Translation: centrists are non-aligned. Having to often make this point since I first started commenting here I'll just observe that all those captured in the binary political frame still find it hard to look outside and notice that a third of the electorate have escaped.
"“The purpose of the National Party is to govern the country,” a National MP explained to me recently, “and that’s hard to do well, as those muppets-” he jerked his head at the Beehive, “are finding out”. During her first term Ardern has spent a lot of her time and communications expertise delicately explaining why she wasn’t going to stand down another incompetent minister, or why her government had abandoned yet another campaign promise, or why some new jaw-dropping ethical scandal in her cabinet was none of her business."
That's Labour normalcy, right there. The pandemic-induced poll results will mask the reality for a while, and commentators here with starry eyes will believe their own misread and promote the notion that Labour shifted out of their normalcy into a new age. Then Labour MPs will return to normal. They can't help it.
"I like to think New Zealand voters will continue to support Ardern for as long as she continues to do her job well (and some of this success seems to involve keeping most of her cabinet in a sub-basement of the Beehive “to guard the bee”, as the Simpsons gag went, a joke currently popular in Wellington political circles)."
Protect the PM by confining the Labour mediocrities to the basement seems sensible, but could prove impractical. I'd allow them out on controlled walks, at least. Even better would be to give them this work schedule: track down the missing million and convert them into Labour voters. Of course the consequences would be negligible, but it would be a valuable learning experience for them.
I look across this Cabinet and really miss Cullen, Maharey, Cunliffe, Anderton. Even little energisers like Harre and Fitzsimmons. They achieved more than survival.
We're going into an election with results saying 'well, we survived'.
Ad we have more than survived. This Govt have eradicated the virus…This is the most significant thing that can happen in terms of getting the economy going again.
I note on a previous post you were emphasising Muller's experience in business, govt university etc, etc…..
This is how I see it. This Govt has done a amazing job in the most challenging situation our country has faced for decades. It wasn't just Jacinda. Each and everyone of those ministers had stuff to get done, and get down they did. Whether it was housing all homeless people very quickly, setting up a site for people to report price gauging, getting Kiwi's stranded back from overseas, setting up quarantine, organising schools for learning from home, setting up a job subsidy, small business loan, setting up employment agencies across NZ, getting shovel ready jobs across the line as soon as possible, getting environmental jobs up and running, the huge amount of work to support the health system cope with the crisis, getting a trade agreement with Singapore in Covid times (thanks Parker), ensuring supply routes via airlines to make sure vital medical supplies etc were protected. ………..
Imagining trinary voting blocs instead of binary does a disservice to pretty much everyone who thinks the whole "floating voter" concept is bullshit (and his link article isn't too much better). It's a democracy, there are a gazillion reasons why people change their vote or don't vote. Attraciting them isn't as simple as appealing to one voting bloc – there isn't a clearly "centrist" policy line to support or oppose (like asset sales or environmental issues).
Reducing government to a couple of ministerial cockups is likewise bullshit.
Many but not all voters are too lazy and apathetic, simply stick with tribal BAU, and vote accordingly. People are complex beings and to reduce their behaviour to simple binary or trinary choices is simplistic.
Please note that my comment was deliberately ambiguous and neutral in intention
I was not saying DF was right but rather that the labels, and labels in general, are irrelevant and unhelpful in addressing the question of being right or wrong or the actual issue itself.
The problem with blog format is that it operates like a broadcast, so a commenter addresses an audience (largely anonymous) while responding to another commenter. So the conversation stream is group discourse as much as dialogue. Nuances work well with those who are on your wavelength but are lost on most participants, so we end up painting with a broad brush more often than not.
The antique binary frame is the traditional default. My attempt to reframe as triadic is the simplest possible improvement. The real world is way more complex, but people do group in relation to other groups, and voters have established the three-way split in all western countries (more than 30 years ago) so there's a realistic basis for triangulating.
If you don't like this medium, there are others. Do a fecking podcast.
As for "traditional defaults", when power structures tend towards two or three blocs (be they electoral or sociopolitical or hereditary) bi/trinary are fine for describing the competing groups, but not the motivations of the members of those groups. To use it to describe the latter is shallow, pseudointellectual punditry.
What makes me, specifically, yawn is that you use enough words to make more sophisticated points but only present trivial observations that a two-bit assistant political reporter could present in a one-minute piece to camera.
There are lots of models to use when one can't identify specific policy points that have obvious core sector support. My personal favourite is a rough-Weberian approach: three gauges showing the traditional, charismatic, and bureaucratic support for a leadership candidate or group. But there are others that have similar usability and much more sophisticated analyses than just adding another group to a binary model. Seriously, the net improvement to the resolution of analyses between a binary and trinary system is negligible. Why do you think media love "the floating voter" as a concept? It looks deep but adds little to their workload.
You want a demo? Muller's not going to significantly improve the lot of the National party. Why?
His parliamentary and professional esperience revolves around primary industry and trade. Ardern, for example, had diverse policy roles before the leadership. Muller has come out of nowhere. He hasn't obviously demonstrated competence, therefore his bureaucratic merits for leadership seem to be lacking. Additionally, National has spent two years shitting on the government without presenting any viable, or even specific, alternatives to government approaches. When govt says "L3", nats say "L4 now!". When govt says "L4", nats say "L2 as soon as possible, you're playing it too safe!".
Charisma: Todd Who-ller? Prior to Leadership, people knew who Ardern was. Similarly, the rest of the nats are largely "who" or "ew" for many voters ("ew" is often referred to as "polarising", means nats will vote for them but thousands wouldn't).
Traditional support: well, the nats are down to their dyed in the wool supporters. They need a good policy platform and some charisma to get back into contention, and in mmp they're doing it without mates. The leadership change might be enough for NZ1 to go with them, but even then it's a big ask.
Now lets look at a trinary analysis:
um, they need to take some floating voters of Labour somehow. Then they will win. Otherwise they might lose.
I haven't allocated a common motivation to centrists because there has never been one evident. The subgroup that operate as swing-voters does share a motivation: to change the govt. However the recent polls suggest a centrist shift 4 or 5 times that size. You can only read their common motivation as disgust with National's leader & endorsement of Labour's – but likely to be ephemeral.
Re trivial observations, any communicator has to pitch to the average grasp of the audience. If I pointed out that there is substantial metaphysical basis for seeing a triadic structure to be fundamental to both nature and the psyche I'd lose them real fast.
Re Muller's prospects as a leader, I've made my prediction. If time proves me right, will you remember to give me credit for it? People usually don't. If I can be bothered pointing it out to them they fall back on the Reagan defense ("I can't remember"). However, I will quite happily acknowledge it if time proves you right.
Lack of charisma may limit his prospects. He could be the kind of person who flourishes in a leadership role however, so could remedy that lack eventually.
Your policy point seems merely partisan. I'm likewise unimpressed but I don't discount the tribal affiliations that empower their policies. If he tweaks the mix to appeal to centrists as well as Nats he will pull more of them back across the line – but his team will have to pull together fast & efficiently to make that happen before the election, and I don't rate their collective abilities any higher than Labour's. I don't expect him to win the election at this stage but reckon pulling National back into the 40s is likely.
Dennis, there is only reality. Do you disagree, regarding climate change, there is only 10 years to do anything to save the species? But the party political reality is down to the next 3 years, and all about mortgages. And no one accepts the real reality. We here on the NZ Left blogs exact the fluff from our tummy buttons. And, may I say, from extensive stomachs, as the most damning evidence.
My grasp of climate science in historical context suggests the species isn't under immediate threat like you imply. I see a seriously-worsening future, but over a much longer timeframe.
Gaia will keep experimenting with different culling mechanisms, and some may cull more extensively than others. The four horsemen of the apocalypse seem to canter toward us in a fairly leisurely manner, often pausing awhile to allow their horses to crop the grass. But I've been watching carefully since Hansen first sounded the alarm long ago so I feel no need to persuade anyone. Sheeple see no wolf. Crying wolf keeps failing to work. Duh!!
Longer timeframe to the past, sees poverty. It's not a 'laid-on' sort of feast, our days. Mind-bending, anti-rationalists on Left blogs. And everyone picking points rather than addressing what matters most.
Binary and trinary framing have their use but are crude models and have many limitations. This can and does lead to all sorts of problems in analysis and discourse. It is as useful or useless as GDP or CPI as a measure of how well off I am. People don’t group in relation to other groups, politically. That’s just lazy bollocks. People have many different views on many different things. Then some clever cookies device a questionnaire and plot your aggregate answer on a 2-dimnesional graph, which they overlay with half a dozen parties. Next they suggest that you most align with (x,y) and thus with party P3. Next thing is that you believe that you group or are grouped with like-minded people who all align with Party P3’s policies and values. This is a form of unintentional (?) conditioning based on a mathematical projection onto a plane. Psychology is full of this Factor Analysis, etc. Doesn’t help you much when you see a psychologist for therapy.
Anyway, this is not the most interesting part of your comment.
This is a political blog site and I can’t quite remember the stats but IIRC many readers are returning and (semi-)regular readers. You can give them some credit for being able to understand most comments here as long as the English language hasn’t been mangled too much (it happens).
Secondly, it is very hard but it is possible to explain even the most complex things in plain simple language so that most interested people can follow and understand it. In science there is now a sub-field called science communication. If you simplify things too much you’ll start to omit/lose important information and you might end up with banal trivia and painting with a broad brush. People love to learn, some more than others, and be challenged (not too much in one go) as long as they are not made to feel like ignorant imbeciles. It takes effort but it’s worth it. It helps if you know your audience or the audience you want to reach – one size does not fit all.
Thirdly, some threads here go far and deep and are well outside my comfort range of understanding. Indeed, they’re often dialogues between two commenters who generally both know what they’re talking about or one who does and one who is called Dunning-Kruger.
Lastly, there is a general complaint that MSM have dumbed down its readership/audience and the public, for that matter. This is a fair point but many blogs are what the commentariats make of them. The medium has limitations, for sure, but that’s no excuse for throwing your hands up in the air
People don’t group in relation to other groups, politically.
I'm puzzled that you believe this. It's so obviously untrue! The entire rationale of identity politics seems to be based on the fact that they do group together on the basis of shared identity, and usually this gets defined in relation to some group they oppose.
To your earlier point, re triadic framing being simplistic like binary framing, my usage is utilitarian in practice while emerging from a metaphysical basis. Remember that Aristotle said the latter lies beyond physics – in the sense of being deeper terrain. Just because our society is superficial & trivia-obsessed, doesn't mean we can disregard our mental foundations. Archetypes remain fundamental.
How does the triadic frame operate in the binary structure of parliament? Uneasily! The third of the electorate who are neither left nor right currently use NZF to control the binary primitives, and that has worked reasonably well. But they lack formal representation as such due to the antique frame deriving from the French revolutionaries' `people vs rulers'.
Nowadays the people think more diversely than that. A class-based parliament would be genuinely triadic – if it instituted working class, middle-class and upper class via separately-elected representations. Middle-class hegemony would result, of course. Not much different to the current de facto reality…
Power does play a fundamental role in the structural relations, true. Particularly for marginalised groups. My point was more general, applying to the generic situation.
The small quote I recycled from BFD commentary the other day captured it by dismissing the new Nat leadership team as `nothing but bluegreen socialists'.
It’s not that easy for them to get home. Are we so screwed we can’t extend a bit of a helping hand to people in this sort of need? After all we encouraged them to come.
And of course there's always the question of where they now consider 'home'.
Especially those people brought here under false pretences and who've now spent a big part of their adult life here.
Now that the shit is hitting the fan and there is money that needs to be spent on supporting them, there's a lot of cudda shudda wuddas to be considered. Might just be easier to pull out a Hilary Clinton type reset button, acknowledge we stuffed up and make changes from this point on if Ao/NZ wants to at least pretend we're a more caring/sharing little nation that punches above its weight than others.
Short term visa holders make a declaration that they have enough funds to support themselves in NZ, unaided, when they apply for the visa.
How is it NZ's responsibility that those visa holders then come here, spend that money on travelling around NZ using those very funds that are supposed to assist them, unaided, and then cry poverty?
It doesn't sit right with me. I'm all for the NZ Government assisting them on an outward journey back home (even though the visa declaration says they have enough money to pay for a return ticket)
The long term upside I suppose, is that the median wage should rise over time, as employers now no longer have the ability to import large numbers of migrants and pay them the minimum wage. New Zealanders know what things cost, so minimum wage offers for many jobs will be forced to increase their hourly rates. This is likely moreso to happen in the farming, horticulture and what remains of the tourism sector, when they end up having to hire New Zealanders to do the jobs that minimum wage slaves used to be imported for. An additional upside is that money paid to NZers will end up staying in NZ. Many migrants send NZ $ back to their families overseas which ends up worsening the Balance of Payments.
Paying higher wages to New Zealanders means more PAYE given to the government and more money spent in the local communities by New Zealanders as they will be able to afford doing so.
"Short term visa holders make a declaration that they have enough funds to support themselves in NZ, unaided, when they apply for the visa."
Not unlike all those Kiwis dotted around the world in remote places now pleading poverty and asking for rescue.
And then of course there's all those promises of work and sometimes shitty tertiary courses that the NZ gummint did NOTHING to counter over the past decade – just as long as they could keep up the churn.
Except that when a New Zealander goes to a NZ Embassy, we actually provide them with emergency funds to tide them over. However many run to the media first rather than the embassy.
It's a shame that other countries on't see fit to help their foreign nationals stuck in NZ in the same way.
That would explain why there are quite a few moans then I guess about the lack of support they've been shown.
I seem to remember we've been here before James ( a while back )
It's just as well the failings of INZ and associated agencies are a matter of record and there are still a number of things that they don't/haven't been able to adequately explain.
And then of course there's all that stuff like 'demographic profiling' and T&C surveillance, and James Cassons and his ilk that remain in place.
I understand some of them, in their "wisdom" have left the NZ gummint a little bit exposed. We might also be grovelling for a FTA or two for a while longer – with negotiations little more than talk fests.
We don't identify whose bright idea it was to commission a lot of it, but some of them are still there – thankfully they've not been forgotten and just as there are people such as yourself who have "no sympathy" (End of Story!!!!!!!!!), there are others that've got your number.
Generally …….. people don't really like being treated like shit, but then there'll always be people such as yourself that don't mind being the ones imposing the shit on others
Time for the people who employed migrant workers because they're cheaper and more compliant than NZers to take responsibility for their own actions, surely? If that bankrupts them, NZ has a social welfare system.
The package would "help address the shortfall of workers in the primary sector nationally by reskilling workers and attracting new workers by building career pathways", the ministers said.
Queenstown Lakes Mayor Jim Boult welcomed the announcement and expected it to assist the council’s initiative, "loosely entitled In The Wild", intended to retrain unemployed people in "nature-based" jobs such as clearing wilding pines, gorse and broom, reducing pest numbers and creating and maintaining cycle and walking trails.
"A large number of the people who will be without a job are actually used to working in the outdoors, particularly a lot of the outdoor tourism folk.
There's also a lot of "shovel ready" projects coming through in the district. I know of one developer who put forward 12 projects, some in partnership with others, and he's saying that 11 are moving forward. Some of them are rather large, the total for the 12 was north of $100 mill, with some conservation / community recreation component in there as well. That's just one organisation, there's lots of others with similar vision.
It's quite possible with the programs in train, and a possible re-opening of the border to Australia later in the year (think ski season will be domestic only) that Central Otago could be well employed, maybe over employed in 6 months time.
Does anyone know when the approved "shovel ready" projects will be announced, I had late last week in my mind, but events may have overtaken that.
I went & looked at the immigration website (some parts are less confusing than others)
Looks like the work visa's have a couple of broad categorues
-temp ones
the young peoples 1 year work & explore
working while studying and the post study one year if the course is high grade. If we get students back I think we should limit this category harshly to post grad study only at recognised institutions
These people will either need help from NZ or embassies or a push to go home when they can but in the meantime maybe some sort of basic food supply/accommodation with repayment where appropriate? We have a high level of unemployed young NEETs so in the near future will this category need to exist or be promoted. Nor do I think we need those useless private courses that were essentially selling a part time work visa.
working visas
– employer sponsored – well the employers can pay for the return trip on those plus costs in the meantime, if there are no jobs now. I see some of these are people working in hotels in Q'town which are likely to be largely chains. In future maybe these types of visa need to pay a large bond to immigration. I don't see that unhitching these visa's will do anything other than flood the local market.
-skills shortages open visas. We need to chop this occupation list back promptly.It was used under Nact as a cheap labour source for employers not reflecting real shortages. Labour was steadily tightening the rules. A few categories may need to taper till local employers get used to paying better wages .
Where do people call home? Remitting money back suggests it is not here. I am also surprised at the number of people who seem to have been here for around 5 years on some mixed bag of student & precarious work visas. Maybe an upper time limit is needed in total in the future? I don't think that we need to convert all visa's to something longer term and less onerous- we have an oversupplied labour market for the next while.
Then there is also the shadow of permanent residence visas where people have not been here for years as they have moved elsewhere and are likely to turn up for welfare purposes only. Maybe just expire anyone who hasn't been tax residence for 5 years and in future make it 10 to 15 years to become a citizen.
According to INZ, NZ imported 65,000 workers in the "tourism sector" in 2019.
Therefore, the talk of "100,000 NZers in the tourism sector will lose their jobs" is fairly chicken little stuff. It's more like 30,000 NZers that will be directly affected. I daresay many of them will be able to find jobs elsewhere, or will be retained by the employer.
It'll be the short term visa holders that will be let go. Again, very little sympathy. The tourism sector has priced out NZers for years from participating in activities, and now want the support.
I am concerned about the young NEETS too where unemployment is high. They need those starter jobs and a lot of the work visa's have just been crack cocaine for employers in the race to the bottom and meaning they don't wantt to train.
There doesn't seem to be much real analysis in the media just interviews.
PLEEEEEEESE! Someone put that man Thrace in a uniform – preferably one that's the most ostentatious with lots of medals. Give him the fanciest job title you can dream up as well.
No need to measure the size of it's dick – rest assured it goes without saying it's WELL above average.
If you do that – he'll do us proud even if he hasn't yet come to realise the difference between public service and the policies of an elected government's agenda, versus those of his own. If you do that – we can dress James' up as being impartial and apolitical in the service of the erectorate
National will very likely be led by Muller into the 40s, come the election. Bomber seems out of touch with kiwis, big-time. City-slicker syndrome? The chances that the Nats will sink further under Muller & Kaye are infinitesimally small. On the contrary, a rebound is inevitable. The new team will be an effective combo for National. Enough to win? Unlikely at present.
National will very likely be led by Muller into the 40s, come the election … The chances that the Nats will sink further under Muller & Kaye are infinitesimally small. On the contrary, a rebound is inevitable.
That's what the Media consensus said when National's rising star, Bill English, toppled Jenny Shipley in October 2001. Bill was, they implied, young, firm buttocked & dashing. A roarer, a rogerer & a puker. Every Woodford House debutante's dream. His vigorous leadership apparently guaranteed to usher in a new electorally competitive era for the Nats with the very real prospect of victory.
The result:
Last Colmar Brunton before English toppled Shipley:
By early 2002, more astute National voters saw the writing on the wall, the re-election of the Clark Labour Govt looked inevitable … so the Right vote significantly fragments as large numbers of 1999 Nat supporters sought to provide a counterweight to any Leftward thrust in the new incoming Govt, in the process, if possible, keeping the Greens away from power.
I wouldn’t entirely rule out at least a vague echo of that freefall happening again.
There was another reason I think Swordfish, I as usual helped out on the Labour team in Kaikoura electorate ( which is everything north of Chch except Nelson ) and also being a farmer I know a lot of Nats and they were pissed off, English lost them in a big way being deaf to the usual 20 year cycle of droughts of which the '99-2002 one was a biggie, he and the rest of the Take The Cockies For Granted Party advocated tough love, stand on your own 2 feet stuff.
It wasn't popular, during Meet the Minister meetings an old school mates job was to make sure that the back door of the country halls was jambed open and the crown limo idling for the fast getaway that they needed a fair few times.
The farming community stayed home on election day and the wives if they voted went for the woman ( Helen ) or Green, one small valley booth put the Nats in third. Unheard of.
This in an electorate that generally a dead dog with a blue ribbon is a shoe-in.
Big swings into non-voting from both National and Labour voters in 2002 (according to the New Zealand Election Study).
Sounds (from your eyewitness account) like Farmers may have been a core component of the former (although, bear in mind the farming community comprises a pretty small % of voters in general … & even a relatively minor % of National voters … but if their anger spilled over into erstwhile Nats voting in small rural towns & smaller regional centres then it could have had quite an impact)..
Labour certainly won the Party Vote in Kaikoura in 2002 (that was also the case in every one except 3 Rural seats (possibly re-inforcing your point) … but it's easily forgotten that the Party won a whole swathe of Rural seats in the previous Election as well)
Was that one small valley booth French Pass ?
Incidentally, Helen Clark would’ve been intersted in you … IIRR she did her MA seeking to explain why a small minority of Farmers broke ranks & persisently voted Labour.
It's time to drop the MMP threshold to 3 or 4%, it really sucks watching NZF and Greens hovering around 5%, that means a huge slice of the electorate will potentially lose their votes to a larger party
Or do away with the party vote entirely and just have 120 or 130 electorates with STV voting. At least that way MPs are directly accountable to voters, and there might actually be opportunities for actual independents to get in Parliament. Once voting is complete, it'll be the largest grouping of aligned parties + independents that form the government.
I think party politics has a lot to answer for but I’d rather do away with the electorate vote. Local and regional politics should be covered more than adequately (or not) by local and regional politicians. Central politics is a completely different kettle of fish where the interests of the whole nation and all people have to be balanced against those of individual electorates.
I would envisage that people standing in electorates for central government would be aligned with the policies of the parties they are standing for.
Independents may not necessarily have the overarching 'policy' rationale, but if enough people in the electorate believed they had something to offer in the big house, they'd still be able to have an influence on overall policies for the country.
I'm not sure that party vote alone would be ideal. In that case, how would people be able to contact representatives? Who would decide what areas/regions MPs would serve?
Yes Nationals medis friends have started with total blanket coverage that has replaced COVID 19.
Looking at the tv networks last night you could feel their desperation in making sure in their new catch cry " New Zealand's biggest political party " that Muller was the new National saviour.
Bryan: "let me remind you “business as usual” – the pre pandemic economy- benefitted the few not the many and THAT is what they want us to return to. Well I for one don’t want that. How about you?"
Me too. Shame he isn't honest enough to point out that Labour leaders never campaign to change that system, huh? I see that lack of honesty as typical of leftists. Some commentators here get irritated by such generalisations from me, and I empathise since those folk are on the side of the angels, but to me it is a necessary realism in political commentary. Truth hurts sometimes…
They do anyway. I sometimes include the proviso (exceptions to every rule) but it gets tedious so often don't bother. Anyway, I can confidently predict that Jacinda, even with her ratings in the stratosphere, will never campaign to change the system. She will prove my point instead.
I started thinking about it and even thought there might be a Post in it but then realised I have not yet read the other Post today, which may actually cover much of the same; there is no such thing as coincidence when it comes to ideas.
I’ll try to articulate clearly my muddled thinking.
I think the premise of your question is fair enough and aligns with common sense/perception but is not necessarily realistic.
If one makes changes to a system other than tinkering and cosmetic changes, it is real change to another system. This is not just playing with words.
I believe much change comes from within a system. This is often called different names such as transformation, paradigm shift, or evolution – in biology there is another process that involves radical differentiation and sudden radical change in bodily structure, appearance (morphology), and function called metamorphosis.
Revolutionary change involves the destruction or dissolution of large parts of the system and then replacing these with new different parts or rearranging existing parts to give them new functions and responsibilities (and new names, of course – re-branding is vitally important in revolution).
As with a virus jumping to a new species, this only works when it is able to survive in the new host. It has to have accumulated the appropriate mutations (read: changes) to be ready to make the jump. Of course, the opportunity needs to present itself. Before the jump, nothing seems ‘unusual’ (read: BAU), but after the jump a completely new world (environment) opens up for the virus. The changes come from within; the jump could be equated to a paradigm shift.
After the jump, the virus needs to adapt to survive and propagate optimally in the new environment.
The virus is an analogy for a system. Small intrinsic changes can ready it for big changes ahead that could secure its future and survival. The virus is changed yet the same.
I believe this Government led by the PM is making real changes to the system that too many may seem BAU and trivial. The pandemic has created a unique opportunity for major changes ahead, a paradigm shift is possible (a jump). One that might also help increase the chances of survival through adaptation to/under CC. Will it happen? Will it succeed? There’s only one way to find out …
I did warn you that my thinking is muddled – too much COVID-19 on the mind
Yeah, incremental. On a good day, you tell yourself every little bit helps since it's in the right general direction. On a bad day it's Labour asleep at the wheel as usual.
Times like now, a political paradigm shift is required. Best fudge to be expected from Labour: a plan makeshift enough to seem semi-plausible to mainstreamers.
I doubt they are even thinking that far forward. If the new National team actually does produce a plan to campaign on, watch Labour go into headless-chook mode.
Are you hoping to achieve something with these rebukes @4:01 pm?
"Labour asleep at the wheel as usual."
"Best fudge to be expected from Labour: a plan makeshift enough to seem semi-plausible…"
"Labour go into headless-chook mode."
You certainly crammed your 'point' home. Anyone else seeing more than one "headless chook" here?
I get you don't like his comments, but is there a point to pointing that out instead of addressing what he raises? He's not the only one that is disappointed by Labour.
Weka, I'm disappointed with much of what the current Government has done or failed to achieve in its first term: installing the TPPA; Kiwibuild; inequality and climate change incrementalism; no CGT; inadequate Pharmac funding.
And I'm glad, and more that little relieved that we have this Government, rather than three more years of the only realistic alternative which (IMHO) would have been a disaster for many NZers. As bad as things are now (quite bad and probably going in the wrong direction thanks to the pandemic, among other things), they could be a lot worse. Does Dennis think about that while dissing the Labour party (again and again, and again) here?
I for one have taken Dennis’ views of Labour on board, and wonder if there is a point to his pointing out how awful he thinks Labour is? That's what I'm asking. I'm assuming he party-votes Green; in the absence of any functional alternative that's what I'm doing.
Fair enough DMK. There have definitely been times when Labour-bashing has been a sport on TS and it does get tiresome. I guess what interests me is if criticising Labour takes us anywhere useful. In a climate of St Jacinda (who most of us acknowledge is good at what she does and is a really good thing for NZ at this time), and lots of people still intending to vote Labour instead of Green, I think that pointing to Labour's shortcomings makes sense.
I am hoping we can get to something more constructive, and I agree with Dennis that many left wing men have been raised to talk politics like this, it's a hard pattern to shift.
I'd be happy with a L/G govt this year with more Green MPs. The Greens will go as far as NZ lets them, but it's hard to see Robertson for instance being open to the change that is needed. He might surprise me, who knows what Labour would do if the Overton Window shifted.
Yeah, I wish lefties would stop assuming that because of Ardern the election is a done deal. Makes me nervous, even if just for 2023.
Sorry to upset you Weka. SHE made a big thing about helping the poorest and did nothing much re the poverty group's recommendations. Unless she's an innocent ignor-ant she took that evil deep into herself and consciously put her face against it. And chatted away.
I don't think that makes her a devil, just self-betrayed. Shallowness, like Key.
Who thinks our country is undermined by not looking after the least? It strikes at the Left idea of NZ. It draws us into the American hollow.
The main problem is the elite are all having a great time under ROGE-RULE. They think they all have meritocratically got there. And it's the best of all worlds. Why both Corbyn and Sanders are great people. If there is money you're serving the rich rather than the people. Why there was one in Britain and one in America.
you're not upsetting me sumsuch, I largely agree. Thing is, we have Ardern as PM not Shaw/Davidson (who would do something about poverty) because NZ voters want Ardern. If Ardern went boldly left, would the voters follow her? I'm not convinced they would, which is why the GP are polling on 5% despite having the best left wing policies in parliament.
Yes, there is much fuckery from the elites in both Sanders and Corbyn's situations, like there was with Turei, but again, people still vote for someone else because most people want what we have now.
I don't think this is hopeless. I think NZ has a real chance at shifting the Overton Window because of covid, and if we got a L/G govt with more Green MPs. That would mean by 2023 the general public (voters) would be more onboard with left wing values and policies.
By real chance I don't mean a good chance necessarily. The left is still largely centred in macho politics, and tearing things down, and isn't very good at building things up at the moment. I hope this will change. One of the reasons Ardern is good at what she does is because she knows the value of making people feel good. Not everyone, but that sense of togetherness can take us further down the path to something good and leaves an opening for the edge to effect change.
I read Bryan Bruce quite regularly, and think you are being disingenuous about his failure to " point out that Labour leaders never campaign to change that system ".
He is critical of policy that does not meet his idea of progressive delivery, irrespective of who promotes it. And he has been critical of Labour policies and projects over the last three years.
The dishonesty you point out seems to be closer to home.
Huh?? He failed to point it out. They don't campaign to change the system. They never do! Telling the truth about that is honesty. So I did. So he ought to do it too! Not sure what part of that logic you don't get.
Look, neocon Den, it'll depend on whether Todd Munter has an actual plan, one that he's willing to share with the electorate. Look, his plan could be to sell everything but look, he probably wouln't know the little punters to know that. Look, his plan might be to Make Newzillin Great Again.
I see that NZH readers will "know" Muller shortly as he is the beneficiary of endless fluff pieces – one would think it was the second coming of Christ the way they bang on.
Surprising to see someone so furiously boosting Muller here and at the same time bagging the shit out of the Labour Party ……well DF I have duly noted your fawning sycophancy and will remember your comments for the future. Your credibility to me has been extinguished.
That MAGA "Make America Great Again" baseball cap in Todd Muller's trophy cabinet is a concern. I saw the photo of Muller standing alongside these shelves and I looked at what was in my 'office' personal space. What was there was what was important to me.
For Muller, having a symbol of a right wing nationalist American president and another of the US itself is important enough to have pride of place in his office where visitors see them.
In a New Zealand politician's trophy shelf?
The paraphernalia is there for a message. It says "This is what is important to me". It's also a message for those who see it. It's a public statement.
And that worries me. It is a signal to right wing nationalists that the values of the Trump campaign and administration are his- a visual dogwhistle, if you like.
And I don't.
MAGA? With its gun laws, racism, mass shootings, border walls, neglect of the poor, exultation of the rich, extreme nationalism, war-mongering, Empire-building, selfish individualism, obesity, inward-looking smugness, poor education and poor knowledge of the rest of the world.
I bet it's not there to celebrate bluegrass, jazz, blues, American writers, painters, thinkers, artists, and all its diverse cultures………….
The Chinese liquor worries me more than anything else. Another politician ready to sell our country for a few inflated directorships (read 'bribes') from the dragon?
Maybe, Peter ChCh. Being the original fulminator I need to say that the MAGA hat may have a more innocent explanation. It'll be interesting to see whether it appears in the new office.
The Chinese liquor may be as innocent as the bottle of Japanese sake on my shelf- a memento of a trip and a possible talking point, a tribute to a part of Chinese culture.
Or, as you say, a symbol of more than cultural affinity, like the Irish and Scottish whisky/ey also on my shelf.
But MAGA? That's an overt political message. Of what? I like Trump? I met Trump and he gave me a hat? I avow MAGA type politics and agenda? I am a magamaniac?
I read today that Trump spoke approvingly of the "bloodlines" of Henry Ford, an avowed Anti-Semite, in an aside to his prepared speech (which points towards expression of personal opinions). That was a dogwhistle to the racist Right.
In his first speech as Leader of the Opposition, Muller descended into the abyss of stereotyping people by even jokingly referring to red-haired people as being prone to disagreement. If a man has such an atonal dearness to the wrongness of that, what else is there in his MAGAzine?
I don't see that there is any innocent explanation for keeping & treasuring a MAGA hat so much that you display it. Why wouldn 't you stuff it in the throwaway bag. Did he buy it? That would be worse.
You misunderstand the MAGA hat. National is always invited by the Republican Party to send a few up and comers to observe the Presidential election. Just as the Democrats do with Labour.
Having the hat on display signifies that Todd was one of the MP's invited. It says to his colleagues that the Republicans had picked him out as a rising star. It is not, and is not meant to be, a signifier that he endorses Trumps policies. Trying to say it does will fail.
It is much more sensible to measure Todd by what he has done and said here. In politics, the most notable being the principal advocate within the Caucus to back the Zero Carbon Bill and negotiating with James Shaw. This showed his colleagues three things.
First, that he would do what was right, even though he knew it would displease a fair chunk of National. Two, that he was forward looking and could see that NZ needed to the right thing on climate change. Three, that he has the temperament and skill to negotiate across the Aisle on the things that matter.
And those who saw his speech immediately after the leadership change, and have any sense of objectivity at all, will know that Labour will now have to watch out.
Thanks Wayne for confirming that actually we do understand only too well. Todd and MAGA inclinations are a huge threat.
If the repugs ( and even before Trump there was the tea party gang) see Todd as some body they may want to do business with in the near future then we should all be very very concerned.
There is also the stunning lack of judgement in 2016 in even accepting such an invitation. Care to tell us who else has been on these repug jaunts since say 2000.
There was one of those stuff fun polls in 2016 – but 70% voted for Bernie Saunders. Stop trying to use James Shaw as a now grossly undersized fig leaf.
" he was forward looking and could see that NZ needed to the right thing on climate change"
Not so much Wayne.
Remember when he " railed against an exhibit at Te Papa laying out several options for getting New Zealand's emissions down, calling it "biased and not science-based"."
It is just a hat for the occasion; John Key had and wore many hats, a different one for each occasion. His Make Amnesia Great Again hat was so well camouflaged that you could never tell he was wearing it and Key himself forgot about it too at times. It was pretty harmless, all in all.
Talking of fluff pieces, Steve Elers puts the boot into our Tova because the gal had the gall to state that Jacinda Ardern is the most popular PM in a century. Elers has quite a few axes to grind, purely out of academic interest, of course, and indeed, Tova failed to show the evidence.
Unfortunately, Dr Elers doesn’t seem to know that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
Also unfortunate is that Dr Elers then apparently supports the ‘analysis’ by the NZ Herald, which compared its Digipolls with the Newshub/Reid-Research poll of 1000 people. Any academic worth his ‘credentials’ would have pointed out the difference between these polls and their relative self-selection biases. However, this didn’t suit the narrative of the learned doctor and his proud denouncement of Tova’s “fake news”.
That’s fake news, folks. Why? Because it isn’t true.
Well, Dr Elers, you are spreading fake news too, you know, because you don’t know that it isn’t true. Now, be a man of integrity and go tell your students.
"“The purpose of the National Party is to govern the country,” a National MP explained to me recently, “and that’s hard to do well, as those muppets-” he jerked his head at the Beehive, “are finding out”.
Yeah right the old National born to rule gobshite quoted and unchallenged sigh.
I have been wondering how Christopher Luxtons doing right now…..”but that was my job, boo hoo”.
another white male who has wanted to be PM since he was a boy…..aw shucks I have heard that one before.
i think Jacinda should go hard and early with him….. Mr Muller states he has a plan..and I think he been so focussed on his plan that he has failed to see we have a plan and it is working and every one of my 20 cabinet ministers have made that happen (throw in a few eg such as David Parker securing trade agreement singapore, wood/Faifoi houses all homeless people, job agency set up by Carmel S, shovel ready projects past the first stage and ready to go in weeks, school lunch programme which will absorb some of the casualties of hospo. But it seems like Mr Muller was so busy working on his plan (to roll bridges), that he missed our plan and is stuck in the past firing off about kiwibuild.
I think we all need to be afraid of Muller. His support of trump is deeply worryingly….his maiden speech about how he was Vice President of the United States and then the president died and I got the job forever, and his statement in his speech yesterday “I will be PM” are very real personality markers.
Nikki Kaye somewhat feebly saying muller is one of the best people I know……and to that I say “time to get out more Niki
Part of my lock-down viewing was catching up on a range of documentary films I had bookmarked for watching over the last year. 'Union Maids' was one of these, a compelling look back to a different era. (51mins)
"Union Maids" is very much about trade-unionism but it's even more about three extraordinary women, Kate Hyndman, Stella Nowicki and Sylvia Woods who, in the course of three separate interviews, which are intercut with each other and with period newsreel footage, recall their lives as women laborers and union organizers in Chicago in the late 20's and 30's" (link)
Sylvia Wood's hopeful comments right at the end would haunt her today.
"I don't think american working people are going to let down this country, and I don't think any fascist bastards are going to take over either'
What's going on with Matthew Hooton? He's quit Twitter, rumour is to join Muller's staff. He's been running a dirty politics campaign for his pal Todd and the media lapped it up
There was the article below in the NZ Herald 18 May by Mathew saying that Winston should be sacked for his China comments. (Paywalled).I stumbled across a large reddit thread – don't know how to get back to it – that was wondering (!) why it was so favourable to China with a strong sub theme of concern about the NZherald – chinese edition – CCP influence.
Other than that MH seems a risky choice as a news commentator now.
Yep I think it's pretty certain now that Hooton has signed up to the Muller camp, he's even deleted the Exceltium website. Interesting times, I hope this doesn't mean a return to Whaleoil-style gutter politics.
In the middle of a pandemic with tens of millions of "Muricans staring down the barrel at unprecedented levels of unemployment and years of economic misery, Needy Amin wags the dog.
Don't these ass hats understand MAD – yay we won what does it mean -it means you better have bunkers to live in for decades as nuclear winter and radiation poisoning bork the world
A very good and timely opinion piece on Māori and Pacific Island representation in NZ Medical Schools, which easily could be applied to all other areas of our society where (collective) needs of the community outweigh that of (privileged) individuals or groups of individuals.
When this blew up years ago I think the explanation was that while a student with lower grades gained initial entry, they had by the end of the first year of study to have pass grades at the same high level as all the other students.
This allowed for racial differences and those students who had been at say ordinary small colleges without the automatic boosts that more privileged kids had had, were given a chance but still had to be top students.
Years ago they said that all candidates who had been accepted had to "pass" the end of year final exam. Any one regardless of their origins, had to pass and those who didn't had to look for another career. (Going on memory because I had to defend against the belief that those low level Maori get a free pass to be 2nd rate doctors. Not so of course.)
Brian Easton writes a compelling column on the way forward. (I didn't understand the bulk of it but the last paragraphs make sense to me. And Todd Muller may be opting to repeat the Key English strategy?)
The public debt ratio is expected to increase from about 19 percent today to about 54 … That’s a big lift; the fiscal response to the milder GFC lifted the ratio from about 7 percent of GDP in 2008 to 26 percent in 2013. … Now a debt-to-GDP of 54 percent is not bad by current international standards, …
It would be prudent to get the ratio down but observe that the Key-English Government took five years to get it from 26 percent to 19 percent, nowhere near the level they started with. They did so by squeezing expenditure on public services to the point where the incoming Ardern-Peters Government found itself struggling to do the things we wanted them to do. …
Will we repeat that public sector squeeze? Or perhaps raise taxes? Or continue to maintain a high public debt ratio and fail to cope during the next great crisis? …
See what has happened? In my view the government was right to borrow to get us through the Covid Crisis and reduce its economic damage. That means that while people will suffer economically (and thus far we have avoided the health suffering that some other countries are going through), we have done so by shifting part of the burden of the adjustment into the future.
Nact will go for the squeeze every bit of expenditure (austerity on wheels) and chop working rights (think annual leave and sick leave) and benefits (like food parcels not money) as hard as they can.
Otherwise the alternative is to redistribute by raising taxes on the wealthy. This is actually what we should do. IIRC the Nact high end tax cuts plus the GST switch took about $4 billion out of the public purse and dumped it into high earner hands per annum. The reverse moves plus some wealth taxes ( that catch in particular – overseas ownership by high net worth individuals of land etc here) plus some tech company taxes should get the lot paid back in about 5 years so it doesn't become a burden hanging over a whole generation.
My point is will Muller announce a plan of austerity and tax cuts in order to show that National is the Party to manage the revival? If so how would the Electorate react to that? (Remember the Health failures and the night school closures and the attacks on bludging beneficiaries?)
I’d welcome a plan from National that encapsulates more than five bullet points on a PowerPoint slide. I’d require independent analysis of its fiscal implications because we know how bad the Nats (cue: Joyce) are with numbers, big numbers, especially when it is somebody else’s money such as the Taxpayers’. The Green did this at the last election and set a good example.
Regugs are generally touched but folk in the UK approaching bat boy abducted by lizard aliens levels of insanity is something else.
According to a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll, 44 percent of Republicans believe that Bill Gates is plotting to use a mass COVID-19 vaccination campaign as a pretext to implant microchips in billions of people and monitor their movements — a widely debunked conspiracy theory with no basis in fact.
The survey, which was conducted May 20 and 21, found that only 26 percent of Republicans correctly identify the story as false.
In contrast, just 19 percent of Democrats believe the same spurious narrative about the Microsoft founder and public-health philanthropist. A majority of Democrats recognize that it’s not true.
About 1 in 5 adults in England believe the coronavirus is to some extent a hoax, according to research on conspiracy theories by the University of Oxford.
In addition, researchers found nearly 3 out of 5 adults in England believe the government is misleading them to some extent about the cause of the virus, and nearly 1 in 10 strongly agree that China developed the coronavirus to destroy the West — which is utterly false.
Onomatopoeia is the process of creating a word that phonetically imitates, resembles, or suggests the sound that it describes. Such words are themselves also called onomatopoeias. Common onomatopoeias include animal noises such as "oink", "meow" (or "miaow"), "roar" and "chirp"
I take a Darwinian view of whatever people like that end up visiting upon themselves. But the sad fact is there will inevitably be spillover onto people that have taken it seriously and taken reasonable precautions for self-protection but end up suffering and maybe even dying for other people's stupids.
What is up with the "Replies Tab" today? It was showing me replies sent to Byd0nz's comments. I refreshed and was showing me replies sent to Dennis Frank's comments. Every time I refresh the replies tab shows me replies sent to another user and not me. It seams to be linked somehow to the last person who posted a comment on the site and randomly picks them or the person they commented to when it picks who it thinks I am in the replies tab.
He he you are missing out jester. I get the replies to everyone not just selected posters. Our wonderful Lprent will fix this. I'm using firefox with the add on that doesn't let the isp see where I am
The Master of the Looniverse getting his jollies wrecking things he doesn't understand:
First the Intermediate-range nuclear forces treaty. Then the Iran nuclear agreement. Then the open skies treaty. Now he's talking about doing new nuclear weapons tests.
Get the money moving "rich pricks" – holiday in flash NZ hotels and get the wife to have dresses made by local dressmakers and milliners like the wonderful, inspirational and learned scholar and NZLP politician M Bassett's mum and suits for themselves made onshore by local tailors. Spend money locally on locally made items. Trend start fashionable NZ items, only so many can be made by each artisan so be in the know and "who is your tailor". Buy PAINTINGS. Wind down the offshore spend, spend it at home.
Good to see Shane Jones calling out Northland iwi for barring access to Cape Reinga as they claim it had to be spiritually cleansed to let the dying spirits depart. We need more straight talkers like Shane telling it like it is, not holding the rest of NZ to ransom with deluded beliefs & the usual nonsense.
@ I feel love, I have the same thoughts about all beliefs that there is no evidence for, which means all of them. Each to their own as long as they don’t try to push it on other people.
This a different immune system to the antibody mechanism. Could explain why people can get covid-19 without showing antibodies, and why the antibody tests have been somewhat 'variable' (apart from the huckster problem). Also the range of symptomatic responses to the disease.
T cells are among the immune system's most powerful weapons, but their importance for battling SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, has been unclear. Now, two studies show infected people harbor T cells that target the virus—and may help them recover. Both studies also found that some people never infected with SARS-CoV-2 have these cellular defenses, most likely because they were previously infected with other coronaviruses that cause the common cold.
The new report details the effects of unmet dental need and the financial strains, such as incurring debt including large MSD loans. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong story short, I spoke to researcher and campaigner Kayli Taylor in the interview above about her ActionStation Aotearoa report into unmet need ...
Hi,Late yesterday afternoon Webwormpublished a story on our website (www.webworm.co) — which this morning is top of New Zealand reddit, which is nice.But I wanted to get it to your inbox first thing today with a bit of added background.Webworm can report that various health professionals involved in gender ...
Germany had its Federal Election this week, and, well, people are talking about the map: Yes. That looks very much like the old German Democratic Republic (GDR) reborn, aka East Germany. Only this time, rather than Communism, the region has given itself over to the Far-Right (the Alternative ...
Prof Jane Kelsey examines what the ACT party and the NZ Initiative are up to as they seek to impose on the country their hardline, right wing, neoliberal ideology. A progressive government elected in 2026 would have a huge job putting Humpty Dumpty together again and rebuilding a state that ...
So. Farewell thenAndrew Bayly.It’s not easy to imagine something a minister could do in the Luxon Beehive that would be beyond the pale.But youseem to have a knack for finding it.I took the discussion too far and I placed a hand on their upperarm, you said.You sound like the sheriff ...
Back in January, Samoan cabinet minister La’auli Leuatea Schmidt was charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice. When he refused to resign, samoan prime minister Fiame Naomi Mata'afa sacked him - triggering a political crisis. Because a majority of her political party felt that she should have not ...
Hi,Webworm can report that various health professionals involved in gender affirming care in New Zealand have received a threatening legal letter from Wellington law firm Franks Ogilvie.The law firm who sent the letter.The letter was sent on behalf of Inflection Point NZ, an anti-trans lobby group that boasts speakers including ...
Ryman Healthcare last year abandoned plans for a ‘boutique retirement village’ and sold this central Wellington site, after demolishing the former factory (seen here) and leaving it to sit vacant for 14 years. Now it has announced it will slash its building rate and look to dump more of its ...
Yesterday we covered a big part of a recent speech by Minister of Housing and Transport Chris Bishop. One aspect we didn’t cover was about the City Rail Link and his announcement of $200 million towards the removal of level crossings. On the CRL he notes: I’ve been down to ...
Long story short, I interviewed Reserve Bank of New ZealandChief Economist Paul Conway yesterday in the full video above about:the Monetary Policy Committee’s decision to cut the Official Cash Rate by 50 basis points to 3.75% last week;the bank’s projection in its Monetary Policy Statement (MPS) for three more ...
Stay where you areYou're not going, just leavingI will sit around, let everybody talkAnd they will say what they knowThey will end up believingI will sit around, let everybody talkAndrew by Fur Patrol.Subscribe to Nick's Kōrero and save 20%Around lunchtime yesterday, I started seeing notifications about Andrew Bayly’s resignation. To ...
Hi,Something interesting has happened in Aotearoa, where one of the country’s most toxic Christian churches has pushed things too far, and properly fucked New Zealand off.As I wrote last week, members of Destiny church protested a Pride event in a library, pushing and punching their way inside.Destiny has always been ...
Allegedly, the defence environment has changed, and New Zealand thus needs to spend significantly more on Defence. The rationale is that China (our main trading partner) has been raising its profile in the Pacific, a region hitherto seen to be our own backyard, and an American lake. The cheek of ...
Germans went to the polls today, in what looks to be their most important election since 1945. The good news is that they seem to have kept the fascists out, with the Putin/Trump/Musk-backed Alternative für Deutschland coming second and effectively excluded from power. Instead, it looks like a Christian Democrat ...
I relaxed myself into the dentist chair first thing this morning. I was back for a quick second filling that couldn’t be done on the last visit because it had to go alongside the one he’d just done.I like the dentist, Geoff, very much. You may recall me mentioning the ...
The Way We Were - And Hoped To Remain: The iconic photograph of Prime Minister Norman Kirk holding the hand of a little Māori boy at Waitangi on 6 February 1973 held out the promise of a future founded upon the uncomplicated and uncontested acceptance of racial equality.WAITANGI DAY commentary ...
Over the weekend, David Seymour announced the government’s plans to “overhaul” the Overseas Investment Act.The Act looks after overseas investments in sensitive assets in New Zealand. Its main purpose is balancing foreign money in our sensitive assets/lands/fisheries/forestries with the risks associated with that.This includes considering New Zealand’s national and economic ...
Last month, David Seymour’s press release on school lunches said:“The [school lunch] programme was reformed to deliver the same outcomes while costing taxpayers less. This was achieved by embracing commercial expertise, using government buying power, and generating supply chain efficiencies…”And while that all sounded fair, the end result is - ...
Here are some thoughts about the hysteria surrounding a Chinese Peoples Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) flotilla conducting freedom of navigation exercises in the Tasman Sea, including live fire drills. 1) The flotilla has been tracked for over a week by New Zealand and Australian forces. The tracking began when the ...
Insurance premia are already sky high, especially in Wellington and other places deemed high risk, and now another cost of living shock is set to be delivered by a Government. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things that stood out to me in our political ...
On Friday, Chris Bishop, the Minister of Housing, Transport, Infrastructure and RMA Reform, gave an absolutely fantastic speech to the Committee for Auckland. As a starter, he really sums up well why we need better cities with this line. I make no apologies for being an urbanist. Well-functioning urban environments ...
You can be amazingYou can turn a phrase into a weapon or a drugYou can be the outcastOr be the backlash of somebody's lack of loveOr you can start speaking upNothing's gonna hurt you the way that words doWhen they settle 'neath your skinKept on the inside and no sunlightSometimes, ...
The Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, Simon Upton, wagged a metaphorical finger at the National Party on Saturday, and RMA Minister Chris Bishop wagged straight back. A former National Party Environment Minister, Upton was a keynote speaker at the party’s Blue Greens Forum in Methven. His speech went right to ...
A listing of 33 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, February 16, 2025 thru Sat, February 22, 2025. This week's roundup is again published soleley by category. We are still interested in feedback to hone the categorization, so if ...
Several years ago, as an intellectual exercise, I had the fun of ranking the worst Emperors of the Western Roman Empire (https://phuulishfellow.wordpress.com/2020/09/04/the-five-worst-western-roman-emperors/). I even followed it up with a look at Honorius historiography. But there was still a missing piece of the puzzle. I was limiting myself to Emperors from ...
Prof Jane Kelsey examines what the ACT party and the NZ Initiative are up to as they seek to impose on the country their hardline, right wing, neoliberal ideology. A progressive government elected in 2026 would have a huge job putting Humpty Dumpty together again and rebuilding a state that ...
Kia Ora,I was reading about the history New Zealand Timekeeping and I think I may have identified a factual error on this page from 2006:Page 1. Time past - Te Ara: The Encyclopedia of New Zealand[The rest of the Te Ara article is included for substack readers]In Europe other markers ...
None of the official measures of child poverty improved in the year to June, 2024. Photo: Lynn GrievesonLong stories short, the top six things that stood out to me in our political economy around housing, climate and poverty in the week to Sunday, February 23 were:Stats NZreported on Thursday ...
1/ Join community / common cause organisations Find organisations you resonate with. Join them and/or donate. In the fight against the state, it’s critical we pool together in all cases. If you don’t have the financial resources, sign up for information & updates. Knowledge is power. These groups, and the ...
Long story short: Aotearoa-NZ now has to make some difficult and probably expensive decisions about how we work and trade with China and the United States, our two largest trading partners. That’s because Donald Trump just overturned 80 years of certainty about how the US deals with and protects the ...
People killin', people dyin'Children hurt, and you hear them cryin'Can you practice what you preach?And would you turn the other cheek?Father, father, father, help usSend some guidance from above'Cause people got me, got me questioningWhere is the love?Songwriters: will.i.am, Justin Timberlake, Taboo, apl.de.ap, Printz Board, Michael Fratantuno, George Pajon, Jr.Where ...
A Bully in a China Shop?It is a mystery what Donald Trump learned when he did his BA in economics at the University of Pennsylvania in the mid-1960s. The Ivy League college has a good economics reputation, but even had Trump been a top student – unlikely or he would ...
The conflict we can see echoing across the world is being imported directly into New Zealand by outside powers and monetary influences that we don't want in our politics. It makes our politics messy and confusing, but untangling the puppet strings can help make sense of how we got here.This ...
Questions1. The poem that offers the immortal words The boy stood on the burning deck is about what?a. Eskimo Nell’s younger brotherb. The Reichstag firec. One of Napoleon’s shipsd. Christopher Luxon’s first year as Prime Minister2. What happens to the boy in the poem?a. Goes on an absolute bender in ...
I decided not to bother listening to the Reserve Bank’s appearance at FEC yesterday morning. After all, the OCR decision had been much as expected and foreshadowed, the forecast tracks etc hadn’t changed much, and – with all due respect to some new FEC members – how searching was any ...
Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedQuote of the day:Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published“Our primary duty, I believe, is to maintain our water, our lakes, our rivers in a form in nature that supports life, ecosystems, communities, and, indeed, it ...
NZ’s peaceful and historic Hikoi for Maori rights and bottom, London police arrest environmental protestorsPeaceful protesters around the world are being jailed for years for nothing more than turning up or planning a protestAusralian climate change protesters To continue to receive posts like this, consider becoming a free or paid ...
And mama said mmmmh, mmmmhWhy don't the newscasters cryWhen they read about people who dieAt least they could be decent enoughTo put just a tear in their eyesAnd mama saidIt's just make-believeYou can't believe everything you seeSo baby, close your eyes to the lullabiesOn the news tonightSongwriters: Jack Hody Johnson.The ...
Hi,With the United States of America currently going down in a giant ball of flames like the Hindenburg disaster, it seemed like a good idea to get on a blimp. That line is basically meaningless, but it sounded good in my head so I went with it as an opener. ...
(My apologies. The version sent earlier this morning had the audio of last week’s podcast attached. It was good, but not that good. I have now updated with this week’s podcast. This is my error and please accept my apologies.)The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers ...
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:, Helen Clark and on the week in geopolitics, including Donald Trump’s wrecking of the post-WW II politicial landscape; and, ...
Open access notables Long-lasting intense cut-off lows to become more frequent in the Northern Hemisphere, Mishra et al., Communications Earth & Environment:Cut-off Lows are slow-moving mid-latitude storms that are detached from the main westerly flow and are often harbingers of heavy and persistent rainfall. The assessment of Cut-off Lows ...
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Data released today by Statistics New Zealand showed the urgent problem facing Aotearoa New Zealand in tackling child poverty, said NZCTU Te Kauae Kaimahi Economist Craig Renney. “Child poverty is estimated by Stats NZ on three measures – before housing costs, after housing costs, and material poverty. All three central ...
It is almost never an (unconditionally) good thing if an official policy interest rate (in our case the OCR) is being adjusted in large bites, whether that is (for example) 175 basis points of cuts in the last six months or 375 basis points of increases in just twelve months ...
Here are your morning catch ups in health, workplace, environment and politics.And then later, amust read critical piece from No Right Turn on the government’s attempt to expand police powers follows. ENVIRONMENTNew Zealand's glaciers have shrunk by 29% since 2000: The grim news - published in scientific journal Nature ...
And when we first came hereWe were cold, and we were clearWith no colours in our skinUntil we let the spectrum inSay my nameAnd every colour illuminatesWe are shiningAnd we will never be afraid againSongwriters: Florence Leontine Mary Welch / Paul Epworth.“What did Gerry say?”To be honest, with multiple people ...
Long story short, I spoke to Core Logic Head of Research Nick Goodall & Real Estate Institute of New Zealand (REINZ) CEO Jen Baird for a 15 minute mini-Hoon last night after the Reserve Bank of New Zealandannounced it had cut the Official Cash Rate 50 bps to 3.75% ...
There is a widening fear in Wellington that the Cook Islands – China deal is in danger of becoming a foreign policy crisis. Foreign Minister Winston Peters yesterday delivered a blunt assessment of the situation saying that New Zealand wanted to reset and restate the formal parameters of the relationship ...
Good to see that this year, the New Zealand film societies are celebrating what would have been Sam Peckinpah’s 100th birthday with what they are calling “Peckinpah’s West” – a tribute consisting of screenings of The Wild Bunch and Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid. That’s where the good part ...
Tomorrow afternoon, if things go really really badly, I may find myself down to one eye. People who used to sneer at me on Twitter will no doubt say So what's changed? Nothing, that's what, you one-eyed lefty.I don’t mean to be dramatic, it’s just a routine bit of cataract ...
A few weeks ago an invitation dropped into my email inbox to attend a joint Treasury/Motu seminar on recent, rather major, changes that had apparently been made to the discount rates used by The Treasury to evaluate proposals from government agencies. It was all news to me, but when ...
All your life is Time magazineI read it tooWhat does it mean?PressureI'm sure you'll have some cosmic rationaleBut here you are with your faithAnd your Peter Pan adviceYou have no scars on your faceAnd you cannot handle pressureSongwriter: Billy Joel.Christopher Luxon is under pressure from all sides. The reviews are ...
After seeing yet-more-months of political debate and policy decisions to ‘go for growth’ by pulling the same old cheap migration and cheap tourism levers without nearly-enough infrastructure, or any attempt to address the same old lack of globally conventional tax incentives for investment, I thought it would be worth issuing ...
The plans for the buildings that will replace the downtown carpark have been publicly notified giving us the first detailed glance at what is proposed for one of the biggest and best development sites in the city centre. The council agreed to sell the site to Precinct Properties for $122 ...
With the Reserve Bank expected today to return the Official Cash Rate to where it was in mid-2022 comes a measure of how much of a psychological impact the rate has. Federated Farmers has published its latest six-monthly farm confidence survey, which shows that profit expectations have fallen and risen ...
Kiwis Disallowed From Waiting Lists Based on Arbitrary MeasuresWellington hospital are now rejecting patients from specialist waiting lists due to BMI (body mass index).This article from Rachel Thomas for The Post says it all (emphasis mine):A group of Porirua GPs are sounding alarm bells after patients with body mass indexes ...
The Prime Minister says he's really comfortable with us not knowing the reoffending rate for his boot camp programme.They asked him for it at yesterday’s press conference, and he said, nah, not telling, have to respect people's privacy.Okay I'll bite. Let's say they release this information to us:The rate of ...
Warning 1: There is a Nazi theme at the end of this article related to the disabled community. Warning 2: This article could be boring!One day, last year, I excitedly opened up a Substack post that was about how to fight back, and the answer at the end was disappointing ...
This may be rhetorical but here goes: did any of you invest in the $Libra memecoin endorsed and backed by Argentine president and darling of the global Right Javier Milei (who admitted to being paid a fee for his promotion of the token)? You know, the one that soared above ...
Last week various of the great and good of New Zealand economics and public policy trooped off to Hamilton (of all places) for the annual Waikato Economics Forum, one of the successful marketing drives of university’s Vice-Chancellor. My interest was in the speeches delivered by the Minister of Finance and ...
The Prime Minister says the Government would be open to sending peacekeepers to Ukraine if a ceasefire was reached. The government has announced a $30 million spend on tourism infrastructure and biodiversity projects, including $11m spent to improve popular visitor sites and further $19m towards biodiversity efforts. A New Zealand-born ...
This is a re-post from The Climate Brink by Andrew Dessler “But what about when the sun doesn't shine?!” Ah yes, the energy debate’s equivalent of “The Earth is flat!” Every time someone mentions solar or wind power, some self-proclaimed energy expert emerges from the woodwork to drop this supposedly devastating truth bomb: ...
This post by Nicolas Reid was originally published on Linked in. It is republished here with permission.In this article I look into data on how well the rail network serve New Zealanders, and how many people might be able to travel by train… if we ran more than a ...
Hi,Before we get into Hayden Donnell’s new column about how yes, Donald Trump is definitely the Antichrist, I wanted to touch on something feral that happened in New Zealand last week.Members of Destiny Church pushed and punched their way into an Auckland library, apparently angry it was part of Pride ...
Despite delays, logjams and overcrowding in our emergency departments, funding constraints are limiting the numbers of nurses and doctors being trained. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Tuesday, February 18 are:A NZ Herald investigation ...
The Government has spent $3.6 million dollars on a retail crime advisory group, including paying its chair $920 a day, to come up with ideas already dismissed as dangerous by police. ...
The Green Party supports the peaceful occupation at Lake Rotokākahi and are calling for the controversial sewerage project on the lake to be stopped until the Environment Court has made a decision. ...
ActionStation’s Oral Healthcare report, released today, paints a dire picture of unmet need and inequality across the country, highlighting the urgency of free dental care for all New Zealanders. ...
The Golden Age There has been long-standing recognition that New Zealand First has an unrivalled reputation for delivering for our older New Zealanders. This remains true, and is reflected in our coalition agreement. While we know there is much that we can and will do in this space, it is ...
Labour Te Atatū MP Phil Twyford has written to the charities regulator asking that Destiny Church charities be struck off in the wake of last weekend’s violence by Destiny followers in his electorate. ...
Bills by Labour MPs to remove rules around sale of alcohol on public holidays, and for Crown entities to adopt Māori names have been drawn from the Members’ Bill Ballot. ...
The Government is falling even further behind its promised target of 500 new police officers, now with 72 fewer police officers than when National took office. ...
This morning’s Stats NZ child poverty statistics should act as a wake-up call for the government: with no movement in child poverty rates since June 2023, it’s time to make the wellbeing of our tamariki a political priority. ...
Green Party Co-Leader Marama Davidson’s Consumer Guarantees Right to Repair Amendment Bill has passed its first reading in Parliament this evening. ...
“The ACT Party can’t be bothered putting an MP on one of the Justice subcommittees hearing submissions on their own Treaty Principles Bill,” Labour Justice Spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
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. ...
As the world marks three years since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced additional sanctions on Russian entities and support for Ukraine’s recovery and reconstruction. “Russia’s illegal invasion has brought three years of devastation to Ukraine’s people, environment, and infrastructure,” Mr Peters says. “These additional sanctions target 52 ...
Associate Finance Minister David Seymour has today announced the Government’s plan to reform the Overseas Investment Act and make it easier for New Zealand businesses to receive new investment, grow and pay higher wages. “New Zealand is one of the hardest countries in the developed world for overseas people to ...
Associate Health Minister Hon Casey Costello is traveling to Australia for meetings with the aged care sector in Melbourne, Canberra, and Sydney next week. “Australia is our closest partner, so as we consider the changes necessary to make our system more effective and sustainable it makes sense to learn from ...
The Government is boosting investment in the QEII National Trust to reinforce the protection of Aotearoa New Zealand's biodiversity on private land, Conservation Minister Tama Potaka says. The Government today announced an additional $4.5 million for conservation body QEII National Trust over three years. QEII Trust works with farmers and ...
The closure of the Ava Bridge walkway will be delayed so Hutt City Council have more time to develop options for a new footbridge, says Transport Minister Chris Bishop and Mayor of Lower Hutt, Campbell Barry. “The Hutt River paths are one of the Hutt’s most beloved features. Hutt locals ...
Good afternoon. Can I acknowledge Ngāti Whātua for their warm welcome, Simpson Grierson for hosting us here today, and of course the Committee for Auckland for putting on today’s event. I suspect some of you are sitting there wondering what a boy from the Hutt would know about Auckland, our ...
The Government will invest funding to remove the level crossings in Takanini and Glen Innes and replace them with grade-separated crossings, to maximise the City Rail Link’s ability to speed up journey times by rail and road and boost Auckland’s productivity, Transport Minister Chris Bishop and Auckland Minister Simeon Brown ...
The Government has made key decisions on a Carbon Capture, Utilisation, and Storage (CCUS) framework to enable businesses to benefit from storing carbon underground, which will support New Zealand’s businesses to continue operating while reducing net carbon emissions, Energy and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “Economic growth is a ...
Minister for Regulation David Seymour says that outdated and burdensome regulations surrounding industrial hemp (iHemp) production are set to be reviewed by the Ministry for Regulation. Industrial hemp is currently classified as a Class C controlled drug under the Misuse of Drugs Act, despite containing minimal THC and posing little ...
The Ministerial Advisory Group on transnational and serious organised crime was appointed by Cabinet on Monday and met for the first time today, Associate Police Minister Casey Costello announced. “The group will provide independent advice to ensure we have a better cross-government response to fighting the increasing threat posed to ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon will travel to Viet Nam next week, visiting both Ha Noi and Ho Chi Minh City, accompanied by a delegation of senior New Zealand business leaders. “Viet Nam is a rising star of Southeast Asia with one of the fastest growing economies in the region. This ...
The coalition Government has passed legislation to support overseas investment in the Build-to-Rent housing sector, Associate Minister of Finance Chris Bishop says. “The Overseas Investment (Facilitating Build-to-Rent Developments) Amendment Bill has completed its third reading in Parliament, fulfilling another step in the Government’s plan to support an increase in New ...
The new Police marketing campaign starting today, recreating the ‘He Ain’t Heavy’ ad from the 1990s, has been welcomed by Associate Police Minister Casey Costello. “This isn’t just a great way to get the attention of more potential recruits, it’s a reminder to everyone about what policing is and the ...
No significant change to child poverty rates under successive governments reinforces that lifting children out of material hardship will be an ongoing challenge, Child Poverty Reduction Minister Louise Upston says. Figures released by Stats NZ today show no change in child poverty rates for the year ended June 2024, reflecting ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden is pleased to announce the most common family names given to newborns in 2024. “For the seventh consecutive year, Singh is the most common registered family name, with over 680 babies given this name. Kaur follows closely in second place with 630 babies, while ...
A new $3 million fund from the International Conservation and Tourism Visitor Levy will be used to attract more international visitors to regional destinations this autumn and winter, Tourism and Hospitality Minister Louise Upston says. “The Government has a clear priority to unleash economic growth and getting our visitor numbers ...
Good Evening Let us begin by acknowledging Professor David Capie and the PIPSA team for convening this important conference over the next few days. Whenever the Pacific Islands region comes together, we have a precious opportunity to share perspectives and learn from each other. That is especially true in our ...
The Reserve Bank’s positive outlook indicates the economy is growing and people can look forward to more jobs and opportunities, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The Bank today reduced the Official Cash Rate by 50 basis points. It said it expected further reductions this year and employment to pick up ...
Agriculture Minister, Todd McClay and Minister for Māori Development, Tama Potaka today congratulated the finalists for this year’s Ahuwhenua Trophy, celebrating excellence in Māori sheep and beef farming. The two finalists for 2025 are Whangaroa Ngaiotonga Trust and Tawapata South Māori Incorporation Onenui Station. "The Ahuwhenua Trophy is a prestigious ...
The Government is continuing to respond to the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care by establishing a fund to honour those who died in care and are buried in unmarked graves, and strengthen survivor-led initiatives that support those in need. “The $2 million dual purpose fund will be ...
A busy intersection on SH5 will be made safer with the construction of a new roundabout at the intersection of SH28/Harwoods Road, as we deliver on our commitment to help improve road safety through building safer infrastructure, Transport Minister Chris Bishop says. “Safety is one of the Government’s strategic priorities ...
The Government is turbo charging growth to return confidence to the primary sector through common sense policies that are driving productivity and farm-gate returns, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced today. “The latest Federated Farmers Farm Confidence Survey highlights strong momentum across the sector and the Government’s firm commitment to back ...
Improving people’s experience with the Justice system is at the heart of a package of Bills which passed its first reading today Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee says. “The 63 changes in these Bills will deliver real impacts for everyday New Zealanders. The changes will improve court timeliness and efficiency, ...
Returning the Ō-Rākau battle site to tūpuna ownership will help to recognise the past and safeguard their stories for the benefit of future generations, Minister for Māori Crown Relations Tama Potaka says. The Te Pire mō Ō-Rākau, Te Pae o Maumahara / Ō-Rākau Remembrance Bill passed its third reading at ...
A new university programme will help prepare PhD students for world-class careers in science by building stronger connections between research and industry, Science, Innovation and Technology Minister Dr Shane Reti says. “Our Government is laser focused on growing New Zealand’s economy and to do that, we must realise the potential ...
Health Minister Simeon Brown has today announced funding of more than $14 million to replace the main water supply and ring mains in the main building of Auckland City Hospital. “Addressing the domestic hot water system at the country’s largest hospital, which opened in 2003, is vitally important to ensure ...
The Government is investing $30 million from the International Visitor Conservation and Tourism Levy to fund more than a dozen projects to boost biodiversity and the tourist economy, Conservation Minister Tama Potaka says. “Tourism is a key economic driver, and nature is our biggest draw card for international tourists,” says ...
Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters will travel to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, China, Mongolia, and the Republic of Korea later this week. “New Zealand enjoys long-standing and valued relationships with Saudi Arabia and the UAE, both highly influential actors in their region. The visit will focus on building ...
Minister for Rail Winston Peters has announced director appointments for Ferry Holdings Limited – the schedule 4a company charged with negotiating ferry procurement contracts for two new inter-island ferries. Mr Peters says Ferry Holdings Limited will be responsible for negotiating long-term port agreements on either side of the Cook Strait ...
Ophthalmology patients in Kaitaia are benefiting from being able to access the complete cataract care pathway closer to home, Health Minister Simeon Brown says. “Ensuring New Zealanders have access to timely, quality healthcare is a priority for the Government. “Since 30 September 2024, Kaitaia Hospital has been providing cataract care ...
The foreign minister will be raising the matters of the warships and the controversial Cook Islands deals in three high-level meetings in Beijing this week. ...
The Prime Minister has arrived for his first trade mission of the year, with a business delegation of tech, food and beverage, and education heavy-hitters in tow. ...
If there is one hard lesson we in New Zealand know all too well, it’s that when hate spreads online, it doesn’t stay there. There’s an information war going on in the world right now. And we are losing.Elon Musk and Donald Trump, supported by an army of bots, ...
The foreign minister is meeting with his Chinese equivalent in Beijing today, as New Zealand and Australia express concerns over Chinese naval exercises in the Tasman Sea. Here’s what you need to know. So Winston Peters is in Beijing this week – what’s he doing there? Like most international trips ...
Comment: The Trump administration has imposed tariffs on imports to the United States, a controversial decision that will rock numerous economies directly affected. They will also likely backfire on the US.Economists don’t like tariffs because countries are much better off producing and exporting goods in which they have a comparative ...
The truth is rarely simple. And in season two of Fractured, the shocking revelations will leave you questioning medicine, justice and the devastating power of a single diagnosis.Award-winning investigative journalist Melanie Reid returns with the next chapter of Fractured, the podcast rocking legal and medical assumptions in New Zealand and beyond.In season ...
Freshwater protections have been bolstered by the outcomes of two recent court cases, but the Government now looks set to give industry bodies a workaround in its Resource Management Act changes.Industry groups have welcomed the proposed reforms while conservationists warn they could undermine water quality protections and the core tenets ...
Whanganui was in a mood for change in 2004. The incumbent mayor, Chas Poynter, a bookseller and the son of a bookseller, had been in office since 1986, a total of 18 years. He had gained some credit among right-wing voters for his staunch opposition to the occupation of Moutoa ...
It’s unclear if Ngāi Tahu’s farms can meet stringent freshwater limits being promoted by an ecological expert in the tribe’s High Court case.The case, in its third week, seeks a series of declarations from the court, including Crown recognition of its rangatiratanga (chiefly authority) over wai māori (freshwater) within its ...
Israel has now banned another European Union parliamentarian from entering the country, reports Al Jazeera. The government gave no reasons why Lynn Boylan, who chairs the European Parliament EU-Palestine delegation, was denied entry. “This utter contempt from Israel is the result of the international community failing to hold them to ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ivan Vinogradov, Animal Behaviour Researcher, Australian National University Turner Brockman/iNaturalist, CC BY-SA We humans often underestimate the intelligence of other animals. You’ve probably seen videos of monkeys, ravens or parrots solving puzzles. But fish also possess impressive problem-solving skills, despite the ...
The Treaty Principles Bill will "whitewash" the Crown and Māori partnership, and "elevate the oppression of my people", says the daughter of Joe Hawke, who led the Bastion Point land occupation. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dirk Baur, Professor of Finance, The University of Western Australia The gold price has surged to a new all-time high above US$2,900 (A$4,544) an ounce this month. It has risen by 12% since the start of the year and clearly outperformed ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Leigh Carriage, Senior Lecturer in Music, Southern Cross University The multi-Grammy award winner Roberta Flack has passed away at 88. Her approach and sound were a unique combination of soul, folk, rhythm and blues, jazz, pop and musicianship, and arranging skills so ...
Everything you missed from day nine of the Treaty principles bill hearings, when the Justice Committee heard 14 hours of submissions across two sessions.Read our recaps of the previous hearings here.Simultaneous oral submissions on the Treaty principles bill were heard over eight hours on Tuesday – one in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Philippa Collin, Professor, Institute for Culture and Society, Western Sydney University Shutterstock Ahead of the Australian election, candidates, advisers and political parties might be paying attention to what young people think. And if they’re not, they should be. This election ...
By Christina Persico, RNZ Pacific bulletin editor Samoan Prime Minister Fiame Naomi Mata’afa has survived a vote of no confidence after weeks of political turmoil. In a vote today, she defeated the motion by 34 votes in favour and 15 against. The motion was prompted by a split in the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dennis Wesselbaum, Associate Professor, Department of Economics, University of Otago Piyaset/Shutterstock Climate change is no longer a distant threat. It’s here, it’s real and it increasingly affects us all. But predicting climate change and its associated costs, particularly over long ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Yi Li, Senior Lecturer in Marketing, Macquarie University udra11, Shutterstock When you’re deciding what to eat for lunch or dinner, do you consider the meal’s greenhouse gas emissions? How do you compare the carbon footprint of a beef sandwich with that ...
Liv Sisson reviews the latest instalment of the Christchurch music festival with a growing reputation as one of the best in the country. There were plenty of memorable outfits at Electric Avenue, but one stuck out for me. On day two I saw a guy, maybe mid-50s, dancing hard while ...
“The Chinese state is an authoritarian nightmare with an aggressive plan for military spending and zero regard for human rights. The experiences in Hong Kong and Xinjiang should be evidence for how much respect China has for basic rights and freedoms”, ...
Alex Casey talks to access coordinator Felicity Hamil about one of the newest jobs in the screen industry, and why it’s been a long time coming. From the very first moments of Sight Unseen, it is clear it isn’t your average documentary series. “At a ski field, a person wearing ...
In the third episode of Bryn & Ku’s Singles Club, the pair head into the heart of Ōtepoti’s student quarter to find out how young singletons are faring. Bryn & Ku’s Singles Club is a new documentary series for The Spinoff following award-winning comedians and friends Brynley Stent ...
Heading into the heart of Ōtepoti’s student party scene, Bryn and Ku find insights about modern romance and hook-up culture at the bottom of a beer funnel. Bryn & Ku’s Singles Club follows comedians Brynley Stent and Kura Forrester as they head out on a cross-country quest to ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Aaron J. Cavosie, Senior lecturer, School of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Curtin University A view of the Utopia Planitia region on Mars which is believed to be the site of an ancient ocean. ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA In the 1970s, images ...
"It says something very healthy about the state of our democracy, I think, that about a third of the population are persuadable to switch allegiance to another party" opines Danyl. https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/23-05-2020/national-voters-were-ready-to-fall-in-love-but-they-couldnt-love-simon-bridges/
Translation: centrists are non-aligned. Having to often make this point since I first started commenting here I'll just observe that all those captured in the binary political frame still find it hard to look outside and notice that a third of the electorate have escaped.
"“The purpose of the National Party is to govern the country,” a National MP explained to me recently, “and that’s hard to do well, as those muppets-” he jerked his head at the Beehive, “are finding out”. During her first term Ardern has spent a lot of her time and communications expertise delicately explaining why she wasn’t going to stand down another incompetent minister, or why her government had abandoned yet another campaign promise, or why some new jaw-dropping ethical scandal in her cabinet was none of her business."
That's Labour normalcy, right there. The pandemic-induced poll results will mask the reality for a while, and commentators here with starry eyes will believe their own misread and promote the notion that Labour shifted out of their normalcy into a new age. Then Labour MPs will return to normal. They can't help it.
"I like to think New Zealand voters will continue to support Ardern for as long as she continues to do her job well (and some of this success seems to involve keeping most of her cabinet in a sub-basement of the Beehive “to guard the bee”, as the Simpsons gag went, a joke currently popular in Wellington political circles)."
Protect the PM by confining the Labour mediocrities to the basement seems sensible, but could prove impractical. I'd allow them out on controlled walks, at least. Even better would be to give them this work schedule: track down the missing million and convert them into Labour voters. Of course the consequences would be negligible, but it would be a valuable learning experience for them.
I look across this Cabinet and really miss Cullen, Maharey, Cunliffe, Anderton. Even little energisers like Harre and Fitzsimmons. They achieved more than survival.
We're going into an election with results saying 'well, we survived'.
Ad we have more than survived. This Govt have eradicated the virus…This is the most significant thing that can happen in terms of getting the economy going again.
I note on a previous post you were emphasising Muller's experience in business, govt university etc, etc…..
This is how I see it. This Govt has done a amazing job in the most challenging situation our country has faced for decades. It wasn't just Jacinda. Each and everyone of those ministers had stuff to get done, and get down they did. Whether it was housing all homeless people very quickly, setting up a site for people to report price gauging, getting Kiwi's stranded back from overseas, setting up quarantine, organising schools for learning from home, setting up a job subsidy, small business loan, setting up employment agencies across NZ, getting shovel ready jobs across the line as soon as possible, getting environmental jobs up and running, the huge amount of work to support the health system cope with the crisis, getting a trade agreement with Singapore in Covid times (thanks Parker), ensuring supply routes via airlines to make sure vital medical supplies etc were protected. ………..
Do you believe people disagree with your view because it has not been heard enough?
The comment @1 seemed patronising – methinks he "can't help it."
Sounding patronising or hypocritical is only a small price to pay for being right.
If vonly he were (in any sense of the word).
Imagining trinary voting blocs instead of binary does a disservice to pretty much everyone who thinks the whole "floating voter" concept is bullshit (and his link article isn't too much better). It's a democracy, there are a gazillion reasons why people change their vote or don't vote. Attraciting them isn't as simple as appealing to one voting bloc – there isn't a clearly "centrist" policy line to support or oppose (like asset sales or environmental issues).
Reducing government to a couple of ministerial cockups is likewise bullshit.
Well said.
Many but not all voters are too lazy and apathetic, simply stick with tribal BAU, and vote accordingly. People are complex beings and to reduce their behaviour to simple binary or trinary choices is simplistic.
Please note that my comment was deliberately ambiguous and neutral in intention
I was not saying DF was right but rather that the labels, and labels in general, are irrelevant and unhelpful in addressing the question of being right or wrong or the actual issue itself.
The problem with blog format is that it operates like a broadcast, so a commenter addresses an audience (largely anonymous) while responding to another commenter. So the conversation stream is group discourse as much as dialogue. Nuances work well with those who are on your wavelength but are lost on most participants, so we end up painting with a broad brush more often than not.
The antique binary frame is the traditional default. My attempt to reframe as triadic is the simplest possible improvement. The real world is way more complex, but people do group in relation to other groups, and voters have established the three-way split in all western countries (more than 30 years ago) so there's a realistic basis for triangulating.
If you don't like this medium, there are others. Do a fecking podcast.
As for "traditional defaults", when power structures tend towards two or three blocs (be they electoral or sociopolitical or hereditary) bi/trinary are fine for describing the competing groups, but not the motivations of the members of those groups. To use it to describe the latter is shallow, pseudointellectual punditry.
What makes me, specifically, yawn is that you use enough words to make more sophisticated points but only present trivial observations that a two-bit assistant political reporter could present in a one-minute piece to camera.
There are lots of models to use when one can't identify specific policy points that have obvious core sector support. My personal favourite is a rough-Weberian approach: three gauges showing the traditional, charismatic, and bureaucratic support for a leadership candidate or group. But there are others that have similar usability and much more sophisticated analyses than just adding another group to a binary model. Seriously, the net improvement to the resolution of analyses between a binary and trinary system is negligible. Why do you think media love "the floating voter" as a concept? It looks deep but adds little to their workload.
You want a demo? Muller's not going to significantly improve the lot of the National party. Why?
Now lets look at a trinary analysis:
I haven't allocated a common motivation to centrists because there has never been one evident. The subgroup that operate as swing-voters does share a motivation: to change the govt. However the recent polls suggest a centrist shift 4 or 5 times that size. You can only read their common motivation as disgust with National's leader & endorsement of Labour's – but likely to be ephemeral.
Re trivial observations, any communicator has to pitch to the average grasp of the audience. If I pointed out that there is substantial metaphysical basis for seeing a triadic structure to be fundamental to both nature and the psyche I'd lose them real fast.
Re Muller's prospects as a leader, I've made my prediction. If time proves me right, will you remember to give me credit for it? People usually don't. If I can be bothered pointing it out to them they fall back on the Reagan defense ("I can't remember"). However, I will quite happily acknowledge it if time proves you right.
Lack of charisma may limit his prospects. He could be the kind of person who flourishes in a leadership role however, so could remedy that lack eventually.
Your policy point seems merely partisan. I'm likewise unimpressed but I don't discount the tribal affiliations that empower their policies. If he tweaks the mix to appeal to centrists as well as Nats he will pull more of them back across the line – but his team will have to pull together fast & efficiently to make that happen before the election, and I don't rate their collective abilities any higher than Labour's. I don't expect him to win the election at this stage but reckon pulling National back into the 40s is likely.
jesus christ this is a political blogsite, the "average grasp of the audience" is significantly greater than year 8 social studies.
Don't recall what your prediction was re: muller, but I tend to fall asleep before you get to the point.
Simple minds reduce things to individuals.
Dennis, there is only reality. Do you disagree, regarding climate change, there is only 10 years to do anything to save the species? But the party political reality is down to the next 3 years, and all about mortgages. And no one accepts the real reality. We here on the NZ Left blogs exact the fluff from our tummy buttons. And, may I say, from extensive stomachs, as the most damning evidence.
My grasp of climate science in historical context suggests the species isn't under immediate threat like you imply. I see a seriously-worsening future, but over a much longer timeframe.
Gaia will keep experimenting with different culling mechanisms, and some may cull more extensively than others. The four horsemen of the apocalypse seem to canter toward us in a fairly leisurely manner, often pausing awhile to allow their horses to crop the grass. But I've been watching carefully since Hansen first sounded the alarm long ago so I feel no need to persuade anyone. Sheeple see no wolf. Crying wolf keeps failing to work. Duh!!
Longer timeframe to the past, sees poverty. It's not a 'laid-on' sort of feast, our days. Mind-bending, anti-rationalists on Left blogs. And everyone picking points rather than addressing what matters most.
I agree with your comment, more or less.
Binary and trinary framing have their use but are crude models and have many limitations. This can and does lead to all sorts of problems in analysis and discourse. It is as useful or useless as GDP or CPI as a measure of how well off I am. People don’t group in relation to other groups, politically. That’s just lazy bollocks. People have many different views on many different things. Then some clever cookies device a questionnaire and plot your aggregate answer on a 2-dimnesional graph, which they overlay with half a dozen parties. Next they suggest that you most align with (x,y) and thus with party P3. Next thing is that you believe that you group or are grouped with like-minded people who all align with Party P3’s policies and values. This is a form of unintentional (?) conditioning based on a mathematical projection onto a plane. Psychology is full of this Factor Analysis, etc. Doesn’t help you much when you see a psychologist for therapy.
Anyway, this is not the most interesting part of your comment.
This is a political blog site and I can’t quite remember the stats but IIRC many readers are returning and (semi-)regular readers. You can give them some credit for being able to understand most comments here as long as the English language hasn’t been mangled too much (it happens).
Secondly, it is very hard but it is possible to explain even the most complex things in plain simple language so that most interested people can follow and understand it. In science there is now a sub-field called science communication. If you simplify things too much you’ll start to omit/lose important information and you might end up with banal trivia and painting with a broad brush. People love to learn, some more than others, and be challenged (not too much in one go) as long as they are not made to feel like ignorant imbeciles. It takes effort but it’s worth it. It helps if you know your audience or the audience you want to reach – one size does not fit all.
Thirdly, some threads here go far and deep and are well outside my comfort range of understanding. Indeed, they’re often dialogues between two commenters who generally both know what they’re talking about or one who does and one who is called Dunning-Kruger.
Lastly, there is a general complaint that MSM have dumbed down its readership/audience and the public, for that matter. This is a fair point but many blogs are what the commentariats make of them. The medium has limitations, for sure, but that’s no excuse for throwing your hands up in the air
People don’t group in relation to other groups, politically.
I'm puzzled that you believe this. It's so obviously untrue! The entire rationale of identity politics seems to be based on the fact that they do group together on the basis of shared identity, and usually this gets defined in relation to some group they oppose.
To your earlier point, re triadic framing being simplistic like binary framing, my usage is utilitarian in practice while emerging from a metaphysical basis. Remember that Aristotle said the latter lies beyond physics – in the sense of being deeper terrain. Just because our society is superficial & trivia-obsessed, doesn't mean we can disregard our mental foundations. Archetypes remain fundamental.
How does the triadic frame operate in the binary structure of parliament? Uneasily! The third of the electorate who are neither left nor right currently use NZF to control the binary primitives, and that has worked reasonably well. But they lack formal representation as such due to the antique frame deriving from the French revolutionaries' `people vs rulers'.
Nowadays the people think more diversely than that. A class-based parliament would be genuinely triadic – if it instituted working class, middle-class and upper class via separately-elected representations. Middle-class hegemony would result, of course. Not much different to the current de facto reality…
You seem to be ignoring power in those relationships between groups. Crucial in which social groups get 'opposed'. Does not go both ways.
Power does play a fundamental role in the structural relations, true. Particularly for marginalised groups. My point was more general, applying to the generic situation.
The small quote I recycled from BFD commentary the other day captured it by dismissing the new Nat leadership team as `nothing but bluegreen socialists'.
I would never regard Slater and his fellow knuckle-draggers as founts of wisdom.
https://i.stuff.co.nz/otago/121576983/coronavirus-the-desperation-of-queenstowns-migrant-workers
Sounds tough but kiwis citizens must come first for jobs and welfare, time to go home for unemployed Visa holders
It’s not that easy for them to get home. Are we so screwed we can’t extend a bit of a helping hand to people in this sort of need? After all we encouraged them to come.
We should keep them feed and housed and help them go home.
And of course there's always the question of where they now consider 'home'.
Especially those people brought here under false pretences and who've now spent a big part of their adult life here.
Now that the shit is hitting the fan and there is money that needs to be spent on supporting them, there's a lot of cudda shudda wuddas to be considered. Might just be easier to pull out a Hilary Clinton type reset button, acknowledge we stuffed up and make changes from this point on if Ao/NZ wants to at least pretend we're a more caring/sharing little nation that punches above its weight than others.
I have little sympathy.
Short term visa holders make a declaration that they have enough funds to support themselves in NZ, unaided, when they apply for the visa.
How is it NZ's responsibility that those visa holders then come here, spend that money on travelling around NZ using those very funds that are supposed to assist them, unaided, and then cry poverty?
It doesn't sit right with me. I'm all for the NZ Government assisting them on an outward journey back home (even though the visa declaration says they have enough money to pay for a return ticket)
The long term upside I suppose, is that the median wage should rise over time, as employers now no longer have the ability to import large numbers of migrants and pay them the minimum wage. New Zealanders know what things cost, so minimum wage offers for many jobs will be forced to increase their hourly rates. This is likely moreso to happen in the farming, horticulture and what remains of the tourism sector, when they end up having to hire New Zealanders to do the jobs that minimum wage slaves used to be imported for. An additional upside is that money paid to NZers will end up staying in NZ. Many migrants send NZ $ back to their families overseas which ends up worsening the Balance of Payments.
Paying higher wages to New Zealanders means more PAYE given to the government and more money spent in the local communities by New Zealanders as they will be able to afford doing so.
"I have little sympathy"
I bet!
"Short term visa holders make a declaration that they have enough funds to support themselves in NZ, unaided, when they apply for the visa."
Not unlike all those Kiwis dotted around the world in remote places now pleading poverty and asking for rescue.
And then of course there's all those promises of work and sometimes shitty tertiary courses that the NZ gummint did NOTHING to counter over the past decade – just as long as they could keep up the churn.
But I guess that’s different eh?
Except that when a New Zealander goes to a NZ Embassy, we actually provide them with emergency funds to tide them over. However many run to the media first rather than the embassy.
It's a shame that other countries on't see fit to help their foreign nationals stuck in NZ in the same way.
That would explain why there are quite a few moans then I guess about the lack of support they've been shown.
I seem to remember we've been here before James ( a while back )
It's just as well the failings of INZ and associated agencies are a matter of record and there are still a number of things that they don't/haven't been able to adequately explain.
And then of course there's all that stuff like 'demographic profiling' and T&C surveillance, and James Cassons and his ilk that remain in place.
I understand some of them, in their "wisdom" have left the NZ gummint a little bit exposed. We might also be grovelling for a FTA or two for a while longer – with negotiations little more than talk fests.
We don't identify whose bright idea it was to commission a lot of it, but some of them are still there – thankfully they've not been forgotten and just as there are people such as yourself who have "no sympathy" (End of Story!!!!!!!!!), there are others that've got your number.
Generally …….. people don't really like being treated like shit, but then there'll always be people such as yourself that don't mind being the ones imposing the shit on others
Time for the people who employed migrant workers because they're cheaper and more compliant than NZers to take responsibility for their own actions, surely? If that bankrupts them, NZ has a social welfare system.
This was announced yesterday, hopefully to soak up some of the recently un-employed from tourism.
https://www.odt.co.nz/regions/queenstown/government-funds-tourism-worker-retraining-scheme
There's also a lot of "shovel ready" projects coming through in the district. I know of one developer who put forward 12 projects, some in partnership with others, and he's saying that 11 are moving forward. Some of them are rather large, the total for the 12 was north of $100 mill, with some conservation / community recreation component in there as well. That's just one organisation, there's lots of others with similar vision.
The wilding conifer removal and re-forestation around the district would keep everyone employed for 20 years if it's funded.
It's quite possible with the programs in train, and a possible re-opening of the border to Australia later in the year (think ski season will be domestic only) that Central Otago could be well employed, maybe over employed in 6 months time.
Does anyone know when the approved "shovel ready" projects will be announced, I had late last week in my mind, but events may have overtaken that.
I went & looked at the immigration website (some parts are less confusing than others)
Looks like the work visa's have a couple of broad categorues
-temp ones
the young peoples 1 year work & explore
working while studying and the post study one year if the course is high grade. If we get students back I think we should limit this category harshly to post grad study only at recognised institutions
These people will either need help from NZ or embassies or a push to go home when they can but in the meantime maybe some sort of basic food supply/accommodation with repayment where appropriate? We have a high level of unemployed young NEETs so in the near future will this category need to exist or be promoted. Nor do I think we need those useless private courses that were essentially selling a part time work visa.
working visas
– employer sponsored – well the employers can pay for the return trip on those plus costs in the meantime, if there are no jobs now. I see some of these are people working in hotels in Q'town which are likely to be largely chains. In future maybe these types of visa need to pay a large bond to immigration. I don't see that unhitching these visa's will do anything other than flood the local market.
-skills shortages open visas. We need to chop this occupation list back promptly.It was used under Nact as a cheap labour source for employers not reflecting real shortages. Labour was steadily tightening the rules. A few categories may need to taper till local employers get used to paying better wages .
Where do people call home? Remitting money back suggests it is not here. I am also surprised at the number of people who seem to have been here for around 5 years on some mixed bag of student & precarious work visas. Maybe an upper time limit is needed in total in the future? I don't think that we need to convert all visa's to something longer term and less onerous- we have an oversupplied labour market for the next while.
Then there is also the shadow of permanent residence visas where people have not been here for years as they have moved elsewhere and are likely to turn up for welfare purposes only. Maybe just expire anyone who hasn't been tax residence for 5 years and in future make it 10 to 15 years to become a citizen.
According to INZ, NZ imported 65,000 workers in the "tourism sector" in 2019.
Therefore, the talk of "100,000 NZers in the tourism sector will lose their jobs" is fairly chicken little stuff. It's more like 30,000 NZers that will be directly affected. I daresay many of them will be able to find jobs elsewhere, or will be retained by the employer.
It'll be the short term visa holders that will be let go. Again, very little sympathy. The tourism sector has priced out NZers for years from participating in activities, and now want the support.
Yeah, nah.
I am concerned about the young NEETS too where unemployment is high. They need those starter jobs and a lot of the work visa's have just been crack cocaine for employers in the race to the bottom and meaning they don't wantt to train.
There doesn't seem to be much real analysis in the media just interviews.
PLEEEEEEESE! Someone put that man Thrace in a uniform – preferably one that's the most ostentatious with lots of medals. Give him the fanciest job title you can dream up as well.
No need to measure the size of it's dick – rest assured it goes without saying it's WELL above average.
If you do that – he'll do us proud even if he hasn't yet come to realise the difference between public service and the policies of an elected government's agenda, versus those of his own. If you do that – we can dress James' up as being impartial and apolitical in the service of the erectorate
Not really clear why you refer to me as 1) a man and then 2) "it's"
Bomber bombs out: "I think under Simon, National could have at least held onto the low 30s, under this shadow of a nobody, it could free fall into the 20s." https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2020/05/22/simon-bridges-loses-national-leadership-a-loaf-of-white-bread-wins/
National will very likely be led by Muller into the 40s, come the election. Bomber seems out of touch with kiwis, big-time. City-slicker syndrome? The chances that the Nats will sink further under Muller & Kaye are infinitesimally small. On the contrary, a rebound is inevitable. The new team will be an effective combo for National. Enough to win? Unlikely at present.
That's what the Media consensus said when National's rising star, Bill English, toppled Jenny Shipley in October 2001. Bill was, they implied, young, firm buttocked & dashing. A roarer, a rogerer & a puker. Every Woodford House debutante's dream. His vigorous leadership apparently guaranteed to usher in a new electorally competitive era for the Nats with the very real prospect of victory.
The result:
Last Colmar Brunton before English toppled Shipley:
Sep 2001 CB: Nat 40.0% … 2002 Election Result 20.9% (down 19.1)
Sep 2001 CB: Nat + ACT 43.0% … … 2002 Election Result 28.0% (down 15.0)
By early 2002, more astute National voters saw the writing on the wall, the re-election of the Clark Labour Govt looked inevitable … so the Right vote significantly fragments as large numbers of 1999 Nat supporters sought to provide a counterweight to any Leftward thrust in the new incoming Govt, in the process, if possible, keeping the Greens away from power.
I wouldn’t entirely rule out at least a vague echo of that freefall happening again.
Including a boost for Winston First, yes.
Absolutely … might just prove to be the Winstonistas' salvation.
NZF
2002 CB Poll (4 Months before Election) 2.0% … 2002 Election Result 10.4% (up 8.4)
2020 CB Poll (4 Months before Election) 2.9% …
In some key senses, a different context, 10.4% is remarkably unlikely … but still, watch this space …
There was another reason I think Swordfish, I as usual helped out on the Labour team in Kaikoura electorate ( which is everything north of Chch except Nelson ) and also being a farmer I know a lot of Nats and they were pissed off, English lost them in a big way being deaf to the usual 20 year cycle of droughts of which the '99-2002 one was a biggie, he and the rest of the Take The Cockies For Granted Party advocated tough love, stand on your own 2 feet stuff.
It wasn't popular, during Meet the Minister meetings an old school mates job was to make sure that the back door of the country halls was jambed open and the crown limo idling for the fast getaway that they needed a fair few times.
The farming community stayed home on election day and the wives if they voted went for the woman ( Helen ) or Green, one small valley booth put the Nats in third. Unheard of.
This in an electorate that generally a dead dog with a blue ribbon is a shoe-in.
Big swings into non-voting from both National and Labour voters in 2002 (according to the New Zealand Election Study).
Sounds (from your eyewitness account) like Farmers may have been a core component of the former (although, bear in mind the farming community comprises a pretty small % of voters in general … & even a relatively minor % of National voters … but if their anger spilled over into erstwhile Nats voting in small rural towns & smaller regional centres then it could have had quite an impact)..
Labour certainly won the Party Vote in Kaikoura in 2002 (that was also the case in every one except 3 Rural seats (possibly re-inforcing your point) … but it's easily forgotten that the Party won a whole swathe of Rural seats in the previous Election as well)
Was that one small valley booth French Pass ?
Incidentally, Helen Clark would’ve been intersted in you … IIRR she did her MA seeking to explain why a small minority of Farmers broke ranks & persisently voted Labour.
It's time to drop the MMP threshold to 3 or 4%, it really sucks watching NZF and Greens hovering around 5%, that means a huge slice of the electorate will potentially lose their votes to a larger party
STV would be even better
Or do away with the party vote entirely and just have 120 or 130 electorates with STV voting. At least that way MPs are directly accountable to voters, and there might actually be opportunities for actual independents to get in Parliament. Once voting is complete, it'll be the largest grouping of aligned parties + independents that form the government.
I think party politics has a lot to answer for but I’d rather do away with the electorate vote. Local and regional politics should be covered more than adequately (or not) by local and regional politicians. Central politics is a completely different kettle of fish where the interests of the whole nation and all people have to be balanced against those of individual electorates.
I would envisage that people standing in electorates for central government would be aligned with the policies of the parties they are standing for.
Independents may not necessarily have the overarching 'policy' rationale, but if enough people in the electorate believed they had something to offer in the big house, they'd still be able to have an influence on overall policies for the country.
I'm not sure that party vote alone would be ideal. In that case, how would people be able to contact representatives? Who would decide what areas/regions MPs would serve?
" On the contrary, a rebound is inevitable "
Yes Nationals medis friends have started with total blanket coverage that has replaced COVID 19.
Looking at the tv networks last night you could feel their desperation in making sure in their new catch cry " New Zealand's biggest political party " that Muller was the new National saviour.
Its the economy and profits stupid.
https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2020/05/22/guest-blog-bryan-bruce-beware-of-the-right/
Bryan: "let me remind you “business as usual” – the pre pandemic economy- benefitted the few not the many and THAT is what they want us to return to. Well I for one don’t want that. How about you?"
Me too. Shame he isn't honest enough to point out that Labour leaders never campaign to change that system, huh? I see that lack of honesty as typical of leftists. Some commentators here get irritated by such generalisations from me, and I empathise since those folk are on the side of the angels, but to me it is a necessary realism in political commentary. Truth hurts sometimes…
"I see that lack of honesty as typical of leftists." Certainly no-one could accuse you of promoting the "all as bad as each other" meme.
They do anyway.
I sometimes include the proviso (exceptions to every rule) but it gets tedious so often don't bother. Anyway, I can confidently predict that Jacinda, even with her ratings in the stratosphere, will never campaign to change the system. She will prove my point instead.
Have you been asleep for the last three years?
Either you cannot see it because you’re looking in the wrong places or you cannot see it because you don’t want to.
She's making changes to the existing system, not changing it to another system.
That sounds good but is it accurate?
I started thinking about it and even thought there might be a Post in it but then realised I have not yet read the other Post today, which may actually cover much of the same; there is no such thing as coincidence when it comes to ideas.
is it accurate that she's making changes to the existing system? Or that she's not changing it to another system?
I’ll try to articulate clearly my muddled thinking.
I think the premise of your question is fair enough and aligns with common sense/perception but is not necessarily realistic.
If one makes changes to a system other than tinkering and cosmetic changes, it is real change to another system. This is not just playing with words.
I believe much change comes from within a system. This is often called different names such as transformation, paradigm shift, or evolution – in biology there is another process that involves radical differentiation and sudden radical change in bodily structure, appearance (morphology), and function called metamorphosis.
Revolutionary change involves the destruction or dissolution of large parts of the system and then replacing these with new different parts or rearranging existing parts to give them new functions and responsibilities (and new names, of course – re-branding is vitally important in revolution).
As with a virus jumping to a new species, this only works when it is able to survive in the new host. It has to have accumulated the appropriate mutations (read: changes) to be ready to make the jump. Of course, the opportunity needs to present itself. Before the jump, nothing seems ‘unusual’ (read: BAU), but after the jump a completely new world (environment) opens up for the virus. The changes come from within; the jump could be equated to a paradigm shift.
After the jump, the virus needs to adapt to survive and propagate optimally in the new environment.
The virus is an analogy for a system. Small intrinsic changes can ready it for big changes ahead that could secure its future and survival. The virus is changed yet the same.
I believe this Government led by the PM is making real changes to the system that too many may seem BAU and trivial. The pandemic has created a unique opportunity for major changes ahead, a paradigm shift is possible (a jump). One that might also help increase the chances of survival through adaptation to/under CC. Will it happen? Will it succeed? There’s only one way to find out …
I did warn you that my thinking is muddled – too much COVID-19 on the mind
Yeah, incremental. On a good day, you tell yourself every little bit helps since it's in the right general direction. On a bad day it's Labour asleep at the wheel as usual.
Times like now, a political paradigm shift is required. Best fudge to be expected from Labour: a plan makeshift enough to seem semi-plausible to mainstreamers.
I doubt they are even thinking that far forward. If the new National team actually does produce a plan to campaign on, watch Labour go into headless-chook mode.
Are you hoping to achieve something with these rebukes @4:01 pm?
You certainly crammed your 'point' home. Anyone else seeing more than one "headless chook" here?
I get you don't like his comments, but is there a point to pointing that out instead of addressing what he raises? He's not the only one that is disappointed by Labour.
Sorry, it's that damned old kiwi male thing, from upbringing; calling a spade a spade. Just can't seem to help it!
Weka, I'm disappointed with much of what the current Government has done or failed to achieve in its first term: installing the TPPA; Kiwibuild; inequality and climate change incrementalism; no CGT; inadequate Pharmac funding.
And I'm glad, and more that little relieved that we have this Government, rather than three more years of the only realistic alternative which (IMHO) would have been a disaster for many NZers. As bad as things are now (quite bad and probably going in the wrong direction thanks to the pandemic, among other things), they could be a lot worse. Does Dennis think about that while dissing the Labour party (again and again, and again) here?
I for one have taken Dennis’ views of Labour on board, and wonder if there is a point to his pointing out how awful he thinks Labour is? That's what I'm asking. I'm assuming he party-votes Green; in the absence of any functional alternative that's what I'm doing.
Fair enough DMK. There have definitely been times when Labour-bashing has been a sport on TS and it does get tiresome. I guess what interests me is if criticising Labour takes us anywhere useful. In a climate of St Jacinda (who most of us acknowledge is good at what she does and is a really good thing for NZ at this time), and lots of people still intending to vote Labour instead of Green, I think that pointing to Labour's shortcomings makes sense.
I am hoping we can get to something more constructive, and I agree with Dennis that many left wing men have been raised to talk politics like this, it's a hard pattern to shift.
I'd be happy with a L/G govt this year with more Green MPs. The Greens will go as far as NZ lets them, but it's hard to see Robertson for instance being open to the change that is needed. He might surprise me, who knows what Labour would do if the Overton Window shifted.
Yeah, I wish lefties would stop assuming that because of Ardern the election is a done deal. Makes me nervous, even if just for 2023.
We will be fortunate indeed to get a straight run to 2023 without any more major challenges.
Only fair to give them another chance. If they hadn't done so well so far I'd be more critical. And DMK more irritated…
and tbf, Ardern is very good at what she does, we're lucky in that.
Sorry to upset you Weka. SHE made a big thing about helping the poorest and did nothing much re the poverty group's recommendations. Unless she's an innocent ignor-ant she took that evil deep into herself and consciously put her face against it. And chatted away.
I don't think that makes her a devil, just self-betrayed. Shallowness, like Key.
Who thinks our country is undermined by not looking after the least? It strikes at the Left idea of NZ. It draws us into the American hollow.
The main problem is the elite are all having a great time under ROGE-RULE. They think they all have meritocratically got there. And it's the best of all worlds. Why both Corbyn and Sanders are great people. If there is money you're serving the rich rather than the people. Why there was one in Britain and one in America.
you're not upsetting me sumsuch, I largely agree. Thing is, we have Ardern as PM not Shaw/Davidson (who would do something about poverty) because NZ voters want Ardern. If Ardern went boldly left, would the voters follow her? I'm not convinced they would, which is why the GP are polling on 5% despite having the best left wing policies in parliament.
Yes, there is much fuckery from the elites in both Sanders and Corbyn's situations, like there was with Turei, but again, people still vote for someone else because most people want what we have now.
I don't think this is hopeless. I think NZ has a real chance at shifting the Overton Window because of covid, and if we got a L/G govt with more Green MPs. That would mean by 2023 the general public (voters) would be more onboard with left wing values and policies.
By real chance I don't mean a good chance necessarily. The left is still largely centred in macho politics, and tearing things down, and isn't very good at building things up at the moment. I hope this will change. One of the reasons Ardern is good at what she does is because she knows the value of making people feel good. Not everyone, but that sense of togetherness can take us further down the path to something good and leaves an opening for the edge to effect change.
I read Bryan Bruce quite regularly, and think you are being disingenuous about his failure to " point out that Labour leaders never campaign to change that system ".
He is critical of policy that does not meet his idea of progressive delivery, irrespective of who promotes it. And he has been critical of Labour policies and projects over the last three years.
The dishonesty you point out seems to be closer to home.
Huh?? He failed to point it out. They don't campaign to change the system. They never do! Telling the truth about that is honesty. So I did. So he ought to do it too! Not sure what part of that logic you don't get.
Look, neocon Den, it'll depend on whether Todd Munter has an actual plan, one that he's willing to share with the electorate. Look, his plan could be to sell everything but look, he probably wouln't know the little punters to know that. Look, his plan might be to Make Newzillin Great Again.
I see that NZH readers will "know" Muller shortly as he is the beneficiary of endless fluff pieces – one would think it was the second coming of Christ the way they bang on.
Surprising to see someone so furiously boosting Muller here and at the same time bagging the shit out of the Labour Party ……well DF I have duly noted your fawning sycophancy and will remember your comments for the future. Your credibility to me has been extinguished.
Will he wear his MAGA hat for the photo-shoot?
That MAGA "Make America Great Again" baseball cap in Todd Muller's trophy cabinet is a concern. I saw the photo of Muller standing alongside these shelves and I looked at what was in my 'office' personal space. What was there was what was important to me.
For Muller, having a symbol of a right wing nationalist American president and another of the US itself is important enough to have pride of place in his office where visitors see them.
In a New Zealand politician's trophy shelf?
The paraphernalia is there for a message. It says "This is what is important to me". It's also a message for those who see it. It's a public statement.
And that worries me. It is a signal to right wing nationalists that the values of the Trump campaign and administration are his- a visual dogwhistle, if you like.
And I don't.
MAGA? With its gun laws, racism, mass shootings, border walls, neglect of the poor, exultation of the rich, extreme nationalism, war-mongering, Empire-building, selfish individualism, obesity, inward-looking smugness, poor education and poor knowledge of the rest of the world.
I bet it's not there to celebrate bluegrass, jazz, blues, American writers, painters, thinkers, artists, and all its diverse cultures………….
And also on the shelf; expensive Chinese liquor.
The Chinese liquor worries me more than anything else. Another politician ready to sell our country for a few inflated directorships (read 'bribes') from the dragon?
Maybe, Peter ChCh. Being the original fulminator I need to say that the MAGA hat may have a more innocent explanation. It'll be interesting to see whether it appears in the new office.
The Chinese liquor may be as innocent as the bottle of Japanese sake on my shelf- a memento of a trip and a possible talking point, a tribute to a part of Chinese culture.
Or, as you say, a symbol of more than cultural affinity, like the Irish and Scottish whisky/ey also on my shelf.
But MAGA? That's an overt political message. Of what? I like Trump? I met Trump and he gave me a hat? I avow MAGA type politics and agenda? I am a magamaniac?
I read today that Trump spoke approvingly of the "bloodlines" of Henry Ford, an avowed Anti-Semite, in an aside to his prepared speech (which points towards expression of personal opinions). That was a dogwhistle to the racist Right.
https://truthout.org/articles/trump-condemned-for-praising-noted-anti-semite-henry-fords-good-bloodlines/
In his first speech as Leader of the Opposition, Muller descended into the abyss of stereotyping people by even jokingly referring to red-haired people as being prone to disagreement. If a man has such an atonal dearness to the wrongness of that, what else is there in his MAGAzine?
From the man's mouth, as to why the hat…..
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2020/05/todd-muller-defends-owning-maga-hat-says-no-one-cares-about-his-hillary-clinton-badge.html
I don't see that there is any innocent explanation for keeping & treasuring a MAGA hat so much that you display it. Why wouldn 't you stuff it in the throwaway bag. Did he buy it? That would be worse.
You misunderstand the MAGA hat. National is always invited by the Republican Party to send a few up and comers to observe the Presidential election. Just as the Democrats do with Labour.
Having the hat on display signifies that Todd was one of the MP's invited. It says to his colleagues that the Republicans had picked him out as a rising star. It is not, and is not meant to be, a signifier that he endorses Trumps policies. Trying to say it does will fail.
It is much more sensible to measure Todd by what he has done and said here. In politics, the most notable being the principal advocate within the Caucus to back the Zero Carbon Bill and negotiating with James Shaw. This showed his colleagues three things.
First, that he would do what was right, even though he knew it would displease a fair chunk of National. Two, that he was forward looking and could see that NZ needed to the right thing on climate change. Three, that he has the temperament and skill to negotiate across the Aisle on the things that matter.
And those who saw his speech immediately after the leadership change, and have any sense of objectivity at all, will know that Labour will now have to watch out.
Thanks Wayne for confirming that actually we do understand only too well. Todd and MAGA inclinations are a huge threat.
If the repugs ( and even before Trump there was the tea party gang) see Todd as some body they may want to do business with in the near future then we should all be very very concerned.
There is also the stunning lack of judgement in 2016 in even accepting such an invitation. Care to tell us who else has been on these repug jaunts since say 2000.
There was one of those stuff fun polls in 2016 – but 70% voted for Bernie Saunders. Stop trying to use James Shaw as a now grossly undersized fig leaf.
" he was forward looking and could see that NZ needed to the right thing on climate change"
Not so much Wayne.
Remember when he " railed against an exhibit at Te Papa laying out several options for getting New Zealand's emissions down, calling it "biased and not science-based"."
It is just a hat for the occasion; John Key had and wore many hats, a different one for each occasion. His Make Amnesia Great Again hat was so well camouflaged that you could never tell he was wearing it and Key himself forgot about it too at times. It was pretty harmless, all in all.
TBF, it is making a bit of slight relief from the endless fluff pieces on Ardern.
But agree it is noticeable.
Talking of fluff pieces, Steve Elers puts the boot into our Tova because the gal had the gall to state that Jacinda Ardern is the most popular PM in a century. Elers has quite a few axes to grind, purely out of academic interest, of course, and indeed, Tova failed to show the evidence.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2020/05/newshub-reid-research-poll-jacinda-ardern-goes-stratospheric-simon-bridges-is-annihilated.html
Unfortunately, Dr Elers doesn’t seem to know that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
Also unfortunate is that Dr Elers then apparently supports the ‘analysis’ by the NZ Herald, which compared its Digipolls with the Newshub/Reid-Research poll of 1000 people. Any academic worth his ‘credentials’ would have pointed out the difference between these polls and their relative self-selection biases. However, this didn’t suit the narrative of the learned doctor and his proud denouncement of Tova’s “fake news”.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/opinion/300017369/news-turns-fake-when-facts-give-way-to-untruths-hyperbole
Well, Dr Elers, you are spreading fake news too, you know, because you don’t know that it isn’t true. Now, be a man of integrity and go tell your students.
agreed Barfly.
"“The purpose of the National Party is to govern the country,” a National MP explained to me recently, “and that’s hard to do well, as those muppets-” he jerked his head at the Beehive, “are finding out”.
Yeah right the old National born to rule gobshite quoted and unchallenged sigh.
I have been wondering how Christopher Luxtons doing right now…..”but that was my job, boo hoo”.
another white male who has wanted to be PM since he was a boy…..aw shucks I have heard that one before.
i think Jacinda should go hard and early with him….. Mr Muller states he has a plan..and I think he been so focussed on his plan that he has failed to see we have a plan and it is working and every one of my 20 cabinet ministers have made that happen (throw in a few eg such as David Parker securing trade agreement singapore, wood/Faifoi houses all homeless people, job agency set up by Carmel S, shovel ready projects past the first stage and ready to go in weeks, school lunch programme which will absorb some of the casualties of hospo. But it seems like Mr Muller was so busy working on his plan (to roll bridges), that he missed our plan and is stuck in the past firing off about kiwibuild.
I think we all need to be afraid of Muller. His support of trump is deeply worryingly….his maiden speech about how he was Vice President of the United States and then the president died and I got the job forever, and his statement in his speech yesterday “I will be PM” are very real personality markers.
Nikki Kaye somewhat feebly saying muller is one of the best people I know……and to that I say “time to get out more Niki
Part of my lock-down viewing was catching up on a range of documentary films I had bookmarked for watching over the last year. 'Union Maids' was one of these, a compelling look back to a different era. (51mins)
"Union Maids" is very much about trade-unionism but it's even more about three extraordinary women, Kate Hyndman, Stella Nowicki and Sylvia Woods who, in the course of three separate interviews, which are intercut with each other and with period newsreel footage, recall their lives as women laborers and union organizers in Chicago in the late 20's and 30's" (link)
Sylvia Wood's hopeful comments right at the end would haunt her today.
"I don't think american working people are going to let down this country, and I don't think any fascist bastards are going to take over either'
What's going on with Matthew Hooton? He's quit Twitter, rumour is to join Muller's staff. He's been running a dirty politics campaign for his pal Todd and the media lapped it up
https://twitter.com/ToddScottNBR/status/1263793550627532801?s=20
https://twitter.com/MsWonderOutLoud/status/1263925084718170112?s=20
https://twitter.com/SuzanneRobins1/status/1263896591938682880?s=20
There was the article below in the NZ Herald 18 May by Mathew saying that Winston should be sacked for his China comments. (Paywalled).I stumbled across a large reddit thread – don't know how to get back to it – that was wondering (!) why it was so favourable to China with a strong sub theme of concern about the NZherald – chinese edition – CCP influence.
Other than that MH seems a risky choice as a news commentator now.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=12332783
Yep I think it's pretty certain now that Hooton has signed up to the Muller camp, he's even deleted the Exceltium website. Interesting times, I hope this doesn't mean a return to Whaleoil-style gutter politics.
I think the gutter politics is just sneaking round in the dark at the moment. Maybe he will be in charge of the non local donors.
I find the NZ herald situation a bit worrying though. With a lack of money are they likely to be vulnerable to soft power money?
Yes. (I read that Herald piece via some jiggery-pokery, its obesiance to the CCP is gross)
In the middle of a pandemic with tens of millions of "Muricans staring down the barrel at unprecedented levels of unemployment and years of economic misery, Needy Amin wags the dog.
https://twitter.com/peterbakernyt/status/1263475995585196041
https://twitter.com/Reuters/status/1263580335729594368
"U.S. prepared to spend Russia, China 'into oblivion' to win nuclear arms race: U.S. envoy https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-usa-armscontrol-idUSKBN22X2LS?"
Don't these ass hats understand MAD – yay we won what does it mean -it means you better have bunkers to live in for decades as nuclear winter and radiation poisoning bork the world
A very good and timely opinion piece on Māori and Pacific Island representation in NZ Medical Schools, which easily could be applied to all other areas of our society where (collective) needs of the community outweigh that of (privileged) individuals or groups of individuals.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/opinion/121591599/pkeh-consultant-psychiatrist-backs-university-medical-school-selection-procedures
When this blew up years ago I think the explanation was that while a student with lower grades gained initial entry, they had by the end of the first year of study to have pass grades at the same high level as all the other students.
This allowed for racial differences and those students who had been at say ordinary small colleges without the automatic boosts that more privileged kids had had, were given a chance but still had to be top students.
Correct, it is only the entry level criteria that are slightly different.
So they are meant to claw it all back in one year? I'd have thought maybe 2/3rds then the alst third the 2nd year.
Years ago they said that all candidates who had been accepted had to "pass" the end of year final exam. Any one regardless of their origins, had to pass and those who didn't had to look for another career. (Going on memory because I had to defend against the belief that those low level Maori get a free pass to be 2nd rate doctors. Not so of course.)
Brian Easton writes a compelling column on the way forward. (I didn't understand the bulk of it but the last paragraphs make sense to me. And Todd Muller may be opting to repeat the Key English strategy?)
https://www.pundit.co.nz/content/what-the-2020-budget-forecasts-mean
Nact will go for the squeeze every bit of expenditure (austerity on wheels) and chop working rights (think annual leave and sick leave) and benefits (like food parcels not money) as hard as they can.
Otherwise the alternative is to redistribute by raising taxes on the wealthy. This is actually what we should do. IIRC the Nact high end tax cuts plus the GST switch took about $4 billion out of the public purse and dumped it into high earner hands per annum. The reverse moves plus some wealth taxes ( that catch in particular – overseas ownership by high net worth individuals of land etc here) plus some tech company taxes should get the lot paid back in about 5 years so it doesn't become a burden hanging over a whole generation.
Don't forget they would sell everything in sight.
My point is will Muller announce a plan of austerity and tax cuts in order to show that National is the Party to manage the revival? If so how would the Electorate react to that? (Remember the Health failures and the night school closures and the attacks on bludging beneficiaries?)
No he won't (my prediction)he will lie and spin and avoid any real plan but at the same time bang on and on about how National is better than Labour
In the words of Rodney Hide I think? We'd never get elected if they knew our real agenda.
I’d welcome a plan from National that encapsulates more than five bullet points on a PowerPoint slide. I’d require independent analysis of its fiscal implications because we know how bad the Nats (cue: Joyce) are with numbers, big numbers, especially when it is somebody else’s money such as the Taxpayers’. The Green did this at the last election and set a good example.
https://www.greens.org.nz/greens-launch-independently-costed-policy-manifesto
The Green Party also suggested the formation of a Policy Costings Unit (PCU), which has not (yet) been taken up, AFAIK.
https://www.greens.org.nz/policy_costings_unit
In other words, if you want us to trust you with our money, show us the money.
Easton would be the finance minister in my govt of all the social-democratic talents. Of course that'd exclude … Labour.
They are compromises. When they are straightforward again we'll vote for them straightforwardly. Or, the neediest will vote for their interests.
Regugs are generally touched but folk in the UK approaching bat boy abducted by lizard aliens levels of insanity is something else.
According to a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll, 44 percent of Republicans believe that Bill Gates is plotting to use a mass COVID-19 vaccination campaign as a pretext to implant microchips in billions of people and monitor their movements — a widely debunked conspiracy theory with no basis in fact.
The survey, which was conducted May 20 and 21, found that only 26 percent of Republicans correctly identify the story as false.
In contrast, just 19 percent of Democrats believe the same spurious narrative about the Microsoft founder and public-health philanthropist. A majority of Democrats recognize that it’s not true.
https://news.yahoo.com/new-yahoo-news-you-gov-poll-shows-coronavirus-conspiracy-theories-spreading-on-the-right-may-hamper-vaccine-efforts-152843610.html
About 1 in 5 adults in England believe the coronavirus is to some extent a hoax, according to research on conspiracy theories by the University of Oxford.
In addition, researchers found nearly 3 out of 5 adults in England believe the government is misleading them to some extent about the cause of the virus, and nearly 1 in 10 strongly agree that China developed the coronavirus to destroy the West — which is utterly false.
https://www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2020/05/22/860947708/1-in-5-in-england-think-the-coronavirus-is-a-hoax
Hoo boy…
https://twitter.com/JoshuaPotash/status/1263957793293336579
Political rallies would be more fun if they believed AIDS was a hoax, too.
I wasn't aware that the activities likely to transmit AIDS were likely to occur at political rallies. Maybe I need to go to some.
Make America Orgy Again!
MAOA – that's quite the onomatopoeic acronym.
The what??
Thank-you Andre.
I think I will avoid verbally using the word.
Prob'ly wise. When spoken it sounds like something Ragent Orange might hire some russian hookers to do.
The guy who came up with covfefe? Ask him to spell it first.
outstanding
I take a Darwinian view of whatever people like that end up visiting upon themselves. But the sad fact is there will inevitably be spillover onto people that have taken it seriously and taken reasonable precautions for self-protection but end up suffering and maybe even dying for other people's stupids.
Didn't sound to me like there were too many people there. A handful of claps. No cheers and ra ras American style.
What is up with the "Replies Tab" today? It was showing me replies sent to Byd0nz's comments. I refreshed and was showing me replies sent to Dennis Frank's comments. Every time I refresh the replies tab shows me replies sent to another user and not me. It seams to be linked somehow to the last person who posted a comment on the site and randomly picks them or the person they commented to when it picks who it thinks I am in the replies tab.
A short while after I posted my comment and a 3 refreshes later and it now is displaying me comments sent as replies to me.
Refreshed again and now it thinks I'm someone else again. First Andre and now joe90.
Who will the reply tab think I am next?
I'm using the 76.0.1 64bit Firefox browser.
He he you are missing out jester. I get the replies to everyone not just selected posters. Our wonderful Lprent will fix this. I'm using firefox with the add on that doesn't let the isp see where I am
I'm using the new MS Edge (it's actually good) and get the same thing.
It is a issue with the performance plugin update. Looks like it flicked over the object cache again. I need to fix that properly.
Can someone please tell me which one of these pale stale males is the new Nats leader?
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EYhHC-RU0AcK1dy?format=jpg&name=medium
I resemble that remark! Some of us pale males are ripe (not showering, saving water)
Dunno. It's either B or C or E.
Who is G? Shivers. Wouldn’t want to meet him in a dark alleyway.
Matt Lucas.
Maybe not in a dark alleyway, but there's a good chance you'd quite enjoy watching his TV work.
Yep. He's a nice bloke. Reminds me not to judge a book by its cover.
Oh god, that image brought back horrible memories of Vogon Prostetnic Joyce reciting his lines.
The Master of the Looniverse getting his jollies wrecking things he doesn't understand:
First the Intermediate-range nuclear forces treaty. Then the Iran nuclear agreement. Then the open skies treaty. Now he's talking about doing new nuclear weapons tests.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/world/americas/donald-trumps-america/300019251/trump-administration-discussed-conducting-first-us-nuclear-test-in-decades
He removed everything he could that Obama put in place and now is trying to blame him for all the things he has done wrong or are happening now.
https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1263901802233094144
Get the money moving "rich pricks" – holiday in flash NZ hotels and get the wife to have dresses made by local dressmakers and milliners like the wonderful, inspirational and learned scholar and NZLP politician M Bassett's mum and suits for themselves made onshore by local tailors. Spend money locally on locally made items. Trend start fashionable NZ items, only so many can be made by each artisan so be in the know and "who is your tailor". Buy PAINTINGS. Wind down the offshore spend, spend it at home.
Good to see Shane Jones calling out Northland iwi for barring access to Cape Reinga as they claim it had to be spiritually cleansed to let the dying spirits depart. We need more straight talkers like Shane telling it like it is, not holding the rest of NZ to ransom with deluded beliefs & the usual nonsense.
What you think about the new Nat leaders "delusional beliefs"?
ooh, where can I see a copy of the note?
@ I feel love, I have the same thoughts about all beliefs that there is no evidence for, which means all of them. Each to their own as long as they don’t try to push it on other people.
This is useful..
T cells found in coronavirus patients ‘bode well’ for long-term immunity
This a different immune system to the antibody mechanism. Could explain why people can get covid-19 without showing antibodies, and why the antibody tests have been somewhat 'variable' (apart from the huckster problem). Also the range of symptomatic responses to the disease.
Both T helpers and T killers.
This too.
https://twitter.com/DrDenaGrayson/status/1263902644759920641