Open mike 13/02/2024

29 comments on “Open mike 13/02/2024 ”

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1. Sanctuary 1

   13 February 2024 at 6:31 am

   https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/02/11/cost-cuts-loom-at-the-guardian-amid-widening-losses/

   RNZ take note – never shit on your base.
2. gsays 2

   13 February 2024 at 7:08 am

   Wags made a statement last night on the swipecard post that is ringing bells for me.

   Where is the opposition on these 4 anointed individuals with their premier access?

   Surely Hipkins et al can claim the higher ground and make some points, start forming a narrative about the government and their nefarious ways.

   Or maybe this is political tragic/beltway stuff that doesn't cut through.
   • Cricklewood 2.1

     13 February 2024 at 7:45 am

     The Nats are pretty cunning what chance one of recipients is from the 'left' side… someone like Kris Faafoi perhaps…
     • Robert Guyton 2.1.1

       13 February 2024 at 8:31 am

       Will the Speaker explain his decision in the House?

       If so, what reasons, with examples, might he offer for the anonymity aspect?

       I can't think of any valid reasons for wanting one's identity hidden due to visiting Bowen House/The Beehive, can anyone here?
     • Patricia Bremner 2.1.2

       13 February 2024 at 9:04 am

       More likely Nash
   • Incognito 2.2

     13 February 2024 at 9:29 am

     Hipkins did give a brief interview on the new swipe card access rules for lobbyists: https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/middayreport/audio/2018925693/chris-hipkins-on-lobbyist-access-to-parliament.

     It wasn’t a great interview, IMO, but it was ok-ish.
     • gsays 2.2.1

       13 February 2024 at 10:05 am

       Thanks Incog, I will check that out.
   • Anne 2.3

     13 February 2024 at 10:07 am

     Labour appear to have been keeping their powder dry. It makes sense to me because anything they said or did in recent months had no cut-through. They were the losers and the media were not interested. Not indeed the voters

     A four week parliamentary session begins today, so I think we might start seeing some fireworks from the Opposition parties. They should get better coverage.
3. Joe90 3

   13 February 2024 at 8:05 am

   The world's most moral army.

   /

   Shayan Sardarizadeh

   @Shayan86

   The official state of Israel account has posted this video, saying it is facilitating aid into Gaza. A short clip at the end of the video, claiming to show tents and shelter equipment for Gazans, was actually filmed in March 2022, showing tents in Moldova for Ukrainian refugees.

   https://twitter.com/Shayan86/status/1757032141454446758
   • Rolling-on-Gravel 3.1

     13 February 2024 at 1:34 pm

     Shame on Israel, good on Moldova.

     They should throw Netanyahu and Likud & Ben Gvir & his pet pro-settlers out.

     Palestinians and Israelis deserves better than this situation.
4. Adrian 4

   13 February 2024 at 8:24 am

   Why are so many so intimidated as to not call that which the IDF is doing by its rightful name, genocide, ethnic cleansing, invasion and land theft ?
   • Robert Guyton 4.1

     13 February 2024 at 8:37 am

     Chlöe isn't.

     There was a situation in Invercargill some years back, when a kebab-shop owner refused to serve a woman who spoke Hebrew. A protest against his action was quickly organised. Our local National Party MP was front and centre. Letters to the editor amassed quickly, letters arriving from all over the country and some from overseas. The networks designed to counter anti-Israeli sentiment are efficient.
   • Barfly 4.2

     13 February 2024 at 11:06 am

     Ethnic cleansing and land theft are able to be determined at the end of the armed conflict in Gaza – Genocide? yep the IDF are ticking that box hard.IMO.
5. weka 5

   13 February 2024 at 11:03 am

   Just going to put this out there because I think it needs to be named.

   I realised this morning that The Standard commentariat is losing its ability to debate. Not everyone and not all the time, but something that has been irritating me just became clear. The dynamic of unwillingness or inability to respond to the other person's points with one's own thinking, and instead just going straight to one's own points, is what happens on social media and it's why it's hard (not impossible) to debate politics in places like twitter.

   We didn't use to be like that. And a fair amount of the time we still do debate. But we are losing that slowly.

   Moderation can only do so much about that. Incognito and myself in particular have been weeding out the trolls in the past 12 months. That's about clearing the space for good conversation to happen. But much of the frustration with moderation for me comes down to people not listening to others and not valuing the exchange of ideas as much as we used to.

   My theory about it is that the great intersecting crisis (climate, pandemic, economic, war) are so permanent and overwhelming now that people are retrenching into positions that make sense to them, and are less inclined to be open to change. It's a natural response to a scary situation, but it's useful when the crises have an end point. Ours don't, the only way is through. And getting through means we have to be able to talk with each other.
   • Kay 5.1

     13 February 2024 at 12:51 pm

     Yes, it's extremely hard to debate anything when even the smallest attempt to initiate comment is completely ignored. I left here a good 2-3 years ago because of problems with trolls, came back for the election to read the (usually) interesting discourse. I don't pretend to be politically academically fluent but it used to be possible to engage here. It's all gone extremely cliquey now. A pity, there's some great discourse out there.
     • Robert Guyton 5.1.1

       13 February 2024 at 1:08 pm

       Kay, could you please name/list those cliques; that is, what are the topics the hold to?

       Thanks.
       • Kay 5.1.1.1

         13 February 2024 at 2:22 pm

         Apologies Robert. By "cliquey" it was more my initial impression when returning to TS that the contributors had narrowed down to such a small group and not very open to someone new trying to contribute. Probably not the right word
         • Robert Guyton 5.1.1.1.1

           13 February 2024 at 2:45 pm

           Thanks, Kay. I wonder if you've any view on why the commentariat here may have shrunk?
         • Grey Area 5.1.1.1.2

           13 February 2024 at 2:59 pm

           "… not very open to someone new trying to contribute". That's been my sense a few times as well, Kay. It's left me with a feeling of being ignored or not being part of the cool crowd. Maybe my comments just weren't very interesting.
           • weka 5.1.1.1.2.1

             13 February 2024 at 6:27 pm

             your comments are interesting, I don’t think it’s that. (I’ve just replied to a comment you made a few weeks ago that I lost track of ☺️). Sometimes it’s a matter of style, but I agree with the idea that people who know each other are more likely to talk to each others. I was roundly ignored when I first started commenting on TS. And on twitter.
           • Anne 5.1.1.1.2.2

             13 February 2024 at 6:27 pm

             It feels that way sometimes, especially if you are new to the site, but your contributions are being read. It just takes time for the commentariat to discover your presence and start to respond.
             • weka …

               13 February 2024 at 6:29 pm

               this 👆
           • Robert Guyton 5.1.1.1.2.3

             13 February 2024 at 8:06 pm

             I think you are cool, Grey Area 🙂

             If you want to provoke responses and discussion, you have to be provocative – try poking and prodding – works* for me 🙂

             *mostly
     • weka 5.1.2

       13 February 2024 at 2:53 pm

       great to see you again Kay. Please let us know if you have any suggestions.
6. Darien Fenton 6

   13 February 2024 at 11:03 am

   I agree there is a need to think about lobbyists. I don't think the issue is about swipe cards. After all, it's not that hard to access parliament ; you just have to go through a security check. And there are plenty of other places to meet, Ministerial diaries are an important means of disclosure, and I see these have not been updated. Lobbyists try to build a career on their relationships by telling others how parliament works. As an MP I took little notice of them but they probably never saw me as influential anyway. We have a system where we don’t need to influence individual MPs because they will follow party lines. But it is the dark forces we need to be worried about like the Atlas connections and the large donors to NAF. They won’t be lining up for a swipe card.
   • Anne 6.1

     13 February 2024 at 6:08 pm

     … it is the dark forces we need to be worried about like the Atlas connections and the large donors to NAF. They won't be lining up for a swipe card.

     Indeed it is.

     We have seen numerous political links to the Atlas network (including via PM Chris Luxon himself) and large corporate enterprises. It is no coincidence that these corporate monstrosities stand to ultimately gain from the policies as outlined by this govt.

     The term "the tail is wagging the dog" springs to mind. The tail, made up of the extreme libertarian movement Atlas, together with their local corporate sponsors, are the ones who are really running this country.
   • veutoviper 6.2

     13 February 2024 at 11:23 pm

     Ooops, my comment at 7 was meant to be a reply to this comment.
7. veutoviper 7

   13 February 2024 at 5:13 pm

   Well put, Darien.

   As a former Wellington public servant, I spent a lot of time in the Parliamentary precinct over many years. The number of people going in and out of the precinct daily via the main non-swipe card access and security check process was – and presumably still is enormous. In the main this non-swipe card process was pretty quick and painless thereby making swipe cards only slightly more efficient/desirable.

   The range of reasons for people going in and out is also extremely wide and trying to narrow and define those reasons and decide which categories should and should not have swipe card access is a major task in itself. Not saying that this work should not be done but my impressions are that this has not been seen as a high priority and lip service only has been paid to this – as evidenced by the small number of approved swipe card holders listed on the parliamentary web page which Micky Savage linked to * in his post on "Who are the four lobbyists with Parliamentary swipe cards?"

   IMHO this list likely only covers a very, very small proportion of "non-residents" with swipe cards to the Parliamentary precinct.

   I also totally agree with you that of far greater concern are "the dark forces like the Atlas connections and the large donors to NAF – and they won’t be lining up for a swipe card!"

   There are so many things that just do not seem to "compute" in this new government and the interconnections not only with organisations like Atlas Network but also between the three parties themselves …

   For example, the fact that Casey Costello has popped up as a MP in NZF after her long background with ACT, as co-founder of Hobson's Pledge with Don Brash, and her connections to the NZ Taxpayers Union etc. There are some areas of commonality with Winston Peters in terms of opposition to Maori electorates and similar – but I still find it strange; not to mention her introduction to Parliament of in effect "establishing her reputation" as a tobacco lobbyist! – rather than these ACT, Brash, NZTU connections.

   I may post more detail on this in a separate comment here on TS some time soon .

   Of relevance to this conversation, a small thing I found out is that Costello is not new to the Parliamentary precinct … According to her Wikipedia entry, she was in fact employed /contracted by Parliamentary Services for 2 years 7 months (2004 – 2007) as Parliament's manager of security and operations, overseeing a security upgrade.[1]

   Presumably in this capacity she would have been responsible for Swipe cards (or their predecessors) and other processes covering access to the precinct and MPs etc!

   Links:

   • https://www.parliament.nz/en/visit-and-learn/how-parliament-works/office-of-the-speaker/corporate-documents/approved-visitor-list-to-parliament/

   [1] 'Most Māori are successful' – Casey Costello pushes message of aspiration". NZ Herald. 11 November 2023.
   • gsays 7.1

     13 February 2024 at 5:35 pm

     Cheers for your insight.

     If access is reasonably available, it makes Brownlee's decision to maintain secrecy for the 4 card holders all the more intriguing.

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