Open mike 11/07/2019

Written By: - Date published: 7:00 am, July 11th, 2019 - 156 comments
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156 comments on “Open mike 11/07/2019 ”

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  1. Andre 1
    11 July 2019 at 7:45 am

    Amanda Marcotte takes a look the Seth Rich saga and how that all tied in to the campaign to smear Clinton and suppress Dem-leaning votes.

    https://www.salon.com/2019/07/10/how-the-seth-rich-conspiracy-theory-put-trump-in-the-white-house/

    Expect to see more of this tactic through the 2020 election. Voting in the USA is such a pain-in-the-ass time-suck that it's awfully tempting to not bother when you're unenthusiastic about the candidate at the top of the ticket. Which then flows on to reduced support for other candidates further down the ballot such as the Senate, House and locl government.

    • reason 1.1
      11 July 2019 at 10:01 am

      and wikileakjs exposed her as a revolting war criminal drenched in blood …

      you can read about Blumfeild and her spreading false viagra and mass rape claims about Gaddafis fictional ' black mercenerys.

      And her results from that are all over the internet …

      You can read about the black men ending up on meathooks, lynched or slave traded … you can read about black libyan women kidnapped, sex trafficked or murdered.

      But I bet you already knew that Andre … Your demo gal

      She went … she murdered …. she destroyed …. tee hee hee

      Actually You should go to Israel with no regrets Wayne …

      Waynes a real zionist .. he may not be full uber ,,, but he's definatly no under- Palastinian either

    • Morrissey 1.2
      11 July 2019 at 10:05 am

      She's a lovely person. Just like her wonderful husband.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0uCrA7ePno&t=22s

    • xanthe 1.3
      11 July 2019 at 10:06 am

      "Amanda Marcotte takes a look the Seth Rich saga and how that all tied in to the campaign to smear Clinton and suppress Dem-leaning votes."

      The link contributes precisely zero to our understanding of what happened to Seth Rich

      • Andre 1.3.1
        11 July 2019 at 10:16 am

        The link is about how outright lying to smear a murder victim was used as a successful political ploy. And about how convergence moonbats and second-option bias idiots happily took the smear and amplified it. And how they probably have learned nothing from the experience so will probably do so again.

        edit: (“they” that have learned nothing being the convergence moonbats and second-option bias idiots: the perps will have learned that it works quite well and are probably full of ideas how to do it better next time)

        • xanthe 1.3.1.1
          11 July 2019 at 10:24 am

          Agreed!…. You have learned nothing from the experience so will probably do so again.

        • Morrissey 1.3.1.2
          11 July 2019 at 10:34 am

          She lost. Her campaign managers shafted the far more popular, and electable, Bernie Sanders.

          You need to move on, buddy. You're almost as sad as an MSNBC talking head.

        • Adrian Thornton 1.3.1.3
          11 July 2019 at 10:49 am

          Clinton lost the most winnable election in post war US history to a fucking moronic imbecile, and even after cheating! Clinton stood for everything shit in the Democratic party and US politics in general that is why she lost, and now Obama's legacy is Trump…thanks liberalism, job well done.

          • Puckish Rogue 1.3.1.3.1
            11 July 2019 at 12:52 pm

            True. Sanders probably would have won, Warren probably would have won (they at least would have visited more states) yet they selected Clinton…

            • Wayne 1.3.1.3.1.1
              11 July 2019 at 3:20 pm

              My memory of the polls taken at the time is that would have lost. Basically too far left. Ironically he would do better this time since the Dems have shifted a bit. But he won’t be the candidate.

              In my view it will be Harris.

        • Andre 1.3.1.4
          11 July 2019 at 11:37 am

          … and then there's the comprehension-challenged that can't respond to the actual content of an article, instead diverting to well-worn simplistic slogans they've been repeating for years. Maybe someone needs to read it to them as an audio or video clip.

          • xanthe 1.3.1.4.1
            11 July 2019 at 12:41 pm

            This meets Einstein's definition of insanity

          • Adrian Thornton 1.3.1.4.2
            11 July 2019 at 12:56 pm

            Maybe some people need to really understand that the way to win elections going forward isn't by forcing the same old bullshit down peoples throats. I mean, come on seriously, do you really think that Seth story had any effect on the US elections?

            Talk about clutching at straws.

          • Psycho Milt 1.3.1.4.3
            11 July 2019 at 12:56 pm

            I think there's basically a Pavlov's dog response from some people to any mention of the word "Clinton." Must be a pain in the arse for people who actually come from Clinton, not being able to say their home town's name without Morrissey going on about his Hillary videos for the 40,396th time.

    • francesca 1.4
      11 July 2019 at 12:08 pm

      And she cites the very same full of shit Isikoff ,who broke the Steele dossier news then later recanted from the most lurid allegations, having unleashed
      a murky fake story on the gullible that never had legs.

      • Psycho Milt 1.4.1
        11 July 2019 at 12:58 pm

        This might be a tough one to grasp, but most people don't assess the merits of an article based on your opinions of one of the people involved.

    • McFlock 1.5
      11 July 2019 at 2:40 pm

      They'll definitely repeat the tactic, but Clinton was uniquely vulnerable – repugs had literally spent decades inventing lies and scandals (to the degree that the ones WJC should have faced became lost in all the repug bullshit).

      Seth Rich wasn't the first death repugs lied about for political gain. Before him there was Vince Foster.

      So whomever gets the nomination probably won't have a track record of a generation being conditioned to believe something is corrupt about them. Especially if Biden doesn't get it.

      • Sam 1.5.1
        11 July 2019 at 2:57 pm

        I do think FOX CNN and the rest of the media industrial complex is to blame for spreading the conspiracy theory/theories. Y'know I also think Seths supervisor was being a little too proud to be a Hillary supporter, making Seth work late knowing he'd have to walk through one of the more dangerous areas of Washington well known for armed hold ups, homelessness and poverty.

        • McFlock 1.5.1.1
          11 July 2019 at 3:08 pm

          Case in point. Anything to blame the dems, even if it involves making shit up. You're a real piece of crap, sam.

          • Sam 1.5.1.1.1
            11 July 2019 at 3:37 pm

            Looks like you've hit the limits of your intelligence. What exactly did I make up?

            why don't you cry to one of the moderators to help you find an argument and win a debate, McTrash.

            [Thanks for drawing my attention although this willy-waving contest was hard to miss so early in OM. I wish you two were having a debate but as it stands you are just having a fight in the sandpit throwing sand in each other’s eyes. There are no winners, only losers (plural) and these are mainly everybody else who has to scroll past this pathetic exchange. In the interest of TS, I think I should send you two away on a wee holiday so that the rest of the TS community can enjoy this space. The only two questions for me are when and for how long? Incognito]

            • McFlock 1.5.1.1.1.1
              11 July 2019 at 3:51 pm

              making Seth work late knowing he'd have to walk through one of the more dangerous areas of Washington

              That bit. Complete invention on your part.

              • Sam …
                11 July 2019 at 3:57 pm

                Are you aware that Seth died of gunshot wounds walking home from work?

                • McFlock …
                  11 July 2019 at 4:03 pm

                  You are, once again, incapable of reading links and demonstrably wrong. He was walking home from a bar in the wee small hours of a Sunday morning.

                  • Sam …
                    11 July 2019 at 4:20 pm

                    Links to online conspiracy theories is not an excuse for wrong doing. It's not clear from what you said exactly what claims you are making but it is entirely about intentional behaviour.

                    • McFlock …
                      11 July 2019 at 4:25 pm

                      It’s not clear from what you said exactly what claims you are making
                      "He was walking home from a bar in the wee small hours of a Sunday morning."

                      What part of that do you have difficulty understanding?

                    • Sam …
                      11 July 2019 at 4:50 pm

                      Seth was on punish duties at work for some FOX news conspiracy theory. I think his work supervisor was being over zealous and if I'm not mistaken Seths parents are suing FOX. Now that I'v restated my position do you have a counter argument?

                    • McFlock …
                      11 July 2019 at 5:16 pm

                      Says you.

                      Every link I've found so far claims he was walking home from a bar. None claimed that part of his work duties involved being at a sports bar until it shut on a saturday night/sunday morning.

                      Therefore your unsubstantiated rumours about his work are irrelevant to his death.

                      Therefore you're just repeating lies and innuendo about a murder in order to sully people you oppose politically.

                      Therefore you are a piece of shit.

                      And your still failed to explain just what you found "unclear" about "He was walking home from a bar in the wee small hours of a Sunday morning."

                    • Sam …
                      11 July 2019 at 5:37 pm

                      I was implying that the conspiracy theories was coming from CNN and FOX news. The only one talking about online conspiracy theories was you. That's why I said something. It's got nothing to do with some sort of imaginary outrage in your own mind. It's was all produced by Fox News not some imaginary republican smear campaign. Clinton smeared herself, get over it. This bullshit is fucking years old and you're still crying about it.

                    • McFlock …
                      11 July 2019 at 5:41 pm

                      So, just to be clear, you wrote:

                      Y'know I also think Seths supervisor was being a little too proud to be a Hillary supporter, making Seth work late knowing he'd have to walk through one of the more dangerous areas of Washington well known for armed hold ups, homelessness and poverty.

                      as an example of the sort of lies that were spread, rather than meaning to imply that you actually believed it?

                    • Sam …
                      11 July 2019 at 5:51 pm

                      You're just geared for it aren't ya. You just have to signal how virtuous and outrage you can be don't you. You're so fucken ideological you can't even see the trees from the forest.

                      Y'know it happened in the middle of Clintons Presidential campaign. DNC staffers don't get weekends during presidential campaigns. Y'know I looked at all this stuff years ago, it should be like accepted truth by now. But you just keep denying that Trump won fair and square.

                    • McFlock …
                      11 July 2019 at 6:00 pm

                      So rather than simply clarify whether you were making shit up, you go off on another tangent. Again.

                      Blessed be the Way of Sam.

                    • Sam …
                      11 July 2019 at 6:07 pm

                      nope. Not rather. Just not caring very much about your hurt feelings. Why on earth would I go through any effort for a low iq specimen to try and unfuck your own confusion. Why should I when I'm having so much fun with your emotions.

                    • McFlock …
                      11 July 2019 at 6:45 pm

                      If my regarding you as a stupid piece of shit who spreads contemptible lies (and then lies about his lies) is a source of joy to you, then you have succeeded beyond your wildest dreams.

                    • Sam …
                      11 July 2019 at 7:06 pm

                      No, McTrash. It's not about me, and it's not about you either.

                      Seth was working late, he stopped at a local bar, got drunk and got murdered on his way home. Theres no conspiracies here, no hidden agenda. There's no hidden outrage. Trump didn't steal anything. It was a media beat up.

                      Yknow so what if Seth leaked something, it was just an accident.

                    • McFlock …
                      11 July 2019 at 7:24 pm

                      More lies and innuendo from a transparent scumbucket.

                    • Sam …
                      11 July 2019 at 7:53 pm

                      No McTrash. There was no lies. That's just in your own head. From what I remember Kim Dotcom was willing to testify for the Muller investigation that Seth did hand Wikileaks something. Their only one in denial is you, McTrash. That Seth was Mudrered probably has nothing to do with anything you're on about.

                    • McFlock …
                      11 July 2019 at 8:10 pm

                      KDC offered another moment of truth, huh?

                      What you remember rarely overlaps with what you provide evidence for and that itself rarely overlaps with reality. KDC has similarly been caught out once or twice. So you talking about what KDC promised is like someone claiming that their spirit guide told them that unicorns claim to fart rainbows.

                    • Sam …
                      11 July 2019 at 8:19 pm

                      Prove what exactly? Seth is dead. You need to move on.

                    • McFlock …
                      11 July 2019 at 8:24 pm

                      I love the way you're on first name terms with the guy whose murder you're shamelessly exploiting for your own deranged purposes. That's probably meant to be a distraction from the fact that you haven't backed up a single one of your claims. Any of them.

                    • Sam …
                      11 July 2019 at 8:43 pm

                      Nope. It's not about love because I'm not going to provide you with anything. If you want to be more cooperative you're going to have to learn to be civil. Or I could just rubbish you all the time.

                    • McFlock …
                      11 July 2019 at 8:51 pm

                      Blessed indeed is the Way of Sam.

                    • Sam …
                      11 July 2019 at 8:57 pm

                      Nope. It's not about me my boy,

                    • McFlock …
                      11 July 2019 at 8:59 pm

                      "It" keeps changing as you shift the goalposts, dear boy.

                    • Sam …
                      11 July 2019 at 9:14 pm

                      Nope. The goal post didn't change.

                    • McFlock …
                      11 July 2019 at 9:20 pm

                      And yet someone went from walking home after working late because of their demanding supervisor to simply walking home from a bar.

                    • Sam …
                      11 July 2019 at 10:15 pm

                      Do campaign staffers get the weekends off where you are from?

                    • McFlock …
                      11 July 2019 at 10:53 pm

                      lol see.

                      You just pull shit out of your arse and wear it as a crown.

                    • Sam …
                      11 July 2019 at 11:07 pm

                      You can't even accept simple truths. DNC staffers don't get weekends off during presedintial races. There was no conspiracy theory to begin with. You just wanted to signal how virtuous you are. So go right ahead.

                    • McFlock …
                      11 July 2019 at 11:35 pm

                      But he wasn't at work in a bar, was he.

                      You assert these things as "facts", but they're just assumptions you make to support your desire to use a robbery gone wrong as a weapon against the dems.

                      And, in my experience, people who use the term "virtue signalling" do so only to avoid explicitly declaring that they have no concept of empathy or humanity. It is the penultimate refuge of the unregenerate scoundrel.

                    • Sam …
                      12 July 2019 at 12:20 am

                      nope. Nothing to do with assumptions, empathy or the Democratic Party at this point.

              • Incognito …
                11 July 2019 at 11:31 pm

                See my Moderation note @ 3:37 PM under Sam’s comment.

            • Incognito 1.5.1.1.1.2
              11 July 2019 at 11:30 pm

              See my Moderation note @ 3:37 PM.

      • Andre 1.5.2
        11 July 2019 at 3:07 pm

        Clinton certainly had had decades of smears targeted directly at her – hell, the curtains in the White House had barely been changed in '93 before the bumper stickers and graffitti appeared saying "Impeach Clinton. And her husband".

        Then while Vince Foster conspiracy theories were certainly a thing, what I saw of it was confined to definite Repug circles. While I was certainly acquainted with a few people with convergence moonbat tendencies, they didn't buy into the Vince Foster thing.

        I'm not sure about the "uniquely vulnerable" bit, though. Kerry got successfully swiftboated. If Shrub hadn't made himself so fkn unpopular, it's possible the shit about that Kenyan, Barack Hussein Obama, might have got more traction. It's a worry that neither Sanders, Warren or Harris have ever before gone up against an opponent that simply doesn't have a bottom for how low he will go. Let's face it, elections are pretty cruisy, genteel things for liberals in Vermont, Massachusetts and California.

  2. Dennis Frank 2
    11 July 2019 at 8:34 am

    Thanks to the link provided by KJT, I'm posting an insight into the Greek leftist self-immolation that has played out over the past four years:

    "The moment I walked into the office of Alexis Tsipras, he told me he had decided to fold, to ignore the people’s No, and to side with New Democracy in order to pass through parliament the bills by which Greece would, again, surrender to the troika. After I failed to dissuade him, I resigned as minister of finance. A few hours later, Mr Tsipras convened a meeting with the acting leader of New Democracy, and the leaders of the other pro-troika parties, whose votes he needed in parliament to pass the third bailout. It was at that moment that New Democracy was retrieved from history’s dustbin and placed on a track leading, with mathematical precision, to election victory."

    "Since that night, Greece’s parliament has been the stage for a four-year long tragicomedy: Syriza MPs passed austerity and fire-sale bills with which they disagreed, while, on the other side, New Democracy MPs voted them down — in spite of agreeing with them. How my former colleagues convinced themselves that this would end in anything other than a devastating defeat for Syriza is beyond my comprehension."

    https://www.yanisvaroufakis.eu/2019/07/09/how-syrizas-capitulations-allowed-the-greek-right-to-escape-the-dustbin-of-history-the-new-statesman/

    What gets me about this reveal by one of the key players is that the top leftist unilaterally decided to betray the people: it was not a collective decision of the government. That strikes me as extremely weird. Imagine any PM of ours making a decision on behalf of our government, and it being implemented without consulting the cabinet. It's possible that the author of the New Statesman reveal simply chose not to mention that the decision to betray the people was subsequently ratified by the government.

    If so, I assume he doesn't want to acknowledge that his resignation was an admission of defeat – instead of fighting the battle with his colleagues against his leader. Perhaps he is ashamed of his cowardice. Perhaps he is signalling the reader that he believes consensus is too irrelevant to mention. Leftist politics has traditionally operated in defiance of the consensus principle, which is why splitting has always been endemic on the left. He may have thought the notion too sophisticated for his colleagues to comprehend.

    • Wayne 2.1
      11 July 2019 at 9:14 am

      I suspect it did go through a collective decision making process, but of course someone has to start it all. That would be the PM.

      In any event Syriza has had 10 years, which is pretty decent amount of time in government. Inevitably they were eventually going to lose to the right. It is the nature of democracy.

      • Kevin 2.1.1
        11 July 2019 at 11:13 am

        More like the nature of those who control the purse strings. Wayne. And that is most definitely not the Greek government.

        Tsipras certainly did not help his cause with a lot of the decisions his government made, so they should really have stepped aside. But once again, power for powers sake.

        Varoufakis was the only one with any conscience out of all of them.

        • Wayne 2.1.1.1
          11 July 2019 at 3:30 pm

          Much more likely the Greek people just got tired of having the same government for 10 without things getting much better. They certainly weren’t going to go more left. Varoufakis was in the contest but got nowhere.

          So it is logical the Greeks were going to shift to the major conservative party.

          Just as New Zealand will at some point go back to National. It won’t be as a result of international capital or international media, more as a result that people will feel safe with National (as indeed they do at present with Labour).

    • Sacha 2.2
      11 July 2019 at 9:20 am

      Imagine any PM of ours making a decision on behalf of our government, and it being implemented without consulting the cabinet.

      David Lange banning the USS Buchanan visit?

      • Dennis Frank 2.2.1
        11 July 2019 at 9:28 am

        You could be right. And of course pulling the plug on Roger Douglas is likewise a viable example…

      • Anne 2.2.2
        11 July 2019 at 10:14 am

        David Lange banning the USS Buchanan visit?

        That was a strange affair. We later discovered that Lange had been subjected to some bizarre behaviour during that period both in NZ and when he was on a visit to the USA.

        The one that comes to mind was the 'bogus' alarm sent to his Office (and presumably Foreign affairs) about a "missile attack” heading for the USA. They expected them to arrive in 20 mins. Lange sat in his office helpless because what can one do in 20 mins. It came and went and nothing happened. A further message arrived that it was just a flock of birds mistaken for a missile attack. I can’t recall hearing whether any other allied nation received the message.

        When you look at what goes on in the US today, it doesn't take much to figure out the game they were playing. Whatever, it might have had a bearing on Lange's decision making. He took that secret to the grave with him.

    • Adrian Thornton 2.3
      11 July 2019 at 9:40 am

      It hardly matters wether Varoufakis was or wasn't a "coward" the fact remains that the Syriza party under the leadership of Alexis Tsipras acted completely against the very mandate that they were voted in for by the people, Tsipras will now be a name of ignominy for those on the Left in Greece for ever, as is Lange is to those who support an actual strong progressive and proudly Left wing labour in NZ.

      Although I have some misgiving's about Varoufakis's credibility on a few issues myself, I followed the debacle of Syriza closely at the time of it's election through to it's rather quick and unsightly capitulation to the radical austerity ideology being foisted upon it from abroad. Through that time of watching interviews with many of Varoufakis's detractors,from within and without Syriza, I don't remember anyone saying or implying that he would have made any difference to keeping the party on track had he remained, though that being said, you could well be right, I don't profess to be an expert on the subject….maybe he is just an ashamed coward trying to cover his tracks ( I have never thought that of him myself, slightly dodgy maybe)..who knows.

      " Imagine any PM of ours making a decision on behalf of our government " Muldoon at the height of his powers comes to mind, who at times (I have read) had a cabinet that would pretty much bend to any of his whims or fancies.

      Roger Douglas it also seemed at times, held our government in a state trance, most willing and enabling to install his nefarious ideological madness..with only a couple of notable exceptions, sort of like in Greece.

  3. OnceWasTim 3
    11 July 2019 at 8:49 am

    Sorry to keep banging on about the state of our public service, but Easton nails it:

    https://www.pundit.co.nz/content/how-important-is-local-knowledge

    Parachuting in the generic manager from offshore into senior positions when they do not yet understand (or have experienced) NZ society and culture always seems to end in tears, and it usually just goes on to serve the neo-lib' agenda.

    • Rosemary McDonald 3.1
      11 July 2019 at 9:23 am

      My partner and I had to attend a meeting with three mangers from the Waikato DHB after we had made a complaint.

      All three either simply stared blankly, or deftly deflected our issues by implying we were somehow in the wrong. Even with written evidence of the agency's failings and with an advocate from the Health and Disability Commission in tow we not only got nowhere close to resolving the issues but the situation was made much worse.

      All three of these managers were English, of about the same age and were fairly recent arrivals.

      Not long after Peter and I shouted ourselves to the movies to see I, Daniel Blake.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8jbVGKICso

      • One Two 3.1.1
        11 July 2019 at 9:57 am

        IOM: Insight to thought processes

        Hi Rosemary…

        Well over 100 pages of a meeting held almost 20 years ago.

        The thinking , process , pressure and influence behind the meeting may resemble some of your experiences with MOH etc.

        Top down.

      • OnceWasTim 3.1.2
        11 July 2019 at 10:08 am

        Yep. The thing that gets me is that it's NOT that they're English, or even from somewhere else. It's that they are parachuted in without any understanding of NZ kulcha and society, and they can't be expected to know or understand it. They're recruited as though they're almost God-like in their expertise – often that expertise is most relevant to where they've come from. They then begin to produce and frame policy based on that.

        Tariana Turia said something that struck me on Q+A the other night – that Maori appear to have lost faith in themselves. SO too have others. (The more I hear about OT, AND having been a part of TPK in the past, the more I understand what I see as public service and politician 'capture' by it all)

        What we're doing is simply perpetuating and fast tracking all that 'periphery to core' concept (Immanual W), and increasingly becoming more and more culturally insecure. One sees it in everyday life (whether its the way some recent arrival has 'shown us' the way to paint our various emergency service vehicles – the pastel yellow and green ambulances, fire appliances and pleece), to the way we're handling our immigration policy and lack of action (until recently) over worker exploitation of brown people. Really quite pathetic in many ways.

        The thing I like most about The Great Big Whurl is its diversity and ongoing cultural mixes. What we're doing is just continuing to roll over and succumb to our various colonial masters whether its the Old Country, the USA (and what fuckups both those are proving to be), or the emerging ones..

        I feel a @ Wayne coming on soon – probably with accusations of naivety. But no worries – I see him as a relic from the 50s, 60s and 70s.

        Anyway, I'm more interested at the mo' in seeing contributors' responses

        /endrave

        .

        • Rosemary McDonald 3.1.2.1
          11 July 2019 at 10:41 am

          Is it a lack of confidence in our Kulcha and the collective Kiwi inferiority complex or is it a calculated effort to import these managers who are kind of related to some of us but come from a country that is much further down the track of instituting state sanctioned bullying of the vulnerable an marginalised?

          When we sat across the table from Pom 1, Pom 2 and Pom 3 we were struck how, well, not quite us they were. And they were a team. They all spoke the same language of bureaucracy and seemed not to see us as totally of the same species.

          (For the record. I came to New Zealand as a child in the early 1970s. Though living south of the border in the UK, we were culturally Scots. I saw those parachuted in managers as complete foreigners. )

          • OnceWasTim 3.1.2.1.1
            11 July 2019 at 11:14 am

            Probably a bit of both?

            Well there's another example by the way: "They all spoke the same language of bureaucracy ……….. " (going forward, of course), and apparently it's all "Best Practice", "on the back of" their various external experiences.

            "Ultimately……………….", etc.

            They'd make good used car salesmen some of them.

            Gtg for the mo'
            EDIT: before I do, it’s increasingly evident that over the past decade or so, the Peter Principle, or variations on that theme are alive and well

            • greywarshark 3.1.2.1.1.1
              11 July 2019 at 6:54 pm

              OwT

              I saw your link re generic and imported managers on TDB and read it – agree with what was said. Between getting imported managers probably with impressive degrees (to the lower echelons of NZ) and those who have climbed to the higher levels from within NZ, where the air is sweeter and refined, and you have the key to your own washroom, we seem to be being fleeced by these confident chiefs who are looking to feather their own nests, like shining cuckoos who have rolled the greywarblers over the edge.

              I had noticed that item about the new UK manager from Brum? And spent a fascinating time reading the back history of Chch Council and Marryatt, Parker et al. It didn't build confidence in Chch's advancement, going forward.

          • OnceWasTim 3.1.2.1.2
            11 July 2019 at 5:50 pm

            By the way Rosemary – here we go again:

            https://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/114147627/birmingham-chief-to-take-up-reins-at-christchurch-city-council

            Funnily enough, my son and family just landed in Birmingham less than 24 hours ago. Already the feedback is streaming back/

  4. RedLogix 4
    11 July 2019 at 9:04 am

    Most offenders, like myself, have trauma and mental health issues that are often unaddressed in a society that spends far too little on preventative and protective factors. Mental illness, trauma, adversity, homelessness — these all correlate with offending, yet we keep cutting vital services and housing that could help address these issues.

    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-07-10/tax-cuts-could-starve-social-services-increase-crime/11293336

    This inside story confirms what I've long said, that probably 80% or so of people in our prisons need not have been there. If this govt's focus on mental health starts to turn this horrible stat around it will become a landmark achievement.

    With crime there is no magic wand that untangles the complex knots of personal accountability and social dysfunction from which it is woven. Tackle one end of the problem while ignoring the other, the knot only tightens.

    Our present system has not progressed it's fundamental tenents in centuries, yet it routinely fails victims, families and even offenders alike. If mental health was a stigmatised concern, forever marginalised … crime remains firmly at the bottom of our priorities. Yet the manifest failure remains intolerable.

    We need to examine the roots of the system, recasting the problem with redemption as the ultimate goal. We need to see crime in terms of a chain of events, starting with personal temperament, family stability, the socialisation of the child, the building of conscience and shame, an understanding of how brain injury derails behaviour, instilling the courage to take opportunities, dealing resiliently with failures, and most critically finding a place to stand as part of a healthy community. Each one points of these is a stack of books in it's own right.

    Yet we need a framework that stops the 'soft on crime' narrative dead; we cannot erase or minimise personal accountability, because without it there can be no forgiveness, no reconciliation and no redemption.

    • Adrian Thornton 4.1
      11 July 2019 at 10:30 am

      "We need to examine the roots of the system," I completely agree, the system of free market liberalism has proved itself not to work well for most humans.Funny thing is humans,as it turns out, need more in their lives than a system that demands a never ending need for more ( of what no one can define exactly) a system based on combativity with your fellow citizens to get ahead or even maintain, a system that relentlessly commodifies absolutely everything, the steam off your shit if it could…suicide is at critical levels, my friend cut a neighbors 14 year old son down from the rafters in the garage two weeks ago, I walk to work and their are homeless people huddled in groups on the streets to keep warm, all the motels in town are always full, not with out of town visitors, with homeless people..it;s fucked up that's for sure..and badly

      And while all this is going on, we now import cheap labour to build our roads, build our building, pick our fruit, maintain our power networks,farm our land, something is very very broken in this model, and it doesn't take an economist to figure that out, infact that is probably the last person you want on the job!..it seems that the only human emotion that liberal economists seem to understand and cater too is greed, one of the very worse human traits and motivators..

      So yes I agree we need to examine this broken system and then radically change our course.

      If we on the progressive Left in NZ can't get our shit together and offer a viable alternative soon (as Sanders and Corbyn) then you can be sure that the Right will, and when people are hurting, they will reject and punish the status quo, and turn to whom ever has the strongest message, are we going to wait for a nutter like Collins to take the initiative, we must act….and I have to say that sorry, but I just don't believe that Ardern or her brand of centrist pragmatism is that type of transformative leader or brand of political ideology the Left need for this looming moment in NZ history.

      Turn Labour Left!

      • greywarshark 4.1.1
        11 July 2019 at 11:32 am

        Edit:
        It's not greed alone, Adrian that drives economists, it's their employers' greed, whom economists serve by achieving better results from efficiencies. All economists aren't the same, but some are more equal than others; those economists who believe in efficiency before all, adopt the morals and principles that drove Ayn Rand to the top of the RW hit parade.

        Aldous Huxley commented to Orwell this: 'the nightmare of Nineteen Eighty-Four is destined to modulate into the nightmare of a world having more resemblance to that which I imagined in Brave New World. The change will be brought about as a result of a felt need for increased efficiency. ' https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/01/huxley-to-orwell-my-dystopia-is-better-than-yours/508769/

        and this: The worst enemy of life, freedom and the common decencies is total anarchy; their second worst enemy is total efficiency. Aldous Huxley

        Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/aldous_huxley_391055

        It's more efficient to bring in overseas people for high-skilled jobs as their education has been paid for where they came from. I am thinking of Phillipine workers because they are desperate to maintain a life, and been brought up, no doubt, under the aegis of the Catholic religion and taught the precepts of obedience and to supplicate to God and Mary for help in their travails. One of our commenters who employed them was fulsome in his praise of them and their characters and work standards (which was opposite to the workers he could obtain in NZ.) That is no doubt why my phone call was directed to someone in Manila, Philippines about why my paper wasn’t delivered to my home in New Zealand.

        Maori have been thrown into unemployment by the efficiency drive of the money-mad, those who have destroyed our domestic economy so they can increase their wealth through exporting. When you export but don't import the country has an imbalance of trade. It was a nice efficient solution to sell to other countries, and bring in their products made more cheaply than we could for ourselves. Ergo, a neat efficient system for the wealthy, the wannabees, and the c-ooff. Not for those who were happy to work and have a life and who would expect that these things would be enhanced by their government, not destroyed.

        Maori believed in gods and had precepts too but it was respect for their community and working together on their land and water, which underpinned their humanity and being. They didn't have money, and they didn't have alcohol. They were combative, but were held together by loyalty and aroha to their whanau and hapu. They adopted Christianity often, but found that pakeha didn't practice what they preached. Their culture was eroded, with the remnants determinedly and fiercely held so as to preserve a worthy way of life which enabled all, without turning communist which too easily sets into state authoritarianism.

        The Maori story is the story of most of NZs eventually. As the money-mad advance on their crazed, obsessive way we will all be pushed, or thrown, aside. The rising suicide numbers are a feature of this situation. The government and elites concern about people, suicide, violence, baby deaths is a feature of an addled tainted society that wants to look satisfactory to an indiscriminate glance, but actually wants to exclude and ignore the reality of the shambles that the system has manufactured for itself.

        We need to recycle our caring, human citizenship. There will be no room for individual graves soon for the numbers that fall from disease and suicide, and un-natural disasters, though at present we are buried with ritual niceties. Land will be limited; it will not be efficient to have large areas set aside for burials, even cremations will have to wait for a monthly ceremony for the ashes to be interred in a common grave.

        We who are not individuals of wealth or note will be disregarded more and more. Unless we stand for people-caring-community that adopts respect and practicality as keystones of systems, and freedom of thought and to be heard, our society will continue to deteriorate. Lastly is the need to control the money-mad and their desire for growth and consumer society for their profit and their sickness of eternally wanting and being never satisfied.

      • RedLogix 4.1.2
        11 July 2019 at 11:54 am

        We agree on the causes of social dysfunction, but struggle with what to do about it. After the litany of Marxist catastrophies from the last century I find it tiresome that various ill-defined forms of Marxism still seem to hold a default monopoly on left wing thinking.

        To give Marx is very real due, there was much that he said about our present system that was useful. He was really the first to detail why competitive market economies would create a small minority of spectacular winners and a vast lumpen of losers. This is a deep problem that all societies have struggled with; the more prosperity a society generates the more it tends to be unequally distributed. It's called the Matthew Effect and pre-dates capitalism by … forever.

        Marx proposed essentially that the losers in this competition should simply rise up by sheer force of numbers, overthrow the winners, and then replace the system with one that was not competitive but co-operative. For reasons of conciseness I won't expand on why this doesn't work; Marx's analysis was essentially materialistic and the authoritarian regimes needed to impose this constraint on the human spirit were intolerable.

        Modern socialists, like this centrist govt, therefore position themselves as a balancing countervailing force to the inequality problem all social systems generate, without too much challenge to them. Yet still far too many people … like your friends … experience the heart stopping grief of a world going terrible wrong for them in ways that all to often were entirely avoidable. In my view each one of these speaks in a deep way to the failure of the left to advocate effectively for the vulnerable, the dispossessed and all those trapped by poverty of expectations.

        I'm by no means the only leftie to sense, however dimly, the need to rebuild the left wing argument on a fresh basis; one that doesn't seem so intent on tearing down the successful, so intent on repeating past mistakes … but one that pays real attention to the poor we profess to care about. Because until we know how to change for the better the life of even just one person we care for, how can we possibly claim to know how to change the world?

        Because that's perhaps the deeper point of the article I linked to above; it's about one young person, horribly derailed by life, yet one other person persisted with her, and slowly and patiently over many years turned her life around. There was no magic wand moment; their victory was gentle and incremental.

        • Blazer 4.1.2.1
          11 July 2019 at 12:56 pm

          Hey Red would you say sovereign Govts being in control of a nations money supply,as opposed to private central bankers(Fed)constitutes…Marxism?

          • RedLogix 4.1.2.1.1
            11 July 2019 at 2:19 pm

            Most ideas don't come with hermetic boundaries, there is often a quite fluid interchange going on. There is no big red box labelled "Marxism" into which we can stuff a bunch of ideas, lock the lid and throw away the key.

            In most modern economies we run a mix of private credit creation, quite tightly controlled by government Reserve Banks. Almost anyone expert in this area would argue the present system is excessively tilted in favour of private credit creation and from a global perspective there is lot we can do to further optimise how the system works.

            The problem is that strictly government controlled credit creation has a terrible track record of being hijacked for venal and destructive political purposes. Until we've learned how to solve that problem, it's going to be a case of the devil we know I'm afraid.

            • Blazer 4.1.2.1.1.1
              11 July 2019 at 3:17 pm

              No big red box of 'Marxism',just as there is no big blue box of 'Capitalism,I venture.

              'after the litany of Marxist catastrophies from the last century'

              'after the litany of Capitalist catastrophies from the last century'.

              As for the 'devil we know',why would that devil relinquish control,given his ubiquitous influence and dedication to the status quo?

        • WeTheBleeple 4.1.2.2
          11 July 2019 at 1:15 pm

          To me it's not about tearing down the successful at all. It's tearing down the corruption, the non-contribution, the war-mongering, the false-narratives – of the 'successful.' The bleeding of the planet and its people for profit. The corporate hand-outs. The two sets of rules. The minimal jail sentences for heinous crimes. The victimisation of the vulnerable. The myopia concerning real costs of these planet destroying scum in suits.

          These are no 'happened-to-do-wells.' They are fucking dirt. Either our rules apply to them, or they can fuck right off and hide under a rock cos the public have had a gutsful.

          They deserve every pitchfork wielding lunatic hammering at their doors. Then some.

          But somehow it’s the left’s failure… Nonsense. it’s the right’s acquiescence and obeisance to scummy humans all because they have money.

          • greywarshark 4.1.2.2.1
            11 July 2019 at 1:44 pm

            Edit
            …one that doesn't seem so intent on tearing down the successful, so intent on repeating past mistakes … but one that pays real attention to the poor we profess to care about. Because until we know how to change for the better the life of even just one person we care for, how can we possibly claim to know how to change the world?

            Oh we have to start somewhere – and it is essential that we start with our over-blown ideas of ourselves. One that pays real attention to the poor we profess to care about. And remember that there, for the grace of God, go I….and try and shine with some reflection of that God, that goodness, because we are on a different level to that poor person because they didn't have what we did.

            Sometimes they can find that different life quite satisfying though, everyone doesn't have to be the same. But the hard thing is to put some effort into helping others who have missed out, and even more important is making sure that when they are babies, toddlers and terrible-three-year-olds, they get the same good start we had. Let them have firm, regular childhoods with decent food, clothes and some coaching in how to defend themselves against bullying, the most important bit of education they can get. Learn to present themselves with humour and understand others motivations, the E-Q rather than the I-Q – I reckon the first raises the second.

            And not dividing the world into Superior, deserving Me, and Receivers of Charity and Good Works them because they are lesser. Look for the soul in people, the honesty in their words and minds, and there is the goodness – start with giving a busker a gold or silver coin, keep a supply with you so you can. Bring satisfaction into their lives, and keep doing that plus a brief thumbs up, that's great, look them in the eye, acknowledge them as people, they are doing something for the world and themselves, that would be a good start.

            We are connected by our sameness, even as we diverge in our lives, our interests. Understand yourself, be humble a bit – not too much, and then you can connect for a few seconds at least, with someone and know a bit about where they are coming from, what life is like for them.

            • WeTheBleeple 4.1.2.2.1.1
              11 July 2019 at 2:09 pm

              I used that saying 'There but for the Grace of God go I', in a routine on homelessness in a performance this week.

              At one point: 'you can't hate on the homeless, that's not hate, it's fear. But you know who really does hate the homeless?

              Winter.'

              Some miniature peacock comes up after the show. "I hate the homeless, I think they've already got too much money"… thought he was hilarious. I told him he didn't know what the fuck he was talking about and dressed him down in front of his wife and friends.

              People who take pleasure in the misfortune of others, who think humor is about punching down – less than worthless no matter how much gold is dripping off them.

          • RedLogix 4.1.2.2.2
            11 July 2019 at 2:07 pm

            To me it's not about tearing down the successful at all.

            And then the rest of your comment is an exercise in contradicting this claim.

            The problem this approach has is that if cannot distinguish between the 'happen to do well's' with those who through 'a combination of talent, hard work and some good luck have done well'. Both exist, no-one is proposing that any system us flawed and limited humans can create will be perfect, we will always produce a mix of good, bad and very ugly. At root the evil is not wealth in itself, nor 'success' in whatever dimension you care to define it, but in who we are. And money merely makes us more of who we are.

            Kicking down doors and impaling the rich on pitchforks changes nothing if they're replaced with people no better. Except the new people in charge have just bonfired their moral authority which usually turns out for the worse.

            • WeTheBleeple 4.1.2.2.2.1
              11 July 2019 at 2:15 pm

              Nonsense. It's rather easy to determine who avoids taxes, who denigrates minorities etc.

              Listing the ills of the world perpetrated by rich people very clearly shows how and why the mess.

              Two sets of rules is unacceptable but clear as day.

              This is not the angry mobs doing. The angry mob is the rich's doing.

              I'd rather the corruption is dealt with, corporate power over people is stripped. But they wedge their own laws in, their own media and narrative, they police everyone but themselves. Cruel indifference.

              Then they whine when they find a riot in their yard.

              Hypocritical bullshit. Wake up and smell the cheapass instant coffee.

              • RedLogix …
                11 July 2019 at 2:34 pm

                Listing the ills of the world perpetrated by rich people

                Yet nowhere do you attempt to list the manifold benefits very successful people bring to the world.

                All people are a complex mix; it isn't as simple as you think to unravel the good and the bad we all do. Everyone is flawed in some dimension, we can all be cast onto pitchforks for some reason.

                Your complaint is real, I have no quibble with that. What if the answer to it was quite different to the one you have reached for. What if we all became better people? Like all of us, and we all started to sincerely think of ways to help each other?

                We can put in place all the rules and authoritarian processes you could dream of, and more. But none of it will help unless we simply require of ourselves to turn away from resentment, anger and vengeance, and look to fixing our own lives.

                And that I think is all RedLogix has to say. It's been more than a decade now, and I want to thank you all for being so generous with your time and energy.

                • KJT …
                  11 July 2019 at 6:59 pm

                  "Successful people", in the form of those who bring the greatest benefits to the world, are rarely, wealthy!

                • swordfish …
                  11 July 2019 at 10:51 pm

                  I regard you as one of the more astute, principled & clear-sighted participants here, RL. And I greatly appreciated your moral support regarding the situation my Parents have found themselves in.

                  From time to time, you've been the victim of a pretty nasty & self-righteous mob mentality that tends to be closely associated with the ID Politics faction … so I know it hasn't always been a bed of roses for you … but you've consistently displayed a great deal of dignity & patience under fire.

                  I'll be very sorry if this is your last ever comment here.

                  • Incognito …
                    11 July 2019 at 11:21 pm

                    I am 100% behind this comment. I’d like to think that RedLogix tends to make excellent, well-considered, well-explained, and concise arguments about very complex, sensitive, and personal issues that affect us all to a more or lesser degree. The more heat was put on him, the better his arguments, which is one reason why I never stepped in as moderator. He may not have swayed the usual ‘lynch mob’ but for each commenter there are many silent readers of TS. Those people can read the arguments and form their own opinions. We don’t know what impact it has on the silent majority but I’d like to think that, on balance, it has been positive. I thank RedLogix for his resilience and perseverance, which may have come at a personal cost to him.

            • Dennis Frank 4.1.2.2.2.2
              11 July 2019 at 2:25 pm

              A profound point. I've often commented on evil here – usually in an attempt to rectify the delusional thinking produced by postmodern denial that it exist – so I agree it's in human nature & money empowers it.

              The satanic focus of christian fundamentalists ought to be replaced by Jungian theory. Too bad psychologists seem collectively unable to learn Jung's lessons. If evil is conceived as an archetype lurking in the collective unconscious, activated in some lives by subconscious prompts, and personified by a few people who seem captive to it sufficiently for it to displace other normal dimensions of human nature such as empathy and the moral compass, then we make sense of it. That's better than collective evasion of the topic, or denial.

            • KJT 4.1.2.2.2.3
              11 July 2019 at 6:58 pm

              The whole idea that we can help those at the bottom, without giving up something ourselves, has proven to be a fallacy. "A rising tide" does not lift all boats", which is what you are actually getting at.

              The right wing, apart from their foolish followers, know that memes like the above, "economic growth, and "trickle down" are totally false, but they serve, to bamboozle the thick.

              The "successful" do have to contribute more to the common pot, so everyone can have a share. If you add it up we would not have to contribute much, on top marginal tax rates, to lift everyone out of poverty. Even less if we tax finance and Queen Street capital gains tax farmers, dead in the water, unfortunately!

        • McFlock 4.1.2.3
          11 July 2019 at 3:26 pm

          In an unfair system, the "successful" achieve that level at the expense of others, usually more by luck rather than merit.

  6. gsays 6
    11 July 2019 at 9:48 am

    Just a touch of good news this morning: Congratulations to Kane Williamson and the cricket team for their semi-final win over India overnight.

    An against the odds win against the best cricket nation. A match that had tension, excitement and spectacular cricket skills: Boult's manipulating Kohli into LBW, Santner restricting the run rate, Guptill's run out and Williamson's canny captaincy.

    Bring on either Australia or England for another late night on Sunday.

    • Shadrach 6.1
      11 July 2019 at 10:09 am

      I'm in Melbourne, so slightly friendlier time zone. Stayed up and watched until the final ball – fantastic effort by the boys. Go the Black caps!

    • Rosemary McDonald 6.2
      11 July 2019 at 11:45 am

      After the previous night's abandonment due to the mizzle….we were not going to repeat yet another night with the trannie barely audibly broadcasting the play. Prevents that deep sleep that has the necessary restorative benefits. However, when by 11pm the odds had gone for a Kiwi win from 2% to 78%, the trannie got another sub audible run, and I managed to properly wake in time to catch the last four overs.

      We have just watched the highlights….

    • Gabby 6.3
      11 July 2019 at 1:12 pm

      Ockies getting beaten like they stole something would cap off the week nicely. Shame bothe sides can't lose though.

    • CHCoff 6.4
      11 July 2019 at 1:36 pm

      India are the best cricket team at the tournament, bad luck India however

      Black Caps have been best value ambassadors of cricket matches in the tournament and also well deserved their place in the final.

      Use to be our NZ staple with the rugby but great to have it back with the cricket, great advertisements for the full naunces and complexities of the sport while bringing the singular sum of the NZ game to the party.

      I would put the value of this run at a world cup, similarities & up there with what the AB team of the time represented & bought to the South African rugby wc in representing NZ's sporting interests to add in the mix, giving top shelve value.

  7. reason 7
    11 July 2019 at 10:22 am

    The Apartheid state of Israel has devolved into the biggest and most murderous right wing hate movement in the world.

    Even 48% of usa Jews thought Israel was not interested in peace …. a remarkably well informed percentage …. given the bias and anti Palestinian reporting … from usa main media

    Two weeks ago, the British for Middle Eastern Studies (BRISMES) adopted the academic boycott of Israeli universities over their complicity in planning, implementing and justifying Israel’s grave human rights violations.

    https://bdsmovement.net/news/bds-14-hope-face-israeli-apartheid

  8. bewildered 8
    11 July 2019 at 10:24 am

    Outstanding victory for nz in the cricket last night

    Sport not really important barring it’s one of the few things that tends to unite us as a country where so many forces seek to divide

  9. mac1 9
    11 July 2019 at 10:49 am

    Yep, a unifying force. The only ones bewildered were the Indians who have yet to figure it out.

    A pitch with a bit in it for the bowlers sorts out the flat track whackers and those with issues of technique. A bit like politics, really………

  10. bewildered 10
    11 July 2019 at 10:59 am

    Yep Indian cricket team all froth not a lot of substance, lack of depth, did not deliver on hype, a bit like politics……😊👍

    • mauī 10.1
      11 July 2019 at 11:22 am

      Cricket is a tool of the elite. First Class, Lords, Tea, Drinks… Though it is no surprise yourself and the broken down horse prefer this so called "Gentleman's game".

      • bewildered 10.1.1
        11 July 2019 at 11:29 am

        Sigh! What a miserable existence it must be inside your head

        • mauī 10.1.1.1
          11 July 2019 at 11:44 am

          Watched the game with your polynesian and Māori brothers and sisters did you? Was it that kind of unifying experience for you….

          • bewildered 10.1.1.1.1
            11 July 2019 at 1:05 pm

            Hmmm, very racist and stereotyping of you I know and have many Maori and Polynesian friends and colleagues who enjoyed the cricket and are talking about it today Maybe get out of your cellar and off your keyboard and into the sunlight What do these 3 things have in common Maui, The Grinch and Scrooge 😊

            • mauī 10.1.1.1.1.1
              11 July 2019 at 2:21 pm

              " I know and have many Maori and Polynesian friends and colleagues who enjoyed the cricket"

              lol, let me guess… they are also raving right wingers and like what ACT has to say. Truly believable BS.

              • bewildered …
                11 July 2019 at 3:16 pm

                Hey Maui with respect fk off to the miserable joyless cesspit you love to paddle in😊

                • mauī …
                  11 July 2019 at 6:17 pm

                  Time to look outside yourself bewildred.. this isn't all about you. Perhaps some self reflection is in order? You sound angry…

                  • Bewildered …
                    11 July 2019 at 8:33 pm

                    Not angry at all Maui I am not one of the perpetual offended that’s why I gave you a emoji to help your one brain cell to comprehend You make no sense at all re self reflection on context about being happy a nz team made a World Cup final You simply mirror my point I put to you. I can only surmise your a moron or severely dim so I will go easy on you Now a happy fk off and wriggle back to your place of malcontent 😊😊😊😊👍

                    • In Vino …
                      11 July 2019 at 8:53 pm

                      Staggering arrogance. Sneering Bewildered is not offended ? Why sneer then? Call someone a moron, typing 'your a moron' in the act? It should be "you're" you semi-literate dimwit. It is you who are in the place of dimness. I don't need to tell you to wriggle off to anywhere: you could hardly wriggle any lower than the position you have already reached by your own efforts.

                      Ka pai Maui

      • joe90 10.1.2
        11 July 2019 at 11:44 am

        The cricketers I know will be tickled to know that they're elite.

        But hey, pissing one someone else's fun is what bleating malcontents do.

        /

      • David Mac 10.1.3
        11 July 2019 at 12:12 pm

        The best and cleanest way to defeat anyone is to play them at their own game and win.

        You would do you your cause way more good by putting on pads than spitting in the faces of sportspeople.

    • mac1 10.2
      11 July 2019 at 11:53 am

      Relying on a few top performers, not really believing in the team or its ethics, inadequate preparation, lack of familiarity with different wickets, pitch preparation favouritism, home crowds and ‘impressionable’ umpires, compliant media……. yep, a bit like politics.

      Now watch the inadequate players hive off into commentary, radio and TV 'journalism' and into business sinecures where a bit of a name helps impress the punters, maybe an Honour or even a job in politics!

    • Drowsy M. Kram 10.3
      11 July 2019 at 12:16 pm

      Great game. Losing team could source a ‘player’ from China – “one’s worth two“, etc. wink

    • Gabby 10.4
      11 July 2019 at 1:08 pm

      Sure, until the next time they thrash us beewee.

      • bewildered soon to be beewee 10.4.1
        11 July 2019 at 3:18 pm

        Loss me Gabbs, by the way can I have your permission to take your beewee as my new handle It’s a lot easier to type with my fat thumbs

  11. Pete 11
    11 July 2019 at 11:12 am

    Kim Darroch, UK ambassador to US resigns, proving the adage 'the truth hurts.' Well, telling the truth hurts.

    • joe90 11.1
      11 July 2019 at 11:32 am

      Conveniently, Farage is the main beneficiary.

      So the content matters less than the fact of the leak. Someone – maybe a civil servant, maybe a minister – seems to be after the ambassador, Kim Darroch. The contents were leaked to Isabel Oakeshott, the journalist who acts as the de-facto communications office of Aaron Banks, Nigel Farage's donor. The Brexit party leader quickly popped up to demand Darroch be sacked. And their Leave.EU outfit then stepped up to launch its campaign to make sure Farage replaced him. Incredible timing.

      Darroch is facing the usual fate of the non-believers, those have not achieved full Brexit transcendance and therefore must be ejected from their position before they can keep asking critical questions.

      But the story also shows something else: When you scratch at the surface of this movement for total British sovereignty, you quite often find servility to the US lying underneath.

      https://www.politics.co.uk/blogs/2019/07/08/trump-ambassador-revelations-brexiters-reveal-the-trump-love

  12. joe90 12
    11 July 2019 at 11:28 am

    Oh look, the Italian far-right has a new sugar daddy.

    The six men — three Russians, three Italians — gathered beneath the spectacular painted glass ceiling in the hotel lobby last October had their eyes on history too. Their nominal purpose was an oil deal; their real goal was to undermine liberal democracies and shape a new, nationalist Europe aligned with Moscow.

    […]

    BuzzFeed News has obtained an explosive audio recording of the Metropol meeting in which a close aide of Europe’s most powerful far-right leader — Italian Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini — and the other five men can be heard negotiating the terms of a deal to covertly channel tens of millions of dollars of Russian oil money to Salvini’s Lega party.

    The recording reveals the elaborate lengths the two sides were willing to go to conceal the fact that the true beneficiary of the deal would be Salvini’s party — a breach of Italian electoral law, which bans political parties from accepting large foreign donations — despite the comfort with which he and Europe’s other far-right leaders publicly parade their pro-Kremlin political sympathies.

    https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/albertonardelli/salvini-russia-oil-deal-secret-recording

    • Gabby 12.1
      11 July 2019 at 1:06 pm

      Not Russians, surely not. Morpissey! Defend the poor Russian oligarch kleptocrat victims of vicious smears!

    • RedLogix 13.1
      11 July 2019 at 12:26 pm

      Using mercury for gold extraction is illegal pretty much everywhere, and all legal and legitimate miners deplore it's use deeply. It's a failure of government to enforce their own laws which let this appalling shit still happen.

  14. soddenleaf 14
    11 July 2019 at 12:04 pm

    Clinton lost because the media made Trump much more entertaining, interesting, and yes loathsome. Trump was running for decades, household name, jerk in your fired, etc. Trump will win because stupidity isn't exposed by the media, it's consent manufacture all Trumps way.

  15. greywarshark 15
    11 July 2019 at 12:34 pm

    Another example of trickle down opportunities and creative solutions and projects that are never allowed to occur.

    In Christchurch on red-zoned land some young guys got together and shovelled humps and hollows and made a bike circle track for themselves. It has been destroyed on the basis that it was a 'hazard'.

    https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/114139882/levelling-boys-bike-park-sad-testament-to-public-administration

    Christchurch again – damn the spending fitting the ideas of hide-bound officials and conservatives. They are thinking of spending $15 million on a memorial to the fallen at the mosque (and ultimately lax administration at the borders and low-lifes and guns in NZ). Trickling down in small drops of awhi and mercy that is strained and measured.

    What would be good is if they put that same money into a small building that is attractive and runs Humanities programs on culture, ours and others, philosophies and why we need religions and precepts of behaviour etc. Humanities helps us to understand our own and others human persona. It could be in the grounds of Canterbury University and be an adjunct of whatever humanities programs they have there.

    And for general public experience and memorial, there could be a series of flag poles with all the flags of the countries from where the fallen in Christchurch, both at the mosque and in the earthquakes. Every day at say between midday and 5 minutes after, one of the flags would be put at half-mast, and the previous day's flag would be hoisted again. Make a thing of it like Ypres in Belgium – they have been doing this since the Wars.It would be a moving memorial, literally, as the colourful flags hung or lifted in the breeze, not passive solid forms.

    At present in Christchurch they are mulling over designs for a memorial bridge that they have had for years. One being considered was particularly artistic – a bridge in the clouds caused by a fine spray of water as you climbed up steps no doubt. Just what you would want, to be damped down, as you crossed a stream to keep dry. One sounded great – I liked the sound of it – it was a golden bridge made out of brass I think. But practicality here – I also have read recently of a murdered man who was a scrap metal dealer, and often dealing with people who were on the criminal fringe. No doubt in time if it was possible, bits of the bridge would have been removed and sold with consequences to strength. safety and appearance. So practicality has definitely to be considered, but also give people the opportunity to look for more than expensive monuments to disasters. Beauty would be also in how it remembers the past and enhances and improves the future.

    And I am thinking again about trickle down. The Kiwibuild idea as the only one going under the 1st Labour Coalition shows up their limitations – their distance from ordinary people of lower income. I have noticed amongst the successful middle class that they think they have life sussed and know all there is to know, and can make better decisions for the strugglers than they can. Then the m-class do that, without asking what the strugglers would prefer out of what is available, instead of giving them time to have a brainstorm session, go wild with ideas. Then think how each one could be practically done, or possibly one or two done as a trial.

    The building houses program might have come up with a communal suburb of mixed colour tiny houses, some of which could be connected by a closed in walkway to enable extended families to live close together. Then the young people could be trained to work on these along with reliable (non-leaky-homes) builders. That would have been trickle-up.

    Let's give people more opportunities, incentives and rewards to come up with ideas, group together for viable projects and facilitate doing while they are being. Not have everything planned by the big-people who live in 'It's too difficult, never-never land', because they are stunted by their own limitations of conformity – it ends up paralysis by analysis!

    • ianmac 15.1
      11 July 2019 at 3:00 pm

      In Christchurch on red-zoned land some young guys got together and shovelled humps and hollows and made a bike circle track for themselves. It has been destroyed on the basis that it was a 'hazard'.

      Bluddy disgraceful. Too hard to mow? Too hard to spray weeds? No resource consent? Enterprising lads should have been given a medal or better, they should have been left alone to get on with it!

      • greywarshark 15.1.1
        11 July 2019 at 3:46 pm

        I've just been reading an excoriating opinion piece on Christchurch which the writer says has been dysfunctional since 1989 amalgamation. It is written by a dyed-in-the-wool RW money-maker, but will have some truth and probably sheds light on how the faulty buildings there got signed off.

        The opinion was that good people had left and the remaining administration ran it to the beat of their own drum.

      • greywarshark 15.1.2
        11 July 2019 at 7:17 pm

        It was published today at 5.30am and at 7 pm there were 191 comments which have now been closed so people felt strongly about it. Our lives are being narrowed, our ability to branch out and explore with open spaces limited by the dreaded health and safety issue.

        • Real – Under this logic there should be a warning sign at every entrance on the the roading network warning of the danger on the roads.
        • Timid, no rights – people" are the Government. My kids are doing something similar but are starting with a petition and then going to the council rather than just assuming they can do what they please.
        • Real life danger and boldness – And they wonder why kids are sitting at home playing computer games. Seems it's the only safe thing to do these days. In the 1950s in England boys like my brother and his friends were playing on bombed sites and clambering over piles of rubble! Here's an idea – why don't councils provide safe courses for boys to ride their mountain bikes then? They may have the odd scrape when they fall off now and again but that will always happen. If they're worried about a crumbling cliff then put up fencing and a warning sign to keep away from cliff edge. Too hard? I commend those boys for using their imagination and doing what boys have always done.
        • Whingers who don't like children being active and creative –
          I’m not surprised, the same thing happened to my son ( then 12) and his friends built a cycle track on an unused riverside area on council land which was waste land that no one used, they spent hours making a few jumps.
          On this occasion the neighbours complained to the police who confiscated their spades

        It seemed that comments under women's names were likely to be about getting permission, complying with rules, not about whether those rules were necessary or OTT. Femmes are too compliant methinks, need to stand and object to being overloaded with nos, let's have a more permissive society.

    • Molly 15.2
      11 July 2019 at 6:24 pm

      15 million for a memorial?

      Apart from the fact that some funds should be diverted to family members that are struggling – I thought that both mosques have propertites nearby that can be made a purchase offer on, and have islamic designed gardens installed that integrated them with the mosques themselves.

      The gardens could be open to the public whenever the mosques wanted to, and could be designed in such a way to provide a level of security. The gardens should be given to the ownership of the islamic community, but a volunteer group of gardeners could continue newly built community relationships to be sustained and strengthened into the future.

      Any memorial should prioritise the healing for the islamic community, rather than the boundaries of the secular supporters.

      • greywarshark 15.2.1
        11 July 2019 at 6:39 pm

        Yes I agree. My idea I guess. was to extend the mental boundaries by doing some philosophy and look at the different ways that we build our idea of our world that we tend to have and hold tight to with some carrying this to extremes.

  16. Gabby 16
    11 July 2019 at 1:04 pm

    Why waste 15 mill on the murdered families when you can dole it out to architects, designers, consultants and associated ticket clippers.

    • greywarshark 16.1
      11 July 2019 at 3:42 pm

      I imagine that was the silent thought passing through some people's skulls.

      'I wonder if Roger would like to put forward a design? We can talk it over when we meet for our …dinner party or at the box when we have a drink after the sports occasion.'?

  17. greywarshark 17
    11 July 2019 at 3:39 pm

    Good news for how to make better housing. https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/394155/building-standards-now-available-online-for-free

    This follows on from a pilot that funded five important building Standards and a handbook in 2017.

    The standards presently range in cost from $5.50 to $550.

    Building and Construction Minister Jenny Salesa said these standards helped ensure New Zealand buildings and homes were safe and well-constructed.

    "They will help building professionals and homeowners with methods for designing and constructing timber framing in buildings and selecting appropriately treated timber used in building work.

    "They will also help engineers with earthquake loads on buildings."

    Ms Salesa said the government was dismantling road blocks in the building sector.

    "I have listened to the building and construction sector, and professional groups who access these standards regularly, and to New Zealand's homeowners.

  18. greywarshark 18
    11 July 2019 at 3:57 pm

    I am against putting fees up for ordinary people as a disincentive to some so that they change their ways. I didn't like tip fees being raised to discourage people from throwing things out, which Environment Minister Sage has done.

    Now she is reported as insisting that the SI West Coast pay for the rubbish tip spread, while they say rightly they have a small tax base and low population. Which is true. They have been doing what many Councils have done with rubbish. Her response to their plight:

    "The Westland District Council said it couldn't cope and it was calling down a short-term loan to pay for some of the costs involved. That shows a degree of problems with financial management I think, with that particular council," she said.

    There is a place for disincentives, but after a while they can cease to be effective, for instance as with tax on cigarettes. Now they are desirable goods for theft. Too hard and high, makes poor people's life harder. Punish those naughty people! Hit them till it hurts. You can't do that to children but who cares for the adults who are vulnerable?

    • Ad 18.1
      11 July 2019 at 5:37 pm

      Ain't nothing worth stealing out of that trash.

      Sage should kick them harder.

      Bad enough they need bailing out by NZDF.

      • greywarshark 18.1.1
        11 July 2019 at 6:41 pm

        Ad I hope that you don't get into local or central government with an approach like that.

        • Ad 18.1.1.1
          11 July 2019 at 7:10 pm

          Seriously one of New Zealand's laziest local governments: have prepared zero for climate change other than build another sliver on a seawall, inspired their population to continually leave, diversified their economy about zero, and can't even build a road.

          This isn't a tax on cigarettes.

          This is doing one of the most basic job in local government: rubbish collection. And they swear they don't have enough money for even that. Hey Coasters: boot this lot out!

  19. Ad 19
    11 July 2019 at 5:35 pm

    Bolton, Pompeo and Pence meet with Hong Kong democracy activist Jimmy Lai.

    That's an extended finger like the Chinese Premier meeting with Julian Assange or Bernie Sanders.

    Excellent signal Mr Trump.

  20. Eco maori 20
    12 July 2019 at 8:04 am

    Kia ora The Am Show.

    Ryan it looks like you have shifted to the right.

    I agree Willie this is true institutional racism is a true phenomenon and a fact .

    Good on France for a tax on big technology companies.

    judy if your lot stopped the raid on the poor peoples money cutting benefits making it a miserable experience applying for a benefit shorting the housing market a tax system that cost the poor common people more lowering paye tax a rising gst poverty is a major driver of family Violence .

    I say a gas guzzling vehicle tax is NEEDED to get people into clean energy efficient electric cars and out of cars into public transportation and the money used to subsidize clean energy cars.

    The big point is the rangatahi are the ones that will have to live with the bad effects of climate change Eco Maori say it is there right to protect their future Humanity is so short sighted with the blinds that the billionaire oil barons put on us by manipulating the media paying for false studies all to line there pocket with more money than anyone NEEDS.

    Ryan why not talk about the people who have the biggest carbon footprint the billionaire private planes heaps of excessive waste of carbon being burned to keep up their lavish lifestyle.

    Good on Sharndre for creating a huge educational company education is needed so that the billionaire can not FOOL us with their LIES.

    Ka kite ano

  21. Eco maori 21
    12 July 2019 at 9:38 am

    Whanau more extreme weather caused by our climate warning because of the greed of a few wealthy people. Times are going to change.

    Warning of more severe weather after storm kills seven in Greece

    Two children among dead after series of incidents in Halkidiki region, with dozens injured

    Greece: 20-minute storm kills six tourists in Halkidiki – video report

    Greek meteorologists have warned that more harsh weather could be on the way after seven people died and dozens were injured when a freak storm ripped through beachfronts in a popular tourist region in the north of the country.

    Panic-stricken holidaymakers were caught on camera fleeing as the 20–minute late-night storm uprooted trees, overturned cars and caused mudslides in waterfront resorts

    Ka kite ano link below.

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jul/11/six-tourists-killed-fierce-storms-northern-greece-halkidiki

  22. Eco maori 22
    12 July 2019 at 12:25 pm

    Some Eco Maori music for the minute.

    https://youtu.be/QrY9eHkXTa4