I thought it mighty clever of the weather to turn to Winter overnight. Sitting pretty here in a house of brick. It wasn't always so easy.
Let's hear it for a budget tackling homelessness, let's hear it for a government trying to address mental health.
Sleep.
I spent parts of winter sleeping half at night, half in the day. This was in order to cope with the cold. From cars to windowless squats, beneath bridges and basements abandoned; the houses of homelessness are cold.
To sleep it helped to be inebriated so one's body (and head) would allow you some sleep. I'd curl up in a foetal position with covers over my head to recirculate the warm air, and hands tucked between my legs to try get them warm. It was enough for a while and I'd drift off, but by around 4 a.m. either my reserves or the temperature had dropped sufficiently that it woke me.
There were several hours till dawn and though many preferred to stay down, shivering as temperatures bottomed out, I had to move.
Morning calisthenics. 4 a.m. drills for the idle unemployed. Press ups, squats, burpees. Soon I'd be warm enough to stop shivering, warm enough that the ringing in my ears would subside, warm enough to roll a smoke without tearing the paper in half. The burning coal of a cigarette cupped in the palms of my hands.
I'd march. Off to the parks, to the coast and the dunes. Under lupins and round the river mouths. In the places fungi grew in abundance. Magical fungi, munchable fungi. From the city to the fields and back again.
We ate fungi, watercress, seafood, rustled sheep, pilfered fruit, garden raids, dumpster diving and homeless handouts. We never thought about how we were homeless, we were surviving. Mental health, abuse, alcoholism, addiction, abandonment. It was all there, and it was all intertwined. We absolved ourselves with three Fuck You's and a bottle of grog.
A portion of us were typically in prison. This was normal. Some were locked up for stealing liquor, others robbing chemists; I for picking mushrooms and growing weed. Whatever it takes means different things to different people, and survival trumped law in most cases. As society had done to us the things that were done to us, then fuck society. We would look after ourselves.
We were divided in attitudes between those of us who wanted to change the world, and those who wanted to burn it all down. There's too much time to think when you are homeless. To feel purpose it helps if one can move purposefully. To live amongst the hopeless it requires a special kind of strength to even dare to dream. We were young and we still dared, but for many it was a dream.
Overdose, car accident, murder, life. Slowly they vanished as if they'd never existed. Long forgotten by those purported to love them. Dead.
The eulogies I wrote were prosaic and deep. It was tragedy and tragedy then tragedy again. Absentee parents wailed soulfully upon the caskets of those they held dear. Too little and too late they'd turn up in their cars. Countenance grave; soft words finally spoken.
Thanks for sharing that. Such insights into our collective reality are essential, and a helpful antidote to the economic/political spin around the budget, reminding us what it's all about really. And resilience contains emotional intelligence as a social necessity…
Same as Dennis and HS; you've hinted at this before so it's not a surprise. But I am moved by the intensity of it. And not only have you journeyed through that dark, damp land … but you found the path out of it.
I for one await more of the story, if and when it's time to tell it.
I echo all of the sentiments by the rest on here WTB. A wonderful piece, and thank you for sharing. There are a few favourite places here in our town for some to find a bit of shelter. A convenient nook in an alleyway just off the main street makes an ideal spot. It's covered over and reasonably secluded, but it would be a bugger in a westerly! Behind the church is good too and just over the road from the pub. It's also sheltered from the wind and has soft grass. We have around 15 to 20 sleeping really rough here, and are about to get expanded accommodation for those nights when it really is too bad to be unsheltered.
WOW! A brilliant piece of writing WTB (1) … I'd like to say it was a great story. However, the story you told wasn't/isn't so great for far too many Kiwis.
Thanks for taking the time to share such a raw, gritty expose` of homelessness in NZ, through personal experience.
Lived experience speaks with an authentic voice. Thank you WTB for sharing, for keeping your sense of hope and for recognising the efforts made to change the way budgets are formed. May you enjoy your brick house and the winter warmth your home offers you for the rest of your days. Please write more.
"In Portugal and Spain, the incumbent governments of the centre-left were rewarded by voters. In Spain, voters rejected the far right populist party Vox, which collapsed back to 6% from the 10% high it achieved only a fortnight ago in the Spanish general elections."
"On the radical left, Podemos saw its support decline to 10%, a sharp fall from the 18% they’d scored in the last European Parliament elections. The decline of Podemos holds a cautionary message for the Green Party in New Zealand. Now that Podemos is no longer an outsider party but is actively propping up the Socialist government of Pedro Sanchez, much of its support has been bleeding back to Sanchez and his PSOE party, which has long been Spain’s neo-liberal Third Way party of the centre-left. In a further blow, radical left mayors in major cities (including the high profile administration of Ada Colau in Barcelona) lost their fights for re-election. In Spain as whole, the radical left is being marginalised by regional parties, and by the Establishment left."
As a life-long radical, I've always found the radical left amusing. I share their striving to attain an ideal world, while remaining baffled at their reluctance to learn from political experience. It makes no sense for the Greens to marginalise themselves on the extreme left. Too few voters support such idiocy.
Usually radical leftists reject centrism in favour of ideological purity. They refuse to admit that support for the underdog is more politically potent when it comes from a party that controls the political centre and selects governments. As Winston has proven. The GP needs leaders who are capable of learning the lesson.
Nuance. I made no blanket statement re the Greens, just advised against any leftist extremism. There's a ginger group (mainly idealistic youngsters) within the party which formed several years ago to lobby for such positioning. I've seen their spokespeople being explicit in calling for that partisan stance and alignment at our conferences. They are open, honest, and forthright in doing so.
Add to that is the unending nauseating way media professionals keep depicting the Greens as `to the left of Labour'. Hardly surprising that a popular view of the Greens being wild-eyed radicals has gained currency. Hopelessly unrealistic…
You fail to point out that since the emergence of centrist liberalisim as the dominating force in western left wing politics from the late 1970's, what was once just left is now framed as extreme or radical left.
The reason cenerism should and is being rejected is because it has failed to work, or work for the many and not just the few..or haven't you noticed.
Go and read WeTheBleeple’s piece at the beginning of today’s open mike, and think about the homeless families living in cars all over NZ, all the working poor in NZ who spend over half their wages on rent, that is free market centerism in action for you.
Green suit-wearers will be careerists, of course, but doesn't mean inability to grasp the big picture. Here we have the Values schism to teach us that the centrists are essential to the political success of the Green left (if they were able to learn the lesson) whereas in Germany the thirty years war between fundies & realos seems to have been resolved.
"A surge of support, helped by the Fridays for Future protest movement, propelled Germany's Greens to second place in Sunday's European Parliament elections, at the expense of the mainstream parties. Chancellor Angela Merkel's centre-right CDU/CSU bloc and their ailing junior coalition partners the Social Democrats (SPD) both suffered historic losses after being caught flat-footed on environmental policy."
The thing with all of this thinking, within multiple contexts/systems:
The edge is where the action occurs. New ideas, new genes, new philosophies.
The center is where most of the energy resides, but this is mostly used to maintain the status quo, broken or not. There is an illusion in the center, being the 'holders of power', that everything held in check belongs to the center and is of the center's doing.
But it came from an edge. The refusal to listen to the fringe is everyone's limitation.
I understand your position in trying to help more fringe lefties gain some ideas for relative longevity and a platform for their positions: but the center swallows the edge, it's very nature being conformity to the center.
Much better that we allow fringe political players to be their own entities (within reason and civility) as a think-tank for the center – as it has always been, but let's be honest about who's doing all the thinking.
The people with real problems to solve – or the well to do?
…who's doing all the thinking. The people with real problems to solve – or the well to do?
I don't find thinking and questioning and willingness to consider other less-materially-successful peoples viewpoint among the well to do. Not as a rule.
You have to step aside and view things objectively, wonder about how it is for others, listen to their tales and then wonder about what led them there. The amount of wondering that people do, of the different ways that people react to the same events and treatment, all helps to get a depth to relating to others. Most well to do are too busy managing their resources, and choosing ways to observe things or do things important to their group to sit and wonder.
Running in marathons is a perfect example. A totally unimportant activity, a personal challenge to skite about, and very much about self and proving yourself not lazy and meeting some herd convention. Why don't people raise to merit the groups going out to cut down old mans beard suffocating forest for instance. That requires all the fitness put into a marathon; that would be the wondering herd in action, not the stampeding herd off on some psychological desire to prove themselves as good as the old pioneers.
"Running marathons is a perfect example" greywarshark, the same idiocy is involved in climbing the same mountain 10 times.
Feck, the airfares the costs and the energy could have built several tiny homes.
Climbers are held up to us as heroes. Edmund Hillary was, because he followed up with meaningful humanitarian efforts. Now it is a mighty money churn and less than edifying.
Many who are well off do not see their wealth, because they "Don't have a ……." (put a toy in there).
The edge is where the action occurs. New ideas, new genes, new philosophies.
Agreed. But keep in mind that only a small fraction of new ideas turn out to be good ideas. Radicals always risk going too far in their search.
The center is where most of the energy resides, but this is mostly used to maintain the status quo, broken or not.
Again agreed, yet keep in mind that while the status quo is always flawed and imperfect, we still depend on it for our daily survival. Yet as you say when it refuses to listen, the centre stagnates and becomes tyrannical.
The edge is represents the new, the unknown and the unstable, while the centre is the opposite. While both domains have their natural inhabitants, they also both need each other. They need to trade.
When you're mixing ingredients preparing to cook something, you keep adding and blending, repeating that till the mix is in right proportions needed for a good outcome. We need better chefs, cooks and kitchen hands following better practices if we want to lift our standards and then share out the buns fairly. That way we wouldn't get egg on our own faces or want to decorate the faces of supposed smart leaders.
Difference between a chef and a cook is a chef knows how to shop better. Asians by far have a far superior cultural tradition of low end deliciousness because across the Asian continent food has been far more democratised than in the west. In Asia cooks don't have to make difficult choices because the produce is so cheap to source and buy. In Asia it is possible to pick up a delicious hot sit down meal for 50 cents served to your table. In the west the well housed and well fed have a far greater cultural tradition of deciding who gets to eat and who doesn't.
In the 80's jokes was the currency of the work place smoko room. In the 90's not so much and in the naughties the lunch room turned into a sour affair as work breaks became less and less and productivity up and up. No one has the instincts to tell a joke any more. The people that make up The Labour Party flow in and out of ministerial offices, they are no longer selected from the people who know something about society so Labour lacks those democtratic instincts and must rely on committee groups to come up with ideas and working groups to hold there hands as they run the country.
Even though Labour are after higher wages and higher health they recognise the injustice of what Māori went through because they still have a beating heart. That kind of Labour Party will serve New Zealand particularly well. If MPs can teach themselves the big things then they'll have the instincts to know how things are run and then those smarties won't need pollsters. Although we can't whined the economy back to the 80's we've got a changing industrial relationship and every one doesn't wear the old high school knock around shoes anymore. We do have a different economy today. The same instincts are around and we've got to have more of that in The Labour Party and we've missed doing that in the last 15-20 years.
Yes, I fully agree with your reasoning & analysis. I'm still on the edge, in respect of investigating new thinking continuously, but I plonked one foot in the establishment at the start of '75, to have a career, and ended up straddling both realms, uneasily.
I've always found most Greens too mainstream in their thinking, for instance. Yet to get consensus, I had to work constructively with them. Overcoming my natural distaste for compromising essential principles was always hard, yet the sustained effort got us into parliament, and the compromises our reps in parliament have had to make are similar to mine in those respects.
So nowadays I advocate a consensus praxis to overcome partisan divides, and am pleased that we finally have a government actually doing that. Still, we must keep pushing for more innovative thinking around governance. The world needs that, not just us here in Aotearoa!
The launch this week of the book Whale Oil understandably put Cameron Slater and his dirty blogging at the centre of attention. But he has been in some cases paid and aided, abetted and used by a number of accomplices.
Someone who has been closely associated with Slater in his sustained attacks on Matt Blomfield is an ex-business associate of Blomfield’s, Marc Spring. If anything he has done more for longer than Slater.
One way Spring has kept attacks going against Blomfield) is his use of many identities in his online activities.
How many identities? That’s hard to quantify, but it’s many. my guess is well over a hundred identities, if not many more.
I identified over 40 in an eight month period on just one blog.
There have probably been some here.
Use of multiple pseudonyms is deceptive, and is bad for the many people who legitimately and reasonably use a pseudonym, as id discredits the use of pseudonyms generally.
That is very informative and insightful pete george. Thank you. We do have to keep watch for the evil people that are round, sort of have sensitive traps in our minds that register particular types of thought and action; a bit like traps for insects and predators that can be so deadly for our food sources.
Having seen of some of his antics over the years your description sounds pretty right. You could have used the word 'multiple' in front of obsessive.
It's interesting describing the behaviour and the personality in proper scientific, psychological terms. The easiest thing would be to say things like 'dirty, lowdown, scumbag piece of shit."
Here are Marc Spring identities that have been used on various blogs and media comments forums.
ThreeMonkeys
SHAFT
The Ape
NOT MIKE
4077th
Gweg pwesland
pimp
phillip
DaveG
slicedcheesesandwich
Justice4Matt
BLOMFIELDS EX BIZ PARTNER
Harry ‘Gold Star’ Stottle
Harry Stottle
to HELL in a handbasket
The Assasin
David Jessop
CHEEKY DARKY
the MONKEYS RAINCOAT
Elton
Samantha Hays
The Barber
They Walk, they talk, they harm
THE PRIEST
Hannibal Lecters Psychologist
Inspector Clouseau
Rod
I HAVE THE HARD DRIVE
MARC NEVER FORGETS CUNT
I AM OWED TOO
THE WORST NIGHTMARE
When dies Bankrupt = Businessman
Jean
Bus Driver
LORD DONKEY
Harvey Specter
TYRANT/THE TYRANT
HUSTLER
BUCK WIT
Shagger
Gimp of Greenhithe
Spiderman wants his mask back
RAMBONE OF RAMBONIA
Reaper Crew
Gay Mo
Rolf Harris
Bill Brown
Reaper Crew
The last one is one of I believe a number he has used at LF.
Isn’t that one of those psychological word-association tests to unearth deep psychological trauma, damaged or stalled identity development, and psychopathic tendencies?
I suppose this has already been noted here. Amy Adams of National accusing Labour Coalition of playing 'petty politics' in changes to the convention of the pre-Budget practices. WTF when Simon B does it, it is okay – he is just testing the government by breaking reasonable agreements.
I should think that Labour Coalition was actually trying to prevent National doing more of their petty measures and turning what was a serious financial presentation into a Punch and Judy show.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1905/S00287/government-playing-petty-politics-with-budget-day-process.htm
National’s Finance spokesperson Amy Adams says. 29 May 2019 “While media and other parties are given three and a half hours to examine the Government’s accounts before they are released, National is only allowed 60 minutes. Because of this we need a wide range of subject matter experts to review their areas. Last year we had 16 of our team present and to have this arbitrarily halved this year is unreasonable and petty, particularly when we are told this year’s Budget will look very different to previous years.
Ah but that can be played out as part of a Conspiracy against National.
And perhaps the room was further from the toilets – another form of harassment. Gnats are really sick in the mind, and it says something too about the people who keep voting them in, keep supporting them, keep listening to the diatribe from the bellicose broadcasters providing them with a comforting blanket of words for the day that the Right Crowd can repeat to prevent any uncomfortable thoughts from filtering through the Matrix.
I notice a lot of Rudyard Kipling’s poem ‘If’ is pertinent. If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:
And even that wording can be bent and used against you by the RW and some from the Left as well. And that is dealt with in those lines also. A meaningful poem. https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46473/if—
Fascinating in-depth documentary on the influence of cannabis in the Bible. It seems the word cannabis was Scythian in origin and it was they who traded and spread it throughout Eurasia. The Greeks called it by the same name while the Jews called it Kaneh Bosm, each culture giving the plant a variation of the Scythian name. Like others, the Jews valued its ability to get high (restricted to the high priests, prophets and kings), nutritional value and use for hemp clothing.
Thanks for this john. I've been following this sad development and watching the entire fiasco unravel on every front. I used some strong language a few days back, and the light of this I don't resile from it one jot.
All I have is a voice
To undo the folded lie,
The romantic lie in the brain
Of the sensual man-in-the-street
And the lie of Authority
Whose buildings grope the sky:
There is no such thing as the State
And no one exists alone;
Hunger allows no choice
To the citizen or the police;
We must love one another or die.
I think what could help Assange is if someone from the RW speaks up who has perceptions of being decent and also concerned about USA keeping an appearance of having standards of behaviour that bear scrutiny. That person would suggest that it is a bad idea to not enable Assange's health so he can stand trial and not in the USA's best interests to allow Assange to fall seriously ill or worse.
The USA must try to keep its image alive of being a fair nation that behaves in a superior way to others and acts to keep the Peace in the World. So – something should be said and acted on in this manner and the UK can encourage that and show they have blood in their veins.
This?
'Though USA is very unhappy about the revelations of secrets that WikiLeaks supplied, it does not wish to harm the individual responsible as other lesser civilised countries would do. And so it is transferring Assange (to Australia, to a facility where he can recover his strength with wellbeing) until he is ready to face trial.'
That sort of thing. The USA won't have a high horse to look down from if they don't make an effort to repair their fraying image.
“They made him very ill by refusing him ANY access to life sustaining fresh air, exercise, sun/VitD or proper medical care for 6 YEARS of illegal Embassy detention
Kristinn Hrafnsson, WikiLeaks' editor-in-chief, wrote that "Julian's case is of major historic significance. It will be remembered as the worst attack on press freedom in our lifetime. The People need to voice their condemnation; it is their politicians, their courts, their police and their prisons that are being abused in order to leave this black stain on history. Please act now to avert this shame".
Unfortunately the mass campaign to vilify Assange has done its work.
Even on this supposedly progressive site, the attack lines are relentlessly repeated
"Melzer went on:
“In the course of the past nine years, Mr. Assange has been exposed to persistent, progressively severe abuse ranging from systematic judicial persecution and arbitrary confinement in the Ecuadorian embassy, to his oppressive isolation, harassment and surveillance inside the embassy, and from deliberate collective ridicule, insults and humiliation, to open instigation of violence and even repeated calls for his assassination.”
Trigger alert : sensitive souls may note this comes from Consortium News and includes information that may be contrary to dearly held beliefs
I looked at the letter writing to Assange at Belsem? Prison campaign, it advises to put in a plain sheet of paper and self addressed envelope with UK stamps for reply – of course he woud need a pen or pencil. I have not been able to find NZPost information about how to deal with pre-paid mail in other country's currency. At present I have a question placed yesterday about this but have received no email reply.
I asked about stamps or an international coupon which I imagine there should be available but who knows it seems to me that NZ Post is just managing down the business. If I could buy a pre-paid envelope rather than stamps – that would be practical. I thought they might have replied by now.
…deliberate collective ridicule, insults and humiliation… We have seen that on this site frequently and from people who one would expect to have been on the side of exposing the secrets of powerful people and countries willing to destroy others for their purposes.
For good people to do nothing…. Have I got time to be good, what with all the other things I give my time to, as well as my own living tasks for me, my family, friends and community? These sort of unworthy thoughts about my lack of action are I think echoed by quite a number.
We should be out in the streets for Assange, but the attention now is on climate change and receiving a living wage for those who are trying to hold society together and retain the advances that were gained by exhaustive social interaction last century.
Got to keep trying to do it all or the golden bulldozer driven by a robot with such a cheeky, lovable grin in such a cute hat, will scoop us all up. Ever looked at the photos of naked bodies being thrown into burial pits in Holocaust archives? That sort of thing has happened multiple times in even near history. Those images should be in everyone's minds; the reality of what we can do when we have our mind setting on the mark of Cold, Hard, Unfeeling, Uncaring, Unrespecting, Unloving, and Choose your level of Evil – Eager, Sometimes, Neutral, Not sure, Wrestling against it every day.
I'm sorry – I do go on. I understand if its tl:dr. But laying it out occasionally, how someone is feeling I think helps to understand what's going on in society for some people.
The problem is that life presently is so depressing – the constant flow of viciousness, unfairness, violence and the imbalance with meanness high and easy generosity so low; how to create a bright spot, some hope, some comfort takes mental energy, even requires mental exercises. And under austerity with a religious wash, joy is not allowed, unless it is preachy Joy in the Lord.
I am sure the Great Spirit-Creator would be satisfied to see us being just great humans showing respect and receiving it in return; trying to get on together and building a feeling of solidarity and strength to face off the nastiness. That's hard even when the basics of life are under control. I see this blog as a living personification? of what those here with goodwill are reaching for. That's why I get upset at repeat vicious put-downs and faux concerns that have a thorn in them. I can stand argy bargy from those who are trying like me to establish a buzzy beehive of ideas and co-operation to make up for the failings of the one in Wellington at present. I don't think though we will ever see a united group of all parties working for the good of NZ in Wellington. So I see it as important to keep talking about good things, and then doing something so that I don't end up feeling helpless and life a wet noodle. So will soon shut up and go and do something useful for me and have done something else already this morning so that's a tick for me.
We have to keep our eye on civility, honesty, kindness and practicality as these are needed in relationships all round the world. In NZ too many have been vaccinated with poisonous ideas, some sanctimonious, many adopting misanthropy and so finding it exciting to embrace robots (and possibly one day literally as well as figuratively).
On the contrary. I'd wager that every argument you've made this past 8 years that Assange's problems are 'self inflicted' is authoritatively debunked here:
Given that he starts with the "no charges" bullshit that is a mi-statement of the "no proceedings" argument that the british courts threw out of his original extradition hearings, that's a bold wager.
One of the hounds that pollute this site has unloaded another of his complacent, vicious, obscenity-larded tirades. The following captures his motivation just about perfectly…..
Abstaining from the witchhunt would have classed the dissenter as an enemy. Stalin was supported by fanatics, cynics, sadists and moral cowards.
—-Donald Rayfield, Stalin and His Hangmen: An Authoritative Portrait of a Tyrant and Those Who Served Him (Viking, 2004)
yeah the only reason I said anything was because it was just a matter of time before some self-important jerk wrote that people who have the unmitigated gall to suggest that people to be extradited for sexual assault proceedings shouldn't jump bail are "strangely silent".
So no, it changes nothing. He chose to abscond, that's his choice, he wears the consequences. If you're going to do that, copy Biggs or Papillon instead.
Ignoring the role Julian Assange has played in exposing America's misdeeds for some fantasy that Julian committed sexual assault probably has more evidence than the evidence against Julian Assange.
So you are still in denial about the bogus charges against Assange. We've got the rise in denial of routine law. A rise in denial about science, a rise in religious denial, and I'm talking about you, McFlock (lol) the amount of denial. The greater the denial> the greater the darkness.
You think the sexual assault investigation is bogus? Is that because you have any connection to the case, or just because google and confirmation bias have an unhealthy relationship in your mind?
It's because you excel at pointing at flaws in Julian Assanges arguments and are very quiet and deceptive about the flaws in the prosecutions arguments.
You are still only telling half of the truth. Consent laws was brought into Sweden so to charge adults with raping minors, not adults raping adults. If consent laws was punished as you would prescribe, McFlock 🙂 then the legal age of consent would be 30 or how ever old the victims you allege was raped by Julian Assange. That's it.
Because if your scenario has anything at all to do with Assange, my previous answer is sufficient. Otherwise there was no relevance to your comment at all and I incorrectly inferred the opposite.
In that case of course woman can say no condom no sex. What is unacceptable is a law intended for protecting minors against sex with out a condom because under Swedish law there had to be signs of physical harm, is then used to prosecute a crime from 7 years ago. And the definitions don't even fit current law.
You'd have to at least prove that your hypothetical occurred after the 2018 consent law changes. The rape allegations have already been thrown out of EU court once, woke lefties are just pleaing for them to be thrown out of a Swedish court a secound time.
I love Mezler's response to Jeremy Hunt's assertion that Assange had always been free to leave the Embassy.
After finding that Julian Assange displayed symptoms of “prolonged psychological torture,” UN Special Rapporteur Nils Melzer has traded barbs with the UK’s Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt over the WikiLeaks founder’s persecution.
This is wrong. Assange chose to hide in the embassy and was always free to leave and face justice. The UN Special Rapporteur should allow British courts to make their judgements without his interference or inflammatory accusations.
“The UN Special Rapporteur should allow British courts to make their judgments without his interference or inflammatory accusations,” Hunt added.
Melzer quickly fired back in a rather creative fashion, saying: “With all due respect, Sir: Mr Assange was about as ‘free to leave’ as someone sitting on a rubber boat in a sharkpool.” He also reiterated comments that the British justice system had failed to show the “impartiality and objectivity required by the rule of law.”
I'm equally sure that people here will still think his work with wikileaks should give him a free pass, even if they accept the verdict, if he's found guilty.
The charges are fantasy charges. The women with whom he had consensual sex were inveigled and bullied into this obscene travesty by the Swedish prosecutor, who was herself under duress from U.S. "diplomats."
If there were any credible charges against him, that would be another matter entirely. Your abuse of those who support this political dissenter and journalist is invalid.
Political asylum is a thing McFlock.Its not granted to avoid being charged with a crime.Unless there is strong suspicion the charges are politically motivated
They were criminals. Assange is a journalist, an exposer of and dissenter from official lies. Which makes him, of course, an extreme threat and a target for destruction.
He's a guy who jumped bail to avoid extradition to face allegations of criminal activity. Any journalism he might also have undertaken is irrelevant to that.
A bullshit argument that omits the crucial context. It's like blaming someone for breaking their leg jumping out of a third floor window and not mentioning the building was on fire.
Well, not mentioning that he claimed the building was on fire after the home-owners arrived home early and there were questions about whether he was legally permitted to be inside the room from which he jumped. Oh, and that so far the only fire discovered is in the fireplace, well-contained according to fire code standards.
By ambiguity I mean the woke have called Assage a rapist so such with out a conviction of rape that it's prejudiced any trail he may have. It's impossible for Assange to receive a fair trial now.
A bullshit argument that omits the crucial context.
I didn't mention the specific allegations or their context, but they're not exactly crucial to the point that he's a guy who jumped bail to avoid extradition to face allegations of criminal activity. Whatever claims Assange or anyone else has about the allegations being part of a dastardly if somewhat illogical conspiracy, they're just claims, and evidence-free ones at that.
Whatever claims Assange or anyone else has about the allegations being part of a dastardly if somewhat illogical conspiracy, they're just claims, and evidence-free ones at that.
So now you are claiming the Americans are only pretending to be making an extradition case against him?
The alleged conspiracy is that the Swedish extradition request was part of a plot to extradite Assange to the US. There's no evidence of such a plot, and it would have been a pointless plot anyway, as the US could have just requested his extradition from the UK – as it's now done.
Adrian, if you encountered someone so disgusting on the street, you'd probably ignore him. Don't expect a thoughtful or serious answer to your question.
Yes I know, but it can be amusing to try and follow their mental gymnastics in their convoluted answers sometimes, I guess I am saying they can some times be good for a cheap laugh….only if you are in the mood that is, otherwise they are just annoying and distasteful.
Kamenev and Smirnov walked to the execution chamber stoically. But Zinoviev clung to the boots of his guards and was taken down by stretcher. This was re-enacted several times at supper in Stalin’s dacha, the bodyguard Karl Pauker playing the part of Zinoviev—begging for Stalin to be fetched and then crying out “Hear, o Israel”—until even Stalin found the charade distasteful.
— Donald Rayfield Stalin and His Hangmen (Viking, 2004) page 270
Russian versions of McFlock, meanwhile, tut-tutted and said "Zinoviev inflicted it on himself."
Mprrissey better not to make the argument more distressing. This goes direct to a sensitive nerve of McFlock's and coughing up Stalin who was a mega maniac with a matching power complex is not helpful in the situation. Just disagree will you and not feed the fire. It upsets me my friend.
The point of comparison is the behaviour of Stalin’s henchmen. McFlock and several others on this forum are analogues of Karl Pauker, Lavrenty Beria and the other ghouls who delighted in the suffering of officially designated enemies.
Except that adding in "Russian versions of McFlock, meanwhile […]" shows that there is no "analogue" of me in the actual quote.
I get that you were trying to be a dick and compare Assange's self-chosen Ecuadorean Escapade with the deaths of twenty-odd million people in a totalitarian state run by a tyrant, but the English language (like the rest of reality) didn't quite fit your narrative.
Assange might have chosen most of his "Ecuadorean Escapade", but I doubt that he chose the ending, let alone subsequent events – these were imposed, and perhaps more difficult to foresee than the consequences of having "jumped off the bridge".
How the fuck did he think it was going to finish? Do cops stop chasing robbers once they reach "safe", all is forgiven? Would he get into a literal "diplomatic bag" and be put on a slow boat to Ecuador?
He had literal months to figure out his absconding plan, and that's what he came up with? No helicopter out to an Ecuadorian freighter 20 miles off shore? No yacht trip? No disguise, false identity, or escape tunnel from the embassy? No, let's take a car ride into the middle of London and stay there.
As well as repeatedly firing the word “rape” around, despite its complete inappropriateness, this tick "McFlock" keeps trying to associate a journalist and political dissident with robbers—yesterday he used the examples of Ronald Biggs and Papillon, for pity's sake.
I guess when you've chosen your line, no matter how wrongheaded and demonstrably false it is, you're committed to it. George W. Bush was like that. And his deputy Tony Bliar. And “Honest John” Howard.
Nah … rape is the bogus charge that was cooked up for political purposes. Every sane reading of the events around his association with the two Swedish women, both before and after, and during the initial interviews … absolutely do not suggest coercion or assault. The first investigator concluded 'no crime of any kind'.
It was only after he left Sweden that someone had the bright idea that what happened could be twisted into this disgusting charade.
Any sane reading suggests that the facts as reported indicate he was at the very least reckless as to whether either of his partners were consenting to him not using a condom.
But you know that's all bogus, so fucking yay, I guess courts are unnecessary, with such omniscient beings amongst us.
It's my impression the vast majority of people, including me, who support Assange have always said that ideally the allegations should be tested in Court.
But everything about this case tells us nothing is ideal, nothing is normal about how this case has been laid and prosecuted. If this was really about Assange's 'recklessness' … and nothing else … he would have done exactly what he said he has stated all along, and traveled back to Sweden to clear his name at Court.
And Steve Jobs should have gone for recognised medical treatments sooner.
People react oddly to things, and in different ways. Sometimes it's panic, or ego, or denial/avoidance. Sometimes people say stuff for so long that they end up believing their own hype.
Could be any of those, could be that a mole in the FBI/CIA secretly emailed him the full outline of a plot to use these allegations to gitmo him, and he panicked and ran to the embassy. Or maybe that was the plan – send him an invented plot so he does something stupid like jumping bail.
Bullshit. For years you've been deflecting from the obvious, that the USA would use any opportunity to extradite him if possible. Assange could not know in advance exactly how, but he had every good reason to suspect that these 'rape' allegations were bogus and a ploy to get him into a legal jurisdiction more amenable to American pressure.
For years you pretended this was just a paranoid fabrication to avoid facing trial in Sweden … yet now the Americans have indeed played their hand openly and you have been proven factually wrong.
For years I've been saying that if he genuinely believed it was all a US plot, why flee from Sweden into the jurisdiction of America's closest ally?
And yes, they showed their hand – in UK courts.
And it's one thing to pretend Sweden is more "amenable" to extradtition to the US than the UK (which is an arguable point full of opinions and maybes), it's another thing entirely to say the Swedes are "amenable" to fabricating rape proceedings in order to be in a position to extradite to the US.
And if it's a genuine sex crime investigation, then he needs to face it.
look at the ones where the asylum seekers were seeking asylum from the country the embassy was in.
The happy endings lower drastically in proportion.
And that's if you call the Mariel Boatlift a happy ending.
Not sure the Cardinal’s experience was too happy, either. Got there in the end, but after how long? He must have not had a cat.
Your “cat” reference lends credence to Brigid’s comment @8.3.2.
Your ‘but’ negated your previous word and displayed your faux concern.
Enough with your disingenuous utterances.
The linked page lists seven examples where "asylum seekers were seeking asylum from the country the embassy was in." All the asylum seekers apparently got what they asked for, some sooner than others. You believe this applies to Assange – lol, “sad“.
2012: "He left after six days, and subsequently was allowed to go to New York with his wife and two children."
1989: "Noriega surrendered 10 days later after being assured he would not face the death penalty in the United States." A one-time useful ally of the US.
1989: "They lived in the embassy for 13 months before being allowed to go to the United States."
1986: Howard 'escaped' to Russia via their Finnish embassy.
1980: From the information given, it seems likely that the six Cubans granted asylum in Peru's Havana embassy 'got out'.
1966: "She returned to the Soviet Union in 1984, saying she wanted to reunite with her family. Her Soviet citizenship was restored but she left a year later to go back to the U.S. following a family feud."
1956: "lived in the U.S. Embassy in Budapest from 1956 until 1971, when he was allowed to leave for Vienna." The only example in that list of an asylum that lasted (much) longer than Assange's. The US honoured that request for asylum until he was allow to leave.
I think you need to look up Noriega, and what happened to him, and relations with the US before they invaded Panama.
Howard ditched his tail in the US and went to Helsinki, where he claimed asylum in the Soviet Embassy there. He didn't go from the Soviets' Washington embassy. The Finns didn't want him, the yanks did. Similarly, Stalin went to the US embassy in New Delhi. The Indians didn't want here, the Soviets did.
Cuba was happy to get rid of them, and everyone else. And some occupants of its jail cells and mental asylums. Mariel Boatlift.
And the US had skin in the game to protect the Cardinal. He was a PR bonus. He could easily have been abandoned if the chips had fallen the other way.
Assange was fleeing the UK, so went to the Ecuadorian embassy in the UK.
I.e. the location of the embassy and the country being fled were the same country.
That applies to the two Chinese instances (diplomatic horse-trading likely involved), the Cardinal (same), and the Cubans (which Cuba used to clear the country of dissidents and prisoners).
You cited those seven examples in response to my question:
Once granted, how do cases of asylum typically end?Sadly?
In those seven examples, no asylum seeker was forcibly removed from the embassy that granted asylum. Only Noriega was subsequently incarcerated, after extracting a guarantee and surrendering voluntarily.
If those historical cases are anything to go by then it seems to me that the way Assange's ayslum ended, and his subsequent treatment, are atypical – I'm happy for readers to draw their own conclusions.
Like, outside my work, there's a pigeon that got hit by a car in the street and is now a flat streak of feathery grease. I'm not cut up about it or anything, but as I drive over it there is a sombre reflection on all that we are and become. There's no glee that a disease-encrusted rat of the sky is no more. It was a thing, and now it is a dead thing.
That sort of level of sad, I guess. Where you do that sort of inward "tch" sound, maybe slightly shake your head, and then get on with your day.
"Treasury hacking: The time I hacked WINZ – Keith Ng."
Remember the fuss when Keith discovered the "hole" in WINZ? He did the right thing by informing WINZ about the "hole." Bridges didn't did he?
Imagine if you only saw the last part of the process. Imagine you didn't see the first 200,000 times where the security system blocked access, and you just saw the 200,001st attempt. You would simply see the hacker walk in and succeed at accessing the information. You might think there was no security at all.
ANZ New Zealand tries to fob it off as a minor error that occurred. Maybe they can find an ‘emotional junior staffer’ to take the blame. It most certainly wasn’t the Board.
The point is made that this is a fundamental issue of incompetence:
"In my view … this failure indicates that the board was/is not competent and also raises serious questions about the bank's management and reinforces my concern with the competence of the boards of the banks generally," McDonald wrote.
"It indicates a lack of knowledge, capability and responsibility in relation to the bank's risk parameters, which must be at the core of any banks competence."
…
"In my opinion, reflecting the false attestations alone, the chairman and chief executive of the bank should resign or be removed from role, as well as heads of risk, legal and compliance and at least two other directors should be 'retired' as part of a board 'refresh' to improve the overall competence of the board," he said.
The RBNZ is working in a plan to force the banks in NZ to hold more capital as a bulwark against future financial shocks. The banks have embarked on a campaign of fear-mongering claiming that the RBNZ’s plan would act like “a handbrake” on our economy and ultimately lead to higher (borrowing) costs for customers.
The New Zealand Bankers Association's (NZBA) had commissioned a report by research organisation Sapere to counter the RBNZ’s plans.
The NZBA-commissioned report by Sapere said that the Reserve Bank's proposals focused on credit crisis, when generally in New Zealand when central authorities needed to step in to help the banking system, it tended to be because of poor management or governance, not an external shock. [my bold]
It seems to me that ANZ New Zealand is trying to have it both ways.
IRONY ALERT! Noelle McCarthy, who laughs at the suffering of political prisoners and sneers at human rights protestors, interviewed someone about "assholes" this morning.
RNZ National, Saturday 1 June 2019
After the 9 a.m. news the breathy, chirpy, Cork-accented Noelle McCarthy interviewed one John Walker, a Canadian who has made a documentary entitled Assholes: A Theory. According to his own publicity material, the film is "a direct response to psychology professor Aaron James' witty bestseller about why some people are assholes and how to deal with them – in an age when the trait seems to be on the rise."
The interview itself turned out to be neither particularly amusing nor insightful. At one point Noelle McCarthy chortled knowingly when he said: "Imagine the situation when one of these assholes is actually running your country!" Perhaps she was thinking of the situation in New Zealand from 2008 to December 2016.
The discussion was interesting, though, for what it left out: a sub-species of asshole who delights in the suffering of others. I sent the laughing hostess the following email….
You forgot the most disgusting assholes of all
Dear Noelle,
In your interview about "assholes" with John Walker this morning, neither of you mentioned a particularly noxious and heinous example of the genus, viz., those unspeakable individuals who laugh at the suffering of political prisoners.
Here's an especially repellent example of that kind of thing:
"Heh, heh, heh. Well someone else with not such a good view is Edward Snowden. [snicker] Looks like he’s STILL in the airport! … Y-y-y-y-yeeeeeessss, …. [snort] ….he he he! He’s still in hiding. He he he! …. He he he he he! Yes he is still in that terminal! …[snort]… He he he he he he! ….[snort]…. He’s got a choice! Venezuela, Bolivia or Ecuador! …. Bolivia would be hard with the altitude! …. "
Hopefully you can interview John Walker another time, and add that kind of vicious asshole to his list.
Thumbs down to Radionz for settling on ironic and cynical themes for one, and not promoting some of regular NZ journalists to the role of supporting workers which Noelle seems to be part of. Can we hear NZ voices more please, not all these British and other 5 Eyes imports who are lovely people except for one failing, they are taking a NZ place in their own country's media, and we must have better balance – aim for 80/20 perhaps.
"Political prisoner and outspoken critic of Kremlin boss Vladimir Putin, Yulije Asanjey has been locked up in one of Russia's worst prisons for many years and may now face death through deliberate neglect of his medical condition
Asanjey became famous in the 2000's through exposing Russian aggression and covert spy activities over several years
Initially imprisoned for what many regard as trumped up charges,Asanjey has been declared the victim of torture by leading UN rapporteurs and experts on torture.
Russia's notorious prison system has long had a deliberate policy of breaking down prisoners so that they either die or are rendered incapable of conducting an effective defence. Denial of access or very limited access to lawyers and medical attention is a common ploy
Journalists from all over the world have expressed their support of Asanjey.
Amnesty International , Human Rights Watch and press freedom campaigners have joined under the common banner Free Asanjey!
The US has applied far reaching economic sanctions on Russia, for its continued flouting of UN rulings and increasing crack down on the free press"
Aha got it. But it sounded so true, and is with a reversal of approach. I still think I should support Amnesty I but sometimes the way things are done is surprising. Is Amnesty British – they could pop up to No.10 and sort everything out quite quickly, no, now I think of it they are tied up in knots, choose your own version, over Brexit and also who will be the next Clown Jester for PM.
Here are some knots and how to tie them. This might be the most useful information that arises from the blog today.
Hi Jenny How. Another time that you rush off before telling us what it's about. I’ll set it up under a keyword presumed explanation but it’s discombobulated in it original transition to the post here.
Indeed, many a commenter here seems to think that TS is their personal playground in which they can play by themselves or have one-on-one fun & games. At the same time, they seem to be oblivious to the fact that they are being watched, so to speak, by many silent readers of the site.
Do Nations have the Right to protect their Citizens, their Laws, their Trade and their Freedoms. ?
Or do they have to put up with illegal and weird Hackers, and Uninvited camera men rumaging for so called "scandal reports" and free feeds day and night.
I think it is proper for a Nation to clean up its own numerous flaws, before pronouncing the wickedness of others.
One must say they are consistent though mustn't one! And apparently those with the 3 B's – Beach and bach, BMW and Boat – are quite happy to live in a sort of rotten borough.
I wouldn't be surprised if this has been up before but it sounds good., Stephen Fry on Brexit. Called Brexit: The End Game – The Hidden Money. It starts off with the info that Europe doesn't decide on how to spend UKs money.
He says "Britain can't take back control from the EU; because we never lost it. 99% of UK public expenditure is determined by the UK government." Immigration is different but Britain controls the major amount of immigration which is from outside the EU; 248,000 net migration compared to EU – 74,000 net migration.
We are embarrassingly unaware of how divided our societies are, and Brexit grew out of a deep, unexamined divide between those that fear globalization and those that embrace it, says social scientist Alexander Betts.
How do we now address that fear as well as growing disillusionment with the political establishment, while refusing to give in to xenophobia and nationalism? Join Betts as he discusses four post-Brexit steps toward a more inclusive world.
If anyone still believes there are adequate protections for people with disabilities within the End Of Life Choices Bill you really need to read Chris Ford's piece posted in Newsroom.
I know that this will put me in the same column as Christian conservatives who also oppose the legislation for moral reasons. Personally, this makes me feel very uneasy given that I hold otherwise progressively social liberal views on issues such as abortion and reproductive rights, LGBTI rights, women’s issues and indigenous issues, etc. Yet, I want to outline from a socialist, progressive and disability rights perspective as to why I have swung my support to the anti-euthanasia camp.
The turning point for me came about a month ago. I saw the report of a meeting hosted by disabled people’s organisation, People First (a group run by and for people with learning/intellectual disabilities) in the Central North Island. At that meeting, access to health care was discussed, as this is a key issue – particularly for people within this segment of the disability community – for whom find it difficult accessing care for many reasons, including attitudinal issues on the part of some medical professionals. This was exemplified by the stories shared at the meeting where some people – who had gone to hospital for treatment – had discovered upon reading their files that they had ‘no resuscitation’ orders attached to them. More problematically, these orders had not been requested by any of the disabled people or their families.
Rosemary, I'm sure your realize that there is no comparison between a decision not to prolong the artificial extension of a person's life and a decision to actively kill a patient.
I'm not sure the likes of David Seymour and Michael Laws appreciate the difference, which is a grave concern.
This passive euthanasia is happening at an ED near you.
My partner was bailed up by an ED supervising doctor with a clipboard a few weeks ago and was told in no uncertain terms that opting for the DNR option made perfectly good sense because, like, 'you know we'd probably break your ribs doing CPR, and you'd end up with pneumonia and its doubtful that ICU would take someone with your co-morbidities any way…' Sign here…
He had rather dramatically passed out. He was confused upon coming round. Yet two hours later and after a battery of health and cognitive function tests he was adjudged to be in tip- top health. They even noted that his leukaemia was so far in remission that heamatology considered him 'cured'. The only 'off' thing was strangely fluctuating blood pressure, which is so common as to be considered normal… for a C5 tetraplegic.
And it was the tetraplegia that tipped him into the 'we'd rather not bother resuscitating your sorry arse' category.
My man, by this time, had resumed normal function and proceeded to 'negotiate' with the clipboard carrying ED doctor with his sheaf of DNR forms that he expected them to try active resuscitation for at least 15-20 minutes.
Fashion needs to give way to having clothing and other goods to last decades and not mare minutes in in reality. I can remember when a new pear of jeans last 2 months and then split up the backside.
I say buying secondhand is were the NEW fashion trend needs to go it is all read happening in some Nordic Countries very cool trend that will help preserve our mokopuna futures.
I say making sure that the things we buy are made humanely and environmentally friendly ways that's is the way OUR future has to GO.
I say less is best we have heaps of consumer goods that we don't need that's bad for our future and environment juses blenders pie maker pancakes maker and many other goods that we actually do need.
The mental health and the health of our tamariki is of utmost importance.
I agree strongly with Mike's statement that thinking is taking to yourself.
I'm constantly examining past events finding the TRUTH of what occurred and why things occurred.
I agree that we need to give our tamariki confidence to nurture them tell them you love them every day and treating them with love also .I say disciplining correctly is giving them love if you can see tamariki making mistakes doing things wrong you must discipline them so they learn not to do dumb Shit and tell them you love them afterwards. conferdince is giving with aroha
Whanau Eco Maori did not like the way shonky was ruining Aotearoa I could see it a mile away his underarm plays.
This story proves it he is a cheat the 00.1 % cheat all the time as they know that a fraction of there money that they gain from cheating will buy them impunity
ANZ's board, led by the former leader of our country, had been signing off on an operational risk model (which works out how much capital the bank needs in case of a shock or economic downturn) that had actually been dumped in
The ANZ board is stocked with people who you might assume would know a thing or three about bank capital.
How did this come about? The Reserve Bank "had encouraged" ANZ to review its attestation process, through which bank directors assess whether the bank is complying with the conditions of its regulations. It was only after this nudge that ANZ discovered the problem.
But before you get hot about it, it's cool. The Reserve Bank made it hold more money in case of a rainy day rather than lend it out in profitable ways like mortgages.
When the Reserve Bank found out, it stripped ANZ of its right to calculate how much risk capital it will hold. Yes, it used to be able to decide this itself.
This means our biggest bank is required to hold a further $277 million, taking it to a total of about $760m in case of bad news.
Kerry McDonald was chairman of BNZ for 12 years until 2008 and also sat on the board of its owners, National Australia Bank from 2005 to 2008.
Ouchie.
Now, ANZ won't like this one bit. This ruling increases the minimum capital ANZ must hold by around 60 per cent.
As Simplicity founder Sam Stubbs has pointed out, one reason profits are so high here is the Australian owned banks have to provide less capital than locally owned banks to support their lending.
So this will hurt ANZ in the wallet. But with the chunky-profits these Aussie banks make here, I think ANZ (who earned a record profit a sniff under $2 billion in the last financial year just in New Zealand) will cope.
Unlike former BNZ chairmanKerry McDonald, who wrote to Reserve Bank governor Adrian Orr to call for heads to roll, I am neither amazed, nor surprised, at the penalty imposed on the bank. Thanks Dad.
He argues that Key, chief executive David Hisco, the highest paid bank executive in New Zealand who is currently off on sick leave, and several others, at ANZ should resign.
The bank's board had been signing this off for years, apparently without noticing if you give them the benefit of the doubt.
And it has to be said, Sir John Key wasn't there in 2014, 2015 or 2016 – joining the bank with his shiny new title smartly after leaving Parliament in 2017.
The board is stocked with people who you might assume would know a thing or three about banking. Ka kite ano p.s I smelt a korori
I agree with Sadiq Khan trump and his alt right m8 are shorting the world political they will make a big mess of our Papatuanuku and take human rights back a hundred years if the leftys don’t get up and stop them
Donald Trump is like a 20th-century fascist, says Sadiq Khan
The mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has compared the language used by Donald Trump to rally his supporters to that of “the fascists of the 20th century” in an explosive intervention before the US president’s state visit to London that begins on Monday.
Writing in the Observer, Khan condemned the red-carpet treatment being afforded to Trump who, with his wife Melania, will be a guest of the Queen during his three-day stay, which is expected to provoke massive protests in the capital on Tuesday
Khan said: “President Donald Trump is just one of the most egregious examples of a growing global threat. The far right is on the rise around the world, threatening our hard-won rights and freedoms and the values that have defined our liberal, democratic societies for more than 70 years.
It’s un-British to roll out the red carpet for Donald Trump
Read more
“Viktor Orbán in Hungary, Matteo Salvini in Italy, Marine Le Pen in France and Nigel Farage here in the UK are using the same divisive tropes of the fascists of the 20th century to garner support, but with new sinister methods to deliver their message. And they are gaining ground and winning power and influence in places that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago
Donald Trump is a populist and a nationalist of the largest economy and still most powerful country on earth. Khan is the current Mayor of one city, and an outsider within his own Labour Party.
Trump is not a Nazi, despite all the protestations of Madeline Albright et al. He's just a self-interested thug making bank for his family for a few years before he's turfed next year.
The hard right had their chance in the EU elections last week, and they showed they didn't have what it takes to storm the castle and start dismantling.
The Youth Rainbow community needs to be shown respect as all people do.
I say that the airline should be included in the plan to mitigate climate change this will make them chase alternatives powers for planes.
trump has to remember that every word he says bounces around the world media I sort of know what that is like.
The foxglacia council should have cleaned up the dump mess I say that they have had enough money to clean it up.
It's a hard task getting whare at the minute I would not like to try and rent a whare with tamariki these days you would need to no the owner or have a wand.
That's the way Julain championing the poverty of the Ugandan people and tamariki is bad ka pai M8.
Eco Maori say those people who have thrown darts at the Rainbow community are only thinking about their public profiles and not the damage they have done to the people of the Rainbow community.
Te Whare tu is helping keep tangata whenua O Aotearoa cultural going strong ka pai I get a sore face knowing that OUR culture is getting te mana back.
I totally agree us Maori men are portrayed as violent thefting thugs that really PISSs Eco Maori off thanks for making films that show Maori men in a cleaner light.
Cool I tau toko you for encouraging Maori to seek a higher education .
These are the people who rule our Papatuanuku I hope they can see that most people want a better future for there tamariki and NOW is the time to embrace the change if they don't jump on the Climate Mitigation Waka they will be left in OUR dust time to dump CARBON.
Security at the wharf was drum tight. Amid a sea of secret service personnel, Pompeo was accompanied by the US ambassador to Switzerland, Ed McMullen. The pair looked keen to continue the geopolitical strategizing over canapés.
The secretary general of Nato, Jens Stoltenberg, was flanked by heavily armed bodyguards as he strode along the jetty. He has attended the last three Bilderberg meetings, turning up for “informal discussions” with a watchful squad of security and staff
Bilderberg has a keen and growing interest in high-tech and AI. Schmidt’s fellow Bilderberg insider Peter Thiel, the billionaire founder of PayPal and a director of Facebook, was seen arriving with the Swedish physicist and AI expert Sara Mazur ka kite ano link below.
Its thanks to people like Blomfield who have the mana to stand up to people like Slater and don't let Slaters intimidating tactics scare them into staying silent.
If it wasn't for people like Blomfield we would not have found out about the $40.000 double dip by a well known MP.
People like Blomfield are few and far between quite rear so Eco Maori is asking everyone to tau toko Blomfield and BUY HIS BOOK he deserves the leftys tau toko.
The case was never about defamation. It has been a way that Blomfield could force his tormenter to verify the fantasies being presented as fact on his now disgraced blog. Slater failed and was finally impaled by a harpoon that he had unleashed, ultimately on himself
As the stories dragged on and I got to know Blomfield better, I told him not to worry. The lies told about him were not as appalling as the truth frequently told about me. But the lies were having a toll and this unwanted fight with a cyber thug with connections to the highest offices in the land was taxing what was an otherwise irrepressible spirit.
Blomfield, it needs to be said, and I am pleased to say it, isn't a man to be dissuaded by slander, intimidation or a gunman discharging a shotgun in his face. For seven years he took Slater and his cohort of degenerates through the long and painful process of a defamation trial.
The case was never about defamation. It has been a way that Blomfield could force his tormenter to verify the fantasies being presented as fact on his now disgraced blog. Slater failed and was finally impaled by a harpoon that he had ka kite ano link below.
Ka pai Pio for championing tiny houses and sustainable live off the land + clean energy solar power we need more tangata like you to champion the cause.
Our Mokopuna futures depend on people like us never giving up the cause.
TV personality Pio Terei is hatching a tiny house plan.
It was a plan that needed some research first. So he hopped on his electric bike and headed off to seek out some of the country's most innovative home owners; Kiwis who've chucked caution and convention to the wind to live sustainably and build the life of their dreams on their own terms. And boy, did he find them, dwelling in everything from teepees to whare uke, from container houses to earth ships.
Those encounters became Off The Grid,an eight episode TV series from Māori Television that aims to inspire viewers to give sustainable living a go. There's the sharing of practical advice and a few laughs along the way. Talking to him a couple of months before the show is set to air, it seems to have the actor, singer and comedian all fired up for a tiny house of his own
Ka kite ano links below P.S I know what you're name means kia ora
Kia kaha to the Youth climate activist it is your futures WE are fighting for go hard it makes me happy to see that the climate is taking center stage now after all the Strikes you have staged.
Youth climate activists set for nationwide rallies ahead of landmark case
Students in Austin, Texas, want you to veg out. Kids in Westport, Connecticut will screen a film. And in rural North Carolina, activists will draw on a toxic spill to commemorate the environmental justice movement. The slogan refers to the landmark court case in Oregon in which 21 youths are suing the United States government over climate change.
Named for Kelsey Juliana, a 23-year-old activist and college student, the case was filed in 2015 and is headed back to court on Tuesday. The campaign to raise its profile – dubbed #IAmJuliana or #AllEyesOnJuliana – is the brainchild of Our Children’s Trust, the organization behind the lawsuit, and Future Coalition, the not-for-profit network forged to empower youth after the Parkland shooting.
A youth activist on the climate crisis: politicians won't step up.
What’s unique about the campaign is what it signals: the infrastructure behind the youth climate movement is growing, decentralizing, and gaining momentum, all while activists set sights on the 2020 election
All of these rallies will be part of an international campaign on Saturday to spotlight environmental issues. Their message: Ka kite ano link below
Its cool to see more Wahine receiving houners congrats Grame you deserve your tohu houner I remember when the Kiwi players of old going hard At the Sea Eagles Billaria.
The Aviation industry has to change to green fuels or everyone will just use skipe for business meetings they will save money and carbon being burned to protect their children futures.
Its not on that the Richmonds have to fight for custody of their mokopuna from the man who killed their daughter.
Its good that Ken got his houner for his mahi of looking after men who have been abused .
Kia ora Patsy's for your honorable recognition of your services to he tangata.
I agree the tabaco taxs are hurting Maori in the hip pocket but the amount of people at the hospital with respiratory problems has dropped dramatically we need programs to help our people quit smoking.
Redcross needs more donations to help cope with the huge numbers needing their good help dig deep Whanau you can find the Red Cross site online.
Ka kite ano P.S I will put up a link to Redcross site
What to do to improve the public perception of the newly elected National party leader, when her performance so far has no doubt disappointed the expectations of her supporters? The answer is to get a National-supporting newspaper (the Herald) to organise a poll that could be guaranteed to provide an ...
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There are only a few days left to make a submission on Statistics New Zealand's consultation on sex and gender identity statistical standards. This represents a really important step for recognising the very real diversity of gender, including people with no gender, and ensuring everyone has the option to see ...
Since finishing the Cranky Uncle vs. Climate Change book, I’ve frequently dipped into that 176-page clip-art library, reshaping the cartoons to fit the 1920 x 1080 pixel format for Powerpoint presentations. I’ve also adapted many of the cartoons for the Cranky Uncle video series. Over the last few weeks, a few people ...
NewsHub Nation has launched a new podcast, "Supplementary Question". Their inaugural episode is about the OIA, and asks "is our most important transparency law fit for purpose?" While they interviewed Justice Minister Andrew Little and Ombudsman Peter Boshier for this, there's not actually a lot of them in there, and ...
Remember the Ruataniwha dam? The Hawke's Bay Regional Council wasted $14 million trying to push this environmental disaster through before the Supreme Court ruled that the land swap it relied on with DoC was illegal. At the end of it, they wrote off the money and sold the existing consents ...
For years we've had a housing crisis in New Zealand, driven by immigration-driven population growth and the market refusing to build enough houses (and enough of the right sort of houses) to meet it. As a result, people can't get homes, while Boomer landlords leech away their income and parasitical ...
Story of the Week... Toon of the Week... Coming Soon on SkS... Poster of the Week... SkS Week in Review... Story of the Week... Drawdown Review 2020: How To Address Global Warming In A Responsible Manner Source: Project Drawdown Project Drawdown is a non-profit organization that relies ...
Dr Tim Chambers, Prof Nick Wilson, Jayne Richards, A/Prof Simon Hales, Dr Mike Joy, Prof Michael Baker (author affiliations*)Increasing water-related health threats, notably the waterborne campylobacter outbreak in Havelock North, have highlighted failings in NZ’s regulatory system for drinking water. In this blog we consider how the new Water ...
Yes, an election is in the offing – and we all know that elections can be polarising, as parties of the left and right square off against each other. But we should not allow our party and political allegiances to obscure the fact that, in a properly functioning democracy like ...
Dr Sommer Kapitan, Auckland University of Technology, and Dr Patrick van Esch, Auckland University of TechnologyThe Smokefree Environments and Regulated Products (Vaping) Amendment Bill will limit vape sales at dairies and service stations to only three flavours, and make vaping illegal in smokefree areas. Vaping laws will be more ...
A chronological listing of news articles linked to on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week: Sun, Aug 2, 2020 through Sat, Aug 8, 2020Editor's ChoiceFive Years After Speaking Out on Climate Change, Pope Francis Sounds an Urgent AlarmThe encyclical ‘Laudato Si’ motivated many people ...
From some quarters, incessant scaremongering. From others, it’s a full-on tilt into touching the alarmist buttons a little too readily (uncertain times make for very captive audiences with this angle of attack). The (so-called) Opposition (and merely regarding them as that seems to be a far looser term now ...
National Party leader - Judith CollinsElections often bring out the best and worst in politicians. Some rise to the occasion and provide us with a clear vision for the future. While others wallow in resentment and controversy, over-relying on attack politics to try to attain the interest of voters.That’s been ...
The attempts to sabotage Corbyn's leadership seems likely to do more damage than Corbyn supposedly ever could have done, even if all the stories about him were true:I was reluctant to say anything but this is too important, the full story needs to be told.Don’t let anyone ever tell ...
Good day to everyone. I’ve been asked by Mr Thinks to come here and talk to you all about my concerns regarding the government response to Covid-19. We’ve been living through this pandemic for, what seems like, years. Years and years and years. Why else would the National Party have ...
‘Good Economics for Hard Times’ should be on your reading list. New Zealand does not have a Minister of Labour. It has Ministers of Immigration and Workplace Relations and Safety but there is no minister with responsibility for the labour market. That responsibility was abolished in 2012 when ...
Back in the Kyoto era, the international climate change regime included a Clean Development Mechanism to fund emissions reduction projects in developing nations. Essentially someone would certify that a project - e.g. building a windfarm, or installing energy-efficient lightbulbs - would reduce emissions over and above "business-as-usual". The project would ...
As the classic MMP cartoon goes, just look at who is against it. Yesterday, the Hamilton City Council voted to use STV for its next two local body elections. The move was initially opposed by deputy mayor Geoff Taylor. The reason? Because a voting system which provided accurate representation and ...
On Wednesday evening (which in Parliament’s weird world technically was still Tuesday because urgency had been taken and so time stood still), MPs united to remove a pretty terrible piece of law from our statute books. No real fanfare or fireworks accompanied this action. Indeed, I didn’t even know about it ...
By Geoffrey Miller Prominent refugee advocate Murdoch Stephens says he is disappointed by Judith Collins’ reaction to Immigration New Zealand’s decision to grant refugee status to Kurdish-Iranian writer Behrouz Boochani. Judith Collins told media last month that “there’s a lot of concern in New Zealand about what they see as ...
Hello all. Judith here to talk about how National are going to take the election in September. The National Party prides itself its unity and cohesion. We are working together to deliver for New Zealanders. First of all, ee are a strong team. We are a very strong team. Our ...
Parliament has just begun the adjournment debate, signalling the effective end of this Parliament. So it seems like an appropriate time to assess Labour's term in office. Unfortunately, its a pretty dismal assessment. Labour campaigned on one thing: change. Not just a change in who got the top jobs and ...
Our climate change policies are insufficient to achieve our goal of carbon neutrality by 2050, according to independent assessor Climate Action Tracker: New Zealand won’t be carbon neutral by 2050 without much stronger policies, says an independent analysis by Climate Action Tracker. The non-profit highlighted a lack of active ...
That was clearly a huge explosion. Just after the explosion, we see a cloud of ‘fog’ moving outwards at high speed. This is a shockwave, rather similar to that which causes a sonic boom. The ‘fog’ is caused by water condensing from the atmosphere in areas of intense low pressure ...
Can we postpone this year’s election? Quite frankly, the political parties don’t seem ready for it, and aren’t about to offer voters the necessary policy choices for the unprecedented times we’re in. We’ve ended up with a campaign focused on scandal, personality and leadership, with a policy void that’s worse ...
It is the last sitting day of Parliament, and the last question time before the House is dissolved. So, are there any questions about the damning findings of the Hit and Run inquiry, and how the government plans to bring the military back under democratic control? Of course not. ...
Property speculator - John KeyThe National Party must be in dire straits to have to rely on John Key to campaign on their behalf. Not only has the former PM been in the news claiming the recently released unemployment figures aren’t accurate, the fool has also been promoting the opening ...
Nothing Too Drastic: Few would dispute that the Left, today, are few in number. Is their failure to make the public aware of and act upon the manifest failures of the present system attributable to their lack of active energy and intelligence? Or, is it simply because the Left’s ideas ...
by Don Franks This talk was given to the Wellington Anti Capitalist Alliance, fifteen years ago. The ultimate weapons of mass destruction so far seen on this planet have been used just twice, 60 years ago this month. August 6 and August 9 1945 witnessed the US atomic bombing ...
After I noticed that my name had been taken yet again in vain by my friendly antagonist Tom Hunter over at No Minister, I went over to see what the fuss was about. Nothing much, but then I discovered a post about the Operation Burnham Inquiry by Psycho Milt. I ...
The COVID-19 Public Health Response Act 2020 was extended today, until December 1st or the tenth sitting day following the resumption of Parliament after the election. It seems like a necessary extension. While we currently have eradicated the virus in New Zealand, it is still banging at the door, and ...
One of the government's key policies - extracted by NZ First as part of its coalition agreement - is the "Provincial Growth Fund": $1 billion a year spent on creating jobs in rural New Zealand. Yesterday the Auditor-General issued a report on the fund, finding that it lacks transparency, and ...
The Warehouse, one of New Zealand's biggest retailers, has decided to stop selling coal. Good. Coal is a dirty, polluting fossil fuel, and the less of it we have out there, the better. Retailers choosing not to sell it sends a clear message that this is not a fuel we ...
The labour market statistics have been released, and they show that unemployment actually dropped last quarter. All told, there are 111,000 unemployed - 15,000 fewer than when the government took office. But before anyone thinks that the pandemic hasn't put people out of work, remember that this is for ...
Judy KavanaghI’m OK with wearing a CovidCard. But are you? There’s no point me doing it alone.The author modelling a (fake) CovidCard. I didn’t know much about the CovidCard proposal until I read Dave’s latest blog post. You would wear the card visibly on your person. It ...
Climate Explained is a collaboration between The Conversation, Stuff and the New Zealand Science Media Centre to answer your questions about climate change.If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, please send it to climate.change@stuff.co.nzWhy can’t I use the battery from my electric car ...
As many good things come in threes (as the saying goes), we are happy to announce a third partnership between Skeptical Science and other websites. Fakebook.eco in Brazil is joining Klimafakten.de in Germany and Nauka o Klimacie in Poland to leverage translated rebuttal material and to make the information readily available in other ...
This interview on RNZ with Ross Tucker, the scientist who headed a review of transgender athletes playing in women’s rugby, discusses the findings of the review and what it means for women in sports. The review that World Rugby undertook had a broad range of independent experts and included a ...
Siouxsie WilesThe restrictions in place for metropolitan Melbourne now are in some ways stricter than those that were in force during New Zealand’s COVID-19 lockdown. A curfew is in place and most people have to wear masks when they leave their home – neither of which happened in New ...
On Friday the Hit and Run inquiry delivered a devastating report which found that NZDF had systematically misled Ministers over civilian deaths. The report called into question civilian control of the military (and indeed, military control of the military), a fundamental principle of our democracy. So you'd expect our politicians ...
Let's Do This Again: What else can Jacinda do in a political environment so bereft of imagination and courage but seek a continuance? If she trades upon the extraordinary personal qualities that she has, miraculously, carried with her into the office of Prime Minister, then I, for one, will offer ...
How corrupt are the New Zealand Police? This corrupt: On 10 February 2019, Police attended a family harm incident. The suspect attempted to run the attending officers over in a driveway with his car, narrowly missing them, before fleeing the scene. A short pursuit followed, ending when the suspect stopped ...
Parliament's triennial Review of Standing Orders was released today, and it contains a number of welcome, if minor, improvements. The ones that caught my are: A move to encourage "pre-legislative engagement" - the government consulting widely on legislation before it is introduced - by promising easier passage (e.g. with ...
Lauren Vargo, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of WellingtonGlaciers around the world are melting — and for the first time, we can now directly attribute annual ice loss to climate change. We analysed two years in which glaciers in New Zealand melted the most in at least four ...
Caroline Shaw, Anja MizdrakE-bikes are everywhere. Sales are booming and predicted to overtake sales of new cars in a few years. There were three times as many e-bikes and e-scooters imported into NZ in 2019 alone as there are e-cars in the entire country. You can’t go out in ...
New Zealand First is facing a difficult struggle to get re-elected, but Josh Van Veen, who was once a researcher for Winston Peters, argues that there is still a very significant section of cultural conservatives who oppose mass immigration and political correctness and might yet be won back over to ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Karin Kirk Many Americans these days seem unable to avoid controversy on practically any topic, so why not embrace the discord and wade into the especially volatile arena of nuclear energy? Advocates claim it’s the only way to meet global climate goals, ...
Can we trust New Zealand’s military? There must now be serious doubt, given the landmark report released on Friday concluding the investigation into allegations made in the book Hit and Run by Nicky Hager and Jon Stephenson about a 2010 SAS killing raid in Afghanistan. The most recent Colmar Brunton ...
In New Zealand, we've just had the report of the Hit and Run inquiry, which found that a New Zealand led raid had accidentally killed civilians, including a child. meanwhile, around the same time, the British SAS was conducting its own raids in Afghanistan, and theirs were a hell of ...
In addition to establishing a process for setting emissions reductions plans, the Zero Carbon Act established a process for managing the risks of climate change. The first part of this is the preparation of regular risk assessments, looking at the risks to our economy, society, environment, and ecology. The first ...
Over on The spinoff, Amnesty International's Meg de Ronde has a response to Friday's release of the Hit and Run report. And in response to Attorney-General David Parker's claim that the government was being "transparent" by releasing the report, its titled "we shouldn’t have to work this hard to get ...
Story of the Week... Opinion of the Week... Toon of the Week... Coming Soon on SkS... Poster of the Week... SkS Week in Review... Story of the Week... Rising Seas Could Menace Millions Beyond Shorelines, Study FindsAs climate change raises sea levels, storm surges and high tides will ...
There's an election next month, so you'd be expecting political parties to be telling us what they stand for and what they'd do if they'd win. But while the Greens have given us a detailed policy platform, and National has talked about roads and austerity, Labour, currently leading the polls ...
"Who's youse accusin' of innference?" Without the timely intervention of a team of top American political consultants and campaign experts, Boris Yeltsin would never have won his second term as President of the Russian Federation. The Russians waited 20 years to return the favour.WHEN IT COMES to the disinformation game, ...
As polling day in the American presidential election draws closer, things are looking bad for Donald Trump. The polls show that he is tracking well behind his Democrat rival. Most people assume that the President will be striving might and main to avoid what looks increasingly likely to be a ...
Our health professionals do an amazing job. Image credit: Wikipedia – Cardiac surgery. Finally, I have got back to these rankings. A long period in hospital and computer problems meant the June 2020 rankings were abandoned. Now, with a new personal defibrillator implanted in my chest and a new hard ...
A chronological listing of news articles linked to on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week: Sun, July 26 through Sat, Aug 1, 2020Editor's ChoiceThe four types of climate denier, and why you should ignore them allThe shill, the grifter, the egomaniac and the ideological ...
Over the last few days, reports have emerged of people travelling from New Zealand and testing positive for Covid-19 upon arrival at their destination. First in South Korea and now in Australia. What might these positive tests mean?They’re false-positives As Toby Morris and I have explained before, there are ...
Former National Minister - Wayne MappYou could tell that the Hit and Run book by investigative journalists Nicky Hager and Jon Stephenson was right on the money by the way former National Party Minister of Defence, Wayne Mapp, reacted to its now largely vindicated claims.Even though the recent inquiry into ...
So, the Hit and Run inquiry has reported back, and found some appalling shit at NZDF and NZSIS. And while they quibble a few of the details - the name of a dead child - they basicly uphold Hager and Stephenson's version of events. The SAS went to those villages. ...
We are failing to think though the interdependencies in an economy. We miss economist Bryan Philpott (1921-2000). I miss him personally – we used to have such great discussions – but this column is about how the nation misses his economic experience and wisdom. We tend to ...
Michelle Boag - LeakerThe Heron report (PDF) was released yesterday, and it was a bit disappointing to say the least. It correctly found that former National Party president Michelle Boag and National Party MP Hamish Walker were politically motivated in leaking peoples private medical information, but didn’t look further into ...
Adam Smith, Massey UniversityA recent global assessment of shark populations at 371 coral reefs in 58 countries found no sharks at almost 20% of reefs and alarmingly low numbers at many others. The study, which involved over 100 scientists under the Global FinPrint project, gave New Zealand a good ...
On different trajectories and from different ends of the political spectrum, last night’s One News/Colmar Brunton poll has the Green Party and ACT converging around the five percent mark. And, as odd as it may sound, they head into the election campaign with a lot in common.Putting the Greens and ...
Janet Stephenson, University of OtagoA proposed multibillion-dollar project to build a pumped hydro storage plant could make New Zealand’s electricity grid 100% renewable, but expensive new infrastructure may not be the best way to achieve this. New Zealand’s electricity generation is already around 80% renewable, with just over half ...
Truth In Advertising: Labour, it would seem, is the party that knows nothing about running the economy right up until the moment that it does. HOW DID LABOUR acquire its reputation for being a poor economic manager? As with most things political and historical, it’s a long story.In the beginning, the ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections Government rulemakers looking to decide how much money to spend to avoid adding more greenhouse gases to the atmosphere need a good estimate of what a warming climate will cost in social damages, for example through more extreme weather events. That point makes ...
It's campaign time! The official countdown to Election Day is underway, with Labour supporters crowding into Auckland's Town Hall for our 2020 Campaign Launch. We recap some of the highlights below ...
It's campaign time! The official countdown to Election Day is underway, with Labour supporters crowding into Auckland's Town Hall for our 2020 Campaign Launch. We recap some of the highlights below ...
We've announced that we will expand the Flexi-wage programme to support up to 40,000 more people into work, or to help them start their own business. It's yet another way we're helping keep our economy moving by getting people into work and training. Read on to find out more ...
Business subsidy of on average $7500, and up to $22,000, to hire unemployed New ZealandersUp to 40,000 jobs to be supported by $311 million investment in keeping New Zealanders off the unemployment benefitRing-fenced fund to help unemployed start their own business ...
This week was the last of the 52nd Parliament: a major milestone for our Government and a great opportunity to look back at all the progress we've made for New Zealanders. This week, we increased support for businesses to take on apprentices, improved access to hospital care in Northland, and ...
Kia orana and kia ora koutou katoa. It is a privilege to be able to speak in this adjournment debate and to mark and acknowledge the fact that we are now two years and 10 months into the conclusion of a parliamentary term that has been extraordinary in so many ...
On 1 August, we marked the anniversary of Jacinda Ardern becoming the Leader of the Labour Party. On that day in 2017, Leader Andrew Little nominated Jacinda Ardern to succeed him and lead the party to victory.Now, three years on, we look back at some of the key moments ...
With the June 2020 quarter showing underemployment increasing, the Green Party is calling for a Guaranteed Minimum Income and an increase to the abatement threshold to ensure everyone has a dignified income. ...
We went hard and we went early in our health response to COVID-19, and we did everything we could to cushion the economic impact too. In fact, we can fill every letter of the alphabet with the steps we took to fight COVID-19 and ensure we were in a position ...
Investing in our people, backing businesses, and upgrading infrastructure and housing throughout the country - it's been another week of progress for New Zealanders as we deliver our plan to recover and rebuild. ...
July was another busy month, packed with key investments aimed at progressing our economic recovery as we rebuild New Zealand. We extended support for businesses, helped create jobs through local infrastructure projects, and kept working to clean up our waterways so Kiwis can access safe clean water. Check out the ...
The Green Party is calling for the Defence Force Chiefs in place between 2010-2017 to front up and explain how dishonesty, process and policy failures within the Defence Force led to ‘a series of incorrect statements in briefings to ministers and public releases’ regarding alleged breaches of international torture prevention ...
Thanks to our strong health response, New Zealand’s economy is more open than many other countries. But as COVID continues to surge around the world, the economic consequences of the virus will continue to be a challenge, which is why we have a detailed plan to help New Zealand bounce ...
Thanks to our strong health response, New Zealand’s economy is more open than many other countries. But as COVID continues to surge around the world, the economic consequences of the virus will continue to be a challenge, which is why we have a detailed plan to help New Zealand bounce ...
The Government is stepping up action to deal with environmentally harmful products – including plastic packaging, tyres and e-waste – before they become waste. ...
The Green Party are ensuring that New Zealanders who were overseas when COVID-19 hit will not be charged for the cost of isolation or quarantine if they return home to live. ...
It's been another week of creating jobs, supporting local businesses, and investing in infrastructure up and down the country - all of which are helping to keep our economy moving post-COVID-19. ...
Law changes to end tenure review and provide for better management of Crown pastoral lands in the South Island high country were considered by Parliament today with the first reading of the Crown Pastoral Land Reform Bill says Minister for Land Information, Eugenie Sage. ...
The Green Party have secured legislative amendments in a bill expected to pass third reading this week, to ensure better rules for school teachers and staff, so they can de-escalate children with diverse needs and cognitive differences, such as autism, rather than using unnecessary and often traumatising force. ...
A report undertaken by Ministerial Services into Iain Lees-Galloway’s ministerial expenditure has found no evidence of any inappropriate transactions or spending. Ministerial Services undertook a line by line review of all his expenditure, including staff and spouse expenses for the period 1 January 2019 to 30 June 2020. “I commissioned ...
Managed isolation charges for returnees will come into force from 12.01am Tuesday 11th August, after they passed their last cabinet milestone today, Housing Minister Megan Woods said. “The new charging system balances the rights of New Zealanders to return home and helps reduce pressure on the managed isolation and quarantine ...
The Prime Minister of New Zealand Jacinda Ardern and the Prime Minister of the Cook Islands Henry Puna have welcomed the completion of phase one in the establishment of a travel bubble between New Zealand and the Cook Island. Negotiations on the text of an ‘Arrangement to Facilitate Quarantine-Free Travel ...
The Government has launched a new online, phone and onsite service to help New Zealanders connect to a range of employment support and products for workers and businesses affected by COVID-19, announced Minister of Education Chris Hipkins and Minister for Social Development Carmel Sepuloni. Connected.govt.nz is a one-stop-shop for jobseekers, ...
Security guards contracted to the Ministry of Social Development will be paid at least the Living Wage from next month supporting the Government’s commitment towards fair pay and employment conditions, announced Minister for Social Development Carmel Sepuloni. “MSD was among the first government agencies to pay its employees the living ...
The Minister of Conservation Eugenie Sage today launched Te Mana o te Taiao, the Aotearoa New Zealand Biodiversity Strategy - a way forward that envisions Aotearoa New Zealand as a place where ecosystems are healthy and resilient, and people embrace the natural world. “Many of New Zealand’s plants and wildlife species ...
“Pacific languages, cultures and identity are essential to the health, wellbeing and lifetime success of our Pacific peoples and their communities in Aotearoa. The strength and resilience of Pacific Aotearoa is not only vital to their own prosperity but integral to the prosperity of all New Zealanders, and is particularly ...
· $38 million to help schools cover unexpected costs related to COVID-19 · $69 million upgrade for online learning · $107 million contingency funding to support school construction suppliers facing additional costs due to the lockdown. The Government is releasing $214 million from the COVID-19 response and recovery fund to ...
Despite the Government installing safety upgrades around the country, people should still take care around rail crossings, said Transport Minister Phil Twyford launching Rail Safety Week. Phil Twyford said installing safety infrastructure is crucial, but we are encouraging people to be more careful around trains too. “We’re making good progress ...
The Government is providing a cash injection to help Palmerston North City Council complete a programme to provide 78 social housing units for vulnerable tenants. The $4.7 million to build 28 units in the Papaioea Place redevelopment comes from the $3 billion set aside for infrastructure in the Government’s COVID-19 ...
A pest free Banks Peninsula/Te Pātaka o Rākaihautū is one step closer with a $5.11 million boost to accelerate this project and create jobs, announced Conservation Minister Eugenie Sage in Canterbury today. “This is a game changer for this ambitious project to restore the native wildlife and plants on Ōtautahi/Christchurch’s doorstep ...
A Government grant of $6.4 million will expand the Pettigrew Arena in Taradale with new indoor courts of national standard. “The project is likely to take 18 months with approximately 300 people employed through the process,” Grant Robertson said. “The expansion will increase the indoor court space up to 11 ...
The Far North tourist destination of Mangonui is to receive Government funding to improve waterfront infrastructure, open up access to the harbour and improve water quality, Infrastructure Minister Shane Jones has announced. A total of $6.5 million from the $3 billion set aside in the COVID-19 Response and Recovery Fund ...
The Government has re-affirmed its commitment to supporting the hosting of the ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup, which the ICC has delayed from 2021 to 2022. “This is obviously a disappointing decision for cricket players and fans around the world and for the White Ferns and their supporters here at ...
Cyclists and walkers will now have a safer way to get around Taupō, Tūrangi, and between Hamilton and Cambridge, with funding for shared paths and Te Awa River Ride, Associate Minister of Transport Julie Anne Genter announced today. “The Te Awa River Ride is the latest part of massive growth ...
Six major cycle routes will be completed in Christchurch thanks to funding from the Government’s investment in shovel-ready infrastructure as part of the COVID-19 recovery Associate Minister of Transport Julie Anne Genter announced today. $125 million will be invested to kick-start construction and fund the completion of the following cycleway ...
Plans are underway for a brand new state-of-the-art hub for Whanganui’s justice and social agencies, following confirmation the ageing Whanganui Central Police Station is to be replaced. Police Minister Stuart Nash has announced $25 million in new infrastructure spending to improve facilities for the wider community, and for staff who ...
An adjustment payment has been made to Waikato-Tainui and Ngāi Tahu under the relativity mechanisms in their 1995 and 1997 Treaty of Waitangi settlements, Minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations Andrew Little announced today. The latest payments to Waikato-Tainui and Ngāi Tahu are $2,700,000 and $2,600,000 respectively to ensure the ...
Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters and Transport Minister Phil Twyford today kicked off the start of the Auckland NZ Upgrade Programme rail projects which will support over 400 jobs and help unlock our biggest city. Both ministers marked the start of enabling works on the third main rail line project ...
The Provincial Growth Fund (PGF) investment of $3.78 million in Wairoa will create much needed economic stimulus and jobs, Under-Secretary for Regional Economic Development Fletcher Tabuteau announced today. PGF projects announced today include: $200,000 loan to Nuhaka Kiwifruit Holdings Ltd (operated by Pine Valley Orchard Ltd) to increase the productivity ...
Tenants in public and Māori housing may be benefiting from their own affordable renewable energy in future – a fund to trial renewable energy technology for public and Māori housing has today been announced by Energy and Resources Minister Megan Woods and Associate Minister for Housing (Māori Housing) Nanaia Mahuta. ...
Hokianga will receive $2.7 million to redevelop four of its wharves and upgrade its water supply, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones has announced. Far North District Council will receive $1.8 million from the Provincial Growth Fund for the work on the wharves. “The work will include the construction of ...
A $350 million Residential Development Response Fund is being established to support the residential construction sector and to minimise the economic impact from COVID-19, the Housing Minister Dr Megan Woods has announced. “The Residential Development Response Fund will help to progress stalled or at-risk developments that support our broader housing ...
As part of a broader plan to divert waste from landfill, the Government today announced $10.67 million for new infrastructure as part of the Resource Recovery Network across the Auckland region. “This key investment in Auckland’s community recycling network is part of the Government’s Infrastructure Reference Group ‘shovel ready’ projects ...
The Government is investing $45 million in the first stage of an ambitious urban development project for Tauranga that will employ up to 250 people and help the region grow, Urban Development Minister Phil Twyford announced today. Phil Twyford says the funding has been allocated out of the $3 billion ...
Getting low-emission trucks on the road is a step closer with investment in infrastructure to support hydrogen vehicles, the Energy and Resources Minister Megan Woods has announced. The Infrastructure Reference Group has provisionally approved $20 million for New Plymouth company Hiringa Energy to establish a nationwide network of hydrogen-fuelling stations. ...
A new trades training centre to upskill the local workforce will be built in the South Waikato town of Tokoroa through funding from the Government’s COVID-19 Response and Recovery Fund, Education Minister Chris Hipkins and Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones have announced. The Government will contribute $10.84 million from ...
The Government has agreed to repeal part of the Oranga Tamariki Act subsequent children provisions, Minister for Children Tracey Martin announced today. “There are times when children need to go into care for their safety – the safety and care of children must always be paramount,” Minister Martin said. “But ...
A $1.5 million boost to grow primary mental health and addiction services for Pacific peoples in Auckland, Hamilton and Canterbury will lead to better outcomes for Pacific communities, Associate Health Minister Jenny Salesa says. Pasifika Futures has received funding to expand services through The Fono, Aotearoa New Zealand’s largest by ...
Twenty-two projects to boost the sustainability and climate resilience of New Zealand’s food and fibres sector have been announced today by Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor. The $18m funding will deliver practical knowledge to help farmers and growers use their land more sustainably, meet environmental targets, remain prosperous, and better understand ...
Employment Minister Willie Jackson welcomes an initiative that assists employers to get mature workers into New Zealand small businesses. The disadvantages that older people face in the workplace was highlighted in the whole of Government Employment Strategy. In order to address this, a Mature Workers Toolkit has been developed and ...
New Zealand and Australia reaffirmed today the need for the closest possible collaboration as they tackle a global environment shaped by COVID-19, Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters said. “In these challenging times, our close collaboration with Australia is more vital than ever,” said Mr Peters. Mr Peters and his Australian ...
The recovery and forensic examination of the loader driven by survivor Russell Smith means the underground team are now moving into an area of the Pike River Mine that has not been seen since the explosion, Minister Responsible for Pike River Re-entry Andrew Little said. “The fifth and last robot ...
The Government has confirmed a community-wide trial of CovidCard technology as it explores options for COVID-19 contact tracing. “Effective contact tracing is a vital part of the COVID-19 response,” Minister of Health Chris Hipkins said. “While manual processes remain the critical component for contact tracing, we know digital solutions can ...
The government is proposing changes to aquaculture legislation to improve the process for allocating and transferring aquaculture assets to iwi. Fisheries Minister Stuart Nash has introduced the Maori Commercial Aquaculture Claims Settlement Amendment Bill to Parliament. It proposes a limited new discretionary power for Te Ohu Kaimoana Trustee Limited (ToKM). ...
The Minister of Justice has today introduced the Family Court (Supporting Children in Court) Legislation Bill – the next step in the ongoing programme of work to fix the failed 2014 Family Court reforms led by then Justice Minister Judith Collins. The Bill arises from the report of the Independent ...
A new Department of Conservation (DOC) action plan tackles the impacts of climate change on New Zealand’s biodiversity and DOC managed infrastructure including tracks, huts and cultural heritage. Minister of Conservation Eugenie Sage says extreme weather events around the country have really brought home our vulnerability to changing weather patterns. ...
A heavily scaled back international Antarctic season will commence this week, Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters and Research, Science and Innovation Minister Megan Woods have confirmed. “Antarctica is the only continent that is COVID-19 free,” Mr Peters said. “Throughout the global pandemic, essential operations and long-term science have continued at ...
The Government is providing up to $30 million to help fund the NZ Campus of Innovation and Sport in Upper Hutt - an investment that will create 244 jobs. “The sports hub is designed to be a world-leading shared service for a range of sports, offering the level of facilities ...
Transport Minister Phil Twyford announced today transport projects currently in construction will continue at pace due to extra Government support for transport projects to mitigate the impact of COVID-19. To keep the $16.9 billion 2018-21 National Land Transport Programme going the Government has allocated funding from the COVID Response and ...
Linda Burgess reviews Curtis Sittenfeld’s much-anticipated novel, Rodham. I read Rodham a while ago now but I put off writing about it. I was waiting. Waiting for what exactly? Well, waiting to see if they do what Trump kept insisting they do, back then, when the world seemed what we nostalgically ...
The 52nd Parliament will be dissolved this week, formally marking the first step towards holding the general election. The public is invited to witness this significant, triennial event which will take place on the Parliament forecourt on Wednesday 12 ...
The Public Service Association welcomes the decision by FIRST Union to join the campaign for an Aotearoa Wellbeing Commitment, a policy proposal that all New Zealanders should receive services like healthcare, education, public transport and broadband ...
An increased focus on ‘talking about it’ will only help if we’re honest with ourselves and each other about what is driving self-inflicted deaths in this country, writes Carla na Nagara.There has always been debate about whether talking about suicide is responsible or constructive. And since the Covid-19 alert level ...
“The racing industry continues to get special treatment as the Government makes ad hoc decisions at the border,” according to ACT Leader David Seymour. “Racing has been given significant taxpayer funds through NZ First’s slush fund and now ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Bradfield, Research Fellow in Behavioural Neuroscience, University of Technology Sydney As COVID-19 lockdowns were introduced, we all suddenly had to find new ways of doing things. Schooling shifted online, meetings moved to Zoom, workplaces brought in new measures and even social ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Denis Muller, Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Advancing Journalism, University of Melbourne Media coverage of disasters follows a broadly similar trajectory, even though the disasters themselves might take very different forms. The COVID-19 crisis in Victoria is no exception. Although it is ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Madeline Taylor, Lecturer, University of Sydney New South Wales planning authorities relied on flawed evidence when backing a highly controversial coal seam gas project that may endanger critical water supplies, farmland and threatened species, our analysis has found. Early next month, the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Noetel, Senior Lecturer in Psychology, Australian Catholic University In response to COVID-19, almost every university has scrambled to move its teaching online. To do this, academics have been choosing between two approaches: live videoconferencing using tools such as Zoom, or pre-recording ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Doran, Associate professor/Deputy head of school, UNSW The stock market is not the economy. This old and playful maxim is typically not true: often the stock market is a good proxy for the economy and a very good indication of what ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Isaac Gross, Lecturer in Economics, Monash University The government has widely touted its support for small businesses – most notably the provision of loans subsidised by the Reserve Bank. In its economic update on Friday the Reserve Bank talked up its low-cost ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Marie Hadley, Associate Lecturer in Law, University of Newcastle The Australian Copyright Agency has licensed an Indigenous artwork for a custom tattoo. It is the first instance of tattoo licensing for the agency, and perhaps Australia at large. The agency granted a ...
Welcome to Election Live for August 11, bringing you the latest on election 2020 and other breaking news. For key dates in the election seasonclick here. For all you need to know about the cannabis referendum click here. For the assisted dying referendum click here. Policy launches soon. Get ...
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Concern from the Cook Islands over travel bubble, inquiry clears Iain Lees-Galloway of any spending impropriety, and Oranga Tamariki facing further damaging report findings.A draft agreement on a travel bubble with the Cook Islands is close to being finalised, the ...
An essay, and memoir, by Dunedin writer Talia Marshall on fighting the White Power bitches at school Sophia turns up at my new place by happy accident. We haven’t seen each other properly for over 20 years but we’re friends on Facebook. One of the reasons I like Facebook, apart ...
A lack of central government policy on climate change adaptation has left councils treading water as they attempt to engage with threatened communities. ...
Since a nationwide amalgamation in 2017 there have been mass resignations at the SPCA, claims of bullying and employment dispute payouts. Now an online petition calling for a government inquiry has gained nearly 1000 signatures in five days A petition for a government inquiry to be launched into the transparency and accountability ...
A bizarre allegation on the TV news and a scolding of party members by a top official set the scene for a highly charged National Party candidate selection The National Party has chosen Emma Mellow as its candidate for the Auckland Central seat with less than four weeks until early voting begins, ...
In announcing the company's full-year results on Monday, Contact Energy CEO Mike Fuge warned of a "turbulent time" for the electricity market amid the exit of Tiwai Point. ...
After struggling with depression while recovering from a devastating knee injury, Tactix midcourter Erikana Pedersen wants to take her career in a new direction to help others. Last year was the “crappiest" of Erikana Pedersen’s 26 revolutions around the sun. But this year may turn out to be the best. Pedersen's year of ...
The polls and pundits are predicting the demise of NZ First leader Winston Peters and his party, but he has no plans to surrender or retire from politics, Dileepa Fonseka writes. ...
Those most impacted by Covid-19 are those who can least afford to weather it, write Professor Merryn Gott and Dr Jackie Robinson Emerging evidence from overseas regarding the clear link between poverty and Covid-19 is as predictable as it is heartbreaking. People living in the most deprived areas of England and Wales ...
A mining company director demands Newsroom take down a story on rehabilitation conditions agreed with DoC for a former site on conservation land National leader Judith Collins' husband is threatening defamation action against Newsroom over a story about a West Coast mine site that the conservation department allowed to be left ...
A bizarre allegation on the TV news and a scolding of party members by a top official set the scene for a highly charged National Party candidate selection The National Party has chosen Emma Mellow as its candidate for the Auckland Central seat with less than four weeks until early voting begins, ...
Those most impacted by Covid-19 are those who can least afford to weather it, write Professor Merryn Gott and Dr Jackie Robinson Emerging evidence from overseas regarding the clear link between poverty and Covid-19 is as predictable as it is heartbreaking. People living in the most deprived areas of England and Wales ...
Te Arawhiti is bypassing Te Rūnanganui o Ngāti Hikairo to try and get Ngāti Hikairo claims included in the Ngāti Maniapoto Settlement. Ngāti Maniapoto have set up two meetings in Kāwhia ‘with Ngāti Hikairo’ to consult on their Treaty settlements. ...
Welcome to the third edition of Memebers of parliament, a politics column for people who just want the memes.Let’s just get to it, shall we?Buses – YESBuses. They’re back. Winston Peters has had his giant face on a big ol’ bus for a while now, but he surely won’t be ...
The New Zealand government’s aid in developing countries is not going to projects where it is needed most, says Oxfam, according to a new report published by agency today. Less than two percent of aid spending went to activities focused solely on ...
The Provincial Growth Fund is meant to fund… growth… in the provinces. So why is it building a huge new racetrack in one of New Zealand’s biggest cities? Because the racing industry seems to get whatever it wants, argues Duncan Greive. Yesterday morning saw a blazing RNZ report that the Provincial ...
Long awaited changes to tenancy law have been made - are they really the landlord-killers that some make them out to be? Last week the Government passed under urgency a series of big changes to New Zealand's tenancy laws. The reforms of the 1986 Residential Tenancies Act have been in ...
Tonight the National Party has selected Emma Mellow to stand in the Auckland Central electorate for the 2020 General Election. Emma Mellow replaces retiring MP Nikki Kaye who first won the seat from Labour in 2008. Emma leads a team of communications ...
Pacific Media Watch Newsdesk Radio 95bFM The Wire’s Zoë Larsen Cumming and Justin Wong talked to Pacific Media Centre director Professor David Robie today about a resurgence of coronavirus cases in Papua New Guinea and the impact of other Pacific cases on two very important upcoming votes in Bougainville and ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Chris Maylea, Senior Lecturer, Law and Social Work, RMIT University The second wave of the coronavirus and the resulting restrictions have impacted all Victorians. Many are struggling, but some are struggling more than others. In response to the increasing number of people ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Louise Stone, General practitioner; Clinical Associate Professor, ANU Medical School, Australian National University Last week, the Australian government announced it will provide ten extra Medicare-subsidised psychological therapy sessions for Australians in lockdown areas due to COVID-19. In such a stressful time, many ...
It looks like science has come off second best in government considerations during the development of Te Mana o te Taiao, the Aotearoa New Zealand Biodiversity Strategy, which envisions New Zealand as a place where ecosystems are healthy and resilient, and people embrace the natural world. The press statement announcing ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Wanning Sun, Professor of Media and Cultural Studies, University of Technology Sydney US President Donald Trump’s recent moves against Tiktok, the popular video-sharing platform, have been widely seen as part of a new “tech Cold War” between the US and China. Trump ...
National leader Judith Collins has endorsed David Seymour in the Epsom seat and recent polls have put support for ACT anywhere between 3 and 5 percent - giving it up to six MPs. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lily O’Neill, Research Fellow, Australian National University Huge clean energy projects, such as the Asian Renewable Energy Hub in the Pilbara, Western Australia, are set to produce gigawatts of electricity over vast expanses of land in the near future. The Asian Renewable ...
Remarks by new coach Nathan Brown and the closed-door discussions by the club around recruiting a man facing sexual assault charges undermines the rugby league club’s values, writes Tiffany Salmond.It’s been a hot topic in rugby league circles for well over a year – but not for the right reasons.Former ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Uri Gal, Associate Professor in Business Information Systems, University of Sydney The recent questioning of the heads of Amazon, Facebook, Google and Apple in the US Congress has highlighted the threat their practices pose to our privacy and democracy. However these big ...
Good habits start young, and with Money Week this week, now is a great time to look at how we can support and nourish our kids’ financial journeys writes Banqer’s Simon Brown. For some reason, a lot of people see money as a boring topic. But the fact is, it’s a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Melbourne This week’s federal Newspoll, conducted August 5-8 from a sample of 1,509, gave the Coalition a 52-48 lead, a one-point gain for Labor since the last Newspoll, three weeks ago. ...
A tender for underwater inspection services at the abandoned oil field off the coast of Taranaki has shed light on the dubious state of its subsea infrastructure. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Plank, Professor in Mathematics, University of Canterbury Our latest modelling shows New Zealanders need to redouble their efforts to keep track of people they meet, if we are to have a chance of controlling any re-emergence of COVID-19. The director general ...
Local Government New Zealand’s (LGNZ) Regional Sector has today welcomed the launch of Te Mana o te Taiao, the Aotearoa New Zealand Biodiversity Strategy, citing robust collaboration with iwi, regional councils and private landowners and leadership from ...
The High Court has ruled today that Greenpeace is entitled to register as a charity and that the Charities Registration Board was in error for declining the environmental campaigning organisation’s application. In a summary of the judgement posted online ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephen Dobson, Professor and Dean of Education, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington The English language in education today is all-pervasive. “Hear more English, speak more English and become more successful” has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Some say it’s already ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stuart Richards, Lecturer in Screen Studies, University of South Australia Review: Welcome to Chechnya, screening at the Melbourne International Film Festival Welcome to Chechnya, screening online as part of MIFF 68½, is a bracing documentary. This film is part of a queer ...
It’s become fashionable among some political circles to advocate for a laissez-faire approach to debt, on the basis that the government can issue as much debt as it likes – for as long as it likes. But there’s one big drawback to ‘just print more money’ argument, writes Pattrick Smellie ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Australia’s aged care sector was “underprepared” to deal with the COVID-19 outbreak and federal authorities had no specific plan for it, according to a stinging indictment from Peter Rozen QC, senior counsel assisting the royal ...
A Productivity Commission report finding was based on a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of disease transmission dynamics, and now that error has itself been transmitted in the media and into the election campaign, write Nic Steyn, Mike Plank, Alex James, Rachelle Binny, Audrey Lustig and Shaun Hendy of Te ...
Latest from the Beehive Here’s hoping the hundreds of millions of dollars pumped into Northland from the Provincial Growth Fund and other government programmes do much more to promote the region’s economic and social wellbeing than they are doing to enhance Shane Jones’ election prospects. He is bound to be ...
The first Auckland Central debate took place last night, despite the lack of a National candidate. Josie Adams went along to watch Helen White, Chlöe Swarbrick and the rest.The Auckland Central electorate stretches from the depths of Grafton across the Hauraki Gulf to Aotea (Great Barrier). Its residents are Waiheke’s ...
Kiwibank was right to refuse the business of sex-trade operators exploiting women and children, says Wahine Toa Rising, a newly-formed organisation led by survivors of the trade in New Zealand. Spokeswoman Ally Marie Diamond said "we were gutted ...
During the worst days of the Covid-19 outbreak in New Zealand, Matamata was right at the heart of it all. Alex Braae went to the Waikato town to ask people how they’re getting on now.On the signs heading out to the Hobbiton Movie Set about 10 minutes away from the ...
The government has announced a pay increase for security guards at the Ministry of Social Development as the Labour Party makes a commitment to government agency workers for fair pay and working conditions. ...
“As sure as God made little apples, she would have reinvented herself and she will be ripping someone off in England as we speak,” predicted a former colleague of Joanne Harrison. A new investigation reveals the charming fraudster, who stole ...
Lihir is the second mine in Papua New Guinea to report a confirmed covid-19 case as the national total of infections reached 214 at the weekend. Newcrest Mining Limited confirmed that a 30-year-old male, a mine employee who had flown in from the capital Port Moresby on July 30, had ...
E te rangatira, e te tohunga, e te Tiati, haere, haere, haere atu ra. Haere ki o tupuna, no ratou nga taonga i tuku iho ki a koe, hei whangai mai ki a matou. ...
Commitment from all political parties to implementing the new Te Mana o te Taiao - Aotearoa New Zealand Biodiversity Strategy is vital to protecting our future, says Forest & Bird. “The Strategy clearly says that New Zealand’s environment ...
The 75th anniversary of the end of the Second World War will be acknowledged on 15 August, with a commemorative service at Pukeahu National War Memorial Park in Wellington, Manatū Taonga Ministry for Culture and Heritage Chief Executive Bernadette ...
Open mike 01/06/2019 
What to do to improve the public perception of the newly elected National party leader, when her performance so far has no doubt disappointed the expectations of her supporters? The answer is to get a National-supporting newspaper (the Herald) to organise a poll that could be guaranteed to provide an ...17 mins ago
Today’s content Auckland Central Tova O’Brien (Newshub): Senior National Party figure accused of using secret alter ego ‘Merv’ to derail Auckland Central candidate RIchard Harman (Politik): “Merv” upsets Nats’ Auckland Central selection Luke Kirkness (Herald): National Party’s Roger Bridge accused of using ‘Merv’ alter ego to derail candidate Nuwanthie Samarakone Tim Murphy (Newsroom): Out ...2 hours ago
Campaigns. Culture. Character. And perhaps most of all, Covid. Now the House has risen and politicians are hitting the road to pitch their woo to voters, those will be front of mind for the candidates.They were also where the new season of politics podcast Caucus began on Thursday. This year ...12 hours ago
There are only a few days left to make a submission on Statistics New Zealand's consultation on sex and gender identity statistical standards. This represents a really important step for recognising the very real diversity of gender, including people with no gender, and ensuring everyone has the option to see ...12 hours ago
Since finishing the Cranky Uncle vs. Climate Change book, I’ve frequently dipped into that 176-page clip-art library, reshaping the cartoons to fit the 1920 x 1080 pixel format for Powerpoint presentations. I’ve also adapted many of the cartoons for the Cranky Uncle video series. Over the last few weeks, a few people ...16 hours ago
NewsHub Nation has launched a new podcast, "Supplementary Question". Their inaugural episode is about the OIA, and asks "is our most important transparency law fit for purpose?" While they interviewed Justice Minister Andrew Little and Ombudsman Peter Boshier for this, there's not actually a lot of them in there, and ...18 hours ago
Dr Tim Chambers, Prof Nick Wilson, Jayne Richards, A/Prof Simon Hales, Dr Mike Joy, Prof Michael Baker (author affiliations*) Increasing water-related health threats, notably the waterborne campylobacter outbreak in Havelock North, have highlighted failings in NZ’s regulatory system for drinking water. In this blog we consider how the new Water ...1 day ago
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From some quarters, incessant scaremongering. From others, it’s a full-on tilt into touching the alarmist buttons a little too readily (uncertain times make for very captive audiences with this angle of attack). The (so-called) Opposition (and merely regarding them as that seems to be a far looser term now ...3 days ago
National Party leader - Judith CollinsElections often bring out the best and worst in politicians. Some rise to the occasion and provide us with a clear vision for the future. While others wallow in resentment and controversy, over-relying on attack politics to try to attain the interest of voters.That’s been ...3 days ago
The attempts to sabotage Corbyn's leadership seems likely to do more damage than Corbyn supposedly ever could have done, even if all the stories about him were true: I was reluctant to say anything but this is too important, the full story needs to be told.Don’t let anyone ever tell ...3 days ago
Good day to everyone. I’ve been asked by Mr Thinks to come here and talk to you all about my concerns regarding the government response to Covid-19. We’ve been living through this pandemic for, what seems like, years. Years and years and years. Why else would the National Party have ...3 days ago
5 days ago
by Don Franks This talk was given to the Wellington Anti Capitalist Alliance, fifteen years ago. The ultimate weapons of mass destruction so far seen on this planet have been used just twice, 60 years ago this month. August 6 and August 9 1945 witnessed the US atomic bombing ...5 days ago
Our health professionals do an amazing job. Image credit: Wikipedia – Cardiac surgery. Finally, I have got back to these rankings. A long period in hospital and computer problems meant the June 2020 rankings were abandoned. Now, with a new personal defibrillator implanted in my chest and a new hard ...1 week ago
It's campaign time! The official countdown to Election Day is underway, with Labour supporters crowding into Auckland's Town Hall for our 2020 Campaign Launch. We recap some of the highlights below ...14 hours ago
The Green Party has revealed its Homes for All Plan, which lays the foundation for an Aotearoa where everyone has a warm, dry and affordable home. ...2 days ago
A report undertaken by Ministerial Services into Iain Lees-Galloway’s ministerial expenditure has found no evidence of any inappropriate transactions or spending. Ministerial Services undertook a line by line review of all his expenditure, including staff and spouse expenses for the period 1 January 2019 to 30 June 2020. “I commissioned ...13 hours ago
Linda Burgess reviews Curtis Sittenfeld’s much-anticipated novel, Rodham. I read Rodham a while ago now but I put off writing about it. I was waiting. Waiting for what exactly? Well, waiting to see if they do what Trump kept insisting they do, back then, when the world seemed what we nostalgically ...6 mins ago
Editor’s Note: Here below is a list of the main issues currently under discussion in New Zealand and links to media coverage. Today’s content Auckland Central Tova O’Brien (Newshub): Senior National Party figure accused of using secret alter ego ‘Merv’ to derail Auckland Central candidate RIchard Harman (Politik): “Merv” upsets Nats’ Auckland ...17 mins ago
The 52nd Parliament will be dissolved this week, formally marking the first step towards holding the general election. The public is invited to witness this significant, triennial event which will take place on the Parliament forecourt on Wednesday 12 ...40 mins ago
An essay, and memoir, by Dunedin writer Talia Marshall on fighting the White Power bitches at school Sophia turns up at my new place by happy accident. We haven’t seen each other properly for over 20 years but we’re friends on Facebook. One of the reasons I like Facebook, apart ...5 hours ago
A lack of central government policy on climate change adaptation has left councils treading water as they attempt to engage with threatened communities. ...5 hours ago
Since a nationwide amalgamation in 2017 there have been mass resignations at the SPCA, claims of bullying and employment dispute payouts. Now an online petition calling for a government inquiry has gained nearly 1000 signatures in five days A petition for a government inquiry to be launched into the transparency and accountability ...5 hours ago
A bizarre allegation on the TV news and a scolding of party members by a top official set the scene for a highly charged National Party candidate selection The National Party has chosen Emma Mellow as its candidate for the Auckland Central seat with less than four weeks until early voting begins, ...5 hours ago
In announcing the company's full-year results on Monday, Contact Energy CEO Mike Fuge warned of a "turbulent time" for the electricity market amid the exit of Tiwai Point. ...5 hours ago
After struggling with depression while recovering from a devastating knee injury, Tactix midcourter Erikana Pedersen wants to take her career in a new direction to help others. Last year was the “crappiest" of Erikana Pedersen’s 26 revolutions around the sun. But this year may turn out to be the best. Pedersen's year of ...5 hours ago
The polls and pundits are predicting the demise of NZ First leader Winston Peters and his party, but he has no plans to surrender or retire from politics, Dileepa Fonseka writes. ...5 hours ago
Those most impacted by Covid-19 are those who can least afford to weather it, write Professor Merryn Gott and Dr Jackie Robinson Emerging evidence from overseas regarding the clear link between poverty and Covid-19 is as predictable as it is heartbreaking. People living in the most deprived areas of England and Wales ...5 hours ago
A mining company director demands Newsroom take down a story on rehabilitation conditions agreed with DoC for a former site on conservation land National leader Judith Collins' husband is threatening defamation action against Newsroom over a story about a West Coast mine site that the conservation department allowed to be left ...5 hours ago
Long awaited changes to tenancy law have been made - are they really the landlord-killers that some make them out to be? Last week the Government passed under urgency a series of big changes to New Zealand's tenancy laws. The reforms of the 1986 Residential Tenancies Act have been in ...5 hours ago
The latest ANZ Business Outlook Survey is more downbeat, and Contact holds the line on profit ...5 hours ago
Turkey’s relationships with Europe and the world are complicated. But an impending currency and economic crisis will not make them any better. ...5 hours ago
National's Emma Mellow will be up against Labour's Helen White, the Green's Chloe Swarbrick, and TOP's Tuariki Delamere. ...12 hours ago
It looks like science has come off second best in government considerations during the development of Te Mana o te Taiao, the Aotearoa New Zealand Biodiversity Strategy, which envisions New Zealand as a place where ecosystems are healthy and resilient, and people embrace the natural world. The press statement announcing ...15 hours ago
Latest from the Beehive Here’s hoping the hundreds of millions of dollars pumped into Northland from the Provincial Growth Fund and other government programmes do much more to promote the region’s economic and social wellbeing than they are doing to enhance Shane Jones’ election prospects. He is bound to be ...21 hours ago
I thought it mighty clever of the weather to turn to Winter overnight. Sitting pretty here in a house of brick. It wasn't always so easy.
Let's hear it for a budget tackling homelessness, let's hear it for a government trying to address mental health.
Sleep.
I spent parts of winter sleeping half at night, half in the day. This was in order to cope with the cold. From cars to windowless squats, beneath bridges and basements abandoned; the houses of homelessness are cold.
To sleep it helped to be inebriated so one's body (and head) would allow you some sleep. I'd curl up in a foetal position with covers over my head to recirculate the warm air, and hands tucked between my legs to try get them warm. It was enough for a while and I'd drift off, but by around 4 a.m. either my reserves or the temperature had dropped sufficiently that it woke me.
There were several hours till dawn and though many preferred to stay down, shivering as temperatures bottomed out, I had to move.
Morning calisthenics. 4 a.m. drills for the idle unemployed. Press ups, squats, burpees. Soon I'd be warm enough to stop shivering, warm enough that the ringing in my ears would subside, warm enough to roll a smoke without tearing the paper in half. The burning coal of a cigarette cupped in the palms of my hands.
I'd march. Off to the parks, to the coast and the dunes. Under lupins and round the river mouths. In the places fungi grew in abundance. Magical fungi, munchable fungi. From the city to the fields and back again.
We ate fungi, watercress, seafood, rustled sheep, pilfered fruit, garden raids, dumpster diving and homeless handouts. We never thought about how we were homeless, we were surviving. Mental health, abuse, alcoholism, addiction, abandonment. It was all there, and it was all intertwined. We absolved ourselves with three Fuck You's and a bottle of grog.
A portion of us were typically in prison. This was normal. Some were locked up for stealing liquor, others robbing chemists; I for picking mushrooms and growing weed. Whatever it takes means different things to different people, and survival trumped law in most cases. As society had done to us the things that were done to us, then fuck society. We would look after ourselves.
We were divided in attitudes between those of us who wanted to change the world, and those who wanted to burn it all down. There's too much time to think when you are homeless. To feel purpose it helps if one can move purposefully. To live amongst the hopeless it requires a special kind of strength to even dare to dream. We were young and we still dared, but for many it was a dream.
Overdose, car accident, murder, life. Slowly they vanished as if they'd never existed. Long forgotten by those purported to love them. Dead.
The eulogies I wrote were prosaic and deep. It was tragedy and tragedy then tragedy again. Absentee parents wailed soulfully upon the caskets of those they held dear. Too little and too late they'd turn up in their cars. Countenance grave; soft words finally spoken.
Thanks for sharing that. Such insights into our collective reality are essential, and a helpful antidote to the economic/political spin around the budget, reminding us what it's all about really. And resilience contains emotional intelligence as a social necessity…
That's a stunning piece WTB, thank you for sharing.
Amazing writing. The lampooning of absentee parents is exquisite.
National are absentee parents. Wailing over the graves they create.
Same as Dennis and HS; you've hinted at this before so it's not a surprise. But I am moved by the intensity of it. And not only have you journeyed through that dark, damp land … but you found the path out of it.
I for one await more of the story, if and when it's time to tell it.
Wonderful writing BLP
And I want to hear more of this wonderful life
Ditto francesca (1.5)
Nice work there.
Gives your thoughts context.
I echo all of the sentiments by the rest on here WTB. A wonderful piece, and thank you for sharing. There are a few favourite places here in our town for some to find a bit of shelter. A convenient nook in an alleyway just off the main street makes an ideal spot. It's covered over and reasonably secluded, but it would be a bugger in a westerly! Behind the church is good too and just over the road from the pub. It's also sheltered from the wind and has soft grass. We have around 15 to 20 sleeping really rough here, and are about to get expanded accommodation for those nights when it really is too bad to be unsheltered.
WTB if TS don't make you an author, go to TDB. You owe it to all of us.
Thank you.
WOW! A brilliant piece of writing WTB (1) … I'd like to say it was a great story. However, the story you told wasn't/isn't so great for far too many Kiwis.
Thanks for taking the time to share such a raw, gritty expose` of homelessness in NZ, through personal experience.
Lived experience speaks with an authentic voice. Thank you WTB for sharing, for keeping your sense of hope and for recognising the efforts made to change the way budgets are formed. May you enjoy your brick house and the winter warmth your home offers you for the rest of your days. Please write more.
Gordon Campbell analyses the European election outcome (http://werewolf.co.nz/2019/05/gordon-campbell-on-europes-non-surrender-to-far-right-extremism/)and here's an interesting section:
"In Portugal and Spain, the incumbent governments of the centre-left were rewarded by voters. In Spain, voters rejected the far right populist party Vox, which collapsed back to 6% from the 10% high it achieved only a fortnight ago in the Spanish general elections."
"On the radical left, Podemos saw its support decline to 10%, a sharp fall from the 18% they’d scored in the last European Parliament elections. The decline of Podemos holds a cautionary message for the Green Party in New Zealand. Now that Podemos is no longer an outsider party but is actively propping up the Socialist government of Pedro Sanchez, much of its support has been bleeding back to Sanchez and his PSOE party, which has long been Spain’s neo-liberal Third Way party of the centre-left. In a further blow, radical left mayors in major cities (including the high profile administration of Ada Colau in Barcelona) lost their fights for re-election. In Spain as whole, the radical left is being marginalised by regional parties, and by the Establishment left."
As a life-long radical, I've always found the radical left amusing. I share their striving to attain an ideal world, while remaining baffled at their reluctance to learn from political experience. It makes no sense for the Greens to marginalise themselves on the extreme left. Too few voters support such idiocy.
Usually radical leftists reject centrism in favour of ideological purity. They refuse to admit that support for the underdog is more politically potent when it comes from a party that controls the political centre and selects governments. As Winston has proven. The GP needs leaders who are capable of learning the lesson.
while remaining baffled at their reluctance to learn from political experience.
It's less baffling if you contemplate their probable motives, the ones they never speak to directly.
Nonsense. The Greens are about as "Left" as Holyoak.
Extreme only in your dreams.
The extremists are those who think business as usual is even possible.
Nuance. I made no blanket statement re the Greens, just advised against any leftist extremism. There's a ginger group (mainly idealistic youngsters) within the party which formed several years ago to lobby for such positioning. I've seen their spokespeople being explicit in calling for that partisan stance and alignment at our conferences. They are open, honest, and forthright in doing so.
Add to that is the unending nauseating way media professionals keep depicting the Greens as `to the left of Labour'. Hardly surprising that a popular view of the Greens being wild-eyed radicals has gained currency. Hopelessly unrealistic…
@KJT +1 “The extremists are those who think business as usual is even possible.”
You fail to point out that since the emergence of centrist liberalisim as the dominating force in western left wing politics from the late 1970's, what was once just left is now framed as extreme or radical left.
The reason cenerism should and is being rejected is because it has failed to work, or work for the many and not just the few..or haven't you noticed.
Go and read WeTheBleeple’s piece at the beginning of today’s open mike, and think about the homeless families living in cars all over NZ, all the working poor in NZ who spend over half their wages on rent, that is free market centerism in action for you.
Turn Labour Left!
Cameron to get a software upgrade:
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/may/31/david-cameron-takes-job-with-us-artificial-intelligence-firm?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
Green suit-wearers will be careerists, of course, but doesn't mean inability to grasp the big picture. Here we have the Values schism to teach us that the centrists are essential to the political success of the Green left (if they were able to learn the lesson) whereas in Germany the thirty years war between fundies & realos seems to have been resolved.
"A surge of support, helped by the Fridays for Future protest movement, propelled Germany's Greens to second place in Sunday's European Parliament elections, at the expense of the mainstream parties. Chancellor Angela Merkel's centre-right CDU/CSU bloc and their ailing junior coalition partners the Social Democrats (SPD) both suffered historic losses after being caught flat-footed on environmental policy."
https://www.thelocal.de/20190527/the-perfect-storm-germany-feels-heat-of-climate-vote?utm_source=piano&utm_medium=onsite&utm_campaign=71&tpcc=de-just-rhs
The thing with all of this thinking, within multiple contexts/systems:
The edge is where the action occurs. New ideas, new genes, new philosophies.
The center is where most of the energy resides, but this is mostly used to maintain the status quo, broken or not. There is an illusion in the center, being the 'holders of power', that everything held in check belongs to the center and is of the center's doing.
But it came from an edge. The refusal to listen to the fringe is everyone's limitation.
I understand your position in trying to help more fringe lefties gain some ideas for relative longevity and a platform for their positions: but the center swallows the edge, it's very nature being conformity to the center.
Much better that we allow fringe political players to be their own entities (within reason and civility) as a think-tank for the center – as it has always been, but let's be honest about who's doing all the thinking.
The people with real problems to solve – or the well to do?
…who's doing all the thinking. The people with real problems to solve – or the well to do?
I don't find thinking and questioning and willingness to consider other less-materially-successful peoples viewpoint among the well to do. Not as a rule.
You have to step aside and view things objectively, wonder about how it is for others, listen to their tales and then wonder about what led them there. The amount of wondering that people do, of the different ways that people react to the same events and treatment, all helps to get a depth to relating to others. Most well to do are too busy managing their resources, and choosing ways to observe things or do things important to their group to sit and wonder.
Running in marathons is a perfect example. A totally unimportant activity, a personal challenge to skite about, and very much about self and proving yourself not lazy and meeting some herd convention. Why don't people raise to merit the groups going out to cut down old mans beard suffocating forest for instance. That requires all the fitness put into a marathon; that would be the wondering herd in action, not the stampeding herd off on some psychological desire to prove themselves as good as the old pioneers.
"Running marathons is a perfect example" greywarshark, the same idiocy is involved in climbing the same mountain 10 times.
Feck, the airfares the costs and the energy could have built several tiny homes.
Climbers are held up to us as heroes. Edmund Hillary was, because he followed up with meaningful humanitarian efforts. Now it is a mighty money churn and less than edifying.
Many who are well off do not see their wealth, because they "Don't have a ……." (put a toy in there).
It get's cold at night so the mountaineers have to hold each other. It's still debatable to this day: who was on top first, Hillary, or Tensing. – Me.
Harry Holland's life confirms your analysis.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Holland
Cripes Jenny How – a second great Australian in the early Labour party, Holland Savage.
And I always sniggered at Muldoon's quip:
New Zealanders who leave for Australia raise the IQ of both countries · Robert Muldoon.
Now I'm laughing on the other side of my face.
Of course, then there was the Premier of Queensland.
Yes – but Queenslander's voted for him!
The edge is where the action occurs. New ideas, new genes, new philosophies.
Agreed. But keep in mind that only a small fraction of new ideas turn out to be good ideas. Radicals always risk going too far in their search.
The center is where most of the energy resides, but this is mostly used to maintain the status quo, broken or not.
Again agreed, yet keep in mind that while the status quo is always flawed and imperfect, we still depend on it for our daily survival. Yet as you say when it refuses to listen, the centre stagnates and becomes tyrannical.
The edge is represents the new, the unknown and the unstable, while the centre is the opposite. While both domains have their natural inhabitants, they also both need each other. They need to trade.
When you're mixing ingredients preparing to cook something, you keep adding and blending, repeating that till the mix is in right proportions needed for a good outcome. We need better chefs, cooks and kitchen hands following better practices if we want to lift our standards and then share out the buns fairly. That way we wouldn't get egg on our own faces or want to decorate the faces of supposed smart leaders.
Difference between a chef and a cook is a chef knows how to shop better. Asians by far have a far superior cultural tradition of low end deliciousness because across the Asian continent food has been far more democratised than in the west. In Asia cooks don't have to make difficult choices because the produce is so cheap to source and buy. In Asia it is possible to pick up a delicious hot sit down meal for 50 cents served to your table. In the west the well housed and well fed have a far greater cultural tradition of deciding who gets to eat and who doesn't.
In the 80's jokes was the currency of the work place smoko room. In the 90's not so much and in the naughties the lunch room turned into a sour affair as work breaks became less and less and productivity up and up. No one has the instincts to tell a joke any more. The people that make up The Labour Party flow in and out of ministerial offices, they are no longer selected from the people who know something about society so Labour lacks those democtratic instincts and must rely on committee groups to come up with ideas and working groups to hold there hands as they run the country.
Even though Labour are after higher wages and higher health they recognise the injustice of what Māori went through because they still have a beating heart. That kind of Labour Party will serve New Zealand particularly well. If MPs can teach themselves the big things then they'll have the instincts to know how things are run and then those smarties won't need pollsters. Although we can't whined the economy back to the 80's we've got a changing industrial relationship and every one doesn't wear the old high school knock around shoes anymore. We do have a different economy today. The same instincts are around and we've got to have more of that in The Labour Party and we've missed doing that in the last 15-20 years.
Yes, I fully agree with your reasoning & analysis. I'm still on the edge, in respect of investigating new thinking continuously, but I plonked one foot in the establishment at the start of '75, to have a career, and ended up straddling both realms, uneasily.
I've always found most Greens too mainstream in their thinking, for instance. Yet to get consensus, I had to work constructively with them. Overcoming my natural distaste for compromising essential principles was always hard, yet the sustained effort got us into parliament, and the compromises our reps in parliament have had to make are similar to mine in those respects.
So nowadays I advocate a consensus praxis to overcome partisan divides, and am pleased that we finally have a government actually doing that. Still, we must keep pushing for more innovative thinking around governance. The world needs that, not just us here in Aotearoa!
The launch this week of the book Whale Oil understandably put Cameron Slater and his dirty blogging at the centre of attention. But he has been in some cases paid and aided, abetted and used by a number of accomplices.
Someone who has been closely associated with Slater in his sustained attacks on Matt Blomfield is an ex-business associate of Blomfield’s, Marc Spring. If anything he has done more for longer than Slater.
One way Spring has kept attacks going against Blomfield) is his use of many identities in his online activities.
How many identities? That’s hard to quantify, but it’s many. my guess is well over a hundred identities, if not many more.
I identified over 40 in an eight month period on just one blog.
There have probably been some here.
Use of multiple pseudonyms is deceptive, and is bad for the many people who legitimately and reasonably use a pseudonym, as id discredits the use of pseudonyms generally.
The many identities of Marc Spring
It sounds to me like this man Spring is a pyschopath with obsessive disorders. Has he been investigated? He sounds dangerous.
That is very informative and insightful pete george. Thank you. We do have to keep watch for the evil people that are round, sort of have sensitive traps in our minds that register particular types of thought and action; a bit like traps for insects and predators that can be so deadly for our food sources.
Having seen of some of his antics over the years your description sounds pretty right. You could have used the word 'multiple' in front of obsessive.
It's interesting describing the behaviour and the personality in proper scientific, psychological terms. The easiest thing would be to say things like 'dirty, lowdown, scumbag piece of shit."
Be good to know his aliases here
Here are Marc Spring identities that have been used on various blogs and media comments forums.
ThreeMonkeys
SHAFT
The Ape
NOT MIKE
4077th
Gweg pwesland
pimp
phillip
DaveG
slicedcheesesandwich
Justice4Matt
BLOMFIELDS EX BIZ PARTNER
Harry ‘Gold Star’ Stottle
Harry Stottle
to HELL in a handbasket
The Assasin
David Jessop
CHEEKY DARKY
the MONKEYS RAINCOAT
Elton
Samantha Hays
The Barber
They Walk, they talk, they harm
THE PRIEST
Hannibal Lecters Psychologist
Inspector Clouseau
Rod
I HAVE THE HARD DRIVE
MARC NEVER FORGETS CUNT
I AM OWED TOO
THE WORST NIGHTMARE
When dies Bankrupt = Businessman
Jean
Bus Driver
LORD DONKEY
Harvey Specter
TYRANT/THE TYRANT
HUSTLER
BUCK WIT
Shagger
Gimp of Greenhithe
Spiderman wants his mask back
RAMBONE OF RAMBONIA
Reaper Crew
Gay Mo
Rolf Harris
Bill Brown
Reaper Crew
The last one is one of I believe a number he has used at LF.
https://yournz.org/2019/06/01/the-many-identities-of-marc-spring-include/
Isn’t that one of those psychological word-association tests to unearth deep psychological trauma, damaged or stalled identity development, and psychopathic tendencies?
Mad as a meat-axe . Threemonkeys and Rod ring a bell for me. Never frequented Whale Oil or Kiwiblog so suspect he used them here in times past.
I suppose this has already been noted here. Amy Adams of National accusing Labour Coalition of playing 'petty politics' in changes to the convention of the pre-Budget practices. WTF when Simon B does it, it is okay – he is just testing the government by breaking reasonable agreements.
I should think that Labour Coalition was actually trying to prevent National doing more of their petty measures and turning what was a serious financial presentation into a Punch and Judy show.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1905/S00287/government-playing-petty-politics-with-budget-day-process.htm
National’s Finance spokesperson Amy Adams says. 29 May 2019
“While media and other parties are given three and a half hours to examine the Government’s accounts before they are released, National is only allowed 60 minutes. Because of this we need a wide range of subject matter experts to review their areas. Last year we had 16 of our team present and to have this arbitrarily halved this year is unreasonable and petty, particularly when we are told this year’s Budget will look very different to previous years.
From what I read in te newspaper, they had to move the whole lock-up process to a smaller room this year. That's all.
Ah but that can be played out as part of a Conspiracy against National.
And perhaps the room was further from the toilets – another form of harassment. Gnats are really sick in the mind, and it says something too about the people who keep voting them in, keep supporting them, keep listening to the diatribe from the bellicose broadcasters providing them with a comforting blanket of words for the day that the Right Crowd can repeat to prevent any uncomfortable thoughts from filtering through the Matrix.
I notice a lot of Rudyard Kipling’s poem ‘If’ is pertinent.
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:
And even that wording can be bent and used against you by the RW and some from the Left as well. And that is dealt with in those lines also. A meaningful poem.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46473/if—
Fascinating in-depth documentary on the influence of cannabis in the Bible. It seems the word cannabis was Scythian in origin and it was they who traded and spread it throughout Eurasia. The Greeks called it by the same name while the Jews called it Kaneh Bosm, each culture giving the plant a variation of the Scythian name. Like others, the Jews valued its ability to get high (restricted to the high priests, prophets and kings), nutritional value and use for hemp clothing.
Assange showing symptoms of 'psychological torture': UN
Statement accuses the US, UK, Sweden and Ecuador of "ganging up" on Assange to "isolate, demonise and abuse" him.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/05/assange-showing-symptoms-psychological-torture-190531135445284.html
John Pilger: US Charges Against Julian Assange are RIDICULOUS!
Thanks for this john. I've been following this sad development and watching the entire fiasco unravel on every front. I used some strong language a few days back, and the light of this I don't resile from it one jot.
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2019/05/the-unrelenting-state/
WH Auden says it for Assange:'
I think what could help Assange is if someone from the RW speaks up who has perceptions of being decent and also concerned about USA keeping an appearance of having standards of behaviour that bear scrutiny. That person would suggest that it is a bad idea to not enable Assange's health so he can stand trial and not in the USA's best interests to allow Assange to fall seriously ill or worse.
The USA must try to keep its image alive of being a fair nation that behaves in a superior way to others and acts to keep the Peace in the World. So – something should be said and acted on in this manner and the UK can encourage that and show they have blood in their veins.
This?
'Though USA is very unhappy about the revelations of secrets that WikiLeaks supplied, it does not wish to harm the individual responsible as other lesser civilised countries would do. And so it is transferring Assange (to Australia, to a facility where he can recover his strength with wellbeing) until he is ready to face trial.'
That sort of thing. The USA won't have a high horse to look down from if they don't make an effort to repair their fraying image.
Julian Assange's mother condemns UK government for 'unlawfully slowly killing my son'
https://www.sott.net/article/414092-Julian-Assanges-mother-condemns-UK-government-for-unlawfully-slowly-killing-my-son?fbclid=IwAR0XS8Rm9JF-AaKNcjDTszhn9l7B14NGM7auC1QlT-1FfFVRt1dVvkxJVa8
“They made him very ill by refusing him ANY access to life sustaining fresh air, exercise, sun/VitD or proper medical care for 6 YEARS of illegal Embassy detention
Kristinn Hrafnsson, WikiLeaks' editor-in-chief, wrote that "Julian's case is of major historic significance. It will be remembered as the worst attack on press freedom in our lifetime. The People need to voice their condemnation; it is their politicians, their courts, their police and their prisons that are being abused in order to leave this black stain on history. Please act now to avert this shame".
Unfortunately the mass campaign to vilify Assange has done its work.
Even on this supposedly progressive site, the attack lines are relentlessly repeated
"Melzer went on:
I looked at the letter writing to Assange at Belsem? Prison campaign, it advises to put in a plain sheet of paper and self addressed envelope with UK stamps for reply – of course he woud need a pen or pencil. I have not been able to find NZPost information about how to deal with pre-paid mail in other country's currency. At present I have a question placed yesterday about this but have received no email reply.
I asked about stamps or an international coupon which I imagine there should be available but who knows it seems to me that NZ Post is just managing down the business. If I could buy a pre-paid envelope rather than stamps – that would be practical. I thought they might have replied by now.
"Abstaining from the witchhunt would have classed the dissenter as an enemy. Stalin was supported by fanatics, cynics, sadists and moral cowards."
—-Donald Rayfield, Stalin and His Hangmen: An Authoritative Portrait of a Tyrant and Those Who Served Him (Viking, 2004)
…deliberate collective ridicule, insults and humiliation… We have seen that on this site frequently and from people who one would expect to have been on the side of exposing the secrets of powerful people and countries willing to destroy others for their purposes.
For good people to do nothing…. Have I got time to be good, what with all the other things I give my time to, as well as my own living tasks for me, my family, friends and community? These sort of unworthy thoughts about my lack of action are I think echoed by quite a number.
We should be out in the streets for Assange, but the attention now is on climate change and receiving a living wage for those who are trying to hold society together and retain the advances that were gained by exhaustive social interaction last century.
Got to keep trying to do it all or the golden bulldozer driven by a robot with such a cheeky, lovable grin in such a cute hat, will scoop us all up. Ever looked at the photos of naked bodies being thrown into burial pits in Holocaust archives? That sort of thing has happened multiple times in even near history. Those images should be in everyone's minds; the reality of what we can do when we have our mind setting on the mark of Cold, Hard, Unfeeling, Uncaring, Unrespecting, Unloving, and Choose your level of Evil – Eager, Sometimes, Neutral, Not sure, Wrestling against it every day.
You're right Grey
Just the sheer numbing pressure of being under the hammer , the struggle to provide a roof and food, and pay the bills is all many can cope with
I'm sorry – I do go on. I understand if its tl:dr. But laying it out occasionally, how someone is feeling I think helps to understand what's going on in society for some people.
The problem is that life presently is so depressing – the constant flow of viciousness, unfairness, violence and the imbalance with meanness high and easy generosity so low; how to create a bright spot, some hope, some comfort takes mental energy, even requires mental exercises. And under austerity with a religious wash, joy is not allowed, unless it is preachy Joy in the Lord.
I am sure the Great Spirit-Creator would be satisfied to see us being just great humans showing respect and receiving it in return; trying to get on together and building a feeling of solidarity and strength to face off the nastiness. That's hard even when the basics of life are under control. I see this blog as a living personification? of what those here with goodwill are reaching for. That's why I get upset at repeat vicious put-downs and faux concerns that have a thorn in them. I can stand argy bargy from those who are trying like me to establish a buzzy beehive of ideas and co-operation to make up for the failings of the one in Wellington at present. I don't think though we will ever see a united group of all parties working for the good of NZ in Wellington. So I see it as important to keep talking about good things, and then doing something so that I don't end up feeling helpless and life a wet noodle. So will soon shut up and go and do something useful for me and have done something else already this morning so that's a tick for me.
We have to keep our eye on civility, honesty, kindness and practicality as these are needed in relationships all round the world. In NZ too many have been vaccinated with poisonous ideas, some sanctimonious, many adopting misanthropy and so finding it exciting to embrace robots (and possibly one day literally as well as figuratively).
They are trying to kill Julian Assange
Martha S. 1 day ago
The so-called journalists of the msm are presstitutes, they write what is expected from them. They sold their soul.
That Mike Who? is one of the best paid presstitutes infesting NZ airways and press.
Chris Marsden demands freedom for Julian Assange
Sad, but self-inflicted.
On the contrary. I'd wager that every argument you've made this past 8 years that Assange's problems are 'self inflicted' is authoritatively debunked here:
https://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2019-05-27/abuses-show-assange-case-was-never-about-law/
Given that he starts with the "no charges" bullshit that is a mi-statement of the "no proceedings" argument that the british courts threw out of his original extradition hearings, that's a bold wager.
One of the hounds that pollute this site has unloaded another of his complacent, vicious, obscenity-larded tirades. The following captures his motivation just about perfectly…..
yeah the only reason I said anything was because it was just a matter of time before some self-important jerk wrote that people who have the unmitigated gall to suggest that people to be extradited for sexual assault proceedings shouldn't jump bail are "strangely silent".
So no, it changes nothing. He chose to abscond, that's his choice, he wears the consequences. If you're going to do that, copy Biggs or Papillon instead.
Ignoring the role Julian Assange has played in exposing America's misdeeds for some fantasy that Julian committed sexual assault probably has more evidence than the evidence against Julian Assange.
Swedish prosecutors and british courts disagree.
So you are still in denial about the bogus charges against Assange. We've got the rise in denial of routine law. A rise in denial about science, a rise in religious denial, and I'm talking about you, McFlock (lol) the amount of denial. The greater the denial> the greater the darkness.
You think the sexual assault investigation is bogus? Is that because you have any connection to the case, or just because google and confirmation bias have an unhealthy relationship in your mind?
It's because you excel at pointing at flaws in Julian Assanges arguments and are very quiet and deceptive about the flaws in the prosecutions arguments.
What flaws are those?
Sex without consent = rape.
Removing the condom when the condom was requested negates previous consent.
Therefore, if the facts of the case are correct, there's at lease a case to make that rape occurred.
You are still only telling half of the truth. Consent laws was brought into Sweden so to charge adults with raping minors, not adults raping adults. If consent laws was punished as you would prescribe, McFlock 🙂 then the legal age of consent would be 30 or how ever old the victims you allege was raped by Julian Assange. That's it.
Are you arguing that rape is legal in Sweden as long as the person being raped is over a certain age?
I'm saying you can't come up with an argument why I couldn't or even shouldn’t mount a fertile red blooded woman laying next to me bareback.
Because she doesn't want you to.
That sentence only makes sense if I replace "she" with "McFlock."
Keep telling yourself that.
What makes you so sure that I would have violated a law in the situation that I outlined above?
Because if your scenario has anything at all to do with Assange, my previous answer is sufficient. Otherwise there was no relevance to your comment at all and I incorrectly inferred the opposite.
Either case is possible.
In that case of course woman can say no condom no sex. What is unacceptable is a law intended for protecting minors against sex with out a condom because under Swedish law there had to be signs of physical harm, is then used to prosecute a crime from 7 years ago. And the definitions don't even fit current law.
So if she did say "no condom, no sex", and he slying removes the condom or doesn't wear one, is that rape?
You'd have to at least prove that your hypothetical occurred after the 2018 consent law changes. The rape allegations have already been thrown out of EU court once, woke lefties are just pleaing for them to be thrown out of a Swedish court a secound time.
lol you might want to look at the original extradition case again. Well before 2018.
Good one
I love Mezler's response to Jeremy Hunt's assertion that Assange had always been free to leave the Embassy.
After finding that Julian Assange displayed symptoms of “prolonged psychological torture,” UN Special Rapporteur Nils Melzer has traded barbs with the UK’s Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt over the WikiLeaks founder’s persecution.
“The UN Special Rapporteur should allow British courts to make their judgments without his interference or inflammatory accusations,” Hunt added.
Melzer quickly fired back in a rather creative fashion, saying: “With all due respect, Sir: Mr Assange was about as ‘free to leave’ as someone sitting on a rubber boat in a sharkpool.” He also reiterated comments that the British justice system had failed to show the “impartiality and objectivity required by the rule of law.”
@McFlock I'm sure he'll get more support once he's faced and beaten the rape charges in a court of law.
If that happens.
I'm equally sure that people here will still think his work with wikileaks should give him a free pass, even if they accept the verdict, if he's found guilty.
It certainly seems that way.
The charges are fantasy charges. The women with whom he had consensual sex were inveigled and bullied into this obscene travesty by the Swedish prosecutor, who was herself under duress from U.S. "diplomats."
If there were any credible charges against him, that would be another matter entirely. Your abuse of those who support this political dissenter and journalist is invalid.
If there were and credible evidence of what you claim, the extradition bid would have failed in 2012.
It's that sort of baseless but categorical claim of Assange's innocence that brings forth the description "rape apologist".
We don't know he's guilty, but nor do we know he is innocent. That is what the courts are for.
Political asylum is a thing McFlock.Its not granted to avoid being charged with a crime.Unless there is strong suspicion the charges are politically motivated
Prominent people asking for asylum are political pawns. Bargaining chips.
... copy Biggs or Papillon instead.
????
They were criminals. Assange is a journalist, an exposer of and dissenter from official lies. Which makes him, of course, an extreme threat and a target for destruction.
He's a guy who jumped bail to avoid extradition to face allegations of criminal activity. Any journalism he might also have undertaken is irrelevant to that.
A bullshit argument that omits the crucial context. It's like blaming someone for breaking their leg jumping out of a third floor window and not mentioning the building was on fire.
Well, not mentioning that he claimed the building was on fire after the home-owners arrived home early and there were questions about whether he was legally permitted to be inside the room from which he jumped. Oh, and that so far the only fire discovered is in the fireplace, well-contained according to fire code standards.
Nope, there's enough ambiguity in your argument to call bulshit. Assanges rape allegations was just a tool for the U.S. to persecute Assange.
Or he's a rapist.
Or every possible permutation, interpretation, or misunderstanding, in between.
By ambiguity I mean the woke have called Assage a rapist so such with out a conviction of rape that it's prejudiced any trail he may have. It's impossible for Assange to receive a fair trial now.
I'm sure his legal team will make that argument, and the courts will consider it.
A bullshit argument that omits the crucial context.
I didn't mention the specific allegations or their context, but they're not exactly crucial to the point that he's a guy who jumped bail to avoid extradition to face allegations of criminal activity. Whatever claims Assange or anyone else has about the allegations being part of a dastardly if somewhat illogical conspiracy, they're just claims, and evidence-free ones at that.
Whatever claims Assange or anyone else has about the allegations being part of a dastardly if somewhat illogical conspiracy, they're just claims, and evidence-free ones at that.
So now you are claiming the Americans are only pretending to be making an extradition case against him?
The alleged conspiracy is that the Swedish extradition request was part of a plot to extradite Assange to the US. There's no evidence of such a plot, and it would have been a pointless plot anyway, as the US could have just requested his extradition from the UK – as it's now done.
Your 'but' negated your previous word and displayed your faux concern.
Enough with your disingenuous utterances.
http://members5.boardhost.com/xxxxx/msg/1559337637.html
A “sad” case of “self-inflicted” psychological torture?
What could Assange do now to minimise further “self-inflicted” psychological torture?
Not much. How do you change your mind after you jumped off the bridge?
"One little push, and over he went – he made quite a 'splash'." Sad indeed.
@ McFlock , 'self-inflicted'…really how so?
He chose to be a political pawn for Ecuador. Should have jumped on a yacht.
Adrian, if you encountered someone so disgusting on the street, you'd probably ignore him. Don't expect a thoughtful or serious answer to your question.
Yes I know, but it can be amusing to try and follow their mental gymnastics in their convoluted answers sometimes, I guess I am saying they can some times be good for a cheap laugh….only if you are in the mood that is, otherwise they are just annoying and distasteful.
Still hanging on brother. Trump is trying to shake you off and you are still hanging on.
Russian versions of McFlock, meanwhile, tut-tutted and said "Zinoviev inflicted it on himself."
Mprrissey better not to make the argument more distressing. This goes direct to a sensitive nerve of McFlock's and coughing up Stalin who was a mega maniac with a matching power complex is not helpful in the situation. Just disagree will you and not feed the fire. It upsets me my friend.
The point of comparison is the behaviour of Stalin’s henchmen. McFlock and several others on this forum are analogues of Karl Pauker, Lavrenty Beria and the other ghouls who delighted in the suffering of officially designated enemies.
Yeah i just think your exagerrated point might be dropped being a regular here and knowing a bit about the site commenters.
Except that adding in "Russian versions of McFlock, meanwhile […]" shows that there is no "analogue" of me in the actual quote.
I get that you were trying to be a dick and compare Assange's self-chosen Ecuadorean Escapade with the deaths of twenty-odd million people in a totalitarian state run by a tyrant, but the English language (like the rest of reality) didn't quite fit your narrative.
And my gulags will be safe with you around brother. Extra portions of cabbage soup for you.
See, now you're the one claiming to be a totalitarian. Which is the opposite of what mozza was claiming. Try to keep up, Sam, there's a good lad.
No cabbage soup for you is a naughty boy.
Assange might have chosen most of his "Ecuadorean Escapade", but I doubt that he chose the ending, let alone subsequent events – these were imposed, and perhaps more difficult to foresee than the consequences of having "jumped off the bridge".
Still “sad“.
How the fuck did he think it was going to finish? Do cops stop chasing robbers once they reach "safe", all is forgiven? Would he get into a literal "diplomatic bag" and be put on a slow boat to Ecuador?
He had literal months to figure out his absconding plan, and that's what he came up with? No helicopter out to an Ecuadorian freighter 20 miles off shore? No yacht trip? No disguise, false identity, or escape tunnel from the embassy? No, let's take a car ride into the middle of London and stay there.
As well as repeatedly firing the word “rape” around, despite its complete inappropriateness, this tick "McFlock" keeps trying to associate a journalist and political dissident with robbers—yesterday he used the examples of Ronald Biggs and Papillon, for pity's sake.
I guess when you've chosen your line, no matter how wrongheaded and demonstrably false it is, you're committed to it. George W. Bush was like that. And his deputy Tony Bliar. And “Honest John” Howard.
And our friend Wayne.
Rape is what he remains accused of.
Other escaped criminals are resonable "analogues" for someone who absconded from bail for the better part of a decade.
Nah … rape is the bogus charge that was cooked up for political purposes. Every sane reading of the events around his association with the two Swedish women, both before and after, and during the initial interviews … absolutely do not suggest coercion or assault. The first investigator concluded 'no crime of any kind'.
It was only after he left Sweden that someone had the bright idea that what happened could be twisted into this disgusting charade.
Any sane reading suggests that the facts as reported indicate he was at the very least reckless as to whether either of his partners were consenting to him not using a condom.
But you know that's all bogus, so fucking yay, I guess courts are unnecessary, with such omniscient beings amongst us.
It's my impression the vast majority of people, including me, who support Assange have always said that ideally the allegations should be tested in Court.
But everything about this case tells us nothing is ideal, nothing is normal about how this case has been laid and prosecuted. If this was really about Assange's 'recklessness' … and nothing else … he would have done exactly what he said he has stated all along, and traveled back to Sweden to clear his name at Court.
And Steve Jobs should have gone for recognised medical treatments sooner.
People react oddly to things, and in different ways. Sometimes it's panic, or ego, or denial/avoidance. Sometimes people say stuff for so long that they end up believing their own hype.
Could be any of those, could be that a mole in the FBI/CIA secretly emailed him the full outline of a plot to use these allegations to gitmo him, and he panicked and ran to the embassy. Or maybe that was the plan – send him an invented plot so he does something stupid like jumping bail.
Bullshit. For years you've been deflecting from the obvious, that the USA would use any opportunity to extradite him if possible. Assange could not know in advance exactly how, but he had every good reason to suspect that these 'rape' allegations were bogus and a ploy to get him into a legal jurisdiction more amenable to American pressure.
For years you pretended this was just a paranoid fabrication to avoid facing trial in Sweden … yet now the Americans have indeed played their hand openly and you have been proven factually wrong.
For years I've been saying that if he genuinely believed it was all a US plot, why flee from Sweden into the jurisdiction of America's closest ally?
And yes, they showed their hand – in UK courts.
And it's one thing to pretend Sweden is more "amenable" to extradtition to the US than the UK (which is an arguable point full of opinions and maybes), it's another thing entirely to say the Swedes are "amenable" to fabricating rape proceedings in order to be in a position to extradite to the US.
And if it's a genuine sex crime investigation, then he needs to face it.
"How the fuck did he think it was going to finish?" – you sound upset.
Once granted, how do cases of asylum typically end? Sadly?
Normally, people requesting asylum do so after they are in the country in question, or walk into the embassy of the save haven in a third country.
Fleeing into an embassy in the country you are fleeing from seems to have very mixed results.
IMHO the 7 examples in that 2012 list all had 'happy' endings for the asylum seekers. Most of the examples are at least 30 years old.
Assange’s "Escapade" seems an outlier wrt duration and outcome.
“Sad“.
look at the ones where the asylum seekers were seeking asylum from the country the embassy was in.
The happy endings lower drastically in proportion.
And that's if you call the Mariel Boatlift a happy ending.
Not sure the Cardinal’s experience was too happy, either. Got there in the end, but after how long? He must have not had a cat.
Your “cat” reference lends credence to Brigid’s comment @8.3.2.
The linked page lists seven examples where "asylum seekers were seeking asylum from the country the embassy was in." All the asylum seekers apparently got what they asked for, some sooner than others. You believe this applies to Assange – lol, “sad“.
2012: "He left after six days, and subsequently was allowed to go to New York with his wife and two children."
1989: "Noriega surrendered 10 days later after being assured he would not face the death penalty in the United States." A one-time useful ally of the US.
1989: "They lived in the embassy for 13 months before being allowed to go to the United States."
1986: Howard 'escaped' to Russia via their Finnish embassy.
1980: From the information given, it seems likely that the six Cubans granted asylum in Peru's Havana embassy 'got out'.
1966: "She returned to the Soviet Union in 1984, saying she wanted to reunite with her family. Her Soviet citizenship was restored but she left a year later to go back to the U.S. following a family feud."
1956: "lived in the U.S. Embassy in Budapest from 1956 until 1971, when he was allowed to leave for Vienna." The only example in that list of an asylum that lasted (much) longer than Assange's. The US honoured that request for asylum until he was allow to leave.
I think you need to look up Noriega, and what happened to him, and relations with the US before they invaded Panama.
Howard ditched his tail in the US and went to Helsinki, where he claimed asylum in the Soviet Embassy there. He didn't go from the Soviets' Washington embassy. The Finns didn't want him, the yanks did. Similarly, Stalin went to the US embassy in New Delhi. The Indians didn't want here, the Soviets did.
Cuba was happy to get rid of them, and everyone else. And some occupants of its jail cells and mental asylums. Mariel Boatlift.
And the US had skin in the game to protect the Cardinal. He was a PR bonus. He could easily have been abandoned if the chips had fallen the other way.
BTW, I misphrased it.
Assange was fleeing the UK, so went to the Ecuadorian embassy in the UK.
I.e. the location of the embassy and the country being fled were the same country.
That applies to the two Chinese instances (diplomatic horse-trading likely involved), the Cardinal (same), and the Cubans (which Cuba used to clear the country of dissidents and prisoners).
You cited those seven examples in response to my question:
In those seven examples, no asylum seeker was forcibly removed from the embassy that granted asylum. Only Noriega was subsequently incarcerated, after extracting a guarantee and surrendering voluntarily.
If those historical cases are anything to go by then it seems to me that the way Assange's ayslum ended, and his subsequent treatment, are atypical – I'm happy for readers to draw their own conclusions.
Even 14% is not an unexpected return. It happens.
Would you agree that ‘forcible removal’ was unprecedented, and could therefore be regarded as atypical?
No idea.
Maybe if he’d considered his diplomatic worth versus an IMF loan after a change in president, he’d have avoided the embassy in the first place.
"Sad"
It is sad.
Like, outside my work, there's a pigeon that got hit by a car in the street and is now a flat streak of feathery grease. I'm not cut up about it or anything, but as I drive over it there is a sombre reflection on all that we are and become. There's no glee that a disease-encrusted rat of the sky is no more. It was a thing, and now it is a dead thing.
That sort of level of sad, I guess. Where you do that sort of inward "tch" sound, maybe slightly shake your head, and then get on with your day.
Got it – let 'justice' take its course, nothing to see here, just one more “disease-encrusted rat of the sky“, etc.
“Oh dear, how sad, never mind.”
"right".
"Treasury hacking: The time I hacked WINZ – Keith Ng."
Remember the fuss when Keith discovered the "hole" in WINZ? He did the right thing by informing WINZ about the "hole." Bridges didn't did he?
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12236128
Report on clever hacking from African sources this time, not Russian! Through email phishing.
Nelson family nearly lose home deposit to African hackers
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/113115596/nelson-family-nearly-lose-home-deposit-to-african-hackers
I https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/113169105/former-bnz-chair-calls-for-sir-john-key-to-be-forced-to-resign-from-anz
Hmmm.
ANZ New Zealand tries to fob it off as a minor error that occurred. Maybe they can find an ‘emotional junior staffer’ to take the blame. It most certainly wasn’t the Board.
The point is made that this is a fundamental issue of incompetence:
The RBNZ is working in a plan to force the banks in NZ to hold more capital as a bulwark against future financial shocks. The banks have embarked on a campaign of fear-mongering claiming that the RBNZ’s plan would act like “a handbrake” on our economy and ultimately lead to higher (borrowing) costs for customers.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/112832162/reserve-bank–plan-has-significant-negative-consequences-for-our-country-banks?rm=m
The New Zealand Bankers Association's (NZBA) had commissioned a report by research organisation Sapere to counter the RBNZ’s plans.
It seems to me that ANZ New Zealand is trying to have it both ways.
IRONY ALERT! Noelle McCarthy, who laughs at the suffering of political prisoners and sneers at human rights protestors, interviewed someone about "assholes" this morning.
RNZ National, Saturday 1 June 2019
After the 9 a.m. news the breathy, chirpy, Cork-accented Noelle McCarthy interviewed one John Walker, a Canadian who has made a documentary entitled Assholes: A Theory. According to his own publicity material, the film is "a direct response to psychology professor Aaron James' witty bestseller about why some people are assholes and how to deal with them – in an age when the trait seems to be on the rise."
The interview itself turned out to be neither particularly amusing nor insightful. At one point Noelle McCarthy chortled knowingly when he said: "Imagine the situation when one of these assholes is actually running your country!" Perhaps she was thinking of the situation in New Zealand from 2008 to December 2016.
The discussion was interesting, though, for what it left out: a sub-species of asshole who delights in the suffering of others. I sent the laughing hostess the following email….
You forgot the most disgusting assholes of all
Dear Noelle,
In your interview about "assholes" with John Walker this morning, neither of you mentioned a particularly noxious and heinous example of the genus, viz., those unspeakable individuals who laugh at the suffering of political prisoners.
Here's an especially repellent example of that kind of thing:
Hopefully you can interview John Walker another time, and add that kind of vicious asshole to his list.
Yours sincerely,
Morrissey Breen
Northcote Point
https://morrisseybreen.blogspot.com/2018/01/chris-trotter-reckons-zimmerman-jury.html
https://morrisseybreen.blogspot.com/2018/08/noelle-mccarthy-is-doggedly-reigning-in.html
https://morrisseybreen.blogspot.com/2017/12/possibly-most-repellent-panel-pre-show.html
Thumbs down to Radionz for settling on ironic and cynical themes for one, and not promoting some of regular NZ journalists to the role of supporting workers which Noelle seems to be part of. Can we hear NZ voices more please, not all these British and other 5 Eyes imports who are lovely people except for one failing, they are taking a NZ place in their own country's media, and we must have better balance – aim for 80/20 perhaps.
Remembering Flanders and Swann in reverse:
"Political prisoner and outspoken critic of Kremlin boss Vladimir Putin, Yulije Asanjey has been locked up in one of Russia's worst prisons for many years and may now face death through deliberate neglect of his medical condition
Asanjey became famous in the 2000's through exposing Russian aggression and covert spy activities over several years
Initially imprisoned for what many regard as trumped up charges,Asanjey has been declared the victim of torture by leading UN rapporteurs and experts on torture.
Russia's notorious prison system has long had a deliberate policy of breaking down prisoners so that they either die or are rendered incapable of conducting an effective defence. Denial of access or very limited access to lawyers and medical attention is a common ploy
Journalists from all over the world have expressed their support of Asanjey.
Amnesty International , Human Rights Watch and press freedom campaigners have joined under the common banner Free Asanjey!
The US has applied far reaching economic sanctions on Russia, for its continued flouting of UN rulings and increasing crack down on the free press"
Oh those wicked Russians!
Thank god we're not like that!
Thanks fransesca I have just thought again about doing something through Amnesty International. So will help with Free Asaney.
Have they a continuing campaign for Assange?
Amnesty International Get Involved
No.
Amnesty's only support of Assange has been this
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2012/09/sweden-should-issue-assurance-it-won-t-extradite-assange-usa/
Thats why my inclusion of them in the mock news report is ironic
Aha got it. But it sounded so true, and is with a reversal of approach. I still think I should support Amnesty I but sometimes the way things are done is surprising. Is Amnesty British – they could pop up to No.10 and sort everything out quite quickly, no, now I think of it they are tied up in knots, choose your own version, over Brexit and also who will be the next Clown Jester for PM.
Here are some knots and how to tie them. This might be the most useful information that arises from the blog today.
https://www.outdoorlife.com/photos/gallery/hunting/2012/02/essential-knots-how-tie-20-knots-will-keep-you-alive#page-4
useful link!
Another useful link:
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/05/31/us-figure-casualties-iraq-and-syria-hides-true-devastating-scale-civilian-deaths?cd-origin=rss&utm_term=US%20Figure%20of%20Casualties%20in%20Iraq%20and%20Syria%20Hides%20True%2C%20%27Devastating%20Scale%27%20of%20Civilian%20Deaths%2C%20Says%20Amnesty&utm_campaign=Ocasio-Cortez%20and%20Ted%20Cruz%20Agree%20%7C%20News%20%2526%20Views&utm_content=email&utm_source=Daily%20Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&cm_mmc=Act-On%20Software-_-email-_-Ocasio-Cortez%20and%20Ted%20Cruz%20Agree%20%7C%20News%20%2526%20Views-_-US%20Figure%20of%20Casualties%20in%20Iraq%20and%20Syria%20Hides%20True%2C%20%27Devastating%20Scale%27%20of%20Civilian%20Deaths%2C%20Says%20Amnesty
Hi Jenny How. Another time that you rush off before telling us what it's about. I’ll set it up under a keyword presumed explanation but it’s discombobulated in it original transition to the post here.
Jenny’s Mystery Link is Something to do with Amnesty
Indeed, many a commenter here seems to think that TS is their personal playground in which they can play by themselves or have one-on-one fun & games. At the same time, they seem to be oblivious to the fact that they are being watched, so to speak, by many silent readers of the site.
Indeed. Many dozens for each of us who speak. All part of the community.
Jenny, as a general rule you can cut off anything after the question mark: https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/05/31/us-figure-casualties-iraq-and-syria-hides-true-devastating-scale-civilian-deaths
Shamnesty, you mean.
https://professorsblogg.com/2014/05/11/swedish-amnesty-international-voted-for-reject-support-to-human-right-issues-on-assange-snowden-and-guantanamo-prisoners/?fbclid=IwAR3oHLkw9dNCUPUPQ339vP93fFLwjtM1t1VzmynLOVefkU28mRneTz5oWg8
In 1969, Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In predicted that the Berlin Wall would be torn down in 1989, and that Reagan would be President in 1988.
Starts at the 4:30 mark….
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEK8vZlzR1tPg2WOlZ59r8w
Click the following link to see another outlandish prediction that came true….
https://morrisseybreen.blogspot.com/2018/01/who-will-be-lead-mourner-at-obamas.html
Sovereign Nations
Do Nations have the Right to protect their Citizens, their Laws, their Trade and their Freedoms. ?
Or do they have to put up with illegal and weird Hackers, and Uninvited camera men rumaging for so called "scandal reports" and free feeds day and night.
I think it is proper for a Nation to clean up its own numerous flaws, before pronouncing the wickedness of others.
Can't seem to find this on The Standard:
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=12236522
BUSINESS
Former bank director calls for Sir John Key to be forced to resign from ANZ
1 Jun, 2019 12:44pm
Here: https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-01-06-2019/#comment-1623499
And here: https://thestandard.org.nz/bene-bashing/#comment-1623572
Thank you Incognito; I should have known it would be.
Yup. The Nats' current leader is flat-out dodgy, and their four previous were crooked too:
Shipley Corrupt dealings resulting in the collapse of Mainzeal – in court for $6M.
Brash The Hollow Man – had the Exclusive Brethren campaign for him. Also probably a white supremacist.
Key Where the hell do you start???
English Paid his mates $1.7B in the dead of the night.
Bridges Cash for list seats, and now data thief.
What about the next one..?
Collins Happily used Slater to intimidate public servants, ffs.
A shit-show since 1997.
One must say they are consistent though mustn't one! And apparently those with the 3 B's – Beach and bach, BMW and Boat – are quite happy to live in a sort of rotten borough.
I wouldn't be surprised if this has been up before but it sounds good., Stephen Fry on Brexit. Called Brexit: The End Game – The Hidden Money. It starts off with the info that Europe doesn't decide on how to spend UKs money.
He says "Britain can't take back control from the EU; because we never lost it. 99% of UK public expenditure is determined by the UK government." Immigration is different but Britain controls the major amount of immigration which is from outside the EU; 248,000 net migration compared to EU – 74,000 net migration.
Edit:
And TED talk from 2016 – Why Brexit Happened.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcwuBo4PvE0
Alexander Betts (British!) 18 mins
We are embarrassingly unaware of how divided our societies are, and Brexit grew out of a deep, unexamined divide between those that fear globalization and those that embrace it, says social scientist Alexander Betts.
How do we now address that fear as well as growing disillusionment with the political establishment, while refusing to give in to xenophobia and nationalism? Join Betts as he discusses four post-Brexit steps toward a more inclusive world.
That's very good. It’s always ‘follow the money’
Onya, girls.
https://twitter.com/influencer_com_/status/1133140922022023168
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/5/31/1861668/–These-School-Girls-Just-Aren-t-To-Take-It-Anymore-Jail-The-Molester?
If anyone still believes there are adequate protections for people with disabilities within the End Of Life Choices Bill you really need to read Chris Ford's piece posted in Newsroom.
https://www.newsroom.co.nz/2019/05/27/602948/why-i-changed-my-mind-on-euthanasia#
I know that this will put me in the same column as Christian conservatives who also oppose the legislation for moral reasons. Personally, this makes me feel very uneasy given that I hold otherwise progressively social liberal views on issues such as abortion and reproductive rights, LGBTI rights, women’s issues and indigenous issues, etc. Yet, I want to outline from a socialist, progressive and disability rights perspective as to why I have swung my support to the anti-euthanasia camp.
The turning point for me came about a month ago. I saw the report of a meeting hosted by disabled people’s organisation, People First (a group run by and for people with learning/intellectual disabilities) in the Central North Island. At that meeting, access to health care was discussed, as this is a key issue – particularly for people within this segment of the disability community – for whom find it difficult accessing care for many reasons, including attitudinal issues on the part of some medical professionals. This was exemplified by the stories shared at the meeting where some people – who had gone to hospital for treatment – had discovered upon reading their files that they had ‘no resuscitation’ orders attached to them. More problematically, these orders had not been requested by any of the disabled people or their families.
Rosemary, I'm sure your realize that there is no comparison between a decision not to prolong the artificial extension of a person's life and a decision to actively kill a patient.
I'm not sure the likes of David Seymour and Michael Laws appreciate the difference, which is a grave concern.
This passive euthanasia is happening at an ED near you.
My partner was bailed up by an ED supervising doctor with a clipboard a few weeks ago and was told in no uncertain terms that opting for the DNR option made perfectly good sense because, like, 'you know we'd probably break your ribs doing CPR, and you'd end up with pneumonia and its doubtful that ICU would take someone with your co-morbidities any way…' Sign here…
He had rather dramatically passed out. He was confused upon coming round. Yet two hours later and after a battery of health and cognitive function tests he was adjudged to be in tip- top health. They even noted that his leukaemia was so far in remission that heamatology considered him 'cured'. The only 'off' thing was strangely fluctuating blood pressure, which is so common as to be considered normal… for a C5 tetraplegic.
And it was the tetraplegia that tipped him into the 'we'd rather not bother resuscitating your sorry arse' category.
My man, by this time, had resumed normal function and proceeded to 'negotiate' with the clipboard carrying ED doctor with his sheaf of DNR forms that he expected them to try active resuscitation for at least 15-20 minutes.
The 'Slippery Slope' arguments in practice, real life.
Peter Singer and the rest of the Utilitarian ethicists would feel so proud.
Kia ora R&R.
Fashion needs to give way to having clothing and other goods to last decades and not mare minutes in in reality. I can remember when a new pear of jeans last 2 months and then split up the backside.
I say buying secondhand is were the NEW fashion trend needs to go it is all read happening in some Nordic Countries very cool trend that will help preserve our mokopuna futures.
I say making sure that the things we buy are made humanely and environmentally friendly ways that's is the way OUR future has to GO.
I say less is best we have heaps of consumer goods that we don't need that's bad for our future and environment juses blenders pie maker pancakes maker and many other goods that we actually do need.
Ka kite ano
Kia ora hui.
The mental health and the health of our tamariki is of utmost importance.
I agree strongly with Mike's statement that thinking is taking to yourself.
I'm constantly examining past events finding the TRUTH of what occurred and why things occurred.
I agree that we need to give our tamariki confidence to nurture them tell them you love them every day and treating them with love also .I say disciplining correctly is giving them love if you can see tamariki making mistakes doing things wrong you must discipline them so they learn not to do dumb Shit and tell them you love them afterwards. conferdince is giving with aroha
Ka kite ano
Whanau Eco Maori did not like the way shonky was ruining Aotearoa I could see it a mile away his underarm plays.
This story proves it he is a cheat the 00.1 % cheat all the time as they know that a fraction of there money that they gain from cheating will buy them impunity
A sense of unfairness, and wanting to see power held to account, I think has contributed to the explosion of interest in the call for former prime minister Sir John Key, chairman of our biggest bank, to resign.
ANZ's board, led by the former leader of our country, had been signing off on an operational risk model (which works out how much capital the bank needs in case of a shock or economic downturn) that had actually been dumped in
The ANZ board is stocked with people who you might assume would know a thing or three about bank capital.
How did this come about? The Reserve Bank "had encouraged" ANZ to review its attestation process, through which bank directors assess whether the bank is complying with the conditions of its regulations. It was only after this nudge that ANZ discovered the problem.
But before you get hot about it, it's cool. The Reserve Bank made it hold more money in case of a rainy day rather than lend it out in profitable ways like mortgages.
When the Reserve Bank found out, it stripped ANZ of its right to calculate how much risk capital it will hold. Yes, it used to be able to decide this itself.
This means our biggest bank is required to hold a further $277 million, taking it to a total of about $760m in case of bad news.
Kerry McDonald was chairman of BNZ for 12 years until 2008 and also sat on the board of its owners, National Australia Bank from 2005 to 2008.
Ouchie.
Now, ANZ won't like this one bit. This ruling increases the minimum capital ANZ must hold by around 60 per cent.
As Simplicity founder Sam Stubbs has pointed out, one reason profits are so high here is the Australian owned banks have to provide less capital than locally owned banks to support their lending.
So this will hurt ANZ in the wallet. But with the chunky-profits these Aussie banks make here, I think ANZ (who earned a record profit a sniff under $2 billion in the last financial year just in New Zealand) will cope.
MORE FROM
REBECCA STEVENSON • NATIONAL BUSINESS EDITOR
rebecca.stevenson@stuff.co.nz
But no-one has been held to account.
Unlike former BNZ chairman Kerry McDonald, who wrote to Reserve Bank governor Adrian Orr to call for heads to roll, I am neither amazed, nor surprised, at the penalty imposed on the bank. Thanks Dad.
He argues that Key, chief executive David Hisco, the highest paid bank executive in New Zealand who is currently off on sick leave, and several others, at ANZ should resign.
The bank's board had been signing this off for years, apparently without noticing if you give them the benefit of the doubt.
And it has to be said, Sir John Key wasn't there in 2014, 2015 or 2016 – joining the bank with his shiny new title smartly after leaving Parliament in 2017.
The board is stocked with people who you might assume would know a thing or three about banking. Ka kite ano p.s I smelt a korori
https://i.stuff.co.nz/business/113182741/when-rules-are-merely-suggestions-youre-probably-rich-or-powerful
I agree with Sadiq Khan trump and his alt right m8 are shorting the world political they will make a big mess of our Papatuanuku and take human rights back a hundred years if the leftys don’t get up and stop them
Donald Trump is like a 20th-century fascist, says Sadiq Khan
The mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has compared the language used by Donald Trump to rally his supporters to that of “the fascists of the 20th century” in an explosive intervention before the US president’s state visit to London that begins on Monday.
Writing in the Observer, Khan condemned the red-carpet treatment being afforded to Trump who, with his wife Melania, will be a guest of the Queen during his three-day stay, which is expected to provoke massive protests in the capital on Tuesday
Khan said: “President Donald Trump is just one of the most egregious examples of a growing global threat. The far right is on the rise around the world, threatening our hard-won rights and freedoms and the values that have defined our liberal, democratic societies for more than 70 years.
It’s un-British to roll out the red carpet for Donald Trump
Read more
“Viktor Orbán in Hungary, Matteo Salvini in Italy, Marine Le Pen in France and Nigel Farage here in the UK are using the same divisive tropes of the fascists of the 20th century to garner support, but with new sinister methods to deliver their message. And they are gaining ground and winning power and influence in places that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jun/01/donald-trump-like-20th-century-fascist-says-sadiq-khan
Donald Trump is a populist and a nationalist of the largest economy and still most powerful country on earth. Khan is the current Mayor of one city, and an outsider within his own Labour Party.
Trump is not a Nazi, despite all the protestations of Madeline Albright et al. He's just a self-interested thug making bank for his family for a few years before he's turfed next year.
The hard right had their chance in the EU elections last week, and they showed they didn't have what it takes to storm the castle and start dismantling.
Kia Newshub.
The Youth Rainbow community needs to be shown respect as all people do.
I say that the airline should be included in the plan to mitigate climate change this will make them chase alternatives powers for planes.
trump has to remember that every word he says bounces around the world media I sort of know what that is like.
The foxglacia council should have cleaned up the dump mess I say that they have had enough money to clean it up.
It's a hard task getting whare at the minute I would not like to try and rent a whare with tamariki these days you would need to no the owner or have a wand.
That's the way Julain championing the poverty of the Ugandan people and tamariki is bad ka pai M8.
Ka kite ano
Kia ora te ao Maori news.
Eco Maori say those people who have thrown darts at the Rainbow community are only thinking about their public profiles and not the damage they have done to the people of the Rainbow community.
Te Whare tu is helping keep tangata whenua O Aotearoa cultural going strong ka pai I get a sore face knowing that OUR culture is getting te mana back.
I totally agree us Maori men are portrayed as violent thefting thugs that really PISSs Eco Maori off thanks for making films that show Maori men in a cleaner light.
Cool I tau toko you for encouraging Maori to seek a higher education .
Ka kite ano
These are the people who rule our Papatuanuku I hope they can see that most people want a better future for there tamariki and NOW is the time to embrace the change if they don't jump on the Climate Mitigation Waka they will be left in OUR dust time to dump CARBON.
Security at the wharf was drum tight. Amid a sea of secret service personnel, Pompeo was accompanied by the US ambassador to Switzerland, Ed McMullen. The pair looked keen to continue the geopolitical strategizing over canapés.
The secretary general of Nato, Jens Stoltenberg, was flanked by heavily armed bodyguards as he strode along the jetty. He has attended the last three Bilderberg meetings, turning up for “informal discussions” with a watchful squad of security and staff
Bilderberg has a keen and growing interest in high-tech and AI. Schmidt’s fellow Bilderberg insider Peter Thiel, the billionaire founder of PayPal and a director of Facebook, was seen arriving with the Swedish physicist and AI expert Sara Mazur ka kite ano link below.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jun/02/bilderberg-pompeo-kushner-nato-stoltenberg
Its thanks to people like Blomfield who have the mana to stand up to people like Slater and don't let Slaters intimidating tactics scare them into staying silent.
If it wasn't for people like Blomfield we would not have found out about the $40.000 double dip by a well known MP.
People like Blomfield are few and far between quite rear so Eco Maori is asking everyone to tau toko Blomfield and BUY HIS BOOK he deserves the leftys tau toko.
The case was never about defamation. It has been a way that Blomfield could force his tormenter to verify the fantasies being presented as fact on his now disgraced blog. Slater failed and was finally impaled by a harpoon that he had unleashed, ultimately on himself
As the stories dragged on and I got to know Blomfield better, I told him not to worry. The lies told about him were not as appalling as the truth frequently told about me. But the lies were having a toll and this unwanted fight with a cyber thug with connections to the highest offices in the land was taxing what was an otherwise irrepressible spirit.
Blomfield, it needs to be said, and I am pleased to say it, isn't a man to be dissuaded by slander, intimidation or a gunman discharging a shotgun in his face. For seven years he took Slater and his cohort of degenerates through the long and painful process of a defamation trial.
The case was never about defamation. It has been a way that Blomfield could force his tormenter to verify the fantasies being presented as fact on his now disgraced blog. Slater failed and was finally impaled by a harpoon that he had ka kite ano link below.
https://i.stuff.co.nz/opinion/113082451/cameron-slaters-thuggish-ways-stymied-after-long-and-painful-defamation-case
Ka pai Pio for championing tiny houses and sustainable live off the land + clean energy solar power we need more tangata like you to champion the cause.
Our Mokopuna futures depend on people like us never giving up the cause.
TV personality Pio Terei is hatching a tiny house plan.
It was a plan that needed some research first. So he hopped on his electric bike and headed off to seek out some of the country's most innovative home owners; Kiwis who've chucked caution and convention to the wind to live sustainably and build the life of their dreams on their own terms. And boy, did he find them, dwelling in everything from teepees to whare uke, from container houses to earth ships.
Those encounters became Off The Grid,an eight episode TV series from Māori Television that aims to inspire viewers to give sustainable living a go. There's the sharing of practical advice and a few laughs along the way. Talking to him a couple of months before the show is set to air, it seems to have the actor, singer and comedian all fired up for a tiny house of his own
Ka kite ano links below P.S I know what you're name means kia ora
https://i.stuff.co.nz/life-style/homed/celebrity-homes/113111219/off-the-grid-pio-tereis-building-a-tiny-house-and-reckons-you-should-too
https://e-tangata.co.nz/korero/pio-terei-im-meant-to-be-here-bro/
Kia kaha to the Youth climate activist it is your futures WE are fighting for go hard it makes me happy to see that the climate is taking center stage now after all the Strikes you have staged.
Youth climate activists set for nationwide rallies ahead of landmark case
Students in Austin, Texas, want you to veg out. Kids in Westport, Connecticut will screen a film. And in rural North Carolina, activists will draw on a toxic spill to commemorate the environmental justice movement. The slogan refers to the landmark court case in Oregon in which 21 youths are suing the United States government over climate change.
Named for Kelsey Juliana, a 23-year-old activist and college student, the case was filed in 2015 and is headed back to court on Tuesday. The campaign to raise its profile – dubbed #IAmJuliana or #AllEyesOnJuliana – is the brainchild of Our Children’s Trust, the organization behind the lawsuit, and Future Coalition, the not-for-profit network forged to empower youth after the Parkland shooting.
A youth activist on the climate crisis: politicians won't step up.
What’s unique about the campaign is what it signals: the infrastructure behind the youth climate movement is growing, decentralizing, and gaining momentum, all while activists set sights on the 2020 election
All of these rallies will be part of an international campaign on Saturday to spotlight environmental issues. Their message: Ka kite ano link below
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/may/31/i-am-juliana-climate-protests-youth-activism
Kia ora Newshub.
Its cool to see more Wahine receiving houners congrats Grame you deserve your tohu houner I remember when the Kiwi players of old going hard At the Sea Eagles Billaria.
The Aviation industry has to change to green fuels or everyone will just use skipe for business meetings they will save money and carbon being burned to protect their children futures.
Its not on that the Richmonds have to fight for custody of their mokopuna from the man who killed their daughter.
Its good that Ken got his houner for his mahi of looking after men who have been abused .
Alex I think there's snow on te monga
Ka kite ano
Kia ora te ao Maori News.
Congratulations for your win in the Netball.
Kia ora Patsy's for your honorable recognition of your services to he tangata.
I agree the tabaco taxs are hurting Maori in the hip pocket but the amount of people at the hospital with respiratory problems has dropped dramatically we need programs to help our people quit smoking.
Redcross needs more donations to help cope with the huge numbers needing their good help dig deep Whanau you can find the Red Cross site online.
Ka kite ano P.S I will put up a link to Redcross site