February breaks global temperature records by ‘shocking’ amounthttps://www.theguardian.com/science/2016/mar/14/february-breaks-global-temperature-records-by-shocking-amount
Well, you know, we came marching out of Africa just not that long ago and spread around the globe, wiping out fellow species of human and Neanderthal on the way, reaching the farthest reaches like NZ in just the last millennium and ever since then we have just thickened up and thickened up until the current point where the natural environment is beginning to creak and break up, while we continue to thicken until, well, the natural environment is on the way to being in zoos only and we are as thick as ants crawling all over the entire place. This is the history and this is the future surely until some catastrophe wreaks havoc on the populace and the planet.
I don’t know, but I think we can be better as a species than the trivial, ignorant, self-centred, vacuous, unthinking and reactive model encouraged by the Herald.
No, that’s actually how the right-wing actually view things. They think that a dystopia is all we can ever hope to achieve and thus they only ever look out for #1 thus causing the dystopian vision that they have.
The NZ Wood Council says the free trade agreement with China is not working, they’ve been hit with multiple tariffs which make it hard to compete with China’s domestic wood product.
So much for free trade. Looking forward to TPP, anyone?
Because the political and business elite do not think in terms on nationality, unless it serves their purposes to do so. The non-elite have more in common with their equivalents in other countries than they do the rich and powerful from their own countries.
@ CV They are not even political or business elite – they are often just dumbo opportunists, un convicted white collar crims, or people with psychological disorders who just happened to have stumbled onto being able to control a country like some sort of public school, bully boy fiefdom with no rules having paid the MSM off.
I mean can we call Slater, Key, Brownlee, Bennett, Collins, English – political and business elite???
If they win another election, it will be like Lord of the Flies.
I actually blame the opposition too, if you can’t defeat these people and actually join forces against bullies for your own self presevation and get a few policies going that are reasonable and benefit most people and are relevant, what the F is going on?
Just copy Bernie Sanders, not only his policies but how to write and articulate them.
The opposition need to stop going on about pet issues, but start to articulate a bigger picture.
Free trade is really just turning into litegatious trade, where bigger and more wealthy parties win and stall all fights so that the little partners have to back down or spend all their time and money trying to fight. In short, it will just stall trade and innovation for NZ.
None of it bodes well.
With any agreement the detail is the most important. We all know ‘details’ or ‘potential consequences’ have never been a strong point with this government.
They can’t even get a convention centre or a supercity working or even public transport going. Lordy keep them away from exports.
They are like babes in the woods (but not so innocent) with economy and trade.
Would you let a bunch of 7 year olds loose with your ATM card, unlimited power to screw up a country and casks of wine? Pretty much Groser on the free trade trail with Fed farmers in tow. All being championed along by a currency speculator with zero scruples known as the smiling assassin, who gets off on making people redundant.
“A SHOCK JOCK who is politically WAY out of his depth.”
Did Toni Street take advice from Janet Wilson before she executed
Monday’s exquisite live-on-air attack on Mike “Contra” Hosking? Seven Sharp, Television One, Monday 14 March 2016
The glib little homilies scheduled for the end of each episode of Television One’s godawful Seven Sharp are usually not worth the wait. If it’s not thirty seconds of something banal, it’s something infuriating, like Mike “Contra” Hosking boasting, contrary to all evidence, how he gave Nicky Hager a “hard time”. [1] Anyone who actually makes a point of listening to them is either (a) bored, (b) stupid, ( c) bewildered, or (d) an aficionado of the dismal.
Tonight, however, the closing homilies followed an item that was actually interesting—about a dive bomb competition in Taupo. That’s why I was still watching when it came time for the sub-Father Ted routines. After the item was finished, Hosking’s offsider Toni Street stared at the camera, pausing just a little longer than would be comfortable. Then she delivered something she had clearly been planning for a long time: she let Hosking—and the viewers—know exactly what she thought of him.
But she could not afford to criticize him directly, of course; instead, she followed the time-honored tradition of criticizing someone who exhibits identical characteristics to the actual object of her scorn. [2] So to have a go at Hosking, she had to find a substitute target to attack. Who could be out there with a level of arrogance, pomposity, shallowness and overbearing conceitedness that approaches that of Mike Hosking?
After that tense extended pause at the end of the dive-bombing item, Toni Street launched her remarkable little insurrection. She began by talking about Megan Kelly, the Fox News broadcaster who suffered a nasty public attack by Donald Trump last year. Noting with satisfaction that Megan Kelly was now more popular than she had ever been, Street paused again, and then said this….
TONI STREET: The increase in her ratings indicates the support for someone who can out Donald Trump for what he is: a shock jock who is politically way out of his depth. …..
At the end of that remarkable little hatchet job, its victim immediately began thirty seconds of pedestrian and ill-informed comment about something else. He showed no apparent signs of appreciating he’d just been (metaphorically) tarred, feathered and kicked in the arse by someone who really despises him.
[2] What made it so effective was that Toni Street maintained her composure throughout. She wielded the hatchet with exemplary coolness. Media junkies will no doubt remember Janet Wilson’s far more hysterical hatchet job on her husband three years ago….
+100..Great !…thanks…that really is a good humorous expose on Hillary Clinton…although he didnt get into the more sinister stuff of what she did in Libya
Quote: “Unfortunately for the majority of the 3300 staff who were employed by Dick Smith, there’s probably zero chance of Kogan reviving any of the 393 physical stores in Australia and New Zealand. The deal was for the online stores only, plus the Dick Smith brand and its associated intellectual property.
Which is not to say that Kogan won’t open any stores. The retail entrepreneur was originally vehemently opposed to physical stores in favour of online shopping, but admitted in December last year that that absolute stance was wrong, and opened a pop-up shop in Melbourne’s posh Prahran. Kogan might just have to work out how to create a profitable physical presence to bring in the cash, as the online Dick Smith will be just a fraction of the size of the old company.” Quote end
In Christchurch alone there were 426 people on the social housing register – the millions of dollars spent on testing and treating P houses could have bought an extra 15 properties.
Then the government should probably stop taking a hundred million dollar dividend from HNZ every year.
That post of Georges just gets better and better … because Rachinger has accused me of being an alcoholic and Kitty Catkin has basically said that I suffer from Multiple Personality Disorder … and George and others believe that I am in cahoots with their mortal enemy. LOL.
Audrey writes another anti-Little piece. Poorly written and ambiguous really.
Except for this quote,
“But a tweet by Labour MP Iain Lees-Galloway summed up Labour’s view of Key as “a complete and utter banker”.
Naughty Iain!
What got me was her assertion that Labour have lost on the TPP front because of all the tariffs it drops. Really? we got a list of this amazing tariff smashing TPP does? cause from what I remember it was incredibly limited.
Audrey is a moll troll. Can’t be said any other way sorry. The National Party is in her bones and everything. And fittingly given that she is the Political Editor of The Harold.
Good cooperative Left Opposition work in Parliament yesterday..despite the noise and heckling:
Winston Peters in parliament asks John Key:
Why Is the government blocking a free trade deal with Russia?
Why is the government pouring massive taxpayer support into the Hollywood film industry, Skycity Casino, Rio Tinto and now the TPPA campaign ?
(…when the Democratic and Republican campaign leadership in the United States think it is a REAL DOG…and a big corporate protection racket against the interests of their workers and farmers)
Andrew Little asks John Key:
Whose side is the PM on?… the dairy farmers?… or the banks?
“Scrappy start to the week with John Key and Winston Peters having a right honourable stoush, each accusing the other of misleading the House and demanding an apology. The Speaker, David Carter, was having none of that and was repeatedly back on his feet restoring order. Questions for the prime minister were dominated by the pressure on dairy farmers from lower milk prices and servicing bank loans.”
Notice that Winston did not say it was Key who spoke of the $5billion. He asked about the reported comments of two Ministers re the $5billion. Key deflected all that by accusing Winston of “misleading the House.” Carter refused Winston the right to re-read his question which would have defeated Key’s deflection. Funny that!
Michael Hill want the Queenstown basin all for himself and other rich people, nobody else.
That other wanker Sam Neill wanted pretty much the same a few years ago.
They want to stop all the huge development that has taken place already to accommodate them and their silly big houses, and have no more happen. They want to very selfishly pull up the ladder – quelle surprise…
Well I suggest one way to do this is to require, in fact, a reversal of development to make the place like it was, with even less people than now. That would improve the place even more, according to Michael Hill’s logic.
So legislate and regulate to require that every time one of these wankers wishes to sell their silly big homes, or passes on to the afterlife, their property is required to be sold solely for farming and other non-residential type activities… that should see it right ….
Seriously, what planet do these rich bastards live on? They are actually divorced from reality
Queenstown provides a centre for investment and tourism in southern NZ and is a blessing to some extent to preserve the region when Dairy goes down, till Sheep fight their way up more, Beef can perhaps keep going, and Bluff doesn’t have oysters killed by that disease.
No more housing for the wealthy in Queenstown as suggested by Sam Neill would be good. But attractive small apartments for the workers at reasonable rents close to Queenstown, with shuttle buses at very reasonable cost, would be of value. That is what is needed and if they have a council that isn’t run by Mini-Cooper type people, then that will be what is presently being planned and implemented. Bets anyone?
Money Supply:
Currency isn’t expanded to account for growth, debt is expanded to match demand.
Banks do not expand money supply, they extend temporary credit based on demand to enable transactions.
Once the transaction has been completed and credit repaid the supplied credit zeros out and creases to exist.
Banks have been positioned to supply virtually all currency to enable all financial transactions, this basically means they take a percentage cut off the top of all production. This is the cost of doing business, and is inflation.
The current system relies on all wealth created being a result of work done.
Wealth created outside of production; non productive wealth creation can only be payed for by destroying wealth for another sector of the economy.
Instead of the pie getting bigger, the pie gets cut into smaller slices, borrowers and those without appreciating assets effected the most.
The pie did actually increase, that increase remaining with the wealthy and being the difference between the government stated inflation and true inflation.
And that is how it works, the government, the elite and the banks working together to transfer wealth from production to the lords and masters, the banks facilitating the theft and government either to stupid or corrupt to care.
Additionally:
In a consumer society where the consumers only product is their time, as technology improves and populations increase the consumer has less to trade, thus less demand/ ability to consume, which means less credit supplied by the banks, which kills businesses and eventually threatens the wealthy, hence the need for a UBI.
Some time ago I said Putin was a great man! I was mocked as having a wet dream! 🙁
But events have born me out:
1. He’s restored Russia’s sovereignty and self respect after the neoliberal trashing under Yeltsin.
2. His military intervention in Syria has produced the beginnings of peace with most of the actors willing to talk with each other for the first time compared to the U$ and Anglo and Turkish behaviour of pouring gasoline onto a raging fire.
3. He has exposed the Neocon Warshington war criminals for all who can be bothered to notice. And the western presstitute media that has relentlessly demonised and slandered him.
4. We may,it’s hoped get peace in the Ukraine eventually.
Don’t omit the murders of Politkovskaya, Litvinenko and Nemtsov, or of the civilian passengers of MH17, the civilians in the Moscow Theatre gassing, and many many more. Putin is a scumbag of epic proportions.
Just because the US involvement in the Ukraine was exceedingly seedy doesn’t give them godlike powers to rearrange events – or they’d do a better job. It would be better if the US were not involved – but it was Russia that shot down MH17. There is an abundance of physical evidence, and no evidence that bears scrutiny to the contrary.
The aircraft nonsense is largely discredited due to the lack of cannon damage in the debris. But equally important are the plethora of false stories Russian official sources serially released as they grasped desperately at straws to cover up their act of mass murder.
Stuart M
Scumbags of a determined character rise to the top when a nation’s systems of governance break down. They also can ooze through when there are pauses in the regular flow of society such as happens in USA. What caused Ronald Reagan to get up there, followed by Margaret Thatcher etc.? I forget. But they ooze upwards at cracks at pressure points like Christchurch liquefaction.
Putin might be the right person to be where he is with his KGB knowledge and ability to outmaneouvre others at home and those sly ones abroad. It’s considered that the Middle East scumbags removed by the USA scumbags, were preferable to the new ones. These days it is a time for pragmatism, go for the best scumbags available now, and work for 80% improvement, knowing that getting even 40% would be thankfully welcomed.
Perhaps we should have a popular vote on greatest scumbags since WW2.
Pot Pot and gang must be up there. Then who gassed people in their homes in the Middle East with one that would flow to the lowest point and be effective in cellars where women and children would be hiding?
“The worst part was when their venom turned toward me,” Troup wrote. “There were protestors around me who got ushered out, and then people started pointing at me, motioning for the Secret Service to ‘get him out of there.’ Now mind you, I hadn’t uttered a single word the entire rally, but people still said things like ‘Well what about this one? He needs to go too!’”
Ultimately, Troup left the event feeling as if he’d witnessed something darker and more insidious than a simple political rally.
“At that rally, I saw the scary underbelly of America I saw unadulterated hate, fueled by intentional misinformation,” Troup said. “These people who, just 2 hours ago, seemed like good and kind people, were now cheering for blood.”
It will be interesting if Anonymous can find anything incriminating on Trump …more than what we already know…(eg are there any hidden emails and secret associations and agendas like Hillary Clinton had in her closet)
‘Anonymous declares ‘total war’ on Trump, plans April attack (VIDEO)’
Interesting how spelling can get confused these days with all our aids. I see two ways to spell Sir Tipene O’Reagan/ O’Regan. Willie Jackson should know how to spell Sir Douglas Graham’s name after all the Maori Treaty negotiations yet it is Graeme in this article. http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/local-blogs/willie-jackson/8338152/Different-rules-for-Maori-and-Pakeha
But the article is interesting itself, worth a read. Sounds factual as might be expected from someone of the Jackson family, with a high position in Maori matters.
He writes about the tribe that have control of Lake Taupo wanting a fee of $58,000 from the Ironman contest for using it. He points out that the Ironman contest is an $800,000 event.
And this next quote is one of the angry, dismissive, racist comments at the end of the article. With all the efforts that NZ has made to get a better understanding of the unpleasant start of this colony, and the shameful behaviour adopted by businessmen/land speculators with an armed gang to back them, this reaction is more frequent than we thought possible. I went on to background the late Louis Crimp who was a Maori hater, and to read about him gives insight into the type of person that befouls good attempts to provide some reparation and set NZ up as a country of justice, fairness and equality.
What a shame the Ironman New Zealand organisers lack the mettle of their competitors.
What a shame they agreed to bribe the tribe.
What a shame they did not reply to the Tuwharetoa extortion demand of $58,000 thus:
“Dear tribe,
“Get stuffed.
“We refuse to pay you so much as a bent cent to swim in our largest lake.
“And it is our lake. Not your lake. It belongs to us. All of us.
“All the people of New Zealand.
In the item Jackson refers to John Ansell, who was connected with ACT. (But the Louis Crimp item below says Ansell left ACT – Advertising guru John Ansell quit the party after adverts he designed asking Kiwis if they were “Fed up with the Maorification of Everything” were cancelled.)
Willie Jackson commented on him: He’s running the Treaty Gate project where he accuses all and sundry of telling lies over New Zealand’s history and relationship with Maori.
He clearly puts little value on Maori culture and his main financial backer has been Invercargill millionaire Louis Crimp, who last year claimed most Pakeha despise Maori.
Louis Crimp was a multi millionaire, now dead. He was one of a group of old white men whose blood has turned to vinegar, and who appear to have little left in life but to hold onto all their money, and their little energy goes to putting the Maori in his or her lower place than their high chairs. I saw them in full flow during the Constitution Conversations a year or so ago.
About Louis Crimp ACT supporter to John Ansell: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10806938 The biggest donor to the Act Party says he gave the money to Don Brash and John Banks so they could stop special treatment for Maori who were “either in jail or on welfare”.
In an extraordinary interview with the Weekend Herald, Louis Crimp said he believed he had the support of Brash, Banks and other “white New Zealanders”.
Mr Crimp made the largest financial contribution to the Act Party for the 2011 election with a $125,520 donation.
Crimp said in another interview: http://www.nbr.co.nz/article/two-hours-louis-crimp-ck-126301 “I can’t smile properly because my face is petrified, it doesn’t move, it’s paralysed because I had cancer. I can only smile with one side. So I’ve just got a grimace.”
Mr Crimp has made millions through his various property ventures, and has gained many supporters in Invercargill for his charitable donations, including more than $1 million each to the SPCA and the St John Ambulance Service….
Mr Crimp says that from an early age he has was forced to “watch [his] pennies. I was the oldest boy in Southland who had a paper run, at the age of 16, because we were poor, my family”.
His income? Derived from housing – rented to Maori gang and then evicted them.
Derived from pokies, which he could rail against or utilise takings of at random: Mr Crimp is in no position to rail, with any integrity, against the foundation’s use of pokie proceeds. He has, himself, been one of the grandfathers of the pokies industry in Invercargill, albeit in rivalry with the trust. So his contempt can hardly stem from holding the machines themselves to be an intolerable social harm. Far from overbrimming with sympathy for the problems of pokie addiction, he wrote to our public opinion column in April referring witheringly to “the suckers who addict themselves to poker machines”…
it is Mr Crimp who has been caught up in notorious and inglorious misuses of pokie funds. This was in the 1990s, and involved decisions so imperious that they offended rules that were less strict than they are now. The Southland Pool Players’ Club, upon whose executive Mr Crimp had been a member, dispensed the money from pokies at one of Mr Crimp’s most high-profile establishments, Players’ pool hall, for a team of nine members, including Mr Crimp, to attend a pool competition in Australia. This was just part of what Internal Affairs inspectors described as “gross misapplication of proceeds”.
Undaunted, as he so often is, by official disapproval, Mr Crimp had then stuck his hand out for Players’ pokie profits to help pay the 1998 election expenses of Southland Action, a group of candidates which he led into the Invercargill City Council election race.
So unprincipled himself, but cunning as a shithouse rat, to shamelessly accuse others. http://fundypost.blogspot.co.nz/2012/05/louis-crimp-man-of-actions.html
Casino and share deals: http://shareinvestornz.blogspot.co.nz/2010/11/sky-city-entertainment-group-ltd.html The Christchurch Casino was purchased by SKC in June 2004, off Aspinall (NZ) Limited, which held a 40.5% shareholding in Christchurch Casinos Limited. The purchase price was NZ$93.75 million and in October 2010 SKC bought an 8.6 % stake held by Invercargill businessman Louis Crimp’s Southern Equities, to take their holding to near 50%. In 2008 SKC bought a 5.2% stake off their then business partner the Crowne Plaza Hotel, taking their ownership interest in Christchurch Casino to 45.7%. With the 8.6% stake then SKC control the company with a 54.3% stake.
Coarse in his speech, nastily prejudiced and as braindead and disgusting as a gutter drunk Crimp prompted Brian Rudman to comment on his backing ACT and Don Brash who Crimp hoped would pursue anti Maori policies: http://m.nzherald.co.nz/brian-rudman-on-auckland/news/article.cfm?c_id=1502866&objectid=11280946 Mr Crimp, you may recall, donated the money after Don Brash seized control of Act. Recalling Dr Brash’s notorious 2004 Orewa speech as National Party leader, Mr Crimp was hopeful his cash would ensure his anti-Maori views would be pursued. But in a follow-up interview on TV, the eccentric Mr Crimp soon went off subject and asked interviewer Jane Luscombe whether she’d ever had sex against a tree!
His Southland Times obituary says:
Crimp, an Invercargill businessman, philanthropist, former city councillor, character and longstanding critic of the Invercargill Licensing Trust, died at his home at 9.20pm last night.
Memorial – He knew what he was agin.
edited
@Brian
Yes he seemed evil and venal. You notice that the Southland Times obit was short, not unkind, and called him eccentric. ( And I noted what his memorial could be.)
I think he had so much money that he managed to suck in a fair few amoral buddies, such as the ones he gathered together to have a go at the Council. But to sweeten the report that he had been dipping his fingers in the pokie till, I think he felt it would be good PR to donate large to St Johns and the SPCA. He would have won some kudos there for helping these perennially cash strapped groups.
I was amazed at how despicable he was, and only his money meant that he couldn’t be ignored. And how low ACT was and is, is exemplified by them taking from him. Though it was only $125,000 or so, not millions. I think he was careful that his ‘philanthropy’-investments were sure to bring him advantage.
How many, I wonder, of our political parties are being funded by people who are such misanthropists like him. He seemed to despise everyone really.
Speaking of tin foil, the real economic crisis is happening in the daily lives of ordinary NZers.
A gram and a half for 100 bucks!? It’s daylight robbery: five times the average price for a gram and, at something like $300 per ounce wholesale (likely cheaper in larger, commercial amounts), a profit of $90 untaxed and straight into the black market.
Has Phil Goff really come out in favour of building a waterfront stadium in Auckland?
Be very afraid Auckland ratepayers.
The favoured candidate for the Mayoralty appears to be choosing a campaign slogan which starts “We’ve got to waste a billion or two, we’ve got to waste a billion or two”.
Even Len’s choo-choo isn’t as stupid.
“ignorant of your own one”
Like hell I am. It doesn’t mean Auckland have to repeat mistakes do they?
That was one of those things where the main proponent, Fran Wilde, managed to get a “loan” out of the local bodies that was promised to be repaid. It never was of course because you never do make money out of such things.
Melbourne is an exception but they have about 50 AFL games a year at the MCG and another 50 at Etihad stadium. The crowds probably range from 25,000 to 90,000 for the club games and 100,000 for the finals.
The Wellington cost $130 million I believe. However it is sunk money and we certainly can’t sell it. After all, who would buy it? At least they didn’t consider putting a roof on it.
Could be worse of course. The Olympic Stadium in Sydney went broke and ended up being owned by the ANZ I believe. They were silly enough to make a loan on the thing.
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This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Gary Yohe, Henry Jacoby, Richard Richels, and Benjamin Santer Imagine a major climate change law passing the U.S. Congress unanimously? Don’t bother. It turns out that you don’t need to imagine it. Get this: The Global Change Research Act of 1990 was passed ...
“They’re here already! You’re next! You’re next! You’re next!”WHO CAN FORGET the penultimate scene of the 1956 movie classic, Invasion of the Body Snatchers? The wild-eyed doctor, stumbling down the highway, trying desperately to warn his fellow citizens: “They’re here already! You’re next! You’re next! You’re next!”Ostensibly science-fiction, the movie ...
TheOneRing.Net has got its paws on the official synopsis of the upcoming Amazon Tolkien TV series. It’s a development that brings to mind the line about Sauron deliberately releasing Gollum from the dungeons of Barad-dûr. Amazon knew exactly what they were doing here, in terms of drumming up publicity: ...
Since Dwight Eisenhower’s inauguration in 1953, US presidents have joined an informal club intended to provide support - and occasionally rivalry - between those few who have been ‘leaders of the free world’. Donald Trump, elected on a promise to ‘drain the swamp’ and a constant mocker of his predecessors, ...
For over a decade commentators have noted the rise of a new brand of explicitly ideological politics throughout the world. By this they usually refer to the re-emergence of national populism and avowedly illiberal approaches to governance throughout the “advanced” democratic community, but they also extend the thought to the ...
The US House of Representatives has just impeached Donald Trump, giving him the dubious honour of being the only US President to be impeached twice. Ten Republicans voted for impeachement, making it the most bipartisan impeachment ever. The question now is whether the Senate will rise to the occasion, and ...
Kieren Mitchell; Alice Mouton, Université de Liège; Angela Perri, Durham University, and Laurent Frantz, Ludwig Maximilian University of MunichThanks to the hit television series Game of Thrones, the dire wolf has gained a near-mythical status. But it was a real animal that roamed the Americas for at least 250,000 ...
Tide of tidal data rises Having cast our own fate to include rising sea level, there's a degree of urgency in learning the history of mean sea level in any given spot, beyond idle curiosity. Sea level rise (SLR) isn't equal from one place to another and even at a particular ...
Well, some of those chickens sure came home bigly, didn’t they… and proceeded to shit all over the nice carpet in the Capitol. What we were seeing here are societal forces that have long had difficulty trying to reconcile people to the “idea” of America and the reality of ...
In the wake of Donald Trump's incitement of an assault on the US capitol, Twitter finally enforced its terms of service and suspended his account. They've since followed that up with action against prominent QAnon accounts and Trumpers, including in New Zealand. I'm not unhappy with this: Trump regularly violated ...
Peter S. Ross, University of British ColumbiaThe Arctic has long proven to be a barometer of the health of our planet. This remote part of the world faces unprecedented environmental assaults, as climate change and industrial chemicals threaten a way of life for Inuit and other Indigenous and northern ...
Susan St John makes the case for taxing a deemed rate of return on excessive real estate holdings (after a family home exemption), to redirect scarce housing resources to where they are needed most. Read the full article here ...
I’m less than convinced by arguments that platforms like Twitter should be subject to common carrier regulation preventing them from being able to decide who to keep on as clients of their free services, and who they would not like to serve. It’s much easier to create competition for the ...
The hypocritical actions of political leaders throughout the global Covid pandemic have damaged public faith in institutions and governance. Liam Hehir chronicles the way in which contemporary politicians have let down the public, and explains how real leadership means walking the talk. During the Blitz, when German bombs were ...
Over the years, we've published many rebuttals, blog posts and graphics which came about due to direct interactions with the scientists actually carrying out the underlying research or being knowledgable about a topic in general. We'll highlight some of these interactions in this blog post. We'll start with two memorable ...
Yesterday we had the unseemly sight of a landleech threatening to keep his houses empty in response to better tenancy laws. Meanwhile in Catalonia they have a solution for that: nationalisation: Barcelona is deploying a new weapon in its quest to increase the city’s available rental housing: the power ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Jeff Masters, PhD The 2020 global wildfire season brought extreme fire activity to the western U.S., Australia, the Arctic, and Brazil, making it the fifth most expensive year for wildfire losses on record. The year began with an unprecedented fire event ...
NOTE: This is an excerpt from a digital story – read the full story here.Tess TuxfordKo te Kauri Ko Au, Ko te Au ko Kauri I am the kauri, the kauri is me Te Roroa proverb In Waipoua Forest, at the top of the North Island, New ...
Story of the Week... Toon of the Week... Coming Soon on SkS... Poster of the Week... SkS Week in Review... Story of the Week... Coming attraction: IPCC's upcoming major climate assessmentLook for more emphasis on 'solutions,' efforts by cities, climate equity ... and outlook for emissions cuts in ...
Ringing A Clear Historical Bell: The extraordinary images captured in and around the US Capitol Building on 6 January 2021 mirror some of the worst images of America's past.THERE IS A SCENE in the 1982 movie Missing which has remained with me for nearly 40 years. Directed by the Greek-French ...
To impact or not to impeach? I understand why some of those who are justifiably aghast at Trump’s behaviour over recent days might still counsel against impeaching him for a second time. To impeach him, they argue, would run the risk of making him a martyr in the eyes of ...
The Capitol Building, Washington DC, Wednesday, 6 January 2021. Oh come, my little one, come.The day is almost done.Be at my side, behold the sightOf evening on the land.The life, my love, is hardAnd heavy is my heart.How should I live if you should leaveAnd we should be apart?Come, let me ...
A chronological listing of news articles linked to on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week: Sun, Jan 3, 2021 through Sat, Jan 9, 2021Editor's ChoiceAfter the Insurrection: Accountability, Reform, and the Science of Democracy The poisonous lies and enablers of sedition--including Senator Hawley, pictured ...
This article, guest authored by Prof. Angela Gallego-Sala & Dr. Julie Loisel, was originally published on the Carbon Brief website on Dec 21, 2020. It is reposted below in its entirety. Click here to access the original article and comments. Peatlands Peatlands are ecosystems unlike any other. Perpetually saturated, their ...
The assault on the US Capitol and constitutional crisis that it has caused was telegraphed, predictable and yet unexpected and confusing. There are several subplots involved: whether the occupation of the Michigan State House in May was a trial run for the attacks on Congress; whether people involved in the ...
On Christmas Eve, child number 1 spotted a crack in a window. It’s a double-glazed window, and inspection showed that the small, horizontal crack was in the outermost pane. It was perpendicular to the frame, about three-quarters of the way up one side. The origins are a mystery. It MIGHT ...
Anne-Marie Broudehoux, Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM)Will the COVID-19 pandemic prompt a shift to healthier cities that focus on wellness rather than functional and economic concerns? This is a hypothesis that seems to be supported by several researchers around the world. In many ways, containment and physical distancing ...
Does the US need to strike a grand bargain with like-minded countries to pool their efforts? What does this tell us about today’s global politics? Perhaps the most remarkable editorial of last year was the cover leader of the London Economist on 19 November 2020. Shortly after Joe Biden was ...
Alexander Gillespie, University of Waikato and Valmaine Toki, University of WaikatoAotearoa New Zealand likes to think it punches above its weight internationally, but there is one area where we are conspicuously falling behind — the number of sites recognised by the UNESCO World Heritage Convention. Globally, there are 1,121 ...
An event organised by the Auckland PhilippinesSolidarity group Have a three-course lunch at Nanam Eatery with us! Help support the organic farming of our Lumad communities through the Mindanao Community School Agricultural Foundation. Each ticket is $50. Food will be served on shared plates. To purchase, please email phsolidarity@gmail.com or ...
"Abandon Hope All Ye Who Enter Here." Prisons are places of unceasing emotional and physical violence, unrelieved despair and unforgivable human waste.IT WAS NATIONAL’S Bill English who accurately described New Zealand’s prisons as “fiscal and moral failures”. On the same subject, Labour’s Dr Martyn Findlay memorably suggested that no prison ...
This is a re-post from Inside Climate News by Ilana Cohen. Inside Climate News is a nonprofit, independent news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for the ICN newsletter here. Whether or not people accept the science on Covid-19 and climate change, both global crises will have lasting impacts on health and ...
. . American Burlesque As I write this (Wednesday evening, 6 January), the US Presidential election is all but resolved, confirming Joe Biden as the next President of the (Dis-)United State of America. Trump’s turbulent political career has lasted just four years – one of the few single-term US presidents ...
A growing public housing waiting list and continued increase of house prices must be urgently addressed by Government, Green Party Co-leader Marama Davidson said today. ...
The Government has released its Public Housing Plan 2021-2024 which outlines the intention of where 8,000 additional public and transitional housing places announced in Budget 2020, will go. “The Government is committed to continuing its public house build programme at pace and scale. The extra 8,000 homes – 6000 public ...
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has congratulated President Joe Biden on his inauguration as the 46th President of the United States of America. “I look forward to building a close relationship with President Biden and working with him on issues that matter to both our countries,” Jacinda Ardern said. “New Zealand ...
A major investment to tackle wilding pines in Mt Richmond will create jobs and help protect the area’s unique ecosystems, Biosecurity Minister Damien O’Connor says. The Mt Richmond Forest Park has unique ecosystems developed on mineral-rich geology, including taonga plant species found nowhere else in the country. “These special plant ...
To further protect New Zealand from COVID-19, the Government is extending pre-departure testing to all passengers to New Zealand except from Australia, Antarctica and most Pacific Islands, COVID-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said today. “The change will come into force for all flights arriving in New Zealand after 11:59pm (NZT) on Monday ...
Bay Conservation Cadets launched with first intake Supported with $3.5 million grant Part of $1.245b Jobs for Nature programme to accelerate recover from Covid Cadets will learn skills to protect and enhance environment Environment Minister David Parker today welcomed the first intake of cadets at the launch of the Bay ...
The Prime Minister of New Zealand Jacinda Ardern and the Prime Minister of the Cook Islands Mark Brown have announced passengers from the Cook Islands can resume quarantine-free travel into New Zealand from 21 January, enabling access to essential services such as health. “Following confirmation of the Cook Islands’ COVID ...
Jobs for Nature funding is being made available to conservation groups and landowners to employ staff and contractors in a move aimed at boosting local biodiversity-focused projects, Conservation Minister Kiritapu Allan has announced. It is estimated some 400-plus jobs will be created with employment opportunities in ecology, restoration, trapping, ...
The Government has approved an exception class for 1000 international tertiary students, degree level and above, who began their study in New Zealand but were caught offshore when border restrictions began. The exception will allow students to return to New Zealand in stages from April 2021. “Our top priority continues ...
Today’s deal between Meridian and Rio Tinto for the Tiwai smelter to remain open another four years provides time for a managed transition for Southland. “The deal provides welcome certainty to the Southland community by protecting jobs and incomes as the region plans for the future. The Government is committed ...
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has appointed Anna Curzon to the APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC). The leader of each APEC economy appoints three private sector representatives to ABAC. ABAC provides advice to leaders annually on business priorities. “ABAC helps ensure that APEC’s work programme is informed by business community perspectives ...
The Government’s prudent fiscal management and strong policy programme in the face of the COVID-19 global pandemic have been acknowledged by the credit rating agency Fitch. Fitch has today affirmed New Zealand’s local currency rating at AA+ with a stable outlook and foreign currency rating at AA with a positive ...
The Government is putting in place a suite of additional actions to protect New Zealand from COVID-19, including new emerging variants, COVID-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said today. “Given the high rates of infection in many countries and evidence of the global spread of more transmissible variants, it’s clear that ...
$36 million of Government funding alongside councils and others for 19 projects Investment will clean up and protect waterways and create local jobs Boots on the ground expected in Q2 of 2021 Funding part of the Jobs for Nature policy package A package of 19 projects will help clean up ...
The commemoration of the 175th anniversary of the Battle of Ruapekapeka represents an opportunity for all New Zealanders to reflect on the role these conflicts have had in creating our modern nation, says Associate Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Kiri Allan. “The Battle at Te Ruapekapeka Pā, which took ...
Babies born with tongue-tie will be assessed and treated consistently under new guidelines released by the Ministry of Health, Associate Minister of Health Dr Ayesha Verrall announced today. Around 5% to 10% of babies are born with a tongue-tie, or ankyloglossia, in New Zealand each year. At least half can ...
The prisoner disorder event at Waikeria Prison is over, with all remaining prisoners now safely and securely detained, Corrections Minister Kelvin Davis says. The majority of those involved in the event are members of the Mongols and Comancheros. Five of the men are deportees from Australia, with three subject to ...
Travellers from the United Kingdom or the United States bound for New Zealand will be required to get a negative test result for COVID-19 before departing, and work is underway to extend the requirement to other long haul flights to New Zealand, COVID-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins confirmed today. “The new PCR test requirement, foreshadowed last ...
Tara Ward hands out her first impression roses as she dives deep into the sea of single men vying to win The Bachelorette NZ’s heart. While the world burns in a searing fireball of unpredictability, we can take comfort in the fact that some things never change. The heart still yearns, ...
In its Thursday editorial the NZ Herald speaks an important truth: “Investment important to stay on track”. This won’t have startled its more literate readers but in its text it notes the strong result in the latest Global Dairy Trade auction, which prompted Westpac to raise its forecast for dairy ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Craig Mark, Professor, Faculty of International Studies, Kyoritsu Women’s University With the spread of COVID-19 steadily worsening in Japan since the onset of winter — daily records for infections and deaths continue to be broken — the fate of the Tokyo Summer ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adam Taylor, Early Career Research Leader, Emerging Viruses, Inflammation and Therapeutics Group, Menzies Health Institute Queensland, Griffith University All eyes are on COVID-19 vaccines, with Australia’s first expected to be approved for use shortly. But their development in record time, without compromising ...
Yesterday’s government announcement on new state housing is a pathetic response to the biggest housing crisis in New Zealand since the 1940s. At a time when the country needs an industrial-scale state house building programme, the government ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Obadiah Mulder, PhD Candidate in Computational Biology, University of Southern California Australia is in the midst of tropical cyclone season. As we write, a cyclone is forming off Western Australia’s Pilbara coast, and earlier in the week Queenslanders were bracing for a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lynette Vernon, School of Education – VC Research Fellow, Edith Cowan University When the holidays end, barring a fresh outbreak of COVID-19, teenagers across Australia will head back to school. Some will bounce out of bed well before the alarm goes off, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Richard Holden, Professor of Economics, UNSW In an age of hyperpartisan politics, the Biden presidency offers a welcome centrism that might help bridge the divides. But it is also Biden’s economic centrism that offers a chance to cut through what has become ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gary Mortimer, Professor of Marketing and Consumer Behaviour, Queensland University of Technology Twenty years ago, on January 25 2001, a virtually unknown German supermarket chain quietly opened its first stores in Australia. The two stores – one in Sydney’s inner-west suburb of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Liz Giuffre, Senior Lecturer in Communication, University of Technology Sydney Bluey is easily the most successful Australian television show of the last decade. A record-breaking success for its local broadcaster the ABC, as well as production partners BBC Studios and Screen Australia, ...
*This article first appeared on RNZ and is republished with permissionIt will take $3 million to clean up 1 million litres of abandoned toxic waste from a property in Ruakaka - three times more than the last big chemical clean-up undertaken by government agencies A two-year mission to clean up 1 million ...
*This article first appeared on RNZ and is republished with permission. The action Biden took on just his first afternoon in office demonstrates a radical shift in priority for the US when it comes to its efforts to combat the climate crisis. It could put more pressure on New Zealand to step up. ...
Ban Bomb Day event at the New Brighton Pier, 9am, on January 22nd, 2021 January 22nd, 2021, marks the first day the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) Enters into Force and becomes international law. Aotearoa NZ is one of the ...
This week's biggest-selling New Zealand books, as recorded by the Nielsen BookScan New Zealand bestseller list and described by Steve BrauniasFICTION 1 Tell Me Lies by J.P. Pomare (Hachette, $29.99) Every January, there's a new best-selling crime thriller by the New Zealand-born author who lives in Melbourne. Pomare is ...
Our approach so far in trying to end what Dr Collin Tukuitonga describes as a 'racist' disease - rheumatic fever - has not worked. It's time we try something new, he writes. Acute rheumatic fever and the rheumatic heart disease it causes, long-known as a disease of poverty, is a blight on ...
New Zealand triple-code star, Anna Harrison, can't stop returning to the courts - whether it's netball or beach volleyball. She tells Ashley Stanley what keeps drawing her back. The day before Anna Harrison leaps back into netball, she will have one more hit-out at another of her favourite old sports ...
The lights are burning into the night at the New York Yacht Club's America's Cup base as they race to fix their damaged boat. And Suzanne McFadden discovers something surprising may emerge. Out of American Magic’s calamity may come opportunity - for even more speed. While the lights burn bright ...
New to sailing? With the Prada Cup resuming this weekend, here’s how to bluff your way into sounding like a pro. When I was 10, my mum made my brother and I join the local sailing club. It was a favourite pastime of families in Kerikeri, and my brother was actually ...
A formal complaint to the UN, signed by a NZ Muslim group, says France’s Islamophobic laws and policies are entrenching discrimination and breaching human rights laws. The Khadija Leadership Network has joined a global coalition of Muslim organisations to formally complain about the French government’s systemic entrenchment of Islamophobia and discrimination against ...
Summer reissue: Join Michèle A’Court, Alex Casey, Leonie Hayden and a lineup of incredibly successful New Zealand women as they confront their imposter syndrome once and for all. First published 20 October, 2020. Independent journalism depends on you. Help us stay curious in 2021. The Spinoff’s journalism is funded by its members ...
With criticism from National piling on over the property market, the prime minister has detailed when the government will make housing announcements. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Marco Rizzi, Senior Lecturer in Law, University of Western Australia Some Australians could be receiving a COVID-19 vaccine within weeks. Amid the continued spread of the virus and emergence of highly contagious variants, the federal government has accelerated the start of the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Euan Ritchie, Professor in Wildlife Ecology and Conservation, Centre for Integrative Ecology, School of Life & Environmental Sciences, Deakin University Australia’s Threatened Species Strategy — a five-year plan for protecting our imperilled species and ecosystems — fizzled to an end last year. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Arosha Weerakoon, Lecturer, General Dentist & PhD Candidate, The University of Queensland Baby teeth, or milk teeth, act like lighthouses to guide the adult ones to their correct destination. A baby tooth will become wobbly and fall out because the adult tooth ...
Business is Boring is a weekly podcast series presented by The Spinoff in association with Callaghan Innovation. Host Simon Pound speaks with innovators and commentators focused on the future of New Zealand. This week he’s joined by Simon Coley, co-founder of All Good and Karma Drinks.Bananas are one of the ...
Tackling topics such as rugby and body image, Stuff’s latest podcast shines a much-needed light on Aotearoa’s complex relationship with masculinity, writes Trevor McKewen, author of the book Real Men Wear Black.I wasn’t sure what to think when two episodes of the new local podcast He’ll Be Right landed in ...
The Rainforest Alliance reveals that 68%* of Kiwis say the COVID-19 pandemic has made them more conscious about environmental and social sustainability issues. Seventy two percent* state that they have been trying to make more sustainable purchasing ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tama Leaver, Professor of Internet Studies, Curtin University The inventor of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners-Lee, has raised concerns that Australia’s proposed News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code could fundamentally break the internet as we know it. His concerns ...
ANALYSIS:By Scott Lucas, University of Birmingham Politics doesn’t have to be a raging fire destroying everything in its path Two weeks after the storming of the US Capitol by the followers of his predecessor, in the middle of an out-of-control pandemic that has killed more than 400,000 ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Cantrell, Lecturer, Creative Writing & English Literature, University of Southern Queensland Described as “the world’s greatest storyteller”, Roald Dahl is frequently ranked as the best children’s author of all time by teachers, authors and librarians. However, the new film adaptation of ...
Peak housing body, Community Housing Aotearoa (CHA) welcomes the updated Public Housing Plan announced today by Minister Woods, and the commitment by this Government to fix New Zealand’s housing crisis. The 8,000 additional homes are a significant ...
Having recently walked much of the South Island stretch of Te Araroa, Kirsten O’Regan reflects on the magnificent landscapes and interesting characters she encountered along the way.On our 36th day of walking, we climb through the fire-blackened hills above Ohau, stopping to examine heat-disfigured trail markers. Fresh green shoots have ...
Miss Torta in central Auckland is putting the spotlight on a snack that’s commonplace in Mexico, but until now relatively unknown in New Zealand.You’ve heard of a torta, but what is it, exactly? Well, depending on the cuisine it can mean a flatbread, cake, tart, sweet pie, savoury pie or ...
Two of three ministerial statements from the Beehive have been released in the name of the PM over the past two days. The more important, insofar as it involves political action that will affect the wellbeing of significant numbers of Kiwis, was the release of the government’s Public Housing Plan ...
Jacinda Ardern has reminded Labour MPs "ongoing vigilance" will be required in 2021 to avoid another Covid outbreak, admitting she held her breath over the summer break. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Zareh Ghazarian, Senior Lecturer, School of Social Sciences, Monash University Despite many young Australians having a deep interest in political issues, most teenagers have a limited understanding about their nation’s democratic system. Results from the 2019 National Assessment Program – Civics and ...
Pinged $65 for overstaying 10 minutes in a parking block? Put away your hard-earned cash and read this first.Hopefully, by now, I’ve already established myself at The Spinoff as the resident tightarse, determined to avoid all unfair and unnecessary punishments (see: oversize baggage charges). Today, I’m focusing my attention on ...
Nuclear weapons states and their allies risk reputational ruin if they flout a new UN Treaty, Carolina Panico argues The United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons will come into force this month, on January 22, 2021, turning nuclear weapons into illegal objects. It is an achievement that ...
How does one turn into a rabid extremist over the description of a children’s bike? Emily Writes looks at Facebook comments so you don’t have to.You’ve been there, I know it. You’re scrolling along, trying to avoid QAnon conspiracy theories and Trump apocalypse memes when a story catches your eye. ...
Joe Biden is now the President of the United States and many people across America and throughout the world will consequently be breathing more easily. But while the erratic, unpredictable and irresponsible years of the Trump Presidency may be over, ...
Tough border testing for New Zealand honey imports to Japan is re-igniting the conversation about the use of the weed killer glypohsate in New Zealand. ...
The Taxpayers Union should be aware of the law and of the history of ACC. The ACC is a legal system introduced in 1974 to replace the common law right of accident victims to sue for damages for personal injury sustained as a result of negligence ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Denis Muller, Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Advancing Journalism, University of Melbourne Terrorism, political extremism, Donald Trump, social media and the phenomenon of “cancel culture” are confronting journalists with a range of agonising free-speech dilemmas to which there are no easy answers. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nial Wheate, Associate Professor of the Sydney Pharmacy School, University of Sydney You’ve just come from your monthly GP appointment with a new script for your ongoing medical condition. But your local pharmacy is out of stock of your usual medicine. Your ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Deanna D’Alessandro, Professor & ARC Future Fellow, University of Sydney On Wednesday this week, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was measured at at 415 parts per million (ppm). The level is the highest in human history, and is growing ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Renwick, Professor, Physical Geography (climate science), Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington It might be summer in New Zealand but we’re in for some wild weather this week with forecasts of heavy wind and rain, and a plunge in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Zareh Ghazarian, Senior Lecturer, School of Social Sciences, Monash University Despite many young Australians having a deep interest in political issues, most teenagers have a limited understanding about their nation’s democratic system. Results from the 2019 National Assessment Program – Civics and ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle O’Shea, Senior Lecturer, School of Business, Western Sydney University Last week, the McIver’s Ladies Baths in Sydney came under fire for their (since removed) policy stating “only transgender women who’ve undergone a gender reassignment surgery are allowed entry”. The policy was ...
There are good grounds for optimism after the guardrails of American democracy held firm through to Joe Biden's inauguration today as President, writes Stephen Hoadley Pessimism abounds about the perilous condition of American democracy. Commentators and headline writers proffer memes such as ‘broken and divided nation’, ‘the threat from within’. ...
*This article was originally appeared on RNZ and is republished with permission. Donald Trump will forever be remembered as the president who was impeached twice - and for his rhetoric that struck a chord so deep in America that it will take years to dissipate. Donald Trump leaves Washington with the lowest approval ...
A new plan shows how and where the Government will build 8,000 new state housing places it funded in Budget 2020, Marc Daalder reports Jacinda Ardern has kicked off the political year with a major announcement, promising hundreds of new state housing places in regional centres across the country. With ...
This is the full transcript of President Joe Biden's speech after being sworn in at his inauguration this morning in Washington DC Chief Justice Roberts, Vice President Harris, Speaker Pelosi, Leader Schumer, Leader McConnell, Vice President Pence, and my distinguished guests, my fellow Americans, this is America's day. This ...
Analysis: President Donald Trump has left the White House, and his deputy chief of staff confirms he is withdrawing his candidacy to lead the OECD. New Zealander Christopher Liddell withdrew his nomination to be Secretary-General of the powerful 37-member OECD and was one of the last members of the Trump Administration to depart ...
Kate Wills is facing stage four cancer with the same fierce approach she takes into her ocean swimming - never say can't. Even on the mornings Kate Wills feels wretched from her fortnightly chemotherapy treatment, she drags herself up at 5am and goes swimming. “I have to. It’s my job – to ...
Some costs associated with meetings speak for themselves, others are less conspicuous. Victoria University of Wellington's Val Hooper lays those costs out, making suggestions on where we can rein them in. Meetings – when last did we count the costs? And so it’s back to work and one of the ...
Andrew Paul Wood assesses the best-selling picture book by Grahame Sydney It's no great secret the commercially very successful Grahame Sydney has a long-standing beef that his work doesn’t receive more critical and institutional approval. I sympathise about the lack of critical attention, but I can understand why. The Discourse™ ...
This story was produced in collaboration with the Center for Public Integrity and Columbia Journalism Investigations. It was originally published by Public Integrity, Mother Jones, The Arizona Republic and Orlando Sentinel. It is republished here as part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the ...
Analysis: It has been easy to ignore anyone daring to criticise or even question any aspect of the government’s Covid-19 response. Their voices have rarely been heard, and when they have been raised they have been quickly and decisively howled down by the favoured coterie of academics. ...
Welcome to The Spinoff’s US presidential inauguration live blog: inauguration news, analysis and reaction, updated through Wednesday and Thursday. The inauguration ceremony begins at 5.15am Thursday, NZ time, and Joe Biden takes the oath of office around 6am. 7.25am: And what about Trump?In the early hours of this morning, NZ ...
In 10 x 100, we survey a group of 100 people via Stickybeak and ask them 10 questions. Last month we quizzed Wellingtonians. Today, we ask NZ drivers how they’ve found a holiday period without international tourists, and what they get up to while they’re on the road.Across Aotearoa roads ...
Emmanuel Macron's anti-separatist policies have garnered backlash from the international Muslim community. Now, a global coalition has complained to the UN. ...
Summer reissue: Join Michèle A’Court, Alex Casey and Leonie Hayden as they go on an odyssey of women’s rage, and find out how we can channel our anger into good. First published September 15, 2020.Independent journalism depends on you. Help us stay curious in 2021. The Spinoff’s journalism is funded by ...
By Lorraine Ecarma in Cebu City The University of the Philippines Visayas (UPV) will continue to stand against any threats to human rights, chancellor Clement Camposano has declared in response to the termination of a long-standing accord preventing military incursion on campus. In a Facebook post, Camposano said the academic ...
ANALYSIS:By Jennifer S. Hunt, Australian National University Every four years on January 20, the US exercises a key tenant of democratic government: the peaceful transfer of power. This year, the scene looks a bit different. If the last US presidential inauguration in 2017 debuted the phrase “alternative facts”, the ...
By Lulu Mark in Port Moresby In spite of Papua New Guinea’s mandatory mask-wearing requirement under the National Pandemic Act 2020, many public servants attending a dedication service in Port Moresby have failed to wear one. They were issued masks before entering the Sir John Guise Indoor Complex but took ...
February breaks global temperature records by ‘shocking’ amounthttps://www.theguardian.com/science/2016/mar/14/february-breaks-global-temperature-records-by-shocking-amount
Milk continues its slide
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/rural/299027/global-dairy-prices-drop-overnight
And the Herald thinks the goings on in the Bachelor are more important
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=11606103
Well, you know, we came marching out of Africa just not that long ago and spread around the globe, wiping out fellow species of human and Neanderthal on the way, reaching the farthest reaches like NZ in just the last millennium and ever since then we have just thickened up and thickened up until the current point where the natural environment is beginning to creak and break up, while we continue to thicken until, well, the natural environment is on the way to being in zoos only and we are as thick as ants crawling all over the entire place. This is the history and this is the future surely until some catastrophe wreaks havoc on the populace and the planet.
what else can there be?
I don’t know, but I think we can be better as a species than the trivial, ignorant, self-centred, vacuous, unthinking and reactive model encouraged by the Herald.
+1 And we often are better than that. The Herald is an aberration.
No, that’s actually how the right-wing actually view things. They think that a dystopia is all we can ever hope to achieve and thus they only ever look out for #1 thus causing the dystopian vision that they have.
That’s not what I was saying.
I was pointing out that the views of the NZHerald aren’t an aberration. That it’s simply how RWNJs think.
So what were you saying?
That the culture at the herald is an aberration of humans.
That the culture at the herald is an aberration of humans.
I agree with you that we can be better, but we won’t be.
We can be better. Unfortunately it seems to me that humanity is at its best when things are at their worst.
Unfortunately the movie idiocracy is rapidly becoming a reality
The NZ Wood Council says the free trade agreement with China is not working, they’ve been hit with multiple tariffs which make it hard to compete with China’s domestic wood product.
So much for free trade. Looking forward to TPP, anyone?
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/299028/china-accused-of-unfair-play-on-forestry
+1 amirite
Oh, good – means that we can save our forests, use the wood to build houses in NZ instead and rebuild our saw-milling industry.
Yup however its a japanese company doing a fair amount of the extraction currently from mills in kaitaia, masterton and gisborne.
New Zealand will never solve its problems until it abandons neoliberalism and globalism.
Free trade deals are killing this country.
The political and business elite who work against the long term interests of their own people are killing this country.
Because the political and business elite do not think in terms on nationality, unless it serves their purposes to do so. The non-elite have more in common with their equivalents in other countries than they do the rich and powerful from their own countries.
+1
@ CV They are not even political or business elite – they are often just dumbo opportunists, un convicted white collar crims, or people with psychological disorders who just happened to have stumbled onto being able to control a country like some sort of public school, bully boy fiefdom with no rules having paid the MSM off.
I mean can we call Slater, Key, Brownlee, Bennett, Collins, English – political and business elite???
If they win another election, it will be like Lord of the Flies.
I actually blame the opposition too, if you can’t defeat these people and actually join forces against bullies for your own self presevation and get a few policies going that are reasonable and benefit most people and are relevant, what the F is going on?
Just copy Bernie Sanders, not only his policies but how to write and articulate them.
The opposition need to stop going on about pet issues, but start to articulate a bigger picture.
https://berniesanders.com/issues/
+100 saveNZ
+1 Paul
Free trade is really just turning into litegatious trade, where bigger and more wealthy parties win and stall all fights so that the little partners have to back down or spend all their time and money trying to fight. In short, it will just stall trade and innovation for NZ.
None of it bodes well.
With any agreement the detail is the most important. We all know ‘details’ or ‘potential consequences’ have never been a strong point with this government.
They can’t even get a convention centre or a supercity working or even public transport going. Lordy keep them away from exports.
They are like babes in the woods (but not so innocent) with economy and trade.
Would you let a bunch of 7 year olds loose with your ATM card, unlimited power to screw up a country and casks of wine? Pretty much Groser on the free trade trail with Fed farmers in tow. All being championed along by a currency speculator with zero scruples known as the smiling assassin, who gets off on making people redundant.
+1
The Free-trade deals are killing the world.
“A SHOCK JOCK who is politically WAY out of his depth.”
Did Toni Street take advice from Janet Wilson before she executed
Monday’s exquisite live-on-air attack on Mike “Contra” Hosking?
Seven Sharp, Television One, Monday 14 March 2016
The glib little homilies scheduled for the end of each episode of Television One’s godawful Seven Sharp are usually not worth the wait. If it’s not thirty seconds of something banal, it’s something infuriating, like Mike “Contra” Hosking boasting, contrary to all evidence, how he gave Nicky Hager a “hard time”. [1] Anyone who actually makes a point of listening to them is either (a) bored, (b) stupid, ( c) bewildered, or (d) an aficionado of the dismal.
Tonight, however, the closing homilies followed an item that was actually interesting—about a dive bomb competition in Taupo. That’s why I was still watching when it came time for the sub-Father Ted routines. After the item was finished, Hosking’s offsider Toni Street stared at the camera, pausing just a little longer than would be comfortable. Then she delivered something she had clearly been planning for a long time: she let Hosking—and the viewers—know exactly what she thought of him.
But she could not afford to criticize him directly, of course; instead, she followed the time-honored tradition of criticizing someone who exhibits identical characteristics to the actual object of her scorn. [2] So to have a go at Hosking, she had to find a substitute target to attack. Who could be out there with a level of arrogance, pomposity, shallowness and overbearing conceitedness that approaches that of Mike Hosking?
After that tense extended pause at the end of the dive-bombing item, Toni Street launched her remarkable little insurrection. She began by talking about Megan Kelly, the Fox News broadcaster who suffered a nasty public attack by Donald Trump last year. Noting with satisfaction that Megan Kelly was now more popular than she had ever been, Street paused again, and then said this….
TONI STREET: The increase in her ratings indicates the support for someone who can out Donald Trump for what he is: a shock jock who is politically way out of his depth. …..
At the end of that remarkable little hatchet job, its victim immediately began thirty seconds of pedestrian and ill-informed comment about something else. He showed no apparent signs of appreciating he’d just been (metaphorically) tarred, feathered and kicked in the arse by someone who really despises him.
[1] http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-15032015/#comment-985614
[2] What made it so effective was that Toni Street maintained her composure throughout. She wielded the hatchet with exemplary coolness. Media junkies will no doubt remember Janet Wilson’s far more hysterical hatchet job on her husband three years ago….
So you support Hillary
@Adam +100 – that is very funny!!! Someone should show it to NZ media and the Labour party.
+100..Great !…thanks…that really is a good humorous expose on Hillary Clinton…although he didnt get into the more sinister stuff of what she did in Libya
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/03/13/exposing-libyan-agenda-closer-look-hillarys-emails
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/01/13/what-hillary-knew-about-libya
I see Paula Bennett has figured out how to respond to the dairy crisis.
single mums, the worlds most dangerous being
and then there is this – but I am sure the rock star economy will provide with well paying jobs for these soon to be unemployed people.
I wonder what happened to the 700+ people that lost their jobs with Fonterra a few month back, wonder if they are back into work?
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=11606127
Quote: “Unfortunately for the majority of the 3300 staff who were employed by Dick Smith, there’s probably zero chance of Kogan reviving any of the 393 physical stores in Australia and New Zealand. The deal was for the online stores only, plus the Dick Smith brand and its associated intellectual property.
Which is not to say that Kogan won’t open any stores. The retail entrepreneur was originally vehemently opposed to physical stores in favour of online shopping, but admitted in December last year that that absolute stance was wrong, and opened a pop-up shop in Melbourne’s posh Prahran. Kogan might just have to work out how to create a profitable physical presence to bring in the cash, as the online Dick Smith will be just a fraction of the size of the old company.” Quote end
Then the government should probably stop taking a hundred million dollar dividend from HNZ every year.
OH MY GOD !!!
Just saw a post that George wrote about me last night … with people like Rachinger chiming in with their opinions about me.
It’s mostly bull-shit and it is a very carefully manipulated piece of text.
I said last week that I thought Pete George was losing it … and I still think it.
As for Rachinger … everybody will see soon enough who he really is.
The stats on YourNZ have dropped recently … so George won’t be happy about that.
Good to know that in my absence … I am still useful to him as “Click-Bait” fodder. LOL.
That post of Georges just gets better and better … because Rachinger has accused me of being an alcoholic and Kitty Catkin has basically said that I suffer from Multiple Personality Disorder … and George and others believe that I am in cahoots with their mortal enemy. LOL.
http://yournz.org/2016/03/15/mike-c-and-lf/
Audrey writes another anti-Little piece. Poorly written and ambiguous really.
Except for this quote,
“But a tweet by Labour MP Iain Lees-Galloway summed up Labour’s view of Key as “a complete and utter banker”.
Naughty Iain!
What got me was her assertion that Labour have lost on the TPP front because of all the tariffs it drops. Really? we got a list of this amazing tariff smashing TPP does? cause from what I remember it was incredibly limited.
Audrey is a moll troll. Can’t be said any other way sorry. The National Party is in her bones and everything. And fittingly given that she is the Political Editor of The Harold.
Good cooperative Left Opposition work in Parliament yesterday..despite the noise and heckling:
Winston Peters in parliament asks John Key:
Why Is the government blocking a free trade deal with Russia?
Why is the government pouring massive taxpayer support into the Hollywood film industry, Skycity Casino, Rio Tinto and now the TPPA campaign ?
(…when the Democratic and Republican campaign leadership in the United States think it is a REAL DOG…and a big corporate protection racket against the interests of their workers and farmers)
Andrew Little asks John Key:
Whose side is the PM on?… the dairy farmers?… or the banks?
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/inparliament/audio/201793289/today-in-parliament-for-15-march-2016-evening-edition
“Scrappy start to the week with John Key and Winston Peters having a right honourable stoush, each accusing the other of misleading the House and demanding an apology. The Speaker, David Carter, was having none of that and was repeatedly back on his feet restoring order. Questions for the prime minister were dominated by the pressure on dairy farmers from lower milk prices and servicing bank loans.”
Notice that Winston did not say it was Key who spoke of the $5billion. He asked about the reported comments of two Ministers re the $5billion. Key deflected all that by accusing Winston of “misleading the House.” Carter refused Winston the right to re-read his question which would have defeated Key’s deflection. Funny that!
Michael Hill want the Queenstown basin all for himself and other rich people, nobody else.
That other wanker Sam Neill wanted pretty much the same a few years ago.
They want to stop all the huge development that has taken place already to accommodate them and their silly big houses, and have no more happen. They want to very selfishly pull up the ladder – quelle surprise…
http://www.stuff.co.nz/travel/news/77806483/cap-tourists-and-development-to-keep-arrowtown-special–sir-michael-hill
Well I suggest one way to do this is to require, in fact, a reversal of development to make the place like it was, with even less people than now. That would improve the place even more, according to Michael Hill’s logic.
So legislate and regulate to require that every time one of these wankers wishes to sell their silly big homes, or passes on to the afterlife, their property is required to be sold solely for farming and other non-residential type activities… that should see it right ….
Seriously, what planet do these rich bastards live on? They are actually divorced from reality
Queenstown provides a centre for investment and tourism in southern NZ and is a blessing to some extent to preserve the region when Dairy goes down, till Sheep fight their way up more, Beef can perhaps keep going, and Bluff doesn’t have oysters killed by that disease.
No more housing for the wealthy in Queenstown as suggested by Sam Neill would be good. But attractive small apartments for the workers at reasonable rents close to Queenstown, with shuttle buses at very reasonable cost, would be of value. That is what is needed and if they have a council that isn’t run by Mini-Cooper type people, then that will be what is presently being planned and implemented. Bets anyone?
Thinking out loud….Big lies and flawed models:
Money Supply:
Currency isn’t expanded to account for growth, debt is expanded to match demand.
Banks do not expand money supply, they extend temporary credit based on demand to enable transactions.
Once the transaction has been completed and credit repaid the supplied credit zeros out and creases to exist.
Banks have been positioned to supply virtually all currency to enable all financial transactions, this basically means they take a percentage cut off the top of all production. This is the cost of doing business, and is inflation.
The current system relies on all wealth created being a result of work done.
Wealth created outside of production; non productive wealth creation can only be payed for by destroying wealth for another sector of the economy.
Instead of the pie getting bigger, the pie gets cut into smaller slices, borrowers and those without appreciating assets effected the most.
The pie did actually increase, that increase remaining with the wealthy and being the difference between the government stated inflation and true inflation.
And that is how it works, the government, the elite and the banks working together to transfer wealth from production to the lords and masters, the banks facilitating the theft and government either to stupid or corrupt to care.
Additionally:
In a consumer society where the consumers only product is their time, as technology improves and populations increase the consumer has less to trade, thus less demand/ ability to consume, which means less credit supplied by the banks, which kills businesses and eventually threatens the wealthy, hence the need for a UBI.
Some time ago I said Putin was a great man! I was mocked as having a wet dream! 🙁
But events have born me out:
1. He’s restored Russia’s sovereignty and self respect after the neoliberal trashing under Yeltsin.
2. His military intervention in Syria has produced the beginnings of peace with most of the actors willing to talk with each other for the first time compared to the U$ and Anglo and Turkish behaviour of pouring gasoline onto a raging fire.
3. He has exposed the Neocon Warshington war criminals for all who can be bothered to notice. And the western presstitute media that has relentlessly demonised and slandered him.
4. We may,it’s hoped get peace in the Ukraine eventually.
Don’t omit the murders of Politkovskaya, Litvinenko and Nemtsov, or of the civilian passengers of MH17, the civilians in the Moscow Theatre gassing, and many many more. Putin is a scumbag of epic proportions.
Hi Stuart
MH17 has conclusively been shown to have been caused by the U$ backed Ukrainians, that Putin had anything to do with this atrocity is another slander of the western presstitute media.http://www.globalresearch.ca/meet-the-pilot-who-shot-down-malaysian-boeing-mh-17-vladislav-voloshin-the-plane-was-in-the-wrong-place-at-the-wrong-time/5421363
Nonsense – and that is why the Dutch investigators found conclusively against Russia.
If you’re interested in the facts most of them are here:
https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2015/10/08/mh17-the-open-source-evidence/
http://www.goodfellow.com/E/Tin-Foil.html
Just because the US involvement in the Ukraine was exceedingly seedy doesn’t give them godlike powers to rearrange events – or they’d do a better job. It would be better if the US were not involved – but it was Russia that shot down MH17. There is an abundance of physical evidence, and no evidence that bears scrutiny to the contrary.
The aircraft nonsense is largely discredited due to the lack of cannon damage in the debris. But equally important are the plethora of false stories Russian official sources serially released as they grasped desperately at straws to cover up their act of mass murder.
I agree, Stuart. I replied in the wrong place.
Stuart M
Scumbags of a determined character rise to the top when a nation’s systems of governance break down. They also can ooze through when there are pauses in the regular flow of society such as happens in USA. What caused Ronald Reagan to get up there, followed by Margaret Thatcher etc.? I forget. But they ooze upwards at cracks at pressure points like Christchurch liquefaction.
Putin might be the right person to be where he is with his KGB knowledge and ability to outmaneouvre others at home and those sly ones abroad. It’s considered that the Middle East scumbags removed by the USA scumbags, were preferable to the new ones. These days it is a time for pragmatism, go for the best scumbags available now, and work for 80% improvement, knowing that getting even 40% would be thankfully welcomed.
Perhaps we should have a popular vote on greatest scumbags since WW2.
Pot Pot and gang must be up there. Then who gassed people in their homes in the Middle East with one that would flow to the lowest point and be effective in cellars where women and children would be hiding?
+100 johnm
johnm, here is Pussy Riot to sing to you, why you are wrong.
A black man goes to a Trump rally.
“The worst part was when their venom turned toward me,” Troup wrote. “There were protestors around me who got ushered out, and then people started pointing at me, motioning for the Secret Service to ‘get him out of there.’ Now mind you, I hadn’t uttered a single word the entire rally, but people still said things like ‘Well what about this one? He needs to go too!’”
Ultimately, Troup left the event feeling as if he’d witnessed something darker and more insidious than a simple political rally.
“At that rally, I saw the scary underbelly of America I saw unadulterated hate, fueled by intentional misinformation,” Troup said. “These people who, just 2 hours ago, seemed like good and kind people, were now cheering for blood.”
http://fusion.net/story/280795/donald-trump-dayton-rally/
It will be interesting if Anonymous can find anything incriminating on Trump …more than what we already know…(eg are there any hidden emails and secret associations and agendas like Hillary Clinton had in her closet)
‘Anonymous declares ‘total war’ on Trump, plans April attack (VIDEO)’
https://www.rt.com/usa/335725-anonymous-total-war-trump/
Today is a BFD – 691 Democrat delegates and 358 Republican delegates are up for grabs.
AP Eastern U.S. Verified account
@APEastRegion
As the polls begin to close, a quick reminder of what’s at stake in tonight’s primary elections. #Elections2016
edit: forgot the results/tracker
http://www.politico.com/2016-election/results/map/president
http://www.politico.com/2016-election/results/delegate-count-tracker
Interesting how spelling can get confused these days with all our aids. I see two ways to spell Sir Tipene O’Reagan/ O’Regan. Willie Jackson should know how to spell Sir Douglas Graham’s name after all the Maori Treaty negotiations yet it is Graeme in this article.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/local-blogs/willie-jackson/8338152/Different-rules-for-Maori-and-Pakeha
But the article is interesting itself, worth a read. Sounds factual as might be expected from someone of the Jackson family, with a high position in Maori matters.
He writes about the tribe that have control of Lake Taupo wanting a fee of $58,000 from the Ironman contest for using it. He points out that the Ironman contest is an $800,000 event.
And this next quote is one of the angry, dismissive, racist comments at the end of the article. With all the efforts that NZ has made to get a better understanding of the unpleasant start of this colony, and the shameful behaviour adopted by businessmen/land speculators with an armed gang to back them, this reaction is more frequent than we thought possible. I went on to background the late Louis Crimp who was a Maori hater, and to read about him gives insight into the type of person that befouls good attempts to provide some reparation and set NZ up as a country of justice, fairness and equality.
What a shame the Ironman New Zealand organisers lack the mettle of their competitors.
What a shame they agreed to bribe the tribe.
What a shame they did not reply to the Tuwharetoa extortion demand of $58,000 thus:
“Dear tribe,
“Get stuffed.
“We refuse to pay you so much as a bent cent to swim in our largest lake.
“And it is our lake. Not your lake. It belongs to us. All of us.
“All the people of New Zealand.
In the item Jackson refers to John Ansell, who was connected with ACT. (But the Louis Crimp item below says Ansell left ACT – Advertising guru John Ansell quit the party after adverts he designed asking Kiwis if they were “Fed up with the Maorification of Everything” were cancelled.)
Willie Jackson commented on him:
He’s running the Treaty Gate project where he accuses all and sundry of telling lies over New Zealand’s history and relationship with Maori.
He clearly puts little value on Maori culture and his main financial backer has been Invercargill millionaire Louis Crimp, who last year claimed most Pakeha despise Maori.
Louis Crimp was a multi millionaire, now dead. He was one of a group of old white men whose blood has turned to vinegar, and who appear to have little left in life but to hold onto all their money, and their little energy goes to putting the Maori in his or her lower place than their high chairs. I saw them in full flow during the Constitution Conversations a year or so ago.
About Louis Crimp ACT supporter to John Ansell:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10806938
The biggest donor to the Act Party says he gave the money to Don Brash and John Banks so they could stop special treatment for Maori who were “either in jail or on welfare”.
In an extraordinary interview with the Weekend Herald, Louis Crimp said he believed he had the support of Brash, Banks and other “white New Zealanders”.
Mr Crimp made the largest financial contribution to the Act Party for the 2011 election with a $125,520 donation.
Crimp said in another interview:
http://www.nbr.co.nz/article/two-hours-louis-crimp-ck-126301
“I can’t smile properly because my face is petrified, it doesn’t move, it’s paralysed because I had cancer. I can only smile with one side. So I’ve just got a grimace.”
Mr Crimp has made millions through his various property ventures, and has gained many supporters in Invercargill for his charitable donations, including more than $1 million each to the SPCA and the St John Ambulance Service….
Mr Crimp says that from an early age he has was forced to “watch [his] pennies. I was the oldest boy in Southland who had a paper run, at the age of 16, because we were poor, my family”.
His income? Derived from housing – rented to Maori gang and then evicted them.
Derived from pokies, which he could rail against or utilise takings of at random:
Mr Crimp is in no position to rail, with any integrity, against the foundation’s use of pokie proceeds. He has, himself, been one of the grandfathers of the pokies industry in Invercargill, albeit in rivalry with the trust. So his contempt can hardly stem from holding the machines themselves to be an intolerable social harm. Far from overbrimming with sympathy for the problems of pokie addiction, he wrote to our public opinion column in April referring witheringly to “the suckers who addict themselves to poker machines”…
it is Mr Crimp who has been caught up in notorious and inglorious misuses of pokie funds. This was in the 1990s, and involved decisions so imperious that they offended rules that were less strict than they are now. The Southland Pool Players’ Club, upon whose executive Mr Crimp had been a member, dispensed the money from pokies at one of Mr Crimp’s most high-profile establishments, Players’ pool hall, for a team of nine members, including Mr Crimp, to attend a pool competition in Australia. This was just part of what Internal Affairs inspectors described as “gross misapplication of proceeds”.
Undaunted, as he so often is, by official disapproval, Mr Crimp had then stuck his hand out for Players’ pokie profits to help pay the 1998 election expenses of Southland Action, a group of candidates which he led into the Invercargill City Council election race.
So unprincipled himself, but cunning as a shithouse rat, to shamelessly accuse others.
http://fundypost.blogspot.co.nz/2012/05/louis-crimp-man-of-actions.html
Casino and share deals:
http://shareinvestornz.blogspot.co.nz/2010/11/sky-city-entertainment-group-ltd.html
The Christchurch Casino was purchased by SKC in June 2004, off Aspinall (NZ) Limited, which held a 40.5% shareholding in Christchurch Casinos Limited. The purchase price was NZ$93.75 million and in October 2010 SKC bought an 8.6 % stake held by Invercargill businessman Louis Crimp’s Southern Equities, to take their holding to near 50%. In 2008 SKC bought a 5.2% stake off their then business partner the Crowne Plaza Hotel, taking their ownership interest in Christchurch Casino to 45.7%. With the 8.6% stake then SKC control the company with a 54.3% stake.
Coarse in his speech, nastily prejudiced and as braindead and disgusting as a gutter drunk Crimp prompted Brian Rudman to comment on his backing ACT and Don Brash who Crimp hoped would pursue anti Maori policies:
http://m.nzherald.co.nz/brian-rudman-on-auckland/news/article.cfm?c_id=1502866&objectid=11280946
Mr Crimp, you may recall, donated the money after Don Brash seized control of Act. Recalling Dr Brash’s notorious 2004 Orewa speech as National Party leader, Mr Crimp was hopeful his cash would ensure his anti-Maori views would be pursued. But in a follow-up interview on TV, the eccentric Mr Crimp soon went off subject and asked interviewer Jane Luscombe whether she’d ever had sex against a tree!
His Southland Times obituary says:
Crimp, an Invercargill businessman, philanthropist, former city councillor, character and longstanding critic of the Invercargill Licensing Trust, died at his home at 9.20pm last night.
Memorial – He knew what he was agin.
edited
Crimp was a nasty man. A favourite of Fair Go. His Southland Times obituary was disgusting – he was an evil character with no grace.
@Brian
Yes he seemed evil and venal. You notice that the Southland Times obit was short, not unkind, and called him eccentric. ( And I noted what his memorial could be.)
I think he had so much money that he managed to suck in a fair few amoral buddies, such as the ones he gathered together to have a go at the Council. But to sweeten the report that he had been dipping his fingers in the pokie till, I think he felt it would be good PR to donate large to St Johns and the SPCA. He would have won some kudos there for helping these perennially cash strapped groups.
I was amazed at how despicable he was, and only his money meant that he couldn’t be ignored. And how low ACT was and is, is exemplified by them taking from him. Though it was only $125,000 or so, not millions. I think he was careful that his ‘philanthropy’-investments were sure to bring him advantage.
How many, I wonder, of our political parties are being funded by people who are such misanthropists like him. He seemed to despise everyone really.
Speaking of tin foil, the real economic crisis is happening in the daily lives of ordinary NZers.
A gram and a half for 100 bucks!? It’s daylight robbery: five times the average price for a gram and, at something like $300 per ounce wholesale (likely cheaper in larger, commercial amounts), a profit of $90 untaxed and straight into the black market.
http://thespinoff.co.nz/16-03-2016/a-nation-in-crisis-new-zealands-catastrophic-marijuana-shortage/
You should move up north weka, no shortage and cheap if your in the know.
Lol, I’m good thanks. I just thought it was a funny article all things considered.
Has Phil Goff really come out in favour of building a waterfront stadium in Auckland?
Be very afraid Auckland ratepayers.
The favoured candidate for the Mayoralty appears to be choosing a campaign slogan which starts “We’ve got to waste a billion or two, we’ve got to waste a billion or two”.
Even Len’s choo-choo isn’t as stupid.
Clearly you’re ignorant of your own one Wellingtonian.
“ignorant of your own one”
Like hell I am. It doesn’t mean Auckland have to repeat mistakes do they?
That was one of those things where the main proponent, Fran Wilde, managed to get a “loan” out of the local bodies that was promised to be repaid. It never was of course because you never do make money out of such things.
Melbourne is an exception but they have about 50 AFL games a year at the MCG and another 50 at Etihad stadium. The crowds probably range from 25,000 to 90,000 for the club games and 100,000 for the finals.
The Wellington cost $130 million I believe. However it is sunk money and we certainly can’t sell it. After all, who would buy it? At least they didn’t consider putting a roof on it.
Could be worse of course. The Olympic Stadium in Sydney went broke and ended up being owned by the ANZ I believe. They were silly enough to make a loan on the thing.
‘How the West Got It Wrong as the Syrian Civil War Developed’ by Robert Fisk
Five years ago, we were high on Arab revolutions, and journalists were growing used to ‘liberating’ Arab capitals
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/03/15/how-west-got-it-wrong-syrian-civil-war-developed