You strike me as a person who looks life’s challenges straight in the eye & lives life to the best & fullest extent possible.
80 years is a significant milestone for anyone & you thoroughly deserve to have got there. May you have many more birthdays & adventures to come.
You’ll no doubt be the star at your party & nosh up today. Wish I could be there to celebrate it with you.
If you post today what time lunch with all the trimmings is expected to be served up, I’ll raise a glass of kahlua & milk & drink a toast to your good health at Gezza’s Bird Café here at Pookden Manor.
Bless, The whole thing kicks off at lunch time. About 12.30. We always begin with a glass raised to absent family and friends, then it is food and music and drinks. We don't dance anymore but we used to do that as well . A good auld c'eilidh. Cheers Gezza You added to my day.
the difference between those two vaccines – the Pfizer vaccine will recode your DNA and turn you into a child-trafficking zombie controlled by Bill Gates whereas the AstraZeneca vaccine will also recode your DNA and turn you into a child-trafficking zombie, but you’ll be controlled by Jeff Bezos.
lol. At some point NZ will have to decide what to do with the people it is currently ridiculing. We might get lucky and they merge back into society. Or we might find they're a monster class by the time of the next election.
Remember when Hungary was censured for building fences to keep migrants and refugees out ?(to my mind they're all refugees, from climate crisis and war)
Now Uk soldiers are being sent to Poland's border .Not to help with processing asylum requests, or provide humanitarian help, but to help"strengthen the border" aka reinforcing fences
It is by no means the first time Putin's Russia has deployed migrants to destabilize peaceable European neighbours – though Boris's motives may well be as self-serving as a desperate shortage of truck drivers.
37 year old niece, who wouldn't get the vaccine because she didn't know what was in it. Diagnosed with covid, and isolating at home had to go into North Shore Hospital after developing breathing problems.
The good news; feels much better after being put on a drip.
No one who needs an IV, ever refuses it because they don't know what is in it.
I got put on one recently, after 6 failed attempts by nurses to get a working cannula into a vein, before a young surgeon finally succeeded & they could pump in the opioid I needed for excruciating abdominal pain. They sent me down to radiology forcan abdominal X-ray & put me on Nil By Mouth until the docs had seen the radiologist’s report.
I needed IV fluids for 12 hours. I didn’t ask what was in it.
A woman walks up to an elevator door, there's a man inside wearing a suit and looking normal. Her intuition says don't get in the elevator, her rational mind says it's the middle of the day, in a busy building, he looks fine, nothing is going to happen. What should she do?
👍🏼
I think that’s the right answer. There’s sometimes a debate about whether women are more intuitive than man. I think they are, when it comes to reading people or situations – for that very reason. They need to protect themselves from physically stronger, predatory men, & so many have highly developed instincts to that end.
On average women are more physically vulnerable than men in any number of ways. But this doesn't necessarily make them victims.
The other side of this equation is that men do most of the protecting and sacrificing for the women. This was a lot more obvious in the pre-industrial world because life then was so much more dangerous.
Looked at this way men evolved via sexual selection to be the somewhat more dangerous sex in order to be useful to women. There is however an inherent risk in having potentially hazardous things lying about the house 🙂
Last line – that’s about how my Friday caregiver described the fathers of her two adult children, except she used the term lazy bastards who saw me coming & noticed I had DOORMAT written all over me. She was a real character. Much prefers looking after herself & living without a man. She was visiting Israel in 1973 when the Arabs attacked.
Because some men are dangerous sexual predators. The thing is you can’t always tell who these bastards are, & and unfortunately neither can those of us men who love & honour women as God’s greatest ever invention, & would would happily castrate these animals if we could.
Because men in suits generally don't use the stairs, even if they can find them
Ha! Agree with the 'generally', but my partner does use the stairs – that's because he's a fitness freak – however, because he runs them noisily, in his suit, it's pretty clear he's no threat to anyone. He'd be appalled if he thought he was, and change his behaviour.
But you touch on a point about intuition. My thoughts are that intuition is not something outside of rationality. It's a sum of things you've learned through experience and stories and the weight you put on the contradictions in the things you've learned.
The difference with rationality is that its generally thought of as a weighing up of the odds in any given situation and choosing to do the action that is most likely to be safe (take the stairs – 99.99% of the time you're safe). Intuition (i.e. the weighing up of experience and stories) may lead to the opposite decision (avoid the stairs). Intuition in these cases is also self-reinforcing (you stayed safe by avoiding the man, therefore it was the right thing to do).
many different answers for many different reasons. (1) it is lunchtime ,so she should take the time and exercise by walking up the stairs. (2) who wants to share a small enclosed space with a normal suit wearer?so, she should let the elevator go, and wait for some interesting company.(3) its her ex-husband, and her intuition is that he;s going to try and borrow money. etc etc
Throughout COP 26, Resilience Frontiers has been challenging participants’ mindsets , aiming to promote a global paradigm shift towards resilience through eight novel pathways.
On Thursday, 11 November, participants considered the final pathway, which focused on developing transformative financial instruments.
Its goal was rethinking prosperity, growth, and value, and nurturing human wellbeing and the environment, while harnessing emerging technologies to transform financial networks and instruments.
The next session was chaired by Robert Filipp, Founder and President of Innovative Finance Foundation, with a panel featuring: Kim Stanley Robinson, Science Fiction Author; Elena Lopez-Gunn, Director of ICATALIST; Alex Gordon-Brander, CEO of Teratree; and Adam Rockefeller-Growald, Co-Founder of Teratree.
Although a cynic would dismiss this as mere leftist consciousness-raising, I get the sense that it does at least launch a geopolitical work in progress:
The final pathway sparked a dialogue on equity, collaboration, and how we value nature. Through group discussions, reflection exercises, and expert panel conversations, the Lab explored thoughts around a subconscious desire to co-exist with the biosphere in a respectful, regenerative, and resilient way.
At a reception celebrating the discussions held at the Lab at COP 26, Youssef Nassef, Founder of Resilience Frontiers, and Director of the Adaptation Division, UNFCCC Secretariat, thanked all participants who had engaged with the themes during the two weeks, welcoming them to the growing Resilience Frontiers community.
Admitted to the bar in 1990, Grey recently fought a losing battle with the High Court on behalf of four aviation security workers who refused to get vaccinated, despite a Government mandate. Her practising certificate was last renewed in July.
She frequently shares misinformation on her social media pages about COVID-19 and the Pfizer vaccine, such as falsely inflating the number of deaths linked to the vaccine, and calling the recent rollout of the vaccine to teenagers "Government-mandated genocide".
I suspect the relevant framing is creative interpretation. That's extremely traditional, of course! Hard-wired as part of the privilege system. The basic idea has always been that justice arrives as an incidental product of the competitive storytelling.
There is an artifice around the notion of fact, and precedence tends to be given to authoritative sources such as scientists & media (I'm not kidding) to establish fact.
I am guessing then, that the Law Society's deliberations may come down to a matter of integrity.
If it can be shown that she guarded her words in court knowing that they could be shown to be proven falsehoods by authoritative sources such as scientists & media. But then spread these falsehoods in public statements outside of court.
It could be evidence of a certain mens rea.
In her defence Sue Grey says that she was speaking as a politician not a lawyer.
Newshub has contacted Grey for a response. In a letter to the Law Society in her own defence, Stuff reports she made the ‘genocide’ comment “in my personal capacity as a political leader”, not a lawyer.
More arcane priesthood than cabal. Extremely important to protect the common interests of members (the principle of territoriality being the antique basis of that). Therefore rulings are normally protectionist.
So it will depend whether they see her as a wolf in sheep's clothing or not. Fear derives from audacious setting of precedents: such adventurism will be sure to come back and bite them in the future. Rationalists will adopt the stance ‘hey, she's one of us, the political clothing is irrelevant'. Protectionists will adopt the stance ‘yeah but the cowboy thing is a bad look, we must always wear suits, sorry – I meant cowgirl'.
Then there’s her `chinese walls in the mind’ rationale to consider. Dunno if there’s legal precedent around that.
she isn't a politician as far as I know. I wanna be but failed politician yes. Unless she is on a local body somewhere and then I guess a local body politician yes.
I do think that Sue Grey is a lawyer and person of high integrity and maybe we are lucky to have some one like her willing take on the contentious – especially the opposite views to that the government departments want to promulgate.
I have no doubt that there will be those out there wanting to cut her down at any opportunity because of her past achievements.
As with anyone who attempts to expose judicial corruption, furtive attempts by the judiciary have been made to discredit her. These have been only minimally effective due to her exemplary legal background, as well as her political savvy in keeping the focus on the negative commercial and economic effect such judicial corruption is having on her major wool producing client.
Dr David Collins QC (Solicitor General)
When allegations of Wilson J’s misconduct originally surfaced, Collins endeared himself to the judiciary by moving quickly to quash it. He orchestrated the firing of whistle-blower Sue Grey from her job at Department of Conservation, filed extensive legal submissions in support of Judge Wilson’s conduct and personally appeared in Court to show his support for Wilson in what was a civil case between two private parties.
My own granddaughter does not want to proceed on with her second vaccination because of what is online about young people and myocarditis in this links such as this.
does she just peddle misinformation on her Facebook and other platforms Janet?
If the story reported about her speculating a death from the pfizer vaccine before the person was vaccinated is correct. must be a pretty strong vaccine to do that.
On Jan. 6, violent insurrectionists erected a gallows, stormed the U.S. Capitol, and chanted “hang Mike Pence!” as they searched for him. Pence’s boss, former President Donald Trump, was totally fine with it.
That’s the revelation from an interview between ABC News correspondent Jonathan Karl and Trump, in which the former president defended the people who threatened the life of his vice president. A clip of the interview was released on Friday in advance of the publication of Karl’s book, “Betrayal: The Final Act of the Trump Show,” which comes out next week.
Typical leftist fake news. Trump didn't say anything to indicate he agreed that Pence ought to be hung. The biased reporter uses the `sin by omission' theory to frame Trump as supporting the rabble's call. Trump was clearly supporting the rabble, and just as clearly refraining from comment. Bullshit from Huffpost dude.
Wasn’t just the Trumpanzees pushing those sorts of “alternative facts”. The liberals / Dems were into it just as badly – twisting & bending events & statements to back up prejudices & false assertions.
Maybe you've been following the ignominious unravelling of the so-called "Steele Dossier". Four years of US liberal media calling Trump out as a Russian asset – based on complete bullshit.
It's reasons like this that if another election were held tomorrow, Trump would stand a decent shot at winning. That's pretty damned depressing really.
I consider that whole saga as finalising the decline of journalism, and the public trust in journalism to an unprecedented degree, even including the Iraq war lead up.
Trump winning the election prompted such outrage than any hack could utter any unverifiable crap as gospel , and as long as it was anti Trump it was endorsed and cheered and could build a career
It would go a long way if some media figures had the guts to say – "I was wrong – we fucked that up and we have to do some work to earn back your trust".
“Maybe you’ve been following the ignominious unravelling of the so-called “Steele Dossier”. Four years of US liberal media calling Trump out as a Russian asset – based on complete bullshit.”
……………………….
Yep. I loathe Trump – despicable, narcissistic, bullying lying individual in my eyes – so I didn’t want to know initially, but as it unravelled it was obvious it was both a completely fallacious AND an utterly farcical allegation.
“It’s reasons like this that if another election were held tomorrow, Trump would stand a decent shot at winning. That’s pretty damned depressing really.”
………………………….
The Dems have the same problem with Joe Biden as they did with Hillary Clinton. Both of them compromised candidates. Joe’s obviously well past his prime – when his prime was pretty patchy, to say the least.
Hard to see how Biden’s ongoing muddlesome gaffes & obvious frailty will stand up to a full-on Trump challenge. Harris, an unknown quantity. Cos Joe may be past his best, such as it ever was, but he’s a grumpy old stickler for getting top billing & doing all the (heavily scripted) talking.
The liberal media are likely going to have their work cut out for them trying present Joe as on top of things when he blunders.
Trump’s just as bad for blithering nonsense word salads, as well as spouting out dog whistling rhetoric, but audiences lap that up & don’t expect anything else from that charlatan.
It's a pathetic descent into echo-chamber Tribalism … the Clintonistas as bad as (and far more dominant within the US Establishment than) the Trumpards. Each side deploying their own crude conspiracy theories.
You bet! Trump would have exhibited sanctimony! "Unfortunately my folks got carried away by their enthusiasm. It was god's will that Pence became a martyr for the cause. His heart was in the right place even if his head wasn't."
Pence isn't a strong contender for the nomination next time but it's in Trump's interest to minimise any competitor. He's sending a carefully-nuanced signal to the right: disloyalty to the chief will be punished one way or another…
Technical point to you on that. Trump is forever doing a reframe of the narrative. Rabble chanting is so totally irrelevant to him that the interviewers point gets over-ridden and ignored automatically. He's always telling someone what to think! His irritation that the interviewer is waving a red herring at him gets displaced by the essentiality of having to impose his narrative.
He genuinely doesn't get the concern the interviewer is trying to project. Who cares what the rabble chant? Not him! His gobbledygook trying to explain common sense results from his internal imperative. Narcissism compels that.
Trump didn't condemn the crowd, he didn't back Pence. It's all about Trump really, the mob was doing what Trump wanted, Pence declined to do what Trump wanted. Pretty clear from Trump that it is all about himself, and his delusions and his blow arse self aggrandisement. A 'wasn't very much' wannabe who cannot accept reality of "trump, you're fired".
Actually no. I've worked with about a dozen in both Canada and Latin America. They were generally easy to get to know and good people to work with.
When the topic drifted onto politics – they'd usually concede or openly state that Trump was a flawed, troublesome personality. Or as one guy put it sorrowfully, "how the fuck did the US come down to a choice between these two shitheads?"
We've been over this political ground many times, but for me it comes down to a question of just how accountable are we going to be? Because if the left cannot manage an utter landslide win over someone so blatantly unsuitable as Trump – then exactly what claim to political competence do we have?
Voters need to understand the fundamental differences between liberalism and leftism. It’s the difference between a candidate who believes capitalism, with just a little refereeing, will eventually provide what working people need, versus a candidate who believes serious intervention in the capitalist economy is necessary.
He didn't have to run for the Democrats nomination under any rule. He could have done what Ross Perot did in 1992 and run for a third party. The problem he would have had was two-fold. He didn't have any source of a great deal of money and he didn't have an organisation to carry out the basic tasks like getting on the ballot in all the States. They are all different and the rules are really all there to make it nearly impossible for a third party to get started. For example, when Perot ran –
"In New York, ballot access appeared to be the most difficult to attain. In a five-week summer period, the campaign would be required to compile 20,000 signatures from non-primary voters, including 100 from each of half of the state's Congressional districts"
Perot managed it but it helped that he was a billionaire and was willing to spend enormous amounts of his own money on the campaign. That was when a billion dollars was worth something.
Sanders on the other hand simply didn't have any money or organisation to do such a thing. That meant he became a Democrat as long as he was in the campaign, simply because they had an organisation to do the donkey work, before going back to being an Independent when he dropped out of the campaign which is what he remains, as far as I know.
Sociologist Stephanie Mudge explored the terrain three years ago.
In Leftism Reinvented: Western Parties from Socialism to Neoliberalism, Mudge looks at left parties in advanced capitalist countries over the last century and shows how the experts aligned with those parties pushed them in the direction of spin doctors and markets. In the process, left parties’ ability to represent the interests of their own working-class constituencies was eroded — and ordinary people were shut out of the halls of power.
Political organizer and socialist activist Chase Burghgrave recently spoke with Mudge about her new book, the role of experts in democratic societies, and whether a more vibrant, egalitarian politics is possible.
The Democratic Party is trickier, because of its very different history. It has always been a mass party in a certain sense, but not a socialist or ideological one. I include it because, when the leading liberal or New Deal faction of the Democratic Party embraced Keynesianism around the time of the 1937 recession, it became somewhat comparable to social-democratic and labor parties. And, last but not least, in the 1990s the Democratic Party was a major exporter of “third way” politics to Europe and elsewhere. So that is why it needed to be part of the story.
She goes into why the left defaults to experts, then the future…
The short answer is that left politics needs experts who make spin unnecessary. Left politics should have intuitive appeal because it speaks to people’s real needs and concerns.
That said, I don’t think new experts will magically cure the ills of left politics. Nor is it my place to say who the next left party experts should be. I think that party experts can be anyone — and maybe, in the current moment, left parties should be dedicating their resources to playing the long game by radically broadening the profiles of the people we consider “experts.”
But I will say this: it is absolutely essential that left parties cultivate people’s ability to understand, and critically engage with, the structure and logic of contemporary financial capitalism. I think Alexis de Tocqueville once said that you have to “educate democracy.” I would give this a Marxian twist: you have to educate capitalist democracy. There can be no left politics without a shared understanding of today’s specific economic circumstances
Instead of the bipolar left-right model that's served as the default model for two hundred years, I'm suggesting it's more interesting to use three poles – conservative, liberal and socialist. Like all social models it's not meant to be perfect but I'm using it more and more these days.
I'd have a few quibbles with the details. Haidt is worth reading but that moral framework never struck me as compelling. Metaphysics always strikes me as a surer basis (principles, archetypes, models, assumptions & hypotheses). Although your scheme seems similar to the third way, it would be interesting to know if you see it as different, and how.
I mean, from a metaphysical perspective, triangulation is the common basis. So both have the merit of transcending the binary. I always saw the third way as fake – liberal capitalism and conservative capitalism are the same system. Blair's framing (from Giddens wasn't it?) was basically a pr sham to unhook Labour from socialism.
“The rise of “culture wars” has been incredibly important for the political atmosphere that we are now in. Quite simply it doesn’t lend itself to debate and discussion, or finding middle ground. Instead, it’s more polarising – it lends itself to the labelling of opponents as racists, sexists, or in the case of Hilary Clinton, talking about the masses as “deplorables”. So, there’s a strong strain of sneering from many on the left – especially against those that are seen as socially backward. The old slogan of: “The personal is political” now underpins the focus on how to fix the problems of the world.
good quote. I've been thinking lately that some of the language used to talk about the freedom protestors reminds me of Clinton's use of deplorables. Like we didn't learn anything from the time of Trump. Blows my mind.
i find this funny and interesting at the same time.
Largely it’s an elite top-down model of politics, reflective of the left being made up of the highly-educated stratum of society. They confidently believe that they know best.
later
And this is why it’s somewhat surprising that increasingly the left want either the state or society to put limits on political debate and expression.
lol, it must be hard to understand how someone who fought for the working class – proletariat and precariat' is now demanding no debate on issues that affect predominantly the proletariat and the precariat.
The turning point for me was Jonathan Haidt's ideas on Moral Foundations theory. All humans share a common suite of core moral drivers, but we place different weights on them. And this does seem to be closely linked to innate personality differences:
Researchers have found that people's sensitivities to the five/six moral foundations correlate with their political ideologies. Using the Moral Foundations Questionnaire, Haidt and Graham found that libertarians are most sensitive to the proposed Liberty foundation, liberals are most sensitive to the Care and Fairness foundations, while conservatives are equally sensitive to all five/six foundations.
According to Haidt, the differences have significant implications for political discourse and relations. Because members of two political camps are to a degree blind to one or more of the moral foundations of the others, they may perceive morally driven words or behavior as having another basis – at best self-interested, at worst evil, and thus demonize one another.
Haidt and Graham suggest a compromise can be found to allow liberals and conservatives to see eye-to-eye. They suggest that the five foundations can be used as "doorway" to allow liberals to step to the conservative side of the "wall" put up between these two political affiliations on major political issues (i.e. legalizing gay marriage). If liberals try to consider the latter three foundations in addition to the former two (therefore adopting all five foundations like conservatives for a brief amount of time) they could understand where the conservatives' viewpoints stem from and long-lasting political issues could finally be settled.
All too often we make the debate all about these moral weightings – which are fundamentally unresolvable at that level. If instead we accept that the people we perceive as our opponents are simply coming at an issue with a different set of priorities and interests – we're more likely to engage in a constructive negotiation.
And that's how all the great politicians got the results they’re remembered for, they understood their opponents and could make deals with them.
“All too often we make the debate all about these moral weightings – which are fundamentally unresolvable at that level. If instead we accept that the people we perceive as our opponents are simply coming at an issue with a different set of priorities and interests – we’re more likely to engage in a constructive negotiation.”
…………………………
That tends to be how I’ve always looked at issues. At various times in my life it’s seemed like a character flaw, because others with stronger egos & opinions made judgements & decisions (often, needed decisions) faster & with more conviction & certainty than I was comfortable with.
Then I began to notice how many of those decisions subsequently (sometimes a year or two later) turned to be bad ones, with negative blowback effects, from things that were bothering me as risks at the time I felt like a slow-minded fool for wanting more information or discussion.
I like people. I appear to be highly empathetic, at least at times. I seem to have the happy knack of easily getting people to talk to me and explain their viewpoint. Thereafter I find I can sometimes see the issue thru their eyes, from their perspective, as well as my own. I decided in the end that this isn’t a flaw, it’s an inbuilt talent, & I now employ it usefully whenever I can.
I can across this regarding people holding opposing political view but treated each other with respect (that IMO all are due) John Wayne and Mark Rydell.
"“He really wanted to do The Cowboys,” Rydell said. “He treated me with the most respect. I was like this (cringing) waiting for him to say something anti semitic or anti-Indian or anti-anything. I was ready to jump. But he taught me a lesson.
“I know a lot of people with whom I agree politically and otherwise who are jerks,” Rydell said. “And then you take someone like him who I disagreed with in almost every area, except art. And he was a terrific person. The first guy on the set, the last person to leave. The picture was full of kids. They climbed up on him like the monkey bars on a playground. He was available to everybody. We went out to dinner he would sign autographs for everybody. He never was unfair or unpleasant. It was a big lesson to me not to pre-judge.”
youtube 4:15 Mark Rydell director of The Cowboys,The Rose, On Golden Pond etc.
From a social science perspective, the question is if the theory can be validated via research. First, the stats basis would have to be robust in his home nation, then it would have to be replicated in the other western countries.
Since Liberalism morphed historically into separate beasts in the various countries that it invaded (as a meme) from Britain, I would expect the stats to render his thesis context-dependent only. Here, for example, liberalism has manifested only as a strand within the Alliance in the '90s plus economic ideology shared by Nat/Lab since the '80s, since our original Liberal Party died a century ago.
Just realised that there is something good about wearing a mask. Tromp around the supermarket, leave to go to the bike stand and then off with the mask. "Wow!." that first breath of fresh air is so great.
I am amazed by how good people are actually to be honest. I have a strikt no one enters the premise policy, plague door is mounted and all interaction is customer on one side and me on the other and everyone is very very understanding.
It allows me to trade without having to police people on vaccination status or mask wearing. And People are wearing their masks at about 95% rate. And if someone comes without one, i have spares to hand out and they are generally well accepted.
there are more of us doing the right things than not. That is always something we should keep in mind.
I agree, from what I have seen, with mask wearing. But jeez, wearing them indoors all day, thank you (I work on my own out doors mostly, so can slip it on & off).
i have been told by someone whom i trust on these issues tht mask wearing considerably reduces the risk of transmitting covid, as we keep our droplets to our self. And thus i am a great promoter of masks. Specifically indoors. I do tend to have one with me when out and about and will wear it when people are around. I feel naked now without one. Humans get used to this stuff fairly quickly i reckon.
Some useful information about another vaccine, Pandemrix. The following is from Peter Doshi, the associate editor of the BMJ (formerly the British Medical Journal):
In October 2009, the US National Institutes of Health infectious diseases chief, Anthony Fauci, appeared on YouTube to reassure Americans about the safety of the “swine flu” vaccine. “The track record for serious adverse events is very good. It’s very, very, very rare that you ever see anything that’s associated with the vaccine that’s a serious event,” he said.
Four months earlier, the World Health Organization had declared H1N1 influenza a pandemic, and by October 2009 the new vaccines were being rolled out across the world. A similar story was playing out in the UK, with prominent organisations, including the Department of Health, British Medical Association, and Royal Colleges of General Practitioners, working hard to convince a reluctant NHS workforce to get vaccinated. “We fully support the swine flu vaccination programme … The vaccine has been thoroughly tested,” they declared in a joint statement.
Except, it hadn’t.
…
The BMJ conducted its own analysis of the adverse events, most of which seem to have been reported spontaneously to GSK. For a range of concerning adverse events, reports were coming in for Pandemrix at a consistently higher rate than for the other two GSK pandemic vaccines–four times the rate of facial palsy, eight times the rate of serious adverse events, nine times the rate of convulsions. Overall, Pandemrix had, proportionally, five times more adverse events reported than Arepanrix and the unadjuvanted vaccine.
But those being vaccinated against swine flu were seemingly unaware of these side-effects, including narcolepsy. The vaccine manufacturer was aware of this side-effect but failed to inform health consumers. One can imagine why they might have been reluctant to provide such information.
Ian Mac, feel for the Covid nurses and doctors, my wife found while training and wearing N95 masks, they are brilliant at protection but it doesn’t take long before one is just recycling ones own CO2 even if it just a little bit every breath, a hard job made harder.
I have three cotton masks. They have an under cotton lining, open at both ends, so that the wearer can insert an extra layer for better protection. I haven't felt the need so far, but with rapidly rising cases I am wondering if it would be a good idea.
Can you recommend something I could slide in between the outer mask and the lining? It would have to be something a bit stiffer then normal.
I’m pretty sceptical of most reports of vaccine reactions, a 30 year old working with me after having her vaccination had just about every reaction you could think of from sunburn, “ Ohh that’s worse than I’ve had before” to tripping on something. “ I don’t usually do that “ ad infinitum …. turns out her mother had been diagnosed with hypochondria, and that’s the thing about hypochondriacs .. you can’t tell them they are sick because that’s exactly what they want to hear.
It's interesting to observe people getting upset about Covid spreading and their attitude towards those who are determined to not follow strictures or suggestions designed to protect.
Then saying that all border controls should go. And people should be trusted because they'll make the right decisions.
A person needs to think for their self and guide those dependent on them when it comes to their health.
There are going to be less health services available for those who already rely on the health system and who will need to enter it. This means longer waiting times and people becoming sicker.
Flag-waving images of protester really disturb me. I've been thinking that the meanings of those flags (United Tribes and Tino Rangatiratanga)
If, as a Pākehā, what is the first thing that would come to mind if I changed my cover photo on Facebook or Twitter to the Tino Rangatiratanga flag?
I support Māori aspirations for their people
I’m a pro-gun rights, anti-1080 anti-vaxxer with possible white supremacist tendencies who thinks the PM should be hung and scientists & health officials should face a Nuremburg trial over covid?
If 2., how do we remind people of the meaning of this symbol of Māori aspiration? How do we remove the re-purposing of the flag as a symbol of disinformation and violence?
“2., how do we remind people of the meaning of this symbol of Māori aspiration? How do we remove the re-purposing of the flag as a symbol of disinformation and violence?”
………………………….
The Tino Rangatiratanga flag turns up at all sorts of rallies and protests against the gummint, councils, private contractors, or Pākehā. It never gets a long term asociation with those because the fact that some Māori people purloin the flag & wave it around at demos as a means of personally expressing just their Māoriness is understood by most people, imo.
It won’t suffer a change of symbolism as result of being raised during the awfully muddled vaccination protests, imo.
It’s a shame this flag is forever associated with a coterie of perennial Pākehā-bashing Māori separatists. It’s iconic – the coolest design. If had a more inclusive cause & meaning I’d vote for it in a heartbeat to be Kiwiland’s new national flag.
Looks like today’s protesters achieve something Wellington Council and Wellington Police failed* to do for decades… the majority of cars driving within the speed limit.
If you want that history raw rather than re-cooked, just go to the Waitangi Tribunal hearing publications on the Ngati Paoa, Ngati Whaua Orakei, Te Kawerau a Maki, and Manukau Tainui. Not a barrel o' laffs necessarily but rich and detailed.
Also the one on the Musket Wars which is just utu manifold.
Also Belich's early Auckland accounts from Marsden etc up the Tamaki River in Making Peoples Vol 1. That spans the worlds old and new.
It's interesting. Typing away online, there's a separation when discussing irritating things. not perfect, but significant.
But talking to someone last night, the topic of covid came up, and I actually surprised myself with how just plain angry I got thinking about how constant white-anting defeatism from the very beginning has put us where we are now.
People are dying now because when people weren't dying, capitalists and the alliance of nutters demanded bubbles and relaxed restrictions and overseas holidays etc etc etc. Fuck 'em all. They managed to trip us up on the final lap.
So now the government is fighting a holding action against progressive expansion of covid in the hope the health system doesn't get overwhelmed. It's just such a pointless waste. We fucking had this thing. Another few months would have drastically changed the game, and much fewer people wouldn't be wondering whether they should go to the hospital because they were coughing up blood.
Same. I have to step away from thinking about it a lot.
Are you think the break was with the border control and delta getting in? Or when Labour gave up on elimination?
how constant white-anting defeatism from the very beginning has put us where we are now.
it still blows my mind. I can generally understand most political positions even the ones I outright hate. But this one I really don't get, that we should just have let a whole lot of people die. Do they not realise it might be them or their loved ones?
Death by a thousand nags, rather than any specific point.
Got lucky a couple of times, lucked out once or twice. But the constant rust eroding every single effort… just corrosive. Even if the govt had stood firm, enforcement would have had to get more drastic and still be less successful.
I think the ones who should know better, but were consultants for an international airport or wanted their nightclubs open 24/7 (or whatever) generally felt they could minimise their personal exposure. Who cares if your bar staff get it, you're isolating on a lifestyle block and working remotely. Isolation from society helps the tamakis. The rest? Just sad.
Seems obvious that Delta got spread by those who crossed borders. Rule-breakers got helped by bureaucrats using privacy law to prevent the public punishing them. Haven't seen much evidence of the system punishing them either, so I got the impression nobody was serious about the rules.
How many other folk got the same impression? If you enforce rules, people take them more seriously. Instead, we got an official sham. Understandably, Labour's poll rating dropped significantly compared to last year's effort.
Delta is endemic globally. Unless you were going to absolutely isolate NZ – and I mean no-one ever entered the border indefinitely into the future – then it was always going to arrive. It was just a matter of time.
There were only ever two justifications for lockdowns and isolation. Initially we needed to apply the precautionary principle in the face of a novel and unknown virus. The second was to buy time in order to prepare as best we could for COVID's inevitable arrival.
As far as the first precautionary principle is concerned that has pretty much expired. (And we might note the irony of the 'vax or die' crowd de-humanising those who would apply the same principle when faced with a novel vaccine with unknowable long term safety.)
As for preparing for the inevitable arrival of Delta, it seems to me that if public health really had been our top priority there was quite a deal more than could have been done.
Any strategy that relied on 90% or more of people complying with it, especially when it came to a novel vaccine technology, was always going to be high stakes politically.
True – but it's come at a cost. The anti-protests in NSW and VIC have been both a lot more politically intense and damaging than anything NZ has experienced.
Last I looked Melbourne was closing in on 280 days of lockdown in the past 12 months – one of the highest in the world.
Would people have taken the rules more seriously without a year of defeatists?
Recognising inevitability is one thing, embracing it is another. Half a dozen people (give or take) are dead because we couldn't hold it together. And that number's only going to increase.
seems like someone within National is cranking up the ABC (anyone but collins) campaign again, stories in the NZHerald about planning a coup. A few % points increase and the Govt having a roughish time with some covid stuff and soneone within National starts sharpening the knife
Yeah I saw that way back then after I read the book by Michael Lewis. He's brilliant every time! Starting with Liar's Poker late '80s. I own around 8/9 books analysing the gfc & have read 3/4 more & it's remarkable how they all reveal new angles.
Although Paulson (a different one than the Paulson in Bush Jr's cabinet who had to mastermind the rescue of the system & his book is also essential) is the main focus, the book includes cameos of several other guys who bet against both the establishment & the market herd & won hugely.
Thanks guy will watch that tomorrow, Just finishing tonight the last from series 3 of Fauda tonight. I know that series and movies have their framing – But taken back by the subject matter, and it has expanded for me the area and issues. I would say in lockdown you get to watch some gems that otherwise you wouldn't watch. I see Margin Call is on youtube.
Just finishing Alexandria by Edmond Richardson – So Dennis will be looking for something different to read so will follow your recommendation.
Cheers, RL, just watched it for the first time this morning on your recommendation … I see one critic called it"easily the best Wall Street movie ever made" & I can see why … hard to believe it's Chandor’s debut as a director.
I think I must have watched it four or five times now. Apart from some of the standout scenes with Jeremy Irons – that boardroom meeting is a masterpiece of scripting, direction and acting – what deeply appeals to me is that it opens up the world of big finance, lays bare it's ugliness and the very human costs -without ever once veering into preachiness or smugness.
The dying dog that bookends the movie is of course a brilliant metaphor.
If anybody is still under the illusion that the guy who harangued the PM in Northland was a "journalist" and she was "avoiding the media", this is from the backgrounder in today's herald:
For a journalist Shane Chafin has interesting ways of dealing with other journalists.
From David Fisher in interviewing Chafin:
"Do you also know I have had Muslim friends for 20 years? And they are willing to go on record." Chafin would not connect the Herald with anyone. "I'm a reporter. I can go on my channel and talk about that content any time I want to." Chafin said he had been a reporter for two months and "I'm the one making news around the world". "I made viral news around the world. When's the last time you did that?”
Chafin floated various claims about Covid-19, which – when challenged – led to him asking: "Are you f***ing stupid? Are you mentally ill? Maybe your meds aren't right. I'm a professional – maybe I could help your psychiatrist.”
The man who wraps his phone and computer in tin foil and puts them in a freezer asks someone else if they are mentally ill? And suggests that they have a psychiatrist?
He came from America because he didn't like the way things were going there. (Under Obama.) I can see he doesn't like the way things are going here. We certainly don't need him here and Northland with its low vaccination rates sure doesn't need him. He should bugger off.
It is claimed that the present ‘shockingly low’ conviction rate [in sexual cases] makes this bill necessary, but what is the evidence for this? The 2019 Justice Ministry ‘Attrition and Progression Report’ appears to be a main source.
This report says that only 11% of “perpetrators” who are reported to the Police by “victims” are convicted, but is based on the erroneous assumption that all allegations are valid. Figures for these “victimisations” include all cases in which the police were unable to act (for example no perpetrator was identified or insufficient evidence to prosecute), but absurdly also those which the police deemed actually “not to be a crime” and those where the accuser recanted. Even verdicts of not guilty are included, where juries had actually found police allegations to be unsubstantiated. The report therefore flies in the face of the presumption of innocence (a basic tenet of justice), not to mention good science.
Another incongruity is the purportedly ‘low’ conviction rate for cases that do make it to court. However, 2020 conviction rates of 39% for sexual violation and 50% for attempted sexual violation are not meagre when viewed against rates for some other violent crimes such as abductions and kidnapping (35%), aggravated robbery (41%), attempted murder (29%) and at the top, murder (56%). In no other crime is undermining defendants’ trial rights proposed to increase conviction rates.
I have insufficient expertise to support the legislation the Professor opposes. Nor am I doing so above.
But when she compares sex crime conviction failure to be comparable to a more general crime conviction failure, and then extrapolates that as a reason to not, essentially, worry, well ….. then I worry.
It's not PC I'm sure, but Police bring people to a court before a judge because they've done the crime.
Twenty or so years ago we had a tv show made here featuring spin doctors. Seemed quite good at the time. Public relations is the old label. Now we have the American beltway thing happening so we're getting a focus on lobbyists:
Good to see Labour & the Greens getting hip to the scene (just kidding) & the revolving door thing revving up. Soon it'll be just like the USA with the same folk switching jobs between industry & regulator constantly.
Stalin is the best model: leading revolutionary & state secret service agent simultaneously. In the middle, you get to play both sides against each other. Shapeshifter technique.
It has been made with the Ardern version for a little while as I have seen it used by RW people. They think it is so smart but I just think that they lack discernment – most of those NZers looking at the hat and logo think of Trump.
The NZ ones may be out of touch and think little of aligning themselves with Trump who many NZers think is a moron. They clearly have forgotten the pounding that Todd Muller got when his Maga hat was on display. He had to say that he collected this kind of memorabilia to get any kind of sympathy for him about having a Maga hat. It just shows how out of touch this rag tag mob was/is. Then the Trump flags ………, the upside down United Tribes flag etc etc.
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New Zealand has today missed the opportunity to uphold the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, says James Shaw after his member’s bill was voted down in its first reading. ...
Today’s advice from the Climate Change Commission paints a sobering reality of the challenge we face in combating climate change, especially in light of recent Government policy announcements. ...
Minister for Disability Issues Penny Simmonds appears to have delayed a report back to Cabinet on the progress New Zealand is making against international obligations for disabled New Zealanders. ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters’ engagements in Türkiye this week underlined the importance of diplomacy to meet growing global challenges. “Returning to the Gallipoli Peninsula to represent New Zealand at Anzac commemorations was a sombre reminder of the critical importance of diplomacy for de-escalating conflicts and easing tensions,” Mr Peters ...
Ambassador Millar, Burgemeester, Vandepitte, Excellencies, military representatives, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen – good morning and welcome to this sacred Anzac Day dawn service. It is an honour to be here on behalf of the Government and people of New Zealand at Buttes New British Cemetery, Polygon Wood – a deeply ...
Distinguished guests - It is an honour to return once again to this site which, as the resting place for so many of our war-dead, has become a sacred place for generations of New Zealanders. Our presence here and at the other special spaces of Gallipoli is made ...
Mai ia tawhiti pamamao, te moana nui a Kiwa, kua tae whakaiti mai matou, ki to koutou papa whenua. No koutou te tapuwae, no matou te tapuwae, kua honoa pumautia. Ko nga toa kua hinga nei, o te Waipounamu, o te Ika a Maui, he okioki tahi me o ...
Paul Goldsmith will take on responsibility for the Media and Communications portfolio, while Louise Upston will pick up the Disability Issues portfolio, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon announced today. “Our Government is relentlessly focused on getting New Zealand back on track. As issues change in prominence, I plan to adjust Ministerial ...
Recreational catch limits will be reduced in areas of Fiordland and the Chatham Islands to help keep those fisheries healthy and sustainable, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The lower recreational daily catch limits for a range of finfish and shellfish species caught in the Fiordland Marine Area and ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed an important milestone in New Zealand’s hydrogen future, with the opening of the country’s first network of hydrogen refuelling stations in Wiri. “I want to congratulate the team at Hiringa Energy and its partners K one W one (K1W1), Mitsui & Co New Zealand ...
The coalition Government is delivering on its commitment to improve resource management laws and give greater certainty to consent applicants, with a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) expected to be introduced to Parliament next month. RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop has today outlined the first RMA Amendment ...
Overseas models for regulating the oil and gas sector, including their decommissioning regimes, are being carefully scrutinised as a potential template for New Zealand’s own sector, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. The Coalition Government is focused on rebuilding investor confidence in New Zealand’s energy sector as it looks to strengthen ...
Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell has today released the Report of the Government Inquiry into the response to the North Island Severe Weather Events. “The report shows that New Zealand’s emergency management system is not fit-for-purpose and there are some significant gaps we need to address,” Mr Mitchell ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith is today travelling to Europe where he’ll update the United Nations Human Rights Council on the Government’s work to restore law and order. “Attending the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva provides us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while ...
Associate Agriculture Minister, Mark Patterson, formally reopened the world’s largest wool processing facility today in Awatoto, Napier, following a $50 million rebuild and refurbishment project. “The reopening of this facility will significantly lift the economic opportunities available to New Zealand’s wool sector, which already accounts for 20 per cent of ...
Hon Andrew Bayly, Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing At the Southland Otago Regional Engineering Collective (SOREC) Summit, 18 April, Dunedin Ngā mihi nui, Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Ko Whanganui aho Good Afternoon and thank you for inviting me to open your summit today. I am delighted ...
The Government is delivering on its commitment to bring back the Three Strikes legislation, Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee announced today. “Our Government is committed to restoring law and order and enforcing appropriate consequences on criminals. We are making it clear that repeat serious violent or sexual offending is not ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has today announced four new diplomatic appointments for New Zealand’s overseas missions. “Our diplomats have a vital role in maintaining and protecting New Zealand’s interests around the world,” Mr Peters says. “I am pleased to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the ...
New Zealand is contributing NZ$7 million to support communities affected by severe food insecurity and other urgent humanitarian needs in Ethiopia and Somalia, Foreign Minister Rt Hon Winston Peters announced today. “Over 21 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance across Ethiopia, with a further 6.9 million people ...
Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Paul Goldsmith is congratulating Mataaho Collective for winning the Golden Lion for best participant in the main exhibition at the Venice Biennale. "Congratulations to the Mataaho Collective for winning one of the world's most prestigious art prizes at the Venice Biennale. “It is good ...
The Government is reforming financial services to improve access to home loans and other lending, and strengthen customer protections, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly and Housing Minister Chris Bishop announced today. “Our coalition Government is committed to rebuilding the economy and making life simpler by cutting red tape. We are ...
“China remains a strong commercial opportunity for Kiwi exporters as Chinese businesses and consumers continue to value our high-quality safe produce,” Trade and Agriculture Minister Todd McClay says. Mr McClay has returned to New Zealand following visits to Beijing, Harbin and Shanghai where he met ministers, governors and mayors and engaged in trade and agricultural events with the New ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has completed a successful trip to Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, deepening relationships and capitalising on opportunities. Mr Luxon was accompanied by a business delegation and says the choice of countries represents the priority the New Zealand Government places on South East Asia, and our relationships in ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. “Recently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
A stopbank upgrade project in Tairawhiti partly funded by the Government has increased flood resilience for around 7000ha of residential and horticultural land so far, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones today attended a dawn service in Gisborne to mark the end of the first stage of the ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters will represent the Government at Anzac Day commemorations on the Gallipoli Peninsula next week and engage with senior representatives of the Turkish government in Istanbul. “The Gallipoli campaign is a defining event in our history. It will be a privilege to share the occasion ...
Science, Innovation and Technology and Defence Minister Judith Collins will next week attend the OECD Science and Technology Ministerial conference in Paris and Anzac Day commemorations in Belgium. “Science, innovation and technology have a major role to play in rebuilding our economy and achieving better health, environmental and social outcomes ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with the President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The Prime Minister was accompanied by MP Paulo Garcia, the first Filipino to be elected to a legislature outside the Philippines. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon and President Marcos Jr discussed opportunities to ...
The Government has announced that $20 million in funding will be made available to Westport to fund much needed flood protection around the town. This measure will significantly improve the resilience of the community, says Local Government Minister Simeon Brown. “The Westport community has already been allocated almost $3 million ...
The Government is proud to support the first ever Repco Supercars Championship event in Taupō as up to 70,000 motorsport fans attend the Taupō International Motorsport Park this weekend, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. “Anticipation for the ITM Taupō Super400 is huge, with tickets and accommodation selling out weeks ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced an increase to the Rates Rebate Scheme, putting money back into the pockets of low-income homeowners. “The coalition Government is committed to bringing down the cost of living for New Zealanders. That includes targeted support for those Kiwis who are doing things tough, such ...
The Coalition Government is investing in a project to boost survival rates of New Zealand mussels and grow the industry, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones has announced. “This project seeks to increase the resilience of our mussels and significantly boost the sector’s productivity,” Mr Jones says. “The project - ...
Benefit figures released today underscore the importance of the Government’s plan to rebuild the economy and have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker Support, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “Benefit numbers are still significantly higher than when National was last in government, when there was about 70,000 fewer ...
The Government’s commitment to doubling New Zealand’s renewable energy capacity is backed by new data showing that clean energy has helped the country reach its lowest annual gross emissions since 1999, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand’s latest Greenhouse Gas Inventory (1990-2022) published today, shows gross emissions fell ...
The Government is bringing the earthquake-prone building review forward, with work to start immediately, and extending the deadline for remediations by four years, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “Our Government is focused on rebuilding the economy. A key part of our plan is to cut red tape that ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and his Thai counterpart, Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, have today agreed that New Zealand and the Kingdom of Thailand will upgrade the bilateral relationship to a Strategic Partnership by 2026. “New Zealand and Thailand have a lot to offer each other. We have a strong mutual desire to build ...
RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Transport Minister Simeon Brown have today announced the Coalition Government’s intention to extend port coastal permits for a further 20 years, providing port operators with certainty to continue their operations. “The introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991 required ports to obtain coastal ...
Today’s announcement that inflation is down to 4 per cent is encouraging news for Kiwis, but there is more work to be done - underlining the importance of the Government’s plan to get the economy back on track, acting Finance Minister Chris Bishop says. “Inflation is now at 4 per ...
Refreshed health guidance released today will help parents and schools make informed decisions about whether their child needs to be in school, addressing one of the key issues affecting school attendance, says Associate Education Minister David Seymour. In recent years, consistently across all school terms, short-term illness or medical reasons ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is streamlining high-level oceans management while maintaining a focus on supporting the sector’s role in the export-led recovery of the economy. “I am working to realise the untapped potential of our fishing and aquaculture sector. To achieve that we need to be smarter with ...
Toomaj and his resistance to tyranny through his songs have become an icon for the youth of Iran, so his sentence has hit the nation hard. Toomaj Salehi is not the first artist to pay the price for standing with the people. ...
My cousin Dylan and I spotted these big eels under the bridge that summer. We watched them lounging under the dark weed, facing into the flow of water, their mouths frozen open. Dylan and I couldn’t stop thinking about those eels. The night we went down to the creek, we ...
Newsroom, home of satire. My long-running weekly satirical series The Secret Diary has moved to Newsroom and will appear every Saturday, with Victor Billot’s wildly popular satirical Odes continuing to appear every Sunday. Diaries, Odes – while serious political columnists toil at meaningful opinions and stroke their chins to an ...
Tara Ward unravels the many nuanced layers of a cartoon about talking dogs.This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. It’s not often an episode of a children’s cartoon has adults sobbing into their sleeves, but that’s exactly what happened this week when ...
There’s an island in the far reaches of Auckland’s territory, sitting off the tip of the Coromandel Peninsula, 30 minutes by air from the city or four hours on the slow boat. Aotea Great Barrier is off-grid, it has a population of fewer than a thousand people … and most ...
Working as a doctor in developing countries to help communities achieve better health outcomes is nothing short of a life goal for Jessica Tater. The University of Otago medical student has her sights firmly set on joining the international humanitarian organisation Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) when she qualifies ...
Asia Pacific Report An Australian author and advocate, Jim Aubrey, today led a national symbolic one minute’s silence to mark the “blood debt” owed to Papuan allies during the Second World War indigenous resistance against the invading Japanese forces. “A promise to most people is a promise,” Aubrey said in ...
Asia Pacific Report The Freedom Flotilla is ready to sail to Gaza, reports Kia Ora Gaza. All the required paperwork has been submitted to the port authority, and the cargo has been loaded and prepared for the humanitarian trip to the besieged enclave. However, organisers received word of an “administrative ...
Pacific Media Watch Palestine solidarity protesters today demonstrated at the Auckland headquarters of Television New Zealand, accusing the country’s major TV network of broadcasting “propaganda” backing Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. About 50 protesters targeted the main entrance to the TVNZ building near Sky Tower and also picketed a side ...
Opinion by Lynley Hood. Forty years on from my 1985 Fulbright Grant, my disquiet over the war in Gaza evoked some troubling questions. The answer to my first question – What is the primary purpose of the Fulbright Programme? – was on the Fulbright NZ website. It says: US Senator, ...
The ministers responsible for green-lighting major projects need to be open about potential conflicts of interest, says Transparency International. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anastasia Powell, Professor, Family and Sexual Violence, RMIT University It has been a particularly distressing start to the year. There is little that can ease the current grief of individuals, families and communities who have needlessly lost a loved one to men’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gregory Moore, Senior Research Associate, School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences, The University of Melbourne Lichen, the first described example of symbiosis.AdeJ Artventure/Shutterstock Once known only to those studying biology, the word symbiosis is now widely used. Symbiosis is the intimate ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kim Hemsley, Head, Childhood Dementia Research Group, Flinders Health and Medical Research Institute, College of Medicine and Public Health, Flinders University Olena Ivanova/Shutterstock “Childhood” and “dementia” are two words we wish we didn’t have to use together. But sadly, around 1,400 ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Whiteford, Professor, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University The government’s Economic Inclusion Advisory Committee has just published its second report. It was set up by Treasurer Jim Chalmers and Minister for Social Services Amanda Rishworth in 2022 to provide: ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne The Queensland state election will be held in October. A YouGov poll for The Courier Mail, conducted April 9–17 from a sample ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Naeni, PhD candidate at Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University There’s been much talk in recent months about what a possible second Donald Trump presidency in the United States could mean for Europe, Russia’s war in Ukraine, the ...
A brief round-up of submissions on the controversial proposed law. This is an excerpt from our weekly environmental newsletter Future Proof. Sign up here. Last week, submissions on the controversial Fast-track Approvals Bill closed just hours after the government released a list of stakeholder organisations who were sent letters advising how they could ...
A poem from Robin Peace’s new collection Detritus of Empire: feather / grass / rock. Cereal giving I see a woman’s hands, see her curious hands break a stalk as she walks through the tall prairie, the savannah, the steppe, wherever it was. See her idly bite the grass that ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Hemingway’s Goblet by Dermot Ross (Mary Egan Publishing, $38)A handsomely produced (debossed cover, lovely ...
The Commissioner's decision validates the longstanding efforts of the local community and ensures that Awataha Marae will be managed to serve the needs of the local community, particularly for hosting tangihanga. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tristan Salles, Associate professor, University of Sydney Examples of Australian landscapes.Unsplash Seventy thousand years ago, the sea level was much lower than today. Australia, along with New Guinea and Tasmania, formed a connected landmass known as Sahul. Around this time – ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Felicity Castagna, Lecturer, Creative Writing, Western Sydney University Day Day Market, ParramattaPhoto: Garry Trinh I live on the edge of Parramatta, Australia’s fastest-growing city, on the kind of old-fashioned suburban street that has 1950s fibros constructed in the post-war housing boom, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Ryan, Teaching Fellow in Economics, University of Waikato GettyImagesfatido/Getty Images There is an ongoing global debate over whether the high inflation seen in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic can be lowered without a recession. New Zealand is not ...
The ‘Wicked Game’ heartthrob is in his late 60s now. That didn’t stop him putting on a lively, goofy and very sparkly show. Apart from ‘Wicked Game’, which graces a sultry playlist of mine simply called 💋, my last sustained Chris Isaak listening session took place when I was about ...
Analysis - Two ministers were stripped of portfolios in a warning to Cabinet, drama broke out at the Waitangi Tribunal, and the gang patch ban bill ran into opposition. ...
Tara Ward makes an impassioned plea for some vital pop culture merch. In April 1999, I became obsessed with a new reality television show called Popstars. Every Tuesday night, five strangers transformed into music royalty before my very eyes as Joe, Keri, Carly, Erika and Megan were chosen to form ...
PNG Post-Courier In the early hours of ANZAC Day, aerial photographs captured an impressive gathering of Australians and Papua New Guineans at Isurava in the Northern (Oro) Province. The solemn dawn service yesterday was held at a site steeped in history, where some of the fiercest battles of World War ...
The PSA is shocked that Oranga Tamariki has used the cost cutting drive to downgrade its commitment to Te Ao Māori and remove many specialist Māori roles. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Kemish, Adjunct Professor, School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry, The University of Queensland There can be no more powerful symbol of the relationship between Australia and Papua New Guinea than the prime ministers of these neighbouring countries walking together on the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sharon Robinson, Distinguished Professor and Deputy Director of ARC Securing Antarctica’s Environmental Future (SAEF), University of Wollongong, University of Wollongong Andrew Netherwood Over the last 25 years, the ozone hole which forming over Antarctica each spring has started to shrink. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Viktoria Kahui, Senior Lecturer in Environmental Economics, University of Otago Getty Images/Amy Toensing Biodiversity is declining at rates unprecedented in human history. This suggests the ways we currently use to manage our natural environment are failing. One emerging concept focuses on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Timothy Colin Bednall, Associate Professor in Management, Swinburne University of Technology marvent/Shutterstock Finding the best person to fill a position can be tough, from drafting a job ad to producing a shortlist of top interview candidates. Employers typically consider information from ...
Wondering where to host your next BYO? Whether its a small gathering or a massive party, we’ve got some recommendations. I was first introduced to the concept of BYOs at Dunedin’s India Gardens, a legendary but sadly defunct establishment, which purveyed enormous quantities of mango chicken to Aotearoa’s drunkest future ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Julien Cooper, Honorary Lecturer, Department of History and Archaeology, Macquarie University Julien Cooper The hyper-arid desert of Eastern Sudan, the Atbai Desert, seems like an unlikely place to find evidence of ancient cattle herders. But in this dry environment, my new ...
The sector says it’s hopeful her replacement Paul Goldsmith will be able to throw it a lifeline, after six months with a minister deemed missing in action, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign ...
The government can't just rely on axing public sector jobs and has to do more to cut spending, says the chief economist at a free market think tank. ...
Rock The Vote NZ, known for its advocacy for minor party unity and its role within the Freedoms NZ Coalition during the 2023 General Election, celebrates this merger as a strategic enhancement of its operational strength and outreach. ...
Nearly everyone has experienced the frustration of something you use breaking and being difficult or expensive to fix. Proposed legislation could change that. It’s been raining on and off all Sunday afternoon but people are lining up outside a building in a corner of Gribblehirst Park in Sandringham, Auckland. In ...
What does a forever relationship look like when you don’t believe in marriage? And how do you celebrate it? This essay is part of our Sunday Essay series, made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.I’m going to do it, right now. I’m going to say ...
The Prime Minister has committed to resuming direct flights to Thailand. But it’s not a promise he will be able to deliver on anytime soon. The post Prime Minister jumps the gun in Thailand appeared first on Newsroom. ...
It’s not that long ago Eliza McCartney was seriously wondering if the Paris Olympics would be her pole vaulting swansong. After years of being hounded by injury after injury, the Rio Olympics bronze medallist was still confident she would compete at her second Olympics in Paris in July, unless something ...
FICTION 1 Take Two by Danielle Hawkins (Allen & Unwin, $36.99) There’s commercial fiction, like this book, and then there’s quality fiction, quality writers, quality literature; the forthcoming Auckland Writers Festival is full of quality, and ReadingRoom has two tickets to give away to the following events: Paul Lynch (Dublin ...
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You can’t have missed the Gallipoli story as the movies, documentaries, essays and books capture what it was like for New Zealand troops in their eight-month campaign on the Peninsula. But this Anzac Day the Auckland War Memorial Museum has published a book that sheds light on a little-known aspect of the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra In the free-for-all between the Australian government and Big Tech boss Elon Musk this week, the government had to be on a winner. Most people would have little sympathy with Musk’s vociferous opposition to ...
Asia Pacific Report Chief Mandla Mandela, a member of the National Assembly of South Africa and Nelson Mandela’s grandson, has joined the Freedom Flotilla in istanbul as the ships prepare to sail for Gaza, reports Kia Ora Gaza. Mandela is also the ambassador for the Global Campaign to Return to ...
Pacific Media Watch Journalists who report on environmental issues are encountering growing difficulties in many parts of the world, reports Reporters Without Borders. According to the tally kept by RSF, 200 journalists have been subjected to threats and physical violence, including murder, in the past 10 years because they were ...
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards, Democracy Project (https://democracyproject.nz)Political scientist, Dr Bryce Edwards. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has surprised everyone with his ruthlessness in sacking two of his ministers from their crucial portfolios. Removing ministers for poor performance after only five months in the job just doesn’t normally happen in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Hawkins, Senior Lecturer, Canberra School of Politics, Economics and Society, University of Canberra BagzhanSadvakassov/Upsplash, CC BY-SA Australia’s inflation rate has fallen for the fifth successive quarter, and it’s now less than half of what it was back in late 2022. ...
ACT's Rural Communities and Veterans spokesman Mark Cameron responds to cancellations and protests of ANZAC Day commemorations in Wellington. He says, "These pitiful attempts to detract from ANZAC Day are not at all indicative of the feelings of mainstream ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Meighen McCrae, Associate Professor of Strategic & Defence Studies, Australian National University American and Australian stretcher bearers working together near the front line during the Battle of Hamel in 1918.Australian War Memorial While the AUKUS alliance is new, the Australian-American partnership ...
Pōneke based peace activists staged a silent protest at the ANZAC day service to highlight New Zealand’s complicity in war and genocide, and urge the government to take concrete steps to stop the genocide in Palestine. ...
🍾 Happy Birthday, Patricia 🎂
You strike me as a person who looks life’s challenges straight in the eye & lives life to the best & fullest extent possible.
80 years is a significant milestone for anyone & you thoroughly deserve to have got there. May you have many more birthdays & adventures to come.
You’ll no doubt be the star at your party & nosh up today. Wish I could be there to celebrate it with you.
If you post today what time lunch with all the trimmings is expected to be served up, I’ll raise a glass of kahlua & milk & drink a toast to your good health at Gezza’s Bird Café here at Pookden Manor.
Hope you enjoy the gif I chose for your birthday.
https://imgur.com/01MdCKf.gif
All the best
🐧 Sir Gerald Ormsby Battersea Bradders, RSVP, PC 🐧
North Wellington Avian Aviation Authority
Gosh, Labour sure does know how to party! Who knew? If all their conferences were that good recruiting would be a breeze, eh?
might recruit Gezza
Bless, The whole thing kicks off at lunch time. About 12.30. We always begin with a glass raised to absent family and friends, then it is food and music and drinks. We don't dance anymore but we used to do that as well . A good auld c'eilidh. Cheers Gezza You added to my day.
Hey Patricia, congratulations and best wishes. Have a wonderful 80th year.
Patricia,your a good sole and for many more.
Thank you very much.
Thank you I have had a great day, but a bit tired lol
Love the video Gezza and your kind birthday greetings to Patricia. The vid should be used by Labour to kick off its 2023 election campaign … hee hee
Newsroom writer explains
.
😮 😂
At least with Bezos, if they have any promotions, some of us might end up with a cool brief trip into space ….
lol. At some point NZ will have to decide what to do with the people it is currently ridiculing. We might get lucky and they merge back into society. Or we might find they're a monster class by the time of the next election.
Anyone wanting a fuller picture of what's happening on the Belarus /Poland border would do well to read this article.
https://nims360.blogspot.com/2021/11/the-interpreter-belarus-border-crisis.html
Remember when Hungary was censured for building fences to keep migrants and refugees out ?(to my mind they're all refugees, from climate crisis and war)
Now Uk soldiers are being sent to Poland's border .Not to help with processing asylum requests, or provide humanitarian help, but to help"strengthen the border" aka reinforcing fences
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/nov/12/british-troops-sent-to-poland-to-assist-with-belarus-border-situation
Europe pulling the ladder up.
Ironic isn't it
It is by no means the first time Putin's Russia has deployed migrants to destabilize peaceable European neighbours – though Boris's motives may well be as self-serving as a desperate shortage of truck drivers.
Even France, by no means the US's best buddy at present, finds the cynicism of Russia intrigue deplorable.
37 year old niece, who wouldn't get the vaccine because she didn't know what was in it. Diagnosed with covid, and isolating at home had to go into North Shore Hospital after developing breathing problems.
The good news; feels much better after being put on a drip.
No one who needs an IV, ever refuses it because they don't know what is in it.
True.
I got put on one recently, after 6 failed attempts by nurses to get a working cannula into a vein, before a young surgeon finally succeeded & they could pump in the opioid I needed for excruciating abdominal pain. They sent me down to radiology forcan abdominal X-ray & put me on Nil By Mouth until the docs had seen the radiologist’s report.
I needed IV fluids for 12 hours. I didn’t ask what was in it.
Jenny, it is a hard way to learn. Hope she fully recovers.
Thank you Patricia.
She is feeling much better. You have to give it to our health workers, they really are angels.
people are intuitive and emotional as well as rational beings.
👍🏼
More or less, most of us.
Aye – but are also usually self-aware enough to know which is which, and not let them intrude into each others' spaces.
A woman walks up to an elevator door, there's a man inside wearing a suit and looking normal. Her intuition says don't get in the elevator, her rational mind says it's the middle of the day, in a busy building, he looks fine, nothing is going to happen. What should she do?
If there had been a huge background check onto him and highly trusted experts said he was all good , she should ride the elevator.
what if it's that he has covid?
Oooos have misunderstood your comment. Thought you were using an analogy to explain her intuition.
Its a bugger having a weird brain
I was trying to point out that sometimes intuition is the best source of data and out ranks rationality.
Intuition won't tell you rationally why not to get into the elevator. So background checks on the dude are beside the point.
Follow her instinct,I think that's your point
We've learnt self preservation that way
👍🏼
I think that’s the right answer. There’s sometimes a debate about whether women are more intuitive than man. I think they are, when it comes to reading people or situations – for that very reason. They need to protect themselves from physically stronger, predatory men, & so many have highly developed instincts to that end.
On average women are more physically vulnerable than men in any number of ways. But this doesn't necessarily make them victims.
The other side of this equation is that men do most of the protecting and sacrificing for the women. This was a lot more obvious in the pre-industrial world because life then was so much more dangerous.
Looked at this way men evolved via sexual selection to be the somewhat more dangerous sex in order to be useful to women. There is however an inherent risk in having potentially hazardous things lying about the house 🙂
Last line – that’s about how my Friday caregiver described the fathers of her two adult children, except she used the term lazy bastards who saw me coming & noticed I had DOORMAT written all over me. She was a real character. Much prefers looking after herself & living without a man. She was visiting Israel in 1973 when the Arabs attacked.
yes, and that sometimes intuition is more useful than rationality.
I think the question should be:
"Why do women find themselves in this situation"
See my reply above.
Because some men are dangerous sexual predators. The thing is you can’t always tell who these bastards are, & and unfortunately neither can those of us men who love & honour women as God’s greatest ever invention, & would would happily castrate these animals if we could.
I have a male friend who on a lonely dark street ,will cross the road rather than alarm a woman coming towards him , to signal he has no ill intent.
That’s a good idea. Sounds like a really nice guy.
Because men in suits generally don't use the stairs, even if they can find them.
Ha! Agree with the 'generally', but my partner does use the stairs – that's because he's a fitness freak – however, because he runs them noisily, in his suit, it's pretty clear he's no threat to anyone. He'd be appalled if he thought he was, and change his behaviour.
But you touch on a point about intuition. My thoughts are that intuition is not something outside of rationality. It's a sum of things you've learned through experience and stories and the weight you put on the contradictions in the things you've learned.
The difference with rationality is that its generally thought of as a weighing up of the odds in any given situation and choosing to do the action that is most likely to be safe (take the stairs – 99.99% of the time you're safe). Intuition (i.e. the weighing up of experience and stories) may lead to the opposite decision (avoid the stairs). Intuition in these cases is also self-reinforcing (you stayed safe by avoiding the man, therefore it was the right thing to do).
many different answers for many different reasons. (1) it is lunchtime ,so she should take the time and exercise by walking up the stairs. (2) who wants to share a small enclosed space with a normal suit wearer?so, she should let the elevator go, and wait for some interesting company.(3) its her ex-husband, and her intuition is that he;s going to try and borrow money. etc etc
Will she get vaccinated now?
Although a cynic would dismiss this as mere leftist consciousness-raising, I get the sense that it does at least launch a geopolitical work in progress:
Are lawyers allowed to lie in court?
This case may come down to whether or not this conspiracy theorist lawyer used misinformation and proven lies in the courtroom.
Are lawyers allowed to lie in court?
I suspect the relevant framing is creative interpretation. That's extremely traditional, of course! Hard-wired as part of the privilege system. The basic idea has always been that justice arrives as an incidental product of the competitive storytelling.
There is an artifice around the notion of fact, and precedence tends to be given to authoritative sources such as scientists & media (I'm not kidding) to establish fact.
I am guessing then, that the Law Society's deliberations may come down to a matter of integrity.
If it can be shown that she guarded her words in court knowing that they could be shown to be proven falsehoods by authoritative sources such as scientists & media. But then spread these falsehoods in public statements outside of court.
It could be evidence of a certain mens rea.
In her defence Sue Grey says that she was speaking as a politician not a lawyer.
Newshub has contacted Grey for a response. In a letter to the Law Society in her own defence, Stuff reports she made the ‘genocide’ comment “in my personal capacity as a political leader”, not a lawyer.
Are politicians allowed to lie.
Assuredly.
This must rank as one of the greatest defence arguments put up by a lawyer-cum-politician, ever.
‘I am a politician I am allowed to lie’.
Whether this defence will wash with the Law Society might be another matter.
I suspect it will, just from the sheer gall of it.
the Law Society
More arcane priesthood than cabal. Extremely important to protect the common interests of members (the principle of territoriality being the antique basis of that). Therefore rulings are normally protectionist.
So it will depend whether they see her as a wolf in sheep's clothing or not. Fear derives from audacious setting of precedents: such adventurism will be sure to come back and bite them in the future. Rationalists will adopt the stance ‘hey, she's one of us, the political clothing is irrelevant'. Protectionists will adopt the stance ‘yeah but the cowboy thing is a bad look, we must always wear suits, sorry – I meant cowgirl'.
Then there’s her `chinese walls in the mind’ rationale to consider. Dunno if there’s legal precedent around that.
she isn't a politician as far as I know. I wanna be but failed politician yes. Unless she is on a local body somewhere and then I guess a local body politician yes.
It coming to a matter of integrity might take things to a realm outside Sue Grey.
I mean my reading in the news today suggests she doesn't have any.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/126822668/by-positioning-herself-as-a-truth-seeker-lawyer-sue-grey-is-fuelling-covid19-disinformation
I do think that Sue Grey is a lawyer and person of high integrity and maybe we are lucky to have some one like her willing take on the contentious – especially the opposite views to that the government departments want to promulgate.
I have no doubt that there will be those out there wanting to cut her down at any opportunity because of her past achievements.
https://www.kiwisfirst.com/players-woolgate-supreme-court-scandal/
Sue Grey (Saxmere’s counsel
As with anyone who attempts to expose judicial corruption, furtive attempts by the judiciary have been made to discredit her. These have been only minimally effective due to her exemplary legal background, as well as her political savvy in keeping the focus on the negative commercial and economic effect such judicial corruption is having on her major wool producing client.
Dr David Collins QC (Solicitor General)
When allegations of Wilson J’s misconduct originally surfaced, Collins endeared himself to the judiciary by moving quickly to quash it. He orchestrated the firing of whistle-blower Sue Grey from her job at Department of Conservation, filed extensive legal submissions in support of Judge Wilson’s conduct and personally appeared in Court to show his support for Wilson in what was a civil case between two private parties.
My own granddaughter does not want to proceed on with her second vaccination because of what is online about young people and myocarditis in this links such as this.
https://www.myocarditisfoundation.org/myocarditis-and-pericarditis-following-mrna-covid-19-vaccination/?gclid=-qTfuE0nsRjf73XF_weLfLFb_ZOJtRnzJymn7BrqlajeGrYRoCeIcQAvD_BwE
does she just peddle misinformation on her Facebook and other platforms Janet?
If the story reported about her speculating a death from the pfizer vaccine before the person was vaccinated is correct. must be a pretty strong vaccine to do that.
Trump suggested Pence could be well hung?
Typical leftist fake news. Trump didn't say anything to indicate he agreed that Pence ought to be hung. The biased reporter uses the `sin by omission' theory to frame Trump as supporting the rabble's call. Trump was clearly supporting the rabble, and just as clearly refraining from comment. Bullshit from Huffpost dude.
Good on you for calling out fake news & BS.
Wasn’t just the Trumpanzees pushing those sorts of “alternative facts”. The liberals / Dems were into it just as badly – twisting & bending events & statements to back up prejudices & false assertions.
Maybe you've been following the ignominious unravelling of the so-called "Steele Dossier". Four years of US liberal media calling Trump out as a Russian asset – based on complete bullshit.
It's reasons like this that if another election were held tomorrow, Trump would stand a decent shot at winning. That's pretty damned depressing really.
I consider that whole saga as finalising the decline of journalism, and the public trust in journalism to an unprecedented degree, even including the Iraq war lead up.
Trump winning the election prompted such outrage than any hack could utter any unverifiable crap as gospel , and as long as it was anti Trump it was endorsed and cheered and could build a career
The media wasn’t attacked, it was an inside job
It would go a long way if some media figures had the guts to say – "I was wrong – we fucked that up and we have to do some work to earn back your trust".
You’re absolutely right, Red.
“Maybe you’ve been following the ignominious unravelling of the so-called “Steele Dossier”. Four years of US liberal media calling Trump out as a Russian asset – based on complete bullshit.”
……………………….
Yep. I loathe Trump – despicable, narcissistic, bullying lying individual in my eyes – so I didn’t want to know initially, but as it unravelled it was obvious it was both a completely fallacious AND an utterly farcical allegation.
“It’s reasons like this that if another election were held tomorrow, Trump would stand a decent shot at winning. That’s pretty damned depressing really.”
………………………….
The Dems have the same problem with Joe Biden as they did with Hillary Clinton. Both of them compromised candidates. Joe’s obviously well past his prime – when his prime was pretty patchy, to say the least.
Hard to see how Biden’s ongoing muddlesome gaffes & obvious frailty will stand up to a full-on Trump challenge. Harris, an unknown quantity. Cos Joe may be past his best, such as it ever was, but he’s a grumpy old stickler for getting top billing & doing all the (heavily scripted) talking.
The liberal media are likely going to have their work cut out for them trying present Joe as on top of things when he blunders.
Trump’s just as bad for blithering nonsense word salads, as well as spouting out dog whistling rhetoric, but audiences lap that up & don’t expect anything else from that charlatan.
.
It's a pathetic descent into echo-chamber Tribalism … the Clintonistas as bad as (and far more dominant within the US Establishment than) the Trumpards. Each side deploying their own crude conspiracy theories.
I wonder if we don't have an opportunity here at TS to set our own direction against this trend.
Not easy – but it would be the direction to go in I think.
Of course Trump didn't say he agreed that Pence ought to be hung.
Do you reckon Trump hoped that Pence would be hung or something otherwise dire happen to him?
You bet! Trump would have exhibited sanctimony! "Unfortunately my folks got carried away by their enthusiasm. It was god's will that Pence became a martyr for the cause. His heart was in the right place even if his head wasn't."
Pence isn't a strong contender for the nomination next time but it's in Trump's interest to minimise any competitor. He's sending a carefully-nuanced signal to the right: disloyalty to the chief will be punished one way or another…
For those who have not followed this here is a snippet of the interview:
Trump doesn't exactly condemn the insurrectionists does he. In fact he says to hang Pence is common sense!
Technical point to you on that. Trump is forever doing a reframe of the narrative. Rabble chanting is so totally irrelevant to him that the interviewers point gets over-ridden and ignored automatically. He's always telling someone what to think! His irritation that the interviewer is waving a red herring at him gets displaced by the essentiality of having to impose his narrative.
He genuinely doesn't get the concern the interviewer is trying to project. Who cares what the rabble chant? Not him! His gobbledygook trying to explain common sense results from his internal imperative. Narcissism compels that.
Trump didn't condemn the crowd, he didn't back Pence. It's all about Trump really, the mob was doing what Trump wanted, Pence declined to do what Trump wanted. Pretty clear from Trump that it is all about himself, and his delusions and his blow arse self aggrandisement. A 'wasn't very much' wannabe who cannot accept reality of "trump, you're fired".
trump supporters are like anti-vaxxers…
dont have time for either…
both types are the most dangerous people on the planet atm imo
Actually no. I've worked with about a dozen in both Canada and Latin America. They were generally easy to get to know and good people to work with.
When the topic drifted onto politics – they'd usually concede or openly state that Trump was a flawed, troublesome personality. Or as one guy put it sorrowfully, "how the fuck did the US come down to a choice between these two shitheads?"
We've been over this political ground many times, but for me it comes down to a question of just how accountable are we going to be? Because if the left cannot manage an utter landslide win over someone so blatantly unsuitable as Trump – then exactly what claim to political competence do we have?
tbf, the US doesn't really have a political left.
Worth reading for the historical back-story too! Notice that the author definition sorts out pseudo-leftists in Aotearoa rather effectively as well.
Good article. Very clear.
Bernie Sanders? Most seem to consider him poltically left?
He still had to run for the Dems though, who aren't left.
He didn't have to run for the Democrats nomination under any rule. He could have done what Ross Perot did in 1992 and run for a third party. The problem he would have had was two-fold. He didn't have any source of a great deal of money and he didn't have an organisation to carry out the basic tasks like getting on the ballot in all the States. They are all different and the rules are really all there to make it nearly impossible for a third party to get started. For example, when Perot ran –
"In New York, ballot access appeared to be the most difficult to attain. In a five-week summer period, the campaign would be required to compile 20,000 signatures from non-primary voters, including 100 from each of half of the state's Congressional districts"
Perot managed it but it helped that he was a billionaire and was willing to spend enormous amounts of his own money on the campaign. That was when a billion dollars was worth something.
Sanders on the other hand simply didn't have any money or organisation to do such a thing. That meant he became a Democrat as long as he was in the campaign, simply because they had an organisation to do the donkey work, before going back to being an Independent when he dropped out of the campaign which is what he remains, as far as I know.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ross_Perot_1992_presidential_campaign
Sociologist Stephanie Mudge explored the terrain three years ago.
She gets your point…
She goes into why the left defaults to experts, then the future…
I've found it helpful to move toward a tri-polar political model.
Instead of the bipolar left-right model that's served as the default model for two hundred years, I'm suggesting it's more interesting to use three poles – conservative, liberal and socialist. Like all social models it's not meant to be perfect but I'm using it more and more these days.
I'd have a few quibbles with the details. Haidt is worth reading but that moral framework never struck me as compelling. Metaphysics always strikes me as a surer basis (principles, archetypes, models, assumptions & hypotheses). Although your scheme seems similar to the third way, it would be interesting to know if you see it as different, and how.
I mean, from a metaphysical perspective, triangulation is the common basis. So both have the merit of transcending the binary. I always saw the third way as fake – liberal capitalism and conservative capitalism are the same system. Blair's framing (from Giddens wasn't it?) was basically a pr sham to unhook Labour from socialism.
I think this piece by Bryce Edwards is surprisingly good, and has some relevance to the toxic muddles we get into here on TS
https://democracyproject.nz/2021/05/23/bryce-edwards-the-state-of-the-political-left-in-the-age-of-outrage/
an excerpt
“The rise of “culture wars” has been incredibly important for the political atmosphere that we are now in. Quite simply it doesn’t lend itself to debate and discussion, or finding middle ground. Instead, it’s more polarising – it lends itself to the labelling of opponents as racists, sexists, or in the case of Hilary Clinton, talking about the masses as “deplorables”. So, there’s a strong strain of sneering from many on the left – especially against those that are seen as socially backward. The old slogan of: “The personal is political” now underpins the focus on how to fix the problems of the world.
good quote. I've been thinking lately that some of the language used to talk about the freedom protestors reminds me of Clinton's use of deplorables. Like we didn't learn anything from the time of Trump. Blows my mind.
i find this funny and interesting at the same time.
later
lol, it must be hard to understand how someone who fought for the working class – proletariat and precariat' is now demanding no debate on issues that affect predominantly the proletariat and the precariat.
The turning point for me was Jonathan Haidt's ideas on Moral Foundations theory. All humans share a common suite of core moral drivers, but we place different weights on them. And this does seem to be closely linked to innate personality differences:
All too often we make the debate all about these moral weightings – which are fundamentally unresolvable at that level. If instead we accept that the people we perceive as our opponents are simply coming at an issue with a different set of priorities and interests – we're more likely to engage in a constructive negotiation.
And that's how all the great politicians got the results they’re remembered for, they understood their opponents and could make deals with them.
“All too often we make the debate all about these moral weightings – which are fundamentally unresolvable at that level. If instead we accept that the people we perceive as our opponents are simply coming at an issue with a different set of priorities and interests – we’re more likely to engage in a constructive negotiation.”
…………………………
That tends to be how I’ve always looked at issues. At various times in my life it’s seemed like a character flaw, because others with stronger egos & opinions made judgements & decisions (often, needed decisions) faster & with more conviction & certainty than I was comfortable with.
Then I began to notice how many of those decisions subsequently (sometimes a year or two later) turned to be bad ones, with negative blowback effects, from things that were bothering me as risks at the time I felt like a slow-minded fool for wanting more information or discussion.
I like people. I appear to be highly empathetic, at least at times. I seem to have the happy knack of easily getting people to talk to me and explain their viewpoint. Thereafter I find I can sometimes see the issue thru their eyes, from their perspective, as well as my own. I decided in the end that this isn’t a flaw, it’s an inbuilt talent, & I now employ it usefully whenever I can.
I can across this regarding people holding opposing political view but treated each other with respect (that IMO all are due) John Wayne and Mark Rydell.
"“He really wanted to do The Cowboys,” Rydell said. “He treated me with the most respect. I was like this (cringing) waiting for him to say something anti semitic or anti-Indian or anti-anything. I was ready to jump. But he taught me a lesson.
“I know a lot of people with whom I agree politically and otherwise who are jerks,” Rydell said. “And then you take someone like him who I disagreed with in almost every area, except art. And he was a terrific person. The first guy on the set, the last person to leave. The picture was full of kids. They climbed up on him like the monkey bars on a playground. He was available to everybody. We went out to dinner he would sign autographs for everybody. He never was unfair or unpleasant. It was a big lesson to me not to pre-judge.”
youtube 4:15 Mark Rydell director of The Cowboys,The Rose, On Golden Pond etc.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFcw2ejwQGo
https://outsider.com/news/entertainment/john-wayne-wasnt-the-cowboys-directors-first-choice-star-classic/
From a social science perspective, the question is if the theory can be validated via research. First, the stats basis would have to be robust in his home nation, then it would have to be replicated in the other western countries.
Since Liberalism morphed historically into separate beasts in the various countries that it invaded (as a meme) from Britain, I would expect the stats to render his thesis context-dependent only. Here, for example, liberalism has manifested only as a strand within the Alliance in the '90s plus economic ideology shared by Nat/Lab since the '80s, since our original Liberal Party died a century ago.
I was Given his "The Righteous Mind"
I wish I had been given Cliffs notes along with it.It was complex stuff and requires full commitment.I'll have another go at it
@ Red….Have a read of Michael Tomasky (Left for Dead) it's twenty odd years on but I think a quick read.
Hilary Clinton has been demonstrably accurate for the United States.
Edwards' piece doesn't reflect anything about politics to me.
Just realised that there is something good about wearing a mask. Tromp around the supermarket, leave to go to the bike stand and then off with the mask. "Wow!." that first breath of fresh air is so great.
Exactly ianmac, and the opportunity to put your glasses back on!
You have no idea how lovely that bit of fresh air is once you take the mask of after several hours of wearing them at work.
Appreciate yours & other retailers efforts Sabine, thank you.
I am amazed by how good people are actually to be honest. I have a strikt no one enters the premise policy, plague door is mounted and all interaction is customer on one side and me on the other and everyone is very very understanding.
It allows me to trade without having to police people on vaccination status or mask wearing. And People are wearing their masks at about 95% rate. And if someone comes without one, i have spares to hand out and they are generally well accepted.
there are more of us doing the right things than not. That is always something we should keep in mind.
I agree, from what I have seen, with mask wearing. But jeez, wearing them indoors all day, thank you (I work on my own out doors mostly, so can slip it on & off).
i have been told by someone whom i trust on these issues tht mask wearing considerably reduces the risk of transmitting covid, as we keep our droplets to our self. And thus i am a great promoter of masks. Specifically indoors. I do tend to have one with me when out and about and will wear it when people are around. I feel naked now without one. Humans get used to this stuff fairly quickly i reckon.
Some useful information about another vaccine, Pandemrix. The following is from Peter Doshi, the associate editor of the BMJ (formerly the British Medical Journal):
In October 2009, the US National Institutes of Health infectious diseases chief, Anthony Fauci, appeared on YouTube to reassure Americans about the safety of the “swine flu” vaccine. “The track record for serious adverse events is very good. It’s very, very, very rare that you ever see anything that’s associated with the vaccine that’s a serious event,” he said.
Four months earlier, the World Health Organization had declared H1N1 influenza a pandemic, and by October 2009 the new vaccines were being rolled out across the world. A similar story was playing out in the UK, with prominent organisations, including the Department of Health, British Medical Association, and Royal Colleges of General Practitioners, working hard to convince a reluctant NHS workforce to get vaccinated. “We fully support the swine flu vaccination programme … The vaccine has been thoroughly tested,” they declared in a joint statement.
Except, it hadn’t.
…
The BMJ conducted its own analysis of the adverse events, most of which seem to have been reported spontaneously to GSK. For a range of concerning adverse events, reports were coming in for Pandemrix at a consistently higher rate than for the other two GSK pandemic vaccines–four times the rate of facial palsy, eight times the rate of serious adverse events, nine times the rate of convulsions. Overall, Pandemrix had, proportionally, five times more adverse events reported than Arepanrix and the unadjuvanted vaccine.
But those being vaccinated against swine flu were seemingly unaware of these side-effects, including narcolepsy. The vaccine manufacturer was aware of this side-effect but failed to inform health consumers. One can imagine why they might have been reluctant to provide such information.
https://archive.hshsl.umaryland.edu/bitstream/handle/10713/8270/Doshi_Pandermrix2018.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/health/narcolepsy-case-raises-important-questions-about-vaccine-approval-1.4088792
https://www.mcgarrsolicitors.ie/2012/06/05/pandemrix/
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/courts/high-court/swine-flu-cases-settlements-totalling-over-4-5m-approved-by-high-court-1.4634179
Ian Mac, feel for the Covid nurses and doctors, my wife found while training and wearing N95 masks, they are brilliant at protection but it doesn’t take long before one is just recycling ones own CO2 even if it just a little bit every breath, a hard job made harder.
Mask use for year 4 up next week in schools at level 3 step 2 lockdown I have been giving this some thought.
I can manage a mask better when seated than when walking.
I am sewing material masks again today for family, 100% cotton needs to be used.
@ Treetop.
I have three cotton masks. They have an under cotton lining, open at both ends, so that the wearer can insert an extra layer for better protection. I haven't felt the need so far, but with rapidly rising cases I am wondering if it would be a good idea.
Can you recommend something I could slide in between the outer mask and the lining? It would have to be something a bit stiffer then normal.
Coffee and tea filters are used as inserts for masks. They can be organic and made of cotton. Probably non reusable as they collect moisture.
Paper towels can be used as well.
There is a lot online.
I’m pretty sceptical of most reports of vaccine reactions, a 30 year old working with me after having her vaccination had just about every reaction you could think of from sunburn, “ Ohh that’s worse than I’ve had before” to tripping on something. “ I don’t usually do that “ ad infinitum …. turns out her mother had been diagnosed with hypochondria, and that’s the thing about hypochondriacs .. you can’t tell them they are sick because that’s exactly what they want to hear.
New Covid case in Taupo.
Was to be expected as they found hte samples in the waste water.
mask, physical distance, sanitze, jab and hopefully it works.
Wairarapa is my pick for the next region.
See super spreader events on again
It's interesting to observe people getting upset about Covid spreading and their attitude towards those who are determined to not follow strictures or suggestions designed to protect.
Then saying that all border controls should go. And people should be trusted because they'll make the right decisions.
Interesting huh!! Deranged more like it!!
A person needs to think for their self and guide those dependent on them when it comes to their health.
There are going to be less health services available for those who already rely on the health system and who will need to enter it. This means longer waiting times and people becoming sicker.
But my Freedoms!
Thankfully people still have the freedom to think for their self.
450 wide?
couldn't edit for some reason as there was no edit button. Had to leave it.
Flag-waving images of protester really disturb me. I've been thinking that the meanings of those flags (United Tribes and Tino Rangatiratanga)
If, as a Pākehā, what is the first thing that would come to mind if I changed my cover photo on Facebook or Twitter to the Tino Rangatiratanga flag?
If 2., how do we remind people of the meaning of this symbol of Māori aspiration? How do we remove the re-purposing of the flag as a symbol of disinformation and violence?
“2., how do we remind people of the meaning of this symbol of Māori aspiration? How do we remove the re-purposing of the flag as a symbol of disinformation and violence?”
………………………….
The Tino Rangatiratanga flag turns up at all sorts of rallies and protests against the gummint, councils, private contractors, or Pākehā. It never gets a long term asociation with those because the fact that some Māori people purloin the flag & wave it around at demos as a means of personally expressing just their Māoriness is understood by most people, imo.
It won’t suffer a change of symbolism as result of being raised during the awfully muddled vaccination protests, imo.
It’s a shame this flag is forever associated with a coterie of perennial Pākehā-bashing Māori separatists. It’s iconic – the coolest design. If had a more inclusive cause & meaning I’d vote for it in a heartbeat to be Kiwiland’s new national flag.
I hope you're right about the lack of association with this set of protests. I live in hope.
I wouldn't comment on how Maori use their flag, I'm only commenting on the misappropriation by Pakeha in this set of protests.
Looks like today’s protesters achieve something Wellington Council and Wellington Police failed* to do for decades… the majority of cars driving within the speed limit.
___
* Although you can only fail if you try.
This looks interesting, despite Auckland being a foreign land to me.
https://twitter.com/BWB_NZ/status/1458996728422563848
If you want that history raw rather than re-cooked, just go to the Waitangi Tribunal hearing publications on the Ngati Paoa, Ngati Whaua Orakei, Te Kawerau a Maki, and Manukau Tainui. Not a barrel o' laffs necessarily but rich and detailed.
Also the one on the Musket Wars which is just utu manifold.
Also Belich's early Auckland accounts from Marsden etc up the Tamaki River in Making Peoples Vol 1. That spans the worlds old and new.
I need the story telling. Raw history is just too hard at this point.
That does sound interesting
Then again it might be just too damned depressing
I'm hoping that the way she connects land and people will lift it. But yeah, we'll see.
Gridlock protest held up an ambulance. Scum.
https://mobile.twitter.com/drivethrupod/status/1459319708784623616
User name
Sorry. It seems to be an auto-fill problem on another device that I keep forgetting about..
yeah, seems to affect quite a few people.
Unsurprising. He does it every day on his podcast.
https://www.sportbible.com/australia/mma-joe-rogan-reveals-he-can-perform-auto-fellatio-20211112
It's interesting. Typing away online, there's a separation when discussing irritating things. not perfect, but significant.
But talking to someone last night, the topic of covid came up, and I actually surprised myself with how just plain angry I got thinking about how constant white-anting defeatism from the very beginning has put us where we are now.
People are dying now because when people weren't dying, capitalists and the alliance of nutters demanded bubbles and relaxed restrictions and overseas holidays etc etc etc. Fuck 'em all. They managed to trip us up on the final lap.
So now the government is fighting a holding action against progressive expansion of covid in the hope the health system doesn't get overwhelmed. It's just such a pointless waste. We fucking had this thing. Another few months would have drastically changed the game, and much fewer people wouldn't be wondering whether they should go to the hospital because they were coughing up blood.
Gah. Fuck everything.
Same. I have to step away from thinking about it a lot.
Are you think the break was with the border control and delta getting in? Or when Labour gave up on elimination?
it still blows my mind. I can generally understand most political positions even the ones I outright hate. But this one I really don't get, that we should just have let a whole lot of people die. Do they not realise it might be them or their loved ones?
Death by a thousand nags, rather than any specific point.
Got lucky a couple of times, lucked out once or twice. But the constant rust eroding every single effort… just corrosive. Even if the govt had stood firm, enforcement would have had to get more drastic and still be less successful.
I think the ones who should know better, but were consultants for an international airport or wanted their nightclubs open 24/7 (or whatever) generally felt they could minimise their personal exposure. Who cares if your bar staff get it, you're isolating on a lifestyle block and working remotely. Isolation from society helps the tamakis. The rest? Just sad.
Seems obvious that Delta got spread by those who crossed borders. Rule-breakers got helped by bureaucrats using privacy law to prevent the public punishing them. Haven't seen much evidence of the system punishing them either, so I got the impression nobody was serious about the rules.
How many other folk got the same impression? If you enforce rules, people take them more seriously. Instead, we got an official sham. Understandably, Labour's poll rating dropped significantly compared to last year's effort.
Delta is endemic globally. Unless you were going to absolutely isolate NZ – and I mean no-one ever entered the border indefinitely into the future – then it was always going to arrive. It was just a matter of time.
There were only ever two justifications for lockdowns and isolation. Initially we needed to apply the precautionary principle in the face of a novel and unknown virus. The second was to buy time in order to prepare as best we could for COVID's inevitable arrival.
As far as the first precautionary principle is concerned that has pretty much expired. (And we might note the irony of the 'vax or die' crowd de-humanising those who would apply the same principle when faced with a novel vaccine with unknowable long term safety.)
As for preparing for the inevitable arrival of Delta, it seems to me that if public health really had been our top priority there was quite a deal more than could have been done.
This is not encouraging.
https://twitter.com/dgurdasani1/status/1459245078543802376
Not it isn't. That last sentence nails it for me.
Any strategy that relied on 90% or more of people complying with it, especially when it came to a novel vaccine technology, was always going to be high stakes politically.
But that isn't what either New Zealand or Australia have done.
True – but it's come at a cost. The anti-protests in NSW and VIC have been both a lot more politically intense and damaging than anything NZ has experienced.
Last I looked Melbourne was closing in on 280 days of lockdown in the past 12 months – one of the highest in the world.
Would people have taken the rules more seriously without a year of defeatists?
Recognising inevitability is one thing, embracing it is another. Half a dozen people (give or take) are dead because we couldn't hold it together. And that number's only going to increase.
But some people wanted xmas holidays, boo hoo.
and they will get them again this year.
The best and smartest thing anyone can do is staying at home for the holidays.
but not holding my breath.
seems like someone within National is cranking up the ABC (anyone but collins) campaign again, stories in the NZHerald about planning a coup. A few % points increase and the Govt having a roughish time with some covid stuff and soneone within National starts sharpening the knife
Lock down in Auckland for 12 weeks-and its raining !!
If you have a spare 2 hours I recommend The Big Short. Great to view what was happening 2007-8 and a great cast, with a movie that makes you think.
Yeah I saw that way back then after I read the book by Michael Lewis. He's brilliant every time! Starting with Liar's Poker late '80s. I own around 8/9 books analysing the gfc & have read 3/4 more & it's remarkable how they all reveal new angles.
The best is this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Greatest_Trade_Ever
Although Paulson (a different one than the Paulson in Bush Jr's cabinet who had to mastermind the rescue of the system & his book is also essential) is the main focus, the book includes cameos of several other guys who bet against both the establishment & the market herd & won hugely.
Another fabulous movie on the same theme is Margin Call.
Tight direction, strong cast, great story-telling and in the end very moving. One of my all-time favourites.
Thanks guy will watch that tomorrow, Just finishing tonight the last from series 3 of Fauda tonight. I know that series and movies have their framing – But taken back by the subject matter, and it has expanded for me the area and issues. I would say in lockdown you get to watch some gems that otherwise you wouldn't watch. I see Margin Call is on youtube.
Just finishing Alexandria by Edmond Richardson – So Dennis will be looking for something different to read so will follow your recommendation.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/saturday/audio/2018801419/edmund-richardson-finding-the-lost-city-of-alexandria
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fauda
.
Cheers, RL, just watched it for the first time this morning on your recommendation … I see one critic called it "easily the best Wall Street movie ever made" & I can see why … hard to believe it's Chandor’s debut as a director.
I think I must have watched it four or five times now. Apart from some of the standout scenes with Jeremy Irons – that boardroom meeting is a masterpiece of scripting, direction and acting – what deeply appeals to me is that it opens up the world of big finance, lays bare it's ugliness and the very human costs -without ever once veering into preachiness or smugness.
The dying dog that bookends the movie is of course a brilliant metaphor.
If anybody is still under the illusion that the guy who harangued the PM in Northland was a "journalist" and she was "avoiding the media", this is from the backgrounder in today's herald:
https://twitter.com/MattNippert/status/1459271101947826178
For a journalist Shane Chafin has interesting ways of dealing with other journalists.
From David Fisher in interviewing Chafin:
"Do you also know I have had Muslim friends for 20 years? And they are willing to go on record." Chafin would not connect the Herald with anyone. "I'm a reporter. I can go on my channel and talk about that content any time I want to." Chafin said he had been a reporter for two months and "I'm the one making news around the world". "I made viral news around the world. When's the last time you did that?”
Chafin floated various claims about Covid-19, which – when challenged – led to him asking: "Are you f***ing stupid? Are you mentally ill? Maybe your meds aren't right. I'm a professional – maybe I could help your psychiatrist.”
The man who wraps his phone and computer in tin foil and puts them in a freezer asks someone else if they are mentally ill? And suggests that they have a psychiatrist?
He came from America because he didn't like the way things were going there. (Under Obama.) I can see he doesn't like the way things are going here. We certainly don't need him here and Northland with its low vaccination rates sure doesn't need him. He should bugger off.
Piece of structural sadness for the day:
Of 100 adult sexual victimisations,
Less than 10 of those are reported to the Police.
Of that less-than-ten number, 31% get to Court,
and of that 31% of the less-than-ten who get the perp into Court,
"11 per cent resulted in a conviction and
6 per cent had a prison sentence imposed."
(according to the 2014 New Zealand Crime and Safety Survey).
Survivor of child sexual abuse finally gets justice by secretly recording abuser's confession – NZ Herald
The other side of the same coin:
It is claimed that the present ‘shockingly low’ conviction rate [in sexual cases] makes this bill necessary, but what is the evidence for this? The 2019 Justice Ministry ‘Attrition and Progression Report’ appears to be a main source.
This report says that only 11% of “perpetrators” who are reported to the Police by “victims” are convicted, but is based on the erroneous assumption that all allegations are valid. Figures for these “victimisations” include all cases in which the police were unable to act (for example no perpetrator was identified or insufficient evidence to prosecute), but absurdly also those which the police deemed actually “not to be a crime” and those where the accuser recanted. Even verdicts of not guilty are included, where juries had actually found police allegations to be unsubstantiated. The report therefore flies in the face of the presumption of innocence (a basic tenet of justice), not to mention good science.
Another incongruity is the purportedly ‘low’ conviction rate for cases that do make it to court. However, 2020 conviction rates of 39% for sexual violation and 50% for attempted sexual violation are not meagre when viewed against rates for some other violent crimes such as abductions and kidnapping (35%), aggravated robbery (41%), attempted murder (29%) and at the top, murder (56%). In no other crime is undermining defendants’ trial rights proposed to increase conviction rates.
https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2021/06/21/guest-blog-professor-felicity-goodyear-smith-faulty-assumptions-underpin-sexual-violence-bill/
I have insufficient expertise to support the legislation the Professor opposes. Nor am I doing so above.
But when she compares sex crime conviction failure to be comparable to a more general crime conviction failure, and then extrapolates that as a reason to not, essentially, worry, well ….. then I worry.
It's not PC I'm sure, but Police bring people to a court before a judge because they've done the crime.
NZLS | Conviction, sentencing and imprisonment of adults in 2019 (lawsociety.org.nz)
Twenty or so years ago we had a tv show made here featuring spin doctors. Seemed quite good at the time. Public relations is the old label. Now we have the American beltway thing happening so we're getting a focus on lobbyists:
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/bryce-edwards-the-government-lobbying-revolving-door-just-keeps-on-turning/OK2TRISU6A2LAURUIC2KQKXX2Q/
Good to see Labour & the Greens getting hip to the scene (just kidding) & the revolving door thing revving up. Soon it'll be just like the USA with the same folk switching jobs between industry & regulator constantly.
Stalin is the best model: leading revolutionary & state secret service agent simultaneously. In the middle, you get to play both sides against each other. Shapeshifter technique.
Oh I get it – not the Trump meme, it's morphed into homegrown:
It has been made with the Ardern version for a little while as I have seen it used by RW people. They think it is so smart but I just think that they lack discernment – most of those NZers looking at the hat and logo think of Trump.
The NZ ones may be out of touch and think little of aligning themselves with Trump who many NZers think is a moron. They clearly have forgotten the pounding that Todd Muller got when his Maga hat was on display. He had to say that he collected this kind of memorabilia to get any kind of sympathy for him about having a Maga hat. It just shows how out of touch this rag tag mob was/is. Then the Trump flags ………, the upside down United Tribes flag etc etc.