Grant Hobbs seems to see the tragedy here as being in the loss of a potentially good rugby player, not in Pora’s loss of his life and liberty. Even when they try to say something worthwhile, these sort of people just make me shake my head.
Why is Hurley a jonolist ? Because Collins did NOT add her name to the list of people calling into question the convictions which have had this boy a murderer and a rapist for the past 20 years.
One comment that he “could be innocent…..” does not qualify Bevan. You misrepresent Collins’ demeanour. At the very best her position has softened to “Oh well we’ll see……..not boverred really.”
The comments of Peter Williams QC are more to the point – Teina Pora could be out of prison now were our justice system not the fiefdom of Justice Sow who doesn’t actually give a stuff.
She might be seen to give a stuff in time but that will be according to how she will do out of the issue – forget about Teina the boy now the man.
Where does one get the “Free Teina Pora” teeshirts ?
http://www.illicit.co.nz is where TDB says you can get a “Free Teina” T-shirt. I’d get one myself except it’s rare that I have a spare $28, though at least $8 of that goes into a trust for the Pora family.
“…Mr Key’s superstitious habit of repeating “white rabbits, white rabbits, white rabbits”, on the first of each month. The early morning ritual is believed to bring luck, he said yesterday. Mr Key admits he has visibly aged over the past five years as prime minister. It “comes with the job”. ”
I commented on this yesterday (in the; “What a Dick”, post), it doesn’t seem to be satire; just very peculiar coming, as it does, from Fearfacts. Also, I tried to link this particular compulsion with ShonKey’s compulsive; lying & gambling, by way of OCD, but in retrospect that didn’t really work.
“If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear”
The above statement first attributed to Joseph Goebbels and recently resurrected by those calling for more powers for the GCSB and the NSA is a lie.
You may have nothing to hide, but what about your neighbors and your friends?
What about your work colleagues?
At least one of them, will have something that they don’t want you, or others to know about. This makes them vulnerable to those who seek to know everyone’s secrets. This is how the surveillance state of East Germany worked. The Stasi exploited the foibles of the vulnerable. The Stasi were able to get friend to spy on friend. They were able to get neighbor to smear and spread gossip against neighbor. At work they were able to block your promotion and the progress of your career if they didn’t like your political views.
How? The Stasi knew all the secrets of your managers and indeed of the company itself.
Do we really want to give our secret security forces these powers?
Do we really trust them that much?
Are the anonymous and secretive men and women who run our own secret agencies of such high moral standing and trustworthiness to have access to the secrets of a whole population that metadata spying will give them? Do we really trust them to hold that much power over us?
The East German secret police, the Stasi were able to spread fear and paranoia and suspicion and keep under subjection a whole population for 40 years.
Through mass surveillance the Stasi were able to intimidate everybody. How?
They knew everybody’s secrets.
Do we really want to give our secret agencies this power?
Are we really sure that they won’t abuse them?
Recent events seem to say no.
“If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear”
You may have nothing to hide. But you have everything to fear from those who do.
Apart from your friends, neighbors and colleagues who may have secrets….
At the top of the list are the most fearsome of those with something to hide.
Who guard their own secrets most obsessively.
Who are prepared to go to extreme lengths to protect their secrets from any who dare threaten to expose theim.
These people are the secret security services themselves.
If the supporters of the NSA and GCSB truly believed, “If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear”. Then they would release Bradly Manning. They should drop their persecution of Julien Assange and abandon their international manhunt against Edward Snowden.
First Lavabit, now a second US-based encryption-based secure email company founder ethically chooses to close rather than offer up all its customers to surveillance … his comments are a must read ..
RSA cryptography, based on the products of huge prime numbers, is practically uncrackable. There are two routes that are being followed by the US and allied governments to get around this. One is that they will persecute anyone offering it, and perhaps even make it illegal. The other is research into quantum computing. Using Shor’s algorithm, quantum computers, which don’t really exist yet, can factorise the products and break the codes. The US and Australian governments spend hundreds of millions (at least) on the research, which as far as I can see is directly designed to let them spy on us. I do not work on it, but have colleagues who do. Some of them even consider themselves to be socialist warriors in the struggle for a better world. My opinion of them is not quite so high.
Quantum cryptography, on the other hand, is completely unbreakable. In fact, you can tell if someone has even had a look. It is used commercially by some Swiss financial institutions. It would be difficult, but not impossible, to set it up for normal use. I suspect it would be made illegal as soon as someone looked like doing that, so it’s likely to remain the preserve of governments and corrupt financial institutions for a while yet.
I’d like to add that Stasi was continuing the great tradition of German governments spying on its own people and German citizens – neigbours, friends, family members spying on each other, starting with the Nazi Germany where any dissenters and critics of the regime were disposed of promptly and permanently.
Are the anonymous and secretive men and women who run our own secret agencies of such high moral standing and trustworthiness to have access to the secrets of a whole population that metadata spying will give them?
Nope.
The content of the communications is secondary. The primary is peoples social and business networks. The collection of metadata will expose those networks and once exposed they can be broken. This is, IMO, why the government wants to collect the metadata and so it should not be allowed.
No protection from self incrimination under duress.
A few slaps, a couple of kicks.
From there but a small step to the almost 100% police conviction rate in Communist China’s Orwellian court system.
All it needs to complete the picture is a compliant media automatically and covertly monitored 24/7 by the state, too intimidated to speak up, all their phone calls and movements traced and recorded for later reference.
Peter Dunne, said inquiry head David Henry had detailed to him the movements of Fairfax journalist Andrea Vance in and out of the parliamentary precinct.
The conversation related to Vance’s movements the day before the leaked report was published.
It appeared to be based on Henry having access to records of when she entered and left the building using her security swipe card.
The New Zealand military received help from US spy agencies to monitor the phone calls of Kiwi journalist Jon Stephenson and his associates while he was in Afghanistan reporting on the war.
Stephenson has described the revelation as a serious violation of his privacy, and the intrusion into New Zealand media freedom has been slammed as an abuse of human rights.
Is this why most of our MSM journalists give this overbearing and intrusive right wing administration such a free ride when in comparison the same journalists publicly and unrelentedly caned the Clark administration for weeks for trying to regulate energy efficient lightbulbs over incandescent lamps. Until they forced Labour to drop it?
Hey how’s the Arab Spring going in Libya? I heard the country is disintegrating into armed tribal factions, the western corporations are looting Libya’s gold, oil and other natural resources, while the advanced healthcare and education systems Gadaffi set up for his people are being run down.
With such gems as the following…
“But as ministers turned the lights out on a week of endless Beehive crisis meetings and headed for Nelson and the party’s annual conference, there was a sense the situation was at least under control.”
Then quoting Judith Collins and not questioning in any way this outrageous statement.
“We’ve learnt to be very upfront and straight out fronting issues.”
This government ..upfront about issues?
Actually, a lapdog media is one of the biggest reasons why this government continually escapes crisis after crisis. ‘Jonolists’ like Tracy Watkins do the 4th estate a disservice. They do the work of big corporates very well.
yes, its interesting how the media are treating The National Party Conference versus how they treated The Labour Party Conference in November.
Peter Goodfellow (President of National) and family own a huge slice of Sanford fishing (via Amalgamated Dairies Ltd), perhaps the media should be digging to see whether the recreational snapper limit cuts have something to do with him and more National cronyism. I would think so.
its interesting how the media are treating The National Party Conference versus how they treated The Labour Party Conference in November.
Has any accredited journo sighted any media harassment and intimidation of a Nat. MP with a view to forcing them to say something that could be misconstrued by others as a challenge to the leader? You know… walking backwards around the conference venue with a camera lens permanently shoved in their face and asking the same question over and over again until they got something… then behaving like school yard pimps by running off to the leadership telling petty tales out of school?
Joyce wasn’t the only senior Nat indulging their naughty side at this weekend’s Nelson event. The simmering unofficial leadership struggle between Joyce and justice minister Judith Collins will take a new turn this morning as the matriarch appears on TVNZ alongside Key.
While outward appearances were of a rigorously choreographed agenda, delegates were furiously whispering about her decision yesterday.
The party and her senior minister colleagues were spitting tacks about the brazen move. Given the policy announcements carefully lined-up by party strategists, it should have been a moment for Joyce to shine, alongside housing minister Nick Smith and environment minister Amy Adams.
For whatever the talk show topic, the appearance raises the spectre of Collins’ ambitions to take charge of the party.
National don’t have the same leadership woes currently plaguing Labour. The question of who will succeed John Key is a perennial curiosity.
But it’s largely academic, for now. …
G.. help us all if Collins gets the leadership. OTH, I cannot see her having the blind faith followers that Key has had.
In reference to Nationals RMA tampering, especially with relevance to Auckland, speeding up the building consents process, looks very problematic. There are a lot of powerful people opposed to moves of allowing multi level dwellings being built in urban areas of the City. All worried their swanky suburbs are going to be down valued with affordable apartments popping up everywhere.
Concerns of views being blocked and commoner tenants inhabited their posh streets. Interesting to see how many switch to ACT?
I don’t think the New Zealand public will view the rise of ACT in the polls positively if that’s the case. National would not like the bad perception that brings. Which of course we on the Left, promote as a third term Nact Government is going to reveal their true nasty right-wing ideological master plans.
Collins will have her followers. The sort of troglodytes who write in the sewer blogs worship her with a sexual passion. On the positive side, I think she’d take NAct back to its core voters, with the same percentages that Brash got, those who like their racism and bigotry strident rather than casual. I don’t think even Crosby Textor could sell her to a much wider audience.
Yep, she’ll only ever be a hit with the extremists. She’ll never make it with the ordinary apolitical bbq dickheads that have won the last two elections for Key.
Ideologically and morally I don’t think the two of them are far apart, one just seems to be better at hiding it.
And that’s the nub. To quote Chris Trotter, Key is the greatest political salesman this country has ever seen. With Key gone, the current National Party ideology has much the same shelf-life as NZ1 without Winston.
Beardy, last night on 3 news it looked like he had fallen asleep at the speakers table and then blearily woke up and had that “What?! Where I am I? What am I doing?!” look about him.
My view on Nationals next leader, once Key decides to call it a day.
Collins – next National Leader, has the drive and ambition and presence
natural leader.
Joyce – not interested can achieve more as number 2
Paula Bennett – maybe in another 10 years, if still around
Brownlee – been around long enough, knows his strengths and weakness,realizes he doesn’t have the drive or enthusiasm to be leader.
Much better being in the top echelon rather than running the show.
Must admit there was a hint of sarcasm in the outfits I [claim] he was texting, but take your point RedLogix. I saw Helen Clark last Sunday at a function and she looked stunning – 20 years younger.
These sociopaths in power are undeniably deviously tricky, every now and then I refer back to chapters of the book Hollow Men, just to refresh my memory. The smoke & mirrors game playing really is shocking.
Government in control over milk powder crisis, mooted reduction in recreational fishers quota, squashed. Sense distraction over GCSB bill, smelter subsidy to prop up power shares/float, Housing crisis ( major spin announced later today). And that Stuff article highlights the start of an attack to wipe Winston Peters out for good in 2014.
How? John Key has started publicly stalking Winston Peters (Key’s principles when it comes to Peters remain-don’t be fooled).
Last elections late supporters, (& the way Key is flaunting a welcome mat) some loyal supporters are not willing to gamble Peters will join a coalition with Labour/Green, they want certainty. All this is increasing the negative effect on NZF’s support.
Key the smiling assassin will be grinning at NZF currently polling down on 3%. But it will be a ‘nervous’ smile. Winston earlier in the week rubbed Key’s nose in it, with fresh allegations of illegal spying of him during the cup of tea saga, which got NZF back into parliament.
Wonder if Key has nightmares of Peters speech opposing the GCSB bill the other day, which was classic “spy’s lies and alibis.”
Tracy Watkins has consistently shown herself to be a cheerleader and apologist for the National Government. In particular, in the past she has written articles about Key, and barely been able to contain her gushing admiration for the slime ball. Maybe in years to come she will look back on them with deep embarrassment and see that she sounded like a 15 year school girl with her first big crush. I kind of feel sorry for her. She needs an aunty in her life to tell her about bad men.
“In order to currently qualify for Government assistance of a $5000 deposit, the most a couple may jointly earn is $100,000. That threshold will be increased to $120,000.”
“The house price caps will be adjusted upwards as well, with the Auckland cap of $400,000 rising to $485,000.”
So under the heading “Government Tackles Affordability”, the government has merely provided assistance to slightly wealthier people…is this for real? How the hell does this tackle affordability…come on Audrey Young, do some analysis. Couldnt she just pick up the phone and call Twyford to see what his view was…or would that wreck it for her? (I think her father was a National Party MP?)
Brilliant, a boost to the first home vendors scheme. Now every property flipper can boost their asking price up another $5K of tax payer funded largesse.
Yes, Venn Young, the author of the first homosexual law reform measure to come before Parliament – late 70s early 80s (?). MP for one of the Taranaki electorates (?).
Can’t remember how far it went before it foundered. Seem to recall that his bubbling, vivacious wife was particularly energised about it, more than him. Wasn’t a bad fulla for a Tory which was true akshully of a number of them in the day. Peter Gordon for example, Minister of Transport at some point. Even old Talboys, whose alleged affair he with “yards and yards of anonymous cloth hanging between his legs….” as characterised by Chris Wheeler, the hilariously subversive stirrer behind the sinful libel sheet “Cock”.
Quite unlike the digusting crooks, Tea Party-ish backwoodmen and scabs comprising today’s National /Act obscenity.
Young’s Bill legalising homosexuality was defeated on 4 July 1975, 34 – 29 with an abstention of 23.
Had the bill gone through there would have been no inquiry into an alleged breach of confidentiality of the police file on the Honourable Colin James Moyle, MP.
The full police evidence has not seen the light of day and I would like to see it in my life time for many reasons.
Employment lawyers and unions should start asking for bosses and managers facebook records if they are going to regularly sink as low as Air NZ has in this case. One of the times it is good to be a freelancer–I only have myself to sack.
The key quote from the article.
“”Because while this is best evidence . . . doesn’t it creep you out a bit? It feels intrusive and just, frankly, wrong.”
That’s a peculiar demand from the ERA, because they are usually called on to determine whether the decision made at the conclusion of the disciplinary process was correct. And that decision is made with the facts known at that time. ie, knowing what they knew, did the boss make a reasonable decision?
It looks like the ERA is saying it’s ok to dismiss based on suspicion alone, if there’s a vague possibility of proving it correct if other information comes to hand later on.
Yes it is a worry TRP, fair and discernible process in such settings has always bugged the torys so any chance to deal with such cases by applying fear and loathing will be taken if their record such as 90 day “fire at will” is any indication. The ERA was not originally set up to operate on that basis so would be interesting to get a practitioners view.
….and then Stuff whacks up an ancient Tory Standards piece complete with comments from 323 days ago! The Shonkey Python show continues for the masses while the cream attend their annual orgy.
I’m against Tasers anyway; but if our overlords really need their goons to carry electric whips, then surely they should be trained to use them properly. Of those UK police forces that could be arsed replying to a freedom of information request (18 out of 45), 57% shot tasers at the chests of suspects.
“There is evidence to suggest that shots to the chest are more dangerous because they can result in cardiac arrest. The manufacturer’s own training guidance states: “When possible, avoid targeting the frontal chest area near the heart to reduce the risk of potential serious injury or death.”.”
The NZ coppers have used tasers as a compliance device since introduction rather than the touted “substitute for lethal force” and if aimed at the chest could (and have internationally) constitute lethal force anyway.
Why negotiate with citizens annoying as some of them can be, or use other methods, when you can just zap ’em.
Thrust of the article is that the powder is being removed under precautionary measures (after being requested to by the Sri Lankan Ministry of Health).
However, the paragraphs that caught my eye are below:
Earlier this year, Fonterra hit headlines in Sri Lanka after the country’s Atomic Energy Authority claimed in Colombo’s Sunday Times it had been put under pressure from New Zealand officials to suspend testing of New Zealand milk powder samples.
At the time, the Ministry for Primary Industries took over damage control reassuring all overseas consumers milk powder from New Zealand was safe.
If true, why would we be putting pressure on another government to suspend testing? And who was/were these overseas officials?
As far as I can ascertain, two New Zealand government officials from the Ministry of Primary Industries travelled to Sri Lanka in May this year to pressure their Atomic Energy Authority to stop testing New Zealand milk powder samples for radiation.
The only reason they would do this is because the government knew that Fonterra’s milk powder was contaminated with radioactive chemicals. Why else would they suddenly demand Sri Lanka stop testing?
Was it all Fonterra NZ sourced milk powder or also Fonterra Chinese sourced milk powder?
I ask because it appears that TEPCO has been lying through the teeth about contaminated water from Fukushima, and hundreds of tons a day of radioactive water have been leaking into the Pacific.
Sri Lanka has halted all Fonterra milk powder imports from New Zealand. I’ve seen no reports saying that they’ve halted imports from China as well?
It’s unlikely that radiation from Fukushima that is leaking into the Pacific Ocean would get into the dairy process in China. It is however likely that it is getting into fish stocks around Japan.
The radiation contamination in Fonterra’s milk products has likely come from landfarming in Taranaki, of which there are around a dozen sites. Six of these landfarming operations supply milk to Fonterra, the other six to other dairy companies. Fonterra is probably not the only supplier affected.
Did anybody just hear “The New Entrepreneurism” on RNZ forming today’s “ideas” segment?
I’d be interested in hearing/seeing Standard contributors thoughts.
I’m in two minds :p
In some ways I’m thinking more of a new buzz, an exercise in commodification of “social enterprise”, yet there are one or two good aspects to it.
Social enterprise – the brits have got into it for about two years I think and have been closing down welfare for about the same time.
If that was the one referring to social enterprises they seem to have been going on this for about two years I think. That would fit with their observable timetable of cutting welfare wouldn’t it?
If so they are taking a dump people in the water to see if they can swim. It could be better than old hate filled government approach time will tell, the program is on the roll – could be as much of a failure as when brit withdrew supplies after the first irish food crop failure.
yea well – at the risk of outing myself to RNZ staff, I offered the following hastily written:
The New Entrpreneuism
Chris,
I was interested in today’s “Ideas” segment, and I’m left wondering whether I must be part of “The New Curmudgeon” sector.
I’m not knocking it at all, it’s just that it occurred to me that many of these admirable initiatives once evolved naturally, as a result of a fully functioning, well (or at least, adequately) educated, egalitarian society – one where its citizens (both public and corporate) got involved and participated.
It concerns me that we must now market it all and turn it into a business in order for it to be part of our consciousness.
… etc
and then a PS later, when Wayne Brittendon and guests did a piece on NeoLiberalism:
PS!!!! ‘The NEW ENTREPRENEUISM” I should have waited
My concerns are being answered as I type: NEOLIBERALISM
…. etc.
in response to this:
11:40 Wayne Brittenden’s Counterpoint
The Guardian reports that in 2012, the world’s 100 richest people became $241 billion richer, and the rich-poor gap continues to spiral. Wayne takes a critical look at the prevailing global economic orthodoxy of neo-liberalism and Chris follows up with Professor Michael Peters, from Waikato University. http://www.radionz.co.nz/sunday
Btw …. it’s also why I’ll never vote Labour again UNTIL they clearly and unambiguously give one of the most insidious ideologies the flik!! So far they’ve only ever half-heartedly apologised for Roger and his ilk.
Another Conspiracy theory bites the dust as it becomes reality.
When the Tsunami hit Japan and Fukushima I was called an alarmist and conspiracy nut when I stated that Fukushima was an ongoing disaster with global implications. Today I can say: “I told you so”.
While it is understandable given the amount of fear/ego based abuse issues in certain directions, that as more conspiracies become realities, there is a natural tendency to feel relief, when shown to not be nut jobs, or similar!
Unfortunately, the seriousness of the majority of the former, conspiracies, is such that the I told you so call, can be seen as a bit of an own goal, for mine.
Oh don’t worry, I’m saying the I told you so really angry and not a gloat in my mind. This is I told you so as in: wake the fuck up and smell the plutonium! (Third reactor has a couple of tons of MOX fuel in a “cooling” pool with steam coming out of the building around about the spot where it should be cool)
I remember one gentleman in particular, Lanthanide I think he calls himself who couldn’t ridicule my assertions enough at the time!
not really.
All that’s happened is that if you predict the worst outcome for every event that happens in the world, sooner or later you’ll be right – especially if one ignores whether the timing is wildly off.
Not necessarily. If I said “Mandela is dead” every day for the next five years, sooner or later I will probably be correct. That does not mean I was correct when I first said it.
Might pay to be a little more circumspect with the insults, because those timelines have been very short, and will grow increasingly shorter between the revelations!
An as for choosing the worst possible outcome, don’t fool yourself laddy, that’s simply another insult for those who have bothered to take time to understand and learn enough, to get a little closer to reality, while others sit back in the largess lobbing insults.
That’s nice.
At least when I hit the pearly gates I’ll be able to say that I gave joy to simple-minded fools. Might offset some of my misdeeds a touch. And just to make it obvious enough for even you to understand, yes, you are indeed one of those simpleminded fools.
might be like that poor raccoon from Ice Age : The Meltdown; reach all those acorns, then the really big Acorn, only to receive resusc. from a sloth.
Oh to be Hindu, but then, all those gods to contend with. Interestingly, maybe the Aryan invaders implemented / codified the caste system, in India anyway.
Neither process had an inevitable conclusion when it first started, however. To state that a catastrophic conclusion is occurring before it is even inevitable can merely have a purely coincidental relationship with reality, even at the best of times.
I wonder if there was a person who claimed the Titanic was sinking even before it hit an iceberg? What if they claimed it after the iceberg were hit, but it they had no idea that it had in fact hit an iceberg, because they were in Birmingham at the time? To then argue “see, I was right, not a nutbar” seems to lack a certain epistemological robustness.
meh.
Fully encouraged by their recent close brush with reality, apparently the tinfoilhat claims have been escalated to Fukushima being an extinction event. So apparently we are all doomed (again).
Have missed your wit, (although, ev makes for interesting reading in ‘my newsfeed’), but then, there is always reality of all flavours to contend with. Like, improving income 😀 … maybe a pedal powered ice-cream cart with (not) 88 flavours of sugar to choose from. Shouldn’t you be working? Ahhh, late lunch. Cheese and home-made pickled onions this (and the other) end. Did you know that even authors with multiple published titles may only achieve the minimum wage if all the hours involved are accounted for. Seems so pointless 😉
I wonder if there was a person who claimed the Titanic was sinking even before it hit an iceberg?
The correct parallel to be drawn are to the officers and passengers who believed that the Titanic was fine after 5 compartments were holed, especially as the ship was still sitting perfectly quietly and drinks and food were still being served.
Neither process had an inevitable conclusion when it first started, however.
Same with being shot in the head or falling off a six story building. Doesn’t mean that you can’t pick what’s (most likely) going to happen next.
The correct parallel to be drawn are to the officers and passengers who believed that the Titanic was fine after 5 compartments were holed, especially as the ship was still sitting perfectly quietly and drinks and food were still being served.
Flipside of the same coin, but at least you get the idea that without accurate information causally and obviously related to the observed outcome, any connection between belief and reality is purely coincidental. Me, I’m off to sit in my lead-lined fridge for the duration of the radioactive apocalypse.
Neither process had an inevitable conclusion when it first started, however.
Same with being shot in the head or falling off a six story building. Doesn’t mean that you can’t pick what’s (most likely) going to happen next.
Well, the laws of physics tend to be a bit more reliable than chemtrail/worldgovt/nanothermite idiots on the internet. But even, then pistol-calibre gunshots to the head tend to have (ISTR) something like a 10% survival rate, and the survival rate for falling six storeys is even better as I recall. So really, without more precise information I’d still not be collecting on their life insurance.
Fukushima was never a conspiracy travellerev. It happened and was/is real. The only conspiracy is the one of governmental silence and mis-information surrounding the causes, the gravity of the immediate effects and the potential long term consequences.
And yes, there were plenty of people who chimed in, downplaying the seriousness of the situation and poo-pooing potential long term consequences. Adherents to authoritarianism tend to back centers of authority though. So, the fact of a ‘she’ll be right’ brigade is hardly surprising.
As time goes by I’m struck by how pervasive the “authoritarian” personality is. Quite remarkably they’ll moan and grizzle about how badly they’re been treated .. but when you point out that it’s the hierarchy and the misuse of power that fundamentally which is screwing them over … they leap to it’s defence.
I think its the “subservient/follower mentality”…the beaten slave (battered woman?) who nevertheless leaps to their master’s (husbands?) defence because that is all the options their identity and world view gives them.
The danger is when servants and followers of charismatic authoritarian figures energise en masse to enable real historical ugliness.
Look at the USA – Democrats under George Bush who hated the patriot act, hated state surveillance, hated drone strikes…are all supportive of exactly the same things under Obama. Bad news.
Authoritarianism marks and thrives in the absense of personal responsibility. And to save any grief … this is completely different to the supposed ‘lack of personal responsibility’ we hear touted as a mere distraction from systemic/cultural disadvantages/abuses that themselves have arisen and hold sway precisely because too many people have authoritarian traits…and that’s the very self same people who then tend to bang on about various victim’s ‘lack of personal responsibilty’.
Hope that makes sense….was a kind of long sentence 😉
No. Not necessarily ‘tooled up’ agents of state or corporate oppression. Just the people next door and down the road and next to you at work who defer without question to authority – they’re the authoritarians as much as the ‘tooled up’ monkeys of oppression, the pollies, CEOs and managers.
Travellerev, you are an alarmist and conspiracy nut and long before you had said jack shit about “ongoing”, commenters on online Physics forums were detailing exactly how and why, based on nothing more than the photos of the damage and their knowledge of reactor design.
Like a stopped clock, you are right twice a day. Congratulations.
And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music -Nietzsche
Let me give you the sheet music. You still won’t hear it but hey, you’ve got to start somewhere!
For the last two years 300 tons of water has been leaking (I would call that gushing but I’m sure you’d think that alarmist) into the Pacific ocean and TEPCO has finally admitted lying about it. Not only that they are now pumping water into the ocean while the pretense of containment is dropped as the true size of the meltdowns can no longer be denied. THERE SIMPLY IS NO CONTAINMENT!
Here is a nice animation of the predicted dispersion of radioactive Cs-137 over the next 10 years.
And if you think this is going to help mitigate the unfolding disaster ( I would go as far as calling it a slowly unfolding extinction event, particularly if the 3 reactor cooling bath no longer cools the MOX fuel rods) there really is no hope you’ll ever hear the music
Pointing out that you’ve got your central claim 100% wrong isn’t nitpicking, Ev. Fukushima is a disaster on many levels, but your apocolyptical shouting (a slowly unfolding extiction event!) adds nothing to our understanding of the actual damage done to the environment.
Agree with you about the tuna though. Meat is murder.
Reactor No 3 was using MOX fuel. That is around 2 million times more toxic than Uranium. Here is what happened in 2011. If you believe that those rods are safe and all is well in Fukushima you are one sad puppy and yes, a MOX fuel rd meltdown is an extinction event
I’m sure a standard meltdown is pretty FUBAR to but MOX fuel is a mix between Uranium and Pluto and the US feels it’s Japan’s job to burn that shit. I think the telling detail is that MOX is 2 million times more toxic than Uranium.
Good idea No. 2001.5. Bottle John Key’s personal fragrance and sell as a medicinal aid and performance enhancer – the John Key Super Relaxant. It releases all taut muscles, especially round the jaw and sphincter, relieves stress trauma and headaches, and in addition is a social aid as it prevents any disagreeable response caused by faux pas or unfortunate rudeness, all the time exuding a subtle aroma around the person which draws all into his ambit so ensuring the most favourable effect at every appearance.
A parcel or packet sent to you from overseas has been screened and assessed by NZ Customs, and is how being held (for ransom) by NZ Post pending customs release…
Revenue Type:
GST
Import Transaction Fee
GST on Import Transaction Fee
Bio-Security Levy
GST on Bio-security Levy
TOTAL
So having already purchased, what is not available for sale in NZ, and paid the shipping costs, I now have the pleasure of paying tax on a sale that would not have happened otherwise, as well as the import transaction fee + GST (WTF is that about) – How are import transaction fees, and levy’s classified such that they attract GST, anyone ?
Who at coloseum did their homework on premier league rights. Having secured live coverage for a pay per view style service with our dodgy broadband capacity and now sky has 4 of the top teams separately via a premier league rule that allows it.
Top teams get the bulk of viewers so looks like coloseum just had their wings clipped before takeoff.
Yes aware of that but as few people watch it live IMO this will erode the value of coluseum when you can watch the big teams with an existing sky connection and the highlights show is on tv1
“Make no mistake, our opposition comes from the far left of politics. The Greens are leading Labour by the nose. It’s important that New Zealanders understand what a Green-dominated government would look like. They want to tax you more, rack up more debt and make you work two more years before you can retire. They want a government department to run the entire electricity system, just like it did in the old days when we had blackouts. They want to stop oil, gas and mineral exploration that would create jobs and growth. They blame foreigners for all the ills of the country when our future prosperity lies in being open and connected to the rest of the world.
They even characterize businesses relocating jobs from Australia to New Zealand as ‘deeply worrying’. And they take petty, opportunistic political positions on national security in the face of the obvious need to clarify the GCSB law – a law they passed in the first place!
Well, I can tell you that as Prime Minister, I take the role of our agencies and my responsibilities in terms of national security, very, very seriously. And I always will. For our part, the National Party has a track record of sensible economic management and policies that actually make a difference to peoples’ lives. We are guided by the enduring values and principles of the National Party.
and more yadda yadda yadda in the same tone. *big fucking yawn* http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10911082
LolNats @Lol_Nats 2m
John Key said today his plan to help low income people into homes by giving wealthier people support to buy more expensive ones cant fail.
“Make no mistake, our opposition comes from the far left of politics.
Ah, the spin-meister. He’s so far out on a neoliberal, right wing, anti-democratic, govern for the corporates plutocracy – he thinks centre left is far left.
They want a government department to run the entire electricity system, just like it did in the old days when we had blackouts.
The bit he fails to mention is that we had brown outs due to low rainfall and that this was corrected by building more dams – before the market model took over.
National’s election campaign is already pretty clear. They are going to use the “centre vs hard left” meme for all it’s worth to try and frighten the horses. but that fact that you, me and uncle Tom Cobley can see what they are going to do doesn’t mean the museum exhibits that inhabit the upper reaches of the parliamentary labour party caucus will twig onto it in time to come up with a clever counter plan.
Yip given another term they will sell the lot. State (us) will own nothing. Private sector will be rubbing their hands with glee. Only way to stop them is getting people out to vote.
Just collected another 60 signatures (within the Auckland Central electorate) for the following petition:
“To National Party Member of Parliament for Auckland Central, Nikki Kaye :
“The will of the people is the basis of the authority of Government.”
We, the undersigned, call upon YOU, as an MP, to defend the lawful human rights of New Zealanders to privacy, freedom of association and freedom of expression – that is – to oppose arbitrary search and surveillance by the State over citizens.
If YOU, as an MP, vote for this GCSB Bill, which will allow widespread spying on New Zealanders, we, the undersigned hereby PLEDGE to campaign against your re-election in 2014, and to encourage our families, neighbours and workmates to do the same.”
______________________________________________________________________________
45 signatures to go and that will make ONE THOUSAND (1000) people who have PLEDGED to vote against Nikki Kaye if she votes for the GCSB Bill.
(Remember – Nikki Kaye has only a 717 vote majority in Auckland Central over Labour’s Jacinda Adern. )
Not a bad effort for basically TWO people?
Come on folks!
Give those MPs who are currently supporting the GCSB the one message they CAN’T ignore!
Signatures of angry voters PLEDGING to CAMPAIGN against them.
(Politicians understand ONE thing – VOTES…….. 🙂
Sample/ template petitions that can be used/ adapted/ whatever/ are available HERE!
Particularly would LOVE to see 1500 signatures delivered to Peter Dunne on Monday 19 August 2013 for the following:
“PETITION
To Independent MP for Ohariu Peter Dunne
“The will of the people is the basis of the authority of Government.”
We, the undersigned, call upon YOU, to defend the lawful human rights of New Zealanders to privacy, freedom of association and freedom of expression – that is – to oppose arbitrary search and surveillance by ‘BIG BROTHER’ State over citizens.
We note your public objections to the recent violations of your lawful rights to privacy, and look forward to consistency in your support for New Zealanders equal lawful rights to privacy.
If YOU, as an MP, vote for this GCSB Bill, which will allow widespread spying on New Zealanders, we, the undersigned hereby PLEDGE to campaign against your re-election in 2014, and to encourage our families, neighbours and workmates to do the same.
NAME ADDRESS SIGNED ”
___________________________________________________________________________
Remember!
It’s the masses who get off their asses that ‘make history’!
And – it’s REALLY easy to get signatures for these petitions………
‘So what do you teach?’ she asked as I worked on her presentation.
‘Computing’ I replied.
‘Oh… I guess these days you must find that the kids know more about computers than the teachers…’
Normally when someone spouts this rubbish I just nod and smile. This time I simply couldn’t let it pass. ‘Not really, most kids can’t use computers.’
I’ve found this to be true as well. His suggestion that kids fix the computer after they break them is similar to what I said in a seminar once that had people looking at me in horror. My suggestion to the person who had just said that he played games but couldn’t use a computer was to pull the PC apart and then put it back together. And then do it again and again.
There’s some unbelievable stories of computer incompetence at that link.
Having taught a range of people young and old, in my time, I have found that, contrary to popular belief, there are quite a few young people who are not very savvy at using computers.
Yet, still these days I come across people who automatically expect any young guy present to be better with computers than others.
Ask lprent how he thinks the young versus the ahem, not so young, do on computer systems.
Another thing to think about is how a lot of computer systems nowadays…eg Apple iOS and Android, have been designed to make computers into consumer appliances. Completely unlike the young nerds at school who used to edit batch files and autoexecs for DOS and under the hood of Windows 3.0…
Agree totally. These days relatively few people can give a coherent explanation of how computers really work … from the quantum mechanical explanation of how semiconductors function, through to how electronic circuits, logic and programmable arrays are built up, through to the structures of CPU’s, memory devices, graphics and various I/O channels, firmware, BIOS, OS’s and finally to networking, and the application layers.
When you step back and look at the entire intellectual and technical edifice it’s astonishing that it all works as well and as reliably as it does. Yet relatively few people have a decent grasp even of the broad picture, much less the specific details. (And I’m not claiming to be any kind of expert on any or all of it … just sufficiently educated and experienced to have dabbled with all the various bits of computing technology.)
The idea that some 14yr old is inherently smarter or more capable than an experienced professional or technical expert is just a risible nonsense.
The best comparison is how we used to laugh at our grandparents for whom the first telephones were an astonishing novelty … and how some of them never quite got past their tendency to speak very loudly and formally into the machine. It was easy to forget that they had lived in a time when communication was snailmail or telegrams at best.
I grew up at a time when the modern cell phone could not have been built in anything less than a large room full of hardware and I still have respect for the achievement they represent… yet today’s kids treat them with utter nonchalance. It is easy however to mistake this almost contemptuous familiarity with expertise. Not the same thing at all.
It fascinates me how quickly people adapt to technological changes. My first experience of a phone when I was very young, was the party line in our home. I would get told off if I picked up the handset when people somewhere else were having a conversation. Our only other electrical communications at home was a little radio.
TV, computers, mobile phones, etc, etc…. now all a very mundane part of my home & work world. I only have a very basic understanding of the way each of these technologies work. Though I have taken the lid off desk top pcs to do small mechanical maintenance – not really recommended with laptops.
I have been reading recently about the development of the telegraph, and the laying of undersea cables. It was partly trial and error getting the undersea cables to work – the right components and layers in the cables, correct weights etc. And that made a big difference to life, even though it was quite expensive first off to use.
It made a big difference for life in NZ – communicating throughout the country, and creating a sense of being part of the same nation – and much quicker information coming from overseas.
“It is easy however to mistake this almost contemptuous familiarity with expertise. Not the same thing at all.”
Yes that sums it up well.
It’s not just computers and phones either, people increasingly don’t know how anything works. Which both follows from and leads to not being able to make or fix anything.
Can’t disagree with your post AT ALL and the various responses having had (past tense) 25 yrs plus in the trade.
What amazes me is that I’m aware of a few people such as yourself (and even myself – now in the 50 plus age group) that are unemployed, or at least no longer employed in the IT sector. YET we constantly hear about various skill shortages. When one is registered with just about every agency in town, like various folk I know, the silence from those agencies is deafening.
Thankfully I’ve been able to de-programme, de-hex, de-assemble and have a bloody good lay down.
Ageism is absolutely rife in the industry. Last year I applied for a job for which I ticked every single box… at expert level. Zero response. Put in several unanswered calls and emails.
Advert still live a fortnight later. So I put the same CV in with a different name but edited to look 20yrs younger. Got a mad keen phone call within hours.
Had very similar experience(s), AND told them to shove it too.
Those agencies btw also have a habit of advertising non-existent, or already filled vacancies in order to get people ‘on their books’.
The other thing I find amusing is all that noise about the number of jobs advertised, based on the number of job adverts. You delve into it a bit and there are half a dozen different agencies advertising the same job (not limited to IT of course) – all clamouring to clip the ticket.
Phew.
I’m like almost everyone in regard to these machines.
One little thing though, why shouldn’t we leave the room, (or the house or the district,) while logged in somewhere? I do this all the time – the machine shuts down to power saving until I bring it back to life, often many hours later.
Apart from wasting power, what’s the problem?
It’s not a problem if there is no-one else who’s likely to use the machine in your absence.
But in a school or work environment where accountability of use and confidentiality of information is important … then you really don’t want someone else simply using the machine under your own user account.
And here is where the contemporary economics profession seems to be failing the most. The professional academic economist seems to take the tools of control and exploitation for granted. They are unquestionable facts of life that lie outside the economists’ proper field, at least as they now conceive that field. Economic education seems dedicated to the practice of status quo stabilization. The contemporary academic economist doesn’t seem particularly concerned with the various ways alternative ways an economy could be run; about the history of ways in which economic systems have been run; about how one such system evolves into another such system; or about the ways in which social mores, values and tastes evolve in conjunction with the evolution in economic systems. The economist seems to live in a fixed, abstract and peopleless landscape of the mind describing a fixed and providentially arranged world of interacting forces. For them, economics consists of a fundamentally good system running perpetually in natural equilibrium unless something very unusual, something perverse and weird and inexplicable, something called a “shock”, hits the system like an asteroid from outer space. When that happens, the economist is concerned above all to restore the system to its previous, psychologically comforting pattern of approved existence.
Are you out there Gower?
Did not see you stuffing a microphone up the nose of Collins or Joyce at the National Party Circus every ten seconds repeatedly asking if they were planning a coup against Key like you did to Cunliffe at the Labour party conference. No badgering like you did to Cunliffe until you got the perceived answer you wanted. Why not , please tell us, were you shit scared that you would have been told to fuck off or, is it that your masters and controllers instructed you not to rock the cosy right wing dream world boat.
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Some of our country’s most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a ‘get out of jail free’ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
The government's decision to reintroduce Three Strikes is a destructive and ineffective piece of law-making that will only exacerbate an inherently biased and racist criminal justice system, said Te Pāti Māori Justice Spokesperson, Tākuta Ferris, today. During the time Three Strikes was in place in Aotearoa, Māori and Pasifika received ...
Cuts to frontline hospital staff are not only a broken election promise, it shows the reckless tax cuts have well and truly hit the frontline of the health system, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
Te Pāti Māori is disgusted at the confirmation that hundreds are set to lose their jobs at Oranga Tamariki, and the disestablishment of the Treaty Response Unit. “This act of absolute carelessness and out of touch decision making is committing tamariki to state abuse.” Said Te Pāti Māori Oranga Tamariki ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi, and Mema Paremata mō Tāmaki-Makaurau, Takutai Tarsh Kemp, will travel to the Gold Coast to strengthen ties with Māori in Australia next week (15-21 April). The visit, in the lead-up to the 9th Australian National Kapa haka Festival, will be an opportunity for both ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Government’s democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
The National Government’s proposed changes to the Residential Tenancies Act will mean tenants can be turfed from their homes by landlords with little notice, Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said. ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson is calling on all parties to support a common-sense change that’s great for the planet and great for consumers after her member’s bill was drawn from the ballot today. ...
A significant milestone has been reached in the fight to strike an anti-Pasifika and unfair law from the country’s books after Teanau Tuiono’s members’ bill passed its first reading. ...
New Zealand has today missed the opportunity to uphold the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, says James Shaw after his member’s bill was voted down in its first reading. ...
Today’s advice from the Climate Change Commission paints a sobering reality of the challenge we face in combating climate change, especially in light of recent Government policy announcements. ...
Minister for Disability Issues Penny Simmonds appears to have delayed a report back to Cabinet on the progress New Zealand is making against international obligations for disabled New Zealanders. ...
Hundreds of New Zealand families affected by Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD) will benefit from a new Government focus on prevention and treatment, says Health Minister Dr Shane Reti. “We know FASD is a leading cause of preventable intellectual and neurodevelopmental disability in New Zealand,” Dr Reti says. “Every day, ...
Regional Development Minister Shane Jones today attended the official opening of Kaikohe’s new $14.7 million sports complex. “The completion of the Kaikohe Multi Sports Complex is a fantastic achievement for the Far North,” Mr Jones says. “This facility not only fulfils a long-held dream for local athletes, but also creates ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters’ engagements in Türkiye this week underlined the importance of diplomacy to meet growing global challenges. “Returning to the Gallipoli Peninsula to represent New Zealand at Anzac commemorations was a sombre reminder of the critical importance of diplomacy for de-escalating conflicts and easing tensions,” Mr Peters ...
Ambassador Millar, Burgemeester, Vandepitte, Excellencies, military representatives, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen – good morning and welcome to this sacred Anzac Day dawn service. It is an honour to be here on behalf of the Government and people of New Zealand at Buttes New British Cemetery, Polygon Wood – a deeply ...
Distinguished guests - It is an honour to return once again to this site which, as the resting place for so many of our war-dead, has become a sacred place for generations of New Zealanders. Our presence here and at the other special spaces of Gallipoli is made ...
Mai ia tawhiti pamamao, te moana nui a Kiwa, kua tae whakaiti mai matou, ki to koutou papa whenua. No koutou te tapuwae, no matou te tapuwae, kua honoa pumautia. Ko nga toa kua hinga nei, o te Waipounamu, o te Ika a Maui, he okioki tahi me o ...
Paul Goldsmith will take on responsibility for the Media and Communications portfolio, while Louise Upston will pick up the Disability Issues portfolio, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon announced today. “Our Government is relentlessly focused on getting New Zealand back on track. As issues change in prominence, I plan to adjust Ministerial ...
Recreational catch limits will be reduced in areas of Fiordland and the Chatham Islands to help keep those fisheries healthy and sustainable, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The lower recreational daily catch limits for a range of finfish and shellfish species caught in the Fiordland Marine Area and ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed an important milestone in New Zealand’s hydrogen future, with the opening of the country’s first network of hydrogen refuelling stations in Wiri. “I want to congratulate the team at Hiringa Energy and its partners K one W one (K1W1), Mitsui & Co New Zealand ...
The coalition Government is delivering on its commitment to improve resource management laws and give greater certainty to consent applicants, with a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) expected to be introduced to Parliament next month. RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop has today outlined the first RMA Amendment ...
Overseas models for regulating the oil and gas sector, including their decommissioning regimes, are being carefully scrutinised as a potential template for New Zealand’s own sector, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. The Coalition Government is focused on rebuilding investor confidence in New Zealand’s energy sector as it looks to strengthen ...
Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell has today released the Report of the Government Inquiry into the response to the North Island Severe Weather Events. “The report shows that New Zealand’s emergency management system is not fit-for-purpose and there are some significant gaps we need to address,” Mr Mitchell ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith is today travelling to Europe where he’ll update the United Nations Human Rights Council on the Government’s work to restore law and order. “Attending the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva provides us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while ...
Associate Agriculture Minister, Mark Patterson, formally reopened the world’s largest wool processing facility today in Awatoto, Napier, following a $50 million rebuild and refurbishment project. “The reopening of this facility will significantly lift the economic opportunities available to New Zealand’s wool sector, which already accounts for 20 per cent of ...
Hon Andrew Bayly, Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing At the Southland Otago Regional Engineering Collective (SOREC) Summit, 18 April, Dunedin Ngā mihi nui, Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Ko Whanganui aho Good Afternoon and thank you for inviting me to open your summit today. I am delighted ...
The Government is delivering on its commitment to bring back the Three Strikes legislation, Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee announced today. “Our Government is committed to restoring law and order and enforcing appropriate consequences on criminals. We are making it clear that repeat serious violent or sexual offending is not ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has today announced four new diplomatic appointments for New Zealand’s overseas missions. “Our diplomats have a vital role in maintaining and protecting New Zealand’s interests around the world,” Mr Peters says. “I am pleased to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the ...
New Zealand is contributing NZ$7 million to support communities affected by severe food insecurity and other urgent humanitarian needs in Ethiopia and Somalia, Foreign Minister Rt Hon Winston Peters announced today. “Over 21 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance across Ethiopia, with a further 6.9 million people ...
Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Paul Goldsmith is congratulating Mataaho Collective for winning the Golden Lion for best participant in the main exhibition at the Venice Biennale. "Congratulations to the Mataaho Collective for winning one of the world's most prestigious art prizes at the Venice Biennale. “It is good ...
The Government is reforming financial services to improve access to home loans and other lending, and strengthen customer protections, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly and Housing Minister Chris Bishop announced today. “Our coalition Government is committed to rebuilding the economy and making life simpler by cutting red tape. We are ...
“China remains a strong commercial opportunity for Kiwi exporters as Chinese businesses and consumers continue to value our high-quality safe produce,” Trade and Agriculture Minister Todd McClay says. Mr McClay has returned to New Zealand following visits to Beijing, Harbin and Shanghai where he met ministers, governors and mayors and engaged in trade and agricultural events with the New ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has completed a successful trip to Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, deepening relationships and capitalising on opportunities. Mr Luxon was accompanied by a business delegation and says the choice of countries represents the priority the New Zealand Government places on South East Asia, and our relationships in ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. “Recently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
A stopbank upgrade project in Tairawhiti partly funded by the Government has increased flood resilience for around 7000ha of residential and horticultural land so far, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones today attended a dawn service in Gisborne to mark the end of the first stage of the ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters will represent the Government at Anzac Day commemorations on the Gallipoli Peninsula next week and engage with senior representatives of the Turkish government in Istanbul. “The Gallipoli campaign is a defining event in our history. It will be a privilege to share the occasion ...
Science, Innovation and Technology and Defence Minister Judith Collins will next week attend the OECD Science and Technology Ministerial conference in Paris and Anzac Day commemorations in Belgium. “Science, innovation and technology have a major role to play in rebuilding our economy and achieving better health, environmental and social outcomes ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with the President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The Prime Minister was accompanied by MP Paulo Garcia, the first Filipino to be elected to a legislature outside the Philippines. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon and President Marcos Jr discussed opportunities to ...
The Government has announced that $20 million in funding will be made available to Westport to fund much needed flood protection around the town. This measure will significantly improve the resilience of the community, says Local Government Minister Simeon Brown. “The Westport community has already been allocated almost $3 million ...
The Government is proud to support the first ever Repco Supercars Championship event in Taupō as up to 70,000 motorsport fans attend the Taupō International Motorsport Park this weekend, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. “Anticipation for the ITM Taupō Super400 is huge, with tickets and accommodation selling out weeks ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced an increase to the Rates Rebate Scheme, putting money back into the pockets of low-income homeowners. “The coalition Government is committed to bringing down the cost of living for New Zealanders. That includes targeted support for those Kiwis who are doing things tough, such ...
The Coalition Government is investing in a project to boost survival rates of New Zealand mussels and grow the industry, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones has announced. “This project seeks to increase the resilience of our mussels and significantly boost the sector’s productivity,” Mr Jones says. “The project - ...
Benefit figures released today underscore the importance of the Government’s plan to rebuild the economy and have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker Support, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “Benefit numbers are still significantly higher than when National was last in government, when there was about 70,000 fewer ...
The Government’s commitment to doubling New Zealand’s renewable energy capacity is backed by new data showing that clean energy has helped the country reach its lowest annual gross emissions since 1999, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand’s latest Greenhouse Gas Inventory (1990-2022) published today, shows gross emissions fell ...
The Government is bringing the earthquake-prone building review forward, with work to start immediately, and extending the deadline for remediations by four years, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “Our Government is focused on rebuilding the economy. A key part of our plan is to cut red tape that ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and his Thai counterpart, Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, have today agreed that New Zealand and the Kingdom of Thailand will upgrade the bilateral relationship to a Strategic Partnership by 2026. “New Zealand and Thailand have a lot to offer each other. We have a strong mutual desire to build ...
RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Transport Minister Simeon Brown have today announced the Coalition Government’s intention to extend port coastal permits for a further 20 years, providing port operators with certainty to continue their operations. “The introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991 required ports to obtain coastal ...
Today’s announcement that inflation is down to 4 per cent is encouraging news for Kiwis, but there is more work to be done - underlining the importance of the Government’s plan to get the economy back on track, acting Finance Minister Chris Bishop says. “Inflation is now at 4 per ...
Asia Pacific Report From France to Australia, university pro-Palestine protests in the United States have now spread to several countries with students pitching on-campus camps. And students at Columbia and other US universities remain defiant as campuses have witnessed the biggest protests since the anti-Vietnam war and anti-apartheid eras in ...
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards, Democracy Project (https://democracyproject.nz)New Zealand Government’s Fast Track legislation. Many criticisms are being made of the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill, including by this writer. But as with everything in politics, every story has two sides, and both deserve attention. It’s important to understand what the Government ...
Tara Ward talks to presenter Naomi Toilalo about the new TV show that turns food waste into a three course feast. Naomi Toilalo is standing in the warehouse at Good Neighbour Tauranga, helping unpack the two-and-a-half tonnes of rejected food that will arrive at the community support hub that day. ...
Scout is our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Scout’s human, Avril, for her support. Dog name: Scout (named after the little girl in To Kill a Mockingbird – she inherited the independent spirit ...
Megan Alatini takes us through her life in TV, including ‘terrible’ daytime TV, the class of Carol Hirschfeld and her most embarrassing TrueBliss moment. When she responded to a vague newspaper ad asking “do you have what it takes to be a popstar?” 25 years ago, Megan Alatini never guessed ...
A new exhibition in Wellington showcases the faces behind your local goods and services. Back in 1977, when I was a fine arts student at the University of Canterbury, I took a series of photographs of Christchurch shopkeepers. The photos were for a calendar – a project for my end ...
Toomaj and his resistance to tyranny through his songs have become an icon for the youth of Iran, so his sentence has hit the nation hard. Toomaj Salehi is not the first artist to pay the price for standing with the people. ...
My cousin Dylan and I spotted these big eels under the bridge that summer. We watched them lounging under the dark weed, facing into the flow of water, their mouths frozen open. Dylan and I couldn’t stop thinking about those eels. The night we went down to the creek, we ...
Newsroom, home of satire. My long-running weekly satirical series The Secret Diary has moved to Newsroom and will appear every Saturday, with Victor Billot’s wildly popular satirical Odes continuing to appear every Sunday. Diaries, Odes – while serious political columnists toil at meaningful opinions and stroke their chins to an ...
Tara Ward unravels the many nuanced layers of a cartoon about talking dogs.This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. It’s not often an episode of a children’s cartoon has adults sobbing into their sleeves, but that’s exactly what happened this week when ...
Working as a doctor in developing countries to help communities achieve better health outcomes is nothing short of a life goal for Jessica Tater. The University of Otago medical student has her sights firmly set on joining the international humanitarian organisation Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) when she qualifies ...
There’s an island in the far reaches of Auckland’s territory, sitting off the tip of the Coromandel Peninsula, 30 minutes by air from the city or four hours on the slow boat. Aotea Great Barrier is off-grid, it has a population of fewer than a thousand people … and most ...
Asia Pacific Report An Australian author and advocate, Jim Aubrey, today led a national symbolic one minute’s silence to mark the “blood debt” owed to Papuan allies during the Second World War indigenous resistance against the invading Japanese forces. “A promise to most people is a promise,” Aubrey said in ...
Asia Pacific Report The Freedom Flotilla is ready to sail to Gaza, reports Kia Ora Gaza. All the required paperwork has been submitted to the port authority, and the cargo has been loaded and prepared for the humanitarian trip to the besieged enclave. However, organisers received word of an “administrative ...
Pacific Media Watch Palestine solidarity protesters today demonstrated at the Auckland headquarters of Television New Zealand, accusing the country’s major TV network of broadcasting “propaganda” backing Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. About 50 protesters targeted the main entrance to the TVNZ building near Sky Tower and also picketed a side ...
Opinion by Lynley Hood. Forty years on from my 1985 Fulbright Grant, my disquiet over the war in Gaza evoked some troubling questions. The answer to my first question – What is the primary purpose of the Fulbright Programme? – was on the Fulbright NZ website. It says: US Senator, ...
The ministers responsible for green-lighting major projects need to be open about potential conflicts of interest, says Transparency International. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anastasia Powell, Professor, Family and Sexual Violence, RMIT University It has been a particularly distressing start to the year. There is little that can ease the current grief of individuals, families and communities who have needlessly lost a loved one to men’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gregory Moore, Senior Research Associate, School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences, The University of Melbourne Lichen, the first described example of symbiosis.AdeJ Artventure/Shutterstock Once known only to those studying biology, the word symbiosis is now widely used. Symbiosis is the intimate ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kim Hemsley, Head, Childhood Dementia Research Group, Flinders Health and Medical Research Institute, College of Medicine and Public Health, Flinders University Olena Ivanova/Shutterstock “Childhood” and “dementia” are two words we wish we didn’t have to use together. But sadly, around 1,400 ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Whiteford, Professor, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University The government’s Economic Inclusion Advisory Committee has just published its second report. It was set up by Treasurer Jim Chalmers and Minister for Social Services Amanda Rishworth in 2022 to provide: ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne The Queensland state election will be held in October. A YouGov poll for The Courier Mail, conducted April 9–17 from a sample ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Naeni, PhD candidate at Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University There’s been much talk in recent months about what a possible second Donald Trump presidency in the United States could mean for Europe, Russia’s war in Ukraine, the ...
A brief round-up of submissions on the controversial proposed law. This is an excerpt from our weekly environmental newsletter Future Proof. Sign up here. Last week, submissions on the controversial Fast-track Approvals Bill closed just hours after the government released a list of stakeholder organisations who were sent letters advising how they could ...
A poem from Robin Peace’s new collection Detritus of Empire: feather / grass / rock. Cereal giving I see a woman’s hands, see her curious hands break a stalk as she walks through the tall prairie, the savannah, the steppe, wherever it was. See her idly bite the grass that ...
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 Hemingway’s Goblet by Dermot Ross (Mary Egan Publishing, $38)A handsomely produced (debossed cover, lovely ...
The Commissioner's decision validates the longstanding efforts of the local community and ensures that Awataha Marae will be managed to serve the needs of the local community, particularly for hosting tangihanga. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tristan Salles, Associate professor, University of Sydney Examples of Australian landscapes.Unsplash Seventy thousand years ago, the sea level was much lower than today. Australia, along with New Guinea and Tasmania, formed a connected landmass known as Sahul. Around this time – ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Felicity Castagna, Lecturer, Creative Writing, Western Sydney University Day Day Market, ParramattaPhoto: Garry Trinh I live on the edge of Parramatta, Australia’s fastest-growing city, on the kind of old-fashioned suburban street that has 1950s fibros constructed in the post-war housing boom, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Ryan, Teaching Fellow in Economics, University of Waikato GettyImagesfatido/Getty Images There is an ongoing global debate over whether the high inflation seen in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic can be lowered without a recession. New Zealand is not ...
The ‘Wicked Game’ heartthrob is in his late 60s now. That didn’t stop him putting on a lively, goofy and very sparkly show. Apart from ‘Wicked Game’, which graces a sultry playlist of mine simply called 💋, my last sustained Chris Isaak listening session took place when I was about ...
Analysis - Two ministers were stripped of portfolios in a warning to Cabinet, drama broke out at the Waitangi Tribunal, and the gang patch ban bill ran into opposition. ...
Tara Ward makes an impassioned plea for some vital pop culture merch. In April 1999, I became obsessed with a new reality television show called Popstars. Every Tuesday night, five strangers transformed into music royalty before my very eyes as Joe, Keri, Carly, Erika and Megan were chosen to form ...
PNG Post-Courier In the early hours of ANZAC Day, aerial photographs captured an impressive gathering of Australians and Papua New Guineans at Isurava in the Northern (Oro) Province. The solemn dawn service yesterday was held at a site steeped in history, where some of the fiercest battles of World War ...
The PSA is shocked that Oranga Tamariki has used the cost cutting drive to downgrade its commitment to Te Ao Māori and remove many specialist Māori roles. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Kemish, Adjunct Professor, School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry, The University of Queensland There can be no more powerful symbol of the relationship between Australia and Papua New Guinea than the prime ministers of these neighbouring countries walking together on the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sharon Robinson, Distinguished Professor and Deputy Director of ARC Securing Antarctica’s Environmental Future (SAEF), University of Wollongong, University of Wollongong Andrew Netherwood Over the last 25 years, the ozone hole which forming over Antarctica each spring has started to shrink. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Viktoria Kahui, Senior Lecturer in Environmental Economics, University of Otago Getty Images/Amy Toensing Biodiversity is declining at rates unprecedented in human history. This suggests the ways we currently use to manage our natural environment are failing. One emerging concept focuses on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Timothy Colin Bednall, Associate Professor in Management, Swinburne University of Technology marvent/Shutterstock Finding the best person to fill a position can be tough, from drafting a job ad to producing a shortlist of top interview candidates. Employers typically consider information from ...
Wondering where to host your next BYO? Whether its a small gathering or a massive party, we’ve got some recommendations. I was first introduced to the concept of BYOs at Dunedin’s India Gardens, a legendary but sadly defunct establishment, which purveyed enormous quantities of mango chicken to Aotearoa’s drunkest future ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Julien Cooper, Honorary Lecturer, Department of History and Archaeology, Macquarie University Julien Cooper The hyper-arid desert of Eastern Sudan, the Atbai Desert, seems like an unlikely place to find evidence of ancient cattle herders. But in this dry environment, my new ...
The sector says it’s hopeful her replacement Paul Goldsmith will be able to throw it a lifeline, after six months with a minister deemed missing in action, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign ...
The government can't just rely on axing public sector jobs and has to do more to cut spending, says the chief economist at a free market think tank. ...
Rock The Vote NZ, known for its advocacy for minor party unity and its role within the Freedoms NZ Coalition during the 2023 General Election, celebrates this merger as a strategic enhancement of its operational strength and outreach. ...
Nearly everyone has experienced the frustration of something you use breaking and being difficult or expensive to fix. Proposed legislation could change that. It’s been raining on and off all Sunday afternoon but people are lining up outside a building in a corner of Gribblehirst Park in Sandringham, Auckland. In ...
What does a forever relationship look like when you don’t believe in marriage? And how do you celebrate it? This essay is part of our Sunday Essay series, made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.I’m going to do it, right now. I’m going to say ...
It’s not that long ago Eliza McCartney was seriously wondering if the Paris Olympics would be her pole vaulting swansong. After years of being hounded by injury after injury, the Rio Olympics bronze medallist was still confident she would compete at her second Olympics in Paris in July, unless something ...
FICTION 1 Take Two by Danielle Hawkins (Allen & Unwin, $36.99) There’s commercial fiction, like this book, and then there’s quality fiction, quality writers, quality literature; the forthcoming Auckland Writers Festival is full of quality, and ReadingRoom has two tickets to give away to the following events: Paul Lynch (Dublin ...
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You can’t have missed the Gallipoli story as the movies, documentaries, essays and books capture what it was like for New Zealand troops in their eight-month campaign on the Peninsula. But this Anzac Day the Auckland War Memorial Museum has published a book that sheds light on a little-known aspect of the ...
The Prime Minister has committed to resuming direct flights to Thailand. But it’s not a promise he will be able to deliver on anytime soon. The post Prime Minister jumps the gun in Thailand appeared first on Newsroom. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra In the free-for-all between the Australian government and Big Tech boss Elon Musk this week, the government had to be on a winner. Most people would have little sympathy with Musk’s vociferous opposition to ...
Re the Teina Pora travesty:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10911006
Who the hell is Bevan Hurley ? Clearly a jonolist
Grant Hobbs seems to see the tragedy here as being in the loss of a potentially good rugby player, not in Pora’s loss of his life and liberty. Even when they try to say something worthwhile, these sort of people just make me shake my head.
Why is Hurley a jonolist ? Because Collins did NOT add her name to the list of people calling into question the convictions which have had this boy a murderer and a rapist for the past 20 years.
One comment that he “could be innocent…..” does not qualify Bevan. You misrepresent Collins’ demeanour. At the very best her position has softened to “Oh well we’ll see……..not boverred really.”
The comments of Peter Williams QC are more to the point – Teina Pora could be out of prison now were our justice system not the fiefdom of Justice Sow who doesn’t actually give a stuff.
She might be seen to give a stuff in time but that will be according to how she will do out of the issue – forget about Teina the boy now the man.
Where does one get the “Free Teina Pora” teeshirts ?
@ North
http://www.illicit.co.nz is where TDB says you can get a “Free Teina” T-shirt. I’d get one myself except it’s rare that I have a spare $28, though at least $8 of that goes into a trust for the Pora family.
Link (to TDB): http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2013/08/08/its-time-free-teina-pora/
Thanks P.
Down the Rabbit Hole:
“…Mr Key’s superstitious habit of repeating “white rabbits, white rabbits, white rabbits”, on the first of each month. The early morning ritual is believed to bring luck, he said yesterday. Mr Key admits he has visibly aged over the past five years as prime minister. It “comes with the job”. ”
Link (hat-tip to Eddie): http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/9025151/Today-in-politics-Saturday-August-10
I commented on this yesterday (in the; “What a Dick”, post), it doesn’t seem to be satire; just very peculiar coming, as it does, from Fearfacts. Also, I tried to link this particular compulsion with ShonKey’s compulsive; lying & gambling, by way of OCD, but in retrospect that didn’t really work.
The above statement first attributed to Joseph Goebbels and recently resurrected by those calling for more powers for the GCSB and the NSA is a lie.
You may have nothing to hide, but what about your neighbors and your friends?
What about your work colleagues?
At least one of them, will have something that they don’t want you, or others to know about. This makes them vulnerable to those who seek to know everyone’s secrets. This is how the surveillance state of East Germany worked. The Stasi exploited the foibles of the vulnerable. The Stasi were able to get friend to spy on friend. They were able to get neighbor to smear and spread gossip against neighbor. At work they were able to block your promotion and the progress of your career if they didn’t like your political views.
How? The Stasi knew all the secrets of your managers and indeed of the company itself.
Do we really want to give our secret security forces these powers?
Do we really trust them that much?
Are the anonymous and secretive men and women who run our own secret agencies of such high moral standing and trustworthiness to have access to the secrets of a whole population that metadata spying will give them? Do we really trust them to hold that much power over us?
The East German secret police, the Stasi were able to spread fear and paranoia and suspicion and keep under subjection a whole population for 40 years.
Through mass surveillance the Stasi were able to intimidate everybody. How?
They knew everybody’s secrets.
Do we really want to give our secret agencies this power?
Are we really sure that they won’t abuse them?
Recent events seem to say no.
You may have nothing to hide. But you have everything to fear from those who do.
Apart from your friends, neighbors and colleagues who may have secrets….
At the top of the list are the most fearsome of those with something to hide.
Who guard their own secrets most obsessively.
Who are prepared to go to extreme lengths to protect their secrets from any who dare threaten to expose theim.
These people are the secret security services themselves.
If the supporters of the NSA and GCSB truly believed, “If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear”. Then they would release Bradly Manning. They should drop their persecution of Julien Assange and abandon their international manhunt against Edward Snowden.
Nothing to fear nothing to hide. Yeah right.
The easiest way to cut through this bs is to ask anyone spouting it to allow you access to their computer history. Men especially will baulk.
First Lavabit, now a second US-based encryption-based secure email company founder ethically chooses to close rather than offer up all its customers to surveillance … his comments are a must read ..
http://gigaom.com/2013/08/09/another-u-s-secure-email-service-shuts-down-to-protect-customers-from-authorities/
RSA cryptography, based on the products of huge prime numbers, is practically uncrackable. There are two routes that are being followed by the US and allied governments to get around this. One is that they will persecute anyone offering it, and perhaps even make it illegal. The other is research into quantum computing. Using Shor’s algorithm, quantum computers, which don’t really exist yet, can factorise the products and break the codes. The US and Australian governments spend hundreds of millions (at least) on the research, which as far as I can see is directly designed to let them spy on us. I do not work on it, but have colleagues who do. Some of them even consider themselves to be socialist warriors in the struggle for a better world. My opinion of them is not quite so high.
Quantum cryptography, on the other hand, is completely unbreakable. In fact, you can tell if someone has even had a look. It is used commercially by some Swiss financial institutions. It would be difficult, but not impossible, to set it up for normal use. I suspect it would be made illegal as soon as someone looked like doing that, so it’s likely to remain the preserve of governments and corrupt financial institutions for a while yet.
I’d like to add that Stasi was continuing the great tradition of German governments spying on its own people and German citizens – neigbours, friends, family members spying on each other, starting with the Nazi Germany where any dissenters and critics of the regime were disposed of promptly and permanently.
Nope.
The content of the communications is secondary. The primary is peoples social and business networks. The collection of metadata will expose those networks and once exposed they can be broken. This is, IMO, why the government wants to collect the metadata and so it should not be allowed.
In other words, “If you play by our rules then you can trust us to leave you alone.”
Can’t recall who said it but this sums it up perfectly……..
“Nothing to hide nothing to fear !”
“Well…….you don’t need ANY rights then, do you ?”
Indeed. North. Indeed. Isn’t this the same government that has been weakening the right to silence by those charged by the police?
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10685442
No right to privacy.
No right to silence
No protection from self incrimination under duress.
A few slaps, a couple of kicks.
From there but a small step to the almost 100% police conviction rate in Communist China’s Orwellian court system.
All it needs to complete the picture is a compliant media automatically and covertly monitored 24/7 by the state, too intimidated to speak up, all their phone calls and movements traced and recorded for later reference.
Oh that’s right. They already do.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/8853155/Journalists-movements-tracked-by-leak-inquiry
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/8972743/US-spy-agencies-eavesdrop-on-Kiwi
Is this why most of our MSM journalists give this overbearing and intrusive right wing administration such a free ride when in comparison the same journalists publicly and unrelentedly caned the Clark administration for weeks for trying to regulate energy efficient lightbulbs over incandescent lamps. Until they forced Labour to drop it?
Will they ever run out of wet bus tickets?
Hey how’s the Arab Spring going in Libya? I heard the country is disintegrating into armed tribal factions, the western corporations are looting Libya’s gold, oil and other natural resources, while the advanced healthcare and education systems Gadaffi set up for his people are being run down.
Nomination for ‘jonolism’ today
Tracy Watkins for this article. “Nats take hurdles in stride”
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/9027528/Nats-take-hurdles-in-stride
With such gems as the following…
“But as ministers turned the lights out on a week of endless Beehive crisis meetings and headed for Nelson and the party’s annual conference, there was a sense the situation was at least under control.”
Then quoting Judith Collins and not questioning in any way this outrageous statement.
“We’ve learnt to be very upfront and straight out fronting issues.”
This government ..upfront about issues?
Actually, a lapdog media is one of the biggest reasons why this government continually escapes crisis after crisis. ‘Jonolists’ like Tracy Watkins do the 4th estate a disservice. They do the work of big corporates very well.
The media in this country sucks.
yes, its interesting how the media are treating The National Party Conference versus how they treated The Labour Party Conference in November.
Peter Goodfellow (President of National) and family own a huge slice of Sanford fishing (via Amalgamated Dairies Ltd), perhaps the media should be digging to see whether the recreational snapper limit cuts have something to do with him and more National cronyism. I would think so.
Has any accredited journo sighted any media harassment and intimidation of a Nat. MP with a view to forcing them to say something that could be misconstrued by others as a challenge to the leader? You know… walking backwards around the conference venue with a camera lens permanently shoved in their face and asking the same question over and over again until they got something… then behaving like school yard pimps by running off to the leadership telling petty tales out of school?
No, to all of your questions Anne!
However, this has just popped up on Stuff from Andrea Vance from the Nat conference
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/opinion/9028228/Nats-goodie-bag-shows-battles-lines-drawn
Hidden quite a way down is this
Joyce wasn’t the only senior Nat indulging their naughty side at this weekend’s Nelson event. The simmering unofficial leadership struggle between Joyce and justice minister Judith Collins will take a new turn this morning as the matriarch appears on TVNZ alongside Key.
While outward appearances were of a rigorously choreographed agenda, delegates were furiously whispering about her decision yesterday.
The party and her senior minister colleagues were spitting tacks about the brazen move. Given the policy announcements carefully lined-up by party strategists, it should have been a moment for Joyce to shine, alongside housing minister Nick Smith and environment minister Amy Adams.
For whatever the talk show topic, the appearance raises the spectre of Collins’ ambitions to take charge of the party.
National don’t have the same leadership woes currently plaguing Labour. The question of who will succeed John Key is a perennial curiosity.
But it’s largely academic, for now. …
G.. help us all if Collins gets the leadership. OTH, I cannot see her having the blind faith followers that Key has had.
In reference to Nationals RMA tampering, especially with relevance to Auckland, speeding up the building consents process, looks very problematic. There are a lot of powerful people opposed to moves of allowing multi level dwellings being built in urban areas of the City. All worried their swanky suburbs are going to be down valued with affordable apartments popping up everywhere.
Concerns of views being blocked and commoner tenants inhabited their posh streets. Interesting to see how many switch to ACT?
I don’t think the New Zealand public will view the rise of ACT in the polls positively if that’s the case. National would not like the bad perception that brings. Which of course we on the Left, promote as a third term Nact Government is going to reveal their true nasty right-wing ideological master plans.
What do you think?
Collins will have her followers. The sort of troglodytes who write in the sewer blogs worship her with a sexual passion. On the positive side, I think she’d take NAct back to its core voters, with the same percentages that Brash got, those who like their racism and bigotry strident rather than casual. I don’t think even Crosby Textor could sell her to a much wider audience.
Yep, she’ll only ever be a hit with the extremists. She’ll never make it with the ordinary apolitical bbq dickheads that have won the last two elections for Key.
Ideologically and morally I don’t think the two of them are far apart, one just seems to be better at hiding it.
And that’s the nub. To quote Chris Trotter, Key is the greatest political salesman this country has ever seen. With Key gone, the current National Party ideology has much the same shelf-life as NZ1 without Winston.
Thank goodness that Labour has a clear political ideology set and ready to walk all over them, then.
ooops…. yes.
We have a problem Houston. (And I’m old enough to remember hearing that live…)
Does anyone else out there think that Key is sounding like an automaton at this conference. Just reading the words, going through the motions?
Beardy, last night on 3 news it looked like he had fallen asleep at the speakers table and then blearily woke up and had that “What?! Where I am I? What am I doing?!” look about him.
He must be all like “I’m soooo over this job”
Waiting for his exile to Hawaii
I saw that-he looked completely knackered/bored.
All these late night texting sessions with Fonterra, GCSB, NSA, Warner Bros. and the FBI must be wearing him out.
Ha! 3 News on who has Nat leadership ambitions tonight:
Collins is obviously interest – no denials, just that she will be one among many:
Joyce said what Key said a couple of months before rolling Brash – “there is no vacancy right now”.
Paula Benefit outs herself over her crush on Key.
Brownlee looks so overcome by the wonderfulness of imagining himself as PM, he’s a stuttering school boy.
Simon Bridges tries to sound coy about his ambitions.
My view on Nationals next leader, once Key decides to call it a day.
Collins – next National Leader, has the drive and ambition and presence
natural leader.
Joyce – not interested can achieve more as number 2
Paula Bennett – maybe in another 10 years, if still around
Brownlee – been around long enough, knows his strengths and weakness,realizes he doesn’t have the drive or enthusiasm to be leader.
Much better being in the top echelon rather than running the show.
Simon Bridges -see Bennett
BAAAARRRRFFFFF…BAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRFFFFFFFF…..sorry BM, just throwing-up over the thought of your choices.
“Collins – next National Leader, has the drive and ambition and presence
natural leader.”
lolz. The way to spot a natural leader is that they have natural followers (and no, paying someone to campaign for you doesn’t count as natural)
Collins seems to inspire the black leather steel buckled boot heel licking amongst right wing followers
She’s one sexy woman, check her out taking a swim.
http://500px.com/photo/2854399
She is the fish in that photo.
All these late night texting sessions with Fonterra, GCSB, NSA, Warner Bros. and the FBI must be wearing him out.
I agree Anne. The way we run politics in this country places an insane burden on the PM.
No matter who has the job, or what I think of their politics … you have to have some respect for the sheer brain-crushing workload they have taken on.
Must admit there was a hint of sarcasm in the outfits I [claim] he was texting, but take your point RedLogix. I saw Helen Clark last Sunday at a function and she looked stunning – 20 years younger.
I can’t help but feel a bit sorry for him. Many of the problems that he is facing now are not his doing.
Poor guy, its sad to hear that those years of fun photo ops didn’t help in governing the country.
Someone should have said something.
They didn’t like to felix. Bursting the happy bubble would’ve hurt him.
The Fourth Estate has self-corrupted into the Fart Estate.
These sociopaths in power are undeniably deviously tricky, every now and then I refer back to chapters of the book Hollow Men, just to refresh my memory. The smoke & mirrors game playing really is shocking.
Government in control over milk powder crisis, mooted reduction in recreational fishers quota, squashed. Sense distraction over GCSB bill, smelter subsidy to prop up power shares/float, Housing crisis ( major spin announced later today). And that Stuff article highlights the start of an attack to wipe Winston Peters out for good in 2014.
How? John Key has started publicly stalking Winston Peters (Key’s principles when it comes to Peters remain-don’t be fooled).
Last elections late supporters, (& the way Key is flaunting a welcome mat) some loyal supporters are not willing to gamble Peters will join a coalition with Labour/Green, they want certainty. All this is increasing the negative effect on NZF’s support.
Key the smiling assassin will be grinning at NZF currently polling down on 3%. But it will be a ‘nervous’ smile. Winston earlier in the week rubbed Key’s nose in it, with fresh allegations of illegal spying of him during the cup of tea saga, which got NZF back into parliament.
Wonder if Key has nightmares of Peters speech opposing the GCSB bill the other day, which was classic “spy’s lies and alibis.”
Tracy Watkins has consistently shown herself to be a cheerleader and apologist for the National Government. In particular, in the past she has written articles about Key, and barely been able to contain her gushing admiration for the slime ball. Maybe in years to come she will look back on them with deep embarrassment and see that she sounded like a 15 year school girl with her first big crush. I kind of feel sorry for her. She needs an aunty in her life to tell her about bad men.
“She needs an aunty in her life to tell her about bad men.”
True. As long as the Aunty is not Paula Bennett, did you see her crush giggle on 3News when she was pretending she wasn’t looking at the top job?
It gets worse, this just published in the herald on line.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10911079
Government Tackles Affordability by Audrey young
“In order to currently qualify for Government assistance of a $5000 deposit, the most a couple may jointly earn is $100,000. That threshold will be increased to $120,000.”
“The house price caps will be adjusted upwards as well, with the Auckland cap of $400,000 rising to $485,000.”
So under the heading “Government Tackles Affordability”, the government has merely provided assistance to slightly wealthier people…is this for real? How the hell does this tackle affordability…come on Audrey Young, do some analysis. Couldnt she just pick up the phone and call Twyford to see what his view was…or would that wreck it for her? (I think her father was a National Party MP?)
Her brother is a National MP. Jonothan Young in New Plymouth… or is it Palmerston North? Its one of them.
Brilliant, a boost to the first home vendors scheme. Now every property flipper can boost their asking price up another $5K of tax payer funded largesse.
$5,000 towards a deposit of $97,000. Whoopedydoodah!
Yes, her father was a Nat MP, Venn Young. Served in Muldoon’s cabinet from memory – not 100% sure about that.
Yes, Venn Young, the author of the first homosexual law reform measure to come before Parliament – late 70s early 80s (?). MP for one of the Taranaki electorates (?).
Can’t remember how far it went before it foundered. Seem to recall that his bubbling, vivacious wife was particularly energised about it, more than him. Wasn’t a bad fulla for a Tory which was true akshully of a number of them in the day. Peter Gordon for example, Minister of Transport at some point. Even old Talboys, whose alleged affair he with “yards and yards of anonymous cloth hanging between his legs….” as characterised by Chris Wheeler, the hilariously subversive stirrer behind the sinful libel sheet “Cock”.
Quite unlike the digusting crooks, Tea Party-ish backwoodmen and scabs comprising today’s National /Act obscenity.
Young’s Bill legalising homosexuality was defeated on 4 July 1975, 34 – 29 with an abstention of 23.
Had the bill gone through there would have been no inquiry into an alleged breach of confidentiality of the police file on the Honourable Colin James Moyle, MP.
The full police evidence has not seen the light of day and I would like to see it in my life time for many reasons.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/9027510/Facebook-used-in-worker-dismissal
Employment lawyers and unions should start asking for bosses and managers facebook records if they are going to regularly sink as low as Air NZ has in this case. One of the times it is good to be a freelancer–I only have myself to sack.
The key quote from the article.
“”Because while this is best evidence . . . doesn’t it creep you out a bit? It feels intrusive and just, frankly, wrong.”
That’s a peculiar demand from the ERA, because they are usually called on to determine whether the decision made at the conclusion of the disciplinary process was correct. And that decision is made with the facts known at that time. ie, knowing what they knew, did the boss make a reasonable decision?
It looks like the ERA is saying it’s ok to dismiss based on suspicion alone, if there’s a vague possibility of proving it correct if other information comes to hand later on.
Yes it is a worry TRP, fair and discernible process in such settings has always bugged the torys so any chance to deal with such cases by applying fear and loathing will be taken if their record such as 90 day “fire at will” is any indication. The ERA was not originally set up to operate on that basis so would be interesting to get a practitioners view.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/education/7715044/How-New-Zealand-schools-rate
….and then Stuff whacks up an ancient Tory Standards piece complete with comments from 323 days ago! The Shonkey Python show continues for the masses while the cream attend their annual orgy.
Lovely stuff from Rod Oram this morning on the economic value of brands to countries and our stark options at this point:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/opinion-analysis/9023041/Rod-Oram-NZ-Inc-must-start-delivering-on-its-promises
I’m against Tasers anyway; but if our overlords really need their goons to carry electric whips, then surely they should be trained to use them properly. Of those UK police forces that could be arsed replying to a freedom of information request (18 out of 45), 57% shot tasers at the chests of suspects.
“There is evidence to suggest that shots to the chest are more dangerous because they can result in cardiac arrest. The manufacturer’s own training guidance states: “When possible, avoid targeting the frontal chest area near the heart to reduce the risk of potential serious injury or death.”.”
Link: http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2013/jul/14/taser-use-police-forces-uk-data
The NZ coppers have used tasers as a compliance device since introduction rather than the touted “substitute for lethal force” and if aimed at the chest could (and have internationally) constitute lethal force anyway.
Why negotiate with citizens annoying as some of them can be, or use other methods, when you can just zap ’em.
NZ Herald has another piece on Fonterra this morning Fonterra powder recalled in Sri Lanka.
Thrust of the article is that the powder is being removed under precautionary measures (after being requested to by the Sri Lankan Ministry of Health).
However, the paragraphs that caught my eye are below:
Earlier this year, Fonterra hit headlines in Sri Lanka after the country’s Atomic Energy Authority claimed in Colombo’s Sunday Times it had been put under pressure from New Zealand officials to suspend testing of New Zealand milk powder samples.
At the time, the Ministry for Primary Industries took over damage control reassuring all overseas consumers milk powder from New Zealand was safe.
If true, why would we be putting pressure on another government to suspend testing? And who was/were these overseas officials?
As far as I can ascertain, two New Zealand government officials from the Ministry of Primary Industries travelled to Sri Lanka in May this year to pressure their Atomic Energy Authority to stop testing New Zealand milk powder samples for radiation.
The only reason they would do this is because the government knew that Fonterra’s milk powder was contaminated with radioactive chemicals. Why else would they suddenly demand Sri Lanka stop testing?
Was it all Fonterra NZ sourced milk powder or also Fonterra Chinese sourced milk powder?
I ask because it appears that TEPCO has been lying through the teeth about contaminated water from Fukushima, and hundreds of tons a day of radioactive water have been leaking into the Pacific.
Sri Lanka has halted all Fonterra milk powder imports from New Zealand. I’ve seen no reports saying that they’ve halted imports from China as well?
It’s unlikely that radiation from Fukushima that is leaking into the Pacific Ocean would get into the dairy process in China. It is however likely that it is getting into fish stocks around Japan.
The radiation contamination in Fonterra’s milk products has likely come from landfarming in Taranaki, of which there are around a dozen sites. Six of these landfarming operations supply milk to Fonterra, the other six to other dairy companies. Fonterra is probably not the only supplier affected.
Did anybody just hear “The New Entrepreneurism” on RNZ forming today’s “ideas” segment?
I’d be interested in hearing/seeing Standard contributors thoughts.
I’m in two minds :p
In some ways I’m thinking more of a new buzz, an exercise in commodification of “social enterprise”, yet there are one or two good aspects to it.
Check out http://www.socialenterprise.co.nz/#top
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ideas
Social enterprise – the brits have got into it for about two years I think and have been closing down welfare for about the same time.
If that was the one referring to social enterprises they seem to have been going on this for about two years I think. That would fit with their observable timetable of cutting welfare wouldn’t it?
If so they are taking a dump people in the water to see if they can swim. It could be better than old hate filled government approach time will tell, the program is on the roll – could be as much of a failure as when brit withdrew supplies after the first irish food crop failure.
yea well – at the risk of outing myself to RNZ staff, I offered the following hastily written:
The New Entrpreneuism
Chris,
I was interested in today’s “Ideas” segment, and I’m left wondering whether I must be part of “The New Curmudgeon” sector.
I’m not knocking it at all, it’s just that it occurred to me that many of these admirable initiatives once evolved naturally, as a result of a fully functioning, well (or at least, adequately) educated, egalitarian society – one where its citizens (both public and corporate) got involved and participated.
It concerns me that we must now market it all and turn it into a business in order for it to be part of our consciousness.
… etc
and then a PS later, when Wayne Brittendon and guests did a piece on NeoLiberalism:
PS!!!! ‘The NEW ENTREPRENEUISM” I should have waited
My concerns are being answered as I type: NEOLIBERALISM
…. etc.
in response to this:
11:40 Wayne Brittenden’s Counterpoint
The Guardian reports that in 2012, the world’s 100 richest people became $241 billion richer, and the rich-poor gap continues to spiral. Wayne takes a critical look at the prevailing global economic orthodoxy of neo-liberalism and Chris follows up with Professor Michael Peters, from Waikato University.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/sunday
Btw …. it’s also why I’ll never vote Labour again UNTIL they clearly and unambiguously give one of the most insidious ideologies the flik!! So far they’ve only ever half-heartedly apologised for Roger and his ilk.
Another Conspiracy theory bites the dust as it becomes reality.
When the Tsunami hit Japan and Fukushima I was called an alarmist and conspiracy nut when I stated that Fukushima was an ongoing disaster with global implications. Today I can say: “I told you so”.
?
While it is understandable given the amount of fear/ego based abuse issues in certain directions, that as more conspiracies become realities, there is a natural tendency to feel relief, when shown to not be nut jobs, or similar!
Unfortunately, the seriousness of the majority of the former, conspiracies, is such that the I told you so call, can be seen as a bit of an own goal, for mine.
?
Oh don’t worry, I’m saying the I told you so really angry and not a gloat in my mind. This is I told you so as in: wake the fuck up and smell the plutonium! (Third reactor has a couple of tons of MOX fuel in a “cooling” pool with steam coming out of the building around about the spot where it should be cool)
I remember one gentleman in particular, Lanthanide I think he calls himself who couldn’t ridicule my assertions enough at the time!
Yep. You know that truism about how real life is stranger than fiction? That’s what all the intellectual rationalists around here keep forgetting.
2013: the year the Tin Foil Hat Brigade pwned reality. Over and over and over and over again.
not really.
All that’s happened is that if you predict the worst outcome for every event that happens in the world, sooner or later you’ll be right – especially if one ignores whether the timing is wildly off.
was always right but previously heckled, just got confirmed now that’s all
Not necessarily. If I said “Mandela is dead” every day for the next five years, sooner or later I will probably be correct. That does not mean I was correct when I first said it.
Is that your version of a climbdown , McFlock!
Might pay to be a little more circumspect with the insults, because those timelines have been very short, and will grow increasingly shorter between the revelations!
An as for choosing the worst possible outcome, don’t fool yourself laddy, that’s simply another insult for those who have bothered to take time to understand and learn enough, to get a little closer to reality, while others sit back in the largess lobbing insults.
Correlation does not equal causation, especially when the frequency is that low.
Keep at it, I enjoy watching denial in real time!
Get the digger out, McFlock.
Brooom, Broooom, honk honk!
That’s nice.
At least when I hit the pearly gates I’ll be able to say that I gave joy to simple-minded fools. Might offset some of my misdeeds a touch. And just to make it obvious enough for even you to understand, yes, you are indeed one of those simpleminded fools.
Toot toot!
might be like that poor raccoon from Ice Age : The Meltdown; reach all those acorns, then the really big Acorn, only to receive resusc. from a sloth.
Oh to be Hindu, but then, all those gods to contend with. Interestingly, maybe the Aryan invaders implemented / codified the caste system, in India anyway.
I didn’t predict. I said this was happening from day one. TEPCO can’t deny it anymore ‘s all.
Indeed you did. But it wasn’t happening from day one, was it.
Don’t confuse the process with the event. It’s like fossil fuel related climate change. Started with the very first tonne of coal burnt.
Neither process had an inevitable conclusion when it first started, however. To state that a catastrophic conclusion is occurring before it is even inevitable can merely have a purely coincidental relationship with reality, even at the best of times.
I wonder if there was a person who claimed the Titanic was sinking even before it hit an iceberg? What if they claimed it after the iceberg were hit, but it they had no idea that it had in fact hit an iceberg, because they were in Birmingham at the time? To then argue “see, I was right, not a nutbar” seems to lack a certain epistemological robustness.
some clever resilience there McDock!
meh.
Fully encouraged by their recent close brush with reality, apparently the tinfoilhat claims have been escalated to Fukushima being an extinction event. So apparently we are all doomed (again).
Have missed your wit, (although, ev makes for interesting reading in ‘my newsfeed’), but then, there is always reality of all flavours to contend with. Like, improving income 😀 … maybe a pedal powered ice-cream cart with (not) 88 flavours of sugar to choose from. Shouldn’t you be working? Ahhh, late lunch. Cheese and home-made pickled onions this (and the other) end. Did you know that even authors with multiple published titles may only achieve the minimum wage if all the hours involved are accounted for. Seems so pointless 😉
The correct parallel to be drawn are to the officers and passengers who believed that the Titanic was fine after 5 compartments were holed, especially as the ship was still sitting perfectly quietly and drinks and food were still being served.
Same with being shot in the head or falling off a six story building. Doesn’t mean that you can’t pick what’s (most likely) going to happen next.
The correct parallel to be drawn are to the officers and passengers who believed that the Titanic was fine after 5 compartments were holed, especially as the ship was still sitting perfectly quietly and drinks and food were still being served.
Flipside of the same coin, but at least you get the idea that without accurate information causally and obviously related to the observed outcome, any connection between belief and reality is purely coincidental. Me, I’m off to sit in my lead-lined fridge for the duration of the radioactive apocalypse.
Well, the laws of physics tend to be a bit more reliable than chemtrail/worldgovt/nanothermite idiots on the internet. But even, then pistol-calibre gunshots to the head tend to have (ISTR) something like a 10% survival rate, and the survival rate for falling six storeys is even better as I recall. So really, without more precise information I’d still not be collecting on their life insurance.
Fukushima was never a conspiracy travellerev. It happened and was/is real. The only conspiracy is the one of governmental silence and mis-information surrounding the causes, the gravity of the immediate effects and the potential long term consequences.
And yes, there were plenty of people who chimed in, downplaying the seriousness of the situation and poo-pooing potential long term consequences. Adherents to authoritarianism tend to back centers of authority though. So, the fact of a ‘she’ll be right’ brigade is hardly surprising.
Bill …
As time goes by I’m struck by how pervasive the “authoritarian” personality is. Quite remarkably they’ll moan and grizzle about how badly they’re been treated .. but when you point out that it’s the hierarchy and the misuse of power that fundamentally which is screwing them over … they leap to it’s defence.
I think its the “subservient/follower mentality”…the beaten slave (battered woman?) who nevertheless leaps to their master’s (husbands?) defence because that is all the options their identity and world view gives them.
The danger is when servants and followers of charismatic authoritarian figures energise en masse to enable real historical ugliness.
Look at the USA – Democrats under George Bush who hated the patriot act, hated state surveillance, hated drone strikes…are all supportive of exactly the same things under Obama. Bad news.
Ah fuck it, I’ll say it.
Authoritarianism marks and thrives in the absense of personal responsibility. And to save any grief … this is completely different to the supposed ‘lack of personal responsibility’ we hear touted as a mere distraction from systemic/cultural disadvantages/abuses that themselves have arisen and hold sway precisely because too many people have authoritarian traits…and that’s the very self same people who then tend to bang on about various victim’s ‘lack of personal responsibilty’.
Hope that makes sense….was a kind of long sentence 😉
Good ol’ SWAT/SAS/riot police teams with the full face balaclavas or masks.
No. Not necessarily ‘tooled up’ agents of state or corporate oppression. Just the people next door and down the road and next to you at work who defer without question to authority – they’re the authoritarians as much as the ‘tooled up’ monkeys of oppression, the pollies, CEOs and managers.
Travellerev, you are an alarmist and conspiracy nut and long before you had said jack shit about “ongoing”, commenters on online Physics forums were detailing exactly how and why, based on nothing more than the photos of the damage and their knowledge of reactor design.
Like a stopped clock, you are right twice a day. Congratulations.
And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music -Nietzsche
Let me give you the sheet music. You still won’t hear it but hey, you’ve got to start somewhere!
For the last two years 300 tons of water has been leaking (I would call that gushing but I’m sure you’d think that alarmist) into the Pacific ocean and TEPCO has finally admitted lying about it. Not only that they are now pumping water into the ocean while the pretense of containment is dropped as the true size of the meltdowns can no longer be denied. THERE SIMPLY IS NO CONTAINMENT!
Here is a nice animation of the predicted dispersion of radioactive Cs-137 over the next 10 years.
And if you think this is going to help mitigate the unfolding disaster ( I would go as far as calling it a slowly unfolding extinction event, particularly if the 3 reactor cooling bath no longer cools the MOX fuel rods) there really is no hope you’ll ever hear the music
Oh dear, To REDUCE leakage TEPCO is now PUMPING the groundwater directly into the ocean. GREAT PLAN!!! (Sorry for the yelling but how FUBAR is this?)
Er, no they’re not pumping it directly into the ocean. The actual facts are in the link you provided.
Erm, it’s actually more like 600 tons daily straight into the ocean and that is just the “leakage” Tritium jumped a 150% in 2 days, I wouldn’t touch Tuna if my life depended on it but go ahead and continue to nitpick and have some more of those sushi with Nori seaweed from Japan while you’re at it.
You’ve got about five years before all this shit reaches the US coast and about 10 until it reaches New Zealand.
Pointing out that you’ve got your central claim 100% wrong isn’t nitpicking, Ev. Fukushima is a disaster on many levels, but your apocolyptical shouting (a slowly unfolding extiction event!) adds nothing to our understanding of the actual damage done to the environment.
Agree with you about the tuna though. Meat is murder.
Reactor No 3 was using MOX fuel. That is around 2 million times more toxic than Uranium. Here is what happened in 2011. If you believe that those rods are safe and all is well in Fukushima you are one sad puppy and yes, a MOX fuel rd meltdown is an extinction event
How is it an ELE compared to a standard uranium fuel rod meltdown?
I’m sure a standard meltdown is pretty FUBAR to but MOX fuel is a mix between Uranium and Pluto and the US feels it’s Japan’s job to burn that shit. I think the telling detail is that MOX is 2 million times more toxic than Uranium.
Huh? Which part of my saying it’s a disaster did you mistake for my denying it’s a disaster?
And, no, Fukushima is not an extinction event. Do try and get a grip.
Oh dear, https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=VZvi8N9SZ2k#at=37
So what?
Good idea No. 2001.5. Bottle John Key’s personal fragrance and sell as a medicinal aid and performance enhancer – the John Key Super Relaxant. It releases all taut muscles, especially round the jaw and sphincter, relieves stress trauma and headaches, and in addition is a social aid as it prevents any disagreeable response caused by faux pas or unfortunate rudeness, all the time exuding a subtle aroma around the person which draws all into his ambit so ensuring the most favourable effect at every appearance.
You might need to attend the “Social Enterprise” conference this week Grey. Could be money to be made!
Tim
I’m working on it!! When I work out how to extract it that is. Without killing the golden goose!
I add to the above this clip from Brett – Conchords just for fun.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cAfoZWzl8M
National’s policy to help first-time buyers get into houses is pretty weak:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/9028322/Sting-in-tail-of-Nats-new-housing-policy
Subsidising home sellers…
So having already purchased, what is not available for sale in NZ, and paid the shipping costs, I now have the pleasure of paying tax on a sale that would not have happened otherwise, as well as the import transaction fee + GST (WTF is that about) – How are import transaction fees, and levy’s classified such that they attract GST, anyone ?
Her Majesty’s agents, hard at work!
GST is also applied on top of the various petrol taxes. Seems to be the way that the government likes it.
Who at coloseum did their homework on premier league rights. Having secured live coverage for a pay per view style service with our dodgy broadband capacity and now sky has 4 of the top teams separately via a premier league rule that allows it.
Top teams get the bulk of viewers so looks like coloseum just had their wings clipped before takeoff.
I think you will find that Sky,s broadcasts are delayed and not live.
Yes aware of that but as few people watch it live IMO this will erode the value of coluseum when you can watch the big teams with an existing sky connection and the highlights show is on tv1
Key’s scaremongering:
“Make no mistake, our opposition comes from the far left of politics. The Greens are leading Labour by the nose. It’s important that New Zealanders understand what a Green-dominated government would look like. They want to tax you more, rack up more debt and make you work two more years before you can retire. They want a government department to run the entire electricity system, just like it did in the old days when we had blackouts. They want to stop oil, gas and mineral exploration that would create jobs and growth. They blame foreigners for all the ills of the country when our future prosperity lies in being open and connected to the rest of the world.
They even characterize businesses relocating jobs from Australia to New Zealand as ‘deeply worrying’. And they take petty, opportunistic political positions on national security in the face of the obvious need to clarify the GCSB law – a law they passed in the first place!
Well, I can tell you that as Prime Minister, I take the role of our agencies and my responsibilities in terms of national security, very, very seriously. And I always will. For our part, the National Party has a track record of sensible economic management and policies that actually make a difference to peoples’ lives. We are guided by the enduring values and principles of the National Party.
and more yadda yadda yadda in the same tone. *big fucking yawn*
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10911082
LolNats @Lol_Nats 2m
John Key said today his plan to help low income people into homes by giving wealthier people support to buy more expensive ones cant fail.
National Party confernces are, as usual and always will be, just bullshit for the masses.
Can’t really argue with that…
Nope, I can’t either. The question is if the differences were a net gain or loss and I’m betting on the latter.
“Make no mistake, our opposition comes from the far left of politics.
Ah, the spin-meister. He’s so far out on a neoliberal, right wing, anti-democratic, govern for the corporates plutocracy – he thinks centre left is far left.
He thinks centre-right is far left.
The bit he fails to mention is that we had brown outs due to low rainfall and that this was corrected by building more dams – before the market model took over.
National’s election campaign is already pretty clear. They are going to use the “centre vs hard left” meme for all it’s worth to try and frighten the horses. but that fact that you, me and uncle Tom Cobley can see what they are going to do doesn’t mean the museum exhibits that inhabit the upper reaches of the parliamentary labour party caucus will twig onto it in time to come up with a clever counter plan.
Well, the obvious counter plan is obvious: a good swerve to the right wing “middle” will prove that National is full of shit.
“They want to tax you more, rack up more debt ”
To pay for things like schools, hospitals and state housing. I will defend state housing, schools and hospitals TO THE DEATH.
“They want a government department to run the entire electricity system”
And what. Government should own the power, otherwise people wont be able to afford to heat their homes.
Key must go ASAP.
Yip given another term they will sell the lot. State (us) will own nothing. Private sector will be rubbing their hands with glee. Only way to stop them is getting people out to vote.
Just collected another 60 signatures (within the Auckland Central electorate) for the following petition:
“To National Party Member of Parliament for Auckland Central, Nikki Kaye :
“The will of the people is the basis of the authority of Government.”
We, the undersigned, call upon YOU, as an MP, to defend the lawful human rights of New Zealanders to privacy, freedom of association and freedom of expression – that is – to oppose arbitrary search and surveillance by the State over citizens.
If YOU, as an MP, vote for this GCSB Bill, which will allow widespread spying on New Zealanders, we, the undersigned hereby PLEDGE to campaign against your re-election in 2014, and to encourage our families, neighbours and workmates to do the same.”
______________________________________________________________________________
45 signatures to go and that will make ONE THOUSAND (1000) people who have PLEDGED to vote against Nikki Kaye if she votes for the GCSB Bill.
(Remember – Nikki Kaye has only a 717 vote majority in Auckland Central over Labour’s Jacinda Adern. )
Not a bad effort for basically TWO people?
Come on folks!
Give those MPs who are currently supporting the GCSB the one message they CAN’T ignore!
Signatures of angry voters PLEDGING to CAMPAIGN against them.
(Politicians understand ONE thing – VOTES…….. 🙂
Sample/ template petitions that can be used/ adapted/ whatever/ are available HERE!
http://www.occupyaucklandvsaucklandcouncilappeal.org.nz/
Particularly would LOVE to see 1500 signatures delivered to Peter Dunne on Monday 19 August 2013 for the following:
“PETITION
To Independent MP for Ohariu Peter Dunne
“The will of the people is the basis of the authority of Government.”
We, the undersigned, call upon YOU, to defend the lawful human rights of New Zealanders to privacy, freedom of association and freedom of expression – that is – to oppose arbitrary search and surveillance by ‘BIG BROTHER’ State over citizens.
We note your public objections to the recent violations of your lawful rights to privacy, and look forward to consistency in your support for New Zealanders equal lawful rights to privacy.
If YOU, as an MP, vote for this GCSB Bill, which will allow widespread spying on New Zealanders, we, the undersigned hereby PLEDGE to campaign against your re-election in 2014, and to encourage our families, neighbours and workmates to do the same.
NAME ADDRESS SIGNED ”
___________________________________________________________________________
Remember!
It’s the masses who get off their asses that ‘make history’!
And – it’s REALLY easy to get signatures for these petitions………
Cheers 🙂
Penny Bright
2013 Auckland Mayoral candidate
Kids Can’t Use Computers…
I’ve found this to be true as well. His suggestion that kids fix the computer after they break them is similar to what I said in a seminar once that had people looking at me in horror. My suggestion to the person who had just said that he played games but couldn’t use a computer was to pull the PC apart and then put it back together. And then do it again and again.
There’s some unbelievable stories of computer incompetence at that link.
Having taught a range of people young and old, in my time, I have found that, contrary to popular belief, there are quite a few young people who are not very savvy at using computers.
Yet, still these days I come across people who automatically expect any young guy present to be better with computers than others.
Ask lprent how he thinks the young versus the ahem, not so young, do on computer systems.
Another thing to think about is how a lot of computer systems nowadays…eg Apple iOS and Android, have been designed to make computers into consumer appliances. Completely unlike the young nerds at school who used to edit batch files and autoexecs for DOS and under the hood of Windows 3.0…
Cripes… my first programs were hand assembled hex code for Motorola 6809C’s.
Wow. Hexadecimal. A 1MHz processor. Hot stuff. (For the non-technical, a budget basic smart phone today runs at 600MHz…)
I once did a bit of work on an IBM AT (80286), nothing too serious.
Agree totally. These days relatively few people can give a coherent explanation of how computers really work … from the quantum mechanical explanation of how semiconductors function, through to how electronic circuits, logic and programmable arrays are built up, through to the structures of CPU’s, memory devices, graphics and various I/O channels, firmware, BIOS, OS’s and finally to networking, and the application layers.
When you step back and look at the entire intellectual and technical edifice it’s astonishing that it all works as well and as reliably as it does. Yet relatively few people have a decent grasp even of the broad picture, much less the specific details. (And I’m not claiming to be any kind of expert on any or all of it … just sufficiently educated and experienced to have dabbled with all the various bits of computing technology.)
The idea that some 14yr old is inherently smarter or more capable than an experienced professional or technical expert is just a risible nonsense.
The best comparison is how we used to laugh at our grandparents for whom the first telephones were an astonishing novelty … and how some of them never quite got past their tendency to speak very loudly and formally into the machine. It was easy to forget that they had lived in a time when communication was snailmail or telegrams at best.
I grew up at a time when the modern cell phone could not have been built in anything less than a large room full of hardware and I still have respect for the achievement they represent… yet today’s kids treat them with utter nonchalance. It is easy however to mistake this almost contemptuous familiarity with expertise. Not the same thing at all.
It fascinates me how quickly people adapt to technological changes. My first experience of a phone when I was very young, was the party line in our home. I would get told off if I picked up the handset when people somewhere else were having a conversation. Our only other electrical communications at home was a little radio.
TV, computers, mobile phones, etc, etc…. now all a very mundane part of my home & work world. I only have a very basic understanding of the way each of these technologies work. Though I have taken the lid off desk top pcs to do small mechanical maintenance – not really recommended with laptops.
I have been reading recently about the development of the telegraph, and the laying of undersea cables. It was partly trial and error getting the undersea cables to work – the right components and layers in the cables, correct weights etc. And that made a big difference to life, even though it was quite expensive first off to use.
It made a big difference for life in NZ – communicating throughout the country, and creating a sense of being part of the same nation – and much quicker information coming from overseas.
“It is easy however to mistake this almost contemptuous familiarity with expertise. Not the same thing at all.”
Yes that sums it up well.
It’s not just computers and phones either, people increasingly don’t know how anything works. Which both follows from and leads to not being able to make or fix anything.
Can’t disagree with your post AT ALL and the various responses having had (past tense) 25 yrs plus in the trade.
What amazes me is that I’m aware of a few people such as yourself (and even myself – now in the 50 plus age group) that are unemployed, or at least no longer employed in the IT sector. YET we constantly hear about various skill shortages. When one is registered with just about every agency in town, like various folk I know, the silence from those agencies is deafening.
Thankfully I’ve been able to de-programme, de-hex, de-assemble and have a bloody good lay down.
Ageism is absolutely rife in the industry. Last year I applied for a job for which I ticked every single box… at expert level. Zero response. Put in several unanswered calls and emails.
Advert still live a fortnight later. So I put the same CV in with a different name but edited to look 20yrs younger. Got a mad keen phone call within hours.
Told them exactly where to shove it.
You tricky old bastard. In the very best way heh.
Had very similar experience(s), AND told them to shove it too.
Those agencies btw also have a habit of advertising non-existent, or already filled vacancies in order to get people ‘on their books’.
The other thing I find amusing is all that noise about the number of jobs advertised, based on the number of job adverts. You delve into it a bit and there are half a dozen different agencies advertising the same job (not limited to IT of course) – all clamouring to clip the ticket.
😆
“…These days relatively few people can give a coherent explanation of how computers really work…”
Really? the speed of light is constant. I thought everyone knew that!
Phew.
I’m like almost everyone in regard to these machines.
One little thing though, why shouldn’t we leave the room, (or the house or the district,) while logged in somewhere? I do this all the time – the machine shuts down to power saving until I bring it back to life, often many hours later.
Apart from wasting power, what’s the problem?
It’s not a problem if there is no-one else who’s likely to use the machine in your absence.
But in a school or work environment where accountability of use and confidentiality of information is important … then you really don’t want someone else simply using the machine under your own user account.
Aaaah.
Ta
Getting to the Bottom of Things
Bold mine.
Are you out there Gower?
Did not see you stuffing a microphone up the nose of Collins or Joyce at the National Party Circus every ten seconds repeatedly asking if they were planning a coup against Key like you did to Cunliffe at the Labour party conference. No badgering like you did to Cunliffe until you got the perceived answer you wanted. Why not , please tell us, were you shit scared that you would have been told to fuck off or, is it that your masters and controllers instructed you not to rock the cosy right wing dream world boat.