I looked that up Reality. All well thought out and fits what we observe and feel. I particularly noticed something about National and Chris's opinion that their 'hazing' treatment is what drives Bridges.
“Jacinda’s” empathic political persona contrasts sharply with the less-than-sunny ways of her principal political opponent – the National Party Leader of the Opposition, Simon Bridges. As a fan of the band AC/DC, Bridges will be well acquainted with the concept of “dirty deeds done dirt cheap”. It is one of the darker features of National Party culture that, in order to succeed, their aspiring leaders must consent to being “blooded”. Generally speaking, this requires them to implement policies with which, at a personal level, they may profoundly disagree. The psychic injury inflicted by this requirement to prove oneself “a good soldier” is easily imagined. And the real tragedy is that, having done it once, it gets easier and easier to do it again, and again, and again. The inevitable result is a coarsening of character and an increased susceptibility to harsh and ruthless arguments.
Shallow waters ride over earthquake zones with swimming ease. If she really believes in the ideals of people-ism she'll make these few months a stepping stone to taking back control from the powerful. I think she believes in the ideals of easiness fundamentally. Her and Grant, like the rest of the middle class polies, have no real probs. The diff between a CV and the fight to survive of real demo-crats.
I think that the lack of empathy required to plot long-term revolutionary change in a time like this runs at odds with the requirements of managing the immediate problem.
The difference is between the UK response of letting the pandemic slide, vs the NZ response of trying to stamp it out from the start. One lot looked at percentages without empathy, the other lot looked at every possible death as a human life lost.
We've got the correct sort of government for this problem.
Looks like the middle class self-indulgence of taking overseas holidays will end up killing some of us who can't afford such things. I know we are meant to all be in this together, and we are, but the thought occurs.
Well we could do without having some people. But Winston is acting in accordance with the Party's name NZFirst, and encouraging those who want to return to come back to their homeland for the near future.
You’ll have to ask WRP. It is likely to become next to impossible to return to NZ in the near future. Kiwis may miss out on medical care if they’re overseas and the healthcare systems have to prioritise.
I’d imagine that many people would rather be home with friends & family to look or be looked after.
Sounds like you disapprove though of Kiwis returning home; should they be refused entry into their own country and be returned on the next flight back?
I most certainly do not disapprove of Kiwis returning home , in a managed way, but they should not have been waiting so long to come home.. I hope Kiwis don,t miss out on medical care because they are not prioritised over non residents.
It is hard to say what is best under the circumstances but as long as individuals still have a choice, they should make up their minds quickly. The interests of the general population outweigh individual concerns at present and this will tilt towards less personal freedom in the foreseeable future till things have stabilised IMO.
And the advice is pretty ambiguous. It's not at all clear what the status of the 500,000 or so kiwis living in Australia under the 'temporary' SCV444 visa is going to be. The ongoing problem with this visa is that it's officially termed a 'temporary' visa that allows kiwis to 'live and work in Australia indefinitely'. This is a bloody awful fudge that means we aren't really citizens in either country.
Taken at face value the NZ govt's advice that all citizen's living overseas temporarily should return to NZ asap, logically captures all kiwis in Australia too. Yet in practice it cannot mean this for all sorts of practical reasons.
On the other hand if Australia, like every other nation, gets to the point of rationing ICU beds, you can bet your sweet nelly that 'non-citizens' will be at the bottom of the list.
QAnon conspiracy theorist Liz Crokin floats the possibility that celebrities are getting the coronavirus because "the white hats tainted the elite’s adrenochrome supply with the coronavirus." https://t.co/itwyLwjFdtpic.twitter.com/A0RODtlMbZ
..and Russian loons default to racism, Soros and Gates.
There are many theories about the origin of coronavirus and the further development of events. The most popular one concerns the monstrous prediction of Microsoft CEO Bill Gates. Last year, he said that 33 million people could die from such a coronavirus in 250 days. The calculations are purely mathematical, but true, the IT tycoon is sure.
After such statements, adherents of conspiracy theories literally have no doubt that the virus is of artificial origin, and Bill Gates is one of its main sponsors. Another fact adds weight to this theory – a few months ago, the head of Microsoft held a conditional exercise called Event 201, which simulated an outbreak of a new virus that killed 65 million people in 18 months. The idea of the teachings is simple – globalization in the name of salvation.
It is noteworthy that the famous pharmaceutical giants and the Pentagon leadership participated in this theater of cruel cynicism.
The fact is that while the disease affects only representatives of the Mongoloid race, such suspicious selectivity raises questions from experts. No less extensive discussion was caused by the story around the laboratory for the study of dangerous viruses. It is located in Wuhan, 32 kilometers from the same market where the disease was first recorded.
However, there is another biolaboratory in Wuhan – until recently, nothing was known about it. Her address is like someone’s joke – Gaoxin, three sixes – the number mentioned in the Bible, under which the name of the beast of the Apocalypse is hidden. But it’s even more symbolic that it exists on the money of the famous banker Jorozh Soros, who shares the global ideas of Bill Gates. It would seem that nuclear conspiracy theology is completely different, but experts say that a tricky plan lies behind an absurd wrapper.
Should Bernie drop out now? His only realistic path to the nomination now is Biden suffering an extreme adverse medical event. There simply aren’t enough votes left for him to win the nomination with actual votes.
There's a good argument it's time to pass the torch to a new generation of progressive leaders. Marie Newman's victory over establishment Dem machine favourite Dan Lipinski in solidly Dem Illinois 3rd, where Sanders lost to Biden by 41k votes to 63k votes strongly hints there's a big place for progressive ideas and people, but that Sanders is no longer the best person to front them.
There's a good public health argument the time is right for Bernie to step down and allow the remaining primaries to be the rubber-stamping exercise they were going to be anyway without needing large crowds to gather at polling places. And that by doing so, he actually increases his leverage to get progress on his priorities.
I haven't been following closely, but there's also the argument that a strong progressive/left wing voice is needed for its own sake and to keep those values and politics visible at a time when they are desperately needed. If Sanders pulls out and Bidens is it, this will demoralise the left and make the true system change harder. Will probably drop the vote too. This is true irrespective of how Bidens would then do in the main election, but hugely problematic if he loses (likely).
If the worst case scenario happens (45 wins), then what is the state of the left wing resistance at that point? That would be high on my priority list if I was in the US.
Seems to me the best way forward for progressive ideas is to focus on the contrast with Repug ideas, not to inflate the relatively small differences between the various Dem factions.
For instance, the Repug position is they are quite happy with people getting bankrupted, unnecessarily suffering, and dying early because they can't afford healthcare. In that context, the difference is trivial between Medicare-for-all-who-want-it that is available to everyone but still allows the half of Americans with employer provided health insurance to keep it if they prefer, and a purist Medicare-for-all which bans private health insurance and forces everyone into government health care.
In the context of trying to promote progressive ideas, it's entirely possible Sanders could do a lot more good lending his support to helping progressive challengers to crusty old forever-troughers in safe Dem seats, rather than continuing a doomed quest for his own presidential ambitions. If Sanders could make the difference in unseating the likes of Steny Hoyer and Richard Neal and replacing them with actual progressives, that would really be something.
Then there's the risk that if Bernie continues his campaign way beyond the point of no real hope, then it might inflate the Bernie-or-bust types, who would then go on to undermine Biden in the general election. Thereby depressing Dem vote, inflating third party vote, and widening Don the Con's path to re-election. As happened in 2016, likely contributing to the poor showing for House and Senate candidates as well as Hillary's surprise loss.
Biden needs to move on his VP pick pronto. He's already promised it will be a female.
Warren would be a useful choice to restructure and re-regulate the economy after this mess. Although unlikely since she’s not supporting him (or Sanders).
I reckon Warren would get a lot more done as Treasury Secretary.
This piece has a bunch of thumbnails of the probable top 12. It ranks Kamala Harris #1. Since there's a reasonable chance Biden would only go one term, that makes the VP pick this time around the most likely Dem nominee for 2024, and Harris strikes me as the most credible candidate for prez.
So how do y'all Jacinda-lovers reconcile the terrifying disconnection between her words "Toughest controls in the world" and the reality that travellers are finding as they enter New Zealand?
This is just one of many reports of what is (not) going on at our borders; there is no effective control to prevent entry of people even if they are symptomatic. There is absolutely NO control to prevent asymptomatic people entering the county just now. Effectively, our borders are wide open, and virus-laden travellers can be circulating wherever they choose – on public transport, domestic air and tourist and business destinations.
Until we see a tightening of the border – preferably close all incoming flights – the PM's words are frighteningly empty.
This is not a time for endless posidivity (words), it is a time to shut the gate (action)
The woman complaining, must have been totally isolated in her own bubble, not to have seen all the information the MOH, and border control have out there. Only a few clicks away.
Seems more like a National voter trying to play a Simon Bridges, gambit.
Seems more like a National voter trying to play a Simon Bridges, gambit.
Yes. My thoughts too.
From the thousands of travellers who have arrived in NZ in the past week or so (many of them NZers returning home), only a handful seem to have had this 'experience' and funnily enough they don't seem to come to public notice until Simon Bridges brings them up at QT time in the House.
I bet if she had to sit in a little cubicle for 8 hours while every arriving passenger was given the 3rd degree shed be moaning louder . Moaners gunna moan
Our borders aren't wide open. They weren't even that before covid. I think that rhetoric doesn't serve us either.
There are others who can speak to this more here, but this is about minimising risk within the constraints of a system. If we shut things down too fast or unprepared there are other consequences eg the call to shut down schools pretty quickly leads to a conversation about childcare and how that would work in covid terms. The state is instead working with what is most likely to work in the real world. Yes, mistakes will be made, we're all humans here. But I'm seeing a govt that is responsive and working very hard to get this right and mostly succeeding.Lots of what we do now will be not ideal, but still better than the other thing.
One consequence of shutting down all flights is if this is done before other supply chains are set up, what happens to essential goods like medical supplies, pharmaceuticals, that crucial part in the a power generation plant that suddenly failed unexpectedly. There will be many examples, and until we can replace those import systems we need some planes flying.
There's also some obligation to NZers trying to get back home.
I saw the woman's post yesterday. It needs fact checking.
She was on Morning Report this morning. Her description seemed to be self defeating. No information given but notices handed out and officials shouting instructions.
How would you do that? If you shut down the commercial people flights today, how do all the essential goods coming into the country over the next week get here? I'm betting there are materials for covid tests on some of those flights.
We can shut down flights, and I'd wager good money that the government is planning in case that becomes necessary, but it takes time for all the reasons I've explained already.
You avoid the fact that there have been a number of similar reports where Border Control does not seem to be taking this seriously enough, in the opinions of several travellers who have experienced what other countries are doing. No point shooting this particular messenger – there are plenty more saying the same thing.
In 20 days time we shall see who is right, shan't we? Those who cried for moderation in the response, or those who begged that the issue be hit as hard as possible as early as possible.
The cost of getting it wrong will be measured in the unnecessary premature deaths of New Zealand citizens.
A very expensive stupid mistake / deliberate trade off decision, that could have been prevented early February by shutting the borders then of OUR ISLAND NATION. Unlike a place like Switzerland where 170,000 people cross the border from Italy per day o work in Switzerland …..
"You avoid the fact that there have been a number of similar reports where Border Control does not seem to be taking this seriously enough, in the opinions of several travellers who have experienced what other countries are doing"
I didn't ignore those, I'm sure there are those accounts, feel free to share some and we'll address those too.
The internet is full of reckons right now. We can't base emergency policy on that, although I'm sure that the relevant authorities will be checking their processes.
You however are conflating two things: the fails in an otherwise appropriate system, with the need to have completely closed borders. In your argument you are avoiding the issues that I raised, those of unintended consequences. Do you know the impact of shutting down all incoming flights and shipping this week? What happens if of the 80,000 NZers overseas 1,000 of them are nurses and doctors trying to get home? Or even 100.
"No point shooting this particular messenger – there are plenty more saying the same thing."
I'm not shooting you, I'm making a cogent argument to address the points you raised. This is what we do here.
"In 20 days time we shall see who is right, shan't we? Those who cried for moderation in the response, or those who begged that the issue be hit as hard as possible as early as possible"
People who say told you so at that point are still largely ignorant of the points I raised above and there will be literally no way to know if shutting down the ports and airports this week would have been a better option. Points which lots of people are saying btw, including those with actual expertise.
I didn’t call for moderation btw, you seem to have misunderstood what I said.
Why has this uninformed reckon got so much coverage? Because she planned it. Check her FB page, she has done a full scale media release blitz. Maree Glading is a hard core National supporter who knows how to self-publicise, she got all sorts of soft interviews for pie business when she set it up – she is clearly well connected in the Auckland high-Tory circles (which includes most of the NZ Herald).
It should be no surprise to anyone that a well connected rich white women has no trouble getting an unverified reckon published uncritically in the Herald, that is how that paper works.
But next time Shayne Currie and Duncan Grieve and Toby Manhire ad neseum have a whine about the decline of journalism, this piece of stinking class biased fake news should be raised.
The same letter was read out by Duncan Garner on the AM show this morning. Ashley Bloomfield addressed it calmly.
Reducing the discussion to "Jacinda-lovers" isn't helping. This is a massive challenge and the work isn't being done by headlines and slogans – it's being done by well-qualified, overworked, tired people. Who are contributing far more to the common good than commentators with instant reckons.
If the DG of health and medical professionals told the PM to (e.g.) close the airports do you think she would casually ignore him? Do you think the staff would remain silent? It's not Chernobyl in the USSR.
It is certain that procedures will change as the situation evolves. It is (almost) certain that people will die. Even martial law and a curfew wouldn't prevent that.
I'm wondering what the analysis is around that, in terms of bigger picture issues. We can of course crash the economy, and I'm sure that if was the bubonic plague that was going to kill half the population we'd have done that already. But crashing the economy brings death too, especially if other countries follow suit.
Our best case scenario here is that we contain cv, but it's more likely that it will eventually be in the community and that we will have flattened the curve to significantly minimise deaths.
I don't read herald but RNZ has a similar story and the family said they felt safer in Thailand. In Thailand the heroin smuggling MP’s aide has been caught hoarding face masks for sale to China for personal gain,
Yep … a whole series of Countries are now closing their borders & it's becoming more & more evident that a major lockdown is the only way to defeat this virus. The earlier the better.
WHO Executive Director, Dr Michael Ryan:
You need to act quickly, you need to go after the virus. You need to stop the chains of transmission … the lessons I've learned after so many Ebola outbreaks in my career are be fast, have no regrets, you must be the first mover. The virus will always get you if you don't move quickly … if you need to be right before you move – you will never win. Perfection is the enemy of the good … speed trumps perfection. .And the problem we have at the moment is that everyone is afraid of making a mistake, everyone is afraid of the consequence of error. But the greatest error is not to move, the greatest error is to be paralysed by the fear of failure.
We need exhaustive testing & contact tracing … but. failing that, a complete lockdown.
So many Western Govts (including our own) have been just pissing around with COVID-19, this idea that you can roll out some sort of finely-tuned, wonderfully-nuanced, carefully calibrated plan in a series of discrete little stages … dangerously stupid people deluding themselves that they have some kind of control over Coronavirus. They soooo fucking don't.
-US soldier who raped a 14-yr old Muslim girl, before killing her: “I didn't think of Iraqis as humans” -Nazis called Jews “rats” -slaveowners considered slaves subhuman animals.
People are apparently panicking – friends of mine report chaos at supermarkets.
This is a serious question – should we start considering censorship of the media? Is the panicking mongering click bait reckons of dickheads "news" or an irresponsible luxury we can't affford just now?
Went to a slack n slave in Hamilton last night and couldn't even buy a tin of baked beans, all brands, shelves cleared. Spent most of my time at the checkout asking people with loaded trolleys if they think they've horded enough yet or will they need to make another run at it.
What makes it worse, now I'm flying solo with the kid at uni and fortunate enough to always work alone, practising social distancing, the supermarket is my main entryway for covid 19. Sucks to increase my exposure at long queues while not even being able to get the one thing I really came in for.
Can't speak to regular office hours, but I have noticed large queues during off peak times over the past couple of weeks, though no bare shelves until yesterday.
Just went to the Lincoln Rd Pak'n'save coz around now is usually a quietish time. Holy fuck! I didn't even bother going in, there were cars circling the carpark looking for a space.
I might end up chewing through my emergency supplies and outdoor activity food waiting for the wave of panic buying to pass.
TBH I didn't even look as I went past on the way there since I've never shopped there, and I left the Pak'n'save by the shared road with Mitre10 and turned right so didn't see it on the way out.
After your fifth or sixth, you won’t taste let alone care about the tonic water. That said, the first few are going to be awful but all medicines taste like shit, by design, and then, after a while, make you (feel) better (or not).
I went down to my local supermarket today to buy a few items. The queues were unbelievable! This in a town of 8000+ people. I have never seen anything like the chaos. Not even during the christmas rush, when those travelling to the beach for the holidays call in for their supplies – . Almost all out of towners stocking up for god knows what reason. Apparently it has been like this all week. On the way out I met one of our practise nurses from the local medical centre about to go in to do her shopping and mentioned – "its just madness in there" "Yes" she said "You wonder why and what they think they are achieving when this is going to go on for months." Exactly.
I called in to the local butcher on the way home . She was saying that the shop had been inundated earlier with people buying up large. She was worried she would run out for her local customers.
Nope I would say most just here for the day – we are just over an hours drive from Hamilton, and Auckland, and an hour and a half from Tauranga. The bachs (cribs) are mostly empty this time of year. I had to drive north to Auckland this past week. The traffic travelling south down SH2 and SH25 was a steady stream. Not the normal flow.
From the number of cars in the car park which is usually half empty on a Thursday around 10am I would definitely say so – and see Joe's comment below as to similar activity in Australia.
Spoke to a Countdown manager about 2 hrs ago and told her it's time they rationed bread. Visited three local supermarkets and all of them were out of bread. Saw a woman leave a supermarket with a trolley overflowing with bread. The effing selfish &*^%. 👿
Glad to say a number of shoppers heard me talking to the manager. Every last one of them looked guilty. So they should. We're a country that produces food for the rest of the world. We are not going to run out.
This isn't like the chch earthquakes, where Dunedin supermarkets ran low on bread because the bread factory and the transport networks were physically damaged.
This is all about people overbuying and throwing bread in the freezer. Or worse, it goes to waste.
we don't need bread. We need carbs, protein, fat, vitamins/minerals etc. Even if we did end up with the shortage of bread, there are ample other ways for us to get the calories we need in a day. Anne's point is incredibly sound.
NZ has been growing wheat for years – I worked in my varsity summer hols on a combine harvester harvesting wheat. Some bakers preferred the Aussie wheat for baking, but there has always been NZ wheat. I remember attending a cabinet economic committee meeting once in the early '80's – Muldoon was PM – and price fixing was in vogue. One of the topics for discussion was to be the price of wheat.
SM. Gladdens my heart you can a) afford to shop at the costlier speciality stores rather than the supermarket and b) you deign to grace TS with your exalted presence. Don't you have investments go check or something?
The fruit and vegetables shops where i live are often better quality and cheaper than the supermarket as are the weekend markets.
The butchers are more expensive but much better quality and I eat far less meat these days so choose to support local business over the large supermarket chains.
If all that makes me a nutter and least I'm happy in my madness.
Can we agree we are all nutters then? Maybe consider that we could ease up a bit on each other too? The points being made seem sound, the poking at each other is probably not the best strategy for us at this time.
Of course, you are fully aware of my circumstances that you pass judgement, twice, for my disgraceful choices.
Being a Hamilton local you will be aware that both Pak n saves are at each end of city centre?
We're currently squatting with whanau in Nawton. I cannot get Peter from his wheelchair into the loaner vehicle we have, so made the call to make the quicker trip to Te Rapa NW rather than leave Peter alone for longer than absolutely necessary. Yes, cost a wee bit more, but cheap, in terms of safety.
And replenishing our hosts' cupboards is the least we can do in exchange for free board.
Calm down, it was just a light hearted response to your nasty above, though you sure Mill st isn't closer? But lucky you went earlier, my sources tell me te rapa new world has just closed because they've run out of food.
New World Te Rapa crowded this morning with non panicked shoppers of all ages.
I did the trolly waltz with an older woman who laughingly canceled my license….then she accepted my excuse that I have never shopped in that particular supermarket before so if I was looking lost it was because I was.
Had a couple of young fellows on because they had neglected to buy actual food food. Not even 2 minute noodles…🙄
All very polite, if focused on our respective quarry.
Best conversation was in the baby wipes section. Disability, housebus dwelling and baby wipes are an actual thing. The other shopper was near frantically rifling through the various brands looking for the baby unfriendly wipes…the ones not labeled "alcohol free'.
"Might be good for baby's bum, but no use for sterilizing surfaces…!"
I suggested dilute bleach and washable cloths…the sterilizing wipes having been snapped up days ago.
Big ups to the supermarket staff. Respect. Shelves being restocked in a civilised manner and the checkout staff unflappably polite, quietly packing our goodies.
Told them they were all kinds of awesome and I do believe it made their morning.
Told them they were all kinds of awesome and I do believe it made their morning.
Good on you. Our local operators have been amazing too. So on to it and doing a fantastic job calming angry, frustrated shoppers like me. It's taught me to appreciate their real worth – not that I didn't know it before – and make the effort to tell them.
I agree, the feelings are similar to yours in the UK.
'I have spent days and days trying to calm down nearest and dearest, especially my Mum, who is scared shitless that her days are numbered due to her age and the fact she has asthma and borderline COPD. I know precisely why – because every fucking five minutes on BBC news (which she watches every evening) they are banging on about the number of deaths, details about those who have died, speculation as to how many more will die…….doom, doom and more fucking doom.
They fucking drone on about panic buying and how the public are going bat shit crazy, but who is stoking that fire and creating that panic? Yeah, that is right, you F… a…. c….s – YOU!!!
It's probably time for the government to look at the issue of equal access to supermarkets to reassure people about provisions in future.
I would suggest something like allocating days of the week for shopping – in store, or on-line. Based around the first letter of the surname – proof of ID at checkout for this (they already have surnames for on-line).
1/7th, or so, for each of the days.
Just the idea of such a system being considered/developed might be enough to reduce panic buying now.
stores could actually do this without the state mandating it. They can do this to manage their supply lines. They can also prioritise goods for people with special needs. eg online shopping for people that shouldn't be exposed to cv, young mums, elderly, disabled and so on.
Maree Glading would probably shit herself if she knew how much was known about her condition and history before she got to the last door. The other night on TV news there was a shot over a techies shoulder of a monitor showing a black and white image of disembarking passengers. There is some pretty impressive gear there at Customs/Immigration. Also the intuition and experience of the staff is bloody amazing. She is a dopey bullshitter.
The number of people with C-19 arrival is a lot less than 1 in God knows how many thousands. And anybody with a temperature probably only has a cold. As long ago as 3 weeks ago a mate pulled aside a few people in the course of a day who had appeared to have a temperature, they were overdressed for an Auckland summer but OK for a cool aircraft cabin so the C/I staff let them rest in a room and dress lighter and retested them again, all were OK.
We are going to be alright, we are well looked after by people we don't even know we have to thank.
A factory manager I was talking to,gave me an example of one teen(they took on at Xmas 17 yr) was employed because he was to be the bread winner of a family of 6.He is taking home at present an xtra 500$.
The manager said that pricing differentials meant their products were now significantly cheaper,then overseas products.
Countdown supermarket limiting some goods: You'll only be allowed to buy 2x of hand sanitiser, soap, paracetamol, antibacterial wipes, disinfectant & household cleaners, toilet paper, paper towels, serviettes, tissues, pasta, rice. https://t.co/QeqHl6T0cz
I'd like to see an analysis of how bad it is. The Herald can go get fucked. What are the TV networks doing? RNZ? Commercial radio.
I think censorship is a step too far right now, but there could be public education plans.
Btw, for the convo upthread, know what would really send large part of the population into panic? Shutting the borders completely and too fast and having medical supply and other shortages as a result.
Without trying to sound arrogant, a number of comments don’t even sound ill-advised but as not thought through at all and based on ignorance and fear (possibly with some anger). It’s ok to vent IMO, but some here, at least, are skirting close to appointing blame for deaths, for example, that have not even occurred yet. All action so far has been aimed at containment, i.e. preventing the disease spreading and causing major mayhem.
Lots of people are super stressed for sure. I am, and I have decent enough skills around stress and survival issues, I can imagine that for people who aren't used to having to think about these things they're in a fair amount of chaos (hence panic buying, and blame*). There's a thing going on about whether the pandemic is bringing out the worst in people or the best. I'm aiming for the best for myself, but I am being tested on this for sure.
*I also think we have this in the culture anyway, including in political spaces.
"should we start considering censorship of the media?"
This question has been bothering me for some time now short answer is yes something must be done and not just because of covid19. (those of you who scream straw horses at me will be ignored we need a proper discussion on this!)
I have been thinking about this one for some time and the only solution I can see that (could) work without immediate descent into state censorship of unpopular views is some sort of external set of editorial standards
a couple of areas to start is clearly labeling NEWS as different analysis as different from opinion as different from attempted influencing. (an example here would be hoskings currently labeled as "opinion" it is not and should be clearly labeled "attempted influencing")
another area is press conferences if you ask a question in a press conference that is not intended to elicit some new piece of information you get a black mark. do it three times and you are not invited back.
these are just very basic ideas as a starting point that need collective work to become some sort of workable policy but one thing that is certain we cannot continue with the current media crap and if we dont sort it out in a reasonable and fair way we will end up with state censorship which will ultimately be worse.
Wot. Are you saying we should add to the already considerable list of things we are prohibited from honestly talking about in New Zealand after the Chch debacle? The thing that is required right now is the ability to vigorously discuss our predicament and how we deal with it. If we censor any perspective we risk missing essential views of other people who think differently from us which may save us from painting ourselves into a dangerous corner.
ahh but i am not suggesting prohibiting any subject of discussion just suggesting a set of editorial standards ie visible correct and accurate labeling and separation of News , analysis, opinion, or bullshit. If you want to be a "news" outlet with journalistic privilege you follow that standard. to be "journalism" it needs to be based on facts
Troll be b*ggered! I like this blog because I find contributors to be intelligent and relatively open to changing their minds if the evidence is sound, as am I. Like many, I am treading the fine line between panic at the social and economic horror and anger at the ineptitude of those in whom we place our trust to keep us safe. I welcome all points of view, as I hope my contributions are of service too
I don't know, we spent six weeks ignoring the logical consequences of what some people were trying to say in late January. Specifically that the silent transmission characteristic of this virus made it different to almost anything we've encountered before.
And now mid March I'm still hearing people downplaying this. It takes some people a full kick to the nuts to clear the wax from their ears.
So having frittered away the best opportunity to suppress this virus at relatively low cost, we now have to pay the higher price. Tough.
1. There needs to be spare medical equipment stored as part of planning for one.
2. There should be enough testing capacity for the tracking testing necessary to prevent community spread AND community spread sampling to reassure the public so that (they and) the government would know there was community spread soon after it occurred. The latter reduces fear, the former is the means to prevent community spread.
Lesson from China
It is easier to contain it if you have a central source area to contain it in. It is harder when it is coming at you from multiple places (business and personal travel)
Yes. I think those of us that can need to start now with the staying home (mostly) and making that cultural shift. It takes time to adjust to this and if some are starting now it will be easier for others to make that change too.
This Washington Post article by Beth Cameron is excellent, detailed and informative:
When President Trump took office in 2017, the White House's National Security Council Directorate for Global Health Security and Biodefense survived the transition intact. Its mission was the same as when I was asked to lead the office, established after the Ebola epidemic of 2014: to do everything possible within the vast powers and resources of the U.S. government to prepare for the next disease outbreak and prevent it from becoming an epidemic or pandemic.
One year later, I was mystified when the White House dissolved the office, leaving the country less prepared for pandemics like Covid-19.
The U.S. government's slow and inadequate response to the new coronavirus underscores the need for organised, accountable leadership to prepare for and respond to pandemic threats.
Not satire; the pricks who spent billions on stock buybacks and then rather than investing in building a new aircraft, recycled one from the sixties and it killed several hundred people. Now they want money.
Boeing is just out with its bailout ask in a new statement. Minimum $60 billion in access to "public and private liquidity, including loan guarantees"
Bailouts currently on table for: hotels; airlines; cruises; casinos; oil & gas producershttps://t.co/XVyrVukE8L
And if there's any doubt about just how craven the fuckers are, a little more than 11 million people because 'bidness.
Sen. Ron Johnson: "Getting coronavirus is not a death sentence except for maybe no more than 3.4 percent of our population…probably far less." "We don’t shut down our economy because tens of thousands of people die on the highways"https://t.co/0Sqk8oGHsX via @journalsentinel
Looks like Elizabeth Warren is onto it in the USA. An eight point plan for companies who receive taxpayer funds. Maintain payroll, pay minimum wage, maintain collective bargaining, chop executive bonuses, etc.
Hope plenty of strings are attached here. Collective bargaining to be the norm, worker seats on the board , executive compensation to be dropped, working hour reductions to be spread.
]And it would be even better if Air NZ stopped saying it needed to lose 30% of its jobs and said 30% of the hours worked. Still seems low – an 85% service reduction is mooted.
I am already reading reports of how quickly the environment is reacting ( fish returning to waterways) to the dramatic reduction of human activity.
One positive of our current situation will be to read what reduction of co2 and other gases and see how any reduction follows predictions/models. Perhaps we underestimate the eco system to rebound or recalibrate. But not to take any reduction as an excuse to continue on our destructive manner.
Similar thing happened with places that got closed off to prevent spread of Kauri rot. Wildlife in general and feral/wild pigs and goats have been running riot.
Interesting the reason given is that there is no "“The water now looks clearer because there is less traffic on the canals, allowing the sediment to stay at the bottom,” a spokesman"
I can't help notice that the regulars here who for years have implicitly argued that we had to 'smash capitalism' and 'hit the big reset button' on our modern industrial economy … are now all very worried for themselves now an actual event threatens to disrupt our world.
Sometimes you should be careful what you wish for.
There’s a subtle difference between a controlled burn off and an out-of-control large fire that threatens to engulf and destroy everything in its path.
Fair point, although as someone familiar with the insanely complex industrial systems on which the modern world is is built, I was always dubious that the left's ideology was sufficiently nuanced to accomplish the kind of 'controlled burn off' you have in mind.
If nothing else this should underline to us all the huge damage uncontrolled shocks can cause. Whacking complex systems with big hammers, never makes anything better.
If you could do it under experimental/lab conditions with a realistic empirical model (akin earthquake testing of buildings & structures) it could be informative. Alternatively, Kobayashi Maru 😉
With the Neo-liberal unbridled capitalism, hammer.
Certainly right wing ideology has been conclusively proven to be much worse than “insufficiently nuanced”.
But. That was a right wing revolution, so "it is fine" no matter how destructive it has proven to be.
All the deaths, poverty disease and destruction it is causing is ignored.
Until when when something like coronavirus, or financial meltdowns, happens. Then all the individual responsibility, give me freedom to rip everyone else off, capitalists, suddenly become keen on socialism and State control. But, only to protect themselves, you notice. The amount of people on Facebook wanting social welfare for their business, but "fuck beneficiaries" and the already disadvantaged, is embarrassing.
The Left are really very very mild, and are pushing for controled change.
The refusal to take that on at anything other than a snails pace..a snails pace made redundant by the rapidly evolving Climate Change and Money/Power grab of the Corporations and super rich (who come out of these crises very nicely) ..are what make real, violent Revolution and the ensuing chaos all the more inevitable down the line
The "left" at least in New Zealand are all for controlled change, democratically controlled and based on evidence.
I've seen very few arguing for a revolution. Most are after solutions that have been proven to work, already
It was the "right" who bought in disaster capitalism by stealth in the 80's and 90's. A violent revolution, that is killing people in much greater numbers than coronavirus, still.
As Andre suggests if Biden gets the nod and chooses someone like Kamala Harris as his running mate, Elizabeth Warren would be an excellent choice for the Treasury. She has a very good history of achievement in introducing valuable change particularly following the GFC.
The intro looks interesting, but sadly it's paywalled. I've no objection to detailed, organic plans that allow for nuance and complexity, plans that encourage and incentivise evolution.
It's the ideological 'take a big hammer to it all' types that irk me.
I'm sorry she has withdrawn from the race because if anyone could change what is now the American system she could. But hopefully with a new President and a shift in the composition of Senate, to allow change to occur, some of what she perceives will eventuate.
Not me I not worried, I still say, let the system fall.
But it's not going to – the best we can hope for is that people stop worshiping the elites/managerial/technocrat class like gods, and actually start to think and do for themselves.
Because just in case you missed it – the orange one started a bombing campaign in Iran last week which was huge.
And whilst the supply train is currently broken in China, it will be fixed. The fact that growth is not going to be world killing will be a good thing long term.
This is not the end of capitalism, far from it.
Just more step in the crap (shocks) and insanity (wreaking) we have to survive through whilst it dies.
As for blaming those with no power in this demise, is a really shitty case of punching down.
From Newshub:
All relate to overseas travel, which Director-General Dr Ashley Bloomfield says shows New Zealand does not yet have any recorded community transmission. Close contact tracing is underway.
Of the eight new cases, two are in Southland, two in Taranaki, one in Rotorua, two in Auckland and one in Northland.
All from international travel, and we're getting to the period where anyone who gets it from overseas should have gone straight into isolation, thus limiting the close contacts.
Really, the only slight misstep I can see the government making was the announcement of the isolation requirement a couple of days before it was implemented, leading to people rushing to get back before they "had to" go into isolation. Not as serious as the Lombardy lockdown plans being leaked so people fled throughout Italy, though.
Forward modelling isn't my field (but I can backward trend with the best of 'em 🙂 ), but it's largely a function of travel numbers and proportion of longer term stays in NZ.
Assuming no community outbreak, I'd expect increasing overseas-sourced cases daily over the next week or two, especially as testing abilities ramp up. The reverse-diaspora and longer term stays in NZ to allow symptoms to develop, reflecting a lag on the conditions that prevailed in the country they departed from.
As someone put it, in 6-8 weeks the world went from "we might have a problem" to "I might starve, but I refuse to die with an unwiped ass".
We might still be lucky. We'll see if the incoming cases peak soon.
Arrive in Hamilton, ring the reception there and am advised to wait for a call In an hour the triage nurse calls, listens to my kid tell her how shes been feeling We spend 2 more hours watching Tik Tok videos 2 women come out in basically hazmat suits and do swabs#COVID19nz
While Italy is currently the "worst-case scenario" for the United States, the small Italian town of Vò has not reported any new cases of COVID-19 since last Friday and the spread of the illness has been completely stopped there.
Vò, a town of 3,300 just outside Venice, was part of an experiment that involved aggressive testing and quarantine measures. Every single resident was tested for coronavirus in late February when Northern Italy was first rocked by the outbreak, and three percent of inhabitants were found to be carrying the virus.
Andrea Crisanti, an infections expert at Imperial College London, was involved with the experiment and told news outlets that half of the carriers exhibited no symptoms.
“In the UK, there are a whole lot of infections that are completely ignored,” Crisanti told the Financial Times. “We were able to contain the outbreak here because we identified and eliminated the ‘submerged’ infections and isolated them. That is what makes the difference.”
Anyone who tested positive was placed under quarantine, as were individuals that came into recent contact with the infected. The town's residents were then tested again 10 days later, and just .3 percent of the population was found to be carrying the virus. However, at least six infected individuals were asymptomatic and would not have been tested in most other countries.
[''']
Crisanti also warned Sky News that, "for every patient that shows symptoms for COVID-19 there were about 10 who don't."
Yeah, we'll just pull 4 million testing kits and an appropriate number of lab techs and labs out of our arse, shall we?
In order to discover if there are 9 or so people in the country who are asymptomatic, because we're not getting symptomatic patients from the wider community yet?
The nice thing about contact tracing is that it works backwards, too – not just the people who get infected by the patient, but the person who infected them.
Of returnees like an acquaintance who arrived in the country last Thursday who's since been yuking it up around the town with not a thought about self isolation.
All the Logan Park (Dunedin) tests are in: all negative.
This is how the system works – resources are finite, while the population is infinite (literally, because you'd have to start again and re-check once the entire population had been tested).
Tests don't happen just by thinking of a number and doubling it. Real people, working overtime and under great stress, are carrying out these tests. They deserve our thanks.
I know it's millions of deaths but when it comes down to it it's c. 3 % of the population. But we haven't had such an upset since Polio, TB or WW 2. And don't we need it. We've begun to think complacent comfort is a right, and the climate change cliff so near. This new war govt should continue on. Comfort-comfort-comfort kills alertness for survival. And, yes, we've never encountered a certainty of complete doom preceded by a decade or two of increasing comfort. Like those birds fooled by cuckoos to raise their chicks we can't deal with that fiddling with our genetic programme.
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern addressed the nation today about the decline in daylight New Zealand has been experiencing over the previous few months. She said “As many of you will notice, our attempts to stem the dwindling of the daylight over the last few months have been completely ...
Redline received this article from the KOE a Marxist party in Greece Our friends in the KOE describe here the mounting crisis in Greece and tensions on the Turkish border. As desperate people flee from their homelands which have been ruined after decades of imperialist wars and interventions the people ...
As the first week of Level Four lockdown unfolded, mounting questions grew as to just what was (and was not) allowed under its “rules”. Partly these were driven by some apparently contradictory messagesfrom different authority figures and explanations carried in the media. Partly they reflected a somewhat sketchy legal basis ...
. . April 3: Day 9 of living in lock-down… Another late-start to my work day. Everything is temporarily upended as clients are shuffled around so we can minimise our “bubble” by reducing the number of people we help. One of my colleagues has been removed from his clients; his ...
In order to meet our 2050 carbon target and do our bit to avoid making the Earth uninhabitable, New Zealand needs to decarbonise our economy, replacing fossil fuels with electricity in the energy, industrial and transport sectors. The good news is that it will mean cheaper power for all of ...
For those folk who find my other Lock-Down Diary versions too “negative” or otherwise unpalatable… Here’s a photo of a pretty flower, . . Better? Tomorrow’s Sanitised Version: a cute animal video. . . . =fs= ...
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As Aotearoa enters week two of lockdown, it’s clear we’re all still working out what our “bubbles” look like and how to stay in them to stop the spread of Covid-19. New to the government’s Covid-19 website is some good guidance for people living in apartment blocks. Recent decades have ...
“There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen.” Lenin Don’t we all know that feeling now.
Prospect Magazine alerted me to this particularly apt quote. It is a much more evocative quote than Hemingway’s “gradually then suddenly” which is also doing ...
Yesterday was the day the consequences of the lockdown suddenly got very real for many. Firms have been closing and laying people off since the outset of the quarantine but this has mostly been happening out of the public eye. The mass closure of a number of iconic New Zealand ...
Brian Williamson1, Prof Nick Wilson2 (1Economic consultant, UK; 2University of Otago Wellington)In this blog, we outline how a win-win social contract could be forged to address the major dimensions of response to the COVID-19 pandemic when using a mitigation strategy: the particular need to protect older people from high ...
Resuming Normal Service: The Republican Party's nominee for in 1920, Warren Harding, promised the American people: “not heroics, but healing; not nostrums, but normalcy; not revolution, but restoration”. If she wishes to remain our prime minister, then Jacinda Ardern will offer New Zealanders the same.HOW EDUCATED AMERICA snickered when the ...
No Free Society Without A Free And Functioning News Media: If we are to surrender our civil rights to the broader cause of defeating Covid-19, then foreign corporations must, likewise, surrender their right to inflict immense economic and cultural harm on New Zealanders simply because it improves their bottom line.I’M ...
by Daphna Whitmore A third of the world is under lockdown and a clear assessment of this measure to curb the spread of COVID-19 is urgently needed. With any high-stakes decisions it has to be asked what are we dealing with here? Are the measures warranted? Will they achieve their ...
I haven’t done a huge amount in the last few days. I’m reading The Poppy War and I’ve sort of poked at a couple of games – I started SOMA but I’m a wimp and I quit while in the first room after the brain scan. I might try it ...
The swan politicians may be gliding on the water, occasionally snapping at one another. Meanwhile, as the Covid19 crisis illustrates, the officials are desperately paddling below providing the real locomotion. One of the most fatuous recent grandstanding comments (of about a week ago), adding to the public’s anxieties, was ...
Much has been written about the importance of discretion in an emergency situation, and the concerns raised by the potential for it to be exercised arbitrarily. Given the quality of the discussion, there seemed little point in adding to it at any length. In particular, I point to the evidence ...
Today has felt surreal. I was all set to touch base online with my science communication students when a colleague shared the news that Bauer Media would be shutting down its publications immediately. The first link I saw implied it was Woman’s Weekly affected, and even that shocked me. But ...
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Outgoing Police Commissioner Mike Bush appeared before the Epidemic Response Committee today, who asked him for the rules police are using to enforce the lockdown. He refused:Police Commissioner Mike Bush has admitted the advice given to Kiwis about what they're able to do during the lockdown hasn't been clear enough. ...
For those folk who find my other Lock-Down Diary versions too “negative” or otherwise unpalatable… Here’s a photo of my cat, . . Better? Tomorrow’s Sanitised Version: a pretty flower. . . . =fs= ...
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Funnily enough, my thought as I start this post is whether it will be well written enough. Or should that be well enough written? Because so much of what I know about good writing came from my two stints at The Listener, which this morning was shut down due to ...
With normal democratic procedures in abeyance, there were two ways to go. First, it was open for the government to dissolve itself and invite the National Party to join a ministry of national salvation. That would have lessened the democratic deficit of the times by having a team of rivals without ...
Dr Kirsty Ross Children and young people can respond differently in times of distress. This also varies by age and developmental stage, with younger children having more magical and imaginative thinking, and older children having more awareness and knowledge of the issues our communities are facing (which brings up ...
Hungary has been a virtual dictatorship for a decade now, as Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has gradually eroded its democracy. But now, its official, with the passage of an indefinite emergency law allowing rule by decree:Hungary’s parliament has passed a new set of coronavirus measures that includes jail terms for ...
While the economy is on pause under lockdown, the government is beginning to plan how to cope with the post-lockdown, post-tourism, post-export education world we will eventually find ourselves in. They're planning a lot of infrastructure spending as economic stimulus, and have asked for proposals which can start the moment ...
It's my distraction, setting up tiny scenes to photograph. I've got stuck on the Babushka dolls for now. Something about their bubble shape. Something about their never changing, smiling features, suggesting persistent equanimity. Can we get through everything that is being thrown at us and keep at least a tiny ...
. . March 31: Day six of living in lock-down… This time I managed to sleep a little longer and the alarm woke me at the pre-set time: 6.55am. Then remembered I was working a later shift and could’ve slept in. Oh well, there are things to do at home. ...
Image credit:Diamond Harbour School Blogs I notice a few regulars no longer allow public access to the site counters. This may happen accidentally when the blog format is altered. If your blog is unexpectedly missing or ...
Yesterday's Horizon poll showing support for a "Yes" vote in this year's cannabis referendum sliding into the majority for the first time in a year looked like good news for reformers – and it probably is. But the result warrants some scrutiny.The poll is the fifth in a series commissioned ...
For almost a week now, every one of us who isn’t an essential worker has been confined to their bubble. We are allowed to go shopping for groceries, to visit the doctor, and to get a bit of exercise if we stay local. The reason we are doing this is ...
The Covid-19 saga will no doubt produce many twists and turns for us before it is finally brought to an end. But one thing it has shown us – and what comfort it should bring us – is that our country’s government is in good hands. I am not thinking ...
In the absence of a vaccine or a cure for a deadly disease, staying home in your bubble is what you do, the concept is not new. To the best of my knowledge last time we did this in NZ was for polio, in the years before a vaccine came ...
The following statement was released on March 28 by the National Network on Cuba, a coalition of 40 groups, based in the United States. In recent weeks, Cuba has deployed hundreds of medical providers to over a dozen countries in Europe, Asia, as well as to their neighbors in Latin ...
This has been a terrible summer for Hector’s dolphins. The first indication was very low numbers of dolphin sightings during late spring and early summer. The Otago University Marine Mammal Research Team has carried out routine dolphin surveys at Banks Peninsula for more than 30 years. In all that time, ...
On March 17, Finance Minister Grant Robertson was quick out of the blocks with an economic rescue package to help businesses through the inevitable recession resulting from the coronavirus pandemic. Robertson had pulled together a scheme in short order that so far seems to have saved many jobs. In his ...
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. . March 30: Day five of living in lock-down… Woke up still in darkness. Alarm hadn’t gone off. Turn to radio clock; it’s a few minutes after 6am… I lie there in the dark, waiting to drift off to sleep… but it ain’t happening. Clock ticks over to 6.55 ...
The story of Les Gray, the public sector psychologist who told the truth about his use of cannabis and set off a storm, has a special place in the lore of cannabis reform in New Zealand.When Paul Shannon interviewed Gray for the 'Dope and Hope' issue of Planet magazine in ...
by Phil Duncan For Marxists, a key concern about social trends is their context – not just their causes, but why they happen when they do. Events and phenomena have causes, but they also are time or period-specific. While much of the left have capitulated recently to postmodernism, most notably ...
Since the lockdown began, we've all suddenly been reminded who the actually essential workers in our society are: not the people at the top who pay themselves the big bucks and rort the perks, but the people at the bottom they screw over and squeeze: cleaners, warehouse staff, truck drivers ...
Kia ora! As I've watched nearly all my remaining work vanish over the past couple of days, it has occured to me that one good way to keep me away from arguing with fools on Twitter all the time (in the knowledge that all we're really doing is processing our ...
Aotearoa New Zealand has committed to trying to extirpate the virus that causes COVID-19 from its shores. To do that, as a society we’ve moved to “Level 4”. That means adapting to unprecedented restrictions on our personal freedoms, particularly to our rights to move freely and associate with friends and ...
When the Prime Minister declared a state of emergency last week, she handed the police powers to enforce it. And almost immediately, we started hearing about heavy-handed, arbitrary "enforcement" by police who (at best) cared more about order than law, or (more likely) had no idea what the rules were ...
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by Don Franks Hi David, Nice hearing from you, I’m glad to hear you’re getting by okay in these grim times. You asked how’s it going for us back here in New Zealand. You would have heard that the whole country is locked down and with breaks for exercise and ...
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A chronological listing of news articles linked to on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week, i.e., Sun, Mar 22, 2020 through Sat, Mar 28, 2020Articles Linked to on FacebookSun, Mar 22, 2020In Just 10 Years, Warming Has Increased the Odds of Disasters by Chelsea Harvey, ...
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The CV-19 (COVID) pandemic has seen the imposition of a government ordered national quarantine and the promulgation of a series of measures designed to spread the burden of pain and soften the economic blow on the most strategically important and most vulnerable sectors of society. The national narrative is framed ...
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Fortune's Children: Under extraordinary pressure, the leader of the Government and the leader of the Opposition will each show us what they are made of. Have they been blessed with intelligence, grace, wit, poise, toughness, empathy and humour – and in what measure? More importantly, to what extent have they ...
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Right now low waged and insecure workers are feeling the economic brunt of the looming #Covid19 Recession. In response legal advocate Toby Cooper* and hospitality and worker’s rights advocate Chloe Ann-King, are putting together a series of legal blogs about your employment rights:In this legal blog we outline some ...
by Equipo Jurídico Pueblos and Gearóid Ó Loingsigh (25/03/2020) An escape plan in question On the night of March 21st and the early morning of the 22nd, the forces of the Colombian state stormed into the Modelo prison in Bogotá, murdering 23 prisoners and injuring 83, in response to the ...
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Broad, Sunlit Uplands: How those words fired my young imagination! Or, perhaps, it is more accurate to say: how those words fused, in my young mind, with the image printed on every packet of Fielder’s Cornflour. Always fascinated by history, especially modern history, I cannot hear Churchill’s wonderfully evocative words, even ...
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This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections A respected research group, Project Drawdown, finds that deploying solutions consistent with meeting the Paris climate targets would cost tens of trillions of dollars globally. But crucially, those outlays would also yield long-term savings many times larger than the up-front costs. The new 2020 Drawdown ...
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We’ve been meaning t write something on Cuba and the coronavirus but have just discovered a very good article on the subject in the US left publication Jacobin. The article looks at how Cuba, a poor country but one where capitalism has been done away with, is leading the way ...
In 2018, El Shafee Elsheikh and Alexanda Kotey - two British citizens who had purportedly been stripped of their citizenship by the British government - were captured while fighting for Isis in Syria. The British government then conspired to hand them over to the US, and agreed to provide evidence ...
Transformers: The disaster of the Great Depression was transformed into a new and fairer society by the democratic socialism of the First Labour Government. The disaster of the Covid-19 Pandemic offers a similar transformative possibility to the Labour-NZ First-Green Government. Seize the time, Jacinda! You will never have a better ...
Tamper with The System? Well, we already are. But there's a difference between accidentally trickling sand into a precision gearbox versus formulating a plan to alter it on the fly with improvements in mind. One action is more or less innocently unscrupulous, the other amenable to earning an easy ...
Associate Prof George Thomson, Louise Delany, Prof Nick WilsonWhile it is possible that New Zealand can use intense public health controls to eradicate COVID-19 from the country – we must also plan for other scenarios where thousands of New Zealanders are sick – including many urgently hospitalised.1 Better resilience ...
Kia ora my name is Chloe Ann-King* and I am the founder of Raise the Bar, a campaign and non-profit that gives free legal aid, advocacy and tautoko to hospitality workers in Aotearoa. Right now all over our country hospo workers are being fired at will, having shifts cut or being ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters says getting New Zealanders back home and other travellers out of the country is "a nightmare for our embassies, consuls, and staff around the world".Speaking to NewstalkZB's Mike Hosking, the Foreign Minister said that he gave a clear message to people travelling overseas that they ...
The domestic travel ban has been lifted for stranded foreign tourists trying to get to international airports to fly home, after the Coalition Government announced a plan to help the tens of thousands of foreigners stranded here. Foreign Minister Rt. Hon. Winston Peters spoke with RNZ's Susie Ferguson said foreign ...
Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters believes the country is rediscovering its resilience and self-reliance through its response to the COVID-19 pandemic.He says he is heartened that the mass majority of New Zealanders are following lockdown rules and that the government looking at the future, including paying to keep much ...
New Zealand can emulate the success of the US after the Great Depression by exploiting our own resources to turn the economy around quickly, Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters says. Mr. Peters told Magic Talk that New Zealand has an opportunity to come out of the COVID-19 pandemic a "superior, ...
All 45 New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) personnel are either on their way back to New Zealand, or already in the country, according to Defence Minister Ron Mark."Twenty-eight personnel arrived back in New Zealand last week and are in isolation at the Royal New Zealand Air Force base in ...
The COVID-19 situation in New Zealand is moving fast - and to avoid what we've seen overseas - the Government's response must be to move fast too. We're committed to keeping New Zealanders safe and well-informed every step of the way. ...
We know people are feeling anxious about COVID-19. While the situation is serious, New Zealand has a world-class health system and we’re well-prepared to keep New Zealanders safe. ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters is encouraging New Zealanders overseas to stay where they are amid the COVID-19 pandemic. "We are reaching a point where the best option for most New Zealanders offshore is to shelter in place, by preparing to safely stay where they are.” "This includes following the instructions ...
Rt. Hon. Winston Peters, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Foreign Affairs Foreign Minister Winston Peters is encouraging the tens of thousands of New Zealanders travelling overseas to consider sheltering in place, in light of COVID-19. “Since 18 March, we have been warning New Zealanders offshore that the window for flying ...
Ground-breaking law has passed that will decriminalise abortion and ensure women and pregnant people seeking abortions have compassionate healthcare. ...
The Green Party says that the measures announced by the Government today will help families and businesses to prioritise our collective health and wellbeing in the response to COVID-19. ...
As New Zealanders brace for a global downturn due to Covid-19, Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters says his Coalition Government’s rescue package "more significant" than any other he's seen around the world. The Coalition is to reveal a multi-billion-dollar stimulus plan on Tuesday afternoon designed to cushion the economic blow ...
The Government will be introducing legislation to make changes to the Companies Act to help companies facing insolvency due to COVID-19 to remain viable and keep New Zealanders in jobs. The temporary changes include: Giving directors of companies facing significant liquidity problems because of COVID-19 a ‘safe harbour’ from insolvency ...
The Government’s plan to cushion the blow of COVID-19 by supporting incomes, jobs and businesses, and position the economy to recover has been backed by another international report. International credit rating agency Moody’s today reaffirmed its highest Aaa credit rating on New Zealand, saying the economy is expected to remain ...
National sports organisations have been given certainty of funding to ensure they can remain viable through the COVID-19 pandemic, Sport and Recreation Minister Grant Robertson announced today. “The global spread of COVID-19 has had a significant impact on sport and recreation in New Zealand, including the cancellation or postponement of ...
Changes have been made to allow butchers to process pork, only for supply to supermarkets or other processors or retailers that are open, Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor has announced. “We carefully weighed the risk of allowing butchers to open their shops for retail customers, but the risk of spreading COVID-19 ...
Essential workers who take leave from work to comply with public health guidance are being supported with a leave scheme to ensure they will continue to receive income, say the Minister of Workplace Relations and Safety Iain Lees-Galloway and Minister for Social Development, Carmel Sepuloni. A number of essential businesses ...
A Government WhatsApp channel has been launched to help make information more easily accessible and shareable in the fight against COVID-19. Govt.NZ, which is free to use on any mobile device, will carry information and news for the public, businesses, healthcare providers, not for profits and local government. It can ...
The Government has announced a plan to enable the safe, orderly exit of tens of thousands of stranded foreign nationals from New Zealand during the current COVID-19 Alert Level 4 restrictions, Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Winston Peters has said. “When we moved into lockdown a week ago, the ...
Health Minister Dr David Clark says the Government is delivering on its commitment to support general practice doctors and nurses, and pharmacies on the front-line of our fight against COVID-19. "For us to overcome COVID-19, we need community health services such as general practice and community pharmacy to step up ...
Justice Susan Thomas has been appointed Chief High Court Judge, Attorney-General David Parker announced today. She replaces Justice Geoffrey Venning who has resigned from the position. David Parker paid tribute to Justice Venning, who he said had stewarded the High Court very capably over the last five years. “On behalf ...
Businesses can start applying to their banks for loans under the Business Finance Guarantee Scheme set up to support the New Zealand economy during the COVID-19 pandemic. “We’re moving quickly to protect New Zealand businesses, jobs and the economy during this unprecedented global economic shock,” Finance Minister Grant Robertson said. ...
Work is underway looking at measures to speed up consents for development and infrastructure projects during the recovery from COVID 19, to provide jobs and stimulate our economy. Environment Minister David Parker said the COVID-19 pandemic is a serious global crisis that will have a wide ranging and lasting impact ...
Advance payments will be made to transport construction industry contractors to retain the workforce and ensure it is ready to quickly gear up to build projects which will be vital to New Zealand’s COVID-19 economic recovery, Transport Minister Phil Twyford announced today. He said keeping the workforce required to build ...
The Government has tasked a group of industry leaders to seek out infrastructure projects that are ready to start as soon as the construction industry returns to normal to reduce the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, Economic Development Minister Phil Twyford and Infrastructure Minister Shane Jones say. The Infrastructure ...
Work to scale up the health system in preparation for COVID-19 was today outlined by Health Minister David Clark, as he reported back to the new Epidemic Response Committee. “We are well placed to contain the spread of COVID-19. We have taken early and decisive action at our borders, and ...
The Government is refining its COVID-19 essential business guidance to include the distribution of news publications for communities which are hard to reach. The Minister of Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media, Kris Faafoi, said the move was in recognition of the importance for New Zealanders who might be harder to ...
The Government is ensuring supermarkets can open on Easter Sunday so we can buy groceries, but stay closed on Good Friday allowing workers to take a break. This provides a balanced approach and ensures we avoid large queues that two days closure may cause. “Supermarkets will be able to open ...
Following the successful conclusion of the Building Partner Capacity (BPC) mission at Taji, New Zealand defence personnel are returning to New Zealand from Iraq, in accordance with the Cabinet decision made in June 2019, Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Ron Mark announced today. “New Zealand is very ...
The State of National Emergency to help stop the spread of COVID-19 has been extended for a further seven days, Minister of Civil Defence Peeni Henare said. The initial declaration on March 25 lasted seven days and can be extended as many times as necessary. “Since we went into isolation ...
New Zealand’s ability to go hard and go early in the fight against COVID-19 has been underpinned by strong Government finances and the growing economy heading into this global pandemic, Finance Minister Grant Robertson says. The Treasury today released the Crown financial statements for the eight months to the end ...
Health Minister Dr David Clark says 36 new intensive care beds at Christchurch Hospital’s new Hagley building are being fast tracked so they are available for treatment of COVID-19 patients. The Ministry of Health is working with contractor CPB and Canterbury DHB to enable access to the hospital’s ICU, ...
The Government has fast-tracked up to $1 million to help Air New Zealand move urgent freight to and from New Zealand, with the first flight to Shanghai leaving tonight, Transport Minister Phil Twyford announced today. Phil Twyford says it’s crucial that trade in vital goods such as medical supplies and ...
New Zealand will temporarily remove tariffs on all medical and hygiene imports needed for the COVID-19 response. Trade and Export Growth Minister David Parker and Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Kris Faafoi said today that the New Zealand Customs Service will apply tariff concessions to all diagnostic reagents and testing ...
Minister of Finance Grant Robertson has clarified that the changes to the wage subsidy scheme announced yesterday mean that employers should be passing on the full subsidy to workers, except in the case where the person’s normal income is less than the level of the subsidy. “We still want employers ...
Medical face masks from the national reserve supply are now being distributed to District Health Boards, while at the same time local production is being ramped up. Yesterday more than 640,000 masks were sent to DHBS – that is an immediate two week supply, with more to follow in coming ...
The Government has made modifications to the wage subsidy scheme to ensure people don’t lose their jobs during the national lockdown. These changes will soften the impact of COVID-19 on workers, families and businesses, and position them to exit the lockdown and look to recovery, Finance Minister Grant Robertson says. ...
Farmers whose herds were culled in response to the outbreak of Mycoplasma bovis will be able to minimise the tax treatment of their income in some circumstances. Revenue Minister Stuart Nash says Cabinet has agreed to change the law. It means farmers may be eligible to spread their income over ...
A $27 million dollar package, effective immediately, is being provided to social sector services and community groups to ensure they can continue to provide essential support to communities as we stay at home as a nation to stop the spread of COVID-19, Minister for Social Development Carmel Sepuloni announced. “At ...
“The guilty plea today will provide some relief to the many people whose lives were shattered by what happened on March 15,” Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said. “These guilty pleas and conviction bring accountability for what happened and also save the families who lost loved ones, those who were injured, ...
The Prime Minister is holding daily press conferences to update New Zealanders on the Government's response to COVID-19. Links to videos and transcripts of these updates below. These transcripts also include All of Government press conferences led by Director Ministry of Health's Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield. 25 March: Live update from the Prime ...
Frontline Police numbers have broken through the 10,000 mark for the first time in history as officers step forward to keep the community safe during the COVID19 lockdown. “Two Police graduations in Auckland and Wellington in the past week have been conducted in unprecedented circumstances,” Police Minister Stuart Nash said. ...
Urgent legislation has been passed to support the package of economic and social measures needed to recover from the impact of the coronavirus outbreak. “The COVID-19 Response (Taxation and Social Assistance Urgent Measures) Bill will cushion New Zealanders from the worst economic impacts of the COVID-19 outbreak,” said Revenue Minister ...
From tomorrow, Government support for farmers and growers affected by drought will be expanded and extended across the country, with access to Rural Assistance Payments (RAPS) available throughout the North Island, parts of the South Island and the Chatham Islands, Social Development Minister Carmel Sepuloni announced. “These challenging conditions have ...
Parliament has passed amendments to legislation that give the Secretary of Education stronger powers to act in the fight to limit the spread of COVID-19, Education Minister Chris Hipkins said today. “They are part of a suite of changes passed under the COVID-19 Response (Urgent Management Measures) Legislation Bill,” Chris ...
Canada, Australia, Chile, Brunei and Myanmar have joined forces with New Zealand and Singapore by committing to keep supply chains open and remove any existing trade restrictive measures on essential goods, especially medical supplies, in the face of the Covid-19 crisis. Trade and Export Growth Minister David Parker today welcomed ...
Immediate freeze on rent increases Tenancies will not be terminated during the lock-down period, unless the parties agree, or in limited circumstances Tenants who had previously given notice can stay in their if they need to stay in the tenancy during the lock-down period Tenants will still be able to ...
As New Zealand unites to lock-down in the fight against COVID-19, the Finance Minister is urging all businesses and workers to stay connected over the next four weeks. “We understand the extreme pressure many businesses are under right now. I know most business owners think of their workers as family ...
A State of National Emergency has been declared across the country as the Government pulls out all the stops to curtail the spread of COVID-19. “Today we put in place our country’s second ever State of National Emergency as we fight a global pandemic, save New Zealanders’ lives and prevent ...
Mr Speaker I wish to make a Ministerial Statement under Standing Order 347 in relation to the recent declaration of a State of National Emergency. Having considered the advice of the Director Civil Defence Emergency Management, the Minister of Civil Defence declared a State of National Emergency for the whole of ...
People needing to travel on domestic flights, trains and Cook Strait ferries to get home before the country moves into level 4 lock-down tomorrow night will be able to continue using the passenger services until midnight on Friday, Transport Minister Phil Twyford said today. Domestic passenger services, particularly ferries, have ...
The Government, retail banks and the Reserve Bank are today announcing a major financial support package for home owners and businesses affected by the economic impacts of COVID-19. The package will include a six month principal and interest payment holiday for mortgage holders and SME customers whose incomes have been ...
Like countless New Zealanders stranded overseas, Wellingtonian Rosie O’Hagan will be braving authorities, airlines, airports and uncertainty to make it back from the other side of the world, writes Jim Kayes.Rosie O’Hagan hadn’t stepped outside for three weeks.When she finally did – around midnight on Friday ...
PACIFIC PANDEMIC DIARY:By David Robie A rather beautiful Guåhan legend is rather poignant in these stressed pandemic times. It is one about survival and cooperation. In ancient times, goes the story, a giant fish was eating great chunks out of this western Pacific island. The men used muscle ...
Simon Wren-Lewis, Emeritus Professor of Economics and Fellow of Merton College, University of Oxford, raises good questions about Britain’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. Some of them seem germane to this country’s response. Wren-Lewis posted his critique on his Mainly Macro blog under the heading Following the Science or a ...
Alex Casey speaks to a dream expert about why so many people are suddenly remembering their vivid and often horrible dreams. As the days begin to blur together and the only thing we get between sleeps is unimaginably horrible news and an embarrassing tootle around the block, it’s no surprise ...
How is Covid-19 spreading within the country? Newsroom is collating information as it's available to paint a picture of what's happening.The following charts are based on numbers shared at the daily press conference. These may vary from the full day's numbers released in the Ministry of Health's spreadsheet of ...
Medical centres across the country are condensing services, moving online, and ushering in pandemic plans. Josie Adams assesses what it’s like to access and provide essential medical care under alert level four.On Monday, Sandra Russell woke up before dawn and drove to Milford to get her blood tested. She has ...
In our new series The Lockdown Letters, some of New Zealand’s best writers tell us what they’ve been up to in the days of Covid-19 alert level four. Today, writer and doctor Glenn Colquhoun, with the second of his Letters to Hone Tūwhare and his Travelling Band of Constant Companions. ...
ANALYSIS:By Haiqing Yu of RMIT University and Michael Keane of Curtin University China has gradually emerged out of its shadow of despair as the epicentre where the coronavirus pandemic started. Now, there is face saving required – as well as agenda-setting in the global power play. China played ...
Tech giant Google has released a giant global data set which shows how different countries are locking down, and which NZ regions are most compliant with its lockdown.A giant set of reports released by Google, created using its anonymised cellphone location data reveals the scale of human behaviour change the ...
Comedian Penny Ashton writes on the necessity of the arts, especially during lockdown.On March 22, everyone’s favourite fiscal bloodhounds, the New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union, sent out a tweet in response to Creative New Zealand’s announcement that it will dedicate an emergency response package to helping New Zealand’s artists, in the ...
Wellington writer Philippa Swan’s new novel TheNight of All Souls is an homage to Pulitzer-winning and all-round fabulous American writer Edith Wharton. Wharton died in 1937 but, Swan writes, she’s very much of the moment. Nobody does social distancing like Wharton did. While Wharton was still comparatively young, she created the ...
For all The Spinoff’s latest coverage of Covid-19 see here. Read Siouxsie Wiles’s work here. New Zealand is currently in alert level four. The country is shut down, apart from essential services. For updated official government advice, see here.The Spinoff’s coverage of the Covid-19 outbreak is funded by The Spinoff Members. To support this work, join The ...
Normally heaving year-round, Queenstown has ground to an eerie halt as Covid-19 cases rise and tourism income plummets, reports Paul Taylor. On a hill behind Queenstown's coronavirus Covid-19 community testing centre, the resort's iconic Skyline gondola sits motionless. More than 17 million people are estimated to have ridden the gondola ...
Are we drinking more in the lockdown? Hard to know, writes David Slack, but we’re certainly having to get creative about it. Almost every phone call I’ve answered this week has begun the same way: “You still off the drink, then?” Fair question. What a time to be not drinking. ...
Kiwi clinical psychologist Desiree Dickerson is stuck with her family in Spain and has written a guide in Nature: "Seven tips to manage your mental health and well-being during the Covid-19 outbreak." It’s Day 17 of the Covid-19 lockdown in Spain. In a small village on the Mediterranean coast, about ...
"Will our ills be cured? Will our feet carry us? For how long?": a short story set in Henderson by West Auckland writer Serie Barford.I learned to drive a tractor when I was a kid feeding out hay with my cousins on a dairy farm down the line. I ...
Without active testing in the community our Covid-19 picture isn’t complete, an epidemiologist says. David Williams reports. There are worse places to be self-isolating than Whakatāne, in the Bay of Plenty, says Bridget Robson, who lives on a two-acre block and keeps chickens. “We live in a beautiful part of ...
How do you hold a funeral service with the country in lockdown? Where there’s a will – and a tech-savvy uncle – there’s a way, Erin Kavanagh-Hall discovered.I was floating somewhere in the Cook Strait when I heard my grandfather’s funeral had been cancelled.I should elaborate. It was a Monday, ...
‘Stay in your bubble’ didn’t exist 100 years ago, but our ancestors would want us to know how essential it is to do so, says Jai Breitnauer.It was a warm but slightly grey January day in 2019 when I pulled the car over to the side of SH1, just south ...
David Clark’s misadventure in mountain biking was a stupid, but ultimately forgivable offence. The bigger problem is the continued uncertainty around what is and isn’t appropriate activity in lockdown, as Sam Sachdeva writes. Given the pressure he and his Cabinet colleagues are under, it is little surprise Health Minister David ...
Assessing the economic impact of Covid-19 requires a new approach to a problem economists have not encountered in modern times, writes Dr Kirdan Lees Covid-19 has presented quite a problem for economists. Containment policies that seek to flatten the Covid-19 curve or eliminate the virus, restrict economic activity. All governments ...
Every day at 1pm New Zealand’s Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield announces precise figures on the number of confirmed and probable cases of Covid-19 in the country. He is working on the best information available, and during this week the level of community transmission was put at around ...
Most of New Zealand's MPs are in lockdown just like the rest of us, confined to their neighbourhoods and stuck in their bubbles. Checkpoint called a few to ask them what they're doing. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ben Deery, Lecturer in Early Childhood Education, University of Melbourne “Stupid coronavirus!” I heard my six-year-old mumble while talking in her sleep. Earlier that day her swimming and basketball lessons were cancelled, a birthday party postponed, and she had to race with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Tuffley, Senior Lecturer in Applied Ethics & CyberSecurity, Griffith University “Zoombombing” in case you haven’t heard, is the unsavoury practice of posting distressing comments, pictures or videos after gatecrashing virtual meetings hosted by the videoconferencing app Zoom. With hundreds of millions ...
Analysis - A leading epidemiologist says health authorities 'really have no idea' of the extent of community spread, Parliament's Epidemic Response Committee gets its teeth into what's going on during the lockdown and the horrendous economic imp ...
The fifth in our new series of charts, graphics and data visualisations by Chris McDowall, covering the Covid-19 epidemic within New Zealand. We’ll publish the latest set each day on The Spinoff.This work is entirely funded by the generosity of The Spinoff MembersInformation about confirmed and probable cases of Covid-19 ...
The Finance Minister says struggling companies will be able to put some debt into hibernation, under new legislation unveiled today. Watch the latest government update here. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Lund, Commissioning Editor, The Conversation Editor’s note: The following is current as at April 3, 2020. Things are changing quickly so best to keep an eye on the latest information from WA Health, as well as the federal government.This article ...
During the challenges associated with lockdown, the Māori Party are congratulating Ngāti Ruanui and South Taranaki on the decision of the Court of Appeal, announced today, to stop Trans-Tasman Resources plans for risky seabed mining off the South ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sunanda Creagh, Head of Digital Storytelling What does the COVID-19 pandemic sound like? For this episode, Dallas Rogers – a senior lecturer in the School of Architecture, Design and Planning at the University of Sydney – asked academic colleagues from all over ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sven Gallasch, Lecturer in Law, Swinburne University of Technology “People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion,” wrote Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations (published in 1776), “but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the ...
Environment Minister David Parker has directed officials to find ways to fast-track consents for infrastructure and development projects. He says his goal is to help create a pipeline of projects so that some can start immediately once Covid-19 restrictions are lifted “so people can get back into work as fast ...
Analysis by Keith Rankin Spain and Switzerland top cases, countries converging. Chart by Keith Rankin.Spain and Switzerland top cases, countries converging. Chart by Keith Rankin.Of the larger European countries, Italy is now in third place for known cases per person in the population. Spain has overtaken Switzerland for ...
Contact tracing is a crucial part of the Covid-19 puzzle and technology might prove essential to scaling up New Zealand's tracing capacity, Marc Daalder reports With the lockdown reducing physical contact between members of the public and testing ramping up, the only missing piece of the Covid-19 puzzle is contact tracing. ...
Insolvency laws will be temporarily changed to allow troubled companies to trade while technically insolvent Finance Minister Grant Robertson has announced changes to the Companies Act to allow companies to put their debts into "hibernation". Robertson said companies facing liquidity problems would have "safe harbour" from their normal insolvency duties ...
Te Rūnanga o Ngāti Ruanui and Te Kaahui o Rauru are celebrating the decision of the Court of Appeal, announced today, to stop Trans-Tasman Resources plans for risky seabed mining off the South Taranaki Bight. The Court of Appeal found that there ...
Bernard Hickey talks to Kiwibank Chief Economist Jarrod Kerr about a massive spike in US jobless claims, and they talk about an inspiring Kiwi app to fight Covid-19 globally. Guest, Pie Funds chief executive Mike Taylor also joins them to talk about the massive market swings and hopes for recovery. Bernard zooms out ...
Political commentators from the left and right sides of the political divide are questioning the powers being exercised by police during the nation-wide “lockdown”. The Asian Invasion 2019 blog draws attention to the warning sounded by former UK Supreme Court Justice Jonathan Sumption when he challenged Covid-19 actions by British ...
Pacific Media Watch The International Coalition for Human Rights in the Philippines (ICHRP) has strongly condemned the shoot-to-kill order by President Rodrigo Duterte this week as a ‘dangerous’ opening to target and kill anyone in a public space. “We are raising the alarm in the international community on President ...
The Reserve Bank looks set to start buying council bonds as well as Government bonds to unfreeze financial markets and allow councils to defer rates and jointly invest in infrastructure with the central Government, Dileepa Fonseka reports In what would be another unprecedented move to calm financial markets and help ...
Four PhD students engaged a clinical psychologist to help them navigate an uncertain time in their studies. They share their findings here.As four PhD students from Massey University’s Joint Centre for Disaster Research we, like many others, can’t stop reading and talking about the unfolding events that have gripped our ...
The SpinoffBy Ashleigh Rushton, Lisa McLaren, Marion Tan & Sara Harrison
Covid-19 testing of the wider population is on the cards as World Health Organisation research shows people are most contagious within their first few days of being infected Director-General of Health Ashley Bloomfield says Covid-19 carriers are highly infectious when they show few signs of carrying the virus. People were ...
Z Energy is the latest company to cut its dividend payout and start talking to its banks about strengthening its finances. Chief executive Mike Bennetts said the company, the largest fuel retailer in the country, had been battered by a range of issues over the past 18 months, and was ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Melissa Kang, Associate professor, University of Technology Sydney Young people in Australia are among the fastest-growing group to contract COVID19. According to the Department of Health, there are now more cases in Australia among people aged 20 – 29 years than any ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Cassandra Pattinson, Research Fellow, The University of Queensland Getting a good night’s sleep can be difficult at the best of times. But it can be even harder when you’re anxious or have something on your mind – a global pandemic, for example. ...
Journalist and Great Barrier Island resident Lindsay Wright reflects on outer gulf pandemic preparedness. Hardy locals can tough it out but Auckland bach owners and boaties should keep their distance. Aotea Great Barrier, the easternmost island in the Hauraki Gulf, are undergoing a Covid-19-inspired population flood. Great Barrier has scenery that makes ...
The Pharmaceutical Society of New Zealand is delighted that the government has moved quickly to provide an initial financial support package for pharmacy. The $15 million package was paid this week to pharmacy contract holders. Pharmaceutical Society president ...
How is Covid-19 spreading within the country? Newsroom is collating information as it's available to paint a picture of what's happening.The following charts are based on numbers shared at the daily press conference and are "as of 9am" of the day. There were 71 new cases of Covid-19 in ...
A new poem by Wellington poet and bookseller Ash Davida Jane. washed up! it gets tiring pushing the fire alarm every nightbut things keep catching on fireor sometimes ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Charles Foster, Postdoctoral Research Associate, University of Sydney Our earliest vertebrate (animals with backbones) ancestors laid eggs, but over millions of years of evolution, some species began to give birth to live young. There is a traditional dichotomy in vertebrate reproduction: species ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Charles Foster, Postdoctoral Research Associate, University of Sydney Our earliest vertebrate (animals with backbones) ancestors laid eggs, but over millions of years of evolution, some species began to give birth to live young. There is a traditional dichotomy in vertebrate reproduction: species ...
Welcome to the second edition of our lockdown Top 10s. A reminder that this chart has nothing to do with sales or launches or the publishing cycle; these are just books the Unity team love – and this week it’s westerns, full of big skies and long rides and showdowns.AUCKLANDAll ...
Wellington Mayor Andy Foster’s plan to cover revenue shortfalls through borrowing without cutting low priority spending is immoral, says the New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union . “Businesses and households across the country are meeting financial challenges ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kevin John Brophy, Emeritus Professor of Creative writing, University of Melbourne “Katrina, I had in mind a prayer, but only this came,” Bruce Dawe wrote to his infant daughter, new-born, in intensive care, her life in the balance, declaring as poets must ...
The shock closure of Bauer NZ – and with it all of the country’s current affairs magazines – is a stark reminder of the fragile state of local media, writes Mel Bunce, the author of a book on the subject.It is a dark week for journalism in New Zealand, with ...
Join Leonie Hayden as she works through the first four weeks of Scotty Morrison’s Māori Made Easy.Rāmere/FridayWe made it to the end of week one e te whānau. It wasn’t that hard! In fact it was… Māori made easy.To end our week of pronunciation practice we’re going to revisit everything we ...
India faces more challenges battling Covid-19 than any other country in the world. With 1.3 billion inhabitants, hundreds of different languages spoken, and an estimated 80% of the workforce daily wage earners currently without jobs, it could be a recipe for disaster.I’ve been living in India for more than three ...
By Sri Krishnamurthi of Pacific Media Watch The Vanuatu government is using the Covid-19 to impose draconian measures and authoritarian rule by end of last month. Wholesale censorship of all Covid-19 related content has been instituted. Office of the Government Chief Information Officer (OGCIO) took the extraordinary step to ...
People with lower credit scores increased their borrowing upon news of the lockdown, while those with higher scores dropped away. March data from the credit-reporting agency Centrix, which runs credit checks on behalf of banks, finance companies, online lenders, and buy now pay later schemes, showed credit inquiries dropped sharply ...
Small business owners say commercial rent relief is desperately needed if they are to survive past the Covid-19 disruptions. While the wage subsidy helped with staff costs, there is currently no government assistance for commercial rent - which typically accounts for 40 percent of a firm's fixed costs. Landlords and ...
SkyCity is making 200 staff redundant as part of cost cutting because of the Covid-19 virus. The casino operator said it had no choice but to cut the size of the workforce given that once business resumes it will be at much reduced level. Chief executive Graeme Stephens said it's ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Glikson, Earth and paleo-climate scientist, Australian National University At several points in the history of our planet, increasing amounts of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere have caused extreme global warming, prompting the majority of species on Earth to die out. In ...
Editor’s Note: Here below is a list of the main issues currently under discussion in New Zealand and links to media coverage.New Zealand Parliament Buildings, Wellington, New Zealand. Today’s contentMedia Henry Cooke (Stuff): There’s no easy way for Government to save media drowning. But a fast fix is ...
Just after midday a cyclist was killed on a straight road on a clear day, after being hit by a van in North Canterbury. Lucinda Rees from NZ School Speeds is asking for the mandatory cyclist/vulnerable road user passing gap, which is in consultation, ...
By Indra Singh in Suva Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama says that if Fijians continue to disregard the Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic directives from authorities, a nationwide 24-hour curfew could be imposed. His comments come as Fiji yesterday recorded its two latest coronavirus cases, taking the total to seven. Bainimarama said ...
In our new series The Lockdown Letters, some of New Zealand’s best writers tell us what they’ve been up to in the days of Covid-19 alert level four. Today, Ōtaki author Renée.Yes, a few cyclists out and about. I remember my first bike bought from Farmers around 1942, five shillings a ...
Internal memos from NZ’s biggest magazine company, which announced its sudden closure yesterday, state they were lobbying to change a ban on publication. But the minister responsible, Kris Faafoi, has doubled down on rejecting that position, calling those internal communications ‘contradictory’ to what they said to him directly.Magazine publishing giant ...
Up to 100,000 foreigners could be seeking to leave the country in coming weeks, now the Government has relaxed domestic travel restrictions for them. ...
The loss of a loved one can be difficult in the best of times. But it’s even more painful when the planes are grounded.Late on Saturday night, three days into New Zealand’s level four lockdown, Harish got a call from his sister in India telling him that his father had ...
Health Minister David Clark has flouted the Government's advice to exercise locally after confirming he drove to a park to go mountain biking on Thursday. ...
Open mike 19/03/2020 
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern addressed the nation today about the decline in daylight New Zealand has been experiencing over the previous few months. She said “As many of you will notice, our attempts to stem the dwindling of the daylight over the last few months have been completely ...6 hours ago
Redline received this article from the KOE a Marxist party in Greece Our friends in the KOE describe here the mounting crisis in Greece and tensions on the Turkish border. As desperate people flee from their homelands which have been ruined after decades of imperialist wars and interventions the people ...8 hours ago
As the first week of Level Four lockdown unfolded, mounting questions grew as to just what was (and was not) allowed under its “rules”. Partly these were driven by some apparently contradictory messages from different authority figures and explanations carried in the media. Partly they reflected a somewhat sketchy legal basis ...11 hours ago
. . April 3: Day 9 of living in lock-down… Another late-start to my work day. Everything is temporarily upended as clients are shuffled around so we can minimise our “bubble” by reducing the number of people we help. One of my colleagues has been removed from his clients; his ...14 hours ago
We must root out the traitors among us! ...1 day ago
In order to meet our 2050 carbon target and do our bit to avoid making the Earth uninhabitable, New Zealand needs to decarbonise our economy, replacing fossil fuels with electricity in the energy, industrial and transport sectors. The good news is that it will mean cheaper power for all of ...2 days ago
As Aotearoa enters week two of lockdown, it’s clear we’re all still working out what our “bubbles” look like and how to stay in them to stop the spread of Covid-19. New to the government’s Covid-19 website is some good guidance for people living in apartment blocks. Recent decades have ...2 days ago
Resuming Normal Service: The Republican Party's nominee for in 1920, Warren Harding, promised the American people: “not heroics, but healing; not nostrums, but normalcy; not revolution, but restoration”. If she wishes to remain our prime minister, then Jacinda Ardern will offer New Zealanders the same.HOW EDUCATED AMERICA snickered when the ...2 days ago
I haven’t done a huge amount in the last few days. I’m reading The Poppy War and I’ve sort of poked at a couple of games – I started SOMA but I’m a wimp and I quit while in the first room after the brain scan. I might try it ...2 days ago
Much has been written about the importance of discretion in an emergency situation, and the concerns raised by the potential for it to be exercised arbitrarily. Given the quality of the discussion, there seemed little point in adding to it at any length. In particular, I point to the evidence ...2 days ago
46 Articles Physical science of global warming & effects Global response of evapotranspiration ratio to climate conditions and watershed characteristics in a changing environment Greenhouse effect: the relative contributions of emission height and total absorption Observations & observational methods of global warming & effects Climate change induced a ...3 days ago
Image credit: Diamond Harbour School Blogs I notice a few regulars no longer allow public access to the site counters. This may happen accidentally when the blog format is altered. If your blog is unexpectedly missing or ... 4 days ago
The Covid-19 saga will no doubt produce many twists and turns for us before it is finally brought to an end. But one thing it has shown us – and what comfort it should bring us – is that our country’s government is in good hands. I am not thinking ...4 days ago
The following statement was released on March 28 by the National Network on Cuba, a coalition of 40 groups, based in the United States. In recent weeks, Cuba has deployed hundreds of medical providers to over a dozen countries in Europe, Asia, as well as to their neighbors in Latin ...4 days ago
Yesterday, New Zealand recorded its first Covid-19 related death on the West Coast. Unfortunately this is unlikely to be the only fatality, with the virus now being found in every region of the country.However despite the significant danger, people are still unfortunately breaching lockdown rules.There’s really only one main very ...6 days ago
The CV-19 (COVID) pandemic has seen the imposition of a government ordered national quarantine and the promulgation of a series of measures designed to spread the burden of pain and soften the economic blow on the most strategically important and most vulnerable sectors of society. The national narrative is framed ...1 week ago
Society-wise, aside from the specific morbidity shall we say of the medically-oriented aspects of this COVID-19 crisis, what is unfolding before the world is in more than one way an instructive study of humanity and reactions to a high intensity, high stress environment in real time. Friends, we are at ...1 week ago
Right now low waged and insecure workers are feeling the economic brunt of the looming #Covid19 Recession. In response legal advocate Toby Cooper* and hospitality and worker’s rights advocate Chloe Ann-King, are putting together a series of legal blogs about your employment rights: In this legal blog we outline some ...1 week ago
Kia ora my name is Chloe Ann-King* and I am the founder of Raise the Bar, a campaign and non-profit that gives free legal aid, advocacy and tautoko to hospitality workers in Aotearoa. Right now all over our country hospo workers are being fired at will, having shifts cut or being ...2 weeks ago
Foreign Minister Winston Peters says getting New Zealanders back home and other travellers out of the country is "a nightmare for our embassies, consuls, and staff around the world". Speaking to NewstalkZB's Mike Hosking, the Foreign Minister said that he gave a clear message to people travelling overseas that they ...2 days ago
The COVID-19 situation in New Zealand is moving fast - and to avoid what we've seen overseas - the Government's response must be to move fast too. We're committed to keeping New Zealanders safe and well-informed every step of the way. ...1 week ago
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The scale of what we face right now is unlike anything we have ever seen before. Overcoming it is our common purpose. ...1 week ago
The Government will be introducing legislation to make changes to the Companies Act to help companies facing insolvency due to COVID-19 to remain viable and keep New Zealanders in jobs. The temporary changes include: Giving directors of companies facing significant liquidity problems because of COVID-19 a ‘safe harbour’ from insolvency ...1 day ago
Like countless New Zealanders stranded overseas, Wellingtonian Rosie O’Hagan will be braving authorities, airlines, airports and uncertainty to make it back from the other side of the world, writes Jim Kayes. Rosie O’Hagan hadn’t stepped outside for three weeks. When she finally did – around midnight on Friday ...9 hours ago
PACIFIC PANDEMIC DIARY: By David Robie A rather beautiful Guåhan legend is rather poignant in these stressed pandemic times. It is one about survival and cooperation. In ancient times, goes the story, a giant fish was eating great chunks out of this western Pacific island. The men used muscle ...10 hours ago
Simon Wren-Lewis, Emeritus Professor of Economics and Fellow of Merton College, University of Oxford, raises good questions about Britain’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. Some of them seem germane to this country’s response. Wren-Lewis posted his critique on his Mainly Macro blog under the heading Following the Science or a ...11 hours ago
Alex Casey speaks to a dream expert about why so many people are suddenly remembering their vivid and often horrible dreams. As the days begin to blur together and the only thing we get between sleeps is unimaginably horrible news and an embarrassing tootle around the block, it’s no surprise ...12 hours ago
How is Covid-19 spreading within the country? Newsroom is collating information as it's available to paint a picture of what's happening. The following charts are based on numbers shared at the daily press conference. These may vary from the full day's numbers released in the Ministry of Health's spreadsheet of ...13 hours ago
Normally heaving year-round, Queenstown has ground to an eerie halt as Covid-19 cases rise and tourism income plummets, reports Paul Taylor. On a hill behind Queenstown's coronavirus Covid-19 community testing centre, the resort's iconic Skyline gondola sits motionless. More than 17 million people are estimated to have ridden the gondola ...20 hours ago
Are we drinking more in the lockdown? Hard to know, writes David Slack, but we’re certainly having to get creative about it. Almost every phone call I’ve answered this week has begun the same way: “You still off the drink, then?” Fair question. What a time to be not drinking. ...20 hours ago
Kiwi clinical psychologist Desiree Dickerson is stuck with her family in Spain and has written a guide in Nature: "Seven tips to manage your mental health and well-being during the Covid-19 outbreak." It’s Day 17 of the Covid-19 lockdown in Spain. In a small village on the Mediterranean coast, about ...21 hours ago
"Will our ills be cured? Will our feet carry us? For how long?": a short story set in Henderson by West Auckland writer Serie Barford. I learned to drive a tractor when I was a kid feeding out hay with my cousins on a dairy farm down the line. I ...21 hours ago
Without active testing in the community our Covid-19 picture isn’t complete, an epidemiologist says. David Williams reports. There are worse places to be self-isolating than Whakatāne, in the Bay of Plenty, says Bridget Robson, who lives on a two-acre block and keeps chickens. “We live in a beautiful part of ...21 hours ago
David Clark’s misadventure in mountain biking was a stupid, but ultimately forgivable offence. The bigger problem is the continued uncertainty around what is and isn’t appropriate activity in lockdown, as Sam Sachdeva writes. Given the pressure he and his Cabinet colleagues are under, it is little surprise Health Minister David ...21 hours ago
Assessing the economic impact of Covid-19 requires a new approach to a problem economists have not encountered in modern times, writes Dr Kirdan Lees Covid-19 has presented quite a problem for economists. Containment policies that seek to flatten the Covid-19 curve or eliminate the virus, restrict economic activity. All governments ...1 day ago
Most of New Zealand's MPs are in lockdown just like the rest of us, confined to their neighbourhoods and stuck in their bubbles. Checkpoint called a few to ask them what they're doing. ...1 day ago
During the challenges associated with lockdown, the Māori Party are congratulating Ngāti Ruanui and South Taranaki on the decision of the Court of Appeal, announced today, to stop Trans-Tasman Resources plans for risky seabed mining off the South ...1 day ago
Environment Minister David Parker has directed officials to find ways to fast-track consents for infrastructure and development projects. He says his goal is to help create a pipeline of projects so that some can start immediately once Covid-19 restrictions are lifted “so people can get back into work as fast ...1 day ago
Contact tracing is a crucial part of the Covid-19 puzzle and technology might prove essential to scaling up New Zealand's tracing capacity, Marc Daalder reports With the lockdown reducing physical contact between members of the public and testing ramping up, the only missing piece of the Covid-19 puzzle is contact tracing. ...1 day ago
Insolvency laws will be temporarily changed to allow troubled companies to trade while technically insolvent Finance Minister Grant Robertson has announced changes to the Companies Act to allow companies to put their debts into "hibernation". Robertson said companies facing liquidity problems would have "safe harbour" from their normal insolvency duties ...1 day ago
Bernard Hickey talks to Kiwibank Chief Economist Jarrod Kerr about a massive spike in US jobless claims, and they talk about an inspiring Kiwi app to fight Covid-19 globally. Guest, Pie Funds chief executive Mike Taylor also joins them to talk about the massive market swings and hopes for recovery. Bernard zooms out ...1 day ago
The Reserve Bank looks set to start buying council bonds as well as Government bonds to unfreeze financial markets and allow councils to defer rates and jointly invest in infrastructure with the central Government, Dileepa Fonseka reports In what would be another unprecedented move to calm financial markets and help ...1 day ago
Covid-19 testing of the wider population is on the cards as World Health Organisation research shows people are most contagious within their first few days of being infected Director-General of Health Ashley Bloomfield says Covid-19 carriers are highly infectious when they show few signs of carrying the virus. People were ...1 day ago
Z Energy is the latest company to cut its dividend payout and start talking to its banks about strengthening its finances. Chief executive Mike Bennetts said the company, the largest fuel retailer in the country, had been battered by a range of issues over the past 18 months, and was ...1 day ago
Journalist and Great Barrier Island resident Lindsay Wright reflects on outer gulf pandemic preparedness. Hardy locals can tough it out but Auckland bach owners and boaties should keep their distance. Aotea Great Barrier, the easternmost island in the Hauraki Gulf, are undergoing a Covid-19-inspired population flood. Great Barrier has scenery that makes ...1 day ago
How is Covid-19 spreading within the country? Newsroom is collating information as it's available to paint a picture of what's happening. The following charts are based on numbers shared at the daily press conference and are "as of 9am" of the day. There were 71 new cases of Covid-19 in ...2 days ago
Vodafone says its continuing to see significant increases in calls and data on its networks after the first week of level 4 lockdown. ...2 days ago
People with lower credit scores increased their borrowing upon news of the lockdown, while those with higher scores dropped away. March data from the credit-reporting agency Centrix, which runs credit checks on behalf of banks, finance companies, online lenders, and buy now pay later schemes, showed credit inquiries dropped sharply ...2 days ago
Small business owners say commercial rent relief is desperately needed if they are to survive past the Covid-19 disruptions. While the wage subsidy helped with staff costs, there is currently no government assistance for commercial rent - which typically accounts for 40 percent of a firm's fixed costs. Landlords and ...2 days ago
SkyCity is making 200 staff redundant as part of cost cutting because of the Covid-19 virus. The casino operator said it had no choice but to cut the size of the workforce given that once business resumes it will be at much reduced level. Chief executive Graeme Stephens said it's ...2 days ago
Up to 100,000 foreigners could be seeking to leave the country in coming weeks, now the Government has relaxed domestic travel restrictions for them. ...2 days ago
Health Minister David Clark has flouted the Government's advice to exercise locally after confirming he drove to a park to go mountain biking on Thursday. ...2 days ago
Chris Trotter’s best ever article in today’s Daily Blog. Read it and be ever thankful Jacinda is our Prime Minister and not Simon Bridges.
I give thanks for that every day at the moment.
I looked that up Reality. All well thought out and fits what we observe and feel. I particularly noticed something about National and Chris's opinion that their 'hazing' treatment is what drives Bridges.
[Fixed the tags into a block-quote – Incognito]
Shallow waters ride over earthquake zones with swimming ease. If she really believes in the ideals of people-ism she'll make these few months a stepping stone to taking back control from the powerful. I think she believes in the ideals of easiness fundamentally. Her and Grant, like the rest of the middle class polies, have no real probs. The diff between a CV and the fight to survive of real demo-crats.
I think that the lack of empathy required to plot long-term revolutionary change in a time like this runs at odds with the requirements of managing the immediate problem.
The difference is between the UK response of letting the pandemic slide, vs the NZ response of trying to stamp it out from the start. One lot looked at percentages without empathy, the other lot looked at every possible death as a human life lost.
We've got the correct sort of government for this problem.
Looks like the middle class self-indulgence of taking overseas holidays will end up killing some of us who can't afford such things. I know we are meant to all be in this together, and we are, but the thought occurs.
So why is Winston encouraging the last 80,000 home – bugs and all ? To kill off a few more pensioners ?
Well we could do without having some people. But Winston is acting in accordance with the Party's name NZFirst, and encouraging those who want to return to come back to their homeland for the near future.
You’ll have to ask WRP. It is likely to become next to impossible to return to NZ in the near future. Kiwis may miss out on medical care if they’re overseas and the healthcare systems have to prioritise.
I’d imagine that many people would rather be home with friends & family to look or be looked after.
Sounds like you disapprove though of Kiwis returning home; should they be refused entry into their own country and be returned on the next flight back?
I most certainly do not disapprove of Kiwis returning home , in a managed way, but they should not have been waiting so long to come home.. I hope Kiwis don,t miss out on medical care because they are not prioritised over non residents.
It is hard to say what is best under the circumstances but as long as individuals still have a choice, they should make up their minds quickly. The interests of the general population outweigh individual concerns at present and this will tilt towards less personal freedom in the foreseeable future till things have stabilised IMO.
And the advice is pretty ambiguous. It's not at all clear what the status of the 500,000 or so kiwis living in Australia under the 'temporary' SCV444 visa is going to be. The ongoing problem with this visa is that it's officially termed a 'temporary' visa that allows kiwis to 'live and work in Australia indefinitely'. This is a bloody awful fudge that means we aren't really citizens in either country.
Taken at face value the NZ govt's advice that all citizen's living overseas temporarily should return to NZ asap, logically captures all kiwis in Australia too. Yet in practice it cannot mean this for all sorts of practical reasons.
On the other hand if Australia, like every other nation, gets to the point of rationing ICU beds, you can bet your sweet nelly that 'non-citizens' will be at the bottom of the list.
Loon loons..
..and Russian loons default to racism, Soros and Gates.
There are many theories about the origin of coronavirus and the further development of events. The most popular one concerns the monstrous prediction of Microsoft CEO Bill Gates. Last year, he said that 33 million people could die from such a coronavirus in 250 days. The calculations are purely mathematical, but true, the IT tycoon is sure.
After such statements, adherents of conspiracy theories literally have no doubt that the virus is of artificial origin, and Bill Gates is one of its main sponsors. Another fact adds weight to this theory – a few months ago, the head of Microsoft held a conditional exercise called Event 201, which simulated an outbreak of a new virus that killed 65 million people in 18 months. The idea of the teachings is simple – globalization in the name of salvation.
It is noteworthy that the famous pharmaceutical giants and the Pentagon leadership participated in this theater of cruel cynicism.
The fact is that while the disease affects only representatives of the Mongoloid race, such suspicious selectivity raises questions from experts. No less extensive discussion was caused by the story around the laboratory for the study of dangerous viruses. It is located in Wuhan, 32 kilometers from the same market where the disease was first recorded.
However, there is another biolaboratory in Wuhan – until recently, nothing was known about it. Her address is like someone’s joke – Gaoxin, three sixes – the number mentioned in the Bible, under which the name of the beast of the Apocalypse is hidden. But it’s even more symbolic that it exists on the money of the famous banker Jorozh Soros, who shares the global ideas of Bill Gates. It would seem that nuclear conspiracy theology is completely different, but experts say that a tricky plan lies behind an absurd wrapper.
https://tvzvezda.ru/news/vstrane_i_mire/content/202023353-O9wUV.html
google translate
"adrenochrome is extracted from the pituitary glands of tortured children"
I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Either way, Liz Crokin probably needs counselling.
Should Bernie drop out now? His only realistic path to the nomination now is Biden suffering an extreme adverse medical event. There simply aren’t enough votes left for him to win the nomination with actual votes.
There's a good argument it's time to pass the torch to a new generation of progressive leaders. Marie Newman's victory over establishment Dem machine favourite Dan Lipinski in solidly Dem Illinois 3rd, where Sanders lost to Biden by 41k votes to 63k votes strongly hints there's a big place for progressive ideas and people, but that Sanders is no longer the best person to front them.
https://www.salon.com/2020/03/18/bernie-needs-to-step-back-and-let-other-progressive-leaders-flourish–especially-women/
There's a good public health argument the time is right for Bernie to step down and allow the remaining primaries to be the rubber-stamping exercise they were going to be anyway without needing large crowds to gather at polling places. And that by doing so, he actually increases his leverage to get progress on his priorities.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/03/sanders-drop-out-primary-coronavirus.html
I haven't been following closely, but there's also the argument that a strong progressive/left wing voice is needed for its own sake and to keep those values and politics visible at a time when they are desperately needed. If Sanders pulls out and Bidens is it, this will demoralise the left and make the true system change harder. Will probably drop the vote too. This is true irrespective of how Bidens would then do in the main election, but hugely problematic if he loses (likely).
If the worst case scenario happens (45 wins), then what is the state of the left wing resistance at that point? That would be high on my priority list if I was in the US.
It is just like the Greens standing in all electorates.
Scares Labour into adopting Green policies, when they see enough voters splitting off what they regard as "their vote" to the Greens.
Nice one, good example.
That's more or less what happened in 2016, where Hillary's final platform moved a long way towards Bernie's. If you recall, it didn't end well.
Yes, I recall.
When Trump was promising even more leftward things than Hilary.
Like getting US rust belt workers, back to work!
Worked for him.
Seems to me the best way forward for progressive ideas is to focus on the contrast with Repug ideas, not to inflate the relatively small differences between the various Dem factions.
For instance, the Repug position is they are quite happy with people getting bankrupted, unnecessarily suffering, and dying early because they can't afford healthcare. In that context, the difference is trivial between Medicare-for-all-who-want-it that is available to everyone but still allows the half of Americans with employer provided health insurance to keep it if they prefer, and a purist Medicare-for-all which bans private health insurance and forces everyone into government health care.
In the context of trying to promote progressive ideas, it's entirely possible Sanders could do a lot more good lending his support to helping progressive challengers to crusty old forever-troughers in safe Dem seats, rather than continuing a doomed quest for his own presidential ambitions. If Sanders could make the difference in unseating the likes of Steny Hoyer and Richard Neal and replacing them with actual progressives, that would really be something.
Then there's the risk that if Bernie continues his campaign way beyond the point of no real hope, then it might inflate the Bernie-or-bust types, who would then go on to undermine Biden in the general election. Thereby depressing Dem vote, inflating third party vote, and widening Don the Con's path to re-election. As happened in 2016, likely contributing to the poor showing for House and Senate candidates as well as Hillary's surprise loss.
Biden needs to move on his VP pick pronto. He's already promised it will be a female.
Warren would be a useful choice to restructure and re-regulate the economy after this mess. Although unlikely since she’s not supporting him (or Sanders).
Catherine Cortez Mastro needs to be in the mix.
I reckon Warren would get a lot more done as Treasury Secretary.
This piece has a bunch of thumbnails of the probable top 12. It ranks Kamala Harris #1. Since there's a reasonable chance Biden would only go one term, that makes the VP pick this time around the most likely Dem nominee for 2024, and Harris strikes me as the most credible candidate for prez.
lol … it has to be Hillary
aww, now you're just shit-stirring.
You have to hope I am ….
Warren came third in her own State primaries..even Warren voters have seen through her..
Though I'm sure her lack of support for Sanders is more than enough to keep Biden happy.
I'd love it to be Warren, but … I suspect it will be Klobuchar. That pre-Super Tuesday endorsement.
So how do y'all Jacinda-lovers reconcile the terrifying disconnection between her words "Toughest controls in the world" and the reality that travellers are finding as they enter New Zealand?
Coronavirus: Auckland woman Maree Glading disappointed in checks at international arrivals
This is just one of many reports of what is (not) going on at our borders; there is no effective control to prevent entry of people even if they are symptomatic. There is absolutely NO control to prevent asymptomatic people entering the county just now. Effectively, our borders are wide open, and virus-laden travellers can be circulating wherever they choose – on public transport, domestic air and tourist and business destinations.
Until we see a tightening of the border – preferably close all incoming flights – the PM's words are frighteningly empty.
This is not a time for endless posidivity (words), it is a time to shut the gate (action)
The woman complaining, must have been totally isolated in her own bubble, not to have seen all the information the MOH, and border control have out there. Only a few clicks away.
Seems more like a National voter trying to play a Simon Bridges, gambit.
Yes. My thoughts too.
From the thousands of travellers who have arrived in NZ in the past week or so (many of them NZers returning home), only a handful seem to have had this 'experience' and funnily enough they don't seem to come to public notice until Simon Bridges brings them up at QT time in the House.
I bet if she had to sit in a little cubicle for 8 hours while every arriving passenger was given the 3rd degree shed be moaning louder . Moaners gunna moan
Our borders aren't wide open. They weren't even that before covid. I think that rhetoric doesn't serve us either.
There are others who can speak to this more here, but this is about minimising risk within the constraints of a system. If we shut things down too fast or unprepared there are other consequences eg the call to shut down schools pretty quickly leads to a conversation about childcare and how that would work in covid terms. The state is instead working with what is most likely to work in the real world. Yes, mistakes will be made, we're all humans here. But I'm seeing a govt that is responsive and working very hard to get this right and mostly succeeding.Lots of what we do now will be not ideal, but still better than the other thing.
One consequence of shutting down all flights is if this is done before other supply chains are set up, what happens to essential goods like medical supplies, pharmaceuticals, that crucial part in the a power generation plant that suddenly failed unexpectedly. There will be many examples, and until we can replace those import systems we need some planes flying.
There's also some obligation to NZers trying to get back home.
I saw the woman's post yesterday. It needs fact checking.
She was on Morning Report this morning. Her description seemed to be self defeating. No information given but notices handed out and officials shouting instructions.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/audio/player?audio_id=2018739156
Probably back at school she used to claim that teachers shouted at her and ignored her.
Wan,t thinking shut down freighting of goods. just freighting of people !
How would you do that? If you shut down the commercial people flights today, how do all the essential goods coming into the country over the next week get here? I'm betting there are materials for covid tests on some of those flights.
We can shut down flights, and I'd wager good money that the government is planning in case that becomes necessary, but it takes time for all the reasons I've explained already.
Freight could sit on seats too you know …. where there is a will there is a way. There seem to have been no will.
And if the flight hit some heavy turbulence – all hell could break loose. Yeah, nah.
This does need fact checking – this woman is a marketing professional, all her words are carefully chosen.
yep. If she'd come onto TS with that story people would have been all over it for the problems with what she said.
something RNZ should do before giving her the soapbox, but then it's a pathetic excuse for a broadcaster with gluon and susie still around.
I find it interesting that part of the bail out for Air NZ, is paying for security.
You avoid the fact that there have been a number of similar reports where Border Control does not seem to be taking this seriously enough, in the opinions of several travellers who have experienced what other countries are doing. No point shooting this particular messenger – there are plenty more saying the same thing.
In 20 days time we shall see who is right, shan't we? Those who cried for moderation in the response, or those who begged that the issue be hit as hard as possible as early as possible.
The cost of getting it wrong will be measured in the unnecessary premature deaths of New Zealand citizens.
If you want to bring about a change to the current protocols, and save lives, then obviously Open Mike on The Standard is the best place to do that.
A very expensive stupid mistake / deliberate trade off decision, that could have been prevented early February by shutting the borders then of OUR ISLAND NATION. Unlike a place like Switzerland where 170,000 people cross the border from Italy per day o work in Switzerland …..
"You avoid the fact that there have been a number of similar reports where Border Control does not seem to be taking this seriously enough, in the opinions of several travellers who have experienced what other countries are doing"
I didn't ignore those, I'm sure there are those accounts, feel free to share some and we'll address those too.
The internet is full of reckons right now. We can't base emergency policy on that, although I'm sure that the relevant authorities will be checking their processes.
You however are conflating two things: the fails in an otherwise appropriate system, with the need to have completely closed borders. In your argument you are avoiding the issues that I raised, those of unintended consequences. Do you know the impact of shutting down all incoming flights and shipping this week? What happens if of the 80,000 NZers overseas 1,000 of them are nurses and doctors trying to get home? Or even 100.
"No point shooting this particular messenger – there are plenty more saying the same thing."
I'm not shooting you, I'm making a cogent argument to address the points you raised. This is what we do here.
"In 20 days time we shall see who is right, shan't we? Those who cried for moderation in the response, or those who begged that the issue be hit as hard as possible as early as possible"
People who say told you so at that point are still largely ignorant of the points I raised above and there will be literally no way to know if shutting down the ports and airports this week would have been a better option. Points which lots of people are saying btw, including those with actual expertise.
I didn’t call for moderation btw, you seem to have misunderstood what I said.
Why has this uninformed reckon got so much coverage? Because she planned it. Check her FB page, she has done a full scale media release blitz. Maree Glading is a hard core National supporter who knows how to self-publicise, she got all sorts of soft interviews for pie business when she set it up – she is clearly well connected in the Auckland high-Tory circles (which includes most of the NZ Herald).
It should be no surprise to anyone that a well connected rich white women has no trouble getting an unverified reckon published uncritically in the Herald, that is how that paper works.
But next time Shayne Currie and Duncan Grieve and Toby Manhire ad neseum have a whine about the decline of journalism, this piece of stinking class biased fake news should be raised.
All of this ^
The same letter was read out by Duncan Garner on the AM show this morning. Ashley Bloomfield addressed it calmly.
Reducing the discussion to "Jacinda-lovers" isn't helping. This is a massive challenge and the work isn't being done by headlines and slogans – it's being done by well-qualified, overworked, tired people. Who are contributing far more to the common good than commentators with instant reckons.
If the DG of health and medical professionals told the PM to (e.g.) close the airports do you think she would casually ignore him? Do you think the staff would remain silent? It's not Chernobyl in the USSR.
It is certain that procedures will change as the situation evolves. It is (almost) certain that people will die. Even martial law and a curfew wouldn't prevent that.
"It is (almost) certain that people will die"
I'm wondering what the analysis is around that, in terms of bigger picture issues. We can of course crash the economy, and I'm sure that if was the bubonic plague that was going to kill half the population we'd have done that already. But crashing the economy brings death too, especially if other countries follow suit.
Our best case scenario here is that we contain cv, but it's more likely that it will eventually be in the community and that we will have flattened the curve to significantly minimise deaths.
I don't read herald but RNZ has a similar story and the family said they felt safer in Thailand. In Thailand the heroin smuggling MP’s aide has been caught hoarding face masks for sale to China for personal gain,
https://thaipoliticalprisoners.wordpress.com/2020/03/12/masking/
Talk about keeping your head firmly in the sand,
Adam Ash
Yep … a whole series of Countries are now closing their borders & it's becoming more & more evident that a major lockdown is the only way to defeat this virus. The earlier the better.
WHO Executive Director, Dr Michael Ryan:
We need exhaustive testing & contact tracing … but. failing that, a complete lockdown.
So many Western Govts (including our own) have been just pissing around with COVID-19, this idea that you can roll out some sort of finely-tuned, wonderfully-nuanced, carefully calibrated plan in a series of discrete little stages … dangerously stupid people deluding themselves that they have some kind of control over Coronavirus. They soooo fucking don't.
Oh joy, self declared wartime president invoking wartime act[s] to fight a Chinese virus riffs on punishment with this shit going on in the background.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-usa-trump-act/trump-says-he-will-invoke-wartime-act-to-fight-enemy-coronavirus-idUSKBN2152XL
People are apparently panicking – friends of mine report chaos at supermarkets.
This is a serious question – should we start considering censorship of the media? Is the panicking mongering click bait reckons of dickheads "news" or an irresponsible luxury we can't affford just now?
Went to a slack n slave in Hamilton last night and couldn't even buy a tin of baked beans, all brands, shelves cleared. Spent most of my time at the checkout asking people with loaded trolleys if they think they've horded enough yet or will they need to make another run at it.
lol – I've taken to doing most of my shopping with the local butcher, fruit and vegetable shop, weekend markets etc supporting local.
The nutters at the supermarkets can get bent.
What makes it worse, now I'm flying solo with the kid at uni and fortunate enough to always work alone, practising social distancing, the supermarket is my main entryway for covid 19. Sucks to increase my exposure at long queues while not even being able to get the one thing I really came in for.
that does really suck. Are the supermarkets getting peaks and waves, or is it crowded all the time?
Can't speak to regular office hours, but I have noticed large queues during off peak times over the past couple of weeks, though no bare shelves until yesterday.
Just went to the Lincoln Rd Pak'n'save coz around now is usually a quietish time. Holy fuck! I didn't even bother going in, there were cars circling the carpark looking for a space.
I might end up chewing through my emergency supplies and outdoor activity food waiting for the wave of panic buying to pass.
What about Countdown on the other side of the road?
TBH I didn't even look as I went past on the way there since I've never shopped there, and I left the Pak'n'save by the shared road with Mitre10 and turned right so didn't see it on the way out.
Give it a try, next time.
They don't have any brands of tonic water that I like, everything they sell is too sugared up for my taste. Pam's goes down the best for me.
It’s going to be tough times ahead of you, I’m afraid.
Yeah. Especially if I'm going to have to get down 300 a day to get an effective dose like McFlock said yesterday.
After your fifth or sixth, you won’t taste let alone care about the tonic water. That said, the first few are going to be awful but all medicines taste like shit, by design, and then, after a while, make you (feel) better (or not).
Make mine a Gunners. Excellent after a round of golf in the Singapore sun
I went down to my local supermarket today to buy a few items. The queues were unbelievable! This in a town of 8000+ people. I have never seen anything like the chaos. Not even during the christmas rush, when those travelling to the beach for the holidays call in for their supplies – . Almost all out of towners stocking up for god knows what reason. Apparently it has been like this all week. On the way out I met one of our practise nurses from the local medical centre about to go in to do her shopping and mentioned – "its just madness in there" "Yes" she said "You wonder why and what they think they are achieving when this is going to go on for months." Exactly.
I called in to the local butcher on the way home . She was saying that the shop had been inundated earlier with people buying up large. She was worried she would run out for her local customers.
I think all these panic shoppers must be intending on an obesity epidemic …
Might be time to start rationing.
Are the out of towners in town to stay in cribs? Or?
Nope I would say most just here for the day – we are just over an hours drive from Hamilton, and Auckland, and an hour and a half from Tauranga. The bachs (cribs) are mostly empty this time of year. I had to drive north to Auckland this past week. The traffic travelling south down SH2 and SH25 was a steady stream. Not the normal flow.
Are they driving there specifically to buy supplies?
From the number of cars in the car park which is usually half empty on a Thursday around 10am I would definitely say so – and see Joe's comment below as to similar activity in Australia.
Same hysteria across the ditch.
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/city-vultures-are-slammed-after-travelling-to-rural-towns-by-the-busload-to-clear-out-regional-supermarkets-in-a-panic-buying-frenzy/ar-BB11hwmK
In countries that are locked down, people are still allowed to buy food though right?
I think food and medical are it, with penalties for non-compliance.
Greece’s infection total approached 230 with three deaths, and police there arrested 45 shopkeepers Saturday for violating a ban on operations.
https://time.com/5803206/france-spain-lockdown-coronavirus/
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/18/italy-charges-more-than-40000-people-violating-lockdown-coronavirus
Spoke to a Countdown manager about 2 hrs ago and told her it's time they rationed bread. Visited three local supermarkets and all of them were out of bread. Saw a woman leave a supermarket with a trolley overflowing with bread. The effing selfish &*^%. 👿
Glad to say a number of shoppers heard me talking to the manager. Every last one of them looked guilty. So they should. We're a country that produces food for the rest of the world. We are not going to run out.
Your local bread is made with imported flour. Duh.
Not necessarily.
"Duh": classy way to enhance your point, so convincing …
Imported on ships, no? Has maritime cargo been halted? Doesn't seem to be.
This isn't like the chch earthquakes, where Dunedin supermarkets ran low on bread because the bread factory and the transport networks were physically damaged.
This is all about people overbuying and throwing bread in the freezer. Or worse, it goes to waste.
we don't need bread. We need carbs, protein, fat, vitamins/minerals etc. Even if we did end up with the shortage of bread, there are ample other ways for us to get the calories we need in a day. Anne's point is incredibly sound.
Nice link Alice, I didn't know that.
@weka
NZ has been growing wheat for years – I worked in my varsity summer hols on a combine harvester harvesting wheat. Some bakers preferred the Aussie wheat for baking, but there has always been NZ wheat. I remember attending a cabinet economic committee meeting once in the early '80's – Muldoon was PM – and price fixing was in vogue. One of the topics for discussion was to be the price of wheat.
"We're a country that produces food for the rest of the world. We are not going to run out."
Thank-you, this is such a good point.
SM. Gladdens my heart you can a) afford to shop at the costlier speciality stores rather than the supermarket and b) you deign to grace TS with your exalted presence. Don't you have investments go check or something?
All the best,
Nutter.
@ Rosemary
The fruit and vegetables shops where i live are often better quality and cheaper than the supermarket as are the weekend markets.
The butchers are more expensive but much better quality and I eat far less meat these days so choose to support local business over the large supermarket chains.
If all that makes me a nutter and least I'm happy in my madness.
SM. Have another read Possum.
I signed off as "Nutter" having just 'done' New World.
Nowhere did I call you a nutter…au contraire…you are the one casting aspersions on the sanity of others.
Sighs.
Rolls eyes.
Despairs of commenters who can't bleeding read.
Can we agree we are all nutters then? Maybe consider that we could ease up a bit on each other too? The points being made seem sound, the poking at each other is probably not the best strategy for us at this time.
@ Rosemary – apologies for misunderstanding your signoff.
Also I did not accuse you of being a nutter, just those who are in a frenzy of toilet roll and bottled water hoarding.
New World is much more expensive than pak n save.
You shop like you aren't even watching the pennies.
Hey, big spender, drop it like it's hot.
Some places, lots, don't have a Pak n Save 😉
Hamilton does, though, two of them.
Shame on me.
Of course, you are fully aware of my circumstances that you pass judgement, twice, for my disgraceful choices.
Being a Hamilton local you will be aware that both Pak n saves are at each end of city centre?
We're currently squatting with whanau in Nawton. I cannot get Peter from his wheelchair into the loaner vehicle we have, so made the call to make the quicker trip to Te Rapa NW rather than leave Peter alone for longer than absolutely necessary. Yes, cost a wee bit more, but cheap, in terms of safety.
And replenishing our hosts' cupboards is the least we can do in exchange for free board.
😉👍🙄
Calm down, it was just a light hearted response to your nasty above, though you sure Mill st isn't closer? But lucky you went earlier, my sources tell me te rapa new world has just closed because they've run out of food.
Got some funny looks yesterday.
But, in fact our normal two weekly for 6 adults and two children, with a half a dozen cans added.
The staff said big run on some things but restocked already.
New World Te Rapa crowded this morning with non panicked shoppers of all ages.
I did the trolly waltz with an older woman who laughingly canceled my license….then she accepted my excuse that I have never shopped in that particular supermarket before so if I was looking lost it was because I was.
Had a couple of young fellows on because they had neglected to buy actual food food. Not even 2 minute noodles…🙄
All very polite, if focused on our respective quarry.
Best conversation was in the baby wipes section. Disability, housebus dwelling and baby wipes are an actual thing. The other shopper was near frantically rifling through the various brands looking for the baby unfriendly wipes…the ones not labeled "alcohol free'.
"Might be good for baby's bum, but no use for sterilizing surfaces…!"
I suggested dilute bleach and washable cloths…the sterilizing wipes having been snapped up days ago.
Big ups to the supermarket staff. Respect. Shelves being restocked in a civilised manner and the checkout staff unflappably polite, quietly packing our goodies.
Told them they were all kinds of awesome and I do believe it made their morning.
Good on you. Our local operators have been amazing too. So on to it and doing a fantastic job calming angry, frustrated shoppers like me. It's taught me to appreciate their real worth – not that I didn't know it before – and make the effort to tell them.
I agree, the feelings are similar to yours in the UK.
'I have spent days and days trying to calm down nearest and dearest, especially my Mum, who is scared shitless that her days are numbered due to her age and the fact she has asthma and borderline COPD. I know precisely why – because every fucking five minutes on BBC news (which she watches every evening) they are banging on about the number of deaths, details about those who have died, speculation as to how many more will die…….doom, doom and more fucking doom.
They fucking drone on about panic buying and how the public are going bat shit crazy, but who is stoking that fire and creating that panic? Yeah, that is right, you F… a…. c….s – YOU!!!
Bastards. I can hardly bear to look at what is happening in the UK.
It's probably time for the government to look at the issue of equal access to supermarkets to reassure people about provisions in future.
I would suggest something like allocating days of the week for shopping – in store, or on-line. Based around the first letter of the surname – proof of ID at checkout for this (they already have surnames for on-line).
1/7th, or so, for each of the days.
Just the idea of such a system being considered/developed might be enough to reduce panic buying now.
good idea.
I live in the provinces and am not hearing of this in the smaller places.
I think some public education would be good too, but I'm guessing the govt is swamped with tasks at the moment. The MSM should be doing this.
"…It's probably time for the government to look at the issue of equal access to supermarkets to reassure people about provisions in future…"
You mean rationing?
stores could actually do this without the state mandating it. They can do this to manage their supply lines. They can also prioritise goods for people with special needs. eg online shopping for people that shouldn't be exposed to cv, young mums, elderly, disabled and so on.
Maree Glading would probably shit herself if she knew how much was known about her condition and history before she got to the last door. The other night on TV news there was a shot over a techies shoulder of a monitor showing a black and white image of disembarking passengers. There is some pretty impressive gear there at Customs/Immigration. Also the intuition and experience of the staff is bloody amazing. She is a dopey bullshitter.
The number of people with C-19 arrival is a lot less than 1 in God knows how many thousands. And anybody with a temperature probably only has a cold. As long ago as 3 weeks ago a mate pulled aside a few people in the course of a day who had appeared to have a temperature, they were overdressed for an Auckland summer but OK for a cool aircraft cabin so the C/I staff let them rest in a room and dress lighter and retested them again, all were OK.
We are going to be alright, we are well looked after by people we don't even know we have to thank.
"we are well looked after by people we don't even know we have to thank."
So mindful of this among all the criticism.
I was really impressed that they quarantined the two tourists who had no self isolation plan and then will just deport them. That's not mucking around
More like flattening the curve.
heh.
now I want to write a post about flattening the grocery curve.
I gave it a mention in a post just now, but it deserves wider exploration and attention.
In CHCH a number of factories are now working extended weekend shifts to meet both local and export demand for FMCG.
First time they have had overtime for two years (double bubble at weekends)
The significant depreciation of the NZ$ (and supply shocks) is having and effect (read localism)
this is good because it's extra work/income for people and keeping businesses in good shape?
A factory manager I was talking to,gave me an example of one teen(they took on at Xmas 17 yr) was employed because he was to be the bread winner of a family of 6.He is taking home at present an xtra 500$.
The manager said that pricing differentials meant their products were now significantly cheaper,then overseas products.
wow, this is a good story, thanks.
We will have rationing by the end of the week. Thank you glorious comrade Ardernsky.
what day does your week end? Sunday?
Probably Wibble.
Then we get headlines like this – they should be ashamed of themselves.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/120334508/coronavirus-what-is-new-zealands-plan-if-mass-deaths-occur
On the contrary the MoH couldn't ask for a better social distancing campaign and they got it for free too.
I'd like to see an analysis of how bad it is. The Herald can go get fucked. What are the TV networks doing? RNZ? Commercial radio.
I think censorship is a step too far right now, but there could be public education plans.
Btw, for the convo upthread, know what would really send large part of the population into panic? Shutting the borders completely and too fast and having medical supply and other shortages as a result.
Without trying to sound arrogant, a number of comments don’t even sound ill-advised but as not thought through at all and based on ignorance and fear (possibly with some anger). It’s ok to vent IMO, but some here, at least, are skirting close to appointing blame for deaths, for example, that have not even occurred yet. All action so far has been aimed at containment, i.e. preventing the disease spreading and causing major mayhem.
Lots of people are super stressed for sure. I am, and I have decent enough skills around stress and survival issues, I can imagine that for people who aren't used to having to think about these things they're in a fair amount of chaos (hence panic buying, and blame*). There's a thing going on about whether the pandemic is bringing out the worst in people or the best. I'm aiming for the best for myself, but I am being tested on this for sure.
*I also think we have this in the culture anyway, including in political spaces.
I’ll respond in the back-end.
check your email too 🙂
I’ll dust it off later.
"should we start considering censorship of the media?"
This question has been bothering me for some time now short answer is yes something must be done and not just because of covid19. (those of you who scream straw horses at me will be ignored we need a proper discussion on this!)
I have been thinking about this one for some time and the only solution I can see that (could) work without immediate descent into state censorship of unpopular views is some sort of external set of editorial standards
a couple of areas to start is clearly labeling NEWS as different analysis as different from opinion as different from attempted influencing. (an example here would be hoskings currently labeled as "opinion" it is not and should be clearly labeled "attempted influencing")
another area is press conferences if you ask a question in a press conference that is not intended to elicit some new piece of information you get a black mark. do it three times and you are not invited back.
these are just very basic ideas as a starting point that need collective work to become some sort of workable policy but one thing that is certain we cannot continue with the current media crap and if we dont sort it out in a reasonable and fair way we will end up with state censorship which will ultimately be worse.
there is another option and we need to find it.
Wot. Are you saying we should add to the already considerable list of things we are prohibited from honestly talking about in New Zealand after the Chch debacle? The thing that is required right now is the ability to vigorously discuss our predicament and how we deal with it. If we censor any perspective we risk missing essential views of other people who think differently from us which may save us from painting ourselves into a dangerous corner.
ahh but i am not suggesting prohibiting any subject of discussion just suggesting a set of editorial standards ie visible correct and accurate labeling and separation of News , analysis, opinion, or bullshit. If you want to be a "news" outlet with journalistic privilege you follow that standard. to be "journalism" it needs to be based on facts
Adam Ash is transparent. He wants his right to troll.
Let’s assume he’s as anxious as anybody else now, please.
Troll be b*ggered! I like this blog because I find contributors to be intelligent and relatively open to changing their minds if the evidence is sound, as am I. Like many, I am treading the fine line between panic at the social and economic horror and anger at the ineptitude of those in whom we place our trust to keep us safe. I welcome all points of view, as I hope my contributions are of service too
I don't know, we spent six weeks ignoring the logical consequences of what some people were trying to say in late January. Specifically that the silent transmission characteristic of this virus made it different to almost anything we've encountered before.
And now mid March I'm still hearing people downplaying this. It takes some people a full kick to the nuts to clear the wax from their ears.
So having frittered away the best opportunity to suppress this virus at relatively low cost, we now have to pay the higher price. Tough.
Pandemic lessons learnt so far
1. There needs to be spare medical equipment stored as part of planning for one.
2. There should be enough testing capacity for the tracking testing necessary to prevent community spread AND community spread sampling to reassure the public so that (they and) the government would know there was community spread soon after it occurred. The latter reduces fear, the former is the means to prevent community spread.
Lesson from China
It is easier to contain it if you have a central source area to contain it in. It is harder when it is coming at you from multiple places (business and personal travel)
Yes. I think those of us that can need to start now with the staying home (mostly) and making that cultural shift. It takes time to adjust to this and if some are starting now it will be easier for others to make that change too.
This Washington Post article by Beth Cameron is excellent, detailed and informative:
All class.
/
.
I just hope Richard struggles through.
https://newsthump.com/2020/03/18/worried-nation-demands-reassurance-richard-branson-will-not-be-financially-impacted-by-coronavirus/?fbclid=IwAR1X1k4eYW2L1vTLakZ44fltQEJiFMJ2ZjM4fU67i2R1a3dunJ1UbMs1gpk
Not satire; the pricks who spent billions on stock buybacks and then rather than investing in building a new aircraft, recycled one from the sixties and it killed several hundred people. Now they want money.
And if there's any doubt about just how craven the fuckers are, a little more than 11 million people because 'bidness.
Looks like Elizabeth Warren is onto it in the USA. An eight point plan for companies who receive taxpayer funds. Maintain payroll, pay minimum wage, maintain collective bargaining, chop executive bonuses, etc.
Hope plenty of strings are attached here. Collective bargaining to be the norm, worker seats on the board , executive compensation to be dropped, working hour reductions to be spread.
]And it would be even better if Air NZ stopped saying it needed to lose 30% of its jobs and said 30% of the hours worked. Still seems low – an 85% service reduction is mooted.
I am already reading reports of how quickly the environment is reacting ( fish returning to waterways) to the dramatic reduction of human activity.
One positive of our current situation will be to read what reduction of co2 and other gases and see how any reduction follows predictions/models. Perhaps we underestimate the eco system to rebound or recalibrate. But not to take any reduction as an excuse to continue on our destructive manner.
Similar thing happened with places that got closed off to prevent spread of Kauri rot. Wildlife in general and feral/wild pigs and goats have been running riot.
Sadly I think the feral goats and pigs have been doing a fantastic job of spreading kauri rot…
.law of unintended consequences 1 people 0
I read somewhere about the quality of the water ways in Venice too
Interesting the reason given is that there is no "“The water now looks clearer because there is less traffic on the canals, allowing the sediment to stay at the bottom,” a spokesman"
https://abcnews.go.com/International/venice-canals-clear-fish-coronavirus-halts-tourism-city/story?id=69662690
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/18/photos-water-in-venice-italys-canals-clear-amid-covid-19-lockdown.html
Canals of Venice run crystal clear…with wee fish!
Literally brought a tear to my eye did that…
We simply don't deserve this Earth.
I can't help notice that the regulars here who for years have implicitly argued that we had to 'smash capitalism' and 'hit the big reset button' on our modern industrial economy … are now all very worried for themselves now an actual event threatens to disrupt our world.
Sometimes you should be careful what you wish for.
There’s a subtle difference between a controlled burn off and an out-of-control large fire that threatens to engulf and destroy everything in its path.
Fair point, although as someone familiar with the insanely complex industrial systems on which the modern world is is built, I was always dubious that the left's ideology was sufficiently nuanced to accomplish the kind of 'controlled burn off' you have in mind.
You should try Systems Biology 😉
I have no burn off in mind; I’m more of an evolutionary type 😉
As I am too; very much so.
If nothing else this should underline to us all the huge damage uncontrolled shocks can cause. Whacking complex systems with big hammers, never makes anything better.
If you could do it under experimental/lab conditions with a realistic empirical model (akin earthquake testing of buildings & structures) it could be informative. Alternatively, Kobayashi Maru 😉
We have already done that.
With the Neo-liberal unbridled capitalism, hammer.
Certainly right wing ideology has been conclusively proven to be much worse than “insufficiently nuanced”.
But. That was a right wing revolution, so "it is fine" no matter how destructive it has proven to be.
All the deaths, poverty disease and destruction it is causing is ignored.
Until when when something like coronavirus, or financial meltdowns, happens. Then all the individual responsibility, give me freedom to rip everyone else off, capitalists, suddenly become keen on socialism and State control. But, only to protect themselves, you notice. The amount of people on Facebook wanting social welfare for their business, but "fuck beneficiaries" and the already disadvantaged, is embarrassing.
With the Neo-liberal unbridled capitalism, hammer.
When you have only a hammer, all problems look like nails.
The Left are really very very mild, and are pushing for controled change.
The refusal to take that on at anything other than a snails pace..a snails pace made redundant by the rapidly evolving Climate Change and Money/Power grab of the Corporations and super rich (who come out of these crises very nicely) ..are what make real, violent Revolution and the ensuing chaos all the more inevitable down the line
The "left" at least in New Zealand are all for controlled change, democratically controlled and based on evidence.
I've seen very few arguing for a revolution. Most are after solutions that have been proven to work, already
It was the "right" who bought in disaster capitalism by stealth in the 80's and 90's. A violent revolution, that is killing people in much greater numbers than coronavirus, still.
Elizabeth Warren has a Plan For That.
As Andre suggests if Biden gets the nod and chooses someone like Kamala Harris as his running mate, Elizabeth Warren would be an excellent choice for the Treasury. She has a very good history of achievement in introducing valuable change particularly following the GFC.
The intro looks interesting, but sadly it's paywalled. I've no objection to detailed, organic plans that allow for nuance and complexity, plans that encourage and incentivise evolution.
It's the ideological 'take a big hammer to it all' types that irk me.
Here is a good summation of what she has in mind.
https://www.vox.com/2018/8/15/17683022/elizabeth-warren-accountable-capitalism-corporations
I'm sorry she has withdrawn from the race because if anyone could change what is now the American system she could. But hopefully with a new President and a shift in the composition of Senate, to allow change to occur, some of what she perceives will eventuate.
Not me I not worried, I still say, let the system fall.
But it's not going to – the best we can hope for is that people stop worshiping the elites/managerial/technocrat class like gods, and actually start to think and do for themselves.
Because just in case you missed it – the orange one started a bombing campaign in Iran last week which was huge.
And whilst the supply train is currently broken in China, it will be fixed. The fact that growth is not going to be world killing will be a good thing long term.
This is not the end of capitalism, far from it.
Just more step in the crap (shocks) and insanity (wreaking) we have to survive through whilst it dies.
As for blaming those with no power in this demise, is a really shitty case of punching down.
I know these guys are way too white and privileged to suit the ideology of many people here, but it's 8 minutes of good thinking:
Eight new Covid-19 cases in NZ.
From Newshub:
All relate to overseas travel, which Director-General Dr Ashley Bloomfield says shows New Zealand does not yet have any recorded community transmission. Close contact tracing is underway.
Of the eight new cases, two are in Southland, two in Taranaki, one in Rotorua, two in Auckland and one in Northland.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2020/03/coronavirus-eight-new-cases-in-new-zealand1.html
All from international travel, and we're getting to the period where anyone who gets it from overseas should have gone straight into isolation, thus limiting the close contacts.
Really, the only slight misstep I can see the government making was the announcement of the isolation requirement a couple of days before it was implemented, leading to people rushing to get back before they "had to" go into isolation. Not as serious as the Lombardy lockdown plans being leaked so people fled throughout Italy, though.
would you expect infection rate to decrease soon then (assuming it's not in the community)?
Forward modelling isn't my field (but I can backward trend with the best of 'em 🙂 ), but it's largely a function of travel numbers and proportion of longer term stays in NZ.
Assuming no community outbreak, I'd expect increasing overseas-sourced cases daily over the next week or two, especially as testing abilities ramp up. The reverse-diaspora and longer term stays in NZ to allow symptoms to develop, reflecting a lag on the conditions that prevailed in the country they departed from.
As someone put it, in 6-8 weeks the world went from "we might have a problem" to "I might starve, but I refuse to die with an unwiped ass".
We might still be lucky. We'll see if the incoming cases peak soon.
Correction: Queenstown and Dunedin. Not 'Southland'
Four tweets, nailed it.
Large scale testing, please.
While Italy is currently the "worst-case scenario" for the United States, the small Italian town of Vò has not reported any new cases of COVID-19 since last Friday and the spread of the illness has been completely stopped there.
Vò, a town of 3,300 just outside Venice, was part of an experiment that involved aggressive testing and quarantine measures. Every single resident was tested for coronavirus in late February when Northern Italy was first rocked by the outbreak, and three percent of inhabitants were found to be carrying the virus.
Andrea Crisanti, an infections expert at Imperial College London, was involved with the experiment and told news outlets that half of the carriers exhibited no symptoms.
“In the UK, there are a whole lot of infections that are completely ignored,” Crisanti told the Financial Times. “We were able to contain the outbreak here because we identified and eliminated the ‘submerged’ infections and isolated them. That is what makes the difference.”
Anyone who tested positive was placed under quarantine, as were individuals that came into recent contact with the infected. The town's residents were then tested again 10 days later, and just .3 percent of the population was found to be carrying the virus. However, at least six infected individuals were asymptomatic and would not have been tested in most other countries.
[''']
Crisanti also warned Sky News that, "for every patient that shows symptoms for COVID-19 there were about 10 who don't."
https://www.sfgate.com/coronavirus/article/Italian-town-experiment-coronavirus-testing-Vo-15141033.php
Yeah, we'll just pull 4 million testing kits and an appropriate number of lab techs and labs out of our arse, shall we?
In order to discover if there are 9 or so people in the country who are asymptomatic, because we're not getting symptomatic patients from the wider community yet?
The nice thing about contact tracing is that it works backwards, too – not just the people who get infected by the patient, but the person who infected them.
Of returnees like an acquaintance who arrived in the country last Thursday who's since been yuking it up around the town with not a thought about self isolation.
Even if they supposedly beat the cutoff, say something.
We all have a responsibility to keep others and ourselves safe so do your duty!
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2020/03/coronavirus-how-you-can-dob-someone-in-for-breaking-self-isolation.html
All the Logan Park (Dunedin) tests are in: all negative.
This is how the system works – resources are finite, while the population is infinite (literally, because you'd have to start again and re-check once the entire population had been tested).
Tests don't happen just by thinking of a number and doubling it. Real people, working overtime and under great stress, are carrying out these tests. They deserve our thanks.
yus!
& space! They used the stadium to test these people.
I know it's millions of deaths but when it comes down to it it's c. 3 % of the population. But we haven't had such an upset since Polio, TB or WW 2. And don't we need it. We've begun to think complacent comfort is a right, and the climate change cliff so near. This new war govt should continue on. Comfort-comfort-comfort kills alertness for survival. And, yes, we've never encountered a certainty of complete doom preceded by a decade or two of increasing comfort. Like those birds fooled by cuckoos to raise their chicks we can't deal with that fiddling with our genetic programme.