President Trump said on Wednesday that the United States would no longer insist on a Palestinian state as part of a peace accord between Israel and the Palestinians, backing away from a policy that has underpinned America’s role in Middle East peacemaking since the Clinton administration.
“I’m looking at two states and one state,” Mr. Trump said, appearing in a joint news conference at the White House with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel. “I like the one that both parties like. I can live with either one.”
Mr. Trump’s comments were a striking departure from decades of diplomatic orthodoxy, and they raised a host of thorny questions about the viability of his position. The Palestinians are highly unlikely to accept anything short of a sovereign state, and a single Israeli state encompassing the Palestinians would either become undemocratic or no longer Jewish, given the faster growth rate of the Arab population.
The problem being of course, that “The Palestinians are highly unlikely to accept anything short of a sovereign state” means what they have now, plus all of Israel.
… a single Israeli state encompassing the Palestinians would either become undemocratic or no longer Jewish, given the faster growth rate of the Arab population.
If they tried to retain representative majority for a minority Jewish population, that would be undemocratic.
The statement is either or – either a single Israeli state would be no longer Jewish, as Jews would be a minority of the population; or for the state to remain Jewish it would need to have an undemocratic electoral system.
For Israel to stay a “Jewish” State they would have to disenfranchise the Palestinian majority.
Which is why a “two State” solution is likely the only viable option.
Israeli settlements and genocidal attacks on Palestinians are making a peaceful solution less likely. However i doubt if peace is in the Israeli agenda, as they need an excuse to continue the takeover of Palestinian begun in the 50’s.
Thinking of those down south today who are suffering from the fires. All lives matter, please stay safe and if you are told to get out, don’t muck around just go, stuff can be replaced, lives can’t.
Just how would it serve the Canadian interest (or for that matter the NZ interest) if Trudeau had spent his time lecturing Trump?
Both Trudeau and English made it plain enough that they disagreed with the Immigration Executive Order, and in any event they could have confidence that the US courts would roll it back.
What more should they do?
It is worth recalling that despite all Trump’s faults he has not signalled that he wants to start a war on the scale of Iraq or going further back, Vietnam. In fact I would say the indications are the opposite.
It was not so long ago that a number of commenters on this site were saying they preferred Trump over Clinton, precisely because he was seen as less of a war risk. I personally thought that was ridiculous. Why would Clinton start any wars?
More importantly Trump is the President of a country that many countries, especially in the west, have a deep relationship. In fact the US is seen as the indispensable nation with in the west. The vast number of components of this relationship will continue, despite Trump, since they are not based on any one person but on a network of enduring links.
I appreciate you do not agree with any of this, but in large part the relationship is based on common values, namely being democracies, with the independent rule of law, and broadly speaking open economies.
The connection between the western nations actually goes far deeper in time, since these institutions and values have their origins in Judaeo-Christian philosophy and ethics, and go back as far as democracy of Athens and the republic of Rome.
So Trump would have to be much worse than at present before any western nation would significantly curtail the relationship.
Personally I have complete trust in the constitution of the US and the rule of law that will keep Trump within acceptable confines. He might say some surprising things, but a lot of that will prove to be bluster.
In fact what the European nations want is for Trump to actually affirm US leadership of NATO, the centrepiece of western mutual obligation. The scariest thing for European nations is the thought that NATO would be put in jeopardy by US “neo-isolationism.” Even Corbyn recognises this (at least on a pragmatic level, even if not personally) that unravelling NATO would give rise to dangerous uncertainty. For some European nations (the Baltics) this is literally an existential threat.
Thanks Wayne. Some good points there. By the way, I meant to get back to you after you responded to my swingeing attack on you last Saturday. I accept your criticism wasn’t personal, and I must say that I was impressed by your unflappability and your maintenance of a civil discourse, as I had tried to employ all my rhetorical force against you.
However, I was banned by the moderators for another matter, so please accept my belated apology.
In fact the US is seen as the indispensable nation with in the west.
Only by a small clique of authoritarians.
Personally, I see NZ as the only indispensable nation as far as NZ is concerned and that it’s under threat from the US.
The connection between the western nations actually goes far deeper in time, since these institutions and values have their origins in Judaeo-Christian philosophy and ethics, and go back as far as democracy of Athens and the republic of Rome.
That’s the past and we cannot find solutions for today or the future in the past.
Both Athens and Rome were massively undemocratic and highly authoritarian. Great for their time but not for today. Today we need to move on from those failed systems rather than trying to keep them alive.
Personally I have complete trust in the constitution of the US and the rule of law that will keep Trump within acceptable confines.
I would – except for all the actions that the US Administration has done that go against those.
In fact what the European nations want is for Trump to actually affirm US leadership of NATO, the centrepiece of western mutual obligation. The scariest thing for European nations is the thought that NATO would be put in jeopardy by US “neo-isolationism.” Even Corbyn recognises this (at least on a pragmatic level, even if not personally) that unravelling NATO would give rise to dangerous uncertainty. For some European nations (the Baltics) this is literally an existential threat.
Nothing is forever.
The world has changed and is changing further away from the old authoritarian past.
I was obviously not suggesting that Greece and Rome were like modern democracies, after all they both had slaves. But I am sure you know that many of our legal principles and philosophy has its origins with them.
As for the decline of the west. Well, yes it does seem the peak of the influence has passed but as yet no other set of states has supplanted the west. Asia (China and India) could do so but that will take more than 50 years, probably significantly longer. In contrast to western nations China is actually organised on authoritarian lines.
Your first point is perhaps the most interesting. Does the leadership of the US only appeal to a small clique of authoritarians?
Perhaps the best proxy would be a referendum on whether European nations/people would wish to see the end of NATO. Realistically such a referendum is not going to happen.
But we do know that parties that do actually propose withdrawal from NATO do not win elections, in fact they do very badly. I am certain if this was UK Labour party policy, they would be pretty much wiped out electorally.
So I suggest you misunderstand the popular mood (as opposed to views of left activists). People may have all sorts of complaints about the US, but not many are actually willing to forgo its protection. That is particularly true the further east you go in Europe.
There can hardly be a single Pole who would say “Get out of NATO.” When I went there, all the Poles I spoke felt that their sovereignty was finally guaranteed. Not surprising when you think of the Polish experience throughout the twentieth century.
However I appreciate that perhaps 20% of New Zealanders think as you do do. I guess we are in the safest place in the world to be able to do so.
The US might, as you write, be seen as the indispensable nation within the West but I struggle to think of any significant contribution to human knowledge by US educated and acculturated people.
Also the US is isolated geographically from the historical knowledge and cultural sources that it relies on, Europe, the Middle East, India, China. IMO it has always been a taker, not a giver. A taker of people and a taker of knowledge.
The US appears to me reliant on the rest of the world for its ideas and technologies.
I don’t agree that the western nations institutions and values have their origins in Judaeo-Christian philosophy and ethics. These were imposed from without and important state structures eg, Monarchies, Class Systems, Roman Law predated them.
You are risking a knockdown in claiming that the popular mood can be gauged by support or otherwise of voters for continuing membership of NATO because you do not take account of voter participation in elections, which in Poland at least has been abysmal. http://www.electionguide.org/countries/id/173/
I struggle to think of any significant contribution to human knowledge by US educated and acculturated people.
I expect the irony of engaging in this struggle while using a personal computer connected to the Internet didn’t occur?
Yeah, it does seem that the Groaning Hand clearly hasn’t been around computer systems for the last 60 years or so.
Perhaps he should consider Grace Hopper, the author of the A compiler in 1952 to prove that you could write code in something other than maths. Of course COBOL sucks. But it has the hardy robustness such that means that 57 years after it’s (and my) birth, banks and the IRD are still trying to find something that works better..
My favourite language is still C++ developed by another extremely bright yank, Bjarne Stroustrup, in 1979. I’ve written more than 50 million lines of tight code in it since I learnt it in 1991. And I’m still learning to express myself in it now.
For me those are still the highlights of one small area of my overly educated and acculturated mind. It is the area that has me sanely clasped in its creative trance for 30 odd years without suffering the boredom of sucking up the cultures of mere people like the vacuum cleaner I am in the social science or the arts.
The US appears to me reliant on the rest of the world for its ideas and technologies.
Just about every area of knowledge that I have sucked into with depth in the last 40 years has been dominated by the concepts from the US. Everything from computer systems to management to earth sciences. Sure, a lot of those concepts have been from the first 3 generations of immigrants. But most of those people were there because it was largely impossible to do the things that they did in the countries of their parents or grandparents.
A prosaic and highly visible example would be to just look at the inspired comedy of John Oliver. The same thing happens in any country that welcomes immigration. Here for instance.
Just looking around my apartment, it is rather freaky realising how much of it was directly developed in the US, or was redeveloped there to drop the cost. Sure it is made by the Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, etc at present. But the flood of innovation arriving every year from the US is a rather large torrent. Nothing like it arrives from anywhere else.
Basically, I’d have speculate that the Groaning Hand is more interested in the same types of such largely useless esoteric medieval meanderings as the quest for detirmining the number of naked angels of their preferred gender that could dance on a pinhead, or other microscopic obsessions based on the self-referential arguments of nearly blind scholars trying to read under candle-light. I guess it beats having to do any real work understanding the real world.
Sure, a lot of those concepts have been from the first 3 generations of immigrants. But most of those people were there because it was largely impossible to do the things that they did in the countries of their parents or grandparents.
And which is probably the same reason why our best and brightest pick up sticks and leave. They simply cannot do what they want here in NZ because of the poor support for creativity that we have.
When I went there, all the Poles I spoke felt that their sovereignty was finally guaranteed.
Of course, the UN and international is supposed to do that and not individual nations.
Of course, we do have the example of Israel and the UN dictating the invasion of a sovereign state in favour of a small group of people.
And, of course, the US has been undermining the UN for decades. From where I sit, the problem of people not feeling that there sovereignty is guaranteed is a direct result of the US’ undermining of the UN and ongoing invasions of sovereign nations.
If nations feel secure because of NATO then it’s because they’re kissing US arse.
I reckon the world would be a much better place if the UN could stop the US, Russia, or China (or frankly any military power) from invading smaller countries, it would be full of rainbows and unicorn farts.
But that us not currently in the power of the UN.
So Poland and Baltic countries look to NATO, because Russia.
And most of the military interventions in the world over the last century or so has been by the US fighting for their corporations.
What I’m saying here is that the solution that those countries need is the UN, not NATO, but those powerful countries are keeping the UN powerless to act against them.
So, how do we get the majority of countries to change the UN for the better?
Hey, Britain France and Russia have done their bit and all.
The main problem with the UN is the permanent member veto, but also the reliance on US funds because it’s got the biggest economy.
If all the littler countries put more money into the UN, there’d still be the issue of the security council veto. I have no idea how to alter that, save waiting for the next big was ad the irradiated survivors could do a League of Nations: Third Time Lucky.
The world has changed and is changing further away from the old authoritarian past.
I don’t think increasing authoritarianism can really be described as changing “away from” authoritarianism. “Embracing a more authoritarian future” seems more accurate.
I certainly believe you’re wrong. Putin and Erdogan are popular in their own countries, the USA just democratically elected an authoritarian demagogue, nationalist authoritarian parties are increasing in popularity in Europe, and a UK referendum has voted to exit the international cooperative it belongs to because nationalism is becoming more popular. That’s the general populace, not the powers that be.
With 77.8% of Canadian exports going to the USA and Mexico (NAFTA)…I suspect the Canadians are more than happy to keep things civil with Trump. Of course its Trudeau who’s very pro NAFTA, and Trump who had to moderate his opinions which is ironic….
Though I think Trudeau handing Trump a photograph of Trump and daddy Trudeau back in the day speaks volumes about our Leading families and the distribution, or lack thereof, of power.
Kathryn Ryan—completely out of her depth this morning:
Further evidence that standards at RNZ National are declining. Nine to Noon, RNZ National, Thursday 16 February 2017, 10:10 a.m.
I’m listening to Kathryn Ryan making a fool of herself, yet again, this time as she interviews Rudolph Herzog, author of Dead Funny: Telling Jokes in Hitler’s Germany. He’s already firmly corrected her after she claimed that the Jewish prisoners at Theresienstadt put on a cabaret to boost their morale; in fact, he informed her, they were compelled to put on the cabaret. He’s also caviled at her use of the word “humanising”, which implies the Nazis were not human. He also seems perturbed by her suggestion that the Nazis had a sense of humour. ”
Does she do ANY preparation, or reading, before these interviews? Are there any standards at RNZ National any more?
Looks like we will have the code for the project after work in the hands of the testers tomorrow. In celebration, if it continues to rain and be cool in Auckland, I will fix a password field and get the search function back on line.
Please ask the deity (or lack thereof) for rain in Auckland and the fire areas of NZ…. I will take care of the code.
The key to understanding the dispute is that both sides are big, powerful semi-monopolies. Both want control and both want to clip the ticket on every transaction. It can mean rivers of gold.
More rentier capitalism.
The Australian banks argue that opening up the iPhone NFC chip will allow innovation to flourish. Apple argues customers will get a better digital wallet experience if it retains control. Among other things it means customers can run cards issued by different banks from a single app.
Banks elsewhere might be as uneasy with Apple Pay, but few banking markets are as tight-held as Australia and New Zealand. This gives the local big banks a clout that, say, US banks don’t have.
And this shows how competition in standards fails to bring about satisfactory results for society.
The power of those big four banks to fuck around with our currency and transactions is another reason why we should be looking to nationalise the transaction system and maintain a single standard.
The private banks have control of our monetary supply and create too much of it and they own the EFT-POS system pulling in massive amounts of profit from us using our money.
It was a banner moment for the decade-old website, known for reporting obvious hoaxes as legitimate news and headlines such as: “EXPOSED=>HILLARY HITMAN Breaks Silence” and “Dental Expert: Hillary Clinton Is Suffering From Serious Gum Infection” and “One Week After Election Loss Hillary Clinton Looks Like Death.”
Hoft was on his way to his first White House news conference in the company of self-described “brand strategist” Lucian Wintrich, the Gateway Pundit’s inaugural White House correspondent, who for his first day on the job wore a blue tie studded with elephants in every color of the rainbow to announce his gay Republican pride.
I’m still for fighting worthwhile fights, but at the same time, keeping a weather eye on the big issue. Stopping the every day stuff because the freight-train headlight is blinding us is going to multiply our daily problems, so yes, protest the dams, the plight of the homeless and so on and on. Taking practical steps individually to prepare for challenging circumstances seem very wise right now.
On the big issue stuff, I think Leighton Smith over at ZB needs to be challenged everyday on this issue. Arguing with people who listen to him is getting a joke. Not that he uses the gifts of science for anything. Mind you did get a straight answer why they oppose this issue. Because it’s simple and easy to do nothing, and call the other side crazy.
Though I suspect her and her husband, Damon Harvey, are making a play for the position of Hastings Mayor, so it makes sense to win over the voters of Havelock North.
Yule has had it for well long enough, and as Chair of LGNZ for nearly two decades has functioned as both Mayor and MP together in the one person, merrily clipping the ticket for both as he goes.
There is no way some far left snowflake would survive on that hard dry political soil. Maybe Anna Lorck and Damon Harkey are the right people for right there.
I see in the Herald the mother of Nia Glassie the little girl who was tortured and murdered, is going to be released on parole after serving 8 of her 9 years in jail. What an evil looking woman she is. Why was this woman only given a 9 year sentence and not a minimum of 9 years and allowed to be released a year before her time. The description of the torture of that little girl is horrific.
What I cannot understand is why Scott Watson is still in jail and was given a minimum of 17 years and is now serving over that time and I think it was said he isn’t up for parole for another 4 years. There is something really wrong with the sentencing system.
I for one, do not want that woman released, children will never be safe around her and she does not look repentant with what she has done. Just because Scott Watson still denies the crime it does not warrant him being lock away forever.
Obama Killed a 16-Year-Old American in Yemen.
Trump Just Killed His 8-Year-Old Sister.
by GLENN GREENWALD, The Intercept, Jan. 31, 2017
IN 2010, PRESIDENT Obama directed the CIA to assassinate an American citizen in Yemen, Anwar al-Awlaki, despite the fact that he had never been charged with (let alone convicted of) any crime, and the agency successfully carried out that order a year later with a September 2011 drone strike. While that assassination created widespread debate — the once-again-beloved ACLU sued Obama to restrain him from the assassination on the ground of due process and then, when that suit was dismissed, sued Obama again after the killing was carried out — another drone killing carried out shortly thereafter was perhaps even more significant yet generated relatively little attention.
Two weeks after the killing of Awlaki, a separate CIA drone strike in Yemen killed his 16-year-old American-born son, Abdulrahman, along with the boy’s 17-year-old cousin and several other innocent Yemenis. The U.S. eventually claimed that the boy was not their target but merely “collateral damage.” Abdulrahman’s grief-stricken grandfather, Nasser al-Awlaki, urged the Washington Post “to visit a Facebook memorial page for Abdulrahman,” which explained: “Look at his pictures, his friends, and his hobbies. His Facebook page shows a typical kid.”
Few events pulled the mask off Obama officials like this one. It highlighted how the Obama administration was ravaging Yemen, one of the world’s poorest countries: just weeks after he won the Nobel Prize, Obama used cluster bombs that killed 35 Yemeni women and children. Even Obama-supporting liberal comedians mocked the arguments of the Obama DOJ for why it had the right to execute Americans with no charges: “Due Process Just Means There’s A Process That You Do,” snarked Stephen Colbert. And a firestorm erupted when former Obama press secretary Robert Gibbs offered a sociopathic justification for killing the Colorado-born teenager, apparently blaming him for his own killing by saying he should have “had a more responsible father.”
The U.S. assault on Yemeni civilians not only continued but radically escalated over the next five years through the end of the Obama presidency, as the U.S. and the U.K. armed, supported, and provide crucial assistance to their close ally Saudi Arabia as it devastated Yemen through a criminally reckless bombing campaign. Yemen now faces mass starvation, seemingly exacerbated, deliberately, by the U.S.-U.K.-supported air attacks. Because of the West’s direct responsibility for these atrocities, they have received vanishingly little attention in the responsible countries.
In a hideous symbol of the bipartisan continuity of U.S. barbarism, Nasser al-Awlaki just lost another one of his young grandchildren to U.S. violence. On Sunday, the Navy’s SEAL Team 6, using armed Reaper drones for cover, carried out a commando raid on what it said was a compound harboring officials of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. A statement issued by President Trump lamented the death of an American service member and several others who were wounded, but made no mention of any civilian deaths. U.S. military officials initially denied any civilian deaths, and (therefore) the CNN report on the raid said nothing about any civilians being killed. …..
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Muriel Newman writes – The Coalition Government says it is moving with speed to deliver campaign promises and reverse the damage done by Labour. One of their key commitments is to “defend the principle that New Zealanders are equal before the law.” To achieve this, they have pledged they “will not advance ...
Chris Trotter writes – The absence of anything resembling a fightback from the public servants currently losing their jobs is interesting. State-sector workers’ collective fatalism in the face of Coalition cutbacks indicates a surprisingly broad acceptance of impermanence in the workplace. Fifty years ago, lay-offs in the thousands ...
Mariupol, on the Azov Sea coast, was one of the first cities to suffer almost complete destruction after the start of the Ukraine War started in late February 2022. We remember the scenes of absolute destruction of the houses and city structures. The deaths of innocent civilians – many of ...
Lindsay Mitchell writes – Ten years ago, I wrote the following in a Listener column: Every year around one in five new-born babies will be reliant on their caregivers benefit by Christmas. This pattern has persisted from at least 1993. For Maori the number jumps to over one in three. ...
Climate change is expected to generate more and more extreme events, delivering a sort of structural shock to inflation that central banks will have to react to as if they were short-term cyclical issues. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāMy pick of the six newsey things to know from Aotearoa’s ...
It’s a simple deal. We pay taxes in order to finance the social services we want and need. The carnage now occurring across the public sector though, is breaking that contract. Over 3,000 jobs have been lost so far. Many are in crucial areas like Education where the impact of ...
Hi,A friend had their 40th over the weekend and decided to theme it after Curb Your Enthusiasm fashion icon Susie Greene. Captured in my tiny kitchen before I left the house, I ending up evoking a mix of old lesbian and Hillary Clinton — both unintentional.Me vs Hillary ClintonIf you’re ...
This is a re-post from Andrew Dessler at the Climate Brink blogIn 2023, the Earth reached temperature levels unprecedented in modern times. Given that, it’s reasonable to ask: What’s going on? There’s been lots of discussions by scientists about whether this is just the normal progression of global warming or if something ...
The schools are on holiday and the sun is shining in the seaside village and all day long I have been seeing bunches of bikes; Mums, Dads, teens and toddlers chattering, laughing, happy, having a bloody great time together. Cheers, AT, for the bits of lane you’ve added lately around the ...
Today in our National-led authoritarian nightmare: Shane Jones thinks Ministers should be above the law: New Zealand First MP Shane Jones is accusing the Waitangi Tribunal of over-stepping its mandate by subpoenaing a minister for its urgent hearing on the Oranga Tamariki claim. The tribunal is looking into the ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Politicians across the political spectrum are implicated in the New Zealand media’s failing health. Either through neglect or incompetent interventions, successive governments have failed to regulate, foster, and allow a healthy Fourth Estate that can adequately hold politicians and the powerful to account. ...
Citizen Science writes – Last week saw two significant developments in the debate over the treatment of trans-identifying children and young people – the release in Britain of the final report of Dr Hilary Cass’s review into gender healthcare, and here in New Zealand, the news that the ...
One night while sleeping in my bed I had a beautiful dreamThat all the people of the world got together on the same wavelengthAnd began helping one anotherNow in this dream, universal love was the theme of the dayPeace and understanding and it happened this wayAfter such an eventful day ...
This is a guest post by Oscar Simms who is a housing activist, volunteer for the Coalition for More Homes, and was the Labour Party candidate for Auckland Central at the last election. ...
Turning what Labour called the “holiday highway” into a four-lane expressway from Auckland to Whangarei could bring at least an economic benefit of nearly two billion a year for Northland each year. And it could help bring an end to poverty in one of New Zealand’s most deprived regions. The ...
Tonight’s six-stack includes: launching his substack with a bunch of his previous documentaries, including this 1992 interview with Dame Whina Cooper. and here crew give climate activists plenty to do, including this call to submit against the Fast Track Approvals bill. writes brilliantly here on his substack ...
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 ...
You're in the mall when you hear it: some kind of popping sound in the distance, kids with fireworks, maybe. But then a moment of eerie stillness is followed by more of the fireworks sound and there’s also screaming and shrieking and now here come people running for their lives.Does ...
Karl du Fresne writes – There’s a crisis in the news media and the media are blaming it on everyone except themselves. Culpability is being deflected elsewhere – mainly to the hapless Minister of Communications, Melissa Lee, and the big social media platforms that are accused of hoovering ...
I don’t normally send out two newsletters in a day but I figured I’d say something about… the news. If two newsletters is a bit much then maybe just skip one, I don’t want to overload people. Alternatively if you’d be interested in sometimes receiving multiple, smaller updates from me, ...
Buzz from the Beehive David Seymour and Winston Peters today signalled that at least two ministers of the Crown might be in Wellington today. Seymour (as Associate Minister of Education) announced the removal of more red tape, this time to make it easier for new early learning services to be ...
Politicians across the political spectrum are implicated in the New Zealand media’s failing health. Either through neglect or incompetent interventions, successive governments have failed to regulate, foster, and allow a healthy Fourth Estate that can adequately hold politicians and the powerful to account. Our political system is suffering from the ...
David Farrar writes – The Broadcasting Standards Authority ruled: Comments by radio host Kate Hawkesby suggesting Māori and Pacific patients were being prioritised for surgery due to their ethnicity were misleading and discriminatory, the Broadcasting Standards Authority has found. It is a fact such patients are prioritised. ...
PRC and its proxies in Solomons have been preparing for these elections for a long time.A lot of money, effort and intelligence have gone into ensuring an outcome that won’t compromise Beijing’s plans. Cleo Paskall writes – On April 17th the Solomon Islands, a country of ...
Is speeding up the trip to and from Wellington airport by 12 minutes worth spending up more than $10 billion? Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The six news items that stood out to me in the last day to 8:26 am today are:The Lead: Transport Minister Simeon Brownannounced ...
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. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Government’s democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
The National Government’s proposed changes to the Residential Tenancies Act will mean tenants can be turfed from their homes by landlords with little notice, Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said. ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson is calling on all parties to support a common-sense change that’s great for the planet and great for consumers after her member’s bill was drawn from the ballot today. ...
A significant milestone has been reached in the fight to strike an anti-Pasifika and unfair law from the country’s books after Teanau Tuiono’s members’ bill passed its first reading. ...
New Zealand has today missed the opportunity to uphold the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, says James Shaw after his member’s bill was voted down in its first reading. ...
Today’s advice from the Climate Change Commission paints a sobering reality of the challenge we face in combating climate change, especially in light of recent Government policy announcements. ...
Minister for Disability Issues Penny Simmonds appears to have delayed a report back to Cabinet on the progress New Zealand is making against international obligations for disabled New Zealanders. ...
The Government’s newly announced review of methane emissions reduction targets hints at its desire to delay Aotearoa New Zealand’s urgent transition to a climate safe future, the Green Party said. ...
The Government must commit to the Maitai School building project for students with high and complex needs, to ensure disabled students from the top of the South Island have somewhere to learn. ...
Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey and his Government colleagues have made a meal of their mental health commitments, showing how flimsy their efforts to champion the issue truly are, says Labour Mental Health spokesperson Ingrid Leary. ...
Māori are yet to see anything from this Government except cuts, reversals and taking our people backwards, Māori Development spokesperson Willie Jackson said. ...
The Coalition Government’s refusal to commit to ongoing funding for social housing is seeing the sector pull back on developments and families watch their dreams of securing a home fade away, says Labour Housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty. ...
Changes to minimum wage and benefit indexation means many New Zealanders will get less this year, as the Government gives a big tax break to landlords instead. ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. “Recently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
A stopbank upgrade project in Tairawhiti partly funded by the Government has increased flood resilience for around 7000ha of residential and horticultural land so far, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones today attended a dawn service in Gisborne to mark the end of the first stage of the ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters will represent the Government at Anzac Day commemorations on the Gallipoli Peninsula next week and engage with senior representatives of the Turkish government in Istanbul. “The Gallipoli campaign is a defining event in our history. It will be a privilege to share the occasion ...
Science, Innovation and Technology and Defence Minister Judith Collins will next week attend the OECD Science and Technology Ministerial conference in Paris and Anzac Day commemorations in Belgium. “Science, innovation and technology have a major role to play in rebuilding our economy and achieving better health, environmental and social outcomes ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with the President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The Prime Minister was accompanied by MP Paulo Garcia, the first Filipino to be elected to a legislature outside the Philippines. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon and President Marcos Jr discussed opportunities to ...
The Government has announced that $20 million in funding will be made available to Westport to fund much needed flood protection around the town. This measure will significantly improve the resilience of the community, says Local Government Minister Simeon Brown. “The Westport community has already been allocated almost $3 million ...
The Government is proud to support the first ever Repco Supercars Championship event in Taupō as up to 70,000 motorsport fans attend the Taupō International Motorsport Park this weekend, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. “Anticipation for the ITM Taupō Super400 is huge, with tickets and accommodation selling out weeks ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced an increase to the Rates Rebate Scheme, putting money back into the pockets of low-income homeowners. “The coalition Government is committed to bringing down the cost of living for New Zealanders. That includes targeted support for those Kiwis who are doing things tough, such ...
The Coalition Government is investing in a project to boost survival rates of New Zealand mussels and grow the industry, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones has announced. “This project seeks to increase the resilience of our mussels and significantly boost the sector’s productivity,” Mr Jones says. “The project - ...
Benefit figures released today underscore the importance of the Government’s plan to rebuild the economy and have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker Support, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “Benefit numbers are still significantly higher than when National was last in government, when there was about 70,000 fewer ...
The Government’s commitment to doubling New Zealand’s renewable energy capacity is backed by new data showing that clean energy has helped the country reach its lowest annual gross emissions since 1999, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand’s latest Greenhouse Gas Inventory (1990-2022) published today, shows gross emissions fell ...
The Government is bringing the earthquake-prone building review forward, with work to start immediately, and extending the deadline for remediations by four years, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “Our Government is focused on rebuilding the economy. A key part of our plan is to cut red tape that ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and his Thai counterpart, Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, have today agreed that New Zealand and the Kingdom of Thailand will upgrade the bilateral relationship to a Strategic Partnership by 2026. “New Zealand and Thailand have a lot to offer each other. We have a strong mutual desire to build ...
RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Transport Minister Simeon Brown have today announced the Coalition Government’s intention to extend port coastal permits for a further 20 years, providing port operators with certainty to continue their operations. “The introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991 required ports to obtain coastal ...
Today’s announcement that inflation is down to 4 per cent is encouraging news for Kiwis, but there is more work to be done - underlining the importance of the Government’s plan to get the economy back on track, acting Finance Minister Chris Bishop says. “Inflation is now at 4 per ...
Refreshed health guidance released today will help parents and schools make informed decisions about whether their child needs to be in school, addressing one of the key issues affecting school attendance, says Associate Education Minister David Seymour. In recent years, consistently across all school terms, short-term illness or medical reasons ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is streamlining high-level oceans management while maintaining a focus on supporting the sector’s role in the export-led recovery of the economy. “I am working to realise the untapped potential of our fishing and aquaculture sector. To achieve that we need to be smarter with ...
Associate Agriculture Minister Mark Patterson is speaking at the International Wool Textile Organisation Congress in Adelaide, promoting New Zealand wool, and outlining the coalition Government’s support for the revitalisation the sector. "New Zealand’s wool exports reached $400 million in the year to 30 June 2023, and the coalition Government ...
The Government is making legislative changes to make it easier for new early learning services to be established, and for existing services to operate, Associate Education Minister David Seymour says. The changes involve repealing the network approval provisions that apply when someone wants to establish a new early learning service, ...
Changes to the Resource Management Act will align consenting for coal mining to other forms of mining to reduce barriers that are holding back economic development, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. “The inconsistent treatment of coal mining compared with other extractive activities is burdensome red tape that fails to acknowledge ...
Trade, Agriculture and Forestry Minister Todd McClay has concluded productive discussions with ministerial counterparts in Beijing today, in support of the New Zealand-China trade and economic relationship. “My meeting with Commerce Minister Wang Wentao reaffirmed the complementary nature of the bilateral trade relationship, with our Free Trade Agreement at its ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon today paid tribute to Singapore’s outgoing Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. Meeting in Singapore today immediately before Prime Minister Lee announced he was stepping down, Prime Minister Luxon warmly acknowledged his counterpart’s almost twenty years as leader, and the enduring legacy he has left for Singapore and South East ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. While in Singapore as part of his visit to South East Asia this week, Prime Minister Luxon also met with Singapore President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and will meet with Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has made further appointments to the Board of Antarctica New Zealand as part of a continued effort to ensure the Scott Base Redevelopment project is delivered in a cost-effective and efficient manner. The Minister has appointed Neville Harris as a new member of the Board. Mr ...
Finance Minister Nicola Willis will travel to the United States on Tuesday to attend a meeting of the Five Finance Ministers group, with counterparts from Australia, the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. “I am looking forward to meeting with our Five Finance partners on how we can work ...
The coalition Government has today announced purrfect and pawsitive changes to the Residential Tenancies Act to give tenants with pets greater choice when looking for a rental property, says Housing Minister Chris Bishop. “Pets are important members of many Kiwi families. It’s estimated that around 64 per cent of New ...
State Highway 1 (SH1) through Wellington City is heavily congested at peak times and while planning continues on the duplicate Mt Victoria Tunnel and Basin Reserve project, the Government has also asked NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) to consider and provide advice on a Long Tunnel option, Transport Minister Simeon Brown ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Foreign Minister Winston Peters have condemned Iran’s shocking and illegal strikes against Israel. “These attacks are a major challenge to peace and stability in a region already under enormous pressure," Mr Luxon says. "We are deeply concerned that miscalculation on any side could ...
Hundreds of people in little over a week have turned out in Northland to hear Regional Development Minister Shane Jones speak about plans for boosting the regional economy through infrastructure. About 200 people from the infrastructure and associated sectors attended an event headlined by Mr Jones in Whangarei today. Last ...
Health Minister Dr Shane Reti has today thanked outgoing Health New Zealand – Te Whatu Ora Chair Dame Karen Poutasi for her service on the Board. “Dame Karen tendered her resignation as Chair and as a member of the Board today,” says Dr Reti. “I have asked her to ...
The NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has signalled their proposed delivery approach for the Government’s 15 Roads of National Significance (RoNS), with the release of the State Highway Investment Proposal (SHIP) today, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Boosting economic growth and productivity is a key part of the Government’s plan to ...
New Zealand is renewing its connections with a world facing urgent challenges by pursuing an active, energetic foreign policy, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “Our country faces the most unstable global environment in decades,” Mr Peters says at the conclusion of two weeks of engagements in Egypt, Europe and the United States. “We cannot afford to sit back in splendid ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has announced the Australian Governor-General, His Excellency General The Honourable David Hurley and his wife Her Excellency Mrs Linda Hurley, will make a State visit to New Zealand from Tuesday 16 April to Thursday 18 April. The visit reciprocates the State visit of former Governor-General Dame Patsy Reddy ...
Associate Health Minister David Seymour has announced that Medsafe has approved 11 cold and flu medicines containing pseudoephedrine. Pharmaceutical suppliers have indicated they may be able to supply the first products in June. “This is much earlier than the original expectation of medicines being available by 2025. The Government recognised ...
New Zealand and the United States have recommitted to their strategic partnership in Washington DC today, pledging to work ever more closely together in support of shared values and interests, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “The strategic environment that New Zealand and the United States face is considerably more ...
April 11, 2024 Joint Declaration by United States Secretary of State the Honorable Antony J. Blinken and New Zealand Minister of Foreign Affairs the Right Honourable Winston Peters We met today in Washington, D.C. to recommit to the historic partnership between our two countries and the principles that underpin it—rule ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced further New Zealand cooperation with the United States in the Pacific Islands region through $16.4 million in funding for initiatives in digital connectivity and oceans and fisheries research. “New Zealand can achieve more in the Pacific if we work together more urgently and ...
In apparent defiance of the Biden administration, the Netanyahu government has now initiated missile strikes against Iran. Last Saturday night (Sunday morning in New Zealand) Iran launched more than 300 drones, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles against Israeli military targets. With the assistance of US, UK and possibly French forces, ...
Māori representation brings a perspective that encompasses not only the interests of Māori communities but also a broader, holistic approach to environmental stewardship and community well-being, principles deeply embedded in Te Ao Māori (the Māori ...
This week in Auckland, a group of young people took over the microphone at a ministerial press conference, to explain why they oppose the Fast-Track Approvals Bill. One young woman said, ‘We’re here because we love Aotearoa New Zealand. We want to raise our children in an environment that’s thriving, ...
The summer was wonderful. Evie was wonderful, too; finally a teenager, finally worthy of long, hot days. She shaved her legs for the first time and bought cut-off shorts from the op-shop that made them look long. She got a Warehouse singlet so tight on her new shape that her ...
When Thomas James was on his solo camp as part of Outward Bound, the keen outdoorsman didn’t find it too challenging, as others often do. In what might just be the perfect illustration of his character, he saw it as a great opportunity to solve a few problems. “I thought, ...
From the unstable and drippy to the hi-tech and pretty, here’s our ranking of all the tunnels you can drive through in this country. The first tunnel seems to have been built in 2200BC in Babylonia, kicking off a global phenomenon for digging holes in order to get places more ...
Lucinda Bennett on the art of being greedy but resourceful. This is an excerpt from our weekly food newsletter, The Boil Up. When I picture the market, it is always this time of year. Crisp air, dripping nose, counting coins with cold fingers. Sunlight pale, filtered through specks of dew still ...
Zoë Colling’s favourite piece in the ‘That’s So Last Century’ collection is a lubrication chart for a sewing machine from the ’60s. It’s about the size of a postcard, and carefully maintained. “I like it that this piece of ephemera highlights that manual and technical side of the skill involved ...
Kia Ora Gaza A passionate haka reverberated through Auckland International Airport as a medical team of three New Zealand doctors received an emotional farewell from a big crowd of supporters before flying to Turkey to join the international Freedom Flotilla to Gaza. The doctors, who left Auckland yesterday, hope to ...
With submissions closing today, Macassey-Pickard says groups around the country have been supporting a huge range of people to make their submissions. ...
Our response to the new legislation is informed by targeted conversations with practitioners working in the system and through an implementation lens. ...
The new ‘Fast-track Approvals Bill’ would give just three Ministers the power to approve or deny development projects. They would avoid the usual checks and balances that are in place to protect rivers, land, the ocean, and communities. ...
COMMENTARY:By Eugene Doyle Helen Clark, how I miss you. The former New Zealand Prime Minister — the safest pair of hands this country has had in living memory — gave a masterclass on the importance of maintaining an independent foreign policy when she spoke at an AUKUS symposium held ...
The government's released the list of organisations provided with information on how to apply - just hours before public submissions on the bill close. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Milton Speer, Visiting Fellow, School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, University of Technology Sydney Before climate change really got going, eastern Australia’s flash floods tended to concentrate on our coastal regions, east of the Great Dividing Range. But that’s changing. Now ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Elizabeth Finkel, Vice-Chancellor’s Fellow, La Trobe University Sia Duff / South Australian Museum In February, the South Australian Museum “re-imagined” itself. In the face of rising costs and inadequate government funds, CEO David Gaimster, who took the reins last June, declared ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alan Pearce, Professor, School of Allied Heath, Human Services & Sport, La Trobe University, La Trobe University This week, Collingwood AFL player Nathan Murphy announced his retirement, brought on by his concussion history and ongoing issues. The 24-year-old’s seemingly sudden retirement, ...
The Mental Health Foundation provides support and resources for those facing the loss of their job, so it’s wrong in the very week the Government adds another 1000 jobs to its tally of cuts, that this is happening. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexander Howard, Senior Lecturer, Discipline of English and Writing, University of Sydney Daniel Boud/Sydney Theatre Company Decay, terror, revulsion. These are three of the central themes of Thomas Bernhard’s rarely performed play The President. The Austrian is one of the greatest ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ye In (Jane) Hwang, Postdoctoral Research Associate at School of Population Health, UNSW Sydney Shutterstock You’d be hard pressed to find any aspect of daily life that doesn’t require some form of digital literacy. We need only to look back ten ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says threats by ministers Shane Jones and David Seymour to reform or close down the Waitangi Tribunal were “ill-considered”, as legal experts say the ministers may have breached Cabinet Manual conventions. “I think those comments are ill-considered and we expect all ministers to actually exercise good ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rob Newton, Professor of Exercise Medicine, Edith Cowan University Pexels/RDNE stock project You’re not in your 20s or 30s anymore and you know regular health checks are important. So you go to your GP. During the appointment they measure your waist. ...
A new poem by Evangeline Riddiford Graham. Mitochondrial Problem I. It was long drive to Kansas for the man and his dog but you have to understand he said She doesn’t fly. Which calls to mind not carsick shitting barking or whining but a dog who chooses not to as ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Hemingway’s Goblet by Dermot Ross (Mary Egan Publishing, $38)Hot off the press, this debut ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Wajnryb McDonald, PhD candidate in Criminology, University of Sydney Less than 24 hours after Ashlee Good was murdered in Bondi Junction, her family released a statement requesting the media take down photographs they had reproduced of Ashlee and her family without ...
Chief executive Shaun Robinson said it has not had any government funding cut, but government-funded contracts have not kept pace with rising costs. ...
The Ministry of Health has delayed the release of its evidence brief on the safety, reversibility and mental health and wellbeing outcomes for puberty blockers. While we wait, Julia de Bres speaks to those with firsthand experience. Best practice gender-affirming healthcare is based on trans people’s self-determination and agency. The ...
Barcelona’s city streets have gone from traffic-clogged to pedestrian-friendly. How? Superblocks. Ellen Rykers explains. This is an excerpt from our weekly environmental newsletter Future Proof. Sign up here. Last week I read a great interview with renowned urbanist Janette Sadik-Khan by The Spinoff’s Wellington editor Joel MacManus: “You can reimagine streets, ...
Student groups ‘Climate Action VUW’, Schools Strike 4 Climate and VUWSA will be on the street in Wellington today, the last day for submissions on the Fast-track Approvals Bill, with a message that the fight against the Government’s ‘War on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sofia Ammassari, Research Fellow, Griffith University Since 2014, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s popularity has grown exponentially – and so has the formidable organisational machine of his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). These two factors will be key to delivering the BJP a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brendon Hyndman, Associate Professor of Education (Adjunct) & Senior Manager (BCE), Charles Sturt University During COVID almost all Australian students and their families experienced online learning. But while schools have long since gone back to in-person teaching, online learning has not gone ...
Yes, they’re better for the environment. No, that’s not a good enough reason for me to use them. Once every 26 days or so, my period arrives, and if struck by an act of God, I am caught red-crotched without products. How, after 17 years of this, do I still ...
“It will cause significant harm to our environment and communities. It is completely at odds with New Zealanders’ relationship with nature and our need for a low-carbon, sustainable economic future." ...
The Chair of the National Maori Authority, Matthew Tukaki, has warned a Parliamentary Select Committee that fast-tracking legislation is a perilous practice that undermines the core tenets of democracy, transparency, and accountability. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tim Tenbensel, Associate Professor, Health Policy, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau Getty Images Since coming into power, the coalition government has adopted a simple but shrewd see-how-fast-we-can-move political strategy. However, in the health sector this need for speed entails ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Anastasia Hronis, Clinical Psychologist, University of Technology Sydney Darya Sannikova/Pexels Whether you’re watching TV, attending a footy game, or eating a meal at your local pub, gambling is hard to escape. Although the rise of gambling is not unique to Australia, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Wong, Forrest Fellow, School of Biological Sciences, The University of Western Australia Have you ever wondered if there are more insects out at night than during the day? We set out to answer this question by combing through the scientific ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Carol T Kulik, Research Professor, University of South Australia IR Stone/Shutterstock In Australia, it’s not the done thing to know – let alone ask – what our colleagues are paid. Yet, it’s easy to see how pay transparency can make pay ...
The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) is sounding a warning to migrants, that running foul of the law may see them leaving the country prematurely. ...
The government’s plan to get 50,000 people off jobseeker support by 2030 has had a rocky start, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. Beneficiary numbers are up – and so are ...
Raglan Roast is a staple of Wellington coffee culture. But with five branches across the capital, which one is the best? I am a die-hard Raglan Roast fan. It’s consistently the most affordable cafe in Wellington, and one of the only places you can get a coffee after 3pm. So, ...
Residents of University of Auckland halls are being urged to withhold their accommodation fees from May 1, in a bid to force the university to take student concerns over rent hikes seriously.The University of Auckland is facing a strike from students over the cost of on-campus accommodation. The Students ...
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Opinion: With maths understanding at 42 percent for Year 8 students, there’s no doubt something has to be done. But how? The post Financial literacy should be on all of us appeared first on Newsroom. ...
Hineaupounamu ‘Missy’ Nuku has been scaling mountains in Canada for her college basketball team, the Lakeland Rustlers. Alberta is currently home for the 20-year-old point guard, who is in her first year of a scholarship at Lakeland College, where she is studying for a business degree. She has certainly made ...
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The thousands of government “back-office” job cuts are causing widespread pain in the capital city. In today’s episode of The Detail, we speak to three journalists and a think tank researcher, looking at the larger picture around the cuts and what effect it will have on Wellington, a city that’s ...
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Trump says he can live with a One State Israel
The problem being of course, that “The Palestinians are highly unlikely to accept anything short of a sovereign state” means what they have now, plus all of Israel.
Rofl
You may say that, but decent fair talks and honest action thereafter would enable a change in their position.
… a single Israeli state encompassing the Palestinians would either become undemocratic or no longer Jewish, given the faster growth rate of the Arab population.
????
How would such a state “become undemocratic”?
If they tried to retain representative majority for a minority Jewish population, that would be undemocratic.
The statement is either or – either a single Israeli state would be no longer Jewish, as Jews would be a minority of the population; or for the state to remain Jewish it would need to have an undemocratic electoral system.
It’s already undemocratic by most democratic and civilised standards. It’s a big myth that israel is a haven of democracy in the mid east.
For Israel to stay a “Jewish” State they would have to disenfranchise the Palestinian majority.
Which is why a “two State” solution is likely the only viable option.
Israeli settlements and genocidal attacks on Palestinians are making a peaceful solution less likely. However i doubt if peace is in the Israeli agenda, as they need an excuse to continue the takeover of Palestinian begun in the 50’s.
Christchurch Port Hills fires: What you need to know
Thinking of those down south today who are suffering from the fires. All lives matter, please stay safe and if you are told to get out, don’t muck around just go, stuff can be replaced, lives can’t.
Profiles in Courage. NOT
No. 1: Justin Trudeau
http://www.ourwindsor.ca/news-story/7138370-canadians-don-t-want-pm-to-lecture-another-country-says-trudeau/
Morrissey,
Just how would it serve the Canadian interest (or for that matter the NZ interest) if Trudeau had spent his time lecturing Trump?
Both Trudeau and English made it plain enough that they disagreed with the Immigration Executive Order, and in any event they could have confidence that the US courts would roll it back.
What more should they do?
It is worth recalling that despite all Trump’s faults he has not signalled that he wants to start a war on the scale of Iraq or going further back, Vietnam. In fact I would say the indications are the opposite.
It was not so long ago that a number of commenters on this site were saying they preferred Trump over Clinton, precisely because he was seen as less of a war risk. I personally thought that was ridiculous. Why would Clinton start any wars?
More importantly Trump is the President of a country that many countries, especially in the west, have a deep relationship. In fact the US is seen as the indispensable nation with in the west. The vast number of components of this relationship will continue, despite Trump, since they are not based on any one person but on a network of enduring links.
I appreciate you do not agree with any of this, but in large part the relationship is based on common values, namely being democracies, with the independent rule of law, and broadly speaking open economies.
The connection between the western nations actually goes far deeper in time, since these institutions and values have their origins in Judaeo-Christian philosophy and ethics, and go back as far as democracy of Athens and the republic of Rome.
So Trump would have to be much worse than at present before any western nation would significantly curtail the relationship.
Personally I have complete trust in the constitution of the US and the rule of law that will keep Trump within acceptable confines. He might say some surprising things, but a lot of that will prove to be bluster.
In fact what the European nations want is for Trump to actually affirm US leadership of NATO, the centrepiece of western mutual obligation. The scariest thing for European nations is the thought that NATO would be put in jeopardy by US “neo-isolationism.” Even Corbyn recognises this (at least on a pragmatic level, even if not personally) that unravelling NATO would give rise to dangerous uncertainty. For some European nations (the Baltics) this is literally an existential threat.
Thanks Wayne. Some good points there. By the way, I meant to get back to you after you responded to my swingeing attack on you last Saturday. I accept your criticism wasn’t personal, and I must say that I was impressed by your unflappability and your maintenance of a civil discourse, as I had tried to employ all my rhetorical force against you.
However, I was banned by the moderators for another matter, so please accept my belated apology.
Only by a small clique of authoritarians.
Personally, I see NZ as the only indispensable nation as far as NZ is concerned and that it’s under threat from the US.
That’s the past and we cannot find solutions for today or the future in the past.
Both Athens and Rome were massively undemocratic and highly authoritarian. Great for their time but not for today. Today we need to move on from those failed systems rather than trying to keep them alive.
I would – except for all the actions that the US Administration has done that go against those.
Nothing is forever.
The world has changed and is changing further away from the old authoritarian past.
Draco,
I was obviously not suggesting that Greece and Rome were like modern democracies, after all they both had slaves. But I am sure you know that many of our legal principles and philosophy has its origins with them.
As for the decline of the west. Well, yes it does seem the peak of the influence has passed but as yet no other set of states has supplanted the west. Asia (China and India) could do so but that will take more than 50 years, probably significantly longer. In contrast to western nations China is actually organised on authoritarian lines.
Your first point is perhaps the most interesting. Does the leadership of the US only appeal to a small clique of authoritarians?
Perhaps the best proxy would be a referendum on whether European nations/people would wish to see the end of NATO. Realistically such a referendum is not going to happen.
But we do know that parties that do actually propose withdrawal from NATO do not win elections, in fact they do very badly. I am certain if this was UK Labour party policy, they would be pretty much wiped out electorally.
So I suggest you misunderstand the popular mood (as opposed to views of left activists). People may have all sorts of complaints about the US, but not many are actually willing to forgo its protection. That is particularly true the further east you go in Europe.
There can hardly be a single Pole who would say “Get out of NATO.” When I went there, all the Poles I spoke felt that their sovereignty was finally guaranteed. Not surprising when you think of the Polish experience throughout the twentieth century.
However I appreciate that perhaps 20% of New Zealanders think as you do do. I guess we are in the safest place in the world to be able to do so.
The US might, as you write, be seen as the indispensable nation within the West but I struggle to think of any significant contribution to human knowledge by US educated and acculturated people.
Also the US is isolated geographically from the historical knowledge and cultural sources that it relies on, Europe, the Middle East, India, China. IMO it has always been a taker, not a giver. A taker of people and a taker of knowledge.
The US appears to me reliant on the rest of the world for its ideas and technologies.
I don’t agree that the western nations institutions and values have their origins in Judaeo-Christian philosophy and ethics. These were imposed from without and important state structures eg, Monarchies, Class Systems, Roman Law predated them.
You are risking a knockdown in claiming that the popular mood can be gauged by support or otherwise of voters for continuing membership of NATO because you do not take account of voter participation in elections, which in Poland at least has been abysmal.
http://www.electionguide.org/countries/id/173/
I struggle to think of any significant contribution to human knowledge by US educated and acculturated people.
I expect the irony of engaging in this struggle while using a personal computer connected to the Internet didn’t occur?
Yeah, it does seem that the Groaning Hand clearly hasn’t been around computer systems for the last 60 years or so.
Perhaps he should consider Grace Hopper, the author of the A compiler in 1952 to prove that you could write code in something other than maths. Of course COBOL sucks. But it has the hardy robustness such that means that 57 years after it’s (and my) birth, banks and the IRD are still trying to find something that works better..
My favourite language is still C++ developed by another extremely bright yank, Bjarne Stroustrup, in 1979. I’ve written more than 50 million lines of tight code in it since I learnt it in 1991. And I’m still learning to express myself in it now.
For me those are still the highlights of one small area of my overly educated and acculturated mind. It is the area that has me sanely clasped in its creative trance for 30 odd years without suffering the boredom of sucking up the cultures of mere people like the vacuum cleaner I am in the social science or the arts.
Just about every area of knowledge that I have sucked into with depth in the last 40 years has been dominated by the concepts from the US. Everything from computer systems to management to earth sciences. Sure, a lot of those concepts have been from the first 3 generations of immigrants. But most of those people were there because it was largely impossible to do the things that they did in the countries of their parents or grandparents.
A prosaic and highly visible example would be to just look at the inspired comedy of John Oliver. The same thing happens in any country that welcomes immigration. Here for instance.
Just looking around my apartment, it is rather freaky realising how much of it was directly developed in the US, or was redeveloped there to drop the cost. Sure it is made by the Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, etc at present. But the flood of innovation arriving every year from the US is a rather large torrent. Nothing like it arrives from anywhere else.
Basically, I’d have speculate that the Groaning Hand is more interested in the same types of such largely useless esoteric medieval meanderings as the quest for detirmining the number of naked angels of their preferred gender that could dance on a pinhead, or other microscopic obsessions based on the self-referential arguments of nearly blind scholars trying to read under candle-light. I guess it beats having to do any real work understanding the real world.
And which is probably the same reason why our best and brightest pick up sticks and leave. They simply cannot do what they want here in NZ because of the poor support for creativity that we have.
Of course, the UN and international is supposed to do that and not individual nations.
Of course, we do have the example of Israel and the UN dictating the invasion of a sovereign state in favour of a small group of people.
And, of course, the US has been undermining the UN for decades. From where I sit, the problem of people not feeling that there sovereignty is guaranteed is a direct result of the US’ undermining of the UN and ongoing invasions of sovereign nations.
If nations feel secure because of NATO then it’s because they’re kissing US arse.
Or they’re kissing US arse because they were feeling insecure for some completely unknown reason…
Would nations feel insecure if the UN had the power to stop the US invading other countries?
I suspect that if that were true then nations wouldn’t be turning to the US and NATO for protection.
I reckon the world would be a much better place if the UN could stop the US, Russia, or China (or frankly any military power) from invading smaller countries, it would be full of rainbows and unicorn farts.
But that us not currently in the power of the UN.
So Poland and Baltic countries look to NATO, because Russia.
And the UN isn’t in that position because USA.
And most of the military interventions in the world over the last century or so has been by the US fighting for their corporations.
What I’m saying here is that the solution that those countries need is the UN, not NATO, but those powerful countries are keeping the UN powerless to act against them.
So, how do we get the majority of countries to change the UN for the better?
Hey, Britain France and Russia have done their bit and all.
The main problem with the UN is the permanent member veto, but also the reliance on US funds because it’s got the biggest economy.
If all the littler countries put more money into the UN, there’d still be the issue of the security council veto. I have no idea how to alter that, save waiting for the next big was ad the irradiated survivors could do a League of Nations: Third Time Lucky.
The world has changed and is changing further away from the old authoritarian past.
I don’t think increasing authoritarianism can really be described as changing “away from” authoritarianism. “Embracing a more authoritarian future” seems more accurate.
IMO, the general populace is changing to be less authoritarian and the PTB are becoming more so as a response to that.
But, there is flux and uncertainty ATM so I could be wrong.
I certainly believe you’re wrong. Putin and Erdogan are popular in their own countries, the USA just democratically elected an authoritarian demagogue, nationalist authoritarian parties are increasing in popularity in Europe, and a UK referendum has voted to exit the international cooperative it belongs to because nationalism is becoming more popular. That’s the general populace, not the powers that be.
With 77.8% of Canadian exports going to the USA and Mexico (NAFTA)…I suspect the Canadians are more than happy to keep things civil with Trump. Of course its Trudeau who’s very pro NAFTA, and Trump who had to moderate his opinions which is ironic….
Though I think Trudeau handing Trump a photograph of Trump and daddy Trudeau back in the day speaks volumes about our Leading families and the distribution, or lack thereof, of power.
Very interesting, Siobhan. I didn’t see that photograph.
I must say, though, that I am not at all impressed with Trudeau Junior. He seems like another Tony Blair.
Kathryn Ryan—completely out of her depth this morning:
Further evidence that standards at RNZ National are declining.
Nine to Noon, RNZ National, Thursday 16 February 2017, 10:10 a.m.
I’m listening to Kathryn Ryan making a fool of herself, yet again, this time as she interviews Rudolph Herzog, author of Dead Funny: Telling Jokes in Hitler’s Germany. He’s already firmly corrected her after she claimed that the Jewish prisoners at Theresienstadt put on a cabaret to boost their morale; in fact, he informed her, they were compelled to put on the cabaret. He’s also caviled at her use of the word “humanising”, which implies the Nazis were not human. He also seems perturbed by her suggestion that the Nazis had a sense of humour. ”
Does she do ANY preparation, or reading, before these interviews? Are there any standards at RNZ National any more?
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon
This article I found interesting
Love history
http://international.sueddeutsche.de/post/157058066625/we-have-at-most-a-year-to-defend-american
Ms Kendzior writes about the new old.
https://thebaffler.com/blog/its-already-happened-here-kendzior
Thanks joe – such a great read from a great writer and thinker on a difficult subject. Big ups to you and weka for introducing her writing to me.
You can tell we are in election year again.
Lots of posts. Lots of comments.
And a rapidly increasing number of page views….
Looks like we will have the code for the project after work in the hands of the testers tomorrow. In celebration, if it continues to rain and be cool in Auckland, I will fix a password field and get the search function back on line.
Please ask the deity (or lack thereof) for rain in Auckland and the fire areas of NZ…. I will take care of the code.
It shall be so.
lprent
Done. Drizzle in Christchurch tomorrow, or sooner as I have requested.
The Wizard famously brought rain to drought-stricken regions on several occasions, according to his memoirs.
Here’s the thing about Apple Pay and banks
More rentier capitalism.
And this shows how competition in standards fails to bring about satisfactory results for society.
The power of those big four banks to fuck around with our currency and transactions is another reason why we should be looking to nationalise the transaction system and maintain a single standard.
There is absolutely nothing stopping you starting a bank in nz, and nothing stopping me choosing to bank with any of the 24 registered banks in NZ
And is that actually working? No, it’s not.
The private banks have control of our monetary supply and create too much of it and they own the EFT-POS system pulling in massive amounts of profit from us using our money.
The dumbest man on the internet gets himself accredited.
It was a banner moment for the decade-old website, known for reporting obvious hoaxes as legitimate news and headlines such as: “EXPOSED=>HILLARY HITMAN Breaks Silence” and “Dental Expert: Hillary Clinton Is Suffering From Serious Gum Infection” and “One Week After Election Loss Hillary Clinton Looks Like Death.”
Hoft was on his way to his first White House news conference in the company of self-described “brand strategist” Lucian Wintrich, the Gateway Pundit’s inaugural White House correspondent, who for his first day on the job wore a blue tie studded with elephants in every color of the rainbow to announce his gay Republican pride.
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/02/fake-news-gateway-pundit-white-house-trump-briefing-room-214781
Chris Trotter and Rachel Stewart deliver a mighty Double-Whallop
http://bowalleyroad.blogspot.co.nz/2017/02/too-little-too-late-rachel-stewart-on.html
When Chris is on ball he is the best.
And this is him at his snarly best.
Thank God we have Rachel Stewart.
I’m still for fighting worthwhile fights, but at the same time, keeping a weather eye on the big issue. Stopping the every day stuff because the freight-train headlight is blinding us is going to multiply our daily problems, so yes, protest the dams, the plight of the homeless and so on and on. Taking practical steps individually to prepare for challenging circumstances seem very wise right now.
On the big issue stuff, I think Leighton Smith over at ZB needs to be challenged everyday on this issue. Arguing with people who listen to him is getting a joke. Not that he uses the gifts of science for anything. Mind you did get a straight answer why they oppose this issue. Because it’s simple and easy to do nothing, and call the other side crazy.
The right wing in NZ seem to be getting really upset about the diversification of the Labour party
http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2017/02/littles_u-turn.html
Labour Candidate Anna Lorck fighting the good fight for the homeless executives and wealthy retirees of Havelock North..
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/hawkes-bay-today/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503462&objectid=11801317
Though I suspect her and her husband, Damon Harvey, are making a play for the position of Hastings Mayor, so it makes sense to win over the voters of Havelock North.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/hawkes-bay-today/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503462&objectid=11783670
They are like the Clintons of the Hawkes Bay. Yup.
Yule has had it for well long enough, and as Chair of LGNZ for nearly two decades has functioned as both Mayor and MP together in the one person, merrily clipping the ticket for both as he goes.
There is no way some far left snowflake would survive on that hard dry political soil. Maybe Anna Lorck and Damon Harkey are the right people for right there.
I see in the Herald the mother of Nia Glassie the little girl who was tortured and murdered, is going to be released on parole after serving 8 of her 9 years in jail. What an evil looking woman she is. Why was this woman only given a 9 year sentence and not a minimum of 9 years and allowed to be released a year before her time. The description of the torture of that little girl is horrific.
What I cannot understand is why Scott Watson is still in jail and was given a minimum of 17 years and is now serving over that time and I think it was said he isn’t up for parole for another 4 years. There is something really wrong with the sentencing system.
I for one, do not want that woman released, children will never be safe around her and she does not look repentant with what she has done. Just because Scott Watson still denies the crime it does not warrant him being lock away forever.
Obama Killed a 16-Year-Old American in Yemen.
Trump Just Killed His 8-Year-Old Sister.
by GLENN GREENWALD, The Intercept, Jan. 31, 2017
IN 2010, PRESIDENT Obama directed the CIA to assassinate an American citizen in Yemen, Anwar al-Awlaki, despite the fact that he had never been charged with (let alone convicted of) any crime, and the agency successfully carried out that order a year later with a September 2011 drone strike. While that assassination created widespread debate — the once-again-beloved ACLU sued Obama to restrain him from the assassination on the ground of due process and then, when that suit was dismissed, sued Obama again after the killing was carried out — another drone killing carried out shortly thereafter was perhaps even more significant yet generated relatively little attention.
Two weeks after the killing of Awlaki, a separate CIA drone strike in Yemen killed his 16-year-old American-born son, Abdulrahman, along with the boy’s 17-year-old cousin and several other innocent Yemenis. The U.S. eventually claimed that the boy was not their target but merely “collateral damage.” Abdulrahman’s grief-stricken grandfather, Nasser al-Awlaki, urged the Washington Post “to visit a Facebook memorial page for Abdulrahman,” which explained: “Look at his pictures, his friends, and his hobbies. His Facebook page shows a typical kid.”
Few events pulled the mask off Obama officials like this one. It highlighted how the Obama administration was ravaging Yemen, one of the world’s poorest countries: just weeks after he won the Nobel Prize, Obama used cluster bombs that killed 35 Yemeni women and children. Even Obama-supporting liberal comedians mocked the arguments of the Obama DOJ for why it had the right to execute Americans with no charges: “Due Process Just Means There’s A Process That You Do,” snarked Stephen Colbert. And a firestorm erupted when former Obama press secretary Robert Gibbs offered a sociopathic justification for killing the Colorado-born teenager, apparently blaming him for his own killing by saying he should have “had a more responsible father.”
The U.S. assault on Yemeni civilians not only continued but radically escalated over the next five years through the end of the Obama presidency, as the U.S. and the U.K. armed, supported, and provide crucial assistance to their close ally Saudi Arabia as it devastated Yemen through a criminally reckless bombing campaign. Yemen now faces mass starvation, seemingly exacerbated, deliberately, by the U.S.-U.K.-supported air attacks. Because of the West’s direct responsibility for these atrocities, they have received vanishingly little attention in the responsible countries.
In a hideous symbol of the bipartisan continuity of U.S. barbarism, Nasser al-Awlaki just lost another one of his young grandchildren to U.S. violence. On Sunday, the Navy’s SEAL Team 6, using armed Reaper drones for cover, carried out a commando raid on what it said was a compound harboring officials of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. A statement issued by President Trump lamented the death of an American service member and several others who were wounded, but made no mention of any civilian deaths. U.S. military officials initially denied any civilian deaths, and (therefore) the CNN report on the raid said nothing about any civilians being killed. …..
Read more….
https://theintercept.com/2017/01/30/obama-killed-a-16-year-old-american-in-yemen-trump-just-killed-his-8-year-old-sister/