‘A typical example of GCSB operations is spying on Vietnamese diplomatic communications. Vietnam has friendly relations with New Zealand and is a growing trading partner. It poses no security or terrorist threat to New Zealand, the traditional explanation for the GCSB given to the public, but it is still on the GCSB spying list. The only conceivable explanation for New Zealand spying on Vietnam is as part of broader NSA-driven strategy.’
Ashamed what our government is doing to our reputation as a decent fair country.
Not in my name, John Key.
here’s the thing Paul. Wayne Mapp, Tim Groser and others say the people of NZ cannot read the TPP before it is signed to preserve the confidentiality of negotiations. BUT, here is the flaw, we are finding out that at least the USA (and probably everyone in 5 eyes) is spying like fuck on each other. There is NO SECRET to be preserved for purposes of negotiation. After so many years of negotiating the USA will be well aware through its spying of exactly what its partners are saying about the TPP and their bottom lines… To think otherwise is a joke.
Indeed. We already know that the USA, with the help of their FVEY partner Canada, spied on their “friends” and “allies” at the G8 and G20 summits. This is more of the same, and the assumption that the authorities are frequently and directly lying to us about their activities, intentions and plans can I feel at this point, be taken for granted.
Once the parties have negotiated a deal, does it not get tabled and debated in Parliament BEFORE it is signed by the Givernment ? Is that not the time for rational debate about what is in the agreement ?
Love how you dont trust these bureaucrats !
I dont particluarly trust this lot either, but the negotiators have been accessible and relatively open when asked questions. I expect them to do their job, put up teh best deal they can get AND, then leave it to elected officilas and the PUBLIC to debatye and sign-off – unlike faceless Akl City bureacrats who cant follow the RMA process correctly.
The Cabinet decides what to negotiate, instructs the officials, signs the treaty and ratifies the TPPA, not the Parliament.
From Professor Jane Kelsey:
“One more time, Prime Minister, read the Cabinet Manual: Parliament does not get to ratify the TPPA!
‘How many times do the Prime Minister and other members of the government have to be hauled up for misrepresenting the role of Parliament in making treaties, especially the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement’, asked Professor Jane Kelsey from the University of Auckland.
On NewstalkZB this morning John Key claimed, yet again, that ‘In the end, this thing has to go through our Parliament has to be ratified by our Parliament and has to bear scrutiny and I believe is in the best interests of New Zealand.’
‘The Prime Minister is either woefully ignorant of the fundamental process of treaty making, as set out in the Cabinet Manual, or he is wilfully misrepresenting the process to the New Zealand public’, Kelsey said.
‘Parliament’s role in treaty making is largely symbolic. It has no power to decide whether or not the TPPA should be signed or ratified and no ability to change its terms TPPA or require it to be renegotiated.’
‘The select committee process is a farcical exercise because its members know they cannot change the treaty.’
‘At most, Parliament could refuse to pass legislation that is required to bring a particular law into compliance with the TPPA. But the government will have plenty of non-legislative ways to achieve compliance,’ according to Kelsey.
“‘Until the government makes Parliament responsible for overseeing, signing and then ratifying treaties, they should be honest with the New Zealand public: the Executive, in other words the Cabinet, decides what to negotiate, instructs the officials, signs the treaty and ratifies it’, Kelsey said.”
You need to educate yourself. Once it is signed it is a done deal. I can’t believe anyone purporting to offer an opinion on that aspect doesn’t know that…
In Breaking News Stats NZ release GDP growth which shows that Northland has grown by 7.7%, Auckland 5.4%, Wellington 4.4%, Canterbury 10.6%……..Southland 11%.
Bit of a fly in the oinment for Winston First in Northland…oh hang on, since when will facts actually get in his way of a good story. I can only imagine his two press releases ready for the this release – if Northland was 3%, then all fire and brimstone against the Govt (who he would do a deal with over labour in a heartbeat), OR< " there are lies, dam lies and statistics".
Bit of a fly in the oinment for Winston First in Northland…oh hang on, since when will facts actually get in his way of a good story.
Old fellow, you need to change your prescription glasses. They’re obscuring the facts with statistics. When you do get clearance to drive North visit places other than Russell and Paihia.
The Russian bloke building his billionaire’s bach could easily have skewed Northland’s growth statistics by that amount. And I counter your 7% growth with a perfect 10 in the deprivation index.
Growth is uneven throughout Northland, and those eating barren dirt will vote Winston.
Can you post the latest poverty statistics while you are researching, for Northland? Also unemployment against rest of country, health and criminal representation? Thanks in advance
Will Do, sure they will be released just like the Stats NZ release. Only poverty stat to hand is that while Parliamnet is sitting, all school kids in Northalnd (or maybe just 90% accoridng to Material Turei) are starving, yet during Parliamentary recess and school holidays, all kids seem ok and well fed.
They probably have a range of diversions ready to go at the drop of a dead cat whenever an issue is damaging the brand key.
With MSM on side, a top drawer chock full of DP material, the whale and farrar blog on tap, the usual helpers in big business/rural and no end of favours owed by the sellout of sovereignty, laws and assets the choice of which diversion would be the toughest decision.
No they were aware of the threat 3 months ago. They intended to release the information next week but decided that yesterday would be better /sarcasm for no expedient political purpose at all /end sarcasm.
No reporter that I heard asked the following question of Fonterra:
Have you ever received any kind of threats to your product/customers before?
If no. cool.
If yes, how many and what made you think they didnt need to be taken seriously enough to go public…
I would be surprised if some companies don’t get threats from time to time by nutters. I assume the PM is threatened all the time and only on occassions that suit (like justifying his large group of golf caddies) he tells us people threaten his life.
Alternatively, you could of course accept the perfectly reasonable explanation Key has given.
The story had leaked to the press and TV1 and Fairfax (I think they were the two I heard him mention on Morning Report) had started to ask questions on the subject.
Or you could do a Winston and claim that it all a conspiracy to take the spotlight of him.
Yes Tracey, I agree. Of course they are playing politics with babies lives. Key, the cops, the Federated Farmers, MAF, MPI, they are all in in it together. It’s a conspiracy.
Tracey … John Key leaked it. It’s obvious. He doesn’t care about babies, he would leverage the fear of babies lives for political gain. That’s just the type of guy he his. He’s an evil despicable man. That he would jeopardise our international trade and trivialise babies lives in the name of political point scoring proves it. And all those people at MAF, MPI, the cops, and Fed farmers, hard to believe that all those people at high levels of these organisations got in behind Key, just to protect his political interests, but yes, they did, of course they did, all of them. Shame on them all.
One Anonymous Bloke .. yip, our shiny lovely PM turns out to be a reckless nut job, putting our number 1 industry at stake, and using the leverage of babies lives to do it. Gosh, who would have thought….
No, Amanda, please think more clearly: the official story is that the Police were going to go public next week and their public statement ‘we want to establish a dialogue’ directly contradicts Big-John’s fantasy epic. The one with the terrorists.
Why not just answer the question? You clearly don’t think the PM did, fair enough. Who do you think leaked it ahead of the planned announcement next week and why?
1. Whoever sent the letters is playing with peoples’ lives. Chiefly their own, because I’d like to strangle them. No, not really.
2. The release of the information has been stage managed, and I am interested by the disparity between what the Police are saying – “criminal blackmail” – and what other parties with conflicting interests have been saying.
WHO leaked it alwyn… and why a week before the official announcement when so many people had kept it secret for over 3 months (according to Fed Farmers today).
How on earth should I know, Tracey?
The statement was made that 1000 people already knew. If that is the case I am amazed it stayed quiet for so long.
As you probably have heard telling one person a secret means it isn’t a secret anymore.
Lets blame it on the person making the threat shall we? He/She/It, whatever, possibly has the main interest in getting it made public, wouldn’t you say?
To repeat. I don’t know but I am amazed it took so long to get out.
I agree – with this many in the loop and a testing regime that involved creating a brand new test, it’s surprising it didn’t come out sooner.
Thing is the timing could always appear suspicious, because this Government is always embroiled in some sort of dodging dealing or debacle.
If there’s one thing these boys value it’s money, and I think they would have been preferred this to stay quiet to avoid the market fallout.
but this was our biggest industry. Leaking this information could irrepairedly hurt it yet Key has ordered no inquiry into who leaked it?
If 1000 people knew, then they know those 1000 people. Pretty quick investigation you’d think.
By the time this leak was made Ergo, the Government and agencies and industry already knew an announcement was to be made next week, so they already had their strategy for dealing with any fallout.
Weird – investigating 1000 people would be quick?
That’s just silly. Information gets out, randomly, it takes just one conversation with someone who has an interest in getting it to the public domain.
With some obvious exceptions science types who would be involved in testing often aren’t overly interested in politics, which might be why it took this long.
cos whether it would be “pretty quick” is the nub of the issue, right?
my point was never about speed, which I assume you know, but the duplicity of no Investigation being demanded by the PM of this leak which threatened our largest export industry. But you keep focusing on “pretty quick” non investigation of the leak.
Apparently they have already identified the people who knew, so that part of the investigation is already completed before the investigation even begins. Ergo, it would be “pretty quick” compared to an investigation that hasn’t yet identified who had the information to leak.
the point is alwyn it DID stay quiet that long… and fell just a week short of the recently confirmed public announcement.
But don’t be so precious, I was responding to your comment
“you could of course accept the perfectly reasonable explanation Key has given.
The story had leaked to the press and TV1 and Fairfax (I think they were the two I heard him mention on Morning Report) had started to ask questions on the subject”…
Did I miss Key demanding the police immediately begin investigating the leak which could have harmed our largest industry? That would be perfectly reasonable and in line with his actions over other leaks and tea cup trangressions? You know, with our entire dairy industry at stake.
I think he took the entirely realistic view that with so many people involved it would be completely impossible to track it down.
Somebody who officially knew could probably cause the leak without even realising it. Suppose a scientist analysing the milk powder simply said to his/her partner, also a scientist, when asked what he/she had been up to at work. “I was trying to work out how to measure accurately the concentration of very diluted 1080 in milk powder. It is amazingly hard”. Their daughter hears and at school the next day talks to a friend. Friend asks parents, one being a reporter “what is 1080”.
Bang, the story is out. Now how are you going to track that down?
nb. All conversations are imaginary. I am not going to answer questions as to why I think it is hard to do or listen to people telling me I don’t know what I am talking about when I say that. I have made it up
November when letter received by Fonterra, they contacted Police and MPI.
Over the last two days media have asked for comment from MPI and John Key about the treat. Rumours circulating over the last 2 weeks, see NZX on dairy stock trends.
I read a column by one Jamie Gray, business reporter, in the mobile version of the Herald this morning (can’t find it on the main page, didn’t try to hard). In it, he said that dairy futures had dropped by 15 % in the few days before this announcement. Fonterra couldn’t explain the drop with it’s own actions, so “deducted” that someone must have heard of this 3 months old threat.
Now I can think of other reasons as to why dairy futures would drop. Unsustainable practices (“a form of eco-terrorism”) , a decision to sell yet more milk as the cheapest bulk product possible, or even a desire to dump on someone whose government spies on all and sundry.
A diversion it is indeed, and an opportunity to blame those environmentalists for corporate stuff-ups. Watch dairy prices drop at the next auction, and the blame directed there rather than where it belongs. Again.
Do you think it might have just been some folk who think next week’s dairy auction is going to be even worse than expected and lightened their portfolios accordingly ?
Mr Little gave a very good explanation on tv3 of the difference between the Epsom deal the nats do and what’s happening in northland with labour/nzf.
He pointed out that the nats could win Epsom any time were as Labour haven’t held northland for 70 years.
man this “can’t win, won’t win, never won” bullshit is really ripping my undies – personally I can’t see the ‘middle’ liking that too much – it goes against the prevailing narrative of our age and society. And whether true or not (beyond the point) is not what people want to hear – doesn’t inspire confidence imo.
Would you have been ok if the GP stand someone in Te Tai Tokerau next election and by doing so keep Mana out of parliament despite the fact that the GP can’t win the seat?
If the GP put up a candidate to try and get party and electorate votes then whatever they get is good. I would imagine that with limited resources and energy any Party has to make decisions on where those resources and energy go. Could the GP win the vote – yes. For example the environment and associated issues – mining, exploitation plus poverty, inequality and so on are all big, important issues up north as elsewhere. If the macro environment changed – say the arctic stopped freezing or a drought lasted much much longer then the GP could be seen as a Party to give votes to. And it doesn’t have to big a massive big issue that ‘tips’ peoples perceptions over any ‘local’ issue could do it. The GP could win up north. And if they did and that kept Mana out, well that is the way it is.
The same applies to labour and the ‘can’t win’ bullshit – there are multiple tipping points that could change everything in an instant IF the eyes are open for the opportunities. If the eyes aren’t open it doesn’t matter what happens you’ll never see it. This isn’t magic wishing or believing it makes it so – it is practical reality, it is the way it works imo.
The other part is perceptions. We can’t win, we can’t win – oh we want to be government won’t work imo.
It’s most likely true that the GP still has to make decisions about budget and standing in the electorates. They like standing candidates because it increases the list vote. But there is no big enough environmental crisis to get more votes (well actually there is, but it’s not getting the votes), so in reality, it’s not possible for the GP to win the TTT seat next election. Standing there would give them more list votes, but I suspect that even those wanting to vote GP would vote GP on the list and someone else on the electorate vote.
If the GP did stand someone and it meant that Mana didn’t get the seat and that meant that NACT got a 4th term, that for me is far far more important than me getting personal satisfaction from my personal vote.
For me, having a left wing govt IS where my values lie. I am a pragmatic voter, but I don’t know what I would do in the Northland situation given that I think Peters is a loose unit as far as the left is concerned.
” it’s not possible for the GP to win the TTT seat next election.”
not true
No one has any idea of how their vote will affect or influence things when parties coalesce to form government – all we have is our integrity regarding our personal beliefs and our personal vote.
Your dilemna in northland is the same one many people have with labour, and the Greens and probably Mana for some too.
I honestly can’t see the problem here. There is the possibility of a positive vote and the possibility of a negative vote. In the case of Northland, a supporter of Labour could vote positively – for Labour. Or they could vote against the Nats.
I believe it’s been said, but getting the longer term message out is valuable even if the seat is unlikely to be won. So any party could/should do that and voters can decide whether to cast a positive vote or a negative vote.
edit – and as the landscape changes, negative voting may well give way to positive voting 😉
sure Bill – my point has been simply that – with a low vote last election, multiple leaders, and now a new good leader that labour could drive home that leader and his messages in this by-election with a long term view of gaining the treasury benches next general election. I don’t see the current strategy being employed as aligned with that view and by repeating the ‘can’t win up there’ meme that also detaches from the message that labour and little can govern. i just don’t see any potential bloody nose to the gnats by losing to winnie as being worth not driving home the little is great, labour better- to ensure as much as possible a labour victory next general election.
I get that others don’t agree – we’ll see what happens…
it is true the way things stand now. I get what you are saying, that the potential is there. But it’s not a potential that has much potential if you take my meaning. Forming coalitions comes after voting not before, and party choices about candidates even earlier. If the GP made an active decision to not stand in TTT because of the split vote issue then they have my gratitude and support.
I think we have more than our integrity and personal beliefs and personal votes, that’s what political movements are all about, going beyond the personal and working collectively and co-operatively.
“Your dilemna in northland is the same one many people have with labour, and the Greens and probably Mana for some too.”
hmm, not sure about that. The Northland situation strikes me as being reasonabl unique.
I started out very anti labour doing anything other than go for the win .I hope it doesn’t make me to much of a sheep to be coming round to liking the idea of Winston winning while labour still get out and push there message.
Of course if national wins or peters deals with key it will be a bad day .
No – it just means you are open minded enough to listen to the various arguments and reasoned your way to a different conclusion from your original one. As long as you can follow the logic of your change of opinion there is nothing wrong with doing so. Holding intransigently firm to a particular view can sometimes be as bad as constantly flip-flopping. 😈
Must say agreeing with Penny Bright’s argument that this is a council who are light on finical detail, rings very true with collection of propaganda puff pieces.
So back to my main argument – Have and are we in the grip of austerity via the local bodies in this country – rather than at a National level?
And if this is the case, is it to make a government look better finical managers – than they really are?
Sad to hear that Mike Jackson, former head of the National Distribution Union has died. Mike retired a few years ago, after losing the leadership of the union to someone who sadly didn’t have his loyalty or commitment, and was living in Australia in recent years.
He worked alongside Bill Andersen to build the NDU (now First Union) into an integrated national organisation, representing workers in all parts of the retail supply chain. A lovely bloke and a staunch comrade.
Gee, and there was I thinking I was being diplomatic!
Laila’s coup had a significant effect on both the union generally and Mike personally. It can certainly be argued that she took the union forward in her brief stay, but Mike paid a big price for that. My distaste at how she rolled him hasn’t stopped me working with her productively since then and she remains someone I rate highly, even if her most recent project flopped badly. However, my generally positive opinion of her is not shared by all of Mike’s friends, many of whom use far more colourful language than I do to describe her role in ending Mike’s leadership of the union.
So JK, true to form went back on his word “I will resign if there is mass surveillance on NZer’s”. (paraphrased) Finds there’s mass surveillance is occurring. Doesn’t resign. Says it’s data collection.
Tells the public that whatever Nicky Hagar has to say don’t believe it, before any ones even knows the content, and then goes on to instruct the public not to read it. Actually tells public what they shouldn’t read.
Tries to get political mileage out of the 1080 blackmail threat by referring to it as “eco terrorism”. Terrorism. Righto. Good thing we have the GCSB and SIS to prevent these things happening eh? Thats working out really well. Most likely green voters that stuck that 1080 in the baby formula and sent it to Theo Spierings eh John? In the meantime, Police refer to it as a blackmail threat.
(Let’s not forget JK is sending troops to Iraq at the USA’s bidding, and out of our 5 eyes partners, we are spending the most per capita on our military involvement. Not in my name Key)
The guy’s out of control. He is out of his depth as his deeds and lies catch up with him. He looks harried and he’s being snappy with reporters.
So back to that resignation promise. Are we going to hold him to that, as NZer’s? Are we going to let him forget it? Are we going to demand he resign?
When’s a good time to demand his resignation? After the Northland by election results come in?
What do you think?
Outside Parliament on a day they’re sitting. Thousands chanting “hey hey! ho ho! JK must go!”
IF NZF win Northland (big IF), maybe MP and Dunne will put their values where their mouths are and cross the floor Budget time forcing a stalemate in govt… and possibly a new election. Would take guts though…
It is a big if now National have dumped 1080 (poison) down on Peters campaign. No
better way to bring farmers back into line than threatening their income.
That would be very unlikely Tracey.
Both parties gave guarantees of their votes on matters of confidence and supply for the duration of this term and that is what a Budget vote is.
I don’t think either of them would go back on that.
In the scenario you put forward Tracey it may be possible for the MP to be guided by their core values and act accordingly(I know, I know, some of you may choke on that idea) but I would never see Dunne doing that, crossing the floor, unless there was something in it for him. He’s always banging on about values but doesn’t ever display any.
I’m also thinking about ways NZer’s can destabilise National’s credibility as they pull out the brand Key puppet for campaigning in Northland. A mass public call for Key’s resignation right now, while the events are fresh in people’s mind (we tend to have memories like fish sometimes in NZ) might have some impact.
Such events take time to organise though. National events have to be well coordinated and well planned, such as the anti TPP rallies last weekend. One of the organisers told me it took 6 weeks to plan.
Maybe just a rally in Northland to start with, in the areas that Key will be visiting?
Either way, I don’t think we can sit back much longer and just watch the horror show that is the Key Govt, trundle along, business as usual.
Excellent weka! Thats two of us. We need a minimum of 998 more. Organisers of the TPP rally in the weekend counted approximately 1200 in their images they took of the day. We made a helluva racket.
Like your analogy 🙂
When Key was interviewed about the fate of the Titirangi tree’s last night on 3 news he couldn’t be more disinterested if he tried and mumbled something about it “being old” but that wasn’t in context with anything else he said.
Key is the phoney glue that holds together the image of the National Party. With him gone, they will be left exposed, naked, without their make up
Voters who party vote National, who are not National Party members, just ordinary non politically engaged people, are voting for Brand Key, not for some belief in National Party values, and as was the case last year, they certainly weren’t voting for any policy because there wasn’t any.
Sure, we would still be left with a National Government, but when someone like, lets say, Steven Joyce stepped up as PM in the unlikely event Key did resign, those voters will be able see that they only voted for a man and will have no loyalty to the Party, or no connection with it. They may even begin to wake up to the fact they were duped by a cheesey grin and fake blokiness.
Disillusioned they may be inclined to vote differently in 2017.
Having Key gone may weaken National’s hopes for 2017.
I agree that no one in the Nat caucus would roll Key, but for more reasons than you suggest. Key is their meal ticket. they won’t want him gone.
In 2013 when Key said he would resign if he discovered that the GCSB had been undertaking mass surveillance on NZer’s I thought he was being fairly cocky. It was a risky thing to do but he would have known there would be a way to weasel his way out of it, otherwise he wouldn’t have said it.
So, as a matter of principle he must resign. Even if we are left with the same government, we are left with a government weakened without it’s previously popular leader, and a disillusioned voter group whose eyes will be looking elsewhere
Yes Rosie I think that yek has managed to puff charisma from a smoke gun and create a brain fog for the more vulnerable voter and believer-in-money-as-a-measure-of-worth who think of themselves as realists. If you’ve got it, you must have smart qualities and be able to foot it in the business world, have good contacts, have the nous ‘we’ want.
Can you please tell me where the “yek” term came from? I’ve seen you use in reference to John Key.
Just to dig my heels in further. I think it’s high time that someone of standing and mana (other than Dotcom) call for Key’s resignation.
It’s something that the Labour Party, Greens and NZ First could make a united front on too. The leaders of the opposing parties could make a solemn press statement calling for Key’s resignation.
Tuesday night must just be starting over in Ireland as I type this. I imagine there’s going to be quite a few dance parties for a weekday!
A written judgment released by the Republic’s court of appeal said part of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1977, which allows certain substances to be controlled, is unconstitutional, meaning all government orders banning substances such as ecstasy and magic mushrooms are void – and it is not an offence to possess them… The Irish government now has to force through emergency legislation in its parliament on Tuesday evening in response to the ruling.
The emergency law won’t come into place until the Republic’s second chamber, the Seanad, endorses the legislation. Following that the country’s president, Michael D Higgins, will have to gave his approval.
Quote from the release. “By GCSB staff helping to translate and analyse communications intercepted by other Five Eyes agencies.”
So we have the staff and they have the skills to do the above. This seems to me to be of great importance to the debate.
Lucky no NZer is subject to their work though if something cropped up in mass “collection”, would there be just cause for the agents to go back and seek and discover information?
A while ago I wrote a guest post about the difficulties my daughter was having finding a job. Just to let you know she has one part time but permanent and in the area she wants a career. Its a start. She did it herself without the help of family contacts. Still think the job market is really hard for young people but relieved my daughter made it
I really appreciated reading your post and thanks for the update – this is great news. yes, it’s a really difficult time for young people so all the very best to your daughter for her step on the ladder.
thats good news fairy. now when she is established and can show her worth, that part time position can fairly rapidly change to full time or her renumeration may grow.
kia kaha to your daughter.
This week in the face of incontrovertible evidence that the GCSB conducts mass surveillance of our Pacific neighbours and sends the unprocessed data direct to the US National Security Agency the Prime Minister cracked. He offered no counter argument or evidence but simply delivered strident attacks on the messengers – Nicky Hagar in particular – who were exposing his various fabrications.
In the normal course of politics a Prime Minister wouldn’t get away with any of this but he has two important factors on his side.
Firstly the mainstream media have poo-poohed the latest revelations. They say it tells us nothing we didn’t already know and are ready to move on. So aside from widely reporting the Prime Minister’s incredulous bluff and bluster there has yet been little deeper analysis.
Secondly and just as important to Key’s position is that Labour has essentially the same policy and Labour leader Andrew Little’s comments have simply added to the smokescreen John Key is doing his best to create around this issue.
Despite what I read here, I dont think the “ordinary not very political but we still vote” folk really care about this issue very much.
It didnt make a decent dent in the Nats popularity in the 2014 election, perhaps almost none at all if you measure it by their increased party vote that the Nats got.
The Nats will lose the next election as they will be at the end of their popularity cycle, just as Helen Clark was in 2008.
Labour just needs to work on some polices that resonate with the voters, and the other parties need to work on policies that will energise the “missing million” to come on out and vote, because its unlikely that Labours policies alone will achieve that.
The mission million are lost to Labour for good, as well as National for that matter (as well as the Greens). It will be a new movement that they will flock to, to be led by a charismatic leader waiting in the wings. What movement or who that leader is, no one knows, but there is a vacuum, and someone will fill it. Then those who sit in their million dollar houses, and their latte dens will have good reason to tremble.
And it wont be me. I have more important things to worry about 🙂
Wikipedia is suing the NSA over surveillance programs that involve tapping internet traffic en masse from communications infrastructure in the U.S. in order to search it for intelligence purposes.
The lawsuit argues that this broad surveillance, revealed in documents leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, violates the First Amendment by chilling speech and the open exchange of information, and that it also runs up against Fourth Amendment privacy protections.
“The surveillance that we’re challenging gives the government virtually unfettered access to U.S. communications and the content of those communications,” said Patrick Toomey, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, which is bringing the litigation on behalf of the Wikimedia Foundation, which operates Wikipedia, and a group of human rights and media organizations including The Nation magazine and Amnesty International, who say that their sensitive overseas communications are imperiled by the NSA’s snooping.
This desire to make an event about NZ people being killed in a nasty way in WW1 a long time ago by-passes other who also should be remembered and celebrated for their actions. And it continues that pathetic drone every Anzac Day about the wonderful fallen and we will remember them spoken in a solemn and repetitive way. Nothing said about really preventing war, how horrible it is and how you are lucky to have life, a working body and mind, sanity and your soul at the finish, just acceptance that they are dead. Another pocketful of mumbles.
The RSA tried to keep the Vietnam fighters away from joining in Anac Day marches.
Not a real war apparently. My father didn’t come back from WW2. There was anxiety that the children who wished to march in their dead parent’s place shouldn’t be confused with the survivors. Medals must be worn on the opposite chest or great offence would be taken by the forces men.
It is a waste of money. We already have memorials why build more. If we have so much dosh to throw around, gather all the Turks in NZ and the people being fought now, the Palestinians etc and have a ceremony of community, warmth, conciliation and compassion, remembrance for all who have suffered that we have been connected with. And avow that we want to prevent war if we can do so in a way that is fair to all.
My point was actually on how the government can choose to spend money on one particular war and not others, and have picked one that is mighty distant in the past. Why not the Boer War. We were just getting on our feet here then and off to war we went. http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/war/south-african-boer-war/introduction Eager to display New Zealand’s commitment to the British Empire, Premier Richard Seddon offered to send troops two weeks before conflict broke out. Hundreds of men applied to serve, and by the time war began in October 1899, the First Contingent was already preparing to depart for South Africa. Within a few months they would be fighting the Boers.
By the time peace was concluded 2½ years later, 10 contingents of volunteers totalling over 6500 men (plus 8000 horses) had sailed for Africa, along with doctors, nurses, veterinary surgeons and a small number of schoolteachers. Seventy-one New Zealanders were killed in action or died of wounds, with another 159 dying in accidents or as result of disease.
It is probably worth noting that Maori were not allowed to fight in the Boer War because British policy forbade non-white troops from fighting against white troops.
Also, while on that subject, the Maori Battallion was kept out of the Pacific theatre in WW2, because the US didnt want to fight with them.
An RSA timeline of war that goes up to Vietnam war in 1965. Where we might choose to remember a Good Thing that happened is 4 November 1918 at Le Quesnoy where we showed a concern and intelligent lack of maximum firepower in not shelling the town but climbing over the walls and surprising and capturing the resident Germans, for which apparently we are still remembered. http://rsa.org.nz/Remembrance/OtherCommemorations/Timeline.aspx
Wars every 30 years or so. That was the general pattern in the 20th century.
There was Vietnam and then the Cold War, also the threat of annihilation by nuclear bomb. (Raymond Briggs showed us how the trusting and vulnerable would manage in that circumstance.)
On more mundane homegrown conflict we had the Army fighting the farming couple over who was responsible for the bridge collapse, just to keep their hand in while not overseas. That went on for years as they tried to ruin locals in this domestic spat.
Then Afghanistan, Iraq, etc. So plenty of action to think about.
I see.
I didn’t read it in quite as general a manner as you meant.
Regarding Seddon and the Boer War, we didn’t learn very quickly did we?
Look at Savage in 1939 and his statement.
” Both with gratitude for the past and confidence in the future, we range ourselves without fear beside Britain. Where she goes, we go. Where she stands, we stand.”
Technically we then declared war on Germany before anyone else. Imagine if, at the last moment, Britain and France hadn’t declared war? We could have fought Germany on our own.
I think we could add some homegrown ones into this, sadly.
“This post is a collection of racially-themed parties and events at college and high school campuses. They’re examples of one kind of simple individual racism that still perpetuates daily life in the U.S.”
“The first revolution, the agricultural revolution, was instituted by women,” he says, “and the first counter-revolution and the first negative hierarchies were created by men.” In one pamphlet the PKK’s leader, Abdullah Ocalan – now languishing in Turkish jail – writes: “Liberating life is impossible without a radical women’s revolution which would change mentality and life.” He coins the concept of “total divorce”, or “the ability to divorce from the five thousand years old culture of male domination”.
And yes, I still harbour severe mis-givings over the involvement of Leninist organisations in the revolution unfolding in Northern Syria as their influence will be one pushing for a form of democratic centralism (ie, an authoritarian polity).
This is an informative and entertaining video about the spread of ideas which the presenter calls “thought-germs” (memes might be more accurate), the role of emotion (especially anger) in the spread and retention of these ideas online and the development of communities that have a shared idea.
When opposing groups get big, they don’t really argue with each other, they mostly argue with themselves about how angry the other group makes them. We can actually graph fights on the Internet to see this in action. Each becomes its own quasi isolated internet, sharing thoughts about the other.
Each group becomes a breeding ground for thought-germs about the other – and as before the most enraging, but not necessarily the most accurate, spread fastest. A group almost can’t help but construct a totem of the other so enraging they talk about it all the time
Food for thought – especially when it comes to political blogs across the spectrum in NZ (and maybe a little introspection about our community : is this evident here? If so, is it something that we should work to overcome?).
Note it does not actually say when this happened, and if you read the article a few times you are left with a vague 2012-2014 timeframe. Not what one would call specific. One is also left with a few niggling thoughts, here are three.
1: If the Government had recently posted a $3.37 billion surplus, surely they would have mentioned that achievement once or twice during the election, instead of the
‘ we will hit surplus any day now ‘ message that was being trumpeted from the ramparts.
2: If the Government had recently hit surplus, then they must have gone backwards in one hell of a hurry to have spent all of last year talking up such a small projected surplus that might or might not be seen sometime next year if you squint facing south when the moon hits azimuth and are wearing your lucky undies.
There is also a fun new game in the NZ Herald, where you guess what word they meant to use:
“The liability for Accident Compensation Corp was $34.92 billion, some $4.5 billion more than expected, while Earthquake Commission property damage liability was $370 million [?] than forecast at $3.66 billion.”
So, instead of the forecast deficit of $635 million we now have a surplus of $77 million, which is the improvement of $712 million that is heralded everywhere in the media. However, the tax-take was $456 million better than forecast and outgoings were $249 million below forecast. Together, this adds up to $705 million. That leaves $7 million unexplained. Has anybody got a clue? A ‘rounding error’ perhaps?
I am still scratching my head at how The Herald posts an article saying the government posted a 3.37 billion dollar surplus recently and no-one blinks an eye
In my view, the gaffe video of ‘okey-blokey’ John Key, which has apparently been VIRALING – out of ‘spin doctor’ control, showing the TRADER trying to be a TRADIE, but failing hideously in his attempt to bang a single nail into a piece of wood, as part of National’s (doomed) Northland by-election campaign, will trump the famous Don Brash ‘walking the plank’ gaffe.
The reaction I’m getting to this on Kiwiblog tends to suggest that I may be right?
Doesn’t quite fit the Kiwi DIY concept?
POOR Crosby Textor 😉
At the end of the day – I can’t see them feeling either relaxed or comfortable about the amount of public ridicule to which their client is now being subjected?
Just undid YEARS of their Crosby Textor masterfully crafted ‘spin doctoring’?
Ordinary Kiwi blokes are now going to queue up to shake the hand of this (part-time) Prime Minister John Key, whom has obviously never held a hammer?
Didn’t Crosby Textor not first do a ‘dummy run’ to check that this ex-Wall Street banker could actually bang a nail into a piece of wood?
Worthwhile contemplating the fact that yesterday or the day before was the anniversary of Operation Meetinghouse (which I just heard on the Radio) – “later estimated to be the single most destructive bombing raid in history”
On the night of 9–10 March (“Operation Meetinghouse”),[9] 334 B-29s took off to raid with 279 of them dropping 1,665 tons of bombs on Tokyo. The bombs were mostly the 500-pound (230 kg) E-46 cluster bomb which released 38 napalm-carrying M-69 incendiary bomblets at an altitude of 2,000–2,500 ft (610–760 m). The M-69s punched through thin roofing material or landed on the ground; in either case they ignited 3–5 seconds later, throwing out a jet of flaming napalm globs. A lesser number of M-47 incendiaries was also dropped: the M-47 was a 100-pound (45 kg) jelled-gasoline and white phosphorus bomb which ignited upon impact…
… The individual fires caused by the bombs joined to create a general conflagration, which would have been classified as a firestorm but for prevailing winds gusting at 17 to 28 mph (27 to 45 km/h).[12] Approximately 15.8 square miles (4,090 ha) of the city was destroyed and some 100,000 people are estimated to have died.[13][14]
…The US Strategic Bombing Survey later estimated that nearly 88,000 people died in this one raid, 41,000 were injured, and over a million residents lost their homes. The Tokyo Fire Department estimated a higher toll: 97,000 killed and 125,000 wounded. The Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department established a figure of 124,711 casualties including both killed and wounded and 286,358 buildings and homes destroyed. Richard Rhodes, historian, put deaths at over 100,000, injuries at a million and homeless residents at a million.[17]
LeMay was aware of the implication of his orders. The New York Times reported at the time, “Maj. Gen. Curtis E. LeMay, commander of the B-29s of the entire Marianas area, declared that if the war is shortened by a single day, the attack will have served its purpose.”[9][10] The argument was that it was his duty to carry out the attacks in order to end the war as quickly as possible, sparing further loss of life.
He also remarked that had the U.S. lost the war, he fully expected to be tried for war crimes.[19]
Apparently Japan had already approached MacArthur with offers of surrender on pretty much the same terms that they signed later in Tokyo Bay. The seppos still needed a lot more dead Japanese to show Stalin the power of their bombers.
I have just been listening to Question Time in the house today and I wish to let the Standard know that, in my opinion the PM is a nasty little man with a complete lack of respect for our Parliament. He has the manners of a guttersnipe and Lord knows what that says of his upbringing. What a cheap and chatty little man he is. It brings to mind what my dear late mother would say to us when we got out of line “I did not raise you kids to behave like this …”. God save us from him.
Henry Rollins on living in the USA – It’s not living in a country, it’s a video game.
7+ minutes on how he managed to get out of minimum wage precariat level.
Henry Rollins – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Rollins
He says he has been lucky. But when luck presented him with an opportunity he gave it a go. He would be early for any appointment to make sure he was there on time if something unexpected happened on the way. He learned his lines, he stuck at things and made sure he finished them. Gives you satisfaction even if you don’t succeed as hoped. I can learn from that. I think it could speak to a lot of us here, we have had it fairly easy up til now.
All of them. Key kept going off on a mad tangent, failing to address any question adequately. Several times, regardless of the question asked, he threw in a few electioneering comments, promoting Northland Natsy patsy Osborne!
At one stage he started arguing his position at a recent press conference, whether he was at the time making statements as PM or Leader of National. This was at the PM’s press conference for goodness sake!
And more often than not, the Speaker turned a blind eye, preferring to reprimand the Opposition instead!
No, he was all buoyed up, arrogant and cocky today, and digressing widely off the questions asked with the speaker as usual treating him with his usual shameless partiality!
I’ve been offline for a few hours to feed the ‘mouths’, but TV3 now has it up on their website – and there is a wonderful boxing picture (photoshopped) in the comments. Beyond my skills to copy it and paste here …..
“Beyond my skills to copy it and paste here”
[Tip for you veutoviper: On the TV3 picture on the link you posted, right click on the picture and go to ‘view image info’ about 2/3 of way down. You will get the picture and the following link]
What this whole episode has shown is all that needed to do is write couple of letter to fonterra and Fed Farmers and then wait for the fallout and the destruction of NZ financial base.
Campbell live at 7 is gong to talk about the Key bribed but Winston inspired Winston’s ten Northland bridges. Programme starts in 2 minutes. I am off to watch it now,
Is this 1080 threat has been investigated for four month, how come police only started taking to the anti 1080 campaigners in the last couple of days, as reported this evening on Stuff and the Herald?
Because if you officially ask someone questions you’re telling them that you know that the threat exists, your are actively investigating it, and that you believe that they might have something to do with it or be connected to someone who does.
As opposed to all the sneaky stuff you can do if someone doesn’t know you’re looking for them.
Now that they have to investigate openly, they might even just be rattling the bars to provoke a reaction from the letter-writer.
by Rafael D. Quiles (gender-critical gay man from Puerto Rico) The writing on the wall is right in people’s faces and people just don’t see it or don’t want to. What could actually possess a heterosexual male to want to feminize himself and claim that he is a lesbian? Because ...
From the Wall Street Journal:Inside a room of the ornately decorated Hotel du Palais during last month’s Group of Seven summit in Biarritz, France, President Trump awaited a meeting with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi. Mr. Trump looked over a gathering of American and Egyptian officials and called out in ...
by the Redline blog collective At Redline we are very saddened to hear of the death of Magdalen Burns who passed away on the morning of Friday, September 13 (British time). Magdalen was a great fighter for the rights of women in general and lesbian women in particular, a defender ...
The Brexit issue has certainly brought with it a series of apparently difficult constitutional issues, many of them concerning the respective roles of the executive and parliament. Most of them arise because of the unwillingness of MPs, despite their professions to the contrary, to be bound by a constitutional rarity ...
. . This blogpost is different to my usual format of reporting on issues… Since July 1011, I have blogged on a variety of political issues; near always political and/or environmental; mostly highly critical of the previous National Government. Other issues included Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands and repression of ...
Those close to the Police Minister believe the initiative may be the result of Nash “seeing a great deal” on AliExpress. In a move that comes seemingly out of nowhere, Police Minister Stuart Nash announced this afternoon that he expects all frontline staff to don bearskin hats, famously worn by ...
The government has released its Arms Legislation Bill, containing the second tranche of changes to gun laws following the March 15 massacre. And it all looks quite sensible: a national gun register, higher penalties for illegal possession and dealing, tighter restrictions on arms dealers and shooting clubs, and a shorter ...
Private prisons are a stain on humanity. Prison operators explicitly profit from human misery, then lobby for longer prisons terms so they can keep on profiting. And in the US, prison companies run not only local and state prisons, but also Donald Trump's immigration concentration camps. Faced with this moral ...
When National was in power, they were very keen on Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) - basicly, using private companies to finance public infrastructure as a way of hiding debt from the public. They were keen on using them for everything - roads, schools, hospitals. But as the UK shows, that "service" ...
Moving And Shaking: There was a time when people spoke matter-of-factly about the “labour movement” – a political phenomenon understood to embrace much more than the Labour Party. Included within the term’s definition was the whole trade union movement – many of whose members looked upon the Labour Party as ...
by Philip Ferguson Much of the left, even people who formally identify as marxists, have collapsed politically in the face of postmodern gender theory of the sort pioneered by American philosopher Judith Butler. For Butler even biological sex is socially constructed. “If the immutable character of sex is contested, perhaps ...
The media is reporting that the (alleged) Labour party sexual assaulter has resigned from their job at Parliament, which means hopefully he won't be turning up there making people feel unsafe in future. Good. But as with everything about this scandal, it just raises other questions. Most significantly: why the ...
By Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern I am every bit as angry as you are. I am every bit as disappointed as you must be. The people with power, oversight and the ability to do something about these processes within the Labour Party should be ashamed. Whoever those people are, I ...
Property developers think there is an "oversupply" of houses in Auckland:High turnover rates and falling prices may be a sign that there are too many new houses going in to some parts of Auckland, commentators say. [...] Property developer David Whitburn said there was a "bit of an oversupply" in ...
Labour Party president Nigel Haworth resigned yesterday over the party's sexual assault scandal. But while that's good news, its unlikely to take away the stench of a coverup. Because according to Paula Bennett in Parliament yesterday, pretty much everyone in the Prime Minister's office was involved as well:I have been ...
Two-Faced? Labour insiders' commitment to the neoliberal status quo puts them at odds with their party’s membership; its trade union affiliates; and a majority of Labour voters, but this only serves to strengthen the perception they have of themselves as a special elite. Among the lesser breeds, they’ll talk up a ...
There has been a lot of talk about Boris Johnson wanting an election, and he has blustered with great gusto about 'chicken' Jeremy Corbyn refusing one, but I think there are many reasons why he is secretly glad he has been refused the opportunity:The Tories are an utter rabble,tearing themselves ...
Scottish appeal court judges have declared that Boris Johnson’s decision to suspend parliament in the run-up to the October Brexit deadline is unlawful. The three judges, chaired by Lord Carloway, Scotland’s most senior judge, overturned an earlier ruling that the courts did not have the powers to interfere in the prime ...
By Simon Bridges. The following is a press release from the office of Simon Bridges, leader of The National Party. Key ora, New Zealand. Happy Maori Language Week. Look, I’m writing to you today because I want to clear something up. There’s been a lot of kerfuffle around some things ...
I understand there's some stuff going round about how the SIS "was removed from the list of public offices covered by the Public Records Act in 2017". The context of course being their records derived from US torture, which will be disposed of or sealed. The good news is that ...
Dr. Christopher Labos and Jonathan Jarry discuss the recent Canadian fluoride/IQ research. They provide an expert analysis of the paper and its problems. Click on image to go to podcast. The critical debate about the recent ...
Australia is burning down again, and meanwhile its natural disaster minister is denying climate change:Australia’s minister responsible for drought and natural disasters, David Littleproud, has said that he doesn’t “know if climate change is manmade”. Clarifying earlier comments that the question is “irrelevant” when considering the Coalition government’s response to ...
Auckland Philippines Solidarity is excited to host Professor Judy Taguiwalo for a speaking tour of NZ in September. She is a well-known activist in the Philippines and was a political prisoner under the Marcos dictatorship. Professor Taguiwalo briefly served as a Cabinet member under President Duterte but was forced from ...
This open letter to the Green Party was penned after an opinion piece by Jill Abigail, a feminist and founding member of the party, was censored by the Greens’ leadership. (Redline has reprinted her article here).The intolerance of the Green Party leaders and their acceptance of the misogyny of gender ...
Today is a Member's day, and David Seymour's End of Life Choice Bill continues its slow crawl through its committee stage. They're spending the whole day on it today, though the first hour is likely to be spent on voting left over from last time. After that they'll move on ...
An ambitious plan to fly to Los Angeles petered out into a brief sight-seeing trip and a desire to return home and get some sleep before work tomorrow. Air New Zealand has confirmed a flight to Los Angeles last night was turned back about a quarter of the way into ...
There appears to be consensus – by omission – that the concept of indigenous futures should be accepted at face value. So I scavenged the internet to see if I could locate an academic descriptor or a framework around how we think about it as a concept, and whether it ...
Here’s another novelty chocolate to shove in your gob, New Zealand Cadbury could be seeking to make itself great again with a rumoured new release: Pineapple Trumps, a spin on its classic chocolate-encased pineapple treat and do-it-yourself tooth remover. The global confectionery manufacturer and bumbling “before” character in an infomercial, ...
During my time in the Pentagon I had the privilege of sitting down with military leaders and defence and security officials from a variety of Latin American nations. Sometimes I was present as a subordinate assistant to a senior US defence department official, sometimes as part of a delegation that ...
Kia ora, Aotearoa. It’s that magical time of year. Te Wiki o te Reo Māori. In English, the week that frightens talk radio. As you probably know by now, all your favourite media outlets are participating, some more successfully than others. Stuff has changed its name to Puna for the ...
Eighteen months ago, the government promised to strengthen the Bill of Rights Act, by explicitly affirming the power of the courts to issue declarations of inconsistency and requiring Parliament to formally respond to them. So how's that going? I was curious, so I asked for all advice about the proposal. ...
As the Brexit saga staggers on, the focus is naturally enough on the Prime Minister and his attempts to achieve Brexit “do or die”. But the role played by the Leader of the Opposition is of almost equal interest and complexity. The first problem for Jeremy Corbyn is that he ...
Last week, English Prime Minister Boris Johnson boldly declared that he would rather die be dead in a ditch than delay Brexit. Unfortunately for him, the UK parliament accepted the challenge, and promptly dug one for him. The "rebellion bill" requires him to ask for and secure yet another temporary ...
Lost In Political Space: The most important takeaway from this latest Labour sexual assault scandal, which (if I may paraphrase Nixon’s White House counsel’s, John Dean’s, infamous description of Watergate) is “growing like a cancer” on the premiership, is the Labour Party organisation’s extraordinary professional paralysis in the face of ...
by Daphna Whitmore Every Sunday for the past two months unionists from First Union, with supporters from other unions, have set out to the Ihumatao land protest, put up gazebos and gas barbeques, and cooked food for a few hundred locals and supporters who have come from across the country. ...
Newsroom today has an excellent, in-depth article on pine trees as carbon sinks. The TL;DR is that pine is really good at soaking up carbon, but people prefer far-less efficient native forests instead. Which is understandable, but there's two problems: firstly, we've pissed about so long on this problem that ...
Canan Kaftancioglu is a Turkish politician and member of the opposition Republican People's Party (CHP). Like most modern politicians, she tweets, and uses the platform to criticise the Turkish government. She has criticised them over the death of a 14-year-old boy who was hit by a tear gas grenade during ...
Hi there, just call me Tim.We face tough problems, and I’d like to help, because there are solutions.An Auckand District Health Board member has nominated me for as a candidate for the ADHB, because her MS-related pain and fatigue is reduced with hemp products from Rotorua. Nothing else helped her. If I ...
The Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security has published their report on whether the SIS and GCSB had any complicity in American torture. And its damning. The pull quote is this:The Inquiry found both agencies, but to a much greater degree, the NZSIS, received many intelligence reports obtained from detainees who, ...
Bewhiskered Cassandra? Professor Hugh White’s chilling suggestion, advanced to select collections of academic, military and diplomatic Kiwi experts over the course of the past week, is that the assumptions upon which Australia and New Zealand have built their foreign affairs and defence policies for practically their entire histories – are ...
For most of the time I was a British MP, my party was out of government – these were the Thatcher years, when it was hard for anyone else to get a look-in. As a front-bencher and shadow minister, I became familiar with the strategies required in a parliamentary democracy ...
by Gearóid Ó Loingsigh On August 29th a video in which veteran FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) commander Iván Márquez announced that they had taken up arms again was released. There was no delay in the reaction to it, from longtime Liberal Party figure and former president Uribe, for ...
Air New Zealand couldn’t believe its luck that this seemingly ideal piece of real estate had so far gone entirely unnoticed. Air New Zealand’s search for a site to build a second Auckland Airport may have made a breakthrough this afternoon, after employees scanning Google satellite imagery spotted a huge, ...
No-one on the anti-capitalist left in this country today puts forward a case that Labour is on the side of the working class. There are certainly people who call themselves ‘socialist’ who do, but they are essentially liberals with vested interests in Labourism – often for career reasons. Nevertheless, there ...
When National was in government and fucking over the poor for the benefit of the rich, foodbanks were a growth industry. And now Labour is in charge, nothing has changed: A huge demand for emergency food parcels means the Auckland City Mission is struggling to prepare for the impending arrival ...
Gayford, pictured here on The Project, before things got wildly out of control. A bold public relations move by the Government to encourage parents to vaccinate their children has gone horribly wrong. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern appeared on tonight’s episode of Three’s The Project, where the plan was for her ...
Mr. Whippy’s business model has driven it down a dark road of intimidation. Residents in major centres around the country are becoming disgruntled by the increasingly aggressive actions of purported ice cream company Mr. Whippy, who have taken to parking on people’s front lawns and doorsteps in a desperate attempt ...
Today the government released its Action Plan for Healthy Waterways, aimed at cleaning up our lakes and rivers. Its actually quite good. There will be protection for wetlands, better standards for swimming spots, a requirement for continuous improvement, and better standards for wastewater and stormwater. But most importantly, there's a ...
Today I appeared before the Environment Committee to give an oral submission on the Zero Carbon Bill. Over 1,500 people have asked to appear in person, so they've divided into subcommittees and are off touring the country, giving people a five minute slot each. The other submitters were a mixed ...
Anti-fluoride activists have some wealthy backers – they are erecting billboards misrepresenting the Canadian study on many New Zealand cities – and local authorities are ordering their removal because of their scaremongering. Many New Zealanders ...
So, those who “know best” have again done their worst. While constantly claiming to be the guardians of democracy and the constitution, and respecters of the 2016 referendum result, diehard Remainers (who have never brought themselves to believe that their advice could have been rejected) have striven might and main ...
Following publication of this article, the Ministry has requested it to be noted that this supplied image is not necessarily representative of what the final house will look like, and it “probably won’t be that nice.” As part of today’s long-anticipated reset of the Government’s flagship KiwiBuild policy, Housing Minister ...
Over the next week or two we will be running three synopses of parts of the opening chapter of John Smith’s Imperialism in the 21st Century (New York, Monthly Review Press, 2016). The synopsis and commentary below is written by Phil Duncan. Marx began Capital not with a sweeping historical ...
The State Services Commission and Ombudsman have released another batch of OIA statistics, covering the last six months. Request volumes are up, and the core public service is generally handling them within the legal timeframe, though this may be because they've learned to extend rather than just ignore things. And ...
In 1994, I was editing an ambitious street mag called Planet, from a fabled office at at 309 Karangahape Road. The thirteenth issue of the magazine was published in the winter of that year and its cover embodied a particularly ambitious goal: the end of cannabis prohibition.I wanted to do ...
KiwiBuild was one of the Ardern government's core policies. The government would end the housing crisis and make housing affordable again by building 100,000 new homes. Of course, it didn't work out like that: targets weren't met, the houses they did build were in the wrong place, and the whole ...
As the climate crisis escalates, it is now obvious that we need to radically decarbonise our economy. The good news is that its looking easy and profitable for the energy sector. Wind is already cheaper than fossil fuels, and now solar is too:The levellised cost of solar PV has fallen ...
A Crown Asset? For reasons relating to its own political convenience, the Crown pretends to believe that “No one owns the water.” To say otherwise would re-vivify the promises contained in the Treaty of Waitangi – most particularly those pertaining to the power of the chiefs and their proprietary rights ...
Most people would say, no doubt, that they have a pretty good idea of what money is. They live with the reality of money every day. It is what is needed to buy the necessities of life and to maintain a decent standard of living. You get money, they would ...
The article below was an opinion piece that appeared in the Spring 2019 issue of Te Awa (the NZ Green Party’s newsletter) and on the Greens website. In keeping with their policy of hostility to women defending women’s right to female-only spaces, Green bureaucrats have since removed the opinion piece. ...
Longer term readers may remember my complaining that, as a political scientist, it is burdensome to have non-political scientists wanting to engage me about politics. No layperson would think to approach an astrophysicist and lecture him/her on the finer details of quarks and black holes, but everybody with an opinion ...
Joining The Fight: Stevan Eldred-Grigg's argument for New Zealand staying out of the Second World War fails not only on the hard-headed grounds of preserving the country’s strategic and economic interests; and not just on the soft-hearted grounds of duty and loyalty to the nation that had given New Zealand ...
On September 27, School Strike 4 Climate will be striking for a future to pressure the government for meaningful climate action. This time, they've asked adults to join them. And now, Lincoln University and Victoria University of Wellington have signed on:Victoria University of Wellington has joined Lincoln University in endorsing ...
Another day, another constitutional outrage in the UK. This time, the government is saying that if parliament passes a law to stop Brexit before being prorogued, they may just ignore it:A senior cabinet minister has suggested Boris Johnson could defy legislation to prevent a no-deal Brexit if it is forced ...
Environment Canterbury has finally proposed nitrogen limits to stop dairy farmers from poisoning Christchurch's water supply. And naturally, farmers are whining about it:A proposed move by Environment Canterbury (ECan) to protect Christchurch's drinking water by setting tough – some would say, draconian – nitrate reductions in the decades ahead and ...
The Zero Carbon Bill is currently before select committee. While its targets are weak, its a generally sensible bill that promises to establish a long-term framework to guide emissions reductions. But National hasn't made up its mind on whether it will support it - and according to Andrea Vance in ...
Dum-de-doo. Children across New Zealand have known him for generations as the lovable giraffe who tells them to exercise, hydrate and not to shove lit cigarettes up their nostrils. But a world renowned giraffe expert says we shouldn’t be getting attached to Life Education’s Harold the Giraffe, as he is ...
By Mike Hosking. Yesterday morning, I waltzed into work, and as I walked past the drones aggressively typing out news on the computers I’ve repeatedly asked to be moved further away from, I caught a glimpse of the words “climate change”, and noticed that suspiciously they weren’t in condescending quotation ...
National's Deputy Leader Paula Bennett spent the week claiming a serious cover-up in the Prime Minister's office. She used parliamentary privilege to name three of the Prime Minister's closest advisors who, she says, knew about the sexual assault ...
Six months on from the worst terrorist attack in New Zealand history, Simon Shepherd asked Al Noor Mosque spokesperson Anthony Green how the Christchurch Muslim is community faring. ...
“The Game Animal Council is concerned that the Government’s second tranche of firearms legislation released today may contain unreasonable provisions that will unfairly impact hunters,” says Game Animal Council Chair Don Hammond. ...
Government policy work on the Carbon Zero bill highlights connections between climate change, carbon sequestration and agriculture. Water quality and allocation are also topical with the release of the Draft Policy Statement for Freshwater Management ...
DairyNZ Chief Executive Dr Tim Mackle is welcoming this afternoon’s announcement that consultation on Essential Freshwater has been extended by two weeks - but is calling on the Minister to go further. ...
DairyNZ chief executive Dr Tim Mackle is calling on the Government to move swiftly to extend the six-week timeframe of the Essential Freshwater consultation. ...
Immigration New Zealand could really benefit from an large investment of money, comments Ms June Ranson, chair of the New Zealand Association for Migration and Investment (NZAMI) , a leading voice in the immigration sector. “Instead of spending $25m ...
In recent times there has been no shortage of commentary regarding whistleblowers, with the proposed amendments to the Protected Disclosures Act 2000. These are aimed at strengthening the protection available to whistleblowers in New Zealand. That ...
Gun Control NZ strongly welcomes the comprehensive gun law reform bill and calls on all political parties to support it. Gun Control NZ encourages New Zealanders to let their MPs know they support this Bill, submit to the Select Committee, and ...
Federated Farmers agrees with most of the steps by government to protect people from illegal or irresponsible firearms use. But concerns about pest control and the effectiveness of a register remain. ...
Today at Parliament the NZ Drug Foundation released Taking control of cannabis: A model for responsible regulation, a new report that shows how we can take back control of cannabis from organised crime. ...
In the face of overwhelming public opinion that farmers need to clean up after themselves, Federated Farmers has mounted an offensive to try and stop some of its members having to do just that. ...
Responding to reports that Associate Health Minister Jenny Salesa plans to restrict flavoured e-cigarette liquid, New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union Executive Director Jordan Williams says: ...
Māori and non- Māori value different aspects of plantation forestry, which owners should bear in mind if they want to maximise their social licence to operate, a new study shows. ...
The Prime Minister’s Award in the first annual Spirit of Service Awards has been won by the Ministry of Health and five agencies who teamed up on the Healthy Homes Initiative. ...
Smoking kills 5,000 Kiwis each year, so any government policies to help reduce smoking are a good thing. However, the current approaches are not working nor will the proposed limit on flavoured e-liquid that Associate Minister Salesa announced on the news ...
A petition, that promises a significant and dramatic improvement for the New Zealand economy, was handed to Dr Deborah Russell, the MP for New Lynn today. The petition, signed by over 5,000 New Zealanders addresses our crippling level of debt as well ...
The New Zealand Medical Association welcomes the announcement of an Initial Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission. We look forward to working with the newly appointed Chair Hayden Wano and the Commission. “It is vital that the steps to mental health ...
For anyone who even randomly follows the news will know that Hong Kong has been embroiled in demonstrations for months. These sometimes bloody demonstrations initially started as a result of a proposed Extradition Bill whereby there would be special ...
The release yesterday of Port Otago’s financial result for 2019, outlining a 12% increase and profits, including the news that the Chief Executive had received a $100,000 pay increase taking his remuneration to between $610,000-620,000, is like ...
“ I continue to be amazed at the incompetence of this Government when it comes to suicide prevention and mental health. Not only is this Government about to appoint a regional coroner who has a history of under reporting suicides amongst children ...
An unannounced inspection at Tongariro Prison has found a safe and well-managed prison, with a clear sense of purpose and striving for continuous improvement. ...
The Auditor-General’s discussion paper Public accountability: A matter of trust and confidence was presented to the House of Representatives today. ...
Keep New Zealand Beautiful (KNZB) are proud to announce the winners of the Young Reporters for the Environment (YRE) – Litter Less 2019 competition. ...
The Far North District Council (FNDC) and the Whangarei District Council (WDC) have lodged a joint appeal against the Northland Regional Council’s (NRC) omission of precautionary rules in its plan. [1] ...
The Independent Police Conduct Authority has found that an officer was not justified in tasering a man for a second time during an arrest in Picton on 23 June 2018. ...
The Chairman of the Authority, Judge Colin Doherty, has agreed to assist the Hong Kong Independent Police Complaints Council (IPCC) as a member of an international panel to provide high level advice to the IPCC in relation to its proposed "Thematic ...
“Putting families into motels is a temporary fix for desperate situations, rather than a sustainable solution to problems of poverty and homelessness,” says Scott Figenshow, Chief Executive of Community Housing Aotearoa. He was commenting on media ...
The New Zealand Psychological Society (NZPsS) says the current partial strike by 600 psychologists working in district health boards is a sign that temporary fixes to ongoing workforce shortages in the profession are not working. ...
New Zealand’s contribution to military operations in Malaya and Malaysia from the late 1940s to the mid-1960s will be commemorated in a national service held at Pukeahu National War Memorial Park at 11.00am on Monday 16 September. ...
The Christchurch mosque attack might not have occurred had police had the resources to enforce firearms restrictions they control, according to the Council of Licenced Firearms Owners (COLFO). ...
The resignation of the President of the Labour Party over the sex pest allegations was inevitable. It was inevitable because of his appalling handling of the situation so far; and, because in situations like this where there has to be a “fall guy” ...
“It’s disappointing that Parliament failed to address the accountability issues in the End of LifeChoice Bill ,” says Renée Joubert, Executive Officer of Euthanasia-Free NZ . ...
Yesterday Hon Grant Robertson Minister of Finance issued a welcome ‘clear directive’ in the press to ensure every Government considers the wellbeing of New Zealanders when creating future budgets . ...
The Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa has written to Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters today urging that New Zealand condemn the Israeli Prime Minister’s planned annexation of vast tracts of the occupied West Bank of Palestine. ...
A groundbreaking tool launched today at The Spinoff will help voters across New Zealand see who’s running for local government election in their area and what they stand for. ...
Today Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga New Zealand’s Māori Centre of Research Excellence (NPM) releases its next Te Arotahi paper calling on government to pay even closer attention to the issues of whānau and whakapapa within the criminal justice system. ...
“Technology adoption supports higher productivity growth, higher income growth and increased resources to pay for the things New Zealanders’ value. But the main problem facing New Zealand today isn’t too much technology, it’s not enough,” ...
DairyNZ Biosecurity Manager, Dr. Liz Shackleton, will be appearing before Parliament’s Primary Production Select Committee today to submit on the National Animal Identification and Tracing Amendment Bill (No 2). ...
Federated Farmers is asking nicely - please can the Government immediately extend the timeframe of the Essential Freshwater consultation so we can find a pathway forward that provides for both the health of the water, the health of people and the health ...
Youthline applauds the Government’s commitment to boosting mental health and addiction programmes and its intention to establish a Suicide Prevention Office but we urge swifter action in relation to implementing the programmes announced in the last budget ...
An Auckland mayoral candidate has broken the internet* by announcing a plan for a monorail around the central city. Who is Craig Lord, and is he serious? Alex Braae spoke to him shortly after his campaign launch to find out.The Spinoff local election coverage is made possible thanks to The SpinoffMembers. ...
Antibiotics are becoming increasingly less effective, so what treatments can we use when the drugs stop working? With help from plant extracts, award-winning company HerbScience is set to breathe new life into how we treat bacterial infections.When Cynthia Hunefeld was just 10 years old, her father was hospitalised with a ...
For some, it symbolises the very backbone of New Zealand’s food culture. But can Kiwi onion dip survive after the factory that makes reduced cream is shut down?The Australian factory that makes Nestlé reduced cream, an integral ingredient in Kiwi onion dip, is shutting down, casting a shadow over the ...
Every year Matariki X brings Māori innovators and entrepreneurs together to share their experiences and inspire one another. Callaghan Innovation’s Vinnie Campbell says the Māori economy’s biggest strengths have nothing to do with money.This story was funded by The Spinoff Members. For more about becoming a member and supporting The ...
Today marks the start of Covering Climate Now. To launch the week, the New Zealand climate change minister, James Shaw, writes an open letter to participants in the School Strike 4 Climate ahead of their day of action later this month.The Spinoff’s participation in Covering Climate Now is thanks to ...
National’s new agriculture spokesperson finds himself in one of the party’s most important portfolios, at a time of dramatically increasing tensions in the sector. Will Todd Muller, a man regularly mentioned as a future leader contender, find common ground?Todd Muller’s obsession with politics began with an American encyclopaedia, which his ...
Although few would now deny that there are far-right extremists in NZ, questions remain around whether we have truly reckoned with the root causes of white supremacy. ...
To celebrate Te Wiki o te Reo Māori, cookbook authors, 2014 MasterChef-winning sisters and badass wāhine Māori Karena and Kasey Bird (Te Arawa, Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Manawa) have translated some of the delicious recipes from their second cookbook, Hungry, into te reo Māori for The Spinoff. Today, poached pears in chocolate.NGĀ PEA KŌHUA ...
Miss June’s Bad Luck Party was recorded literally between hospital shifts, and their summer schedule includes both festival dates and their frontwoman’s graduation from medical school. We sat down with the band to ask just how, exactly, they’ve survived so far.The first years of life for Tāmaki Makaurau pop-punk quartet ...
The following four short extracts are from A City Possessed: The Christchurch Child Crèche Case by Lynley Hood, which has just been reprinted by Otago University Press. The book was first published in 2001 and won the Montana Medal for Non-Fiction at the Montana New Zealand Book Awards. The controversial ...
Hamilton councillors have drawn headlines this year for being anti-science and insensitive to terror victims. At a mayoral debate on Wednesday, there were signs a campaign for change is gathering force.The Spinoff local election coverage is made possible thanks to The SpinoffMembers. For more about becoming a member and supporting The Spinoff’s journalism click ...
The Spinoff editor writes on the story that has engulfed NZ politics this week.One of the very few positive things to come out of a hideous week in New Zealand politics has been the sieving-out of the blinkered, partisan zealots. On one side, those who are ready to conjure up ...
In June 2018, Rawinia Higgins was appointed chairperson of Te Taura Whiri i te Reo Māori. She’s the first female and the first te reo Māori second-language speaker to hold the role, and during Te Wiki o te Reo Māori, she sat down with The Spinoff to talk about her ...
Compulsory New Zealand history in schools is an exciting opportunity but it’s crucial we’re critical of the stories we tell ourselves, writes Dr Aroha Harris. History is not simply an assemblage of facts and evidence. History is also the interrogation of those things.This may be unsettling news for some, including the ...
The government and the Drug Foundation say they are committed to keeping the public informed and keeping fear mongering to a minimum ahead of the cannabis referendum. ...
One of the people who first brought Labour's assault complaints scandal to light says the party has a long way to go before it's clear it has learnt from its mistakes. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hugh Breakey, Senior Research Fellow, Moral philosophy, Institute for Ethics, Governance & Law, Law Futures Centre, Griffith University Argument is everywhere. From the kitchen table to the boardroom to the highest echelons of power, we all use argument to persuade, investigate new ...
Climate change is not just an environmental threat but also a psychological crisis, especially as children increasingly shoulder the burden to act. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alastair Blanshard, Paul Eliadis Chair of Classics and Ancient History Deputy Head of School, The University of Queensland Comedy often succeeds where tragedy fails. Fangirls, the pop musical which premiered on Thursday night in Brisbane, is not the first drama to explore ...
On the 10th anniversary of the infamous “Imma let you finish” episode, Josie Adams reflects on what this moment revealed about both Taylor Swift and Kanye West.Cast your mind back a decade: 2009 DJ Earworm was still good, Barack Obama was sworn in as president of the US, Israeli ground ...
Analysis - An astounding week in politics has left Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern carrying responsibility for sorting out the mess the Labour Party is in over the sexual assault allegation, writes Peter Wilson. ...
Newsroom joins 250 media organisations internationally who are highlighting global climate change in the week leading to a critical United Nations summit. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Karen Dwyer, Deputy Head, School of Medicine, Deakin University Autosomal-dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD) is the most common genetic kidney disorder, and the fourth most common cause of kidney failure in Australian adults. It affects about one in 1,000 Australians. In people ...
Police Minister Stuart Nash has confirmed details of a new bill that will create a registry of guns, and new offences and penalties for illegal manufacture, trafficking or changing markings of firearms. ...
To celebrate Te Wiki o te Reo Māori, cookbook authors, 2014 MasterChef-winning sisters and badass wāhine Māori Karena and Kasey Bird (Te Arawa, Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Manawa) have translated some of the delicious recipes from their second cookbook, Hungry, into te reo Māori for The Spinoff. Today, a tino reka salmon salad.NGĀ MOMO ...
James Elliott suggests it might be time for Simon Bridges to turn to AI for answers and for the Prime Minister to move her meetings to the Koru Lounge. ...
Charli XCX has just released her latest album, Charli. The futuristic musician is always looking ahead, and so are her fans. We’ve paired each star sign with their perfect Charli XCX song.Charli XCX burst onto the scene in 2012, when she co-wrote and performed electro-pop headbanger ‘I Love It’ with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Benedict Sheehy, Associate professor, University of Canberra British health-care conglomerate Bupa runs more nursing homes in Australia than anyone else. We now know its record in meeting basic standards of care is also worse than any other provider. This is more than ...
Fable is best remembered for the disastrous, over-the-top promises made by its designer Peter Molyneux. But maybe, Adam Goodall argues, we’re remembering it all wrong.“There is something I have to say. And I have to say it because I love making games.” So opens an October 2004 post on the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hugh Breakey, Senior Research Fellow, Moral philosophy, Institute for Ethics, Governance & Law, Law Futures Centre, Griffith University Argument is everywhere. From the kitchen table to the boardroom to the highest echelons of power, we all use argument to persuade, investigate new ...
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 Native Son: The Writer’s Memoir by Witi Ihimaera (Penguin Random House, $40)Stand by for a review from ...
The liquidator of Stanley Group says the construction company is facing a $13.5 million deficit and it appears it has not held on to some retentions. ...
Tara Ward delved into Māori TV’s impressive OnDemand catalogue and found some of the best TV taonga for your viewing pleasure. From lifestyle shows to documentaries, from current affairs to reality TV, Māori TV has an abundance of quality telly that celebrates and acknowledges the people, places and cultures of ...
A new poem by London-based poet Morgan Bach.Turning, hurtlingI march diligently to sunshine in the parkeverything bathed and turning golden.A woman breathes fire by the folly framing herlike a personal door to hell. Conkers are pitched from high boughsto break and give up fruit, a spire emergent from the baring ...
Simon Day learns about the history and power of Chinese five-spice. Both the origins of Chinese five-spice and the flavour itself are a little mysterious. My internet investigations revealed the powder’s name could be in reference to the use of five spices (although this often grows to six or seven), or ...
Revelations around alleged sexual assault by a Labour staffer and the party inquiry into his behaviour have dominated the week. Alex Casey and Mihi Forbes join Gone By Lunchtime to survey the damage.Alex Casey, author of the Spinoff feature published on Monday, “A Labour volunteer alleged a violent sexual assault ...
In the fourth episode of Actually Interesting, The Spinoff’s monthly podcast exploring the effect AI has on our lives, Russell Brown speaks to Ana Arriola, general manager and partner at Microsoft AI and Research, about ethics and transparency in tech.Subscribe to Actually Interesting via iTunes or listen on the player below.To download this ...
Editor’s Note: Here below is a list of the main issues currently under discussion in New Zealand and links to media coverage.New Zealand Parliament Buildings, Wellington, New Zealand.Today’s content by Dr Bryce Edwards.Labour Party sexual assault allegations Andrea Vance (Stuff): How to make the Labour abuse scandal ...
Toi Kai Rākau Iti, who is running in the Eastern Bay of Plenty Kohi Māori constituency, encounters an unlikely channel of youth engagement.In te ao Māori you’re always looking for tohu, or symbols. They guide you through uncertain territory and help you make sense of the world. The arrival of ...
A member of the Labour Party's youth wing says the party's handling of sexual assault allegations has left him heartbroken and doubting his commitment to the party. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tomer Ventura, Senior Lecturer, School of Science and Engineering, University of the Sunshine Coast The creation of all-male or all-female groups of animals, known as monosex populations, has become a potentially useful approach in aquaculture and livestock rearing. Researchers and those in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Holmes, Director, Climate Change Communication Research Hub, Monash University Predictably, both major political parties are resisting calls this week for a parliamentary conscience vote to declare a climate emergency in Australia. The resistance is unsurprising because both the Coalition and Labor ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Elizabeth Shi, Lecturer, Graduate School of Business and Law, RMIT University If the Religious Discrimination Bill passes into law, women may find it harder to get an abortion. That’s because health practitioners with an objection to performing the procedure on religious grounds ...
Open mike 11/03/2015 
Open mike is your post.
by Rafael D. Quiles (gender-critical gay man from Puerto Rico) The writing on the wall is right in people’s faces and people just don’t see it or don’t want to. What could actually possess a heterosexual male to want to feminize himself and claim that he is a lesbian? Because ...7 hours ago
From the Wall Street Journal:Inside a room of the ornately decorated Hotel du Palais during last month’s Group of Seven summit in Biarritz, France, President Trump awaited a meeting with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi. Mr. Trump looked over a gathering of American and Egyptian officials and called out in ...14 hours ago
The Brexit issue has certainly brought with it a series of apparently difficult constitutional issues, many of them concerning the respective roles of the executive and parliament. Most of them arise because of the unwillingness of MPs, despite their professions to the contrary, to be bound by a constitutional rarity ...2 days ago
. . This blogpost is different to my usual format of reporting on issues… Since July 1011, I have blogged on a variety of political issues; near always political and/or environmental; mostly highly critical of the previous National Government. Other issues included Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands and repression of ...2 days ago
Those close to the Police Minister believe the initiative may be the result of Nash “seeing a great deal” on AliExpress. In a move that comes seemingly out of nowhere, Police Minister Stuart Nash announced this afternoon that he expects all frontline staff to don bearskin hats, famously worn by ...2 days ago
The government has released its Arms Legislation Bill, containing the second tranche of changes to gun laws following the March 15 massacre. And it all looks quite sensible: a national gun register, higher penalties for illegal possession and dealing, tighter restrictions on arms dealers and shooting clubs, and a shorter ...2 days ago
Moving And Shaking: There was a time when people spoke matter-of-factly about the “labour movement” – a political phenomenon understood to embrace much more than the Labour Party. Included within the term’s definition was the whole trade union movement – many of whose members looked upon the Labour Party as ...3 days ago
by Philip Ferguson Much of the left, even people who formally identify as marxists, have collapsed politically in the face of postmodern gender theory of the sort pioneered by American philosopher Judith Butler. For Butler even biological sex is socially constructed. “If the immutable character of sex is contested, perhaps ...3 days ago
By Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern I am every bit as angry as you are. I am every bit as disappointed as you must be. The people with power, oversight and the ability to do something about these processes within the Labour Party should be ashamed. Whoever those people are, I ...3 days ago
Two-Faced? Labour insiders' commitment to the neoliberal status quo puts them at odds with their party’s membership; its trade union affiliates; and a majority of Labour voters, but this only serves to strengthen the perception they have of themselves as a special elite. Among the lesser breeds, they’ll talk up a ...4 days ago
By Simon Bridges. The following is a press release from the office of Simon Bridges, leader of The National Party. Key ora, New Zealand. Happy Maori Language Week. Look, I’m writing to you today because I want to clear something up. There’s been a lot of kerfuffle around some things ...4 days ago
Dr. Christopher Labos and Jonathan Jarry discuss the recent Canadian fluoride/IQ research. They provide an expert analysis of the paper and its problems. Click on image to go to podcast. The critical debate about the recent ... 4 days ago
An ambitious plan to fly to Los Angeles petered out into a brief sight-seeing trip and a desire to return home and get some sleep before work tomorrow. Air New Zealand has confirmed a flight to Los Angeles last night was turned back about a quarter of the way into ...5 days ago
There appears to be consensus – by omission – that the concept of indigenous futures should be accepted at face value. So I scavenged the internet to see if I could locate an academic descriptor or a framework around how we think about it as a concept, and whether it ...5 days ago
Here’s another novelty chocolate to shove in your gob, New Zealand Cadbury could be seeking to make itself great again with a rumoured new release: Pineapple Trumps, a spin on its classic chocolate-encased pineapple treat and do-it-yourself tooth remover. The global confectionery manufacturer and bumbling “before” character in an infomercial, ...5 days ago
During my time in the Pentagon I had the privilege of sitting down with military leaders and defence and security officials from a variety of Latin American nations. Sometimes I was present as a subordinate assistant to a senior US defence department official, sometimes as part of a delegation that ...5 days ago
Kia ora, Aotearoa. It’s that magical time of year. Te Wiki o te Reo Māori. In English, the week that frightens talk radio. As you probably know by now, all your favourite media outlets are participating, some more successfully than others. Stuff has changed its name to Puna for the ...5 days ago
Lost In Political Space: The most important takeaway from this latest Labour sexual assault scandal, which (if I may paraphrase Nixon’s White House counsel’s, John Dean’s, infamous description of Watergate) is “growing like a cancer” on the premiership, is the Labour Party organisation’s extraordinary professional paralysis in the face of ...6 days ago
Hi there, just call me Tim.We face tough problems, and I’d like to help, because there are solutions.An Auckand District Health Board member has nominated me for as a candidate for the ADHB, because her MS-related pain and fatigue is reduced with hemp products from Rotorua. Nothing else helped her. If I ...7 days ago
Bewhiskered Cassandra? Professor Hugh White’s chilling suggestion, advanced to select collections of academic, military and diplomatic Kiwi experts over the course of the past week, is that the assumptions upon which Australia and New Zealand have built their foreign affairs and defence policies for practically their entire histories – are ...7 days ago
Air New Zealand couldn’t believe its luck that this seemingly ideal piece of real estate had so far gone entirely unnoticed. Air New Zealand’s search for a site to build a second Auckland Airport may have made a breakthrough this afternoon, after employees scanning Google satellite imagery spotted a huge, ...1 week ago
Gayford, pictured here on The Project, before things got wildly out of control. A bold public relations move by the Government to encourage parents to vaccinate their children has gone horribly wrong. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern appeared on tonight’s episode of Three’s The Project, where the plan was for her ...1 week ago
Mr. Whippy’s business model has driven it down a dark road of intimidation. Residents in major centres around the country are becoming disgruntled by the increasingly aggressive actions of purported ice cream company Mr. Whippy, who have taken to parking on people’s front lawns and doorsteps in a desperate attempt ...1 week ago
Anti-fluoride activists have some wealthy backers – they are erecting billboards misrepresenting the Canadian study on many New Zealand cities – and local authorities are ordering their removal because of their scaremongering. Many New Zealanders ... 1 week ago
Following publication of this article, the Ministry has requested it to be noted that this supplied image is not necessarily representative of what the final house will look like, and it “probably won’t be that nice.” As part of today’s long-anticipated reset of the Government’s flagship KiwiBuild policy, Housing Minister ...2 weeks ago
A Crown Asset? For reasons relating to its own political convenience, the Crown pretends to believe that “No one owns the water.” To say otherwise would re-vivify the promises contained in the Treaty of Waitangi – most particularly those pertaining to the power of the chiefs and their proprietary rights ...2 weeks ago
Joining The Fight: Stevan Eldred-Grigg's argument for New Zealand staying out of the Second World War fails not only on the hard-headed grounds of preserving the country’s strategic and economic interests; and not just on the soft-hearted grounds of duty and loyalty to the nation that had given New Zealand ...2 weeks ago
Dum-de-doo. Children across New Zealand have known him for generations as the lovable giraffe who tells them to exercise, hydrate and not to shove lit cigarettes up their nostrils. But a world renowned giraffe expert says we shouldn’t be getting attached to Life Education’s Harold the Giraffe, as he is ...2 weeks ago
Image credit: 22 BLOGGERS WITH ADVICE FOR RESEARCHERS AND EVALUATORS, ILLUSTRATED I notice a few regulars no longer allow public access to the site counters. This may happen accidentally when the blog format is altered. If your ... 2 weeks ago
By Mike Hosking. Yesterday morning, I waltzed into work, and as I walked past the drones aggressively typing out news on the computers I’ve repeatedly asked to be moved further away from, I caught a glimpse of the words “climate change”, and noticed that suspiciously they weren’t in condescending quotation ...2 weeks ago
National's Deputy Leader Paula Bennett spent the week claiming a serious cover-up in the Prime Minister's office. She used parliamentary privilege to name three of the Prime Minister's closest advisors who, she says, knew about the sexual assault ...2 days ago
An Auckland mayoral candidate has broken the internet* by announcing a plan for a monorail around the central city. Who is Craig Lord, and is he serious? Alex Braae spoke to him shortly after his campaign launch to find out.The Spinoff local election coverage is made possible thanks to The Spinoff Members. ...13 hours ago
Antibiotics are becoming increasingly less effective, so what treatments can we use when the drugs stop working? With help from plant extracts, award-winning company HerbScience is set to breathe new life into how we treat bacterial infections.When Cynthia Hunefeld was just 10 years old, her father was hospitalised with a ...19 hours ago
In the wake of the Christchurch terror attack, there are signs of healing, support and, of course, ongoing struggle. ...21 hours ago
For some, it symbolises the very backbone of New Zealand’s food culture. But can Kiwi onion dip survive after the factory that makes reduced cream is shut down?The Australian factory that makes Nestlé reduced cream, an integral ingredient in Kiwi onion dip, is shutting down, casting a shadow over the ...22 hours ago
Every year Matariki X brings Māori innovators and entrepreneurs together to share their experiences and inspire one another. Callaghan Innovation’s Vinnie Campbell says the Māori economy’s biggest strengths have nothing to do with money.This story was funded by The Spinoff Members. For more about becoming a member and supporting The ...22 hours ago
Today marks the start of Covering Climate Now. To launch the week, the New Zealand climate change minister, James Shaw, writes an open letter to participants in the School Strike 4 Climate ahead of their day of action later this month.The Spinoff’s participation in Covering Climate Now is thanks to ...22 hours ago
National’s new agriculture spokesperson finds himself in one of the party’s most important portfolios, at a time of dramatically increasing tensions in the sector. Will Todd Muller, a man regularly mentioned as a future leader contender, find common ground?Todd Muller’s obsession with politics began with an American encyclopaedia, which his ...22 hours ago
While some despair about the fate of our planet, climate scientist James Renwick says it is never too late to take action. ...1 day ago
Although few would now deny that there are far-right extremists in NZ, questions remain around whether we have truly reckoned with the root causes of white supremacy. ...1 day ago
Hamilton councillors have drawn headlines this year for being anti-science and insensitive to terror victims. At a mayoral debate on Wednesday, there were signs a campaign for change is gathering force.The Spinoff local election coverage is made possible thanks to The Spinoff Members. For more about becoming a member and supporting The Spinoff’s journalism click ...2 days ago
In June 2018, Rawinia Higgins was appointed chairperson of Te Taura Whiri i te Reo Māori. She’s the first female and the first te reo Māori second-language speaker to hold the role, and during Te Wiki o te Reo Māori, she sat down with The Spinoff to talk about her ...2 days ago
The government and the Drug Foundation say they are committed to keeping the public informed and keeping fear mongering to a minimum ahead of the cannabis referendum. ...2 days ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hugh Breakey, Senior Research Fellow, Moral philosophy, Institute for Ethics, Governance & Law, Law Futures Centre, Griffith University Argument is everywhere. From the kitchen table to the boardroom to the highest echelons of power, we all use argument to persuade, investigate new ...2 days ago
Climate change is not just an environmental threat but also a psychological crisis, especially as children increasingly shoulder the burden to act. ...2 days ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alastair Blanshard, Paul Eliadis Chair of Classics and Ancient History Deputy Head of School, The University of Queensland Comedy often succeeds where tragedy fails. Fangirls, the pop musical which premiered on Thursday night in Brisbane, is not the first drama to explore ...2 days ago
Newsroom joins 250 media organisations internationally who are highlighting global climate change in the week leading to a critical United Nations summit. ...2 days ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Karen Dwyer, Deputy Head, School of Medicine, Deakin University Autosomal-dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD) is the most common genetic kidney disorder, and the fourth most common cause of kidney failure in Australian adults. It affects about one in 1,000 Australians. In people ...2 days ago
Of the 11,500 girls and boys taking part in the AIMS Games, Hayley Cornwall is the officially the busiest of them all. ...3 days ago
James Elliott suggests it might be time for Simon Bridges to turn to AI for answers and for the Prime Minister to move her meetings to the Koru Lounge. ...3 days ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Benedict Sheehy, Associate professor, University of Canberra British health-care conglomerate Bupa runs more nursing homes in Australia than anyone else. We now know its record in meeting basic standards of care is also worse than any other provider. This is more than ...3 days ago
Fable is best remembered for the disastrous, over-the-top promises made by its designer Peter Molyneux. But maybe, Adam Goodall argues, we’re remembering it all wrong.“There is something I have to say. And I have to say it because I love making games.” So opens an October 2004 post on the ...3 days ago
The liquidator of Stanley Group says the construction company is facing a $13.5 million deficit and it appears it has not held on to some retentions. ...3 days ago
Tara Ward delved into Māori TV’s impressive OnDemand catalogue and found some of the best TV taonga for your viewing pleasure. From lifestyle shows to documentaries, from current affairs to reality TV, Māori TV has an abundance of quality telly that celebrates and acknowledges the people, places and cultures of ...3 days ago
The number of houses sold around the country has fallen to its lowest level in seven months. ...3 days ago
Simon Day learns about the history and power of Chinese five-spice. Both the origins of Chinese five-spice and the flavour itself are a little mysterious. My internet investigations revealed the powder’s name could be in reference to the use of five spices (although this often grows to six or seven), or ...3 days ago
In the fourth episode of Actually Interesting, The Spinoff’s monthly podcast exploring the effect AI has on our lives, Russell Brown speaks to Ana Arriola, general manager and partner at Microsoft AI and Research, about ethics and transparency in tech.Subscribe to Actually Interesting via iTunes or listen on the player below. To download this ...3 days ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Holmes, Director, Climate Change Communication Research Hub, Monash University Predictably, both major political parties are resisting calls this week for a parliamentary conscience vote to declare a climate emergency in Australia. The resistance is unsurprising because both the Coalition and Labor ...3 days ago
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Quiggin, Professor, School of Economics, The University of Queensland Looking at the state of policy on energy and climate change in Australia, it’s tempting to give in to despair. At the national level, following the abandonment of the National Energy Guarantee ...3 days ago
Convenient for John Key that this was knocked off the top of the news.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11415172
I do wonder what China thinks of us acting as the US’s puppet in the Pacific.
An independent foreign policy?
Gone by lunchtime.
‘A typical example of GCSB operations is spying on Vietnamese diplomatic communications. Vietnam has friendly relations with New Zealand and is a growing trading partner. It poses no security or terrorist threat to New Zealand, the traditional explanation for the GCSB given to the public, but it is still on the GCSB spying list. The only conceivable explanation for New Zealand spying on Vietnam is as part of broader NSA-driven strategy.’
Ashamed what our government is doing to our reputation as a decent fair country.
Not in my name, John Key.
here’s the thing Paul. Wayne Mapp, Tim Groser and others say the people of NZ cannot read the TPP before it is signed to preserve the confidentiality of negotiations. BUT, here is the flaw, we are finding out that at least the USA (and probably everyone in 5 eyes) is spying like fuck on each other. There is NO SECRET to be preserved for purposes of negotiation. After so many years of negotiating the USA will be well aware through its spying of exactly what its partners are saying about the TPP and their bottom lines… To think otherwise is a joke.
Indeed. We already know that the USA, with the help of their FVEY partner Canada, spied on their “friends” and “allies” at the G8 and G20 summits. This is more of the same, and the assumption that the authorities are frequently and directly lying to us about their activities, intentions and plans can I feel at this point, be taken for granted.
Once the parties have negotiated a deal, does it not get tabled and debated in Parliament BEFORE it is signed by the Givernment ? Is that not the time for rational debate about what is in the agreement ?
No.
The public has every right to give the negotiators a steer, just like any other affected stakeholder.
Love how you trust these bureaucrats to do the right thing: your opinions are all over the place 😆
Love how you dont trust these bureaucrats !
I dont particluarly trust this lot either, but the negotiators have been accessible and relatively open when asked questions. I expect them to do their job, put up teh best deal they can get AND, then leave it to elected officilas and the PUBLIC to debatye and sign-off – unlike faceless Akl City bureacrats who cant follow the RMA process correctly.
Don’t whine to me when Rodney Hide’s faith-based incompetence comes back to bite you. No room for elected officials in your right wing trainwreck.
The Cabinet decides what to negotiate, instructs the officials, signs the treaty and ratifies the TPPA, not the Parliament.
From Professor Jane Kelsey:
“One more time, Prime Minister, read the Cabinet Manual: Parliament does not get to ratify the TPPA!
‘How many times do the Prime Minister and other members of the government have to be hauled up for misrepresenting the role of Parliament in making treaties, especially the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement’, asked Professor Jane Kelsey from the University of Auckland.
On NewstalkZB this morning John Key claimed, yet again, that ‘In the end, this thing has to go through our Parliament has to be ratified by our Parliament and has to bear scrutiny and I believe is in the best interests of New Zealand.’
‘The Prime Minister is either woefully ignorant of the fundamental process of treaty making, as set out in the Cabinet Manual, or he is wilfully misrepresenting the process to the New Zealand public’, Kelsey said.
‘Parliament’s role in treaty making is largely symbolic. It has no power to decide whether or not the TPPA should be signed or ratified and no ability to change its terms TPPA or require it to be renegotiated.’
‘The select committee process is a farcical exercise because its members know they cannot change the treaty.’
‘At most, Parliament could refuse to pass legislation that is required to bring a particular law into compliance with the TPPA. But the government will have plenty of non-legislative ways to achieve compliance,’ according to Kelsey.
“‘Until the government makes Parliament responsible for overseeing, signing and then ratifying treaties, they should be honest with the New Zealand public: the Executive, in other words the Cabinet, decides what to negotiate, instructs the officials, signs the treaty and ratifies it’, Kelsey said.”
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1403/S00429/one-more-time-pm-parliament-does-not-get-to-ratify-tppa.htm
You need to educate yourself. Once it is signed it is a done deal. I can’t believe anyone purporting to offer an opinion on that aspect doesn’t know that…
In Breaking News Stats NZ release GDP growth which shows that Northland has grown by 7.7%, Auckland 5.4%, Wellington 4.4%, Canterbury 10.6%……..Southland 11%.
Bit of a fly in the oinment for Winston First in Northland…oh hang on, since when will facts actually get in his way of a good story. I can only imagine his two press releases ready for the this release – if Northland was 3%, then all fire and brimstone against the Govt (who he would do a deal with over labour in a heartbeat), OR< " there are lies, dam lies and statistics".
Kiaora Old Mickey
Bit of a fly in the oinment for Winston First in Northland…oh hang on, since when will facts actually get in his way of a good story.
Old fellow, you need to change your prescription glasses. They’re obscuring the facts with statistics. When you do get clearance to drive North visit places other than Russell and Paihia.
The Russian bloke building his billionaire’s bach could easily have skewed Northland’s growth statistics by that amount. And I counter your 7% growth with a perfect 10 in the deprivation index.
Growth is uneven throughout Northland, and those eating barren dirt will vote Winston.
Can you post the latest poverty statistics while you are researching, for Northland? Also unemployment against rest of country, health and criminal representation? Thanks in advance
Will Do, sure they will be released just like the Stats NZ release. Only poverty stat to hand is that while Parliamnet is sitting, all school kids in Northalnd (or maybe just 90% accoridng to Material Turei) are starving, yet during Parliamentary recess and school holidays, all kids seem ok and well fed.
They probably have a range of diversions ready to go at the drop of a dead cat whenever an issue is damaging the brand key.
With MSM on side, a top drawer chock full of DP material, the whale and farrar blog on tap, the usual helpers in big business/rural and no end of favours owed by the sellout of sovereignty, laws and assets the choice of which diversion would be the toughest decision.
When did the government first know of this threat?
Was it really only yesterday?
No they were aware of the threat 3 months ago. They intended to release the information next week but decided that yesterday would be better /sarcasm for no expedient political purpose at all /end sarcasm.
No reporter that I heard asked the following question of Fonterra:
Have you ever received any kind of threats to your product/customers before?
If no. cool.
If yes, how many and what made you think they didnt need to be taken seriously enough to go public…
I would be surprised if some companies don’t get threats from time to time by nutters. I assume the PM is threatened all the time and only on occassions that suit (like justifying his large group of golf caddies) he tells us people threaten his life.
Alternatively, you could of course accept the perfectly reasonable explanation Key has given.
The story had leaked to the press and TV1 and Fairfax (I think they were the two I heard him mention on Morning Report) had started to ask questions on the subject.
Or you could do a Winston and claim that it all a conspiracy to take the spotlight of him.
Whom do we know has an office with a track record of leaking information to media?
Take your time. It is a bit of a D’oh question, given that an entire book was published about it last year, but you might not be keeping up…
Why won’t you just take Key’s word for it McFlock?
WHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHY
It’s not me, it’s reality’s well-known liberal bias…
Yes Tracey, I agree. Of course they are playing politics with babies lives. Key, the cops, the Federated Farmers, MAF, MPI, they are all in in it together. It’s a conspiracy.
Why do you think that a secret which had been kept by many for months suddenly got leaked yesterday?
Who do you think leaked it to the press Amanda?
Tracey … John Key leaked it. It’s obvious. He doesn’t care about babies, he would leverage the fear of babies lives for political gain. That’s just the type of guy he his. He’s an evil despicable man. That he would jeopardise our international trade and trivialise babies lives in the name of political point scoring proves it. And all those people at MAF, MPI, the cops, and Fed farmers, hard to believe that all those people at high levels of these organisations got in behind Key, just to protect his political interests, but yes, they did, of course they did, all of them. Shame on them all.
That explains the difference between the Police statements and those of the lovely shiny Prime Minister 😆
One Anonymous Bloke .. yip, our shiny lovely PM turns out to be a reckless nut job, putting our number 1 industry at stake, and using the leverage of babies lives to do it. Gosh, who would have thought….
No, Amanda, please think more clearly: the official story is that the Police were going to go public next week and their public statement ‘we want to establish a dialogue’ directly contradicts Big-John’s fantasy epic. The one with the terrorists.
Amanda
Why not just answer the question? You clearly don’t think the PM did, fair enough. Who do you think leaked it ahead of the planned announcement next week and why?
1. Whoever sent the letters is playing with peoples’ lives. Chiefly their own, because I’d like to strangle them. No, not really.
2. The release of the information has been stage managed, and I am interested by the disparity between what the Police are saying – “criminal blackmail” – and what other parties with conflicting interests have been saying.
3. Sabin!
4. We spy on China. We steal their mail. Yay!
[redacted]
6. Nothing to see here.
WHO leaked it alwyn… and why a week before the official announcement when so many people had kept it secret for over 3 months (according to Fed Farmers today).
How on earth should I know, Tracey?
The statement was made that 1000 people already knew. If that is the case I am amazed it stayed quiet for so long.
As you probably have heard telling one person a secret means it isn’t a secret anymore.
Lets blame it on the person making the threat shall we? He/She/It, whatever, possibly has the main interest in getting it made public, wouldn’t you say?
To repeat. I don’t know but I am amazed it took so long to get out.
I agree – with this many in the loop and a testing regime that involved creating a brand new test, it’s surprising it didn’t come out sooner.
Thing is the timing could always appear suspicious, because this Government is always embroiled in some sort of dodging dealing or debacle.
If there’s one thing these boys value it’s money, and I think they would have been preferred this to stay quiet to avoid the market fallout.
but this was our biggest industry. Leaking this information could irrepairedly hurt it yet Key has ordered no inquiry into who leaked it?
If 1000 people knew, then they know those 1000 people. Pretty quick investigation you’d think.
By the time this leak was made Ergo, the Government and agencies and industry already knew an announcement was to be made next week, so they already had their strategy for dealing with any fallout.
Weird – investigating 1000 people would be quick?
That’s just silly. Information gets out, randomly, it takes just one conversation with someone who has an interest in getting it to the public domain.
With some obvious exceptions science types who would be involved in testing often aren’t overly interested in politics, which might be why it took this long.
if they know 1000 people know, they must know who they are. otherwise they don’t know 1000 people know.
Tracey, sorry, I don’t think your last comment makes a lot of sense.
How would investigating – not merely identifying – 1000 people be quick?
cos whether it would be “pretty quick” is the nub of the issue, right?
my point was never about speed, which I assume you know, but the duplicity of no Investigation being demanded by the PM of this leak which threatened our largest export industry. But you keep focusing on “pretty quick” non investigation of the leak.
Apparently they have already identified the people who knew, so that part of the investigation is already completed before the investigation even begins. Ergo, it would be “pretty quick” compared to an investigation that hasn’t yet identified who had the information to leak.
the point is alwyn it DID stay quiet that long… and fell just a week short of the recently confirmed public announcement.
But don’t be so precious, I was responding to your comment
“you could of course accept the perfectly reasonable explanation Key has given.
The story had leaked to the press and TV1 and Fairfax (I think they were the two I heard him mention on Morning Report) had started to ask questions on the subject”…
Did I miss Key demanding the police immediately begin investigating the leak which could have harmed our largest industry? That would be perfectly reasonable and in line with his actions over other leaks and tea cup trangressions? You know, with our entire dairy industry at stake.
I think he took the entirely realistic view that with so many people involved it would be completely impossible to track it down.
Somebody who officially knew could probably cause the leak without even realising it. Suppose a scientist analysing the milk powder simply said to his/her partner, also a scientist, when asked what he/she had been up to at work. “I was trying to work out how to measure accurately the concentration of very diluted 1080 in milk powder. It is amazingly hard”. Their daughter hears and at school the next day talks to a friend. Friend asks parents, one being a reporter “what is 1080”.
Bang, the story is out. Now how are you going to track that down?
nb. All conversations are imaginary. I am not going to answer questions as to why I think it is hard to do or listen to people telling me I don’t know what I am talking about when I say that. I have made it up
November when letter received by Fonterra, they contacted Police and MPI.
Over the last two days media have asked for comment from MPI and John Key about the treat. Rumours circulating over the last 2 weeks, see NZX on dairy stock trends.
The Police will have contacted the govt immediately. Economic damage, no surprises, etc.
And they’re saying criminal blackmail, while the hopelessly shiny Prime Minister says Labour did it too, or whatever a mouthpiece says.
It is a diversion and nothing more.
There is no threat. There never was a threat.
Its John Key bullshit
I read a column by one Jamie Gray, business reporter, in the mobile version of the Herald this morning (can’t find it on the main page, didn’t try to hard). In it, he said that dairy futures had dropped by 15 % in the few days before this announcement. Fonterra couldn’t explain the drop with it’s own actions, so “deducted” that someone must have heard of this 3 months old threat.
Now I can think of other reasons as to why dairy futures would drop. Unsustainable practices (“a form of eco-terrorism”) , a decision to sell yet more milk as the cheapest bulk product possible, or even a desire to dump on someone whose government spies on all and sundry.
A diversion it is indeed, and an opportunity to blame those environmentalists for corporate stuff-ups. Watch dairy prices drop at the next auction, and the blame directed there rather than where it belongs. Again.
Maybe China is annoyed we are spying on them
So Key reveals the poison story the day before NZ’s spying on China is revealed in the news.
Dodgy.
Do you think it might have just been some folk who think next week’s dairy auction is going to be even worse than expected and lightened their portfolios accordingly ?
Mr Little gave a very good explanation on tv3 of the difference between the Epsom deal the nats do and what’s happening in northland with labour/nzf.
He pointed out that the nats could win Epsom any time were as Labour haven’t held northland for 70 years.
Stop that!
Stop what?
pointing out obvious differences to though that swear they are identical situations…
man this “can’t win, won’t win, never won” bullshit is really ripping my undies – personally I can’t see the ‘middle’ liking that too much – it goes against the prevailing narrative of our age and society. And whether true or not (beyond the point) is not what people want to hear – doesn’t inspire confidence imo.
Would you have been ok if the GP stand someone in Te Tai Tokerau next election and by doing so keep Mana out of parliament despite the fact that the GP can’t win the seat?
why can’t they win the seat?
Not enough GP voters, plus the split vote issue.
Okay
If the GP put up a candidate to try and get party and electorate votes then whatever they get is good. I would imagine that with limited resources and energy any Party has to make decisions on where those resources and energy go. Could the GP win the vote – yes. For example the environment and associated issues – mining, exploitation plus poverty, inequality and so on are all big, important issues up north as elsewhere. If the macro environment changed – say the arctic stopped freezing or a drought lasted much much longer then the GP could be seen as a Party to give votes to. And it doesn’t have to big a massive big issue that ‘tips’ peoples perceptions over any ‘local’ issue could do it. The GP could win up north. And if they did and that kept Mana out, well that is the way it is.
The same applies to labour and the ‘can’t win’ bullshit – there are multiple tipping points that could change everything in an instant IF the eyes are open for the opportunities. If the eyes aren’t open it doesn’t matter what happens you’ll never see it. This isn’t magic wishing or believing it makes it so – it is practical reality, it is the way it works imo.
The other part is perceptions. We can’t win, we can’t win – oh we want to be government won’t work imo.
It’s most likely true that the GP still has to make decisions about budget and standing in the electorates. They like standing candidates because it increases the list vote. But there is no big enough environmental crisis to get more votes (well actually there is, but it’s not getting the votes), so in reality, it’s not possible for the GP to win the TTT seat next election. Standing there would give them more list votes, but I suspect that even those wanting to vote GP would vote GP on the list and someone else on the electorate vote.
If the GP did stand someone and it meant that Mana didn’t get the seat and that meant that NACT got a 4th term, that for me is far far more important than me getting personal satisfaction from my personal vote.
For me, having a left wing govt IS where my values lie. I am a pragmatic voter, but I don’t know what I would do in the Northland situation given that I think Peters is a loose unit as far as the left is concerned.
” it’s not possible for the GP to win the TTT seat next election.”
not true
No one has any idea of how their vote will affect or influence things when parties coalesce to form government – all we have is our integrity regarding our personal beliefs and our personal vote.
Your dilemna in northland is the same one many people have with labour, and the Greens and probably Mana for some too.
I honestly can’t see the problem here. There is the possibility of a positive vote and the possibility of a negative vote. In the case of Northland, a supporter of Labour could vote positively – for Labour. Or they could vote against the Nats.
I believe it’s been said, but getting the longer term message out is valuable even if the seat is unlikely to be won. So any party could/should do that and voters can decide whether to cast a positive vote or a negative vote.
edit – and as the landscape changes, negative voting may well give way to positive voting 😉
Except that for some people voting for Peters is a negative negative vote (not a positive negative vote), and it might backfire and lead to disaster 😉
sure Bill – my point has been simply that – with a low vote last election, multiple leaders, and now a new good leader that labour could drive home that leader and his messages in this by-election with a long term view of gaining the treasury benches next general election. I don’t see the current strategy being employed as aligned with that view and by repeating the ‘can’t win up there’ meme that also detaches from the message that labour and little can govern. i just don’t see any potential bloody nose to the gnats by losing to winnie as being worth not driving home the little is great, labour better- to ensure as much as possible a labour victory next general election.
I get that others don’t agree – we’ll see what happens…
it is true the way things stand now. I get what you are saying, that the potential is there. But it’s not a potential that has much potential if you take my meaning. Forming coalitions comes after voting not before, and party choices about candidates even earlier. If the GP made an active decision to not stand in TTT because of the split vote issue then they have my gratitude and support.
I think we have more than our integrity and personal beliefs and personal votes, that’s what political movements are all about, going beyond the personal and working collectively and co-operatively.
“Your dilemna in northland is the same one many people have with labour, and the Greens and probably Mana for some too.”
hmm, not sure about that. The Northland situation strikes me as being reasonabl unique.
Well we’ll have to agree to disagree although I suspect we don’t disagree that much 🙂
🙂
One problem will also be for those who dont trust Winston to not back the government…
I started out very anti labour doing anything other than go for the win .I hope it doesn’t make me to much of a sheep to be coming round to liking the idea of Winston winning while labour still get out and push there message.
Of course if national wins or peters deals with key it will be a bad day .
No – it just means you are open minded enough to listen to the various arguments and reasoned your way to a different conclusion from your original one. As long as you can follow the logic of your change of opinion there is nothing wrong with doing so. Holding intransigently firm to a particular view can sometimes be as bad as constantly flip-flopping. 😈
NZ ‘s reputation as an ‘honest broker’ around the world must be on the way out.
yup…unfortunately…John Key has made us a lap dog….and where is Little Labour on this?…or have they lost their voice and independence?
Already in the skip.
Wonder how those Pacific nations now feel about voting us on to the Security Council.
Is it just me – Or does the Auckland city 10 year plan look like more austerity for Auckland?
Here is the links page – it’s a link to a few of councils .PDFs about the plan.
http://www.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/EN/planspoliciesprojects/plansstrategies/longtermplan2015/Pages/home.aspx?utm_source=shorturl&utm_medium=print&utm_campaign=Long_Term_Plan
Must say agreeing with Penny Bright’s argument that this is a council who are light on finical detail, rings very true with collection of propaganda puff pieces.
So back to my main argument – Have and are we in the grip of austerity via the local bodies in this country – rather than at a National level?
And if this is the case, is it to make a government look better finical managers – than they really are?
“So back to my main argument – Have and are we in the grip of austerity via the local bodies in this country – rather than at a National level?”
All councils are effectively insolvent. We’re just waiting for the other shoe to drop, now.
Sad to hear that Mike Jackson, former head of the National Distribution Union has died. Mike retired a few years ago, after losing the leadership of the union to someone who sadly didn’t have his loyalty or commitment, and was living in Australia in recent years.
He worked alongside Bill Andersen to build the NDU (now First Union) into an integrated national organisation, representing workers in all parts of the retail supply chain. A lovely bloke and a staunch comrade.
RIP
Joined the Union at my new job yesterday (well confirmed my joining).
+1 RIP Mike. Plenty of good unionists come out of NDU.
Why the dig at Harre te reo putake? What a sad comment from you, using someone’s passing to push your own agenda – what a sorry approach to politics.
You would rather engage in factional b.s., and negativity – rather than celebrate a person’s life and achievements. People like you
Gee, and there was I thinking I was being diplomatic!
Laila’s coup had a significant effect on both the union generally and Mike personally. It can certainly be argued that she took the union forward in her brief stay, but Mike paid a big price for that. My distaste at how she rolled him hasn’t stopped me working with her productively since then and she remains someone I rate highly, even if her most recent project flopped badly. However, my generally positive opinion of her is not shared by all of Mike’s friends, many of whom use far more colourful language than I do to describe her role in ending Mike’s leadership of the union.
So why not just talk about the good Mike did – because he did a lot of good?
Celebrate his life.
Celebrate his achievements – which there were many.
Look to his positive impact on lives – which there were many.
Smile, laugh and think well of the good times with Mike – which there were many.
Bugger the negative crap – don’t we get enough of that from the fools who worship money?
this ^^^^
So JK, true to form went back on his word “I will resign if there is mass surveillance on NZer’s”. (paraphrased) Finds there’s mass surveillance is occurring. Doesn’t resign. Says it’s data collection.
Tells the public that whatever Nicky Hagar has to say don’t believe it, before any ones even knows the content, and then goes on to instruct the public not to read it. Actually tells public what they shouldn’t read.
Tries to get political mileage out of the 1080 blackmail threat by referring to it as “eco terrorism”. Terrorism. Righto. Good thing we have the GCSB and SIS to prevent these things happening eh? Thats working out really well. Most likely green voters that stuck that 1080 in the baby formula and sent it to Theo Spierings eh John? In the meantime, Police refer to it as a blackmail threat.
(Let’s not forget JK is sending troops to Iraq at the USA’s bidding, and out of our 5 eyes partners, we are spending the most per capita on our military involvement. Not in my name Key)
The guy’s out of control. He is out of his depth as his deeds and lies catch up with him. He looks harried and he’s being snappy with reporters.
So back to that resignation promise. Are we going to hold him to that, as NZer’s? Are we going to let him forget it? Are we going to demand he resign?
When’s a good time to demand his resignation? After the Northland by election results come in?
What do you think?
Outside Parliament on a day they’re sitting. Thousands chanting “hey hey! ho ho! JK must go!”
Time to knock planet key off it’s axis I think.
IF NZF win Northland (big IF), maybe MP and Dunne will put their values where their mouths are and cross the floor Budget time forcing a stalemate in govt… and possibly a new election. Would take guts though…
It is a big if now National have dumped 1080 (poison) down on Peters campaign. No
better way to bring farmers back into line than threatening their income.
That would be very unlikely Tracey.
Both parties gave guarantees of their votes on matters of confidence and supply for the duration of this term and that is what a Budget vote is.
I don’t think either of them would go back on that.
you are probably right. only john keys word is really in doubt.
It’s possible that they could be democratically persuaded.
Is that the diplomatic words for bribed?
Or is it like the scene in The Godfather? “I’m gonna make him an offer he can’t refuse”
Part of Representative Democracy is pushing the representatives to actually do what the community wants and not just what they want.
Quite a bit hinges on that IF………….
In the scenario you put forward Tracey it may be possible for the MP to be guided by their core values and act accordingly(I know, I know, some of you may choke on that idea) but I would never see Dunne doing that, crossing the floor, unless there was something in it for him. He’s always banging on about values but doesn’t ever display any.
I’m also thinking about ways NZer’s can destabilise National’s credibility as they pull out the brand Key puppet for campaigning in Northland. A mass public call for Key’s resignation right now, while the events are fresh in people’s mind (we tend to have memories like fish sometimes in NZ) might have some impact.
Such events take time to organise though. National events have to be well coordinated and well planned, such as the anti TPP rallies last weekend. One of the organisers told me it took 6 weeks to plan.
Maybe just a rally in Northland to start with, in the areas that Key will be visiting?
Either way, I don’t think we can sit back much longer and just watch the horror show that is the Key Govt, trundle along, business as usual.
Guts – the entrail trail. This would be politics in a very visceral form. Don’t know if the two mentioned entities are full-blooded enough.
Wont happen Tracey.
They got the Ministerial Limos, and the big salaries, so they arent going to vote for the bus ticket option to Welly Airport.
“Would take guts though…”
Well that rules them both out then innit.
😉
If I was any where near Wellington I’d join you outside parliament Rosie. Symbolic Kauri sitting, only this time it’s saving the country.
Excellent weka! Thats two of us. We need a minimum of 998 more. Organisers of the TPP rally in the weekend counted approximately 1200 in their images they took of the day. We made a helluva racket.
Like your analogy 🙂
When Key was interviewed about the fate of the Titirangi tree’s last night on 3 news he couldn’t be more disinterested if he tried and mumbled something about it “being old” but that wasn’t in context with anything else he said.
I don’t think that Key is such a monster that forcing him to resign would be “saving the country”. National would still be in power, after all.
It’s far more likely he’d be toppled by an internal coup, like Bolger was and Abott is about to be.
Imagine what would be happening now if Abott had said “I’ll resign if XYZ happens”, and then it happened and he didn’t resign? He’d be pushed.
No one in the Nats caucus is going to roll Key because he hasn’t done anything to warrant it in the public’s opinion, and the caucus know that.
Key is the phoney glue that holds together the image of the National Party. With him gone, they will be left exposed, naked, without their make up
Voters who party vote National, who are not National Party members, just ordinary non politically engaged people, are voting for Brand Key, not for some belief in National Party values, and as was the case last year, they certainly weren’t voting for any policy because there wasn’t any.
Sure, we would still be left with a National Government, but when someone like, lets say, Steven Joyce stepped up as PM in the unlikely event Key did resign, those voters will be able see that they only voted for a man and will have no loyalty to the Party, or no connection with it. They may even begin to wake up to the fact they were duped by a cheesey grin and fake blokiness.
Disillusioned they may be inclined to vote differently in 2017.
Having Key gone may weaken National’s hopes for 2017.
I agree that no one in the Nat caucus would roll Key, but for more reasons than you suggest. Key is their meal ticket. they won’t want him gone.
In 2013 when Key said he would resign if he discovered that the GCSB had been undertaking mass surveillance on NZer’s I thought he was being fairly cocky. It was a risky thing to do but he would have known there would be a way to weasel his way out of it, otherwise he wouldn’t have said it.
So, as a matter of principle he must resign. Even if we are left with the same government, we are left with a government weakened without it’s previously popular leader, and a disillusioned voter group whose eyes will be looking elsewhere
And it’s onwards and upwards to 2017
No one in the Nats caucus is going to roll Key because although he has done heaps to warrant it, the caucus know what he’s done but the public don’t.
FIFY
+100 Rosie
Yes Rosie I think that yek has managed to puff charisma from a smoke gun and create a brain fog for the more vulnerable voter and believer-in-money-as-a-measure-of-worth who think of themselves as realists. If you’ve got it, you must have smart qualities and be able to foot it in the business world, have good contacts, have the nous ‘we’ want.
Ain’t that the truth Warbs 🙂
Can you please tell me where the “yek” term came from? I’ve seen you use in reference to John Key.
Just to dig my heels in further. I think it’s high time that someone of standing and mana (other than Dotcom) call for Key’s resignation.
It’s something that the Labour Party, Greens and NZ First could make a united front on too. The leaders of the opposing parties could make a solemn press statement calling for Key’s resignation.
Tuesday night must just be starting over in Ireland as I type this. I imagine there’s going to be quite a few dance parties for a weekday!
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/10/irish-es-are-smiling-ecstasy-drugs-temporarily-legal-in-ireland
A few folks arrested in recent weeks wil lbe thrilled (provided their case hasnt finalised)
Quote from the release. “By GCSB staff helping to translate and analyse communications intercepted by other Five Eyes agencies.”
So we have the staff and they have the skills to do the above. This seems to me to be of great importance to the debate.
Lucky no NZer is subject to their work though if something cropped up in mass “collection”, would there be just cause for the agents to go back and seek and discover information?
translate and analyse… is that part of data collection or mass surveillance.
i note fed farmers just confirmed the 1080 announcement was definitely scheduled for next week.
A while ago I wrote a guest post about the difficulties my daughter was having finding a job. Just to let you know she has one part time but permanent and in the area she wants a career. Its a start. She did it herself without the help of family contacts. Still think the job market is really hard for young people but relieved my daughter made it
Well done and good luck to her! I hope she enjoys her new work.
great stuff.
+1 good for her.
I really appreciated reading your post and thanks for the update – this is great news. yes, it’s a really difficult time for young people so all the very best to your daughter for her step on the ladder.
+100…the young have it pretty tough today…and it is every parents’ relief when they find a job!
Good.
thats good news fairy. now when she is established and can show her worth, that part time position can fairly rapidly change to full time or her renumeration may grow.
kia kaha to your daughter.
The truth can be difficult to accept.
Good article from John Minto
http://mananews.co.nz/wp/?p=3645
+100 …where is Labour on this issue?…nowhere to be seen!….the Greens and Mana would have done better and David Cunliffe
Despite what I read here, I dont think the “ordinary not very political but we still vote” folk really care about this issue very much.
It didnt make a decent dent in the Nats popularity in the 2014 election, perhaps almost none at all if you measure it by their increased party vote that the Nats got.
The Nats will lose the next election as they will be at the end of their popularity cycle, just as Helen Clark was in 2008.
Labour just needs to work on some polices that resonate with the voters, and the other parties need to work on policies that will energise the “missing million” to come on out and vote, because its unlikely that Labours policies alone will achieve that.
Most don’t care about a single Kauri, but enough did and apparently a decision has changed.
Critivcal mass and all that, of and realising you have to live next door to the people your affected by your decision
;
0
The mission million are lost to Labour for good, as well as National for that matter (as well as the Greens). It will be a new movement that they will flock to, to be led by a charismatic leader waiting in the wings. What movement or who that leader is, no one knows, but there is a vacuum, and someone will fill it. Then those who sit in their million dollar houses, and their latte dens will have good reason to tremble.
And it wont be me. I have more important things to worry about 🙂
Over 21,000 have signed the petition against felling Titirangi’s Kauri and Rimu tree. The number is climbing by hundreds every hour.
This will now be an item at Auckland Council’s City Development Committee tomorrow.
https://www.toko.org.nz/petitions/save-the-patuaroa-kauri
https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/03/10/wikipedia-sues-nsa-dragnet-internet-surveillance/
interesting!… and positive! ….thanks weka
Go Wikipedia, my respected and learned friend.
Might be time to make another donation…
Doesn’t “National Security” trump everything, or does the Constitution sit above even that?
It might be a bit early, as Anzac Day is six weeks away, but here’s an interesting piece Dean Parker wrote about the need to remember those who resisted WW1: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2013/08/14/anzac-day-time-to-remember-those-who-tried-to-resist-war/
A review of Field Punishment #1: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2014/04/24/field-punishment-no-1-reviewed-reminder-that-the-wars-not-over/
And here’s a piece on the Gallipoli invasion and what was really going on:
https://rdln.wordpress.com/2012/04/24/gallipoli-invasion-a-dirty-and-bloody-business/
An article on Stevan Eldred Grigg’s book ‘The Great Wrong War’: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2013/08/02/stevan-eldred-griggs-the-great-wrong-war-nz-society-and-ww1/
Not exactly anti-war, but there’s an interesting ‘on demand’ series from Maori TV on World War 1 that a Philip Ure comment alerted me to. It’s based on the work of war historian(?) Hew Strachan. The link.. http://www.maoritelevision.com/tv/shows/first-world-war/S01E001/first-world-war-series-1-episode-1
This desire to make an event about NZ people being killed in a nasty way in WW1 a long time ago by-passes other who also should be remembered and celebrated for their actions. And it continues that pathetic drone every Anzac Day about the wonderful fallen and we will remember them spoken in a solemn and repetitive way. Nothing said about really preventing war, how horrible it is and how you are lucky to have life, a working body and mind, sanity and your soul at the finish, just acceptance that they are dead. Another pocketful of mumbles.
The RSA tried to keep the Vietnam fighters away from joining in Anac Day marches.
Not a real war apparently. My father didn’t come back from WW2. There was anxiety that the children who wished to march in their dead parent’s place shouldn’t be confused with the survivors. Medals must be worn on the opposite chest or great offence would be taken by the forces men.
It is a waste of money. We already have memorials why build more. If we have so much dosh to throw around, gather all the Turks in NZ and the people being fought now, the Palestinians etc and have a ceremony of community, warmth, conciliation and compassion, remembrance for all who have suffered that we have been connected with. And avow that we want to prevent war if we can do so in a way that is fair to all.
There actually is a service at the Ataturk memorial in Wellington on Anzac day.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/8586440/Anzac-Day-Wellington-region-services
See Ataturk park.
I can’t tell you exactly what form it takes as I have never been to it but someone else reading this may know.
My point was actually on how the government can choose to spend money on one particular war and not others, and have picked one that is mighty distant in the past. Why not the Boer War. We were just getting on our feet here then and off to war we went.
http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/war/south-african-boer-war/introduction
Eager to display New Zealand’s commitment to the British Empire, Premier Richard Seddon offered to send troops two weeks before conflict broke out. Hundreds of men applied to serve, and by the time war began in October 1899, the First Contingent was already preparing to depart for South Africa. Within a few months they would be fighting the Boers.
By the time peace was concluded 2½ years later, 10 contingents of volunteers totalling over 6500 men (plus 8000 horses) had sailed for Africa, along with doctors, nurses, veterinary surgeons and a small number of schoolteachers. Seventy-one New Zealanders were killed in action or died of wounds, with another 159 dying in accidents or as result of disease.
NZ Population – At the 1896 census the non-Maori population was just over 703,000. The Maori population was under 40,000. The transformation of New Zealand from a Maori …
http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/classroom/ncea3/19th-century-history-1870-1900
It is probably worth noting that Maori were not allowed to fight in the Boer War because British policy forbade non-white troops from fighting against white troops.
Also, while on that subject, the Maori Battallion was kept out of the Pacific theatre in WW2, because the US didnt want to fight with them.
@ millsy
Fascinating the protocols of war. The Maori battalions were asked for in some theatres because they were so good. Or so I understand.
An RSA timeline of war that goes up to Vietnam war in 1965. Where we might choose to remember a Good Thing that happened is 4 November 1918 at Le Quesnoy where we showed a concern and intelligent lack of maximum firepower in not shelling the town but climbing over the walls and surprising and capturing the resident Germans, for which apparently we are still remembered.
http://rsa.org.nz/Remembrance/OtherCommemorations/Timeline.aspx
Wars every 30 years or so. That was the general pattern in the 20th century.
There was Vietnam and then the Cold War, also the threat of annihilation by nuclear bomb. (Raymond Briggs showed us how the trusting and vulnerable would manage in that circumstance.)
On more mundane homegrown conflict we had the Army fighting the farming couple over who was responsible for the bridge collapse, just to keep their hand in while not overseas. That went on for years as they tried to ruin locals in this domestic spat.
Then Afghanistan, Iraq, etc. So plenty of action to think about.
I see.
I didn’t read it in quite as general a manner as you meant.
Regarding Seddon and the Boer War, we didn’t learn very quickly did we?
Look at Savage in 1939 and his statement.
” Both with gratitude for the past and confidence in the future, we range ourselves without fear beside Britain. Where she goes, we go. Where she stands, we stand.”
Technically we then declared war on Germany before anyone else. Imagine if, at the last moment, Britain and France hadn’t declared war? We could have fought Germany on our own.
Actually, on the subject of militarism here’s an interesting article by Murray Horton on Labour’s introduction of peacetime conscription in 1949 and the fight against it by the left (led by people like Jock Barnes), pacifists etc:
https://rdln.wordpress.com/2011/10/26/labours-introduction-of-peacetime-conscription-and-the-fight-against-it/
And here’s another one by Murray on the first Labour government during WW2: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2011/07/20/the-secret-history-of-ww2/
Phil
I think we could add some homegrown ones into this, sadly.
“This post is a collection of racially-themed parties and events at college and high school campuses. They’re examples of one kind of simple individual racism that still perpetuates daily life in the U.S.”
http://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2013/05/11/individual-racism-alive-and-well/
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/mar/10/revolutionary-kurdish-isis-ivana-hoffman
And yes, I still harbour severe mis-givings over the involvement of Leninist organisations in the revolution unfolding in Northern Syria as their influence will be one pushing for a form of democratic centralism (ie, an authoritarian polity).
This is an informative and entertaining video about the spread of ideas which the presenter calls “thought-germs” (memes might be more accurate), the role of emotion (especially anger) in the spread and retention of these ideas online and the development of communities that have a shared idea.
Food for thought – especially when it comes to political blogs across the spectrum in NZ (and maybe a little introspection about our community : is this evident here? If so, is it something that we should work to overcome?).
CGP Grey : this video will make you angry
Interesting comment on a post by Frank Mackasy on TDB: Someone at Fairfax is a subversive.
Jeremy points out: “The links are based on the first ID, not the slug following the last slash.
That’s opened up a whole new set of possibilities for me when posting links on my Herald comments.
Here is a quote from today’s NZ Herald
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11415434
“The government posted a surplus of $3.37 billion a year earlier, when its investment portfolios were riding gains in global financial markets.”
Note it does not actually say when this happened, and if you read the article a few times you are left with a vague 2012-2014 timeframe. Not what one would call specific. One is also left with a few niggling thoughts, here are three.
1: If the Government had recently posted a $3.37 billion surplus, surely they would have mentioned that achievement once or twice during the election, instead of the
‘ we will hit surplus any day now ‘ message that was being trumpeted from the ramparts.
2: If the Government had recently hit surplus, then they must have gone backwards in one hell of a hurry to have spent all of last year talking up such a small projected surplus that might or might not be seen sometime next year if you squint facing south when the moon hits azimuth and are wearing your lucky undies.
3: The fact no such surplus shows up in the budget charts is, I guess, just one of those opinion thingys that the PM keeps talking about .
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/new-zealand/government-budget
There is also a fun new game in the NZ Herald, where you guess what word they meant to use:
“The liability for Accident Compensation Corp was $34.92 billion, some $4.5 billion more than expected, while Earthquake Commission property damage liability was $370 million [?] than forecast at $3.66 billion.”
So, instead of the forecast deficit of $635 million we now have a surplus of $77 million, which is the improvement of $712 million that is heralded everywhere in the media. However, the tax-take was $456 million better than forecast and outgoings were $249 million below forecast. Together, this adds up to $705 million. That leaves $7 million unexplained. Has anybody got a clue? A ‘rounding error’ perhaps?
Only the Dipton Double Dipper can answer that in his long monotonous and bullshitting boring way.
I am still scratching my head at how The Herald posts an article saying the government posted a 3.37 billion dollar surplus recently and no-one blinks an eye
In my view, the gaffe video of ‘okey-blokey’ John Key, which has apparently been VIRALING – out of ‘spin doctor’ control, showing the TRADER trying to be a TRADIE, but failing hideously in his attempt to bang a single nail into a piece of wood, as part of National’s (doomed) Northland by-election campaign, will trump the famous Don Brash ‘walking the plank’ gaffe.
The reaction I’m getting to this on Kiwiblog tends to suggest that I may be right?
Doesn’t quite fit the Kiwi DIY concept?
POOR Crosby Textor 😉
At the end of the day – I can’t see them feeling either relaxed or comfortable about the amount of public ridicule to which their client is now being subjected?
Just undid YEARS of their Crosby Textor masterfully crafted ‘spin doctoring’?
Ordinary Kiwi blokes are now going to queue up to shake the hand of this (part-time) Prime Minister John Key, whom has obviously never held a hammer?
Didn’t Crosby Textor not first do a ‘dummy run’ to check that this ex-Wall Street banker could actually bang a nail into a piece of wood?
Obviously NOT.
bugger …..
Penny Bright
Winnie has put up a video of himself hammering in a nail. Cunliffe should do the same. Metiria as well.
On Spying, Fonterra’s 1080 Scare And How Information Can Be Used To Manipulate Perception
Worthwhile contemplating the fact that yesterday or the day before was the anniversary of Operation Meetinghouse (which I just heard on the Radio) – “later estimated to be the single most destructive bombing raid in history”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Tokyo
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_LeMay
lest we forget…
Apparently Japan had already approached MacArthur with offers of surrender on pretty much the same terms that they signed later in Tokyo Bay. The seppos still needed a lot more dead Japanese to show Stalin the power of their bombers.
http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v16/v16n3p-4_Weber.html
I have just been listening to Question Time in the house today and I wish to let the Standard know that, in my opinion the PM is a nasty little man with a complete lack of respect for our Parliament. He has the manners of a guttersnipe and Lord knows what that says of his upbringing. What a cheap and chatty little man he is. It brings to mind what my dear late mother would say to us when we got out of line “I did not raise you kids to behave like this …”. God save us from him.
An opinion I’m sure no one on the Standard agrees with 😉
or is he just ……verrry, verrry druuunk
I share your opinion.
Henry Rollins on living in the USA – It’s not living in a country, it’s a video game.
7+ minutes on how he managed to get out of minimum wage precariat level.
Henry Rollins – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Rollins
He says he has been lucky. But when luck presented him with an opportunity he gave it a go. He would be early for any appointment to make sure he was there on time if something unexpected happened on the way. He learned his lines, he stuck at things and made sure he finished them. Gives you satisfaction even if you don’t succeed as hoped. I can learn from that. I think it could speak to a lot of us here, we have had it fairly easy up til now.
Slavoj Zizek has similar ideas on his capitalism and democracy –
what now? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXVEnxtZe_w
Anyone else see Key’s performance in Parliament today?
The man is a rabid nut job judging by his behaviour in the House today!
Which question?
All of them. Key kept going off on a mad tangent, failing to address any question adequately. Several times, regardless of the question asked, he threw in a few electioneering comments, promoting Northland Natsy patsy Osborne!
At one stage he started arguing his position at a recent press conference, whether he was at the time making statements as PM or Leader of National. This was at the PM’s press conference for goodness sake!
And more often than not, the Speaker turned a blind eye, preferring to reprimand the Opposition instead!
but …
1080
1080
1080
Do tell , is he loseing it ?
All those chickens coming home to roost starting to shit down his back and leave a nasty smell.?
No, he was all buoyed up, arrogant and cocky today, and digressing widely off the questions asked with the speaker as usual treating him with his usual shameless partiality!
Winston did not get much media attention today. Did anyone else notice that? I wonder why!!
But, but but – Winston nailed it!
https://t.co/QZAgTYC28f
LOL! Nice video! Winston did that all by himself, while Key needed a whole bunch of his voluminous dudes to assist him to do it!
Thanks veutoviper – the link was priceless
Brilliant
I’ve been offline for a few hours to feed the ‘mouths’, but TV3 now has it up on their website – and there is a wonderful boxing picture (photoshopped) in the comments. Beyond my skills to copy it and paste here …..
http://www.3news.co.nz/nznews/video-no-nail-fail-for-winston-peters-2015031117
“Beyond my skills to copy it and paste here”
[Tip for you veutoviper: On the TV3 picture on the link you posted, right click on the picture and go to ‘view image info’ about 2/3 of way down. You will get the picture and the following link]
http://a.disquscdn.com/uploads/mediaembed/images/1823/821/original.jpg?w=600&h
Just loved his smile to the camera as he pulled another nail out of his mouth.
What a cool dude.
What this whole episode has shown is all that needed to do is write couple of letter to fonterra and Fed Farmers and then wait for the fallout and the destruction of NZ financial base.
ALL for $2.
That is real bang for the buck.
Campbell live at 7 is gong to talk about the Key bribed but Winston inspired Winston’s ten Northland bridges. Programme starts in 2 minutes. I am off to watch it now,
Is this 1080 threat has been investigated for four month, how come police only started taking to the anti 1080 campaigners in the last couple of days, as reported this evening on Stuff and the Herald?
Because if you officially ask someone questions you’re telling them that you know that the threat exists, your are actively investigating it, and that you believe that they might have something to do with it or be connected to someone who does.
As opposed to all the sneaky stuff you can do if someone doesn’t know you’re looking for them.
Now that they have to investigate openly, they might even just be rattling the bars to provoke a reaction from the letter-writer.
That and they probably don’t think the anti-1080 campaigners have anything to do with it. They’re not suspects as far as I can tell.