Open mike 12/03/2015
Written By:
- Date published:
6:30 am, March 12th, 2015 - 320 comments
Categories: open mike -
Tags:
Open mike is your post.
For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose.
The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy).
Step up to the mike …
320 comments on “Open mike 12/03/2015 ”
- Comments are now closed
- Comments are now closed
Recent Comments
- Building a norm against nuclear weapons
Back in 2017, the UN General Assembly approved the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, and New Zealand was one of the first countries to sign. Now, a 50th ratification is finally going to bring it into force: Campaigners have hailed a "new chapter" after a key step ...19 hours ago - Change wins in ChileThis time last year, Chile was in rebellion against its government. Protests against a train fare increase turned into protests against inequality, and then, when the right-wing government deployed the military to crush them, into protests against the government and the dictator-imposed constitution. And the protestors won: half the cabinet ...20 hours ago
- Speaker: Rewarding competence
If you were listening to New Zealand’s punditocracy in the days since Labour won the general election with a record-setting outright majority, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Labour had actually lost.Last time around pundits could barely deal with the fact that the National government had lost its majority, and ...1 day ago - NZ Politics Daily – 27 October 2020
Today’s content Labour Party and new Labour Government Andrea Vance (Stuff): ‘Labour Connect’ the data analysis tool that boosted Jacinda Ardern’s campaign Heather du Plessis-Allan (Herald): Time for Govt to take some risks (paywalled) Audrey Young (Herald): Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern on her big win and big plans (paywalled) Audrey Young: What Kelvin Davis wants for Māori from ...1 day ago - Thirty Years Ago Today: Musings on the Fourth Labour Government
The New Zealand media and the New Zealand public are still chattering about what Jacinda Ardern will do with her brand-spanking-new single party majority Government. The consensus – apart from a few wishful-thinkers – is “probably not much.” This is the era of “incrementalism”, which during the Helen Clark ...1 day ago - Water on the Moon?
The space news this week is largely focused on an announcement from NASA regarding the discovery of water on the Moon. Not liquid water – the lunar surface is far too cold for that – but apparently ice deposits in the surface layers in near-polar regions, and perhaps deeper ...1 day ago - Yes Minister.
What it is like to be a new Minister Good morning Minister? Congratulations, you are minister for the very important department of state which I run as Chief Excutive. Have they fixed you up with all the accoutrements of office: the chauffeured limousine, your own car, state supplied accommodation ...2 days ago - The Debunking Handbook 2020: Debunk often and properly
This blog post is part 4 of a series of excerpts from The Debunking Handbook 2020 which can be downloaded here. The list of references is available here. Debunk often and properly If you cannot preempt, you must debunk. For debunking to be effective, it is important to provide detailed ...2 days ago - The Debunking Handbook 2020: ReferencesThis is the list of references for The Debunking Handbook 2020Lewandowsky, S., Cook, J., Ecker, U. K. H., Albarracín, D., Amazeen, M. A., Kendeou, P., Lombardi, D., Newman, E. J., Pennycook, G., Porter, E. Rand, D. G., Rapp, D. N., Reifler, J., Roozenbeek, J., Schmid, P., Seifert, C. M., Sinatra, ...2 days ago
- When the dictator wears capes.
Today Chileans voted overwhelmingly to elect a constitutional assembly and redraft the 1980 Constitution promulgated by the dictatorship of Agusto Pinochet. I regret that my old friend Bob Barros, whose death I wrote about a while ago, is not around to see this moment because he was the first person ...2 days ago - Everyone I don’t like is Hitler, or, how i got banned by Facebook
I do not really use Facebook anymore. I used to. For several years now, however, my drug of choice has been Twitter. It is equally pointless but is more agreeable better than Zuckerberg's monster is for me.I haven't deactivated my account because I still use FB as a means of ...2 days ago - Gal Gadot, The Orient and Identity Politics
by Gearóid Ó Loingsigh (14/10/2020) A row has recently erupted over the casting of the Israeli actress Gal Gadot as Cleopatra in an upcoming film. Part of the objections to her playing the role are based on the fact that she is not only Israeli, but a Zionist to boot, ...2 days ago - Getting Our Priorities Right
Much of the political debate over the past few months – as we have grappled with the coronavirus pandemic – has centred on the question of whether it is the interests of business or the health of the community that should take priority in policy terms. Much has been made ...2 days ago - 2020 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #43Story of the Week... Toon of the Week... Quote of the Week... Coming Soon on SkS... Poster of the Week... SkS Week in Review Story of the Week... Alarm as Arctic sea ice not yet freezing at latest date on record Delayed freeze in Laptev Sea could have ...2 days ago
- 2020 – Post mortem or Prologue?
. . A narcissistic, third-rate, Bond-villain code-named “Trump” takes control of the United States; a global pandemic brings human civilisation to a near stand-still; Whakaari/White Island erupts creating a hellish tragedy; Level 4 and 3 Lockdowns result in deserted streets straight out of The Quiet Earth; a new “Fortress ...2 days ago - Media Link: Some Bolivian and NZ post-election analysis on “A View from Afar.”This last week’s podcast featuring Selwyn Manning and I focused on post-election analysis in two small states, one land locked and the other surrounded by water. Check it out here. ...3 days ago
- Analysis of an Election – Aaaarghghgh! What happened????
With a week or so gone since the catastrophic election result for the National Party of Aotearoa New Zealand, MyThinks have set the team to work to come up with their hot takes on what has caused the previous all powerful party of government to collapse under the weight of ...3 days ago - A response to Judith ButlerFeminist Ani O’Brien takes a critical look at Judith Butler and the Kim Hill interview (17/10/20): It has been a while since I have done a bit-by-bit response piece, but this weekend Radio New Zealand journalist Kim Hill interviewed Professor Judith Butler on the conflict between trans activists and “TERFs” and I have ...3 days ago
- 2020 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #43A chronological listing of news articles linked to on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week: Sun, Oct 18, 2020 through Sat, Oct 24, 2020 Editor's Choice A second Trump term would mean severe and irreversible changes in the climate No joke: It would be disastrous on the ...3 days ago
- National’s electoral slaughter
4 days ago - The Ideal and the Reality for a New MP
Being an MP is not quite what you think. Hello Mr Orange Man, I’ve really depended on you during the election over the last few weeks. Thankyou for helping me to get elected to parliament. So what are you doing here, meeting me in parliament, now I have ...5 days ago - COVID-19: backing our front rowNew Zealand has been called out as an outstanding player in managing COVID-19. We’ve done well,[1] but we’re far from perfect. We could do a lot better at backing our front row. Epidemiologists advise nations not to play “wait and see”. If By the time they do see, it’s all ...5 days ago
- Fleeing to the Dawn – accepted
Good bit of news on the short story front: my 1700 word fantasy piece, Fleeing to the Dawn, has been accepted for the Autumn 2020 edition of Shorts Magazine: http://shortsmagazine.com/ This one was a case of a previously unsuccessful story being dusted off and polished up. It is ...5 days ago - The Debunking Handbook 2020: The elusive backfire effectsThis blog post is part 3 of a series of excerpts from The Debunking Handbook 2020 which can be downloaded here. The list of references is available here. The elusive backfire effects Ten years ago, scholars and practitioners were concerned that corrections may “backfire”; that is, ironically strengthen misconceptions rather ...5 days ago
- Prosecute ICEWe knew that US Immigration and Customs Enforcement was a moral void: they run concentration camps, and forcibly separate children from their parents. And now they're outright torturing people: US immigration officers allegedly tortured Cameroonian asylum seekers to force them to sign their own deportation orders, in what lawyers ...5 days ago
- Fly on the wall of the first National caucus since electionOver the past several months, the team at MyThinks have been involved in a vast insect training programme. We have been working to teach our six-legged friends to become the finest of political reporters. This week we sent our deputy political diptera into the National Party caucus room for their ...5 days ago
- The Twilight Of Boomer Power.
5 days ago - NZ Politics Daily – 23 October 2020Today’s content Labour government Peter Dunne (Newsroom): At the highwater mark with little wriggle room RNZ: Caucus: Explaining The Red Tide: Kiwis hug Jacinda back as Labour breaks records Chris Trotter (Daily Blog): It’s Time For Some “Earnest Struggle” Chris Trotter: “Change That Sticks.” Chris Trotter (Daily Blog): The Twilight Of Boomer Power Brent Edwards ...5 days ago
- “Change That Sticks.”Implementing Change With Us - Not Imposing It On Us: Jacinda Ardern, like Mickey Savage before her, understands what her more revolutionary critics do not: that the only sort of socialism that endures is democratic socialism – socialism by popular demand and with popular consent.AFTER THE BIGGEST WIN in nearly ...5 days ago
- Science at the movies: The new comet impact filmDisaster movies forever capture the public attention… but did you ever stop to think that the word disaster actually means bad star? That is, ‘dis’ implies a pejorative (as in disease, or disgust, or disrespect), while ‘aster’ comes from the Latin astrum, similarly the Greek astron. Asteroids are called that ...6 days ago
- The Adventures of Annalax: Volume XI
Yes, dinosaurs. Annalax would think of them as giant horned lizards. They were also terrified of us, what with Magni still being covered in spider goo, and hence smelling like a Leng Spider. The ... 6 days ago - PrioritiesMuch of the political debate over the past few months – as we have grappled with the coronavirus pandemic – has centred on the question of whether it is the interests of business or the health of the community that should take priority in policy terms. Much has been made ...6 days ago
- Farmers earning their reputation againNew Zealand farmers routinely complain about the public viewing them as environmental vandals. At the same time, they're opposing basic environmental regulation: Federated Farmers has asked that a wide-ranging plan change setting water use rules for South Canterbury remove all references to the protection of “indigenous fish”. [...] ...6 days ago
- NZ Politics Daily – 22 October 2020Labour-Greens talks, Labour govt Henry Cooke (Stuff): There is no evidence National voters backed Labour to keep the Greens out Audrey Young (Herald): Labour holds all the cards as Ardern’s talks with Greens get underway RNZ: Greens better off independent – Former Green MP Catherine Delahunty Heather du Plessis-Allan (Newstalk ZB): Greens would be ...6 days ago
- Geoffrey Miller: Stardust across the Middle East: How Arab media reported on NZ’s electionNews is not in short supply in the Middle East, and on Saturday, Arab media remained focused heavily on the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia in Nagorno-Karabakh. Nevertheless, the New Zealand election – and especially Jacinda Ardern’s personal success – received significant attention from Arabic-language TV news channels, newspapers and ...6 days ago
- Geoffrey Miller: Stardust across the Middle East – how Arab media covered the New Zealand electionNews is not in short supply in the Middle East, and at the weekend, Arabic-language media remained firmly focused on the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia in Nagorno-Karabakh. Nevertheless, the New Zealand election – and above all Jacinda Ardern’s personal success – still received significant attention from Arabic-language TV news ...6 days ago
- It's Time For Some “Earnest Struggle”.6 days ago
- Party Like It’s 1936: Songs for the Philologists
It’s the most obscure Tolkien book of all… so obscure that only fourteen copies exist: Songs for the Philologists, a 1936 collection of thirty humorous verses, by Tolkien (who wrote thirteen), E.V. Gordon, and ... 6 days ago - Bryce Edwards: Political Roundup – National’s catastrophic collapse and fraught rebuildThe National Party’s defeat has been so comprehensive that few in the party seem optimistic they will recover anytime soon. Falling from 47% in 2017 to just 27% (which might drop as low as 25% once special votes are counted), is one of the most severe collapses in New Zealand’s ...7 days ago
- Skeptical Science New Research for Week #42, 2020Dust-up at the Denial Corral, in "journal time" Way back in 2017 the Institute of Physics publication Environmental Research Letters (ERL) published a featured article, Assessing ExxonMobil's climate change communications (1977–2014), by Supran & Oreskes. The article reverberated widely as it exposed a documented a pattern of behavior arguably described as perfidious. The authors ...7 days ago
- Now’s the time – expand ACC
Having ruled out Capital Gains Tax and Wealth Tax, the incoming Labour government must be looking for some significant progressive policies that they haven’t already ruled out. Expanding the ACC scheme fits that brief, and the Green Party have conveniently already proposed doing so. But, how to fund it? The accident/illness ...7 days ago - Managing to the targetNew Zealand's health system is chronicly underfunded, and so almost all DHBs run deficits. Last month, just before he bailed out Canterbury DHB, Health Minister Chris Hipkins was repeating the mantra that DHBs must live within their means and "have a credible plan to return to financial sustainability". But yesterday, ...7 days ago
- Solarise all the things!If we are to avoid dangerous levels of climate change, we need to decarbonise the economy and shift our energy supply completely to renewables. The good news is that the International Energy Agency thinks that that is going to happen. The reason? Interest rates have dropped. And this means that ...7 days ago
- New Zealand weighs up a nation-sized batteryIan Mason and Robert McLachlan Climate change was a small but perceptible part of the recent election. On climate change, Labour pointed proudly to their record of legislating for net zero emissions by 2050 (nicknamed the ‘Zero Carbon Act’), establishing a Climate Change Commission to set carbon budgets and advise ...7 days ago
- WHO reform: a call for an early-warning protocol for infectious diseasesPeter Gluckman and Alexander Gillespie, University of Waikato The World Health Organization (WHO) has come in for its share of criticism for its handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. While some faults are the responsibility of the WHO, others were caused by member states, which did not always act as quickly ...1 week ago
- NZ Politics Daily – 21 October 2020Today’s content Election Jack Vowles (The Conversation): The 2020 NZ election saw record vote volatility — what does that mean for the next Labour government? Jason Walls and Chris Knox (Herald): 20 fascinating facts about the 2020 election you might have missed Stuff: Labour Day: A vote-by-vote analysis of New Zealand’s historic shift ...1 week ago
- Do Landslides Change the Landscape in the Long Run?
It was easy for election night commentators to use the ‘landslide’ trope to describe Labour’s winning of the 2020 election. But the historical record suggests that such landslides may not last long. In 1935, the First (Savage-Fraser) Labour Government won 53 seats in a parliament of 80; National ...1 week ago - The Debunking Handbook 2020: Prevent misinformation from sticking if you canThis blog post is part 2 of a series of excerpts from The Debunking Handbook 2020 which can be downloaded here. The list of references is available here. Prevent misinformation from sticking if you can Because misinformation is sticky, it’s best preempted. This can be achieved by explaining misleading or ...1 week ago
- Graeme Edgeler: Mandates are not mandatory, but they are also not meaninglessThere’s a lot of talk about what the Labour Government’s new mandate is. For a discussion of exactly what that might mean, Graeme Edgeler explores the murky logic of what they can and can’t do, pointing out that ultimately voters decide if this mandate was properly used in three years. ...1 week ago
- Hyping it up over fluoridation
In my time as a scientific researcher, honest scientists used to condemn colleagues who over-hyped their science. To our mind there should have been a special place in hell for scientists who misrepresented their ... 1 week ago - Don’t fall for the Covid contrariansAs life in Aotearoa gets back to some kind of normal after our latest Covid-19 outbreak, cases in the northern hemisphere are on the rise again and that puts us all at risk. Because no one is safe until we are all safe. This is a tricky virus. We now ...1 week ago
- Liam Hehir: Online abuse and the standard you walk byThere’s a lot of nastiness in the online public sphere, much of it tribal, petty and personal. Political commentator and Twitter enthusiast Liam Hehir has seen too much of it, and explains why he’s going to actively stand up against it. I did a radio interview a little while ...1 week ago
- Tanzania: elections, neoliberalism and economic diplomacyPolitics in New Zealand is the main focus of Redline, along with supporting liberation movements and anti-imperialist struggles. We have had little material from the African continent, so are pleased to print this submission from a Tanzanian writer on their pending elections. Tanzania will be going to the polls on ...1 week ago
- Governing For All Of Us.1 week ago
- NZ Politics Daily – 20 October 2020Today’s content Coalition negotiations, shape of government Gordon Campbell: On why the Greens shouldn’t join the government Andrew Geddis (Pundit): What Sort Of Relationship Might Labour And The Greens Agree On? Audrey Young (Herald): Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern holds preparatory talks with Greens but coalition looking unlikely Thomas Coughlan (Stuff): Jacinda Ardern tight-lipped after ...1 week ago
- What sort of relationship might Labour and the Greens agree on?
Even without knowing the final election result (because, don’t forget there’s about 500,000 special votes still to count and they very likely will change Saturday’s results), we can say two things for certain about the next government. Jacinda Ardern will be its Prime Minister. And Labour will be at its core. But ...1 week ago - Bryce Edwards: Political Roundup – Leftwing euphoria meets realityThe political left has been euphoric since Saturday’s night historic landslide victory for Labour. But political commentators from across the spectrum are united in warning that the new Government isn’t about to be transformative. Instead, we will see more of a status quo administration grappling with a crisis, with very ...1 week ago
- Yes, a mandate for sure… but issues for NZ will be far, far more difficult now
With the NZ General Election and Referendums over for 2020, Jacinda Ardern is to form a Government over the next few weeks, “there are some areas we do want to crack on with, that we will need to expedite”, and talks will begin to form around what the voters ...1 week ago - Labour Party landslide – 2020 Election in reviewJacinda Ardern - Prime Minister of New ZealandThe 2020 General Election has been one of the most interesting in New Zealand’s political history. Not only did we have voters provide the Labour Party with a stratospheric 49.1% mandate to govern, the results also delivered National with a crushing 26.8% defeat ...1 week ago
- Be careful what you wish for: Labour's difficult triumph
Labour’s overwhelming victory at the election has been greeted with rousing cheers on the left of New Zealand politics and the start of transformational demands. It’s a multi-generational win for Labour, out-polling the Kirk, Lange and Clark victories. You have to go back to 1938 for a bigger percentage (55.8%) ...1 week ago - A Skeptical Science member's path to an experiment on carbon sequestrationDuring what now seems like another era entirely- back in February of this long year- Skeptical Science regular RedBaron (aka Scott Strough) mentioned in a discussion thread here that he'd been working on an idea for no-till cultivation of vegetables, was seeking to quantify what appeared to be promising results. Scott ...1 week ago
- Jacinda Will Keep Us Moving – To The Same Place.Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes? Not Likely: Though few New Zealanders would express it in such a fashion: Jacinda’s and Labour’s general handling of the Covid-19 crisis proved both to be highly effective defenders of the capitalist status quo. She, and they, kept the lights on. And that, in the absence of an alternative ...1 week ago
- The Greens and LabourWith an absolute majority, Labour can govern in its own right, and doesn't need partners. But while unnecessary, they're a nice-to-have, both as backup and for PR reasons. Ardern has talked about "consensus", and there are obvious benefits for her of having government policy endorsed by as many parties as ...1 week ago
- 2020 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #42Story of the Week... Toon of the Week... Coming Soon on SkS... Climate Feedback Claim Review... SkS Week in Review... Poster of the Week... Story of the Week... Earth has warmest September on record, and 2020 may clinch hottest year Record warmth in Europe and Asia overwhelms a ...1 week ago
- Josh Van Veen: The Vindication of Winston PetersAn egalitarian spirit is currently being revived in New Zealand, and we should thank Winston Peters for keeping alive that spirit. Josh Van Veen, who once worked with the NZ First leader, pays his tribute. With New Zealand First receiving less than 3% of the vote, critics are happily ...1 week ago
- The Hunt for Red October: Musings on Taieri
So New Zealand has had its general election. Jacinda Ardern has managed a single-party majority government, New Zealand’s first in twenty-six years, and its first since the adoption of proportional representation. I intend to do a comment on that further down the line – my feelings on the Sunday ...1 week ago - Lessons from the ElectionThis year’s general election has broken new ground – and not just in terms of its outcome, the seats won and votes cast, and – in an MMP environment – the margin of victory. It also suggests that something quite fundamental has changed in New Zealand politics. The outcome is ...1 week ago
- The unexpected resultThe people have spoken, and its a Labour majority government. This wasn't meant to happen under MMP, and in fact its exactly what the system was designed to prevent: no majority governments, no elected dictatorships, unless we really, really want it (which at the time seemed unlikely on 40 years ...1 week ago
- Schadenfreude is a dish best served blueWhat started out as the largest party in parliament has ended election night scratching the back door of the house of irrelevance. ...1 week ago
- 2020 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #42A chronological listing of news articles linked to on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week: Sun, Oct 11, 2020 through Sat, Oct 17, 2020 Editor's Choice A FIELD GUIDE TOTHE ELECTION AND CLIMATE CHANGE The presidential election is just weeks away, and climate change has broken ...1 week ago
- Legal Beagle: Election '20: The Special VotesThe 2020 General Election has a preliminary result. For reasons I am unable to really explain, we will not have even a preliminary result for the end of life choice and cannabis legalisation referendums for some weeks (I dropped the ball on that one when the referendum legislation was before ...1 week ago
- National rejects tonight’s result as a ‘rogue poll’
National are dismissing tonight’s election result as an “obvious outlier” Half an hour into counting, National Party leader Judith Collins and deputy leader Gerry Brownlee are already dismissing tonight’s election result as a “rogue poll”, saying it’s an incomplete survey with shoddy methodology. Brownlee called an emergency media stand-up just ...2 weeks ago - Jacinda Ardern ran down four National supporters with her car this morning but due to electoral law ...Dr. Ashley Bloomfield reported at today’s 1pm health briefing that the Coronavirus turns out not to exist, but that information was also withheld on the same grounds. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern began her election morning by ruthlessly driving her car into a family of National supporters just blocks from her ...2 weeks ago
- Six weird animals that have nothing to do with the electionGet a load of these things! Some of these animals are just crazy. You wouldn’t want a single one of these animals anywhere near your kids. It could ruin them for life. Last thing you’d want is your kid growing up around any of these, and thinking that’s what animals ...2 weeks ago
- 1pm Covid Health Update for 17th October, 2020What follows is today’s 1pm health update from the Ministry of Health There are 12 new cases of Covid-19 today, six in managed isolation, three escaped, and three are wealthy foreigners so it’s fine. One of these cases is a man in his 50s who visited Auckland sex club Fisting ...2 weeks ago
- WATCH LIVE: Election Night 2020
...2 weeks ago - Election Night Speech – Marama Davidson
Kia ora tātou kātoa. Ngā mihi maioha ki a koutou Te Roopu Kakariki, ngā kaitautoko, e aroha ana I te kaupapa mo te taiao me te mokopuna. No reira tena koutou, tena koutou, tena koutou katoa. I am so proud to be standing here tonight, at the end of an ...2 weeks ago - Election Night Speech – James ShawOn Election Night three years ago I stood up in front of you to say, “We are still here!” Well, tonight, not only are we still here, we are the first support party in MMP history to have started and finished a term in government above the 5% threshold. We ...2 weeks ago
- Greens only party with plan to meet scale of climate challengeA new report showing that the effects of climate change are already being felt in Aotearoa New Zealand shows the importance of the Green Party pushing for urgent action in the next Government. ...2 weeks ago
- Green Party commits to stronger urban tree protection and no new mines on public conservation landThe Green Party is the only party in Parliament which is explicitly committing to protecting public conservation land and the indigenous plants and wildlife which live there, from destructive mining. ...2 weeks ago
- Greens close campaign with COVID-19 recovery pitchThe Green Party says a Green-Labour partnership next term is the only way to ensure that we build back better than before, whilst addressing the other crises of biodiversity, climate change and poverty. ...2 weeks ago
- Vote still undecided? Watch this.As of today, over 1.4 million New Zealanders have already cast their votes in this year’s election. While this shows that a huge number of people have already made up their minds about who they want to lead our country, there are many who are still undecided. ...2 weeks ago
- Labour's 2020 Election ManifestoThe Labour Party understands how important continuity, stability and clarity are for New Zealanders in these uncertain times. That’s why, in our 2020 Election Manifesto, we’re setting out how we will continue to invest in people, jobs, small businesses, infrastructure, and global trade, to set New Zealand up for the ...2 weeks ago
- Green Party releases tourism policyToday the Green Party’s conservation spokesperson Eugenie Sage went kayaking on Akaroa Harbour to highlight the greater protection achieved for Hector’s and Maui dolphins this term and the Greens’ election commitment to supporting sustainable tourism. ...2 weeks ago
- National’s false ‘wealth tax’ claims: The “last roll of the misinformation dice”“Collins has warned voters to expect a wealth tax. This is despite the fact Labour has ruled this out a number of times.” – Jason Walls, NZ Herald. “The Labour Party has ruled out implementing the Green Party's wealth tax.” – Henry Cooke, Stuff. “Labour has time and time again ...2 weeks ago
- Week that was: Counting down to Election DayIt’s getting incredibly close to Election Day now – and over a million people have already cast their vote! ...2 weeks ago
- Jacinda Ardern's Wellington Rally SpeechJacinda Ardern delivers a rally speech at Wellington's Michael Fowler Centre. ...2 weeks ago
- Grant Robertson's Wellington Rally SpeechGrant Robertson delivers a rally speech at Wellington's Michael Fowler Centre. ...2 weeks ago
- Building a vibrant creative sector The Green Party will push for better conditions, more certainty, and greater opportunities for New Zealand’s artists and creatives as part of the next Government, Co-leader of the Green Party, James Shaw said today. ...2 weeks ago
- Greens promise continued action to reduce mental health waiting timesThe Green Party is committed to reduce the waiting times people in mental distress have to put up with before they receive attention and get treatment. ...3 weeks ago
- Early voting is openDid you know that early voting is open? That means you can go out and cast your vote right now - whether you've already enrolled or not. Almost 600,000 Kiwis have already voted, and you can join them! ...3 weeks ago
- Greens would go further and faster for kauri protectionThe Green Party says Labour’s commitment to protecting kauri is a good start, but the Greens would go further and faster to keep our kauri standing. ...3 weeks ago
- Greens would bring urban food farms to Auckland CityThe Green Party will invest funding in community agriculture and urban food gardens in places like Auckland city centre. ...3 weeks ago
- Tokelau Language Week reminds us to stay united and strong
Staying strong in the face of challenges and being true to our heritage and languages are key to preserving our cultural identity and wellbeing, is the focus of the 2020 Tokelau Language Week. Minister for Pacific Peoples, Aupito William Sio, says this year’s theme, ‘Apoapo tau foe, i nā tāfea ...5 days ago - NZ announces a third P-3 deployment in support of UN sanctionsThe Government has deployed a Royal New Zealand Air Force P-3K2 Orion (P-3) maritime patrol aircraft to support the implementation of United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions imposing sanctions against North Korea, announced Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters and Minister of Defence Ron Mark. “New Zealand has long supported ...1 week ago
- Pacific trade and development agreement a realityPacific regional trade and development agreement PACER Plus will enter into force in 60 days now that the required eight countries have ratified it. Trade and Export Growth Minister David Parker welcomed the announcement that the Cook Islands is the eighth nation to ratify this landmark agreement. “The agreement represents ...2 weeks ago
- Securing a pipeline of teachersThe Government is changing its approach to teacher recruitment as COVID-19 travel restrictions continue, by boosting a range of initiatives to get more Kiwis into teaching. “When we came into Government, we were faced with a teacher supply crisis,” Education Minister Chris Hipkins said. “Over the past three years, we ...2 weeks ago
- Border exceptions for a small number of international students with visasThe Government has established a new category that will allow 250 international PhD and postgraduate students to enter New Zealand and continue their studies, in the latest set of border exceptions. “The health, safety and wellbeing of people in New Zealand remains the Government’s top priority. Tight border restrictions remain ...2 weeks ago
- First COVID-19 vaccine purchase agreement signedThe Government has signed an agreement to purchase 1.5 million COVID-19 vaccines – enough for 750,000 people – from Pfizer and BioNTech, subject to the vaccine successfully completing all clinical trials and passing regulatory approvals in New Zealand, say Research, Science and Innovation Minister Megan Woods and Health Minister Chris Hipkins. ...2 weeks ago
- International statement – End-to-end encryption and public safetyWe, the undersigned, support strong encryption, which plays a crucial role in protecting personal data, privacy, intellectual property, trade secrets and cyber security. It also serves a vital purpose in repressive states to protect journalists, human rights defenders and other vulnerable people, as stated in the 2017 resolution of the ...2 weeks ago
- Ministry of Defence Biodefence Assessment releasedThe Ministry of Defence has today released a Defence Assessment examining Defence’s role across the spectrum of biological hazards and threats facing New Zealand. Biodefence: Preparing for a New Era of Biological Hazards and Threats looks at how the NZDF supports other agencies’ biodefence activities, and considers the context of ...2 weeks ago
- New Approaches to Economic Challenges: Confronting Planetary Emergencies: OECD 9 October 2020New Approaches to Economic Challenges: Confronting Planetary Emergencies: OECD 9 October 2020 Hon David Parker’s response following Thomas Piketty and Esther Duflo. Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening, wherever in the world you might be. I first acknowledge the excellent thought provoking speeches of Thomas Piketty and Esther ...3 weeks ago
- Kaipara Moana restoration takes next stepA Memorandum of Understanding has been signed today at Waihāua Marae between the Crown, local iwi and councils to protect, restore and enhance the mauri of Kaipara Moana in Northland. Environment Minister David Parker signed the document on behalf of the Crown along with representatives from Ngā Maunga Whakahī, Ngāti ...3 weeks ago
- New Zealand and Uruguay unite on reducing livestock production emissionsAgriculture Minister Damien O’Connor and Uruguayan Minister of Livestock, Agriculture and Fisheries Carlos María Uriarte have welcomed the launch of a three-year project that will underpin sustainable livestock production in Uruguay, Argentina, and Costa Rica. The project called ‘Innovation for pasture management’ is led by Uruguay’s National Institute of Agricultural ...3 weeks ago
- 3100 jobs created through marae upgradesHundreds of marae throughout the country will be upgraded through investments from the Provincial Growth Fund’s refocused post COVID-19 funding to create jobs and put money into the pockets of local tradespeople and businesses, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones and Māori Development Minister Nanaia Mahuta have announced. “A total ...3 weeks ago
- Health volunteers recognised in annual awardsHealth Minister Chris Hipkins has announced 9 teams and 14 individuals are the recipients of this year’s Minister of Health Volunteer Awards. “The health volunteer awards celebrate and recognise the thousands of dedicated health sector volunteers who give many hours of their time to help other New Zealanders,” Mr Hipkins ...3 weeks ago
- Community COVID-19 Fund supports Pacific recoveryThe Minister for Pacific Peoples, Aupito William Sio says a total of 264 groups and individuals have successfully applied for the Pacific Aotearoa Community COVID-19 Recovery Fund, that will support Pacific communities drive their own COVID-19 recovery strategies, initiatives, and actions. “I am keen to see this Fund support Pacific ...3 weeks ago
- Community benefits from Māori apprenticeshipsUp to 50 Māori apprentices in Wellington will receive paid training to build houses for their local communities, thanks to a $2.75 million investment from the Māori Trades and Training Fund, announced Employment Minister Willie Jackson today. “This funding will enable Ngāti Toa Rangatira Incorporated to provide its Ngā Kaimahi ...3 weeks ago
- Training fund supports Māori jobseekersRapidly growing sectors will benefit from a $990,000 Māori Trades and Training Fund investment which will see Wellington jobseekers supported into work, announced Employment Minister Willie Jackson today. “This funding will enable Sapphire Consultants Ltd. to help up to 45 Māori jobseekers into paid training initiatives over two years through ...3 weeks ago
- Newsletter: New Zealand Politics Daily – October 28 2020
Editor’s Note: Here below is a list of the main issues currently under discussion in New Zealand and links to media coverage. Today’s content Greens and coalition negotiations John Armstrong (1News): Don’t mistake Ardern’s talks with Green Party for kindness David Williams (Newsroom): A tale of two Green ministers Richard Harman (Politik): Greens’ high stakes game ...27 mins ago - The New Zealand designer behind Rihanna’s lingerie has gone solo
Chloé Julian’s been supporting boobs for years under big names like Stella McCartney and Agent Provocateur. Now, home in New Zealand, she’s launched Videris, a lingerie line that focuses on comfort over everything.After 15 years working in the lingerie industry, Hamilton-raised Chloé Julian knows the ins and outs of bras ...1 hour ago - Live updates, October 28: All arrivals into the country should be tested – health ministerWelcome to The Spinoff’s live updates for October 28. All the latest New Zealand news, updated throughout the day. Reach us at stewart@thespinoff.co.nz7.45am: All arrivals into the country should be tested – health ministerThe health minister Chris Hipkins has called for all arrivals into the country to be tested for ...2 hours ago
- Why this Queensland election is different — states are back at the forefront of political attentio...Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Graeme Orr, Professor of Law, The University of Queensland On October 31, Queensland will become Australia’s first state to go to the polls during the pandemic. Normally, state elections pass amiably. They matter to the MPs, ministers and senior public servants concerned. ...3 hours ago
- New polling shows 79% of Aussies care about climate change. So why doesn’t the government listen?Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Colvin, Lecturer, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University We will remember 2020 as a year of crisis. COVID-19 hit Australia just as we were beginning to make sense of the horror bushfires and smoke of last summer, a sinister ...3 hours ago
- Industry cadetships: a good but small step to tap the talents of women in STEMSource: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Pi-Shen Seet, Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Edith Cowan University An overarching criticism of the recent federal budget is that it overlooked the workers hit hardest by the COVID-19 pandemic, namely women. However, the budget includes one promising, albeit small, initiative that ...3 hours ago
- Will I or won’t I? Scientists still haven’t figured out free will, but they’re having fun tryi...Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stefan Bode, Postdoctoral Research Fellow Decision Neuroscience Laboratory, University of Melbourne Social media algorithms, artificial intelligence, and our own genetics are among the factors influencing us beyond our awareness. This raises an ancient question: do we have control over our own lives? ...3 hours ago
- Cervical, breast, heart, bowel: here’s what women should be getting screened regularlySource: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jenny Doust, Clinical Professorial Research Fellow, The University of Queensland Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, many have felt anxious about going to the GP and other health facilities, believing these places have had a greater risk of transmission. A lot of us have ...3 hours ago
- Blink and you’ll miss it: what the budget did for working mumsSource: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Miranda Stewart, Professor, University of Melbourne Working mothers get something in the budget, but not much, and not for long. Before the budget the second earner in a couple with young children (usually the mother) lost almost all of the income she ...3 hours ago
- Total Recall at 30: why this brutal action film remains a classicSource: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ari Mattes, Lecturer in Communications and Media, University of Notre Dame Australia People often roll their eyes when they hear about a major Hollywood studio re-releasing a film from its back catalogue to cinemas. Director’s cuts, “reduxes” and remastered prints can seem ...3 hours ago
- The Bulletin: Should the government back Chris Liddell for OECD?Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Should the government back Chris Liddell for OECD, testing and app scan numbers jump over long weekend, and an update on talks between Labour and Greens.The government’s decision on whether to back New Zealander Chris Liddell for the top job ...3 hours ago
- Recognising Palestine Should Be The First Step For Our New Minister Of Foreign Affairs
Recognising Palestine should be the first policy announcement of our new Foreign Minister after they are announced next week. Successive New Zealand governments have claimed to take an “even-handed” approach to the Middle East but this is untrue. ...3 hours ago - Business & Investing: Sept trade surplus at six-year high
New Zealand records its second best trade result in 25 years, plus the big bid for Coca Cola here and in Australia. ...4 hours ago - The rookie ACT MPs who might not be what you expect
ACT scored big on election night but it was a "bittersweet" victory - the party is still on the wrong side of power. So what will its nine new MPs do for the next three years? ...5 hours ago - National MPs need to avoid their own spin
Publicly, the National Party claims it did all that it could in the election campaign and is silent about the leader in the room. But it's time to put away the blue-tinted spectacles, writes Tim Murphy ...5 hours ago - Is Tokelauan facing extinction?
What happens when a language outlives its homeland, when its speakers live here, in New Zealand? John Middleton on the challenge for Tokelauan. It is Tokelau Language Week and although a brief glance at the statistics paints a dire picture for its survival, the real picture for Tokelauan is much ...5 hours ago - What next for the US Supreme Court
The US Supreme Court now has a clear conservative majority, but predicting how individual justices might decide cases can be a fool's game, writes Hayden Thorne Donald Trump’s nominee to fill Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s seat on the United States Supreme Court, Amy Coney Barrett has been confirmed by the US Senate ...5 hours ago - NZ research sheds light on unexplained deaths
NZ-led research is guiding families through the tragedy of sudden unexplained death, addressing questions like: would a potential diagnosis of a genetic cardiac condition threaten employment prospects or eligibility for health insurance? A 25-year-old woman with a young infant collapses after an unexpected visitor rings the doorbell late one evening. Despite the ...5 hours ago - Catherine Chidgey by Aimee Cronin & Jane Ussher
We continue our extraordinary series of portraits of New Zealand authors as Aimee Cronin (words) and Jane Ussher (pictures) profile novelist Catherine Chidgey From Catherine Chidgey’s doorstep you can see right into the colourful room of her young daughter Alice, pictures and photos all over the walls. Look out to ...5 hours ago - The price of kindness
One promising area of policy came to a shuddering halt in the first term of the Labour government. Bob Kerridge argues now is the time to put animal rights and welfare back in the mix Three years ago, the Labour Party regained the Government benches and signalled a number of social ...5 hours ago - A tale of two Green ministers
Green Party ministerial picks might be a good yardstick for the next Government’s ambition. David Williams reports Opinion: A downpour of predictions has spurted from political pundits on possible Labour-Greens cooperation in the next Government. Despite Labour being able to rule alone, we’re told there have been “fruitful discussions”. Former United ...5 hours ago - Track and field women go hammer and tongs for Tokyo
Sarah Cowley Ross catches up with three Olympic track and field hopefuls - Camille Buscomb, lifted up by a flock of Kiwi runners, and hammer throwers Julia Ratcliffe and Lauren Bruce, pushing each other to reach Tokyo. It’s often a lonesome journey for an individual athlete. Gruelling solo training sessions ...5 hours ago - The infrastructure Aotearoa has got right so far is digital
With the Covid-19 economic rebuild on everyone’s minds, Aotearoa should double down on its world-class digital infrastructure and focus even more on digital adoption to thrive, writes Vodafone NZ CEO Jason Paris Historically, governments have tended to focus most of their collective investment on 20th Century physical infrastructure. Yet we have digital ...5 hours ago - Arrival of parliament’s new migrant MPs sparks rejoicing, and backlashWhile our newest migrant MPs are inspiring people across the world, their first week in parliament has not passed without controversy here in New Zealand. Not since the early 1900s, when recent immigrants flooded the colonial parliament’s benches, has the Beehive seen such an influx of foreign-born MPs – albeit ...5 hours ago
- Me hoki whenua mai? Putting tāngata back on the whenuaTo mark the anniversary of the signing of He Whakaputanga o te Rangatiratanga, the Declaration of Independence, on this day in 1835, race relations commissioner Meng Foon has one message: land back.Whenua is fundamental to Māori identity and whakapapa. Whenua and housing are essential for wellbeing. Yet despite Māori resilience, ...5 hours ago
- Crowded house – the newbie ACT MPs
Don't expect a bunch of neo-liberal automatons in the new intake of ACT MPs, says Newsroom Pro's Jonathan Milne. 2020’s extraordinary election sees 40 new MPs in Parliament. Labour alone has 22 fresh faces but in terms of rookie caucuses, ACT beats them all. David Seymour – the youngest party leader, ...5 hours ago - Just Fix the F**king Housing Problem. Please!
It is far, far, past time for politicians to mandate the changes that will help Kiwis live in secure, affordable homes. Just do it, pleads Jess Berentson-Shaw. ...5 hours ago - New MP Ibrahim Omer’s election highlights the challenges refugees from Africa face in New ZealandSource: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Samuel Judah Seomeng, Postgraduate student, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington The election of Labour candidate Ibrahim Omer on October 17 makes him New Zealand’s first African MP and one of only two former refugees to sit in the New ...12 hours ago
- Facebook is tilting the political playing field more than ever, and it’s no accidentSource: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Brand, Adjunct A/Prof of Data Science and Artificial Intelligence, Monash University As the US presidential election polling day draws close, it’s worth recapping what we know about how Facebook has been used to influence election results. The platform is optimised for ...16 hours ago
- Momentum vs underdog status: this time the advantage is with Joe BidenSource: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lionel Page, Professor in Economics, University of Technology Sydney Polls highly favour Joe Biden to win the US presidential election. These polls are not just abstract information. By telling prospective voters who is the most likely to win, can they influence the ...16 hours ago
- Labour and Greens meeting: 'There's a lot to work through'Green Party co-leaders have emerged from their second round of talks with Labour in hopes of taking a deal to their membership by the end of the week. ...16 hours ago
- Who will Muslim Americans vote for in the US elections?Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mehmet Ozalp, Associate Professor in Islamic Studies, Director of The Centre for Islamic Studies and Civilisation and Executive Member of Public and Contextual Theology, Charles Sturt University Muslims are a small minority in the United States, but they may have a significant ...17 hours ago
- Evening Report LIVE: Tech Now with Sarah Putt and Selwyn Manning – Consumer Rights + Google in DoJ...Hello I’m Selwyn Manning and you are watching Tech Now. Tonight, we are joined by technology commentator Sarah Putt to discuss some of the week’s big tech issues, including: A new Telecommunications Commissioner started in June. And the commissioner has a big focus on telco consumer rights. We’ll talk ...17 hours ago
- Could a test really detect if someone is a COVID-19 ‘superspreader’?Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lara Herrero, Research Leader in Virology and Infectious Disease, Griffith University Last week we heard Queensland-based biotech company Microbio had developed a test that could, according to media reports, tell whether someone is a COVID-19 superspreader. While this may sound like an ...17 hours ago
- Climate explained: did atomic bomb tests damage our upper atmosphere?Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brett Carter, Senior lecturer, RMIT University CC BY-ND Climate Explained is a collaboration between The Conversation, Stuff and the New Zealand Science Media Centre to answer your questions about climate change. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, ...18 hours ago
- Review: Louise Milligan’s Witness is a devastating critique of the criminal trial processSource: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ben Mathews, Professor, School of Law, Queensland University of Technology Book review: Witness, by Louise Milligan (Hachette). Louise Milligan’s new book, Witness, is an excoriating critique of the failures of the criminal justice system in sexual assault trials. Informed by Milligan’s two ...18 hours ago
- NZPP leaders decide the best way to make progress politically is to step back from Advance NZ
Browsing through items of political news published on Labour Day, we came across a statement from the New Zealand Public Party (NZPP) and Reset New Zealand which declared they were retreating from Jami-Lee Ross’s Advance New Zealand party. Not a full retreat, necessarily. Rather, they “ … have moved ...18 hours ago - Activists Picket FarmRight, Demand End To Use Of Western Sahara Blood PhosphateProtesters today picketed the FarmRight head office in Ōtautahi Christchurch to call on FarmRight to cease using phosphate fertiliser illegally sourced from Western Sahara on the farms it manages. The protest was in solidarity with the Polisario ...18 hours ago
- Covid-19 has changed New Zealand forever. The experts explain how: part twoSome of the smartest people in the country examine the effects of the pandemic on Aotearoa’s future in 400 words or fewer. Read part one here. Beyond the horrific global death toll and the economic shutdowns, there is hope that Covid-19 will allow us to build a better society in the ...18 hours ago
- Super-charged: Australia’s biggest renewables project will change the energy gameSource: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Mathews, Professor Emeritus, Macquarie Business School, Macquarie University Australia doesn’t yet export renewable energy. But the writing is on the wall: demand for Australia’s fossil fuel exports is likely to dwindle soon, and we must replace it at massive scale. The ...19 hours ago
- Dear Australia, your sympathy helps, but you can’t quite understand Melbourne’s lockdown experie...Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Brady, Research Fellow – Community Resilience, University of Melbourne The joy Melburnians feel about coming out of lockdown is palpable, but another thread is also emerging: if you don’t live in Melbourne and haven’t experienced what we’ve experienced, you can’t actually ...19 hours ago
- How to be brave in the face of, you know, everythingWhat does it mean to find courage in the face of a global pandemic, race protests, border strife and climate anxiety? Books editor Catherine Woulfe writes:Christchurch’s Word spring festival opens tomorrow. In real life! A highlight will be the Brave Worlds gala on Friday night, at which luminaries (Becky Manawatu, Witi ...19 hours ago
- ALRANZ Denounces US Senate Confirmation Of Judge BarrettALRANZ Abortion Rights Aotearoa denounces the US Senate’s confirmation of Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court seat formerly held by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg. “This action demonstrates the rank hypocrisy of the once-respected upper chamber ...20 hours ago
- The backlash against big techFrom antitrust suits to restrictive new laws, the world’s digital behemoths are in hot water. So who’s on the naughty list and why? Hal Crawford explains.All around the world, governments are moving against big tech companies. The US government last week filed a suit against Google in an era-defining antitrust ...20 hours ago
- Public sculpture commemorating Dame Hilda RossDame Hilda Ross was the first Hamilton/Waikato woman elected as an MP in 1945 and became the second woman in New Zealand to become a Cabinet Minister in 1949. Artist Matt Gauldie’s bronze sculpture portrays Dame Hilda in Parliament, with one hand ...20 hours ago
- Motorbikes Major Factor In Road TollThe high number of motorbike deaths and injuries in New Zealand has prompted a call for urgent action. Clive Matthew Wilson, editor of the car review website dogandlemon.com , says: “Over Labour Weekend, two of the worst accidents involved motorbikes.“ ...21 hours ago
- Countdown Customer Care Strike Continues As Frustration GrowsCountdown customer care specialists who deal with the supermarket’s online orders are taking partial strike action today and withdrawing labour relating to online shopping as anger grows among workers at the company’s comments about pay and value, ...21 hours ago
- Ranking the strongest ladies in New Zealand – our tunnel boring machinesIn an effort to bring The Spinoff’s favourite format – the ranking – to its knees, Alice Webb-Liddall ranks the most boring thing she can think of: borers.If something is to be named after me when I have passed away after a lifetime of goodwill and national recognition, I would ...21 hours ago
- Pendulum swings back from the mean politics of the market
Leading unionist Richard Wagstaff has high hopes for lasting change after an election that shifted influence from boomers and the market to younger, fairer thinking. It has taken a few days to fully comprehend the enormity of what happened on election night. That’s because there are few moments in politics ...22 hours ago - Stay out of cabinet – be independent, former MP tells GreensBy RNZ News Former Green Party MP Keith Locke says his contemporaries should stay out of the New Zealand cabinet in order to remain critical of Labour while also working constructively with it. Any cabinet positions offered to the Greens by Labour would be a favour, not a necessity, and ...22 hours ago
- Heartland Bank Workers Take Strike Action In Auckland Over Low Pay RatesWorkers at Heartland Bank in Auckland are taking strike action today and walking off the job after unsuccessful negotiations with the employer have failed to result in meaningful increases to wages that union officials say are well below market rates, ...22 hours ago
- 57,000 books to be flicked at Trentham
The National Library is about to hock off 57,000 books for $2 each at a glorified garage sale Steve Braunias, ReadingRoom literary editor: About 57,000 books hauled out of the Overseas Collection at Wellington's National Library are about to be hocked off at a flat rate of $2 per book ...22 hours ago - ParityBOT_NZ Processed Nearly 200,000 Tweets To Find And Fight Online Abuse Over The NZ ElectionAuckland, New Zealand: Of the almost 200,000 tweets directed at women candidates that Areto Labs’ proprietary election Twitter bot, ParityBOT_NZ, processed over the New Zealand election period, nearly 4,000 were classified as toxic and triggered ...22 hours ago
- Emily Writes: Bad Halloween ideas to entertain your little devilsHalloween is just around the corner. If you’re a parent looking for spooky activities to entertain your beastly offspring, Emily Writes has got your back.What to do for Halloween during a global pandemic? It’s a question few parents care about or are asking, but I’m on deadline and so here ...22 hours ago
- From penthouse to prison cell: The downfall of Eric WatsonThe jailing this week of New Zealand playboy businessman Eric Watson was nearly a decade in the legal making, writes the NZ Herald’s Matt Nippert in this Herald Premium article.The fall of Eric John Watson, from penthouse-dwelling playboy to prisoner in apparent penury, didn’t happen overnight. He’s also recently caught ...23 hours ago
- Problems zoning schools 'at heart' of transient neighbourhoods
Schools are the hearts of their communities, – but principals feel they're being treated as pawns. ...24 hours ago - Ngāi Tahu Treaty Settlement Subject Of New UC StudyAs the father of a nine-year-old daughter, David Tikao feels personally invested in how well his iwi organisation – Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu – is distributing wealth to beneficiaries and investing for future generations. He is researching how ...1 day ago
- Look Out For Animal Health And Welfare Around Guy FawkesThis year, look after the animals - don’t let off fireworks at home or around your community. Every year, veterinary clinics see animals injured and traumatised by fireworks. These include pets, wildlife and stock. Some injuries are horrific. ...1 day ago
- How the lockdown changed our diets, affected our sleep, and left us lonelyIn 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic prompted New Zealand and much of the world to undertake something few of us had ever contemplated: a near-total lockdown of society. In this Lockdown legacies series, James Dann explores the impacts of those extraordinary measures, intended and otherwise. Today: the lifestyle changes it brought ...1 day ago
- Green Party should avoid Cabinet positions and remain an independent, critical voice – former ...Former Green Party MP Keith Locke says his contemporaries should stay out of Cabinet in order to remain critical of Labour while also working constructively with it. ...1 day ago
- Newsletter: New Zealand Politics Daily – October 27 2020Editor’s Note: Here below is a list of the main issues currently under discussion in New Zealand and links to media coverage. Today’s content Labour Party and new Labour Government Andrea Vance (Stuff): ‘Labour Connect’ the data analysis tool that boosted Jacinda Ardern’s campaign Heather du Plessis-Allan (Herald): Time for Govt to take some ...1 day ago
- 'Walk away from it. Create something that beats like your own heart.'
The Waitangi Tribunal has heard multiple, strong calls for an independent, Māori-run authority to replace Oranga Tamariki. Laura Walters reports Māori leaders have told the Waitangi Tribunal they’re sick of waiting while the Crown fails Māori children and whānau. The Waitangi Tribunal’s Oranga Tamariki Urgent Inquiry has heard a series ...1 day ago - Op-Ed: The United Nations, 75 years young – Engaging youth social entrepreneurs to accelerate the ...Opinion by Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana. Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana is the United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP). This year, the United Nations is marking its 75th anniversary – a milestone of extraordinary economic and social progress in Asia and ...1 day ago
- Review: Match Fit shows former All Blacks overweight and struggling – just like the rest of usIn their heyday they were invulnerable, but now the likes of Piri Weepu and Eroni Clarke are all too human. That’s what makes Match Fit so compelling, says Duncan Greive.Match Fit is aimed at the more casual class of rugby fan, but its audience would likely bristle at what lies ...1 day ago
- National Party post-election review to look at campaign and past three years in oppositionJudith Collins says a review of the National Party's election campaign will extend to the past three years in opposition, but won't say much else. ...1 day ago
- What would a Biden presidency mean for Australia?Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tony Walker, Adjunct Professor, School of Communications, La Trobe University American presidential elections do not, as a rule, change the calculus much for Australian foreign policy. Elections come and go, American presidents complete their terms and business continues more or less as ...1 day ago
- Our minds may be wandering more during the pandemic — and this can be a good thingSource: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jennifer Windt, Senior Research Fellow, Monash University Many feel the coronavirus pandemic has changed not just our everyday lives, but also our inner mental lives. There has been talk of a mental health pandemic, but also of lockdown brain fog when we ...1 day ago
- Live updates, October 27: ‘Clearly, more went wrong’ – National Party review underwayWelcome to The Spinoff’s live updates for October 27. All the latest New Zealand news, updated throughout the day. Reach us at stewart@thespinoff.co.nz7.40am: ‘More went wrong’ – Judith Collins speaks ahead of National Party reviewThe National Party is set to reassemble this week to discuss plans for opposition, as the ...1 day ago
- Cool discovery: new studies confirm Moon has icy polesSource: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Dempster, Director, Australian Centre for Space Engineering Research; Professor, School of Electrical Engineering and Telecommunications, UNSW Water is more abundant on the Moon than we might have suspected, according to two papers published today in Nature Astronomy that confirm the presence ...1 day ago
- Reimagining the laser: new ideas from quantum theory could herald a revolutionSource: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Howard Wiseman, Director, Centre for Quantum Dynamics, Griffith University Lasers were created 60 years ago this year, when three different laser devices were unveiled by independent laboratories in the United States. A few years later, one of these inventors called the unusual ...1 day ago
- Wage theft and casual work are built into university business modelsSource: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Damien Cahill, Associate Professor, Department of Political Economy, University of Sydney The COVID crisis has exposed the destructive consequences of an over-reliance on casual labour across the economy. Australian universities provide one of the clearest examples of this. For the past two ...1 day ago
- The Bulletin: Unaffordable dental care in the spotlightGood morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Unaffordable dental care in the spotlight, update on the two crops of Covid cases, and Billy TK quits Advance NZ alliance.One of the weeping sores of the health system is the high cost of dental care, and the health effects ...1 day ago
- Labour and Greens to wrap-up final talks this weekLabour and the Greens will meet again today to thrash out areas they can cooperate on in government. ...1 day ago
- Business & Investing: Infratil eyes acquisition target
Infratil lines up a radiology play in Australia, plus a big week in the US with a third of the S&P500 companies reporting and GDP figures out ...1 day ago - Chihuahua sparks constitutional conversation
A tweet about the oath of allegiance gets to the core of a much-needed conversation about NZ's constitution. ...1 day ago
The kauri tree will stay, proclaims the Herald.
A small victory.
But will the Herald actually look at the law changes this government made that took away protections from trees in our city?
Doubt it.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11415759
We need a binding promise from the landowners. The letter looks like a promise but when you reread it the letter looks more like an offer …
Yep, sounds like they are angling to sell the land to the council or similar organisation.
I wouldn’t come down from the tree until the owners have written to council and asked to quash the RC and the council has done that.
“…Normally a land use consent is granted for unlimited duration, as long as the development detailed in the consent has been implemented to a significant level within five years (or a different period as written in the consent). If not, your consent will lapse.
Any land use consent that is granted is attached to the property (as opposed to a specific person)”
auckland council website
There is a provision in the RMA under which a resource consent holder can request/require the Council to revoke the consent. Have used it meself
guy up tree seems to know it too…
thanks for the clarification.
I notice the 1080 story has successfully knocked Winston Peter’s campaign in Northland off the top of the headlines.
Oh that ..and Lydia Ko….a biker clocking 218 km/hr….a P smuggler cleared to teach ( another Herald attack on the teaching profession)…..jilted Eagles fans….
The capitalist media in this country is quite a propaganda machine for the banking elite.
As evidence, the Northern Advocate ( part of the APN corporate stable..same group as the Herald) dragged up someone from the Hawkes Bay to write an article slagging off Winston Peters….
And this was their leading story!
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/northern-advocate/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503450&objectid=11415367
Love the online below the story!
The facile fearmongering of The Northern Advocate’s ‘visitor from Hawke’s Bay’ re Winston Peters will piss-off more Northland voters than it will impress. Bad call whoever’s behind it !
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/northern-advocate/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503450&objectid=11415367
My, the wheels do seem to be falling off……
Of the 42 comments only 2 were supportive of the writer.
Those 2 probably written by Farrar and Slater.
Paul, you know APN is now NZME. (New Zealand Media and Entertainment)
Their agenda is clear:
“Right now we’re seen as a publishing business, a radio business and an e-commerce business,” she said. “But clients don’t come to us and say ‘I want to buy publishing’. They say: ‘I have a brand, this is the audience I’m after. How can you connect my brand with that audience?'”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11330863
I still have difficulty understanding why people read the Herald.
I’m off to listen to the Scoop report on the radio 🙂
(And now we have Eveningreport.nz !)
No need for rags like the Herald.
“No need for rags like the Herald.”
How else would we keep our fish ‘n’ chips warm???
Or provide a lining for the kitty tray…………..
“Or provide a lining for the kitty tray…”
Hell no, would not think of using it for that. The poor thing might catch something
Best use ever for the Granny. Is to be crapped on by a small furry creature of the Genus Feline. (Or walking flea hotel which ever takes your fancy). Yep a very good use of the Granny, more likely to catch something if used for food warming. to say nothing of the taste of burnt paper.
FIFY. 😈
The establishment do not like him because he takes them on at every turn. Simple really.
Paul your quite correct with your claim.
The editor of the local NZH rag veto’s (edits/bins) politically natured stories that he doesn’t like. Twice 2 separate reporters covering local events have said ‘if it gets past the editor’. I think he got kicked to touch as the Waikato Times editor. Wasn’t surprised to hear he is mates with the local Tory old boys network. In saying this 2 of their columnist’s are left leaning, and do publish criticism of the Tories, all be it a Gower type attack follows by one of his pets.
From the article: “Winston will be 70 this month, a pensioner for five years and still being paid a party leader’s salary by the taxpayer.”
What drivel, ageism and meanness.
While I don’t agree 100% with Winston Peters, I think he should be paid a royalty/stipend or call it a “democracy pension” for ALL the services he has done fir New Zealanders in Parliament, a watchful eye and calling people out when he sees or has heard untoward, undemocratic or plain corrupt practices.
He has done more for this country single handedly than many of us collectively could do. Sure he is a rogue, but he has more mana than most other politicians.
70 is nothing! Look at this 95-yr old smashing the WR 200m sprint. I just love the headline that he’s a retired dentist. LOL
@Paul P addicted smuggler teacher is allowed to stay on teaching, with the NZ teachers council disciplinary tribunal saying she is ‘talented’ enough to stay on with just a censure, and you say the herald is attacking the teaching profession….
Really! are you for real or a teacher
Listening to the pair of useful idiots Espiner and Furgeson going big on NatRad “with all the developments on today’s big story” (1080 scare) I wondered where it all went wrong in this country. Our journalists are all now somehow able to combine cynicism and naïvety and be bullies who cringe wide eyed in the face of their masters. There are no “developments” in the story. It isn’t of much interest to anyone offshore, who correctly see it for what it is – a cynically trumped up minor threat – and are doing what they normally do.
Meanwhile, instead of quizzing Key about why he went public against advice, or why he is calling it terrorism and the police are not, or what political agenda Key might be pursuing, our media swallow the hook, the line, sinker, and the wharf.
What a bunch of idiots. Espiner and Ferguson would spend their last show before nuclear armageddon repeating John Key’s assurances that he’ll remain PM from his spacestation, foreign press reaction, and the best way to make stone tipped weapons to fight off the mutants in the post apocalyptic world the survivors will emerge into than dare ask why we were being attacked of if the Key might be to blame.
Nick Smith backed up dear leader on tv3 this morning ,calling the 1080 issue eco terrorism good to keep the fear alive I guess.
Has any one thought it could be industrial espionage, the 1080 letters that is.
of course not… Industry would never act otherwise in the best interests…
an example below of the kinds of people that Hooton helps on a daily basis…
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/lifestyle/news/article.cfm?c_id=6&objectid=11415707
See they don’t care who they hurt in the chase for the almighty fuckin dollar.
There should be a court these pricks can be taken, and charged with crimes against children!
they have a court, it is the one propose din the TPP, it will be made up of corporate lawyers… is that what you meant? 😉
No not really of was thinking of one for the Children. Not one for the corporate leeches. And the Tpp courts will be heaven for these leeches.
National does not seem to think crimes against children are all that bad really.
well said murray .. an exacting truth.
Oops sabotage was the word I wanted to use not espionage. I’d imagine there are lots of overseas interests that would be happy to see the nz dairy industry fail.
Wondering how Key got away with exchange between Anette King, Carter and himself in NZQT yesterday?
Implying that Carter should not have let the question through??
Implying he cannot be expected to be speaking as the PM at the PM’s post cabinet speach? Can somebody explain to him he is ALWAYS the Prime Minister, unless he is handing over to deputy PM.
Surely, it is time for Key to play a round of golf in Hawaii with Obama? Any good courses in Northland? He can’t hammer a nail but at least he can putt. Oh wait, Key is too busy bribing campaigning.
Yep 😈
Yep. Key’s post Cabinet Press Conference it is not he as PM, when he is challenged by his words spoken at that session. Therefore no need to answer Annette’s questions. And when that does not stop her, then Carter says her supplementary question is too long! They must be rattled?
If he speaks about GCSB or Iraq he is representing the USA, so in fairness he is not being our PM then…
Even I’m getting confused is he the PM, or the leader of the Nat party, Or a Husband, or someone who puts the cat out at night? We know he’s not a man because Bronagh reportedly gets a Man in.
I watched that. Carter and FJK both disgusted me.
Do all MP’s get chauffeurs and body guards?
Possibly a very important question, because presumably in each and all his capacities he is still maintaining full protections from those official body guards. Perhaps he needs to tell the nation in what capacity he is acting (someone parading around behind him carrying a banner declaring which.) Could save the taxpayer a lot in these straitened times
I’m sure if he had to do without the Praetorian Guard, he’d be prumstah 24 hours a day.
A small group of kiwis saved a Kauri from bureaucracy because they were heard by the developers who will be their neighbours. The developers will have to live amongst the people they have upset. Accordingly they have backed down (so they say) and the Kauri will stay.
When people making decisions have to face each other, see the consequences of their decision-making etc theoutcome is often different to those who make decisions on high with the privilege of never actually becoming part of the process, of the people, of the environment.
The Kauri is not “just a tree”.
Homeopathy; scam or just preying on the hopes and fears of the gullible to make money? You decide …
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/mar/11/homeopathy-not-effective-for-treating-any-condition-australian-report-finds
Or both. I hope finally this can put the myth of Homeopathy to rest.
I’m sorry to say: prepare to be disappointed. Contradictory facts harden false beliefs.
Exhibit a: The National Party 😉
I’ve always thought it was as effective as placebo for some people.
Homeopathy has worked amazingly well on my dogs and cats as a placebo. How did they know?
What homeopathy have you used on your pets?
Exhibit b.
More to the point how did you know ?
“More to the point how did you know ?”
It actually doesn’t matter, but consider this. If you eat chilli and your mouth gets hot, how do you know the chilli caused that? And does it matter?
Yeah, it does. Who made the diagnosis, for example?
If you cut your finger at home, do you need a professional diagnosis before you put on a bandaid?
I’m unlikely to give my dog a sugar pill to treat a wound.
Capsaicin…… there’s some violent examples about for sale these days…dangerous going in and coming out !
Tolerance can be acquired lol
Why do you think they give you a yoghurt drink in Indian restaurants? There’s something in milk that can dissipate the heat of chillies in the mouth. For the other end? Soft toilet paper.
Hey Doc! Check this awesome scienciness:
Sad and true.
😆
Homeopathy made my health worse once – consistently so throughout a course of treatment. During a month or so where I ceased homeopathic treatment, my health condition returned to its (unsatisfactory) norm. When I restarted the homeopathic treatment once more I got noticeably worse again. Quit the whole thing after 3 or 4 more weeks.
But it was a great A-B-A type trial which showed me that homeopathic treatment can have strong biological effects.
Before I call complete bullshit……could you share what the treatment was and for what condition ?
It was a bit of nasty infected eczema resistant to conventional treatment, including fluclox.
You can hardly call bullshit on a patient’s reported experience though. They actually lived through it while you haven’t.
Actually I can quite happily call bullshit on you comment that
“But it was a great A-B-A type trial which showed me that homeopathic treatment can have strong biological effects.”
feel free to cut out sources of knowledge and information, not my problem.
heh.
Cutting out the source of your problem is a good idea.
What control did you use to rule out the nocebo effect?
Exactly! Both the placebo effect and nocebo effect are very powerful phenomena. Traditional medicines understand it pretty well.
Well, I have no problem with practitioners of ‘traditional medicine’ using the placebo effect to treat people, but they should be honest and upfront about it, rather than claiming that their medicine works because of ‘unknown forms of energy’ or other such nonsense.
Hmmm? How do you think the placebo effect actually works if not through energy, psychic or otherwise?
The placebo effect has be something to do with the mind-body interaction. As the brain is part of the body, it is perfectible reasonable to suggest that the mind is able to influence the physiology of the body. But of course, I don’t know exactly how the placebo effect works, no one does. Regardless, it is possible to study the placebo effect using science, and such efforts are ongoing. This will allow us to eventually understand how it works.
Energy has a very specific scientific meaning. If you are using the term ‘psychic energy’ to explain the placebo effect, then I’m afraid you are venturing into pseudoscientific babble and I’m not interested into engaging with you.
Energy is directly proportional to mass and both mass and energy are measurable, can’t be accounted for, can be studied and have specific meaning.
Like wtl says “energy” in the way you are suggesting is just what I like to define as “woo” or “magic!”.
Basically fucking nonsense
Just to recap: homeopathy actually works because the placebo effect uses midochlorians.
Or maybe placebos just work on patient-reported symptoms like pain or nausea, but not really on tumour size or the actual condition being treated.
Then we’re both quite happy. Cheers.
@mcflock….no according to the america’s college of homeopaths, it’s great for cancer !
http://www.thehomeopathiccollege.org/cancer-treatment/homeopathy-effective-cancer-treatment/
The words “Batshit” and “crazy” come to mind.
”Like wtl says “energy” in the way you are suggesting is just what I like to define as “woo” or “magic!”.
Basically fucking nonsense”
@Contrarian, what you display is the hubris common in science of dismissing as worthless or nonsense what can’t be explained yet.
Like when scientists first sequenced the genome and wrote off 98% as ”junk DNA” and then later were like Oh, actually it is pretty crucial to understanding how it all works.
Pretty poor example, ER. Even if your summary of ‘junk DNA’ was correct, you need to factor in that there is only 30 years between its discovery (and Crick saying “little more than junk” about 97% of it) and you saying “pretty crucial”.
Homeopathy has been around for a lot longer and yet no evidence previously existed for it being anything other than junk. And the current analysis of everything that is known about it still comes up with, er, junk. And tomorrow, guess what? Yep, still junk.
Scientific and technological progress is starting to bump its head against some very serious limitations now. This civilisation is in the last one or two rounds of true scientific and technological advancement before virtually all that is left of truly creative, public science is all corporatised, commercialised, compartmentalised and/or put to use for the military intelligence industrial government complex.
And for those who fully believe in fossil fuel depletion and climate change, things are going to start sliding backwards very rapidly soon after.
That’s when alternative healthcare methods are going to be very, very useful to have around.
If it doesn’t work for you, then don’t fucking use it. Just don’t presume you can dictate to others what works or does not work for them. BTW there’s a reason a lot of people give up on kinds of medical treatments which are backed by all the evidence – it doesn’t work for them.
It’s not about me, you doofus. I don’t use the products of quacks. It’s about the tens of thousands of people who, out of ignorance or desperation, pay for this sad and useless perfumed piss. Often instead of real medicine that might actually help them. Just as I think pay day loan companies and cigarette manufacturers should be run out of town, I think alternative medical scam artists need to be exposed for what they really are; crooks preying on the gullible.
You silly billy, traditional healing modalities were around while conventional medicine was killing far more people than it was helping, and traditional healing modalities will still be around when most people can no longer access modern medical care.
Get used to it.
LOL have you ever noticed that over the last 100 years as the scientific medical types have poured both scorn and ridicule, and court cases, against traditional healing methods, that traditional healing methods have been becoming more and more used, and more and more accepted, and not less?
“Often instead of real medicine that might actually help them”
Citation for that please. I rarely meet people who have rejected conventional medicine out of hand. Most people use both.
CR: Con-artists and crackpots selling snake-oil have always been around, but now we have the evidence base to demonstrate that their treatments don’t work any better than magic or water. You deal with it.
LOL have you ever noticed that over the last 100 years as the scientific medical types have poured both scorn and ridicule, and court cases, against cigarettes, that cigarettes have been becoming more and more used, and more and more accepted, and not less?
Fixed it for you.
But, seriously, so fucken what? P’s popular too. So’s drinking too much alcohol. So’s Justin fucken Beiber. None of the above are the least bit desirable and just cause they haven’t gone away doesn’t make them magically good for you.
What are you on about? Smoking rates have fallen in most countries as knowledge of the harm has increased.
Yeah, ‘cos getting pissed is just like making informed choices about one’s health care.
You have the evidence base eh? Big fucking deal.
The alternative practitioners I know get zero subsidies from the Ministry of Health and DHBs.
Yet patients keep flocking to them for their care, referring in their friends, family members and colleagues, taking their children in to be looked after, and these are patients all willing to pay full coin out of their own pockets, instead of (or often in addition to) using conventional medical care which is often less expensive (or free) due to tax payer subsidies.
ER, smoking continues to rise in popularity globally. The bastards are focussing on the third world now that we in the first world have accepted the facts about tobacco. The West and its damn fixation on scientific analysis, eh! Always putting consumers first, lest they sue, bah humbug.
weka, making informed choices is exactly what I’m asking for. At the moment, it’s all about uninformed choices, which is why this morning’s news is so important.
Anyhoo, one thing I’m sure we all agree is healthy is sleep, so I’m off. Ciao for now.
Oh, I never said that the con-artists and crackpots were bad at selling their bullshit. Just that it doesn’t seem to make the patients any better than a glass of water and a positive attitude can.
The people who choose to reduce or minimise the use of pharmaceutical products and surgical procedures are often amongst the most informed patients there are around.
Keep telling yourself that.
“weka, making informed choices is exactly what I’m asking for. At the moment, it’s all about uninformed choices, which is why this morning’s news is so important.”
Actually you’re not. You are suggesting that people be denied informed choice. By all means tell people what the view is from the fundamentalist science box, but don’t pretend that you are in a position to judge alternative therapies when you patently don’t know much about them. That degree of patronising arrogance is one of the core reasons why informed consent became such an issue in the patients rights movements. It’s not about bowing to other people’s belief systems, it’s about sharing information and using empowerment models so that people can make their own choices to the degree that they want to. The holier than thou, you’re all stupid attitude taken by some in this conversation is the exact antithesis of informed consent.
Wishing you a good sleep nontheless 🙂
“Keep telling yourself that.”
McFlock, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you demonstrate an educated understanding of alternative therapies and the people who use them. Not that I read every comment you make, but I think it’s a fair representation of you to say that you’re working off second and third hand ideas.
I am however willing to be proven wrong if you would like to share your experience and knowledge of people who use alternative therapies.
Pretty much all the people I know who have used them have been desperate or dropped acid in their past. And yeah, that’s more than a couple of people I know.
Results have been about as mixed as one might expect.
Closest I’ve come is acupunture from a physio and a couple of herbal tea from a flatmate when I had a cold. But then neither claimed to cure cancer.
from what I can make out they’re all gullible, easily misled, not very smart.
edit – oh McFlock out did me, I should have included, drug addled and fucked in the head.
BTW most physios who use acupuncture needles don’t actually do acupuncture.
Some were desperate.
All had their good points.
Contaminated water?
Maybe they were just thirsty.
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/mar/11/homeopathy-not-effective-for-treating-any-condition-australian-report-finds
Vested interests use their considerable institutional power to protect their interests, what a surprise. Was there anything in that article that takes an even handed look at the metastudy? Of course not (they didn’t even link to the study ffs).
“You decide …”
Pretty hard to make decisions when such blatantaly biased information is all that is on offer.
I’ve always found this article to be a reasoned view on homeopathy.
http://www.theguardian.com/science/blog/2012/apr/03/homeopathy-why-i-changed-my-mind
An concise summary, thanks.
From the Guardian article: ““There will be a tail of people who won’t respond to this report, and who will say it’s all a conspiracy of the establishment,” Glasziou said.”
Guess he got that right. Given that this report basically endorses what the Cochrane Collaboration already found (twice!), and that the Cochrane Collaboration is the exact opposite of “vested interests using their institutional power to protect their interests,” I’d say it’s pretty conclusive.
Pull up 3 pieces of research on homeopathy that the Cochrane group reviewed, and I’ll critique them for you and explain why the meta analysis was flawed.
Seriously? Anonymous internet commenter is going to explain to me how those mooks at the Cochrane Collaboration don’t know how to do systematic reviews properly?
I guess the Cochrane guys are OK right until we get to their reviews which say that the flu jab has been overhyped and seriously lacks the evidence to support its many years of use and tax payers expense.
You mean like how homeopathy seriously lacks the evidence to support it?
Were you jilted by a pretty homeopath in your younger days?
Are you really this dissociated? Have you been into the ketamine tonight?
CR/CV/Tat: The flu shot seriously lacks the evidence to support its many years of use.
CT: You mean like homeopathy lacks evidence to support?
CR/CV/Tat: *Glib and irrelevant comment*
Do you have no internal dialogue that at least keeps you consistent?
Oh lighten up a bit for goodness sake contrarian. You’re getting personal in a way that CV, while being somewhat cheeky, did not.
no
weka, “Pull up 3 pieces of research on homeopathy that the Cochrane group reviewed, and I’ll critique them for you and explain why the meta analysis was flawed.”
Psycho Milt, “Seriously? Anonymous internet commenter is going to explain to me how those mooks at the Cochrane Collaboration don’t know how to do systematic reviews properly?”
That’s a pretty interesting reaction for number of reasons. I’m guessing it’s a defensive reaction because you’ve never looked properly at the Chochrane review on homeopathy and have no idea what the problems might be (you probably just picked up some ideas about the review off the internet). But more interesting is that you appear to believe in the absolute powers of the Cochrane group and that they are infallible and therefore beyond critique. Not even medical science believes that medical science is infallible. Only the fundies think that, and they are demonstrably wrong, including by the structures they put their faith in.
There are very good reasons why medical research largely fails to study homeopathy well. Even if you want to consider one of the reasons to be that homeopathy has no objective efficacy, the genuine science mind would understand that that needs to be based on evidence not belief in a higher power. Thinking that any research or any meta analysis is all powerful is not really that different to believing in the omnipotence of God. Which is all well and good, it’s just not very rational.
Back on point, I’m sure the Cochrane group knows how to do reviews properly. The problem is they’re reviewing research that often doesn’t understand what homeopathy is and fundamentally fails to study it in a scientific manner.
I think the homeopathists’ problem is that a lot of researchers do understand how to research it in a scientific manner, which means they exclude anecdotes involving post-hoc fallacies, don’t for a moment consider whether there might be some woo they aren’t taking into account, and lack all interest in how long this treatment’s been around or how many people think it works.
Cochrane put plenty of effort into weeding out studies that didn’t meet a scientific standard or didn’t take enough steps to eliminate potential bias. They certainly aren’t infallible, but they’re as good as we’ve got.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-03-11/homeopathy-no-more-effective-than-placebos-major-study-says/6302722
A link in this story shows the leaked paper in 2012 that revealed the council was considering taking the position homeopathy was unethical before looking at all the evidence.
So this politically motivated hit job need not be taken seriously.
Exhibit c.
uhh, the evidence that homeopathy is complete bunk has been around since before 2012 and debate about the ethics of it because of its ineffectiveness has been around since before 2012 also so, no, it isn’t a “politically motivated hit job”.
What? That makes no sense.
You were the one hailing this as the great debunking, after which you ”hope finally this can put the myth of Homeopathy to rest”.
Yes because it is ANOTHER widely circulated study which shows it is complete bullshit. There have been MANY of such studies so I am hoping that FINALLY this will hammer it home.
Your “politically motivated hit job” is complete crap because homeopathy has been known to be false for decades.
That’s just a stupid statement right there. You’re not going to invalidate peoples usage of this treatment modality – if it works for them. A big part of the homeopathic effect may be related to the placebo effect – but that is exactly the same for major aspects of medical care.
“A big part of the homeopathic effect may be related to the placebo effect – but that is exactly the same for major aspects of medical care.”
Ummmm no….. for medicines to be registered they must be proven to be safe and efficacious above and beyond the placebo effect. although perhaps you were referring to some other aspect of medical care ……. do tell ?
I wasn’t talking about registered medicines! I was talking about medical care. Seeing someone in a white coat in a nice professional office setting with lots of diplomas framed up on the wall.
+1
Northshoredoc, do you believe that placebo has any positive action in your practice?
Do you believe that the quality of the interaction between you and patients has any impact on outcomes?
“Ummmm no….. for medicines to be registered they must be proven to be safe and efficacious above and beyond the placebo effect.”
Pretty sure some anti-depressants have made it to market that don’t fit tha efficacy criteria. (Lots of drugs have failed the safety test but that’s a different conversation)
Some anti-depressants haven’t met efficiency criteria, so toss them in the trash with the sugar pills.
PS: do the quacks use specially blessed organic sugar or just the regular evil ‘refined’ stuff? 😈
Huh? Which ones are you thinking of that have been removed from the market for that reason?
I was (mis)quoting Weka – for efficiency read efficacy.
I have no idea what you are talking about OAB and to be honest can’t be bothered asking for clarification (aka to tired for the clever dick routine). You know how to communicate well, so when you do that clearly I’ll take it as a sign of good faith in the conversation.
@ weka
Northshoredoc, do you believe that placebo has any positive action in your practice?
NO
Do you believe that the quality of the interaction between you and patients has any impact on outcomes?
NO .. very nebulous question though… who measures the quality and what is it ?
“Do you believe that the quality of the interaction between you and patients has any impact on outcomes?
NO .. very nebulous question though… who measures the quality and what is it ?”
I have to go with weka on this one – if only because the quality of the patient-GP interaction can have a massive effect on:
1. what the patient believes
2. their sense of well-being
3. their future healthcare decision-making
It can also affect how the GP interprets the patient’s concerns.
1 & 2 can be a result of education & reassurance and therefore may be explained away as a placebo (good enough for many worried patients with illnesses/concerns that will disappear without medical intervention). If you’re talking about eventual clinical outcomes in your ‘NO’ answer then you’ve missed the crucial importance of No3.
Delays to appropriate medical care might be one way of measuring the effect of quality of GP-patient interactions. I’m sure there are many others.
@northshoredoc – One measure is how highly communication issue complaints figure in health and disability commissioner’s statistics. I’m pretty sure they outrank treatment complaints, but would need to check.
Consultation quality clearly affects patient outcomes, and is poorly acknowledged in my view.
@miravox…most of my patient contact is whilst they are unconscious ……….
for some light relief on the day we’ve lost a great writer can i direct you to two comedians on the subject of homeopathy.
So if it’s ”known to be false for decades” there was in your view no need to conduct this study?
You reveal your own lack of respect for the scientific method that you claim a moral purchase on.
For those helped by homeopathy, they probably accept it doesn’t work in a mechanistic way, and its results can’t be aggregated to suit evidence based medicine.
By the way, have you checked out the serious doubt over the effectiveness of antidepressants; do you rail against them too?
http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.0050045
“So if it’s ”known to be false for decades” there was in your view no need to conduct this study?”
No there shouldn’t be any need to conduct this study but unfortunately it still has to be done because homeopathic “remedies” are still being stacked along side actual medicine.
“You reveal your own lack of respect for the scientific method that you claim a moral purchase on.”
Yeah the scientific method actually works and shows homeopathic remedies are bullshit. And yes, I have serious concerns over antidepressants. But don’t introduce a irrelevant red herring – this is about homeopathy, not SSRI’s.
It’s not a red herring, it points out a double standard.
At least sugar pills don’t harm people. The same can’t be said for psychiatric medicine.
No one is talking about SSRI’s – this conversation is about homeopathy and about how it is proven, once again to be utter horseshit.
Says something is not a red herring. Provides another red herring. Oh dear.
And sugar pills don’t harm people, but neither do they have any positive effect. Homeopathic pills are different because there is an expectation that they may have a positive effect and so are dangerous when they are used instead of a proven medical treatment.
WTF? “Sugar pills” (inert placebo) pills have positive effects all the time!!! This has literally been documented in thousands of studies.
If homeopathic remedies are effective as placebo’s then that should be made clear on the labeling – “Has no active ingredient – some placebo effect may be experienced”
When doctors prescribe placebos
with good results.
A doctor who prescribed a placebo for heart disease, on the other hand, would probably be mistaken or negligent. A quack, on the other hand? What skill their diagnoses?
Not to mention putting flashy looking placebos without any warning that they are actually placebos and have no medicinal effect whatsoever next to actual medicine is kinda misleading and unethical
Reply to CR: obviously placebos have positive effects. They even have effects relative to other placebos, such as blue sugar pills vs red sugar pills for different ailments. None of this in anyway means that giving someone a homeopathic treatment is anything other than quackery, just like anything else where science has comprehensively demonstrated is fraudulent – like crystal healing, faith healing, colour therapy, reiki, chiropracty, naturopathy, anything that makes reference to qi, osteopathy, bloodletting, trepanning…the list is endless really.
Karate makes reference to Qi. Just saying.
@ Ergo …re “For those helped by homeopathy, they probably accept it doesn’t work in a mechanistic way”….well it worked in a mechanistic way on my 8 year old
….after going to local GPs for a week and being misdiagnosed as stomach flu ….and being misdiagnosed in hospital for several days… he was eventually reluctantly given an operation to check for appendicitis…he was found to have a leaking gangrenous appendix ( an emergency ) and after being on intravenous antibiotics for several days he was released from hospital still ailing and pale and listless….a neighbour left the appropriate homeopathics for the aftermath of such an operation in the letterbox to try ( my son had not had any homeopathics prior in his life) …. i gave them to my son without telling him what they were or making a song and dance about it….the recovery was almost immediate ….and the specialists at the hospital , who still expected possible complications and a long convalescence and possible return to hospital, were surprised at his robust recovery
….so yup imo homeopathics also work in a mechanistic way ….as well as placebo effect ( this is not to say they are a substitute for other medicine or surgery)…how they work is another question….but the effects are mechanistic
i have also used homeopathics in India and Tibet…and am convinced they work ( not as a substitute for Western medicine …but sometimes they work better than Western medicine) especially for gut diarrhea and chest bronchial issues ( in fact we were advised to use homeopathics by a NZer who had lived in India for years…and who had found Western medicine did not work for gut issues)
🙄 😆
“so yup imo homeopathics also work in a mechanistic way ”
Your opinion goes against the entire body of science on the subject.
+100 😆
You can laugh all you like but there re many people who have had similar experiences as Chooky. My self included. I have a degree in science and the scientific method, have always considered conventional medicine first (and will continue to do so) but I have seen remarkable results in my 2 month old grandson who had floppy airway and serious reflux – so bad he was in hospital under observation for a week. He was given the conventional medicine (can’t remember the name now) but he vomited it up every time. He had a monitor on him at all times for his heart beat and blood oxygen levels. A single treatment of belladonna brought about an immediate change.
Now don’t tell me homeopathic treatment is ineffective.
“A single treatment of belladonna brought about an immediate change.
Now don’t tell me homeopathic treatment is ineffective.”
That’s not homeopathy
@Contrarian. What – so now you get to define the nature of an effect you don’t believe exists??
It’s a distinct feature of conversations like this, that the science fundamentalists argue against something when they don’t even know what it is.
Because Homeopathy is distinct.
Merely using belladona is not homeopathy. It’s about dilution and using like to treat like. You should know this
You think they treated a 2 month old baby with the herb belladonna? LOL. Look it up TC and understand the daftness of what you just said.
It’s pretty obvious to anyone here who knows what they are talking about that Macro was referring to homeopathic belladonna (a well known homeopathic remedy).
Here, I’ll save you the google http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atropa_belladonna
Don’t worry about these fundies weka, they can keep going on stuck in a self righteous intellectual rut whereas others can use the best of both conventional orthodox medicine and alternative healthcare modalities, depending on what is more suitable and effective at the time.
True, but the belladonna comment TC made was classic, and a very good example of the irrationality of the science fundamentalists.
And Macro’s story was a great read.
🙄
So the baby was not given belladonna, it was given water.
I presume the baby was given a belladonna homeopathic preparation.
that’s what I said.
Yep. And you were 99.999% right.
Actually, I was competely right.
Yes was given a homeopathic dosage of Belladona – and just the one one treatment.
We had a public health nurse visiting regularly – he saw a doctor almost every week. Very few babies had as much medical attention as he had in his first few months. He was born with transposed greater arteries, visited 3 hospitals, had 2 helicopter rides, and an operation in his first 24 hours, and open heart surgery at 4 days old. At about 6 weeks old he was again admitted to Hospital in the middle of the night – his breathing was irregular and his blood oxygen levels were low. He was diagnosed with the floppy airway and this was being aggravated with severe reflux – something he would grow out of at around 6 months when his airways enlarged as he grew older. The point was the conventional medicine did not work.
The public health nurse who visited and the hospital paediatrician both acknowledged the effectiveness of the treatment. The ear nose and throat specialist didn’t want to hear. She like so many in her profession have cloth ears and can’t accept that medical science hasn’t all the answers.
Oh what’s a billionth between friends eh.
Macro, ta for the detailed field report.
“Macro, ta for the detailed field report.”
+tahi.
Nothing, if the “billionth” is almost certainly not in there.
@Macro – that’s great. It must have been a huge relief for all concerned.
What works in practice is so much more important than what a textbook says should work when there is suffering.
@ Ergo Robertina
Yes it certainly was a huge relief. My daughter and the grandchildren were living with us in NZ at the time. The family were in between returning to NZ and then returning back to Perth where her husband works at Rockingham Hospital. (It’s a long story – but essentially the Govt changed in 2008 and we waived good bye to our loved ones! – Not what the Nat Bill board said! ). I’m currently in Perth at the moment – just had a 36 degree day today – don’t tell me that the world isn’t heating. Baby sitting the said young monster who is doing very well. 🙂
Wow – that is hot. I was sweltering in Dunedin and I think it got to around 20, although I didn’t hear the official top temp.
I have family in WA too and often find myself saying it actually feels hotter on summer days than the official temp says, but maybe I’ve just acclimatised.
“Where is the line of demarcation between “descriptive” and “mechanistic?”
….”the epithets “descriptive” and “mechanistic” are epistemologically related and differ quantitatively rather than qualitatively. In other words, observations become regarded as progressively less descriptive and more mechanistic as one probes more deeply into a phenomenon. In fact, one might argue that there is no real line of demarcation between descriptive and mechanistic science but that the difference is rather a matter of depth and one’s preferences.”
http://iai.asm.org/content/77/9/3517
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dana-ullman/homeopathic-medicine-euro_b_402490.html
“Numerous surveys over the past 150 plus years have confirmed that people who seek homeopathic treatment tend to be considerably more educated than those who don’t (1). What is not as well known is the fact that homeopathic medicine is the leading “alternative” treatment used by physicians in Europe…and growing numbers of the citizenry”……
““Numerous surveys over the past 150 plus years have confirmed that people who seek homeopathic treatment tend to be considerably more educated than those who don’t”
One of life’s great mysteries, not proof that homeopathy works better than a placebo.
If it’s a great placebo and it resolves health issues for a person without the risk of liver or kidney failure, what’s the problem???
As TheContrarian pointed out above, it is misleading and unethical to use the placebo effect to treat someone without being honest and upfront about it. Or worse, being deliberately deceptive and coming up with pseudoscientific explanations to trick people into using (and maybe paying for) a treatment when it is only functioning as a placebo.
Firstly because a placebo can’t resolve you of anything like, say, cancer or a virus like a flu – it might make you feel better but it won’t cure you.
Secondly, it is unethical to sell something that is actually placebo while pretending it has a health benefit it doesn’t. I mean you have all but admitted homeopathy is nothing more than a placebo – is it not unethical to actually market it as something else?
Tell me, how do you ascertain whether or not it was the placebo effect of going to a medical practitioners office which helps a patient get better or the prescription the patient was given (which may or may not be filled)?
If on another visit the doctor suggests to the patient that they will probably feel better with a day or two rest, and it actually happens – how do you know that’s not the placebo effect?
You skipped both points –
Getting better and feeling better are two different things.
Secondly, and actually more importantly, (I’ll actually be verbatim here), it is unethical to sell something that is actually placebo while pretending it has a health benefit it doesn’t. I mean you have all but admitted homeopathy is nothing more than a placebo – is it not unethical to actually market it as something else?
You answer my question of why the medical profession is allowed to use the placebo effect in clinical situations, and not tell patients about it, but no one else is.
So I ask you something, you completely dodge it so I ask again, then you put up a question that I must answer first despite having failed to address anything I have said?
Hmmmmmm, why don’t you actually address the points as they are raised instead of putting up these silly barriers to actually answering what is put to you?
I’ll ask you again and I’ll make it easy on you – just one point which I’ll drill down into a simple format:
You have all but admitted homeopathy is nothing more than a placebo – is it not unethical to actually market it as something else?
Why should I play your silly games about what you personally consider ethical or not? Or to abide by your stupid rules of acceptable rhetoric.
Homeopathy was around while orthodox conventional medicine was killing far more people than it saved, it will still be around long after orthodox conventional medicine is no longer regularly available to the vast majority of the population, and it is a form of healthcare which doesn’t need tax payers subsidies to survive.
Again, medical practitioners use the placebo effect every day, why are you fine with them doing that but not other professions?
“Or to abide by your stupid rules of acceptable rhetoric”
Not my rules buddy – you’d be shit in the house.
“doesn’t need tax payers subsidies to survive.”
And your position on the TPPA and Pharmac is…?
Not to mention it wouldn’t survive is the labels honesty and ethically stated “Contains no active ingredients” instead of making claims of efficacy which are proven to be incorrect. You yourself have all but admitted it is a placebo – why don’t you address false advertising and unethical marketing?
Oh yeah because I ask you something, you completely dodge it so I ask again, then you put up a question that I must answer first despite having failed to address anything I have said.
Just goes to show that more education does not always make people wiser.
“Firstly because a placebo can’t resolve you of anything like, say, cancer or a virus like a flu – it might make you feel better but it won’t cure you.”
That’s unlikely to be true. There’s a lot of work being done on the mind body connection which demonstrates real effects via the brain, nervous, immune and endocrine systems from things like meditation. It’s not just about “feeling better”, whatever that might mean, it’s about the roles that improved physiology plays in healing. This is why complementary medicine should be one of the core focusses of cancer research, because it can both improve chances of survival and mitigate side effects of conventional treatment.
Belief can effect physiology.
“You answer my question of why the medical profession is allowed to use the placebo effect in clinical situations, and not tell patients about it, but no one else is.”
Do you have any instances of where it is ‘allowed’ to prescribe placebos as a clinical remedy without advising patients – i.e. prescribing a bottle of sugar pills?
– Or are you saying advice and reassurance are placebos that are like selling a homeopathic remedy?
– Or are you saying the medical profession that refers people to say, osteopaths, acupuncturists and chiropractors without telling them about the likelihood of it working shouldn’t be allowed to because these are (with a few possible exceptions) not clinically proven therapies?
– Or are you saying that, for example, anti-depressants are being prescribed without any efficacy above the placebo effect and patients don’t know this?
I’m with you on the last two points, but not the first. And if it is something similar to the last two options that you’re complaining about – I suggest it would make more sense to advocate for these practises to cease rather than saying that other treatments with low efficacy should be added to the clinically proven health toolbox.
I wonder what all the science fundies think of phenomena like breast cancer going away by itself without treatment. Do they think its impossible? That it must have been some kind of mistake? That its a one in a million fluke?
Its a very strange world they live in where big pharma products heal, but the body doesn’t.
I talked about use of the placebo effect, not use of placebo treatments. A patient walks into a professional office, diplomas on the wall, a sincere sounding person with an air of authority in a white coat, and experiences a good interpersonal interaction, there’s a fuck load of placebo effect going on right there.
BTW “proven evidence based therapies” fail a shit load of patients in one way or another. Some very badly. If they didn’t, most of these people wouldn’t be seeking out alternative therapies would they.
miravox, many patients will have no idea of the efficacy above placebo rate of the meds they are on. Pre-internet it would have been most patients.
Here’s something I just pulled off the internet about SSRIs and placebo rates. I haven’t analysed it, but let’s use it as a starting point. There are huge ethical issues around psychiatric prescribing that are far more serious than any ethical issues around homeopathic practice. No-one really talks about it though, funny that.
http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=185157
“BTW “proven evidence based therapies” fail a shit load of patients in one way or another. Some very badly. If they didn’t, most of these people wouldn’t be seeking out alternative therapies would they.”
I think unless one is in circles of people who use alternative modalities, or one is an alternative practitioner, it’s very hard to understand just how many people routinely use healthcare outside of mainstream medicine because mainstream medicine has failed them (i.e. after mainstream medicine has failed them).
That wasn’t my point Chooky. There are other ways in which things work other than mechanistic or placebo.
Not every energy force is understood.
“There are other ways in which things work other than mechanistic or placebo.”
Yeah but in the case of homeopathy it doesn’t work – as proven time and time again.
Oh dreary contrarian, repeating your sneer merchant mantra will not alter the fact that just as many people will gain health benefit from homeopathy as before this slanted politically motivated hit job was published.
Dead right, ER, exactly the same number will benefit. Zero is a number, isn’t it?
Same denailist tactic as a global warming denier: ignore all the science, claim some kind of political conspiracy, ignore every piece of evidence to the contrary.
Fact: Homeopathy has never shown to be effective and never will because it is scientifically impossible as proven over and over and over and over….
TRP – No, a great many people receive benefit. And better informed detractors acknowledge the fact.
People better informed than the overwhelming majority of the medical community? Who are these amazing polymaths?
You do know what the term ”detractor” means?
I think you misunderstood the comment.
Anyway, enough procrastination for me, work is calling.
I do.
Can you list any of these detractors?
You guys seem a bit stressed. Rescue remedy anyone?
So, was this the strong nuclear force or the weak nuclear force? Gravity? Or are you just making stuff up because you want mystic crystal new age mesmerism nonsense to be real?
Every single time homeopathy is comprehensively shown to be a fraud, people still blithely go ahead and ignore all the evidence in favour of make-believe.
Like I said – just like a climate change denier
Very many are not.
But homeopathy had no ‘energy force’ because it is compete bullshit. Magical thinking….
Well, homeopaths don’t need government subsidies to stay in business. So you better convince patients that their practitioners are bullshit, that they themselves are gullible saps, and to quit going to them and ***willingly paying 100% out of pocket***
I’ll tell you what true “magical thinking” is – that more science and more technology is going to be able to answer the major health concerns of society over the next few very difficult decades.
“I’ll tell you what true “magical thinking” is – that more science and more technology is going to be able to answer the major health concerns of society over the next few very difficult decades.”
Yeah because science has totally failed to improve our life span, eradicate disease, and provide a better life for the sick and in-firmed. Yeah lets forget the eradication of smallpox, transplant technology, polio vaccines, extension of life-span, that being diagnosed with HIV is no longer the death sentence it was, 3-printing of limbs and organs, microscopic surgery, greater understanding of diet, research into stem-cells, research into being able to transplant pig organs into humans, hand transplants, rebuilding peoples faces, greater understanding of locked in syndrome, pacemakers, anesthesia, studying into using LSD and other alkaloids for PTSD, early detections of melanoma, breast cancer and bowl cancer drastically improving the survival rates of those afflicted, vaccinations, early childhood care, recognition of previously swept under the carpet mental disorders so people afflicted can now have better lives, Stephen Hawkings fucking chair.
You give me one fucking example of your magical thinking providing anything like the above. I fucking dare you.
@thecontrarian
I believe CVs answer to such questions is….’because ‘merica and multinationals !’ ….mmmmmmkay ?
So your kid recovered from a serious medical condition after receiving appropriate medical treatment. Also, your kid took a fake remedy that did nothing.
Any further suggestion is a post-hoc fallacy.
Homeopathy is built on “post hoc, ergo propter hoc.” I got better. Also, I took this homeopathic remedy. Therefore, I got better because I took this homeopathic remedy. Works for faith healing, too.
And note how those who argue for the efficacy of homeopathy rely purely on anecdotal evidence without a shred of actual evidence
The evidence is yourself or your child getting better when medical options struggled to offer anything workable.
Get off your intellectual high horse.
+100 CR…i really dont know why I was so rash to have joined this discussion with these regulars who pretend to be doctors….lol….really they are very threatened!….. that is the only conclusion one can have ….plus they are control freaks….it is a wonder they have any patients left ( that is if they are doctors, which i doubt)…they are so contemptuous of anyone who can think for themselves!….and I know a number of ordinary medical practitioners who offer an alternative in homeopathy treatment …so it is not a big deal…a waste of space arguing here….i also suspect vested interests in BIG PHARMA…homeopathy is very affordable
That’s a special kind of crazy right there Chooky. But homeopathy isn’t cheap – it’s very expensive water.
You are no better than a climate change denier
A robin feathering his nest…
…these regulars who pretend to be doctors…
Identifying a post hoc, ergo propter hoc fallacy isn’t the same thing as “pretending to be a doctor.” In fact, there’s no reason to assume doctors have any particular expertise at identifying logical fallacies.
…these regulars who pretend to be doctors…
As opposed to those here knowing they aren’t doctors yet think they can over-turn the vast, overwhelming majority of doctors and medical institutions as well as decades of research that disproves homeopathy in its entirety based upon their own personal anecdotes.
@ TheContrarian…you dont know who is a doctor and who isnt a doctor here!…or are you psychic?…there are many medical practitioners who use homeopathy both in NZ and overseas
…you are full of bullshit
That’s really quite a transparent dodge and avoidance of actually addressing what I said.
Are you are a doctor? I’m going with no until you actually state otherwise. So in not being a doctor what makes you think you are qualified in doubting the completely overwhelming medical and scientific evidence that homeopathy has no value whatsoever?
I would hope you could actually address the argument.
Oh that’s very simple, the studies are not reflective of the actual real life experiences of people in their day to day healthcare.
@CV 🙄
But only a day or two back you were whining that you didn’t have access to studies that you couldn’t understand anyway, so how would you know?
Shorter CV:
“Those studies are flawed because they didn’t ask my neighbor about his personal anecdote”
The same as saying
“Global warming is false because it felt cold during summer”
“Oh that’s very simple, the studies are not reflective of the actual real life experiences of people in their day to day healthcare.”
The studies were, for the most part, the usual blind tests (ie a mixture of homeopathic ‘remedies’ and genuine placebos. In addition, information supplied by the industry was studied. Both sources are examples of studies very much based on the “real life experiences of people in their day to day healthcare.”
That’s actually the way such studies are done.
Australians and their establishment do not tolerate conventional Doctors or free speech either
Sherri Tenpenny
Observation.
the RWNJ’s often call-out the Left-wing-Radio-New-Zealand-National.
Yesterday’s Standard discussion re Kathryn Ryan made some references to her politics.
So what evidence do we have of current/former politically aligned left leaning week-day RNZ hosts.
Maggie Barry – National MP
Mike Hoskings
Sean Plunkett
Can anyone add to this list of outed rabid left wing hosts?
I think they base their claim on suspicions rather than actually knowing, and usually amongst those who usually have nothing to do with news production – but media analysis (e.g. Colin Peacock, Jeremy Rose – those bloody Media Studies ‘types’), and others who they suspect are just aging hippie ‘types’ (Phil Obrien, Simon Morton, etc). Disagreement with the current junta simply means they left-wing kinsprissy thereists.
What I find interesting is that Dear Leader used to avoid RNZ like the plague until the Natzis were able to start stacking the deck through their appointments, and the recruitment of Espiner and programme ‘reshuffle’.
Its time that appointments such as to RNZ Board/CEO/etc. should be non-partisan – that is, have cross-party approval.
They attacked Espiner on Monday because of his questioning of Key. Espinner – left wing??? I reckon that he would be a shoo-in for a safe Nat seat.
Espiner has always appeared to me to be moderately right wing.
I have family members who are further to the right than Espiner and I consider them moderate.
He does have blind spots and bad days (we all do).
My impression is that he also approaches his job in a reasonably considered way – as opposed to someone like Gower whose modus operandi seems to be; hassle people in order to get a response that he can edit into a racy sound bite and an exciting sounding heading (facts and context? Don’t be silly).
I made a post yesterday about Kathryn Ryan. I do not know what her politics are.
yes I saw that. I’m loathe to give an opinion on Ms Ryan other than I think she should stay away from political discussions, and that I find her affectations bloody annoying to listen to. I also noted some comments about her ego and being ‘difficult’ to work for – I couldn’t possibly comment – it’d cause issyouse
I find nine to noon much better when Lynne Freeman is standing in. (But then that might be because she’s one of those artyfarty ‘types’ so she must be a bloody leftie /sarc)
I agree @ Lynne Freeman BUT I am usually happy enough with Kathryn Ryan but yesterday was a step too far for me…
Kathryn Ryan is bloody good imo…of course the interviewees dont get done over the way Kim Hill did….but Ryan is a considered interviewer , sometimes brilliant and sometimes not…she tries to walk a neutral line between Right and Left…..she is certainly no slouch…and as much as Lynne Freeman is a nice person and good on the arts ….i think Kathryn Ryan asks sharper questions all around….the only person who comes close to Ryan’s quality imo is “Summer Noelle” (not her real name)
did you listen to this interview? Cos that’s the one I have the beef with. Any move to radically change the system regarding sexual violence will meet some opposition as it did when some chose to misrepresent labour Policy pre election (including Little mis-representing it)… and so an important issue got sidelined and turned into a myth.
Boshier had a chance to speak to those proposed changes and was largely sidelined by Ryan. IMO
“So what evidence do we have of current/former politically aligned left leaning week-day RNZ hosts.
Maggie Barry – National MP
Mike Hoskings
Sean Plunkett”
Perhaps you can enlighten me as your statement is news to me, and I suspect others?
What RNZ week-day programs do these three people you nominate appear on?
Maggie Barry had the Nine to Noon block.
Hoskins – Morning Report
Sean Plunkett – Morning report.
Suggests National radio is a breeding ground for the right.
They were all “impartial” broadcasters fronting news and current affairs.
And read the comment again and you will see that I said weekday – weekday.
Yes you did say weekday. I was not aware that they had different management for the weekday as opposed to the weekend programs though. Surely they aren’t like the Herald?
On the other hand I have never seen any overt political leanings on the part of Plunkett and I wouldn’t really see him as overtly political at all.
The other two don’t work there any more, do they?
Perhaps leaning right is a little like being gay in the old days. Provided you stayed in the closet you kept your job.
When Barry and Hosking “came out” the lost their jobs?
Leaning left was OK for RNZ as the case’s of Edwards and Laidlaw illustrate though. They were hired after they showed up as failed left-wing politicians.
I think the point is @ alwyn that there are those that are prone to letting their own political persuasions affect their journalistic integrity, and those that do not. You might be quite surprised at where say Kim Hill or Wallace Chapman ‘lean’ (I’d say leftish on some things, rightish on others). We know Hosking and ilk make stories more about themselves and what THEY think (as did Yessirree Paul and others).
Ryan peeves me because of her affectations and she appears to have an inflated sense of herself, but I note a number of her guests are impressed with her style (usually during non-political discussions (one can often hear them say “that’s a very good question”.
Let’s have PSB with a bipartisan approach overall – at the moment – weekdays it definitely leans right of centre plus plus and on weekends centre to left of centre.
You can’t deny tho’ that the Natzis have been stacking the deck with appointments since they took office.
It’s a wonder that some have survived. How about that bloody Bollinger. I almost expect a few redundancies sometimes due to another ‘reorganisation’ of their schedule. In such as reorg, we could expect a Bollinger to go (because he comes from a line of commie bastards), and maybe a Matine Idle to bite the dust to be replaced by everyman”s best friend Mora. Talkback even – on the grounds that Natrad is taking heed of the people’s voice!
And of course let’s not forget the number of people who once were ‘lefties’ until they discovered the benefits of American Express Gold (The Act Party is full of ’em from Roger the Dodger to Donna H). And look at Joyce ffs! Once the student radio advocate – now the Apologist in Chief for those with fascist tendencies. They often use the excuse that they grew up and got real and responsible – which is often a euphemism for they got comfortable, lazy, complacent, holier than thou and selfish (life is easier that way – they often get phat too)
“often hear them say “that’s a very good question”.”
Agree, which is why the boshier interview annoyed me so much… but I think that telling her it’s a great question sometimes leads her to think she knows as much as they do and either through personal interest she begins to slip into an exploratory for her own benefit. I know I would find it hard not to divert as things piqued my own interest but I am neither trained not to or paid not to.
… and “current/former”.
As for the weekend magazine shows, – different genre altogether.
Chris Laidlaw and Brian Edwards were excellent interviewers – not the aggressive creeps of the aforementioned closet Tories.
And besides the listener was aware of their political affiliations long before they were on radio.
I suppose we could add a left-winger or two.
Why was Chris Laidlaw ever allowed near the Sunday morning program. Former Labour MP wasn’t he? Would you say that he should have been banned?
Perhaps Brian Edwards should have got the boot. Former Labour candidate after all wasn’t he?
Why is Mike Williams on RNZ. Former Labour Party President of course.
At least we know, like Maggie Barry, their politics. When did Sean ever come out on behalf of a political party?
Are you really of the McCarthy school of politics?
I agree with all you have written except for the Mike Williams bit cos his political affiliation is declared each and every time he appears … no matter how misleading introducing him as a voice of the left may be 😉
My initial observation was that the RWNJ’s continually assert that RNZ is a left-wing dominated network. I asked how many journalists on RNZ have turned out to be left wing zealots but indicated at least three immediately come to mind who have turned out to be Tories. Incidentally none lost their positions but resigned for commercial reasons.
Laidlaw and Edwards were magazine show presenters – not news/current affairs broadcasters with editorial input to emphasis/angle on news. Williams features on a panel as a foil for Hooton in a political forum.
NORTHLAND : The learned judge declares the winner :
[1] KEY (in spinning loop ) : http://i.imgur.com/9M2KqSs.gif
[2] PETERS (in macho cool ) : https://t.co/QZAgTYC28f
[3] AND THE WINNER IS (in unforgettable victory) :
http://a.disquscdn.com/uploads/mediaembed/images/1823/821/original.jpg?w=600&h
The ref was biased.
Well put together! Thanks.
As the new Greek government attempts to reverse the vicious austerity policies of the previous New Democracy/PASOK (in NZ terms, National/Labour) coalition, the troika (EU heads, ECB and IMF) and Greek capital are applying maximum pressure on Syriza to bend to their will.
There’s an interesting article by a Syriza central committee member on the way forward that went up on Redline last night: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2015/03/11/the-road-forward-for-syriza-a-view-from-a-central-committee-member/
Phil
The response of the US-trained Iraqi army when faced with ISIS has often been to run away. It is the Kurdish militias that have stopped ISIS and pushed it back.
The fact that the PKK, whose forces have done a whack of the fighting and whose armed forces include a significant number of women, is on the terrorism list in this country is indicative of the lies of successive NZ governments about the region and their involvement in it.
If the NZ government was primarily motivated by the desire to help defeat ISIS in order that the people of the region could improve their lives, they could just hand over a load of weapons, medical supplies and money to the Kurdish fighters, with no strings attached.
Instead, they have made it illegal in this country to help one of the key Kurdish movements which stands for people’s liberation and that has thrown back the ultra-right forces of ISIS.
Several things can be done here:
1. Demand that the PKK be removed from the NZ government’s list of terrorist organisations
2. Demand that people here be able to raise funds and other support for the Kurdish liberation movement; and people could raise support and funds for them anyway, regardless of what the government does
3. Demand the government not send NZ forces but hand over to the Kurdish forces the equivalent in funds and/or equipment of what they would spend on having NZ armed forces there; this to be handed over with no strings attached. In other words, if the deployment of NZ forces to Iraq was going to cost X million dollars, then X million dollars should be handed over to the Kurds.
The Kurds have been screwed over continuously by western powers – for instance, when France and Britain carved up the Ottoman Empire after WW1, the Kurds never got a country.
Some pieces:
The Kurds: treated as pawns by the western powers: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2014/12/04/the-kurds-treated-as-pawns-by-western-powers/
The ‘other’ Kurds fighting the Islamic State: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2014/09/08/the-other-kurds-fighting-the-islamic-state/
PFLP calls for international support for Kurds fighting ISIS at Kobane: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2014/10/15/pflp-calls-for-united-revolutionary-support-for-kurds-at-kobane/
Phil
Turkey, a key NATO member, wouldn’t like that. Neither would the Shiite authorities in Baghdad.
I’ m sure they wouldn’t!
And, of course, no NZ government this side of a revolution would do any such thing.
But if they were motivated by what they pretend to be motivated by, that’s what they’d do.
Phil
A lot of the reason for the US and other Western nations not liking/supporting a group like the Kurds is because it will change the established borders. Basically, it comes down to geopolitics and the fact that they know damn well that if those borders are changed in the way that the people there want them changed they will lose power and wealth.
In a related vein:
Maybe Obama’s Sanctions on Venezuela are not really about his “DEEP CONCERN” over suppression of political rights
The more I watch the US led nations the more it becomes obvious that they’re operating to shore up the Western Empire and that they’re failing. The whole lot is falling apart and they’re promoting wars and fear of others in an attempt to prevent that.
If they were really concerned about the suppression of political rights they would be looking at Columbia, Haiti and Panama, for a start.
Not to mention Saudi Arabia, who has beheaded many more people, than Isis.
Of course, their Governments are suitably supportive of US corporate power.,.
+ 100
And BTW – now Boko Haram has pledged allegiance to Da’ish isn’t it about time we offered to support our fellow member of the Commonwealth, Nigeria, with equivalent support and assistance?
Anyone hear the member for Epsom opining this morning that the election of Winston Peters would upset the balance of power.
Now let’s see, we have an MP who has a seat in government on the basis of less than one percent of the vote (Ignore the gerrymander that got him in) talks about upsetting the balance of power. He will also be advising ACT supporters to vote National in Northland. What a magnanimous gesture.
I imagine there was a pretty swift text this morning from Joyce to the Hologram from Epsom along the lines of “just shut the fuck up!”
And a friend in Australia says the nail-fail made the telly news there!
How helpful! He might shift the vote towards National by a whopping one-half of one percent.
Yeah, ACT received a grand total of 162 Party-Votes in Northland in 2014. (Behind Aotearoa Legalise Cannabis but ahead of the Ban 1080 Party). And a plurality of ACT Party-Voters went for Sabin (rather than the ACT candidate) anyway.
Still, you never know. Could come down to just a handful of votes.
“He will also be advising ACT supporters to vote National in Northland. ”
He can take them all out for dinner.
Table for 150 please!
That gave me a genuine laugh.
So that’s three more votes for the National candidate!
Phil
Shaw to bid for co-leadership?
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/67256847/mp-bids-for-greens-coleader-role
interesting thanks….i think Shaw has huge appeal and ability….question is whether he is right wing?…Really this is the acid question for the Greens. The new co-leader must be unequivocally Left !
Naomi Kleim spells it out with her new book ‘This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs Climate’
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/sep/19/this-changes-everything-capitalism-vs-climate-naomi-klein-review
Speaking of Naomi, I came across this today:
Johann Hari & Naomi Klein: Does Capitalism Drive Drug Addiction?
http://www.democracynow.org/blog/2015/3/11/johann_hari_naomi_klein_does_capitalism
Winston Peters take John Key apart on diversionary tactics as regards 1080 scare…”timing smells”…”timing was not coincidental” with other things going on eg Iraq situation and GCSB:
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/20170584/winston-peters-scoffs-at-act's-threat-to-swing-its-support
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/20170582/recent-1080-poison-scare-draws-parallels-with-2005-foot-and-mouth-hoax
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/20170566/anti-1080-campaigner-says-police-visit-was-a-surprise
Lot of money to be made when markets are shaken down.
But no, Key thinks its eco-terror.
I think its some meat eater who sources their food locally and does not want their larder poisoned, not ecological more food to mouth subsistenance since they obvioysly do not have a piece of the wider economic rural benefits/trickledown.
lone wolf economically marginalized rural type.
While primarily about Britain, this article is highly relevant to New Zealand, where the ‘golden weather’ of the long post-WW2 economic boom was even more golden than in Britain and lasted a bit longer; what happened here afterwards is also similar to Britain
by Michael Roberts
I am part of the lucky generation. I am a member of that cohort of people born between 1946 and 1965, the baby boomer generation. We are lucky because we came into the world in countries of advanced capitalism at a time when there was unprecedented economic growth, near ‘full employment’, relative low inequality of wealth and income and strongish labour movements able to extract concessions from Capital on labour rights, a welfare state, universal health and education, public housing.
Capital was able to concede these gains for labour because it was experiencing high rates of profitability after the destruction of capital values during the war. It could draw on a huge reserve army of labour in Europe and Asia, along with new technology, to exploit. And global capitalism had one hegemonic power, the US, that could provide credit and investment in Europe and Asia within Pax Americana. In short, this was a Golden Age for capitalism. Concessions to labour were possible. . .
full at: https://rdln.wordpress.com/2015/03/11/the-lucky-generation/
Interesting article on the post-WW2 long economic boom, its end and what subsequent generations have had to deal with – increasingly casualised employment, extension of working lives through the raising of the retirement age, cuts to public services and commodification or partial commodification of such services too, etc etc. . .
Ain’t capitalism glorious?
Phil
Wasn’t that wonderful for everybody. As a bright 16yr old I was told by my High School career’s advisor in 1966 that I should go to secretarial college as I would make somebody a wonderful secretary. I said that I thought I would make a better “somebody” and that I was going to University.
Yes, there were jobs, but the Help Wanted section in the paper was divided into Men’s Jobs and Women’s Jobs.
In 1981 when I bought my house the policy of the BNZ was that they did not lend $$$ to single women to buy houses. The Manager was too chicken to tell me that – he just rang my father and told him that the only way I would get the loan was if he counter signed for it. Regardless of my substantial deposit and more than adequate income.
And that is before we got onto the treatment of Maori, LGBT and any other minority.
The boomer years were all about white, straight blokes.
What you say is right, but what happened was not an extension of the benefits of being a white straight bloke to the rest of the population. Those who promoted better gender and race conditions also let neoliberalism in the door. Their emphasis was on the individual betterment of women, Maori, and gays, rather than as part of a class. This meant that things got a lot better for some, like the gay Tories that ran the Auckland Pride Parade, but much worse for the trans Maori woman who didn’t want screws marching.
We lost the good things in exchange for a bit of equality for some. We could have had both.
Kiaora Murray
Their emphasis was on the individual betterment of women, Maori, and gays, rather than as part of a class.
I don’t think Māori were particularly interested in being part of a “class struggle.” Particularly as the Māori struggle isn’t about gaining equality with Joe Pākehā.
Plenty of Maori have been very strong in class struggle and I don’t think it was because they wanted to be like Joe. When the whole basis of Kiwi capitalism was the confiscation and purchase of land from Maori, I don’t see how it is possible to stand aside from class struggle anyway. The Maori Party disagrees with me, but I can handle that.
Surprised that the Marlborough Express devoted a full page to explaining “Snowden Files Spooks Collect Your Data.” Includes the Waihopai explanation. Did other papers publish this?
http://www.stuff.co.nz/marlborough-express/news/67082905/Snowden-files-Inside-Waihopais-domes
(The online version is reduced compared to the paper version)
This was interesting on National Radio last night
Maskirovka: Deception Russian-Style
Lucy Ash examines the Russian military strategy of deception, maskirovka, from the 14th Century to the current crisis in Ukraine.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02kq0gq
NB not that I’m taking sides on the Russia/Ukraine conflict – just interesting background to Russian military strategy
An excellent piece. Particularly relevant now that Putin has admitted lying about the Crimea invasion.
Yep, Russia anticipated the west’s move to destabilise Ukraine and turn it into a NATO outpost well ahead of time. There was never any way that Russia was going to allow Sevastapol to become a NATO base, and the west should have realised that from the start.
🙄
Prof John Mersheimer says west is determined to peel Ukraine away from Russia
Using three means:
1) NATO expansion eastward.
2) EU expansion eastward.
3) “Democracy promotion” (toppling pro-Russian regimes and replacing them with pro-western, anti-Russian regimes).
Ukraine is a core strategic interest for Russia; however it is not a core strategic interest for the western powers.
A political settlement would be Ukraine becoming a neutral buffer state between Europe and Russia.
http://rt.com/shows/sophieco/238905-us-ukraine-ceasefire-russia/
thanks …i will check it out
here is more on USA foreign affairs …still relevant given Netanyahu’s Israel attempt recently to influence American Foreign policy on Iran….this Published on Nov 23, 2013
‘Gwenyth Todd – Whistleblower on Planned Iran War & WW3′
“Press TV’s documentary program “Untold Truths” is a revealing documentary film about the life and experiences of former White House Middle East policy adviser, Gwenyth Todd, who has now escaped to Australia to keep safe from FBI prosecution”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLhbXaF5yec
http://rt.com/news/225539-netanyahu-congress-usa-rift/
Watching the doco on Gwyneth Todd…wow. Thanks for the link. Iranian TV hit this one out of the park.
That is a good link CR and explains the line that you have been outlining here over the last month. It sounds like the only viable way to go.
Chur GW.
Colonial Rawshark speaks a lot of sense….
Listen to that steady drum beat for us to go to war, a just war, an honourable war, a necessary war, a moral war. So many lefties have forgotten – war is a racket.
A lot of sense? Sadly, not for a quite a while. Colonel Viper is a long, long way back from the frontline on so many issues these days.
Did I hear Armchair General Westmoreland say something about hanging back in the rear while being all keen to send our young men and women off to a civil war?
Off in the distance, through the binoculars, I can just make out a figure retreating into the sunset waving a white flag. Its pitiful whine can just be made out … “Fuckem, fuckem all. I’m alriiiiight jack, so fuckem all …”
It’s good to hear an echo of Old Labour when I read you Te Reo Putake. I can see why we have our preent day NZ going around in wide circles which some have realised are actually slipping away down the plughole. But terrific to see brave Old Time Labour standing strong, like Canute by the waterside, (though he was doing it ironically to show his old Labourites where wish-fulfilment ended and reality starts).
One thing I was thinking about is the relatively low level of tax on high-income earners in NZ.
See this link: http://money.cnn.com/interactive/pf/taxes/top-income-tax-rate/?iid=EL
Only 6 countries in the OECD have a top rate lower than NZ. Australia and Canada are 48%. The UK was 50% in 2012 but is now 45%. USA is 44%. Ireland is 48%. So NZ clearly has the lowest tax rate in the Anglo countries at just 33%. If we look at continental European countries, we see that Denmark taxes at 60%, Netherlands at 52%, Sweden at 57%, Germany at 48%, France at 51% etc etc..
It is quite weird that the sub-35% top tax rates have fallen out of favour in much of the weird yet NZ maintains a 33% tax rate. Labour only proposed a 36% tax rate last election, and even the Greens only went for 40%. Helen Clark would only go up to 39%. Why is something in the 40s so toxic? It is interesting because in general the ‘centre’ of New Zealand politics is more towards the left than in other Anglo countries. (NZ right wingers are less right wing than other Anglo countries and left-wingers are more left leaning. But on tax? Not so much..)
UK Labour support a 50% top rate. US Democratic Party support a 40% federal rate(with the US Progressives supporting a 45% rate), in addition to state-level income taxes which add up to 5-10% on top of that. Why are NZ left leaning parties proposing to maintain such low levels of high-income taxation? Personally I’d propose a 45% or 50% rate on incomes above $180k. Which is not really that radical compared to other countries.
Which is odd when you consider that we are constantly told how over taxed such people are
The burden falls on low and average earners while high income earners pay nothing on their capital gains and get away with a 33% tax rate.
Capital gains and wealth taxes are where NZ totally misses out at the moment. A higher top tier tax rate could be introduced for the top 1% – just remember that many in the top of the top 1% have minimal declared income however and will be totally untouched by that.
Yup. I would just tax all capital gains as normal income from wages on the progressive scale, with an exemption for the family home. Why should someone with income from shares or the sale of a second home pay no tax (or a reduced rate), while the minimum wage earner pays a higher rate?
Can you please explain why you would exempt the family home?
Would you say that someone who invests their money into a business that creates work for other New Zealander’s and rents their place of abode, should pay more in taxes than someone who pours their savings into a mansion in Herne Bay? and doesn’t otherwise save anything
Just exempt the first $50K of capital gains a year, from whatever sources.
That is an a perfectly debatable point but it isn’t the one that supporters of the Labour and Green Parties make.
It seems to be an article of faith that “We will exempt the family home”.
I could see why you would do it from a political viewpoint, as in the old “don’t do it in the street and scare the horses” but it makes no economic sense to exclude anything.
The $50k/year exemption of course has a problem that if I have an increase in wealth of $50k/yr and realise it I won’t pay any tax.
If I spend 40 years developing a farm and then sell it to retire at an increase in nominal value of $1 million I would be lumbered with a $300k (say) tax bill even though the actual capital gain will be less than half the amount of the person who realises it every year.
I agree with you for once.
Excluding the family home will means a lot of wealthy 16 year olds owning a “family home” in Remuera.
Better excluding the first 400k, say, (it could be set at the median value of an NZ house) of assets from a CGT, or wealth tax makes it more progressive, but also takes away the political disadvantage of taxing peoples homes.
It is more a political decision, because of the fun that NACT would have with “taxing the family home”, even though we already pay a wealth tax on homes. Rates.
Hmm, I do agree with you on that:
What about an exemption on the first home, up to a cap? So you get say the first $100-200k of your capital gains on the family home tax-free.
AND off set the capital gain by inflation, so you don’t pay tax on inflation.
I think that could definitely be a fair thing to do.
So capital gains would be taxed as normal income, with an exclusion for the family home up to a cap for an average house sale gain; and people would only be charged tax on the *real* capital gain, not nominal.
What would you do about interest payments?
If you get interest on money you have loaned out you really shouldn’t pay tax on the interest rate which only covers inflation should you?
If I loan money, say to the bank as a TD, and I get 4% when the inflation is 2% I really shouldn’t have to pay tax on the first 2%.
After all that would be paying tax on inflation. The problem is trying to decide on what is interest covering inflation and what is interest that is real income. It gets to be almost impossible when there are multiple amounts of money at multiple interest rates, particularly when money may be in a current account that just pays a nominal 1% and where the amount concerned changes from day to day.
Tain’t easy baby.
http://tvnz.co.nz/national-news/has-government-got-its-planned-pay-rise-limit-mps-wrong-6253468
It seems that what the left hand taketh away, the right hand giveth back.
The government’s change to the way MP’s salary increases are calculated it seems will return almost the same amount ($800 less over a $31,000 actual increase in the term of this government.)
shaking head…
The Herald even went so far as to call the bill a ‘shambles’.
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1988-04-17/news/8803090394_1_marconi-scientists-suicides
Dead Scientists
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/reagans-great-lie-in-the-sky-star-wars-scientists-may-have-deceived-moscow-and-congress-about-the-project-writes-david-usborne-in-washington-1463972.html
Q. Did they die because of the work they were doing ?
Spies parking data overseas to ticket us later. Onerous govt.
Bye-bye Bibi?
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/11/israel-elections-rising-panic-in-likud-ranks-as-opposition-gains-momentum
not laughing
“Australian comedian Heath Franklin, who goes by the stage name Chopper, will front a new comedy series for TV3, which is set to receive $90,000 of taxpayer money from New Zealand on Air.
The NZoA spokesperson went on to say the key funding criteria is that the production company is based in New Zealand, not the onscreen talent.
The series will be produced by Hikoi New Zealand, a Rotorua-based production company, Managing director Piripi Curtis said they chose Chopper to front the show due to an exisiting relationship with him. He said they never considered using a Kiwi comedian to host the series.
He confirmed Chopper still lives in Australia and would be flown to New Zealand to work on the series…”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=11416198
Wrong – this should get NO money – wtf firstly this guy is not funny as his stint on the very unfunny 7 days has shown, secondly there is NO good reason a Aotearoan should not get the gig – that would help the local comedians more than this waste of space and they need more help as 7 days has shown IMO
hi marty, u do have a bee in yr bonnet over this.
who are the funny comedians that should get funding for this tv show (that is only being made to sell ads).
i find 7 days humerous and only a year ago was appointment viewing, however have seen one episode this season.
i found chopper to be quite quick witted although sometimes a tad vulgar (australian).
will you be wanting to check the citizenship of all the crew too?
yeah I’ll untie my bonnet the bee has stung – lol
and, sure, humour is subjective – I’m glad some find enjoyment in there.
the best bits crew are quite funny
If NZ idol and reality shows can get funding I don’t see an issue with this. Heaths actually funny, unlike most of the 7 days dross dished up, and the show will highlight NZ talent.
Outrageous fortune had an Oz in the lead alongside Malcolm so more herald diversions rather than put some focus on nationals pork barreling in northland and Shonkeys squeaky bum time which has far more national significance than more road crashes.
It’s in the entertainment section so hardly a diversion tc – I think WE have the talent, the people, the ideas so for me NO to using aussies or brits and whatevers – buy local, eat local, employ local, love local
Wasn’t in that section online when I saw it, it was in the main section alongside other leaders.
hmmm well I agree they would use anything to create a distraction from the shit their beloved leader is doing or usually not doing.
And this is why Telecom should never have been privatised:
We’ve already paid billions of dollars and we’re now having to pay billions more to get the service that we’ve already paid for. The only people that privatisation has benefited are the new owners and everyone else is worse off.
Yes and exactly how does that benefit northland, UFB needs dense population to make it a reasonable cost per dwelling passed, more BS unless Amy nominates which town gets it.
210mill easily swallowed up lighting up the rest of central north island and sth island towns where diversity exists like matamata, morinsville, raglan, etc….con job central.
” This afternoon (11/03 ) Insiders New Zealand published a political poll with just over 500 eligible voters asking New Plymouth voters, if the election were held today who would you choose for MP of New Plymouth?”
56.17% of the voter’s polled said they would vote the Labour Leader Andrew Little, compared to current National MP Jonathan Young’s 26.09%.
7.56% said they were not sure who they’d vote for.
Apparently if it couldn’t get any worse for the former safe blue seat, it has. 78.92% of those that wish to vote Andrew Little will also vote for the Labour Party and just 11.07% will not. 13.21% were not sure.
The poll for Insiders was conducted by Michael Riley and surveyed the opinions of 500 people.
Yes I know there is a long way to go before we are able to test the polls validity, but ….
Good news! I imagine the locals are cottoning on to the fact that having the Prime Minister as your local MP can have real benefits. 2017 can’t come soon enough!
Absolutely.
During the 2014 election campaign the Taranaki Daily News published a poll carried out by the local polytech’s (WITT) journalistic students. Their poll had Andrew Little at 13% support. When I questioned the tutors methodology she said that the students in pairs had a copy of the local telephone book and randomly opened a page and drew a horizontal line across the mid section. One of them rang those people whose numbers were directly above the line ( say 20) while the other rang 20 people below the line. I asked how that would achieve a true demographic picture which should include things like the age of the sample, where people lived, their socio economic status, maybe their race etc. Her response was that this was the method she was taught and for all intents and purposes was the method used in similar teachings.
No wonder we have a MSM unfit for purpose.
Breaking news.
Andrew little appears to have quit and moved with his family to Oamaru.
Have a look at the photo and admire the speed with which he grew a beard.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/nz-life-leisure/66872932/family-of-six-lives-off-less-than-90-a-week
Is the one who looks like a goat Trevor?
Three Hellfire missiles – $330,000.
5:18 a.m.
Pilot: They’re praying.
Sensor: This is definitely it. This is their force. Praying? I mean, seriously, that’s what they do.
Mission intelligence coordinator: They’re going to do something nefarious.
[…]
8:45 a.m.
Sensor: Hey, MC.
Mission intelligence controller: Yes?
Sensor: Remember, Kill Chain!
MIC: Will do.
[…]
9:10 a.m.
Mission intelligence coordinator: Screener said there weren’t any women earlier.
Sensor: What are those? They were in the middle vehicle.
Mission intelligence coordinator: Women and children.
[…]
Families of the dead ultimately received $5,000 each, plus one goat.
http://boingboing.net/2015/03/11/drones-and-the-rise-of-the-hig.html
Kiaora Murray
Plenty of Maori have been very strong in class struggle and I don’t think it was because they wanted to be like Joe. When the whole basis of Kiwi capitalism was the confiscation and purchase of land from Maori, I don’t see how it is possible to stand aside from class struggle anyway. The Maori Party disagrees with me, but I can handle that.
A great many more Māori disagree with you. The Māori struggle cannot be seen as simply an appendage to other peoples desires for equality. That Māori have supported other peoples struggles is because of the manaaki we share for others but in no way does that support then translate into the subjugation of our Treaty based arguments to fit other peoples agendas. We call that assimilation. Class is a concept off the same boat as the coloniser.
Or to put it another way, your class struggle is atop lands that were stolen.
When the Foreshore and Seabed protest occurred in Wellington, upwards of 80,000 Māori protested, and the only divisions recognised was in terms of tribal connections.
Kia ora Adele
I agree that the Treaty based arguments must not be subjugated. The Foreshore and Seabed protests resulted in the Maori Party, which has since subjugated heaps to FJK’s agenda. Maybe if “divisions” besides tribal connections had been recognised, FJK wouldn’t be so strong today.
I suspect our views of what class struggle entails are not the same.
Kiaora Murray
The Foreshore and Seabed protests resulted in the Maori Party, which has since subjugated heaps to FJK’s agenda. Maybe if “divisions” besides tribal connections had been recognised, FJK wouldn’t be so strong today.
It was a Labour Government that established the rationale for the creation of the Māori Party through its arrogant and dismissive treatment of its treaty obligations towards Māori. Maybe, if Labour hadn’t pissed all over Māori aspirations they would still be in Government. The Māori Party was born from betrayal.
Under National, the Māori Party get to sit at the table. Under Labour, they’re the last cab on the rank. And how convenient that the anti Māori Party stalwarts, never fully contextualise the voting record of the Māori Party. That it votes much more times against the Government agenda than with it. What is Labour’s record in comparison.
National and Labour are cut from the same raggedy cloth. Essentially the same thinking driving both. The only difference is in colour, a blue rag, and a red rag. And golly gosh, Māori get to wear the rags.
We are in the land of plenty but many of my people still cannot afford the cab fare home from the supermarket.
Well said Adele.
Yes, Labour is the party of betrayal. They are also not a party of class struggle.