About time. The problem with these simple minded slogan policies is that they such large amounts of resources away from programs that are actually in place and working.
In NZ fad slogans like national standards pulled money away from and effectively terminated programmes that were operational and effective like adult education to the reading and numerical. For what? The national standards don’t look like they are achieving anything apart from killing trees producing meaningless reports even in the schools and the now disillusioned parents that enthusiastically took it up.
How well is national standards actually doing? We don’t know. Because the idiots that pushed it into the system seem to have forgotten to put in any monitoring of the new system to find out if it is actually achieving anything.
Asset sell-off
Just what would the comeback be to those who are “promising” the majority of the 49% going to NZ and NZ mums and dads if that didn’t eventuate and they did finish up in foreign hands? Could those ministers with the respective portfolios be liable for prosecution?
What financial crisis…
Are we mugs or not? I can think of a few needs in New Zealand that could have been met if this profit had remained sloshing around in New Zealand owned banks – we used to have some – but instead has been sucked away to Australia and further afield.
I don’t understand how people fail to see how damaging it is to send this sort of profit off-shore.
Only a tiny portion of that money will ever make its way into the til of a New Zealand shopkeeper.
And now we’re going to do the exact same thing with the power companies: send the money off-shore to be spent in foreign shops, when it could be spent in the shops of Kiwis, who would then employ Kiwis and buy goods from other Kiwis (even if they were imported…but let’s not go there).
It boggles my mind that people don’t see the problem. How can you have increasing levels of wealth and prosperity for the masses when all your wealth gets shipped into the pockets of people overseas?
The majority of the NZ banking industry has pretty much always been in overseas hands. Three of the major banks ANZ/National (prior to the merger), and Westpac. The exception was BNZ and POSB. I exclude ASB because prior to the 1990’s it was not a big player nation wide.
Inmteresting though that some lefties were arguing that the introduction of Kiwibank somehow stopped the other banks from making extraordinary profits. How is this theory looking now? Mighty flawed I’d suggest.
Just more proof that we need to drop the private banks and go all national. Have banking as a state service as it should be rather than a rort that enriches only the few.
ome lefties were arguing that the introduction of Kiwibank somehow stopped the other banks from making extraordinary profits. How is this theory looking now? Mighty flawed I’d suggest.
KiwiBank as it stands now was but one step.
Putting the backing of Government behind KiwiBank would do it.
For once I agree with CV (I hope this not a trend…)- Kiwibank may not have drastically changed the fee landscape but on the margin it will have had some impact – who knows what would have happened without them
In fact when Kiwibank started my own fees went down by over $100 a month. Multiply that by all New Zealander’s business and private accounts. That is why the banking industry is so keen to get rid of Kiwibank. It keeps them partially honest.
Yep suddenly I had people ringing me from my bank suddenly noticing I was entitled to reduced fees, offering me a credit card with lower interest rates, asking me for my opinion on what they could do for me and knocking 1/4 percent off my mortgage.
Saved me quite a bit of money.
The struggle against climate change, and the struggle against autocracy, and for democracy are closely linked.
One of the fronts in the global battle against climate change is the Maldives.
The democratically elected president and global campaigner against climate change has been injured in a military and police coup.
President Mohammed Nasheed who was also a political prisoner of the previous autocratic dictatorship that ruled his country for 30 years. Says he will stand again if democratic elections are allowed by the new regime.
As the Climate Change Crisis deepens, events are showing, that the 1 percenters are prepared to, lie, conspire, and even kill, to protect their right to exploit both the human and natural environment to the point of collapse. (and beyond)
[lprent: Dickhead. Regardless of what you (or I or anyone) thinks of his business practices, remember that people including his family will google and find this tasteless and upsetting. I haven’t had to deal with you before so you get the introductory 1 week ban. ]
When the 1% reform, and desist from lying, conspiring and killing to further their control of society, then I’ll shed a tear. Until then I’ll celebrate the death of these animals. Evil doesn’t deserve compassion.
[lprent: Ah. You may – but not on our space. Ban increased to 2 weeks. And read the policy. ]
Writen like a true leftist despot in waiting. I can see you organising the ‘re-education’ camps now for those who dare disagree with the ‘mainstream’ views.
The silience of other lefties on this site to the above comment is telling….they either
1) Agree with TT
2) Are so biased that they refuse to critize a comrade
Or, as in my case, they didn’t even see it! (It was deleted some time ago) I gather it celebrated someone’s death, and that is never acceptable!
Right on TT. I really hope Gareth Morgan gets Aids and Bob Jones gets something really painfull like Ebola.
Fuck you.
[lprent: You just came off a ban for being a dick. And I see that you have moved on from wanting to shoot people to wanting them infected instead. http://thestandard.org.nz/the-biggest-fraud/comment-page-1/#comment-413972 I will be generous and I won’t give you a year.. 4 weeks for being a reactive dumbarse. ]
I have no idea who or what she/he is. Only had 4 comments, 2 today (which picked up two bans).
The others were run of the mill extremist. Could be a wingnut trying to sound like one of their fantasies (it has been done before). Or as much of a moonbeam as he/she reads. But whatever; it will get educated about acceptable behaviour the same way everyone else does.
Apparently some doofus made a pretty loathsome comment and picked up a ban because of it. But because the guy was allegedly a lefty, apparently it’s proof that all the left are just as bitter and small-minded as some on the right.
Oh, and a whole bunch of tories believe that if they read a comment before the mods catch it, everyone else has, too.
It was pretty crass. I have no idea who he was talking about (apart from the company), but I think that families should be allowed to let their loved ones get laid to rest without reading about some idiot gloating about it.
“We do,” said US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland when asked by reporters, if Washington recognizes the new government as the legitimate government of the Maldives. Nuland called Waheed the president and Nasheed the former president.
Meanwhile, at the same time, as the US was busy cosying up to the coup leaders.
Nasheed, according to reports, has been threatened with arrest and ‘life in jail’ just days after he was forced to resign at gunpoint by renegade police and military forces.
I think you are overstating the current position of Climat Change. There is general consensus that the world is more likely to be cooling rather than warming. There has been no perceptible increase in sea levels. The ice caps are stable and the glaciers growing.
Using a unique pair of satellites that have monitored the disappearing ice over the entire surface of the globe, scientists estimated that some 1,000 cubic miles of ice has disappeared between 2003 and 2010 – enough to cover the US in one-and-a-half feet of water.
The survey found that the melting of the cryosphere has been responsible for raising sea levels by about half an inch over the same period, equivalent to a rise of about 1.5mm a year. This was on top of sea-level increases due to the thermal expansion of seawater caused by rising ocean temperatures.
The survey found that the melting of the cryosphere has been responsible for raising sea levels by about half an inch over the same period, equivalent to a rise of about 1.5mm a year. This was on top of sea-level increases due to the thermal expansion of seawater caused by rising ocean temperatures.
MILANO – L’attuale fase di riscaldamento globale almeno un lato positivo ce l’ha. La prossima era glaciale, il cui inizio era stato indicato tra circa 1.500 anni, è rinviata di alcune migliaia di anni. La fase interglaciale in cui stiamo vivendo, iniziata circa 12 mila anni fa dopo che 6 mila anni prima i ghiacci avevano raggiunto la massima espansione, è infatti un’anomalia in un periodo complessivamente freddo che dura da circa 1,2 milioni di anni e che negli ultimi 500 mila anni ha già fatto registrare quattro lunghe glaciazioni.
MILAN – The current phase of global warming has at least one positive side. The next ice age, the beginning of which was expected in about 1,500 years, is postponed for some thousands of years. The interglacial stage in which we live, which began about 12,000 years ago after 6 thousand years before the ice had reached its apex, is in fact an anomaly in a cold period that lasted a total of about 1.2 million years and that in the last 500 thousand years has already seen four long ice ages.
The underlying trend for the next 10k years is for cooling. That is the major solar cycles and orbital cycles. However that is being washed under by greenhousing the atmosphere.
Quite simply it is a effect that would have already made a difference if we hadn’t already been modifying the atmosphere fot tge last 5k years or so. Basically since we started pushing methane out.
Those cooling effects make no difference for the next few thousand years regardless what happens now. The last 200 years of CO2 releases will persist washing out underlying effects for at least that long. The question is how much worse we make it in pursuit of profits and SUVs
BTW the current ice age is easily traceable back to about 40Mya. Antarticia drifted fully into the polar position then and started to ice up. Our species developed in ice ages. It is unlikely we’d survive normal earth climates. In a few generations they will find out.
We have a thing called tides and weather that confuses the issue. Seeing cm’s of average rise over decades when sealevels normally change by meters daily is hard.
But of course there is no perceptible change in sea levels. Humans aren’t equipped to perceive it. Most cannot remember what they had for breakfast on the same day last year. That is why we rely on records of previous measurements. However contrary to your carefully worded statement, sealevels are measurably steadily rising, mostly at present from thermal expansion. In many locations this is probably not perceptible because people don’t remember well enough to perceive it.
A few (but not most) mountain glaciers are growing. It is what you expect to happen when you measure increased precipitation in their circes. It is a sign of shifting weather patterns and is actually something to worry about. Weather patterns don’t shift outside of cylic events unless there is significiant climate change. Glaciers are a complex mix of the rate that they get fed vs the rate that they melt. You are thinking of one without considering the other.
See the reply about overall cycles I made to someone else. But surfice into say that is you wanted to show how much of a stupid arse you are on the science of climate change, then your two observations (that I pointed out the half truths in above) made that amply clear.
Even you should have been able to see the idiotic flaws in the statements to anyone who’d done any science.
While i don’t condone illegal downloading is anyone else getting more uneasy with the Kim Dotcom fiasco?
I am getting the distinct impression that the NZ Government & Police will do anything to please the USA/FBI.
Heavy handed is an understatement.
There is also the instance of the British kid facing deportation to the US for the same thing. His revenue came from the advertisers on his site and as far as I know. I wonder how many other cases there are?
Briefly, they hold that a .org or .net address = US jurisdiction and that ‘inducing’ others to download copy right material (by running a link site) is enough of a reason to seek extradition and prosecute in the US. The fact that O’Dwyer did nothing illegal under UK law and had no US based servers is apparently irrelevant. So I guess the same goes for Dotcom with regards NZ law.
What is scary beyond the means of arrest is that there has been no evidence produced to substantiate the arrest and detention of Mr Dotcom. Surely it would be remarkable if you or I was arrested without any case having been made to the Courts. Uneasy? Yes.
I’ve been trying to collect all the links to the excellent ‘Divided Auckland’ series in the Herald this week (the website itself doesn’t seem to have them centrally located anywhere).
If anyone has missed any of these, they are well worth a read. A very comprehensive look at inequality and poverty in Auckland by the Herald’s social issues reporter Simon Collins. There is still one more part to go tomorrow, which is supposed to be about what can be done to improve this situation.
I know some on this site believe that Mediaworks are in the pocket of this government. I don’t think that. A large number of people in broadcasting (I’d argue MSM) are inherently conservative (learned from two decades around these people – I think it’s because they need to reach a mass audience meaning they lean right) so naturally they will support a government made of conservative elements.
More to the point, though, Mediaworks is largely devoid of decency. We saw this prior to the election where they were prepared to hand over an hour or programming to Mr Key even though it was obviously not in the interests of democracy. Here’s the latest stunt from one of their radio stations – surprise your spouse with a divorce on air. http://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/valentines-day-2012/6394715/Radio-stations-divorce-promo-cowardly
The Rock also do the vile Wind Up Your Wife segment, where practical ‘jokes’ like telling a woman she took the wrong baby home from the hospital is par for the course.
And Mediaworks were behind that show that thought breaching airport security would be good for a laugh. When they appeared in court the culprits were all cowardly in the extreme – if you’re such rebels guys you go down fighting, not with a whimper.
And the government did a deal with these people to keep them in business?
I know some on this site believe that Mediaworks are in the pocket of this government.
Actually, I think it’s more that this government is in the pockets of the MSM.
I think it’s because they need to reach a mass audience meaning they lean right) so naturally they will support a government made of conservative elements.
The majority of people in the country are neither conservative nor right leaning. This would indicate that they have another reason for producing right leaning news.
“The majority of people in the country are neither conservative nor right leaning. This would indicate that they have another reason for producing right leaning news”
Nor as the election showed left leaning…..hence they must all be in the centre!
Does that include the 27% who didn’t vote? We can’t just assume that they would have voted in lock step with everyone else and research shows a) that it’s the poor who tend not to vote and b) that they would normally vote left if they did.
BTW, if we continue to accept Labour as a left-wing party then today’s centre is right-leaning.
A few factors at play here.
1. Senior journalism. It takes experience, intellect and good research backing it. Most have retired or left the industry, those that remain don’t get the resouces due to below.
2. Short attention span and cheap reality TV amongst others. Why bother crafting a well strctured 20 min piece on say the GFC when most folk can’t focus beyond the first 5 minutes and celebrity strip snooker sex darts on ice rates 5 times higher amd costs less….ka ching
3. Who’s your dadddy. Stories that upset the management/owners are never going to get focus…recall ‘the insider’ and GE’s influence on 60 minutes etc etc not to mention the links between mediawonks and a certain govt minister who brokered the interest free loan that renewed their licences.
4. Emotion’s a quick easy target over intellect, so dog whistle away.
5. those well crafted press releases look just journalism if you don’t look to hard and soo much cheaper than doing any actual research.
There’s others but you get the picture….and it’s SBW taking his shirt off again…awww swoon.
So Key says now that the returns from state assets are not as good Greens and Labour are saying, this of course
belies the obvious reality of peak oil naturally increasing the worth of renewables energy sources. So National is
willing to risk the irony that future state asset ledgers showing massive returns in the future, and Nationals future
economic competence is brought into question each year (when the state assets profits are declared to parliament),
the opposition parties will rise in a coarse and loud laughter, never let National sell your home! But what I find
find immediately funny is the uber investment salesman Key is talking down the state assets even as he is trying to
sell them. Can Key be any more ridiculous? National trying NOT to explain how peak oil will blow out profit as demand
rises in the face of peaks in oil price, and is in fact trying to damage the past history of dividend returns.
But as I have pointed out, governments cannot mislead foriegn investers because of free trade rules, but can mislead native investors. One problem core to world capitalism is boardrooms paying themselves huge bonuses despite selling shareholders down the river.
Free trade inevitably means a global elite of global firms and dynasties will emerge who can lobby native
governments to rip local tax payers off.
Imagine for a second government in one term buying land, building a dam and
then selling the dam immediately, if the market could not provide the funding at the time the dam was built then why
should the market be able to buy the dam once it has been built and makes a huge one off windfall profit (no innovation there!).
Especially when there are other instruments to offset debt without losing ownership, like selling off future returns
on product like Fonterra has. So the question is why is Key so purposefully clueless? Asset sales, even with iwi
agreement, is a bad deal for NZ, a best hopelessly incompetence, at worse against the long term interests of the nation.
And we have not even got to the question of standing, how will the government insure all Kiwis have first dibs at the
shares without provoking the ire of the free trade? Unless government admits that since tax payers already own the
assets! And if government does that then taxpayers have a right to take their case to the free trade judges and argue
that government intervention has to be in their best interest, and government cannot sell off assets without a
referendum of the people, the shareholders, like any company who has to take big decisions to the shareholders.
And treat them like any other investor!!!
Free trade works for “all” investors not just foriegn investors, otherwise it is unconscionable. Many people voted
National despite its asset sale policy, its naive of National to argue that every citizen that voted for them agreed
with every line of their manifesto – especially when their MPs have said as much in times past.
So Dunne says he supports the decision of the people, to sit with the National party, Dunne went to the electorate as
the voice of moderation in the centre, who has worked with all sides. Now National got less than 50% of the vote, and
the moderate position to take surely when there is a hanging chad situation (and time to sort out the issue) is to go
back and have some form of recount, like a referendum. So is Dunne going to suggest that he will vote for partial
asset sales if there is a referendum on such a significant national issue? Why should we have all this fog about
asset sales, as if they were now a foregone conclusion once iwi sign on them? Dunne can clear the way with one word,
referendum. Does Dunne like Key believe the voters would vote for them anyway, well then put up a referendum.
Its like Key getting off a plane from Hier Hitler waving a agreement to sell assets…
…was just a delaying tactic because Key lost by winning the last election with a smaller coalition.
Will Dunne go the way of Hide? Hide was unelectable when he covered up Garrett crime and punishment history, will Dunne go the same way by not forcing a referendum and going against his moderating center of politics. Can you image for a moment the Greens forcing a citizens referendum on asset sales after Dunne had been sitting on his hands?
Free trade protects (rightly) foreign investors equal treatment but if local investors cannot (or do not) gain access to WTO arbitration then over time without remedy too poor government policy (like asset sales) . Foreign investors have the incentive to lubricate the political elite to produce favorable policies (at the expense tax payers). What are Asset Sales but selling off dams built with tax payer money and returning very nice profits (and likely to get much better due to peak oil)? So if a company board were to fail to take a partial sell off of their company to a shareholder vote they’d be sued, but if the government fails to take partial asset sales a referendum at considerable lose (due to world governments printing money and prospects for the assets being so considerable in the peak oil future).
Key is currently trying to get rich from China not by emulating China but by selling our assets to China. This is a profound article on “State Capitalism” and why the free market will fail us..
Late last month, the Economist magazine published a debate on state capitalism, in which it proposed that state-led market economies are fast becoming a global rival to the old models of liberal, free market capitalism.
When you hear someone say the words ‘nanny state’, ask if they know the causes of Pike River
When you hear someone say we should cut red tape, ask if they know someone with a leaky home
When you hear someone say the words ‘nanny state’, ask if the know why the CTV building collapsed
When you hear someone say the market is the solution, ask if they know someone who lost all their savings from a finance company
It’s just a start….I imagine people can think of more
Now, why doesn’t the media ask those questions??
I guess Steven Joyce would say ” Each time we say ‘you can’t’ it carries a cost”
Maybe the media should ask him “What is the cost of saying “you can?”
The answer………….Pike River, leaky buildings, CTV, the 2008 crash….
Why are they so bad at their job?
They’re so bad at their job because they aren’t doing their job, they’re creating profit. The environment they do it in is irrelevent.
Ever wonder why the entertainment industry often turns out music, film and stories so awfully bad that you wonder how it happened? Then you read the credits and it’s like a telephone book of influencial friends? Because to make it in the entertainment world (or anywhere else that money collects) you must be, first and foremost, be a connected business person – not a competent craftsman. Musician, screen writer, builder, architect, manager, miner – business first, everything else way down the list. Until people realise money, political connections, “passion”, ambition and greed are not indicators of competency, we can expect a worsening of all crafts.
Ever wonder how it is that within any profession you choose, you’ll find a large percentage of the people as almost cookie cutter clones? Many aren’t doing their job. They’re living a persona generated to make profit.
In the last 2 weeks I have done flying trips to Germany, UK, Denmark Switzerland, and now Thailand. I have a few impressions.
1. Europe is bloody cold!!
2. Customs and immigration searches are getting over the top and much more invasive. The bastards at Heathrow (don’t go there) took my half empty bottle of contact lens solution (Helpfully telling me I could buy a new one in the transit lounge). With the ridiculous lengths they go to against bona fide travellers, I think the terrorists have already won. Notice how they don’t explosive search anyone even remotely looking like the might have a bomb – of course not!! If you searched a terrorist he might set it off – thats why you only see the hassling little old white ladies!
3. Swiss customs and cops don’t mess around – they are right into racial profiling. Arabic or black – you will be done over coming into the country and probably stopped at random in the street.
4. Picked up the inevitable cold but was delighted to find out that the only cold remedy at Dubai contained Pseudoephedrine. Needless to say, 24 hrs later I am cured. Looks like, in NZ the criminals have won, dooming us all to colds and flu that is impossible to get rid of!
5. iPads are the answer, no more lugging around the bloody laptop and with the bluetooth keyboard and iPad holder I bought duty free at Copenhagen, really useful.
6. The plane heading back to NZ is always the best flight!
Too bloody hot in Auckland at present. My brain starts misfiring from 2pm onwards ( programming makes you utterly aware if and when stupidity is setting in ). Roll on winter…
Re # 2: I disagree with you there. Being a person of indeterminate ethnic origin (I’m half PI and half English but I look vaguely Arabic, particularly if I haven’t shaved for a few days), I will ALWAYS get singled out for the carry-on bag swab and scan test. I don’t mind, they’re just doing their job. But I’m not kidding myself that I’m not being racially profiled. I’m yet to see any “little old white ladies” singled out.
I’ve been singled out (little white lady) – a few years ago carry-on bags were ‘randomly’ checked at Heathrow, and surprise – I was a ‘random’ checked at the U.S stopover as well. The added touch was extra questioning and luggage check by customs on arrival in Auckland.
After thinking about it, I guess buying tickets for a trip of only a few days, 2 days before the flight, gave me the profile of a drug smuggler (the trip was for a funeral).
Again an extra scan and bag checks at Heathrow just last month for no particular reason.
Re # 6: Yes it is, it’s always full of kiwis happy to be getting home or tourists happy to be heading here. And if you get an immigration officer that says to you “Welcome home”, that’s the icing on the cake.
I fekkin hate travelling through airports, the tyranny of the state becomes so obvious…we are all supposed to be scared that on our way between Auckland Wellington and Shakytown some Arab sympathiser iis going to set of a bomb in mid air. Or hijack us and fly us into the Beehive. For that I must be stoppped scanned, searched and deprived of metalic objects incase I use something as inocuous as a fishing reel as a weapon of mass destruction. Argghhhh!!!!!
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The Sincerest Form Of Flattery: As anybody with the intestinal fortitude to brave the commentary threads of local news-sites, large and small, will attest, the number of Trump-supporting New Zealanders is really quite astounding. IT’S SO DIFFICULT to resist the temptation to be smug. From the distant perspective of New Zealand, ...
RNZ reports on continued arbitrariness on decisions at the border. British comedian Russell Howard is about to tour New Zealand and other acts allowed in through managed isolation this summer include drag queen RuPaul and musicians at Northern Bass in Mangawhai and the Bay Dreams festival. The vice-president of the ...
As families around the world mourn more than two million people dead from Covid-19, the Plan B academics and their PR industry collaborator continue to argue that the New Zealand government should stop focusing on our managed isolation and quarantine system and instead protect the elderly so that they can ...
A chronological listing of news articles linked to on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week: Sun, Jan 10, 2021 through Sat, Jan 16, 2021Editor's ChoiceNASA says 2020 tied for hottest year on record — here’s what you can do to helpPhoto by Michael Held on Unsplash ...
Health authorities in Norway are reporting some concerns about deaths in frail elderly after receiving their COVID-19 vaccine. Is this causally related to the vaccine? Probably not but here are the things to consider. According to the news there have been 23 deaths in Norway shortly after vaccine administration and ...
Happy New Year! No, experts are not concerned that “…one of New Zealand’s COIVD-1( vaccines will fail to protect the country” Here is why. But first I wish to issue an expletive about this journalism (First in Australia and then in NZ). It exhibits utter failure to actually truly consult ...
All nations have shadows; some acknowledge them. For others they shape their image in uncomfortable ways.The staunch Labour supporter was in despair at what her Rogernomics Government was doing. But she finished ‘at least, we got rid of Muldoon’, a response which tells us that then, and today, one’s views ...
Grigori GuitchountsIn November, Springer Nature, one of the world’s largest publishers of scientific journals, made an attention-grabbing announcement: More than 30 of its most prestigious journals, including the flagship Nature, will now allow authors to pay a fee of US$11,390 to make their papers freely available for anyone to read ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Gary Yohe, Henry Jacoby, Richard Richels, and Benjamin Santer Imagine a major climate change law passing the U.S. Congress unanimously? Don’t bother. It turns out that you don’t need to imagine it. Get this: The Global Change Research Act of 1990 was passed ...
“They’re here already! You’re next! You’re next! You’re next!”WHO CAN FORGET the penultimate scene of the 1956 movie classic, Invasion of the Body Snatchers? The wild-eyed doctor, stumbling down the highway, trying desperately to warn his fellow citizens: “They’re here already! You’re next! You’re next! You’re next!”Ostensibly science-fiction, the movie ...
TheOneRing.Net has got its paws on the official synopsis of the upcoming Amazon Tolkien TV series. It’s a development that brings to mind the line about Sauron deliberately releasing Gollum from the dungeons of Barad-dûr. Amazon knew exactly what they were doing here, in terms of drumming up publicity: ...
Since Dwight Eisenhower’s inauguration in 1953, US presidents have joined an informal club intended to provide support - and occasionally rivalry - between those few who have been ‘leaders of the free world’. Donald Trump, elected on a promise to ‘drain the swamp’ and a constant mocker of his predecessors, ...
For over a decade commentators have noted the rise of a new brand of explicitly ideological politics throughout the world. By this they usually refer to the re-emergence of national populism and avowedly illiberal approaches to governance throughout the “advanced” democratic community, but they also extend the thought to the ...
The US House of Representatives has just impeached Donald Trump, giving him the dubious honour of being the only US President to be impeached twice. Ten Republicans voted for impeachement, making it the most bipartisan impeachment ever. The question now is whether the Senate will rise to the occasion, and ...
Kieren Mitchell; Alice Mouton, Université de Liège; Angela Perri, Durham University, and Laurent Frantz, Ludwig Maximilian University of MunichThanks to the hit television series Game of Thrones, the dire wolf has gained a near-mythical status. But it was a real animal that roamed the Americas for at least 250,000 ...
Tide of tidal data rises Having cast our own fate to include rising sea level, there's a degree of urgency in learning the history of mean sea level in any given spot, beyond idle curiosity. Sea level rise (SLR) isn't equal from one place to another and even at a particular ...
Well, some of those chickens sure came home bigly, didn’t they… and proceeded to shit all over the nice carpet in the Capitol. What we were seeing here are societal forces that have long had difficulty trying to reconcile people to the “idea” of America and the reality of ...
In the wake of Donald Trump's incitement of an assault on the US capitol, Twitter finally enforced its terms of service and suspended his account. They've since followed that up with action against prominent QAnon accounts and Trumpers, including in New Zealand. I'm not unhappy with this: Trump regularly violated ...
Peter S. Ross, University of British ColumbiaThe Arctic has long proven to be a barometer of the health of our planet. This remote part of the world faces unprecedented environmental assaults, as climate change and industrial chemicals threaten a way of life for Inuit and other Indigenous and northern ...
Susan St John makes the case for taxing a deemed rate of return on excessive real estate holdings (after a family home exemption), to redirect scarce housing resources to where they are needed most. Read the full article here ...
I’m less than convinced by arguments that platforms like Twitter should be subject to common carrier regulation preventing them from being able to decide who to keep on as clients of their free services, and who they would not like to serve. It’s much easier to create competition for the ...
The hypocritical actions of political leaders throughout the global Covid pandemic have damaged public faith in institutions and governance. Liam Hehir chronicles the way in which contemporary politicians have let down the public, and explains how real leadership means walking the talk. During the Blitz, when German bombs were ...
Over the years, we've published many rebuttals, blog posts and graphics which came about due to direct interactions with the scientists actually carrying out the underlying research or being knowledgable about a topic in general. We'll highlight some of these interactions in this blog post. We'll start with two memorable ...
Yesterday we had the unseemly sight of a landleech threatening to keep his houses empty in response to better tenancy laws. Meanwhile in Catalonia they have a solution for that: nationalisation: Barcelona is deploying a new weapon in its quest to increase the city’s available rental housing: the power ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Jeff Masters, PhD The 2020 global wildfire season brought extreme fire activity to the western U.S., Australia, the Arctic, and Brazil, making it the fifth most expensive year for wildfire losses on record. The year began with an unprecedented fire event ...
NOTE: This is an excerpt from a digital story – read the full story here.Tess TuxfordKo te Kauri Ko Au, Ko te Au ko Kauri I am the kauri, the kauri is me Te Roroa proverb In Waipoua Forest, at the top of the North Island, New ...
Story of the Week... Toon of the Week... Coming Soon on SkS... Poster of the Week... SkS Week in Review... Story of the Week... Coming attraction: IPCC's upcoming major climate assessmentLook for more emphasis on 'solutions,' efforts by cities, climate equity ... and outlook for emissions cuts in ...
Ringing A Clear Historical Bell: The extraordinary images captured in and around the US Capitol Building on 6 January 2021 mirror some of the worst images of America's past.THERE IS A SCENE in the 1982 movie Missing which has remained with me for nearly 40 years. Directed by the Greek-French ...
To impact or not to impeach? I understand why some of those who are justifiably aghast at Trump’s behaviour over recent days might still counsel against impeaching him for a second time. To impeach him, they argue, would run the risk of making him a martyr in the eyes of ...
The Capitol Building, Washington DC, Wednesday, 6 January 2021. Oh come, my little one, come.The day is almost done.Be at my side, behold the sightOf evening on the land.The life, my love, is hardAnd heavy is my heart.How should I live if you should leaveAnd we should be apart?Come, let me ...
A chronological listing of news articles linked to on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week: Sun, Jan 3, 2021 through Sat, Jan 9, 2021Editor's ChoiceAfter the Insurrection: Accountability, Reform, and the Science of Democracy The poisonous lies and enablers of sedition--including Senator Hawley, pictured ...
This article, guest authored by Prof. Angela Gallego-Sala & Dr. Julie Loisel, was originally published on the Carbon Brief website on Dec 21, 2020. It is reposted below in its entirety. Click here to access the original article and comments. Peatlands Peatlands are ecosystems unlike any other. Perpetually saturated, their ...
The assault on the US Capitol and constitutional crisis that it has caused was telegraphed, predictable and yet unexpected and confusing. There are several subplots involved: whether the occupation of the Michigan State House in May was a trial run for the attacks on Congress; whether people involved in the ...
On Christmas Eve, child number 1 spotted a crack in a window. It’s a double-glazed window, and inspection showed that the small, horizontal crack was in the outermost pane. It was perpendicular to the frame, about three-quarters of the way up one side. The origins are a mystery. It MIGHT ...
A growing public housing waiting list and continued increase of house prices must be urgently addressed by Government, Green Party Co-leader Marama Davidson said today. ...
[Opening comments, welcome and thank you to Auckland University etc] It is a great pleasure to be here this afternoon to celebrate such an historic occasion - the entry into force of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. This is a moment many feared would never come, but ...
The Government is providing $3 million in one-off seed funding to help disabled people around New Zealand stay connected and access support in their communities, Minister for Disability Issues, Carmel Sepuloni announced today. The funding will allow disability service providers to develop digital and community-based solutions over the next two ...
Border workers in quarantine facilities will be offered voluntary daily COVID-19 saliva tests in addition to their regular weekly testing, COVID-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said today. This additional option will be rolled out at the Jet Park Quarantine facility in Auckland starting on Monday 25 January, and then to ...
The next steps in the Government’s ambitious firearms reform programme to include a three-month buy-back have been announced by Police Minister Poto Williams today. “The last buy-back and amnesty was unprecedented for New Zealand and was successful in collecting 60,297 firearms, modifying a further 5,630 firearms, and collecting 299,837 prohibited ...
Upscaling work already underway to restore two iconic ecosystems will deliver jobs and a lasting legacy, Conservation Minister Kiri Allan says. “The Jobs for Nature programme provides $1.25 billion over four years to offer employment opportunities for people whose livelihoods have been impacted by the COVID-19 recession. “Two new projects ...
The Government has released its Public Housing Plan 2021-2024 which outlines the intention of where 8,000 additional public and transitional housing places announced in Budget 2020, will go. “The Government is committed to continuing its public house build programme at pace and scale. The extra 8,000 homes – 6000 public ...
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has congratulated President Joe Biden on his inauguration as the 46th President of the United States of America. “I look forward to building a close relationship with President Biden and working with him on issues that matter to both our countries,” Jacinda Ardern said. “New Zealand ...
A major investment to tackle wilding pines in Mt Richmond will create jobs and help protect the area’s unique ecosystems, Biosecurity Minister Damien O’Connor says. The Mt Richmond Forest Park has unique ecosystems developed on mineral-rich geology, including taonga plant species found nowhere else in the country. “These special plant ...
To further protect New Zealand from COVID-19, the Government is extending pre-departure testing to all passengers to New Zealand except from Australia, Antarctica and most Pacific Islands, COVID-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said today. “The change will come into force for all flights arriving in New Zealand after 11:59pm (NZT) on Monday ...
Bay Conservation Cadets launched with first intake Supported with $3.5 million grant Part of $1.245b Jobs for Nature programme to accelerate recover from Covid Cadets will learn skills to protect and enhance environment Environment Minister David Parker today welcomed the first intake of cadets at the launch of the Bay ...
The Prime Minister of New Zealand Jacinda Ardern and the Prime Minister of the Cook Islands Mark Brown have announced passengers from the Cook Islands can resume quarantine-free travel into New Zealand from 21 January, enabling access to essential services such as health. “Following confirmation of the Cook Islands’ COVID ...
Jobs for Nature funding is being made available to conservation groups and landowners to employ staff and contractors in a move aimed at boosting local biodiversity-focused projects, Conservation Minister Kiritapu Allan has announced. It is estimated some 400-plus jobs will be created with employment opportunities in ecology, restoration, trapping, ...
The Government has approved an exception class for 1000 international tertiary students, degree level and above, who began their study in New Zealand but were caught offshore when border restrictions began. The exception will allow students to return to New Zealand in stages from April 2021. “Our top priority continues ...
Today’s deal between Meridian and Rio Tinto for the Tiwai smelter to remain open another four years provides time for a managed transition for Southland. “The deal provides welcome certainty to the Southland community by protecting jobs and incomes as the region plans for the future. The Government is committed ...
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has appointed Anna Curzon to the APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC). The leader of each APEC economy appoints three private sector representatives to ABAC. ABAC provides advice to leaders annually on business priorities. “ABAC helps ensure that APEC’s work programme is informed by business community perspectives ...
The Government’s prudent fiscal management and strong policy programme in the face of the COVID-19 global pandemic have been acknowledged by the credit rating agency Fitch. Fitch has today affirmed New Zealand’s local currency rating at AA+ with a stable outlook and foreign currency rating at AA with a positive ...
The Government is putting in place a suite of additional actions to protect New Zealand from COVID-19, including new emerging variants, COVID-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said today. “Given the high rates of infection in many countries and evidence of the global spread of more transmissible variants, it’s clear that ...
$36 million of Government funding alongside councils and others for 19 projects Investment will clean up and protect waterways and create local jobs Boots on the ground expected in Q2 of 2021 Funding part of the Jobs for Nature policy package A package of 19 projects will help clean up ...
The commemoration of the 175th anniversary of the Battle of Ruapekapeka represents an opportunity for all New Zealanders to reflect on the role these conflicts have had in creating our modern nation, says Associate Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Kiri Allan. “The Battle at Te Ruapekapeka Pā, which took ...
A recent returnee has tested positive for Covid-19 after testing negative twice during her 14 days in managed isolation, Marc Daalder reports There is little information available about a new community case of Covid-19 identified by testing today - other than she is in Whangarei and used the Covid app ...
by Andi Cockroft Chairman Council of Outdoor Recreation Associations of NZ An Otago Daily Times report (23 January) that nearly two-thirds of Dunedin residents think public consultation is lacking at the Dunedin City Council, according to the latest ...
“If today’s probable case of Covid-19 in Northland turns out to be community transmission the Government’s overarching objective must be avoiding another lockdown,” says ACT Leader David Seymour. “The best news would be that this is a false alarm, ...
E tū Lifewise homecare members have been taking strike and picket action since December 2020 for basic improvements in their working conditions. Members are asking for increased sick and bereavement leave, a collective agreement, and more guaranteed ...
Welcome to The Spinoff’s live updates for January 24. Reach me on stewart@thespinoff.co.nz1.15pm: Suspected community case in NorthlandHealth officials are investigating a suspected community case of Covid-19 in Northland, related to someone who was recently released from managed isolation and quarantine, the NZ Herald is reporting.A spokesperson for Covid-19 response ...
We’re only a few weeks into the year, and already there are two new seasons of Drag Race. Are we in danger of reaching peak Drag Race? In the first month of this year, there’s been more RuPaul’s Drag Race than ever. The 13th season of the flagship US version debuted ...
In her first years of adulthood, Jai Breitnauer found herself living in a bold and hopeful nation. More than two decades on, she laments on how the Britain we know now came to be.Apparently, fish off the coast of the United Kingdom are happier because they’re British. This is what ...
Dunedin writer Victor Billot resumes his weekly odes to New Zealanders in the news. This week: the blogging firm of Michael Bassett, Don Brash and Rodney HideThree Men in a BoatIt sounds like a conveyancing firm in Levin.It sounds like TV funny guys who’ll ...
Under a thick layer of concrete at the Cathedral of the Blessed Sacramentin Christchurch is a metal box likely containing hundreds of holy relics – a historical treasure trove set to be uncovered after 50 years of near total obscurity.As the earth shook and buildings crumbled, a statue of ...
Bananas are unequivocally the best fruit in the world, and there’s nothing you can say to change my mind, writes Alice Webb-Liddall.I was about 15 when I realised that halftime banana cake wasn’t a tradition outside of my family. On the day of an All Blacks game a banana cake ...
Summer reissue: Join Michèle A’Court, Alex Casey and Leonie Hayden as On the Rag looks at how the world around us has been built by men, for men. First published December 7, 2020.Independent journalism depends on you. Help us stay curious in 2021. The Spinoff’s journalism is funded by its members ...
At an antagonistic hearing yesterday, the internet giant laid out the ‘worst case scenario’. And Facebook is also considering an ‘amputation’. Hal Crawford was watching.Google is poised to hit self-destruct in Australia according to a fractious Senate hearing into an unprecedented law that will force digital giants to pay money ...
It’s great to hear Phil Twyford celebrating a success. Not a personal ministerial success, it’s fair to say, but a success nevertheless related to arms control. The arms on which Twyford is focused, it should be noted, will make quite a mess if they are triggered. They tend to be ...
Duncan Greive and Leonie Hayden were young hip hop heads and music journalists during the era captured in a new documentary about the rise and fall of South Auckland hip hop label Dawn Raid. Here they discuss the film and their memories (what’s left of them) of that time. Warning: contains ...
Houses might be the most popular and inflated purchases in New Zealand, but there are plenty of other products that are seeing soaring demand and prices over the past few months. Here’s a list of what New Zealanders are spending their money on with international travel out of the picture.Used ...
"The young boy leaps, the muscles in his thighs tensing and twisting as he lifts from the handrail": the noble art of bombing, by Pātea writer Airana Ngarewa A beautifully muscled boy is posted on the side of a pool, his feet fixed to the top of a pair of ...
How Waiwera Hot Pools went from New Zealand’s most visited water park to dereliction and decay. Many who grew up in Auckland likely have fond memories of Waiwera Hot Pools. Like me, they remember summer days spent racing down the slides and playing in the naturally hot pools. But how did ...
A government contract for a P rehab programme was canned after half a million dollars of taxpayer money was given out. Aaron Smale investigates. The Ministry of Health spent over half a million dollars on a P Rehab contract before pulling the pin because there were no results or progress reports. ...
Kia Koropp and her husband John Daubeny have been cruising the Pacific, Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean over the past decade with their two children onboard their 50ft yacht, Atea. Starting in 2011 from Auckland, New Zealand, they have sailed more than 64,000 kilometres and just completed their longest ...
We are drowning out the natural world with synthetic sounds, and it’s getting worse, writes Michelle Langstone.It used to be quiet once. Remember that? Remember the hush that settled over the cities like the silence that comes down in a snowstorm? It’s less than a year since Aotearoa first locked ...
Summer reissue: Join Michèle A’Court, Alex Casey and Leonie Hayden in the latest episode of On the Rag as they examine the topic of boobs from every possible angle. First published November 16, 2020.Independent journalism depends on you. Help us stay curious in 2021. The Spinoff’s journalism is funded by its ...
Seventy-five years after the US detonated the first nuclear tests in the Pacific, New Zealand pledges its support to Joe Biden's first tentative step towards disarmament. Today, the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons comes into effect, making it illegal for New Zealand and the 50 other ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Terry, Professor of Psychology, University of Southern Queensland The challenge of bringing the world’s best tennis players and support staff, about 1,200 people in all, from COVID-ravaged parts of the world to our almost pandemic-free shores was always going to be ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Geoffrey Browne, Research Fellow in International Urban Development, University of Melbourne The Victorian government has committed to removing 75 road/rail level crossings across Melbourne by 2025. That’s the fastest rate of removal in the city’s history. The scale of the investment — ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Richard Holden, Professor of Economics, UNSW In an age of hyperpartisan politics, the Biden presidency offers a welcome centrism that might help bridge the divides. But it is also Biden’s economic centrism that offers a chance to cut through what has become ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Stevens, Lecturer in History, University of Waikato In a year of surprises, one of the more pleasant was the recent runaway viral popularity of 19th century sea shanties on TikTok. A collaborative global response to pandemic isolation, it saw singers and ...
The sudden departure of Graine Moss from her Chief Executive role at Oranga Tamariki is a vital first step in a sequence of changes that must take place at the Ministry according to a group of wahine Māori leaders. Dame Naida Glavish, Dame Tariana Turia, ...
A new poem from Dunedin poet Jenny Powell.Her uncle’s eyeShe introduced us to her uncle’s eye floating in a jar.Lost in an accident, he hadn’t wanted to lose it again. He left it to her in his will.We must have looked shocked. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘I turn him to ...
The chief executive of Oranga Tamariki is quitting, leaving behind an agency she’s admitted suffers from structural racism. Justin Giovannetti looks at the future of Oranga Tamariki.Grainne Moss’s tenure as head of Oranga Tamariki has been untenable since November when the government’s senior Māori minister wouldn’t express any confidence in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Sainsbury, Senior Lecturer Composition, Australian National University Despite having different cultural backgrounds and experiences — Indigenous composers with an Indigenous mentor, and a pianist descended from Anglo-colonial history — it is nevertheless possible to create a project that can serve as ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Plank, Professor in Applied Mathematics, University of Canterbury With new, more infectious variants of COVID-19 detected around the world, and at New Zealand’s border, the risk of further level 3 or 4 lockdowns is increased if those viruses get into the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rachel Hogg, Lecturer in Psychology, Charles Sturt University Horse racing is an ethical hotbed in Australia. The Melbourne Cup alone has seen seven horses die after racing since 2013, and animal cruelty protesters have become a common feature at carnivals. The latest ...
Right now, our most fiery national debate is over whether New Zealanders were nice to the singer Amanda Palmer in a café. Desperate to restore peace in our nation, Hayden Donnell went in search of the truth.Joe Biden had barely finished calling for unity when Amanda Palmer posted a tweet ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 When We Cease to Understand the World by Benjamin Labatut (Pushkin Press, $37)Maths, cyanide, suicide, gardening; ye ...
Wellington artist Estère isn’t just breaking boundaries, she’s dissecting them. Maddi Rowe spoke to her about her new album, Archetypes.“That’s the story of pelicans, they’ll stab themselves in the heart to feed their young.”Despite the somewhat dark subject matter, Estère Dalton’s eyes sparkle with fascination. We’ve met to discuss Archetypes, ...
Cycling advocates are welcoming new advice from the Transport Agency on safe cycling. "Cyclists hate it when drivers pass too close. That's scary and dangerous," said Patrick Morgan from Cycling Action Network. "So it's encouraging to see ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tilman Ruff, Honorary Principal Fellow, School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne Today, many around the world will celebrate the first multilateral nuclear disarmament treaty to enter into force in 50 years. The UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear ...
The Public Service Association welcomes the creation of a Chief Executive role to lead the public service’s pay equity work, and the appointment of Grainne Moss to this position. "Unions and public service employers are currently working ...
The Council of Trade Unions is warning that the Consumer Price Index (CPI) figures out today illustrate that the cost of living is increasing disproportionately for those on lower incomes; resulting in the poor getting poorer. CTU Economist Craig ...
Why are there so many offensive comments on the New Zealand Police Facebook page and are they breaking the law? Janaye Henry investigates. New Zealand Police Facebook pages – there are a number of them, for different regional police districts around the country – are an interesting place to spend ...
Our guide to stopping procrastinating and actually (finally) getting on top of investing. Because there’s a good chance that if you’re reading this, you don’t know a single thing about it.In part one, we covered some of the basic things you need to know about investing – why do it? ...
Children’s Commissioner Andrew Becroft acknowledges the huge effort and commitment of departing Oranga Tamariki Chief Executive Grainne Moss and says her decision to resign today was principled. “The issues facing Oranga Tamariki are beyond individual ...
Analysis by Keith Rankin. Two Large Waves versus One Tsunami. Chart by Keith Rankin. Two Large Waves versus One Tsunami. Chart by Keith Rankin. With Covid19, Italy shows the classic European pattern, with its early outbreak, substantial recovery thanks to lockdowns and other public health measures, and resurgence thanks to complacency ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gabrielle Appleby, Professor, UNSW Law School, UNSW This year has already seen significant progress in the government’s commitment to establish a body – a “Voice” – that would allow Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to have a say when the government ...
Northland farmer Derek Robinson was sentenced earlier today by the District Court in Whangarei for two offences of ill-treating animals at rodeo events. Mr Robinson was found guilty in November last year, following a defended hearing. The charges ...
Under fire Oranga Tamariki chief executive Grainne Moss has announced she will resign, effective February 28, Marc Daalder reports After four and a half years at the helm of child protection agency Oranga Tamariki, chief executive Grainne Moss has announced she will be leaving the position at the end of ...
The Department of Internal Affairs and New Zealand Police acknowledge the sentencing of 36-year-old Aaron Joseph Hutton on charges relating to the possession of child sexual exploitation material, and entering into a dealing involving the sexual exploitation ...
Ngā Tāngata Microfinance (NTM) is calling for tougher penalties for those caught promoting pyramid schemes. Such business models are illegal under the Fair Trading Act 1986. This call comes after the Commerce Commission issued a ‘stop now’ notice ...
British High Commissioner to New Zealand Laura Clarke is calling on young women aged 17 to 25 to apply for the annual ‘Be British High Commissioner for the Day’ competition. The winner will have the opportunity to become an ‘honorary High Commissioner’, ...
The Māori Party is welcoming the resignation of Oranga Tamariki chief executive Grainne Moss after sustained pressure from leading figures within the Māori Party. This resignation is the result of the continued strong pressure of the Māori Party ...
In a historic corner of Dunedin, startup culture is thriving. Catherine McGregor visited the city’s Warehouse Precinct to meet the people driving the movement. When Jason and Kate Lindsey bought the four storey building now known as Petridish, it was an absolute wreck. Once home to a thriving hat and textiles ...
Summer reissue: The Fold’s very first guest is back to tell Duncan Greive how she pulled off the media deal of the year.The chaotic couple of weeks which finally saw the end of the Stuff-NZME saga were riveting and strange, replete with stock exchange announcements, legal challenges and finally the ...
Chris Liddell has dropped his candidacy to become director-general of the Paris-based OECD. Without support from the Ardern government and vilified in the media as somehow being involved in the encouragement by Donald Trump of the Washington riots, he plainly saw he had little chance of crowning his stellar career ...
Tara Ward hands out her first impression roses as she dives deep into the sea of single men vying to win The Bachelorette NZ’s heart. While the world burns in a searing fireball of unpredictability, we can take comfort in the fact that some things never change. The heart still yearns, ...
People from all around New Zealand will be converging on the super-secret Waihopai satellite interception spybase, in Marlborough, on Saturday January 30th. ...
In its Thursday editorial the NZ Herald speaks an important truth: “Investment important to stay on track”. This won’t have startled its more literate readers but in its text it notes the strong result in the latest Global Dairy Trade auction, which prompted Westpac to raise its forecast for dairy ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Craig Mark, Professor, Faculty of International Studies, Kyoritsu Women’s University With the spread of COVID-19 steadily worsening in Japan since the onset of winter — daily records for infections and deaths continue to be broken — the fate of the Tokyo Summer ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adam Taylor, Early Career Research Leader, Emerging Viruses, Inflammation and Therapeutics Group, Menzies Health Institute Queensland, Griffith University All eyes are on COVID-19 vaccines, with Australia’s first expected to be approved for use shortly. But their development in record time, without compromising ...
Yesterday’s government announcement on new state housing is a pathetic response to the biggest housing crisis in New Zealand since the 1940s. At a time when the country needs an industrial-scale state house building programme, the government ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Obadiah Mulder, PhD Candidate in Computational Biology, University of Southern California Australia is in the midst of tropical cyclone season. As we write, a cyclone is forming off Western Australia’s Pilbara coast, and earlier in the week Queenslanders were bracing for a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lynette Vernon, School of Education – VC Research Fellow, Edith Cowan University When the holidays end, barring a fresh outbreak of COVID-19, teenagers across Australia will head back to school. Some will bounce out of bed well before the alarm goes off, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Richard Holden, Professor of Economics, UNSW In an age of hyperpartisan politics, the Biden presidency offers a welcome centrism that might help bridge the divides. But it is also Biden’s economic centrism that offers a chance to cut through what has become ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gary Mortimer, Professor of Marketing and Consumer Behaviour, Queensland University of Technology Twenty years ago, on January 25 2001, a virtually unknown German supermarket chain quietly opened its first stores in Australia. The two stores – one in Sydney’s inner-west suburb of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Liz Giuffre, Senior Lecturer in Communication, University of Technology Sydney Bluey is easily the most successful Australian television show of the last decade. A record-breaking success for its local broadcaster the ABC, as well as production partners BBC Studios and Screen Australia, ...
*This article first appeared on RNZ and is republished with permissionIt will take $3 million to clean up 1 million litres of abandoned toxic waste from a property in Ruakaka - three times more than the last big chemical clean-up undertaken by government agencies A two-year mission to clean up 1 million ...
*This article first appeared on RNZ and is republished with permission. The action Biden took on just his first afternoon in office demonstrates a radical shift in priority for the US when it comes to its efforts to combat the climate crisis. It could put more pressure on New Zealand to step up. ...
Ban Bomb Day event at the New Brighton Pier, 9am, on January 22nd, 2021 January 22nd, 2021, marks the first day the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) Enters into Force and becomes international law. Aotearoa NZ is one of the ...
This week's biggest-selling New Zealand books, as recorded by the Nielsen BookScan New Zealand bestseller list and described by Steve BrauniasFICTION 1 Tell Me Lies by J.P. Pomare (Hachette, $29.99) Every January, there's a new best-selling crime thriller by the New Zealand-born author who lives in Melbourne. Pomare is ...
Our approach so far in trying to end what Dr Collin Tukuitonga describes as a 'racist' disease - rheumatic fever - has not worked. It's time we try something new, he writes. Acute rheumatic fever and the rheumatic heart disease it causes, long-known as a disease of poverty, is a blight on ...
Obama waiving “No Child Left Behind”, Law. Tide going against National Stndards
It that supposed to be a haiku (it isn’t), or were you trying to communicate something?
About time. The problem with these simple minded slogan policies is that they such large amounts of resources away from programs that are actually in place and working.
In NZ fad slogans like national standards pulled money away from and effectively terminated programmes that were operational and effective like adult education to the reading and numerical. For what? The national standards don’t look like they are achieving anything apart from killing trees producing meaningless reports even in the schools and the now disillusioned parents that enthusiastically took it up.
How well is national standards actually doing? We don’t know. Because the idiots that pushed it into the system seem to have forgotten to put in any monitoring of the new system to find out if it is actually achieving anything.
Well spotted Monique. Sadly the new Minister of Ed has declared onwards and downwards.
I didnt think you would be the type of person to oppose National standards….
Asset sell-off
Just what would the comeback be to those who are “promising” the majority of the 49% going to NZ and NZ mums and dads if that didn’t eventuate and they did finish up in foreign hands? Could those ministers with the respective portfolios be liable for prosecution?
http://www.pundit.co.nz/content/asset-sales-–-where-are-mum-and-dad’s-shares
What financial crisis…
Are we mugs or not? I can think of a few needs in New Zealand that could have been met if this profit had remained sloshing around in New Zealand owned banks – we used to have some – but instead has been sucked away to Australia and further afield.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/6394291/Banks-take-3b-profit-overseas
Yep, just think what we could have done in R&D with $3b to throw at it. Instead it’s been wasted in profit.
I don’t understand how people fail to see how damaging it is to send this sort of profit off-shore.
Only a tiny portion of that money will ever make its way into the til of a New Zealand shopkeeper.
And now we’re going to do the exact same thing with the power companies: send the money off-shore to be spent in foreign shops, when it could be spent in the shops of Kiwis, who would then employ Kiwis and buy goods from other Kiwis (even if they were imported…but let’s not go there).
It boggles my mind that people don’t see the problem. How can you have increasing levels of wealth and prosperity for the masses when all your wealth gets shipped into the pockets of people overseas?
Shonkey and his corrupt crew don’t want wealth and prosperity for the masses they want it ALL for themselves.
That tired old politics of envy meme. You must be a riot at parties Marsman.
Ah, look, Gosman is here to protect his masters greed again, how cute.
Gosman plays the Politics of Greed.
And defends foreign masters emptying NZ of financial and investment capital.
Oh how cute! You two are like a double team like Abbott and Costello, Morcambe and Wise, Tweedledum and Tweedledumber…
+1
The majority of the NZ banking industry has pretty much always been in overseas hands. Three of the major banks ANZ/National (prior to the merger), and Westpac. The exception was BNZ and POSB. I exclude ASB because prior to the 1990’s it was not a big player nation wide.
Inmteresting though that some lefties were arguing that the introduction of Kiwibank somehow stopped the other banks from making extraordinary profits. How is this theory looking now? Mighty flawed I’d suggest.
Just more proof that we need to drop the private banks and go all national. Have banking as a state service as it should be rather than a rort that enriches only the few.
KiwiBank as it stands now was but one step.
Putting the backing of Government behind KiwiBank would do it.
For once I agree with CV (I hope this not a trend…)- Kiwibank may not have drastically changed the fee landscape but on the margin it will have had some impact – who knows what would have happened without them
In fact when Kiwibank started my own fees went down by over $100 a month. Multiply that by all New Zealander’s business and private accounts. That is why the banking industry is so keen to get rid of Kiwibank. It keeps them partially honest.
Yep suddenly I had people ringing me from my bank suddenly noticing I was entitled to reduced fees, offering me a credit card with lower interest rates, asking me for my opinion on what they could do for me and knocking 1/4 percent off my mortgage.
Saved me quite a bit of money.
Welcome to the new dystopian future.
The struggle against climate change, and the struggle against autocracy, and for democracy are closely linked.
One of the fronts in the global battle against climate change is the Maldives.
The democratically elected president and global campaigner against climate change has been injured in a military and police coup.
President Mohammed Nasheed who was also a political prisoner of the previous autocratic dictatorship that ruled his country for 30 years. Says he will stand again if democratic elections are allowed by the new regime.
Common Dreams .org Headlines
“President of Maldives, Climate Crusader, Ousted in Coup”
As the Climate Change Crisis deepens, events are showing, that the 1 percenters are prepared to, lie, conspire, and even kill, to protect their right to exploit both the human and natural environment to the point of collapse. (and beyond)
[deleted]
[lprent: Dickhead. Regardless of what you (or I or anyone) thinks of his business practices, remember that people including his family will google and find this tasteless and upsetting. I haven’t had to deal with you before so you get the introductory 1 week ban. ]
Disgraceful comment, Lloyd was a great businessman and a top chap – moderators can you please expunge the comment above.
this comment crosses the line of human decency
You are a seriously sad and deranged person TT.
When the 1% reform, and desist from lying, conspiring and killing to further their control of society, then I’ll shed a tear. Until then I’ll celebrate the death of these animals. Evil doesn’t deserve compassion.
[lprent: Ah. You may – but not on our space. Ban increased to 2 weeks. And read the policy. ]
Writen like a true leftist despot in waiting. I can see you organising the ‘re-education’ camps now for those who dare disagree with the ‘mainstream’ views.
The silience of other lefties on this site to the above comment is telling….they either
1) Agree with TT
2) Are so biased that they refuse to critize a comrade
Don’t be silly. They wait for a moderator to spot it. That can be several hours away depending on work.
It is really only the hysterical from the sewer and the like that assume that we should read every comment as it arrives.
Or, as in my case, they didn’t even see it! (It was deleted some time ago) I gather it celebrated someone’s death, and that is never acceptable!
True, best to celebrate a person’s life and this was a pretty remarkable one.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10784603
Right on TT. I really hope Gareth Morgan gets Aids and Bob Jones gets something really painfull like Ebola.
Fuck you.
[lprent: You just came off a ban for being a dick. And I see that you have moved on from wanting to shoot people to wanting them infected instead. http://thestandard.org.nz/the-biggest-fraud/comment-page-1/#comment-413972 I will be generous and I won’t give you a year.. 4 weeks for being a reactive dumbarse. ]
Meh, TT is another Right Wing troll. Talk about shooting at your own set up targets.
Sad to see that Morrison has passed on well before his time. He’s made a massive difference to the community in the too short a time that he was here.
I have no idea who or what she/he is. Only had 4 comments, 2 today (which picked up two bans).
The others were run of the mill extremist. Could be a wingnut trying to sound like one of their fantasies (it has been done before). Or as much of a moonbeam as he/she reads. But whatever; it will get educated about acceptable behaviour the same way everyone else does.
I have just got back to my computer. What on earth has been going on?
Apparently some doofus made a pretty loathsome comment and picked up a ban because of it. But because the guy was allegedly a lefty, apparently it’s proof that all the left are just as bitter and small-minded as some on the right.
Oh, and a whole bunch of tories believe that if they read a comment before the mods catch it, everyone else has, too.
It was pretty crass. I have no idea who he was talking about (apart from the company), but I think that families should be allowed to let their loved ones get laid to rest without reading about some idiot gloating about it.
A big loss, one smart hard working operator who saved the Pheonix. Regards to his family he’s left quite a hole.
Good grief.
It must be a record.
Unbelievably the US government has rushed to recognise the new military rulers of the Maldives.
Common Dreams .org, Headlines:
“US Recognizes Maldives Government That Ousted Democratically Elected Nasheed”
“We do,” said US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland when asked by reporters, if Washington recognizes the new government as the legitimate government of the Maldives. Nuland called Waheed the president and Nasheed the former president.
Meanwhile, at the same time, as the US was busy cosying up to the coup leaders.
I think you are overstating the current position of Climat Change. There is general consensus that the world is more likely to be cooling rather than warming. There has been no perceptible increase in sea levels. The ice caps are stable and the glaciers growing.
You can sleep easy.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/billions-of-tons-of-water-lost-from-worlds-glaciers-satellite-reveals-6672129.html
No doubt that’s intended to be a refutation of what Grumpy said above. However, I noted with both bemusement and some amusement, an article in Corriere della Sera recently that said gaily that the consensus is we’re heading for cooling – which, they said, is all good, as it will cancel out anthropogenic global warming!
http://www.corriere.it/ambiente/12_gennaio_09/prossima-era-glaciale_b323775e-3acc-11e1-8a43-34573d1838c1.shtml
The underlying trend for the next 10k years is for cooling. That is the major solar cycles and orbital cycles. However that is being washed under by greenhousing the atmosphere.
Quite simply it is a effect that would have already made a difference if we hadn’t already been modifying the atmosphere fot tge last 5k years or so. Basically since we started pushing methane out.
Those cooling effects make no difference for the next few thousand years regardless what happens now. The last 200 years of CO2 releases will persist washing out underlying effects for at least that long. The question is how much worse we make it in pursuit of profits and SUVs
BTW the current ice age is easily traceable back to about 40Mya. Antarticia drifted fully into the polar position then and started to ice up. Our species developed in ice ages. It is unlikely we’d survive normal earth climates. In a few generations they will find out.
Paolo Virtuani can make all the gay assertions he likes. It is afterall, his column. And he’s expected to offer an opinion.
We have a thing called tides and weather that confuses the issue. Seeing cm’s of average rise over decades when sealevels normally change by meters daily is hard.
But of course there is no perceptible change in sea levels. Humans aren’t equipped to perceive it. Most cannot remember what they had for breakfast on the same day last year. That is why we rely on records of previous measurements. However contrary to your carefully worded statement, sealevels are measurably steadily rising, mostly at present from thermal expansion. In many locations this is probably not perceptible because people don’t remember well enough to perceive it.
A few (but not most) mountain glaciers are growing. It is what you expect to happen when you measure increased precipitation in their circes. It is a sign of shifting weather patterns and is actually something to worry about. Weather patterns don’t shift outside of cylic events unless there is significiant climate change. Glaciers are a complex mix of the rate that they get fed vs the rate that they melt. You are thinking of one without considering the other.
See the reply about overall cycles I made to someone else. But surfice into say that is you wanted to show how much of a stupid arse you are on the science of climate change, then your two observations (that I pointed out the half truths in above) made that amply clear.
Even you should have been able to see the idiotic flaws in the statements to anyone who’d done any science.
While i don’t condone illegal downloading is anyone else getting more uneasy with the Kim Dotcom fiasco?
I am getting the distinct impression that the NZ Government & Police will do anything to please the USA/FBI.
Heavy handed is an understatement.
There is also the instance of the British kid facing deportation to the US for the same thing. His revenue came from the advertisers on his site and as far as I know. I wonder how many other cases there are?
Here’s a couple of links on O’Dwyers case and the actions/logic of the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency. http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/07/big-content-unveils-latest-antipiracy-weapon-extradition.ars and http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/jul/03/us-anti-piracy-extradition-prosecution
Briefly, they hold that a .org or .net address = US jurisdiction and that ‘inducing’ others to download copy right material (by running a link site) is enough of a reason to seek extradition and prosecute in the US. The fact that O’Dwyer did nothing illegal under UK law and had no US based servers is apparently irrelevant. So I guess the same goes for Dotcom with regards NZ law.
Absolutely yes! It’s scary…
What is scary beyond the means of arrest is that there has been no evidence produced to substantiate the arrest and detention of Mr Dotcom. Surely it would be remarkable if you or I was arrested without any case having been made to the Courts. Uneasy? Yes.
I’ve been trying to collect all the links to the excellent ‘Divided Auckland’ series in the Herald this week (the website itself doesn’t seem to have them centrally located anywhere).
If anyone has missed any of these, they are well worth a read. A very comprehensive look at inequality and poverty in Auckland by the Herald’s social issues reporter Simon Collins. There is still one more part to go tomorrow, which is supposed to be about what can be done to improve this situation.
Friday – Education
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10784481
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10784480
Thursday – Health
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10784293
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10784294
Wednesday – Housing
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10784060
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10784058
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10784056
Tuesday – Tax and benefits
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/simon-collins/news/article.cfm?a_id=135&objectid=10783837
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/simon-collins/news/article.cfm?a_id=135&objectid=10783835
Monday – The widening gap
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/simon-collins/news/article.cfm?a_id=135&objectid=10783692
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/simon-collins/news/article.cfm?a_id=135&objectid=10783636
I know some on this site believe that Mediaworks are in the pocket of this government. I don’t think that. A large number of people in broadcasting (I’d argue MSM) are inherently conservative (learned from two decades around these people – I think it’s because they need to reach a mass audience meaning they lean right) so naturally they will support a government made of conservative elements.
More to the point, though, Mediaworks is largely devoid of decency. We saw this prior to the election where they were prepared to hand over an hour or programming to Mr Key even though it was obviously not in the interests of democracy. Here’s the latest stunt from one of their radio stations – surprise your spouse with a divorce on air.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/valentines-day-2012/6394715/Radio-stations-divorce-promo-cowardly
The Rock also do the vile Wind Up Your Wife segment, where practical ‘jokes’ like telling a woman she took the wrong baby home from the hospital is par for the course.
And Mediaworks were behind that show that thought breaching airport security would be good for a laugh. When they appeared in court the culprits were all cowardly in the extreme – if you’re such rebels guys you go down fighting, not with a whimper.
And the government did a deal with these people to keep them in business?
Actually, I think it’s more that this government is in the pockets of the MSM.
The majority of people in the country are neither conservative nor right leaning. This would indicate that they have another reason for producing right leaning news.
“The majority of people in the country are neither conservative nor right leaning. This would indicate that they have another reason for producing right leaning news”
Nor as the election showed left leaning…..hence they must all be in the centre!
Does that include the 27% who didn’t vote? We can’t just assume that they would have voted in lock step with everyone else and research shows a) that it’s the poor who tend not to vote and b) that they would normally vote left if they did.
BTW, if we continue to accept Labour as a left-wing party then today’s centre is right-leaning.
A few factors at play here.
1. Senior journalism. It takes experience, intellect and good research backing it. Most have retired or left the industry, those that remain don’t get the resouces due to below.
2. Short attention span and cheap reality TV amongst others. Why bother crafting a well strctured 20 min piece on say the GFC when most folk can’t focus beyond the first 5 minutes and celebrity strip snooker sex darts on ice rates 5 times higher amd costs less….ka ching
3. Who’s your dadddy. Stories that upset the management/owners are never going to get focus…recall ‘the insider’ and GE’s influence on 60 minutes etc etc not to mention the links between mediawonks and a certain govt minister who brokered the interest free loan that renewed their licences.
4. Emotion’s a quick easy target over intellect, so dog whistle away.
5. those well crafted press releases look just journalism if you don’t look to hard and soo much cheaper than doing any actual research.
There’s others but you get the picture….and it’s SBW taking his shirt off again…awww swoon.
So who are the real clowns?
So North American Indians are suing brewers
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10784587
How long before an Iwi takes on DB or Lion Nathan?
So Key says now that the returns from state assets are not as good Greens and Labour are saying, this of course
belies the obvious reality of peak oil naturally increasing the worth of renewables energy sources. So National is
willing to risk the irony that future state asset ledgers showing massive returns in the future, and Nationals future
economic competence is brought into question each year (when the state assets profits are declared to parliament),
the opposition parties will rise in a coarse and loud laughter, never let National sell your home! But what I find
find immediately funny is the uber investment salesman Key is talking down the state assets even as he is trying to
sell them. Can Key be any more ridiculous? National trying NOT to explain how peak oil will blow out profit as demand
rises in the face of peaks in oil price, and is in fact trying to damage the past history of dividend returns.
But as I have pointed out, governments cannot mislead foriegn investers because of free trade rules, but can mislead native investors. One problem core to world capitalism is boardrooms paying themselves huge bonuses despite selling shareholders down the river.
Free trade inevitably means a global elite of global firms and dynasties will emerge who can lobby native
governments to rip local tax payers off.
Imagine for a second government in one term buying land, building a dam and
then selling the dam immediately, if the market could not provide the funding at the time the dam was built then why
should the market be able to buy the dam once it has been built and makes a huge one off windfall profit (no innovation there!).
Especially when there are other instruments to offset debt without losing ownership, like selling off future returns
on product like Fonterra has. So the question is why is Key so purposefully clueless? Asset sales, even with iwi
agreement, is a bad deal for NZ, a best hopelessly incompetence, at worse against the long term interests of the nation.
And we have not even got to the question of standing, how will the government insure all Kiwis have first dibs at the
shares without provoking the ire of the free trade? Unless government admits that since tax payers already own the
assets! And if government does that then taxpayers have a right to take their case to the free trade judges and argue
that government intervention has to be in their best interest, and government cannot sell off assets without a
referendum of the people, the shareholders, like any company who has to take big decisions to the shareholders.
And treat them like any other investor!!!
Free trade works for “all” investors not just foriegn investors, otherwise it is unconscionable. Many people voted
National despite its asset sale policy, its naive of National to argue that every citizen that voted for them agreed
with every line of their manifesto – especially when their MPs have said as much in times past.
So Dunne says he supports the decision of the people, to sit with the National party, Dunne went to the electorate as
the voice of moderation in the centre, who has worked with all sides. Now National got less than 50% of the vote, and
the moderate position to take surely when there is a hanging chad situation (and time to sort out the issue) is to go
back and have some form of recount, like a referendum. So is Dunne going to suggest that he will vote for partial
asset sales if there is a referendum on such a significant national issue? Why should we have all this fog about
asset sales, as if they were now a foregone conclusion once iwi sign on them? Dunne can clear the way with one word,
referendum. Does Dunne like Key believe the voters would vote for them anyway, well then put up a referendum.
Its like Key getting off a plane from Hier Hitler waving a agreement to sell assets…
…was just a delaying tactic because Key lost by winning the last election with a smaller coalition.
Will Dunne go the way of Hide? Hide was unelectable when he covered up Garrett crime and punishment history, will Dunne go the same way by not forcing a referendum and going against his moderating center of politics. Can you image for a moment the Greens forcing a citizens referendum on asset sales after Dunne had been sitting on his hands?
Aero, if you want to do some sort of cut-and-paste for your comments, can you at least tidy it up so its readable? Cheers.
Free trade protects (rightly) foreign investors equal treatment but if local investors cannot (or do not) gain access to WTO arbitration then over time without remedy too poor government policy (like asset sales) . Foreign investors have the incentive to lubricate the political elite to produce favorable policies (at the expense tax payers). What are Asset Sales but selling off dams built with tax payer money and returning very nice profits (and likely to get much better due to peak oil)? So if a company board were to fail to take a partial sell off of their company to a shareholder vote they’d be sued, but if the government fails to take partial asset sales a referendum at considerable lose (due to world governments printing money and prospects for the assets being so considerable in the peak oil future).
Key is currently trying to get rich from China not by emulating China but by selling our assets to China. This is a profound article on “State Capitalism” and why the free market will fail us..
http://werewolf.co.nz/2012/02/why-state-capitalism-is-beating-the-free-market/
Dunno if this has been posted already, but there is now a Save Our Port fb page.
It’s:
https://www.facebook.com/saveourport?sk=wall
When you hear someone say the words ‘nanny state’, ask if they know the causes of Pike River
When you hear someone say we should cut red tape, ask if they know someone with a leaky home
When you hear someone say the words ‘nanny state’, ask if the know why the CTV building collapsed
When you hear someone say the market is the solution, ask if they know someone who lost all their savings from a finance company
It’s just a start….I imagine people can think of more
Now, why doesn’t the media ask those questions??
A good question…
I guess Steven Joyce would say ” Each time we say ‘you can’t’ it carries a cost”
Maybe the media should ask him “What is the cost of saying “you can?”
The answer………….Pike River, leaky buildings, CTV, the 2008 crash….
Why are they so bad at their job?
They’re so bad at their job because they aren’t doing their job, they’re creating profit. The environment they do it in is irrelevent.
Ever wonder why the entertainment industry often turns out music, film and stories so awfully bad that you wonder how it happened? Then you read the credits and it’s like a telephone book of influencial friends? Because to make it in the entertainment world (or anywhere else that money collects) you must be, first and foremost, be a connected business person – not a competent craftsman. Musician, screen writer, builder, architect, manager, miner – business first, everything else way down the list. Until people realise money, political connections, “passion”, ambition and greed are not indicators of competency, we can expect a worsening of all crafts.
Ever wonder how it is that within any profession you choose, you’ll find a large percentage of the people as almost cookie cutter clones? Many aren’t doing their job. They’re living a persona generated to make profit.
In the last 2 weeks I have done flying trips to Germany, UK, Denmark Switzerland, and now Thailand. I have a few impressions.
1. Europe is bloody cold!!
2. Customs and immigration searches are getting over the top and much more invasive. The bastards at Heathrow (don’t go there) took my half empty bottle of contact lens solution (Helpfully telling me I could buy a new one in the transit lounge). With the ridiculous lengths they go to against bona fide travellers, I think the terrorists have already won. Notice how they don’t explosive search anyone even remotely looking like the might have a bomb – of course not!! If you searched a terrorist he might set it off – thats why you only see the hassling little old white ladies!
3. Swiss customs and cops don’t mess around – they are right into racial profiling. Arabic or black – you will be done over coming into the country and probably stopped at random in the street.
4. Picked up the inevitable cold but was delighted to find out that the only cold remedy at Dubai contained Pseudoephedrine. Needless to say, 24 hrs later I am cured. Looks like, in NZ the criminals have won, dooming us all to colds and flu that is impossible to get rid of!
5. iPads are the answer, no more lugging around the bloody laptop and with the bluetooth keyboard and iPad holder I bought duty free at Copenhagen, really useful.
6. The plane heading back to NZ is always the best flight!
Too bloody hot in Auckland at present. My brain starts misfiring from 2pm onwards ( programming makes you utterly aware if and when stupidity is setting in ). Roll on winter…
Re # 2: I disagree with you there. Being a person of indeterminate ethnic origin (I’m half PI and half English but I look vaguely Arabic, particularly if I haven’t shaved for a few days), I will ALWAYS get singled out for the carry-on bag swab and scan test. I don’t mind, they’re just doing their job. But I’m not kidding myself that I’m not being racially profiled. I’m yet to see any “little old white ladies” singled out.
I’ve been singled out (little white lady) – a few years ago carry-on bags were ‘randomly’ checked at Heathrow, and surprise – I was a ‘random’ checked at the U.S stopover as well. The added touch was extra questioning and luggage check by customs on arrival in Auckland.
After thinking about it, I guess buying tickets for a trip of only a few days, 2 days before the flight, gave me the profile of a drug smuggler (the trip was for a funeral).
Again an extra scan and bag checks at Heathrow just last month for no particular reason.
Re # 6: Yes it is, it’s always full of kiwis happy to be getting home or tourists happy to be heading here. And if you get an immigration officer that says to you “Welcome home”, that’s the icing on the cake.
I fekkin hate travelling through airports, the tyranny of the state becomes so obvious…we are all supposed to be scared that on our way between Auckland Wellington and Shakytown some Arab sympathiser iis going to set of a bomb in mid air. Or hijack us and fly us into the Beehive. For that I must be stoppped scanned, searched and deprived of metalic objects incase I use something as inocuous as a fishing reel as a weapon of mass destruction. Argghhhh!!!!!
While the Occupy movement could justifiably be accused of killing grass, there has been even more evidence to show how the big four Aussie banks are killing our economy!
http://localbodies-bsprout.blogspot.co.nz/2012/02/banking-profits-vindicate-occupy-nz.html
Meanwhile, Yet a another Democratically elected Government that challenges the profits of the US oil industry is removed.
http://www.alternet.org/newsandviews/article/778615/coup_in_maldives_threatens_ousted_president_mohamed_nasheed%2C_a_leading_voice_for_island_states_threatened_by_global_warming/#paragraph2
How many is that again.