Open mike 18/10/2015

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, October 18th, 2015 - 48 comments
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48 comments on “Open mike 18/10/2015 ”

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  1. Manuka AOR 1
    18 October 2015 at 8:38 am

    Why is Kelvin the only MP taking significant action on this?
    http://www.skynews.com.au/news/world/asiapacific/2015/10/17/nz-labour-mp-to-visit-christmas-island.html

    (Missing Campbell Live acutely – They would have been there and back by now.)

    • DoublePlusGood 1.1
      18 October 2015 at 9:01 am

      And where are the MPs condeming the mess in our own prisons? Sam Lotu-Iiga still has his job, and that just simply should not be the case.

      • aerobubble 1.1.1
        18 October 2015 at 10:21 am

        You invite a family to come say with you, your kids grow up like brothers, knowing nothing different, having signed up to nothing, discover that though paying the same taxes, wholely differing punishments lay in wait should you be for guilty of offense. Any civilized society regards its justice system as a product of humanity, concerned that innocents wrongly convicted as happens aren’t harmed irrevocable. What could harm a child more than finding out that not only are they taxed higher but should they fall, or worse become targeted, their whole lives will depend upon the uprightness of their parents. Australia is a shameless nation, its treatment of its first peoples, its voting system that criminalizes, or removed the right to vote, as it effective binds your consent for the most mediocre of candidates, is it no wonder Australian parliaments have no principled backbones, bunch of sponges with thought of being greater than all. I hang my head in shame that I carry a Aussie passport, I won’t live there until the voting system elects fair representatives and representation.

  2. Manuka AOR 2
    18 October 2015 at 9:27 am

    One of the so-called “criminals” dumped at the airport:
    http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11530899

    Tetraplegic who had been jailed for self-medicating with painkillers. After 36 years living in Aus and no family or friends over here, was dumped at Auckland airport with $200.

    • Manuka AOR 2.1
      18 October 2015 at 9:29 am

      “Paul, who broke his neck in a 2010 accident, said the deportation policy didn’t take into account the severity of someone’s crime.

      “I’m not making excuses for what I did, but I didn’t hurt anyone and I wasn’t dealing anything,” he said.

      “He was told his visa was being withdrawn by the Australian Government two days before his second jail term was up. He said he then spent an additional four months in a detention centre while his deportation was organised.”

    • AsleepWhileWalking 2.2
      18 October 2015 at 10:38 am

      Good grief.

    • vto 2.3
      18 October 2015 at 10:42 am

      Why aren’t we reacting to this?

      Is it because John Key is a useless pussy and bends over too easily?

      • Kiwiri 2.3.1
        18 October 2015 at 11:15 am

        Merrill Lynch gives in to Goldman Sachs

      • alwyn 2.3.2
        18 October 2015 at 12:21 pm

        Just what action do you think we should take that would have any effect?
        Declare war, perhaps?
        I have commented elsewhere on this site recently that we have precisely zero influence on Australian politicians and people, and it has been like that for at least 50 years.
        To repeat. What do you think we can do? Complaining about it isn’t going to get us anywhere is it? After all, no Australian politician has ever lost popularity by bashing New Zealanders.

    • millsy 2.4
      18 October 2015 at 3:03 pm

      I am more worried out the fact that he was put in jail simply for putting the wrong (probably in the eyes of the Catholic Church) chemicals into his own body.

      WTF?

  3. Sirenia 3
    18 October 2015 at 9:34 am

    This is really disgraceful, and the disabled person is just the latest. Interesting that for all John Key’s supposed international charm and schmoozing he doesn’t appear to care about this issue and isn’t doing anything. If he did he could. Or is he waiting for the focus groups? Will they need to remind him that these deported people are also humans.

    • alwyn 3.1
      18 October 2015 at 12:23 pm

      ” and isn’t doing anything. If he did he could”
      Come, enlighten us. Just what do you think he could do that would have any useful effect at all?

  5. Tautoko Mangō Mata 5
    18 October 2015 at 10:26 am

    Here is an excellent article by Dr Vandana Shiva for World Food Day..
    “For all the destruction it causes, the industrial food system produces only 30% of the food eaten by people. If we continue, we will soon have a dead planet and no food. There is, however, another road to food security. The road that was abandoned by research institutes and governments under the influence of giant chemical corporations (now seed and Biotechnology Corporations). This is the road of agroecology and small scale farming, which still produce 70% of the food.”
    ……
    Currently 1500 patents on Climate Resilient crops have been taken by corporations like Monsanto. Navdanya Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology, has published the list in the report “Biopiracy of Climate Resilient Crops: Gene Giants Steal Farmers Innovation. With these very broad patents, corporations like Monsanto can prevent access to climate resilient seeds in the aftermath of climate disasters through patents. But we must know that climate resilient traits are not created through genetic engineering, but are pirated from seeds farmers who have evolved them. Women farmers have had a key role in seed evolution and breeding.”
    http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/10/16/big-ag-doesnt-serve-us-reflections-world-food-day

    Also read about patenting warning from 2009

    ““This is a form of biopiracy since the traits that the corporations are patenting have been evolved through centuries of farmers’ breeding. On the basis of this biopiracy, the biotech industry is positioning itself as the “climate saviour,” making governments and the public believe that without them there will be no seeds of climate resilience. By making broad claims on all crops and all traits, the industry is in fact closing future options for adaptation in climate change,” she told journalists.”
    http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/ngo-warns-against-biopiracy-of-climateresilient-crops/article259600.ece

    TPPA- the DEAD RAT TREATY, has been influenced by these big AGCHEM firms who financially support US politicians- another reason why the TPPA should not be ratified!

    • aerobubble 5.1
      18 October 2015 at 10:37 am

      Your elected leaders hold to the economic ideological faith that to regulate is a sin and all the while they regulate TTPs or acts etc. They lie to us, and keep getting voted in, its been happening for the last thirty years. they justify it saying that tax cuts increase revenue, sure when year on year energy prices drop, I.e not the tax cut just basic energy inputs. We live in a worked where media lies, take Arab tv news, the newsreaders are enslaved by the nation, unless they can pay to buy their way out they are screwed. Global malaise of the mediocre.

    • Psycho Milt 5.2
      18 October 2015 at 11:53 am

      She seems to define “industrial food system” as non-organic farming, so it’s a partisan piece from the start. Organic farming has lower productivity than non-organic, this despite also using pesticides – just less-effective pesticides, because organic is basically magic-woo farming that equates “natural” with “morally superior.” In fact, what’s “natural” is living a short life as food for other creatures and having as many offspring as you can so that some of them survive to reproductive age. There’s nothing warm and cuddly about “natural.” It’s worth keeping in mind that back when western countries used organic farming on small holdings, any year could be a famine year and for most people the big question was always “Can we survive the next winter?” Fuck that and anyone who wants us to go back there.

      • Paul 5.2.1
        18 October 2015 at 12:03 pm

        You should watch this film.

        “Cowspiracy: The Sustainability Secret” is a groundbreaking feature-length environmental documentary following an intrepid filmmaker as he uncovers the most destructive industry facing the planet today, and investigates why the world’s leading environmental organizations are too afraid to talk about it.”

        • Psycho Milt 5.2.1.1
          18 October 2015 at 1:02 pm

          I should? Is there some reason I should watch it, or were you just recommending it as a good movie?

          • Paul 5.2.1.1.1
            18 October 2015 at 3:06 pm

            It’s a good movie and it shows how we need to change how we eat for the sake of the planet.

            • Psycho Milt 5.2.1.1.1.1
              18 October 2015 at 4:26 pm

              Who’s “we” in this? Most of the propaganda against farming for meat and milk is about countries where they feed human-edible crops to cows. By all means those countries should stop doing that, but it says nothing about whether organic farming is better than the non-woo kind.

              • Paul …
                18 October 2015 at 7:21 pm

                Did you watch the film?
                Or just come to a prejudged opinion. Emotive language like ‘propaganda’ suggests not.
                The film looks at the environmental footprint of eating meat.

                • Psycho Milt …
                  18 October 2015 at 9:24 pm

                  Didn’t watch the film, because emotive language like “propaganda” is appropriate for anything involving vegetarian evangelism. They point out that a meat-based diet is bad for the planet, while ignoring the relevant question of what impact on the planet 7 billion people following a soy-based diet would have. Hint: the problem is the number of people, not the type of agriculture – with those numbers, the planet gets a hiding no matter what.

                  Judging by the trailer, it’s a film made by Americans – their annoyance at the practice of using human-edible crops to feed livestock is understandable, but if they’re trying to spin it into a “meat is bad for the planet” propaganda exercise they can fuck right off.

              • maui …
                18 October 2015 at 8:22 pm

                Our current form of farming is the most inefficient we’ve ever had. 10 units of oil to produce 1 unit of food is good how?

                Then there’s the by-products, like the destruction of the island of Nauru from New Zealand mining it to oblivion for fertiliser. Then on home soil there’s the rivers we’ve ruined, the millions of hectares of native vegetation we’ve removed, the soil we’ve degraded. Pretty much any other kind of farming could beat industrial agriculture blindfolded.

                • Psycho Milt …
                  18 October 2015 at 9:25 pm

                  I’m not sure what kind of farming you’re imagining that doesn’t involve land cleared of whatever was growing on it before farmers turned up. The fantasy that this planet can feed 7 billion people without fertiliser or cutting down trees is just that. It would be nice if more people over the last hundred years had used a bit of contraception instead of bullshitting themselves that children are a blessing from God, but it’s a bit late for regrets.

                  When you say “our” current form of farming uses 10 units of oil to produce 1 unit of food, are you referring to NZ farming? Because the word “our” is misleading if you aren’t. “Our” as in NZ farming is doing a lot of damage via over-intensification lately, but that’s an issue of over-intensification, not farming in general. Organic farming also uses oil, and fertiliser, and pesticides, and is overall less productive than regular farming, so it’s not clear why we’d want to go down that path. Do you picture us returning to Third-World-style subsistence agriculture?

                  • weka …
                    18 October 2015 at 9:40 pm

                    it’s also a fantasy that there’s no such thing as peak phosphate or peak soil. It’s a fantasy that you can cut down all the trees and still maintain land over many generations and increasing population. Oil has created a bulge of food production that can’t be sustained, and we’re now coming to the end. Plain old physics, bummer it doesn’t fit the rhetoric.

                    btw, your description of organics upthread marks you as someone who has no idea what they are talking about. You’ve just trotted out some pretty superficial tropes that have very little to do with sustainable agriculture. They’re also memes used by people with vested interests against sustainable agriculture.

                  • maui …
                    20 October 2015 at 12:48 am

                    If we really tried 1/4 acre food gardens at home could support most of the food needs for every town/city household. Ok that wouldn’t work for those in a skyscraper, but I think it’s possible otherwise. A little hard to keep cattle in the city, but if people changed their meat diet to chicken then we’re living off urban land and freeing up a lot of rural land for restoration/regeneration. I’m not saying we should retire most rural farmland but it illustrates how much land we could save if we tried other methods like food forests.

                    My version of organics is no pesticides/herbicides and artificial fertiliser, and minimal fuel use. That means growing food at your home locally. I’m sure organic companies do use all those industrial inputs you listed but I don’t call that organic farming.

                    The 10:1 ratio relates to industrial agriculture and that’s the practice commonly used in New Zealand. Yes we could well return to a 3rd world lifestyle because the oil and fertiliser taps will turn off eventually, we’re already looking for oil in far flung places and barely viable places. We should be concerned about that.

            • weka 5.2.1.1.1.2
              18 October 2015 at 9:42 pm

              “It’s a good movie and it shows how we need to change how we eat for the sake of the planet.”

              From the reviews I’ve read, it’s a propaganda movie and it tells people how we need to eat from vegan ideology dressed up as the good of the planet, but it doesn’t stack up. References are very poorly done.

        • Ad 5.2.1.2
          18 October 2015 at 7:01 pm

          The Utilitarian philosopher Peter Singer is excellent on this area.

          I made the regrettable decision to forego red meat recently.
          I mourn bacon.

      • Rosemary McDonald 5.2.2
        18 October 2015 at 2:06 pm

        Now, on the one hand we have the GE and Pesticide Peddlars claiming to want to feed a starving world.

        And on the other hand we have a rampant obesity epidemic in the ‘western’ world.

        Doh?

      • millsy 5.2.3
        18 October 2015 at 3:00 pm

        I would imagine that farming techniques and agricultural science have moved on since the the times when failed harvests would lead to impoverished and starving communities.

        I dont think peasant farmers in 1400’s Somerset would have been able to pop down to the local research station for a seminar.

        Im not opposed to GE as such, however it looks to be more about handing our food supply networks over to the likes of Monsanto than anything else.

        • Psycho Milt 5.2.3.1
          18 October 2015 at 4:22 pm

          It will be about handing our food supply networks over to the likes of Monsanto if we continue preventing public-sector researchers’ involvement in it. Leaving GE up to the Americans and Chinese is one of the biggest strategic mistakes we’re making right now. And once the Nats have driven all our scientists overseas and the population consists largely of people who think “natural” is a synonym of “good,” we’ll end up looking more like than those 1400s Somerset peasants than we’d want to.

  6. Paul 6
    18 October 2015 at 11:48 am

    This is worthy of a post in its own rights.

    Insight in Iraq.
    Radio New Zealand’s political editor Jane Patterson travels to Taji Camp for a first-hand view of the training operations being undertaken by New Zealand troops.

    ‘Primarily, the trip was for the Prime Minister to visit the 100 or so New Zealanders serving in a training mission in Taji Camp, north west of Baghdad, to show his personal support.

    Taking nothing away from the significance of that visit to the New Zealand defence force personnel, the trip at its core was a PR exercise, designed to show John Key suited and booted in military apparel, travelling to one of the most dangerous countries in the world.’

    http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/insight/audio/201774742/insight-for-18-october-nz's-mission-to-iraq

  7. Chooky 7
    18 October 2015 at 12:11 pm

    The joys of the uncensored internet:

    While I was innocently searching the internet for the title of an arthouse British film about two bus loads of geriatrics …(one bus load of old IRA and the other bus load of old Orangemen)…double booked for their Xmas bash at a lonely country Irish pub and the ensuing hilarious brawl that resulted ( I thought the title of the film was ‘Double Booked’….but it wasnt ) ….I discovered an April 2006 article in ‘The Atlantic’ by Matthew Teague called:

    ‘Double Blind-The untold story of how British intelligence infiltrated and undermined the IRA’

    http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2006/04/double-blind/304710/

    This is a chilling story needless to say…and one which everyone should read because it has implications for political parties and political movements today ..(whether they be bad or good political parties and/or movements..and I hasten to add I have never been a sympathiser with the IRA. I find it morally repellent)

    The crux of the matter is:

    “British spies subverted the IRA from within, leaving it in military ruin, and Irish Republicans—who want to end British rule in Northern Ireland and reunite the island—have largely shifted their weight to Sinn Féin and its peaceable, political efforts. And so the Dirty War provides a model for how to dismantle a terrorist organization. The trick is to not mind killing, and to expect dying….

    “Kitson rolled into Northern Ireland in the early 1970s with considerable experience battling insurgencies in Kenya, Malaya, and elsewhere. …Kitson’s methods proved so effective that he wrote a now-classic counterinsurgency book, ‘Low Intensity Operations: Subversion, Insurgency, Peacekeeping’, which laid out principles now being followed by American forces in Iraq. By the time Kitson arrived in Northern Ireland, Low Intensity Operations had become his instruction manual for war there…

    http://www.amazon.com/Low-Intensity-Operations-Subversion-Peacekeeping/dp/0571271022

    Question is are these methods being used elsewhere on more benign political movements?

  8. Paul 8
    18 October 2015 at 1:19 pm

    ‘With Canadians heading to the polls soon, Staff columnist for the Toronto Star Heather Mallick is hoping for a change in government.

    She is the author of two books, and her piece on Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, The Nixon of the North, appears in the latest issue of Harper’s magazine.
    Despite being in power since 2006, Harper seems to have a knack for alienating people , and Mallick describes him as “Nixon, but without the charm”. She is clearly frustrated at the prospect of another Liberal term in government. ”

    “I’m so embarrassed. You know what. I want my country to go back to being the nice, dull, kind place it used to be.”

    That sounds like how I feel about New Zealand since we got looted and lied to by the neo-liberal clique who have taken over our country.

    http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/saturday/audio/201774091/heather-mallick-stephen-harper-and-canada

  9. Stuart Munro 9
    18 October 2015 at 1:31 pm

    Allan Hubbard’s blood cries out from the ground for justice.

    • Chooky 9.1
      18 October 2015 at 2:02 pm

      link?..photos?

    • seeker 9.2
      18 October 2015 at 2:28 pm

      It certainly does Stuart. Thank you for reminding us all. Any news on the progress towards justice?

      • greywarshark 9.2.1
        18 October 2015 at 8:53 pm

        Any news on Allan or Hubbard or blood or Justice? Don’t know what this is about. Meaningless without context. Why didn’t you send it as a text on your phone?

  10. Peter Watt 10
    18 October 2015 at 1:50 pm

    There are steps that could be pursued. No entitlements for Australians/ dual passport holders to superannuation, no access to student loans, no cover by ACC while living/visiting in NZ. A start.

    • alwyn 10.1
      18 October 2015 at 4:19 pm

      “No entitlements for Australians/ dual passport holders to superannuation, no access to student loans, no cover by ACC while living/visiting in NZ”
      That is an interesting selection you have made.
      Do you realise that any New Zealander living in Australia, even if only on the special visa they give us is entitled to all those things?
      It might make more sense to suggest things that we cannot get in Australia don’t you think?

  11. Ad 11
    18 October 2015 at 3:32 pm

    In case people can’t get enough of Margaret Attwood’s dystopia’s, here’s an interview of her explaining her hybrid of gated communities and private prisons.

    http://www.salon.com/2015/10/17/margaret_atwood_on_our_real_life_dystopia_what_really_worries_me_is_creeping_dictatorship/

    She has this great knack of pushing reality out into almost-likely wigginess that puts current reality into stark contrast, or likelihood.

  12. North 12
    18 October 2015 at 7:58 pm

    What a joy to watch (through teary eyes) South Auckland kids performing in the Auckland Town Hall, playing violin a la symphonia…….”Sunday”, TV One tonight. A programme now developing beyond South Aux to open worlds by getting kids into symphonic musical instruments.

    Some REAL good news in this crass and dirty neo-lib’ NZ where our fascinations are manipulatively steered by MSM/Crosby Textor towards fizzing about the gauche, effetely simpering, bankster PM’s latest idiot ‘quip’.

    And we all know a star/stars will emerge of course. Many, many thanks to the wonderful woman leading the programme, the funders, the helpers.

    • maui 12.1
      18 October 2015 at 8:25 pm

      I thought there wouldn’t have been a dry eye in the Town hall house, but the audience they showed looked fairly non-plussed.

  13. Pat 13
    18 October 2015 at 8:44 pm

    “Some of these allegations have been proved. In the 11 years since he became leader of the country’s Conservatives, the party has been fined for breaking electoral rules, and various members of Team Harper have been caught misleading parliament, gagging civil servants, subverting parliamentary committees, gagging scientists, harassing the supreme court, gagging diplomats, lying to the public, concealing evidence of potential crime, spying on opponents, bullying and smearing. Harper personally has earned himself the rare rebuke of being found to be in contempt of his parliament.”

    Sound familiar?

    http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/oct/15/stephen-harper-master-manipulator

  14. Adrian 14
    18 October 2015 at 11:45 pm

    For Chooky, it’s called No Surrender and it is very funny .