The first is entitled ‘Why Silicon Valley billionaires are prepping for the apocalypse in New Zealand’
It part of the Guardian’s ‘Long read’ section and provides a lot of insight into Thiel, libertarians, their hatred of Winston Peters and tells about the company traitor Roger Douglas keeps.
One quote.
Byrt, who drew my attention to these passages, had even turned up evidence of a property deal in the mid-1990s in which a giant sheep station at the southern tip of the North Island was purchased by a conglomerate whose major shareholders included Davidson and Rees-Mogg. Also in on the deal was one Roger Douglas, the former Labour finance minister who had presided over a radical restructuring of New Zealand economy along neoliberal lines in the 1980
Wealth does not mean smarter. Chump Trump inherited his. The rich are just as gormless as the rest of us, fads happen to them too. Nz will get badly hit by climate change, the only place I figure off the top of my head that will improve, become a bread basket for the world, is the Simpson desert.
‘Is this the end of capitalism? US Federal Reserve financial safety net is gone.’
and starts in an arresting fashion
Say your prayers. We no longer have a lender of last resort fully standing behind the global financial system. The US Federal Reserve is prohibited by law from carrying out precisely those emergency actions that halted contagion and a worldwide collapse in October 2008.
It continues to explain why capitalism is in trouble and why the oncoming crash will not be mitigated until it comes to its scathing conclusion.
While one branch of western governments has created this leviathan of leverage and interlinked global asset speculation, another branch has called into question whether there will be a lender-of-last resort when the moment of reckoning finally comes. Just brilliant.
Simon Wilson makes sensible suggestions to remedy Auckland’s transport woes.
His 5 point plan
1. Create as many new dedicated bus lanes on main routes as possible. Forget permanent markings: use road cones.
2. Add as many more buses and trains as possible, right through the day, well into the night and over the weekends. Target all those big events.
3. Exclude general traffic from selected inner-city streets. Convert them to bus parks and bus routes, and allow service vehicles too. (More buses is a short-term solution, for many reasons, including that there’s nowhere to put them when they get to town. Bring on the light rail and more trains.)
4. Improve the service: good visible security and how about food and other vendors on the platforms?
5. Launch a great new marketing campaign to get people to leave their cars at home if they can. Include schools.
I’d say start to solve the transport/housing/pollution/infrastructure/poverty crisis by stopping immigration and stepping down tourism.
Nope, thought not, the screams from businesses needing to be paid $20k for a job visa will be huge, the multinational hotels and casinos, not having their cheap exploitable labour!
No of course make the local poorer people pay!
Often comments about getting more people on public transport are from people who live in the inner city and central suburbs – how about some of these AT execs randomly go from 100 different locations in the supercity in particular the outlying ones and work out how long it will take on public transport, how to get from the house to the public transport etc and then from work to another place in the city. Then do a return journey and do it for a week. See the average time it takes.
Remember the Patrick Renolds types who probably commute less than 5 minutes per day telling everyone what they should do. Get some people who actually do commute from different locations and people who don’t, time it, should be a start!
I went on a bus about 12km and it regularly takes about 45minutes that’s in inner city type suburbs. It’s not traffic it’s just the routes they take and waiting times for buses!
Then go from west Auckland, south Auckland, north shore and east Auckland and see how long it takes. If you have hours up your sleeve in your life, to take the buses good for you! The trains are much better but only go on selected routes and by all accounts are well used and successful.
With all the construction in the centre I had to ask 3 drivers who did not know at all where the bus stop had moved to last time I tried to bus back.
Also suggest someone at transport starts to swab some of the new buses for hazardous materials because I went on a newish bus that smelt like it had been made from e waste plastic.
With their order of asbestos trains who know where they are getting them from. Have they checked the safety of the buses interiors?
Nice to see another Simon getting sensible and finally climbing out of a bubble.
Perhaps next time he might be honest enough to acknowledge a pleb or too now he’s reached the heights of the legit 4th Estate acceptance. Maybe (hopefully longevity and experience) has shown him its no substitute for a glass or two of Chard and A kathryn Ryan and David Russell.
I find it hard to take him seriously though I acknowledge he’s improving with age…though I’m probably a bit biased having experienced the Burma Rd polished concrete floors and the painful freakouts and truthiness on his taking a Jolly Green Giant
Finally, Brian Fallow looks at a disturbing trend.
Another reminder that this government cannot afford to tinker.
Unless radical action is taken to undo the damaging structures that underpin neoliberalism, our problems are not going away.
‘Retired & renting – the trend isn’t comforting.’
The risk is growing that we will see more and more older people living in housing-related poverty.
That is one conclusion of the Stocktake of New Zealand’s Housing released this week. It reflects a toxic combination of trends.
One is the declining rate of home ownership, which means that more of the 65-plus age group will be renting — and that age group is growing apace as the population ages.
All the financial advisers were advising how great it was to rent in your retirement a while back and ‘free up’ your money. Yep, take all financial advice with a pinch of salt. 90% of time they are just paid to sell financial products.
Treasury warning that it might lead to fewer sales. On the other hand, some landlords have been threatening to sell all their properties if changes to tenancy laws are enacted.
Of course, now it’s the end of ‘Capitalism’ (“show me some!”), I expect all fiat currencies will collapse by say, next Thursday, so there won’t be a housing market at all /sarc.
Only 18 months ago we were in such a real estate froth that a full hard landing appeared inevitable.
Both governments have managed to deflate this slowly but surely.
It will take several years, but they have bought a little time for foolishly overstretched Kiwis to pay down private debt rather than perpetually reaching for more.
Debt is still cheap. Solution: raise interest rates. Consequences of raising interest rates: negative equity, foreclosures, etc. I like to be optimistic, and I know that short term optimism is usually stupid and wrong 🙂
‘Both governments have managed to deflate this slowly but surely.’Thank god it didn’t deflate too much before John Key cashed up in Parnell.Fantastic price,buyer had a chinese sounding surname,too.
@ Ad, Yep blame the “foolishly overstretched Kiwis to pay down private debt rather than perpetually reaching for more”.
The poor are poor because of bad decisions, those that are forced into private debt to afford a house are ‘foolish’, the government leads the way of course.
I guess the smart ones, are ones who buy in NZ for cash I expect.
Listening to Chump spouting his trite, hypocritical, predictable phrases about the latest school shooting in Florida strung together in his inimitable fashion just now on RNZ nearly made me throw up.
America is one family in our grief – tick
No school pupil or teacher should have to go through this – tick
We’re standing with you – tick
Anything you need – tick
Meaningful gun control to try to minimise the chances of this happening again as it has once a week on average for the past five years – didn’t hear that bit.
The USA is a sick society that seems incapable of keeping its citizens safe, A failed state.
This guy says 11 in the last 23 days and offers some insight into what he sees as cruel individualism that he calls stoicism. The breakdown of social connection and caring.
Americans fear that gun control will means people will come into their homes and take their guns.
This is exactly what should happen.
this is the 8th, school shooting this year and the white houses responses to say “So many signs that the Florida shooter was mentally disturbed, even expelled from school for bad and erratic behavior. Neighbors and classmates knew he was a big problem. Must always report such instances to authorities, again and again!”
thats right, snitch and blame the victims and the community, people always say “he was a loaner”or “I knew this would happen” its a coping mechanism to categorize grief and well documented as being meaningless, no-one know the hearts of humankind and trump’s suggestion would waste police resources on pointless persecution instead of tackling the real issues.
It’s always been the guns, it always will be the gun’s and by presidential order you need to get the law enforcement to stop chasing immigrants, go into peoples homes are take the guns away.. luckily even some americans are starting to see that.
a white supremacist group has claim responsibility and “trained” the shooter, which trump ordered law enforcement to scale back on and it solely focus on Islamic groups.
and the FBI had a tip off from a you tube comment that was reported, but they could not ID the account holder. (even though his name was on the comment and school records are digitized/searchable, including past attendees.)
“It’s always been the guns, it always will be the gun’s and by presidential order you need to get the law enforcement to stop chasing immigrants, go into peoples homes are take the guns away.. luckily even some americans are starting to see that.”
I politely disagree. It’s about the lack of licensing. We have licences here, and it by and large gets it right in terms of who does or doesn’t get a licence.
What both centrist liberals and the progressive left in the USA need to do is work together to assemble the legal argument that gun licensing is not unconstitutional, and that the second amendment right to bear arms can be reasonably qualified by using licencing to better ensure the collective right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
The American right will often argue that firearms owned under the second amendment do guarantee the rights derived from the first amendment – but misused, they can also threaten those rights.
So what interests me here is seeing how this issue could reawaken the American left and liberal political and legal thought around the constitution, which hasn’t really galvanized them all that much over the last few decades. But Trump has actually reawakened constitutionalism on the left. The so far successful resistance to the travel ban was proof that States Rights is not a frivolously conservative cause. Now it’s time for the American left to see what else they can accomplish when they respect their actually very robust constitution.
I offer a rebuttal, I agree licensing should be an option, but that doesn’t address the amount of guns in the hands of people who should not have them, this only addresses future sales (and gun ownership laws/licensing is done on a state by state basis, what your talking about would need to be federal)
There are two problems,
1) Lax gun ownership laws/licensing
2) the sheer amount of firearms in the US (a study in new york found that there are 102 legally owned guns per 100 people)
its too easy for the mentally disturbed or those with past criminal history to get guns, licensing increases would only fuel a blackmarket. You need to actually removed and destroy existing stocks of firearms.
A) That licensing is necessary because there are certain people who must never be allowed to own firearms of any kind on mental health grounds, or on grounds of having a criminal record.
B) Yes, there will be some shortcomings, and this one is the most significant, you’d have to either live with that, or address it with issues ranging from a buyback, to more coercive options which may in themselves cause trouble. I’m honestly open to good ideas for how you do that. But in the meantime, licensing at sets you up for a better future than a numbing repeat of the past – or present.
You’re correct it would need to be a federal law, states don’t just have their own gun ownership laws, they have their own constitutions. It wouldn’t be practical to take it on that way. You’d be looking for a federal move and it would end up being fought all the way to the supreme court, which is why you’d want some good legal minds combing over the Federalist Papers and the like to have a good argument which shows that licensing would be in keeping with the general framing of the constitution.
Only thing I feel like I disagree with in your rebuttal – though it’s not to a point I think either of us need to dig in over – is that I don’t know that the quantity of weapons in existence bothers me all that much. You can only carry so many at once, and you can only use one at a time (ok yes you can run around with a pair of pistols, but I guarantee that’s not working out for you like it does in a Hollywood film).
When it comes to a psycho doing their thing, I’d be more concerned about the guy who has drilled himself repeatedly with hours of range time on one favourite rifle and is packing a practical selection of spare mags which he’s used and checked repeatedly, rather than the standard mass shooter situation where guy goes off with gym bag full of guns he’s never used and mags he’s never tested, gets a jam two mags into his shooting spree, then blows his own brains out in a panic, leaving two unfired long arms, four unfired pistols, and a couple thousand rounds of unused ammo lying on the ground in the bag. Kind of a quality is more dangerous than quantity thing.
Still, I can see where you’re coming from in terms of the less there is in existence, the less there is to make its way into the wrong hands. That side of things does make sense and if that’s the sense in which you’re arguing for it, then I think the best option is a buyback than confiscation given the political culture you’d be dealing with. Expensive but necessary.
But as on that same article, gun restrictions did work so they can be used in combination, unfortunately US’s issue is far more problematic they have a lot more guns than australia and alot more people with the mentality that “guns are our rights” and “Need them to protect” Neither of which are true in a strict sense.
If the US did a buy back I would hypothesize that the NRA would launch a massive marketing campaign that would mean very little guns would be “bought back”
I honestly think the only option as this point would be acquisitions, then you can implement licensing laws etc.
I agree that buybacks have mixed results – but I do wonder in the Australian case how many of the firearms used there to commit crimes may in fact have been smuggled in by organized crime networks since the post-Port Arthur laws and buybacks, and may have never been legally owned in the first place. But that’s just conjecture on my part, I have little to go on based on that report.
Still, it would seem to me that the combination of going as far as you can with buy backs and reforming future ownership through licensing is as good as it gets.
“I honestly think the only option as this point would be acquisitions, then you can implement licensing laws etc.”
One thing: when you say ‘acquisitions’, you do mean ‘confiscations’, right? You mean a mass program of law enforcement agencies entering people’s homes to confiscate their weapons, right? Or something else?
Sorry for the late reply, but yes, I think if you went beyond a buyback and tried for mass confiscations, you’d get violence on an epic scale, and worse still probably resistance from law enforcement themselves.
Your right, but it’s unfortunately one of the only options left.
I was reading an article this morning about the recent school shooting and an interview with the parent, one thing that struck me as odd, “after a recent burglary They bought guns”
this epitomizes the issue, instead of adding new lock or security measures they decided firearms were the correct response, not for hunting but home defense. Stats show that firearms used in home defense are more likely to be used on the owners than the offender, as much as everyone thinks they are rambo, guns are pretty stupid weapons to use for home defense, deception, deterrents and outside intervention (police, security patrols) is far better and more effective.
But in the US, they feel they NEED guns as a form of protection from “burglars” instead of what other western nations do which is add deterrents, guns have become so much of a part of the culture that not having them is seen as weird.
But it’s quite obviously from an outsider’s perspective the cause of alot of the issues, it’s not a root cause(mental health support, the recent school shooter could not get psychological help because of the cost) but it is something that could be controlled easily with simple legislation.
yes they do, simple controls and checks as well as licensing means mass shooting happen much more infrequently.
A fun fact, Last year in the US there were more gun deaths in the US than in the entire world combined (this includes war zones)
SO what’s the difference between the rest of the world and the US, Gun control, even making getting a firearm as hard as applying for a drivers license reduces gun violence and mass shootings quite a lot, when australia introduced gun control in just two decades following the reforms, the annual rate of gun deaths fell from 2.9 per 100,000 in 1996 to 0.9 per 100,000 in 2016, there reforms were prompted after the 1996 Port arthur massacre. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_Arthur_massacre_(Australia)
Aust has not had a single mass shooting since, gun deaths are down and there is no corresponding uptick in attacks by other types of weapons (mass bombings etc) So guns are the issue.
As a former firearms licensed holder here in Oz, gun ownership is up and firearm thief is on rise especially in the small arms aka pistols or illegal importation of them. It the illegal use small arms in the hands of the criminals that causing most if not of the firearm related deaths here in Oz.
My license was suspended when I had run down the rabbit with my PTSD, and no access to them anyway as they locked up and the lads had change the codes to the vaultand the safe for the Magazine keys.
Genter and Nash need to have a chat on driving and recreational drug use. Genter was weak in the House yesterday. NZTA are rolling out a campaign on drug-impaired crashes. Police support it.
Needs political alignment, fast, before the debate infects the legalisation legislation.
Weak in what way? If it was “weak” in the sense of wanting to find out the nature and extent of the problem before jumping on a NZTA/Police anti-drugs bandwagon, then great – let’s have a lot more of that kind of “weakness” from our ministers.
that was really interesting. Gender looks like she’s covering all the bases well, so I’m also not sure what Ad is on about. Not sure why he is criticising Gender instead of Nash, but it thought she handled that question well.
Anyone know what the impairment test is that the police already use?
Ad, why did you feel Genter was “weak” ?- I watched and agree with those here who thought her responses appropriate. She’s sharp.
Edit: I see alwyn’s snarky comment and get that he’s curmudgeonly, but you Ad? Why the negativity? What did you see?
From reading scoop last night she was all over it like pickle heat after 12hrs of wearing body armour. What got me was the fact she using evidence base lead facts to support her case unlike the other muppet shooting his mouth off. Is that typical of Mr Nash BTW?
Morning Breakfast people We should make our own choices in what policy we legerslate into law and not let USA dictate what we do. I charge my opinion of people as I learn more think more about them Obama does not make my top ten humane people I admire. He knows exactly what shonky key was doing to Maori and Atoearoa he still let shonky gain influence from his associationing with Obama. The American president gets privy to most information he knows exactly what shonky was doing. Ana to kai.
Ka kite ano
You give the US way to much credit, Who cares about NZ, in the scope of the world we are nothing, we barely rate as a world power, we have little population, almost no economic capital, no military to speak of. We may think were “hot stuff” but were not.
I still cannot login to TS from my macbook on Firefox. I get a bad request notice. then when I just try to access TS mainpage, I get the same notice – something about cannot find server.
It also seems to infect any attempt to login from Safari on my macbook for 15 minutes or so.
Please cut and paste the two error messages into a comment.
Can you please try doing a test comment using this protocol and let me know what happens?
– Make sure you are logged out
– Delete browser cookies
– Restart browser
– Make a comment with same user name but a different email address (make one up, or put 2 after your email name before the @, so you can tell them apart. TS doesn’t require valid email addresses)
– First comment will go into spam, because you are considered a new user
– Subsequent comments should go through ok
That sounds very optimistic if she is anything like my wife.
My using her tablet would be almost the equivalent of me going through her handbag.
You will notice I said “almost the equivalent” not “like me”.
I would never dare touch either object.
Lyn may be a much more obliging lady.
There’s been shit happening all day @ caroyn. Timeouts. Site un reachable. Bearing in mind tho I’m 8.5 hours behind…. but @ lprent. i wouldn’t get my knickers in a twist over a temporary network glitch that would force an obsessive/compulsive into redesigning a whole system.
The browser app is left running in a tab for a long time (overnight) and continues to make background requests via JS.
At some point, the session times out and it starts receiving redirects to refresh its session. Each of these requests is setting a new state cookie.
The Javascript code doesn’t handle this case, so it just keeps blindly sending requests and accumulating state cookies until it exceeds the max request cookie size limit and starts getting 401 errors
Clearing cookies in the browser is a working stopgap.
Yeah I did, I thought it’s the wet season/ local storms playing havoc again with the Internet today, but I was to log on to my usual other Kiwi haunts after I did the house work today
it helps when you do it for a living 🙂 the companies I work for runs 26 Ecom sites, some have wordpress integrations, it was fun looking of the page source for this state seeing how the .js was implemented.
@ greywarshark (11.2.1.2) … same here, I was unable to access TS all afternoon. Was only able to reach it this evening. Something about a problem with the local network. Other sites were fine.
Thought the Blue gremlins had sabotaged TS for a while there!
Me too. And ex Kiwi you are in Oz aren’t you?
I kept thinking of things I wanted to comment on and was discombobulated to be cut off in my prime so to speak.
weka OIDCUnAuthAction 401 needs to added to the .js path at the .html level, its not something the user needs to do, this is a site dev fixes for the known firefox bug.
I wanted to see what happened when Carolyn commented without logging in (there is a bug that affects people with logins when they try and comment without logging in).
Lissa Lucas the women who was dragged off the podium and not allowed to speak no more at a hearing on minerals, speaks to Jimmy Dore. 19.10 minute video. Centerists should avoid, as this involves a discussion on removing money from politics, and it might just hurt their feelings.
Tax cuts. Inflated property prices & rents further fuelled by hyper-immigration. Wage suppression through hyper-immigration. Don’t ask to me to go on, please!
The government’s legislative program can be found on Parliament’s website. You’re the one whining, so it’s up to you to say where you think it’s deficient.
Or you can continue to be a lazy and passive-aggressive concern troll.
Nope.
No press release to match your requirements.
No phone calls to tell caucus members how to suck eggs.
Probably not so much as a peep.
And no “excuse” needed at all.
Why, I hear you concern troll?
Because the Greens have been doing this longer and more successfully than you have. Not only do they not need your advice or to meet your demands, following it would result in a constant, bland whining about the smallest procedural, regulatory, and supervisory events that most bureaucrats wouldn’t want to envisage, and it would therefore give the greens the electorate appeal of a small off-yellow puddle of cat puke.
Well, mostly because it’s an expectation that the Greens should serve your priorities and expectations, and if they do not satisfy your expectations 100% then they are being inadequate in some way. Check that privilege.
But I also suspect that if the Greens had released a statement abouteach corrections report released that day, you would have found some other government publication or media event that the Greens had failed to give attention to, and you’d have written another of your boilerplate demands about that.
So in order to prevent these formulaic criticisms from you (and only you), the Greens would be releasing 2k press releases a day about the most minute crap imaginable, and their actual priorities would be lost in the flood.
“Well, mostly because it’s an expectation that the Greens should serve your priorities and expectations…”
Seriously? Your logic is messed up. I’m far from the only person concerned about the state of our prisons. Moreover, I’m sure the Greens don’t condone the failings highlighted in the reports. So to suggest it’s only my expectation they publicly address these findings is totally ludicrous.
Evidently, it’s your attempt to diminish this failure by the Greens by painting it as solely my expectation.
And no, I don’t expect them to release a press release over the most minute crap imaginable.
Damned near every day you have something that you believe the Greens need to “up their game” on. If not them then Labour.
The issue isn’t that you care about prisons. The issue isn’t even that you think the Greens should have paid it more attention. The issue is that you ignore what they do say in order to criticise that they haven’t addressed your issue of the day.
If I were a cynic, I’d say that it’s interesting how you’re always finding the thing that day that the Greens didn’t comment on loudly enough for your satisfaction. It’s almost like you look at their daily activities and then look through the news for something they haven’t mentioned.
The fact there are a number of issues frequently requiring our attention is largely a reflection of their failings and the overall mess our country is in.
Nor is it merely my belief there are certain issues requiring them to up their game.
When it comes to them getting it right, clearly they don’t require help, hence I largely don’t bother commenting. There are plenty of cheerleaders for that. Unfortunately there is not as many when it comes to holding their feet to the fire. Which, as voters we should feel obliged to do.
I genuinely care about the issues raised, which is why I raise them. Moreover, they are not just my issue of the day.
Take these two reports, I didn’t make them a media story. And if you follow the news and Green Party press releases, you’ll see there is a lot of news they don’t comment on. Hence, a lot I don’t pull them up on.
And yet you still turn up regularly with your quota of complaints.
Your choice of the expression “hold their feet to the fire” is strangely appropriate: torture is almost always useless, and its use indicates more about the shortcomings of the torturer than the victim.
You appeal to nobody. Public pressure has an effect when it increases from normal levels. The low-level hum of discontent that you represent is constant, but also remarkably concentrated only around you and folk like Tanz or PR.
At best, you’ll just bore the political interest out of people. Which is the opposite of applying pressure.
Like frequently occurring zits, one has to address the cause for them to totally go away.
And again, it’s not just me. Hence, the issues raised do have public appeal (such as the state of our prisons). They wouldn’t be news worthy if they didn’t.
Personally, I may not appeal to anybody, it’s all rather subjective really. But I sure as hell get your (and a few others on here) attention.
At the end of the day, it’s not about me. It’s about the issues being raised. Attempting to make it all about me (and a couple of others) simply ignores the larger discontent that’s out there.
Don’t confuse “public interest” with “public appeal”.
Let’s contrast the Greens today with Labour under Shearer – now there was “larger discontent”, reflected in the polls for years and with a solid half dozen to dozen commenters railing against the inadequacies they perceived, multiple times a day. Each and every one of them was pissed.
The Greens today? Pretty much just you. On a daily basis. If there’s a genuine level of unrest within Green support, they sure seem to be doing well at hiding it.
I’m not. But you seem to be overlooking the two largely go hand in hand. Things people have no interest in, don’t tend to appeal to them.
It very well may be pretty much just me, on here. But not out there. And the Greens would be foolish to overlook that.
As I’ve highlighted before, the Greens have obtained the most political power they have ever had. They have ministerial positions and outlined their 20 goal plan with Labour. Yet, no surge in support.
Whereas, after Meteria’s announcement, their support surged to one of their highest ratings ever. So despite their current political wins, they are not resonating as they once did.
In fact, their support dropped in the latest poll. And there is no hiding that.
Was that the 18–28 Jan 2018 Newshub Reid Research poll? Had 6% from the previous 7% poll? Because that margin for error for a thousand-sample poll looks like 1.5% or so @ ~5%. Without rounding, either – you could be whinging about a 6.5% vs 6.4% “drop”.
If that’s the drop you’re talking about, it’s a good example of your concern trolling. They’ve had two post-election polls in the 10% range, one at 7, and the last at 6%, about the same as on election night.
As for Green support “surging” after Turei made her announcement, they went from their existing 13% to 15%, waivered, then fell.
By the way, I can’t see any comments from you in the Turei-tagged posts around that time. Were you not interested in it?
edit: nothing in this comment should be taken to indicate that even if I thought the Greens were in trouble I would think that they should follow your demands. They shouldn’t. Your advice is as bullshit as your interpretation of stats.
Yes, it was only a slight drop. Nevertheless, it is was a drop. Even if it was within the margin of error.
The point here is their support should have increased considering their political wins (which includes their 20 goal plan). But it didn’t. Not even within the margin of error. Hence, there is something for them to worry about.
It was a 4% surge for the Greens from 11% to 15% after Meteria’s announcement.
And I commented on the matter.
Yes, tell the Greens not to listen to me and lets watch them further fall.
Latest 1 news Colmar Brunton. Greens down 2%. Now polling at 5%.
A “drop” within the margin for error by definition might not be a drop at all.
Who says “their support should have increased”? Other than you? It’s not like the Greens have been monopolising media coverage.
As for the “surge” – you’re only looking at Colmar Brunton, aren’t you? You’re skipping the Roy Morgan that had the Greens on 13.5% before Turei’s announcement. Shit like that makes me think your motives aren’t as pure as you claim.
A as far as the poll is concerned, it was a registered drop (albeit within the margin of error).
And that in it self wouldn’t mean much. But as you are aware, I’m not looking at it within itself.
The feedback I’ve had suggested their support will fall and the latest Colmar Brunton further confirms this.
“Who says “their support should have increased”
Logic. As explained above.
Moreover, as they have largely outlined what they plan to achieve this term (their 20 goal plan) they are going to struggle to regrow their support without upping their game and doing more.
I look at all the polls. But yes, I was referring to the Colmar Brunton, which, offhand, produced their largest surge at that time.
My motives are simple. I want to see the Greens up their game, grow their support, while remaining a party of the left.
That’s not logic. It’s a blinkered warping of reality.
The Greens are a junior partner in the coalition. They’ve achieved agreement to implement a number of their policies, but the implementation hasn’t happened for a lot of them. Labour’s been in a 100days rush. National is fracturing.
And you think the Greens should be gaining ground in that PR environment, rather than drifting 2% in three polls.
Oh, yes, and you cherry pick the poll results to suit your narrative.
Thanks for your concern, but you’re either lying about your motives or you’re a political idiot. Either way your advice is worthless.
The logic is solid, therefore I disagree. They’ve obtained there largest political gains ever, therefore it’s logical to assume their support would reflect that.
The fact that it isn’t points to it failing to resonate. And this shouldn’t be taken lightly. Doing so will be at their own peril.
And while their goals are yet to be implemented, they’ve already been outlined. Therefore, when it comes to implementing them, it will merely be seen as a rehash of their initial intent and look as if they have nothing new to offer. Which will go on (20 goals) to further damage their support.
All the polls had an upsurge at the time (some more than others) therefore, they all suited my narrative.
Yes, keep telling everyone my advise is worthless and we’ll see how well they go repeating what they are currently doing.
peril?! nooooooooooo!!!!
Political exposure doesn’t happen in a vacuum.
“All the polls” continued the Greens’ previous increases in popularity until a couple of polls after Turei’s announcement. There wasn’t a sudden change in the trend until the mud started being slung.
Anyway, ok. You keep giving useless advice, and I’ll keep pointing out your cherry-picked stats and constant narrative of doom.
Up until Turei’s announcement, the Greens were struggling to get media cut through. So a vacuum indeed.
After the cracks in her story started to shine through, the media frenzy was really on. And while the media are culpable to some extent, what really hurt the Green’s support was Turei standing down, along with their management of the whole saga.
In a matter of weeks (or was that days) she went from standing up for the poor to abandoning them. Which, of course, let a lot of people down. Her back story was coming apart and she couldn’t get away quick enough.
“You keep giving useless advice, and I’ll keep pointing out your cherry-picked stats and constant narrative of doom.”
Yes, I will continue to highlight the issues, provide my advice and offer viable alternatives, as you carry on with your diminishing and smearing tactics while all along ignoring their loss of support.
And with such a welcoming reception, it’s no wonder why more don’t come here to express their concerns. For the less capable, people like you are rather threatening, hence a deterrent.
You say that, but pretty much the only person who expects them to decline is you.
In 2020, especially if they ignore your advice, the Greens will most likely be well above their 2017 election tally. Unless you think the last 20 years of mounting popularity will be negated by one muckraking episode a couple of months out from an election.
Get real. I wasn’t calling you dear, egg. It was a typo.
“You say that, but pretty much the only person who expects them to decline is you.”
That’s what the feedback suggests, and it’s been spot on thus far.
Remember, it predicted this current fall while you were in total denial. As you are now.
Moreover, the Turei saga was only one episode. To date, there has been more.
As explained throughout our discussions, the Greens are not bringing their A game. They’ve already outlined their goals, thus at this stage, have little more to offer.
And it is all of this combined, that the expectation is based upon.
As for your ruminations, it might predict falls, but when did you last predict a rise? Clocks running backwards are right more often than stopped clocks.
But I’ve said repeatedly that even without your cherry-picking (and ain’t you lucky the margin for error in the poll fell your way this time), the polls are irrelevant for the next 18 months anyway. I expect this to be the low area for the Greens, because they’re in it for the long term and have more solid support than your pessimism suggests.
Labour’s in pride of place now, and rightfully so. They grabbed victory when, frankly, I expected them to get bollocked in the election when Little resigned. ISTR your “lift their game” halitosis was aimed at them for some time last year – what were your polling predictions then?
As I said above, unless they take action. Hence, at this stage, they still have time to do that. So in 18 months, there may be a turnaround.
If it wasn’t for Jacinda and her cult of personality, Labour would have got hammered, as expected. And at the end they knew it, hence the last-minute change of leadership.
I was listening to Jacinda the other day. She was pointing to giving the Greens credit and acknowledgment (for policy they initiated such as the Green investment fund) as a means of growing their support. Implying once that was on the way they should see some turnaround.
However, that has already been announced in their 20 goal plan. Which has been widely touted.
Moreover, a plan outlined is not the same as implementing one. Which, of course, runs the risk of things going wrong. Hence, may backfire.
And going off the Greens management skills of late, they are really going to require to produce their A game if they want to avoid stuffing up.
Additionally, I expect Labour to further disappoint. Hence, the Greens should pick up some support off them.
You expect Labour “further disappoint” and “Greens should pick up some support off them”. Therefore if the Greens keep doing what they’re doing, we will see them grow rather than further fall.
Labour have already created some rather large disappointments to date, yet the Greens have gone down.
With the Jacinda effect still largely taking hold, this will take time to filter through. In the meantime, the Greens can’t afford to further fall. Hence, will require to up their game in the process.
Especially as they are widely known for polling higher than what they get on election day.
They really can’t fall much further. So unless you’re suggesting that the growth in support the Greens will gain from Labour being such a disappointment will actually be trivially small, really if the Greens do absolutely nothing the Greens will end up rising in the polls.
No advice needed at all, according to your expectations.
Why not? What’s your reasoning for this assertion?
“So unless you’re suggesting that the growth in support the Greens will gain from Labour being such a disappointment will actually be trivially small, really if the Greens do absolutely nothing the Greens will end up rising in the polls.”
No.
As I explained above, for the Greens to secure the disgruntled Labour vote (which will take some time to filter through) they need to up their game, thus current support so as to not be perceived as a wasted vote.
The maximum logical distance they can fall from the last poll is ~5%, because they can’t have negative popularity.
Therefore, if the Green growth in support from Labour being such a tragic disappointment is >5%, the Greens’ support must grow from its present point. So your advice is useless if the objective is to prevent a further fall in Green support.
If you’re expecting less than 5% growth in Green support from Labour being so horribly disappointing, well, that’s an amount of “growth” that’s close to the margin for error. So really you’re expecting growth in support that might be undetectable. Which seems to be a worthless prediction.
So it seems that at the very least either your advice is useless at preventing a further fall in support, or your predictions are unverifiable and therefore worthless. I suspect both, but each to their own. Your self-proclaimed mission is redundant.
“The maximum logical distance they can fall from the last poll is ~5%, because they can’t have negative popularity.”
Yes, but that doesn’t explain your assertion they can’t fall much further that what they are currently polling at.
“Therefore, if the Green growth in support from Labour being such a tragic disappointment is >5%, the Greens’ support must grow from its present point.”
You are overlooking the time it will take for the Jacinda effect to wear off. In which time (as I’ve explained extensively above) they risk further falling. At which point, by the time the Jacinda effect wears off, the Green’s support may be so low they will no longer be a viable option for that disgruntled Labour vote.
Which is why they need to up their game and grow their support now.
Whereas if a margin-for-error drop in Labour support goes over to the Greens, that’s 3.5% for almost no detectable drop in Labour popularity.
Are you predicting that the Greens will fall to <1.5% (still a fuckall drop in the greater scheme of things) if they don't follow your every direction?
Indeed. Which is why even at 5% they risk no longer being a viable option for the disgruntled Labour vote come election day.
Therefore, they don’t really have to fall any further to be considered a risk, deterring the Labour vote from crossing over.
So yes, at this stage I’m predicting they will further fall unless they up their game. But, again at this stage, I’m unable to put an exact number on how large or small that fall will be.
*Sincerely, with a tear of disappointment in the corner of his eye
“I was hoping the Greens would be better than that.”
*Sobs, quietly, so no one will notice
The Greens have lost their way. They once cared deeply for the homeless homers. Now…
… Shaw! He’s at the bottom of this! Shaw!!!
The coalition’s a farce – bring back Bill!!!
The leading law firm has been named winner of ‘Best Gender Diversity Initiative by National Firm’ at last night’s IFLR Euromoney Legal Media Group Asia Women in Business Law Awards, held in Hong Kong.
Russell McVeagh senior partner and board member Sarah Armstrong said the award highlights the firm’s success in implementing and supporting diversity and inclusion initiatives and progress of its long-term, firm-wide Diversity Project, launched in 2014.
Meanwhile on Newsroom
What we know so far is that five female clerks have made a series of claims, ranging from serious sexual assault to sexual harassment, while they were employed at top-tier law firm Russell McVeagh in Wellington.
Interesting how the two stories are so different.
Calling on NZ Government to stop giving work to any lawyers working under the banner of law firm Russell McVeagh
The firm acts for 11 of the NZX 15 companies, and New Zealand’s major corporates, including numerous energy and utilities companies, all of New Zealand’s retail banks, and New Zealand’s largest company and largest listed company.
These companies should stop giving work to any lawyers working under the banner of law firm Russell McVeagh
They won’t change unless it hurts them in the pocket.
I say go after the big fish first, they are clearly at fault. They want to say “everyone is doing it” do not play into their PR spin. THey are the ones doing it. Stop them first.
“What’s black and brown and looks good on a lawyer? A doberman.”
In reality, government decisions can be challenged in court. I have no axe to grind for RMcV or any other dog-food, and I wonder about the timing of this “hit”, and note that “Plan B” hasn’t commented since my question about their interests.
Labour looking at revamping abortion laws. Not just decriminalising, but things like where it can be performed (RU486) and the triple-consultation requirement and making referrals mandatory.
Cue the concern-o-bots worried that improving access to healthcare will get in the way of ‘real’ issues…
You have to wonder what sort of country we are becoming, certainly not clean and green. And why do we have laws that allow a resource consent to proceed when they don’t even have access in place for the mine and are relying on taking conservation land for that purpose. (but clearly breaking up the consent aka steal our harbour style).
Having to fight these bad consents and our pathetic RMA plunder at will rules, removes valuable community money and resources which could be better spent on actually helping our forests and birds not stopping their habitat being threatened on a weekly basis by bad resource consents!
Remember Pike River, fully consented death trap! NZ are turning into primitive yokels.
It’s battle and fight and justify and fight and petition and deny and battle and march and protest and promise and argue and weak legislation to paper over and it’s ignore and drink up and listen to the stockmarket reports and check bank balances and consult with tax accountants and order a new car and think about a small plane, and ignore laggards and whiners. What do they know?
Where are the Green Party on this? If they were more media present on this type of issue then it might help to reassure their missing 100,000, as well as preserve the environment.
Is Labour going to coast along thinking they can implant the Natz agenda, and Jacinda will distract the public from that like JK’s barbecues?
If more people had voted for them, they wouldn’t be spread so thin. But in this case I think that because the Minister of Conservation is a Green MP, the Greens have obligations including acting within the agreement with Labour. So Eugenie Sage needs to act within her roles as Minister i.e. she’s part of the government. If another Green MP spoke out on this, they risk speaking against their own MP and Minister. I think what is happening here is that the Greens now do their work though government, except where a portfolio sits outside of that role.
I assume the Greens (and Labour) don’t want to interfere with due process. If we’re talking about the proposed mine in the Buller, then the permission granted this week was by the High Court. The government can’t just override that. As Patricia points out, the government will need to strengthen laws around this. I’m guessing that this mine was already in the pipeline before the govt changed. I hope they stop it, but I don’t think it’s a simple as some people think.
The mining company still needs to get resources consent from the local councils. And then it needs consent to access the site over conservation land. I assume DOC will decide on that. Given DOC’s history of taking a neutral rather than protective stance in similar situations, I’ll be very interested to see if that changes under the new Minister. I’ve never really been clear where DOC’s directive was coming from on that in the past i.e. legislatively mandated, or from the Minister or what.
Immediately stop using all metal objects. Allow only wood or stone materials in your life.
Especially stop using the internet as it relies on electricity that is conducted everywhere by that demon metal copper. In fact anything electronic which uses all manner of metals
If everybody did this immediately the world would be such a better, less destructive place.
I see in the Herald online that Avon Cosmetics are shutting shop in Australasia after 55 years here. The company obviously think we are not paying our way down here. No warnings and now 220 staff and 21,400 representatives are without a job – that is a big chunk of the workforce now looking for work.
Apart from a huge upset for their customers obviously its just a day at the office for the restructuring team who has orchestrated this. How much profit is too much profit –
jobs are just severed without a bye your leave.
Can you please clarify who the ‘we’ is in that sentence?
Does it include the Avon employees? Or is it just you speaking in the (royal) third person?
Once the ‘we’ is defined then some other questions might open up – like the responsibilities of each member of the ‘we’ towards other members of the ‘we’.
I don’t want your condolences you f—–g piece of s–t, my friends and teachers were shot. Multiple of my fellow classmates are dead. Do something instead of sending prayers. Prayers won’t fix this. But Gun control will prevent it from happening again,
About my tweet directed to president trump, I apologize for the profanity and harsh comment I made. I hope you know I’m a grieving 16 year old girl who lost friends, teachers, and peers yesterday. I was and am still angry. I am apologizing for my comment but not for my anger.— sarah (@sarahchad_) February 15, 2018
My phone was down I couldn’t get thestandard.org.nz website I tx the Rock radio station about my problem and walar I can get thestandard.org.nz sandflys are at it again Ana to kai
The University of Canterbury academic’s home was broken into on Wednesday. Three laptops, including one on which she wrote the paper, two cellphones and an encrypted memory stick from her last trip to China were taken.
Brady also received a letter this week – since handed on to police, who were also investigating the break-in – warning her of “what was going on” and saying she would be attacked.
“China hasn’t had to pressure New Zealand to accept China’s soft power activities and political influence. The New Zealand government has actively courted it,”
Professor Anne-Marie Brady says “associates in China had been brought in for questioning by the country’s Ministry of State Security”. “Principles” are only tested when there’s risk involved. Like, for example, our nuclear free policy.
As a small country, we “owe service” (Lao Tzu). There’s a difference between service and vassal status. If Professor Brady’s concerns are valid, it’s time there was some overt push-back.
And here is Matt Nippert on it -we get to see the honorable investigative journalist himself in the vid at the link – recorded after the release of the research paper, and before our elections.
If Nippert says it’s scary stuff (as he did on twitter today), then we should be worried.
In her research, Brady sets out connections between former political figures and Chinese interests, including former National leader Dr Don Brash, former Prime Minister Dame Jenny Shipley and former Christchurch Mayor Bob Parker.
And Judith Collins, who has Chinese commercial influences of her own, is campaigning to be Nat leader.
Congratulations to South Africa New president Cyril Ramaphosa ECO MAORI know that you will be a humble humane president that gets the big picture he tangata he tangata give the people a bright happy future and all will be well
Hillary & Jeremy I tried a sugar supplement starting feeling a the side effects I Google them and what do you know one side effects is it causes cancer.
You no what they say about a plump man it’s true PS I will cut down on my sugar when I sue the police ka kite ano
I Google my high blood pressure pills an the side effects are huge on should Google all the medication you are given as the doctor doesn’t tell you the side effects at least you will know what to expect Ka kite ano
New Zealand is again having to reconcile conflicting pressures from its military and its trade interests. Should we join Pillar Two of AUKUS and risk compromising our markets in China? For a century after New Zealand was founded in 1840, its external security arrangements and external economics arrangements were aligned. ...
The ‘50 Shades of Green’ farmers’ protest in 2019 was heavy on climate change denial, but five years on, scepticism and criticism about the idea that pine forests can save us is growing across the board. File photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: Here’s the top six news items of note in climate ...
This morning the sky was bright.The birds, in their usual joyous bliss. Nature doesn’t seem to feel the heat of what might angst humans.Their calls are clear and beautiful.Just some random thoughts:MāoriPaul Goldsmith has announced his government will roll back the judiciary’s rulings on Māori Customary Marine Title, which recognises ...
In 2003, the Court of Appeal delivered its decision in Ngati Apa v Attorney-General, ruling that Māori customary title over the foreshore and seabed had not been universally extinguished, and that the Māori Land Court could determine claims and confirm title if the facts supported it. This kicked off the ...
Earlier this week at Parliament, Labour leader Chris Hipkins was applauded for saying that the response to the final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care had to be “bigger than politics.” True, but the fine words, apologies and “we hear you” messages will soon ring ...
TL;DR: In news breaking this morning:The Ministry of Education is cutting $2 billion from its school building programme so the National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government has enough money to deliver tax cuts; The Government has quietly lowered its child poverty reduction targets to make them easier to achieve;Te Whatu Ora-Health NZ’s ...
Kia ora. These are some stories that caught our eye this week – as always, feel free to share yours in the comments. Our header image this week (via Eke Panuku) shows the planned upgrade for the Karanga Plaza Tidal Swimming Steps. The week in Greater Auckland On ...
1. What's not to love about the way the Harris campaign is turning things around?a. Nothingb. Love all of itc. God what a reliefd. Not that it will be by any means easye. All of the above 2. Documents released by the Ministry of Health show Associate Health Minister Casey ...
Trust in me in all you doHave the faith I have in youLove will see us through, if only you trust in meWhy don't you, you trust me?In a week that saw the release of the 3,000 page Abuse in Care report Christopher Luxon was being asked about Boot Camps. ...
TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking about the Royal Commission Inquiry into Abuse in Carereport released this week, and with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent on a UN push to not recognise carbon offset markets and ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 26, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Transport: Simeon Brown announced$802.9 million in funding for 18 new trains on the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines, which ...
The northern expressway extension from Warkworth to Whangarei is likely to require radical changes to legislation if it is going to be built within the foreseeable future. The Government’s powers to purchase land, the planning process and current restrictions on road tolling are all going to need to be changed ...
Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedFirst they came for the doctors But I was confused by the numbers and costs So I didn't speak up Then they came for our police and nurses And I didn't think we could afford those costs anyway So I ...
Photo by Joshua J. Cotten on UnsplashWe’re back again after our mid-winter break. We’re still with the ‘new’ day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when we have our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm.Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream ...
Notes: This is a free article. Abuse in Care themes are mentioned. Video is at the bottom.BackgroundYesterday’s report into Abuse in Care revealed that at least 1 in 3 of all who went through state and faith based care were abused - often horrifically. At least, because not all survivors ...
Luxon speaks in Parliament yesterday about the Abuse in Care report. Photo: Hagen Hopkins/Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:PM Christopher Luxon said yesterday in tabling the Abuse in Carereport in Parliament he wanted to ‘do the ...
About a decade ago I worked with a bloke called Steve. He was the grizzled veteran coder, a few years older than me, who knew where the bodies were buried - code wise. Despite his best efforts to be approachable and friendly he could be kind of gruff, through to ...
Some of the recent announcements from the government have reminded us of posts we’ve written in the past. Here’s one from early 2020. There were plenty of reactions to the government’s infrastructure announcement a few weeks ago which saw them fund a bunch of big roading projects. One of ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Thursday, July 25 are:News: Why Electric Kiwi is closing to new customers - and why it matters RNZ’s Susan EdmundsScoop: Government drops ...
Hi,I felt a small wet tongue snaking through one of the holes in my Crocs. It explored my big toe, darting down one side, then the other. “He’s looking for some toe cheese,” said the woman next to me, words that still haunt me to this day.Growing up in New ...
Yesterday I happily quoted the Prime Minister without fact-checking him and sure enough, it turns out his numbers were all to hell. It’s not four kg of Royal Commission report, it’s fourteen.My friend and one-time colleague-in-comms Hazel Phillips gently alerted me to my error almost as soon as I’d hit ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Thursday, July 25, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day were:The Abuse in Care Royal Commission of Inquirypublished its final report yesterday.PM Christopher Luxon and The Minister responsible for ...
The Official Information Act has always been a battle between requesters seeking information, and governments seeking to control it. Information is power, so Ministers and government agencies want to manage what is released and when, for their own convenience, and legality and democracy be damned. Their most recent tactic for ...
TL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:Transport and Energy Minister Simeon Brown is accelerating plans to spend at least $10 billion through Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) to extend State Highway One as a four-lane ‘Expressway’ from Warkworth to Whangarei ...
I live my life (woo-ooh-ooh)With no control in my destinyYea-yeah, yea-yeah (woo-ooh-ooh)I can bleed when I want to bleedSo come on, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)You can bleed when you want to bleedYea-yeah, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)Everybody bleed when they want to bleedCome on and bleedGovernments face tough challenges. Selling unpopular decisions to ...
Please note:To skip directly to the- parliamentary footage in the video, scroll to 1:21 To skip to audio please click on the headphone iconon the left hand side of the screenThis video / audio section is under development. ...
Given the crackdown on wasteful government spending, it behooves me to point to a high profile example of spending by the Luxon government that looks like a big, fat waste of time and money. I’m talking about the deployment of NZDF personnel to support the US-led coalition in the Red ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:40 am on Wednesday, July 24 are:Deep Dive: Chipping away at the housing crisis, including my comments RNZ/Newsroom’s The DetailNews: Government softens on asset sales, ...
As I reported about the city centre, Auckland’s rail network is also going through a difficult and disruptive period which is rapidly approaching a culmination, this will result in a significant upgrade to the whole network. Hallelujah. Also like the city centre this is an upgrade predicated on the City ...
Today, a 4 kilogram report will be delivered to Parliament. We know this is what the report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care weighs, because our Prime Minister told us so.Some reporter had blindsided him by asking a question about something done by ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Wednesday, July 24, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Beehive:Transport Minister Simeon Brownannounced plans to use PPPs to fund, build and run a four-lane expressway between Auckland ...
NewstalkZB host Mike Hosking, who can usually be relied on to give Prime Minister Christopher Luxon an easy run, did not do so yesterday when he interviewed him about the HealthNZ deficit. Luxon is trying to use a deficit reported last year by HealthNZ as yet another example of the ...
Back in January a StatsNZ employee gave a speech at Rātana on behalf of tangata whenua in which he insulted and criticised the government. The speech clearly violated the principle of a neutral public service, and StatsNZ started an investigation. Part of that was getting an external consultant to examine ...
Renting for life: Shared ownership initiatives are unlikely to slow the slide in home ownership by much. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:A Deloittereport for Westpac has projected Aotearoa’s home-ownership rate will ...
You're broken down and tiredOf living life on a merry go roundAnd you can't find the fighterBut I see it in you so we gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsWe gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsAnd I'll rise upI'll rise like the dayI'll rise upI'll rise unafraidI'll rise upAnd I'll ...
There’s been a change in Myers Park. Down the steps from St. Kevin’s Arcade, past the grassy slopes, the children’s playground, the benches and that goat statue, there has been a transformation. The underpass for Mayoral Drive has gone from a barren, grey, concrete tunnel, to a place that thrums ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections Global society may have finally slammed on the brakes for climate-warming pollution released by human fossil fuel combustion. According to the Carbon Monitor Project, the total global climate pollution released between February and May 2024 declined slightly from the amount released during the same ...
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TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Tuesday, July 23, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Health: Shane Reti announcedthe Board of Te Whatu Ora-Health New Zealand was being replaced with Commissioner Lester Levy ...
Health NZ warned the Government at the end of March that it was running over Budget. But the reasons it gave were very different to those offered by the Prime Minister yesterday. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon blamed the “botched merger” of the 20 District Health Boards (DHBs) to create Health ...
Long ReadKey Summary: Although National increased the health budget by $1.4 billion in May, they used an old funding model to project health system costs, and never bothered to update their pre-election numbers. They were told during the Health Select Committees earlier in the year their budget amount was deficient, ...
As a momentous, historic weekend in US politics unfolded, analysts and commentators grasped for precedents and comparisons to help explain the significance and power of the choice Joe Biden had made. The 46th president had swept the Democratic party’s primaries but just over 100 days from the election had chosen ...
TL;DR: I’m casting around for new ideas and ways of thinking about Aotearoa’s political economy to find a few solutions to our cascading and self-reinforcing housing, poverty and climate crises.Associate Professor runs an online masters degree in the economics of sustainability at Torrens University in Australia and is organising ...
The Finance and Expenditure Committee has reported back on National's Local Government (Water Services Preliminary Arrangements) Bill. The bill sets up water for privatisation, and was introduced under urgency, then rammed through select committee with no time even for local councils to make a proper submission. Naturally, national's select committee ...
Some years ago, I bought a book at Dunedin’s Regent Booksale for $1.50. As one does. Vandrad the Viking (1898), by J. Storer Clouston, is an obscure book these days – I cannot find a proper online review – but soon it was sitting on my shelf, gathering dust alongside ...
History is not on the side of the centre-left, when Democratic presidents fall behind in the polls and choose not to run for re-election. On both previous occasions in the past 75 years (Harry Truman in 1952, Lyndon Johnson in 1968) the Democrats proceeded to then lose the White House ...
This is a free articleCoverageThis morning, US President Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the Presidential race. And that is genuinely newsworthy. Thanks for your service, President Biden, and all the best to you and yours.However, the media in New Zealand, particularly the 1News nightly bulletin, has been breathlessly covering ...
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What has happened to it all?Crazy, some'd sayWhere is the life that I recognise?(Gone away)But I won't cry for yesterdayThere's an ordinary worldSomehow I have to findAnd as I try to make my wayTo the ordinary worldYesterday morning began as many others - what to write about today? I began ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Monday, July 22 are:Today’s Must Read: Father and son live in a tent, and have done for four years, in a million ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Monday, July 22, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:US President Joe Biden announced via X this morning he would not stand for a second term.Multinational professional services firm ...
A listing of 32 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, July 14, 2024 thru Sat, July 20, 2024. Story of the week As reflected by preponderance of coverage, our Story of the Week is Project 2025. Until now traveling ...
This weekend, a friend pointed out someone who said they’d like to read my posts, but didn’t want to pay. And my first reaction was sympathy.I’ve already told folks that if they can’t comfortably subscribe, and would like to read, I’d be happy to offer free subscriptions. I don’t want ...
National: The Party of ‘Law and Order’ IntroductionThis weekend, the Government formally kicked off one of their flagship policy programs: a military style boot camp that New Zealand has experimented with over the past 50 years. Cartoon credit: Guy BodyIt’s very popular with the National Party’s Law and Orderimage, ...
Day one of the solo leg of my long journey home begins with my favourite sound: footfalls in an empty street. 5.00 am and it’s already light and already too warm, almost.If I can make the train that leaves Budapest later this hour I could be in Belgrade by nightfall; ...
Do you remember Y2K, the threat that hung over humanity in the closing days of the twentieth century? Horror scenarios of planes falling from the sky, electronic payments failing and ATMs refusing to dispense cash. As for your VCR following instructions and recording your favourite show - forget about it.All ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
Waiting In The Wings:For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSAannounced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent talking about the National-ACT-NZ First Government’s release of its first Emissions Reduction Plan;University of Otago Foreign Relations Professor and special guest Dr Karin von ...
Open access notablesImproving global temperature datasets to better account for non-uniform warming, Calvert, Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society:To better account for spatial non-uniform trends in warming, a new GITD [global instrumental temperature dataset] was created that used maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) to combine the land surface ...
A late change to charter school legislation will cheat educators out of fair pay and negotiating power proving charter schools are just a vehicle to make profit out of our education system. ...
In 2004 te iwi Māori rallied against the Crown’s attempt to confiscate our coastlines and moana with the Foreshore and Seabed Act. This led to the largest hīkoi of a generation and the birth of Te Pāti Māori. 20 years later, history is repeating itself. Today the government has announced ...
It has been five and a half years since the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care was established to investigate the abuse of children, young people, and vulnerable adults within state and faith-based institutions. Yesterday, the final report - Whanaketia through pain and trauma, from darkness to light ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to take action off the back of the International Court of Justice ruling on Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. ...
On Friday the International Court of Justice reaffirmed what Palestinian’s have been telling us for decades: that the occupation and colonisation of Palestinian lands by Israel is illegal and must end immediately. They also called for reparations for Palestinian’s who have lived under Israeli occupation since it began in 1967. ...
Labour calls on the Government to act after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories is illegal. ...
The 53.7 percent rise in benefit sanctions over the last year is more proof of this Government’s disdain for our communities most in need of support. ...
Aotearoa could be a country where every child grows up feeling safe, loved and with a sense of belonging in their whānau and community. But for some of our children, this is far from reality. Instead, they are trapped in a maze of intergenerational harm that they can’t escape on ...
Te Pāti Māori are calling for David Seymour to resign as Associate Health Minister in response to his call for Pharmac to ignore the Treaty of Waitangi. “This announcement is just another example of the government’s anti-Tiriti, anti-Māori agenda.” Said Co-leader and spokesperson for health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. “Seymour thinks it ...
The soaring price of renting is driving the rise of inflation in this country - with latest figures from Stats NZ showing rents are up 4.8 per cent on average while annual inflation is at 3.3 per cent. ...
National’s Emissions Reduction Plan will take New Zealand further from the economy we need to ensure the next generation has a stable climate and secure livelihoods. ...
Following consultation with named parties and thorough consideration of privacy interests, the Green Party is in a position to release the Executive Summary of the final report from the independent investigation into Darleen Tana. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon should be asking serious questions of his Minister for Resources Shane Jones now it’s been revealed he misled the public about a dinner with mining companies that he didn’t declare and said wasn’t pre-arranged. ...
Te Pāti Māori have submitted to the Justice Select Committee against the Sentencing (Reinstating Three Strikes) Amendment Bill. The bill will further entrench racism in our justice system and fails to focus on rehabilitation. “Reinstating Three Strikes will empower a systematically racist system and exacerbate the overrepresentation of Māori in ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee is set to make a determination on the Residential Tenancies Amendment (RTA) Bill in the coming weeks. “This legislation will give landlords the power to kick our whānau out onto the street for no reason” said Housing spokesperson, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “Their solution to the housing ...
“National’s campaign was about tackling crime and the best they can do is a two-year long Ministerial Advisory Group,” Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
“There are more examples of charter schools failing their students than there are success stories. The coalition Government is driving to dismantle our public school system and instead promote a privatised, competitive structure that puts profits before kids,” Jan Tinetti said. ...
“This government is choosing to deliberately mislead and withhold information, keeping our people in the dark about this government’s agenda and the future of our mokopuna,” said co-leader and spokesperson for Health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. The call comes after the demand from the Chief Ombudsman that Associate Minister of Health, Casey ...
“Today’s climate announcement by Simon Watts makes clear the National Government is simply paying lip service to meeting its climate change targets,” Megan Woods said. ...
National is choosing to make life harder for workers by taking away the rights our communities have fought hard for. Here's how they’re taking workers backwards. ...
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue. We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views. “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
Tēnā tātou katoa, Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts. “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet. “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks. “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. At the heart of this report are the ...
For the first time, the Government is formally acknowledging some children and young people at Lake Alice Psychiatric Hospital experienced torture. The final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament ...
The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 courageous survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care. The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through ...
With a week to go before hard-working New Zealanders see personal income tax relief for the first time in fourteen years, 513,000 people have used the Budget tax calculator to see how much they will benefit, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “Tax relief is long overdue. From next Wednesday, personal income ...
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden says a bill that has passed its first reading will improve parental leave settings and give non-biological parents more flexibility as primary carer for their child. The Regulatory Systems Amendment Bill (No3), passed its first reading this morning. “It includes a change ...
Two Bills designed to improve regulation and make it easier to do business have passed their first reading in Parliament, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. The Regulatory Systems (Economic Development) Amendment Bill and Regulatory Systems (Immigration and Workforce) Amendment Bill make key changes to legislation administered by the Ministry ...
New legislation paves the way for greater competition in sectors such as banking and electricity, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly says. “Competitive markets boost productivity, create employment opportunities and lift living standards. To support competition, we need good quality regulation but, unfortunately, a recent OECD report ranked New ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says lotteries for charitable purposes, such as those run by the Heart Foundation, Coastguard NZ, and local hospices, will soon be allowed to operate online permanently. “Under current laws, these fundraising lotteries are only allowed to operate online until October 2024, after which ...
The Coalition Government is accelerating work on the new four-lane expressway between Auckland and Whangārei as part of its Roads of National Significance programme, with an accelerated delivery model to deliver this project faster and more efficiently, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “For too long, the lack of resilient transport connections ...
Sir Don McKinnon will travel to Viet Nam this week as a Special Envoy of the Government, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “It is important that the Government give due recognition to the significant contributions that General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong made to New Zealand-Viet Nam relations,” Mr ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says newly appointed Commissioner, Grant Illingworth KC, will help deliver the report for the first phase of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into COVID-19 Lessons, due on 28 November 2024. “I am pleased to announce that Mr Illingworth will commence his appointment as ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters travels to Laos this week to participate in a series of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-led Ministerial meetings in Vientiane. “ASEAN plays an important role in supporting a peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” Mr Peters says. “This will be our third visit to ...
Construction of a new mental health facility at Te Nikau Grey Hospital in Greymouth is today one step closer, Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey says. “This $27 million facility shows this Government is delivering on its promise to boost mental health care and improve front line services,” Mr Doocey says. ...
New Zealand is committing nearly $50 million to a package supporting sustainable Pacific fisheries development over the next four years, Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones announced today. “This support consisting of a range of initiatives demonstrates New Zealand’s commitment to assisting our Pacific partners ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour says proposed changes to the Education and Training Amendment Bill will ensure charter schools have more flexibility to negotiate employment agreements and are equipped with the right teaching resources. “Cabinet has agreed to progress an amendment which means unions will not be able to initiate ...
In response to serious concerns around oversight, overspend and a significant deterioration in financial outlook, the Board of Health New Zealand will be replaced with a Commissioner, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti announced today. “The previous government’s botched health reforms have created significant financial challenges at Health NZ that, without ...
Minister for Space and Science, Innovation and Technology Judith Collins will travel to Adelaide tomorrow for space and science engagements, including speaking at the Australian Space Forum. While there she will also have meetings and visits with a focus on space, biotechnology and innovation. “New Zealand has a thriving space ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts will travel to China on Saturday to attend the Ministerial on Climate Action meeting held in Wuhan. “Attending the Ministerial on Climate Action is an opportunity to advocate for New Zealand climate priorities and engage with our key partners on climate action,” Mr Watts says. ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is travelling to the Solomon Islands tomorrow for meetings with his counterparts from around the Pacific supporting collective management of the region’s fisheries. The 23rd Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Committee and the 5th Regional Fisheries Ministers’ Meeting in Honiara from 23 to 26 July ...
The Government today launched the Military Style Academy Pilot at Te Au rere a te Tonga Youth Justice residence in Palmerston North, an important part of the Government’s plan to crackdown on youth crime and getting youth offenders back on track, Minister for Children, Karen Chhour said today. “On the ...
The Government has welcomed news the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has begun work to replace nine priority bridges across the country to ensure our state highway network remains resilient, reliable, and efficient for road users, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says.“Increasing productivity and economic growth is a key priority for the ...
Acting Prime Minister David Seymour has been in contact throughout the evening with senior officials who have coordinated a whole of government response to the global IT outage and can provide an update. The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has designated the National Emergency Management Agency as the ...
New Zealand and Japan will continue to step up their shared engagement with the Pacific, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “New Zealand and Japan have a strong, shared interest in a free, open and stable Pacific Islands region,” Mr Peters says. “We are pleased to be finding more ways ...
New developments in the heart of North Island forestry country will reinvigorate their communities and boost economic development, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones visited Kaingaroa and Kawerau in Bay of Plenty today to open a landmark community centre in the former and a new connecting road in ...
President Adeang, fellow Ministers, honourable Diet Member Horii, Ambassadors, distinguished guests. Minasama, konnichiwa, and good afternoon, everyone. Distinguished guests, it’s a pleasure to be here with you today to talk about New Zealand’s foreign policy reset, the reasons for it, the values that underpin it, and how it ...
Opinion: The Canadian short story writer Alice Munro – winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013 – died in May at the age of 92. Her work was about “the damage people inflict on one another in the name of love”, Deborah Treisman wrote in the New Yorker. ...
This month marks two years since the most powerful telescope ever built sent its first pictures back to earth. From its lofty vantage point, beyond the moon in orbit around the sun, the James Webb Space Telescope was tuned to observe the first stars and galaxies being born soon after ...
Comment: After Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ preview several weeks ago, I had some optimism about the Government’s emissions reduction plan. Now I’ve read the discussion document, that hope has been dashed. How can the Government propose a plan that wants to take New Zealand taxpayers’ hard-earned money, and spend ...
Christopher Luxon: hurdles The little man from National jumps hurdles in his sleep. He’s quite good at it in his dreams and even though the reality doesn’t quite match up you have to give him credit for getting up every morning and crashing into the very first hurdle of the ...
Comment: It was a good two hours into the conversation when Tyrone Marks raised the most basic of questions when I first spoke to him in 2017. “They didn’t explain the things they did to me. They never told me why. And they still haven’t. There’s no explanation for it. ...
Last summer when Matairangi burned, Ginny and Tom stood at the window of their lounge, watching kākā shoot skyward from the burning trees. From the distance, they looked to Ginny like pages torn from books and thrown into a bonfire. It was Tom, voice tight, who told her it was ...
Madeleine Chapman rounds out Death Week on The Spinoff with a final recommendation. You can read all of our Death Week coverage here. Nothing forces you to reflect on your life and relationships quite like proximity to death. For those whose nearest and dearest have died, there are reasonably obvious ...
Whitney Greene takes us through her life in television, including the TV character she’d like to plan a funeral for and her cow lung catastrophe on The Traitors NZ. “If the phone rings, I have to answer it,” Whitney Greene from The Traitors NZ warns as we begin our My ...
Maddie Ballard reviews the debut essay collection of Pōneke writer Flora Feltham.In ‘The Raw Material’, the longest essay in Flora Feltham’s dazzling debut collection, the author heads out for a run after hours of weaving and sees the world turn to textile. “Pounding along the Parade, I saw the ...
Andy Christiansen, one half of the experimental rock-pop duo TRiPS, shares the tunes inspiring the band’s perfect weekend and new release. “Good speakers, good food, good music, no distractions”: that’s all you need to enjoy the psychedelic stylings of TRiPS, a new band formed by Fly My Pretties’ Barnaby Weir ...
Celebrating our quadrennial opportunity to become experts in a bunch of sports we never normally watch.The games of the XXXIII Olympiad are upon us. Paris will host this year’s showcase of sporting and athletic prowess, which means some late-night and early-morning viewing for us in Aotearoa.But what sports ...
The photograph is striking and beautiful, but also disturbing – a reminder that my love for John was often entangled in shame.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.In the spring of 1980, in Dunedin, shortly before his death, someone took a photograph ...
Get to know Babushka, our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Babu’s humans, Jo and Isabel, for their support. Dog name: Babushka (Babu for short) Age: 2Breed: Border Collie X poodleIf rescued, ...
Pacific Media Watch A Lebanese photojournalist who was severely wounded during an Israeli air strike in south Lebanon carried the Olympic torch in Paris this week in honour of her peers who have been wounded and killed in the field — especially in Gaza and Lebanon. Christina Assi of Agence ...
The first report in a five-part web series focused on the 15th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women taking place in the Marshall Islands this week.SPECIAL REPORT:By Netani Rika in Majuro Women continue to fight for justice 70 years after the first nuclear tests by the United States caused ...
Christopher Luxon has joined with Australia and Canada's leaders in voicing support for US President Joe Biden's ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The 2022 election brought the “teal wave” into parliament. The next election will test whether teals, who occupy what were Liberal seats, and other independents can maintain their momentum. Joining us on the Podcast ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Musgrave, Senior lecturer in Pharmacology, University of Adelaide Pixavri/Shutterstock A major Federal Court class action has been dismissed this week after Justice Michael Lee ruled there was not enough evidence to prove the weedkiller Roundup causes cancer. Plaintiff Kelvin ...
In The Week in Politics: politicians have to decide what to do about child abuse, Health NZ is booked in for major surgery and Darleen Tana returns. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Corbould, Associate Professor, Contemporary Histories Research Group, Deakin University Mainstream media are surprisingly muted at the prospect of the world’s most powerful nation being led for the first time by a woman – specifically a woman of colour, Vice President Kamala ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Bennett, PhD Student, Associate Research Fellow, Deakin University Last week, a drone delivery company called Wing (owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet) started operating in Melbourne. Some 250,000 residents in parts of the city’s eastern suburbs can now order food from ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonathan Foo, Lecturer, Physiotherapy, Monash University pikselstock/Shutterstock In the next 40 years in Australia, it’s predicted the number of Australians aged 65 and over will more than double, while the number of people aged 85 and over will more than triple. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katrina Grant, Research Associate, Power Institute for Arts and Visual Culture, University of Sydney Jonas Åkerström’s 1790 work, Session of the Accademia dell’Arcadia on August 17 1788.Nationalmuseum/Cecilia Heisser Ever wondered whether you’d have a better chance at winning an Olympic gold ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexandra Jones, Program Lead, Food Governance, George Institute for Global Health wavebreakmedia/Shutterstock On Thursday, Australian and New Zealand food ministers at state, federal and national levels met to thrash out what’s next for health star ratings on packaged foods. Now, after ...
The Abuse in Care report found many Pacific survivors lost their connections to their culture and language, resulting in trauma that has been carried from generation to generation. ...
In the regulatory review, ECC intends to suggest that ERO focus on curriculum delivery reviews rather than the Ministry, because it’s not efficient or effective to have two agencies with radically different approaches climbing over each other. ...
Te Rūnanga Nui o Ngā Kura Kaupapa Māori invites the current government to work in partnership with them to develop a pathway forward, including the development of a parallel pathway and meaningful policy and strategy for Kura Kaupapa Māori ...
If you haven’t started watching yet, Tara Ward begs you to reconsider. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. In the world of New Zealand reality television, we have many gems in our crown. There’s the delicious second season of the Celebrity Treasure ...
A new poem by Fiona Kidman. The clothes of the dead I did not keep my mother’s furry red beret for long nor the stringy scarves that adorned the necks of my aunts, although I have kept tag ends of gold, the rings and trinkets they wore, the brooches no ...
The government’s announcement that it will re-open the foreshore and seabed controversy by changing the rules on recognising centuries-old Māori customary title for a third time goes against the rule of law and New Zealand values,” Mr Tipa says. ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Lioness by Emily Perkins (Bloomsbury, $25) Roarrrr! Perkins’ brilliant, award-winning, Marian-Keyes anointed, darkly funny, long ...
The 2004 Act vested ownership of the foreshore and seabed in the Crown, extinguishing any Māori claims to ownership and causing widespread outrage and protests among Māori communities. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Antje Deckert, Associate Professor (Criminology), Auckland University of Technology Getty Images Despite the connection between institutional harm and gang membership made clear in this week’s mammoth royal commission abuse-in care report, the government seems unlikely to soften its “get tough on ...
From Lewis Clareburt in the swimming to the start of the rowing – the first seven days of Paris 2024 promise to be big for New Zealand. There are few events that bring the country together quite like an Olympic Games. Nothing quite matches the excitement of getting up in ...
Groundbreaking local science just showed up in the most surprising of places: the season finale of The Kardashians. In the season five finale of The Kardashians last night, several members of the family gathered together in one of their signature empty, cream-coloured rooms to hear test results that had been ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Saikal, Emeritus professor of Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies, Australian National University The Middle East is on the brink of a possibly devastating regional war, with hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah reaching an extremely dangerous level. Washington has engaged in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Elizabeth Eades, Rheumatologist, Monash University Lupus is an inflammatory autoimmune illness, where the body’s immune system mistakenly attacks itself. Lupus can affect virtually any part of the body, although it most commonly affects the skin, joints and kidneys. The symptoms ...
A law firm that specialises in working with survivors of abuse in State care is disappointed that the Government fails to recognise that its boot camps can be directly compared to previous boot camps from the 1990s and 2000s. ...
Dying is a natural part of life, like updating your Wof or seeing your hairdresser, but without the word-of-mouth recs that help guarantee a good service. What if we changed that? Dying Reviews received by The Spinoff have had the names of organisations redacted while Hospice NZ collects further data. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonti Horner, Professor (Astrophysics), University of Southern Queensland Mike Lewinski/Flickr, CC BY On any clear night, if you gaze skywards long enough, chances are you’ll see a meteor streaking through the sky. Some nights, however, are better than others. At ...
Despite having no bars or other designated spaces for lesbians, Auckland boasts a small but mighty lesbian museum. So how did it get here? The past 18 months has brought increasing hostility towards the queer community across Aotearoa. Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull’s anti-trans rally in Tamaki Makaurau last March led to a ...
Poneke Antifascist Coalition has invited Wellingtonians to stand in solidarity with the Kanak people at 12pm today outside the French Embassy in Wellington. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Layton, Visiting Fellow, Strategic Studies, Griffith University Drones are the signature technology of the Ukraine war. A few miniature aircraft designs were used in the war’s early days, but an incredible array of drones have now evolved. There are different types, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Slee, Associate Professor, Clinical Academic Neurologist, Flinders University Francisco Gonzelez/Unsplash Migraine is many things, but one thing it’s not is “just a headache”. “Migraine” comes from the Greek word “hemicrania”, referring to the common experience of migraine being predominantly ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lee White, Senior Lecturer and Horizon Fellow, School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Sydney Australia was slow to introduce minimum building standards for energy efficiency. The Nationwide House Energy Rating Scheme (NatHERS) only came into force in 2003. Older homes ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Steven Sherwood, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences, Climate Change Research Centre, UNSW Sydney The past century of human-induced warming has increased rainfall variability over 75% of the Earth’s land area – particularly over Australia, Europe and eastern North America, new research shows. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tony Heynen, Program Coordinator, Sustainable Energy, The University of Queensland A temporary stadium in the Champ-de-Mars, ParisEkaterina Pokrovsky/Shutterstock As Paris prepares to host the Olympic and Paralympic Games, the sustainability of the event is coming under scrutiny. The organisers have promoted ...
A night of karaoke and community in a pub that feels like a memory. You’d barely even notice it, unless you knew to look. Tucked away behind a liquor store on busy Constable Street is the capital’s last great pub. Newtown Sports Bar is an emblem of the pub culture ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Wright, Professor in Marine Geology, University of Canterbury Louise Corcoran/Getty Images The decline in the number of doctoral candidates at New Zealand universities is a worrying sign for the country’s effort to build a knowledge-based economy. Aotearoa New Zealand’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laurie Berg, Associate Professor, University of Technology Sydney defotoberg/Shutterstock Migrant worker exploitation is entrenched in workplaces across Australia. Tragically, a deep fear of immigration consequences means most unlawful employer conduct goes unreported. On Wednesday, however, the government officially launched a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Vaughan Cruickshank, Senior Lecturer in Health and Physical Education, University of Tasmania Paris is about to host its third summer Olympics. While we don’t yet know what the legacy of this year’s games will be, let’s take the opportunity to reflect on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hugh Breakey, Deputy Director, Institute for Ethics, Governance & Law, Griffith University In the wake of the assassination attempt on former US President Donald Trump, there were calls from bothsides of US politics, as well as internationally, to reduce the brutal, ...
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Some excellent articles in the papers today.
The first is entitled ‘Why Silicon Valley billionaires are prepping for the apocalypse in New Zealand’
It part of the Guardian’s ‘Long read’ section and provides a lot of insight into Thiel, libertarians, their hatred of Winston Peters and tells about the company traitor Roger Douglas keeps.
One quote.
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/feb/15/why-silicon-valley-billionaires-are-prepping-for-the-apocalypse-in-new-zealand
Wealth does not mean smarter. Chump Trump inherited his. The rich are just as gormless as the rest of us, fads happen to them too. Nz will get badly hit by climate change, the only place I figure off the top of my head that will improve, become a bread basket for the world, is the Simpson desert.
The second has an arresting title.
‘Is this the end of capitalism? US Federal Reserve financial safety net is gone.’
and starts in an arresting fashion
It continues to explain why capitalism is in trouble and why the oncoming crash will not be mitigated until it comes to its scathing conclusion.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/money/101494449/is-this-the-end-of-capitalism-us-federal-reserve-financial-safety-net-is-gone
Third article of note.
Simon Wilson makes sensible suggestions to remedy Auckland’s transport woes.
His 5 point plan
1. Create as many new dedicated bus lanes on main routes as possible. Forget permanent markings: use road cones.
2. Add as many more buses and trains as possible, right through the day, well into the night and over the weekends. Target all those big events.
3. Exclude general traffic from selected inner-city streets. Convert them to bus parks and bus routes, and allow service vehicles too. (More buses is a short-term solution, for many reasons, including that there’s nowhere to put them when they get to town. Bring on the light rail and more trains.)
4. Improve the service: good visible security and how about food and other vendors on the platforms?
5. Launch a great new marketing campaign to get people to leave their cars at home if they can. Include schools.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11995364
I’d say start to solve the transport/housing/pollution/infrastructure/poverty crisis by stopping immigration and stepping down tourism.
Nope, thought not, the screams from businesses needing to be paid $20k for a job visa will be huge, the multinational hotels and casinos, not having their cheap exploitable labour!
No of course make the local poorer people pay!
Often comments about getting more people on public transport are from people who live in the inner city and central suburbs – how about some of these AT execs randomly go from 100 different locations in the supercity in particular the outlying ones and work out how long it will take on public transport, how to get from the house to the public transport etc and then from work to another place in the city. Then do a return journey and do it for a week. See the average time it takes.
Remember the Patrick Renolds types who probably commute less than 5 minutes per day telling everyone what they should do. Get some people who actually do commute from different locations and people who don’t, time it, should be a start!
I went on a bus about 12km and it regularly takes about 45minutes that’s in inner city type suburbs. It’s not traffic it’s just the routes they take and waiting times for buses!
Then go from west Auckland, south Auckland, north shore and east Auckland and see how long it takes. If you have hours up your sleeve in your life, to take the buses good for you! The trains are much better but only go on selected routes and by all accounts are well used and successful.
With all the construction in the centre I had to ask 3 drivers who did not know at all where the bus stop had moved to last time I tried to bus back.
Also suggest someone at transport starts to swab some of the new buses for hazardous materials because I went on a newish bus that smelt like it had been made from e waste plastic.
With their order of asbestos trains who know where they are getting them from. Have they checked the safety of the buses interiors?
Nice to see another Simon getting sensible and finally climbing out of a bubble.
Perhaps next time he might be honest enough to acknowledge a pleb or too now he’s reached the heights of the legit 4th Estate acceptance. Maybe (hopefully longevity and experience) has shown him its no substitute for a glass or two of Chard and A kathryn Ryan and David Russell.
I find it hard to take him seriously though I acknowledge he’s improving with age…though I’m probably a bit biased having experienced the Burma Rd polished concrete floors and the painful freakouts and truthiness on his taking a Jolly Green Giant
Finally, Brian Fallow looks at a disturbing trend.
Another reminder that this government cannot afford to tinker.
Unless radical action is taken to undo the damaging structures that underpin neoliberalism, our problems are not going away.
‘Retired & renting – the trend isn’t comforting.’
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11995035
Or they will sell up, buy a moto rhome or caravan and become NZ’s snow birds, similar to the American scene, complete with villages.
All ready for the next tornado I hope
All the financial advisers were advising how great it was to rent in your retirement a while back and ‘free up’ your money. Yep, take all financial advice with a pinch of salt. 90% of time they are just paid to sell financial products.
Bet they’re all planning to own their own home(s)
Good to see the CGT bright line test extended to five years.
Treasury warning that it might lead to fewer sales. On the other hand, some landlords have been threatening to sell all their properties if changes to tenancy laws are enacted.
Of course, now it’s the end of ‘Capitalism’ (“show me some!”), I expect all fiat currencies will collapse by say, next Thursday, so there won’t be a housing market at all /sarc.
It’s a tweak, but a good tweak.
Only 18 months ago we were in such a real estate froth that a full hard landing appeared inevitable.
Both governments have managed to deflate this slowly but surely.
It will take several years, but they have bought a little time for foolishly overstretched Kiwis to pay down private debt rather than perpetually reaching for more.
Debt is still cheap. Solution: raise interest rates. Consequences of raising interest rates: negative equity, foreclosures, etc. I like to be optimistic, and I know that short term optimism is usually stupid and wrong 🙂
Don Brash hiked interest rates back in the 1990’s and all it did was lengthen the Dole and food bank queues
Hence the remark about optimism.
‘Both governments have managed to deflate this slowly but surely.’Thank god it didn’t deflate too much before John Key cashed up in Parnell.Fantastic price,buyer had a chinese sounding surname,too.
Yes we noticed that self serving action. Total tosser.
@ Ad, Yep blame the “foolishly overstretched Kiwis to pay down private debt rather than perpetually reaching for more”.
The poor are poor because of bad decisions, those that are forced into private debt to afford a house are ‘foolish’, the government leads the way of course.
I guess the smart ones, are ones who buy in NZ for cash I expect.
I suspect it’s more the middle class overstretching on the mortgage, than the poor
Its not all bad. Number 3 seems like a positive note.
By this time next Thursday, we’ll all be millionaires. I plan to short the market just after I do the laundry.
Just don’t forget, to do the laundry I mean.
Buy buy buy !
Listening to Chump spouting his trite, hypocritical, predictable phrases about the latest school shooting in Florida strung together in his inimitable fashion just now on RNZ nearly made me throw up.
America is one family in our grief – tick
No school pupil or teacher should have to go through this – tick
We’re standing with you – tick
Anything you need – tick
Meaningful gun control to try to minimise the chances of this happening again as it has once a week on average for the past five years – didn’t hear that bit.
The USA is a sick society that seems incapable of keeping its citizens safe, A failed state.
America is a plutocracy.
America is a rogue state.
Reports vary as to whether it’s the eighth or eighteenth school shooting this year.
If you ask me, they need better access to mental health services, and a lower GINI.
The shootings are now so regular, it would actually be news to say there were no mass shootings today.
This guy says 11 in the last 23 days and offers some insight into what he sees as cruel individualism that he calls stoicism. The breakdown of social connection and caring.
https://eand.co/why-is-america-the-rich-worlds-most-ultraviolent-society-2d9f0fa084c6
Miss 13 was asking about it, she now knows about the NRA and gun lobbies etc.
She was shocked to discover that money is more important than life in ‘Murica.
Americans fear that gun control will means people will come into their homes and take their guns.
This is exactly what should happen.
this is the 8th, school shooting this year and the white houses responses to say “So many signs that the Florida shooter was mentally disturbed, even expelled from school for bad and erratic behavior. Neighbors and classmates knew he was a big problem. Must always report such instances to authorities, again and again!”
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/964110212885106689
thats right, snitch and blame the victims and the community, people always say “he was a loaner”or “I knew this would happen” its a coping mechanism to categorize grief and well documented as being meaningless, no-one know the hearts of humankind and trump’s suggestion would waste police resources on pointless persecution instead of tackling the real issues.
It’s always been the guns, it always will be the gun’s and by presidential order you need to get the law enforcement to stop chasing immigrants, go into peoples homes are take the guns away.. luckily even some americans are starting to see that.
additional http://washingtonpress.com/2018/02/15/white-supremacist-militia-just-admitted-trained-florida-school-shooter/
a white supremacist group has claim responsibility and “trained” the shooter, which trump ordered law enforcement to scale back on and it solely focus on Islamic groups.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-extremists-program-exclusiv/exclusive-trump-to-focus-counter-extremism-program-solely-on-islam-sources-idUSKBN15G5VO
and the FBI had a tip off from a you tube comment that was reported, but they could not ID the account holder. (even though his name was on the comment and school records are digitized/searchable, including past attendees.)
https://twitter.com/BNONews/status/964167990643216384/photo/1
it was the most recent school shooter, so much for report to authorities.
Where’s Antione? We need an American apologist to come along about now
Me?? I never comment on American stuff
“It’s always been the guns, it always will be the gun’s and by presidential order you need to get the law enforcement to stop chasing immigrants, go into peoples homes are take the guns away.. luckily even some americans are starting to see that.”
I politely disagree. It’s about the lack of licensing. We have licences here, and it by and large gets it right in terms of who does or doesn’t get a licence.
What both centrist liberals and the progressive left in the USA need to do is work together to assemble the legal argument that gun licensing is not unconstitutional, and that the second amendment right to bear arms can be reasonably qualified by using licencing to better ensure the collective right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
The American right will often argue that firearms owned under the second amendment do guarantee the rights derived from the first amendment – but misused, they can also threaten those rights.
So what interests me here is seeing how this issue could reawaken the American left and liberal political and legal thought around the constitution, which hasn’t really galvanized them all that much over the last few decades. But Trump has actually reawakened constitutionalism on the left. The so far successful resistance to the travel ban was proof that States Rights is not a frivolously conservative cause. Now it’s time for the American left to see what else they can accomplish when they respect their actually very robust constitution.
I offer a rebuttal, I agree licensing should be an option, but that doesn’t address the amount of guns in the hands of people who should not have them, this only addresses future sales (and gun ownership laws/licensing is done on a state by state basis, what your talking about would need to be federal)
There are two problems,
1) Lax gun ownership laws/licensing
2) the sheer amount of firearms in the US (a study in new york found that there are 102 legally owned guns per 100 people)
its too easy for the mentally disturbed or those with past criminal history to get guns, licensing increases would only fuel a blackmarket. You need to actually removed and destroy existing stocks of firearms.
Oh yes, I agree with these two things:
A) That licensing is necessary because there are certain people who must never be allowed to own firearms of any kind on mental health grounds, or on grounds of having a criminal record.
B) Yes, there will be some shortcomings, and this one is the most significant, you’d have to either live with that, or address it with issues ranging from a buyback, to more coercive options which may in themselves cause trouble. I’m honestly open to good ideas for how you do that. But in the meantime, licensing at sets you up for a better future than a numbing repeat of the past – or present.
You’re correct it would need to be a federal law, states don’t just have their own gun ownership laws, they have their own constitutions. It wouldn’t be practical to take it on that way. You’d be looking for a federal move and it would end up being fought all the way to the supreme court, which is why you’d want some good legal minds combing over the Federalist Papers and the like to have a good argument which shows that licensing would be in keeping with the general framing of the constitution.
Only thing I feel like I disagree with in your rebuttal – though it’s not to a point I think either of us need to dig in over – is that I don’t know that the quantity of weapons in existence bothers me all that much. You can only carry so many at once, and you can only use one at a time (ok yes you can run around with a pair of pistols, but I guarantee that’s not working out for you like it does in a Hollywood film).
When it comes to a psycho doing their thing, I’d be more concerned about the guy who has drilled himself repeatedly with hours of range time on one favourite rifle and is packing a practical selection of spare mags which he’s used and checked repeatedly, rather than the standard mass shooter situation where guy goes off with gym bag full of guns he’s never used and mags he’s never tested, gets a jam two mags into his shooting spree, then blows his own brains out in a panic, leaving two unfired long arms, four unfired pistols, and a couple thousand rounds of unused ammo lying on the ground in the bag. Kind of a quality is more dangerous than quantity thing.
Still, I can see where you’re coming from in terms of the less there is in existence, the less there is to make its way into the wrong hands. That side of things does make sense and if that’s the sense in which you’re arguing for it, then I think the best option is a buyback than confiscation given the political culture you’d be dealing with. Expensive but necessary.
unfortuntly gun-buyback don’t really work (inconclusive), Evidence: https://theconversation.com/factcheck-qanda-did-government-gun-buybacks-reduce-the-number-of-gun-deaths-in-australia-85836
But as on that same article, gun restrictions did work so they can be used in combination, unfortunately US’s issue is far more problematic they have a lot more guns than australia and alot more people with the mentality that “guns are our rights” and “Need them to protect” Neither of which are true in a strict sense.
If the US did a buy back I would hypothesize that the NRA would launch a massive marketing campaign that would mean very little guns would be “bought back”
I honestly think the only option as this point would be acquisitions, then you can implement licensing laws etc.
I agree that buybacks have mixed results – but I do wonder in the Australian case how many of the firearms used there to commit crimes may in fact have been smuggled in by organized crime networks since the post-Port Arthur laws and buybacks, and may have never been legally owned in the first place. But that’s just conjecture on my part, I have little to go on based on that report.
Still, it would seem to me that the combination of going as far as you can with buy backs and reforming future ownership through licensing is as good as it gets.
“I honestly think the only option as this point would be acquisitions, then you can implement licensing laws etc.”
One thing: when you say ‘acquisitions’, you do mean ‘confiscations’, right? You mean a mass program of law enforcement agencies entering people’s homes to confiscate their weapons, right? Or something else?
Unfortunate yes, you could start with a buyback programs, but it will most likely comes to forcible removal.
I have a fair idea how that will play out… war.
Sorry for the late reply, but yes, I think if you went beyond a buyback and tried for mass confiscations, you’d get violence on an epic scale, and worse still probably resistance from law enforcement themselves.
Your right, but it’s unfortunately one of the only options left.
I was reading an article this morning about the recent school shooting and an interview with the parent, one thing that struck me as odd, “after a recent burglary They bought guns”
this epitomizes the issue, instead of adding new lock or security measures they decided firearms were the correct response, not for hunting but home defense. Stats show that firearms used in home defense are more likely to be used on the owners than the offender, as much as everyone thinks they are rambo, guns are pretty stupid weapons to use for home defense, deception, deterrents and outside intervention (police, security patrols) is far better and more effective.
But in the US, they feel they NEED guns as a form of protection from “burglars” instead of what other western nations do which is add deterrents, guns have become so much of a part of the culture that not having them is seen as weird.
But it’s quite obviously from an outsider’s perspective the cause of alot of the issues, it’s not a root cause(mental health support, the recent school shooter could not get psychological help because of the cost) but it is something that could be controlled easily with simple legislation.
So how would gun control laws have prevented this from happening? Gun control laws don’t stop bad people from obtaining guns.
yes they do, simple controls and checks as well as licensing means mass shooting happen much more infrequently.
A fun fact, Last year in the US there were more gun deaths in the US than in the entire world combined (this includes war zones)
SO what’s the difference between the rest of the world and the US, Gun control, even making getting a firearm as hard as applying for a drivers license reduces gun violence and mass shootings quite a lot, when australia introduced gun control in just two decades following the reforms, the annual rate of gun deaths fell from 2.9 per 100,000 in 1996 to 0.9 per 100,000 in 2016, there reforms were prompted after the 1996 Port arthur massacre. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_Arthur_massacre_(Australia)
Aust has not had a single mass shooting since, gun deaths are down and there is no corresponding uptick in attacks by other types of weapons (mass bombings etc) So guns are the issue.
details of the reforms, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Firearms_Agreement
As a former firearms licensed holder here in Oz, gun ownership is up and firearm thief is on rise especially in the small arms aka pistols or illegal importation of them. It the illegal use small arms in the hands of the criminals that causing most if not of the firearm related deaths here in Oz.
My license was suspended when I had run down the rabbit with my PTSD, and no access to them anyway as they locked up and the lads had change the codes to the vaultand the safe for the Magazine keys.
Sent from iPad
Only in Australia…
It couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of guys 🙄
Genter and Nash need to have a chat on driving and recreational drug use. Genter was weak in the House yesterday. NZTA are rolling out a campaign on drug-impaired crashes. Police support it.
Needs political alignment, fast, before the debate infects the legalisation legislation.
Genter was weak in the House yesterday
I’m not going to take your word for that. Link please.
Weak in what way? If it was “weak” in the sense of wanting to find out the nature and extent of the problem before jumping on a NZTA/Police anti-drugs bandwagon, then great – let’s have a lot more of that kind of “weakness” from our ministers.
She wasn’t weak. Ad is just revealing his bias again.
Genter “weak” ? Nonsense. She was thoroughly in control of the moment in my observation.
I think they will be approaching you to appear in a new TV commercial.
“North should have gone to Specsavers”
that was really interesting. Gender looks like she’s covering all the bases well, so I’m also not sure what Ad is on about. Not sure why he is criticising Gender instead of Nash, but it thought she handled that question well.
Anyone know what the impairment test is that the police already use?
Um, *Genter…
Paging Dr. Freud 🙂
Lol, paging a smarter auto correct.
See edit for impairment test 🙂
Crickey, I know people that can’t stand on one leg even when not impaired.
But yeah, makes sense, and I trust Genter to being using evidence.
Basic balance trick: think about the foot you’re standing on 🙂
Nice.
Hopefully your own
Lol, very funny A.
Ad, why did you feel Genter was “weak” ?- I watched and agree with those here who thought her responses appropriate. She’s sharp.
Edit: I see alwyn’s snarky comment and get that he’s curmudgeonly, but you Ad? Why the negativity? What did you see?
Nash being a moron is not Genter’s fault.
From reading scoop last night she was all over it like pickle heat after 12hrs of wearing body armour. What got me was the fact she using evidence base lead facts to support her case unlike the other muppet shooting his mouth off. Is that typical of Mr Nash BTW?
Sent from IPad
Morning Breakfast people We should make our own choices in what policy we legerslate into law and not let USA dictate what we do. I charge my opinion of people as I learn more think more about them Obama does not make my top ten humane people I admire. He knows exactly what shonky key was doing to Maori and Atoearoa he still let shonky gain influence from his associationing with Obama. The American president gets privy to most information he knows exactly what shonky was doing. Ana to kai.
Ka kite ano
You give the US way to much credit, Who cares about NZ, in the scope of the world we are nothing, we barely rate as a world power, we have little population, almost no economic capital, no military to speak of. We may think were “hot stuff” but were not.
Obama administration instergated the bad changes to OUR justice system Ana to kai
New Zealand initiated the TPPA in the first place. In 2005.
Labour initiated the TPPA in the first place. In 2005.
But without the United States, and thus it was at that time free of many of the objectionable provisions.
I still cannot login to TS from my macbook on Firefox. I get a bad request notice. then when I just try to access TS mainpage, I get the same notice – something about cannot find server.
It also seems to infect any attempt to login from Safari on my macbook for 15 minutes or so.
how long has that been happening?
Please cut and paste the two error messages into a comment.
Can you please try doing a test comment using this protocol and let me know what happens?
– Make sure you are logged out
– Delete browser cookies
– Restart browser
– Make a comment with same user name but a different email address (make one up, or put 2 after your email name before the @, so you can tell them apart. TS doesn’t require valid email addresses)
– First comment will go into spam, because you are considered a new user
– Subsequent comments should go through ok
Will do….. back to the mac…
just logged in successfully on safari on the mac
Edit: but having difficulty accessing TS on Firefox: still this message:
Bad Request
It’s been going on like this for a few weeks.
I will have a look at it later today or tomorrow. First with Firefox on linux. Otherwise I will try to convince Lyn to let me use her MacBook.
The login is working fine for me with Firefox on Ubuntu at the moment.
That sounds very optimistic if she is anything like my wife.
My using her tablet would be almost the equivalent of me going through her handbag.
You will notice I said “almost the equivalent” not “like me”.
I would never dare touch either object.
Lyn may be a much more obliging lady.
Lynn TS just came up again on dogpile/microsoft/google chrome sites so looks good now thanks.
There’s been shit happening all day @ caroyn. Timeouts. Site un reachable. Bearing in mind tho I’m 8.5 hours behind…. but @ lprent. i wouldn’t get my knickers in a twist over a temporary network glitch that would force an obsessive/compulsive into redesigning a whole system.
There’s a huge solar storm beating down on Earth and that may cause a few problems with network connectivity, etc.
deleting the browser history and cookies, then restarting the browser worked. Can log in from firefox now.
Thanks.
it’s a known firefox issue on JS heavy sites.
The browser app is left running in a tab for a long time (overnight) and continues to make background requests via JS.
At some point, the session times out and it starts receiving redirects to refresh its session. Each of these requests is setting a new state cookie.
The Javascript code doesn’t handle this case, so it just keeps blindly sending requests and accumulating state cookies until it exceeds the max request cookie size limit and starts getting 401 errors
Clearing cookies in the browser is a working stopgap.
— For the MODS to pass onto a DEV — there are workaround/fixes that can be added to mitigate the 401 errors see: https://github.com/zmartzone/mod_auth_openidc/wiki/Cookies
thanks.
leonhart..
That’s useful.
By the way did anyone else find TS was not accessible all afternoon? I haven’t noticed comment from anyone else about it yet?
Yeah I did, I thought it’s the wet season/ local storms playing havoc again with the Internet today, but I was to log on to my usual other Kiwi haunts after I did the house work today
it helps when you do it for a living 🙂 the companies I work for runs 26 Ecom sites, some have wordpress integrations, it was fun looking of the page source for this state seeing how the .js was implemented.
@ greywarshark (11.2.1.2) … same here, I was unable to access TS all afternoon. Was only able to reach it this evening. Something about a problem with the local network. Other sites were fine.
Thought the Blue gremlins had sabotaged TS for a while there!
Me too. And ex Kiwi you are in Oz aren’t you?
I kept thinking of things I wanted to comment on and was discombobulated to be cut off in my prime so to speak.
Glad that’s sorted (I take it you didn’t use the protocol above?)
weka OIDCUnAuthAction 401 needs to added to the .js path at the .html level, its not something the user needs to do, this is a site dev fixes for the known firefox bug.
I wanted to see what happened when Carolyn commented without logging in (there is a bug that affects people with logins when they try and comment without logging in).
She was having problems with two browsers.
Thanks, LH.
The safari was OK until I got locked out via firefox, but came good after a short wait.
I will have a look at what WordPress does. But I suspect that it doesn’t use mod-auth at all.
In fact I suspect that I haven’t even bothered to manually turn it on any auth in apache simply because that is handled internal to WordPress.
Of course it could have come in as part of mod_ssl or something else.
This isn’t exactly a corporate site.
the session cookie could have been altered see OIDCCookie primitive its default is mod_auth_openidc_session but wordpress may use a different ID.
no.
Lissa Lucas the women who was dragged off the podium and not allowed to speak no more at a hearing on minerals, speaks to Jimmy Dore. 19.10 minute video. Centerists should avoid, as this involves a discussion on removing money from politics, and it might just hurt their feelings.
I saw her speech the other day, a strong, important woman.
Funny. I wonder if this person was bribing people with free Air New Zealand air points 🙂
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/political/350310/38-people-allegedly-voted-twice-in-election
Why would you need to bribe people on the Northshore to vote National ?
Everyone who votes National has been bribed.
With which bribe Robert ?
Look around and name one of the many. An alert person like you would be able to spot one or two easily.
Tax cuts. Inflated property prices & rents further fuelled by hyper-immigration. Wage suppression through hyper-immigration. Don’t ask to me to go on, please!
Robert; said “Everyone who votes National has been bribed.”
Brainwashed more like.
Bribed, or made to feel fearful. If one doesn’t get them, the other will.
Corrections has published the inspection reports for both Manawatū and Auckland prisons.
Yet, there seems to be nothing from the Green’s correction spokesperson on these reports.
Wakey-wakey.
Nothing from the Minister either, nor any of the other parties. You must be so concerned.
Shows how much they all care. Hence, we should all be concerned.
I was hoping the Greens would be better than that.
Or, too busy building fences at the top of the cliff, but wait, what’s that whining noise?
“Too busy building fences at the top of the cliff…”
What happen to walking and chewing gum?
And what fences would that be exactly?
The government’s legislative program can be found on Parliament’s website. You’re the one whining, so it’s up to you to say where you think it’s deficient.
Or you can continue to be a lazy and passive-aggressive concern troll.
You’re the one pointing to them being too busy building fences, hence it’s not up to me to back up your assertion.
What’s deficient is no press release presented after the release of two reports.
If I was Shaw (the party leader) I’d be on the phone wanting to know why there is nothing from their corrections spokesperson.
If you were Shaw, he’d never have made it into caucus, let alone the leadership.
But he is party leader, so what is his excuse?
He doesn’t need an excuse for your witless concern trolling.
“He doesn’t need an excuse…”
So he’s been on the phone then? Press release due out soon is it?
No, you misunderstand: I’m expressing contempt for your behaviour and opinion.
Nope.
No press release to match your requirements.
No phone calls to tell caucus members how to suck eggs.
Probably not so much as a peep.
And no “excuse” needed at all.
Why, I hear you concern troll?
Because the Greens have been doing this longer and more successfully than you have. Not only do they not need your advice or to meet your demands, following it would result in a constant, bland whining about the smallest procedural, regulatory, and supervisory events that most bureaucrats wouldn’t want to envisage, and it would therefore give the greens the electorate appeal of a small off-yellow puddle of cat puke.
Which would still be more popular than you.
What the hell for?
😆
@ McFlock
And do you now speak for the Greens?
No, I merely speak as another person who finds your behaviour and opinions contemptible.
Why do you find the expectation that the Greens express their view on two recently released correction reports contemptible?
Well, mostly because it’s an expectation that the Greens should serve your priorities and expectations, and if they do not satisfy your expectations 100% then they are being inadequate in some way. Check that privilege.
But I also suspect that if the Greens had released a statement abouteach corrections report released that day, you would have found some other government publication or media event that the Greens had failed to give attention to, and you’d have written another of your boilerplate demands about that.
So in order to prevent these formulaic criticisms from you (and only you), the Greens would be releasing 2k press releases a day about the most minute crap imaginable, and their actual priorities would be lost in the flood.
“Well, mostly because it’s an expectation that the Greens should serve your priorities and expectations…”
Seriously? Your logic is messed up. I’m far from the only person concerned about the state of our prisons. Moreover, I’m sure the Greens don’t condone the failings highlighted in the reports. So to suggest it’s only my expectation they publicly address these findings is totally ludicrous.
Evidently, it’s your attempt to diminish this failure by the Greens by painting it as solely my expectation.
And no, I don’t expect them to release a press release over the most minute crap imaginable.
Yawn.
Damned near every day you have something that you believe the Greens need to “up their game” on. If not them then Labour.
The issue isn’t that you care about prisons. The issue isn’t even that you think the Greens should have paid it more attention. The issue is that you ignore what they do say in order to criticise that they haven’t addressed your issue of the day.
If I were a cynic, I’d say that it’s interesting how you’re always finding the thing that day that the Greens didn’t comment on loudly enough for your satisfaction. It’s almost like you look at their daily activities and then look through the news for something they haven’t mentioned.
The fact there are a number of issues frequently requiring our attention is largely a reflection of their failings and the overall mess our country is in.
Nor is it merely my belief there are certain issues requiring them to up their game.
When it comes to them getting it right, clearly they don’t require help, hence I largely don’t bother commenting. There are plenty of cheerleaders for that. Unfortunately there is not as many when it comes to holding their feet to the fire. Which, as voters we should feel obliged to do.
I genuinely care about the issues raised, which is why I raise them. Moreover, they are not just my issue of the day.
Take these two reports, I didn’t make them a media story. And if you follow the news and Green Party press releases, you’ll see there is a lot of news they don’t comment on. Hence, a lot I don’t pull them up on.
And yet you still turn up regularly with your quota of complaints.
Your choice of the expression “hold their feet to the fire” is strangely appropriate: torture is almost always useless, and its use indicates more about the shortcomings of the torturer than the victim.
You really do try and appeal to the ignorant.
I didn’t mean it literally. It’s an idiom, meaning to apply public pressure. But you already knew that.
And yes, as explained above, I will be frequently turning up.
Like a zit.
You appeal to nobody. Public pressure has an effect when it increases from normal levels. The low-level hum of discontent that you represent is constant, but also remarkably concentrated only around you and folk like Tanz or PR.
At best, you’ll just bore the political interest out of people. Which is the opposite of applying pressure.
Like frequently occurring zits, one has to address the cause for them to totally go away.
And again, it’s not just me. Hence, the issues raised do have public appeal (such as the state of our prisons). They wouldn’t be news worthy if they didn’t.
Personally, I may not appeal to anybody, it’s all rather subjective really. But I sure as hell get your (and a few others on here) attention.
At the end of the day, it’s not about me. It’s about the issues being raised. Attempting to make it all about me (and a couple of others) simply ignores the larger discontent that’s out there.
Don’t confuse “public interest” with “public appeal”.
Let’s contrast the Greens today with Labour under Shearer – now there was “larger discontent”, reflected in the polls for years and with a solid half dozen to dozen commenters railing against the inadequacies they perceived, multiple times a day. Each and every one of them was pissed.
The Greens today? Pretty much just you. On a daily basis. If there’s a genuine level of unrest within Green support, they sure seem to be doing well at hiding it.
I’m not. But you seem to be overlooking the two largely go hand in hand. Things people have no interest in, don’t tend to appeal to them.
It very well may be pretty much just me, on here. But not out there. And the Greens would be foolish to overlook that.
As I’ve highlighted before, the Greens have obtained the most political power they have ever had. They have ministerial positions and outlined their 20 goal plan with Labour. Yet, no surge in support.
Whereas, after Meteria’s announcement, their support surged to one of their highest ratings ever. So despite their current political wins, they are not resonating as they once did.
In fact, their support dropped in the latest poll. And there is no hiding that.
Thanks for your concern.
Was that the 18–28 Jan 2018 Newshub Reid Research poll? Had 6% from the previous 7% poll? Because that margin for error for a thousand-sample poll looks like 1.5% or so @ ~5%. Without rounding, either – you could be whinging about a 6.5% vs 6.4% “drop”.
If that’s the drop you’re talking about, it’s a good example of your concern trolling. They’ve had two post-election polls in the 10% range, one at 7, and the last at 6%, about the same as on election night.
As for Green support “surging” after Turei made her announcement, they went from their existing 13% to 15%, waivered, then fell.
By the way, I can’t see any comments from you in the Turei-tagged posts around that time. Were you not interested in it?
edit: nothing in this comment should be taken to indicate that even if I thought the Greens were in trouble I would think that they should follow your demands. They shouldn’t. Your advice is as bullshit as your interpretation of stats.
Yes, it was only a slight drop. Nevertheless, it is was a drop. Even if it was within the margin of error.
The point here is their support should have increased considering their political wins (which includes their 20 goal plan). But it didn’t. Not even within the margin of error. Hence, there is something for them to worry about.
It was a 4% surge for the Greens from 11% to 15% after Meteria’s announcement.
And I commented on the matter.
Yes, tell the Greens not to listen to me and lets watch them further fall.
Latest 1 news Colmar Brunton. Greens down 2%. Now polling at 5%.
https://www.tvnz.co.nz/one-news/new-zealand/labour-soars-highest-level-in-15-years-new-1-news-colmar-brunton-poll?auto=5736314087001
A “drop” within the margin for error by definition might not be a drop at all.
Who says “their support should have increased”? Other than you? It’s not like the Greens have been monopolising media coverage.
As for the “surge” – you’re only looking at Colmar Brunton, aren’t you? You’re skipping the Roy Morgan that had the Greens on 13.5% before Turei’s announcement. Shit like that makes me think your motives aren’t as pure as you claim.
A as far as the poll is concerned, it was a registered drop (albeit within the margin of error).
And that in it self wouldn’t mean much. But as you are aware, I’m not looking at it within itself.
The feedback I’ve had suggested their support will fall and the latest Colmar Brunton further confirms this.
“Who says “their support should have increased”
Logic. As explained above.
Moreover, as they have largely outlined what they plan to achieve this term (their 20 goal plan) they are going to struggle to regrow their support without upping their game and doing more.
I look at all the polls. But yes, I was referring to the Colmar Brunton, which, offhand, produced their largest surge at that time.
My motives are simple. I want to see the Greens up their game, grow their support, while remaining a party of the left.
That’s not logic. It’s a blinkered warping of reality.
The Greens are a junior partner in the coalition. They’ve achieved agreement to implement a number of their policies, but the implementation hasn’t happened for a lot of them. Labour’s been in a 100days rush. National is fracturing.
And you think the Greens should be gaining ground in that PR environment, rather than drifting 2% in three polls.
Oh, yes, and you cherry pick the poll results to suit your narrative.
Thanks for your concern, but you’re either lying about your motives or you’re a political idiot. Either way your advice is worthless.
The logic is solid, therefore I disagree. They’ve obtained there largest political gains ever, therefore it’s logical to assume their support would reflect that.
The fact that it isn’t points to it failing to resonate. And this shouldn’t be taken lightly. Doing so will be at their own peril.
And while their goals are yet to be implemented, they’ve already been outlined. Therefore, when it comes to implementing them, it will merely be seen as a rehash of their initial intent and look as if they have nothing new to offer. Which will go on (20 goals) to further damage their support.
All the polls had an upsurge at the time (some more than others) therefore, they all suited my narrative.
Yes, keep telling everyone my advise is worthless and we’ll see how well they go repeating what they are currently doing.
peril?! nooooooooooo!!!!
Political exposure doesn’t happen in a vacuum.
“All the polls” continued the Greens’ previous increases in popularity until a couple of polls after Turei’s announcement. There wasn’t a sudden change in the trend until the mud started being slung.
Anyway, ok. You keep giving useless advice, and I’ll keep pointing out your cherry-picked stats and constant narrative of doom.
Up until Turei’s announcement, the Greens were struggling to get media cut through. So a vacuum indeed.
After the cracks in her story started to shine through, the media frenzy was really on. And while the media are culpable to some extent, what really hurt the Green’s support was Turei standing down, along with their management of the whole saga.
In a matter of weeks (or was that days) she went from standing up for the poor to abandoning them. Which, of course, let a lot of people down. Her back story was coming apart and she couldn’t get away quick enough.
“You keep giving useless advice, and I’ll keep pointing out your cherry-picked stats and constant narrative of doom.”
Yes, I will continue to highlight the issues, provide my advice and offer viable alternatives, as you carry on with your diminishing and smearing tactics while all along ignoring their loss of support.
And with such a welcoming reception, it’s no wonder why more don’t come here to express their concerns. For the less capable, people like you are rather threatening, hence a deterrent.
The most recent poll before her announcement, they were on 13%.
They increased to 15%.
Then ended up on 6.3%.
Your advice is useless, your alternatives aren’t viable in the real world, and frankly you’re a better tory propagandist than Farrar.
I see you are now opting to tar me with the righty smear, ha.
“ They increased to 15%.
Then ended up on 6.3%.”
And now they are in free-fall, currently at 5%. And dear I say (unless they take action) expected to further decline.
You say that, but pretty much the only person who expects them to decline is you.
In 2020, especially if they ignore your advice, the Greens will most likely be well above their 2017 election tally. Unless you think the last 20 years of mounting popularity will be negated by one muckraking episode a couple of months out from an election.
And don’t call me “dear”.
Get real. I wasn’t calling you dear, egg. It was a typo.
“You say that, but pretty much the only person who expects them to decline is you.”
That’s what the feedback suggests, and it’s been spot on thus far.
Remember, it predicted this current fall while you were in total denial. As you are now.
Moreover, the Turei saga was only one episode. To date, there has been more.
As explained throughout our discussions, the Greens are not bringing their A game. They’ve already outlined their goals, thus at this stage, have little more to offer.
And it is all of this combined, that the expectation is based upon.
No typo. Someone just hasn’t seen “Airplane!”.
As for your ruminations, it might predict falls, but when did you last predict a rise? Clocks running backwards are right more often than stopped clocks.
But I’ve said repeatedly that even without your cherry-picking (and ain’t you lucky the margin for error in the poll fell your way this time), the polls are irrelevant for the next 18 months anyway. I expect this to be the low area for the Greens, because they’re in it for the long term and have more solid support than your pessimism suggests.
Labour’s in pride of place now, and rightfully so. They grabbed victory when, frankly, I expected them to get bollocked in the election when Little resigned. ISTR your “lift their game” halitosis was aimed at them for some time last year – what were your polling predictions then?
As I said above, unless they take action. Hence, at this stage, they still have time to do that. So in 18 months, there may be a turnaround.
If it wasn’t for Jacinda and her cult of personality, Labour would have got hammered, as expected. And at the end they knew it, hence the last-minute change of leadership.
I was listening to Jacinda the other day. She was pointing to giving the Greens credit and acknowledgment (for policy they initiated such as the Green investment fund) as a means of growing their support. Implying once that was on the way they should see some turnaround.
However, that has already been announced in their 20 goal plan. Which has been widely touted.
Moreover, a plan outlined is not the same as implementing one. Which, of course, runs the risk of things going wrong. Hence, may backfire.
And going off the Greens management skills of late, they are really going to require to produce their A game if they want to avoid stuffing up.
Additionally, I expect Labour to further disappoint. Hence, the Greens should pick up some support off them.
yawn.
whatever, doofus.
Looks like now you expect things to improve for the greens without them taking your advice.
As usual, you’re overlooking a major factor.
For this to happen, it requires the Greens to maintain and grow their current support. And that will require them to up their game.
Anything less makes voting for them a risk, thus being seen as a wasted vote.
You expect Labour “further disappoint” and “Greens should pick up some support off them”. Therefore if the Greens keep doing what they’re doing, we will see them grow rather than further fall.
Labour have already created some rather large disappointments to date, yet the Greens have gone down.
With the Jacinda effect still largely taking hold, this will take time to filter through. In the meantime, the Greens can’t afford to further fall. Hence, will require to up their game in the process.
Especially as they are widely known for polling higher than what they get on election day.
They really can’t fall much further. So unless you’re suggesting that the growth in support the Greens will gain from Labour being such a disappointment will actually be trivially small, really if the Greens do absolutely nothing the Greens will end up rising in the polls.
No advice needed at all, according to your expectations.
“They really can’t fall much further”
Why not? What’s your reasoning for this assertion?
“So unless you’re suggesting that the growth in support the Greens will gain from Labour being such a disappointment will actually be trivially small, really if the Greens do absolutely nothing the Greens will end up rising in the polls.”
No.
As I explained above, for the Greens to secure the disgruntled Labour vote (which will take some time to filter through) they need to up their game, thus current support so as to not be perceived as a wasted vote.
My reasoning is math.
The maximum logical distance they can fall from the last poll is ~5%, because they can’t have negative popularity.
Therefore, if the Green growth in support from Labour being such a tragic disappointment is >5%, the Greens’ support must grow from its present point. So your advice is useless if the objective is to prevent a further fall in Green support.
If you’re expecting less than 5% growth in Green support from Labour being so horribly disappointing, well, that’s an amount of “growth” that’s close to the margin for error. So really you’re expecting growth in support that might be undetectable. Which seems to be a worthless prediction.
So it seems that at the very least either your advice is useless at preventing a further fall in support, or your predictions are unverifiable and therefore worthless. I suspect both, but each to their own. Your self-proclaimed mission is redundant.
“The maximum logical distance they can fall from the last poll is ~5%, because they can’t have negative popularity.”
Yes, but that doesn’t explain your assertion they can’t fall much further that what they are currently polling at.
“Therefore, if the Green growth in support from Labour being such a tragic disappointment is >5%, the Greens’ support must grow from its present point.”
You are overlooking the time it will take for the Jacinda effect to wear off. In which time (as I’ve explained extensively above) they risk further falling. At which point, by the time the Jacinda effect wears off, the Green’s support may be so low they will no longer be a viable option for that disgruntled Labour vote.
Which is why they need to up their game and grow their support now.
5% isn’t much.
That’s all they can fall.
Whereas if a margin-for-error drop in Labour support goes over to the Greens, that’s 3.5% for almost no detectable drop in Labour popularity.
Are you predicting that the Greens will fall to <1.5% (still a fuckall drop in the greater scheme of things) if they don't follow your every direction?
“5% isn’t much.”
Indeed. Which is why even at 5% they risk no longer being a viable option for the disgruntled Labour vote come election day.
Therefore, they don’t really have to fall any further to be considered a risk, deterring the Labour vote from crossing over.
So yes, at this stage I’m predicting they will further fall unless they up their game. But, again at this stage, I’m unable to put an exact number on how large or small that fall will be.
lol
so now the Greens won’t get an increase in support when “disappointment in Labour” leads to a drop in Labour’s support.
Make up your mind.
As I said above, should. Which, of course, depends on all the factors extensively explained to you above.
So what percentage do the Greens need to be at in order to gain votes off Labour, in your expectation?
*Sincerely, with a tear of disappointment in the corner of his eye
“I was hoping the Greens would be better than that.”
*Sobs, quietly, so no one will notice
All that signals to me Robet is you don’t care. Hence, aren’t willing to get in behind and hold the Greens to a higher standard.
lolz
For your next trick you’ll lecture the Pope about Catholic theology.
Mcflock
LOL
You are on form today. OAB too.
A Lighter Shade Of Green – The Chairman’s quintessential song.
“You just don’t care !!
*Sobs, this time, uncontrollably
And then there is the need for a home for homeless homing pigeons. Have the Greens made an strong statement on this? And if not, why not?
The Greens have lost their way. They once cared deeply for the homeless homers. Now…
… Shaw! He’s at the bottom of this!
Shaw!!!
The coalition’s a farce – bring back Bill!!!
Shawly not.
It’s shawking to hear.
lolz
Re: Russell McVeagh
The New Zealand Government should advise all Government Departments and SOEs that they are not allowed to use the services of Russell McVeagh
The culture of Russell McVeagh appears to have allowed behaviors to develop that are contrary to the standards expected in New Zealand society.
Real change will only come if it hurts them in the pocket.
Government and SOEs should be petitioned to stop using the services of Russell McVeagh immediately.
Individual lawyers currently working at Russell McVeagh would be free to tender for government work but not under the banner of Russell McVeagh.
What do you think the odds are that this happens.
(I suspect the answer is ‘precisely nil’)
A.
If the problem were confined to Russell McVeigh that might be effective.
+1 Russell McVeagh biggest rogues!
Ask any lawyer about their ‘bloodstock’ offerings in the 1980’s…
Gloating on The Russell McVeagh website
The leading law firm has been named winner of ‘Best Gender Diversity Initiative by National Firm’ at last night’s IFLR Euromoney Legal Media Group Asia Women in Business Law Awards, held in Hong Kong.
Russell McVeagh senior partner and board member Sarah Armstrong said the award highlights the firm’s success in implementing and supporting diversity and inclusion initiatives and progress of its long-term, firm-wide Diversity Project, launched in 2014.
Meanwhile on Newsroom
What we know so far is that five female clerks have made a series of claims, ranging from serious sexual assault to sexual harassment, while they were employed at top-tier law firm Russell McVeagh in Wellington.
Interesting how the two stories are so different.
Calling on NZ Government to stop giving work to any lawyers working under the banner of law firm Russell McVeagh
What about the law firm that hired one of the perpetrators after RMcV sacked him?
According to the Russell McVeagh website:
The firm acts for 11 of the NZX 15 companies, and New Zealand’s major corporates, including numerous energy and utilities companies, all of New Zealand’s retail banks, and New Zealand’s largest company and largest listed company.
These companies should stop giving work to any lawyers working under the banner of law firm Russell McVeagh
They won’t change unless it hurts them in the pocket.
Now that might be more the go
I say go after the big fish first, they are clearly at fault. They want to say “everyone is doing it” do not play into their PR spin. THey are the ones doing it. Stop them first.
Do you have any conflicts of interest in this regard?
My personal experience of lawyers tells me this is not confined to one law firm.
It makes sense to just pick someone and shoot them then – pour encourager les autres.
“What’s black and brown and looks good on a lawyer? A doberman.”
In reality, government decisions can be challenged in court. I have no axe to grind for RMcV or any other dog-food, and I wonder about the timing of this “hit”, and note that “Plan B” hasn’t commented since my question about their interests.
Wow.
Labour looking at revamping abortion laws. Not just decriminalising, but things like where it can be performed (RU486) and the triple-consultation requirement and making referrals mandatory.
Cue the concern-o-bots worried that improving access to healthcare will get in the way of ‘real’ issues…
Sounds like the potential for some good process improvements there
A.
You have to wonder what sort of country we are becoming, certainly not clean and green. And why do we have laws that allow a resource consent to proceed when they don’t even have access in place for the mine and are relying on taking conservation land for that purpose. (but clearly breaking up the consent aka steal our harbour style).
Having to fight these bad consents and our pathetic RMA plunder at will rules, removes valuable community money and resources which could be better spent on actually helping our forests and birds not stopping their habitat being threatened on a weekly basis by bad resource consents!
Remember Pike River, fully consented death trap! NZ are turning into primitive yokels.
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/350538/bid-to-stop-new-coal-mine-overturned-in-high-court
Bid to stop new coal mine overturned in High Court
It’s battle and fight and justify and fight and petition and deny and battle and march and protest and promise and argue and weak legislation to paper over and it’s ignore and drink up and listen to the stockmarket reports and check bank balances and consult with tax accountants and order a new car and think about a small plane, and ignore laggards and whiners. What do they know?
This government needs to strengthen the laws protecting conservation values.
Mining mongrels will KEEP coming.
Mining should be seen as the destructive activity it is.
Where are the Green Party on this? If they were more media present on this type of issue then it might help to reassure their missing 100,000, as well as preserve the environment.
Is Labour going to coast along thinking they can implant the Natz agenda, and Jacinda will distract the public from that like JK’s barbecues?
If more people had voted for them, they wouldn’t be spread so thin. But in this case I think that because the Minister of Conservation is a Green MP, the Greens have obligations including acting within the agreement with Labour. So Eugenie Sage needs to act within her roles as Minister i.e. she’s part of the government. If another Green MP spoke out on this, they risk speaking against their own MP and Minister. I think what is happening here is that the Greens now do their work though government, except where a portfolio sits outside of that role.
I assume the Greens (and Labour) don’t want to interfere with due process. If we’re talking about the proposed mine in the Buller, then the permission granted this week was by the High Court. The government can’t just override that. As Patricia points out, the government will need to strengthen laws around this. I’m guessing that this mine was already in the pipeline before the govt changed. I hope they stop it, but I don’t think it’s a simple as some people think.
The mining company still needs to get resources consent from the local councils. And then it needs consent to access the site over conservation land. I assume DOC will decide on that. Given DOC’s history of taking a neutral rather than protective stance in similar situations, I’ll be very interested to see if that changes under the new Minister. I’ve never really been clear where DOC’s directive was coming from on that in the past i.e. legislatively mandated, or from the Minister or what.
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/350538/bid-to-stop-new-coal-mine-overturned-in-high-court
Patricia,
Immediately stop using all metal objects. Allow only wood or stone materials in your life.
Especially stop using the internet as it relies on electricity that is conducted everywhere by that demon metal copper. In fact anything electronic which uses all manner of metals
If everybody did this immediately the world would be such a better, less destructive place.
LOLZ!
I see in the Herald online that Avon Cosmetics are shutting shop in Australasia after 55 years here. The company obviously think we are not paying our way down here. No warnings and now 220 staff and 21,400 representatives are without a job – that is a big chunk of the workforce now looking for work.
Apart from a huge upset for their customers obviously its just a day at the office for the restructuring team who has orchestrated this. How much profit is too much profit –
jobs are just severed without a bye your leave.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11995331
Do we really need a company that does nothing productive and just annoys lots of people?
Anyway, their days were probably numbered, on account of Internet retailing.
A.
(Edit: no disrespect to anyone who worked there or liked buying their stuff)
I think it was the loss of jobs that was the worry…
Can you please clarify who the ‘we’ is in that sentence?
Does it include the Avon employees? Or is it just you speaking in the (royal) third person?
Once the ‘we’ is defined then some other questions might open up – like the responsibilities of each member of the ‘we’ towards other members of the ‘we’.
They did not go online, and that is the problem. They have huge competition.
Newspaper puts the slipper in.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DWDnZAsXUAAWU3S.jpg
https://twitter.com/NYDailyNews
And this kid spelt it out.
I don’t want your condolences you f—–g piece of s–t, my friends and teachers were shot. Multiple of my fellow classmates are dead. Do something instead of sending prayers. Prayers won’t fix this. But Gun control will prevent it from happening again,
http://assets.nydailynews.com/polopoly_fs/1.3822789.1518714497!/img/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/article_1200/students16n-4-web.jpg
the heart breaks.
My phone was down I couldn’t get thestandard.org.nz website I tx the Rock radio station about my problem and walar I can get thestandard.org.nz sandflys are at it again Ana to kai
Mate sometimes the site is simply DOWN –
It’s certainly not always a conspiracy to get at you
Looks like the soft power is hardening up.
Professor Anne-Marie Brady says “associates in China had been brought in for questioning by the country’s Ministry of State Security”. “Principles” are only tested when there’s risk involved. Like, for example, our nuclear free policy.
As a small country, we “owe service” (Lao Tzu). There’s a difference between service and vassal status. If Professor Brady’s concerns are valid, it’s time there was some overt push-back.
And here is Matt Nippert on it -we get to see the honorable investigative journalist himself in the vid at the link – recorded after the release of the research paper, and before our elections.
If Nippert says it’s scary stuff (as he did on twitter today), then we should be worried.
I’m not inclined to be “scared” of BAU. Awareness is another thing entirely.
And Judith Collins, who has Chinese commercial influences of her own, is campaigning to be Nat leader.
‘Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. Three times is enemy action.”
Ian Fleming
Congratulations to South Africa New president Cyril Ramaphosa ECO MAORI know that you will be a humble humane president that gets the big picture he tangata he tangata give the people a bright happy future and all will be well
Hillary & Jeremy I tried a sugar supplement starting feeling a the side effects I Google them and what do you know one side effects is it causes cancer.
You no what they say about a plump man it’s true PS I will cut down on my sugar when I sue the police ka kite ano
I Google my high blood pressure pills an the side effects are huge on should Google all the medication you are given as the doctor doesn’t tell you the side effects at least you will know what to expect Ka kite ano