Obama and Romney come to an agreement on Climate Change.
They both agree not to talk about it.
However despite Obama and Romney’s gentlmen’s agreement to keep silent on climate change. An opposite and more forthright agreement to openly discuss climate change is developing among lower ranked US political leaders.
After ‘Sandy’ the possibility of an East Coast, if not nation wide bipartisan political consensus to tackle climate change is beginning to emerge.
“There has been a series of extreme weather incidents. That is not a political statement. That is a factual statement,”
” Anyone who says there’s not a dramatic change in weather patterns, I think, is denying reality.”
“I think part of learning from this is realizing that climate change is a reality.”
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo press briefing Tuesday (Oct. 30)
“All up and down the East Coast, there are mayors … being told, ‘You’ve got to move these houses back away from the ocean. You’ve got to lift them up. Climate change is going to raise the water levels on a permanent basis. If you want your town insured, you have to do this.”
Former President Bill Clinton before a crowd Tuesday (Oct. 30)
Obama is the better candidate to deal with climate change, which may have contributed to the superstorm.
New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg Thursday (Nov. 1)
High-profile figures like Bloomberg, Cuomo and Clinton speaking candidly and practically about climate change suggests a change of pace among public officials. But will the dialogue on extreme weather and climate that has emerged in Sandy’s wake alter the national conversation (or lack thereof) on climate change? Or will that discussion recede with Sandy’s floodwaters and the week’s news cycle?
If they choose to pick it up, Whichever candidate emerges victorious they will have the makings of this bipartisan consensus lying at hand all around them.
Whichever candidate wins the US presidential elections, the first order of business, must be to immediately order an assessment of the best strategy to combat climate change, seeking the best advice of the world’s best scientists and climate experts. The fate of civilisation, possibly even the fate of humanity depend on it.
Of the two candidates, Obama, in my opinion, would be best placed to do this, being less close to vested business interest linked to the oil and coal lobby. But all the evidence is, that he is failing the test.
Agreed. They also cannot say how much of “Sandy” is attributable to solar flares, warm water, ocean gods, or some guy mooning the latter from the beach.
Your statement is meaningless because everything is statistically based and an absolute level of confidience is something that science leaves for matters of religous faith.
Imagine that the actuarial tables on mortality state that a man of your age has a say 1 in 50 probability of dying this year. Does this ‘reliably’ inform us whether you will be alive at the end of the year or not?
Of course not.
The only sense in which such tables are meaningful are when you examine (or sample) a whole lot of men of your age. If for example you sampled say 1000 men, then you could be fairly sure that 20 of them might not make it to the end of the year. But it tells you nothing about each individual man.
In the same way science can reliably predict that increased ocean temperatures and more water vapour in the atmosphere will increase the probability of more frequent severe storms, and increase their peak intensity. It doesn’t reliably tell you anything much about an individual storm. Instead you have to wait until you’ve had many dozens of storms like Sandy before we can confirm the statistical prediction reliably.
Of course the insurance industry might well spit the dummy at funding such an extended and expensive experiment. The death toll might prove a bit of an irritation too.
There is a fair amount of data available regarding the recent storm in the US all one can say is only that some of its components may have been due to climate change.
The late-season formation may have been influenced by a shifting climate, but its meet-up with an early North American winter storm had no climate change connection.
A high-pressure blocking event, which may have been climate change-related, steered the storm toward the East Coast rather than out to sea.
Unusually high tides amplified the storm surge and flooding, but the tides had nothing to do with climate change. And the fact that those four events happened simultaneously was just a very unfortunate coincidence.
Warmer temperatures, which allowed the storm to carry more moisture, and higher sea level are likely to have amplified its effects. The higher sea level — a foot higher than when the city’s protective sea walls were built a century ago can almost certainly be attributed to climate change.
So if I read what you are saying, then you agree that man-made climate change is real and is fast becoming a significant component of severe and adverse weather events?
And going back to your first point; that the barrier to doing anything about it is political … and always has been.
In other words, climate change affects existing weather and how it intersects with other phenomena like geography, tides and time. Isn’t that a given already?
Hs: Your second and third paragraph are in direct contradiction with each other.
The reason this particular storm came onshore at that latitude rather than doing the usual wander into the Atlantic was because it was blocked by a northern jetstream coming lower in latitude than usual.
If you look at the historic tracks for hurricanes at that latitude you will see that it is almost unknown for them to turn inland. If you look at the historic tracks of the jetstreams you will see that they seldom come down far enough to block which provides the room for hurricanes driven by the otherwise minor effect of the earths rotation to move east .
The physics of arctic warming when modeled indicate that the jetstreams will have a higher amplitude, and over the last decade that is exactly what has been seen. So it becomes a higher probability that there will be offshore blocking events driving hurricanes into the upper eastern seaboard of the US. That also increases the probability of hitting cold fronts being spun out of the arctic by those same jetstreams and following that same rotational spin towards the east (frontal systems have quite predictable tracks as well when they don’t get blocked).
It isn’t coincidental. It will probably become more and more obvious through the rest of this current weather cycle for the next few years, then it will reduce in probability as the rate of the deicing of the arctic wanes and the atmosphere shifts to a new equilibrium. It will then resume in the 2020’s.
What the SA was saying was that the degree of the impact of climate change on that storm wasn’t proveable yet (although highly likely) because it takes a number of events to get a statistical sample sufficient to establish confidience. By the time that there is the required confidience, the east coast will have developed good hurricane systems anyway – they will have had received quite a few – probably 10 or more to get to a 90% confidience level that there has been a shift in the high latitude hurricane tracks.
Reductionism of the type you were repeating has it’s place in science, but in weather and climate systems you really have to look at the whole because the effects work on each other in a much more complex set of interactions.
Thanks 1prent. Most people view the weather as a surface event only but it is not. What goes on in the upper atmosphere plays a major role in how things turn out at the surface. In recent decades the polar jets (both North and South) have been tracking further into lower latitudes than has hitherto been the case. When this happens and cold air from those upper level jet streams feed into warmer surface cyclonic weather systems then you can expect further cyclonic generation to occur. It is certainly due to global warming, and as a consequence… expect to see deeper and more frequent tropical cyclonic events occurring in the Southern Pacific region too.
It is their article I was quoting but perhaps you should send them a letter what with your earth sciences BSc I’m sure you’re far more erudite than any of their contributors and with your computer skills you’d be able to model weather events with far greater reliability than anyone else has to date.
What can be denied is the youtube video you have linked to with alarmist comments suggests a warming of 6 or more degrees C in the next few decades.
You’ve not been keeping up. The video was quoting the IEA:
LONDON, April 27 (UPI) — Global greenhouse gas emissions will nearly double by 2050 under current policies unless urgent action is taken, the International Energy Agency has warned.
Issuing a stark assessment this week at a London environmental conference, the energy policy advisory group said failure to develop fossil fuel alternatives quickly will put the world on an irreversible course to a catastrophic long-term temperature increase of 6 degrees Celsius.
“Under current policies, we estimate that energy use and (carbon dioxide) emissions would increase by a third by 2020, and almost double by 2050,” said IEA Deputy Executive Director Richard Jones.
“This would likely send global temperatures at least 6 degrees higher. Such an outcome would confront future generations with significant economic, environmental and energy security hardships,” he added.
The grim forecast was delivered at the third annual Clean Energy Ministerial, which brought together ministers from 23 governments for discussions on clean energy progress and opportunities.
While it’s true that some years ago, 6 degrees was considered a fringe ‘worst-case’ scenario, as with so many other things around climate science, it’s rapidly become a lot more main-stream.
Coming as it is just a week before Election Day, Sandy makes the fact that climate change has been entirely ignored during this campaign seem all the more grotesque. In a year of record-breaking temperatures across the U.S., record drought conditions in the country’s corn belt, and now a record storm affecting the nation’s most populous cities, neither candidate found the issue to be worthy of discussion. Pressed about this finally the other day on MTV, President Obama called climate change a “critical issue” that he was “surprised” hadn’t come up during any of the debates, a response that was at once completely accurate and totally disingenuous. (As one commentator pointed out, he might have brought up this “critical” issue on his own since “he is the friggin’ POTUS.”)
Definition: The CCDs argue that climate change is not real and is not happening. CCDS explain the controversy is a result of global conspiracy deliberately concocted by scientists politicians and media, unfortunately they have not been able to give any rational explanation of the reasons for this conspiracy.
Current Status: The CCDs are Pretty much at the fringes of the current debate on climate change
Title: Climate Change Apologists
Definition: CCAs admit that climate change is happening, but say that jobs, profits, the economy and growth, and a myriad other issues are far more important than taking steps to address climate change. The apologists are also adept at blaming or scapegoating others, usually groups that they have taken a dislike to anyway. This group are quite comfortable with the idea of millions if not billions of human deaths, as well as the destruction of entire eco systems and the resulting animal and plant extinctions. Their previously listed preoccupations are considered far more important.
Current status: The most sinister, cynical and dangerous of the different Climate Change factions. Currently the CCAs are the main spear carriers for doing nothing about climate change
And now a third category has arisen:
Title: Climate Change Ignorers
Definition: Political leaders and parties who refuse to even mention Climate Change, if they can avoid it. Usually for sectarian political advantage, ie not scare the horses, not look too radical in the eyes of the voters, not offend vested interest etc etc.
Rather than alert the electorate and the wider population to the danger, the CCIs put getting bums on seats for their particular sectarian grouping more important than even alerting their political rivals who could steal a policy march on them.
The whole topic of Climate Change is a ‘no go area’ for these politicians. They will rarely if ever mention the subject of Climate Change unless it is pushed right up under their noses, and often not even then. If forced to mention Climate Change CCIs say that one day when they are in complete control of the presidency and the congress, or have the most seats in the house of parliament then they will call for action on Climate Change. CCIs neither deny, or apologise for climate change, they just simply ignore it.
Current Status: The most ridiculous and laughable faction of all, I don’t expect it to last long.
Being connected to the internal network is definitely a security breach waiting to happen, but I find it hard to believe that such an obvious problem went unnoticed for 13 years, yet within 1 year of the new kiosks being set up it was discovered on at least 2 separate occasions (that we know of).
Therefore, I suggest, that although the old computers may have been connected to the internal network, they did not exhibit the same basic security breach (that is, navigating with an ‘open file’ dialog in Word would give you access to the entire network) probably through some configuration option that stopped it, which should also have been configured on the kiosks but wasn’t.
This means that the security was still incredibly lax and just waiting for someone malicious to exploit it, but this would have required a specific intent to do so by someone with the required skills, rather than any moderately-knowledgeable office worker with Microsoft Office skills being able to find it.
In short, no, the evidence would suggest that National is worse than Labour.
That depends. I’d like to see the report. But on the face of it, MSD under National were told, at least twice, that there was a serious problem and to fix it, and that advice was ignored. What happened under Labour? I don’t think we know yet.
Says so much about his myopic view of our society and how he thinks he’ll ‘add value’.
Talk about give a bigot RWNJ, with established psych issues, an even bigger soapbox to indoctrinate the frogs with, last roll of the dice for the truth IMO.
if they can’t boost the circulation appealing with dog whistles they are history like so may publications are already.
It’d only sell at union sites (well maybe they need to be a bit more careful with the money…) but it might put a stop to the rampant jealousy of whaleoil…
Rortney Hide on the financial transparency war path! Has Rortney come clean on his girlfriend’s parliamentary travel perks yet? Or his flash international hotel stays?
Yeah Draco. Bluddy right wing nobs. They say that they are: ” Legatum Institute (LI) is an independent non-partisan public policy organisation whose research, publications, and programmes advance ideas and policies in support of free and prosperous societies around the world.”
Must be a trick in there somewhere. I expect Parata will now quote the claim that NZ is “first in the World Education” as being the product and vision of her leadership. Yeah Right!
Their credibility? In their own words, “…we have a vision of a more prosperous world based on greater economic and political liberty balanced with personal and institutional responsibility.”
So, free markets and personal responsibility and political liberty that is probably measured in terms of consumer choice and institutional responsibility measured in terms of protecting a market ‘free for all’ and keeping pesky citizens who want more political freedom than mere consumer choice firmly in line.
Chalupabot, your count is getting too high. 18.4% of all comments on this site in the last 48 hours have been made using your handle. As you know, the limit to avoid unwanted attention is 9.7%
Please return to an acceptable ratio or use some of your other handles.
Interesting boots on the ground report of the chaos that is Sandy. Disturbingly there are still Americans full of the belief that someone will rescue them, so they don’t need to prep.
Give it a week and that attitude will be wiped out – at least in affected areas. We would do well to heed their experience.
DB Breweries has been slammed for abusing Kim Dotcom’s wife on a Tui billboard. Seventeen billboards around the country say “She clearly married Dotcom for his body. Yeah right”.
Dotcom, in a statement to the Herald on Sunday, described the campaign as “hurtful and insulting. It’s not only offensive to me and my wife but to everyone who is overweight and their partners”, he said.
He said his wife Mona had been through hell in the past nine months.
Tui marketing manager Jarrod Bear said the billboards were an irreverent spin on topical issues that would appeal to “everyday Kiwis”.
One person, (not Dotcom) has laid a complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority.
Fuckin’ A, weka. Tui can sometimes be actually funny but the rest of the time it’s just embarrassing the way their marketing team’s rampant insecurities are put out their for the world to see …
+1 Only a complete moron would drink that ferrets piss anyway. I guess with such despicable advertising that only a moron could like, DB Breweries is trying to appeal to their consumer base. An irreverent spin on topical issues… Yeah right! It’s defamatory rubbish that many New Zealanders will be offended at.
Yep. One Tui billboard in ten might actually be funny. Unless Jarrod Bear is willing to put a photo of him/herself and partner on a billboard, he/she should just shut up.
Yes Fran O Cyclops has really lost the plot, or that article was intended to be a job application to join the (non) Truth. ( I see production problems looming with frequent web-breaks* due to slaters being keen to feast on rotting paper)
*web-breaks is printers jargon for the reel of paper snapping when press is running
And under Fran O’Sullivan’s embrassing brain-blurt, is the perfec place to copy the email I sent to my son today, after doing some reading:
“This was said on the IMDB boards about a Romney supporter, arrested
for voting twice:
“I understand why you and the government would hate such a women.
She’s a hero, one of the very few Americans actually trying to rid us
of the corrupt regime currently hogging power.
“Lock her up” You said, well so did all the dictators.”
Hilarious, and yet very disturbing…”
I’m sorry I clicked that. But I guess it was time for my annual reminder of how pathetic “evidence” has to be for WO to treat it as hard-hitting gospel.
(For those who don’t wish to click: Hamish Keith tweets “why no Labour MPs at Fabians”, Cunliffe tweets “sorry, I had a cold”, Cactus responds “you didn’t look sick when I saw you in town today!” It’s fucking riveting journalism, Keith Ng should take note of how it’s really done.)
Maybe he was sick enough that he couldn’t attend a major function and put on his future-labour leader face….but he was well enough to get up for a meal.
A few weeks back I wasn’t feeling well enough to get over the other side of town for a meeting, but I could get down to the supermarket.
You need to stop letting whaleoil think for you chalupa batman, you can probably do better with your own brain
Exactly. There’s no reason anyone has to be deliberately lying, it’s just bullshit for Cactus/WO to act like one non-medical professional’s opinion of how a person looks has any bearing on their actual state of health.
I’m sure the Fabians would approach Cunliffe if they had a reason.
Everyone’s working toward the same goal etc.
When it comes down to doing something concrete is when we’ll see them talking.
One should always take with a great deal of cynicism anything that Slater says about Cunliffe. I am interested in his obsession with DC, obviously he thinks that Cunliffe is a threat to the right and needs to be attacked at every opportunity.
The reality is that David is crook. He pulled out of some no asset sales petition campaigning that was arranged for this morning and this afternoon he is missing an important party fundraiser. I have spoken to him a couple of times and he sounds sick as.
Oh yes, it’s been amusing – Richard Long begging Shearer not to reshuffle, Hooters saying that really, David Shearer needs more support and Cunliffe should be sacked while Farrar, knowing that Shearer’s a lost cause, suggests the next waste of space, Robertson.
All of them presenting themselves as sensible voices of reason – just like Pete George, come to think of it.
Alas, the Right and their shills know what they want and make it clear…
Now I was under the impression that, that vindictive old bat lived in Hong Kong. So HOW could she see Cunliffe in town? Also when I had the flu, I still had to go out, and people probably from looking at me didn’t realise I was screwing up their lives for the 3 weeks it takes to get over the flu. And anyway, anything Whaleshit says, needs to be checked, rechecked, verified, with at least 10 other neutral people. And I still WILL NOT believe a word he vomits.
There’s been a lot of disinformation being promoted by the right wing at the moment concerning Unions. In fact if you didn’t know the real reasons behind what propagandists like David Farrar, Cameron Slater and Rodney Hide were saying, you might believe that Unions are an evil blight on society…
Do you mean the Unions should follow the rules or the NBR should adhere to publication laws Chalupa Batman? The Unions have followed the rules. The NBR hasn’t because it’s publishing inaccuracies based on Hides speculation. There has been no finding of wrongdoing on the part of the Unions. Clearly the NBR has again breached publication laws by promoting defamatory and inaccurate speculation.
Good article Jackal, I’d like to see these dropkicks getting their asses sued for defamation by the Unions concerned.
Hide should find a rock and invite those other creeps to join him in entombment.
Thanks fender. You’re clearly talking about Act’s standard retirement package… Slithering under a rock is the best place for the likes of the unlawful David Garrett, John Banks and the rest of the deluded Actoids. What a bunch of worms!
How about this then, we wait for Neville Harris to decide whats what and if in the unlikely event theres nothing I’ll apoligise. Of course once something dodgy has been uncovered we’ll expect an apology from you?
Apologize for saying that there’s been no finding of any wrongdoing? Get off the grass Chalupa. Just like Affco’s complaint to the Serious Fraud Office, the Companies Office won’t find anything unlawful either. That’s because Rodney Hide is full of shit, and always has been.
You want me to say I’ll apologize about a what if? How retarded!
The claims by Hide and Slater that the Maritime and Meatworkers Union’s are hiding and misspending millions of dollars of their members money are in the present tense false. There is no evidence, I repeat no evidence of this. They’re speculating and then trying to say their assumptions are facts.
I think QoT summed it up nicely today when she wrote:
I’m sorry I clicked that. But I guess it was time for my annual reminder of how pathetic “evidence” has to be for WO to treat it as hard-hitting gospel.
In my opinion, the same can be said about the deplorable Rodney Hide as well.
Hunter S. Thompson was onto that trick long ago, relating an anecdote about Lyndon Johnson wanting stories about his opponent fucking pigs to be promulgated. When his advisors were shocked (this was a more innocent time), saying that there was no evidence, Johnson retorted, “I want him up there denying that he fucks pigs!”
Hide’s article’s aren’t about if something is found, he’s saying they’re already guilty even though there’s no evidence of this. My article is about Hide and Slater’s baseless propaganda, which is a fact. Therefore I won’t be apologizing to you Chalupa Batman.
Oh for gods sake CB will you just get over it, your tiny mind has obviously been overloaded with this discussion, other wise you would be writing something of substance and value instead of repeating Whaleshit’s propaganda, and wanting an apology to a non existent wet dream you once had?
I heard the recognisable thud thud thud of a helicopter’s rotor blades. I looked up to see one of our birds coming in, guns blazing!
“We’re saved!” I yelled, leaping to my feet, waving my arms so as to be seen.
The chopper came in on its run, and I knew it would leave a trail of destruction. The gunner let loose and the world all around us turned to fire. Roy and Douglas went down in a bloody mist, but Johnny somehow escaped being eviscerated by the chopper’s 30-mm chain gun. I dived to the ground.
“You’re shooting at the wrong target!” I screamed into the radio.
“Sorry about that,” came the reply. I knew the voice all too well. “But frankly, er, you’re lucky we even came. Stand by for pick-up. Gunner Perigo, er, have you got a fix on the enemy?”
If Cameron Slater is ‘no holds barred’ in holding politicians ‘feet to the fire’ – what has he done to hold John Bank’s (and Don Brash’s) ‘feet to the fire’ over the ‘ONE LAW FOR ALL’ (that they both support) – not yet applying to them over Huljich?
(John Banks and Don Brash were both former Directors of Huljich Wealth Management (NZ) Ltd, and both signed Huljich Kiwisaver Registered Prospectuses dated 22 August 2008 and 18 September 2009 which contained untrue statements – a ‘strict liability’ offence under s.58(3) of the Securities Act.)
I formally requested the Finance Markets Authority (FMA), the Serious Fraud Office (SFO), and the NZ Police apply ‘ONE LAW FOR ALL’ to the former and current ACT Party Leaders.
When each of the above-mentioned put it in writing that they would do nothing, I petitioned Parliament for an urgent investigation. However – the national party dominated Commerce Select Committee also chose to do nothing.
At least I tried!
What has Cameron Slater done on this issue?)
Why has Cameron Slater banned me for commenting on his ‘Whaleoil’ blog – is he purports to support ‘freedom of expression’?
If staff at the ‘TRUTH’ are covered by employment law – how long is Cameron Slater going to last, as ‘TRUTH’ Editor?
(Kind regards Cameron – I’d be making this comment to you directly – on YOUR blog – if you hadn’t ‘banned’ me? 🙂
Why has Cameron Slater banned me for commenting on his ‘Whaleoil’ blog – is he purports to support ‘freedom of expression’?
– Probably because you posted long-winded, boring diatribes that basically had nothing to do with the thread, wouldn’t reply when challenged and ignored the warnings given
Good because National/Key (there’s no difference) continue to fade. Plan A is finished, only Plan B will save them. There won’t be a “National plus electorate Righties” majority at the next election. Key’s been found out, and the voters are looking for alternatives.
Which brings us to National’s Plan B … a third term thanks to Labour fucking up. That’s their best hope now.
So again, a good poll because the (few) remaining Labour ostriches can’t keep those heads in the sand. As National’s support declines, voters will turn to the opposition that is not Labour. Like Winston, in this poll.
Unless Labour decide (finally) to do something about that.
Polls like this – and the last Roy Morgan one – make it more likely that they will. Good.
Taken in concert with the most recent roymorgan, beginning to be a bit concerning. The issue for labour is to get out of the low30s in CB polls and at the moment it seems pretty steady.
During the time this poll was taken the following was going on:
-MSD privacy scandal
– The Government messing up on asset sales and Maori water rights
– Christchurch school screw ups
– Sweet talking its way through “No manufacturing crisis”
– Key being absolutely unbelievable and brain faded in the Dotcom/GCSB affair.
I never watch TV these days but clicked through to get a taste of everything that’s not changed. Front of vid is a still picture of JK raising a glass (in the vid it coincides with him saying ‘cheers’). JK in a factory that’s still open! And (the only potentially dodgy one) in operating garb to a voice over about ‘the good health’ of the Nats. Shearer edited to be heard apparently taking advice from a fucking wizard. Shearer standing looking at derelict sites and (twice?) framed alongside a ‘No Public Access’ sign.
And less than 50% of those polled thinking the economy will improve is spun in a positive light!
Anyway. If a Shearer led Labour Party that does nothing but shoot itself in the foot and offer gift horses to the Nats is still over 30%, just imagine what a Labour Party could do.
And then the scare mongering begins about the prospect of a dysfunctional NZ1/Green/Labour coalition. Because we’re meant to believe that NZ1 wouldn’t go with the Nats!?
Funny how TV1 says National can govern alone on 44%.
They ignore NZF because they are only on 4.9%.
Yet they count The Maori Party, Act, the Conservative Party and Mana who are all struggling to register.
So if you put Labour 32%, Greens 12%, NZF 4.9% = 48.9%.
This for the sake of discussion trumps National on the poll, doesn’t it?
Not all that good for Labour but not that bad either 2 years out from an election.
You’d think by now we would have a user-friendly web app for calculating various results. And that the MSM would be putting polls in those contexts.
Old fashioned I know, but I think the media’s job here is to report on the range of things that might happen (you know, actually inform people), rather than promoting one in particular. Would love to know how that editorial decision was made.
Ian, the reason they are counting MP, ACT, UF and Mana is because they’re all in parliament due to safe-ish electoral seats (except maybe UF). NZF is completely dependent on crossing the 5%.
Well actually there is a calculator for working out the allocated seats depending on vote percentages. It’s called the MMP seat allocation calculator. Of course the MSM can’t be bothered using it because it would mean they couldn’t peddle their propaganda.
You would increase or decrease the likelihood of certain MPs winning electoral seats on the previous election results in comparison to the percentage of current polling. Just assuming that the current incumbent MPs would retain their seats even though their party support has declined and then claiming the right wing would be able to form the next government is obviously wrong!
In fact it’s astounding just how arrogant the media is with its manipulations. They treat the public like fools!
Yes I know about that calculator, it’s just not very user friendly.
I’m not sure that there is such a direct correlation re the seats and previous/current polls, esp re the Maori Party/Mana seats. Have you done that calculation?
Right on, mac. It’s a Brolmar, and NACT’s desperate for good news. Take 10% off NAT, add 5% to Lab, have a good chortle at “add ACT and MP” and the ignoring of Winnie, and relax.
In 1863, in the lead up to its illegal invasion of the Waikato, the New Zealand government illegally confiscated the land of Māori living south of Auckland. One of the areas confiscated was Ihumātao, once one of the biggest farming ...
The Resource Management Act is one of the most important pieces of legislation in the country, both in terms of its impact and its influence. If you want to build a house, run a farm, or dig a mine, or ...
Democracy is important in many senses. It is first and foremost a form of government – famously described as, “government of the people, by the people and for the people”. It is then a process, which enables us to choose ...
By Sam Neill I was recently speaking with my pet pig, Angelica, about the wonders of science, and all the marvellous things it allows us to do with its zip-zappys and wing-wangeries. “Angelica, dear,” I said in my rich pleather ...
The person responsible for the ad has been sent to their bedroom for further scapegoating. The Green Party is standing by its views that 16-year-olds should be eligible to vote, even as they acknowledge that they shouldn’t have let them ...
My idealistic position on the role of MPs was articulated by Edmund Burke: ‘Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion.’read more ...
When she was running for election, Jacinda Ardern called climate change "my generation's nuclear-free moment". It was meant to convey a sense of both the scale and moral imperitive of the challenge. So how is her government meeting that challenge? ...
In its Open Government Partnership National Action Plan, the government promised to "Test the merits of undertaking a review of the Official Information Act 1982 and provide and publish advice to Government". Originally, they planned to do this in secret, ...
Having spent the last 3 months in these countries and getting some appreciation of their dependence on fossil fuels – oil, gas, coal – one realises how loopy is the idea popular in societies like New Zealand that have negligible ...
In the wake of the March 15 mass-murder, the government moved swiftly to ban semi-automatic firearms, weapons for which there is really no case for being allowed to own in New Zealand. and now, it has announced phase two of ...
Local body politicians are concerned that the hostile online environment might deter people from running, and want British-style laws to prevent "online attacks". So what sorts of attacks are they concerned about? Death threats (illegal under the Crimes Act)? Sustained ...
When allegations emerged that civilians had been killed during an SAS raid in Afghanistan, NZDF was absolutely unequivocal in its denials, both the Ministers and the public. Since then, we've learned that they were well aware that there were reports ...
Over the past few months, we've seen a number of local authorities respond to public pressure over climate change by declaring a climate emergency. So what should they do next? Writing in The Spinoff, Sarah Thomson has some suggestions. Most ...
I have been unimpressed with Western corporate media coverage of the tensions involving Iran in the Straits of Hormuz. They repeat the line that Iran is the source of current tensions, that it is a major sponsor of terrorism, that ...
Victory, But Not Ours: Trump uses his deplorable words in exactly the same way as C.S. Lewis' wicked queen, Jadis, used her single 'Deplorable Word'. To win – no matter what the cost. He knows the power of words. He ...
Seeking Refuge: Were Jesus, Mary and Joseph fleeing persecution in Palestine or Judea? Were they Palestinians or Jews? Green MP, Golriz Ghahraman, in describing the Holy Family as Palestinian refugees, touched off a firestorm of controversy, demonstrating the sinister ease ...
Much like Tuvalu, the manmade climate change Cult love to tell people the Maldives is almost totally underwater. In fact the dishonest Maldives Govt d on the same bandwagon, believing they would receive billions of dollars aid from other Countries ...
According to every manmade climate change cultist on Earth, the pacific islands of Tuvalu are being flooded by rising sea levels. In fact, incredibly even a google search will bring up an immediate claim the islands are almost underwater! The ...
Firstly, it’s important you know that I am not paid by fossil fuel companies, nor do I have any association with them at all, and in fact I’m not a fan of any industry that doesn’t do it’s best to ...
As the entry on Wikipedia shows (and no, one doesn’t necessarily have to regard Wikipedia as the be-all and end-all of truth, because it isn’t on a great many things, to agree with the following): “…a fallacious argument that concludes ...
by Daphna Whitmore The story of how the world awoke to a big injustice is starting to be told. The Pacific Games held this month in Samoa is another chapter. On the podium was Laurel Hubbard, the giant transgender weightlifter, ...
Our conversations and push against specific supremacist and ultra-Nationalist groups, and the pseudo-intellectual underpinnings of them, need to mature at all levels. But in doing so, it’s going to have to include a more thorough and brutally honest self-examination ...
Why do so many people mistrust the police? Because they pull shit like this:The police are flouting the rules on breath testing, carrying out tests in people's homes to catch them out sometimes up to two hours after they were ...
I have been reading and listening to the aftermath of Trump’s comments about the four female first term Democratic representatives, all of whom are “people of color.” I found the US coverage interesting both as evidence of partisanship and the ...
The Herald reports that the housing shortage / bubble has hit a new level:New Zealand is short of 130,000 homes, the tally having risen lately by 30,000, two economists say. Jarrod Kerr and Jeremy Couchman, Kiwibank economists said: "This time ...
Milk producer Fonterra is one of New Zealand's biggest coal-users, using it to power all its South Island (and a few of its North Island) dairy factories. They'd previously "committed" to not building any new coal boilers after 2030. Now, ...
The proposed Climate Change Response (Zero Carbon) Amendment Bill treats biogenic methane emissions differently from all other carbon emissions. The latter are to be measured net so that emissions from fossil fuels can be offset by carbon stored in trees. ...
by Gearóid Ó Loingsigh This article aims to answer a simple question, whether the conflict is only a rural one or whether it is also urban. The verb ‘to be’ is conjugated in the present tense as ,despite what some ...
Yesterday the government released its discussion document on action on agricultural emissions. As sadly usual, it proposed enormous subsidies for farm emissions, including for nitrogen-based fertiliser. This is a huge mistake. In addition to being one of the chief drivers ...
Earlier this year, the Ministry of Justice conducted a public consultation exercise on whether to hold a review of the Official Information Act (this replaced their previous plans to hold a secret consultation with handpicked people). 285 people submitted on ...
Always Playing Catch-Up: Throughout the 1970s, the purchasing power of the ordinary worker’s pay packet – the only meaningful measure of his or her wealth – was being eaten away every passing year by seemingly inexorable rises in the cost-of-living. ...
The Interim Climate Change Committee's report on Action on agricultural emissions: Evidence, analysis and recommendations was finally released today, and as you might guess from the title, it is recommending that we actually act, rather than let farmers keep ...
On Sunday July 7, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Associate Health Minister Julie Anne Genter announced their intention to review the Ministry of Health’s Funded Family Care policy and repeal Part 4Aof the 2000 NZ Public Health and Disability Act. These are festering injustices ...
Agriculture is our biggest source of greenhouse gas emissions, responsible for 48% of the total. It follows that meeting any credible emissions reduction target requires cutting agricultural emissions, most likely by having fewer cows. But National thinks people shouldn't be ...
How scummy is the UK Home Office? This scummy:The Home Office lied to EU member states to remove victims of human trafficking and modern slavery in breach of European law, according to whistleblowers. Legal experts have said the practice is ...
Belle is a lovely fifteen year-old border collie who belongs to our friends and neighbours at Bryan’s Beach, Michael and Judy Corboy. Belle, in her old age, can hardly see or hear, but – as a constant participant at social ...
“We wuz robbed!” is the classic cry of the disappointed losers of a closely contested sporting contest – it is very much to the credit of the Black Caps that we heard no such sentiment from them following the stunning ...
The Youth Parliament is being held this week, and some of the youth MPs are campaigning for a lower voting age:Molly Doyle, 17, is one Youth MP who wants this to change. She is part of a non-partisan campaign run ...
Up till now, Australia has made its living by digging up coal and exporting it to other countries, destroying the global climate in the process. But now they have a new option: exporting solar power:The desert outside Tennant Creek, deep ...
Later this month, thousands of people are expected to march to parliament as part of the #HandsOffOurTamaraki movement. At its heart, the movement is about preserving whānau and demanding that the state stop removing children from their whānau, hapū and iwi. ...
by Gearóid Ó Loingsigh The recent statements made by the former FARC commander, Carlos Lozada (legal name Julian Gallo), where, from his seat in Congress, he praised the Colombian Army demonstrate how low the farianos have sunk. Lozada began by ...
A Woman’s Place is on the Podium was a public meeting in London on 10 July to discuss women’s sports and the impact of transwomen competing against women. The venue was sold out with a packed hall of 750 people. ...
Last month I talked about the no-fly movement: people who refuse to fly or limit it to absolute necessity to avoid destroying the climate. Now, that movement has a somewhat surprising new member: Dutch airline KLM:Dutch airline KLM has launched ...
In the 1960's, humanity faced a terrible threat: global thermonuclear war. Nuclear weapons were uniquely destructive and dangerous, and if more countries got them, the logic of MAD and the pre-emptive strike would put us on a hair-trigger to destruction. ...
An occasional series where I will ponder allegations of anti-Semitism directed at the British Labour Party and its members.In this case, we are thinking about an allegedly anti-Semitic image shared by a Labour Party member. Its origins appear to be ...
Matariki has been and gone, but this year we saw a couple of op-eds arguing that it should be a public holiday, replacing the foreign monarch's fake birthday. And now, New Zealand Republic - a group which campaigns for an ...
The discussion on the quality of economic advice, which we reported last week, has spilled over into a discussion about whether so many senior appointments should be of non-New Zealanders. Recall I discussed the failure to develop career paths within ...
When Nicky Hager revealed US footage of the Operation Burnham raid, obtained under the US Freedom of Information Act, one of the obvious questions was whether Ministers had seen it - and in particular, whether they'd been told that it ...
Northern Ireland is the Alabama of the UK: a backwards region where women and gay people are denied fundamental rights. But Westminster has just decided to fix that:MPs have voted resoundingly to extend same-sex marriage and access to abortion to ...
There's a problem with "synthetic cannabis", and not just the one you think. It's the name.We're in the midst of a wave of news stories that link synthetic drugs to serious harm, through deadly road accidents and accidental overdoses (which ...
Ranjit Kauri, The Dancing Maharani and Other Stories, Swansea, Head and Heart, 2019, £6.99; reviewed by Don Franks Working people are not the same country to country. Our struggles for a better life take place in surroundings of very different ...
Let's Do Them! All Jacinda Ardern has to do to clinch the 2020 General Election is frighten the bejesus out of the electorate by describing in the most graphic terms imaginable what will happen to all the positive beginnings her ...
It may be that we have all misinterpreted the somewhat surprising “bromance” between Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un. It has been all too easy to assume that it is Kim who is cosying up to Trump rather than the ...
by Michael Roberts So the full circle is completed. The corrupt pro-business conservative New Democracy party in Greece that was ousted by the anti-capitalist Syriza party in 2015 has been returned to office in yesterday’s general election, with an outright ...
When the Australian government passed a series of new spy laws over the last few years, they pinky-promised that they wouldn't use them to spy on journalists and subvert freedom of the press. They lied:The anti-encryption laws passed by the ...
From 1975 to 1989, the spy agencies of South America's right-wing military dictatorships cooperated in Operation Condor, a joint campaign of extermination against the continent's left. Roughly 400,000 people were imprisoned, 30,000 disappeared, and 60,000 murdered - kidnapped, tortured, executed, ...
When she was standing for office, Jacinda Ardern promised she would take abortion out of the Crimes Act. And to be fair, there was some early action on that, with an immediate referral of the issue to the Law Commission ...
When the government introduced the Zero Carbon Bill, people rightly asked what they planned to do to reduce transport emissions, which basicly had no policy at all other than the ETS. Today, they responded, announcing a "feebate" system which would ...
At almost every level, the problem with medicinal cannabis is a lack of good information. In the US, FDA regulations make it hard to research. Most doctors aren't familiar with what research there is and most patients don't know either. ...
Redline is critical of Corbyn for his political weaknesses, but he’s no anti-Semite. There is no substance to the McCarthyist witch-hunt being run by the right wing, and the pro-Israel lobby inside and outside the Labour Party in the UK. ...
The government's billion trees program is the sort of policy which could make a real difference to our emissions and the fight against climate change. But climate scientist Jim Salinger isn't convinced:The Forestry Minister Shane Jones' one billion trees won't ...
Last month the government was celebrating another surplus. Meanwhile, children are starving:One in five children are living in households where putting food on the table is a struggle, according to a new report from the Ministry of Health. It found ...
Show Me The Money! The alternative to state funding of infrastructure is, of course, to fund it by taking on massive amounts of private debt. On this issue, at least, Auckland mayoral challenger, Tamihere, has some solid points to make. ...
If we are to avoid making the earth uninhabitable, we need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to practically nothing over the next decade. But that will still leave us with the problem of the carbon we have already emitted, which ...
Former Waikato DHB CEO Nigel Murray allegedly misused public funds, spending more than $120,000 of public money on unjustified travel. He was forced to resign and the Serious Fraud Office began an investigation. But despite the SFO finding that the ...
Jeremy Corbyn, we are told, is being advised – not least by his deputy (as well as by some of his would-be successors) – that he must come “off the fence” on the Brexit issue if he wants to bolster ...
The End of Life bill has been read a second time and is now heading for the House for further debate. Personally, I support the proposal. I don't ever epect to take advantage of the Bill's provisions myself, but as ...
Before the substantive issue which this column is about – whether there has been a deterioration in the economic advice given to the government – a paragraph about the budget leaks.read more ...
The first full week of the firearms buy-back and amnesty has produced a strong turnout as events roll out nationwide for the first time. “Momentum is slowly starting to build as community collection events are held across the entire country, ...
A new digital platform aims to make it easier for small businesses to access services from multiple government agencies, leaving them more time to focus on their own priorities. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Minister for Small Business Stuart Nash ...
Million-dollar start to gun collection eventsPolice Minister Stuart Nash says a solid start has been made to the gun buyback and amnesty after the first weekend of community collection events. “Gun owners will walk away with more than ...
Police Minister Stuart Nash has praised Police and gun owners after the first firearms collection event saw a busy turnout at Riccarton Racecourse in Christchurch. “Police officers and staff have put a tremendous effort into planning and logistics for the ...
Seventy-eight new Police constables are heading out to the regions following today’s graduation of a new recruit wing from the Royal New Zealand Police College. Police Minister Stuart Nash says the record high number of new Police officers being recruited, ...
Community Law stands ready and willing to implement a key recommendation of today’s Inaia Tonu Nei Report on the justice system - to establish Kaupapa Maori Legal Services across its 24 Community Law Centres. ...
JustSpeak is calling on Govermnent leaders and decision makers to honour the calls from a Māori justice hui and begin urgent work to enable Māori to lead the way on justice reform. ...
Port Nelson have joined 107 other signatories to the Climate Leaders Coalition. A collective of signatories who together they make up 60% of New Zealand’s gross emissions, nearly a third of private sector GDP, and employ more than 170,000 New ...
Responding to reports that staff advised Christchurch City Council against bailing out the beleaguered Christchurch Adventure Park, New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union spokesman Louis Houlbrooke says: ...
She was the first woman to serve at sea in the Royal New Zealand Navy. Breaking new ground a few years later, she returned from maternity leave to become the New Zealand Defence Force’s first part-time working parent. And, when ...
Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) is heartened by the commentary from Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern in conversation with Jack Tame on TVNZ’s Q&A this past Monday . ...
Land protectors allied with SOUL Ihumātao in Wellington have brought the CBD to a halt, as they occupy the intersection between Parliament, the Supreme Court, and Bowen House. ...
The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union is calling on the National Party to work constructively with Labour on RMA reform to ensure a focus on housing affordability and reducing regulatory taxes. Taxpayers' Union spokesman Louis Houlbrooke says, “The effect ...
Kāpiti Coast mayoral candidate Gwynn Compton says news the government is overhauling the Resource Management Act with a focus on delivering more affordable housing is a good start, but the key will be whether any changes make it into law ...
The Resource Management Act has largely failed to protect biodiversity and water quality, and a review is desperately needed to fix the legislation. ...
Nominations have opened for the 2019 Local Elections and for most that means a multitude of billboards on fences and lawns. Campaigning has changed a lot in the past few elections with social media and even augmented reality being used. ...
The government’s announcement today of a comprehensive overhaul of the Resource Management System is a nation-building opportunity that should lead to enhanced environmental and social wellbeing outcomes, says the Resource Reform New Zealand (RRNZ) group ...
Fish & Game New Zealand endorses Environment Minister David Parker’s announcement that he is consulting on a comprehensive review of the Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA). ...
On Wednesday 24 July, allies in Wellington will stand in solidarity with SOUL (Save Our Unique Landscape) at Ihumātao. The kaitiaki at the historical site were served an eviction notice yesterday by the police and Fletchers for protecting their ancestral ...
The New Zealand parliament seems closer to adopting a bill to amend copyright legislation to make it easier for visually impaired people to access published works. ...
Motor sporting legend and road safety advocate Greg Murphy heads to Parliament today over New Zealand’s “broken driver licensing system”. Murphy, who is meeting with the Associate Minister of Transport Julie Anne Genter, says he will raise serious ...
Tuesday, July 23: The Greenpeace climbers who are scaling the outside of the tallest building in Wellington have reached OMV’s offices on the 20th floor and announced a public protest to evict the Austrian oil giant. ...
The New Zealand Deerstalkers Association says it will take an active role in the debate on proposed firearm law changes to ensure any future legislation is fair, reasonable and meets the needs of both firearm owners and the general public. ...
The latest Safety of Children in Care report reveals the scale of the challenge facing social workers as they act to better protect children / tamariki and young people / rangatahi in Oranga Tamariki in the system. While the statistics ...
The next round of proposed Arms Act Amendments will further alienate law abiding firearms licence holders from the Government, according to the NZ Outdoors Party. ...
The current law for dividing property on separation is out of date and in need of reform, the Law Commission concludes in its report, Review of the Property (Relationships) Act 1976 – Te Arotake i te Property (Relationships) Act 1976 ...
First National Real Estate Chief Executive Bob Brereton is predicting that homes currently being built as part of a KiwiBuild development, in Te Kauwhata, will not sell and that the Government will be left with 175 homes and few, if ...
A short time ago, kaumatua and kuia representing mana whenua from Te Kawerau ā Maki, Te Ākitai Waiohua, and Tainui, walked onto the land that Fletcher Building owns at Ōruarangi Road, known as Ihumātao, and asked protestors to leave. ...
The Greenpeace climb of the Majestic Tower in Wellington is ignorant grandstanding says the Petroleum Exploration and Production Association of New Zealand (PEPANZ). ...
Tuesday, July 23: The two Greenpeace climbers who are scaling the outside of the tallest building in Wellington have unfurled the first of a series of banners. ...
The Independent Police Conduct Authority has found that an officer's decision to fire three warning shots to stop a fleeing driver from reversing towards him was not justified. ...
Government figures out today are consistent with what working people have told the Council of Trade Unions in our own survey, that a significant group of working Kiwis are unhappy and dissatisfied at work. Now the Government must act to ...
Deputy State Services Commissioner John Ombler has today announced the outcome of an examination of what led Inland Revenue to commission a public poll that included a question about the political leanings of taxpayers. ...
The Taxpayers’ Union is slamming Tracey Martin for wasting money on a meaningless “translation” of a written press statement into a sign language video, when the vast majority of any deaf or hard-of-hearing persons are perfectly capable of reading ...
Te Mana o Ngāti Rangitihi Trust (Te Mana) and Tūhourangi Tribal Authority (TTA) have announced that they will jointly negotiate with the Crown for the return of the lands at Waimangu and Otūkapuarangi. These lands have been at the centre ...
Government documents reveal the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) approved a shipment of cattle last month, despite the Government announcing a review into live export five days earlier. ...
“The Government’s second round of firearms reforms has hunters concerned that they will be burdened with onerous and unnecessary compliance and costs,” says Game Animal Council Chair Don Hammond. ...
The Council of Licenced Firearms Owners (COLFO) are concerned at the statements by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Police Minister Stuart Nash at the Post-Cabinet Press Conference this afternoon stating that firearm ownership and licences should ...
National’s Climate Change spokesperson Todd Muller told Q+A he has “total confidence” that technology will be developed to mitigate the effects of climate change. “To simply take the New Zealand agriculture sector which is the most emissions efficient ...
PM can’t say whether the Government will meet its KiwiBuild goals. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern couldn’t say whether the Government would meet its goal of building 16-thousand KiwiBuild homes by the end of its first term. She was interviewed on ...
Greenpeace climbers are scaling the outside of the Majestic Centre, the tallest building in Wellington, to reach the headquarters of Austrian oil giant, OMV. ...
Media statement on behalf of Sir Edward Taihākurei Durie and Donna Marie Tai Tokerau Hall: Māori Television has admitted publishing false allegations about former High Court justice, Sir Edward Taihākurei Durie, and his wife, Donna Hall, and it has ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Asanka Gunasekara, Lecturer in Management, Swinburne University of Technology In a multicultural country like Australia, it’s easy for migrants to keep their heritage culture alive. But our recent research that surveyed more ...
Comment - It was no surprise Boris Johnson won Torie hearts and minds to become Conservative Party leader, but as new UK prime minister he will face the same issues as his embattled predecessor, [writes *David Townsend. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Leibold, Associate Professor of Politics and Asian Studies, La Trobe University As China grows more powerful and influential, our New Superpower series looks at what this means for the world – ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Renee Knake, RMIT Fulbright Distinguished Chair in Entrepreneurship and Innovation; Professor of Law at the University of Houston, RMIT University In this series, we look at under-acknowledged women through the ages. When ...
With less than a week to go until the Love Island UK villa evicts its beautiful tenants, Alex Casey and Tara Ward look back at the season that was. Alex: Did you get my text?Tara: I GOT A TEXTAlex: *Ovie in ...
At the same time as supermarkets adapt to increasing demand for online shopping, some supermarkets are investing in the development of their people. Alice Webb-Liddall finds out why humans still count. Online supermarket shopping and Click & Collect services aim to ...
Editor’s Note: Here below is a list of the main issues currently under discussion in New Zealand and links to media coverage.New Zealand Parliament Buildings, Wellington, New Zealand.Today’s contentClimate change, environment Henry Cooke (Stuff): Government extends tax ...
COMMENTARY:By Phil Fitzpatrick in Tumby BayThe recent horrific events in Hela Province have brought the role of the police force in Papua New Guinea into sharp focus. Prime Minister James Marape is currently in Australia and has ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra After a bruising election outcome, GetUp is regrouping around a batch of issues – with press freedom the big ticket item. The activist group’s national ...
Richard Babor, a general surgeon, explains what’s he learned about cancer prevention during the making of his TVNZ show How Not to Get Cancer.The first memory I have of cancer is when my aunt got diagnosed. I was young, in ...
More must be done to tackle critical skill shortages in project management and leadership, the head of the Registered Master Builders Association says. ...
Committed alcohol enthusiast Samuel Flynn Scott investigates whether it’s possible to have fun – and find drinks that hit the spot – when booze is not an option. Choosing not to drink on a night out has traditionally led to a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bruce Mountain, Director, Victoria Energy Policy Centre, Victoria University Last week the body that governs Australia’s energy market released a draft proposal to introduce a demand response mechanism to the wholesale electricity ...
Ravinder Hunia was at both the Cricket and Netball World Cup grand finals. Here's her summary of witnessing New Zealand make history, twice in one week. ...
Jeanette Winterson has based previous fiction on witch trials, her experience of growing up lesbian in a Pentecostal community, and her own affair with her agent. Jean Sergent reviews her latest novel, a reworking of Mary Shelley’s classic – and ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has welcomed the "seriously intelligent" Mr Johnson's appointment, saying it will help New Zealand "hit the ground running" with the UK and EU. ...
Francis McWhannell goes on a grand tour of escapism, adventure and parochialism with our quintessential expatriate artist, Frances Hodgkins, at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki.Few artists from Aotearoa deliver escapism like Frances Hodgkins (1869–1947). She has a gift for ...
The government has set in motion a plan for a major overhaul of the law that's supposed to sustainably manage New Zealand's natural and physical resources. ...
The government have announced plans to reform the Resource Management Act, a hideously complicated piece of legislation that gets a bad rap for all sorts of reasons. Here’s what it all means.What’s all this then?Imagine a set of laws which ...
The National Party leader thought the Green's attack ad mocking his accent was "kinda funny" but showed they and the government were under pressure, he said. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Belinda Nicholson, Lecturer, University of Southern Queensland Curious Kids is a series for children. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, send it to curiouskids@theconversation.edu.au You might also ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ray Markey, Emeritus Professor, Macquarie University One of the Coalition government’s first priorities in the new parliament is the passage of its Ensuring Integrity Bill, aimed at tightening regulations on unions and ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Koval, Academic, Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, University of Melbourne How does a woman feel when a man wolf-whistles at her from across the street? Or when a male coworker gives ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Daniel Edwards, Research Director, Australian Council for Educational Research Australia spent A$111.8 billion on education in 2015, the most recent year for which the full dataset for all levels of education spending ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Neil Sipe, Professor of Urban and Regional Planning, The University of Queensland While car parking was a non-negotiable amenity for baby boomers, it is an eyesore to millennials and the up-and-coming iGen. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Whiteford, Professor, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University Since parliament has resumed three Liberal members – Dean Smith, Russell Broadbent and Andrew Wallace – have joined a group of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Renee Knake, RMIT Fulbright Distinguished Chair in Entrepreneurship and Innovation; Professor of Law at the University of Houston, RMIT University In this series, we look at under-acknowledged women through the ages. When ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Roderick, Professor, Research School of Earth Sciences and Chief Investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate Extremes, Australian National University The federal parliament has voted to funnel A$200 million ...
Good morning, and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Tax break for oil rigs raises subsidy questions, crackdown by police against Ihumātao occupation, and Boris Johnson set to become UK PM.A story about tax breaks for oil rigs has ...
The 700-page Thomas Piketty economic treatise Capital in the 21st Century was a surprise blockbuster five years ago. Now it’s been made into a documentary film, directed and produced by New Zealanders. The message is out there, Danyl Mclauchlan writes ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Scott Morrison on Tuesday had a firm message for his troops in the Coalition party room. Don’t go freelancing in public. Discipline is important in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Simon Tormey, Professor of Politics, University of Sydney To no-one’s great surprise, Boris Johnson has been elected by the members of the Conservative Party to be the new leader, and by extension ...
Funny, charismatic, erudite – what could possibly go wrong? The votes are in and the people have decided – correction: the Conservative Party membership has decided – that the new prime minister of the United Kingdom shall be Alexander Boris ...
Opinion - The gun buyback scheme is working to remove firearms from society and enforcement laws are strong, but creating a meaningful gun registry is also essential, writes Lew Stoddart. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Therese Keane, Associate Professor, Deputy Chair Department of Education, Swinburne University of Technology A cute human-like robot taught students in a small, rural school how to code while also helping them learn ...
After months of protest, the last occupants were moved off Ihumātao in south Auckland by police this afternoon. Don Rowe reports. Most of the occupants of Ihumātao had been moved on. The police, numbering at least 30, had finally made good ...
Hundreds of people marched to Parliament today calling for reform of New Zealand's abortion laws, as Cabinet prepares to consider a bill that would remove abortion from the Crimes Act. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The two Centre Alliance senators, Stirling Griff and Rex Patrick will often be pivotal to the fate of government legislation. The smaller non-Green Senate crossbench ...
Open mike 04/11/2012 
In 1863, in the lead up to its illegal invasion of the Waikato, the New Zealand government illegally confiscated the land of Māori living south of Auckland. One of the areas confiscated was Ihumātao, once one of the biggest farming ...57 mins ago
Democracy is important in many senses. It is first and foremost a form of government – famously described as, “government of the people, by the people and for the people”. It is then a process, which enables us to choose ...6 hours ago
By Sam Neill I was recently speaking with my pet pig, Angelica, about the wonders of science, and all the marvellous things it allows us to do with its zip-zappys and wing-wangeries. “Angelica, dear,” I said in my rich pleather ...7 hours ago
The person responsible for the ad has been sent to their bedroom for further scapegoating. The Green Party is standing by its views that 16-year-olds should be eligible to vote, even as they acknowledge that they shouldn’t have let them ...19 hours ago
My idealistic position on the role of MPs was articulated by Edmund Burke: ‘Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion.’read more ...22 hours ago
Having spent the last 3 months in these countries and getting some appreciation of their dependence on fossil fuels – oil, gas, coal – one realises how loopy is the idea popular in societies like New Zealand that have negligible ...1 day ago
I have been unimpressed with Western corporate media coverage of the tensions involving Iran in the Straits of Hormuz. They repeat the line that Iran is the source of current tensions, that it is a major sponsor of terrorism, that ...3 days ago
3 days ago
3 days ago
Much like Tuvalu, the manmade climate change Cult love to tell people the Maldives is almost totally underwater. In fact the dishonest Maldives Govt d on the same bandwagon, believing they would receive billions of dollars aid from other Countries ...4 days ago
As the entry on Wikipedia shows (and no, one doesn’t necessarily have to regard Wikipedia as the be-all and end-all of truth, because it isn’t on a great many things, to agree with the following): “…a fallacious argument that concludes ...4 days ago
by Daphna Whitmore The story of how the world awoke to a big injustice is starting to be told. The Pacific Games held this month in Samoa is another chapter. On the podium was Laurel Hubbard, the giant transgender weightlifter, ...4 days ago
Our conversations and push against specific supremacist and ultra-Nationalist groups, and the pseudo-intellectual underpinnings of them, need to mature at all levels. But in doing so, it’s going to have to include a more thorough and brutally honest self-examination ...5 days ago
Something I missed: not only did Youth MPs declare a climate emergency; they also launched a campaign to lower the voting age to 16:Youth Parliament week in Parliament has seen the establishment of Make it 16, a campaign to ...5 days ago
by Gearóid Ó Loingsigh This article aims to answer a simple question, whether the conflict is only a rural one or whether it is also urban. The verb ‘to be’ is conjugated in the present tense as ,despite what some ...1 week ago
1 week ago
On Sunday July 7, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Associate Health Minister Julie Anne Genter announced their intention to review the Ministry of Health’s Funded Family Care policy and repeal Part 4Aof the 2000 NZ Public Health and Disability Act. These are festering injustices ...1 week ago
An occasional series where I will ponder allegations of anti-Semitism directed at the British Labour Party and its members.In this case, we are thinking about an allegedly anti-Semitic image shared by a Labour Party member. Its origins appear to be ...2 weeks ago
2 weeks ago
2 weeks ago
The first full week of the firearms buy-back and amnesty has produced a strong turnout as events roll out nationwide for the first time. “Momentum is slowly starting to build as community collection events are held across the entire country, ...2 days ago
A shakeup of the Resource Management System is a big step in the right direction, BusinessNZ chief executive Kirk Hope says. ...14 mins ago
North American stories proclaimed our country's gun buyback a failure. Just one problem: it hadn't actually started. ...10 mins ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Asanka Gunasekara, Lecturer in Management, Swinburne University of Technology In a multicultural country like Australia, it’s easy for migrants to keep their heritage culture alive. But our recent research that surveyed more ...19 mins ago
Comment - It was no surprise Boris Johnson won Torie hearts and minds to become Conservative Party leader, but as new UK prime minister he will face the same issues as his embattled predecessor, [writes *David Townsend. ...32 mins ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Leibold, Associate Professor of Politics and Asian Studies, La Trobe University As China grows more powerful and influential, our New Superpower series looks at what this means for the world – ...49 mins ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Renee Knake, RMIT Fulbright Distinguished Chair in Entrepreneurship and Innovation; Professor of Law at the University of Houston, RMIT University In this series, we look at under-acknowledged women through the ages. When ...50 mins ago
With less than a week to go until the Love Island UK villa evicts its beautiful tenants, Alex Casey and Tara Ward look back at the season that was. Alex: Did you get my text?Tara: I GOT A TEXTAlex: *Ovie in ...1 hour ago
At the same time as supermarkets adapt to increasing demand for online shopping, some supermarkets are investing in the development of their people. Alice Webb-Liddall finds out why humans still count. Online supermarket shopping and Click & Collect services aim to ...2 hours ago
COMMENTARY: By Phil Fitzpatrick in Tumby Bay The recent horrific events in Hela Province have brought the role of the police force in Papua New Guinea into sharp focus. Prime Minister James Marape is currently in Australia and has ...3 hours ago
The next election is looming, and the omens are mixed for Labour. ...3 hours ago
Richard Babor, a general surgeon, explains what’s he learned about cancer prevention during the making of his TVNZ show How Not to Get Cancer.The first memory I have of cancer is when my aunt got diagnosed. I was young, in ...4 hours ago
More must be done to tackle critical skill shortages in project management and leadership, the head of the Registered Master Builders Association says. ...4 hours ago
Online peer-to-peer money lender Harmoney has made a maiden profit. ...4 hours ago
Committed alcohol enthusiast Samuel Flynn Scott investigates whether it’s possible to have fun – and find drinks that hit the spot – when booze is not an option. Choosing not to drink on a night out has traditionally led to a ...5 hours ago
Ravinder Hunia was at both the Cricket and Netball World Cup grand finals. Here's her summary of witnessing New Zealand make history, twice in one week. ...5 hours ago
Jeanette Winterson has based previous fiction on witch trials, her experience of growing up lesbian in a Pentecostal community, and her own affair with her agent. Jean Sergent reviews her latest novel, a reworking of Mary Shelley’s classic – and ...5 hours ago
Francis McWhannell goes on a grand tour of escapism, adventure and parochialism with our quintessential expatriate artist, Frances Hodgkins, at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki.Few artists from Aotearoa deliver escapism like Frances Hodgkins (1869–1947). She has a gift for ...6 hours ago
A working group is to consider how to reform the "under-performing" Resource Management Act. ...7 hours ago
The government have announced plans to reform the Resource Management Act, a hideously complicated piece of legislation that gets a bad rap for all sorts of reasons. Here’s what it all means.What’s all this then?Imagine a set of laws which ...7 hours ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Belinda Nicholson, Lecturer, University of Southern Queensland Curious Kids is a series for children. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, send it to curiouskids@theconversation.edu.au You might also ...9 hours ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ray Markey, Emeritus Professor, Macquarie University One of the Coalition government’s first priorities in the new parliament is the passage of its Ensuring Integrity Bill, aimed at tightening regulations on unions and ...9 hours ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Koval, Academic, Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, University of Melbourne How does a woman feel when a man wolf-whistles at her from across the street? Or when a male coworker gives ...9 hours ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Daniel Edwards, Research Director, Australian Council for Educational Research Australia spent A$111.8 billion on education in 2015, the most recent year for which the full dataset for all levels of education spending ...9 hours ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Neil Sipe, Professor of Urban and Regional Planning, The University of Queensland While car parking was a non-negotiable amenity for baby boomers, it is an eyesore to millennials and the up-and-coming iGen. ...9 hours ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Whiteford, Professor, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University Since parliament has resumed three Liberal members – Dean Smith, Russell Broadbent and Andrew Wallace – have joined a group of ...9 hours ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Renee Knake, RMIT Fulbright Distinguished Chair in Entrepreneurship and Innovation; Professor of Law at the University of Houston, RMIT University In this series, we look at under-acknowledged women through the ages. When ...9 hours ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Roderick, Professor, Research School of Earth Sciences and Chief Investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate Extremes, Australian National University The federal parliament has voted to funnel A$200 million ...9 hours ago
Good morning, and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Tax break for oil rigs raises subsidy questions, crackdown by police against Ihumātao occupation, and Boris Johnson set to become UK PM.A story about tax breaks for oil rigs has ...10 hours ago
Elsepth Sandys shares an edited extract from her new book, A Communist in the Family: Searching for Rewi Alley. ...12 hours ago
Two years after Mycoplasma bovis hit the headlines, there are still problems with tracking stock movements. ...12 hours ago
Dr Neal Curtis argues we are moving away from democracy to a new form of aristocracy that puts the worst of us at the top. ...12 hours ago
The housing crisis has got worse but Kiwibank economist Jeremy Couchman says there are signs it will soon start improving. ...12 hours ago
Out of sight and out of mind fungi play important roles in ecosystems but have been largely forgotten in global conservation listings. ...12 hours ago
The 700-page Thomas Piketty economic treatise Capital in the 21st Century was a surprise blockbuster five years ago. Now it’s been made into a documentary film, directed and produced by New Zealanders. The message is out there, Danyl Mclauchlan writes ...12 hours ago
Aotearoa will be marking the 250th anniversary of Captain Cook's landing in a very different way to the 1969 bi-centennial. ...12 hours ago
Funny, charismatic, erudite – what could possibly go wrong? The votes are in and the people have decided – correction: the Conservative Party membership has decided – that the new prime minister of the United Kingdom shall be Alexander Boris ...18 hours ago
After months of protest, the last occupants were moved off Ihumātao in south Auckland by police this afternoon. Don Rowe reports. Most of the occupants of Ihumātao had been moved on. The police, numbering at least 30, had finally made good ...23 hours ago
“Don’t talk about the war”
Obama and Romney come to an agreement on Climate Change.
They both agree not to talk about it.
However despite Obama and Romney’s gentlmen’s agreement to keep silent on climate change. An opposite and more forthright agreement to openly discuss climate change is developing among lower ranked US political leaders.
After ‘Sandy’ the possibility of an East Coast, if not nation wide bipartisan political consensus to tackle climate change is beginning to emerge.
Actually no one can reliably say how much of ‘Sandy’ is attributable to climate change man made or otherwise.
Regardless the POTUS will do whatever their lobbyists and pollsters tell them to do.
As will all the primary and Presidential candidates. ‘Leadership’ is DEAD.
Agreed. They also cannot say how much of “Sandy” is attributable to solar flares, warm water, ocean gods, or some guy mooning the latter from the beach.
Your statement is meaningless because everything is statistically based and an absolute level of confidience is something that science leaves for matters of religous faith.
Are you trying to make some point ?
Sometimes it’s difficult to tell with one who is so erudite. Remember not all of us have the vast repository of knowledge that you have.
I understood his point.
Have to say, the bickering is getting boring.
As lprent stated … it is a matter of probability.
Imagine that the actuarial tables on mortality state that a man of your age has a say 1 in 50 probability of dying this year. Does this ‘reliably’ inform us whether you will be alive at the end of the year or not?
Of course not.
The only sense in which such tables are meaningful are when you examine (or sample) a whole lot of men of your age. If for example you sampled say 1000 men, then you could be fairly sure that 20 of them might not make it to the end of the year. But it tells you nothing about each individual man.
In the same way science can reliably predict that increased ocean temperatures and more water vapour in the atmosphere will increase the probability of more frequent severe storms, and increase their peak intensity. It doesn’t reliably tell you anything much about an individual storm. Instead you have to wait until you’ve had many dozens of storms like Sandy before we can confirm the statistical prediction reliably.
Of course the insurance industry might well spit the dummy at funding such an extended and expensive experiment. The death toll might prove a bit of an irritation too.
There is a fair amount of data available regarding the recent storm in the US all one can say is only that some of its components may have been due to climate change.
The late-season formation may have been influenced by a shifting climate, but its meet-up with an early North American winter storm had no climate change connection.
A high-pressure blocking event, which may have been climate change-related, steered the storm toward the East Coast rather than out to sea.
Unusually high tides amplified the storm surge and flooding, but the tides had nothing to do with climate change. And the fact that those four events happened simultaneously was just a very unfortunate coincidence.
Warmer temperatures, which allowed the storm to carry more moisture, and higher sea level are likely to have amplified its effects. The higher sea level — a foot higher than when the city’s protective sea walls were built a century ago can almost certainly be attributed to climate change.
hs…a solid assessment.
It’s not mine it’s Scientific American’s.
So if I read what you are saying, then you agree that man-made climate change is real and is fast becoming a significant component of severe and adverse weather events?
And going back to your first point; that the barrier to doing anything about it is political … and always has been.
Update:
Just in case someone hasn’t got it yet :
No.
That was your opportunity to explain what you did mean. Wanna try again?
Only this time without the unattributed cut and paste please.
In other words, climate change affects existing weather and how it intersects with other phenomena like geography, tides and time. Isn’t that a given already?
I would have thought so.
Hs: Your second and third paragraph are in direct contradiction with each other.
The reason this particular storm came onshore at that latitude rather than doing the usual wander into the Atlantic was because it was blocked by a northern jetstream coming lower in latitude than usual.
If you look at the historic tracks for hurricanes at that latitude you will see that it is almost unknown for them to turn inland. If you look at the historic tracks of the jetstreams you will see that they seldom come down far enough to block which provides the room for hurricanes driven by the otherwise minor effect of the earths rotation to move east .
The physics of arctic warming when modeled indicate that the jetstreams will have a higher amplitude, and over the last decade that is exactly what has been seen. So it becomes a higher probability that there will be offshore blocking events driving hurricanes into the upper eastern seaboard of the US. That also increases the probability of hitting cold fronts being spun out of the arctic by those same jetstreams and following that same rotational spin towards the east (frontal systems have quite predictable tracks as well when they don’t get blocked).
It isn’t coincidental. It will probably become more and more obvious through the rest of this current weather cycle for the next few years, then it will reduce in probability as the rate of the deicing of the arctic wanes and the atmosphere shifts to a new equilibrium. It will then resume in the 2020’s.
What the SA was saying was that the degree of the impact of climate change on that storm wasn’t proveable yet (although highly likely) because it takes a number of events to get a statistical sample sufficient to establish confidience. By the time that there is the required confidience, the east coast will have developed good hurricane systems anyway – they will have had received quite a few – probably 10 or more to get to a 90% confidience level that there has been a shift in the high latitude hurricane tracks.
Reductionism of the type you were repeating has it’s place in science, but in weather and climate systems you really have to look at the whole because the effects work on each other in a much more complex set of interactions.
Thanks 1prent. Most people view the weather as a surface event only but it is not. What goes on in the upper atmosphere plays a major role in how things turn out at the surface. In recent decades the polar jets (both North and South) have been tracking further into lower latitudes than has hitherto been the case. When this happens and cold air from those upper level jet streams feed into warmer surface cyclonic weather systems then you can expect further cyclonic generation to occur. It is certainly due to global warming, and as a consequence… expect to see deeper and more frequent tropical cyclonic events occurring in the Southern Pacific region too.
Tell it Scientific American.
It is their article I was quoting but perhaps you should send them a letter what with your earth sciences BSc I’m sure you’re far more erudite than any of their contributors and with your computer skills you’d be able to model weather events with far greater reliability than anyone else has to date.
Can we have a link please? I tried a random cut and paste of your post in google and go no hits.
It’s in the very first comment of the thread.
Read your own reference hs;
Warmer temperatures, which allowed the storm to carry more moisture, and higher sea level are likely to have amplified its effects.
which is pretty much congruent with what we are saying.
Yes, there’s no denying that.
What can be denied is the youtube video you have linked to with alarmist comments suggests a warming of 6 or more degrees C in the next few decades.
What can be denied is the youtube video you have linked to with alarmist comments suggests a warming of 6 or more degrees C in the next few decades.
You’ve not been keeping up. The video was quoting the IEA:
Read more: http://www.upi.com/Business_News/Energy-Resources/2012/04/27/IEA-warns-of-doubled-CO2-emissions/UPI-62511335522600/#ixzz2BEWQKE7U
While it’s true that some years ago, 6 degrees was considered a fringe ‘worst-case’ scenario, as with so many other things around climate science, it’s rapidly become a lot more main-stream.
Title: Climate Change Deniers
Definition: The CCDs argue that climate change is not real and is not happening. CCDS explain the controversy is a result of global conspiracy deliberately concocted by scientists politicians and media, unfortunately they have not been able to give any rational explanation of the reasons for this conspiracy.
Current Status: The CCDs are Pretty much at the fringes of the current debate on climate change
Title: Climate Change Apologists
Definition: CCAs admit that climate change is happening, but say that jobs, profits, the economy and growth, and a myriad other issues are far more important than taking steps to address climate change. The apologists are also adept at blaming or scapegoating others, usually groups that they have taken a dislike to anyway. This group are quite comfortable with the idea of millions if not billions of human deaths, as well as the destruction of entire eco systems and the resulting animal and plant extinctions. Their previously listed preoccupations are considered far more important.
Current status: The most sinister, cynical and dangerous of the different Climate Change factions. Currently the CCAs are the main spear carriers for doing nothing about climate change
And now a third category has arisen:
Title: Climate Change Ignorers
Definition: Political leaders and parties who refuse to even mention Climate Change, if they can avoid it. Usually for sectarian political advantage, ie not scare the horses, not look too radical in the eyes of the voters, not offend vested interest etc etc.
Rather than alert the electorate and the wider population to the danger, the CCIs put getting bums on seats for their particular sectarian grouping more important than even alerting their political rivals who could steal a policy march on them.
The whole topic of Climate Change is a ‘no go area’ for these politicians. They will rarely if ever mention the subject of Climate Change unless it is pushed right up under their noses, and often not even then. If forced to mention Climate Change CCIs say that one day when they are in complete control of the presidency and the congress, or have the most seats in the house of parliament then they will call for action on Climate Change. CCIs neither deny, or apologise for climate change, they just simply ignore it.
Current Status: The most ridiculous and laughable faction of all, I don’t expect it to last long.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10844736
So Nationals as bad as Labour?
Being connected to the internal network is definitely a security breach waiting to happen, but I find it hard to believe that such an obvious problem went unnoticed for 13 years, yet within 1 year of the new kiosks being set up it was discovered on at least 2 separate occasions (that we know of).
Therefore, I suggest, that although the old computers may have been connected to the internal network, they did not exhibit the same basic security breach (that is, navigating with an ‘open file’ dialog in Word would give you access to the entire network) probably through some configuration option that stopped it, which should also have been configured on the kiosks but wasn’t.
This means that the security was still incredibly lax and just waiting for someone malicious to exploit it, but this would have required a specific intent to do so by someone with the required skills, rather than any moderately-knowledgeable office worker with Microsoft Office skills being able to find it.
In short, no, the evidence would suggest that National is worse than Labour.
So in a race to the bottom Nationals leading?
ACT already won it
Not sure in what way that would be surprising.
That depends. I’d like to see the report. But on the face of it, MSD under National were told, at least twice, that there was a serious problem and to fix it, and that advice was ignored. What happened under Labour? I don’t think we know yet.
Oh look a Slater repeater …
AAAHHHHH I’M blind…………. Slater on TV before morning coffee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1
Just think how much more influential hes going to become…most popular blog, newspaper editor, tv columnist
Muwahahahahaha!
You’re channeling WO’s inner fantasys now…break the link before it’s TOO LATE!!!
What a comedy Whaleoil trying to justify his editorial prowess. Oh well at least the Greengrocers will have something to wrap the lettuces in.
hmmm… so WO has just said on TV3 that his new rag is for the average NZ “bloke”. So revolutionary!
Considering the herald and dom post it actually is
Says so much about his myopic view of our society and how he thinks he’ll ‘add value’.
Talk about give a bigot RWNJ, with established psych issues, an even bigger soapbox to indoctrinate the frogs with, last roll of the dice for the truth IMO.
if they can’t boost the circulation appealing with dog whistles they are history like so may publications are already.
Hey left-wing types are more than welcome to start up/take over a newspaper to get their views out there
Well in fact that is what needs to be done, newspapers and other news media channels.
so do it
OK mate, but only because you said so!!! We could do with a $5K donation from you.
Yeah right, who’d want to read that
You were all for the idea a moment ago!
It’d only sell at union sites (well maybe they need to be a bit more careful with the money…) but it might put a stop to the rampant jealousy of whaleoil…
Why would it only sell at union sites?
400,000 union members, potential for more than 20x the circulation of Truth, Not bad eh.
“You were all for the idea a moment ago!”
No they weren’t.
Well, I know that and you know that 🙂
Sunday morning tr*lls, what can you do?
So with a readership of what 25000 ? There’s not many “Average NZ blokes” out there, that want to waste their money on that rag.
http://www.nbr.co.nz/article/maritime-union-asked-explain-accounts-lf-131705
Interesting…
Rortney Hide on the financial transparency war path! Has Rortney come clean on his girlfriend’s parliamentary travel perks yet? Or his flash international hotel stays?
Yep thats sorted it, good plan
Well, when Rodney Hide advocates that all business financial dealings become public (which I believe should happen anyway) then he’ll have a point.
Funny this. Wonder about their credibility?
The annual Legatum Prosperity Index has ranked New Zealand as the fifth most prosperous country in the world overall, and first in the education category.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10845034
Just another RWNJ think-tank by the looks of things.
Yeah Draco. Bluddy right wing nobs. They say that they are: ” Legatum Institute (LI) is an independent non-partisan public policy organisation whose research, publications, and programmes advance ideas and policies in support of free and prosperous societies around the world.”
Must be a trick in there somewhere. I expect Parata will now quote the claim that NZ is “first in the World Education” as being the product and vision of her leadership. Yeah Right!
Their credibility? In their own words, “…we have a vision of a more prosperous world based on greater economic and political liberty balanced with personal and institutional responsibility.”
So, free markets and personal responsibility and political liberty that is probably measured in terms of consumer choice and institutional responsibility measured in terms of protecting a market ‘free for all’ and keeping pesky citizens who want more political freedom than mere consumer choice firmly in line.
Chalupabot, your count is getting too high. 18.4% of all comments on this site in the last 48 hours have been made using your handle. As you know, the limit to avoid unwanted attention is 9.7%
Please return to an acceptable ratio or use some of your other handles.
Wow, where can you go to see those stats, felix?
I pulled them out of Chalupa’s arse.
I changed to Chalupa Batman because of the league, you really should watch it
CHRISTOPHER!
The league commissioners ruling is final!
Heh, yeah great show.
http://www.silvergoldsilver.com/entry/qe-sandy
Quote:
“One sentence post: Is the next QE bailout masked to be a Sandy bailout for the insurers?”
Good question SGS. Probably.
Interesting boots on the ground report of the chaos that is Sandy. Disturbingly there are still Americans full of the belief that someone will rescue them, so they don’t need to prep.
Give it a week and that attitude will be wiped out – at least in affected areas. We would do well to heed their experience.
http://www.tfmetalsreport.com/blog/4293/guest-post-ground-nyc-green-lantern
New York City authorities have been doing an amazing job of getting things going again. It reminds me of what a great hard working nation America was.
As for the “preppers” anyone who is serious about that would not be living in NYC or New Jersey.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10844971
Fuck Tui and their fatphobic, culture-manipulative, body-hating excuse of an ad agency.
+1 to your last sentence!
Fuckin’ A, weka. Tui can sometimes be actually funny but the rest of the time it’s just embarrassing the way their marketing team’s rampant insecurities are put out their for the world to see …
Tui? Bad taste all round.
+1 Only a complete moron would drink that ferrets piss anyway. I guess with such despicable advertising that only a moron could like, DB Breweries is trying to appeal to their consumer base. An irreverent spin on topical issues… Yeah right! It’s defamatory rubbish that many New Zealanders will be offended at.
Absolutely agreed. That billboard is vicious.
Yep. One Tui billboard in ten might actually be funny. Unless Jarrod Bear is willing to put a photo of him/herself and partner on a billboard, he/she should just shut up.
Tui can still be proud of producing such an awesome beer though. Yeah right.
It’s no surprise that Fran O Sullivan is a detestable old right wing battleaxe, but this shallow article endorsing Romney really had me flabbergasted http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=10844776
I find it an embarrassment that our supposed premiere newspaper prints this rubbish *facepalms*
Yes Fran O Cyclops has really lost the plot, or that article was intended to be a job application to join the (non) Truth. ( I see production problems looming with frequent web-breaks* due to slaters being keen to feast on rotting paper)
*web-breaks is printers jargon for the reel of paper snapping when press is running
http://www.whaleoil.co.nz/2012/11/cunliffe-learning-to-lie-already/
Do we believe Cactus or Cunliffe? Though to be fair to Cunliffe it did sound really boring.
I’m sorry I clicked that. But I guess it was time for my annual reminder of how pathetic “evidence” has to be for WO to treat it as hard-hitting gospel.
(For those who don’t wish to click: Hamish Keith tweets “why no Labour MPs at Fabians”, Cunliffe tweets “sorry, I had a cold”, Cactus responds “you didn’t look sick when I saw you in town today!” It’s fucking riveting journalism, Keith Ng should take note of how it’s really done.)
Editorial standards at Truth are going up already. Up in smoke.
Well someones lying, who do you think it is?
Maybe he was sick enough that he couldn’t attend a major function and put on his future-labour leader face….but he was well enough to get up for a meal.
A few weeks back I wasn’t feeling well enough to get over the other side of town for a meeting, but I could get down to the supermarket.
You need to stop letting whaleoil think for you chalupa batman, you can probably do better with your own brain
Exactly. There’s no reason anyone has to be deliberately lying, it’s just bullshit for Cactus/WO to act like one non-medical professional’s opinion of how a person looks has any bearing on their actual state of health.
Could’ve been worse – he might have been seen fixing his roof.
Yep. It’s not like Cunliffe was painting his roof.
Edit: DoS beats me to the punchline!
That’s some desperate stuff. Even for those wretches.
Is Cactus Kate a qualified medical doctor as well as a lawyer?
I’m sure the Fabians would approach Cunliffe if they had a reason.
Everyone’s working toward the same goal etc.
When it comes down to doing something concrete is when we’ll see them talking.
Probably as well qualified as LPRENT I guess…
classic whaloil…jeeze, the tories really are scared of cunliffe
One should always take with a great deal of cynicism anything that Slater says about Cunliffe. I am interested in his obsession with DC, obviously he thinks that Cunliffe is a threat to the right and needs to be attacked at every opportunity.
The reality is that David is crook. He pulled out of some no asset sales petition campaigning that was arranged for this morning and this afternoon he is missing an important party fundraiser. I have spoken to him a couple of times and he sounds sick as.
Oh yes, it’s been amusing – Richard Long begging Shearer not to reshuffle, Hooters saying that really, David Shearer needs more support and Cunliffe should be sacked while Farrar, knowing that Shearer’s a lost cause, suggests the next waste of space, Robertson.
All of them presenting themselves as sensible voices of reason – just like Pete George, come to think of it.
Alas, the Right and their shills know what they want and make it clear…
Did you hear Hoots on the wireless slagging Cunliffe off this week? Really vicious, nasty stuff.
They’re all terrified. As they should be.
Now I was under the impression that, that vindictive old bat lived in Hong Kong. So HOW could she see Cunliffe in town? Also when I had the flu, I still had to go out, and people probably from looking at me didn’t realise I was screwing up their lives for the 3 weeks it takes to get over the flu. And anyway, anything Whaleshit says, needs to be checked, rechecked, verified, with at least 10 other neutral people. And I still WILL NOT believe a word he vomits.
Do I believe Cactus is a demented stalker? Yeah, I do.
Are you tired of the US election yet? Abby sure is! I hope her mom votes for Bronco Bamma anyway 😉
Rodney Hide’s Union bashing fetish
There’s been a lot of disinformation being promoted by the right wing at the moment concerning Unions. In fact if you didn’t know the real reasons behind what propagandists like David Farrar, Cameron Slater and Rodney Hide were saying, you might believe that Unions are an evil blight on society…
Or they could just follow the rules…
Do you mean the Unions should follow the rules or the NBR should adhere to publication laws Chalupa Batman? The Unions have followed the rules. The NBR hasn’t because it’s publishing inaccuracies based on Hides speculation. There has been no finding of wrongdoing on the part of the Unions. Clearly the NBR has again breached publication laws by promoting defamatory and inaccurate speculation.
More time & money wasted because someone has an axe to grind ….. no other reason.
Good article Jackal, I’d like to see these dropkicks getting their asses sued for defamation by the Unions concerned.
Hide should find a rock and invite those other creeps to join him in entombment.
Thanks fender. You’re clearly talking about Act’s standard retirement package… Slithering under a rock is the best place for the likes of the unlawful David Garrett, John Banks and the rest of the deluded Actoids. What a bunch of worms!
How about this then, we wait for Neville Harris to decide whats what and if in the unlikely event theres nothing I’ll apoligise. Of course once something dodgy has been uncovered we’ll expect an apology from you?
Apologize for saying that there’s been no finding of any wrongdoing? Get off the grass Chalupa. Just like Affco’s complaint to the Serious Fraud Office, the Companies Office won’t find anything unlawful either. That’s because Rodney Hide is full of shit, and always has been.
I’ve said I’ll apoligise if theres nothing found, will you apoligise if something is found?
You want me to say I’ll apologize about a what if? How retarded!
The claims by Hide and Slater that the Maritime and Meatworkers Union’s are hiding and misspending millions of dollars of their members money are in the present tense false. There is no evidence, I repeat no evidence of this. They’re speculating and then trying to say their assumptions are facts.
I think QoT summed it up nicely today when she wrote:
In my opinion, the same can be said about the deplorable Rodney Hide as well.
Hunter S. Thompson was onto that trick long ago, relating an anecdote about Lyndon Johnson wanting stories about his opponent fucking pigs to be promulgated. When his advisors were shocked (this was a more innocent time), saying that there was no evidence, Johnson retorted, “I want him up there denying that he fucks pigs!”
😀
So thats a no, not even willing to put up an apology if something is found (which you strenuously deny any possibility of)
Hide’s article’s aren’t about if something is found, he’s saying they’re already guilty even though there’s no evidence of this. My article is about Hide and Slater’s baseless propaganda, which is a fact. Therefore I won’t be apologizing to you Chalupa Batman.
Oh for gods sake CB will you just get over it, your tiny mind has obviously been overloaded with this discussion, other wise you would be writing something of substance and value instead of repeating Whaleshit’s propaganda, and wanting an apology to a non existent wet dream you once had?
CB is is full of BS and is thick as bat shit
strenuously
Hey, congrats on getting that ticked off your Big Word of the Day checklist!
Thank you, one tries to improve ones vocabulary
Perhaps the next word you want to learn about is Sarcasm Chalupa Batman.
One might also work on one’s punctuation :p
The dodgy has already been uncovered – it’s Hide and WO.
Not really, but then again I believe that David Farrar, Cameron Slater, and Rodney Hide, are all an evil blight on our society
A Day In The Life Of Rodney Hide
Great work Jackal. Because for us all that would be left otherwise with just the slur. Will watch developments.
http://www.nbr.co.nz/article/video-whaleoil-goes-mainstream-ck-131794#
MY COMMENT – YET TO BE PUBLISHED:
If Cameron Slater is ‘no holds barred’ in holding politicians ‘feet to the fire’ – what has he done to hold John Bank’s (and Don Brash’s) ‘feet to the fire’ over the ‘ONE LAW FOR ALL’ (that they both support) – not yet applying to them over Huljich?
(John Banks and Don Brash were both former Directors of Huljich Wealth Management (NZ) Ltd, and both signed Huljich Kiwisaver Registered Prospectuses dated 22 August 2008 and 18 September 2009 which contained untrue statements – a ‘strict liability’ offence under s.58(3) of the Securities Act.)
I formally requested the Finance Markets Authority (FMA), the Serious Fraud Office (SFO), and the NZ Police apply ‘ONE LAW FOR ALL’ to the former and current ACT Party Leaders.
When each of the above-mentioned put it in writing that they would do nothing, I petitioned Parliament for an urgent investigation. However – the national party dominated Commerce Select Committee also chose to do nothing.
At least I tried!
What has Cameron Slater done on this issue?)
Why has Cameron Slater banned me for commenting on his ‘Whaleoil’ blog – is he purports to support ‘freedom of expression’?
If staff at the ‘TRUTH’ are covered by employment law – how long is Cameron Slater going to last, as ‘TRUTH’ Editor?
(Kind regards Cameron – I’d be making this comment to you directly – on YOUR blog – if you hadn’t ‘banned’ me? 🙂
Penny Bright
‘Anti-corruption campaigner’
http://www.dodgyjohnhasgone.com
http://www.pennybright4epsom.org.nz
Why has Cameron Slater banned me for commenting on his ‘Whaleoil’ blog – is he purports to support ‘freedom of expression’?
– Probably because you posted long-winded, boring diatribes that basically had nothing to do with the thread, wouldn’t reply when challenged and ignored the warnings given
Good luck Penny in that.
Oh dear, Never mind.
Brothel vs Church
H/T Trevor Mallard through twitter
Bugger another rouge Poll?
No, another good poll.
Good because National/Key (there’s no difference) continue to fade. Plan A is finished, only Plan B will save them. There won’t be a “National plus electorate Righties” majority at the next election. Key’s been found out, and the voters are looking for alternatives.
Which brings us to National’s Plan B … a third term thanks to Labour fucking up. That’s their best hope now.
So again, a good poll because the (few) remaining Labour ostriches can’t keep those heads in the sand. As National’s support declines, voters will turn to the opposition that is not Labour. Like Winston, in this poll.
Unless Labour decide (finally) to do something about that.
Polls like this – and the last Roy Morgan one – make it more likely that they will. Good.
This one?
Taken in concert with the most recent roymorgan, beginning to be a bit concerning. The issue for labour is to get out of the low30s in CB polls and at the moment it seems pretty steady.
Link?
TV One
Labour dropped from 34% 6 weeks ago to 32% now.
During the time this poll was taken the following was going on:
-MSD privacy scandal
– The Government messing up on asset sales and Maori water rights
– Christchurch school screw ups
– Sweet talking its way through “No manufacturing crisis”
– Key being absolutely unbelievable and brain faded in the Dotcom/GCSB affair.
http://tvnz.co.nz/politics-news/national-support-holds-labour-slips-in-poll-5194717
I never watch TV these days but clicked through to get a taste of everything that’s not changed. Front of vid is a still picture of JK raising a glass (in the vid it coincides with him saying ‘cheers’). JK in a factory that’s still open! And (the only potentially dodgy one) in operating garb to a voice over about ‘the good health’ of the Nats. Shearer edited to be heard apparently taking advice from a fucking wizard. Shearer standing looking at derelict sites and (twice?) framed alongside a ‘No Public Access’ sign.
And less than 50% of those polled thinking the economy will improve is spun in a positive light!
Anyway. If a Shearer led Labour Party that does nothing but shoot itself in the foot and offer gift horses to the Nats is still over 30%, just imagine what a Labour Party could do.
And then the scare mongering begins about the prospect of a dysfunctional NZ1/Green/Labour coalition. Because we’re meant to believe that NZ1 wouldn’t go with the Nats!?
TV is staying in the ‘bad stuff’ cupboard.
Funny how TV1 says National can govern alone on 44%.
They ignore NZF because they are only on 4.9%.
Yet they count The Maori Party, Act, the Conservative Party and Mana who are all struggling to register.
So if you put Labour 32%, Greens 12%, NZF 4.9% = 48.9%.
This for the sake of discussion trumps National on the poll, doesn’t it?
Not all that good for Labour but not that bad either 2 years out from an election.
You’d think by now we would have a user-friendly web app for calculating various results. And that the MSM would be putting polls in those contexts.
Old fashioned I know, but I think the media’s job here is to report on the range of things that might happen (you know, actually inform people), rather than promoting one in particular. Would love to know how that editorial decision was made.
Ian, the reason they are counting MP, ACT, UF and Mana is because they’re all in parliament due to safe-ish electoral seats (except maybe UF). NZF is completely dependent on crossing the 5%.
Well actually there is a calculator for working out the allocated seats depending on vote percentages. It’s called the MMP seat allocation calculator. Of course the MSM can’t be bothered using it because it would mean they couldn’t peddle their propaganda.
You would increase or decrease the likelihood of certain MPs winning electoral seats on the previous election results in comparison to the percentage of current polling. Just assuming that the current incumbent MPs would retain their seats even though their party support has declined and then claiming the right wing would be able to form the next government is obviously wrong!
In fact it’s astounding just how arrogant the media is with its manipulations. They treat the public like fools!
Yes I know about that calculator, it’s just not very user friendly.
I’m not sure that there is such a direct correlation re the seats and previous/current polls, esp re the Maori Party/Mana seats. Have you done that calculation?
Right on, mac. It’s a Brolmar, and NACT’s desperate for good news. Take 10% off NAT, add 5% to Lab, have a good chortle at “add ACT and MP” and the ignoring of Winnie, and relax.