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December 20, 2021 8:00am by Kokila Patel

General Debate 20 December 2021

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General Debate

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Warren

Non disclosure exit payouts rife in Public Service, Researcher finds.
I wonder if some of these approximately $ 800,000 payouts are similar to what Nick Smith was accused of by a former staffer, as it seems this Government has been paying out on a lot of grievances while they have been in office.
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December 20, 2021 8:00am
- Batman
  
  Warren do you have a link to this?
  
  I’m genuinely curious what this looks like. 800,000 is an astonishing figure given the public section is 40k or so and the circumstances to warrant that sort of agreement would be pretty wild.
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:07am
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    Try this:
    https://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/wellington/127298776/nondisclosure-exit-payouts-rife-in-public-service-researcher-finds
    
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    December 20, 2021 9:18am
  - pdm
    
    $40k batman – even the rubbish bin emptiers get more than that under this government.
    
    Try $140k you might be closer to the mark for the bureaucratic pen pushers.
    
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    December 20, 2021 9:44am
    - Flossie
      
      Did Batman not mean there are 40,000 public service employees? I thought that’s what he was saying.
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:10am
      - Batman
        
        Yes that’s what I meant Flossie. That figure was an educated guess though, this government has inflated the numbers a lot by converting contractors into employees (which are cheaper but less easy to get rid of)
        
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        December 20, 2021 10:12am
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        Try 60,000 and you’d be nearer the mark.
        
        About 60,000 public servants working in 36 agencies
        
        https://www.publicservice.govt.nz/our-work/workforce-data/public-service-census-2021/
        
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        December 20, 2021 10:43am
      - pdm
        
        Apologies Batman – I interpreted it as salaries.
        
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        December 20, 2021 11:24am
      - Batman
        
        Thanks Maggy and no worries PDM!
        
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        December 20, 2021 2:08pm
mikenmildagain

Happy 50th birthday to Médecins Sans Frontières / Doctors Without Borders!
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December 20, 2021 8:00am
- Jack5
  
  Has Médecins Sans Frontières had the internal purge that apparently Wokies were seeking last year (link below)?
  
  A thousand staff or former staff last year claimed MSF is institutionally racist and reinforces colonialism and white supremacy.
  
  (MSF employs up to 65,000 staff in a year, mostly hired in the Third World countries where it is busy).
  
  One of those seeking radical change was a British-born physician of Sudanese and Iranian parents, Javid Abdelmoneim. He at the time was chair of the British board of MSF.
  
  Wikipedia reports that, in 2017, Abdelmoneim presented the BBC series No More Boys and Girls, in which a primary school, under his guidance, experimented with gender-neutral language and activities.
  
  https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2020/jul/10/medecins-sans-frontieres-institutionally-racist-medical-charity-colonialism-white-supremacy-msf
  
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  December 20, 2021 3:03pm
  - mikenmildagain
    
    I can’t answer that question, Jack, but here’s one for you: is there any international aid or human rights organisation that you don’t hate?
    
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    December 20, 2021 4:49pm
Benedict Yu

We are starting to see the first scientific studies of Omicron, as distinct from stories from South Africa.

https://researchnews.cc/news/10606/HKUMed-finds-Omicron-SARS-CoV-2-can-infect-faster-and-better-than-Delta-in-human-bronchus#.Yb9zAmmYbqu

Main points…

Omicron infects and multiplies 70 times faster than the Delta variant and original SARS-CoV-2 in human bronchus. These are the upper air passages. Unlike Delta it rarely penetrates deeply into the lower lung tissues. This was characteric of Delta with people literally drowning from pneumonia and their immune response filling their lungs with fluid.

According to these researchers, Omicron will overwhelmingly cause “bronchitis” like disease, not “pneumonia” like disease. That is good news. Well, at least relative to Delta.

There are two problems with Omicron.

Firstly it escapes immune responses from two doses of Pfizer.

Secondly these researchers are saying it is “70 times” more infectious. That could mean most of a population infected in a few months. Watch the UK during January.

Now, milder symptoms compared to Delta is good news. But think about it. An entire population being swept with bronchitis like symptoms, including the vulnerable and elderly? Not so good. The researchers sum it up.

“… by infecting many more people, a very infectious virus may cause more severe disease and death even though the virus itself may be less pathogenic. Therefore, taken together with our recent studies showing that the Omicron variant can partially escape immunity from vaccines and past infection, the overall threat from Omicron variant is likely to be very significant.’

So, watch this space. All I know is the Government needs a plan. Which is not the current plan. No point in having vaccine passes with a vaccine that offers negligible protection against infection. ?
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December 20, 2021 8:00am
- Bridgenag
  
  Lockdown straight after the “royal” wedding………sigh
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:06am
- cmm
  
  BY: Look at Dr John Campbell’s break down of the same report.
  
  “Secondly these researchers are saying it is “70 times” more infectious. “. Nope. They did NOT say that.
  
  They said it is up to 70 times more infectious in bronchial tissue (the pipes going into the lungs), and is less infectious in lung tissue itself.
  
  That is generally a Very Good Thing because it means far less of the pneumonia symptoms.
  
  That is consistent with what has been observed in South Africa – far milder symptoms and most of the patients in hospital that are CV19 positive are there for other reasons but just happened to test positive.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:07am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    Thanks for that correction ?.
    
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    December 20, 2021 8:09am
  - ClanMcleod
    
    I’ve brought it up before, Original Antigenic Sin is looking like it is a thing. The bad news is the jab is showing negative efficacy against omicron. Meaning the jabbed are more likely to catch it. The good news is it isn’t anywhere near as dangerous as delta.
    Here’s the data analysis. Anyone taking issue with it please do so with supporting information. I’m not an expert. Mind you, neither are most of those held up in the media in NZ as such.
    
    “vaccines, including boosters are showing strong negative efficacy vs omicron
    
    this is consistent with omicron being an OAS enabled escape variant
    
    omicron continues to show evidence of mildness relative to past variants”
    
    https://boriquagato.substack.com/p/theres-something-antigenic-in-denmark
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:20am
  - Aunty
    
    I see Brian May of Queen and his wife have recently tested positive for Covid. He’s has 3 jabs of Pfizer and credits his vaccinations with saving his life. And he is probably correct in that.
    
    Perhaps when all you genius doctors and medical scientists stop posting your little medical epistles and opinions we might actually start making some progress around here? (I mean my God, who needs Medical School when we have you lot)
    
    But I won’t hold my breath.
    
    https://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/queen-guitarist-brian-may-catches-covid-19-at-birthday-party-truly-horrible-few-days/NEBBNDJAFQLLGCTGJABDVYLLKQ/
    
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    December 20, 2021 11:55am
    - ClanMcleod
      
      Aunty most people here post reputable evidence from reputable sources that is open for challenge by anyone using other reputable evidence. It happens regularly.
      
      You have posted anecdotal evidence from an aging former rock star published in Ardern’s bought and paid for media outlet, the Whoreald.
      
      Seriously, when you want to actually debate the science make sure it’s actually science based. Brian May has a PhD, I’ve no doubt he believes the jab saved him, it might have, but it’s hardly scientific data.
      BTW, I am a huge fan of Brian May and Queen, I was fortunate enough to see them twice in their heyday in the 80s. But his opinion on covid is just that, opinion.
      Amazing how many triple jabbed people are now catching covid? Almost as if experts who predicted leaky vaccines would drive variants like omicron were onto something. Keep an eye on the numbers aunty, things are going to start getting interesting. We’ve got a few months to get the picture, but let’s get the royal wedding out of the way first!
      
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      December 20, 2021 1:37pm
    - cmm
      
      You want another anecdote?
      
      My twice-jabbed mother died in August with CV19 causing pneumonia which filled up her lungs. Did it save her life?
      
      There is overwhelming evidence that some people are helped by having the vaccine – that is particularly true of those with compromised immunity and commodities.
      
      It WAS especially true in the days of Delta. As we lurch towards Omicron, the value of the vaccination decreases.
      
      You tell us the doctors know everything. Well maybe they do. One thing they certainly DO know is that VitD and Zinc levels are extremely low in many people and that Vit D is one of the critical building blocks for immunity.
      
      That has been well understood since 1925 and has not been at all controversial since the 1930s.
      
      Having low Vit D levels compromises immunity. Why are they not telling the people the importance of VitD and Zinc?
      
      According to Cindy, all you need to know is told to us from the podium of truth. Yet I doubt they’ve mentioned Vit D once.
      
      IMHO anyone who thinks they don’t need to worry about Vit D if they have been vaccinated is a bloody idiot. The other way around makes more sense.
      
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      December 20, 2021 3:13pm
      - mikenmildagain
        
        Your views on vitamin D are a gross over-simplification of a complex area. I think you should be cautious about touting your suppositions as established fact.
        
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        December 20, 2021 4:56pm
    - Surely Knott
      
      Only in the covid era could you be thrice jabbed with a vaccine and months later catch the disease you were vaccinated against and claim the vaccine is a success!
      
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      December 20, 2021 8:57pm
      - Observer of Life
        
        A friend in the UK messaged me today. She has Covid. Had the booster about a month ago. Her symptoms “a cough and cold”. They haven’t told her, but she thinks it’s omicron. She has to self isolate for 10 days. Then does a lateral flow test at home (free and yes, she does it herself – she’s an adult Cindy!!).
        
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        December 20, 2021 10:46pm
- Lee C
  
  When people realise all the privations of the past two years amounted to nothing, it’s going to take more than a ‘celebrity wedding’ to re-dust this stinking turd of a government.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:08am
  - MCōs
    
    That comment would be directed at the likes of me who have not been medically effected by covid-19 as opposed to a Kiwi I knew in Thailand who died because he caught the bug.
    
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    December 20, 2021 9:40am
    - Man Among the Ruins
      
      MCōs
      Sorry, but I’m not that interested in the experiences of some random Kiwi you knew in Thailand.
      
      https://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2021/12/general_debate_19_december_2021.html#comment-3088426
      
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      December 20, 2021 12:12pm
      - ISeeRed
        
        Burn of the Day.
        
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        December 20, 2021 4:35pm
  - Yvette
    
    Lee C, least that I should advise anyone how to write English, but may I please suggest rather than
    ”… re-dust this stinking turd of a government” it may have been ”re-fairy-dust” or maybe better ”re-star-dust this stinking turd of a Government”
    
    Perhaps see the book, The Specialist, by Charles Sale – the personal credo of one Lem Putt, a specialist, from his hometown of Urbana, Illinois – an outhouse builder, this book presents the philosophy of a man who loves his trade and has considered every aspect of it. Illustrated by William Kermode.
    Or for further perspective: “Poo With a View: High Alpine Shitters of the Canadian Rockies”
    (I have used the more conventional accommodeation, as a symbolic gesture, on the highest publicly assessable level of the Empire State Building)
    – sorry, for crapping on – remember: ”re-star-dust”
    
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    December 20, 2021 9:47am
    - H. Upmann
      
      🙂
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:23am
    - Ed Snack
      
      The old outhouse on the Routeburn track at the Routeburn Falls hut had magnificent views out over the lower Routeburn valley ! There was a little sign just before you got to the outhouse that you could set to “occupied” so you could sit and leave the door open to admire the view without being disturbed.
      
      The new hut has attached flush toilets, far nicer as bogs but sadly missing the spectacular views. By new I mean quite a few years old, it was a long time ago that I first visited the Routeburn.
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:24am
      - freemark
        
        Nice. There is (was?) a similar one on the track along the top of the Kaimais. Beautiful view out ove the BOP/Coromandel.
        
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        December 20, 2021 5:11pm
    - Lee C
      
      Yeah I considered ‘re-fairy-dust’ but thought it didn’t scan very well.
      
      Besides, given the context and audeince it was written for, I thought brevity would easily triumph over pedantry.
      
      Thanks.
      
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      December 20, 2021 2:59pm
- Mr_Blobby
  
  Welcome to another day of lockdown Tyranny.
  
  Is our local Tyrant truly Evil of a useful idiot.
  
  Why are people so afraid of Covid?
  
  Why is the Government so desperate for everyone to take a “vaccine” that obviously does not work?
  
  A mortality rate similar to influenza
  Does not even make the top 10 list of things that will kill us.
  Where are the early at home treatment options?
  Where are the options to encourage personal health?
  The latest variant is flooding into the Country carried in by the fully vaccinated.
  The growing number of vaccine injured.
  Alert people that we don’t know the long-term effects of the vaccine.
  Covid affects the unhealthy more than the Healthy, who get a short mild illness and long-lasting immunity.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:09am
  - Wayne Mapp
    
    People have been worried because in countries like the US nearly 1 in 300 of the total population have died of covid. Translated to NZ that would have been 15,000 dead. Similar numbers for many European countries.
    The whole purpose of the various measures was to avoid that outcome. By and large they have been successful in both NZ and Australia. Some what less so in Australia, but that is because our rules are stricter than theirs.
    Now you may dismiss all of this as irrelevant, but that is not how most New Zealanders see it.
    
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    December 20, 2021 9:36am
    - Charmaine Hawke
      
      Sadly Mr Mapp you are right it as most New Zealanders (as you yourself have been) were scared into believing this was the second coming of the black death.
      In reality we all just needed to look at The Diamond Princess data and know this wasn’t a serious illness at all. The cruise she sailed on is known in the industry as the last cruise someone will do before they leave this life and on this ship were 3 terminally ill people within months of death (sadly they died on board).
      Alas you have allowed yourself to be fooled into the smug notion that we actually did something remarkable when we, by accident of geography, got lucky.
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:00am
    - CPB
      
      No, 1 in 300 didn’t die OF Covid. They tested positive for Covid at time of death, or died within a few weeks of testing positive. The CDC has said as few as 10% had Covid as the sole cause of death (no co-mordibities), and research indicates anywhere between 15-30% of the global death count had nothing to do with Covid at all.
      
      The full story will be told when we have excess mortality data for 2019 – 2024, but we should expect that the weaponising of statistics to instill fear in western populations will be studied in universities for the next century.
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:05am
      - Batman
        
        If someone has type 1 diabetes and is living perfectly well, then gets covid and dies, is it the diabetes that killed them or covid?
        
        Willfully sticking your head in the sand is great until reality smacks you on the arse.
        
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        December 20, 2021 10:21am
      - Spoff
        
        Factor in the U.S. standard 35-45 cycle PCR test known to produce about 97% false positives due to PCR doing what it was designed to do – find viri or fragments thereof in any patient sample regardless of infection. Bear in mind that the presence of viri or fragments does not indicate infection. Those of us who are immune to any particular cold or flu will test positive at 35 cycles.
        “Your Coronavirus Test Is Positive. Maybe It Shouldn’t Be.”
        https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/29/health/coronavirus-testing.html
        
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        December 20, 2021 11:48am
      - bronny1
        
        Batman – that depends if they have live well with type 1 diabetes always. For example ,my 25 yo niece has had type 1 since she was 10. She’s had an insulin pump since 13, so her diabetes has been extremely well controlled and she probably has no damage to her blood vessels.
        My uncle on the other hand got it. At 20 and it was never well controlled. He went on to suffer related illnesses consistently from about 50 until he died at 75. His vessels would have been a mess and anything could have taken him out. IMO if he died of covid that should not necessarily be a covid death whereas if she did, it certainly should be.
        
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        December 20, 2021 12:06pm
      - Batman
        
        Bronny your comment goes to show exactly why you should get vaccinated. For the health and lives of your neice and uncle.
        
        Or, don’t have any in person contact until the pandemic is done.
        
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        December 20, 2021 2:16pm
    - Spoff
      
      “in countries like the US nearly 1 in 300 of the total population have died of covid”
      Utterly bogus statistic. Over half the supposed Corona deaths reported were beyond the average life-span, no account of co-morbidity (i.e. died with rather than from according to a massively flawed PCR test).
      The IFR of Alpha is .15% – one-and a half per thousand infected.
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:06am
      - Batman
        
        So because they don’t frame them the way you want in order to minimise them to your preferred criteria, they don’t count?
        
        What a joke. Pull the other one.
        
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        December 20, 2021 10:15am
    - ClanMcleod
      
      Wayne Mapp you’ve been reading the Herald and listening to RNZ far too much. None of that is true. Ardern kicked the covid can down the road while destroying the economy and shredding the social fabric. Both of these will take decades to recover from. She has irreparably damaged the mental health of a whole generation. She has implemented a form of digital ID that will be enhanced and added to and will evolve into a social credit system similar to China. She has created an apartheid society. She has destroyed friendships and torn families apart. She is a complete and utter failure as a politician unless you call conning people a positive skill. Yet you still somehow think she “saved” us from the plague?
      I really despair at the level of incompetence and lack of intelligence of the majority of MPs and former MPs but it does explain a lot of the incomprehensible actions of recent years.
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:29am
      - sooty
        
        She has destroyed the health and wellbeen of many sick New Zealanders who have not been able to go to medical appointments or even get them. Who compensates them for a shorter sicker life! Jacinda Ardern you are fricken useless!
        
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        December 20, 2021 12:54pm
    - Ed Snack
      
      It is a major problem with this whole Covid situation that they data capture has been so badly done that rational estimations of deaths and injuries are hard to work out.
      
      The USA uses a system not unlike what we have here, that is anyone who dies who has a detectable trace of Covid – from a current or past infection, symptomatic or not – is counted as a Covid death. This is aggravated in the US by a system that compensates hospitals for Covid deaths but not other deaths leading to a massive over reporting of supposed Covid deaths.
      
      Estimates are hard to obtain, but I have seen some efforts that suggest that the actual death toll from Covid is less than 10% of the nominal toll, and this is supported by excess deaths numbers.
      
      So the actual impact of Covid is more like 1 in 3000 at worst, and the huge majority of those deaths are in the group most likely to die within a year anyway.
      
      For young (<50) healthy people the rate is around the 1-5 per million or so range, the younger the person the lower the risk.
      
      Our whole discussion of the perceived risks is distorted by this (deliberate I’m sure) misrepresentation of the injuries and fatalities from Covid.
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:31am
    - Show me the evidence
      
      Australia as a whole has been less successful because NSW and Vic skew the stats, but actually Queensland (5M people) , WA, Tasmania, and NT have done far better than us. I know for a fact that QLD has had far less restrictions than us as I have family there – there was never a L4 lockdown, but more like L3 and they’ve had the odd week at L2 or L3 but that’s it. Taiwan has also fared alot better and in 2020 never introduced lockdowns although I think they had a light lockdown this year. There has been alot of data analysis done by mathematicians and epidemiologists that prove there is no correlation between level of restrictions/outcomes because there are so many other factors that come into play. Sweden actually did alot better than UK did without any lockdowns. But they didn’t just let it rip but rather came up with guidelines and measures to try and minimise spread and harm. Obviously being isolated (which we are) and low pop density are huge factors and management of the border once you’ve got low case numbers is the biggest factor. It’s far more nuanced – and you have merely come to the conclusion that the govt (via the media) wanted you to come to without actually looking at the data. Frankly I am sick of all the simplistic, shallow and binary thinking exhibited by 90% of the population. This now extends to nonsense we have regarding vaccinations and mandates.
      
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      December 20, 2021 11:04am
    - Cinematic
      
      You could be right as Baker says the average flu kills 10k in NZ annually. So really 15k is no big deal.
      
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      December 20, 2021 11:46am
    - bronny1
      
      That was alpha, or most of it. A harsher variant and physicians only learning g how to treat it. We know how to treat it now, and it’s a very mild illness for most, let’s just get on with it.
      
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      December 20, 2021 12:02pm
    - Ra Henare
      
      Cherry picking again Wayne….?
      
      Pick Taiwan, Denmark or a whole bunch of other Countries oh my gosh more than 180 to chose from!! That were nowhere near the rate in teh USA.
      https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/
      
      The NZ Government abetted by media scared the bejesus out of the population.
      
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      December 20, 2021 12:27pm
    - Mr_Blobby
      
      So Wayne I don’t think you are Evil but you are fitting the description of useful idiot.
      
      However is there anything in my post that you think is incorrect.
      
      So you are afraid of Covid, when/if you catch it, you will die and that you are desperately clinging to the vaccine as your salvation.
      
      I understand, I do, it is OK to be afraid.
      
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      December 20, 2021 1:27pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  We will manage to hold omicron at bay over summer… which means it will rip through NZ this autumn and winter…
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:15am
  - bronny1
    
    Please please let them be as incompetent as normal so it gets out and spreads!
    
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    December 20, 2021 8:27am
  - Inandout
    
    Maggy, is that how politics works?
    
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    December 20, 2021 8:49am
  - UrbanNeocolonialist
    
    Which is just idiotic. Summer sees people in peak physical condition, lots of well ventilated houses, more vitamin D, out and about and more active, and often better rested as well. It is also the best time to get sick so as not to cause disruption to work etc.
    
    So govt will of course try to delay it till autumn/winter when it will do most damage.
    
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    December 20, 2021 9:46am
    - tui47
      
      Death rates for the elderly rise in Winter. The cold weather makes heart attacks more likely. Of course this is also the time they die with the flu.
      
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      December 20, 2021 12:40pm
  - oldfella
    
    Maggy, but after the Wedding of the Century. Nothing must spoil that feel-good event. /s
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:29am
- slightlyrighty
  
  Good luck with a plan from the Government. They’re bad enough when they’re operating, but now they’re closed for christmas!
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:17am
  - Ed Snack
    
    Surely when the government is shut down it can’t do even more damage, which is a plus of sorts.
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:32am
  - oldfella
    
    SR, can’t wait to see this govt swing into action in the New Year to vaccinate all our 5-11 year old kids (expect an announcement after today’s cabinet meeting, the last one of the year). While at the same time dishing out boosters to all who will take them.
    With an emphasis on Maori in both categories.
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:37am
    - sooty
      
      Bet they jab all the kids during the school holidays!
      
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      December 20, 2021 12:58pm
- krazykiwi
  
  The overall increase in infectiousness is ~5x, although this varies by vaccination status. What we DON’T appear to have here us vaccine escape. VE would give infection parity between vaccinated and the unvaccinated. The evidence (will link 2 studies later) point to Original Antigenic Sin at work, this is where vaccination with Pfizer and Moderna is making individuals MORE susceptible to Omicron infection relative to unvaccinated peers.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:27am
  - kevn
    
    @kk…. I wonder how my (traditional vaccine) Valneva jab will manage the Omni?
    
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    December 20, 2021 8:31am
  - Lee C
    
    A military doctor speaks out about mandatory vaccinations in the US military – employing tools available to her and discussing ‘medical errors’.
    
    https://www.facebook.com/watch?v=584050229560561
    
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    December 20, 2021 8:35am
    - Jim
      
      Very compelling viewing especially exampling the vast difference in industry risk management approaches. This is why we jump on an aeroplane with little regard for gravity and the potential of death.
      Certainly if the aviation sector had the same much higher risk appetite as the pharmaceutical industry, all too often there would be reports of catastrophic errors as aircraft accident statistics mounted. However, quite simply the pharmaceutical industry doesn’t need to apply the same onerous risk management threshold, as its errors are often isolated and less obvious than aviation errors. This also allows the pharmaceutical industry legal and media powerhouse to spin it’s highly effective ‘offensive defence’ to bury the truth.
      Everyone should be aware that the pharmaceutical industry cleverly spends millions lobbying governments, funding medical research, funding education, funding corporate media companies and generally anything that promotes the illusion of trust and benevolence. But remember the piper always get paid!
      Here are a few well explained and entertaining examples:
      https://youtu.be/zvyCUqRBuyw
      https://youtu.be/7fQ6JklHjBc
      https://youtu.be/L-A027BFV7k
      
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      December 20, 2021 11:40am
      - Lee C
        
        Thank you Jim,
        
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        December 20, 2021 4:47pm
- virtualmark
  
  Benedict,
  
  Couple of quick points:
  1) The 70x = 70x as infectious in *bronchial tissue*, rather than 70x as infectious overall. (oops, ninja’d by cmm)
  2) The existing vaccines – developed for the original variant – at their original doses, are still somewhat effective … certainly better than being unvaccinated or having had previous Covid infection (https://twitter.com/DrEricDing/status/1471035675382358018)
  3) 3 doses of Pfizer seems to have strong enough protection from Omicron (not as high an antibody response as 2x Pfizer on original Covid, but strong enough to deter infection).
  4) Omicron is likely to be mild enough, and bronchial rather than lung-focused, that it shouldn’t cause the deaths and health system overload … but there will still be deaths, primarily among unvaxxed and compromised.
  5) So far Covid appears to be following the same trajectory as previous coronaviruses, which start off killing many when they are new and novel, but progressively become milder and milder until they are just the cause of the common headcold. Not sure that is the inevitable pathway, but it seems to once again be the case here.
  6) Forgot to mention … the “vaccine effectiveness” is calculated by measuring antibody levels, but our immune system is more complex than just antibodies. For example, T-cell response from prior vaccinations should be unaffected from Delta-to-Omicron.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:50am
  - ClanMcleod
    
    [Stop repeating yourself every few minutes. You made your point @ 10.20. mod.]
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:37am
    - quarterpack
      
      boriquagato.substack.com? Hardly a sound source of information there mate . Give me a minute and I will find a site that offers indisputable evidence that Mermaids exist, and they can be seen frolicking with unicorns
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:52am
      - ClanMcleod
        
        quarterpack – I’m picking you’ll refer me to something from the BBC or RNZ. Go for it, but attacking the source of information isn’t good form. In fact it’s downright weak and the refuge of those who don’t do critical analysis and have limited ability to think for themselves.
        Try reading the information and the data analysis, then come back with a rebuttal. Take your time. I’ll check in later.
        
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        December 20, 2021 11:35am
      - krazykiwi
        
        I suggest that summary dismission of content on the basis of the name of the author is a little facile. But yes, an odd name, and he’s quite quirky. I’ve been reading this persons posts for a few months now, and can attest to some very in-depth analysis that shows him to be highly intelligent.
        
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        December 20, 2021 11:56am
    - ClanMcleod
      
      Sorry mod, relatively new to this format, I sometimes think it’s like having a real conversation with people so when a new person alludes to the same topic I repeat myself. Merry Xmas and I’ll refrain from doing it again……!
      
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      December 20, 2021 11:41am
      - quarterpack
        
        So no interest in the Mermaids OR Unicorns then…….but you would only question my sources anyways……
        
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        December 20, 2021 2:37pm
    - Biscuit
      
      Mod, would that you could use the same standards with St Jacinda and her Podium of Truth pronouncements.
      
      There’s only so much ‘Be kind’, ‘Team of 5 Million” ‘We went hard and early’. ‘Jessica, then Tova’ bovine excreta we can all take.
      
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      December 20, 2021 12:22pm
      - Batman
        
        If the Prime Minister starts commenting on kiwiblog I am sure she will be subject to the same rules as everyone else ?
        
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        December 20, 2021 2:21pm
  - krazykiwi
    
    VM, You might find this paper – by Neil Ferguson no less – interesting: Growth, population distribution and Immune escape of Omicron in England. It was published 4 days ago. I thought Table 2 was particularly revealing in respect of negative vaccine efficiency. Some useful analysis over at Bartrams’s Folly.
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:59am
    - virtualmark
      
      Seems weird … I’ve not heard any serious medical researchers pointing to negative vaccine efficiency re Omicron. I’m not saying this is wrong, just that it seems out-of-step with the Pharma research. Let’s wait and see.
      
      The sense I get is that 2-doses of Pfizer are about 95% effective against hospitalisation from original variant, a little less than that against hospitalisation from Delta, and perhaps <50% effective against hospitalisation from Omicron. And then your immune response starts to weaken over time too.
      
      But that's complicated by us not yet having really reliable info on the hospitalisation rates of Omicron in an unvaxxed, uninfected population. It seems Omicron is less virulent and causes less hospitalisations, but that is hard to be really accurate about given the %age of populations who are vaccinated and/or prior infected.
      
      FWIW, I can't see MIQ holding Omicron at bay for more than a month, and then it's likely to spread through the country pretty fast given how contagious it is. So we're all going to get to find out in the next 6 months.
      
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      December 20, 2021 3:16pm
      - ClanMcleod
        
        I would suggest the pharma data is suspect to say the least. If I say what I really think the mod will get upset.
        
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        December 20, 2021 10:49pm
  - ClanMcleod
    
    Here’s another great piece on the subject of negative vaccine efficacy. An anonymous contributor to the Daily Sceptic, not a peer reviewed study, but then again those are being shown to be often worthless these days. Anyway, worth a read I believe. An excerpt re the second time the author caught covid –
    
    “I was a bit surprised because I’ve already had it – I caught it back in December 2019. (Before anyone yells ‘that’s before Covid came!’, I caught it at a hotel frequented by Air China pilots and cabin-crew and I also note that there was a strange peak in ambulance call-outs for cardiac/respiratory arrest back in Nov/Dec ‘19, as discussed here.) This time I caught it because I had to pop into the office, which is mainly frequented by the double jabbed. And as we all know, the double-jabbed are suffering from negative vaccine efficiency and are thus more likely to catch Covid than anyone else (somewhere between –50%, –100% or even –150%). The only people who don’t seem to know this are politicians…”
    
    If you go to the article there are hyperlinks to take you to evidence re the assertion that double jabbed are more likely to catch covid than anyone else. As with my other posts, feel free to rebut with supporting evidence.
    
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    December 20, 2021 11:40am
    - krazykiwi
      
      That anonymous contributor to the Daily Sceptic is Bartram of Bartram’s Folly. From what I can work out he has a formal background in statistical analysis. I subscribe to his substack.
      
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      December 20, 2021 12:00pm
      - ClanMcleod
        
        Thanks for the info kk. I’ll check it out. It certainly makes sense in the article I posted.
        
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        December 20, 2021 1:45pm
  - Show me the evidence
    
    Addressing point 6 – this is not how Pfizer calculated VE at all. Have you even read the datasheet on Medsafe? They used case numbers in placebo versus trial group (difference as a %). If cases became symptomatic then they were tested. Of course, there were a couple of hundred cases from the trial group that were excluded for some reason but with no explanation. If these were positive cases (from memory they were) then this would have given a VE of 20%. That may not have been the reality, but it does illustrate how a trial result can be manipulated to overstate efficacy and understate the safety issues. Not that big Pharma would ever do that when they could be sued….oh, wait they can’t……they have indemnity for even wilful misconduct for these vaccines, how convenient (sarc).
    
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    December 20, 2021 11:43am
    - ClanMcleod
      
      It beggars belief that people in NZ believe that this vaccine was “tested and approved” without scratching even a little below the surface.
      I contacted Medsafe and asked them to specifically outline how they “tested” the vaccine before approving it. Of course they did zero testing, instead they relied on data supplied by Pfizer! Fox and henhouse obviously comes to mind. When I pushed them I was referred to the Risk Management Plan, again supplied by Pfizer. It can be read here, only 6 pages so not too onerous reading. I recommend anyone seriously interested in this subject to do so.
      
      https://www.medsafe.govt.nz/COVID-19/Comirnaty-RMP.pdf
      
      Table 1 on page 2 shows a “: List of important risks and missing information” –
      
      Important identified – risks Anaphylaxis
      Important potential risks – Vaccine-associated enhanced disease (VAED) including vaccineassociated enhanced respiratory disease (VAERD)
      
      Missing information – Use in pregnancy and while breast feeding
      Use in immunocompromised patients
      Use in frail patients with co-morbidities (eg, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease [COPD], diabetes, chronic neurological disease,
      cardiovascular disorders)
      Use in patients with autoimmune or inflammatory disorders
      Interaction with other vaccines
      Long-term safety data
      
      How could this vaccine possibly have been given approval for use when Medsafe had this information available?
      As for the Pfizer data itself, the WHO clearly print a disclaimer at the top of the spreadsheet containing the data. Pfizer have indemnity from criminal prosecution. For such a “safe and effective” treatment nobody seems to want to vouch for it.
      
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      December 20, 2021 1:58pm
    - virtualmark
      
      Nope. Same general intent, but two different ways of measuring.
      
      What you’ve described is the process for the Phase III trials. Which is basically the process in any Phase III trial.
      
      What I described is the in-vitro lab-based testing using tissue samples where the researchers measure the amount of neutralising antibodies. It’s not as authoritative as a Phase III trial, but it can be done quickly and is accurate enough. The in-vitro tests measure neutralising antibodies, but those are just one part of our immune systems, and they are the part that is most tailored for each individual virus/variant.
      
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      December 20, 2021 2:56pm
      - ClanMcleod
        
        virtualmark always remember, we are talking about probably the most corrupt corporation on the planet. Pfizer supplied the data used by Medsafe who took it at face value when making their decision to approve it. Insanity.
        Here’s more evidence of the corruption of Pfizer.
        
        https://www.bmj.com/content/375/bmj.n2635
        
        I wouldn’t buy a second hand car from them let alone trust them with the health of my family.
        
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        December 20, 2021 8:42pm
      - virtualmark
        
        Yes yes, I know that’s what you think.
        
        But:
        1) I’ve dealt with them, and I didn’t find them seedy or untrustworthy. In fact I was impressed by the Pfizer people I met.
        2) All corporations are somewhat “untrustworthy”, in that they will put their interests first, and your interests kind-of-nowhere apart from where those serve their interests.
        
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        December 21, 2021 11:58am
  - cmm
    
    To be very clear, I do not think I “ninja’d” BY.
    
    I am not attacking the person. Nor am I attacking what he said. While we do disagree on a few points I hold BY’s opinions, and the quality of his research, in very high regard.
    
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    December 20, 2021 11:54am
    - virtualmark
      
      I meant “ninja’d” as in “you beat me to it”, or “someone else has already pointed this out”. It’s a term of praise, not criticism.
      
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      December 20, 2021 3:11pm
- Show me the evidence
  
  Here’s a few more studies for you about Omnicron Benedict:
  https://www.eurosurveillance.org/content/10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2021.26.50.2101146
  
  Highlights 1.2% cases hospitalised
  0.3% ICU
  0% deaths
  76% fully/booster vaxed
  14% not vaxed
  4.3% previous infection
  
  https://www.bmj.com/content/375/bmj.n3103
  The title “Covid-19: Runny nose, headache, and fatigue are commonest symptoms of omicron, early data show” tells you all you need to know
  
  https://www.bmj.com/content/375/bmj.n3104
  Covid-19: Omicron is causing more infections but fewer hospital admissions than delta, South African data show
  
  https://www.med.hku.hk/en/news/press/20211215-omicron-sars-cov-2-infection
  “HKUMed finds Omicron SARS-CoV-2 can infect faster and better than Delta in human bronchus but with less severe infection in lung”
  
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  December 20, 2021 11:57am
- KevO'Brien
  
  Don’t let this gobblement near any planners send them off to the polls instead.
  Another year of planned fear?
  I have watched this fear porn bug arise and be exploited world wide. We can stop stop it by refusing to let it get to us.
  Nothing is possible until after the PM’s nups.
  
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  December 20, 2021 12:37pm
- Ra Henare
  
  Another reason not to vax kids.
  https://www.straitstimes.com/world/united-states/low-dose-of-pfizers-covid-19-vaccine-fails-for-children-aged-2-to-under-5
  
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  December 20, 2021 1:21pm
cmm

Use your mana to aid colleagues – so says the person who used her mana to attack people for addressing the “Maori science is real science” craziness.

Now she’s backpedalling to say all she was do was attacking racism and sexism. What complete bullshit. An apology would have worked better.

But no, narcissists can never say sorry. All they can ever do is redirect and double down and her clarification has in many ways made things worse. There is absolutely no evidence here that they were being racist or sexist.

The original seven were not racist or sexist in what they were saying. They didn’t say that women or Maori were incapable of being scientists. They just said that “Maori knowledge” was not science.

I am sure they would also say that many facets of Western knowledge are not science either. How to drive a car or sail a ship is not science. How to read, write and do basic arithmetic is not science. Woodwork is not science. A recipe book is not science. A story about Jack and the Beanstalk is not science.

Clearly she is at least street savvy enough to recognise that her actions did not go down well and that she has brought the scientific industry, including the credibility of all scientists, into disrepute – doubly so for herself.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/science/300480580/academics-use-your-mana-to-aid-colleagues-not-fight-them
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December 20, 2021 8:00am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  The level of debate by our academics seems to hit rock bottom in the twitterverse:
  
  Here Professor Wiles tweets on “dinosaurs”
  
  another Professor allegedly tweets on OWGs.
  
  https://pointofordernz.wordpress.com/2021/12/17/bring-on-the-wiles-v-dawkins-debate-and-prospects-of-our-being-demystified-but-he-might-be-disqualified-as-a-dinosaur/
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:08am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    I would love to see that. Dawkins would demolish pink hair.
    
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    December 20, 2021 8:12am
    - Suze Wainwright
      
      Someone told me hair dye can be carcinogenic too. Follow the evidence and take the advice…?
      
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      December 20, 2021 8:57am
      - Jack5
        
        Maori are digging themselves deeper into their “Maori knowledge is science” hangi-trap.
        
        In Stuff today, Maori activist (blog and vocal) Morgan Godfery claims that Maori scientifically adapted the kumera (sweet potato) so that it would grow in what he calls “freezing Dunedin”.
        
        Or, or … Morgan… Maori gradually moved south and eventually it was too cold to grow kumera, as in Southland, including Stewart Island.
        
        That explains the sparse, coast-bound population of Maori when the modern world arrived with CaptainCook.
        
        Science would surely include selection, monitored trials, and confirmation of experiments, with discussion, and perhaps challenges. Didn’t happen. Maori just expanded south until they couldn’t grow kumera, then the folk of Southland, including Stewart Island Ruapuke, lived on sea food and birds.
        
        In technology, why hadn’t Maori retained the technology of building ocean-going, double-hull craft when Cook arrived? Similarly with the technology of ocean navigation. Why had Maori lost it?
        
        The answer is Maori didn’t have a written language to record and progress it, and this raises the question of whether you can have technology or science without a written langage.
        
        In fact much Maori knowledge was primitive: oral records, no use of the wheel, tools of stone or timber. Technology was primeval, and science was absent.
        
        Godfery is described on internet sites as a writer and trade unionist, but the Stuff article says he is a senior lecturer at Otago University, which, however, lists Godfery as Maori research partnerships manager.
        
        Godfery’s name has other connotations. Was he in the campaign against journalist-blogger Rachel Stewart?
        
        Godfery digs the “Maori science” hole deeper:
        
        https://www.stuff.co.nz/pou-tiaki/127320504/it-took-science-for-polynesians-to-settle-the-corners-of-the-vast-pacific
        
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        December 20, 2021 10:09am
      - Flossie
        
        Oh no! Please don’t let that be true…
        
        I’m doomed due to years of vanity!
        
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        December 20, 2021 10:14am
      - Spoff
        
        Jack5.
        “In technology, why hadn’t Maori retained the technology of building ocean-going, double-hull craft when Cook arrived? Similarly with the technology of ocean navigation. Why had Maori lost it?”
        Have any Maori artefacts been found in lands to windward of NZ? Or in Australia for that matter.
        Asking for a pink haired friend. ?
        
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        December 20, 2021 4:00pm
      - mikenmildagain
        
        I’d be interested in exactly when Jack considers that ‘science’ began. His definition:
        
        Science would surely include selection, monitored trials, and confirmation of experiments, with discussion, and perhaps challenges
        
        might well exclude anyone before Francis Bacon from being referred to as a ‘scientist’.
        Sorry Aristotle, Aristarchus, Pliny the Elder, and Archimedes – Jack of Kiwiblog says you weren’t scientists.
        
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        December 20, 2021 5:10pm
      - Jack5
        
        A common tactic of Milky: extend someone’s argument then hammer the extension.
        
        Milky’s Aristarchus: there was a real astronomer, whose heloiocentric theory could be assessed and checked, proved (or not) by all. The myth of Maui slowing down the sun isn’t even a theory.
        
        The great Aristotle made many innovative suggestions about scientific method, and volume 7 of the Macmillan Encyclopedia of Philosophy says (page 340) that Aristotle was a great scientist as well as a great philosopher.
        
        It adds that Aristotle “exemplified the truth that whatever philosophical theory is adhered to, the practice of science constrains the investigator to observe certain autonomous canons.”
        
        Tell us about equivalent canons of “Maori science,” Milky, and an estimate of Maui as a scientist.
        
        And Archimedes? Here’s a web-site description of his work:
        
        Archimedes was a prodigy in the field of mathematics and science, where he pushed the boundaries of both subjects to obtain a profound result through careful research, calculation, and observation.
        
        Expect more quibbling like Milky’s from Maori activists and Woke supporters as they vainly try to equate Maori knowledge to science.
        
        A web site on Archimedes:
        
        https://sciencestruck.com/inventions-of-archimedes
        
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        December 20, 2021 8:10pm
      - Mike
        
        I’ll back my extended argument against your strawman, Jack. Matauranga is as dependent on the mythical feats of Maui as Aristotle’s science was on the exploits of Hercules.
        
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        December 20, 2021 9:28pm
  - graham
    
    So in one breath, we have people saying sexism and racism is not okay – which I think most people would agree with …
    
    … then in the next breath, we reportedly have Professor Joanna Kidman (University of Wellington) calling Richard Dawkins an “OWG” (which apparently means “old white guys”), and Professor Siouxsie Wiles (University of Auckland) referring to “dinosaurs” because they disagree with her.
    
    Ri-i-i-i-ght.
    
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    December 20, 2021 8:39am
    - Maggy Wassilieff
      
      And of course, if we go back to the letter in the Listener, it is not about researchers and their employment prospects at Universities.. it is about the NCEA science curriculum .. for secondary school kids.
      
      The fact that Professor Wiles and colleagues can’t understand a simple, clear letter is of concern.
      
      If our young folk are going to enter STEM fields for their future careers, then they need a solid science and maths foundation.
      
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      December 20, 2021 9:47am
      - cmm
        
        They are primarily activists and political players, knifing people to get ahead.
        
        They don’t try to understand what was said.
        
        What they look for is to find a way to twist what was said into a soapbox for their activism and opportunities for themselves.
        
        Hence, something said about science curricula has now been twisted into how senior science positions are mainly staffed by OWGs (aka experienced people).
        
        She of course has a vested interest. If she can harass the OWGs sufficiently then they will resign and she will be able to take their position.
        
        If she can influence the OWG’s funders sufficiently then she can get the funding redirected to people like herself.
        
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        December 20, 2021 12:01pm
      - KevO'Brien
        
        Yes. I had 4 years of maths, applied maths, trig, geometry and all the other variants as well as physics, chemistry, metallurgy, workshop practice and few other trivialities like English. I still think like the engineer we were being trained to be.
        
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        December 20, 2021 12:45pm
  - nathie
    
    Makes one wonder … is Dr Wiles a Bully?
    
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    December 20, 2021 12:04pm
    - Tony Stuart
      
      Is the Pope a Catholic? Do big, brown bears shit in the woods?
      
      12 2
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      December 20, 2021 12:28pm
      - ClanMcleod
        
        Does Rose Kennedy own a black dress?
        
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        December 20, 2021 2:03pm
      - NeverMindTheBollocks
        
        Hey! Don’t bring the Pope into it!
        
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        December 20, 2021 7:13pm
    - KevO'Brien
      
      A lot of over “educated” people are bullies trying hard to show their standing in the puddle of mud they inhabit. Truth is an irrelevancy as it may interfere with their self perception.
      
      Truth may be hard to ascertain but it’s in scripture and otherwise in the midst of comparative examinations of sets of validated facts. We don’t have the truth about omicron yet. I see the fear being added to initial clear observations obscuring the elemental truth they projected.
      
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      December 20, 2021 12:52pm
      - RichardX
        
        KevO’Brien
        
        …
        Truth may be hard to ascertain but it’s in scripture and otherwise in the midst of comparative examinations of sets of validated facts.
        …
        
        DECEMBER 20, 2021 12:52PM
        
        What methods do you use to validate your facts?
        
        Was it scripture or “comparative examinations of sets of validated facts” that led you to “know” maori spirits “are behind much mental illness as well as evil.”
        
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        December 20, 2021 6:11pm
      - KevO'Brien
        
        Evil spirits are outlined in scripture.
        Also I have personally had to deal with some and are on guard. Not for the unauthorised. I need the armour of god for such battles.
        
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        December 20, 2021 10:29pm
    - Observer of Life
      
      Do fish have water right arses?
      
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      December 21, 2021 3:43pm
- rouppe
  
  There’s this piece of propaganda as well:
  http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/explained/127300075/covid19-nz-the-prochoice-argument-against-vaccines-explained
  
  Love how they bring the old seat belt metaphor in to it.
  Seat belts: what are the chances of being in a car crash? Slim. What are the chances of dying in an open road crash while not wearing a seat belt? High.
  Vaccine: what are the chances of catching covid? Let’s say medium if isolation is used effectively. What are the chances of dying if you catch covid? 2%
  
  The seat belt argument is not comparable
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:13am
  - Batman
    
    Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
    The focus on oneself, to the exclusion of all else, gives away the game here.
    
    If you don’t wear a seatbelt, you will probably only hurt yourself, unless your unsecured body flies into some other poor person during a crash.
    
    If you don’t get vaccinated, you are likely to spread that disease to everyone you come into contact with, right from children with immune system issues to your elderly parents, wife with a blood pressure issue, or a random person with cancer who is extremely vulnerable and you practically sentence them to death because you were an irresponsible dickhead.
    
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    December 20, 2021 9:17am
    - I remember when
      
      Batman:
      This has always been the case.
      The question is when does the responsibility become the government’s right.
      What actions should be taken before the government makes their decision.
      
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      December 20, 2021 9:33am
      - Batman
        
        That is the question in a way. Though the line in my view is when you’re passing harm onto others.
        
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        December 20, 2021 9:59am
    - In Vino Veritas
      
      Batman, my understanding is that vaccinated people can carry and spread the virus. If this is true, then surely it doesn’t matter whether you are vaccinated or not, you will still “spread that disease to everyone you come into contact with, right from children with immune system issues to your elderly parents, wife with a blood pressure issue, or a random person with cancer who is extremely vulnerable and you practically sentence them to death”. Do vaccinated people carry and spread?
      
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      December 20, 2021 9:53am
      - Batman
        
        Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
        Being vaccinated reduces spread and reduces severity of symptoms. You get vaccinated to suppress spread and to look after yourself should you get it.
        
        You also get vaccinated to help those who really cannot get vaccinated, as opposed to people who believe anything they read on the internet.
        
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        December 20, 2021 10:00am
      - Fletch
        
        Right. The only use for the vaccines at present is as a personal treatment to lessen your own symptoms. They don’t do anything else. The point a lot are making is that if that is the case then there are far safer and more effective treatments.
        
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        December 20, 2021 10:19am
      - Reid
        
        No, it doesn’t reduce spread at all. The only thing it does is produce antibodies trained to hunt for the spike protein, in your own body.
        
        That’s all it does mate. You can get it as easily as I can if we’re both in the same room as the virus.
        
        Thinking otherwise ignores the science. Obviously, the actual science is a long way away from what the lying media tells everyone it is, so you have to look elsewhere to get it, but it’s easily obtainable if you have an open mind. If you don’t, you can stare straight at it and you still won’t see it.
        
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        December 20, 2021 11:06am
      - Benedict Yu
        
        “You get vaccinated to suppress spread and to look after yourself should you get it.”
        
        I am vaccinated and I got vaccinated with enthusiasm for these reasons.
        
        But the evidence is clear that two shots offers, at best 30 percent protection against Omicron infection. That is a vastly different picture to when I was vaccinated three months ago.
        
        I MAY have a booster. I will wait to see what Omicron does in New Zealand. But to repeat my earlier comment, Omicron will wreck the rationale of the vaccine passes, especially if there is not a rapid uptake of booster shots.
        
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        December 20, 2021 11:13am
      - KevO'Brien
        
        The reports are adding up to the vaccinated being unknowingly super spreaders, including amongst each other.
        This all be clearer within a few months.
        Is the new omicron designed to take our eyes off the Delta version and obscure its after affects?
        
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        December 20, 2021 12:56pm
      - mawm
        
        Reid- I was about to jump in and say the same thing.
        
        What works better than the vaccine to stop spread? Staying at home when you are symptomatic; vaxxed or unvaxxed.
        
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        December 20, 2021 3:31pm
    - Surely Knott
      
      It is not a seatbelt. Seatbelts are approved, a known technology, non-invasive, effective, and no danger to the person wearing them. With the MRNA vaccine they are a new technology, there is a risk of myocarditis, clotting and death. They are only provisionally approved by medsafe, who state “We expect that most vaccines will be granted provisional consent because data to support the longer-term safety and efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines is not yet available.”
      The manufacturer has indemnity. They provide poor protection against spread (as admitted by b. gates, b. johnson.) particularly with “delta ” and “omicron”. The protection is for a short time . The main protection they appeared to provide is for yourself . MRNA supporters like to pretend they are doing it for the good of the country instead of themselves. But actually those who have refused passports are making a massive sacrifice and standing up for the democracy they believe in.
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:07am
      - Batman
        
        Victimhood is a poor look no matter which side of the political fence is using it.
        
        The risks have been massively hyped up and the credulous only too happy to lap it up as it reinforces their other incorrect views about both the pandemic and reality as a whole.
        
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        December 20, 2021 10:14am
      - Surely Knott
        
        The risks of the vaccine have been hyped up or covid or both? The more serious risks of the vaccine aren’t in any ministry of health pamphlet that were sent out, nor in any mainstream media until a minor mention in the first death. Any time you mention those serious effects you have to put the word rare and a disclaimer or be banned. But the same rules do not apply to people talking about “covid deaths” which we are now told may not have anything to actually do with covid. Aka driveway shootings.
        
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        December 20, 2021 10:22am
      - quarterpack
        
        I am sadly old enough to remember the introduction of compulsory wearing of seatbelts, and the similar objections put up there to what we have now with the covid vaccine….that it was in breach of a drivers right to choose, and you might not be able to release your seatbelt if your car caught fire, you might be better off thrown clear in a car accident (this was the same argument put up for drunk driving) Natural selection has probably taken it care of the proponents of these arguments, as well it may in the current debate
        
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        December 20, 2021 11:29am
      - KevO'Brien
        
        “We expect that most vaccines will be granted provisional consent because data to support the longer-term safety and efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines is not yet available.”
        
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        December 20, 2021 1:01pm
    - Ed Snack
      
      The vaccinated catch and spread the disease as readily as the unvaccinated, or so the science strongly suggests.
      
      So your comparison fails. Being vaccinated gives one an almost entirely private benefit, a reduction of symptoms. It has little or no impact on the spread of the disease. The same effect can be obtained by using effective anti-viral treatment regimes without the short and long term risks form the “vaccine”.
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:44am
    - oldfella
      
      Batty:
      
      If you don’t get vaccinated, you are likely to spread that disease to everyone you come into contact with
      
      I’m double vaxxed and booked for my booster, as is Mrs Oldfella. But… although we may improve our odds of getting really sick, we can still catch and spread Delta. And that looks even more likely with Omicron when it arrives, and that’s inevitable.
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:48am
      - Batman
        
        Right so the solution is not to do anything about it and willfully aid the spread?
        
        Good on you for getting vaccinated but shit, the lack of concern for commenters’ families, friends, co-workers, or strangers is quite something.
        
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        December 20, 2021 2:27pm
    - ClanMcleod
      
      If you’re jabbed you will pass the virus on as much as someone who is not. Your claims re the unjabbed “killing granny” was destroyed months ago. Try and keep up. Oh, and look up original antigenic sin while you’re at it. You might be in for a surprise in a few months.
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:50am
      - Batman
        
        Clan you have lost sight of reality so I’ll gladly pop back in a few months to report on your wrongness.
        
        The “killing granny” argument is exactly the excuse that you lot use. The “oh it only effects the old and infirm so let’s not worry too much” line which has led to millions of parents and grandparents dying.
        
        You guys are so committed to refuting every little fact that you’ve done at least a couple of laps since reaching full circle on the logic of it.
        
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        December 20, 2021 2:30pm
    - rouppe
      
      It’s just a rebuttal of comparisons that are not comparable.
      
      I’ve chosen to be vaccinated (x3). Others may not. Convincing them should not use spurious arguments.
      
      It comes back to the same old thing. If data that is fishy is used, no one will believe the data
      
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      December 20, 2021 12:51pm
    - gravedodger
      
      That is a little daft Batman as “vaccinated”(advisedly) persons are perfectly capable of transmitting The Rona and it is widely misunderstood inoculation with Phizer income stream enhancement as well as giving a higher ability to withstand a viral attack as far as Lung disablement is involved has little effect on transmission but there are wide discrepancies as to what difference there is between inoculated Vs not inoculated as regards transmission status. In fact more so with Omricon with asymptomatics allegedly abounding.
      Any one feeling comforted that every one they come near is double tapped is living in false security and may be taking greater risks than someone being socially aware as regards distance and keeping their personal hygiene ahead of the curve.
      There is a rapidly growing number who are nearing the expiring six month protection status so double tapped is becoming a nonsense exponentially, we are almost five months and counting but the luverly Vaxine Pass says something entirely different as it is less than one month old.
      
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      December 20, 2021 2:06pm
      - Batman
        
        Calling it income enhancement stream leaves no doubt as you where your biases lie. So no point debating really.
        
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        December 20, 2021 2:11pm
  - Alan Wilkinson
    
    The seatbelt issue is comparable. Both are obnoxious. Both assume the right to usurp the individual’s ability to manage their own risks. That is the prime and continuing cause of loss of individual freedoms
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:54am
    - Batman
      
      Are you an academic philosopher Alan?
      
      Only a moronic white tower dweller or ideologue would argue that seatbelts infringe individual freedoms.
      
      Though if you’re just advocating for a chaos society where there are no laws or rules, let me know so I can start burgling your house. Because as you say, stopping me doing that is infringing on my personal freedoms.
      
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      December 20, 2021 2:34pm
  - ClanMcleod
    
    His title is “explainer editor”. smh
    
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    December 20, 2021 2:09pm
- 7kiwi11
  
  I was surprised she didn’t slip the latest lefty buzz word in there ‘equity / equitable’.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:36am
- Alan Wilkinson
  
  Wiles’ commitment to free speech would be more convincing if she published her rubbish somewhere that enabled a right of reply rather than Stuffed’s safe space.
  
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  December 20, 2021 11:37am
Pavel

So the Northland checkpoints are gone. Didn’t even last two weeks.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/police-checkpoints-in-north-to-become-mobile-with-spot-checks/VWWHKMGQY5WDQV2TQ754OMA6JI/
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December 20, 2021 8:02am
- oldfella
  
  avel, remember all the fuss when they were set up? So how can anyone justify dropping them now when most of the travel from Auckland north won’t happen till after Christmas Day?
  Can’t wait for the MSM to ask hard questions about this aborted experiment, and the waste of taxpayer money and police resources.
  Oh, wait! MSM/hard questions? Nah.
  
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  December 20, 2021 10:54am
  - kevn
    
    @oldfella… There will be some cheap marquees around or being used for local family gatherings.
    
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    December 20, 2021 12:03pm
  - KevO'Brien
    
    Perhaps Ngapuhi have become an embarrassment for the Police.
    They were being seen to have the upper hand yet it is Waikato who are running the govt. That should naturally put Ngapuhi back in it place.
    
    Expect more turf wars. Mahuta wants NZ back under her tribe’s control. Eyes wide shut, unhappily we go to get jabbed while our lands are filched back from us.
    
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    December 20, 2021 1:11pm
- Tony Stuart
  
  Try five days. They were set up last Wednesday, when the Auckland border closed. As of 6am this morning, they’re gooooooooone!
  
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  December 20, 2021 11:50am
- rouppe
  
  The damage to business had been done. Cancellations hand over fist.
  
  Harawira doesn’t care about them, though
  
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  December 20, 2021 12:57pm
- gravedodger
  
  How much pressure emanated from the teams of Iwi who failed basic Police vetting and becoming identified as such, oops unintended consequences strike again LoL
  
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  December 20, 2021 2:10pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  And it’s a resounding NO to border checks here on the East Coast.
  
  https://www.gisborneherald.co.nz/local-news/20211220/no-to-border-checks/
  
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  December 20, 2021 3:00pm
slightlyrighty

https://www.stuff.co.nz/science/300480580/academics-use-your-mana-to-aid-colleagues-not-fight-them

Sorry Dr. Wiles. Your “explanation” doesn’t wash with me. Also, the hubris of a Pakeha Scientist trying to explain to a Maori Scientist about the use of Mana to help establish the place of tradtional Thinking in science is a bit rich.
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December 20, 2021 8:03am
- nathie
  
  Agree, I think we can call it Inappropriate Cultural Appropriation.
  
  Also a couple of things stand out from that article opinion piece.
  
  1. Dr Wiles employs the same tactics (as when exposed by The BFD when she went to the beach with a friend when it was against the covid rules) when she is caught out, which is: never admit culpability; obfuscate by bringing up other non-related issues (eg “sexism and racism”); minimise the damage that she has caused; continue to indirectly blame the innocent party anyway (by lumping them in with other “bad” issues).
  
  2. That Dr Wiles and that fool Hendy didn’t wait or seek clarification, instead they both mounted an immediate “witch hunt” campaign against the 7 Academics (their names are at the top of their letter listing). What then does this say about the unprofessional, immature, uninformed nature of these two? Would they ever be trusted with leadership roles now that they have outed their unsuitability (to act impartially etc)?
  
  3. The BFD exposed Dr Wiles’ weaselly texts she sent to Bloomfield minimising the “swimming incident”, so did she also minimise and downplay the issue when she approached Stuff to print her opinion piece?
  
  4. In Dr Wiles and Hendy’s haste to condemn the 7 Academics, have they inadvertently damaged the reputations of some of those hundreds that signed their letter and petition, as they are now linked to Wiles and Hendy’s madness?
  
  5. I’m pretty sure Dr Wiles called for the “cancelling” of those 7 academics at the time? Perhaps it was a tweet or response answer to some MSM questioning … but I accept I could be wrong. Does anyone know for sure?
  
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  December 20, 2021 10:37am
  - KevO'Brien
    
    {Aside, don’t let Wiles or Hendy near omicron.}
    
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    December 20, 2021 1:13pm
- oldfella
  
  It’s what Hollywood calls ‘White Savourism’ when a white person sweeps in to rescue helpless black people who can’t help themselves. Wow.
  Tokenism, or what? Mind you, any white woman who calls herself Siouxsie is already playing in that sandpit.
  
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  December 20, 2021 10:59am
Lee C

Some time ago, for The Daily examiner Leao Tildsley wrote the following heart-felt ‘Thank you’ to Jacinda Ardern:

Dear Prime Minister,

I’ve often thought about what I would say if I ever wrote you a letter. Today, the 8th of December, five days after you introduced the traffic light segregation system, I know exactly what I need to say.

This may be a surprise to you, as it has been for me, but I want to say thank you. Thank you for showing me what I am capable of in adversity. Thank you for reminding me that the core values I was bought up with are dependable. I thank you for drawing me out of my false sense of security that I have lived in for so long. You have shown me that if we stray from God’s path, then we will end up serving whatever false system of thought that comes along.
Thank you for strengthening my resolve, by having to deal with the bullies thrown at me by your traffic light system. I have learned a lot about what coercion and manipulation can become on a large scale from your policies. Such policies are an interesting departure from the usual “diverse and inclusive community” your government usually touts. I understand now from your policies that some are more equal than others, also that what people think matters little, unless such thoughts increment towards your underlying goal, such as “My body, my choice.”

Last week I watched a beautiful woman close her daycare center after 15 years. Everything she taught her children about saying no to wrong things, about bullying, was the very thing you and your ministers were now punishing her and her teachers for. She decided she would rather close her center with dignity and integrity than bow to your pressure. She in my eyes is one of the real heroes of the day. In contrast to your $50 million media portrayed “vaccination heroes”, but the true heroes of the day who refuse to segregate or discriminate against ordinary New Zealanders who want to live their lives, to show each other the kiwi way and truly honor each other.

Here’s another thing I thank you for Prime Minister: your formal apology for the dawn raids you made earlier this year. Your expression to our people was this: it was a Samoan gesture of Ifoga which involved placing a fine mat over you, a powerful moment of reconciliation. The gesture was meant to correct the injustices and breaches of human rights and demonstrate remorse, seeking forgiveness and healing. I feel enlightened now that I know that it was merely another misappropriation of culture to increment towards your goal. You needed the Island Community on your side to implement your current policy of segregation against another people-group. The breach of human rights and discrimination, Prime Minster, is now directed towards those who refuse to comply with your government mandates. Might I remind you that the word ‘minister’ means servant?

Our way of life has changed dramatically now. We can’t come and go as we please. We’re divided now by the fear of, not the disease, but the fines from the government. I’m no longer taking for granted being able to go to a café with a friend. Being told to stand at the grass verge while other patrons enjoy full service privilege, even using their restroom, all because we don’t have one of your vaccine passports, which you campaign-promised would never be mandated.

Finally, I want to thank you for drawing me closer to God. You probably don’t realise this, but you single-handedly brought more people to their knees in prayer on your watch than you’ll ever know – and that’s a good thing. I am truly grateful that you reminded me who the real one source of truth is, and that is God.

Most Sincerely

Leao

Remember, Remember, the Eight of December.

https://www.thedailyexaminer.co.nz/dear-prime-minister-thank-you/?fbclid=IwAR072e4zO2KbZOfr0h6fYPUnxdFv997tmLtIa2-dxLdIGBI0YX6KU27Mt4Q
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December 20, 2021 8:04am
- Lee C
  
  Whoops should be ‘remember remember the Second of December, but that doesn’t really scan as well…
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:11am
  - Jack5
    
    That was a plug for the Daily Examiner.
    
    Who is/are behind that blog? It seems to have links to the New Conservative Party.
    
    Not much about the Daily Examiner itself on its site, but plenty about abortion, euthanasia, etc.
    
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    December 20, 2021 8:54am
- quarterpack
  
  Question…will Leao decline the place in a hospital ward should the power of prayer not be enough and he succumbs to a Covid infection? Or does he only ignore science when it suits him to do so?
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:39am
  - Fletch
    
    You’re following the govt narrative and making it an either/or situation. It doesn’t have to be this way. Just look at how the situation is being treated in Japan –
    
    Japan’s ministry of health states: “Although we encourage all citizens to receive the COVID-19 vaccination, it is not compulsory or mandatory. Vaccination will be given only with the consent of the person to be vaccinated after the information provided.”
    
    Furthermore, they state: “Please get vaccinated of your own decision, understanding both the effectiveness in preventing infectious diseases and the risk of side effects. No vaccination will be given without consent.”
    
    Finally, they clearly state: “Please do not force anyone in your workplace or those who around you to be vaccinated, and do not discriminate against those who have not been vaccinated.”
    
    They also link to a “Human Rights Advice” page that includes instructions for handling any complaints if individuals face vaccine discrimination at work.
    
    Other nations would do well to follow Japan’s lead with this balanced and ethical approach.
    
    https://brownstone.org/articles/japans-vaccination-policy-no-force-no-discrimination/
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:38am
  - Reid
    
    [If you wish to discuss a moderation decision, editor@kiwiblog.co.nz ]
    
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    December 20, 2021 11:21am
  - bronny1
    
    Will the obese persons with hypertension and renal failure that are currently clogging up middlemore please vacate the health system as well. After all they have had two years in which to lose weight and address lifestyle issues.
    
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    December 20, 2021 12:27pm
- KevO'Brien
  
  Read this too. The gov admits the jabbers haven’t been giving the full picture in a message to health professionals. It’s more than the headline.
  
  https://www.thedailyexaminer.co.nz/breaking-ministry-of-health-admits-under-reporting-of-covid-19-vaccine-associated-myocarditis-pericarditis/
  
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  December 20, 2021 1:28pm
- Observer of Life
  
  Lee C: I find it intriguing that heart felt honest letter gets 4 downtick!! ??
  
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  December 21, 2021 4:08pm
Chuck Bird

I’ll repeat this from late yesterday’s GD. It is not premium.

Sir Ian Taylor: Politicians and officials go on holiday at arguably the most dangerous time in this pandemic

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/sir-ian-taylor-politicians-and-officials-go-on-holiday-at-arguably-the-most-dangerous-time-in-this-pandemic/SNGH2DVEUYFRJ76TT3EO2QVQMM/
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December 20, 2021 8:06am
- cmm
  
  After their performance so far, is going on holiday really so bad?
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:09am
  - pdm
    
    cmm – it might help to keep the rest of us safe and definitely should save us from uncontrolled and poorly conceived spending for a few weeks.
    
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    December 20, 2021 8:22am
  - G152
    
    Definition of holiday. Do nothing laze about.
    Pretty much explains parliament
    
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    December 20, 2021 8:43am
- Lee C
  
  Ahh yes.
  
  I keep forgetting how ‘dangerous’ the ‘pandemic’ is.
  
  Funny that.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:09am
- Benedict Yu
  
  I have mixed feelings. Yes they need an omicron plan. So don’t go on holiday..
  
  Oh wait, their plans usually cause more harm than good. Bugger it.. Off you go on holiday.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:14am
  - Julie
    
    The most sensible thing they can do is bring forward the booster shots and roll them out faster, including ensuring vaccination centres are open 7 days a week. Also roll out children’s vaccines asap. We are in summer, have school holidays and already have mask wearing in all close contact places.
    If it hits our community those most vulnerable should be told to isolate like in the UK. What we do not need is hundreds of thousands of us otherwise healthy and low risk citizens forced into an unnecessary lockdown!
    
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    December 20, 2021 8:23am
    - Rodney Hide
      
      Hi Julie
      
      1. What do you estimate the risk from covid is to a 5 year;
      2. What do you think the chance is of an infected 5 year old passing on the infection; and,
      3. What difference do you think vaccinating 5 year olds will make?
      
      Rodney Hide
      
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      December 20, 2021 9:34am
      - KevO'Brien
        
        Rodney, If I had still any 5 year olds they would not be getting the Fauci shots.
        The evidence of a serious fraud is emerging with consequential future community health issues. It looks daily more likely to be an attack on the population as Gates and them have wished for. This should be more clear within 6 months. The future fertility of children has been questioned.
        Keep on eye on it.
        
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        December 20, 2021 1:35pm
    - Ed Snack
      
      Julie, why enforce mask wearing when it makes absolutely no difference to the spread of the disease ? Do you like wearing them or something ?
      
      Why not just follow the “science”, and just do things that are actually effective, like use anti-viral treatments for a start.
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:48am
      - Julie
        
        I hate wearing a mask and only do so where made to . My point is we should not be seeing any mad decisions from the govt to further restrict our lives because of omicron. Bringing boosters forward and at pace from overseas evidence will be the most useful course of action.
        The issue with omicron is the shear number of people getting sick at a time and boosters from overseas evidence is preventing those vulnerable medically from hospitalisation.
        
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        December 20, 2021 11:29am
    - ClanMcleod
      
      Stop reading the Herald Julie. Please. Stop it.
      
      12 2
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      December 20, 2021 10:56am
    - Julie
      
      I appreciate many have concerns that the risks for children out weight the benefits. I’m no expert on that but still fell it needs to be rolled out as there are definitely those children were it is the opposite.
      I don’t have either a child or grandchild in that age group so don’t have to consider it personally.
      Unlike for older children and adults I certainly do not think there should be any compulsion or sanctions if family opt out.
      
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      December 20, 2021 11:01am
      - Cinematic
        
        Are you Michael Baker?
        
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        December 20, 2021 11:55am
      - ClanMcleod
        
        Children are at statistically zero risk from covid. Their is a high incidence of adverse reactions including deaths now being seen. Why would you impose this on children?
        
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        December 20, 2021 2:15pm
    - mawm
      
      I highly recommend watching this video of an interview of and then audience questions for Dr Robert Malone. It’s promoted as On Covid Child Vaccinations but is really a much broader spectrum and is very informative, and explained in easy to understand terms. It should be listened to by every parent contemplating vaccinating their children. It’s an hour and a half long but is riveting.
      
      https://www.bitchute.com/video/uGjXMiBHKe55/
      
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      December 20, 2021 3:52pm
  - RoboRob
    
    This govt doesn’t do plans. They should go on holiday, they don’t add anything usefull anyway 🙂
    
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    December 20, 2021 9:01am
- Chuck Bird
  
  Sir Ian Taylor was on NewstalkZB just after 8 this morning as the Deputy PM was too busy. You can listen to it on play back.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:24am
- artemisia
  
  A few ‘Sir Ians’ quietly appearing in the MSM. Mostly not though.
  
  Most people appear to support the government’s actions. Fair enough. But once folk have seen a different POV they will not be able to unsee it. Tick, tick …
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:57am
- TS Child
  
  I think thank god they’re on holiday and we can have a brief period of comparative stability. But more importantly, surely they are all exhausted right now. Wait – hear me out: the more tired people are, the more mistakes they make, the more reactive they are, the more inflexible they are. Do we really want this crowd to box on exhausted? Things can always get worse… So to the Labour Party: enjoy your break, rest, spend time with family, eat, please sleep a LOT .. everything is absolutely fine. MSM – same for you … holidays for everyone!
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:00am
- Nickc2
  
  Exactly! Cindy, FWIW, Churchill, Truman, Stalin and their Cabinets didn’t take holidays when their countries were at war. In case you didn’t know, your people are at war with a disease called Covid. Some are sick, some are infirmed and some are even dead.
  Get off your arse, call your merry band of fuck-wits back to work and lead your people.
  If you had any sense whatsoever (which I seriously doubt), you would even invite Opposition Parties to join you.
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:09am
  - mikenmildagain
    
    In his five years of wartime premiership, Churchill spent over a year in total overseas. For Churchill, luxury and ease was an essential, though he was notoriously demanding of his personal staff. So dining out in Washington or painting in Marrakesh, while not specifically holidays, were also occasions when the prime minister could relax in a gentler environment than wartime England.
    
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    December 20, 2021 2:21pm
    - Jack5
      
      Churchill was an old man, and the flights he made were arduous.
      
      This gives an idea of his two trips to Moscow:
      
      “August 1942. Churchill flew in the back of an unheated Liberator bomber; it had no bed, but a shelf on which he was able to lie in the dark, cold and noise. It flew from UK far out into the Atlantic before turning South and eventually East, landing at Gibraltar after about 7 hours. The next leg was over Spanish Morocco and Vichy-controlled French North Africa (ignoring diplomatic niceties), and landing at Cairo after a further 10 hours. Thence to Teheran (another 7 hours) and finally to Moscow (another 10 hours). The return followed the same route; Churchill was 67.
      
      “”October 1944. Two major improvements by this date: the aircraft was an Avro York rather than a Liberator; and it was now safe to fly over Western France, Southern Italy and much of the Mediterranean. The route was from London to Naples (7 hours), thence to Cairo, via Benghazi in order to avoid Crete, which was still in German hands (another 7 hours), thence to Moscow via the Aegean, Dardanelles and Crimea. The same route was followed on the way back; by the time of his return Churchill was six weeks short of his 70th birthday.”
      
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      December 20, 2021 5:33pm
    - Nickc2
      
      I’m suprised you didn’t say he used to relax in his bath.
      
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      December 20, 2021 7:53pm
- Bridgenag
  
  Certainly gives the Horrid more credibility having Sir Ian commenting there……
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:58am
Maggie Pie

When this tweet just popped up on my twitter feed, I thort…. honestly, is there anything this woman WONT do for a headline?

Dr Siouxsie expresses her concern about what she calls “Racist feedback”

https://twitter.com/SiouxsieW/status/1472632711244251137
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December 20, 2021 8:14am
- Lee C
  
  I wouldn’t visit her account this close to having consumed breakfast – or for the 24 hours afterwards.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:18am
- I remember when
  
  Perhaps the more meaningful comment on her post was from –
  Dick @ Some Richard
  It’s probably inevitable, but once again northern Maori language colonizes Southern Maori … with unwitting well meaning Pakeha approval.
  
  Does this highlight the problem with fiddling in areas when you simply follow.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:49am
- Homas
  
  “…is there anything this woman WONT do for a headline?”
  
  Um, I’m gonna go with “achieve something of note in her actual day job”.
  
  Of course, her failure to do so will be entirely due to systemic misogyny within the scientific establishment, not to being an affirmative action hire with a side hustle placing demands upon her profoundly limited cognitive resources.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:52am
- Alan Wilkinson
  
  The woman does banal well.
  
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  December 20, 2021 10:59am
Bridgenag

Big anti vac protests in Brisbane and Melbourne according to the Daily Telegraph. Victoria considering mandating the boosters……… Twitter people can see the videos
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December 20, 2021 8:15am
Lee C

Meanwhile Jacinda ‘I’m a bit hip’ Ardern, nails it once again:
https://www.instagram.com/p/CXjt-EPhUfI/?fbclid=IwAR3NB1-PilLc8b0qTwcjksjXHwyyGqeBKQCE-h9aYO9DKIpenL1STJUdg4A
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December 20, 2021 8:15am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  FFS!
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:27am
  - Lee C
    
    Yup – it’s all a big f**n joke to these people.
    
    38 2
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    December 20, 2021 8:30am
Nukuleka

Hosted a young person over the weekend who has just completed a one year Early Childhood Graduate Diploma at the University of Canterbury. It seems that the concept of ‘white privilege’ is an integral facet of this tax-payer funded, government- approved course. It’s good to know that, not only are early childhood teachers themselves indoctrinated in this socially disruptive racist narrative but that they are also being encouraged to take it into their kindergartens and pre-schools to indoctrinate the 0-6 years old as well. Thanks Chris Hipkins.
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December 20, 2021 8:22am
- Nickc2
  
  IMO, it’s going to take a pretty powerful Govt to wind down all this leftie-woke indoctrination crap. I hope Luxon’s team’s up to it.
  There will be some pretty stiff opposition from those who don’t know any better. They are the ones currently being indoctrinated and their indoctrinators/forebears.
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:35am
- ClanMcleod
  
  I am so happy we took our daughter out of this indoctrination system masquerading as education.
  
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  December 20, 2021 11:06am
I remember when

Just read article with Charles Piutau talking about playing for Tonga in the next Rugby World Cup.
He talks about the thought of playing with the likes of Ngani Laumape and Malaki Fekitoa.
Although they may not be quite the force they have been as players, the thought of a Tongan backline with them present makes their prospects look much rosier.
If they have reasonable success, the number of Pacific Island players arranging their international careers, to fit in at least one Cup for their ‘home’ country, may change the rugby landscape.
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December 20, 2021 8:28am
- Nickc2
  
  In a way, I don’t blame them. However, who’s going to pay them? Going by previous PI Rugby history, (Fiji exempt) financial management is not as efficient and effective as many of their players’ playing skills.
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:40am
  - I remember when
    
    I always thought Charles Piutau would have been one of the truly great All Blacks.
    Instead he went to the UK where he became (reportedly) the highest paid player.
    It may depend on what their thoughts are for ‘life after they finish playing.’
    Money is not always their main reason for playing.
    
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    December 20, 2021 2:44pm
- pdm
  
  I saw a Tongan team with Israel Folau in it as well – he was a very very good fullback in his day – perhaps the best in recent times..
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:50am
Lee C

A concerned father speaks about vaccinating 5 to 11 year olds.
https://www.facebook.com/100041581598627/videos/3023094094624186
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December 20, 2021 8:29am
Raphael

The British Medical Journal is fighting with Facebook’s “Fact Checking*” process

*which FB has stated in court “is just like your opinion man”.

https://www.bmj.com/content/375/bmj.n2635/rr-80

The BMJ commissioned an investigative reporter to write up the story for our journal. The article was published on 2 November, following legal review, external peer review and subject to The BMJ’s usual high level editorial oversight and review.[1]

But from November 10, readers began reporting a variety of problems when trying to share our article. Some reported being unable to share it. Many others reported having their posts flagged with a warning about “Missing context … Independent fact-checkers say this information could mislead people.” Those trying to post the article were informed by Facebook that people who repeatedly share “false information” might have their posts moved lower in Facebook’s News Feed. Group administrators where the article was shared received messages from Facebook informing them that such posts were “partly false.”
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December 20, 2021 8:37am
TripeWryter

Sir Ian Taylor is emerging as a credible, vociferous, and persistent critic of this government.

I think that ministers’ attempts to shut him up by ignoring him and pretending he’s not there might backfire.
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December 20, 2021 8:37am
- lifesgood
  
  And he said he has voted Labour all his life. He loses a little bit of my respect for that,,,otherwise, you go Sir Ian!
  
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  December 20, 2021 10:55am
  - Tony Stuart
    
    With the exception of one election (2011, I think), where he voted National because of John Key.
    
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    December 20, 2021 11:53am
Benedict Yu

Funny that someone drove the full length of the new Transmission Gully motorway before it had opened. 🙂

https://www.stuff.co.nz/motoring/127287665/accidental-transmission-gully-user-scared-and-impressed-by-experience

I am predicting no opening ceremony. The current Ministers all opposed the motorway. They hate motorways. It would be great if they could be magnanimous and let Steven Joyce open it but that will never happen.

I would also like to see a memorial to the people that were killed and seriously on the existing road in the 80 years it was in operation.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/10696288/Down-to-the-wire-barrier-saves-lives
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December 20, 2021 8:38am
Captain Mainwaring

A few people have apparently been driving Transmission Gully ‘by accident’ late at night and have reported that it’s a beautiful road.
JUST OPEN THE BLOODY THING.
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December 20, 2021 8:39am
- Captain Mainwaring
  
  Sorry Ben beat me to it.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:40am
  - Biscuit
    
    I dislike ‘Official Openings’ with a passion.
    
    Far more memorable are the occasions when they go spectacularly belly-up. Like this one:
    
    Francis de Groot became famous when, on Saturday 19 March 1932, he upstaged the Premier of New South Wales, Lang at the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, before a crowd of 300,000 people.
    He was not a member of the official party but, on horseback and dressed in his military uniform, he was able to blend in with the escort party of NSW Lancers. Lang was about to cut the ribbon to formally open the bridge, when De Groot rode forward and drew his ceremonial sword, making to cut the ribbon and declare the bridge open “in the name of the decent and respectable people of New South Wales”.
    
    De Groot was subsequently charged with three offences:
    Having maliciously damaged a ribbon which was the property of the Government of New South Wales to the value of £2;
    Having behaved in an offensive manner in a public place; and
    Having used threatening words to Inspector Stuart Robson in a public place.
    
    While the first and third charges laid against him were dismissed, the Magistrate did find De Groot guilty of offensive behaviour in Bradfield Highway – a public place. He was fined the maximum penalty of £5, with £4 in costs. The Magistrate found that “… the actions of the defendant were grossly offensive, provocative, and clearly unlawful.”
    
    After the court case he sued for wrongful arrest on the grounds that a police officer had no right to arrest an officer of the Hussars. An out-of-court settlement was reached, and De Groot’s ceremonial sword was returned to him.
    
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    December 20, 2021 9:15am
Maggie Pie

TRENDING

Despite efforts by Cindy’s media-minders to repeatedly try and get her to ‘tone down’ the rhetoric about the opulence of their wedding venue, it’s feared ClarkE has been skiting so much to his fishing buddies, that it became impossible to keep it under wraps any longer.

In an attempt to mitigate any adverse fallout from her loyal support base, it’s been suggested the PM promise Gizzie’s local iwi leaders, that their tamariki will be given first opportunity to indulge in a little ‘dumpster-diving’ the day following the wedding breakfast.

https://twitter.com/quazigod/status/1472134038903148545
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December 20, 2021 8:46am
- Inandout
  
  A workmate of Pacific extraction told me that on one island in that body of water the father in law gets to sleep with the bride-to-be, presumably as a test. Hopefully this tradition has died out because what if the bride-to-be is unsuitable?.
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:22am
  - fightingtemeraire
    
    What about Le Droit de Seigneur in Medieval France!!!
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:12am
- Flossie
  
  ClarkE has always had a predilection for opening his mouth inappropriately.
  
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  December 20, 2021 10:52am
Benedict Yu

I would be grateful for any views on this experience. My only experience with the public health system has been in relation to being stitched up after minor accidents.

My partner’s father is 84. Diagnosed 8 weeks ago with esophegaeal cancer. He has had a CT scan. But after 8 weeks he has had NO treatment and has not yet seen an oncologist. (Tomorrow apparently.) The poor guy can’t swallow and has lost 20 kg. We called an ambulance last weekend. In the hospital they gave him some jelly and ice cream, and sent him home.

Is this what you would expect? I feel very sad for him 🙁
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December 20, 2021 8:46am
- Captain Mainwaring
  
  Yes, tragically it is what you would expect from a health system run buy the arrogant and useless Angry Andrew Little.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:54am
  - MCōs
    
    The health system isn’t run by the Minister of Health.
    The local DHB is responsible for administering healthcare.
    They’ll probably say they don’t have the personnel to keep up with the workload. Why they don’t have the personnel I’ll leave up to your imagination.
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:06am
    - Captain Mainwaring
      
      If the health system isn’t run by the Minister of Health through the DHBs that report to him, what the Hell does he do all day?
      
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      December 20, 2021 10:57am
      - MCōs
        
        He sets policy in conjunction with cabinet and wrings money out of the the Minister of Finance.
        He delegates responsibility and fronts up if they fuck up. Or he should.
        
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        December 20, 2021 11:14am
      - Steve Otto(North Shore)
        
        Thinks up lies to tell?
        
        4 2
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        December 20, 2021 2:53pm
  - Flossie
    
    The money that’s been poured into Pike River would have been far better spent on helping the living.
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:23am
- Matt Long
  
  Sadly it is what to expect, if you have the resources for private treatment or to get treatment overseas, even in Australia it seems likely treatment would be much better.
  
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  December 20, 2021 8:55am
  - Matt Long
    
    Or if you have a contact in the hospital that can help navigate the system that can help.
    
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    December 20, 2021 8:56am
    - Inandout
      
      Matt, or if you can prove a Polynesian blood line. This I am told opens theatre doors.
      
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      December 20, 2021 9:25am
- Hollyfield
  
  I suggest someone accompany him to his appointment to advocate for him. It is easy to feel reassured at the time of the appointment, and a person often doesn’t want to appear pushy.
  
  My mother-in-law had been ill and in severe pain for several years and was on the waiting list for tests. She wasn’t the type to make a fuss, and always downplayed it. One day she was so ill she called an ambulance, and then had a stroke in the emergency room. The hospital treated her for the stroke, and then wanted to discharge her a week or two later. Her daughter refused to take her home until the hospital had investigated the reason she went to hospital in the first place. 24 hours later she had the diagnosis of two types of cancer and given 2 weeks to live. Imagine if she had gone home that day.
  
  My father had a small stroke, he went to his doctor the next day, who sent him to hospital by ambulance. He was put on the waiting list for a brain scan and discharged, and was told if it happened again to call an ambulance immediately. Two weeks later, it happened again, he was unable to stand up and couldn’t speak for about 10 minutes. Mum called an ambulance. In the emergency room, by the time a doctor came round, my father had mostly recovered, but still had slow speech and was generally a bit “dopey”. The doctor was quite condescending, told him that he was an old man, he had to expect it would be hard for him to get out of a chair, and to not be as mentally sharp as he used to be. I waited for my father to say something about his history – but with his fuzzy thinking and slow speech he said nothing. I waited for my mother to say something – nothing. So I interrupted and told the doctor of his previous stroke. The doctor’s attitude changed instantly, and my father was admitted to hospital where he stayed until he had the brain scan and a treatment plan. (I believe the doctor should have actually done the basic stroke tests of asking my father to smile, to raise both arms above his head etc, and should have checked my father’s notes before just dismissing him as a hypochondriac old man, but it taught me you have to push to make sure the doctor is aware of all information.)
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:11am
- alloytoo
  
  When I was diagnosed with Testicular cancer in 2018 the offending organ was removed within two weeks. Unfortunately Chemo was delayed due to a post operative infection, but commenced as soon as my “C” section wound healed (within days of that).
  
  Most of this was done Auckland DHB oncology (which treats cancer for the whole city).
  
  There are of course different kinds of cancers and treatments.
  
  My oncology nurse indicated to me a couple of weeks ago that they appeared to be diagnosing similar number of cases as they did pre-covid. (so not huge delays in Auckland)
  
  However a close friend who was diagnosed with Prostrate cancer through private health care “Appeared” to suffer some delays before being operated on.
  
  Where is your partner’s father based?
  
  It’s very poor form not to have had consultation with an oncologist to discuss treatment options very soon after scan and diagnosis.
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:25am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    “Where is your partner’s father based?”
    
    Christchurch.
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:15am
  - All_on_Red
    
    Good to hear you have recovered Alloytoo, and I reckon you still have more balls than Mikenmild
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:48am
    - mikenmildagain
      
      Did that comment make you feel clever?
      Lol
      
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      December 20, 2021 11:29am
      - All_on_Red
        
        Yep- better than your snark
        Lol
        
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        December 20, 2021 12:30pm
- mudrunner
  
  I had treatment for very advanced throat cancer this year at CCDHB. The response was excellent, the treatment at all levels was first class and the results seem to show that it has been succesfully dealt with even to the surprise of the oncologist. It all started just before covid restrictions but carried on through. My wife has had breast cancer threatment (twice) and the process has been faultless as far as we are concered. I do hope your father gets successful treatment and does not impact your posts here which I enjoy.
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:27am
- Tony
  
  I have a son with severe Crohn’s disease, which can potentially be life-threatening.
  
  He is rushed straight in whenever he needs to be in hospital. So, a fantastic response there.
  
  OTOH, I have a 71 year old brother who has a suspected blockage in one of his heart arteries.
  He has been put on medication and has to wait weeks/months to see a specialist.
  
  Quite often, the best option is to “collapse” in the doctor’s surgery. Then you are rushed in by ambulance and get the full monty so far as treatment goes.
  
  That is what happened with my mother who was in a similar situation a number of years ago. Her doctor decided to instigate the nuclear option because of the concern he had for my mother’s condition.
  
  She was rushed straight in and had stents put in immediately, and lived another 10 years or so as a result and died peacefully in her 90s.
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:43am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  No, it’s not what should happen.
  
  Contact every member of your DHB Board and ask when your F-in-law will be seen by an oncologist.
  
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  December 20, 2021 10:00am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    He has an appointment tomorrow.
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:17am
    - mawm
      
      Wait to hear what they say. All further treatment depends on the stage of the cancer. At his age they probably won’t offer major surgery.
      
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      December 20, 2021 4:11pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Remember when politicians discussed Cancer Treatment targets?
  https://www.health.govt.nz/our-work/diseases-and-conditions/cancer/previous-cancer-initiatives/faster-cancer-treatment
  
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  December 20, 2021 10:04am
- UrbanNeocolonialist
  
  His misfortune is to have a non-headlining disease. Institutional covid monomania is accumulating an awful unseen deathtoll via neglect and absence of balance in treating other maladies that kill more people (26000 cancer diagnoses a year in NZ is an order of magnitude more than covid could kill).
  
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  December 20, 2021 10:05am
- Ed Snack
  
  It is the new norm Benedict. Now if you could change his skin colour it might be different…
  
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  December 20, 2021 11:11am
- WaveyDavey
  
  Go private. Both for the consult & the treatment
  
  It will be quicker
  
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  December 20, 2021 11:35am
- oldgolfer
  
  Beggars belief.
  
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  December 20, 2021 11:35am
- bronny1
  
  No. My 80 yo dad has been sick for 6 months. They can’t figure out what it is but boy have they tried. 2×1 week stays inpatient plus scans and cameras looking at every part of his body. We did have to chase up some appts but generally within 2-4 weeks eg 3 weeks from seeing dog at hospital to gastroscope then 3 weeks to appt with doc, then 2 weeks to scan of brain etc etc. this is a regional hospital.
  
  I think you have to be proactive about chasing up appts as the docs say 2 weeks then it goes to the booking people who do whatever they like with it. Also I insisted when he was in hospital on being there for consultant rounds using the excuse that it was “too much for my mother to take in”. So they bent their covid rules so I could attend and he spent at least 20 mins on two occasions going through everything with us.
  
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  December 20, 2021 12:37pm
  - sooty
    
    Remember when we would send patients to Australia for treatment!
    
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    December 20, 2021 1:23pm
thetiedarch

Went to the movies last night here in Christchurch. Masks required on entry, need to scan in and show vaccine pass.

But then you can take your mask off…..

Cinema was packed. Air con didn’t seem to be on at all.

If there’s going to be an outbreak of Covid in Christchurch, my money is on it starting there.
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December 20, 2021 8:47am
- Inandout
  
  the, my partner had to visit a local movie theatre to get some gift vouchers. Not to eat at the cafe nor attend a screening, just buy tickets. The girl serving said by entering the movie foyer you must show a passport before buying the vouchers. Luckily I wasn’t with her.
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:30am
Maggie Pie

Did u know you need to show your ‘Vaccine Pass’ to access Taupo’s SuperLoo.
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December 20, 2021 9:29am
- Lee C
  
  I dare say the experience would be worth it…
  
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  December 20, 2021 10:16am
- Observer of Life
  
  Maggie: I hope they find people who are caught short use the area around the toilet if they can’t access it. Bloody ridiculous situation!! Someone posted the Taupo Council email address yesterday, so I let them know my thoughts. As yet haven’t heard back from them.
  
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  December 21, 2021 4:44pm
Sacha

In my recent experience, it seems that people of advanced years, with advanced malignancies do not choose surgical intervention or intense chemotherapy. Sometimes the results of such therapies. just cause major misery for all concerned. ‘Life’ for the patient is miserable, and for the family it’s a graceless way for a life to end.
Nature will be left to take its course, with the inevitable outcome, and in a way I completely agree – as long as we can give adequate comfort and pain relief for as long as life lasts.
We had a family conference: what did want for our relative? We all agreed that a person in his late ’70’s, who had had a long and healthy working and family life deserved the respect of choice. We chose one person to go the oncologist’s clinic with him, and be his support. They asked for honest predictions of out comes, and discussed the way things might be managed.
Well, the prognosis was dire, but it could be managed comfortably if the patient decided not to have further treatment, and there was time to make a decision –
In the end he decided on palliative care, the family rallied round, and he died peacefully at home within a few days.
We all agreed that he had made the right decision. Death comes to us all, sometimes quickly, and sometimes lingering along the way.
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December 20, 2021 9:30am
- Benedict Yu
  
  In the case of my Partner’s father, the scan showed the cancer had not spread. But the tumour in his esophegus (sp) is large, to the point where he cannot eat and even drinking water is difficult. He is 84 and had several other health issues, including heart disease and diabetes. I am not hopeful.
  
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  December 20, 2021 11:58am
  - Tony Stuart
    
    Sadly BY, the prognosis for oesophageal cancer is grim. I had an aunt who died from it around 30 years ago. She had radical surgery when first diagnosed, but after a recurrence, she went downhill very quickly. By the time of death she was pitifully thin.
    
    Given this chap’s age and other health issues, I doubt that surgery will be offered in his case. I hate to be so negative, but there’s very little positive to say about this diagnosis. Much aroha to you and your family.
    
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    December 20, 2021 12:37pm
  - bronny1
    
    My mum has Barrett’s which is the precursor to oesophageal cancer. She has 3 yearly endoscopy at her local hospital. If that was my mother BY, I would have been jumping up and down for the past 6 weeks. Please make sure you do going forward.
    
    I’m in chch (my fam isn’t) and had a friend have a horrible cancer experience here last year lockdown. He was pushed out and out until there was irreparable damage.
    
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    December 20, 2021 12:47pm
Surely Knott

Morgan Godfrey: Senior lecturer at the Otago Business School. Te ao Māori editor at @MetroMagNZ . Contributor at the @guardian , appears to have removed his 18 Dec. post “I want to be legally segregated from antivaxxers” This is a person who is regularly quoted by our media and is a lecturer at a university calling for total segregation. Could the Human Rights commissioner advise if this is hate speech? Mind you what we have currently is banishment because their is no attempt at separate but equal. So maybe segregation would be a step forward.

But David Farrier (also reguarly quoted by NZ mainstream media) is standing by his Dec 17 post “anti-vaxxers are selfish fucking idiots who — for a variety of reasons — don’t give a fuck about anyone but themselves” which got 1.7 thousand likes. Thanks NZ. Could the Human rights commission please advise where they stand on this comment?

Do these tweets move you more towards thinking these mandates are more about health or politics and control?
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December 20, 2021 9:36am
curry4me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgXuWS02JvQ

Wellington 30,000 Protest!

This is footage of the Freedom and Rights protest at parliament last Thursday. The figure of 30,000 is an exaggeration. The Pravda 2.0 figure of 2000 is a lie. Not like they’ve got 110,000,000 reasons to lie though. [3:07]
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December 20, 2021 9:38am
- Batman
  
  2,000 is probably about right given the photos and videos of the event. I’ve seen a shitload of protests and that was a size small/medium.
  
  Remember it’s only about 3-4% of the population which is exercised about that stuff.
  
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  December 20, 2021 9:45am
  - Lee C
    
    Well, they are certainly out there Batman.
    https://voicesforfreedom.co.nz/
    
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    December 20, 2021 10:20am
  - bronny1
    
    Friends of mine in Welly that saw it said they thought about 25000
    
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    December 20, 2021 12:49pm
    - Batman
      
      Well bronny I can say as someone who has worked in the parliament precinct for a number of years and saw the protest in person as it filed below my window, it was probably around 2,000.
      
      Your friends may have gotten a little excited, or require an optometrist appointment ?
      
      25,000 would gridlock the central city and parade route, take about 1.5 hours to travel the route, and fill the parliament grounds and Molesworth street outside. That protest did neither of those things.
      
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      December 20, 2020 2:52pm
curry4me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkpA91Ojc6U

Farage reacts to Lord Frost.

I can fully understand why Lord Frost has resigned, after all he is a true Brexiteer and a genuine Conservative.’ [1:55]
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December 20, 2021 9:38am
Rusty

Why cant One and 3 News have a 6.30 covid news report for 10 min instead of having it as the leading headlines virtually every night?

A similar thing could be done for radio and newspaper news reports.

There is nothing that they are actually telling us about covid that is earth shattering or end of the world stuff.

Unless hundreds of Nzers have died of covid that day whats the point having it as headlines?

But we know why the media are doing it …
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December 20, 2021 9:48am
- Bridgenag
  
  Best thing is not to watch. ………… Looks like some huge media shakeup happening according to the [not yet read] Listener
  Feel queasy at the thought
  
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  December 20, 2021 10:11am
- I remember when
  
  “Unless hundred of Nzers have died of covid that day.”
  Isn’t it interesting how little fanfare covid deaths in NZ attract from the media now.
  Perhaps a bit if they are under 50 to show the dangers.
  
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  December 20, 2021 11:00am
Maggie Pie

Jacinda labeled a ‘nut-job’ and a ‘Commie Prime Minister’ with ‘COVID CAMPS’ in New Zealand!

Check out the responses to this tweet from AZ Senator Wendy Rogers 😀

https://twitter.com/WendyRogersAZ/status/1470412989190782978
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December 20, 2021 10:03am
- MCōs
  
  Who’s this Wendy Rodgers person & why’s she having a dig at NZ?
  Arizona.
  I’ve been to Arizona a couple of times. The people there have hardly heard of NZ.
  
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  December 20, 2021 10:19am
  - Maggie Pie
    
    TBH Cossie, heaps of people we know communicate with Wendy.
    
    In fact here’s an email she’s only just been sent by a friend…..
    
    https://twitter.com/WendyRogersAZ/status/1472687981592993798
    
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    December 20, 2021 11:14am
    - MCōs
      
      That doesn’t answer the question.
      
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      December 20, 2021 11:27am
      - Maggie Pie
        
        One of the girls from tennis was saying they own a large vineyard out Kaukapakapa way. So quite entitled to have a view on how the country is being run.
        
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        December 20, 2021 12:17pm
      - Batman
        
        Mcos, she’s jumping on the bandwagon of delusion about what NZ is like. They can’t do the same with Biden so they need to find a new fear figure to keep the MAGA base afraid of the mythical communists
        
        Frankly I think the PG rated trolls in reply to her weren’t nearly savage enough.
        
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        December 20, 2021 3:01pm
      - MCōs
        
        I would say the chances of her owning a piece of land in NZ are zero.
        
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        December 20, 2021 4:41pm
  - mikenmildagain
    
    As usual with American nutjobs, the interwebs are having some fun:
    https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/republican-arizona-senator-wendy-rogers-trolled-after-saying-kiwis-are-emailing-her-about-jacinda-ardern-and-covid-camps/ZAWEIFMIAME5LDZUZ52FT73SUY/
    
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    December 20, 2021 11:32am
Reid

Interesting short segment from Sky News interviewing U.K. Health Minister Gillian Keegan about the U.K. response to the Omicron variant. At 5.42, the minister is asked how many people are in hospital from Omicron. 10. That’s right, ten people in hospital from Omicron, from the UK Health Minister.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QEt8t2XTWYk
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December 20, 2021 10:35am
- mandk
  
  Yes, but they had one person die with COVID, and that’s so bad they need to shut down the whole country again.
  
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  December 20, 2021 11:51am
WaveyDavey

Looking at the pollie-of-the-year poll leads me to a question

No snark, no point scoring, no idiocy please

Given that Ardern gave Labour a 13% lift in 2017 when Little stepped down, how many points is she worth today?

Personally I can only believe that she’s worth more today than 4 years ago because surely Labour’s incompetence and failures would lead to lower polling than in 2017 when they bottomed out at 24%
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December 20, 2021 10:44am
- UrbanNeocolonialist
  
  Almost all of the 2017 Ardern ‘lift’ was Green voters rejecting Green Caucus’s embrace of Me-Tu benefit fraud that was admitted to at the same time as Ardern took leadership. Ardern maybe lifted left by 3 pts off the low low of massively unlikeable Angry Little
  
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  December 20, 2021 1:16pm
  - WaveyDavey
    
    So Labour today, sans Ardern, would be polling mid-30s?
    
    After 4 years of their proven incompetence and damage they’re 10% higher than they were under Little?
    
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    December 20, 2021 2:56pm
- Gravelroad
  
  Ms Ardern is the Labour Party’s trump card.
  According to various polls, many voters still believe in her fairy dust and love her dedication to being our saviour.
  I think more and more of her acolytes see her as a presidential figure somehow remote from the Labour Party incompetents and hangers on.
  They believe that while she is looking after us, all will be well.
  We have a wedding to look forward to and even the boring people in economic reporting circles say we are doing marvellous.
  Only when Ms Ardern chooses to step down from her throne will we see how popular the Labour Party really is.
  
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  December 20, 2021 2:33pm
  - WaveyDavey
    
    Can’t disagree but the question was how many points do you think she’s worth
    
    For my money, given the M/F split I think she’s why female voters are even more disproportionately biased to Labour
    
    I’d suggest Labour is at or around 40% in real money and she’s at least 10 of that
    
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    December 20, 2021 3:15pm
- Batman
  
  15-18 points, given their current polling.
  
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  December 20, 2021 3:03pm
  - WaveyDavey
    
    Thanks for the answer. I think you’re a little high because that would put Labour at 23% and that puts them back into Andrew Little territory. I’m not sure that they’re quite that unpopular
    
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    December 20, 2021 3:19pm
burt

Stuff seem to be having issues again with their headlines, I’ve helped them with this one.

Hundreds face Christmas in quarantine in South Australia after fully vaccinated teen with Covid-19 parties at club
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December 20, 2021 10:45am
- Surely Knott
  
  The Herald seems to have some headline issues also.
  “Charlie the dogs saves woman after bike accident.” should read “Woman with broken neck waits three hours for ambulance.”
  
  https://www.nzherald.co.nz/northern-advocate/news/charlie-the-dog-saves-woman-after-bike-accident-in-whangarei/5H3HQICYIMRFWSJVCA46R6V5A4/
  
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  December 20, 2021 11:34am
Reid

Neil Oliver from the GBNews in the UK talks to Dr Robert Malone. (Vid is prompted to the right bit..)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpYocpWc3yw&t=1970s
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December 20, 2021 10:49am
- Vory v zakone
  
  Yep Dr Robert Malone, the ARCHITECT of mRNA vaccines, has a warning. Before your child is injected, watch his statement on child COVID vaccinations
  https://t.co/1vW5NqoiCe
  
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  December 20, 2021 5:02pm
  - Vory v zakone
    
    And last week Dr Malone investigates the new variant….
    https://rwmalonemd.substack.com/p/omicron-today
    
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    December 20, 2021 6:17pm
Fletch

re: DPF’s post yesterday ‘Stupidity is the Enemy’, there seems to be no one more stupid and stuck in his cultish anti-Trump mindset than Democrat Adam Schiff.

Two years and $32 million from the taxpayers later, Mueller concluded that “the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.” Trump-Russia collusion couldn’t be found because Trump-Russia collusion never happened.

Still, a month after Mueller’s conclusion, Schiff went on ABC’s “This Week” and repeated his lie that there was “ample evidence of collusion in plain sight.” Like a madman, Schiff refused to accept reality, and instead repeated the failed, unconvincing story he had spent years rehearsing in his own deranged mind.

While Schiff is both a liar and fraud, he is doggedly persistent–as lunatics often are. That’s why, in Schiff’s case, persistence is not a virtue, but rather a vice.

Six months after the Mueller investigation came up with zilch, Schiff conceived his second failed story line. He stood before Congress on September 26, 2019 and dramatically pitched his latest story to the American people: “Quid Pro Quo.”

[…]

Employing the tactic he had used to falsify Trump’s phone call in Quid Pro Quo, Schiff doctored and falsified a text message sent to Trump’s chief of staff from Representative Jim Jordan (R-Ohio)—claiming that Jordan had called on Vice President Pence to “subvert the will of the American people.”

https://amgreatness.com/2021/12/18/adam-schiffs-delusion/
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December 20, 2021 10:50am
I remember when

Are we getting to the point where it will be news when –
“There were no shootings in the Auckland CBD today.”
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December 20, 2021 10:51am
Fletch

AT least some Democrats have integrity. Joe Manchin is refusing to vote for Biden’s $2 trillion “build back better” scheme, and likely will not vote for so-called “voting rights” legislation that will institute California-style practices like “ballot harvesting” that helped Biden fraudulently win the election in 2019.

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2021/12/19/democrats-media-hollywood-and-never-trump-freak-out-after-joe-manchin-says-no-to-build-back-better/
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December 20, 2021 10:53am
- Man Among the Ruins
  
  “Who is the President of the United States”?
  
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOOfTC4jj9M
  
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  December 20, 2021 12:29pm
Lee C

Make of this, what you will…

“This was sent to me thought I’d Share..
Take Note; let everyone know you heard this important information right now so that when it happens they will know this was planned.

Its back to FULL lockdown at the beginning of January.
They are already informing the top ranks of the service and hotel industry not to employ any more staff or existing staff to expect any more shifts after New Year. Or make holiday plans.
This info is from the top.
How can they predict a ‘covid’ situation before there are more cases?
Because its all part of the plan to remove freedom from everyone.
The plan to create full digital control of our whereabouts at all times and our finances with the introduction of a cashless society.
That is their end game, once implemented, no one will be able to buy or sell anything THEY dont want you to.
Is there anyone left that is still believing this Plandemic nonsense was about health?
We are on the precipice of Tyranny. Its time for vaxed and unvaxed to unite and stand up to these ‘lockdown’ rules when they come.
You got vaxed so there would never be another lockdown, you were lied to and they knew they were lying.
Mass non compliance is the only way forward when they try another lockdown and the only way to make that a success is to spread this information early.
Tell people right now you have been told of this plan for January so that when it happens they will know it was all in the govs plans.
Share NOW, if we don’t organise to fight these rules now for you and your children, there will soon come a day when you wish you had.”
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December 20, 2021 11:10am
- Ehlana
  
  So, thinking critically, who did it come from? Anyone can make up and send information over the internet, what is the credibility of the source?
  
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  December 20, 2021 12:15pm
  - ClanMcleod
    
    I would imagine any of the ‘conspiracy theorists” of the last 2 years could have written that, and based on their record od predicting events so far it is almost certainly 100% correct.//
    
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    December 20, 2021 2:23pm
- Bridgenag
  
  “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
  
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  December 20, 2021 2:46pm
  - Captain Mainwaring
    
    Don’t believe that crap.
    There will be no lockdowns until AFTER the Royal wedding.
    
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    December 20, 2021 8:54pm
graham

Hmm … is some Jacinda fan trying to make out that she’s still cool and with it and totally down? Or is someone trying to make a point?

Ecstasy pills pressed with Jacinda Ardern’s name and a crude caricatured imprint of the Prime Minister’s face are being sold on New Zealand’s underground drugs market.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/ecstasy-pills-featuring-prime-minister-jacinda-arderns-name-for-sale/AAFICMYRMVQJTZJFD2337ADQWE/

By the way … anybody heard about Karel Sroubek lately?
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December 20, 2021 11:18am
- nathie
  
  How inappropriate!
  
  Ecstasy became infamous due to its use in the DJ/dance party scene …
  
  Ms Ardern was (or occasionally still is) a DJ!
  
  https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/101861816/prime-minister-immortalised-as-dj-puppet-at-wellingtons-backbencher-pub
  
  “Or is someone trying to make a point?”
  Perhaps they are paying homage to her?! 😉
  
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  December 20, 2021 12:11pm
ClanMcleod

Confirmation (not that it was needed) that modeling by the likes of Hendy and Plank, the physics teacher and the mathematician, is little more than clairvoyance on steroids.
An astonishing exchange on Twitter with one of the UK SAGE modelers responsible for the fear porn over the last 2 years.

– SAGE Modeller Says They Don’t Model Good Outcomes Because “It Doesn’t Add Any Further Information”

Worth checking out the complete exchange. Astonishing stuff.

https://dailysceptic.org/2021/12/18/sage-modeller-says-they-dont-model-good-outcomes-because-it-doesnt-add-any-further-information/
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December 20, 2021 11:31am
- Alan Wilkinson
  
  That was posted yesterday. My comment then was that these models have told us nothing useful that couldn’t have been produced from a simple exponential fit to current data. The contribution from “epidemiologists” has been indistinguishable from zero.
  
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  December 20, 2021 11:47am
  - ClanMcleod
    
    Apologies for re posting, I had a lovely day off yesterday playing golf and having a few beers with friends. Zero covid discussion which was wonderful!
    
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    December 20, 2021 2:25pm
Surely Knott

Ecstasy pills for sale with the pills in a caricature of the prime minister. Will the mandates increase drug use. If it’s illegal to get a coffee or a beer at a pub or cafe without a passport, will the unpassported chose other blackmarket options instead.
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December 20, 2021 11:42am
- cmm
  
  The gangs are already making big coin out of illegal smokes.
  
  Will they soon be able to make $ out of sly coffee?
  
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  December 20, 2021 12:03pm
  - Surely Knott
    
    I wonder if the gangs are any good at haircuts. It’s been 4 months+ for unpassported aucklanders.
    
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    December 20, 2021 4:41pm
    - Captain Mainwaring
      
      And the stupid bastards deserve it.
      
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      December 20, 2021 8:56pm
graham

The Herald is running a story about how Eric Clapton sued a woman for trying to sell a burned copy of a 1980s recording of Clapton in concert on eBay for €9.95 ($NZ13).

They’re playing this up in a major way, implying that Clapton is a heartless sod who pursued a poor widow who “had no idea that what she’d done was illegal and appealed the charge”, for trying to make a measly $13.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/eric-clapton-sues-german-widow-over-13-cd-sold-on-ebay/Y5M3L3AN4IEJAZI47IEH2AML3A/

Of course, this is COMPLETELY UNRELATED to the fact that Eric Clapton just happens to be a rather vocal critic public health management around Covid-19 and legalised discrimination against unvaccinated people.
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December 20, 2021 12:02pm
- Rusty
  
  Hypocrite Brian May of Queen called Eric Clapton an idiot for his anti-vax stand. Has May now got covid I read somewhere?
  
  Also May was interviewed on UK tv by zoom on global warming from his home — a reporter asked him — is that a gas heater burning behind you in your living home?
  
  May said I’m cold and the heater came with the house — what a hypocrite!
  
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  December 20, 2021 3:59pm
  - mikenmildagain
    
    I don’t know why people get invested in what random artists, authors, celebrities, etc have to say about random other stuff.
    I really don’t care if Eric Clapton is stark, raving mad, or is omniscient about medical matters. Or if Fletch (see comment below) gets excited because some irrelevant idiot punched out another irrelevant idiot. Or if Lorde or whoever tells everyone to get vaxxed.
    Note to all morons – as support for your worldview, these things are equally invalid:
    1. Your most favourite celebrity sharing your political opinions
    2. Your most favourite celebrity opposing your personal [political] opinions.
    3. Your least favourite celebrity sharing your personal opinions.
    4. Your least favourite celebrity opposing your personal opinions.
    
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    December 20, 2021 7:40pm
  - ClanMcleod
    
    Yes May is triple jabbed and got covid and recovered. He thinks the jab saved his life. A bit like the person who died a couple of months ago of covid and the family said if he hadn’t been vaccinated it could have been worse. There is some serious cognitive dissonance going on here.
    
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    December 20, 2021 9:02pm
Tony

Omicron is surely a deadly disease:

https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/uk-reports-leap-10000-confirmed-omicron-coronavirus-cases-2021-12-18/

7 deaths out of 10000 cases in the UK so far. And, based in the classification methodology, some of those probably died in a car crash or the like and were found later to also to have had the Omicron variation at the time of death.
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December 20, 2021 12:07pm
- cmm
  
  Even the cases in hospital track the same.
  
  If you’re admitted to hospital for CV19 symptoms then it is because you’re at least having problems breathing and need oxygen. Well at least 90% anyway.
  
  Most of the “Omicron patients” in hospital are not even getting supplemental oxygen. Those are clearly not there for CV19 and are there for other reasons.
  
  Even of those in hospital and are getting oxygen will likely be getting it for other reasons (eg. when I was in hospital for Afib I was given oxygen for a bit).
  
  The same too with how they’re counting ICU patients and those on ventilators. Many of those will be in ICU for other reasons.
  
  Of South Africa’s (approx) 5000 ICU beds, less than 400 are occupied by patients testing positive for Omicon and many, if not most, are really there for other reasons.
  
  The numbers of patients WITH CV19 that end up in hospital will go up, but that is because the number of people with CV19 will go up everywhere.
  
  Calling them CV19 patients is a bloody lie.
  
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  December 20, 2021 1:36pm
- mandk
  
  10000 is the latest daily count.
  The running total is just under 25000.
  
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  December 20, 2021 3:04pm
Maggie Pie

Idiot woke caller to NewstalkZB tells Francessca…

“It takes a village to raise kids, and people.
They ‘act out’ for a reason.
We can’t just give up on them”

As my partner said…. “Well I’ve got news for that clown”

https://twitter.com/nzherald/status/1472627203758243841

Imagine having to put up with shite like this 🙁
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December 20, 2021 1:02pm
Fletch

YouTuber-turned-pro boxer Jake Paul has knocked out former MMA champion, aspiring rapper, and vocal Black Lives Matter supporter Tyron Woodley in a boxing rematch with an overhand right punch.

https://twitter.com/fightswfriends/status/1472440993706250246

Goes down like a sack of potatoes, out before he even hits the canvas… ?

While some in the the crowd shouting “fk Joe Biden!”
https://twitter.com/yoba_nigga/status/1472393727092183041
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December 20, 2021 1:33pm
- Cinematic
  
  A crushing right but crikey that was telegraphed.
  
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  December 20, 2021 5:10pm
  - Fletch
    
    Looks like he fakes with his left jab first.
    
    https://youtu.be/1xzYLkxjdag?t=77
    
    3 1
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    December 20, 2021 6:54pm
zulumonster

I’m not sure this is the answer!

In a supposed concession to opposition to the mandated 3 Waters plan, Minister Mahuta has come up with a proposal where all councils will be represented on the governing bodies of the 4 new water authorities. Can anyone else see a problem with this? The money quote for me is below:

“… the Taranaki-Waikato-Bay of Plenty “Entity B” corporation, which is comprised of 22 councils, would be allowed 22 local authority representatives, matched by 22 mana whenua members. That’s 44 in total.”

https://www.newsroom.co.nz/sprawling-governing-bodies-to-allow-all-councils-say-in-three-waters-corporations?utm_source=Friends+of+the+Newsroom&utm_campaign=a5f9574b36-Daily+Briefing+20.12.2021&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_71de5c4b35-a5f9574b36-97957964
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December 20, 2021 3:15pm
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  Imagine the bill for the biccies
  
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  December 20, 2021 7:41pm
  - Captain Mainwaring
    
    Not to mention the plane fares to get them all there.
    
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    December 20, 2021 9:02pm
    - artemisia
      
      And the per diems. And it will be AMT, PMT, lunch. I hope the staff don’t get too attached to their jobs. Apart from the jobs being dismantled with a change of government, not going to be much fun being directed by a committee of dozens.
      
      Pity actually, as reform probably is needed. The elephant in the room not so much.
      
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      December 21, 2021 6:06am
Jack5

Did I hear correctly that Red Radio will have our host, David Farrar, in The Panel team of Wallace Chapman, from 3.45 to 5pm today?

He can be supported with texts to 2101 (RNZ says each one will cost 20c) or email to thepanel@rnz.co.nz.
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December 20, 2021 3:16pm
MCōs

Here’s a bit of interesting news re elections in Chile https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/20/gabriel-boric-wins-chiles-presidential-election
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December 20, 2021 3:20pm
Steve Otto(North Shore)

Remember back when we used to all eat cake when someone blew all over it?
Wild times.
Happy fucking Birthday
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December 20, 2021 3:45pm
- Biscuit
  
  A (small) birthday cake used to feature at family birthdays here, Steve.
  Because no-one here is much fond of the super-sweet shop-made sponge cakes that invariably feature at birthdays-time.
  
  The (one) candle would get lit.
  And the family’s littlie would be invited to blow that candle out ‘because we’ve all forgotten how’…
  
  He’s growing up – and wising up.
  
  The most recent birthday had him rolling his eyes and opining ‘If anyone says they have forgotten how to blow a candle out…’
  Sniff, eh?
  And he used to be SO fond of showing us forgetful oldies how to do it!
  
  And, Steve, remember the days we used to take said littlies to the local bowling alley and eat pizza/fries/whatever with them there after removing our fingers from (were-those-things-EVER-cleaned) bowling balls?
  
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  December 20, 2021 4:17pm
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    At the end, ten pin! LOL, I miss that with my grandkids. Who knows where those balls have been?
    
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    December 20, 2021 5:27pm
    - mikenmildagain
      
      As the actress said to the bishop.
      
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      December 20, 2021 7:27pm
Reid

The Awareness Foundation hosts a roundtable with distinguished international superstars in the covid field.

https://brandnewtube.com/watch/the-awareness-foundation-covid-19-roundtable_V2XfgefMU9wbDr9.html
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December 20, 2021 3:49pm
Reid

Some people haven’t heard about the fact a top Chinese spy defected about 24 months ago and has been kept sequestered and out of access from the CIA and other elements of the intel community. I understand the Defence Intelligence Agency is conducting the debrief.

This doesn’t mention what I just told you about the case, it just gives you general background. You can find out the above details from multiple sources discussing this online. This is just a taster for anyone interested in following their nose.

His name is Dong Jingwei.

https://www.news.com.au/world/coronavirus/chinese-spy-dong-jingwei-defects-to-the-west-while-offering-covid-secrets/news-story/d61277b586d043c6942bcce7b8b70d44
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December 20, 2021 3:58pm
Spoff

Apologies to the mods and the two posters I inadvertently reported. I don’t report but sometimes hit that button when “reply” is exhausted.
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December 20, 2021 4:17pm
- Biscuit
  
  Join the club, Spoff!
  
  I say ‘Oh, you (censored censored censored) of a (censored), Biscuit!’ as I ‘report’ a completely-unreportable post rather than, as I’d intended, uptick/downtick/reply to it.
  
  And then I almost blush when I think some poor overworked mod is going to have to read the completlely-unreportable post in question SEVERAL times to try to fathom just why it had supposedly attracted my ire.
  
  [Mod. Note: For the nth time, individual “report” ticks do not register. Get over yourselves. And as for the narcissists who post that someone has dared to down-tick their post, boohoo. ]
  
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  December 20, 2021 4:32pm
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    Mods are leaning to the left a bit in my opinion.
    Saying just that could get me a ban /////
    
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    December 20, 2021 5:30pm
    - mikenmildagain
      
      Poor Steve, all the world’s against you mate.
      
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      December 20, 2021 7:24pm
  - Biscuit
    
    Ah, thanks for the clarification, Mr/Mrs/Ms Mod. I (honestly!) didn’t know that before…
    
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    December 20, 2021 9:59pm
surfing

This poor fellow, Rory Nairn, who died from the vaccine. The reporting as usual is quite bad.

He developed myocarditis, had symptoms but did not seek treatment.

My biggest question, was it treatable and what is the success rate of treatment. And, what steps are being taken to ensure that people are educated as to when to seek medical care.

When I had my vaccination, the post vaccine medical advice is extremely poor and does not emphasise the importance of having certain symptoms checked by a medical professional.
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December 20, 2021 5:39pm
TT500

When i was a kid growing up in the sixties
My mum always told me to ask a Grown Up
for help if i got lost etc.

Glad i,m not a kid today
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December 20, 2021 6:29pm
Maggie Pie

Just caught that lefty suxhole Tim Roxbrah on 1ZB filling in for Heather.
Honestly, if I had to chose between Him & John Campbell…I’d go with Danny Watson.

SHEEESH!!
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December 20, 2021 6:48pm
Maggy Wassilieff

Thought I might give my evening stroll up the hill a miss…

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/127340259/police-seek-hira-john-wharepapa-warn-public-not-to-approach
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December 20, 2021 7:40pm
- Maggie Pie
  
  HOLY MOTHER! You be careful out there Maggz.
  To think he would have stood-out once’
  And why has he got ‘FISTING’ tattooed above his eyes?
  
  As ma says….”There’s nowt so queer as folk”
  
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  December 20, 2021 7:59pm
fernglas

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/lifestyle/casketeers-francis-and-kaiora-tipene-open-up-about-health-scare-i-was-so-close-to-losing-him/RE7TOMF2T5CZIVN6LDG7373FQA/
The story is that this idiot TV “personality” had an emergency appendectomy, but discharged himself from hospital and when he got home he felt well so he removed the drain himself. Unsurprisingly, he had complications and had to be re-admitted.
So some fool nearly killed himself and wasted precious medical resources, and Woman’s Day thinks it’s worthy of a puff piece? You do have to wonder how stupid they think their readers are.
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December 20, 2021 8:24pm
ClanMcleod

CJ Hopkins, novelist, playwright and satirist. An excellent writer. Talking about the rising fascism in Europe.

https://off-guardian.org/2021/12/20/the-year-of-the-new-normal-fascist/
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December 20, 2021 11:16pm

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