Search Results
No posts found - try a different search?
- Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka National Flag It has taken me a while to comprehend what has happened in Sri Lanka. 321 people killed in churches and hotels because of the coordinated actions of a number ...7 hours ago - Hard News: Digital persuasion and the dark places of democracy
Last week, officially the first of Australia's 2019 federal election campaign, potential voters were subjected to a series of false claims about the Labor Party's policy on vehicle emissions reduction. But not everyone saw the ads, and of those who ...24 hours ago - Is the grid ready for electric vehicles?
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Jan Ellen Spiegel Some Americans appear increasingly ready to give up their gas cars for electric vehicles. But are the country’s electric grids prepared for them? The question is a critical one ...1 day ago - Doesn’t hate-speech need to include some hatred?
The other Sunday evening, a few of us at church were talking about Israel Folau’s recent post warning drunks, homosexuals, adulterers, liars, fornicators, thieves, atheists and idolators that they are hell-bound if they don’t repent and get themselves saved. read more ...2 days ago - Owning a gun is a privilege: Firearms licences may need better checks & balancesGiven the public mood following the Christchurch terror attacks, I have felt some discomfort in admitting I hold a firearms licence. Understandbly, in the wake of the mosque shootings, there is a very strong anti-firearms sentiment in the public mind.read ...2 days ago
- 2019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #16
Story of the Week... Editorial of the Week... El Niño/La Niña Update... Toon of the Week... Quote of the Week... Graphic of the Week... SkS in the News... Coming Soon on SkS... Poster of the Week... SkS Week in ...2 days ago - 2019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #16
A chronological listing of news articles posted on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week, i.e., Sun, Apr 14 through Sat, Apr 20, 2019 Editor's Pick How We Roll: Study Shows We're More Lone Wolves Than Team Players ...3 days ago - More Marxist critiques of trans ideology
Below are two more Marxist critiques of trans ideology and the assault on women and women’s rights, in particular by the heterosexual males claiming to be lesbians. As well as more Marxist critiques emerging, there are starting to be more ...4 days ago - A Taxing and Spending Matter.The power to tax and spend is at the heart of our constitutional democracy. In 1649 the English beheaded their monarch; one of their grievances was that he was levying taxes without parliamentary authorisation. The 1688 Bill of Rights, which ...6 days ago
- CGT: A bad idea finally put to bed once and for allThe decision of the Labour-led government to back away from a capital gains tax was a good move in a number of ways.read more ...6 days ago
- Kid on swing embodies Kiwi dream by going back and forth and never getting anywhere
Charlie O’Brien, 16, has single-handedly destroyed the SEO value of every other Charlie O’Brien in New Zealand. Some fucking kid has sat on a swing for 32 hours and inspired hope in a nation otherwise desperate for a hero. Hate ...6 days ago - New research, April 8-14, 2019A selection of new climate related research articles is shown below. This post has separate sections for: Climate Change, Climate Change Impacts, Climate Change Mitigation, and Other Papers. Climate change mitigation Climate change communication Perception of public opinion on global ...6 days ago
- Our environment is in trouble
Statistics New Zealand has released their latest Environment Aotearoa report, and it shows that our environment is in trouble:New Zealand's environment is in a precarious state and facing an overwhelming number of threats, according to a sweeping government stocktake. The ...6 days ago - The cost of cowardiceHow big a mistake was Jacinda Ardern's cowardly act of rejecting fairer taxes, not just now but for the rest of her political career? Not only has it poisoned her own base against her and created a strong incentive to ...6 days ago
- Who owns England?Why do we need to tax land and wealth? Because otherwise we'll end up like England, where 1% of the population own half the country:Half of England is owned by less than 1% of its population, according to new data ...6 days ago
- CRL a step closer but more expensive
The City Rail Link, the country’s biggest transport project, just got $1 billion bigger but also few steps closer to reality as part of three “significant announcements” made yesterday....
6 days ago - Jacinda Ardern thuds back to earth thanks to NZF’s ‘carefully generated torpedo’ (...If not now, when? If not this, what? If not her, who? Those are the questions that must be bedeviling Labour and Green Party supporters as Winston Peters has not for the first, second or even third time, put his ...7 days ago
- Prime Minister John Key announces there will be no capital gains tax
Prime Minister John Key had just spent the last two hours making phone calls and preparing the final touches to his capital gains announcement. The clock had just passed 2pm, and he was slightly late. Nothing to be worried about, ...7 days ago - Labour-led government dumps idea of a Capital Gains TaxPeople who chose to delude themselves about the progressive qualities of Jacinda Ardern and her Labour-led government must be feeling let down today. It has been made clear that there will be no Capital Gains Tax. Even something as minimal ...7 days ago
- Don’t get fooled againRemember how in 2017 Labour campaigned on change? They were going to fix things, introduce a capital gains tax, make the rich pay their fair share for once. Yeah, fooled us all, didn't they? And they'll no doubt try and ...7 days ago
- This government does not deserve re-electionBack in February, Green co-leader James Shaw asked a good question: does the government deserve to be re-elected if they failed to implement a capital gains tax? Today, the government gave its answer: it does not. The government has ruled ...7 days ago
- A start on odious debtLast year, when the government finally admitted that the meth-testing industry was a scam and that they had wrongfully evicted hundreds of state housing tenants on the basis of bullshit "meth tests", it moved swiftly to compensate its victims. But ...7 days ago
- Folau’s Folly
The strife that Israel Folau has found himself in, following his statement that homosexuals and others are destined for hell, and calling on them to “repent”, has many consequences and ramifications – and not just for him and those whom ...1 week ago - Spies are just murderous scumFrom 1975 to 1989, the spy agencies of South America's right-wing military dictatorships cooperated in Operation Condor, a joint campaign of extermination against the continent's left. Roughly 400,000 people were imprisoned, 30,000 disappeared, and 60,000 murdered - kidnapped, tortured, executed, ...1 week ago
- The Future for Australian Coal
Problems Australia is the worlds’ largest exporter of coal, selling thermal coal for electricity generation and coking coal for smelting world-wide. In 2017 its export of this commodity was valued at over $40 billion, most of it produced in Queensland and New ...1 week ago - Tamaki Dr Safety propsals
At the end of last month Auckland Transport launched two consultations aiming to improve road safety in two of Auckland’s most iconic seaside villages – Mission Bay and St Heliers. AT say that between 2013 and 2017: Mission Bay had ...1 week ago - Climate Change: No future for farmingOver at The Spinoff, energy analyst Briony Bennett has an article about our pathway to net-zero emissions by 2050. Its going to be a difficult path, given the weather-dependence of our renewables and need for more electricity generation to power ...1 week ago
- A step forwardOne of the big problems with local government is gerontocracy: only 6% of local authority members are under 40, while 83% of them are over 50. This doesn't just mean that local government is unrepresentative, it distorts policy outcomes - ...1 week ago
- Hard News: Splore 2019 – Please Don’t F*ck This Up Part 3: Harm ReductionThis is the third excerpt from the panel looking at the next two years' pending drug policy reforms at the Splore Listening Lounge in February this year.Those reforms include a new amendment guiding police discretion in the case of drug ...1 week ago
- Temporary Traffic Management – Auckland is awash with cones
This is a guest post from Dave Tilton of Parallaxx There will be people that read this that scratch their head daily when looking at Temporary Traffic Management (TTM). They will see the signs and cones, and Traffic Controllers ...1 week ago - Folau, diversity and the almighty dollar
by Daphna Whitmore A top Australian rugby player looks set to be sacked for quoting the Bible. Israel Folau has breached Australian Rugby Union (ARU) inclusiveness rules by saying that hell awaits homosexuals. Folau would be within his rights to ...1 week ago - 99% renewable is probably good enough for nowRadio New Zealand reports that getting from 99% to 100% renewable electricity is likely to be very expensive:A government body is poised to announce that a core of the country's energy policy will be prohibitively expensive to implement. [...] [The ...1 week ago
- 2019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #15
Story of the Week... Toon of the Week... Coming Soon on SkS... Climate Feedback Review... SkS Week in Review... Poster of the Week... Story of the Week... How a Few Small Fixes Could Stop Climate Change "We have ...1 week ago - The arrest of Julian AssangeThirteen years ago Wikileaks exposed to the world torture and cruelty at the US naval base in Guantánamo Bay in Cuba. More exposures followed showing abuses by US armed forces in Afghanistan and Iraq. In 2010 video footage shot from ...1 week ago
- Aladdin and the Magic Modeshift
Accelerating Modeshift was the subject of a workshop for Councillors last Friday. (Credit: Cathy Casey, via Facebook):
Modeshift away from private car ... 1 week ago - Tom Scott and Aramoana’s Long Shadow
From Tom Scott’s collection of cartoons, “Life in New Zealand” – his tribute to the Aramoana massacre on 13 November 1990 where a crazed gunman shot and killed thirteen people. . . The next one is a Public Service announcement ...1 week ago - Flashback Sunday: Peds Rule
Every weekend we dig into the archives. This post by Kent was originally published in July 2013.
Transport Blog1 week ago- 2019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #15
A chronological listing of news articles posted on the Skeptical Science Facebook Page during the past week, i.e., Sun, Apr 7 through Sat, Apr 13, 2019 Editor's Pick The world could transition entirely to cheap, safe renewable energy before 2050: ...1 week ago- New research, April 1-7, 2019
A selection of new climate related research articles is shown below. This post has separate sections for: Climate Change, Climate Change Impacts, Climate Change Mitigation, and Other Papers. Climate change impacts Mankind Potential impacts of climate change on dengue fever ...2 weeks ago- A shameful response to Turkey’s generosity at Gallipoli
. – Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, first President of Turkey (b. 1881 d. 1938) . When President Atatürk uttered those words* in the plaque at the top of this page, it was an act of humanity, love, and generosity that few ...2 weeks ago- New funding model needed
With the consultation period for the Reform of Vocational Education nowclosed, the Government will be considering submissions ...2 weeks ago- State of the Tertiary Education Sector survey
Two years ago news headlines highlighted the pressure staff in tertiary education were under to elevate grades, and it seems pressures are still ...2 weeks ago- New minimum wage and living wage for 2019
This week saw New Zealand’s minimum wage increase and a new living wage rate announced. ...2 weeks ago- The Domestic Violence – Victims’ Protection Act 2018
The TEU supports the introduction of the Domestic Violence –Victims’Protection Act which builds in to law protections and support for victims ...2 weeks ago- With power comes responsibility
Lexie Matheson, AUT, looks at the latest harmful words of Israel Folau and what it means for the LGBTIQ community and all of us. ...2 weeks ago- Staff shocked at the depth of the financial and planning issues at Whitireia and Weltec
Staff at Whitireia and Weltec are making a stand for a quality vocational education system that places communities at its centre. ...2 weeks ago- Making The Tradies Pay.
2 weeks ago- Uber’s S1 and slowing growth
Uber released their S1, their prospectus for their IPO today. The biggest concern for potential investors is probably their falling growth rates, which makes it hard to model a future where the company can produce significant earnings to justify ...2 weeks ago- Places to go, people to see
While there's news today, I'm off to Wellington to attend Armageddon on the weekend. Normal bloggage will resume on Monday. ...2 weeks ago- Mar-19 Ridership
When it comes to tracking public transport ridership in Auckland, finding out the results for March is one of my favourite times of the year. March is usually the busiest month of the year thanks to a number of factors, ...2 weeks ago- Have We Abandoned the Egalitarian Society?
Eighty years ago, the First Labour Government imbedded New Zealanders’ aspirations for an egalitarian society in the welfare state it created. Thirty years ago, both the Labour and National Governments began an assault on that egalitarianism and the traditional welfare ...2 weeks ago- Code Pink, Madonna and Palestinian resistance
by Phil Duncan Code Pink, a US-based peace and social reform group, has issued a call to Madonna not to perform at Eurovision which, this year, is being held in Tel Aviv. They note, “Israel’s regime of military occupation, settler-colonialism ...2 weeks ago- New Fisk
2 weeks ago- How the SIS can protect NZ elections
The SIS has been appearing before the Justice Select Committee to discuss concerns about foreign interference in New Zealand elections. In the process, they suggested that something dubious has been going on around donations:"We do see foreign interference activity from ...2 weeks ago- Acting responsibly – recent governance lessons
In California the giant electricity utility PG&E requested bankruptcy protection. In New Zealand a former Prime Minister and her previous colleagues around the Board table of Mainzeal have been fined $36 million – although both sides are appealing that. Also ...2 weeks ago- Climate Change: The latest inventory
The annual inventory report[PDF] of New Zealand's greenhouse gas emissions has been released, showing a slight increase in emissions: Its small, and the government is blaming the weather (2017 was not a good hydro year), but it is still not ...2 weeks ago- “We are one class” – free movement for the workers of the world
by The Spark Hundreds of thousands of men, women and children are fleeing for their lives, trying to gain entry into the U.S. Most are from Central America: El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, where there is some of the highest ...2 weeks ago- Are ramp signals fundamentally flawed?
Ramp signals – those traffic lights on motorway on-ramps that are designed to limit the number of vehicles that enter the motorway and thereby help keep traffic flowing, have long been a controversial transport initiative. They were first introduced on ...2 weeks ago- The Gap
There’s a lot of work going on at the moment trying to address the funding needs of hundreds of companies that are emerging from New Zealand. Investors, groups of investors and funds are all lifting their sights, raising and contributing ...2 weeks ago- Cheap at twice the price
In Parliament to day, opportunistic hologram David Seymour attacked the government's proposed gun buyback scheme, claiming that it would be costly and unsuccessful. Its success is obviously up to gun owners and police - and I would hope that they ...2 weeks ago- Immigration is people seeking a better life
by Don Franks Assumptions in an article on immigration numbers dropping show the crude capitalist values of our media. The question of immigration has always been a difficult balancing act for New Zealand’s political parties. On one hand, businesses need ...2 weeks ago- No wonder she didn’t want to answer
Last week, Parliament threatened the Chief Statistician with contempt to force her to produce basic statistics on last year's census. This morning, she finally produced them. And its become clear why she wanted to keep them secret: because the census ...2 weeks ago- Convenient Fictions
2 weeks ago- Climate Change: Business as usual
Remember when Jacinda Ardern called climate change "my generation's nuclear free moment"? From that tough talk, you'd expect urgent and real action to stop fossil fuels and reduce emissions. But when they banned offshore oil exploration, existing permits were left ...2 weeks ago- The case for allowing aid in dying in New Zealand
The End of Life Choice Bill, a member's bill in the name of David Seymour that would permit aid in dying, has been reported back by Parliament's Health Committee.read more ...2 weeks ago- Climate change poses security risks, according to decades of intelligence reports
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections A series of authoritative governmental and nongovernmental analyses over more than three decades lays a strong foundation for concern over climate change implications for national security. Most recently, the national intelligence community – ...2 weeks ago- New E-Scooter trial and rules coming
At the end of last year and beginning of this year e-scooters dominated the news cycles. I’m still not entirely why they got so much attention but media were absolutely obsessed with them. Perhaps this is a reflection of how ...2 weeks ago- Will the SIS double down on Islamophobia?
Yesterday the government announced the terms of reference for a royal commission of inquiry into the Christchurch terrorist attack. Among other things, the inquiry will be examining the failure of intelligence agencies in allowing a violent Nazi to buy weapons ...2 weeks ago- New Zealand landlords have it easy
Landlords and house-hoarders are whining about the prospect of a capital gains tax forcing them to pay their fair share. But in Berlin, they have a different solution to controlling rising rents: forced expropriation:Thousands of Berlin residents took to the ...2 weeks ago- Reported back
The Justice Committee has reported back on the End of Life Choice Bill. As expected, they were unable to agree on a contentious piece of legislation, so they have recommended a few minor technical amendments, while leaving major policy questions ...2 weeks ago- Proper planning, not cuts demanded at Whitireia and Weltec
Staff at Whitireia and Weltec are making a stand for a quality vocationaleducation system that places communities at its centre. ...2 weeks ago- Expertise and resources the key to vocational education reforms
Ensuring students get access to expert teachers and industry practitionersis the focus of the Tertiary Education Union’s submission on the ...2 weeks ago- Doing what they promised II
The Finance and Expenditure Committee reported back on the Arms (Prohibited Firearms, Magazines, and Parts) Amendment Bill, and recommended that it be passed with only minor amendments. There are new exemptions allowing commercial pest controllers and people with heirlooms to ...2 weeks ago- The secret closed trials of Soviet Russia. (And Aotearoa New Zealand)
. . History throughout the 20th century is replete with authoritarian regimes using closed, secret trials to persecute dissidents. Closed, secret trials give a veneer of legal “respectability” to an autocratic regime that wants to do away with its critics, ...2 weeks ago- Getting Light Rail to the Northwest in three easy steps
On Saturday, Transport Minister Phil Twyford held a public meeting in Henderson about transport in West Auckland and I was one of the speakers. At the event there was lot of discussion about rapid transit on the SH16 corridor where ...2 weeks ago- And over on The Irish Revolution
Several of us at Redline maintain separate blogs: the Irish Revolution (about Irish history and politics) and 100 Years of Trenches (anti-militarism, anti-imperialism, in particular in relation to NZ). Below are some recent highlights from the Irish revolution blog: Bernadette ...2 weeks ago - 2019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #15
... 
And over on The Irish Revolution
Several of us at Redline maintain separate blogs: the Irish Revolution (about Irish history and politics) and 100 Years of Trenches (anti-militarism, anti-imperialism, in particular in relation to NZ). Below are some recent highlights from the Irish revolution blog: Bernadette ...
2 weeks ago
And over on The Irish Revolution
Several of us at Redline maintain separate blogs: the Irish Revolution (about Irish history and politics) and 100 Years of Trenches (anti-militarism, anti-imperialism, in particular in relation to NZ). Below are some recent highlights from the Irish revolution blog: Bernadette ...
2 weeks ago
And over on The Irish Revolution
Several of us at Redline maintain separate blogs: the Irish Revolution (about Irish history and politics) and 100 Years of Trenches (anti-militarism, anti-imperialism, in particular in relation to NZ). Below are some recent highlights from the Irish revolution blog: Bernadette ...
2 weeks ago
Recent Comments