"This initiative is calledThe Million Hazelnut Campaign, and I love it. It aims to do three things: First, raise awareness of how terrific hazelnuts are, environmentally, and as an economic engine for farmers, as well as a tasty food. Second, the campaign intends to persuade some farmers to take a gamble on hazelnuts, and transition some land to the shrubby nut-bearing trees. Finally, it wants us restaurant-going city-types to kick in some cash to make it all happen. So buddy, can you spare $7 to plant a local hazelnut tree?"
Here’s what hazelnuts do that’s good: First, like all plants, they take carbon out of the air, and put it back in the ground. However, hazelnuts have a sturdy root system, and unlike, say, corn, once they get established, their land never has to be plowed again, preventing erosion. They also pull an ever greater amount of carbon out of the air as they grow. They prevent erosion and protect waterways. They’re drought-tolerant and don’t need irrigation. They’re bird, critter, and pollinator-friendly and provide habitat up and down the web of life. They’re hardy and pest-resistant and don’t require poisons like pesticides or other inputs. They’re permaculture crops that can live for many years, possibly centuries, because after they’re planted, if they get old and weak you can cut them to the ground and they’ll start up again. “I think it’s on my generation to start showing a real way out of this climate crisis,” says Gamer. “For the farmers who are drowning in debt and input-costs, and for everyone. The way out is hazelnuts.”
I've been arguing for tree crops for years though I also advocate for regenerative farming. Basically, in NZ, we could combine both in many instances, and do very well by it. I can't speak for the rest of NZ but in the Auckland bioregion Macadamias, Walnuts and Hazelnuts are low-no maintenance high value crops.
My neighbour has quite a few hazelnut trees and production is pretty good, like more than the neighbourhood can consume. But they are bloody hard on the fingers getting the things out of the shell, really needs a mechanised sheller.
The plus side is that the rats can't get into them either so aren't attracted. Chestnuts or walnuts are another story, they'll pull every rat in town if you don't collect the nuts as soon as they hit the ground.
Pretty sure there are hazelnut shellers already, but I bet the availability and design would improve if more hazelnuts were being grown/eaten. The people who sell them off their land are shelling them, so there must be a way to do it that is worth the while.
You don't have an excess of rats you have a shortage of hunting cats 😉 (to paraphrase a permaculture solution).
The hunting cats are all good until they present you with a nightly rat from under the walnut tree, on your pillow, at 3am, as an expression of their love…..
Empty rabbit wrappers between the toes on the kitchen floor in the half light of dawn are another delight
lol we had a big cat when I was growing up – it used to leave the rabbit colon behind the best chair in the living room. Ate the rest. Used to have breakfast with us on occasion – the crunching sounds put us off the meal lol
I use a pair of plumbers multigrips (slipjaw pliers) to shell hazelnuts. This works very well if you have small hands and means you can't gobble them all up in one go. It also works for other nuts as you can adjust them.
Growing them from nuts is easy. Buy "Whiteheart" and sow and grow en masse, then purchase as many pollinators as you need (not many). The idea that "city folk" might support a farmer wanting to transition to tree cropping, is to my mind, a very good one, especially if the connection is kept via an app or something, tracking how "your" tree is doing. Sweet chestnuts are an even better option, perhaps, and just as easy to grow from nuts. I imagine someone growing sweet chestnuts and hazels in their back yard might be able to find places to plant them somewhere in the neighbourhood
Russiagate 2.0 drowns out Trump's reckless escalation of US-Russia nuclear arms race
'Pushback with Aaron Maté US media is once again consumed with evidence-free claims that Russia intends to interfere on Donald Trump's behalf. But as Democrats accuse Trump of being "Putin's Puppet," Trump is overseeing a hawkish agenda that has worsened US-Russia tensions. Nowhere is that more dangerous than Trump's escalation of the nuclear arms race with Russia: abandoning arms control treaties while deploying and developing new nuclear weapons. Former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter joins Pushback to discuss the overlooked dangers. Guest: Scott Ritter, former UN Weapons Inspector, Marine Corps Intelligence Officer, and author of "Scorpion King: America's Suicidal Embrace of Nuclear Weapons from FDR to Trump."
Trump is overseeing a hawkish agenda that has worsened US-Russia tensions. Nowhere is that more dangerous than Trump's escalation of the nuclear arms race with Russia: abandoning arms control treaties while deploying and developing new nuclear weapons.
Of course he is escalating tensions around the world. He is the new Hitler. But I would have thought his principle target – apart from the Middle East – was China.
I don't care all that much who he's aiming for, just so long as the war mongering thug is annihilated before he destroys all of us.
Hitler had multiple personality flaws but I'm not sure narcissism was one of them. How is Trump a maniac exactly? What has he done that suggests some sort of mania?
WHEN IT’S TOO LATE TO STOP FASCISM, ACCORDING TO STEFAN ZWEIG
I wonder how far along the scale of moral degeneration Zweig would judge America to be in its current state. We have a magnetic leader, one who lies continually and remorselessly—not pathologically but strategically, to placate his opponents, to inflame the furies of his core constituency, and to foment chaos. The American people are confused and benumbed by a flood of fake news and misinformation. Reading in Zweig’s memoir how, during the years of Hitler’s rise to power, many well-meaning people “could not or did not wish to perceive that a new technique of conscious cynical amorality was at work,” it’s difficult not to think of our own present predicament. Last week, as Trump signed a drastic immigration ban that led to an outcry across the country and the world, then sought to mitigate those protests by small palliative measures and denials, I thought of one other crucial technique that Zweig identified in Hitler and his ministers: they introduced their most extreme measures gradually—strategically—in order to gauge how each new outrage was received. “Only a single pill at a time and then a moment of waiting to observe the effect of its strength, to see whether the world conscience would still digest the dose,” Zweig wrote. “The doses became progressively stronger until all Europe finally perished from them.”
And still Zweig might have noted that, as of today, President Trump and his sinister “wire-pullers” have not yet locked the protocols for their exercise of power into place. One tragic lesson offered by “The World of Yesterday” is that, even in a culture where misinformation has become omnipresent, where an angry base, supported by disparate, well-heeled interests, feels empowered by the relentless lying of a charismatic leader, the center might still hold
That such a piece can be written and published when Trump is President suggests that real similarities between Trump and Hitler and not quite as apparent as his opponents would want people to believe.
Oh he's for sure a wannabe Hitler, and an emergent toddler to boot. How tenaciously people grip at straws to defend this so called leader only lends understanding as to how Germany sunk so low in the grip of such a man. Goose-stepwise we go, into the abyss.
If reality is too harsh for a child, they retreat to fantasy. It seems this translates to adults telling themselves they're all good with Trump, or even those who sense cracks in the matrix, but think 'it's not that bad.'
It is that bad. Trumps (convenient for some) climate denial alone threatens the planet. The people he chooses and the people he refuses shows nothing but absolute self-absorption and contempt for all else. He is a fascist bully boy to whom his supporters are just a means to an end. They are the abused children who live in fantasy – for their reality (that their caregiver is abusive) is dark.
Trump is a spinner of lies and discarder of lives.
It's only daft in the sense that any person compared to another will also have points to contrast.
The slow methodical dismantling of common decency, the slow build up of public tolerance to bullshit, the loading of the courts, the dismantling of judicial process… the targeting and blaming of others… You know I could write a seriously lengthy list of 'colorful quirks' this drug fucked fascist has. You can play pick-a-part all you want, he's a little Hitler wannabe. That's not actually Hitler, in case you were struggling with that bit.
As an aside, I have just finished 'Blitzed' by Norman Ohler. It's about the drug use by the Nazis during WWII.
The blitzkrieg was in part fuelled by methamphetamine, soldiers and tanks non stop advancing for three days.
Hitler had a personal physician that kept The Fuhrer 'detached' using, amongst other concoctions, opiates, pure cocaine and amphetamines. Sometimes in the same injection.
Apparently Hitler was a pathetic shell of a junkie leading up to his demise.
Yes I have listened to several interviews with that author, there really was some crazy drug abuse going on during WW2, and not just with the Germans, I must read that book, thanks for reminding me.
Trouble is, Anne, the Democrats—apart from Bernie Sanders and Tulsi Gabbard—are little better. Trump has not started any new strife, he's just continuing what Obama, the Bushes and Clinton did in Central America, South America, Africa and the Middle East.
Today has been an interesting one and it's not even luncheon. Twice already DFP has thrown his support behind what he considers dangerous left-wing extremists solely for the purpose of attacking other, presumably more dangerous extremists.
He claims if he were eligible he would vote Bernie Sanders over Trump in that possible scenario.
And he uses Sue Bradford's opinion piece as an attack on The Green Party.
Just goes to show PDF will work with anyone, so bereft of principle is he.
And to Sue Bradford. I drive past the Avondale race course a lot and a bigger eyesore and testament to decline you could not see. That place does not embody healthy community spirit unless you mean the weekend market in the car park.
That place reminds the community not of what could be but of what was, and not in a good way. I think West Auckland wants houses there, not a decrepit third race course in a city whose future demographic doesn’t scream for whipping horses and running them until they drop dead, literally.
The racecourse was eyed by the old Waitakere Council as a huge potential development opportunity for homes and businesses, complete with another connecting road to New Lynn.
"a return to a muscular American first diplomacy that the US developed pre-WWI." read, a ultra aggressive US foreign policy (otherwise known as interventionism) that has changed little in over 100 years, destabilizing, destroying and wreaking havoc at will around the world for their own self interest and that of their corporations and industries.
Nothing has changed in US foreign policy since Marine Corps Major General Smedley Darlington Butler wrote his famous dissertation on the matter titled War is A Racket, in which he wrote;
“I spent thirty-three years and four months in active military service… And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street, and for the Bankers.”
Bernie's lived a charmed political life where he's been able to just skate away from awkward situations and questions. Nobody has ever really gone hard after him on anything, mostly because he has basically been an irrelevant sideshow that just needs to be occasionally tossed a minor amendment to a bill to keep him voting for Dem priorities.
That's about to change. Hopefully he'll be properly tested before the majority of primary votes happen. Because sure as shit if he's the nominee, he's in for a firestorm orders of magnitude greater than he's ever faced before, so he'd better get a bit of training before it hits. To see if he can deal with it.
Here's just the first few gentle licks of what's coming, and his answers on his past support of Castro and Ortega, as well as the costs and how to pay for his proposals, are frankly quite crap.
Could you give us an example of what's going to be unleashed on him? Will the "firestorm orders of magnitude greater than he's ever faced before" be lit by those same experts in the Democratic Party who targeted Trump with their awesome powers?
Is Bernie Sanders a Russian stooge? Will they be able to convince people like they've done in the case of Trump?
Trust me, what he has faced to date with the Democratic party establishment is going to be nothing compared to what Trump and the GOP attack machine will throw at him if he become the Democrat nominee
Ooh scary–Bernie will be questioned–and he will likely answer, as he does most enquiries now, in short sentences that can be easily understood, even by “Trumpettes”.
Trust you Gosman? to drop floaters in the pool on daily basis perhaps.
Win or lose, the Sanders Campaign will have changed US politics by the end of the year. People are backing themselves in increasing numbers and next election the young, black, Latino, working class vote will have the best chance ever to defeat the reactionary remnants.
I've no idea what Repugs might have dug up and are holding in their back pockets.
But just in terms of what is already known, and ratfuckers' propensity for fabricating misinformation leveraging off a kernel of truth, there will be stuff attacking Sanders about his record on gun laws purportedly from concerned lefties, Jane's dodgy dealings will get a thorough working over and embellishment, his support for the likes of Castro and Ortega will be blown way up and possibly be 'added to' with deepfakes, his honeymoon in Russia and so on.
Kerry was successfully swiftboated in 2004. There's vastly more technology to create and spread falsehoods available today, and Sanders' background has a much richer variety of source material to provide a kernel of truth to leverage off than Kerry ever did. How do you think Sanders is going to fare against that kind of attack if his defenses are as weak as the fumbling shown in the two links above?
You mean his support for the people of Cuba and Nicaragua, and his opposition to his own government's illegal blockades and terrorism against those people.
Kerry was successfully swiftboated in 2004.
Kerry, as has become abundantly clear in the last decade or so, is not in the same stratosphere as Sanders, either morally or intellectually.
How do you think Sanders is going to fare against kind of attack if his defenses are as weak as the fumbling shown in the two links above?
Fair comment. But can you imagine the unspeakable Michael Bloomberg, the ludicrous Mayor Pete or that ridiculous Elizabeth Warren handling the attacks any better?
There is nothing illegal in what the US did with Cuba in relation to the embargo (not blockade). They are in fact doing something similar with Iran. What international law stops them doing that?
"How do you think Sanders is going to fare against that kind of attack if his defenses are as weak as the fumbling shown in the two links above?"
I don't think they do show that though. If the issue here is that Sanders needs to be prepared for the shit storm about to rain down on him if he wins the nomination, where's the evidence that he isn't prepared?
The first link is an article that talks a lot about the issues of Sanders' political positioning, but it doesn't show him responding to those. Likewise for the video. Neither are evidence that he is fumbling. In fact the video halfway down the page of you first link, shows him being strong and rebutting some stupid communism comment from Bloomberg.
Yes, I accepted Andre's basic premise that much shit will be thrown at Sanders. What I'm saying is that I don't see the evidence for Sanders being weak at dealing with that. His political positioning might be a mistake, but that's not a weakness in Sanders' ability to deal with shit being thrown at him.
eg if I were to give an example of where Cunliffe failed in the 2014 election I'd show the video of him debating Key on national television where he looked like he was being repeatedly punched. His policies were good, but he didn't have the strength to deal with the shit that Key and National were throwing at him. I took Andre's comment to be about that kind of thing, but maybe I misread and he really meant the political positioning.
btw, that vox article is a very good example of irony.
“They would also be required to take government-approved courses that didn’t tolerate any criticism of socialism as a way of life. In other words, education was seen as key to the revolution taking hold and creating a literate population loyal to the government.”
Castro used education bribes, Trump uses social media and hackers.
Yep. I only did it for four years, starting 50 years ago, but I can still remember it:
” I pledge allegiance, to Queen Fragg,And her mighty state of hysteria. And to the reporters, with delicious hams, One nation, under bob, indefensible, With quibbling and lettuce for all. ”
He's fumbling because when it comes to Cuba, there's a large group of swing voters that will totally miss all the nuance in his explanation and just take away 'Bernie thinks Castro did good'. Fantastic fodder for attack ads, so Bernie probably now has zero chance to win Florida in November. That's a fumble before the game has even started.
He's fumbling on the price of his proposals and how they are going to be paid for by not having clear defensible numbers. Numbers he comes out with may turn out to be complete bullshit, but if they are stated confidently and clearly, it sets the frame. By dithering, his opponents can be first out of the blocks with numbers and thereby set the frame.
Similarly with paying for Medicare for all – there's an opportunity for a message like 'right now, employed people's health plans are mostly paid by the employer, and that is how Medicare for All will be paid too. But as workers, the savings from eliminating insurance admin will come back to you by eliminating co-pays'. But no, Bernie's quite quick to say taxes will go up to pay for it. Nobody likes to hear their taxes are going up.
"That's a fumble before the game has even started."
Yeah I think I misunderstood what you meant. To me that's an issue of political positioning rather than weakness (see explanation above).
"but if they are stated confidently and clearly, it sets the frame."
That's more what I was thinking, but I didn't see him not doing that in the links. Not saying you are wrong, and I agree that he needs to be able to demonstrate he can hack the pace before he is nominated, but that applies to all the front runners I assume.
Every time with you Andre, the same attack lines that the MSM media generate against any left candidate.
You did the horse shit "poor union members and their medical insurance" attack line – and what did the union members do – voted for bernie ON MASS!
You did the racist and sexist bernie bro meme. Well enough said on that lie.
And now this, fsheesh Andre why don't you just admit your a corporate lackey and be done with it.
But like most of your arguments there is the sad attempts at spin, but this time the concern trolling is way over the top. I'm surprised you didn't bring up Bernie being anti-semitic – no wait – joe90 covered that for you. Can always trust joe90 to go all tin foil hat.
Bury your head all you want but the repugs are honing their attack lines and the day Sanders is nominated, there will be an absolute deluge of negative material released.
From 2016 –
So what would have happened when Sanders hit a real opponent, someone who did not care about alienating the young college voters in his base? I have seen the opposition book assembled by Republicans for Sanders, and it was brutal. The Republicans would have torn him apart. And while Sanders supporters might delude themselves into believing that they could have defended him against all of this, there is a name for politicians who play defense all the time: losers.
Here are a few tastes of what was in store for Sanders, straight out of the Republican playbook: He thinks rape is A-OK. In 1972, when he was 31, Sanders wrote a fictitious essay in which he described a woman enjoying being raped by three men. Yes, there is an explanation for it—a long, complicated one, just like the one that would make clear why the Clinton emails story was nonsense. And we all know how well that worked out.
Come on, grow up. Pointing out there will be attacks is not a new idea. I'd be shocked if the GOP weren't working on it.
Like how the last loser the DNC put up – and how her depraved husband happened to be a real hinderance.
Sure – but rather than be all tin foil hat about it, – offer solutions. Short sharpe solutions.
Because when the GOP do the whole anti-semitic thing to Bernie – the response from the Bernie camp is probably going to scear you. So many people have been working on it.
I get you don't like the social democratic left – and personally I would like them to be far more radical – but the reality is a social democratic is way more preferable to any sort of authoritarian leftist, or the utter failings of the liberal left.
adam, I live in hope to see the day your reading comprehension skills develop to the point where you can see your idol's name in close proximity to something not entirely positive, and not immediately jump to the conclusion that your chosen one is being sacrilegiously attacked.
When you repeat the same shit over and over, and use attack lines straight from the corporate media – it's tiresome. Be nice if you offered solutions, rather than vapid concern trolling and rehashing baiting memes.
I'm no fan boy of Bernies – I'm for the left actually having a line in the sand. That means not being corporate lap dogs, nor wimps.
When you can pull your head out of your ass, and see the difference. Maybe people would not have to point out your shortcomings. You get there is an actually chance of having a change in the US which will end the failed economics of the last 40 odd years. The bullshit you pull is the odd politics of defeat and wimpish shortcoming. Grow a spin.
It was an observation that a response that has little if any connection to the comment it is following on from simply demonstrates the point of the previous comment if the previous comment suggests the responder has poor and overly defensive reading comprehenson skills.
I didn't start the fire. You're a walking flame war, because you don't make even a cursory attempt to read what people actually write.
Bernie faces a massive shitstorm of bullshit in this election, and berniebros going off half-cocked like you do could well cause him more harm than any actual and intended slights or slurs.
I prefer Warren. Between Bernie and the mayor, I prefer Bernie. I reckon he'll achieve less than Obama did (or even mayor pete might), but he'll keep changing the game to the left.
Most of the people you spend your time abusing probably have a similar opinion. try fighting some tories once in a while.
No you are quite right there McFlock, adam is quite wrong, liberal centrists are more like a cancer in Left politics that need to be cut out before they destroys their host..which people like you have been doing for far far to long….not not Left wing in any sense of the word that is for sure..I mean just look at how the centrists in the UK and USA have shown quite plainly and out in the open that they would rather lose to the Right than win with a Left progressive project, exposing that their ideology is more closely aligned with the Right than that Left.
Yes it's about time you lot grew some back bone and just slink off and start your own centre lane political parties…but then back bone is something centrists have never made much of displayed of.
Yes it's about time you lot grew some back bone and just slink off and start your own centre lane political parties…but then back bone is something centrists have never made much of displayed of.
Let's see – fair call on NZLabour, it definitely tilted right from the left in the 80s.
But the dems? They did start their own party. Bernie only joins it when he wants to use dem organisational resources to run for president. By your logic, he's the one who should start his own damned party.
I didn't say that the dems don't have a right wing. I said that the dems have never been anywhere as left wing as Bernie is. This is why Bernie joins the dems when he wants to run for president, then becomes an independent again.
The dems built their own party. Bernie piggie-backs on it. He has good policies, but I can see why some people who have worked for the dems for their entire lives would want him to fuck off.
"..but I can see why some people who have worked for the dems for their entire lives would want him to fuck off."
The Dems aren't working for working people, haven't for a long long time…so tough shit for them, it's time for them to fuck off and let working people have a voice that really is on their side first and foremost..and if that great thing does happen ( which I will be surprised if it does) hopefully some of that real Left wing progressive excitement will spill over into our political sphere..who knows?
..maybe then our hospital here in the Hawkes Bay will get some love instead of having to operate like some sort of seventies era Soviet satellite state run hospital…which liberal austerity forces upon it today under both Labour and National, it's a fucking disgrace!
So if someone doesn't completely conform to your politics and does not have their own party, they should make their own rather than join someone else's.
If they don't conform to your politics and have their own party, people who do conform to your politics should be able to take over that party with no hard feelings, and the people who don't conform to your politics should slink off and start another "center lane" party all over again.
People who do conform to your politics should just take over a center lane party and not expect any pushback on that at all.
As for hospitals, apparently they're starting demolition on the site for the new Dunedin hospital, oft-promised by the nats and delivered by Labour. Hawke's Bay got a railway and building prefab plant, didn't it?
For all the commenters in this subthread, a reminder about the Policy, especially this bit,
We encourage robust debate and we’re tolerant of dissenting views. But this site run for reasonably rational debate between dissenting viewpoints and we intend to keep it operating that way.
What we’re not prepared to accept are pointless personal attacks, or tone or language that has the effect of excluding others. We are intolerant of people starting or continuing flamewars where there is little discussion or debate.
I'm not following US politics particularly closely, so when I take a gander at some of the threads here the problem comments (in terms of the Policy) really stand out for me as a moderator.
The closer we get to the election the tenser things will be and the more likely it will be that moderation will be required. May as well signal now that the constant name calling and focus on the player not the ball is unlikely to run. There is a plethora of political content in the US election this year, more than enough to focus on. If you can't do that, and are making a comment to simply have a go at another commenter you have history with, then understand that sooner or later that will get moderator attention.
Please, step back from the aggro and make the political points instead. Every person in this subthread is very capable of making political arguments and the debate will be better for that being the focus. The range of political views of commenters here should be an asset (and has been in the past), let's see if we can make it that way again.
Edited to add: I don’t mean any of that to put people off commenting here today. There’s plenty of analysis going on as well, but just a pointer to the problem of the name calling and personal attacks getting out of hand.
100% to Bernie who completed owned his Cuba comments in today's CNN Town Hall with Chris Cumo. And he also owned the China comments (lifting millions out of poverty) that he took artillery for last year.
Weinstein may be a convicted rapist – but also guilty of aesthetic crime in persuading Jackson to turn Tolkien's fantasy into neo-Wagnerian megalomania.
True that, except Wagner was a great artist from beginning to end where as Jackson had a very good period starting with Bad Taste and ending with The Frighteners, well IMO anyway.
Hello Morrissey was wondering where you had got to?
I don't know what Wagner payed anyone, however the story behind his Der Ring des Nibelungen is well worth diving into, it is almost as epic as the opera itself.
As far as Jackson goes, I really believe that his movies have suffered from way too much budget, all his later movies are top heavy and to long for purpose..not to mention he completely butchered both King Kong and Tin Tin, two of my personal favourites.
When my children where young I used to play the original King Kong on 8mm film at their parties (5 reels from memory) all the kids loved it.
June is sooner than the experts thought. Will be a great lead up to the Election especially if "evidence" proving to smear beyond the four charged. I still wonder about the three who say that they were just following the process that they were told to follow.
"If we all pull together, guys, we can still stop this madman from giving us healthcare and a decent education."
In the following clip, those bizarre, anti-democratic Democratic Party "strategists" and their MSNBC mouthpieces are by turns hilarious, hysterical, horrific. Especially funny is the loathesome Clinton apparatchik James Carville at the 1:30 mark, and Chris Matthews at 2:30—especially the part where he says Carville is "damn smart."
In that clip, Chris Matthews actually compares Sanders' win to the Nazis defeating France. Then he goes on to call James Carville “damn smart.” I never thought I'd see a broadcaster more abject and stupid than Duncan Garner, but now I have.
Seems to me like its become more of an echo chamber lately with people getting banned who have different opinions. Personally, I like reading their alternate views even if I do not agree with them
It usually isn't the different opinions that are the issue for moderators, it is how they are expressed. Basically moderators get pissed off cleaning the crap and peeing of the simple of mind who want to have excrement contests. Especially those who go way off topic in posts.
So they see some dickwaving and decide to cut off the flag waving genitals earlier so they don't have to clean up the crap later. After a while the process becomes to cut deeper so we don't have to see the fuckwits for longer.
After all we aren't here to give juvenile morons toilet training. We're here to moderate a robust discussion. Getting rid of reflexive fools who can't control themselves is the easiest and simplest solution. I'm always amazed that most of the moderators don't follow my solution. In election year I start banning repeat offenders who can't seem to help themselves until after the election – for both their own good and for that of everyone who can control themselves.
Problem is, we do not know. Personally I'd say him and his oafish sidekick would have backed a fishing industry wishlist without any fiscal encouragement. But I can't prove it.
Isn't it already being looked at by the relevant authorities?
No doubt the voters will make their opinion known. If they don't want NZ1 in government, they shouldn't vote for 'em. Coalitions are about policy compatibilities.
The three government parties have a lot of common policy areas: regional development, infrastructure, helping poor people (albeit with different ways of doing it).
They have disagreements about other things – fisheries for example.
The coalition document outlines what the govt will work on. Everything else is on a case by case basis, and disagreement on those things isn't a government-breaker.
But to be clear: without NZ1, this government will fall and the other two parties will look like weak failures. Cutting ties to NZ1 because of allegations in order to be propped up by the party whose former bagman is facing actual charges would just be bloody stupid, differing policy frameworks aside.
So unless there is an explicit and demonstrated reason to disown NZ1, labgrn might as well work with them.
So little has been achieved or delivered by this government, largely due to NZ1, it could be argued it's a deal breaker to stay with them. But hey, they managed to work together for 2 years doing little without any serious fights. many successful marriages are built on less
Even if I agreed that the govt had achieved "little", the alternative was a nat/nz1/act govt achieving a lot – in the other direction. So be careful which house you burn down first.
love your binary fpp thinking there. plenty of space to be occupied on the cross benches by any party. National has even less to gain by working with NZ1 on any issue, the greens hand is stronger than they let themselves believe
I never knew my low opinion of NZ1 could be so powerful or persuasive. Thanks Cinny.
Let me make this very clear, my abhorrence for NZ1 has nothing to do with a secret like for simon and national. He looks more like a human thumb every day. the koru croissants are killing him
I'm surprised 25% of National left. If they didn't want simon bridges as leader all they had to do was stay and lose by the narrow margin they likely will when the greens finally grow a spine and attack the soft neo cons in nz1 in the week before the election
And PT turning up to hear Winston speak at the Motueka RSA during last election cycle was perfectly normal.
PT can't stand conservationists, he hates them. He hates the media just as much and is incredibly private.
Am not one little bit surprised about this news. After all TCER forms and the like, would have to be filled in accurately if vessels had camera's on board.
Well look for NZ to take a tumble in the next corruption index, 2 Major political parties one in govt, one recently out are involved in what appears to be fraudulent behavior of a serious nature around funding.
Its corruption plain and simple lets call it as such and
Notice that those nice people were refused in 2016 by the then National Government. So now were are to be pulled by emotional response to allow them a free pass?
Pretty obvious National ploy to undermine the integrity of Immigration helped by an unscrupulous Puck?
With the number and ferocity of career criminals that Australia is sending back here, it's high time that there was a really strong handover of files from Australian state police to our own on these people so that they can be tracked until the very end of their days.
I'm looking forward to the social welfare system, tax system, the intelligence system, and the justice system wrapping all their services around them just to let them know how truly supported they really are.
Congrats – you picked up a ban for being a stupid liar. I found you describing me as having self-proclaimed I was the world greatest sys-op – a somewhat funny and a completely inaccurate assertion about the self-proclaimed. So I exercised a sysop privilege and banned you until October 2021.
I watched the start, but not all of it because it's a year old and it's about some local UK politics, not the rise of fascism in the US. I think the UK is at risk of fascism, but I don't think it's happening yet despite the right there using some of the tactics of 45's team.
If Pie's argument and thus yours, is that UK politics isn't anything like pre-Nazi Germany, then bear in mind that there's plenty of good political analysis of the US situation from people who have studied fascism (and people who have lived through it) pointing to all the things happening in the US that are in fact parallels of what happened in pre-Nazi Germany. They're different because it's the 21C, but the dynamics are the same. We can't say we weren't warned.
You're right. His creeping paranoia makes him more Stalinist than Hitlerite.
The Trump White House and its allies, over the past 18 months, assembled detailed lists of disloyal government officials to oust — and trusted pro-Trump people to replace them — according to more than a dozen sources familiar with the effort who spoke to Axios.
Driving the news: By the time President Trump instructed his 29-year-old former body man and new head of presidential personnel to rid his government of anti-Trump officials, he'd gathered reams of material to support his suspicions.
While Trump's distrust has only intensified since his impeachment and acquittal, he has long been on the hunt for "bad people" inside the White House and U.S. government, and fresh "pro-Trump" options. Outside advisers have been happy to oblige.
In reporting this story, I have been briefed on, or reviewed, memos and lists the president received since 2018 suggesting whom he should hire and fire. Most of these details have never been published.
A well-connected network of conservative activists with close ties to Trump and top administration officials is quietly helping develop these "Never Trump"/pro-Trump lists, and some sent memos to Trump to shape his views, per sources with direct knowledge.
Members of this network include Ginni Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, and Republican Senate staffer Barbara Ledeen.
Buzz from the Beehive Housing Minister Chris Bishop delivered news – packed with the ingredients to enflame political passions – worthy of supplanting Winston Peters in headline writers’ priorities. He popped up at the post-Cabinet press conference to promise a crackdown on unruly and antisocial state housing tenants. His ...
Ele Ludemann writes – The Reserve Bank is advertising for a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion advisor. The Bank has one mandate – to keep inflation between one and three percent. It has failed in that and is only slowly getting inflation back down to the upper limit. Will it ...
Last week former National Party leader Simon Bridges was appointed by the Government as the new chair of the New Zealand Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA). You can read about the appointment in Thomas Coughlan’s article, Simon Bridges to become chair of NZ Transport Agency Waka KotahiThe fact that a ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Last week former National Party leader Simon Bridges was appointed by the Government as the new chair of the New Zealand Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA). You can read about the appointment in Thomas Coughlan’s article, Simon Bridges to become chair of NZ Transport Agency ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: Gavin Jacobson talks to Thomas Piketty 10 years on from Capital in the 21st CenturyThe SalvoLocal scoop: Green MP’s business being investigated over migrant exploitation claims StuffSteve KilgallonLocal deep-dive: The commercial contractors making money from School ...
It’s a home - but Kāinga Ora tenants accused of “abusing the privilege” may lose it. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The Government announced a crackdown on Kāinga Ora tenants who were unruly and/or behind on their rent, with Housing Minister Chris Bishop saying a place in a state ...
This is a guest post by Connor Sharp of Surface Light Rail Light rail in Auckland: A way forward sooner than you think With the coup de grâce of Auckland Light Rail (ALR) earlier this year, and the shift of the government’s priorities to roads, roads, and more roads, it ...
Note: As a paid-up Webworm member, I’ve recorded this Webworm as a mini-podcast for you as well. Some of you said you liked this option - so I aim to provide it when I get a chance to record! Read more ...
TL;DR: In my ‘six-stack’ of substacks at 6.06pm on Monday, March 18:IKEA is accused of planting big forests in New Zealand to green-wash; REDD-MonitorA City for People takes a well-deserved victory lap over Wellington’s pro-YIMBY District Plan votes; A City for PeopleSteven Anastasiou takes a close look at the sticky ...
Buzz from the Beehive Here’s hoping for a lively post-cabinet press conference when the PM and – perhaps – some of his ministers tell us what was discussed at their meeting today. Until then, Point of Order has precious little Beehive news to report after its latest monitoring of the ...
David Farrar writes – We now have almost all 2023 data in, which has allowed me to update my annual table of how labour went against its promises. This is basically their final report card. The promiseThe result Build 100,000 affordable homes over 10 ...
I’m a bit worried that I’ve started a previous newsletter with the words “just when you think they couldn’t get any worse…” Seems lately that I could begin pretty much every issue with that opening. Such is the nature of our coalition government that they seem to be outdoing each ...
Geoffrey Miller writes – Timing is everything. And from China’s perspective, this week’s visit by its foreign minister to New Zealand could be coming at just the right moment. The visit by Wang Yi to Wellington will be his first since 2017. Anniversaries are important to Beijing. ...
Depictions of Islam in Western popular culture have rarely been positive, even before 9/11. Five years on from the mosque shootings, this is one of the cultural headwinds that the Muslim community has to battle against. Whatever messages of tolerance and inclusion are offered in daylight, much of our culture ...
Last week Transport Minster Simeon Brown and Mayor Wayne Brown opened the new Auckland Rail Operations Centre. The new train control centre will see teams from KiwiRail, Auckland Transport and Auckland One Rail working more closely together to improve train services across the city. The Auckland Rail Operations Centre in ...
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: Retiring former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson said in an exit interview with Q+A yesterday the Government can and should sustain more debt to invest in infrastructure for future generations. Elsewhere in the news in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy at 6:36am: Read more ...
Timing is everything. And from China’s perspective, this week’s visit by its foreign minister to New Zealand could be coming at just the right moment. The visit by Wang Yi to Wellington will be his first since 2017. Anniversaries are important to Beijing. It is more than just a happy ...
TL;DR: The key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to March 18 include:China’s Foreign Minister visiting Wellington today;A post-cabinet news conference this afternoon; the resumption of Parliament on Tuesday for two weeks before Easter;retiring former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson gives his valedictory speech in Parliament; ...
New Zealand First Leader Winston Peters’s state-of-the-nation speech on Sunday was really a state-of-Winston-First speech. He barely mentioned any of the Government’s key policies and could not even wholly endorse its signature income tax cuts. Instead, he rehearsed all of his complaints about the Ardern Government, including an extraordinary claim ...
A listing of 35 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 10, 2024 thru Sat, March 16, 2024. Story of the week This week we'll give you a little glimpse into how we collect links to share and ...
A listing of 35 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 10, 2024 thru Sat, March 16, 2024. Story of the week This week we'll give you a little glimpse into how we collect links to share and ...
“I’ve been internalising a really complicated situation in my head.”When they kept telling us we should wait until we get to know him, were they taking the piss? Was it a case of, if you think this is bad, wait till you get to know the real Christopher, after the ...
Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
.“$10 and a target that bleeds” - Bleeding Targets for Under $10!.Thanks for reading Frankly Speaking ! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.This government appears hell-bent on either scrapping life-saving legislation or reintroducing things that - frustrated critics insist - will be dangerous and likely ...
“It hardly strikes me as fair to criticise a government for doing exactly what it said it was going to do. For actually keeping its promises.”THUNDER WAS PLAYING TAG with lightning flashes amongst the distant peaks. Its rolling cadences interrupted by the here-I-come-here-I-go Doppler effect of the occasional passing car. ...
Subversive & Disruptive Technologies: Just as happened with that other great regulator of the masses, the Medieval Church, the advent of a new and hard-to-control technology – the Internet – is weakening the ties that bind. Then, and now, those who enjoy a monopoly on the dissemination of lies, cannot and will ...
Been Here Before: To find the precedents for what this Coalition Government is proposing, it is necessary to return to the “glory days” of Muldoonism.THE COALITION GOVERNMENT has celebrated its first 100 days in office by checking-off the last of its listed commitments. It remains, however, an angry government. It ...
Bob Edlin writes – And what is the world watching today…? The email newsletter from Associated Press which landed in our mailbox early this morning advised: In the news today: The father of a school shooter has been found guilty of involuntary manslaughter; prosecutors in Trump’s hush-money case ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Is another Green MP on their way out? And are the Greens severely tarnished by another integrity scandal? For the second time in three months, the Green Party has secretly suspended an MP over integrity issues. Mystery is surrounding the party’s decision to ...
For the last few years, the Green Party has been the party that has managed to avoid the plague of multiple scandals that have beleaguered other political parties. It appears that their luck has run out with a second scandal which, unfortunately for them, coincided with Golraz Ghahraman, the focus ...
TL;DR: The six newsey things that stood out to me as of 6:46am on Saturday, March 16.Andy Foster has accidentally allowed a Labour/Green amendment to cut road user chargers for plug-in hybrid vehicles, which the Government might accept; NZ HeraldThomas CoughlanSimeon Brown has rejected a plea from Westport ...
What seemed a booming success a couple of years ago has collapsed into fraud convictions.I looked at the crash of FTX (short for ‘Futures Exchange’) in November 2022 to see whether it would impact on the financial system as a whole. Fortunately there was barely a ripple, probably because it ...
Anybody following the situation in Ukraine and Russia would probably have been amused by a recent Tweet on X NATO seems to be putting in an awful lot of effort to influence what is, at least according to them, a sham election in an autocracy.When do the Ukrainians go to ...
TL;DR:Shaun Baker on Wynyard Quarter's transformation. Magdalene Taylor on the problem with smart phones. How private equity are now all over reinsurance. Dylan Cleaver on rugby and CTE. Emily Atkin on ‘Big Meat’ looking like ‘Big Oil’.Bernard’s six-stack of substacks at 6pm on March 15Photo by Jeppe Hove Jensen ...
Buzz from the Beehive Finance Minister Nicola Willis had plenty to say when addressing the Auckland Business Chamber on the economic growth that (she tells us) is flagging more than we thought. But the government intends to put new life into it: We want our country to be a ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee has reported back on the Road User Charges (Light Electric RUC Vehicles) Amendment Bill, basicly rubberstamping it. While there was widespread support among submitters for the principle that EV and PHEV drivers should pay their fair share for the roads, they also overwhelmingly disagreed with ...
Peter Dunne writes – This week’s government bailout – the fifth in the last eighteen months – of the financially troubled Ruapehu Alpine Lifts company would have pleased many in the central North Island ski industry. The government’s stated rationale for the $7 million funding was that it ...
See if you can spot the difference. An Iranian born female MP from a progressive party is accused of serial shoplifting. Her name is leaked to the media, which goes into a pack frenzy even before the Police launch an … Continue reading → ...
Ele Ludemann writes – The government is omitting general Treaty references from legislation : The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last Government in a bid to get greater coherence in the public service on Treaty ...
What was that judge thinking?Peter Williams writes – That Golriz Ghahraman and District Court Judge Maria Pecotic were once lawyer colleagues is incontrovertible. There is published evidence that they took at least one case to the Court of Appeal together. There was a report on ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read:Climate Scorpion – the sting is in the tail. Introducing planetary solvency. A paper via the University of Exeter’s Institute and Faculty of Actuaries.Local scoop:Kāinga Ora starts pulling out of its Auckland projects and selling land RNZ ...
Wellington’s massively upzoned District Plan adds the opportunity for tens of thousands of new homes not just in the central city (such as these Webb St new builds) but also close to the CBD and public transport links. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: Wellington gave itself the chance of ...
It’s Friday and we’re halfway through March Madness. Here’s some of the things that caught our attention this week. This Week in Greater Auckland On Monday Matt asked how we can get better event trains and an option for grade separating Morningside Dr. On Tuesday Matt looked into ...
Something you might not know about me is that I’m quite a stubborn person. No, really. I don’t much care for criticism I think’s unfair or that I disagree with. Few of us do I suppose.Back when I was a drinker I’d sometimes respond defensively, even angrily. There are things ...
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:PM Christopher Luxon said the reversal of interest deductibility for landlords was done to help renters, who ...
It was not so much the Labour Party but really the Chris Hipkins party yesterday at Labour’s caucus retreat in Martinborough. The former Prime Minister was more or less consistent on wealth tax, which he was at best equivocal about, and social insurance, which he was not willing to revisit. ...
Buzz from the BeehiveThe text reproduced above appears on a page which records all the media statements and speeches posted on the government’s official website by Melissa Lee as Minister of Media and Communications and/or by Jenny Marcroft, her Parliamentary Under-secretary. It can be quickly analysed ...
For forty years, Robert Muldoon has been a dirty word in our politics. His style of government was so repulsive and authoritarian that the backlash to it helped set and entrench our constitutional norms. His pig-headedness over forcing through Think Big eventually gave us the RMA, with its participation and ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Is the new government reducing tax on rental properties to benefit landlords or to cut the cost of rents? That’s the big question this week, after Associate Finance Minister David Seymour announced on Sunday that the Government would be reversing the Labour Government’s removal ...
Saudi Arabia is rarely far from the international spotlight. The war in Gaza has brought new scrutiny to Saudi plans to normalise relations with Israel, while the fifth anniversary of the controversial killing of Jamal Khashoggi was marked shortly before the war began on October 7. And as the home ...
Questions need to be asked on both sides of the worldPeter Williams writes – The NRL Judiciary hands down an eight week suspension to Sydney Roosters forward Spencer Leniu , an Auckland-born Samoan, after he calls Ezra Mam, Sydney-orn but of Aboriginal and Torres Strait ...
Ele Ludemann writes – Contrary to what many headlines and news stories are saying, residential landlords are not getting a tax break. The government is simply restoring to them the tax deductibility of interest they had until the previous government removed it. There is no logical reason ...
I can't remember when it was goodMoments of happiness in bloomMaybe I just misunderstoodAll of the love we left behindWatching our flashbacks intertwineMemories I will never findIn spite of whatever you becomeForget that reckless thing turned onI think our lives have just begunI think our lives have just begunDoes anyone ...
Michael Bassett writes – At first reading, a front-page story in the New Zealand Herald on 13 March was bizarre. A group of severely intellectually limited teenagers, with little understanding of the law, have been pleading to the Justice Select Committee not to pass a bill dealing with ram ...
How much political capital is Christopher Luxon willing to burn through in order to deliver his $2.9 billion gift to landlords? Evidently, Luxon is: (a) unable to cost the policy accurately. As Anna Burns-Francis pointed out to him on Breakfast TV, the original ”rock solid” $2.1 billion cost he was ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read:Jonathon Porritt calling bullshit in his own blog post on mainstream climate science as ‘The New Denialism’.Local scoop:The Wellington City Council’s list of proposed changes to the IHP recommendations to be debated later today was leaked this ...
TL;DR:Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said yesterday tenants should be grateful for the reinstatement of interest deductibility because landlords would pass on their lower tax costs in the form of lower rents. That would be true if landlords were regulated monopolies such as Transpower or Auckland Airport1, but they’re not, ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Tom Toro Tom Toro is a cartoonist and author. He has published over 200 cartoons in The New Yorker since 2010. His cartoons appear in Playboy, the Paris Review, the New York Times, American Bystander, and elsewhere. Related: What 10 EV lovers ...
The business section of the NZ Herald is full of opinion. Among the more opinionated of all is the ex-Minister of Transport, ex-Minister of Railways, ex MP for Auckland Central (1975-93, Labour), Wellington Central (1996-99, ACT, then list-2005), ex-leader of the ACT Party, uncle to actor Antonia, the veritable granddaddy ...
Hi,Just quickly — I’m blown away by the stories you’ve shared with me over the last week since I put out the ‘Gary’ podcast, where I told you about the time my friend’s flatmate killed the neighbour.And you keep telling me stories — in the comments section, and in my ...
The first season of Rings of Power was not awful. It was thoroughly underwhelming, yes, and left a lingering sense of disappointment, but it was more expensive mediocrity than catastrophe. I wrote at length about the series as it came out (see the Review section of the blog, and go ...
Buzz from the Beehive Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden told Auckland Business Chamber members they were the first audience to hear her priorities as a minister in a government committed to cutting red tape and regulations. She brandished her liberalising credentials, saying Flexible labour markets are the ...
Chris Trotter writes – TO UNDERSTAND WHY NEWSHUB FAILED, it is necessary to understand how TVNZ changed. Up until 1989, the state broadcaster had been funded by a broadcasting licence fee, collected from every citizen in possession of a television set, supplemented by a relatively modest (compared ...
Bob Edlin writes – The Māori Party has been busy issuing a mix of warnings and threats as its expresses its opposition to interest deductibility for landlords and the plans of seabed miners. It remains to be seen whether they follow the example of indigenous litigants in Australia, ...
Every year, in the Budget, Parliament forks out money to government agencies to do certain things. And every year, as part of the annual review cycle, those agencies are meant to report on whether they have done the things Parliament gave them that money for. Agencies which consistently fail to ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – Recent events in American universities point to an underlying crisis of coherent thinking, an issue that increasingly affects the progressive left across the Western world. This of course is nothing new as anyone who can either remember or has read of the late ...
The thing about life’s little victories is that they can be followed by a defeat.Reader Darryl told me on Monday night:Test again Dave. My “head cold” last week became COVID within 24 hours, and is still with me. I hear the new variants take a bit longer to show up ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read:Angus Deaton on rethinking his economics IMFLocal scoop: The people behind Tamarind, the firm that left a $500m cleanup bill for taxpayers at Taranaki’s Tui oil well, are back operating in Taranaki under a different company name. Jonathan ...
Normally when we talk about accessing public transport it’s about improving how easy it is to get to, such as how easy is it to cross roads in a station/stop’s walking catchment, is it possible to cycle to safely, do bus connections work, or even if are there new routes/connections ...
Politicians are not renowned for telling the truth. Some tell us things that are verifiably not true. They offer statements that omit critical pieces of information. Gloss over risks, preferring to offer the best case scenario.Some not truths are quite small, others amusing in their transparency. There are those repeated ...
The pressure is mounting on the Government as it finalises its Budget Policy Statement, but yet more predicted revenue ‘goes missing’. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The Climate Commission has delivered another funding blow to the National-ACT-NZ First coalition Government’s tax-cutting plans, potentially carving $1.4 billion off the ‘climate ...
The Government now faces the prospect of having to watch another tax raise the price of petrol when, only six days ago, it abolished the Auckland Regional Fuel tax. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon argued that the regional fuel tax imposed costs on lower-income people with less fuel-efficient vehicles and that ...
Kicking the most vulnerable people out of state housing and pushing them towards homelessness will result in a proliferation of poverty and trauma across our most vulnerable communities. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader and MP for Waiariki, Rawiri Waititi has penned a letter asking MPs to support his members bill to remove GST from all food. The bill is expected to go through its first reading in parliament this Wednesday. “I’m calling on all political parties to support my ...
This year is about getting real with Kiwis and discussing the tough issues, as the National Government exacerbates inequality and divides New Zealand, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said ...
The Government adding Significant Natural Areas (SNAs) to its already roaring environmental policy bonfire is an assault on the future of wildlife that makes Aotearoa unique. ...
After 12 years of fighting to protect our moana we are finding ourselves back at square one and back at court. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency is sitting in Hawera to reconsider an application from Trans-Tasman Resources to dig up 50 million tonnes of the seabed in South Taranaki. This ...
Minister Shane Jones’ decision to step away from a seabed mining project is evidence of the murky waters surrounding the Government’s fast-track legislation. ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The Coalition Government’s miscalculation saga continues as it has forgotten an eyewatering $90 million gap in its interest deductibility cost figures, say Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds and Revenue Spokesperson Deborah Russell. ...
He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission has today released advice that says if the Government doesn’t act now New Zealand is at risk of not meeting its climate goals. ...
The Coalition Government has today confirmed it is abandoning first home buyers who are struggling to get ahead, says Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds. ...
The New Zealand public voted for a change in direction at the 2023 general election and that is exactly what this coalition government has been delivering in its first 100 days. There was an immediate focus on the economy, easing the cost of living, cracking down on law and order ...
The Government has left the health system as an afterthought, announcing half-baked targets at the last minute of their 100-day plan, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
Kiwis are still waiting for their promised cost of living support after 100 days of a National Government that is taking us backwards, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
The National Government has spent its first 100 days stopping, cutting and reversing. They have scrapped stuff for stuff for the sake of it, without putting up any solutions of their own – and it’s hardworking New Zealanders who will pay for it. ...
100 days of National taking NZ backwardsThe National Government has spent its first 100 days stopping, cutting and reversing. They have scrapped stuff for stuff for the sake of it, without putting up any solutions of their own – and it’s hardworking New Zealanders who will pay for it. ...
The Government must commit to funding free and healthy school lunches, as thousands of people sign the petition to keep them, education spokesperson Jan Tinetti says. ...
If the Government was serious about moving families into public housing, they would build more houses so there is actually somewhere for people to go. ...
The free and healthy school lunches programme feeds our kids, helps them to learn, and saves families money – but it is at risk under this Government, education spokesperson Jan Tinetti said. ...
The Government’s proposed changes to Firearms Prohibition Orders (FPO) add almost nothing new and are merely an attempt to distract from its plans to loosen gun laws, police spokesperson Ginny Andersen and justice spokesperson Dr Duncan Webb said. ...
The great Victorian era English politician Lord Macauley stood in the British House of Parliament and said, "The gallery in which the reporters sit has become a fourth estate of the realm".He understood and outlined even way back then, the significant role and influence media have in a democracy. ...
The government’s attack on Māori health this week is committing tangata-whenua to a premature death, says Te Pāti Māori. “The government have begun their onslaught on Māori health with the abolishment of the Māori Health Authority and smokefree laws in the same day” said health spokesperson and co-leader, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. ...
Today marks a tragic milestone for New Zealanders as the Coalition Government side with big tobacco to repeal the Smokefree Environments and Regulated Products (Smoked Tobacco) Amendment Act 2022, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins and Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall said. ...
New Zealand’s social workers are qualified, experienced, and more representative of the communities they serve, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “I want to acknowledge and applaud New Zealand’s social workers for the hard work they do, providing invaluable support for our most vulnerable. “To coincide with World ...
Cabinet has agreed to a reduced road user charge (RUC) rate for plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs), Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. Owners of PHEVs will be eligible for a reduced rate of $38 per 1,000km once all light electric vehicles (EVs) move into the RUC system from 1 April. ...
Minister of Agriculture and Trade, Todd McClay, says that today’s opening of Riverland Foods manufacturing plant in Christchurch is a great example of how trade access to overseas markets creates jobs in New Zealand. Speaking at the official opening of this state-of-the-art pet food factory the Minister noted that exports ...
Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Wellington today. “It was a pleasure to host Foreign Minister Wang Yi during his first official visit to New Zealand since 2017. Our discussions were wide-ranging and enabled engagement on many facets of New Zealand’s relationship with China, including trade, ...
Kāinga Ora – Homes & Communities has been instructed to end the Sustaining Tenancies Framework and take stronger measures against persistent antisocial behaviour by tenants, says Housing Minister Chris Bishop. “Earlier today Finance Minister Nicola Willis and I sent an interim Letter of Expectations to the Board of Kāinga Ora. ...
Tēna koutou katoa. Greetings everyone. Thank you to the Auckland Chamber of Commerce and the Honourable Simon Bridges for hosting this address today. I acknowledge the business leaders in this room, the leaders and governors, the employers, the entrepreneurs, the investors, and the wealth creators. The coalition Government shares your ...
Minister Winston Peters completed the final leg of his visit to South and South East Asia in Singapore today, where he focused on enhancing one of New Zealand’s indispensable strategic partnerships. “Singapore is our most important defence partner in South East Asia, our fourth-largest trading partner and a ...
Minister of Internal Affairs and Workplace Relations and Safety, Hon. Brooke van Velden, will travel to the Republic of Korea to represent New Zealand at the Third Summit for Democracy on 18 March. The summit, hosted by the Republic of Korea, was first convened by the United States in 2021, ...
ICNZ Speech 7 March 2024, Auckland Acknowledgements and opening Mōrena, ngā mihi nui. Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Nor Whanganui aho. Good morning, it’s a privilege to be here to open the ICNZ annual conference, thank you to Mark for the Mihi Whakatau My thanks to Tim Grafton for inviting me ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Lead Coordination Minister Judith Collins have expressed their deepest sympathy on the five-year anniversary of the Christchurch terror attacks. “March 15, 2019, was a day when families, communities and the country came together both in sorrow and solidarity,” Mr Luxon says. “Today we pay our respects to the 51 shuhada ...
Speech for Financial Advice NZ Conference 5 March 2024 Acknowledgements and opening Morena, Nga Mihi Nui. Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Nor Whanganui aho. Thanks Nate for your Mihi Whakatau Good morning. It’s a pleasure to formally open your conference this morning. What a lovely day in Wellington, What a great ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters held discussions in Jakarta today about the future of relations between New Zealand and South East Asia’s most populous country. “We are in Jakarta so early in our new government’s term to reflect the huge importance we place on our relationship with Indonesia and South ...
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters has announced that the Foreign Minister of China, Wang Yi, will visit New Zealand next week. “We look forward to re-engaging with Foreign Minister Wang Yi and discussing the full breadth of the bilateral relationship, which is one of New Zealand’s ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has today opened the new Auckland Rail Operations Centre, which will bring together KiwiRail, Auckland Transport, and Auckland One Rail to improve service reliability for Aucklanders. “The recent train disruptions in Auckland have highlighted how important it is KiwiRail and Auckland’s rail agencies work together to ...
The Government is proud to support the 10th edition of Crankworx Rotorua as the Crankworx World Tour returns to Rotorua from 16-24 March 2024, says Minister for Economic Development Melissa Lee. “Over the past 10 years as Crankworx Rotorua has grown, so too have the economic and social benefits that ...
Legislation implementing coalition Government tax commitments and addressing long-standing tax anomalies will be progressed in Parliament next week, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The legislation is contained in an Amendment Paper to the Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill issued today. “The Amendment Paper represents ...
Associate Environment Minister Andrew Hoggard has today announced that the Government has agreed to suspend the requirement for councils to comply with the Significant Natural Areas (SNA) provisions of the National Policy Statement for Indigenous Biodiversity for three years, while it replaces the Resource Management Act (RMA).“As it stands, SNAs ...
Agriculture Minister Todd McClay has classified the drought conditions in the Marlborough, Tasman, and Nelson districts as a medium-scale adverse event, acknowledging the challenging conditions facing farmers and growers in the district. “Parts of Marlborough, Tasman, and Nelson districts are in the grip of an intense dry spell. I know ...
The Government is helping farmers eradicate the significant impact of facial eczema (FE) in pastoral animals, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced. “A $20 million partnership jointly funded by Beef + Lamb NZ, the Government, and the primary sector will save farmers an estimated NZD$332 million per year, and aims to ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has completed a successful visit to India, saying it was an important step in taking the relationship between the two countries to the next level. “We have laid a strong foundation for the Coalition Government’s priority of enhancing New Zealand-India relations to generate significant future benefit for both countries,” says Mr Peters, ...
Cabinet has agreed to provide $7 million to ensure the 2024 ski season can go ahead on the Whakapapa ski field in the central North Island but has told the operator Ruapehu Alpine Lifts it is the last financial support it will receive from taxpayers. Cabinet also agreed to provide ...
Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says the launch of a new mobile breast screening unit in Counties Manukau reinforces the coalition Government’s commitment to drive better cancer services for all New Zealanders. Speaking at the launch of the new mobile clinic, Dr Reti says it’s a great example of taking ...
Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says the launch of a new mobile breast screening unit in Counties Manukau reinforces the coalition Government’s commitment to drive better cancer services for all New Zealanders. Speaking at the launch of the new mobile clinic, Dr Reti says it’s a great example of taking ...
Unlocking economic growth and land for housing are critical elements of the Government’s plan for our transport network, and planned upgrades to State Highway 29 (SH29) near Tauriko will deliver strongly on those priorities, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “The SH29 upgrades near Tauriko will improve safety at the intersections ...
Unlocking economic growth and land for housing are critical elements of the Government’s plan for our transport network, and planned upgrades to State Highway 29 (SH29) near Tauriko will deliver strongly on those priorities, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “The SH29 upgrades near Tauriko will improve safety at the intersections ...
Lower fruit and vegetable prices are welcome news for New Zealanders who have been doing it tough at the supermarket, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. Stats NZ reported today the price of fruit and vegetables has dropped 9.3 percent in the 12 months to February 2024. “Lower fruit and vege ...
Tēnā koutou katoa and greetings to you all. Chair, I am honoured to address the sixty-eighth session of the Commission on the Status of Women. I acknowledge the many crises impacting the rights of women and girls. Heightened global tensions, war, climate related and humanitarian disasters, and price inflation all ...
Tēnā koutou katoa and greetings to you all. Chair, I am honoured to address the 68th session of the Commission on the Status of Women. I acknowledge the many crises impacting the rights of women and girls. Heightened global tensions, war, climate related and humanitarian disasters, and price inflation all ...
The coalition Government is supporting farmers to enhance land management practices by investing $3.3 million in locally led catchment groups, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced. “Farmers and growers deliver significant prosperity for New Zealand and it’s vital their ongoing efforts to improve land management practices and water quality are supported,” ...
Good evening everyone and thank you for that lovely introduction. Thank you also to the Honourable Simon Bridges for the invitation to address your members. Since being sworn in, this coalition Government has hit the ground running with our 100-day plan, delivering the changes that New Zealanders expect of us. ...
Recommendations from the Climate Change Commission for New Zealand on the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) auction and unit limit settings for the next five years have been tabled in Parliament, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “The Commission provides advice on the ETS annually. This is the third time the ...
The coalition Government is beginning its fight to lower building costs and reduce red tape by exempting minor building work from paying the building levy, says Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk. “Currently, any building project worth $20,444 including GST or more is subject to the building levy which is ...
Proposed changes to tax legislation to prevent the over-taxation of low-earning trusts are welcome, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The changes have been recommended by Parliament’s Finance and Expenditure Committee following consideration of submissions on the Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill. “One of the ...
Assalaamu alaikum. السَّلَام عليكم In light of the holy month of Ramadan, I want to extend my warmest wishes to our Muslim community in New Zealand. Ramadan is a time for spiritual reflection, renewed devotion, perseverance, generosity, and forgiveness. It’s a time to strengthen our bonds and appreciate the diversity ...
Former Transport Minister and CEO of the Auckland Business Chamber Hon Simon Bridges has been appointed as the new Board Chair of the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) for a three-year term, Transport Minister Simeon Brown announced today. “Simon brings extensive experience and knowledge in transport policy and governance to the role. He will ...
Good morning all, it is a pleasure to be here as Minister of Science, Innovation and Technology. It is fantastic to see how connected and collaborative the life science and biotechnology industry is here in New Zealand. I would like to thank BioTechNZ and NZTech for the invitation to address ...
Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says he is looking forward to the day when three key water projects in Northland are up and running, unlocking the full potential of land in the region. Mr Jones attended a community event at the site of the Otawere reservoir near Kerikeri on Friday. ...
Associate Finance Minister David Seymour has today announced that the Government has agreed to restore deductibility for mortgage interest on residential investment properties. “Help is on the way for landlords and renters alike. The Government’s restoration of interest deductibility will ease pressure on rents and simplify the tax code,” says ...
Sport and Recreation Minister Chris Bishop will travel to Switzerland today to attend an Executive Committee meeting and Symposium of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). Mr Bishop will then travel on to London where he will attend a series of meetings in his capacity as Infrastructure Minister. “New Zealanders believe ...
This year’s Pacific Language Weeks celebrate regional unity and the contribution of Pacific communities to New Zealand culture, says Minister for Pacific Peoples Dr Shane Reti. Dr Reti announced dates for the 2024 Pacific Language Weeks during a visit to the Pasifika festival in Auckland today and says there’s so ...
By Lydia Lewis, RNZ Pacific journalist Food rationing is underway in remote areas in Papua New Guinea’s Highlands following torrential rain and flash flooding. More than 20 people have been reported dead in Chimbu Province. In nearby Enga Province, the centre of last month’s massacre, a 15-year-old boy has been ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Hughes, Lecturer, Research School of Management, Australian National University After months of debate and intrigue, the AFL’s 19th and newest team, the Tasmania Devils, finally launched its jumper, logo and colours in Devonport this week. The Devils will wear green, ...
Brannavan Gnanalingam reviews the debut novel by Saraid de Silva.One of the most baffling things for children who move to a new country is what their parents’ (or grandparents’) lives were like prior to moving – for kids in particular, they’re too busy trying to fit in in their ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephen Gaunson, Associate Professor in Cinema Studies, RMIT University Narelle Portanier/Binge “If you don’t know who your mob are, you don’t know who you are,” Detective Andrea “Andie” Whitford (played by Leah Purcell) is told early into the new crime ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Elise Klein, Associate professor, Australian National University It’s commonly accepted that women do the vast majority of caregiving in Australian society. But less appreciated is that Indigenous women do larger amounts of unpaid care than any other group. Working with the Aboriginal ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne Joe Biden and Donald Trump have both secured their parties’ nominations for the November 5 United States general election by winning a ...
Comment: There has been a striking contrast in trans-Tasman interest about Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi’s visit to New Zealand and Australia. While the Australian press has been full of articles about the visit – including his curious decision to meet with former prime minister and China booster Paul Keating ...
After years of pressuring banks and other institutions to stop investing in fossil fuels, climate campaigners are making some progress. So how does divestment work?For years, climate activists have been pushing banks and other big institutions to divest from fossil fuels. New research from climate advocacy group 350 Aotearoa ...
For Boba, Ethan and Ashley, K-pop is a place to belong, a way to express themselves, and a bridge to connect with others. The three young Polynesians are part of a K-pop fan community in Tāmaki Makaurau. It’s one of many that have sprung up worldwide as K-pop has gone ...
For Boba, Ethan and Ashley, K-pop is a place to belong, a way to express themselves, and a bridge to connect with others. This one-off documentary presents three intimate portraits of young Polynesians who are pulled into a Korean cultural phenomenon. K-POLYS is directed by Litia Tuiburelevu, Produced by Hex ...
There’s ample evidence demonstrating free school lunch programmes provide wide benefits across schools, households and communities according to public health researchers. ACT Minister David Seymour wants to reduce the spending on Aotearoa New Zealand’s ...
By Wata Shaw in Suva Fiji is facing an exodus of Fijians as many are leaving for overseas seeking employment and education and others are migrating, says Opposition MP Viliame Naupoto. Speaking in Parliament, he said: “His Excellency’s speech (Ratu Wiliame Katonivere) comes after a little over one year of ...
The Taxpayers’ Union is welcoming comments from Christopher Luxon this morning recommitting to ‘no new taxes’ as part of Budget 2024. “Mr Luxon’s refusal at the Post-Cabinet press conference yesterday to repeat the ‘no new taxes’ promise ...
SAFE is urgently calling on the Environment Committee to reject the Government’s Fast-Track Approvals Bill, and is urging New Zealanders to rally behind the call. The proposed Bill, currently under consideration with the Environment select committee, ...
Teammates who spend all their time picking fights with spectators are only helpful for the other team, writes Madeleine Chapman. Anyone who has ever played a team sport competitively, particularly as a child and particularly, for some reason, basketball, will know that there’s a lot of politics involved. While there ...
The long-running Wellington music festival is too focused on the Jim Beam-ness and not enough on the Homegrown-ness.There is something about Homegrown that’s difficult to place. A barely perceptible-ness. Like feeling a ghost is watching you from the corner of the room but when you look, there’s nothing there. ...
The latest Ipsos New Zealand Issues Monitor reveals that fewer New Zealanders believe crime / law and order is one of the top issues facing our country. In 2018, Ipsos New Zealand started tracking the key issues facing New Zealand. In this wave ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Griffiths, Deputy Program Director, Budgets and Government, Grattan Institute Australia’s political donations rules are woefully inadequate, but donations reform is finally on the agenda. The federal government has signalled its interest in reform and will soon begin briefing MPs on its ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Patrick Taylor, Chief Environmental Scientist, EPA Victoria; Honorary Professor, School of Natural Sciences, Macquarie University Naiyana Somchitkaeo/Shutterstock A recent study published in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine has linked microplastics with risk to human health. The study ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Albert Van Dijk, Professor, Water and Landscape Dynamics, Fenner School of Environment & Society, Australian National University Global climate records were shattered in 2023, from air and sea temperatures to sea-level rise and sea-ice extent. Scores of countries recorded their hottest year ...
As part of our series exploring how New Zealanders live and our relationship with money, a teacher explains why he and his partner are in frugal mode – and how they’re making it work. Gender: Male Age: 35Ethnicity: Pākehā Role: I am an intermediate school teacher and my partner is ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sarah Bendall, Senior Lecturer, Institute for Humanities and Social Sciences, Australian Catholic University Binge Mary & George, the new British television drama series, depicts the real-life story of Mary Villiers and her son George, and their social climbing at the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jason Nassios, Associate Professor, Centre of Policy Studies, Victoria University This article is part of The Conversation’s series examining the housing crisis. Read the other articles in the series here. Australian state and federal governments spend money in many ways to ...
The finance minister is denying that there’s a $5.6b shortfall in paying for the government’s campaign promises, including tax cuts. At his post-cabinet press conference yesterday, the PM refused to rule out new taxes to pay for the cuts, writes Anna Rawhiti-Connell in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s ...
Kāinga Ora tenants abused by their neighbours are doubting the government's crackdown on disruptive tenants will make a difference on their behaviour. ...
Kāinga Ora is New Zealand’s biggest residential landlord, housing more than 180,000 vulnerable people in more than 67,000 properties. Yesterday the government announced a crackdown on its tenants who fall behind on rent. One longtime Kāinga Ora tenant shares her experience.For 18 years I lived in a 1960s standalone ...
Why does this myth persist, and what’s the real reason our skin is suffering?It’s one of the biggest international grievances New Zealanders hold, up there with the sinking of the Rainbow Warrior and 1981’s underarm incident. We’re quick to tell international travellers that the world’s pollution led to the ...
When the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act was introduced in 2009 it was firmly targeted at gangs and drugs. The legislation means police no longer need a conviction to seize assets that criminals can’t prove were paid for legitimately, as long as their alleged offences are punishable by more than a ...
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Bob’s relationship with certain members of Lincoln’s academic staff continued to deteriorate in the 1990s. Others supported him publicly, though articles such as Roland Clark’s 1993 piece in Growing Today cannot have pleased the university management. Clark wrote that Bob was selling onions from the Biological Husbandry Unit to a ...
SailGP’s races feature in-your-face action, with agile, hydro-foiling catamarans tacking and jibing for the title over several days. However, public comments ahead of the global series’ return to New Zealand have left this past year’s controversy in the shadows, as a key appointment attracts criticism from dolphin advocates. A year ...
Opinion: We are fast approaching a fundamental change in prisons. As the number of people on custodial remand looks set to overtake the number of sentenced prisoners, the main function of prisons in New Zealand may become incarcerating un-sentenced people who may not be guilty of offending. We have already ...
A huge seven months lies in store for the White Ferns, beginning this week with the visit of England and culminating with the T20 World Cup in Bangladesh in September and October. Starting on Tuesday in Dunedin, the world ranked No. 2 visitors will play five T20s and three ODIs, ...
Opinion: In a move that has shocked road safety advocates across the country, the new Minister of Transport, Simeon Brown, is poised to abandon the previous government’s speed limit reduction policy, particularly around schools. Even more alarmingly, he wants school speed limits to be variable rather than full-time, arguing ...
Auckland Council is opposing a fast-track development backed by Sir John Kirwan and Spark NZ, because it doesn’t meet stringent new climate adaptation requirements The post Surf-data centre faces new 3.8C climate warming rules appeared first on Newsroom. ...
The letters, which were published last week, were addressed to Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) Chairperson Megawati Sukarnoputri, National Democrat Party (NasDem) Chairperson Surya Paloh, National Awakening Party (PKB) Chairperson Muhaimin Iskandar, Justice and Prosperity Party (PKS) President Ahmad Syaikhu and United Development Party (PPP) Chairperson Muhammad Mardiono. In ...
Evicting more people from state housing is ignorant to the consequences of poverty, the Greens say, but the Housing Minister says it's a privilege that can be taken away if abused. ...
Evicting more people from state housing is ignorant to the consequences of poverty, the Greens say, but the Housing Minister says it's a privilege that can be taken away if abused. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emerald L King, Lecturer in Humanities, University of Tasmania IMDB Between Netflix’s 2023 live-action version of One Piece, and its latest take on Avatar: The Last Airbender, fans are once again asking: why are live-action anime adaptations so tricky to ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emerald L King, Lecturer in Humanities, University of Tasmania IMDB Between Netflix’s 2023 live-action version of One Piece, and its latest take on Avatar: The Last Airbender, fans are once again asking: why are live-action anime adaptations so tricky to ...
The government says it still intends to deliver tax cuts by July, but will not lock them in until they have got them past their coalition partners. ...
Kiingi Tuheitia Pootatau Te Wherowhero VII has hosted members of the Green Party Caucus at Tuurangawaewae Marae in Ngaaruawahia. The audience follows the King’s Hui-aa-Motu on 20 January, where more than 10,000 people gathered to discuss national ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dr Rachael Potter, Research Associate and Lecturer in Work and Organisational Psychology, University of South Australia Ground Picture/Shutterstock Pregnant women and workers with children are often unfairly treated by their bosses and colleagues, despite laws to protect against workplace discrimination ...
Reacting to Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s refusal to rule out introducing new taxes at the budget, Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns Manager, Connor Molloy, said: “Today’s refusal to rule out new taxes suggests the Government is nothing more ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephen Duckett, Honorary Enterprise Professor, School of Population and Global Health, and Department of General Practice and Primary Care, The University of Melbourne Aila Images/Shutterstock Aged-care workers will receive a significant pay increase after the Fair Work Commission ruled they ...
He’s bringing ‘Sophie’ back, yeah. Goodshirt’s ‘Sophie’ music video is one of the most instantly recognisable New Zealand music videos of all time. Featuring a woman listening to the song on headphones while her entire house is burgled behind her, the video won the New Zealand music award for Best ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Blaxland, Professor, Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, Australian National University A year ago, the AUKUS agreement was formally announced between Australian and UK Prime Ministers Anthony Albanese and Rishi Sunak and US President Joe Biden. The agreement mapped out the “optimal ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andreas Helwig, Associate Professor, Electro-Mechanical Engineering, University of Southern Queensland SmartS/Shutterstock Steam locomotives clattering along railway tracks. Paddle steamers churning down the Murray. Dreadnought battleships powered by steam engines. Many of us think the age of steam has ended. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Carrie Leonetti, Associate Professor of Law, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau Victims who experience family violence in Aotearoa New Zealand are treated differently, depending on which part of the justice system they turn to for help. But a new member’s bill ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Tesch, Visiting Fellow at the ANU Centre for European Studies, Australian National University In perhaps the least surprising news of the year, Vladimir Putin has triumphed at the Russian ballot box and been enthroned for the fifth time as president. He ...
The Papua New Guinea Supreme Court has stopped a byelection for the Madang Open seat being held until an appeal filed by former MP Bryan Kramer is concluded. Kramer had appealed to the Supreme Court over a National Court decision not to review his application of the Leadership Tribunal decision ...
By Miriam Zarriga in Port Moresby Despite a “historic” ceasefire agreement in Papua New Guinea between Enga authorities and tribal leaders after months of bitter warfare, a young woman has been found brutally killed near Kaekin village, Wapenamanda. Despite the peace agreement and signing concluded in Port Moresby last Thursday ...
The second season of Ryan Murphy’s Feud is a sadder and slower entry into his canon of true story-telling, leaning heavily on a verdict about the cost of a single work of art. Hollywood heavyweight Ryan Murphy has had a bit of “ick” about him in the last few years. ...
Are you deeply passionate about sharing Māori stories? We’re on the hunt for an experienced writer/editor to lead coverage in our Ātea section.Ātea is a deeply valued section of The Spinoff site, offering Māori perspectives and insights across politics, current affairs and culture. We are thrilled to be looking ...
By Aisha Azeemah in Suva With the lights on one of his sneakers blinking as he ran through the gallery, a little boy looked up at several works of art. One of them was a sculpture of his grandfather: the man who changed how we see the Pacific — Epeli ...
WHAT: Uber drivers are holding a rally outside the Court of Appeal in Wellington tomorrow, as the company begins its appeal against 2022’s Employment Court verdict (in a case taken jointly by FIRST Union and E tū) that four drivers were permanent ...
RNZ Pacific The Fiji Meteorological Service has a heavy rain warning still in place for the whole of the country after a weekend of flooding, although some floodwaters have receded. Flood and flash flood warnings and alerts are also in place, including a warning for all flash flood-prone areas, small ...
Responding to Grant Robertson’s recent admission on a Q+A with Jack Tame that his only regret from his time in office was that he didn’t take on more debt, Taxpayers’ Union spokesperson, Alex Murphy, said: “Grant Robertson has now admitted that he ...
"This initiative is called The Million Hazelnut Campaign, and I love it. It aims to do three things: First, raise awareness of how terrific hazelnuts are, environmentally, and as an economic engine for farmers, as well as a tasty food. Second, the campaign intends to persuade some farmers to take a gamble on hazelnuts, and transition some land to the shrubby nut-bearing trees. Finally, it wants us restaurant-going city-types to kick in some cash to make it all happen. So buddy, can you spare $7 to plant a local hazelnut tree?"
Here’s what hazelnuts do that’s good: First, like all plants, they take carbon out of the air, and put it back in the ground. However, hazelnuts have a sturdy root system, and unlike, say, corn, once they get established, their land never has to be plowed again, preventing erosion. They also pull an ever greater amount of carbon out of the air as they grow. They prevent erosion and protect waterways. They’re drought-tolerant and don’t need irrigation. They’re bird, critter, and pollinator-friendly and provide habitat up and down the web of life. They’re hardy and pest-resistant and don’t require poisons like pesticides or other inputs. They’re permaculture crops that can live for many years, possibly centuries, because after they’re planted, if they get old and weak you can cut them to the ground and they’ll start up again. “I think it’s on my generation to start showing a real way out of this climate crisis,” says Gamer. “For the farmers who are drowning in debt and input-costs, and for everyone. The way out is hazelnuts.”
http://mspmag.com/eat-and-drink/foodie/is-it-time-for-a-million-hazelnuts/
Reads as freebies for US farmers to me. Plenty of causes closer to home that require attention.
But wouldn't you agree that many of its benefits are a sound answer to many of the issues we have here?
I've been arguing for tree crops for years though I also advocate for regenerative farming. Basically, in NZ, we could combine both in many instances, and do very well by it. I can't speak for the rest of NZ but in the Auckland bioregion Macadamias, Walnuts and Hazelnuts are low-no maintenance high value crops.
Good crop option for Otago and Southland. As with many foods, seasonal hazelnuts taste incredible.
My neighbour has quite a few hazelnut trees and production is pretty good, like more than the neighbourhood can consume. But they are bloody hard on the fingers getting the things out of the shell, really needs a mechanised sheller.
The plus side is that the rats can't get into them either so aren't attracted. Chestnuts or walnuts are another story, they'll pull every rat in town if you don't collect the nuts as soon as they hit the ground.
Pretty sure there are hazelnut shellers already, but I bet the availability and design would improve if more hazelnuts were being grown/eaten. The people who sell them off their land are shelling them, so there must be a way to do it that is worth the while.
You don't have an excess of rats you have a shortage of hunting cats 😉 (to paraphrase a permaculture solution).
The hunting cats are all good until they present you with a nightly rat from under the walnut tree, on your pillow, at 3am, as an expression of their love…..
Empty rabbit wrappers between the toes on the kitchen floor in the half light of dawn are another delight
lol we had a big cat when I was growing up – it used to leave the rabbit colon behind the best chair in the living room. Ate the rest. Used to have breakfast with us on occasion – the crunching sounds put us off the meal lol
Under the duvet, still alive, for some more playtime.
The family cat from yesteryear used to shove her dead mice into the toes of our shoes. Not a good experience. 🙁
My ex bought me a huge bag of Central Otago hazelnuts (unshelled) from Xmas-superb.
how did you shell them?
Slowly, savoured them for a few weeks…I bought a wooden nut-cracker in Spain a few years ago that tightens with a screw-action…does the trick.
I use a pair of plumbers multigrips (slipjaw pliers) to shell hazelnuts. This works very well if you have small hands and means you can't gobble them all up in one go. It also works for other nuts as you can adjust them.
this is a good idea. Gobbling fresh hazelnuts is definitely an issue.
and who doesn't like nutella, win – win
there has to be a RWNJ joke in there somewhere. Or maybe it's too hard to crack.
I walnut respond to that pun as it would cause irresponsible damage to my dignuty
Hazelnut flavoured plunger coffee is superb.
We're considering planting hazelnuts as part of a big planting project on a 40 hectare block we own.
Lots of delicious things to do with them – hazelnut butter for example.
Growing them from nuts is easy. Buy "Whiteheart" and sow and grow en masse, then purchase as many pollinators as you need (not many). The idea that "city folk" might support a farmer wanting to transition to tree cropping, is to my mind, a very good one, especially if the connection is kept via an app or something, tracking how "your" tree is doing. Sweet chestnuts are an even better option, perhaps, and just as easy to grow from nuts. I imagine someone growing sweet chestnuts and hazels in their back yard might be able to find places to plant them somewhere in the neighbourhood
Hazelnut yoghurt.
We could be the hazelnut empire of the world. 😀
So is Frangelico!
So is Frangelico!
Woops, sorry posted twice
Coffee flavoured anything is blah (though I understand most people would disagree)
Can cows eat them bobs?
Only if you shell them, toast them, dip them in molasses and serve them up on a silver platter, but sure, they'll eat them!
Russiagate 2.0 drowns out Trump's reckless escalation of US-Russia nuclear arms race
'Pushback with Aaron Maté US media is once again consumed with evidence-free claims that Russia intends to interfere on Donald Trump's behalf. But as Democrats accuse Trump of being "Putin's Puppet," Trump is overseeing a hawkish agenda that has worsened US-Russia tensions. Nowhere is that more dangerous than Trump's escalation of the nuclear arms race with Russia: abandoning arms control treaties while deploying and developing new nuclear weapons. Former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter joins Pushback to discuss the overlooked dangers. Guest: Scott Ritter, former UN Weapons Inspector, Marine Corps Intelligence Officer, and author of "Scorpion King: America's Suicidal Embrace of Nuclear Weapons from FDR to Trump."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDiLulWaC94
Of course he is escalating tensions around the world. He is the new Hitler. But I would have thought his principle target – apart from the Middle East – was China.
I don't care all that much who he's aiming for, just so long as the war mongering thug is annihilated before he destroys all of us.
Trump is nowhere near being a new Hitler. At most Trump represents a return to a muscular American first diplomacy that the US developed pre-WWI.
Bullshit. He's an obsessional, narcissistic maniac in exactly the same way as Hitler was.
There are none so blind as those who cannot see. Why are conservatives so devoid of insight and comprehension?
Hitler had multiple personality flaws but I'm not sure narcissism was one of them. How is Trump a maniac exactly? What has he done that suggests some sort of mania?
Black unemployment under Trump is the lowest its ever been, elections are still held, hes beloved in Israel and his daughter converted to Judaism…
It Trumps like Hitler then hes not a doing a good job of it
Perhaps you might read this Opinion piece in the New Yorker:
https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/when-its-too-late-to-stop-fascism-according-to-stefan-zweig
That such a piece can be written and published when Trump is President suggests that real similarities between Trump and Hitler and not quite as apparent as his opponents would want people to believe.
Oh he's for sure a wannabe Hitler, and an emergent toddler to boot. How tenaciously people grip at straws to defend this so called leader only lends understanding as to how Germany sunk so low in the grip of such a man. Goose-stepwise we go, into the abyss.
Well theres this:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jan/09/america-dropped-26171-bombs-2016-obama-legacy
and
https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-bacevich-trump-iran-strike-cancellation-20190630-story.html
But sure Orange Man Bad
He's for sure a wannabe Hitler based on what exactly ? Seemingly we just need to take your word as gospel and agree with you.
Let's see:
subverting the judiciary in order to oppress religious minorities
an obsession with militarism, especially parades
a disjointed organisational structure that encourages competing power blocs within his leadership, including people with unclear and overlapping roles
encouraging his followers to commit violence.
If reality is too harsh for a child, they retreat to fantasy. It seems this translates to adults telling themselves they're all good with Trump, or even those who sense cracks in the matrix, but think 'it's not that bad.'
It is that bad. Trumps (convenient for some) climate denial alone threatens the planet. The people he chooses and the people he refuses shows nothing but absolute self-absorption and contempt for all else. He is a fascist bully boy to whom his supporters are just a means to an end. They are the abused children who live in fantasy – for their reality (that their caregiver is abusive) is dark.
Trump is a spinner of lies and discarder of lives.
You know who was like Hitler? Hitler was like Hitler, not Trump not anyone.
All that equating Hitler with Trump achieves is minimising what Hitler did
But hey Orange Man Bad right
Who is saying they're all good with Trump on this site ?
All people are commenting on is that comparisons of Trump with Hitler are a bit daft.
Give him time. He's only had three years so far. It took Hitler six years to get serious about lebensraum and ethnic cleansing.
It's only daft in the sense that any person compared to another will also have points to contrast.
The slow methodical dismantling of common decency, the slow build up of public tolerance to bullshit, the loading of the courts, the dismantling of judicial process… the targeting and blaming of others… You know I could write a seriously lengthy list of 'colorful quirks' this drug fucked fascist has. You can play pick-a-part all you want, he's a little Hitler wannabe. That's not actually Hitler, in case you were struggling with that bit.
Yep Trump beloved by Israel (enough said), he might not be a Hitler but he is a clear and present danger to the future of the planet that's for sure…
‘Unprecedented brutality’: Family of Palestinian mangled by bulldozer condemn Israel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRsX1I8tKkw
Chomsky: Republican Party 'most dangerous organisation on earth'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghO77CTvy_s
Wow, Anti-Israel and Noam Chomsky in the same post. You just need to add John Pilger and we have the holy trinity of the hard left belief system.
And you refute what parts of either of the clips?
Grossman has sprayed, now is time to walk away.
Like that muscular relationship Poland enjoyed, eh.
As an aside, I have just finished 'Blitzed' by Norman Ohler. It's about the drug use by the Nazis during WWII.
The blitzkrieg was in part fuelled by methamphetamine, soldiers and tanks non stop advancing for three days.
Hitler had a personal physician that kept The Fuhrer 'detached' using, amongst other concoctions, opiates, pure cocaine and amphetamines. Sometimes in the same injection.
Apparently Hitler was a pathetic shell of a junkie leading up to his demise.
Yes I have listened to several interviews with that author, there really was some crazy drug abuse going on during WW2, and not just with the Germans, I must read that book, thanks for reminding me.
It's not really an aside. US has a drug epidemic right now. And their leader is a ritalin raddled racist.
Trouble is, Anne, the Democrats—apart from Bernie Sanders and Tulsi Gabbard—are little better. Trump has not started any new strife, he's just continuing what Obama, the Bushes and Clinton did in Central America, South America, Africa and the Middle East.
Farrar watch:
Today has been an interesting one and it's not even luncheon. Twice already DFP has thrown his support behind what he considers dangerous left-wing extremists solely for the purpose of attacking other, presumably more dangerous extremists.
He claims if he were eligible he would vote Bernie Sanders over Trump in that possible scenario.
And he uses Sue Bradford's opinion piece as an attack on The Green Party.
Just goes to show PDF will work with anyone, so bereft of principle is he.
And to Sue Bradford. I drive past the Avondale race course a lot and a bigger eyesore and testament to decline you could not see. That place does not embody healthy community spirit unless you mean the weekend market in the car park.
That place reminds the community not of what could be but of what was, and not in a good way. I think West Auckland wants houses there, not a decrepit third race course in a city whose future demographic doesn’t scream for whipping horses and running them until they drop dead, literally.
I follow the link re the Sue Bradford piece , was very interesting and she has a point. https://www.pundit.co.nz/content/donations-amp-loss-of-property-rights-means-racing-bill-should-be-withdrawn-immediately
It's not a Bill the Green party should support nor should Labour in theory but I guess that's MMP politics and a formal coalition agreement.
Kind of like a CGT?
Pehaps it wasn't just Winston First that stopped progress.
I suppose it is conceivable that the landlords in the Labour party help kill that initiative off.
The racecourse was eyed by the old Waitakere Council as a huge potential development opportunity for homes and businesses, complete with another connecting road to New Lynn.
"a return to a muscular American first diplomacy that the US developed pre-WWI." read, a ultra aggressive US foreign policy (otherwise known as interventionism) that has changed little in over 100 years, destabilizing, destroying and wreaking havoc at will around the world for their own self interest and that of their corporations and industries.
Nothing has changed in US foreign policy since Marine Corps Major General Smedley Darlington Butler wrote his famous dissertation on the matter titled War is A Racket, in which he wrote;
“I spent thirty-three years and four months in active military service… And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street, and for the Bankers.”
https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/02/21/where-have-you-gone-smedley-butler/
Bernie's lived a charmed political life where he's been able to just skate away from awkward situations and questions. Nobody has ever really gone hard after him on anything, mostly because he has basically been an irrelevant sideshow that just needs to be occasionally tossed a minor amendment to a bill to keep him voting for Dem priorities.
That's about to change. Hopefully he'll be properly tested before the majority of primary votes happen. Because sure as shit if he's the nominee, he's in for a firestorm orders of magnitude greater than he's ever faced before, so he'd better get a bit of training before it hits. To see if he can deal with it.
Here's just the first few gentle licks of what's coming, and his answers on his past support of Castro and Ortega, as well as the costs and how to pay for his proposals, are frankly quite crap.
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/02/24/florida-dems-uproar-sanders-cuba-comments-117213
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/02/24/politics/bernie-sanders-donald-trump-2020/index.html
That's about to change.
Could you give us an example of what's going to be unleashed on him? Will the "firestorm orders of magnitude greater than he's ever faced before" be lit by those same experts in the Democratic Party who targeted Trump with their awesome powers?
Is Bernie Sanders a Russian stooge? Will they be able to convince people like they've done in the case of Trump?
Trust me, what he has faced to date with the Democratic party establishment is going to be nothing compared to what Trump and the GOP attack machine will throw at him if he become the Democrat nominee
Three comments in a row from the same commenter 🙂
Trust me…
LOL.
agreed, I disagree with his policies but on a personal level I feel sorry for him, the heat will be unbearable
Yes, "the heat" has really damaged Trump, hasn't it.
the heat that the Dems have managed to apply to Trump is like a candle compared to the sun that Bernie will face
What "heat" have those incompetents applied to Trump?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrKKPGhh-ZU&t=3s
Ooh scary–Bernie will be questioned–and he will likely answer, as he does most enquiries now, in short sentences that can be easily understood, even by “Trumpettes”.
Trust you Gosman? to drop floaters in the pool on daily basis perhaps.
Win or lose, the Sanders Campaign will have changed US politics by the end of the year. People are backing themselves in increasing numbers and next election the young, black, Latino, working class vote will have the best chance ever to defeat the reactionary remnants.
"to drop floaters in the pool on daily basis perhaps."
Spot on.
I've no idea what Repugs might have dug up and are holding in their back pockets.
But just in terms of what is already known, and ratfuckers' propensity for fabricating misinformation leveraging off a kernel of truth, there will be stuff attacking Sanders about his record on gun laws purportedly from concerned lefties, Jane's dodgy dealings will get a thorough working over and embellishment, his support for the likes of Castro and Ortega will be blown way up and possibly be 'added to' with deepfakes, his honeymoon in Russia and so on.
Kerry was successfully swiftboated in 2004. There's vastly more technology to create and spread falsehoods available today, and Sanders' background has a much richer variety of source material to provide a kernel of truth to leverage off than Kerry ever did. How do you think Sanders is going to fare against that kind of attack if his defenses are as weak as the fumbling shown in the two links above?
his support for the likes of Castro and Ortega
You mean his support for the people of Cuba and Nicaragua, and his opposition to his own government's illegal blockades and terrorism against those people.
Kerry was successfully swiftboated in 2004.
Kerry, as has become abundantly clear in the last decade or so, is not in the same stratosphere as Sanders, either morally or intellectually.
How do you think Sanders is going to fare against kind of attack if his defenses are as weak as the fumbling shown in the two links above?
Fair comment. But can you imagine the unspeakable Michael Bloomberg, the ludicrous Mayor Pete or that ridiculous Elizabeth Warren handling the attacks any better?
Illegal blockade – LOL!!!!
There is nothing illegal in what the US did with Cuba in relation to the embargo (not blockade). They are in fact doing something similar with Iran. What international law stops them doing that?
Work in progress.
https://twitter.com/IfNotNowOrg/status/1231606354240065538
"How do you think Sanders is going to fare against that kind of attack if his defenses are as weak as the fumbling shown in the two links above?"
I don't think they do show that though. If the issue here is that Sanders needs to be prepared for the shit storm about to rain down on him if he wins the nomination, where's the evidence that he isn't prepared?
The first link is an article that talks a lot about the issues of Sanders' political positioning, but it doesn't show him responding to those. Likewise for the video. Neither are evidence that he is fumbling. In fact the video halfway down the page of you first link, shows him being strong and rebutting some stupid communism comment from Bloomberg.
There is a very good article on Vox which looks at this issue in some detail here:
https://www.vox.com/2020/2/24/21147388/bernie-sanders-cuba-60-minutes-nicaragua
We can be sure that whatever the nuances in play – the Republicans and Trump will spin this to the maximum.
Yes, I accepted Andre's basic premise that much shit will be thrown at Sanders. What I'm saying is that I don't see the evidence for Sanders being weak at dealing with that. His political positioning might be a mistake, but that's not a weakness in Sanders' ability to deal with shit being thrown at him.
eg if I were to give an example of where Cunliffe failed in the 2014 election I'd show the video of him debating Key on national television where he looked like he was being repeatedly punched. His policies were good, but he didn't have the strength to deal with the shit that Key and National were throwing at him. I took Andre's comment to be about that kind of thing, but maybe I misread and he really meant the political positioning.
btw, that vox article is a very good example of irony.
Castro used education bribes, Trump uses social media and hackers.
The US literally makes children stand up at the beginning of school each day and pledge allegiance to the flag.
Yep. I only did it for four years, starting 50 years ago, but I can still remember it:
” I pledge allegiance, to Queen Fragg,And her mighty state of hysteria. And to the reporters, with delicious hams, One nation, under bob, indefensible, With quibbling and lettuce for all. ”
https://no6ody.wordpress.com/2012/01/31/i-pledge-a-mondegreen-to-queen-frag-and-her-mighty-state-of-hysteria/
He's fumbling because when it comes to Cuba, there's a large group of swing voters that will totally miss all the nuance in his explanation and just take away 'Bernie thinks Castro did good'. Fantastic fodder for attack ads, so Bernie probably now has zero chance to win Florida in November. That's a fumble before the game has even started.
He's fumbling on the price of his proposals and how they are going to be paid for by not having clear defensible numbers. Numbers he comes out with may turn out to be complete bullshit, but if they are stated confidently and clearly, it sets the frame. By dithering, his opponents can be first out of the blocks with numbers and thereby set the frame.
Similarly with paying for Medicare for all – there's an opportunity for a message like 'right now, employed people's health plans are mostly paid by the employer, and that is how Medicare for All will be paid too. But as workers, the savings from eliminating insurance admin will come back to you by eliminating co-pays'. But no, Bernie's quite quick to say taxes will go up to pay for it. Nobody likes to hear their taxes are going up.
"That's a fumble before the game has even started."
Yeah I think I misunderstood what you meant. To me that's an issue of political positioning rather than weakness (see explanation above).
"but if they are stated confidently and clearly, it sets the frame."
That's more what I was thinking, but I didn't see him not doing that in the links. Not saying you are wrong, and I agree that he needs to be able to demonstrate he can hack the pace before he is nominated, but that applies to all the front runners I assume.
Bad for the heart, too, all that pressure.
Calling the strongest candidate the american left has an "irrelevant sideshow"… enlightening.
What else would you expect to hear from a centrist attack dog like Andre', a statement like that is him all over.
Every time with you Andre, the same attack lines that the MSM media generate against any left candidate.
You did the horse shit "poor union members and their medical insurance" attack line – and what did the union members do – voted for bernie ON MASS!
You did the racist and sexist bernie bro meme. Well enough said on that lie.
And now this, fsheesh Andre why don't you just admit your a corporate lackey and be done with it.
But like most of your arguments there is the sad attempts at spin, but this time the concern trolling is way over the top. I'm surprised you didn't bring up Bernie being anti-semitic – no wait – joe90 covered that for you. Can always trust joe90 to go all tin foil hat.
Bury your head all you want but the repugs are honing their attack lines and the day Sanders is nominated, there will be an absolute deluge of negative material released.
From 2016 –
So what would have happened when Sanders hit a real opponent, someone who did not care about alienating the young college voters in his base? I have seen the opposition book assembled by Republicans for Sanders, and it was brutal. The Republicans would have torn him apart. And while Sanders supporters might delude themselves into believing that they could have defended him against all of this, there is a name for politicians who play defense all the time: losers.
Here are a few tastes of what was in store for Sanders, straight out of the Republican playbook: He thinks rape is A-OK. In 1972, when he was 31, Sanders wrote a fictitious essay in which he described a woman enjoying being raped by three men. Yes, there is an explanation for it—a long, complicated one, just like the one that would make clear why the Clinton emails story was nonsense. And we all know how well that worked out.
https://www.newsweek.com/myths-cost-democrats-presidential-election-521044
Come on, grow up. Pointing out there will be attacks is not a new idea. I'd be shocked if the GOP weren't working on it.
Like how the last loser the DNC put up – and how her depraved husband happened to be a real hinderance.
Sure – but rather than be all tin foil hat about it, – offer solutions. Short sharpe solutions.
Because when the GOP do the whole anti-semitic thing to Bernie – the response from the Bernie camp is probably going to scear you. So many people have been working on it.
I get you don't like the social democratic left – and personally I would like them to be far more radical – but the reality is a social democratic is way more preferable to any sort of authoritarian leftist, or the utter failings of the liberal left.
adam, I live in hope to see the day your reading comprehension skills develop to the point where you can see your idol's name in close proximity to something not entirely positive, and not immediately jump to the conclusion that your chosen one is being sacrilegiously attacked.
Today is not that day.
When you repeat the same shit over and over, and use attack lines straight from the corporate media – it's tiresome. Be nice if you offered solutions, rather than vapid concern trolling and rehashing baiting memes.
I'm no fan boy of Bernies – I'm for the left actually having a line in the sand. That means not being corporate lap dogs, nor wimps.
When you can pull your head out of your ass, and see the difference. Maybe people would not have to point out your shortcomings. You get there is an actually chance of having a change in the US which will end the failed economics of the last 40 odd years. The bullshit you pull is the odd politics of defeat and wimpish shortcoming. Grow a spin.
case in point.
What is that comment, apart from trying to start a flame war?
It was an observation that a response that has little if any connection to the comment it is following on from simply demonstrates the point of the previous comment if the previous comment suggests the responder has poor and overly defensive reading comprehenson skills.
I didn't start the fire. You're a walking flame war, because you don't make even a cursory attempt to read what people actually write.
Bernie faces a massive shitstorm of bullshit in this election, and berniebros going off half-cocked like you do could well cause him more harm than any actual and intended slights or slurs.
I prefer Warren. Between Bernie and the mayor, I prefer Bernie. I reckon he'll achieve less than Obama did (or even mayor pete might), but he'll keep changing the game to the left.
Most of the people you spend your time abusing probably have a similar opinion. try fighting some tories once in a while.
The liberal left like yourself are the new tories.
awwww, you called me "left", that's sweet.
No you are quite right there McFlock, adam is quite wrong, liberal centrists are more like a cancer in Left politics that need to be cut out before they destroys their host..which people like you have been doing for far far to long….not not Left wing in any sense of the word that is for sure..I mean just look at how the centrists in the UK and USA have shown quite plainly and out in the open that they would rather lose to the Right than win with a Left progressive project, exposing that their ideology is more closely aligned with the Right than that Left.
Yes it's about time you lot grew some back bone and just slink off and start your own centre lane political parties…but then back bone is something centrists have never made much of displayed of.
lols damn now I'm a cancer.
Let's see – fair call on NZLabour, it definitely tilted right from the left in the 80s.
But the dems? They did start their own party. Bernie only joins it when he wants to use dem organisational resources to run for president. By your logic, he's the one who should start his own damned party.
Not really sure what you are talking about there, the Dems have swung Right over the past few decades…as with the Labour UK (before Corbyn)
Here is a good piece unpacking some of the reasons why most liberal centrists don't understand this obvious truth…
Why Can't the Media Admit the Democratic Party Has a Right Wing?
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/why-cant-the-media-admit-the-democratic-party-has-a-right-wing/
Not even FDR argued for "medicare for all".
Did Johnson ever push for it?
I didn't say that the dems don't have a right wing. I said that the dems have never been anywhere as left wing as Bernie is. This is why Bernie joins the dems when he wants to run for president, then becomes an independent again.
The dems built their own party. Bernie piggie-backs on it. He has good policies, but I can see why some people who have worked for the dems for their entire lives would want him to fuck off.
"..but I can see why some people who have worked for the dems for their entire lives would want him to fuck off."
The Dems aren't working for working people, haven't for a long long time…so tough shit for them, it's time for them to fuck off and let working people have a voice that really is on their side first and foremost..and if that great thing does happen ( which I will be surprised if it does) hopefully some of that real Left wing progressive excitement will spill over into our political sphere..who knows?
..maybe then our hospital here in the Hawkes Bay will get some love instead of having to operate like some sort of seventies era Soviet satellite state run hospital…which liberal austerity forces upon it today under both Labour and National, it's a fucking disgrace!
So if someone doesn't completely conform to your politics and does not have their own party, they should make their own rather than join someone else's.
If they don't conform to your politics and have their own party, people who do conform to your politics should be able to take over that party with no hard feelings, and the people who don't conform to your politics should slink off and start another "center lane" party all over again.
People who do conform to your politics should just take over a center lane party and not expect any pushback on that at all.
As for hospitals, apparently they're starting demolition on the site for the new Dunedin hospital, oft-promised by the nats and delivered by Labour. Hawke's Bay got a railway and building prefab plant, didn't it?
For all the commenters in this subthread, a reminder about the Policy, especially this bit,
I'm not following US politics particularly closely, so when I take a gander at some of the threads here the problem comments (in terms of the Policy) really stand out for me as a moderator.
The closer we get to the election the tenser things will be and the more likely it will be that moderation will be required. May as well signal now that the constant name calling and focus on the player not the ball is unlikely to run. There is a plethora of political content in the US election this year, more than enough to focus on. If you can't do that, and are making a comment to simply have a go at another commenter you have history with, then understand that sooner or later that will get moderator attention.
Please, step back from the aggro and make the political points instead. Every person in this subthread is very capable of making political arguments and the debate will be better for that being the focus. The range of political views of commenters here should be an asset (and has been in the past), let's see if we can make it that way again.
Edited to add: I don’t mean any of that to put people off commenting here today. There’s plenty of analysis going on as well, but just a pointer to the problem of the name calling and personal attacks getting out of hand.
Andre 11:05 ……
100% to Bernie who completed owned his Cuba comments in today's CNN Town Hall with Chris Cumo. And he also owned the China comments (lifting millions out of poverty) that he took artillery for last year.
"I'm only speaking the truth"
All power to his arm.
Weinstein may be a convicted rapist – but also guilty of aesthetic crime in persuading Jackson to turn Tolkien's fantasy into neo-Wagnerian megalomania.
True that, except Wagner was a great artist from beginning to end where as Jackson had a very good period starting with Bad Taste and ending with The Frighteners, well IMO anyway.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJ3GvutirCQ
Was Wagner bullied by a mega-corporation's lawyers into not paying his workers properly?
Hello Morrissey was wondering where you had got to?
I don't know what Wagner payed anyone, however the story behind his Der Ring des Nibelungen is well worth diving into, it is almost as epic as the opera itself.
As far as Jackson goes, I really believe that his movies have suffered from way too much budget, all his later movies are top heavy and to long for purpose..not to mention he completely butchered both King Kong and Tin Tin, two of my personal favourites.
When my children where young I used to play the original King Kong on 8mm film at their parties (5 reels from memory) all the kids loved it.
Ross & co plead not guilty, next appearance June.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/410293/four-men-facing-sfo-charges-over-national-party-donations-plead-not-guilty
June is sooner than the experts thought. Will be a great lead up to the Election especially if "evidence" proving to smear beyond the four charged. I still wonder about the three who say that they were just following the process that they were told to follow.
By whom?
Gives the Nats a few months to thoroughly paint JLR as a rogue operator..
So if JLR was a rogue operator, when will the NATZ pay the 200k back!!
They don't know yet. They're waiting until nearer the time when a senior Nat will let them know what the process was… and who told them.
Brief statement from the Serious Fraud Office – note that they are calling this "the National Party donations case" which is worth repeating often: https://www.sfo.govt.nz/defendants-plead-not-guilty-in-national-party-donations-case
Sorry, I needed to bold that to stand out from the adjacent pollution.
The party name just keeps on coming up despite Simon's attempts at distancing & distracting.
Media are mentioning National Party a fair bit too. Examples from quick Google search:
"If we all pull together, guys, we can still stop this madman from giving us healthcare and a decent education."
In the following clip, those bizarre, anti-democratic Democratic Party "strategists" and their MSNBC mouthpieces are by turns hilarious, hysterical, horrific. Especially funny is the loathesome Clinton apparatchik James Carville at the 1:30 mark, and Chris Matthews at 2:30—especially the part where he says Carville is "damn smart."
Enjoy….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ZAFlqJQDdI&feature=emb_logo
A free Health System? Sanders must be mad! Must be another Hitler surely?
Thanks Morrissey for the link.
Sanders is more like Ardern. Except that Kiwibuild was probably more achievable than Healthcare but both are simply not going to happen
So you don't live in a country which has free health care like many other hundreds of millions right across the western world their Puckish Rogue?
So you did move to North Korea then?
That was fantastic Morrissey, thanks for posting
In that clip, Chris Matthews actually compares Sanders' win to the Nazis defeating France. Then he goes on to call James Carville “damn smart.” I never thought I'd see a broadcaster more abject and stupid than Duncan Garner, but now I have.
Oh how I have missed this post degenerating daily into a shitstorm of denial about US politics. Thank goodness the various bans have expired.
Nice to see you again, Sacha, and thanks for the warm welcome.
A few more long-term bans are about to expire.
Because it is Election Year, cretinous commenting is on the increase, it seems, and Moderators’ tolerance levels are inversely related to this.
I really do feel for you. Can we maybe re-introduce a separate daily sandpit if needed to siphon away the foreign focus?
"daily sandpit"
Given its a shitstorm maybe 'daily cesspit' would be more appropriate …
Some people like it.
will see how it goes but am certainly open to doing this again. Especially to keep other spaces clear for the NZ election.
Seems to me like its become more of an echo chamber lately with people getting banned who have different opinions. Personally, I like reading their alternate views even if I do not agree with them
Then you won't mind reading them in a separate post for foreign politics.
More that those banned who have different opinions struggled to articulate them in a responsible way.
Those banned who have different opinions are on the wind-up first. Articulating those different opinions is secondary.
It usually isn't the different opinions that are the issue for moderators, it is how they are expressed. Basically moderators get pissed off cleaning the crap and peeing of the simple of mind who want to have excrement contests. Especially those who go way off topic in posts.
So they see some dickwaving and decide to cut off the flag waving genitals earlier so they don't have to clean up the crap later. After a while the process becomes to cut deeper so we don't have to see the fuckwits for longer.
After all we aren't here to give juvenile morons toilet training. We're here to moderate a robust discussion. Getting rid of reflexive fools who can't control themselves is the easiest and simplest solution. I'm always amazed that most of the moderators don't follow my solution. In election year I start banning repeat offenders who can't seem to help themselves until after the election – for both their own good and for that of everyone who can control themselves.
Winston First getting undeclared donations from Talleys: https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/in-depth/410299/concerns-over-secret-fisheries-donations-to-nz-first-foundation
From I/S in the sidebar: http://norightturn.blogspot.com/2020/02/more-nz-first-corruption.html
Surely WinnieFirst's position on the Kermadec Marine Sanctuary was not in the slightest influenced by anything like this?
Problem is, we do not know. Personally I'd say him and his oafish sidekick would have backed a fishing industry wishlist without any fiscal encouragement. But I can't prove it.
Got to look strong though by refusing the calls to look at a governments partners poor behaviour, let alone look at it.
Isn't it already being looked at by the relevant authorities?
No doubt the voters will make their opinion known. If they don't want NZ1 in government, they shouldn't vote for 'em. Coalitions are about policy compatibilities.
C0aLiTions ArE aBOuT PoLiCY CoMPaTaBiLiTie/
not this one. This one is all about clinging to power for NZ1 and not actually having policies to implement.
keep telling yourself it’s pure and excellent though. 2/3 parties could be but refuse to cut the anchor chain
The three government parties have a lot of common policy areas: regional development, infrastructure, helping poor people (albeit with different ways of doing it).
They have disagreements about other things – fisheries for example.
The coalition document outlines what the govt will work on. Everything else is on a case by case basis, and disagreement on those things isn't a government-breaker.
But to be clear: without NZ1, this government will fall and the other two parties will look like weak failures. Cutting ties to NZ1 because of allegations in order to be propped up by the party whose former bagman is facing actual charges would just be bloody stupid, differing policy frameworks aside.
So unless there is an explicit and demonstrated reason to disown NZ1, labgrn might as well work with them.
So little has been achieved or delivered by this government, largely due to NZ1, it could be argued it's a deal breaker to stay with them. But hey, they managed to work together for 2 years doing little without any serious fights. many successful marriages are built on less
Even if I agreed that the govt had achieved "little", the alternative was a nat/nz1/act govt achieving a lot – in the other direction. So be careful which house you burn down first.
love your binary fpp thinking there. plenty of space to be occupied on the cross benches by any party. National has even less to gain by working with NZ1 on any issue, the greens hand is stronger than they let themselves believe
"Binary fpp thinking"? It was the result of the 2017 mmp election.
climaction, there's an election in Sept, let the people decide.
Last election, the people decided that they didn't want a national led government and voted for change.
This election 25% of sitting national MP's have decided to resign, they don't want to be part of simons national led government either.
won't you let the people decide climaction???
I never knew my low opinion of NZ1 could be so powerful or persuasive. Thanks Cinny.
Let me make this very clear, my abhorrence for NZ1 has nothing to do with a secret like for simon and national. He looks more like a human thumb every day. the koru croissants are killing him
I'm surprised 25% of National left. If they didn't want simon bridges as leader all they had to do was stay and lose by the narrow margin they likely will when the greens finally grow a spine and attack the soft neo cons in nz1 in the week before the election
If you are going to quote me, do make sure it's accurate, rather than adding words, swapping words around or adding question marks.
climaction, misquoting people makes you appear dishonest.
And PT turning up to hear Winston speak at the Motueka RSA during last election cycle was perfectly normal.
PT can't stand conservationists, he hates them. He hates the media just as much and is incredibly private.
Am not one little bit surprised about this news. After all TCER forms and the like, would have to be filled in accurately if vessels had camera's on board.
Well look for NZ to take a tumble in the next corruption index, 2 Major political parties one in govt, one recently out are involved in what appears to be fraudulent behavior of a serious nature around funding.
Its corruption plain and simple lets call it as such and
Seems impossible for the local branch of Transparency International to whitewash it any longer.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12311405
There maybe more to it but c'mon this seems (on the face of it) an easy decision to say yes to, the sort of people we want to encourage here
Notice that those nice people were refused in 2016 by the then National Government. So now were are to be pulled by emotional response to allow them a free pass?
Pretty obvious National ploy to undermine the integrity of Immigration helped by an unscrupulous Puck?
What Labour could say is that National were wrong not to let these people stay so we'll fix Nationals error and we'll let them stay
An easy win-win for Labour I'd have thought
With the number and ferocity of career criminals that Australia is sending back here, it's high time that there was a really strong handover of files from Australian state police to our own on these people so that they can be tracked until the very end of their days.
I'm looking forward to the social welfare system, tax system, the intelligence system, and the justice system wrapping all their services around them just to let them know how truly supported they really are.
And send the bill back to Australia.
For all those who think Trump is anything like Hitler:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Hrn6vnOjRs
Trump is a lot more like Hitler than any President of the United States since Hitler.
That he can't pursue Hitler-like programs is not for want of doing so, rather the impossibility of the task under the US system.
He is dabbling though. Muslims and Mexicans being the new Jews and Gypsies, etc.
Didn’t watch your video, by the way.
You should, hes a funny guy, quite well balanced in that he gives it to both sides
Congrats – you picked up a ban for being a stupid liar. I found you describing me as having self-proclaimed I was the world greatest sys-op – a somewhat funny and a completely inaccurate assertion about the self-proclaimed. So I exercised a sysop privilege and banned you until October 2021.
/open-mike-23-02-2020/#comment-1686924
You can speak about the election here a year after it happens. I find that funny.
Hitler would never have been so kind and compassionate as this though
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3fpmFJTMes
I watched the start, but not all of it because it's a year old and it's about some local UK politics, not the rise of fascism in the US. I think the UK is at risk of fascism, but I don't think it's happening yet despite the right there using some of the tactics of 45's team.
If Pie's argument and thus yours, is that UK politics isn't anything like pre-Nazi Germany, then bear in mind that there's plenty of good political analysis of the US situation from people who have studied fascism (and people who have lived through it) pointing to all the things happening in the US that are in fact parallels of what happened in pre-Nazi Germany. They're different because it's the 21C, but the dynamics are the same. We can't say we weren't warned.
oh, the kiddiecamps. I forgot the kiddiecamps and subsequent "adoptions".
You're right. His creeping paranoia makes him more Stalinist than Hitlerite.
The Trump White House and its allies, over the past 18 months, assembled detailed lists of disloyal government officials to oust — and trusted pro-Trump people to replace them — according to more than a dozen sources familiar with the effort who spoke to Axios.
Driving the news: By the time President Trump instructed his 29-year-old former body man and new head of presidential personnel to rid his government of anti-Trump officials, he'd gathered reams of material to support his suspicions.
In reporting this story, I have been briefed on, or reviewed, memos and lists the president received since 2018 suggesting whom he should hire and fire. Most of these details have never been published.
https://www.axios.com/trump-memos-deep-state-white-house-ce5be95f-2418-433d-b036-2bf41c9700c3.html