nice ‘ picture of the P.M smiling, holding a kitten on the NZH front page today.Was wondering why Annette King does not accuse the snaKey P.M of lying outside Parliament…it would create a focus on his serial behaviour ,and get some attention.
The great wall signifies conscious climate change denial.
The White Walkers signify the inevitability and destructiveness of change.
And everything else signifies the games that the major houses/powers (read: US, China, India) are contesting over remaining realms, rather than face the power of what they are holding back.
Personally I’m waiting for Beowulf’s dragon to make a guest appearance somewhere … signifying… hmmm … radical Islam, or terrorist threats generally, or something.
… you’re likely to either be eating out of a dumpster in your old age or be (literally) eaten.
If you currently have counted more than 65 revolutions around the sun in your life then you may avoid this, but only through the most-macabre of means: you’ll die of something else first.
Let me explain: If you’re between 40 – 65 you have somewhere between 20 and 45 years remaining on this planet, statistically speaking. Oh sure, some of you will do better, some worse, but those are the numbers.
This means you must manage at least 20 years without things going to hell if you’re on the older end, and 45 years if you’re on the younger. What are the odds?
Cont …http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=230208
Dramatic language, but I understand and have accepted the sentiment. There is an alternative though, if we all voluntarily start today, that can be summed up: Whatever it is you are doing, do not flatter the greed.
The people who wrote that seem to think that as long as the financial spreadsheets were better looking, then the world would be sweet. Ridiculous misconception. You cannot eat Treasury bills, and you cannot eat gold.
Over the next quarter century the economic issues we face will see explosive growth in all areas of poverty, homelessness, crime and the many ills of life the contributing elements create. In the darkly brilliant Children of Men they introduce a euthanasia product, called Quietude, designed to deal with the extreme despondency the world experiences when faced with an apparently insurmountable problem.
As depressing and controversial as the idea appears today, I have no doubt we will see similar products on our shelves by then.
The fact none of the present doomsday scenarios actually have to happen, and could be avoided if humanity just grew up a little, is treated like some idealistic but unstable isotope. One whose steady decay is certainly useful in measuring the decline of the equality it once supported, but is seen by many as nothing more than an inevitable, even natural process, leading to the creation of exciting new elements. The reality these new elements are often dangerous & potentially toxic is apparently of little concern.
we already accept people deadening their minds, emotions and consciousness in order to “cope” with the reality that the power elite have constructed in society. Things like anti-depressants and alchohol are amongst the most profitable businesses.
After revelations that the CDC is receiving some funding from industry, Jeanne Lenzer investigates how it might have affected the organisation’s decisions
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) includes the following disclaimer with its recommendations: “CDC, our planners, and our content experts wish to disclose they have no financial interests or other relationships with the manufacturers of commercial products . . . CDC does not accept commercial support.”
The right bar ‘comments’ tab does not seem to provide the most current updates for who is commenting on what. It seems to be slightly behind or sometimes even stalled?
It could be a problem with my browser but I suspect it is The Standard not updating as usual??
Anyway, I am thinking of typing something provocative to catch your attention here so that you will come looking to ban me 😉 but I will leave you to catch up with this message in your own time.
Btw, you’ve got my curiosity piqued about The Nation tomorrow.
I think that the caching has gotten a bit more ‘aggressive’ after a plugin update earlier in the week.
extended:
It is odd as it isn’t happening all of the time. Just some of the time.
However it is unlikely to be the browser. I caught it on my linux laptop yesterday in both Chrome and Firefox out through my Spark cellphone. I’d login and get the non-logged in front page.
Meanwhile Chrome and IE were working perfectly on another laptop on a different network, and same for Chrome and Safari on the same network on a Mac.
It will probably be the weekend before I can do much about it.
I’m sure somebody else will have commented on this, but I was impressed with Labour’s response to the leak of their election review.
First, when they found Gower had it, they released it immediately to the whole media, spiking Gower’s guns. Secondly, on Backbenches Jacinda cleverly dismissed the leak as (paraphrasing here) nothing new here, just stating the obvious, which defused the issue immediately.
Maybe Labour is learning how to play the media at last?
On the Gower coverage on 3 News, Andrew Little fronting the press looked drawn and on the backfoot in my opinion. That in itself is the most damaging in my opinion, reinforcing the negative messaging the media is trying to portray.
@maui yep he needs to relax a bit, but what he said was ok.
Taxes, death and Little leading Labour into the next election are the only certainties in life.
I don’t watch Gower very often, but ffs could he be any more biased? Is this what we’ve come to, where his agenda is what informs the public about politics and current affairs? I have no doubt that he fully understands the difference between reporting and manipulating, so can only assume his agenda is motivated by politics.
Bryce Edwards always has had a rather strange view of Labour.
It looks like he got stuck in a New Labour mould several decades ago and never actually fell out of the romanticism. It is a pity because he clearly has no frigging idea about how much ‘organisation’ plays in getting electoral victories. It is way way more important than his frigging beloved ‘ideology’
Reading rapidly through the list of ‘left’ reviews, what I notice is that they were either done by
1. People who have never been involved inside Labour, eg Mclauchlan and journos.
2. People who left with New Labour back in what? 1991 – Trotter and ? Edwards ?himself
3. People who were previously political employees and distinctly on the right of Labour – eg Leyland, Quin.Neither exactly had graceful exits from the jobs as I remember it. I tend to view them as more into utu than activity.
For a review that was written for the members of the Labour party, leaked to outside the party, there is a curious lack of depth and highly selective picking of the links for people inside the Labour party exhibited in Bryce’s selection.
It was obviously written by someone wanting to crap in the tent rather than working on it… But I rather suspect that was the intention. Bryce’s heart (as far as I can see) tends to go out to those parties of the left that spend their time in strange self-destructive immolation at election time. I guess it is romantic if you are into that kind of thing. But organisation less of the precious wee egos tends to get voters out.
The idea of the review was to figure out how to get Labour working better for election victories. You’d think that Bryce would have had a look around and noticed the almost eerie silence from active Labour members without utu issues. But the only one in his entire piece was from Scott Yorke…. And that was a satirical post.
It’d be nice if he’d actually look at where there weren’t reactions from. Like the many Labour members authoring and commenting here. I sure as hell noticed it.
Just because some scumbag leaked it to Paddy Gower (and we’d all like to know who it was) doesn’t mean that Labour members are that interested in discussing their party with people who aren’t active in the party.
Note on that last point – that doesn’t include me anymore.
The editorial starts by damning with faint praise, then openly attacking, running over all the same old attack lines: get rid of Cunliffe and his supporters (the bogey men), get rid of the influence of unions and other sector groups; Labour need not do anything except garnish our political system with the appearance of democracy by being in eternal opposition; the article uses hyperbole that isn’t in or implied in the original document – nothing was “slammed”, no “indictments” were made; and otherwise paints the picture that Labour is financially broke and has personnel and organisational issues that won’t stop until things that have already happened are accepted as real events in the mind of the Herald editorship – which will be never. All this from the editors who protected the “democratic acts” of Rachel Glucina by exercising their democratic right to prostitute the fourth estate to the National government’s best interests.
Subtly, but totally unbalanced, would be my label for that editorial.
Will we ever see in New Zealand The Storm is Coming “Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren politicians ” for Change for We 99%.?? Aren,t you sick and tired of the Key Zero Accountability Rhetoric and BS we voters have to put up with year after year aided and abetted by the Dirty Politics tactics of some Tame Media ,bloggers,TV clowns and Political strategists. So The TPPA agreement is visible in the The USA Why aren,t we picking up on it here?
Now that the government is making kiwisaver enrolment automatic, Labour should follow the example, and Hilary Clinton’s, and make electoral roll registration automatic. That is likely to lift the vote without punitive measures.
Is it just me or has something really changed over the last few weeks?
Talking to people the mood is harsh – it’s like a veil has been lifted for many, and the light has been shown them something, they did not want to see.
Many have woken up to the fact – that selling everything to corporations is morally repulsive, as well as, just a stupid way to run a society. The amoral outfits who wrecked the world in the name of greed just 6 years ago – have not done a damn thing to change their money grubbing ways.
All we are left with Is bankrupt thinking at best. Messy, ugly, godless and lazy self righteous. My guess, those in power have no idea, except to cling to this bereft ideology and push polls to get them though.
What is worse – is they are utterly dishonest about using this approach to cling to power.
James what a pathetic response – really, the polls is your defence. Where did you learn rhetoric, on the back of a weetbix packet?
I’d say you need to take up your own suggestion. It seems you lost in lala land of your own making. Or is this the fabled planet Key? Have a wee look around sunshine. Or maybe open yourself and talk to the downtrodden. Or if you’re feeling brave, ask some of your mates how much debt they really are in.
But I should have guessed I’d get a dishonest response, relying on the same ideological underpinnings that keeps this corrupt edifice in place.
So God bless James, any chance you could live up to your name sake?
The Queen’s Speech has all the pomposity and solemnity of a panto you’re not allowed to laugh at. This bowdlerises its political content, grimly apparent were it delivered by a nerd in a lounge suit. Elizabeth lumbers in, glazed and jowly, with the familiar cast of attendant lords, including her husband, her heir and her heir’s duchess, who’s kitted out with a purple sash that could be left over from the Ukip election campaign. As ever the queen herself looks as if her breakfast porridge had too much mogadon in it. Since she always reads her script as if she were reciting the E numbers on a packet of jelly, it’s anyone’s guess what, if anything, she thinks about it. The custodian of the speech is a nerd usually seen in a lounge suit, Michael Gove, who from journeyman beginnings as a Times hack and a Commons expenses home-flipper, has now hit it big as lord chancellor. Yesterday he got to try out his new 18th-century chancellorial garb.
Aided by the Tory speech team, Gove has clearly put his trade to work ventriloquising the queen, of whom he’s a diehard fan. Some utterances seem patently mendacious: ‘My government will legislate in the interests of everyone in our country.’ One Nation under Gove, previously the Big Society, is a bigger marquee than cynical commentators have supposed. Things will be especially nice for the well-to-do mansion-dweller, the non-immigrant, the non-zero-hours employee, the non-druggie, the non-fox, and above all for the hard-working working-class worker, his toiling family, his slavishly diligent dog and its no less Stakhanovite, busily bloodsucking fleas. The more austerity depresses output – creates more work – the more virtue there is in industry. One falls to wondering if it’s the queen or her government who counts as lying. Is she to be held responsible for what drops from her lips, or is she, as her government’s puppet, legibus soluta, no more a moral agent than Kermit the frog? Her mien suggests the queen suspects it’s the latter.
In his online introduction to the speech, David Cameron avows his plan to get people’s noses out to the grindstone rather than ‘sitting at home’, where if not teleworking or enjoying the proceeds of their trust fund, they may be doing non-work things like bringing up children or caring for a frail relative. Whence the ‘workless households’ Cameron mentions, which menace the docility that is the Englishman’s birthright and solemn duty. Trade unions, organisations to stop workers working, get a further whack – ‘essential service’ employees will need a turnout of 50 per cent to authorise strike action, with 40 per cent of eligible voters in favour of it (so at least 80 per cent of votes on a 50 per cent turnout). The work business even pops up in the section that promises to ban so-called ‘legal highs’ (normals’ psychoactive drugs of choice – ethanol, caffeine, nicotine and so on – are unaffected; after all, you need something to make working life bearable). The ban aims to ‘protect hard-working citizens’ from psychoactive degeneracy; slackers are fair game from whom no better can be expected.
Quasi-privatisation continues with the spread of ‘free’ schools and the enforced flog-off of housing association properties. The government still wants to crash out of the European human rights convention. There will, on top, be English votes for English laws. All this makes it likelier that the Scots try to peel off from the Union, particularly if the English (for they will be responsible) choose to leave the EU in 2017. Either the English will fume at being locked into the EU by No-voting Welsh and Scots, or the latter will resent being sprung from it by the English. Her majesty reads out the recipe for strife and the possible dismemberment of her kingdom phlegmatically. The mogadon has done its job.
That’s more than can be said for Gove, who managed to fluff his one duty of the day – putting the speech in its fetching damask bag, an operation he’s walked through by the nonagenarian Duke of Edinburgh. On day one of his old job as chief whip, Gove locked himself in a toilet, from which someone had the heartlessness to rescue him.
Last week, Kieran McAnulty called out Chris Bishop and Nicola Willis for their claims that Kāinga Ora’s costs were too high.They had claimed Kāinga Ora’s cost were 12% higher than market i.e. private devlopersBut Kāinga Ora’s Chair had already explained why last year:"We're not building to sell, so we'll be ...
Stuff’s Political Editor Luke Malpass - A Fellow at New Zealand IniativeLast week I half-joked that Stuff / The Post’s Luke Malpass1 always sounded like he was auditioning for a job at the New Zealand Initiative.Mountain Tui is a reader-supported publication. For a limited time, subscriptions are 20% off. Thanks ...
At a funeral on Friday, there were A4-sized photos covering every wall of the Dil’s reception lounge. There must have been 200 of them, telling the story in the usual way of the video reel but also, by enlargement, making it more possible to linger and step in.Our friend Nicky ...
Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. This fact brief was written by Sue Bin Park from the Gigafact team in collaboration with members from our team. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline. Is methane the ...
The Government’s idea is that the private sector and Community Housing Providers will fund, build and operate new affordable housing to address our housing crisis. Meanwhile, the Government does not know where almost half of the 1,700 children who left emergency housing actually went. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong ...
Oh, home, let me come homeHome is wherever I'm with youOh, home, let me come homeHome is wherever I'm with youSongwriters: Alexander Ebert / Jade Allyson CastrinosMorena,I’m on a tight time frame this morning. In about an hour and a half, I’ll need to pack up and hit the road ...
This is a post about the Mountain Tui substack, and small tweaks - further to the poll and request post the other day. Please don’t read if you aren’t interested in my personal matters. Thank you all.After oohing-and-aahing about how to structure the Substack model since November, including obtaining ...
This transcript of a recent conversation between the Prime Minister and his chief economic adviser has not been verified.We’ve announced we are the ‘Yes Government’. Do you like it?Yes, Prime Minister.Dreamed up by the PR team. It’s about being committed to growth. Not that the PR team know anything about ...
The other day, Australian Senator Nick McKim issued a warning in the Australian Parliement about the US’s descent into fascim.And of course it’s true, but I lament - that was true as soon as Trump won.What we see is now simply the reification of the intention, planning, and forces behind ...
Among the many other problems associated with Musk/DOGE sending a fleet of teenage and twenty-something cultists to remove, copy and appropriate federal records like social security, medicaid and other supposedly protected data is the fact that the youngsters doing the data-removal, copying and security protocol and filter code over-writing have ...
Jokerman dance to the nightingale tuneBird fly high by the light of the moonOh, oh, oh, JokermanSong by Bob Dylan.Morena folks, I hope this fine morning of the 7th of February finds you well. We're still close to Paihia, just a short drive out of town. Below is the view ...
It’s been an eventful week as always, so here’s a few things that we have found interesting. We also hope everyone had a happy and relaxing Waitangi Day! This week in Greater Auckland We’re still running on summer time, but provided two chewy posts: On Tuesday, a guest ...
Queuing on Queen St: the Government is set to announce another apparently splashy growth policy on Sunday of offering residence visas to wealthy migrants. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in our political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Friday, February 7:PM Christopher ...
The fact that Waitangi ended up being such a low-key affair may mark it out as one of the most significant Waitangi Days in recent years. A group of women draped in “Toitu Te Tiriti” banners who turned their backs on the politicians’ powhiri was about as rough as it ...
Hi,This week’s Flightless Bird episode was about “fake seizure guy” — a Melbourne man who fakes seizures in order to get members of the public to sit on him.The audio documentary (which I have included in this newsletter in case you don’t listen to Flightless Bird) built on reporting first ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Karin Kirk The 119th Congress comes with a price tag. The oil and gas industry gave about $24 million in campaign contributions to the members of the U.S. House and Senate expected to be sworn in January 3, 2025, according to a ...
Early morning, the shadows still long, but you can already feel the warmth building. Our motel was across the road from the historic homestead where Henry Williams' family lived. The evening before, we wandered around the gardens, reading the plaques and enjoying the close proximity to the history of the ...
Thanks folks for your feedback, votes and comments this week. I’ll be making the changes soon. Appreciate all your emails, comments and subscriptions too. I know your time is valuable - muchas gracias.A lot is happening both here and around the world - so I want to provide a snippets ...
Data released today by Statistics NZ shows that unemployment rose to 5.1%, with 33,000 more people out of work than last year said NZCTU Te Kauae Kaimahi Economist Craig Renney. “The latest data shows that employment fell in Aotearoa at its fastest rate since the GFC. Unemployment rose in 8 ...
The December labour market statistics have been released, showing yet another increase in unemployment. There are now 156,000 unemployed - 34,000 more than when National took office. And having thrown all these people out of work, National is doubling down on cruelty. Because being vicious will somehow magically create the ...
Boarded up homes in Kilbirnie, where work on a planned development was halted. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in our political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Wednesday, February 5 are;Housing Minister Chris Bishop yesterday announcedKāinga Ora would be stripped of ...
This week Kiwirail and Auckland Transport were celebrating the completion of the summer rail works that had the network shut or for over a month and the start of electric trains to Pukekohe. First up, here’s parts of the press release about the shutdown works. Passengers boarding trains in Auckland ...
Through its austerity measures, the coalition government has engineered a rise in unemployment in order to reduce inflation while – simultaneously – cracking down harder and harder on the people thrown out of work by its own policies. To that end, Social Development Minister Louise Upston this week added two ...
This year, we've seen a radical, white supremacist government ignoring its Tiriti obligations, refusing to consult with Māori, and even trying to legislatively abrogate te Tiriti o Waitangi. When it was criticised by the Waitangi Tribunal, the government sabotaged that body, replacing its legal and historical experts with corporate shills, ...
Poor old democracy, it really is in a sorry state. It would be easy to put all the blame on the vandals and tyrants presently trashing the White House, but this has been years in the making. It begins with Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan and the spirit of Gordon ...
The new school lunches came in this week, and they were absolutely scrumptious.I had some, and even though Connor said his tasted like “stodge” and gave him a sore tummy, I myself loved it!Look at the photos - I knew Mr Seymour wouldn’t lie when he told us last year:"It ...
The tighter sanctions are modelled on ones used in Britain, which did push people off ‘the dole’, but didn’t increase the number of workers, and which evidence has repeatedly shown don’t work. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in our political economy around housing, ...
Catching you up on the morning’s global news and a quick look at the parallels -GLOBALTariffs are backSharemarkets in the US, UK and Europe have “plunged” in response to Trump’s tariffs. And while Mexico has won a one month reprieve, Canada and China will see their respective 25% and 10% ...
This post by Nicolas Reid was originally published on Linked in. It is republished here with permission. Gondolas are often in the news, with manufacturers of ropeway systems proposing them as a modern option for mass transit systems in New Zealand. However, like every next big thing in transport, it’s hard ...
This is a re-post from The Climate BrinkBoth 2023 and 2024 were exceptionally warm years, at just below and above 1.5C relative to preindustrial in the WMO composite of surface temperature records, respectively. While we are still working to assess the full set of drivers of this warmth, it is clear that ...
Hi,I woke up feeling nervous this morning, realising that this weekend Flightless Bird is going to do it’s first ever live show. We’re heading to a sold out (!) show in Seattle to test the format out in front of an audience. If it works, we’ll do more. I want ...
From the United-For-Now States of America comes the thrilling news that a New Zealander may be at the very heart of the current coup. Punching above our weight on the world stage once more! Wait, you may be asking, what New Zealander? I speak of Peter Thiel, made street legal ...
Even Stevens: Over the 33 years between 1990 and 2023 (and allowing for the aberrant 2020 result) the average level of support enjoyed by the Left and Right blocs, at roughly 44.5 percent each, turns out to be, as near as dammit, identical.WORLDWIDE, THE PARTIES of the Left are presented ...
Back in 2023, a "prominent political figure" went on trial for historic sex offences. But we weren't allowed to know who they were or what political party they were "prominent" in, because it might affect the way we voted. At the time, I said that this was untenable; it was ...
I'm going, I'm goingWhere the water tastes like wineI'm going where the water tastes like wineWe can jump in the waterStay drunk all the timeI'm gonna leave this city, got to get awayI'm gonna leave this city, got to get awayAll this fussing and fighting, man, you know I sure ...
Waitangi Day is a time to honour Te Tiriti o Waitangi and stand together for a just and fair Aotearoa. Across the motu, communities are gathering to reflect, kōrero, and take action for a future built on equity and tino rangatiratanga. From dawn ceremonies to whānau-friendly events, there are ...
Subscribe to Mountain Tūī ! Where you too can learn about exciting things from a flying bird! Tweet.Yes - I absolutely suck at marketing. It’s a fact.But first -My question to all readers is:How should I set up the Substack model?It’s been something I’ve been meaning to ask since November ...
Here’s the key news, commentary, reports and debate around Aotearoa’s political economy on politics and in the week to Feb 3:PM Christopher Luxon began 2025’s first day of Parliament last Tuesday by carrying on where left off in 2024, letting National’s junior coalition partner set the political agenda and dragging ...
The PSA have released a survey of 4000 public service workers showing that budget cuts are taking a toll on the wellbeing of public servants and risking the delivery of essential services to New Zealanders. Economists predict that figures released this week will show continued increases in unemployment, potentially reaching ...
The Prime Minister’s speech 10 days or so ago kicked off a flurry of commentary. No one much anywhere near the mainstream (ie excluding Greens supporters) questioned the rhetoric. New Zealand has done woefully poorly on productivity for a long time and we really need better outcomes, and the sorts ...
President Trump on the day he announced tariffs against Mexico, Canada and China, unleashing a shock to supply chains globally that is expected to slow economic growth and increase inflation for most large economies. Photo: Getty ImagesLong stories short, the top six things in our political economy around housing, climate ...
Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on UnsplashHere’s what we’re watching in the week to February 9 and beyond in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty:Monday, February 3Politics: New Zealand Government cabinet meeting usually held early afternoon with post-cabinet news conference possible at 4 pm, although they have not been ...
Trump being Trump, it won’t come as a shock to find that he regards a strong US currency (bolstered by high tariffs on everything made by foreigners) as a sign of America’s virility, and its ability to kick sand in the face of the world. Reality is a tad more ...
A listing of 24 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, January 26, 2025 thru Sat, February 1, 2025. This week's roundup is again published soleley by category. We are still interested in feedback to hone the categorization, so if ...
What seems to be the common theme in the US, NZ, Argentina and places like Italy under their respective rightwing governments is what I think of as “the politics of cruelty.” Hate-mongering, callous indifference in social policy-making, corporate toadying, political bullying, intimidation and punching down on the most vulnerable with ...
If you are confused, check with the sunCarry a compass to help you alongYour feet are going to be on the groundYour head is there to move you aroundSo, stand in the place where you liveSongwriters: Bill Berry / Michael Mills / Michael Stipe / Peter Buck.Hot in the CityYesterday, ...
Shane Jones announced today he would be contracting out his thinking to a smarter younger person.Reclining on his chaise longue with a mouth full of oysters and Kina he told reporters:Clearly I have become a has-been, a palimpsest, an epigone, a bloviating fossil. I find myself saying such things as: ...
Warning: This post contains references to sexual assaultOn Saturday, I spent far too long editing a video on Tim Jago, the ACT Party President and criminal, who has given up his fight for name suppression after 2 years. He voluntarily gave up just in time for what will be a ...
Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. This fact brief was written by Sue Bin Park from the Gigafact team in collaboration with members from our team. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline. Is global warming ...
Our low-investment, low-wage, migration-led and housing-market-driven political economy has delivered poorer productivity growth than the rest of the OECD, and our performance since Covid has been particularly poor. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in our political economy around housing, climate and poverty this ...
..Thanks for reading Frankly Speaking ! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.As far as major government announcements go, a Three Ministers Event is Big. It can signify a major policy development or something has gone Very Well, or an absolute Clusterf**k. When Three Ministers assemble ...
One of those blasts from the past. Peter Dunne – originally neoliberal Labour, then leader of various parties that sought to work with both big parties (generally National) – has taken to calling ...
Completed reads for January: I Am Legend, by Richard Matheson The Black Spider, by Jeremias Gotthelf The Spider and the Fly (poem), by Mary Howitt A Noiseless Patient Spider (poem), by Walt Whitman August Heat, by W.F. Harvey Charlotte’s Web, by E.B. White The Shrinking Man, by Richard Matheson ...
Do its Property Right Provisions Make Sense?Last week I pointed out that it is uninformed to argue that the New Zealand’s apparently poor economic performance can be traced only to poor regulations. Even were there evidence they had some impact, there are other factors. Of course, we should seek to ...
Richard Wagstaff It was incredibly jarring to hear the hubris from the Prime Minister during his recent state of the nation address. I had just spent close to a week working though the stories and thoughts shared with us by nearly 2000 working people as part of our annual Mood ...
Odd fact about the Broadcasting Standards Authority: for the last few years, they’ve only been upholding about 5% of complaints. Why? I think there’s a range of reasons. Generally responsible broadcasters. Dumb complaints. Complaints brought under the wrong standard. Greater adherence to broadcasters’ rights to freedom of expression in the ...
And I said, "Mama, mama, mama, why am I so alone"'Cause I can't go outside, I'm scared I might not make it homeWell I'm alive, I'm alive, but I'm sinking inIf there's anyone at home at your place, darlingWhy don't you invite me in?Don't try to feed me'Cause I've been ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ star is on the rise, having just added the Energy, Local Government and Revenue portfolios to his responsibilities - but there is nothing ambitious about the Government’s new climate targets. Photo: SuppliedLong stories short, the top six things in our political economy around housing, climate ...
It may have been a short week but there’s been no shortage of things that caught our attention. Here is some of the most interesting. This week in Greater Auckland On Tuesday Matt took a look at public transport ridership in 2024 On Thursday Connor asked some questions ...
The East Is Red: Journalists and commentators are referring to the sudden and disruptive arrival of DeepSeek as a second “Sputnik moment”. (Sputnik being the name given by the godless communists of the Soviet Union to the world’s first artificial satellite which, to the consternation and dismay of the Americans, ...
Hi,Back on inauguration day we launched a ridiculous RFK Jr. “brain worms” tee on the Webworm store, and I told you I’d be throwing my profits over to Mutual Aid LA and Rainbow Youth New Zealand. Just to show I am not full of shit, here are the receipts. I ...
The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night features co-hosts & talking about the week’s news with regular and special guests, including: on the week in geopolitics, including the latest from Donald Trump over Gaza and Ukraine.Health expert and author David Galler ...
In an uncompromising paper Treasury has basically told the Government that its plan for a third medical school at Waikato University is a waste of money. Furthermore, the country cannot afford it. That advice was released this week by the Treasury under the Official Information Act. And it comes as ...
Back in November, He Pou a Rangi provided the government with formal advice on the domestic contribution to our next Paris target. Not what the target should be, but what we could realistically achieve, by domestic action alone, without resorting to offshore mitigation. Their answer was startling: depending on exactly ...
Photo by Mauricio Fanfa on UnsplashKia oraCome and join us for our weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm today.Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream for our chat about the week’s news with myself , plus regular guest David Patman and ...
I don't like to spend all my time complaining about our government, so let me complain about the media first.Senior journalistic Herald person Thomas Coughlan reported that Treasury replied yeah nah, wrong bro to Luxon's claim that our benighted little country has been in recession for three years.His excitement rose ...
Back in 2022, when the government was consulting internally about proactive release of cabinet papers, the SIS opposed it. The basis of their opposition was the "mosaic effect" - people being able to piece together individual pieces of innocuous public information in a way which supposedly harms "national security" (effectively: ...
With The Stroke Of A Pen:Populism, especially right-wing populism, invests all the power of an electoral/parliamentary majority in a single political leader because it no longer trusts the bona fides of the sprawling political class among whom power is traditionally dispersed. Populism eschews traditional politics, because, among populists, traditional politics ...
I’ve spent the last week writing a fairly substantial review of a recent book (“Australia’s Pandemic Exceptionalism: How we crushed the curve but lost the race”) by a couple of Australian academic economists on Australia’s pandemic policies and experiences. For all its limitations, there isn’t anything similar in New Zealand. ...
Our originating document, theTreaty of Waitangi, was signed on February 6, 1840. An agreement between Māori and the British Crown. Initially inked by Ngā Puhi in Waitangi, further signatures were added as it travelled south. The intention was to establish a colony with the cession of sovereignty to the Crown, ...
Te Whatu Ora Chief Executive Margie Apa leaving her job four months early is another symptom of this government’s failure to deliver healthcare for New Zealanders. ...
The Green Party is calling for the Prime Minister to show leadership and be unequivocal about Aotearoa New Zealand’s opposition to a proposal by the US President to remove Palestinians from Gaza. ...
The latest unemployment figures reveal that job losses are hitting Māori and Pacific people especially hard, with Māori unemployment reaching a staggering 9.7% for the December 2024 quarter and Pasifika unemployment reaching 10.5%. ...
Waitangi 2025: Waitangi Day must be community and not politically driven - Shane Jones Our originating document, theTreaty of Waitangi, was signed on February 6, 1840. An agreement between Māori and the British Crown. Initially inked by Ngā Puhi in Waitangi, further signatures were added as it travelled south. ...
Despite being confronted every day with people in genuine need being stopped from accessing emergency housing – National still won’t commit to building more public houses. ...
The Green Party says the Government is giving up on growing the country’s public housing stock, despite overwhelming evidence that we need more affordable houses to solve the housing crisis. ...
Before any thoughts of the New Year and what lies ahead could even be contemplated, New Zealand reeled with the tragedy of Senior Sergeant Lyn Fleming losing her life. For over 38 years she had faithfully served as a front-line Police officer. Working alongside her was Senior Sergeant Adam Ramsay ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson will return to politics at Waitangi on Monday the 3rd of February where she will hold a stand up with fellow co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick. ...
Te Pāti Māori is appalled by the government's blatant mishandling of the school lunch programme. David Seymour’s ‘cost-saving’ measures have left tamariki across Aotearoa with unidentifiable meals, causing distress and outrage among parents and communities alike. “What’s the difference between providing inedible food, and providing no food at all?” Said ...
The Government is doubling down on outdated and volatile fossil fuels, showing how shortsighted and destructive their policies are for working New Zealanders. ...
Green Party MP Steve Abel this morning joined Coromandel locals in Waihi to condemn new mining plans announced by Shane Jones in the pit of the town’s Australian-owned Gold mine. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to strengthen its just-announced 2030-2035 Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) under the Paris Agreement and address its woeful lack of commitment to climate security. ...
Today marks a historic moment for Taranaki iwi with the passing of the Te Pire Whakatupua mō Te Kāhui Tupua/Taranaki Maunga Collective Redress Bill in Parliament. "Today, we stand together as descendants of Taranaki, and our tūpuna, Taranaki Maunga, is now formally acknowledged by the law as a living tūpuna. ...
Labour is relieved to see Children’s Minister Karen Chhour has woken up to reality and reversed her government’s terrible decisions to cut funding from frontline service providers – temporarily. ...
It is the first week of David Seymour’s school lunch programme and already social media reports are circulating of revolting meals, late deliveries, and mislabelled packaging. ...
The Green Party says that with no-cause evictions returning from today, the move to allow landlords to end tenancies without reason plunges renters, and particularly families who rent, into insecurity and stress. ...
The Government’s move to increase speed limits substantially on dozens of stretches of rural and often undivided highways will result in more serious harm. ...
In her first announcement as Economic Growth Minister, Nicola Willis chose to loosen restrictions for digital nomads from other countries, rather than focus on everyday Kiwis. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to stand firm and work with allies to progress climate action as Donald Trump signals his intent to pull out of the Paris Climate Accords once again. ...
The Government’s commitment to get New Zealand’s roads back on track is delivering strong results, with around 98 per cent of potholes on state highways repaired within 24 hours of identification every month since targets were introduced, Transport Minister Chris Bishop says. “Increasing productivity to help rebuild our economy is ...
The former Cadbury factory will be the site of the Inpatient Building for the new Dunedin Hospital and Health Minister Simeon Brown says actions have been taken to get the cost overruns under control. “Today I am giving the people of Dunedin certainty that we will build the new Dunedin ...
From today, Plunket in Whāngarei will be offering childhood immunisations – the first of up to 27 sites nationwide, Health Minister Simeon Brown says. The investment of $1 million into the pilot, announced in October 2024, was made possible due to the Government’s record $16.68 billion investment in health. It ...
New Zealand’s strong commitment to the rights of disabled people has continued with the response to an important United Nations report, Disability Issues Minister Louise Upston has announced. Of the 63 concluding observations of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), 47 will be progressed ...
Resources Minister Shane Jones has launched New Zealand’s national Minerals Strategy and Critical Minerals List, documents that lay a strategic and enduring path for the mineral sector, with the aim of doubling exports to $3 billion by 2035. Mr Jones released the documents, which present the Coalition Government’s transformative vision ...
Firstly I want to thank OceanaGold for hosting our event today. Your operation at Waihi is impressive. I want to acknowledge local MP Scott Simpson, local government dignitaries, community stakeholders and all of you who have gathered here today. It’s a privilege to welcome you to the launch of the ...
Racing Minister, Winston Peters has announced the Government is preparing public consultation on GST policy proposals which would make the New Zealand racing industry more competitive. “The racing industry makes an important economic contribution. New Zealand thoroughbreds are in demand overseas as racehorses and for breeding. The domestic thoroughbred industry ...
Business confidence remains very high and shows the economy is on track to improve, Economic Growth Minister Nicola Willis says. “The latest ANZ Business Outlook survey, released yesterday, shows business confidence and expected own activity are ‘still both very high’.” The survey reports business confidence fell eight points to +54 ...
Enabling works have begun this week on an expanded radiology unit at Hawke’s Bay Fallen Soldiers’ Memorial Hospital which will double CT scanning capacity in Hawke’s Bay to ensure more locals can benefit from access to timely, quality healthcare, Health Minister Simeon Brown says. This investment of $29.3m in the ...
The Government has today announced New Zealand’s second international climate target under the Paris Agreement, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand will reduce emissions by 51 to 55 per cent compared to 2005 levels, by 2035. “We have worked hard to set a target that is both ambitious ...
Nine years of negotiations between the Crown and iwi of Taranaki have concluded following Te Pire Whakatupua mō Te Kāhui Tupua/the Taranaki Maunga Collective Redress Bill passing its third reading in Parliament today, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “This Bill addresses the historical grievances endured by the eight iwi ...
As schools start back for 2025, there will be a relentless focus on teaching the basics brilliantly so all Kiwi kids grow up with the knowledge, skills and competencies needed to grow the New Zealand of the future, Education Minister Erica Stanford says. “A world-leading education system is a key ...
Housing Minister Chris Bishop and Associate Agriculture Minister Mark Patterson have welcomed Kāinga Ora’s decision to re-open its tender for carpets to allow wool carpet suppliers to bid. “In 2024 Kāinga Ora issued requests for tender (RFTs) seeking bids from suppliers to carpet their properties,” Mr Bishop says. “As part ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour has today visited Otahuhu College where the new school lunch programme has served up healthy lunches to students in the first days of the school year. “As schools open in 2025, the programme will deliver nutritious meals to around 242,000 students, every school day. On ...
Minister for Children Karen Chhour has intervened in Oranga Tamariki’s review of social service provider contracts to ensure Barnardos can continue to deliver its 0800 What’s Up hotline. “When I found out about the potential impact to this service, I asked Oranga Tamariki for an explanation. Based on the information ...
A bill to make revenue collection on imported and exported goods fairer and more effective had its first reading in Parliament, Customs Minister Casey Costello said today. “The Customs (Levies and Other Matters) Amendment Bill modernises the way in which Customs can recover the costs of services that are needed ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Department of Internal Affairs [the Department] has achieved significant progress in completing applications for New Zealand citizenship. “December 2024 saw the Department complete 5,661 citizenship applications, the most for any month in 2024. This is a 54 per cent increase compared ...
Reversals to Labour’s blanket speed limit reductions begin tonight and will be in place by 1 July, says Minister of Transport Chris Bishop. “The previous government was obsessed with slowing New Zealanders down by imposing illogical and untargeted speed limit reductions on state highways and local roads. “National campaigned on ...
Finance Minister Nicola Willis has announced Budget 2025 – the Growth Budget - will be delivered on Thursday 22 May. “This year’s Budget will drive forward the Government’s plan to grow our economy to improve the incomes of New Zealanders now and in the years ahead. “Budget 2025 will build ...
For the Government, 2025 will bring a relentless focus on unleashing the growth we need to lift incomes, strengthen local businesses and create opportunity. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon today laid out the Government’s growth agenda in his Statement to Parliament. “Just over a year ago this Government was elected by ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour welcomes students back to school with a call to raise attendance from last year. “The Government encourages all students to attend school every day because there is a clear connection between being present at school and setting yourself up for a bright future,” says Mr ...
The Government is relaxing visitor visa requirements to allow tourists to work remotely while visiting New Zealand, Economic Growth Minister Nicola Willis, Immigration Minister Erica Stanford and Tourism Minister Louise Upston say. “The change is part of the Government’s plan to unlock New Zealand’s potential by shifting the country onto ...
The opening of Kāinga Ora’s development of 134 homes in Epuni, Lower Hutt will provide much-needed social housing for Hutt families, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “I’ve been a strong advocate for social housing on Kāinga Ora’s Epuni site ever since the old earthquake-prone housing was demolished in 2015. I ...
Trade and Investment Minister Todd McClay will travel to Australia today for meetings with Australian Trade Minister, Senator Don Farrell, and the Australia New Zealand Leadership Forum (ANZLF). Mr McClay recently hosted Minister Farrell in Rotorua for the annual Closer Economic Relations (CER) Trade Ministers’ meeting, where ANZLF presented on ...
A new monthly podiatry clinic has been launched today in Wairoa and will bring a much-needed service closer to home for the Wairoa community, Health Minister Simeon Brown says.“Health New Zealand has been successful in securing a podiatrist until the end of June this year to meet the needs of ...
The Judicial Conduct Commissioner has recommended a Judicial Conduct Panel be established to inquire into and report on the alleged conduct of acting District Court Judge Ema Aitken in an incident last November, Attorney-General Judith Collins said today. “I referred the matter of Judge Aitken’s alleged conduct during an incident ...
Students who need extra help with maths are set to benefit from a targeted acceleration programme that will give them more confidence in the classroom, Education Minister Erica Stanford says. “Last year, significant numbers of students did not meet the foundational literacy and numeracy level required to gain NCEA. To ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters has announced three new diplomatic appointments. “Our diplomats play an important role in ensuring New Zealand’s interests are maintained and enhanced across the world,” Mr Peters says. “It is a pleasure to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and ...
Ki te kahore he whakakitenga, ka ngaro te Iwi – without a vision, the people will perish. The Government has achieved its target to reduce the number of households in emergency housing motels by 75 per cent five years early, Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka says. The number of households ...
The opening of Palmerston North’s biggest social housing development will have a significant impact for whānau in need of safe, warm, dry housing, Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka says. The minister visited the development today at North Street where a total of 50 two, three, and four-bedroom homes plus a ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced the new membership of the Public Advisory Committee on Disarmament and Arms Control (PACDAC), who will serve for a three-year term. “The Committee brings together wide-ranging expertise relevant to disarmament. We have made six new appointments to the Committee and reappointed two existing members ...
Ka nui te mihi kia koutou. Kia ora, good morning, talofa, malo e lelei, bula vinaka, da jia hao, namaste, sat sri akal, assalamu alaikum. It’s so great to be here and I’m ready and pumped for 2025. Can I start by acknowledging: Simon Bridges – CEO of the Auckland ...
The Government has unveiled a bold new initiative to position New Zealand as a premier destination for foreign direct investment (FDI) that will create higher paying jobs and grow the economy. “Invest New Zealand will streamline the investment process and provide tailored support to foreign investors, to increase capital investment ...
Science, Innovation and Technology Minister Judith Collins today announced the largest reset of the New Zealand science system in more than 30 years with reforms which will boost the economy and benefit the sector. “The reforms will maximise the value of the $1.2 billion in government funding that goes into ...
Turbocharging New Zealand’s economic growth is the key to brighter days ahead for all Kiwis, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says. In the Prime Minister’s State of the Nation Speech in Auckland today, Christopher Luxon laid out the path to the prosperity that will affect all aspects of New Zealanders’ lives. ...
The latest set of accounts show the Government has successfully checked the runaway growth of public spending, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. “In the previous government’s final five months in office, public spending was almost 10 per cent higher than for the same period the previous year. “That is completely ...
The Government’s welfare reforms are delivering results with the number of people moving off benefits into work increasing year-on-year for six straight months. “There are positive signs that our welfare reset and the return consequences for job seekers who don't fulfil their obligations to prepare for or find a job ...
Jon Kroll and Aimee McCammon have been appointed to the New Zealand Film Commission Board, Arts Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “I am delighted to appoint these two new board members who will bring a wealth of industry, governance, and commercial experience to the Film Commission. “Jon Kroll has been an ...
Finance Minister Nicola Willis has hailed a drop in the domestic component of inflation, saying it increases the prospect of mortgage rate reductions and a lower cost of living for Kiwi households. Stats NZ reported today that inflation was 2.2 per cent in the year to December, the second consecutive ...
Two new appointed members and one reappointed member of the Employment Relations Authority have been announced by Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden today. “I’m pleased to announce the new appointed members Helen van Druten and Matthew Piper to the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) and welcome them to ...
ACT Party leader David Seymour said he wrote to police about the treatment of Philip Polkinghorne because it's an electorate MP's job to pass on the concerns of their constituents. ...
MEDIAWATCH:By Colin Peacock, RNZ Mediawatch presenter By the time US President Donald Trump announced tariffs on China and Canada last Monday which could kickstart a trade war, New Zealand’s diplomats in Washington, DC, had already been deployed on another diplomatic drama. Republican Senator Ted Cruz had said on social ...
By Caleb Fotheringham, RNZ Pacific journalist Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown says New Zealand is asking for too much oversight over its deal with China, which is expected to be penned in Beijing next week. Brown told RNZ Pacific the Cook Islands-New Zealand relationship was reciprocal. “They certainly did ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne Byelections occurred on Saturday in the Victorian state seats of Prahran and Werribee. The Liberals gained Prahran from the Greens by a ...
A long time ago, Brian Turner wrote a poem in which, among the mountains, as he slept on a river flat … My speechless ancestors played like mice among my dreamsand he woke to the river running over my bed of stone. I have come to know that where a ...
Pacific Media Watch President Donald Trump has frozen billions of dollars around the world in aid projects, including more than $268 million allocated by Congress to support independent media and the free flow of information. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has denounced this decision, which has plunged NGOs, media outlets, and ...
Otago University professor of international relations Robert Patman says New Zealand should provide a robust response to Donald Trump's Gaza plan, and also "should stop tip-toeing" around Trump. ...
The new minister of transport has opened the door for public consultation on at least some of the speed limit changes the government said would be automatic. ...
Officially, they’re called ‘memecoins,’ but Kōura Wealth founder Rupert Carlyon says the crypto world has another name for them: ‘shitcoins’.In digital finance, that phrase is used for tokens that have no true value – in essence, a money-grab.A few days before his inauguration, US President Donald Trump launched his own ...
Madeleine Chapman reflects on the week that was. Guy Williams has made a whole show off the joke that he is a “volunteer” journalist. So getting publicly owned by David Seymour while trying to act as a journalist is a good and timely reminder not to underestimate the nuance and ...
Many of Sāmoa’s beloved dishes are the result of cultural collaboration, writes Madeleine Chapman. All photos by Jin FelletIf you ever find yourself at a barbecue in a Sāmoan home, there’s 99% chance that sapasui (chop suey) will be on the table. For the past century, sapasui has ...
The funnyman takes us through his life in television, including Jono and Ben mayhem, live Telethon flubs, and funnelling all those experiences into his new comedy Vince. There’s an inciting incident in Three’s new comedy Vince where morning television presenter Vince Walters (Jono Pryor) is visiting sick kids in hospital ...
People often claim they just want Waitangi Day to be a celebration. At Waitangi, away from the headlined political acrimony and the marae ātea, celebrating is what most people are doing. The Spinoff Essay showcases the best essayists in Aotearoa, on topics big and small. Made possible by the generous ...
Is there anything more fashionable than a Māori get together? One of the best things about Northland is that nobody cares what they look like — probably because they’re all naturally more stylish than the rest of us, famously. Māori from the Far North, especially. In 27 degree heat, wearing ...
I’ve been in love with him since last July, but it’s only now in this tepid hotel room that I find myself wondering why. The first thing he does when we arrive is smoke a cone in the bathroom – he emerges, hacking up a lung, fists thrust into his ...
MONDAY“Name,” barked a representative of the lower orders.I regarded him with a look of stern disapproval, and told him from up high, “May I remind you that I have name suppression. I shall also thank you to ask with more respect as befits a former president of the Act Party, ...
Books of Mana: 180 Māori-Authored Books of Significance, edited by Jacinta Ruru, Angela Wanhalla and Jeanette Wikaira has just been released by Otago University Press. In this essay, Books are Taonga, Jeanette Wikaira explores her personal relationship to books and their value.For me, books are taonga. The knowledge ...
Get to know Tara, our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Tara’s human for their support! Dog name: Tara Age: Two Breed: Mostly Border Collie and a little bit Catahoula Leopard dog If dog ...
Health NZ's CEO has resigned, but frontline healthworkers are sceptical that installing new leadership will make any difference to a system grappling with problems. ...
Health NZ's CEO has resigned, but frontline healthworkers are sceptical that installing new leadership will make any difference to a system grappling with problems. ...
Gail Duncan, Chairperson of the St Peter’s on Willis Social Justice Group, one of the organisations invited to submit on the Bill, says the Government’s actions are unprecedented. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amani Kasherwa, School of Nursing, Midwifery and Social Work, The University of Queensland In late January, a rebel group that has long caused mayhem in the sprawling African nation of Democratic Republic of Congo took control of Goma, a major city of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Yee-Fui Ng, Associate Professor, Faculty of Law, Monash University An ad falsely depicting independent candidate Alex Dyson as a Greens member.ABC News/Supplied The highly pertinent case of a little-known independent candidate in the Victorian seat of Wannon has exposed a gaping ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lauren Ball, Professor of Community Health and Wellbeing, The University of Queensland Nik/Unsplash You might have heard that eating too many eggs will cause high cholesterol levels, leading to poor health. Researchers have examined the science behind this myth again, and ...
Everything you missed from the third day of the Treaty principles bill hearings, when the Justice Committee heard four hours of oral submission. Read our recaps of day one of the hearings here, and day two here. Parliament was quiet on Friday for the third day of hearings on the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Thomas Jeffries, Senior Lecturer in Microbiology, Western Sydney University Tijana Simic/Shutterstock The news last week that three people in Sydney were hospitalised with botulism after receiving botox injections has raised questions about the regulation of the cosmetic injectables industry. The ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jens Blotevogel, Principal Research Scientist and Team Leader for Remediation Technologies, CSIRO Mino Surkala, Shutterstock Lithium-ion batteries are part of everyday life. They power small rechargeable devices such as mobile phones and laptops. They enable electric vehicles. And larger versions store ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Edith Jennifer Hill, Associate Lecturer, Learning & Teaching Innovation, Flinders University Netflix Netflix’s new limited series, Apple Cider Vinegar, tells the story of the elaborate cancer con orchestrated by Australian blogger Annabelle (Belle) Gibson. The first episode opens with Gibson’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dee Ninis, Earthquake Scientist, Monash University Greece’s government has just declared a state of emergency on the island of Santorini, as earthquakes shake the island multiple times a day and sometimes only minutes apart. The “earthquake swarm” is also affecting other ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne The Western Australian state election will be held on March 8. A Newspoll, conducted January 29 to February 4 from a sample ...
She’s back behind the wheel, and this time, she wants to find out what it is that makes us tick. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. After a prolific career on stage and screen, 83-year-old Miriam Margolyes is on the road again. ...
A new poem by Jordan Hamel. Real Poet Every word earned its place and so did he, so should you. Real poet lives in the capital but writes himself into the Mackenzie country golden hour, man of the paper land, he neglects to mention his pollen ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Understanding Te Tiriti by Roimata Smail (Wai Ako Press, $25) No better time to get ...
The committee has published this list to inform the public about its work, and to give clarity to submitters who have contacted the committee asking if they will be invited to make an oral submission. ...
Alex Casey and Gabi Lardies dissect their Laneway 2025 experience. Gabi Lardies: Hi Alex :))))))) Congratulations on not getting sunburnt. Everyone I talked to at Laneway yesterday was braving the sun for one thing. Charli XCX. How was your brat experience?Alex Casey: We will talk about the rest of ...
The US President's suggestion, which sparked enormous debate globally, has been labelled as a threat, not a proposal, by the Federation of Islamic Associations. ...
nice ‘ picture of the P.M smiling, holding a kitten on the NZH front page today.Was wondering why Annette King does not accuse the snaKey P.M of lying outside Parliament…it would create a focus on his serial behaviour ,and get some attention.
as usual distraction wheeled in by Gower’s paddy, hoping we ll missed the PM barefaced lying to the public…….whaaaaaat?
Apparently Games of Thrones is an allegory for the human response to climate change:
http://www.salon.com/2015/06/04/is_game_of_thrones_an_allegory_for_global_climate_change/
The great wall signifies conscious climate change denial.
The White Walkers signify the inevitability and destructiveness of change.
And everything else signifies the games that the major houses/powers (read: US, China, India) are contesting over remaining realms, rather than face the power of what they are holding back.
Personally I’m waiting for Beowulf’s dragon to make a guest appearance somewhere … signifying… hmmm … radical Islam, or terrorist threats generally, or something.
If You’re Older Than 40 And Reading This…*
… you’re likely to either be eating out of a dumpster in your old age or be (literally) eaten.
If you currently have counted more than 65 revolutions around the sun in your life then you may avoid this, but only through the most-macabre of means: you’ll die of something else first.
Let me explain: If you’re between 40 – 65 you have somewhere between 20 and 45 years remaining on this planet, statistically speaking. Oh sure, some of you will do better, some worse, but those are the numbers.
This means you must manage at least 20 years without things going to hell if you’re on the older end, and 45 years if you’re on the younger. What are the odds?
Cont …http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=230208
Dramatic language, but I understand and have accepted the sentiment. There is an alternative though, if we all voluntarily start today, that can be summed up: Whatever it is you are doing, do not flatter the greed.
A good example of someone mistaking finances for the economy.
+1000
The people who wrote that seem to think that as long as the financial spreadsheets were better looking, then the world would be sweet. Ridiculous misconception. You cannot eat Treasury bills, and you cannot eat gold.
Over the next quarter century the economic issues we face will see explosive growth in all areas of poverty, homelessness, crime and the many ills of life the contributing elements create. In the darkly brilliant Children of Men they introduce a euthanasia product, called Quietude, designed to deal with the extreme despondency the world experiences when faced with an apparently insurmountable problem.
As depressing and controversial as the idea appears today, I have no doubt we will see similar products on our shelves by then.
The fact none of the present doomsday scenarios actually have to happen, and could be avoided if humanity just grew up a little, is treated like some idealistic but unstable isotope. One whose steady decay is certainly useful in measuring the decline of the equality it once supported, but is seen by many as nothing more than an inevitable, even natural process, leading to the creation of exciting new elements. The reality these new elements are often dangerous & potentially toxic is apparently of little concern.
we already accept people deadening their minds, emotions and consciousness in order to “cope” with the reality that the power elite have constructed in society. Things like anti-depressants and alchohol are amongst the most profitable businesses.
Debate: is New Zealand’s democracy an outgrowth of the European Enlightenment, or does it have local sources, in the Maori nationalist & workers’ movements? http://readingthemaps.blogspot.co.nz/2015/06/enlightening-new-zealand-open-letter-to.html
I am a suspicious old thing, but when I read the following headline, I couldn’t help but think of the Patriot Act debate… coincidence?
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-33017310
I’d buy that for a dollar.
Ahh, the sweet hypocrisy of it all….
It appears that by simply signing your name on an object someone else created, it does become an artwork 😉
http://media.nzherald.co.nz/webcontent/image/jpg/201523/011279278c67659ee517e871c5004b3054934cbc_220x147.jpg
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/stratford-press/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503390&objectid=11459125
http://www.percythomsongallery.org.nz/c_exhibition.asp
🙄
IF John Key had sped to get to an All Black game he would be lauded as a great kiwi bloke…
At least we can be certain that when he signed that matchbox, he did so in the role of Prime Minister. Unless PM stands for “Partly Missing”.
” PM stands for “Partly Missing”
PM=Ponytail Man
http://www.bmj.com/content/350/bmj.h2362
After revelations that the CDC is receiving some funding from industry, Jeanne Lenzer investigates how it might have affected the organisation’s decisions
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) includes the following disclaimer with its recommendations: “CDC, our planners, and our content experts wish to disclose they have no financial interests or other relationships with the manufacturers of commercial products . . . CDC does not accept commercial support.”
One piece at a time
Lprent:
The right bar ‘comments’ tab does not seem to provide the most current updates for who is commenting on what. It seems to be slightly behind or sometimes even stalled?
It could be a problem with my browser but I suspect it is The Standard not updating as usual??
Anyway, I am thinking of typing something provocative to catch your attention here so that you will come looking to ban me 😉 but I will leave you to catch up with this message in your own time.
Btw, you’ve got my curiosity piqued about The Nation tomorrow.
I think that the caching has gotten a bit more ‘aggressive’ after a plugin update earlier in the week.
extended:
It is odd as it isn’t happening all of the time. Just some of the time.
However it is unlikely to be the browser. I caught it on my linux laptop yesterday in both Chrome and Firefox out through my Spark cellphone. I’d login and get the non-logged in front page.
Meanwhile Chrome and IE were working perfectly on another laptop on a different network, and same for Chrome and Safari on the same network on a Mac.
It will probably be the weekend before I can do much about it.
Cheers. Just wanted you to be aware of the issue.
A better balanced article about the Labour Party Review report:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/opinion/69097307/editorial-labour-still-has-work-to-do
I’m sure somebody else will have commented on this, but I was impressed with Labour’s response to the leak of their election review.
First, when they found Gower had it, they released it immediately to the whole media, spiking Gower’s guns. Secondly, on Backbenches Jacinda cleverly dismissed the leak as (paraphrasing here) nothing new here, just stating the obvious, which defused the issue immediately.
Maybe Labour is learning how to play the media at last?
On the Gower coverage on 3 News, Andrew Little fronting the press looked drawn and on the backfoot in my opinion. That in itself is the most damaging in my opinion, reinforcing the negative messaging the media is trying to portray.
@maui ah ok I didn’t see that. Maybe he needs some serious media training. Crucial to do this asap.
This is the clip of it: http://www.3news.co.nz/nznews/where-labour-went-wrong–election-review-leaked-2015060315#axzz3c8moMdnd
It might just be my impression though, others might have thought he looked ok. But he hasn’t looked as confident since the Super backdown.
@maui yep he needs to relax a bit, but what he said was ok.
Taxes, death and Little leading Labour into the next election are the only certainties in life.
Andrew looked fine. However, David Cunliffe looked rather pale, though that might just be the lighting.
I don’t watch Gower very often, but ffs could he be any more biased? Is this what we’ve come to, where his agenda is what informs the public about politics and current affairs? I have no doubt that he fully understands the difference between reporting and manipulating, so can only assume his agenda is motivated by politics.
Yep – Must have defused the issue.
On the Herald … http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=11460446
“Labour facing ‘oblivion’ “. Yep – Diffused.
Meh, Edwards has his own little agenda, I guess. You’ll note his round up is only of links that support his ‘oblivion’ sneering.
Bryce Edwards always has had a rather strange view of Labour.
It looks like he got stuck in a New Labour mould several decades ago and never actually fell out of the romanticism. It is a pity because he clearly has no frigging idea about how much ‘organisation’ plays in getting electoral victories. It is way way more important than his frigging beloved ‘ideology’
Reading rapidly through the list of ‘left’ reviews, what I notice is that they were either done by
1. People who have never been involved inside Labour, eg Mclauchlan and journos.
2. People who left with New Labour back in what? 1991 – Trotter and ? Edwards ?himself
3. People who were previously political employees and distinctly on the right of Labour – eg Leyland, Quin.Neither exactly had graceful exits from the jobs as I remember it. I tend to view them as more into utu than activity.
For a review that was written for the members of the Labour party, leaked to outside the party, there is a curious lack of depth and highly selective picking of the links for people inside the Labour party exhibited in Bryce’s selection.
It was obviously written by someone wanting to crap in the tent rather than working on it… But I rather suspect that was the intention. Bryce’s heart (as far as I can see) tends to go out to those parties of the left that spend their time in strange self-destructive immolation at election time. I guess it is romantic if you are into that kind of thing. But organisation less of the precious wee egos tends to get voters out.
The idea of the review was to figure out how to get Labour working better for election victories. You’d think that Bryce would have had a look around and noticed the almost eerie silence from active Labour members without utu issues. But the only one in his entire piece was from Scott Yorke…. And that was a satirical post.
It’d be nice if he’d actually look at where there weren’t reactions from. Like the many Labour members authoring and commenting here. I sure as hell noticed it.
Just because some scumbag leaked it to Paddy Gower (and we’d all like to know who it was) doesn’t mean that Labour members are that interested in discussing their party with people who aren’t active in the party.
Note on that last point – that doesn’t include me anymore.
The editorial starts by damning with faint praise, then openly attacking, running over all the same old attack lines: get rid of Cunliffe and his supporters (the bogey men), get rid of the influence of unions and other sector groups; Labour need not do anything except garnish our political system with the appearance of democracy by being in eternal opposition; the article uses hyperbole that isn’t in or implied in the original document – nothing was “slammed”, no “indictments” were made; and otherwise paints the picture that Labour is financially broke and has personnel and organisational issues that won’t stop until things that have already happened are accepted as real events in the mind of the Herald editorship – which will be never. All this from the editors who protected the “democratic acts” of Rachel Glucina by exercising their democratic right to prostitute the fourth estate to the National government’s best interests.
Subtly, but totally unbalanced, would be my label for that editorial.
Will we ever see in New Zealand The Storm is Coming “Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren politicians ” for Change for We 99%.?? Aren,t you sick and tired of the Key Zero Accountability Rhetoric and BS we voters have to put up with year after year aided and abetted by the Dirty Politics tactics of some Tame Media ,bloggers,TV clowns and Political strategists. So The TPPA agreement is visible in the The USA Why aren,t we picking up on it here?
What can you say. Ted Cruz is a nasty piece of work.
Now that the government is making kiwisaver enrolment automatic, Labour should follow the example, and Hilary Clinton’s, and make electoral roll registration automatic. That is likely to lift the vote without punitive measures.
Real transport for liveable cities (video)
http://i.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/all-blacks/69152950/Former-All-Black-Jerry-Collins-killed-in-car-accident-in-France-local-media-reports-say
A sad finish to the week . One of the great characters in rugby .
Is it just me or has something really changed over the last few weeks?
Talking to people the mood is harsh – it’s like a veil has been lifted for many, and the light has been shown them something, they did not want to see.
Many have woken up to the fact – that selling everything to corporations is morally repulsive, as well as, just a stupid way to run a society. The amoral outfits who wrecked the world in the name of greed just 6 years ago – have not done a damn thing to change their money grubbing ways.
All we are left with Is bankrupt thinking at best. Messy, ugly, godless and lazy self righteous. My guess, those in power have no idea, except to cling to this bereft ideology and push polls to get them though.
What is worse – is they are utterly dishonest about using this approach to cling to power.
this has been said (in words to this effect) over and over again on this blog. Still the elections and polling dont reflect what “you” people see.
I would suggest getting out more and conversing with a wider range of folk.
Have a great weekend.
Pitchforks.
James what a pathetic response – really, the polls is your defence. Where did you learn rhetoric, on the back of a weetbix packet?
I’d say you need to take up your own suggestion. It seems you lost in lala land of your own making. Or is this the fabled planet Key? Have a wee look around sunshine. Or maybe open yourself and talk to the downtrodden. Or if you’re feeling brave, ask some of your mates how much debt they really are in.
But I should have guessed I’d get a dishonest response, relying on the same ideological underpinnings that keeps this corrupt edifice in place.
So God bless James, any chance you could live up to your name sake?
RIP Jerry Collins. He showed the way to deal to the opposition. Thoughts and sympathy for his whānau.
The patently mendacious, shameful Queen’s Speech
should have been delivered by a professional comedian
by GLEN NEWEY, 28 May 2015
http://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2015/05/28/glen-newey/patently-mendacious/
The Queen’s Speech has all the pomposity and solemnity of a panto you’re not allowed to laugh at. This bowdlerises its political content, grimly apparent were it delivered by a nerd in a lounge suit. Elizabeth lumbers in, glazed and jowly, with the familiar cast of attendant lords, including her husband, her heir and her heir’s duchess, who’s kitted out with a purple sash that could be left over from the Ukip election campaign. As ever the queen herself looks as if her breakfast porridge had too much mogadon in it. Since she always reads her script as if she were reciting the E numbers on a packet of jelly, it’s anyone’s guess what, if anything, she thinks about it. The custodian of the speech is a nerd usually seen in a lounge suit, Michael Gove, who from journeyman beginnings as a Times hack and a Commons expenses home-flipper, has now hit it big as lord chancellor. Yesterday he got to try out his new 18th-century chancellorial garb.
Aided by the Tory speech team, Gove has clearly put his trade to work ventriloquising the queen, of whom he’s a diehard fan. Some utterances seem patently mendacious: ‘My government will legislate in the interests of everyone in our country.’ One Nation under Gove, previously the Big Society, is a bigger marquee than cynical commentators have supposed. Things will be especially nice for the well-to-do mansion-dweller, the non-immigrant, the non-zero-hours employee, the non-druggie, the non-fox, and above all for the hard-working working-class worker, his toiling family, his slavishly diligent dog and its no less Stakhanovite, busily bloodsucking fleas. The more austerity depresses output – creates more work – the more virtue there is in industry. One falls to wondering if it’s the queen or her government who counts as lying. Is she to be held responsible for what drops from her lips, or is she, as her government’s puppet, legibus soluta, no more a moral agent than Kermit the frog? Her mien suggests the queen suspects it’s the latter.
In his online introduction to the speech, David Cameron avows his plan to get people’s noses out to the grindstone rather than ‘sitting at home’, where if not teleworking or enjoying the proceeds of their trust fund, they may be doing non-work things like bringing up children or caring for a frail relative. Whence the ‘workless households’ Cameron mentions, which menace the docility that is the Englishman’s birthright and solemn duty. Trade unions, organisations to stop workers working, get a further whack – ‘essential service’ employees will need a turnout of 50 per cent to authorise strike action, with 40 per cent of eligible voters in favour of it (so at least 80 per cent of votes on a 50 per cent turnout). The work business even pops up in the section that promises to ban so-called ‘legal highs’ (normals’ psychoactive drugs of choice – ethanol, caffeine, nicotine and so on – are unaffected; after all, you need something to make working life bearable). The ban aims to ‘protect hard-working citizens’ from psychoactive degeneracy; slackers are fair game from whom no better can be expected.
Quasi-privatisation continues with the spread of ‘free’ schools and the enforced flog-off of housing association properties. The government still wants to crash out of the European human rights convention. There will, on top, be English votes for English laws. All this makes it likelier that the Scots try to peel off from the Union, particularly if the English (for they will be responsible) choose to leave the EU in 2017. Either the English will fume at being locked into the EU by No-voting Welsh and Scots, or the latter will resent being sprung from it by the English. Her majesty reads out the recipe for strife and the possible dismemberment of her kingdom phlegmatically. The mogadon has done its job.
That’s more than can be said for Gove, who managed to fluff his one duty of the day – putting the speech in its fetching damask bag, an operation he’s walked through by the nonagenarian Duke of Edinburgh. On day one of his old job as chief whip, Gove locked himself in a toilet, from which someone had the heartlessness to rescue him.
https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/queens-speech-2015