Up early to watch dawn service on ODT, so was glancing at sites I'd not looked at for a while. I guess this is not as bad as the RSA's (Rhodesian Services Association) cooption of ANZAC day up in Tauranga, but the ignorance of history is astonishing – especially when linked to the slogan; "Lest we Forget"
The Military Service Act 1916 required the registration of non-Māori men aged between 20 and 46. They were sorted into two divisions – the unmarried or recently married, and everyone else. Some were chosen by ballot, initially from the first division and later from the second, and sent to training camps…
Men who objected to military service could appeal to the Military Service Board and about half of those called up did so. They could appeal on grounds of family hardship, public interest (that they were carrying out socially useful work at home) or religious objection. The boards rejected most appeals and unsuccessful appellants who refused to serve were imprisoned.
Oof! "Today we wear the puppy..", but I did like that she continued on despite the flub rather than drawing more attention with correction. Eg "Centenary.. uh; Centennial" just now.
Prayers now, which I can't be bothered with – one advantage of the Pandemic is that I don't have to pretend quiet respect for that.
What kind of clueless arsehole do you have to be to stand at the front of an ANZAC day crowd unmasked and chatting during the moment of silence between the Last Post and Reveille? Camera held on them for an uncomfortably long time too! There were enough unmasked that I am glad I didn't attend for my own safety's sake, but at least most had the grace to remain silent during the heart of the event.
I am actually slightly nauseated. But then I am also rather hungover, so it could be a bit of that too.
Anyway, to expand on my earlier point regarding the "Freedom" those NZers who participated in the "Great War" had:
The opening of a national memorial in Dunedin for conscientious objectors has been held up as a celebration of courage and prompted an apology from Deputy Prime Minister Grant Robertson.
The memorial includes an abstract depiction of Field Punishment No1, for which men were tied to posts and had their hands tightly bound behind their backs for hours at a time during World War 1.
Opening the Archibald Baxter Peace Garden yesterday, Mr Robertson said the punishment was a gross and inhumane form of state-sponsored torture.
‘‘I want to say sorry {-} it was wrong.’’
Mr Robertson said the apology was personal, rather than officially from the Government, and he acknowledged the suffering of conscientious objectors…
Several speakers, including Mr Robertson, referred to the 1881 invasion of Parihaka, which happened the same year Mr Baxter was born.
Why was this not an official governmental apology? Would that open them to claims for compensation from the tortured's descendants or something? I mean; ka pai ki Robertson for making the statement as an individual citizen, but it does ring a little hollow with his role as deputy PM.
Only Quakers, Christadelphians and, later, Seventh-day Adventists were automatically exempted from military service. Most other conscientious objectors were imprisoned for up to two years with hard labour, and sometimes returned to prison if they still refused to go to war. Fourteen especially determined conscientious objectors were forcibly shipped overseas and faced severe punishments – they included Archibald Baxter who later wrote about his experiences. At the end of the war New Zealand was the only country to deny conscientious objectors voting rights or employment in the public service or local bodies – for 10 years…
His son, the poet James K. Baxter, later wrote:
When I was only semen in a gland
Or less than that, my father hung
From a torture post at Mud Farm
Because he would not kill.
The giant $5.4 billion Hells Gates Dam project has received guaranteed funding, unlocking the agriculture sector in some of the driest parts of northern Australia.
Key points:
The federal government has committed $5.4 billion to building Hells Gates Dam.
The 2,100-gigalitre dam is forecast to unlock agriculture in northern Australia.
The dam is still subject to a business case and environmental approvals.
But the project remains subject to a business case expected in June this year, and other environmental approvals.
The Federal Government has since committed $54M towards Phase 1 of the Project which includes the $30M for the first stage of Big Rocks Weir at Charters Towers. The final Business Case for Big Rocks Weir was delivered to the Department of Natural Resources, Mines and Energy and North Queensland Water Infrastructure Authority on 21 August 2020 and has had both State and Federal governments commit $60M for the construction of Big Rocks Weir.
The remaining $24M is for the Business Case of the Hells Gates Dam, including geotechnical and cultural heritage assessments, construction proposals, enhanced economic modelling works, environmental impact and social assessment and engineering investigations. The Business Case will assess and provide further investigative works into the findings of the feasibility study completed in 2018.
Coincidentally the latest Caspian Report covered some of the history of this plan.
The money shot….'Neither party wants to acknowledge the real causes of our inflation: explosive housing costs driven by leveraged investment demand and super-powered by monopoly power across most of the economy.'
Vote Luxon for PM and risk following Sri Lanka into economic disaster.
If you love tax cuts be warned
Causes of Sri Lanka’s Economic crisis
Lack of Foreign Reserves: Sri Lanka “has been running a trade deficit for decades.” …..
Hits to the Tourism Industry: …..such hits worsened the nation’s ability to repay its debt.
Agri-Sector Crisis: In 2021, the Rajapaksa government, with the aim of moving toward 100% organic agriculture, chose to ban chemical fertilizers. This decimated farmers’ yields,….
Ill-Advised Tax Cuts: In a bid to revitalize the economy, the government cut taxes. However, this had the backfiring effect of greatly impacting government revenue. The action also “prompted rating agencies to downgrade Sri Lanka to near default levels,”…..”
Government Mismanagement: Rather than supporting the local economy and boosting its exports, the Sri Lankan government has been borrowing vast sums of money to fund public services and imported goods…..
Russia-Ukraine Conflict: The ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine has led to a staggering “price inflation of crude oil, sunflower oil and wheat.”….
While our government may not be able to control things like hits to the tourism sector by the covid crisis.
Or rising costs of crude oil and wheat due to the war in Ukraine.
Or making unavoidable cuts to our agricultural emissions to save the planet.
Over the things our government can control, New Zealand would be very poorly served if we copied Sri Lanka's "Ill advised" tax cuts.
The other thing that sunk the Sri Lanka economy was that country’s massive amount of overseas borrowing.
The legacy of massive overseas borrowing by the Key government to bail out the financiers and billionaire investors who lost their investments after the GFC also has to be accounted for in this country.
You paint a misleading picture Ad. It is always better to deal in facts.
The profligate high-spending Key/English government added a huge amount to public debt between 2008-17 after the Clark/Cullen government of 1999-2008 had massively reduced public debt. The Ardern/Robertson government, 2017-onwards, was in the process of reducing public debt as the pandemic hit when, of course, public debt was bound to balloon.
You can see this from the 25 year chart on this site.
good info bearded .Luxons slip ups and selfishness shown up by direct questioning from Jack Tane put Nationals policy of crumbs for the poor and huge tax windfalls for the well off and the very well off like Luxon in the spotlight. Luxons plan was as inflationary as Labours as well so own goal by Luxon.Tane should have asked Luxon if he would cut Air NZ bailout to.Luxon was fuming by the end of the interview.Tane only mentioned the tax cuts Luxon would get from his parliamentry salary $18,000 a year not the income from his 7 rental properties and other investments maybe up to $30,000 a year plus in tax cuts. While the vast majority do it hard .Then govt revenue drops and no doubt National would have to cut spending on public services like Health,education,policing, and welfare denying payments to the homeless and disadvantaged.
And the books will be worse then forecast,due to the problem with falling asset values.The NZ superannuation fund lost 1.2 billion in the first two months of this year,which will have doubled in the last 2 months.
Those ethical investments are good creators of wealth destruction.
ACC will have a double problem with falling investment values,and increased medical costs not due to more accidents,but increased wages for health such as vehicle registration,fuel levy,income levy etc.
It is bad Ad, but could be miles worse. I have just read an article on Stephanie Browitt a survivor of Te Puia o Whakari White Island.
It is humbling and uplifting and says a great deal about the human spirit and our ability to overcome difficulties. Despair does more damage.
Hindsight is being clever after the fact. Luxon may think he has a handle on things, and yes he may improve with advice, but truly steam was coming out his ears and he was very red with shock at being challenged by Tame.
This is a double whammy, Pandemic dollars plus the oil shock/ wheat/ sunflower oil/ all combining to create difficult conditions.
Robertson and we are between a rock and a hard place. I don’t think the Opposition has any answers, just move the pieces and pay their piper.
We are a very inter related World now, and Luxon is no diplomat.
Sri Lanka has been operating a fixed exchange rate to reach the present situation. NZ went through a similar currency crisis in 1984 and has floated its exchange rate since.
The differences are NZ has a lot more space for fiscal policy interventions, the country mostly borrows in NZ currency (so if the govt wants any such debt to be repaid, or guaranteed the country has the means to make that payment).
As a result of this the countries are not really comparable.
You are correct Nic, Sri Lanka and New Zealand are not directly comparable.
But it would be foolish to ignore the lesson of Sri Lanka. Because you reap what you sow.
The Grim reaper.
Christopher Luxon sharpens his metaphorical scythe for tax cuts.
You reap what you sow.
Sri Lankan lessons: as you sow, so you reap
Abdul Bayes | Published: April 24, 2022 21:53:25
…..The reasons for such a sorry state of affairs of the Sri Lankan economy can be traced back to several factors.
First, the present government of Sri Lanka went for a dramatic reduction in both personal and corporate taxes resulting in lower revenue earnings and bigger budget deficit…..
Second, the president of the country declared in April 2021 that use of chemical fertilisers would be banned to pave the way for organic farming……
The takeaway lesson for New Zealand is this; If you really want to take radical measures to protect the environment and the climate, you must be prepared to tax the rich to pay for it.
Luxon on climate change.
'Random' [sic] government activity at huge cost is dangerous..
Pretentious necessity
@ 2;00 minutes ….if we look at transport, ….. we know there is a good technology and pathway to solve those emissions over the next 15 years.
@ 2:50 minutes …we've got an Emissions Trading Scheme.
@ 3:15 minutes ….the danger is a government that goes in with a lot of random activity at huge cost.
@ 3:50 minutes ….The market will sort that out.
@ 4:20 minutes …When we are talking about agriculture.
There is no obvious technological pathway to deal with agricultural emissions.
Unfortunately that narrative places the rich in the benefactor position of paying for a countries climate policy. Since they are paying they will ultimately determine the terms of the transition off fossil fuel. I don't think this is going to accelerate the transition. This is unfortunate as NZ can afford to fund many transitional policies as is, and wont actually face such a currency crisis as a result.
Reuters has articles describing the Central Bank devaluing to slow foreign exchange losses and the Rupee is otherwise described as a closed currency (not available outside Sri Lanka).
"Sri Lanka has a floating exchange rate system since 2001 which allowed the independent adjustment of the exchange rate according to the market forces of demand and supply. However, there could be interventions in the market for the purpose of curbing excess volatility in the exchange rate. The CBSL prescribes maximum net open position (NOP) limits for LCBs and closely monitors the activities in the domestic foreign exchange market to ensure an orderly functioning of the market."
I think its floating inside Sri Lanka is how to read that. But clearly their arrangements are not providing financial stability due to the amount of foreign denominated debt the country has taken on.
Not at all…it is quite evident that the suppliers of goods from offshore no longer accept the Rupee as payment and want hard currency and Sri Lanka has run out of reserves…a situation any economy, including NZ could face,
Confidence in a currency is tied to collateral and its obvious all confidence in the Sri Lankan economy has been lost….a floating exchange rate dosnt function when confidence is lost.
Theatre company tries to put on a queer culture sex education show for teens and their parents. Called The Family Sex Show (yes, really). All hell breaks loose. Stock writes a very funny but also nuanced and intelligent post about what happened and what the problems are and in the process breaks the binary.
The Family Sex Show was advertised as suitable for 5yrs +.
Link to the cleaned up website that now doesn’t suggest children use Google to search for “animals that masturbate” so they can draw pictures of them, can be found here:
hmm, I'm seeing conflicting things about the age bracket. But yeah, that's pretty clear, and yep, their sense of what's ok is well off. But we knew that from the name. I wish I could feel some confidence that lessons might be learned.
The title "the family sex show" is a red flag for me.
Introduction to knowledge about sex (and sex itself ) needs to be age appropriate.
Animals masturbating? Please. As an adult I don't see why I need to know about that. What is the purpose of getting kids to google search it? It embeds the idea that you can search for things of a sexual nature on the net……..
I am glad to hear apple a putting in a filter on their devices that filters out nudity. Good.
60,000 of new irrigated land on the other side of the Queensland ranges, funded by the Morrison government. One big new dam and several major reservoirs.
If the Australian Federal government wants to essentially replace much of Ukraine's agricultural production, pulling all the climate change floodwater from Queensland and tunneling it through the ranges to the west, and link up with the Murray-Darling, would be the way to do it.
I imagine there are plenty of areas in New Zealand that could easily grow wheat. For instance, Central Otago, where they tend to have very dry, hot summers.
Who knows, going forward, wheat production could become more profitable and less damaging to the environment than dairy production given that the set up and ongoing costs should be a lot lower I imagine.
Further to that, there is quite a bit of grain production in that area already, so could potentially be expanded.
Canterbury produces 70% of the worlds carrot seed.Agree on the land pricing,that was a result of low livestock prices and wool.There is still with some arable farmers who use livestock when they rotate the land to lie fallow,and put it back into pasture.
With constant droughts and rivers drying up and suffering degradation from nitrogen run off , cryptosporidiam andfaecal matter. Growing grains such as wheat and sunflower would be far more enviromentaly sustainable. With high prices profitable as well. also Chinas expansionism it would be smart to reduce our dpendence on Dairy production.
Arable farming is inherently risky….the returns are seasonal and fluctuate…especially when compared to dairy with its consistent output and monthly cheques.
As many cropping farmers are want to say, arable farming is a capital gain game….the capital outlay to return is considerable and dont really reflect the risks…and everyone in the chain clips the ticket.
My son Grant who was a Trade Cert Baker in a former life, tells me New Zealand produces flour that tends to make a heavy / wet crumb. It was mixed with Australian flour to lighten the crumb. With dry conditions and growing temperatures and improved varieties our wheat crumb may improve.
Other valuable crops could be sunflowers for oil and hemp for clothing As dairy prices go into retreat, other farming may begin.
UK think tank report on Russia's imperial delusion, what went wrong, expectations and conclusions.
The foremost conclusion is that Russia is now preparing, diplomatically, militarily and economically, for a protracted conflict
[…]
The pattern is universal.Almost all of Russia’s modern military hardware is dependent upon complex electronics imported from the US, the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Japan, Israel, China and further afield.57
[…]
Finally, the Russian decision to double down is a high-stakes gamble. If Russia mobilises and eventually overcomes Ukrainian resistance then NATO will face an aggressive, isolated and militarised state. If Russia loses then President Putin has now begun radicalising the population in the pursuit of policies that he will struggle to deliver. Failure to defeat the Ukrainian state after relentlessly comparing it to the Nazi regime may have serious consequences for Putin and those around him. To frame a conflict as existential and to lose must necessarily call the suitability of a leader into question among Russia’s political elites. NATO states therefore need to consider how to manage escalation pathways that follow if Russia is not only defeated in Donbas but finds its newly mobilised and poorly trained troops, with few remaining stocks of precision munitions, unable to deliver a victory in the summer. The death of Putin’s political project is plausible, but it has already inflicted immense damage internationally and risks doing considerably more.
So far, Russia’s attempts to expand its available military manpower has rested on pressuring conscripts to sign contracts of service and reducing the requirements for people to join without prior military service. For Russia to significantly increase its numbers it would need to retain its last round of conscripts and call up reserves. Both of these are politically contentious in Russia. Nevertheless, the propaganda narrative and local initiatives to rally support appear to be creating an environment in which 9 May can be used as a fulcrum to mobilise a much larger force. It appears increasingly likely that rather than use it to announce victory, the Russian government will instead use 9 May as the day on which the ‘special military operation’ is officially framed as a ‘war’
Probably scrambling up more forces by declaring war is possible. I think the biggest issue for the Russians will be arming the new troops.
I have seen a number of videos of Russian soldiers using vintage rifles etc. And, they are having trouble manufacturing new gear to replace the existing equipment being lost due to the sanctions.
As someone often critical of poor legislation, I appreciated this report from RNZ:
For an insight into how drafting works, The House [Phil Smith]chatted with Cassie Nicholson (who as Chief Parliamentary Counsel is the chief executive of the PCO) and Richard Wallace (who heads the drafting team) about the art of drafting law.
All law begins with a policy idea. Sometimes PCO is involved in that early, feeding back on how it could (and couldn’t) work. Cassie Nicholson says the entry point can vary. “Sometimes [we get] a fully formed policy paper to comment on, sometimes an idea that then we work with the agency to flesh out, but it can vary from quite detailed to a very high level idea.”
This early work is done with the policy and legal folk inside a ministry. Nicholson says this is “because we want ministers to be making a decision on as close to fully formed policy as possible, something that can actually be built when it comes to us”.
Wallace describes this as “testing the policy,” Nicholson calls it “kicking the tyres, (in a really gentle, friendly way) to make sure that actually we've worked through the logic and the wrinkles; we understand the anticipated flow-on consequences, both for the real world and the statute book”. No actual law is written until the policy is approved by cabinet so PCO doesn’t waste its time writing legislation that will never be law.
I was impressed at how they incorporate the principle of reflexivity into praxis:
Once it is approved, the PCO received drafting instructions outlining the legal effect to be achieved. Thankfully, no-one sits down and just blats out law from start to finish. Wallace says it’s an iterative process sending out drafts to government departments. “We continue doing that until we're all comfortable that we've addressed all the issues and that what we've got actually works. So we're not trying to do it on a single shot.”
Here's an insight into the psychology that comes into play:
Richard Wallace describes constructing law as both storytelling and puzzle solving. It is also answering hundreds of questions about what is really wanted.
You can summarise that last sentence as stakeholder interactivity. The Q+A format drives the process of design towards optimal output – in theory. As a grouch like me would point out, results suggest the theory often gets flawed by the practice!
The Parliamentary Counsel is not an individual but a large team… not just lawyers. They comprise publishing experts (who publish legislation), and IT and web teams (the law is published online); plus all the others that make an office run. PCO doesn’t offer legal advice to Parliament or the Government. That’s the Office of the Clerk’s team (for Parliament), and the Solicitor General at the Crown Law Office (for Government).
Wait a sec. "Its boss describes it as “the Government's legislative advisors”. So legal advice and legislative advice are different critters. Ok, got it. A fine distinction!
Crown Law, parts of DPMC, and legal counsel within the sponsoring Departments also have strong drafting roles. Some Departments are a lot better at gaming out the operational practise of new legislation than others.
Didn't make the msm last year, but a noteworthy report from the leading edge:
researchers at Google in collaboration with physicists at Stanford, Princeton and other universities say that they have used Google’s quantum computer to demonstrate a genuine “time crystal.”
Like a perpetual motion machine, a time crystal forever cycles between states without consuming energy.
Physics grad went huh??
In addition, a separate research group claimed earlier this month to have created a time crystal in a diamond. “The consequence is amazing: You evade the second law of thermodynamics,” said Roderich Moessner, director of the Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems in Dresden, Germany, and a co-author on the Google paper. That’s the law that says disorder always increases.
The time crystal is a new category of phases of matter, expanding the definition of what a phase is. All other known phases, like water or ice, are in thermal equilibrium: their constituent atoms have settled into the state with the lowest energy permitted by the ambient temperature, and their properties don’t change with time. The time crystal is the first “out-of-equilibrium” phase: It has order and perfect stability despite being in an excited and evolving state.
“This is just this completely new and exciting space that we’re working in now,” said Vedika Khemani, a condensed matter physicist now at Stanford who co-discovered the novel phase while she was a graduate student and co-authored the new paper with the Google team.
A revolutionary paradigm-shifter, seemingly plausible due to replication (two teams of physicists), but we await further developments that may point to utility.
The new time crystal demo marks one of the first times a quantum computer has found gainful employment.
With yesterday’s preprint, which has been submitted for publication, and other recent results, researchers have fulfilled the original hope for quantum computers. In his 1982 paper proposing the devices, the physicist Richard Feynman argued that they could be used to simulate the particles of any imaginable quantum system. A time crystal exemplifies that vision. It’s a quantum object that nature itself probably never creates, given its complex combination of delicate ingredients. Imaginations conjured the recipe, stirred by nature’s most baffling laws.
Quanta presents a summary of that recipe on their page. It uses this triad:
1. many-body localisation (a row of particles get stuck in synch)
2. eigenstate order (they retain symmetry when spin-flipped)
3. periodic driver (laser light triggers system flipping which perseveres)
A 2015 paper described it in these words:
when you tickle a localized chain of spins with a laser in a particular way, they’ll flip back and forth, moving between two different many-body localized states in a repeating cycle forever without absorbing any net energy from the laser.
Thus authenticity to claim the first workable demonstration of the mythical perpetual-motion machine. Now the challenge is to invent uses that users deem valuable…
A climate activist, Wynn Bruce, has died after setting himself on fire outside the US Supreme Court.
The U.S. Supreme Court had heard arguments in late February on an important environmental case that could restrict or even eliminate the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority to control pollution. The court’s conservative majority had voiced skepticism of the agency’s authority to regulate carbon emissions, suggesting that a decision by the justices could deal a sharp blow to the Biden administration’s efforts to address climate change.
…
Bruce set himself on fire in an apparent imitation of Vietnamese monks who burned themselves to death in protest during the Vietnam War. His Facebook page commemorated the death of Thich Nhat Hanh, an influential Zen Buddhist master and anti-war activist who died in January.
Thich Nhat Hanh, in a letter he wrote in 1965 to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., had idolized those monks. Kritee cited that letter in another tweet on Bruce’s death Sunday morning.
“The press spoke then of suicide, but in the essence, it is not. It is not even a protest,” Thich Nhat Hanh wrote of the monks, adding that “to burn oneself by fire is to prove that what one is saying is of the utmost importance. There is nothing more painful than burning oneself. To say something while experiencing this kind of pain is to say it with utmost courage, frankness, determination and sincerity.”
If it was indeed a protest then it must be witnessed. At it's end a protest is a performance, and if it is ignored then it is futile. Sadly for Wynn Bruce, and for all of us, it is seemingly easier to despair the systemic inaction of the status quo powers.
I encourage anyone feeling despair to reach out to those around you, like action on climate change, we can all support each other through this, be it just conversation and a cuppa, advice and encouragement, all the way through to developing and honing skills in gardening and composting, to reusing and reprocessing materials; We can all work towards food and material sustainability and that really helps to feel more positive.
In the last 13 years, nearly 160 Tibetan Buddhists have set themselves on fire in opposition to the Chinese government’s violent suppression of their country and national identity.
Bruce belonged to Shambhala, a Boulder-born Buddhist organization. He was also a regular presence at virtual sanghas, online gatherings of Buddhists to reflect and meditate, according to other members.
Last December, Bruce posted a quote attributed to Carl Sagan to his Facebook. “Don’t sit this one out,” it read. “Do something. You are – by accident of fate – alive at an absolutely critical moment in the history of (y)our planet.”
In 2018, environmental advocate and civil rights lawyer David Buckel set himself on fire in Brooklyn. In a statement he emailed to multiple news outlets the morning of his death, Buckel explained that his “early death by fossil fuel reflects what we are doing to ourselves.”
One must respect another's intent in ending their lives via such signalling. Not for us to judge spiritual motivations. The assumption that changes in public policy will result (triggered by mass realisation that they must happen) is based on a misread of mass psychology, unfortunately…
Are you saying that an isolated act, assuming it political, of self-immolation is not affecting public policy change or that any isolated and individual act is ineffective? Either way, it sounds your personal belief (aka reckon) rather than a generally accepted fact.
When a single act of self-immolation catalyses a movement, as has happened in other countries, you will be hard-pushed to ignore and categorically deny its influence in each and every case.
Yeah, just my take on the effect it seems to have on western countries. Your point is valid – a single immolation triggered the Arab Spring phenomenon that brought down a couple of dictators & threatened a few others.
So I suppose a better generalisation would be that the catalysis effect is culture-dependent. The symbolism activates a shared feeling that is likely to ramp up via contagion in suitable cultural/political contexts…
Population transfers, summary executions, mass deportations and the beginnings of an attempt to erase a nation and it's people from the textbooks.
But sure, it's all about de-nazification and NATO.
/
"Here in the Federation Council they found out that not all children" from the liberated territories of Donbass "have sufficient command of the Russian language. They will be retrained."
On February 24, Vladimir Putin announced the start of a "special operation" and Russian troops invaded Ukraine. Immediately after that, employees of the Enlightenment group of companies, one of the largest and oldest publishers of educational and pedagogical literature in the country, were urged to remove the “incorrect” references to Ukraine and Kyiv from all school textbooks. "Mediazona" talked with the editors of the publishing house about how the "cleansing" of history, geography and literature is going on.
[…]
So, from paragraphs that give examples of the heraldry of different states, including flags, a few years ago it was strongly recommended to remove the flag of Ukraine and replace it with the flag of any other country. If it is necessary to give an example of the capital in the chapter, Kyiv was replaced by another capital. “A couple of times I had to remove the US flag as well, but it’s simpler there, our program pays little attention to world history,” says one of the Enlightenment employees. Now editors should remove references to Ukraine wherever possible.
“That is, we are faced with the task of making it as if Ukraine simply does not exist,” his colleague says. “It's much worse when the textbook just doesn't mention a country. A person grows up without a knowledge base about some country, and then it is much easier for him to believe what he is told about it from TV.
The hardest part is for those who work on history textbooks: it is often impossible to remove references to Ukraine and Kyiv without compromising the content, then you have to change the wording to more “safe” ones.
Ljubljana, Slovenia (Reuters)Slovenia's populist Prime Minister, Janez Janša, lost a national election on Sunday as the environmentalist Freedom Movement party won more votes than his SDS party, according to preliminary figures from election authorities.
Janša, who had hoped to win a fourth term in office, conceded that he had been defeated in the vote, adding however that his SDS party had secured more votes than ever before.
"The results are what they are. Congratulations to the relative winner," Janša said, addressing his supporters.
The election had been expected to be tight but the official preliminary figures showed the Freedom Movement, a newcomer in the election, leading with 34.34% of the vote, far more than expected, while the SDS secured 23.83%, based on 98.20% of counted ballots.
That would give the Freedom Movement, which campaigned on a transition to green energy, an open society and the rule of law, 40 seats in the 90-seat parliament, and the SDS 28 seats.
kicked off deal negotiations with Elon Musk on Sunday [who] has been meeting with Twitter shareholders in the last few days, seeking support for his bid… Many Twitter shareholders reached out to the company after Musk outlined a detailed financing plan for his bid on Thursday and urged it not to let the opportunity for a deal slip away, Reuters reported earlier.
The social media company adopted a poison pill after Musk made his offer to prevent him from raising his more than 9% stake in the company above 15% without negotiating a deal with its board. In response, Musk has threatened to launch a tender offer that he could use to register Twitter shareholder support for his bid on Sunday.
Liberals are freaked. Dunno why, but useful insights here:
Robert Reich, former U.S. secretary of labor and professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley, lamented that Musk was seeking to “control one of the most important ways the public now receives news” and “be the wizard behind the curtain” deciding what gets projected onto the world’s computer screens. Max Boot, a one-time conservative pundit now aligned with Democrats as a result of his opposition to Donald Trump, even suggested on Twitter that there was cause to worry about the future of democracy itself if Musk were to acquire the platform.
I have no doubt that a lot of right-wing complaints of oppression on Twitter are whiny grievance politics. In a recent study led by researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, for instance, two-thirds of “strong Republican” Twitter users thought it was “anti-conservative” to suspend accounts pushing the QAnon conspiracy theory about global pedophile cabals. The same study found that in the six months after the 2020 election, pro-Trump accounts were roughly five times more likely to get suspended on Twitter than ones supporting Joe Biden
Users have been banned, suspended and otherwise censored not only for attacking specific transgender women, but for making general statements such as, “All rapists are men. In U.K. law, rape is committed by a person with a penis.” Meanwhile, tweets that appear to call for the violent rape of a mainstream, left-of-center journalist who has been accused of transphobia for writing about the complexities of gender transition for minors are allowed to stay up.
This is less about intentional discrimination than about the instinctive progressive biases of many of the top staff at Twitter. Del Harvey, a Twitter veteran who served as the company’s vice president for trust and safety until last October, has been fairly open about her belief that preventing “harm” to “marginalized” users—women, racial minorities, LBGT people, etc.—should take priority. However noble the intent, this is a prescription for nannyism at best (especially since progressive discourse defines “harm” very broadly) and political bias at worst.
You can see why Musk wants to clean the thing up, eh? Then there's this glimpse into the twits & their leverage on the msm…
I do think one potentially good lesson from the Musk/Twitter saga would be to prompt a rethinking of the extent to which we have made Twitter our “town square”—given that only one in five Americans use it and 10 percent of users provide 80 percent of the content. (Notably, Twitter’s policing of election-fraud and anti-vaxx conspiracy theories has not prevented large segments of the population from embracing them.)
Part of Twitter’s outsize importance is that it’s the playpen of choice for media and for political activists. It can be a useful tool for news gathering and discussion, but it can also create a faux consensus increasingly adrift from the real world. Too many journalists are too married to Twitter.
Gates replied, “Sorry to say I haven’t closed it out. I would like to discuss philanthropy possibilities.”
Musk confirmed that the messages were real and added that he did not leak them to the New York Times… Musk told Gates that he was unable to take his philanthropy on climate change seriously in light of Gates’ short position against Tesla.
Humanity is divided into serious folk & fun folk? Well, some are a bit of both, eh? Ole Bill was just having a bit of fun but young Elon didn't see the funny side.
"It's part of a larger conversation, because there are councils all around the country right now that are talking about the idea of co-governance. It's a very important kaupapa."
In a statement on Friday, Coffey said: "This is a Local Bill, so the changes are being requested by the Rotorua District Council, not the Government. As such, the Rotorua District Council will need to consider the implications of the Bill of Rights analysis, alongside the select sommittee."
"The proposed arrangements in the Bill would make the number of council members for the Māori ward disproportionately higher than the number of council members for the General ward in comparison to their respective populations," Parker wrote in his legal analysis published on Friday.
"As the disadvantaged group is those on the General roll, changing representation arrangements away from proportional representation therefore creates a disadvantage for non-Māori as they cannot in future elect to change rolls."
Parker concluded: "The Bill appears to limit the right to be free from discrimination affirmed in s 19 of the Bill of Rights Act and cannot be justified."
"As the disadvantaged group is those on the General roll, changing representation arrangements away from proportional representation therefore creates a disadvantage for non-Māori as they cannot in future elect to change rolls."
I imagine you have a vote in your ward and an at large vote.
As to proportion..
"The Council is currently pursuing a law change to enable an undemocratic representation model to be implemented. The model it prefers would consist of three Māori ward seats, three general ward seats, and four at-large seats. However, adopting this arrangement would give the 19,791 citizens on the Māori roll 2.6 times the voting power of the 51,618 citizens on the general roll.
The proposed model is not only unfair, it is also unlawful. Clause 2 of Schedule 1A of the Local Electoral Act requires representation from wards to be proportional to their electoral populations. "
107 years ago the Ottoman Empire kicked off it's effort to exterminate it's two million Armenian subjects. New Zealand is yet to acknowledge Armenian suffering. For shame.
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 27 were:1. The Minister for Ford Rangers strikes againTransport Minister Simeon Brown was again the busiest of the Cabinet ministers this week, announcing an ...
You got a fast carAnd I want a ticket to anywhereMaybe we make a dealMaybe together we can get somewhereAny place is betterYesterday’s newsletter, Trust In Me, on the report of abuse in state care, and by religious organisations, between 1950 and 2019, coupled with the hypocrisy of Christopher Luxon ...
New Zealand is again having to reconcile conflicting pressures from its military and its trade interests. Should we join Pillar Two of AUKUS and risk compromising our markets in China? For a century after New Zealand was founded in 1840, its external security arrangements and external economics arrangements were aligned. ...
The ‘50 Shades of Green’ farmers’ protest in 2019 was heavy on climate change denial, but five years on, scepticism and criticism about the idea that pine forests can save us is growing across the board. File photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: Here’s the top six news items of note in climate ...
This morning the sky was bright.The birds, in their usual joyous bliss. Nature doesn’t seem to feel the heat of what might angst humans.Their calls are clear and beautiful.Just some random thoughts:MāoriPaul Goldsmith has announced his government will roll back the judiciary’s rulings on Māori Customary Marine Title, which recognises ...
In 2003, the Court of Appeal delivered its decision in Ngati Apa v Attorney-General, ruling that Māori customary title over the foreshore and seabed had not been universally extinguished, and that the Māori Land Court could determine claims and confirm title if the facts supported it. This kicked off the ...
Earlier this week at Parliament, Labour leader Chris Hipkins was applauded for saying that the response to the final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care had to be “bigger than politics.” True, but the fine words, apologies and “we hear you” messages will soon ring ...
TL;DR: In news breaking this morning:The Ministry of Education is cutting $2 billion from its school building programme so the National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government has enough money to deliver tax cuts; The Government has quietly lowered its child poverty reduction targets to make them easier to achieve;Te Whatu Ora-Health NZ’s ...
Kia ora. These are some stories that caught our eye this week – as always, feel free to share yours in the comments. Our header image this week (via Eke Panuku) shows the planned upgrade for the Karanga Plaza Tidal Swimming Steps. The week in Greater Auckland On ...
1. What's not to love about the way the Harris campaign is turning things around?a. Nothingb. Love all of itc. God what a reliefd. Not that it will be by any means easye. All of the above 2. Documents released by the Ministry of Health show Associate Health Minister Casey ...
Trust in me in all you doHave the faith I have in youLove will see us through, if only you trust in meWhy don't you, you trust me?In a week that saw the release of the 3,000 page Abuse in Care report Christopher Luxon was being asked about Boot Camps. ...
TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking about the Royal Commission Inquiry into Abuse in Carereport released this week, and with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent on a UN push to not recognise carbon offset markets and ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 26, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Transport: Simeon Brown announced$802.9 million in funding for 18 new trains on the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines, which ...
The northern expressway extension from Warkworth to Whangarei is likely to require radical changes to legislation if it is going to be built within the foreseeable future. The Government’s powers to purchase land, the planning process and current restrictions on road tolling are all going to need to be changed ...
Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedFirst they came for the doctors But I was confused by the numbers and costs So I didn't speak up Then they came for our police and nurses And I didn't think we could afford those costs anyway So I ...
Photo by Joshua J. Cotten on UnsplashWe’re back again after our mid-winter break. We’re still with the ‘new’ day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when we have our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm.Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream ...
Notes: This is a free article. Abuse in Care themes are mentioned. Video is at the bottom.BackgroundYesterday’s report into Abuse in Care revealed that at least 1 in 3 of all who went through state and faith based care were abused - often horrifically. At least, because not all survivors ...
Luxon speaks in Parliament yesterday about the Abuse in Care report. Photo: Hagen Hopkins/Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:PM Christopher Luxon said yesterday in tabling the Abuse in Carereport in Parliament he wanted to ‘do the ...
About a decade ago I worked with a bloke called Steve. He was the grizzled veteran coder, a few years older than me, who knew where the bodies were buried - code wise. Despite his best efforts to be approachable and friendly he could be kind of gruff, through to ...
Some of the recent announcements from the government have reminded us of posts we’ve written in the past. Here’s one from early 2020. There were plenty of reactions to the government’s infrastructure announcement a few weeks ago which saw them fund a bunch of big roading projects. One of ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Thursday, July 25 are:News: Why Electric Kiwi is closing to new customers - and why it matters RNZ’s Susan EdmundsScoop: Government drops ...
Hi,I felt a small wet tongue snaking through one of the holes in my Crocs. It explored my big toe, darting down one side, then the other. “He’s looking for some toe cheese,” said the woman next to me, words that still haunt me to this day.Growing up in New ...
Yesterday I happily quoted the Prime Minister without fact-checking him and sure enough, it turns out his numbers were all to hell. It’s not four kg of Royal Commission report, it’s fourteen.My friend and one-time colleague-in-comms Hazel Phillips gently alerted me to my error almost as soon as I’d hit ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Thursday, July 25, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day were:The Abuse in Care Royal Commission of Inquirypublished its final report yesterday.PM Christopher Luxon and The Minister responsible for ...
The Official Information Act has always been a battle between requesters seeking information, and governments seeking to control it. Information is power, so Ministers and government agencies want to manage what is released and when, for their own convenience, and legality and democracy be damned. Their most recent tactic for ...
TL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:Transport and Energy Minister Simeon Brown is accelerating plans to spend at least $10 billion through Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) to extend State Highway One as a four-lane ‘Expressway’ from Warkworth to Whangarei ...
I live my life (woo-ooh-ooh)With no control in my destinyYea-yeah, yea-yeah (woo-ooh-ooh)I can bleed when I want to bleedSo come on, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)You can bleed when you want to bleedYea-yeah, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)Everybody bleed when they want to bleedCome on and bleedGovernments face tough challenges. Selling unpopular decisions to ...
Please note:To skip directly to the- parliamentary footage in the video, scroll to 1:21 To skip to audio please click on the headphone iconon the left hand side of the screenThis video / audio section is under development. ...
Given the crackdown on wasteful government spending, it behooves me to point to a high profile example of spending by the Luxon government that looks like a big, fat waste of time and money. I’m talking about the deployment of NZDF personnel to support the US-led coalition in the Red ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:40 am on Wednesday, July 24 are:Deep Dive: Chipping away at the housing crisis, including my comments RNZ/Newsroom’s The DetailNews: Government softens on asset sales, ...
As I reported about the city centre, Auckland’s rail network is also going through a difficult and disruptive period which is rapidly approaching a culmination, this will result in a significant upgrade to the whole network. Hallelujah. Also like the city centre this is an upgrade predicated on the City ...
Today, a 4 kilogram report will be delivered to Parliament. We know this is what the report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care weighs, because our Prime Minister told us so.Some reporter had blindsided him by asking a question about something done by ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Wednesday, July 24, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Beehive:Transport Minister Simeon Brownannounced plans to use PPPs to fund, build and run a four-lane expressway between Auckland ...
NewstalkZB host Mike Hosking, who can usually be relied on to give Prime Minister Christopher Luxon an easy run, did not do so yesterday when he interviewed him about the HealthNZ deficit. Luxon is trying to use a deficit reported last year by HealthNZ as yet another example of the ...
Back in January a StatsNZ employee gave a speech at Rātana on behalf of tangata whenua in which he insulted and criticised the government. The speech clearly violated the principle of a neutral public service, and StatsNZ started an investigation. Part of that was getting an external consultant to examine ...
Renting for life: Shared ownership initiatives are unlikely to slow the slide in home ownership by much. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:A Deloittereport for Westpac has projected Aotearoa’s home-ownership rate will ...
You're broken down and tiredOf living life on a merry go roundAnd you can't find the fighterBut I see it in you so we gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsWe gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsAnd I'll rise upI'll rise like the dayI'll rise upI'll rise unafraidI'll rise upAnd I'll ...
There’s been a change in Myers Park. Down the steps from St. Kevin’s Arcade, past the grassy slopes, the children’s playground, the benches and that goat statue, there has been a transformation. The underpass for Mayoral Drive has gone from a barren, grey, concrete tunnel, to a place that thrums ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections Global society may have finally slammed on the brakes for climate-warming pollution released by human fossil fuel combustion. According to the Carbon Monitor Project, the total global climate pollution released between February and May 2024 declined slightly from the amount released during the same ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Tuesday, July 23 are:Deep Dive: Penlink: where tolling rhetoric meets reality BusinessDesk-$$$’sOliver LewisScoop:Te Pūkenga plans for regional polytechs leak out ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Tuesday, July 23, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Health: Shane Reti announcedthe Board of Te Whatu Ora-Health New Zealand was being replaced with Commissioner Lester Levy ...
Health NZ warned the Government at the end of March that it was running over Budget. But the reasons it gave were very different to those offered by the Prime Minister yesterday. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon blamed the “botched merger” of the 20 District Health Boards (DHBs) to create Health ...
Long ReadKey Summary: Although National increased the health budget by $1.4 billion in May, they used an old funding model to project health system costs, and never bothered to update their pre-election numbers. They were told during the Health Select Committees earlier in the year their budget amount was deficient, ...
As a momentous, historic weekend in US politics unfolded, analysts and commentators grasped for precedents and comparisons to help explain the significance and power of the choice Joe Biden had made. The 46th president had swept the Democratic party’s primaries but just over 100 days from the election had chosen ...
TL;DR: I’m casting around for new ideas and ways of thinking about Aotearoa’s political economy to find a few solutions to our cascading and self-reinforcing housing, poverty and climate crises.Associate Professor runs an online masters degree in the economics of sustainability at Torrens University in Australia and is organising ...
The Finance and Expenditure Committee has reported back on National's Local Government (Water Services Preliminary Arrangements) Bill. The bill sets up water for privatisation, and was introduced under urgency, then rammed through select committee with no time even for local councils to make a proper submission. Naturally, national's select committee ...
Some years ago, I bought a book at Dunedin’s Regent Booksale for $1.50. As one does. Vandrad the Viking (1898), by J. Storer Clouston, is an obscure book these days – I cannot find a proper online review – but soon it was sitting on my shelf, gathering dust alongside ...
History is not on the side of the centre-left, when Democratic presidents fall behind in the polls and choose not to run for re-election. On both previous occasions in the past 75 years (Harry Truman in 1952, Lyndon Johnson in 1968) the Democrats proceeded to then lose the White House ...
This is a free articleCoverageThis morning, US President Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the Presidential race. And that is genuinely newsworthy. Thanks for your service, President Biden, and all the best to you and yours.However, the media in New Zealand, particularly the 1News nightly bulletin, has been breathlessly covering ...
A homeless person’s camp beside a blocked-off slipped damage walkway in Freeman’s Bay: we are chasing our tail on our worsening and inter-related housing, poverty and climate crises. Photo: Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy ...
What has happened to it all?Crazy, some'd sayWhere is the life that I recognise?(Gone away)But I won't cry for yesterdayThere's an ordinary worldSomehow I have to findAnd as I try to make my wayTo the ordinary worldYesterday morning began as many others - what to write about today? I began ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Monday, July 22 are:Today’s Must Read: Father and son live in a tent, and have done for four years, in a million ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Monday, July 22, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:US President Joe Biden announced via X this morning he would not stand for a second term.Multinational professional services firm ...
A listing of 32 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, July 14, 2024 thru Sat, July 20, 2024. Story of the week As reflected by preponderance of coverage, our Story of the Week is Project 2025. Until now traveling ...
This weekend, a friend pointed out someone who said they’d like to read my posts, but didn’t want to pay. And my first reaction was sympathy.I’ve already told folks that if they can’t comfortably subscribe, and would like to read, I’d be happy to offer free subscriptions. I don’t want ...
National: The Party of ‘Law and Order’ IntroductionThis weekend, the Government formally kicked off one of their flagship policy programs: a military style boot camp that New Zealand has experimented with over the past 50 years. Cartoon credit: Guy BodyIt’s very popular with the National Party’s Law and Orderimage, ...
Day one of the solo leg of my long journey home begins with my favourite sound: footfalls in an empty street. 5.00 am and it’s already light and already too warm, almost.If I can make the train that leaves Budapest later this hour I could be in Belgrade by nightfall; ...
Do you remember Y2K, the threat that hung over humanity in the closing days of the twentieth century? Horror scenarios of planes falling from the sky, electronic payments failing and ATMs refusing to dispense cash. As for your VCR following instructions and recording your favourite show - forget about it.All ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
Waiting In The Wings:For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSAannounced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
Te Rangi e tu nei (The sky above us) Te Papa e takoto nei (The land beneath us) Tatou katoa te hunga ora (To us all the living) Tena koutou katoa (Greetings) ...
A late change to charter school legislation will cheat educators out of fair pay and negotiating power proving charter schools are just a vehicle to make profit out of our education system. ...
In 2004 te iwi Māori rallied against the Crown’s attempt to confiscate our coastlines and moana with the Foreshore and Seabed Act. This led to the largest hīkoi of a generation and the birth of Te Pāti Māori. 20 years later, history is repeating itself. Today the government has announced ...
It has been five and a half years since the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care was established to investigate the abuse of children, young people, and vulnerable adults within state and faith-based institutions. Yesterday, the final report - Whanaketia through pain and trauma, from darkness to light ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to take action off the back of the International Court of Justice ruling on Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. ...
On Friday the International Court of Justice reaffirmed what Palestinian’s have been telling us for decades: that the occupation and colonisation of Palestinian lands by Israel is illegal and must end immediately. They also called for reparations for Palestinian’s who have lived under Israeli occupation since it began in 1967. ...
Labour calls on the Government to act after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories is illegal. ...
The 53.7 percent rise in benefit sanctions over the last year is more proof of this Government’s disdain for our communities most in need of support. ...
Aotearoa could be a country where every child grows up feeling safe, loved and with a sense of belonging in their whānau and community. But for some of our children, this is far from reality. Instead, they are trapped in a maze of intergenerational harm that they can’t escape on ...
Te Pāti Māori are calling for David Seymour to resign as Associate Health Minister in response to his call for Pharmac to ignore the Treaty of Waitangi. “This announcement is just another example of the government’s anti-Tiriti, anti-Māori agenda.” Said Co-leader and spokesperson for health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. “Seymour thinks it ...
The soaring price of renting is driving the rise of inflation in this country - with latest figures from Stats NZ showing rents are up 4.8 per cent on average while annual inflation is at 3.3 per cent. ...
National’s Emissions Reduction Plan will take New Zealand further from the economy we need to ensure the next generation has a stable climate and secure livelihoods. ...
Following consultation with named parties and thorough consideration of privacy interests, the Green Party is in a position to release the Executive Summary of the final report from the independent investigation into Darleen Tana. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon should be asking serious questions of his Minister for Resources Shane Jones now it’s been revealed he misled the public about a dinner with mining companies that he didn’t declare and said wasn’t pre-arranged. ...
Te Pāti Māori have submitted to the Justice Select Committee against the Sentencing (Reinstating Three Strikes) Amendment Bill. The bill will further entrench racism in our justice system and fails to focus on rehabilitation. “Reinstating Three Strikes will empower a systematically racist system and exacerbate the overrepresentation of Māori in ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee is set to make a determination on the Residential Tenancies Amendment (RTA) Bill in the coming weeks. “This legislation will give landlords the power to kick our whānau out onto the street for no reason” said Housing spokesperson, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “Their solution to the housing ...
“National’s campaign was about tackling crime and the best they can do is a two-year long Ministerial Advisory Group,” Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
“There are more examples of charter schools failing their students than there are success stories. The coalition Government is driving to dismantle our public school system and instead promote a privatised, competitive structure that puts profits before kids,” Jan Tinetti said. ...
“This government is choosing to deliberately mislead and withhold information, keeping our people in the dark about this government’s agenda and the future of our mokopuna,” said co-leader and spokesperson for Health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. The call comes after the demand from the Chief Ombudsman that Associate Minister of Health, Casey ...
“Today’s climate announcement by Simon Watts makes clear the National Government is simply paying lip service to meeting its climate change targets,” Megan Woods said. ...
National is choosing to make life harder for workers by taking away the rights our communities have fought hard for. Here's how they’re taking workers backwards. ...
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue. We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views. “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
Tēnā tātou katoa, Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts. “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet. “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks. “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. At the heart of this report are the ...
For the first time, the Government is formally acknowledging some children and young people at Lake Alice Psychiatric Hospital experienced torture. The final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament ...
The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 courageous survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care. The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through ...
With a week to go before hard-working New Zealanders see personal income tax relief for the first time in fourteen years, 513,000 people have used the Budget tax calculator to see how much they will benefit, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “Tax relief is long overdue. From next Wednesday, personal income ...
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden says a bill that has passed its first reading will improve parental leave settings and give non-biological parents more flexibility as primary carer for their child. The Regulatory Systems Amendment Bill (No3), passed its first reading this morning. “It includes a change ...
Two Bills designed to improve regulation and make it easier to do business have passed their first reading in Parliament, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. The Regulatory Systems (Economic Development) Amendment Bill and Regulatory Systems (Immigration and Workforce) Amendment Bill make key changes to legislation administered by the Ministry ...
New legislation paves the way for greater competition in sectors such as banking and electricity, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly says. “Competitive markets boost productivity, create employment opportunities and lift living standards. To support competition, we need good quality regulation but, unfortunately, a recent OECD report ranked New ...
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Up early to watch dawn service on ODT, so was glancing at sites I'd not looked at for a while. I guess this is not as bad as the RSA's (Rhodesian Services Association) cooption of ANZAC day up in Tauranga, but the ignorance of history is astonishing – especially when linked to the slogan; "Lest we Forget"
https://twitter.com/Te_Taipo/status/1518183580794466304
https://teara.govt.nz/en/conscription-conscientious-objection-and-pacifism/page-1
Oof! "Today we wear the puppy..", but I did like that she continued on despite the flub rather than drawing more attention with correction. Eg "Centenary.. uh; Centennial" just now.
Prayers now, which I can't be bothered with – one advantage of the Pandemic is that I don't have to pretend quiet respect for that.
What kind of clueless arsehole do you have to be to stand at the front of an ANZAC day crowd unmasked and chatting during the moment of silence between the Last Post and Reveille? Camera held on them for an uncomfortably long time too! There were enough unmasked that I am glad I didn't attend for my own safety's sake, but at least most had the grace to remain silent during the heart of the event.
I am actually slightly nauseated. But then I am also rather hungover, so it could be a bit of that too.
Anyway, to expand on my earlier point regarding the "Freedom" those NZers who participated in the "Great War" had:
https://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/conscientious-objectors-commemorated
Why was this not an official governmental apology? Would that open them to claims for compensation from the tortured's descendants or something? I mean; ka pai ki Robertson for making the statement as an individual citizen, but it does ring a little hollow with his role as deputy PM.
https://teara.govt.nz/en/conscription-conscientious-objection-and-pacifism/page-2
Has anyone seen any commentary in the Australian federal election campaign about the New Bradford Plan?
I can see Queensland Labor are pretty keen especially after the last big floods.
Was just thinking about whether Australia would go full-noise nationbuilding to replace Ukrainian wheat production, in time.
New Bradfield scheme on agenda as north Queensland prepares for floods (brisbanetimes.com.au)
Mad Bob (Bob Katter), usually have something on the Bradford Plan as it's one of his "Pet Projects".
Actually the scheme has been assured funding. Still subject to a business case being released in June.
More info here.
Coincidentally the latest Caspian Report covered some of the history of this plan.
Lovely and even-handed work by Mr Hickey this morning on the political economy of inflation and real estate capitalism.
The dirty little secrets inside our nation of inflation (substack.com)
Hickey absolutely nails it.
The money shot….'Neither party wants to acknowledge the real causes of our inflation: explosive housing costs driven by leveraged investment demand and super-powered by monopoly power across most of the economy.'
Vote Luxon for PM and risk following Sri Lanka into economic disaster.
If you love tax cuts be warned
While our government may not be able to control things like hits to the tourism sector by the covid crisis.
Or rising costs of crude oil and wheat due to the war in Ukraine.
Or making unavoidable cuts to our agricultural emissions to save the planet.
Over the things our government can control, New Zealand would be very poorly served if we copied Sri Lanka's "Ill advised" tax cuts.
The other thing that sunk the Sri Lanka economy was that country’s massive amount of overseas borrowing.
The legacy of massive overseas borrowing by the Key government to bail out the financiers and billionaire investors who lost their investments after the GFC also has to be accounted for in this country.
Actually it's this Labour government that has borrowed the most in many decades.
Both our public and private sector debt is astonishingly high under this government.
You paint a misleading picture Ad. It is always better to deal in facts.
The profligate high-spending Key/English government added a huge amount to public debt between 2008-17 after the Clark/Cullen government of 1999-2008 had massively reduced public debt. The Ardern/Robertson government, 2017-onwards, was in the process of reducing public debt as the pandemic hit when, of course, public debt was bound to balloon.
You can see this from the 25 year chart on this site.
https://tradingeconomics.com/new-zealand/government-debt
The clear message being Vote Labour/Green for sound financial management.
good info bearded .Luxons slip ups and selfishness shown up by direct questioning from Jack Tane put Nationals policy of crumbs for the poor and huge tax windfalls for the well off and the very well off like Luxon in the spotlight. Luxons plan was as inflationary as Labours as well so own goal by Luxon.Tane should have asked Luxon if he would cut Air NZ bailout to.Luxon was fuming by the end of the interview.Tane only mentioned the tax cuts Luxon would get from his parliamentry salary $18,000 a year not the income from his 7 rental properties and other investments maybe up to $30,000 a year plus in tax cuts. While the vast majority do it hard .Then govt revenue drops and no doubt National would have to cut spending on public services like Health,education,policing, and welfare denying payments to the homeless and disadvantaged.
Excellent all round thanks Bearded Git. Selected stats can often skew the view.
Your cited graph net debt exploding under Labour-Greens in 2020-2021.
Back in 2019 Roberston sort-of still had a debt target.
Grant Robertson blurs the line on his debt target | Stuff.co.nz
But he’s basically given up. Net core Government debt is now $123 billion, 35% of our GDP.
Grant Robertson urges caution after Government books bounce back from Covid – NZ Herald
Much of that he threw at employers as wage subsidies to keep us sane in 2020.
Treasury has warned about the implications.
Treasury warning to Government: Trillions of dollars in 'unsustainable' debt cycle – NZ Herald
A decently-briefed Luxon would not find it hard to show where this debt has not been good for us.
And the books will be worse then forecast,due to the problem with falling asset values.The NZ superannuation fund lost 1.2 billion in the first two months of this year,which will have doubled in the last 2 months.
Those ethical investments are good creators of wealth destruction.
ACC will have a double problem with falling investment values,and increased medical costs not due to more accidents,but increased wages for health such as vehicle registration,fuel levy,income levy etc.
It "exploded" because of the pandemic as i said before,,,d'oh.
You would have just crashed the economy would you?
Shovelling an untagged $60b was not the only way to address the crisis.
Our grandchildren are going to be paying for the set of decisions they made in a hurry in April 2020.
New Zealand Gross GDP 43.6% Nett GDP 11.6%
Norway Gross GDP 41.4% Nett GDP -121%
Sweden Gross GDP 37.3% Nett GDP 5.5%
U K Gross GDP 104.5%Nett GDP 91.8%
USA Gross GDP 133.9%Nett GDP 98.7
Germany Gross GDP 69.7%Nett GDP 50.1
Australia Gross GDP 57.3%Nett GDP 34.4
Now NZ’s is 53% during a pandemic and a war?
How does New Zealand compare? You decide.
History is making that public debt binge and easy Reserve Bank money to make the evaluation decision pretty easy:
Pandemic response funding
+Reserve Bank credit availability
+manufactured house price spike
+global supply chain crisis
+Ukraine War
= local and global inflation and interest rates heading for 10% per year
So Patricia you can decide out of the following consequences:
$4 91 per litre petrol, $3.9 per litre diesel,
$7 for a bag of apples,
Mortgage payments doubling in a year,
And the quickest and highest class separation since 1985.
Anyone here remember October 1987?
Is it any different anywhere else?
… is not an argument in anyone's favour. Nor particularly relevant to us: it is our government that intervened the most per capita across the OECD..
We have 3 weeks to Budget 2022 and to the Carbon Zero budget.
Will the greatest and fastest debt+public subsidy in our history get us anywhere?
It is bad Ad, but could be miles worse. I have just read an article on Stephanie Browitt a survivor of Te Puia o Whakari White Island.
It is humbling and uplifting and says a great deal about the human spirit and our ability to overcome difficulties. Despair does more damage.
Hindsight is being clever after the fact. Luxon may think he has a handle on things, and yes he may improve with advice, but truly steam was coming out his ears and he was very red with shock at being challenged by Tame.
This is a double whammy, Pandemic dollars plus the oil shock/ wheat/ sunflower oil/ all combining to create difficult conditions.
Robertson and we are between a rock and a hard place. I don’t think the Opposition has any answers, just move the pieces and pay their piper.
We are a very inter related World now, and Luxon is no diplomat.
Sri Lanka has been operating a fixed exchange rate to reach the present situation. NZ went through a similar currency crisis in 1984 and has floated its exchange rate since.
The differences are NZ has a lot more space for fiscal policy interventions, the country mostly borrows in NZ currency (so if the govt wants any such debt to be repaid, or guaranteed the country has the means to make that payment).
As a result of this the countries are not really comparable.
You are correct Nic, Sri Lanka and New Zealand are not directly comparable.
But it would be foolish to ignore the lesson of Sri Lanka. Because you reap what you sow.
The Grim reaper.
Christopher Luxon sharpens his metaphorical scythe for tax cuts.
You reap what you sow.
The takeaway lesson for New Zealand is this; If you really want to take radical measures to protect the environment and the climate, you must be prepared to tax the rich to pay for it.
Luxon on climate change.
'Random' [sic] government activity at huge cost is dangerous..
Unfortunately that narrative places the rich in the benefactor position of paying for a countries climate policy. Since they are paying they will ultimately determine the terms of the transition off fossil fuel. I don't think this is going to accelerate the transition. This is unfortunate as NZ can afford to fund many transitional policies as is, and wont actually face such a currency crisis as a result.
Sri Lanka floated the Rupee in 2001….as always the lender determines the conditions of the credit.
Do you have a source for that claim?
Reuters has articles describing the Central Bank devaluing to slow foreign exchange losses and the Rupee is otherwise described as a closed currency (not available outside Sri Lanka).
"Sri Lanka has a floating exchange rate system since 2001 which allowed the independent adjustment of the exchange rate according to the market forces of demand and supply. However, there could be interventions in the market for the purpose of curbing excess volatility in the exchange rate. The CBSL prescribes maximum net open position (NOP) limits for LCBs and closely monitors the activities in the domestic foreign exchange market to ensure an orderly functioning of the market."
https://www.cbsl.gov.lk/en/financial-system/financial-markets/domestic-foreign-exchange-market
A floating exchange rate is neither a panacea nor is it immune to manipulation.
I think its floating inside Sri Lanka is how to read that. But clearly their arrangements are not providing financial stability due to the amount of foreign denominated debt the country has taken on.
NZs situation is quite far from that.
Not at all…it is quite evident that the suppliers of goods from offshore no longer accept the Rupee as payment and want hard currency and Sri Lanka has run out of reserves…a situation any economy, including NZ could face,
Confidence in a currency is tied to collateral and its obvious all confidence in the Sri Lankan economy has been lost….a floating exchange rate dosnt function when confidence is lost.
It is a fair weather mechanism.
The foreign debts of Sri Lanka are not a recent thing.
One of the main reasons importers would not want to accept Rupee is because the only exchange market for that is inside Sri Lanka.
NZs situation is quite far from that.
The Sri Lankan Rupee is as tradable as the NZD….if you can find any takers
Top Traded Currencies
NZ comes in at #11.
Yep, we're a speculative currency that trades WAAAAAY above requirement.
Theatre company tries to put on a queer culture sex education show for teens and their parents. Called The Family Sex Show (yes, really). All hell breaks loose. Stock writes a very funny but also nuanced and intelligent post about what happened and what the problems are and in the process breaks the binary.
https://twitter.com/wekatweets/status/1518337821831958528?s=21
The Family Sex Show was advertised as suitable for 5yrs +.
Link to the cleaned up website that now doesn’t suggest children use Google to search for “animals that masturbate” so they can draw pictures of them, can be found here:
https://thefamilysexshow.com/tfss
The Family Sex Show
It’s indicative of how far they are removed from age-appropriate content, to see what still remains after they have “scrubbed” their site.
hmm, I'm seeing conflicting things about the age bracket. But yeah, that's pretty clear, and yep, their sense of what's ok is well off. But we knew that from the name. I wish I could feel some confidence that lessons might be learned.
I had a good look when the story broke, and took particular notice of the recommended age for the tour venues. At that time is was definitely 5yrs+.
Might have changed since the issue was highlighted.
I was mostly following on twitter, and as per usual there was a lot of exclammation and not a lot of backing up.
Sorry, meant had a good look at the website and the venues promoting, not just tweets.
I got that 🙂 You had a better look at it than me.
The title "the family sex show" is a red flag for me.
Introduction to knowledge about sex (and sex itself ) needs to be age appropriate.
Animals masturbating? Please. As an adult I don't see why I need to know about that. What is the purpose of getting kids to google search it? It embeds the idea that you can search for things of a sexual nature on the net……..
I am glad to hear apple a putting in a filter on their devices that filters out nudity. Good.
Always found this pretty funny…and sad
And here we are…
/
https://twitter.com/Tom_Winter/status/1517694818041880577
Can you elaborate on where you think 'here' is? And how you think we got there?
Here is innocents endangered. Rhetoric got us there.
Clarity not a strong point?
What rhetoric and from whom?
60,000 of new irrigated land on the other side of the Queensland ranges, funded by the Morrison government. One big new dam and several major reservoirs.
Morrison’s green light for Queensland’s Hells Gates Dam threatens Great Barrier Reef, experts warn | Queensland | The Guardian
This is the first part of the New Bradfield Scheme that is a revised version of the big Bradfield Scheme of 1942.
New Bradfield scheme on agenda as north Queensland prepares for floods (brisbanetimes.com.au)
This is irrigation on a terraforming scale.
If the Australian Federal government wants to essentially replace much of Ukraine's agricultural production, pulling all the climate change floodwater from Queensland and tunneling it through the ranges to the west, and link up with the Murray-Darling, would be the way to do it.
I imagine there are plenty of areas in New Zealand that could easily grow wheat. For instance, Central Otago, where they tend to have very dry, hot summers.
Who knows, going forward, wheat production could become more profitable and less damaging to the environment than dairy production given that the set up and ongoing costs should be a lot lower I imagine.
Further to that, there is quite a bit of grain production in that area already, so could potentially be expanded.
https://www.odt.co.nz/rural-life/rural-life-other/grain-production-passes-1million-tonnes
There's not a lot of wheat left growing in Canterbury now that it's almost fully irrigated. It's solid dairy as far as the eye can see,
But it's odd going up to Houhora in the Far North and seeing what was pretty average dairy country converted into avocados.
Then you must have one eye closed….wheat production has steadily increased in NZ since the dairy boom began and around 80% of it is from Canterbury.
Its also the largest pea production area in the Southern hemisphere,with the longest harvest season.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/rural/2020/02/longest-pea-harvest-in-the-world-underway-in-canterbury.html
Peas are a huge growth crop.
They are being used as gluten free substitutes in an array of new foods.![yes yes](https://cdn2.thestandard.org.nz/wp-content/plugins/ark-wysiwyg-comment-editor/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/thumbs_up.png?x42494)
Gluten-free is going to be a big thing going forward given the amount of wheat production going off-line with the current conflict.
The problem is for many countries "gluten-free" means zero food.
Rice,corn,peas, potatos,cassava….fruit,veges ,plenty of GF crops to replace …wheat.
Fill your boots.
I am aware of the volumes Russia and Ukraine produce.
Regardless of war…25,000 die of starvation every day around the world.
I read somewhere over 20% of food produced is…wasted.
If you really want to scare yourself.
Interesting observations by PZ there Red.
Insightful comments too.
Zeihan regards Russia's whole existence is threatened!
A perfect storm mounting for rampant inflation….and the nuclear option.
And as mentioned in the article, seed crops…a lot of seed grown here to supply offshore producers.
But if it was so easy (and profitable) there wouldnt have been the mass conversion to dairy in the region that has occurred the past 20 years or so.
A lot of the conversions wernt by choice….as said before, inflated property values are not only a housing problem.
Canterbury produces 70% of the worlds carrot seed.Agree on the land pricing,that was a result of low livestock prices and wool.There is still with some arable farmers who use livestock when they rotate the land to lie fallow,and put it back into pasture.
With constant droughts and rivers drying up and suffering degradation from nitrogen run off , cryptosporidiam andfaecal matter. Growing grains such as wheat and sunflower would be far more enviromentaly sustainable. With high prices profitable as well. also Chinas expansionism it would be smart to reduce our dpendence on Dairy production.
Arable farming is inherently risky….the returns are seasonal and fluctuate…especially when compared to dairy with its consistent output and monthly cheques.
As many cropping farmers are want to say, arable farming is a capital gain game….the capital outlay to return is considerable and dont really reflect the risks…and everyone in the chain clips the ticket.
My son Grant who was a Trade Cert Baker in a former life, tells me New Zealand produces flour that tends to make a heavy / wet crumb. It was mixed with Australian flour to lighten the crumb. With dry conditions and growing temperatures and improved varieties our wheat crumb may improve.
Other valuable crops could be sunflowers for oil and hemp for clothing As dairy prices go into retreat, other farming may begin.
UK think tank report on Russia's imperial delusion, what went wrong, expectations and conclusions.
The foremost conclusion is that Russia is now preparing, diplomatically, militarily and economically, for a protracted conflict
[…]
The pattern is universal. Almost all of Russia’s modern military hardware is dependent upon complex electronics imported from the US, the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Japan, Israel, China and further afield.57
[…]
Finally, the Russian decision to double down is a high-stakes gamble. If Russia mobilises and eventually overcomes Ukrainian resistance then NATO will face an aggressive, isolated and militarised state. If Russia loses then President Putin has now begun radicalising the population in the pursuit of policies that he will struggle to deliver. Failure to defeat the Ukrainian state after relentlessly comparing it to the Nazi regime may have serious consequences for Putin and those around him. To frame a conflict as existential and to lose must necessarily call the suitability of a leader into question among Russia’s political elites. NATO states therefore need to consider how to manage escalation pathways that follow if Russia is not only defeated in Donbas but finds its newly mobilised and poorly trained troops, with few remaining stocks of precision munitions, unable to deliver a victory in the summer. The death of Putin’s political project is plausible, but it has already inflicted immense damage internationally and risks doing considerably more.
https://static.rusi.org/special-report-202204-operation-z-web.pdf
The image on the cover of that report is remarkably striking. Will read.
Them turrets get around and fuck the crews. Cannon fodder.
https://taskandpurpose.com/analysis/russian-tanks-ukraine-turrets-blown-off/
Another chilling quote:
Probably scrambling up more forces by declaring war is possible. I think the biggest issue for the Russians will be arming the new troops.
I have seen a number of videos of Russian soldiers using vintage rifles etc. And, they are having trouble manufacturing new gear to replace the existing equipment being lost due to the sanctions.
Troop plus equipment do not equal capability. There is one hell of a lot more to it than this – you may find this extremely interesting.
Thank you for that. That was a really good read, and very informative.
Have you seen this latest video that adds quite a bit of weight to the theory going around for awhile that Putin has some serious disease such as Parkinsons or cancer.
Certainly looks a bit weird, and not the normal way people tend to sit at a table.
Seems alot more composed and lucid than the leader of the …free' world imo.
LOL. Probably not wrong there.
His right side doesn't look too flash.
https://twitter.com/Team_Stollberg/status/1498762759357480969
https://twitter.com/AIertaMundiaI/status/1517346393446391808
As someone often critical of poor legislation, I appreciated this report from RNZ:
I was impressed at how they incorporate the principle of reflexivity into praxis:
Here's an insight into the psychology that comes into play:
You can summarise that last sentence as stakeholder interactivity. The Q+A format drives the process of design towards optimal output – in theory. As a grouch like me would point out, results suggest the theory often gets flawed by the practice!
Wait a sec. "Its boss describes it as “the Government's legislative advisors”. So legal advice and legislative advice are different critters. Ok, got it. A fine distinction!
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/the-house/audio/2018838304/painting-the-legal-jigsaw-one-piece-at-a-time
Crown Law, parts of DPMC, and legal counsel within the sponsoring Departments also have strong drafting roles. Some Departments are a lot better at gaming out the operational practise of new legislation than others.
I wonder how long it’ll be before someone on the opposition’s benches tries this.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/apr/24/angela-rayner-hits-back-at-claims-of-basic-instinct-tactics-to-distract-pm?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
Or maybe the Daily Herald.
Not very likely, still waiting for them to expose their mythical "big brains".
https://twitter.com/Thefinnigans/status/1518323753364590592?cxt=HHwWgMCs1ZjalZIqAAAA
Chooks are scary.
https://twitter.com/Abraxsys/status/1517937912574140422
They are a forest bird after all – very cool.
Helping a mate with his emus I often thought thank dog chooks aren't this big.
I sometimes thought tramping in NZ would have been a very different proposition if the moa was not extinct![surprise surprise](https://cdn2.thestandard.org.nz/wp-content/plugins/ark-wysiwyg-comment-editor/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/omg_smile.png?x42494)
Didn't make the msm last year, but a noteworthy report from the leading edge:
Physics grad went huh??
A revolutionary paradigm-shifter, seemingly plausible due to replication (two teams of physicists), but we await further developments that may point to utility.
Quanta presents a summary of that recipe on their page. It uses this triad:
1. many-body localisation (a row of particles get stuck in synch)
2. eigenstate order (they retain symmetry when spin-flipped)
3. periodic driver (laser light triggers system flipping which perseveres)
A 2015 paper described it in these words:
Thus authenticity to claim the first workable demonstration of the mythical perpetual-motion machine. Now the challenge is to invent uses that users deem valuable…
A climate activist, Wynn Bruce, has died after setting himself on fire outside the US Supreme Court.
…
If it was indeed a protest then it must be witnessed. At it's end a protest is a performance, and if it is ignored then it is futile. Sadly for Wynn Bruce, and for all of us, it is seemingly easier to despair the systemic inaction of the status quo powers.
I encourage anyone feeling despair to reach out to those around you, like action on climate change, we can all support each other through this, be it just conversation and a cuppa, advice and encouragement, all the way through to developing and honing skills in gardening and composting, to reusing and reprocessing materials; We can all work towards food and material sustainability and that really helps to feel more positive.
There's context:
One must respect another's intent in ending their lives via such signalling. Not for us to judge spiritual motivations. The assumption that changes in public policy will result (triggered by mass realisation that they must happen) is based on a misread of mass psychology, unfortunately…
Are you saying that an isolated act, assuming it political, of self-immolation is not affecting public policy change or that any isolated and individual act is ineffective? Either way, it sounds your personal belief (aka reckon) rather than a generally accepted fact.
When a single act of self-immolation catalyses a movement, as has happened in other countries, you will be hard-pushed to ignore and categorically deny its influence in each and every case.
Yeah, just my take on the effect it seems to have on western countries. Your point is valid – a single immolation triggered the Arab Spring phenomenon that brought down a couple of dictators & threatened a few others.
So I suppose a better generalisation would be that the catalysis effect is culture-dependent. The symbolism activates a shared feeling that is likely to ramp up via contagion in suitable cultural/political contexts…
Population transfers, summary executions, mass deportations and the beginnings of an attempt to erase a nation and it's people from the textbooks.
But sure, it's all about de-nazification and NATO.
/
"Here in the Federation Council they found out that not all children" from the liberated territories of Donbass "have sufficient command of the Russian language. They will be retrained."
https://twitter.com/md_rud/status/1514170489761148931
On February 24, Vladimir Putin announced the start of a "special operation" and Russian troops invaded Ukraine. Immediately after that, employees of the Enlightenment group of companies, one of the largest and oldest publishers of educational and pedagogical literature in the country, were urged to remove the “incorrect” references to Ukraine and Kyiv from all school textbooks. "Mediazona" talked with the editors of the publishing house about how the "cleansing" of history, geography and literature is going on.
[…]
So, from paragraphs that give examples of the heraldry of different states, including flags, a few years ago it was strongly recommended to remove the flag of Ukraine and replace it with the flag of any other country. If it is necessary to give an example of the capital in the chapter, Kyiv was replaced by another capital. “A couple of times I had to remove the US flag as well, but it’s simpler there, our program pays little attention to world history,” says one of the Enlightenment employees. Now editors should remove references to Ukraine wherever possible.
“That is, we are faced with the task of making it as if Ukraine simply does not exist,” his colleague says. “It's much worse when the textbook just doesn't mention a country. A person grows up without a knowledge base about some country, and then it is much easier for him to believe what he is told about it from TV.
The hardest part is for those who work on history textbooks: it is often impossible to remove references to Ukraine and Kyiv without compromising the content, then you have to change the wording to more “safe” ones.
https://zona.media/article/2022/04/23/enlightenment
google translate
More stuff catching on fire in Russia. Now it is an oil refinery between Ukraine and Moscow mysteriously catching fire.
Prior to that there was a mysterious fire at a weapons research facility.
The there was a fire at a Russia's biggest chemical plant.
Now the fire I just mentioned above.
Lots of people smoking where they shouldn't perhaps?
Perhaps the quickest way to stop the war might be to target all the vodka factories. Inhumane I know …![devil devil](https://cdn2.thestandard.org.nz/wp-content/plugins/ark-wysiwyg-comment-editor/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/devil_smile.png?x42494)
Yes!! How to pass that idea on to the Ukrainians?
Hard to be grateful to the French for retaining Macron, but there it is.
You can probably thank Poots for a good chunk of that outcome.
Poots is on a roll.
Ljubljana, Slovenia (Reuters)Slovenia's populist Prime Minister, Janez Janša, lost a national election on Sunday as the environmentalist Freedom Movement party won more votes than his SDS party, according to preliminary figures from election authorities.
Janša, who had hoped to win a fourth term in office, conceded that he had been defeated in the vote, adding however that his SDS party had secured more votes than ever before.
"The results are what they are. Congratulations to the relative winner," Janša said, addressing his supporters.
The election had been expected to be tight but the official preliminary figures showed the Freedom Movement, a newcomer in the election, leading with 34.34% of the vote, far more than expected, while the SDS secured 23.83%, based on 98.20% of counted ballots.
That would give the Freedom Movement, which campaigned on a transition to green energy, an open society and the rule of law, 40 seats in the 90-seat parliament, and the SDS 28 seats.
https://edition.cnn.com/2022/04/25/europe/slovenia-election-environmentalists-beat-populists-intl/index.html
Cleaned up but unlikely to ever be forgotten.
https://twitter.com/IAPonomarenko/status/1518213277515497472
Musk/Twitter saga update: https://www.reuters.com/article/twitter-m-a-musk-investors-exclusive-idUSKCN2MG0K7
So Twitter
Liberals are freaked. Dunno why, but useful insights here:
You can see why Musk wants to clean the thing up, eh? Then there's this glimpse into the twits & their leverage on the msm…
Bill Gates shorted Tesla.
https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1517707521343082496?cxt=HHwWgMC-qeK8_Y8qAAAA
And there were consequences…
Humanity is divided into serious folk & fun folk? Well, some are a bit of both, eh? Ole Bill was just having a bit of fun but young Elon didn't see the funny side.
Microsoft share price has lost 20% this year,Twitter is up 10% on the Musk offer.
As the US Fed has forced short positions on the SNAG stocks such as the FANG's,all the Billionaires will have downgrades in their wealth positions.
Seems to me that Musk is a bored rich boy who gets his kicks seeing how he can manipulate markets…..too much money and spare time.
They all are,the troublesome ones are at the WEF meetings,some of the thinking being out of the worst dystopian novels.
Joyful celebrations in France overnight.
https://twitter.com/steve_hanke/status/1518377269743529985
Macron wins by around 5 million votes with around 12 million non voters
NOT much of a choice under the runoff system,and Macron will have the problem of increased ECB interest rates,that will now come sooner then later.
and a population thats not afraid to take to streets.
Car burning season is coming regardless of who won the election.
https://www.thelocal.fr/20191231/is-the-famous-french-tradition-of-torching-cars-dying-out/
Can anyone explain how the proposed Rotorua Council elections would work?
https://letstalk.rotorualakescouncil.nz/letstalk-rotorualakescouncil-nz-local-bill
"It's part of a larger conversation, because there are councils all around the country right now that are talking about the idea of co-governance. It's a very important kaupapa."
In a statement on Friday, Coffey said: "This is a Local Bill, so the changes are being requested by the Rotorua District Council, not the Government. As such, the Rotorua District Council will need to consider the implications of the Bill of Rights analysis, alongside the select sommittee."
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2022/04/attorney-general-david-parker-deems-rotorua-council-s-proposed-m-ori-ward-restructure-discriminatory.html
"The proposed arrangements in the Bill would make the number of council members for the Māori ward disproportionately higher than the number of council members for the General ward in comparison to their respective populations," Parker wrote in his legal analysis published on Friday.
"As the disadvantaged group is those on the General roll, changing representation arrangements away from proportional representation therefore creates a disadvantage for non-Māori as they cannot in future elect to change rolls."
Parker concluded: "The Bill appears to limit the right to be free from discrimination affirmed in s 19 of the Bill of Rights Act and cannot be justified."
Yes, I saw that. What I don't understand is how the voting would work. What is the at large vote? Does everyone get two votes (ward and at large)?
Lol, kind of like Māori now.
I imagine you have a vote in your ward and an at large vote.
As to proportion..
"The Council is currently pursuing a law change to enable an undemocratic representation model to be implemented. The model it prefers would consist of three Māori ward seats, three general ward seats, and four at-large seats. However, adopting this arrangement would give the 19,791 citizens on the Māori roll 2.6 times the voting power of the 51,618 citizens on the general roll.
The proposed model is not only unfair, it is also unlawful. Clause 2 of Schedule 1A of the Local Electoral Act requires representation from wards to be proportional to their electoral populations. "
https://www.democracyaction.org.nz/rotorua_lakes_council_pushing_for_maori_co_governance
Onya, Glen.
/
https://twitter.com/Wilson__Valdez/status/1518306626675134467
107 years ago the Ottoman Empire kicked off it's effort to exterminate it's two million Armenian subjects. New Zealand is yet to acknowledge Armenian suffering. For shame.
Countries that Recognize the Armenian Genocide
https://www.armenian-genocide.org/recognition_countries.html
https://www.newsroom.co.nz/a-stain-on-our-moral-record