Lmao !! A friend was taught woodwork by brownlee, he said that brownlee was a useless bully of a teacher who spent most of his time in his office chasing political dreams.
Cheers, Cinny – I’m well aware Brownlee was hopeless in the classroom – but worse than as the minister in charge of the ChCh rebuild? Or as foreign minister?
No, I think with his experience he could just about manage to fuck up teaching apprentices!
Apologies in advance (I withdraw and unreservedly apologise Mr Speaker).
He’s quite good at balancing a Metroliner (pencil plane) when seat allocations have gone awry and caused most passengers to be placed on the same side.
Thankfully Metroliners have already been phased out, and hopefully Brownlee soon will be.
Carbon dioxide levels grew at record pace in 2016, U.N. says
ReutersOctober 30, 2017
By Tom Miles
GENEVA (Reuters) – The amount of carbon dioxide in the earth’s atmosphere grew at record rate in 2016 to a level not seen for millions of years, potentially fuelling a 20-metre rise in sea levels and adding 3 degrees to temperatures, the United Nations said on Monday.
Related SearchesCarbon DioxideWhat Is Carbon DioxideCo2 LevelsCarbon Dioxide Levels In BloodCarbon Dioxide Poisoning
Atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2), the main man-made greenhouse gas, hit 403.3 parts per million (ppm), up from 400.0 in 2015, the U.N. World Meteorological Organization said in its annual Greenhouse Gas Bulletin.
That growth rate was 50 percent faster than the average over the past decade, driving CO2 levels 45 percent above pre-industrial levels and further outside the range of 180-280 ppm seen in recent cycles of ice ages and warmer periods.
“Today’s CO2 concentration of ~400 ppm exceeds the natural variability seen over hundreds of thousands of years,” the WMO bulletin said.
The latest data adds to the urgency of a meeting in Bonn next month, when environment ministers from around the world will work on guidelines for the Paris climate accord backed by 195 countries in 2015.
The agreement is already under pressure because U.S. President Donald Trump has said he plans to pull the United States out of the deal, which seeks to limit the rise in temperatures to “well below” 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial times.
Human CO2 emissions from sources such as coal, oil, cement and deforestation reached a record in 2016, and the El Niño weather pattern gave CO2 levels a further boost, the WMO said.
As far as scientists can tell, the world has never experienced a rise in carbon dioxide like that of recent decades, which has happened 100 times faster than when the world was emerging from the last ice age.
Scientists know prehistoric levels from tiny air bubbles found in ancient Antarctic ice cores, and they can derive even older data from fossils and chemicals trapped in sediment.
The last time carbon dioxide levels reached 400 ppm was 3-5 million years ago, in the mid-Pliocene era.
“During that period, global mean surface temperatures were 2–3°C warmer than today, ice sheets in Greenland and West Antarctica melted and even parts of East Antarctica’s ice retreated, causing the sea level to rise 10–20 m higher than that today,” the WMO bulletin said.
Since 1990, the global warming effect of CO2 and other long-lived greenhouse gases has risen by 40 percent. The two other main gases – methane and nitrous oxide – also grew to record concentrations last year, although at a slower rate of increase than carbon dioxide.
(Reporting by Tom Miles; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
Well now this will be interesting, is this the marker that will determine how this government goes?
Meaning theres a lot of people that support the TPP (mostly on the right) but a lot of Labour/NZFirst/Green supporters didn’t so it’ll be interesting to see how large a rat Jacinda is willing to swallow…or how much slack the left will give her if she fails
…or how accurately the media will present this story of Labour once again having to clean up after the Tory fuckwits. From the linked story:
Essentially, the pair will be asserting their country’s right to prevent foreign speculators from purchasing urban property and farmland within its borders. A right the previous National Government, for reasons it never adequately explained, failed to assert. A right reserved by just about every other signatory to the TPP agreement.
Yet another example of those sharp negotiation skills National brought to the Warner Bros deal and the Auckland convention centre. What will genuinely be interesting is the limits on the ability of a competent government to correct the egregious failures of an incompetent predecessor. My money’s on “strong limits.”
Chris73…………….Finlayson, you sold us out when you allowing your national Party to sign TPPA in Auckland against the will of the people, and was that a “good thing”??????????
“… A right the previous National Government, for reasons it never adequately explained, failed to assert…”
I know a guy who is/was part of the negotiating team for TPP, a very short fellow with an enormous short man syndrome. He started life a self-interested liberal and rapidly shifted to full blown free market ideology fanatic. These days spends his time doing his best to channel the distainful and dismissive arrogance of Chris Finlayson to anyone who questions the NZ bureaucratic establishments absolute commitment to free market ideology.
The signing away of our rights to control who can buy land is typical of the sort of attitude of this guy and his ilk, a class of diplomats and officials who consider themselves global Galtians above the petty interests of the grubby people who live in anachronistic nation states.
Nothing incompetent with National’s negotiating here. Seems clear that this was a deliberate block to stop future governments doing what this government now wants to do.
“A right the previous National Government, for reasons it never adequately explained, failed to assert.”
During the Leaders Debate Jacinda asked Bill several times why not? Bill mumbled that it was just not a concern for them.
Yes, I have read the claims from David Parker that the changes that can be made to the TPP11 may be limited. We have the key elements that need to be addressed to make the document attractive to NZ. Things like:
• Removal investor state dispute resolution through a non-court environment
• Land and home ownership restrictions being introduced
• IP protections being toned down from USA demands
But the over-riding issue is that the Treaty should leave NZ better off. To do this the cost benefit analysis needs to be done and it needs to stack up. Last year’s run through with the full TPPA (with the USA included) gave a net benefit to NZ that was well within the margins of error. Removing the USA may well remove the net upside of the proposed TPP11, if so why are we even going there.
Somehow this TPP Agreement seems to have got a life of its own. The pressure to do the deal appears to outweigh the benefits of the deal: negotiators have the equivalence of Gold Fever.
Pressure on NZ to sign a deal is manufactured. Most of the other participants will realize that there has been a recent election in NZ that produced a Government whose members have reservations about the existing construct of the document and we a body politic that does not support the concept. Pressure to sign is created by the bureaucrats – it has all the signs of being something straight out of “Yes Minister.”
Grant Roberstson’s backsliding recently has revealed him as the self-serving managerialist and self-serving careerist he always has been, and just now this morning David Parker has been backsliding and being tricky on the TPP.
Labour needs to understand they were elected on a change platform. If the likes of Parker and Robeertson are allowed to let Labour slip into business as usual, neoliberal managerialism they will lose – and lose badly – in 2020.
The only extra votes that Labour can get have to come from National. They will not be won by a hard left programme. They will only be persuaded if the govt is seen as reasonable. Anyone voting National does not want increased taxes, they do not want hard left radicalism. They expect a reasonably moderate government. That is true even of soft National voters.
So they will give credit to Jacinda when she gets things like TPP done. If she is seen as fixing the things that concern New Zealanders, without embarking on a revolution she will probably win over some of the soft National voters.
Your approach will mean she would only have one three year term. Some of the NZF vote and in fact some of the right end of Labour vote would swing back to National. It has happened before, as in 1975.
It does rather look like Labour is going to end up spending some of is time battling against Standardnistas, just as they had to in respect of New Labour and the Alliance.
It’s true that we did increase voter turnout (and the number of enrolled voters) this time, OAB, and that definitely seems to have favoured the left. In my electorate (Dunedin North) a lot of younger voters signed up and voted during the two weeks before election day and the Labour vote went up significantly (a bit more than 15%). Having said that, there’s an element of truth in what Wayne says – any major party that wants to increase its vote needs to be acceptable to ordinary, non-political NZers. In particular, on the left, people with strong left wing views are likely to favour the Greens, and pulling them away to Labour only rearranges the left vote, rather than increasing it. The people on this site who constantly campaign to “turn Labour left” need to think through some political realities.
That doesn’t mean that Labour shouldn’t be a party of the left (it is) or that it shouldn’t be true to its principals and to its election promises (it should), but a hard left agenda isn’t likely to win the day with middle of the road voters, and they’re the ones who decide the government, when push comes to shove.
I agree with some of what you say Wayne. Jacinda and co. will be given credit if they are seen to be “fixing the things that concern New Zealanders without embarking on a revolution….“. I am in no doubt that will be the approach of this Labour-led government because – contrary to the attempt by National to paint them otherwise – they have always been reasonable and moderate in government but with a more socially responsible bent.
As for 1975. This isn’t the first time you have raised the spectre of the 72/75 Labour govt. as being “radical and hard left prompting the voters to swing back to National.” They swung to National because Muldoon dangled the biggest election bribe in NZ’s history in front of their middle-aged noses. I refer to the reduction of the age of Super entitlement to 60 years and increasing the amount to 80% of the average wage – a bribe we’re still paying dearly for today.
It is time you stopped peddling that myth. It does not become your elder statesman persona.
I agree with your last sentence – the comments do reveal the truth rather than the crafted image, bit like hootons slip ups, and is therefore valuable. It is too easy to think other people are as nice as us when they aren’t imo ☺
They swung back to National, when they introduced “hard left” type welfare policies, like lowering the super age. Funny that. Doesn’t exactly agree with Wayne’s take on things.
Again, this election, National tried to hide the poverty and unemployment figures. Each election National pretend to be more “left” than they are. Because National, and Crosby Textor, know what voters want.
moderate people do not engage in actions which result in child killing ….not even for trade deals, Wayne.
Racist dishonest warmongers like yourself can not actually be termed ‘moderate’.
If we were to Fix up John Keys and your National party tax segregation laws ……. then everyone who does not use creative accounting or tax havens would pay less tax.
I was not going to engage with you. However, I consider I must on the basis of defending New Zealand soldiers. No-one in the New Zealand Defence Force would ever deliberately undertake an action that they knew was likely to result in the death of civilians.
Recall in this instance the overall mission to Baghlan province was specifically approved by Sir Jerry Mateparae, the Chief of the Defence Force at the time. He is a man of integrity.
As has been explained numerous times, what happened was an accident, being the result of a faulty weapon in a US helicopter.
And New Zealand is not in Afghanistan because of trade deals. That is a slander on Helen Clark and her government, as much as it on National.
Both governments have been part of the overall Afghanistan mission because both thought it the right thing to do. It does, after all, have its origins in the Al Quaeda attack on the World Trade Centre. President Obama referred to Afghanistan as the right war, as opposed to Iraq, which was the wrong war. Helen Clark as PM agreed with that.
The only extra votes that Labour can get have to come from National. They will not be won by a hard left programme. They will only be persuaded if the govt is seen as reasonable. … That is true even of soft National voters.
So they will give credit to Jacinda when she gets things like TPP done.
(1) While it would certainly be a bonus, there is no absolute necessity for Labour to make further in-roads into National support in order to remain in Govt
(2) Winning Elections & maintaining your Party Vote are as much about holding on to your own voters as winning over new ones
An overwhelming 73% of Labour voters opposed TPP in one of the last Polls on the issue (3 News Reid Research) along with 87% of NZ First Supporters & 84% of Greens
(3) Even 23% of intending Nat voters were opposed – probably the more softly-aligned ones
A Colmar Brunton published around the same time suggested a similarly large-ish minority of Nat opposition at 26% (with another 37% Unsure)
The only extra votes that Labour can get have to come from National.
And Labour teaming up with National will have them losing pretty much all their votes.
They expect a reasonably moderate government.
Translation: They expect a Labour led government that kowtows to National’s radical right-wing ideology.
If she is seen as fixing the things that concern New Zealanders, without embarking on a revolution…
She can’t do it that way but I don’t think she, and the rest of Labour/NZ1st, realise that yet.
Capitalism doesn’t work as history has proven time and time again thus we need to shift away from capitalism.
It has happened before, as in 1975.
Ah yes, National’s first truly successful scare campaign of dancing cossacks followed by the biggest electoral bribe ever. A bribe that we’re still paying for.
It does rather look like Labour is going to end up spending some of is time battling against Standardnistas
That’s better than the sycophantic following of the RWNJs for whatever their leader of the time says.
@Sanctuary, totally agree about Robertson, I think hes a very weak link in the chain, but unfortunately holds a most powerful portfolio. He doesnt give me the impression that he has a clear understanding of Finance…..I am probABLY wrong.
Interesting that the WhiteHouse is desperately trying to deflect from the Manafort indictment by replaying the greatest hits from “but Hill-a-reeee”. That’s sooo 2016.
Hillary is a fading has-been that will never again do anything significant. t-Rump is where the action is now. He da man making da decisions that actually affect people.
While I doubt Tyrannosaurus Arse is aware of Shrub’s popularity boost after 9/11 or its relevance to his situation, no doubt “they” are. So it’s a definite worry.
I have only recently become aware of Paul Mannafort after watching ‘Get me Roger Stone’.
A doco on a political insider who started out in the Nixon years.
Amongst other things, Stone got trump to stand against Buchanan in a third party leadership challenge for the presidency. Thus discrediting the third party and ensuring a win for the republicans (Bush snr.)
Looks like the old it wasn’t me, ref, it must have been some other bloke won’t wash.
In fact, Papadopoulos’ crime relates expressly to campaign activity, specifically, offers of meetings w/Russians offering “dirt” on Clinton https://t.co/S09lvchQuP— Jim Sciutto (@jimsciutto) October 30, 2017
President Trump’s longtime attorney Michael Cohen will be a deputy national finance chairman of the Republican National Committee, the RNC announced on Monday.
Cohen served as executive vice president special counsel to Trump at the Trump Organisation and sat on multiple boards of other Trump corporations.
The RNC said in the press release that Cohen has “been an active spokesperson and advisor for the President during his interest in seeking office since 2011.”
A company listed in the Monday indictment of former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and his associate Rick Gates received funds from the Republican National Committee for work done in coordination with Donald Trump’s election campaign.
Bade LLC, listed in the indictment among 17 domestic entities that Manafort and Gates are alleged to have used to hide foreign earnings, particularly from Ukraine, was paid a total of $70,000 in three payments by the Republican National Committee in September 2016, October 2016 and January 2017.
The payments, all for “political strategy services,” each list an address associated with Gates.
President Donald Trump dismissed the indictment in a Monday morning tweeting, saying the activities were “years ago, before Paul Manafort was part of the Trump campaign.
But the first page of the grand jury indictment charges that “In order to hide Ukraine payments from United States authorities, from approximately 2006 through at least 2016, Manafort and Gates laundered the money through scores of United States and foreign corporations, partnerships and bank accounts.”
attorney-client privilege might be a solid firewall
Or not.
Prosecutors convinced a federal judge to require a lawyer for Trump campaign officials Paul Manafort and Rick Gates to testify before the grand jury investigating Russian involvement in the 2016 election, a court ruling unsealed on Monday showed.
The unusual move is an indication of the aggressiveness of special counsel Robert Mueller’s prosecution team as they prepared to indict Manafort and Gates on charges of money laundering and failing to register as foreign agents. The 12-count indictment was made public on Monday.
Lawyers for Manafort and Gates fought the prosecution’s drive to intrude on attorney-client communications. But Chief Judge Beryl Howell of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ruled that an exception, which involves using a lawyer to commit crime or fraud, applied to contacts with an attorney who helped respond to inquiries about why the pair had not filed foreign-agent lobbying registrations with the Justice Department.
Leighton Smith says the Russian thing is a Democratic Party conspiracy to save face for their loss of the elections.
And all his callers agree with him.
Leighton Smith is an idiot, who has been spouting the pro-Trump line for some time on his morning radio show. I am really surprise that he is able to dominate his show with biased right-wing rhetoric. He needs to go back to Sydney taxi driving as a job, just to get that reality check back.
I’d think the desperation, if there is any, might have more to do with the realisation they’ve been had. It’s looking more and more like the ‘russia investigation’ was a complete sham, intended only to provide the means by which they could shake the tree until things started falling out.
The US is tearing itself apart, not sure that’s a good thing either.
Perhaps it’s significant in your fevered imagination, it means little to me. They never did get any dirt on Clinton so all the claims of collusion on that point are rather moot. If there’s a smoking gun it’s unlikely to be about dirt on Clinton, I’d think the best they could come up with there would be intent to collude.
These indictments could just be the beginning with more to come, who knows, but so far they haven’t been for colluding with Russia and that’s what the investigation began as.
I don’t see it as earth shattering. It would be similar to having an employee repeatedly emailing the boss asking that the company should work with the competition. Haven’t seen much sign of what the bosses thoughts on that were yet. One Washington Post article I’ve read says the bosses thought it was a pretty dumb idea.
See my comment below – Papadopolous has cut a plea deal in exchange for his cooperation. They don’t do plea bargains with people who have nothing to offer.
so far they haven’t been for colluding with Russia
Dude pleaded guilty to lying about his involvement in the tRump campaign’s attempts to collude with a foreign government.
And he’s going to finger the rest of the crew.
Papadopoulos, who was arrested in late July, pled guilty to making false statements to the FBI. That plea was unsealed on Monday—as were court paper showing that Papadopoulos, the professor, and the so-called “niece” had been part of an effort to establish a back channel between Trump and the Kremlin, and to obtain thousands of Clinton emails before anyone knew those messages had been hacked.
I suspect any “grassing” will already have occurred.
Edit:
The Government agrees to bring to the Court’s attention at sentencing the defendant’s efforts to cooperate with the Government, on the condition that your client continues to respond and provide information regarding any and all matters as to which the Government deems relevant.
Yep the slippery slope for the mango Mussolini has just got slipperier. The dominos will fall – he might have to invent another pizza pedo scandal or watch out nth Korea, war is coming. False flag radar engaged – anything could happen and it could be right now!
“Money talks truth walks.” We have this here with National Party lies and deceit so we will never fing the real truth what happend during “the dirty tricks campaigns of 2011 Phil Goff, or “The Panama Papers” and the latest issue of the 300 texts Bill English sent to Todd Barclay’s secretary either, so we have the same “swamp” that Washington has don’t we.
But now we have our ex Finance Minister Steven Joyce falsly claiming we are his “members or suppoorters” that is a bloody lis as we hate him, expecially now he is asking his ememies like us for money to fight against the labour “coatition experiment” Joyce calls them just take a look at this;
Ha ha Steven Joyce wants a donation!!!!!!!!
After he lied to our community he can take a hike he tried to destroy our rail the creep.
From: Steven Joyce [mailto:hq@national.org.nz]
Sent: Tuesday, 31 October 2017 2:03 PM
To: janet
Subject: Fighting fund
j———,
As we prepare to return to the new Parliament next week, National’s 56 MPs will make up the largest opposition in New Zealand’s history. We will be working hard to hold the new government to account, and ensure they don’t squander the progress that New Zealanders have worked so hard to achieve.
Donate to our Fighting Fund today.
Labour and its coalition partners are planning a huge number of policy changes, and there are very few details available. However it is clear that many of them would take New Zealand backwards from our strong economic position which is currently the envy of much of the western world.
They also haven’t been upfront on the costs for their coalition agreements – these are the bills that hardworking taxpayers, like you, will have to cover out of your collective back pockets.
In the last week the coalition has also announced a Regional Fuel Tax, a potential Sugar Tax, removing standards and accountability in our schools, and scrapping the tax threshold changes due from April 1 in our Family Incomes Package.
The new government is already bloated, with an executive of 31 Ministers and Undersecretaries.
Hard-working New Zealanders can’t afford this coalition Government.
We’ve heard from thousands of New Zealanders like you over the last few weeks, wanting to know how you can help.
So today we’re launching our Fighting Fund – chip in $15, $25, $50 or whatever you can and it’ll help us as we begin taking on this Labour-Greens-NZ First political experiment. We need you with us.
Donate
National is the only party with the policies to deliver a strong and stable economy that really works for New Zealanders. We are confident and optimistic about the future our country. Let’s not let Labour take us backwards.
Thanks,
Steven
________________________________________
This email was sent to ———————–
We believe that email is one of the best ways to stay in touch with our members & supporters, but you can click here if you would like to unsubscribe from these messages.
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Authorised by G Hamilton, 41 Pipitea St, Wellington.
I especially liked Bill English’s reasoning that Dr Jian Yang couldn’t be a spy, or involved in spying, because he was a NZ citizen, and also a “satisfactory” MP. (On RNZ morning report.)
Further, Bill English would not say why Jian Yang was removed from the Foreign Affairs Select Committee. It was a backdown from English firstly saying there are so many changes he could not remember, to ultimately that English was not 100% certain why he was swapped out so would not comment.
All this ignores why Jian Yang has not had his citzenship reviewed on the basis that he failed to disclose his employment at at the Spy School/Military University in his residency visa application.
In my view It is obvious that the TPP 11 trade deal OUR new coalition goverment is analyzing has details that make it to negative to our future to walk away from IT.
I still prefer to spend on advertising but we are a small nation whom has to go with the flow or we could damage our future’s earning . Many thanks to Europe for there trade deal. I no have changed my opinion on this but the Europeans could have many negative effects from climate change so they have backed mitigating against climate climate change for years they are leader’s in this industry and we can learn a lot from them. And we should always team up with our Australian cousins when we negotiate trade deal’s our two Society have a lot in common and the old saying many hands make light work Its logical
{ It’s Assume to see these People making these super power full people accountable for there action’s we are all human being’s and demanded to be treated humanly and equally} That newly born Kiwi was beautiful a new life born in Rotorua we have all our living animals future in our hands. And this is one reason why We need to invest in OUR bio security to protect there future our future and our future earning’s there are to many threats to our future to take this{ subject to lightly }.is not intelligent.
If I was a bystander analyzing my situation I would be asking a lot of questions like would I like to leave this state service to look after my Moko’s future I would not like to think that this type of service that I’m receiving could be dished out to my Moko.
Everyone can see that they are breaching all of my rights as a human being They are using the courts to stop me from defending my future and my moko’s future .
But this situation I find my self in is my fate and I will correct the wrongs that this state orgnization has dished out to me and my whano . This is why I wrote about the power that this state service has over US ALL and I think that there should be checks and balances forced on this state institution so no one is ever treated like I am being treated at the minute because not everyone is like me to have the ability to counter there propaganda and have moral the support of our nation And I will fight for equality for US ALL. I just thought I was just a ordinary half caste Maori man but analyzing my past and what’s happening now and I have come to the conclusion that I’m a leader and that all the people that have attached me and my family have underestimated me and have and will pay the consequences for there assumption. Sorry thats heavy but that had to be told . The Zane and Duncan drive home show gives me a sore face and Jen ads a good ladys touch to the morning Rumble I no whom has my back kia Kaha
You said “I have come to the conclusion that I’m a leader and that all the people that have attached me and my family have underestimated me and have and will pay the consequences for there assumption”
How are you planning to make these people pay? Have you decided yet?
Today is the mid way point between the Equinox and the Solstice. In the northern hemisphere it’s Halloween (Samhain), and here in the south it is Beltane.
We’ve two massive spiders on the roof, a grim reaper by the letterbox and a witch cooking in a cauldron on the front lawn to lure in the ‘trick or treaters’.
If kids want to brave the garden path to ask for a treat, best they beware of our tricks that await. Looking forward to jumping out of the bushes and freaking out the older kids.
I’be been getting the news before it is the news!!
The interesting Louise Mensch has been publishing stories long before the NYT, WSJ , MSNBC et al have secured sufficient corroboration. Here is her list of who is going to be charged and just about the whole Whitehouse is on the list!
The most left–field one the the GOP itself!
“The Republican Party as a body is under investigation for RICO for accepting Russian money. The GOP itself is being considered to be a corrupt organization under the RICO statutes. Sources were firm that the GOP, as it is presently known, may no longer exist after this investigation and a new party of the right may have to form. Sources did not say if charges or indictments had been returned against the party however.”
Her product mostly appeals to a nutty segment of the moonbat left in the same way that Jones’ product mostly appeals to a nutty segment of the wingnut right.
What has ‘good reporting’ got to do with being left or right?
I pointed to her writing as much of what she has been saying for the past while about the Russia scandal has been found to be correct.
I’ve no interest in defending her or the NYT WSJ et al. Read widely and form your own opinions.
Screenjunkies is my most favourite thing to watch on youtube and it made me really…sad I guess for the victims because the victims were mostly, but not all, fans of the show
Yeah although with him its a bit more difficult. I mean I believe him but hes coming across as a bit…unhinged…which is probably a result of what happened to him and Corey Haim
Damnit, I go to the movies and watch movie news to escape from reality 🙁
Well whats interesting, to me anyway, is the way Hollywood has torn into Trump and yet the casting couch isn’t exactly a secret, that Meryl Streep can give Roman Polanski a standing ovation, that Woody Allen still gets the a listers, that Casey and Ben Affleck get Oscars, Bill Cosby was at it for decades etc etc
Not really related imo. For instance do you think every police investigator doesn’t have skeletons in their closets?
Sadly holywood revelations are just a visible aspect of a sick widespread integral aspect of patriarchy – the abuse and subjugation of women – that shit has to stop NOW!
Well sure closets ok but Casey Affleck paid off women, Roman Polanski plead guilty, Woody Allen was accused so these are not hidden they’re out in the open and were known to a lot of people and yet the biggest stars want to work with them and they still win oscars
Even muggins here in NZ heard a lot of these stories so how could some of these A-listers plead ignorance is beyond me
But yes there is a power imbalance and when you have young, super-attractive people who really, really want something and these old men can give it to them somethings going to happen
But hopefully something good will come out of all this badness
I hope you’re not implicating the victims or saying it was their own fault because they knew there was a concept of casting couch because that would need to be addressed…
Nope I’m not saying that at all, what I’m saying is these stars (male and female) will have heard the same stories I’ve heard yet choose to appear in their films thereby legitimising them however they also condemn the behaviour of Trump, Weinstein etc
House of cards cancelled now – spacey will be really thinking about ‘all those rumours’ as he put it.
The point you are making puck is directly related to the massive power imbalance in these abuses – it can barely be understood unless you’ve gone through it and sadly in all endeavours where the imbalance is there, this shit happen. Business, politics, entertainment – all of them from big to small.
I thought that the two series were both good but also both different enough to stand on their own
Not quite, I’m talking about those actors that are already at the top of the tree. The ones that can turn down roles, the ones like Kate Winslet, Meryl Streep, Matt Damon etc etc
They heard what was happening but they turned a blind eye to what was happening to the young up and comers and even if they didn’t speak out they still accepted the roles
What is your actual point on that? I think it is too much to offer judgment on that personally – the power imbalance is one aspect amongst so many. You really are just speculating and moving into areas fraught with difficulties. A lot of shaming occurs for women that supposedly don’t act or react to abuse in the ways some men expect.
Edit – I see in rereading that your point is a bit more nuanced – I will let this go now because I just feel uncomfortable offering judgments around this.
Strap yourself in tightly dearie and stay sober: the weirdness is about to get a whole lot weirder! Rainbows End Rollercoasters and wild mushrooms have nothing on what is about to happen.
Constitutional Roller Coaster #1
If Trump goes, Pence becomes president: if Pence is under investigation it goes to Ryan; if Ryan is under investigation it goes to Orrin Hatch; if Hatch is under investigation it goes to Rex Tillerson; if Tillerson is under investigation it goes to Mnunchin; if he is under investigation is goes to General James Mattis.
I think Mattis is the next president! Robert H. Scales, a retired United States Army major general, described him as “… one of the most urbane and polished men I have known.” Reinforcing this intellectual persona was the fact he carried a copy of the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius throughout his deployments.=wiki
btw Ben Carson is no 13 and de Vos is no 15!
Constitutional Roller Coaster #2
The Prime minister in London is having a nervous breakdown. The EU are trying hard to keep her stable because the alternative is the bumbling idiot person Boris Johnson. Another General Election could deliver Jeremy Corbyn, another little england nationalist, to No 10. It will also probably deliver a united Ireland and and independent Scotland, both within the EU.
The entertainment never ceases…..
Just in case anyone thinks Pence being under investigation would keep him from the presidency, nope. His status as elected Vice-President is independent of the Chump’s shenanigans.
That means that at the moment Trump becomes an early ex-President, the only thing that will prevent Pence from becoming president is if he’s already resigned, or been impeached and convicted. As I understand it, he could have already been impeached by the House and be partway through his trial in the Senate, and he would still be sworn in as president. (although I’d imagine the Senate would seriously hurry-up the trial in that circumstance).
He will offload his staff to the prosecutors like White Russians throwing relatives one at a time, off the back of the sleigh, to fast-encroaching wolves. Even his daughter isn’t safe.
Fox News keeps the sleigh speeding along.
Now that a few have been turned, blood’s in the water and will keep pouring.
He will hang in to the end of the term, bloodied but unbowed.
A fairly high bar must be set for WINZ to prosecute. Contributing factors are length of time not complying, severity of offending, acceptance/confession, amounts involved, repayments/ability to recover debt, subsequent life position, and the strength of WINZ’s case in the first place.
My guess is that Turei’s case did not meet the bar.
In Barclay’s case the complainant appears to have been bought off by the National Party in the form of John Key’s prime ministerial services account, and soothing late night texts from the twice failed Bill English.
I don’t listen to newstalk zb from about 5 to 6 in the morning because that’s when Hosking comes on. Often in the hour before that the teeth have to be gritted.
Now they have the quinella.
“Kate Hawkesby to host Newstalk ZB’s Early Edition”
If her rant on the decision of Peters to go how he did is any indication, the one household can unload all it’s bile in one place in the same sort of time slot.
ZB doubling down on their right wing hosts. Mark Dye (along with Tim Roxborogh) was probably the only out and out leftie on ZB and he’s quit/been fired.
The line up is now fully RWNJ from 0500 to 1900 every single day.
So the Stepford Wife is joining the awful man who does the ZB Breakfast. Nepotism at work here. Thankfully for most people it is not a station they tune into. It probably will be more of the same garbage like her column she does in a womens’ rag. All the enlightening stuff about how to be a mother and a wife – as if all the other wonderful mothers and wives don’t already know about how to glue a household together. Does she think she is the expert in this for god’s sake. Being on the gravy train will enable her to get a really good nanny in to do all her housewifely chores and dropping kids off to school ec. Yawn yawn.
And to be really bitchy – she needs to get out of this 1970’s time warp and do something with her bloody hair.
I think his crazed serialised rant in the NZH in the week following NZ1’s decision to opt for Labour has cooked his goose in the eyes of many – or at least those that live outside the rarified climes of Remmers …
Yeah somehow a bunch of apathetic right wingers like yourself know so much more about mine safety and re-entry than the former UK principal mine inspector and former head NZ mines inspector Tony Forster who says it’s entirely possible and is happy to go in himself.
“I’ve read two comprehensive reports so far both say yes there are risks, but yes this is possible…You’ve just got to manage those risks, so let’s find a way to do that.
Every undertaking such as re entering the mine has a risk involved. The question is not just about rationality but humanity.
As for the argument of risk per se I belief the workers have shown the ultimate willingness on that point to their employer and we should at least support all endeavors to retrieve the bodies so that the families can have closure.
Where’s your concern about every other place that safety cannot be “guaranteed”?
Little’s main objectives in that interview were: the families would be listened to and geniunely consulted with; and that risks can be mitigated.
If risks cannot be mitigated down to a reasonable level and the families still want them to go in, there might be a law change in this case. The thing is, I think the perception of many people (definitely my perception, anyway) is that “health and safety” is being used as a handy excuse to hide behind in order to excuse inactivity.
If that were removed as an excuse, and the families were genuinely consulted with, I think you’ll still find that they wouldn’t want people to die trying to recover their loved ones and evidence. They just want an honest appraisal of the situation.
I wouldn’t accept anything from Dr. Sir John Key that hadn’t first been through an extreme vetting and fact-checking process. That’s a consequence of his well-earned reputation for lying through his teeth.
The issue around H&S is a red herring, so far. There might be genuine reasons not to go in, but the previous regime were pretty bloody quick to go ‘oh gosh, H&S ties our hands in this situation, how sad, problem over’.
I suspect that you will find that they change the law to allow sort of “good samaritan” efforts to rescue/recover evidence and people. I hope they make it a systemic change, not restricted to Pike River Mine. People should not be “sent” down if it’s unsafe – but if the reason is strong enough, they should be allowed to go, and not be held back by a paper-pusher worried about their own personal legal liability.
There were so many violations of safe practice identified by the Royal Commission that I’ll guess if the cause is tracked down it’ll just be one of the problems already identified. Shit like methane sensors getting covered over, failure to use explosion-proof motors, workers smuggling in unsafe equipment etc.
I would hope that “we don’t exactly know what caused Pike River” hasn’t been a hold-up in sorting that shit out at other mines.
Here's George Papadopoulos. In London. Five days ago. Wearing a wire. So..any idea who he met?? https://t.co/dXb0mAEni8— Carole Cadwalladr (@carolecadwalla) October 30, 2017
I’d love it if a law was set requiring that policies be supported by facts where such are available. That’d pretty much kill all National Party policies.
People get readyThere's a train a-comingYou don't need no baggageYou just get on boardAll you need is faithTo hear the diesels hummingDon't need no ticketYou just thank the LordSongwriter: Curtis MayfieldYou might have seen Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde's speech at the National Prayer Service in the US following Trump’s elevation ...
Long stories short, the six things of interest in the political economy in Aotearoa around housing, climate and poverty on Thursday January 23 are:PM Christopher Luxon’s State of the Nation speech after midday today, which I’ll attend and ask questions at;Luxon is expected to announce “new changes to incentivise research ...
I’m trying a new way to do a more regular and timely daily Dawn Choruses for paying subscribers through a live video chat about the day’s key six things @ 6.30 am lasting about 10 minues. This email is the invite to that chat on the substack app on your ...
Yesterday, Trump pardoned the founder of Silk Road - a criminal website designed to anonymously trade illicit drugs, weapons and services. The individual had been jailed for life in 2015 after an FBI sting.But libertarian interest groups had lobbied Donald Trump, saying it was “government overreach” to imprison the man, ...
The Prime Minister will unveil more of his economic growth plan today as it becomes clear that the plan is central to National’s election pitch in 2026. Christopher Luxon will address an Auckland Chamber of Commerce meeting with what is being billed a “State of the Nation” speech. Ironically, after ...
This video includes personal musings and conclusions of the creator climate scientist Dr. Adam Levy. It is presented to our readers as an informed perspective. Please see video description for references (if any). 2025 has only just begun, but already climate scientists are working hard to unpick what could be in ...
The NZCTU’s view is that “New Zealand’s future productivity to 2050” is a worthwhile topic for the upcoming long-term insights briefing. It is important that Ministers, social partners, and the New Zealand public are aware of the current and potential productivity challenges and opportunities we face and the potential ...
The NZCTU supports a strengthening of the Commerce Act 1986. We have seen a general trend of market consolidation across multiple sectors of the New Zealand economy. Concentrated market power is evident across sectors such as banking, energy generation and supply, groceries, telecommunications, building materials, fuel retail, and some digital ...
The maxim is as true as it ever was: give a small boy and a pig everything they want, and you will get a good pig and a terrible boy.Elon Musk the child was given everything he could ever want. He has more than any one person or for that ...
A food rescue organisation has had to resort to an emergency plea for donations via givealittle because of uncertainty about whether Government funding will continue after the end of June. Photo: Getty ImagesLong stories short in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Wednesday, January 22: Kairos Food ...
Leo Molloy's recent "shoplifting" smear against former MP Golriz Ghahraman has finally drawn public attention to Auror and its database. And from what's been disclosed so far, it does not look good: The massive privately-owned retail surveillance network which recorded the shopping incident involving former MP Golriz Ghahraman is ...
The defence of common law qualified privilege applies (to cut short a lot of legal jargon) when someone tells someone something in good faith, believing they need to know it. Think: telling the police that the neighbour is running methlab or dobbing in a colleague to the boss for stealing. ...
NZME plans to cut 38 jobs as it reorganises its news operations, including the NZ Herald, BusinessDesk, and Newstalk ZB. It said it planned to publish and produce fewer stories, to focus on those that engage audience. E tū are calling on the Government to step in and support the ...
Data released by Statistics New Zealand today showed that inflation remains unchanged at 2.2%, defying expectations of further declines, said NZCTU Te Kauae Kaimahi Economist Craig Renney. “While inflation holding steady might sound like good news, the reality is that prices for the basics—like rent, energy, and insurance—are still rising. ...
I never mentioned anythingAbout the songs that I would singOver the summer, when we'd go on tourAnd sleep on floors and drink the bad beerI think I left it unclearSong: Bad Beer.Songwriter: Jacob Starnes Ewald.Last night, I was watching a movie with Fi and the kids when I glanced ...
Last night I spoke about the second inauguration of Donald Trump with in a ‘pop-up’ Hoon live video chat on the Substack app on phones.Here’s the summary of the lightly edited video above:Trump's actions signify a shift away from international law.The imposition of tariffs could lead to increased inflation ...
An interesting article in Stuff a few weeks ago asked a couple of interesting questions in it’s headline, “How big can Auckland get? And how big is too big?“. Unfortunately, the article doesn’t really answer those questions, instead focusing on current growth projections, but there were a few aspects to ...
Today is Donald J Trump’s second inauguration ceremony.I try not to follow too much US news, and yet these developments are noteworthy and somehow relevant to us here.Only hours in, parts of their Project 2025 ‘think/junk tank’ policies — long planned and signalled — are already live:And Elon Musk, who ...
How long is it going to take for the MAGA faithful to realise that those titans of Big Tech and venture capital sitting up close to Donald Trump this week are not their allies, but The Enemy? After all, the MAGA crowd are the angry victims left behind by the ...
California Burning: The veteran firefighters of California and Los Angeles called it “a perfect storm”. The hillsides and canyons were full of “fuel”. The LA Fire Department was underfunded, below-strength, and inadequately-equipped. A key reservoir was empty, leaving fire-hydrants without the water pressure needed for fire hoses. The power companies had ...
The Waitangi Tribunal has been one of the most effective critics of the government, pointing out repeatedly that its racist, colonialist policies breach te Tiriti o Waitangi. While it has no powers beyond those of recommendation, its truth-telling has clearly gotten under the government's skin. They had already begun to ...
I don't mind where you come fromAs long as you come to meBut I don't like illusionsI can't see them clearlyI don't care, no I wouldn't dareTo fix the twist in youYou've shown me eventually what you'll doSong: Shimon Moore, Emma Anzai, Antonina Armato, and Tim James.National Hugging Day.Today, January ...
Is Rwanda turning into a country that seeks regional dominance and exterminates its rivals? This is a contention examined by Dr Michela Wrong, and Dr Maria Armoudian. Dr Wrong is a journalist who has written best-selling books on Africa. Her latest, Do Not Disturb. The story of a political murder ...
The economy isn’t cooperating with the Government’s bet that lower interest rates will solve everything, with most metrics indicating per-capita GDP is still contracting faster and further than at any time since the 1990-96 series of government spending and welfare cuts. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short in ...
Hi,Today is the day sexual assaulter and alleged rapist Donald Trump officially became president (again).I was in a meeting for three hours this morning, so I am going to summarise what happened by sharing my friend’s text messages:So there you go.Welcome to American hell — which includes all of America’s ...
This is a re-post from the Climate BrinkI have a new paper out today in the journal Dialogues on Climate Change exploring both the range of end-of-century climate outcomes in the literature under current policies and the broader move away from high-end emissions scenarios. Current policies are defined broadly as policies in ...
Long story short: I chatted last night with ’s on the substack app about the appointment of Chris Bishop to replace Simeon Brown as Transport Minister. We talked through their different approaches and whether there’s much room for Bishop to reverse many of the anti-cycling measures Brown adopted.Our chat ...
Last night I chatted with Northland emergency doctor on the substack app for subscribers about whether the appointment of Simeon Brown to replace Shane Reti as Health Minister. We discussed whether the new minister can turn around decades of under-funding in real and per-capita terms. Our chat followed his ...
Christopher Luxon is every dismal boss who ever made you wince, or roll your eyes, or think to yourself I have absolutely got to get the hell out of this place.Get a load of what he shared with us at his cabinet reshuffle, trying to be all sensitive and gracious.Dr ...
The text of my submission to the Ministry of Health's unnecessary and politicised review of the use of puberty blockers for young trans and nonbinary people in Aotearoa. ...
Hi,Last night one of the world’s biggest social media platforms, TikTok, became inaccessible in the United States.Then, today, it came back online.Why should we care about a social network that deals in dance trends and cute babies? Well — TikTok represents a lot more than that.And its ban and subsequent ...
Sometimes I wake in the middle of the nightAnd rub my achin' old eyesIs that a voice from inside-a my headOr does it come down from the skies?"There's a time to laugh butThere's a time to weepAnd a time to make a big change"Wake-up you-bum-the-time has-comeTo arrange and re-arrange and ...
Former Health Minister Shane Reti was the main target of Luxon’s reshuffle. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short to start the year in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate: Christopher Luxon fired Shane Reti as Health Minister and replaced him with Simeon Brown, who Luxon sees ...
Yesterday, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon announced a cabinet reshuffle, which saw Simeon Brown picking up the Health portfolio as it’s been taken off Dr Shane Reti, and Transport has been given to Chris Bishop. Additionally, Simeon’s energy and local government portfolios now sit with Simon Watts. This is very good ...
The sacking of Health Minister Shane Reti yesterday had an air of panic about it. A media advisory inviting journalists to a Sunday afternoon press conference at Premier House went out on Saturday night. Caucus members did not learn that even that was happening until yesterday morning. Reti’s fate was ...
Yesterday’s demotion of Shane Reti was inevitable. Reti’s attempt at a re-assuring bedside manner always did have a limited shelf life, and he would have been a poor and apologetic salesman on the campaign trail next year. As a trained doctor, he had every reason to be looking embarrassed about ...
A listing of 25 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, January 12, 2025 thru Sat, January 18, 2025. This week's roundup is again published soleley by category. We are still interested in feedback to hone the categorization, so if ...
After another substantial hiatus from online Chess, I’ve been taking it up again. I am genuinely terrible at five-minute Blitz, what with the tight time constraints, though I periodically con myself into thinking that I have been improving. But seeing as my past foray into Chess led to me having ...
Rise up o children wont you dance with meRise up little children come and set me freeRise little ones riseNo shame no fearDon't you know who I amSongwriter: Rebecca Laurel FountainI’m sure you know the go with this format. Some memories, some questions, letsss go…2015A decade ago, I made the ...
In 2017, when Ghahraman was elected to Parliament as a Green MP, she recounted both the highlights and challenges of her role -There was love, support, and encouragement.And on the flipside, there was intense, visceral and unchecked hate.That came with violent threats - many of them. More on that later.People ...
It gives me the biggest kick to learn that something I’ve enthused about has been enough to make you say Go on then, I'm going to do it. The e-bikes, the hearing aids, the prostate health, the cheese puffs. And now the solar power. Yes! Happy to share the details.We ...
Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. This fact brief was written by Sue Bin Park from the Gigafact team in collaboration with members from our team. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline. Can CO2 be ...
The old bastard left his ties and his suitA brown box, mothballs and bowling shoesAnd his opinion so you'd never have to choosePretty soon, you'll be an old bastard tooYou get smaller as the world gets bigThe more you know you know you don't know shit"The whiz man" will never ...
..Thanks for reading Frankly Speaking ! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.The Numbers2024 could easily have been National’s “Annus Horribilis” and 2025 shows no signs of a reprieve for our Landlord PM Chris Luxon and his inept Finance Minister Nikki “Noboats” Willis.Several polls last year ...
This Friday afternoon, Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka announced an overhaul of the Waitangi Tribunal.The government has effectively cleared house - appointing 8 new members - and combined with October’s appointment of former ACT leader Richard Prebble, that’s 9 appointees.[I am not certain, but can only presume, Prebble went in ...
The state of the current economy may be similar to when National left office in 2017.In December, a couple of days after the Treasury released its 2024 Half Year Economic and Fiscal Update (HEYFU24), Statistics New Zealand reported its estimate for volume GDP for the previous September 24 quarter. Instead ...
So what becomes of you, my love?When they have finally stripped you ofThe handbags and the gladragsThat your poor old granddadHad to sweat to buy you, babySongwriter: Mike D'aboIn yesterday’s newsletter, I expressed sadness at seeing Golriz Ghahraman back on the front pages for shoplifting. As someone who is no ...
It’s Friday and time for another roundup of things that caught our attention this week. This post, like all our work, is brought to you by a largely volunteer crew and made possible by generous donations from our readers and fans. If you’d like to support our work, you can join ...
Note: This Webworm discusses sexual assault and rape. Please read with care.Hi,A few weeks ago I reported on how one of New Zealand’s richest men, Nick Mowbray (he and his brother own Zuru and are worth an estimated $20 billion), had taken to sharing posts by a British man called ...
The final Atlas Network playbook puzzle piece is here, and it slipped in to Aotearoa New Zealand with little fan fare or attention. The implications are stark.Today, writes Dr Bex, the submission for the Crimes (Countering Foreign Interference) Amendment Bill closes: 11:59pm January 16, 2025.As usual, the language of the ...
Excitement in the seaside village! Look what might be coming! 400 million dollars worth of investment! In the very beating heart of the village! Are we excited and eager to see this happen, what with every last bank branch gone and shops sitting forlornly quiet awaiting a customer?Yes please, apply ...
Much discussion has been held over the Regulatory Standards Bill (RSB), the latest in a series of rightwing attempts to enshrine into law pro-market precepts such as the primacy of private property ownership. Underneath the good governance and economic efficiency gobbledegook language of the Bill is an interest to strip ...
We are concerned that the Amendment Bill, as proposed, could impair the operations and legitimate interests of the NZ Trade Union movement. It is also likely to negatively impact the ability of other civil society actors to conduct their affairs without the threat of criminal sanctions. We ask that ...
I can't take itHow could I fake it?How could I fake it?And I can't take itHow could I fake it?How could I fake it?Song: The Lonely Biscuits.“A bit nippy”, I thought when I woke this morning, and then, soon after that, I wondered whether hell had frozen over. Dear friends, ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections Asheville, North Carolina, was once widely considered a climate haven thanks to its elevated, inland location and cooler temperatures than much of the Southeast. Then came the catastrophic floods of Hurricane Helene in September 2024. It was a stark reminder that nowhere is safe from ...
Early reports indicate that the temporary Israel/Hamas ceasefire deal (due to take effect on Sunday) will allow for the gradual release of groups of Israeli hostages, the release of an unspecified number of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails (likely only a fraction of the total incarcerated population), and the withdrawal ...
My daily news diet is not what it once was.It was the TV news that lost me first. Too infantilising, too breathless, too frustrating.The Herald was next. You could look past the reactionary framing while it was being a decent newspaper of record, but once Shayne Currie began unleashing all ...
Hit the road Jack and don't you come backNo more, no more, no more, no moreHit the road Jack and don't you come back no moreWhat you say?Songwriters: Percy MayfieldMorena,I keep many of my posts, like this one, paywall-free so that everyone can read them.However, please consider supporting me as ...
This might be the longest delay between reading (or in this case re-reading) a work, and actually writing a review of it I have ever managed. Indeed, when I last read these books in December 2022, I was not planning on writing anything about them… but as A Phuulish Fellow ...
Kia Ora,I try to keep most my posts without a paywall for public interest journalism purposes. However, if you can afford to, please consider supporting me as a paid subscriber and/or supporting over at Ko-Fi. That will help me to continue, and to keep spending time on the work. Embarrassingly, ...
There was a time when Google was the best thing in my world. I was an early adopter of their AdWords program and boy did I like what it did for my business. It put rocket fuel in it, is what it did. For every dollar I spent, those ads ...
A while back I was engaged in an unpleasant exchange with a leader of the most well-known NZ anti-vax group and several like-minded trolls. I had responded to a racist meme on social media in which a rightwing podcaster in the US interviewed one of the leaders of the Proud ...
Hi,If you’ve been reading Webworm for a while, you’ll be familiar with Anna Wilding. Between 2020 and 2021 I looked at how the New Zealander had managed to weasel her way into countless news stories over the years, often with very little proof any of it had actually happened. When ...
It's a long white cloud for you, baby; staying together alwaysSummertime in AotearoaWhere the sunshine kisses the water, we will find it alwaysSummertime in AotearoaYeah, it′s SummertimeIt's SummertimeWriters: Codi Wehi Ngatai, Moresby Kainuku, Pipiwharauroa Campbell, Taulutoa Michael Schuster, Rebekah Jane Brady, Te Naawe Jordan Muturangi Tupe, Thomas Edward Scrase.Many of ...
Last year, 292 people died unnecessarily on our roads. That is the lowest result in over a decade and only the fourth time in the last 70 years we’ve seen fewer than 300 deaths in a calendar year. Yet, while it is 292 people too many, with each death being ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Jeff Masters and Bob HensonFlames from the Palisades Fire burn a building at Sunset Boulevard amid a powerful windstorm on January 8, 2025 in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. The fast-moving wildfire had destroyed thousands of structures and ...
..Thanks for reading Frankly Speaking ! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.The Regulatory Standards Bill, as I understand it, seeks to bind parliament to a specific range of law-making.For example, it seems to ensure primacy of individual rights over that of community, environment, te Tiriti ...
Happy New Year!I had a lovely break, thanks very much for asking: friends, family, sunshine, books, podcasts, refreshing swims, barbecues, bike rides. So good to step away from the firehose for a while, to have less Trump and Seymour in your day. Who needs the Luxons in their risible PJs ...
Patrick Reynolds is deputy chair of the Auckland City Centre Advisory Panel and a director of Greater Auckland In 2003, after much argument, including the election of a Mayor in 2001 who ran on stopping it, Britomart train station in downtown Auckland opened. A mere 1km twin track terminating branch ...
For the first time in a decade, a New Zealand Prime Minister is heading to the Middle East. The trip is more than just a courtesy call. New Zealand PMs frequently change planes in Dubai en route to destinations elsewhere. But Christopher Luxon’s visit to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) ...
A listing of 23 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, January 5, 2025 thru Sat, January 11, 2025. This week's roundup is again published soleley by category. We are still interested in feedback to hone the categorization, so if ...
The decade between 1952 and the early 1960s was the peak period for the style of music we now call doo wop, after which it got dissolved into soul music, girl groups, and within pop music in general. Basically, doo wop was a form of small group harmonising with a ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to stand firm and work with allies to progress climate action as Donald Trump signals his intent to pull out of the Paris Climate Accords once again. ...
The Green Party has welcomed the provisional ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas, and reiterated its call for New Zealand to push for an end to the unlawful occupation of Palestine. ...
The Green Party welcomes the extension of the deadline for Treaty Principles Bill submissions but continues to call on the Government to abandon the Bill. ...
Complaints about disruptive behaviour now handled in around 13 days (down from around 60 days a year ago) 553 Section 55A notices issued by Kāinga Ora since July 2024, up from 41 issued during the same period in the previous year. Of that 553, first notices made up around 83 ...
The time it takes to process building determinations has improved significantly over the last year which means fewer delays in homes being built, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “New Zealand has a persistent shortage of houses. Making it easier and quicker for new homes to be built will ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden is pleased to announce the annual list of New Zealand’s most popular baby names for 2024. “For the second consecutive year, Noah has claimed the top spot for boys with 250 babies sharing the name, while Isla has returned to the most popular ...
Work is set to get underway on a new bus station at Westgate this week. A contract has been awarded to HEB Construction to start a package of enabling works to get the site ready in advance of main construction beginning in mid-2025, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says.“A new Westgate ...
Minister for Children and for Prevention of Family and Sexual Violence Karen Chhour is encouraging people to use the resources available to them to get help, and to report instances of family and sexual violence amongst their friends, families, and loved ones who are in need. “The death of a ...
Uia te pō, rangahaua te pō, whakamāramatia mai he aha tō tango, he aha tō kāwhaki? Whitirere ki te ao, tirotiro kau au, kei hea taku rātā whakamarumaru i te au o te pakanga mo te mana motuhake? Au te pō, ngū te pō, ue hā! E te kahurangi māreikura, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne A national Resolve poll for Nine newspapers, conducted January 15–21 from a sample of 1,610, gave the Coalition a 51–49 lead using ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lisa French, Professor & Dean, School of Media and Communication, RMIT University Searchlight Pictures In 1961, aged 19, Bob Dylan left home in Minnesota for New York City and never looked back. Unknown when he arrived, he would later be widely ...
According to official Customs information, total interceptions of illegal cigarettes and cigars grew 31.4%, from 4.94 million in 2019–2020 to 6.5 million in 2023–2024. ...
The charity Māui and Hector’s Dolphin Defenders, is calling on Luxon's National-led coalition government for more protection for the dolphins throughout their rang ...
National cannot fall into the habit of simply naming a new Ministerial portfolio and trying to jaw-bone public policy outcomes, says Taxpayers' Union Executive Director Jordan Williams. ...
Luxon is due to give his State of the Nation speech today which will once again prioritise the War On Nature. These destructive policies, including the fast track law, have become one of the trademarks of his first year in office. ...
The November results are reported against forecasts based on the Half Year Economic and Fiscal Update 2024 (HYEFU 2024), published on 17 December 2024, and the results for the same period for the previous year. ...
Until there is a considerable strengthening of the accountability mechanisms, the parliamentary term should not be extended, argues Brian Easton in this edited excerpt from his latest book In Open Seas: How the New Zealand Labour Government Went Wrong: 2017–2023.A British Lord Chancellor described the British political system as ...
By Don Wiseman, RNZ Pacific senior journalist Fiji’s Deputy Prime Minister Biman Prasad has told an international conference in Bangkok that some of the most severely debt-stressed countries are the island states of the Pacific. Dr Prasad, who is also a former economic professor, said the harshest impacts of global ...
Comment: Labour should not have to be asking whether voters feel better off – but helping them feel that they realistically could be The post Do you feel better off, punk? Well, do ya? appeared first on Newsroom. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emma Russell, ARC DECRA Associate Professor in Crime, Justice and Legal Studies, La Trobe University Data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics show prisoner numbers are growing in every Australian state and territory — except Victoria. Nationally, our per capita imprisonment ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bioantika, PhD Candidate, Global Centre for Mineral Security, Sustainable Minerals Institute, The University of Queensland An excavator dredges sea sand in Lhokseumawe, Sumatra.Mohd Arafat/Shutterstock Over 20 years ago, then Indonesian president Megawati Soekarnoputri banned the export of sea sand from her ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Samantha Vlcek, Lecturer in inclusive education, RMIT University Annie Spratt/Unsplash, CC BY From next week, schools will start to return for term 1. This can be a nervous time for some students, who might be anxious about new teachers, classes and ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lynn Buckley, Senior Lecturer, Business School, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau Reforms to the Companies Act are meant to make Aotearoa New Zealand an easier and safer place to do business. But key gaps in the reforms mean they could fall ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tuba Degirmenci, PhD Candidate School of Advertising, Marketing and Public Relations, Queensland University of Technology Tsuguliev/Shutterstock We’ve all seen the marketing message “handmade with love”. It’s designed to tug at our heartstrings, suggesting extra care and affection went into crafting a ...
A lot of my friendships these days feel more like external audits, and it’s making me dread our coffee dates. Want Hera’s help? Email your problem to helpme@thespinoff.co.nzDear Hera,I am seeking your advice on catch-up friendships.I think most people have friendships that don’t form part of their ...
Comment: New Zealand stood uncertainly at multiple economic and social crossroads at the end of 2024. The hope was that a long, hot summer break would induce people to face 2025 with more confidence. But a combination of circumstances, domestic and international, as well as largely indifferent summer weather which ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christine Carson, Senior Research Fellow, School of Medicine, The University of Western Australia The war in Gaza will leave its mark in many ways, long after the recently negotiated ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas. One legacy relates to how the chaos ...
The cost of living crisis appears to be over, even if it doesn’t feel like it yet, writes Stewart Sowman-Lund for The Bulletin. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. ...
Simeon Brown was a hardline transport minister who ruthlessly pursued his agenda. For many in the sector, Chris Bishop’s more flexible approach will be a welcome relief. Prime minister Christopher Luxon made the first significant political move of the year on Sunday afternoon, announcing a cabinet reshuffle. Most notably, Luxon ...
A small stretch of road has come to define the struggle for control between Wayne Brown and Auckland Transport. With work on the upgrade project finally under way, former councillor Pippa Coom looks back at the contentious 10-year saga. A roadside karakia blessing last Monday marked the official start of ...
Opinion: In amongst the vagaries of the New Year news flow, a couple of things have stood out to us (meme coins aside). The first is the continued, volatile, upward trend in offshore long-term interest rates. The second is how short the average tenor of NZ mortgage borrowing has become. On ...
Opinion: Global fertility rates are declining. New Zealand’s fertility rates reflect international trends, particularly those in middle- to high-income countries. In 2023, the total fertility rate in New Zealand, which has been below 2.1 since 2013, dropped to a record-low of 1.56 births per person.Demographers and social scientists attribute the ...
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Asia Pacific Report Israeli forces have been ramping up operations in the occupied West Bank– mainly the Jenin refugee camp – to “distract” from the Gaza ceasefire deal, says political analyst Dr Mohamad Elmasry. The Qatari professor said the ceasefire was being viewed domestically as a “spectacular failure” for Prime ...
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COMMENTARY:By Saige England Celebration time. Some Palestinian prisoners have been released. A mother reunited with her daughter. A young mother reunited with her babies. Still in prison are people who never received a fair trial, people that independent inquirers say are wrongly imprisoned. Still in prison kids who cursed ...
7am RNZ news – NZ wide shortage of woodwork teachers!
Offer Brownlee a worthwhile job doing something to help this country!
Lmao !! A friend was taught woodwork by brownlee, he said that brownlee was a useless bully of a teacher who spent most of his time in his office chasing political dreams.
Cheers, Cinny – I’m well aware Brownlee was hopeless in the classroom – but worse than as the minister in charge of the ChCh rebuild? Or as foreign minister?
No, I think with his experience he could just about manage to fuck up teaching apprentices!
Apologies in advance (I withdraw and unreservedly apologise Mr Speaker).
He’s quite good at balancing a Metroliner (pencil plane) when seat allocations have gone awry and caused most passengers to be placed on the same side.
Thankfully Metroliners have already been phased out, and hopefully Brownlee soon will be.
Carbon dioxide levels grew at record pace in 2016, U.N. says potentially fuelling a 20-metre rise in sea levels and adding 3 degrees to temperatures,
https://www.yahoo.com/news/carbon-dioxide-levels-grew-record-pace-2016-u-100129353.html
We are toast, as no there s no political will for us to change our ways now so we are doomed.
This is what we are now facing.
PM Jacinda Ardern said “climate change is the nuclear event of her gerneration” so they had better get serious about it now.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/carbon-dioxide-levels-grew-record-pace-2016-u-100129353.html
Carbon dioxide levels grew at record pace in 2016, U.N. says
ReutersOctober 30, 2017
By Tom Miles
GENEVA (Reuters) – The amount of carbon dioxide in the earth’s atmosphere grew at record rate in 2016 to a level not seen for millions of years, potentially fuelling a 20-metre rise in sea levels and adding 3 degrees to temperatures, the United Nations said on Monday.
Related SearchesCarbon DioxideWhat Is Carbon DioxideCo2 LevelsCarbon Dioxide Levels In BloodCarbon Dioxide Poisoning
Atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2), the main man-made greenhouse gas, hit 403.3 parts per million (ppm), up from 400.0 in 2015, the U.N. World Meteorological Organization said in its annual Greenhouse Gas Bulletin.
That growth rate was 50 percent faster than the average over the past decade, driving CO2 levels 45 percent above pre-industrial levels and further outside the range of 180-280 ppm seen in recent cycles of ice ages and warmer periods.
“Today’s CO2 concentration of ~400 ppm exceeds the natural variability seen over hundreds of thousands of years,” the WMO bulletin said.
The latest data adds to the urgency of a meeting in Bonn next month, when environment ministers from around the world will work on guidelines for the Paris climate accord backed by 195 countries in 2015.
The agreement is already under pressure because U.S. President Donald Trump has said he plans to pull the United States out of the deal, which seeks to limit the rise in temperatures to “well below” 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial times.
Human CO2 emissions from sources such as coal, oil, cement and deforestation reached a record in 2016, and the El Niño weather pattern gave CO2 levels a further boost, the WMO said.
As far as scientists can tell, the world has never experienced a rise in carbon dioxide like that of recent decades, which has happened 100 times faster than when the world was emerging from the last ice age.
Scientists know prehistoric levels from tiny air bubbles found in ancient Antarctic ice cores, and they can derive even older data from fossils and chemicals trapped in sediment.
The last time carbon dioxide levels reached 400 ppm was 3-5 million years ago, in the mid-Pliocene era.
“During that period, global mean surface temperatures were 2–3°C warmer than today, ice sheets in Greenland and West Antarctica melted and even parts of East Antarctica’s ice retreated, causing the sea level to rise 10–20 m higher than that today,” the WMO bulletin said.
Since 1990, the global warming effect of CO2 and other long-lived greenhouse gases has risen by 40 percent. The two other main gases – methane and nitrous oxide – also grew to record concentrations last year, although at a slower rate of increase than carbon dioxide.
(Reporting by Tom Miles; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/opinion/98377913/trade-negotiations-will-test-parker-and-arderns-mettle
Well now this will be interesting, is this the marker that will determine how this government goes?
Meaning theres a lot of people that support the TPP (mostly on the right) but a lot of Labour/NZFirst/Green supporters didn’t so it’ll be interesting to see how large a rat Jacinda is willing to swallow…or how much slack the left will give her if she fails
…or how accurately the media will present this story of Labour once again having to clean up after the Tory fuckwits. From the linked story:
Essentially, the pair will be asserting their country’s right to prevent foreign speculators from purchasing urban property and farmland within its borders. A right the previous National Government, for reasons it never adequately explained, failed to assert. A right reserved by just about every other signatory to the TPP agreement.
Yet another example of those sharp negotiation skills National brought to the Warner Bros deal and the Auckland convention centre. What will genuinely be interesting is the limits on the ability of a competent government to correct the egregious failures of an incompetent predecessor. My money’s on “strong limits.”
I’m guessing there’ll be a lot of hot air and bluster but mostly it’ll go through as planned and thats a good thing
So you’re saying it won’t go through as planned. I’m guessing you didn’t mean to say that, but then you also said Winston would choose National.
We need better wingnuts.
Chris73…………….Finlayson, you sold us out when you allowing your national Party to sign TPPA in Auckland against the will of the people, and was that a “good thing”??????????
The government going against the wishes of the people to make rich people richer is considered a Good Thing by National.
“… A right the previous National Government, for reasons it never adequately explained, failed to assert…”
I know a guy who is/was part of the negotiating team for TPP, a very short fellow with an enormous short man syndrome. He started life a self-interested liberal and rapidly shifted to full blown free market ideology fanatic. These days spends his time doing his best to channel the distainful and dismissive arrogance of Chris Finlayson to anyone who questions the NZ bureaucratic establishments absolute commitment to free market ideology.
The signing away of our rights to control who can buy land is typical of the sort of attitude of this guy and his ilk, a class of diplomats and officials who consider themselves global Galtians above the petty interests of the grubby people who live in anachronistic nation states.
Nothing incompetent with National’s negotiating here. Seems clear that this was a deliberate block to stop future governments doing what this government now wants to do.
Hmmm yes, on second thoughts incompetence probably comes in way behind ideology on this one.
“A right the previous National Government, for reasons it never adequately explained, failed to assert.”
During the Leaders Debate Jacinda asked Bill several times why not? Bill mumbled that it was just not a concern for them.
Yes, I have read the claims from David Parker that the changes that can be made to the TPP11 may be limited. We have the key elements that need to be addressed to make the document attractive to NZ. Things like:
• Removal investor state dispute resolution through a non-court environment
• Land and home ownership restrictions being introduced
• IP protections being toned down from USA demands
But the over-riding issue is that the Treaty should leave NZ better off. To do this the cost benefit analysis needs to be done and it needs to stack up. Last year’s run through with the full TPPA (with the USA included) gave a net benefit to NZ that was well within the margins of error. Removing the USA may well remove the net upside of the proposed TPP11, if so why are we even going there.
Somehow this TPP Agreement seems to have got a life of its own. The pressure to do the deal appears to outweigh the benefits of the deal: negotiators have the equivalence of Gold Fever.
Pressure on NZ to sign a deal is manufactured. Most of the other participants will realize that there has been a recent election in NZ that produced a Government whose members have reservations about the existing construct of the document and we a body politic that does not support the concept. Pressure to sign is created by the bureaucrats – it has all the signs of being something straight out of “Yes Minister.”
Grant Roberstson’s backsliding recently has revealed him as the self-serving managerialist and self-serving careerist he always has been, and just now this morning David Parker has been backsliding and being tricky on the TPP.
Labour needs to understand they were elected on a change platform. If the likes of Parker and Robeertson are allowed to let Labour slip into business as usual, neoliberal managerialism they will lose – and lose badly – in 2020.
Sanctuary
You need to swot up in electoral mathematics.
The only extra votes that Labour can get have to come from National. They will not be won by a hard left programme. They will only be persuaded if the govt is seen as reasonable. Anyone voting National does not want increased taxes, they do not want hard left radicalism. They expect a reasonably moderate government. That is true even of soft National voters.
So they will give credit to Jacinda when she gets things like TPP done. If she is seen as fixing the things that concern New Zealanders, without embarking on a revolution she will probably win over some of the soft National voters.
Your approach will mean she would only have one three year term. Some of the NZF vote and in fact some of the right end of Labour vote would swing back to National. It has happened before, as in 1975.
It does rather look like Labour is going to end up spending some of is time battling against Standardnistas, just as they had to in respect of New Labour and the Alliance.
The only extra votes that Labour can get have to come from National.
…and from increasing turnout again… don’t “forget” turnout, Wayne.
battling
I realise it’s difficult for an authoritarian follower to understand, but debate is a sign of robust good health.
It’s true that we did increase voter turnout (and the number of enrolled voters) this time, OAB, and that definitely seems to have favoured the left. In my electorate (Dunedin North) a lot of younger voters signed up and voted during the two weeks before election day and the Labour vote went up significantly (a bit more than 15%). Having said that, there’s an element of truth in what Wayne says – any major party that wants to increase its vote needs to be acceptable to ordinary, non-political NZers. In particular, on the left, people with strong left wing views are likely to favour the Greens, and pulling them away to Labour only rearranges the left vote, rather than increasing it. The people on this site who constantly campaign to “turn Labour left” need to think through some political realities.
That doesn’t mean that Labour shouldn’t be a party of the left (it is) or that it shouldn’t be true to its principals and to its election promises (it should), but a hard left agenda isn’t likely to win the day with middle of the road voters, and they’re the ones who decide the government, when push comes to shove.
I agree with some of what you say Wayne. Jacinda and co. will be given credit if they are seen to be “fixing the things that concern New Zealanders without embarking on a revolution….“. I am in no doubt that will be the approach of this Labour-led government because – contrary to the attempt by National to paint them otherwise – they have always been reasonable and moderate in government but with a more socially responsible bent.
As for 1975. This isn’t the first time you have raised the spectre of the 72/75 Labour govt. as being “radical and hard left prompting the voters to swing back to National.” They swung to National because Muldoon dangled the biggest election bribe in NZ’s history in front of their middle-aged noses. I refer to the reduction of the age of Super entitlement to 60 years and increasing the amount to 80% of the average wage – a bribe we’re still paying dearly for today.
It is time you stopped peddling that myth. It does not become your elder statesman persona.
I agree with your last sentence – the comments do reveal the truth rather than the crafted image, bit like hootons slip ups, and is therefore valuable. It is too easy to think other people are as nice as us when they aren’t imo ☺
They swung back to National, when they introduced “hard left” type welfare policies, like lowering the super age. Funny that. Doesn’t exactly agree with Wayne’s take on things.
Again, this election, National tried to hide the poverty and unemployment figures. Each election National pretend to be more “left” than they are. Because National, and Crosby Textor, know what voters want.
A 3 News Reid Research poll showed that overall 54% of voters oppose the TPP.
Interestingly enough, Wayne, 23% of National supporters oppose it too.
Therefore, there is plenty of voter support for Labour to oppose the TPP.
moderate people do not engage in actions which result in child killing ….not even for trade deals, Wayne.
Racist dishonest warmongers like yourself can not actually be termed ‘moderate’.
If we were to Fix up John Keys and your National party tax segregation laws ……. then everyone who does not use creative accounting or tax havens would pay less tax.
Your a bent part of the problem Wayne ……………..
Reason,
I was not going to engage with you. However, I consider I must on the basis of defending New Zealand soldiers. No-one in the New Zealand Defence Force would ever deliberately undertake an action that they knew was likely to result in the death of civilians.
Recall in this instance the overall mission to Baghlan province was specifically approved by Sir Jerry Mateparae, the Chief of the Defence Force at the time. He is a man of integrity.
As has been explained numerous times, what happened was an accident, being the result of a faulty weapon in a US helicopter.
And New Zealand is not in Afghanistan because of trade deals. That is a slander on Helen Clark and her government, as much as it on National.
Both governments have been part of the overall Afghanistan mission because both thought it the right thing to do. It does, after all, have its origins in the Al Quaeda attack on the World Trade Centre. President Obama referred to Afghanistan as the right war, as opposed to Iraq, which was the wrong war. Helen Clark as PM agreed with that.
Wayne
(1) While it would certainly be a bonus, there is no absolute necessity for Labour to make further in-roads into National support in order to remain in Govt
(2) Winning Elections & maintaining your Party Vote are as much about holding on to your own voters as winning over new ones
An overwhelming 73% of Labour voters opposed TPP in one of the last Polls on the issue (3 News Reid Research) along with 87% of NZ First Supporters & 84% of Greens
(3) Even 23% of intending Nat voters were opposed – probably the more softly-aligned ones
A Colmar Brunton published around the same time suggested a similarly large-ish minority of Nat opposition at 26% (with another 37% Unsure)
And Labour teaming up with National will have them losing pretty much all their votes.
Translation: They expect a Labour led government that kowtows to National’s radical right-wing ideology.
She can’t do it that way but I don’t think she, and the rest of Labour/NZ1st, realise that yet.
Capitalism doesn’t work as history has proven time and time again thus we need to shift away from capitalism.
Ah yes, National’s first truly successful scare campaign of dancing cossacks followed by the biggest electoral bribe ever. A bribe that we’re still paying for.
That’s better than the sycophantic following of the RWNJs for whatever their leader of the time says.
@Sanctuary, totally agree about Robertson, I think hes a very weak link in the chain, but unfortunately holds a most powerful portfolio. He doesnt give me the impression that he has a clear understanding of Finance…..I am probABLY wrong.
Interesting that the WhiteHouse is desperately trying to deflect from the Manafort indictment by replaying the greatest hits from “but Hill-a-reeee”. That’s sooo 2016.
Hillary is a fading has-been that will never again do anything significant. t-Rump is where the action is now. He da man making da decisions that actually affect people.
https://thinkprogress.org/following-news-of-mueller-charges-white-house-desperately-tries-to-shift-focus-to-clinton-7b27d39e7060/
And I’m just gobsmacked at how many lunatic fringe commenters here are running the exact same diversion strategy.
Bad enough to push them/him to push the button and create the ultimate diversion?
While I doubt Tyrannosaurus Arse is aware of Shrub’s popularity boost after 9/11 or its relevance to his situation, no doubt “they” are. So it’s a definite worry.
I have only recently become aware of Paul Mannafort after watching ‘Get me Roger Stone’.
A doco on a political insider who started out in the Nixon years.
Amongst other things, Stone got trump to stand against Buchanan in a third party leadership challenge for the presidency. Thus discrediting the third party and ensuring a win for the republicans (Bush snr.)
Thoroughly recommend the doco.
Are you talking about Trump’s attempt to win the 2000 nomination against Buchanan for the Reform party?
That year it wasn’t George Hands’a Wanderin’ Bush that was the Repug, it was his sprog.
True Andre, I started on a sentence and wasn’t sure of the ending and bluffed.
My apologies.
Looks like the old it wasn’t me, ref, it must have been some other bloke won’t wash.
https://twitter.com/jimsciutto/status/925055378433478662
An election campaign adviser to Donald Trump has confessed to lying to the FBI about the timing of his meetings with alleged go-betweens for Russia.
George Papadopoulos admitted the meetings happened while he was working for the campaign, and not before, unsealed court documents reveal.
He said he had been told the Russians possessed “dirt” on Hillary Clinton.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-41808227
Would it happen here? Would National find some dirt during an election and use it against a person or Party? Surely not? Bennett? Joyce?
Another good piece about the whataboutery getting sprayed around right now.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/world/americas/donald-trumps-america/98388213/trump-runs-amok-with-clinton-whataboutism–and-that-tells-us-a-lot
And a special treat for anyone about to whine “whaddabout the other dodgy Dems?”. They’re copping it too.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/mueller-probe-appears-to-hit-democratic-powerhouses-too
Oh boy….
President Trump’s longtime attorney Michael Cohen will be a deputy national finance chairman of the Republican National Committee, the RNC announced on Monday.
Cohen served as executive vice president special counsel to Trump at the Trump Organisation and sat on multiple boards of other Trump corporations.
The RNC said in the press release that Cohen has “been an active spokesperson and advisor for the President during his interest in seeking office since 2011.”
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/trump-lawyer-michael-cohen-rnc-finance-executive-2017-4?r=US&IR=T
A company listed in the Monday indictment of former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and his associate Rick Gates received funds from the Republican National Committee for work done in coordination with Donald Trump’s election campaign.
Bade LLC, listed in the indictment among 17 domestic entities that Manafort and Gates are alleged to have used to hide foreign earnings, particularly from Ukraine, was paid a total of $70,000 in three payments by the Republican National Committee in September 2016, October 2016 and January 2017.
The payments, all for “political strategy services,” each list an address associated with Gates.
President Donald Trump dismissed the indictment in a Monday morning tweeting, saying the activities were “years ago, before Paul Manafort was part of the Trump campaign.
But the first page of the grand jury indictment charges that “In order to hide Ukraine payments from United States authorities, from approximately 2006 through at least 2016, Manafort and Gates laundered the money through scores of United States and foreign corporations, partnerships and bank accounts.”
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/national/article181708151.html
It’ll be fun to watch Cohen get nailed, if it happens. But attorney-client privilege might be a solid firewall for stubbyfingers to hide behind.
The mention of laundered money and the RNC in the same article is rather delicious, though.
Or not.
Prosecutors convinced a federal judge to require a lawyer for Trump campaign officials Paul Manafort and Rick Gates to testify before the grand jury investigating Russian involvement in the 2016 election, a court ruling unsealed on Monday showed.
The unusual move is an indication of the aggressiveness of special counsel Robert Mueller’s prosecution team as they prepared to indict Manafort and Gates on charges of money laundering and failing to register as foreign agents. The 12-count indictment was made public on Monday.
Lawyers for Manafort and Gates fought the prosecution’s drive to intrude on attorney-client communications. But Chief Judge Beryl Howell of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ruled that an exception, which involves using a lawyer to commit crime or fraud, applied to contacts with an attorney who helped respond to inquiries about why the pair had not filed foreign-agent lobbying registrations with the Justice Department.
https://www.politico.com/story/2017/10/30/mueller-manafort-gates-testimony-244339
Holy crap! Mueller does not piss around.
This is going to make a great movie!
titles?
All the President’s Mendacity
From Russia with Lobbyists
The Tower of Babble
The Pelicanovich Brief
Indepen-dunce Day
The Putarian Candidate
The sum of all smears
Goodby Gorky Lies
Just off the top of my head ☺
Leighton Smith says the Russian thing is a Democratic Party conspiracy to save face for their loss of the elections.
And all his callers agree with him.
Move on, nothing to see here.
Leighton Smith is an idiot, who has been spouting the pro-Trump line for some time on his morning radio show. I am really surprise that he is able to dominate his show with biased right-wing rhetoric. He needs to go back to Sydney taxi driving as a job, just to get that reality check back.
I’d think the desperation, if there is any, might have more to do with the realisation they’ve been had. It’s looking more and more like the ‘russia investigation’ was a complete sham, intended only to provide the means by which they could shake the tree until things started falling out.
The US is tearing itself apart, not sure that’s a good thing either.
So Papadopoulos pleading guilty to lying to the FBI about his contacts with Russia on behalf of the campaign is a big nothing? Ah-huh…
http://edition.cnn.com/2017/10/30/politics/george-papadopolous-trump-guilty/index.html
Sure it’s a big nothing… so far. He was stupid enough to lie under oath and now he’s paying for it.
What he lied about is significant.
Perhaps it’s significant in your fevered imagination, it means little to me. They never did get any dirt on Clinton so all the claims of collusion on that point are rather moot. If there’s a smoking gun it’s unlikely to be about dirt on Clinton, I’d think the best they could come up with there would be intent to collude.
These indictments could just be the beginning with more to come, who knows, but so far they haven’t been for colluding with Russia and that’s what the investigation began as.
Clinton…Clinton…
In my fevered imagination, the FBI is investigating the Trump campaign.
…and then there’s this (from the link at 3.6.1):
Collusion: secret agreement or cooperation especially for an illegal or deceitful purpose.
…Clinton…Clinton…Clinton… 😆
I don’t see it as earth shattering. It would be similar to having an employee repeatedly emailing the boss asking that the company should work with the competition. Haven’t seen much sign of what the bosses thoughts on that were yet. One Washington Post article I’ve read says the bosses thought it was a pretty dumb idea.
See my comment below – Papadopolous has cut a plea deal in exchange for his cooperation. They don’t do plea bargains with people who have nothing to offer.
Dude pleaded guilty to lying about his involvement in the tRump campaign’s attempts to collude with a foreign government.
And he’s going to finger the rest of the crew.
Papadopoulos, who was arrested in late July, pled guilty to making false statements to the FBI. That plea was unsealed on Monday—as were court paper showing that Papadopoulos, the professor, and the so-called “niece” had been part of an effort to establish a back channel between Trump and the Kremlin, and to obtain thousands of Clinton emails before anyone knew those messages had been hacked.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/putins-niece-catfished-george-papadopoulos-offered-kremlin-meeting
Him being charged does kinda suggest he won’t be grassing anyone up. Maybe he cut a deal for lesser charges, I guess we’ll find out in due course.
I suspect any “grassing” will already have occurred.
Edit:
Stuff.
So much to look forward to.
We look forward to telling all of the details of George’s story at that time.
https://twitter.com/politiCOHEN_/status/925041547594395648
Yep the slippery slope for the mango Mussolini has just got slipperier. The dominos will fall – he might have to invent another pizza pedo scandal or watch out nth Korea, war is coming. False flag radar engaged – anything could happen and it could be right now!
Who can we believe now?
“Money talks truth walks.” We have this here with National Party lies and deceit so we will never fing the real truth what happend during “the dirty tricks campaigns of 2011 Phil Goff, or “The Panama Papers” and the latest issue of the 300 texts Bill English sent to Todd Barclay’s secretary either, so we have the same “swamp” that Washington has don’t we.
But now we have our ex Finance Minister Steven Joyce falsly claiming we are his “members or suppoorters” that is a bloody lis as we hate him, expecially now he is asking his ememies like us for money to fight against the labour “coatition experiment” Joyce calls them just take a look at this;
Ha ha Steven Joyce wants a donation!!!!!!!!
After he lied to our community he can take a hike he tried to destroy our rail the creep.
From: Steven Joyce [mailto:hq@national.org.nz]
Sent: Tuesday, 31 October 2017 2:03 PM
To: janet
Subject: Fighting fund
j———,
As we prepare to return to the new Parliament next week, National’s 56 MPs will make up the largest opposition in New Zealand’s history. We will be working hard to hold the new government to account, and ensure they don’t squander the progress that New Zealanders have worked so hard to achieve.
Donate to our Fighting Fund today.
Labour and its coalition partners are planning a huge number of policy changes, and there are very few details available. However it is clear that many of them would take New Zealand backwards from our strong economic position which is currently the envy of much of the western world.
They also haven’t been upfront on the costs for their coalition agreements – these are the bills that hardworking taxpayers, like you, will have to cover out of your collective back pockets.
In the last week the coalition has also announced a Regional Fuel Tax, a potential Sugar Tax, removing standards and accountability in our schools, and scrapping the tax threshold changes due from April 1 in our Family Incomes Package.
The new government is already bloated, with an executive of 31 Ministers and Undersecretaries.
Hard-working New Zealanders can’t afford this coalition Government.
We’ve heard from thousands of New Zealanders like you over the last few weeks, wanting to know how you can help.
So today we’re launching our Fighting Fund – chip in $15, $25, $50 or whatever you can and it’ll help us as we begin taking on this Labour-Greens-NZ First political experiment. We need you with us.
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Hillary card – for when you have no actual argument:
https://i.imgur.com/XiTmEWF.jpg
Liddle’ hands Gallup daily approval rating suck to a new low of 33% percent over the weekend… SO SAD!
http://news.gallup.com/poll/201617/gallup-daily-trump-job-approval.aspx
But the the White house care givers turn the graph upside down when they show it to him so it’s all good.
Blinglish struggling on MORNING REPORT re chinese spies in the nest….
Struggling? He started smooth and self righteous then turned back into his duplicitous lying self.
Exactlycgaribaldi ,
He (English) sounded weak and was intentionally thinking up lies ) when I heard him speak; — the bloody liar.
I especially liked Bill English’s reasoning that Dr Jian Yang couldn’t be a spy, or involved in spying, because he was a NZ citizen, and also a “satisfactory” MP. (On RNZ morning report.)
Further, Bill English would not say why Jian Yang was removed from the Foreign Affairs Select Committee. It was a backdown from English firstly saying there are so many changes he could not remember, to ultimately that English was not 100% certain why he was swapped out so would not comment.
All this ignores why Jian Yang has not had his citzenship reviewed on the basis that he failed to disclose his employment at at the Spy School/Military University in his residency visa application.
In my view It is obvious that the TPP 11 trade deal OUR new coalition goverment is analyzing has details that make it to negative to our future to walk away from IT.
I still prefer to spend on advertising but we are a small nation whom has to go with the flow or we could damage our future’s earning . Many thanks to Europe for there trade deal. I no have changed my opinion on this but the Europeans could have many negative effects from climate change so they have backed mitigating against climate climate change for years they are leader’s in this industry and we can learn a lot from them. And we should always team up with our Australian cousins when we negotiate trade deal’s our two Society have a lot in common and the old saying many hands make light work Its logical
{ It’s Assume to see these People making these super power full people accountable for there action’s we are all human being’s and demanded to be treated humanly and equally} That newly born Kiwi was beautiful a new life born in Rotorua we have all our living animals future in our hands. And this is one reason why We need to invest in OUR bio security to protect there future our future and our future earning’s there are to many threats to our future to take this{ subject to lightly }.is not intelligent.
If I was a bystander analyzing my situation I would be asking a lot of questions like would I like to leave this state service to look after my Moko’s future I would not like to think that this type of service that I’m receiving could be dished out to my Moko.
Everyone can see that they are breaching all of my rights as a human being They are using the courts to stop me from defending my future and my moko’s future .
But this situation I find my self in is my fate and I will correct the wrongs that this state orgnization has dished out to me and my whano . This is why I wrote about the power that this state service has over US ALL and I think that there should be checks and balances forced on this state institution so no one is ever treated like I am being treated at the minute because not everyone is like me to have the ability to counter there propaganda and have moral the support of our nation And I will fight for equality for US ALL. I just thought I was just a ordinary half caste Maori man but analyzing my past and what’s happening now and I have come to the conclusion that I’m a leader and that all the people that have attached me and my family have underestimated me and have and will pay the consequences for there assumption. Sorry thats heavy but that had to be told . The Zane and Duncan drive home show gives me a sore face and Jen ads a good ladys touch to the morning Rumble I no whom has my back kia Kaha
Be the warrioor you need to be eco Maori/kiwi,
We need to rid our lives of lying right wingnuts andd neoliberal arseholes.
Hey eco Maori / kiwi
You said “I have come to the conclusion that I’m a leader and that all the people that have attached me and my family have underestimated me and have and will pay the consequences for there assumption”
How are you planning to make these people pay? Have you decided yet?
A.
Court
Thats good I was worried you were going to go postal (no offence)
I like the Break fast show a lot of laughs it’s just every time i see a opening for my defence they close it up WTF Ka pai
Today is the mid way point between the Equinox and the Solstice. In the northern hemisphere it’s Halloween (Samhain), and here in the south it is Beltane.
We’ve two massive spiders on the roof, a grim reaper by the letterbox and a witch cooking in a cauldron on the front lawn to lure in the ‘trick or treaters’.
If kids want to brave the garden path to ask for a treat, best they beware of our tricks that await. Looking forward to jumping out of the bushes and freaking out the older kids.
Imported American consumerism, which NZ could do without, and has no historical links to..
I’be been getting the news before it is the news!!
The interesting Louise Mensch has been publishing stories long before the NYT, WSJ , MSNBC et al have secured sufficient corroboration. Here is her list of who is going to be charged and just about the whole Whitehouse is on the list!
https://patribotics.blog/2017/10/29/exclusive-mueller-has-dozens-of-sealed-indictments-including-on-donald-trump/
The most left–field one the the GOP itself!
“The Republican Party as a body is under investigation for RICO for accepting Russian money. The GOP itself is being considered to be a corrupt organization under the RICO statutes. Sources were firm that the GOP, as it is presently known, may no longer exist after this investigation and a new party of the right may have to form. Sources did not say if charges or indictments had been returned against the party however.”
Too good to be true.
Oh Christ. Louise Mensch, huh? The left’s Alex Jones…
“Unhinged British witch” “a textbook succubus”- Russian Insider.
They are better jibes: from the profile of her Twitter page.
Her stories have foreshadowed the same corroborated stories in the big newspapers.
She is an ex-Tory MP. How is she left?
Her product mostly appeals to a nutty segment of the moonbat left in the same way that Jones’ product mostly appeals to a nutty segment of the wingnut right.
What has ‘good reporting’ got to do with being left or right?
I pointed to her writing as much of what she has been saying for the past while about the Russia scandal has been found to be correct.
I’ve no interest in defending her or the NYT WSJ et al. Read widely and form your own opinions.
…based on bogus information from a hoaxer who falsely claimed to work in law enforcement.
Beware the Jabberwock.
Lots of fun there thanks.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=11938743
Damn…always one of my favourite actors
Spaceys response not good. I agree with rosie he’s just reinforced the gay predator bulllshit and hate thought.
That’s true, he probably wasn’t intending it but that’s how its coming across.
Mind you something that went beneath the radar that affected me even more was this: http://variety.com/2017/digital/news/honest-trailers-creator-andy-signore-fired-for-egregious-and-intolerable-sexual-behavior-1202583996/
Screenjunkies is my most favourite thing to watch on youtube and it made me really…sad I guess for the victims because the victims were mostly, but not all, fans of the show
Corey Feldman must be making some people nervous too.
Yeah although with him its a bit more difficult. I mean I believe him but hes coming across as a bit…unhinged…which is probably a result of what happened to him and Corey Haim
Damnit, I go to the movies and watch movie news to escape from reality 🙁
These revelations from movie land will make you believe ☺
Well whats interesting, to me anyway, is the way Hollywood has torn into Trump and yet the casting couch isn’t exactly a secret, that Meryl Streep can give Roman Polanski a standing ovation, that Woody Allen still gets the a listers, that Casey and Ben Affleck get Oscars, Bill Cosby was at it for decades etc etc
Hell look up some of the Shirely Temple Baby Burlesks from the 30s http://time.com/12851/before-the-good-ship-lollipop-shirley-temple-did-baby-burlesks/ and its been going on a very long time
Like I’m not saying Hollywood shouldn’t say anything about Trump but maybe sort their own house in order first
Not really related imo. For instance do you think every police investigator doesn’t have skeletons in their closets?
Sadly holywood revelations are just a visible aspect of a sick widespread integral aspect of patriarchy – the abuse and subjugation of women – that shit has to stop NOW!
Well sure closets ok but Casey Affleck paid off women, Roman Polanski plead guilty, Woody Allen was accused so these are not hidden they’re out in the open and were known to a lot of people and yet the biggest stars want to work with them and they still win oscars
Even muggins here in NZ heard a lot of these stories so how could some of these A-listers plead ignorance is beyond me
But yes there is a power imbalance and when you have young, super-attractive people who really, really want something and these old men can give it to them somethings going to happen
But hopefully something good will come out of all this badness
I just hope nothing comes up about Keanu Reeves
I hope you’re not implicating the victims or saying it was their own fault because they knew there was a concept of casting couch because that would need to be addressed…
Nope I’m not saying that at all, what I’m saying is these stars (male and female) will have heard the same stories I’ve heard yet choose to appear in their films thereby legitimising them however they also condemn the behaviour of Trump, Weinstein etc
House of cards cancelled now – spacey will be really thinking about ‘all those rumours’ as he put it.
The point you are making puck is directly related to the massive power imbalance in these abuses – it can barely be understood unless you’ve gone through it and sadly in all endeavours where the imbalance is there, this shit happen. Business, politics, entertainment – all of them from big to small.
I thought that the two series were both good but also both different enough to stand on their own
Not quite, I’m talking about those actors that are already at the top of the tree. The ones that can turn down roles, the ones like Kate Winslet, Meryl Streep, Matt Damon etc etc
They heard what was happening but they turned a blind eye to what was happening to the young up and comers and even if they didn’t speak out they still accepted the roles
What is your actual point on that? I think it is too much to offer judgment on that personally – the power imbalance is one aspect amongst so many. You really are just speculating and moving into areas fraught with difficulties. A lot of shaming occurs for women that supposedly don’t act or react to abuse in the ways some men expect.
Edit – I see in rereading that your point is a bit more nuanced – I will let this go now because I just feel uncomfortable offering judgments around this.
Thanks for that
Well, the gay predator meme is not going away any time soon – clearly.
We have had an enormous amount of women talking about heterosexual male predators. One gay male predator, and people invoke that old stereotype.
Yup its not a good look
the biggest fear of a heterosexual male, that they may be treated by some ‘predatory’ male they way they treat women every day.
I am no longer sure what US political reality is right now, or even which one I favour.
My favourite show since the West Wing is cancelled because of alleged sexual misconduct by the person playing the President, or …
…. the actual-world President’s closest allies getting indicted by the FBI with a whole brown torrent more of them to come.
I’m going to have to start binge-watching Fox News interviews with the President to get my US political fix …
… or maybe Jacinda and Gayford will finally get married and have children and get divorced and then she remarries Winston Peters, or something.
Yeah its like Hollywood lied to me or something 🙁
I’ll have to go into a kind of odd binge-purge-binge cycle from fiction to reality and back again.
Strap yourself in tightly dearie and stay sober: the weirdness is about to get a whole lot weirder! Rainbows End Rollercoasters and wild mushrooms have nothing on what is about to happen.
Constitutional Roller Coaster #1
If Trump goes, Pence becomes president: if Pence is under investigation it goes to Ryan; if Ryan is under investigation it goes to Orrin Hatch; if Hatch is under investigation it goes to Rex Tillerson; if Tillerson is under investigation it goes to Mnunchin; if he is under investigation is goes to General James Mattis.
I think Mattis is the next president! Robert H. Scales, a retired United States Army major general, described him as “… one of the most urbane and polished men I have known.” Reinforcing this intellectual persona was the fact he carried a copy of the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius throughout his deployments.=wiki
btw Ben Carson is no 13 and de Vos is no 15!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_line_of_succession
Constitutional Roller Coaster #2
The Prime minister in London is having a nervous breakdown. The EU are trying hard to keep her stable because the alternative is the bumbling idiot person Boris Johnson. Another General Election could deliver Jeremy Corbyn, another little england nationalist, to No 10. It will also probably deliver a united Ireland and and independent Scotland, both within the EU.
The entertainment never ceases…..
Just in case anyone thinks Pence being under investigation would keep him from the presidency, nope. His status as elected Vice-President is independent of the Chump’s shenanigans.
That means that at the moment Trump becomes an early ex-President, the only thing that will prevent Pence from becoming president is if he’s already resigned, or been impeached and convicted. As I understand it, he could have already been impeached by the House and be partway through his trial in the Senate, and he would still be sworn in as president. (although I’d imagine the Senate would seriously hurry-up the trial in that circumstance).
Ditto Ryan and Hatch.
Trump will deal himself through this and succeed.
He will offload his staff to the prosecutors like White Russians throwing relatives one at a time, off the back of the sleigh, to fast-encroaching wolves. Even his daughter isn’t safe.
Fox News keeps the sleigh speeding along.
Now that a few have been turned, blood’s in the water and will keep pouring.
He will hang in to the end of the term, bloodied but unbowed.
Mm. Hows the Turei prosecution coming along?
A.
[TheStandard: A moderator moved this comment to Open Mike as being off topic or irrelevant in the post it was made in. Be more careful in future.]
Didn’t he go to London to avoid the police?
he?
dv is talking about Todd Barclay
A.
Not sure what that has to do with Turei but thanks for clearing that up
A fairly high bar must be set for WINZ to prosecute. Contributing factors are length of time not complying, severity of offending, acceptance/confession, amounts involved, repayments/ability to recover debt, subsequent life position, and the strength of WINZ’s case in the first place.
My guess is that Turei’s case did not meet the bar.
In Barclay’s case the complainant appears to have been bought off by the National Party in the form of John Key’s prime ministerial services account, and soothing late night texts from the twice failed Bill English.
Sorry mate, you just seem to be trying to rationalize a double standard to me
A.
I know which one cost the taxpayer more!
I don’t listen to newstalk zb from about 5 to 6 in the morning because that’s when Hosking comes on. Often in the hour before that the teeth have to be gritted.
Now they have the quinella.
“Kate Hawkesby to host Newstalk ZB’s Early Edition”
If her rant on the decision of Peters to go how he did is any indication, the one household can unload all it’s bile in one place in the same sort of time slot.
ZB doubling down on their right wing hosts. Mark Dye (along with Tim Roxborogh) was probably the only out and out leftie on ZB and he’s quit/been fired.
The line up is now fully RWNJ from 0500 to 1900 every single day.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11938800
So the Stepford Wife is joining the awful man who does the ZB Breakfast. Nepotism at work here. Thankfully for most people it is not a station they tune into. It probably will be more of the same garbage like her column she does in a womens’ rag. All the enlightening stuff about how to be a mother and a wife – as if all the other wonderful mothers and wives don’t already know about how to glue a household together. Does she think she is the expert in this for god’s sake. Being on the gravy train will enable her to get a really good nanny in to do all her housewifely chores and dropping kids off to school ec. Yawn yawn.
And to be really bitchy – she needs to get out of this 1970’s time warp and do something with her bloody hair.
I think his crazed serialised rant in the NZH in the week following NZ1’s decision to opt for Labour has cooked his goose in the eyes of many – or at least those that live outside the rarified climes of Remmers …
This is interesting:
“Andrew Little says the Government may waive health and safety laws for a manned re-entry to Pike River”
https://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/98390520/andrew-little-govt-may-waive-health-and-safety-laws-for-pike-river-reentry
Given Health and Safety laws are there to ensure the protection of workers – I find this a strange and dangerous precedent
“He said an independent third party could be made responsible for the operations, but he was prepared to take responsibility himself. ”
All credit that he is willing to take responsibility. But given that nobody can guarantee it safe – I really hope that this does not end badly.
Yeah somehow a bunch of apathetic right wingers like yourself know so much more about mine safety and re-entry than the former UK principal mine inspector and former head NZ mines inspector Tony Forster who says it’s entirely possible and is happy to go in himself.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/98252389/pike-river-families-back-andrew-littles-appointment-to-lead-reentry
Even Andrew Little says there are risk.
“I’ve read two comprehensive reports so far both say yes there are risks, but yes this is possible…You’ve just got to manage those risks, so let’s find a way to do that.
http://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2017/10/we-ve-waited-nearly-seven-years-for-this-pike-river-widow.html
Dont get me wrong – Kudos for him taking responsibility, and Im happy for the families if they get their loved ones home for a proper burial.
But again – I think changing the Health and Safety laws to enable it is a issue and a dangerous precedent.
One thing that I think we can all agree on – nobody wants anyone else to get hurt there.
Every undertaking such as re entering the mine has a risk involved. The question is not just about rationality but humanity.
As for the argument of risk per se I belief the workers have shown the ultimate willingness on that point to their employer and we should at least support all endeavors to retrieve the bodies so that the families can have closure.
Where’s your concern about every other place that safety cannot be “guaranteed”?
Little’s main objectives in that interview were: the families would be listened to and geniunely consulted with; and that risks can be mitigated.
If risks cannot be mitigated down to a reasonable level and the families still want them to go in, there might be a law change in this case. The thing is, I think the perception of many people (definitely my perception, anyway) is that “health and safety” is being used as a handy excuse to hide behind in order to excuse inactivity.
If that were removed as an excuse, and the families were genuinely consulted with, I think you’ll still find that they wouldn’t want people to die trying to recover their loved ones and evidence. They just want an honest appraisal of the situation.
“If risks cannot be mitigated down to a reasonable level and the families still want them to go in, there might be a law change in this case”
and thats what I have issue with.
So IF they cannot mitigate the risk – they will change the law to send people down there actively knowing that there is risk to them.
You would not accept that from John Key – esp if there was a further accident from the unmitigated risk they knew about.
I wouldn’t accept anything from Dr. Sir John Key that hadn’t first been through an extreme vetting and fact-checking process. That’s a consequence of his well-earned reputation for lying through his teeth.
Dunnokeyo was last years’ problem.
The issue around H&S is a red herring, so far. There might be genuine reasons not to go in, but the previous regime were pretty bloody quick to go ‘oh gosh, H&S ties our hands in this situation, how sad, problem over’.
I suspect that you will find that they change the law to allow sort of “good samaritan” efforts to rescue/recover evidence and people. I hope they make it a systemic change, not restricted to Pike River Mine. People should not be “sent” down if it’s unsafe – but if the reason is strong enough, they should be allowed to go, and not be held back by a paper-pusher worried about their own personal legal liability.
I just hope that when they go back in a full investigation is done. We need to know what happened to those people so we can act to correct it.
^ I would agree with that also.
There were so many violations of safe practice identified by the Royal Commission that I’ll guess if the cause is tracked down it’ll just be one of the problems already identified. Shit like methane sensors getting covered over, failure to use explosion-proof motors, workers smuggling in unsafe equipment etc.
I would hope that “we don’t exactly know what caused Pike River” hasn’t been a hold-up in sorting that shit out at other mines.
http://pikeriver.royalcommission.govt.nz/Volume-One—What-Happened-at-Pike-River—Part-Two
Going large.
https://twitter.com/carolecadwalla/status/925144729548935169
Yep – gonna take the nuclear option for t.rump to get outta this – you can be on top until below you starts moving.
Hey, why can’t this work for National Party policies?
I’d love it if a law was set requiring that policies be supported by facts where such are available. That’d pretty much kill all National Party policies.
Breaking news. Foreign speculators to be banned from buying NZ residential housing from early 2018. Legislation to be introduced before Christmas.
Apart from Australians, I expect a number of businesses to now be set up to purchase on behalf of foreign buyers..all ‘legal’ of course.
Excellent. Now to stop offshore speculators using resident proxies to act as buyers for them.
Jacinda also said (if I heard it right) that instructions would be given to NZ negotiators that NZ will not agree to ISDS clauses in TPP.