Give the calls over the past years to raise the superannuation age, it would be worth looking into poverty and unemployment rates among those who are 60-64 and if they have become worse off since the NS age was last raised from 60-65 from 1991 – 2001. I don’t think that this has been looked into.
I think it is time we thought about putting the age back to 60.
Why would you put it back to 60? Most of us are still perfectly capable of working at that age, and there are systems in place for those that aren’t. There’s plenty to fix in our country before we get to that. If there’s money to throw around it would be better to raise the super rate for those that are now eligible, wouldn’t it?
I am about to turn 60 in June. Have no intention of retiring until I can’t code well.
But my knees ache when I get up from the low sofa and I find flights of 5 stairs discouraging when I meet them on a daily basis. But e-biking is fun.
Not all of us can wind up writing code on our butts in a freezing aircond office. The 5 months of working outside in Singapore last year on site might have been an experience. But one that I wouldn’t want to repeat too frequently.
I also couldn’t be a farm worker, factory worker, soldier or bar man as I was in my youth. It’d kill me fast.
I suspect that super needs to be more flexible about giving it to people who are working, especially since the changes to secondary tax remove the clawbacks.
They aren’t particularly good. But there are (or maybe were) various provisions for people to get pensions down to about age 55 if they were unable to hold down a job and had to retire early. These may have been subsumed into other benefit systems.
Apart from the impossibility of getting another job after 50, let alone 55 for most, due to extreme ageism in this country.
Just had two more of our staff permanently medically unfit to work.
Ironically, one was only in his 40’s, from work related conditions.
A few years ago ACC, would have helped, but now ACC, staff specialize in pretending work related illnesses are “age related” even when it relates to a previous injury.
Now they go in the hilariously named, “jobseekers”, where some wet behind the ears, who can’t spell, takes compulsory courses in resume writing.
While WINZ pretends they have a chance, in a job market where even fit, keen young people, miss out.
I know many builders, nurses, seafarers, fishermen and other workers where it takes a serious toll on your body, who struggle to work to 55, let alone 60. I was lucky, as I had another trade i could do, at Management level, at 50, after RSI stopped me building. I can still cope with the physical demands of the job. Hopefully for a few more years.
Not to mention so many, skilled and unskilled, manual workers, have had “precarious” employment since the 80’s “reforms”. With their savings and houses long gone.
University educated paper pushers don’t have a fucking clue.
The lucky “boomers” only ever applied to a minority. Admittedly a large one. The lives of many never recovered after the “reforms”.
We have dumped our children, and are starting to do the same to our elderly. The “brighter future” for North shore speculators.
Privatisation of super has worked just as well as all the other privatisations.
KJT
I think you spell it out well,
The ordinary working person on ordinary pay may have managed to put away some money in their lifetime if they haven’t had to move and
have lived in their home a long time paying an ordinary mortgage.
The rest will probably have been stuffed with high prices for housing or accommodation, by the colonial land grab from the overseas money machines.
If a 65 year old person goes on working in their own business that is paying its way then good on them, and they should get some super and good medical help.
If they have listened to neolib advice that benefits are bad, and being self-sustaining is good and stay on after 65 or 67 because they can and are still capable, then they take away the opportunity for another to be promoted and earn some money towards their own retirement. It is another way of boomers soaking up advantages for themselves despite being patted on the head by self-professed wise advisors on retirement.
One of the answers is to require all capable seniors beyond 60 or 65 to do voluntary work. They will be paid their super, and their helpful work in areas of need, which they can choose, for varying hours a week as suitable to them, will be regarded as work. It would be just another form of ‘Work for the Dole’. And that is fair and reasonable practice, and beneficial to both nation and the individual when designed to fit their abilities, and personal situations in a way that enhances their lives.
The country would be a better place to live, would rise in its standards, and the citizen involvement would result in them keeping an eye on its progress and its politicians, because they have personal, physical skin in the game. No sitting around making complaints about their theories of how things should be, totally unrealistic ones.
The maori party policy of a age band from 60 through to 70 is still the best idea . If you take it early you get a bit less but im ok with that as most of sweat of the brow types live on less all our lives .
I worked as a gardener developing gardens on several large properties all my working life, well since the age of 34. (and managed to raise 4 children on my own on that pay)
I still have one big garden I keep on for sentimental reasons
I can tell you I was mighty pleased to stop at the age of 65 and was ready to stop well before that
So your personal circumstances should dictate public policy. Why is the left so self absorbed and willing to take handouts? That’s isn’t socialism. It’s lazy greed
Don’t be silly! Of course, public policy should be completely disconnected from personal circumstances unless you’re Mr Mean or Ms Ave Rage.
Superannuation is most definitely socialism in action! It allows or should allow the lower paid workers and members of society a decent retirement income after they have slaved all their working lives for the capitalists.
Yes, Robert. I felt very sad. A great friend and I lit candles in the Notre Dame in 1990. She was of Maori and French connections, and while we are also discussing the pension…. Marina died 5 years before she would have received it, as many Maori people do.
It’s not just a religious symbol, it’s a symbol of civic and national identity, and and amazing work of art and engineering.
The organisation of its structure and the little clues and tweaks enable us to gain a connection to the minds of its builders almost a thousand years ago. The personal touches to some of the features build a human connection with the artists long deceased.
Whether the beams were numbered in arabic or roman numerals gives us a clue as to the timescale of how that mathematical advance spread across Europe first as a secret guild tool and then as an accepted part of “higher education”.
And finally, the sheer mass of the imposing structure built with crude tools and human power over several lifetimes is a tribute to our ancestors and a testament to what we are capable of today.
“just an old building”. Holy shitfuckballs. For it to be destroyed would be a global loss, like losing the pyramids or Anker Wat (again).
Thank you McFlock – well said. I have been there. I lived in Lyon for 2 years, visiting Paris only briefly.
All of France will be bleeding over this, but you can bet that they will restore it.
I marvelled at the restoration done in West Germany after WW2. This will be no different.
No repeat of Christchurch Cathedral conundrum, you can be sure.
Not sure why Rosemary is stirring. Feeding and sheltering the poor is indeed worthy, but can Rosemary really believe that cultural monuments which mark moments of civilization are of no value?
Has a site of feeding the poor ever been recognised, let alone inspired?
“Not sure why Rosemary is stirring. ” So, expressing an opinion that differs from what is obviously the norm is “stirring”? Interesting, and I’ll bear that in mind during the next ‘discussion’ on the perils and pitfalls of free speech.
“Feeding and sheltering the poor is indeed worthy, (so pleased to see that actually writ, here, on the Left’s last bastion 😉 ) but can Rosemary really believe that cultural monuments which mark moments of civilization are of no value?
Rosemary is getting crankier and more cynical as tempus fugits and has given up all hope that somehow mankind (yes, YOU) is capable of evolving much further. I’m not exactly convinced that these monuments to man’s ingenuity and enterprise and sheer determination (we’ll put aside any squeamishness that perhaps not all involved in the hard graft were fired and inspired entirely by the desire to raise the stones to the Heavens for the Glory of God) are the best places to focus our thought for a survivable future. Does one stand in awe at the astounding capability of human endeavour, or does one merely bide a wee reflecting that at least for a short time, as a species, we were actually capable of achieving Great Erections?
Perhaps I see these as monuments to our lost civilisation?
Because surely to God, any species that can construct something so absolutely awesomely technologically sophisticated can feed and house the poor and marginalised and halt climate change in it’s tracks?
Rosemary, you are stirring all right.
Surprisingly to you maybe, I agree that mankind seems incapable of evolving much further. This is because I believe that mankind has succeeded in destroying his own environment: climate change, as we like to call it, is likely to wipe us all out – rich and poor alike.
I have often pondered about how those medieval marvels were built. I suspect that the blood and suffering of the poor in those days was immense – that Notre Dame is a monument to the powerful built through the near slavery and blood and suffering and deaths of the poor. The cruelty and suffering of the poor in those days was, I would say, worse than most of the poor suffer nowadays – certainly in France. So what are you really railing at, Rosemary?
There probably isn’t much human future (although we are not supposed to say that) and for advanced countries the poverty was worse in the past, if still morally intolerable now.
Yes, I too would like a nice little site where some of the poor could be fed for a little while.
But I would not see it as a landmark in the evolution (or devolution?) of human society.
You are wrong.
Man can construct great art, but he seems utterly incapable of creating a just society, and looks fully capable of destroying his own environment. No point in complaining – that is how it is.
Man can construct great art, but he seems utterly incapable of creating a just society …
There’s no comparison between these two!
Any talented skilled person can produce art in a relatively short time. Any genius can create great art within their (usually short) lifetime. It takes a whole population and many generations and (in no particular order) inspirational leaders, great thinkers, brave radical activists, to name a few, to create something that approaches a just society.
For the same token, it is ‘easier’ to create an image of a black hole 55 million light-years away than to let a woman shine.
Jesus christ I’ve known some glum bastards in my time, but I’ll never understand how someone can be so consumed in being glum that they can’t take a second to appreciate something so awesome, or worry about it when it is in danger, and think that is a normal way to live.
I took more than a second to appreciate the awesomeness….”Because surely to God, any species that can construct something so absolutely awesomely technologically sophisticated….” see, see, …”can feed and house the poor and marginalised and halt climate change in it’s tracks?”
Do you think, McFlock, that in the year 3019 our decedents will look around in awe and wonder at the Earth in all her rehabilitated glory?
Will our multi- times great grandies bathe in clean rivers and sit down to wholesome meals, safe in the knowledge that all on the planet are similarly blessed? Will they go to sleep in their homes after hearing stories about how their ancestors a thousand years ago decided that humans had inflicted enough pain and suffering on the Planet and her inhabitants and collectively undertook to Put Things Right?
What it represents to me Rosemary as an Athiest it represents all the skills artistry and passion of generations. It is NOT just an old building It represents what the western society is all about complete with its faults
It is tragic, a priceless treasure has been semi-destroyed. Let’s hope it is rebuilt.
Putting the Paris homeless in it will NOT solve the problems the world has today
You regularly piss on religious related discussions using derogatory language…along with others here…
Respect, my foot…how hypocritical can you get…you reckon, Andre…
My read is Rosemary was highlighting a truism of attitudes frequenting this place….while also offering thoughts on another practical use for the site …
Empathy is the issue. Grief for what is lost. Compassion for their pain. Some comfort in that some parts are saved.My six year old niece visited Notre Dame three days ago. She is inconsolable, her parents write, because she loved that building. She understands.
Oh jeez, can we all please not have yet another long thread of One Two’s content-free pseudo-delphic attempted put-downs of others’ thinking abilities and the obvious responses thereto?
The put down was yours…to Rosemary…I simply pointed out the hypocrisy in your comment…which along with your smears and abuse…is a regular feature of your musings…
And when you don’t like being called out…you cry for moderation…
What is it with you ALMC guys…serve up continual abuse and derogatory statements…then ask for protection when a mirror is held up to each of you…
You contentious so and so One Two. Why can’t you let other people make strong statements in their own time and way without putting your critical and negative oar in. This is an example of freedom of speech and expression which is reasonable and you are trying to crush it.
Notre Dame soared into the air towards heaven expressing the uplifting thoughts of the puny humans who got together and built this over centuries.
Appreciating beauty that we have created ourselves, something grand and with ‘lofty’ views and also appreciating the fine skilled work and hard graft that was put in by people who could put aside the everyday and seek a lasting monument to greatness, is part of our advanced human society.
It is something to look at and wonder at, and embedded in it are human dreams and intellectual longings, and the complete range of human endeavour and intelligence.
The Paris homeless are the same as the homeless everywhere, needy and ill-used. But it is barbaric to not care about the destruction of monuments to ideals that may never be realised, at least while they remain they remind us of the desire and effort to transcend the vicissitudes of life. The Taliban deliberately destroyed ancient monuments hand-carved and apparently ever-lasting. The USA and other countries have destroyed precious places to break the spirit of the people.
Now fire in a loft has affected this building with its lofty purview. Most sad.
People there will inevitably say – Hitler asked ‘Is Paris burning’ so how come this could happen in peacetime? There were insufficient fire-prevention installations apparently. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Is_Paris_Burning%3F_(book)
“…is part of our advanced human society.
It is something to look at and wonder at, and embedded in it are human dreams and intellectual longings, and the complete range of human endeavour and intelligence.”
Have you been there, Rosemary McDonald? It has immense spiritual value, similar to the spiritual uplift I saw at Glencoe in Scotland when I visited the church where my McDonald ancestor was married. Age, connection, beauty.
No. France was not on the list of holiday destinations in my youth in the UK. Old buildings abound in the UK…bit of a yawn fest after a while. There was a certain delight when some of the Peers had to open up their stately homes to the public for money to pay their taxes….eww….having to let the riff raff in must have really hurt.
Scandinavia…and apart from a few museums with viking longboats, the Fram and the KonTiki, I don’t remember much in the way of Scandinavians resting on their architectural or technological laurels to attract the tourists.
Scotland, of course, being Scots and all that….yes. But only to the extent that loathing of royalty and the so called upper classes is at a genetic memory level. Yes, I do ‘remember’ Glencoe, (sniveling, slimy, treacherous Campbells, may them and all their decedents rot etc etc.) but at some point we have to move forward.
Keeping harping back to real and perceived injustices and horrors from centuries ago benefits whom? Many a Scotsman has snotted into his glass, blaming past injustices for his propensity for the drink. At some stage one has to wipe of the chip and move on.
Emigrate is of course what my lot did. Away from the old squabbles.Just as the old Protestant/Catholic divide was also largely forgotten in NZ. My joke with my wife is that I married a member of a Campbell-affiliated clan. By marriage we mend the old hurts. Not even an issue for us. Just an historical awareness, a cultural sharing, a part of identity.
At Glencoe I was shown around by our tour driver who also was a Glencoe McDonald on his mother’s side. There are three islands in the loch where clans met to talk over and agree to deals and where the dead were buried, close to the water and the underworld, which reminded me of a walk along Spirit’s Bay when I was a young man.
It’s good to seek and find the connections between people rather than the differences.
I first went to see Notre Dame simply because it was one of those things to do when you go to Paris. I was completely unprepared for the overwhelming sense of awe which flooded over me when I stood inside and looked up toward the magnificent round stained glass window. I had to sit down and just let it wash over me and found myself close to tears. It is not just a building.
I find myself close to tears again this morning and can hardly bear to look at the photos and videos of it burning.
It’s hugely culturally significant. It stands as a stunning example of what beautiful works can be achieved by people working together seeking spiritual nourishment, while simultaneously standing as a reminder that all throughout history there have been small classes of the powerful so intent on their personal ends that they get off on exploiting the masses to achieve that gratification.
The engineering of it is truly remarkable. It stands as an incredible embodiment of what can be achieved using evolutionary development with low-performance materials and very limited theoretical understanding or analysis tools.
It’s economically significant. Notre Dame is part of the tourist drawcard for Paris.
It’s simply aesthetically pleasing to go and spend time there, regardless of any underlying views about the religious ideas it represents.
Yet you want to trash all this for short term relief of a social problem that can and should be addressed independently. There’s no shortage of places and ways to help the homeless that don’t involve trashing such a significant part of our shared heritage. I’m disgusted.
edit: here’s a worthwhile read on just part of why Notre Dame matters.
To be totally honest, at a personal level that’s my reaction too. If I’m gonna travel and brave the crowds at historical tourist attractions I’d much rather it was outside my cultural background. Give me Great Zimbabwe or Chan-Chan or Luxor or Chichen Itza or Borobudur any day.
I get about the …”The engineering of it is truly remarkable. It stands as an incredible embodiment of what can be achieved using evolutionary development with low-performance materials and very limited theoretical understanding or analysis tools.” I really do….but for all that, here in 2019, how far have we evolved from those days of “the powerful so intent on their personal ends that they get off on exploiting the masses to achieve that gratification.”?
Not very far I fear. Hence my plan to care for a facility to care for the needs of the decedents of the exploited downtrodden to rise from the rubble.
Andre…you do understand that it was not moi who set fire to Notre Dame?
Like, I am not personally responsible for the bloody thing being on fire?
Like, suggesting that instead of an expensive rebuild of a monument to mankind’s folly a place devoted to the welfare of the most vulnerable be erected instead is not me somehow destroying French civilization as we know it?
Here’s another blow for you to process, there’s enough of the existing structure to rebuild and Macron and local authorities have vowed to do the rebuild.
“The French leader has repeatedly said he won’t reintroduce a wealth tax on the country’s richest people — one of the protesters’ major demands.
The yellow vest movement, prompted by a fuel tax hike in November, has expanded into a broader revolt against Macron’s policies, which protesters see as favoring the rich and big businesses. Their protests, which often turned violent, especially in Paris, provoked a major domestic crisis that sent Macron’s popularity to record low levels.”
Conservative commentator Mark Steyn said the French were “among the most godless people” in the modern Western world during a Notre Dame fire segment on Fox News’ Tucker Carlson Tonight.
[…]
Another analysis by Pew Research Center in December 2018 found that France’s religious commitment among adults was higher compared to other European nations In the analysis, 34 countries were ranked by four individual measures of religiosity: Importance of religion, worship attendance, frequency of prayer and belief in God. Based on the analysis, France was deemed the ninth-least religious country in Europe, with Germany, Switzerland, United Kingdom, Belgium, Sweden, Czech Republic, Denmark and Estonia all found to be less religious.
“On Twitter, white nationalist Richard Spencer hoped that the fire “serves to spur the White man into action.” Noted Islamophobe Pam Gellar opined that Islam had something to do with it.”
just didn’t think these people were this low – my bad
Islam is apparently responsible for all the horrors that plague stupid racist white men — male pattern baldness, erectile dysfunction, the irresistible compulsion to prove themselves dribbling simpletons whenever they open their mouths.
Richard Spencer could do with another smack in the gob to be honest. Never heard of Pam Gellar, but she sounds adorable.
Pamela Geller, Brigitte Gabriel, Sam Harris, all have interesting perspectives on Islam. I particularly like Sam Harris’ “motherlode of bad ideas” comment.
Jeez, what next? Are flying water tankers even a thing?? I suppose if they are it could be seen as a practical suggestion, but I don’t recall anything other than choppers using those big buckets that can open at the bottom.
One imagines the city authorities being reluctant to have one of those unloading over the Île de la Cité. I don’t think Trump’s good at imagining, though.
I’m curious how close the nearest one would actually be. Or how close even the nearest chopper with a monsoon bucket is and how soon it could get there.
If it was a good idea to hit ancient stone masonry with fifty tons on water dropped from a great height I guess the good burghers of all the major European cities containing medieval architecture would give them a jolly good shower on an annual basis. The fact that they don’t is a good indication that gentler methods are preferred.
They considered using aerial water bombing but then reckoned that the weight of the water falling on the damaged roof would have done even more damage. Of course tRump has no appreciation of anything other than himself, so he would have missed that vital piece of information.
I feel like a cat that has brought in a mouse as a gift. But looking at Nietzsche’s thoughts being analysed was interesting while we are thinking tangentially on religion and the value of churches. When we attempt to grapple with the confusions of the day, we walk in the footsteps of these great thinkers. Nietzsche thinks we have abandoned God and Christianity in our seeking for truth. And we will not be happy – we won’t be able to handle ‘our’ truth!
In this sense, Nietzsche sees the Enlightenment pursuit of Truth as being one and the same with the goal of Christianity. The values of individual dignity and human equality esteemed by the Enlightenment and dressed up by philosophers in the language of rational objectivity are for Nietzsche Christian values.
Thus, to him, the Enlightenment, far from being the repudiation of the Christian world-view, is its continuation, and a supreme example of what Nietzsche castigates as the ‘prejudices of philosophers’ (Beyond Good and Evil). The chief philosophic prejudice, according to Nietzsche, is the pretence to pursue objective truth.
Nietzsche interprets philosophy as being successive attempts by great minds to flee from the face of reality and construct higher worlds, from Plato’s ‘Theory of Forms’ to Kant’s ‘thing-in-itself’ and, in so doing, ‘revenge themselves against life’ (Twilight of the Idols: III, 6). In its pursuit of the ‘will to truth’ the Enlightenment made inevitable its own collapse; the unrestrained pursuit of truth leads to its own devaluation…
The death of God unleashes an age of nihilism, when ‘there is no goal, no answer to the question: why?’ and ‘the highest values devalue themselves’ (The Will to Power: 2). In other words, with the death of God comes the collapse of the very values that have dominated the West for two thousand years.
This time on our practically non existent Public Health service. No, not the hospitals and the ambulances but the folks trying to influence policy that will “look after the collective health of our nation.”
“”The leadership position for public health in New Zealand, is held by the Director of Public Health, a position now held – after being vacant for some years – by Dr Caroline McElnay.
It’s a position required by legislation.
Skegg describes McElnay as very good but points out despite the title, she is not part of the Ministry of Health executive leadership team.
“They [the Ministry of Health] have an executive leadership team which has got about 10 people on. It’s quite big, but the director of public health is not there. So, you can see the amount of priority, the Ministry is giving to public health.”
The executive leadership team has 16 members. There is deputy director-general population health and prevention on the team, but the director of public health is not included.
Also required by legislation is a division within the Ministry of Health call the Public Health Group.
“The public health group in recent years has just been just a remnant actually. Just a very small number of people. You can’t even find them on the Ministry of Health website,” said Skegg.
He believes the Ministry is “totally overwhelmed” administering personal health services.
“There just aren’t the experts in the Ministry of Health that a country like New Zealand needs to plan and oversee public health programs and to respond to emergencies.”
How do we score?
Once New Zealand was referred to as the campylobacter capital of the world by food safety experts.
It’s estimated there are 30,000 cases per year, most caught from fresh chicken. A report released in 2018 shows 60 to 90 percent of fresh chicken has high levels of the bacteria which can cause stomach illness and lead to complications such as arthritis and the paralysing Guillain-Barre syndrome.
Skegg said the Ministry for Primary Industries has declined to lower the allowable contamination levels for fresh chicken any further.
“The Ministry for Primary Industries won’t even agree to put a warning label on the packages to tell people.””
Nothing much has changed….industry lobby groups and biased officials continue to failed to respond when the health of the public s at risk.
Brian Easton has a good column on equity in health care:
“Healthcare
What has happened to healthcare is nicely illustrated by an international analysis of healthcare systems by the prestigious (American) Commonwealth Fund. It compares 11 countries (it always finds the US has the worst system). In 2017 it found New Zealand’s ranking was 8th (out of 11) on the equity dimension, ahead of France, Canada and the US. We were behind Britain, Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, Norway, Germany and Australia.” https://www.pundit.co.nz/content/have-we-abandoned-the-egalitarian-society
Yes, Easton has written oft times about our health system, and some of his earlier work was almost prophetic.
You’d think that a mass education/consciousness raising campaign on the dangers of under-cooking chicken would be a no brainer….especially if it were couched in more politically acceptable ‘cost to the health sector/loss of earnings’ terms . Like wise for sugar and alcohol consumption.
But no. We’d hate to annoy our funders wouldn’t we?
I recall it’s our chicken *suppliers* who are at fault, with way more processed carcasses and cuts sporting a coat of bacteria than is allowed in other countries. If they refuse to lift their game to international standards, the solution proposed by NZ’s expert on this, Prof Michael Baker, is for govt to regulate that only frozen chicken can be supplied to the public. Tick tock.
The first thing to remember about this health grading ianmac link 3.2 was that it covered only 11 countries that are regarded as developed. So we are near bottom as a country on a number of things. Would some measures indicate clearly all the lows or would some be hidden by averaging out?
Among all adults, we came
9th of those with cost-access-related problems,
7th= in terms of those had skipped dental care in the past year because of cost; and
10th in terms of those who had waited two months or longer for a specialist appointment.
” Of course there was inequality in the egalitarian society before 1985, but it was rare for the rich to show it, to display, what Thorstein Veblen called, ‘conspicuous consumption’. After 1985 it became common to flaunt how rich you were.”
Not only how rich, but how privileged. Privilege in the disability environment is exemplified by the disparities between ACC and MOH. There are two regular publications in NZ featuring articles pertaining to spinal cord impairment. Both were set up shortly after ACC were ‘persuaded’ to fund 24/7 home based care to tetraplegics (rather than forcing close family to provide unpaid care). Both publications feature inspirational tales of sporting and artistic achievements, travel and access to the latest adaptive tech. Great, if you’re funded by ACC. Tough shit if you’re not. And while both organisations purport to represent ALL with spinal impairment, they seldom publish articles highlighting the disparities and profound differences in rights and entitlements.
The last article printed in both publications were contributed by both my partner and myself some years ago.
We’ve given up on both organisations, as they both not only refuse to acknowledge the rank privilege of their ACC funded members but continue to publish brag pieces of how great life can be with a spinal cord injury if only one has the right attitude.
So what has that got to do with the arrest of a whistle blower, and probable extradition to the USA, for no other reason than the USA does not like having its dirty laundry put on show?
Sorry
I’ve done it too, but I do have a life and I’m about to get on with it, so wont be clogging up TS with any more pointless replies to TRP.His mind is set in concrete.
I once overheard an elderly acquaintance say to another “You be comforted by your prejudices and I’ll be comforted by mine”
I think thats where we’re at
Having just commented on the recent Assange post I thought I would make a couple of observations here.
I didn’t notice whistleblower mentioned at all in the post or the comments.
In the tags list for the article, the likes of whistleblower and ‘truth to power’ are not to be found. Domestic violence, patriarchy, abuse of power are all there.
It is hard to discuss that subject when you feel you have to tiptoe and whisper when in contrast you have folks with the fertiliser spreader on full spraying anyone that didn’t bring a rain coat.
Strictly speaking he’s not a whistle blower, ie not working in an organisation and leaking damning info. But without him, whistleblowers do not have the means of bringing their information in to the light of day
As a wee gloat, I am off to the big smoke to catch The Raconteurs tomorrow night at The Powerstation.
Very excited to see Jack White, have loved listening to him for yonks, especially his latest solo album.
First rocker I have seen look cool with the flying V guitar.
Bob Mould always looked awkward with his.
Band tight, but still had a jam/improvising edge to it.
The drummer had a Gene Kruper feel to some of the songs particularly ‘Gyp’ Dig the slowness.
5 or 6 guitars on Mr Whites rack. Sorry I couldn’t name what styles there were apart from his flying V.
A couple of sing along moments: Steady as she goes and Now that you’re gone.
Highlights: an impromptu You don’t understand me fantastic piano, Blue veins, and a bonus Carolina drama.
A BIG plus was no phones. There was a plan to have phones stored away in bags but they didn’t arrive so plan turned into a plea that was respected.
Talk about blinkered TRP
If you can’t see that there’s something off over an Interpol Red notice being issued (usually reserved for terrorists and murderers)for a sexual misdemeanour a Standard writer in 2010 was perfectly willing to admit to :
you are practising a peculiar form of wilful self blinkering yourself
The article you link to is factually wrong, the only reason the Swedish prosecutors could not interrogate Assange was their own unwillingness to travel to the UK to do so, and they were criticised by the Swedish Bar and in 2014 by a Swedish Court for this very thing.
There was nothing to stop them doing so , and many precedents for doing so, which points to them not treating Assange the same as other individuals wanted for questioning
Assange was available, under house arrest for 15 months ,with electronic leg manacles for questioning if justice for the Swedish women was really the name of the game.
Long before he jumped bail in 2012
Has anyone ever had an Interpol Red notice put on them for the same allegations?
No wonder Assange and most of the civilised world at that time smelled a rat
A concerted campaign to character assassinate Assange in the intervening years has served its purpose…manufacturing consent amongst the gullible so that the state can wreak its vengeance on Assange, no holds barred and shut down true journalism once and for all
The message out there for journalists and publishers is that the only information allowed is that provided by the state
+100
It seems to me so many people have lost sight of the main issue here. Patrick Cockburn nails it:
” “Oh yeah, look at those dead bastards,” and “ha, ha, I hit them” say the pilots of a US Apache helicopter in jubilant conversation as they machine-gun Iraqi civilians on the ground in Baghdad on 12 July 2007……..”
“……Lost in this dog-fight is what Assange and WikiLeaks really achieved and why it was of great importance in establishing the truth about wars being fought on our behalf in which hundreds of thousands of people have been killed.
This is what Daniel Ellsberg did when he released the Pentagon Papers about the US political and military involvement in Vietnam between 1945 and 1967. Like Assange, he exposed official lies and was accused of putting American lives in danger though his accusers were typically elusive about how this was done.
But unless the truth is told about the real nature of these wars then people outside the war zones will never understand why they go on so long and are never won. Governments routinely lie in wartime and it is essential to expose what they are really doing. I remember looking at pictures of craters as big as houses in an Afghan village where 147 people had died in 2009 and which the US defence secretary claimed had been caused by the Taliban throwing grenades. In one small area called Qayara outside Mosul in in 2016-17, the US air force admitted to killing one civilian but a meticulous examination of the facts by The New York Times showed that the real figure was 43 dead civilians including 19 men, eight women and 16 children aged 14 or under”
I just looked at Notre Dame burning on stuff a 36 second video and at 25 seconds a snippet of the next video protruded onto the screen and I couldn’t see how to turn it off. It was a skeleton thousands of years old but I didn’t want to see it then or at all.
On line Media is very intrusive of pushing video at you. Sometimes I can be looking at a quite long text with numerous pictures in and the audio starts and then I have to go back to the beginning and turn it off – it seems the damned things are opt-out rather than leaving it to person to opt-in. Don’t like the system.
Even with all the denizens of words shoveled out by Australian Julian Assange and the Videos of his Australian friend John Pilger, we are still as war mongering as ever.
Assange adds spice, because he has a tendency to avoid the Summons of High Level Government. He Flees and makes up highly convoluted torturous scripts between destinations.
He is thought to be a “Whistleblower” replete with spledid sources of Sex. Sometimes Staff – it would seem. Consent being way way afar from his driving passion. His recent stay with the obliging Ecaudor Embassy left a Cat and a wall of Feces. So it is said. The Embassy got tired of him.
Journalists and Embassies (of inquisitive mind) want to keep close to Assange – feces not withstanding. But a mere small slice of Spy – and any particular Journalist will be captured on Sovereign Intelligence by the United States of America who have 46 Bases on our Planet.
Spies have a long Life. In prison, 35 years is the going rate. No matter where our Ozzie Julian goes – his whistle will be removed from his cat. Journalists the same.
Wonderful thing – the Internet. Wonderful Wars – the Killing Wars.
Condolences Ad, this will be very close to home for you.
Condemnation must rest on the construction company; a monumental breach of H&S protocols. Being familiar with hot work procedures on large construction sites it seems someone has some very tough questions to answer.
Congratulations to the firefighters who’ve pulled off a miracle to save the core structure.
Cheers Red.
It makes me want to chuck in the day job – satisfying as it is – and go work on its art conservation and structural rebuilds for a few years.
Sure it’s just stone and copper, not God.
But for me it carries more human sweat, candle soot, and mixed-up tenebrae dimness than anything in Rome.
“Condemnation must rest on the construction company”
you
“The cathedral was begun in 1160 under Bishop Maurice de Sully and largely completed by 1260, though it was modified frequently in the following centuries. In the 1790s”
Is that your problem? Yes poor form finding something funny in another’s comment during these dark times. Don’t ever do it gabby you’ll get shade thrown at you – that is my advice.
“Pope Francis issued a statement late on Monday expressing the Vatican’s ‘shock and sadness’ at ‘the news of the terrible fire that devastated the Cathedral of Notre Dame, a symbol of Christianity in France and in the world.”’
‘We express closeness to the French Catholics and the people of Paris and we assure our prayers for the firemen and those who are doing everything possible to face this dramatic situation,’ the statement read.”
—
No word about dipping his hand into the vast Catholic Church coffers to restore the Cathedral though. They will probably leave that to the taxpayers of France and generosity of a few wealthy individuals.
I came down here straightaway to say my piece about that piece of … John Roughan retiring from the Herald. Expect you’ve addressed it above me. ‘Wise man ‘ according to the ex-Herald editor on the weekly media watch section of RNZ National 9 to Noon. He’s been writing anonymously their editorial for 30 years. Right-wing tosser writer of John Key’s biography. Always found him densely vile. As reflective as mud. Where the Herald’s heart lies, with their 4 daily pounder columnists for the rich, leaving alone the utterly ridiculous Leighton Smith. Association with his nonsense is Trumpian, Herald. But then again you’ve had Roughan for 30 years. And enabled Whale-oil etc. Do you care about your country? Or do you put money first? Rhetorical, you strangle-tied twots.
Hear about Leighton Smith – soothing the comfortably off for all their years.
Can understand that a little bit of him to a questioning brain would cause despair, luckily most keep their brains in cold storage and inactive, saving them in case they are needed for some emergency later.
Bit of Don McLean here. The Herald does all these things that Don mentions in Prime Time in his sarcastic way. It does have some factual, thoughtful stuff, but
the thought is too often adulterated.
Well will you take the car, or will you take the trip?
Remove annoying hair from your upper lip
What’s it really worth? Does she really care?
What’s the best shampoo that I can use on my hair?
Hey what’s the real future of democracy?
How’re we gonna streamline the bureaucracy?
Hey, hey, the cost of life has gone sky-high
Does the deodorant I’m using really keep me dry?
Kia ora The AM Show.
The subcontractors should be payed a deposit for their work so if the main company goes broke they could get some money back.
Captial gains tax is a must people like Mark just can’t see that all earning should be taxed not just the common poor people paying all the tax.
Batteries technology is advancing fast now that the technology is to big to be held back by the oil barrons.
I think it’s good that the Kenyan families are sueing Boeing for the losses of their love ones this is needed to keep big companies HOUNEST in our WORLD .
I think that NZ Acc act is bullshit Acc doesn’t pay the injured fairly when one is injured you need more money not less try living on 80 % of your wage while injured.??????? The kicker is you can not SUE when wronged that just protects the upper class at the expense of the common person.
RYAN I agree with you heaps of money for the church in France and no money pouring in for all the starving children around the world. Go figure. Eco Maori Tau toko the people who got arrested in Britain fighting to get human caused Global Climate change back in the MEDIA with all the distraction that have come up as of late KIA KAHA.
Ka kite ano
2017 https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/business/332928/nz-s-biowaste-profits-going-to-waste New Zealand is missing out on a multi-billion-dollar waste product industry, according to the Bioenergy Association….
“The announcement by Queensland University of Technology that it is leading a $14 million research programme to develop profitable processes for turning livestock-industry wastes into bioenergy and other bioproducts, such as fertilisers, animal feeds, chemicals and plastics, shows what we should and could do here,” Mr Cox said.
“That project in conjunction with Meat & Livestock Australia shows the value of cross-sector coordination.”
Mr Cox said by 2040, biomass and waste-based industries could supply more than 15 percent of New Zealand’s energy needs and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 5 percent.
“You would think that with opportunities such as this, that the government would b
“If we can use our ability as a leading technology developer in America’s Cup yacht racing, we can use that capability to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
To keep climate change under 2 degrees Celcius, the average world citizen will need to eat 75 percent less beef, 90 percent less pork and half the number of eggs they are today, while tripling their consumption of beans and pulses and quadrupling the amount of nuts and seeds they eat, according to a new study published in Nature magazine.
The University of Oxford’s Marco Springmann, who led the research team, talks to Kathryn about their findings.
So what exactly is a flexitarian?
Someone who eats red meat once a week maximum and otherwise eats predominantly a plant-based diet of fruit, vegetables, legumes, nuts and whole grains, Dr Springmann says.
Dietary guidelines are often out of touch with scientific knowledge but this is as cutting edge as it gets, he says.
“Think about it as technological innovation, but an innovation for diet.”
Less animal food production would reduce deforestation and freshwater consumption, but increased water efficiency will still be required and support given to farmers in adopting more sustainable and non-polluting practices, he says.
Eco Maori backs the climate change CHAMPION’S all around Papatuanuku
Thousands of people have taken part in the civil disobedience protests, blockading four landmarks in the capital in an attempt to force the government to take action on the escalating climate crisis.
Now the activist group Extinction Rebellion says it is planning to step up its action to disrupt rail and tube lines in London.
A spokesman said: “People really don’t want to do this but the inaction of the government in the face of this emergency leaves us little choice.”
Ka kite ano links below .
We need to have more respect for OUR WILDLIFE as we are the guardians of that wildlife for OUR decendints come on wake the fuck UP
New research shows the Maui’s dolphin is sliding closer to extinction, but it is far from the only species struggling to cope in New Zealand’s water, forests and rivers. Environment reporter Isaac Davison looks at 10 mammals and birds that are clinging to survival.
Top 5 birds
1. New Zealand Fairy Tern
Ka kite ano links below
Kia ora Newshub.
Well if the Prime minister says its not the correct time for a capital gains tax so be it.
Well most big construction projects go up the Auckland City rail project will save the country a lot of carbon from being burned.
Its sad about the church in France Lloyd looks like you need some Kiwi Kai.
That’s cool that food aid is reaching the poor people in Venezuela it doesn’t have to be like that.
I have seen a few shocking videos.
How do we know what the preserve or the amount of prosessed meat those people eat in that study was the meat grass feed or what I will take it with a grain of salt. There have been many conflicting story on eggs sugar salt WTF.
That’s the way the Mana Wahine of Sudan taking the power of Sudan government and getting equal rights for Wahine KIA KAHA Mana Wahine from ECO Maori.
Yes the big tech companies need to start protecting the people. Ka kite ano
Here you go Whanau OUR Austrailian tangata whenua cousins have it much HARDER thank us . We can thank OUR tipuna for every thing we have now but Tangata Whenua O Aotearoa are being treated like 3 rate people in OUR own Whenua Ma te wa this is going to change as we will have the power to rule it won’t come eazy we will have to be on OUR toes as the cheats that don’t want MAORI to have the Mana will use ANYONE they can and use ANYTHING they can dream up to suppress tangata whenua Wairua Mana and these people have the power of the state to USE to keep Maori down but NO WE WILL WIN IN THE END
The family of an Aboriginal woman who died in custody in Perth last week say she was mistakenly arrested by police who did not check her identity before restraining her in her mother’s house, hours before she lost consciousness.
Cherdeena Wynne, 26, died in hospital on Tuesday, five days after she became unresponsive while handcuffed by police on a side street off Albany Highway.
Less than two hours before falling unconscious, the mother-of-three was arrested and held on the ground in her mother’s house in Victoria Park, according to her family, in what they say was a case of racial profiling and mistaken identity.
Deaths inside: Indigenous Australian deaths in custody
Her mother, Shirley Wynne, and grandmother, Jennifer Clayton, are calling for eyewitnesses to come forward.
Her death comes 20 years after her father, Warren Cooper, died in custody after being found unresponsive in a police watchhouse in Albany. Cooper was also 26 years old.
“It’s time for this to stop,” Clayton told Guardian Australia. “I have lost my son and now I have lost a granddaughter.” Ka kite ano links below . P.S we will fight for all our indignous cousin MANA
Whanau you see Whanau Bob Eddy Peter and many other musical artist waita ring true to this day some from hundreds of years ago .
The wicked get stronger close freind worste enemy worste enemy best freind .
I have had a revalation the other day that made all that has happened in my past become logical and from that revalation I have figured out the sandflys have had me on there radar for 32 years .
The revalation that I have been working on for 3 month’s tell’s me why some people from te tairawhiti were treating Eco Maori so bad they did not know who they were stuffing with now they no my Mana .
Whanau if you have been head down ass up working hard and treating everyone with respect and you FIND that you have gone know were your { maunga is still a ant hill }some one close is shitting on YOUR MANA so look closely into your past and present and find the persons shitting on your MANA and keep a close eye on them
Ka kite ano P.S It could the state shitting on your mana to some of the people were actors for the state.
Kia ora Newshub.
Ma te wa for the capital gains tax Jacinda will have plenty of TIME to chase that goal you know that old saying better to wait till the time is correct than push shit up hill.
Animals spear parts for humans is just around the corner.
I the crooks are drawn to the honey business and Manakua honey is big money and draws more crooks that guy looks like the fall guy.
Many thanks to all the people who put their time and effort in to protesting about climate change in Britain and around the world to get the story out there OVER trumps interference of the true information on climate change around Papatuanukue.
Yes I seen the Tau toko for ECO Maori last night people are learning the TRUTH Ka pai I say NO more Ka kite ano P.S I’m glad I was to busy this morning I would have been to exposed to judy. Keith is one of my favourite actors
Eric Crampton writes – A fashion industry group is lobbying for protections. They make the usual arguments and a newer one. None of it makes sense. An industry group says it pumped $7.8 billion into the economy last year – that’s 1.9 percent of New Zealand’s GDP. ...
In December 2006, Fiji's military leader Voreqe Bainimarama overthrew the elected government in a coup. He ruled Fiji for the next 16 years, first as dictator, then as "elected" Prime Minister. But now, he's finally been sent to jail where he belongs. Sadly, this isn't for his real crime of ...
Don't like National's corrupt Muldoonist "fast-track" law? Aotearoa's environmental NGO's - Greenpeace, Forest & Bird, WWF, Coromandel Watchdog, Coal Action Network Aotearoa, Kiwis Against Seabed Mining, and others - have announced a joint march against it in Auckland in June: When: 13:00, 8 June, 2024 Where: Aotea Square, Auckland You ...
Seymour describes sushi as too woke for school meals. There are no fish sushi meals recommended by the School Lunches programme. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / Getty ImagesTL;DR: The Government will swap out hot meals for packaged sandwiches to save $107 million on school lunches for poor kids. MSD has pulled ...
I don't mind stealin' bread from the mouths of decadenceBut I can't feed on the powerless when my cup's already overfilled, yeahBut it's on the table, the fire's cookin'And they're farmin' babies, while slaves are workin'The blood is on the table and the mouths are chokin'But I'm goin' hungry, yeahSome ...
The Ardern Government’s chickens came home to roost yesterday with the news that the country is short of natural gas. In 2018, Labour banned offshore petroleum exploration, and industry executives say that the attendant loss of confidence by the industry impacted overall investment in onshore gas fields. Energy Resources Minister ...
Hi,If you’ve been digging through the newly launched Webworm store (orders are being dispatched worldwide as I type!) you’ll have noticed the best model we had was Calvin.This is Calvin.Calvin.Calvin is 7, and is the son of my producer over on Flightless Bird, Rob — aka “Wobby Wob”. Rob also ...
This video includes conclusions of the creator climate scientist Dr. Adam Levy. It is presented to our readers as an informed perspective. Please see video description for references (if any). Climate change is everywhere. And when something's everywhere it can feel like it's nowhere. So how do we get our heads ...
Its a law like gravity: whenever a right-wing government is elected, they start attacking democracy. And now, after talking to their Republican and Tory and Fidesz chums at the International Democracy Union forum in Wellington, National is doing it here, announcing plans to remove election-day enrolment. Or, to put it ...
Yesterday Winston Peters focussed his attention on the important matter at hand. Tweeting. Like the former, and quite possibly next, orange POTUS, from whom he takes much of his political strategy, Winston is an avid X’er.His message didn’t resemble an historic address this time. In fact it was more reminiscent ...
Buzz from the Beehive A significant decline in natural gas production has given Resources Minister Shane Jones an opportunity to reiterate his enthusiasm for the mining and burning of coal. For good measure, he has praised an announcement from Genesis Energy that it will resume importing coal. He and Energy ...
“Follow the money” is the classic directive to journalists trying to understand where power and influence lie in society. In terms of uncovering who influences various New Zealand political parties and governments, it therefore pays to look at who is funding them. The political parties are legally obliged to make ...
Rob MacCullough writes – Here is my subjective ranking on a “most-left” to “most-right” scale of most of our major NZ Universities, with some anecdotal (and at times amusing) evidence to back up the claim.Extreme Left Auckland University of TechnologyEvidenceThe ...
Eric Crampton writes – I hadn’t thought about this one until a helpful email showed up in my inbox.It’s pretty obvious that income tax thresholds should automatically index with inflation – whether to anchor the thresholds in percentiles of the income distribution, or to anchor against a real ...
Jacqui Van Der Kaay writes – Parliament’s speaker had no option but to refer Green MP Julie Anne Genter to the Privileges Committee for her behaviour in the House last Wednesday evening. The incident, in which she crossed the floor to wave a book and yell at National ...
Gary Judd writes – The Dean of the law school at the Auckland University of Technology is someone called Khylee Quince. I have been sent her social media posting in which she has, over the LawNews headline “Senior King’s Counsel files complaint about compulsory tikanga Maori studies for ...
Cleo Paskal writes – WASHINGTON, D.C.: ‘Many of us have received phone calls from [the opposing camp] telling them if they join the camp they will be given projects for their wards and $300,000 [around US$35,000] each’, says former Malaita Premier Daniel Suidani. The elections in Solomon Islands aren’t ...
With hindsight, it was inevitable that (a) Hamas would agree to the ceasefire deal brokered by Egypt and Qatar and that ( b) Israel would then immediately launch attacks on Rafah, regardless. We might have hoped the concessions made by Hamas would cause Israel to desist from slaughtering thousands more ...
Placards and mourners outside the Kilbirnie Mosque following the Christchurch terror attack: MSD has terminated the Kaiwhakaoranga service, which has been used by 415 families since the attacks. Photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: The Government’s pledge to only cut ‘back office’ staff rather than ‘frontline’ services is on increasingly shaky ground, with ...
There’s been a few smaller public transport announcements over the last week or so that I thought I’d cover in a single post. Fareshare I’ve long called for Auckland Transport to offer a way to enable employer-subsidised public transport options. The need for this took on even more importance ...
Parliament’s speaker had no option but to refer Green MP Julie Anne Genter to the Privileges Committee for her behaviour in the House last Wednesday evening. The incident, in which she crossed the floor to wave a book and yell at National Minister Matt Doocey, reflects poorly on Genter and ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
Who likes being sneered at? Nobody. Worse yet, when the sneerer has their facts all wrong, and might well be an idiot.The sneer in question is The adults are in charge now, and it is a sneer offered in retort to criticism of this new Government, no matter how well ...
When in government, Labour pushed to extend the Parliamentary term to four years, to reduce accountability and our ability to vote out a bad government. And now, they're trying to do it through the member's ballot, with a Four-Year Parliamentary Term Legislation Bill. The bill at least requires a referendum ...
A ballot for a single Member's Bill was held today, and the following bill was drawn: Public Works (Prohibition of Compulsory Acquisition of Māori Land) Amendment Bill (Hūhana Lyndon) The bill would prevent the government from stealing Māori land in breach of Te Tiriti o Waitangi. It ...
Simeon Brown, alongside Wayne Brown, is favouring a political figleaf now in exchange for loading up tens of millions in extra interest costs on Auckland ratepayers. Photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: Ratings agency Standard & Poor’s is pushing back hard at suggestions from Local Government Minister Simeon Brown and Mayor Wayne Brown ...
Buzz from the Beehive One headline-grabber from the Beehive yesterday was the OECD’s advice that the government must bring the Budget deficit under control or face higher interest rates. Another was the announcement of a $1.9 billion “investment” in Corrections over the next four years. In the best interests of ...
Chris Trotter writes – Had Zheng He’s fleet sailed east, not west, in the early Fifteenth Century, how different our world would be. There is little reason to suppose that the sea-going junks of the Ming Dynasty, among the largest and most sophisticated sailing vessels ever constructed, would have failed ...
David Farrar writes – Two articles give a useful contrast in balance. Both seek to be neutral explainer articles. This one in the Herald on Social Investment covers the pros and cons nicely. It links to critical pieces and talks about aspects that failed and aspects that are more ...
The tikanga regulations will compel law students to be taught that a system which does not conform with the rule of law is nevertheless law which should be observed and applied…Gary Judd KC writes – I have made a complaint to Parliament’s Regulation ...
The future of Te Huia, the train between Hamilton and Auckland, has been getting a lot of attention recently as current funding for it is only in place till the end of June. The government initially agreed to a five year trial, through to April 2026, but that was subject ...
TL;DR: Hamas has just agreed to Israel’s ceasefire plan. Nelson hospital’s rebuild has been cut back to save money. The OECD suggests New Zealand break up network monopolies, including in electricity. PM Christopher Luxon’s news conference on a prison expansion announcement last night was his messiest yet.Here’s my top six ...
A homicide in Ponsonby, a manhunt with a killer on the run. The nation’s leader stands before a press conference reassuring a frightened nation that he’ll sort it out, he’ll keep them safe, he’ll build some new prison spaces.Sorry what? There’s a scary dude on the run with a gun ...
Hi,I know it’s been awhile since there’s been any Webworm merch — and today that all changes!Over the last four months, I’ve been working with New Zealand artist Jess Johnson to create a series of t-shirts, caps and stickers that are infused with Webworm DNA — and as of right ...
The OECD’s chief economist yesterday laid it on the line for the new Government: bring the deficit under control or face higher Reserve Bank interest rates for longer. And to bring the deficit under control, she meant not borrowing for tax cuts. But there was more. Without policy changes—introducing a ...
After a hiatus of over four months Selwyn Manning and I finally got it together to re-start the “A View from Afar” podcast series. We shall see how we go but aim to do 2 episodes per month if possible. … Continue reading → ...
In 2008, the UK Parliament passed the Climate Change Act 2008. The law established a system of targets, budgets, and plans, with inbuilt accountability mechanisms; the aim was to break the cycle of empty promises and replace it with actual progress towards emissions reduction. The law was passed with near-universal ...
Buzz from the Beehive Local Water Done Well – let’s be blunt – is a silly name, but the first big initiative to put it into practice has gone done well. This success is reflected in the headline on an RNZ report:District mayors welcome Auckland’s new water deal with ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate ConnectionsA farmworker cleans the solar panels of a solar water pump in the village of Jagadhri, Haryana Country, India. (Photo credit: Prashanth Vishwanathan/ IWMI) Decisions made in India over the next few years will play a key role in global ...
Lindsay Mitchell writes – The Children’s Minister, Karen Chhour, intends to repeal Section 7AA from the Oranga Tamariki Act 1989 because it creates conflict between claimed Crown Treaty obligations and the child’s best interests. In her words, “Oranga Tamariki’s governing principles and its act should be colour ...
Geoffrey Miller writes – The gloves are off. That might seem to be the undertone of surprisingly tough talk from New Zealand’s foreign and trade ministers. Winston Peters, the foreign minister, may be facing legal action after making allegations about former Australian foreign minister Bob Carr on Radio New Zealand. ...
Brian Easton writes – This is about the time that the Treasury will be locking up its economic forecasts to be published in the 2024 Budget Economic and Fiscal Update (BEFU) on budget day, 30 May. I am not privy to what they will be (I will report on them ...
TL;DR:Winston Peters is reported to have won a budget increase for MFAT. David Seymour wanted his Ministry of Regulation to be three times bigger than the Productivity Commission. Simeon Brown is appointing a Crown Monitor to Watercare to protect the Claytons Crown Guarantee he had to give ratings agencies ...
The gloves are off. That might seem to be the undertone of surprisingly tough talk from New Zealand’s foreign and trade ministers. Winston Peters, the foreign minister, may be facing legal action after making allegations about former Australian foreign minister Bob Carr on Radio New Zealand. Carr had made highly ...
I could be a florist'Round the corner from Rye LaneI'll be giving daisies to craziesBut, baby, I'll wrap you up real safe Oh, I can give you flowers At the end of every dayFor the center of your table, a rainbowIn case you have people 'round to stay Depending on ...
TL;DR: The six key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to May 12 include:PM Christopher Luxon is scheduled to hold a post-Cabinet news conference at 4 pm today. Finance Minister Nicola Willis will give a pre-budget speech on Thursday.Parliament sits from Question Time at 2pm on ...
The price of the foreign affairs “reset” is now becoming apparent, with Defence set to get a funding boost in the Budget. Finance Minister Nicola Willis has confirmed that it will be one of the few votes, apart from Health and Education and possibly Police, which will get an increase ...
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Yesterday I received come lovely feedback following my Star Wars themed newsletter. A few people mentioned they’d enjoyed reading the personal part at the beginning.I often begin newsletters with some memories, or general thoughts, before commencing the main topic. This hopefully sets the mood and provides some context in which ...
April 30 was going to be the day we’d be calling Mum from London to wish her a happy birthday. Then it became the day we would be going to St. Paul's at Evensong to remember her. The aim of the cathedral builders was to find a way to make their ...
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A new report warns an estimated third of the adult population have unmet need for health care.Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāHere’s the six key things I learned about Aotaroa’s political economy this week around housing, climate and poverty:Politics - Three opinion polls confirmed support for PM Christopher Luxon ...
Today is May the fourth. Which was just a regular day when my mother took me to see the newly released Star Wars at the Odeon in Rotorua. The queue was right around the corner. Some years later this day became known as Star Wars Day, the date being a ...
Buzz from the Beehive Much more media attention is being paid to something Winston Peters said about former Australian Foreign Minister Bob Carr than to a speech he delivered to the New Zealand China Council. One word is missing from the speech: AUKUS. But AUKUS loomed large in his considerations ...
Is the economy in another long stagnation? If so, why?This is about the time that the Treasury will be locking up its economic forecasts to be published in the 2024 Budget Economic and Fiscal Update (BEFU) on budget day, 30 May. I am not privy to what they will be ...
The annual list of who's been bribing our politicians is out, and journalists will no doubt be poring over it to find the juiciest and dirtiest bribes. The government's fast-track invite list is likely to be a particular focus, and we already know of one company on the list which ...
In the weeks after the October 7 Hamas attacks on Southern Israel I wrote about the possible 2nd, 3rd and even 4th order effects of the conflict. These included new fronts being opened in the West Bank (with Hamas), Golan … Continue reading → ...
Peter Dunne writes – It is one of the oldest truisms that there is never a good time for MPs to get a pay rise. This week’s announcement of pay raises of around 2.8% backdated to last October could hardly have come at a worse time, with the ...
David Farrar writes – Newshub reports: Newshub can reveal a fresh allegation of intimidation against Green MP Julie-Anne Genter. Genter is subject to a disciplinary process for aggressively waving a book in the face of National Minister Matt Doocey in the House – but it’s not the first time ...
The Treasury has published a paper today on the global productivity slowdown and how it is playing out in New Zealand: The productivity slowdown: implications for the Treasury’s forecasts and projections. The Treasury Paper examines recent trends in productivity and the potential drivers of the slowdown. Productivity for the whole economy ...
Winston Peters’ comments about former Australian foreign minister look set to be an ongoing headache for both him and Luxon. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for subscribers features co-hosts and , along with regular guests on Gaza and ...
These puppet strings don't pull themselvesYou're thinking thoughts from someone elseHow much time do you think you have?Are you prepared for what comes next?The debating chamber can be a trying place for an opposition MP. What with the person in charge, the speaker, typically being an MP from the governing ...
The land around Lyme Regis, where Meryl Streep once stood, in a hood, on the Cobb, is falling into the sea.MerylThe land around Lyme Regis, around the Cobb that made it rich, has always been falling slowly but surely into the sea. Read more ...
Photo by Jari Hytönen on UnsplashIt’s that new day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when and I co-host our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm. Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream for our chat about the week’s news ...
The Green Party is welcoming the announcement by the Minister Responsible for RMA Reform Chris Bishop to approve most of the Wellington City Council’s District Plan recommendations. ...
David Seymour has failed to get the sweeping cuts he wanted to the free and healthy school lunch programme, Labour education spokesperson Jan Tinetti said. ...
Hon Willie Jackson has been invited by the Oxford Union to debate the motion “This House Believes British Museums are not Very British’ on May 23rd. ...
Green Party MP Hūhana Lyndon says her Public Works (Prohibition of Compulsory Acquisition of Māori Land) Amendment Bill is an opportunity to right some past wrongs around the alienation of Māori land. ...
A senior, highly respected King’s Counsel with decades of experience in our law courts, Gary Judd KC, has filed a complaint about compulsory tikanga Māori studies for law students - highlighting the utter depths of absurdity this woke cultural madness has taken our society. The tikanga regulations will compel law ...
The Government needs to be clear with the people of the Nelson Marlborough region about the changes it is considering for the Nelson Hospital rebuild, Labour health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall said. ...
Ministers must front up about which projects it will push through under its Fast Track Approvals legislation, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
The Government is again adding to New Zealand’s growing unemployment, this time cutting jobs at the agencies responsible for urban development and growing much needed housing stock. ...
With Minister Karen Chhour indicating in the House today that she either doesn’t know or care about the frontline cuts she’s making to Oranga Tamariki, we risk seeing more and more of our children falling through the cracks. ...
The Labour Party is saddened to learn of the death of Sir Robert Martin, a globally renowned disability advocate who led the way for disability rights both in New Zealand and internationally. ...
Labour is calling for the Government to urgently rethink its coalition commitment to restart live animal exports, Labour animal welfare spokesperson Rachel Boyack said. ...
Today’s Financial Stability Report has once again highlighted that poverty and deep inequality are political choices - and this Government is choosing to make them worse. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to do more for our households in most need as unemployment rises and the cost of living crisis endures. ...
Unemployment is on the rise and it’s only going to get worse under this Government, Labour finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds said. Stats NZ figures show the unemployment rate grew to 4.3 percent in the March quarter from 4 percent in the December quarter. “This is the second rise in unemployment ...
The New Zealand Labour Party welcomes the entering into force of the European Union and New Zealand free trade agreement. This agreement opens the door for a huge increase in trade opportunities with a market of 450 million people who are high value discerning consumers of New Zealand goods and ...
The National-led Government continues its fiscal jiggery pokery with its Pharmac announcement today, Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall says. “The government has increased Pharmac funding but conceded it will only make minimal increases in access to medicine”, said Ayesha Verrall “This is far from the bold promises made to fund ...
This afternoon’s interim Waitangi Tribunal report must be taken seriously as it affects our most vulnerable children, Labour children’s spokesperson Willow-Jean Prime. ...
Te Pāti Māori are demanding the New Zealand Government support an international independent investigation into mass graves that have been uncovered at two hospitals on the Gaza strip, following weeks of assault by Israeli troops. Among the 392 bodies that have been recovered, are children and elderly civilians. Many of ...
Our two-tiered system for veterans’ support is out of step with our closest partners, and all parties in Parliament should work together to fix it, Labour veterans’ affairs spokesperson Greg O’Connor said. ...
Stripping two Ministers of their portfolios just six months into the job shows Christopher Luxon’s management style is lacking, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said. ...
Tonight’s court decision to overturn the summons of the Children’s Minister has enabled the Crown to continue making decisions about Māori without evidence, says Te Pāti Māori spokesperson for Children, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “The judicial system has this evening told the nation that this government can do whatever they want when ...
It appears Nicola Willis is about to pull the rug out from under the feet of local communities still dealing with the aftermath of last year’s severe weather, and local councils relying on funding to build back from these disasters. ...
The Government is making short-sighted changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that will take away environmental protection in favour of short-term profits, Labour’s environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
Labour welcomes the release of the report into the North Island weather events and looks forward to working with the Government to ensure that New Zealand is as prepared as it can be for the next natural disaster. ...
The Labour Party has called for the New Zealand Government to recognise Palestine, as a material step towards progressing the two-State solution needed to achieve a lasting peace in the region. ...
Some of our country’s most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a ‘get out of jail free’ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
The government's decision to reintroduce Three Strikes is a destructive and ineffective piece of law-making that will only exacerbate an inherently biased and racist criminal justice system, said Te Pāti Māori Justice Spokesperson, Tākuta Ferris, today. During the time Three Strikes was in place in Aotearoa, Māori and Pasifika received ...
Cuts to frontline hospital staff are not only a broken election promise, it shows the reckless tax cuts have well and truly hit the frontline of the health system, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
Jobseeker beneficiaries who have work obligations must now meet with MSD within two weeks of their benefit starting to determine their next step towards finding a job, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “A key part of the coalition Government’s plan to have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker ...
A new standalone Social Investment Agency will power-up the social investment approach, driving positive change for our most vulnerable New Zealanders, Social Investment Minister Nicola Willis says. “Despite the Government currently investing more than $70 billion every year into social services, we are not seeing the outcomes we want for ...
Check against delivery Good morning. It is a pleasure to be with you to outline the Coalition Government’s approach to our first Budget. Thank you Mark Skelly, President of the Hutt Valley Chamber of Commerce, together with your Board and team, for hosting me. I’d like to acknowledge His Worship ...
Your Excellency Ambassador Meredith, Members of the Diplomatic Corps and Ambassadors from European Union Member States, Ministerial colleagues, Members of Parliament, and other distinguished guests, Thank you everyone for joining us. Ladies and gentlemen - In diplomacy, we often speak of ‘close’ and ‘long-standing’ relations. ...
The Therapeutic Products Act (TPA) will be repealed this year so that a better regime can be put in place to provide New Zealanders safe and timely access to medicines, medical devices and health products, Associate Health Minister Casey Costello announced today. “The medicines and products we are talking about ...
The Minister Responsible for RMA Reform, Chris Bishop, today released his decision on twenty recommendations referred to him by the Wellington City Council relating to its Intensification Planning Instrument, after the Council rejected those recommendations of the Independent Hearings Panel and made alternative recommendations. “Wellington notified its District Plan on ...
Rape Awareness Week (6-10 May) is an important opportunity to acknowledge the continued effort required by government and communities to ensure that all New Zealanders can live free from violence, say Ministers Karen Chhour and Louise Upston. “With 1 in 3 women and 1 in 8 men experiencing sexual violence ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour has today announced that the Government will be delivering a more efficient Healthy School Lunches Programme, saving taxpayers approximately $107 million a year compared to how Labour funded it, by embracing innovation and commercial expertise. “We are delivering on our commitment to treat taxpayers’ money ...
New research on the impacts of extreme weather on coastal marine habitats in Tairāwhiti and Hawke’s Bay will help fishery managers plan for and respond to any future events, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. A report released today on research by Niwa on behalf of Fisheries New Zealand ...
Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Winston Peters will lead a broad political delegation on a five-stop Pacific tour next week to strengthen New Zealand’s engagement with the region. The delegation will visit Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu, New Caledonia, and Tuvalu. “New Zealand has deep and ...
There has been a material decline in gas production according to figures released today by the Gas Industry Co. Figures released by the Gas Industry Company show that there was a 12.5 per cent reduction in gas production during 2023, and a 27.8 per cent reduction in gas production in the ...
Defence Minister Judith Collins tonight announced the recipients of the Minister of Defence Awards of Excellence for Industry, saying they all contribute to New Zealanders’ security and wellbeing. “Congratulations to this year’s recipients, whose innovative products and services play a critical role in the delivery of New Zealand’s defence capabilities, ...
Welcome to you all - it is a pleasure to be here this evening.I would like to start by thanking Greg Lowe, Chair of the New Zealand Defence Industry Advisory Council, for co-hosting this reception with me. This evening is about recognising businesses from across New Zealand and overseas who in ...
It is a pleasure to be speaking to you as the Minister for Digitising Government. I would like to thank Akolade for the invitation to address this Summit, and to acknowledge the great effort you are making to grow New Zealand’s digital future. Today, we stand at the cusp of ...
New Zealand is urging both Israel and Hamas to agree to an immediate ceasefire to avoid the further humanitarian catastrophe that military action in Rafah would unleash, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “The immense suffering in Gaza cannot be allowed to worsen further. Both sides have a responsibility to ...
A new online data dashboard released today as part of the Government’s school attendance action plan makes more timely daily attendance data available to the public and parents, says Associate Education Minister David Seymour. The interactive dashboard will be updated once a week to show a national average of how ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced Rosemary Banks will be New Zealand’s next Ambassador to the United States of America. “Our relationship with the United States is crucial for New Zealand in strategic, security and economic terms,” Mr Peters says. “New Zealand and the United States have a ...
The Government is considering creating a new tier of minerals permitting that will make it easier for hobby miners to prospect for gold. “New Zealand was built on gold, it’s in our DNA. Our gold deposits, particularly in regions such as Otago and the West Coast have always attracted fortune-hunters. ...
Minister for Trade Todd McClay today announced that New Zealand and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) will commence negotiations on a free trade agreement (FTA). Minister McClay met with his counterpart UAE Trade Minister Dr Thani bin Ahmed Al Zeyoudi in Dubai, where they announced the launch of negotiations on a ...
New Zealand Sign Language Week is an excellent opportunity for all Kiwis to give the language a go, Disabilities Issues Minister Louise Upston says. This week (May 6 to 12) is New Zealand Sign Language (NZSL) Week. The theme is “an Aotearoa where anyone can sign anywhere” and aims to ...
Six tertiary students have been selected to work on NASA projects in the US through a New Zealand Space Scholarship, Space Minister Judith Collins announced today. “This is a fantastic opportunity for these talented students. They will undertake internships at NASA’s Ames Research Center or its Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), where ...
New Zealanders will be safer because of a $1.9 billion investment in more frontline Corrections officers, more support for offenders to turn away from crime, and more prison capacity, Corrections Minister Mark Mitchell says. “Our Government said we would crack down on crime. We promised to restore law and order, ...
The OECD’s latest report on New Zealand reinforces the importance of bringing Government spending under control, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The OECD conducts country surveys every two years to review its members’ economic policies. The 2024 New Zealand survey was presented in Wellington today by OECD Chief Economist Clare Lombardelli. ...
The Government has delivered on its election promise to provide a financially sustainable model for Auckland under its Local Water Done Well plan. The plan, which has been unanimously endorsed by Auckland Council’s Governing Body, will see Aucklanders avoid the previously projected 25.8 per cent water rates increases while retaining ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters discussed the need for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, and enhanced cooperation in the Pacific with German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock during her first official visit to New Zealand today. "New Zealand and Germany enjoy shared interests and values, including the rule of law, democracy, respect for the international system ...
The Minister Responsible for RMA Reform, Chris Bishop today released his decision on four recommendations referred to him by the Western Bay of Plenty District Council, opening the door to housing growth in the area. The Council’s Plan Change 92 allows more homes to be built in existing and new ...
Thank you, John McKinnon and the New Zealand China Council for the invitation to speak to you today. Thank you too, all members of the China Council. Your effort has played an essential role in helping to build, shape, and grow a balanced and resilient relationship between our two ...
The Government is modernising insurance law to better protect Kiwis and provide security in the event of a disaster, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly announced today. “These reforms are long overdue. New Zealand’s insurance law is complicated and dated, some of which is more than 100 years old. ...
The coalition Government is refreshing its approach to supporting pay equity claims as time-limited funding for the Pay Equity Taskforce comes to an end, Public Service Minister Nicola Willis says. “Three years ago, the then-government introduced changes to the Equal Pay Act to support pay equity bargaining. The changes were ...
Structured literacy will change the way New Zealand children learn to read - improving achievement and setting students up for success, Education Minister Erica Stanford says. “Being able to read and write is a fundamental life skill that too many young people are missing out on. Recent data shows that ...
Trade Minister Todd McClay says Canada’s refusal to comply in full with a CPTPP trade dispute ruling in our favour over dairy trade is cynical and New Zealand has no intention of backing down. Mr McClay said he has asked for urgent legal advice in respect of our ‘next move’ ...
The rights of our children and young people will be enhanced by changes the coalition Government will make to strengthen oversight of the Oranga Tamariki system, including restoring a single Children’s Commissioner. “The Government is committed to delivering better public services that care for our most at-risk young people and ...
The Government is making it easier for minor changes to be made to a building consent so building a home is easier and more affordable, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on making it easier and cheaper to build homes so we can ...
New Zealand lost a true legend when internationally renowned disability advocate Sir Robert Martin (KNZM) passed away at his home in Whanganui last night, Disabilities Issues Minister Louise Upston says. “Our Government’s thoughts are with his wife Lynda, family and community, those he has worked with, the disability community in ...
Good evening – Before discussing the challenges and opportunities facing New Zealand’s foreign policy, we’d like to first acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of International Affairs. You have contributed to debates about New Zealand foreign policy over a long period of time, and we thank you for hosting us. ...
From today, passengers travelling internationally from Auckland Airport will be able to keep laptops and liquids in their carry-on bags for security screening thanks to new technology, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Creating a more efficient and seamless travel experience is important for holidaymakers and businesses, enabling faster movement through ...
People with an interest in the health of Northland’s marine ecosystems are invited to a public meeting to discuss how to deal with kina barrens, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones will lead the discussion, which will take place on Friday, 10 May, at Awanui Hotel in ...
Kiwi exporters are $100 million better off today with the NZ EU FTA entering into force says Trade Minister Todd McClay. “This is all part of our plan to grow the economy. New Zealand's prosperity depends on international trade, making up 60 per cent of the country’s total economic activity. ...
There are heartening signs that the extractive sector is once again becoming an attractive prospect for investors and a source of economic prosperity for New Zealand, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. “The beginnings of a resurgence in extractive industries are apparent in media reports of the sector in the past ...
The return of the historic Ō-Rākau battle site to the descendants of those who fought there moved one step closer today with the first reading of Te Pire mō Ō-Rākau, Te Pae o Maumahara / The Ō-Rākau Remembrance Bill. The Bill will entrust the 9.7-hectare battle site, five kilometres west ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gary Sacks, Professor of Public Health Policy, Deakin University Drazen Zigic/Shutterstock In recent years, there’s been increasinghype about the potential health risks associated with so-called “ultra-processed” foods. But new evidence published this week found not all “ultra-processed” foods are linked ...
Fears that New Zealand is relying too heavily on low-cost forests to absorb its carbon dioxide emissions have been reignited by a report from the OECD. ...
Finance Minister Nicola Willis has confirmed the total dollar savings target from public sector cuts has been met, but the reductions have not been felt evenly across public agencies. Government departments were told to make savings set at 6.5 percent or 7.5 percent where headcount had grown by more than ...
She doesn’t have a single kind word for me and it’s getting under my skin.Want Hera’s help? Email your problem to helpme@thespinoff.co.nzDear Hera,I have two amazing friends that I absolutely adore. Grace (all names have been changed) and I lived together across 2023 and Olivia moved in with us this ...
Can Western science and Māori science work together to support our well-being? The Te Ohu Mō Papatūānuku (TOMP) Trials Project was a landmark case for healing the land and people with the guidance of Māori science and leadership. This is what happened when Papatūānuku (Earth) was contaminated by toxic discharge, ...
The District Plan is a blueprint for a bigger, better Wellington, through tens of thousands of new apartments and townhouses and a new approach to urban growth. Joel MacManus lays out the vision. The process of putting together Wellington’s new District Plan has been long and excruciating. As a city, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Leah Williams Veazey, ARC DECRA Research Fellow, University of Sydney DavideAngelini/Shutterstock In the 2007 film The Bucket List Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman play two main characters who respond to their terminal cancer diagnoses by rejecting experimental treatment. Instead, they go ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mohan Singh, Professor of Agri-Food Biotechnology, School of Agriculture, Food and Ecosystem Sciences at the University of Melbourne., The University of Melbourne Tanja Esser/Shutterstock Australia’s vital agriculture sector will be hit hard by steadily rising global temperatures. Our climate is already ...
The Acumen Edelman Trust barometer reported that New Zealand’s political trust score now sits below the global average, a topic explored in a recent discussion paper by Maxim Institute. ...
Greenpeace Aotearoa executive director Russel Norman says, "The Fast-Track Bill is the most damaging piece of environmental legislation any Government has introduced in living memory. People are angry, and it’s time to march." ...
The school lunches programme has been retained – and will be extended to some preschoolers. So how is it going to cost $107 million less? To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. The minister with many hats David Seymour wears a number of hats, but this week ...
“Show us the bird,” I found myself muttering at times while reading Hard by the Cloud House by Peter Walker, a deeply thoughtful, often hilarious, at times rambling – but somehow delightfully so – search for the story of a big bird. But not just any bird: the bird. This ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jack Marley, Environment + Energy Editor, UK edition DPVUE .images/Shutterstock Your home was probably designed for a climate that no longer exists. As long as humanity continues to burn fossil fuel, padding the heat-trapping blanket of gases in Earth’s atmosphere, the ...
A senior lawyer has filed a complaint about tikanga becoming a required law school module. Law lecturer Carwyn Jones explains what he’s getting wrong. “…the first law of Aotearoa, a law that served the needs of tangata whenua for a thousand years before the arrival of tauiwi.”– Ani Mikaere ...
In 2019, an Auckland woman woke up from surgery to find that she had undergone a treatment she didn’t consent to. She tells Alex Casey about her experience. From her very first period at the age of 14, Laura experienced “debilitating” levels of pain that forced her to withdraw from ...
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Comment: Concerns about the state of the economy are creeping up to the top of firms’ list of challenges. That’s evident in both surveys and the tone of our recent client discussions. Skimming the past few weeks of eco-news, it’s not hard to see why. – Retail card spending fell ...
Opinion: Could former co-leader James Shaw still make a difference to working with National? The post How the Greens could be contenders appeared first on Newsroom. ...
Opinion: What if we got rid of our existing drug laws and replaced them with a new law that legalised and carefully regulated all psychoactive substances, from cannabis to MDMA, methamphetamine and LSD to magic mushrooms? And which also included legal drugs such as alcohol and nicotine. “Wow,” you might ...
In the gloom following director-general Al Morrison’s job cuts in 2013, the Department of Conservation restructured its operations arm. Eleven conservancy districts were whittled into six new “conservation delivery” regions, under which the Rēkohu/Wharekauri/Chatham Islands area, comprising 40 scattered islands more than 800km east of Christchurch, was tethered to the ...
One of th e country’s top litigation lawyers says New Zealand is seeing a lift in court action between companies. Chapman Tripp partner Justin Graham, who oversees a team of around 80 litigation specialists, says the courts are now so log-jammed that it’s taking over two years to get cases ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The Albanese government is talking up the crucial role of gas as a transition fuel “through to 2050 and beyond”. In a gas strategy to be released on Thursday, the government envisages the fuel’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Next week the government will again next try to get its legislation through to deal with non-citizens who won’t cooperate with efforts to deport them. The bill, which the opposition and crossbench refused to rush ...
A long-term project that will set out an alternative vision for Aotearoa that looks beyond the narrow confines of the policy straight jacket adopted by successive governments. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bree Hurst, Associate Professor, Faculty of Business and Law, QUT, Queensland University of Technology TK Kurikawa/Shutterstock A much-awaited report into Coles and Woolworths has found what many customers have long believed – Australia’s big supermarkets engage in price gouging. What started ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Daniel Ghezelbash, Associate Professor and Deputy Director, Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law, UNSW Law & Justice, UNSW Sydney The Albanese government wanted to avoid an inquiry into its migration amendment bill. The report, handed down yesterday by a senate committee that ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Joo-Cheong Tham, Professor, Melbourne Law School, The University of Melbourne Lobbying is at the heart of government. Who has access to and influence over key government officials shapes the decisions governments make – and how they make them. The ability to influence ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Myfany Turpin, Associate Professor, Ethnomusicology, Linguistics and Ethnobiology, University of Sydney The act representing Australia at this year’s Eurovision contest has sadly not qualified for the grand final. Yet for Zaachariaha Fielding and Michael Ross, the duo that makes up Electric Fields, ...
In announcing changes to the school lunches programme, David Seymour said kids would no longer be served ‘woke’ foods. To clear up any confusion, The Spinoff has compiled a guide to the wokeness levels of some common food items. Apple = NOT WOKE Avocado = WOKE Avocado, smashed = EVEN ...
The Minister Responsible for GCSB and the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security have been notified of this review, and have been provided a finalised Terms of Reference. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Minglu Chen, Senior Lecturer, Government and International Relations, University of Sydney Robert Way/Shutterstock As the past few years have illustrated so clearly, the Australia-China relationship is complicated. As such, it is crucial for Australians to develop a more nuanced understanding of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mariana Campbell, Research Lecturer, Conservation, Charles Darwin University Marilyn Connell Australian freshwater turtles are facing an alarming trend. Almost half of these species are listed as vulnerable, endangered or critically endangered. The Mary River turtle (Elusor macrurus) is one of Australia’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Debbie Passey, Digital Health Research Fellow, The University of Melbourne Algorithms have become integral to our lives. From social media apps to Netflix, algorithms learn your preferences and prioritise the content you are shown. Google Maps and artificial intelligence are nothing without ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Josephine Barbaro, Associate Professor, Principal Research Fellow, Psychologist, La Trobe University Unsplash We’ve come a long way in terms of understanding that everyone thinks, interacts and experiences the world differently. In the past, autistic people, people with attention deficit hyperactive disorder ...
PNG Post-Courier Papua New Guinea’s deputy opposition leader James Nomane has accused the government of “reckless economic management” that has forced devaluation to manage loan repayments in foreign currency and placate the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Prime Minister James Marape “must stop lying to the people of Papua New Guinea”, ...
Welcome to The Spinoff Bookseller Confessional, in which we get to know Aotearoa’s booksellers. This week: Jane Arthur, author of Brown Bird, and former bookseller at Good Books.The book I wish I’d writtenI have been working on not comparing myself to others. On accepting that what I can ...
The final decision on the Wellington District Plan makes it official: High-density housing is legal across most of Wellington. Housing minister Chris Bishop has announced his decision on the Wellington District Plan, approving a series of amendments to radically upzone most of Wellington, allowing tens of thousands of new townhouses ...
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards – Democracy Project (https://democracyproject.nz)Political scientist, Dr Bryce Edwards. “Follow the money” is the classic directive to journalists trying to understand where power and influence lie in society. In terms of uncovering who influences various New Zealand political parties and governments, it therefore pays to ...
RNZ News As Israel presses ahead with strikes in Rafah and seizing the Rafah crossing from Egypt, aid agencies are sounding the alarm of a “catastrophic humanitarian situation”. Rafah was “significant” because it was the only part in Gaza that had not been terribly damaged by the conflict, United Nations ...
With funding set to be scrapped for the Hamilton-Auckland commuter train, Te Huia enthusiast Georgie Dansey argues for it to be thrown a lifeline. It’s 5.45am and the chain of my crappy old bike falls off slugging up the one hill in Hamilton. I contemplate yeeting the bike into the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anna Cooke, Honorary Fellow, School of the Environment, The University of Queensland We feel ecological grief when we lose places, species or ecosystems we value and love. These losses are a growing threat to mental health and wellbeing globally. We all see ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Shauna Brail, Associate Professor, Institute for Management & Innovation, University of Toronto A shift to hybrid and remote work continues to affect worker presence in Toronto’s downtown.(Shutterstock) Downtown Toronto, the core of Canada’s largest city, continues to reel from the lingering ...
Responding to an Auditor-General's report slamming failures in the administration of the 2023 General Election, Taxpayers’ Union Policy and Public Affairs Manager, James Ross, said: ...
Productivity apps now make up a big chunk of the software market. But do they work? And why do they all have AI integrations?Despite being firmly on the record as a physical planner fan, I sometimes dream of something better than my pretty diary and its scrawled, ugly, interior ...
The Taxpayers’ Union says the Beehive need to lead by example, following reports of more than $50,000 spent upgrading video conferencing equipment and furniture in the Prime Minister’s office. Taxpayers’ Union Campaign Manager, Connor Molloy, ...
An objective list of the 50 most powerful people in New Zealand, as judged by the Spinoff Editorial Board. It’s power list season, baby, and we want in on the action. Sure, there’s the rich list and the powerful “c-suite” list and the young people with power (hmmm) but here, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Thalia Anthony, Professor of Law, University of Technology Sydney ShutterstockThis article contains information on deaths in custody and the names of deceased people, and describes ongoing colonial violence towards Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. First Nations people in Australia ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alex Simpson, Senior Lecturer in Criminology, Macquarie University Netflix Baby Reindeer’s phenomenal success has much to do with its writer and lead, Richard Gadd, who plays Donny in a tender semi-autobiographical account of sexual abuse, harassment and stalking. Gadd’s story has ...
Give the calls over the past years to raise the superannuation age, it would be worth looking into poverty and unemployment rates among those who are 60-64 and if they have become worse off since the NS age was last raised from 60-65 from 1991 – 2001. I don’t think that this has been looked into.
I think it is time we thought about putting the age back to 60.
Why would you put it back to 60? Most of us are still perfectly capable of working at that age, and there are systems in place for those that aren’t. There’s plenty to fix in our country before we get to that. If there’s money to throw around it would be better to raise the super rate for those that are now eligible, wouldn’t it?
I am about to turn 60 in June. Have no intention of retiring until I can’t code well.
But my knees ache when I get up from the low sofa and I find flights of 5 stairs discouraging when I meet them on a daily basis. But e-biking is fun.
Not all of us can wind up writing code on our butts in a freezing aircond office. The 5 months of working outside in Singapore last year on site might have been an experience. But one that I wouldn’t want to repeat too frequently.
I also couldn’t be a farm worker, factory worker, soldier or bar man as I was in my youth. It’d kill me fast.
I suspect that super needs to be more flexible about giving it to people who are working, especially since the changes to secondary tax remove the clawbacks.
Well said, lprent.
JanM…” ….and there are systems in place for those that aren’t.”
What systems?
They aren’t particularly good. But there are (or maybe were) various provisions for people to get pensions down to about age 55 if they were unable to hold down a job and had to retire early. These may have been subsumed into other benefit systems.
All gone. As far as I know.
Apart from the impossibility of getting another job after 50, let alone 55 for most, due to extreme ageism in this country.
Just had two more of our staff permanently medically unfit to work.
Ironically, one was only in his 40’s, from work related conditions.
A few years ago ACC, would have helped, but now ACC, staff specialize in pretending work related illnesses are “age related” even when it relates to a previous injury.
Now they go in the hilariously named, “jobseekers”, where some wet behind the ears, who can’t spell, takes compulsory courses in resume writing.
While WINZ pretends they have a chance, in a job market where even fit, keen young people, miss out.
I know many builders, nurses, seafarers, fishermen and other workers where it takes a serious toll on your body, who struggle to work to 55, let alone 60. I was lucky, as I had another trade i could do, at Management level, at 50, after RSI stopped me building. I can still cope with the physical demands of the job. Hopefully for a few more years.
Not to mention so many, skilled and unskilled, manual workers, have had “precarious” employment since the 80’s “reforms”. With their savings and houses long gone.
University educated paper pushers don’t have a fucking clue.
The lucky “boomers” only ever applied to a minority. Admittedly a large one. The lives of many never recovered after the “reforms”.
We have dumped our children, and are starting to do the same to our elderly. The “brighter future” for North shore speculators.
Privatisation of super has worked just as well as all the other privatisations.
KJT
I think you spell it out well,
The ordinary working person on ordinary pay may have managed to put away some money in their lifetime if they haven’t had to move and
have lived in their home a long time paying an ordinary mortgage.
The rest will probably have been stuffed with high prices for housing or accommodation, by the colonial land grab from the overseas money machines.
If a 65 year old person goes on working in their own business that is paying its way then good on them, and they should get some super and good medical help.
If they have listened to neolib advice that benefits are bad, and being self-sustaining is good and stay on after 65 or 67 because they can and are still capable, then they take away the opportunity for another to be promoted and earn some money towards their own retirement. It is another way of boomers soaking up advantages for themselves despite being patted on the head by self-professed wise advisors on retirement.
One of the answers is to require all capable seniors beyond 60 or 65 to do voluntary work. They will be paid their super, and their helpful work in areas of need, which they can choose, for varying hours a week as suitable to them, will be regarded as work. It would be just another form of ‘Work for the Dole’. And that is fair and reasonable practice, and beneficial to both nation and the individual when designed to fit their abilities, and personal situations in a way that enhances their lives.
The country would be a better place to live, would rise in its standards, and the citizen involvement would result in them keeping an eye on its progress and its politicians, because they have personal, physical skin in the game. No sitting around making complaints about their theories of how things should be, totally unrealistic ones.
An excellent summation. Thank you.
“We have dumped our children, and are starting to do the same to our elderly. The “brighter future” for North shore speculators.”
Yep.
Solid statement, kjt…
Also Lp at 1.1.1
Cheers to both…
KiwiSaver has been a stunning success? How has the addition of private superfunds been a bad thing?
Or should New Zealanders be spending all their money rather than saving it and hoping the government does what KJT wants? Idiot
The maori party policy of a age band from 60 through to 70 is still the best idea . If you take it early you get a bit less but im ok with that as most of sweat of the brow types live on less all our lives .
As someone in the physical field still I concur. In the ideal reality manual workers would retire at 40, after that we are running on our rims.
Lowering it to 16 would make more sense.
I worked as a gardener developing gardens on several large properties all my working life, well since the age of 34. (and managed to raise 4 children on my own on that pay)
I still have one big garden I keep on for sentimental reasons
I can tell you I was mighty pleased to stop at the age of 65 and was ready to stop well before that
So your personal circumstances should dictate public policy. Why is the left so self absorbed and willing to take handouts? That’s isn’t socialism. It’s lazy greed
Don’t be silly! Of course, public policy should be completely disconnected from personal circumstances unless you’re Mr Mean or Ms Ave Rage.
Superannuation is most definitely socialism in action! It allows or should allow the lower paid workers and members of society a decent retirement income after they have slaved all their working lives for the capitalists.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e8/Pyramid_of_Capitalist_System.jpg
Notre Dame Cathedral is burning.
I spend a lot of good times there a long time ago. Oh la tristesse!
The collapsing spire is a shock.
Yes, Robert. I felt very sad. A great friend and I lit candles in the Notre Dame in 1990. She was of Maori and French connections, and while we are also discussing the pension…. Marina died 5 years before she would have received it, as many Maori people do.
Yeah, I’m really hoping they’ve pulled some of the art out for the renovations. Poor Paris.
All of the bronzes were out.
Monument to a benevolent deity destroyed by fire???
Perhaps a divine message?
Demolish, clear the rubble and build shelter and support services for the city’s homeless.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-sh/Paris_homeless
good grief, seriously , good fucking grief.
this chruch was started to build in 1160 finished almost two hundred years later, and has stood for 850 nows.
go find a different tree to leave your piss.
Just go away.
Seriously Sabine….it is just an old building.
What does it represent to you?
Never been there, never seen it for real.
Not religious.
But the news saddens me greatly.
It’s not just a religious symbol, it’s a symbol of civic and national identity, and and amazing work of art and engineering.
The organisation of its structure and the little clues and tweaks enable us to gain a connection to the minds of its builders almost a thousand years ago. The personal touches to some of the features build a human connection with the artists long deceased.
Whether the beams were numbered in arabic or roman numerals gives us a clue as to the timescale of how that mathematical advance spread across Europe first as a secret guild tool and then as an accepted part of “higher education”.
And finally, the sheer mass of the imposing structure built with crude tools and human power over several lifetimes is a tribute to our ancestors and a testament to what we are capable of today.
“just an old building”. Holy shitfuckballs. For it to be destroyed would be a global loss, like losing the pyramids or Anker Wat (again).
Thank you McFlock – well said. I have been there. I lived in Lyon for 2 years, visiting Paris only briefly.
All of France will be bleeding over this, but you can bet that they will restore it.
I marvelled at the restoration done in West Germany after WW2. This will be no different.
No repeat of Christchurch Cathedral conundrum, you can be sure.
Not sure why Rosemary is stirring. Feeding and sheltering the poor is indeed worthy, but can Rosemary really believe that cultural monuments which mark moments of civilization are of no value?
Has a site of feeding the poor ever been recognised, let alone inspired?
“Not sure why Rosemary is stirring. ” So, expressing an opinion that differs from what is obviously the norm is “stirring”? Interesting, and I’ll bear that in mind during the next ‘discussion’ on the perils and pitfalls of free speech.
“Feeding and sheltering the poor is indeed worthy, (so pleased to see that actually writ, here, on the Left’s last bastion 😉 ) but can Rosemary really believe that cultural monuments which mark moments of civilization are of no value?
Rosemary is getting crankier and more cynical as tempus fugits and has given up all hope that somehow mankind (yes, YOU) is capable of evolving much further. I’m not exactly convinced that these monuments to man’s ingenuity and enterprise and sheer determination (we’ll put aside any squeamishness that perhaps not all involved in the hard graft were fired and inspired entirely by the desire to raise the stones to the Heavens for the Glory of God) are the best places to focus our thought for a survivable future. Does one stand in awe at the astounding capability of human endeavour, or does one merely bide a wee reflecting that at least for a short time, as a species, we were actually capable of achieving Great Erections?
Perhaps I see these as monuments to our lost civilisation?
Because surely to God, any species that can construct something so absolutely awesomely technologically sophisticated can feed and house the poor and marginalised and halt climate change in it’s tracks?
Rosemary, you are stirring all right.
Surprisingly to you maybe, I agree that mankind seems incapable of evolving much further. This is because I believe that mankind has succeeded in destroying his own environment: climate change, as we like to call it, is likely to wipe us all out – rich and poor alike.
I have often pondered about how those medieval marvels were built. I suspect that the blood and suffering of the poor in those days was immense – that Notre Dame is a monument to the powerful built through the near slavery and blood and suffering and deaths of the poor. The cruelty and suffering of the poor in those days was, I would say, worse than most of the poor suffer nowadays – certainly in France. So what are you really railing at, Rosemary?
There probably isn’t much human future (although we are not supposed to say that) and for advanced countries the poverty was worse in the past, if still morally intolerable now.
Yes, I too would like a nice little site where some of the poor could be fed for a little while.
But I would not see it as a landmark in the evolution (or devolution?) of human society.
You are wrong.
Man can construct great art, but he seems utterly incapable of creating a just society, and looks fully capable of destroying his own environment. No point in complaining – that is how it is.
There’s no comparison between these two!
Any talented skilled person can produce art in a relatively short time. Any genius can create great art within their (usually short) lifetime. It takes a whole population and many generations and (in no particular order) inspirational leaders, great thinkers, brave radical activists, to name a few, to create something that approaches a just society.
For the same token, it is ‘easier’ to create an image of a black hole 55 million light-years away than to let a woman shine.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/life/112045936/its-easier-to-photograph-a-black-hole-than-let-a-woman-shine
Jesus christ I’ve known some glum bastards in my time, but I’ll never understand how someone can be so consumed in being glum that they can’t take a second to appreciate something so awesome, or worry about it when it is in danger, and think that is a normal way to live.
I took more than a second to appreciate the awesomeness….”Because surely to God, any species that can construct something so absolutely awesomely technologically sophisticated….” see, see, …”can feed and house the poor and marginalised and halt climate change in it’s tracks?”
Do you think, McFlock, that in the year 3019 our decedents will look around in awe and wonder at the Earth in all her rehabilitated glory?
Will our multi- times great grandies bathe in clean rivers and sit down to wholesome meals, safe in the knowledge that all on the planet are similarly blessed? Will they go to sleep in their homes after hearing stories about how their ancestors a thousand years ago decided that humans had inflicted enough pain and suffering on the Planet and her inhabitants and collectively undertook to Put Things Right?
Nah…it’ll be this…
Using it as a set-up for the next variation on your favourite theme isn’t “appreciation”.
And let’s not forget you started with “it’s just an old building”.
Idiocracy was off on a number of levels (particularly genetics and IQ). The only clip that comes to mind for this discussion is from the simpsons.
Well you have all become glummer all day. This has been going on all day. Enjoy!
“What does it represent to you?”
What it represents to me Rosemary as an Athiest it represents all the skills artistry and passion of generations. It is NOT just an old building It represents what the western society is all about complete with its faults
It is tragic, a priceless treasure has been semi-destroyed. Let’s hope it is rebuilt.
Putting the Paris homeless in it will NOT solve the problems the world has today
You really have no respect for anything but your particular little hobbyhorses, have you?
You regularly piss on religious related discussions using derogatory language…along with others here…
Respect, my foot…how hypocritical can you get…you reckon, Andre…
My read is Rosemary was highlighting a truism of attitudes frequenting this place….while also offering thoughts on another practical use for the site …
You wouldn’t be able to understand – it’s above your empathy paygrade. Stick to telling everyone you’re brainy cos that seems to work lol
Empathy is the issue. Grief for what is lost. Compassion for their pain. Some comfort in that some parts are saved.My six year old niece visited Notre Dame three days ago. She is inconsolable, her parents write, because she loved that building. She understands.
“You wouldn’t be able to understand – it’s above your empathy paygrade. Stick to telling everyone you’re brainy cos that seems to work lol”
Early contender for post of the day 😆
You believe to know enough about my comments to make such a claim…You don’t…You can’t…becauae you’re angry and abusive…
But through your repeated ALM aggressive abusive rants…I understand plenty…about you…your birthday spew was quite something…eh…
Triggered by my highlighting just how full of it you are…how incorrect you were by calling me a liar…multiple times…
I’ll re-post the lot…if you like…
Now…if my comments bring out your feelings of inadequacy…that’s your problem, marty…
But have the awereness to know..I’ve got your number…
Everytime!
Oh jeez, can we all please not have yet another long thread of One Two’s content-free pseudo-delphic attempted put-downs of others’ thinking abilities and the obvious responses thereto?
Asking (begging) for moderation now…is it, Andre…
The put down was yours…to Rosemary…I simply pointed out the hypocrisy in your comment…which along with your smears and abuse…is a regular feature of your musings…
And when you don’t like being called out…you cry for moderation…
What is it with you ALMC guys…serve up continual abuse and derogatory statements…then ask for protection when a mirror is held up to each of you…
Andre pseudo delphic Lol You are very readable these days.
Please let’s just leave it here. Rather than having yet another Battley Townswomen’s Guild Re-enactment of Pearl Harbor (kitten edition)
You contentious so and so One Two. Why can’t you let other people make strong statements in their own time and way without putting your critical and negative oar in. This is an example of freedom of speech and expression which is reasonable and you are trying to crush it.
Notre Dame soared into the air towards heaven expressing the uplifting thoughts of the puny humans who got together and built this over centuries.
Appreciating beauty that we have created ourselves, something grand and with ‘lofty’ views and also appreciating the fine skilled work and hard graft that was put in by people who could put aside the everyday and seek a lasting monument to greatness, is part of our advanced human society.
It is something to look at and wonder at, and embedded in it are human dreams and intellectual longings, and the complete range of human endeavour and intelligence.
The Paris homeless are the same as the homeless everywhere, needy and ill-used. But it is barbaric to not care about the destruction of monuments to ideals that may never be realised, at least while they remain they remind us of the desire and effort to transcend the vicissitudes of life. The Taliban deliberately destroyed ancient monuments hand-carved and apparently ever-lasting. The USA and other countries have destroyed precious places to break the spirit of the people.
Now fire in a loft has affected this building with its lofty purview. Most sad.
People there will inevitably say – Hitler asked ‘Is Paris burning’ so how come this could happen in peacetime? There were insufficient fire-prevention installations apparently.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Is_Paris_Burning%3F_(book)
“…is part of our advanced human society.
It is something to look at and wonder at, and embedded in it are human dreams and intellectual longings, and the complete range of human endeavour and intelligence.”
And somehow appropriate in goes up in flames.
Andre…pray tell, what is it about this building that deserves particular respect?
Have you been there, Rosemary McDonald? It has immense spiritual value, similar to the spiritual uplift I saw at Glencoe in Scotland when I visited the church where my McDonald ancestor was married. Age, connection, beauty.
No. France was not on the list of holiday destinations in my youth in the UK. Old buildings abound in the UK…bit of a yawn fest after a while. There was a certain delight when some of the Peers had to open up their stately homes to the public for money to pay their taxes….eww….having to let the riff raff in must have really hurt.
Scandinavia…and apart from a few museums with viking longboats, the Fram and the KonTiki, I don’t remember much in the way of Scandinavians resting on their architectural or technological laurels to attract the tourists.
Scotland, of course, being Scots and all that….yes. But only to the extent that loathing of royalty and the so called upper classes is at a genetic memory level. Yes, I do ‘remember’ Glencoe, (sniveling, slimy, treacherous Campbells, may them and all their decedents rot etc etc.) but at some point we have to move forward.
Keeping harping back to real and perceived injustices and horrors from centuries ago benefits whom? Many a Scotsman has snotted into his glass, blaming past injustices for his propensity for the drink. At some stage one has to wipe of the chip and move on.
Emigrate to the other side of the globe perhaps?
So when the Scottish emigrated they built temples and cathedrals to the Scottish rite .
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Rite_Cathedral_(Indianapolis)
Emigrate is of course what my lot did. Away from the old squabbles.Just as the old Protestant/Catholic divide was also largely forgotten in NZ. My joke with my wife is that I married a member of a Campbell-affiliated clan. By marriage we mend the old hurts. Not even an issue for us. Just an historical awareness, a cultural sharing, a part of identity.
At Glencoe I was shown around by our tour driver who also was a Glencoe McDonald on his mother’s side. There are three islands in the loch where clans met to talk over and agree to deals and where the dead were buried, close to the water and the underworld, which reminded me of a walk along Spirit’s Bay when I was a young man.
It’s good to seek and find the connections between people rather than the differences.
I first went to see Notre Dame simply because it was one of those things to do when you go to Paris. I was completely unprepared for the overwhelming sense of awe which flooded over me when I stood inside and looked up toward the magnificent round stained glass window. I had to sit down and just let it wash over me and found myself close to tears. It is not just a building.
I find myself close to tears again this morning and can hardly bear to look at the photos and videos of it burning.
One of the finest examples of French gothic architecture there is, stunningly beautiful inside and out and approaching its 700th birthday
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Notre-Dame_de_Paris
As iconic to the french as the opera house is to Australia or the pyramids are to Egypt.
In no particular order.
It’s hugely culturally significant. It stands as a stunning example of what beautiful works can be achieved by people working together seeking spiritual nourishment, while simultaneously standing as a reminder that all throughout history there have been small classes of the powerful so intent on their personal ends that they get off on exploiting the masses to achieve that gratification.
The engineering of it is truly remarkable. It stands as an incredible embodiment of what can be achieved using evolutionary development with low-performance materials and very limited theoretical understanding or analysis tools.
It’s economically significant. Notre Dame is part of the tourist drawcard for Paris.
It’s simply aesthetically pleasing to go and spend time there, regardless of any underlying views about the religious ideas it represents.
Yet you want to trash all this for short term relief of a social problem that can and should be addressed independently. There’s no shortage of places and ways to help the homeless that don’t involve trashing such a significant part of our shared heritage. I’m disgusted.
edit: here’s a worthwhile read on just part of why Notre Dame matters.
https://www.vox.com/culture/2019/4/15/18311758/notre-dame-fire-victor-hugo-hunchback
I have to disagree as a kid I was dragged around these old buildings so boring to me they are just building’s.
To be totally honest, at a personal level that’s my reaction too. If I’m gonna travel and brave the crowds at historical tourist attractions I’d much rather it was outside my cultural background. Give me Great Zimbabwe or Chan-Chan or Luxor or Chichen Itza or Borobudur any day.
But I get it why Notre Dame really matters.
Why drag your boring thoughts around on this blog Peter T?
What happened to “A quiet ‘that sounds bad'” ?
“Yet you want to trash all this …”
No. And kindly don’t put words in my mouth.
I get about the …”The engineering of it is truly remarkable. It stands as an incredible embodiment of what can be achieved using evolutionary development with low-performance materials and very limited theoretical understanding or analysis tools.” I really do….but for all that, here in 2019, how far have we evolved from those days of “the powerful so intent on their personal ends that they get off on exploiting the masses to achieve that gratification.”?
Not very far I fear. Hence my plan to care for a facility to care for the needs of the decedents of the exploited downtrodden to rise from the rubble.
Thank you for your reply.
“Yet you want to trash all this …”
No. And kindly don’t put words in my mouth.
I do apologise. Your exact words were “Demolish, clear the rubble …”.
Andre…you do understand that it was not moi who set fire to Notre Dame?
Like, I am not personally responsible for the bloody thing being on fire?
Like, suggesting that instead of an expensive rebuild of a monument to mankind’s folly a place devoted to the welfare of the most vulnerable be erected instead is not me somehow destroying French civilization as we know it?
Good. I’m glad we cleared that up. 🙂 🙂
Here’s another blow for you to process, there’s enough of the existing structure to rebuild and Macron and local authorities have vowed to do the rebuild.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/notre-dame-cathedral-fire-paris_n_5cb4bc32e4b0ffefe3b4b72e
Whew!
Thank goodness!
The French soul would be lost without it’s spiritual home.
And of course there’s pots of dosh in the economy to pay for it….
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/frances-macron-to-respond-to-yellow-vest-economic-crisis/2019/04/15/c132c242-5f8a-11e9-bf24-db4b9fb62aa2_story.html?utm_term=.24e07d2e8294
“The French leader has repeatedly said he won’t reintroduce a wealth tax on the country’s richest people — one of the protesters’ major demands.
The yellow vest movement, prompted by a fuel tax hike in November, has expanded into a broader revolt against Macron’s policies, which protesters see as favoring the rich and big businesses. Their protests, which often turned violent, especially in Paris, provoked a major domestic crisis that sent Macron’s popularity to record low levels.”
Entire nations and their ancient cultural sites get destroyed…including by French lead air strikes…
So…yeah…perspective…
They saved Jesus’s head-dress, or summat, according to RNZ news, without interposing ‘supposed’. Simple sentences beloved of modern media.
Very sad – beautiful building
I have a hunch it was an inside job.
Thats a very serious accusation there young Igor.
Yes, Kevin – your hunch could get quite a few backs up.
Ah -huh.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/notre-dame-cathedral-fire-conspiracy-theories_n_5cb4ce57e4b098b9a2d825c7
I’m sure Fox can blame Ilhan Omar for it. Somehow.
Wasn’t she seen stuffing a flaming hijab under the foundations – if only a metaphorical one?
The batshit crazies are too much even for Faux.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/fox-news-shep-smith-neil-cavuto-shut-down-notre-dame-fire-conspiracy-theories?ref=home
Well, too much for some.
Conservative commentator Mark Steyn said the French were “among the most godless people” in the modern Western world during a Notre Dame fire segment on Fox News’ Tucker Carlson Tonight.
[…]
Another analysis by Pew Research Center in December 2018 found that France’s religious commitment among adults was higher compared to other European nations In the analysis, 34 countries were ranked by four individual measures of religiosity: Importance of religion, worship attendance, frequency of prayer and belief in God. Based on the analysis, France was deemed the ninth-least religious country in Europe, with Germany, Switzerland, United Kingdom, Belgium, Sweden, Czech Republic, Denmark and Estonia all found to be less religious.
https://www.newsweek.com/tucker-carlson-guest-says-french-among-most-godless-people-western-world-1397506
That religion is a real beam mattering half a shit to deal to others. Ridiculous plutocracy.
unbelievable
“On Twitter, white nationalist Richard Spencer hoped that the fire “serves to spur the White man into action.” Noted Islamophobe Pam Gellar opined that Islam had something to do with it.”
just didn’t think these people were this low – my bad
Islam is apparently responsible for all the horrors that plague stupid racist white men — male pattern baldness, erectile dysfunction, the irresistible compulsion to prove themselves dribbling simpletons whenever they open their mouths.
Richard Spencer could do with another smack in the gob to be honest. Never heard of Pam Gellar, but she sounds adorable.
Pamela Geller, Brigitte Gabriel, Sam Harris, all have interesting perspectives on Islam. I particularly like Sam Harris’ “motherlode of bad ideas” comment.
Neither here nor there though is it shadders.
You might not think so if you were this woman https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/07/iranian-woman-who-removed-headscarf-sentenced-to-two-years.
You omitted passive-aggressive lawn-mowing and scrotal itch
And this from Trump: “Perhaps flying water tankers could be used to put it out. Must act quickly!” https://www.huffpost.com/entry/donald-trump-notre-dame-fire_n_5cb4c426e4b082aab08a079e
Jeez, what next? Are flying water tankers even a thing?? I suppose if they are it could be seen as a practical suggestion, but I don’t recall anything other than choppers using those big buckets that can open at the bottom.
DC 10 air tanker.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=WG06xAbBf3Q
But still, Trump is a tit.
One imagines the city authorities being reluctant to have one of those unloading over the Île de la Cité. I don’t think Trump’s good at imagining, though.
I’m curious how close the nearest one would actually be. Or how close even the nearest chopper with a monsoon bucket is and how soon it could get there.
Sécurité Civile has a fleet of fire-fighting aircraft based in Marseille.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%C3%A9curit%C3%A9_Civile#Water_bomber_group
If it was a good idea to hit ancient stone masonry with fifty tons on water dropped from a great height I guess the good burghers of all the major European cities containing medieval architecture would give them a jolly good shower on an annual basis. The fact that they don’t is a good indication that gentler methods are preferred.
He does realise what the purpose of a roof is, right?
They considered using aerial water bombing but then reckoned that the weight of the water falling on the damaged roof would have done even more damage. Of course tRump has no appreciation of anything other than himself, so he would have missed that vital piece of information.
Just waiting for Orange is the New Twank to tell them to use lots of asbestos fireproofing in the rebuild, and he’s got just the supplier for it.
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/russian-asbestos-trump_face/
The stupid hurts.
https://twitter.com/Partisangirl/status/1117847713750470656
Anaykh
I feel like a cat that has brought in a mouse as a gift. But looking at Nietzsche’s thoughts being analysed was interesting while we are thinking tangentially on religion and the value of churches. When we attempt to grapple with the confusions of the day, we walk in the footsteps of these great thinkers. Nietzsche thinks we have abandoned God and Christianity in our seeking for truth. And we will not be happy – we won’t be able to handle ‘our’ truth!
In this sense, Nietzsche sees the Enlightenment pursuit of Truth as being one and the same with the goal of Christianity. The values of individual dignity and human equality esteemed by the Enlightenment and dressed up by philosophers in the language of rational objectivity are for Nietzsche Christian values.
Thus, to him, the Enlightenment, far from being the repudiation of the Christian world-view, is its continuation, and a supreme example of what Nietzsche castigates as the ‘prejudices of philosophers’ (Beyond Good and Evil). The chief philosophic prejudice, according to Nietzsche, is the pretence to pursue objective truth.
Nietzsche interprets philosophy as being successive attempts by great minds to flee from the face of reality and construct higher worlds, from Plato’s ‘Theory of Forms’ to Kant’s ‘thing-in-itself’ and, in so doing, ‘revenge themselves against life’ (Twilight of the Idols: III, 6). In its pursuit of the ‘will to truth’ the Enlightenment made inevitable its own collapse; the unrestrained pursuit of truth leads to its own devaluation…
The death of God unleashes an age of nihilism, when ‘there is no goal, no answer to the question: why?’ and ‘the highest values devalue themselves’ (The Will to Power: 2). In other words, with the death of God comes the collapse of the very values that have dominated the West for two thousand years.
To use the Jungian phrase, the death of God brings man before the ‘void’, from which he turns away in ‘horror’.[1] Nietzsche’s great fear is that once men come to realize the full implications of the death of God, they will conclude that nothing is worth striving for…
https://www.therethinkingsociety.com/rethinkinarticles/2019/1/30/nietzsche-and-the-end-of-modernity
Thanks for that , was wondering about him. And now why at 52 despite many snoutlings around do I still not really know what existensialism is?
Yet another excellent bit of work from Newsroom.
https://www.newsroom.co.nz/2019/04/16/531451/nzs-deadly-public-health-battle
This time on our practically non existent Public Health service. No, not the hospitals and the ambulances but the folks trying to influence policy that will “look after the collective health of our nation.”
“”The leadership position for public health in New Zealand, is held by the Director of Public Health, a position now held – after being vacant for some years – by Dr Caroline McElnay.
It’s a position required by legislation.
Skegg describes McElnay as very good but points out despite the title, she is not part of the Ministry of Health executive leadership team.
“They [the Ministry of Health] have an executive leadership team which has got about 10 people on. It’s quite big, but the director of public health is not there. So, you can see the amount of priority, the Ministry is giving to public health.”
The executive leadership team has 16 members. There is deputy director-general population health and prevention on the team, but the director of public health is not included.
Also required by legislation is a division within the Ministry of Health call the Public Health Group.
“The public health group in recent years has just been just a remnant actually. Just a very small number of people. You can’t even find them on the Ministry of Health website,” said Skegg.
He believes the Ministry is “totally overwhelmed” administering personal health services.
“There just aren’t the experts in the Ministry of Health that a country like New Zealand needs to plan and oversee public health programs and to respond to emergencies.”
How do we score?
Once New Zealand was referred to as the campylobacter capital of the world by food safety experts.
It’s estimated there are 30,000 cases per year, most caught from fresh chicken. A report released in 2018 shows 60 to 90 percent of fresh chicken has high levels of the bacteria which can cause stomach illness and lead to complications such as arthritis and the paralysing Guillain-Barre syndrome.
Skegg said the Ministry for Primary Industries has declined to lower the allowable contamination levels for fresh chicken any further.
“The Ministry for Primary Industries won’t even agree to put a warning label on the packages to tell people.””
Nothing much has changed….industry lobby groups and biased officials continue to failed to respond when the health of the public s at risk.
We truly are a backward country.
Is a backward country one in which people don’t cook chicken? Or cook it properly?
undercooked chook is one of the ways to get ill.
tossing a salad after handling raw chicken, without washing hands adequately will do it to.
tongs, spoons, chopping boards…
it would be great if the companies involved in chicken would lift their game.
Brian Easton has a good column on equity in health care:
“Healthcare
What has happened to healthcare is nicely illustrated by an international analysis of healthcare systems by the prestigious (American) Commonwealth Fund. It compares 11 countries (it always finds the US has the worst system). In 2017 it found New Zealand’s ranking was 8th (out of 11) on the equity dimension, ahead of France, Canada and the US. We were behind Britain, Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, Norway, Germany and Australia.”
https://www.pundit.co.nz/content/have-we-abandoned-the-egalitarian-society
Yes, Easton has written oft times about our health system, and some of his earlier work was almost prophetic.
You’d think that a mass education/consciousness raising campaign on the dangers of under-cooking chicken would be a no brainer….especially if it were couched in more politically acceptable ‘cost to the health sector/loss of earnings’ terms . Like wise for sugar and alcohol consumption.
But no. We’d hate to annoy our funders wouldn’t we?
I recall it’s our chicken *suppliers* who are at fault, with way more processed carcasses and cuts sporting a coat of bacteria than is allowed in other countries. If they refuse to lift their game to international standards, the solution proposed by NZ’s expert on this, Prof Michael Baker, is for govt to regulate that only frozen chicken can be supplied to the public. Tick tock.
The first thing to remember about this health grading ianmac link 3.2 was that it covered only 11 countries that are regarded as developed. So we are near bottom as a country on a number of things. Would some measures indicate clearly all the lows or would some be hidden by averaging out?
Among all adults, we came
9th of those with cost-access-related problems,
7th= in terms of those had skipped dental care in the past year because of cost; and
10th in terms of those who had waited two months or longer for a specialist appointment.
His column was focussed on “equity” rather than the whole Health System. To be just ahead of USA is horrifying don’t you think Grey?
” Of course there was inequality in the egalitarian society before 1985, but it was rare for the rich to show it, to display, what Thorstein Veblen called, ‘conspicuous consumption’. After 1985 it became common to flaunt how rich you were.”
Not only how rich, but how privileged. Privilege in the disability environment is exemplified by the disparities between ACC and MOH. There are two regular publications in NZ featuring articles pertaining to spinal cord impairment. Both were set up shortly after ACC were ‘persuaded’ to fund 24/7 home based care to tetraplegics (rather than forcing close family to provide unpaid care). Both publications feature inspirational tales of sporting and artistic achievements, travel and access to the latest adaptive tech. Great, if you’re funded by ACC. Tough shit if you’re not. And while both organisations purport to represent ALL with spinal impairment, they seldom publish articles highlighting the disparities and profound differences in rights and entitlements.
The last article printed in both publications were contributed by both my partner and myself some years ago.
We’ve given up on both organisations, as they both not only refuse to acknowledge the rank privilege of their ACC funded members but continue to publish brag pieces of how great life can be with a spinal cord injury if only one has the right attitude.
Where is the media outrage over the Assange arrest?
FFS, even Fox News gets it.
https://youtu.be/SnwC_1Pf9VQ
Here’s what you’re looking for Kevin: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/apr/15/left-blinkered-claims-julian-assange-sexual-assault
So what has that got to do with the arrest of a whistle blower, and probable extradition to the USA, for no other reason than the USA does not like having its dirty laundry put on show?
It’s an opinion piece nothing more, sad we have to rely on Fox for journalism now.
Please don’t start The Raving Potato, off again.
Sorry
I’ve done it too, but I do have a life and I’m about to get on with it, so wont be clogging up TS with any more pointless replies to TRP.His mind is set in concrete.
I once overheard an elderly acquaintance say to another “You be comforted by your prejudices and I’ll be comforted by mine”
I think thats where we’re at
Having just commented on the recent Assange post I thought I would make a couple of observations here.
I didn’t notice whistleblower mentioned at all in the post or the comments.
In the tags list for the article, the likes of whistleblower and ‘truth to power’ are not to be found. Domestic violence, patriarchy, abuse of power are all there.
It is hard to discuss that subject when you feel you have to tiptoe and whisper when in contrast you have folks with the fertiliser spreader on full spraying anyone that didn’t bring a rain coat.
Strictly speaking he’s not a whistle blower, ie not working in an organisation and leaking damning info. But without him, whistleblowers do not have the means of bringing their information in to the light of day
As a wee gloat, I am off to the big smoke to catch The Raconteurs tomorrow night at The Powerstation.
Very excited to see Jack White, have loved listening to him for yonks, especially his latest solo album.
First rocker I have seen look cool with the flying V guitar.
Bob Mould always looked awkward with his.
First time in Aotearoa, first gig outside the state’s since 2011.
Steady as she goes!
Here is their newish song:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kHpWUTCAR4I
Lucky. Will be a great gig. Report back.
Storming gig.
Band tight, but still had a jam/improvising edge to it.
The drummer had a Gene Kruper feel to some of the songs particularly ‘Gyp’ Dig the slowness.
5 or 6 guitars on Mr Whites rack. Sorry I couldn’t name what styles there were apart from his flying V.
A couple of sing along moments: Steady as she goes and Now that you’re gone.
Highlights: an impromptu You don’t understand me fantastic piano, Blue veins, and a bonus Carolina drama.
A BIG plus was no phones. There was a plan to have phones stored away in bags but they didn’t arrive so plan turned into a plea that was respected.
Thanks – very envious 🙁
This guy used to play a flying V pretty damn good. Watch his video and you too can be a rock star!
Rockstars you didnt hear about.
Talk about blinkered TRP
If you can’t see that there’s something off over an Interpol Red notice being issued (usually reserved for terrorists and murderers)for a sexual misdemeanour a Standard writer in 2010 was perfectly willing to admit to :
https://thestandard.org.nz/marianne-ny-making-an-arse-of-swedish-law/
you are practising a peculiar form of wilful self blinkering yourself
The article you link to is factually wrong, the only reason the Swedish prosecutors could not interrogate Assange was their own unwillingness to travel to the UK to do so, and they were criticised by the Swedish Bar and in 2014 by a Swedish Court for this very thing.
There was nothing to stop them doing so , and many precedents for doing so, which points to them not treating Assange the same as other individuals wanted for questioning
Assange was available, under house arrest for 15 months ,with electronic leg manacles for questioning if justice for the Swedish women was really the name of the game.
Long before he jumped bail in 2012
Has anyone ever had an Interpol Red notice put on them for the same allegations?
No wonder Assange and most of the civilised world at that time smelled a rat
A concerted campaign to character assassinate Assange in the intervening years has served its purpose…manufacturing consent amongst the gullible so that the state can wreak its vengeance on Assange, no holds barred and shut down true journalism once and for all
The message out there for journalists and publishers is that the only information allowed is that provided by the state
+100
It seems to me so many people have lost sight of the main issue here. Patrick Cockburn nails it:
” “Oh yeah, look at those dead bastards,” and “ha, ha, I hit them” say the pilots of a US Apache helicopter in jubilant conversation as they machine-gun Iraqi civilians on the ground in Baghdad on 12 July 2007……..”
“……Lost in this dog-fight is what Assange and WikiLeaks really achieved and why it was of great importance in establishing the truth about wars being fought on our behalf in which hundreds of thousands of people have been killed.
This is what Daniel Ellsberg did when he released the Pentagon Papers about the US political and military involvement in Vietnam between 1945 and 1967. Like Assange, he exposed official lies and was accused of putting American lives in danger though his accusers were typically elusive about how this was done.
But unless the truth is told about the real nature of these wars then people outside the war zones will never understand why they go on so long and are never won. Governments routinely lie in wartime and it is essential to expose what they are really doing. I remember looking at pictures of craters as big as houses in an Afghan village where 147 people had died in 2009 and which the US defence secretary claimed had been caused by the Taliban throwing grenades. In one small area called Qayara outside Mosul in in 2016-17, the US air force admitted to killing one civilian but a meticulous examination of the facts by The New York Times showed that the real figure was 43 dead civilians including 19 men, eight women and 16 children aged 14 or under”
https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/04/15/calling-assange-a-narcissist-misses-the-point/
Thanks for bringing us back to ground aj – sometimes facts and reasons get lost in the rhetoric.
Or more amusingly
‘larious!!
“Authorised by Americas’s bitches”
I just looked at Notre Dame burning on stuff a 36 second video and at 25 seconds a snippet of the next video protruded onto the screen and I couldn’t see how to turn it off. It was a skeleton thousands of years old but I didn’t want to see it then or at all.
On line Media is very intrusive of pushing video at you. Sometimes I can be looking at a quite long text with numerous pictures in and the audio starts and then I have to go back to the beginning and turn it off – it seems the damned things are opt-out rather than leaving it to person to opt-in. Don’t like the system.
Thoughts with France today, so sad to see a historical building go up in flames. The amount of history that may be lost is devastating.
The Assange Gaps & Craps
Even with all the denizens of words shoveled out by Australian Julian Assange and the Videos of his Australian friend John Pilger, we are still as war mongering as ever.
Assange adds spice, because he has a tendency to avoid the Summons of High Level Government. He Flees and makes up highly convoluted torturous scripts between destinations.
He is thought to be a “Whistleblower” replete with spledid sources of Sex. Sometimes Staff – it would seem. Consent being way way afar from his driving passion. His recent stay with the obliging Ecaudor Embassy left a Cat and a wall of Feces. So it is said. The Embassy got tired of him.
Journalists and Embassies (of inquisitive mind) want to keep close to Assange – feces not withstanding. But a mere small slice of Spy – and any particular Journalist will be captured on Sovereign Intelligence by the United States of America who have 46 Bases on our Planet.
Spies have a long Life. In prison, 35 years is the going rate. No matter where our Ozzie Julian goes – his whistle will be removed from his cat. Journalists the same.
Wonderful thing – the Internet. Wonderful Wars – the Killing Wars.
Da faqueue wonabaht obitoki?
What – do the hokey tokey?
Notre Dame fire.
I’ve visited every second year for over a decade.
Burnt out and needs rebuilding:
good Catholic Church metaphor.
heh
Fire is very purifying – hence witches.
Condolences Ad, this will be very close to home for you.
Condemnation must rest on the construction company; a monumental breach of H&S protocols. Being familiar with hot work procedures on large construction sites it seems someone has some very tough questions to answer.
Congratulations to the firefighters who’ve pulled off a miracle to save the core structure.
Cheers Red.
It makes me want to chuck in the day job – satisfying as it is – and go work on its art conservation and structural rebuilds for a few years.
Sure it’s just stone and copper, not God.
But for me it carries more human sweat, candle soot, and mixed-up tenebrae dimness than anything in Rome.
la croix est resté intact
https://twitter.com/LPLdirect/status/1117932764232331265
… the groin is on fire. Poor bugger, that’s even worse than the rotunda.
It sucks, but gotta look on the humerous side…
The humerus is not that far from the groin..
lol good one
“Condemnation must rest on the construction company”
you
“The cathedral was begun in 1160 under Bishop Maurice de Sully and largely completed by 1260, though it was modified frequently in the following centuries. In the 1790s”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Notre-Dame_de_Paris
bugger those fly by nighters are well gone now.
Edit – I know that isn’t what you meant but I couldn’t let a joke go by.
lols
S’alright mardymardy, I’m sure arsons closer to home are equally hilarious.
Sounds like you have something on your mind that you want to fess up to. Not sure it’s a great audience for that to be fair.
I don’t go round torching taonga mardymardy, if that’s what you’re suggesting, and I get little amusement from it.
Oh Gabby you are an example to us all. And we do take you as seriously as you take everyone else you write about.
Yours greywarry
Good – don’t start torching treasures or buildings please cos that won’t be a good look and potentially dangerous.
You won’t mind the odd chuckle at the tribulations of those you value above the common herd though will you mardymardy?
Is that your problem? Yes poor form finding something funny in another’s comment during these dark times. Don’t ever do it gabby you’ll get shade thrown at you – that is my advice.
You’re right mardymardy, poor form indeed, hopefully you’ll manage to restrain your mirth over the next flood/massacre/conflagration.
Just be the bigger person gabby – you know you’re talking shit now.
Classic mardymardy, you wag.
Thread.
https://twitter.com/GreggFavre/status/1117847726786371585
https://tttthreads.com/thread/1117847726786371585.html
Before and after images of the cathedral’s post revolution reconstruction by Eugène Viollet-le-Duc.
http://www.paris-unplugged.fr/1840-notre-dame-avant-restauration/
Most of those parts are gone.
I’d like to see it brought back to what it was before it was ransacked by the Revolutionaries.
“Pope Francis issued a statement late on Monday expressing the Vatican’s ‘shock and sadness’ at ‘the news of the terrible fire that devastated the Cathedral of Notre Dame, a symbol of Christianity in France and in the world.”’
‘We express closeness to the French Catholics and the people of Paris and we assure our prayers for the firemen and those who are doing everything possible to face this dramatic situation,’ the statement read.”
—
No word about dipping his hand into the vast Catholic Church coffers to restore the Cathedral though. They will probably leave that to the taxpayers of France and generosity of a few wealthy individuals.
Faux News tried to dunk on Bernie over Medicare For All. Oops.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/bernie-sanders-2020-democrat-presidential-primary-medicare-for-all-switch_n_5cb51675e4b0ffefe3b58e7d
I came down here straightaway to say my piece about that piece of … John Roughan retiring from the Herald. Expect you’ve addressed it above me. ‘Wise man ‘ according to the ex-Herald editor on the weekly media watch section of RNZ National 9 to Noon. He’s been writing anonymously their editorial for 30 years. Right-wing tosser writer of John Key’s biography. Always found him densely vile. As reflective as mud. Where the Herald’s heart lies, with their 4 daily pounder columnists for the rich, leaving alone the utterly ridiculous Leighton Smith. Association with his nonsense is Trumpian, Herald. But then again you’ve had Roughan for 30 years. And enabled Whale-oil etc. Do you care about your country? Or do you put money first? Rhetorical, you strangle-tied twots.
Hear about Leighton Smith – soothing the comfortably off for all their years.
Can understand that a little bit of him to a questioning brain would cause despair, luckily most keep their brains in cold storage and inactive, saving them in case they are needed for some emergency later.
Bit of Don McLean here. The Herald does all these things that Don mentions in Prime Time in his sarcastic way. It does have some factual, thoughtful stuff, but
the thought is too often adulterated.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CW7jrDAx22
Kia ora The AM Show.
The subcontractors should be payed a deposit for their work so if the main company goes broke they could get some money back.
Captial gains tax is a must people like Mark just can’t see that all earning should be taxed not just the common poor people paying all the tax.
Batteries technology is advancing fast now that the technology is to big to be held back by the oil barrons.
I think it’s good that the Kenyan families are sueing Boeing for the losses of their love ones this is needed to keep big companies HOUNEST in our WORLD .
I think that NZ Acc act is bullshit Acc doesn’t pay the injured fairly when one is injured you need more money not less try living on 80 % of your wage while injured.??????? The kicker is you can not SUE when wronged that just protects the upper class at the expense of the common person.
RYAN I agree with you heaps of money for the church in France and no money pouring in for all the starving children around the world. Go figure. Eco Maori Tau toko the people who got arrested in Britain fighting to get human caused Global Climate change back in the MEDIA with all the distraction that have come up as of late KIA KAHA.
Ka kite ano
P.S went off topic but I have seen someone being under arm bowled from ACC
Some interesting older items from Radionz
2017
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/business/332928/nz-s-biowaste-profits-going-to-waste
New Zealand is missing out on a multi-billion-dollar waste product industry, according to the Bioenergy Association….
“The announcement by Queensland University of Technology that it is leading a $14 million research programme to develop profitable processes for turning livestock-industry wastes into bioenergy and other bioproducts, such as fertilisers, animal feeds, chemicals and plastics, shows what we should and could do here,” Mr Cox said.
“That project in conjunction with Meat & Livestock Australia shows the value of cross-sector coordination.”
Mr Cox said by 2040, biomass and waste-based industries could supply more than 15 percent of New Zealand’s energy needs and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 5 percent.
“You would think that with opportunities such as this, that the government would b
“If we can use our ability as a leading technology developer in America’s Cup yacht racing, we can use that capability to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
2018
On food and making a difference by eating different.
https://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/audio/2018668273/is-becoming-flexitarian-the-best-thing-we-can-do-for-the-planet
full interview duration 16′ :03″
To keep climate change under 2 degrees Celcius, the average world citizen will need to eat 75 percent less beef, 90 percent less pork and half the number of eggs they are today, while tripling their consumption of beans and pulses and quadrupling the amount of nuts and seeds they eat, according to a new study published in Nature magazine.
The University of Oxford’s Marco Springmann, who led the research team, talks to Kathryn about their findings.
So what exactly is a flexitarian?
Someone who eats red meat once a week maximum and otherwise eats predominantly a plant-based diet of fruit, vegetables, legumes, nuts and whole grains, Dr Springmann says.
Dietary guidelines are often out of touch with scientific knowledge but this is as cutting edge as it gets, he says.
“Think about it as technological innovation, but an innovation for diet.”
Less animal food production would reduce deforestation and freshwater consumption, but increased water efficiency will still be required and support given to farmers in adopting more sustainable and non-polluting practices, he says.
Eco Maori backs the climate change CHAMPION’S all around Papatuanuku
Thousands of people have taken part in the civil disobedience protests, blockading four landmarks in the capital in an attempt to force the government to take action on the escalating climate crisis.
Now the activist group Extinction Rebellion says it is planning to step up its action to disrupt rail and tube lines in London.
A spokesman said: “People really don’t want to do this but the inaction of the government in the face of this emergency leaves us little choice.”
Ka kite ano links below .
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/apr/16/extinction-rebellion-climate-protesters-disrupt-london-rail-tube-lines-blockade-landmarks
Some Eco Maori Music for the minute.
We need to have more respect for OUR WILDLIFE as we are the guardians of that wildlife for OUR decendints come on wake the fuck UP
New research shows the Maui’s dolphin is sliding closer to extinction, but it is far from the only species struggling to cope in New Zealand’s water, forests and rivers. Environment reporter Isaac Davison looks at 10 mammals and birds that are clinging to survival.
Top 5 birds
1. New Zealand Fairy Tern
Ka kite ano links below
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10797165
Kia ora Newshub.
Well if the Prime minister says its not the correct time for a capital gains tax so be it.
Well most big construction projects go up the Auckland City rail project will save the country a lot of carbon from being burned.
Its sad about the church in France Lloyd looks like you need some Kiwi Kai.
That’s cool that food aid is reaching the poor people in Venezuela it doesn’t have to be like that.
I have seen a few shocking videos.
How do we know what the preserve or the amount of prosessed meat those people eat in that study was the meat grass feed or what I will take it with a grain of salt. There have been many conflicting story on eggs sugar salt WTF.
That’s the way the Mana Wahine of Sudan taking the power of Sudan government and getting equal rights for Wahine KIA KAHA Mana Wahine from ECO Maori.
Yes the big tech companies need to start protecting the people. Ka kite ano
Some Eco Maori Music for the minute.
https://youtu.be/vqnwqsJYyiU
Here you go Whanau OUR Austrailian tangata whenua cousins have it much HARDER thank us . We can thank OUR tipuna for every thing we have now but Tangata Whenua O Aotearoa are being treated like 3 rate people in OUR own Whenua Ma te wa this is going to change as we will have the power to rule it won’t come eazy we will have to be on OUR toes as the cheats that don’t want MAORI to have the Mana will use ANYONE they can and use ANYTHING they can dream up to suppress tangata whenua Wairua Mana and these people have the power of the state to USE to keep Maori down but NO WE WILL WIN IN THE END
The family of an Aboriginal woman who died in custody in Perth last week say she was mistakenly arrested by police who did not check her identity before restraining her in her mother’s house, hours before she lost consciousness.
Cherdeena Wynne, 26, died in hospital on Tuesday, five days after she became unresponsive while handcuffed by police on a side street off Albany Highway.
Less than two hours before falling unconscious, the mother-of-three was arrested and held on the ground in her mother’s house in Victoria Park, according to her family, in what they say was a case of racial profiling and mistaken identity.
Deaths inside: Indigenous Australian deaths in custody
Her mother, Shirley Wynne, and grandmother, Jennifer Clayton, are calling for eyewitnesses to come forward.
Her death comes 20 years after her father, Warren Cooper, died in custody after being found unresponsive in a police watchhouse in Albany. Cooper was also 26 years old.
“It’s time for this to stop,” Clayton told Guardian Australia. “I have lost my son and now I have lost a granddaughter.” Ka kite ano links below . P.S we will fight for all our indignous cousin MANA
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/apr/15/its-time-for-this-to-stop-aboriginal-woman-dies-in-custody-20-years-after-her-father
Whanau you see Whanau Bob Eddy Peter and many other musical artist waita ring true to this day some from hundreds of years ago .
The wicked get stronger close freind worste enemy worste enemy best freind .
I have had a revalation the other day that made all that has happened in my past become logical and from that revalation I have figured out the sandflys have had me on there radar for 32 years .
The revalation that I have been working on for 3 month’s tell’s me why some people from te tairawhiti were treating Eco Maori so bad they did not know who they were stuffing with now they no my Mana .
Whanau if you have been head down ass up working hard and treating everyone with respect and you FIND that you have gone know were your { maunga is still a ant hill }some one close is shitting on YOUR MANA so look closely into your past and present and find the persons shitting on your MANA and keep a close eye on them
Ka kite ano P.S It could the state shitting on your mana to some of the people were actors for the state.
Some Eco Maori Music for the minute.
https://youtu.be/05ZNay0S2zE
This song fits my revolution quite good.
Kia ora Newshub.
Ma te wa for the capital gains tax Jacinda will have plenty of TIME to chase that goal you know that old saying better to wait till the time is correct than push shit up hill.
Animals spear parts for humans is just around the corner.
I the crooks are drawn to the honey business and Manakua honey is big money and draws more crooks that guy looks like the fall guy.
Many thanks to all the people who put their time and effort in to protesting about climate change in Britain and around the world to get the story out there OVER trumps interference of the true information on climate change around Papatuanukue.
Yes I seen the Tau toko for ECO Maori last night people are learning the TRUTH Ka pai I say NO more Ka kite ano P.S I’m glad I was to busy this morning I would have been to exposed to judy. Keith is one of my favourite actors