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6:00 am, November 6th, 2023 - 34 comments
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Open mike is your post.
For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose.
The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy).
Step up to the mike …
https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/301001586/jehan-casinader-oranga-tamariki-stopped-uplifting-children-is-this-what-we-wanted
My thoughts are that if a child's name is registered as Ruthless, they should be removed immediately as there is no hope for them in a family that damaged.
Putting children under oranga tamariki has proven to have worse outcomes than leaving children in highly dysfunctional families.No easy fixes .It's easy to say but the solution is worse .
So dead is better than in care?
Better to have uplift as an option and make sure you have solid systems to protect the child in care .
Really?
Best you cite facts supporting your assertion that the solution is worse.
This may unfortunately be another sad case.
Police investigating unexplained baby death at Papakura house – NZ Herald
Our primary exponent of commercial democracy thus far has been a union:
The basic idea of a union is to represent common interests of members. Like-minded supporters can contribute funds regardless of whether they're members or not. This enabling of commercial democracy by both left & right remains consensual.
Conceive politics as deriving from a structural triad: voters/representatives/govt. Insert lobby groups (PACs in the USA) into this process and you get a tetrad. The process of democracy gets commercialised and becomes a different beast.
He's an academic, so naturally he gets the labelling wrong. Democracy remains public. What he thinks is private is actually commercial. The deal or transaction is an exchange of influence for money, out of which you get leverage on the process.
You are you, so naturally you must make a snarky and disrespectful comment about somebody else’s opinion, especially when that person is an academic.
In any case, you’re wrong and you’ve not understood anything of what the Newsroom article and particularly that academic said.
Lift your game – how many times do I need to say this to you?
It is surely time for a New Zealand labour movement industrial response to the Israeli butchers at Gaza.
Transport bans, and local action against any company that supports the operations, one way or another, of the IDF would be a good start.
Plus BDS as per usual–Boycott, Divest, Sanction. There is a fair amount of misinformation on this re Nike, Puma etc. so go to source perhaps…
https://bdsmovement.net/get-involved/what-to-boycott
Yes TM , it's good to see the Belgian union response
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/belgian-unions-refuse-handling-arms-shipments-israel-hamas-conflict-2023-10-31/
Great stuff, and other tentative moves (because so many are still wary of challenging Israel’s occupation) around the world’s unions. The Israeli State and Military are hyper sensitive to any challenge so that is why we need to sticker Sodastream's and Tahini etc.
The Israeli troll farms went ballistic a couple of years back just because Lorde declined to play there.
The least NZ workers can do is to accept some personal employment risk in solidarity with Palestinians.
Maybe the MSM might get around to reporting this …
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/31/northwest-syria-witnesses-most-intense-military-escalation-in-three-years
Gender equity update: https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/06-11-2023/a-national-act-nz-first-government-would-mean-a-whole-lot-of-men-in-charge-again
Compared to the almost-balanced parliament, the govt in prospect is 2/3 men.
The are likely to be a lot of old rural women happy at steps being made to them being back where they should be – in aprons in kitchens. While men take care of the important stuff.
Am picking that you don't know many rural women.
Doesn't know any and never received a clip under the ear from one either.. but keep talking like that and its not far away.
The people spoke really clearly.
Not just some imaginary set of Country Women's Institute scone-bakers. Millions of women voted against the left, despite Ardern leading far and away the most female-friendly government in political memory.
We also might want to inhale a bit until there's a cabinet list before we complain about who precisely is in and out of power.
This is a bit of a worry though , been trending this way for a while
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/nov/04/plans-to-redefine-extremism-would-include-undermining-uk-values
When even the Guardian reports on it!
In the perpetual competition amongst rightists to see who will win the title of Dork Supreme, Gove is proving a persistent contender. Probably insufficiently savvy to fully grasp the potential of his labelling technique.
Once listed as extremist, young rebels will glory in their tag. It will prove a generational escalator to power, wealth and fame. The marketing opportunities are limitless. Anyone with spare cash ought to find a plastic factory in China & commission a zillion extremist badges for the listed rebels and copycats…
Guardians an establishment outlet IMO running tory narratives such as the Corbyn smear.
No surprise that one of the major players of the brexit con is behind this in Michael Gove.
When conglomerates form cartels and or lobby the government for industry favour – such as to silence those environmentalists or those Occupy Wall Street anti-capitalists …
When institutions of state seek to act on their behalf without noting they might also use the same legislation to silence those who question the defence build-ups, foreign policy, the secret surveillance state … and covert psy ops against the public …
Otherwise it's comforting that someone in the UK government believes in their traditional values – it had appeared that mere lip service had been offered up in recent decades (lies about WMD in Iraq, the setting up of the dodgy Fixated Threat Assessment Centre 2006 etc, police getting involved in matters of free speech as well as hate speech).
They just need to note that organising to realise change is part of democratic practice and citizens have a right to do it as much as those corporate cartels/industry lobbyists who contact Minister's parties and MP's. Establishment figures distinguishing between those acting in accord with traditional values and those not, is more than mere conservatism, it implies the UK is imploding into a paranoid insecure regime since Brexit. Panic in the London clubs at the prospect of Tories losing power … ?
The Policing of "wrongthink".
https://www.faircop.org.uk/case-studies/harry-miller/
"I need to check your thinking,’ says PC Gul.
I point out that 1984 is a dystopian novel and not a how-to manual but the reference is lost on PC Gul. He’s been on a course. Just not a very literary one.
The following week, the assistant chief constable threw the full weight of his bulging ACPO lapel behind his constable, sternly warning about escalation and proportionate action whilst publicly labelling me a transphobe. Just in case I hadn’t got the message (I had – I ignored it) Inspector Wilson called, urging me to disengage with public political debate. I reminded him of my Article 10 Rights. His response was, ‘If you don’t like it, sue.’
My own formal interface in this area was when police first asked a local NZ Post shop to stop sending faxes of mine to the US embassy (explanations of why going into Iraq was wrong) and then one said any letters I sent would be intercepted.
I was later one of those questioned after a threat to a visiting golfer, because opposing American wars, is opposing American security, is being a threat to Americans and makes one a fellow traveller of "unAmerican born POTUS Barack Obama on Air Force One".
At least in your case they were open about what they were doing. In 1999 I was approached by a young American in an unusual set of circumstances while exercising my dog on North Head, Devonport. It was on the same day President Clinton arrived in NZ. He claimed to have just arrived as an exchange Massey university student. During the course of a general conversation I smilingly suggested to him that he had come all this way to get away from his president only to find he [said president] had followed him here. I wish I had been able to take a photo of his facial expression. It was priceless. He was either Secret Service or CIA checking up on me – just in case I had plans to do their beloved pressi some harm. Talk about being so obvious and gauche. Was never seen again.
I had worked with a former US Marine Officer on the aforementioned NZ Defence Force base in the 1980s. No prizes for guessing what he was really up to at such an apposite time in our anti-nuclear history.
The week before APEC 1999 was an interesting time for a few of us. I have a story, or two, about that time. The way police chose to create an incident to coincide with their reply to a letter to the Police Minister and I also communicated an opine to the American embassy about the matter of independence for East Timor and Indonesia's future territorial integrity.
Did it involve police cars making intimidatory movements in your presence? They are quite prone to such behaviour when it takes their fancy.
They said that without photo ID, DL or passport, I could not prove I was the homeowner of my property.
Stuff reporter does stylistic analysis of Winston in launch campaign mode:
Stuff helpfully provides a close-up of the rat-tail taken from behind Winston.
Taking notes from your candidates's speech is most unusual. I suspect a lawyer's analytic tendency at play here. Could also be a machiavellian motive of course.
Yes, I get that gesturing is antique biological signalling, but let's not overdo it.
Media critique is always helpful. Especially when it enables a venerable member of the establishment to play on the political stage as an anti-establishment rebel. Trumpian.
For political historians and anyone who was a part of the anti-nuclear movement of the 70s and 80s (includes the Labour Party) should be very interested in the following story:
https://www.newsroom.co.nz/a-secret-history-of-the-battle-over-nzs-nuclear-free-policy#:~:text=Author%20and%20former%20anti%2Dnuclear,him%20to%20seek%20his%20help.
PM David Lange, DPM Geoffrey Palmer and Defence Minister Frank O'Flynn sabotaged a plan by NZ and US officials to scuttle the anti-nuclear legislation. The hero of the day was Nicky Hager. NZ owes him a huge thank-you. I owe him an even bigger thank-you for revealing something that is quintessential to my own experiences I have alluded to here from time to time.
The dark under-belly of the times had their genesis in the Muldoon years.
Brilliant piece from Nicky, thanks for bringing it to our attention Anne.
I have long maintained that Nicky Hager, as well as being one of our few public intellectuals, is a true New Zealand patriot.
The backroom officials networks are still a pestilence on our democracy as the Police and establishment reactions to Mr Hager’s work have illustrated.
As Hager postulates at the end of the story;
So, the story has relevance and implications for the crises of current times.
And the police who were asked to, or chose to, take the (CIA sourced …) threat to an American golfer seriously by treating left wingers opposed to the war in Iraq as suspects.
I approached the police on several occasions and reported the criminal activity that was occurring in the 1980s and again in the early 1990s following the commencement of 'Operation Desert Storm'. (I was working on a Defence Force base during the second round) and they refused to conduct an investigation.
It left me feeling hurt and humiliated as though they believed I was making it all up. I suspect now they were told by someone not to conduct any investigation.
We can note that at times of crisis, the tendency of state power to increasse.
1. The Foreshore and Seabed legislation and the dissent of those who formed the Maori Party
The Special Police Unit that then formed later invaded the Urewera's to inspect a group of iwi warriors who wanted to corner the pig hunting market in the area (which has only played into their hands as concessions since have guaranteed this outcome).
2. The mosque attack
The Fixated Threat Assessment Centre 2019 (modelled on one formed in the UK 2006). Presumably they have Liz Gunn under close watch – given all the others could nar get above naught to lead a revolution against the power of those in government office.
Without compliance to the will of the foreign protectorate – then came the Rainbow Warrior bombing, then land of milk and honey economy facing the invasion of white clover leaf weevil and varrua jacobsini beemite and some didymo – the sort of economic sabotage we usually associate with sanctions against a left wing state applied here when National chose to stay with the nuclear free policy (see sanctions against oil industry tech to Venezuela when they elected a socialist President).
If anyone here suspected it … what did they say to Josiah (5 Eyes) Beeman when he was here as Ambassador?
I wrote him a letter and told him that their tariffs on our lamb exports were not things proper men do to such animals and taking up the Noahide standard I had raised I asked him to inform the CIA to be pro human rights in future. I note that a few years ago, when a woman was appointed Director, she apologised for her involvement in rendition and water boarding.
In commercial democracy the deepest pockets get the maximum leverage:
Privacy laws assist corporate lobby groups by masking their funding sources. Left & right routinely collude to maintain the mask. This BAU protection system is what the Labour Party will continue to support when it gets its act together, I expect. Absolutely vital to maintain control of the democratic process to protect the establishment!