disagree there cleangreen.
it was a fairly scrappy affair in the first half but the team settled into a rhythm in second half.
this was a chance for a lot of second string players to make a mark.
jordie barrett scored 4 tries and had a good all round game.
we had hookers putting good kicks through to set up tries.
ok, the result was never in doubt but the nature of the all blacks performance in the final test of a long season was heartening for this fan.
of more concern is the lopsided score england vs australia. 37-18 to england.
we need australian rugby to be stronger than it is at the moment.
ps, i don’t pay for any sport nowadays, its such an old fashioned habit.
We’re a country the size of Melbourne, generating sports teams that continue to conquer the world.
In Italy we just beat a country with the economic capacity to buy all of our top Rugby players multiple times over if it wanted.
Currently we’re battling it out with Pakistan, a country with 202 million people and over 10 million cricket players. We would be lucky to scrape together 2,000 top players.
Sport is one of New Zealand’s top industries.
It’s also one of the fastest upward routes out of deprivation for many of our citizens.
Well I certainly dislike the kiwi battler meme – bit of a cliche now – I dislike the financial/money angle for sure but hate? Bit OTT there – go and dig the garden you seem a bit worked up old chap.
Anyway I cannot be bothered getting hassled by the likes of you and james so I’ll fuck off and leave you to it.
You got reciprocated twerp. And ad, well the little battler bullshit stuck in my throat esp after the non acceptance from him imo last night that iwi organisations are more than corporates.
But being given shade from a rwnj like you is actually a badge of honour in leftie circles so thanks for the cred LOL
We have issues like climate change confronting the world, yet our puppet media and desperate people dribble on about a sports victory against a minnow team .
Rugby in Aotearoa is more than just a sport.
Rugby clubs have unified communities for generations.
Professional and labourer, town and country, Maori and Pakeha.
It is also how we grew up a little, and got out from the mother country yoke.
That doesn’t mean I can’t be concerned by inequality and CC.
Sport is simply bread and circuses for the masses. Our inane obsession with it says a lot about the mental immaturity of our Country. There are far more important pursuits in life. Sure, keep fit by doing some sport, but professionalism has turned it into something as bad as fundamentalist religion.
Ad isn’t always wrong marty mars. Don’t be prejudiced against him because he sees most things through a money lens. It is true that sport generates money, gives us an international profile, gives opportunities to see the world for low income men and women, gives jobs now to many low income families in a job–poor society (despite rock star rah rah statistics (finely made to match international specifications).
Ad can be relied on to take a certain pragmatic approach, and is pretty consistent, so we know what to expect and respect in his opinions.
I cannot tell you how much I am looking forward to the World Women’s 7’s in Hamilton next year. We’ve already booked tickets. There are a couple of our greats who are close to retirement.
Gould might have also mentioned how blessed New Zealand has been to have waves of Pasifika migration to draw talent from across so many sporting fields including Rugby.
In some respects also we are good at enabling female participation as a matter of public policy – but only in the last two years. That’s unusual in global terms still, even if slowly improving.
Don’t get stuck on critique savenz. Bad for mental health. You are so good at taking a country-wide and global view so we know our problems, and also seeing what we could do. Perhaps each separate critical para you state how a change could improve or turn all negative into partly positive I think making a small positive input all the time may make a great change to the mood of the readers.
David Slack’s comment: “You can’t rely on the weather but there are two things you can set your clock by in November: NCEA exams and NCEA exam controversy. This year the level three history exam provided the popcorn. A question used the world ‘trivial’ and students complained this was not a word they knew. There was much rolling of eyes by people of a greater age.”
” There are more than 170,000 words in the Oxford dictionary, and it’s not easy staying on top of them all. John Key, an Auckland businessman and retired politician, left school with a B Bursary and prospered in the world of buying and selling money. He was once a luncheon guest of the Queen. They shared a glass of champagne, hollandaise eggs, beef, a panna cotta dessert and some cheese. “It was quite a fulsome lunch,” he told reporters afterwards, “I’m fairly full.” Over the past eight centuries the word fulsome has been used to mean copious, and it has also been used to mean foul, odious and rotten. Which meaning did he intend? What a conundrum of syzygy.”
Which meaning of syzygy did Slack mean? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syzygy – bright students would ponder the selection and come up with a simile not present: conjoined. Explain that to the class & the other students would be wondering `what does conjoined mean?’
Not in NCEA they can’t. A student asked me whether the word ‘differ’ was the same derivation as ‘different’. I couldn’t answer as an exam supervisor. All I could do was tell him I was not allowed and to do his best.
Some lucky bastards can be as fat as santa and have every other measurement within normal parameters – blod pressure, heart rate, uric acid, liver function, all of that shit. And live to a ripe old age.
In a nutshell: an AB win acts like mass medication to make Kiwis feel good about themselves (Big People) and their country. An AB loss OTOH makes Kiwis feel like Small People in a small country at the bottom of the World (AKA trivial).
Watched in horror on Friday as an elderly male bus driver jumped out of the blue Metro bus he was driving and ran to the vehicle in front. Karate chopped the front windscreen and then punched the young woman driver in the head 2 or 3 times. All happened in peak hour traffic and very quickly. Where do I lodge a report about this ? Police and Auckland Transport ? I have the bus number / time / place etc. And another witness who was with me.
Thank you, Ad. By the time I got out of my car the traffic was moving and the car driver behind me was blowing his horn. The passengers on the bus were not impressed but not sure they could see the violence.
Hard for anyone else to do something in that short space and time. And that fact of crush of traffic and impatience is probably behind the violence, and what might happen at home to an offending female explodes in public.
They are under so much stress, bus and truck drivers. Very sad it comes to that.
I feel that this could tie into something I noticed the other day. The driver of the local recycling truck came along on his busy round. They have a specially built cabin with the wheel on the left side, near the kerb, and space to stand behind it. They draw in, empty the bins into the moving auger? system carefully, make sure they stop that before they reach in to clear anything etc. and quickly move on to the next place. A busy and lonely job,.
I happened to be on the pavement nearby and said Good morning, no response. I spoke again about the weather, but no appearance of being heard or seen. I wondered if he was deaf, and watched how he went about it. He was concentrating on the job, finished dealing with a number of bins, and didn’t look up at all, head down all the time. It seemed, he didn’t want to have any interaction with others around, he seemed sullen, internally angry and unhappy.
It looked to me as if he had a major negative attitude brewing in his brain, was isolating himself from the general public, and it seemed as if a huge resentment and hate might be simmering which left me feeling very uneasy.
What’s your point gabby? Do you want to live in a friendly, happy, interactive society or not? If you have something to say can you make it have some point instead of the first thing that passes through your head momentarily.
That’s what you get when you pay $20 p/h in a stressful job. You mention he was elderly, and male, anything else you want to add in there Patricia? I’m guessing he was not white, thus not fitting the white male privilege… that people love to blame on everything these days… but happy to be proved wrong.
savenz
You are sounding like the way that China is thinking about reporting facts and truth, that they should be filtered in a way so that the results match their requirements for the ‘right’ appearance to be presented that matches the desired approach and image.
Yep, if you want to give a description do it properly, not subjectively, revealing your own bias or these days it seems more a concern about woke identity politics as a sort of brain washing, if you don’t want to reveal a person’s physical appearance, then just use the word, bus driver. The police will want to know anyway.
Actually I first thought is was not a big thing, but actually thinking about a bus driver that has actually left the vehicle to attack a women, actually sounds like a crime that is a police matter, especially as there is a growing issue in Auckland of fake drivers driving commercial vehicles and I have a friend who was hospitalised by one .
If he is that out of control he is assaulting people in public who knows what other things might be revealed.
Also maybe the guy goes home and beats up his wife, who knows?
Assault is a crime for police, not for AT, which is more for bad driving.
If you remove indentity politics, and it’s resulting gender, racial prejudice you get this.
I witnessed a bus driver hop out of the bus, go up to a car, smash the window and assault the driver.
Identity is irrelevant to the event, or the reality of a crime being committed.
Identity politics effect on Law results in a doubled sentence, due to the victims identity, for the male bus driver if the act or harm is identicle if a woman was the bus driver.
Don’t call Auckland Transport, they will do nothing. Call the police and lodge a report, if the driver is that bad they might run someone over next time they have a road rage attack and at least with the police there will be more chance of them catching who did it and working out whether the driver should be working with the public or not.
Also the police can check whether he has a fake bus license or not, which is a growing problem of both fake licenses and also identity swaps where the person driving does not match the whoever was supposed to be driving the vehicle.
Know someone who was hospitalised by that scam. Police are investigating and I think did bring charges, but the person who caused the accident looked nothing like the drivers license photo and tried to flee the scene in his delivery van. Meanwhile our hospitals are filling up and people’s lives being destroyed by injury by these fakes.
AT employ so many people doing processes it will never get anywhere, let alone they understand the seriousness of what is going on with drivers attacking people and all the fakes out there.
Gee you see a woman punched in the head two or three times and two days later ask on a forum where do you lodge a report?
It’s amazes me that people can’t work shit like this out and are happy to drive on and do nothing like call the police when they see a young woman assaulted.
Gee a little inadequate twerp makes all sorts of ill informed and ignorant judgments about another based on a question on this forum and shows, once again, why he is a waste of space and a loser.
It amazes me that people like that, so puffed up with their own privilege, just mouth off without engaging their brains.
Not stupidness but boredom – the boredom of a right wing nut job when pretending is even too much.
No, James has a point there. The incident should have been reported on Friday. As it was assault it probably should have been a 111 call but a *555 probably would have worked as well.
That said, this speaks of what I said the other day. People seeing an action that they don’t know how to handle because it’s outside of their experience.
The New Zealand truckies are workers seeking to stop being required to work over 70 hours a week. That’s 6 days a week 12 hours a day.
Those workers are controlling machinery weighing 1-2 tonnes traveling at 90 kilometers an hour often mere centimeters from the public which includes you and your family.
They don’t want to be worked so hard that they cause deaths.
Another option is to get trains running and a more workable way to transit from them (aka don’t put a port in the middle of downtown Auckland) so that we don’t need all these polluting, road damaging, and dangerous trucks on the road.
“Trucking companies are competing for big contracts at the expense of their staff, a truck driver’s union has warned.
It says the companies are competing for tenders by forcing drivers to accept low pay rates and long work hours.
First Union secretary for transport Jared Abbott said a lot of drivers were working at least 70 hours, the maximum hours allowed per week.
“We see it a lot where people are pushed to break the logbook rules or to breach health and safety in some way.
“Their scared – rightfully so – for their livelihoods to test it and we see it a lot with quite reputable companies where people do test it, they get shafted.”
Part of problem is most truckers are contractors in corporate colours ( mainfreifgt freight Courier post etc) They own the issue as well as many on wages now and in the pass have taken the piss on hours and looking after company vehicals; etc not to mention over the top Union action They in essence shafted themselves Saying that contractor drivers are way more incentivised to align business and individual interest; albeit agree it is a race to the bottom to a degree at the moment driven by procurement division of buyers of freight services not the freight companies themselves
At our NGO committee meeting with ‘Port of Napier’ executives in November 2016 we were advised of this; –
“The truckies have warned the Port of Napier that they will fight rail to retaining their 90% of moving logs to the port”.
So we are fighting a war against truckies who don’t want to use public owned rail period.
As to road safety;
So the Government needs urgently now to sort the truckies out here, as we will loose many lives on our narrow windy roads as the “wall of wood arrives”.
Your key responsibilities as an executive officer
Some key responsibilities may include ensuring that:
• your business practices do not require or encourage
drivers to:
― exceed the speed limits
― exceed regulated driving hours
― fail to meet the minimum rest requirements
― drive while impaired by fatigue.
• heavy vehicles and their loads comply with relevant mass
and dimension requirements
• you remain informed of business performance in regards
to CoR responsibilities
• you lead other parties in the supply chain with effective
guidance with regards to complying with the HVNL
• your decisions do not influence the conduct of the
corporation to breach the law
• systems to manage safety and all requirements and
obligations of the HVNL are in place.”
As I understand it, if an incident occurs the driver’s logs etc are examined to ensure that the workload expected and time taken to deliver was reasonable. If not, the responsibility for the incident is shifted to management.
That was disappointing Gabby. For a second I saw the ch and thought you were talking about chocolate! Choochoos, Thomas the tank engine and all, aren’t they stories that you read to children about long ago ways to get around and go to see at old technology parks? /sarc cleangreen don’t blow a foofoo valve.
Wonder if the truckies would be supportive of a law that prevented them from working more than 8 hours a day and no more than five days a week. They are, after all, correct in that long hours behind driving is dangerous and it’s not just to them but to the rest of the population as well.
I bet they\ truckies would not want to limit themselves to short hours like that and would rather work longer hours, but not to the extent they are pushed now. It wouldn’t be so bad if truckies got extra payment for working unsocial hours, and over the 8 hour limit, which would be justified. They would have been paid properly for their time and effort like that once. And of course there has to be an upper limit otherwise it is too hard on the drivers.
But they are being pressured to go too far for too long, and the roads are not coping. Nine years National had to work out a better transport plan, but no. And their stooge Ken Shirley happily on the one hand talks about how busy the transport industry is and then wants more money spent on roads. He used to be in the Labour Party I think. He knew which side has the best butter and most bread.
David is purposely starting fights in bars so someone will beat him up.
Jo is knowingly getting into positions that cause injury on the rugby field. Jo then aggravates the injury.
Daniel hides his self-harming and tells a counsellor years later after stopping.
Females aren’t the only ones that self-harm. David and Daniel are male. Jo is agender…
… there is an emphasis on seeing self-harm as largely a female issue – see for example a recent Stuff article, “Why are our girls hurting themselves?”
Some research suggests self-harm is more common in females. Other research suggests the number of males and females self-harming is about the same. And don’t forget there are more than two genders.
But even if self-harm is more common in females, it is still an issue for other genders…
… Stuff obtained figures from the Ministry of Health to show there was a significant number – 4,328 – of females aged between 10 and 29 hospitalised due to self-injury last year. Self-injury probably means suicidal behaviour and non-suicidal self-harm.
The figures also show there was a significant number of males hospitalised – 1,630…
… I worry anyone who isn’t female might hesitate to be open about self-harming. They may even fail to recognise that what they are doing is self-harm. This might hinder them asking for help, if it is needed.
A thought provoking post marty. Would this come under mental health?
Perhaps it shows expression of deeply felt pain. More funding for trained help could assist.
How do we create connections to provide community support? Self harm can be so hard to see sometimes. Some harm behaviours need a trigger, some are repeated responses to stress.
This is apparently a growing problem. A symptom of larger social ills?
Perhaps we are ‘connected by the internet’ but are ‘touch deprived’ so have constant grief.
Self harm for males can be exactly the same as females, in being a cry for help. It’s just not addressed, identified, diagnosed as well as females.
One issue for males is risk taking self harm. So the young male who isn’t intentionaly suiciding engages in high risk acts. Driving extremely dangerously combines with “look at me” male behavours. An episode of suicidle thoughts may combine with dangerous driving, as a release.
So the self harm is never identified because they don’t cut themselves etc.
Suicide for men often involves “cry for help” with nobody giving a shit.
Parliaments self immolation victim is a perfect example.
Male teens engage in risk-taking activities and behaviour because they think they’re indestructible, which is fuelled by testosterone spikes and the fact that their brains haven’t fully developed and matured.
It’s mating behavour of look at me, I’m the best, strongest, healthiest driven by sexual chemistry far more complex than just testosterone. You said they think but then said they don’t think.
It’s a direct counter to young females biologically being attracted older men, in that older men have proven to have successful genes. There is no thinking involved in the females mating preference.
Just as there is no thinking involved in females being sexually attracted to males or a male being sexually attracted to other men.
Replicated throughout the animal kingdom.
That is completely different from depression based suicide behavours and self harming.
Your comment is why recognising males with problems is ignored as it just gets attributed to feminist ideology that males are inherently flawed. A male acting out can be a cry for help but is put down as you expressed as just the actions of a stupid male.
It was true for some risk-taking males, just as your initial comment was true for others.
The difficulty with the self harm identified in the article is how an observer is supposed to identify the intention. Does someone get into bar fights because they are insecure and drunk, or because they are intentionally self-destructive? Is a fight a good time for them, reasserting macho dominance? A sportsman playing through an injury: intentional self harm, or foolish machismo “toughing out” the injury? A guy jumping off a wall: poor decision making, or intentional self harm?
Cuts with a razor and (sometimes) prescription overdoses leave little ambiguity.
But yes, just as heart attacks in women are often underdiagnosed because the publicised symptoms tend to be in males, and just as males can be late-diagnosed with eating disorders or breast cancer, self harm in males can be underdiagnosed.
Difficult as very few can deconstruct what they witness from family and freinds. Resulting in family saying they never saw any signs of there loved ones having issues prior to suicide. But they were present.
In the case of ambiguous injuries, there is a shortcoming where if we can’t see it, we can’t count it, and if we can’t count it, we can’t assess it as a need of the population.
And everything is a balance of resources until utopia comes: if a DHB has X$ to spend on public health and wellness campaigns and a greater number of potential compaigns looking for funding, It comes down to which selection of programs will do the greatest good for X$ spent. Which is how qualitative stuff sometimes gets ignored.
Very well said. Acting out often is just what it is: acting out, establishing boundaries, developing identity (and persona). Where warning signs can become tell-tale signs is when a negative repetitive pattern develops, for example.
The scientific literature must be awash with feminist propaganda but I stick with the literature nevertheless if you don’t mind – indeed, there are competing (or rather complementing) scientific hypotheses. But feel free to put up a credible link that supports your statement.
It’s mating behavour [sic] of look at me, I’m the best, strongest, healthiest driven by sexual chemistry far more complex than just testosterone.
Just as well that I didn’t argue that it was all down to “just testosterone”.
You said they think but then said they don’t think.
Please read it again; that isn’t at all what I said.
Your comment is why recognising males with problems is ignored as it just gets attributed to feminist ideology that males are inherently flawed.
This makes no sense whatsoever!? Males are flawed and therefore we ignore their problems or we assume that they don’t have a problems!? You seem to have hang ups about this “feminist ideology” you keep referring to.
A male acting out can be a cry for help but is put down as you expressed as just the actions of a stupid male.
This is exactly the point I was trying to make, which is that correct interpretation of a male acting out is very difficult. You grabbed the wrong end of the stick and went off on your rant.
True that, many males are still stuck in their teenage years. After all, it’s an important market segment for gyms. And don’t get me started on roid rage.
A apposed to females with I’m a princess syndrome manifesting in things like bridezillas who reject males for only offering $1,000 rings vs $5,000 dollar ones. An important market for pointless bits of rock.
All part of the mating behaviour. To you it’s a pointless bit of rock but to her it’s clear sign how much the potential mate ‘values’ her and how far he can and will go to woe her. Many women want their wedding day to be very special and the best day of their lives (AKA the dream wedding) but that doesn’t make them princesses or bridezillas. Reality TV is a misnomer, you know?
What does the man get in turn for this “woman want”. It is clearly not necessary then. It should be “special, best day”. Like out of a fantasy movie. Everything else is equal isn’t it?
So what do men get? Equality speaking. For a fantasy to come true for them?
We’re still talking about the mating ritual, are we? Almost 8 billion people on this planet all chasing fantasies? About half of them are bridezillas and the other half are hapless creatures that cannot and must not get fulfilment (or, as more directly verbalised by the Rolling Stones: satisfaction)? Do you and/or your partner/spouse wear a ring? A pointless bit of metal?
You’re all over the place; does your left hand know what your right hand is doing? You seem to have too much time on your hands …
Well, it seems we do have something in common: an overactive brain that doesn’t know when to stop. For this reason I landed on TS a few years back and I’ve found it very therapeutic as well as educational and informative. Some Standardistas just blow me away. And there’s humour, not quite enough IMO, but at times it is enough to dissipate the worries and stresses of a long day at work and life in general.
You think of something, think “X would like that”, and do it, because you love them. And X does the same, not as a transaction but because they love you.
And sometimes people need reassurance that they are loved, and sometimes all this other crap is going on and future inlaws might be judging and the seating plan can’t have exes close to each other etc etc etc.
If I proposed to someone and they turned me down because the ring wasn’t expensive enough, I’d know it wasn’t reciprocal love and I’d be well out of that. But if someone’s cool with a transactional arrangement, fair enough.
If you want to reject someone then it’s easier to say “you’re ring is not worth enough” rather than “you’re the last man on earth I’d ever want to marry”. Rejected males are not the safest people to be around so it’s best to do it as impersonally as possible.
Yep. I was scared a partner would stab me to death in my sleep once. I had already had to flee through the house shuting myself in a room because my partner used a knife to explain my bank account was empty for good reasons. Getting out of relationships with crazy individuals isn’t easy. Honesty and self preservation conflict.
On a post last week, somebody mentioned a new article by public finance expert Don Gilling on AUT’s Briefing Papers website had disappeared. It is now back online:
It raises questions about the stewardship of the National Library and Archives NZ by the Department of Internal Affairs since these agencies were merged into DIA in 2010. Gilling notes the decline in NLNZ budget under DIA, even while the Department’s overall budget has risen, as well as the increasing proportion of NLNZ budget going to DIA for centrally managed costs. The implication is that DIA is milking NLNZ and Archives to cover other departmental functions.
One might also ask why the DIA is managing the current review of the Library, Archives and Nga Taonga, when there is such an apparent conflict of interest. Brian Easton alluded to this on his Pundit blog some months back:
lprent commented on Don’s article disappearing from Briefing Papers inhis patest post here (link below) and asked if anyone knew Don Gilling etc. he would be interested in seeing the article.
I do know him and was intending contacting him (or Brian Easton who is a very close friend/associate of Don’s) to ask what happened with it. By coincidence, yesterday I met his wife in a shop and mentioned the article and its disappearance from BPs and the fact that there were people here including lprent interested in seeing it. Apparently it had been put up there by someone else, not Don so then taken down. She was going to raise it with Don, but the article was probably already back up on BPs already by that stage.
Apparently Don has been getting a lot of interest and feedback on his thoughts in this article. I noted recently that Don is also now on the Committee of the Friends of the Turnbull Library here in Wellington for the 2018/19 year,
An implication of Don Gilling’s article is that NLNZ & Archives NZ have been subject to the same kind of austerity RNZ suffered under the last government. But, buried layers down in DIA, this has been far less visible.
Didn’t we lose a collection of historical photos a few years ago, due to the asinine decision to outsource them to a small digital conversion outfit in the US, which then went into bankruptcy and never returned those photos?
Whether they have been returned yet I don’t know. There were concerns at the time about whether Ministry of Culture and Heritage had exercised proper oversight under the Protected Objects Act.
We are like children being led into the Forest of Business and Dubious Efficiency. Questions were raised about the wisdom and good faith involved in taking control in 2010 of our heritage material and putting it under the wing of a big Department with wide responsibilities.
It raises questions about the stewardship of the National Library and Archives NZ by the Department of Internal Affairs since these agencies were merged into DIA [Department of Internal Affairs] in 2010.
Now we should be determined to stop this downgrading of irreplaceable stuff about our past. We have had decades of dilettantes in government to make useful profitable connections for themselves, interested in cutting the part of the budget that went on tasks requiring and needing government care and scrutiny. (Notice Sam A 5.2.1 – the missing photographs so carelessly dispensed with to the USA business.)
Also remember the horror of letting a populist politician get control over important historic records in Canada.
Like a bull in a china shop. The Harper Government Has Trashed and Destroyed Environmental Books and Documents
In the first few days of 2014, scientists, journalists, and environmentalists were horrified to discover that the Harper government had begun a process to close seven of the 11 of Canada’s world-renowned Department of Fisheries and Oceans libraries… https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/4w578d/the-harper-government-has-trashed-and-burned-environmental-books-and-documents
Various NZ s over the years need to set themselves up as Guardians of whatever and follow the taonga, Friends of the Taonga or Friends of … to differentiate Maori from pakeha objects as there are so many that could be lost, the kaitiaki of each should watch what they know and treasure, working in conjunction.
Thanks Sam. I couldn’t recall the details of the archive, and having it identified as Fairfax decision rather than government, means that our collective archive was not affected.
I recall at the time seeing images of some of the colonial photos that were being advertised on eBay, which seemed such a loss.
John Wight exposes the West’s war crimes in Yemen.
‘’As crimes pile up, they become invisible’: Western complicity in Saudi Arabia’s dirty war in Yemen.
The complicity of Western governments in the ocean of suffering being wrought in Yemen exposes them as agents of Saudi brutality.
After three years of relentless conflict, it has been estimated that out of a population of 27.4 million, 22.2 million people in Yemen are in need of humanitarian assistance, 17 million are food insecure, 14.8 million lack basic healthcare, 4.5 million children are suffering malnourishment, while 2.9 million people are internally displaced. As for dead and injured, the toll stands at almost 10,000 and 50,000 respectively.
…..Returning to Western complicity in the carnage and suffering being meted out to the Yemeni people, never has there been a more naked example of hypocrisy masquerading as democracy. Indeed, the longstanding alliance between the US, UK and Saudi Arabia takes a scalpel to the oft-repeated boasts of Washington and London when it comes to their self-appointed role as champions and guardians of human rights and democracy.
Beginning with the Obama administration, and ramped up under Trump, US involvement in this brutal conflict has consisted of direct military airstrikes (carried out against Al-Qaeda and Islamic State targets, according to Washington), along with logistical, intelligence, and other non-combat support provided to the anti-Houthi Saudi-led coalition. This, of course, is not forgetting US arms sales to the Kingdom, consisting of over 50 percent of all US arms exports.
….The war in Yemen is a dirty war, being waged by a Western-supported Saudi kleptocracy in the name of clerical fascism. Bertolt Brecht was right: “As crimes pile up, they become invisible”
On Monday, November 26, 2018, NASA’s Mars Insight is scheduled to land on Mars. The spacecraft will touch down at approximately 20:00 UTC (3 p.m. EST). Watch coverage of the event on NASA TV. Live landing commentary runs from 19:00-20:30 UTC (2-3:30 p.m. EST). Translate UTC to your time.
Great thanks Joe. The new age of hope perhaps turning into reality?
And this more of the same:
“…Instead of using propellers or turbines, the researchers used electroaerodynamics. The technology works by sending a current through an electrode which electrically charges the molecules in the surrounding air. These charged molecules are then attracted towards a separate electrode on the aircraft – this movement of ions and neutral air particles generates an effect known as ionic or electric wind. By positioning an aerofoil in this air flow, lift can be generated, potentially allowing powered flight.” https://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=12164473
Ion engines are already well established as the best in space, propulsion engine.
Essentially the rocket engine ejects matter at low speed, requiring scale to lift the rocket. The ion engine ejects very little mass but it is at extremely high speed.
The efficiency of rockets to create momentum is small. The efficiency of ion engines to create momentum is very high.
The energy for an ion energy is electricity from, nuclear heat/Stirling engines, or Solar. Solar is effective in the inner solar system but not in the outer solar system so most projects have nuclear heat/Stirling engines. Not to be confused by Nuclear power plants as they are not a controlled fission. They are simply concentrated radioactive elements giving off heat designed to match power needs, with the Stirling engine designed to match.
In theory ion engines (today’s tech) could accelerate a starship into the 5% to 10% of speed of light range. This results in interstellar travel below the 200 year mark for already identified colonisation viable solar systems.
The energy for an ion energy is electricity from, nuclear heat/Stirling engines, or Solar.
Nope. Radioisotope thermoelectric generator just use standard thermocouples. No Stirling engines involved. I suspect the added mass and complexity makes Stirling engines impractical.
I think this sort of tech is interesting because it highlights energy sources that are green and as yet have limited practical applications. I think it’s wrong to bypass it because it is yet to raise a Cessna.
Another that interests me is the way air rushes out of a tube that stretches from sea level up to mountain top.
It would be great if there was a natural geological tube that coastal air shot up and would carry positioned parcels up to a certain height and platform, then they could be directed down slides or something to a collection point below using gravity.
Probably not viable but the idea of a tube effect of fast moving air upwards is appealing.
That fast moving air upwards has to get its energy from somewhere. If we’re looking at then using that fast moving air to do work, chances are it’ll work out to be more efficient, convenient, and flexible to turn that energy into electricity. Either by using the fast moving air to drive a generator, or going a step further back and harvesting whatever energy source that made the air move fast to make electricity instead.
Reliability of the Stirling is an issue but I have seen figures of 100,000 hours reliable for inline magnetic and air bearing versions. They are not that big for the advantages, anything from cup size to fridge size, but much bigger than thermocouples. More expensive too.
A good example is adoption in sun following dish/mirrors in that they are by far the best performing heat to usable energy system.
If the basis of the system is to give grunt to an engine then the power you can put in matters.
Imagine a spacecraft supporting lots of people. The power requirements will be huge without solar being effective. The small spacecraft with 100W needs is perfect for RTG but large ships will go in the Stirling direction.
The Stirling generators were extensively tested on Earth by NASA, but their development was cancelled in 2013 before they could be deployed on actual spacecraft missions.
Reliability of the Stirling is an issue but I have seen figures of 100,000 hours reliable for inline magnetic and air bearing versions.
Voyager has been running continuously for 40+ years so for ~400,000 hours.
Imagine a spacecraft supporting lots of people. The power requirements will be huge without solar being effective. The small spacecraft with 100W needs is perfect for RTG but large ships will go in the Stirling direction.
More than likely at some point but it hasn’t happened yet.
Yes, they canceled that project along with many others, but it is still being developed for other projects in space. The lifecycle of the engine isn’t an issue if a person is there to do repairs. Voyager is a good example of what the design requirements are. No maintenance possible and thermocouples are the only option.
I was reading about spaceships powered by ion drives half a century ago, in scifi books, when I was a teenager. I knew enough college physics to get that it was plausible in theory, but haven’t heard of any building of such in practice since, so I routinely dismiss all such stuff nowadays a mere speculation.
In fact, although Kim Stanley Robinson did an excellent trilogy about the terraforming of Mars and atmospheric production could make it habitable if the rate exceeded gravitational loss at the upper margin, I’ve long since given up on the notion that it’ll happen. Those dozens of breakdowns & malfunctions in the DEW system, Chernobyl, Murphy’s Law, the tendency of computers to head into dysfunction just like people, nah, I got no faith in technology left…
I was reading about spaceships powered by ion drives half a century ago, in scifi books, when I was a teenager. I knew enough college physics to get that it was plausible in theory, but haven’t heard of any building of such in practice since, so I routinely dismiss all such stuff nowadays a mere speculation.
“We have shown that X3 can operate at over 100 kW of power,” said Alec Gallimore, who is leading the project, in an interview with Space.com. “It operated at a huge range of power from 5 kW to 102 kW, with electrical current of up to 260 amperes. It generated 5.4 Newtons of thrust, which is the highest level of thrust achieved by any plasma thruster to date,” added Gallimore, who is dean of engineering at the University of Michigan. The previous record was 3.3 Newtons, according to the school.
NOW EXPOSED: A UK-led, ‘New Cold War’ int’l intelligence propaganda & disinformation operation, using top Mainstream Media ‘journalists’, govt staff, #AtlanticCouncil, in partnership w/#NATO designed to increase fear and tension between West & Russia:.
Anonymous has published documents which it claims have unearthed a massive UK-led psyop to create a “large-scale information secret service” in Europe.
I wouldn’t view that stuff as anything much beyond an example of how stupidly paranoid some people are. This made me laugh – (From the “Integrity Initiative” handbook)
…the Integrity Initiative is funded by the Institute for Statecraft. The IfS gets its funding from multiple sources to ensure its independence. These include: private individuals; charitable foundations; international organisations (EU, NATO); UK Govt (FCO, MOD)
Kind of lacking in basic integrity I’d have thought. Oh, and the “independence”? Yeah well… probably best not to comment on the narrow focus embodied by such a ‘broad’ sweep of ‘diverse’ funding bodies, eh? 😉
Yes Germany has long wanted to even the score with Russia for the loss of the war in 1945 so the underside of Germany is alive still and want to see another ‘action’ against Russia.
Germany cant change their spots like others cant either.
That is human nature unfortunately and Britain knows that all to well.
There was a throwaway sentence in a textbook I was reading: "In 1793, the French actress Olympe de Gouges was guillotined by the Jacobins, after daring to demand political rights for women as well as men." Of course I had to find out who she was, and why I'd never heard of her. pic.twitter.com/59HaeekhtR— Hanna Nina Jameson (@Hanna_Jameson) October 27, 2018
Probably because a person who fights for the political rights for women as well as men is an actual Feminist. Completely different from those who stand in parliament spouting the magnificent Ministry for Women, claiming to be feminists, then vehemently attacking attempts to create a Ministry for Men.
Plus the patriarchy narrative requires ignoring the reality of our past so many brave women and mens actions are ignored. Kate Sheppards advocacy for women is made godlike, while the decades long voting rights battle behind both male suffrage and its resulting female voting rights becomes a footnote. Very few would know the names of the men who put forward male sufferage laws in NZ or who put forward female sufferage laws in NZ.
The Ecuadorian government has removed its ambassador to the UK, sparking speculation over Julian Assange’s future at the diplomatic mission there.
The 47-year-old founder of WikiLeaks moved into the Ecuadorian Embassy in central London in 2012 while wanted for questioning over sexual assault allegations in Sweden. Assange maintained his innocence and claimed the charges were nothing more than an attempt to extradite him to the United States.
Yes but where will they go. And perhaps there should be hermitage, sanctuary for whistleblowers who need protecting so they don’t get shot, damaged by acid, sawn up and other grisly outcomes.
he is a grown up, he can get a job, rent a flat, find a supermarket and buy some groceries. And next time he has sex with a women and the deal/agreement/consent is only with a condom, i suggest he wears a condom.
Can’t give a flying poo about this guy, he can go in the wilderness and stay there. The sooner he gets out of the media, real of fake the better. He has spammed the world long enough.
It is a pity that you “Pride Parade” guys and girls, slander the police. You clearly don’t understand the constant Bravery and Service the Police give to the Citizens of New Zealand.
No wonder the significant Businesses of Auckland have withdrawn their support from you – because of your childish attitudes.
Show off and Dance on our streets. Yes. But don’t pretend you are anything like as important as our Police Women and Men. They Lay their Bodies on the line. – Day and Night.
A couple of takeouts from Daniel Andrews’ crushing landslide win for Labor in Victoria.
Voters will overlook any number of missteps in a government if they see that government getting on doing stuff to make their lives better – so knock yourself out National, bang on about Sroubek, Clare Curran, Meka Whaitiri and all the rest of it as much as you like. So long voters think the Coalition is working for them it won’t make any difference.
It’s totally game over for the old Tory trick of promising tax cuts and small government without compromising essential services. Voters have wised up to that bullshit, they know they can’t have both tax cuts and well maintained hospitals, schools and transport and all the other government services. Middlemore Hospital, the WOF debacle, schools maintenance, you name it National is going to get whacked with this.
Infrastructure spending wins votes. Voters in Melbourne, a city bursting at the seams (its population topped 5 milllion earlier this year according to Stats Australia) flocked to Labor on the back of Andrews’ pledge to spend 50 billion dollars on infrastructure and they didn’t much care that some of that money will need to be borrowed.
With crime falling in most western democracies, banging the law and order drum doesn’t work like it used to. Earlier this year Peter Dutton claimed that Victorians were too scared to go out for dinner at night because of gang violence in Melbourne. A ridiculous statement that just seems to have pissed off Melburnians, not least because he’s a Queensland federal MP.
Nathan Guy was pretty unelectable after being sprung doing dodgy deals with developers in his role as the responsible minister when last in power.
Like here they’re getting on with it on an almost gridlocked Melbourne that’s done nowhere near enough on public transport as it zoomed past 5mill a few months ago.
In the days before mass immigration the middle classes of Russian, China, Middle East and India would rise up and overthrow their dictators and demand further rights, nowadays, the middle class support them, get a plane ticket out of those countries to places like NZ and the west and leave the tin pot dictators alone, who then use their money to reduce the welfare and rights of small countries like NZ, influence big countries, whose governments are only too keen to take the cash, the loans, and the cheap labour, decrease then educational standards, and pocket the money for their assets to be bought. Sometimes they are so frightened of being ‘racist’ they give them away for free, aka water rights because the laws have been written for that very purpose. Anyone who doesn’t agree is ‘racist’ apparently.
Likewise the mass displacement of the Middle East and Africa of refugees and economic migrants. Guess what, nobody says stop bombing the shit out of those countries and start spending money on making sure that those countries are habitable with enough food and water and resources to support themselves, that is where the debate should be…
nope straight too, where should these people go and making other countries forces secure the oil lines etc?
The people of earth themselves are between rock and a hard place with so many stupid politicians and political strategists and the world’s media owned by the world’s wealthy and sending the same messages of distraction and neoliberalism to further a short term gain and environmental destruction, massive migration for the privileged or desperate.
None of this will turn out well in the end for any of the countries and most of the people and the flora and fauna, but great if your individual goal in life is to own a super yacht, a sports team, gold curtains and more money and houses and assets than you can live in or even manage, and earn that by legal and illegal theft or manipulation of former public assets and resources.
I was looking at Karl Marx and petite bourgeoisie yesterday and go the quote below. It seems that the middle classes are not action-oriented for better things for all, rather re-action to protect their standard of living and growing privilege.
When i worked in a solicitor’s office dealing with accident claims before ACC, I didn’t notice them trying to get better law that was helpful and kinder to those who had workplace injuries. He wasn’t into changing anything for that reason.
An interesting piece of theory – He [Wilhelm Reich] claimed that the middle classes were a hotbed for political reaction due to their reliance on the patriarchal family (according to Reich, small businesses are often self-exploiting enterprises of families headed by the father, whose morality binds the family together in their somewhat precarious economic position) and the sexual repression that underlies it.[5]‘ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petite_bourgeoisie
It seems to me that feminists were majorly middle class and were agitating for better conditions. But they were thinking of themselves and when the
changes happened that suited them with a with some trickle-down to the poorer, disadvantaged, the pressure for change dropped. Things improved and then change slowed, and the ones who needed most, only got a toe-in I think, not a shoe-in.
Point being that the middle classes have never risen up against squat.
They are who they are because of their obeisance to their betters, their contemptible disregard for their lessors, and their continued prosperity relies entirely on maintaining the status quo.
Oooh you are so hard joe 90. I think I prefer living in the middle classes and perhaps I am not so good about caring and sharing. Thinks – uncomfortable.
Wrong. The middle class are the swing voters in democracy. (Steriotyping) The poor will vote left no matter what’s happening. The rich will vote right no matter what’s happening. The middle class will react to incompetence buy voting for the opposite, or react to voting bribes. The middle class in self preservation reacts to propaganda.
They rise up at every election. They just don’t march in the streets.
Hence democracy fails in that it never addresses the poor or reigns in the rich. The minority becomes oppressed by the majority.
S’cuse the ignorance, but since I don’t follow the machinations of Australian politics, I have to ask, – assuming that the Liberal Party is of the full on soggy shit smeared variety, is the Australian Labor Party much more worth or use than slightly and suspiciously soiled toilet paper ?
The bloke Julian Assange threw into the Washington military dungeon turned out to be a sweet young lady. Chelsea.
I hope Assange controls himself and keeps well away from her, – now that she is a respected USA Citizen.
What with Jules going a bit far with his two Swedish female staff – and Trump famous for his ever ready Pussygrope, Chelsea should take lots of care. Always board the right Boeing – Chelsea
in the meantime, Assange is pulling faces at the Ecuador Embassy and generally being the objectionable upstart that he always is.
Fascinating stuff Observer. This is why i generally keep away from discussing the USA-involved political stuff. It’s a sideshow to keep us from thinking about the serious development stuff we need to concentrate on – the world is a stage, and we need to be actors in our part of it is my certainty. Climate change is changing the scenery.
This is an example of how we can be easily distracted from politics. Start replacing interest in what is happening with entertainment – Punch and Judy anyone? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcE7ppOT_0c
Then on the other hand, can what is being shown in the longer show after the first short excerpt, is from Brighton Beach, UK. indicate an approach that would be right for now for New Brighton beach and pier in Christchurch NZ.
If Brighton, Christchurch could throw a regular event between 1 and 3pm on Saturday afternoons with traditional things like donkey rides, balloons, music, dancing to a youth band, and do it with good publicity for a season, they could boost their economic life.
Try Napier beach now it has a heavy deep ditch 10 meters off the shoreline, that now has developed super sized ‘undertow” of swirling currents that now knock you off your feet and drag you under.
Several have drowned now from this super sized undertow so yes the beaches are changing dramatically now because of increases in current flow and surrounding sea temperature increases we are told.
Here is piece on Christchurch, New Brighton that shows how well they are doing
and mentions the problems. That beach is one of Christchurch’s assets and
I am sure they will adapt and build jobs and businesses for the locals. Pop-ups for cheaper buildings on shaky ground, with limited investment in a changing coastline for instance. If you are there at Christmas – school holidays give them a visit and fly kites if the wind is right and make sandcastles on real sand on the long beach. And I think there is kite-surfing there.
It has a pretty good UPS system with the server and the network endpoints on it. I check it every 4 months and battery replace every year. It will last about 6-8 hours on fresh batteries. 4-6 when I replace them.
I’m in central Auckland which has been somewhat refurbished power-wise after they blacked or browned me and everyone else out periodically for 3 months in 1998 in a stunning display of the efficiency of greed and deregulation 🙂
Wouldn’t mind some largeish Li-ion or Li-iron. But they need very good control systems – especially in my living room 🙂 I work with large Li-ion in large quantities, so I can tell you that I don’t to see that kind of failure here.
Currently the prices are formidable, but coming down. But in the meantime sealed lead-acid is good enough and cheap enough to keep the site running.
From a farm pov this is a notable problem that shows up the city as polluter.
But we are talking here about people pollution, not farm animals. It is obvious that many NZ dairy farms are overstocked and ignoring good husbandry of their animals and their effluent. First step is to control runoff, limit irrigation, and destock numbers.
Similarly with people. The farm-business big-export, big-profit phalanx want to overstock NZ with people who either bring in investment money or are charged for working here at minimal wages. We now have too many people in pockets of concentration, for the modern facilities provided to keep the place healthy and attractive. If you want to reduce city pollution complain to the decision-making people suffering from the hungry tapeworm called super-wealth.
(There appears to be a serious outbreak of some disease which may be parasitic tapeworms – Ingesting the eggs leads to tapeworm larvae growing in many different human tissues, particularly brain and muscle. https://www.verywellhealth.com/parasitic-infections-of-the-central-nervous-system-2488670)
This would explain why we see such little brain power indicated in poor planning and decision making in the country, and the lack of physical activity driving many of these debilitated people to sit all day playing around with computer models which are supposed to mirror real life, but actually are pale imitations.
You started me off bwaghorn – the above guff is your fault!
Scientists are proposing an ingenious but as-yet-unproven way to tackle climate change: spraying sun-dimming chemicals into the Earth’s atmosphere.
The research by scientists at Harvard and Yale universities, published in the journal Environmental Research Letters, proposes using a technique known as stratospheric aerosol injection, which they say could cut the rate of global warming in half.
The technique would involve spraying large amounts of sulfate particles into the Earth’s lower stratosphere at altitudes as high as 12 miles. The scientists propose delivering the sulfates with specially designed high-altitude aircraft, balloons or large naval-style guns.
From the Exec summary of this months O3/wmo report.
Intentional long-term geoengineering applications that substantially increase stratospheric aerosols to mitigate global warming by reflecting sunlight would alter the stratospheric ozone layer. The estimated magnitude and even the sign of ozone changes in some regions are uncertain because of the high sensitivity
to variables such as the amount, altitude, geographic location, type of injection and the halogen loading. An increase of the stratospheric sulfate aerosol burden in amounts sufficient to substantially reduce global radiative forcing would delay the recovery of the Antarctic ozone hole. Much less is known about the effects on
ozone from geoengineering solutions using non-sulfate aerosols.
Science proceeds via experiment. Trial & error. Atmosphere experimentation: if it doesn’t work, just throw it away & get another one. Normal scientific method, as performed by normal scientists.
The Archdruid is usually good on the big picture, and the past year or two he’s been on about faustian culture. Google it gets you this:
“Faustian culture is driven to reach as far as it can in all directions, almost as a virtue in itself. It sees itself as built atop all previous cultures. It dreams of global dominance, and has many senses achieved that but it is unsatisfied. The climb of perpetual progress is an important story to the Faustian man.”
“Faustian Culture began in Western Europe around the 10th century and according to Spengler such has been its expansionary power that by the 20th century it was covering the entire earth, with only a few regions where Islam provides an alternative world view.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Decline_of_the_West
Alerts us to why China’s dictator is in rebel mode, eh? Too negligible to even rate a mention. “The use of the word ‘Faustian’ when describing the Western culture Spengler explained by pointing out a parallel between the tragic figure of Faust and the Western world. Just as Faust sold his soul to the devil to gain greater power, the Western man sold his soul to technics.” https://faustianeurope.wordpress.com/2007/07/…/oswald-spengler-and-faustian-cultur…
So there you have it. Techne – modern equivalent of magic – driven toward global transformation by the Promethean power drive in our collective unconscious. Don’t assume atmosphere experiments are merely scientific hubris!
Nothing obvious in the way of a substantial advance since I read up on it around seven years ago. Usage would snowball noticeably if the successes cited were generally replicable. The economic rewards would compel that.
One. Two
You know it all you smart arse. Well get off your bottom and go and fix it, whatever, instead of hanging round here trying to prevent us getting to know about some of the things your great mind has already absorbed. I am just so sick of you lazy geniuses, all talk and no commitment to useful action for the good of humankind.
You have no idea what I do or who I am, GW…so dial it a little bit eh…
If you think my pointing out that J90 was posting rehashed articles, which he has admitted to not actually reading before linking 20.4…then you’re barking up the wrong tree…
On you can be in your own way..same applies to every one of us…
which he has admitted to not actually reading before linking 20.4
Arse. After reading the abstract of the paper referred to in the CNN article I posted, I noted that the CNN article erroneously inferred that the paper was an actual proposal.
So again, do fuck off you supercilious sack of shit, and take your disingenuous drivel with you.
I have every idea what you do on this blog One Two. And what line you take usually – negative. Seeing that the world is in crisis perhaps you could start looking for better ways to aid your fellow humans instead of slagging us off.
By the way this site doesn’t profess to have the latest scientific things, and if you find there is something better, put up the link. Say this might be more up to date don’t criticise us as your first move.
Refer to what is important yourself instead.
Your style as here is not acceptable to me as a serious person worrying about the known problems not being tackled and the unknown ones that are looming.
‘Dimming The Sun’
Article title, that you linked Joe…
The ‘clue’ is in the title of the respective articles which are the ‘same subject’…
If you can’t ‘see’ the relationship…well…I would not be surprised if you’re not reading or understanding what you post about…
And after a quick squiz at the abstract, and despite my own flippancy, it looks like CNN clickbait.
The author’s read it as an actual proposal rather than what it is, a pie in the sky assessment.
Abstract
We review the capabilities and costs of various lofting methods intended to deliver sulfates into the lower stratosphere. We lay out a future solar geoengineering deployment scenario of halving the increase in anthropogenic radiative forcing beginning 15 years hence, by deploying material to altitudes as high as ~20 km. After surveying an exhaustive list of potential deployment techniques, we settle upon an aircraft-based delivery system. Unlike the one prior comprehensive study on the topic (McClellan et al 2012 Environ. Res. Lett. 7 034019), we conclude that no existing aircraft design—even with extensive modifications—can reasonably fulfill this mission. However, we also conclude that developing a new, purpose-built high-altitude tanker with substantial payload capabilities would neither be technologically difficult nor prohibitively expensive. We calculate early-year costs of ~$1500 ton−1 of material deployed, resulting in average costs of ~$2.25 billion yr−1 over the first 15 years of deployment. We further calculate the number of flights at ~4000 in year one, linearly increasing by ~4000 yr−1. We conclude by arguing that, while cheap, such an aircraft-based program would unlikely be a secret, given the need for thousands of flights annually by airliner-sized aircraft operating from an international array of bases.
I find your post fascinating Joe. It leads me to wonder what other ways we could turn the sun’s energy back on itself.
We all know how something painted black sucks up heat and something white has a greater tendency to reflect the heat and light.
One of the problems with diminishing snow and ice is that we’re not bouncing as much light and heat back up.
What if every sun struck man made item was white or mirrored? Cars, building roofs, supermarket carparks. Could pasture be genetically modified to be white?
Could we float a bio product on oceans that reflects more light than salt water?
The subject of albedo (reflectivity) is certainly a complex aspect of global warming.
In short, making the artificial surfaces you have control over white (or light green) actually does do quite a bit to reduce warming. To the point I was absolutely astonished when I found out Auckland Council required dark roofs on new construction in at least one semi-rural area.
Grassland is also quite a lot more reflective than forest. Most deserts are more reflective than grassland. In total, the increase in the earth’s reflectivity from land-use changes from human activity counteracts maybe 5% of the global warming from the greenhouse gases we’ve dumped into the atmosphere.
But the big albedo variable that’s still poorly understood is clouds. It’s for sure that a warmer world means more moisture in the atmosphere, which means more clouds, which you would think would reflect more sunlight. But it turns out to be a lot more complicated than that, since they also reflect heat radiated from the earth back down to ground (think how much warmer mornings are after a cloudy night than a clear night). The net effect apparently depends on how high and how thick the clouds are (among other variables).
Latent heat is the energy absorbed by or released from a substance during a phase change from a gas to a liquid or a solid or vice versa. … When these gas molecules condense into liquid drops, latent heat is released into the atmosphere which warms the air surrounding the molecule.
Yeah, that’s part of the complexity of clouds’ net effect on warming. I vaguely recall reading something that came to the conclusion that the height at which the latent heat was released or absorbed was fairly significant from a warming perspective, and that the water-ice transition was still quite important even though the latent heat of fusion is around 1/6 that of evaporation for water.
This is useful information to householders and landscapers too. Different plants have different levels of reflection. Part of reflection is heat energy.
Dark trees absorb more light and heat. Lighter trees reflect more light and heat. Nature does ambient lighting, you just need to be aware what you’re looking at.
Could we float rafts that create shadows and havens for fish and bird life on seas near coastlines. Perhaps over the Australian reefs, and where fisher people live so they can continue their ‘peasant’ fishing culture and diet.
We could float rafts that provide habitat, shelter, and double as phosphate collectors and even oceanic monitoring stations.
In freshwater we could float rafts that grow rampant plants as stock food, meanwhile stripping excess nutrients from water, providing habitat and shade, and with some cunning design, aeration to the surrounding water.
I was knocking up these designs for some NZ lakes when they were deemed to be complete shit holes decades ago. But the policy then was to pretend they weren’t shit holes.
Some such rafts are already in operation here in NZ. They work successfully, but many of our degraded lakes are big. Estuaries are the focus now – the penultimate receiving bodies of all that goes on and in further up the catchment. Silt and nutrient are the big issues, eutrophication the symptom of human carelessness. Unless big tides clear clogged estuaries, there’s not a lot else that can be done; all ideas gratefully received. (Rafts of plants are challenged by brackish waters). Giant sludge-sucking pumps are great science fiction.
I think really people need to realize that changes are coming and it does not matter what they burn down in anger.
France has a good public transport system at least in the larger areas and conecting to rural areas of importance.
But there are things to be done, i .e. community cars. Rather then have two / three cars per family, have community cars that are owned by a trust, that are maintained by membership contribution and that people can book in for when they need a car. Take me, i don’t actually need a car, – the little car that i got from my partner when his company gave him a car has served my inlaws when they lost their cars in the big floods a few years ago, then it was driven by the son in law when his car died and he could not afford one, then it was driven by a young lady with three kids who needed a car but could not afford one outright, so she the little old one until she had enough saved up to buy one herself. I haven not missed this car in a year and a half.
We – the people – need to come of our sofas and realise that the gravy years are over. We either want this planet to sustain us, or we can drive in an SUV to hell without a return ticket.
As for the conomic system being upset, it already is.
I like it when Shakespeare peers over our shoulders – thanks for reminding me!
I am a dullard compared to you writers … but yes – Iwanka taking her laptop home tof fiddle with Trumpian Profundities is very Innocent. Says Daddy.
How Lprent rides the WiFI Surf day in day out- I shall never know. But I admire his alertness and patience.
The Brighton Wharf is long – if i remember correctly. It could be Colourful if we allowed Judith Collins to invite her and her Beijing Comrades to bring the dragons and Balloons down there of a weekend.
China V Canterbury – attacking each other with high diving Kites.
Looks like someone has the stones to reel in the data crims.
The UK Parliament invoked a rarely used legal power to compel a US software company to hand over internal Facebook documents that could contain revelations on the run-up to the Cambridge Analytica scandal.
Damian Collins, MP and chair of the culture, media and sport select committee used a rare parliamentary mechanism to compel the founder of Six4Three to hand over the documents while on a business trip, local media reported on Saturday.
A serjeant was sent to his hotel to issue a final call and communicate a two-hour deadline to comply with the order. British daily The Guardian reported that when the firm founder failed to comply, he was escorted to parliament. Not complying with the request could have led to fines and even imprisonment.
The cache of documents is alleged to include email exchange between senior executives, including Facebook founder Mark Zuckenberg.
“We are in uncharted territory,” Mr Collins, who also chairs an inquiry into fake news, told local media. “This is an unprecedented move but it’s an unprecedented situation. We’ve failed to get answers from Facebook and we believe the documents contain information of very high public interest.”
Peter Calder went to check it out: “the Islamic Republic of Iran – is a hypermoralist theocracy in which pornography, prostitution, alcohol, drugs, YouTube, Facebook, and much else besides, is banned, on pain of imprisonment, and corporal or even capital punishment. Yet the population accesses all of them with a quietly exuberant abandon. Defiance, indeed, is the currency of daily life.”
“As the PBS show Frontline reported, Iran is the only state in which the executive branch does not control the armed forces.” “The hijab – a head-covering scarf – remains obligatory, even for tourist women. Meanwhile, the basij, a volunteer auxiliary corps of young men recognisable by their neatly trimmed beards and black clothing, enforce internal security, police morals (they question couples walking together to establish the legitimacy of their relationship) and suppress dissidents and protest gatherings.”
So you can see why some leftists onsite here support Iran in its opposition to Saudi Arabia, eh? That’d be because Trump doesn’t like the Iranian regime. Having to choose between a conservative narcissist and a totalitarian regime, they understandably prefer the latter.
“The exchange rate of the Iranian rial is soaring: the US dollar, worth IRR43,000 in international markets, was fetching 120,000 in early September and 140,000 by the end of the month. A grim joke doing the rounds asked what the dollar is worth. “Do you mean now, now or now?” was the punchline answer. Not since I was in Argentina in the 1970s have I experienced an exchange rate so grotesquely advantaging the visitor as it hammered the locals.”
Iran and Saudi Arabia drive their people to hate each other, and they are about as oppressive as each other. They aren’t the only two choices available.
European Council President Donald Tusk has recommended that the EU approve the Brexit deal at a summit on Sunday.
It comes after Spanish PM Pedro Sanchez received assurances from the UK government over Gibraltar, and dropped his threat to boycott the summit.
He said he had received the written guarantees he needed over Spain’s role in the future of the British territory.
UK Prime Minister Theresa May has arrived in Brussels and held talks with top EU officials, ahead of the summit.
The terms of the UK’s withdrawal have been under negotiation since June 2016 following a referendum in which 51.9% voted to leave the EU.
Even if the EU approves the deal, it still has to be passed by the UK Parliament, with many MPs having stated their opposition.
Spain had raised last-minute objections ahead of the summit about how the issue of Gibraltar had been handled in the Brexit talks so far.
But EU leaders secured a compromise with the Spanish prime minister, who said that Europe and the UK “had accepted the conditions set down by Spain” and so would “vote in favour of Brexit”.
Mr Tusk, who represents EU leaders on the world stage, said he recommended “that we approve on Sunday the outcome of the Brexit negotiations” in a letter to members of the European Council.
He added: “No-one has reasons to be happy. But at least at this critical time, the EU 27 has passed the test of unity and solidarity.”
The political declaration, which sets out what the UK and EU’s relationship may be like after Brexit – outlining how things like UK-EU trade and security will work.
The EU withdrawal agreement: a 585-page, legally binding document setting out the terms of the UK’s exit from the EU. It covers the UK’s £39bn “divorce bill”, citizens’ rights and the Northern Ireland “backstop” – a way to keep the border with the Republic of Ireland open, if trade talks stall.
There is no formal vote on Sunday but the EU expects to proceed after reaching a consensus.
Dumb as I am, may I ask what good Merry England is going to do by snubbing its snotty nose at the accomplished EU. ?
We all know that Brits think themselves the bees knees and have the answer to everything under the Sun. But I have a feeling that the Boris Johnsons – and the Farrages will do well and the glory tories- but the rest of the UK will be living off sweet nothing.
Scotland and Ireland will do well. Because they are not stupid like the grumbling Brits. Hopefully the Welsh will ditch the mad Poms too.
Observer Tokoroa; – Ouch! – I married a pom 42 years ago and she’s been o/k.
I good mate I reckon, am I lucky?
I find that the EU was to hard on Greece and they are dictatorial after they allowed Greece borrow so much private funding to develop there infrastructure and went bust on foreign capital .
we are similarly exposed like Greece too.
Actually we still don’t know who we have borrowed $60 Billion from do we?
Goldman Sachs was the agent that Greece used and they are a shifty lot too.
I worry when the next GFC comes around what will happen to all those ‘cling-ons” new smaller states to the EU.
Some are very shaky, especially the eastern side of Europe, like Hungary and Romania and some others.
Actually, in NZ we are in a much more secure situation than Greece. The problem for Greece is that it uses a ‘foreign’ currency in the Euro and must therefore stay on good terms with the ECB and other European institutions. Unfortunately for Greece good terms means agreeing to aggressive Austerity demands and other economic ‘reforms’. Despite IMF forecasts for a quick recovery these reforms caused a 25% shrinkage in the Greek economy and 20% unemployment rate and will negatively influence the Greek economy for more than a decade.
In return for this (and probably against the letter of the ECB legislation) the ECB has been supporting the Greek government by maintaining a lowish interest rate on Greek government debt and allowing them not to default. The ECB is also doing this for other Euro countries.
In NZ however our parliament ultimately controls our central bank (which can do the same kinds of things as the ECB does) and so if push comes to shove NZ will never experience such problems of being bullied economically by higher level institutions. The UK is similar to NZ in that it also controls its Bank of England meaning the exchequer ultimately calls the shots for the UK. Not that this prevents self inflicted economic pain, as George Osborne caused when he (predictably, it was predicted) turned a single dip recession into a triple dip recession through mindless austerity policies. However I think the conservatives soon realized that running the economy into the ground with ideologically driven Austerity policies was going to be bad for their chances of re-election. At that point they kept talking up all the austerity they were doing, but basically stopped doing it.
Ultimately the important question seems to be if this stuff is controlled by elected representatives or if the elected representatives have to answer to un-elected institutions.
Amazon’s Alexa probably won’t admit there was a murder in her home, but the data she stores on the company’s servers might tell a different story.
An Amazon Echo, the device that houses the company’s Alexa AI, in the kitchen of a Farmington, N.H., home is at the heart of a double murder trial. Earlier this month, a judge ordered partial records of that device be released.
Prosecutors believe there may be recordings of the stabbings of two women from January 2017. Amazon has not yet said if it would release the information.
“I think this is the beginning of the ‘internet of evidence’ where lots of pieces of smart devices are going to show up in criminal prosecutions,” Andrew Guthrie Ferguson, author of The Rise of Big Data Policing: Surveillance, Race, and the Future of Law Enforcement, told Day 6.
Kia ora The Am Show the jail term for dairy dack is just a political stunt by national there is no thought about what is good for people just what floats there toilet polls.
Last year all the retailers were advertising chrismas a the start of October this year they have not even started. Just like the work being done on the inter Island power cables being carried out at the start of summer instead of a few months earlier when the Hydro lakes are full. ?????????.
My Huawei phone got the signal fine I was not going to com on this subject till I heard Azzes make his statement .
simon your m8 has moved to Bali .
So long as the new Australian Governments combat climate change that’s the big picture Jason I will be doing a post on what the dozens of ex judges are calling for in Australia anti white collar corruption force nearly all the carbon lobbyist are ex mps a big conflicted of interest there hence all the problem in the Australian governments lobbyist should be banned all around the world .
The santa issue is just some man grandstanding the topic of Equality and everyone has fallen for the neo anti Equality mens tricks.
Who wrote those word for you Mark Communism is just a word nowadays used to trash socialism whats so wrong with the wealthy shearing there billions of lollies with common poor people so they get a house and not a bridge he tangata he tangata.
Yes we need a cabon tax and use the tax to of set the price of clean energy like Norway . Its cool that we have a lot of people buying electric cars in Aotearoa now.
I agree its stupid not rolling out a electric Car subsidy when we import most of our oil come on . Ka kite ano
This is a Wahine whos actions speak as loud as her word and a Mana Wahine I will tau toko her ka pai
Sweden’s then deputy prime minister remained enigmatic as the picture went viral and she was asked whether she had been “trolling” the US president. “It is up to the observer to interpret the photo,” she was quoted as saying. “We are a feminist government, which shows in this photo.”
Lövin is one of the leading figures in what she says is a resurgence in environmentally conscious politics across the continent. “There is a green wave going on in Europe, in Germany, Luxembourg and Belgium, and in Finland as well,” she says. “I’m convinced that green parties offer a positive vision, and also the willingness to take on the huge challenges that we see in the world right now.” Ka kite ano link below.
Dozens of former judges urge Scott Morrison to set up anti-corruption watchdog
Arguing that existing federal integrity agencies “lack the necessary jurisdiction, powers and know-how to investigate properly the impartiality and bona fides of decisions made by, and conduct of, the federal government and public sector” .
Greed drive the carbon barons to propagandize lie and cheat so they can keep poisoning our Grandchildren’s future with carbon. link below.
The Nationals’ WA branch similarly failed to respond when asked why it failed to declare the $20,000 donation from Mineral Resources.
The iron ore miner confirmed it had given a $20,000 bank cheque to the Nationals in March last year, around the time of the state election. But a spokesman said the company made donations to all sides, not just the Nationals. Its donations to Labor and the Liberals were declared properly.
More than half of all Australian lobbyists previously worked inside government or for the major political parties, with one in four staffing the offices of ministers, parliamentary secretaries or backbenchers.
Guardian Australia has investigated the backgrounds of all 483 individuals listed on July’s federal lobbyist register, checking each for a history in federal or state government, either as politicians, political staffers, party officials or public servants.
Australia’s lax lobbying regime the domain of party powerbrokers
Read more
The analysis, believed to be the first of its kind, reveals 255 lobbyists, or 52.8%, have a previous history within government or political party hierarchies.
It also revealed one in four lobbyists have worked as staffers – policy advisers, chiefs of staff, or electorate or media officers – to Australian politicians. Ka kite ano link below.
Kia ora Newshub Its cool that the District Health is upping the wages of there low paid workers .
Lloyd nice scarf .
Changing the WOF to 12 months was a fool of a move we don’t have nice flat straight 2 lane roads like they do overseas hence 6 monthly WOF .
Well thats shocking all these surgical devices being sold to Kiwis and they have not been tested wtf the people who make these thing are playing Russian roulette with Kiwi lives .
trump will be a bigger fool if he lets the ICE shoot those refugees at there Mexico boarder .
Ollie Ka pai to Scott for his win on the Super Car .
Ka kite ano
Kia ora The Crowd Goes Wild congrats to Mikayla and Brodie for there prizes .
Storm that was a good win for Scott.
Yes you cant do that to the Ranfurly Shield .
I liked his acting as Muhammad Ali Will that is that’s a cool movie they don’t make em like they use to.
Jen Hackman is a cool actor.
I say a golf game between Barak and trump would be cool
Good win King .
Ka kite ano Some countrys don’t no how to be good host guys
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
What is it with the mining industry? Its not enough for them to pillage the earth - they apparently can't even be bothered getting resource consent to do so: The proponent behind a major mine near the Clutha River had already been undertaking activity in the area without a ...
Photo # 1 I am a huge fan of Singapore’s approach to housing, as described here two years ago by copying and pasting from The ConversationWhat Singapore has that Australia does not is a public housing developer, the Housing Development Board, which puts new dwellings on public and reclaimed land, ...
Buzz from the Beehive Reactions to news of the government’s readiness to make urgent changes to “the resource management system” through a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) suggest a balanced approach is being taken. The Taxpayers’ Union says the proposed changes don’t go far enough. Greenpeace says ...
I’m starting to wonder if Anna Burns-Francis might be the best political interviewer we’ve got. That might sound unlikely to you, it came as a bit of a surprise to me.Jack Tame can be excellent, but has some pretty average days. I like Rebecca Wright on Newshub, she asks good ...
Chris Trotter writes – Willie Jackson is said to be planning a “media summit” to discuss “the state of the media and how to protect Fourth Estate Journalism”. Not only does the Editor of The Daily Blog, Martyn Bradbury, think this is a good idea, but he has also ...
Graeme Edgeler writes – This morning [April 21], the Wellington High Court is hearing a judicial review brought by Hon. Karen Chhour, the Minister for Children, against a decision of the Waitangi Tribunal. This is unusual, judicial reviews are much more likely to brought against ministers, rather than ...
Both of Parliament’s watchdogs have now ripped into the Government’s Fast-track Approvals Bill. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāMy pick of the six newsey things to know from Aotearoa’s political economy and beyond on the morning of Tuesday, April 23 are:The Lead: The Auditor General,John Ryan, has joined the ...
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The infrastructure industry yesterday issued a “hurry up” message to the Government, telling it to get cracking on developing a pipeline of infrastructure projects.The hiatus around the change of Government has seen some major projects cancelled and others delayed, and there is uncertainty about what will happen with the new ...
Hi,Over the weekend I revisited a podcast I really adore, Dead Eyes. It’s about a guy who got fired from Band of Brothers over two decades ago because Tom Hanks said he had “dead eyes”.If you don’t recall — 2001’s Band of Brothers was part of the emerging trend of ...
Buzz from the Beehive The 180 or so recipients of letters from the Government telling them how to submit infrastructure projects for “fast track” consideration includes some whose project applications previously have been rejected by the courts. News media were quick to feature these in their reports after RMA Reform Minister Chris ...
It would not be a desirable way to start your holiday by breaking your back, your head, or your wrist, but on our first hour in Singapore I gave it a try.We were chatting, last week, before we started a meeting of Hazel’s Enviro Trust, about the things that can ...
Calling all journalists, academics, planners, lawyers, political activists, environmentalists, and other members of the public who believe that the relationships between vested interests and politicians need to be scrutinised. We need to work together to make sure that the new Fast-Track Approvals Bill – currently being pushed through by the ...
Feel worried. Shane Jones and a couple of his Cabinet colleagues are about to be granted the power to override any and all objections to projects like dams, mines, roads etc even if: said projects will harm biodiversity, increase global warming and cause other environmental harms, and even if ...
Bryce Edwards writes- The ability of the private sector to quickly establish major new projects making use of the urban and natural environment is to be supercharged by the new National-led Government. Yesterday it introduced to Parliament one of its most significant reforms, the Fast Track Approvals Bill. ...
Michael Bassett writes – If you think there is a move afoot by the radical Maori fringe of New Zealand society to create a parallel system of government to the one that we elect at our triennial elections, you aren’t wrong. Over the last few days we have ...
Without a corresponding drop in interest rates, it’s doubtful any changes to the CCCFA will unleash a massive rush of home buyers. Photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: The six things that stood out to me in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Monday, April 22 included:The Government making a ...
Sunday was a lazy day. I started watching Jack Tame on Q&A, the interviews are usually good for something to write about. Saying the things that the politicians won’t, but are quite possibly thinking. Things that are true and need to be extracted from between the lines.As you might know ...
In our Weekly Roundup last week we covered news from Auckland Transport that the WX1 Western Express is going to get an upgrade next year with double decker electric buses. As part of the announcement, AT also said “Since we introduced the WX1 Western Express last November we have seen ...
TL;DR: The six key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 29 include:PM Christopher Luxon is scheduled to hold a post-Cabinet news conference at 4 pm today. Stats NZ releases its statutory report on Census 2023 tomorrow.Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivers a pre-Budget speech at ...
A listing of 29 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, April 14, 2024 thru Sat, April 20, 2024. Story of the week Our story of the week hinges on these words from the abstract of a fresh academic ...
The ability of the private sector to quickly establish major new projects making use of the urban and natural environment is to be supercharged by the new National-led Government. Yesterday it introduced to Parliament one of its most significant reforms, the Fast Track Approvals Bill. The Government says this will ...
This is a column to say thank you. So many of have been in touch since Mum died to say so many kind and thoughtful things. You’re wonderful, all of you. You’ve asked how we’re doing, how Dad’s doing. A little more realisation each day, of the irretrievable finality of ...
Identifying the engine type in your car is crucial for various reasons, including maintenance, repairs, and performance upgrades. Knowing the specific engine model allows you to access detailed technical information, locate compatible parts, and make informed decisions about modifications. This comprehensive guide will provide you with a step-by-step approach to ...
Introduction: The allure of racing is undeniable. The thrill of speed, the roar of engines, and the exhilaration of competition all contribute to the allure of this adrenaline-driven sport. For those who yearn to experience the pinnacle of racing, becoming a race car driver is the ultimate dream. However, the ...
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Your car battery is an essential component that provides power to start your engine, operate your electrical systems, and store energy. Over time, batteries can weaken and lose their ability to hold a charge, which can lead to starting problems, power failures, and other issues. Replacing your battery before it ...
In most states, you cannot register a car without a valid driver’s license. However, there are a few exceptions to this rule. Exceptions to the RuleIf you are under 18 years old: In some states, you can register a car in your name even if you do not ...
Mazda, a Japanese automotive manufacturer with a rich history of innovation and engineering excellence, has emerged as a formidable player in the global car market. Known for its reputation of producing high-quality, fuel-efficient, and driver-oriented vehicles, Mazda has consistently garnered praise from industry experts and consumers alike. In this article, ...
Struts are an essential part of a car’s suspension system. They are responsible for supporting the weight of the car and damping the oscillations of the springs. Struts are typically made of steel or aluminum and are filled with hydraulic fluid. How Do Struts Work? Struts work by transferring the ...
Car registration is a mandatory process that all vehicle owners must complete annually. This process involves registering your car with the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) and paying an associated fee. The registration process ensures that your vehicle is properly licensed and insured, and helps law enforcement and other authorities ...
Zoom is a video conferencing service that allows you to share your screen, webcam, and audio with other participants. In addition to sharing your own audio, you can also share the audio from your computer with other participants. This can be useful for playing music, sharing presentations with audio, or ...
Building your own computer can be a rewarding and cost-effective way to get a high-performance machine tailored to your specific needs. However, it also requires careful planning and execution, and one of the most important factors to consider is the time it will take. The exact time it takes to ...
Sleep mode is a power-saving state that allows your computer to quickly resume operation without having to boot up from scratch. This can be useful if you need to step away from your computer for a short period of time but don’t want to shut it down completely. There are ...
Introduction Computer-Assisted Translation (CAT) has revolutionized the field of translation by harnessing the power of technology to assist human translators in their work. This innovative approach combines specialized software with human expertise to improve the efficiency, accuracy, and consistency of translations. In this comprehensive article, we will delve into the ...
In today’s digital age, mobile devices have become an indispensable part of our daily lives. Among the vast array of portable computing options available, iPads and tablet computers stand out as two prominent contenders. While both offer similar functionalities, there are subtle yet significant differences between these two devices. This ...
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Rob MacCulloch writes – In 2022, the Curriculum Centre at the Ministry of Education employed 308 staff, according to an Official Information Request. Earlier this week it was announced 202 of those staff were being cut. When you look up “The New Zealand Curriculum” on the Ministry of ...
Chris Bishop’s bill has stirred up a hornets nest of opposition. Photo: Lynn Grieveson for The KākāTL;DR: The six things that stood out to me in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate from the last day included:A crescendo of opposition to the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill is ...
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Graham Adams writes about the $55m media fund — When Patrick Gower was asked by Mike Hosking last week what he would say to the many Newstalk ZB callers who allege the Labour government bribed media with $55 million of taxpayers’ money via the Public Interest Journalism Fund — and ...
Note: this blog post has been put together over the course of the week I followed the happenings at the conference virtually. Should recordings of the Great Debates and possibly Union Symposia mentioned below, be released sometime after the conference ends, I'll include links to the ones I participated in. ...
The following was my submission made on the “Fast Track Approvals Bill”. This potential law will give three Ministers unchecked powers, un-paralled since the days of Robert Muldoon’s “Think Big” projects.The submission is written a bit tongue-in-cheek. But it’s irreverent because the FTAB is in itself not worthy of respect. ...
One Could Reduce Child Poverty At No Fiscal CostFollowing the Richardson/Shipley 1990 ‘redesign of the welfare state’ – which eliminated the universal Family Benefit and doubled the rate of child poverty – various income supplements for families have been added, the best known being ‘Working for Families’, introduced in 2005. ...
Buzz from the Beehive A few days ago, Point of Order suggested the media must be musing “on why Melissa is mute”. Our article reported that people working in the beleaguered media industry have cause to yearn for a minister as busy as Melissa Lee’s ministerial colleagues and we drew ...
1. What was The Curse of Jim Bolger?a. Winston Peters b. Soon after shaking his hand, world leaders would mysteriously lose office or shuffle off this mortal coilc. Could never shake off the Mother of All Budgetsd. Dandruff2. True or false? The Chairman of a Kiwi export business has asked the ...
Jack Vowles writes – New Zealand is said to be suffering from ‘serious populist discontent’. An IPSOS MORI survey has reported that we have an increasing preference for strong leaders, think that the economy is rigged toward the rich and powerful, and political elites are ignoring ‘hard-working people’. ...
It appears Nicola Willis is about to pull the rug out from under the feet of local communities still dealing with the aftermath of last year’s severe weather, and local councils relying on funding to build back from these disasters. ...
The Government is making short-sighted changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that will take away environmental protection in favour of short-term profits, Labour’s environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
Labour welcomes the release of the report into the North Island weather events and looks forward to working with the Government to ensure that New Zealand is as prepared as it can be for the next natural disaster. ...
The Labour Party has called for the New Zealand Government to recognise Palestine, as a material step towards progressing the two-State solution needed to achieve a lasting peace in the region. ...
Some of our country’s most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a ‘get out of jail free’ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
Cuts to frontline hospital staff are not only a broken election promise, it shows the reckless tax cuts have well and truly hit the frontline of the health system, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Government’s democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
The National Government’s proposed changes to the Residential Tenancies Act will mean tenants can be turfed from their homes by landlords with little notice, Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said. ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson is calling on all parties to support a common-sense change that’s great for the planet and great for consumers after her member’s bill was drawn from the ballot today. ...
A significant milestone has been reached in the fight to strike an anti-Pasifika and unfair law from the country’s books after Teanau Tuiono’s members’ bill passed its first reading. ...
New Zealand has today missed the opportunity to uphold the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, says James Shaw after his member’s bill was voted down in its first reading. ...
Today’s advice from the Climate Change Commission paints a sobering reality of the challenge we face in combating climate change, especially in light of recent Government policy announcements. ...
Minister for Disability Issues Penny Simmonds appears to have delayed a report back to Cabinet on the progress New Zealand is making against international obligations for disabled New Zealanders. ...
The Government’s newly announced review of methane emissions reduction targets hints at its desire to delay Aotearoa New Zealand’s urgent transition to a climate safe future, the Green Party said. ...
The Government must commit to the Maitai School building project for students with high and complex needs, to ensure disabled students from the top of the South Island have somewhere to learn. ...
Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey and his Government colleagues have made a meal of their mental health commitments, showing how flimsy their efforts to champion the issue truly are, says Labour Mental Health spokesperson Ingrid Leary. ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed an important milestone in New Zealand’s hydrogen future, with the opening of the country’s first network of hydrogen refuelling stations in Wiri. “I want to congratulate the team at Hiringa Energy and its partners K one W one (K1W1), Mitsui & Co New Zealand ...
The coalition Government is delivering on its commitment to improve resource management laws and give greater certainty to consent applicants, with a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) expected to be introduced to Parliament next month. RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop has today outlined the first RMA Amendment ...
Overseas models for regulating the oil and gas sector, including their decommissioning regimes, are being carefully scrutinised as a potential template for New Zealand’s own sector, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. The Coalition Government is focused on rebuilding investor confidence in New Zealand’s energy sector as it looks to strengthen ...
Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell has today released the Report of the Government Inquiry into the response to the North Island Severe Weather Events. “The report shows that New Zealand’s emergency management system is not fit-for-purpose and there are some significant gaps we need to address,” Mr Mitchell ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith is today travelling to Europe where he’ll update the United Nations Human Rights Council on the Government’s work to restore law and order. “Attending the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva provides us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while ...
Associate Agriculture Minister, Mark Patterson, formally reopened the world’s largest wool processing facility today in Awatoto, Napier, following a $50 million rebuild and refurbishment project. “The reopening of this facility will significantly lift the economic opportunities available to New Zealand’s wool sector, which already accounts for 20 per cent of ...
Hon Andrew Bayly, Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing At the Southland Otago Regional Engineering Collective (SOREC) Summit, 18 April, Dunedin Ngā mihi nui, Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Ko Whanganui aho Good Afternoon and thank you for inviting me to open your summit today. I am delighted ...
The Government is delivering on its commitment to bring back the Three Strikes legislation, Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee announced today. “Our Government is committed to restoring law and order and enforcing appropriate consequences on criminals. We are making it clear that repeat serious violent or sexual offending is not ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has today announced four new diplomatic appointments for New Zealand’s overseas missions. “Our diplomats have a vital role in maintaining and protecting New Zealand’s interests around the world,” Mr Peters says. “I am pleased to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the ...
New Zealand is contributing NZ$7 million to support communities affected by severe food insecurity and other urgent humanitarian needs in Ethiopia and Somalia, Foreign Minister Rt Hon Winston Peters announced today. “Over 21 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance across Ethiopia, with a further 6.9 million people ...
Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Paul Goldsmith is congratulating Mataaho Collective for winning the Golden Lion for best participant in the main exhibition at the Venice Biennale. "Congratulations to the Mataaho Collective for winning one of the world's most prestigious art prizes at the Venice Biennale. “It is good ...
The Government is reforming financial services to improve access to home loans and other lending, and strengthen customer protections, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly and Housing Minister Chris Bishop announced today. “Our coalition Government is committed to rebuilding the economy and making life simpler by cutting red tape. We are ...
“China remains a strong commercial opportunity for Kiwi exporters as Chinese businesses and consumers continue to value our high-quality safe produce,” Trade and Agriculture Minister Todd McClay says. Mr McClay has returned to New Zealand following visits to Beijing, Harbin and Shanghai where he met ministers, governors and mayors and engaged in trade and agricultural events with the New ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has completed a successful trip to Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, deepening relationships and capitalising on opportunities. Mr Luxon was accompanied by a business delegation and says the choice of countries represents the priority the New Zealand Government places on South East Asia, and our relationships in ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. “Recently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
A stopbank upgrade project in Tairawhiti partly funded by the Government has increased flood resilience for around 7000ha of residential and horticultural land so far, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones today attended a dawn service in Gisborne to mark the end of the first stage of the ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters will represent the Government at Anzac Day commemorations on the Gallipoli Peninsula next week and engage with senior representatives of the Turkish government in Istanbul. “The Gallipoli campaign is a defining event in our history. It will be a privilege to share the occasion ...
Science, Innovation and Technology and Defence Minister Judith Collins will next week attend the OECD Science and Technology Ministerial conference in Paris and Anzac Day commemorations in Belgium. “Science, innovation and technology have a major role to play in rebuilding our economy and achieving better health, environmental and social outcomes ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with the President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The Prime Minister was accompanied by MP Paulo Garcia, the first Filipino to be elected to a legislature outside the Philippines. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon and President Marcos Jr discussed opportunities to ...
The Government has announced that $20 million in funding will be made available to Westport to fund much needed flood protection around the town. This measure will significantly improve the resilience of the community, says Local Government Minister Simeon Brown. “The Westport community has already been allocated almost $3 million ...
The Government is proud to support the first ever Repco Supercars Championship event in Taupō as up to 70,000 motorsport fans attend the Taupō International Motorsport Park this weekend, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. “Anticipation for the ITM Taupō Super400 is huge, with tickets and accommodation selling out weeks ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced an increase to the Rates Rebate Scheme, putting money back into the pockets of low-income homeowners. “The coalition Government is committed to bringing down the cost of living for New Zealanders. That includes targeted support for those Kiwis who are doing things tough, such ...
The Coalition Government is investing in a project to boost survival rates of New Zealand mussels and grow the industry, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones has announced. “This project seeks to increase the resilience of our mussels and significantly boost the sector’s productivity,” Mr Jones says. “The project - ...
Benefit figures released today underscore the importance of the Government’s plan to rebuild the economy and have 50,000 fewer people on Jobseeker Support, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “Benefit numbers are still significantly higher than when National was last in government, when there was about 70,000 fewer ...
The Government’s commitment to doubling New Zealand’s renewable energy capacity is backed by new data showing that clean energy has helped the country reach its lowest annual gross emissions since 1999, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand’s latest Greenhouse Gas Inventory (1990-2022) published today, shows gross emissions fell ...
The Government is bringing the earthquake-prone building review forward, with work to start immediately, and extending the deadline for remediations by four years, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “Our Government is focused on rebuilding the economy. A key part of our plan is to cut red tape that ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and his Thai counterpart, Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, have today agreed that New Zealand and the Kingdom of Thailand will upgrade the bilateral relationship to a Strategic Partnership by 2026. “New Zealand and Thailand have a lot to offer each other. We have a strong mutual desire to build ...
RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Transport Minister Simeon Brown have today announced the Coalition Government’s intention to extend port coastal permits for a further 20 years, providing port operators with certainty to continue their operations. “The introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991 required ports to obtain coastal ...
Today’s announcement that inflation is down to 4 per cent is encouraging news for Kiwis, but there is more work to be done - underlining the importance of the Government’s plan to get the economy back on track, acting Finance Minister Chris Bishop says. “Inflation is now at 4 per ...
Refreshed health guidance released today will help parents and schools make informed decisions about whether their child needs to be in school, addressing one of the key issues affecting school attendance, says Associate Education Minister David Seymour. In recent years, consistently across all school terms, short-term illness or medical reasons ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is streamlining high-level oceans management while maintaining a focus on supporting the sector’s role in the export-led recovery of the economy. “I am working to realise the untapped potential of our fishing and aquaculture sector. To achieve that we need to be smarter with ...
Associate Agriculture Minister Mark Patterson is speaking at the International Wool Textile Organisation Congress in Adelaide, promoting New Zealand wool, and outlining the coalition Government’s support for the revitalisation the sector. "New Zealand’s wool exports reached $400 million in the year to 30 June 2023, and the coalition Government ...
The Government is making legislative changes to make it easier for new early learning services to be established, and for existing services to operate, Associate Education Minister David Seymour says. The changes involve repealing the network approval provisions that apply when someone wants to establish a new early learning service, ...
Changes to the Resource Management Act will align consenting for coal mining to other forms of mining to reduce barriers that are holding back economic development, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. “The inconsistent treatment of coal mining compared with other extractive activities is burdensome red tape that fails to acknowledge ...
Trade, Agriculture and Forestry Minister Todd McClay has concluded productive discussions with ministerial counterparts in Beijing today, in support of the New Zealand-China trade and economic relationship. “My meeting with Commerce Minister Wang Wentao reaffirmed the complementary nature of the bilateral trade relationship, with our Free Trade Agreement at its ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon today paid tribute to Singapore’s outgoing Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. Meeting in Singapore today immediately before Prime Minister Lee announced he was stepping down, Prime Minister Luxon warmly acknowledged his counterpart’s almost twenty years as leader, and the enduring legacy he has left for Singapore and South East ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon held a bilateral meeting today with Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. While in Singapore as part of his visit to South East Asia this week, Prime Minister Luxon also met with Singapore President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and will meet with Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong. During today’s meeting, Prime Minister Luxon ...
COMMENTARY:By Murray Horton New Zealand needs to get tough with Israel. It’s not as if we haven’t done so before. When NZ authorities busted a Mossad operation in Auckland 20 years ago, the government didn’t say: “Oh well, Israel has the right to defend itself.” No, it arrested, prosecuted, ...
NEWSMAKERS:By Vijay Narayan, news director of FijiVillage Blessed to be part of the University of Fiji (UniFiji) faculty to continue to teach and mentor those who want to join our noble profession, and to stand for truth and justice for the people of the country. I was privileged to ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Martin, Visiting Fellow, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University Three weeks from now, some of us will be presented with a mountain of budget papers, and just about all of us will get to hear about them on radio, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dan Lowry, Ice Sheet & Climate Modeller, GNS Science Hugh Chittock/Antarctica New Zealand, CC BY-SA As the climate warms and Antarctica’s glaciers and ice sheets melt, the resulting rise in sea level has the potential to displace hundreds of millions of ...
The government's plan to reintroduce a three strikes regime is being strongly opposed by lawyers, who argue there is no evidence it reduces crime or helps people rehabilitate. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dan Jerker B. Svantesson, Professor specialising in Internet law, Bond University Do Australian courts have the right to decide what foreign citizens, located overseas, view online on a foreign-owned platform? Anyone inclined to answer “yes” to this question should perhaps also ask ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Giovanni E Ferreira, NHMRC Emerging Leader Research Fellow, Institute of Musculoskeletal Health, University of Sydney Last week in a post on X, owner of the platform Elon Musk recommended people look into disc replacement if they’re experiencing severe neck or back pain. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Hayward, Emeritus Professor of Public Policy, RMIT University anek.soowannaphoom/Shutterstock NSW Treasurer Daniel Mookhey caught the headlines yesterday, courtesy of a blistering speech condemning the latest GST carve-up. New South Wales, he claimed, would be A$11.9 billion worse off over the ...
While police are "broadly in favour", the government's proposed anti-gang laws are facing pushback from lawyers, rights groups and former gang members. ...
While police are "broadly in favour", the government's proposed anti-gang laws are facing pushback from lawyers, rights groups and former gang members. ...
By Miriam Zarriga in Port Moresby Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has arrived at Kokoda Station, Northern province, at the start of his state visit to Papua New Guinea. Both Albanese and Prime Minister James Marape will meet with the locals and the Northern Provincial government before they begin their ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Chris Wallace, Professor, School of Politics Economics & Society, Faculty of Business Government & Law, University of Canberra Shutterstock An important principle was invoked by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese last week in defence of the government’s Future Made in Australia industry ...
By Patrick Decloitre, RNZ Pacific correspondent French Pacific desk Security forces reinforcements were sent from France ahead of two rival marches in the capital Nouméa today, at the same time and only two streets away one from the other. One march, called by Union Calédonienne party (a component of the ...
A poll last August found that just 16% of New Zealanders oppose bringing back the ‘Three Strikes’ law. The nationwide poll of 1,000 New Zealanders was commissioned by Family First NZ and carried out by Curia Market Research. ...
The solo show from Ana Scotney is both sprawling and intimate, and a must-see, writes Mad Chapman. In the opening moments of Scattergun: After the Death of Rūaumoko, writer and performer Ana Scotney lays out the groundwork, literally. Silently moving around the square stage, Scotney is not so much dancing ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Burridge, Professor of Linguistics, Monash University Who makes the words? Why are trees called trees and why are shoes called shoes and who makes the names? – Elliot, age 5, Eltham, Victoria Good question Elliot! Let’s start with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephen Duckett, Honorary Enterprise Professor, School of Population and Global Health, and Department of General Practice and Primary Care, The University of Melbourne at amRawpixel.com/Shutterstock Roles of health professionals are still unfortunately often stuck in the past. That is, before the ...
COMMENTARY:By Malcolm Evans Last week’s leaked New York Times staff directive, as to what words can and cannot be used to describe the carnage Israel is raining on Palestinians, is proof positive, since those reports are published verbatim here in New Zealand, that our understanding of the conflict is ...
In the case of New Zealand, the results confirm that there is no popular support for the vicious austerity program being imposed by the National Party-led government, which is backed in all fundamental respects by the opposition Labour Party. ...
The ‘Vampire’ singer has never visited our part of the world, but that might all be about to change. We assess the evidence.Olivia Rodrigo’s Guts World Tour is pulling in massive crowds as it whips around the US and Europe, even helping to catapult regular supporting act Chappell Roan ...
Testing of drinking water in rural Canterbury over the weekend by Greenpeace revealed that several public town supplies were reaching levels of nitrate above 5 mg/L - the threshold which a growing body of scientific evidence has linked to increased ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rohan Fisher, Information Technology for Development Researcher, Charles Darwin University It may come as a surprise to hear 2023 was Australia’s biggest bushfire season in more than a decade. Fires burned across an area eight times as big as the 2019–20 Black ...
Responding to the Government’s announcement of changes to resource management laws, Taxpayers’ Union Executive Director, Jordan Williams, said: “These changes are a step in the right direction in terms of removing ideological and unworkable ...
More than two years after the Human Rights Council called for the establishment of a national human rights commission, such a body has yet to be formed. ...
Comment:An emergency management system with wide variations in performance, significant capability gaps, funding shortfalls and above all a setup that is not meeting the needs of New Zealanders at times of crisis. The Government’s inquiry into the response to Cyclone Gabrielle and other severe weather events in the North ...
Welcome to the whirring wonders of one brain trying to align its actions with its beliefs within a system it thinks is evil. My brain has been spiralling in a woke conundrum ever since I found out a bookshop I’ve never been to was shutting down. Good Books, a bookshop ...
We repeat our call for criminal justice policy to be based on evidence, something the three strikes regime neglects to recognise – with no evidence that it either reduces crime or assists with rehabilitation. ...
By Koroi Hawkins, RNZ Pacific editor in Honiara With only four more seats in the 50-member Parliament yet to be officially declared, there is no outright winner in the Solomon Islands elections. As of Monday, the two largest blocs in the winner’s circle, independents and the incumbent Prime Minister Manasseh ...
Two/fiftyseven is a multi-purpose space hidden in the heart of Wellington that is paving a way for sustainable building and responsible landlording in Aotearoa and beyond.By 2060 the world is predicted to double its entire building stock, which equates to building an entire New York City every 34 days, ...
Popstars wasn’t just a reality television revolution, it was also a huge moment for Y2K fashion.It’s 25 years since girl group TrueBliss was formed on New Zealand national television, breaking new ground for both the reality television industry and the shiny clothing industry. With the first episode on NZ ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Pepping, Associate Professor in Clinical Psychology, Griffith University Marvin / Shutterstock Are all single people insecure? When we think about people who have been single for a long time, we may assume it’s because single people have insecurities that make ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By William Geary, Lecturer in Quantitative Ecology & Biodiversity Conservation, The University of Melbourne Trismegist san, Shutterstock Landscapes that have escaped fire for decades or centuries tend to harbour vital structures for wildlife, such as tree hollows and large logs. But these ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Gladstone-Gallagher, Lecturer in Marine Science, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau Shutterstock/S Curtis Why are we crossing ecological boundaries that affect Earth’s fundamental life-supporting capacity? Is it because we don’t have enough information about how ecosystems respond to change? Or ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Matthew Crocker, PhD Student in Economics, Deakin University Here’s something for the board of the Reserve Bank of Australia to ponder as it meets next month to set interest rates. It has pushed up rates on 13 occasions since it began its ...
As part of our series exploring how New Zealanders live and our relationship with money, a charity director outlines how she’s saving for retirement and buying secondhand. Want to be part of The Cost of Being? Fill out the questionnaire here.Gender: Female Age: 45 Ethnicity: Pākehā Role: Charity director, mum of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sophie Yates, Research Fellow, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University Many Australians with disability feel on the edge of a precipice right now. Recommendations from the disability royal commission and the NDIS review were released late last year. Now a ...
It’s been called a failed experiment and a judicial straightjacket but the government says the revised three strikes law will be a more workable regime, writes Anna Rawhiti-Connell in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. Three ...
New Zealand’s Palestinian community and Palestinian Youth Aotearoa are voicing alarm and disappointment with the lack of factual rigour present during the Israeli Ambassador’s appearance as a guest on TVNZ’s Q+A With Jack Tame Sunday (21/04). ...
Both ACT leader David Seymour, who played a key role in drawing up the assisted dying law, and hospice leaders say it's time the legislation was changed. ...
Public submissions on proposed gang control laws are being heard today. Rising gang membership has been cited as rationale for a crackdown – but what do we actually know about how many people belong to gangs in New Zealand?What’s all this then?A rise in the number of gang ...
Climate activists are setting their sights on an unpopular target, and hoping to bring lots of the public with them. It’s hard to miss the Majestic Princess: the enormous cruise ship, docked at Auckland’s Prince’s Wharf, looms over the nearby buildings. The ship, which can fit nearly 6,000 people, ...
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Loading…(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){var ql=document.querySelectorAll('A[quiz],DIV[quiz],A[data-quiz],DIV[data-quiz]'); if(ql){if(ql.length){for(var k=0;k<ql.length;k++){ql[k].id='quiz-embed-'+k;ql[k].href="javascript:var i=document.getElementById('quiz-embed-"+k+"');try{qz.startQuiz(i)}catch(e){i.start=1;i.style.cursor='wait';i.style.opacity='0.5'};void(0);"}}};i['QP']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)})(window,document,'script','https://take.quiz-maker.com/3012/CDN/quiz-embed-v1.js','qp'); Got a good quiz question?Send Newsroom your questions. The post Newsroom daily quiz, Tuesday 23 April appeared first on Newsroom. ...
The following korero between Ngāhuia te Awekōtuku, author of the newly published memoir Hine Toa, one of the year’s most important books, and Dale Husband from e-tangata, was first published in October. It traverses her involvement with the activist group Ngā Tamatoa at Auckland University in the early 1970s, her ...
In the 16 years since it was bought by the government for $690 million, KiwiRail has had several overhauls and turnaround plans worth billions of dollars. Its ambitions as a successful, profitable operator of tourism, freight and ferries have often been derailed by disasters from earthquakes to cyclones, mine explosions ...
Black Ferns trailblazer Kendra Cocksedge was on the verge of tears when her young protégé, Hannah King, unassumingly broke the news. Three-time Rugby World Cup winner Cocksedge and Lincoln agriculture student King meet every few weeks over a hot chocolate, in an enduring mentorship that’s spanned years. “Before we even ...
Opinion: We’ve kicked the tyres on the perception NZ’s economy is in a parlous state compared to Australia. We take a quick tour of relative trends in GDP, housing markets, labour markets, trade, the fiscal situation, and the outlooks for inflation and interest rates. We find the cyclical positions of ...
By Russell Palmer, RNZ News digital political journalist New Zealand’s Foreign Minister Winston Peters is putting off recognition of Palestine as a state, despite opposition Labour’s formal request that he make the move. Peters said diplomatic recognition of Palestine was a matter of “when not if”, but doing so now ...
The opposition has laid into the government's plan to reintroduce a "three strikes" regime, saying it's inequitable and there's very little evidence it works. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rob Nicholls, Senior research associate, University of Sydney Australia’s eSafety Commissioner has ordered social media platform “X” (formerly known as Twitter) to remove graphic videos of the stabbing of Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel in Sydney last week from the site. The incident ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Turnbull, Postdoctoral Research Associate, University of Sydney John Turnbull, CC BY-NC-ND In past bleaching events on the Great Barrier Reef, the southern region has sometimes been spared worst of the bleaching. Not this time. This year’s intense underwater heat has ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sarah Austin, Lecturer in Theatre, The University of Melbourne Darren Gill/Mackey, Darling & Collaborators The relationship between witchcraft and teenage girls has been the subject of many books, films and television shows. Over time, the traditional image of witch as crone ...
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Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Becky Freeman, Associate Professor, School of Public Health, University of Sydney Andres Siimon/Unsplash There are no silver bullets, magic tricks or secret hacks to solving complex public health problems. Taking on the global tobacco industry and reducing the devastating consequences of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adam B. Watts, Research Associate in galaxy evolution, The University of Western Australia ESO/A. Watts et al., CC BY We breathe oxygen and nitrogen gas in our atmosphere every day, but did you know that these gases also float through space, ...
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RNZ at 7am news said that the ‘All blacks beat Italy with 10 tries today’
Yawn.
Glad I didn’t pay to watch it.
Just a walk in the park as Italy is not a rugby country but a rabid soccer loving country stacked full of fans.
We can’t feel good about beating Italy in rugby here. Hollow victory we got only.
disagree there cleangreen.
it was a fairly scrappy affair in the first half but the team settled into a rhythm in second half.
this was a chance for a lot of second string players to make a mark.
jordie barrett scored 4 tries and had a good all round game.
we had hookers putting good kicks through to set up tries.
ok, the result was never in doubt but the nature of the all blacks performance in the final test of a long season was heartening for this fan.
of more concern is the lopsided score england vs australia. 37-18 to england.
we need australian rugby to be stronger than it is at the moment.
ps, i don’t pay for any sport nowadays, its such an old fashioned habit.
We’re a country the size of Melbourne, generating sports teams that continue to conquer the world.
In Italy we just beat a country with the economic capacity to buy all of our top Rugby players multiple times over if it wanted.
Currently we’re battling it out with Pakistan, a country with 202 million people and over 10 million cricket players. We would be lucky to scrape together 2,000 top players.
Sport is one of New Zealand’s top industries.
It’s also one of the fastest upward routes out of deprivation for many of our citizens.
It’s good for us, celebrate the wins.
yeah – the wee battler yarp, yarp, yarp,
Change your mythology imo – because you seem to filter everything through that money-lens of yours.
You need to calm down and pull back from your keyboard.
You’re not adding anything except hate.
Well I certainly dislike the kiwi battler meme – bit of a cliche now – I dislike the financial/money angle for sure but hate? Bit OTT there – go and dig the garden you seem a bit worked up old chap.
Anyway I cannot be bothered getting hassled by the likes of you and james so I’ll fuck off and leave you to it.
“I cannot be bothered getting hassled by the likes of you and james so I’ll fuck off and leave you to it.”
Which is ironic since you replied to both of us with stupid and rude comments.
We hadn’t even engaged with you. But you try to make it all about you and we are hassling you. /facepalm
You got reciprocated twerp. And ad, well the little battler bullshit stuck in my throat esp after the non acceptance from him imo last night that iwi organisations are more than corporates.
But being given shade from a rwnj like you is actually a badge of honour in leftie circles so thanks for the cred LOL
I’m with you mm on this subject. I’m sure that makes you feel heaps better. 😉
Sick and tired of the ABs. Sometimes wish they would take a running jump over the nearest cliff.
As for the “we’re the little kiwi battlers” theme… get over all your insecurities I say and get on with your lives.
We have issues like climate change confronting the world, yet our puppet media and desperate people dribble on about a sports victory against a minnow team .
Pathetic.
You know Eddie that people like to read a wide range of topics – not everyone loves to wallow in misery and doom.
James you are a member of the elite. Of course you would not care.
Ed, life ain’t binary.
Yes I accept bread and circuses aspect to sport.
Rugby in Aotearoa is more than just a sport.
Rugby clubs have unified communities for generations.
Professional and labourer, town and country, Maori and Pakeha.
It is also how we grew up a little, and got out from the mother country yoke.
That doesn’t mean I can’t be concerned by inequality and CC.
Anyhoo, back to the grindstone.
You wish they would jump off a cliff because you are sick and tired of other people being entertained by them.
Classy.
What about consideration for those of us who have spent years having the ABs rammed down our throats.
Selfish.
Easier to just scroll past or change channel than wishing they jump off a cliff.
But hey wishing harm on others because you don’t like sports says a lot about you.
In addition to James not being able to spel good, it appears he doesn’t know what a figure of speech is.
Sport is simply bread and circuses for the masses. Our inane obsession with it says a lot about the mental immaturity of our Country. There are far more important pursuits in life. Sure, keep fit by doing some sport, but professionalism has turned it into something as bad as fundamentalist religion.
James,
I also am sick and tired of sports bullshit.
Get real; – and give constructive input into the ‘real issues’ climate change flooding and polluting of our environment for instance.
These things are far more serious than you will ever know if you ignore the signs that are impacting our lives.
try this firstly; -https://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/afternoons/audio/2018670839/mike-joy-solving-nz-s-freshwater-crisis
Will you lower the tone on the sports banter as it is boring and so over-rated!!!!!!!.
Colin Peacock nails it on Mediawatch, displaying the idiocy of media rugby reporters in New Zealand.
https://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player?audio_id=2018672555
Ed, thank you.
Ad isn’t always wrong marty mars. Don’t be prejudiced against him because he sees most things through a money lens. It is true that sport generates money, gives us an international profile, gives opportunities to see the world for low income men and women, gives jobs now to many low income families in a job–poor society (despite rock star rah rah statistics (finely made to match international specifications).
Ad can be relied on to take a certain pragmatic approach, and is pretty consistent, so we know what to expect and respect in his opinions.
Bryan Gould on why New Zealand is so good at Rugby across the genders and age-grades.
http://www.bryangould.com/what-makes-the-all-blacks-so-good/
I cannot tell you how much I am looking forward to the World Women’s 7’s in Hamilton next year. We’ve already booked tickets. There are a couple of our greats who are close to retirement.
Gould might have also mentioned how blessed New Zealand has been to have waves of Pasifika migration to draw talent from across so many sporting fields including Rugby.
In some respects also we are good at enabling female participation as a matter of public policy – but only in the last two years. That’s unusual in global terms still, even if slowly improving.
Professional Sport Ad. The rest is recreation. Cheers.
Recreational sport is a massive direct and indirect social and economic benefit to this country as well.
We all started as amateurs, and most continue to give back long after their professional paying years are done.
Makes for a great country to be in sport.
Don’t you mean sport is one of NZ’s top corporate welfare recipients.
Actually certain sports such as Rugby and Yacht racing are NZ’s top corporate welfare recipients.
Crumbs for other sports and for participation in sports, judging from our growing obesity rates.
Plenty of fat people into sport, and good on them. I was one.
All industry gets welfare in this country. It’s our thing.
Yes forgot you can be fat and fit now, with the PC culture.
Being fat is just woke healthy.
I better go off and try and start a twitter account to change the word ‘trivial’.
Don’t get stuck on critique savenz. Bad for mental health. You are so good at taking a country-wide and global view so we know our problems, and also seeing what we could do. Perhaps each separate critical para you state how a change could improve or turn all negative into partly positive I think making a small positive input all the time may make a great change to the mood of the readers.
David Slack’s comment: “You can’t rely on the weather but there are two things you can set your clock by in November: NCEA exams and NCEA exam controversy. This year the level three history exam provided the popcorn. A question used the world ‘trivial’ and students complained this was not a word they knew. There was much rolling of eyes by people of a greater age.”
” There are more than 170,000 words in the Oxford dictionary, and it’s not easy staying on top of them all. John Key, an Auckland businessman and retired politician, left school with a B Bursary and prospered in the world of buying and selling money. He was once a luncheon guest of the Queen. They shared a glass of champagne, hollandaise eggs, beef, a panna cotta dessert and some cheese. “It was quite a fulsome lunch,” he told reporters afterwards, “I’m fairly full.” Over the past eight centuries the word fulsome has been used to mean copious, and it has also been used to mean foul, odious and rotten. Which meaning did he intend? What a conundrum of syzygy.”
Which meaning of syzygy did Slack mean? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syzygy – bright students would ponder the selection and come up with a simile not present: conjoined. Explain that to the class & the other students would be wondering `what does conjoined mean?’
OK Google. What did John Key mean when he said he had a fulsome lunch?
(In summary – I’m a complete dickhead)
The students have the right to ask the meaning of the word during a test. A trivial point, but an important one.
Not in NCEA they can’t. A student asked me whether the word ‘differ’ was the same derivation as ‘different’. I couldn’t answer as an exam supervisor. All I could do was tell him I was not allowed and to do his best.
I’ve been misinformed. It was a right wing person that did that too me as well.
It reminded me of a movie scene. A chain of monkeys sending a message up to a penguin.
Some lucky bastards can be as fat as santa and have every other measurement within normal parameters – blod pressure, heart rate, uric acid, liver function, all of that shit. And live to a ripe old age.
Utter bastards.
So fat & fit is a thing.
It was always going to be an easy game.
I assume that you didn’t pay for England or Ireland either.
The Ireland game was particularly good.
In a nutshell: an AB win acts like mass medication to make Kiwis feel good about themselves (Big People) and their country. An AB loss OTOH makes Kiwis feel like Small People in a small country at the bottom of the World (AKA trivial).
That’s a very broad brush you are painting with there incognito.
Indeed, it is.
Watched in horror on Friday as an elderly male bus driver jumped out of the blue Metro bus he was driving and ran to the vehicle in front. Karate chopped the front windscreen and then punched the young woman driver in the head 2 or 3 times. All happened in peak hour traffic and very quickly. Where do I lodge a report about this ? Police and Auckland Transport ? I have the bus number / time / place etc. And another witness who was with me.
Call Auckland Transport 09 301 0101
Thank you, Ad. By the time I got out of my car the traffic was moving and the car driver behind me was blowing his horn. The passengers on the bus were not impressed but not sure they could see the violence.
Hard for anyone else to do something in that short space and time. And that fact of crush of traffic and impatience is probably behind the violence, and what might happen at home to an offending female explodes in public.
They are under so much stress, bus and truck drivers. Very sad it comes to that.
I feel that this could tie into something I noticed the other day. The driver of the local recycling truck came along on his busy round. They have a specially built cabin with the wheel on the left side, near the kerb, and space to stand behind it. They draw in, empty the bins into the moving auger? system carefully, make sure they stop that before they reach in to clear anything etc. and quickly move on to the next place. A busy and lonely job,.
I happened to be on the pavement nearby and said Good morning, no response. I spoke again about the weather, but no appearance of being heard or seen. I wondered if he was deaf, and watched how he went about it. He was concentrating on the job, finished dealing with a number of bins, and didn’t look up at all, head down all the time. It seemed, he didn’t want to have any interaction with others around, he seemed sullen, internally angry and unhappy.
It looked to me as if he had a major negative attitude brewing in his brain, was isolating himself from the general public, and it seemed as if a huge resentment and hate might be simmering which left me feeling very uneasy.
Maybe you should let him get on with his job and stop trying to distract him.
What’s your point gabby? Do you want to live in a friendly, happy, interactive society or not? If you have something to say can you make it have some point instead of the first thing that passes through your head momentarily.
I don’t want to be crushed by a bloke emptying bins because some clot wanted a chinwag greysy.
So, what you’re saying is that it’s better for a worker in an unsatisfying job to ‘flip’ rather than for you to be inconvenienced?
Getting crushed by a truck’s bloody incovenient draccy.
Why would you be standing in front of it?
A distracted operator, and the fucker could kill in an instant.
https://screenshotscdn.firefoxusercontent.com/images/ba85ef93-0808-44f9-824d-4a6ba9369521.png
Neithrt do I want people to be treated like robotsd by an uncaring and thoughtless master or mistress class grabby.
Perhaps he didn’t speak english?
That’s what you get when you pay $20 p/h in a stressful job. You mention he was elderly, and male, anything else you want to add in there Patricia? I’m guessing he was not white, thus not fitting the white male privilege… that people love to blame on everything these days… but happy to be proved wrong.
savenz
You are sounding like the way that China is thinking about reporting facts and truth, that they should be filtered in a way so that the results match their requirements for the ‘right’ appearance to be presented that matches the desired approach and image.
Yep, if you want to give a description do it properly, not subjectively, revealing your own bias or these days it seems more a concern about woke identity politics as a sort of brain washing, if you don’t want to reveal a person’s physical appearance, then just use the word, bus driver. The police will want to know anyway.
Actually I first thought is was not a big thing, but actually thinking about a bus driver that has actually left the vehicle to attack a women, actually sounds like a crime that is a police matter, especially as there is a growing issue in Auckland of fake drivers driving commercial vehicles and I have a friend who was hospitalised by one .
If he is that out of control he is assaulting people in public who knows what other things might be revealed.
Also maybe the guy goes home and beats up his wife, who knows?
Assault is a crime for police, not for AT, which is more for bad driving.
If you remove indentity politics, and it’s resulting gender, racial prejudice you get this.
I witnessed a bus driver hop out of the bus, go up to a car, smash the window and assault the driver.
Identity is irrelevant to the event, or the reality of a crime being committed.
Identity politics effect on Law results in a doubled sentence, due to the victims identity, for the male bus driver if the act or harm is identicle if a woman was the bus driver.
Don’t call Auckland Transport, they will do nothing. Call the police and lodge a report, if the driver is that bad they might run someone over next time they have a road rage attack and at least with the police there will be more chance of them catching who did it and working out whether the driver should be working with the public or not.
Also the police can check whether he has a fake bus license or not, which is a growing problem of both fake licenses and also identity swaps where the person driving does not match the whoever was supposed to be driving the vehicle.
Know someone who was hospitalised by that scam. Police are investigating and I think did bring charges, but the person who caused the accident looked nothing like the drivers license photo and tried to flee the scene in his delivery van. Meanwhile our hospitals are filling up and people’s lives being destroyed by injury by these fakes.
AT employ so many people doing processes it will never get anywhere, let alone they understand the seriousness of what is going on with drivers attacking people and all the fakes out there.
Gee you see a woman punched in the head two or three times and two days later ask on a forum where do you lodge a report?
It’s amazes me that people can’t work shit like this out and are happy to drive on and do nothing like call the police when they see a young woman assaulted.
Stupidity or laziness is enabling the attacker.
Gee a little inadequate twerp makes all sorts of ill informed and ignorant judgments about another based on a question on this forum and shows, once again, why he is a waste of space and a loser.
It amazes me that people like that, so puffed up with their own privilege, just mouth off without engaging their brains.
Not stupidness but boredom – the boredom of a right wing nut job when pretending is even too much.
You are a bitter wee thing today aren’t you.
I mean more than you normally are.
Try doing something fun today – it might put you in a better disposition.
Yes you and ad are onto me lol
I just think you were mean and I replyed in the same vein. Probably a mistake but there you go.
Anyway you are correct I’ve had a hard night with the people I work with so i’ll leave you and ad to it.
Cheer up Marty Mars. There is a fine line between bitterness and pithy.
You often ‘put your finger on ‘ popular concerns.
Sorry you are going through a ‘hard time with people you work with’.
That can change the way a person views everything else.
Been there done the hard yards. Kia mau kaha toku hoa.
DFTT and your internal rage and depression.
You keep saying your going Marty and leaving james et al to it; only to bounce back in a couple of threads, take a break for every ones benefit
No, James has a point there. The incident should have been reported on Friday. As it was assault it probably should have been a 111 call but a *555 probably would have worked as well.
That said, this speaks of what I said the other day. People seeing an action that they don’t know how to handle because it’s outside of their experience.
Woah that would have been scary to see.
Good on you for having the sense to note the details and doing something about it.
I heard this on RNZ truckies want rules to stop pressures on truck drivers
https://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player?audio_id=2018672721
And BBC news; – Truckies and farmers in France want diesel tax dropped!!!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDO8SDIlxNk
So it appears that they want to keep using ‘dirty diesel to pollute planet’ eh?
Mmmmmm!
The New Zealand truckies are workers seeking to stop being required to work over 70 hours a week. That’s 6 days a week 12 hours a day.
Those workers are controlling machinery weighing 1-2 tonnes traveling at 90 kilometers an hour often mere centimeters from the public which includes you and your family.
They don’t want to be worked so hard that they cause deaths.
Seems pretty reasonable.
I’ll agree with you on that, AD.
Another option is to get trains running and a more workable way to transit from them (aka don’t put a port in the middle of downtown Auckland) so that we don’t need all these polluting, road damaging, and dangerous trucks on the road.
Yes totally agree.
“Trucking companies are competing for big contracts at the expense of their staff, a truck driver’s union has warned.
It says the companies are competing for tenders by forcing drivers to accept low pay rates and long work hours.
First Union secretary for transport Jared Abbott said a lot of drivers were working at least 70 hours, the maximum hours allowed per week.
“We see it a lot where people are pushed to break the logbook rules or to breach health and safety in some way.
“Their scared – rightfully so – for their livelihoods to test it and we see it a lot with quite reputable companies where people do test it, they get shafted.”
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/376670/trucking-contracts-putting-staff-at-risk
Part of problem is most truckers are contractors in corporate colours ( mainfreifgt freight Courier post etc) They own the issue as well as many on wages now and in the pass have taken the piss on hours and looking after company vehicals; etc not to mention over the top Union action They in essence shafted themselves Saying that contractor drivers are way more incentivised to align business and individual interest; albeit agree it is a race to the bottom to a degree at the moment driven by procurement division of buyers of freight services not the freight companies themselves
You do know that the rail used to go to the port right?
The big trucks are more like 30 tonne
???
That’s up to 50+ tonnes.
The machinery I had in mind there was just the truck so 1-2 tonnes.
The regs for weight by each kind of axle are here:
https://www.drivingtests.co.nz/resources/heavy-vehicle-weights-and-loads/
‘Truckies; Slow to learn, resistant to change, another type of nimby.
Or workers trying to change their conditions in a threatened industry.
Yes Patricia, SaveNZ, and Ad.
At our NGO committee meeting with ‘Port of Napier’ executives in November 2016 we were advised of this; –
“The truckies have warned the Port of Napier that they will fight rail to retaining their 90% of moving logs to the port”.
So we are fighting a war against truckies who don’t want to use public owned rail period.
As to road safety;
So the Government needs urgently now to sort the truckies out here, as we will loose many lives on our narrow windy roads as the “wall of wood arrives”.
Australia have already made moves to address this with the CoR – Chain of Responsibility legislation.
As I understand it, if an incident occurs the driver’s logs etc are examined to ensure that the workload expected and time taken to deliver was reasonable. If not, the responsibility for the incident is shifted to management.
You no doubt noticed that programme didn’t mention choochoos once that I recall cleany?
That was disappointing Gabby. For a second I saw the ch and thought you were talking about chocolate! Choochoos, Thomas the tank engine and all, aren’t they stories that you read to children about long ago ways to get around and go to see at old technology parks? /sarc cleangreen don’t blow a foofoo valve.
Wonder if the truckies would be supportive of a law that prevented them from working more than 8 hours a day and no more than five days a week. They are, after all, correct in that long hours behind driving is dangerous and it’s not just to them but to the rest of the population as well.
I bet they\ truckies would not want to limit themselves to short hours like that and would rather work longer hours, but not to the extent they are pushed now. It wouldn’t be so bad if truckies got extra payment for working unsocial hours, and over the 8 hour limit, which would be justified. They would have been paid properly for their time and effort like that once. And of course there has to be an upper limit otherwise it is too hard on the drivers.
But they are being pressured to go too far for too long, and the roads are not coping. Nine years National had to work out a better transport plan, but no. And their stooge Ken Shirley happily on the one hand talks about how busy the transport industry is and then wants more money spent on roads. He used to be in the Labour Party I think. He knew which side has the best butter and most bread.
A good follow up article on self harm.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/108797977/females-arent-the-only-ones-that-selfharm
Maybe that was Patricia’s bus driver. Desperate to leave AT.
A thought provoking post marty. Would this come under mental health?
Perhaps it shows expression of deeply felt pain. More funding for trained help could assist.
How do we create connections to provide community support? Self harm can be so hard to see sometimes. Some harm behaviours need a trigger, some are repeated responses to stress.
This is apparently a growing problem. A symptom of larger social ills?
Perhaps we are ‘connected by the internet’ but are ‘touch deprived’ so have constant grief.
Self harm for males can be exactly the same as females, in being a cry for help. It’s just not addressed, identified, diagnosed as well as females.
One issue for males is risk taking self harm. So the young male who isn’t intentionaly suiciding engages in high risk acts. Driving extremely dangerously combines with “look at me” male behavours. An episode of suicidle thoughts may combine with dangerous driving, as a release.
So the self harm is never identified because they don’t cut themselves etc.
Suicide for men often involves “cry for help” with nobody giving a shit.
Parliaments self immolation victim is a perfect example.
Male teens engage in risk-taking activities and behaviour because they think they’re indestructible, which is fuelled by testosterone spikes and the fact that their brains haven’t fully developed and matured.
That was feminist propaganda.
It’s mating behavour of look at me, I’m the best, strongest, healthiest driven by sexual chemistry far more complex than just testosterone. You said they think but then said they don’t think.
It’s a direct counter to young females biologically being attracted older men, in that older men have proven to have successful genes. There is no thinking involved in the females mating preference.
Just as there is no thinking involved in females being sexually attracted to males or a male being sexually attracted to other men.
Replicated throughout the animal kingdom.
That is completely different from depression based suicide behavours and self harming.
Your comment is why recognising males with problems is ignored as it just gets attributed to feminist ideology that males are inherently flawed. A male acting out can be a cry for help but is put down as you expressed as just the actions of a stupid male.
It was true for some risk-taking males, just as your initial comment was true for others.
The difficulty with the self harm identified in the article is how an observer is supposed to identify the intention. Does someone get into bar fights because they are insecure and drunk, or because they are intentionally self-destructive? Is a fight a good time for them, reasserting macho dominance? A sportsman playing through an injury: intentional self harm, or foolish machismo “toughing out” the injury? A guy jumping off a wall: poor decision making, or intentional self harm?
Cuts with a razor and (sometimes) prescription overdoses leave little ambiguity.
But yes, just as heart attacks in women are often underdiagnosed because the publicised symptoms tend to be in males, and just as males can be late-diagnosed with eating disorders or breast cancer, self harm in males can be underdiagnosed.
Good comment Mc Flock
Difficult as very few can deconstruct what they witness from family and freinds. Resulting in family saying they never saw any signs of there loved ones having issues prior to suicide. But they were present.
In the case of ambiguous injuries, there is a shortcoming where if we can’t see it, we can’t count it, and if we can’t count it, we can’t assess it as a need of the population.
And everything is a balance of resources until utopia comes: if a DHB has X$ to spend on public health and wellness campaigns and a greater number of potential compaigns looking for funding, It comes down to which selection of programs will do the greatest good for X$ spent. Which is how qualitative stuff sometimes gets ignored.
Very well said. Acting out often is just what it is: acting out, establishing boundaries, developing identity (and persona). Where warning signs can become tell-tale signs is when a negative repetitive pattern develops, for example.
The scientific literature must be awash with feminist propaganda but I stick with the literature nevertheless if you don’t mind – indeed, there are competing (or rather complementing) scientific hypotheses. But feel free to put up a credible link that supports your statement.
Just as well that I didn’t argue that it was all down to “just testosterone”.
Please read it again; that isn’t at all what I said.
This makes no sense whatsoever!? Males are flawed and therefore we ignore their problems or we assume that they don’t have a problems!? You seem to have hang ups about this “feminist ideology” you keep referring to.
This is exactly the point I was trying to make, which is that correct interpretation of a male acting out is very difficult. You grabbed the wrong end of the stick and went off on your rant.
Teenage males aren’t alone in that coggy.
True that, many males are still stuck in their teenage years. After all, it’s an important market segment for gyms. And don’t get me started on roid rage.
A apposed to females with I’m a princess syndrome manifesting in things like bridezillas who reject males for only offering $1,000 rings vs $5,000 dollar ones. An important market for pointless bits of rock.
All part of the mating behaviour. To you it’s a pointless bit of rock but to her it’s clear sign how much the potential mate ‘values’ her and how far he can and will go to woe her. Many women want their wedding day to be very special and the best day of their lives (AKA the dream wedding) but that doesn’t make them princesses or bridezillas. Reality TV is a misnomer, you know?
What does the man get in turn for this “woman want”. It is clearly not necessary then. It should be “special, best day”. Like out of a fantasy movie. Everything else is equal isn’t it?
So what do men get? Equality speaking. For a fantasy to come true for them?
We’re still talking about the mating ritual, are we? Almost 8 billion people on this planet all chasing fantasies? About half of them are bridezillas and the other half are hapless creatures that cannot and must not get fulfilment (or, as more directly verbalised by the Rolling Stones: satisfaction)? Do you and/or your partner/spouse wear a ring? A pointless bit of metal?
You’re all over the place; does your left hand know what your right hand is doing? You seem to have too much time on your hands …
I’m trying to use my time wisely. It’s not easy living a a mind that doesn’t have a pause button. This just good therapy and positive thoughts.
Well, it seems we do have something in common: an overactive brain that doesn’t know when to stop. For this reason I landed on TS a few years back and I’ve found it very therapeutic as well as educational and informative. Some Standardistas just blow me away. And there’s humour, not quite enough IMO, but at times it is enough to dissipate the worries and stresses of a long day at work and life in general.
I’m not sure romantic love is a transaction.
You think of something, think “X would like that”, and do it, because you love them. And X does the same, not as a transaction but because they love you.
And sometimes people need reassurance that they are loved, and sometimes all this other crap is going on and future inlaws might be judging and the seating plan can’t have exes close to each other etc etc etc.
If I proposed to someone and they turned me down because the ring wasn’t expensive enough, I’d know it wasn’t reciprocal love and I’d be well out of that. But if someone’s cool with a transactional arrangement, fair enough.
Depends on the man/fantasy and the arrangement between the couple. Tis their business and nobody else’s, as long as it harms none.
Everyone has different ideas, dreams. Relationships are about compromise, nothing like a wedding to start that ball rolling.
Exhusband and I both agreed that buying our first home was way more important than a fancy wedding. So we did it that way.
Wedding was awesome, honeymoon was epic. Buying that house, worked out well for all.
Everyone has different priorities re a wedding, depends on the volume of brainwashing and visual media one has been exposed to.
Also depends on the communication channels and honesty between a couple.
Yep you got it spot on.
If you want to reject someone then it’s easier to say “you’re ring is not worth enough” rather than “you’re the last man on earth I’d ever want to marry”. Rejected males are not the safest people to be around so it’s best to do it as impersonally as possible.
Yep. I was scared a partner would stab me to death in my sleep once. I had already had to flee through the house shuting myself in a room because my partner used a knife to explain my bank account was empty for good reasons. Getting out of relationships with crazy individuals isn’t easy. Honesty and self preservation conflict.
On a post last week, somebody mentioned a new article by public finance expert Don Gilling on AUT’s Briefing Papers website had disappeared. It is now back online:
http://briefingpapers.co.nz/follow-the-money/
It raises questions about the stewardship of the National Library and Archives NZ by the Department of Internal Affairs since these agencies were merged into DIA in 2010. Gilling notes the decline in NLNZ budget under DIA, even while the Department’s overall budget has risen, as well as the increasing proportion of NLNZ budget going to DIA for centrally managed costs. The implication is that DIA is milking NLNZ and Archives to cover other departmental functions.
One might also ask why the DIA is managing the current review of the Library, Archives and Nga Taonga, when there is such an apparent conflict of interest. Brian Easton alluded to this on his Pundit blog some months back:
https://www.pundit.co.nz/content/whither-archives-new-zealand-and-the-national-library
Thanks for that, Sam A.
lprent commented on Don’s article disappearing from Briefing Papers inhis patest post here (link below) and asked if anyone knew Don Gilling etc. he would be interested in seeing the article.
https://thestandard.org.nz/my-civics-the-new-zealand-civil-war/
I do know him and was intending contacting him (or Brian Easton who is a very close friend/associate of Don’s) to ask what happened with it. By coincidence, yesterday I met his wife in a shop and mentioned the article and its disappearance from BPs and the fact that there were people here including lprent interested in seeing it. Apparently it had been put up there by someone else, not Don so then taken down. She was going to raise it with Don, but the article was probably already back up on BPs already by that stage.
Apparently Don has been getting a lot of interest and feedback on his thoughts in this article. I noted recently that Don is also now on the Committee of the Friends of the Turnbull Library here in Wellington for the 2018/19 year,
I read it on my way back home on Thursday. Planning to write a post on it after I get the anger under control.
Thanks, look forward to your post. I haven’t read Don’s article yet …
Yes I look forward to that also.
An implication of Don Gilling’s article is that NLNZ & Archives NZ have been subject to the same kind of austerity RNZ suffered under the last government. But, buried layers down in DIA, this has been far less visible.
Didn’t we lose a collection of historical photos a few years ago, due to the asinine decision to outsource them to a small digital conversion outfit in the US, which then went into bankruptcy and never returned those photos?
Molly, I think this is what you refer to:
https://i.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/93966105/fairfax-nz-photo-library-set-to-return-home-after-us-wrangle
Whether they have been returned yet I don’t know. There were concerns at the time about whether Ministry of Culture and Heritage had exercised proper oversight under the Protected Objects Act.
We are like children being led into the Forest of Business and Dubious Efficiency. Questions were raised about the wisdom and good faith involved in taking control in 2010 of our heritage material and putting it under the wing of a big Department with wide responsibilities.
It raises questions about the stewardship of the National Library and Archives NZ by the Department of Internal Affairs since these agencies were merged into DIA [Department of Internal Affairs] in 2010.
Now we should be determined to stop this downgrading of irreplaceable stuff about our past. We have had decades of dilettantes in government to make useful profitable connections for themselves, interested in cutting the part of the budget that went on tasks requiring and needing government care and scrutiny. (Notice Sam A 5.2.1 – the missing photographs so carelessly dispensed with to the USA business.)
Also remember the horror of letting a populist politician get control over important historic records in Canada.
Like a bull in a china shop.
The Harper Government Has Trashed and Destroyed Environmental Books and Documents
In the first few days of 2014, scientists, journalists, and environmentalists were horrified to discover that the Harper government had begun a process to close seven of the 11 of Canada’s world-renowned Department of Fisheries and Oceans libraries…
https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/4w578d/the-harper-government-has-trashed-and-burned-environmental-books-and-documents
Various NZ s over the years need to set themselves up as Guardians of whatever and follow the taonga, Friends of the Taonga or Friends of … to differentiate Maori from pakeha objects as there are so many that could be lost, the kaitiaki of each should watch what they know and treasure, working in conjunction.
Some links about caring for safety of museum and artifacts disasters and heroism:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donny_George_Youkhanna
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/revealed-the-real-story-behind-the-great-iraq-museum-thefts-515067.html
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-32824379 – Palmyra
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/aug/18/isis-beheads-archaeologist-syria
https://www.ajaonline.org/online-review-museum/364
https://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/afternoons/audio/201841596/saving-ancient-religious-manuscripts-from-destruction
https://riotimesonline.com/brazil-news/rio-politics/national-museum-staff-saves-irreplaceable-pieces-during-fire/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kristinakillgrove/2018/09/05/heres-how-you-can-help-document-rios-national-museum-collections-after-the-catastrophic-fire/#8e5b2303dacd
https://mentalfloss.com/article/556959/wikipedia-digitally-preserving-items-destroyed-brazil-national-museum-fire
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/why-we-need-fight-save-mosuls-cultural-heritage-180962091/
http://savingantiquities.org/natural-disasters-and-their-impact-on-looting-and-destruction-of-cultural-heritage/
https://www.britishcouncil.org/voices-magazine/destroying-cultural-heritage-more-just-material-damage
Thanks Sam. I couldn’t recall the details of the archive, and having it identified as Fairfax decision rather than government, means that our collective archive was not affected.
I recall at the time seeing images of some of the colonial photos that were being advertised on eBay, which seemed such a loss.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2018/11/auckland-pride-parade-organisers-consider-ditching-sponsors-completely.html
Im guessing that this might be the last pride festival (if this one happens at all).
I do not believe that the board understands how off side they are with public opinion on this one.
Correct james.
John Wight exposes the West’s war crimes in Yemen.
‘’As crimes pile up, they become invisible’: Western complicity in Saudi Arabia’s dirty war in Yemen.
The complicity of Western governments in the ocean of suffering being wrought in Yemen exposes them as agents of Saudi brutality.
After three years of relentless conflict, it has been estimated that out of a population of 27.4 million, 22.2 million people in Yemen are in need of humanitarian assistance, 17 million are food insecure, 14.8 million lack basic healthcare, 4.5 million children are suffering malnourishment, while 2.9 million people are internally displaced. As for dead and injured, the toll stands at almost 10,000 and 50,000 respectively.
…..Returning to Western complicity in the carnage and suffering being meted out to the Yemeni people, never has there been a more naked example of hypocrisy masquerading as democracy. Indeed, the longstanding alliance between the US, UK and Saudi Arabia takes a scalpel to the oft-repeated boasts of Washington and London when it comes to their self-appointed role as champions and guardians of human rights and democracy.
Beginning with the Obama administration, and ramped up under Trump, US involvement in this brutal conflict has consisted of direct military airstrikes (carried out against Al-Qaeda and Islamic State targets, according to Washington), along with logistical, intelligence, and other non-combat support provided to the anti-Houthi Saudi-led coalition. This, of course, is not forgetting US arms sales to the Kingdom, consisting of over 50 percent of all US arms exports.
….The war in Yemen is a dirty war, being waged by a Western-supported Saudi kleptocracy in the name of clerical fascism. Bertolt Brecht was right: “As crimes pile up, they become invisible”
https://t.co/PMfkXdrCW3?amp=1
For the spaceflight tragics.
(Tuesday 27 at 9.00am)
On Monday, November 26, 2018, NASA’s Mars Insight is scheduled to land on Mars. The spacecraft will touch down at approximately 20:00 UTC (3 p.m. EST). Watch coverage of the event on NASA TV. Live landing commentary runs from 19:00-20:30 UTC (2-3:30 p.m. EST). Translate UTC to your time.
https://earthsky.org/space/how-to-watch-insight-mars-landing-nov26-2018
Wonder if the ion energy that you linked to will be a feature in the space travel? Powered by solar energy I expect.
Little things make big things happen.
https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/214206-the-first-satellite-powered-entirely-by-ion-engines-is-online
Great thanks Joe. The new age of hope perhaps turning into reality?
And this more of the same:
“…Instead of using propellers or turbines, the researchers used electroaerodynamics. The technology works by sending a current through an electrode which electrically charges the molecules in the surrounding air. These charged molecules are then attracted towards a separate electrode on the aircraft – this movement of ions and neutral air particles generates an effect known as ionic or electric wind. By positioning an aerofoil in this air flow, lift can be generated, potentially allowing powered flight.”
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=12164473
Ion engines are already well established as the best in space, propulsion engine.
Essentially the rocket engine ejects matter at low speed, requiring scale to lift the rocket. The ion engine ejects very little mass but it is at extremely high speed.
The efficiency of rockets to create momentum is small. The efficiency of ion engines to create momentum is very high.
The energy for an ion energy is electricity from, nuclear heat/Stirling engines, or Solar. Solar is effective in the inner solar system but not in the outer solar system so most projects have nuclear heat/Stirling engines. Not to be confused by Nuclear power plants as they are not a controlled fission. They are simply concentrated radioactive elements giving off heat designed to match power needs, with the Stirling engine designed to match.
In theory ion engines (today’s tech) could accelerate a starship into the 5% to 10% of speed of light range. This results in interstellar travel below the 200 year mark for already identified colonisation viable solar systems.
Nope. Radioisotope thermoelectric generator just use standard thermocouples. No Stirling engines involved. I suspect the added mass and complexity makes Stirling engines impractical.
I think this sort of tech is interesting because it highlights energy sources that are green and as yet have limited practical applications. I think it’s wrong to bypass it because it is yet to raise a Cessna.
Another that interests me is the way air rushes out of a tube that stretches from sea level up to mountain top.
I’m pretty sure that radioisotopes aren’t all that green.
???
Maybe a solar updraft tower?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_updraft_tower
It would be great if there was a natural geological tube that coastal air shot up and would carry positioned parcels up to a certain height and platform, then they could be directed down slides or something to a collection point below using gravity.
Probably not viable but the idea of a tube effect of fast moving air upwards is appealing.
That fast moving air upwards has to get its energy from somewhere. If we’re looking at then using that fast moving air to do work, chances are it’ll work out to be more efficient, convenient, and flexible to turn that energy into electricity. Either by using the fast moving air to drive a generator, or going a step further back and harvesting whatever energy source that made the air move fast to make electricity instead.
You will be interested in this then.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stirling_radioisotope_generator
So 4 times as energy efficient as an RTG system.
Reliability of the Stirling is an issue but I have seen figures of 100,000 hours reliable for inline magnetic and air bearing versions. They are not that big for the advantages, anything from cup size to fridge size, but much bigger than thermocouples. More expensive too.
A good example is adoption in sun following dish/mirrors in that they are by far the best performing heat to usable energy system.
If the basis of the system is to give grunt to an engine then the power you can put in matters.
Imagine a spacecraft supporting lots of people. The power requirements will be huge without solar being effective. The small spacecraft with 100W needs is perfect for RTG but large ships will go in the Stirling direction.
From your link.
Voyager has been running continuously for 40+ years so for ~400,000 hours.
More than likely at some point but it hasn’t happened yet.
Yes, they canceled that project along with many others, but it is still being developed for other projects in space. The lifecycle of the engine isn’t an issue if a person is there to do repairs. Voyager is a good example of what the design requirements are. No maintenance possible and thermocouples are the only option.
I was reading about spaceships powered by ion drives half a century ago, in scifi books, when I was a teenager. I knew enough college physics to get that it was plausible in theory, but haven’t heard of any building of such in practice since, so I routinely dismiss all such stuff nowadays a mere speculation.
In fact, although Kim Stanley Robinson did an excellent trilogy about the terraforming of Mars and atmospheric production could make it habitable if the rate exceeded gravitational loss at the upper margin, I’ve long since given up on the notion that it’ll happen. Those dozens of breakdowns & malfunctions in the DEW system, Chernobyl, Murphy’s Law, the tendency of computers to head into dysfunction just like people, nah, I got no faith in technology left…
The first successful test of one was in 1964. There have been quite a few since then.
General info
Ion Thruster Prototype Breaks Records in Tests, Could Send Humans to Mars
NOW EXPOSED: A UK-led, ‘New Cold War’ int’l intelligence propaganda & disinformation operation, using top Mainstream Media ‘journalists’, govt staff, #AtlanticCouncil, in partnership w/#NATO designed to increase fear and tension between West & Russia:.
Anonymous has published documents which it claims have unearthed a massive UK-led psyop to create a “large-scale information secret service” in Europe.
https://t.co/mwgjKrxpvv?amp=1
I wouldn’t view that stuff as anything much beyond an example of how stupidly paranoid some people are. This made me laugh – (From the “Integrity Initiative” handbook)
…the Integrity Initiative is funded by the Institute for Statecraft. The IfS gets its funding from multiple sources to ensure its independence. These include: private individuals; charitable foundations; international organisations (EU, NATO); UK Govt (FCO, MOD)
Kind of lacking in basic integrity I’d have thought. Oh, and the “independence”? Yeah well… probably best not to comment on the narrow focus embodied by such a ‘broad’ sweep of ‘diverse’ funding bodies, eh? 😉
Hi Ed,
Yes Germany has long wanted to even the score with Russia for the loss of the war in 1945 so the underside of Germany is alive still and want to see another ‘action’ against Russia.
Germany cant change their spots like others cant either.
That is human nature unfortunately and Britain knows that all to well.
Thread.
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1056198831086452737.html
Thanks joe 90 and we thought we were trail blazers back in the mid 1900’s.
We live in interesting times, centuries, millenia! (I hope.)
Probably because a person who fights for the political rights for women as well as men is an actual Feminist. Completely different from those who stand in parliament spouting the magnificent Ministry for Women, claiming to be feminists, then vehemently attacking attempts to create a Ministry for Men.
Plus the patriarchy narrative requires ignoring the reality of our past so many brave women and mens actions are ignored. Kate Sheppards advocacy for women is made godlike, while the decades long voting rights battle behind both male suffrage and its resulting female voting rights becomes a footnote. Very few would know the names of the men who put forward male sufferage laws in NZ or who put forward female sufferage laws in NZ.
[citation needed]
Males have always been able to vote in NZ. It was non-owners that were prevented.
Who has dibs on Jules?
The Ecuadorian government has removed its ambassador to the UK, sparking speculation over Julian Assange’s future at the diplomatic mission there.
The 47-year-old founder of WikiLeaks moved into the Ecuadorian Embassy in central London in 2012 while wanted for questioning over sexual assault allegations in Sweden. Assange maintained his innocence and claimed the charges were nothing more than an attempt to extradite him to the United States.
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/11/23/uk/julian-assange-ecuador-diplomacy-gbr-intl/index.html
Gosh you just can’t evict some wily tenants.
stop feeding them and watch them squirrel away into the darkness to find some other ‘benefactor’ that will keep the housed and fed.
Yes but where will they go. And perhaps there should be hermitage, sanctuary for whistleblowers who need protecting so they don’t get shot, damaged by acid, sawn up and other grisly outcomes.
he is a grown up, he can get a job, rent a flat, find a supermarket and buy some groceries. And next time he has sex with a women and the deal/agreement/consent is only with a condom, i suggest he wears a condom.
Can’t give a flying poo about this guy, he can go in the wilderness and stay there. The sooner he gets out of the media, real of fake the better. He has spammed the world long enough.
Hey – Look At my wonderful body
It is a pity that you “Pride Parade” guys and girls, slander the police. You clearly don’t understand the constant Bravery and Service the Police give to the Citizens of New Zealand.
No wonder the significant Businesses of Auckland have withdrawn their support from you – because of your childish attitudes.
Show off and Dance on our streets. Yes. But don’t pretend you are anything like as important as our Police Women and Men. They Lay their Bodies on the line. – Day and Night.
Can’t the police have their own parade? I don’t remember them parading with Pride in the early days, maybe because they didn’t.
Police marched in this year’s parade.
A couple of takeouts from Daniel Andrews’ crushing landslide win for Labor in Victoria.
Voters will overlook any number of missteps in a government if they see that government getting on doing stuff to make their lives better – so knock yourself out National, bang on about Sroubek, Clare Curran, Meka Whaitiri and all the rest of it as much as you like. So long voters think the Coalition is working for them it won’t make any difference.
It’s totally game over for the old Tory trick of promising tax cuts and small government without compromising essential services. Voters have wised up to that bullshit, they know they can’t have both tax cuts and well maintained hospitals, schools and transport and all the other government services. Middlemore Hospital, the WOF debacle, schools maintenance, you name it National is going to get whacked with this.
Infrastructure spending wins votes. Voters in Melbourne, a city bursting at the seams (its population topped 5 milllion earlier this year according to Stats Australia) flocked to Labor on the back of Andrews’ pledge to spend 50 billion dollars on infrastructure and they didn’t much care that some of that money will need to be borrowed.
With crime falling in most western democracies, banging the law and order drum doesn’t work like it used to. Earlier this year Peter Dutton claimed that Victorians were too scared to go out for dinner at night because of gang violence in Melbourne. A ridiculous statement that just seems to have pissed off Melburnians, not least because he’s a Queensland federal MP.
Nathan Guy was pretty unelectable after being sprung doing dodgy deals with developers in his role as the responsible minister when last in power.
Like here they’re getting on with it on an almost gridlocked Melbourne that’s done nowhere near enough on public transport as it zoomed past 5mill a few months ago.
Matthew Guy . . . .
‘Murica – raise $10k, or die.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Dsxs93cU8AEkm0J.jpg
In the days before mass immigration the middle classes of Russian, China, Middle East and India would rise up and overthrow their dictators and demand further rights, nowadays, the middle class support them, get a plane ticket out of those countries to places like NZ and the west and leave the tin pot dictators alone, who then use their money to reduce the welfare and rights of small countries like NZ, influence big countries, whose governments are only too keen to take the cash, the loans, and the cheap labour, decrease then educational standards, and pocket the money for their assets to be bought. Sometimes they are so frightened of being ‘racist’ they give them away for free, aka water rights because the laws have been written for that very purpose. Anyone who doesn’t agree is ‘racist’ apparently.
Likewise the mass displacement of the Middle East and Africa of refugees and economic migrants. Guess what, nobody says stop bombing the shit out of those countries and start spending money on making sure that those countries are habitable with enough food and water and resources to support themselves, that is where the debate should be…
nope straight too, where should these people go and making other countries forces secure the oil lines etc?
The people of earth themselves are between rock and a hard place with so many stupid politicians and political strategists and the world’s media owned by the world’s wealthy and sending the same messages of distraction and neoliberalism to further a short term gain and environmental destruction, massive migration for the privileged or desperate.
None of this will turn out well in the end for any of the countries and most of the people and the flora and fauna, but great if your individual goal in life is to own a super yacht, a sports team, gold curtains and more money and houses and assets than you can live in or even manage, and earn that by legal and illegal theft or manipulation of former public assets and resources.
When did the middle classes of Russian, China, Middle East and India rise up?.
I was looking at Karl Marx and petite bourgeoisie yesterday and go the quote below. It seems that the middle classes are not action-oriented for better things for all, rather re-action to protect their standard of living and growing privilege.
When i worked in a solicitor’s office dealing with accident claims before ACC, I didn’t notice them trying to get better law that was helpful and kinder to those who had workplace injuries. He wasn’t into changing anything for that reason.
An interesting piece of theory –
He [Wilhelm Reich] claimed that the middle classes were a hotbed for political reaction due to their reliance on the patriarchal family (according to Reich, small businesses are often self-exploiting enterprises of families headed by the father, whose morality binds the family together in their somewhat precarious economic position) and the sexual repression that underlies it.[5]‘
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petite_bourgeoisie
It seems to me that feminists were majorly middle class and were agitating for better conditions. But they were thinking of themselves and when the
changes happened that suited them with a with some trickle-down to the poorer, disadvantaged, the pressure for change dropped. Things improved and then change slowed, and the ones who needed most, only got a toe-in I think, not a shoe-in.
Point being that the middle classes have never risen up against squat.
They are who they are because of their obeisance to their betters, their contemptible disregard for their lessors, and their continued prosperity relies entirely on maintaining the status quo.
OTOH, peasants…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peasant_revolts
Oooh you are so hard joe 90. I think I prefer living in the middle classes and perhaps I am not so good about caring and sharing. Thinks – uncomfortable.
Wrong. The middle class are the swing voters in democracy. (Steriotyping) The poor will vote left no matter what’s happening. The rich will vote right no matter what’s happening. The middle class will react to incompetence buy voting for the opposite, or react to voting bribes. The middle class in self preservation reacts to propaganda.
They rise up at every election. They just don’t march in the streets.
Hence democracy fails in that it never addresses the poor or reigns in the rich. The minority becomes oppressed by the majority.
It never ends well joey, not even in France.
Bloodbath, landslide.
Labour smash the coalition out of the park. That said the Greens did not really increase their vote.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-11-24/as-it-happened-victorian-election-2018-results/10521290
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-11-25/victorian-election-winners-and-losers/10544750
S’cuse the ignorance, but since I don’t follow the machinations of Australian politics, I have to ask, – assuming that the Liberal Party is of the full on soggy shit smeared variety, is the Australian Labor Party much more worth or use than slightly and suspiciously soiled toilet paper ?
No.
You should have seen Peta Credlin spinning like a top. You could almost see the wrinkles developing around her mouth
Hi Greywarshark
The bloke Julian Assange threw into the Washington military dungeon turned out to be a sweet young lady. Chelsea.
I hope Assange controls himself and keeps well away from her, – now that she is a respected USA Citizen.
What with Jules going a bit far with his two Swedish female staff – and Trump famous for his ever ready Pussygrope, Chelsea should take lots of care. Always board the right Boeing – Chelsea
in the meantime, Assange is pulling faces at the Ecuador Embassy and generally being the objectionable upstart that he always is.
Hit and Hide – is Jules motto.
Fascinating stuff Observer. This is why i generally keep away from discussing the USA-involved political stuff. It’s a sideshow to keep us from thinking about the serious development stuff we need to concentrate on – the world is a stage, and we need to be actors in our part of it is my certainty. Climate change is changing the scenery.
This is an example of how we can be easily distracted from politics. Start replacing interest in what is happening with entertainment – Punch and Judy anyone?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcE7ppOT_0c
Then on the other hand, can what is being shown in the longer show after the first short excerpt, is from Brighton Beach, UK. indicate an approach that would be right for now for New Brighton beach and pier in Christchurch NZ.
If Brighton, Christchurch could throw a regular event between 1 and 3pm on Saturday afternoons with traditional things like donkey rides, balloons, music, dancing to a youth band, and do it with good publicity for a season, they could boost their economic life.
greywarshark; 100% to that.
Try Napier beach now it has a heavy deep ditch 10 meters off the shoreline, that now has developed super sized ‘undertow” of swirling currents that now knock you off your feet and drag you under.
Several have drowned now from this super sized undertow so yes the beaches are changing dramatically now because of increases in current flow and surrounding sea temperature increases we are told.
Here is piece on Christchurch, New Brighton that shows how well they are doing
and mentions the problems. That beach is one of Christchurch’s assets and
I am sure they will adapt and build jobs and businesses for the locals. Pop-ups for cheaper buildings on shaky ground, with limited investment in a changing coastline for instance. If you are there at Christmas – school holidays give them a visit and fly kites if the wind is right and make sandcastles on real sand on the long beach. And I think there is kite-surfing there.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/100814553/the-long-road-towards-a-new-new-brighton
Kite surfing
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBO7dZPMndo
You’re on it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0oqohzfA5ZM
Running
Christchurch 10km Series: Sand – NZ Running Calendar
https://www.runningcalendar.co.nz/event/christchurch-10km-series-sand/
Nov 9, 2018 – The first event in the 2019 Christchurch 10km Series has sand and sea at North Beach in New Brighton on Sunday, 20 January.
Christchurch
https://www.christchurchnz.org.nz/news/christchurch-welcomes-a-bumper-summer-of-events/
Nasty power blip. Both UPS blipped. Screen went off for 20 seconds.
Normally my systems don’t blip. It usually means a nasty power outage somewhere in Auckland. Anyone on batteries?
Tripped at te awamutu.
https://www.transpower.co.nz/sites/default/files/interfaces/exn/EXN%20Voltage%20North%20Island%20Te%20Awamutu%20T1%20Tripped%2C%20Hangatiki%202953737450.pdf
System is still fragile due to cook strait HVDC shutdown,and intermittent wind.
Shit Iprent,
We need to put a fund raiser up to buy you a backup battery solar power system?
It has a pretty good UPS system with the server and the network endpoints on it. I check it every 4 months and battery replace every year. It will last about 6-8 hours on fresh batteries. 4-6 when I replace them.
I’m in central Auckland which has been somewhat refurbished power-wise after they blacked or browned me and everyone else out periodically for 3 months in 1998 in a stunning display of the efficiency of greed and deregulation 🙂
Wouldn’t mind some largeish Li-ion or Li-iron. But they need very good control systems – especially in my living room 🙂 I work with large Li-ion in large quantities, so I can tell you that I don’t to see that kind of failure here.
Currently the prices are formidable, but coming down. But in the meantime sealed lead-acid is good enough and cheap enough to keep the site running.
Iprent,
My son has been installing backup solar systems all around HB to Waitako and several lodges and motels with Tesla battery backup systems.
He is buggering off to Germany for a year but has all the data on them.
I am considering one to, but i would like to see the government give some grants for solar like Germany does.
We will wait their move to solar.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12165591
We need to start seriously imposing big fines on these filthy councils ruining our beaches.
From a farm pov this is a notable problem that shows up the city as polluter.
But we are talking here about people pollution, not farm animals. It is obvious that many NZ dairy farms are overstocked and ignoring good husbandry of their animals and their effluent. First step is to control runoff, limit irrigation, and destock numbers.
Similarly with people. The farm-business big-export, big-profit phalanx want to overstock NZ with people who either bring in investment money or are charged for working here at minimal wages. We now have too many people in pockets of concentration, for the modern facilities provided to keep the place healthy and attractive. If you want to reduce city pollution complain to the decision-making people suffering from the hungry tapeworm called super-wealth.
(There appears to be a serious outbreak of some disease which may be parasitic tapeworms – Ingesting the eggs leads to tapeworm larvae growing in many different human tissues, particularly brain and muscle.
https://www.verywellhealth.com/parasitic-infections-of-the-central-nervous-system-2488670)
This would explain why we see such little brain power indicated in poor planning and decision making in the country, and the lack of physical activity driving many of these debilitated people to sit all day playing around with computer models which are supposed to mirror real life, but actually are pale imitations.
You started me off bwaghorn – the above guff is your fault!
So, chemtrails it is.
Scientists are proposing an ingenious but as-yet-unproven way to tackle climate change: spraying sun-dimming chemicals into the Earth’s atmosphere.
The research by scientists at Harvard and Yale universities, published in the journal Environmental Research Letters, proposes using a technique known as stratospheric aerosol injection, which they say could cut the rate of global warming in half.
The technique would involve spraying large amounts of sulfate particles into the Earth’s lower stratosphere at altitudes as high as 12 miles. The scientists propose delivering the sulfates with specially designed high-altitude aircraft, balloons or large naval-style guns.
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/11/23/health/sun-dimming-aerosols-global-warming-intl-scli/index.html
From the Exec summary of this months O3/wmo report.
Intentional long-term geoengineering applications that substantially increase stratospheric aerosols to mitigate global warming by reflecting sunlight would alter the stratospheric ozone layer. The estimated magnitude and even the sign of ozone changes in some regions are uncertain because of the high sensitivity
to variables such as the amount, altitude, geographic location, type of injection and the halogen loading. An increase of the stratospheric sulfate aerosol burden in amounts sufficient to substantially reduce global radiative forcing would delay the recovery of the Antarctic ozone hole. Much less is known about the effects on
ozone from geoengineering solutions using non-sulfate aerosols.
Dont need it for the SH.
Science proceeds via experiment. Trial & error. Atmosphere experimentation: if it doesn’t work, just throw it away & get another one. Normal scientific method, as performed by normal scientists.
The Archdruid is usually good on the big picture, and the past year or two he’s been on about faustian culture. Google it gets you this:
“Faustian culture is driven to reach as far as it can in all directions, almost as a virtue in itself. It sees itself as built atop all previous cultures. It dreams of global dominance, and has many senses achieved that but it is unsatisfied. The climb of perpetual progress is an important story to the Faustian man.”
“Faustian Culture began in Western Europe around the 10th century and according to Spengler such has been its expansionary power that by the 20th century it was covering the entire earth, with only a few regions where Islam provides an alternative world view.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Decline_of_the_West
Alerts us to why China’s dictator is in rebel mode, eh? Too negligible to even rate a mention. “The use of the word ‘Faustian’ when describing the Western culture Spengler explained by pointing out a parallel between the tragic figure of Faust and the Western world. Just as Faust sold his soul to the devil to gain greater power, the Western man sold his soul to technics.” https://faustianeurope.wordpress.com/2007/07/…/oswald-spengler-and-faustian-cultur…
So there you have it. Techne – modern equivalent of magic – driven toward global transformation by the Promethean power drive in our collective unconscious. Don’t assume atmosphere experiments are merely scientific hubris!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beijing_Weather_Modification_Office
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weather_modification
Nothing obvious in the way of a substantial advance since I read up on it around seven years ago. Usage would snowball noticeably if the successes cited were generally replicable. The economic rewards would compel that.
Always hard how much credit to give WP but you may have missed the hint to a non-Western culture.
See, SirPonyboy was right all along.That’ll be why he’s positioned himself on the Air NZ board.
Old ‘news’ J90.
Another years old rehashed article…signalling what has already been deployed…
Global Dimming…BBC ran articles about that ‘phenomena’…years ago also..
Which was about the declining amount of solar energy reaching the Earth’s surface, and has zip to do with the article posted.
‘Dimming The Sun’
Article title, that you linked Joe…
The ‘clue’ is in the title of the respective articles which are the ‘same subject’…
If you can’t ‘see’ the relationship…well…I would not be surprised if you’re not reading or understanding what you post about…
Edit: wiki is acceptable for such a reference
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_dimming
Oh do fuck off with your arcane claptrap.
One. Two
You know it all you smart arse. Well get off your bottom and go and fix it, whatever, instead of hanging round here trying to prevent us getting to know about some of the things your great mind has already absorbed. I am just so sick of you lazy geniuses, all talk and no commitment to useful action for the good of humankind.
You have no idea what I do or who I am, GW…so dial it a little bit eh…
If you think my pointing out that J90 was posting rehashed articles, which he has admitted to not actually reading before linking 20.4…then you’re barking up the wrong tree…
On you can be in your own way..same applies to every one of us…
I have every idea what you do on this blog One Two. And what line you take usually – negative.
Seeing that the world is in crisis perhaps you could start lookinhg for ways to aid your fellow humans instead of slagging us off.
Arse. After reading the abstract of the paper referred to in the CNN article I posted, I noted that the CNN article erroneously inferred that the paper was an actual proposal.
So again, do fuck off you supercilious sack of shit, and take your disingenuous drivel with you.
I have every idea what you do on this blog One Two. And what line you take usually – negative. Seeing that the world is in crisis perhaps you could start looking for better ways to aid your fellow humans instead of slagging us off.
By the way this site doesn’t profess to have the latest scientific things, and if you find there is something better, put up the link. Say this might be more up to date don’t criticise us as your first move.
Refer to what is important yourself instead.
Your style as here is not acceptable to me as a serious person worrying about the known problems not being tackled and the unknown ones that are looming.
‘Dimming The Sun’
Article title, that you linked Joe…
The ‘clue’ is in the title of the respective articles which are the ‘same subject’…
If you can’t ‘see’ the relationship…well…I would not be surprised if you’re not reading or understanding what you post about…
Edit: wiki is acceptable for such a reference
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_dimming
Your style here is not acceptable to me…
So instead of dialing it back you’ve doubled down…
GW, if my comments and the syle of them go past you…well..so be it…I don’t write for you…
That you ‘believe’ I see the world as a crisis indicates you don’t comprehend my comments…you’re a long way off the mark…
Your comments read like you have a grudge of some sort…
Move on from it…leave the personal insults to others here…you’re probably better than that…
And after a quick squiz at the abstract, and despite my own flippancy, it looks like CNN clickbait.
The author’s read it as an actual proposal rather than what it is, a pie in the sky assessment.
Abstract
We review the capabilities and costs of various lofting methods intended to deliver sulfates into the lower stratosphere. We lay out a future solar geoengineering deployment scenario of halving the increase in anthropogenic radiative forcing beginning 15 years hence, by deploying material to altitudes as high as ~20 km. After surveying an exhaustive list of potential deployment techniques, we settle upon an aircraft-based delivery system. Unlike the one prior comprehensive study on the topic (McClellan et al 2012 Environ. Res. Lett. 7 034019), we conclude that no existing aircraft design—even with extensive modifications—can reasonably fulfill this mission. However, we also conclude that developing a new, purpose-built high-altitude tanker with substantial payload capabilities would neither be technologically difficult nor prohibitively expensive. We calculate early-year costs of ~$1500 ton−1 of material deployed, resulting in average costs of ~$2.25 billion yr−1 over the first 15 years of deployment. We further calculate the number of flights at ~4000 in year one, linearly increasing by ~4000 yr−1. We conclude by arguing that, while cheap, such an aircraft-based program would unlikely be a secret, given the need for thousands of flights annually by airliner-sized aircraft operating from an international array of bases.
http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aae98d/meta
I find your post fascinating Joe. It leads me to wonder what other ways we could turn the sun’s energy back on itself.
We all know how something painted black sucks up heat and something white has a greater tendency to reflect the heat and light.
One of the problems with diminishing snow and ice is that we’re not bouncing as much light and heat back up.
What if every sun struck man made item was white or mirrored? Cars, building roofs, supermarket carparks. Could pasture be genetically modified to be white?
Could we float a bio product on oceans that reflects more light than salt water?
The subject of albedo (reflectivity) is certainly a complex aspect of global warming.
In short, making the artificial surfaces you have control over white (or light green) actually does do quite a bit to reduce warming. To the point I was absolutely astonished when I found out Auckland Council required dark roofs on new construction in at least one semi-rural area.
Grassland is also quite a lot more reflective than forest. Most deserts are more reflective than grassland. In total, the increase in the earth’s reflectivity from land-use changes from human activity counteracts maybe 5% of the global warming from the greenhouse gases we’ve dumped into the atmosphere.
But the big albedo variable that’s still poorly understood is clouds. It’s for sure that a warmer world means more moisture in the atmosphere, which means more clouds, which you would think would reflect more sunlight. But it turns out to be a lot more complicated than that, since they also reflect heat radiated from the earth back down to ground (think how much warmer mornings are after a cloudy night than a clear night). The net effect apparently depends on how high and how thick the clouds are (among other variables).
https://skepticalscience.com/earth-albedo-effect-intermediate.htm
Latent heat is the energy absorbed by or released from a substance during a phase change from a gas to a liquid or a solid or vice versa. … When these gas molecules condense into liquid drops, latent heat is released into the atmosphere which warms the air surrounding the molecule.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latent_heat
Yeah, that’s part of the complexity of clouds’ net effect on warming. I vaguely recall reading something that came to the conclusion that the height at which the latent heat was released or absorbed was fairly significant from a warming perspective, and that the water-ice transition was still quite important even though the latent heat of fusion is around 1/6 that of evaporation for water.
This is useful information to householders and landscapers too. Different plants have different levels of reflection. Part of reflection is heat energy.
Dark trees absorb more light and heat. Lighter trees reflect more light and heat. Nature does ambient lighting, you just need to be aware what you’re looking at.
Could we float rafts that create shadows and havens for fish and bird life on seas near coastlines. Perhaps over the Australian reefs, and where fisher people live so they can continue their ‘peasant’ fishing culture and diet.
We could float rafts that provide habitat, shelter, and double as phosphate collectors and even oceanic monitoring stations.
In freshwater we could float rafts that grow rampant plants as stock food, meanwhile stripping excess nutrients from water, providing habitat and shade, and with some cunning design, aeration to the surrounding water.
I was knocking up these designs for some NZ lakes when they were deemed to be complete shit holes decades ago. But the policy then was to pretend they weren’t shit holes.
Some such rafts are already in operation here in NZ. They work successfully, but many of our degraded lakes are big. Estuaries are the focus now – the penultimate receiving bodies of all that goes on and in further up the catchment. Silt and nutrient are the big issues, eutrophication the symptom of human carelessness. Unless big tides clear clogged estuaries, there’s not a lot else that can be done; all ideas gratefully received. (Rafts of plants are challenged by brackish waters). Giant sludge-sucking pumps are great science fiction.
In the meantime Paris
https://www.rawstory.com/2018/11/watch-utter-anarchy-champs-elysees-paris-erupts-fiery-protests-fuel-prices/
Diesel has gone up 23% in the last year. Bound to upset the economic system.IIRR
it will go up further.
I think really people need to realize that changes are coming and it does not matter what they burn down in anger.
France has a good public transport system at least in the larger areas and conecting to rural areas of importance.
But there are things to be done, i .e. community cars. Rather then have two / three cars per family, have community cars that are owned by a trust, that are maintained by membership contribution and that people can book in for when they need a car. Take me, i don’t actually need a car, – the little car that i got from my partner when his company gave him a car has served my inlaws when they lost their cars in the big floods a few years ago, then it was driven by the son in law when his car died and he could not afford one, then it was driven by a young lady with three kids who needed a car but could not afford one outright, so she the little old one until she had enough saved up to buy one herself. I haven not missed this car in a year and a half.
We – the people – need to come of our sofas and realise that the gravy years are over. We either want this planet to sustain us, or we can drive in an SUV to hell without a return ticket.
As for the conomic system being upset, it already is.
” the world is a stage” all the world
Greywarshark
I like it when Shakespeare peers over our shoulders – thanks for reminding me!
I am a dullard compared to you writers … but yes – Iwanka taking her laptop home tof fiddle with Trumpian Profundities is very Innocent. Says Daddy.
How Lprent rides the WiFI Surf day in day out- I shall never know. But I admire his alertness and patience.
The Brighton Wharf is long – if i remember correctly. It could be Colourful if we allowed Judith Collins to invite her and her Beijing Comrades to bring the dragons and Balloons down there of a weekend.
China V Canterbury – attacking each other with high diving Kites.
Hey Observer you have found this blog very invigorating for ideas as I have.
Cheers.
Looks like someone has the stones to reel in the data crims.
The UK Parliament invoked a rarely used legal power to compel a US software company to hand over internal Facebook documents that could contain revelations on the run-up to the Cambridge Analytica scandal.
Damian Collins, MP and chair of the culture, media and sport select committee used a rare parliamentary mechanism to compel the founder of Six4Three to hand over the documents while on a business trip, local media reported on Saturday.
A serjeant was sent to his hotel to issue a final call and communicate a two-hour deadline to comply with the order. British daily The Guardian reported that when the firm founder failed to comply, he was escorted to parliament. Not complying with the request could have led to fines and even imprisonment.
The cache of documents is alleged to include email exchange between senior executives, including Facebook founder Mark Zuckenberg.
“We are in uncharted territory,” Mr Collins, who also chairs an inquiry into fake news, told local media. “This is an unprecedented move but it’s an unprecedented situation. We’ve failed to get answers from Facebook and we believe the documents contain information of very high public interest.”
https://www.thenational.ae/world/europe/uk-parliament-seizes-internal-facebook-documents-1.795495
Peter Calder went to check it out: “the Islamic Republic of Iran – is a hypermoralist theocracy in which pornography, prostitution, alcohol, drugs, YouTube, Facebook, and much else besides, is banned, on pain of imprisonment, and corporal or even capital punishment. Yet the population accesses all of them with a quietly exuberant abandon. Defiance, indeed, is the currency of daily life.”
“As the PBS show Frontline reported, Iran is the only state in which the executive branch does not control the armed forces.” “The hijab – a head-covering scarf – remains obligatory, even for tourist women. Meanwhile, the basij, a volunteer auxiliary corps of young men recognisable by their neatly trimmed beards and black clothing, enforce internal security, police morals (they question couples walking together to establish the legitimacy of their relationship) and suppress dissidents and protest gatherings.”
So you can see why some leftists onsite here support Iran in its opposition to Saudi Arabia, eh? That’d be because Trump doesn’t like the Iranian regime. Having to choose between a conservative narcissist and a totalitarian regime, they understandably prefer the latter.
“The exchange rate of the Iranian rial is soaring: the US dollar, worth IRR43,000 in international markets, was fetching 120,000 in early September and 140,000 by the end of the month. A grim joke doing the rounds asked what the dollar is worth. “Do you mean now, now or now?” was the punchline answer. Not since I was in Argentina in the 1970s have I experienced an exchange rate so grotesquely advantaging the visitor as it hammered the locals.”
“Islam is more than a religion; it is a tool of state control. Most Iranians (particularly in urban areas) are not devout, or even practising, Muslims, but admitting as much is fatal to employment prospects.” https://www.noted.co.nz/currently/world/iran-us-sanctions-corrupt-ideologues-defiance/
Iran and Saudi Arabia drive their people to hate each other, and they are about as oppressive as each other. They aren’t the only two choices available.
Brexit looks to be a goer today.
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-46330380
European Council President Donald Tusk has recommended that the EU approve the Brexit deal at a summit on Sunday.
It comes after Spanish PM Pedro Sanchez received assurances from the UK government over Gibraltar, and dropped his threat to boycott the summit.
He said he had received the written guarantees he needed over Spain’s role in the future of the British territory.
UK Prime Minister Theresa May has arrived in Brussels and held talks with top EU officials, ahead of the summit.
The terms of the UK’s withdrawal have been under negotiation since June 2016 following a referendum in which 51.9% voted to leave the EU.
Even if the EU approves the deal, it still has to be passed by the UK Parliament, with many MPs having stated their opposition.
Spain had raised last-minute objections ahead of the summit about how the issue of Gibraltar had been handled in the Brexit talks so far.
But EU leaders secured a compromise with the Spanish prime minister, who said that Europe and the UK “had accepted the conditions set down by Spain” and so would “vote in favour of Brexit”.
Mr Tusk, who represents EU leaders on the world stage, said he recommended “that we approve on Sunday the outcome of the Brexit negotiations” in a letter to members of the European Council.
He added: “No-one has reasons to be happy. But at least at this critical time, the EU 27 has passed the test of unity and solidarity.”
The political declaration, which sets out what the UK and EU’s relationship may be like after Brexit – outlining how things like UK-EU trade and security will work.
The EU withdrawal agreement: a 585-page, legally binding document setting out the terms of the UK’s exit from the EU. It covers the UK’s £39bn “divorce bill”, citizens’ rights and the Northern Ireland “backstop” – a way to keep the border with the Republic of Ireland open, if trade talks stall.
There is no formal vote on Sunday but the EU expects to proceed after reaching a consensus.
Hi Cleangreen
Dumb as I am, may I ask what good Merry England is going to do by snubbing its snotty nose at the accomplished EU. ?
We all know that Brits think themselves the bees knees and have the answer to everything under the Sun. But I have a feeling that the Boris Johnsons – and the Farrages will do well and the glory tories- but the rest of the UK will be living off sweet nothing.
Scotland and Ireland will do well. Because they are not stupid like the grumbling Brits. Hopefully the Welsh will ditch the mad Poms too.
Observer Tokoroa; – Ouch! – I married a pom 42 years ago and she’s been o/k.
I good mate I reckon, am I lucky?
I find that the EU was to hard on Greece and they are dictatorial after they allowed Greece borrow so much private funding to develop there infrastructure and went bust on foreign capital .
we are similarly exposed like Greece too.
Actually we still don’t know who we have borrowed $60 Billion from do we?
Goldman Sachs was the agent that Greece used and they are a shifty lot too.
I worry when the next GFC comes around what will happen to all those ‘cling-ons” new smaller states to the EU.
Some are very shaky, especially the eastern side of Europe, like Hungary and Romania and some others.
Time will tell.
Actually, in NZ we are in a much more secure situation than Greece. The problem for Greece is that it uses a ‘foreign’ currency in the Euro and must therefore stay on good terms with the ECB and other European institutions. Unfortunately for Greece good terms means agreeing to aggressive Austerity demands and other economic ‘reforms’. Despite IMF forecasts for a quick recovery these reforms caused a 25% shrinkage in the Greek economy and 20% unemployment rate and will negatively influence the Greek economy for more than a decade.
In return for this (and probably against the letter of the ECB legislation) the ECB has been supporting the Greek government by maintaining a lowish interest rate on Greek government debt and allowing them not to default. The ECB is also doing this for other Euro countries.
In NZ however our parliament ultimately controls our central bank (which can do the same kinds of things as the ECB does) and so if push comes to shove NZ will never experience such problems of being bullied economically by higher level institutions. The UK is similar to NZ in that it also controls its Bank of England meaning the exchequer ultimately calls the shots for the UK. Not that this prevents self inflicted economic pain, as George Osborne caused when he (predictably, it was predicted) turned a single dip recession into a triple dip recession through mindless austerity policies. However I think the conservatives soon realized that running the economy into the ground with ideologically driven Austerity policies was going to be bad for their chances of re-election. At that point they kept talking up all the austerity they were doing, but basically stopped doing it.
Ultimately the important question seems to be if this stuff is controlled by elected representatives or if the elected representatives have to answer to un-elected institutions.
Telescreens, anyone?
Amazon’s Alexa probably won’t admit there was a murder in her home, but the data she stores on the company’s servers might tell a different story.
An Amazon Echo, the device that houses the company’s Alexa AI, in the kitchen of a Farmington, N.H., home is at the heart of a double murder trial. Earlier this month, a judge ordered partial records of that device be released.
Prosecutors believe there may be recordings of the stabbings of two women from January 2017. Amazon has not yet said if it would release the information.
“I think this is the beginning of the ‘internet of evidence’ where lots of pieces of smart devices are going to show up in criminal prosecutions,” Andrew Guthrie Ferguson, author of The Rise of Big Data Policing: Surveillance, Race, and the Future of Law Enforcement, told Day 6.
https://t.co/DZk9GcH7K2
Scoop needs us. It is ready to go further as a community NZ owned news service.
https://www.pledgeme.co.nz/projects/5837-scoop-3-0-crowdsale-and-crowdfunding-campaign
What’s with the lack of produce in the supermarket lately?
Thanks Cleangreen
I am glad you are pleased with your lovely Girl. She is a Treasure.
Although I am of British stock I do not trust the Parliament of the Uk.
It exists for the very Wealthy. Not for the Many.
Perhaps one day the Brits may realise that Equality and Fraternity are better than a sham toy Parliament.
Again thanks Cleangreen
Kia ora The Am Show the jail term for dairy dack is just a political stunt by national there is no thought about what is good for people just what floats there toilet polls.
Last year all the retailers were advertising chrismas a the start of October this year they have not even started. Just like the work being done on the inter Island power cables being carried out at the start of summer instead of a few months earlier when the Hydro lakes are full. ?????????.
My Huawei phone got the signal fine I was not going to com on this subject till I heard Azzes make his statement .
simon your m8 has moved to Bali .
So long as the new Australian Governments combat climate change that’s the big picture Jason I will be doing a post on what the dozens of ex judges are calling for in Australia anti white collar corruption force nearly all the carbon lobbyist are ex mps a big conflicted of interest there hence all the problem in the Australian governments lobbyist should be banned all around the world .
The santa issue is just some man grandstanding the topic of Equality and everyone has fallen for the neo anti Equality mens tricks.
Who wrote those word for you Mark Communism is just a word nowadays used to trash socialism whats so wrong with the wealthy shearing there billions of lollies with common poor people so they get a house and not a bridge he tangata he tangata.
Yes we need a cabon tax and use the tax to of set the price of clean energy like Norway . Its cool that we have a lot of people buying electric cars in Aotearoa now.
I agree its stupid not rolling out a electric Car subsidy when we import most of our oil come on . Ka kite ano
This is a Wahine whos actions speak as loud as her word and a Mana Wahine I will tau toko her ka pai
Sweden’s then deputy prime minister remained enigmatic as the picture went viral and she was asked whether she had been “trolling” the US president. “It is up to the observer to interpret the photo,” she was quoted as saying. “We are a feminist government, which shows in this photo.”
Lövin is one of the leading figures in what she says is a resurgence in environmentally conscious politics across the continent. “There is a green wave going on in Europe, in Germany, Luxembourg and Belgium, and in Finland as well,” she says. “I’m convinced that green parties offer a positive vision, and also the willingness to take on the huge challenges that we see in the world right now.” Ka kite ano link below.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/nov/24/isabella-lovin-trolled-trump-swedish-minister-climate-change-mission-fishing-ban
Dozens of former judges urge Scott Morrison to set up anti-corruption watchdog
Arguing that existing federal integrity agencies “lack the necessary jurisdiction, powers and know-how to investigate properly the impartiality and bona fides of decisions made by, and conduct of, the federal government and public sector” .
Greed drive the carbon barons to propagandize lie and cheat so they can keep poisoning our Grandchildren’s future with carbon. link below.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/nov/25/dozens-of-former-judges-urge-scott-morrison-to-set-up-anti-corruption-watchdog
The Nationals’ WA branch similarly failed to respond when asked why it failed to declare the $20,000 donation from Mineral Resources.
The iron ore miner confirmed it had given a $20,000 bank cheque to the Nationals in March last year, around the time of the state election. But a spokesman said the company made donations to all sides, not just the Nationals. Its donations to Labor and the Liberals were declared properly.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/nov/26/major-parties-failed-to-declare-corporate-donations-electoral-commission-finds
More than half of all Australian lobbyists previously worked inside government or for the major political parties, with one in four staffing the offices of ministers, parliamentary secretaries or backbenchers.
Guardian Australia has investigated the backgrounds of all 483 individuals listed on July’s federal lobbyist register, checking each for a history in federal or state government, either as politicians, political staffers, party officials or public servants.
Australia’s lax lobbying regime the domain of party powerbrokers
Read more
The analysis, believed to be the first of its kind, reveals 255 lobbyists, or 52.8%, have a previous history within government or political party hierarchies.
It also revealed one in four lobbyists have worked as staffers – policy advisers, chiefs of staff, or electorate or media officers – to Australian politicians. Ka kite ano link below.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/sep/16/in-the-family-majority-of-australias-lobbyists-are-former-political-insiders
Kia ora Newshub Its cool that the District Health is upping the wages of there low paid workers .
Lloyd nice scarf .
Changing the WOF to 12 months was a fool of a move we don’t have nice flat straight 2 lane roads like they do overseas hence 6 monthly WOF .
Well thats shocking all these surgical devices being sold to Kiwis and they have not been tested wtf the people who make these thing are playing Russian roulette with Kiwi lives .
trump will be a bigger fool if he lets the ICE shoot those refugees at there Mexico boarder .
Ollie Ka pai to Scott for his win on the Super Car .
Ka kite ano
Kia ora The Crowd Goes Wild congrats to Mikayla and Brodie for there prizes .
Storm that was a good win for Scott.
Yes you cant do that to the Ranfurly Shield .
I liked his acting as Muhammad Ali Will that is that’s a cool movie they don’t make em like they use to.
Jen Hackman is a cool actor.
I say a golf game between Barak and trump would be cool
Good win King .
Ka kite ano Some countrys don’t no how to be good host guys