carried the Olympic torch in Paris this week in honour of her peers who have been wounded and killed in the field — especially in Gaza and Lebanon. Christina Assi of Agence ...
The first report in a five-part web series focused on the 15th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women taking place in the Marshall Islands this week.SPECIAL REPORT:By Netani Rika in Majuro Women continue to fight for justice 70 years after the first nuclear tests by the United States caused ...
Christopher Luxon has joined with Australia and Canada's leaders in voicing support for US President Joe Biden's ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The 2022 election brought the “teal wave” into parliament. The next election will test whether teals, who occupy what were Liberal seats, and other independents can maintain their momentum. Joining us on the Podcast ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Musgrave, Senior lecturer in Pharmacology, University of Adelaide Pixavri/Shutterstock A major Federal Court class action has been dismissed this week after Justice Michael Lee ruled there was not enough evidence to prove the weedkiller Roundup causes cancer. Plaintiff Kelvin ...
In The Week in Politics: politicians have to decide what to do about child abuse, Health NZ is booked in for major surgery and Darleen Tana returns. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Corbould, Associate Professor, Contemporary Histories Research Group, Deakin University Mainstream media are surprisingly muted at the prospect of the world’s most powerful nation being led for the first time by a woman – specifically a woman of colour, Vice President Kamala ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Bennett, PhD Student, Associate Research Fellow, Deakin University Last week, a drone delivery company called Wing (owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet) started operating in Melbourne. Some 250,000 residents in parts of the city’s eastern suburbs can now order food from ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonathan Foo, Lecturer, Physiotherapy, Monash University pikselstock/Shutterstock In the next 40 years in Australia, it’s predicted the number of Australians aged 65 and over will more than double, while the number of people aged 85 and over will more than triple. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katrina Grant, Research Associate, Power Institute for Arts and Visual Culture, University of Sydney Jonas Åkerström’s 1790 work, Session of the Accademia dell’Arcadia on August 17 1788.Nationalmuseum/Cecilia Heisser Ever wondered whether you’d have a better chance at winning an Olympic gold ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexandra Jones, Program Lead, Food Governance, George Institute for Global Health wavebreakmedia/Shutterstock On Thursday, Australian and New Zealand food ministers at state, federal and national levels met to thrash out what’s next for health star ratings on packaged foods. Now, after ...
The Abuse in Care report found many Pacific survivors lost their connections to their culture and language, resulting in trauma that has been carried from generation to generation. ...
In the regulatory review, ECC intends to suggest that ERO focus on curriculum delivery reviews rather than the Ministry, because it’s not efficient or effective to have two agencies with radically different approaches climbing over each other. ...
Te Rūnanga Nui o Ngā Kura Kaupapa Māori invites the current government to work in partnership with them to develop a pathway forward, including the development of a parallel pathway and meaningful policy and strategy for Kura Kaupapa Māori ...
If you haven’t started watching yet, Tara Ward begs you to reconsider. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. In the world of New Zealand reality television, we have many gems in our crown. There’s the delicious second season of the Celebrity Treasure ...
A new poem by Fiona Kidman. The clothes of the dead I did not keep my mother’s furry red beret for long nor the stringy scarves that adorned the necks of my aunts, although I have kept tag ends of gold, the rings and trinkets they wore, the brooches no ...
The government’s announcement that it will re-open the foreshore and seabed controversy by changing the rules on recognising centuries-old Māori customary title for a third time goes against the rule of law and New Zealand values,” Mr Tipa says. ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Lioness by Emily Perkins (Bloomsbury, $25) Roarrrr! Perkins’ brilliant, award-winning, Marian-Keyes anointed, darkly funny, long ...
The 2004 Act vested ownership of the foreshore and seabed in the Crown, extinguishing any Māori claims to ownership and causing widespread outrage and protests among Māori communities. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Antje Deckert, Associate Professor (Criminology), Auckland University of Technology Getty Images Despite the connection between institutional harm and gang membership made clear in this week’s mammoth royal commission abuse-in care report, the government seems unlikely to soften its “get tough on ...
From Lewis Clareburt in the swimming to the start of the rowing – the first seven days of Paris 2024 promise to be big for New Zealand. There are few events that bring the country together quite like an Olympic Games. Nothing quite matches the excitement of getting up in ...
Groundbreaking local science just showed up in the most surprising of places: the season finale of The Kardashians. In the season five finale of The Kardashians last night, several members of the family gathered together in one of their signature empty, cream-coloured rooms to hear test results that had been ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Saikal, Emeritus professor of Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies, Australian National University The Middle East is on the brink of a possibly devastating regional war, with hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah reaching an extremely dangerous level. Washington has engaged in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Elizabeth Eades, Rheumatologist, Monash University Lupus is an inflammatory autoimmune illness, where the body’s immune system mistakenly attacks itself. Lupus can affect virtually any part of the body, although it most commonly affects the skin, joints and kidneys. The symptoms ...
A law firm that specialises in working with survivors of abuse in State care is disappointed that the Government fails to recognise that its boot camps can be directly compared to previous boot camps from the 1990s and 2000s. ...
Dying is a natural part of life, like updating your Wof or seeing your hairdresser, but without the word-of-mouth recs that help guarantee a good service. What if we changed that? Dying Reviews received by The Spinoff have had the names of organisations redacted while Hospice NZ collects further data. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonti Horner, Professor (Astrophysics), University of Southern Queensland Mike Lewinski/Flickr, CC BY On any clear night, if you gaze skywards long enough, chances are you’ll see a meteor streaking through the sky. Some nights, however, are better than others. At ...
Despite having no bars or other designated spaces for lesbians, Auckland boasts a small but mighty lesbian museum. So how did it get here? The past 18 months has brought increasing hostility towards the queer community across Aotearoa. Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull’s anti-trans rally in Tamaki Makaurau last March led to a ...
Poneke Antifascist Coalition has invited Wellingtonians to stand in solidarity with the Kanak people at 12pm today outside the French Embassy in Wellington. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Layton, Visiting Fellow, Strategic Studies, Griffith University Drones are the signature technology of the Ukraine war. A few miniature aircraft designs were used in the war’s early days, but an incredible array of drones have now evolved. There are different types, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Slee, Associate Professor, Clinical Academic Neurologist, Flinders University Francisco Gonzelez/Unsplash Migraine is many things, but one thing it’s not is “just a headache”. “Migraine” comes from the Greek word “hemicrania”, referring to the common experience of migraine being predominantly ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lee White, Senior Lecturer and Horizon Fellow, School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Sydney Australia was slow to introduce minimum building standards for energy efficiency. The Nationwide House Energy Rating Scheme (NatHERS) only came into force in 2003. Older homes ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Steven Sherwood, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences, Climate Change Research Centre, UNSW Sydney The past century of human-induced warming has increased rainfall variability over 75% of the Earth’s land area – particularly over Australia, Europe and eastern North America, new research shows. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tony Heynen, Program Coordinator, Sustainable Energy, The University of Queensland A temporary stadium in the Champ-de-Mars, ParisEkaterina Pokrovsky/Shutterstock As Paris prepares to host the Olympic and Paralympic Games, the sustainability of the event is coming under scrutiny. The organisers have promoted ...
A night of karaoke and community in a pub that feels like a memory. You’d barely even notice it, unless you knew to look. Tucked away behind a liquor store on busy Constable Street is the capital’s last great pub. Newtown Sports Bar is an emblem of the pub culture ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Wright, Professor in Marine Geology, University of Canterbury Louise Corcoran/Getty Images The decline in the number of doctoral candidates at New Zealand universities is a worrying sign for the country’s effort to build a knowledge-based economy. Aotearoa New Zealand’s ...
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I hope everyone had a great Christmas and Boxing Day. While I havent had much time to post on here in the past year, I have been still able to read some of insightful posts on this blog.
And of course..I hope this Christmas just gone is the last with John Key in power/office.
Its going to be one hell of an election campaign next year.
And David Cunliffe needs to set the agenda from the outset. I suggest an “Orewa” style speech, but without the Maori-bashing. It is coming up to 10 year since Don Brash delivered his speech, and it enabled National to set the political agenda from there on in (right up to the present day). He could have quite easily won in 2005
I suggest an “Orewa” style speech, but without the Maori-bashing.
And also without the glib, cruel, simplistic economic “theory”.
(just in case some are struggling to find policy-solutions..
..i offer this aid..)
http://www.alternet.org/economy/how-fix-economy-13-easy-charts
“..Policies that ensure broadly shared prosperity –
– should be policymakers’ foremost priorities in 2014..”
..(are there any problems with that dictum/imperative –
– for labour party apparatchik readers here..?..)
phillip ure..
BBC hack has a go at Japan’s “passive reporters”
Humbug Corner No. 23: Rupert Wingfield-Hayes
Radio NZ National News, Friday 27 December 2013, 6 a.m.
At this time of year, Japanese prime ministers have traditionally visited the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo—an act of homage which, because the shrine holds the remains of twelve notorious war criminals, outrages people in China, Korea and many other countries.
Some of the loudest protests, however, have come from people who themselves are incorrigible apologists for state aggression. Noam Chomsky has written trenchantly about the hypocrisy of U.S. ideologues selectively condemning the gall of JAPANESE leaders…..
http://www.chomsky.info/articles/199508–.htm
Yesterday, Shinzo Abe became the first Japanese prime minister for seven years to visit the Yasukuni shrine. This of course provided the perfect opportunity for critiquing not only the brazenness of Japanese politicians but also the uselessness of the Japanese media.
This is how the BBC’s Tokyo correspondent Rupert Wingfield-Hayes began his piece about the latest provocation:
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
“Confronted by passive reporters at the gates of the Yasukuni Shrine….”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Some of Rupert Wingfield-Hayes’s listeners no doubt have a more well developed sense of irony than he does, and will have shaken their heads in wonderment at the gall of a BBC reporter condemning Japanese reporters—-or indeed any reporters—for being passive.
More classic examples of humbug….
http://thestandard.org.nz/hypocrisy-watch/#comment-740695
Oh dear, more breening from Moz:
“Confronted by passive reporters at the gates of the Yasukuni Shrine….”
Actual words of the journalist:
“Confronted by a pack of reporters …”
http://www.radionz.co.nz/radionz/programmes/news-bulletin/audio/2581194/radio-new-zealand-news
Quelle mortification! This is what happens when one listens to the radio while half-asleep. I thought at the time that the formulation “confronted by passive reporters” didn’t quite make sense—but I went ahead and published anyway! And now comes the well deserved bollocking.
My apologies to Rupert Wingfield-Hayes, and to my loyal readers at the Standard. As they used to say in Greece: even Homer nods. Or as they still say in Japan: even monkeys fall from trees.
And, most of all, a special round of applause for, and heartfelt thanks to, my punctilious pal Te Reo Putake. Take a bow, buddy….
http://casaofgila.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/butler.jpg
@ Moz…
RNZ is in holiday mode.
That means its a bit more like weekend mode.
The perfectly ‘work-life balanced’ lady with isssssssyous (that ‘incisive’, well-respected, hugely-experienced ex-parly arment gallery reporter – still down with, and in touch with the new breed – able to ‘get across’ all newz stories, unaffected by cronyism and nepotism with collegial appointments – INDEED, the perfect specimen any sort of public service radio host should try and model themselves on) ….. AND the nicest man on Earth are having their well-deserved break. Why the nicest man on Earth might even keep in touch with the people by serving in some fast food outlet somewhere, or perhaps repainting a Marae he once daubed with an horrific, and disliked colour scheme as atonement for participating in Public Service TV reality programming.
What it means though is its relatively safe to listen to Natrad ’24/7′
I wonder if the nicest man on Earth ever worries about whether Matinee Idle would be preferable to the stale, trite, hackneyed, mashed potato slop that gets dished up daily – equipped as it is with all its pre-programmed talking heads and audio pus.
I share your positive views about Matinee Idle, Tim. And I’m happy about most of the morning programme—except for one thing, and it’s a bit of a major obstacle, I’m afraid: I find Noelle McCarthy utterly insufferable. The fact that she was outed as a plagiarist a few years ago is the least of her sins.
I really enjoy and look forward to Matinee Idle – but heard (I think) today that their allotment of programmes has been cut back this year. Was only half listening at the time.
Going back to the vacuous Mora, I still have clearly stuck in my mind a remark he made about three years ago prior to Christmas. A remark to the effect that “But everyone has a ham at Christmas!”.
Sure, Mora, beneficiaries can really afford a ham at Christmas – only about the cost of two or more weeks’ total food bill for one ham?
Hate to be really prickish, but as a kid growing up, what most of us kids grew up with was mutton-hams. I think it would have been the early 70’s before hams as such became affordable to alot of kiwis. But with the price of lamb/mutton today, even that is probably unrealistic.
Why is it that New Zealand producers expect New Zealand consumers to pay a premium for goods produced here in New Zealand, while overseas customers get the benefit of all the tax advantages that the New Zealand Government can throw their way. It seems National takes great delight in screwing the New Zealand consumer regardless.
As do I. I did think that the complete works of the Topp twins was a trivial over the top today. There is only so much nasal spray that I can stand whilst driving. The rest of the show was pretty damn hilarious.
and this is the preferred-destination for new zealand for the randite-neo-libs (from both national and labour) who have been systematically shredding the social net/contract..
..for the past 30 yrs..
http://www.alternet.org/what-america-would-look-if-libertarians-got-their-way
..and why are we still staring at the same faces in labour who fucken did this to us..to nz..?
..why haven’t they fucken slunk away..?
..apologising/begging our forgiveness as they crawl out the door..eh..?
..and what do we get..?
..we get parker promising to shred that social net/contract even further..
..with the hobson’-choice of either a higher pension age..or a raise in gst..
..both options a further kick in the guts for those most in need..
..and a labour party that refuses to speak of the real poor/poverty..
..you watch ardern..
..media ask her about poverty/labour policies/ideas..
..and she is out of that room like a scalded cat..
..all the labour party will ever speak of..
..is ‘the working-poor’..
..now..do i find all this totally dismaying..?
..yes..yes i do..
..phillip ure..
Very true Phil – personally if i never hear ‘fair deal’ again it will be too soon…
Labour had the opportunity to have a good clean out in it’s 9 years in power, but they couldn’t achieve that. If Labour do win, there are some who will want to hang on for another 3 – 6 or 9 years, just because they think they can.
The problem facing Labour today, is Labour is full of too many middle class people, and too many academics. Poverty to them is an “exercise”, not something they actually relate too.
Parliamentarians are by definition, the 1%. If you want to keep them working for you, you have to apply constant pressure and demands on them.
After all, that’s what the corporate lobbyists do.
I’m not sure if all of them are the 1% – aren’t you trying to get in there? It seems to me that perhaps a small percentage of them are the 1%, like maybe 10% of them 🙂
🙂
By Parliamentarians I meant MPs…and $150K p.a. base MP pay is in the top 1% to 1.5% of NZ income brackets.
When a libertarian goes Randian.
Stoked by his Wall Street success, Lampert plunged headlong into the retail world. Undaunted by his lack of industry experience and hailed a genius, Lampert boldly pushed to merge Kmart and Sears with a layoff and cost-cutting strategy that would, he promised, send profits into the stratosphere. Meanwhile the hotshot threw cash around like an oil sheikh, buying a $40 million pad in Florida’s Biscayne Bay, a record even for that star-studded county.
Fast-forward to 2013: The fairy tale has become a nightmare.
Lampert is now known as one of the worst CEOs in America — the man who flushed Sears down the toilet with his demented management style and harebrained approach to retail. Sears stock is tanking. His hedge fun is down 40 percent, and the business press has turned from praising Lampert’s genius to watching gleefully as his ship sinks. Investors are running from “Crazy Eddie” like the plague.
http://www.alternet.org/economy/eddie-lampert-and-ayn-rand?paging=off¤t_page=1#bookmark
Rand talks about success as if the successful were superhuman, but capitalism will find those necessary to meet market needs and if you not it, someone else will be, and its therefore backwards to talk about winners making them the essential initiators of wealth. Hitler did something similar with evolution. Religion also makes the same mistake, putting humanity on top. It requires merging ignorance and distortion of origins and then apply a intellectual argument that otherwise would hold.
She of course doesn’t represent all libertarians. In fact surely we are all libertarians when we believe in liberty, which I hope we all do. The civil libertarians defend, even for example, nazi’s right to free-speech, go figure. I’m wary of anyone who say libertarianism is wrong, just as wary as anyone who say every libertarian is right.
Its certainly true now, that having proponents of free market theory on your board is going to hurt shareholder value.
During the Spanish Revolution, the POUM referred to themselves as libertarian communists. Reading Homage to Catalonia was my first experience of the concept of libertarianism and it did my head in a bit later when I saw it hijacked by people like Brash, Hide, and Perigo. While the POUM believed in liberation of the human spirit through collective endeavour, and a few puffs on the electric puha if that turned you on, modern libertarians believe in liberation of their bank balances by way of a militarised police force and private prisons. I think of myself as reasonably libertarian, but I have nothing in common with any of the selfish wankers who have hijacked the term these days.
Libertarians believe in their liberty but when the solo slips show it reveals their disdain for our liberty.
http://radishmag.wordpress.com/2013/04/26/carlyle-rising/#carlyle-rising
http://radishmag.wordpress.com/2013/04/26/carlyle-rising/#equality
http://www.salon.com/2011/08/30/lind_libertariansim/
http://valleywag.gawker.com/reminder-peter-thiel-is-ted-cruzs-gay-billionaire-all-1427666663
Or as I put it:
Libertarians: Dictators hiding behind liberal values.
And that is exactly what we see from both National and Act and probably UF although they’re more hiding behind sensible centrism.
hah, love it because they’ll never accept that their “theory” is wrong. Unfortunately, the same can be said of most economists.
The nation needs to be reminded of that as well from every left leaning political party. The RWNJs just don’t believe it though and so will keep rolling out the dystopia that their policies bring about.
And that inevitably applies to deregulation across the board, The rich and the corporations do well but society is worse off.
Came to that conclusion about property rights years ago. Greater property rights will, inevitably, result in more oppression of the poor by the rich.
Just been reading through yesterday’s open mike discussion on education – very thought provoking discussion.
I put a lot of value on the importance of education in its broadest sense: formal and/or informal, in education institutions or community based; abstract or practical. I’ve experienced all of them. I learned a lot in unis, but most of my political education was begun in the women’s movement in London and was community and volunteer-based.
The latter were initiatives from a group of women who set up some workshops in low rent and basic community halls – seminars on things like Marxism and feminism, through which I first came into contact with the writings of Marx and the kinds of writing that followed, as well as learning about the long legacy of feminist politics.
I’ve also learned a lot form discussions in online forums such as on TS.
I’m all for following one’s own interests in reading (or listening or viewing) widely. However that requires access to written texts, either from public libraries or accessible digital technologies and internet connections (these days libraries also provide some of the latter).
Also in depth learning requires more than reading, listening, or viewing selected texts – it requires debate and discussion and having your learnings challenged. Saw quite a bit of that on yesterday’s open mike.
@karol..
i found this one yesterday..
“..The 24 Pieces That Should Be Required Reading For Women From 2013..”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/23/required-reading-2013-women_n_4473740.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopular
“..for the second year in a row we’ve curated a list of pieces we felt reflected some of the most insightful female voices of the year..”
phillip ure..
Thanks, phillip.
Interesting list. Each article looks worthy in it’s own right, showing some crucial, but limited aspects of feminism. But overall, the articles tend to talk back to celebrity culture, and promote a feminism that accepts a lot of the wider “neoliberal”/capitalist structure.
The only I article that stands out for me, going by the summary of each article, is the one by bell hooks: This is a must read for anyone wanting to understand what a left wing fminism is about.
hooks critiques a very opular book that she labels “faux feminism” – I would characterise that book as a kind of “liberal feminsm” that doesn’t want to change the status quo, but just seeks an equal place for (largely) middle to upper income women within that structure/culture.
An extract from hook’s piece:
Yah . thanks philip.
There’s a lot of reading there, but a quick speed scan shows some of it rather beautiful and confronting at the same time.
If nothing else it’s proof that feminism remains a vital and broad movement that defies neat pigeonholing.
Agreed Karol.
The only thing that spoils the Standard is the white noise created by all the right wingers, who only come here to disrupt intelligent debate and discussion.
yeah paul..but they have their place in the grand scheme of things..
..not the least being the honing of arguments to rubbish/demolish their randite/neo-lib fallacies..
..they are the foils..
..and ‘free speech’ is far more important than mere ‘annoyance’..eh..?
..just consider/dismiss them as necessary-clutter..eh..?
phillip ure..
The Herald fawns over the wealthy and the powerful.
What a tawdry little rag it shows itself to be.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11178384
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/lifestyle/news/article.cfm?c_id=6&objectid=11178260
Yup paul. The barkers bought a “do up” for 2.1 m. Poor things. The writer makes it sound like they will do it all themselves. Its the journalism of envy… to keep us all on the treadmill for the vain belief that if we keep working hard we can get that too… interesting how many of the owners dont have what we might call ordinary jobs.
A good life for a loser, eh?
Lets not forget the annual parade of the wealthy and entertaining over the volunteers in the new years honours list
Have continued this conversation on Shop till you drop.
Now that will be very interesting Tracey,Because there may not be too much tine left for those National rich dicks to get their snob gong. Two more chances and with luck the Nat’s will be out./So who do you think will become Sir or Dame ?
I would not be surprised if Phil. O’Grady is top of the list . Do you think Key will get his this year ?Don’t be surprised if he does , What is certain is that the majority will be very rich and most will be from the political right and far right. What a farce .
My wise old grand mother always said only one title maters Gentleman and Lady in the true sense of course ,
Why does power switch not work for Waikato?
@aerobubble..
..dunno..
..trailer-trash-bye-pass..is all i’ve got..
phillip ure..
Look at Google Images for “unidentified guest”. You’d never guess who the top images are about!
Ok – so I looked; and laughed.
I particularly liked this Guardian article of 12 Dec about our PM , the “unidentified guest” and its summary of his ‘high’ moments on his various overseas trips!
https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/12/new-zealand-john-key-unidentified-guest&sa=U&ei=Ubq8Uun0JY_uoAS1-4HgBQ&ved=0CAYQFjAA&client=internal-uds-cse&usg=AFQjCNHz00HB9z1bDQtWGlnxZp38HdOaug
Uugh! And now to the TS FAQs to finally learn how to do those short links!
Test
I particularly liked this Guardian article
Finally learnt after some false starts! Not too hard once you figure it out!
An urgent ticker-tape from Hell
Pete George needs assistance
I have just received an email, ostensibly from Pete George, the well-known politico and ex- Standardista. I wonder if I should help out the poor fellow, who seems to be having rather a hard time of it….
NEED YOUR HELP
Good Morning,
Just hoping this email reaches you well, I’m sorry for this emergency and for not informing you about my urgent trip to lugansk (ukraine) but I just have to let you know my present predicament. Everything was fine until I was attacked on my way back to the hotel, I wasn’t hurt but I lost my money, bank cards, mobile phone and my bag in the course of this attack. I immediately contacted my bank in other to block my cards and also made a report at the nearest police station. I’m physically OK and fine but I’m urgently in need of some money to pay for my hotel bills and my flight ticket home, will pay back as soon as i get back home.Kindly let me know if you would be able to help me out
This disturbing letter was accompanied by a warning from the Gmail people: “Be careful with this message. It contains content that’s typically used to steal personal information.”
How much money should I send Pete George? A grand? Five grand? Any ideas?
Scam unless absolutely proven otherwise.
Besides the real PG would have included a turgid page and half of whinging on the latest perfidy at The Standard…
and he would have spoken of his (faux)-‘balance’..
..in that particular situation..?
..surely..?
phillip ure..
smells scammy especially as I’ve seen that wording, word for word, before.
Got one of those this morning. Looks like PG’s email has been hacked. Virtually identical to several others over the years.
and if it were his sychophant/bell-ringer..
..dunny-brush wd help him..
..surely..?
phillip ure..
It’s a facebook scam.
I received this email as well. I had a similarly worded email from Bob Harvey not that long ago. He was apparently in Mumbai and someone had stolen his wallet and yadeyadeyada …
Happens all the time.
Make sure your passwords are secure …
Don’t believe it….send PG an IOU…. but For emails like this, reply and ask a personal question that only the authentic person could answer.(Not birthday or grandma’s name)- say ‘what was the name of your second best friend..your 2nd pet? your teddy bear?’
BUT, but, but ….. would you know the name of PG’s second best friend , his 2nd pet, his teddy bear?
Personally, I am very sceptical – I even had an email from God on Boxing day. What to do, what to do?
I deleted it and cleared my Deleted box, so will never know what God had to say to me ……
Don’t think PG had two friends.
God has i think.
LOL!
And I did not make the God email up – actually got it, despite very good spam block etc ….
But, seriously now, had a look at PG’s websiteYyourNZ and he can’t be overseas anyway as he had a post up yesterday, suggesting that Clare Curran’s postion as Labour rep for Dunedin South may be in doubt. Supposedly according to an article (unlinked) in the ODT.
That seems to be at odds with an email I got a few days ago from the Labour Party with a status report on selection of candidates for the 2014 election. This reported that both the Dunedin North and Dunedin South electorate candidate selections were currently uncontested with nominations closing on Feb 28.
Hello, there CV – and anyone else down Dunedin way. What is your understanding of the current position?
VV. No one, including myself, has put in a selection nomination against Clare Curran that I know of. More I cannot say at this stage 😈
Thanks CV. I will continue to live in hope………….
only online odt hits are for half-sentence speculations in articles about Colin King, from Audrey Young pieces in the Herald.
Upon which PG has apparently expanded into full posts? Big surprise. Interviewing his own eyelids, most likely
PG’s teddy bear is called Lynn 😈
I’m aware that Pete has an unnatural fetish with me (as witnessed by his rants about almost anything that I have time to write). And on the odd occasion I have been known to see exactly how far I can twist him into a complete nutter state. However associating me with Theodore Roosevelt is a bit much…
Of course because of the work over the last few months, the shaving has become its usual irregular thing. But my young great-nieces and great-nephews appear to think that makes me santa claus rather the bushy dark thing that Theodore used..
(you do realise that the cadaver has no idea what I look like right?)
And God’s teddy bear……? is it DC?
Then whose teddy bear is Cameron?
Test message. Testing updated server config.
There is still a problem using public and private subnets… A mildly expensive problem when the spam attacks happen.
Testing failure and fallback.
Works fine – about 35 seconds from failure to access a web server to dropping to the backup web server. Main constraint is that I don’t want to do it too fast as we do normally get some spiky load.
Next, see what I can do with the database server