And here’s something else: he seems to associate with a whole bunch of people who seem intent on emailing each other in very odd phrases (what on earth is a ‘pizza related map’ and why would such a ‘map’ be drawn on a ‘hankerchief’???).
Don’t bother trying to please the left wing, it’s not worth it.
By the way, Mexico is complaining that Trump policies have now cost them 3600 well paid manufacturing jobs which were going to move out of the USA to Mexico.
James Clapper is arguably the most notorious liar in the world;
So why is RNZ National treating him as a serious and credible source? Summer Report, RNZ National, Friday 6 January 2017, 8:25 a.m.
I’m sure I was not the only person to listen with interest when perky Summer Report host Anusha Bradley read out from her script that a “leading security analyst” is “more certain than ever” that Russian hackers were working for Donald Trump. It was not until at least thirty seconds into her spiel that Bradley revealed who this “leading security analyst” was: James Clapper, the utterly discredited Director of National Intelligence.
In case you’ve forgotten, James Clapper is the man who lied under oath to Congress, and denied that the NSA was illegally collecting data on American citizens. It was seeing Clapper lying to Congress that prompted Edward Snowden to blow the whistle on the whole of the massive, illegal, unconstitutional NSA spying regime. “Sort of the breaking point was seeing the Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, directly lie under oath to Congress. … Seeing that really meant for me there was no going back.” [1]
None of this seemed to matter to Anusha Bradley, or to “our U.S. correspondent Kevin McAleese”, who chuntered on for a minute or so, recycling Clapper’s anti-Russian rhetoric as if he were a credible source. We are accustomed to RNZ National presenters being naïve (Jesse Mulligan, Bryan Crump), ill-informed (Jesse Mulligan), even nasty (Jim Mora, Noelle McCarthy). But this morning’s performance by Anusha Bradley and her “U.S. correspondent” was as bad, as foolish, and as flagrantly dishonest as anything I have ever heard on any radio station, anywhere.
Not sure that I can ever remember chuntering but it seems fairly clear that the Russians did influence the outcome of the American election as did James Comey.
Okay the cybertrail hasn’t been published yet but I suspect it will be soon.
Good spotting, Scott! I used the word carelessly and imprecisely. I should have just written: “Kevin McAleese said….” His lazy and shoddy journalism is what damns him: he doesn’t need any help from me.
… but it seems fairly clear that the Russians did influence the outcome of the American election as did James Comey.
There is no evidence of Russian influence.
Okay the cybertrail hasn’t been published yet but I suspect it will be soon.
Well, we at least have the word of the world’s most discredited liar to boost our confidence.
This “Indivisible” guide is very much written for an American audience, but a bit of word substitution and tweaking and it is a fantastic slacktivist/occasional activist/activisit guide for NZ as well. I love the inclusion, for example, of suggested call dialogues. The left here needs to publish them so people who might not go on a protest know who to call, and how to manage the conversation!
Apparently it is going down a treat amongst Democrats in the USA, who are finally waking up to the fact that they now have oppositional, parliamentary style politics and they’ve allowed the equivalent of the right wing of the ACT party win power in state after state for the GOP.
But all the poaching of Tea Party organising model will only work if the primary agency for the left is left wing and progressive in the first place, which brings us to the tactic which the representative wing of a political party fears the most: The purge. Nothing gets the attention of a fat cat political careerist like seeing their colleagues getting dumped one by one… Thinking specifically of New Zealand, Up to now, everyone has played nice in New Zealand on this – or rather, they’ve been bullied, browbeaten and purged by MPs whose vigilance in stamping out dissent in the local party sheeple is why Labour is now a hollow shell of a political party – an elite cadre party of like minded careerist technocrats is far, far easier to control than one full of opinionated people who refuse to be bullied. In terms of the purge, in nowadays seems you need an external but affiliated organisation (Momentum or the Tea Party, may God forgive my soul for mentioning them together in the same sentence) to smash the layers of institutional defenses establishment political parties have built to protect their careerist and managerialist cadres.
Some MPs are already reasonably leftist, or pragmatic enough, to be dragged to the left. But many are simply to committed to neo-liberal ideology and/or beneficiaries from their close ties to the neo-liberal establishment to be saved. For them, forced retirement or de-selection challenges should beckon. A time traveller from the 1935 Labour party would be confused to discover the current labour party has no plan to radically reform Labour relations, fully fund “free” education, openly and fulsomely oppose free trade agreements that damage local wages and conditions or support proper progressive taxation of the rich – and will only reluctantly and listlessly pick elements of those things when threatened with open revolt.
The left’s chosen vehicle must grow an ideological backbone if it wants to be able to co-opt the organising tools of their opposition. Any who refuse to do so should be kicked into touch.
For the benefit of the more simple-minded among us, would someone please write a comprehensive list of Labour mps and where they stand on this spectrum. If you are living outside the beltway the information available is patchy to say the least and sources unreliable. We rely on a msm which, as we are clearly aware, is no better than it ought to be and if you read the likes of Chris Trotter you could be forgiven for tearing your hair out and running screaming into the bushes with the total confusion of it !
I personally am only beginning to sneak back to Labour after leaving them as a result of the foreshore and seabed fiasco.
What would be great, assuming that Labour wishes to be seen as philosophically and ideologically in opposition to National, is to have Labour candidates come on here and answer questions from those of us who are quite desperate for change but have lost trust in all of those who aspire to lead.
@Morrissey – hopefully Labour learnt from that, the strategy’s effectiveness or lack of, showed in their election results.
Helping your opponent in their denial is not a winning strategy.
If Labour didn’t know what to do, they should stay out of it and deflect it back to the real protagonists Natz vs Hager. By minimising it and calling it a ‘distraction’ helped the Natz and angered the Labour supporters who are sick of the establishment denials on these issues.
What waypoints tell you that Labour has undergone a “change in the right direction”?
In my view, nothing has changed in the perpetuation of the same careerist ‘hanging on for dear life because I can’t get $150K pa in any other job’ Labour attitude and culture from those days.
Have you heard anything from Labour about the UBI lately? How about anything around a commitment to keep national super? Or any remarks that basic benefits need to be increased?
You appear to want National to have a fourth term, so there really is no point in discussing this with you CV. Plus the whole poisoning not just the well, but the ground around it thing, ffs.
So Labour hasn’t said anything about NZ Super, benefit levels or a UBI lately then, eh? Interesting. They still have 6-7 months before the election so I guess they better start.
I’ve already said elsewhere that it’s 2:1 for a National win next (whoops THIS) year, which will increase further for National if they play the shell game that I am expecting.
At this stage I am picking the extreme upper limit party vote for LAB+GR at 43% to 44%.
Like I said, no point in talking with you while you’ve got your shit-tinted glasses on. You can frame it as a prediction, but everything I have seen from you in the past year suggests that you also want Labour to lose. Your political actions support this. You are abusing your power and I’m not playing that game any more.
“Shit tinted glasses” are probably preferable to having your head buried in the sand. CV is right – we still need Labour to get a voice and say something instead of just barking at passing cars. We need a confident and worthy opposition….. the clock is ticking.
Yeah but that wasn’t what I was referring to about CV at all. I’m happy to clarify if it’s not clear, but I really think you are misleading about what I was saying and doing.
Are you saying that I have my head buried in the sand? Care to provide some evidence of that?
Thanks for taking off the red tinted glasses and for putting putting on corrective, prescription (not prediction) glasses, Colonial Viper. Real Labour supporters must want to face reality and make themselves see clearly in order to hold caucus members, particularly the careerists and old driftwood, to account.
Unlike CV, I’ve never voted Labour, and only voted to the left of Labour. I’m not a Labour supporter, and neither are many in this thread.
The inability to engage with ideas in real terms is pretty tedious and a big part of the problem here. Of course Labour need to be held accountable. That’s nothing to do with what I was saying about CV though.
I’m quite happy to engage with ideas “in real terms”. Eg. I commented on your post the other day about how consumerism was a battle of the 1970s which had long since been lost and the left had no new ideas about it since then.
But you didn’t want to engage with that idea in real terms and shifted my comment off your post.
CV you know how the party works. Policies are released incrementally and the party policy platform contains the general principles. Can you decist from misrepresenting the position all the time. People will suspect you are getting your lines from Hooton.
I was referring to the Party’s performance of late. Sorry weka, I was in no way referring to you re head in the sand. Perhaps I should have used “one”.
Thanks for clarifying garibaldi. There’s hardly anyone here who is happy with Labour’s performance. That’s a different thing than wanting them to lose. So I will in fact take a Labour voter with their head in the sand over the ethically bankrupt politics that CV now pushes with his shit-stained glasses on. And to be clear, I’m not talking in any way at all about not criticising Labour.
Fortunately those aren’t the only choices and there is more to be gained from working constructively (including critiques) than poisoning the well.
As for Labour, I’ve long held the view that they are who they are and it’s better strategy to support them in small incremental shifts so that we get enough reprieve that the real change can be done elsewhere. If Labour fails now, that gives National another term, and that IMO is catastrophic for NZ.
I’ve put this challenge out to CV in the past, and he’s never responded meaningfully, but even if one were to think that a 4th National term might galvanise a true shift in NZ politics for something else good to arise, I’ve yet to see any evidence presented for how that might happen. Much more likely that we would have photo-fascism entrenched even further in NZ as well as more of our ability to effect change stripped from us.
Yes, many of us want a truly left wing party in NZ. We don’t have one. It’s not possible for Labour to be what we want them to be (if you disagree please explain how that could happen).
Time to get on with the work of making what we can with that.
I’ll tell you what I don’t like about Labour. They claim they are a broad church but from the evidence I have seen in the past few years, they lean to the centre right (eg Stuart Nash) and reject the left (eg Hone Harawira). The image of Chris Hipkins visciously attacking David C during the great non-event coup is also etched in my brain.
“I’ll tell you what I don’t like about Labour. They claim they are a broad church but from the evidence I have seen in the past few years, they lean to the centre right (eg Stuart Nash) and reject the left (eg Hone Harawira). The image of Chris Hipkins visciously attacking David C during the great non-event coup is also etched in my brain.”
sure, and there’s plenty of things I don’t like about them too. Nevertheless, they are the only way we are going to have a centre-left govt by the end of the year, so what’s the strategy now?
I’ve put this challenge out to CV in the past, and he’s never responded meaningfully, but even if one were to think that a 4th National term might galvanise a true shift in NZ politics for something else good to arise, I’ve yet to see any evidence presented for how that might happen.
Why would there be “any evidence” today for something which might hypothetically happen some time years in the future?
What was the evidence 12 months ago that Trump would be President of the USA today?
Did that lack of evidence back then preclude Trump becoming President?
I didn’t have any evidence when I picked a clear and significant Trump victory; I just read the political tea leaves.
Well said weka. If we want to see a Government that isn’t a National one this year then we need to see Labour maximise its vote. Some lefties might not be a fan of Labour, but Labour are still going to make up at least 50% of a leftist block in Government. If you’re a Green or NZF voter you need them to do well, your chances rely on their success.
The last few weeks of the year I felt were good ones for Andrew Little. He looked more confident and fired up infront of camera and that’s good for everyone. I’m fine with them not chasing the UBI or anything else that might scare the horses for now… Just keep getting the hits in on our woeful housing situation and that’s half the job done.
Thanks, I don’t see a lot of MSM, so often don’t have a good sense of what Little is doing unless I go look.
(I would add that if people want a centre left govt then they shouldn’t vote NZF. Peters might choose National, or he might choose Labour in which case he will hold Labour to the right. Either way it’s not going to shift us left and it could be downright disastrous).
” If Labour fails now, that gives National another term, and that IMO is catastrophic for NZ.”
Yes I totally agree which is why I made the initial request
The guide is great because what is says is if you don’t like a GOVERNMENT policy, you don’t go and occupy a National party MPs office. You go and occupy the office of a LABOUR MP who won’t come out and oppose it when you ask him or her. So you don’t need to know a “spectrum” – you just ask your local MP for an unequivocal position on an issue, and if they won’t give you one you go and sit in their office or get you and 1000 people to keep ringing them until they turn up and explain why. The pressure is on YOUR SIDE to grow some balls, and take the fight to the right.
I would add that it needs some strategy, or at least some degree of thoughtfulness. Going into an election year, the focus needs to be on policy and direct action against those MPs (and presumably LECs) who aren’t moving left, and avoiding Labour bashing for the sake of it. I’d say it needs to happen now, rather than closer to the election.
I’d like to know what the selection process is, and a timeline on that.
And I’d love to see people on The Standard organising around this. Time we stopped arguing about shit and did something.
It will be great if many of us can visit the local Labour MP offices & blog updates about how often they are not around. I know my mates and I can name half a dozen who are hardly around (may I list them here?) and we can compare notes or a real-time record
( It will be great if many of us can visit the local Labour MP offices )
I recently moved to Pukekohe in south Auckland and thought I would go along to a local branch meeting it’s been a while. I went onto Labour’s web site and I cannot even find if they have one.
“The pressure is on YOUR SIDE to grow some balls, and take the fight to the right.”
I wonder if Labour hopeful (again) Laila Harre took the opportunity to tell her mate Nikki Kaye just how bloody lucky she was that her cancer diagnosis didn’t cost her her job.
Perhaps Laila took the opportunity to remind Nikki of the many people who where not so fortunate, whose employers threw them to the wolves and who got literally the bum’s rush when they were forced to apply to WINZ for support.
On this site most of the commenters, who choose to shred Labour’s MPs on a regular basis for being so-called neo-liberals, are not even members of the party and I suspect have never been members. However, they seem to be of the view they know more about Labour’s MPs than those of us who are members and have been for many years.
I drifted away from Labour around 1983/4 because I was sick of the [then] in-fighting. I didn’t understand the nuts and bolts of it at the time, but in retrospect can appreciate it was the Douglas clan (not always Douglas himself but his hangers-on in the Party) who were behind most of the problems. I rejoined 15 years ago after Helen Clark came to power.
Since the departure of the Douglas crew and their member acolytes in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Labour has been slowly returning to its roots (albeit in a modernised version) and that can be evidenced in the types of policies I know they are planning to put forward this election year. For some people it has been too slow, but to reinvent a political party is not an easy task and it takes time to get everyone back on board again. In this respect, Andrew Little is doing a magnificent job and I am no longer as pessimistic as I was about Labour’s election chances… as I was a year or two ago.
I know there are one or two ‘light to moderate’ neo-liberals still in caucus but they are bowing out at the end of this term. Others – like for example Annette King – have well and truly re-embraced their former Labour values. Indeed I’m sure they never lost them… just put them in a cupboard for safe keeping until the time was right to bring them out again.
Perhaps those of us on the inside can appreciate the extent of the advances that have been made in recent years, but others have yet to catch up. I know CV will disagree but he appears to have had some major run-ins with the Party (I don’t know the details, just what he has revealed here) which are negatively impacting on his judgement. I’m hoping one day he will feel able to re-connect.
“On this site most of the commenters, who choose to shred Labour’s MPs on a regular basis for being so-called neo-liberals, are not even members of the party and I suspect have never been members.”
Guilty as charged, but in my defense I have tried to find enough in Labour and/or the Greens policy to give me reason to sign up.
Both have to do better.
(Oh, and I should maybe re email Annette King about a particular issue (that is within the scope of her responsibilities) and see if her re connection with true Labour roots has progressed far enough for her to challenge the Nats over their lies and deception.)
But maybe not. I did make an approach to Ruth Dyson about the same issue in person, in her office, and oh my goodness gracious me….
We left her office stunned, and shaking our heads that she would say what she did…and realised that as far as our particular issue…Labour was a predominant player in fucking things up.
And if they’ll do that for people with disabilities….
Fair enough comments Rosemary McDonald. Certainly Labour needs to to do better when it comes to policy presentation. They need to be short, sharp and easy to understand for the majority of voters. The long versions can be set aside for us political tragics who like to wallow in the complexities of policy or who have a vested interest (like yourself) in specific policy planks. 🙂
Btw, I wasn’t impressed with Ruth Dyson as a minister in the Clark government. I didn’t know much about her but some of her media responses left a lot to be desired. She was rarely definitive and liked to talk about “looking at options” but never said what those options were. Someone else who is very good like that is Nick Smith.
The wallowing thing…yes, I am focused on non -ACC disability issues and especially the family carer issue. This particular subject I know inside out…including the history under Labour.
Labour could have sorted this. Should have sorted this. Didn’t…but worse…allowed for a system where those who were willing to take a punt at being caught out could circumvent the non- payment of family carers policy.
Ruth Dyson knew this was happening when we spoke with her in early 2013…”It was only a policy not the law”. When this government made the policy that had been determined to be discriminatory actual law…well…I wonder to this day if Ruth Dyson knew that this was going to happen…and the outrage from Labour in the House that day in May 2013 was just pantomime.
Almost as if this suspicion of mine had been broadcast…a commentor on another site told of how exactly that solution (of making the Policy law) was being touted by the Ministry of Health and Crown Law back before the Family Carers case went to the Human Rights Tribunal in 2008…under Labour.
You know, from my point of view…policies and manifestos and candidate bios are all very nice and good…but being honest, truthful, showing a very high level of integrity, is even better.
I know Labour failed this test over the family carers case….in how many other areas of government responsibility did they also neglect to be honest and transparent?
Labour is history in terms of political, popular and ideological relevance. They are no longer needed, but are instead taking up space on the political spectrum which could be better used.
Nope – if the Little/King leadership team had the ability to “reconnect with people” they wouldn’t have left it until 7 months before the election to demonstrate it.
Last year I kept hearing: the affable John Key is the only real asset this National Government has which is keeping them afloat. Without his popularity, National would be gone!
Now that John Key is history and the monotonous expressionless English is in charge, this election should be a walkover for Labour. Shouldn’t it?
Unless of course, you and me are correct in our analysis (which we are).
“Yes CV i agree Labour is finished as a political force , those who continue to support them guarentee national party victory”
I’m genuinely curious as to how you see that working. If Labour are finished and we shouldn’t vote for them or support them in any way, then what else can happen apart from National getting a 4th term? Can you please explain your thinking? e.g. do you think a new left wing party will arise this year and win the election? Or do you think that the Greens will get enough votes to win the election and govern on their own?
” … write a comprehensive list of Labour mps and where they stand on…”
I smiled at that bit, picturing a serious interview with John Key, him answering the question about what his MPs believe. “I believe they believe what I tell them to believe. And believe me they do if they want to believe they have any future chances.”
“For the benefit of the more simple-minded among us, would someone please write a comprehensive list of Labour mps and where they stand on this spectrum.”
I’d be happy to collate and put up a post on that if people here want to make the list. It would need to be evidence based, and we could do it in the sense of a lay-persons guide to the Labour Party. For those of us that don’t know Labour well, there is plenty in the public domain, both words/actions from MPs themselves, as well as analysis in the media (blogosphere, social and mainstream). We could pick say five MPs to focus on at a time and go out and do the research, bring it back to comments, get feedback and then it can go into a post.
I think having an outline of how Labour works internally, including the selection process, would be important too.
That sounds like a great idea – thank you Weka. Like you, I fail to see what the alternative is if Labour can’t make it as the dominant, or at least equal party in power. I’m reading all this hand wringing, but as you suggest, too much of that and we’ll wind up with a 4th term for the Natz
JanM, Rosemary McD et al – Chris Trotter is not a friend of Labour – he’s harbouring some sort of snitch from way back which keeps him blindfolded as to what Labour is actually doing.
When you ask where Labour MPs stand on “this spectrum” – what do you mean? A simple left – right answer, or a bit more detail …… and for that maybe you could look at Labour’s policy platform – formulated after the last election debacle among much debate and argument between Party members and remnants of the neo-lib rightwing bloc . It can be found here https://www.google.co.nz/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=nzlp%20policy%20platform
This is what Labour policy for the 2017 election will be based on.
I’m not so sure it’s an ideological problem, seems more to be lack of talent.
Take the frequent talk about ‘moving more to the centre’ as an example. The general argument is that Labour needs more votes from the centre ergo they need to move politically and ideologically further to the right to capture those votes.
The corollary to that argument is moving to the right will lose votes from the left, the consequent strategy being to pass those votes to the Greens and get them back through a Labour/Green coalition..
That argument is predicated on the rationale that you can’t please both at the same time; you either go for the centre or you go for the left. It seems more a pragmatic approach than an ideological one.
My thinking is meh, this is New Zealand where a good 75% of the population would be considered ‘left’ in pretty much any other country. Just how hard is to to create a policy platform that would satisfy both the left and enough of the middle to capture 50% of the votes? … to my mind it should be a doddle for anyone with a bit of talent.
“I’m not so sure it’s an ideological problem, seems more to be lack of talent.”
Inclined to agree….compounded by special/personal interests.The Future of Work Commission is a glaring example…2 years work to produce what? if labour (or anyone else for that matter) could produce a comprehensive and clear policy prescription for a transitioning society they would be home and hosed (IMO)
Monbiot has made the same point about the left in general worldwide……its called leadership.
The future of work commision simply highlights how automation would exacerbate challenges around inequality & low productivity that New Zealand already faces. Its anti bureaucratic in nature, but not by nature?
Neoliberalism conditions you to believe that value is in paper work. It’s starts on the level of a guy checking to see if you use the rooms in your house properly. Moving up the neoliberal pyramid you have police who spend most of there time filling out paper work but the message is the same, value is in paper work. Then you’ve got managers who’s function seems to revolve around if some one gets payed to much. Derivatives traders which is a really fancy form of paper is at the top of the neoliberal pyramid because they earn the most.
To reevaluate what it means to work means finding away to destroy this mountain of paper work we’ve created that adds no value to the real economy.
Yeah. I’ve tried to avoid even commenting on that Future of Work because every time I see it mentioned I get the recurring image of Nero and his fiddle.
I don’t wish to belittle their work but I can’t see the point of it, they’re not in power they just look to be indulging themselves there.
“Take the frequent talk about ‘moving more to the centre’……” That is media opinion, DH – and is not what Labour is actually talking about.
As Andrew Little has said a couple of times – in his connections with NZers as he goes around the country – everyone he meets considers themselves “middle NZ” (except for the 1%) – so he’s talking to people who are having difficulty getting a home, who have been made redundant, farmers, business people, others who are in work, people who have been ill, etc etc – all of them considering themselves “middle NZ”
Labour is a true left wing party! Promise! Labour will show their true left wing values after we give them power! Why do people not believe this!!! Wreckers and haters!!!!!
I would have thought it’s because they understand they can’t govern alone and have seen how trying to act as a FPP party in an MMP environment has failed them.
Well, I tried to give a bit of background for you JanM but perhaps you already knew it. You’ve got to say Labour is a far better party now than it was seven years ago. Cohesive with good policy coming up and believe me… some outstanding candidates on offer this election starting with the highly talented Michael Wood. Compare them to the types on offer from the National Party and they outflank them in every respect.
Anne , do you know how much “deadwood” Labour is going to shed? Seems to me they need to fair bit of it, just like National has done already. Too many right wingers still in the Labour caucus.
Bearing in mind Labour’s numbers were decimated in 2011 and 2014 so there aren’t as many to be culled as in the National Party:
Clayton Cosgrove, Ruth Dyson, Damien O’Conner (not sure about him but think so) Su’a William Sio and I think one of the Maori electorate MPs might be going . David Shearer has already gone. I’m picking there might be one or two others who have yet to declare they’e going. All in all it looks like at least 8 MPs will be gone by the next election. That opens up a good chance some very bright and talented younger aspirants will enter the caucus. To name two of them Deborah Russell and Claire Szabo. There are others.
Lionel explains how to maximally prosecute the case of 4 black youth in Chicago who kidnapped, tied up, abused, tortured a mentally handicapped white Trump supporter
While yelling invective like “fuck Trump” and “fuck white people.” The alleged perpetrators live streamed their activities. The video is still available on the internet.
He discusses if this is a “hate crime.” Also what if the alleged perpetrators have priors, and what would need to be done to maximise their sentencing.
Also imagine the inverse situation: 4 white youth who kidnapped, tied up, abused, tortured a mentally handicapped black Obama supporter.
While yelling invective like “fuck Obama” and “fuck black people.
Very fucked up (and I strongly suspect) drug induced bullshit.
A ‘hate crime’? I have doubts.
Politically motivated? No.
Kick their collective arses from here to now, but as for pretending this sort of evil nonsense is hugely unusual and then blowing it upout of context to be something it’s not in order to score some point or other? Nah.
Very fucked up (and I strongly suspect) drug induced bullshit.
If it were four young white men who had done exactly the same to a young black intellectually disabled Obama supporter while shouting “fuck blacks” and “fuck Obama” there would be much clearer hate and political motivations, no?
I would even expect President Obama to address the incident in front of the White House press corp. If it had been carried out by white men.
Anyhow, Cook County prosecutors have now filed charges of aggravated kidnap, hate crime, aggravated unlawful restraint and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.
I’m not sure it’s intellectually dishonest if he actually thinks that way. But he is certainly the nastiest sack of shit I’ve had the misfortune to interact with in the recent past.
All hating and wrecking, trying to be a saboteur. Not a single useful considered criticism, not even a valid challenge to viewpoints we get from the likes of BM, Puckish, et al. Just nasty slogans hating on Labour, Greens, Democrats. All the while spreading hate propaganda and fake news all over the site, while trying to get opinion and facts he doesn’t like labelled fake news and trying to trash the idea that there really are objective facts.
Call me old-fashioned, but I don’t see a guy who devotes such ingenuity and diligence to stiffing his employees and contractors as “pro-working class.” Try looking at his actions, rather than his tweets and blowhard speeches.
That bullshit could just have easily revolved around some football team or a religious belief. The rhetoric just served as a vehicle for the abuse and isn’t in and of itself very important.
Your other point about Trump supporters being physically attacked, if true, hasn’t got sweet fuck all to do with this wee group of shit heads being shit.
So no, I won’t be writing angry tweets about what these folk did in Chicago. They are already in jail. They will be punished, I am sure, to the fullest extent of the law, but I’ve written about case after case after case of drug offenses and incidents of sexual assault and even murders committed by white folk where the system gave them a helping hand. The Stanford swimmer, Brock Turner, who was caught in the act of raping a woman, but spent a summer in jail for it instead of the 10 to 20 years he deserved, comes to mind.
Black folk and white folk both use and sell drugs at almost identical rates, with the rates for whites actually being slightly higher in both categories, but African-Americans are sent to prison at four to 10 times the rates of whites for various drug offenses.
Black folk are held super-responsible for every mistake and criminal offense made. We rarely have to march for justice in our communities. American prisons are full of black folk who are being held responsible for every mistake they’ve ever made.
Now I actually see thousands of other whites saying I caused this assault. Of course I reject that foolishness altogether. What’s most disturbing is that I hardly see many whites who are particularly angry about the crime speaking sympathetically about the victim. They are mainly using it to advance their racist agenda and demonize random black folk who had nothing to do with such a thing. Furthermore, I have routinely seen tens of thousands of African-Americans standing up and fighting and protesting for white victims of police brutality and toxic masculinity. The Alt-Right Movement does not care about violence in this country. Thousands of whites murder people every year, but you’d be hard pressed to find a protest or march headed by their movement on white on white crime.
As I type, the top trending topic in the country is now #BLMKidnapping. BLM stands for Black Lives Matter. The people in the video never even suggested such a thing. The Black Lives Matter Movement has never advocated such a thing. I have never advocated such a thing.
Pretty much. Not that that is itself new, but there is something additional going on now where people feel emboldened in promoting ideas that are at the least aligned with white supremacist views e.g. that all racism is equal, that racism is simply how one person treats another, that structural racism isn’t a real thing. I see this happening more in the US, but CV’s comment seemed a fairly classic example of it and I’m guessing we will see more of it in NZ. I noted the other day that Bradbury’s recent post where he is complaining about not being allowed to speak because he is a white man is another example. Different, but maybe part of the same shift happening in the culture. Traditionally we would expect both CV and Bradbury’s comments to come from the right or conservatives or small parts of the left, but now we have these voices becoming larger within left wing spaces.
Bradbury’s recent post where he is complaining about not being allowed to speak because he is a white man
Curiously, Bradbury has said a lot about the Sir Mad B story in the last few days – a flurry of posts, while saying the MSM have more important stories/issues they should be focusing on.
Arthur Edington once said If your theory clashes with the second law of thermal dynamics I can give you no hope, there is nothing for it but to collapse in the deepest humiliation.
Even environmentalists haven’t discovered a theory of production that fits with in the laws of thermal dynamics.
By definition, anything that comes from several points across the globe has a huge carbon footprint.
Drowsy M. Kram is correct. It’s thermodynamics, not thermal dynamics.
We can get a rich function that relates to labour/capital/energy inputs (that hasn’t happened yet). Once you’ve got energy related to parts of production, it talks to a relationship between the 2nd law of thermodynamics and so on, then it will be possible to make links to entropy/wast/ecology issues which economics has failed to do.
I talked to an overseas employment expert/philosopher recently and he was full of praise for Grant Robertson’s Future of Work project. He said it was world leading in scope and vision. I expect we will hear more about aspects of it this year (but hopefully in a form that is clear, succinct and easy to understand).
You gotta be kidding. A mish mash of a report clearly put together by different authors, few cohesive themes, with some chapters far better prepared than others which appeared simply slapdash thrown together.
@JoyFL ….do you really think so ?……I dont, not in election year.
I would prefer they kept to simple policies i..e. Kiwi Build ….and placed Future of Work as a behind the scenes driver.
Good piece here on the Israeli motive of keeping occupied territories just that, occupied. They do this to deny 3 Million Palestinians a vote.
Amazing that Jews in settlements are allowed to vote but Palestinians are not. And Israeli supporters like to say Israel is the only democracy in the region…
The Israeli electoral franchise extends to Jewish settlers in the occupied territories but there is no vote for the nearly three million Palestinians in those territories. If Israel annexed East Jerusalem and the West Bank it would have to give everyone the vote. It has used an endlessly prolonged peace process to save itself from having to do this.
Israel has options.
It can annex the occupied territories, extend the franchise to everyone and accept that Jews are a minority.
Or it can withdraw to a more modest and legally less suspect geographical area within the limits set by the UN in 1947.
Take note RWers who regularly want to deny the poor their piece of the pay pie:
“The CEO of a popular fast food chain said this week that he was “stunned” to see profits soar each time California passed minimum wage increases.
In an interview with KQED on Tuesday, Wetzel’s Pretzels CEO Bill Phelps admitted that his investors were worried about how a 2014 wage hike would impact the business. “Like most business people I was concerned about it,” Phelps said.
For years, opponents of minimum wage increases have argued that wage hikes mean fewer jobs because businesses have to raise prices and cut hours to cover the additional expenses. But Phelps said that his sales skyrocketed after a California law forced businesses to raise wages in 2014.
“I was shocked,” Phelps recalled. “I was stunned by the business.”
The same thing happened earlier this year when California raised the minimum wage to $10.50 per hour, Phelps said.”
Debt “connected” to the President-elect’s companies adding up to more than US$1 billion ($1.4b) is owed to more than 150 financial institutions, the Wall Street Journal reported overnight.
The revelation has prompted renewed concern about a potential conflict of interests minefield when Trump takes office in two weeks’ time.
According to the Journal, the loans were divided, repackaged and then sold in the form of bonds over the past five years, with some of them personally guaranteed by Mr Trump – who previously estimated his companies’ debt obligations at US$315 million.
Trump has made it clear that people who work at a senior level in his Administration will not be able move on and then lobby for corporations (5 year ban) and foreign countries (life time ban).
A good piece that illustrates the difference between shoddy journalism and fake news. A distinction that even Glenn Greenwald can’t seem to get his head around, to his discredit.
President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team has signaled to congressional Republican leaders that his preference is to fund the border wall through the appropriations process as soon as April, according to House Republican officials.</i?
Over the past year and a half, dozens of Palestinian men, women and children have been killed, even though they could have been overpowered while they were still alive. The difference between them and Azaria is that he was videotaped.
by AMIRA HASS, Haaretz, Jan. 5, 2017
There’s one thing on which Palestinians agree with Elor Azaria and his supporters: that he wasn’t the only one, he just had the bad luck to be videotaped without his knowledge. Palestinians agree with Azaria and his supporters that he was complying with the norm and did exactly what other soldiers do – namely, shoot with intent to kill even when nobody’s life is in danger.
Palestinians agree with Azaria that the system discriminated against him. It’s just that they believe dozens of other soldiers and policemen should also have stood trial.
Like Azaria himself, Palestinians are wondering why he stood trial while the soldiers who killed Hadeel al-Hashlamoun of Hebron were never even investigated by the Military Police. She, too, was lying on the ground, after soldiers shot her from a distance at a checkpoint because she held a knife (which no soldier was even scratched by). And then, while she was lying there, they continued shooting her in the upper body. (This was on September 22, 2015, and Hebron residents attribute the subsequent outbreak of lone-wolf attacks to this incident.)
On June 11, 2010, Maxim Vinogradov, a Border Policeman, “confirmed the kill” of Ziad Jilani, who was already lying on the ground, shot and wounded, after having run over other policemen with his car in Jerusalem’s Wadi Joz neighborhood. The prosecution decided against indicting Vinogradov, accepting his ridiculous claim that he feared Jilani had a bomb. He was in the heart of a Palestinian neighborhood – why would he blow himself up there?
Fadi Alloun of Isawiyah was also lying on the ground, after having stabbed an Israel in Jerusalem’s Musrara neighborhood on October 4, 2015. An anonymous policeman shot him to death after passersby encouraged him to do so. In this case, there was video footage from a cell phone, but it wasn’t enough for any steps to be taken against the killer.
Sara Hajuj of Bani Naim pulled a knife on Border Policemen inside the security-inspection room of a Hebron checkpoint on July 1, 2016. They sprayed her in the face with pepper spray and fled the room. Then one of them shot her, while she was alone in the room and didn’t endanger anyone.
On June 2, 2016, Ansar Hirsheh crossed the checkpoint at Anabta, where pedestrian traffic is forbidden, on foot. She had a knife in her belongings, but she didn’t endanger anyone. And there was no reason why the four armed, trained soldiers who surrounded her couldn’t have overpowered her without killing her.
Over the past year and a half, dozens of Palestinian men, women and children have been killed, even though according to both eyewitnesses and common sense, they could have been overpowered while they were still alive. Some, it later turned out, hadn’t even attempted to commit an attack. Dozens of soldiers, Border Policemen and checkpoint guards are walking free among us after having killed Palestinians who posed no danger to their lives. The defense establishment portrayed them as having acted properly.
The boundary between self-defense and nationalist vengeance has been completely blurred. This is the atmosphere in which Azaria operated.
Therefore, the message sent by the military court judges stands out for its rarity: Elor Azaria violated the rules of engagement, so he was convicted. But the message the Israeli defense establishment sends to its soldiers and policemen is equally loud and clear: “Take care that you aren’t videotaped when you do the deed. We know how to downplay the value of photographs taken by Palestinian security cameras and bury the testimony of Palestinian eyewitnesses. But we still haven’t found the solution to close-up, professional video footage.”
Completed reads for April: The Difference Engine, by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling Carnival of Saints, by George Herman The Snow Spider, by Jenny Nimmo Emlyn’s Moon, by Jenny Nimmo The Chestnut Soldier, by Jenny Nimmo Death Comes As the End, by Agatha Christie Lord of the Flies, by ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
Have a story to share about St Paul’s, but today just picturesPopular novels written at this desk by a young man who managed to bootstrap himself out of father’s imprisonment and his own young life in a workhouse Read more ...
The list of former National Party Ministers being given plum and important roles got longer this week with the appointment of former Deputy Prime Minister Paula Bennett as the chair of Pharmac. The Christopher Luxon-led Government has now made key appointments to Bill English, Simon Bridges, Steven Joyce, Roger Sowry, ...
Newsroom has a story today about National's (fortunately failed) effort to disestablish the newly-created Inspector-General of Defence. The creation of this agency was the key recommendation of the Inquiry into Operation Burnham, and a vital means of restoring credibility and social licence to an agency which had been caught lying ...
Holding On To The Present:The moment a political movement arises that attacks the whole idea of social progress, and announces its intention to wind back the hands of History’s clock, then democracy, along with its unwritten rules, is in mortal danger.IT’S A COMMONPLACE of political speeches, especially those delivered in ...
Stuck In The Middle With You:As Christopher Luxon feels the hot breath of Act’s and NZ First’s extremists on the back of his neck and, as he reckons with the damage their policies are already inflicting upon a country he’s described as “fragile”, is there not some merit in reaching out ...
The unpopular coalition government is currently rushing to repeal section 7AA of the Oranga Tamariki Act. The clause is Oranga Tamariki's Treaty clause, and was inserted after its systematic stealing of Māori children became a public scandal and resulted in physical resistance to further abductions. The clause created clear obligations ...
Buzz from the Beehive The government’s official website – which Point of Order monitors daily – not for the first time has nothing much to say today about political happenings that are grabbing media headlines. It makes no mention of the latest 1News-Verian poll, for example. This shows National down ...
It Takes A Train To Cry:Surely, there is nothing lonelier in all this world than the long wail of a distant steam locomotive on a cold Winter’s night.AS A CHILD, I would lie awake in my grandfather’s house and listen to the traffic. The big wooden house was only a ...
Packing A Punch: The election of the present government, including in its ranks politicians dedicated to reasserting the rights of the legislature in shaping and determining the future of Māori and Pakeha in New Zealand, should have alerted the judiciary – including its anomalous appendage, the Waitangi Tribunal – that its ...
Dead Woman Walking: New Zealand’s media industry had been moving steadily towards disaster for all the years Melissa Lee had been National’s media and communications policy spokesperson, and yet, when the crisis finally broke, on her watch, she had nothing intelligent to offer. Christopher Luxon is a patient man - but he’s not ...
Chris Trotter writes – New Zealand politics is remarkably easy-going: dangerously so, one might even say. With the notable exception of John Key’s flat ruling-out of the NZ First Party in 2008, all parties capable of clearing MMP’s five-percent threshold, or winning one or more electorate seats, tend ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Polling shows that Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau has the lowest approval rating of any mayor in the country. Siting at -12 per cent, the proportion of constituents who disapprove of her performance outweighs those who give her the thumbs up. This negative rating is ...
Luxon will no doubt put a brave face on it, but there is no escaping the pressure this latest poll will put on him and the government. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political ...
This is a re-post from The Climate Brink by Andrew Dessler In the wake of any unusual weather event, someone inevitably asks, “Did climate change cause this?” In the most literal sense, that answer is almost always no. Climate change is never the sole cause of hurricanes, heat waves, droughts, or ...
Something odd happened yesterday, and I’d love to know if there’s more to it. If there was something which preempted what happened, or if it was simply a throwaway line in response to a journalist.Yesterday David Seymour was asked at a press conference what the process would be if the ...
Hi,From time to time, I want to bring Webworm into the real world. We did it last year with the Jurassic Park event in New Zealand — which was a lot of fun!And so on Saturday May 11th, in Los Angeles, I am hosting a lil’ Webworm pop-up! I’ve been ...
Education Minister Erica Standford yesterday unveiled a fundamental reform of the way our school pupils are taught. She would not exactly say so, but she is all but dismantling the so-called “inquiry” “feel good” method of teaching, which has ruled in our classrooms since a major review of the New ...
Exactly where are we seriously going with this government and its policies? That is, apart from following what may as well be a Truss-Lite approach on the purported economic “plan“, and Victorian-era regression when it comes to social policy.Oh it’ll work this time of course, we’re basically assured, “the ...
Hey Uncle Dave, When the Poms joined the EEC, I wasn't one of those defeatists who said, Well, that’s it for the dairy job. And I was right, eh? The Chinese can’t get enough of our milk powder and eventually, the Poms came to their senses and backed up the ute ...
Polling shows that Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau has the lowest approval rating of any mayor in the country. Siting at -12 per cent, the proportion of constituents who disapprove of her performance outweighs those who give her the thumbs up. This negative rating is higher than for any other mayor ...
Buzz from the Beehive Pharmac has been given a financial transfusion and a new chair to oversee its spending in the pharmaceutical business. Associate Health Minister David Seymour described the funding for Pharmac as “its largest ever budget of $6.294 billion over four years, fixing a $1.774 billion fiscal cliff”. ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Many criticisms are being made of the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill, including by this writer. But as with everything in politics, every story has two sides, and both deserve attention. It’s important to understand what the Government is trying to achieve and its ...
TL;DR: Here’s my top 10 ‘pick ‘n’ mix of links to news, analysis and opinion articles as of 10:10am on Monday, April 29:Scoop: The children's ward at Rotorua Hospital will be missing a third of its beds as winter hits because Te Whatu Ora halted an upgrade partway through to ...
span class=”dropcap”>As hideous as David Seymour can be, it is worth keeping in mind occasionally that there are even worse political figures (and regimes) out there. Iran for instance, is about to execute the country’s leading hip hop musician Toomaj Salehi, for writing and performing raps that “corrupt” the nation’s ...
Yesterday marked 10 years since the first electric train carried passengers in Auckland so it’s a good time to look back at it and the impact it has had. A brief history The first proposals for rail electrification in Auckland came in the 1920’s alongside the plans for earlier ...
Right now, in Aotearoa-NZ, our ‘animal spirits’ are darkening towards a winter of discontent, thanks at least partly to a chorus of negative comments and actions from the Government Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on ...
You make people evil to punish the paststuck inside a sequel with a rotating castThe following photos haven’t been generated with AI, or modified in any way. They are flesh and blood, human beings. On the left is Galatea Young, a young mum, and her daughter Fiadh who has Angelman ...
April has been a quiet month at A Phuulish Fellow. I have had an exceptionally good reading month, and a decently productive writing month – for original fiction, anyway – but not much has caught my eye that suggested a blog article. It has been vaguely frustrating, to be honest. ...
A listing of 31 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, April 21, 2024 thru Sat, April 27, 2024. Story of the week Anthropogenic climate change may be the ultimate shaggy dog story— but with a twist, because here ...
Hi,I spent about a year on Webworm reporting on an abusive megachurch called Arise, and it made me want to stab my eyes out with a fork.I don’t regret that reporting in 2022 and 2023 — I am proud of it — but it made me angry.Over three main stories ...
The new Victoria University Vice-Chancellor decided to have a forum at the university about free speech and academic freedom as it is obviously a topical issue, and the Government is looking at legislating some carrots or sticks for universities to uphold their obligations under the Education and Training Act. They ...
Do you remember when Melania Trump got caught out using a speech that sounded awfully like one Michelle Obama had given? Uncannily so.Well it turns out that Abraham Lincoln is to Winston Peters as Michelle was to Melania. With the ANZAC speech Uncle Winston gave at Gallipoli having much in ...
She was born 25 years ago today in North Shore hospital. Her eyes were closed tightly shut, her mouth was silently moving. The whole theatre was all quiet intensity as they marked her a 2 on the APGAR test. A one-minute eternity later, she was an 8. The universe was ...
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 in collaboration with members from our Skeptical Science team. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline. Is Antarctica gaining land ice? ...
Images of US students (and others) protesting and setting up tent cities on US university campuses have been broadcast world wide and clearly demonstrate the growing rifts in US society caused by US policy toward Israel and Israel’s prosecution of … Continue reading → ...
Barrie Saunders writes – Dear Paul As the new Minister of Media and Communications, you will be inundated with heaps of free advice and special pleading, all in the national interest of course. For what it’s worth here is my assessment: Traditional broadcasting free to air content through ...
Many criticisms are being made of the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill, including by this writer. But as with everything in politics, every story has two sides, and both deserve attention. It’s important to understand what the Government is trying to achieve and its arguments for such a bold reform. ...
Peter Dunne writes – The great nineteenth British Prime Minister, William Gladstone, once observed that “the first essential for a Prime Minister is to be a good butcher.” When a later British Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, sacked a third of his Cabinet in July 1962, in what became ...
Ele Ludemann writes – New Zealanders had the OECD’s second highest tax increase last year: New Zealanders faced the second-biggest tax raises in the developed world last year, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) says. The intergovernmental agency said the average change in personal income tax ...
We all know something’s not right with our elections. The spread of misinformation, people being targeted with soundbites and emotional triggers that ignore the facts, even the truth, and influence their votes.The use of technology to produce deep fakes. How can you tell if something is real or not? Can ...
This video includes conclusions of the creator climate scientist Dr. Simon Clark. It is presented to our readers as an informed perspective. Please see video description for references (if any). This year you will be lied to! Simon Clark helps prebunk some misleading statements you'll hear about climate. The video includes ...
It is all very well cutting the backrooms of public agencies but it may compromise the frontlines. One of the frustrations of the Productivity Commission’s 2017 review of universities is that while it observed that their non-academic staff were increasing faster than their academic staff, it did not bother to ...
Buzz from the Beehive Two speeches delivered by Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters at Anzac Day ceremonies in Turkey are the only new posts on the government’s official website since the PM announced his Cabinet shake-up. In one of the speeches, Peters stated the obvious: we live in a troubled ...
1. Which of these would you not expect to read in The Waikato Invader?a. Luxon is here to do business, don’t you worry about thatb. Mr KPI expects results, and you better believe itc. This decisive man of action is getting me all hot and excitedd. Melissa Lee is how ...
…it has a restricted jurisdiction which must not be abused: it is not an inquisitionNOTE – this article was published before the High Court ruled that Karen Chhour does not have to appear before the Waitangi Tribunal Gary Judd writes – The High Court ...
Lindsay Mitchell writes – One of reasons Oranga Tamariki exists is to prevent child neglect. But could the organisation itself be guilty of the same?Oranga Tamariki’s statistics show a decrease in the number and age of children in care. “There are less children ...
David Farrar writes: Graeme Edgeler wrote in 2017: In the first five years after three strikes came into effect 5248 offenders received a ‘first strike’ (that is, a “stage-1 conviction” under the three strikes sentencing regime), and 68 offenders received a ‘second strike’. In the five years prior to ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has surprised everyone with his ruthlessness in sacking two of his ministers from their crucial portfolios. Removing ministers for poor performance after only five months in the job just doesn’t normally happen in politics. That’s refreshing and will be extremely ...
TL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the two days to 6:06am on Thursday, April 25:Politics: PM Christopher Luxon has set up a dual standard for ministerial competence by demoting two National Cabinet ministers while leaving also-struggling ...
Hi,Today I mainly want to share some of your thoughts about the recent piece I wrote about success and failure, and the forces that seemingly guide our lives. But first, a quick bit of housekeeping: I am doing a Webworm popup in Los Angeles on Saturday May 11 at 2pm. ...
It is hard to see what Melissa Lee might have done to “save” the media. National went into the election with no public media policy and appears not to have developed one subsequently. Lee claimed that she had prepared a policy paper before the election but it had been decided ...
Open access notablesIce acceleration and rotation in the Greenland Ice Sheet interior in recent decades, Løkkegaard et al., Communications Earth & Environment:In the past two decades, mass loss from the Greenland ice sheet has accelerated, partly due to the speedup of glaciers. However, uncertainty in speed derived from satellite products ...
Buzz from the Beehive A statement from Children’s Minister Karen Chhour – yet to be posted on the Government’s official website – arrived in Point of Order’s email in-tray last night. It welcomes the High Court ruling on whether the Waitangi Tribunal can demand she appear before it. It does ...
Mr Bombastic:Ironically, the media the academic experts wanted is, in many ways, the media they got. In place of the tyrannical editors of yesteryear, advancing without fear or favour the interests of the ruling class; the New Zealand news media of today boasts a troop of enlightened journalists dedicated to ...
It's hard times try to make a livingYou wake up every morning in the unforgivingOut there somewhere in the cityThere's people living lives without mercy or pityI feel good, yeah I'm feeling fineI feel better then I have for the longest timeI think these pills have been good for meI ...
In 1974, the US Supreme Court issued its decision in United States v. Nixon, finding that the President was not a King, but was subject to the law and was required to turn over the evidence of his wrongdoing to the courts. It was a landmark decision for the rule ...
Every day now just seems to bring in more fresh meat for the grinder.In their relentlessly ideological drive to cut back on the “excessive bloat” (as they see it) of the previous Labour-led government, on the mountains of evidence accumulated in such a short period of time do not ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Megan Valére SosouMarket gardening site of the Itchèléré de Itagui agricultural cooperative in Dassa-Zoumè (Image credit: Megan Valère Sossou) For the residents of Dassa-Zoumè, a city in the West African country of Benin, choosing between drinking water and having enough ...
Buzz from the Beehive Melissa Lee – as may be discerned from the screenshot above – has not been demoted for doing something seriously wrong as Minister of ...
Morning in London Mother hugs beloved daughter outside the converted shoe factory in which she is living.Afternoon in London Travelling writer takes himself and his wrist down to A&E, just to be sure. Read more ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – The recent announcement of the University Advisory Group, chaired by Sir Peter Gluckman, makes very clear where the Government’s focus and priorities lie. The remit of the Advisory Group is that Group members will consider challenges and opportunities for improvement in the university sector including: ...
Eric Crampton writes – The Reserve Bank of New Zealand desperately wants to find reasons to have workstreams in climate change. It makes little sense. They’ve run another stress test on the banks looking to see if they could find a prudential regulation case. They couldn’t. They ...
Rob MacCullough writes – Pundits from the left and the right are arguing that National’s Fast Track Bill that is designed to speed up infrastructure decisions could end up becoming mired in a cesspool of corruption. Political commentator ...
Looking at the headlines this morning it’s hard to feel anything other than pessimistic about the future of humanity.Note that I’m not speaking about the future of mankind, but the survival of our humanity. The values that we believe in seem to be ebbing away, by the day.Perhaps every generation ...
Swabbing mixed breed baby chicks to test for avian influenzaUh oh. Bird flu – often deadly to humans – is not only being transmitted from infected birds to dairy cows, but is now travelling between dairy cows. As of last Friday, Bloomberg News reports, there were 32 American dairy herds ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
What is it with the mining industry? Its not enough for them to pillage the earth - they apparently can't even be bothered getting resource consent to do so: The proponent behind a major mine near the Clutha River had already been undertaking activity in the area without a ...
Photo # 1 I am a huge fan of Singapore’s approach to housing, as described here two years ago by copying and pasting from The ConversationWhat Singapore has that Australia does not is a public housing developer, the Housing Development Board, which puts new dwellings on public and reclaimed land, ...
This afternoon’s interim Waitangi Tribunal report must be taken seriously as it affects our most vulnerable children, Labour children’s spokesperson Willow-Jean Prime. ...
Te Pāti Māori are demanding the New Zealand Government support an international independent investigation into mass graves that have been uncovered at two hospitals on the Gaza strip, following weeks of assault by Israeli troops. Among the 392 bodies that have been recovered, are children and elderly civilians. Many of ...
Our two-tiered system for veterans’ support is out of step with our closest partners, and all parties in Parliament should work together to fix it, Labour veterans’ affairs spokesperson Greg O’Connor said. ...
Stripping two Ministers of their portfolios just six months into the job shows Christopher Luxon’s management style is lacking, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said. ...
Tonight’s court decision to overturn the summons of the Children’s Minister has enabled the Crown to continue making decisions about Māori without evidence, says Te Pāti Māori spokesperson for Children, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “The judicial system has this evening told the nation that this government can do whatever they want when ...
It appears Nicola Willis is about to pull the rug out from under the feet of local communities still dealing with the aftermath of last year’s severe weather, and local councils relying on funding to build back from these disasters. ...
The Government is making short-sighted changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that will take away environmental protection in favour of short-term profits, Labour’s environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
Labour welcomes the release of the report into the North Island weather events and looks forward to working with the Government to ensure that New Zealand is as prepared as it can be for the next natural disaster. ...
The Labour Party has called for the New Zealand Government to recognise Palestine, as a material step towards progressing the two-State solution needed to achieve a lasting peace in the region. ...
Some of our country’s most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a ‘get out of jail free’ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
The government's decision to reintroduce Three Strikes is a destructive and ineffective piece of law-making that will only exacerbate an inherently biased and racist criminal justice system, said Te Pāti Māori Justice Spokesperson, Tākuta Ferris, today. During the time Three Strikes was in place in Aotearoa, Māori and Pasifika received ...
Cuts to frontline hospital staff are not only a broken election promise, it shows the reckless tax cuts have well and truly hit the frontline of the health system, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
Te Pāti Māori is disgusted at the confirmation that hundreds are set to lose their jobs at Oranga Tamariki, and the disestablishment of the Treaty Response Unit. “This act of absolute carelessness and out of touch decision making is committing tamariki to state abuse.” Said Te Pāti Māori Oranga Tamariki ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi, and Mema Paremata mō Tāmaki-Makaurau, Takutai Tarsh Kemp, will travel to the Gold Coast to strengthen ties with Māori in Australia next week (15-21 April). The visit, in the lead-up to the 9th Australian National Kapa haka Festival, will be an opportunity for both ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Government’s democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
The National Government’s proposed changes to the Residential Tenancies Act will mean tenants can be turfed from their homes by landlords with little notice, Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said. ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson is calling on all parties to support a common-sense change that’s great for the planet and great for consumers after her member’s bill was drawn from the ballot today. ...
The return of the historic Ō-Rākau battle site to the descendants of those who fought there moved one step closer today with the first reading of Te Pire mō Ō-Rākau, Te Pae o Maumahara / The Ō-Rākau Remembrance Bill. The Bill will entrust the 9.7-hectare battle site, five kilometres west ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has announced 25 new high-speed EV charging hubs along key routes between major urban centres and outlined the Government’s plan to supercharge New Zealand’s EV infrastructure. The hubs will each have several chargers and be capable of charging at least four – and up to 10 ...
The coalition Government will not proceed with the previous Government’s plans to regulate residential property managers, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “I have written to the Chairperson of the Social Services and Community Committee to inform him that the Government does not intend to support the Residential Property Managers Bill ...
The Government has announced an independent review into the disability support system funded by the Ministry of Disabled People – Whaikaha. Disability Issues Minister Louise Upston says the review will look at what can be done to strengthen the long-term sustainability of Disability Support Services to provide disabled people and ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith has attended the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva and outlined the Government’s plan to restore law and order. “Speaking to the United Nations Human Rights Council provided us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while responding to issues and ...
Trade Minister Todd McClay heads overseas today for high-level trade talks in the Gulf region, and a key OECD meeting in Paris. Mr McClay will travel to Riyadh to meet with counterparts from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). “New Zealand’s goods and services exports to the Gulf region ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford has outlined six education priorities to deliver a world-leading education system that sets Kiwi kids up for future success. “I’m putting ambition, achievement and outcomes at the heart of our education system. I want every child to be inspired and engaged in their learning so they ...
The new NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) App is a secure ‘one stop shop’ to provide the services drivers need, Transport Minister Simeon Brown and Digitising Government Minister Judith Collins say. “The NZTA App will enable an easier way for Kiwis to pay for Vehicle Registration and Road User Charges (RUC). ...
Whānau with tamariki growing up in emergency housing motels will be prioritised for social housing starting this week, says Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka. “Giving these whānau a better opportunity to build healthy stable lives for themselves and future generations is an essential part of the Government’s goal of reducing ...
Racing Minister Winston Peters has paid tribute to an icon of the industry with the recent passing of Dave O’Sullivan (OBE). “Our sympathies are with the O’Sullivan family with the sad news of Dave O’Sullivan’s recent passing,” Mr Peters says. “His contribution to racing, initially as a jockey and then ...
Assalaamu alaikum, greetings to you all. Eid Mubarak, everyone! I want to extend my warmest wishes to you and everyone celebrating this joyous occasion. It is a pleasure to be here. I have enjoyed Eid celebrations at Parliament before, but this is my first time joining you as the Minister ...
Associate Health Minister David Seymour has announced Pharmac’s largest ever budget of $6.294 billion over four years, fixing a $1.774 billion fiscal cliff. “Access to medicines is a crucial part of many Kiwis’ lives. We’ve committed to a budget allocation of $1.774 billion over four years so Kiwis are ...
Hon Paula Bennett has been appointed as member and chair of the Pharmac board, Associate Health Minister David Seymour announced today. "Pharmac is a critical part of New Zealand's health system and plays a significant role in ensuring that Kiwis have the best possible access to medicines,” says Mr Seymour. ...
Hundreds of New Zealand families affected by Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD) will benefit from a new Government focus on prevention and treatment, says Health Minister Dr Shane Reti. “We know FASD is a leading cause of preventable intellectual and neurodevelopmental disability in New Zealand,” Dr Reti says. “Every day, ...
Regional Development Minister Shane Jones today attended the official opening of Kaikohe’s new $14.7 million sports complex. “The completion of the Kaikohe Multi Sports Complex is a fantastic achievement for the Far North,” Mr Jones says. “This facility not only fulfils a long-held dream for local athletes, but also creates ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters’ engagements in Türkiye this week underlined the importance of diplomacy to meet growing global challenges. “Returning to the Gallipoli Peninsula to represent New Zealand at Anzac commemorations was a sombre reminder of the critical importance of diplomacy for de-escalating conflicts and easing tensions,” Mr Peters ...
Ambassador Millar, Burgemeester, Vandepitte, Excellencies, military representatives, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen – good morning and welcome to this sacred Anzac Day dawn service. It is an honour to be here on behalf of the Government and people of New Zealand at Buttes New British Cemetery, Polygon Wood – a deeply ...
Distinguished guests - It is an honour to return once again to this site which, as the resting place for so many of our war-dead, has become a sacred place for generations of New Zealanders. Our presence here and at the other special spaces of Gallipoli is made ...
Mai ia tawhiti pamamao, te moana nui a Kiwa, kua tae whakaiti mai matou, ki to koutou papa whenua. No koutou te tapuwae, no matou te tapuwae, kua honoa pumautia. Ko nga toa kua hinga nei, o te Waipounamu, o te Ika a Maui, he okioki tahi me o ...
Paul Goldsmith will take on responsibility for the Media and Communications portfolio, while Louise Upston will pick up the Disability Issues portfolio, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon announced today. “Our Government is relentlessly focused on getting New Zealand back on track. As issues change in prominence, I plan to adjust Ministerial ...
Recreational catch limits will be reduced in areas of Fiordland and the Chatham Islands to help keep those fisheries healthy and sustainable, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The lower recreational daily catch limits for a range of finfish and shellfish species caught in the Fiordland Marine Area and ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed an important milestone in New Zealand’s hydrogen future, with the opening of the country’s first network of hydrogen refuelling stations in Wiri. “I want to congratulate the team at Hiringa Energy and its partners K one W one (K1W1), Mitsui & Co New Zealand ...
The coalition Government is delivering on its commitment to improve resource management laws and give greater certainty to consent applicants, with a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) expected to be introduced to Parliament next month. RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop has today outlined the first RMA Amendment ...
Overseas models for regulating the oil and gas sector, including their decommissioning regimes, are being carefully scrutinised as a potential template for New Zealand’s own sector, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. The Coalition Government is focused on rebuilding investor confidence in New Zealand’s energy sector as it looks to strengthen ...
Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell has today released the Report of the Government Inquiry into the response to the North Island Severe Weather Events. “The report shows that New Zealand’s emergency management system is not fit-for-purpose and there are some significant gaps we need to address,” Mr Mitchell ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith is today travelling to Europe where he’ll update the United Nations Human Rights Council on the Government’s work to restore law and order. “Attending the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva provides us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while ...
Associate Agriculture Minister, Mark Patterson, formally reopened the world’s largest wool processing facility today in Awatoto, Napier, following a $50 million rebuild and refurbishment project. “The reopening of this facility will significantly lift the economic opportunities available to New Zealand’s wool sector, which already accounts for 20 per cent of ...
Hon Andrew Bayly, Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing At the Southland Otago Regional Engineering Collective (SOREC) Summit, 18 April, Dunedin Ngā mihi nui, Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Ko Whanganui aho Good Afternoon and thank you for inviting me to open your summit today. I am delighted ...
The Government is delivering on its commitment to bring back the Three Strikes legislation, Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee announced today. “Our Government is committed to restoring law and order and enforcing appropriate consequences on criminals. We are making it clear that repeat serious violent or sexual offending is not ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has today announced four new diplomatic appointments for New Zealand’s overseas missions. “Our diplomats have a vital role in maintaining and protecting New Zealand’s interests around the world,” Mr Peters says. “I am pleased to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the ...
New Zealand is contributing NZ$7 million to support communities affected by severe food insecurity and other urgent humanitarian needs in Ethiopia and Somalia, Foreign Minister Rt Hon Winston Peters announced today. “Over 21 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance across Ethiopia, with a further 6.9 million people ...
Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Paul Goldsmith is congratulating Mataaho Collective for winning the Golden Lion for best participant in the main exhibition at the Venice Biennale. "Congratulations to the Mataaho Collective for winning one of the world's most prestigious art prizes at the Venice Biennale. “It is good ...
The Government is reforming financial services to improve access to home loans and other lending, and strengthen customer protections, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly and Housing Minister Chris Bishop announced today. “Our coalition Government is committed to rebuilding the economy and making life simpler by cutting red tape. We are ...
“China remains a strong commercial opportunity for Kiwi exporters as Chinese businesses and consumers continue to value our high-quality safe produce,” Trade and Agriculture Minister Todd McClay says. Mr McClay has returned to New Zealand following visits to Beijing, Harbin and Shanghai where he met ministers, governors and mayors and engaged in trade and agricultural events with the New ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has completed a successful trip to Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, deepening relationships and capitalising on opportunities. Mr Luxon was accompanied by a business delegation and says the choice of countries represents the priority the New Zealand Government places on South East Asia, and our relationships in ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. “Recently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
A stopbank upgrade project in Tairawhiti partly funded by the Government has increased flood resilience for around 7000ha of residential and horticultural land so far, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones today attended a dawn service in Gisborne to mark the end of the first stage of the ...
A Waitangi Tribunal inquiry report has warned government that a repeal of Section 7AA of the Oranga Tamariki Act could cause harm to children in care. ...
The Treasury has published today three new papers covering government consumption multipliers, automatic stabilisers and the impacts of global shocks on New Zealand’s economy. ...
Asia Pacific Report The Pacific state of Hawai’i’s House of Representatives has joined the state’s Senate in calling for a ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza, becoming the first state to pass such a resolution, reports Hawaii News Now. In March, the Senate passed a ceasefire resolution with a 24–1 ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Ferrie, A/Prof, UTS Chancellor’s Postdoctoral Research and ARC DECRA Fellow, University of Technology Sydney PsiQuantum The Australian government has announced a pledge of approximately A$940 million (US$617 million) to PsiQuantum, a quantum computing start-up company based in Silicon Valley. Half ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hunter Bennett, Lecturer in Exercise Science, University of South Australia Cameron Prins/Shutterstock If you spend a lot of time exploring fitness content online, you might have come across the concept of heart rate zones. Heart rate zone training has become more ...
SPECIAL REPORT:By Eugene Doyle He is the most popular Palestinian leader alive today — and yet few people in the West even know his name. Absolutely no one in Gaza or the West Bank does not know him. That difference speaks volumes about who dominates the media narrative that ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Will McCallum, PhD Candidate – School of Communication and Creative Arts, Deakin University Earlier this year, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton accused Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of not supporting Operation Sovereign Borders – the military-led border security operation that has “closed Australia’s borders ...
By Melyne Baroi in Port Moresby A Papua New Guinea MP, Peter Isoaimo, who had been ousted by the National Court in an alleged bribery case, has been reinstated by the Supreme Court on appeal. A three-member Supreme Court bench found that the National Court had erred in finding that ...
Publisher Chris Holdaway reflects on the unique project of collecting the work of the late, terrific poet Schaeffer Lemalu. One of the nice things you can do as a truly independent publisher is to make the books that writers want to make, whatever they happen to be. That’s how I’ve ...
Those profiled in the stamp series served on overseas deployments from 1995 onwards, and all have been awarded theNew Zealand Operational Service Medal. ...
Last night’s dismal poll result for the coalition government shows the limits of trying to govern as an opposition, argues Joel MacManus. There’s a quote from the American political activist Barbara Deming: “Vengeance is not the point; change is. But the trouble is that in most people’s minds, the thought ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Shireen Morris, Associate Professor and Director of the Radical Centre Reform Lab at Macquarie University Law School, Macquarie University Leonid Andronov/Shutterstock Foreign interference in Australian democracy poses a growing risk to our national sovereignty. It refers to coercive, corrupt or ...
A defendant charged by the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has pleaded guilty to four charges of obtaining by deception in relation to a mortgage fraud scheme. Sentencing has been scheduled for 14 August 2024. ...
What to say when pesky journalists ask gotcha questions like ‘can you name a single book you’ve ever read?’ and ‘did you read it, or did you just see the movie?’This week, Act Party arts spokesperson Todd Stephenson foolishly agreed to an interview with Newsroom’s Steve Braunias regarding his ...
Explainer - What will a ban on cellphones in schools achieve? Can students use them during lunch breaks? And what happens if you need to contact your child? ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jodi Rowley, Curator, Amphibian & Reptile Conservation Biology, Australian Museum, UNSW Sydney Jodi Rowley, CC BY-NC-ND In winter 2021, Australia’s frogs started dropping dead. People began posting images of dead frogs on social media. Unable to travel to investigate the deaths ...
In the year ended March 2024, 0.4 percent of home transfers were to people who didn’t hold New Zealand citizenship or a resident visa, according to figures released by Stats NZ today. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Wasay Majid, Research Assistant , University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau New Zealand’s accommodation supplement scheme is facing scrutiny, with Social Development Minister Louise Upston recently saying “there is merit in considering whether the current settings are fair and sustainable long-term”. The ...
By Koroi Hawkins, RNZ Pacific editor The first prime ministerial candidate has been announced in Solomon Islands and it is not Manasseh Sogavare. The man of the hour is Jeremiah Manele, the MP for Hograno/Kia/Havulei constituency in Isabel Province, who served as minister of foreign affairs in the last government. ...
Protesting the removal of bins by leaving piles of your dog’s shit for others to deal with doesn’t make you a hero – it’s precious and entitled behaviour. You haven’t truly lived until you’ve stood on the shoreline of Auckland’s Cheltenham beach, desperately trying to scoop increasingly liquid dog shit ...
Analysis - Christopher Luxon will be alert to the factors driving the dire polling, but won't be waving the white flag just yet, RNZ political editor Jo Moir writes. ...
Writer, teacher and academic Vincent O’Sullivan died on Sunday 28 April. Here we gather tributes from friends, colleagues, and students who remember his extraordinary contributions. I went down to the garage tonight. There was a bird shrieking out in the bush, in the dark, maybe a kākā. Miraculously, through the ...
As part of our series exploring how New Zealanders live and our relationship with money, a burnt-out corporate escapee explains how she gets by ‘working as little as possible’. Want to be part of The Cost of Being? Fill out the questionnaire here.Gender: Female Age: 31 Ethnicity: Pākehā Role: Contractor in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Timothy Schmidt, Professor of Chemistry, UNSW Sydney Albert Russ / Shutterstock The icebreaker of many a barbeque conversation is something like “what do you do for a crust?” “I teach chemistry at university,” is what we usually reply. Then silence. Our ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Asher Flynn, Associate Professor of Criminology, Monash University Shutterstock Sexual harassment is often considered to be a person-to-person act, but new research shows Australians are also experiencing and perpetrating workplace harassment in large numbers through technology. Our latest study shows one ...
A petition signed by more than 16,500 people, demanding the government take stronger action to halt the genocide of Palestinians by the State of Israel, is being presented to the House of Representatives today by Hon Phil Twyford. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Burnett, Honorary Associate Professor, ANU College of Law, Australian National University jenmartin/Shutterstock April has been a bad month for the Australian environment. The Great Barrier Reef was hit, yet again, by intense coral bleaching. And Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek delayed ...
Winston Peters might not give a ‘rat’s derriere’ about last night’s poll, but it revealed the unusual absence of a honeymoon period and little payoff for the government’s action plan approach, writes Anna Rawhiti-Connell in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Marco de Jong, Lecturer, Law School, Auckland University of Technology Getty Images Details released by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet under the Official Information Act reveal New Zealand officials have been considering involvement in AUKUS from the outset. ...
The government's treatment of Māori raised eyebrows, with countries saying New Zealand needed to do more to reduce health, education and justice inequities. ...
The age of criminal responsibility was one of numerous human rights issues raised during Aotearoa New Zealand’s UPR. Other key themes were racism and discrimination, the disproportionate representation of Māori in prison, and to uphold the UN Declaration ...
In a sitdown interview ahead of his final day at Parliament this week, the former Green Party co-leader tells RNZ about his lowest point during 2017's rough election campaign. ...
Is the fringe radio station really in a financial crisis, or is it just running a hyped-up donation drive? Fringe internet radio station Reality Check Radio was launched by the anti-vaccine mandates group Voices for Freedom in March 2023. For the next year, it undertook probably the most aggressive promotional ...
Above the Fold: On Monday, the biggest Māori screen production company faced down the biggest funder of Māori content at the High Court. It was an incredibly tense moment – then, just as quickly, it resolved. Duncan Greive breaks down a strange day in the screen sector.Yesterday morning, Māori ...
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It’s a ride that’s lasted almost 30 years for mother and daughter BMX riders Nancy and Toni James, and the next stop is the World Championships in Rock Hill, South Carolina. Almost 27 years ago, Nancy and her husband Gerrard took their oldest child, Daniel, to the Waitākere BMX Club. ...
When it comes to talking about the Government’s controversial fast-track consenting process, political scientist Richard Shaw refers to the famous Chinese sci-fi novel Three-Body Problem, while RNZ’s In Depth journalist Farah Hancock talks about zombie projects. Shaw is referring to the three-party coalition Government and how the proposed legislation is ...
Opinion: The debate over single gender versus co-educational schooling has long been controversial. I went to a co-ed school and was inspired by a remarkable woman who was my maths teacher, and because of her deep knowledge and passion for the subject, I knew that maths was definitely an option ...
He won everything and he earned a knighthood and he was a senior literary figure to the point that he was a living monument to himself until his death in the weekend at 86, but there was something about Vincent O’Sullivan that flew under the radar, that was independent and ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rick Sarre, Emeritus Professor of Law and Criminal Justice, University of South Australia The rate of women killed by their partners in Australia grew by 28% from 2021–22 to 2022–23, according to new statistics released today by the Australian Institute of Criminology ...
Ministry of Disabled People employees were promised a permanent role, but were told to start packing three weeks before their fixed term contract finished, says a former employee. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Blakers, Professor of Engineering, Australian National University Clean Energy Council / Neoen As Australia’s rapid renewable energy rollout continues, so too does debate over land use. Nationals Leader David Littleproud, for example, claimed regional areas had reached “saturation point” and ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brendan C. Walsh, Sessional Academic, The University of Queensland Arrest for witchcraft (1866) by John PettieNGV, CC BY-NC In recent decades, governments the world over have increasingly taken action to address the dark history of witch-hunting. In western Europe, memorials to ...
By Mark Rabago, RNZ Pacific Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas correspondent The US Department of Justice is being urged to condemn and cease its reliance on the “Insular Cases” — a series of US Supreme Court opinions on US territories, which have been labelled racist. Senate Judiciary Committee chair Dick ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kara Dadswell, Senior Lecturer in Psychology, Victoria University Ask your son or daughter, niece, or nephew to draw you a picture of a sport coach. They will most probably draw a man. Why? Our latest research published in the Psychology of Sport ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nicole Rinehart, Professor, Child and Adolescent Psychology, Director, Krongold Clinic (Research), Monash University Shutterstock/Brian A. Jackson “Charlie” is an eight-year-old child with autism. Her parents are worried because she often responds to requests with insults, aggression and refusal. Simple demands, such ...
Rolf Harris only musician to agree to play at Trump inauguration
It is believed that the star will be performing a set packed with favourites, including Two Little Boys, Tie me Kangaroo Down Sport, and I’m Jake the Peg (Grab them by the Pussy).
And Bill Cosby is the Master of Ceremonies, I believe.
—Mike “Contra” Hosking, 2013, after playing one of Cosby’s stand-up routines ranting about the misbehaviour of black youth.
Podesta-Pizza Gate.
Look it up peeps, including his love of dodgy artwork.
Wow, you actually believe that pizza gate nonsense?
I think it’s somewhat suspicious yes, and definitely I do think the Podesta’s have bad taste in dodgy artwork.
Wow.
And here’s something else: he seems to associate with a whole bunch of people who seem intent on emailing each other in very odd phrases (what on earth is a ‘pizza related map’ and why would such a ‘map’ be drawn on a ‘hankerchief’???).
Must be Washington DC speak. Or something.
Again. Wow.
Podesta is scum
The exact wikileaks link. Do you want your pizza related map hankerchief?
https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/32795
NewstalkZB’s dismal Mike “Contra” Hosking, punked on air
Actually, it’s his English equivalent…
Donald Trump, greatest American president since Reagan, tells Toyota to build plant in US or pay!
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/817071792711942145
Now, if only he’d pay the workers in his crummy casinos a decent wage.
Don’t bother trying to please the left wing, it’s not worth it.
By the way, Mexico is complaining that Trump policies have now cost them 3600 well paid manufacturing jobs which were going to move out of the USA to Mexico.
James Clapper is arguably the most notorious liar in the world;
So why is RNZ National treating him as a serious and credible source?
Summer Report, RNZ National, Friday 6 January 2017, 8:25 a.m.
I’m sure I was not the only person to listen with interest when perky Summer Report host Anusha Bradley read out from her script that a “leading security analyst” is “more certain than ever” that Russian hackers were working for Donald Trump. It was not until at least thirty seconds into her spiel that Bradley revealed who this “leading security analyst” was: James Clapper, the utterly discredited Director of National Intelligence.
In case you’ve forgotten, James Clapper is the man who lied under oath to Congress, and denied that the NSA was illegally collecting data on American citizens. It was seeing Clapper lying to Congress that prompted Edward Snowden to blow the whistle on the whole of the massive, illegal, unconstitutional NSA spying regime. “Sort of the breaking point was seeing the Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, directly lie under oath to Congress. … Seeing that really meant for me there was no going back.” [1]
None of this seemed to matter to Anusha Bradley, or to “our U.S. correspondent Kevin McAleese”, who chuntered on for a minute or so, recycling Clapper’s anti-Russian rhetoric as if he were a credible source. We are accustomed to RNZ National presenters being naïve (Jesse Mulligan, Bryan Crump), ill-informed (Jesse Mulligan), even nasty (Jim Mora, Noelle McCarthy). But this morning’s performance by Anusha Bradley and her “U.S. correspondent” was as bad, as foolish, and as flagrantly dishonest as anything I have ever heard on any radio station, anywhere.
[1] http://www.ndr.de/nachrichten/netzwelt/snowden277_page-2.html
@Morrissey +1
@Morrissey +2
Have a read of this, from people who actually understand the technology of hacking.
http://arstechnica.com/security/2016/12/did-russia-tamper-with-the-2016-election-bitter-debate-likely-to-rage-on/
Nice work Mr. M
Not sure that I can ever remember chuntering but it seems fairly clear that the Russians did influence the outcome of the American election as did James Comey.
Okay the cybertrail hasn’t been published yet but I suspect it will be soon.
Hillary is still a criminal
Not sure that I can ever remember chuntering…
Good spotting, Scott! I used the word carelessly and imprecisely. I should have just written: “Kevin McAleese said….” His lazy and shoddy journalism is what damns him: he doesn’t need any help from me.
… but it seems fairly clear that the Russians did influence the outcome of the American election as did James Comey.
There is no evidence of Russian influence.
Okay the cybertrail hasn’t been published yet but I suspect it will be soon.
Well, we at least have the word of the world’s most discredited liar to boost our confidence.
This “Indivisible” guide is very much written for an American audience, but a bit of word substitution and tweaking and it is a fantastic slacktivist/occasional activist/activisit guide for NZ as well. I love the inclusion, for example, of suggested call dialogues. The left here needs to publish them so people who might not go on a protest know who to call, and how to manage the conversation!
https://www.indivisibleguide.com/
Apparently it is going down a treat amongst Democrats in the USA, who are finally waking up to the fact that they now have oppositional, parliamentary style politics and they’ve allowed the equivalent of the right wing of the ACT party win power in state after state for the GOP.
But all the poaching of Tea Party organising model will only work if the primary agency for the left is left wing and progressive in the first place, which brings us to the tactic which the representative wing of a political party fears the most: The purge. Nothing gets the attention of a fat cat political careerist like seeing their colleagues getting dumped one by one… Thinking specifically of New Zealand, Up to now, everyone has played nice in New Zealand on this – or rather, they’ve been bullied, browbeaten and purged by MPs whose vigilance in stamping out dissent in the local party sheeple is why Labour is now a hollow shell of a political party – an elite cadre party of like minded careerist technocrats is far, far easier to control than one full of opinionated people who refuse to be bullied. In terms of the purge, in nowadays seems you need an external but affiliated organisation (Momentum or the Tea Party, may God forgive my soul for mentioning them together in the same sentence) to smash the layers of institutional defenses establishment political parties have built to protect their careerist and managerialist cadres.
Some MPs are already reasonably leftist, or pragmatic enough, to be dragged to the left. But many are simply to committed to neo-liberal ideology and/or beneficiaries from their close ties to the neo-liberal establishment to be saved. For them, forced retirement or de-selection challenges should beckon. A time traveller from the 1935 Labour party would be confused to discover the current labour party has no plan to radically reform Labour relations, fully fund “free” education, openly and fulsomely oppose free trade agreements that damage local wages and conditions or support proper progressive taxation of the rich – and will only reluctantly and listlessly pick elements of those things when threatened with open revolt.
The left’s chosen vehicle must grow an ideological backbone if it wants to be able to co-opt the organising tools of their opposition. Any who refuse to do so should be kicked into touch.
For the benefit of the more simple-minded among us, would someone please write a comprehensive list of Labour mps and where they stand on this spectrum. If you are living outside the beltway the information available is patchy to say the least and sources unreliable. We rely on a msm which, as we are clearly aware, is no better than it ought to be and if you read the likes of Chris Trotter you could be forgiven for tearing your hair out and running screaming into the bushes with the total confusion of it !
I personally am only beginning to sneak back to Labour after leaving them as a result of the foreshore and seabed fiasco.
+ lots 🙂
What would be great, assuming that Labour wishes to be seen as philosophically and ideologically in opposition to National, is to have Labour candidates come on here and answer questions from those of us who are quite desperate for change but have lost trust in all of those who aspire to lead.
In the 2014 campaign, Labour candidates were all instructed to describe Nicky Hager’s Dirty Politics as “a distraction.”
That is how serious and well organized Labour is.
@Morrissey – hopefully Labour learnt from that, the strategy’s effectiveness or lack of, showed in their election results.
Helping your opponent in their denial is not a winning strategy.
If Labour didn’t know what to do, they should stay out of it and deflect it back to the real protagonists Natz vs Hager. By minimising it and calling it a ‘distraction’ helped the Natz and angered the Labour supporters who are sick of the establishment denials on these issues.
“That is how serious and well organized Labour is.”
“That is how serious and well organized Labour was.”
FIFY. Different leader, Goff and Shearer gone etc. Times are a changing, best we support that change in the right direction.
What waypoints tell you that Labour has undergone a “change in the right direction”?
In my view, nothing has changed in the perpetuation of the same careerist ‘hanging on for dear life because I can’t get $150K pa in any other job’ Labour attitude and culture from those days.
Have you heard anything from Labour about the UBI lately? How about anything around a commitment to keep national super? Or any remarks that basic benefits need to be increased?
You appear to want National to have a fourth term, so there really is no point in discussing this with you CV. Plus the whole poisoning not just the well, but the ground around it thing, ffs.
So Labour hasn’t said anything about NZ Super, benefit levels or a UBI lately then, eh? Interesting. They still have 6-7 months before the election so I guess they better start.
I’ve already said elsewhere that it’s 2:1 for a National win next (whoops THIS) year, which will increase further for National if they play the shell game that I am expecting.
At this stage I am picking the extreme upper limit party vote for LAB+GR at 43% to 44%.
Like I said, no point in talking with you while you’ve got your shit-tinted glasses on. You can frame it as a prediction, but everything I have seen from you in the past year suggests that you also want Labour to lose. Your political actions support this. You are abusing your power and I’m not playing that game any more.
Well said Weka.
RT’s megaphone is toxic.
“Shit tinted glasses” are probably preferable to having your head buried in the sand. CV is right – we still need Labour to get a voice and say something instead of just barking at passing cars. We need a confident and worthy opposition….. the clock is ticking.
Yeah but that wasn’t what I was referring to about CV at all. I’m happy to clarify if it’s not clear, but I really think you are misleading about what I was saying and doing.
Are you saying that I have my head buried in the sand? Care to provide some evidence of that?
Weka you seem happy to accuse me of all kinds of nonsense (eg https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-06012017/#comment-1283313) without evidence but people better not accuse you of anything without evidence, because different standard.
Thanks for taking off the red tinted glasses and for putting putting on corrective, prescription (not prediction) glasses, Colonial Viper. Real Labour supporters must want to face reality and make themselves see clearly in order to hold caucus members, particularly the careerists and old driftwood, to account.
Unlike CV, I’ve never voted Labour, and only voted to the left of Labour. I’m not a Labour supporter, and neither are many in this thread.
The inability to engage with ideas in real terms is pretty tedious and a big part of the problem here. Of course Labour need to be held accountable. That’s nothing to do with what I was saying about CV though.
I’m quite happy to engage with ideas “in real terms”. Eg. I commented on your post the other day about how consumerism was a battle of the 1970s which had long since been lost and the left had no new ideas about it since then.
But you didn’t want to engage with that idea in real terms and shifted my comment off your post.
CV you know how the party works. Policies are released incrementally and the party policy platform contains the general principles. Can you decist from misrepresenting the position all the time. People will suspect you are getting your lines from Hooton.
From a non-partisan point of view.
A few months is insufficient to communicate and gain understanding from the electorate on any significant or complex policy.
It is barely enough time to ensure that voters are fully familiar with the headline policy items.
This has been proven over and over again.
You may argue that this is simply the way that the party “works.” That may be so, but it certainly doesn’t work for the public.
+1 Weka – Times are a changing, best we support that change in the right direction.
I was referring to the Party’s performance of late. Sorry weka, I was in no way referring to you re head in the sand. Perhaps I should have used “one”.
Thanks for clarifying garibaldi. There’s hardly anyone here who is happy with Labour’s performance. That’s a different thing than wanting them to lose. So I will in fact take a Labour voter with their head in the sand over the ethically bankrupt politics that CV now pushes with his shit-stained glasses on. And to be clear, I’m not talking in any way at all about not criticising Labour.
Fortunately those aren’t the only choices and there is more to be gained from working constructively (including critiques) than poisoning the well.
As for Labour, I’ve long held the view that they are who they are and it’s better strategy to support them in small incremental shifts so that we get enough reprieve that the real change can be done elsewhere. If Labour fails now, that gives National another term, and that IMO is catastrophic for NZ.
I’ve put this challenge out to CV in the past, and he’s never responded meaningfully, but even if one were to think that a 4th National term might galvanise a true shift in NZ politics for something else good to arise, I’ve yet to see any evidence presented for how that might happen. Much more likely that we would have photo-fascism entrenched even further in NZ as well as more of our ability to effect change stripped from us.
Yes, many of us want a truly left wing party in NZ. We don’t have one. It’s not possible for Labour to be what we want them to be (if you disagree please explain how that could happen).
Time to get on with the work of making what we can with that.
I’ll tell you what I don’t like about Labour. They claim they are a broad church but from the evidence I have seen in the past few years, they lean to the centre right (eg Stuart Nash) and reject the left (eg Hone Harawira). The image of Chris Hipkins visciously attacking David C during the great non-event coup is also etched in my brain.
When youer trying to take votes off National, of course you end up on the right.
Labour isn’t a “broad church” – it can’t even get one in four NZers to vote for it.
“I’ll tell you what I don’t like about Labour. They claim they are a broad church but from the evidence I have seen in the past few years, they lean to the centre right (eg Stuart Nash) and reject the left (eg Hone Harawira). The image of Chris Hipkins visciously attacking David C during the great non-event coup is also etched in my brain.”
sure, and there’s plenty of things I don’t like about them too. Nevertheless, they are the only way we are going to have a centre-left govt by the end of the year, so what’s the strategy now?
Why would there be “any evidence” today for something which might hypothetically happen some time years in the future?
What was the evidence 12 months ago that Trump would be President of the USA today?
Did that lack of evidence back then preclude Trump becoming President?
I didn’t have any evidence when I picked a clear and significant Trump victory; I just read the political tea leaves.
Well said weka. If we want to see a Government that isn’t a National one this year then we need to see Labour maximise its vote. Some lefties might not be a fan of Labour, but Labour are still going to make up at least 50% of a leftist block in Government. If you’re a Green or NZF voter you need them to do well, your chances rely on their success.
The last few weeks of the year I felt were good ones for Andrew Little. He looked more confident and fired up infront of camera and that’s good for everyone. I’m fine with them not chasing the UBI or anything else that might scare the horses for now… Just keep getting the hits in on our woeful housing situation and that’s half the job done.
Thanks, I don’t see a lot of MSM, so often don’t have a good sense of what Little is doing unless I go look.
(I would add that if people want a centre left govt then they shouldn’t vote NZF. Peters might choose National, or he might choose Labour in which case he will hold Labour to the right. Either way it’s not going to shift us left and it could be downright disastrous).
” If Labour fails now, that gives National another term, and that IMO is catastrophic for NZ.”
Yes I totally agree which is why I made the initial request
What did you think about the idea of crowdsourcing the list/post?
edit, sorry, just seen your reply below.
In the 2014 campaign, Labour candidates were all instructed to describe Nicky Hager’s Dirty Politics as “a distraction.”
DUH ! And they still cant figure out why they lost! Thats just about the most counterproductive thing they coukd have done, short of dumping on dotcom
The guide is great because what is says is if you don’t like a GOVERNMENT policy, you don’t go and occupy a National party MPs office. You go and occupy the office of a LABOUR MP who won’t come out and oppose it when you ask him or her. So you don’t need to know a “spectrum” – you just ask your local MP for an unequivocal position on an issue, and if they won’t give you one you go and sit in their office or get you and 1000 people to keep ringing them until they turn up and explain why. The pressure is on YOUR SIDE to grow some balls, and take the fight to the right.
That is brilliant Sanctuary.
I would add that it needs some strategy, or at least some degree of thoughtfulness. Going into an election year, the focus needs to be on policy and direct action against those MPs (and presumably LECs) who aren’t moving left, and avoiding Labour bashing for the sake of it. I’d say it needs to happen now, rather than closer to the election.
I’d like to know what the selection process is, and a timeline on that.
And I’d love to see people on The Standard organising around this. Time we stopped arguing about shit and did something.
It will be great if many of us can visit the local Labour MP offices & blog updates about how often they are not around. I know my mates and I can name half a dozen who are hardly around (may I list them here?) and we can compare notes or a real-time record
Do you mean keeping a log of which electorate MPs spend the least time in their electorates? To what purpose?
( It will be great if many of us can visit the local Labour MP offices )
I recently moved to Pukekohe in south Auckland and thought I would go along to a local branch meeting it’s been a while. I went onto Labour’s web site and I cannot even find if they have one.
“The pressure is on YOUR SIDE to grow some balls, and take the fight to the right.”
I wonder if Labour hopeful (again) Laila Harre took the opportunity to tell her mate Nikki Kaye just how bloody lucky she was that her cancer diagnosis didn’t cost her her job.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11777745
Perhaps Laila took the opportunity to remind Nikki of the many people who where not so fortunate, whose employers threw them to the wolves and who got literally the bum’s rush when they were forced to apply to WINZ for support.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/72993797/Cancer-Society-attacks-ludicrous-benefit-requirements-for-cancer-patients
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/80593373/cancer-sufferer-pleas-for-benefit-break
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/286914/jobseeker-benefit-for-cancer-patients-'ludicrous‘
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11564991
http://www.nzdoctor.co.nz/news/2015/october-2015/14/minister-steps-in-to-deal-with-cancer-patients%E2%80%99-work-and-income-headache.aspx
Hearing about Nikki Kaye’s “beautiful cancer lesson” makes me want to puke.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11772239
On this site most of the commenters, who choose to shred Labour’s MPs on a regular basis for being so-called neo-liberals, are not even members of the party and I suspect have never been members. However, they seem to be of the view they know more about Labour’s MPs than those of us who are members and have been for many years.
I drifted away from Labour around 1983/4 because I was sick of the [then] in-fighting. I didn’t understand the nuts and bolts of it at the time, but in retrospect can appreciate it was the Douglas clan (not always Douglas himself but his hangers-on in the Party) who were behind most of the problems. I rejoined 15 years ago after Helen Clark came to power.
Since the departure of the Douglas crew and their member acolytes in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Labour has been slowly returning to its roots (albeit in a modernised version) and that can be evidenced in the types of policies I know they are planning to put forward this election year. For some people it has been too slow, but to reinvent a political party is not an easy task and it takes time to get everyone back on board again. In this respect, Andrew Little is doing a magnificent job and I am no longer as pessimistic as I was about Labour’s election chances… as I was a year or two ago.
I know there are one or two ‘light to moderate’ neo-liberals still in caucus but they are bowing out at the end of this term. Others – like for example Annette King – have well and truly re-embraced their former Labour values. Indeed I’m sure they never lost them… just put them in a cupboard for safe keeping until the time was right to bring them out again.
Perhaps those of us on the inside can appreciate the extent of the advances that have been made in recent years, but others have yet to catch up. I know CV will disagree but he appears to have had some major run-ins with the Party (I don’t know the details, just what he has revealed here) which are negatively impacting on his judgement. I’m hoping one day he will feel able to re-connect.
“On this site most of the commenters, who choose to shred Labour’s MPs on a regular basis for being so-called neo-liberals, are not even members of the party and I suspect have never been members.”
Guilty as charged, but in my defense I have tried to find enough in Labour and/or the Greens policy to give me reason to sign up.
Both have to do better.
(Oh, and I should maybe re email Annette King about a particular issue (that is within the scope of her responsibilities) and see if her re connection with true Labour roots has progressed far enough for her to challenge the Nats over their lies and deception.)
But maybe not. I did make an approach to Ruth Dyson about the same issue in person, in her office, and oh my goodness gracious me….
We left her office stunned, and shaking our heads that she would say what she did…and realised that as far as our particular issue…Labour was a predominant player in fucking things up.
And if they’ll do that for people with disabilities….
Ruth Dyson is one of those bowing out – I think.
Fair enough comments Rosemary McDonald. Certainly Labour needs to to do better when it comes to policy presentation. They need to be short, sharp and easy to understand for the majority of voters. The long versions can be set aside for us political tragics who like to wallow in the complexities of policy or who have a vested interest (like yourself) in specific policy planks. 🙂
Btw, I wasn’t impressed with Ruth Dyson as a minister in the Clark government. I didn’t know much about her but some of her media responses left a lot to be desired. She was rarely definitive and liked to talk about “looking at options” but never said what those options were. Someone else who is very good like that is Nick Smith.
She did a lot of good for disability issues.
As I said, I didn’t know her but her public performances re-interviews and the like… were not impressive and lacked substance.
“…political tragics..”
🙂 lol, in fact!
The wallowing thing…yes, I am focused on non -ACC disability issues and especially the family carer issue. This particular subject I know inside out…including the history under Labour.
Labour could have sorted this. Should have sorted this. Didn’t…but worse…allowed for a system where those who were willing to take a punt at being caught out could circumvent the non- payment of family carers policy.
Ruth Dyson knew this was happening when we spoke with her in early 2013…”It was only a policy not the law”. When this government made the policy that had been determined to be discriminatory actual law…well…I wonder to this day if Ruth Dyson knew that this was going to happen…and the outrage from Labour in the House that day in May 2013 was just pantomime.
Almost as if this suspicion of mine had been broadcast…a commentor on another site told of how exactly that solution (of making the Policy law) was being touted by the Ministry of Health and Crown Law back before the Family Carers case went to the Human Rights Tribunal in 2008…under Labour.
You know, from my point of view…policies and manifestos and candidate bios are all very nice and good…but being honest, truthful, showing a very high level of integrity, is even better.
I know Labour failed this test over the family carers case….in how many other areas of government responsibility did they also neglect to be honest and transparent?
Labour is history in terms of political, popular and ideological relevance. They are no longer needed, but are instead taking up space on the political spectrum which could be better used.
That’s a bold statement CV. If Anne is correct then maybe, just maybe, Labour might reconnect with people.
The clock is ticking.
Nope – if the Little/King leadership team had the ability to “reconnect with people” they wouldn’t have left it until 7 months before the election to demonstrate it.
Yes CV i agree Labour is finished as a political force , those who continue to support them guarentee national party victory
Last year I kept hearing: the affable John Key is the only real asset this National Government has which is keeping them afloat. Without his popularity, National would be gone!
Now that John Key is history and the monotonous expressionless English is in charge, this election should be a walkover for Labour. Shouldn’t it?
Unless of course, you and me are correct in our analysis (which we are).
“Yes CV i agree Labour is finished as a political force , those who continue to support them guarentee national party victory”
I’m genuinely curious as to how you see that working. If Labour are finished and we shouldn’t vote for them or support them in any way, then what else can happen apart from National getting a 4th term? Can you please explain your thinking? e.g. do you think a new left wing party will arise this year and win the election? Or do you think that the Greens will get enough votes to win the election and govern on their own?
” … write a comprehensive list of Labour mps and where they stand on…”
I smiled at that bit, picturing a serious interview with John Key, him answering the question about what his MPs believe. “I believe they believe what I tell them to believe. And believe me they do if they want to believe they have any future chances.”
“For the benefit of the more simple-minded among us, would someone please write a comprehensive list of Labour mps and where they stand on this spectrum.”
I’d be happy to collate and put up a post on that if people here want to make the list. It would need to be evidence based, and we could do it in the sense of a lay-persons guide to the Labour Party. For those of us that don’t know Labour well, there is plenty in the public domain, both words/actions from MPs themselves, as well as analysis in the media (blogosphere, social and mainstream). We could pick say five MPs to focus on at a time and go out and do the research, bring it back to comments, get feedback and then it can go into a post.
I think having an outline of how Labour works internally, including the selection process, would be important too.
That sounds like a great idea – thank you Weka. Like you, I fail to see what the alternative is if Labour can’t make it as the dominant, or at least equal party in power. I’m reading all this hand wringing, but as you suggest, too much of that and we’ll wind up with a 4th term for the Natz
JanM, Rosemary McD et al – Chris Trotter is not a friend of Labour – he’s harbouring some sort of snitch from way back which keeps him blindfolded as to what Labour is actually doing.
When you ask where Labour MPs stand on “this spectrum” – what do you mean? A simple left – right answer, or a bit more detail …… and for that maybe you could look at Labour’s policy platform – formulated after the last election debacle among much debate and argument between Party members and remnants of the neo-lib rightwing bloc . It can be found here
https://www.google.co.nz/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=nzlp%20policy%20platform
This is what Labour policy for the 2017 election will be based on.
I’m not so sure it’s an ideological problem, seems more to be lack of talent.
Take the frequent talk about ‘moving more to the centre’ as an example. The general argument is that Labour needs more votes from the centre ergo they need to move politically and ideologically further to the right to capture those votes.
The corollary to that argument is moving to the right will lose votes from the left, the consequent strategy being to pass those votes to the Greens and get them back through a Labour/Green coalition..
That argument is predicated on the rationale that you can’t please both at the same time; you either go for the centre or you go for the left. It seems more a pragmatic approach than an ideological one.
My thinking is meh, this is New Zealand where a good 75% of the population would be considered ‘left’ in pretty much any other country. Just how hard is to to create a policy platform that would satisfy both the left and enough of the middle to capture 50% of the votes? … to my mind it should be a doddle for anyone with a bit of talent.
“I’m not so sure it’s an ideological problem, seems more to be lack of talent.”
Inclined to agree….compounded by special/personal interests.The Future of Work Commission is a glaring example…2 years work to produce what? if labour (or anyone else for that matter) could produce a comprehensive and clear policy prescription for a transitioning society they would be home and hosed (IMO)
Monbiot has made the same point about the left in general worldwide……its called leadership.
A team of MBA students working on a one semester assignment would have done better work on the topic than that caucus. It was laughable.
A noticeable portion of the stuff that Labour put out was googled, cut and pasted.
The future of work commision simply highlights how automation would exacerbate challenges around inequality & low productivity that New Zealand already faces. Its anti bureaucratic in nature, but not by nature?
Neoliberalism conditions you to believe that value is in paper work. It’s starts on the level of a guy checking to see if you use the rooms in your house properly. Moving up the neoliberal pyramid you have police who spend most of there time filling out paper work but the message is the same, value is in paper work. Then you’ve got managers who’s function seems to revolve around if some one gets payed to much. Derivatives traders which is a really fancy form of paper is at the top of the neoliberal pyramid because they earn the most.
To reevaluate what it means to work means finding away to destroy this mountain of paper work we’ve created that adds no value to the real economy.
That’s seditious talk, watch I don’t audit you to ISO requirements
I suspect that hasn’t happened because bots aren’t a good excuse for saying I never received that advice.
Yeah. I’ve tried to avoid even commenting on that Future of Work because every time I see it mentioned I get the recurring image of Nero and his fiddle.
I don’t wish to belittle their work but I can’t see the point of it, they’re not in power they just look to be indulging themselves there.
“Take the frequent talk about ‘moving more to the centre’……” That is media opinion, DH – and is not what Labour is actually talking about.
As Andrew Little has said a couple of times – in his connections with NZers as he goes around the country – everyone he meets considers themselves “middle NZ” (except for the 1%) – so he’s talking to people who are having difficulty getting a home, who have been made redundant, farmers, business people, others who are in work, people who have been ill, etc etc – all of them considering themselves “middle NZ”
I think it is what they’re talking about Jenny, why else would they want a MoU with the Greens.
Labour is a true left wing party! Promise! Labour will show their true left wing values after we give them power! Why do people not believe this!!! Wreckers and haters!!!!!
I would have thought it’s because they understand they can’t govern alone and have seen how trying to act as a FPP party in an MMP environment has failed them.
….if you read the likes of Chris Trotter….
There’s your problem, right there.
https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-19072013/#comment-664870
Well, that all went well then!!! 🙁
Well, I tried to give a bit of background for you JanM but perhaps you already knew it. You’ve got to say Labour is a far better party now than it was seven years ago. Cohesive with good policy coming up and believe me… some outstanding candidates on offer this election starting with the highly talented Michael Wood. Compare them to the types on offer from the National Party and they outflank them in every respect.
Anne , do you know how much “deadwood” Labour is going to shed? Seems to me they need to fair bit of it, just like National has done already. Too many right wingers still in the Labour caucus.
Bearing in mind Labour’s numbers were decimated in 2011 and 2014 so there aren’t as many to be culled as in the National Party:
Clayton Cosgrove, Ruth Dyson, Damien O’Conner (not sure about him but think so) Su’a William Sio and I think one of the Maori electorate MPs might be going . David Shearer has already gone. I’m picking there might be one or two others who have yet to declare they’e going. All in all it looks like at least 8 MPs will be gone by the next election. That opens up a good chance some very bright and talented younger aspirants will enter the caucus. To name two of them Deborah Russell and Claire Szabo. There are others.
Deborah Russell. Another career minded academic technocrat for Labour’s ranks.
Funnily enough, Labour doesn’t attract many bombastic right-wing populist demagogues, so it’s no surprise you’re dismissive of its candidates.
Labour doesn’t attract many, full stop.
Nick Leggat and Phil Quin?
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-M_yhz-KlZ3Q/TnYoD5xeHXI/AAAAAAAACmM/gH8uLe42BPI/s1600/P1070759.JPG
Stuart Nash?
Thank you Anne, that’s more leaving than I expected.
“You’ve got to say Labour is a far better party now than it was seven years ago.”
Yes they are ….but still frustratingly undetermined.
Thanks Anne – it all helps
ISIS Pledge to Kill Thousands of Americans by opening Gun Stores across the Mid – West
It is intended the new retail chain will be called ‘All-American Patriot’, and will have an extensive section devoted to easily concealed high calibre weapons with extended magazines.
Oh Wait! The NRA are already doing this!
Over 20M new firearms were sold last year in the USA. A new record. Under Barack Hussein Obama.
Lionel explains how to maximally prosecute the case of 4 black youth in Chicago who kidnapped, tied up, abused, tortured a mentally handicapped white Trump supporter
While yelling invective like “fuck Trump” and “fuck white people.” The alleged perpetrators live streamed their activities. The video is still available on the internet.
He discusses if this is a “hate crime.” Also what if the alleged perpetrators have priors, and what would need to be done to maximise their sentencing.
Also imagine the inverse situation: 4 white youth who kidnapped, tied up, abused, tortured a mentally handicapped black Obama supporter.
While yelling invective like “fuck Obama” and “fuck black people.
And live streaming it.
Very fucked up (and I strongly suspect) drug induced bullshit.
A ‘hate crime’? I have doubts.
Politically motivated? No.
Kick their collective arses from here to now, but as for pretending this sort of evil nonsense is hugely unusual and then blowing it upout of context to be something it’s not in order to score some point or other? Nah.
If it were four young white men who had done exactly the same to a young black intellectually disabled Obama supporter while shouting “fuck blacks” and “fuck Obama” there would be much clearer hate and political motivations, no?
I would even expect President Obama to address the incident in front of the White House press corp. If it had been carried out by white men.
Anyhow, Cook County prosecutors have now filed charges of aggravated kidnap, hate crime, aggravated unlawful restraint and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.
All things being equal, I think I’d view it the same and still ‘call out’ any media seeking to surround it with a convenient context.
That’s awful, and you’re a shithead propagandist trying to score points off it.
How can it be propaganda if all the events relayed are factually true? Trump supporters are being targeted and attacked: both physically and verbally.
🙄
I’m not interested how you justify it to yourself, shithead.
But when people report things trump actually said and did, factually true things, it’s all just a smear.
CV – you are the most intellectually dishonest person I have heard in recent memory.
+1. It’s about the propaganda now. Post-truth. It’s easy to see why he likes Trump so much.
I’m not sure it’s intellectually dishonest if he actually thinks that way. But he is certainly the nastiest sack of shit I’ve had the misfortune to interact with in the recent past.
All hating and wrecking, trying to be a saboteur. Not a single useful considered criticism, not even a valid challenge to viewpoints we get from the likes of BM, Puckish, et al. Just nasty slogans hating on Labour, Greens, Democrats. All the while spreading hate propaganda and fake news all over the site, while trying to get opinion and facts he doesn’t like labelled fake news and trying to trash the idea that there really are objective facts.
Poor old Andre, your flimsy vitriol and othering can’t protect the irrelevance of the establishment pseudo-left (aka free market centre) any more.
In other news: Trump threatens Toyota to build its new plant in the USA, or else face a massive border tax
Trump is the gutsiest pro-working class President in a generation.
(Warning: “fake news” site Zero Hedge:)
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-01-05/trump-threatens-toyota-build-new-plant-us-or-pay-big-border-tax
Call me old-fashioned, but I don’t see a guy who devotes such ingenuity and diligence to stiffing his employees and contractors as “pro-working class.” Try looking at his actions, rather than his tweets and blowhard speeches.
That bullshit could just have easily revolved around some football team or a religious belief. The rhetoric just served as a vehicle for the abuse and isn’t in and of itself very important.
Your other point about Trump supporters being physically attacked, if true, hasn’t got sweet fuck all to do with this wee group of shit heads being shit.
the new face of white supremacy.
?
So no, I won’t be writing angry tweets about what these folk did in Chicago. They are already in jail. They will be punished, I am sure, to the fullest extent of the law, but I’ve written about case after case after case of drug offenses and incidents of sexual assault and even murders committed by white folk where the system gave them a helping hand. The Stanford swimmer, Brock Turner, who was caught in the act of raping a woman, but spent a summer in jail for it instead of the 10 to 20 years he deserved, comes to mind.
Black folk and white folk both use and sell drugs at almost identical rates, with the rates for whites actually being slightly higher in both categories, but African-Americans are sent to prison at four to 10 times the rates of whites for various drug offenses.
Black folk are held super-responsible for every mistake and criminal offense made. We rarely have to march for justice in our communities. American prisons are full of black folk who are being held responsible for every mistake they’ve ever made.
Now I actually see thousands of other whites saying I caused this assault. Of course I reject that foolishness altogether. What’s most disturbing is that I hardly see many whites who are particularly angry about the crime speaking sympathetically about the victim. They are mainly using it to advance their racist agenda and demonize random black folk who had nothing to do with such a thing. Furthermore, I have routinely seen tens of thousands of African-Americans standing up and fighting and protesting for white victims of police brutality and toxic masculinity. The Alt-Right Movement does not care about violence in this country. Thousands of whites murder people every year, but you’d be hard pressed to find a protest or march headed by their movement on white on white crime.
As I type, the top trending topic in the country is now #BLMKidnapping. BLM stands for Black Lives Matter. The people in the video never even suggested such a thing. The Black Lives Matter Movement has never advocated such a thing. I have never advocated such a thing.
Shaun King, Civil Rights and BLM activist.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/king-don-chicago-white-assault-case-blm-movement-article-1.2935825
whole thing is worth a read.
You’re pointing to this “White people are the new victims of racism” stuff that’s behind CV’s post?
Pretty much. Not that that is itself new, but there is something additional going on now where people feel emboldened in promoting ideas that are at the least aligned with white supremacist views e.g. that all racism is equal, that racism is simply how one person treats another, that structural racism isn’t a real thing. I see this happening more in the US, but CV’s comment seemed a fairly classic example of it and I’m guessing we will see more of it in NZ. I noted the other day that Bradbury’s recent post where he is complaining about not being allowed to speak because he is a white man is another example. Different, but maybe part of the same shift happening in the culture. Traditionally we would expect both CV and Bradbury’s comments to come from the right or conservatives or small parts of the left, but now we have these voices becoming larger within left wing spaces.
Bradbury’s recent post where he is complaining about not being allowed to speak because he is a white man
Curiously, Bradbury has said a lot about the Sir Mad B story in the last few days – a flurry of posts, while saying the MSM have more important stories/issues they should be focusing on.
lol, true. It was the Klu Klux Klambs post I was thinking of.
heh. ku klux klambs.
First smile of the day 🙂
(the last few weeks have been a bit shit, with different family members in hospital and a pet death. Fucking circle of life…)
sorry to hear that McFlock.
cheers
no worries, c’est la vie. Looking forward to getting busy again though
CV’s is Slater level posting. The steady decline continues.
You’ll thank us latter when every ones making money
…….. and totally destroying the environment in the rush to “get ahead”.
Arthur Edington once said If your theory clashes with the second law of thermal dynamics I can give you no hope, there is nothing for it but to collapse in the deepest humiliation.
Even environmentalists haven’t discovered a theory of production that fits with in the laws of thermal dynamics.
By definition, anything that comes from several points across the globe has a huge carbon footprint.
Civilisation is a heat engine – Guy McPherson
Pedantic observation – it’s ‘thermodynamics’ (does sound a bit like thermal dynamics); no criticism intended.
Drowsy M. Kram is correct. It’s thermodynamics, not thermal dynamics.
We can get a rich function that relates to labour/capital/energy inputs (that hasn’t happened yet). Once you’ve got energy related to parts of production, it talks to a relationship between the 2nd law of thermodynamics and so on, then it will be possible to make links to entropy/wast/ecology issues which economics has failed to do.
It keeps getting odd. From the ‘Jesus was white’ brigade Megan Kelly, now main stream…
Megyn Kelly is awesome.
What are doing watching Fox News heh
I talked to an overseas employment expert/philosopher recently and he was full of praise for Grant Robertson’s Future of Work project. He said it was world leading in scope and vision. I expect we will hear more about aspects of it this year (but hopefully in a form that is clear, succinct and easy to understand).
Yes@Ethica….clear, succinct and easy to understand….because its definitely not a vote winner in its current form.
You gotta be kidding. A mish mash of a report clearly put together by different authors, few cohesive themes, with some chapters far better prepared than others which appeared simply slapdash thrown together.
Regardless of FoWP’s substance and grunt, or lack of, it is very important for Robertson & Labour to talk it up !!
@JoyFL ….do you really think so ?……I dont, not in election year.
I would prefer they kept to simple policies i..e. Kiwi Build ….and placed Future of Work as a behind the scenes driver.
Good piece here on the Israeli motive of keeping occupied territories just that, occupied. They do this to deny 3 Million Palestinians a vote.
Amazing that Jews in settlements are allowed to vote but Palestinians are not. And Israeli supporters like to say Israel is the only democracy in the region…
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=11777761
Take note RWers who regularly want to deny the poor their piece of the pay pie:
“The CEO of a popular fast food chain said this week that he was “stunned” to see profits soar each time California passed minimum wage increases.
In an interview with KQED on Tuesday, Wetzel’s Pretzels CEO Bill Phelps admitted that his investors were worried about how a 2014 wage hike would impact the business. “Like most business people I was concerned about it,” Phelps said.
For years, opponents of minimum wage increases have argued that wage hikes mean fewer jobs because businesses have to raise prices and cut hours to cover the additional expenses. But Phelps said that his sales skyrocketed after a California law forced businesses to raise wages in 2014.
“I was shocked,” Phelps recalled. “I was stunned by the business.”
The same thing happened earlier this year when California raised the minimum wage to $10.50 per hour, Phelps said.”
https://ww2.kqed.org/news/2017/01/03/minimum-wage-goes-up-and-so-does-business-thats-what-this-fast-food-ceo-says-happened/
But we have been told this many times of course… just some will not listen.
Oh dear. It seems that Trump found a way to hide how much he really owes in his FEC statement.
https://thinkprogress.org/trump-said-he-had-315-million-in-debt-he-left-out-1-5-billion-73577d392896#.vd4vq9r78
Sounds like ordinary business working capital mixed in with long term mortgages on large properties. Nothing remarkable.
The Chump will really drain that swamp, eh.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11777900
Trump has made it clear that people who work at a senior level in his Administration will not be able move on and then lobby for corporations (5 year ban) and foreign countries (life time ban).
Gutsier than Obama ever did.
Paying attention to the types of people he is appointing seems a way more useful predictor of future events than anything the guy said to get elected.
He’s appointing the people he needs to get his agenda done.
Sure and he prolly won’t change his mind about that.
A good piece that illustrates the difference between shoddy journalism and fake news. A distinction that even Glenn Greenwald can’t seem to get his head around, to his discredit.
https://thinkprogress.org/wapo-false-report-is-not-fake-news-30b5c9c89368#.bffxds61k
N.B. Glenn Greenwald is one of the top dozen journalists anywhere in the world today. “Lauren C Wiliams” is not.
You know more than Glenn Greenwald, do you?
It’s funny, but going by the calibre of your posts on this forum over the last month or so, I wouldn’t have credited you with the necessaries.
Another Pumpkin Pinochet promise goes west.
President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team has signaled to congressional Republican leaders that his preference is to fund the border wall through the appropriations process as soon as April, according to House Republican officials.</i?
http://edition.cnn.com/2017/01/05/politics/border-wall-house-republicans-donald-trump-taxpayers/index.html
He’s already taken back 3,600 good paying jobs from Mexico and got billions in new investment for the USA which was going to go to Mexico.
So yes, Mexico is definitely going to pay for the wall. From a certain point of view.
And promised to cancel tens of thousands of jobs across the continental US, alongside the F35.
I’m sure you’ll somehow blame Obama for September’s US unemployment rate.
if the F-35 is cancelled Boeing will get to build more F-18 Super Hornets.
Also, no one outside DC believes those false unemployment statistics. And certainly not in Wisconsin or Pennsylvania.
Obama is irrelevant. Putin demonstrated that masterfully.
“masterfully”.
🙄
Hebron shooter Elor Azaria is indeed the norm
Over the past year and a half, dozens of Palestinian men, women and children have been killed, even though they could have been overpowered while they were still alive. The difference between them and Azaria is that he was videotaped.
by AMIRA HASS, Haaretz, Jan. 5, 2017
There’s one thing on which Palestinians agree with Elor Azaria and his supporters: that he wasn’t the only one, he just had the bad luck to be videotaped without his knowledge. Palestinians agree with Azaria and his supporters that he was complying with the norm and did exactly what other soldiers do – namely, shoot with intent to kill even when nobody’s life is in danger.
Palestinians agree with Azaria that the system discriminated against him. It’s just that they believe dozens of other soldiers and policemen should also have stood trial.
Like Azaria himself, Palestinians are wondering why he stood trial while the soldiers who killed Hadeel al-Hashlamoun of Hebron were never even investigated by the Military Police. She, too, was lying on the ground, after soldiers shot her from a distance at a checkpoint because she held a knife (which no soldier was even scratched by). And then, while she was lying there, they continued shooting her in the upper body. (This was on September 22, 2015, and Hebron residents attribute the subsequent outbreak of lone-wolf attacks to this incident.)
On June 11, 2010, Maxim Vinogradov, a Border Policeman, “confirmed the kill” of Ziad Jilani, who was already lying on the ground, shot and wounded, after having run over other policemen with his car in Jerusalem’s Wadi Joz neighborhood. The prosecution decided against indicting Vinogradov, accepting his ridiculous claim that he feared Jilani had a bomb. He was in the heart of a Palestinian neighborhood – why would he blow himself up there?
Fadi Alloun of Isawiyah was also lying on the ground, after having stabbed an Israel in Jerusalem’s Musrara neighborhood on October 4, 2015. An anonymous policeman shot him to death after passersby encouraged him to do so. In this case, there was video footage from a cell phone, but it wasn’t enough for any steps to be taken against the killer.
Sara Hajuj of Bani Naim pulled a knife on Border Policemen inside the security-inspection room of a Hebron checkpoint on July 1, 2016. They sprayed her in the face with pepper spray and fled the room. Then one of them shot her, while she was alone in the room and didn’t endanger anyone.
On June 2, 2016, Ansar Hirsheh crossed the checkpoint at Anabta, where pedestrian traffic is forbidden, on foot. She had a knife in her belongings, but she didn’t endanger anyone. And there was no reason why the four armed, trained soldiers who surrounded her couldn’t have overpowered her without killing her.
Over the past year and a half, dozens of Palestinian men, women and children have been killed, even though according to both eyewitnesses and common sense, they could have been overpowered while they were still alive. Some, it later turned out, hadn’t even attempted to commit an attack. Dozens of soldiers, Border Policemen and checkpoint guards are walking free among us after having killed Palestinians who posed no danger to their lives. The defense establishment portrayed them as having acted properly.
The boundary between self-defense and nationalist vengeance has been completely blurred. This is the atmosphere in which Azaria operated.
Therefore, the message sent by the military court judges stands out for its rarity: Elor Azaria violated the rules of engagement, so he was convicted. But the message the Israeli defense establishment sends to its soldiers and policemen is equally loud and clear: “Take care that you aren’t videotaped when you do the deed. We know how to downplay the value of photographs taken by Palestinian security cameras and bury the testimony of Palestinian eyewitnesses. But we still haven’t found the solution to close-up, professional video footage.”
http://www.haaretz.com/misc/article-print-page/.premium-1.763074
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/world/321890/huge-iceberg-poised-to-break-off-antarctica
Larsen C starting to join its mates
but none of this is supposed to happen for decades more!!!
I don’t mean to brag – but…
I just put a jig-saw puzzle together in 1 day
And on the box it said 2 – 4 years!
😀
I love jigsaw puzzles!
brilliant!!!