joe90: In NZ the very rich seem to live in high walled secure houses, or in gated communities. By contrast my modest belongings which barely need protection are not a worry to me when I am out. Every time that I see John Key under protection even within the corridors of Parliament I feel no envy. Does it suggest a degree of paranoia as a PM or is it that of a rich man?
And it is remarkably (?) surprising that the tax take has reduced in NZ after the Bush-like tax cuts. Surprise, followed by a cut in spending on Education and Health and Welfare. The parallels are here in NZ too Joe.
What you find should be a wake-up call for New Zealanders as well. Sobering Joe.
If you mass to protest in a way that will seriously threaten the power structure, you will die in a hail of bullets.
That may be how it starts, and it will start, it’s not how it ends. As we’ve seen throughout history the rich cannot maintain their power once everyone else is pissed off enough.
Does he think only the super-rich are going to be attacked by armed thugs? The thugs probably get their training in their own neighbourhood first.
Um, this bit Rosy.
In short, the thugs who are robbing America of our Social Security and Medicare and product safety and education today will live in fear of even bigger thugs tomorrow.
Yes, I get the point – It’s just that the comeuppance will, as usual, hit the poor first. They’ll live in more fear than even now – Mexico is a good example – It’s the poor who are paying for the US war on drugs. But then, they’re meant to expect it. It’s the super-rich who will be shocked when it hits them hard.
The violence can be traced to a civil war between the state and leftist rebels, a three-decade struggle that, from 1960 to 1996, was the dirtiest of Latin America’s dirty wars. More than two hundred thousand people were killed or “disappeared.” According to a U.N.-sponsored commission, at least ninety per cent of the killings were carried out by the state’s military forces or by paramilitary death squads with names like Eye for an Eye.
And isn’t this Tamaulipas state where Fisher & Paykel relocated to (Reynosa)? It makes me absolutely livid – It seems like history repeating with a new part of Latin America tied up in the US push for control – albeit of drugs this time, rather than coups and civil wars, like Guatemala, Nicaragua, Chile etc, etc.
Radio New Zealand shows why publicly owned news gathers and presenters are so vital. It reports on Telecom’s recent $12 million fine. This morning (no link as yet) a very strong link is being drawn between Telecom’s predatory action a decade ago and the Government’s intention to prevent Commerce Commission oversight of Telecom for the next decade.
Bend over and prepare to be rogered New Zealand by your unfriendly formerly publicly owned but overseas controlled telco which should properly be called telecon …
Telecon plan to appeal the decision as well… Watch for more moves against our civil liberties and organisations that hold private companies to account. The National ministers are so in the pocket of big business, when one of them realizes that their is a conflict of interest and steps down from a portfolio, hardly anybody bats an eyebrow… Maybe there are a few people around with their eyes open though:
Have you read The Predator State by James Galbraith? It puts what NACT are doing in context and there’s no way that it’s for the best of the country. What it’s to do is transfer wealth and power away from the people and to the wealthy. It’s unfortunate that so many people wish to help them in their corruption and theft.
Mr Key and your mates in the Business Round Table and all parliamentarians, try to understand this simple fact. New Zealand’s assets are NOT YOURS to sell.
If we do not have the expertise to extract resources, then invite tenders for that expertise to do the job, and pay for those services but the ownership must remain New Zealand’s.
Joseph E Stigliz issues a warning that the “unrest”, born of inequality, we see in the Middle East could happen on the streets of America: Of the 1%, By the 1% and for the 1%
Americans have been watching protests against oppressive regimes that concentrate massive wealth in the hands of an elite few. Yet in our own democracy, 1 percent of the people take nearly a quarter of the nation’s income—an inequality even the wealthy will come to regret.
As we gaze out at the popular fervor in the streets, one question to ask ourselves is this: When will it come to America? In important ways, our own country has become like one of these distant, troubled places.
Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee today announced the make-up of the independent review panel that will assess all legislative and regulatory changes under the new Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Act.
Dame Jenny Shipley being one of them, the people of CHCH will just love being told how there city should be rebuilt by this corrupt patronizing cow!
Yeah, she’ll do to them what she did to us in the 90’s.
Tell them it’s their fault. Tell them they are lazy and unproductive. And when they complain – tell them they are reacting out of the politics of envy.
If anyone is free today please go to the Labour Party Stop Asset Sales Facebook Page, its being overrun by the “tsunami of stupid” – all with plaquards from whale-oils blog. Beware they are stupid and angry, its kind of scarey..
Selfish bastards! Repeat selfish bastards! Required reading for anybody who does not want to sleep walk to defeat. http://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com/
Trotter emphatically makes the same statement that many of us lefties have: he does’nt care for the politics of the left. Damien was right and Labour were too collectively cowardly to get behind him versus factional groups. I am like Chris more than a little pissed that the efete liberal interest groups mean more to Labour than that of struggling Kiwis.
No, just frustrated Ianmac that Labour keeps drifting off track.
I don’t think they are Carol but they’re being flogged by the perception and both Trotter and O’Connor piss me off by fanning the flame. I want my party to work in the interests of workers and their families and in my case my family includes all of the above.
I’m a worker with a family and if a party doesn’t serve my interests then it’s not serving the interests of my family.
Agree, the only time Goff’s ratings improved were after the “sackings” of the homosexual Chris Carter and the “closet’ homosexual Darren Hughes. What does that tell you. That mainstream NZ is homophobic or is it because manistream Nz is fed up with the Rainbow faction, so powerful in the Labour Party?
What does that tell you. That mainstream NZ is homophobic or is it because manistream Nz is fed up with the Rainbow faction, so powerful in the Labour Party?
Are those two things meant to be mutually exclusive? Actually I’d rephrase the last part: perceived to be, or characterised as so powerful in the Labour Party?
Don’t agree on the analysis that Damien was right. Many of us emphatically want policians to support and promote the interests of those people stuggling on low incomes AND attacks on relatively marginal minorities. It’s not either/or. And exactly how is the current Labour Party putting gay interests etc above policies targetting economic inequalities at the moment? We should be working together. Such attacks just divide the left & REALLY are not helping at this time.
And exactly how is the current Labour Party putting gay interests etc
I don’t think they are Carol but they’re being flogged by the perception and both Trotter and O’Connor piss me off by fanning the flame. I want my party to work in the interests of workers and their families and in my case my family includes all of the above.
OK, joe90, then we’re in agreement. I do think that the focus should be on the interests of workers and their families and in my case my family includes all of the above.
and that attacking people who should be allies is not helpful. It’s buying into the right wing lines of attack and spin & letting them set the agenda. And going into panic mode in response to a shonky TV3 poll is not that helpful either. We know Labour is behind National in the polls. It’s time to focus on the essentials, and cut loose from the dominance of economically & socially destructive neo-liberal policies.
I reckon start at the start Carol, win back the people in the $30-$50K bracket who had a rush of blood to the head at the last election and thought they were tories.
As for identity politics, clueless gamed everybody with herceptin but sure, when you’ve got the numbers to advance an issue and, like a pub fight, never start something until you know that you can finish the job.
My belief is Carol is that Labour spent far too much political capital and headlines fighting for social liberalism, and not for policies that would help the bottom 50% of families and wage earners.
Social liberalism should have been done – while getting on with big progressive economic changes as the headlines.
Labour did not get the old message: its the economy, stupid.
(And making the property owners feel richer by driving up private debt levels and house prices to the sky doesn’t cut it)
Social liberalism should have been done – while getting on with big progressive economic changes as the headlines.
Yes, agreed that the economic issues should have been the major focus for a while. And I agree that dealing with them has now become even more urgent.
PS: I also think the neoliberal economic power and influence over the media at home and abroad, has also made it very hard for left wing parties in the west to follow their traditional agenda.
Can anyone point me to O’Conner speaking up for the poor and actually trying to promote economic leftie policy when he was in government?
Saying that it was the social liberals crowding out economic policy is just garbage. There is no reason that the party couldn’t walk and chew gum, and even if that was the case, there is no reason now to use illiberal rhetoric. Just get on with promoting the left wing econmics if that’s what you think would work.
Blaming it on social liberals, saying the party was taken over; is saying that left wing voters would rather have right wing economics than social liberalism. That might well be true, or it might not. But unless the economic left gets up on its hind legs and makes the positive case we can’t know.
It looks to me like Trotter et al spend far too much time crying and not enough time arguing their corner. It looks to me like they want to win votes from bigots via their bigotry rather than offering something that is more worthwhile to them than their bigotry.
The fact that they don’t seem to be able to articulate something more worthwhile without blaming social liberalism? that’s their problem right there.
Carol PB IanMac et al, I think I will go and sit with the “bigots” as you cheerfully label those working class Kiwis who went and voted for Key or did not vote at all. Your inability to see them as part of the left is precisely your electoral problem. I would suggest they are greater in number than your precious middle ground of social liberal chardonnnay socialists.
Bored, I was talking of an inclusive model, not an either/or one. I DO see working class people as part of the left, and people the left should be fighting for. Where have I eer said I don’t see them as part of the left? As far as I understand it, you are trying to exclude some other marginalised people from the left.
And I will challenge expressions of bigotry whereever I see it, on the left or the right.
Carol, I too will shout at bigotry from left or right. To marginalise any group is to exclude, which is precisely what Trotter (and myself) are saying. A core Labour voting block is being driven away because they percieve that their interests are not in alignment, and are placed behind that of sectoral interests. They dont care if you are a Martian, what they care about is that the Martian is one of them first and foremost. They also get mightily pissed off when the Martians then accuse them of bigotry.
Well, Bored, the problem with Labour seems to me, not that issues of social liberalism & policies against idenitity group marginalisation are squeezing out class issues, but that various marginalised groups are being used as a scapegoat for Labour’s limitations on class issues. The way forward seems to be indicated by PB in asking to positively state what you want Labour to support, rather than demonising groups within the left.
I think this demonising of some on the left is not helping the cause (or causes). Curiously, one of the reasons neo-liberalism has been so successful is that it has been able to attract a broad range of people under their umbrellla. It includes both social conservatives and social liberals. They tend not to tear themselves apart over it, at least not in public.
I gave up on voting Labour a while back as being too centrist, though I do think they have some good MPs and candidates in their ranks, and have some good policies (or atleast better than National). But if the left is going to succeeed in getting rid of the cancerous policies associated with neoliberalsm & neoconservatism, then the left needs to accept some differences, and work together on the crucial issues. It’s not going to help telling some on the left to ride in the back of the bus, while white men ride in the front.
According to critics like Trotter, the problem seems to be with Goff’s leadership (hardly someone who is virulently promoting gay, Maori & feminist agendas). The attacks on identity issues has been something that the right has beat up to try and undermine the left – divide and conquer. I don’t see it as helpful to be following their agenda. And as PB said:
Can anyone point me to O’Conner speaking up for the poor and actually trying to promote economic leftie policy when he was in government?
Meanwhile, we saw a very assertive interview with Cunliffe, yesterday, foregrounding the struggles of many relatively low income families, struggling to put food on their tables for their kids. There is no evidence that gays or self-serving unionists are dominating Labour policies, or positions on the labour list.
PB: Labour is not seen as the party of the working class and the under class. Consequently the working class and the under class are not rooting for Labour even though under this NACT Government they are larger than ever.
Neither, according to the polls, are many of the social liberals. However, in the final analysis this is not about blaming the social liberals for following their agenda.
Its about Labour losing its renown for being the champion of the working class and the underclass against all odds. And gaining instead renown for being the champion of civil unions, prostitution law reform, anti-smacking, foreshore and sea bed against all odds.
Thank you CV, precisely my position, summed up beautifully. For the record I have fully supported and endorsed social liberalism. I will not however give it primacy over the needs of the left.
Chur dude.
To me social liberalism even at its greatest extent risks sounding a hollow victory when your poor and old are eating cat food and your young and smart are leaving the country because there are no career prospects here.
Of course. Thats because they will favour the voting middle classes over the non-voting poor. Until we have compulsary voting in NZ, both major parties will betrying to bribe the middle.
Cannot wait for the “Neanderthal of Epsom” to pursue the PM over this one (the way he pursued Helen Clark in 2001) … Herald reports PM used airforce Iroquois to visit V8s
Of course, since the PM had the pressing important dinner engagement, he could have forgone the V8 photo op.
PM flies by helicopter at taxpayers expense so he won’t be late for dinner! Austerity strikes NZ.
Helen Clark was going to meet the Prime Minister of Australia,protocol dictated she not be late. If she’d used an Airforce helicopter the whine from Nat supporters would have been even louder and longer than it already was. And did you speak up when Key was travelling in an illegally speeding motorcade? He wanted a fucking shower!!!
LOLz people attacking a Labour PM who actually tried to fit lots of important shit into her schedule, as opposed to Key swanning around sports fixtures and photo ops.
Sean,
I was told be someone who attended the V8 race, that it took him 1 hour 40m to travel from Hamilton to Auckland on Sunday after the racing had finished.
Sean – actually the motorcade was not the issue here. It was Clark’s use of a military helicopter that the Neanderthal-perk-buster MP for Epsom was in a flap over in 2001. Just waiting for him to pursue the Prime Mincer over this recent issue.
It is ‘micro targeting’ voters, Shonkey got the attention of several thousand petrol heads “what a guy-he choppered in, wow! he’s one of us!” grunt, booya etc. Mission accomplished, any disapproval not important cause he scored.
Typically and quite conveniently, whoosh, Shonkey is nowhere to be found.
“Mr Key could not be contacted as he is in transit to Europe for political meetings and the wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton at Westminster Abbey on 29 April.”
*Cough* flying from one photo-op to another photo-op.
Listen, folks, this won’t be the first time nor the last time he can’t be contacted. This is the modus operandi of a man who has gone beyond having a stake in NZ.
The Kiwi Saver trusties must be shivering in their boots over the governments order to pay back some of the free money they have coned out of the sucked in working public.
Wonder if it will lead to yet more government payouts? opps forgot unlike SCF etc, Kiwi Saver savings are not government guaranteed, if one of these ponzi scams goes tits up it is bad luck suckers.
And least we forget it was Labour and the Greeds that bought you this scam.
Captcha – school … which is were ever KS saver needs to go to learn there is no free lunch
Robert Atack – You seem to have a toxic view of the world. Did you know this is bad for your health? And doesn’t add anything helpful to the cogitations of others who believe there is a better way of doing things if it can be unearthed? That does mean that commenters have to dig down into their brain for ideas not just whirl them from the surface like flying frisbees with a knee-jerk stance.
The world is way worse for my health than anything my little brain can come up with.
Believing there is a better way is like believing in the tooth fairy or that a politician is worth voting for.
The ‘better way’ went out the window years ago.
Wake up P, even Charles Manson understands we are so very fucked )
Adele
I found the below comment at the top of a comments page the other day, it seems appropriate after reading your personal attack
Please use the comments to demonstrate your own ignorance, unfamiliarity with empirical data, ability to repeat discredited memes, and lack of respect for scientific knowledge. Also, be sure to create straw men and argue against things I have neither said nor even implied. Any irrelevancies you can mention will also be appreciated. Lastly, kindly forgo all civility in your discourse . . . you are, after all, anonymous.
At least I have a name and am willing to stand by what I say.
My apologies for not responding sooner to your reply post. I have only just used the site search function to overview my posts – grammar could do with much improvement, although, I do write from an indigenous perspective which has a tendency to screw with western traditions.
I apologies to you sincerely and completely, I mis-used the language towards you – and did take it personal. Occasionally, it is warranted, but not in your case. I’ve read your blog and you fight the good fight – a fight that indigenous peoples practicing indigeneity would wholly applaud,
An indigenous view of science would say that science merely limits possibilities to the capacity of human thinking only. Which is why we are in this anthropogenic mess now. Science is largely responsible – aided and abetted by technology. It has provided the fuel to the human capacity to live selfishly – to live independently and unrelatedly to the natural world.
The dumb thing is, however, that it is not the natural world that suffers. Human beings are literally shitting in their own nest – and we’re supposed to have the intelligence.
Recently I was having a conversation with an old guy (with impressive credentials) and he marvelled at how mankind has progressed from eating their toe nails to landing on the moon – in a relatively short frame of time. Whereas, on reflection, I could only think we haven’t progressed at all.
Big deal that we have landed on the Moon – it simply means more whenua to shit on. We are polluting space as much as Earth. Indigenous peoples credit the natural world with an opinion, and I am fairly sure it will opine ‘good riddance’ once we have become extinct, or the gene pool has reduced to non-viability aka someone that votes National.
In the not to distant future we may very well be living back 200 years albeit with solar-powered internet. I am thinking how do I fit a horse in my backyard.
When I did that transcription from the Cunliffe interview yesterday, I typed it first onto a word document. When I cut & pasted it to the Standard comment box & submitted, it included all the WORD raw codes. I deleted them through editing, but it was a little cumbersome.
When I cut & pasted it to the Standard comment box & submitted, it included all the WORD raw codes.
Easy answer – don’t use MS Word. Either use a text editor (Notepad) or a word processor that doesn’t include unnecessary control codes (OpenOffice comes to mind).
Up to a point, opposition parliamentarians would track closely, i.e. the government proposes, the opposition oppose.
Up to a point, that is.
It would be a tactical call, on an issue to issue basis, for the opposition to propose alternatives. And it would be a strategic matter to decide when to systematically begin campaigning – hopefully neither too early, nor too late.
I suspect that horrible sensation you have is going to be about as good as it gets.
Remember how it’s suggested that Labour want to be ‘nice guys’ who seek compromise? So the response may well be a basic endorsement of the Nat’s proposals with a few suggestions of how they would implement the same basic broad agenda a little differently.
Who is this Labour party of which you speak? There used to be some folk who called themselves by that name but i haven’t seen them since the early eighties.
i did see a Moose the other day chasing a Moa, perhaps they could give us a map to the land of the Lost where these mythical creatures reside :]
Joe90 is pointing to the same threats in the first posts Item 1 today. Chilling stuff if the poor unite in USA. If the force of Govt in Libya flattens the “rebels”, imagine what the might of arms by the USA Govt against their “rebels” could do! They could even use cluster bombs against the people because they would be declared as terrorists.
Labour once claimed to be socialist, which would have involved using the resources of the state to improve the economy. These days, however, the economy is left to the private sector, which is then taxed to provide a “social dividend”. Both parties follow the same agenda. Apart from getting rid of National, do we have any reason for voting Labour?
Here is a bit of historical research that doesn’t the fit the nationalistic narrative of ANZAC Day and therefore won’t be done by anyone – How many of Massey’s Cossacks did the Turks kill off at Gallipoli?
It is an interesting question, because many of the volunteers who went off to fight in 1914-15 came from that particular class of little Britons who had also tasted service in Massey’s Cossacks. The views, letters and diaries of these 15,000 or so men who initially volunteered is all that is offered today as representative of what people in this country thought in 1914-15. The national myth is completely colonised by the words and utterances of a bunch of rather unpleasant reactionary and provincial imperialists.
Yet by 1916 conscription was needed and, dispite the considerable social pressure and incentives to do so (such as choice on what sort of unit you went to), less than a third of the available men in this country ever volunteered for service. Compulsion was required for rest. Could it be migrants from the slums of Glasgow were more sceptical of whose freedom they were defending than the golden sons of the rural squatocracy?
This question will of course not be addressed next Monday. Instead, we will get shrill and simplistic hyper-patriotism wrapped in a flag of maudlin and sentimental tripe.
This award should come as no surprise… Tony Hayward former President and CEO of BP is a complete asshole! Just look at his response to the fact that BP used a risky well-casing plan, did not conduct a test of the well’s cement job and did not use a “lockdown sleeve” device that “would have prevented the seal at the wellhead from being blown out,” all of which could have prevented the Deepwater Horizon disaster that continues to despoil the gulf of Mexico…
What could possibly go wrong. We have a management style that has made a virtue of doing more for less,” said Hayward. To increase BP’s profitability and share price, Browne had encouraged the departure of hundreds of BP’s skilled engineers. To save money, Browne believed BP should use subcontractors to drill for oil, maintain refineries, monitor corrosion in pipelines and supervise the construction of oil platforms. Investigations of the accidents blamed cost savings and the inadequate skills of BP’s own personnel for poor supervision of the subcontractors.
And that is the management style in NZ after 3 decades of neo-liberalism. Cut cut cut and then we wonder why our homes leak, our national telecommunications infrastructure is less than what it should be and the people who caused all the damage are the ones who are most well rewarded.
dtb – That’s not what we were promised in the 1980’s. Changes were needed we were told, there would be pain we were told, but there would be gain but we weren’t told by whom? While we waited for the gain in the normal way of rising wages and commerce we borrowed on our bright future. We been dun!
“Complete extraction of existing, hidden, and deleted phone data, including call history, text messages, contacts, images, and geotags,” a CelleBrite brochure explains regarding the device’s capabilities. “The Physical Analyzer allows visualization of both existing and deleted locations on Google Earth. In addition, location information from GPS devices and image geotags can be mapped on Google Maps.”
hey joe.
i know where you live and I know what you say and I know what you think so why would I get rid of the apparatus that allows me to keep tabs on YOU!
I so lurve how Paula Benefitformeandnotforyou wallows in politicking and deftly front-foots by pre-emptively screaming the other is politicking.
A great move from Tory 101.
So Mora’s Afternoons-party-political-broadcast-show with residential pundit, the Penguin tried again this afternoon. And the well informed Penguin spouted on giving us his “this-is-the-spin-you-are-to-use” line from above about family law excesses. Unfortunately for the Penguin, Law Professor Henaghan from Otago, politely discredited Farrar’s point and on that subject the Penguin added no further comment. Obviously because someone had rumbled that he didn’t know what he was talking about. Perhaps Mora’s panel would be better served by having experts on his show more often.
Then again, it’s irrelevant anyway, because as mentioned before, the listeners to the National Programme are not swayed, only riled, by what the panelists say.
Yeah he shut Farrar down pretty quick. The poison dwarf is so used to his audience of the ill-informed, the uneducated, and the wilfully ignorant sycophants that he doesn’t know what to do when his bullshit is shown up for what it is.
(on the radio he can’t log in under another name and hurl abuse at dissenters)
But yeah, the whole “panel of people who don’t know anything in particular” format is fucking retarded. It’s like a talkback station but the stupidest callers get to talk all afternoon.
Yes Deadly. Appalling that elderly folk are left out in the cold after laying down a plan and paid for security till they die. After paying insurance as part of the fees when they had bought a Kate Shepard unit, the earthquake wiped them out and they get minimal recompense. That’s bad.
But even worse is the way that three Ministers were approached for help, and each refused to reply/comment. Coleman, Carter and Brownlie(?) Not my problem they each said. Shame.
Last night I e-mailed TV3 to ask what happened to the Hide/Act Epson story that they were going to run. I received two replies. One from Pip Keane said that they ran out of Editorial time. Tomorrow instead. The second from John Campbell. Over run and had to cut said John and “We’ll run the story tomorrow.” he said. Today is tomorrow but no story. (I did ask in one word “political interference?” but John said “No such thing.” That just makes me more curious.
No political interference, but what about being politically interconnected?
I’ve recently given up watching Toryvision 3, TV3 … and also Toryvision New Zealand, TVNZ.
You should email them to say you patiently waited yesterday for tomorrow, but today is tomorrow, and you’re now anticipating yesterday’s tomorrow tomorrow.
But by tomorrow it will be yesterday-yesterday’s tomorrow and since everything is future or past, and there is no now I seem frozen in indecision just before and can’t manage the next moment. See?
There was a Pub in NZ that put a sign out that said Free BEER tomorrow!
The next day every one went to the bar and ordered their beers , were given their beers with the words “that’ll be 6 bucks thanks” but the sign said Free beer tomorrrow they complained. Yes thats true said the publican But as well know Tomorrow NEVER comes..
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Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline. Is sea level rise exaggerated? Sea levels are rising at an accelerating rate, not stagnating or decreasing. Warming global temperatures cause land ice ...
Here is a scenario, but first a historical parallel. Hitler and the Nazis could well have accomplished everything that they wanted to do within German borders, including exterminating Jews, so long as they confined their ambitious to Germany itself. After all, the world pretty much sat and watched as the ...
I’ve spent the last couple of days in Hamilton covering Waikato University’s annual NZ Economics Forum, where (arguably) three of the most influential people in our political economy right now laid out their thinking in major speeches about the size and role of Government, their views on for spending, tax ...
Simeon Brown’s Ideology BentSimeon Brown once told Kiwis he tries to represent his deep sense of faith by interacting “with integrity”.“It’s important that there’s Christians in Parliament…and from my perspective, it’s great to be a Christian in Parliament and to bring that perspective to [laws, conversations and policies].”And with ...
Severe geological and financial earthquakes are inevitable. We just don’t know how soon and how they will play out. Are we putting the right effort into preparing for them?Every decade or so the international economy has a major financial crisis. We cannot predict exactly when or exactly how it will ...
Questions1. How did Old Mate Grabaseat describe his soon-to-be-Deputy-PM’s letter to police advocating for Philip Polkinghorne?a.Ill-advisedb.A perfect letterc.A letter that will live in infamyd.He had me at hello2. What did Seymour say in response?a.What’s ill-advised is commenting when you don’t know all the facts and ...
NZCTU Te Kauae Kaimahi President Richard Wagstaff has called on OJI Fibre Solutions to work with the government, unions, and the community before closing the Kinleith Paper Mill. “OJI has today announced 230 job losses in what will be a devastating blow for the community. OJI needs to work with ...
NZCTU Te Kauae Kaimahi President Richard Wagstaff is sounding the alarm about the latest attack on workers from Minister of Workplace Relations and Safety Brooke van Velden, who is ignoring her own officials to pursue reckless changes that would completely undermine the personal grievance system. “Brooke van Velden’s changes will ...
Hi,When I started writing Webworm in 2020, I wrote a lot about the conspiracy theories that were suddenly invading our Twitter timelines and Facebook feeds. Four years ago a reader, John, left this feedback under one of my essays:It’s a never ending labyrinth of lunacy which, as you have pointed ...
And if you said this life ain't good enoughI would give my world to lift you upI could change my life to better suit your moodBecause you're so smoothAnd it's just like the ocean under the moonOh, it's the same as the emotion that I get from youYou got the ...
Aotearoa remains the minority’s birthright, New Zealand the majority’s possession. WAITANGI DAY commentary see-saws manically between the warmly positive and the coldly negative. Many New Zealanders consider this a good thing. They point to the unexamined patriotism of July Fourth and Bastille Day celebrations, and applaud the fact that the ...
The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night features co-hosts & talking about the week’s news with regular and special guests, including: and on the week in geopolitics, including the latest from Donald Trump’s administration over Gaza and Ukraine; on the ...
Up until now, the prevailing coalition view of public servants was that there were simply too many of them. But yesterday the new Public Service Commissioner, handpicked by the Luxon Government, said it was not so much numbers but what they did and the value they produced that mattered. Sir ...
In a moment we explore the question: What is Andrew Bayly wanting to tell ACC, and will it involve enjoying a small wine tasting and then telling someone to fuck off? But first, for context, a broader one: What do we look for in a government?Imagine for a moment, you ...
As expected, Donald Trump just threw Ukraine under the bus, demanding that it accept Russia's illegal theft of land, while ruling out any future membership of NATO. Its a colossal betrayal, which effectively legitimises Russia's invasion, while laying the groundwork for the next one. But Trump is apparently fine with ...
A ballot for a single member's bill was held today, and the following bill was drawn: Employment Relations (Collective Agreements in Triangular Relationships) Amendment Bill (Adrian Rurawhe) The bill would extend union rights to employees in triangular relationships, where they are (nominally) employed by one party, but ...
This is a guest post by George Weeks, reviewing a book called ‘How to Fly a Horse’ by Kevin AshtonBook review: ‘How to Fly a Horse’ by Kevin Ashton (2015) – and what it means for Auckland. The title of this article might unnerve any Greater Auckland ...
This story was originally published by Capital & Main and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. Within just a week, the sheer devastation of the Los Angeles wildfires has pushed to the fore fundamental questions about the impact of the climate crisis that have been ...
In this world, it's just usYou know it's not the same as it wasSongwriters: Harry Edward Styles / Thomas Edward Percy Hull / Tyler Sam JohnsonYesterday, I received a lovely message from Caty, a reader of Nick’s Kōrero, that got me thinking. So I thought I’d share it with you, ...
In past times a person was considered “unserious” or “not a serious” person if they failed to grasp, behave and speak according to the solemnity of the context in which they were located. For example a serious person does not audibly pass gas at Church, or yell “gun” at a ...
Long stories short, the top six things in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Thursday, February 13 are:The coalition Government’s early 2024 ‘fiscal emergency’ freeze on funding, planning and building houses, schools, local roads and hospitals helped extend and deepen the economic and jobs recession through calendar ...
For obvious reasons, people feel uneasy when the right to be a citizen is sold off to wealthy foreigners. Even selling the right to residency seems a bit dubious, when so many migrants who are not millionaires get turned away or are made to jump through innumerable hoops – simply ...
A new season of White Lotus is nearly upon us: more murder mystery, more sumptuous surroundings, more rich people behaving badly.Once more we get to identify with the experience of the pampered tourist or perhaps the poorly paid help; there's something in White Lotus for all New Zealanders.And unlike the ...
In 2016, Aotearoa shockingly plunged to fourth place in the Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index. Nine years later, and we're back there again: New Zealand has seen a further slip in its global ranking in the latest Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI). [...] In the latest CPI New Zealand's score ...
1. You’ve started ranking your politicians on how much they respect the rule of law2. You’ve stopped paying attention to those news publications3. You’ve developed a sudden interest in a particular period of history4. More and more people are sounding like your racist, conspiracist uncle.5. Someone just pulled a Nazi ...
Transforming New Zealand: Brian EastonBrian Easton will discuss the above topic at 2/57 Willis Street, Wellington at 5:30pm on Tuesday 26 February at 2/57 Willis Street, WellingtonThe sub-title to the above is "Why is the Left failing?" Brian Easton's analysis is based on his view that while the ...
Salvation Army’s State of the Nation 2025 report highlights falling living standards, the highest unemployment rates since the 1990s and half of all Pacific children going without food. There are reports of hundreds if not thousands of people are applying for the same jobs in the wake of last year’s ...
Mountain Tui is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Correction: On the article The Condundrum of David Seymour, Luke Malpass conducted joint reviews with Bryce Wilkinson, the architect of the Regulatory Standards Bill - not Bryce Edwards. The article ...
Tomorrow the council’s Transport, Resilience and Infrastructure Committee meet and agenda has a few interesting papers. Council’s Letter of Expectation to Auckland Transport Every year the council provide a Letter of Expectation to Auckland Transport which is part of the process for informing AT of the council’s priorities and ...
All around in my home townThey're trying to track me down, yeahThey say they want to bring me in guiltyFor the killing of a deputyFor the life of a deputySongwriter: Robert Nesta Marley.Support Nick’s Kōrero today with a 20% discount on a paid subscription to receive all my newsletters directly ...
Hi,I think all of us have probably experienced the power of music — that strange, transformative thing that gets under our skin and helps us experience this whole life thing with some kind of sanity.Listening and experiencing music has always been such a huge part of my life, and has ...
Business frustration over the stalled economy is growing, and only 34% of voters are confidentNicola Willis can deliver. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Wednesday, February 12 are:Business frustration is growing about a ...
I have now lived long enough to see a cabinet minister go both barrels on their Prime Minister and not get sacked.It used to be that the PM would have a drawer full of resignations signed by ministers on the day of their appointment, ready for such an occasion. But ...
This session will feature Simon McCallum, Senior Lecturer in Engineering and Computer Science (VUW) and recent Labour Party candidate in the Southland Electorate talking about some of the issues around AI and how this should inform Labour Party policy. Simon is an excellent speaker with a comprehensive command of AI ...
The proposed Waimate garbage incinerator is dead: The company behind a highly-controversial proposal to build a waste-to-energy plant in the Waimate District no longer has the land. [...] However, SIRRL director Paul Taylor said the sales and purchase agreement to purchase land from Murphy Farms, near Glenavy, lapsed at ...
The US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act has been a vital tool in combatting international corruption. It forbids US companies and citizens from bribing foreign public officials anywhere in the world. And its actually enforced: some of the world's biggest companies - Siemens, Hewlett Packard, and Bristol Myers Squibb - have ...
December 2024 photo - with UK Tory Boris Johnson (Source: Facebook)Those PollsFor hours, political poll results have resounded across political hallways and commentary.According to the 1News Verizon poll, 50% of the country believe we are heading in the “wrong direction”, while 39% believe we are “on the right track”.The left ...
A Tai Rāwhiti mill that ran for 30 years before it was shut down in late 2023 is set to re-open in the coming months, which will eventually see nearly 300 new jobs in the region. A new report from Massey University shows that pensioners are struggling with rising costs. ...
As support continues to fall, Luxon also now faces his biggest internal ructions within the coalition since the election, with David Seymour reacting badly to being criticised by the PM. File photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate ...
Not since 1988 when Richard Prebble openly criticised David Lange have we seen such a challenge to a Prime Minister as that of David Seymour to Christopher Luxon last night. Prebble suggested Lange had mental health issues during a TV interview and was almost immediately fired. Seymour hasn’t gone quite ...
Three weeks in, and the 24/7 news cycle is not helping anyone feel calm and informed about the second Trump presidency. One day, the US is threatening 25% trade tariffs on its friends and neighbours. The reasons offered by the White House are absurd, such as stopping fentanyl coming in ...
This video includes personal musings and conclusions of the creator climate scientist Dr. Adam Levy. It is presented to our readers as an informed perspective. Please see video description for references (if any). Wherever you look, you'll hear headlines claiming we've passed 1.5 degrees of global warming. And while 2024 saw ...
Photo by Heather M. Edwards on UnsplashHere’s the key news, commentary, reports and debate around Aotearoa’s politics and economy in the week to Feb 10 below. That’s ahead of live chats on the Substack App and The Kākā’s front page on Substack at 5pm with: on his column in The ...
Is there anyone in the world the National Party loves more than a campaign donor? Why yes, there is! They will always have the warmest hello and would you like to slip into something more comfortable for that great god of our age, the High Net Worth Individual.The words the ...
Waste and fraud certainly exist in foreign aid programs, but rightwing celebration of USAID’s dismantling shows profound ignorance of the value of soft power (as opposed to hard power) in projecting US influence and interests abroad by non-military/coercive means (think of “hearts and minds,” “hugs, not bullets,” “honey versus vinegar,” ...
Health New Zealand is proposing to cut almost half of its data and digital positions – more than 1000 of them. The PSA has called on the Privacy Commissioner to urgently investigate the cuts due to the potential for serious consequences for patients. NZNO is calling for an urgent increase ...
We may see a few more luxury cars on Queen Street, but a loosening of rules to entice rich foreigners to invest more here is unlikely to “turbocharge our economic growth”. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate ...
Let us not dance daintily around the elephant in the room. Our politicians who serve us in the present are not honest, certainly not as honest as they should be, and while the right are taking out most of the trophies for warping narratives and literally redefining “facts”, the kiwi ...
A few weeks ago I took a look at public transport ridership in 2024. In today’s post I’m going to be looking a bit deeper at bus ridership. Buses make up the vast majority of ridership in Auckland with 70 million boardings last year out of a total of 89.4 ...
Oh, you know I did itIt's over and I feel fineNothing you could say is gonna change my mindWaited and I waited the longest nightNothing like the taste of sweet declineSongwriters: Chris Shiflett / David Eric Grohl / Nate Mendel / Taylor Hawkins.Hindsight is good, eh?The clarity when the pieces ...
Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on UnsplashHere’s what we’re watching in the week to February 16 and beyond in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty:Monday, February 10The Kākā’s weekly wrap-up of news about politics and the economy is due at midday, followed by webinar for paying subscribers in Substack’s ...
A listing of 23 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, February 2, 2025 thru Sat, February 8, 2025. This week's roundup is again published soleley by category. We are still interested in feedback to hone the categorization, so if ...
Today, I stumbled across a Twitter Meme: the ending of The Lord of the Rings as a Chess scenario: https://x.com/mellon_heads/status/1887983845917564991 It gets across the basic gist. Aragorn and Gandalf offering up ‘material’ at the Morannon allows Frodo and Samwise to catch Sauron unawares – fair enough. But there are a ...
Last week, Kieran McAnulty called out Chris Bishop and Nicola Willis for their claims that Kāinga Ora’s costs were too high.They had claimed Kāinga Ora’s cost were 12% higher than market i.e. private devlopersBut Kāinga Ora’s Chair had already explained why last year:"We're not building to sell, so we'll be ...
The Government’s newly announced funding for biodiversity and tourism of $30-million over three years is a small fraction of what is required for conservation in this country. ...
The Government's sudden cancellation of the tertiary education funding increase is a reckless move that risks widespread job losses and service reductions across New Zealand's universities. ...
National’s cuts to disability support funding and freezing of new residential placements has resulted in significant mental health decline for intellectually disabled people. ...
The hundreds of jobs lost needlessly as a result of the Kinleith Mill paper production closure will have a devastating impact on the Tokoroa community - something that could have easily been avoided. ...
Today Te Pāti Māori MP for Te Tai Tokerau, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi, released her members bill that will see the return of tamariki and mokopuna Māori from state care back to te iwi Māori. This bill will establish an independent authority that asserts and protects the rights promised in He Whakaputanga ...
The Whangarei District Council being forced to fluoridate their local water supply is facing a despotic Soviet-era disgrace. This is not a matter of being pro-fluoride or anti-fluoride. It is a matter of what New Zealanders see and value as democracy in our country. Individual democratically elected Councillors are not ...
Nicola Willis’ latest supermarket announcement is painfully weak with no new ideas, no real plan, and no relief for Kiwis struggling with rising grocery costs. ...
Half of Pacific children sometimes going without food is just one of many heartbreaking lowlights in the Salvation Army’s annual State of the Nation report. ...
The Salvation Army’s State of the Nation report is a bleak indictment on the failure of Government to take steps to end poverty, with those on benefits, including their children, hit hardest. ...
New Zealand First has today introduced a Member’s Bill which would restore decision-making power to local communities regarding the fluoridation of drinking water. The ‘Fluoridation (Referendum) Legislation Bill’ seeks to repeal the Health (Fluoridation of Drinking Water) Amendment Act 2021 that granted centralised authority to the Direct General of Health ...
New Zealand First has introduced a Member’s Bill aimed at preventing banks from refusing their services to businesses because of the current “Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) Framework”. “This Bill ensures fairness and prevents ESG standards from perpetuating woke ideology in the banking sector being driven by unelected, globalist, climate ...
Erica Stanford has reached peak shortsightedness if today’s announcement is anything to go by, picking apart immigration settings piece by piece to the detriment of the New Zealand economy. ...
Our originating document, theTreaty of Waitangi, was signed on February 6, 1840. An agreement between Māori and the British Crown. Initially inked by Ngā Puhi in Waitangi, further signatures were added as it travelled south. The intention was to establish a colony with the cession of sovereignty to the Crown, ...
Te Whatu Ora Chief Executive Margie Apa leaving her job four months early is another symptom of this government’s failure to deliver healthcare for New Zealanders. ...
The Green Party is calling for the Prime Minister to show leadership and be unequivocal about Aotearoa New Zealand’s opposition to a proposal by the US President to remove Palestinians from Gaza. ...
The latest unemployment figures reveal that job losses are hitting Māori and Pacific people especially hard, with Māori unemployment reaching a staggering 9.7% for the December 2024 quarter and Pasifika unemployment reaching 10.5%. ...
Waitangi 2025: Waitangi Day must be community and not politically driven - Shane Jones Our originating document, theTreaty of Waitangi, was signed on February 6, 1840. An agreement between Māori and the British Crown. Initially inked by Ngā Puhi in Waitangi, further signatures were added as it travelled south. ...
Despite being confronted every day with people in genuine need being stopped from accessing emergency housing – National still won’t commit to building more public houses. ...
The Green Party says the Government is giving up on growing the country’s public housing stock, despite overwhelming evidence that we need more affordable houses to solve the housing crisis. ...
Before any thoughts of the New Year and what lies ahead could even be contemplated, New Zealand reeled with the tragedy of Senior Sergeant Lyn Fleming losing her life. For over 38 years she had faithfully served as a front-line Police officer. Working alongside her was Senior Sergeant Adam Ramsay ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson will return to politics at Waitangi on Monday the 3rd of February where she will hold a stand up with fellow co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick. ...
Te Pāti Māori is appalled by the government's blatant mishandling of the school lunch programme. David Seymour’s ‘cost-saving’ measures have left tamariki across Aotearoa with unidentifiable meals, causing distress and outrage among parents and communities alike. “What’s the difference between providing inedible food, and providing no food at all?” Said ...
The Government is doubling down on outdated and volatile fossil fuels, showing how shortsighted and destructive their policies are for working New Zealanders. ...
Green Party MP Steve Abel this morning joined Coromandel locals in Waihi to condemn new mining plans announced by Shane Jones in the pit of the town’s Australian-owned Gold mine. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to strengthen its just-announced 2030-2035 Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) under the Paris Agreement and address its woeful lack of commitment to climate security. ...
Today marks a historic moment for Taranaki iwi with the passing of the Te Pire Whakatupua mō Te Kāhui Tupua/Taranaki Maunga Collective Redress Bill in Parliament. "Today, we stand together as descendants of Taranaki, and our tūpuna, Taranaki Maunga, is now formally acknowledged by the law as a living tūpuna. ...
The Government’s commitment to get New Zealand’s roads back on track is delivering strong results, with around 98 per cent of potholes on state highways repaired within 24 hours of identification every month since targets were introduced, Transport Minister Chris Bishop says. “Increasing productivity to help rebuild our economy is ...
The former Cadbury factory will be the site of the Inpatient Building for the new Dunedin Hospital and Health Minister Simeon Brown says actions have been taken to get the cost overruns under control. “Today I am giving the people of Dunedin certainty that we will build the new Dunedin ...
From today, Plunket in Whāngarei will be offering childhood immunisations – the first of up to 27 sites nationwide, Health Minister Simeon Brown says. The investment of $1 million into the pilot, announced in October 2024, was made possible due to the Government’s record $16.68 billion investment in health. It ...
New Zealand’s strong commitment to the rights of disabled people has continued with the response to an important United Nations report, Disability Issues Minister Louise Upston has announced. Of the 63 concluding observations of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), 47 will be progressed ...
Resources Minister Shane Jones has launched New Zealand’s national Minerals Strategy and Critical Minerals List, documents that lay a strategic and enduring path for the mineral sector, with the aim of doubling exports to $3 billion by 2035. Mr Jones released the documents, which present the Coalition Government’s transformative vision ...
Firstly I want to thank OceanaGold for hosting our event today. Your operation at Waihi is impressive. I want to acknowledge local MP Scott Simpson, local government dignitaries, community stakeholders and all of you who have gathered here today. It’s a privilege to welcome you to the launch of the ...
Racing Minister, Winston Peters has announced the Government is preparing public consultation on GST policy proposals which would make the New Zealand racing industry more competitive. “The racing industry makes an important economic contribution. New Zealand thoroughbreds are in demand overseas as racehorses and for breeding. The domestic thoroughbred industry ...
Business confidence remains very high and shows the economy is on track to improve, Economic Growth Minister Nicola Willis says. “The latest ANZ Business Outlook survey, released yesterday, shows business confidence and expected own activity are ‘still both very high’.” The survey reports business confidence fell eight points to +54 ...
Enabling works have begun this week on an expanded radiology unit at Hawke’s Bay Fallen Soldiers’ Memorial Hospital which will double CT scanning capacity in Hawke’s Bay to ensure more locals can benefit from access to timely, quality healthcare, Health Minister Simeon Brown says. This investment of $29.3m in the ...
The Government has today announced New Zealand’s second international climate target under the Paris Agreement, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand will reduce emissions by 51 to 55 per cent compared to 2005 levels, by 2035. “We have worked hard to set a target that is both ambitious ...
Nine years of negotiations between the Crown and iwi of Taranaki have concluded following Te Pire Whakatupua mō Te Kāhui Tupua/the Taranaki Maunga Collective Redress Bill passing its third reading in Parliament today, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “This Bill addresses the historical grievances endured by the eight iwi ...
As schools start back for 2025, there will be a relentless focus on teaching the basics brilliantly so all Kiwi kids grow up with the knowledge, skills and competencies needed to grow the New Zealand of the future, Education Minister Erica Stanford says. “A world-leading education system is a key ...
Housing Minister Chris Bishop and Associate Agriculture Minister Mark Patterson have welcomed Kāinga Ora’s decision to re-open its tender for carpets to allow wool carpet suppliers to bid. “In 2024 Kāinga Ora issued requests for tender (RFTs) seeking bids from suppliers to carpet their properties,” Mr Bishop says. “As part ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour has today visited Otahuhu College where the new school lunch programme has served up healthy lunches to students in the first days of the school year. “As schools open in 2025, the programme will deliver nutritious meals to around 242,000 students, every school day. On ...
Minister for Children Karen Chhour has intervened in Oranga Tamariki’s review of social service provider contracts to ensure Barnardos can continue to deliver its 0800 What’s Up hotline. “When I found out about the potential impact to this service, I asked Oranga Tamariki for an explanation. Based on the information ...
A bill to make revenue collection on imported and exported goods fairer and more effective had its first reading in Parliament, Customs Minister Casey Costello said today. “The Customs (Levies and Other Matters) Amendment Bill modernises the way in which Customs can recover the costs of services that are needed ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Department of Internal Affairs [the Department] has achieved significant progress in completing applications for New Zealand citizenship. “December 2024 saw the Department complete 5,661 citizenship applications, the most for any month in 2024. This is a 54 per cent increase compared ...
Reversals to Labour’s blanket speed limit reductions begin tonight and will be in place by 1 July, says Minister of Transport Chris Bishop. “The previous government was obsessed with slowing New Zealanders down by imposing illogical and untargeted speed limit reductions on state highways and local roads. “National campaigned on ...
Finance Minister Nicola Willis has announced Budget 2025 – the Growth Budget - will be delivered on Thursday 22 May. “This year’s Budget will drive forward the Government’s plan to grow our economy to improve the incomes of New Zealanders now and in the years ahead. “Budget 2025 will build ...
The Forum has raised concerns regarding the Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi Bill and the Regulatory Standards Bill, which, if enacted, will radically undermine existing human rights protections, Indigenous rights, and constitutional safeguards ...
The passage of time hasn’t been kind to Ngāi Tahu.When its High Court hearing over wai māori (freshwater) commenced last week, 52 months after the claim was filed, the tribe mourned the loss of two named first plaintiffs – Bishop Richard Wallace, of Makaawhio, and Theo Bunker, of Wairewa – ...
Margie Apa, Nicholas Jones, Diana Sarfati, the board of Health New Zealand … and will Lester Levy be next?The biggest names in our health service are tumbling like dominos.It’s been called a bloodbath and a crisis.What’s going on?Every day there’s a new story about shortages, patients having to wait for ...
Opinion: The coalition Government’s recent revisions to the business investor visa, officially the Active Investor Plus but commonly known as the ‘golden visa’, has put pay-for-residency back in the headlines. While many object to the commodification of citizenship implicit in this policy, questions should be asked about its potential as ...
One Christmas, to thank him for helping me hugely with my writing (on a mentor scheme), I sent Michael King a dark blue cashmere scarf. I chose it with the awful knowledge that he was battling cancer, and I somehow thought it might keep him warm and make him feel ...
Comment: Readers may recall the commentaries from academics that appeared on these pages as well as on many media outlets, alarmed and appalled by the disbanding of the Marsden panels for humanities and the social sciences.The Marsden Fund is a “blue skies” initiative established by Simon Upton in the 1990s. ...
Everything you missed from day five of the Treaty principles bill hearings, when the Justice Committee heard seven hours of submissions. Read our recaps of the previous hearings here.An “insult to every one of our tīpuna” was the first advice the Justice Committee heard on the Treaty principles bill ...
The same councillors who decry excessive spending on pet projects just voted to pump millions of dollars into a greenhouse for flowers. On Thursday last week, Wellington City Council voted to consult on repairing Begonia House, the greenhouse for exotic flowers in Wellington Botanic Garden. The options for repairs range ...
It’s important to respect people’s right to free speech and peaceful assembly, but how much political deference is due when it isn’t peaceful? Commenting on Destiny Church members storming a children’s event at the Te Atatū library and community centre on Saturday, prime minister Christopher Luxon said it’s important to ...
Comment: US is capitulating to Moscow’s demands before negotiations over Ukraine even begin The post The day the West died appeared first on Newsroom. ...
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Asia Pacific Report Two Palestinian resistance groups have condemned “the brutal assault” on prisoners at Ofer Prison, saying it was “barbaric criminal behaviour that reflects the fascist and terrorist nature of” Israel. In the joint statement, Hamas and Palestine Islamic Jihad (PIJ) called the attack a “miserable attempt” by Israel ...
By Caleb Fotheringham, RNZ Pacific journalist in Avarua, Rarotonga Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown hopes to have “an opportunity to talk” with the New Zealand government to “heal some of the rift”. Brown returned to Avarua on Sunday afternoon (Cook Islands Time) following his week-long state visit to China, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sonia R. Grover, Clinical Professor of Gynaecology, The University of Melbourne Polina Zimmerman/Pexels Menstruation, or a period, is the bleeding that occurs about monthly in healthy people born with a uterus, from puberty to menopause. This happens when the endometrium, the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ella Barclay, Senior Lecturer, School of Art and Design, Australian National University Despite the perceived outrage at Khaled Sabsabi’s depiction of Hassan Nasrallah in his 2007 work You, Australian art has long made subjects of outlaws and questionable figures. And it is ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Louise Pryke, Honorary Research Associate, Department of Classics and Ancient History, University of Sydney Lisa Tomasetti/Opera Australia “It’s an old song”, Hermes (Christine Anu) sings at the opening of Hadestown, but “we’re gonna sing it again and again”. Based on a ...
An additional $13 million will be invested in tourism infrastructure, including upgrading huts and resolving the backlog in Milford Sound concessions. ...
The reality is that we have no obligation to tolerate the intolerant. They are using violence to shut down and silence others. The result of tolerating intolerant views is the loss of everyone’s freedom of speech except for the one who most effectively ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert Davis, Associate Professor in Conservation, Edith Cowan University Adwo/Shutterstock Humans have been poisoning rodents for centuries. But fast-breeding rats and mice have evolved resistance to earlier poisons. In response, manufacturers have produced second generation anticoagulant rodenticides such as bromadiolone, widely ...
Alex Casey unearths Simon Court’s full sales pitch for how menstrual cups could end poverty. On Friday last week, Act MP Simon Court was accused of “mansplaining” during a parliamentary committee hearing about benefit sanctions. After submitter Rachel Dibble shared her concerns about period poverty and the impact that sanctions ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexander Gillespie, Professor of Law, University of Waikato It’s an unfortunate fact that bad people sometimes want guns. And while laws are designed to prevent guns falling into the wrong hands, the determined criminal can be highly resourceful. There are three main ...
Asia Pacific Report Two independent Jewish Voices groups in Aotearoa New Zealand have written an open letter to the government condemning the Zionist “colonisation” project leading to genocide and criticising the role of the NZ Jewish Council for its “unelected” and “uncritical support” for Israel. The groups, Alternative Jewish Voices ...
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Many of the young vapers interviewed by a team of public health researchers said they felt unable to resist the pro-vaping environment that surrounded them. New Zealand’s smokefree law was hailed around the world for creating a smokefree generation that would have lifelong protection from smoking’s harms. The smokefree ...
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Don’t envy the super rich…
The Nostradamus award goes to…
Secret memos..
Does he think only the super-rich are going to be attacked by armed thugs? The thugs probably get their training in their own neighbourhood first.
and, yes – just to confirm it was all about the oil.
joe90: In NZ the very rich seem to live in high walled secure houses, or in gated communities. By contrast my modest belongings which barely need protection are not a worry to me when I am out. Every time that I see John Key under protection even within the corridors of Parliament I feel no envy. Does it suggest a degree of paranoia as a PM or is it that of a rich man?
And it is remarkably (?) surprising that the tax take has reduced in NZ after the Bush-like tax cuts. Surprise, followed by a cut in spending on Education and Health and Welfare. The parallels are here in NZ too Joe.
What you find should be a wake-up call for New Zealanders as well. Sobering Joe.
Super rich link
That may be how it starts, and it will start, it’s not how it ends. As we’ve seen throughout history the rich cannot maintain their power once everyone else is pissed off enough.
Yes, I get the point – It’s just that the comeuppance will, as usual, hit the poor first. They’ll live in more fear than even now – Mexico is a good example – It’s the poor who are paying for the US war on drugs. But then, they’re meant to expect it. It’s the super-rich who will be shocked when it hits them hard.
Not just Mexicans losing their lives now Rosy and a cynic would say that the only way change will come is through more Americans losing their lives.
And this wee gem.
The violence can be traced to a civil war between the state and leftist rebels, a three-decade struggle that, from 1960 to 1996, was the dirtiest of Latin America’s dirty wars. More than two hundred thousand people were killed or “disappeared.” According to a U.N.-sponsored commission, at least ninety per cent of the killings were carried out by the state’s military forces or by paramilitary death squads with names like Eye for an Eye.
“Not just Mexicans losing their lives now”
And isn’t this Tamaulipas state where Fisher & Paykel relocated to (Reynosa)? It makes me absolutely livid – It seems like history repeating with a new part of Latin America tied up in the US push for control – albeit of drugs this time, rather than coups and civil wars, like Guatemala, Nicaragua, Chile etc, etc.
Radio New Zealand shows why publicly owned news gathers and presenters are so vital. It reports on Telecom’s recent $12 million fine. This morning (no link as yet) a very strong link is being drawn between Telecom’s predatory action a decade ago and the Government’s intention to prevent Commerce Commission oversight of Telecom for the next decade.
Bend over and prepare to be rogered New Zealand by your unfriendly formerly publicly owned but overseas controlled telco which should properly be called telecon …
Telecon plan to appeal the decision as well… Watch for more moves against our civil liberties and organisations that hold private companies to account. The National ministers are so in the pocket of big business, when one of them realizes that their is a conflict of interest and steps down from a portfolio, hardly anybody bats an eyebrow… Maybe there are a few people around with their eyes open though:
http://tumeke.blogspot.com/2011/04/national-are-dismantling-your-legal.html
Wake up New Zealand.
Have you read The Predator State by James Galbraith? It puts what NACT are doing in context and there’s no way that it’s for the best of the country. What it’s to do is transfer wealth and power away from the people and to the wealthy. It’s unfortunate that so many people wish to help them in their corruption and theft.
Mr Key and your mates in the Business Round Table and all parliamentarians, try to understand this simple fact. New Zealand’s assets are NOT YOURS to sell.
If we do not have the expertise to extract resources, then invite tenders for that expertise to do the job, and pay for those services but the ownership must remain New Zealand’s.
Exactly. Selling off our assets to make some foreign nationals richer is bad for us.
NZ for sale, sanctioned by the government.
Dear Key,
Our assets are not yours to sell
But when sold, they are yours to buy
Oh, the delightful market farces rules
for you
Joseph E Stigliz issues a warning that the “unrest”, born of inequality, we see in the Middle East could happen on the streets of America:
Of the 1%, By the 1% and for the 1%
Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee today announced the make-up of the independent review panel that will assess all legislative and regulatory changes under the new Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Act.
Dame Jenny Shipley being one of them, the people of CHCH will just love being told how there city should be rebuilt by this corrupt patronizing cow!
Yeah, she’ll do to them what she did to us in the 90’s.
Tell them it’s their fault. Tell them they are lazy and unproductive. And when they complain – tell them they are reacting out of the politics of envy.
http://www.imperatorfish.com/2011/04/further-tales-of-duc-deglise-de-christ.html
Nothing more that I can add to what Scott wrote.
If anyone is free today please go to the Labour Party Stop Asset Sales Facebook Page, its being overrun by the “tsunami of stupid” – all with plaquards from whale-oils blog. Beware they are stupid and angry, its kind of scarey..
Selfish bastards! Repeat selfish bastards! Required reading for anybody who does not want to sleep walk to defeat.
http://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com/
Trotter emphatically makes the same statement that many of us lefties have: he does’nt care for the politics of the left. Damien was right and Labour were too collectively cowardly to get behind him versus factional groups. I am like Chris more than a little pissed that the efete liberal interest groups mean more to Labour than that of struggling Kiwis.
Me too B, Labour, a workers party formed by workers for workers.
joe. A bit surprised that you endorse bored? Read your comment three times. Were you being ironic?
No, just frustrated Ianmac that Labour keeps drifting off track.
I don’t think they are Carol but they’re being flogged by the perception and both Trotter and O’Connor piss me off by fanning the flame. I want my party to work in the interests of workers and their families and in my case my family includes all of the above.
I’m a worker with a family and if a party doesn’t serve my interests then it’s not serving the interests of my family.
Agree, the only time Goff’s ratings improved were after the “sackings” of the homosexual Chris Carter and the “closet’ homosexual Darren Hughes. What does that tell you. That mainstream NZ is homophobic or is it because manistream Nz is fed up with the Rainbow faction, so powerful in the Labour Party?
Are those two things meant to be mutually exclusive? Actually I’d rephrase the last part: perceived to be, or characterised as so powerful in the Labour Party?
Hey Sam, do you want homosexuality recriminalised?
Remember, consenting adults and all that…
No.
But consenting adults do it in private, only “drama queens” flaunt it openly.
Don’t agree on the analysis that Damien was right. Many of us emphatically want policians to support and promote the interests of those people stuggling on low incomes AND attacks on relatively marginal minorities. It’s not either/or. And exactly how is the current Labour Party putting gay interests etc above policies targetting economic inequalities at the moment? We should be working together. Such attacks just divide the left & REALLY are not helping at this time.
OK, joe90, then we’re in agreement. I do think that the focus should be on
the interests of workers and their families and in my case my family includes all of the above.
and that attacking people who should be allies is not helpful. It’s buying into the right wing lines of attack and spin & letting them set the agenda. And going into panic mode in response to a shonky TV3 poll is not that helpful either. We know Labour is behind National in the polls. It’s time to focus on the essentials, and cut loose from the dominance of economically & socially destructive neo-liberal policies.
I reckon start at the start Carol, win back the people in the $30-$50K bracket who had a rush of blood to the head at the last election and thought they were tories.
As for identity politics, clueless gamed everybody with herceptin but sure, when you’ve got the numbers to advance an issue and, like a pub fight, never start something until you know that you can finish the job.
My belief is Carol is that Labour spent far too much political capital and headlines fighting for social liberalism, and not for policies that would help the bottom 50% of families and wage earners.
Social liberalism should have been done – while getting on with big progressive economic changes as the headlines.
Labour did not get the old message: its the economy, stupid.
(And making the property owners feel richer by driving up private debt levels and house prices to the sky doesn’t cut it)
Social liberalism should have been done – while getting on with big progressive economic changes as the headlines.
Yes, agreed that the economic issues should have been the major focus for a while. And I agree that dealing with them has now become even more urgent.
PS: I also think the neoliberal economic power and influence over the media at home and abroad, has also made it very hard for left wing parties in the west to follow their traditional agenda.
Can anyone point me to O’Conner speaking up for the poor and actually trying to promote economic leftie policy when he was in government?
Saying that it was the social liberals crowding out economic policy is just garbage. There is no reason that the party couldn’t walk and chew gum, and even if that was the case, there is no reason now to use illiberal rhetoric. Just get on with promoting the left wing econmics if that’s what you think would work.
Blaming it on social liberals, saying the party was taken over; is saying that left wing voters would rather have right wing economics than social liberalism. That might well be true, or it might not. But unless the economic left gets up on its hind legs and makes the positive case we can’t know.
It looks to me like Trotter et al spend far too much time crying and not enough time arguing their corner. It looks to me like they want to win votes from bigots via their bigotry rather than offering something that is more worthwhile to them than their bigotry.
The fact that they don’t seem to be able to articulate something more worthwhile without blaming social liberalism? that’s their problem right there.
Well said, PB.
Carol PB IanMac et al, I think I will go and sit with the “bigots” as you cheerfully label those working class Kiwis who went and voted for Key or did not vote at all. Your inability to see them as part of the left is precisely your electoral problem. I would suggest they are greater in number than your precious middle ground of social liberal chardonnnay socialists.
Bored, I was talking of an inclusive model, not an either/or one. I DO see working class people as part of the left, and people the left should be fighting for. Where have I eer said I don’t see them as part of the left? As far as I understand it, you are trying to exclude some other marginalised people from the left.
And I will challenge expressions of bigotry whereever I see it, on the left or the right.
Carol, I too will shout at bigotry from left or right. To marginalise any group is to exclude, which is precisely what Trotter (and myself) are saying. A core Labour voting block is being driven away because they percieve that their interests are not in alignment, and are placed behind that of sectoral interests. They dont care if you are a Martian, what they care about is that the Martian is one of them first and foremost. They also get mightily pissed off when the Martians then accuse them of bigotry.
Well, Bored, the problem with Labour seems to me, not that issues of social liberalism & policies against idenitity group marginalisation are squeezing out class issues, but that various marginalised groups are being used as a scapegoat for Labour’s limitations on class issues. The way forward seems to be indicated by PB in asking to positively state what you want Labour to support, rather than demonising groups within the left.
I think this demonising of some on the left is not helping the cause (or causes). Curiously, one of the reasons neo-liberalism has been so successful is that it has been able to attract a broad range of people under their umbrellla. It includes both social conservatives and social liberals. They tend not to tear themselves apart over it, at least not in public.
I gave up on voting Labour a while back as being too centrist, though I do think they have some good MPs and candidates in their ranks, and have some good policies (or atleast better than National). But if the left is going to succeeed in getting rid of the cancerous policies associated with neoliberalsm & neoconservatism, then the left needs to accept some differences, and work together on the crucial issues. It’s not going to help telling some on the left to ride in the back of the bus, while white men ride in the front.
According to critics like Trotter, the problem seems to be with Goff’s leadership (hardly someone who is virulently promoting gay, Maori & feminist agendas). The attacks on identity issues has been something that the right has beat up to try and undermine the left – divide and conquer. I don’t see it as helpful to be following their agenda. And as PB said:
Can anyone point me to O’Conner speaking up for the poor and actually trying to promote economic leftie policy when he was in government?
Meanwhile, we saw a very assertive interview with Cunliffe, yesterday, foregrounding the struggles of many relatively low income families, struggling to put food on their tables for their kids. There is no evidence that gays or self-serving unionists are dominating Labour policies, or positions on the labour list.
PB: Labour is not seen as the party of the working class and the under class. Consequently the working class and the under class are not rooting for Labour even though under this NACT Government they are larger than ever.
Neither, according to the polls, are many of the social liberals. However, in the final analysis this is not about blaming the social liberals for following their agenda.
Its about Labour losing its renown for being the champion of the working class and the underclass against all odds. And gaining instead renown for being the champion of civil unions, prostitution law reform, anti-smacking, foreshore and sea bed against all odds.
Thank you CV, precisely my position, summed up beautifully. For the record I have fully supported and endorsed social liberalism. I will not however give it primacy over the needs of the left.
Chur dude.
To me social liberalism even at its greatest extent risks sounding a hollow victory when your poor and old are eating cat food and your young and smart are leaving the country because there are no career prospects here.
Of course. Thats because they will favour the voting middle classes over the non-voting poor. Until we have compulsary voting in NZ, both major parties will betrying to bribe the middle.
Cannot wait for the “Neanderthal of Epsom” to pursue the PM over this one (the way he pursued Helen Clark in 2001) …
Herald reports PM used airforce Iroquois to visit V8s
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10720511
Of course, since the PM had the pressing important dinner engagement, he could have forgone the V8 photo op.
PM flies by helicopter at taxpayers expense so he won’t be late for dinner! Austerity strikes NZ.
So, I can assume you were extremely pissed off when Helen Clark used an illegally travelling motorcade to get to a rugby game then?
By the way – there are reports that it took 3 hours to get to Huntly from Hamilton after the V8’s – so it was actually a good move on the PM.
Helen Clark was going to meet the Prime Minister of Australia,protocol dictated she not be late. If she’d used an Airforce helicopter the whine from Nat supporters would have been even louder and longer than it already was. And did you speak up when Key was travelling in an illegally speeding motorcade? He wanted a fucking shower!!!
Clark was meeting a Head of State, Key was going to dinner at a golf club
‘nuf said
Proof that Clark could no allocate her time properly.
LOLz people attacking a Labour PM who actually tried to fit lots of important shit into her schedule, as opposed to Key swanning around sports fixtures and photo ops.
Sean,
I was told be someone who attended the V8 race, that it took him 1 hour 40m to travel from Hamilton to Auckland on Sunday after the racing had finished.
Sean – actually the motorcade was not the issue here. It was Clark’s use of a military helicopter that the Neanderthal-perk-buster MP for Epsom was in a flap over in 2001. Just waiting for him to pursue the Prime Mincer over this recent issue.
Like travelling in a motorcade at 160kph to egt to the rugby?
It is ‘micro targeting’ voters, Shonkey got the attention of several thousand petrol heads “what a guy-he choppered in, wow! he’s one of us!” grunt, booya etc. Mission accomplished, any disapproval not important cause he scored.
Typically and quite conveniently, whoosh, Shonkey is nowhere to be found.
“Mr Key could not be contacted as he is in transit to Europe for political meetings and the wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton at Westminster Abbey on 29 April.”
*Cough* flying from one photo-op to another photo-op.
Listen, folks, this won’t be the first time nor the last time he can’t be contacted. This is the modus operandi of a man who has gone beyond having a stake in NZ.
The Kiwi Saver trusties must be shivering in their boots over the governments order to pay back some of the free money they have coned out of the sucked in working public.
Wonder if it will lead to yet more government payouts? opps forgot unlike SCF etc, Kiwi Saver savings are not government guaranteed, if one of these ponzi scams goes tits up it is bad luck suckers.
And least we forget it was Labour and the Greeds that bought you this scam.
Captcha – school … which is were ever KS saver needs to go to learn there is no free lunch
Robert Atack – You seem to have a toxic view of the world. Did you know this is bad for your health? And doesn’t add anything helpful to the cogitations of others who believe there is a better way of doing things if it can be unearthed? That does mean that commenters have to dig down into their brain for ideas not just whirl them from the surface like flying frisbees with a knee-jerk stance.
The world is way worse for my health than anything my little brain can come up with.
Believing there is a better way is like believing in the tooth fairy or that a politician is worth voting for.
The ‘better way’ went out the window years ago.
Wake up P, even Charles Manson understands we are so very fucked )
Teenaa koe, Rob
If the world had to depend on whatever issued forth from that little brain of yours, then yes, we are so very fucked.
Adele
I found the below comment at the top of a comments page the other day, it seems appropriate after reading your personal attack
Please use the comments to demonstrate your own ignorance, unfamiliarity with empirical data, ability to repeat discredited memes, and lack of respect for scientific knowledge. Also, be sure to create straw men and argue against things I have neither said nor even implied. Any irrelevancies you can mention will also be appreciated. Lastly, kindly forgo all civility in your discourse . . . you are, after all, anonymous.
At least I have a name and am willing to stand by what I say.
http://oilcrash.com/articles/struggle.htm
Teenaa koe, Rob Atack
My apologies for not responding sooner to your reply post. I have only just used the site search function to overview my posts – grammar could do with much improvement, although, I do write from an indigenous perspective which has a tendency to screw with western traditions.
I apologies to you sincerely and completely, I mis-used the language towards you – and did take it personal. Occasionally, it is warranted, but not in your case. I’ve read your blog and you fight the good fight – a fight that indigenous peoples practicing indigeneity would wholly applaud,
An indigenous view of science would say that science merely limits possibilities to the capacity of human thinking only. Which is why we are in this anthropogenic mess now. Science is largely responsible – aided and abetted by technology. It has provided the fuel to the human capacity to live selfishly – to live independently and unrelatedly to the natural world.
The dumb thing is, however, that it is not the natural world that suffers. Human beings are literally shitting in their own nest – and we’re supposed to have the intelligence.
Recently I was having a conversation with an old guy (with impressive credentials) and he marvelled at how mankind has progressed from eating their toe nails to landing on the moon – in a relatively short frame of time. Whereas, on reflection, I could only think we haven’t progressed at all.
Big deal that we have landed on the Moon – it simply means more whenua to shit on. We are polluting space as much as Earth. Indigenous peoples credit the natural world with an opinion, and I am fairly sure it will opine ‘good riddance’ once we have become extinct, or the gene pool has reduced to non-viability aka someone that votes National.
In the not to distant future we may very well be living back 200 years albeit with solar-powered internet. I am thinking how do I fit a horse in my backyard.
Is this the format that is now permanent for this site?
I’ve found that by writing the full post and then adding links, quotes etc avoids the oddball text and the weird creeping format thing.
When I did that transcription from the Cunliffe interview yesterday, I typed it first onto a word document. When I cut & pasted it to the Standard comment box & submitted, it included all the WORD raw codes. I deleted them through editing, but it was a little cumbersome.
Easy answer – don’t use MS Word. Either use a text editor (Notepad) or a word processor that doesn’t include unnecessary control codes (OpenOffice comes to mind).
Thanks, DTB. That’s helpful.
Just had this horrible sensation that perhaps Labour are waiting for National to set the agenda for the election campaign so they can respond to it.
Please say it isn’t so.
Labour have gone out aggressively on the No Asset Sales campaign, which is causing reactive attacks from righties.
Up to a point, opposition parliamentarians would track closely, i.e. the government proposes, the opposition oppose.
Up to a point, that is.
It would be a tactical call, on an issue to issue basis, for the opposition to propose alternatives. And it would be a strategic matter to decide when to systematically begin campaigning – hopefully neither too early, nor too late.
I suspect that horrible sensation you have is going to be about as good as it gets.
Remember how it’s suggested that Labour want to be ‘nice guys’ who seek compromise? So the response may well be a basic endorsement of the Nat’s proposals with a few suggestions of how they would implement the same basic broad agenda a little differently.
Who is this Labour party of which you speak? There used to be some folk who called themselves by that name but i haven’t seen them since the early eighties.
i did see a Moose the other day chasing a Moa, perhaps they could give us a map to the land of the Lost where these mythical creatures reside :]
capcha: amuse
Numbness? Anaesthesia perhaps? Just a dull aching pain where a feeling of enthusiasm once existed?
I submit the following is a must-read:
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/blocking_the_gates_to_the_temples_of_finance_20110418
Yes it’s the US today, but if it isn’t stopped there it will be here soon enough.
(Yes I know it is now, but it’s still cautious and a little bit timid. Once there’s nothing left to fear…..)
Joe90 is pointing to the same threats in the first posts Item 1 today. Chilling stuff if the poor unite in USA. If the force of Govt in Libya flattens the “rebels”, imagine what the might of arms by the USA Govt against their “rebels” could do! They could even use cluster bombs against the people because they would be declared as terrorists.
@ Name (required) Wow! I love this man on the basis of this one article! How is that for telling it like it is!
Labour once claimed to be socialist, which would have involved using the resources of the state to improve the economy. These days, however, the economy is left to the private sector, which is then taxed to provide a “social dividend”. Both parties follow the same agenda. Apart from getting rid of National, do we have any reason for voting Labour?
One reason is that’s it’s currently the most likely way to get the Greens onto the govt benches.
Yes, Greens need a strong Labour Party. I vote Green Party + Cunliffe for electorate.
Here is a bit of historical research that doesn’t the fit the nationalistic narrative of ANZAC Day and therefore won’t be done by anyone – How many of Massey’s Cossacks did the Turks kill off at Gallipoli?
It is an interesting question, because many of the volunteers who went off to fight in 1914-15 came from that particular class of little Britons who had also tasted service in Massey’s Cossacks. The views, letters and diaries of these 15,000 or so men who initially volunteered is all that is offered today as representative of what people in this country thought in 1914-15. The national myth is completely colonised by the words and utterances of a bunch of rather unpleasant reactionary and provincial imperialists.
Yet by 1916 conscription was needed and, dispite the considerable social pressure and incentives to do so (such as choice on what sort of unit you went to), less than a third of the available men in this country ever volunteered for service. Compulsion was required for rest. Could it be migrants from the slums of Glasgow were more sceptical of whose freedom they were defending than the golden sons of the rural squatocracy?
This question will of course not be addressed next Monday. Instead, we will get shrill and simplistic hyper-patriotism wrapped in a flag of maudlin and sentimental tripe.
Asshole of the Week Award
http://thejackalman.blogspot.com/2011/04/asshole-of-week-award_20.html
This award should come as no surprise… Tony Hayward former President and CEO of BP is a complete asshole! Just look at his response to the fact that BP used a risky well-casing plan, did not conduct a test of the well’s cement job and did not use a “lockdown sleeve” device that “would have prevented the seal at the wellhead from being blown out,” all of which could have prevented the Deepwater Horizon disaster that continues to despoil the gulf of Mexico…
Well he did replace an arsehole Todd.
What could possibly go wrong.
We have a management style that has made a virtue of doing more for less,” said Hayward. To increase BP’s profitability and share price, Browne had encouraged the departure of hundreds of BP’s skilled engineers. To save money, Browne believed BP should use subcontractors to drill for oil, maintain refineries, monitor corrosion in pipelines and supervise the construction of oil platforms. Investigations of the accidents blamed cost savings and the inadequate skills of BP’s own personnel for poor supervision of the subcontractors.
And that is the management style in NZ after 3 decades of neo-liberalism. Cut cut cut and then we wonder why our homes leak, our national telecommunications infrastructure is less than what it should be and the people who caused all the damage are the ones who are most well rewarded.
dtb – That’s not what we were promised in the 1980’s. Changes were needed we were told, there would be pain we were told, but there would be gain but we weren’t told by whom? While we waited for the gain in the normal way of rising wages and commerce we borrowed on our bright future. We been dun!
When will crusher introduce these.
“Complete extraction of existing, hidden, and deleted phone data, including call history, text messages, contacts, images, and geotags,” a CelleBrite brochure explains regarding the device’s capabilities. “The Physical Analyzer allows visualization of both existing and deleted locations on Google Earth. In addition, location information from GPS devices and image geotags can be mapped on Google Maps.”
More:
That means that there’s a built in back door to the encryption used on the phones. Bet that wasn’t touted as a feature on the shiny sales brochure.
hey joe.
i know where you live and I know what you say and I know what you think so why would I get rid of the apparatus that allows me to keep tabs on YOU!
Surely Mr Goff can take whoever he wants to attend these meetings. It is not a good look for any government to behave in this manner
http://www.stuff.co.nz/taranaki-daily-news/news/4907844/Little-angry-at-snub
I so lurve how Paula Benefitformeandnotforyou wallows in politicking and deftly front-foots by pre-emptively screaming the other is politicking.
A great move from Tory 101.
Isn’t this the same kind of bleating the Nats were doing last week with the Palmy MP? No politics, please, it’s election year.
Yup, typical of National MPs.
Remember when mega-genius Misfire Lee shot out at Phil Goff for playing politics at the memorial for Christchurch earthquake victims? And, typically, that backfired.
http://www.3news.co.nz/Melissa-Lee-makes-memorial-tie-gaffe/tabid/370/articleID/203015/Default.aspx
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1104/S00421/crete-veterans-to-be-honoured-at-parliament.htm
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/4904472/Govt-relents-on-grants-for-Crete-veterans
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/4874411/Veterans-seek-aid-to-join-Crete-celebrations
the dots continue to join themselves,
the timeline is a bit of a giveaway tho’
So Mora’s Afternoons-party-political-broadcast-show with residential pundit, the Penguin tried again this afternoon. And the well informed Penguin spouted on giving us his “this-is-the-spin-you-are-to-use” line from above about family law excesses. Unfortunately for the Penguin, Law Professor Henaghan from Otago, politely discredited Farrar’s point and on that subject the Penguin added no further comment. Obviously because someone had rumbled that he didn’t know what he was talking about. Perhaps Mora’s panel would be better served by having experts on his show more often.
Then again, it’s irrelevant anyway, because as mentioned before, the listeners to the National Programme are not swayed, only riled, by what the panelists say.
Yeah he shut Farrar down pretty quick. The poison dwarf is so used to his audience of the ill-informed, the uneducated, and the wilfully ignorant sycophants that he doesn’t know what to do when his bullshit is shown up for what it is.
(on the radio he can’t log in under another name and hurl abuse at dissenters)
But yeah, the whole “panel of people who don’t know anything in particular” format is fucking retarded. It’s like a talkback station but the stupidest callers get to talk all afternoon.
Here ya go .. from 3’39” at
http://podcast.radionz.co.nz/aft/aft-20110420-1608-The_Panel_with_Penny_Ashton_and_David_Farrar_part_1-048.mp3
Anyone watching Campbell live about the Kate Shepard retiree’s . Not too nice on the NAT politicians on it.
Yes Deadly. Appalling that elderly folk are left out in the cold after laying down a plan and paid for security till they die. After paying insurance as part of the fees when they had bought a Kate Shepard unit, the earthquake wiped them out and they get minimal recompense. That’s bad.
But even worse is the way that three Ministers were approached for help, and each refused to reply/comment. Coleman, Carter and Brownlie(?) Not my problem they each said. Shame.
Last night I e-mailed TV3 to ask what happened to the Hide/Act Epson story that they were going to run. I received two replies. One from Pip Keane said that they ran out of Editorial time. Tomorrow instead. The second from John Campbell. Over run and had to cut said John and “We’ll run the story tomorrow.” he said. Today is tomorrow but no story. (I did ask in one word “political interference?” but John said “No such thing.” That just makes me more curious.
No political interference, but what about being politically interconnected?
I’ve recently given up watching Toryvision 3, TV3 … and also Toryvision New Zealand, TVNZ.
You should email them to say you patiently waited yesterday for tomorrow, but today is tomorrow, and you’re now anticipating yesterday’s tomorrow tomorrow.
But by tomorrow it will be yesterday-yesterday’s tomorrow and since everything is future or past, and there is no now I seem frozen in indecision just before and can’t manage the next moment. See?
There was a Pub in NZ that put a sign out that said Free BEER tomorrow!
The next day every one went to the bar and ordered their beers , were given their beers with the words “that’ll be 6 bucks thanks” but the sign said Free beer tomorrrow they complained. Yes thats true said the publican But as well know Tomorrow NEVER comes..
A little wisdom lol
A little bit of deadly Irish methinks.