It's the unpredictable, left-field aspects of C-19 that perhaps hold the greatest potential for a re-imagined world.
"If it's true that the best ideas happen in your sleep, the world could be about to experience a surge in creative output, with many reporting they are having more vivid dreams in lockdown.
Neuroscience educator Nathan Wallis said it's not necessarily that we're having more dreams than usual — it's that we've got a better chance at remembering them when we don't have to leap out of bed in the morning."
Ok. Well I had a vivid dream last night. I went downstairs to my garage and found the floor covered in white sheepskin fur. It looked very nice but I don't know how it got there.
Would someone care to analyse what it means please? 😮
Maybe your subconscious reckons everywhere else is clean enough, and that the only thing left to do is to take soap and a yard broom to the garage floor 🙂
"Golf clubs had been fuming about the delay in responding to their request for an exemption, fearful of fungal disease causing millions of dollars of damage to their courses."
Itching to get their fungicides out and give the greens a good drenching?
Many articles, public communications, news items etc are signalling this period allowing for no maintenance as the death knell for the game in this country. This may sound a bit over-dramatic, but I have seen at least one publication, by a supposedly world recognised body, that not mowing greens for a matter of weeks may result in the need for regrassing! Others are predicting wholesale destruction of greens and other surfaces as the result of disease.
This all sounds very ominous and the hyper connected world we exist in now means this message is spreading far and wide in record time.
It is true?
In a word, No! A lot of what is circulating in my view falls into the “fake news” category.
Announced yesterday:
Sports and Recreation Minister Grant Robertson said the government had allowed urgent maintenance to go ahead but only after new guidelines were issued. This will happen after Easter.
“The Government has agreed that urgent upkeep and maintenance of biological assets will be able to go ahead after the Easter Weekend,” Robertson said. “This includes non-plantation nurseries, stadia turf, and golf and bowling club turf maintenance.”
"… A lot of what is circulating in my view falls into the “fake news” category…"
The Herald peddles a lot of fake news these days, in between piously condemning fake news from sources it doesn't like. For example, take this headline:
One of these stories must be wrong. One of them is fake news. Since the Herald has from day one has allowed it's pages to be used to run a pack of lies from the likes of Hosking et al, I think their story is more likely to be rabble rousing bullshit that Stuffs.
They were certainly swarming up through the Lewis Pass yesterday towards Golden Bay, Nelson and the West Coast – eight campervans and house buses turned back by noon by Police outside Murchison and that was just the start. The Murchison supermarket and petrol station was heaving with people. Very unfair to a small community with no Covid-19 cases, so far, because we have all stuck to the rules.
My partner has been working from home, and is now going to take annual leave for a week, and return before the lockdown lifts. He has been talking with his employer about the changes to their workplace practices, but also about the impact Covid-19 will have on their clients and customers and what adaptations will be necessary in the post lockdown period in order to keep moving forward.
I have read the posts on TS about tourism and other industries, and think that there is a such a diversity of businesses within those industries that it is pointless to try and impose a blanket approach to dealing with the fallout. I'm of a mind to agree with weka, that tourism as it has been practiced in recent years, has not been the positive it has been portrayed. As our advertised attractions have been mostly natural, outdoor environmental experiences, we have gained vast numbers of tourists who can pay little to visit these places, whose impact is often having to be mitigated by local authorities and their residents – sometimes with a very small rating base. Some tourist businesses are thriving, but workers are often lower waged precarious workers.
As someone who worked in hospitality and customer service for quite a few years, those jobs – while providing you with income often put you in a position to experience both the best and the worst of people. I would also be confident in saying that younger females would also have more incidents of harassment to report, both from other staff members and the public.
There are more than a few that assume that payment for food, entertainment means that they are direct employers – rather than they are being delivered a service by workers. And that old chestnut, "The customer is always right" is often used to excuse bad behaviour.
While travelling many years ago in Greece, I remember looking around one of the highly touristed towns with signs out the front of cafes saying "Fish and Chips" and "Full English Breakfast" and wondering what the actual locals felt living in such a place where their culture was covered up by the catering to English tourism. It felt like such a loss, both for the tourists who didn't experience anything different, and for those who made a living to cater to such short-sighted tourism.
As for NZ, I don't know how well our tourism dollars are distributed amongst those who work in the industry. How many zero hours contracts, part-time workers or those not on the living wage? As the costs are socialised amongst ratepayers, and other members of the communities, we really need to have a good look at the business model of distribution before assuming that the amount of income is the only criteria to consider.
Providing for, or mitigating the effects of visitors is a cost often borne by local authorities and this can be at a cost to small bases of local ratepayers, who often see other essential infrastructure put on hold or deferred. As part of the attraction to NZ, is the natural environment the ability to retrieve costs from visitors is limited, while the damage done to those attractions and the surrounding environs is not. This socialisation of costs, while a small proportion of tourism operators and employees enjoy a good return, is a model that strains the state's provision of infrastructure and contributes towards long-term inequality.
So – how do we ensure that the return of employment in this – and other industries – creates environments where resilience is strengthened rather than a return to BAU?
I think we really need to investigate tax structures again, and implement some form of tax system that recognises the benefits of including the other bottom lines of environmental, social and community. These are the impacts of business that give local communities their resilience and value in their locale, and our country.
I'm enamoured with the B-Corporation impact assessment tool. Mostly, because it seems so very comprehensive, that even businesses that seem to be already including the three bottom line approach have only 60% of the total. How impactful would it be to have something similar for NZ, that includes points for climate change mitigation, reinvestment of profits into NZ, investment in employees, environmental and community impact – both positive and negative?
By changing business or corporate tax to reflect a scale that measures the positive impact of each business allows the government to support businesses that have built themselves up to practice sustainable models, by reducing their tax obligations. Businesses that follow the singular financial bottom line, with externalities on community and environment, will have to pay the top of the corporate tax rate.
This means that we don't have to pick and choose industries, or provide grants and incentives that only get accessed by a few. We would have a tax system that collects more from businesses that act without regard for others, while reducing the load on those that do – regardless of size or function.
I'd say licencing fees paid by 'local' businesses for intellectual property of 'completely separate and unrelated' companies based in Switzerland (not at all for tax reasons) would be paid out of after tax profits.
Sorry for the delay, the weather was just too good and the paint pail needed to be finished. Just got back inside.
(Housing needs to be taxed appropriately. That is a whole other discussion, and one that has been had before on TS. NZ needs to regard access to affordable, healthy homes as a necessary and basic building block to build a healthy and equitable society. Some methods of avoiding personal tax by the use of trusts etc needs to be looked at as well. GST is another tax that penalises the lower income and should be phased out. )
However, my suggestion was in terms of corporate or business tax. And I proposed a method of progressive taxation based on the rating of the business in lines of something like the B Corp assessment tool. Businesses that rated highly, would have a lower tax rate. Businesses that did not – and the ones most likely to have external costs that environment or society pays for – would pay a higher rate.
(Compliance and needs to assess and remain on point may be a sticking point, but if you are already running a business that considers these aspects, you will be recognised with a lower tax rate.)
Just got some COVID-19 anecdotes from infected rellies that further highlight why elimination is by far the best strategy. COVID-19 may cause long term breathing dysfunction beyond observed lung damage, with deaths possibly occurring long after apparent recovery.
But first, the caveats. This is from my nephew in France, who recently finished his medical training and has been doing his first few hospital stints. He says his personal observations are corroborated by his colleagues, but I had a quick look online and didn't find anything that even looks vaguely like a proper study. So at best it's an early heads-up of something that might be happening, but more likely just noise rather than signal.
He is currently still in recovery from COVID-19. His case would be called mild – ie like the worst case of flu most people ever experience, but he didn't get to the point of needing external breathing assistance (his mother's case is similar). He has noticed his normal reflex to draw breath has been significantly suppressed. This is shown most dramatically by exhaling as far as possible, then trying to not inhale again. Normally this gets very distressing very quickly. In his current COVID-recovering state, he is able to sit there completely calmly feeling no need to inhale, even while his measured CO2 levels are spiking and oxygen dropping. This is particularly concerning for stopping breathing while asleep, and he notes that simply dying while asleep appears to happening at an unusually high rate among COVID-recovering patients.
It's looking more and more likely that when the dust settles, our government's response will be held out as the best model for western liberal democracies. That Italy and other parts of Europe got hit much harder earlier so we had reports of how bad it could get certainly helped make restrictions here palatable.
American intelligence officers knew a new contagion was sweeping Wuhan in November but they couldn't get the message through to the top, according to ABC News.
Trump was asked about it during yesterdays presser.
He was extremely defensive claiming he knew nothing about it. Then he vilified the media outlet(s) who ran the story, as he always does.
Possibly his most deadly decision was to ignore the advice. Could one go so far as to say he is in part responsible for mass murder.
Edit… those currently setting up for the presser are wearing masks, that’s a first. I wonder if those speaking and reporting will be wearing masks today as well. Agent orange usually appears around 10am – 10.30am for a two hour rant and questions from the press.
The dodgy tory fox network is the only stream that has their chat open. Here’s the link if you are interested
Andre, " Gonna be interesting watching the reaction of the MAGAmorons as info like this trickles out. "
The sad thing is many of them will also put their fingers in their ears, preferring to defend their views rather than appear foolish, just like trump does.
Speaking of which I wonder if agent orange will be on time today.
Possibly his most deadly decision was to ignore the advice. Could one go so far as to say he is in part responsible for mass murder.
Indeed. Now answer me this, what massive political crisis was going down in the USA during Nov, Dec and Jan? Just when you say Trump should have been paying lots of attention to this new virus in China?
Win, Stupid, Weak, Loser(s), Fake News, Deep State, Political Correctness, The Swamp, Smart, Tough, Dangerous, Bad, Veterans, Amazing, Make America Great Again, Tremendous, Terrific, Military, Out of Control, Classy.
American intelligence officers knew a new contagion was sweeping Wuhan in November but they couldn’t get the message through to the top, according to ABC News
My initial reaction is to put that in the 'blame China' box of bullshit.
If covid 19 was 'sweeping' Wuhan in November, then the very first identified case of "unusual pneumonia" from Dec 8th is a lie, yes?
And the lock-down of Wuhan, instead of occurring about four weeks after the realisation that an epidemic was breaking out (Jan 23), would (according to that ABC report) have been some eight weeks or more after an outbreak was suspected.
Aside from the usual tell tale signs of bullshit (ie – unnamed "officials"), a look at the consequences for various countries going into lockdown at given time periods after initial cases have been detected, also points to the reporting being bullshit.
Bottom line – there is a lot of finger pointing going on by officials from countries that were slow off the mark. So, the WHO is to blame for their own levels of incompetence, and China is to blame for their own levels of complacency…
Legacy/mainstream/pop/corporate media (I wish I could settle on a descriptor for the arseholes) really needs to get its shit together and stop giving credence to garbage narratives and desperate propaganda.
I think 'everyone' can agree the US response has been woeful.
What I can't quite get is the free pass being given to political actors who are only interested in notching up points.
For example. The Wisconsin Primary was spun as an "evil Republicans" line, when the reality is that both the Democratic Party and Republican Party have been casually encouraging people to go out in the middle of a pandemic to vote.
And that ABC piece subtly plays on the "blame China" narrative to pivot and ultimately blame Trump and his admin for the situation in the US. While it's legitimate to point to the failures of the current Admin, are we to believe that a Democratic Party President would have been "on the ball" and protected the people of the US? That seems to be the implicit message of the piece.
Yet we've had Biden tweeting that people should get out and vote in spite of there being a pandemic, and we've had the DNC threatening states that might postpone primaries.
To my mind, the "red team/blue team" tribalism that degenerates so much political discussion and debate to the level of 'mindless slanging match', needs to be pinned down, doused and torched.
The "red team" and "blue team" are part and parcel of the same structural and political problem. That that gets overlooked and drowned out by those who noisily rush to cheer on their colour is to the detriment of us all and any understandings we might otherwise develop.
The whole political scene in Amercia is so 'up the creek without a paddle' that it was inevitable something was going to happen to the country which would drag it down to near subsistence level. It looks to me like the combination of a mad president and the pandemic is going to do just that.
Do I have any sympathy? Yes. I feel for the intelligent and sane among them, but the rest of them? Nah. not a bit. They are reaping what they sowed.
Your comment "red team" and "blue team" sums it up. They play their political games like teenage, blonde haired bimbos – complete with brightly coloured feather dusters (that's what I call them) – gyrating round a sports arena barracking for either the red team or the blue team – whichever colour takes your fancy.
The New Zealand government – together with that of Taiwan and Australia – will be entitled to bask in global glory once we decrease our lockdown status.
But as the unemployment lines grow fastest here because the economic hit is so deep and so savage, the longer term judgement will be:
Was the New Zealand public health response worth the deliberate economic damage?
"Was the New Zealand public health response worth the deliberate economic damage?"
Do you seriously wish to suggest that the economy wouldnt be in meltdown now without lockdown?….200,000 jobs in tourism alone and god knows how many riding on the associated increased activity…and then take away the wage subsidy and how does your economy look?
Its not either or and never was….time for some clear thought
That we would now be in economic freefall because of what's happening worldwide no matter what the government did and even if somehow the coronavirus had never made it here is a fact that some people are going to need to be reminded of over and over and over again. Because some people are going to try to pretend otherwise in order to undermine the government.
So even if there might have been a theoretical better response that might have had a tiny bit more economic activity in exchange for a slightly looser response with more resulting disease and death, the reality is the much more likely outcome of a looser response would have been vastly more disease and death in exchange for maybe just a tiny bit less economic pain. If we were lucky, that is, but probably more disease and death and more economic pain.
"Because some people are going to try to pretend otherwise in order to undermine the government."
Some definitely for that reason but many in desperation….its understandable but as said clarity of thought is what is required, fortunately we appear to have it at the top unlike many countries
Was the New Zealand public health response worth the unavoidable and inevitable economic damage?
FIFY
In any case, the Q as such doesn’t make logical sense because it is based on a false premise and is more of a rhetorical one, IMHO 😉
In addition, the Q should be asked, as is happening more and more, what will NZ do when we have eliminated the virus but whilst the rest of the World is still in utter disarray? You could call it the $64,000 Q in more than one way.
Alas, I couldn't edit my comment but was going to add that the meningococcal vaccine, MeNZB, which was rolled out in NZ in 2005 is a good example of large sums of taxpayers' money being wasted despite good intentions. Of course, time will tell whether NZ's response to Covid-19 falls into the same category.
According to some, the Government’s actions are pushing the country to the brink of economic destruction. And according to some, this is a too high a price to save a few lives of people who’d die (soon?) anyway. And according to some, those vulnerable people should be isolated for self-protection so that the rest of the country can return to normal and save the economy or what’s left of it and before it’s too late. According to some, we should follow Sweden’s approach to COVID-19. Irrespective of the validity of those arguments, this is not just wasting a few taxpayers’ dollars on a measly [pun] vaccine.
Irrespective of the validity of those arguments, this is not just wasting a few taxpayers’ dollars on a measly [pun] vaccine.
Well, $200 million isn't a few dollars and apparently was, at the time, the most expensive health programme ever introduced. But I agree that it pales in comparison to the economic cost of the virus.
I'm not convinced that we can afford to save lives at all costs – which seems to be the orthodoxy here. Lobby groups have argued that an increase to Pharmac's funding would save lives. Governments, not just the current one, haven't been persuaded. In other words, there has been, until now, a limit to how much money Government's have spent to save lives. Rolling out MeNZB was a departure from that position, and the current action seems to be a departure.
As I said, time will tell whether we over-reacted.
I disagree with you on multiple points, which is a good thing as it can hopefully stimulate healthy discussion (or not).
I'm not convinced that we can afford to save lives at all costs – which seems to be the orthodoxy here.
There’s no orthodoxy as such. There’s a plan and we, not just the Government, are executing it. It is crystal clear that we cannot “save lives at all costs” as there are already two deaths, sadly. The aim of the plan is, and has always been, AFAIK, to minimise deaths and minimise impact on the economy over the long run.
Lobby groups have argued that an increase to Pharmac's funding would save lives. Governments, not just the current one, haven't been persuaded.
This is a misleading comment IMO. Funding of PHARMAC has increased. Saving lives is not a linear function of funding; you can spend millions on one life-saving drug to save a relatively small (!) number of lives. It is about diminishing returns on relatively large increases in funding. We can never save all lives of cancer patients, for example, not even when we throw unlimited amounts of money, time, and effort at it because we are technically not capable of accomplishing this. There are always real and physical constraints to what we can and cannot control and/or achieve, which is why we have to debate these issues publically. Which is why have politics 😉
In other words, there has been, until now, a limit to how much money Government's have spent to save lives.
There is no given fixed limit as such, unless you can point me to one. As a society, we make a choice on how much to spend on saving lives based on political, economic, social, and moral considerations. If you like, you can divide total Government spending by the number of citizens to derive a crude number spent on each of our lives each year. These considerations slowly change over time in quality and quantity (weighting).
Rolling out MeNZB was a departure from that position, and the current action seems to be a departure.
Not quite. It is a relative shift but not an absolute one. Much of the economic pain would have been imposed on us anyway because of the global response to the pandemic. The ‘relaxed’ approach of Sweden does not seem to be paying off [pardon the pun].
As I said, time will tell whether we over-reacted.
Only to a point, and of limited use right now. We will never really know for sure what – if, we can speculate and direct blame (and guilt & penitence & punishment) …
Was the New Zealand public health response worth the deliberate economic damage?
There would likely have been far more so-called "Economic damage" without the lockdown.
A lot of businesses would have likely been affected by the loss of staff due to deaths and large numbers of those who survived with limited or no ability to continue in their jobs as before due to ongoing medical problems such as damaged lungs, failed or failing organs, and even some emotional problems due to the loss of close loved ones.
Saving as many people as possible makes it much easier to rebuild after this has blown over, than if these steps had not been taken.
Returning to a conversation from last week with mauī and weka, it seems the official advice of the NHS is to avoid ibuprofen, but to treat fevers – including that of Covid-19 – with paracetomol. I have seen this several times in the UK media. (NZ doesn't seem to have this advice.)
Wouldn't this interrupt the immune response to the virus?
(Note, every GP except the one I had 23-25 years ago, told me to treat any viral fever in my children with paracetamol.)
There really doesn't seem to be consensus on whether ibuprofen is harmful or not. The arguments against it seem based on theoretical considerations, rather than clinical observations.
There's a notable absence of anything claiming that ibuprofen has any particularly helpful effects for COVID-19 victims.
So if anyone is foolish enough to follow the reckons of a random dude on da webz over their doctor's advice, personally I'd probably just use paracetamol. Although ibuprofen works well for me in other situations, so I might give it a shot as well just for the placebo effect. If I were in the situation of suffering enough from COVID symptoms to fell the need for pharmaceutical relief, that is.
Well, just in case anyone is foolish enough to follow the reckons of a random dude on da webz over their doctor's advice, I thought I'd link to a NZ source, quoting from the WHO, and give them the opportunity to chase a more informed opinion.
"The television promotions for the various sporting codes – especially Rugby Union and Rugby League – feature a terrifying sequence of images glorifying brutal bodily contact, exaggerated aggressiveness, and exultation bordering on complete loss-of-control. What we see is what’s left of the human male when everything dignified, intelligent, creative and compassionate has been edited out of the masculine narrative.
These promos are made all the more frightful by the knowledge that they wouldn’t look that way if the punters wanted to see something else. Clearly, smearing the screen with testosterone is the best way of getting the boys to tune-in. It’s possible, of course, that the clips are assembled for the pleasure of the sporting codes’ female devotees. At least that would make a sort of – equally troubling! – sense. In the end, however, these gloriously kinetic visual packages are all about reaffirming and celebrating a particular kind of masculinity. They present the human male as a dangerous, uncompromising and predatory bundle of muscle."
Great phalanxes of talented athletic men (and increasingly women) have left New Zealand for Australia, France, Canada, US and UK to get rich when they would otherwise have just caused trouble back here. Most will be getting paid high six figure salaries for about 5-8 years, then get out through injury.
International sport has been our quiet working class revolution for two decades. You can name the schools who will never generate Nobel Prize winners but who can generate international stars. Kelston Boys High. Marist. Penrose. They are islander and Maori dominated, and they got out.
Chris just sounds old his soul.
Unlike those sporting career-people, he lost his testosterone years ago and it shows,
Like "saturation" divers. They don't earn more than anyone else, just earn it faster?
Always considered the "intellectual lefts" dislike of popular culture, such as sports, a spectacular own goal. An artefact of "Opiate for the masses", maybe?
I'm not a sports watcher myself. Even watching the ones I enjoy doing, is boring. Didn’t do well in ball sports at school either. Preferred reading books or going sailing. But I grew out of it.
However it gives pleasure to a huge number of people and a living to many others, often from minorities.
Kilikati is as far from Trotters characterisation as you can get.
There are ignorant Neanderthal sports people, just like anywhere else, Mark Richards. There are also the John Kirwans, and all the Māori and Pacifica youth who’ve, built the discipline and responsibility learned in sport into future careers.
I wonder how much of that is a perception from "intellectuals" themselves, thinking they are not getting the respect from the "plebs" they deserve, rather than reality.
My father, an ex Teacher, and a real "intellectual" himself, has no time for the out of touch University Professors, who he says have inflicted on New Zealand schools a " decades long experiment".
I don’t have time for anyone who’s wilfully and knowingly ‘out of touch’ and flaunts it, wears it like a badge of honour (bumper sticker), and brags about it. This applies across the board.
Far from Trotters characterisation of lockdown flouters as Neanderthal, sports loving Waitakere man, it seems the largest number of rule flouters, and deliberate breakers of the lockdown, are well off beach mansion owners, sneaking out for a holiday under cover of darkness.
Increasing the chances of spreading the virus from their Auckland supermarket, to small holiday towns.
KJT, your characterisation of Trotter's man as a Neanderthal Waitakere man is less than just to his article.
I believe his defining of the characteristics of the rule-flouting, aggressive, ungentlemanly, quick to insult and be violent men who are the subject of his article can also be found in the well-off beach mansion crowd, amongst businessmen and workers, amongst the educated and the illiterate, the powerful and the powerless.
The causes are complex and beyond my present comprehension.
I have sent this article to an old friend and mentor who is a psychologist who worked with youth offenders in the States. I will be interested in his comments, but I bet he will mention fathers, being bullied, abuse and lack of spiritual dimension in the man's life.
Mmmm – some of the kindest most thoughtful young men I know are those who have been vrought up by solo mothers and that includes my two. They also both enjoy sport in fact one is a physed teacher
I agree. Trotter characterises 2 sides of the same masculinity coin (and there are other kinds of masculinity).
But Trotter favours the masculinity of the upperclass British imperialist colonisers. Many of them also did not have such a great record with abusive treatment of women and others with little power, away from the public or official gaze, behind closed doors, etc.
As well as those sneaking off to their holiday homes, are the boaties ignoring polite requests to stay away from Great Barrier Island, draining needed resources from locals, and potentially spreading C-19 there. Irresponsible, selfish, "idiots" all of them.
I like watching men's and women's rugby when it's available on freeview. I record and fast forward through promos (the focus of Trotter's post), pre-match gossip, profiles and chatter, and switch off before the prize giving ceremonies.
Many of the male commentators do present a kind of cheer-leading of macho qualities during men's matches, which I'm not keen on. I've always found some of their language a bit iffy – praising big strong men as "prime beef", and "a big unit" – animal and machine?
You read in so much British writing, the assumption that a tidy house, is a marker of character.
Or in my experience. British Captains judging an officer, on his ability to keep his uniform tidy and smart, and get the flag up at sunrise, on the dot. Never mind if he was bloody useless at anything else.
Na, the bach lot are pretty much the same people, just maybe a bit older and more affluent. The part of society Trotter is describing has always been here, but morphs slightly with each generation. Their whole world is all about 'ME'
To be fair to Chris – dissing sporting culture isn't really at the point of his piece. I think what he is doing is saying that a more rounded form of masculinity might result in fewer cases of idiotic, entitled, lockdown-breaking – and that's across all social classes.
That seems like a reasonable idea to explore at least. But it does lead him into some shallow stereotyping, including of sportspeople. This tends to happen with Chris when the over-fluent language-generating part of his brain overwhelms the editing part. He's a good writer, but at his worst when that happens.
I reckon if one was to take him aside and point out that catholicity of taste, interest and talent is a much truer marker of sophistication than narrow intellectualism – he'd agree with you. Think Sir Philip Sidney – capable both of fighting the Spanish and dashing off a sonnet.
Central hypo ventilation syndrome is when carbon dioxide increases and oxygen decreases. There is a late adult onset which can be deadly during a general anaesethic or with a virus affecting the lungs. A mutation of the PHOX2B gene is usually found in this rear condition.
Reply to Andre @ 4.
There is a considerable family history on my ex husbands side of this.
I would be interested in knowing how many deaths from Covid-19 carry the PHOX2B gene. As well the level of acidosis in people on a ventilator. It is my understanding that organ failure is strongly linked to acidosis.
I noted that immediately after my one operation, that the nurse stood beside me and told me to breathe more deeply because her meter showed my oxygen levels drooping. I assumed that the anaesthetic residue had to be purged.
It could be organ failure but this doesn’t quite explain the loss of the breathing reflex. It is possible that COVID-19 also causes neurological damage to nerves and/or parts of the brain involved in the breathing reflex. If I were a recovering patient, I’d stay off the alcohol for a while, especially in the evening/night 😉
I do not have a clinical or a scientific background. I have learnt a lot through dealing with the health system in the last 20 years, more so in the last 5 years.
What you raise about the consumption of alcohol needs to be taken on board. This could be a factor in a higher death rate in the elderly.
During the 1918 influenza epidemic it was suggested to have a whiskey to ward off catching influenza or to cure the flu.
Fascinating thread. Some ten years ago whilst neutropenic due to chemo for leukemia,the worst happened and my man caught a bug which resulted in a chest infection. Poor isolation rule enforcement on the ward.
For C4/5 tetraplegic this could be fatal. Anyway…himself can cough a little, but unfortunately his efforts triggered some kind of chest wall muscle spasm. Result, atrial fibrillation and his autonomic breathing mechanism folded. At the height of the struggle the nurse and I got him to totally engage with his breathing…"in, two three four, out two three four "
…and this he had to keep up consciously for the next three days and nights. Piped oxygen actually made things worse . Peter recalls now that he pushed the mask away…it simply wasn't helping. Somewhere we read that if the oxygen from the pipe is too high the the body thinks it has enough already.
To sleep I managed to position him semi upright and slightly on his side so he could doze a little. Too high or too low and he had to again concentrate 100% inhale, 100% exhale.
He was not offered CPAP or BIPAP but we did do periodic saline nebulizers. It took a good three days for his autonomic breathing system to 'come right', but even today, if he is doing something requiring effort and concentration(like reeling in a largish fish) he has to 'remember' to breathe.
Funnily enough we have been practicing our breathing over the past few weeks…especially when he was in hospital and hooked up to the oxygen saturation monitor.
Having to post this link as a reply to earlier comment, as the system ate my previous words when I tried to do two links in one post. Typing on a mobile phone is trickier, but at least you can pace and keep an eye on kids while doing so.
Would cut and paste quotes from linked piece, but mobile – so; sorry, I am not going to.
If you want to keep trolling commenting here than I suggest you make your contributions more constructive. I’m more than happy if people point out errors of fact and correct these. You failed on both counts. To self-correct, the drug name should end with “mab”, not “ab” as I said earlier.
Frankly your continued accusation of trolling to anyone who disagrees with you is tedious.
Your are correct in stating that the generic nomenclature ending in 'mab' signifies a monoclonal antibody it is usually expensive when still under patent but pricing often falls dramatically when patents expire.
You don’t seem to understand that it is (your) behaviour that I label as trolling, not the fact that someone (you) disagrees with me. It is common among trolls to misunderstand this difference, which is why they usually continue with their behaviour and cop a ban. Frankly, it is tedious.
It is common for any drug that comes off patent to become available at cheaper price. However, this is relative and depends on demand, effectiveness, and disease type (e.g. so-called life-saving drugs do demand a premium – Yay for the free market). In addition, companies have many ways to extend their patents. It is much harder to make a generic of a biologic than of a synthetic drug, which further adds to the price. My comment still stands, mAbs are expensive irrespective of whether they are on patent or generics.
Clearly you have an issue with me Incognito – that is your problem if you’re determined to ban me on some made up pretext please feel free
(e.g. so-called life-saving drugs do demand a premium – Yay for the free market).
Often this is the case but there are many notable exceptions, insulin is a life saving drug but is very cheap in NZ in comparison to example the newer anti cancer compounds which are often 'life prolongers'.
Many of the very simple cardiovascular medications which could be considered life savers fo certain groups are extraordinarily cheap both before paint expires and after patent expires in comparison to many non life saving medications.
It is much harder to make a generic of a biologic than of a synthetic drug, which further adds to the price.
This is a reasonable assumption for simple pressed API immediate release tablets but is often not the case for complex release oral products or long acting injectable medicines.
My comment still stands, mAbs are expensive irrespective of whether they are on patent or generics.
In some case yes in some cases no – for example Rituximab which is now generic @ around $300 per month is pretty reasonable – all depends what you are comparing it to.
Let’s start with the constructive part of your comment, which was pleasingly well-informed, thank you.
Indeed, insulin is cheaper than, for example, some of the latest cancer immune therapy drugs that have recently come on the market. Of course, insulin has been around for yonks so this comparison is not entirely fair. In addition, for a proportion of cancer patients, these drugs are not just ‘life prolongers’ but potential life savers leading to complete responses.
Yes, you’re correct that I was only referring to the manufacture of the API, thanks.
In the case of Rituximab, the generic is indeed considerably cheaper than the original but still expensive IMO, thank you.
I think none of this is inconsistent with what I said:
However, this is relative and depends on demand, effectiveness, and disease type (e.g. so-called life-saving drugs do demand a premium – Yay for the free market). [with emphasis this time]
Now, for the first part of your comment, there is no pretext for banning you; you’re seeing or making an issue out of either something that isn’t there or mixing up things. The only issue I have, more with some than with others, is their online behaviour here on TS. It is not personal – I don’t know any of the commenters here from a bar of soap nor do I take things personal, unless they make personal insults to others or me.
I focus on behaviours that may have a negative influence on overall commentary here and/or create a bad environment that’s not conducive to what we like to achieve on this site. On the other hand, I don’t go around praising every single comment that falls on the other positive side of the ledger. This is why you usually see me taking issue with something (not somebody) when you see a comment of mine. Does this make sense?
Is the US economy about to take a nose drive into hard concrete? maybe so, as it looks like the Republican/Democratic bullshit bail out is not going to save them..
Bailing Out the Bailout
It will take years to sort through the details, but Trump’s $2 trillion COVID-19 response looks like a double-down on the last disaster
The corporate component of that bailout is US$400 billion +, that the Fed can leverage to US$4 trillion +.
In other words, there will be a happy cohort of disaster capitalists making hay on various short selling or whatev's, also buying swathes of strategic assets at fire sale prices, precisely because of unprecedented levels of unemployment, bankruptcy and business failure.
Is this reactivating behind Singapore's second wave?
The coronavirus may be “reactivating” in people who have been cured of the illness, according to Korea’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
About 51 patients classed as having been cured in South Korea have tested positive again, the CDC said in a briefing on Monday. Rather than being infected again, the virus may have been reactivated in these people, given they tested positive again shortly after being released from quarantine, said Jeong Eun-kyeong, director-general of the Korean CDC.
[…]
Fear of re-infection in recovered patients is also growing in China, where the virus first emerged last December, after reports that some tested positive again — and even died from the disease — after supposedly recovering and leaving hospital. There’s little understanding of why this happens, although some believe that the problem may lie in inconsistencies in test results.
One hypothesis could be that the immune system is primed after the first infection and goes in full overdrive upon the second infection. This could lead to the immune system attacking the infected tissue (cytokine storm) with greater ferocity and with fatal consequences. In the past, this has been a problem with developing vaccines against certain diseases. The immune system is a complex beast.
Amanda Marcotte takes a look at Tinyfingers Twittertwat's attempts to rile up Berners in the wake of Bernie conceding the obvious and dropping out. Gonna be interesting watching how much traction the convergence moonbats that are more interested in sticking it to the libs and Dems than achieving actual progress get this time around compared to last time.
I get it that apparently the media you consume mirrors the all-consuming hatred you feel of anyone that might be cognitively adaptable enough to win election and actually achieve some progressive goals, so you never get spoon-fed any of the real differences between the realistic choices. To help you out, here's just a few bullet points.
Biden wants to expand healthcare coverage to more people and lower costs to consumers. Tyrannosaurus Arse wants to take away coverage from poor people so he can put more money into his pockets.
Biden accepts climate change science and wants to make changes to reduce climate change. Dayglo Swampzilla wants to help his fossil fuel robberbaron friends to continue polluting the world for as long as possible to put more money into their pockets.
Biden's interests in foreign policy include considering how to improve the lives of people in foreign countries (even when that concern leads him into decisions with disastrous unintended consequences). Twitterfinger J. Putinpussy's interests in foreign policy don't extend any further than where he can put his name on hotels to put more money in his own pockets and his friends.
Biden generally supports worker's rights, even if that support is feeble and patchy. The Fifth Avenue Fraud wants to strip worker protections and suppress wages, in order to put more money into his own pockets.
Biden supports protecting natural areas and strengthening parks. America's Prolapsed Rectum just wants to shit all over them so his friends can extract more of the common wealth to put in their own pockets.
That's just a tiny portion of the differences. You're welcome. But it would be really helpful if you could suppress just a tiny bit of your motivated reasoning and broaden your information sources to include at least a few that are grounded in reality.
Yeah. That one thing is sufficient to explain why all the Repugs slurped down a load of Drano to dissolve their spines once it became clear in 2016 the genital-grabbing golem was going to win the nomination.
I read and listen to and read—not "consume"— all kinds of media. I read widely, and skeptically always. You are trying to portray me as something I'm not. You don't "get it" at all.
Biden's interests in foreign policy include considering how to improve the lives of people in foreign countries (even when that concern leads him into decisions with disastrous unintended consequences).
"Unintended consequences". That's a good way to explain away his support for the destruction of Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Palestine (to name just a few) in order to “improve the lives of people in foreign countries".
Putinpussy
We get it. You've swallowed the Russiagate Kool-Aid. How did that Mueller Inquiry go?
So Joe Spidern 'supports' 'generally supports' 'accepts' and he 'wants to'.
Hilarious.
BYW isn't there a website that gives clever, amusing nicknames for Biden? You could use that too.
Why is it a given the opposing candidate of the Murican Mugabe must not be a toady, a sycophant, and dripping in obsequiousness.
The DNC have selected Biden as their sacrificial old ewe and he will make a complete fool of himself in any debate with Thump. If they'd wanted the orangutan out they would have made sure Sanders got the nomination.
If Bernie had made it to the Oval Office, I would have found it fascinating to watch the reaction of Bernie cultists as Bernie dealt with the choice of either achieving nothing whatsoever, or succumbing to having to make the same shitty compromises that everyone else in the position has to make.
"Bernie cultists"? So the millions of people who supported him are a cult? Were they controlled by Russian masterminds like Trump was? Do they drink a kind of vodka-laced Kool-Aid?
Luckily for the rest of humanity there are sane, rational people like you and Keith Olbermann to keep watch over those cultists.
Not all Bernie's supporters are cultists. It seems only around 15% are.
The remaining huge majority of his supporters are capable of maturely swallowing their disappointment that their first choice wasn't the choice of the majority, and go on to support the next best choice to achieve progress towards what is important to them.
If the left/progressives, those who saw Bernie Sanders as a political compromise, get their shit together and bring the streets to bear on Biden's campaign/platform, then they'll possibly achieve a lot of progress.
That said, I suspect a fair few will simply walk away from US representative politics in disgust.
Truth be told, Sanders not being President could turn out to be the best thing that happened to Progressive politics in the US in terms of achieving real world results.
But for that to happen, Biden would have to be President, and well….
I'll assume that US$100 million worth of effort is contingent on him coming to the party.
The more I think about it, the more I'm thinking the DNC might have fucked up. They could have stymied a Sanders White House in a dozen different ways to Sunday. That, and Sander's support base would likely have pulled its collective punches if and when it came to holding his feet to the fire.
But with Biden…
Sanders just has to tread a line, and avoid going out there and overtly promoting any of Biden's problematic policies during a Presidential campaign.
I just went for a walk here in Blenheim. What fascinates me is the silence. Sunny calm day, very few cars, some family bikers and walkers and the deep quiet. I can hear a lawn mower about a block away and the monarch caterpillars chomping away on their leaves. I know everywhere must be quiet but this is amazing! And very pleasant.
Yes. I love the quiet. Was just on my balcony listening to the birds chatter in a tree nearby.
When the lock down ends, I guess the neighbours will have the guys back with the machines, building their half-finished rock wall – hope they finish it quickly. Plus other neighbours in houses and flats recently sold doing some upgrades.
We used to get a lot of dog walkers down our quiet street, but curiously, there's been few walkers since lock down – mostly only people in our street. It maybe that many of the dog walkers were using a narrow walkway from another, busier street to cut through to our street. But, the walkway is too narrow to allow people going in opposite directions and maintain the 2 meter distance….?
Thanks Joe. I wonder if Romans are pleased to not have tourists pounding the streets? I saw one ambulance two cars and one police car. It makes the city more beautiful but without people it is dreadfully like one of those apocalypse movies. Shudders.
Yes, Ian, I hear the same silence! My neighbours talking on their patio, two magpies 100 metres away, twittering small birds, and a monarch fluttered by but I can't claim to have heard it! I see no traffic on SH1 and hear no grape harvesters. The vineyard guns are silent.
Will our lives change because of this experience and how we live the rest of our lives? My wife stays at home every night of the week rather than three nights out. Me the same. We eat better, and more interestingly. Homegrown figs, home cooked oat biscuits, ciabatta buns and oven-roasted beetroot and quinces.
I read that our dreams are more vivid and will affect our imagination more.
I have been phoning Grey Power members who are over 70 and who have no e-mail to be contacted by. They all sounded well and happy, looked after by family and friends. Their biggest concern was how to pay their sub without using KiwiBank cheques.
I just wondered whether these wiser old folks, off-line and away from false news and scare-mongering, haven't got a deeper handle on what is worthwhile in living a good life.
We had 3 caterpillars, the first in years on our swan plant. I covered them with netting till they were fat then brought them inside to sit on the table with a few branches of swan plant as take-aways. I am sure I heard them munching. One took offence at being inside and did a runner. Next morning it turned up on my armchair. I put it back on the table so ungrateful little sod took off again. So I returned it back to the mother plant outside but now cannot find it.
Some bird with a fuller puku, or maybe it's the one that did a fly-by here……..
Just been singing a song by James Taylor on the patio as the sun goes down. The words go, "Well the sun is slowly sinking down, and the moon is slowly on the rise . So this old world must still be spinning around. And I still love you." This to my partner who's been in my bubble for coming up 44 years!
"the monarch caterpillars chomping away on their leaves"
Now that is truly impressive. I assume your hearing was good enough to hear that Holden that started up in Nelson at 5.27pm. Was it a 6 or an 8 cylinder? I heard it from over here in Wellington but my hearing isn't nearly as good as yours seems to be.
Year ago when I was in security I was about to call for backup until the "prowler" in the bushes came scurrying out, about 5.5ft shorter than I expected. Narrowly escaped months of workplace ribbing for that one lol
Around here it is the paper wasps still chomping away on the Monarch caterpillars. They used to stop looking for food around this time, but there now appears to be a new, slightly different type.. Bad news for the Monarchs. Nice weather otherwise.
I really wish I hadn't read that. Monarch Butterflies are so beautiful and wasps so dreadful. I really would prefer to think that every Monarch caterpillar turned into a butterfly than to think of them being eaten up by bloody wasps.
I don't think how nice lambs are when I eat a lamb roast of course.
A pitiless yet hilarious dissection of the likes of Bari Weiss, Amanda Marcotte, David Brooks
On his light chat show, Jim Mora used to regularly quote the right wing New York Times opinionist David Brooks whenever he needed something, however intellectually threadbare, to provide some heft for his own complacent and reactionary views.
There's some very funny and astute analysis of Amanda Marcotte's hopeless New York Times colleagues, esp. David Brooks, from the 51:00 mark….
The old scam e-mail from the LinkedIn breach turned up in my inbox today. The "we know your password, we've hacked your webcam and have vids of you watching porn, pay us bitcoin" one. As it happens, I logged in to LinkedIn for the first time in quite a while a couple of weeks ago. I checked and HIBP sez my email and password were included in the breach.
Is this just coincidence, or does this suggest the scammers still have malware planted on LinkedIn that lets them see LinkedIn's traffic?
"After brief deliberation, the Taxpayers' Union board determined the welfare of our employees to be a more pressing immediate concern than ideological purity."
Why can't the Taxdodger's Union both stick to their "ideological purity", and look after the welfare of their employees?
They could do this by making the offer to pay back the $60,000 wage subsidy they have bludged from the government.
It will be interesting to see who claims the subsidy – there'll certainly be more than just this mob who are dubious recipients of the governments largesse on behalf of the public.
The ideological purity lost out to pragmatism with the tax payers union. It is similar to discussions with fundamentalist bible expounders. Funny how biblical injunctions not to eat pork, or eat leavened bread at Passover, or eat shellfish have been overridden.
We understand with modern science why we can eat these foods safely.
These right wing purists just came up against new circumstances which made an ass of dogma. Good on them for altering their views. I just hope that they will understand that inflexible thinking and ideology lead to dead ends.
That welfarism, social cohesiveness, and even taxation can be creative, life-sustaining, and beneficial.
Donald Trump paused his efforts around the growing coronavirus crisis to sign an executive order clearing the path for US to mine the moon for resources.
According to documents released by the White House, the order rejects the 1979 global agreement known as the Moon Treaty which says any activity in space should conform with international law.
"Americans should have the right to engage in commercial exploration, recovery, and use of resources in outer space," the order states.
Any planet /moon or asteroid should be split by giving countries the exact % of surface area as they have on earth ,in the same area as their country. It would save a lot of agro if we get that far .
This wouldnt stop non spacefaring nations from getting a share of the goodies they could just sell mining rights to their chunk.
The Transportation Security Administration screened 94,931 people on Wednesday, a drop of 96% from a year ago and the second straight day under 100,000.
Historical daily numbers only go back so far, but the nation last averaged fewer than 100,000 passengers a day in 1954, according to figures from trade group Airlines for America.
I apologize for misleading people on this site. I am now convinced the data errors around Covid-19 are completely flawed and apparently meant to deliberately mislead.
While I do not doubt some people are harmed, this is not even remotely close to the level that was projected. We do not need a vaccine, nor do we need to continually monitor our borders. Maintaining a reasonable health standard + the odd vitamin boost if we feel unwell should do it.
Here are a couple of many articles I have found that support this.
But the most damming is the evidence on the ground. I point to the videos put out by Crowdsource The Truth/Jason Goodman from NYC. At first I thought this guy is arrogant and crazy, but it turned out he was just being skeptical and for good reason. The claims in the media that NYC is death central are obviously bullshit. You can't watch this guys videos and draw any other conclusion.
Then there are the photos used for different stories, in different countries. Same photo. A number of examples of this can be found.
We have all been duped.
If someone tells you that you or your family must have a Covid-19 vaccine for their own safety and that of the public tell them to go fuck themselves.
"It is in fact more likely that the coronavirus death toll is much higher than the official figures suggest, rather than it being inflated. The CDC has acknowledged its count is an “underestimation” because it only tallies cases where Covid-19 has been confirmed in a laboratory test.
Epidemiologists say a widespread lack of initial testing in the US means many people died without being counted, while even now some people who die at home or in nursing homes are not being tested for the virus.
In New York City, more than 200 people are dying at home each day during the pandemic, according to city officials, a very much higher rate than usual. Bill de Blasio, New York City’s mayor, has estimated that about 100 to 200 people a day who die at home in the city are not being included in the official virus death count. But the federal government insists the overall figures are largely accurate."
After a hiatus of over four months Selwyn Manning and I finally got it together to re-start the “A View from Afar” podcast series. We shall see how we go but aim to do 2 episodes per month if possible. … Continue reading → ...
In 2008, the UK Parliament passed the Climate Change Act 2008. The law established a system of targets, budgets, and plans, with inbuilt accountability mechanisms; the aim was to break the cycle of empty promises and replace it with actual progress towards emissions reduction. The law was passed with near-universal ...
Buzz from the Beehive Local Water Done Well – let’s be blunt – is a silly name, but the first big initiative to put it into practice has gone done well. This success is reflected in the headline on an RNZ report:District mayors welcome Auckland’s new water deal with ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate ConnectionsA farmworker cleans the solar panels of a solar water pump in the village of Jagadhri, Haryana Country, India. (Photo credit: Prashanth Vishwanathan/ IWMI) Decisions made in India over the next few years will play a key role in global ...
Lindsay Mitchell writes – The Children’s Minister, Karen Chhour, intends to repeal Section 7AA from the Oranga Tamariki Act 1989 because it creates conflict between claimed Crown Treaty obligations and the child’s best interests. In her words, “Oranga Tamariki’s governing principles and its act should be colour ...
Geoffrey Miller writes – The gloves are off. That might seem to be the undertone of surprisingly tough talk from New Zealand’s foreign and trade ministers. Winston Peters, the foreign minister, may be facing legal action after making allegations about former Australian foreign minister Bob Carr on Radio New Zealand. ...
Brian Easton writes – This is about the time that the Treasury will be locking up its economic forecasts to be published in the 2024 Budget Economic and Fiscal Update (BEFU) on budget day, 30 May. I am not privy to what they will be (I will report on them ...
TL;DR:Winston Peters is reported to have won a budget increase for MFAT. David Seymour wanted his Ministry of Regulation to be three times bigger than the Productivity Commission. Simeon Brown is appointing a Crown Monitor to Watercare to protect the Claytons Crown Guarantee he had to give ratings agencies ...
The gloves are off. That might seem to be the undertone of surprisingly tough talk from New Zealand’s foreign and trade ministers. Winston Peters, the foreign minister, may be facing legal action after making allegations about former Australian foreign minister Bob Carr on Radio New Zealand. Carr had made highly ...
I could be a florist'Round the corner from Rye LaneI'll be giving daisies to craziesBut, baby, I'll wrap you up real safe Oh, I can give you flowers At the end of every dayFor the center of your table, a rainbowIn case you have people 'round to stay Depending on ...
TL;DR: The six key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to May 12 include:PM Christopher Luxon is scheduled to hold a post-Cabinet news conference at 4 pm today. Finance Minister Nicola Willis will give a pre-budget speech on Thursday.Parliament sits from Question Time at 2pm on ...
The price of the foreign affairs “reset” is now becoming apparent, with Defence set to get a funding boost in the Budget. Finance Minister Nicola Willis has confirmed that it will be one of the few votes, apart from Health and Education and possibly Police, which will get an increase ...
A listing of 26 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, April 28, 2024 thru Sat, May 4, 2024. Story of the week "It’s straight out of Big Tobacco’s playbook. In fact, research by John Cook and his colleagues ...
Yesterday I received come lovely feedback following my Star Wars themed newsletter. A few people mentioned they’d enjoyed reading the personal part at the beginning.I often begin newsletters with some memories, or general thoughts, before commencing the main topic. This hopefully sets the mood and provides some context in which ...
April 30 was going to be the day we’d be calling Mum from London to wish her a happy birthday. Then it became the day we would be going to St. Paul's at Evensong to remember her. The aim of the cathedral builders was to find a way to make their ...
Rob MacCulloch writes – Can’t remember the last book by a Kiwi author you read? Think the NZ government should spend less on the arts in favor of helping the homeless? If so, as far as Newsroom is concerned, you probably deserve to be called a cultural ignoramus ...
Eric Crampton writes – Grudges are bad. Better to move on. But it can be fun to keep a couple of really trivial ones, so you’re not tempted to have other ones. For example, because of the rootkit fiasco of 2005, no Sony products in our household. ...
A new report warns an estimated third of the adult population have unmet need for health care.Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāHere’s the six key things I learned about Aotaroa’s political economy this week around housing, climate and poverty:Politics - Three opinion polls confirmed support for PM Christopher Luxon ...
Today is May the fourth. Which was just a regular day when my mother took me to see the newly released Star Wars at the Odeon in Rotorua. The queue was right around the corner. Some years later this day became known as Star Wars Day, the date being a ...
Buzz from the Beehive Much more media attention is being paid to something Winston Peters said about former Australian Foreign Minister Bob Carr than to a speech he delivered to the New Zealand China Council. One word is missing from the speech: AUKUS. But AUKUS loomed large in his considerations ...
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The annual list of who's been bribing our politicians is out, and journalists will no doubt be poring over it to find the juiciest and dirtiest bribes. The government's fast-track invite list is likely to be a particular focus, and we already know of one company on the list which ...
In the weeks after the October 7 Hamas attacks on Southern Israel I wrote about the possible 2nd, 3rd and even 4th order effects of the conflict. These included new fronts being opened in the West Bank (with Hamas), Golan … Continue reading → ...
Peter Dunne writes – It is one of the oldest truisms that there is never a good time for MPs to get a pay rise. This week’s announcement of pay raises of around 2.8% backdated to last October could hardly have come at a worse time, with the ...
David Farrar writes – Newshub reports: Newshub can reveal a fresh allegation of intimidation against Green MP Julie-Anne Genter. Genter is subject to a disciplinary process for aggressively waving a book in the face of National Minister Matt Doocey in the House – but it’s not the first time ...
The Treasury has published a paper today on the global productivity slowdown and how it is playing out in New Zealand: The productivity slowdown: implications for the Treasury’s forecasts and projections. The Treasury Paper examines recent trends in productivity and the potential drivers of the slowdown. Productivity for the whole economy ...
Winston Peters’ comments about former Australian foreign minister look set to be an ongoing headache for both him and Luxon. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for subscribers features co-hosts and , along with regular guests on Gaza and ...
These puppet strings don't pull themselvesYou're thinking thoughts from someone elseHow much time do you think you have?Are you prepared for what comes next?The debating chamber can be a trying place for an opposition MP. What with the person in charge, the speaker, typically being an MP from the governing ...
The land around Lyme Regis, where Meryl Streep once stood, in a hood, on the Cobb, is falling into the sea.MerylThe land around Lyme Regis, around the Cobb that made it rich, has always been falling slowly but surely into the sea. Read more ...
Buzz from the Beehive Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters was bound to win headlines when he set out his thinking about AUKUS in his speech to the New Zealand Institute of International Affairs. The headlines became bigger when – during an interview on RNZ’s Morning Report today – he criticised ...
The Post reports on how the government is refusing to release its advice on its corrupt Muldoonist fast-track law, instead using the "soon to be publicly available" refusal ground to hide it until after select committee submissions on the bill have closed. Fast-track Minister Chris Bishop's excuse? “It's not ...
As pressure on it grows, the livestock industry’s approach to the transition to Net Zero is increasingly being compared to that of fossil fuel interests. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / Getty ImagesTL;DR: Here’s the top five news items of note in climate news for Aotearoa-NZ this week, and a discussion above ...
The New Zealand Herald reports – Stats NZ has offered a voluntary redundancy scheme to all of its workers as a way to give staff some control over their “future” amidst widespread job losses in the public sector. In an update to staff this morning, seen by the Herald, Statistics New Zealand ...
On Werewolf/Scoop, I usually do two long form political columns a week. From now on, there will be an extra column each week about music and movies. But first, some late-breaking political events:The rise in unemployment numbers for the March quarter was bigger than expected – and especially sharp ...
David Farrar writes – The Herald reports: TVNZ says it is dealing with about 50 formal complaints over its coverage of the latest 1News-Verian political poll, with some viewers – as well as the Prime Minister and a former senior Labour MP – critical of the tone of the 6pm report. ...
Muriel Newman writes – When Meridian Energy was seeking resource consents for a West Coast hydro dam proposal in 2010, local Maori “strenuously” objected, claiming their mana was inextricably linked to ‘their’ river and could be damaged. After receiving a financial payment from the company, however, the Ngai Tahu ...
Alwyn Poole writes – “An SEP,’ he said, ‘is something that we can’t see, or don’t see, or our brain doesn’t let us see, because we think that it’s somebody else’s problem. That’s what SEP means. Somebody Else’s Problem. The brain just edits it out, it’s like a ...
Our trust in our political institutions is fast eroding, according to a Maxim Institute discussion paper, Shaky Foundations: Why our democracy needs trust. The paper – released today – raises concerns about declining trust in New Zealand’s political institutions and democratic processes, and the role that the overuse of Parliamentary urgency ...
This article was prepared for publication yesterday. More ministerial announcements have been posted on the government’s official website since it was written. We will report on these later today …. Buzz from the BeehiveThere we were, thinking the environment is in trouble, when along came Jones. Shane Jones. ...
New Zealand now has the fourth most depressed construction sector in the world behind China, Qatar and Hong Kong. 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 economy at 8:46am on Thursday, May 2:The Lead: ...
Hi,I am just going to state something very obvious: American police are fucking crazy.That was a photo gracing the New York Times this morning, showing New York City police “entering Columbia University last night after receiving a request from the school.”Apparently in America, protesting the deaths of tens of thousands ...
Winston Peters’ much anticipated foreign policy speech last night was a work of two halves. Much of it was a standard “boilerplate” Foreign Ministry overview of the state of the world. There was some hardening up of rhetoric with talk of “benign” becoming “malign” and old truths giving way to ...
Graham Adams assesses the fallout of the Cass Review — The press release last Thursday from the UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls didn’t make the mainstream news in New Zealand but it really should have. The startling title of Reem Alsalem’s statement — “Implementation of ‘Cass ...
This open-for-business, under-new-management cliché-pockmarked government of Christopher Luxon is not the thing of beauty he imagines it to be. It is not the powerful expression of the will of the people that he asserts it to be. It is not a soaring eagle, it is a malodorous vulture. This newest poll should make ...
The latest labour market statistics, showing a rise in unemployment. There are now 134,000 unemployed - 14,000 more than when the National government took office. Which is I guess what happens when the Reserve Bank causes a recession in an effort to Keep Wages Low. The previous government saw a ...
Three opinion polls have been released in the last two days, all showing that the new government is failing to hold their popular support. The usual honeymoon experienced during the first year of a first term government is entirely absent. The political mood is still gloomy and discontented, mainly due ...
National's Finance Minister once met a poor person.A scornful interview with National's finance guru who knows next to nothing about economics or people.There might have been something a bit familiar if that was the headline I’d gone with today. It would of course have been in tribute to the article ...
Rob MacCulloch writes – Throughout the pandemic, the new Vice-Chancellor-of-Otago-University-on-$629,000 per annum-Can-you-believe-it-and-Former-Finance-Minister Grant Robertson repeated the mantra over and over that he saved “lives and livelihoods”.As we update how this claim is faring over the course of time, the facts are increasingly speaking differently. NZ ...
Chris Trotter writes – IT’S A COMMONPLACE of political speeches, especially those delivered in acknowledgement of electoral victory: “We’ll govern for all New Zealanders.” On the face of it, the pledge is a strange one. Why would any political leader govern in ways that advantaged the huge ...
Bryce Edwards writes – 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 ...
TL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy at 10:06am on Wednesday, May 1:The Lead: Business confidence fell across the board in April, falling in some areas to levels last seen during the lockdowns because of a collapse in ...
Over the past 36 hours, Christopher Luxon has been dong his best to portray the centre-right’s plummeting poll numbers as a mark of virtue. Allegedly, the negative verdicts are the result of hard economic times, and of a government bravely set out on a perilous rescue mission from which not ...
Auckland Transport have started rolling out new HOP card readers around the network and over the next three months, all of them on buses, at train stations and ferry wharves will be replaced. The change itself is not that remarkable, with the new readers looking similar to what is already ...
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 ...
Ministers must front up about which projects it will push through under its Fast Track Approvals legislation, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
The Government is again adding to New Zealand’s growing unemployment, this time cutting jobs at the agencies responsible for urban development and growing much needed housing stock. ...
With Minister Karen Chhour indicating in the House today that she either doesn’t know or care about the frontline cuts she’s making to Oranga Tamariki, we risk seeing more and more of our children falling through the cracks. ...
The Labour Party is saddened to learn of the death of Sir Robert Martin, a globally renowned disability advocate who led the way for disability rights both in New Zealand and internationally. ...
Labour is calling for the Government to urgently rethink its coalition commitment to restart live animal exports, Labour animal welfare spokesperson Rachel Boyack said. ...
Today’s Financial Stability Report has once again highlighted that poverty and deep inequality are political choices - and this Government is choosing to make them worse. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to do more for our households in most need as unemployment rises and the cost of living crisis endures. ...
Unemployment is on the rise and it’s only going to get worse under this Government, Labour finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds said. Stats NZ figures show the unemployment rate grew to 4.3 percent in the March quarter from 4 percent in the December quarter. “This is the second rise in unemployment ...
The New Zealand Labour Party welcomes the entering into force of the European Union and New Zealand free trade agreement. This agreement opens the door for a huge increase in trade opportunities with a market of 450 million people who are high value discerning consumers of New Zealand goods and ...
The National-led Government continues its fiscal jiggery pokery with its Pharmac announcement today, Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall says. “The government has increased Pharmac funding but conceded it will only make minimal increases in access to medicine”, said Ayesha Verrall “This is far from the bold promises made to fund ...
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 OECD’s latest report on New Zealand reinforces the importance of bringing Government spending under control, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The OECD conducts country surveys every two years to review its members’ economic policies. The 2024 New Zealand survey was presented in Wellington today by OECD Chief Economist Clare Lombardelli. ...
The Government has delivered on its election promise to provide a financially sustainable model for Auckland under its Local Water Done Well plan. The plan, which has been unanimously endorsed by Auckland Council’s Governing Body, will see Aucklanders avoid the previously projected 25.8 per cent water rates increases while retaining ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters discussed the need for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, and enhanced cooperation in the Pacific with German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock during her first official visit to New Zealand today. "New Zealand and Germany enjoy shared interests and values, including the rule of law, democracy, respect for the international system ...
The Minister Responsible for RMA Reform, Chris Bishop today released his decision on four recommendations referred to him by the Western Bay of Plenty District Council, opening the door to housing growth in the area. The Council’s Plan Change 92 allows more homes to be built in existing and new ...
Thank you, John McKinnon and the New Zealand China Council for the invitation to speak to you today. Thank you too, all members of the China Council. Your effort has played an essential role in helping to build, shape, and grow a balanced and resilient relationship between our two ...
The Government is modernising insurance law to better protect Kiwis and provide security in the event of a disaster, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly announced today. “These reforms are long overdue. New Zealand’s insurance law is complicated and dated, some of which is more than 100 years old. ...
The coalition Government is refreshing its approach to supporting pay equity claims as time-limited funding for the Pay Equity Taskforce comes to an end, Public Service Minister Nicola Willis says. “Three years ago, the then-government introduced changes to the Equal Pay Act to support pay equity bargaining. The changes were ...
Structured literacy will change the way New Zealand children learn to read - improving achievement and setting students up for success, Education Minister Erica Stanford says. “Being able to read and write is a fundamental life skill that too many young people are missing out on. Recent data shows that ...
Trade Minister Todd McClay says Canada’s refusal to comply in full with a CPTPP trade dispute ruling in our favour over dairy trade is cynical and New Zealand has no intention of backing down. Mr McClay said he has asked for urgent legal advice in respect of our ‘next move’ ...
The rights of our children and young people will be enhanced by changes the coalition Government will make to strengthen oversight of the Oranga Tamariki system, including restoring a single Children’s Commissioner. “The Government is committed to delivering better public services that care for our most at-risk young people and ...
The Government is making it easier for minor changes to be made to a building consent so building a home is easier and more affordable, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on making it easier and cheaper to build homes so we can ...
New Zealand lost a true legend when internationally renowned disability advocate Sir Robert Martin (KNZM) passed away at his home in Whanganui last night, Disabilities Issues Minister Louise Upston says. “Our Government’s thoughts are with his wife Lynda, family and community, those he has worked with, the disability community in ...
Good evening – Before discussing the challenges and opportunities facing New Zealand’s foreign policy, we’d like to first acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of International Affairs. You have contributed to debates about New Zealand foreign policy over a long period of time, and we thank you for hosting us. ...
From today, passengers travelling internationally from Auckland Airport will be able to keep laptops and liquids in their carry-on bags for security screening thanks to new technology, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Creating a more efficient and seamless travel experience is important for holidaymakers and businesses, enabling faster movement through ...
People with an interest in the health of Northland’s marine ecosystems are invited to a public meeting to discuss how to deal with kina barrens, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones will lead the discussion, which will take place on Friday, 10 May, at Awanui Hotel in ...
Kiwi exporters are $100 million better off today with the NZ EU FTA entering into force says Trade Minister Todd McClay. “This is all part of our plan to grow the economy. New Zealand's prosperity depends on international trade, making up 60 per cent of the country’s total economic activity. ...
There are heartening signs that the extractive sector is once again becoming an attractive prospect for investors and a source of economic prosperity for New Zealand, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. “The beginnings of a resurgence in extractive industries are apparent in media reports of the sector in the past ...
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 ...
The Government and Rotorua Lakes Council are committed to working closely together to end the use of contracted emergency housing motels in Rotorua. Associate Minister of Housing (Social Housing) Tama Potaka says the Government remains committed to ending the long-term use of contracted emergency housing motels in Rotorua by the ...
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 ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anthony Nasser, Senior Lecturer in Physiotherapy, University of Technology Sydney PeopleImages.com – Yuri A/Shutterstock The anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) is an important ligament in the knee. It runs from the thigh bone (femur) to the shin bone (tibia) and helps stabilise ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne I covered the May 2 United Kingdom local government elections for The Poll Bludger. The Blackpool South parliamentary byelection was also held, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Deanna Grant-Smith, Professor of Management, University of the Sunshine Coast The federal government has announced a “Commonwealth Prac Payment” to support selected groups of students doing mandatory work placements. Those who are studying to be a teacher, nurse, midwife or social ...
We round up everything coming to streaming services this week, including Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+, Apple TV+, ThreeNow, Neon and TVNZ+. If you love a dark comedy: Bodkin (Netflix, May 9)An English podcaster, an Irish podcaster and American podcaster walk into a pub and…make a TV show? ...
By Eleisha Foon, RNZ Pacific senior journalist A Pacific regionalism academic has called out New Zealand’s Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters for withholding information from the public on AUKUS and says the security deal “raises serious questions for the Pacific region”. Auckland University of Technology academic Dr Marco de Jong ...
How worried should we be about the cloud? This is an excerpt from our weekly environmental newsletter Future Proof. Sign up here. I currently have a few thousand unread emails languishing in my inbox, mostly old marketing newsletters and piles of unread science journal press releases. I have a similar number ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nuurrianti Jalli, Assistant Professor of Communication Studies College of Arts and Sciences Department of Languages, Literature, and Communication Studies, Northern State University Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Southeast Asian governments not only have to deal with the virus but also with the false ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Murakami Wood, Professor of Critical Surveillance and Securities Studies, L’Université d’Ottawa/University of Ottawa The skyline of Riyadh, the capital and largest city of the Kingdom of Saudia Arabia.(Shutterstock) There is a long history of planned city building by both governments ...
The LIVE Recording of A View from Afar podcast will begin today at 12:45pm May 6, 2024 (NZST) which is Sunday evening, 8:30pm (USEST). In an analytical essay titled ‘A moment of friction’ political scientist Dr Paul Buchanan wrote how we are living within a decisive moment of ...
The Boil Up’s Lucinda Bennett considers the oyster – from freshness to pearls to the joy of shucking your own. This is an excerpt from our weekly food newsletter, The Boil Up. In Carmen Maria Machado’s short story ‘Eight Bites’, a woman begins her last supper before bariatric surgery with “a cavalcade ...
Asia Pacific Report A group of 65 Auckland University academics have written an open letter to vice-chancellor Dawn Freshwater criticising the institution’s stance over students protesting in solidarity with Palestine. They have called on her administration to “support” the students who were denied permission to establish an “overnight encampment” by ...
The Student Volunteer Army is on the march, generating approximately 1.6 million hours of volunteering from roughly 35,000 secondary school students in just five years. For Rebekah Brown, the pathway to volunteering started with her singing coach. With a passion for the arts, the suggestion to volunteer at Acting Antics, ...
Keeping up with online communication can be exhausting, so Fran Barclay enlisted the help of Meta’s new ‘intelligent assistant’ to respond to all her messages. Could her mates tell the difference? For centuries, technology has ruled the ways in which we communicate. From the dawn of written language, to the ...
Jamie Arbuckle, a councillor who has become an member of parliament, says he has settled into having two roles so comfortably he's going to keep both pay cheques. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Luis Gómez Romero, Senior Lecturer in Human Rights, Constitutional Law and Legal Theory, University of Wollongong Fifty years ago, Australian feminist Anne Summers denounced “the ideology of sexism” governing over so many women’s lives. Unfortunately, sexism is as lethal today as it ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jose Antonio Lara-Hernandez, Senior Researcher in Architecture, Auckland University of Technology Getty Images The COVID-19 pandemic and the hybrid work patterns it fostered have changed the way we think about office space, and central business districts in general. While fears ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dale Boccabella, Associate Professor of Taxation Law, UNSW Sydney There’s a good reason your local volunteer-run netball club doesn’t pay tax. In Australia, various nonprofit organisations are exempt from paying income tax, including those that do charitable work, such as churches. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Marina Deller, Casual Academic, Creative Writing and English Literature, Flinders University NetflixComedy is opening up spaces for silences to be broken and trauma stories to be told. In 2018, Hannah Gadsby started a revolution with Nanette, asking audiences to rethink ...
The workplace can be a minefield of bad comms and passive aggression. Kinksters can help you navigate it. A friend and colleague recently gave me a compliment I loved. They told me I’d always been good at emotional communication and making people feel comfortable. “But I feel like it’s really ...
Even if some students are now just texting on their laptops. Stewart Sowman-Lund writes in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. ...
Councils from Horowhenua, Kāpiti, Wairarapa, the Hutt Valley, Porirua and Wellington City will meet this Friday to work together on a plan for a Greater Wellington region water deal. ...
Renowned musician, advocate, and proud born and raised daughter of Tauranga, Ria Hall, is announcing her candidacy for Mayor of Tauranga and Pāpāmoa Ward for the upcoming election on July 20th. ...
The new Aotearoa histories curriculum is rich with potential. There’s still work to be done, but the education minister’s criticisms about ‘balance’ miss the mark, argues primary school teacher Jessie Moss. In 2015, Ōtorohanga College students presented to parliament a petition signed by more than 10,000 people calling for a ...
For too long our so-called national bird has maintained its stranglehold on the economy of regional New Zealand. Thanks to the fast track legislation, we will have our revenge. Theories abound on what ails New Zealand’s economy. National leader Chris Luxon has posited that we’re negative, wet, whiny, and inward-looking; ...
If building one of Auckland’s possible waterfront stadiums was funded privately, it would need to hold a sold-out Ed Sherran concert every weekday for 25 years. That’s Rob Hamlin’s finding – he’s a senior marketing lecturer at the University of Otago. “It’s not going to happen; forget about it,” he ...
Comment: The debate over the future relationship between news and social media is bringing us closer to a long-overdue reckoning. Social media isn’t trying to kill journalism, because social media has never really cared about journalism. Social media is resolutely in the attention business. News propels some attention — perhaps ...
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For the past 12 years, Georgia-Rose Brown has balanced on the brink of making an Olympic Games – but always landed gracefully on the wrong side. Reaching the Olympics is a dream the gymnast has harboured since she was a six-year-old; a dream that would dwindle every four years, yet ...
Late one afternoon in March 1860 a man in a thin green velveteen jacket and a wide-awake hat arrived on foot at a sheep station named Glenmark, about 65 kilometres north of Christchurch. The man was in his mid-fifties but he looked older. Several people who met him that day ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra A new Commonwealth Prac Payment will provide students with $319.50 a week when they are on clinical and professional placements. The payment will be means tested and start from July 1 next year, which ...
Asia Pacific Report About 500 people honoured Palestinian journalists in the heart of the New Zealand city of Auckland today for their brave coverage of Israel’s War on Gaza, now in its seventh month with almost 35,000 people killed, mostly women and children. Marking the annual May 3 World Press ...
The Government Communications Security Bureau denies hosting a foreign spying capability flagged by the watchdog, differentiating it from the system recently criticised. ...
RNZ News A group of academic staff at New Zealand’s largest university have expressed concern at the administration’s move to block a protest encampment that was planned to take place on campus calling for support for the rights of Palestinians. This week, the University of Auckland warned that while it ...
Genterwocky After a hard days marching, Sir Doocey calls in at the Village Tavern For a pint of ale and a pork pie. The grim villagers stare at him. “Do not be travelling on the forest road,” warns a crusty old beak. “And why is that, antique peasant?” Grins Sir ...
Political conferences after a party returns to power are usually a chance for some healthy, even unhealthy backslapping. Yet National Party president Sylvia Wood’s address to its mainland representatives on Saturday hardly contained the unalloyed delight that one might have expected following National’s escape from the wilderness of opposition. Yes, ...
Comment: Almost half the world is voting in national elections this year and artificial intelligence is the elephant in the room. There are genuine fears AI-generated or AI-edited deepfakes will potentially manipulate election outcomes not just in the US and UK, but critically in countries such as India. For that ...
Ahead of the reality franchise’s return to New Zealand, allow us to introduce the eight brides and grooms. Chuck on a veil and tie back your man bun, because it’s time to say “I do” to a new season of Married at First Sight NZ. The reality TV “social experiment” ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Norton, Professor in the Practice of Higher Education Policy, Australian National University Every year on June 1, student debt in Australia is indexed to inflation. In 2023, high inflation pushed the indexation rate to 7.1%, the highest since 1990. This ...
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It's the unpredictable, left-field aspects of C-19 that perhaps hold the greatest potential for a re-imagined world.
"If it's true that the best ideas happen in your sleep, the world could be about to experience a surge in creative output, with many reporting they are having more vivid dreams in lockdown.
Neuroscience educator Nathan Wallis said it's not necessarily that we're having more dreams than usual — it's that we've got a better chance at remembering them when we don't have to leap out of bed in the morning."
https://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/well-good/120941308/why-your-dreams-are-so-much-more-vivid-during-lockdown
Ok. Well I had a vivid dream last night. I went downstairs to my garage and found the floor covered in white sheepskin fur. It looked very nice but I don't know how it got there.
Would someone care to analyse what it means please? 😮
A subconscious sense of entitlement?
treasures and comfort in your subconscious?
I'll go with weka. 😉
Anxieties about how to keep things clean?
Not so much how to keep things clean but a concern I will get fed up with all the extra cleaning and washing of hands and start to slack off?
I think you might be right Editactor.
Maybe your subconscious reckons everywhere else is clean enough, and that the only thing left to do is to take soap and a yard broom to the garage floor 🙂
Did that at the start of Summer!
We should keep a running list. It reminds me of the Cuba stories, about the benefits that came from losing cheap oil.
On golf clubs and the "fuming" green keepers:
"Golf clubs had been fuming about the delay in responding to their request for an exemption, fearful of fungal disease causing millions of dollars of damage to their courses."
Itching to get their fungicides out and give the greens a good drenching?
https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/golf/120948493/coronavirus-greenkeepers-fume-as-jacinda-ardern-defends-delay-in-exemption-request
A Hamilton Greenkeeper speaks up:
A voice of reason
Announced yesterday:
"… A lot of what is circulating in my view falls into the “fake news” category…"
The Herald peddles a lot of fake news these days, in between piously condemning fake news from sources it doesn't like. For example, take this headline:
Kiwis swarm to holiday hotspots for Easter, ignore lockdown rules
And compare it with this one from Stuff:
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/120918636/in-pictures-empty-roads-this-easter-weekend-as-covid19-lockdown-continues
One of these stories must be wrong. One of them is fake news. Since the Herald has from day one has allowed it's pages to be used to run a pack of lies from the likes of Hosking et al, I think their story is more likely to be rabble rousing bullshit that Stuffs.
Just going by the headlines (…), both could be right. Devil is in the detail.
They were certainly swarming up through the Lewis Pass yesterday towards Golden Bay, Nelson and the West Coast – eight campervans and house buses turned back by noon by Police outside Murchison and that was just the start. The Murchison supermarket and petrol station was heaving with people. Very unfair to a small community with no Covid-19 cases, so far, because we have all stuck to the rules.
Glad to hear the police are on it.
Council contractors were mowing the local maunga the other day grass was about 5cm long didn't really see that as essential at this point.
Ah…those fungicides, that also double up as wormicides.
Because who on Earth would want those unsightly worm casts spoiling the turf aesthetic?
Turn the turf into food forest!
Affordable housing would not go amiss either, with a nice vege/herb plot.
My partner has been working from home, and is now going to take annual leave for a week, and return before the lockdown lifts. He has been talking with his employer about the changes to their workplace practices, but also about the impact Covid-19 will have on their clients and customers and what adaptations will be necessary in the post lockdown period in order to keep moving forward.
I have read the posts on TS about tourism and other industries, and think that there is a such a diversity of businesses within those industries that it is pointless to try and impose a blanket approach to dealing with the fallout. I'm of a mind to agree with weka, that tourism as it has been practiced in recent years, has not been the positive it has been portrayed. As our advertised attractions have been mostly natural, outdoor environmental experiences, we have gained vast numbers of tourists who can pay little to visit these places, whose impact is often having to be mitigated by local authorities and their residents – sometimes with a very small rating base. Some tourist businesses are thriving, but workers are often lower waged precarious workers.
The idea that Ad previously proposed "We serve. And there is no shame in it" is a good soundbite but flawed. As I previously posted in response:
So – how do we ensure that the return of employment in this – and other industries – creates environments where resilience is strengthened rather than a return to BAU?
I think we really need to investigate tax structures again, and implement some form of tax system that recognises the benefits of including the other bottom lines of environmental, social and community. These are the impacts of business that give local communities their resilience and value in their locale, and our country.
I'm enamoured with the B-Corporation impact assessment tool. Mostly, because it seems so very comprehensive, that even businesses that seem to be already including the three bottom line approach have only 60% of the total. How impactful would it be to have something similar for NZ, that includes points for climate change mitigation, reinvestment of profits into NZ, investment in employees, environmental and community impact – both positive and negative?
By changing business or corporate tax to reflect a scale that measures the positive impact of each business allows the government to support businesses that have built themselves up to practice sustainable models, by reducing their tax obligations. Businesses that follow the singular financial bottom line, with externalities on community and environment, will have to pay the top of the corporate tax rate.
This means that we don't have to pick and choose industries, or provide grants and incentives that only get accessed by a few. We would have a tax system that collects more from businesses that act without regard for others, while reducing the load on those that do – regardless of size or function.
Tax reform would be an excellent place to start the recovery.
Which parts out our tax system would you change, while enabling the government to necessarily massively increases its services to society?
I'd say licencing fees paid by 'local' businesses for intellectual property of 'completely separate and unrelated' companies based in Switzerland (not at all for tax reasons) would be paid out of after tax profits.
Financial transaction tax.
Sorry for the delay, the weather was just too good and the paint pail needed to be finished. Just got back inside.
(Housing needs to be taxed appropriately. That is a whole other discussion, and one that has been had before on TS. NZ needs to regard access to affordable, healthy homes as a necessary and basic building block to build a healthy and equitable society. Some methods of avoiding personal tax by the use of trusts etc needs to be looked at as well. GST is another tax that penalises the lower income and should be phased out. )
However, my suggestion was in terms of corporate or business tax. And I proposed a method of progressive taxation based on the rating of the business in lines of something like the B Corp assessment tool. Businesses that rated highly, would have a lower tax rate. Businesses that did not – and the ones most likely to have external costs that environment or society pays for – would pay a higher rate.
(Compliance and needs to assess and remain on point may be a sticking point, but if you are already running a business that considers these aspects, you will be recognised with a lower tax rate.)
Just got some COVID-19 anecdotes from infected rellies that further highlight why elimination is by far the best strategy. COVID-19 may cause long term breathing dysfunction beyond observed lung damage, with deaths possibly occurring long after apparent recovery.
But first, the caveats. This is from my nephew in France, who recently finished his medical training and has been doing his first few hospital stints. He says his personal observations are corroborated by his colleagues, but I had a quick look online and didn't find anything that even looks vaguely like a proper study. So at best it's an early heads-up of something that might be happening, but more likely just noise rather than signal.
He is currently still in recovery from COVID-19. His case would be called mild – ie like the worst case of flu most people ever experience, but he didn't get to the point of needing external breathing assistance (his mother's case is similar). He has noticed his normal reflex to draw breath has been significantly suppressed. This is shown most dramatically by exhaling as far as possible, then trying to not inhale again. Normally this gets very distressing very quickly. In his current COVID-recovering state, he is able to sit there completely calmly feeling no need to inhale, even while his measured CO2 levels are spiking and oxygen dropping. This is particularly concerning for stopping breathing while asleep, and he notes that simply dying while asleep appears to happening at an unusually high rate among COVID-recovering patients.
One of our colleagues working here is French – his mother and grandmother died of the virus on the same day last weekend.
It's looking more and more likely that when the dust settles, our government's response will be held out as the best model for western liberal democracies. That Italy and other parts of Europe got hit much harder earlier so we had reports of how bad it could get certainly helped make restrictions here palatable.
IN NOVEMBER the US Intelligence had a heads up
Covid 19 coronavirus: Intelligence shows US was warned in November – report
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=12323882
American intelligence officers knew a new contagion was sweeping Wuhan in November but they couldn't get the message through to the top, according to ABC News.
VERY VERY costly for the US.
Trump was asked about it during yesterdays presser.
He was extremely defensive claiming he knew nothing about it. Then he vilified the media outlet(s) who ran the story, as he always does.
Possibly his most deadly decision was to ignore the advice. Could one go so far as to say he is in part responsible for mass murder.
Edit… those currently setting up for the presser are wearing masks, that’s a first. I wonder if those speaking and reporting will be wearing masks today as well. Agent orange usually appears around 10am – 10.30am for a two hour rant and questions from the press.
The dodgy tory fox network is the only stream that has their chat open. Here’s the link if you are interested
Yes
The US has 460k cases and 16k deaths
NY has major problems
China has 81k cases with 3k deaths (Maybe)
Every country is saying they are flattening the curve, trump constantly assures the american people they are doing great.
The scary thing I feel is the USA has only just begun. God help them.
Yes.
The US is getting abt 30k cases per day, which is 20k to 25k greater than any other country currently.
Scary as.
Did they do a case redefinition around 5th April? They were up to 35k new cases on the 4th, then it stepped down to 25k on the 5th.
It looks like a definite step down and then continues a step below the previous path, rather than noise or a continuous change in practise.
I saw by accident some Fox news the other night.
uuuuuuggh
I'm hearing you on that DV.
Andre, " Gonna be interesting watching the reaction of the MAGAmorons as info like this trickles out. "
The sad thing is many of them will also put their fingers in their ears, preferring to defend their views rather than appear foolish, just like trump does.
Speaking of which I wonder if agent orange will be on time today.
May be Cinny you can be nominated as the designated watcher, to slow the spread of the trumpanmenic
Lmfao, funny you should say that….he's just turned up.
If I don't end up zoning out on his crap or throwing something at the computer, I'll do a little update later 🙂
Thank you.
Essential service????
I have been looking carefully each day to see what shade of orange he is.
I have noticed some variation.
Possibly his most deadly decision was to ignore the advice. Could one go so far as to say he is in part responsible for mass murder.
Indeed. Now answer me this, what massive political crisis was going down in the USA during Nov, Dec and Jan? Just when you say Trump should have been paying lots of attention to this new virus in China?
And when senior CCP officials were in the White House on Jan 15 to sign Phase 1 of the hugely important US-China trade deal … did the Chinese bother to give a heads up to Trump?
Or what more can I say about WHO's Tedros whose prevarication and delay is beyond incompetent?
Trump is just one faulty link in a long chain of failure here.
The power of words – a list of Trump's favorites:
Win, Stupid, Weak, Loser(s), Fake News, Deep State, Political Correctness, The Swamp, Smart, Tough, Dangerous, Bad, Veterans, Amazing, Make America Great Again, Tremendous, Terrific, Military, Out of Control, Classy.
Enough said.
https://www.yourdictionary.com/slideshow/donald-trump-20-most-frequently-used-words.html
Gonna be interesting watching the reaction of the MAGAmorons as info like this trickles out.
It may well be that CovidCamacho has a rock-solid floor of 42% cultist support that's absolutely unbreakable.
Maybe the Manchurian Rotmelon will just slowly bleed support as one-by-one the straws add up breaking supporters backs.
Or maybe something will cause the dam to burst and he'll end up in a similar approval/disapproval situation as end-of-second-term Shrub.
American intelligence officers knew a new contagion was sweeping Wuhan in November but they couldn’t get the message through to the top, according to ABC News
My initial reaction is to put that in the 'blame China' box of bullshit.
If covid 19 was 'sweeping' Wuhan in November, then the very first identified case of "unusual pneumonia" from Dec 8th is a lie, yes?
And the lock-down of Wuhan, instead of occurring about four weeks after the realisation that an epidemic was breaking out (Jan 23), would (according to that ABC report) have been some eight weeks or more after an outbreak was suspected.
Aside from the usual tell tale signs of bullshit (ie – unnamed "officials"), a look at the consequences for various countries going into lockdown at given time periods after initial cases have been detected, also points to the reporting being bullshit.
Bottom line – there is a lot of finger pointing going on by officials from countries that were slow off the mark. So, the WHO is to blame for their own levels of incompetence, and China is to blame for their own levels of complacency…
Legacy/mainstream/pop/corporate media (I wish I could settle on a descriptor for the arseholes) really needs to get its shit together and stop giving credence to garbage narratives and desperate propaganda.
Maybe Bill.
Yes lotsa finger pointing!!
Good too see the US in control then. (Sara)
I think 'everyone' can agree the US response has been woeful.
What I can't quite get is the free pass being given to political actors who are only interested in notching up points.
For example. The Wisconsin Primary was spun as an "evil Republicans" line, when the reality is that both the Democratic Party and Republican Party have been casually encouraging people to go out in the middle of a pandemic to vote.
And that ABC piece subtly plays on the "blame China" narrative to pivot and ultimately blame Trump and his admin for the situation in the US. While it's legitimate to point to the failures of the current Admin, are we to believe that a Democratic Party President would have been "on the ball" and protected the people of the US? That seems to be the implicit message of the piece.
Yet we've had Biden tweeting that people should get out and vote in spite of there being a pandemic, and we've had the DNC threatening states that might postpone primaries.
To my mind, the "red team/blue team" tribalism that degenerates so much political discussion and debate to the level of 'mindless slanging match', needs to be pinned down, doused and torched.
The "red team" and "blue team" are part and parcel of the same structural and political problem. That that gets overlooked and drowned out by those who noisily rush to cheer on their colour is to the detriment of us all and any understandings we might otherwise develop.
Fair enough Bill.
Tribalism is a problem.
But the Trumpians don't get the scale of their problem yet.
The whole political scene in Amercia is so 'up the creek without a paddle' that it was inevitable something was going to happen to the country which would drag it down to near subsistence level. It looks to me like the combination of a mad president and the pandemic is going to do just that.
Do I have any sympathy? Yes. I feel for the intelligent and sane among them, but the rest of them? Nah. not a bit. They are reaping what they sowed.
Your comment "red team" and "blue team" sums it up. They play their political games like teenage, blonde haired bimbos – complete with brightly coloured feather dusters (that's what I call them) – gyrating round a sports arena barracking for either the red team or the blue team – whichever colour takes your fancy.
The New Zealand government – together with that of Taiwan and Australia – will be entitled to bask in global glory once we decrease our lockdown status.
But as the unemployment lines grow fastest here because the economic hit is so deep and so savage, the longer term judgement will be:
Was the New Zealand public health response worth the deliberate economic damage?
That's the evaluative scale coming.
"Was the New Zealand public health response worth the deliberate economic damage?"
Do you seriously wish to suggest that the economy wouldnt be in meltdown now without lockdown?….200,000 jobs in tourism alone and god knows how many riding on the associated increased activity…and then take away the wage subsidy and how does your economy look?
Its not either or and never was….time for some clear thought
That we would now be in economic freefall because of what's happening worldwide no matter what the government did and even if somehow the coronavirus had never made it here is a fact that some people are going to need to be reminded of over and over and over again. Because some people are going to try to pretend otherwise in order to undermine the government.
So even if there might have been a theoretical better response that might have had a tiny bit more economic activity in exchange for a slightly looser response with more resulting disease and death, the reality is the much more likely outcome of a looser response would have been vastly more disease and death in exchange for maybe just a tiny bit less economic pain. If we were lucky, that is, but probably more disease and death and more economic pain.
"Because some people are going to try to pretend otherwise in order to undermine the government."
Some definitely for that reason but many in desperation….its understandable but as said clarity of thought is what is required, fortunately we appear to have it at the top unlike many countries
FIFY
In any case, the Q as such doesn’t make logical sense because it is based on a false premise and is more of a rhetorical one, IMHO 😉
In addition, the Q should be asked, as is happening more and more, what will NZ do when we have eliminated the virus but whilst the rest of the World is still in utter disarray? You could call it the $64,000 Q in more than one way.
or the 64 billion dollar question
Is that you, Mr Joyce? 😉
no holes here…except the one im digging
I hope the similarities stop there 😉
so do I
“In any case, the Q as such doesn’t make logical sense because it is based on a false premise and is more of a rhetorical one, IMHO”
I don’t see it as rhetorical.
That’s nice to hear, Ross. How do you see it?
Alas, I couldn't edit my comment but was going to add that the meningococcal vaccine, MeNZB, which was rolled out in NZ in 2005 is a good example of large sums of taxpayers' money being wasted despite good intentions. Of course, time will tell whether NZ's response to Covid-19 falls into the same category.
https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0611/S00403.htm
According to some, the Government’s actions are pushing the country to the brink of economic destruction. And according to some, this is a too high a price to save a few lives of people who’d die (soon?) anyway. And according to some, those vulnerable people should be isolated for self-protection so that the rest of the country can return to normal and save the economy or what’s left of it and before it’s too late. According to some, we should follow Sweden’s approach to COVID-19. Irrespective of the validity of those arguments, this is not just wasting a few taxpayers’ dollars on a measly [pun] vaccine.
Irrespective of the validity of those arguments, this is not just wasting a few taxpayers’ dollars on a measly [pun] vaccine.
Well, $200 million isn't a few dollars and apparently was, at the time, the most expensive health programme ever introduced. But I agree that it pales in comparison to the economic cost of the virus.
I'm not convinced that we can afford to save lives at all costs – which seems to be the orthodoxy here. Lobby groups have argued that an increase to Pharmac's funding would save lives. Governments, not just the current one, haven't been persuaded. In other words, there has been, until now, a limit to how much money Government's have spent to save lives. Rolling out MeNZB was a departure from that position, and the current action seems to be a departure.
As I said, time will tell whether we over-reacted.
I disagree with you on multiple points, which is a good thing as it can hopefully stimulate healthy discussion (or not).
There’s no orthodoxy as such. There’s a plan and we, not just the Government, are executing it. It is crystal clear that we cannot “save lives at all costs” as there are already two deaths, sadly. The aim of the plan is, and has always been, AFAIK, to minimise deaths and minimise impact on the economy over the long run.
This is a misleading comment IMO. Funding of PHARMAC has increased. Saving lives is not a linear function of funding; you can spend millions on one life-saving drug to save a relatively small (!) number of lives. It is about diminishing returns on relatively large increases in funding. We can never save all lives of cancer patients, for example, not even when we throw unlimited amounts of money, time, and effort at it because we are technically not capable of accomplishing this. There are always real and physical constraints to what we can and cannot control and/or achieve, which is why we have to debate these issues publically. Which is why have politics 😉
There is no given fixed limit as such, unless you can point me to one. As a society, we make a choice on how much to spend on saving lives based on political, economic, social, and moral considerations. If you like, you can divide total Government spending by the number of citizens to derive a crude number spent on each of our lives each year. These considerations slowly change over time in quality and quantity (weighting).
Not quite. It is a relative shift but not an absolute one. Much of the economic pain would have been imposed on us anyway because of the global response to the pandemic. The ‘relaxed’ approach of Sweden does not seem to be paying off [pardon the pun].
Only to a point, and of limited use right now. We will never really know for sure what – if, we can speculate and direct blame (and guilt & penitence & punishment) …
Yes.
There would likely have been far more so-called "Economic damage" without the lockdown.
A lot of businesses would have likely been affected by the loss of staff due to deaths and large numbers of those who survived with limited or no ability to continue in their jobs as before due to ongoing medical problems such as damaged lungs, failed or failing organs, and even some emotional problems due to the loss of close loved ones.
Saving as many people as possible makes it much easier to rebuild after this has blown over, than if these steps had not been taken.
Chilling Andre. If dying while asleep is a product of Covid then a whole new disaster will unfold. Hope your nephew is wrong!
Returning to a conversation from last week with mauī and weka, it seems the official advice of the NHS is to avoid ibuprofen, but to treat fevers – including that of Covid-19 – with paracetomol. I have seen this several times in the UK media. (NZ doesn't seem to have this advice.)
Wouldn't this interrupt the immune response to the virus?
(Note, every GP except the one I had 23-25 years ago, told me to treat any viral fever in my children with paracetamol.)
There really doesn't seem to be consensus on whether ibuprofen is harmful or not. The arguments against it seem based on theoretical considerations, rather than clinical observations.
There's a notable absence of anything claiming that ibuprofen has any particularly helpful effects for COVID-19 victims.
So if anyone is foolish enough to follow the reckons of a random dude on da webz over their doctor's advice, personally I'd probably just use paracetamol. Although ibuprofen works well for me in other situations, so I might give it a shot as well just for the placebo effect. If I were in the situation of suffering enough from COVID symptoms to fell the need for pharmaceutical relief, that is.
The World Health Organization [WHO] has confirmed ibuprofen is safe to take for COVID-19 coronavirus cases
That piece doesn't cite any studies, it merely relies on the absence of good clinical evidence against ibuprofen for COVID-19 patients.
Well, just in case anyone is foolish enough to follow the reckons of a random dude on da webz over their doctor's advice, I thought I'd link to a NZ source, quoting from the WHO, and give them the opportunity to chase a more informed opinion.
West Coast local government politicians are not keen to take pay cuts in solidarity with pretty much everyone else:
https://www.odt.co.nz/regions/west-coast/coast-council-leaders-reluctant-take-pay-cut
They claim the Remuneration Authority means taking the money completely is just legally compulsory.
It's not that hard for each Council to form a holding account, put all pay into it, and give it out at a reduced rate, because ……
……. that's what almost every other business in the country is having to do.
FFS when sacrifice is called for, don't call west coast politicians.
Greymouth elected a tory hairdresser who loves loves the vino as their mayor. JS
"don't call west coast politicians".
Who should we call on? Have we heard anything from our Central Government Parliamentarians for example?
Perhaps 50% cut in salary and perks all round for MPs. How does that sound?
Chris Trotter gets stuck in … gently!
"The television promotions for the various sporting codes – especially Rugby Union and Rugby League – feature a terrifying sequence of images glorifying brutal bodily contact, exaggerated aggressiveness, and exultation bordering on complete loss-of-control. What we see is what’s left of the human male when everything dignified, intelligent, creative and compassionate has been edited out of the masculine narrative.
These promos are made all the more frightful by the knowledge that they wouldn’t look that way if the punters wanted to see something else. Clearly, smearing the screen with testosterone is the best way of getting the boys to tune-in. It’s possible, of course, that the clips are assembled for the pleasure of the sporting codes’ female devotees. At least that would make a sort of – equally troubling! – sense. In the end, however, these gloriously kinetic visual packages are all about reaffirming and celebrating a particular kind of masculinity. They present the human male as a dangerous, uncompromising and predatory bundle of muscle."
http://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com/2020/04/men-to-boys.html
A good essay.
Does it also explain why some men have aggressive dogs, shave their heads and wear tattoos, walk with exaggerated thigh movement, and wear hoods?
The ones that are trying to compensate for their low status and powerlessness, in society.
Just as Trotter is still compensating for his low status at high school. Similar impulse behind both, methinks.
Billy Connolly calls them 'spectacularly tattooed fuckwits'.
Obviously, he wasn't any good at sport!
Great phalanxes of talented athletic men (and increasingly women) have left New Zealand for Australia, France, Canada, US and UK to get rich when they would otherwise have just caused trouble back here. Most will be getting paid high six figure salaries for about 5-8 years, then get out through injury.
International sport has been our quiet working class revolution for two decades. You can name the schools who will never generate Nobel Prize winners but who can generate international stars. Kelston Boys High. Marist. Penrose. They are islander and Maori dominated, and they got out.
Chris just sounds old his soul.
Unlike those sporting career-people, he lost his testosterone years ago and it shows,
The only war stories he has are losses.
Like "saturation" divers. They don't earn more than anyone else, just earn it faster?
Always considered the "intellectual lefts" dislike of popular culture, such as sports, a spectacular own goal. An artefact of "Opiate for the masses", maybe?
I'm not a sports watcher myself. Even watching the ones I enjoy doing, is boring. Didn’t do well in ball sports at school either. Preferred reading books or going sailing. But I grew out of it.
However it gives pleasure to a huge number of people and a living to many others, often from minorities.
Kilikati is as far from Trotters characterisation as you can get.
There are ignorant Neanderthal sports people, just like anywhere else, Mark Richards. There are also the John Kirwans, and all the Māori and Pacifica youth who’ve, built the discipline and responsibility learned in sport into future careers.
There’s been a long anti-intellectual undercurrent in NZ and I wonder if the pandemic response has sprung a tiny leak in this. Yeah, nah.
I wonder how much of that is a perception from "intellectuals" themselves, thinking they are not getting the respect from the "plebs" they deserve, rather than reality.
My father, an ex Teacher, and a real "intellectual" himself, has no time for the out of touch University Professors, who he says have inflicted on New Zealand schools a " decades long experiment".
I don’t have time for anyone who’s wilfully and knowingly ‘out of touch’ and flaunts it, wears it like a badge of honour (bumper sticker), and brags about it. This applies across the board.
Far from Trotters characterisation of lockdown flouters as Neanderthal, sports loving Waitakere man, it seems the largest number of rule flouters, and deliberate breakers of the lockdown, are well off beach mansion owners, sneaking out for a holiday under cover of darkness.
Increasing the chances of spreading the virus from their Auckland supermarket, to small holiday towns.
Following Bridges “good” example.
KJT, your characterisation of Trotter's man as a Neanderthal Waitakere man is less than just to his article.
I believe his defining of the characteristics of the rule-flouting, aggressive, ungentlemanly, quick to insult and be violent men who are the subject of his article can also be found in the well-off beach mansion crowd, amongst businessmen and workers, amongst the educated and the illiterate, the powerful and the powerless.
The causes are complex and beyond my present comprehension.
I have sent this article to an old friend and mentor who is a psychologist who worked with youth offenders in the States. I will be interested in his comments, but I bet he will mention fathers, being bullied, abuse and lack of spiritual dimension in the man's life.
Yup. Your last sentence nails it mac.
Men are innately dangerous, but strong men control it, direct it and are admirable. It's the weak, often fatherless ones, who are the hazard.
Mmmm – some of the kindest most thoughtful young men I know are those who have been vrought up by solo mothers and that includes my two. They also both enjoy sport in fact one is a physed teacher
Well said.
For certain every individual story is unique, but the stats on fatherless boys are grim.
You may be right.
I agree. Trotter characterises 2 sides of the same masculinity coin (and there are other kinds of masculinity).
But Trotter favours the masculinity of the upperclass British imperialist colonisers. Many of them also did not have such a great record with abusive treatment of women and others with little power, away from the public or official gaze, behind closed doors, etc.
As well as those sneaking off to their holiday homes, are the boaties ignoring polite requests to stay away from Great Barrier Island, draining needed resources from locals, and potentially spreading C-19 there. Irresponsible, selfish, "idiots" all of them.
I like watching men's and women's rugby when it's available on freeview. I record and fast forward through promos (the focus of Trotter's post), pre-match gossip, profiles and chatter, and switch off before the prize giving ceremonies.
Many of the male commentators do present a kind of cheer-leading of macho qualities during men's matches, which I'm not keen on. I've always found some of their language a bit iffy – praising big strong men as "prime beef", and "a big unit" – animal and machine?
The British "perception is reality".
You read in so much British writing, the assumption that a tidy house, is a marker of character.
Or in my experience. British Captains judging an officer, on his ability to keep his uniform tidy and smart, and get the flag up at sunrise, on the dot. Never mind if he was bloody useless at anything else.
😊
Yep.
Na, the bach lot are pretty much the same people, just maybe a bit older and more affluent. The part of society Trotter is describing has always been here, but morphs slightly with each generation. Their whole world is all about 'ME'
To be fair to Chris – dissing sporting culture isn't really at the point of his piece. I think what he is doing is saying that a more rounded form of masculinity might result in fewer cases of idiotic, entitled, lockdown-breaking – and that's across all social classes.
That seems like a reasonable idea to explore at least. But it does lead him into some shallow stereotyping, including of sportspeople. This tends to happen with Chris when the over-fluent language-generating part of his brain overwhelms the editing part. He's a good writer, but at his worst when that happens.
I reckon if one was to take him aside and point out that catholicity of taste, interest and talent is a much truer marker of sophistication than narrow intellectualism – he'd agree with you. Think Sir Philip Sidney – capable both of fighting the Spanish and dashing off a sonnet.
Central hypo ventilation syndrome is when carbon dioxide increases and oxygen decreases. There is a late adult onset which can be deadly during a general anaesethic or with a virus affecting the lungs. A mutation of the PHOX2B gene is usually found in this rear condition.
Reply to Andre @ 4.
There is a considerable family history on my ex husbands side of this.
I would be interested in knowing how many deaths from Covid-19 carry the PHOX2B gene. As well the level of acidosis in people on a ventilator. It is my understanding that organ failure is strongly linked to acidosis.
I noted that immediately after my one operation, that the nurse stood beside me and told me to breathe more deeply because her meter showed my oxygen levels drooping. I assumed that the anaesthetic residue had to be purged.
I thought about decreased oxygen and increased carbon dixoide and Covid-19 having a link a few days ago.
Central hypo ventilation syndrome could be missed as a cause of breathing differculties after a general anaesethic.
Anaesethic has other causes atelectasis.
I was to late to correct rare and the reply is out of place.
Thanks for that, Treetop. I'll mention it to him. He and his colleagues may be already onto it, he did mention brainstem and genetic factors.
Gene sequencing and Gene screening is required. Also a sleep study to be sure. There are other genetic markers such as NPARM.
The scariest thing is that the condition shows when asleep and when awake there is usually no sign of it.
Even mild sedation can be an issue. Not sure if some medication which causes sedation is increasing the death rate.
I suspect a correlation or Covid-19 is a viral form of central hypo ventilation syndrome.
There has been discussion of CPAP devices, that is what got me thinking about a link.
Some severe cases require a tracheotomy at birth until the child is old enough to wear a CPAP mask.
It could be organ failure but this doesn’t quite explain the loss of the breathing reflex. It is possible that COVID-19 also causes neurological damage to nerves and/or parts of the brain involved in the breathing reflex. If I were a recovering patient, I’d stay off the alcohol for a while, especially in the evening/night 😉
I do not have a clinical or a scientific background. I have learnt a lot through dealing with the health system in the last 20 years, more so in the last 5 years.
What you raise about the consumption of alcohol needs to be taken on board. This could be a factor in a higher death rate in the elderly.
During the 1918 influenza epidemic it was suggested to have a whiskey to ward off catching influenza or to cure the flu.
"…loss of breathing reflex."
Fascinating thread. Some ten years ago whilst neutropenic due to chemo for leukemia,the worst happened and my man caught a bug which resulted in a chest infection. Poor isolation rule enforcement on the ward.
For C4/5 tetraplegic this could be fatal. Anyway…himself can cough a little, but unfortunately his efforts triggered some kind of chest wall muscle spasm. Result, atrial fibrillation and his autonomic breathing mechanism folded. At the height of the struggle the nurse and I got him to totally engage with his breathing…"in, two three four, out two three four "
…and this he had to keep up consciously for the next three days and nights. Piped oxygen actually made things worse . Peter recalls now that he pushed the mask away…it simply wasn't helping. Somewhere we read that if the oxygen from the pipe is too high the the body thinks it has enough already.
To sleep I managed to position him semi upright and slightly on his side so he could doze a little. Too high or too low and he had to again concentrate 100% inhale, 100% exhale.
He was not offered CPAP or BIPAP but we did do periodic saline nebulizers. It took a good three days for his autonomic breathing system to 'come right', but even today, if he is doing something requiring effort and concentration(like reeling in a largish fish) he has to 'remember' to breathe.
Funnily enough we have been practicing our breathing over the past few weeks…especially when he was in hospital and hooked up to the oxygen saturation monitor.
Thanks Rosemary.
You’d be surprised how shallow many people’s breathing is. We seem to think we all know how to breathe well, but we don’t, really 😉
Had a good night's sleep last night for the first time in a week. But optimism proved short lived. IL6 receptor blockers are expensive!
https://www.pharmac.govt.nz/news/notification-2014-05-14-tocilizumab/
The reason I was looking at IL6 (interleukin 6 cytokine) blockers was this piece in the Lancet I read last night:
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanrhe/article/PIIS2665-9913(20)30092-8/fulltext
Having to post this link as a reply to earlier comment, as the system ate my previous words when I tried to do two links in one post. Typing on a mobile phone is trickier, but at least you can pace and keep an eye on kids while doing so.
Would cut and paste quotes from linked piece, but mobile – so; sorry, I am not going to.
If the drug name ends with “ab”, it is an antibody and guaranteed to be expensive.
incorrect
If you want to keep
trollingcommenting here than I suggest you make your contributions more constructive. I’m more than happy if people point out errors of fact and correct these. You failed on both counts. To self-correct, the drug name should end with “mab”, not “ab” as I said earlier.Frankly your continued accusation of trolling to anyone who disagrees with you is tedious.
Your are correct in stating that the generic nomenclature ending in 'mab' signifies a monoclonal antibody it is usually expensive when still under patent but pricing often falls dramatically when patents expire.
You don’t seem to understand that it is (your) behaviour that I label as trolling, not the fact that someone (you) disagrees with me. It is common among trolls to misunderstand this difference, which is why they usually continue with their behaviour and cop a ban. Frankly, it is tedious.
It is common for any drug that comes off patent to become available at cheaper price. However, this is relative and depends on demand, effectiveness, and disease type (e.g. so-called life-saving drugs do demand a premium – Yay for the free market). In addition, companies have many ways to extend their patents. It is much harder to make a generic of a biologic than of a synthetic drug, which further adds to the price. My comment still stands, mAbs are expensive irrespective of whether they are on patent or generics.
Clearly you have an issue with me Incognito – that is your problem if you’re determined to ban me on some made up pretext please feel free
(e.g. so-called life-saving drugs do demand a premium – Yay for the free market).
Often this is the case but there are many notable exceptions, insulin is a life saving drug but is very cheap in NZ in comparison to example the newer anti cancer compounds which are often 'life prolongers'.
Many of the very simple cardiovascular medications which could be considered life savers fo certain groups are extraordinarily cheap both before paint expires and after patent expires in comparison to many non life saving medications.
It is much harder to make a generic of a biologic than of a synthetic drug, which further adds to the price.
This is a reasonable assumption for simple pressed API immediate release tablets but is often not the case for complex release oral products or long acting injectable medicines.
My comment still stands, mAbs are expensive irrespective of whether they are on patent or generics.
In some case yes in some cases no – for example Rituximab which is now generic @ around $300 per month is pretty reasonable – all depends what you are comparing it to.
Let’s start with the constructive part of your comment, which was pleasingly well-informed, thank you.
Indeed, insulin is cheaper than, for example, some of the latest cancer immune therapy drugs that have recently come on the market. Of course, insulin has been around for yonks so this comparison is not entirely fair. In addition, for a proportion of cancer patients, these drugs are not just ‘life prolongers’ but potential life savers leading to complete responses.
Yes, you’re correct that I was only referring to the manufacture of the API, thanks.
In the case of Rituximab, the generic is indeed considerably cheaper than the original but still expensive IMO, thank you.
https://www.pharmac.govt.nz/news/notification-2019-12-05-rituximab/
I think none of this is inconsistent with what I said:
Now, for the first part of your comment, there is no pretext for banning you; you’re seeing or making an issue out of either something that isn’t there or mixing up things. The only issue I have, more with some than with others, is their online behaviour here on TS. It is not personal – I don’t know any of the commenters here from a bar of soap nor do I take things personal, unless they make personal insults to others or me.
I focus on behaviours that may have a negative influence on overall commentary here and/or create a bad environment that’s not conducive to what we like to achieve on this site. On the other hand, I don’t go around praising every single comment that falls on the other positive side of the ledger. This is why you usually see me taking issue with something (not somebody) when you see a comment of mine. Does this make sense?
Is the US economy about to take a nose drive into hard concrete? maybe so, as it looks like the Republican/Democratic bullshit bail out is not going to save them..
Bailing Out the Bailout
It will take years to sort through the details, but Trump’s $2 trillion COVID-19 response looks like a double-down on the last disaster
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/political-commentary/coronavirus-fed-bank-bailout-disaster-976086/
Latest figures show 16 million people have now lost their jobs, with layoffs spreading across the economy
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/apr/09/us-unemployment-filings-coronav
The corporate component of that bailout is US$400 billion +, that the Fed can leverage to US$4 trillion +.
In other words, there will be a happy cohort of disaster capitalists making hay on various short selling or whatev's, also buying swathes of strategic assets at fire sale prices, precisely because of unprecedented levels of unemployment, bankruptcy and business failure.
Is this reactivating behind Singapore's second wave?
The coronavirus may be “reactivating” in people who have been cured of the illness, according to Korea’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
About 51 patients classed as having been cured in South Korea have tested positive again, the CDC said in a briefing on Monday. Rather than being infected again, the virus may have been reactivated in these people, given they tested positive again shortly after being released from quarantine, said Jeong Eun-kyeong, director-general of the Korean CDC.
[…]
Fear of re-infection in recovered patients is also growing in China, where the virus first emerged last December, after reports that some tested positive again — and even died from the disease — after supposedly recovering and leaving hospital. There’s little understanding of why this happens, although some believe that the problem may lie in inconsistencies in test results.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-09/coronavirus-may-reactivate-in-cured-patients-korean-cdc-says
One hypothesis could be that the immune system is primed after the first infection and goes in full overdrive upon the second infection. This could lead to the immune system attacking the infected tissue (cytokine storm) with greater ferocity and with fatal consequences. In the past, this has been a problem with developing vaccines against certain diseases. The immune system is a complex beast.
Mastcells and the release of histamine would play a part.
Quercetin is a natural antihistamine.
A Dr Theoharides has done a lot of research in cytokine storm and mastcells.
Might be a good idea for the government to come up with a way to keep recovered people isolated for a while .
It's just become truly scary if this is true.
Does the Corona Virus share a trait of Herpes and the great Arnold – "I'll be back"
Tuskegee 2.0
https://twitter.com/SFdirewolf/status/1248057200154570752
Amanda Marcotte takes a look at Tinyfingers Twittertwat's attempts to rile up Berners in the wake of Bernie conceding the obvious and dropping out. Gonna be interesting watching how much traction the convergence moonbats that are more interested in sticking it to the libs and Dems than achieving actual progress get this time around compared to last time.
https://www.salon.com/2020/04/09/trump-trolls-bernie-supporters-urging-them-to-turn-against-joe-biden/
Could you explain what a "convergence moonbat" is? And then could you explain how Biden is superior to Trump?
By the way, Amanda Marcotte is about the least credible “journalist” in the U.S.
https://observer.com/2017/07/democratic-establishment-progressives-dominance-politics/
https://www.reddit.com/r/stupidpol/comments/fbfkt6/nyt_cancels_chapo/
"Biden is making morons of us all" …. Joe Rogan
Are you sure it's Biden?
https://twitter.com/DavMicRot/status/1248286165897224193
Too close to call, the madhouse offers a smorgasbord of diagnoses.
2016 all over again … "jeeze do I have to pick?"
Convergence moonbats explained.
I get it that apparently the media you consume mirrors the all-consuming hatred you feel of anyone that might be cognitively adaptable enough to win election and actually achieve some progressive goals, so you never get spoon-fed any of the real differences between the realistic choices. To help you out, here's just a few bullet points.
Biden wants to expand healthcare coverage to more people and lower costs to consumers. Tyrannosaurus Arse wants to take away coverage from poor people so he can put more money into his pockets.
Biden accepts climate change science and wants to make changes to reduce climate change. Dayglo Swampzilla wants to help his fossil fuel robberbaron friends to continue polluting the world for as long as possible to put more money into their pockets.
Biden's interests in foreign policy include considering how to improve the lives of people in foreign countries (even when that concern leads him into decisions with disastrous unintended consequences). Twitterfinger J. Putinpussy's interests in foreign policy don't extend any further than where he can put his name on hotels to put more money in his own pockets and his friends.
Biden generally supports worker's rights, even if that support is feeble and patchy. The Fifth Avenue Fraud wants to strip worker protections and suppress wages, in order to put more money into his own pockets.
Biden supports protecting natural areas and strengthening parks. America's Prolapsed Rectum just wants to shit all over them so his friends can extract more of the common wealth to put in their own pockets.
That's just a tiny portion of the differences. You're welcome. But it would be really helpful if you could suppress just a tiny bit of your motivated reasoning and broaden your information sources to include at least a few that are grounded in reality.
The Supreme Court alone would be all the reason anybody needs.
Yeah. That one thing is sufficient to explain why all the Repugs slurped down a load of Drano to dissolve their spines once it became clear in 2016 the genital-grabbing golem was going to win the nomination.
I get it that apparently the media you consume…
???
I read and listen to and read—not "consume"— all kinds of media. I read widely, and skeptically always. You are trying to portray me as something I'm not. You don't "get it" at all.
Biden's interests in foreign policy include considering how to improve the lives of people in foreign countries (even when that concern leads him into decisions with disastrous unintended consequences).
"Unintended consequences". That's a good way to explain away his support for the destruction of Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Palestine (to name just a few) in order to “improve the lives of people in foreign countries".
Putinpussy
We get it. You've swallowed the Russiagate Kool-Aid. How did that Mueller Inquiry go?
So Joe Spidern 'supports' 'generally supports' 'accepts' and he 'wants to'.
Hilarious.
BYW isn't there a website that gives clever, amusing nicknames for Biden? You could use that too.
Why is it a given the opposing candidate of the Murican Mugabe must not be a toady, a sycophant, and dripping in obsequiousness.
The DNC have selected Biden as their sacrificial old ewe and he will make a complete fool of himself in any debate with Thump. If they'd wanted the orangutan out they would have made sure Sanders got the nomination.
If Bernie had made it to the Oval Office, I would have found it fascinating to watch the reaction of Bernie cultists as Bernie dealt with the choice of either achieving nothing whatsoever, or succumbing to having to make the same shitty compromises that everyone else in the position has to make.
"Bernie cultists"? So the millions of people who supported him are a cult? Were they controlled by Russian masterminds like Trump was? Do they drink a kind of vodka-laced Kool-Aid?
Luckily for the rest of humanity there are sane, rational people like you and Keith Olbermann to keep watch over those cultists.
https://imgflip.com/i/1g3io4
Not all Bernie's supporters are cultists. It seems only around 15% are.
The remaining huge majority of his supporters are capable of maturely swallowing their disappointment that their first choice wasn't the choice of the majority, and go on to support the next best choice to achieve progress towards what is important to them.
Where do you get that figure of 15 per cent from?
A poll joe90 linked a few days ago.
Thanks. That's a lot of cultists.
Is Charles Manson still alive? He could make a run in 2024.
A lot indeed. Maybe even enough to get dolt45 re-elected.
If the left/progressives, those who saw Bernie Sanders as a political compromise, get their shit together and bring the streets to bear on Biden's campaign/platform, then they'll possibly achieve a lot of progress.
That said, I suspect a fair few will simply walk away from US representative politics in disgust.
Truth be told, Sanders not being President could turn out to be the best thing that happened to Progressive politics in the US in terms of achieving real world results.
But for that to happen, Biden would have to be President, and well….
All the main left activist groups have already united and sent a letter spelling out the demands they want to see Biden shift towards.
https://www.dailywire.com/news/left-wing-groups-issue-list-of-policy-demands-to-presumptive-nominee-joe-biden
For which in return they promise to work tirelessly to get rid of Trump.
Good to see people display some smarts 🙂
I'll assume that US$100 million worth of effort is contingent on him coming to the party.
The more I think about it, the more I'm thinking the DNC might have fucked up. They could have stymied a Sanders White House in a dozen different ways to Sunday. That, and Sander's support base would likely have pulled its collective punches if and when it came to holding his feet to the fire.
But with Biden…
Sanders just has to tread a line, and avoid going out there and overtly promoting any of Biden's problematic policies during a Presidential campaign.
Biden is the "I'm not Sanders, I'm not Trump, I'm not…"
But as a functioning palimpsest he's perfectly biddable, and has taken a lot of the Sanders and Warren direction already.
It's not as if his heart
"is an open book, "
for all young Dems
…. to write on.
But if you can imagine Biden in a silky mauve diaphanous top, you'll get the idea ……
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwK_WOXjfc0
Hahaha!
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2020/04/coronavirus-taxpayers-union-gives-up-ideological-purity-accepts-60-000-in-taxpayer-wage-subsidies.html
Schadenfreude!
Not satire!
I just went for a walk here in Blenheim. What fascinates me is the silence. Sunny calm day, very few cars, some family bikers and walkers and the deep quiet. I can hear a lawn mower about a block away and the monarch caterpillars chomping away on their leaves. I know everywhere must be quiet but this is amazing! And very pleasant.
Yes. I love the quiet. Was just on my balcony listening to the birds chatter in a tree nearby.
When the lock down ends, I guess the neighbours will have the guys back with the machines, building their half-finished rock wall – hope they finish it quickly. Plus other neighbours in houses and flats recently sold doing some upgrades.
We used to get a lot of dog walkers down our quiet street, but curiously, there's been few walkers since lock down – mostly only people in our street. It maybe that many of the dog walkers were using a narrow walkway from another, busier street to cut through to our street. But, the walkway is too narrow to allow people going in opposite directions and maintain the 2 meter distance….?
Thanks Joe. I wonder if Romans are pleased to not have tourists pounding the streets? I saw one ambulance two cars and one police car. It makes the city more beautiful but without people it is dreadfully like one of those apocalypse movies. Shudders.
Yes, Ian, I hear the same silence! My neighbours talking on their patio, two magpies 100 metres away, twittering small birds, and a monarch fluttered by but I can't claim to have heard it! I see no traffic on SH1 and hear no grape harvesters. The vineyard guns are silent.
Will our lives change because of this experience and how we live the rest of our lives? My wife stays at home every night of the week rather than three nights out. Me the same. We eat better, and more interestingly. Homegrown figs, home cooked oat biscuits, ciabatta buns and oven-roasted beetroot and quinces.
I read that our dreams are more vivid and will affect our imagination more.
I have been phoning Grey Power members who are over 70 and who have no e-mail to be contacted by. They all sounded well and happy, looked after by family and friends. Their biggest concern was how to pay their sub without using KiwiBank cheques.
I just wondered whether these wiser old folks, off-line and away from false news and scare-mongering, haven't got a deeper handle on what is worthwhile in living a good life.
We had 3 caterpillars, the first in years on our swan plant. I covered them with netting till they were fat then brought them inside to sit on the table with a few branches of swan plant as take-aways. I am sure I heard them munching. One took offence at being inside and did a runner. Next morning it turned up on my armchair. I put it back on the table so ungrateful little sod took off again. So I returned it back to the mother plant outside but now cannot find it.
Can't hear it eating either so who knows?
Some bird with a fuller puku, or maybe it's the one that did a fly-by here……..
Just been singing a song by James Taylor on the patio as the sun goes down. The words go, "Well the sun is slowly sinking down, and the moon is slowly on the rise . So this old world must still be spinning around. And I still love you." This to my partner who's been in my bubble for coming up 44 years!
It’s been a good Friday.
"the monarch caterpillars chomping away on their leaves"
Now that is truly impressive. I assume your hearing was good enough to hear that Holden that started up in Nelson at 5.27pm. Was it a 6 or an 8 cylinder? I heard it from over here in Wellington but my hearing isn't nearly as good as yours seems to be.
Dunno about catipillars, but some small things are louder than they look.
Hedgehogs, for example. And whatever was having a domestic in my roof space the other night (I think rats, but I'm no Attenborough).
"Hedgehogs, for example".
Indeed yes. I was amazed how noisy they were when I first had them appear in my garden. Such little things too.
Year ago when I was in security I was about to call for backup until the "prowler" in the bushes came scurrying out, about 5.5ft shorter than I expected. Narrowly escaped months of workplace ribbing for that one lol
Around here it is the paper wasps still chomping away on the Monarch caterpillars. They used to stop looking for food around this time, but there now appears to be a new, slightly different type.. Bad news for the Monarchs. Nice weather otherwise.
I really wish I hadn't read that. Monarch Butterflies are so beautiful and wasps so dreadful. I really would prefer to think that every Monarch caterpillar turned into a butterfly than to think of them being eaten up by bloody wasps.
I don't think how nice lambs are when I eat a lamb roast of course.
A pitiless yet hilarious dissection of the likes of Bari Weiss, Amanda Marcotte, David Brooks
On his light chat show, Jim Mora used to regularly quote the right wing New York Times opinionist David Brooks whenever he needed something, however intellectually threadbare, to provide some heft for his own complacent and reactionary views.
There's some very funny and astute analysis of Amanda Marcotte's hopeless New York Times colleagues, esp. David Brooks, from the 51:00 mark….
At least our Auckland Harbour will be safe from encroachment !!
Imagine if we had already bowed to the cruise industry and extended Queen's Wharf ??
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/407642/cruise-ship-industry-says-value-could-be-greater-if-auckland-port-had-bigger-berth
Question for the tech geeks here.
The old scam e-mail from the LinkedIn breach turned up in my inbox today. The "we know your password, we've hacked your webcam and have vids of you watching porn, pay us bitcoin" one. As it happens, I logged in to LinkedIn for the first time in quite a while a couple of weeks ago. I checked and HIBP sez my email and password were included in the breach.
Is this just coincidence, or does this suggest the scammers still have malware planted on LinkedIn that lets them see LinkedIn's traffic?
🙂 Aw bugger! That was the very last of my decent coffee 🙁 Is that a public mea-culpa to neuter potential fallout?
2nd C-19 death announced – Christchurch woman transferred from Rest Home earlier in the week.
Oh bugger. Hard on the family. Wonder if the victim was already at risk on top being in a dementia unit patient and aged?
She was 90 years old and "The woman, who had a number of age-related health conditions, died yesterday and recently had returned a positive test."
Yep. Sad for the family. Once the virus gets into a rest home, there can be major problems.
But, also, there was a rise in numbers of confirmed and probable C-19 cases today.
29 new cases yesterday, 44 today.
We have nothing to be complacent about.
Complacency, no, not at all. Also, other countries don't count some deaths from Covid, if they're old (natural causes) & in rest homes.
Porky says:
Why can't the Taxdodger's Union both stick to their "ideological purity", and look after the welfare of their employees?
They could do this by making the offer to pay back the $60,000 wage subsidy they have bludged from the government.
Hypocrisy has scaled new heights!
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2020/04/coronavirus-taxpayers-union-gives-up-ideological-purity-accepts-60-000-in-taxpayer-wage-subsidies.html
It will be interesting to see who claims the subsidy – there'll certainly be more than just this mob who are dubious recipients of the governments largesse on behalf of the public.
I think the Govt itself should make a claim. It is too big to fail, and could lose millions…
Shhhhhhhh… don't someone'll read that and we'll have all the political parties putting their hands out.
The ideological purity lost out to pragmatism with the tax payers union. It is similar to discussions with fundamentalist bible expounders. Funny how biblical injunctions not to eat pork, or eat leavened bread at Passover, or eat shellfish have been overridden.
We understand with modern science why we can eat these foods safely.
These right wing purists just came up against new circumstances which made an ass of dogma. Good on them for altering their views. I just hope that they will understand that inflexible thinking and ideology lead to dead ends.
That welfarism, social cohesiveness, and even taxation can be creative, life-sustaining, and beneficial.
They're going to do it all again.
https://twitter.com/paulkrugman/status/1248286270046044162
brain dead and possibly suicidal
I checked and nope, not satire.
Donald Trump paused his efforts around the growing coronavirus crisis to sign an executive order clearing the path for US to mine the moon for resources.
According to documents released by the White House, the order rejects the 1979 global agreement known as the Moon Treaty which says any activity in space should conform with international law.
"Americans should have the right to engage in commercial exploration, recovery, and use of resources in outer space," the order states.
https://news.sky.com/story/trump-takes-break-from-coronavirus-crisis-to-sign-order-for-us-to-mine-the-moon-11970665
Any planet /moon or asteroid should be split by giving countries the exact % of surface area as they have on earth ,in the same area as their country. It would save a lot of agro if we get that far .
This wouldnt stop non spacefaring nations from getting a share of the goodies they could just sell mining rights to their chunk.
And all of the "seas" on the moon, should be given to our planet's seas.
Whoop! (From the US)
The Transportation Security Administration screened 94,931 people on Wednesday, a drop of 96% from a year ago and the second straight day under 100,000.
Historical daily numbers only go back so far, but the nation last averaged fewer than 100,000 passengers a day in 1954, according to figures from trade group Airlines for America.
Give me another week.
https://twitter.com/Hofmanovitsj1/status/1247971369578639361
That is not only hilarious but very very clever. Thanks Joe.
Have two.
Top work!
I think this song is a silver lining from the lockdown.
I apologize for misleading people on this site. I am now convinced the data errors around Covid-19 are completely flawed and apparently meant to deliberately mislead.
While I do not doubt some people are harmed, this is not even remotely close to the level that was projected. We do not need a vaccine, nor do we need to continually monitor our borders. Maintaining a reasonable health standard + the odd vitamin boost if we feel unwell should do it.
Here are a couple of many articles I have found that support this.
https://www.foxnews.com/media/physician-blasts-cdc-coronavirus-death-count-guidelines
https://www.statnews.com/2020/03/17/a-fiasco-in-the-making-as-the-coronavirus-pandemic-takes-hold-we-are-making-decisions-without-reliable-data/
But the most damming is the evidence on the ground. I point to the videos put out by Crowdsource The Truth/Jason Goodman from NYC. At first I thought this guy is arrogant and crazy, but it turned out he was just being skeptical and for good reason. The claims in the media that NYC is death central are obviously bullshit. You can't watch this guys videos and draw any other conclusion.
Then there are the photos used for different stories, in different countries. Same photo. A number of examples of this can be found.
We have all been duped.
If someone tells you that you or your family must have a Covid-19 vaccine for their own safety and that of the public tell them to go fuck themselves.
"It is in fact more likely that the coronavirus death toll is much higher than the official figures suggest, rather than it being inflated. The CDC has acknowledged its count is an “underestimation” because it only tallies cases where Covid-19 has been confirmed in a laboratory test.
Epidemiologists say a widespread lack of initial testing in the US means many people died without being counted, while even now some people who die at home or in nursing homes are not being tested for the virus.
In New York City, more than 200 people are dying at home each day during the pandemic, according to city officials, a very much higher rate than usual. Bill de Blasio, New York City’s mayor, has estimated that about 100 to 200 people a day who die at home in the city are not being included in the official virus death count. But the federal government insists the overall figures are largely accurate."
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/09/coronavirus-conspiracy-theory-death-overcount-anthony-fauci
Eliminate.
https://twitter.com/MaximilianJans2/status/1248397776020357123
https://twitter.com/MaximilianJans2/status/1248397780860563458
https://youtu.be/qQfetkoGrpU