The weather's a little ragged here today, but there's a new cafe in the village – Jacob's Rivery Bakery, and it's wonderful; excellent coffee, vegetarian/vegan'organic food – I especially like the jackfruit "sausage" roll; the staff are super-friendly, vibrant young people, all of whom live in the village and locals have taken to meeting there; by design or accident, for all sorts of impromptu discussions and debates, celebrations and retreats from ordinary life. The decor is "plants", to my eye at least; there are dozens of glossy, well-cared-for pot plants on shelves and stands throughout the cafe, and I feel at home amongst them. The building is the historic post office with postmasters living quarters upstairs. The enormous clock that used to be fixed high on the wall on the street-face of the building sits in the local museum now; I wish they'd put it back up! If ever you are in Riverton, stop off there for a good time, before walking two stores to the north, where you'll discover the Riverton Environment Centre and everything on offer there, including a yarn with one of the volunteers there, a bearded chap who's willing to die in a ditch for the Green Party
A wonderful picture you paint Robert. We live in turbulent times and we should treasure those oasis of order and grace we do have.
One day we will get back home and I'll make a point of visiting Riverton. An old friend of mine once said, tongue in cheek, "New Zealand gets more civilised the further south you go. Somewhere around Mossburn it comes good."
" An old friend of mine once said, tongue in cheek, "New Zealand gets more civilised the further south you go. Somewhere around Mossburn it comes good."
Late last year I was in that area for the first time in quite a while. I was pleasantly surprised to find good pies in Gore. Because I've heard so much about cheese rolls, I had to try them too. All I can say is, what is wrong with people?
a bearded chap who's willing to die in a ditch for the Green Party
Which is more than you can say for the people of Riverton.
Greens took 18 out of 795 total Party-Votes in 2017.
Just be mindful, Robert, Greenies have occasionally been burned as witches in Southland over recent decades. That's after they throw you in the river to see if you float.
Swordfish – I have, though not a witch per se, been singed many times in the past and had my buoyancy tested on more than one occasion by the good burghers of Riverton. Most recently, a minor kerfuffle over some painted-kindling caused crook'd fingers to be pointed toward the ditch-witch in his forest-garden, but that blew over with the first salt-laden sou'wester; I've weathered many squalls such as that, and expect to face more as the mood of the nation deteriorates along with the water quality, and the Federated Farmers find their muddy feet and big-laryxned voices again. Par for the course, for a provocative shaggy greenie who likes to string words together for effect.
Hi Robert. I have posted you in the past of our resident cock blackbird. He has a damaged foot which has bent in on itself. He manages very good and is looking splendid. I am wondering if you know how long these house wild birds survive in their natural environment. We call him pegleg because of his gammy way of walking. Over the seasons he has mated and reared many clutches of chicks in nests in and around our garden. He is very tame and will come when we call and all of our garden birds are fed every other day with fruit and wildbird seed mixed with wholemeal breadcrumbs and fat mixed. Pegleg is at least seven years old now and considering he was fledged in our garden and we never thought he would survive but he finally got airborne and the rest is history!! Is seven a good age for a blackbird in the wild. He looks as glossy and handsome as ever and is nest building with a mate right now.
I would be interested in your knowledge of longevity in blackbirds in the wild.
Oh hi, Whispering Kate – I remember well your blackbird posts and am pleased to hear your male bird is so well. The number 20 popped into my head when I read your question about longevity, but I think that individual might have been coddled (as yours are being by the sound of it I can't really say then, as I read that some only attain 3 or 4 years before they make way for others of their kind. Ours seem to hang around for yonks, but I haven't kept a record. The several that centre their attentions on my garden especially love the worm-farm, not for the worms, but to intervene in their feeding by helping themselves to porridge-left-overs, sweet corn, home-made bread crusts and so on. I hope you get to enjoy your birds for a long time to come!
Thank you Robert. Yes we love our birds. Tui, fantails, kereru wax eyes and then all the blackies, thrushes starlings you name it. They make such a mess in the garden but then they give us such a lot of fun. They love our bird baths, tui dive bomb into them and the starlings bring the entire family – seven sometimes all in the bath together. Twenty sounds amazing and yes our birds are spoiled so who knows how long pegleg will survive considering his gammy leg.
I like Bernie Sanders a whole lot more now that he's fully put his shoulder to electing Joe Biden for President.
As well as his old policy and comms teams pushing the Biden team a long way into their platforms, anders himself is putting his considerable support base out there with new speeches:
The panel events, Sanders' team said, have racked up more than 850,000 views in all, for an average that exceeds 200,000.
With the Trump Republicans attacking the very voting process by actively sabotaging the Post Office, Sanders' motivational energy is going to be critical to replacing the current US regime.
Well that is a welcome spark of good news. Because so far while Biden is clearly the more worthwhile candidate, he's not winning, just like Clinton wasn't winning in 2016.
In normal times you'd have to think the village idiot could beat someone as clearly unsuited to the job as Trump. Yet the fact that the Democrats are not 30 pts ahead and utterly unbeatable right now rings a big fat alarm bell in my mind.
The Democrats always have the real problem that their voter bases is highly diverse, with often conflicting interests. It usually takes an eloquent and charismatic candidate to unify them, and this Biden ain't. If Sanders can help bridge this deficit and build some real unity in the Democrat base, it may just tip the balance.
It's hard to guess how much effect that will have on his base compared to 2016.
There's a solid component of his base that are middle-finger voters attracted by the idea that Bernie was going to stick it to the establishment. They will think Bernie going in to bat for Biden is selling out and they either won't vote or do a burn-it-down vote for Donasaurus Wrecks.
But if he can bring back to Biden a significant chunk of those that peeled off for Stein (or Johnson) or got taken in by the smears against Clinton and just didn't vote, then he'll have done a solid for the US and the rest of the world.
Sanders and team are being a lot more cooperative towards Biden than they were with HRC at this point. And people like OAC get that they can both reform the Democratic party AND back Biden against Trump.
It will take all of Sanders' base and all progressive others to vote, if they are to overcome the electorate border gerrymandering, Fox news dominance, and active polling place discouragement to change this government.
@Ad, "And people like OAC get that they can both reform the Democratic party" she (and you) must be completely deluded, the DNC would rather eat their own babies than offer anything to the progressive wing of that party…that is why they pretty much said (talking in political optics here) shut the fuck up and sit the fuck down, by not inviting her to even speak at the DNC convention…not sure why you can't just admit the DNC is 100% brought and paid for by corporate USA.
But then this shouldn't surprise me whatsoever, I seem to remember you are one of the liberals who think the FBI are now friends of the left, and seriously, you can't get much more delusional than that.
What was there to dislike previously? Apart from the tendency to give the same speech over and over. Plus the damaging mis-characterisation of himself as a 'socialist', instead of a mainstream social democrat reaching back to the true values of America's past?
Uhh, a complete absence of any legislative success of any difficulty or significance, beyond leveraging his vote to get a few nickel-and-dime amendments. Which appears to be related to an apparent inability to compromise or showing any other coalition-building skills.
The short-fingered vulgarian still using songs after their creators told his team "NO". This time it's Cohen's "Hallelujah". They should have asked for "You Want It Darker". Probably they should also have tried to understand the meaning of "Hallelujah" rather than just assuming it was some kind of religiously fervid praise.
You mean the bit about Repugs using it against Springsteen's expressed wishes. or that the song is an expose of things that are fucked up about the US rather than the paean to American greatness that idiot Repugs seem to think it is?
Don't know if anyone else has posted this but supposedly Labour’s internal polling shows Chloe ahead in Auckland Central. And I don’t call 9% a “marginal lead”.
A decent Operator would release this as an internal hit from Chloe's team against Shaw, while he's getting a kicking, letting the members know that there are leadership alternatives.
If the Greens walked over glass and got Gordon Campbell back, or even godhelpthem Russell Norman, they'd be operating harder and tracking at 9 and not fucking up.
I have a soft spot for those who fuck up. I do it myself all the time. Getting over the threshold is good enough for me; they are not ready yet for Cabinet and by “they” I don’t mean individual MPs.
Please keep it civil. It was not clear at all that you were “talking about the gender balanced aspect of the co-leader thing” until you mentioned it @ 7:22 PM.
No, it wasn’t obvious and that comment came further down anyway and was a reply to one of mine, not Ad’s – the nesting of comments has its downsides. It may have been obvious to you but most of us aren’t mind readers and it may help to keep that in mind and avoid acerbic follow-up comments 🙂
There is only one rule – 'I'll do what I want. You don't like it? Take me to court. By the time my second term is coming to an end the hearings will just about be done. If some pardons and commutation of sentences need to be done, so be it.'
What is called for in a world after Covid-19 is a new educational purpose – one that reconnects thinking around environmental wellbeing, social health and economic fairness. There have been many voices calling for change, for the world to be reset – we cannot go back to how things were. Does education need a reset?
No, it needs a revision. The system needs to be made fit for purpose in the ever-changing world we're in. Lange faked that with Tomorrow's Schools in the '80s, but we know not to trust Labour promises.
We are told that if we send our children to school it will help them get a worthwhile job and have a stable and affluent life; that it will help their self-advancement, help them ‘get ahead’. The myth of education as a commodity to be accumulated is widely accepted.
Mythos is powerful in mass psychology, and when combined with bureaucracy it created an education system with awe-inspiring inertia. Guaranteed to defeat progress. Which is why the system never entered the 20th century.
When I passed thro it in the 1950s/60s it was clearly archaic but effective in mass-producing crap (such as mainstreamers, Nat/Lab voters). I encountered Summerhill in 1970 when it was a hot trend & that crystallised my feelings about how education ought to be done – but nowadays the necessity for real progress is more urgent.
we concentrate on the personal; we now find ourselves part of a worldwide phenomenon. Our connection to global economic movements is suddenly more apparent. We have seen millions of people lose their livelihoods in a week, yet we have learned that previously unthinkable legislation to support those in need can be passed easily.
Suitable leadership can still get the right results fast, and Labour deserves credit for proving that point currently. If only it realised that the same cut-through must be applied to the national curriculum! But connecting the dots is so hard for some. 🙄
We have learnt that the encroachment by people on natural environments causes stresses that lead to the increasingly frequent transmission of zoonotic viruses. At least six viruses have transferred to humans since 2000; more are likely on the way.
Consumption of nature producing pandemics is gnosis too deep for most people to learn, I suspect: the causal relations are opaque unless you happen to be a microbiologist. Capitalists working with third-world govts will produce pandemics unless a greater force stops them. Business as usual.
the economic system, focused on short-term gain, is disconnected from its impacts on people and on the environment; and human misuse of the natural environment leads to a fundamental and dangerous disconnection with the symbiotic relationship between humanity and nature.
The control system has a predatory relationship to nature though, and it determines the future via representative democracy. Kids must learn how to collectively defeat the left & right puppets the system uses. It's the only way to escape becoming victims. Therefore an education system fit for the purpose of human survival must be both radical and beyond left and right.
Over 100 years ago Charles Spearman made two monumental discoveries about human intelligence. First, a general factor of intelligence (g) exists: people who score high on one test of intelligence also tend to score high on other tests of intelligence. Second, Spearman found that the g-factor conforms to the principle of the "indifference of the indicator": It doesn't matter what test of intelligence you administer; as long as the intelligence test is sufficiently cognitively complex and has enough items, you can reliably and validly measure a person's general cognitive ability.
Fast forward to 2018, and a new paper suggests that the very same principle may not only apply to human cognitive abilities, but also to human malevolence. New research conducted by a team from Germany and Denmark suggests that a General Dark Factor of Personality (D-factor) exists among the human population, and that this factor conforms to the principle of indifference of the indicator. This is big news, so let's take a look.
[…]
Note: The Dark Core Scale was adapted from the larger test battery. I selected the items on an ad-hoc basis for entertainment purposes, but I do not recommend using the scale to make any sort of diagnosis. For more on the D-factor, go to http://www.darkfactor.org. To take the self-assessment created by the researchers of the dark factor study, go to: http://qst.darkfactor.org.
Miss 15's arsehole rating was off the charts the other day. But she's good now lololz 🙂 Teenagers, dang, it's almost like they can think for themselves 🙂 🙂
Now that significant volumes of end-of-life lithium batteries are becoming a thing, here's a brief look at ventures underway to recycle and recover value from that resource. Featuring JB Straubel, one of Tesla's founders, so it's about real life rather than just lab demonstration possibilities.
It's not the numbers that scare me. It's that sometimes new cases are still being reported as "under investigation". That suggests to me that new transmissions are still going outside the circles of contacts the contact tracers are finding out about. So I struggle with the idea that the outbreak is "contained".
People better be fkn careful and conscientious about masks and distancing and other transmission-reducing behaviour or we're gonna be back into level 3 or 4 in no time. And maybe not just Dorkland, either.
My God, some people are so f*****g stupid! This response from someone in West Auckland ( I think)
“I’m so confused?! Why would someone get a test if they have no symptoms,” asked one reader. “Two weeks ago we were all told to not get a test if you do not have symptoms! Honestly this is an absolute joke.”
Because situations change. And when that happens the responses have to change. Read the newspapers, listen to the news. Get youself informed and then you won't be "confused" and kicking up ballyhoo for the sake of it.
Lemme think, over the last three months I have had close contact (more than 15 minutes within 2 metres) with exactly 2 people. Those were my sons, who have already tested negative (tested because of attending Avondale College). Apart from that, I have walked past people and momentarily been within 2 metres of them (while masked) on maybe 8 grocery shopping trips in that three months. And they still want me to turn up so they can probe my brains?
“If we can’t immediately link these cases to the main cluster then it is very likely we have undetected active cases in the community and once we go to Level 2, spread could kick off again.
Every under investigation has been changed within a couple of days to the cluster ,just this morning minister of health statement we are going to level2, we know where all the positive have come from, almost all from in isolation
That just means that after the fact they have been able to trace it the path back to where it came from. Not that they have determined a reasonably reliable boundary around the risk.
to do an internal link on TS you either need to put the link in a direct line with some text, or you need to use the link tags. I've fixed your comment as it was linking to the post rather than comment (this is the default if the link is put in a line of its own without tags).
They should have delayed opening schools to Wednesday (3 week lockdown minimum – given new information that children retain viral load for 3 weeks).
That allows planning for social distancing at 2.5 and for people to sort out masks (which should be compulsory for children in schools, on school buses and indoor workers and in street queues).
2.5 for mine should include temperature testing for entry to buildings. And expectation people work from home if they can.
I suspect they eased back down a little early because Mof H bungled planning for a regional lockdown by not having pre granted exemptions for business activity.
If they were influenced by the plight of hospitality business and the looming election they had better hope General Luck is back on duty.
Because going back to Level 3 in Auckland, and to 2.5 for the rest if this spreads, will put an end to the Oct 17 election date.
They’re between a rock and a hard place (i.e. damned either way). I believe the (health) risk is higher than last time we came out of L3 and we need more luck this time.
I think they have been too accommodating of media. The Covid updates are a public health announcement – they should not have been contestable, any more than military announcements would have been in time of war.
The place for the kind of malign aggression media displayed, aside from lonely exile on the Auckland or Bounty Islands, was in regular press conferences, not queering the compliance pitch of an emergency public health announcement.
If, as I fear, we develop a growing outbreak in the wake of relaxing restrictions, it should called the “Morrah/O’Brian” outbreak, in honour of its sponsors.
that's a really good idea about separating out the public health announcements and the press conferences. Do the first, have break and do the rest a bit later. Gives people time to settle down too.
yep too soon for me too. At least they could go "no inter regional travel" out of Auckland and maybe the Waikato. South of Taupo seems to be okay.
But if people don't believe it has been beaten then they will stay home as much as possible anyway. So they won't be out spending money. So we will still have a lot of the economic impact plus the potential virus spread as well.
I'm outside Auckland and it has been very quiet although with no local cases people are starting to go out again. I'll be cutting back outings again from tomorrow. If they kept Auckland in I’d slope off for some skiing
Given that cheaper testing (spit on paper stuff is coming) this might be the last really major lockdown that we would need.
PORTLAND, Ore. — A man was shot and killed Saturday as a large group of supporters of President Trump traveled in a caravan through downtown Portland, Ore., which has seen nightly protests for three consecutive months.
The pro-Trump rally drew hundreds of trucks full of supporters into the city. At times, Trump supporters and counterprotesters clashed on the streets, with people shooting paintball guns from the beds of pickup trucks and protesters throwing objects back at them.
A video that purports to be of the shooting, taken from the far side of the street, showed a small group of people in the road outside what appears to be a parking garage. Gunfire erupts, and a man collapses in the street.
The man who was shot and killed was wearing a hat with the insignia of Patriot Prayer, a far-right group based in Portland that has clashed with protesters in the past.
Experts in linguistic analysis will be studying this statement for decades to come, I suspect. University theses may even be written on what "stood call the Government didn't intend on doing" actually means.
Jones may complain that a Herald journo mangled what he really said in the interests of postmodernism – but methinks such false modesty from the hat won't persuade many.
That is the thing tho, this school is not going to harm anyone but the Greens, why? Only the Greens had a standing policy for over 9 years to not fund private schools – no matter how green washed the 'building' will be. Jones is dong what he always does, Labour can simply wash their hands in innocence, in the meantime the Green Party is getting not much love from many – other then here…. and i don't think that will be enough.
If i were any more cynical then i am i would suggest that the Green Co Party leader was set up to fail and he rant straight into this. But surely the Co Party leader of the Green would not be so stupid after several years now in Parliament. One would hope.
Nobody onsite here has suggested what ought to have happened instead. That collective failure demonstrates the inadequacy of all sideline commentators. They persist in not factoring in budget decision-making constraints that closed off options for James. The primary one being the pressure of GR's schedule!
Imagine the shitfight which would have erupted if he had rejected that line item: "Green Party rejects funding for Green School! Labour & NZF approved the funding!"
Experts in the psychology of brands wheeled out in the media would declare that the Green brand had been reduced to ideological twaddle by the Greens. Spokespeople for the Green movement would point out that rabid leftists were outnumbered by around a hundred to one in the movement. Since I joined it in 1968 that's always been evident.
So it's clear that the GP has dodged a bullet that may have proved fatal. I predict negative consequences will be minimal. Even leftists have to get real eventually…
Imagine the shitfight which would have erupted if he had rejected that line item: "Green Party rejects funding for Green School! Labour & NZF approved the funding!"
Yep, but that would have been a minor storm dealt with by using the focus to highlight the Greens' education policy. Also, if there were one or two thousand applications for the fund, I doubt that turning down this one would have been a big deal. Plenty of others to choose from.
I do think both sides are essentially right here. The problem is that approving the Green School needed a different process, eg one whereby the school was asked to meet certain conditions around funding that were more aligned with GP values.
Again, what are you taking umbrage with? that i say outright that Shane Jones is Shane Jones and wont be anything else ever and he is not even worth discussing?
I am simply over the constant whinging by people here about this party that is not doing shit, that party not doing shit, while the government is good enough to fuck up on their own.
The school is literally just the another drop bringing the bucket to overflow. People losing their jobs, they are locked in their homes, they are told to be fearful of the unseen enemy and National cause Judith will be worse and then this dumb ass blunder by someone who should now better. – nothing i did. Sorry mate.
Us people here in no where land that are not rabidly partisan or super loyal partisan we vote every three years and only get to hope that it 'will get better' and chances are it will not. It never does.
So we look at the parties and their principles and hope to find something that works for us and vote for that then.
We have been educated on this site so many times about what the Green Party can do or can not do it ain't even funny anymore, and btw, often times it is literally just condescending, cause we can read, and we do read, and sometimes we even vote for them, or Labour. Cause not as bad as the other option.
I already have given him the benefit of the doubt. But you don't get to whine about Shane Jones saying its gonna go forward, and not also lay the blame at the feet of the others Parties involved.
Also, last but least, If the Greens would not have a standing policy of 9 years to not fund private schools – and providing money to build one – 'for the construction only' – is still providing money to a private school, non of this brouhaha would have happened and frankly that is the matter at hand. What in the name of a pandemic will be next on the 'nice to have but not needed anymore policy ' on the chopping block. And this is not a question only to be laid at the feet of the Green Party but also includes Labour and NZ First.
At the end of the day, people like me will go to the polls, hold their nose and put a cross under the name of the person they find the least offensive. Not the person who has a good program for the future but the least offensive – because non of the clowns in government actually have a plan for us living on the margins of society. And the Greens now fall into this category, because if this policy is no more valid, then what next.
And if you don't want to discuss this anymore i suggest you don't post links complaining about Shane Jones who says this will go forward. The Greens – thanks to their Co-Leader – happy or not about it – are Co-responsible for it, as James could have said this should not be included, but he did not. And they now need to shoulder this responsibility.
Nobody onsite here has suggested what ought to have happened instead.
Really? Sorry, I thought I had.
What ought to have happened was that this school submitted their application and had it stand on its own merits without the Green Party lobbying for it:
So according to Hipkins, this wasn't a project that Shaw was merely put in the awkward position of announcing – Shaw explicitly requested it.
So my suggestion of what ought to have happened instead is that Shaw, or whomever in the Greens, had shut the fuck up about this private school in whatever meetings the subject occurred.
Hipkins didn't say he did. Nor has anyone else, except you. Since James specified that he was approving it on the Labour/NZF basis of regional infrastructure development, we can't blame him personally for any Green lobbying that may have been done earlier.
You could be right, but I didn't hear him refer to such lobbying on the Zoom call, so I'll wait & see if anyone else did!
Anyway, I was referring to the other options James may have had at the point in the process where he was faced with an apparent binary option: approve or reject. Weka said the rules stopped him running it by the Green caucus for a collective decision. I've already pointed out why rejection would have produced a worse shitstorm for the Greens.
No, "approving" is not "advocating quite strongly for"
Stuff might have been misrepresenting the subject of the quote, or Hipkins was bullshitting and everyone has since gone with that just to keep the shitfight to a minimum, but that's the available comment.
As for Shaw finding himself in "approve or reject", that's when you kick it upstairs.
Not sure why you are referencing Hipkins here (again), he wasn't involved in decisions afaik and his first response to the question was to say it was nothing to do with him, talk to the relevant ministers.
Lobby is not quite the right word, because it implies that the Green Party from the outside promoted the project above others. Whereas my reading is that Shaw was part of the group that looked at more than a thousand applications, shortlisted them, and in that process he used a climate change and environment lens. The mistake was in not using a broader GP policy lens.
Still afaik, the Green Party didn't have anything to do with, it was Shaw and his Ministry staff.
Lobby might be the wrong word for "advocated quite strongly for", but your lens theory is not inconsistent with Hipkins' account.
Shortlisting things in meetings with people who have different perspectives often involves advocating for one's preferred shortlist items.Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes you horse trade. But if you don't advocate, usually your preferred options don't make it to the shortlist.
Budget items, job applicants, even the damned catering menu, sometimes. I'm still quite pleased I got them to include a pepperoni pizza at the last work hobnob.
Yes, it's his job to advocate strongly for projects that are going to help our climate response.
My problem with Hipkins' statement is that afaik the GP wasn't involved. If Hipkins had said Shaw it would have made more sense in terms of getting the public up to speed on what actually happened. I don't blame Hipkins for this, it wasn't his area to comment in, but it's why I don't find that particular statement helpful as a reference point, it just keeps muddying the waters.
Shaw's 30 min explanation and 40 min Q and A (with MD) to the members was important not only for the response to members, but because he basically described the inner workings of govt in ways that are rarely seen. I learned a lot. I wish this was happening regularly.
I can now see why coalitions get so fraught in govt, if parties cannot appraise budget decisions to see if they are inadvertently likely to approve funding for things their policy opposes.
I wonder if the protocols binding the decision-making are in the cabinet manual, or simply agreed ad hoc for each coalition.
If the Greens had not had James in the frame as assoc finance minister, would they have been able to make caucus decisions on budget line items? I doubt it. Yet any funding decision ought to, in principle, be subject to Green caucus assessment. Or is that impractical?
I'm not up with how much say a coalition support party gets, if any, so maybe others are more informed & can elucidate.
I guess he could have had one of his Minister staff run it past GP policy. Not sure if that creates a conflict of interest. Maybe someone else needs to be assigned the role and asked to sign a confidentiality agreement.
I am ok with funding the green school. It's a business that attracts a lot of export dollars and it fits within the fund it got the money from. The perfect shouldn't be the enemy of the good.
However, some schools are in shocking disrepair especially in the provinces and Wellington. I know Auckland is growing but there is an extraordinary discrepancy between Auckland high schools and their facilities and what other school around the country have to make do with.
Contrary to some commenters here, I don’t think all the rich are ‘evil bastards’ by default. For me, context is important, i.e. how did they obtain their wealth and what do they do with it. The stereotypical ‘rich bastard’ is such a lazy label to declare one’s hyper-polarised prejudiced position that immediately kills any meaningful conversation.
for the last few weeks here there has been an ongoing campaing maligning 'overseas students' – buying visas to live here, scams, scammers etc and but this is not it?
It is. And frankly if this school wants to show us it is not just a nice to have unschooling project for the failing kids of the very rich then they can come public as to whom their target group is. Cause 24.000 NZD is a lot of cash for most people in this country.
This is not about all rich people are being evil, but most rich people don't pay taxes, do their best to not pay taxes, and their wealth has so far failed to trickle down to any of us. That i think is more the issue.
Young bright people like to acquire new experiences and explore the world. Some study overseas, some become au pairs, some do their OE after graduation. Some love a country they spend time in so much that they would like to stay or come back and then stay. We cannot have that, so much is clear, because some will abuse the system and our hospitality. Who do they think are, freeloading freedom campers in Aotearoa?
I’m all for a wealth tax 🙂 Hit them where it hurts the most, in their pockets, of course. Paying (higher) taxes is the only way they can re-pay their debt to society, obviously. How these taxes ‘trickle down’ to any of us depends on Government.
When they have ‘thieved’ enough [HT to DtB], they should give away all their ill-gotten gains instead of setting up a school to help others as it helped their children, for example. Like this couple did:
I'm not saying they are all "evil" as such. I object to visa buying on many grounds – I'm with Sabine in their failure to contribute to the community as taxpayers or in many other ways.
Nor do I agree with the wealth being used to buy a bigger say in the decision making processes in the community. if they wanted to just come on limited term visa and be heavily constrained as to what they can spend money on locally – no political donations no dragging in under paid staff etc etc . But we are also winding up with this "super grade of people who trot from country to country legally" and who then move on rather than clean up aany mess they help to create. Frankly Repugs from the USA really grind my wheels – it didn't work there so why should we allow them here. It's a bit like taking on all the priviledged leaders of say the old communist USSR.
The early sections of the book set out Sayer’s most interesting arguments: namely, that the wealth of the rich is unearned, and thus amounts to the extraction of value created by others or else simply speculation.
Just because it was legal doesn't mean that it wasn't theft.
Ad – Don't scorn Proudhon. At least his idea was an interesting concept. Nowadays we have sad dumby right-wingers tediously claiming that tax is theft. Oh dear…
I think your generalization may be a bit of a stretch.
Hubbard, of South Canterbury Finance, didn't really fit that model, which is part of the reason he was so easily ripped off by Key and his accomplices.
A level of incontinent greed is certainly abundant among the wealthy, as are a more innocent set of self-justifying assumptions about those who are not rich. But dishonesty is not obligate, merely frequent.
I think your generalization may be a bit of a stretch.
Nope.
To get rich requires economies of scale applied to income. In other words, income from multiple people being fed into one stream. To achieve that requires some sort of mechanism that takes the wealth generated by those people and transfers it to another without the latter doing any work for it. It’s called, in modern parlance, a passive income.I suppose it got its name changed because its original name, rentier income, has some rather negative connotations.
So, shareholders, owners of rental properties, speculators and capitalists in general are all supported by law that allows such theft.
As I was told when I was doing Amway: A person working will never get rich but someone who has many people working for them will.
As I said, the correlation is strong, but there are counter examples. J. K. Rowling became one of the wealthiest persons in Britain without recourse to financial jiggery pokery – she took the Oracle's advice:
If you would have innocent wealth, bring the bones of Hector out of Asia, and build a shrine to him.
I think that it is as much about the $,s from overseas students as anything else too ! I as a tax payer do not support this. Helping a private school for Kiwi kids I can handle … JUST ! Maybe if the access through the education system to become a NZ citizen was clearly and completely closed I might be able to handle that too.
The best chess players in the WORLD (who can play dozens of games blindfold) make mistakes in a game inside 64 squares that they have played for years – and in some cases decades – 20/20 hindsight is so cheap.
I think the horse has been dead for a while – will you please stop flogging it?
I gotta say, it's been fascinating watching all the special pleading, sophistry, pinhead dancing and wilful misrepresentation of critics that's been happening ever since it was the "good guys" that got busted screwing up.
Peter Navarro spending Saturday night on Jeanine Pirro's Fox show floating the possibility that China "intended all along to spread this virus around the world" and that they may have "genetically engineered" or "weaponized" the coronavirus. pic.twitter.com/hnTTYBmpGm
Whew. They're not asking everyone in South and West Auckland to get tested. That never made sense – that's around 500,000 people and testing capacity is only around 70,000 per week. They have yet to update guidelines on who they want to turn up, but I'll guess they will be asking extra hard for people with even the mildest symptoms and/or any conceivable connection to a case to get checked out.
Andre’s sarcasm was in Andre’s comment, not in the article that Andre linked to.
Just as well you’re not talking about the PM being accountable. At least, the PM is taking steps to correct the mistake and make sure it doesn’t happen again.
Some fool didn't read or listen to the instruction properly and sent out the wrong message. It would have been either a MoH staffer or a media outlet – or both.
I'm getting sick of these staffers or journos who botch- up and (maybe) put others at risk in the process.
Don't know how you are feeling in Auckland but I'm desperately worried about my income and family.
I guess it's ok for people not working because their life doesn't change with Covid. For those of us still producing it's terrifying and having someone from leafy Wanaka on the wind-up is not helpful.
Uh, IIRC Ad is still living in West Auckland (a Titirangi elite, no less) and Ad's workplace is also messed around with at level 3, and has alluded to disruptions from COVID possibly messing up plans to retire to Wanaka. Ad is sharing the disruption, not indulging in windups from a comfortable safe distance.
The latest Observer Opinium poll has Keir Starmer and Labour level pegging with the Tory government for the first time in over a year. Boris and his government have surrendered a 26 point lead in just over 5 months. Both parties are on 40%.
Not sure about blaming public servants and having an agenda to topple the government without giving some supporting links to this assertion. – Why did not Min Hipkins correct the message during his interview during the morning ? Or that it took until midway thru the PM's 1:00 briefing for a correction to be made when our PM was aware of this during the morning.
A) the media reported it from 5pm, but anyone in govt who was familiar with the particular decision wasn't monitoring the media.
B) the media reported it from 5pm, but anyone in govt who was familiar with the particular decision and was monitoring the media just figured that whatever media report they heard had fucked up the message and (being the weekend) they had no inclination or ability inclination to check the website at the time, and the media getting the message wrong is so routine they forgot about it.
C) the media reported it from 5pm, but anyone in govt who was familiar with the particular decision and was monitoring the media underestimated the fuckage they should give and failed to correct it or call a minister about it. Maybe they thought they could wait until monday, who knows.
Not sure about a govt dept consciously sabotaging – Looking forward to your reasoning to discredit.
Option 4 . The minions at comms once contacted by the media, time ticked by as minions were waiting for seniors(Government Group) to give direction and what actions/statements were to be implemented. Story progressed, and still at the time of the PM's 1:00 statement there was still no action with the oversimplified statement still there.
From the Herald timeline (seriously?This bullshit deserves a timeline? Oh well, what the hell) "contacted" can mean "called someone's cellphone" or "sent email to generic comms@-style email address". The latter can easily be a few hours on the weekend depending on their set-up (helpdesk is dealing with other shit, takes a while to escalate, comms minion looks at email at home, verifies issue, escalatesfor instruction, supervisor goes for placeholder statement while they sort out the web editors, maybe has to drive into office). At which point the issue was resolved within a couple of hours. And everyone pulls finger when Ardern gets asked about it, because before then they didn't know that a journo thought it was a massive fucking crisis.
I don’t think it’s deliberate sabotage Dennis. Just poor grammar really and a lack of clear understanding of what needed to be communicated. And the fact it took as long as it did to get it taken down is probably best explained by the fact it’s the bloody weekend and all those 9-to-5ers couldn’t be reached.
What’s annoying is the way the 4th estate all circle the wagons whenever one of their own comes out the worse for wear after an exchange with the PM. It’s getting bloody tedious.
There's probably some very exhausted public servants out there too, along with politicians and journalists.
The odd cock-up and / or over reaction is going to happen with what they've all been through in the last 6 months. Someone will be having an interesting meeting in the boss's office tomorrow morning, if it hasn't happened already. Shouldn't happen in the best laid plans of mice and men, but naive to think that it's not going to happen.
At one point since the message was reported I thought there was suddenly a battle between the MoH and the Govt over policy. Compounding this feeling was the absence of Ashley Bloomfield today…
I am not sure what all the fuss is about re the information about all Westies and Southies getting tested………….Not a biggie at all and maybe it got people back to the testing station which can't be a bad thing.
Honestly people, it is a harmless mistake. Confused and the likes must be as dim as two planks
No I don’t have it now weka. It came up on my Facebook this morning. The headline did say that everyone in West and South Auckland should get a test. But if you read through to the body of the text it was clear they were primarily concerned about people who were displaying symptoms or had any of the co-morbidities linked to Covid or were somehow connected to the Auckland August Cluster. It was clumsily worded for sure. But let’s be honest, you didn’t exactly need Mensa level comprehension skills to figure it out.
The media shitstorm that’s erupted over it today is just self serving click bait bullshit.
Very pleased to be in a country where the biggest political issue is a poorly worded govt comms headline & the questioning thereof …as opposed to, say, the US whose weak govt, growing political street violence, and raging pandemic is eerily reminiscent of Germany 100 yrs ago
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The Government has established class exceptions for border entry for a limited number of veterinarians, deep sea fishing crew, as well as agricultural and horticultural machinery operators. “Tight border restrictions remain the backbone of the Government’s border strategy to protect New Zealand against COVID-19 and ensure New Zealand citizens and ...
The Crown will not appeal the Court of Appeal decision in the Dodds v Southern Response case, Grant Robertson announced today. “Southern Response will be paying the damages awarded by the Court to Mr and Mrs Dodds shortly. The Crown was already meeting their legal costs for this appeal. “The ...
The Provincial Growth Fund is investing nearly $30 million in a diverse range of projects that will create immediate and long-term jobs and lift economic and social outcomes for Northland and its people. Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters and Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones made the announcement today in ...
The Coalition Government has committed to invest $27 million in COVID-19 vaccine development through the global COVAX Facility, Foreign Minister Winston Peters announced today. “The COVAX Facility is a key part of our COVID-19 Vaccine Strategy to obtain safe and effective vaccines. It allows us to invest in a high-quality, ...
The Government will provide up to $1.69 million through the One Billion Trees programme to Māori landowners to make their whenua more productive through the planting of forests, both native and exotic, and improve economic and environmental outcomes, Forestry Minister Shane Jones has announced. “Around 1.5 million ha of land ...
People planning to head outdoors now have a resource that lets them know how accessible an area is for people with varying levels of mobility, Minister of Conservation Eugenie Sage announced today. The Halberg Foundation, Sensibel, and the Department of Conservation (DOC) have launched Accessibel, a new tool which helps ...
One of the most significant battle sites of the 1860s Land Wars will receive $2.96 million from the Provincial Growth Fund to improve the site and help tell the New Zealand story to visitors, Māori Development Minister Nanaia Mahuta and Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones have announced. Nanaia Mahuta ...
The journey towards recognising Māori as an official language and taonga has been captured as a web series and launched today during Te Wiki o te Reo Māori, announced Associate Arts, Culture and Heritage Minister Carmel Sepuloni. “Te reo Māori is a living language, and understanding its significance, and pathways to ...
Today’s better-than-forecast GDP figures show the expected impact of the decision to act quickly to protect New Zealanders from the global COVID-19 pandemic. GDP fell 12.2% in the June quarter from March, reflecting decisions to close New Zealand’s borders and enter Alert Level 4. “This result was better than the ...
The Government is investing $39.7 Million over four years to support the educational needs of Pacific learners and families in the regions hardest hit by COVID-19, with Auckland getting an immediate boost, Associate Minister of Education Jenny Salesa says. “Like all New Zealanders Pacific families want learners to do well ...
New Zealand’s goal of 100,000 kiwi by 2030 is being helped by an extra $19.7 million in funding to accelerate iwi and community efforts to protect kiwi, Minister of Conservation Eugenie Sage announced. “$19.7 million of Jobs for Nature funding is being invested in kiwi conservation activities including increased predator ...
Ensuring New Zealanders can get the best deal on their electricity takes a step in the right direction today with the South Island launch of the EnergyMate pilot run by the Electricity Retailers’ Association, says Minister of Energy and Resources, Dr Megan Woods. EnergyMate is an industry-led programme providing coaching ...
Minister for Women Julie Anne Genter announced today that the Government has reached its target of 50 percent on women on state sector board and committees – setting a new record level of women on state sector boards. “This Government is committed to having more women in leadership roles - ...
Transport Minister Phil Twyford released today the final Government Policy Statement on land transport (GPS) 2021 which outlines the planned $48 billion investment in services and infrastructure over the next decade. “The final GPS supports our Government’s five-point plan for economic recovery by confirming our record investments in transport infrastructure ...
Three ambitious and cutting-edge research programmes that will lift New Zealand’s advanced energy technology research capability over seven years, have been supported by Government today, says Research, Science and Innovation Minister Megan Woods. The projects will each receive a share of $40.7 million investment from the Strategic Science Investment Fund. ...
The critical area for forensic examination known as Pit Bottom in Stone has been reached in what is a major milestone for the Pike River re-entry project, Minister Responsible for Pike River Re-entry Andrew Little announced. “The infrastructure located in Pit Bottom in Stone is of very significant interest in ...
The Government is working on how New Zealand’s retirement income policies and settings can best support Kiwis in light of the COVID-19 economic recovery, with the help of the Retirement Commissioner’s latest review, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Kris Faafoi said. “The Retirement Commissioner’s three-yearly review into New Zealand’s retirement ...
A new digital hub and development centre in Murupara will be instrumental in growing the region’s productivity, said Under-Secretary for Regional Economic Development Fletcher Tabuteau at the official opening of two community initiatives today. “I’m pleased to be here celebrating a significant milestone for two projects set to make a ...
PREFU shows economy doing better than forecast Unemployment to peak at 7.8%, down from 9.8% forecast in the Budget Year-to-June accounts show tax revenue, debt and OBEGAL better than forecast Global forecast downgraded as COVID-19 second waves and uncertainty grows Balanced plan to support critical public services, manage debt and ...
The Kāpiti Coast town of Ōtaki will receive $1.4 million in Government funding for two projects providing scores of jobs for locals while improving community facilities, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones has announced. The Māoriland Charitable Trust will receive a $900,000 Provincial Growth Fund (PGF) grant to upgrade the ...
The Provincial Growth Fund will provide $11.88 million to fund fencing and waterway projects nationwide that will improve the environment and create jobs in their communities, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones has announced. “These projects will create more than 100 jobs nationwide with work starting within the next couple ...
As part of the COVID-19 recovery, the Government has strengthened its procurement rules to ensure its annual $42 billion spend creates more jobs, uses more sustainable construction practices and results in better outcomes for Māori and Pasifika, Government Ministers announced today. Economic Development Minister Phil Twyford says the $42 ...
The Government is supporting a major upgrade of Timaru’s iconic Theatre Royal and the construction of a new connected Heritage Facility museum and exhibition space with $11.6 million from the Government’s Infrastructure Fund, Jacinda Ardern announced today. “We heard the call from the community and the council. The Theatre Royal ...
Chrissy Montague (formerly Armstrong), barrister of Auckland has been appointed as a District Court Judge with Family Court jurisdiction to be based in Wellington, Attorney-General David Parker announced today. Ms Montague commenced practice in Auckland in 1987 and went into general practice dealing with Wills, Estates, Trusts, Conveyancing, Relationship Property ...
A Proposal to provide for the development and operation of commercial film and video production facilities in areas of Christchurch has been given the go ahead. Hon Poto Williams, Associate Minister for Greater Christchurch Regeneration, has approved the Proposal, which was prepared and submitted by Regenerate Christchurch. Minister Williams ...
As part of the Government’s focus on building closer partnerships with Māori and enhancing the quality of, and access to, Māori medium education, a payment of $8 million will be made to Te Wānanga o Raukawa in partial recognition of its Waitangi Tribunal claim (WAI 2698), Associate Education Minister Kelvin ...
The Minister of Conservation Eugenie Sage has announced a $19 million investment over four years in an important forest restoration project involving a partnership between the Department of Conservation, iwi/hapū, the Bay of Plenty and Waikato Regional Councils, community conservation groups and organisations such as Forest and Bird across the ...
New Zealand will be the first country in the world to require the financial sector to report on climate risks, the Minister for Climate Change James Shaw announced today. The changes build on the huge progress this Government has made to tackle the climate crisis. “Today is another step on ...
Economic activity across the Auckland region and the country bounced back to levels experienced under Alert Level 1 following Auckland’s move out of Alert Level 3, analysis in the Treasury’s latest Weekly Economic Update shows. The analysis of economic data since Auckland’s move out of Level 3 shows: Auckland card ...
Takiri mai te ata, ka ao, ka ao, ka awatea, tihei mauriora! Tātou katoa ngā iwi o Aotearoa, tēnā koutou! Tēnā tātou e whakanuia ana i te wiki nei, te wiki o te reo Māori Greeting to you all from Otepoti, Dunedin. This week is the Māori Language week and ...
More mental health and addiction services are available for young New Zealanders in Rotorua and Taupō, Wairarapa, South Canterbury, Dunedin and Southland from next month, Health Minister Chris Hipkins and Associate Health Minister Julie Anne Genter say. “The Government is serious about making sure New Zealanders struggling with mental health ...
The Manuherekia catchment in Central Otago is the third exemplar catchment to be targeted as part of the Government’s plan to clean up waterways by supporting community-led programmes. Environment Minister David Parker said the Manuherekia catchment is vitally important to the people of Central Otago. “The Manuherekia rises in the ...
The Government has agreed on a preferred design for the new Dunedin Hospital featuring two separate buildings, and has provided funding for the next stages of work. Minister of Health Chris Hipkins says Cabinet has approved in principle the detailed business case for the new hospital, giving people in ...
New Zealanders across the country are set to mark history as part of the Māori Language Week commemorations led by Te Taura Whiri i te reo Māori this year. Māori Development Minister, Nanaia Mahuta says the initiative will mark history for all the right reasons including making te reo Māori ...
More than 1000 teachers, support staff and school leaders have graduated from a programme designed to grow their capability to use te reo Māori in their teaching practice, as part of the Government’s plan to integrate te reo Māori into education, Associate Education Minister Kelvin Davis announced today. Being trialled ...
The Minister for Pacific Peoples, Aupito William Sio, says the Toloa Tertiary Scholarships which aims to encourage more Pacific student numbers participating and pursuing STEM-related studies in 2021, are now open. “These tertiary scholarships are administrated by the Ministry for Pacific Peoples (MPP), and are part of MPP’s overall Toloa ...
Four Bay of Plenty timber businesses will receive investments totalling nearly $22 million through the Provincial Growth Fund to boost the local economy and create jobs, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones has announced. Rotorua-based sawmill Red Stag Wood Solutions will receive a $15 million loan to develop an engineered ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters has announced that New Zealand is exploring the viability of working with partners to conduct a search for the black box on the Gulf Livestock 1. “We know how much it would mean to the families of those on the ship to understand more about ...
The first leaders' debate lacked stand-out moments, but covered a wide range of topics plaguing the country as New Zealand feels the pain of the Covid recession. Laura Walters reports. Jacinda Ardern and Judith Collins have gone head-to-head on inequality, infrastructure, jobs, environment and the Covid-19 border response in the first ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Grant Duncan, Associate Professor for the School of People, Environment and Planning, Massey University Prime Minister and Labour leader Jacinda Ardern and National Party leader Judith Collins have met for the first televised debate of the 2020 election campaign. With the results ...
Analysis - Riding high on the back of a stellar public poll, ACT leader David Seymour was the standout performer at the finance debate in Queenstown tonight. ...
Who came out on top in tonight’s leaders’ debate? Here are our debate watchers’ verdicts. A bit knackeredGiven that most of the country, most of the Covid-battered world, is basically just knackered, is it any surprise that tonight’s opening debate felt a bit knackered, tooWhether it was in an attempt to ...
Labour leader Jacinda Ardern and National leader Judith Collins are facing off in their first televised election debate at 7pm, with a new poll out at 6pm. Follow live updates here. ...
The first leader debate begins at 7pm on TVNZ 1. Ready your pencils.Judith Collins, Jacinda Ardern and John Campbell all want you to have a good time during tonight’s first leader debate for election 2020. And so do we.That’s why we (well, Toby Morris mostly) have conjured up a bingo ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Harry Al-Wassiti, Bioengineer and Research Fellow, Monash University On Sunday, the Australian government announced it would put A$6 million towards the research and development of three local COVID-19 vaccine candidates, via the Medical Research Future Fund. The three candidates to share this ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Frank Larkins, Professor Emeritus and Former Deputy Vice Chancellor, University of Melbourne Australian university research funding is made up of discretionary income that comes from various sources, including international student fees. This is additional to the funding, including government grants, specifically received ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Frank Larkins, Professor Emeritus and Former Deputy Vice Chancellor, University of Melbourne Australian university research funding is made up of discretionary income that comes from various sources, including international student fees. This is additional to the funding, including government grants, specifically received ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Paul Haskell-Dowland, Associate Dean (Computing and Security), Edith Cowan University Plot twists in the TikTok saga continue to emerge daily, with a proposed deal to secure the future of the video sharing platform in the United States now in doubt. Under the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Greg Raymond, Lecturer, Australian National University Thousands of Thai students turned out over the weekend to protest in Bangkok — the latest gathering in a long-simmering movement against the power structures that hold sway in Thailand. The three core demands of students ...
Greater Christchurch Regeneration Minister Megan Woods has spoken about the government's decision not to appeal a landmark court case against Southern Response. ...
Dunedin general election candidates will take part in a My Votes Count forum event on 29 September organised by the Dunedin and Districts Disabled Persons Assembly (DPA) alongside Disability Information Service, People First, Blind Citizens New ...
Greater Christchurch Regeneration Minister Megan Woods has spoken about the government's decision not to appeal a landmark court case against Southern Response. ...
Greater Christchurch Regeneration Minister Megan Woods is speaking to media after the government revealed it has decided not to appeal a landmark court case. ...
What happened to the bridge, when will it be fixed, are we ever getting another harbour crossing – and how long will it take to get home tonight?Few of us remember a time before the bridge. Its eight glorious lanes run from St Mary’s Bay across the Waitematā harbour to ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Axel Bruns, Professor, Creative Industries, Queensland University of Technology Google’s role in delivering audiences to news outlets has been under scrutiny of late. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s initiative to redirect advertising revenue from Google and Facebook to news publishers has ...
Discriminatory laws that place unreasonable hurdles to increased Māori participation in local government need to be urgently reformed, says Nelson Mayor Rachel Reese. In a Nelson City Council meeting held on Tuesday, 22 September, Council resolved ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Vivienne Skinner, Industry/Professional Fellow, School of the Built Environment, University of Technology Sydney Australia’s six-month moratorium on evictions is due to end soon. Somestates have extended the moratorium, but when it ends that’s likely to force even more Australians into housing ...
On Thursday night the arts, culture and heritage spokespeople from Labour, National and the Greens will have a conversation on arts policy, facilitated by Miriama Kamo. We’ve got all their policies here, so you know who stands for what.Earlier this year, Ben Thomas wrote for The Spinoff about why politicians ...
Responding to reports that Cr Catherine Chu failed to attend over half of Christchurch City Council briefings since October , the New Zealand Taxpayers' Union says the revelation is proof elected local councillors must refuse their salaries while they ...
From next week, the scheme will cover people who have symptoms of the coronavirus and need to self-isolate while waiting for the results of a test. ...
Pacific Media Centre Newsdesk The Tabernacle Bible Church of Indonesia’s congregation from the Intan Jaya regency in Papua has fled into the forests in fear after the killing of a pastor at the weekend, allegedly by the military, reports CNN Indonesia. The church (GKII) says it believes Rev Yeremia Zanambani ...
When we first checked the Beehive website for press statements this morning, we found just one announcement – from the Deputy PM – had been posted since September 19. His news was that the Coalition Government has committed to invest $27 million in Covid-19 vaccine development through the global COVAX ...
The government’s decision today to slightly loosen border entry restrictions to allow in certain specialised staff crucial to the agriculture and fishing industries is excellent news, Federated Farmers says. "Feds has been strongly advocating ...
We recently built our own members platform so that readers can donate to and support our journalism in a more direct way. If you’re a Spinoff Member, here’s how it affects you. At the end of last year, our team was fortunate to receive a grant that allowed us to ...
Keep New Zealand Beautiful are excited to announce that three New Zealand students have won awards at the 2020 Young Reporters for the Environment (YRE) International competition. These three students were all winners from the national New Zealand ...
The government has announced more border exemptions and visa changes to help get specialised workers in the country and fill labour shortages in key sectors. ...
The National Party leader tells Duncan Greive what conviction means to her, and why she thinks she gets a different treatment to Jacinda Ardern.The first time I saw Judith Collins at close quarters, she was moving through what was inelegantly billed as the “National stakeholder party” held at parliament last ...
Being in the midst of a global pandemic does funny things to you, finds Michelle Langstone as she gives in to an overwhelming urge to return to the Auckland amusement park of her youth. I don’t know if it’s nostalgia working, but my husband and I had an overwhelming urge ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Blair Williams, Associate Lecturer, School of Political Science and International Relations, Australian National University The grand final of Plate of Origin will air on on Channel Seven tonight. Like other blockbuster cooking shows (think MasterChef, My Kitchen Rules), Plate of Origin is ...
The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union has released a list of questions that should be asked at tonight’s TVNZ leaders' debate – and at tonight’s separate finance debate in Queenstown. Questions for Jacinda Ardern and Judith Collins: Is tax theft ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonathan Barrett, Senior Lecturer in Taxation, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington The conservative tax policies proposed by Labour and National ahead of next month’s election are hard to distinguish in substance, with each party offering no more than a ...
Judith Collins says she'll be pointing out a "lack of follow-through" by the Labour leader while for Jacinda Ardern it is less about "sparring" than "directly communicating". ...
National wants to boost the capacity of managed isolation facilities by allowing private accommodation providers to join the government-controlled network and charge what they like. ...
National wants to boost the capacity of managed isolation facilities by allowing private accommodation providers to join the government-controlled network and charge what they like. ...
Covid-19 will not be going away any time soon and the National Party says we should team up with the private sector to let more workers and tourists in safely National have announced that, if elected, they will ramp up the private provision of quarantine to allow workers and long-term tourists ...
A joint statement by the national leaders of most New Zealand church denominations We urge the people of Aotearoa New Zealand to vote very cautiously in the two Referendums, because both decisions carry the risk of inflicting serious long-term damage on our ...
A celebration of 35 years working with whānau in the Heretaunga community was celebrated with a short history lesson, waiata and the cutting of the cake this morning. Iwi chair Ngahiwi Tomoana provided the history of the kaupapa Māori organisation which ...
Fonterra CEO Miles Hurrell says 2019/20 was a good year for the co-op, with profit up, debt down and a strong milk price. The result, a profit of $659m, may have brought a cheer from the co-op’s farmer-suppliers and Hurrell deserves a cheer, too, for succeeding in turning around the ...
Three weeks ago, the NZ Parliament enacted new Water Laws. The WHO says 1.1 levels Nitrogen for rivers is OK. We are already at 0.6. The new Law (The Greens) wants 0.1 Nitrogen, this is impossible and absolutely ridiculous! ...
Too much news? Welcome to the only round-up you need.The election was supposed to be over by now. We were all supposed to be free but instead we’re back talking about fiscal holes and house prices. Bit of housekeeping: there’ll be no more yes, no, huh? in this column as ...
In a time of growing ideological conformity within the New Zealand media, a backlash from the public has seen media outlets seeking to proclaim themselves as the arbiters of truth. The New Zealand media industry, once renowned for impartial journalism, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katherine Wynn, Lead Economist, CSIRO Futures, CSIRO Over the next few years, science and technology will have a vital role in supporting Australia’s economy as it strives to recover from the coronavirus pandemic. At Australia’s national science agency, CSIRO, we’ve identified opportunities ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Yun Jiang, Senior Research Officer, Australian National University Last month, the University of New South Wales came under harsh criticism after its media team deleted an article and tweet in which Elaine Pearson, the Australia director of Human Rights Watch, expressed concern ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Theodore E. (Ted) Zorn, Professor of Organisational Communication and Head of Massey Executive Development, Massey University When New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern was named the “world’s most eloquent leader” last month it raised the question of just how important eloquence is ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Collins, Professor in Nutrition and Dietetics, University of Newcastle Coffee is regularly in the news for its potential health benefits and drawbacks. A review of the research found drinking a few cups of coffee a day was associated with a lower ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bryan Fry, Associate Professor, School of Biological Sciences, The University of Queensland Funnel webs are considered one of Australia’s most fearsome spiders, but their ability to kill humans is by accident rather than design, our new research shows. In findings published today, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tracey Muir, Associate Professor in Mathematics Education, University of Tasmania Parents and carers were responsible for overseeing their children’s learning during the first wave of COVID restrictions in Australia. Many parents in Melbourne and some in regional Victoria will still be doing ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Marilyn Lake, Professorial Fellow in History, University of Melbourne Review: Vida: A Woman for Our Time, published by Penguin (Viking imprint) Australian women were not the first to win the right to vote in national elections. That world-historic distinction belongs to New ...
Welcome to The Spinoff’s Election Live for September 22, bringing you the latest on election 2020 and other NZ news. The essential campaign dates are here. For all you need to know about the cannabis referendum click here. For the assisted dying referendum click here. Explore the parties’ pledges at Policy. I’m ...
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Country outside Auckland now at level one, previewing the first major leader debate, and another error found in National’s costings.The alert levels will shift down around the country this week, with most of the country moving back into level one. Our live ...
Our Seas Our Future (OSOF) is encouraged by the Green Party’s marine policy to protect and restore our seas and oceans, as outlined in its Thriving Oceans Plan. OSOF representative, Noel Jhinku, says that the policy recognises the need to address ...
In an extraordinary exchange during a recent press conference our Finance Minister, when asked why the Reserve Bank does not write off the Covid19 debt, said “it isn’t the way we manage monetary and fiscal policy”. He did not say that it is not technically ...
“ACT has a plan to lift the restrictions holding back the tourism sector and give operators the tax relief they need after being hammered by Covid,” says ACT Leader David Seymour. “I’ve travelled from Northland to Southland talking to tourism ...
With voting set to begin in under two weeks, the Howick Youth Council’s interactive candidate forums have been the first successful community meetings held virtually in the Botany and Pakuranga electorates for the 2020 general election. The youth-led ...
New Zealand is already taking risks allowing Kiwis to return, so why not rich Americans, ACT says. A Southland tourism operator says it's a bold move, but won't get the industry back on its feet. ...
Wealthy people’s money grows at a faster rate than the economy, like a dam hoarding water while the city below grows thirsty. To conserve our way of life, we need to ensure wealth flows between the top and the bottom, writes Tax Justice's Louise Delaney Now both major parties have ...
We continue our week-long series on an extraordinary book of essays by Ghazaleh Golbakhsh with a memoir of the author from Golriz Ghahrman My friend Ghazaleh Golbakhsh is a film-maker, a writer, actor, Iranian, Kiwi, woman of colour, citizen of the world, and wild dreamer. Her new book of essays ...
Angela Merkel’s response to the latest refugee crisis only makes sense in an ideal world - in the real world it is dividing the EU and encouraging human traffickers, says Oliver Hartwich ...
While Covid-19 put the airline’s passenger business into a steep dive the airline’s cargo business has been climbing. It is now referred to as Air New Zealand’s green shoot.Mark Jennings reports. Aside from a massive one day sale of low priced domestic seats there’s not been a lot of good ...
Stephen Hoadley provides some context around US President Donald Trump's claimed successes in the Middle East On September 15, 2020, President Trump hosted leaders from Israel, UAE, and Bahrain at the White House. The event was the signing of agreements in which UAE and Bahrain normalised diplomatic relations with Israel. Trump characterised this ...
Kanyon Paul will wear the Warriors jersey in next month's NRL women's championship with the blessing of her late grandfather - who helped her make the decision to cross the Tasman to play. Kanyon Paul wasn’t meant to play for the Warriors women’s team this season. But her league-loving grandfather ...
The West Coast was promised $140 million from the provincial growth fund. David Williams asks how much has been spent The need is great, and it has been for years. The Pancake Rocks, at Dolomite Point, the foot of the Paparoa National Park, is a must-see natural attraction for tourists ...
On Saturday four parties that believe Covid-19 is being used by the government to impose social control put their differences aside to share a stage. Alex Braae went to Nelson to see where they were coming from. “If you question the government, you get called a conspiracy theorist. Why? And ...
Covid alert Levels 3 and 2.5 in Auckland impact credit card spending in Auckland, but our international online spend-up continues - plus Queensland hotels and apartments face empty summer ...
Open mike 30/08/2020 
Tonight, The Civilian will be live-blogging the first of too many debates between Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and National Party leader Judith Collins, and also the last fifteen minutes of the news. Be sure to tune in from 6:45pm for regular updates, which can be accessed by refreshing this page ...5 hours ago
Social Distancing Be Damned - It's Jacinda! Shortly after ascending to Labour’s leadership, Jacinda described herself as a “pragmatic idealist”. It was an inspired oxymoron – packing into just two words the essence of the social-democrat’s dilemma. It was good to know that she knew what lay ahead of her. ...9 hours ago
Back in 2017, the UK announced that it would ban the sale of new fossil fuel vehicles by 2040. Its a basic climate change measure, aimed at reducing emissions by shifting the vehicle fleet to cleaner technologies. Now, in the wake of the pandemic, they're planning to bring it forward ...10 hours ago
There are a fair few misconceptions about conditions within New Zealand’s Quarantine Hotels. Madeline Grant’s misplaced accusations being one prominent example, though she is not alone. Today, I thought I’d share the inside word, so to speak. A friend of mine has recently returned to New Zealand from overseas, and ...11 hours ago
Last week, major newspapers carried a full-page ad as part of the campaign for a "No" vote to the referendum question about supporting the Cannabis Legalisation and Control Bill. The ad was authorised by the SAM NZ Coalition, which takes its name from a controversial American anti-cannabis group and includes ...12 hours ago
by Ani O’Brien In the absence of a better word with which to refer to the rabid activists who claim progressivism while demanding adherence to an increasingly prescriptive set of political beliefs, I call them “woke”. With its roots in Black American slang, the term originally denoted a person or ...1 day ago
Over the weekend, the Ministry of Health reported a case of Covid-19 in Auckland that is not related to the current Auckland cluster. Before we start to panic, here’s how I think the case happened and how we can strengthen our current border controls. The new Covid-19 case is someone ...1 day ago
Many New Zealanders take a strong interest in US politics, with the death of Supreme Court Judge Ruth Bader Ginsberg being the latest example. Liam Hehir wonders if it very wise for New Zealanders to get so worked about it. Many politically engaged New Zealanders are now furiously ...1 day ago
After stamping the Coronavirus out via strict lockdown between March and May, New Zealand went through a good three months without any community cases. Then a local outbreak in Auckland rather buggered things up last month. Auckland’s been in level 3 and level 2.5 for the past six weeks. ...1 day ago
Story of the Week... Toon of the Week... Coming Soon on SkS... Climate Feedback Claim Review... SkS Week in Review... Poster of the Week... Story of the Week... The tipping points at the heart of the climate crisis Many parts of the Earth’s climate system have been destabilised by ...2 days ago
In the absence of national public opinion polls, we have had to make do in recent weeks with other guides to voter intentions. Those guides, such as the Auckland Central poll, the incidence of google enquiries and the responses to Vote Compass questions, have suggested, not unexpectedly, that Labour is ...2 days ago
Crusher Collins - National Party leaderWe all know that the National Party is desperate to gain some traction during this election campaign and have been throwing pretty much everything at the Labour Party in order to try and undermine Jacinda Ardern and what the Coalition Government has achieved. But unfortunately ...2 days ago
Much of the commentariat’s reporting of the most recent GDP figure was misleading and unhelpful. The prize for the stupidest remark about the GDP figure for second quarter 2020 (2020Q2) released on Thursday (17 Sept) goes to Judith Collins, whose response to Grant Robertson’s comments indicated she did not ...2 days ago
by Gearóid Ó Loingsigh goloing@gmail.com (19/09/2020) Che Guevara said that a true revolutionary is motivated by love i.e. love of the oppressed, the poor, the children dying from preventable illnesses. This phrase of his is true but has been used by reformists and their more hippy wing have taken advantage ...3 days ago
With the National Party this week announcing a new policy of tax cuts to spice up the election campagin. MyThinks went along to the launch and afterwards we spoke to the party’s finance spokesperson Paul “Golden Touch” Goldsmith. MT: Thanks for speaking to us Mr Goldsmith. PG: No. Thank you. ...4 days ago
Always to islanders danger Is what comes over the seas ‘Landfall in Unknown Seas’ (Allen Curnow)Six economic issues external to New Zealand, which will greatly impact upon us. 1. The Diminishing Global Dominance of the US. Since 1941 America has dominated the world economically and politically. Probably it could ...4 days ago
Tax Justice UK, September 2020 Serious tax reform is on the political agenda for the first time in decades due to the coronavirus crisis. As this debate hots up it is important to understand what people think about public spending, wealth and tax. Tax Justice UK, along with Survation and ...5 days ago
Although I had the fortune of being a graduate student of some of the foremost US nuclear strategists of the day (1970s) and later rubbed shoulders with Air Force and Naval officers who were entrusted with parts of the US nuclear arsenal, I seldom get to write or speak about ...5 days ago
At the 2017 election, the New Zealand Labour Party promised a Fees Free Policy for tertiary students. Basically, it would make the first year of university education free in 2018, with a second year in 2021, and a third in 2024. It also promised to restore Post-Graduate access to the ...6 days ago
So the Greens co-leader James Shaw recently made a mistake. In his role as Associate Finance Minister approving funding for “shovel-ready” projects, he fought hard for a private “Green school” to get funding to expand their buildings and, therefore, their student capacity. There are many problems with what he did: ...1 week ago-1f82146fa0d95608c5d921931b8dd46e7f0c9b1b/537110292.jpg?format=1500w)
Windows 95 is famous for requiring the shutting down the system by clicking ‘start, like stopping your car by turning the ignition key on. Why are so many interfaces so user-unfriendly? The Covid app to register your entering premises can be so clumsy. Sometimes I have signed in, sat down ...2 weeks ago
Tonight was the first Leaders’ Debate, broadcast live on TVNZ 1. It was the first time New Zealanders have seen Jacinda Ardern side-by-side Opposition Leader Judith Collins this campaign. ...2 hours ago
The Green Party is calling for Waka Kotahi the NZ Transport Agency to convert a lane over the Auckland Harbour Bridge to bus-only and make buses free to use across the bridge until all lanes are back in operation. ...1 day ago
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The weather's a little ragged here today, but there's a new cafe in the village – Jacob's Rivery Bakery, and it's wonderful; excellent coffee, vegetarian/vegan'organic food – I especially like the jackfruit "sausage" roll; the staff are super-friendly, vibrant young people, all of whom live in the village and locals have taken to meeting there; by design or accident, for all sorts of impromptu discussions and debates, celebrations and retreats from ordinary life. The decor is "plants", to my eye at least; there are dozens of glossy, well-cared-for pot plants on shelves and stands throughout the cafe, and I feel at home amongst them. The building is the historic post office with postmasters living quarters upstairs. The enormous clock that used to be fixed high on the wall on the street-face of the building sits in the local museum now; I wish they'd put it back up! If ever you are in Riverton, stop off there for a good time, before walking two stores to the north, where you'll discover the Riverton Environment Centre and everything on offer there, including a yarn with one of the volunteers there, a bearded chap who's willing to die in a ditch for the Green Party
A wonderful picture you paint Robert. We live in turbulent times and we should treasure those oasis of order and grace we do have.
One day we will get back home and I'll make a point of visiting Riverton. An old friend of mine once said, tongue in cheek, "New Zealand gets more civilised the further south you go. Somewhere around Mossburn it comes good."
Also you may enjoy this story.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/424742/lessons-people-can-learn-from-covid-19-lockdown-live-more-lightly-on-the-planet
I hope you will, RedLogix. I'll buy you coffee and introduce you to the native people of the area
" An old friend of mine once said, tongue in cheek, "New Zealand gets more civilised the further south you go. Somewhere around Mossburn it comes good."
Agree with that 200% How bloody true that is.
Late last year I was in that area for the first time in quite a while. I was pleasantly surprised to find good pies in Gore. Because I've heard so much about cheese rolls, I had to try them too. All I can say is, what is wrong with people?
.
Which is more than you can say for the people of Riverton.
Greens took 18 out of 795 total Party-Votes in 2017.
Just be mindful, Robert, Greenies have occasionally been burned as witches in Southland over recent decades. That's after they throw you in the river to see if you float.
Swordfish – I have, though not a witch per se, been singed many times in the past and had my buoyancy tested on more than one occasion by the good burghers of Riverton. Most recently, a minor kerfuffle over some painted-kindling caused crook'd fingers to be pointed toward the ditch-witch in his forest-garden, but that blew over with the first salt-laden sou'wester; I've weathered many squalls such as that, and expect to face more as the mood of the nation deteriorates along with the water quality, and the Federated Farmers find their muddy feet and big-laryxned voices again. Par for the course, for a provocative shaggy greenie who likes to string words together for effect.
Hi Robert. I have posted you in the past of our resident cock blackbird. He has a damaged foot which has bent in on itself. He manages very good and is looking splendid. I am wondering if you know how long these house wild birds survive in their natural environment. We call him pegleg because of his gammy way of walking. Over the seasons he has mated and reared many clutches of chicks in nests in and around our garden. He is very tame and will come when we call and all of our garden birds are fed every other day with fruit and wildbird seed mixed with wholemeal breadcrumbs and fat mixed. Pegleg is at least seven years old now and considering he was fledged in our garden and we never thought he would survive but he finally got airborne and the rest is history!! Is seven a good age for a blackbird in the wild. He looks as glossy and handsome as ever and is nest building with a mate right now.
I would be interested in your knowledge of longevity in blackbirds in the wild.
"15 years possibly"
http://www.tiritirimatangi.org.nz/blackbird
Oh hi, Whispering Kate – I remember well your blackbird posts and am pleased to hear your male bird is so well. The number 20 popped into my head when I read your question about longevity, but I think that individual might have been coddled (as yours are being by the sound of it
I can't really say then, as I read that some only attain 3 or 4 years before they make way for others of their kind. Ours seem to hang around for yonks, but I haven't kept a record. The several that centre their attentions on my garden especially love the worm-farm, not for the worms, but to intervene in their feeding by helping themselves to porridge-left-overs, sweet corn, home-made bread crusts and so on. I hope you get to enjoy your birds for a long time to come!
Thank you Robert. Yes we love our birds. Tui, fantails, kereru wax eyes and then all the blackies, thrushes starlings you name it. They make such a mess in the garden but then they give us such a lot of fun. They love our bird baths, tui dive bomb into them and the starlings bring the entire family – seven sometimes all in the bath together. Twenty sounds amazing and yes our birds are spoiled so who knows how long pegleg will survive considering his gammy leg.
I like Bernie Sanders a whole lot more now that he's fully put his shoulder to electing Joe Biden for President.
As well as his old policy and comms teams pushing the Biden team a long way into their platforms, anders himself is putting his considerable support base out there with new speeches:
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/08/29/politics/bernie-sanders-joe-biden-voting/index.html
The panel events, Sanders' team said, have racked up more than 850,000 views in all, for an average that exceeds 200,000.
With the Trump Republicans attacking the very voting process by actively sabotaging the Post Office, Sanders' motivational energy is going to be critical to replacing the current US regime.
Well that is a welcome spark of good news. Because so far while Biden is clearly the more worthwhile candidate, he's not winning, just like Clinton wasn't winning in 2016.
In normal times you'd have to think the village idiot could beat someone as clearly unsuited to the job as Trump. Yet the fact that the Democrats are not 30 pts ahead and utterly unbeatable right now rings a big fat alarm bell in my mind.
The Democrats always have the real problem that their voter bases is highly diverse, with often conflicting interests. It usually takes an eloquent and charismatic candidate to unify them, and this Biden ain't. If Sanders can help bridge this deficit and build some real unity in the Democrat base, it may just tip the balance.
It's hard to guess how much effect that will have on his base compared to 2016.
There's a solid component of his base that are middle-finger voters attracted by the idea that Bernie was going to stick it to the establishment. They will think Bernie going in to bat for Biden is selling out and they either won't vote or do a burn-it-down vote for Donasaurus Wrecks.
But if he can bring back to Biden a significant chunk of those that peeled off for Stein (or Johnson) or got taken in by the smears against Clinton and just didn't vote, then he'll have done a solid for the US and the rest of the world.
Sanders and team are being a lot more cooperative towards Biden than they were with HRC at this point. And people like OAC get that they can both reform the Democratic party AND back Biden against Trump.
It will take all of Sanders' base and all progressive others to vote, if they are to overcome the electorate border gerrymandering, Fox news dominance, and active polling place discouragement to change this government.
"It will take all of Sanders' base and all progressive others to vote …"
Nice setup – that makes it pretty clear who will be blamed if Biden falls short.
@Ad, "And people like OAC get that they can both reform the Democratic party" she (and you) must be completely deluded, the DNC would rather eat their own babies than offer anything to the progressive wing of that party…that is why they pretty much said (talking in political optics here) shut the fuck up and sit the fuck down, by not inviting her to even speak at the DNC convention…not sure why you can't just admit the DNC is 100% brought and paid for by corporate USA.
But then this shouldn't surprise me whatsoever, I seem to remember you are one of the liberals who think the FBI are now friends of the left, and seriously, you can't get much more delusional than that.
This is all a performance art routine, right?
Best absorbed through the artform of collective interpretive dance.
You didn't watch her nominating Sanders?
"I like Bernie Sanders a whole lot more now .."
What was there to dislike previously? Apart from the tendency to give the same speech over and over. Plus the damaging mis-characterisation of himself as a 'socialist', instead of a mainstream social democrat reaching back to the true values of America's past?
Uhh, a complete absence of any legislative success of any difficulty or significance, beyond leveraging his vote to get a few nickel-and-dime amendments. Which appears to be related to an apparent inability to compromise or showing any other coalition-building skills.
The short-fingered vulgarian still using songs after their creators told his team "NO". This time it's Cohen's "Hallelujah". They should have asked for "You Want It Darker". Probably they should also have tried to understand the meaning of "Hallelujah" rather than just assuming it was some kind of religiously fervid praise.
https://www.salon.com/2020/08/28/leonard-cohens-reps-say-they-specifically-declined-gop-requests-to-use-hallelujah-at-convention_partner/
It never seemed to bother the 'Born in the USA' users.
You mean the bit about Repugs using it against Springsteen's expressed wishes. or that the song is an expose of things that are fucked up about the US rather than the paean to American greatness that idiot Repugs seem to think it is?
Awesome clip, at the trump rally yesterday he used Phil Collins in the Air tonight, Phil Collins don't like trump.
Exactly.
Don't know if anyone else has posted this but supposedly Labour’s internal polling shows Chloe ahead in Auckland Central. And I don’t call 9% a “marginal lead”.
Greens 33 Labour 24 Nats 22
A decent Operator would release this as an internal hit from Chloe's team against Shaw, while he's getting a kicking, letting the members know that there are leadership alternatives.
Decent Operators are hard to come by. They should have imported some from the UK or Oz or hired Hooton.
If the Greens walked over glass and got Gordon Campbell back, or even godhelpthem Russell Norman, they'd be operating harder and tracking at 9 and not fucking up.
I have a soft spot for those who fuck up. I do it myself all the time. Getting over the threshold is good enough for me; they are not ready yet for Cabinet and by “they” I don’t mean individual MPs.
In Labour you don't get into Cabinet without a fuckup on your CV.
"Don't Fuck It Up" would have been a much better campaign slogan.
How is Chloe a leadership alternative to James?
Chlöe wears cool sweatshirts; James wears suits. Appearance and perception are everything. Enough said.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/fashion/122578671/the-story-behind-green-mp-chle-swarbricks-iconic-sweatshirt
Oh God you people.
There's no operators in the Green Party and Chloe isn't trying to replace James Shaw.
Just get a Gin and enjoy your Sunday.
I didn't think you meant that literally, i was just trying to point to your ignorance of how the Party works.
After the last 24 hours, most people on the planet know how the Membership works over a Green leader.
I am talking about the gender balanced aspect of the co-leader thing knob-end.
Please keep it civil. It was not clear at all that you were “talking about the gender balanced aspect of the co-leader thing” until you mentioned it @ 7:22 PM.
Surely it was obvious after i asked in reply to you @3.54pm if she was considering a change of gender identity.
No, it wasn’t obvious and that comment came further down anyway and was a reply to one of mine, not Ad’s – the nesting of comments has its downsides. It may have been obvious to you but most of us aren’t mind readers and it may help to keep that in mind and avoid acerbic follow-up comments 🙂
Hah! You dropped your poker face first.
but is she thinking to change her gender identity?
Cohen's song? Rules?
There is only one rule – 'I'll do what I want. You don't like it? Take me to court. By the time my second term is coming to an end the hearings will just about be done. If some pardons and commutation of sentences need to be done, so be it.'
A couple of educators share their ponderings on the purpose of education in relation to current social context: https://www.newsroom.co.nz/ideasroom/pandemic-shifts-some-education-myths
No, it needs a revision. The system needs to be made fit for purpose in the ever-changing world we're in. Lange faked that with Tomorrow's Schools in the '80s, but we know not to trust Labour promises.
Mythos is powerful in mass psychology, and when combined with bureaucracy it created an education system with awe-inspiring inertia. Guaranteed to defeat progress. Which is why the system never entered the 20th century.
When I passed thro it in the 1950s/60s it was clearly archaic but effective in mass-producing crap (such as mainstreamers, Nat/Lab voters). I encountered Summerhill in 1970 when it was a hot trend & that crystallised my feelings about how education ought to be done – but nowadays the necessity for real progress is more urgent.
Suitable leadership can still get the right results fast, and Labour deserves credit for proving that point currently. If only it realised that the same cut-through must be applied to the national curriculum! But connecting the dots is so hard for some. 🙄
Consumption of nature producing pandemics is gnosis too deep for most people to learn, I suspect: the causal relations are opaque unless you happen to be a microbiologist. Capitalists working with third-world govts will produce pandemics unless a greater force stops them. Business as usual.
The control system has a predatory relationship to nature though, and it determines the future via representative democracy. Kids must learn how to collectively defeat the left & right puppets the system uses. It's the only way to escape becoming victims. Therefore an education system fit for the purpose of human survival must be both radical and beyond left and right.
Anyone else get Bingo after three sentences?
My Mum might have once..
What's your arsehole score?
( 1.49 )
Over 100 years ago Charles Spearman made two monumental discoveries about human intelligence. First, a general factor of intelligence (g) exists: people who score high on one test of intelligence also tend to score high on other tests of intelligence. Second, Spearman found that the g-factor conforms to the principle of the "indifference of the indicator": It doesn't matter what test of intelligence you administer; as long as the intelligence test is sufficiently cognitively complex and has enough items, you can reliably and validly measure a person's general cognitive ability.
Fast forward to 2018, and a new paper suggests that the very same principle may not only apply to human cognitive abilities, but also to human malevolence. New research conducted by a team from Germany and Denmark suggests that a General Dark Factor of Personality (D-factor) exists among the human population, and that this factor conforms to the principle of indifference of the indicator. This is big news, so let's take a look.
[…]
Note: The Dark Core Scale was adapted from the larger test battery. I selected the items on an ad-hoc basis for entertainment purposes, but I do not recommend using the scale to make any sort of diagnosis. For more on the D-factor, go to http://www.darkfactor.org. To take the self-assessment created by the researchers of the dark factor study, go to: http://qst.darkfactor.org.
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/beautiful-minds/the-dark-core-of-personality/
My dork factor is sky high.
Miss 15's arsehole rating was off the charts the other day. But she's good now lololz 🙂 Teenagers, dang, it's almost like they can think for themselves 🙂 🙂
Now that significant volumes of end-of-life lithium batteries are becoming a thing, here's a brief look at ventures underway to recycle and recover value from that resource. Featuring JB Straubel, one of Tesla's founders, so it's about real life rather than just lab demonstration possibilities.
https://insideevs.com/features/441524/tesla-jb-straubel-future-battery-recycling/
More daily cases than the days leading up to 14/5 when we last entered L2 but Auckland's all set to go to level 2?
It's not the numbers that scare me. It's that sometimes new cases are still being reported as "under investigation". That suggests to me that new transmissions are still going outside the circles of contacts the contact tracers are finding out about. So I struggle with the idea that the outbreak is "contained".
People better be fkn careful and conscientious about masks and distancing and other transmission-reducing behaviour or we're gonna be back into level 3 or 4 in no time. And maybe not just Dorkland, either.
NZGovernment have just put out a request for ALL people in South and West Auckland to take the test.
Andre your closest one is in the New Lynn carpark next to the New Lynn Medical Centre.
Chop chop
Professor Nick Wilson called for Level 2.5 on Q and A on TVNZ this morning.
He said the request for all people in South and West Auckland to take the test shows the governments is not ahead of the cluster.
Professor Wilson called for much better mask use.
1 p.m…..
You beat me to it.
My God, some people are so f*****g stupid! This response from someone in West Auckland ( I think)
Because situations change. And when that happens the responses have to change. Read the newspapers, listen to the news. Get youself informed and then you won't be "confused" and kicking up ballyhoo for the sake of it.
Edit not working:
Addendum to above:
https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/300094975/coronavirus-everyone-in-south-or-west-auckland-urged-to-take-covid19-test
Btw I'm referring to the 'stupid' not you Ad.
'I'm so confused" – is Merve aka Roger Bridge back on the scene?
Lemme think, over the last three months I have had close contact (more than 15 minutes within 2 metres) with exactly 2 people. Those were my sons, who have already tested negative (tested because of attending Avondale College). Apart from that, I have walked past people and momentarily been within 2 metres of them (while masked) on maybe 8 grocery shopping trips in that three months. And they still want me to turn up so they can probe my brains?
Fuck.
I did it late Friday.
It's fucking disgusting. 🙂
It was negative BTW
Thanks. You're a true inspiration.
You'll be good Andre – person up! ( can't use man up). They will find a brain – worse outcome would be if they didn't.
sigh
Oh well, could be worse I s'pose.
Considering that then West and South Auckland probably need to be maintained at level 3 if not pushed to level 4.
No, they have not requested for everyone to be tested.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/300094975/coronavirus-jacinda-ardern-confirms-not-everyone-in-south-or-west-auckland-needs-covid19-test
God the PM just knows how to take all the fun out of a Sunday.
You chose to watch and listen? The liberty that those marchers in the Auckland CBD are so irresponsible about included the right to switch off the TV.
Here's a great song that tells you what to do instead. The late John Prine sung by John Denver.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icrM4_4T1qc
Professor Shaun Hendy on the point you make.
Thank you Ed, superb comment from Hendy there and wonderful of you to highlight it.
Every under investigation has been changed within a couple of days to the cluster ,just this morning minister of health statement we are going to level2, we know where all the positive have come from, almost all from in isolation
That just means that after the fact they have been able to trace it the path back to where it came from. Not that they have determined a reasonably reliable boundary around the risk.
There was an excellent comment on the Standard yesterday by SPC. SPC's post referenced two studies about how children spread the virus.
link: https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-29-08-2020/#comment-1746287
Professor Shaun Hendy has asked the Government to reconsider the planned move down to Covid alert level 2.
Professor Michael Baker was on RNZ this morning, calling for the wearing of masks by everyone at secondary schools. He is emphatic on the issue.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/sunday/audio/2018761759/covid-19-update-with-professor-michael-baker
to do an internal link on TS you either need to put the link in a direct line with some text, or you need to use the link tags. I've fixed your comment as it was linking to the post rather than comment (this is the default if the link is put in a line of its own without tags).
eg link: https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-30-08-2020/#comment-1746522
vs
those two links have the same URL, the first goes to the comment, the second reverts back to the post URL.
They should have delayed opening schools to Wednesday (3 week lockdown minimum – given new information that children retain viral load for 3 weeks).
That allows planning for social distancing at 2.5 and for people to sort out masks (which should be compulsory for children in schools, on school buses and indoor workers and in street queues).
2.5 for mine should include temperature testing for entry to buildings. And expectation people work from home if they can.
I suspect they eased back down a little early because Mof H bungled planning for a regional lockdown by not having pre granted exemptions for business activity.
If they were influenced by the plight of hospitality business and the looming election they had better hope General Luck is back on duty.
Because going back to Level 3 in Auckland, and to 2.5 for the rest if this spreads, will put an end to the Oct 17 election date.
They’re between a rock and a hard place (i.e. damned either way). I believe the (health) risk is higher than last time we came out of L3 and we need more luck this time.
Looks like fatigue to me. The government has been ground down by the brute stupidity of media. A win for the virus. Bring out your dead.
My feelings too. They are walking a tight rope I know, but better to follow through in the way they started , and I think tomorrow is too soon.
certainly appears so
yep. Also the economic pressures and Labour being largely unprepared for how to deal with this once the neoliberal model fails.
and, impending election.
I think they have been too accommodating of media. The Covid updates are a public health announcement – they should not have been contestable, any more than military announcements would have been in time of war.
The place for the kind of malign aggression media displayed, aside from lonely exile on the Auckland or Bounty Islands, was in regular press conferences, not queering the compliance pitch of an emergency public health announcement.
If, as I fear, we develop a growing outbreak in the wake of relaxing restrictions, it should called the “Morrah/O’Brian” outbreak, in honour of its sponsors.
that's a really good idea about separating out the public health announcements and the press conferences. Do the first, have break and do the rest a bit later. Gives people time to settle down too.
yep too soon for me too. At least they could go "no inter regional travel" out of Auckland and maybe the Waikato. South of Taupo seems to be okay.
But if people don't believe it has been beaten then they will stay home as much as possible anyway. So they won't be out spending money. So we will still have a lot of the economic impact plus the potential virus spread as well.
I'm outside Auckland and it has been very quiet although with no local cases people are starting to go out again. I'll be cutting back outings again from tomorrow. If they kept Auckland in I’d slope off for some skiing
Given that cheaper testing (spit on paper stuff is coming) this might be the last really major lockdown that we would need.
My worry now is that Aucklanders will bring the virus south, but I haven't been following closely enough to know what the risk is.
Ouch!
https://www.newsroom.co.nz/a-poem-for-james-shaw-1
Here's the right's latest poster boy for toxic masculinity cleaning up graffiti and here he is sucker-punching a young woman.
clearly it was self defense and economic anxiety.
I can't help wondering if he was even arrested a bit quicker cos it was white folks he murdered rather than black.
https://www.wisn.com/article/jacob-blake-friends-id-2-men-killed-in-kenosha-protest-shootings/33826154
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/08/29/fact-check-video-police-thanked-kyle-rittenhouse-gave-him-water/5661804002/
The USA is rapidly defaulting back to pre-1861 setting as a white supramacist, ultra capitalist, patricarchal theocratic state.
Y'all Queda enters Portland.
And tRump has his Horst Wessel.
PORTLAND, Ore. — A man was shot and killed Saturday as a large group of supporters of President Trump traveled in a caravan through downtown Portland, Ore., which has seen nightly protests for three consecutive months.
The pro-Trump rally drew hundreds of trucks full of supporters into the city. At times, Trump supporters and counterprotesters clashed on the streets, with people shooting paintball guns from the beds of pickup trucks and protesters throwing objects back at them.
A video that purports to be of the shooting, taken from the far side of the street, showed a small group of people in the road outside what appears to be a parking garage. Gunfire erupts, and a man collapses in the street.
The man who was shot and killed was wearing a hat with the insignia of Patriot Prayer, a far-right group based in Portland that has clashed with protesters in the past.
https://archive.li/9J0ak (nyt)
I have 1 suggestion and 1 suggestion only for those living in the USA. Get out as soon as you can, especially if you are black, female or LBGT.
They are coming for you. To be any of the above is bascially the same as being a Jew in Germany in the 1930's.
Ace ponticator Shane Jones out-performs Trump:
Experts in linguistic analysis will be studying this statement for decades to come, I suspect. University theses may even be written on what "stood call the Government didn't intend on doing" actually means.
Jones may complain that a Herald journo mangled what he really said in the interests of postmodernism – but methinks such false modesty from the hat won't persuade many.
That is the thing tho, this school is not going to harm anyone but the Greens, why? Only the Greens had a standing policy for over 9 years to not fund private schools – no matter how green washed the 'building' will be. Jones is dong what he always does, Labour can simply wash their hands in innocence, in the meantime the Green Party is getting not much love from many – other then here…. and i don't think that will be enough.
If i were any more cynical then i am i would suggest that the Green Co Party leader was set up to fail and he rant straight into this. But surely the Co Party leader of the Green would not be so stupid after several years now in Parliament. One would hope.
Nobody onsite here has suggested what ought to have happened instead. That collective failure demonstrates the inadequacy of all sideline commentators. They persist in not factoring in budget decision-making constraints that closed off options for James. The primary one being the pressure of GR's schedule!
Imagine the shitfight which would have erupted if he had rejected that line item: "Green Party rejects funding for Green School! Labour & NZF approved the funding!"
Experts in the psychology of brands wheeled out in the media would declare that the Green brand had been reduced to ideological twaddle by the Greens. Spokespeople for the Green movement would point out that rabid leftists were outnumbered by around a hundred to one in the movement. Since I joined it in 1968 that's always been evident.
So it's clear that the GP has dodged a bullet that may have proved fatal. I predict negative consequences will be minimal. Even leftists have to get real eventually…
Zakly!
Yep, but that would have been a minor storm dealt with by using the focus to highlight the Greens' education policy. Also, if there were one or two thousand applications for the fund, I doubt that turning down this one would have been a big deal. Plenty of others to choose from.
I do think both sides are essentially right here. The problem is that approving the Green School needed a different process, eg one whereby the school was asked to meet certain conditions around funding that were more aligned with GP values.
Again, what are you taking umbrage with? that i say outright that Shane Jones is Shane Jones and wont be anything else ever and he is not even worth discussing?
I am simply over the constant whinging by people here about this party that is not doing shit, that party not doing shit, while the government is good enough to fuck up on their own.
The school is literally just the another drop bringing the bucket to overflow. People losing their jobs, they are locked in their homes, they are told to be fearful of the unseen enemy and National cause Judith will be worse and then this dumb ass blunder by someone who should now better. – nothing i did. Sorry mate.
Us people here in no where land that are not rabidly partisan or super loyal partisan we vote every three years and only get to hope that it 'will get better' and chances are it will not. It never does.
So we look at the parties and their principles and hope to find something that works for us and vote for that then.
We have been educated on this site so many times about what the Green Party can do or can not do it ain't even funny anymore, and btw, often times it is literally just condescending, cause we can read, and we do read, and sometimes we even vote for them, or Labour. Cause not as bad as the other option.
I already have given him the benefit of the doubt. But you don't get to whine about Shane Jones saying its gonna go forward, and not also lay the blame at the feet of the others Parties involved.
Also, last but least, If the Greens would not have a standing policy of 9 years to not fund private schools – and providing money to build one – 'for the construction only' – is still providing money to a private school, non of this brouhaha would have happened and frankly that is the matter at hand. What in the name of a pandemic will be next on the 'nice to have but not needed anymore policy ' on the chopping block. And this is not a question only to be laid at the feet of the Green Party but also includes Labour and NZ First.
At the end of the day, people like me will go to the polls, hold their nose and put a cross under the name of the person they find the least offensive. Not the person who has a good program for the future but the least offensive – because non of the clowns in government actually have a plan for us living on the margins of society. And the Greens now fall into this category, because if this policy is no more valid, then what next.
And if you don't want to discuss this anymore i suggest you don't post links complaining about Shane Jones who says this will go forward. The Greens – thanks to their Co-Leader – happy or not about it – are Co-responsible for it, as James could have said this should not be included, but he did not. And they now need to shoulder this responsibility.
Really? Sorry, I thought I had.
What ought to have happened was that this school submitted their application and had it stand on its own merits without the Green Party lobbying for it:
So according to Hipkins, this wasn't a project that Shaw was merely put in the awkward position of announcing – Shaw explicitly requested it.
So my suggestion of what ought to have happened instead is that Shaw, or whomever in the Greens, had shut the fuck up about this private school in whatever meetings the subject occurred.
Clear?
Shaw explicitly requested it
Hipkins didn't say he did. Nor has anyone else, except you. Since James specified that he was approving it on the Labour/NZF basis of regional infrastructure development, we can't blame him personally for any Green lobbying that may have been done earlier.
You could be right, but I didn't hear him refer to such lobbying on the Zoom call, so I'll wait & see if anyone else did!
Anyway, I was referring to the other options James may have had at the point in the process where he was faced with an apparent binary option: approve or reject. Weka said the rules stopped him running it by the Green caucus for a collective decision. I've already pointed out why rejection would have produced a worse shitstorm for the Greens.
No, "approving" is not "advocating quite strongly for"
Stuff might have been misrepresenting the subject of the quote, or Hipkins was bullshitting and everyone has since gone with that just to keep the shitfight to a minimum, but that's the available comment.
As for Shaw finding himself in "approve or reject", that's when you kick it upstairs.
Not sure why you are referencing Hipkins here (again), he wasn't involved in decisions afaik and his first response to the question was to say it was nothing to do with him, talk to the relevant ministers.
Lobby is not quite the right word, because it implies that the Green Party from the outside promoted the project above others. Whereas my reading is that Shaw was part of the group that looked at more than a thousand applications, shortlisted them, and in that process he used a climate change and environment lens. The mistake was in not using a broader GP policy lens.
Still afaik, the Green Party didn't have anything to do with, it was Shaw and his Ministry staff.
Lobby might be the wrong word for "advocated quite strongly for", but your lens theory is not inconsistent with Hipkins' account.
Shortlisting things in meetings with people who have different perspectives often involves advocating for one's preferred shortlist items.Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes you horse trade. But if you don't advocate, usually your preferred options don't make it to the shortlist.
Budget items, job applicants, even the damned catering menu, sometimes. I'm still quite pleased I got them to include a pepperoni pizza at the last work hobnob.
Yes, it's his job to advocate strongly for projects that are going to help our climate response.
My problem with Hipkins' statement is that afaik the GP wasn't involved. If Hipkins had said Shaw it would have made more sense in terms of getting the public up to speed on what actually happened. I don't blame Hipkins for this, it wasn't his area to comment in, but it's why I don't find that particular statement helpful as a reference point, it just keeps muddying the waters.
Shaw's 30 min explanation and 40 min Q and A (with MD) to the members was important not only for the response to members, but because he basically described the inner workings of govt in ways that are rarely seen. I learned a lot. I wish this was happening regularly.
I can now see why coalitions get so fraught in govt, if parties cannot appraise budget decisions to see if they are inadvertently likely to approve funding for things their policy opposes.
I wonder if the protocols binding the decision-making are in the cabinet manual, or simply agreed ad hoc for each coalition.
If the Greens had not had James in the frame as assoc finance minister, would they have been able to make caucus decisions on budget line items? I doubt it. Yet any funding decision ought to, in principle, be subject to Green caucus assessment. Or is that impractical?
I'm not up with how much say a coalition support party gets, if any, so maybe others are more informed & can elucidate.
I guess he could have had one of his Minister staff run it past GP policy. Not sure if that creates a conflict of interest. Maybe someone else needs to be assigned the role and asked to sign a confidentiality agreement.
Good one McFlock.
They coulda said, we'll build your school and you can give us a 50% share in it, praxically.
What the hell does "praxically" mean?
Gabby has a naughty habit of naughtily mimicking Dennis…
ah, cheers.
in praxis
It's the constant references to the decaying empire I like.
lol…those go right over my head….but one must be practical.
Praxical?
now there's a word….that may be the next big thing
I am ok with funding the green school. It's a business that attracts a lot of export dollars and it fits within the fund it got the money from. The perfect shouldn't be the enemy of the good.
However, some schools are in shocking disrepair especially in the provinces and Wellington. I know Auckland is growing but there is an extraordinary discrepancy between Auckland high schools and their facilities and what other school around the country have to make do with.
Stuff the export dollars they are visa selling to the rich. I'm not interested in that.
Contrary to some commenters here, I don’t think all the rich are ‘evil bastards’ by default. For me, context is important, i.e. how did they obtain their wealth and what do they do with it. The stereotypical ‘rich bastard’ is such a lazy label to declare one’s hyper-polarised prejudiced position that immediately kills any meaningful conversation.
for the last few weeks here there has been an ongoing campaing maligning 'overseas students' – buying visas to live here, scams, scammers etc and but this is not it?
It is. And frankly if this school wants to show us it is not just a nice to have unschooling project for the failing kids of the very rich then they can come public as to whom their target group is. Cause 24.000 NZD is a lot of cash for most people in this country.
This is not about all rich people are being evil, but most rich people don't pay taxes, do their best to not pay taxes, and their wealth has so far failed to trickle down to any of us. That i think is more the issue.
Young bright people like to acquire new experiences and explore the world. Some study overseas, some become au pairs, some do their OE after graduation. Some love a country they spend time in so much that they would like to stay or come back and then stay. We cannot have that, so much is clear, because some will abuse the system and our hospitality. Who do they think are, freeloading freedom campers in Aotearoa?
I’m all for a wealth tax 🙂 Hit them where it hurts the most, in their pockets, of course. Paying (higher) taxes is the only way they can re-pay their debt to society, obviously. How these taxes ‘trickle down’ to any of us depends on Government.
When they have ‘thieved’ enough [HT to DtB], they should give away all their ill-gotten gains instead of setting up a school to help others as it helped their children, for example. Like this couple did:
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/300089556/philanthropic-kiwi-couple-giving-away-more-than-50-million
Redemption is possible although some will never forgive – once a thief, always a thief.
I'm not saying they are all "evil" as such. I object to visa buying on many grounds – I'm with Sabine in their failure to contribute to the community as taxpayers or in many other ways.
Nor do I agree with the wealth being used to buy a bigger say in the decision making processes in the community. if they wanted to just come on limited term visa and be heavily constrained as to what they can spend money on locally – no political donations no dragging in under paid staff etc etc . But we are also winding up with this "super grade of people who trot from country to country legally" and who then move on rather than clean up aany mess they help to create. Frankly Repugs from the USA really grind my wheels – it didn't work there so why should we allow them here. It's a bit like taking on all the priviledged leaders of say the old communist USSR.
The only way to get rich is through theft.
Book Review: Why We Can’t Afford the Rich by Andrew Sayer
Just because it was legal doesn't mean that it wasn't theft.
The only way to get rich is through theft.
And of course the marxist definition of rich is 'anyone wealthier than me'.
And there you go, making shit up again.
Proto-Marxist Proudhon said:
"La propriété, c'est le vol!" : Property Is Theft!
Though he was referring to property owners who "stole" profits from labourers.
He's not remembered for anything else.
Ad – Don't scorn Proudhon. At least his idea was an interesting concept. Nowadays we have sad dumby right-wingers tediously claiming that tax is theft. Oh dear…
Property Tax = double theft or thieving from the thieves? Bring on a Wealth Tax, I say!
Doesn't mean that he wasn't right.
It's apparent from this thread that 'anyone who can afford to send their kids to a private school' fits the bill however.
Seems a pretty good proxy.
Plenty of private school graduates in the Green Party staff.
I think your generalization may be a bit of a stretch.
Hubbard, of South Canterbury Finance, didn't really fit that model, which is part of the reason he was so easily ripped off by Key and his accomplices.
A level of incontinent greed is certainly abundant among the wealthy, as are a more innocent set of self-justifying assumptions about those who are not rich. But dishonesty is not obligate, merely frequent.
Nope.
To get rich requires economies of scale applied to income. In other words, income from multiple people being fed into one stream. To achieve that requires some sort of mechanism that takes the wealth generated by those people and transfers it to another without the latter doing any work for it. It’s called, in modern parlance, a passive income. I suppose it got its name changed because its original name, rentier income, has some rather negative connotations.
So, shareholders, owners of rental properties, speculators and capitalists in general are all supported by law that allows such theft.
As I was told when I was doing Amway: A person working will never get rich but someone who has many people working for them will.
As I said, the correlation is strong, but there are counter examples. J. K. Rowling became one of the wealthiest persons in Britain without recourse to financial jiggery pokery – she took the Oracle's advice:
If you would have innocent wealth, bring the bones of Hector out of Asia, and build a shrine to him.
Metaphorically, of course.
Ahh, the deserving rich…
We all deserve a second chance in life
…. and the endlessly undeserving poor.
Actually a lot of it is to do with random dumb luck. The really interesting question is what can you do to increase the luck of others?
I think that it is as much about the $,s from overseas students as anything else too ! I as a tax payer do not support this. Helping a private school for Kiwi kids I can handle … JUST ! Maybe if the access through the education system to become a NZ citizen was clearly and completely closed I might be able to handle that too.
The best chess players in the WORLD (who can play dozens of games blindfold) make mistakes in a game inside 64 squares that they have played for years – and in some cases decades – 20/20 hindsight is so cheap.
I think the horse has been dead for a while – will you please stop flogging it?
There's a grouping for you: against masks, the UN, and the government generally: Aotea Square raise the roof!
https://www.tvnz.co.nz/content/tvnz/onenews/story/2020/08/29/protest.html?auto=6185687995001
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmo3HFa2vjg
I gotta say, it's been fascinating watching all the special pleading, sophistry, pinhead dancing and wilful misrepresentation of critics that's been happening ever since it was the "good guys" that got busted screwing up.
Just fun teasing the moisties.
Lucky we didn't let them near serious Ministerial responsibility, or walk with tin snips.
Can't say it's been fun watching otherwise intelligent, politically aware people completely misunderstand how govt works.
Chose your characters…establish a plot…
Those cunning Chinese must have planned meticulously for yankistan to engage in collective fuckwittery. How did they pull that off?
Whew. They're not asking everyone in South and West Auckland to get tested. That never made sense – that's around 500,000 people and testing capacity is only around 70,000 per week. They have yet to update guidelines on who they want to turn up, but I'll guess they will be asking extra hard for people with even the mildest symptoms and/or any conceivable connection to a case to get checked out.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/300094975/coronavirus-jacinda-ardern-confirms-not-everyone-in-south-or-west-auckland-needs-covid19-test
And I am guessing no one will be held accountable for the mix up again.
Maybe an emotional junior staffer.
Indeed. As heaven forbid someone senior should take some responsibility
Did you miss Andre's sarcasm or just side step it?
In the linked article?
TBF yes. But it could just be me being thick. Wouldn't be a first.
I am not even talking about her being held accountable.
Andre’s sarcasm was in Andre’s comment, not in the article that Andre linked to.
Just as well you’re not talking about the PM being accountable. At least, the PM is taking steps to correct the mistake and make sure it doesn’t happen again.
… and there I was, just quietly enjoying the whooshing sounds echoing around …
Some fool didn't read or listen to the instruction properly and sent out the wrong message. It would have been either a MoH staffer or a media outlet – or both.
I'm getting sick of these staffers or journos who botch- up and (maybe) put others at risk in the process.
The error was within government somewhere. It was on the Unite Against Covid 19 facebook page, which is a genuine government communication channel.
That advice never seemed right. The PM was pissed off.
Didn't stop Ad getting excited and pushing it right here on this forum though.
Relax. Ad didn't make the screw-up. It was on an official government communication channel.
But he didn't question what was obviously an error. Most reasonably intelligent people would have questioned it, and not said, “chop, chop”.
Why waste a good opportunity for a wind-up and spoil it with expressing skepticism?
I'll get you one day you little scallywag.
Don't know how you are feeling in Auckland but I'm desperately worried about my income and family.
I guess it's ok for people not working because their life doesn't change with Covid. For those of us still producing it's terrifying and having someone from leafy Wanaka on the wind-up is not helpful.
Uh, IIRC Ad is still living in West Auckland (a Titirangi elite, no less) and Ad's workplace is also messed around with at level 3, and has alluded to disruptions from COVID possibly messing up plans to retire to Wanaka. Ad is sharing the disruption, not indulging in windups from a comfortable safe distance.
All true, but a little wind-up in there as well.
So much honesty, you could be a Green Party Co-Leader, one day!
"The criteria remained: anyone with symptoms or links to the cluster should get tested"
https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/30-08-2020/live-updates-august-30-government-renews-call-for-all-south-and-west-aucklanders-to-be-tested/
[content removed for breaching quoting rules]
Crikey, thanks for that info Robert and links etc. Much appreciated
The moderation thread, moderator? I'm not sure where/what that is but rest assured, if I did, I'd visit willingly!
The latest Observer Opinium poll has Keir Starmer and Labour level pegging with the Tory government for the first time in over a year. Boris and his government have surrendered a 26 point lead in just over 5 months. Both parties are on 40%.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/aug/29/boris-johnson-faces-tory-wrath-as-party-slumps-in-shock-poll
The tories have well over 4 years to orchestrate a hate campaign against him, no hurry.
Ken Loach calls out Sturmer for his complicity in the persecution of Julian Assange
https://labourheartlands.com/exclusive-ken-loach-calls-out-sir-keir-starmer-what-was-his-dealings-in-the-julian-assange-case/
"I'm getting really sick of guys named Todd…"
That little gem comes at the 13:15 mark…
Adasenya or Costa?
MMA or MMP?
(hmm…)
Defending NZ from crazy British newspaper columnists:
Of New Zealand and Lockdowns: A Reply to Madeline Grant
Amazing. Public servants once again trying to destabilise the govt. Just saw the PM on Newshub say she's "incredibly angry".
Not sure about blaming public servants and having an agenda to topple the government without giving some supporting links to this assertion. – Why did not Min Hipkins correct the message during his interview during the morning ? Or that it took until midway thru the PM's 1:00 briefing for a correction to be made when our PM was aware of this during the morning.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12360705
Seems there's a couple of options:
A) the media reported it from 5pm, but anyone in govt who was familiar with the particular decision wasn't monitoring the media.
B) the media reported it from 5pm, but anyone in govt who was familiar with the particular decision and was monitoring the media just figured that whatever media report they heard had fucked up the message and (being the weekend) they had no inclination or ability inclination to check the website at the time, and the media getting the message wrong is so routine they forgot about it.
C) the media reported it from 5pm, but anyone in govt who was familiar with the particular decision and was monitoring the media underestimated the fuckage they should give and failed to correct it or call a minister about it. Maybe they thought they could wait until monday, who knows.
Not sure about a govt dept consciously sabotaging – Looking forward to your reasoning to discredit.
Option 4 . The minions at comms once contacted by the media, time ticked by as minions were waiting for seniors(Government Group) to give direction and what actions/statements were to be implemented. Story progressed, and still at the time of the PM's 1:00 statement there was still no action with the oversimplified statement still there.
From the Herald timeline (seriously? This bullshit deserves a timeline? Oh well, what the hell) "contacted" can mean "called someone's cellphone" or "sent email to generic comms@-style email address". The latter can easily be a few hours on the weekend depending on their set-up (helpdesk is dealing with other shit, takes a while to escalate, comms minion looks at email at home, verifies issue, escalatesfor instruction, supervisor goes for placeholder statement while they sort out the web editors, maybe has to drive into office). At which point the issue was resolved within a couple of hours. And everyone pulls finger when Ardern gets asked about it, because before then they didn't know that a journo thought it was a massive fucking crisis.
I don’t think it’s deliberate sabotage Dennis. Just poor grammar really and a lack of clear understanding of what needed to be communicated. And the fact it took as long as it did to get it taken down is probably best explained by the fact it’s the bloody weekend and all those 9-to-5ers couldn’t be reached.
What’s annoying is the way the 4th estate all circle the wagons whenever one of their own comes out the worse for wear after an exchange with the PM. It’s getting bloody tedious.
do you have a link to the original? Wouldn't mind seeing the whole thing.
https://www.google.com/search?q=covid+statement+south+and+west+auckland&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwjNr9vaw8LrAhUfMbcAHXa_AKwQ2-cCegQIABAA&oq=covid+statement+south+and+west+auckland&gs_lcp=CgNpbWcQAzoECCMQJzoCCAA6BggAEAUQHjoGCAAQCBAeOgQIABAYUIE3WNdeYNJlaABwAHgBgAG-AogBpTCSAQgwLjEuMjYuMZgBAKABAaoBC2d3cy13aXotaW1nwAEB&sclient=img&ei=4WVLX427KZ_i3LUP9v6C4Ao&bih=631&biw=1280#imgrc=N692TvpLysRwbM
Thos search gives you the link
Important Message
If your in South or West Auckland please have a test
thanks, I know how to use google. Afaik, those aren't the full version eg I've seen a screen shot of the FB post image that isn't on that page.
There's probably some very exhausted public servants out there too, along with politicians and journalists.
The odd cock-up and / or over reaction is going to happen with what they've all been through in the last 6 months. Someone will be having an interesting meeting in the boss's office tomorrow morning, if it hasn't happened already. Shouldn't happen in the best laid plans of mice and men, but naive to think that it's not going to happen.
Didn't stop Ad using it as a troll moment.
At one point since the message was reported I thought there was suddenly a battle between the MoH and the Govt over policy. Compounding this feeling was the absence of Ashley Bloomfield today…
…that is all conspiracy theory stuff though.
Exhausting weekend!
I am not sure what all the fuss is about re the information about all Westies and Southies getting tested………….Not a biggie at all and maybe it got people back to the testing station which can't be a bad thing.
Honestly people, it is a harmless mistake. Confused and the likes must be as dim as two planks
No I don’t have it now weka. It came up on my Facebook this morning. The headline did say that everyone in West and South Auckland should get a test. But if you read through to the body of the text it was clear they were primarily concerned about people who were displaying symptoms or had any of the co-morbidities linked to Covid or were somehow connected to the Auckland August Cluster. It was clumsily worded for sure. But let’s be honest, you didn’t exactly need Mensa level comprehension skills to figure it out.
The media shitstorm that’s erupted over it today is just self serving click bait bullshit.
The spinoff appears to have the text here, the twitter account as printed doesn't support your disparaging comment regarding comprehension.
https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/30-08-2020/live-updates-august-30-government-renews-call-for-all-south-and-west-aucklanders-to-be-tested/
Precisely. End of story.
It has been a tough weekend in some quarters. Let me recommend Irresistible if you haven't seen it.
And me.
Clint You are so right.
Yes it is…but the distance between the two is closer than you think