Soper’s daily whinge and smear against the government.
He really is a nasty piece of work.
This time he has a go at Golriz Ghahraman.
What a slimeball.
Remember how John Key’s new government in 2008, came in on a raft of two track dirty politics and soft media infotainment spin? And then they were like the deer in the headlines, without much of a plan, so…..
The most expensive proposal from the summit was for an equity investment fund involving the Government and private banks as partners.
…
The most expensive single pledge given yesterday came from Warehouse founder Stephen Tindall, who said the Tindall Foundation would put $1 million towards “bottom-up” training that helped improve people’s access to information and services.
…
At the summit, Mr Key said the public-private investment fund would be “a pot of investment money to help New Zealand companies get the access to share capital they need to grow their cake and therefore to create jobs”.
…
Mr Key said completing the walking track would cost about $6 million.
Adding a cycle track would create huge tourism opportunities.
He singled out for mention a possible public-private fund to help increase tourism.
He also said he wanted to fast-track implementation of National’s youth guarantee scheme which covers the transition from school to training or study.
But she admits that her profile page on the Green Party website, which states that she has put African leaders on trial for abusing their power, “could be clearer”.
Theres a slight difference between prosecuting war criminals and defending war criminals
[lprent: You are simply lying at several levels. But I think this is easier to demonstrate rather than explain at any level..
1. There is no significiant difference between defending and prosecuting. Both are part of a court process that leads to judgement.
2. Her bio actually said – read it carefully
Her studies at Oxford, and work as a lawyer for the United Nations and in New Zealand, have focused on enforcing human rights and holding governments to account. Golriz has lived and worked in Africa, The Hague and Cambodia putting on trial world leaders for abusing their power, and restoring communities after war and human rights atrocities, particularly empowering women engaged in peace and justice initiatives.
3. Putting people on trial is not a prosecution prerogative. It applies to both defense and and prosecution.
4. I think you are trolling and as a local prosecutor and judge, we clearly don’t need a defense. Therefore there should be no trial to look at the actual circumstances.
5. Banned for 1 month for crimes against robust debate..
6. This is not arbitrary in anyway. It is a simple matter of arbitrary lynch mob justice without due process.
And since Golriz Ghahraman has experience of both, she knows an infinite amount more about the difference than you do, but then so does the stenographer.
Yup, from sewer to MSM as the National party smear machine cranks up and all the MSM journos gather around the outflow pipe mouths agape. After all, Farrar negates the need to think, or to resrach, and he helpfully even writes your questions for you.
Soper in particular seems to have decided to wage a misogynistic war on anyone who dares to commit the crime of being young, female and more powerful than him. Linda Clark got it 100% right when she pretty much name checked him and his attitude and told he needed to wake up or ship out.
It’s obvious what the Nats and their MSM enablers are trying to do. The accusations are going to come thick and fast through to the end of this parliamentary session (ie. just before Xmas) leaving a trail of perplexed voters to gather around the barbecues wondering whether they made the right choice voting for Labour/Green or NZ First – whichever. It doesn’t matter the claims are nothing more than garbled rubbish. Its the first part of a slow, subliminal manipulation of their minds.
I noted the sharp edge of cold fury in Barry Soper’s voice at the first stand-up media interviews which followed Winston Peters’ announcement. I knew then he was going to take a vicious approach and he has clearly influenced the little wife, Heather DPA.
That’s kinda the thing about human rights; even the worst of the bad guys have some. It’s part of the complexity of being a human rights lawyer that sometimes you’re defending them.
Ban me if you want, I believe what she did was wrong.
[RL: I don’t care what you believe here, I do care that you dropped a controversial comment with no supporting argument or citation. That ‘smells’ very much like typical hit and run troll behaviour. I moderate on behaviour not content; make your case honestly and I’m unlikely to intervene.]
You realise that without defence lawyers we can’t put people on trial at all? If you want genocide and other human rights abuses to be prosecuted, you have to have court staff.
Take your notion to its logical conclusion and you’re effectively saying that the International Court of Justice enables war crimes, and that our court system enables murder.
There is a role for defense lawyers in the legal system and we need a legal system. That doesnt mean I have to like or endorse those who choose to defend heinous crim inals.
No. That isn’t what you said. Your endearments and endorsements have no value, so with-holding them is of no consequence. However, you made a very specific allegation against people who work on legal defence teams – that their job enables crime.
Are you now backing down from that into a vague sense of disapproval? If so, how about you take some personal responsibility for your disgusting false accusation?
That’s not actually the role of a defense lawyer, any more than the role of a prosecutor is “to get an innocent person convicted”.
Often the morally bankrupt or hard of thinking reduce the functions to simply “get a guilty criminal acquitted” or “innocent person convicted”, but the role of the court is to try to determine the truth. The prosecution present their case, the defense present the case as it appeared to the defendant, and the court decides. Neither party in an adversarial system is allowed to mislead the court, AFAIK. Correct me if I’m wrong.
Why is it unreasonable to point out that Golriz Ghahraman acted for the defence in the genocide trials. When you read her bio on the Green website it gave the impression she was prosecuting genocide, not just in Cambodia but also in Rawanda.
Now I have no problem with her acting for the defence, but she should not have given the wrong impression.
It is not unfair for a journalist to point that out. It is not the act of a slimeball to do so, nether is it sexist.
This site is always saying how terrible National MP’s on the basis they are all psychopaths and liars. But you can’t stand even the slightest adverse comment about those from the left.
What about accusing her of enabling genocide? Which is what “the left” is actually defending her against.
Can you help me understand right wing thinks on this issue please? When you collaborated with Nicky Hager, were you enabling war crimes or Al Quaeda?
What about the Law Commission? You definitely must’ve enabled some pretty serious crimes there, and I don’t just mean the things the National Party wanted 😉
Yes, if we use that ruler to measure Golriz every lawyer that ever defends a criminal is somehow implicated in the crime.
It’s crucial that the crime and the analytical dissection of it after the event are mutually exclusive.
If Golriz’s bio implies she rode around the world on a big white stallion solving the war crime woes of the world, if we all agree everyone is entitled to a quality defence, she did. I lie in mine, I was useless at Rugby.
My comment was in response to Ed’s initial comment, but there have been so many other comments added, it is distanced from that – probably also the result of using an iPhone.
David Farrar on Kiwiblog put the issue in quire a reasonable way, but some of the commenters on his site, not so much. But then some commenters on any of the main political sites use extravagant language accusing people of all sorts of things, and acting from the basest of reasons. The Standard is certainly not immune from that.
DPF put it in as appalling a way as Phil Quin did – as a propaganda call to all those on the right who’d like to skip the human rights stuff and get on with the punishments.
Some one on radio recently was saying how much was paid by observers to watch when they had really brutal punishments. I don’t think that human nature has left those of today unconcerned about the niceties of justice and rule of law, more enlightened than in the past.
There are some amazing things in this piece: If a crowd was denied the spectacle of an execution on the allotted day, occasionally there was some gruesome compensation. In England in 1221, Thomas of Eldersfield was reprieved from hanging at the last moment; in a show of mercy, he was blinded and castrated instead. Robert Bartlett describes the scene: ‘the eyes were thrown to the ground, the testicles used as footballs, the local lads kicking them playfully at the girls’. http://www.historytoday.com/sean-mcglynn/violence-and-law-medieval-england
David Farrar on Kiwiblog put the issue in quire a reasonable way
Farrar? You say “reasonable” because it suits you. “Tendentious” and “disingenuous” are words that come to my mind. You know perfectly well that the Penguin never lets his hands get dirty in public and encourages his troll farm to do the dirty work for him.
but some of the commenters on his site, not so much
What a pity that because we lack your smarmy manners we’ll never be admitted to your gentleman’s club of “reasonable” men. Oh dear.
But in fact at the Rwandan Tribunal she was representing the war criminals in the genocide of around eight hundred thousand Tutsis. She complained about how poorly resourced the defence was. It was as though the United Nations didn’t really believe in the process, she opined.
Ah, I see. He’s the type of person who thinks that people once accused of a crime shouldn’t have any defence and would probably do away with the trial altogether. And, once the trial is over and they’re found guilty, say that the lawyers who made up the defence team are just as bad as the ones found guilty.
Ed (1) … proof Natz (through Joyce) still pulling the strings of msm, with NZH dredging up whatever is possible to smear the coalition government, regardless of how truthful or inconsequential it is!
Golriz was doing her job, as most lawyers are expected to do. Look at Key’s former job as a currency trader. Bet some of the activity there wasn’t above board! Was that ever challenged by msm? No!
Congratulations to Prince Harry and Megan Markle for there engagement there wedding is good for OUR worlds society.
I only advocate Vapours as a tool to give up smoking as I’m using Vapours to give up. The only thing we should be breathing into our lungs is clean air we need to set a age limit R 18 and a display/advertising restrictions to limit the appeal and take up of vaping by our youth. PS your a bit out numbered Hillary you need a lady friend on the breakfast show Ka Pai
But The Treaty adam is between Maori and the Monarchy – not the NZ Govt. This is an issue that if NZ were to progress towards complete independence from England would need to be resolved.
I agree with your comment Adam, but I also have to say, it’s awesome when two people fall in love and get married for the right reasons, his mum would have be thrilled.
But she is no leader of ours. She has done absolutely nothing as our Head of State. She was very polite in how she told Maori to piss off when ask to have some honour and look at the treaty her institution signed.
I now see that the national opposition is attempting to stall the new government’s plan to stop labour/NZF/Greens coalition “17 goals” and run then out of time, by jaming Labour with over 6200 “spam” questions.
So Jacinda needs to show Government “leadership” and need to rush through an urgency bill to reverse the national party changes they (national) placed to allow this attempt to close down the new government, and restore the former system preventing this “tea party style” abuse of our parliamentary system..
“The Government is going all out to tick off all 17 goals on its 100-day plan.
A hundred days. Just over three months. It sounds like plenty of time until you blink and realise a month has passed since the Government was sworn in. They have until February 3.”
I think you are right cleangreen. It is time Ardern showed some steel and dealt with these National ratbags. There is nothing nice about the Natz, they are at war and need to be exposed for their spiteful anti democratic behaviour. New Zealanders deserve better.
Labour coalition only have – 6th 7th 8th, – 12th, 13th, 14th December; – and the xmas party celebrations need to be be put in there somewhere we assume too.
hey have their budget to release and befre 3rd February need to make good on the ’17 goals’ as the ‘100 day pledge’ to NZ.
Labour have just six more days in parliament these emails this year, so we are screwed unless Jacinda can change the legislation today.
Or else Labour are left bound up with these 6200 ‘spam’ emails now and labour now has no choice but to pass a ’emergency bill’ to stop “email spaming” forthwith.
it is preventing government to function under legislation national passed. Remove all National legislation labour must in all areas also.
I knew national would leave ‘hand grenades’ to stymie this new government so they need to remove all national toxic legislation now.
That sitting calendar for 2017 is the one originally in place prior to the election and is now out of date.
Following the swearing in of the new government a revised sitting programme for the remainder of 2017 was drawn up in conjunction with the proposed sitting calendar for 2018.
So Parliament will sit for the next four weeks from today, Tues 28 Nov through until 6pm Thurs, 21 December – not just the two weeks originally planned (6th 7th 8th, – 12th, 13th, 14th December).
Is is highly likely that Parliament will also go into urgency in order to get the PPL legislative amendments through and possibly other legislative business prior to the Christmas/New Year close down – including possibly reversing some Nats legislation.
Thanks for giving us the updated sitting schedules veutoviper,
I went on the usual site but being that the new government had “a minefield” of changes that were needed to be made with the whole moviing of the old tired national mob out into the ‘lower government’ buildings and the new labour coalition Government newly placed on the ninth floor of the ‘Beehive building’.
We know only to well how difficult that two weeks it took to get the new Government communications up and running.
I understood all this as I was employed by the ‘fourth largest communication company globally’ (Bell) and used to place new systems in Government buildings also.
As our many NGO emails went un-anwered for weeks until we got hold of a Government secretary and were told that a “new communication system was in the process of being installed” and they had problems, so I guess this is catch up time for all.
The Parliament website has actually been very quickly updated this round after the election. The new MPs were listed etc within a day of the election etc. and other needed amendments up very quickly.
However, I did find it took a few minutes to relocate the link on the Parliament website to the revised sitting schedule for 2017. I knew that it had been changed but it was not immediately visible because it was included in the article re the proposed 2018 sitting programme.
Having worked in government for many years in Wellington (including very closely working with and in the Parliament precinct), I am pretty sure the actual Parliament website (and related staff etc) would have been unaffected by the physical moves, changes to communications etc related to the change of government, relocation of MPs and parties. Fun days, but actually very much highly planned and managed chaos!
All good now we need to ‘stand in line with national waiting for the reples from the 42 emails we have sent the new government’.
Now our NGO representing many communities wonder if the national email nonsene has now prevented the Labour coalition government from responding to other questions for the community also now?
So that puts the public interest now behind national party’s own interests, and that means national wont care about their own impact upon our communities interests?
Maybe national should have thought clearly how their ‘obstruction’ process over 6200 emails of questions was going to impact on all NZ communities.
An interesting take by the ever-pedantic Graeme Edgeler, but i also suggest people read the comments which put things into a bit more perspective in terms of National’s actions while in government. In particular, it is worth reading Katherine Moody’s comment here
This includes a number of replies by Key and his ministers to very similar diary related questions while in government. The wording of these replies is not only similar to one another of these Nat Ministers, but also to that now being used by the new Labour/NZF/Green government Ministers.
Examples:
Hon Bill English (Minister of Finance) replied: As Minister of Finance I have a large number of meetings in Wellington and around New Zealand. I do not believe it is a good use of staff time to itemise my meetings or engagements, nor attempt to list the names of every person I met over the course of a month. If the member is interested in a specific issue or organisations then I might be able to provide more detailed information.
Hon Steven Joyce (Minister for Economic Development) replied: I hold a large number of meetings both formally and informally each month with a wide range of people and discuss a wide range of topics. I do not consider it reasonable use of official’s time to provide the Member with a comprehensive list of all such meetings, nor is it feasible as the information requested is often not specifically captured by my records. If the Member could be more specific about a particular area of interest I would be happy to consider his request.
English just on on Morning Report claiming National had raised the bar for transparency in government over the past 9 years and that Labour needed to up their game as they were stuck in time a decade ago. LOL. This from the party that totally subverted the OIA request process over the past 9 years.
Hypocrite.
He was also asked if Smith was right in claiming National won the election. He wouldn’t say yes or no but his reply was something like “well we got the most votes
and that’s really unusual”.
Yes Grey it was rough waking up to English in full Billshit mode.
National admitted at one stage during the last 9 years that it did its best to stymie OIA requests and it is legendary how under-resourced the Ombudsman became under the Nats with massive delays.
Ian Lees-Galloway was excellent on Morning Report this morning talking about Paid Parental Leave and how Labour has cooperated with the Nats on this despite Amy Adams negativity-worth a listen.
Here is a link to the excellent Ian L-G interview (via the related RNZ news article with a lovely picture of Ian holding Willow Jean Prime’s baby as an added bonus).
And for anyone wanting to hear/see the Bill English Morning Report interview, here are the links.
(The first one is a lead-in to the actual interview with English. The actual interview was pretty soft with no real challenges from Espiner and the interview ended on a weak excuse by Espiner that the reception was not good as English was on his cellphone).
Talking about hypocracy we met S Joyce twice in three years and the fisrt meeting he was ‘slightly prepared to assist our comittee about saving our Gisborne/Napier rail.
But in the second meeting he was aggressively ‘aloof’ as he proudly publiclly announced that ‘his study’ he produced (since debunked by BERL) was proof the rail must close.
Joyce said the rail is ‘not worth re-openning’.
Later it was our Labour MP Phil Twyford as acting transport spokesperson that placed his ‘expose’ on the web how S Joyce as Minister of Transport allowed kiwirail to remove the $200 Million from kiwirails maintainence fund and at the select committee he was at kiwirail admitted is was that which closed the napier gisborne rail.
So S Joyce is both a true liar and a possible criminal for intentionally causing the destruction of part of the publically owned rail services and harmed the SOE.
“By any international standard the last government was open and transparent, and this government, as with many other things, has expressed these high-minded intentions and then fails to follow through.”
Mr English said the previous National-led government lifted the bar a long way on transparency.
“We stressed the early release of cabinet papers, the full release of budget documents, including draft reports which had not really been done before.
“The extensive release of data because that’s such an important part of being able to monitor what a government is doing and how it is doing it.”
PS….thinking that a ‘leftish’ government would be uncomfortable with such a heavily redacted justification for legislation that removed the rights of New Zealanders I did email the Head Office and requested that the blanked out bits of this document be revealed.
Heard nothing yet. I guess they’re busy trying to spin not releasing documents their coalition partner said would be released.
So the last Government (National) recieved 105 emails from our NGO over five years as I am secretary of it, and only two of the 63 National ministers only answered (on one small section of only of a small”side issue”.)
Question
1/ Is this because we are not officially a government agency but an NGO Puckish Rougue?
And more to the point (PR) question two; –
2/ Are we to expect the same from this new Labour lead government too (PR) Puckish Rouge; – or are you just another “PR” for the last corrupt government ?
Rail is the enemy to a former national Government with a man running it (s joyce) who is rightly called “the tarseal king” who we believe he has interests in trucking we have been informed.
The show must go on I don’t see these people logic in following me around everywhere I go Im sure there are other people that deserve there attention. My neo liberal neighbour must have run out of fireworks you see there are a lot of these people in this little suburb they use fireworks to try and intimidat me. My dates were wrong it’s been 13 years of harassment from the Gisborne man and about 3 1/2 years that he landed his glider on the farm. The Rock one time I got challened to drink a jar of rum can’t remember what happened but a m8 told me I was getting a long with the best crayfishmans daughter lol the next time this guy 2 weeks before try to fight me I put him in his place he made out he was over it and his m8 challenged me to drink a jar of rum woke up the next morning broke ribbs squash nose this guy waited till I fell asleep and attacked me that was a good lesson I don’t get pissed and always have a gard up. Kia kaha
All 84,000 civil servants will receive a year-end Annual Variable Component (AVC) of one month’s pay – higher than the 0.5 month they received in 2016, according to their Public Service Division.
That would motivate those lovelies in MBIE and Treasury and DPMC to pull their finger out and make some serious moves.
I am all for the Singapore model; top tax rate of 22%, no CGT, corporate tax rate of 17% etc
Yeah, and then they take you to the cleaners through indirect taxation.
As mentioned, Singaporeans have been told that we pay low income taxes, but when you compare income taxes with indirect taxes, you would see that Singaporeans pay 3.5 times as much into indirect taxes than direct taxes, whereas Swedes and Finns pay about the same indirect taxes as direct taxes, and the Danes pay only about a lesser 70% of direct taxes into indirect taxes
That’s kinda the thing about human rights; even the worst of the bad guys have some. It’s part of the complexity of being a human rights lawyer that sometimes you’re defending them.
Thanks. I get human rights are universal and our system provides support for all sides and I struggle with it. I struggle that mass murderers get more rights than the many they murdered. I struggle that a sicko can do sicko things throughout their life and at the 11th hour have a big realisation and seek forgiveness. I struggle with these moral dilemmas.
Working the defence is something I couldn’t do. My personal revulsion at someone’s deeds would really interfere with fulfilling my obligations to that person’s defence.
Personally I’m of the opinion that someone that deliberately interferes with someone else’s human rights should forfeit their own. However, even in that mindset, there’s still the issue of determining what culpable deeds have actually been done. But as a general view, it’s at odds with the whole philosophical structure around justice that we’ve built up over time. And I’m really not interested in trying to think through the wrinkles of trying to replace that structure, especially since there’s no chance significant change will happen. At best there will be tinkering around the edges.
Personally I’m of the opinion that someone that deliberately interferes with someone else’s human rights should forfeit their own.
as I think you clearly understand, the whole point of a trial is to determine culpability as an outcome, not as an apriori assumption. Or to put it in the more familiar parlance “innocent until proven guilty”.
That’s not just a human right, it’s a very real protection we afford defendants due to the enormous disparity of resources between the state and the individual. From this came another famous legal dictum ‘that it’s better ten guilty people go free than one innocent person be convicted”. In other words it is a concious feature of our legal system to weight the odds in favour of the defendants. Even culpable ones.
Part of the problem here is the internet has let us all indulge our fantasies of playing at judge, jury and executioner to the extent that these old and important ideas have become diminished, sometimes dismissed altogether.
Those are all points that need to be repeatedly hammered, particularly with the likes of Quin that don’t get it.
But I think your point below at 8.2 expresses a key idea most concisely: if the accused doesn’t have a capable defense team, then the whole process lacks legitimacy. In that context, the defense is just as important as the prosecution for delivering justice. For the victims as well as broader society.
Ghahraman said she has never met Quin, but that his comments showed “an embarrassing lapse in understanding”.
“No one is saying there is no such thing as genocide. It’s like saying a defence lawyer [defending someone charged with murder] in our justice system here is a murder-denier.
The whole point is that in order for a trial to have any legitimacy it’s essential for the defendants to have access to a legal defense. Someone has to do this. Quin’s failure to understand is not just embarrassing, it’s kind of chilling.
Very odd. His point seems to be that defence lawyers somehow endorse their client’s alleged crimes and that to be a defence lawyer you mustn’t have strong morals.
Quin seems a vindictive type and I suspect he’s jealous of other’s achievements.
I read the opposite. That he didn’t have much problem with the green website (I did read that somewhere but can’t find it), but that she chose to work on the defence team saying, “of all the ways to save the world, she chose to send killers back to the villages where their victims’ families are trying to rebuild their lives.”
Most likely Quin has just picked up the ‘doofus of the week’ award off Nick Smith, but it’s an especially bizarre charge to lay against her, given what I personally understand of Gharaman’s family story,
What about mob lawyers – are they just giving their clients a fair go. Lawyers are just like other people – fallable, greedy, stupid and selfish – and with all the qreat qualities too, like compassion.
I get the system and I find it challenging as well.
All those things may well be true in general marty, but in this instance it’s was a young barrister doing tough work, (pro bono IIRC) in a tough environment for all the right reasons.
Indeed that’s the main focus of the interview; the vast gulf between the realities on the ground in Rwanda and NZ.
There are lots of jobs I couldn’t and wouldn’t do and I have some admiration and at least respect for those that can, even with the personal cost that this must entail for them. This is one of those cases.
I think moral questions are often the most intellectually interesting.
I think yes and also no if they ignored evidence in their defence/legal/work with the company to ensure the company could continue to make profit. Hard to prove though ☺
But isn’t that the task of lawyers working for a company to protect the “rights” of the company to sell it’s wares? And you are aware that National’s Chris Bishop worked for Phillip Morris?
And the task of a defence lawyer is to protect the rights of their client – no matter how heinous their crime may have been.
Should a rapist be given a fair trial or a paedophile? Of course they must -otherwise our society descends into lawlessness, such as was the case in Rwanda. If the accused were to receive no defence, then the subsequent conviction would have no more merit than the summary justice they metered out to those they slaughtered.
Unfortunately Marty – as G.E. Moore (a late British Philosopher) explained “goodness” is like “redness” – it is a simple concept that cannot be broken down into constituent parts. Either you perceive redness or you don’t.
I can only say that by their actions you shall know them. Does Gloriz act in a good way or a bad way? Having met her and seen the work she has done (not only acting as a defence lawyer) she is a good person – as are all the Green MPs.
I hope that is of some help.
I agree with your comments about legal process Redlogix.
But Im not sure though if thats the issue here. Isn’t it that Ghahraman and the Greens deliberately fudged her role in the Riwanda war crimes legal process so that the punters would assume that she was on the side of the angels; not the devils, so to speak.
She was perfectly open about what her role was in Rwanda before the Election – because she was a Green candidate – such news was decided not to be published by the MSM – because of “lack of space”. Well I guess it’s much more important to tell us about Bill’s smile
I have no problems with her being on the defense team though why you’d volunteer is beyond me but her profile page on the Green website was, at best, misleading:
“Golriz has lived and worked in Africa, The Hague and Cambodia, putting on trial world leaders for abusing their power.”
Says nothing about defending world leaders either and she herself says “could be clearer”
How those panama papers working out Puckish Rouge? Or the polls buddy? How many more lies do we have to suffer though? Oh wait – you could just revert to type as a racist we all know you are…
Still spinning and lying I see – Oh well can’t be helped, I suppose. It’s what you do.
“Golriz has lived and worked in Africa, The Hague and Cambodia, putting on trial world leaders for abusing their power.”
Says nothing about defending world leaders either and she herself says “could be clearer”
Completely irrelevant. How long is the bio? A few paragraphs?
When I do my three page CV I barely touch the surface of anything on my work history. You’re looking at what I did ina company for 2-4 or even 11 years in a single paragraph. It was like that from when I was 26. By that time I’d had a 10 year work history and several degrees. It had skim paragraphs about time in the army, working as a farm hand, as a barman, a factory machine operator, technical salesman, factory manager, and computer support.
If you want to be be a idiot, then go ahead. Just don’t be surprised if people sum up your CV as “FOOL”
US is seeking the extradition of a British guy (Lauri) for stuff English courts didn’t lay charges over. And apparently …
The US government know that their claims against Lauri will never be tested in court. The way extradition works means that prosecutors do not have to show any evidence to the British authorities. And because those US prosecutors reserve the right to try Lauri three times, in three different districts, with a potential sentence of 99 years, they know he would be under enormous pressure to accept a plea bargain.
Ninety-seven per cent of federal defendants in the United States never get a trial because they are offered a choice of either accepting years in prison if they plead guilty or risking decades to have their day in court. What Lauri is being offered in the United States is not a trial but blackmail with a potential life sentence attached.
GROVEL.
State-sponsored adulation of shepherd-murderer moves into overdrive
Tuesday 28 November 2017
RNZ National, 7:24 a.m. GUYON ESPINER: …. [drily amused] I’ve been taken to task for asking what Harry’s going to wear. SUSIE FERGUSON: It’ll be a uniform, of course! GUYON ESPINER: Of course it will. ….. [grovel, grovel…]
three, a.m. show, 7:25 a.m. DUNCAN GARNER: Royal correspondent Dicky Arbiter, good morning! DICKY ARBITER:[beaming] The Twitter universe has come alight! …[widens his eyes to indicate his great joy]… Like any young couple in love, they’re not hiding their love for each other! AMANDA GILLIES: She wore a BEAUTIFUL new coat, designed by Line the Label. What does this mean for dress designers in the U.K.?….[grovel]…. DICKY ARBITER: They’ll look on her as they did Harry’s mother—as a clothes horse rather than a work horse. They do a tremendous amount of good work; let’s focus on what they DO rather than on what they wear, for a change. DUNCAN GARNER: Yeah, I’m WITH you on this! DICKY ARBITER:[worshipfully] Harry was a soldier. He was at the sharp end in Afghanistan. …. The couple meeting and they see each other across a crowded room, and that’s IT!… They just clicked, just like a jigsaw puzzle. … Younger people see them as role models. ….
7:52 a.m. DUNCAN GARNER: Are you interested in the royal engagement? Some of you are. Some of you aren’t at all! That’s next!
…Advertisements (paid ones, not free ones for the Royal Family)….
7:54 a.m. DUNCAN GARNER: Okay, welcome back. So much feedback for the royal wedding!
MARK RICHARDSON: Prince Harry was happy before this American came along. Well maybe not happy, but he was having a good time.
AMANDA: He wasn’t happy, he’s said that.
DUNCAN GARNER: Our poll question this morning is: “Do you care about the royal engagement between Prince Harry and Mehan Markle?” Well, not everybody does, it seems. Stuey says: “There are lots of unsung heroes in the community. He’s a privileged pillock and welfare beneficiary.”
The others in the studio—Gillies, Richardson, and social presenter Shannon Redstall—titter with pity and amusement.
DUNCAN GARNER: The woooorld of Stuey! I tell you what, Stuey, you can be the producer for the next sixty-threee minutes, and you can decide what’s going to be on the television.
8:02 a.m. DUNCAN GARNER: Coming up on our panel is Rawdon Christie, broadcaster and royalist. We’ll be talking about Prince Harry, because Stuey hasn’t had enough of that yet…
8:35 a.m. DUNCAN GARNER: All right, some things we don’t know about Meghan Markle. Everybody’s talking about this right now! …She has two adopted dogs, Bogart and, and…. AMANDA GILLIES: Guy. DUNCAN GARNER: Yes! You know that? …. Mark, you seem sad. MARK RICHARDSON: He was my guy. He was my royal guy!
8:42 a.m. DUNCAN GARNER: We can’t get away from royal news today! It appears the royal couple may be related….
Thanks, cleangreen, for those very kind words. I do it all by ear, usually. This morning I scribbled it down freehand up to 8 o’clock, and the rest I did on my computer as I listened.
My transcriptions are not always spot on, though, and have elicited some controversy here….
Prince Harry has been photographed groping and kissing girls in a London nightclub. Britain’s The Sun newspaper printed pictures – taken earlier this summer – of Harry and his brother Prince William, partying at London’s Boujis nightclub. … He had his hands all over her and was kissing her on the face. At one point he reached his arm around her and gave her a proper grope on her breast. …. http://www.femalefirst.co.uk/royal_family/Britains+Prince+Harry-22051.html
Groping and snorting in Las Vegas…
The giggling prince’s demeanour here is a world away from his attitude following the firestorm of controversy that engulfed him after his fun and games in his hotel room. He and his friends took over a £1,000-a-day VIP bungalow at the MGM Grand Hotel for one of its infamous Wet Republic pool parties.
These raucous alcohol-fuelled events are popular in Vegas and involve several thousand young people attempting to get as drunk as humanly possible while pulling members of the opposite sex in the fierce sunshine.
By the end of the day, say those with intimate knowledge of such events, the pools contain more urine than water and couples are openly having sex.
“GROPERS” is presented by GroperWatch, a division of Daisycutter Sports Inc.
No.1 George Herbert Walker Bush; No. 2 Bill O’Reilly; No. 3 Al Franken; No. 4 Robin Brooke; No. 5 Lester Beck; No. 6 Arnold Schwarzenegger; No. 7 Joe Biden; No. 8 Rolf Harris; No. 9 Harold Bloom; No. 10 Sir Jimmy Savile; No. 11 Dr Morgan Fahey
You have great memory recall; – I guess nmy chemical poisoning back in 1992 while last working in Canada hurt my brain as I now have poor memory recall.
Especially if I now get exposed to some perfume’s, diesel exhaust, synthetic rubber smells, and many others.
That is why I love things to be ‘cleangreen’.
So I need to use a tape recording and a “very patient wife of 45 yrs” to transcribe the event. (she is my one love, – once married; – us both)
If you’re going to run this series, you really ought to read up a little about “consent” – what it means and how it might be relevant to these posts. Because otherwise you could just end up looking like a grumpy old man who needs to get laid.
I find his scribbing of public affairs issues quite refreshing.
Especially since the ‘media’ fail to cover ‘in depth’ public affairs issues today Morrissey is trying to expose them in a transcibed way and if the persons involved dont like their words repeated were are we left then????
His sources include “The Sun” and “The Daily Mail”.
Geat “credible” sources of info.
Interesting how the Left like to lambast the media; until a story is published that suits their way of thinking
Different Morrissey comment, Cleangreen. This is the one about gropers, not the radio transcript.
My issue with it is it makes no case for the sexual activity being non-consensual and yet lumps it in with the activities of people like Rolf Harris and Jimmy Saville. What makes a “groper” is lack of consent, not the fact of touching someone.
Fair comment, Milt, assuming Prince Harry respected the women he groped. I find that highly unlikely. The women seemed to be initially upset but were eventually flustered into smiling and accepting the mistreatment. Donald Trump and Harvey Weinstein indulged in similar behaviour, and their victims were socialized into grinning and bearing it, or simply keeping quiet.
Sure, give that coke-snorting lout the benefit of the doubt if you want. You think someone who kills shepherds from the sanctuary of a helicopter gunship, then soaks up the adulation of the Murdoch press which dubbed him “The Big H”, gropes only willing women at those orgies.
Addled dotard shows his condescending racist slip.
President Trump: "We have a representative in Congress who they say was here a long time ago. They call her 'Pocahontas.'" pic.twitter.com/9zML2RVFtP— CSPAN (@cspan) November 27, 2017
President Trump: "We have a representative in Congress who they say was here a long time ago. They call her 'Pocahontas.'" pic.twitter.com/9zML2RVFtP
WASHINGTON—For a year and a half, President Donald Trump has been denounced by Native American leaders for calling Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren “Pocahontas.”
He just did it again — at an event honouring Native American war heroes.
Trump held a White House ceremony on Monday to celebrate Navajo “code talkers,” who used their language to transmit secret messages during the Second World War. After complimenting the code talkers, Trump said, “You were here long before any of us were here. Although we have a representative in Congress who they say was here a long time ago. They call her Pocahontas.”
[…]
The jab at Warren was not the only part of the Monday event that was called offensive. Trump decided to make the speech in front of a portrait of president Andrew Jackson, who is notorious among Native Americans for signing the 1830 Indian Removal Act that forced Natives off of their land and produced thousands of deaths.
Trump also referred to his chief of staff John Kelly as “the chief.” And he suggested he was not personally familiar with the history of the code talkers.
“And I have to say, I said to General Kelly, I said, general, how good — here he is, right there, the chief; he’s the general and the chief — I said, how good were these code talkers?” he said.
Kelly’s response, according to Trump: “Sir, you have no idea. You have no idea how great they were.”
Glyphosate. Another 5 years for it as part of Roundup by the EU on the basis of it possibly being carcinogenic but one can’t be sure till enough people die.
It came up after WW2, where chemicals were used regularly to deadly effect.
Glyphosate was first synthesized in 1950 by Swiss chemist Henry Martin, who worked for the Swiss company Cilag. The work was never published.[18]:1 Stauffer Chemical patented the agent as a chemical chelator in 1964 as it binds and removes minerals such as calcium, magnesium, manganese, copper, and zinc.[19]
The European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) maintained their current classification of glyphosate as a substance causing serious eye damage and as a substance toxic to aquatic life, but did not find evidence implicating it to be a carcinogen, a mutagen, toxic to reproduction, nor toxic to specific organs.[17]
Monsanto’s last commercially relevant United States patent expired in 2000….
Farmers quickly adopted glyphosate, especially after Monsanto introduced glyphosate-resistant Roundup Ready crops, enabling farmers to kill weeds without killing their crops. In 2007, glyphosate was the most used herbicide in the United States’ agricultural sector and the second-most used in home and garden (2,4-D being the most used)…
In many cities, glyphosate is sprayed along the sidewalks and streets, as well as crevices in between pavement where weeds often grow. However, up to 24% of glyphosate applied to hard surfaces can be run off by water….
In 2015, 89% of corn, 94% of soybeans, and 89% of cotton produced in the United States were genetically modified to be herbicide-tolerant….
Use of glyphosate to clear milkweed along roads and fields may have contributed to a decline in monarch butterfly populations in the Midwestern United States.[172] Along with deforestation and adverse weather conditions,[173] the decrease in milkweed contributed to an 81% decline in monarchs.[174][175] The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) filed a suit in 2015 against the EPA, in which it is argued that the agency ignored warnings about the dangers of glyphosate usage for monarchs.[176]… https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyphosate
Seems like they are prepared to throw stuff at bees and as long as they keep flying, then the bad individual or combined effects of these chemicals is downplayed.
Then on Radionz we are suffering from leptospirosis which there have been another 93 in NZ for half the year. On and on and our environment and health constantly compromised.
The NZ Initiative a RW thinktank. And lying in heaps.
(Looking at the link that beatie gives above.) They present themselves as cool and rational and informed. They cherry pick the information they disseminate. They quote macro information, quote averages, and then present us with little direct information about individual groups.
With double the income-per-person than what was in 1970, a minimum wage up 50 per cent (inflation adjusted) and better medical care boosting life expectancy and reducing child mortality, you’d think New Zealand would be in its heyday.
It sounds good – double the income of 1970 – how was the inflation adjustment done, what was the base line, apples with apples? Housing has gone up horrendously since 1970, rentals are up, accommodation supplement always trails and the system is its own moral hazard. So that wouldn’t be rosy, but it isn’t mentioned. Instead we hear about child mortality, a nationwide measure, and life expectancy which is a population measure that is of vague concern to someone trying to manage on a pension.
Dr Bryce Wilkinson is just another RW fellow traveller packing a good story against beneficiaries whose opinion and solutions are discounted when pitted against a comfortable professional RW bottom, or even an erect spinal column of bias which is the healthy method of IT work now; (standing, perhaps they could let Peter try it out).
[Peter] has experience in technology and IT but isn’t able to sit in an office chair for longer than three minutes without getting excruciating pain.
“They should do a proper work assessment to see what my experience is and what jobs I can do based on my ability. I’m happy to work from home,” Peter said.
“To me they’re just trying to save costs without any care for the long-term solutions for the beneficiary.”
Wilkinson said a beneficiary’s shortage of money was a symptom rather than a cause of poverty. Instead efforts needed to be made to address drug addiction, alcoholism, mental illness, low skills, poor parenting and a lack of understanding of work habits.
Policies that increase job and income growth must be valued to complement welfare. The report stated the welfare system should “nourish rather than smother self-help”.
“State welfare support is a balancing act. A good system must guard against beneficiaries who could work but do not. This is a waste of human potential and an unwarranted burden on their fellow citizens.”
One notices, one does, the little homily at the end from the stern but just and prudent arbiter of these lives of people who are faulty and unable to take advantage of opportunities that are commonly available, for those who have the ability to exert themselves./sarc
The slimy words of callous, self-centred people are for the purpose of impressing their peer group in society, as to whose fault it is that ‘these people’ are languishing out there. However the dossier that TS has built up over the years gives us examples that ensure we understand the problem in the round, the whole vicious circle that ensures that the welfare system doesn’t work, because the RW don’t want a good, working, society of happy people. Such people are harder to squeeze the last juice out of.
Its now settling down now,holiday time ,to respect our coalition government,as others chance to talk about democracy,as three political parties say, this is our march to our lands care.
I reckon the only reason the nats want to see it is because they want to know why and how they missed out, they just aren’t handling losing the election very well at all.
It’s funny (strange) how so many are going through this small item from Golriz sieving it word by word like someone panning for gold.
Yet Key was here for decades and I don’t think anyone went through his past sorting out where his money actually came from. Did anyone actually know how much he made from selling out a day before… from buying a penthouse that was being rezoned …. from not paying his full tax or by selling a day after the withholding period… etc. And it seemed to be his money that was the main attraction, that gave him gravitas. Once he had that it was such a laugh that he was okay, so free to not care about cheeky comments about peeing in the shower and other things like sitting in a cage with a jerk and a microphone.
Is anyone allowed to ask English what the contents of his 200 or so texts to his lady friend were about. I am sure Nz ers want to know. In the interest of transparency and all.
But Floyd those texts (270 odd wasn’t it) were to do with his electorate – sort of like the electronic equivalent of “notes” between him and his local secretary. He didn’t believe they came under the auspices of the OIA. Now, someone else has said that just in the last 24 hrs. Oh that’s right, the Prime Minister. I guess she has taken her cue from the previous Prime Minister.
While we’re talking about Ms Ghahraman, my other problem with her is that she is a refugee who seeks to bring in more refugees. Feels a bit like a Trojan Horse scenario
A.
[TheStandard: A moderator moved this comment to Open Mike as being off topic or irrelevant in the post it was made in. Be more careful in future.]
Like companies who bring in migrants with work experience rather than hire and intern train up local graduates, replacing those who migrate to Oz (for higher wages) with another immigrant.
New Zealand companies just a Trojan horse back door into Oz.
There are around 20 million refugees in the world today.
Every year around 5 million people are forced for one reason or another to flee from their homes and to seek refuge in another country.
NZ accepts 750 refugees per year.
And you make that offensive comment!
🙄
Your “other” problem!? Why fear something that may never happen? It only exists in your mind because you let it exist there and cling on to it. Let it go and be free of your fears.
Well i can’t avoid the whole bloody country. Anyway you need to be more compassionate and less judgmental imo. Bigotry must be addressed in this country. You can actually hurt people you know.
The Standard is a place for heated debate, as you can well see by reading the posts on pretty much any day. I wouldn’t go round talking like this offline.
I never want to see one of our MPs smiling in a photo alongside a man found guilty of inciting genocide (in an International Criminal Tribunal, and sentenced to 15 years).
We can do without her in NZ. I would like to see her resign as an MP.
No, you didn’t change your mind one bit; you were just a bit slow in making up your mind. It’s funny that so many people seem to go on about changing to improve ‘things’ while in fact they are rooting for status quo and the very last thing they’ll want to do on Earth is to change their (own) minds. I say these people have it back to front big time; reality is not in your head, it is everything but and all outside of your head. Don’t think too long about it as it might change your mind in irrevocable ways.
There is a reason that the Greens almost halved their voter support and lost seats this election…fringe party lunacy, shows what a bastard and undemocratic system MMP is (Winston 2017 may be the straw that broke the MMP back…eventually, and finally). Just as ex National MP Shane Ardern..
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The Finance and Expenditure Committee is holding an inquiry into the COVID-19 Public Health Response Act 2020 which was rushed through Parliament last week, and has called for submissions. Submissions are due by Sunday, 28 June 2020. You can either submit online through the form above, or by posting dead ...
While the world is currently struggling with the pandemic, we have another crisis to deal with as well: climate change. Fortunately, not everyone has forgotten about it, with Spain announcing ambitious plans to go net-zero by 2050: Under the law, which still needs to be approved by Parliament, the government ...
Children used in this study were from Lintingkou town (a normal-fluoride/control area) and Dakoutun town (a high-fluoride area) in Baodi district of Tianjin, China. The towns are 25 km apart. Anti-fluoridation activists on ...
When we see how the pandemic is being handled in the rest of the world, we can thank our lucky stars that we live here, in New Zealand, and under our current government, led by Jacinda Ardern. The latest polls suggest that this is exactly how Kiwis feel. But the ...
Prof Nick Wilson, Dr Sophie Febery, Dr Ling Chan, Dr Jennifer Summers, Prof Michael BakerThe concepts of an Alert Level system, household “bubbles”, and social event size limits are all valuable pandemic control measures. Nevertheless, better “source control” of COVID-19 at various Alert Levels by requiring masks in ...
This is a repost from the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund blog, by CSLDF Executive Director Lauren Kurtz The COVID-19 pandemic illuminates the crucial role scientists at university, state, and local laboratories in the United States and abroad play in protecting public health and safety—and shows that global research must be done ...
Arguments by religious folk that they are being discriminated against under the Level 2 pandemic restrictions in NZ, which limit church services to ten people or less when schools, restaurants, malls and other service outlets are allowed to host many more people under voluntary self-distancing protocols, got me to think ...
Now that the initial wave has passed, and we are (hopefully) safe in our national bubble, the government is thinking about how to keep the economy ticking over, and how to salvage the bits (like tourism) that are now useless. And for that particular industry, she has mentioned a great ...
There’s been a lot of conjecture concerning the reasons behind the National Party’s fall to 30% in the latest Newshub-Reid Research poll. Some commentators have correctly ascertained that the current leader, Simon Bridges, has been consistently getting his tone wrong! Others believe that the shift in support is all about ...
Fletcher Tabuteau, Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Regional Economic Development Hon Eugenie Sage, Minister of Conservation The West Coast forests of Mount Te Kinga at Kotuku Whakaoho/Lake Brunner are the latest predator free project to receive Government funding, announced Minister of Conservation Eugenie Sage and Under Secretary for Regional Economic Development Fletcher ...
The Green Party says major freshwater reforms announced today provide the strongest ever protections of our waterways, to help ensure the next generation can swim in the rivers of Aotearoa. ...
The Green Party has begun the process for a Select Committee inquiry into student accommodation, which has been exposed during COVID-19 as an under-regulated sector that straddles students with unfair debt. ...
Rt Hon Winston Peters, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Foreign Affairs Hon Megan Woods, Minister of Research, Science and Innovation Hon Dr David Clark, Minister of Health Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters, Research, Science and Innovation Minister Megan Woods, and Health Minister David Clark today announced a COVID-19 vaccine strategy, ...
Budget 2020 is about rebuilding together, supporting jobs, getting business moving and the books back into the black. It’s an integral part of our COVID-19 economic response, and our plan to grow our economy and get New Zealand moving again.Here’s a quick look at the five top things you ...
The Coalition Government has approved $206 million in essential upgrades at Ōhakea Air Base. Defence Minister Ron Mark said the money would be spent on improving old infrastructure. He said safety issues would be addressed, as well as upgrades to taxiways, accommodation and fresh, storm and waste water systems. "This ...
Rt Hon Winston Peters, Leader of New Zealand First “I am not persisting with this case just for myself, but for all people who have had their privacy breached. Privacy of information is a cornerstone of our country’s democracy. Without it our society truly faces a bleak future. We now ...
Forestry Minister Shane Jones has introduced a Bill to Parliament that he says will "force more transparency, integrity and respect" for the domestic wood-processing sector through the registration of log traders and practice standards. The Forests (Regulation of Log Traders and Forestry Advisers) Amendment Bill had its first reading in ...
Green MP Golriz Ghahraman is joining over 300 lawmakers from around the world in calling on the big banks and the IMF to forgive the debt of developing countries, in the wake of the COVID crisis. ...
Forestry Minister Shane Jones says concerns that carbon foresters are planting pine trees that will never be harvested are the result of "misinformation". "The billion tree strategy is an excellent idea, unfortunately from time to time it's tainted by misinformation spread by the National Party or their grandees, hiding in scattered ...
The Green Party welcomes funding in the budget to reunite more refugees with their families, ensuring they have the best chance at a new life in Aotearoa New Zealand. ...
This year’s Budget is about rebuilding New Zealand together in the face of COVID-19. Jobs are central to how we’re going to do that.There’s a lot of targeted investment for employment in this year’s Budget, with announcements on creating new jobs, training people for the jobs we have, and supporting ...
Speaking to Stuff's Coronavirus NZ podcast, Foreign Minister Winston Peters revealed China tried to dissuade New Zealand from going into lockdown.“Without speaking out of turn, they wanted a discussion as to why we were doing it, because they thought it was an overreaction,” Mr Peters told Stuff’s Coronavirus NZ podcast.He also ...
The Coalition Government is making changes to the Overseas Investment Act to ensure New Zealand assets don't fall into the hands of foreign ownership in the economic aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. Associate Minister of Finance David Parker announced the Act will be amended to bring forward a national interest ...
A quick start to a trans-Tasman bubble could see the tourism industry make a swift recovery, according to Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters. "I believe tourism will turn around dramatically faster than people think," Mr Peters told reporters after Thursday's Budget. "Why? Because I think the Tasman bubble is [going ...
Rt Hon Winston Peters, Leader of New Zealand First Please check against deliveryhttps://vimeo.com/418303651 Budget 2020: Jobs, Business and Balance Introduction Acknowledgements to all Cabinet colleagues, and party ministers Tracey Martin, Shane Jones and Ron Mark, Under-Secretary Fletcher Tabuteau and to caucus colleagues. Thank you for your support, your ...
The 2020 Budget includes significant support to stabilise New Zealand’s family violence services, whose work has been shown to be so essential throughout the COVID-19 lockdown. ...
The Green Party says huge new investment in public and transitional housing will get thousands more families into the warm, safe homes they deserve. ...
The Green Party says the $1.1 billion environmental investment in this year’s budget to create thousands of green jobs will help jump start a sustainable recovery from the COVID crisis. ...
Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters said today the Coalition Government told foreigners at the start of the Covid-19 crisis that if their circumstances had changed dramatically, they should go home. "And 50,000 did," Mr Peters said. Official advice to Cabinet revealed there is potentially 380,000 foreigners and migrant workers in ...
Rt Hon Winston Peters, Leader of New Zealand First New Zealand First welcomes the decision today to go to Alert Level 2 from midnight Wednesday, says Leader Rt Hon Winston Peters. Alert Level 2 will mean a return to work for the vast majority of New Zealand’s businesses. A return ...
Nurses now look set to get more protection from violence at work, under a proposed new law.This after NZ First MP Darroch Ball's "Protection for First Responders Bill", which introduces a six-month minimum sentence for assaults on first responders, will now also cover emergency department healthcare workers. The ...
Darroch Ball MP, New Zealand First Law and Order Spokesperson An amendment to the ‘Protection of First Responders Bill’ is being tabled which will see emergency department healthcare workers included in the legislation. “During this COVID-19 crisis we have seen reports of violence and specifically increased incidents of spitting towards ...
Infrastructure Minister Shane Jones is breathing new life into the proposal to move Auckland's port to Whangārei to help in the economic recovery post Covid-19 pandemic.If New ZealandFirst was returned in the September general election, Minister Jones said a priority would be development of an "economic haven" at Northport, ...
A jobseekers programme for the creative sector and four new funds have been set up by the Government to help our arts and music industry recover from the blow of COVID-19. Thousands of jobs will be supported through today’s $175 million package in a crucial economic boost to support the ...
Minister for Veterans Ron Mark has welcomed the First Reading of a Bill that will make legislative changes to further improve the veterans’ support system. The Veterans’ Support Amendment Bill No 2, which will amend the Veterans’ Support Act 2014, passed First Reading today. The bill addresses a number of ...
Views sought on Order in Council to help fast track the reinstatement of the Christ Church Cathedral The Associate Minister for Greater Christchurch Regeneration, Hon Poto Williams, will be seeking public written comment, following Cabinet approving the drafting of an Order in Council aimed at fast-tracking the reinstatement of the ...
The law setting out New Zealanders’ basic civil and human rights is today one step towards being strengthened following the first reading of a Bill that requires Parliament to take action if a court says a statute undermines those rights. At present, a senior court can issue a ‘declaration of ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters today reiterated the deep concern of the New Zealand Government following confirmation by China’s National People’s Congress of national security legislation relating to Hong Kong. “New Zealand shares the international community’s significant and long-standing stake in Hong Kong’s prosperity and stability,” Mr Peters said. “New Zealand ...
Thousands of artists and creatives at hundreds of cultural and heritage organisations have been given much-needed support to recover from the impact of COVID-19, Prime Minister and Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Jacinda Ardern announced today. “The cultural sector was amongst the worst hit by the global pandemic,” Jacinda ...
Key New Zealand assets will be better protected from being sold to overseas owners in a way contrary to the national interest, with the passage of the Overseas Investment (Urgent Measures) Bill. The Bill, which passed its third reading in Parliament today, also cuts unnecessary red tape to help attract ...
Setting higher health standards at swimming spots Requiring urban waterways to be cleaned up and new protections for urban streams Putting controls on higher-risk farm practices such as winter grazing and feed lots Setting stricter controls on nitrogen pollution and new bottom lines on other measures of waterway health Ensuring ...
The Government is on the verge of reaching its target of state sector boards and committees made up of at least 50 percent women, says Minister for Women Julie Anne Genter and Minister for Ethnic Communities Jenny Salesa. For the first time, the Government stocktake measures the number of Māori, ...
The Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister and Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media Minister, Kris Faafoi, has today announced the appointment of Tristan Gilbertson as the new Telecommunications Commissioner and member of the Commerce Commission. “Mr Gilbertson has considerable experience in the telecommunications industry and a strong reputation amongst his peers,” ...
The Ministry of Education and NZEI Te Riu Roa have agreed to settle the pay equity claim for teacher aides, Education Minister Chris Hipkins announced today. This will see more than 22,000 teacher aides, mostly women, being valued and paid fairly for the work they do. “Teacher aides are frontline ...
Subcontractors will have greater certainty, more cashflow support and job security with new changes to retention payments under the Construction Contracts Act says Minister for Building and Construction, Jenny Salesa. A recent review of the retentions money regime showed that most of the building and construction sector is complying with ...
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong have marked the first anniversary of the New Zealand-Singapore Enhanced Partnership with a virtual Leaders’ Meeting today. The Enhanced Partnership, signed on 17 May 2019, provides the framework for cooperation across the four main areas of trade, defence and ...
On 17 May 2019, New Zealand and Singapore established an Enhanced Partnership to elevate our relations. The Enhanced Partnership – based on the four pillars of trade and economics, security and defence, science, technology and innovation, and people-to-people links – has seen the long-standing relationship between our countries strengthen over the ...
State-Owned Enterprises Minister Winston Peters has welcomed KiwiRail’s announcement that it is seeking a preferred shipyard to build two new rail-enabled ferries for the Cook Strait crossing. “This Government is committed to restoring rail to its rightful place in New Zealand. Bigger, better ships, with new technology are yet another ...
Better protection for seabirds is being put in place with a new National Plan of Action to reduce fishing-related captures, Fisheries Minister Stuart Nash and Conservation Minister Eugenie Sage announced today. The National Plan of Action for Seabirds 2020 outlines our commitment to reduce fishing-related captures and associated seabird ...
Almost $1 billion in interest-free loans for small businesses More than 55,000 businesses have applied; 95% approved Average loan approx. $17,300 90% of applications from firms with ten or fewer staff A wide cross-section of businesses have applied, the most common are the construction industry, accommodation providers, professional firms, and ...
Thousands of children will have healthier lungs after the Government’s ban on smoking in cars with kids becomes law, says Associate Minister of Health Jenny Salesa. This comes after the third reading of Smoke-free Environments (Prohibiting Smoking in Motor Vehicles Carrying Children) Amendment Bill earlier today. “This law makes it ...
The special Epidemic Response Committee (ERC) has successfully concluded its role, Leader of the House Chris Hipkins said today. The committee was set up on 25 March by the agreement of Parliament to scrutinise the Government and its actions while keeping people safe during levels 4 and 3 of lockdown. ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters today announced four diplomatic appointments: New Zealand’s Ambassador to Belgium, High Commissioners to Nauru and Niue, and Ambassador for Counter-Terrorism. “As the world seeks to manage and then recover from COVID-19, our diplomatic and trade networks are more important than ever,” Mr Peters said. “The ...
New Zealanders will be better protected from online harm through a Bill introduced to Parliament today, says Internal Affairs Minister Tracey Martin. “The internet brings many benefits to society but can also be used as a weapon to spread harmful and illegal content and that is what this legislation targets,” ...
New Zealand’s world-first plan to eradicate the cattle disease Mycoplasma bovis is on track the latest technical data shows, says Agriculture and Biosecurity Minister Damien O’Connor. “Two years ago the Government, DairyNZ and Beef + Lamb New Zealand and industry partners made a bold decision to go hard and commit ...
Further support for New Zealanders affected by 1-in-100 year global economic shock 12-week payment will support people searching for new work or retraining Work programme on employment insurance to support workers and businesses The Government today announced a new temporary payment to support New Zealanders who lose their jobs due ...
The Provincial Growth Fund will play a vital role in New Zealand’s post-COVID-19 recovery by creating jobs in shorter timeframes through at least $600 million being refocused on projects with more immediate economic benefits, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones has announced. The funding is comprised of repurposed Provincial Growth ...
Government exempts some home improvements from costly consents Homeowners, builders and DIYers will soon have an easier time making basic home improvements as the Government scraps the need for consents for low-risk building work such as sleep-outs, sheds and carports – allowing the construction sector to fire back up quicker ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters says the New Zealand Government has reacted with concern at the introduction of legislation in China’s National People’s Congress relating to national security in Hong Kong. “We have a strong interest in seeing confidence maintained in the ‘one country, two systems’ principle under which Hong ...
The Minister for Pacific Peoples Aupito William Sio, says the theme for the 2020 Samoa Language Week is a perfect fit for helping our Pacific communities cope with the unfolding COVID-19 crisis, and to prepare now for the journey ahead as New Zealand focuses on recovery plans and rebuilding New ...
A nearly 40-year programme to protect one of New Zealand’s most critically endangered birds is paying off, with a record number of adult kakī/black stilt recently recorded living in the wild, the Minister of Conservation Eugenie Sage announced today. “Thanks to the team effort involved in the Department of Conservation’s ...
The story of the Waikato-Tainui Treaty process and its enduring impact on the community is being told with a five-part web story launched today on the 25th anniversary of settlement, announced Associate Arts, Culture and Heritage Minister Carmel Sepuloni. “I am grateful to Waikato-Tainui for allowing us to help capture ...
Taita College in the Hutt Valley will be redeveloped to upgrade its ageing classrooms and leaky roofs, Education Minister Chris Hipkins announced today. “The work is long overdue and will make a lasting difference to the school for generations to come,” Chris Hipkins said. “Too many of our schools are ...
The Government is allocating $36.72 million to projects in regions hard hit economically by COVID-19 to keep people working, Economic Development Minister Phil Twyford and Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones announced today. Projects in Hawke’s Bay, Northland, Rotorua and Queenstown will be funded from the Government’s $100 million worker ...
A $35m boost to financial capability service providers funded by MSD will help New Zealanders manage their money better both day to day and through periods of financial difficulty, announced Social Development Minister Carmel Sepuloni. “It’s always been our position to increase support to key groups experiencing or at risk ...
Dunedin barrister Melinda Broek has been appointed as a District Court Judge with Family Court jurisdiction to be based in Rotorua, Attorney-General David Parker announced today. Ms Broek has iwi affiliations to Ngai Tai. She commenced her employment in 1996 with Scholefield Cockroft Lloyd in Invercargill specialising in family and ...
The Coalition Government has approved a business case for $206 million in upgrades to critical infrastructure at Royal New Zealand Air Force Base Ohakea, with the first phase starting later this year, Defence Minister Ron Mark announced today. The investment will be made in three phases over five years, and ...
Transport Minister Phil Twyford today released the Ministry of Transport’s review of the organisational culture at the Civil Aviation Authority. Phil Twyford says all employees are entitled to a safe work environment. “I commissioned this independent review due to the concerns I had about the culture within the CAA, and ...
Ensuring that Stats NZ’s direction and strategy best supports government policy decisions will be a key focus for a new Governance Advisory Board announced today by the Minister for Statistics, James Shaw. The new Governance Advisory Board will provide strategic advice to Stats NZ to ensure it is meeting New ...
Environment Judge David Kirkpatrick of Auckland has been appointed as the Principal Environment Judge, Attorney-General David Parker announced today. Judge Kirkpatrick was appointed an Environment Judge in February 2014. From December 2013 to July 2016 he was Chair of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel. Prior to appointment he ...
A programme to connect marae around the country to the internet has received $1.4 million to expand to include urban marae in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch, Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media Minister Kris Faafoi and Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones announced today. The funding for the Marae Connectivity Programme ...
The Government will provide $500,000 to the Hawke’s Bay Mayoral Drought Relief Fund to help farmers facing one of the worst droughts in living memory, says Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor. “Yesterday afternoon I received a letter from Hawke's Bay's five local Government leaders asking me to contribute to the Fund. ...
Budget 2020 provides a major investment in New Zealand’s documentary heritage sector, with a commitment to leasing a new Archives Wellington facility and an increase in funding for Archives and National Library work. “Last year I released plans for a new Archives Wellington building – a purpose-built facility physically connected ...
In the spirit of international cooperation and mutual chair dancing, Sam Brooks and New York City-based culture critic Mark Blankenship are revisiting the top 10 singles from key weeks in their respective countries. This week, Sam and Mark discuss the top 10 singles from the chart dated May 28, 2000 ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew McLachlan, Head of School and Dean of Pharmacy, University of Sydney A paper published in The Lancet has cast fresh controversy on the use of the malaria drug hydroxychloroquine as a potential treatment for COVID-19. The study’s authors reported they were ...
A new poem by Wellington writer Joanna Cho.Dig deep! I have to write a poembut I’m finding it quite hardso I call Jos and he says‘Dig deep!’ He is driving back from basketballin Palmy, where he trains three times a week. I say ‘I just wanted to run some ideas by you’and he ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jayashri Kulkarni, Professor of Psychiatry, Monash University We’ve recently heard experts raise concerns about a looming mental health crisis, warning COVID-19’s psychological toll on Australians could be like a second wave of the pandemic. Suicide modelling from the University of Sydney’s Brain ...
The government will start publicly releasing wage subsidy audit and repayment data weekly after it was revealed it was only being collected every three months. ...
Creative Kiwis and cockies are among the beneficiaries of government decisions announced yesterday. The creative crowd was given support amounting to $95 million (or so), announced by Prime Minister and Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Jacinda Ardern, who said thousands of artists and creatives at hundreds of cultural and ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Auē by Becky Manawatu (Makaro Press, $35)Winner of the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction, the most ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Clarke, Associate Professor, National Security College, Australian National University There were certainly questions asked when Victoria first signed a memorandum of understanding to join China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in 2018, but it wasn’t until the past week that the ...
The brains trust at World Rugby have conjured up some optional law trials to obviate the risks of coronavirus. Scotty Stevenson is intrigued.The World Rugby Executive Committee yesterday announced that it had “approved 10 optional law trials which are designed to provide national member unions with Covid-19 transmission risk reduction ...
The Government’s lax approach to monitoring wrongful wage subsidy claims sends a dangerous message, says the New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union . Union spokesman Louis Houlbrooke says, “The Government must regularly release figures highlighting how ...
In announcing the Covid Income Relief Payment this week the Hon. Grant Robertson stated the Government is also considering an “enduring solution” to support New Zealanders experiencing job loss beyond the current crisis. The Career Development ...
Workers at Dunedin Railways have rejected Dunedin City Council claims there is not enough time for a feasibility study and commuter rail trial this year. Keep Dunedin Rail Rolling spokesperson Dave Kearns says workers at DRL were bitterly disappointed ...
We’ve published The Auditor-General’s strategic intentions to 2025 . Our strategic intentions describe the outcomes and impacts we are ultimately working towards, and the strategy we have developed to help get us there. Every three years, we publish ...
A new first-person photography game set in a dystopian Tauranga under lockdown is the best work of Māori science-fiction this decade, writes Dan Taipua.Umurangi Generation is a first-person photography game set din the shitty future. Designed and developed by Naphtali Faulkner (aka Veselekov) the game has you move about a ...
“Queen’s Birthday holiday is the most irrelevant public holiday on our calendar. It’s time for a holiday that actually reflects Aotearoa’s unique place in the world” said Lewis Holden, Campaign Chair of New Zealand Republic. New Zealand Republic ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bronwyn Fredericks, Pro Vice-Chancellor (Indigenous Engagement), The University of Queensland National Reconciliation Week is a time of reflection, talking and sharing of histories, cultures and achievements. It is a time to think about our relationships as Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. This year’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Thami Croeser, Research Officer, Centre for Urban Research, RMIT University As Australia re-opens, the bars, cafes and restaurants that give life to our streets face a tough ask: stay open and stay afloat with just a fraction of the customers. From June ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Richard Holden, Professor of Economics, UNSW Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison this week announced plans for a potential “grand bargain” on industrial relations. Speaking at the National Press Club, he framed the issue as one of boosting economic productivity: We must ...
A low toothfish catch hits Sanford's result, but it is less affected by Covid-19 as factories kept working in Level 4 and a high-margin strategy pays off ...
The milestone pay settlement for teacher aides is both good news for gender pay equity and for valuing the education of disabled children, says Disability Rights Commissioner Paula Tesoriero. “The pay rates have negatively impacted women disproportionately ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hannah Dahlen, Professor of Midwifery, Associate Dean Research and HDR, Midwifery Discipline Leader, Western Sydney University Group B streptococcal (GBS) is a common bacteria that likes to live in the human gut and migrate down the rectum, vagina and sometimes to the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Hitchcock, Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, University of Canberra Each year the ocean is inundated with 4.8 to 12.7 million tonnes of plastic washed in from land. A big proportion of this plastic is between 0.001 to 5 millimetres, and called “microplastic”. But ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Malcolm Burt, Amusement academic and disruptive media researcher, CQUniversity Australia In the not-so-distant past I commuted fairly hefty distances in a fairly garbage car. But you didn’t hear me complaining – I had an extensive library of podcasts (or “my stories” as ...
For all The Spinoff’s latest coverage of Covid-19 see here. Read Siouxsie Wiles’s work here. New Zealand is currently in alert level two – read The Spinoff’s giant explainer about what that means here. For official government advice, see here.The Spinoff’s coverage of the Covid-19 outbreak is funded by The Spinoff Members. To support this ...
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Mixed views on freshwater rules, pay equity settlement for teacher aides, and concerns raised about new internet filtering proposal.The final form of a major package of freshwater reforms was announced yesterday, and it was notable how little anger came from ...
Up-to-date data on breaches of the $10 billion wage subsidy scheme are not being provided, with Carmel Sepuloni's office saying it is "not something we're interested in". ...
This week's biggest-selling New Zealand books, as recorded by the Nielsen BookScan New Zealand bestseller list and described by Steve Braunias.FICTION 1 Auē by Becky Manawatu (Makaro Press, $35) Hard-out story of a tragic family, and winner of the best novel of the year at the 2020 Ockham New ...
A case over the treatment of pigs in New Zealand will be in court in less than two weeks. Pat Baskett takes a look at the potential impacts of the outcome. Phoebe was a pig I wrote about some years ago. Her life was a misery. She lived in a ...
Tāmati Kruger speaks to Rod Oram about Tūhoe's response to Covid-19 in the Te Urewera mountains, and how the iwi is looking to a much stronger NZ society that's aware of its obligations to be a far wiser caretaker of our natural resources. ...
Those working to stop family violence must keep consider both victims and the violent - but those at greatest risk of harm must be paramount, writes Julia TolmieIf we are to stop family violence, then offenders need to stop using violence. It follows that we need to engage more ...
How many languages do you think are spoken in New Zealand on a daily basis? Five, 10, 50? The answer is that more than 160 languages. That being the case, how do we make sure all our children are receiving the best possible education? Dr Corinne Seals from Te Herenga ...
After a pandemic-induced lockdown, a ministry pulls services from terror victims because of “minimal contact”. David Williams reports Imam Abdul Alabi Lateef opens the new, sturdy door at Christchurch’s Linwood Islamic Centre which, little more than a year ago, was the scene of a terrorist attack. The first thing he ...
The government is heralding its $700m Te Mana o te Wai package as a game-changer for the health of New Zealand waterways. But for freshwater scientist Russell Death, it’s a bitter disappointment.Two weeks into alert level two, it seems we have already forgotten all those resolutions about the pandemic being ...
The prime minister yesterday announced a package including $25m to ‘provide artists whose projects are funded by Creative NZ with jobs.’ An even more substantial investment in the creative arts will help drive our post-Covid recovery, argues Paul Millar.When Covid-19 forced the postponement of the popular international literary festival WORD ...
How can the country return to normal and still keep the good things about lockdown? That includes kinder politics, and working from home. New Zealand’s Covid-19 pandemic isn’t done and dusted quite yet. But considering daily new cases are now odds-on to be zero, what lessons have we learned from the past ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra It was Greg Combet, one-time ACTU secretary and former Labor minister, who got Christian Porter and Sally McManus together in the early days of the pandemic. Recalling what happened, Porter told the Australian Financial Review ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kristy Hess, Associate Professor (Communication), Deakin University With swift and savage force, the COVID-19 pandemic has inadvertently attacked Australia’s local news media ecology, which was already battling a weakened immune system. As a researcher working on Australia’s largest academic study into the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael (Mike) Joy, Senior Researcher; Institute for Governance and Policy Studies, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington New Zealand’s government has been praised for listening to health experts in its pandemic response, but when it comes to dealing with pollution ...
Rod Oram spoke to the leaders of 16 Kiwi businesses over seven weeks, during which they and their businesses rose to meet unprecedented demands. Here's what he learned. ...
Tenants in the commercial property market continue to wait for Covid-19 relief while government coalition partners Labour and New Zealand First hammer out a deal. ...
They call themselves the Genesis II Church of Health and Healing, but they’re not a church, and the treatment they sell is called Miracle Mineral Supplement – but it’s chlorine dioxide, commonly known as bleach. Susan Strongman reports for RNZ.A New Zealand website is advising people with symptoms of coronavirus ...
Analysis by Keith Rankin. Keith Rankin. On Project Syndicate – and in other places in recent months – orthodox US economist Kenneth Rogoff has presented the case for deeply negative interest rates. Another financial sacred cow falls; yes, interest rates can be negative, even substantially negative. It can take ...
The Government is cracking down on nitrogen fertiliser use and asking councils to speed up their planning processes in order to clean up the country's waterways, Marc Daalder reports One in five farmers will have to reduce the amount of nitrogen fertiliser they are using under a new rule announced ...
Business is Boring is a weekly podcast series presented by The Spinoff in association with Callaghan Innovation. Host Simon Pound speaks with innovators and commentators focused on the future of New Zealand. This week he talks to New Zealand investor and business advisor David Bell. As a university professor ...
The calls for public health specialists for more taxpayer funding could be taken more seriously if they stopped wasting money on pointless public relations campaigns under the guise of public health, says the New Zealand Taxpayers' Union . Union Executive ...
The New Zealand College of Midwives is calling on the Government to release details of the funding allocated to maternity services in this year’s budget, and is supporting their GP colleagues in asking the Minister of Health to immediately release Heather ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Esterman, Professor of Biostatistics, University of South Australia Australia’s chief medical officer Brendan Murphy told a senate inquiry earlier this week our COVID-19 public health response had avoided about 14,000 deaths. This is in contrast to his deputy Paul Kelly, who ...
By Sri Krishnamurthi, contributing editor Pacific Media Watch Homegrown Australian television shows to the tune of $17.1 million will be broadcast in the Pacific in a bid believed intended to stymie China’s diplomatic and media rise in the region. Shows such as The Voice, Border Security, Neighbours and are to ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nik Thompson, Senior Lecturer, Curtin University Data is the new oil, and online platforms will siphon it off at any opportunity. Platforms increasingly demand our personal information in exchange for a service. Avoiding online services altogether can limit your participation in society, ...
By RNZ News New Zealand has reported no new cases of covid-19 coronavirus today, but the death toll has risen to 22 to include a woman who died after recovering from the disease. Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield said there were only eight active cases in the country and ...
Fisheries New Zealand is seeking public feedback on a draft Pāua Fisheries Plan and a proposed subdivision of the pāua fishery along the Kaikōura and Canterbury coasts, known as the PAU3 quota management area. “Splitting the quota management ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jarrod Haar, Professor of Human Resource Management, Auckland University of Technology When New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said recently, “I’ve heard lots of people suggesting we should have a four-day week”, she inevitably ignited debate. Ardern was not, as some critics ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lisa Bricknell, Senior Lecturer in Environmental Health, CQUniversity Australia Now we have fewer cases of COVID-19, and restrictions are lifting, many of us are thinking of rejuvenating our social lives by heading to our local cafe or favourite restaurant. What can we ...
Former Race Relations Commissioner, Gregory Fortuin says he agrees with Judith Collins that no one should be superficially judge on skin colour and ethnicity . Fortuin was responding to Collins’ reported outburst about "sick of being demonised" ...
The government says it allowed the Avatar film crew back into New Zealand in spite of the current border closures because the making of the film offers “significant economic value” to our country. But this criterion is being applied unevenly. What ...
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Soper’s daily whinge and smear against the government.
He really is a nasty piece of work.
This time he has a go at Golriz Ghahraman.
What a slimeball.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11948555
And there there is Trevett’s petty attack.
‘Ardern flourishes in ‘swamp of secrecy’
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11948523
The Herald really does not like this government.
And it has miserable puppets who would sell their soul for a pay cheque.
I wonder if Soper can see the irony in his closing line;
“It’s just that one side has been consistently and conveniently highlighted over the other.”
Didn’t take long to get from Kiwiblog and Whaleoil to the Herald did it.
Brilliant observation.
Remember how John Key’s new government in 2008, came in on a raft of two track dirty politics and soft media infotainment spin? And then they were like the deer in the headlines, without much of a plan, so…..
2009 John Key’s much touted Job Summit, threw up “3 Big Ideas”. Audrey Young raved in the NZ Herald:
The Thiel deal,worked out rather well.For Thiel of course,although Joyce said it was Labour’s fault.
Spinning like a spinning thing:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11948524
But she admits that her profile page on the Green Party website, which states that she has put African leaders on trial for abusing their power, “could be clearer”.
Theres a slight difference between prosecuting war criminals and defending war criminals
[lprent: You are simply lying at several levels. But I think this is easier to demonstrate rather than explain at any level..
1. There is no significiant difference between defending and prosecuting. Both are part of a court process that leads to judgement.
2. Her bio actually said – read it carefully
3. Putting people on trial is not a prosecution prerogative. It applies to both defense and and prosecution.
4. I think you are trolling and as a local prosecutor and judge, we clearly don’t need a defense. Therefore there should be no trial to look at the actual circumstances.
5. Banned for 1 month for crimes against robust debate..
6. This is not arbitrary in anyway. It is a simple matter of arbitrary lynch mob justice without due process.
]
And since Golriz Ghahraman has experience of both, she knows an infinite amount more about the difference than you do, but then so does the stenographer.
I bet she also knows that saying you prosecuted war criminals sounds a lot better than saying you defended them
there’s a slight difference between ‘defending war criminals’ and working as an intern on a defence team for the war criminals
That line of attack is an attack on the entire justice system. Shall we start listing which National Party MPs have worked as defence lawyers?
Everyone who works in a courtroom enables the prosecution of alleged offenders.
Didn’t take long to get from Kiwiblog and Whaleoil to the Herald did it.
It never does. The Herald should cut out the middle-man – ditch Soper and put DPF on a retainer for its right-wing propaganda stories.
Yup, from sewer to MSM as the National party smear machine cranks up and all the MSM journos gather around the outflow pipe mouths agape. After all, Farrar negates the need to think, or to resrach, and he helpfully even writes your questions for you.
Soper in particular seems to have decided to wage a misogynistic war on anyone who dares to commit the crime of being young, female and more powerful than him. Linda Clark got it 100% right when she pretty much name checked him and his attitude and told he needed to wake up or ship out.
It’s obvious what the Nats and their MSM enablers are trying to do. The accusations are going to come thick and fast through to the end of this parliamentary session (ie. just before Xmas) leaving a trail of perplexed voters to gather around the barbecues wondering whether they made the right choice voting for Labour/Green or NZ First – whichever. It doesn’t matter the claims are nothing more than garbled rubbish. Its the first part of a slow, subliminal manipulation of their minds.
I noted the sharp edge of cold fury in Barry Soper’s voice at the first stand-up media interviews which followed Winston Peters’ announcement. I knew then he was going to take a vicious approach and he has clearly influenced the little wife, Heather DPA.
+111
Good analysis Anne. Anyone who thought winning the election was winning the war needs to think again. These sort of attacks will be relentless.
Ghahraman is a genocide enabler
A.
[RL: This smells like a particularly silly attempt at trolling. End it here. No further warning.]
How exactly do you come up with that piece of nonsense, Antoine?
She defended one of the most heinous acts of the 20th century.
A.
Repeat of my comment to marty mars below in case you miss it.
Have you read Andrew Geddis’ piece on Pundit?
https://www.pundit.co.nz/content/did-golriz-ghahraman-do-anything-wrong
That’s kinda the thing about human rights; even the worst of the bad guys have some. It’s part of the complexity of being a human rights lawyer that sometimes you’re defending them.
“She defended one of the most heinous acts of the 20th century.”
That’s a silly claim to make. They defended the person accused, not the act.
Antoine is a dog felcher.
Do I have this game right? It looks like fun but I’m not clear on how to play.
@RL
Ban me if you want, I believe what she did was wrong.
[RL: I don’t care what you believe here, I do care that you dropped a controversial comment with no supporting argument or citation. That ‘smells’ very much like typical hit and run troll behaviour. I moderate on behaviour not content; make your case honestly and I’m unlikely to intervene.]
A.
Bot Antoine, I see you added can’t read to the list of your idiocy.
If you need help with a word, feel free to ask.
https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Trolling
You realise that without defence lawyers we can’t put people on trial at all? If you want genocide and other human rights abuses to be prosecuted, you have to have court staff.
Take your notion to its logical conclusion and you’re effectively saying that the International Court of Justice enables war crimes, and that our court system enables murder.
Is that what you’re saying?
No!
There is a role for defense lawyers in the legal system and we need a legal system. That doesnt mean I have to like or endorse those who choose to defend heinous crim inals.
A.
No. That isn’t what you said. Your endearments and endorsements have no value, so with-holding them is of no consequence. However, you made a very specific allegation against people who work on legal defence teams – that their job enables crime.
Are you now backing down from that into a vague sense of disapproval? If so, how about you take some personal responsibility for your disgusting false accusation?
Grow a spine.
To work to get a guilty criminal acquitted, enables more crime of the same sort. I don’t resile from that
A.
First the verdict, then the trial. Joseph Nzirorera would be proud of you.
That’s not actually the role of a defense lawyer, any more than the role of a prosecutor is “to get an innocent person convicted”.
Often the morally bankrupt or hard of thinking reduce the functions to simply “get a guilty criminal acquitted” or “innocent person convicted”, but the role of the court is to try to determine the truth. The prosecution present their case, the defense present the case as it appeared to the defendant, and the court decides. Neither party in an adversarial system is allowed to mislead the court, AFAIK. Correct me if I’m wrong.
And it’s ok to work for a company that sells a product that kills people and has killed more than the all of Rwanda?
No! That is bad too
Chris Bishop
I never liked Bishop
Why is it unreasonable to point out that Golriz Ghahraman acted for the defence in the genocide trials. When you read her bio on the Green website it gave the impression she was prosecuting genocide, not just in Cambodia but also in Rawanda.
Now I have no problem with her acting for the defence, but she should not have given the wrong impression.
It is not unfair for a journalist to point that out. It is not the act of a slimeball to do so, nether is it sexist.
This site is always saying how terrible National MP’s on the basis they are all psychopaths and liars. But you can’t stand even the slightest adverse comment about those from the left.
What about accusing her of enabling genocide? Which is what “the left” is actually defending her against.
Can you help me understand right wing thinks on this issue please? When you collaborated with Nicky Hager, were you enabling war crimes or Al Quaeda?
What about the Law Commission? You definitely must’ve enabled some pretty serious crimes there, and I don’t just mean the things the National Party wanted 😉
Yes, if we use that ruler to measure Golriz every lawyer that ever defends a criminal is somehow implicated in the crime.
It’s crucial that the crime and the analytical dissection of it after the event are mutually exclusive.
If Golriz’s bio implies she rode around the world on a big white stallion solving the war crime woes of the world, if we all agree everyone is entitled to a quality defence, she did. I lie in mine, I was useless at Rugby.
OAB,
My comment was in response to Ed’s initial comment, but there have been so many other comments added, it is distanced from that – probably also the result of using an iPhone.
David Farrar on Kiwiblog put the issue in quire a reasonable way, but some of the commenters on his site, not so much. But then some commenters on any of the main political sites use extravagant language accusing people of all sorts of things, and acting from the basest of reasons. The Standard is certainly not immune from that.
DPF put it in as appalling a way as Phil Quin did – as a propaganda call to all those on the right who’d like to skip the human rights stuff and get on with the punishments.
Some one on radio recently was saying how much was paid by observers to watch when they had really brutal punishments. I don’t think that human nature has left those of today unconcerned about the niceties of justice and rule of law, more enlightened than in the past.
There are some amazing things in this piece:
If a crowd was denied the spectacle of an execution on the allotted day, occasionally there was some gruesome compensation. In England in 1221, Thomas of Eldersfield was reprieved from hanging at the last moment; in a show of mercy, he was blinded and castrated instead. Robert Bartlett describes the scene: ‘the eyes were thrown to the ground, the testicles used as footballs, the local lads kicking them playfully at the girls’.
http://www.historytoday.com/sean-mcglynn/violence-and-law-medieval-england
Here is some homework for you in case you hadn’t caught up with these. Good primary school info.
http://primaryhomeworkhelp.co.uk/tudors/other.htm
David Farrar on Kiwiblog put the issue in quire a reasonable way
Farrar? You say “reasonable” because it suits you. “Tendentious” and “disingenuous” are words that come to my mind. You know perfectly well that the Penguin never lets his hands get dirty in public and encourages his troll farm to do the dirty work for him.
but some of the commenters on his site, not so much
What a pity that because we lack your smarmy manners we’ll never be admitted to your gentleman’s club of “reasonable” men. Oh dear.
Come on wayne, we have all looked at the whale oil – we are far from that gutter.
Have you ever put a comment there about the sexist, homophobic, and racist garbled crap that comes out of those sad excuses for human beings mouths?
Wayne has never experienced racism or sexism directed against him personally and therefore it does not exist or at least is not significant.
If you can’t see why it’s unreasonable, you need help.
Ah, I see. He’s the type of person who thinks that people once accused of a crime shouldn’t have any defence and would probably do away with the trial altogether. And, once the trial is over and they’re found guilty, say that the lawyers who made up the defence team are just as bad as the ones found guilty.
Yeah, got it.
Ed (1) … proof Natz (through Joyce) still pulling the strings of msm, with NZH dredging up whatever is possible to smear the coalition government, regardless of how truthful or inconsequential it is!
Golriz was doing her job, as most lawyers are expected to do. Look at Key’s former job as a currency trader. Bet some of the activity there wasn’t above board! Was that ever challenged by msm? No!
Natz will give itself a breakdown at this rate!
Congratulations to Prince Harry and Megan Markle for there engagement there wedding is good for OUR worlds society.
I only advocate Vapours as a tool to give up smoking as I’m using Vapours to give up. The only thing we should be breathing into our lungs is clean air we need to set a age limit R 18 and a display/advertising restrictions to limit the appeal and take up of vaping by our youth. PS your a bit out numbered Hillary you need a lady friend on the breakfast show Ka Pai
Monarchy, we don’t need no stinking monarchy.
But The Treaty adam is between Maori and the Monarchy – not the NZ Govt. This is an issue that if NZ were to progress towards complete independence from England would need to be resolved.
Paraphrasing from ‘Blazing Saddles?’ lol
I agree with your comment Adam, but I also have to say, it’s awesome when two people fall in love and get married for the right reasons, his mum would have be thrilled.
Give me monarchy not Trump or Key or Shipley. Let’s have the real thing not the nouveau riche.
You want a genuine old English German lady who thinks her shit don’t stink? WTF for?
She speaks more nicely than you. I like a bit of style in my leaders.
But she is no leader of ours. She has done absolutely nothing as our Head of State. She was very polite in how she told Maori to piss off when ask to have some honour and look at the treaty her institution signed.
Oh, and i don’t want to be your leader.
Ah but will she then be deported like all the other foreigners married to Brits.
So your show is more gender equality Ka pai
I now see that the national opposition is attempting to stall the new government’s plan to stop labour/NZF/Greens coalition “17 goals” and run then out of time, by jaming Labour with over 6200 “spam” questions.
So Jacinda needs to show Government “leadership” and need to rush through an urgency bill to reverse the national party changes they (national) placed to allow this attempt to close down the new government, and restore the former system preventing this “tea party style” abuse of our parliamentary system..
http://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2017/11/how-the-government-s-tracking-on-its-100-day-plan.html
“The Government is going all out to tick off all 17 goals on its 100-day plan.
A hundred days. Just over three months. It sounds like plenty of time until you blink and realise a month has passed since the Government was sworn in. They have until February 3.”
I think you are right cleangreen. It is time Ardern showed some steel and dealt with these National ratbags. There is nothing nice about the Natz, they are at war and need to be exposed for their spiteful anti democratic behaviour. New Zealanders deserve better.
Yes garabaldi;
Labour coalition only have – 6th 7th 8th, – 12th, 13th, 14th December; – and the xmas party celebrations need to be be put in there somewhere we assume too.
hey have their budget to release and befre 3rd February need to make good on the ’17 goals’ as the ‘100 day pledge’ to NZ.
Labour have just six more days in parliament these emails this year, so we are screwed unless Jacinda can change the legislation today.
Or else Labour are left bound up with these 6200 ‘spam’ emails now and labour now has no choice but to pass a ’emergency bill’ to stop “email spaming” forthwith.
it is preventing government to function under legislation national passed. Remove all National legislation labour must in all areas also.
I knew national would leave ‘hand grenades’ to stymie this new government so they need to remove all national toxic legislation now.
That sitting calendar for 2017 is the one originally in place prior to the election and is now out of date.
Following the swearing in of the new government a revised sitting programme for the remainder of 2017 was drawn up in conjunction with the proposed sitting calendar for 2018.
https://www.parliament.nz/en/get-involved/features/sitting-calendar-proposed-for-2018/
So Parliament will sit for the next four weeks from today, Tues 28 Nov through until 6pm Thurs, 21 December – not just the two weeks originally planned (6th 7th 8th, – 12th, 13th, 14th December).
Is is highly likely that Parliament will also go into urgency in order to get the PPL legislative amendments through and possibly other legislative business prior to the Christmas/New Year close down – including possibly reversing some Nats legislation.
Thanks for giving us the updated sitting schedules veutoviper,
I went on the usual site but being that the new government had “a minefield” of changes that were needed to be made with the whole moviing of the old tired national mob out into the ‘lower government’ buildings and the new labour coalition Government newly placed on the ninth floor of the ‘Beehive building’.
We know only to well how difficult that two weeks it took to get the new Government communications up and running.
I understood all this as I was employed by the ‘fourth largest communication company globally’ (Bell) and used to place new systems in Government buildings also.
As our many NGO emails went un-anwered for weeks until we got hold of a Government secretary and were told that a “new communication system was in the process of being installed” and they had problems, so I guess this is catch up time for all.
No problems, cleangreen.
The Parliament website has actually been very quickly updated this round after the election. The new MPs were listed etc within a day of the election etc. and other needed amendments up very quickly.
However, I did find it took a few minutes to relocate the link on the Parliament website to the revised sitting schedule for 2017. I knew that it had been changed but it was not immediately visible because it was included in the article re the proposed 2018 sitting programme.
Having worked in government for many years in Wellington (including very closely working with and in the Parliament precinct), I am pretty sure the actual Parliament website (and related staff etc) would have been unaffected by the physical moves, changes to communications etc related to the change of government, relocation of MPs and parties. Fun days, but actually very much highly planned and managed chaos!
veutoviper thanks for that.
All good now we need to ‘stand in line with national waiting for the reples from the 42 emails we have sent the new government’.
Now our NGO representing many communities wonder if the national email nonsene has now prevented the Labour coalition government from responding to other questions for the community also now?
So that puts the public interest now behind national party’s own interests, and that means national wont care about their own impact upon our communities interests?
Maybe national should have thought clearly how their ‘obstruction’ process over 6200 emails of questions was going to impact on all NZ communities.
Maybe the government could answer the questions properly: https://publicaddress.net/legalbeagle/questions-but-no-answers-with-thanks-to-david/
An interesting take by the ever-pedantic Graeme Edgeler, but i also suggest people read the comments which put things into a bit more perspective in terms of National’s actions while in government. In particular, it is worth reading Katherine Moody’s comment here
https://publicaddress.net/system/cafe/legal-beagle-questions-but-no-answers-with/?p=377313#post377313
This includes a number of replies by Key and his ministers to very similar diary related questions while in government. The wording of these replies is not only similar to one another of these Nat Ministers, but also to that now being used by the new Labour/NZF/Green government Ministers.
Examples:
Hon Bill English (Minister of Finance) replied: As Minister of Finance I have a large number of meetings in Wellington and around New Zealand. I do not believe it is a good use of staff time to itemise my meetings or engagements, nor attempt to list the names of every person I met over the course of a month. If the member is interested in a specific issue or organisations then I might be able to provide more detailed information.
Hon Steven Joyce (Minister for Economic Development) replied: I hold a large number of meetings both formally and informally each month with a wide range of people and discuss a wide range of topics. I do not consider it reasonable use of official’s time to provide the Member with a comprehensive list of all such meetings, nor is it feasible as the information requested is often not specifically captured by my records. If the Member could be more specific about a particular area of interest I would be happy to consider his request.
English just on on Morning Report claiming National had raised the bar for transparency in government over the past 9 years and that Labour needed to up their game as they were stuck in time a decade ago. LOL. This from the party that totally subverted the OIA request process over the past 9 years.
Hypocrite.
He was also asked if Smith was right in claiming National won the election. He wouldn’t say yes or no but his reply was something like “well we got the most votes
and that’s really unusual”.
Yes Grey it was rough waking up to English in full Billshit mode.
National admitted at one stage during the last 9 years that it did its best to stymie OIA requests and it is legendary how under-resourced the Ombudsman became under the Nats with massive delays.
Ian Lees-Galloway was excellent on Morning Report this morning talking about Paid Parental Leave and how Labour has cooperated with the Nats on this despite Amy Adams negativity-worth a listen.
Here is a link to the excellent Ian L-G interview (via the related RNZ news article with a lovely picture of Ian holding Willow Jean Prime’s baby as an added bonus).
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/2018623290/adams-parental-leave-bill-unnecessary-galloway
And for anyone wanting to hear/see the Bill English Morning Report interview, here are the links.
(The first one is a lead-in to the actual interview with English. The actual interview was pretty soft with no real challenges from Espiner and the interview ended on a weak excuse by Espiner that the reception was not good as English was on his cellphone).
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/2018623288/govt-backsliding-on-transparency-pledge-bill-english
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/2018623286/national-slams-govt-as-secretive-disorganised
100% veutoviper,
Talking about hypocracy we met S Joyce twice in three years and the fisrt meeting he was ‘slightly prepared to assist our comittee about saving our Gisborne/Napier rail.
But in the second meeting he was aggressively ‘aloof’ as he proudly publiclly announced that ‘his study’ he produced (since debunked by BERL) was proof the rail must close.
Joyce said the rail is ‘not worth re-openning’.
Later it was our Labour MP Phil Twyford as acting transport spokesperson that placed his ‘expose’ on the web how S Joyce as Minister of Transport allowed kiwirail to remove the $200 Million from kiwirails maintainence fund and at the select committee he was at kiwirail admitted is was that which closed the napier gisborne rail.
So S Joyce is both a true liar and a possible criminal for intentionally causing the destruction of part of the publically owned rail services and harmed the SOE.
Hypocracy pure and simple.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1302/S00183/kiwirail-admits-lack-of-maintenance-led-to-wash-out.htm
Grey Area (4) … you quote the following …
“English just on on Morning Report claiming National had raised the bar for transparency in government over the past 9 years ….”
Aha, now I see. English preparing for his new position, when the knives come out … as a comedian.
Okay, so I’m more than a tad uncomfortable with Ardern’s reluctance to release the 33/38 page coalition discussion document….
But, but, Bill ‘the Lizard’ English’s sanctimonious prattle is genuine high end, puke making hypocrisy…. http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/political/344807/new-govt-has-no-follow-through-national
“By any international standard the last government was open and transparent, and this government, as with many other things, has expressed these high-minded intentions and then fails to follow through.”
Mr English said the previous National-led government lifted the bar a long way on transparency.
“We stressed the early release of cabinet papers, the full release of budget documents, including draft reports which had not really been done before.
“The extensive release of data because that’s such an important part of being able to monitor what a government is doing and how it is doing it.”
This …. http://www.treasury.govt.nz/publications/informationreleases/ris/pdfs/ris-moh-fcc-may13.pdf Bill, is not ‘raising the bar’.
PS….thinking that a ‘leftish’ government would be uncomfortable with such a heavily redacted justification for legislation that removed the rights of New Zealanders I did email the Head Office and requested that the blanked out bits of this document be revealed.
Heard nothing yet. I guess they’re busy trying to spin not releasing documents their coalition partner said would be released.
SSDD.
Well thats the thing isn’t it, you can say things in opposition that you can’t say or do when in power
its easy to talk transperancy when you’re the opposition but a different story when you’re in power as Jacinda “transparent” Ardern is now discovering
Puckish Rougue; –
So the last Government (National) recieved 105 emails from our NGO over five years as I am secretary of it, and only two of the 63 National ministers only answered (on one small section of only of a small”side issue”.)
Question
1/ Is this because we are not officially a government agency but an NGO Puckish Rougue?
And more to the point (PR) question two; –
2/ Are we to expect the same from this new Labour lead government too (PR) Puckish Rouge; – or are you just another “PR” for the last corrupt government ?
I’d have thought that if you campaign on openness and transparency then you should be open and transparent when in power
And donkey did the same, and I did not see you complaining when he was not transparent.
Just pointing out your hypocrisy Puckish Rogue, just your hypocrisy.
Predictable reply from an ‘obstructionist’ so do us all a favour & get over loosing Puckish Rougue eh!
You failed to answer question 1+2 I asked you; –
Yet is it because you are you afraid too?
If so then you are guilty of what you claim Labour coalition are guilty of , now that we clearly see you are doing now?
So dont blame Labour for not answering your fabricated 6200 spam emails (PR).
You are totally wrong if you think labour will be stymied by your oppostion party’s little plan as the labour coalition wont be stopped.
Sitting on a 2016 report into the benefits of rail because it doesn’t fit with dinosaur National Party “thinking”, that’s being transparent.
1000% Grey area.
Rail is the enemy to a former national Government with a man running it (s joyce) who is rightly called “the tarseal king” who we believe he has interests in trucking we have been informed.
+ infinity Grey Area
The show must go on I don’t see these people logic in following me around everywhere I go Im sure there are other people that deserve there attention. My neo liberal neighbour must have run out of fireworks you see there are a lot of these people in this little suburb they use fireworks to try and intimidat me. My dates were wrong it’s been 13 years of harassment from the Gisborne man and about 3 1/2 years that he landed his glider on the farm. The Rock one time I got challened to drink a jar of rum can’t remember what happened but a m8 told me I was getting a long with the best crayfishmans daughter lol the next time this guy 2 weeks before try to fight me I put him in his place he made out he was over it and his m8 challenged me to drink a jar of rum woke up the next morning broke ribbs squash nose this guy waited till I fell asleep and attacked me that was a good lesson I don’t get pissed and always have a gard up. Kia kaha
So he beat you up because he thought you hassled his daughter when you were pissed?
In Singapore, when the economy starts doing really well again, the public servants get a one month bonus:
http://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/civil-servants-to-get-one-months-year-end-bonus-as-economy-does-better
All 84,000 civil servants will receive a year-end Annual Variable Component (AVC) of one month’s pay – higher than the 0.5 month they received in 2016, according to their Public Service Division.
That would motivate those lovelies in MBIE and Treasury and DPMC to pull their finger out and make some serious moves.
I am all for the Singapore model; top tax rate of 22%, no CGT, corporate tax rate of 17% etc
https://www.guidemesingapore.com/business-guides/taxation-and-accounting/personal-tax/singapore-personal-income-tax-guide
Oh I also forgot, The People’s Action Party is Centre Right.
Someone called ThatcherForEver is all for a police state? Quelle surprise…
Along with someone called “Ad”, such a strange world we live in..
The policy is possible without a police state of any kind.
Better to have a motivated public service, just like the private sector.
Bonuses or at-risk components for number of children taken out of poverty. Start there.
Singapore voted for it
What’s your point , Milt?
My point is that right-wing authoritarians are usually keen on police states. Unfortunately, left-wing authoritarians often have the same problem.
Yeah, and then they take you to the cleaners through indirect taxation.
As mentioned, Singaporeans have been told that we pay low income taxes, but when you compare income taxes with indirect taxes, you would see that Singaporeans pay 3.5 times as much into indirect taxes than direct taxes, whereas Swedes and Finns pay about the same indirect taxes as direct taxes, and the Danes pay only about a lesser 70% of direct taxes into indirect taxes
https://thehearttruths.com/category/how-much-tax-are-singaporeans-really-paying/
Bonus payments are a dubious incentive. Empowering people to do their jobs and do them well works out better in the long term.
100% Molly right with you there.
Probably this will blow up – I was a bit surprised that she was on the defense team.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11948524
Have you read Andrew Geddis’ piece on Pundit?
https://www.pundit.co.nz/content/did-golriz-ghahraman-do-anything-wrong
That’s kinda the thing about human rights; even the worst of the bad guys have some. It’s part of the complexity of being a human rights lawyer that sometimes you’re defending them.
Thanks. I get human rights are universal and our system provides support for all sides and I struggle with it. I struggle that mass murderers get more rights than the many they murdered. I struggle that a sicko can do sicko things throughout their life and at the 11th hour have a big realisation and seek forgiveness. I struggle with these moral dilemmas.
Working the defence is something I couldn’t do. My personal revulsion at someone’s deeds would really interfere with fulfilling my obligations to that person’s defence.
Personally I’m of the opinion that someone that deliberately interferes with someone else’s human rights should forfeit their own. However, even in that mindset, there’s still the issue of determining what culpable deeds have actually been done. But as a general view, it’s at odds with the whole philosophical structure around justice that we’ve built up over time. And I’m really not interested in trying to think through the wrinkles of trying to replace that structure, especially since there’s no chance significant change will happen. At best there will be tinkering around the edges.
Yep I’m a bit like you on all that. I tend to imagine neutral is a fallacy in a lawyer anyway but compartmentalism isn’t.
Without wanting to selectively misquote you:
Personally I’m of the opinion that someone that deliberately interferes with someone else’s human rights should forfeit their own.
as I think you clearly understand, the whole point of a trial is to determine culpability as an outcome, not as an apriori assumption. Or to put it in the more familiar parlance “innocent until proven guilty”.
That’s not just a human right, it’s a very real protection we afford defendants due to the enormous disparity of resources between the state and the individual. From this came another famous legal dictum ‘that it’s better ten guilty people go free than one innocent person be convicted”. In other words it is a concious feature of our legal system to weight the odds in favour of the defendants. Even culpable ones.
Part of the problem here is the internet has let us all indulge our fantasies of playing at judge, jury and executioner to the extent that these old and important ideas have become diminished, sometimes dismissed altogether.
They are just ideas not truths or absolutes, they are human conceived and made and thus are fallable and subjective.
For instance, innocent until proven guilty etc is mocked by police and judicial discrimination based on skin colour!!!
Those are all points that need to be repeatedly hammered, particularly with the likes of Quin that don’t get it.
But I think your point below at 8.2 expresses a key idea most concisely: if the accused doesn’t have a capable defense team, then the whole process lacks legitimacy. In that context, the defense is just as important as the prosecution for delivering justice. For the victims as well as broader society.
There is also the idea, that the defense is as robust and lawful as possible, reducing the chance of a mistrial or a later successful appeal.
The justice system needs to be robust and competent and lawyers with integrity on both sides will improve it.
Her final quote nails it:
The whole point is that in order for a trial to have any legitimacy it’s essential for the defendants to have access to a legal defense. Someone has to do this. Quin’s failure to understand is not just embarrassing, it’s kind of chilling.
Very odd. His point seems to be that defence lawyers somehow endorse their client’s alleged crimes and that to be a defence lawyer you mustn’t have strong morals.
Quin seems a vindictive type and I suspect he’s jealous of other’s achievements.
He seems unhappy with the website info where it played up certain aspects.
I read the opposite. That he didn’t have much problem with the green website (I did read that somewhere but can’t find it), but that she chose to work on the defence team saying, “of all the ways to save the world, she chose to send killers back to the villages where their victims’ families are trying to rebuild their lives.”
He must find all defence work reprehensible.
He’s a dickhead bigtime
Most likely Quin has just picked up the ‘doofus of the week’ award off Nick Smith, but it’s an especially bizarre charge to lay against her, given what I personally understand of Gharaman’s family story,
It’s kind of right wing nut job.
What about mob lawyers – are they just giving their clients a fair go. Lawyers are just like other people – fallable, greedy, stupid and selfish – and with all the qreat qualities too, like compassion.
I get the system and I find it challenging as well.
‘Everyone’ hates defence lawyers until they’re accused of something.
Quote – Al Capone or genocidal mass murderer?
All those things may well be true in general marty, but in this instance it’s was a young barrister doing tough work, (pro bono IIRC) in a tough environment for all the right reasons.
Indeed that’s the main focus of the interview; the vast gulf between the realities on the ground in Rwanda and NZ.
There are lots of jobs I couldn’t and wouldn’t do and I have some admiration and at least respect for those that can, even with the personal cost that this must entail for them. This is one of those cases.
And on that I think we wholeheartedly agree.
Marty is it ok for a lawyer to work for a company that sells a legal product that has lead to the death of millions world wide?
I think moral questions are often the most intellectually interesting.
I think yes and also no if they ignored evidence in their defence/legal/work with the company to ensure the company could continue to make profit. Hard to prove though ☺
But isn’t that the task of lawyers working for a company to protect the “rights” of the company to sell it’s wares? And you are aware that National’s Chris Bishop worked for Phillip Morris?
And the task of a defence lawyer is to protect the rights of their client – no matter how heinous their crime may have been.
Should a rapist be given a fair trial or a paedophile? Of course they must -otherwise our society descends into lawlessness, such as was the case in Rwanda. If the accused were to receive no defence, then the subsequent conviction would have no more merit than the summary justice they metered out to those they slaughtered.
Yes I understand all that and I still find it morally murky for me.
Unfortunately Marty – as G.E. Moore (a late British Philosopher) explained “goodness” is like “redness” – it is a simple concept that cannot be broken down into constituent parts. Either you perceive redness or you don’t.
I can only say that by their actions you shall know them. Does Gloriz act in a good way or a bad way? Having met her and seen the work she has done (not only acting as a defence lawyer) she is a good person – as are all the Green MPs.
I hope that is of some help.
I have no issue with her at all btw. I like having her in parliament.
I agree with your comments about legal process Redlogix.
But Im not sure though if thats the issue here. Isn’t it that Ghahraman and the Greens deliberately fudged her role in the Riwanda war crimes legal process so that the punters would assume that she was on the side of the angels; not the devils, so to speak.
Therein lies her and the Greens problem.
She was perfectly open about what her role was in Rwanda before the Election – because she was a Green candidate – such news was decided not to be published by the MSM – because of “lack of space”. Well I guess it’s much more important to tell us about Bill’s smile
I have no problems with her being on the defense team though why you’d volunteer is beyond me but her profile page on the Green website was, at best, misleading:
“Golriz has lived and worked in Africa, The Hague and Cambodia, putting on trial world leaders for abusing their power.”
Says nothing about defending world leaders either and she herself says “could be clearer”
How those panama papers working out Puckish Rouge? Or the polls buddy? How many more lies do we have to suffer though? Oh wait – you could just revert to type as a racist we all know you are…
Still spinning and lying I see – Oh well can’t be helped, I suppose. It’s what you do.
Look a squirrel!
You’re a joke, but you’re not very funny.
Completely irrelevant. How long is the bio? A few paragraphs?
When I do my three page CV I barely touch the surface of anything on my work history. You’re looking at what I did ina company for 2-4 or even 11 years in a single paragraph. It was like that from when I was 26. By that time I’d had a 10 year work history and several degrees. It had skim paragraphs about time in the army, working as a farm hand, as a barman, a factory machine operator, technical salesman, factory manager, and computer support.
If you want to be be a idiot, then go ahead. Just don’t be surprised if people sum up your CV as “FOOL”
And we have a lawyer in Parliament who worked for a tobacco company….
(tobacco related deaths are around 5 million per year)
http://www.who.int/tobacco/publications/surveillance/fact_sheet_mortality_report.pdf?ua=1
This caught my attention. Not sure why they feel we need more cops but anyway…..
https://www.rt.com/news/411027-new-zealand-police-recruitment-video/
US is seeking the extradition of a British guy (Lauri) for stuff English courts didn’t lay charges over. And apparently …
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/lauri-love-hacker-activist-prison-sentence-extradition-america-aspergers-autism-death-sentence-a8076541.html
Been following this one. Why is any country sending their people to the US with its atrocious record of human rights abuses and shonky legal system?
True.
GROVEL.
State-sponsored adulation of shepherd-murderer moves into overdrive
Tuesday 28 November 2017
RNZ National, 7:24 a.m.
GUYON ESPINER: …. [drily amused] I’ve been taken to task for asking what Harry’s going to wear.
SUSIE FERGUSON: It’ll be a uniform, of course!
GUYON ESPINER: Of course it will. ….. [grovel, grovel…]
three, a.m. show, 7:25 a.m.
DUNCAN GARNER: Royal correspondent Dicky Arbiter, good morning!
DICKY ARBITER: [beaming] The Twitter universe has come alight! …[widens his eyes to indicate his great joy]… Like any young couple in love, they’re not hiding their love for each other!
AMANDA GILLIES: She wore a BEAUTIFUL new coat, designed by Line the Label. What does this mean for dress designers in the U.K.?….[grovel]….
DICKY ARBITER: They’ll look on her as they did Harry’s mother—as a clothes horse rather than a work horse. They do a tremendous amount of good work; let’s focus on what they DO rather than on what they wear, for a change.
DUNCAN GARNER: Yeah, I’m WITH you on this!
DICKY ARBITER: [worshipfully] Harry was a soldier. He was at the sharp end in Afghanistan. …. The couple meeting and they see each other across a crowded room, and that’s IT!… They just clicked, just like a jigsaw puzzle. … Younger people see them as role models. ….
7:52 a.m.
DUNCAN GARNER: Are you interested in the royal engagement? Some of you are. Some of you aren’t at all! That’s next!
…Advertisements (paid ones, not free ones for the Royal Family)….
7:54 a.m.
DUNCAN GARNER: Okay, welcome back. So much feedback for the royal wedding!
MARK RICHARDSON: Prince Harry was happy before this American came along. Well maybe not happy, but he was having a good time.
AMANDA: He wasn’t happy, he’s said that.
DUNCAN GARNER: Our poll question this morning is: “Do you care about the royal engagement between Prince Harry and Mehan Markle?” Well, not everybody does, it seems. Stuey says: “There are lots of unsung heroes in the community. He’s a privileged pillock and welfare beneficiary.”
The others in the studio—Gillies, Richardson, and social presenter Shannon Redstall—titter with pity and amusement.
DUNCAN GARNER: The woooorld of Stuey! I tell you what, Stuey, you can be the producer for the next sixty-threee minutes, and you can decide what’s going to be on the television.
8:02 a.m.
DUNCAN GARNER: Coming up on our panel is Rawdon Christie, broadcaster and royalist. We’ll be talking about Prince Harry, because Stuey hasn’t had enough of that yet…
8:35 a.m.
DUNCAN GARNER: All right, some things we don’t know about Meghan Markle. Everybody’s talking about this right now! …She has two adopted dogs, Bogart and, and….
AMANDA GILLIES: Guy.
DUNCAN GARNER: Yes! You know that? …. Mark, you seem sad.
MARK RICHARDSON: He was my guy. He was my royal guy!
8:42 a.m.
DUNCAN GARNER: We can’t get away from royal news today! It appears the royal couple may be related….
I think you’ll find it was Mihinirangi Forbes.
Thank you, it was Mihi Forbes. That slurping and licking sound coming from Espiner’s microphone somewhat diverted my attention.
The groveling continues….
Jim MORA: What is it about this union that makes people so joyful? Is there hope for the world in it, or what?
…..extended groveling from Mora and his two Panelists continues for three minutes….
The Panel, RNZ National, 4:46 p.m.
Awesome transcribing there Morrissey,
Is that done by electronic voice recognition or done manually by you?
I as a secretary need the program if it is done electronically.
Thanks, cleangreen, for those very kind words. I do it all by ear, usually. This morning I scribbled it down freehand up to 8 o’clock, and the rest I did on my computer as I listened.
My transcriptions are not always spot on, though, and have elicited some controversy here….
Morrissey….did you catch the most deft of wee digs from Mihingarangi Forbes this morning while interviewing a Central Otago Community Leading Light? they were discussing the recent deluge and Mihi pronounced the guy’s name how it is spelled, rather than how he pronounces it. She apologised, of course, and had another go…http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/2018623287/shovels-out-in-roxburgh-after-flash-floods-tim-cadogan
I am absolutely positively 100% sure she was not tangentially referencing this…
https://www.odt.co.nz/opinion/haere-mai-everything-far-ka-pa
I missed that, Rosemary. I think Mihi Forbes is a great journalist.
GROPERS
No. 12: Prince Harry
Groping in England….
Groping and snorting in Las Vegas…
“GROPERS” is presented by GroperWatch, a division of Daisycutter Sports Inc.
No.1 George Herbert Walker Bush; No. 2 Bill O’Reilly; No. 3 Al Franken; No. 4 Robin Brooke; No. 5 Lester Beck; No. 6 Arnold Schwarzenegger; No. 7 Joe Biden; No. 8 Rolf Harris; No. 9 Harold Bloom; No. 10 Sir Jimmy Savile; No. 11 Dr Morgan Fahey
Shit, now using The Sun and Daily Mail as your news sources….
Putting aside their smirking and winking approval of Prince Harry’s appalling behaviour, what is inaccurate in either of those accounts?
Morrissey,
You have great memory recall; – I guess nmy chemical poisoning back in 1992 while last working in Canada hurt my brain as I now have poor memory recall.
Especially if I now get exposed to some perfume’s, diesel exhaust, synthetic rubber smells, and many others.
That is why I love things to be ‘cleangreen’.
So I need to use a tape recording and a “very patient wife of 45 yrs” to transcribe the event. (she is my one love, – once married; – us both)
Thanks for all that information morrissey.
If you’re going to run this series, you really ought to read up a little about “consent” – what it means and how it might be relevant to these posts. Because otherwise you could just end up looking like a grumpy old man who needs to get laid.
Shit Psycho Milt,
Thats a bit harsh on Morrissey,
I find his scribbing of public affairs issues quite refreshing.
Especially since the ‘media’ fail to cover ‘in depth’ public affairs issues today Morrissey is trying to expose them in a transcibed way and if the persons involved dont like their words repeated were are we left then????
Democracy is born from free speech.
His sources include “The Sun” and “The Daily Mail”.
Geat “credible” sources of info.
Interesting how the Left like to lambast the media; until a story is published that suits their way of thinking
Different Morrissey comment, Cleangreen. This is the one about gropers, not the radio transcript.
My issue with it is it makes no case for the sexual activity being non-consensual and yet lumps it in with the activities of people like Rolf Harris and Jimmy Saville. What makes a “groper” is lack of consent, not the fact of touching someone.
sweet, yes correctly stated thanks PM.
Fair comment, Milt, assuming Prince Harry respected the women he groped. I find that highly unlikely. The women seemed to be initially upset but were eventually flustered into smiling and accepting the mistreatment. Donald Trump and Harvey Weinstein indulged in similar behaviour, and their victims were socialized into grinning and bearing it, or simply keeping quiet.
Who gives a rat’s ass whether he respected them? Get hold of a dictionary and look up the word “consent” before you go posting about it.
Sure, give that coke-snorting lout the benefit of the doubt if you want. You think someone who kills shepherds from the sanctuary of a helicopter gunship, then soaks up the adulation of the Murdoch press which dubbed him “The Big H”, gropes only willing women at those orgies.
I have a bridge to sell you if you’re interested.
Sure, give that coke-snorting lout the benefit of the doubt if you want.
I hope like fuck no-one ever asks you to sit on a jury.
Addled dotard shows his condescending racist slip.
WASHINGTON—For a year and a half, President Donald Trump has been denounced by Native American leaders for calling Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren “Pocahontas.”
He just did it again — at an event honouring Native American war heroes.
Trump held a White House ceremony on Monday to celebrate Navajo “code talkers,” who used their language to transmit secret messages during the Second World War. After complimenting the code talkers, Trump said, “You were here long before any of us were here. Although we have a representative in Congress who they say was here a long time ago. They call her Pocahontas.”
[…]
The jab at Warren was not the only part of the Monday event that was called offensive. Trump decided to make the speech in front of a portrait of president Andrew Jackson, who is notorious among Native Americans for signing the 1830 Indian Removal Act that forced Natives off of their land and produced thousands of deaths.
Trump also referred to his chief of staff John Kelly as “the chief.” And he suggested he was not personally familiar with the history of the code talkers.
“And I have to say, I said to General Kelly, I said, general, how good — here he is, right there, the chief; he’s the general and the chief — I said, how good were these code talkers?” he said.
Kelly’s response, according to Trump: “Sir, you have no idea. You have no idea how great they were.”
https://www.thestar.com/news/world/2017/11/27/trump-just-called-elizabeth-warren-pocahontas-at-an-event-honouring-native-american-war-heroes.html
Kelly’s response, according to Trump: “Sir, you have no idea. You have no idea how great they were.”
Stated with military precision and accuracy…
He’s like that insect alien inside a human skin suit off men in black. No. Fucking. Idea.
Glyphosate. Another 5 years for it as part of Roundup by the EU on the basis of it possibly being carcinogenic but one can’t be sure till enough people die.
It came up after WW2, where chemicals were used regularly to deadly effect.
Glyphosate was first synthesized in 1950 by Swiss chemist Henry Martin, who worked for the Swiss company Cilag. The work was never published.[18]:1 Stauffer Chemical patented the agent as a chemical chelator in 1964 as it binds and removes minerals such as calcium, magnesium, manganese, copper, and zinc.[19]
The European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) maintained their current classification of glyphosate as a substance causing serious eye damage and as a substance toxic to aquatic life, but did not find evidence implicating it to be a carcinogen, a mutagen, toxic to reproduction, nor toxic to specific organs.[17]
Monsanto’s last commercially relevant United States patent expired in 2000….
Farmers quickly adopted glyphosate, especially after Monsanto introduced glyphosate-resistant Roundup Ready crops, enabling farmers to kill weeds without killing their crops. In 2007, glyphosate was the most used herbicide in the United States’ agricultural sector and the second-most used in home and garden (2,4-D being the most used)…
In many cities, glyphosate is sprayed along the sidewalks and streets, as well as crevices in between pavement where weeds often grow. However, up to 24% of glyphosate applied to hard surfaces can be run off by water….
In 2015, 89% of corn, 94% of soybeans, and 89% of cotton produced in the United States were genetically modified to be herbicide-tolerant….
Use of glyphosate to clear milkweed along roads and fields may have contributed to a decline in monarch butterfly populations in the Midwestern United States.[172] Along with deforestation and adverse weather conditions,[173] the decrease in milkweed contributed to an 81% decline in monarchs.[174][175] The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) filed a suit in 2015 against the EPA, in which it is argued that the agency ignored warnings about the dangers of glyphosate usage for monarchs.[176]…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyphosate
(No heading for honey bees though)- so :
http://www.glyphosate.news/2016-06-27-study-shows-honeybees-are-starving-because-of-roundup.html
and
https://geneticliteracyproject.org/2015/11/03/glyphosate-is-no-bee-killer/
and
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/why-honeybees-dont-have-a-chance-in-the-midst-of-pesticides_us_58c1ec02e4b0c3276fb7831c
and
https://phys.org/news/2015-10-glyphosate-acetamiprid-toxicity-honey-bees.html
Seems like they are prepared to throw stuff at bees and as long as they keep flying, then the bad individual or combined effects of these chemicals is downplayed.
Then on Radionz we are suffering from leptospirosis which there have been another 93 in NZ for half the year. On and on and our environment and health constantly compromised.
Good research greywarshark;
I will make use of the details and links thank you.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11947570
More ‘blame the victim’ bullshit. Apparently throwing more money at beneficiaries won’t help. Why not? It helps everyone else.
The NZ Initiative a RW thinktank. And lying in heaps.
(Looking at the link that beatie gives above.) They present themselves as cool and rational and informed. They cherry pick the information they disseminate. They quote macro information, quote averages, and then present us with little direct information about individual groups.
With double the income-per-person than what was in 1970, a minimum wage up 50 per cent (inflation adjusted) and better medical care boosting life expectancy and reducing child mortality, you’d think New Zealand would be in its heyday.
It sounds good – double the income of 1970 – how was the inflation adjustment done, what was the base line, apples with apples? Housing has gone up horrendously since 1970, rentals are up, accommodation supplement always trails and the system is its own moral hazard. So that wouldn’t be rosy, but it isn’t mentioned. Instead we hear about child mortality, a nationwide measure, and life expectancy which is a population measure that is of vague concern to someone trying to manage on a pension.
Dr Bryce Wilkinson is just another RW fellow traveller packing a good story against beneficiaries whose opinion and solutions are discounted when pitted against a comfortable professional RW bottom, or even an erect spinal column of bias which is the healthy method of IT work now; (standing, perhaps they could let Peter try it out).
[Peter] has experience in technology and IT but isn’t able to sit in an office chair for longer than three minutes without getting excruciating pain.
“They should do a proper work assessment to see what my experience is and what jobs I can do based on my ability. I’m happy to work from home,” Peter said.
“To me they’re just trying to save costs without any care for the long-term solutions for the beneficiary.”
Wilkinson said a beneficiary’s shortage of money was a symptom rather than a cause of poverty. Instead efforts needed to be made to address drug addiction, alcoholism, mental illness, low skills, poor parenting and a lack of understanding of work habits.
Policies that increase job and income growth must be valued to complement welfare. The report stated the welfare system should “nourish rather than smother self-help”.
“State welfare support is a balancing act. A good system must guard against beneficiaries who could work but do not. This is a waste of human potential and an unwarranted burden on their fellow citizens.”
One notices, one does, the little homily at the end from the stern but just and prudent arbiter of these lives of people who are faulty and unable to take advantage of opportunities that are commonly available, for those who have the ability to exert themselves./sarc
The slimy words of callous, self-centred people are for the purpose of impressing their peer group in society, as to whose fault it is that ‘these people’ are languishing out there. However the dossier that TS has built up over the years gives us examples that ensure we understand the problem in the round, the whole vicious circle that ensures that the welfare system doesn’t work, because the RW don’t want a good, working, society of happy people. Such people are harder to squeeze the last juice out of.
RWNJ pays a woman to pretend to be a victim of sexual assault in an effort to discredit reporting about the sexual assault of women and girls.
Take a bow filth, that really does take the biscuit.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/a-woman-approached-the-post-with-dramatic–and-false–tale-about-roy-moore-sje-appears-to-be-part-of-undercover-sting-operation/2017/11/27/0c2e335a-cfb6-11e7-9d3a-bcbe2af58c3a_story.html?tid=ss_tw&utm_term=.e4b342b2a612
Looks like it’s Project Veritas and James O’Keefe again, huh? Such a charming lad.
Thread.
Interesting but there appears to be a patch with two bits that don’t join up.
Don’t know how that gets straightened out.
Its now settling down now,holiday time ,to respect our coalition government,as others chance to talk about democracy,as three political parties say, this is our march to our lands care.
Who in the national party,is going to release the conversations with New Zealand First,who they attempted to negotiate a control deal.
good point.
The 38 page doco that the Nats are trying to obtain from the Coalition has been reduced to 33 pages because someone changed the FONT size!!!
I reckon the only reason the nats want to see it is because they want to know why and how they missed out, they just aren’t handling losing the election very well at all.
I reckon the Nats wouldn’t recognise a real coalition agreement if it hit them 😉
Time the duck,to say,open debate,speakers are open to say,under discrection.However,general debate,is not allowed with notes.
It’s funny (strange) how so many are going through this small item from Golriz sieving it word by word like someone panning for gold.
Yet Key was here for decades and I don’t think anyone went through his past sorting out where his money actually came from. Did anyone actually know how much he made from selling out a day before… from buying a penthouse that was being rezoned …. from not paying his full tax or by selling a day after the withholding period… etc. And it seemed to be his money that was the main attraction, that gave him gravitas. Once he had that it was such a laugh that he was okay, so free to not care about cheeky comments about peeing in the shower and other things like sitting in a cage with a jerk and a microphone.
I think was liked the powerful finance industry that owns NZ’s corporate media.
He was a useful puppet for them
Golriz isn’t.
Is anyone allowed to ask English what the contents of his 200 or so texts to his lady friend were about. I am sure Nz ers want to know. In the interest of transparency and all.
But Floyd those texts (270 odd wasn’t it) were to do with his electorate – sort of like the electronic equivalent of “notes” between him and his local secretary. He didn’t believe they came under the auspices of the OIA. Now, someone else has said that just in the last 24 hrs. Oh that’s right, the Prime Minister. I guess she has taken her cue from the previous Prime Minister.
Many thanks to all the teachers in NZ you have a very important job and I take my hat off to uses Ka pai
Bill,cleaned up.
Lets give im a good kickin then make him shout.
[TheStandard: A moderator moved this comment to Open Mike as being off topic or irrelevant in the post it was made in. Be more careful in future.]
While we’re talking about Ms Ghahraman, my other problem with her is that she is a refugee who seeks to bring in more refugees. Feels a bit like a Trojan Horse scenario
A.
[TheStandard: A moderator moved this comment to Open Mike as being off topic or irrelevant in the post it was made in. Be more careful in future.]
What an unpleasant contribution.
Yep horrible bigoted attitude not needed in our country imo.
Like companies who bring in migrants with work experience rather than hire and intern train up local graduates, replacing those who migrate to Oz (for higher wages) with another immigrant.
New Zealand companies just a Trojan horse back door into Oz.
That seems like a separate issue which perhaps will be addressed by tightening immigration rules…
A.
Still no retraction for that shameful comment?
There are around 20 million refugees in the world today.
Every year around 5 million people are forced for one reason or another to flee from their homes and to seek refuge in another country.
NZ accepts 750 refugees per year.
And you make that offensive comment!
🙄
Your “other” problem!? Why fear something that may never happen? It only exists in your mind because you let it exist there and cling on to it. Let it go and be free of your fears.
That sounds like terrible advice
Your choice: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upādāna
Do you approve of dirty politics as highlighted by Nicky Hager?
It would appear so…….
I do not.
Do you retract your shameful comment at 30?
No.
Shameful.
But on reflection, I will add that she seems like a very nice person and you probably can’t blame her for giving it a go
A.
Where did you grow up
NZ
Well i can’t avoid the whole bloody country. Anyway you need to be more compassionate and less judgmental imo. Bigotry must be addressed in this country. You can actually hurt people you know.
The Standard is a place for heated debate, as you can well see by reading the posts on pretty much any day. I wouldn’t go round talking like this offline.
A.
I do, because not doing so would be disingenuous.
Why wouldn’t you?
Uh, I changed my mind after seeing this: https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/political/344871/green-mp-under-scrutiny-for-role-in-rwandan-genocide-trials
I never want to see one of our MPs smiling in a photo alongside a man found guilty of inciting genocide (in an International Criminal Tribunal, and sentenced to 15 years).
We can do without her in NZ. I would like to see her resign as an MP.
A.
No, you didn’t change your mind one bit; you were just a bit slow in making up your mind. It’s funny that so many people seem to go on about changing to improve ‘things’ while in fact they are rooting for status quo and the very last thing they’ll want to do on Earth is to change their (own) minds. I say these people have it back to front big time; reality is not in your head, it is everything but and all outside of your head. Don’t think too long about it as it might change your mind in irrevocable ways.
There is a reason that the Greens almost halved their voter support and lost seats this election…fringe party lunacy, shows what a bastard and undemocratic system MMP is (Winston 2017 may be the straw that broke the MMP back…eventually, and finally). Just as ex National MP Shane Ardern..