Open mike 07/03/2025

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, March 7th, 2025 - 96 comments
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Open mike is your post.

For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose.

The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy).

Step up to the mike …

96 comments on “Open mike 07/03/2025 ”

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  1. Tony Veitch 1
    7 March 2025 at 6:06 am

    Serious question; did Winston Peters really fire Goff on his own initiative, without reference or running it past the PM first, or was Luxon an integral part of the process?

    In other words, did Winston just ignore the CEO completely – and if he did, what does that say about Luxon’s leadership?

    • Tony Veitch 1.1
      7 March 2025 at 6:11 am

      Oops – forgot the link – TV1 news where they said "without consulting the PM!"

      • Tony Veitch 1.1.1
        7 March 2025 at 6:26 am

        PS – I don't believe it just because TV1 said it!

        • Psych Nurse 1.1.1.1
          7 March 2025 at 8:00 am

          The question is,will Peters take Goff's job ?. He will not be DP in a couple of months.

          • PsyclingLeft.Always 1.1.1.1.1
            7 March 2025 at 8:36 am

            Yea that is a major possibility. Not much chance of him becoming PM anymore ? (although…who would know : )

            And High Commissioner…..maybe its how he ends his political days? He'd probably love it. Be very Interesting to see how his No Free Thinking jibe to Goff is personally applied. (Free Think Mexicans et al…)

            Winston Peters sacks Phil Goff as UK High Commissioner over comments about Donald Trump

            The Irony..(although in saying that…Peters does represent our Govt policies. Shit as they are !)

            "When you are in that position you represent the government and the policies of the day, you're not able to free think, you are the face of New Zealand," Peters said.

            "It's not the way you behave as the front face of a country, diplomatically."

            https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/543936/winston-peters-sacks-phil-goff-as-uk-high-commissioner-over-comments-about-donald-trump

          • gsays 1.1.1.1.2
            7 March 2025 at 8:37 am

            In that vein and timeframe, Luxon may not have his job either.

            David Seymour as Prime Minister anyone? Surely the deputy would take over if the Premiere is dethroned.

    • tWig 1.2
      7 March 2025 at 11:29 am

      RNZ covered this last night, and this morning.

      I heard Peters last night saying he genuinely regretted firing Goff, with whom he has worked for many years, and the way he said it truly was genuine. I was tempted to say ‘propped up the bar with’, but Goff doesn’t seem to me to be a drinker.

      I listened also to Goff's Chatham House question and comment, and it did cross the line, because the question about Trump's mental competency was a rheotorical one. Even just slightly changing the words would have let it skid past. And if it wasn't thin-skinned Trump, who hates, hates being criticised, Goff might have swung it.

      RNZ last night had a university lecturer working in international policy comment, and they said that a professional NZ diplomat, with the standing and ability of NZ's current US ambassador Rosemary Banks, is essential in this role.

      This is not a political hit-job on Goff. He is not the right person for this position at this time, when literally the world order is disrupted.

      • Obtrectator 1.2.1
        7 March 2025 at 5:26 pm

        My feelings exactly, tWig. The diplomatic "plums" (London and Washington in particular) have far too often been used for rewarding clapped-out former PMs or cabinet ministers.

  2. SPC 2
    7 March 2025 at 6:30 am

    Trump has indicated he will bully members of NATO, as he does the trade partners of the USA.

    He is intent on being a GOP agent destroying the American governance regime, internally and externally.

    It's

    1.destroying the 1945 FDR designed world order – for one of transactional power determined by hegemony.

    2.destroying the New Deal and Fair Deal and the Great Society concept.

    3.an attack on DEI, civil rights, affirmative action and social liberalism.

    4.it is sold as kingdom come end of democratic empowerment of equal citizenship to one of obedience to power and hierarchy – as a return to the age before women voted and there was a male primacy based on wealth and status.

    https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/trump-considering-major-nato-policy-shift-rcna195089

    https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:lk2mgi6sl6ifwgwovx3yfwuy/bafkreigyufvfvmud4ofiulb2raidqel3uoomw5afabzjrkejzhirxv6kme@jpeg

  3. Tiger Mountain 3
    7 March 2025 at 8:24 am

    An online “burn” can be fun, but not a school lunch second degree burn from an exploding lunch pack!

    https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360605421/student-taken-hospital-after-being-burnt-hot-school-lunch?fbclid=IwY2xjawI200VleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHTaWjbJhKORf_uNCXTMimOko0jU_83HoZc5oANNjR8b8tzY7VDfvgxm30w_aem_lDj0yQMJZ2T472jYkwdOKQ

    The Principal from the Gisborne school told RNZ that the reheated meals are meant to settle to eating temperature during transit but these did not, and in fact were “Watties Cottage pies” in plastic rather than aluminium containers.

    Another Principal from Christchurch said her area school with a spread of ages from 5 to 18, had small kids trying to open meals with steam pouring out when the seal was broken.

    Right wing nasty NZers have been loving the chance to vent their hatred for the less well off, but they are majorly missing the point, school lunches are not charity rather an investment in the future citizens of this country. Scandinavians and many other wealthier than us countries have no compunction about feeding the kids–what is wrong with the dark NZers? David Seymour will not so far even meet the Minister to discuss this royal fuck up where a working model was ditched in favour of going down to a price, rather than up to quality.

    • gsays 3.1
      7 March 2025 at 8:42 am

      Scalds from steam are very nasty.

      I will take a burn or a cut any day over a scald. They take ages to heal, the nerves stay receptive as opposed to a burn where the nerve ends can be 'killed'.

      The minister needs to show leadership. Seymour must be summoned to the office followed by a directive to end this contract.

      I would go one further and update the food in schools to feed all children in schools. There are so many non balance sheet benefits.

    • Ad 3.2
      7 March 2025 at 8:54 am

      17.7% of NZ children live in poverty.

      Is this programme more a mess than it's worth?

      • Tiger Mountain 3.2.1
        7 March 2025 at 9:20 am

        Did you view the photos in my link Ad?

        Acts intention seems to be making the simple act of feeding the kids all too hard and then cancel. So many families with food security problems surely show the necessity for food in schools.

        The bourgeois glorification of food is quite quease inducing when not everyone is well fed in what should be a land of plenty–Aotearoa NZ rightly brags about its great produce, wine, elite techniques, but all the cooking shows and spin off businesses mask an uncomfortable reality…exploitation of service workers, tenuous small businesses beholden to banks, industrial farming and pollution of waterways etc.

        Food is glorified on one level and denied to others. Seymour needs to pull his head in and fast.

        • I Feel Love 3.2.1.1
          7 March 2025 at 9:36 am

          It's "too hard" for this coalition to manage but Labour managed it successfully.

          • Ad 3.2.1.1.1
            7 March 2025 at 10:50 am

            Oh sure it's a Labour political gift. Gross thought.

            But poverty eradication surely can't be loaded onto schools like this. From what I can see, poverty is far worse this term. Food banks are collapsing, unemployment up, wages frozen or down, donations down to aid NGOs, and of course Education itself in disarray from curriculum to infrastructure to staffing to truancy – this seems like Education being squeezed harder for an MSD responsibility.

            • AB 3.2.1.1.1.1
              7 March 2025 at 1:14 pm

              Yes – it's about time the education system was no longer expected to solve problems that originate outside it and therefore should be solved outside it.

              That includes poor kids arriving at school unfed, behind with their literacy and numeracy, sick far too often, constantly moving around as parents change from rental to rental. And it includes parents who are working but so time-poor they have no opportunity or energy to help with homework. And doubtless may other things that actual teachers could point to.

              I would probably support David Seymour in saying that schools shouldn't supply lunches, if he was committed to ensuring all parents and guardians had the guaranteed income and time to do that job. But he's not committed to that either – meaning we have government by sadistic swine who are prepared to violate the human rights of children.

              And that's not surprising – if we allow wealth to inexorably and disproportionately and undeservedly accumulate at the top of the social pile, that wealth is convertable to power and we will have government by some of the worst people in our society.

              • gsays …
                7 March 2025 at 1:46 pm

                So true.

                What you say can get you elected, delivering on it is another story as we found out with Ardern.

              • Incognito …
                7 March 2025 at 6:12 pm

                Yes – it’s about time the education system was no longer expected to solve problems that originate outside it and therefore should be solved outside it.

                This is nothing new. Have a chat to your GP; a visit to the GP and a prescription aren’t enough to correct the ‘statistical deficit’ of 7-year lower life expectancy for some people, which also depends on where they live (aka post-code lottery in health).

              • KJT …
                7 March 2025 at 8:05 pm

                "That includes poor kids arriving at school unfed, behind with their literacy and numeracy, sick far too often, constantly moving around as parents change from rental to rental. And it includes parents who are working but so time-poor they have no opportunity or energy to help with homework. And doubtless may other things that actual teachers could point to".

                As an "actual Teacher" I can point to the very many ways the size of our tail of underachievers, varies with the degree of poverty in each community

                That is the point I was making previously.

                Of course a right wing commentator was talking past me, and trying to make out it was only about tests, and the quality of teaching.
                https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-04-03-2025/#comment-2027317.

                As if continually measuring the problem, or blaming schools/teachers for societal issues, will fix it.

      • gsays 3.2.2
        7 March 2025 at 9:57 am

        It would be easy to misinterpret your comment to be saying we shouldn't be feeding hungry kids.

        • bwaghorn 3.2.2.1
          7 March 2025 at 11:54 am

          I think he's thinking an more targeted approach, sort of like what English used to harp on ,

          Just feed the kids ffs.

  4. SPC 4
    7 March 2025 at 8:46 am

    The EU (rules based order) way, or GOP Trump USA dictate.

    The EU wants a cease-fire and US back up for its security guarantees to Ukraine.

    Putin wants a cowered Ukraine to accept Russian annexation of occupied territory and no one in NATO providing any security guarantees. And expects sanctions against Russia to then end and to get the frozen asset money back.

    Trump's with-holding of promised military aid and now intelligence and refusal to provide Europeans with any security back-up is only consistent with Russia's preferred outcome.

    The Trump GOP USA is intent on pressuring Europe to full appeasement of Russia, or otherwise a NATO crisis.

    The Senate in 2023 passed legislation to make it impossible for POTUS Trump to leave NATO without a Senate majority. Creating a crisis is vital to any agenda to get that mandate.

    https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/trump-considering-major-nato-policy-shift-rcna195089

    https://www.1news.co.nz/2025/03/07/the-us-or-europe-why-trumps-ukraine-u-turn-is-a-fork-in-the-road-for-nz/

  5. Ad 5
    7 March 2025 at 8:51 am

    The Danish postal service is stopping the delivery of letters.

    We're due for it soon here.

    Surely couriers are enough for legal documents and the occasional looped cursive Valentines card?

    • weka 5.1
      7 March 2025 at 10:24 am

      you'd think so, but I suspect that Courierpost drivers are already stretched and someone would have to pay for all the extra stops. NZPost don't have the public good in mind.

      • Belladonna 5.1.1
        7 March 2025 at 10:46 am

        I think that NZPost are desperate to stop scheduled mail delivery. Unfortunately (for them) it's required by legislation.
        My personal belief is that they make it expensive to post letters and do a poor quality job of delivering them, so as to produce a groundswell of dissatisfaction, which would support the removal of the legal requirement. After all, if it's expensive, and unreliable, why would we still need it?

        • I Feel Love 5.1.1.1
          7 March 2025 at 11:10 am

          I worked at NZ Post for 20 years late 90s til 5 or so years back so saw the decline in mail firsthand. They've been trying to give away letters for years but no one else would take it. The courier drivers will end up taking it & I assume some are delivering right now as some streets only get a few letters anyway (as in 1 or 2). When I started we used to split rounds on heavy days (1000 to 2000 letters) but when they went to the 3 day model we would add rounds to make up our hours (especially middle of week where a round could be as low as 20-50 letters, sometimes less). NZ Posts main selling point to customers was they can deliver to EVERY delivery point. Also remember they changed their logo a couple years back (the old logo was a stylised envelope whereas the new one is just dumb & ugly).

          • weka 5.1.1.1.1
            7 March 2025 at 11:17 am

            RD drivers already delivery mail as well as parcels. But RD letter boxes have to meet a standard so the driver doesn't have to get out of the van for letters and parcels that will fit in the box. How would that work for delivering in towns and cities where there is a foot path between the road and the letter box?

            • Visubversa 5.1.1.1.1.1
              7 March 2025 at 1:08 pm

              Our mail is delivered by a Postie in a little wheeled vehicle which seats 1 person and is road legal. They just lean out of the open sided cab and pop the mail into the box.

              • Karolyn_IS …
                7 March 2025 at 1:53 pm

                One of these buggies? Our residential mail gets delivered by one of these in Mt Eden. They are electric powered.

                I thought the idea for the future was to move to clusters mail boxes at the end of a street, or nearby, where people go to collect them?

                It's pretty much what I already do. I have had a PO Box since a previous flat I lived in had some important mail stolen from it, opened, and left lying around in a neighbour's yard. The PO emails me when there's mail in my PO Box.

                • Visubversa …
                  7 March 2025 at 6:00 pm

                  Yes, one of those. Our street – and the ones surrounding it are quite steep and very hard for mail deliveries on foot.

                • I Feel Love …
                  7 March 2025 at 6:12 pm

                  The "little buggies" Paxters are ending their tenure, they were only temporary (they cost millions & the cost of keeping them running must be astronomical as they need repairs every week). I imagine NZ Post will push for the clusters of boxes but possibly they would just use something like the kind of boxes you see at the supermarket (they were even talking about using existing ones or finding a partner somehow to do this), you'd get a txt to come pick up something & you choose a time etc. If not that then they will get us to do the box cluster thing (I have seen new builds already doing this).

                  The only thing keeping letters with NZ Post is the Deed of Understanding (which they changed anyway to allow 3 day post).

                  RD mail are private contractors (like couriers), which is why it's still 6 day a week in most places.

              • weka …
                7 March 2025 at 2:46 pm

                yeah, but the idea is for couriers to take over delivering mail. Which means a much large volume (which is why they have vans).

                Where's the pick up for those buggies? Do they have a van centralised somewhere?

                • Karolyn_IS …
                  7 March 2025 at 4:30 pm

                  I don't know. But courier vans are localised. NZ Post has 400 Paxter buggies. Top speed 45kms per hr.

                  Courier vans can take more, but they also make different kinds of deliveries eg for faster deliveries. The buggies take more letters etc. It's likely there's a place for both in cities.

                  • weka …
                    7 March 2025 at 5:28 pm

                    they seem good. If NZ Post axe the mail delivery service (via Nactfirst changing the legislation) it wouldn't surprise me if they just sell the buggies.

                    • Karolyn_IS …
                      7 March 2025 at 6:06 pm

                      More than likely. The couriers are contract workers. I think they're likely underpaid and overworked. A lot of the stuff they deliver require knocking on doors and getting signatures, whereas the buggies just go to mail boxes.

                      The couriers also tend to carry bigger parcels.

                    • I Feel Love …
                      7 March 2025 at 6:19 pm

                      The Paxters have a short shelf life, they weren't expected to last, they are real high maintenance Norwegian built machines that need constant servicing (sometimes even have to bring Norwegians over to service). In my day at NZ Post we had on site mechanics for the vans & bikes but they gave them up years ago. The Paxter maintenance crews are all private contractors.

                      Didn't make a big news story but I know at least one person got killed on a Paxter on the job in the Tawa, it seemed like he was at fault (from memory) but still they're scary things to drive (& fun too).

                      Found it https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/nz-post-employee-dies-in-electric-buggy-accident-in-tawa-wellington

                    • weka []
                      7 March 2025 at 6:27 pm

                      that’s bokers. Reading Joe’s comment too.

              • Obtrectator …
                7 March 2025 at 5:39 pm

                …. and if they can't get their buggy close enough for that sort of drop-off, next thing you'll get is a little card telling you to improve the access, otherwise no deliveries (you can still pick up). We had to provide a firmer surface for said buggy to travel on – fortunately we some paving slabs doing nothing – while our sister-in-law's stylish box, put in when the house was first built, was judged to be too far off the ground and they had to provide another that was within reach.

        • weka 5.1.1.2
          7 March 2025 at 11:18 am

          seems like that to me too. Really shitty services design for a long time.

        • mikesh 5.1.1.3
          7 March 2025 at 3:50 pm

          What does a P.O. Box cost these days?

    • bwaghorn 5.2
      7 March 2025 at 11:55 am

      What about rural people,

    • AB 5.3
      7 March 2025 at 1:25 pm

      How will historians and biographers get on without sources of hard-copy letters still held in the hands of the recipients in boxes and garages and eventually in libraries and archives? What guarantees are there about accessing online messages and emails well into the future? Will people in the future know less about their own past than we do about ours?

      • Belladonna 5.3.1
        7 March 2025 at 2:09 pm

        Archivists are already working with this for important communications and/or famous people (think the presidential libraries in the US). Having emails and online communications appropriately archived (and accessible) using a variety of storage options.
        Of course, it's dependent on the electronic access systems working (post-Apocalypse, who knows) – but then physical archives are dependent on other storage systems — fire, earthquake, flood – all place them at risk.

        For your own letters – will your great-grandchildren have access? Probably not. But then how many letters do you have from your own great-grandparents? I think that our family history group resource has maybe 3 or 4 – across 60 or so people recorded. A letter has to be really special in some way to get saved; and then continue to be special to be saved by the next generation and the one after that. And that's just one letter out of several thousand that person wrote/received over their lifetime.

        Having worked with people de-cluttering before moving into resthomes; and with people dealing with parent’s ‘stuff’ as executors – collected papers are often discarded – unless there is a very clear reason to keep them. The old days of people having storage in attics for generations of family papers – are pretty much gone.

        • Karolyn_IS 5.3.1.1
          7 March 2025 at 2:29 pm

          The National Library of NZ keeps a selection of website content, as shown on their catalogue web page:

          INNZ (Index New Zealand)

          Descriptions for articles from a wide range of magazines, journals and newspapers related to New Zealand and the South Pacific. Some full-text online content available.

          I have some letters I've kept, some from other people, some that I wrote home in my overseas travels, which my mother kept then eventually gave to me.

          In my recent bit of decluttering, I got rid of some floppy discs that I had various document on, including some of my research notes.

          I think places like the National Library of NZ keep some technology to access past things like floppy discs, but, they wouldn't be interested in doing it for random people like me.

          • Belladonna 5.3.1.1.1
            7 March 2025 at 2:46 pm

            INNZ is a index to published materials, not individual documentary resources.

            The National Library and National Archives most certainly do have some level of access to electronic storage formats. No guarantee, however, that the format itself won't degrade. It's an ongoing challenge that they have to navigate (lots, and lots of professional discussion, and scenario planning on this topic).

            Local archives (e.g. your Council) do have some space for resources which reflect their own local history (e.g. history of community groups). They did more of this in the past, when councils were smaller. I had some experience of this with a couple of locally important groups my parents belonged to, when the group was wound up, they gifted the papers to the Council archives. But their resources are limited, and they have to prioritize what's most likely to be historically relevant. So probably not your personal papers, unless you're a key figure of high local importance.

            Universities do keep archives of people of literary or scientific importance (writers may donate their papers to a university for future research, for example). I'm most aware of it happening in the US – but I guess it happens in NZ as well. But, of course, the existence of your papers in archives, means that they are going to be accessed eventually (hence the reason people like Ngaio Marsh destroyed the majority of their personal papers).

            Personal archives are fairly likely to be diminished over time (unless you're famous for some reason). You may keep (and even, mirabile dictu, organize) your papers – but your descendants are probably not going to continue to retain them. Archives end up on the scrap heap depressingly often.

      • weka 5.3.2
        7 March 2025 at 2:49 pm

        good questions, there are all sorts of issues. Removing mail services is akin to removing rail tracks. Once the system is gone it's hard to put back (think after ten years all the mail boxes are done). It reduces resiliency, but I don't think NZ Post or hardly anyone is thinking about that.

      • I Feel Love 5.3.3
        7 March 2025 at 6:21 pm

        I predict this will become another Dark Age as far as future archivists are concerned.

  6. kejo 6
    7 March 2025 at 9:55 am

    Trumps long game explained ? Geopolitical Economy Report: Trump helps Blackrock buy Panama canal ports. Maybe someone can put the link up for me ?

  7. Sanctuary 7
    7 March 2025 at 10:14 am

    So we've got Seymour very publicly snubbing Erica Stanford and her request for a please explain meeting.

    Luxon is fine with that.

    Rather than address the concerns of his own education minister Luxon seems to have focus grouped an attack line about marmite sandwiches, raw meat to his base that does nothing about a new delivery model that offers almost no real saving and dishes up utter shit food.

    Luxon is a deeply unserious and arrogant man.

    Winston Peters sacks the high commissioner in London with bothering to tell Luxon, and when pressed irritably told the world that effectively Luxon is his bitch.

    Luxon is fine with that.

    When told of Helen Clark's tweet on the matter he replied with a immature and sullen rant.

    Luxon is a deeply unserious and arrogant man.

    Anyway, Stanford might get the last laugh – rumours are circulating a "female cabinet minister" is being positioned as the liberal leadership challenger. Probably not Willis, she is too closely aligned with Luxon and his brand of brain dead neoliberal austerity and she won't win any elections as leader.

    • Tiger Mountain 7.1
      7 March 2025 at 10:33 am

      Time to stop this contract with Compass. Stanford is at least informed after talking to staff, parents and pupils. Seymour just wants to stop feeding the kids. The burnt child will need treatment for several weeks according to stuff article.

    • AB 7.2
      7 March 2025 at 10:44 am

      When Stanford made it pretty clear that she was annoyed by Seymour not turning up, it looked to me like a thinly veiled leadership play – or if not a play, a warning to Luxon at least.

    • Ad 7.3
      7 March 2025 at 11:01 am

      It is spooky to be in New Zealand when our leadership is so weak, and international politics with our allies so unstable.

      The Reserve Bank leader departing without warning us a clear breakdown with the Minister of Finance.

      The strongest leadership NZ has right now is Fonterra, which is lucky as its the only notable company we've got.

      Our politics hasn't been this weak since Nordmyer chucked it.

    • I Feel Love 7.4
      7 March 2025 at 11:12 am

      Luxon finds the time to tell an Otago school principal they're "out of touch" about the crappy school lunches. In ODT today but paywalled.

    • Stephen D 7.5
      7 March 2025 at 11:48 am

      A Bishop/Stanford ticket. Or vice versa.

      • bwaghorn 7.5.1
        7 March 2025 at 11:59 am

        If luxon got dethroned would the new leader have to honour the agreement to have seymour as dpm?

        • Tiger Mountain 7.5.1.1
          7 March 2025 at 12:18 pm

          Good point. It is hopefully between the parties, but comes down to “confidence and supply” at the end of the day as far as keeping a Govt. going in office.

          The Epsom twerp needs to be sat on his arse regardless.

        • Incognito 7.5.1.2
          7 March 2025 at 12:26 pm

          Yes

          • bwaghorn 7.5.1.2.1
            7 March 2025 at 12:34 pm

            I wonder if it's dawned on seymour and peters that the next labour will have Waititi and Swarbrick as dpms?

            • Adrian 7.5.1.2.1.1
              7 March 2025 at 12:53 pm

              And so much more suitable and capable than the two present clowns. I love that line and what a t-shirt line it is. Peter’s..Luxon is my bitch.

            • weka 7.5.1.2.1.2
              7 March 2025 at 2:51 pm

              this seems unlikely, maybe one of the Green co-leaders if there is a big swing.

              • bwaghorn …
                7 March 2025 at 4:24 pm

                I would have thought the precedent had been set now and if I was a minor party it’d be at bottom line territory

                • weka …
                  7 March 2025 at 5:26 pm

                  the Greens aren't robber barons like Peters and DS though 😉 I think it would depend on the numbers. And the advantage NZF have is they’re centrists and can play both sides. Which means the spectre of a Lab/NZF government again.

                  Wasn't the precedent set in earlier elections with Peters as DPM?

      • Anne 7.5.2
        7 March 2025 at 5:41 pm

        Bishop/Stanford I think.

        Remember, lots of Christian conservatives in their team. They will vote for a male every time.

  8. hereni kiwi 8
    7 March 2025 at 3:05 pm

    20 years ago I visited Rajasthan. Desperately poor villages, no electricity, no running water, no latrines. Tensions building with Pakistan, so troops everywhere. The women had to cross a firing range to get to the river where they could collect water and wash clothes, and the Army did not warn when practices would start. Kids literally in rags or downright naked. No shoes and a lot of broken glass. People toiling to grow food on pocket sized fields. Beggars everywhere, many with serious disabilities.

    There was a school, but few girls attending. Literacy rate for women in Rajasthan at the time 28%. Legally, 18 is the age required for marriage, in practice, an arranged husband when menstruation begins. Hopefully she's pretty and has a good dowry, otherwise when a man comes and tells the parents "I will give you 1000 R if you let me take your daughter to a job in the city….."

    And in the distance a large and very beautiful palace that once belonged to a Rajah who visited in summer to escape the heat elsewhere.

    In one village the people seemed especially lacklustre. They accepted the food and clothing we offered, but showed little emotional response. Nothing of what some call "gratitude." An American Christian asked, "Why are they so indifferent? Is it belief in karma and they think they deserve this?"

    I will never forget the doctor's reply, "These people have been so malnourished in the womb and childhood, that their brains have not developed normally. It will take generations of proper feeding for them to have normal intelligence."

    I began to understand for the first time why it is so hard to break the cycle of poverty in "underdeveloped" countries, and why simplistic solutions proposed by rich outsiders seldom work.

    I am deeply troubled for the future of our country when children are either underfed, or are fed on sugared fizzy water and calorie dense but nutrition less over advertised fast "food."

    Looking back at my experience in Rajasthan, I remember thinking that when Jesus was on Earth 2000 years ago, that would have been what he saw, and why he was so concerned about feeding the poor, rather than fretting over “men in women’s sports.” "Christian" PM Luxon has no idea.

    For the love of God, feed the kids.

    • weka 8.1
      7 March 2025 at 3:17 pm

      do you want to feed the kids, or end poverty?

      • hereni kiwi 8.1.1
        7 March 2025 at 8:07 pm

        Sorry, not sure whether you're replying to me?

        Obviously, I want to do both, but it's a slow business ending poverty, taking one step at a time.

        The point I was trying to make, I guess, is that hungry kids, or malnourished kids (yes, even obese kids can be malnourished if fed on junk) cannot learn in school. There was some talk a while back about a well educated workforce (haven't heard it for a while) and I agree. Education, esp for women, is strongly stressed by aid workers, as the most important step in breaking the cycle of poverty. But the kids must be fed nutritious food as a first step, in order to benefit from school.

        Apart from which, what kind of inhuman monster would willingly starve a child because of some sort of "principle of the thing" political position?

        Hope I haven't misunderstood your post or said anything in a way that sounds patronizing or could be interpreted as a personal attack. I'm just trying to make myself clear.

        • KJT 8.1.1.1
          7 March 2025 at 8:16 pm

          You would think a Government made up of "business people" understand investing for a future return.

          However we have a Government of "businessmen" who are asset strippers, share manipulators, financial cheats and corporate brown nosers.

          The short term gains types, who have wrecked so many NZ businesses, and the country, since the 1980's.

        • weka 8.1.1.2
          7 March 2025 at 9:27 pm

          I was curious why you were dismissive of women's right to safety (the sports issue) and if it was because you saw the problem as children needing fed, rather than the bigger picture of why the kids need fed i.e the system.

          • hereni kiwi 8.1.1.2.1
            8 March 2025 at 8:24 am

            The system.

            Basic economic fact: regardless of the economic theory followed, 50% of the population will be above it and 50% below.

            A policy that favours health, adequate housing and equal opportunity to education in the general population, over the right to Indvidual enrichment at the expense of others, will seek, through taxation and other measures, to reduce the disparities in wealth as much as possible. It will acknowledge that there are always those who are unable to contribute equally eg through physical disabilty, while at the same time not overly discouraging those who are responsible in their finances and end up acquiring more than average. To be clear, many parents work and save in order to give their children and grandchildren better lives, so let us not outlaw inherited wealth entirely, but cap the amount.

            Where the range of income is wider the disparities will continue to grow ie if saving 10% of income for retirement is made compulsory, a person earning $300.000 pa is going to wind up far richer than someone earning $30,000 a year. (sorry if this sounds like belaboring the obvious)

            There is also human nature to contend with. As someone rightly said, "If we all have Toyota Corollas, someone won't be happy till they're flashing their new Ferrari in your face." Abd there will always be those who spend all their own money on whatever else it is they want, and then steal your Toyota.

            In short, a system that's equally fair to everyone is virtually impossible. And if we get our own society up to to a decent standard for everyone in NZ, by world standards we will be above the median, while other countries remain below. Because, to put the matter at its simplest, the only way to get money is to get it from someone else, either by selling goods or labour. And no matter how much talk there is of win/win deals, in reality everyone is looking to get the better of the deal. I am convinced that, long before the invention of money, Ug was telling Mug "Sure I'll let you have a bearskin now if you give me back two bearskins next winter."

            IOW, economic systems are inherently competitive, just as all life on this planet is. If an animal can beat another animal to a juicier bite of grass, or a big fish gobble up a smaller fish, it has a greater chance of surviving and passing its genes on. As humans, we have evolved to be the smartest, most ruthless predators of all. We "civilized" Westerners spend our lives desperately seeking to avoid the brute realities of our human existence.

            I think, therefore, that when Jesus said, :The poor will always be with you," it was not callousness, but a simple observation of reality. He then went on to say, :And whenever you will, you can help them."

            Pause for breath.

          • hereni kiwi 8.1.1.2.2
            8 March 2025 at 9:25 am

            In very small societies, such as gatherer/hunter tribes, it is possible for people be equal since excess material goods are labour intensive to produce, and tend to be a hindrance to nomadic peoples. While van der Post's Lost World of the Kalahari is rather problematic now, with some of its 1950s, male skewed views, it does do a fairly good job of showing how they existed. Note, however, that while the continued existence of the tribe is valued over the individual, survival of the fittest is still the norm. Those who are not physically able to contribute will be eliminated, ie infanticide and eventual abandonment of old people. Sorry to upset you, but we are the descendants of people who survived precisely because the weak did not..

            (Also check out the 900 Days, by Harrison Salisbury, an account of the siege of Leningrad, and see how fast the veneer of "civilization" vanishes when survival is reduced to the basic essentials.)

            I said in my previous post that 50% will always be below the median, but since the start of settled agriculture and the beginnings of civilization and more complex economic activity, the predominating system is more of a pyramid shaped feudal one. A few at the top hold most of the wealth and power, originally obtained by conquest and passed on by inheritance. At the bottom, the vast majority of slaves or very low paid workers produce the food and goods, but generally cannot afford the products of their labour. They are also the source of cannon fodder. The physically not able to work must beg. In between, there are a number of what are now termed middle class, who perform various functions such as managing workers, recording transactions. ensuring laws are followed and generally ensuring the system continues to function for the benefit of the rulers. They are in a precarious position, at various rungs up and down the ladder, now looking up and hoping to join the elite by trampling on those further down the rungs, or slowly descending and clutching at others as they fall, terrified of falling back into the mass at the bottom, whom they criticize and condemn for their supposed faults which produced the poverty, in order to feel a little better about about their own "deserved" small degree of more. A few will ascend to a certain point, then will pause and reach down in order to try and assist others to rise.

            Such has been the case in most societies and nations throughout recorded history. Even when social reformers began seeking a more even distribution of wealth and power, eg in 19th Century Britain, at the same time overseas colonialism was expanding, and increased prosperity for the British working class was obtained at the expense of poor Indians and Africans.. Or in New Zealand, by taking land off the Maori.

            So, although for a while we were able to maintain the image of a just and equal society with moderate wealth for everyone and care of the weak thanks to our welfare state, as a small nation far from anywhere, once the international winds started to affect us in the 80s, we started to realise that we actually have small clout in world trade. (Think Rainbow Warrior and the French threatening to refuse us imports with the EU unless we released the "only following orders" agents. Or the ending of ANZUS over our no nukes policy.)

            So what we are now witnessing globally is effectively a return to the feudal system which has always predominated.

            Pause for breath.

          • hereni kiwi 8.1.1.2.3
            8 March 2025 at 10:48 am

            Since human nature is inherently "flawed" (ie, we don't know everything so how can anything we design be perfect) all attempts at solutions to problems will turn out to cause other problems. eg, we were once reliant on horses. With increased city dwelling, how shall cope with all the shit? Solution! Invent the motor car….Medical advances have enabled millions to live longer and happier lives. But opps. now we have a world population of billions. How shall we feed them all? Science to the rescue! Progress in agriculture! Insecticides! Artificial fertilizers! Monoculture! Factory farms!

            Uhoh. Now we have a huge problem with pollution…..

            As young un in the 60s (yes, I'm a Boomer. My bad. Should have told my parents to use conception.) we we frequently told, and articles were written, about how the coming age of more efficient manufacturing and reliance on computers, would REDUCE the number of number of jobs available (similar to AI predictions) and therefore we must prepare for a future with fewer work hours, more job sharing, and greater leisure time.

            Of course, it turned out instead, that as the number of jobs went down, (more due to manufacturing going overseas than increased efficiency) they were NOT evenly shared. The workforce also increased with more women entering, in part because inflation increased need for household income, and also increased breakdown of marriage (no moral judgements) The more the job market shrank, the louder the virtues of work were praised, and the necessity of finding jobs insisted on. "Job creation" solutions were needed! Those lucky duckies who held onto their jobs eg in the govt "restructuring" of the 80s (they laid off thousands of govt employes to "save money" while unemployment rate was continually rising, and basically told them it was up to them to find new jobs. So many left for Australia, where wages were higher.) had to work even harder and longer hours to make up for lower staffing. And the unfortunate jobless were labelled bludgers and finally punished for it by having their benefits cut in The Mother of All Budgets. Followed by several years of recession (because there was now less money to spend and help keep businesses going) which resulted in even less jobs available. Now we have "intergenerational unemployment". Lazy parents on the dole! Kids growing up learning to live on the dole!

            For school leavers especially, it was difficult to find jobs because of employers requiring Experience (classic Elevator Boy dilemma.) Employers were less willing to take on apprentices and have older workers give on-the-job training. We need a better educated workers! So extend the school leaving age and require young adults to be in further training in order to receive a benefit. Some joblessness is thereby disguised (Disabled and mums at home with kids who would still like to work at least part time but can't find a job, also disguised unemployment.) And we'll change the requirements of the HLFS to the bare minimum and call those who meet it employed even though their main source of income is still a benefit.

            Oh but all this costs money. I have an idea. The govt can loan students money and when they get a job they can pay it back! So more students = fewer jobless in statistics, at least while they're studying. But if you're a student from a low income household who don't know many shoulders you can tap……You mean you're not guaranteed a job in Uncle Harry's law firm or Mum's friend Susan's business? Sucks to be you.

            Steady destruction of small town living. Woolen mills and freezing works which once guaranteed jobs gone. Centralization of govt offices. Disappearing shops, service stations, schools, hospitals……Decline in property values cause no one wants to move here cause there ain't no jobs. People will either stay and exist on the dole, or sell the house at a loss and move to the city. Increased urban dwelling. Law of supply and demand means there is now a rise in housing prices.

            People can't afford rent? Too few state houses? Well. let's have an accommodation allowance so they can choose whether to go state or private! And so the guaranteed flow of income from govt to landlord via the tenant's bank account.

            Not trying to sound bitter, but looking back it seems kinda inevitable that decisions made long ago would put us in our current situation. Sorry to go on at length but those who haven't lived it and don't know history further back, need to know how it came about, so they are not led astray by would be demagogues and fascists blaming various groups. Immigrants! Baby Boomers! The Jews!

            Don't even know if anyone's reading, but I feel better trying to write about it in some sort of logical order, because it's such a complex issue with roots that go back to forever and embrace the best and worst of human nature. But we live in the Age of TikTok. Read a whole history book? A long novel like War and Peace? lol.

            Pause foe breath.

            • roblogic 8.1.1.2.3.1
              8 March 2025 at 10:54 am

              I read it and you described the symptoms well, but IMHO didn't identify the central problem, which has always been a coterie of complete bastards at the top conspiring to control and impoverish nations while enjoying fabulous power and wealth for themselves.

              Leading to various revolutions and social changes. We are due for another

          • hereni kiwi 8.1.1.2.4
            8 March 2025 at 11:14 am

            I am certainly not "dismissing the issue of women's safety." I am a 66 year old who previously lived with a penis owning partner and gave birth to a child. OK?

            Back in 1972 I attended a high school in a small NZ town. It was the year of the Munich Olympics and the Committee had announced all women participants would be gender tested. since there was considerable suspicion over the number of large, heavily muscled Soviet sportswomen – some of whom appeared to have moustaches!

            Feminists were upset. Why are only women having their private parts inspected? We demand all the men be examined too!

            Our science teacher carefully explained to us that the situation was being misunderstood. No examination of external genitalia was taking place. A scrape of inside cheek cells was placed on a glass slide and examined to see what the chromosome makeup was. (We did this with our own cells in class.) Either XX or XY. Simple, right? (Long story short, the Soviets were XX but unknowingly being fed large amounts of steroids. Many consequently unable to have children.)

            BUT THEN, we learned about the many possible genetic mutations…..XXY, XYY, XXX, XXXX and XXYY….. who may or may not have different outward and inward sexual organs, and sometimes both.

            Sexuality, WE learned, was not a simple either/or, but a continuum, with exclusively hetero at one end, and exclusively home at the other. Those in between were varying degrees of bisexual, with cultural norms and the evolutionary drive to reproduce tending to result in more heterosexual activity.

            Wow! Woke Science! In 1972! Who knew?

            Science hastn't changed afaik.

            • Incognito 8.1.1.2.4.1
              8 March 2025 at 11:25 am

              BUT THEN, we learned about the many possible genetic mutations…..XXY, XYY, XXX, XXXX and XXYY…..

              Nope, those are not genetic mutations but conditions caused by abnormal chromosomal re-arrangements.

              https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_chromosome_anomalies

            • weka 8.1.1.2.4.2
              8 March 2025 at 12:22 pm

              we have better chromosomal science now, but there are still only two sexes. Sex is how humans reproduce and it only happens via female and male. That's hardwired into our species via very long evolution and it can't be changed.

              Variations in sexual development don't mean multiple sexes, those people are still either female or male. In sport this matters because people with male bodies have a distinct advantages over women. This is an issue of fairness and of safety.

              There is discussion currently about a young woman who ended up with brain damage in a volleyball came because the person on the other team doing the spiking was a trans woman (trans identified male). That's because men have a completely different strength for that activity than women. We have women's sports precisely for these reasons. Letting trans women take part in those sports destroys fairness and makes those sports unsafe for women.

              People with differences of sexual development are not inherently trans (although they might still have a gender identity opposite their biological sex). There is one DSD where a male child may superficially look like a girl, be raised as a girl, but then goes through male puberty. Once they do that, they have the same kind of physical advantages as other men, and they shouldn't be in women's sports for the above reasons. There are a lot of important social considerations for those people that society needs to pay attention to, but those don't trump women's safety and fairness.

              This is why your comment "…rather than fretting over “men in women’s sports.” came across as dismissive of women's right to safety.

  9. Kay 9
    7 March 2025 at 4:29 pm

    https://www.stuff.co.nz/politics/360606113/nz-first-introduces-bill-remove-diversity-regulations-public-service

    Practically cut + paste from the Republican party, so they can't even come up with an original idea.

    Does Peters genuinely believe this crap, or just pandering to the red-neck populist vote?

    • weka 9.1
      7 March 2025 at 5:37 pm

      private members bill, so I'll go with Trumpesque populism and Peters having his eye on the next election.

      NZ doesn't use the term DEI, he's such an opportunist.

      btw, if we call voters in NZ rednecks, we're kind of doing the same populist thing. Do we want a NZ that respects voters and can work across difference, or do we want to further divisions and keep losing? Is the left going to present a coherent, positive, attractive vision for NZ going forward, or are we doing to keep calling voters names and wonder why people don't like the left? I get that people are angry, I just think we have to stop this kind of rhetoric if we want to avoid a Trumpian future.

  10. Chess Player 10
    7 March 2025 at 8:16 pm

    Stage One:

    https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/significant-concerns-health-nz-was-using-a-single-excel-spreadsheet-to-track-28-billion-of-public-money/WADIE2J26JEDVCLXYL7HKTMNDE/

    Stage Two:

    Announce the need for a huge new IT system using consultants called, purely coincidentally, Deloitte…

  11. hereni kiwi 11
    8 March 2025 at 12:15 pm

    Further, back in 1990, Georgina Beyer was elected mayor of Carterton, first openly trans mayor in the world. Later, she became an MP, ditto first in the world. I am sure there are those who saw her as a "Man in woman's clothes" but the prevailing opinion was that if she was the voter's choice, then that was their right and should be respected.

    So what changed? Why the sudden outbreak of dire warnings of possible child molesters disguising themselves as women to get into toilets? (Only men disguised as women are of concern. If a women disguised as a man goes into a men's toilet and something bad happens, well that's her look out aka asking for it.)

    Simply put, a totally cynical ploy by power hungry people who need a new scapegoat to divert attention from their own nefarious deeds. Jim Crow era = black men are raping white women! Poor whites forget your own misery, at least you're better than a n…….. Don't you feel better now we're rid of that criminal? And your wages are getting further cut next week.

    Jerry Fallwell, founder of the Moral Majority and the man who forged the alliance between "Evangelicals" and the Republican Party, was a bigoted segregationist. But he saw a new scapegoat was needed and started attacking gays. This appealled to the type of person who cannot see themselves as good unless they're pointing to someone they can call bad. (which is why the media makes a lot of money focusing on crime, corruption, disaster and pretty all that's wrong with everyone and evrything else, while journalists and TV pundits will never admit to their own faults and failings. Pretty sure none of us will admit to our shortcomings in this forum either.)

    Even in prisons, there is a hierarchy by crimes committed. As Kris Kristofferson/John Prine puts it

    'Cause everybody's gotta have somebody to look down on

    Prove they can be better than at any time they please

    Someone doin' somethin' dirty, decent folks can frown on

    You can't find nobody else, then help yourself to me

    Remember the "Christian Heritage Party"? Got less than 2% of the vote, because the Christians back then knew better and refused to vote for him. Turned out, he was the predator who went to jail, and as our preacher at the time said, "This should be no surprise to anyone who reads history."

    Note also, the groups being demonised keep getting smaller. Tells you something about the ones attacking them.

    Last fact from the real world, rather than omg bogeyman scare world:

    The vast majority of women and girls attacked are indeed preyed upon by men. Far too often said men are never charged. But only a miniscule number, if any will ever wear women's clothes. The overwhelming majority dress and present as men.

    And the majority of crimes against women and girls take place IN THEIR OWN HOMES. I should know, I am a survivor.

    Also, comparatively few trans people participate in sports, at a far lower rate than male presenting heterosexuals.

    You are, as Jesus said, a blind person being led by the blind, straining at a gnat and swallowing a camel.

    • weka 11.1
      8 March 2025 at 1:08 pm

      So what changed? Why the sudden outbreak of dire warnings of possible child molesters disguising themselves as women to get into toilets? (Only men disguised as women are of concern. If a women disguised as a man goes into a men's toilet and something bad happens, well that's her look out aka asking for it.)

      It's true that the far right and religious conservatives have taken up this issue and are pressing hard. But before that, feminists were talking about the problems for decades.

      What changed was the intentional shift of 'trans' meaning people with gender dysphoria who had a very strong need to live as the opposite sex, and who by and large integrated themselves into society via transition, to trans meaning self ID and any man saying they are a man is one and must be treated as one.

      Which is the opening of the door to abuse of women and children. Not that all trans women are paedophiles, but that males as a class have a pattern of violence against women and children so strong that we safeguard against that in multiple ways across society. There's no evidence that trans women as a class are somehow free from this pattern.

      If you still think of trans women as transsexuals like Georgina and don't understand that trans now also means cross dressing males with AGP (a sexual fetish), then you can't understand what has changed and why women and men are saying no.

      No Debate was an extremely successful strategy that suppressed debate, so a lot of people don't in fact know what trans is now, nor what the issues are. They're often only exposed to the ideas from the liberals that trans acceptance is Good, and everything else is bigotry.

      But there is solid feminist analysis and activism that proves this wrong.

      Here's a piece from Jane Clare Jones, the Annals of the Terf Wars. It's 5 years old, but gives a good overview of 'what changed' from the perspective of feminists.

      https://janeclarejones.com/2018/11/13/the-annals-of-the-terf-wars/