Open mike 02/04/2024

30 comments on “Open mike 02/04/2024 ”

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1. Phillip ure 1

   2 April 2024 at 8:43 am

   Can't answer on 1/4…

   Colour scheme is soviet-era brown on the banner…white background elsewhere..
   • weka 1.1

     2 April 2024 at 9:35 am

     Has the cursor bug only just started? ie were you able to comment and reply on that version say a week ago?
     • Grey Area 1.1.1

       2 April 2024 at 9:45 am

       It's been happening for me for more than a week, maybe up to a month.
       • weka 1.1.1.1

         2 April 2024 at 9:57 am

         did anything change at your end at that time? New device? Updated or upgraded the OS?
         • Grey Area 1.1.1.1.1

           2 April 2024 at 2:34 pm

           Not a new device. Oppo seems to do OS upgrades pretty regularly but I can't recall when the last was.
           • weka 1.1.1.1.1.1

             2 April 2024 at 3:04 pm

             the cursor bug has been around a long time but seems to only affect some people. Lynn can't recreate it. I get it on my iphone, but weirdly this morning I was able to reply all of a sudden.

             Hence my interest in if it has just started with others.

             I will pass this on to Lynn.
2. Phillip ure 2

   2 April 2024 at 9:00 am

   • red on mic…blue and green on some headings..
3. Hunter Thompson II 3

   2 April 2024 at 9:00 am

   People have until Friday 19 April to make a submission to Parliament's Environment select committee on the Fast-track Approvals Bill.

   The Bill, if enacted, will mean a government minister has almost unfettered discretion when deciding whether an infrastructure project is of national or regional significance.

   The prospects for our so-called "clean, green environment" are not good, because as the Environmental Defence Society says:

   " the Bill] is an environmental destruction Bill. It rides roughshod over almost all of the country’s environmental protections that have been established over the last four decades. Unlike existing fast-track legislation, it is about circumventing environmental considerations, not streamlining process."

   Please make your voice heard: see https://www.parliament.nz/en/pb/sc/make-a-submission/document/54SCENV_SCF_083F0A7B-F182-41D5-0897-08DC3E31559C/fast-track-approvals-bill
4. SPC 4

   2 April 2024 at 9:31 am

   The Prime Minister moves from a 100 day plan to one every three months.

   The gangstalking and gaslighting, of those receiving a 25 cent an hour MW increase and even less affordable or secure residential tenancy, continues with this

   "Just like our 100-Day Plan, this next action plan is focused on three key areas to make life better for Kiwis," Luxon said. The first is "rebuilding the economy and easing the cost of living", the second is "restoring law and order" and the third is "delivering better public services" he said.

   A government that thinks that plans to build more and more roads while infrastructure crumbles around New Zealanders, is doing anything for the economy is confusing serving employers and landlords – class war – with wider society well being. Easing the cost of workers to employers and tax liability on landlords is of no use to those who pay the opportunity cost for this direction of government policy.

   The ability to measure improvement of public services is being undermined and the governments law and order plan is to lock up more poor people and make tax collection of the well to do more difficult.

   https://www.1news.co.nz/2024/04/02/pms-very-meaningful-new-36-point-list-of-priorities/
   • AB 4.1

     2 April 2024 at 9:41 am

     30-odd points in a 100-day 'plan' is histrionic arm waving, not a plan.
     • SPC 4.1.1

       2 April 2024 at 9:50 am

       It's just an outline of the legislative programme.

       An effort to conflate legislation with achievement. But if pandering to special interests was the way, we would have higher wages, lower property values/rents and first world infrastructure and public services already.

       This is just a return to the class warfare settings of their former administrations. As is the service to old economy global capital in exploitation of the environment.
   • Bearded Git 4.2

     2 April 2024 at 10:27 am

     To take just 3 of the 36 points:

     "Respond to the independent review of Kāinga Ora’s financial situation, procurement, and asset management."

     This looks like a sell off of state houses to pay for tax cuts per Key/English.

     "Take decisions on the removal of the ban on offshore oil and gas exploration."

     This wrecks NZ's CC credentials.

     "Introduce legislation to reintroduce charter schools."

     Privatise the education system and turn state non-charter schools into lower income parent ghettos.

     Luxon clearly intends to ram all this stuff through under urgency. If not it would take far too long and get bogged down in irritating things like parliamentary and public scrutiny. (sarc)
   • Res Publica 4.3

     2 April 2024 at 10:51 am

     If the previous government could be characterised as lions led by a donkey, then surely this government could be charitably described as donkeys "led" (in the loosest possible sense of the term) by an ass.

     It seems that Luxon et al are attempting to substitute volume and velocity of policy, if you could call it that, for quality.

     The only possible explanation is that they're hoping to break the public service so badly they can rely on voter's bad memories letting them sell themselves as the sole solution to the problem in a couple of years' time. Cynical, yes. But at least it's a plan.

     However, I worry that, at the very least for Luxon, Seymour and Willis, this is actually their genuine policy programme.
5. Anne 5

   2 April 2024 at 10:38 am

   Nick Rockel has come up with a beauty today on David Seymour. [See side-bar "Suddenly Seymour"]

   He posed a potential possibility :

   “A year from now he’ll become the next deputy PM – assuming Winston’s Trumpian behaviour hasn’t reached full on resisting the transfer of power by then.

   Actually such a renegotiation would not surprise me. I can’t see Winston happily playing second fiddle to Seymour, growing less relevant leading into the next election.

   So, we might have a battle royal on our hands in about a years time. Oh, the fun. 🙂
   • SPC 5.1

     2 April 2024 at 10:59 am

     Bolger-Peters and then Shipley with Peters, leaving on a jet plane north.

     Netanyahu and Gantz once had a power sharing agreement (but one did not get their turn) – there is a reason why the centre-right in Israel divided over and over again to form first an coalition partner then permanent opposition to his regime. There was little oxygen for the centre-left to breathe, so many on the centre-right pushed them out of the way to be the opposition (a bit like how Peters campaigned against National in 1996 and yet kept them in power only to realise Tories gotta be Tories and the pre 1984 nationalist economics era was a corpse that the new neo-liberal greed stood on).
6. Ffloyd 6

   2 April 2024 at 10:49 am

   Should luxons pie in the sky dreams, aka our nightmares’come to some sort of fruition, can Labour, Greens changethis back to status quo.
   Most of what they ‘have achieved’ so far is just spiteful repealing of many laws legislated by the Left. That is not achieving anything to my mind.
   I am especially concerned about the Fast Track Law being under the control of the three Ministers selected to implement this. I am presuming, perhaps wrongly, that they are there to do the bidding of shadowy figures and sign off on some of most damaging projects being mooted. They have obviously been selected for their dumb subservience to sponsors and lobbyists. Scary!
7. Stephen D 7

   2 April 2024 at 12:05 pm

   This looks like a plan that could work here. If only budgets weren’t being cut!

   https://tinyurl.com/yfdy57zx

   ”There is one strategy, however, that has not yet been given much attention by policy makers: upgrading current teachers’ maths and statistics knowledge and their skills in how to teach these subjects.

   They already have training and expertise in how to teach and a commitment to the profession. Specific training in maths will mean they can move from being out-of-field to “in-field”.”
8. Stephen D 8

   2 April 2024 at 12:13 pm

   A long form article looking at who, after Putin.

   https://tinyurl.com/yc78sj8w

   ”It is true that the most influential people of this regime, Vladimir Putin and Yuri Kovalchuk, are still adherents of the old system based on cynicism and hedonism, while seeming to desire the creation of an Orthodox Christian version of an Iran-style theocracy. But this will not happen easily, because almost no one believes in these values: neither Kiriyenko’s young technocrats, nor FSB officers, nor lurking liberals. Moreover, Russian bureaucrats don’t believe in anything at all. The last decades have convinced them all that they ought to stop believing in anything. It’s safer that way.”
9. weka 9

   2 April 2024 at 2:05 pm

   For anyone following the Scottish hate crime bill debate, JK Rowling made her power play this morning. Analysis here of what she just did.

   https://x.com/rob_thabuilder/status/1774959860502708291?s=46
   • weka 9.1

     2 April 2024 at 2:06 pm

     I’ll post later about the wider context
     • Visubversa 9.1.1

       2 April 2024 at 4:40 pm

       I know it is the "Daily Fail", but if you scroll through this you will see the examples JK Rowling gave of people who are not women but who the Law would require people to lie about.

       https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13260875/Rishi-Sunak-backs-JK-Rowlings-free-speech-Scotlands-hate-crime-laws-biology-dared-police-arrest-misgendering.html
       • weka 9.1.1.1

         2 April 2024 at 5:10 pm

         The Telegraph basically posted the whole twitter thread, except the longer last one which they did a precis of. In people's faces.

         https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/04/01/jk-rowling-could-investigated-misgendering-snp-law-scotland/

         unpaywalled version https://archive.is/0y9zh
         • weka 9.1.1.1.1

           2 April 2024 at 5:11 pm

           it was a very smart move from JKR, the challenge but also the format. I posted a bunch of images the other day instead of using words, and I think the impact is just that much greater. Images skate around people's biases straight to the brain.
           • Visubversa 9.1.1.1.1.1

             2 April 2024 at 8:40 pm

             I note that JKR called "Isla Bryson" on wearing tights which clearly show his male genitalia. This is just in your face showing off his contempt for women.
             • weka …

               2 April 2024 at 9:02 pm

               They're really taking the piss when they dress like that.
10. aj 10

    2 April 2024 at 4:24 pm

    This headline calculated to feed into the narrative that government spending is wasteful.

    DOC spent nearly $500,000 to kill one stoat in Fiordland

    The story does set the context for this spend but many people won't bother reading the details – certainly not those who will foam at the mouth after seeing the headline. They will just rant.

    https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/350231913/doc-spent-nearly-500000-kill-one-stoat-fiordland
    • weka 10.1

      2 April 2024 at 5:37 pm

      My tweet,

      $483,260 spent over 8 months to maintain island's 25 year predator-free status and to save endangered kākāpō, kiwi and skinks.

      Really shitty headline @NZStuff

      "DOC manages 33% of the country on half a percent of the government's budget"

      https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/350231913/doc-spent-nearly-500000-kill-one-stoat-fiordland

      https://twitter.com/wekatweets/status/1775019327340810275
      • aj 10.1.1

        2 April 2024 at 5:39 pm

        Well done thank you.
      • Tabletennis 10.1.2

        2 April 2024 at 6:12 pm

        Thank you Weka – yes a very shitty headline – and to think they have been working on a very tiny budget for years in comparison with other government departments.
    • weka 10.2

      2 April 2024 at 5:38 pm

      My guess is it's less about supporting the government and more about clickbait to keep Stuff's revenue up.

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