Most Australians back Assange, poll finds
August 9, 2012
by Phillip Coorey, Sydney Morning Herald chief political correspondent
A majority of Australians believe the WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange would not receive a fair trial should he ever be extradited to the United States. The nationwide poll, conducted by UMR Research, also finds more than half do not believe he should be prosecuted for releasing thousands of leaked diplomatic cables.
Meanwhile, public opinion is split over whether the Gillard government is doing enough to help the Australian national.
After unsuccessfully challenging moves to extradite him to Sweden, where he is wanted for questioning over alleged sexual offences, Mr Assange remains holed up inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London.
He is seeking asylum in Ecuador but if unsuccessful could find himself sent to Sweden. Officially, the US government says it has no plans to then extradite him to the US – but a grand jury has been convened to probe the release by WikiLeaks of about 250,000 allegedly stolen diplomatic cables, raising suspicions to the contrary.
[lprent: Small quotes and link rather than whole articles. You’re also lacking any of your opinion. This isn’t a newspaper. We want to see what you think. ]
Idiot. You need to do some reading on this topic; after you’ve learned a little bit, I doubt that you’ll continue with your lame, politically driven “jokes”.
The poll is only about Assange’s chances if he is ever asked to stand trial in America over the leaks. There is no indication that Aussies support his cowardice in relation to the sexual assault investigation and the majority do consider the Aussie government’s consular support of him so far in that matter to be adequate.
Right. So they didn’t go to the police – the cops just turned up on their doorstep saying “we’re going to press charges, you have to go along with it. Oh, and here’s a lawyer who we will make represent you, so when we drop the investigation he’ll appeal the decision ‘on your behalf’ so we can look at the matter again and restart the investigation we already dropped “.
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The Swedish and English judicial systems seem to think the allegations are reasonable enough to investigate/extradite. But you got the interwebz so you know exactly what’s happened.
It does indeed. Which is why I think it’s just an excuse used by groupies who can’t think of a more likely reason someone would want to dodge a sexual assault investigation.
   Â
Apparently Assange has been panning to skip to Ecuador for almost a year. Did he tell this to the people who put up his bail money?Â
Right. So they didnât go to the police â the cops just turned up on their doorstep saying âweâre going to press charges, you have to go along with it. Oh, and hereâs a lawyer who we will make represent you, so when we drop the investigation heâll appeal the decision âon your behalfâ so we can look at the matter again and restart the investigation we already dropped â.
Someone—and it was certainly not the Swedish police—used the women in order to press this ludicrous and uniquely Swedish statute into service as a weapon to use against the most dangerous political dissenter in the world.
The Swedish and English judicial systems seem to think the allegations are reasonable enough to investigate/extradite.
Nobody with any integrity in or outside of the legal system thinks these allegations have a shred of credibility. People like you were persuaded by the compliance and silence of key British legal and government officials in 2003 to accept the bogus case to attack Iraq. You’re impressed and gulled not by authority, but by power.
But you got the interwebz so you know exactly whatâs happened.
There you go with your trivialization strategy again. I know a lot more than you do about this because I read seriously and widely, and I can discriminate between what is serious journalism and what is nothing more than black propaganda. Of course I don’t know exactly what happened; what I do know is what you also know but lack the integrity to admit: that this “case” against Assange is as robust as the 1960 case against Martin Luther King for driving in Georgia on an Alabama license.
Oh my god – are you still promulgating the “sex by surprise” myth? Maybe you need to go to the source. Show me where it says “sex by surprise”.
   Â
I love how you deny the women involved any possible agency in dealing with their own sexual assault allegations – they must have been manipulated or “used” by others. Maybe they are telling the truth and without ulterior motive. Not definitely. Just maybe. In which case it’s not St Julian who’s being victimised and harrassed, is it?
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BTW, if you still believe the “sex by surprise” slur, you “know” fuck all.
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And I cannot believe you just compared Assange to MLK.Â
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“I cannot believe you just compared Assange to MLK.”
Of course not. Martin Luther King was traduced by the FBI—although people like you will deny the evidence of that—and ridiculed by the establishment. He spoke out trenchantly against his country’s destruction of Indo-China, thus incurring undying resentment and hatred from the “liberal” establishment. He also “got with” many of the women who were drawn to him and no doubt had he lived longer, would have suffered a concocted campaign of outrage about an invented incident of rape.
Clearly there are no comparisons obvious to everybody else but yourself.
oh, by the way – if you know so much about it, did Assange tell the people who stumped up his not insubstantial bail money that he had spent months planning to skip the country and leave them out of pocket?Â
Y’know, the accusation is that Assange exhibits inappropriate sexual behaviours. Two complaints from two women relating to (more or less) the same point in time. But where are the other complaints? Don’t know why no-one has picked up on the fact that aside from when the victim of sexual predation (or whatever) is specific and therefore unique, the perpetrator usually has a history of the behaviour complained of. And people emerge from that history when some-one finally does complain or have charges laid or whatever. But in the case of Assange? Nothing. Now, why would that be?
Youâve obviously got a point to make Bill.
why donât you spit it out.
You know perfectly well what his point was. But just to confirm what you already know but lack the integrity to admit: the allegations against Assange are baseless, ludicrous, fantastical, and vicious. The “case” against Assange makes the case—giraffes in the basement and all—against Peter Ellis look robust.
What, Bill? You mean people donât or canât change behaviour (for better or worse) when their situation/ circumstances/ opportunity change?
There is no evidence against Assange, rosy. Why don’t you have the courage to just admit it? Better still, do some reading on this affair. Serious reading, that is—not simply accepting what the comedy writers on the Grauniad staff come up with.
Banks and MMP – this guy actually doesn’t understand the debate.
He is rambling on about this current stable government would have been affected.
Banks did not benefit from either of the two proposed adjustments – “threshold and coat-tailing”. ACT and UF have electorate seats only.
When ACT finally dies I and the thousands of others who went through the Auckland local government restructure will be there to tramp the dirt down on their political graves, good and hard.
My thoughts on his rant on Radio NZ National this morning was that he has also “forgotten” that he is now supposedly ACT not National when he claimed that National will not agree to the changes as if he was their spokesperson.
I think it’s just more bluster designed to cover up how stupid student loans are and deflect attention from more serious problems, such as avoidance and evasion by the rich. Australia told them about a year ago that they weren’t interested.
Bugga ! As much as this is great for Adams it’s a really bad outcome for truth and a fair go as the redneck talkback feeding monkeys that pass for journalists in this country will feel vindicated and ignore the baseless allegations they made and claiim ‘moral high ground’
The fact that Ostapchuk threw, was it 3 national records in about a 10 day period not long before the olympics, in her own country, would have at least begged the question.
Its not like she was throwing world records though, so perhaps not overt in its warnings, but seems to this point was, “enhanced”.
Agree about the red neck media, I find the pundits are simply a mirror of those they preside over, and its a little bit like chicken and egg, which idiot came first the pundit or the fan!
A lot of people, including me, felt that the pattern of her performance over the last ten years did not support the recent radical gain in her outcomes. Speculation is not of itself an indication of redneckery, by which I presume you mean a mean-spirited refusal to recognize merit?
itâs a really bad outcome for truth and a fair go as the redneck talkback feeding monkeys that pass for journalists in this country
From what I just heard on 3 News, yes. They’re talking about the Belorussian woman as if she is the embodiment of all evil…
I wouldn’t care at all, if it didn’t remind me of the American comments in previous Olympics, that all Eastern European women athletes and competitors were all men in disguise.Â
There were comments about how difficult it’s going to be to get Valerie’s medal from around the neck of that evil, lying Russian medal thief!
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That’s the sort of thing that has made me loathe and despise sport all my life.
He was correct, due to sheer dumb luck. He immediately started bawling that the Belorussian was a drug cheat, but he proffered no evidence; as with his rugby commentating, there was no evidence he had done any investigation whatsoever.
Harvard authority on energy claims there could be an oil glut in the next decade.
Maugeri’s report, published by the Belfer Center at Harvard University, states: “contrary to what most people believe, oil supply capacity is growing worldwide at such an unprecedented level that it might outpace consumption.”
Advanced recovery techniques, deep water and unconventional sources could actually postpone a “peak” for some time yet.
Maugeri forecasts new global oil production capacity of 49 million barrels per day (mbpd) by 2020, a number that is âunrestrictedâ by real-world circumstances, and âunadjusted for risk.â This constitutes a whopping 53 percent increase over the current claimed capacity of 93 mbpd in just eight years. While impressive, this headline number obscures some important details.
…
We must conclude that the key assumptions about reserve growth and its effect on decline rates in Maugeriâs report are muddled, speculative and unverifiable. And sprinkling those assertions with repeated declamations about how peak oil is a non-issue, insisting repeatedly that the only real constraints on his scenario have to do with political decisions and geopolitical risks, suggests that his report is more about grinding a political axe on behalf of the oil industry than offering a serious or transparent analysis.
It’s all in the analysis, and I heard a radio report that Maugeri is relying on recovering a lot of hard-to-access oil, through processes like frakking (this is not news) – and that is using processes that cause all kinds of environmental harm.
Yep, there’s plenty of oil, we just need to make the planet uninhabitable to access it. But if thats the price our grandchildren have to pay, so be it, it would seem.
An oil company’s reserve capacity has a direct bearing on its share price which in turn drives executive pay. This is why oil company executives are responding to peak oil by redefining ‘resources’ sich as shale as reserve capacity.
There’s a very good explanation of how this works here:
The Ultimate Corporation
JUNE 7, 2012
Bill McKibben
Reviewing:
Private Empire: ExxonMobil and American Power
by Steve Coll
Penguin, 685 pp., $36.00 Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â
All of his stuff is talking about ‘unconventional’ oil, which is the expensive stuff. He may well be right, that we’re still years or even decades away from a peak in All Liquids, but nothing he says suggests that we’ll see a new peak in conventional oil.
In other words, a peak in All Liquids might be some way away, but when it happens, All Liquids will and must be more expensive than they are now for that to happen, because this will only come about by production of expensive and difficult reserves.
Improved technology tends to act more like a super-straw, sucking up the available oil much faster than it otherwise would have been. This gives much higher short-term production rates, and a high peak, but at the cost of longevity in the well. Frankly I’m more interested in technologies that can significantly increase ultimate recoverable reserves, but not the rate of extraction.
This is an aside, although relevant: I’m about 3/4ths of the way through reading Twilight in the Desert
For all oil fields, there is a figure which is the total amount of oil in the specific reservoir, called Oil In Place (OIP). Production of oil fields practically never recovers 100% of OIP, in fact often recovery is around 40-50% of the total OIP.
Here’s a very contrived example to illustrate the point I made above. Imagine you have 10b barrels of oil in a field, but your ultimate recovery with existing technology is going to be 5b barrels. If you produce at 1b barrels per year constant, you will be able to produce the well for 5 years before it depletes. If you create some new technology that lets you produce at 2b barrels per year, but doesn’t increase the recoverable reserves, that same well will now produce for a total of 2.5 years (2.5 * 2b = 5b). If instead you had a new technology that increased the recoverable oil – think tar sands and shale oil/shale gas, then the recoverable oil might go from 5b to 7b. At your original rate of recovery of 1b the well will now last 7 years instead of 5.
Peak Oil is primarily about the rate of recovery, which is what the ‘peak’ is all about. Oil industry people get very excited about new technology that increases flow rates because it makes a field look very profitable, but they often make the basic mistake of assuming high oil flows has increased the total recoverable reserves in a field, but in experience usually all it does is deplete the same amount of oil faster (a ‘super-straw’). Using my example above, some people see oil flows of 2b/year and keep the production life of the well constant at 5 years, now thinking they are going to recover 10b from the field (or 100% OIP in my example), but actually all they end up doing is depleting the field twice as fast as they would have otherwise.
I think Peak Oil, the price pressure and demand destruction world wide is only a good thing for our consumerist society, but on the flip side I’d like to see a very gradual decline in production post-peak as that will give us the best chance of re-organising society to deal with it. A steep decline after peak will be disastrous to society at large. Hence why I’m more interested in technologies that can improve oil recovery, not flow rates.
In short its all about EROEI (energy return over energy invested)…new technologies might make the EROEI better but eventually you go into deficit and the whole thing becomes pointless. Perhaps the real issue is denial, denial that we cant just keep doing this forever because like the last bottle of wine of the night it runs out before the shop opens.
I did once think that it was a desirable thing to avoid a steep decline: for us to live as we are used to, that’s a desirable option. For us to live at all is another issue. Collapse now might be a far more useful thing if this is to be believed. http://arctic-news.blogspot.co.nz/p/global-extinction-within-one-human.html
PS Who knows if the article is good science, true or likely? Could not possibly say, so shall we work on the principle it is too extreme and just ignore it? Or perhaps wait and see whilst we might or might not go past a point of no return? Perhaps BAU and be damned?
A strict focus on EROEI is actually misleading. Broadly it is true, and in the general case going very much below 1 is going to be financially pointless.
But there are cases where it makes sense, for example when you’re converting energy in one form/source to another form/source that is more useful. Lostinsuburbia below highlights one such case: turning natural gas in Canada into tar sands oil. Natural gas is not as easily traded as oil is, because it requires expensive pipelines or facilities to compress/liquidise it, compared to oil which can go on tankers and pipes much more easily. Oil is also a more valuable fuel for transportation than gas is, again thanks to the shipment but also the energy density.
So therefore an EROEI that is below 1 when using gas energy to unlock oil energy is not necessarily economically infeasible, if you had no other direct economic use for that gas energy.
I bet that on an EROEI case this would be well below 1, but the RTG stores and releases energy in a way that other fuels simply cannot, so it doesn’t matter if the EROEI is below 1 because it’s the special properties of the resultant fuel source that you’re interested in, not the net energy.
All you are talking about is an arbitrage, which does delivery utility whilst wasting energy. This delays the evil day energy is all used up , which may or may not be a good thing.
Reading the link I provided might help you think about whether continuing blithely is a good thing?
Lanth is talking about an economic system which rewards the rapid waste of finite, irreplaceable resources (using up natural gas energy to recover a lesser amount of tar sands oil energy).
I bet that on an EROEI case this would be well below 1, but the RTG stores and releases energy in a way that other fuels simply cannot, so it doesnât matter if the EROEI is below 1
Sure, diverting some extra energy doesn’t matter particularly if there is still excess energy available presently.
It will matter when people and communities are starved in order to make available the energy which needs to be invested in a far away elite project. Of course, we have always done this to the third world and the developing world. Now, its becoming increasingly obvious in the West’s own backyard.
I have no doubt the USAF will still be flying F-22’s using jet fuel for years after the rest of us plebs have to walk or bicycle everywhere. In other words, the prioritisation of remaining highly constrained energy expenditures as the ruling classes see fit.
its also the fact that the “unconventional” sources require prodiguous amounts of energy to “extraact” – just look at the dependency of the Alberta Oil Sands on natural gas. There may be huge amounts of energy locked away in such reserves but it would take equally huge amounts to actually access and use it resulting in very low net energy gain.
We’ll just end up trashing the environment in a race to industrial crash unless we use our remaining reserves wisely and start moving towards smarter uses and sources of energy.
“We must conclude that the key assumptions about reserve growth and its effect on decline rates in Maugeriâs report are muddled, speculative and unverifiable. And sprinkling those assertions with repeated declamations about how peak oil is a non-issue, insisting repeatedly that the only real constraints on his scenario have to do with political decisions and geopolitical risks, suggests that his report is more about grinding a political axe on behalf of the oil industry than offering a serious or transparent analysis. Finally we must note that Maugeri is well known for his hostility to peak oil, as is BP, which funded his report. After taking real-world risks, costs, and restrictions into account, the case for peak oilâwhich is about production rates, not production capacity or reservesâseems far more realistic.”
The TV3 Garner smear on Cunliffe initially was damaging to the Party, Shearer and Cunliffe in that order.Â
Â
Following the appalling weak un-real comments from Shearer yesterday that he was happy with Causus discipline, Â the whole affair now damages Shearer and the ABC nasties. Â Cunliffe’s mana is enhanced by Shearer’s handling of this matter.
The Party needs to be united and Cunliffe has the leadership skills to do so.Â
Sometimes you guys sound like Cunliffe is actually Elvis at the 1964 Comeback Special with the slim black full leather jumsuit, singing I’m Just A Hunk-a Hunk-a Burnin’ Love.
The Hawes article he links to is a cold hard financial analysis of the share float of MRP that does not mention Iwi claims or the risks that they pose.  Hawes’ conclusion is that “[o]n all of these measures, MRP comes out well. It is in a good, stable industry providing energy from renewables, but with growth prospects as it sells its expertise in thermal power to other countries. It has strong finances and very good governance and management.”
It would appear that Pagani thinks buying MRP shares is a good idea.
What an unelectable shambles Shearer’s Caucus and it’s advisers are becoming.
They look about as inspiring as the current gov’t….bravo trev and all you other has beens that feared so much for your undeserving arses you undermined the best choice at taking back the power possibly in your own right with DC out front.
Enjoy the warmth of your safe seats, what a disgrace you all are to the history and mana that was the Labour party and the everyday kiwis being left out to dry at the hands of the Hollowmen because of your ego’s…..SHAME !
Well, it appears that the Australian banks aren’t as pure as the driven snow as some would have liked to think:
I received 4,000 emails and in those emails from the banks to the brokers you’d see clearly bank officers instructing the brokers how to have no-loan mortgage insurance, no income necessary, no assets and liability, virtually just get a signature on a document, send it in and we’ll give this person, no matter what their income or affordability criteria is, give them a $500,000 loan.
I’m not sure if this has been mentioned on here yet, but in case it hasn’t.
Steve Keen is going to be giving talks in NZ in September.
The New Zealand and Australian Asset Markets
Friday 7th September in Auckland
The Global Economy
Saturday 8th September in Auckland
Solutions to the Crisis
Monday 10th September in Wellington
Sad grieving families are saying much about the pathetic lack of controls and safety consciousness in adventure tourism as the hearing about the plane crash at Fox Glacier proceeds. It may be that notice will be taken by leading people suffering the responsibility virus. I really hope so.
A young pilot used to automatic trim to keep the rear of his plane in balance was in a different plane at Fox Glacier, which was manual and had to be set before he took off. That’s what I understood from the radio report this morning. I would be trusting this company to know and give the advice its pilot needed so that 9 people didn’t die.
Complacently we undertake selling forays into the world and succeed in attracting tourists, overseas students etc. But then its too often laissez faire which ends up in some tragedy. Disparagingly remarks are made by NZs about other small countries – that we don’t want to turn into a banana republic. But we are already more like a banana republic than we are like an efficient and modern European country to which I think we compare ourselves.
So we must get restraints on our easy-peasy ways and poor oversight of whatever. CAA keeps being castigated. Make sure they do their job and earn their big pay. Bring in an amendment to accident law so that companies can be sued under certain circumstances, even if the government does it as Safety Master. Sharpen up everybody in tourism and don’t try to delegate the overview of work.
Another example of lack of responsibility and hurried, inadequate checks. The CCTV building in Christchurch was signed off, hurried through, certification missed, lacking senior overview. Result 16 people died, or was it more? And the Christchurch Building Inspections Manager under pressure to get things through faster, government made a lot of noise about slow procedures for builders, so in line with current ‘let business govern itself’ he signed off in line with business assurances when there was any argy-bargy. He is dead now, and another one close to the job also. It would make a sad end for a career to face this situation.
And reports about later work that was done to strengthen it, involved boring holes that could have gone through reinforcing rods so weakening the column. The work involved inserting epoxy or something with slurry to set and hold it firm but the slurry may not have keyed to the building and it has been found in that case that the epoxy tube or wedge can be just pulled out by hand. Trust in supposed experts again in doubt.
I see this common theme of she’ll be right recurring through NZ tragedies. We have to sharpen up, be efficient and timely, but thorough. That is if we want to have self-respect as a nation. And the respect of other nations when we speak about anything.
Aren’t those things meant to be the solution for all our energy problems in a post-fossil fuel and post holocene world? Oh, well. Back to the drawing board I guess.
Eventually, engineers could change the Millford reactorâs intake pipe so it draws water from further below the surface, where temperatures are lower, Mr. Holt said. They could also sharpen their pencils and try to determine whether the plant can operate safely with cooling water above 75 degrees, but neither is a short-term project.
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Pencil sharpening, a metaphor for action in the last days of the empire.
The nuclear reactor having the latest trouble was called Millstone. These tech people have no sense of irony, maybe missing some other senses too. Fear?
True lies – it’s all in the pictures. I guess this is why Key does all those photo ops, often while speaking indecipherable gibberish, rather than attempting a rational explanation:
Trusting research over their guts, scientists in New Zealand and Canada examined the phenomenon Stephen Colbert, comedian and news satirist, calls âtruthinessââthe feeling that something is true. In four different experiments they discovered that people believe claims are true, regardless of whether they actually are true, when a decorative photograph appears alongside the claim. The work is published online in the Springer journal, Psychonomic Bulletin & Review.
Think it was the blocking of facebook that has raisedd Penny’s ‘truth’ antennae McFlock.
Sounds odd, thanks Penny. Am so fed up with deceivers,(so I hope your suspicions come to nought) but it pays to keep watch unless,deceptively, they creep up on you. What a sad old world that we have to live in such an atmosphere of distrust, one that really began in earnest with the onset of neoliberalism and ‘self’ above all else..
Infomercial:
Anyone who wants an excuse to make money by any means, and sod the cost,especially human, look to your bright burnished idols like Thatcher, Douglas, Key (especially key) for any and every wickedly spun reason, answer, mindbend possible:
Change your moral outlook to amoral with these gems that you can add to your business ethics portfolio – “politics of envy”, “mums and Dads”, ‘up to the individual’- “no such thing as society’,”breeding for business”, ‘poverty is a lifestyle choice,’ and my personal more specific favourite phrased proudly by key (credit where credit is due) to mothers of an extra child born for whatever reason, being sent to look for part time work when their child is one year old,
“I personally think it is actually helping …… to actually make sure that they get an opportunity to fill their lives.”
” (translation from me ….sorry kids you are not fulfilling enough, away with you…)
I know key is not known for his intelligent rhetoric but on this occasion, and a few others, when he has to ‘lower himself to the occasion’ on behalf of popularity and money, he can produce ‘stunners’.
I’ve read a couple of his books which have been quite thought provoking and would recommend them. The Institute’s website has quite a lot of good stuff too.
Just thought this might be of interest to a few folks on here!
Seriously??? as Minister of Land Information in the Clark Government how many hectares of land went into foreign ownership while this particular one of the Daves looked on…
Wish i didn’t have to make it really, the point that is, sometimes i feel like i am living in 2 parallel Universe,
My apologies to all you die hard Labour-ites, being able to pretend that the present Labour Party is in any way representative of very much of my view of things is becoming increasingly difficult,
Being able to pretend that it was some other Labour Party that held the Treasury Benches for the 9 years previous to this abysmal National one, impossible…
PS, i don’t even see this as a matter of ism’s, more the sheer dishonesty inherent in a Party that while in Government flicked off New Zealand land like there was a factory making the stuff down the street,
What this makes Labour look like is a Party simply interested in Power for the sake of holding it, no principles,no honesty, if there’s a set of iornclad policy anyplace it appears to be doing duty in the ablutions block as you know what,
Perhaps my expectations are far too high and all we can really expect from Labour is that they sit in the Parliament opposing everything this abhorrent National Government does,
So that once the cycle swings the other way Labour can do it instead, the politics of we oppose what your doing because we think we should be doing it…
Yeah, it concerns me that these kinds of measures further restrict the meagre freedoms of the poor, supposedly for the greater good. Apparently only the poor need to change their ways to this end. Maybe if we had some measures that made their lives less shit….
On a related noted, I was interested to see that Whanau Ora will only help those who agree to stop drinking and smoking completely, into affordable, decent housing*. Those “aunties” get their tentacles into every nook and cranny. They seem to be Big Brother’s sisters, and as the trojan horse into ever increasing privatisation of welfare services, disturbing…
Btw, about how much is a bottle of whisky now?
*Will dig out the link if anyone gives a flying f#$k.
Some can only afford Famous Grouse/Grants Capt Morgan etc. See how many products are well below $50 from the link below. And then think of the PAYE person & what they drink. I wonder if those from Labour/Greens have considered only the rtd’s and low cost wine and not consequence of a $2 policy has on spirits
Those that drink single malts have nothing to worry about under this policy, though for curiosity I wonder what $60 would have purchased 20+ years ago, it must have been good as a classic malt in 2000 was about $45 duty free and that was a 1125 bottle !!!. But not everyone can afford such nectar from heaven. http://www.lk.co.nz/spirits/rum.html
Dewar’s white label sitting nicely on the tongue right now. Not a single malt but quite passable for $40. I have a Talisker sitting patiently in the cabinet for more special occasions.
I prefer anything from Islay. Oldest rocks in the UK and some of the oldest anywhere to be found. You can taste every one of the 600-1000 million years in any bottle from here!! http://www.islaynaturalhistory.org/geology/geology.htm
I think that a min pricing is one of many tools to help cure this problem. But IMO $2 being touted is too steep. Better still would be too increase exercise duty then the added price (tax) would benefit NZ not the alcohol industry & the likes of the supermarkets.
Some can only afford Famous Grouse/Grants Capt Morgan etc.
Yes, and?
And then think of the PAYE person & what they drink.
Beer with the occasional top shelf thrown in.
Those that drink single malts have nothing to worry about under this policy, though for curiosity I wonder what $60 would have purchased 20+ years ago, it must have been good as a classic malt in 2000 was about $45 duty free and that was a 1125 bottle !
Glenfiddich (sp?), Johnny Walker (Black Label) – during the 1990s the prices of liquor came down as tariffs and duties were removed.
Hurrah for the Blackshirts! revisited. The Daily Mail reckons Arbeit Macht Frei. Journo Dominique Jackson advises unemployed young grads to lower their sights:
Â
“The German slogan ‘Arbeit Macht Frei’ is somewhat tainted by its connection with Nazi concentration camps, but its essential message, ‘work sets you free’ still has something serious to commend it.
There is dignity to be gained from any job, no matter how menial, and for young people at the start of their careers, there are valuable lessons to be learned from any form of employment, whether that is on the factory floor, on a supermarket till or in the contemporary hard labour camp of a merchant bank or law office.”
I’d say that’s because big charities are now big business in the UK and they’re scrambling for every reduced penny going. Those involved in workfare schemes have sold-out their ethics. I hope they’ve remembered to change their mission statements to reflect their new purpose.
Having walked through the gates of Dachau and seen the remnants of what went on there, that highly offensive phrase needs to be thrown into the dustbin of history.
Fuck the Daily Mail for using it is all I can say.
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Early in the COVID-19 days, the Boris Johnson government pressed a Big Red Button marked: act immediately, never mind about the paperwork.Their problem was: not having enough PPE gear for all the hospital and emergency staff. Their solution was to expedite things and get them the gear ASAP.This, along with ...
Up until 1989, you could attend a New Zealand University, and never need to pay a cent for your education. That then changed, of course. The sadists of the Fourth Labour Government introduced substantial fees for study, never having had to pay a cent for their own education. The even ...
Ele Ludemann writes – Minister for Children Karen Chhour is putting children first: Hon KAREN CHHOUR: I move, That the Oranga Tamariki (Repeal of Section 7AA) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Social Services and Community Committee to consider the bill.Itâs a privilege ...
David Farrar writes – Newshub reports:  Applause and cheers erupted in the House on Wednesday afternoon as Childrenâs Minister Karen Chhour condemned Te PÄti MÄoriâs insults about her upbringing. Chhour, who grew up in state care, is repealing section 7AA of the Oranga Tamariki Act â sparking uproar from ...
I could corrupt youIt would be uglyThey could sedate youBut what good would drugs be?Good Morning all,Today there’s a guest newsletter from Gerard Otto (G). By which I mean I read his post this morning and he has kindly allowed me to share it with you.If you don’t already I ...
Is the solution to any of the serious, long term issues we all have to face as a nation, because many governments of all stripes we can probably all admit if we’re deeply truthful with ourselves haven’t done near enough work at the very times they should have, to basically ...
The 2018 Social Security Act suggests that Labour may have retreated to the minimalist (neo-liberal) welfare state which has developed out of the Richardson-Shipley âredesignâ. One wonders what Michael Joseph Savage, Peter Fraser and Walter Nash would have thought of the Social Security Act passed by the Ardern Labour Government ...
MPs are supposed to serve the public interest, not their own self-interest. And according to the New Zealand Parliamentâs website, democracy and integrity are tarnished whenever politicians seek to enrich themselves or the people they are connected with. For this reason, the Parliament has a âRegister of Pecuniary Interestsâ in ...
By now, most of you will have heard about the FLICC taxonomy of science denial techniques and how you can train your skills in detecting them with the Cranky Uncle game. If you like to quickly check how good you are at this already, answer the 12 quiz questions in the ...
Buzz from the Beehive The hacks of the Parliamentary Press Gallery have been able to chip into a rich vein of material on the governmentâs official website over the past 24 hours. Among the nuggets is the speech by Regional Development Minister Shane Jones and a press statement to announce ...
When Labour was in power, they wasted time, political capital, and scarce policy resources on trying to extend the parliamentary term to four years, in an effort to make themselves less accountable to us. It was unlikely to fly, the idea having previously lost tworeferendums by huge margins - ...
David Farrar writes – The Herald reports: When Whanau Ora chief executive John Tamihere was asked what his expectations for the Budget next Thursday were, he said: âAll hope is lost.â Last year WhÄnau Ora was allocated $163.1 million in the Budget to last for the next four years ...
Nick Hanne writes – There’s a common malady suffered by bureaucracies the world over. They wish to save us from ourselves. Sadly, NZ officials are no less prone to exhibiting symptoms of this occupational condition.Observe, for instance, the reaction from certain public figures to the news ...
Peter Dunne writes – As the city of Tauranga prepares to elect a new Mayor and Council after three and a half years being run by government-appointed Commissioners, the case for replacing the Wellington City Council with Commissioners strengthens. The Wellington City Council has been dysfunctional for years, ...
This will be s short post. It stems from observations I made elsewhere about what might be characterised as some macro and micro aspects of contemporary collective violence events. Here goes. The conflicts between Israel and Palestine and France and … Continue reading → ...
It may be a relic of a previous era of egalitarianism, but many of us like to think that, in general, most New Zealanders are as honest as the day is long. Weâre good like that, and smart as. If weâre not punching above our weight on the world stage, ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Why arenât politicians taking more action on the housing affordability crisis? The answer might lie in the latest âRegister of Pecuniary Interests.â This register contains details of the various financial interests of parliamentarians. It shows that politicians own real estate in significant numbers. The ...
I built a time machine to see you againTo hear your phone callYour voice down the hallThe way we were back thenWe were dancing in the rainOur feet on the pavementYou said I was your second headI knew exactly what you meantIn the country of the blind, or so they ...
Why arenât politicians taking more action on the housing affordability crisis? The answer might lie in the latest âRegister of Pecuniary Interests.â This register contains details of the various financial interests of parliamentarians. It shows that politicians own real estate in significant numbers. The register published on Tuesday contains a ...
Microsoft’s transparency about its failure to meet its own net-zero goals is creditable, but the response to that failure is worrying. It is offering up a set of false solutions, heavily buttressed by baseless optimism. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: Here’s the top six news items of note in ...
Another Friday, another RÄmere Roundup! Here are a few things that caught our eye this week. This Week in Greater Auckland On Monday, our new writer Connor Sharp roared into print with a future-focused take on the proposed Auckland Future Fund, and what it could invest in. On ...
Still Waiting: MÄori land remains in the hands of Non-MÄori. The broken promises of the Treaty remain broken. The mana of the tangata whenua languishes under racist neglect. The right to wear the huia feather remains as elusive as ever. Perhaps these three transformations are beyond the power of a ...
Posters opposing the proposed Fast-Track Approvals legislation were pasted around Wellington last week. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: One of the architects of the RMA and a former National Cabinet Minister, Simon Upton, has criticised the Government’s Fast-Track Approvals bill as potentially disastrous for the environment, arguing just 1% ...
There was less sharing of the joy this week than at the Chinese New Year celebrations in February. China’s ambassador to NZ (2nd from right above) has toldLuxon that relations between China and New Zealand are now at a ‘critical juncture’ Photo: Getty / Xinhua News AgencyTL;DR: The podcast ...
The importance of New Zealand’s relationship with China was surely demonstrated yesterday with the surprise arrival in the capital of top Chinese foreign policy official Liu Jianchao. The trip was apparently organized a week ago but kept secret. Liu is the Minister of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) International Liaison ...
With a crushing 20-plus point lead in the opinion polls, all the signs are that Labour leader Keir Starmer will be the PM after the general election on 4 July, called by Conservative incumbent Rishi Sunak yesterday. The stars are aligned for Starmer. Rival progressives are in abeyance: the Liberal-Democrat ...
We returned last week from England to London. Two different worlds. A quarter of an hour before dropping off our car, we came to a complete stop on the M25. Just moments before, there had been six lanes of hurtling cars and lorries. Now, everything was at a standstill as ...
Buzz from the Beehive A triumvirate of ministers â holding the Agriculture, Environment and RMA Reform portfolios â has announced the introduction of legislation âto slash the tangle of red and green tape throttling development in key sectorsâ, such as farming, mining and other primary industries. The exact name of ...
The Social Services and Community Committee has called for submissions on the Oranga Tamariki (Repeal of Section 7AA) Amendment Bill. Submissions are due by Wednesday, 3 July 2024, and can be made at the link above. And if you're wondering what to say: section 7AA was enacted because Oranga Tamariki ...
Michael Reddell writes – The Reserve Bank doesnât do independent fiscal forecasts so there is no news in the fiscal numbers in todayâs Monetary Policy Statement themselves. The last official Treasury forecasts donât take account of whatever the government is planning in next weekâs Budget, and as the Bank notes ...
Rob MacCulloch writes – We know the old saying, “Never trust a politician”, and the Charter School debate is a good example of it. Charter Schools receive public funding, yet “are exempt from most statutory requirements of traditional public schools, including mandates around .. human capital management .. curriculum ...
How Do We Silence Them? The ruling obsession of the contemporary Left is that political action undertaken by individuals or groups further to the right than the liberal wings of mainstream conservative parties should not only be condemned, but suppressed.WEB OF CHAOS, a âdeep dive into the world of disinformationâ, ...
Muriel Newman writes –Â As the new Government puts the finishing touches to this monthâs Budget, they will undoubtedly have had their hands full dealing with the economic mess that Labour created. Not only was Labour a grossly incompetent manager of the economy, but they also set out ...
Today the British PM, Rishi Sunak, called a general election for the 4th of July. He spoke of the challenging times and of strong leadership and achievements. It was as if he was talking about someone else, a real leader, rather than he himself or the woeful list of Tory ...
This post marks the return of an old format: Photo of the Day. Recently I was in an apartment in one of those new buildings on Great North Road Grey Lynn at rush hour, perfect day, the view was stunning, so naturally I whipped out my phone: GNR 5pm Turns ...
The Government may struggle with the political optics of scrapping assistance for first home buyers while also cutting the tax burden on landlords, increasing concerns over the growing generational divide. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The Government confirmed it will dump first home buyer grants in the Budget next ...
Yesterday, the Reserve Bank confirmed there will be no free card for the economy to get out of jail during the current term of the Government. Regardless of what the Budget next week says, we are in for three years of austerity. Over those three years, we will have to ...
It doesnât inspire confidence when politicians change their minds. But you must give credit when a bad idea is dropped. Last year, we reported on the determination of British PM Rishi Sunak to lead the world in regulating the dangers of Artificial Intelligence. Perhaps he changed his mind after meeting ...
This video includes conclusions of the creator climate scientist Dr. Adam Levy. It is presented to our readers as an informed perspective. Please see video description for references (if any). Is carbon dioxide removal - aka "negative emissions" - going to save us from climate change? Or is it just a ...
Headed for the legislative wastepaper basket…Â Â Buzz from the Beehive It looks like this government is just as ready as its predecessor to dip into the public funds it is managing to dispense millions of dollars to finance – and favour – the parties it fancies. Or ...
Rob MacCulloch writes – National and Labour and ACT have at various times waxed on about their “vision” of NZ as a high value-added world tech centerWhat subject is tech based upon? Mathematics. A Chicago mathematician just told me that whereas last decade ...
Eric Crampton writes – Danyl McLauchlan over at The Listener on the recent shift toward more contestability in public policy advice in education: Education Minister Erica Stanford, one of Nationalâs highest-ranked MPs, is trying to circumvent the establishment, taking advice from a smaller pool of experts â ...
Ele Ludemann writes – That KÄinga Ora is a mess is no surprise, but the size of the mess is. There have been many reports of unruly tenants given licence to terrorise neighbours, properties bought and left vacant, and the state agency paying above market rates in competition ...
Bryce Edwards writes –Â Itâs being explained as an âinadvertent errorâ. However, National MP David MacLeodâs excuse for failing to disclose $178,000 in donations for his election campaign last year is not necessarily enough to prevent some serious consequences. A Police investigation is now likely, and the result ...
The scathing âindependentâ review of KÄinga Ora barely hit the table before the coalition government had acted on it. The entire KÄinga Ora board will be replaced, and a new chair (Simon Moutter) has been announced. Hmm. No aspersions on Bill English, but the public would have had more confidence ...
I'll light the fireYou place the flowers in the vaseThat you bought todayA warm dry home, you’d think that would be bread and butter to politicians. Home ownership and making sure people aren’t left living on the street, that’s as Kiwi as Feijoa and Apple Crumble. Isn’t it?The coalition are ...
Politics is about compromise, right? And framing it so the voters see your compromise as the better one. John Key was a skilful exponent of this approach (as was Keith Holyoake in an earlier age), and Chris Luxon isnât too bad either. But in politics, the process whereby an old ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
Itâs being explained as an âinadvertent errorâ. However, National MP David MacLeodâs excuse for failing to disclose $178,000 in donations for his election campaign last year is not necessarily enough to prevent some serious consequences. A Police investigation is now likely, and the result of his non-disclosure could even see ...
The relentless drone coming out of the Prime Minister and his deputy for a million days now has been that the last government was just hosing money all over the show and now at last the grownups are in charge and shutting that drunken sailor stuff down. There is a word ...
Buzz from the Beehive Foreign Minister Winston Peters has confirmed a New Zealand Government plane will head to riot-torn New Caledonia in the next hour in the first in a series of proposed flights to begin bringing New Zealanders home. Todayâs flight will carry around 50 passengers with the most ...
Precious declaration saysYours is yours and mine you leave alone nowPrecious declaration saysI believe all hope is dead no longerTick tick tick Boom!Unexploded ordnance. A veritable minefield. A National caucus with a large number of unknowns, candidates who perhaps received little in the way of vetting as the party jumped ...
Rex Ahdar writes –Â The Rt Hon Winston Peters, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, likes to trace his political lineage back to the pioneers of parliamentary Maoridom. Â I will refer to these as the âbig fourâ or better still, the Four Knights. Just as ...
Bryce Edwards writes –Â Willie Jackson will participate in the prestigious Oxford Union debate on Thursday, following in David Langeâs footsteps. Coincidentally, Jackson has also followed Langeâs footsteps by living in his old home in South Auckland. And like Lange, Jackson might be the sort of loud-mouth scrapper ...
That is the only way to describe an MP "forgetting" to declare $178,000 in donations. The amount of money involved - more than five times the candidate spending cap, and two and a half times the median income - is boggling. How do you just "forget" that amount of money? ...
In this week’s “A View from Afar” podcast Selwyn Manning and spoke about the upcoming US elections and what the possibility of another Trump presidency means for the US role in world affairs. We also spoke about the problems Joe … Continue reading → ...
Hi,Two years ago I briefly featured in Justin Pemberton’s Web of Chaos documentary, which touched on things like QAnon during the pandemic.I mostly prattled on about how intertwined conspiracy narratives are with Evangelical Christian thinking, something Webworm’s explored in the past.(The doc is available on TVNZ+, if you’re not in ...
The Government is leaving the entire construction sector and the community housing sector in limbo. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The Government released the long-awaited Bill English-led review of Kāinga Ora yesterday, but delayed key decisions on its build plan and how to help community housing providers (CHPs) build ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Daisy Simmons Farmers who can’t sleep, worrying they’ll lose everything amid increasing drought. Youth struggling with depression over a future that feels hopeless. Indigenous people grief-stricken over devastated ecosystems. For all these people and more, climate change is taking a clear toll ...
New Zealand’s relationship with China is becoming harder to define, and with that comes a worry that a deteriorating political relationship could spill over into the economic relationship. It is about more than whether New Zealand will join Pillar Two of Aukus, though the Chinese Ambassador, more or less, suggested ...
Been hoping we would see something like this from Sir Geoffrey Palmer. This is excellent.The present Bill goes further than the National Development Act 1979 in stripping away procedures designed to ensure that environmental issues are properly considered. The 1979 approach was not acceptable then and this present approach is ...
Heâs Got The Moxie: Only Willie Jackson possesses the credentials to meld together a new Labour message that is, at one and the same moment, staunchly working-class, union-friendly, and which speaks to the hundreds-of-thousands of urban MÄori untethered to the neo-tribal capitalist elites of the Iwi Leaders Forum.ITâS ONE OF THE ...
Tree-huggers may well accuse the Government of giving them the fingers, after Energy Minister Simeon Brown announced new measures to protect powerlines from trees, rather than measures to protect trees from powerlines. It can be no coincidence, surely, that this has been announced at the same as Fisheries Minister Shane Jones ...
Willie Jackson will participate in the prestigious Oxford Union debate on Thursday, following in David Lange’s footsteps. Coincidentally, Jackson has also followed Langeâs footsteps by living in his old home in South Auckland. And like Lange, Jackson might be the sort of loud-mouth scrapper who could take over the Labour ...
Today New Zealand First will introduce a Memberâs Bill that will protect New Zealanders' right of free speech. The âProtection of Freedom of Expression Billâ will ensure that no organisation or individual, when acting within the law, is unreasonably denied use of a public venue for an organised event or ...
The Green Party unequivocally condemns the governing partiesâ attempts to limit the publicâs say on the controversial MÄori wards legislation, after the select committee considering the legislation set a deadline for submissions of just five days. ...
Disabled children and families nationwide have recently found out theyâre no longer able to use disability support funding for programmes during school hours in another quiet update from the Government. ...
Following a horrific case of stalking that ended in tragedy, Labourâs police spokesperson Ginny Andersen has drafted a bill that would add stalking to the Crimes Act. ...
The Rt Hon Winston Peters, joined by Mike King, has announced $24 million over four years for the âI Am Hope Foundationâ, and will provide young people aged between 5 to 25 years with free mental health counselling services.  This funding will help I Am Hopeâs âGumboot Fridayâ initiative give ...
Te PÄti MÄori have launched a petition to stop the repeal of Section 7AA from the Oranga Tamariki Act. This announcement comes prior to the first reading of the Section 7AA repeal bill in Parliament today. âSection 7AA forces the Government to adhere to Te Tiriti o Waitangi with respect ...
The Government has yet again failed to do the one thing that needs to happen to ensure houses can be built â commit to ongoing funding, Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said. ...
Treasury officials have outlined many ways in which the Fast Track Approvals Bill is deeply flawed, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking says. ...
Green Party co-leaders Marama Davidson and ChlÜe Swarbrick used this year's State of the Planet to call on the Government to prioritise people and planet as the delivery of the Budget approaches. A full transcript of their speeches can be found below. ...
Green Party co-leaders Marama Davidson and ChlĂśe Swarbrick have used their State of the Planet speeches to challenge the Government to prioritise people and planet over profit as the delivery of the Budget approaches. ...
More than 4,500 jobs are set to go as the National Government continues its deep cuts to services to pay for irresponsible and ill-timed tax cuts. Â ...
The Governmentâs introduction of legislation that would enable landlords to end tenancies with no reason marks a dark day for the 1.4 million people who rent their home in Aotearoa. ...
The Minister for Mental Health has found the Suicide Prevention Office and mental health support for 111 calls slipping through his fingers, says Labour spokesperson for Mental Health Ingrid Leary. ...
Todayâs justification from the Minister for Children for scrapping protections for our tamariki was either a case of ignorance or deliberate deception. ...
The Green Party says the Governmentâs misguided policy on gangs will fail, following the announcement of the establishment of a national gang unit and district gang disruption units to target gang activities. ...
âWith Police pay negotiations still unresolved after six months in Government, Mark Mitchell has today rolled the Commissioner out for a rebrand of their approach to gang crime,â Labour police spokesperson Ginny Andersen said.  ...
The Government bringing back 50 charter schools will not increase achievement and is a distraction from the core mission of the education system, Labour education spokesperson Jan Tinetti said. ...
Te PÄti MÄori is showing extreme concern over the Environment Select Committees adoption of a lucky dip draw to determine hearings for the Fast Track Approvals bill. Of the 27,000 submissions, 2,900 requested to present. All organisations will be heard; however, the remaining 2,350 submitters will be subject to a ...
Today New Zealand First will introduce a Memberâs Bill that will protect womenâs spaces. The âFair Access to Bathrooms Billâ will require, primarily in the interest and safety of women and girls, that all new non-domestic publicly accessible buildings provide separate, clearly demarcated, unisex and single sex bathrooms. This Bill ...
The Green Party is welcoming Climate Change Minister Simon Wattsâ continuation of Hon. James Shawâs cross-party work on climate adaptation, now in the form of a Finance and Expenditure Committee Inquiry. ...
The National Government plans to cut 390 jobs at ACC, including roles in the areas of prevention of sexual violence, road safety and workplace safety. ...
The Government has been caught in opposition to evidence once again as it looks to usher in tried, tested and failed work seminar obligations for job-seeking beneficiaries. ...
This morningâs pre-Budget speech from the Minister of Finance offered no âmeaningfulâ news on the Governmentâs trickle-down economics based plans. ...
The Green Party is welcoming the announcement by the Minister Responsible for RMA Reform Chris Bishop to approve most of the Wellington City Councilâs District Plan recommendations. ...
David Seymour has failed to get the sweeping cuts he wanted to the free and healthy school lunch programme, Labour education spokesperson Jan Tinetti said. ...
Hon Willie Jackson has been invited by the Oxford Union to debate the motion âThis House Believes British Museums are not Very Britishâ on May 23rd. ...
Over the next four years, Budget 24 will support the training and recruitment of 1,500 teachers into the workforce, Education Minister Erica Stanford announced today. âTo raise achievement and develop a world leading education system weâre investing nearly $53 million over four years to attract, train and retain our valued ...
1.  New Zealand Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Rt Hon Winston Peters; Minister of Health and Minister for Pacific Peoples Hon Dr Shane Reti; and Minister for Climate Change Hon Simon Watts hosted Cook Islands Minister of Foreign Affairs and Immigration Hon Tingika Elikana and Minister of Health Hon Vainetutai Rose Toki-Brown on 24 May ...
The Government has approved two-year extensions for four New Zealand Defence Force deployments to the Middle East and Africa, Defence Minister Judith Collins and Foreign Minister Winston Peters announced today. âThese deployments are long-standing New Zealand commitments, which reflect our ongoing interest in promoting peace and stability, and making active ...
The Climate Change Commission Chair, Dr Rod Carr, has confirmed his plans to retire at the end of his term later this year, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. âPrior to the election, Dr Carr advised me he would be retiring when his term concluded. Dr Rod Carr has led ...
Nine highly respected experts have been appointed to the inaugural board of the new Integrity Sport and Recreation Commission, Sport & Recreation Minister Chris Bishop says. âThe Integrity Sport and Recreation Commission is a new independent Crown entity which was established under the Integrity Sport and Recreation Act last year, ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters confirmed today that Vote Foreign Affairs in Budget 2024 will balance two crucial priorities of the Coalition Government.  While Budget 2024 reflects the constrained fiscal environment, the Government also recognises the critical role MFAT plays in keeping New Zealanders safe and prosperous.  âConsistent with ...
New social housing funding in Budget 2024 will ensure the Government can continue supporting more families into warm, dry homes from July 2025, Housing Ministers Chris Bishop and Tama Potaka say. âEarlier this week I was proud to announce that Budget 2024 allocates $140 million to fund 1,500 new social ...
Introduction Today, we are sharing a red-letter occasion. A Blackball event on hallowed ground. Today we underscore the importance of our mineral estate. A reminder that our natural resource sector has much to offer. Such a contribution will not come to pass without investment. However, more than money is needed. ...
Increasing national and regional prosperity, providing the minerals needed for new technology and the clean energy transition, and doubling the value of minerals exports are the bold aims of the Governmentâs vision for the minerals sector. Resources Minister Shane Jones today launched a draft strategy for the minerals sector in ...
The coalition Governmentâs legislation to restore the rights of communities to determine whether to introduce MÄori wards has passed its first reading in Parliament, Local Government Minister Simeon Brown says. âDivisive changes introduced by the previous government denied local communities the ability to determine whether to establish MÄori wards.â The ...
The coalition Government has today introduced legislation to slash the tangle of red and green tape throttling some of New Zealandâs key sectors, including farming, mining and other primary industries. RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop says the Government is committed to unlocking development and investment while ensuring the environment is ...
The decision by Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) to approve the continued use of hydrogen cyanamide, known as Hi-Cane, has been welcomed by Environment Minister Penny Simmonds and Agriculture Minister Todd McClay. âThe EPA decision introduces appropriate environmental safeguards which will allow kiwifruit and other growers to use Hi-Cane responsibly,â Ms ...
Kia ora, NgÄ mihi nui ki a koutou kÄtoa TÄmaki Herenga Waka, TÄmaki Herenga tangata NgÄ mihi ki ngÄ mana whenua o tÄnei rohe NgÄti WhÄtua Ĺ ĹrÄkei me nga iwi kÄtoa kua tae mai. Mauriora. Greetings everyone. Thank you to the EMA for hosting this event. Let me acknowledge ...
The coalition Government is investing in social housing for New Zealanders who are most in need of a warm dry home, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. Budget 2024 will allocate $140 million in new funding for 1,500 new social housing places to be provided by Community Housing Providers (CHPs), not ...
Thousands more young New Zealanders will have better access to mental health services as the Government delivers on its commitment to fund the Gumboot Friday initiative, says Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters and Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey. âBudget 2024 will provide $24 million over four years to contract the ...
The Coalition Governmentâs Residential Tenancies Amendment Bill, which will improve tenancy laws and help increase the supply of rental properties, has passed its first reading in Parliament says Housing Minister Chris Bishop. âThe Bill proposes much-needed changes to the Residential Tenancies Act 1986 that will remove barriers to increasing private ...
Standing here in Cassino War Cemetery, among the graves looking up at the beautiful Abbey of Montecassino, it is hard to imagine the utter devastation left behind by the battles which ended here in May 1944. Hundreds of thousands of shells and bombs of every description left nothing but piled ...
I present a legislative statement on the Oranga Tamariki (Repeal of Section 7AA) Amendment Bill Mr. Speaker, I move that the Oranga Tamariki (Repeal of Section 7AA) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Social Services and Community Committee to consider the Bill. Thank you, Mr. ...
The Bill to repeal Section 7AA of the Oranga Tamariki Act has had its first reading in Parliament today. The Bill reaffirms the Coalition Governmentâs commitment to the care and safety of children in care, says Minister for Children Karen Chhour. âWhen I became the Minister for Children, I made ...
Kia ora koutou, good morning, and zao shang hao. Thank you Fran for the opportunity to speak at the 2024 China Business Summit â itâs great to be here today. Iâd also like to acknowledge: Simon Bridges - CEO of the Auckland Chamber of Commerce. His Excellency Ambassador - Wang ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has confirmed a New Zealand Government plane will head to New Caledonia in the next hour in the first in a series of proposed flights to begin bringing New Zealanders home.  âNew Zealanders in New Caledonia have faced a challenging few days - and bringing ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has confirmed a New Zealand Government plane will head to New Caledonia in the next hour in the first in a series of proposed flights to begin bringing New Zealanders home. âNew Zealanders in New Caledonia have faced a challenging few days - and bringing them ...
The Coalition Government will introduce legislation this year that will enable roadside drug testing as part of our commitment to improve road safety and restore law and order, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. âAlcohol and drugs are the number one contributing factor in fatal road crashes in New Zealand. In ...
The Government has announced a series of immediate actions in response to the independent review of KÄinga Ora â Homes and Communities, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. âKÄinga Ora is a large and important Crown entity, with assets of $45 billion and over $2.5 billion of expenditure each year. It ...
Associate Health Minister David Seymour is pleased that Pseudoephedrine can now be purchased by the general public to protect them from winter illness, after the coalition government worked swiftly to change the law and oversaw a fast approval process by Medsafe. âPharmacies are now putting the medicines back on their ...
TÄnÄ koutou katoa.âŻDa jia hao.  Good morning everyone.  Prime Minister Luxon, your excellency, a great friend of New Zealand and my friend Ambassador Wang, Mayor of what he tells me is the best city in New Zealand, Wayne Brown, the highly respected Fran OâSullivan, Champion of the Auckland business ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has announced that the Government will make it easier for lines firms to take action to remove vegetation from obstructing local powerlines. The change will ensure greater security of electricity supply in local communities, particularly during severe weather events. âTrees or parts of trees falling on ...
Wairarapa Moana ki Pouakani were the top winners at this yearâs Ahuwhenua Trophy awards recognising the best in MÄori dairy farming. MÄori Development Minister Tama Potaka announced the winners and congratulated runners-up, WhakatĹhea MÄori Trust Board, at an awards celebration also attended by Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Finance Minister ...
"On the 27th of March, I sought assurances from the Chief Executive, Department of Internal Affairs, that the Departmentâs correct processes and policies had been followed in regards to a passport application which received media attention,â says Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden. âI raised my concerns after being ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins has announced the appointment of three new District Court Judges, to replace Judges who have recently retired. Peter James Davey of Auckland has been appointed a District Court Judge with a jury jurisdiction to be based at Whangarei. Mr Davey initially started work as a law clerk/solicitor with ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour is calling on the Post Primary Teachersâ Association (PPTA) to put ideology to the side and focus on studentsâ learning, in reaction to the union holding paid teacher meetings across New Zealand about charter schools.⯠âŻÂ âThe PPTA is disrupting schools up and down the ...
Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly today announced the appointment of Craig Stobo as the new chair of the Financial Markets Authority (FMA). Mr Stobo takes over from Mark Todd, whose term expired at the end of April. Mr Stoboâs appointment is for a five-year term. âThe FMA plays ...
Surf Life Saving New Zealand and Coastguard New Zealand will continue to be able to keep people safe in, on, and around the water following a funding boost of $63.644 million over four years, Transport Minister Simeon Brown and Associate Transport Minister Matt Doocey say. âHeading to the beach for ...
New Zealand and Tuvalu have reaffirmed their close relationship, Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters says. âNew Zealand is committed to working with Tuvalu on a shared vision of resilience, prosperity and security, in close concert with Australia,â says Mr Peters, who last visited Tuvalu in 2019. âIt is my pleasure ...
New Zealand is gravely concerned about the situation in New Caledonia, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. âThe escalating situation and violent protests in NoumĂŠa are of serious concern across the Pacific Islands region,â Mr Peters says. âThe immediate priority must be for all sides to take steps to de-escalate the ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon met today with Samoaâs O le Ao o le Malo, Afioga Tuimalealiifano Vaaletoa Sualauvi II, who is making a State Visit to New Zealand. âHis Highness and I reflected on our two countriesâ extensive community links, with SamoanâNew Zealanders contributing to all areas of our national ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has announced that he has approved Waiheke Island ferry operator Island Direct to be eligible for SuperGold Card funding, paving the way for a commercial agreement to bring the operator into the scheme. âIsland Direct started operating in November 2023, offering an additional option for people ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters today announced further sanctions on 28 individuals and 14 entities providing military and strategic support for Russiaâs invasion of Ukraine. âRussia is directly supported by its military-industrial complex in its illegal aggression against Ukraine, attacking its sovereignty and territorial integrity. New Zealand condemns all entities and ...
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[deleted]
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/most-australians-back-assange-poll-finds-20120808-23uwh.html#ixzz23S2qn2xL
[lprent: Small quotes and link rather than whole articles. You’re also lacking any of your opinion. This isn’t a newspaper. We want to see what you think. ]
Just don’t fall asleep around him. đ
Just don’t fall asleep around him đ
Â
FIFY
Just donât fall asleep around him.
Idiot. You need to do some reading on this topic; after you’ve learned a little bit, I doubt that you’ll continue with your lame, politically driven “jokes”.
The poll is only about Assange’s chances if he is ever asked to stand trial in America over the leaks. There is no indication that Aussies support his cowardice in relation to the sexual assault investigation and the majority do consider the Aussie government’s consular support of him so far in that matter to be adequate.
…his cowardice in relation to the sexual assault investigation
I know that you are only trying to provoke, but surely even you know that there is no evidence whatsoever that Assange committed sexual assault.
Only formal complaints from two women. But I guess that doesn’t mean much, does it.
Something called “OneTrack” seems a tad confused….
Only formal complaints from two women.
There were no complaints from them. The women were inveigled, probably threatened, into complying with this bizarre attempt to snare Assange.
But I guess that doesnât mean much, does it.
The Women Against Rape organization does not think the allegations have any credibility.
Right. So they didn’t go to the police – the cops just turned up on their doorstep saying “we’re going to press charges, you have to go along with it. Oh, and here’s a lawyer who we will make represent you, so when we drop the investigation he’ll appeal the decision ‘on your behalf’ so we can look at the matter again and restart the investigation we already dropped “.
    Â
The Swedish and English judicial systems seem to think the allegations are reasonable enough to investigate/extradite. But you got the interwebz so you know exactly what’s happened.
Reasonable enough to extradite him to Guantanamo Bay? That seems a bit over the top doesn’t it? đ
It does indeed. Which is why I think it’s just an excuse used by groupies who can’t think of a more likely reason someone would want to dodge a sexual assault investigation.
   Â
Apparently Assange has been panning to skip to Ecuador for almost a year. Did he tell this to the people who put up his bail money?Â
Right. So they didnât go to the police â the cops just turned up on their doorstep saying âweâre going to press charges, you have to go along with it. Oh, and hereâs a lawyer who we will make represent you, so when we drop the investigation heâll appeal the decision âon your behalfâ so we can look at the matter again and restart the investigation we already dropped â.
Someone—and it was certainly not the Swedish police—used the women in order to press this ludicrous and uniquely Swedish statute into service as a weapon to use against the most dangerous political dissenter in the world.
The Swedish and English judicial systems seem to think the allegations are reasonable enough to investigate/extradite.
Nobody with any integrity in or outside of the legal system thinks these allegations have a shred of credibility. People like you were persuaded by the compliance and silence of key British legal and government officials in 2003 to accept the bogus case to attack Iraq. You’re impressed and gulled not by authority, but by power.
But you got the interwebz so you know exactly whatâs happened.
There you go with your trivialization strategy again. I know a lot more than you do about this because I read seriously and widely, and I can discriminate between what is serious journalism and what is nothing more than black propaganda. Of course I don’t know exactly what happened; what I do know is what you also know but lack the integrity to admit: that this “case” against Assange is as robust as the 1960 case against Martin Luther King for driving in Georgia on an Alabama license.
Oh my god – are you still promulgating the “sex by surprise” myth? Maybe you need to go to the source. Show me where it says “sex by surprise”.
   Â
I love how you deny the women involved any possible agency in dealing with their own sexual assault allegations – they must have been manipulated or “used” by others. Maybe they are telling the truth and without ulterior motive. Not definitely. Just maybe. In which case it’s not St Julian who’s being victimised and harrassed, is it?
  Â
BTW, if you still believe the “sex by surprise” slur, you “know” fuck all.
 Â
And I cannot believe you just compared Assange to MLK.Â
Â
“I cannot believe you just compared Assange to MLK.”
Of course not. Martin Luther King was traduced by the FBI—although people like you will deny the evidence of that—and ridiculed by the establishment. He spoke out trenchantly against his country’s destruction of Indo-China, thus incurring undying resentment and hatred from the “liberal” establishment. He also “got with” many of the women who were drawn to him and no doubt had he lived longer, would have suffered a concocted campaign of outrage about an invented incident of rape.
Clearly there are no comparisons obvious to everybody else but yourself.
oh, by the way – if you know so much about it, did Assange tell the people who stumped up his not insubstantial bail money that he had spent months planning to skip the country and leave them out of pocket?Â
ooo – the Olympics are over! Ecuador will soon be deciding if they’ll let Assange flee a sexual assault investigation!
    Â
Just for you guys. Don’t say I don’t help out.
http://lpickering.net/item/8468
Just for you guys. Donât say I donât help out.
Unfunny.
I thought it was quite topical and in line with your original comment…………
Y’know, the accusation is that Assange exhibits inappropriate sexual behaviours. Two complaints from two women relating to (more or less) the same point in time. But where are the other complaints? Don’t know why no-one has picked up on the fact that aside from when the victim of sexual predation (or whatever) is specific and therefore unique, the perpetrator usually has a history of the behaviour complained of. And people emerge from that history when some-one finally does complain or have charges laid or whatever. But in the case of Assange? Nothing. Now, why would that be?
You’ve obviously got a point to make Bill.
why don’t you spit it out.
Its a convenient reason to get him to Guantanomo Bay with a quick stopover in Stockholm.
Youâve obviously got a point to make Bill.
why donât you spit it out.
You know perfectly well what his point was. But just to confirm what you already know but lack the integrity to admit: the allegations against Assange are baseless, ludicrous, fantastical, and vicious. The “case” against Assange makes the case—giraffes in the basement and all—against Peter Ellis look robust.
What, Bill? You mean people don’t or can’t change behaviour (for better or worse) when their situation/ circumstances/ opportunity change?
What, Bill? You mean people donât or canât change behaviour (for better or worse) when their situation/ circumstances/ opportunity change?
There is no evidence against Assange, rosy. Why don’t you have the courage to just admit it? Better still, do some reading on this affair. Serious reading, that is—not simply accepting what the comedy writers on the Grauniad staff come up with.
Banks and MMP – this guy actually doesn’t understand the debate.
He is rambling on about this current stable government would have been affected.
Banks did not benefit from either of the two proposed adjustments – “threshold and coat-tailing”. ACT and UF have electorate seats only.
Since when has reality got in the way of a Banks rant?
I heard Banks say on tele last night something to the effect:
“it (the recommendations) opens everything up to gerrymandering…”.
Fortunately I’d just put my coffee mug back on the table.
Intellectually and morally Bank-rupt…. (“that donation was anonymous”)
And Bank’s understanding of Gerrymandering, is anything that Gerry Brownlee want’s.
Very good David H.
I believe Banks is under the impression that he still has a party, and that he is a good chance to bring in more MPs on his coat tails next time.
Then again, he forgot how he managed to acquire thousands of dollars, so maybe his mind really is going.
He probably hasn’t read the commissions’ report, so it’s a bit tough to expect him to take responsibilty for his comments on it.
When ACT finally dies I and the thousands of others who went through the Auckland local government restructure will be there to tramp the dirt down on their political graves, good and hard.
Make sure you also plant garlic and spread holy water around.
My thoughts on his rant on Radio NZ National this morning was that he has also “forgotten” that he is now supposedly ACT not National when he claimed that National will not agree to the changes as if he was their spokesperson.
Katrina Williams, an IRD section director, said in the documents: “In Australia, we are taking legal action and when this fails, issue bankruptcy proceedings when overseas-based borrowers have not paid.”
That would mean that the IRD could get a New Zealand court judgment transferred to Australia, where it would then be enforced.
[lprent: fixed the link. ]
I think it’s just more bluster designed to cover up how stupid student loans are and deflect attention from more serious problems, such as avoidance and evasion by the rich. Australia told them about a year ago that they weren’t interested.
New Zealand has won its sixth gold medal of the Olympics after Valerie Adams’ rival Nadzeya Ostapchuk tested positive for drugs and was stripped of gold.
Tony Johnston, correct?
Bugga ! As much as this is great for Adams it’s a really bad outcome for truth and a fair go as the redneck talkback feeding monkeys that pass for journalists in this country will feel vindicated and ignore the baseless allegations they made and claiim ‘moral high ground’
The fact that Ostapchuk threw, was it 3 national records in about a 10 day period not long before the olympics, in her own country, would have at least begged the question.
Its not like she was throwing world records though, so perhaps not overt in its warnings, but seems to this point was, “enhanced”.
Agree about the red neck media, I find the pundits are simply a mirror of those they preside over, and its a little bit like chicken and egg, which idiot came first the pundit or the fan!
A lot of people, including me, felt that the pattern of her performance over the last ten years did not support the recent radical gain in her outcomes. Speculation is not of itself an indication of redneckery, by which I presume you mean a mean-spirited refusal to recognize merit?
From what I just heard on 3 News, yes. They’re talking about the Belorussian woman as if she is the embodiment of all evil…
I wouldn’t care at all, if it didn’t remind me of the American comments in previous Olympics, that all Eastern European women athletes and competitors were all men in disguise.Â
There were comments about how difficult it’s going to be to get Valerie’s medal from around the neck of that evil, lying Russian medal thief!
Â
That’s the sort of thing that has made me loathe and despise sport all my life.
Tony Johnston, correct?
He was correct, due to sheer dumb luck. He immediately started bawling that the Belorussian was a drug cheat, but he proffered no evidence; as with his rugby commentating, there was no evidence he had done any investigation whatsoever.
Oil isn’t running out: expert
Advanced recovery techniques, deep water and unconventional sources could actually postpone a “peak” for some time yet.
Your link doesn’t work.
You mean this Maugeri, who works for the Italian oil company ENI and a senior fellow at a BP-funded center at Harvard University?
http://ftalphaville.ft.com/blog/2012/07/24/1094111/is-peak-oil-dead/
It’s all in the analysis, and I heard a radio report that Maugeri is relying on recovering a lot of hard-to-access oil, through processes like frakking (this is not news) – and that is using processes that cause all kinds of environmental harm.
Yep, there’s plenty of oil, we just need to make the planet uninhabitable to access it. But if thats the price our grandchildren have to pay, so be it, it would seem.
An oil company’s reserve capacity has a direct bearing on its share price which in turn drives executive pay. This is why oil company executives are responding to peak oil by redefining ‘resources’ sich as shale as reserve capacity.
There’s a very good explanation of how this works here:
The Ultimate Corporation
JUNE 7, 2012
Bill McKibben
Reviewing:
Private Empire: ExxonMobil and American Power
by Steve Coll
Penguin, 685 pp., $36.00 Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2012/jun/07/ultimate-corporation/?pagination=false
The question is rather whether supply of oil will keep up with demand for oil.
At 7 billion world population and rising, there may well be a problem.
All of his stuff is talking about ‘unconventional’ oil, which is the expensive stuff. He may well be right, that we’re still years or even decades away from a peak in All Liquids, but nothing he says suggests that we’ll see a new peak in conventional oil.
In other words, a peak in All Liquids might be some way away, but when it happens, All Liquids will and must be more expensive than they are now for that to happen, because this will only come about by production of expensive and difficult reserves.
Improved technology tends to act more like a super-straw, sucking up the available oil much faster than it otherwise would have been. This gives much higher short-term production rates, and a high peak, but at the cost of longevity in the well. Frankly I’m more interested in technologies that can significantly increase ultimate recoverable reserves, but not the rate of extraction.
Can you explain that a bit more Lanth?
This is an aside, although relevant: I’m about 3/4ths of the way through reading Twilight in the Desert
For all oil fields, there is a figure which is the total amount of oil in the specific reservoir, called Oil In Place (OIP). Production of oil fields practically never recovers 100% of OIP, in fact often recovery is around 40-50% of the total OIP.
Here’s a very contrived example to illustrate the point I made above. Imagine you have 10b barrels of oil in a field, but your ultimate recovery with existing technology is going to be 5b barrels. If you produce at 1b barrels per year constant, you will be able to produce the well for 5 years before it depletes. If you create some new technology that lets you produce at 2b barrels per year, but doesn’t increase the recoverable reserves, that same well will now produce for a total of 2.5 years (2.5 * 2b = 5b). If instead you had a new technology that increased the recoverable oil – think tar sands and shale oil/shale gas, then the recoverable oil might go from 5b to 7b. At your original rate of recovery of 1b the well will now last 7 years instead of 5.
Peak Oil is primarily about the rate of recovery, which is what the ‘peak’ is all about. Oil industry people get very excited about new technology that increases flow rates because it makes a field look very profitable, but they often make the basic mistake of assuming high oil flows has increased the total recoverable reserves in a field, but in experience usually all it does is deplete the same amount of oil faster (a ‘super-straw’). Using my example above, some people see oil flows of 2b/year and keep the production life of the well constant at 5 years, now thinking they are going to recover 10b from the field (or 100% OIP in my example), but actually all they end up doing is depleting the field twice as fast as they would have otherwise.
I think Peak Oil, the price pressure and demand destruction world wide is only a good thing for our consumerist society, but on the flip side I’d like to see a very gradual decline in production post-peak as that will give us the best chance of re-organising society to deal with it. A steep decline after peak will be disastrous to society at large. Hence why I’m more interested in technologies that can improve oil recovery, not flow rates.
In short its all about EROEI (energy return over energy invested)…new technologies might make the EROEI better but eventually you go into deficit and the whole thing becomes pointless. Perhaps the real issue is denial, denial that we cant just keep doing this forever because like the last bottle of wine of the night it runs out before the shop opens.
I did once think that it was a desirable thing to avoid a steep decline: for us to live as we are used to, that’s a desirable option. For us to live at all is another issue. Collapse now might be a far more useful thing if this is to be believed. http://arctic-news.blogspot.co.nz/p/global-extinction-within-one-human.html
PS Who knows if the article is good science, true or likely? Could not possibly say, so shall we work on the principle it is too extreme and just ignore it? Or perhaps wait and see whilst we might or might not go past a point of no return? Perhaps BAU and be damned?
A strict focus on EROEI is actually misleading. Broadly it is true, and in the general case going very much below 1 is going to be financially pointless.
But there are cases where it makes sense, for example when you’re converting energy in one form/source to another form/source that is more useful. Lostinsuburbia below highlights one such case: turning natural gas in Canada into tar sands oil. Natural gas is not as easily traded as oil is, because it requires expensive pipelines or facilities to compress/liquidise it, compared to oil which can go on tankers and pipes much more easily. Oil is also a more valuable fuel for transportation than gas is, again thanks to the shipment but also the energy density.
So therefore an EROEI that is below 1 when using gas energy to unlock oil energy is not necessarily economically infeasible, if you had no other direct economic use for that gas energy.
Another extreme example is the RTG: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoelectric_generator
I bet that on an EROEI case this would be well below 1, but the RTG stores and releases energy in a way that other fuels simply cannot, so it doesn’t matter if the EROEI is below 1 because it’s the special properties of the resultant fuel source that you’re interested in, not the net energy.
All you are talking about is an arbitrage, which does delivery utility whilst wasting energy. This delays the evil day energy is all used up , which may or may not be a good thing.
Reading the link I provided might help you think about whether continuing blithely is a good thing?
Lanth is talking about an economic system which rewards the rapid waste of finite, irreplaceable resources (using up natural gas energy to recover a lesser amount of tar sands oil energy).
Sure, diverting some extra energy doesn’t matter particularly if there is still excess energy available presently.
It will matter when people and communities are starved in order to make available the energy which needs to be invested in a far away elite project. Of course, we have always done this to the third world and the developing world. Now, its becoming increasingly obvious in the West’s own backyard.
I have no doubt the USAF will still be flying F-22’s using jet fuel for years after the rest of us plebs have to walk or bicycle everywhere. In other words, the prioritisation of remaining highly constrained energy expenditures as the ruling classes see fit.
its also the fact that the “unconventional” sources require prodiguous amounts of energy to “extraact” – just look at the dependency of the Alberta Oil Sands on natural gas. There may be huge amounts of energy locked away in such reserves but it would take equally huge amounts to actually access and use it resulting in very low net energy gain.
We’ll just end up trashing the environment in a race to industrial crash unless we use our remaining reserves wisely and start moving towards smarter uses and sources of energy.
Maugeri of full of shit. End of story.
“We must conclude that the key assumptions about reserve growth and its effect on decline rates in Maugeriâs report are muddled, speculative and unverifiable. And sprinkling those assertions with repeated declamations about how peak oil is a non-issue, insisting repeatedly that the only real constraints on his scenario have to do with political decisions and geopolitical risks, suggests that his report is more about grinding a political axe on behalf of the oil industry than offering a serious or transparent analysis. Finally we must note that Maugeri is well known for his hostility to peak oil, as is BP, which funded his report. After taking real-world risks, costs, and restrictions into account, the case for peak oilâwhich is about production rates, not production capacity or reservesâseems far more realistic.”
http://www.davidstrahan.com/blog/?p=1576
http://ftalphaville.ft.com/blog/2012/07/24/1094111/is-peak-oil-dead/
http://peakoilmatters.com/2012/08/06/peak-oil-denial-debunking-the-attempted-debunking/
The TV3 Garner smear on Cunliffe initially was damaging to the Party, Shearer and Cunliffe in that order.Â
Â
Following the appalling weak un-real comments from Shearer yesterday that he was happy with Causus discipline, Â the whole affair now damages Shearer and the ABC nasties. Â Cunliffe’s mana is enhanced by Shearer’s handling of this matter.
The Party needs to be united and Cunliffe has the leadership skills to do so.Â
The experiment is over. Finito!Â
Â
Sometimes you guys sound like Cunliffe is actually Elvis at the 1964 Comeback Special with the slim black full leather jumsuit, singing I’m Just A Hunk-a Hunk-a Burnin’ Love.
It’s possible he’s human.
Are you saying Cunliffe was born in 1964, and that he might be a re-incarnation of Elvis? Â
Nah, he was born in 1963 when Kennedy died…Â
I hear the new shave means he’s proposing to reincarnate himself with his baby photos at the next election.
Typical bloody politicians, using their wedding photos on hoardings right into retirement.Â
After thinking about Josie Pagani’s bene bashing comments yesterday on Radio New Zealand I thought I would check out hubby John Pagani’s activities.
It seems that his blog is down. Â I wonder when that happened.
He has recently sent a couple of tweets. Â One of them says “Martin Hawes on buying shares in Mighty River.Excellent analysis. http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/money/7466680/Ignore-hype-when-investing”
The Hawes article he links to is a cold hard financial analysis of the share float of MRP that does not mention Iwi claims or the risks that they pose.  Hawes’ conclusion is that “[o]n all of these measures, MRP comes out well. It is in a good, stable industry providing energy from renewables, but with growth prospects as it sells its expertise in thermal power to other countries. It has strong finances and very good governance and management.”
It would appear that Pagani thinks buying MRP shares is a good idea.
Is he still speech writing for the Labour Party?
What an unelectable shambles Shearer’s Caucus and it’s advisers are becoming.
They look about as inspiring as the current gov’t….bravo trev and all you other has beens that feared so much for your undeserving arses you undermined the best choice at taking back the power possibly in your own right with DC out front.
Enjoy the warmth of your safe seats, what a disgrace you all are to the history and mana that was the Labour party and the everyday kiwis being left out to dry at the hands of the Hollowmen because of your ego’s…..SHAME !
Well, it appears that the Australian banks aren’t as pure as the driven snow as some would have liked to think:
So, how many loans in NZ were Liars Loans?
Rich and ignorant
It may be that te reo is not spoken in the limited circles Rodney Hide and Bob Jones move in, however it is far from obsolete…
I’m not sure if this has been mentioned on here yet, but in case it hasn’t.
Steve Keen is going to be giving talks in NZ in September.
The New Zealand and Australian Asset Markets
Friday 7th September in Auckland
The Global Economy
Saturday 8th September in Auckland
Solutions to the Crisis
Monday 10th September in Wellington
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/BU1207/S00499/economist-professor-steve-keen-to-visit-new-zealand.htm
Ahhhhh thanks, very handy
Whose Banking Sector Is It Anyway? – An Infographic
Hint, it’s not Spanish or Greek.
http://ineteconomics.org/blog/inet/katharina-pistor-whose-banking-sector-it-anyway-infographic
Sad grieving families are saying much about the pathetic lack of controls and safety consciousness in adventure tourism as the hearing about the plane crash at Fox Glacier proceeds. It may be that notice will be taken by leading people suffering the responsibility virus. I really hope so.
A young pilot used to automatic trim to keep the rear of his plane in balance was in a different plane at Fox Glacier, which was manual and had to be set before he took off. That’s what I understood from the radio report this morning. I would be trusting this company to know and give the advice its pilot needed so that 9 people didn’t die.
Complacently we undertake selling forays into the world and succeed in attracting tourists, overseas students etc. But then its too often laissez faire which ends up in some tragedy. Disparagingly remarks are made by NZs about other small countries – that we don’t want to turn into a banana republic. But we are already more like a banana republic than we are like an efficient and modern European country to which I think we compare ourselves.
So we must get restraints on our easy-peasy ways and poor oversight of whatever. CAA keeps being castigated. Make sure they do their job and earn their big pay. Bring in an amendment to accident law so that companies can be sued under certain circumstances, even if the government does it as Safety Master. Sharpen up everybody in tourism and don’t try to delegate the overview of work.
Another example of lack of responsibility and hurried, inadequate checks. The CCTV building in Christchurch was signed off, hurried through, certification missed, lacking senior overview. Result 16 people died, or was it more? And the Christchurch Building Inspections Manager under pressure to get things through faster, government made a lot of noise about slow procedures for builders, so in line with current ‘let business govern itself’ he signed off in line with business assurances when there was any argy-bargy. He is dead now, and another one close to the job also. It would make a sad end for a career to face this situation.
And reports about later work that was done to strengthen it, involved boring holes that could have gone through reinforcing rods so weakening the column. The work involved inserting epoxy or something with slurry to set and hold it firm but the slurry may not have keyed to the building and it has been found in that case that the epoxy tube or wedge can be just pulled out by hand. Trust in supposed experts again in doubt.
I see this common theme of she’ll be right recurring through NZ tragedies. We have to sharpen up, be efficient and timely, but thorough. That is if we want to have self-respect as a nation. And the respect of other nations when we speak about anything.
This somewhat covers the reality that the economy is not about creating jobs any more. A reality that the political parties just don’t seem to get.
Remember when the Minister got up there in the house and said blah blah blah? Lies.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10826855
Bugger.
http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/13/heat-shuts-down-a-coastal-reactor/
Aren’t those things meant to be the solution for all our energy problems in a post-fossil fuel and post holocene world? Oh, well. Back to the drawing board I guess.
Pencil sharpening, a metaphor for action in the last days of the empire.
Oh well. Back to the coal fired power stations I guess.
Why? Wind and solar work fine – just have to build it.
The nuclear reactor having the latest trouble was called Millstone. These tech people have no sense of irony, maybe missing some other senses too. Fear?
heka paratai getting more and more toxic buy the day.
this mornings dompost.
her head is so swollen that nobody can tell her anything.
True lies – it’s all in the pictures. I guess this is why Key does all those photo ops, often while speaking indecipherable gibberish, rather than attempting a rational explanation:
http://www.springer.com/about+springer/media/springer+select?SGWID=0-11001-6-1385843-0
@ Carol
Excellent link!
IrishBill: too much like stalking for my taste, Penny. Tone it down.
So people who work in IT or business aren’t allowed to be pro-democracy without having some sort of ulterior motive?
       Â
Think it was the blocking of facebook that has raisedd Penny’s ‘truth’ antennae McFlock.
Sounds odd, thanks Penny. Am so fed up with deceivers,(so I hope your suspicions come to nought) but it pays to keep watch unless,deceptively, they creep up on you. What a sad old world that we have to live in such an atmosphere of distrust, one that really began in earnest with the onset of neoliberalism and ‘self’ above all else..
Infomercial:
Anyone who wants an excuse to make money by any means, and sod the cost,especially human, look to your bright burnished idols like Thatcher, Douglas, Key (especially key) for any and every wickedly spun reason, answer, mindbend possible:
Change your moral outlook to amoral with these gems that you can add to your business ethics portfolio – “politics of envy”, “mums and Dads”, ‘up to the individual’- “no such thing as society’,”breeding for business”, ‘poverty is a lifestyle choice,’ and my personal more specific favourite phrased proudly by key (credit where credit is due) to mothers of an extra child born for whatever reason, being sent to look for part time work when their child is one year old,
“I personally think it is actually helping …… to actually make sure that they get an opportunity to fill their lives.”
” (translation from me ….sorry kids you are not fulfilling enough, away with you…)
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/6496132/Key-Mums-of-one-year-olds-better-off-working
I know key is not known for his intelligent rhetoric but on this occasion, and a few others, when he has to ‘lower himself to the occasion’ on behalf of popularity and money, he can produce ‘stunners’.
I suppose it depends on whether Penny’s style came across as harassment to the FB mods.
Richard Heinberg from the Post-Carbon Institute is doing a speaking tour of NZ and Australia next month. Just check out – http://www.postcarbon.org/event/964156-richard-heinberg-australia-and-new-zealand
I’ve read a couple of his books which have been quite thought provoking and would recommend them. The Institute’s website has quite a lot of good stuff too.
Just thought this might be of interest to a few folks on here!
Yay, urgent debate happening in the house right meow.
Kudos to David Parker….. Crafar Farms decision and protection of NZ asset base.
Seriously??? as Minister of Land Information in the Clark Government how many hectares of land went into foreign ownership while this particular one of the Daves looked on…
Good point, bad. He is tainted with neoliberalism. But, still, he’s kept this issue alive. Good to have t he debate.
Wish i didn’t have to make it really, the point that is, sometimes i feel like i am living in 2 parallel Universe,
My apologies to all you die hard Labour-ites, being able to pretend that the present Labour Party is in any way representative of very much of my view of things is becoming increasingly difficult,
Being able to pretend that it was some other Labour Party that held the Treasury Benches for the 9 years previous to this abysmal National one, impossible…
PS, i don’t even see this as a matter of ism’s, more the sheer dishonesty inherent in a Party that while in Government flicked off New Zealand land like there was a factory making the stuff down the street,
What this makes Labour look like is a Party simply interested in Power for the sake of holding it, no principles,no honesty, if there’s a set of iornclad policy anyplace it appears to be doing duty in the ablutions block as you know what,
Perhaps my expectations are far too high and all we can really expect from Labour is that they sit in the Parliament opposing everything this abhorrent National Government does,
So that once the cycle swings the other way Labour can do it instead, the politics of we oppose what your doing because we think we should be doing it…
I’ve a feeling Crafar is not just about the asset base, it’s about Joyce’s ‘intensification of agriculture’.
Oh good one rosy. I have a feeling you may well be correct. “intense” is, unfortunately, a suitable word in this situation.
Will I get banned from The Standard if I threaten to set all the moderators on fire and urinate on the server?
Nah, your too much of a plonker you will just get your thing fried…
Damn, I am trying to martyr myself to the single entity which is the standard who should do things my way
Fry you heathen…
Stop being lazy and ban yourself already đ
I try but I can’t. Some fucker remove me for a month. Damnit
Perhaps you could try some poetry…
Felix red pastel
Oh dear here comes a prolapse
scrumptious ass-tulip
Just call someone a bitch — youll be gone by lunchtime (thank you Dr Brash…)
On the minimum pricing for booze has anyone giving the idea of $2 a serving given any thought what that does for a 1 litre bottle of Whisky/Whiskey/Bourbon/Vodka etc Given that there are 30-35 std drinks per litre then a bottle of top shelve would be ???? $60-$70
http://www.alac.org.nz/sites/default/files/useruploads/Alcohol_YouPDFs/819_stddrinksstraightupguide.dafc3b6c.pdf
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10817774
With such an example how is Labour being relevant to its core blue collar union card holder support base?
At least the left doesn’t appear as self serving as Judith Collins on tv last night
http://tvnz.co.nz/national-news/government-denies-alcohol-industry-pressure-5021331
Yeah, it concerns me that these kinds of measures further restrict the meagre freedoms of the poor, supposedly for the greater good. Apparently only the poor need to change their ways to this end. Maybe if we had some measures that made their lives less shit….
On a related noted, I was interested to see that Whanau Ora will only help those who agree to stop drinking and smoking completely, into affordable, decent housing*. Those “aunties” get their tentacles into every nook and cranny. They seem to be Big Brother’s sisters, and as the trojan horse into ever increasing privatisation of welfare services, disturbing…
Btw, about how much is a bottle of whisky now?
*Will dig out the link if anyone gives a flying f#$k.
I remember paying that much for a bottle of top shelf 20 odd years ago. Which would be $110.48 to $128.89 today so I don’t see your point.
Some can only afford Famous Grouse/Grants Capt Morgan etc. See how many products are well below $50 from the link below. And then think of the PAYE person & what they drink. I wonder if those from Labour/Greens have considered only the rtd’s and low cost wine and not consequence of a $2 policy has on spirits
Those that drink single malts have nothing to worry about under this policy, though for curiosity I wonder what $60 would have purchased 20+ years ago, it must have been good as a classic malt in 2000 was about $45 duty free and that was a 1125 bottle !!!. But not everyone can afford such nectar from heaven.
http://www.lk.co.nz/spirits/rum.html
Dewar’s white label sitting nicely on the tongue right now. Not a single malt but quite passable for $40. I have a Talisker sitting patiently in the cabinet for more special occasions.
I prefer anything from Islay. Oldest rocks in the UK and some of the oldest anywhere to be found. You can taste every one of the 600-1000 million years in any bottle from here!!
http://www.islaynaturalhistory.org/geology/geology.htm
I think that a min pricing is one of many tools to help cure this problem. But IMO $2 being touted is too steep. Better still would be too increase exercise duty then the added price (tax) would benefit NZ not the alcohol industry & the likes of the supermarkets.
Now that’s a geology lesson I can appreciate. Cheers dude.
I’m guessing they don’t have any industrial scale dairy farming in that aquifer catchment then….
I wondered why Wilson’s was so distinctive.
Yes, and?
Beer with the occasional top shelf thrown in.
Glenfiddich (sp?), Johnny Walker (Black Label) – during the 1990s the prices of liquor came down as tariffs and duties were removed.
People forget that 1L of Vodka at less than $20 is generally only about 20% alcohol anyway.
Half the price half the liquor content.
Go check the bottles at your local liquor save if you don’t believe me
That’s not vodka, its just alcohol byproduct sourced from industrial (dairy) processes.
More to ignore.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/08/13/1119768/-New-CryoSat-2-Confirms-Catastrophic-Loss-of-Arctic-Sea-Ice-Volume
Even more disturbing, the Arctic could become totally ice free before 2030 if Wimpeus’ exponential fit to other months is correct.
It’s not……..
Fa&*%sm in Greece.
http://www.bostonreview.net/BR37.4/ari_paul_greece_austerity_golden_dawn_kke_liana_kanelli.php
previously
Hurrah for the Blackshirts! revisited. The Daily Mail reckons Arbeit Macht Frei. Journo Dominique Jackson advises unemployed young grads to lower their sights:
Â
Even UK charities are embracing Tory Govt ‘workfare’ schemes
http://www.guardian.co.uk/voluntary-sector-network/2012/mar/12/large-charities-government-work-schemes
I’d say that’s because big charities are now big business in the UK and they’re scrambling for every reduced penny going. Those involved in workfare schemes have sold-out their ethics. I hope they’ve remembered to change their mission statements to reflect their new purpose.
Having walked through the gates of Dachau and seen the remnants of what went on there, that highly offensive phrase needs to be thrown into the dustbin of history.
Fuck the Daily Mail for using it is all I can say.