Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy). Step right up to the mike…
Enquiry into funding of sexual abuse services deadline for submissions this THURSDAY, Oct 10. Hopefully this will lead to better funding and mean that service providers no longer have to resort to begging for funding instead of treating victims.
John Tamihere, “I shave my legs”, but who cares if I do or don’t”– it doesn’t affect my perception or political understanding, am not a Labour Party member, and not part of the Wellington “belt way”. And I think your various pronouncements on issues of gender and sexuality are highly offensive – I would never vote for someone who makes those kinds of statements regularly and continues to stand by them year after year.
The issue of pokies is important, and i am glad you are bringing it into the open once again. There needs to be as much transparency as possible around pokie operations and the money involved. But it still will not be enough to get me voting for you.
I have already voted this week, and I didn’t vote for you, John.
It may be a ‘broad church’, but surely someone who repeatedly gives the finger to the very constitution of the party, who is abusive towards many, if not most of its membership, and large groups within the wider community….. surely…..
But anyway, he made himself unelectable to a sizeable chunk of the electorate, including, I reckon, many form his support base, when he moved home and abandoned his pets to starve, and it was reported in the media.
Cruelty to animals is widely taken by experts – and any decent human – as an indicator of capacity for cruelty to people, even if it were not utterly vile in itself.
“The issue of pokies is important, and i am glad you are bringing it into the open once again. There needs to be as much transparency as possible around pokie operations and the money involved. “
Agree, Karol. If John Tamihere had stuck with social issues like this he would have gone a long way. I remember back in his days at the Waipareira Trust when the advertisement for gambling control was an image of the Sky Tower as junkie’s needle. Awesome. Also the work the Trust did with health and education for families out West.
As it is, he’s too duplicitous to get the votes of people who remember this brain fart about women in politics, among other things. Maybe he’s hoping for the votes of a new generation that is unaware of his past indiscretions.
The idea of Tamihere standing for Labour seat is bloody ridiculous. He was useless last time. I note he says in the article that he is just using the local election as a sounding board for a possible National Election run next year.
By the way I notice the nice Herald has devoted quite a few inches to Tamihere today. Wonder why?
JT has gone down so far in my estimation that when I read he took reporters on a pub crawl I wondered if he had pre-aarange the people on the pokies as “props” to help him make his point.
Slippery the Prime Minister, strutting His stuff Statesman-like across the World stage via 3News last night,
”China is still there and it isn’t going anywhere”, unquote, Lolz i don’t know just how out of context that particular piece of ‘Colonial Cloddery’ was from the PM but i imagined an elongated ”Derrrrr” occurring after He said it,
The bloke is about as deep as a puddle of piss left in the porch by a stray dog and if National are looking for a ‘dead cats bounce’ in the polls from having the PM pontificating on the global political stage, forget it, Crusty the Clown leaves a more lasting image…
Interesting to read reports of John Tamihere decrying Housing NZ which was considering forbidding its tenants to keep dogs. http://www.radiolive.co.nz/Pet-ownership-is-none-of…NZs…/Default.aspx
This was an invasion of their tenants rights he says. Anyone who has lived near to constantly barking dogs, had them defecate on your own property, knows the effort required to train a dog ie socialise it and give it appropriate obedience training, plus the cost of feeding them, plus providing regular care including vet visits, will know that Housing NZ is doing everybody, including the poverty-stricken tenants, a favour.
Actually John T says he understands their poverty which means that dogs will be unaffordable (even cats can be beyond a bene’s budget) so he is happily inconsistent, expressing the most emotional statement that will present him as a caring, sensible fellow. Times are tough and people on the breadline will use their money to pay for food and power. The first thing that goes is the registration and warrant. The majority of people do not want to break the law, they just cannot afford to keep the law.
This may have been mentioned before, but I was surprised to see the Daily blog adopt an “open mike”. It seemed to have the same graphic as this one did (back in the day).
I guess “the more the merrier”, but I doubt the heavy moderation policy over there will be able to accomodate the sort of discussions we have here. It will be interesting to see how it unfolds.
TDB consolidates a lot of writers well, great to see ‘blue collar’ union backing too, (when was the last time anyone wore a blue collar tho? it is all branded clothing or hi-visis these days) it remains a clunky site to use but with good content.
The Standard is number one really, but everyone is catered for somewhere, luvvies at Public Address, and dirty filthy torys at Kiwi and dark half mentals at Whalespew.
“open mike” many are too busy for another one but am sure Jenny will surface there.
I think open mike on TDB will take a different form from here. TS has systems and moderation policies that encourage discussion. TDB has a moderation policy that tends to make discussions more secondary to the posts – some very good posts by some excellent authors.
Jenny does comment over there, but surprisingly she seems quite rational and calm in her comments there (except an occasional complaint about being censored on TS). Of course, as TDB comments all automatically go through moderation before being released, it’s hard to know if all her comments do get released.
But, curiously, there hasn’t been any posts on climate change on TDB in the last week, and no attacks from Jenny about it. Gotta wonder about her double standards and if, she is just out to undermine TS. I hadn’t previously seen her as a provocateur, just an unreliable commentator on TS – but given the disparity with her TDB comments, I can’t help but wonder.
I’ve been noticing that too Karol, and did think it was a different Jenny until I saw the climate change stuff. I reckon TDB’s moderation system and policy is a lot to do with it (ts gives tr0lls a lot of lattitude), but you might be right that Jenny now has a grudge against ts which affects her behaviour here.
…she seems quite rational and calm in her comments there.
From memory karol, Jenny started off the same way on The Standard. Indeed on one occasion at least her ‘comment’ was so good it was elevated to post status. She made good points and was praised by others for them – including me. Then she started to become more and more unreasonable to the point I stopped reading her diatribes. A bit sad.
I don’t know Jenny like the regular folks here do, but I do wonder if there is common ground that she shares with readers, commenters and authors, and that what would otherwise be camaraderie becomes distance and self isolation via her antagonism and repetition. (I see she earned a lengthy ban).
The situation reminds me of when you are in a meeting where there is a common group goal or aim. Then there’s that one person who shares those goals but aims to highjack the group with their own unique view on the goal. They often end taking up much of the speaking time and give the facilitator a difficult time of it whilst alienating the rest of the group from themselves because of their extreme views and actions. Maybe Jenny has a sense of desperation about the topic of climate change, that’s the expression that comes across at least in her comments. It’s hard to have a rational conversation with someone who is feeling desperate because the mind is stuck on a treadmill. It’s a bit of a shame when that happens.
She did, lol. but it wasn’t on open mic it was on “Cunliffe’s first 100 days” by Martyn Bradbury. It’s a shame really, she’s still upset about TS authors not writing an article about the Solid Energy bail out, despite having it explained to her on two occasions that I have read, what the reason for that is.
“For instance, witness the difficulty The Standard is having in getting out a statement on the Bail out of Solid Energy.” – says Jenny. That was posted yesterday.
I like the articles on The Daily Blog and the work they’ve done around live streaming public meetings but I don’t comment anymore for a variety of reasons that I’ve already mentioned. They do good work though, all strength to them.
Honest to god, this is the truth – I saw that comment about Jenny and I thought “I bet Pete George will too” 😈 Then I trotted over to TDB to see what their Open Mike looks like and the first one I come across is this
Why shouldn’t Jenny talk about her displeasure at coal mining without getting banned here? I’ve known Jenny for years, we support different parties, and we have opposite views about mining and climate change. I agree with a lot of her views and disapprove of others, but I will defend her right to write them. If not in this forum then it will be at another. Why don’t you all join us, somewhere else. Freedom of expression no longer exists on The Standard. And we know whose faullt that is.
If you look at what she got banned for this time:-
1. It was for lying about what I’d said about her on my post. 12 weeks
2. Persistently lying about what the greens and labour’s policies were on a number of topics. 12 weeks
The point was that she didn’t damn well know what the policies were because it was apparent that she’d never looked.
In both offenses she’d been warned what would happen if she did it again the day before, and obviously decided to deliberately do it. I acted in accordance with what I’d said.
I’d call it a penalty peddling fantasies as fact and for stupidity. She is welcome to write at other forums where I’m sure that she will be welcomed /sarc
Jenny is quite free to write her views here or there if she follows the rules set at each blog. There are few rules on TS, but people are required to stick by them or get banned, temporarily or permanently.
Jenny has continuously broken 2 of them – attacking authors, and telling us what to write. She could just have posted her own comments on Solid Energy, etc here. But she, as she has done several times before, told us quite aggressively what she thinks we should be writing about. She has been warned about this several times. She then starts claiming she’s being censored and gets aggressive.
She continually is in attack mode, and seems to think her choice of topics to write on should be everyone’s. Too often, Jenny has not engaged in discussions just harangued and attacked people, even though her comments are not always that reliable in fact or judgement. It becomes tiresome and does not help maintain discussions.
This has all been said before. She has a tendency to express her views in ways that just annoy many people – and to spam us with one long comment after another without really engaging in discussion in any depth. It seems like tr0lling, though that probably isn’t her intention.
I’m very happy if she prefers to comment at TDB on any topic of her choosing.
Freedom of speech is not “freedom to write whatever you like wherever you like with no limitations and free from criticism”.
Jenny is perfectly able to start up her own blog on WordPress or (godsforbid) Blogger and writing about climate change and her personal illusions about Labour and Green policies to her heart’s content.
She does not, however, have the right to use this platform, built and maintained by other people, to tell lies and break the rules, especially after being warned about the consequences of doing so.
And that pretty much goes for any commenter on any site.
Actually, Jenny tries to stifle dissent from her own views with her bullying tactics. Freedom cannot happen without responsibility towards others. Just shouting at others, and not really listening to them, is not what I’d call the kind of freedom of expression that serves democracy.
Basically, Jenny was not banned for what (in terms of political views) she said as much as how she said it.
If you want another left wing blog, why not go start it yourself?
You’ve got the wrong end of the stick. It’s not a general comments post, it’s a post about a guy called Michael who is looking to share his feelings – Open Mike.
Bomber doesn’t take criticism or disagreement well so any open mic on his turf will consist of mostly praise and agreement unlike the standard where debate and disagreement is encouraged
TC, I think it’s just a select few like you who get harshly moderated at TDB. The rest of us have figured out where the boundaries lie and accept the ‘my blog, my rules’ ethos and just get on with it.
Oh Those Statins. My MD can beat your MD any day when it comes to arguments about them. And they may not harm memory thinking at all according to the web.
Now I have found what they are, too much curiosity here, I’ll pass on some possibly helpful information. In addition to their well-known benefits in heart disease, high-dose statins appear to reduce gum inflammation caused by periodontal disease, a new report published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology shows. The findings offer more evidence that heart disease and gum disease may be linked, and also help support the view that statins achieve at least some of their effect not through their cholesterol-lowering effect but through separate inflammation-fighting mechanisms. – Forbes
Testimonial –
I was completely ignorant until I began to blog on The Standard. Now I find that I can discuss anything at any pub I choose to visit and people in the street are struck dumb with my field of knowledge which now includes statins.
If they harmed memory or thinking I’d notice it pretty well immediately. My job is 90% of those with a touch of creativity.
However I am still the vagueness for ordinary matters and short-term memory (that isn’t code) that I always was. I still have a dyslexia on names (hat are not classes, variables, or filenames) that I always did. And I still maintain a catalogue of who has been writing what on this site over the last few years that is sufficient to look the relevant comments up. Not to mention politics and science…
It is ordinary living that I forget and don’t think about that much…. 🙂 Not that important unless Lyn insists (and she is often a pretty geek as well).
I’m not even sure that the statins caused much of my weight gain since I started taking them. That could be due to being forced to stop smoking. However when they doubled up the statin dose to the original level a month ago for my ideological specialist’s reasons, my weight which had been stable started increasing again…
Although you can get a report of just about any side effect you want if you have enough of the population taking a medication, weight gain is pretty unusual for a statin unless you’re beginning to develop Type 2 diabetes or if you’re experiencing muscle and/or joint pain which is causing you to not get as much exercise as usual.
if you are experiencing muscle or joint pain or going to the loo more than usual you should get back to your GP ASAP for further tests.
This is an open mike comment, not a TPP point, KK.
I did not say the US Government brought its own buildings down on 9/11.
I simply provided 4 pieces of evidence that suggest events happen because of conspiracies, not coincidence, which would seem to be your case as you use the disparaging definition of the word conspiracy. I tend to go for the less pejorative description of the words, where conspiracy theory is a term that is a neutral descriptor for any claim of civil, criminal or political conspiracy.
On 9/11, I’m assuming you don’t believe that the buildings came down by coincidence. You believe that there was a conspiracy, I assume, organised by Osama bin Laden. That, KK, is a conspiracy theory.
So you are a conspiracy theorist yourself. You just believe in different conspiracies.
That is a very poor conclusion to draw King Kong,
perhaps you should have read the post, clearly by what you are writing you would have learned something.
“In the case of Karol’s fantasy, she has Travellerev agreeing with her which means you can immediately discount the whole thing as fucking nonsense.”
I suppose the other way to form an opinion on karol’s article would be to read it, but I don’t imagine you’ve got time for that what with all the trooling you have to do.
Even more Interesting that All the WT buildings came down in their own Footprint. IE: Like when they have been wired and dropped, it’s called Demolition.
“Even more Interesting that All the WT buildings came down in their own Footprint. IE: Like when they have been wired and dropped, it’s called Demolition.”
I’m going to look silly if you were just being sarcastic, but neither of the big buildings did that, and, in fact, a large chunk of one hit the 3rd building. As I say, apologies if you were just taking the pi55.
Well, no they didn’t. Quite a lot of debris fell outside the area they had occupied on the ground. Into other buildings. Some of which also fell down.
But they did fall in a generally “downward” direction. This is due to what people like to call “gravity”. The lack of Godzilla applying a constant lateral force meant that toppling did not occur.
Arguing equivalence because they are the same class of thing while ignoring the degree of plausibility of each thing is pretty much what young-earth creationists do.
If we operated like that in real life, we’d all be paralyzed by existential doubt, including the assumption that: “the bread which I’ve eaten my entire life and has sated my hunger previously will sate my hunger when I eat it today” is equivalent to “the bread which I’ve eaten my entire life and has sated my hunger previously will poison me if I eat it today”.
As it is, the same processes that demonstrated the existence of most of the conspiracies (in its purest “multiple people working in contemporary secrecy” form) you mentioned also demonstrated that towers fell because planes hijacked by terrorists flew into them.
Now, the TPP/APEC thing is interesting, because the same mechanisms as above have demonstrated that multinational corporations are, well, frequently morally bankrupt (especially the tobacco industry), and Karol writes excellently researched, structured and referenced posts. On the flipside, as KK points out, T-eve jumping in adds a certain level of crazy to the mix. But after the Hobbit law change, we all know that Key’s actively marketing NZ as for sale to the quickest bidder, fuck the consequences to the populace.
9/11 is the perfect example of this.
People who believe the story about Osama Bin Laden, 19 hijackers, box cutters, etc etc are conspiracy theorists as this was clearly a ‘conspiracy.’ Not a very plausible one either.
9/11 is the perfect example of this.
People who believe the story about Osama Bin Laden, 19 hijackers, box cutters, etc etc are conspiracy theorists as this was clearly a ‘conspiracy.’ Not a very plausible one eithe
A conspiracy that was exceptionally well documented at the time and has been publicly examined extensively by multiple organisations. Will we ever know all the details of the case, like what the hijackers ate for breakfast? No. But we know the bulk of it.
And alternative theories tend to be demonstrably false, extremely tenuous, posited by nutbars, apparently invented for financial gain, and/or significantly more implausible than the generally accepted version.
They are not equivalent positions, any more than “God created the earth six thousand years ago because a magic book told me so” is equivalent to the Theory of Evolution.
And let’s not forget that the conspirators openly claim to have done it, instead of claiming that they were set up by their enemies and are being attacked without reason. Which would be kind of good line to take if it was true.
I’m having to reply to this comment again as there is no reply button under your comment that goes …
“A conspiracy that was exceptionally well documented at the time and has been publicly examined extensively by multiple organisations. Will we ever know all the details of the case, like what the hijackers ate for breakfast? No. But we know the bulk of it.
And alternative theories tend to be demonstrably false, extremely tenuous, posited by nutbars, apparently invented for financial gain, and/or significantly more implausible than the generally accepted version.
They are not equivalent positions, any more than “God created the earth six thousand years ago because a magic book told me so” is equivalent to the Theory of Evolution.”
1. At no stage did I make a statement saying I believed in alternative conspiracy theories. I stated I did not know what happened and commented that the official conspiracy theory ( Bin Laden etc) was implausible.
2, You are trying to control the tone of the conversation by using emotive language such as nutbar, However, there are reputable people who question the 9 11 story. What about these people’s pedigree? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZEvA8BCoBw
3. I am the sceptic here. You believe in one conspiracy theory; I believe in neither and await evidence that supports the theory presented. I refute your attempt to again to frame the conversation through your use of language ( so that I am on the side of new age creationists).\
4. As a believer, can you explain how WTC7 fell, when it was not hit by a plane? I have not heard any evidence to persuade me to the Bin Laden conspiracy theory.
5. If you apply your own thinking to the official conspiracy theory ( i.e. who made money out of it) then there are plenty of candidates!
The observed collapse of the World Trade Centers 1 and 2 have been measured at near the rate of free fall. This is the rate at which nearly all of the “falling energy” (kinetic energy from gravity) must deliver the building to ground level. This leaves no energy for smashing and pulverizing the concrete slabs nor for shredding construction steel.
1: I do not believe that I have ever claimed that you do believe a particular theory.
2: I don’t give a shit about who “controls the tone”. If I recall correctly, AE911Truth has a membership that consists of <1% of the architects (let alone "engineers") in the USA. That is well within the expected margins for serious mental disorders in a population, but then I also think that some of them are just stupid. Either way, they come under the category I like to call "nutters".
3: No, you are not being a sceptic. Your statement that the well-documented events are "not very plausible" implies disbelief and a lack of impartial evaluation. It is the difference between agnosticism and atheism. Sceptics, in the modern sense, are not completely disbelieving, they just step back and rationally examine the evidence. Whereas you, at best, have gone all Ancient Greek, we cannae know anything ever.
As to my "use of language", I merely pointed out that creationists use the same tactic, not that you are on the same side.
4: Fire after parts of a fecking great building hit it. Try reading one of the many investigations that covered it.
and that goes for the BinLaden thing, too.
5: Yes indeed. But it's difficult to get one person, let alone 19, to kill themselves so you can make money.
Paul, you say that people who made money out of it should be looked at as suspects.
Fair enough.
So what’s the theory?
I’ve asked plenty of truthers for an alternate theory that accounts for all the facts.
I would be more than happy to talk about such a theory, if it existed. It’s been more than a decade now, and such a theory has yet to be presented to me so that I might think about it.
Usually when I ask,I’m told that “It’s not our job to provide a theory”. I do not find this at all convincing, and as a sceptic yourself, I’m sure you agree.
As a sceptic, I have not seen enough evidence to convince me that WTC7 (in particular) and the Twin Towers could have collapsed as they did.
There are many reputable people (not nutters) who similarly question the story.
I am not name calling your opinion, but am continually having to deal with words like truther, nutbar..
Your argument should be strong enough not to rely on name calling
Live and let live McFlock.
You believe, I doubt.
Please don’t let your religious fervour get the better of you and mean you start persecuting those who question the holy truth of 9/11.
I’m not asking for anything as well developed as the official theory, (though I will note the more than a decade again, in passing), just a brief explanation of how these buildings came down if it wasn’t due to the planes that flew into them.
Who might have done it, and why it would have made sense for them to do it. Why doing it, the way they did it, was the best way of achieving their aims.
I’m more than happy to talk about such a theory, and to discuss the official theory too.
Usually I just catch abuse.
‘truthers’ however, is hardly abuse. It’s a self identifier.
@McFlock
Given the fact that I am not privy to key information about the events as: I was not on the commission that investigated the events of 11 September and that much of the evidence was destroyed, I am unwilling to come to unsubstantiated theories without evidence.
That’s the scientific method.
Please don’t let your religious fervour get the better of you and mean you start persecuting those who question the holy truth of 9/11.
Challenging ideas in the same forum that they are raised is not “persecution”.
Reducing overwhelming evidence of fact into a mere difference of opinion is also something that creationists like to do. For what it’s worth.
You doubt, fair enough.
From what you have presented here, you have no beliefs of your own. Fair enough.
You regard fringe youtube theorists to be credible counterpoints to multiple investigations and blanket coverage of the events as they happened. Fair enough.
But to then demand respect for the shallow credulity that ensues from the above? That’s a wee bit unfair.
@McFlock
Given the fact that I am not privy to key information about the events as: I was not on the commission that investigated the events of 11 September and that much of the evidence was destroyed, I am unwilling to come to unsubstantiated theories without evidence.
That’s the scientific method.
I am unwilling to come to unsubstantiated theories without evidence.
That’s the scientific method.
there is quite a lot of evidence though Paul.
And one doesn’t need to have all the possible evidence in order to form a theory that accounts for that evidence which we do have.
That too, is the scientific method. Although working out what happened isn’t really science. It’s more akn to history. We need theories about history to weigh againts each other. We use the balance of probability, and testimony, as well as science, to try and work out what happened.
At the moment, the sceptics of the official theory haven’t had a lot of success, as far as i have seen, in coming up with an alternate theory.
I remain more than happy to discuss one, should it arise.
@PB
“At the moment, the sceptics of the official theory haven’t had a lot of success, as far as i have seen, in coming up with an alternate theory.”
That is true.but then they aren’t the gatekeepers of the knowledge.
e.g. A citizen of Japan is less likely to know details about the TPP than a large US corporation.
there is plenty of evidence available to them. there are many known facts. How do they account for them?
What plausible theory is there, other than the official one/
Again, I’m not asking for conclusive evidence for this theory, just a description of an alternate hypothesis that accounts for the known facts.
Over a decade, and they haven’t even started on one, as far as I can tell.
But I sense you don’t have desire to speculate on even the possibilities of an alternate theory, other than your comment about who made money out of it. Shall we start from there?
These people who made money out of it. Was this a rational way of making the money? Were there easier ways perhaps? Less risky ways? How well do the known facts fit with the explanation of them being motivated by making money?
Those seem like good questions to start with to me.
this ‘gatekeepers of knowledge’ phrasing isn’t particularly helpful I think, in keeping the conversation clear.
Are you suggesting there is another conspiracy to keep the relevant knowledge from us?
Or is this a part of the same conspiracy theory, that is needed to account for the failure to come up with an alternate theory?
I’m asking if this is what you mean, because it’s not clear, I’m not suggesting that is what you mean. Nor am I using conspiracy in any negative sense.
“And alternative theories tend to be demonstrably false, extremely tenuous, posited by nutbars, apparently invented for financial gain, and/or significantly more implausible than the generally accepted version.”
You claimed reasons why people might support alternative conspiracy theories.
I simply posited that there might be financial reasons for people behind the official story.
I repeat . No conclusive evidence has been put in favour of any story.
That’s why many independent people want a proper inquiry. Not the farce that occurred in 2004.
No conclusive evidence has been put in favour of any story.
That’s why many independent people want a proper inquiry. Not the farce that occurred in 2004.
The evidence put forward has been beyond reasonable doubt, not beyond all doubt.
If one requires all reasonable doubts to be exhausted before one draws a conclusion, this is only logical in an imperfect world.
If one requires all unreasonable doubts to be exhausted before one draws a conclusion, then one ‘s stated reasoning is questionable.
If someone hasn’t seen enough evidence to reach a conclusion regarding 9/11, despite everything gathered since (not just 2004), then their reasoning is questionable: either they have closed their eyes for 12 years, or they have no idea that some sources of information are less reliable than others,or their faculty of reason is faulty, or they are being purposefully misleading (the most common reason in society to mislead strangers is to gain profit).
You know, I’ve never been moderated either here or at TDB and I don’t think anyone will ever call me a sycophant – even you RWNJs. Perhaps the problem is that those who do get moderated are just too bloody stupid to be able to put together a well reasoned argument.
True – even I’ve managed to avoid a ban, and I’m a fucking arrogant dickhead who uses rude words and likes to play with hypocritical nutbars. But a few folk don’t seem to get the message when the TERSE BOLD MESSAGES SUDDENLY APPEAR 🙂
[lprent: Sometimes not so terse. I’ve looked at a few of your comments for the pointless abuse behaviour criteria. But on investigating the context decided that the points had already been made. ]
This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your ancestors ate manna and died yet whoever feeds on this bread will live forever :
Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old bread leavened with malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
John 6:58
1 Cor. 5:8
Bomber is an extremely dishonest person who serves a great dishonor to the left-wing. Running a blog wherein critical comments are deleted from moderation because they disagree with the party line is somewhat intellectually dishonest coming from a person like Bomber who outwardly champions the freedom of speech…as long as he agrees of course.
And all that bullshit he spun about being hacked by the government. What a fucking crock. Those nice chaps at The Egonomist had a field day with it.
I wouldn’t take it personally, I’ve made a few comments there and think everybody’s comment goes into moderation prior to being released. There’s no way to have a quick debate there, so I just read and leave mostly.
What makes it worse is that there appears to be no easy way to search for comments, so if you go back a day or two later you have to manually search through the dog’s breakfast that is the front page, assuming you remember the name of the post you commented on.
Talking of the Daily Blog, Chris Trotter has an interesting piece there today on the proposed TPPA, Chris in a bit of a ‘lest we forget’ vein exhorts those of us on the left, when we are considering the ramifications of that free trade agreement to remember that ”wealth has to be first created befor that wealth can be redistributed”,
Excuse me Chris, but, What the F**k???, what redistribution of wealth is it that you talk of, all that redistribution of said wealth that has occurred after each act of ‘trade freedom’ that has occurred in the past 40 years perhaps???,
i personally do not see where it is us from ‘the left’ who have forgotten anything here thank you very much Chris Trotter,
Here’s a shortlist of the ‘redistribution of wealth’ so far gained from all this ‘free trade’, 300,000 low waged workers being employed for less than the living wage, another 300,000 workers confined to ‘rotational employment’ having to rely upon welfare benefits as their income as much as they can rely on a wage packet,
The price of dairy products, as the Global demand and therefor prices have increased the cost to those above who obviously have not shared in the miracle of ‘wealth redistribution’ to a point that these are now luxury items off the weekly shopping list as much as they are on it,
And you advocate more of the same Chris Trotter???…
Last day for postal voting apparently (for mail to get delivered by 12pm Sat), according to the GP. Although my papers say to post on Weds at the latest.
Kim Campbell is chief executive of the Employers and Manufacturers Association
What do you expect him to say?
He’s representing his mates.
Paying people more might mean his mates less profits.
Less international holidays, deluxe cars…..
And the Herald’s editors give him a platform to publicise his vile opinions to a large audience.
I wonder who pays them to give the elite’s perspective so much hearing?
Where do you stand on the political spectrum? Michael Marien came up with a table of named ideological positions in 1970 which has been updated in this link. The way that people can sort themselves under different definitions or labels is shown in in an amusing and artful way.
Yes I still read Heinlan and EE Doc Smith, John Wyndham and Harry Harrison of the very very sexist Stainless Steel Rat fame. But one of the best Sci Fi books I ever read was Joe Haldemans The Forever War. But for some more modern Writers, and sexism is now out the window. Corey Doctorow short stories are good Like “When sysadmins ruled the world, And I robot. But for a book that I have read 3 times so far, and I am still enjoying re-reading it, is Accelerando by Charles Stross.
I haven’t read Wyndham in a long time either, that might be worth a look. I read Doctorow’s Little Brother and thoroughly enjoyed it. Funnily enough I got my first wave and pay eftpost card in the mail today (gee thanks ANZ).
Robert Heinlein. I hadn’t heard of him, did quite a lot of things including science fiction. If he said something sexist he was a child of his time I think, born in 1907.
Within the framework of his science fiction stories, Heinlein repeatedly addressed certain social themes: the importance of individual liberty and self-reliance, the obligation individuals owe to their societies, the influence of organized religion on culture and government, and the tendency of society to repress nonconformist thought. He also speculated on the influence of space travel on human cultural practices.
I would rate Heinlein in the top five (fiction) authors who influenced me in my late teens. Great story telling. And yes the sexism was of his time, although there are other writers of his generation whose work has stood the test of time better. I was disappointed to find I can’t read him now. Maybe I’ll try again when I am older.
DTB
Also suitable for The Coiffure.
The original table by Michael Marien had more listings (some regarded as dated) with one called – Primitive Populist with a view of concerns as Domination by pointy-headed pseudo-intellectuals. Proposals were Throw briefcases in [Wellington Harbour] Potomac, and restore common sense.
Has anyone else had long waits to get onto The Standard? This time I went through google as otherwise I couldn’t get connection. Also I again have the annoyance of having things underlined and colours heightened and the edit box partly hidden. Something, some other site, whatever seems to set this off. So have to find how to reset the page from my helper.
Yeah – but I always think its because I’m overloading the computer too quickly and after a while give up …… go and make dinner or do something useful (clean the bathroom) and by the time I get back to it, its unplugged itself !
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Akismet is our offshore anti-spam checker at wordpress.com. I’ll clear them manually until it clears
Thanks for fix Lynn. And that comment from Northshore guy sounds worthy of action. Keep well. I’m planning to go on my one hundredth planned diet. If I actually do follow it, his will give me passing grades in Diet 101.
You need to research the stories you upload, rather than simply repeat what you hear.
You need to think critically.
First up, the Daily Torygraph is hardly a unbiased viewer or source on the matter.
I wonder whether the ‘many Venezuelans’ mentioned are the very wealthy ones who own Venezuela’s media?
One name stands out. Michael Shifter
From Wikipedia.
Michael Shifter is President of the Inter-American Dialogue and an Adjunct Professor of Latin American Studies at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service.[1] He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations[1] and writes for the Council’s journal Foreign Affairs.[2] He is also a member of the Latin American Studies Association(LASA), and a contributing editor to Current History.[1]
The Daily Council on Foreign Relationsis hardly a unbiased viewer or source on the matter.
If you look at the article you will notice this :
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Venezuela expels top US diplomat 30 Sep 2013
I wonder if Uncle Sam has been fomenting unrest?
Now for KK’s education, that is a conspiracy theory.
“A conspiracy theory is an explanatory proposition that accuses two or more people, a group, or an organization of having caused or covered up, through deliberate collusion, an event or phenomenon of great social, political, or economic impact.”
It has happened everywhere south of the Rio Grande, and still is in much of Latin America. Both the US and Canada have been caught recently spying on Brazil, which possibly means we are as well. After the independent place we began to take in the world, we have gone a long way backwards under Shonkey.
“Higher tax revenue and lower than forecast core Crown expenses helped to more than halve the Government’s operating deficit before gains and losses to $4.4 billion in the year to 30 June 2013, compared with a $9.2 billion deficit the previous year.”
So losing $4.4 billion in a year is good, pr?
“Treasury’s Budget 2013 forecasts show net core Crown debt is expected to increase from $10.3 billion in June 2008 to over $70 billion by June 2017.”
And blowing out the government debt to $70 billion an example you would give of fine financial management?
Why do you doubt Labour could have done better? The only time Labour’s maintained government accounts and the economy worse than national was under the ACT government 1984-1990.
The operating balance (after gains and losses) was in surplus by $6.9 billion – $12.6 billion better than Treasury forecast at the start of the year, and $21.8 billion better than in the previous year.
Wow – off by 200% in a six month forecast?
Fire Treasury.
That’s the mantra of the choir. Shame it’s utter bullshit – national simply loot the government finances for their mates, stagnating the economy on the way. The “stability” of the cemetery.
nah, never.
The best you’ll get is when he manages to hit the “reply” button before dropping another slogan. He’s the tory equivalent of the stereotypical Maoist cadre-leader who only screams aphorisms from the little red book.
All of the Green supporters I know have productive jobs or are toiling their way through academia.
While I haven’t met nearly as many Mana supporters, those that I have met usually have productive jobs as well.
In my experience and speaking in general, the party with the parasites supporting it is National. They may have jobs, but many are highly unproductive jobs..
Sorry I can’t answer every post (have to fit it in around work) but yes National made the best of a bad situation, had Labour been in then the policies of Clark, sorry I meant Goff, no dammit I meant Shearer, oops a daisy I mean Cunliffe would have meant NZ in worse position then it is now
So well done John Key, Bill English and (most but not all of) the cabinet for making the decisions that needed to be made
I, for one, am amazed that the enormous magnitude of your lies in a comment that small did not create a terminal critical mass of highly dense bullshit and thereby tear a singularity of logical failure in the fabric of the universe, sucking us all into a parallel dimension of surreality, where the laws of nature are fish sticks.
PR
And why PR? Isn’t that set of initials a dead give away. The stuff he has been quoting sounds as if it’s culled from Key’s newsletter that I might look at if he has funny icons through it and underneath.
The interesting question into 2014 for Cunliffe’s team is what angles they will have to attack National on either in economic management (if the economy keeps stuttering upwards even with 7% uinemployed) or in fiscal management (if they ever get to break even on the public accounts).
If I were briefing Cunliffe it would be simply remainind people of the Clark years: massive term-on-term sustained economic boom, running huge government surpluses to be spent on curing social ills (until the last year alone).
Whereas the Nats, well, pick any Nat term in the last 40 years: can’t get either economic growth or prudent fiscal management in any term you can name.
And now Johnnie can give back the $500,000 he has trousered out of the tax cuts and demand his mates do the same. That will help pay back the debt the Nacts have mismanaged us into.
So you think that losing $4.4 billion in a year is good and blowing out the government debt to $70 billion is an example you would give of fine financial management.
Unbelievable.
Talk about an ideological and doctrinaire approach!
it is, because Puck doesnt think for himself, he relies on Blinglish’s spin of facts. he finds life is easier and he can walk around with a smile on his face, even if it is a bit Gomer pyle.
As Vallas, Kleinman and Biscotti (2009, 66) eloquently summarize: …the knowledge economy did not spontaneously emerge from the bottom up, but was prompted by a top-down stealth industrial policy; government and industry leaders simultaneously advocated government intervention to foster the development of the biotechnology industry and argued hypocritically that government should ‘let the free market work’.
Mazzucato, Mariana (2013-05-15). The Entrepreneurial State: Debunking Public vs. Private Myths in Risk and Innovation (Kindle Locations 1603-1607). Anthem Press. Kindle Edition.
It’s interesting how she manages to shoot down the entire myth of the innovation of the free market in almost all aspects. The simple reality is that capitalists don’t do risk or uncertainty – they do sure things. The reality is that it’s the governments of the world that fund and support the risky stuff of innovation – the private sector comes in after and takes all the laurels and profit for itself without doing any of the real work.
The market would be a gamble if the government didn’t backstop it for their selected heroes. Underlying the entire neo-liberal era are policies that reward the rich for being rich and ensure that if anything does happen that might endanger those riches then protections are in place to prevent that loss.
Besides, I live and learn. Something that economists and RWNJs don’t seem capable of.
Different forms of neurostimulation in humans have now been shown to boost our ability to learn and perform motor actions, to pay attention to events in the environment, to recall information in memory, and to exercise self-control. At the same time, evidence is mounting for more complex effects on cognition. For instance, stimulation of the human prefrontal cortex can enhance or inhibit our tendency to lie, improve our ability to lie successfully, and can encourage us to comply with social norms that carry a punishment for disobedience.
[…]
except that it doesn’t tell the whole story because anything that can boost or rehabilitate human abilities could also be exploited for military or security purposes, as well as by questionable private enterprises. Predictably, some of the major innovations in brain stimulation research are being funded by the US military.
So far the applications of brain stimulation proposed by the military are far-fetched, but what happens when the science catches up with their ambitions? What army wouldn’t take advantage of a method that could make soldiers more alert, faster to react, faster to learn, less likely to binge-drink off duty, and more compliant with authority? What intelligence agency wouldn’t embrace a technology that could help their operatives become better liars, or which limits the ability of prisoners to lie under interrogation?
Could it be used to stop politicians from lying?
The brain is miraculous, and such research could be used to help people with disabilities or brain damage.
Make people more compliant with authority? Worrying.
MIT scientist John Romanishin has done what some said couldn’t be done: He has created a mini-cube robot that has no external moving parts yet can move, climb, leap, and — most importantly — work together with its fellows to create larger shapes.
We already have nano-bots, they’re called “bacteria” 😛 Probably what we’ll end up seeing is modified cell lines that have added in man-made metabolic systems that allow them to do all sorts of interesting chemistry.
Check the notes section. Also in that particular ‘verse the military have long had a means of turning off empathy and other “problematic” bits of the human mind, to create the perfect solider, aka zombies.
But yeah, everything you are is mostly in your head and it turns out organic minds are prone to being hackable via all sorts of stuff. From diet to drugs, to strong magnetic fields, to pathogens and parasites that alter behaviour in very specific ways. Even altering social systems can shift a persons behaviour (see Rule 34, by Charles Stross). So it should come as no surprise that the military will take these things and see if they cannot craft a “better” solider, even if that means creating monsters…
The pilots in WW2 or a bit after, probably in one of those other little wars you know, last century, were given LSD because it enabled them to keep going longer so they could fly longer distances and return apparently safely. Don’t know whether they lived to a happy old age, but does any sentient being since we got civilised?
Is Rodney Councillor Penny Webster’s company’s contract with Auckland Council Controlled Organisation (CCO) Watercare a ‘conflict of interest’?
Should Rodney Councillor Penny Webster be disqualified from standing again, under the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968, because she and her husband have entered into transactions with the Auckland Council Group, totalling $32,189 during 2012, for services provided by their jointly-owned private company, All Rural Fencing Limited ?
Disqualifying contracts between local authorities and their members
(1) Except as provided in subsection (3), no person shall be capable of being elected as or appointed to be or of being a member of a local authority or of any committee of a local authority, if the total of all payments made or to be made by or on behalf of the local authority in respect of all contracts made by it in which that person is concerned or interested exceeds $25,000 in any financial year.
________________________________________________________
I made an inquiry to the Office of the Auditor-General (OAG) – who have the sole responsibility for administering the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968.
This is the reply from OAG Senior Solicitor Belinda Rynhart:
“The prohibition on contracting between local authorities and their members (section 3 of the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968) does not apply to contracts with council-controlled organisations. ”
Belinda Rynhart
Date: Tue, Oct 8, 2013 at 2:01 PM
Dear Penny
I am writing in response to your phone query to us on Friday 4 October. You are concerned about Auckland Council councillor Penny Webster’s husband providing services to the Auckland Council.
This issue was first raised with us at the beginning of the election period. Our preliminary inquiries revealed that in the financial year 2012-2013 All Rural Fencing Limited (Penny’s husband’s company) did not contract with Auckland Council.
All Rural Fencing did however contract to deliver services to one of the Council’s subsidiaries -Watercare Services Limited.
The prohibition on contracting between local authorities and their members (section 3 of the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968) does not apply to contracts with council-controlled organisations.
This means that All Rural Fencing’s contracts with Watercare Services do not cause Penny Webster to be disqualified from being a member of the Council. She did not need to seek the approval of the Auditor-General to be interested in the contracts, and no breach of the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests’) Act has occurred.
In my considered opinion, it is absolutely unacceptable for elected members (or their families) to contract for any form of Council services, whether provided directly by Council, or ‘indirectly’ by Council-Controlled-Organisations (CCOs).
As an ‘anti-corruption /anti-privatisation’ Public Watchdog, I am ‘blowing the whistle’ long and hard on this issue, in order to help achieve a very long-overdue law change to this very outdated piece of legislation.
The Auckland Council ‘Code of Conduct’ states:
“5.3. Public Interest
Members have a duty to make decisions in the public interest. They must not act in order to gain financial or other benefits for themselves, their families, friends or business interests. “
OAG Senior Solicitor Belinda Rynhart told me that the OAG agreed that the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968, was out-of-date, but getting a law change was the responsibility of the Department of Internal Affairs (DIA).
Given that the OAG, not the DIA has administrative responsibility for the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968, I have sent the following ‘Open Letter / OIA request to the CEO of the DIA:
MAYORAL CAMPAIGN 2013 OPEN LETTER TO THE CEO OF THE DIA re OAG requested law changes to the Local Authorities Members Interests Act 1968
What is the public ’perception’, when an Auckland Councillor, Penny Webster (former Chair of the Auckland Council Strategy and Finance Committee), calls on citizens and ratepayers to provide a free service by mowing Auckland Council-owned grass berms, while she and her husband get paid for services provided by their privately-owned company – All Rural Fencing Services Ltd?
______________________________________________
“Rodney councillor Penny Webster says that at a time when household budgets are tight, the council cannot afford the $12 million to $15 million cost of mowing berms for the whole region.
“It’s not fair that one area gets berm mowing, while other areas mow their own,” said Mrs Webster, a former Act MP. “The council had to make things even without increasing rates even more.”
She was disappointed with local body election candidates from the AucklandCity area who were complaining about something the rest of the region did without fuss.
The council voted to save $3 million by not cutting grass berms in the old AucklandCity area from July.
Waitemata councillor Mike Lee said Mrs Webster’s comments were “exactly the outer suburban small-mindedness and parochialism” he had to deal with in his days at the Auckland Regional Council, and which the Super City was meant to stop. ….. ..”
How is this not blinding hypocrisy from Rodney Councillor Penny Webster?
In my considered opinion, as an ‘anti-corruption’ Public Watchdog, Rodney Councillor Penny Webster is NOT ‘fit for duty’, and if I were a Rodney voter, I most certainly would not be voting for her.
I look forward to the turning of this ’bad thing into a good thing,’ and the ensuing public ‘fuss’, over this Rodney Councillor Penny Webster ‘conflict of interest’, helping to achieve a prompt updating of the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968.
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 27 were:1. The Minister for Ford Rangers strikes againTransport Minister Simeon Brown was again the busiest of the Cabinet ministers this week, announcing an ...
You got a fast carAnd I want a ticket to anywhereMaybe we make a dealMaybe together we can get somewhereAny place is betterYesterday’s newsletter, Trust In Me, on the report of abuse in state care, and by religious organisations, between 1950 and 2019, coupled with the hypocrisy of Christopher Luxon ...
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1. What's not to love about the way the Harris campaign is turning things around?a. Nothingb. Love all of itc. God what a reliefd. Not that it will be by any means easye. All of the above 2. Documents released by the Ministry of Health show Associate Health Minister Casey ...
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TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 26, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Transport: Simeon Brown announced$802.9 million in funding for 18 new trains on the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines, which ...
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Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedFirst they came for the doctors But I was confused by the numbers and costs So I didn't speak up Then they came for our police and nurses And I didn't think we could afford those costs anyway So I ...
Photo by Joshua J. Cotten on UnsplashWe’re back again after our mid-winter break. We’re still with the ‘new’ day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when we have our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm.Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream ...
Notes: This is a free article. Abuse in Care themes are mentioned. Video is at the bottom.BackgroundYesterday’s report into Abuse in Care revealed that at least 1 in 3 of all who went through state and faith based care were abused - often horrifically. At least, because not all survivors ...
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About a decade ago I worked with a bloke called Steve. He was the grizzled veteran coder, a few years older than me, who knew where the bodies were buried - code wise. Despite his best efforts to be approachable and friendly he could be kind of gruff, through to ...
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Please note:To skip directly to the- parliamentary footage in the video, scroll to 1:21 To skip to audio please click on the headphone iconon the left hand side of the screenThis video / audio section is under development. ...
Given the crackdown on wasteful government spending, it behooves me to point to a high profile example of spending by the Luxon government that looks like a big, fat waste of time and money. I’m talking about the deployment of NZDF personnel to support the US-led coalition in the Red ...
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Today, a 4 kilogram report will be delivered to Parliament. We know this is what the report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care weighs, because our Prime Minister told us so.Some reporter had blindsided him by asking a question about something done by ...
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Health NZ warned the Government at the end of March that it was running over Budget. But the reasons it gave were very different to those offered by the Prime Minister yesterday. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon blamed the “botched merger” of the 20 District Health Boards (DHBs) to create Health ...
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TL;DR: I’m casting around for new ideas and ways of thinking about Aotearoa’s political economy to find a few solutions to our cascading and self-reinforcing housing, poverty and climate crises.Associate Professor runs an online masters degree in the economics of sustainability at Torrens University in Australia and is organising ...
The Finance and Expenditure Committee has reported back on National's Local Government (Water Services Preliminary Arrangements) Bill. The bill sets up water for privatisation, and was introduced under urgency, then rammed through select committee with no time even for local councils to make a proper submission. Naturally, national's select committee ...
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What has happened to it all?Crazy, some'd sayWhere is the life that I recognise?(Gone away)But I won't cry for yesterdayThere's an ordinary worldSomehow I have to findAnd as I try to make my wayTo the ordinary worldYesterday morning began as many others - what to write about today? I began ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Monday, July 22 are:Today’s Must Read: Father and son live in a tent, and have done for four years, in a million ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Monday, July 22, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:US President Joe Biden announced via X this morning he would not stand for a second term.Multinational professional services firm ...
A listing of 32 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, July 14, 2024 thru Sat, July 20, 2024. Story of the week As reflected by preponderance of coverage, our Story of the Week is Project 2025. Until now traveling ...
This weekend, a friend pointed out someone who said they’d like to read my posts, but didn’t want to pay. And my first reaction was sympathy.I’ve already told folks that if they can’t comfortably subscribe, and would like to read, I’d be happy to offer free subscriptions. I don’t want ...
National: The Party of ‘Law and Order’ IntroductionThis weekend, the Government formally kicked off one of their flagship policy programs: a military style boot camp that New Zealand has experimented with over the past 50 years. Cartoon credit: Guy BodyIt’s very popular with the National Party’s Law and Orderimage, ...
Day one of the solo leg of my long journey home begins with my favourite sound: footfalls in an empty street. 5.00 am and it’s already light and already too warm, almost.If I can make the train that leaves Budapest later this hour I could be in Belgrade by nightfall; ...
Do you remember Y2K, the threat that hung over humanity in the closing days of the twentieth century? Horror scenarios of planes falling from the sky, electronic payments failing and ATMs refusing to dispense cash. As for your VCR following instructions and recording your favourite show - forget about it.All ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
Waiting In The Wings:For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSAannounced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
Te Rangi e tu nei (The sky above us) Te Papa e takoto nei (The land beneath us) Tatou katoa te hunga ora (To us all the living) Tena koutou katoa (Greetings) ...
A late change to charter school legislation will cheat educators out of fair pay and negotiating power proving charter schools are just a vehicle to make profit out of our education system. ...
In 2004 te iwi Māori rallied against the Crown’s attempt to confiscate our coastlines and moana with the Foreshore and Seabed Act. This led to the largest hīkoi of a generation and the birth of Te Pāti Māori. 20 years later, history is repeating itself. Today the government has announced ...
It has been five and a half years since the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care was established to investigate the abuse of children, young people, and vulnerable adults within state and faith-based institutions. Yesterday, the final report - Whanaketia through pain and trauma, from darkness to light ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to take action off the back of the International Court of Justice ruling on Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. ...
On Friday the International Court of Justice reaffirmed what Palestinian’s have been telling us for decades: that the occupation and colonisation of Palestinian lands by Israel is illegal and must end immediately. They also called for reparations for Palestinian’s who have lived under Israeli occupation since it began in 1967. ...
Labour calls on the Government to act after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories is illegal. ...
The 53.7 percent rise in benefit sanctions over the last year is more proof of this Government’s disdain for our communities most in need of support. ...
Aotearoa could be a country where every child grows up feeling safe, loved and with a sense of belonging in their whānau and community. But for some of our children, this is far from reality. Instead, they are trapped in a maze of intergenerational harm that they can’t escape on ...
Te Pāti Māori are calling for David Seymour to resign as Associate Health Minister in response to his call for Pharmac to ignore the Treaty of Waitangi. “This announcement is just another example of the government’s anti-Tiriti, anti-Māori agenda.” Said Co-leader and spokesperson for health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. “Seymour thinks it ...
The soaring price of renting is driving the rise of inflation in this country - with latest figures from Stats NZ showing rents are up 4.8 per cent on average while annual inflation is at 3.3 per cent. ...
National’s Emissions Reduction Plan will take New Zealand further from the economy we need to ensure the next generation has a stable climate and secure livelihoods. ...
Following consultation with named parties and thorough consideration of privacy interests, the Green Party is in a position to release the Executive Summary of the final report from the independent investigation into Darleen Tana. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon should be asking serious questions of his Minister for Resources Shane Jones now it’s been revealed he misled the public about a dinner with mining companies that he didn’t declare and said wasn’t pre-arranged. ...
Te Pāti Māori have submitted to the Justice Select Committee against the Sentencing (Reinstating Three Strikes) Amendment Bill. The bill will further entrench racism in our justice system and fails to focus on rehabilitation. “Reinstating Three Strikes will empower a systematically racist system and exacerbate the overrepresentation of Māori in ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee is set to make a determination on the Residential Tenancies Amendment (RTA) Bill in the coming weeks. “This legislation will give landlords the power to kick our whānau out onto the street for no reason” said Housing spokesperson, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “Their solution to the housing ...
“National’s campaign was about tackling crime and the best they can do is a two-year long Ministerial Advisory Group,” Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
“There are more examples of charter schools failing their students than there are success stories. The coalition Government is driving to dismantle our public school system and instead promote a privatised, competitive structure that puts profits before kids,” Jan Tinetti said. ...
“This government is choosing to deliberately mislead and withhold information, keeping our people in the dark about this government’s agenda and the future of our mokopuna,” said co-leader and spokesperson for Health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. The call comes after the demand from the Chief Ombudsman that Associate Minister of Health, Casey ...
“Today’s climate announcement by Simon Watts makes clear the National Government is simply paying lip service to meeting its climate change targets,” Megan Woods said. ...
National is choosing to make life harder for workers by taking away the rights our communities have fought hard for. Here's how they’re taking workers backwards. ...
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue. We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views. “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
Tēnā tātou katoa, Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts. “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet. “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks. “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. At the heart of this report are the ...
For the first time, the Government is formally acknowledging some children and young people at Lake Alice Psychiatric Hospital experienced torture. The final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament ...
The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 courageous survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care. The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through ...
With a week to go before hard-working New Zealanders see personal income tax relief for the first time in fourteen years, 513,000 people have used the Budget tax calculator to see how much they will benefit, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “Tax relief is long overdue. From next Wednesday, personal income ...
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden says a bill that has passed its first reading will improve parental leave settings and give non-biological parents more flexibility as primary carer for their child. The Regulatory Systems Amendment Bill (No3), passed its first reading this morning. “It includes a change ...
Two Bills designed to improve regulation and make it easier to do business have passed their first reading in Parliament, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. The Regulatory Systems (Economic Development) Amendment Bill and Regulatory Systems (Immigration and Workforce) Amendment Bill make key changes to legislation administered by the Ministry ...
New legislation paves the way for greater competition in sectors such as banking and electricity, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly says. “Competitive markets boost productivity, create employment opportunities and lift living standards. To support competition, we need good quality regulation but, unfortunately, a recent OECD report ranked New ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says lotteries for charitable purposes, such as those run by the Heart Foundation, Coastguard NZ, and local hospices, will soon be allowed to operate online permanently. “Under current laws, these fundraising lotteries are only allowed to operate online until October 2024, after which ...
The Coalition Government is accelerating work on the new four-lane expressway between Auckland and Whangārei as part of its Roads of National Significance programme, with an accelerated delivery model to deliver this project faster and more efficiently, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “For too long, the lack of resilient transport connections ...
Sir Don McKinnon will travel to Viet Nam this week as a Special Envoy of the Government, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “It is important that the Government give due recognition to the significant contributions that General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong made to New Zealand-Viet Nam relations,” Mr ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says newly appointed Commissioner, Grant Illingworth KC, will help deliver the report for the first phase of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into COVID-19 Lessons, due on 28 November 2024. “I am pleased to announce that Mr Illingworth will commence his appointment as ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters travels to Laos this week to participate in a series of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-led Ministerial meetings in Vientiane. “ASEAN plays an important role in supporting a peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” Mr Peters says. “This will be our third visit to ...
Construction of a new mental health facility at Te Nikau Grey Hospital in Greymouth is today one step closer, Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey says. “This $27 million facility shows this Government is delivering on its promise to boost mental health care and improve front line services,” Mr Doocey says. ...
New Zealand is committing nearly $50 million to a package supporting sustainable Pacific fisheries development over the next four years, Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones announced today. “This support consisting of a range of initiatives demonstrates New Zealand’s commitment to assisting our Pacific partners ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour says proposed changes to the Education and Training Amendment Bill will ensure charter schools have more flexibility to negotiate employment agreements and are equipped with the right teaching resources. “Cabinet has agreed to progress an amendment which means unions will not be able to initiate ...
In response to serious concerns around oversight, overspend and a significant deterioration in financial outlook, the Board of Health New Zealand will be replaced with a Commissioner, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti announced today. “The previous government’s botched health reforms have created significant financial challenges at Health NZ that, without ...
Minister for Space and Science, Innovation and Technology Judith Collins will travel to Adelaide tomorrow for space and science engagements, including speaking at the Australian Space Forum. While there she will also have meetings and visits with a focus on space, biotechnology and innovation. “New Zealand has a thriving space ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts will travel to China on Saturday to attend the Ministerial on Climate Action meeting held in Wuhan. “Attending the Ministerial on Climate Action is an opportunity to advocate for New Zealand climate priorities and engage with our key partners on climate action,” Mr Watts says. ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is travelling to the Solomon Islands tomorrow for meetings with his counterparts from around the Pacific supporting collective management of the region’s fisheries. The 23rd Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Committee and the 5th Regional Fisheries Ministers’ Meeting in Honiara from 23 to 26 July ...
The Government today launched the Military Style Academy Pilot at Te Au rere a te Tonga Youth Justice residence in Palmerston North, an important part of the Government’s plan to crackdown on youth crime and getting youth offenders back on track, Minister for Children, Karen Chhour said today. “On the ...
The Government has welcomed news the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has begun work to replace nine priority bridges across the country to ensure our state highway network remains resilient, reliable, and efficient for road users, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says.“Increasing productivity and economic growth is a key priority for the ...
Acting Prime Minister David Seymour has been in contact throughout the evening with senior officials who have coordinated a whole of government response to the global IT outage and can provide an update. The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has designated the National Emergency Management Agency as the ...
New Zealand and Japan will continue to step up their shared engagement with the Pacific, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “New Zealand and Japan have a strong, shared interest in a free, open and stable Pacific Islands region,” Mr Peters says. “We are pleased to be finding more ways ...
New developments in the heart of North Island forestry country will reinvigorate their communities and boost economic development, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones visited Kaingaroa and Kawerau in Bay of Plenty today to open a landmark community centre in the former and a new connecting road in ...
President Adeang, fellow Ministers, honourable Diet Member Horii, Ambassadors, distinguished guests. Minasama, konnichiwa, and good afternoon, everyone. Distinguished guests, it’s a pleasure to be here with you today to talk about New Zealand’s foreign policy reset, the reasons for it, the values that underpin it, and how it ...
Last summer when Matairangi burned, Ginny and Tom stood at the window of their lounge, watching kākā shoot skyward from the burning trees. From the distance, they looked to Ginny like pages torn from books and thrown into a bonfire. It was Tom, voice tight, who told her it was ...
Opinion: The Canadian short story writer Alice Munro – winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013 – died in May at the age of 92. Her work was about “the damage people inflict on one another in the name of love”, Deborah Treisman wrote in the New Yorker. ...
This month marks two years since the most powerful telescope ever built sent its first pictures back to earth. From its lofty vantage point, beyond the moon in orbit around the sun, the James Webb Space Telescope was tuned to observe the first stars and galaxies being born soon after ...
Comment: After Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ preview several weeks ago, I had some optimism about the Government’s emissions reduction plan. Now I’ve read the discussion document, that hope has been dashed. How can the Government propose a plan that wants to take New Zealand taxpayers’ hard-earned money, and spend ...
Christopher Luxon: hurdles The little man from National jumps hurdles in his sleep. He’s quite good at it in his dreams and even though the reality doesn’t quite match up you have to give him credit for getting up every morning and crashing into the very first hurdle of the ...
Comment: It was a good two hours into the conversation when Tyrone Marks raised the most basic of questions when I first spoke to him in 2017. “They didn’t explain the things they did to me. They never told me why. And they still haven’t. There’s no explanation for it. ...
Madeleine Chapman rounds out Death Week on The Spinoff with a final recommendation. You can read all of our Death Week coverage here. Nothing forces you to reflect on your life and relationships quite like proximity to death. For those whose nearest and dearest have died, there are reasonably obvious ...
Whitney Greene takes us through her life in television, including the TV character she’d like to plan a funeral for and her cow lung catastrophe on The Traitors NZ. “If the phone rings, I have to answer it,” Whitney Greene from The Traitors NZ warns as we begin our My ...
Maddie Ballard reviews the debut essay collection of Pōneke writer Flora Feltham.In ‘The Raw Material’, the longest essay in Flora Feltham’s dazzling debut collection, the author heads out for a run after hours of weaving and sees the world turn to textile. “Pounding along the Parade, I saw the ...
Andy Christiansen, one half of the experimental rock-pop duo TRiPS, shares the tunes inspiring the band’s perfect weekend and new release. “Good speakers, good food, good music, no distractions”: that’s all you need to enjoy the psychedelic stylings of TRiPS, a new band formed by Fly My Pretties’ Barnaby Weir ...
Celebrating our quadrennial opportunity to become experts in a bunch of sports we never normally watch.The games of the XXXIII Olympiad are upon us. Paris will host this year’s showcase of sporting and athletic prowess, which means some late-night and early-morning viewing for us in Aotearoa.But what sports ...
The photograph is striking and beautiful, but also disturbing – a reminder that my love for John was often entangled in shame.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.In the spring of 1980, in Dunedin, shortly before his death, someone took a photograph ...
Get to know Babushka, our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Babu’s humans, Jo and Isabel, for their support. Dog name: Babushka (Babu for short) Age: 2Breed: Border Collie X poodleIf rescued, ...
Pacific Media Watch A Lebanese photojournalist who was severely wounded during an Israeli air strike in south Lebanon carried the Olympic torch in Paris this week in honour of her peers who have been wounded and killed in the field — especially in Gaza and Lebanon. Christina Assi of Agence ...
The first report in a five-part web series focused on the 15th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women taking place in the Marshall Islands this week.SPECIAL REPORT:By Netani Rika in Majuro Women continue to fight for justice 70 years after the first nuclear tests by the United States caused ...
Christopher Luxon has joined with Australia and Canada's leaders in voicing support for US President Joe Biden's ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The 2022 election brought the “teal wave” into parliament. The next election will test whether teals, who occupy what were Liberal seats, and other independents can maintain their momentum. Joining us on the Podcast ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Musgrave, Senior lecturer in Pharmacology, University of Adelaide Pixavri/Shutterstock A major Federal Court class action has been dismissed this week after Justice Michael Lee ruled there was not enough evidence to prove the weedkiller Roundup causes cancer. Plaintiff Kelvin ...
In The Week in Politics: politicians have to decide what to do about child abuse, Health NZ is booked in for major surgery and Darleen Tana returns. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Corbould, Associate Professor, Contemporary Histories Research Group, Deakin University Mainstream media are surprisingly muted at the prospect of the world’s most powerful nation being led for the first time by a woman – specifically a woman of colour, Vice President Kamala ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Bennett, PhD Student, Associate Research Fellow, Deakin University Last week, a drone delivery company called Wing (owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet) started operating in Melbourne. Some 250,000 residents in parts of the city’s eastern suburbs can now order food from ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonathan Foo, Lecturer, Physiotherapy, Monash University pikselstock/Shutterstock In the next 40 years in Australia, it’s predicted the number of Australians aged 65 and over will more than double, while the number of people aged 85 and over will more than triple. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katrina Grant, Research Associate, Power Institute for Arts and Visual Culture, University of Sydney Jonas Åkerström’s 1790 work, Session of the Accademia dell’Arcadia on August 17 1788.Nationalmuseum/Cecilia Heisser Ever wondered whether you’d have a better chance at winning an Olympic gold ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexandra Jones, Program Lead, Food Governance, George Institute for Global Health wavebreakmedia/Shutterstock On Thursday, Australian and New Zealand food ministers at state, federal and national levels met to thrash out what’s next for health star ratings on packaged foods. Now, after ...
The Abuse in Care report found many Pacific survivors lost their connections to their culture and language, resulting in trauma that has been carried from generation to generation. ...
In the regulatory review, ECC intends to suggest that ERO focus on curriculum delivery reviews rather than the Ministry, because it’s not efficient or effective to have two agencies with radically different approaches climbing over each other. ...
Te Rūnanga Nui o Ngā Kura Kaupapa Māori invites the current government to work in partnership with them to develop a pathway forward, including the development of a parallel pathway and meaningful policy and strategy for Kura Kaupapa Māori ...
If you haven’t started watching yet, Tara Ward begs you to reconsider. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. In the world of New Zealand reality television, we have many gems in our crown. There’s the delicious second season of the Celebrity Treasure ...
A new poem by Fiona Kidman. The clothes of the dead I did not keep my mother’s furry red beret for long nor the stringy scarves that adorned the necks of my aunts, although I have kept tag ends of gold, the rings and trinkets they wore, the brooches no ...
The government’s announcement that it will re-open the foreshore and seabed controversy by changing the rules on recognising centuries-old Māori customary title for a third time goes against the rule of law and New Zealand values,” Mr Tipa says. ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Lioness by Emily Perkins (Bloomsbury, $25) Roarrrr! Perkins’ brilliant, award-winning, Marian-Keyes anointed, darkly funny, long ...
The 2004 Act vested ownership of the foreshore and seabed in the Crown, extinguishing any Māori claims to ownership and causing widespread outrage and protests among Māori communities. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Antje Deckert, Associate Professor (Criminology), Auckland University of Technology Getty Images Despite the connection between institutional harm and gang membership made clear in this week’s mammoth royal commission abuse-in care report, the government seems unlikely to soften its “get tough on ...
From Lewis Clareburt in the swimming to the start of the rowing – the first seven days of Paris 2024 promise to be big for New Zealand. There are few events that bring the country together quite like an Olympic Games. Nothing quite matches the excitement of getting up in ...
Groundbreaking local science just showed up in the most surprising of places: the season finale of The Kardashians. In the season five finale of The Kardashians last night, several members of the family gathered together in one of their signature empty, cream-coloured rooms to hear test results that had been ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Saikal, Emeritus professor of Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies, Australian National University The Middle East is on the brink of a possibly devastating regional war, with hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah reaching an extremely dangerous level. Washington has engaged in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Elizabeth Eades, Rheumatologist, Monash University Lupus is an inflammatory autoimmune illness, where the body’s immune system mistakenly attacks itself. Lupus can affect virtually any part of the body, although it most commonly affects the skin, joints and kidneys. The symptoms ...
A law firm that specialises in working with survivors of abuse in State care is disappointed that the Government fails to recognise that its boot camps can be directly compared to previous boot camps from the 1990s and 2000s. ...
Dying is a natural part of life, like updating your Wof or seeing your hairdresser, but without the word-of-mouth recs that help guarantee a good service. What if we changed that? Dying Reviews received by The Spinoff have had the names of organisations redacted while Hospice NZ collects further data. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonti Horner, Professor (Astrophysics), University of Southern Queensland Mike Lewinski/Flickr, CC BY On any clear night, if you gaze skywards long enough, chances are you’ll see a meteor streaking through the sky. Some nights, however, are better than others. At ...
Despite having no bars or other designated spaces for lesbians, Auckland boasts a small but mighty lesbian museum. So how did it get here? The past 18 months has brought increasing hostility towards the queer community across Aotearoa. Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull’s anti-trans rally in Tamaki Makaurau last March led to a ...
Poneke Antifascist Coalition has invited Wellingtonians to stand in solidarity with the Kanak people at 12pm today outside the French Embassy in Wellington. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Layton, Visiting Fellow, Strategic Studies, Griffith University Drones are the signature technology of the Ukraine war. A few miniature aircraft designs were used in the war’s early days, but an incredible array of drones have now evolved. There are different types, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Slee, Associate Professor, Clinical Academic Neurologist, Flinders University Francisco Gonzelez/Unsplash Migraine is many things, but one thing it’s not is “just a headache”. “Migraine” comes from the Greek word “hemicrania”, referring to the common experience of migraine being predominantly ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lee White, Senior Lecturer and Horizon Fellow, School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Sydney Australia was slow to introduce minimum building standards for energy efficiency. The Nationwide House Energy Rating Scheme (NatHERS) only came into force in 2003. Older homes ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Steven Sherwood, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences, Climate Change Research Centre, UNSW Sydney The past century of human-induced warming has increased rainfall variability over 75% of the Earth’s land area – particularly over Australia, Europe and eastern North America, new research shows. ...
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A night of karaoke and community in a pub that feels like a memory. You’d barely even notice it, unless you knew to look. Tucked away behind a liquor store on busy Constable Street is the capital’s last great pub. Newtown Sports Bar is an emblem of the pub culture ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Wright, Professor in Marine Geology, University of Canterbury Louise Corcoran/Getty Images The decline in the number of doctoral candidates at New Zealand universities is a worrying sign for the country’s effort to build a knowledge-based economy. Aotearoa New Zealand’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laurie Berg, Associate Professor, University of Technology Sydney defotoberg/Shutterstock Migrant worker exploitation is entrenched in workplaces across Australia. Tragically, a deep fear of immigration consequences means most unlawful employer conduct goes unreported. On Wednesday, however, the government officially launched a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Vaughan Cruickshank, Senior Lecturer in Health and Physical Education, University of Tasmania Paris is about to host its third summer Olympics. While we don’t yet know what the legacy of this year’s games will be, let’s take the opportunity to reflect on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hugh Breakey, Deputy Director, Institute for Ethics, Governance & Law, Griffith University In the wake of the assassination attempt on former US President Donald Trump, there were calls from bothsides of US politics, as well as internationally, to reduce the brutal, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Keith Rathbone, Senior Lecturer, Modern European History and Sports History, Macquarie University Two high-profile assaults on Australians in Paris have raised concerns about security ahead of the Olympic Games. On Saturday evening, a young woman was allegedly sexually assaulted by a ...
Dying is inevitable and, so it seems, is it costing a lot, writes Stewart Sowman-Lund in today’s extract from The Bulletin. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here.The cost of dying ...
The government took Joyce Harris's first baby and sent her off to a girls' home. Half a century on - and out of oceans of hurt - it asked her to be a mother figure. ...
It’s the deadliest fictional town in the country, but which death has been the most bonkers? Alex Casey looks back at 10 seasons of The Brokenwood Mysteries to find out. Warning: The following ranking story contains famous New Zealand actors appearing to be dead (not alive). The Spinoff has been ...
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Enquiry into funding of sexual abuse services deadline for submissions this THURSDAY, Oct 10. Hopefully this will lead to better funding and mean that service providers no longer have to resort to begging for funding instead of treating victims.
http://thehandmirror.blogspot.co.nz/2013/10/government-inquiry-on-sexual-violence.html
Contact the clerk of the house if you want your submission kept private, OR make a generic submission. If you don’t have time to write a submission, print this off to sign and send in freepost or copy and paste the text and submit it online http://www.wellingtonrapecrisis.org.nz/images/stories/pdfs/standardsubmissionformneedingsignatureonly.pdf
John Tamihere, “I shave my legs”, but who cares if I do or don’t”– it doesn’t affect my perception or political understanding, am not a Labour Party member, and not part of the Wellington “belt way”. And I think your various pronouncements on issues of gender and sexuality are highly offensive – I would never vote for someone who makes those kinds of statements regularly and continues to stand by them year after year.
The issue of pokies is important, and i am glad you are bringing it into the open once again. There needs to be as much transparency as possible around pokie operations and the money involved. But it still will not be enough to get me voting for you.
I have already voted this week, and I didn’t vote for you, John.
An acid test for the Labour Party.
It may be a ‘broad church’, but surely someone who repeatedly gives the finger to the very constitution of the party, who is abusive towards many, if not most of its membership, and large groups within the wider community….. surely…..
But anyway, he made himself unelectable to a sizeable chunk of the electorate, including, I reckon, many form his support base, when he moved home and abandoned his pets to starve, and it was reported in the media.
Cruelty to animals is widely taken by experts – and any decent human – as an indicator of capacity for cruelty to people, even if it were not utterly vile in itself.
“The issue of pokies is important, and i am glad you are bringing it into the open once again. There needs to be as much transparency as possible around pokie operations and the money involved. “
Agree, Karol. If John Tamihere had stuck with social issues like this he would have gone a long way. I remember back in his days at the Waipareira Trust when the advertisement for gambling control was an image of the Sky Tower as junkie’s needle. Awesome. Also the work the Trust did with health and education for families out West.
As it is, he’s too duplicitous to get the votes of people who remember this brain fart about women in politics, among other things. Maybe he’s hoping for the votes of a new generation that is unaware of his past indiscretions.
The idea of Tamihere standing for Labour seat is bloody ridiculous. He was useless last time. I note he says in the article that he is just using the local election as a sounding board for a possible National Election run next year.
By the way I notice the nice Herald has devoted quite a few inches to Tamihere today. Wonder why?
JT has gone down so far in my estimation that when I read he took reporters on a pub crawl I wondered if he had pre-aarange the people on the pokies as “props” to help him make his point.
Slippery the Prime Minister, strutting His stuff Statesman-like across the World stage via 3News last night,
”China is still there and it isn’t going anywhere”, unquote, Lolz i don’t know just how out of context that particular piece of ‘Colonial Cloddery’ was from the PM but i imagined an elongated ”Derrrrr” occurring after He said it,
The bloke is about as deep as a puddle of piss left in the porch by a stray dog and if National are looking for a ‘dead cats bounce’ in the polls from having the PM pontificating on the global political stage, forget it, Crusty the Clown leaves a more lasting image…
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/9254385/Free-trade-Key-in-last-minute-US-talks
Once again! Shonkey being told exactly what the US of A wants.
This deal is very suitable for Key. It’s as Shonkey as it gets
Slippery the PM, the running dog of US foreign and trade policy any time a minor official of the US State Department yanks on His chain…
will he say nothing like he did last time he chaired something here????
…why are you turning red Mr Key?
Shut-up, I’m not, it’s hot, times up, stop picking on me….
John Tamihere and abandoned dogs (actually cats), bad 12 with an animal theme. Is that going to be a trend for the day.
Further about the cats http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10124140
Interesting to read reports of John Tamihere decrying Housing NZ which was considering forbidding its tenants to keep dogs.
http://www.radiolive.co.nz/Pet-ownership-is-none-of…NZs…/Default.aspx
This was an invasion of their tenants rights he says. Anyone who has lived near to constantly barking dogs, had them defecate on your own property, knows the effort required to train a dog ie socialise it and give it appropriate obedience training, plus the cost of feeding them, plus providing regular care including vet visits, will know that Housing NZ is doing everybody, including the poverty-stricken tenants, a favour.
Actually John T says he understands their poverty which means that dogs will be unaffordable (even cats can be beyond a bene’s budget) so he is happily inconsistent, expressing the most emotional statement that will present him as a caring, sensible fellow.
Times are tough and people on the breadline will use their money to pay for food and power. The first thing that goes is the registration and warrant. The majority of people do not want to break the law, they just cannot afford to keep the law.
This may have been mentioned before, but I was surprised to see the Daily blog adopt an “open mike”. It seemed to have the same graphic as this one did (back in the day).
I guess “the more the merrier”, but I doubt the heavy moderation policy over there will be able to accomodate the sort of discussions we have here. It will be interesting to see how it unfolds.
TDB consolidates a lot of writers well, great to see ‘blue collar’ union backing too, (when was the last time anyone wore a blue collar tho? it is all branded clothing or hi-visis these days) it remains a clunky site to use but with good content.
The Standard is number one really, but everyone is catered for somewhere, luvvies at Public Address, and dirty filthy torys at Kiwi and dark half mentals at Whalespew.
“open mike” many are too busy for another one but am sure Jenny will surface there.
I think open mike on TDB will take a different form from here. TS has systems and moderation policies that encourage discussion. TDB has a moderation policy that tends to make discussions more secondary to the posts – some very good posts by some excellent authors.
Jenny does comment over there, but surprisingly she seems quite rational and calm in her comments there (except an occasional complaint about being censored on TS). Of course, as TDB comments all automatically go through moderation before being released, it’s hard to know if all her comments do get released.
But, curiously, there hasn’t been any posts on climate change on TDB in the last week, and no attacks from Jenny about it. Gotta wonder about her double standards and if, she is just out to undermine TS. I hadn’t previously seen her as a provocateur, just an unreliable commentator on TS – but given the disparity with her TDB comments, I can’t help but wonder.
Comment from Jenny praising Bomber’s post, but gently chiding him on environmental issues.
Jenny critical of Trotter’s strangely pro TPP post.
And totally reasonable in reply to my comment on TS’s role in making the Kelsey Vs Mapp debate happen.
Almost seems like a different commenter, with a totally different tone – but I think it is the same one.
I’ve been noticing that too Karol, and did think it was a different Jenny until I saw the climate change stuff. I reckon TDB’s moderation system and policy is a lot to do with it (ts gives tr0lls a lot of lattitude), but you might be right that Jenny now has a grudge against ts which affects her behaviour here.
From memory karol, Jenny started off the same way on The Standard. Indeed on one occasion at least her ‘comment’ was so good it was elevated to post status. She made good points and was praised by others for them – including me. Then she started to become more and more unreasonable to the point I stopped reading her diatribes. A bit sad.
I don’t know Jenny like the regular folks here do, but I do wonder if there is common ground that she shares with readers, commenters and authors, and that what would otherwise be camaraderie becomes distance and self isolation via her antagonism and repetition. (I see she earned a lengthy ban).
The situation reminds me of when you are in a meeting where there is a common group goal or aim. Then there’s that one person who shares those goals but aims to highjack the group with their own unique view on the goal. They often end taking up much of the speaking time and give the facilitator a difficult time of it whilst alienating the rest of the group from themselves because of their extreme views and actions. Maybe Jenny has a sense of desperation about the topic of climate change, that’s the expression that comes across at least in her comments. It’s hard to have a rational conversation with someone who is feeling desperate because the mind is stuck on a treadmill. It’s a bit of a shame when that happens.
“Jenny will surface there”
She did, lol. but it wasn’t on open mic it was on “Cunliffe’s first 100 days” by Martyn Bradbury. It’s a shame really, she’s still upset about TS authors not writing an article about the Solid Energy bail out, despite having it explained to her on two occasions that I have read, what the reason for that is.
“For instance, witness the difficulty The Standard is having in getting out a statement on the Bail out of Solid Energy.” – says Jenny. That was posted yesterday.
I like the articles on The Daily Blog and the work they’ve done around live streaming public meetings but I don’t comment anymore for a variety of reasons that I’ve already mentioned. They do good work though, all strength to them.
PS: I see Karol beat me to it above 🙂
“Jenny will surface there”
Honest to god, this is the truth – I saw that comment about Jenny and I thought “I bet Pete George will too” 😈 Then I trotted over to TDB to see what their Open Mike looks like and the first one I come across is this
http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2013/10/08/open-mike-tuesday-8th-october/#comment-110671
Lol, yes, saw that comment by ol’ Petey this morning.
I bet he’ll banned within a month.
Old Petey can’t change sadly.
Followed by a loooooong, comment by Jenny… on …. guess what?
Why shouldn’t Jenny talk about her displeasure at coal mining without getting banned here? I’ve known Jenny for years, we support different parties, and we have opposite views about mining and climate change. I agree with a lot of her views and disapprove of others, but I will defend her right to write them. If not in this forum then it will be at another. Why don’t you all join us, somewhere else. Freedom of expression no longer exists on The Standard. And we know whose faullt that is.
go on
If you look at what she got banned for this time:-
1. It was for lying about what I’d said about her on my post. 12 weeks
2. Persistently lying about what the greens and labour’s policies were on a number of topics. 12 weeks
The point was that she didn’t damn well know what the policies were because it was apparent that she’d never looked.
In both offenses she’d been warned what would happen if she did it again the day before, and obviously decided to deliberately do it. I acted in accordance with what I’d said.
I’d call it a penalty peddling fantasies as fact and for stupidity. She is welcome to write at other forums where I’m sure that she will be welcomed /sarc
Jenny is quite free to write her views here or there if she follows the rules set at each blog. There are few rules on TS, but people are required to stick by them or get banned, temporarily or permanently.
Jenny has continuously broken 2 of them – attacking authors, and telling us what to write. She could just have posted her own comments on Solid Energy, etc here. But she, as she has done several times before, told us quite aggressively what she thinks we should be writing about. She has been warned about this several times. She then starts claiming she’s being censored and gets aggressive.
She continually is in attack mode, and seems to think her choice of topics to write on should be everyone’s. Too often, Jenny has not engaged in discussions just harangued and attacked people, even though her comments are not always that reliable in fact or judgement. It becomes tiresome and does not help maintain discussions.
This has all been said before. She has a tendency to express her views in ways that just annoy many people – and to spam us with one long comment after another without really engaging in discussion in any depth. It seems like tr0lling, though that probably isn’t her intention.
I’m very happy if she prefers to comment at TDB on any topic of her choosing.
I will defend her right to write them.
Freedom of speech is not “freedom to write whatever you like wherever you like with no limitations and free from criticism”.
Jenny is perfectly able to start up her own blog on WordPress or (godsforbid) Blogger and writing about climate change and her personal illusions about Labour and Green policies to her heart’s content.
She does not, however, have the right to use this platform, built and maintained by other people, to tell lies and break the rules, especially after being warned about the consequences of doing so.
And that pretty much goes for any commenter on any site.
But please, http://youtu.be/GdNI0_cx22s?t=6s
Of course I was paraphrasing Voltaire’s beliefs on freedom of thought and expression, which don’t apply here.
I think we need another left-wing blog.
Actually, Jenny tries to stifle dissent from her own views with her bullying tactics. Freedom cannot happen without responsibility towards others. Just shouting at others, and not really listening to them, is not what I’d call the kind of freedom of expression that serves democracy.
Basically, Jenny was not banned for what (in terms of political views) she said as much as how she said it.
If you want another left wing blog, why not go start it yourself?
Were his beliefs along the lines of “I disapprove of what you say, but I will publish it in its entirety, repeatedly, and cover the cost myself”?
No?
well, then.
…and they don’t know how to spell “mic” either…
You’ve got the wrong end of the stick. It’s not a general comments post, it’s a post about a guy called Michael who is looking to share his feelings – Open Mike.
Keep it up KK, as they say on RedGreen tv ‘If they don’t find you handsome, they’ll at least find you handy.’
Bomber doesn’t take criticism or disagreement well so any open mic on his turf will consist of mostly praise and agreement unlike the standard where debate and disagreement is encouraged
I disagree
So do I.
TC, I think it’s just a select few like you who get harshly moderated at TDB. The rest of us have figured out where the boundaries lie and accept the ‘my blog, my rules’ ethos and just get on with it.
You mean the sychophants don’t get moderated? Quelle suprise.
KK
How cultured you are in your ripostes!
reading TS has broadened their lingo
They had better watch out – too much TS broadens the bottom!
I find that too high a dose of statins does that…
Oh Those Statins. My MD can beat your MD any day when it comes to arguments about them. And they may not harm memory thinking at all according to the web.
Now I have found what they are, too much curiosity here, I’ll pass on some possibly helpful information.
In addition to their well-known benefits in heart disease, high-dose statins appear to reduce gum inflammation caused by periodontal disease, a new report published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology shows. The findings offer more evidence that heart disease and gum disease may be linked, and also help support the view that statins achieve at least some of their effect not through their cholesterol-lowering effect but through separate inflammation-fighting mechanisms. – Forbes
Testimonial –
I was completely ignorant until I began to blog on The Standard. Now I find that I can discuss anything at any pub I choose to visit and people in the street are struck dumb with my field of knowledge which now includes statins.
If they harmed memory or thinking I’d notice it pretty well immediately. My job is 90% of those with a touch of creativity.
However I am still the vagueness for ordinary matters and short-term memory (that isn’t code) that I always was. I still have a dyslexia on names (hat are not classes, variables, or filenames) that I always did. And I still maintain a catalogue of who has been writing what on this site over the last few years that is sufficient to look the relevant comments up. Not to mention politics and science…
It is ordinary living that I forget and don’t think about that much…. 🙂 Not that important unless Lyn insists (and she is often a pretty geek as well).
I’m not even sure that the statins caused much of my weight gain since I started taking them. That could be due to being forced to stop smoking. However when they doubled up the statin dose to the original level a month ago for my ideological specialist’s reasons, my weight which had been stable started increasing again…
Although you can get a report of just about any side effect you want if you have enough of the population taking a medication, weight gain is pretty unusual for a statin unless you’re beginning to develop Type 2 diabetes or if you’re experiencing muscle and/or joint pain which is causing you to not get as much exercise as usual.
if you are experiencing muscle or joint pain or going to the loo more than usual you should get back to your GP ASAP for further tests.
http://www.medsafe.govt.nz/profs/datasheet/l/lipitortab.pdf
“You mean the sychophants don’t get moderated? Quelle suprise.”
No, I meant that socially illiterate idiots get moderated. As you well know.
Personally I have never been to TDB as I believe that encouraging Bomber is akin to teasing retards.
The usual ‘play the man, not the ball’ tactic KK?
This is an open mike comment, not a TPP point, KK.
I did not say the US Government brought its own buildings down on 9/11.
I simply provided 4 pieces of evidence that suggest events happen because of conspiracies, not coincidence, which would seem to be your case as you use the disparaging definition of the word conspiracy. I tend to go for the less pejorative description of the words, where conspiracy theory is a term that is a neutral descriptor for any claim of civil, criminal or political conspiracy.
On 9/11, I’m assuming you don’t believe that the buildings came down by coincidence. You believe that there was a conspiracy, I assume, organised by Osama bin Laden. That, KK, is a conspiracy theory.
So you are a conspiracy theorist yourself. You just believe in different conspiracies.
I suppose it was a bit of a coincidence that the buildings came down on the same day a plane hit them.
Of course conspiracy theories can turn out to be true but sometimes a good yard stick to their veracity is the pedigree of those promoting them.
In the case of Karol’s fantasy, she has Travellerev agreeing with her which means you can immediately discount the whole thing as fucking nonsense.
That is a very poor conclusion to draw King Kong,
perhaps you should have read the post, clearly by what you are writing you would have learned something.
Yes it was a co-incidence. After all, on 9-11, 3 large buildings collapsed but there were only two plane impacts.
Don’t you start!
“In the case of Karol’s fantasy, she has Travellerev agreeing with her which means you can immediately discount the whole thing as fucking nonsense.”
I suppose the other way to form an opinion on karol’s article would be to read it, but I don’t imagine you’ve got time for that what with all the trooling you have to do.
What about these people’s pedigree?
Tackling the player, not the ball.
Is this the only way you discuss issues?
Even more Interesting that All the WT buildings came down in their own Footprint. IE: Like when they have been wired and dropped, it’s called Demolition.
“Even more Interesting that All the WT buildings came down in their own Footprint. IE: Like when they have been wired and dropped, it’s called Demolition.”
I’m going to look silly if you were just being sarcastic, but neither of the big buildings did that, and, in fact, a large chunk of one hit the 3rd building. As I say, apologies if you were just taking the pi55.
Well, no they didn’t. Quite a lot of debris fell outside the area they had occupied on the ground. Into other buildings. Some of which also fell down.
But they did fall in a generally “downward” direction. This is due to what people like to call “gravity”. The lack of Godzilla applying a constant lateral force meant that toppling did not occur.
King Kong,
Don’t you agree that the events of 9/11 were a conspiracy?
@ McFlock: lol!
Hmmmm. @Paul
Arguing equivalence because they are the same class of thing while ignoring the degree of plausibility of each thing is pretty much what young-earth creationists do.
If we operated like that in real life, we’d all be paralyzed by existential doubt, including the assumption that: “the bread which I’ve eaten my entire life and has sated my hunger previously will sate my hunger when I eat it today” is equivalent to “the bread which I’ve eaten my entire life and has sated my hunger previously will poison me if I eat it today”.
As it is, the same processes that demonstrated the existence of most of the conspiracies (in its purest “multiple people working in contemporary secrecy” form) you mentioned also demonstrated that towers fell because planes hijacked by terrorists flew into them.
Now, the TPP/APEC thing is interesting, because the same mechanisms as above have demonstrated that multinational corporations are, well, frequently morally bankrupt (especially the tobacco industry), and Karol writes excellently researched, structured and referenced posts. On the flipside, as KK points out, T-eve jumping in adds a certain level of crazy to the mix. But after the Hobbit law change, we all know that Key’s actively marketing NZ as for sale to the quickest bidder, fuck the consequences to the populace.
9/11 is the perfect example of this.
People who believe the story about Osama Bin Laden, 19 hijackers, box cutters, etc etc are conspiracy theorists as this was clearly a ‘conspiracy.’ Not a very plausible one either.
A conspiracy that was exceptionally well documented at the time and has been publicly examined extensively by multiple organisations. Will we ever know all the details of the case, like what the hijackers ate for breakfast? No. But we know the bulk of it.
And alternative theories tend to be demonstrably false, extremely tenuous, posited by nutbars, apparently invented for financial gain, and/or significantly more implausible than the generally accepted version.
They are not equivalent positions, any more than “God created the earth six thousand years ago because a magic book told me so” is equivalent to the Theory of Evolution.
And let’s not forget that the conspirators openly claim to have done it, instead of claiming that they were set up by their enemies and are being attacked without reason. Which would be kind of good line to take if it was true.
I’m having to reply to this comment again as there is no reply button under your comment that goes …
“A conspiracy that was exceptionally well documented at the time and has been publicly examined extensively by multiple organisations. Will we ever know all the details of the case, like what the hijackers ate for breakfast? No. But we know the bulk of it.
And alternative theories tend to be demonstrably false, extremely tenuous, posited by nutbars, apparently invented for financial gain, and/or significantly more implausible than the generally accepted version.
They are not equivalent positions, any more than “God created the earth six thousand years ago because a magic book told me so” is equivalent to the Theory of Evolution.”
1. At no stage did I make a statement saying I believed in alternative conspiracy theories. I stated I did not know what happened and commented that the official conspiracy theory ( Bin Laden etc) was implausible.
2, You are trying to control the tone of the conversation by using emotive language such as nutbar, However, there are reputable people who question the 9 11 story. What about these people’s pedigree?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZEvA8BCoBw
3. I am the sceptic here. You believe in one conspiracy theory; I believe in neither and await evidence that supports the theory presented. I refute your attempt to again to frame the conversation through your use of language ( so that I am on the side of new age creationists).\
4. As a believer, can you explain how WTC7 fell, when it was not hit by a plane? I have not heard any evidence to persuade me to the Bin Laden conspiracy theory.
5. If you apply your own thinking to the official conspiracy theory ( i.e. who made money out of it) then there are plenty of candidates!
The observed collapse of the World Trade Centers 1 and 2 have been measured at near the rate of free fall. This is the rate at which nearly all of the “falling energy” (kinetic energy from gravity) must deliver the building to ground level. This leaves no energy for smashing and pulverizing the concrete slabs nor for shredding construction steel.
1: I do not believe that I have ever claimed that you do believe a particular theory.
2: I don’t give a shit about who “controls the tone”. If I recall correctly, AE911Truth has a membership that consists of <1% of the architects (let alone "engineers") in the USA. That is well within the expected margins for serious mental disorders in a population, but then I also think that some of them are just stupid. Either way, they come under the category I like to call "nutters".
3: No, you are not being a sceptic. Your statement that the well-documented events are "not very plausible" implies disbelief and a lack of impartial evaluation. It is the difference between agnosticism and atheism. Sceptics, in the modern sense, are not completely disbelieving, they just step back and rationally examine the evidence. Whereas you, at best, have gone all Ancient Greek, we cannae know anything ever.
As to my "use of language", I merely pointed out that creationists use the same tactic, not that you are on the same side.
4: Fire after parts of a fecking great building hit it. Try reading one of the many investigations that covered it.
and that goes for the BinLaden thing, too.
5: Yes indeed. But it's difficult to get one person, let alone 19, to kill themselves so you can make money.
Paul, you say that people who made money out of it should be looked at as suspects.
Fair enough.
So what’s the theory?
I’ve asked plenty of truthers for an alternate theory that accounts for all the facts.
I would be more than happy to talk about such a theory, if it existed. It’s been more than a decade now, and such a theory has yet to be presented to me so that I might think about it.
Usually when I ask,I’m told that “It’s not our job to provide a theory”. I do not find this at all convincing, and as a sceptic yourself, I’m sure you agree.
As a sceptic, I have not seen enough evidence to convince me that WTC7 (in particular) and the Twin Towers could have collapsed as they did.
There are many reputable people (not nutters) who similarly question the story.
I am not name calling your opinion, but am continually having to deal with words like truther, nutbar..
Your argument should be strong enough not to rely on name calling
You’re the one who linked to the ae911truth video.
But let’s start with the basics: have you enough evidence to convince you that WTC7 (in particular) and the Twin Towers actually existed?
Live and let live McFlock.
You believe, I doubt.
Please don’t let your religious fervour get the better of you and mean you start persecuting those who question the holy truth of 9/11.
So no theory at all then?
I’m not asking for anything as well developed as the official theory, (though I will note the more than a decade again, in passing), just a brief explanation of how these buildings came down if it wasn’t due to the planes that flew into them.
Who might have done it, and why it would have made sense for them to do it. Why doing it, the way they did it, was the best way of achieving their aims.
I’m more than happy to talk about such a theory, and to discuss the official theory too.
Usually I just catch abuse.
‘truthers’ however, is hardly abuse. It’s a self identifier.
@McFlock
Given the fact that I am not privy to key information about the events as: I was not on the commission that investigated the events of 11 September and that much of the evidence was destroyed, I am unwilling to come to unsubstantiated theories without evidence.
That’s the scientific method.
Challenging ideas in the same forum that they are raised is not “persecution”.
Reducing overwhelming evidence of fact into a mere difference of opinion is also something that creationists like to do. For what it’s worth.
You doubt, fair enough.
From what you have presented here, you have no beliefs of your own. Fair enough.
You regard fringe youtube theorists to be credible counterpoints to multiple investigations and blanket coverage of the events as they happened. Fair enough.
But to then demand respect for the shallow credulity that ensues from the above? That’s a wee bit unfair.
So how do you know the towers existed at all, again?
Oh, and no, it’s not the scientific method
I am unwilling to come to unsubstantiated theories without evidence.
That’s the scientific method.
there is quite a lot of evidence though Paul.
And one doesn’t need to have all the possible evidence in order to form a theory that accounts for that evidence which we do have.
That too, is the scientific method. Although working out what happened isn’t really science. It’s more akn to history. We need theories about history to weigh againts each other. We use the balance of probability, and testimony, as well as science, to try and work out what happened.
At the moment, the sceptics of the official theory haven’t had a lot of success, as far as i have seen, in coming up with an alternate theory.
I remain more than happy to discuss one, should it arise.
Of course the Towers existed.
Are heading for a philosophical discussion?http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meditations_on_First_Philosophy
@PB
“At the moment, the sceptics of the official theory haven’t had a lot of success, as far as i have seen, in coming up with an alternate theory.”
That is true.but then they aren’t the gatekeepers of the knowledge.
e.g. A citizen of Japan is less likely to know details about the TPP than a large US corporation.
That’s irrelevant though.
there is plenty of evidence available to them. there are many known facts. How do they account for them?
What plausible theory is there, other than the official one/
Again, I’m not asking for conclusive evidence for this theory, just a description of an alternate hypothesis that accounts for the known facts.
Over a decade, and they haven’t even started on one, as far as I can tell.
But I sense you don’t have desire to speculate on even the possibilities of an alternate theory, other than your comment about who made money out of it. Shall we start from there?
These people who made money out of it. Was this a rational way of making the money? Were there easier ways perhaps? Less risky ways? How well do the known facts fit with the explanation of them being motivated by making money?
Those seem like good questions to start with to me.
One other thing paul.
this ‘gatekeepers of knowledge’ phrasing isn’t particularly helpful I think, in keeping the conversation clear.
Are you suggesting there is another conspiracy to keep the relevant knowledge from us?
Or is this a part of the same conspiracy theory, that is needed to account for the failure to come up with an alternate theory?
I’m asking if this is what you mean, because it’s not clear, I’m not suggesting that is what you mean. Nor am I using conspiracy in any negative sense.
just seeing the limits of your “scepticism”.
And what PB said as to the rest.
“And alternative theories tend to be demonstrably false, extremely tenuous, posited by nutbars, apparently invented for financial gain, and/or significantly more implausible than the generally accepted version.”
You claimed reasons why people might support alternative conspiracy theories.
I simply posited that there might be financial reasons for people behind the official story.
I repeat . No conclusive evidence has been put in favour of any story.
That’s why many independent people want a proper inquiry. Not the farce that occurred in 2004.
Yes, I did.
The evidence put forward has been beyond reasonable doubt, not beyond all doubt.
If one requires all reasonable doubts to be exhausted before one draws a conclusion, this is only logical in an imperfect world.
If one requires all unreasonable doubts to be exhausted before one draws a conclusion, then one ‘s stated reasoning is questionable.
If someone hasn’t seen enough evidence to reach a conclusion regarding 9/11, despite everything gathered since (not just 2004), then their reasoning is questionable: either they have closed their eyes for 12 years, or they have no idea that some sources of information are less reliable than others,or their faculty of reason is faulty, or they are being purposefully misleading (the most common reason in society to mislead strangers is to gain profit).
You know, I’ve never been moderated either here or at TDB and I don’t think anyone will ever call me a sycophant – even you RWNJs. Perhaps the problem is that those who do get moderated are just too bloody stupid to be able to put together a well reasoned argument.
True – even I’ve managed to avoid a ban, and I’m a fucking arrogant dickhead who uses rude words and likes to play with hypocritical nutbars. But a few folk don’t seem to get the message when the TERSE BOLD MESSAGES SUDDENLY APPEAR 🙂
[lprent: Sometimes not so terse. I’ve looked at a few of your comments for the pointless abuse behaviour criteria. But on investigating the context decided that the points had already been made. ]
“the quality of mercy is not strain’d, it droppeth as the gentle rain from heav’n upon the place beneath” 🙂
This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your ancestors ate manna and died yet whoever feeds on this bread will live forever :
Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old bread leavened with malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
John 6:58
1 Cor. 5:8
Very wise.
Bomber is an extremely dishonest person who serves a great dishonor to the left-wing. Running a blog wherein critical comments are deleted from moderation because they disagree with the party line is somewhat intellectually dishonest coming from a person like Bomber who outwardly champions the freedom of speech…as long as he agrees of course.
And all that bullshit he spun about being hacked by the government. What a fucking crock. Those nice chaps at The Egonomist had a field day with it.
Lots of assertion there TC.
Outwardly, sure – lots of assertion. But I’ll let my comment stand.
Make of it what you will.
Yeah I have given up replying, or anything there, and I am still in Moderation, and I signed up the day after it went on line, from memory.
I wouldn’t take it personally, I’ve made a few comments there and think everybody’s comment goes into moderation prior to being released. There’s no way to have a quick debate there, so I just read and leave mostly.
What makes it worse is that there appears to be no easy way to search for comments, so if you go back a day or two later you have to manually search through the dog’s breakfast that is the front page, assuming you remember the name of the post you commented on.
Yep, it’s a bloody horrible site to navigate through which is why I don’t go there much.
a bit though…(we see, secret squirrel).
Talking of the Daily Blog, Chris Trotter has an interesting piece there today on the proposed TPPA, Chris in a bit of a ‘lest we forget’ vein exhorts those of us on the left, when we are considering the ramifications of that free trade agreement to remember that ”wealth has to be first created befor that wealth can be redistributed”,
Excuse me Chris, but, What the F**k???, what redistribution of wealth is it that you talk of, all that redistribution of said wealth that has occurred after each act of ‘trade freedom’ that has occurred in the past 40 years perhaps???,
i personally do not see where it is us from ‘the left’ who have forgotten anything here thank you very much Chris Trotter,
Here’s a shortlist of the ‘redistribution of wealth’ so far gained from all this ‘free trade’, 300,000 low waged workers being employed for less than the living wage, another 300,000 workers confined to ‘rotational employment’ having to rely upon welfare benefits as their income as much as they can rely on a wage packet,
The price of dairy products, as the Global demand and therefor prices have increased the cost to those above who obviously have not shared in the miracle of ‘wealth redistribution’ to a point that these are now luxury items off the weekly shopping list as much as they are on it,
And you advocate more of the same Chris Trotter???…
then why dont we just legalise class A drugs and tax the crap out of them?
Surely you mean. The Class C ones like Pot. Not the A class like P and Heroin ?
How about we legalize them and not tax the crap out of them?
Just a thought.
Last day for postal voting apparently (for mail to get delivered by 12pm Sat), according to the GP. Although my papers say to post on Weds at the latest.
I have been told libraries will have ballot boxes Wed to Fri of this week.
on the topic of TDB;
“our own Prisons ”
-a compassionate article.
“More!, you want more?”
a not so compassionate article follows
Kim Campbell is chief executive of the Employers and Manufacturers Association
What do you expect him to say?
He’s representing his mates.
Paying people more might mean his mates less profits.
Less international holidays, deluxe cars…..
The 1%, eh?
be fair, they dont mind paying CEO’s more in hard times and good.
Translation: Kim Campbell tells us that the present subsidy to the rich is fine and that we should all stop whinging.
And the Herald’s editors give him a platform to publicise his vile opinions to a large audience.
I wonder who pays them to give the elite’s perspective so much hearing?
Their owners.
Where do you stand on the political spectrum? Michael Marien came up with a table of named ideological positions in 1970 which has been updated in this link. The way that people can sort themselves under different definitions or labels is shown in in an amusing and artful way.
http://upgradeparty.com/public-policy-proposers/
I think I might be classified here as a Romantic Ecologist. Everyone take a look and laugh and ponder!
also an RE, yet not Romantic 😉
Do people still read Heinlen and not choke on the extreme sexism? Not sure why such people should be given the role of future upgrader.
Like grokking to A Stranger. 😀
😀
Yes I still read Heinlan and EE Doc Smith, John Wyndham and Harry Harrison of the very very sexist Stainless Steel Rat fame. But one of the best Sci Fi books I ever read was Joe Haldemans The Forever War. But for some more modern Writers, and sexism is now out the window. Corey Doctorow short stories are good Like “When sysadmins ruled the world, And I robot. But for a book that I have read 3 times so far, and I am still enjoying re-reading it, is Accelerando by Charles Stross.
I haven’t read Wyndham in a long time either, that might be worth a look. I read Doctorow’s Little Brother and thoroughly enjoyed it. Funnily enough I got my first wave and pay eftpost card in the mail today (gee thanks ANZ).
Robert Heinlein. I hadn’t heard of him, did quite a lot of things including science fiction. If he said something sexist he was a child of his time I think, born in 1907.
Within the framework of his science fiction stories, Heinlein repeatedly addressed certain social themes: the importance of individual liberty and self-reliance, the obligation individuals owe to their societies, the influence of organized religion on culture and government, and the tendency of society to repress nonconformist thought. He also speculated on the influence of space travel on human cultural practices.
I would rate Heinlein in the top five (fiction) authors who influenced me in my late teens. Great story telling. And yes the sexism was of his time, although there are other writers of his generation whose work has stood the test of time better. I was disappointed to find I can’t read him now. Maybe I’ll try again when I am older.
Well, found the Pete & Pete Party:
DTB Heh heh.
DTB
Also suitable for The Coiffure.
The original table by Michael Marien had more listings (some regarded as dated) with one called – Primitive Populist with a view of concerns as Domination by pointy-headed pseudo-intellectuals. Proposals were Throw briefcases in [Wellington Harbour] Potomac, and restore common sense.
Has anyone else had long waits to get onto The Standard? This time I went through google as otherwise I couldn’t get connection. Also I again have the annoyance of having things underlined and colours heightened and the edit box partly hidden. Something, some other site, whatever seems to set this off. So have to find how to reset the page from my helper.
Now and then, but have had regularly on the Daily Blog. GCSB/NSA login?
Haven’t had any CPU or database spikes since whatever caused last nights outage went through…
Yeah – but I always think its because I’m overloading the computer too quickly and after a while give up …… go and make dinner or do something useful (clean the bathroom) and by the time I get back to it, its unplugged itself !
Notice popping up in the system
Akismet is our offshore anti-spam checker at wordpress.com. I’ll clear them manually until it clears
Thanks for fix Lynn. And that comment from Northshore guy sounds worthy of action. Keep well. I’m planning to go on my one hundredth planned diet. If I actually do follow it, his will give me passing grades in Diet 101.
Looks like Maryan Street had a big dose of common sense.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2448611/Blind-Dutch-woman-euthanised-loss-sight.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/southamerica/venezuela/10359267/As-socialist-dream-crumbles-Venezuelans-find-Nicolas-Maduro-a-bad-copy-of-Chavez.html
– Can’t even run a country rich in oil…bad omens for NZ
“…bad omens for NZ”
Wow that’s news worth reporting, had no idea Nicolas Maduro intends to run for office in NZ.
You are getting desperate Pukey.
You need to research the stories you upload, rather than simply repeat what you hear.
You need to think critically.
First up, the Daily Torygraph is hardly a unbiased viewer or source on the matter.
I wonder whether the ‘many Venezuelans’ mentioned are the very wealthy ones who own Venezuela’s media?
One name stands out. Michael Shifter
From Wikipedia.
Michael Shifter is President of the Inter-American Dialogue and an Adjunct Professor of Latin American Studies at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service.[1] He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations[1] and writes for the Council’s journal Foreign Affairs.[2] He is also a member of the Latin American Studies Association(LASA), and a contributing editor to Current History.[1]
The Daily Council on Foreign Relationsis hardly a unbiased viewer or source on the matter.
If you look at the article you will notice this :
Related Articles
Venezuela expels top US diplomat 30 Sep 2013
I wonder if Uncle Sam has been fomenting unrest?
Now for KK’s education, that is a conspiracy theory.
“A conspiracy theory is an explanatory proposition that accuses two or more people, a group, or an organization of having caused or covered up, through deliberate collusion, an event or phenomenon of great social, political, or economic impact.”
” I wonder if Uncle Sam has been fomenting unrest? ” Wouldn’t be surprised, Paul.
Its happened before – Nicaragua, Chile etc etc
It has happened everywhere south of the Rio Grande, and still is in much of Latin America. Both the US and Canada have been caught recently spying on Brazil, which possibly means we are as well. After the independent place we began to take in the world, we have gone a long way backwards under Shonkey.
Bob Jones’ Remedy for the “welfare-dependent underclass” : Books
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/education/news/article.cfm?c_id=35&objectid=11136373
(even second-hand ones would probably do the trick peasants).
http://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/crown-accounts-show-surplus-within-reach
– Well done Bill English, I doubt Labour could have done better
“Higher tax revenue and lower than forecast core Crown expenses helped to more than halve the Government’s operating deficit before gains and losses to $4.4 billion in the year to 30 June 2013, compared with a $9.2 billion deficit the previous year.”
So losing $4.4 billion in a year is good, pr?
“Treasury’s Budget 2013 forecasts show net core Crown debt is expected to increase from $10.3 billion in June 2008 to over $70 billion by June 2017.”
And blowing out the government debt to $70 billion an example you would give of fine financial management?
Why do you doubt Labour could have done better? The only time Labour’s maintained government accounts and the economy worse than national was under the ACT government 1984-1990.
Wow – off by 200% in a six month forecast?
Fire Treasury.
Labour lack the discipline and have lacked it for a number of years whereas National have had stability
That’s the mantra of the choir. Shame it’s utter bullshit – national simply loot the government finances for their mates, stagnating the economy on the way. The “stability” of the cemetery.
No answer to 16.1, puckish?
nah, never.
The best you’ll get is when he manages to hit the “reply” button before dropping another slogan. He’s the tory equivalent of the stereotypical Maoist cadre-leader who only screams aphorisms from the little red book.
Except I have a productive job…unlike most of the Mana and Green supporters 🙂
You produce nothing.
All of the Green supporters I know have productive jobs or are toiling their way through academia.
While I haven’t met nearly as many Mana supporters, those that I have met usually have productive jobs as well.
In my experience and speaking in general, the party with the parasites supporting it is National. They may have jobs, but many are highly unproductive jobs..
I’m a Mana supporter with a productive job.
You “can’t answer every post” but have time for cheap shots like this?
@ Puckish Rogue….a productive job in right wing PR?
Sorry I can’t answer every post (have to fit it in around work) but yes National made the best of a bad situation, had Labour been in then the policies of Clark, sorry I meant Goff, no dammit I meant Shearer, oops a daisy I mean Cunliffe would have meant NZ in worse position then it is now
So well done John Key, Bill English and (most but not all of) the cabinet for making the decisions that needed to be made
I, for one, am amazed that the enormous magnitude of your lies in a comment that small did not create a terminal critical mass of highly dense bullshit and thereby tear a singularity of logical failure in the fabric of the universe, sucking us all into a parallel dimension of surreality, where the laws of nature are fish sticks.
.
presactly
PR
And why PR? Isn’t that set of initials a dead give away. The stuff he has been quoting sounds as if it’s culled from Key’s newsletter that I might look at if he has funny icons through it and underneath.
The interesting question into 2014 for Cunliffe’s team is what angles they will have to attack National on either in economic management (if the economy keeps stuttering upwards even with 7% uinemployed) or in fiscal management (if they ever get to break even on the public accounts).
If I were briefing Cunliffe it would be simply remainind people of the Clark years: massive term-on-term sustained economic boom, running huge government surpluses to be spent on curing social ills (until the last year alone).
Whereas the Nats, well, pick any Nat term in the last 40 years: can’t get either economic growth or prudent fiscal management in any term you can name.
Post- Script
And now Johnnie can give back the $500,000 he has trousered out of the tax cuts and demand his mates do the same. That will help pay back the debt the Nacts have mismanaged us into.
great, soon we can use the 75m surplus to paydown the 79bn they have run up by the time we are in surplus.
This is like saying
“look, I have $5 in my bank account, havent I done well.” when your mortgage is $1.2m
Is John Tamihere as toxic a brand in Auckland as Mallard is in Wellington?
“I annoyed people in the beltway of the Labour Party – the rainbows, the women that don’t shave their legs and a few others”.
“A few others” is an understatement, it includes anyone with hair and anyone who shaves hair.
With Shearer gone this gutless blokey posturing is gone too.
He’s welcome to NZFirst if he wants. I could easily see him as Winston’s successor.
So you think that losing $4.4 billion in a year is good and blowing out the government debt to $70 billion is an example you would give of fine financial management.
Unbelievable.
Talk about an ideological and doctrinaire approach!
it is, because Puck doesnt think for himself, he relies on Blinglish’s spin of facts. he finds life is easier and he can walk around with a smile on his face, even if it is a bit Gomer pyle.
Been reading this book:
It’s interesting how she manages to shoot down the entire myth of the innovation of the free market in almost all aspects. The simple reality is that capitalists don’t do risk or uncertainty – they do sure things. The reality is that it’s the governments of the world that fund and support the risky stuff of innovation – the private sector comes in after and takes all the laurels and profit for itself without doing any of the real work.
“The simple reality is that capitalists don’t do risk or uncertainty – they do sure things.”
What bullshit. The entire market is a fucking gamble and you have said so yourself.
@ The Contrarian,
The entire market is a fucking gamble and you have said so yourself.
Not when there are bailouts. The market becomes a very sure thing for those considered too big to fail.
The market would be a gamble if the government didn’t backstop it for their selected heroes. Underlying the entire neo-liberal era are policies that reward the rich for being rich and ensure that if anything does happen that might endanger those riches then protections are in place to prevent that loss.
Besides, I live and learn. Something that economists and RWNJs don’t seem capable of.
Oh. This is scary stuff. Research in brain manipulation being explored by/for military and security interests.
Could it be used to stop politicians from lying?
The brain is miraculous, and such research could be used to help people with disabilities or brain damage.
Make people more compliant with authority? Worrying.
Want scary?
Was reading an article a few weeks back where they’d managed to alter the memories of a mouse.
That is scary. Science fiction often goes there first. Replicant or human?
Well – you did ask.
MIT scientist John Romanishin has done what some said couldn’t be done: He has created a mini-cube robot that has no external moving parts yet can move, climb, leap, and — most importantly — work together with its fellows to create larger shapes.
http://bigthink.com/ideafeed/the-swarmbots-have-arrived?
We already have nano-bots, they’re called “bacteria” 😛 Probably what we’ll end up seeing is modified cell lines that have added in man-made metabolic systems that allow them to do all sorts of interesting chemistry.
Pretty neat work though.
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2013/simple-scheme-for-self-assembling-robots-1004.html
Please tell me that this is all romancing? I do not want to know this!!
Yoink: http://www.rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm
Check the notes section. Also in that particular ‘verse the military have long had a means of turning off empathy and other “problematic” bits of the human mind, to create the perfect solider, aka zombies.
But yeah, everything you are is mostly in your head and it turns out organic minds are prone to being hackable via all sorts of stuff. From diet to drugs, to strong magnetic fields, to pathogens and parasites that alter behaviour in very specific ways. Even altering social systems can shift a persons behaviour (see Rule 34, by Charles Stross). So it should come as no surprise that the military will take these things and see if they cannot craft a “better” solider, even if that means creating monsters…
The pilots in WW2 or a bit after, probably in one of those other little wars you know, last century, were given LSD because it enabled them to keep going longer so they could fly longer distances and return apparently safely. Don’t know whether they lived to a happy old age, but does any sentient being since we got civilised?
FYI
Is Rodney Councillor Penny Webster’s company’s contract with CCO Watercare a ‘conflict of interest’?
Does the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968 URGENTLY need updating?
______________________________________________________________________________
http://www.pennybright4mayor.org.nz/is-rodney-councillor-penny-websters-companys-contract-with-cco-watercare-a-conflict-of-interest/
8 October 2013
Is Rodney Councillor Penny Webster’s company’s contract with Auckland Council Controlled Organisation (CCO) Watercare a ‘conflict of interest’?
Should Rodney Councillor Penny Webster be disqualified from standing again, under the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968, because she and her husband have entered into transactions with the Auckland Council Group, totalling $32,189 during 2012, for services provided by their jointly-owned private company, All Rural Fencing Limited ?
http://www.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/EN/planspoliciesprojects/reports/annual_report/Documents/annualreport20122013volume3.pdf (Pg 80 ) ]
___________________________________________________________
All Rural Fencing Limited (NZ Companies Office)
http://www.business.govt.nz/companies/app/ui/pages/companies/1512665/directors
___________________________________________________________
The relevant LAW is the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968:
http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1968/0147/latest/DLM390003.html#DLM390021
Disqualifying contracts between local authorities and their members
(1) Except as provided in subsection (3), no person shall be capable of being elected as or appointed to be or of being a member of a local authority or of any committee of a local authority, if the total of all payments made or to be made by or on behalf of the local authority in respect of all contracts made by it in which that person is concerned or interested exceeds $25,000 in any financial year.
________________________________________________________
I made an inquiry to the Office of the Auditor-General (OAG) – who have the sole responsibility for administering the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968.
This is the reply from OAG Senior Solicitor Belinda Rynhart:
“The prohibition on contracting between local authorities and their members (section 3 of the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968) does not apply to contracts with council-controlled organisations. ”
Belinda Rynhart
Date: Tue, Oct 8, 2013 at 2:01 PM
Dear Penny
I am writing in response to your phone query to us on Friday 4 October. You are concerned about Auckland Council councillor Penny Webster’s husband providing services to the Auckland Council.
This issue was first raised with us at the beginning of the election period. Our preliminary inquiries revealed that in the financial year 2012-2013 All Rural Fencing Limited (Penny’s husband’s company) did not contract with Auckland Council.
All Rural Fencing did however contract to deliver services to one of the Council’s subsidiaries -Watercare Services Limited.
The prohibition on contracting between local authorities and their members (section 3 of the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968) does not apply to contracts with council-controlled organisations.
This means that All Rural Fencing’s contracts with Watercare Services do not cause Penny Webster to be disqualified from being a member of the Council. She did not need to seek the approval of the Auditor-General to be interested in the contracts, and no breach of the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests’) Act has occurred.
Yours sincerely
Belinda Rynhart
Senior Solicitor
Office of the Auditor-General Te Mana Arotake
100 Molesworth Street, Thorndon
PO Box 3928, Wellington 6140
_______________________________________________________
In my considered opinion, it is absolutely unacceptable for elected members (or their families) to contract for any form of Council services, whether provided directly by Council, or ‘indirectly’ by Council-Controlled-Organisations (CCOs).
As an ‘anti-corruption /anti-privatisation’ Public Watchdog, I am ‘blowing the whistle’ long and hard on this issue, in order to help achieve a very long-overdue law change to this very outdated piece of legislation.
The Auckland Council ‘Code of Conduct’ states:
“5.3. Public Interest
Members have a duty to make decisions in the public interest. They must not act in order to gain financial or other benefits for themselves, their families, friends or business interests. “
http://www.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/SiteCollectionDocuments/aboutcouncil/governingbody/codeofconductelectedmembers.pdf
OAG Senior Solicitor Belinda Rynhart told me that the OAG agreed that the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968, was out-of-date, but getting a law change was the responsibility of the Department of Internal Affairs (DIA).
Given that the OAG, not the DIA has administrative responsibility for the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968, I have sent the following ‘Open Letter / OIA request to the CEO of the DIA:
MAYORAL CAMPAIGN 2013 OPEN LETTER TO THE CEO OF THE DIA re OAG requested law changes to the Local Authorities Members Interests Act 1968
What is the public ’perception’, when an Auckland Councillor, Penny Webster (former Chair of the Auckland Council Strategy and Finance Committee), calls on citizens and ratepayers to provide a free service by mowing Auckland Council-owned grass berms, while she and her husband get paid for services provided by their privately-owned company – All Rural Fencing Services Ltd?
______________________________________________
“Rodney councillor Penny Webster says that at a time when household budgets are tight, the council cannot afford the $12 million to $15 million cost of mowing berms for the whole region.
“It’s not fair that one area gets berm mowing, while other areas mow their own,” said Mrs Webster, a former Act MP. “The council had to make things even without increasing rates even more.”
She was disappointed with local body election candidates from the AucklandCity area who were complaining about something the rest of the region did without fuss.
The council voted to save $3 million by not cutting grass berms in the old AucklandCity area from July.
Waitemata councillor Mike Lee said Mrs Webster’s comments were “exactly the outer suburban small-mindedness and parochialism” he had to deal with in his days at the Auckland Regional Council, and which the Super City was meant to stop. ….. ..”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11133160
How is this not blinding hypocrisy from Rodney Councillor Penny Webster?
In my considered opinion, as an ‘anti-corruption’ Public Watchdog, Rodney Councillor Penny Webster is NOT ‘fit for duty’, and if I were a Rodney voter, I most certainly would not be voting for her.
I look forward to the turning of this ’bad thing into a good thing,’ and the ensuing public ‘fuss’, over this Rodney Councillor Penny Webster ‘conflict of interest’, helping to achieve a prompt updating of the Local Authorities (Members’ Interests) Act 1968.
Penny Bright
2013 Auckland Mayoral candidate