Russian invasion driving more disinformation online
A report from Facebook owner Meta finds a big jump this year in disinformation and propaganda linked to Russia's invasion of Ukraine
By DAVID KLEPPER Associated Press
8 April 2022, 03:34
…..The report outlined other disinformation efforts tied to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, including one involving dozens of fake accounts that spread anti-Ukrainian rhetoric. Another network filed thousands of fake complaints about Ukrainian Facebook users in an effort to get them kicked off the platform. That network hid its activities in a Facebook group supposedly dedicated to cooking.
Even if news sources were not blocked there is still the threat of a person or their family being harmed for speaking out.
War is so ugly for those who are caught up in it. The soldiers and cilvillians who are killed or severely injured. The loss of a home, job, education, no health care and food shortage or starvation. Fear of being tortured or raped or a hidden bomb being activated. Economic collapse and the sight of destroyed buildings and artillery being strewn.
Interesting new interview from Arron Mate' with acques Baud. Former intelligence officer with the Swiss Strategic Intelligence Service who has served in a number of senior security and advisory positions at NATO, the United Nations, and with the Swiss military.
"As the Russia-Ukraine war enters a new phase, former Swiss intelligence officer, senior United Nations official, and NATO advisor Jacques Baud analyzes the conflict and argues that the US and its allies are exploiting Ukraine in a longstanding campaign to bleed its Russian neighbor."
Thanks for your input…it was really insightful…It’s hard to understand why the Ukrainian negotiations teams haven’t scooped you up with such profound and multidimensional insights like that…go figure.
Well it is really that simple. Putin is a despot and a tyrant who decided his approval ratings could do with a boost, just like they got with his invasion of the Crimea, so a nice little week long war of aggression to seize the entire Ukraine was just the ticket.
Only that didn't work out (well he got the polling boost he was after) – the Ukrainians proved to be stubbornly unwilling to be purged and subjugated and lots of other people who happened to have lots of weapons were of a mind to agree with them. The fact that this is also bleeding a Fascist Russia white is a happy bonus.
So if Russia wants out, it can simply stop it’s invasion and pull out of the Ukraine. That’ll mean the end of Putin, but who would shed a tear for that bastard? He is happy to see tens of thousands die in this pointless war for no other reason than to save his own skin.
With negotiators like you, who needs enemies?….interesting how so many arm chair warriors seem so willing to fight an unwinnable war to the last Ukrainian…and bring us all to the edge of WW3 while they are at it…nutters one and all.
You seem to fail to grasp that this war is existential for the Ukraine. Defeat means the extinguishing of their identity, the erasure of their language and culture and the murder or imprisonment and/or exile of it's intelligensia and leadership class. They’ve been down that road before under Stalin and they don’t want it to happen again as long as they can fight and I fully support them in that desire.
They'll keep fighting because it literally is a case of dying on their feet facing the enemy is better than dying kneeling next to a mass grave with a bag over their head.
You are effectively telling to Ukrainians to surrender for their own good. You really are trying to gaslight them. Personally, if they say they are willing to fight to the last man rather than surrender I’ll take them at face value.
And besides, for the Ukraine winning is simply not losing. Everyday they hold out is a day closer to drawing NATO and USA into the fight, or at least getting the weapons they need to drive the Russians back. Zelensky knows this, which is why he spends every day trying to draw the Americans and NATO into the war.
According to Zeihan, the biggest worry for NATO and the US is just how inept the Russian army has been in this conflict. And that it is very clear that any direct conflict between NATO and Russia would result in a rapid, humiliating defeat for Russia.
Therefore, the big fear is, that in such a conflict, the only other option to defeat for Russia would be to go nuclear.
According to Zeihan, Russia's aim, from a strategic standpoint isn't to stop at Ukraine. But if Russia gets its way, it would ideally take over Poland as well, to meet its strategic objective of creating buffer states at its weak points where previous invasions have occurred.
Therefore, the west would prefer to bleed Russia dry or have Ukraine defeat them outright in Ukraine so the feared direct confrontation with NATO doesn't have the opportunity to happen in the first place.
Peter Zeihan is well worth listening to, btw. At the time Crimea was annexed back in 2014, Zeihan predicted a full Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
He based his prediction on the falling birth rates in Russia. He reasoned that Russia needed to take this action by then. Otherwise, its decreasing population would mean it was soon going to be unable to draft sufficient soldiers for its purpose.
Russia would, by this time, probably be relieved by a dirty ceasefire that gave them the Donbas and Mariupol. It is not tenable for Ukraine however, who need their ports to export grain. And of course, the next invasion would be much easier than the current one. Ukraine has little option but to fight.
"You are only looking at the symptoms, not the causes"..are you serious? nearly every thing I post about the war in the Ukraine is about the causes, about historical context…that is exactly what is lacking in all MSM coverage of this conflict…you would think this conflict started six weeks ago out of nowhere.
You reckon they haven't tried talking, negotiations – EU talks, NATO talks. This and that leader going to talk to Putin?
The whole thing's a master plan? GTFO.
You reckon there's been no protests worldwide. No internal protests. No mass arrests.
I reckon your reckons are wildly biased. You simply can't see the monster destroying cities. Because some air brained principle shit that's all in your head.
So tell me what's your option out of this, because talking, so far, has utterly failed.
Putin is clearly a murderous hate filled egomaniacal paranoid delusional asshole. He could be making bank right now, the utter fuckwit. But he's chosen war crimes and genocide, he's cost tens of thousands of lives to 'make his point'. His point being, Ukraine were right to look for protection from that piece of shit.
We can clearly see the world stage, though you are convinced we've all worn our rosy tinted glasses.
Anyone who has established a track record of eliminating political opponents with radiation poisoning ought to be viewed as public enemy #1. Putin has three strikes on that record, so he's out already. However we do need to factor in why Russians selected him in the first place:
The economic reforms of Gorbachev and Yeltsin were so financially and socially painful for the majority of Russians, that by the end of the 1990s the words "democrat" and "reformer" were perceived by many as offensive.
The liberal politicians who had carried out those reforms were seen, at best, as populist losers, at worst, enemies of the people.
After a decade of unpopular reforms — including price liberalization and privatization — and bloody regional conflicts in the post-Soviet space, "stability" and "security" became the most desirable goals of the people.
When American TV presenters ask me today why, according to opinion polls, 83% of Russians support President Vladimir Putin, I know the answer. And it’s a little more complicated than 22 years of government propaganda.
Stanislav Kucher is a journalist and former Russian TV presenter, has previously worked as Editor-in-Chief of the Snob multimedia platform, Chief Political Analyst and Creative Director of Kommersant-fm all-news radio network, Anchor at Sovershenno Sekretno TV channel and Editor-in-Chief of National Geographic Traveler (Russian edition). He lives in New York.
The world's seen plenty of idiots in power who played on circumstances to elevate themselves.
While historical context helps, Putin never was the answer to Russia's problems. Clearly. A history of mismanagement is also not a Russia-centric phenomenon. Blaming history is a weak game. The fascist loves historical grievance to hold as a picture in front of their current psychopathic behaviour.
Putin's not special he's another power drunk fuckwit who believes his own press. Met enough of them, anyone who think's their press is representative of them is a right plonker at best.
Will Putin last as President until 2024 and two 6 year terms after that?
Putin has a master plan otherwise he would not have extended the constitution in April 2021 to run as President for more than two terms and the terms were extended to 6 years each.
When this happened I thought his political ambitions were a warning.
Tenure of an autocrat usually depends on the power base. Random factors such as assassination & ill-health also apply though. As the historical context described by Kucher above suggests, Putin fills a need in the collective psyche of Russians. Therefore his base is extremely broad. Only someone in the Russian hierarchy who can play power games as well as he does can threaten him in that scenario.
There is no single contender to stand up to Putin. He is heavily guarded, he appears to be in good physical health and people would fear the internal intelligence service under his command.
Add to that a couple of other factors. He has likemindedness on his strategy with his second in command – I posted a detailed profile which demonstrated that conclusively a while back. Even more of a hawk than Putin, it showed, couple of years older if I recall correctly.
Usually how it works is betrayal by those somewhat younger in the second level of the power structure, who have developed a consensus that the top guys have lost the plot. A coup requires considerably teamwork and good luck to succeed though, and often is enabled by complacency of those who are confident they have total control. Putin's too shrewd to get that complacent, I suspect.
Like all complex systems though, stasis is vulnerable to tipping points. Military defeat would apply considerable pressure to the power structure. That's why success from his recent pivot is essential.
I tell you one thing, I had no idea how much the Finns and the Balts dislike the Russians until this war occurred. But they really, really don't like Russia.
I suppose they have a fair bit of bitter experience of what it is like living next door to a perennially despotic, reactionary and aggressively expansionist Russian state.
The Finns at least noticed Russia weaponizing refugees by feeding them through their border to the EU. Neutral or friendly countries don't pull stunts like that.
You reckon they haven't tried talking, negotiations – EU talks, NATO talks. This and that leader going to talk to Putin?
This entire article is a must read for an overview of the lead up to this war, written by an ex-NATO officer with insider knowledge. There was plenty of talking over the last 8 years. I posted this a few days ago but it's worth repeating. Adrian has linked to an interview with him further up the page.
… If we cared so much about peace and the Ukraine, why didn’t we encourage the Ukraine to respect the agreements it had signed and that the members of the Security Council had approved?
The Military Situation In The Ukraine (Part Two: The War)
…..In violation of the Minsk Agreements, the Ukraine was conducting air operations in Donbass using drones, including at least one strike against a fuel depot in Donetsk in October 2021. The American press noted this, but not the Europeans; and no one condemned these violations.
In February 2022, events were precipitated. On February 7, during his visit to Moscow, Emmanuel Macron reaffirmed to Vladimir Putin his commitment to the Minsk Agreements, a commitment he would repeat after his meeting with Volodymyr Zelensky the next day. But on February 11, in Berlin, after nine hours of work, the meeting of political advisors of the leaders of the “Normandy format” ended, without any concrete result: the Ukrainians still refused to apply the Minsk Agreements, apparently under pressure from the United States. Vladimir Putin noted that Macron had made empty promises and that the West was not ready to enforce the agreements, as it had been doing for eight years.
Ukrainian preparations in the contact zone continued. The Russian Parliament became alarmed; and on February 15 asked Vladimir Putin to recognize the independence of the Republics, which he refused to do …
Jacques Baud is a former colonel of the General Staff, ex-member of the Swiss strategic intelligence, specialist on Eastern countries. He was trained in the American and British intelligence services. He has served as Policy Chief for United Nations Peace Operations. As a UN expert on rule of law and security institutions, he designed and led the first multidimensional UN intelligence unit in the Sudan. He has worked for the African Union and was for 5 years responsible for the fight, at NATO, against the proliferation of small arms. He was involved in discussions with the highest Russian military and intelligence officials just after the fall of the USSR. Within NATO, he followed the 2014 Ukrainian crisis and later participated in programs to assist the Ukraine.
That was a massively long-winded nothing. Do you really think telling me about The Azov battalion and the Minsk agreements is news?
And all this trotting out of Russian grievance after 2014… GTFO.
Look at just the closing paragraph:
"At the same time, there were reports of sabotage in the Donbass. On 18 January, Donbass fighters intercepted saboteurs, who spoke Polish and were equipped with Western equipment and who were seeking to create chemical incidents in Gorlivka. They could have been CIA mercenaries, led or “advised” by Americans and composed of Ukrainian or European fighters, to carry out sabotage actions in the Donbass Republics.
Ahh, so the Polish speaking CIA mercenaries led or advised by America, who sought to create chemical incidents…
Another Swiss , Guy Mettan, founding member of the Geneva Press Club,ex President of the Geneva Red Cross, Swiss politician ,journalist.
The loss of Swiss neutrality and therefore loss of trust in its institutions.
By unconditionally backing Ukraine and Europe, we are putting the ICRC’s neutrality and impartiality at risk. The two are inseparable in the eyes of the world. And that is why the ICRC had to respond forcefully to Ukrainian attempts to sabotage its work when it was accused of doing business with the Russians, even though neutrality is at the heart of its mission.
This refers to the Ukrainians alleging that the Red Cross was helping the Russians to deport refugees far into the wastelands of Russia
According to your metrics of neutrality we can now discount any Ukraine/Russia analysts from US,UK, EU, Five eyes,currently participating in the Ukraine war
War is the failure of politics. And the rules are different.
In war we ask men like Scud (almost always the men) to put their lives directly on the line. And even if they do not die, they may well return very broken physically or in spirit. Your recycling of misinformation directly undermines and betrays this sacrifice. You make yourself the enemy.
And don't gaslight us with the 'I only want peace we must negotiate' line. Putin is the aggressor, and has rejected all attempts at diplomacy. That is not negotiation, it is a demand for surrender. It does the enemy's work for him.
You enjoy some margin for error here, some latitude because NZ is far away and not yet feeling the impact. But if you lived in Ukraine – or much of Europe right now – you might find your freedom of speech not so cheap. I would imagine for instance that your 'citizen journalist' hero Patrick Lancaster will never be able to set a free foot in Europe or the UK ever again.
This victim blaming gaslighting has gone on long enough. I understand it is in your nature to challenge the conventional narrative – but even this can go too far.
for Russia ,diplomacy since at least 2007 has met a brick wall.How much better it would have been for Ukraine if it had been encouraged to implement the Minsk accords 2 they signed up to in 2015.
Encouraged by the US to flout the accords, then openly declare there would be no implementation, then declare Crimea would be taken back by force,the build up on the LOC, the accelerated flood of weapons into Ukraine and if we are to believe documents on a computer in retaken territory by the DPR, the determination to take the Donbas by force, essentially signed an end to diplomacy.
Misinformation by the way is very subjective it seems
Reports of CW use in Mariupol that inflamed posters yesterday is not quite so slam dunk today it seems But the visceral reaction will remain
Some misinfo has been retracted, but the Russian tank driving over the civilian car in the streets of Kiev city for instance, was aired twice on our screens , several days apart as if it was totally factual .The first airing being dated within 2 days of the invasion, when Russian tanks were nowhere near Kiev city.This has still not been retracted here, though its been totally exposed as false on France 24
Another was the Ukrainian allegation that the Red Cross was in cahoots with Russia
“The ICRC has not been involved with any forced evacuation, forced transfers of civilians into Russia from Mariupol or any other Ukrainian city…The ICRC does not want to open an office in southern Russia to filter Ukrainians as many reports are alleging. So, that is absolutely false. We are not opening a refugee camp or any other type of camp,” said the spokesman for the ICRC.
Mariupol was one of the Donbas cities to rise up against the 2014 coup.Many residents are Russian speaking, ethnic Russians who have family and long connections in Russia.Common sense tells me their preference would be to evacuate to family in Russia.This is spun as "mass deportations"
Yes, I agree, Patrick Lancaster has got a big target on his back.You should watch some of his videos, you might be surprised .His interviewees don't always reinforce a pro russian viewpoint.They certainly show the misery of war.
And actually thank you for being so polite, even though I know how passionately you feel about this.
“In war we ask men like Scud (almost always the men) to put their lives directly on the line.”
No not ‘we’, not people like me, it’s people like you who tell men like Scud to go to war…and always have.
[FFS! This was a solid discussion thread until you parachuted in and ambushed it with your ‘that shoe doesn’t fit me!’ irrelevance. Stop your flaming BS of accusing others of being warmongers all the time when they’re having mature convo about war but happen to say something that doesn’t agree with you or is not to your liking. You add nothing, you derail, but that’s your way of cancelling them, isn’t it? How would you feel if I derailed you for a while? How would you cope reading those comments, stewing that you cannot comment here with the same old BS and you cannot target your usual suspects? One of these days it is going to happen and that day feels awfully close – Incognito]
As you make little to no sense anymore, and have become a unhinged warmonger, which I suspect was always bubbling just below the surface…..I am happy to oblige you in that request…have a nice war relaxing in your soft armchair in your warm safe house RedLogix.
OK, one final thing…It has been interesting to note that as your lust for war has increased your maturity level has decreased by almost equal amounts..of course this should be hardly surprising, when man allows his most base instincts control his emotions and actions, as yours so clearly has, the result has to be some sort of regression and devolution..also a bit sadly I think, very clearly on display.
Anyway unless you want the last word..from me it’s a final cheerio to you….I will now, as you so delicately put it… “fuck off”
McCarthyism re-emerging stronger than ever in Ukraine policy debates
The stakes are far too high to stand by while practitioners of the new McCarthyism again silence dissent. Advocating a policy of caution and restraint does not imply the slightest sympathy for Vladimir Putin or his war of aggression, and we must not allow reckless, unprincipled hawks to get away with asserting that it does.
No blacklists ( Actually the major tool of the process)
Part of that may be because the spectre of Stalinist communism has receded – contemporary Putin supporters are not idealogues, just ignorant folk who unaccountably sympathize with murderous assholes.
Its a typical attitude at his corporate altitude. How many decades has Public transport operated continuously with a fiscal subsidy now anyway? Of course the return on that is the lower demands on the road network and energy.
I think this clearly explains how Luxon intends to try to run the country fiscally, e.g ideally with both public and private sectors reporting profits, as if this is their primary purpose.
I'm surprised Hosking had to ask Mitchell and Woods what the OCR was. I thought he knew everything. Since he was so keen to know you'd have thought he'd gone on line and checked on there.
Richard Prebble: Inflation nation – debunking reckless Government spending, delusions of ministers
The Herald is currently promoting this as a story – a column by Prebble. This is deliberate misinformation by a MSM outlet. F'in neo-liberal hypocrites.
Inflation at the moment is coming from pandemic global supply disruption, related worker shortages (isolation with omicron spread and border controls) and some because of asset wealth from QE stimulus.
Prebble is promoting the myth its because of government spending to promote tax cuts to reduce funding to government.
The OCR decision is coming up. The best approach from the RBG is to provide certainty to business – such as 4 increases of .25 to 2% by the end of the year (1.5 by June, 1.75 by September).
Having a preconceived plan for changes to interest rates is of no value. If the RBNZ detects the bottom falling out of the economy they will put rates back down (as they did in 2014).
Sure, but a 0.5 increase will have a serious impact on renewal of mortgages before then. Which is why a smaller increase and signal to the market of a further increase is a valid alternative.
The RBNZ has already signaled OCR price increases for the year,(markets have already priced in 1.25%)
The also signaled that there was a preference for a .5 change at the last meeting (which dissipated under Omicron,as the Nov change that did not happen under delta)
A .5 change would remove any doubt to the Housing market,that the holiday is over.
The US came into day with 8.5% headline inflation,and US markets have priced in 9 increases for the rest of the year,Germany over 7 (with wholesale rates over 22%) so they have large increases to come.
We still have increases into the energy market to come,with electricity distribution yet to enter,increases in road user charges (after the discount period),increased fuel charges due to the biofuel mandate (these will be a lot larger the estimated)
Members noted that annual consumer price inflation is expected to peak around 7 percent in the first half of 2022. The risk of more persistent high inflation expectations has increased. The Committee agreed that their policy ‘path of least regret’ is to increase the OCR by more now, rather than later, to head off rising inflation expectations and minimise any unnecessary volatility in output, interest rates, and the exchange rate in the future. The Committee agreed to a 50 basis point rise in the OCR, consistent with this least regrets analysis.
Strange goings on at the moment in and around Belgorod in Russia, near the border of Ukraine. Also, a Russian staging ground for its assault on Ukraine.
So please tell me what the advantage for Russia is in these false flag attacks?
A false flag attack, like Tonkin Bay and the anthrax attacks are useful to provide a casus belli.Doesn't apply here. Or in the case of say Ukraine, to bring in more arms, no fly zone, money.Doesn't apply here.
Russia is at war , militarily and economically, already.So I fail to see why Russia would do this
Zelensky suggested in an interview that the oil depot was a legitimate military target.
Ukraine has asserted that the Belgorod attack was by a third party.
As a state a false flag attack isn't obviously beneficial. But states may not be the only players. Imagine an oligarch who sold a large amount of fuel offshore, and also to the Russian state. He might be in considerable trouble – until his inventory goes up in smoke and with it the ability to prove what he'd been up to.
Also hope we get a few months of relative normalcy before the new variant shows up here. I was puzzled that masks are no longer necessary in schools but perhaps young immune systems regenerate faster is the explanation…
With regard schools, after tomorrow there's 2 weeks holiday and maybe the thinking is that the downward trend will continue and when our tamariki go back there's less of a threat. The decision will be up to schools I would imagine.
Not just schools. Otago uni sent an email around today basically removing all mandates – vaccine & mask, except where required as a legal minimum.
I'm so amazingly pissed – they added some bullshit about providing support yadda yadda to folks who didn't feel safe with that. Nothing short of a mandate will support them. We have old folks & vulnerable folks of all flavours. Apparently they can all go fuck themselves.
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NewstalkZB host Mike Hosking, who can usually be relied on to give Prime Minister Christopher Luxon an easy run, did not do so yesterday when he interviewed him about the HealthNZ deficit. Luxon is trying to use a deficit reported last year by HealthNZ as yet another example of the ...
Back in January a StatsNZ employee gave a speech at Rātana on behalf of tangata whenua in which he insulted and criticised the government. The speech clearly violated the principle of a neutral public service, and StatsNZ started an investigation. Part of that was getting an external consultant to examine ...
Renting for life: Shared ownership initiatives are unlikely to slow the slide in home ownership by much. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:A Deloittereport for Westpac has projected Aotearoa’s home-ownership rate will ...
You're broken down and tiredOf living life on a merry go roundAnd you can't find the fighterBut I see it in you so we gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsWe gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsAnd I'll rise upI'll rise like the dayI'll rise upI'll rise unafraidI'll rise upAnd I'll ...
There’s been a change in Myers Park. Down the steps from St. Kevin’s Arcade, past the grassy slopes, the children’s playground, the benches and that goat statue, there has been a transformation. The underpass for Mayoral Drive has gone from a barren, grey, concrete tunnel, to a place that thrums ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections Global society may have finally slammed on the brakes for climate-warming pollution released by human fossil fuel combustion. According to the Carbon Monitor Project, the total global climate pollution released between February and May 2024 declined slightly from the amount released during the same ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Tuesday, July 23 are:Deep Dive: Penlink: where tolling rhetoric meets reality BusinessDesk-$$$’sOliver LewisScoop:Te Pūkenga plans for regional polytechs leak out ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Tuesday, July 23, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Health: Shane Reti announcedthe Board of Te Whatu Ora-Health New Zealand was being replaced with Commissioner Lester Levy ...
Health NZ warned the Government at the end of March that it was running over Budget. But the reasons it gave were very different to those offered by the Prime Minister yesterday. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon blamed the “botched merger” of the 20 District Health Boards (DHBs) to create Health ...
Long ReadKey Summary: Although National increased the health budget by $1.4 billion in May, they used an old funding model to project health system costs, and never bothered to update their pre-election numbers. They were told during the Health Select Committees earlier in the year their budget amount was deficient, ...
As a momentous, historic weekend in US politics unfolded, analysts and commentators grasped for precedents and comparisons to help explain the significance and power of the choice Joe Biden had made. The 46th president had swept the Democratic party’s primaries but just over 100 days from the election had chosen ...
TL;DR: I’m casting around for new ideas and ways of thinking about Aotearoa’s political economy to find a few solutions to our cascading and self-reinforcing housing, poverty and climate crises.Associate Professor runs an online masters degree in the economics of sustainability at Torrens University in Australia and is organising ...
The Finance and Expenditure Committee has reported back on National's Local Government (Water Services Preliminary Arrangements) Bill. The bill sets up water for privatisation, and was introduced under urgency, then rammed through select committee with no time even for local councils to make a proper submission. Naturally, national's select committee ...
Some years ago, I bought a book at Dunedin’s Regent Booksale for $1.50. As one does. Vandrad the Viking (1898), by J. Storer Clouston, is an obscure book these days – I cannot find a proper online review – but soon it was sitting on my shelf, gathering dust alongside ...
History is not on the side of the centre-left, when Democratic presidents fall behind in the polls and choose not to run for re-election. On both previous occasions in the past 75 years (Harry Truman in 1952, Lyndon Johnson in 1968) the Democrats proceeded to then lose the White House ...
This is a free articleCoverageThis morning, US President Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the Presidential race. And that is genuinely newsworthy. Thanks for your service, President Biden, and all the best to you and yours.However, the media in New Zealand, particularly the 1News nightly bulletin, has been breathlessly covering ...
A homeless person’s camp beside a blocked-off slipped damage walkway in Freeman’s Bay: we are chasing our tail on our worsening and inter-related housing, poverty and climate crises. Photo: Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy ...
What has happened to it all?Crazy, some'd sayWhere is the life that I recognise?(Gone away)But I won't cry for yesterdayThere's an ordinary worldSomehow I have to findAnd as I try to make my wayTo the ordinary worldYesterday morning began as many others - what to write about today? I began ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Monday, July 22 are:Today’s Must Read: Father and son live in a tent, and have done for four years, in a million ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Monday, July 22, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:US President Joe Biden announced via X this morning he would not stand for a second term.Multinational professional services firm ...
A listing of 32 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, July 14, 2024 thru Sat, July 20, 2024. Story of the week As reflected by preponderance of coverage, our Story of the Week is Project 2025. Until now traveling ...
This weekend, a friend pointed out someone who said they’d like to read my posts, but didn’t want to pay. And my first reaction was sympathy.I’ve already told folks that if they can’t comfortably subscribe, and would like to read, I’d be happy to offer free subscriptions. I don’t want ...
National: The Party of ‘Law and Order’ IntroductionThis weekend, the Government formally kicked off one of their flagship policy programs: a military style boot camp that New Zealand has experimented with over the past 50 years. Cartoon credit: Guy BodyIt’s very popular with the National Party’s Law and Orderimage, ...
Day one of the solo leg of my long journey home begins with my favourite sound: footfalls in an empty street. 5.00 am and it’s already light and already too warm, almost.If I can make the train that leaves Budapest later this hour I could be in Belgrade by nightfall; ...
Do you remember Y2K, the threat that hung over humanity in the closing days of the twentieth century? Horror scenarios of planes falling from the sky, electronic payments failing and ATMs refusing to dispense cash. As for your VCR following instructions and recording your favourite show - forget about it.All ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
Waiting In The Wings:For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSAannounced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent talking about the National-ACT-NZ First Government’s release of its first Emissions Reduction Plan;University of Otago Foreign Relations Professor and special guest Dr Karin von ...
Open access notablesImproving global temperature datasets to better account for non-uniform warming, Calvert, Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society:To better account for spatial non-uniform trends in warming, a new GITD [global instrumental temperature dataset] was created that used maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) to combine the land surface ...
A late change to charter school legislation will cheat educators out of fair pay and negotiating power proving charter schools are just a vehicle to make profit out of our education system. ...
In 2004 te iwi Māori rallied against the Crown’s attempt to confiscate our coastlines and moana with the Foreshore and Seabed Act. This led to the largest hīkoi of a generation and the birth of Te Pāti Māori. 20 years later, history is repeating itself. Today the government has announced ...
It has been five and a half years since the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care was established to investigate the abuse of children, young people, and vulnerable adults within state and faith-based institutions. Yesterday, the final report - Whanaketia through pain and trauma, from darkness to light ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to take action off the back of the International Court of Justice ruling on Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. ...
On Friday the International Court of Justice reaffirmed what Palestinian’s have been telling us for decades: that the occupation and colonisation of Palestinian lands by Israel is illegal and must end immediately. They also called for reparations for Palestinian’s who have lived under Israeli occupation since it began in 1967. ...
Labour calls on the Government to act after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories is illegal. ...
The 53.7 percent rise in benefit sanctions over the last year is more proof of this Government’s disdain for our communities most in need of support. ...
Aotearoa could be a country where every child grows up feeling safe, loved and with a sense of belonging in their whānau and community. But for some of our children, this is far from reality. Instead, they are trapped in a maze of intergenerational harm that they can’t escape on ...
Te Pāti Māori are calling for David Seymour to resign as Associate Health Minister in response to his call for Pharmac to ignore the Treaty of Waitangi. “This announcement is just another example of the government’s anti-Tiriti, anti-Māori agenda.” Said Co-leader and spokesperson for health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. “Seymour thinks it ...
The soaring price of renting is driving the rise of inflation in this country - with latest figures from Stats NZ showing rents are up 4.8 per cent on average while annual inflation is at 3.3 per cent. ...
National’s Emissions Reduction Plan will take New Zealand further from the economy we need to ensure the next generation has a stable climate and secure livelihoods. ...
Following consultation with named parties and thorough consideration of privacy interests, the Green Party is in a position to release the Executive Summary of the final report from the independent investigation into Darleen Tana. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon should be asking serious questions of his Minister for Resources Shane Jones now it’s been revealed he misled the public about a dinner with mining companies that he didn’t declare and said wasn’t pre-arranged. ...
Te Pāti Māori have submitted to the Justice Select Committee against the Sentencing (Reinstating Three Strikes) Amendment Bill. The bill will further entrench racism in our justice system and fails to focus on rehabilitation. “Reinstating Three Strikes will empower a systematically racist system and exacerbate the overrepresentation of Māori in ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee is set to make a determination on the Residential Tenancies Amendment (RTA) Bill in the coming weeks. “This legislation will give landlords the power to kick our whānau out onto the street for no reason” said Housing spokesperson, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “Their solution to the housing ...
“National’s campaign was about tackling crime and the best they can do is a two-year long Ministerial Advisory Group,” Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
“There are more examples of charter schools failing their students than there are success stories. The coalition Government is driving to dismantle our public school system and instead promote a privatised, competitive structure that puts profits before kids,” Jan Tinetti said. ...
“This government is choosing to deliberately mislead and withhold information, keeping our people in the dark about this government’s agenda and the future of our mokopuna,” said co-leader and spokesperson for Health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. The call comes after the demand from the Chief Ombudsman that Associate Minister of Health, Casey ...
“Today’s climate announcement by Simon Watts makes clear the National Government is simply paying lip service to meeting its climate change targets,” Megan Woods said. ...
National is choosing to make life harder for workers by taking away the rights our communities have fought hard for. Here's how they’re taking workers backwards. ...
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue. We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views. “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
Tēnā tātou katoa, Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts. “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet. “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks. “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. At the heart of this report are the ...
For the first time, the Government is formally acknowledging some children and young people at Lake Alice Psychiatric Hospital experienced torture. The final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament ...
The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 courageous survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care. The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through ...
With a week to go before hard-working New Zealanders see personal income tax relief for the first time in fourteen years, 513,000 people have used the Budget tax calculator to see how much they will benefit, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “Tax relief is long overdue. From next Wednesday, personal income ...
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden says a bill that has passed its first reading will improve parental leave settings and give non-biological parents more flexibility as primary carer for their child. The Regulatory Systems Amendment Bill (No3), passed its first reading this morning. “It includes a change ...
Two Bills designed to improve regulation and make it easier to do business have passed their first reading in Parliament, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. The Regulatory Systems (Economic Development) Amendment Bill and Regulatory Systems (Immigration and Workforce) Amendment Bill make key changes to legislation administered by the Ministry ...
New legislation paves the way for greater competition in sectors such as banking and electricity, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly says. “Competitive markets boost productivity, create employment opportunities and lift living standards. To support competition, we need good quality regulation but, unfortunately, a recent OECD report ranked New ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says lotteries for charitable purposes, such as those run by the Heart Foundation, Coastguard NZ, and local hospices, will soon be allowed to operate online permanently. “Under current laws, these fundraising lotteries are only allowed to operate online until October 2024, after which ...
The Coalition Government is accelerating work on the new four-lane expressway between Auckland and Whangārei as part of its Roads of National Significance programme, with an accelerated delivery model to deliver this project faster and more efficiently, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “For too long, the lack of resilient transport connections ...
Sir Don McKinnon will travel to Viet Nam this week as a Special Envoy of the Government, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “It is important that the Government give due recognition to the significant contributions that General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong made to New Zealand-Viet Nam relations,” Mr ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says newly appointed Commissioner, Grant Illingworth KC, will help deliver the report for the first phase of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into COVID-19 Lessons, due on 28 November 2024. “I am pleased to announce that Mr Illingworth will commence his appointment as ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters travels to Laos this week to participate in a series of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-led Ministerial meetings in Vientiane. “ASEAN plays an important role in supporting a peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” Mr Peters says. “This will be our third visit to ...
Construction of a new mental health facility at Te Nikau Grey Hospital in Greymouth is today one step closer, Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey says. “This $27 million facility shows this Government is delivering on its promise to boost mental health care and improve front line services,” Mr Doocey says. ...
New Zealand is committing nearly $50 million to a package supporting sustainable Pacific fisheries development over the next four years, Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones announced today. “This support consisting of a range of initiatives demonstrates New Zealand’s commitment to assisting our Pacific partners ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour says proposed changes to the Education and Training Amendment Bill will ensure charter schools have more flexibility to negotiate employment agreements and are equipped with the right teaching resources. “Cabinet has agreed to progress an amendment which means unions will not be able to initiate ...
In response to serious concerns around oversight, overspend and a significant deterioration in financial outlook, the Board of Health New Zealand will be replaced with a Commissioner, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti announced today. “The previous government’s botched health reforms have created significant financial challenges at Health NZ that, without ...
Minister for Space and Science, Innovation and Technology Judith Collins will travel to Adelaide tomorrow for space and science engagements, including speaking at the Australian Space Forum. While there she will also have meetings and visits with a focus on space, biotechnology and innovation. “New Zealand has a thriving space ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts will travel to China on Saturday to attend the Ministerial on Climate Action meeting held in Wuhan. “Attending the Ministerial on Climate Action is an opportunity to advocate for New Zealand climate priorities and engage with our key partners on climate action,” Mr Watts says. ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is travelling to the Solomon Islands tomorrow for meetings with his counterparts from around the Pacific supporting collective management of the region’s fisheries. The 23rd Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Committee and the 5th Regional Fisheries Ministers’ Meeting in Honiara from 23 to 26 July ...
The Government today launched the Military Style Academy Pilot at Te Au rere a te Tonga Youth Justice residence in Palmerston North, an important part of the Government’s plan to crackdown on youth crime and getting youth offenders back on track, Minister for Children, Karen Chhour said today. “On the ...
The Government has welcomed news the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has begun work to replace nine priority bridges across the country to ensure our state highway network remains resilient, reliable, and efficient for road users, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says.“Increasing productivity and economic growth is a key priority for the ...
Acting Prime Minister David Seymour has been in contact throughout the evening with senior officials who have coordinated a whole of government response to the global IT outage and can provide an update. The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has designated the National Emergency Management Agency as the ...
New Zealand and Japan will continue to step up their shared engagement with the Pacific, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “New Zealand and Japan have a strong, shared interest in a free, open and stable Pacific Islands region,” Mr Peters says. “We are pleased to be finding more ways ...
New developments in the heart of North Island forestry country will reinvigorate their communities and boost economic development, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones visited Kaingaroa and Kawerau in Bay of Plenty today to open a landmark community centre in the former and a new connecting road in ...
President Adeang, fellow Ministers, honourable Diet Member Horii, Ambassadors, distinguished guests. Minasama, konnichiwa, and good afternoon, everyone. Distinguished guests, it’s a pleasure to be here with you today to talk about New Zealand’s foreign policy reset, the reasons for it, the values that underpin it, and how it ...
Last summer when Matairangi burned, Ginny and Tom stood at the window of their lounge, watching kākā shoot skyward from the burning trees. From the distance, they looked to Ginny like pages torn from books and thrown into a bonfire. It was Tom, voice tight, who told her it was ...
Opinion: The Canadian short story writer Alice Munro – winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013 – died in May at the age of 92. Her work was about “the damage people inflict on one another in the name of love”, Deborah Treisman wrote in the New Yorker. ...
This month marks two years since the most powerful telescope ever built sent its first pictures back to earth. From its lofty vantage point, beyond the moon in orbit around the sun, the James Webb Space Telescope was tuned to observe the first stars and galaxies being born soon after ...
Comment: After Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ preview several weeks ago, I had some optimism about the Government’s emissions reduction plan. Now I’ve read the discussion document, that hope has been dashed. How can the Government propose a plan that wants to take New Zealand taxpayers’ hard-earned money, and spend ...
Christopher Luxon: hurdles The little man from National jumps hurdles in his sleep. He’s quite good at it in his dreams and even though the reality doesn’t quite match up you have to give him credit for getting up every morning and crashing into the very first hurdle of the ...
Comment: It was a good two hours into the conversation when Tyrone Marks raised the most basic of questions when I first spoke to him in 2017. “They didn’t explain the things they did to me. They never told me why. And they still haven’t. There’s no explanation for it. ...
Madeleine Chapman rounds out Death Week on The Spinoff with a final recommendation. You can read all of our Death Week coverage here. Nothing forces you to reflect on your life and relationships quite like proximity to death. For those whose nearest and dearest have died, there are reasonably obvious ...
Whitney Greene takes us through her life in television, including the TV character she’d like to plan a funeral for and her cow lung catastrophe on The Traitors NZ. “If the phone rings, I have to answer it,” Whitney Greene from The Traitors NZ warns as we begin our My ...
Maddie Ballard reviews the debut essay collection of Pōneke writer Flora Feltham.In ‘The Raw Material’, the longest essay in Flora Feltham’s dazzling debut collection, the author heads out for a run after hours of weaving and sees the world turn to textile. “Pounding along the Parade, I saw the ...
Andy Christiansen, one half of the experimental rock-pop duo TRiPS, shares the tunes inspiring the band’s perfect weekend and new release. “Good speakers, good food, good music, no distractions”: that’s all you need to enjoy the psychedelic stylings of TRiPS, a new band formed by Fly My Pretties’ Barnaby Weir ...
Celebrating our quadrennial opportunity to become experts in a bunch of sports we never normally watch.The games of the XXXIII Olympiad are upon us. Paris will host this year’s showcase of sporting and athletic prowess, which means some late-night and early-morning viewing for us in Aotearoa.But what sports ...
The photograph is striking and beautiful, but also disturbing – a reminder that my love for John was often entangled in shame.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.In the spring of 1980, in Dunedin, shortly before his death, someone took a photograph ...
Get to know Babushka, our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Babu’s humans, Jo and Isabel, for their support. Dog name: Babushka (Babu for short) Age: 2Breed: Border Collie X poodleIf rescued, ...
Pacific Media Watch A Lebanese photojournalist who was severely wounded during an Israeli air strike in south Lebanon carried the Olympic torch in Paris this week in honour of her peers who have been wounded and killed in the field — especially in Gaza and Lebanon. Christina Assi of Agence ...
The first report in a five-part web series focused on the 15th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women taking place in the Marshall Islands this week.SPECIAL REPORT:By Netani Rika in Majuro Women continue to fight for justice 70 years after the first nuclear tests by the United States caused ...
Christopher Luxon has joined with Australia and Canada's leaders in voicing support for US President Joe Biden's ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The 2022 election brought the “teal wave” into parliament. The next election will test whether teals, who occupy what were Liberal seats, and other independents can maintain their momentum. Joining us on the Podcast ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Musgrave, Senior lecturer in Pharmacology, University of Adelaide Pixavri/Shutterstock A major Federal Court class action has been dismissed this week after Justice Michael Lee ruled there was not enough evidence to prove the weedkiller Roundup causes cancer. Plaintiff Kelvin ...
In The Week in Politics: politicians have to decide what to do about child abuse, Health NZ is booked in for major surgery and Darleen Tana returns. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Corbould, Associate Professor, Contemporary Histories Research Group, Deakin University Mainstream media are surprisingly muted at the prospect of the world’s most powerful nation being led for the first time by a woman – specifically a woman of colour, Vice President Kamala ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Bennett, PhD Student, Associate Research Fellow, Deakin University Last week, a drone delivery company called Wing (owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet) started operating in Melbourne. Some 250,000 residents in parts of the city’s eastern suburbs can now order food from ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonathan Foo, Lecturer, Physiotherapy, Monash University pikselstock/Shutterstock In the next 40 years in Australia, it’s predicted the number of Australians aged 65 and over will more than double, while the number of people aged 85 and over will more than triple. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katrina Grant, Research Associate, Power Institute for Arts and Visual Culture, University of Sydney Jonas Åkerström’s 1790 work, Session of the Accademia dell’Arcadia on August 17 1788.Nationalmuseum/Cecilia Heisser Ever wondered whether you’d have a better chance at winning an Olympic gold ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexandra Jones, Program Lead, Food Governance, George Institute for Global Health wavebreakmedia/Shutterstock On Thursday, Australian and New Zealand food ministers at state, federal and national levels met to thrash out what’s next for health star ratings on packaged foods. Now, after ...
The Abuse in Care report found many Pacific survivors lost their connections to their culture and language, resulting in trauma that has been carried from generation to generation. ...
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The war on truth continues
Even if news sources were not blocked there is still the threat of a person or their family being harmed for speaking out.
War is so ugly for those who are caught up in it. The soldiers and cilvillians who are killed or severely injured. The loss of a home, job, education, no health care and food shortage or starvation. Fear of being tortured or raped or a hidden bomb being activated. Economic collapse and the sight of destroyed buildings and artillery being strewn.
Interesting new interview from Arron Mate' with acques Baud. Former intelligence officer with the Swiss Strategic Intelligence Service who has served in a number of senior security and advisory positions at NATO, the United Nations, and with the Swiss military.
"As the Russia-Ukraine war enters a new phase, former Swiss intelligence officer, senior United Nations official, and NATO advisor Jacques Baud analyzes the conflict and argues that the US and its allies are exploiting Ukraine in a longstanding campaign to bleed its Russian neighbor."
If Russia doesn't want to be bled white in the Ukraine it could simply stop invading it.
Thanks for your input…it was really insightful…It’s hard to understand why the Ukrainian negotiations teams haven’t scooped you up with such profound and multidimensional insights like that…go figure.
Well it is really that simple. Putin is a despot and a tyrant who decided his approval ratings could do with a boost, just like they got with his invasion of the Crimea, so a nice little week long war of aggression to seize the entire Ukraine was just the ticket.
Only that didn't work out (well he got the polling boost he was after) – the Ukrainians proved to be stubbornly unwilling to be purged and subjugated and lots of other people who happened to have lots of weapons were of a mind to agree with them. The fact that this is also bleeding a Fascist Russia white is a happy bonus.
So if Russia wants out, it can simply stop it’s invasion and pull out of the Ukraine. That’ll mean the end of Putin, but who would shed a tear for that bastard? He is happy to see tens of thousands die in this pointless war for no other reason than to save his own skin.
With negotiators like you, who needs enemies?….interesting how so many arm chair warriors seem so willing to fight an unwinnable war to the last Ukrainian…and bring us all to the edge of WW3 while they are at it…nutters one and all.
You seem to fail to grasp that this war is existential for the Ukraine. Defeat means the extinguishing of their identity, the erasure of their language and culture and the murder or imprisonment and/or exile of it's intelligensia and leadership class. They’ve been down that road before under Stalin and they don’t want it to happen again as long as they can fight and I fully support them in that desire.
They'll keep fighting because it literally is a case of dying on their feet facing the enemy is better than dying kneeling next to a mass grave with a bag over their head.
You are effectively telling to Ukrainians to surrender for their own good. You really are trying to gaslight them. Personally, if they say they are willing to fight to the last man rather than surrender I’ll take them at face value.
And besides, for the Ukraine winning is simply not losing. Everyday they hold out is a day closer to drawing NATO and USA into the fight, or at least getting the weapons they need to drive the Russians back. Zelensky knows this, which is why he spends every day trying to draw the Americans and NATO into the war.
Yes, Peter Zeihan is saying pretty much the same thing.
According to Zeihan, the biggest worry for NATO and the US is just how inept the Russian army has been in this conflict. And that it is very clear that any direct conflict between NATO and Russia would result in a rapid, humiliating defeat for Russia.
Therefore, the big fear is, that in such a conflict, the only other option to defeat for Russia would be to go nuclear.
According to Zeihan, Russia's aim, from a strategic standpoint isn't to stop at Ukraine. But if Russia gets its way, it would ideally take over Poland as well, to meet its strategic objective of creating buffer states at its weak points where previous invasions have occurred.
Therefore, the west would prefer to bleed Russia dry or have Ukraine defeat them outright in Ukraine so the feared direct confrontation with NATO doesn't have the opportunity to happen in the first place.
Peter Zeihan is well worth listening to, btw. At the time Crimea was annexed back in 2014, Zeihan predicted a full Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
He based his prediction on the falling birth rates in Russia. He reasoned that Russia needed to take this action by then. Otherwise, its decreasing population would mean it was soon going to be unable to draft sufficient soldiers for its purpose.
Russia would, by this time, probably be relieved by a dirty ceasefire that gave them the Donbas and Mariupol. It is not tenable for Ukraine however, who need their ports to export grain. And of course, the next invasion would be much easier than the current one. Ukraine has little option but to fight.
‘
Pick a side, Eh Adrian
Blood thirsty imperialist conflicts are going to break out.
You are only looking at the symptoms, not the causes, military experts do what they do discuss tactics and strategies for fighting wars.
https://news.usni.org/2022/03/27/carrier-uss-abraham-lincoln-uss-miguel-keith-operating-in-south-china-sea
To stop war we need to untangle the root cause of imperialist conflicts and war.
An economy that demands endless growth.
The same with stopping climate change.
"You are only looking at the symptoms, not the causes"..are you serious? nearly every thing I post about the war in the Ukraine is about the causes, about historical context…that is exactly what is lacking in all MSM coverage of this conflict…you would think this conflict started six weeks ago out of nowhere.
What you post Adrian is all about the superpower maneuvering leading up to war, and then you pick a side.
The fact is whatever the maneuvering of the West toward Russia, this was still a war of choice. And Russia is the aggressor.
You reckon they haven't tried talking, negotiations – EU talks, NATO talks. This and that leader going to talk to Putin?
The whole thing's a master plan? GTFO.
You reckon there's been no protests worldwide. No internal protests. No mass arrests.
I reckon your reckons are wildly biased. You simply can't see the monster destroying cities. Because some air brained principle shit that's all in your head.
So tell me what's your option out of this, because talking, so far, has utterly failed.
Putin is clearly a murderous hate filled egomaniacal paranoid delusional asshole. He could be making bank right now, the utter fuckwit. But he's chosen war crimes and genocide, he's cost tens of thousands of lives to 'make his point'. His point being, Ukraine were right to look for protection from that piece of shit.
We can clearly see the world stage, though you are convinced we've all worn our rosy tinted glasses.
Anyone who has established a track record of eliminating political opponents with radiation poisoning ought to be viewed as public enemy #1. Putin has three strikes on that record, so he's out already. However we do need to factor in why Russians selected him in the first place:
The world's seen plenty of idiots in power who played on circumstances to elevate themselves.
While historical context helps, Putin never was the answer to Russia's problems. Clearly. A history of mismanagement is also not a Russia-centric phenomenon. Blaming history is a weak game. The fascist loves historical grievance to hold as a picture in front of their current psychopathic behaviour.
Putin's not special he's another power drunk fuckwit who believes his own press. Met enough of them, anyone who think's their press is representative of them is a right plonker at best.
Will Putin last as President until 2024 and two 6 year terms after that?
Putin has a master plan otherwise he would not have extended the constitution in April 2021 to run as President for more than two terms and the terms were extended to 6 years each.
When this happened I thought his political ambitions were a warning.
Tenure of an autocrat usually depends on the power base. Random factors such as assassination & ill-health also apply though. As the historical context described by Kucher above suggests, Putin fills a need in the collective psyche of Russians. Therefore his base is extremely broad. Only someone in the Russian hierarchy who can play power games as well as he does can threaten him in that scenario.
There is no single contender to stand up to Putin. He is heavily guarded, he appears to be in good physical health and people would fear the internal intelligence service under his command.
Add to that a couple of other factors. He has likemindedness on his strategy with his second in command – I posted a detailed profile which demonstrated that conclusively a while back. Even more of a hawk than Putin, it showed, couple of years older if I recall correctly.
Usually how it works is betrayal by those somewhat younger in the second level of the power structure, who have developed a consensus that the top guys have lost the plot. A coup requires considerably teamwork and good luck to succeed though, and often is enabled by complacency of those who are confident they have total control. Putin's too shrewd to get that complacent, I suspect.
Like all complex systems though, stasis is vulnerable to tipping points. Military defeat would apply considerable pressure to the power structure. That's why success from his recent pivot is essential.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/apr/05/vladimir-putin-passes-law-that-may-keep-him-in-office-until-2036
The liberal politicians who had carried out those reforms were seen, at best, as populist losers, at worst, enemies of the people.
Also true of neoliberal Labour – Roger Douglas poisoned their voter well for a generation.
I tell you one thing, I had no idea how much the Finns and the Balts dislike the Russians until this war occurred. But they really, really don't like Russia.
I suppose they have a fair bit of bitter experience of what it is like living next door to a perennially despotic, reactionary and aggressively expansionist Russian state.
The Finns at least noticed Russia weaponizing refugees by feeding them through their border to the EU. Neutral or friendly countries don't pull stunts like that.
This entire article is a must read for an overview of the lead up to this war, written by an ex-NATO officer with insider knowledge. There was plenty of talking over the last 8 years. I posted this a few days ago but it's worth repeating. Adrian has linked to an interview with him further up the page.
The Military Situation In The Ukraine (Part Two: The War)
https://www.thepostil.com/the-military-situation-in-the-ukraine/
That was a massively long-winded nothing. Do you really think telling me about The Azov battalion and the Minsk agreements is news?
And all this trotting out of Russian grievance after 2014… GTFO.
Look at just the closing paragraph:
"At the same time, there were reports of sabotage in the Donbass. On 18 January, Donbass fighters intercepted saboteurs, who spoke Polish and were equipped with Western equipment and who were seeking to create chemical incidents in Gorlivka. They could have been CIA mercenaries, led or “advised” by Americans and composed of Ukrainian or European fighters, to carry out sabotage actions in the Donbass Republics.
Ahh, so the Polish speaking CIA mercenaries led or advised by America, who sought to create chemical incidents…
No really, GTFO.
Another Swiss , Guy Mettan, founding member of the Geneva Press Club,ex President of the Geneva Red Cross, Swiss politician ,journalist.
The loss of Swiss neutrality and therefore loss of trust in its institutions.
This refers to the Ukrainians alleging that the Red Cross was helping the Russians to deport refugees far into the wastelands of Russia
https://www.schweizer-standpunkt.ch/news-detailansicht-en-international/zelenskymania-and-switzerland-s-ruined-image.html
Yup, dude's neutral.
/
Russian citizenship was granted to Mettan by Yeltsin administration.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Mettan
Currently residing in Geneva
According to your metrics of neutrality we can now discount any Ukraine/Russia analysts from US,UK, EU, Five eyes,currently participating in the Ukraine war
@Francesca
War is the failure of politics. And the rules are different.
In war we ask men like Scud (almost always the men) to put their lives directly on the line. And even if they do not die, they may well return very broken physically or in spirit. Your recycling of misinformation directly undermines and betrays this sacrifice. You make yourself the enemy.
And don't gaslight us with the 'I only want peace we must negotiate' line. Putin is the aggressor, and has rejected all attempts at diplomacy. That is not negotiation, it is a demand for surrender. It does the enemy's work for him.
You enjoy some margin for error here, some latitude because NZ is far away and not yet feeling the impact. But if you lived in Ukraine – or much of Europe right now – you might find your freedom of speech not so cheap. I would imagine for instance that your 'citizen journalist' hero Patrick Lancaster will never be able to set a free foot in Europe or the UK ever again.
This victim blaming gaslighting has gone on long enough. I understand it is in your nature to challenge the conventional narrative – but even this can go too far.
War is the failure of politics
Yes and the impact is devastating.
Sorry Red,
for Russia ,diplomacy since at least 2007 has met a brick wall.How much better it would have been for Ukraine if it had been encouraged to implement the Minsk accords 2 they signed up to in 2015.
Encouraged by the US to flout the accords, then openly declare there would be no implementation, then declare Crimea would be taken back by force,the build up on the LOC, the accelerated flood of weapons into Ukraine and if we are to believe documents on a computer in retaken territory by the DPR, the determination to take the Donbas by force, essentially signed an end to diplomacy.
Misinformation by the way is very subjective it seems
Reports of CW use in Mariupol that inflamed posters yesterday is not quite so slam dunk today it seems But the visceral reaction will remain
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/12/did-russia-really-use-chemical-weapons-mariupol-ukraine-expert-remain-sceptical
Some misinfo has been retracted, but the Russian tank driving over the civilian car in the streets of Kiev city for instance, was aired twice on our screens , several days apart as if it was totally factual .The first airing being dated within 2 days of the invasion, when Russian tanks were nowhere near Kiev city.This has still not been retracted here, though its been totally exposed as false on France 24
Another was the Ukrainian allegation that the Red Cross was in cahoots with Russia
https://www.voanews.com/a/disinformation-campaign-targeting-icrc-in-ukraine-harmful-to-conflict-victims/6506312.html
Mariupol was one of the Donbas cities to rise up against the 2014 coup.Many residents are Russian speaking, ethnic Russians who have family and long connections in Russia.Common sense tells me their preference would be to evacuate to family in Russia.This is spun as "mass deportations"
Yes, I agree, Patrick Lancaster has got a big target on his back.You should watch some of his videos, you might be surprised .His interviewees don't always reinforce a pro russian viewpoint.They certainly show the misery of war.
And actually thank you for being so polite, even though I know how passionately you feel about this.
Maybe you are a diplomat after all Red!!
“In war we ask men like Scud (almost always the men) to put their lives directly on the line.”
No not ‘we’, not people like me, it’s people like you who tell men like Scud to go to war…and always have.
[FFS! This was a solid discussion thread until you parachuted in and ambushed it with your ‘that shoe doesn’t fit me!’ irrelevance. Stop your flaming BS of accusing others of being warmongers all the time when they’re having mature convo about war but happen to say something that doesn’t agree with you or is not to your liking. You add nothing, you derail, but that’s your way of cancelling them, isn’t it? How would you feel if I derailed you for a while? How would you cope reading those comments, stewing that you cannot comment here with the same old BS and you cannot target your usual suspects? One of these days it is going to happen and that day feels awfully close – Incognito]
Fuck off
As you make little to no sense anymore, and have become a unhinged warmonger, which I suspect was always bubbling just below the surface…..I am happy to oblige you in that request…have a nice war relaxing in your soft armchair in your warm safe house RedLogix.
Diddums.
OK, one final thing…It has been interesting to note that as your lust for war has increased your maturity level has decreased by almost equal amounts..of course this should be hardly surprising, when man allows his most base instincts control his emotions and actions, as yours so clearly has, the result has to be some sort of regression and devolution..also a bit sadly I think, very clearly on display.
Anyway unless you want the last word..from me it’s a final cheerio to you….I will now, as you so delicately put it… “fuck off”
Pathetic, Red.
Mod note
https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2022/04/11/mccarthyism-re-emerging-stronger-than-ever-in-ukraine-policy-debates/
McCarthyism re-emerging stronger than ever in Ukraine policy debates
Orly? McCarthy destroyed careers – all the Putin Dupes are getting is the occasional mild rebuke.
No dead (Rosenbergs)
None imprisoned (150 under McCarthyism)
No blacklists ( Actually the major tool of the process)
Part of that may be because the spectre of Stalinist communism has receded – contemporary Putin supporters are not idealogues, just ignorant folk who unaccountably sympathize with murderous assholes.
”Public transport ultimately 'can't be subsidised or underwritten' – Christopher Luxon.”
headline on RNZ this morning
This from someone whose only claim to fame was to run a totally underwritten and publicly subsidised business.
Its a typical attitude at his corporate altitude. How many decades has Public transport operated continuously with a fiscal subsidy now anyway? Of course the return on that is the lower demands on the road network and energy.
I think this clearly explains how Luxon intends to try to run the country fiscally, e.g ideally with both public and private sectors reporting profits, as if this is their primary purpose.
Clearly he cant even discern the nonsense coming out his mouth. A smiling mouthpiece but I have not detected a very big brain, not once.
I am beginning to worry Luxon is a bit thick.
Sanc-I think he should avoid head to head TV debates with Jacinda.![smiley smiley](https://cdn2.thestandard.org.nz/wp-content/plugins/ark-wysiwyg-comment-editor/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/regular_smile.png?x42494)
He can't cope with her in QT in parliament – she'll carve him into little bits in any head to head election debate!
Mark Mitchell and Megan Woods did not know the OCR or the unemployment rate today when asked by Hosking on Newstalk ZB.
These people are either wanting to run the country, or are already running the country and they do not know these basic economic measures.
That is frightening.
Here is a link to it that has only just become available on the NZ Herald. Wasn't there when I did the original comment.
Government minister unable to correctly quote official cash rate – NZ Herald
I'm surprised Hosking had to ask Mitchell and Woods what the OCR was. I thought he knew everything. Since he was so keen to know you'd have thought he'd gone on line and checked on there.
I see what you did there! Very amusing.
The Herald is currently promoting this as a story – a column by Prebble. This is deliberate misinformation by a MSM outlet. F'in neo-liberal hypocrites.
Inflation at the moment is coming from pandemic global supply disruption, related worker shortages (isolation with omicron spread and border controls) and some because of asset wealth from QE stimulus.
Prebble is promoting the myth its because of government spending to promote tax cuts to reduce funding to government.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/richard-prebble-inflation-nation-debunking-reckless-government-spending-delusions-of-ministers/6UNWT2HQ32MN3IJOVPLK5UHTNY/
Herald applies useful idiot theory to infotainment. Prebble puts up hand, "Hey, me!"
The OCR decision is coming up. The best approach from the RBG is to provide certainty to business – such as 4 increases of .25 to 2% by the end of the year (1.5 by June, 1.75 by September).
https://www.oneroof.co.nz/news/41238
The only question today is will it be a 0.25 increase or a 0.5 increase.
Either way, our mortgage rates will be increasing.
And someone needs to send a memo to Megan Woods after the decision so as housing minister she actually knows what the rate is!
The RBG moved it to 1.5%, so given 4 more reviews it could go way higher than 2% by the end of the year.
It will place some pressure on those on floating rates and those set to renew.
Having a preconceived plan for changes to interest rates is of no value. If the RBNZ detects the bottom falling out of the economy they will put rates back down (as they did in 2014).
Sure, but a 0.5 increase will have a serious impact on renewal of mortgages before then. Which is why a smaller increase and signal to the market of a further increase is a valid alternative.
The RBNZ has already signaled OCR price increases for the year,(markets have already priced in 1.25%)
The also signaled that there was a preference for a .5 change at the last meeting (which dissipated under Omicron,as the Nov change that did not happen under delta)
A .5 change would remove any doubt to the Housing market,that the holiday is over.
The US came into day with 8.5% headline inflation,and US markets have priced in 9 increases for the rest of the year,Germany over 7 (with wholesale rates over 22%) so they have large increases to come.
We still have increases into the energy market to come,with electricity distribution yet to enter,increases in road user charges (after the discount period),increased fuel charges due to the biofuel mandate (these will be a lot larger the estimated)
OCR increase by.5,War on inflation starts.
https://www.rbnz.govt.nz/news/2022/04/monetary-tightening-brought-forward
Least regrets consensus.
Clear signals for Fiscal policy constraints.
https://www.rbnz.govt.nz/news/2022/04/monetary-tightening-brought-forward
Strange goings on at the moment in and around Belgorod in Russia, near the border of Ukraine. Also, a Russian staging ground for its assault on Ukraine.
Firstly, an arms depot mysteriously exploded recently.
Then helicopters of unknown origin attacked a fuel depot in the area.
And now, a a key rail bridge for supplying the Russian war effort has somehow ended up as a twisted mess of rubbish.
It would probably be a good idea if the Russians stopped all these false-flag attacks on their own critical logistics.
So please tell me what the advantage for Russia is in these false flag attacks?
A false flag attack, like Tonkin Bay and the anthrax attacks are useful to provide a casus belli.Doesn't apply here. Or in the case of say Ukraine, to bring in more arms, no fly zone, money.Doesn't apply here.
Russia is at war , militarily and economically, already.So I fail to see why Russia would do this
Zelensky suggested in an interview that the oil depot was a legitimate military target.
I was being flippant. I didn't seriously believe the Russians would be doing this stuff themselves. I should have included a smiley face.
I don't think even the Russians are stupid enough to do be destroying their own logistics. They have been having enough trouble with that now.
Ukraine has asserted that the Belgorod attack was by a third party.
As a state a false flag attack isn't obviously beneficial. But states may not be the only players. Imagine an oligarch who sold a large amount of fuel offshore, and also to the Russian state. He might be in considerable trouble – until his inventory goes up in smoke and with it the ability to prove what he'd been up to.
Traffic light goes orange: https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/300565072/covid19-all-of-new-zealand-to-move-to-orange-traffic-light-setting
As all kiwi motorists know, that means speed up. Particularly in Auckland.
Yay! I won my orange chocolate egg bet![smiley smiley](https://cdn2.thestandard.org.nz/wp-content/plugins/ark-wysiwyg-comment-editor/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/regular_smile.png?x42494)
Hope it's a big one.![cheeky cheeky](https://cdn2.thestandard.org.nz/wp-content/plugins/ark-wysiwyg-comment-editor/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/tongue_smile.png?x42494)
Also hope we get a few months of relative normalcy before the new variant shows up here. I was puzzled that masks are no longer necessary in schools but perhaps young immune systems regenerate faster is the explanation…
With regard schools, after tomorrow there's 2 weeks holiday and maybe the thinking is that the downward trend will continue and when our tamariki go back there's less of a threat. The decision will be up to schools I would imagine.
Or it's maybe more difficult to control a class if you're constantly telling people to mask up, so either the rule gets ignored or you lose the rule?
Not an ideal public health policy on its own, but then that's why these things go through cabinet: the full range of considerations come in.
Fuck normalcy, though. Not yet.
Schools are always so keen to implement their own pathetic little rules. Other peoples rules not so much.
Not just schools. Otago uni sent an email around today basically removing all mandates – vaccine & mask, except where required as a legal minimum.
I'm so amazingly pissed – they added some bullshit about providing support yadda yadda to folks who didn't feel safe with that. Nothing short of a mandate will support them. We have old folks & vulnerable folks of all flavours. Apparently they can all go fuck themselves.