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January 28, 2022 8:00am by Kokila Patel

General Debate 28 January 2022

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NeverMindTheBollocks

In the UK the contents of one’s will is, post probate, public information.It’s a shame that NZ does not have the same law.

If we did, we might discover whether Michael Cullen was himself a ‘rich prick’.
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January 28, 2022 8:00am
- Simon
  
  Cullen 25 yrs + in parliament (whatever) on a salary package that would put him in the top 1% in global earnings terms.
  
  Got himself in this position through promotion of hate towards the rich. He was part of the fraud which is gubermint.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:57am
- peterwn
  
  Once a probate application has been filed, anyone can see a will (or ask for a copy) at the relevant High Court. After 25 years or so the wills are transferred to National Archives (wills are held in Auckland I think). Unfortunately there would be a rather stiff charges when looking at or getting copied a will held by the High Court.
  
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  January 28, 2022 3:00pm
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    In the UK, the interesting ones are published in The Times, still are AFAIK
    
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    January 28, 2022 5:00pm
CJames

When will the NZ population, or the 40% that still support them, realise Covid management here was a combination of ineptitude, panic and naked opportunism to introduce a command economy by the government? The decision-making, if one can call it that, is not there. There is no evidence that any of the Ministers can think without advisors to get decisions, making them below Gerald Ford in the intellectual stakes (“so dumb he can’t fart and chew gum at the same time” )
Even the MSM is realising that the incompetence in the Cabinet and bureaucracy is so endemic that sensible decisions, or even non-decisions, are praised. The RAT debacle is just the latest of a very long line. Howabout the lenders act stopping first home buyers’ mortgages? Cactus Kate latest post details not only the problems getting a booster shot, but a major issue migrants are having getting a medical. The only big new decisions seem to be the ones tinted with lunacy, like the Auckland bike bridge. No doubt the tram announcement will top that. Ministers have no concept of project management, resourcing or even the cost of money.
But, don’t worry. The Prime Minister can still comandeer the media to give us the latest good news autocue script from Chairman J. Then we can have announcements about announcements to spin the headline hogging publicity out. Which the MSM can breathlessly regurgitate. If it’s bad tidings, send an underling over the top to announce it. As the latter becomes more common, when will the sandbags go up around the Beehive?
Oh for the days of a government of boring competence. But as that would be dominated by experienced white males, it won’t happen. Tony Ryall, David Caygill or George Gair wouldn’t make the cover of the vapid Woman’s Weekly nowadays.
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January 28, 2022 8:00am
- Lee C
  
  When will the National Party realise it is on a road to nowhere?
  I just saw a post by them on fb which indicates they will ‘Repeal Three Waters’.
  
  Whoopie! Take a beltway issue and run with it, while people are literally frightened out of their wits about a ‘virus’ and are being manipulated by narcissists with a fetish for totaliatarianism.
  
  The vast majority of the comments were along the lines of
  
  ‘You support mandates, I won’t vote for you.’.
  
  The same goes for Seymour – he is derided as a Quisling.
  
  They and many in the political bubble are clueless about what is going on here.
  
  So, they can promise to ‘repeal’ all they like, but until they stand up to mandates and stop being Labour’s enablers-in-chief, their promises to ‘repeal this’ or ‘repeal that’ are hot air.
  
  Because they will not get elected.
  
  It’s like that movie about a liner which sailed into an iceberg while the Captain was asleep.
  
  They need to check their moral compas and grow some balls. (if I may mix metaphors for effect)
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:10am
  - Colville
    
    ‘You support mandates, I won’t vote for you.’.
    
    Its shows the lack of brains out there…
    Any vote that is not for ACT/Nat is a vote for Jacinda.
    
    Its the braindead muppets that voted for Winston that put the princess in power I wonder if the same muppets will do it again.
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:15am
    - Simon
      
      “Any vote that is not for ACT/Nat is a vote for Jacinda.”
      
      Luxon thinks we are all children and he can manage the children better than Labo.
      
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      January 28, 2022 9:01am
    - Tom Hunter
      
      It required nine years of Muldoon before the Rogernomics era could begin. Had Labour been elected in 1981 the latter would not have happened until 1987 or later as the Muldoon/Rowling thinking continued on to “manage” systems that were becoming increasingly unfit-for-purpose.
      
      It’s unfortunate but that’s they way things have to roll.
      
      I think we’re heading for another such situation, although this time the “revolution” will be in health, education and welfare, and after 2023, whether we get another three years of this era’s “Muldoon” or six years of this era’s “Rowling”, we’re going to get the changes needed.
      
      Either that or we’re going to lose a hell of a lot of young people who no longer see any hope of buying a house, starting a family, their kids getting a good education, or being taken care by our health sector.
      
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      January 28, 2022 10:21am
      - Taieri
        
        Muldoon/Rowling thinking continued on to “manage” systems that were becoming increasingly unfit-for-purpose.
        ————–
        
        To be fair to Muldoon, he’d a vision for this country. We may disagree on whether it was a right vision but quite a lot of the infrastructure built under his tenure still exists. Not sure whether we’ll be able to say that about the Ardern’s government…
        
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        January 28, 2022 1:04pm
      - ISeeRed
        
        Yes. Think Big is often derided, but attempting to make a country self-sufficient, whether in energy or other critical areas, is something to strive for.
        
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        January 28, 2022 3:25pm
    - Tom Hunter
      
      I should add four more things. First, I voted for Labour between 1987 and 1999, including when I was overseas, and then for National between 2002 and 2017.
      
      Second, the lasting impacts were from changes made by Labour (both good and ill from my POV). National, as even many National people now admit merely manages what Labour puts in place, which has been the story of post-WWII NZ. National was created for one reason only and that’s to keep Labour out of power. It has been very good at that single-minded purpose.
      
      Third, National will not lead for change on anything but will merely go with the flow of public opinion as influenced by others (meaning the Left in all its forms). You can see it above in Mapp’s response to Lee C; they’re waiting for the public to get tired and angry with all the mandate crap, especially as those measures fail to stem the Omicron tide, and then National will sweep into power on the back of that. But they’ll never argue because they’re incapable of making arguments.
      
      Fourth, National voters will rapidly discover after 2023 or 2026 that this inability to argue on the big issues will translate to going with the flow on He Puapua, Three Waters and the rest, just as they have with so many other Labour ideas. Public anger against these may save the day, but not National.
      
      I’ve put up here before the following comment I made in 2008 as John Key was on the verge of taking power in government:
      
      I don’t want to drag this thread too far off topic but what is National going to do should it win this November beyond babysitting the institutions of Labour and the Left. Nursing those things along, tiring all the time and steadily losing votes simply by being in Government and getting blamed for the insanities of those self-same institutions. Until the day comes, one or two election cycles down the road, when a revitalised Labour gets back into power and gets to push forward some more. Ratchet Socialism at its best.
      
      And here we are.
      
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      January 28, 2022 11:04am
      - ISeeRed
        
        Prophetic words.
        
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        January 28, 2022 3:26pm
    - Man Among the Ruins
      
      Colville
      I think that it’s equally braindead to validate National and ACT given they are showing no indication of fundamentally altering the form of “prison NZ.”
      
      Life is about balancing priorities and competing interests. As such, the present Covid tyranny is far and away the most pressing issue, so completely dismantling it must be the goal. Who cares if He Puapua and the like is stopped, if we nonetheless continue to live under the thumb and at the pleasure of the State? Personal liberty trumps separatist governance (though extremely undesirable), in my eyes.
      
      Anyone who will not commit to anti-Covid tyranny policy will not get my vote. Frankly, I’d just as soon see Labour get back in as a big middle finger to the useless opposition. The opposition clearly do not represent my interests based on their alignment with Labour’s Covid de facto dictatorship. While I am just one voter, the “opposition” should seriously consider that some people would rather see them decimated politically than to reward them for being so supine for the last 2 years. If I don’t see ant product that interests me, then I’ll choose to buy nothing.
      
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      January 28, 2022 12:12pm
    - bronny1
      
      There’s a good reason for this. If the right keeps supporting mandates then they are as bad as the left. I’ve voted right all my life. The country is seriously f**ked no matter who wins if the bill of rights is just thrown away at government at will.
      So I will vote for neither and if that’s a vote for Jacinta….we’ll it makes no odds to me.
      
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      January 28, 2022 2:40pm
    - Surely Knott
      
      “Its shows the lack of brains out there…”
      Sorry upvoted you when I disagree.
      
      “Any vote that is not for ACT/Nat is a vote for Jacinda. ” Yes it is. So ACT and Nat need to think about that. I will not vote for any party that supports this disgraceful discrimination and apartheid. The mandates have actively restricted my family from haircuts, kids sports, eating at a restaurant, leaving auckland for a holiday, divided families. The opposition parties participated in the hateful divisive nasty comments. They owe the unvaccinated and the unpassported an apology.
      
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      January 28, 2022 7:41pm
  - slightlyrighty
    
    So?
    
    Who else are they going to vote for? Being Anti-Vax in a country where 95% of eligible people are jabbed is a sure fire recipe for not being voted in at all.
    
    It’s a small but vocal minority that is throwing around these Quisling labels, but they forget that politics in this country has always been about the art of the possible, and this requires a certain amount of pragmatism.
    
    Short term acceptance of a vaccine policy is one thing, but attacking a policy such as 3 waters is something else. This is a constitutional issue that goes to the heart of this country, and the concept of ownership, property rights, and race based entitlement. The stealthy replacement of democracy with ethnocracy has huge long term implications that will go on far longer than a pandemic in its (Hopefully) latter stages.
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:25am
    - Simon
      
      “Being Anti-Vax in a country where 95% of eligible people are jabbed is a sure fire recipe for not being voted in at all.”
      
      No the issue is planning and organizing society around clearly failing vaxxes. You can be pro-vaxx but its not everything about the health response to the covid. Vaxx should form “part” of the response not the whole deal.
      
      Look at that utter clown Bishop. Get boosted. Ok then what?? What is the exist strategy?? This is the start of year 3 of this rubbish.
      
      Two shots for summer fam!! Thats failed. What next??
      
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      January 28, 2022 9:08am
      - Man Among the Ruins
        
        The Covidian ideology is unsustainable on the ever-accumulating facts, and it is dying on the vine, but Labour (and apparently National too) are desperately performing CPR on it. If National had a collective brain, they’d be already pivoting their stance to be on the right side of history when the time comes (cynical as that would be).
        
        That current figure of “95% vaxxed” will plummet with each demand for yet another booster. Nobody is now, or will ever be, permanently “up-to-date” with their vaccine compliance requirements, so to use the current figure as a premise for extrapolating towards possible events in the future is wrongheaded. Thinking that what is the case now, and what attitudes seemingly prevail now, is a case of basing the future upon the situation as it stands at present. This is a fraught strategy, particularly given the ever-evolving nature of this issue. For instance, if a majority of people had incorporated the future (or at least, reasonably foreseeable future states of affairs) into their attitudes towards the present as it stood in April 2020, then we wouldn’t be in the situation we find ourselves in now (i.e. “flattening the curve” quickly became medical apartheid in less than 2 years, and this was predictable with a fair amount of confidence). But no, generally, only the present was taken as a factor.
        
        slightyrighy sounds a bit like Trudeau with his “a small but vocal minority” comment (i.e. detached from reality and unaware of the way the wind is blowing). Current events in Canada (i.e. 50,000 trucks, a 70km long convoy, and 1.4 million people descending to occupy Ottawa) demonstrate that the future for Covidians is looking very tenuous indeed.
        
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbng48PTcts&lc=Ugz3Bb0XJkD14SLwquR4AaABAg.9Xi0Rlu1ORZ9XiXGO1lqwo
        
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        January 28, 2022 12:30pm
      - Observer of Life
        
        And the Pfizer CEO tells us the current booster isn’t right for Omicron … they manufacturing a ‘new’ version, ready for March.
        
        “Pfizer and BioNTech launch clinical trial of Covid vaccine targeting omicron”
        https://www.cnbc.com/2022/01/25/covid-pfizer-and-biontech-launch-clinical-study-of-vaccine-targeting-omicron.html
        Key Points:
        Pfizer and BioNTech are launching a clinical trial to evaluate the safety and efficacy of a vaccine that targets the Covid omicron variant.
        The study will evaluate up to 1,420 participants ages 18 to 55.
        Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla has said the company will have the omicron vaccine ready by March.
        
        How about we just all get it (a cold or maybe mild flu) and then move on like the UK officially did yesterday. No more mandates, masks, stay at home orders for them – go Boris!
        
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        January 28, 2022 12:54pm
    - Lucia Maria
      
      And how many of those 95% jabbed were forced?
      
      It’s like the force aspect of that number is flying over people’s heads!
      
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      January 28, 2022 10:37am
      - Man Among the Ruins
        
        Exactly. “95% jabbed” is not at all equivalent to “95% support vaccination.”
        
        The numbers of vaccinated as they stood in about August 2021, prior to the mass-marketing campaign that employed as its centre piece the spectre of Delta, give a very good indication of who willingly took the jabs, versus who succumbed to non-health related coercive manipulation and social pressure.
        
        At that point in August, the vaccinated proportion (give or take, and I’m certainly open to correction) comprised something in the region of 50% (perhaps it was less?). On this basis, 40% or more of those who are currently deemed vaccinated (and crucially, this designation involves an ever-changing criterion) did not do so willingly. I’d therefore be surprised if the willingly vaccinated people are not in the minority.
        
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        January 28, 2022 12:43pm
    - dcrane
      
      Good grief. You can be for vaccine availability and against mandates of course. Sick of this cynical redefinition of “anti-vax”.
      
      I agree they should also oppose 3 waters. He Puapua is an extremely destructive policy suite/philosophy.
      
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      January 28, 2022 1:27pm
    - bronny1
      
      Where did you get the idea this is anti vax?
      No, it’s about mandates. Vaccines are great – esp ones that actually prevent transmission, and illness and have a good safety record – but I want to choose whether to have one. Not be compelled to so I can keep my job.
      
      I know many people who “took two for the team” but are now ready to give up their job if that’s what it takes. So you’re looking at more like 20%+ than 5.
      
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      January 28, 2022 2:45pm
      - Jim
        
        Ex Pfizer exec Dr Mike Yeadon warned us that the FDA had recently changed regulations allowing MRNA vaccine technology to not take previous robust trial processes. The omicron example demonstrates this insanity, how can big pharma develop, trial, mass produce and distribute a vaccine when omicron wave only lasts about 30-40 days?!
        
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        January 28, 2022 8:08pm
      - Fight4NZ
        
        Voila, antivaxxer.
        
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        January 28, 2022 8:55pm
    - blue collar
      
      Agree brother slightly .
      
      Would the answer be to say the removal of emergency powers and the reinstatement of the bill of rights is the top priority , to give citizens their freedom and rights back ,
      At the first opportunity.?
      
      Leaves wriggle room to placate the wowsers , and hope to the switched on .
      
      At least it’s in the conversation .
      
      Nearer election spell out some parameters … eg …. the cost of doing this far outweighs the savings in life and economics and back it up with all the stats .
      Missed operations , overseas misery , mental health toll , tanked economy , actual death , historic death figures …. etc etc etc .
      
      I’m pumped to see the repeal of 3 waters etc , it’s important and a good start .
      
      Just get freedom in the conversation to start with
      
      A vote for Nat /act is a vote for freedom sort of thing
      
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      January 28, 2022 6:36pm
      - blue collar
        
        And say…. unless we get hit with Ebola …. NO MORE MANDATES !!
        
        Gone the day they are voted in
        
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        January 28, 2022 6:44pm
  - G152
    
    Those ‘puirpose filled posters’ may well be liebor stooges attempting to change the story.
    Politicians and their minions lie
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:28am
  - Loddenthinks
    
    I wonder what Chris GET BOOSTED Bishop thinks of vaccines and mandates? Oh wait, he’s made it really clear….
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:28am
    - Simon
      
      Hard to believe that Bishop’s full time job is National’s covid response clown. I mean is he being paid?? Mush be some sort of volunteer position. Surely NZ isnt paying for this garbage. He was on holiday for almost a month.
      
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      January 28, 2022 9:14am
    - Man Among the Ruins
      
      Chris Bishop is the poster boy of cringe. He alone puts me right off National. It’s just embarrasing to see someone shilling the vaccines so hard, especially given that the case for these vaccines and vaccine passes has been so thoroughly shot to pieces that the only thing sustaining vaccine-talk is irrational appeals to emotion.
      
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      January 28, 2022 12:50pm
      - Fight4NZ
        
        “ the case for these vaccines and vaccine passes has been so thoroughly shot to pieces ”
        Not remotely with any credibility.
        
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        January 28, 2022 8:57pm
    - Observer of Life
      
      I sent Bishop a link yesterday, re the USDoD lawyer at the Senate Hearing with Sen Ron Johnson, along with relevant ‘factual’ info.
      Reply back…
      “I’ll take a look but I back the vast bulk of scientists and doctors supporting vaccination”.
      And there in lies our problem. These people are not prepared to step outside the going narrative. I certainly don’t hold out any hope he will put on a ‘neutral, sit-on-the-fence hat’ and analyse it critically. The mind boggles.
      
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      January 28, 2022 12:59pm
      - bronny1
        
        Yes the vast bulk of doctors and experts who don’t want to lose their job and have their life ruined by trolls for going against the narrative. These people still have mortgages and bills to pay so they shut up and wait till it will hopefully be over one day.
        
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        January 28, 2022 2:50pm
      - Ra Henare
        
        OOL
        Bishop is a populist politician. Enuff said
        
        He will join the sheep. ie go with what he is told is the main stream opinion.
        Thats why he is not worth a hill of beans in my view.
        Just another polly trying to get publicity.
        
        Yes I am on his email list.
        He has joined the announcement of announcement crowd.!!!!!!! Sheesh..
        Told him not to waste my time unless he has something concrete to say
        
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        January 28, 2022 3:41pm
      - Drone
        
        It’s not reasonable to expect a politician to step outside the boundaries set by the medical profession. If Chris or any poli did so it would open them to abuse of a different sort and accusations of irresponsible behaviour from many people.
        
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        January 28, 2022 4:58pm
      - Fight4NZ
        
        “ the vast bulk of doctors and experts who don’t want to lose their job and have their life ruined by trolls”
        Oh yeah, that’s what it will be. Not there years of scientific training and experience. They just need to use google more and they couldn’t help but come around.
        LOL
        
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        January 28, 2022 9:00pm
  - westernScientest
    
    What is the alternative? New Conservatives? well maybe I will consider it if they are polling at near 5% come 2023, but i dont really see that happening. outdoors or something like that, they have their own agenda and are just jumping on antimandates as a way to get votes, dont see any reason why they wouldnt sell that policy down the river in a second to shack up with labour it if meant they got 1080 band or something like that.
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:32am
  - Wayne Mapp
    
    LeeC,
    You need to check opinion polls, rather than just your own opinion. Well over 70% of voters support mandates. The 25% who don’t support mandates would be an obvious support pool for Act, but much less so for National. The great majority of voters would be aghast if a major political party has a covid policy which would be open to immediate condemnation by virtually the entire medical and scientific establishment.
    National needs to go where the great majority of voters are at. Going against mandates, and related ideas (immediate opening of borders and ending MIQ) would make it almost impossible for National to appeal beyond the 25%. Judith flirted with these ideas in 2021 and it badly backfired against her. Luxon has been more careful. It is paying dividends.
    There will come a time when mandates and MIQ will go, but that time has not yet arrived. I predict June this year before these things are practical.
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:32am
    - Fight4NZ
      
      Broadly agree, though I would go with a lower % who don’t support vaccination and mandates. I also think there is more wiggle room for ending MIQ or at least getting a major overhaul, but then this has been a point of attack by National.
      
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      January 28, 2022 9:09am
    - cmm
      
      “There will come a time when mandates and MIQ will go, but that time has not yet arrived. I predict June this year before these things are practical.”
      
      It would be PRACTICAL to do those right now.
      MIQ no longer provide a useful means of reducing infections.
      Mandates no longer provide a useful means of reducing infection.
      
      If you believe otherwise, please explain HOW vaccine mandates reduce infection.
      
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      January 28, 2022 9:10am
      - Loddenthinks
        
        Vaccine mandates are not about reducing infection; they serve an entirely different purpose altogether.
        
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        January 28, 2022 9:44am
      - cmm
        
        Loddenthinks: Yup, coercion and punishment. That is not a medically valid reason.
        
        There is some legitimacy in claiming that vaccination reduces severity of outcomes and therefore vaccination should be encouraged to reduce strain on hospitals.
        
        But there is no biological/medical reason to exclude unvaccinated people from employment or accessing resturants etc. Vaccination status has no bearing on being able to vaccinate others.
        
        There might have been once (debatable), but that is no longer the case with Omicron or Omicron 2.0.
        
        What has been created is a whole lot of divisions in society that will not go away when MIQ and mandates are lifted.
        
        Look where we are re Maori grievances even though Maori got the vote before white people.
        
        Think of all the cops, teachers, fire fighters, restaurant workers etc etc who have been coerced into vaccination or who have been fired.
        
        It’s going to take a long time to rebuild some of these bridges.
        
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        January 28, 2022 10:25am
      - John Pakes
        
        cmm, I note that you are saying that “mandates no longer provide a useful means of reducing infection.”
        You clearly believe that mandates did reduce infection in the past. It is just a matter of timing as to when to stop them?
        
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        January 28, 2022 12:56pm
      - cmm
        
        Pakes: “You clearly believe that mandates did reduce infection.. “. Nope, you’re reading between the lines.
        
        With Omicron the mandates provide no benefit at all. There is no wiggle room for argument on that point.
        
        With Delta there was some arguable small benefit – not enough to make a difference, IMHO. Still, it was open for debate and discussion and a mandate could be somewhat justified with the Delta numbers.
        
        No more.
        
        Times change. A mandate that might have had a benefit in Delta Days no longer applies. They are now a waste of time and should be removed forthwith.
        
        All the continued sanctions against people do is divide an already divided society. It seems that is their main goal.
        
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        January 28, 2022 5:32pm
    - Simon
      
      “National needs to go where the great majority of voters are at. Going against mandates, and related ideas”
      
      This is what it boils down to. Which either of the cosy club National or Labo can appeal best to the cattle.
      
      Given the obesity levels in NZ and the connection between the covid and obesity / immune system you think a public health campaign would be ideal from one of the major parties. But no. The race to majority is who can better promise to take care of all the children voters.
      
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      January 28, 2022 9:20am
      - Man Among the Ruins
        
        National typify the “Managerial Class” of empty suits whose only real principle and reason for being at all is simply “being there” for its own sake as an end in itself. Just go with the flow, don’t make any waves by showing real leadership, and enjoy the perks while you can. No doubt this approach is a nice little earner and so great for them, but less so for people who have definite political principles that exceed mere existence, and would like to see them become manifest.
        
        Wayne claims (without citation) that “Well over 70% of voters support mandates.” This is a prime example of the masses being wrong. Nobody yet has presented and argued any form of a cogent positive case for vaccine mandates, so who cares if 70% support them? Who cares if 90% support them? They are wrong to support mandates, because there is no rational case for such a policy, and there still wouldn’t be any such case regardless of whether the vaccines were effective or not. If anyone disagrees with this assessment, then I invite them to lay out the case for mandates, as opposed to a policy based solely on personal choice.
        
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        January 28, 2022 1:02pm
    - Lee C
      
      Wayne, you illustrate perfectly the leadership vacuum in the National Party.
      
      Certain things will happen.
      
      Yes, but Jacinda will call all the shots, and Natioanal as usual will be in the wake, like seagulls picking up tit-bits.
      
      Challenge yourself.
      
      Wake up.
      
      Show leadership.
      
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      January 28, 2022 9:37am
      - Man Among the Ruins
        
        Leadership? Leadership would involve advocating for what is true and therefore what is right but maybe unpopular at the time, and therefore leadership involves vision and risk, and vison and risk are antithetical to the National Party.
        
        “In the beginning of a change, the patriot is a scarce man, and brave, and hated, and scorned. When his cause succeeds, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot.” – Mark Twain
        
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        January 28, 2022 1:13pm
    - Rodney Hide
      
      Hi Wayne
      
      More than most I appreciate the need for politicians to be mindful of public sentiment and votes. But leadership and principles must also play a part.
      
      In times of fear, leadership matters. In times of unprecedented government over-reach, principles matter.
      
      Jacinda Ardern showed extraordinary leadership in locking the country down. I consider it to be the wrong thing to do but it was gutsy. She was also following her party’s principles which favour state power over the individual.
      
      Of course, one intervention leads to another as New Zealand knows only too well and we are now in the predicted mess and a muddle. The future now is very bleak.
      
      It takes leadership to calm a population and principles to lead a country out of a mess. We saw that with Muldoon and then Roger Douglas. Muldoon was very popular. And people were very scared of change: floating the dollar, opening the economy up, removing subsidies, etc.
      
      In normal times, you would be sadly right about polls and public sentiment. These are no longer normal times. It’s going to take great leadership and clear principles to get New Zealand out of the present morass.
      
      WW2 is always instructive if drawn a little too casually. But it was a time of unprecendented fear and panic. And then there was Churchill. He convinced a people they could win against impossible odds. There was a leader.
      
      I am not expecting a Churchill to appear. Or to suggest we are facing the equivalent of WW2. But I am suggesting we are not going to improve our prospects by relying on polls and public opinion. Leaders lead people. They don’t follow them.
      
      Rodney Hide
      
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      January 28, 2022 9:42am
      - MCōs
        
        Robert Muldoon was popular before he became PM, but although he won two elections as PM he was very polarizing and the Nats won less popular votes than Labour under Bill Rowling.
        
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        January 28, 2022 10:22am
      - septic skeptic
        
        The two comments here by Wayne and Rodney show a profound difference between National and ACT. For me, ACT wins hands down.
        
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        January 28, 2022 10:36am
      - Albert_Ross
        
        But first you’ve got to get elected, and you won’t do that by telling people that you’re going to lead them in a direction they don’t want to go in.
        
        Look, it’s not that difficult, and it’s frankly surprising that a seasoned political hand seems still not to get it.
        
        What you have to say to get elected, and what you have to do after you’ve been elected, are completely different things.
        
        Yes, that’s a pity. But it is how modern democratic politics is.
        
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        January 28, 2022 10:45am
      - kowtow
        
        RH
        
        I love your commentary . However I do not believe she showed any leadership over the first lockdown.
        
        Basically the west copied the CCP , first Italy and then as a reporter in the UK DT put it , the others saw they “could get away with it”.
        
        She’s a follower , not a leader.
        
        But our Media have given her a status way beyond her abilidies.
        
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        January 28, 2022 10:48am
      - Lee C
        
        To tell you the truth Mr. Hide, I don’t think the current paucity of charisma in the Beehive requires a Churchill.
        
        It merely requires a politician with the ethical cahones (or fallopians) to expose the elephant in the room.
        
        Namely, that the reponse to covid has been a political lolly-scramble and the people have been lied to, terrorised and bullied into compliance.
        
        I’ve written to Seymour and pointed out that the arena is ripe for such a person to capitalise on the pent-up disgust, and got a polite ‘Thanks for your letter’ and I dare say never got to read it.
        
        He’s obsessed with the Machiavellian fine-tuning approach. A snipe here, a soundbyte there – all with the collective impact of whipping said elephant with a blade of grass, and he’s taking no one with him. In fact, he’s alientaing people.
        
        The ‘small, vocal minority’ are the tip of the spear.
        
        It astounds me that people here are citing ‘95%’ support for vaccinations, when we all know full well people have been bamboozled, frightened, cajoled, threatened and pressured into taking them.
        
        The ‘95% in favour’ are ordinary types who have struggled monumentally to do the ‘right thing’ – as it has been described to them by their elected representatives. They would come out in equal numbers to see you hanged.
        
        What are we waiting for? A Winston Peters, a Brian Tamaki? Another cynical manipulator who will bleed the nation like a tick?
        
        Are the political classes and their water carriers truly going to sit on their hands and enable Ardern and co. to decay our Nation and its Institutions merely for their own narrow political gain?
        
        In wartime, they would be executed for treason.
        
        How many of these sychophants would be able to face down a decent prosecution Lawyer were they accused of assisting with and facilitating crimes against humanity?
        
        What would their defense be – “I went along with it, because I lacked the imagination or thical character to do my duty by the people who trusted me?”
        
        The real virus here is political corruption, arrogance and nepotism in my view.
        
        Ps. Love your work.
        
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        January 28, 2022 12:26pm
      - Wayne Mapp
        
        As septic skeptic says, the two contributions from myself and Rodney do show the difference between most National and ACT activists (and MP’s).
        
        It seems to me that most on the ACT side are natural contrarians. They are instantly skeptical of much of the pronouncements of the medical and scientific establishment. For instance climate change, as well as covid. Though I note that David Seymour is more nuanced on both these issues.
        
        In contrast, National activists and MP’s, typically being more of the traditional establishment, are much more inclined to accept the consensus of medical and scientific specialists. Not automatically, but also not instantly skeptical. In large measure that also reflects the majority of centre and centre right voters.
        
        So hence National MP’s are basically going to accept that climate change is occurring and that it has a substantial manmade component. National MP’s would also think that New Zealand has to play its part in the international effort. Obviously not at the radical end, and also in a way the essentially preserves the engine room of our economy, the primary sector.
        
        The same applies to covid. National will not automatically reject the medical and scientific consensus. The playbook would inevitably be a bit different to the current govt, for instance more antigen testing in the hands of the private sector, more taking on board what Sir Ian Taylor has to say.
        
        National obviously knows that this won’t appeal to the majority of the active commenters on Kiwiblog, but it would also know that the majority of the commenters come from the skeptical school of thinking. As will be obvious to most, the host of the blog, David Farrar, would be much closer to mainstream National party thinking than most of the commenters.
        
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        January 28, 2022 12:38pm
    - solarsailer
      
      Trump won in 2016 because he knew something the polls didn’t, that people were fed up with the establishment, and they were not revealing that to polling companies. How confident are National that mandates have widespread support? Because mandates are popular on Twitter or Facebook? Because the chattering class say so? Because the media says so? What ordinary person in their right mind would reveal their disagreement with mandates or MIQ given the vitriolic response to any public figure who does.
      
      When was the last time National went door to door and asked people what they thought? A lot of normies are fed up with it and want to see the end of it and National seem unable to recognise that.
      
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      January 28, 2022 11:18am
    - mawm
      
      “National needs to go where the great majority of voters are at.”
      
      Once the National Party had principles that it stood up for. Now it seems to have become just like all the leftwing parties around the world where their values are determined by polling. If I don’t know where they will go I might as well vote for Winston.
      
      At the moment I see a party that is quite happy to see some New Zealanders having their rights taken away from them based on questionable “science”, I see NZ’ers being coerced into taking experimental medication, many against their will and I see a path forward being set by the PM of social credit scores determining what one can do. I do not like the idea of a Techno-autocracy controlling my life ….. and neither ACT or National are standing up for New Zealanders and their God-given freedom. To (mis)quote GW Bush – Either you are with us or against us.
      
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      January 28, 2022 11:19am
    - Observer of Life
      
      Wayne: National need to look at ALL information from overseas sources and evaluate what really is going on here. I realise the media are bought and paid for Labour lovers, but at some point this ugly mess is going to be brought to light and those that sat on the wrong side aren’t going to look good. Looking at you National AND ACT. If there is a God, please help us!!!
      
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      January 28, 2022 1:04pm
    - Ra Henare
      
      Wayne. Believing opinion polls is fraught with danger. ie 70% of voters support mandates.
      
      I strongly recommend you watch this educational on opinion polls.
      
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GSKwf4AIlI
      
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      January 28, 2022 3:44pm
  - Warren
    
    Instead of continually putting the knife into National become a MP or a board member of a political party of your choice and show us what a knowledgeable person you are instead of back stabbing and whinging.
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:33am
    - Brian McDonald
      
      Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
      “back stabbing and whinging,” gee I never noticed.
      
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      January 28, 2022 9:21am
      - Lee C
        
        Who says the left have no sense of irony?
        
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        January 28, 2022 12:34pm
    - Lee C
      
      Oooh poor ickle politicians.
      Am I being a bully?
      Did a nasty man upset our darling idols?
      Do they have hurty feelings?
      
      LoL.
      
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      January 28, 2022 12:32pm
  - curry4me
    
    LeeC: I agree I’m done with ACT. Been a member since 1994.
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:35am
    - Brian McDonald
      
      Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
      I don’t think Act is done but it appears to be heading back to looking like a one-horse party. Even then David’s laconic drawl has a hint of becoming monotonous.
      All over is that the bets are down once again with the hopefuls saying the wheels are coming off and others far from so sure. It’s been the nature of this Government since Robertson got pilloried over the economy but was proved right. The answer always has seemed to lie in the predictions about Covid, blind betting as so many have done here only to be proved wrong and then pretending they were right all along.
      3 months ago it was the low vaccination rates of Maori that was the problem – now they’re at 90% in Auckland so one less thing to squawk about.
      I’m interested to see if Labour jettisons the RATs testing controversy in some way, they will if they are smart and I’d say they have a big machine working on it.
      
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      January 28, 2022 9:39am
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        Labour’s big machine has spent the last 2 years making sure NZers didn’t get access to RATs.
        
        It’s too late to change the narrative…
        
        The RATs aren’t going to get here in time for folks to use them.
        
        My kids in Aussie spent over $300 testing themselves over December-January to ensure that they didn’t inadvertently infect their work mates.
        
        But now most ordinary folks in Greater Melbourne can’t find anywhere selling RATs.
        
        Anyway.. with the s-in-law now having caught omicron, they won’t be needing RATs for a few months.
        
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        January 28, 2022 10:41am
      - MCōs
        
        The shortage of RATs in Oz is not caused by the NZ Govt. From what I understand the Govt over there doesn’t supply them to the public. They must be purchased by the public leading to price gouging.
        
        Here in NZ the media & some people are acting like omicron is the Teliban swooping over the hill & RATs are the only defence.
        Personally I’d compare it to the stray dogs that are all over the place in Bangkok. If you’re not careful one might bite you and if you’re really unlucky it’ll have rabies, but a vaccine gives you protection before the event or an antidote after.
        
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        January 28, 2022 11:45am
  - Jade Warrior
    
    Lee C, if you think Three Waters is just a beltway issue, I can tell you that you are very, very wrong. Over the Christmas and New Year break I did a tour of the South Island, visiting a lot of places and talking to a lot of people. I can tell you that there is significant disquiet about Three Waters among a wide group of New Zealanders.
    
    It seemed like every five kilometres I was passing another sign saying “Stop Three Waters” or something similar. And what surprised me is that many Labour voters are also very much against the whole proposal. Maybe I shouldn’t be giving Labour advice but I would strongly recommend they abandon Three Waters now. Otherwise the poll results they will be getting later on this year will make last night’s results seem like a Sunday stroll in comparison.
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:37am
    - Lee C
      
      I refer to how the voter blocs in the major constituencies are largely oblivious to this issue, Jude. They are teh ones who will really matter in the election.
      
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      January 28, 2022 9:41am
  - cmm
    
    Lee C: I think you have to play the game that’s on the field.
    
    There is no way that ACT would be getting any oxygen in the MSM if he didn’t go along with some of the CV19 nonsense.
    
    Bishop is quite another matter though. He’s going way overboard and has no redeeming qualities.
    
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    January 28, 2022 9:35am
  - Other_Andy
    
    Interesting to see the replies to your post.
    It seems that most National voters do not value BASIC human rights and are willing to throw anybody under the bus who thinks that mandating a medical treatment regardless of its effectiveness, safety, personal need and circumstances is a political trading point.
    A ‘vaccine’ that only temporarily prevent infection, doesn’t prevent the spread and has so far infected only around 15,000 people in two years’ time as opposed to 200,00 people a year that are infected by the flu. We don’t even know how many people have actually been killed by this virus instead of having died WITH it.
    And people still think it is a good idea to force this ‘vaccine’ on people, a vaccine with few benefits for the majority of people, no long term data and a rising number of adverse effects?
    Where do those people have their line in the sand?
    We are now mandating this ‘vaccine’ for children…
    The mandates, while being the worst, is only one of the many issues National and ACT are willing to trade for votes.
    We have medical professionals and scientists being silenced and threatened.
    Protestors being arrested and jailed, laws being ignored and retrospectively rewritten.
    We have restrictions on movement, New Zealanders being locked out of the country.
    All this is possible because Labour is taking advantage of a virus to keep the ‘State of emergency’ going and an opposition too scared to upset the media.
    
    Why would I care about Three Waters while my children and grand children are being forced by the state to undergo medical procedures they don’t want or need and are being silenced when questioning the benefits and risks?
    Is there really anything more important than your children, grandchildren and the freedom to choose what is good for them and you?
    
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    January 28, 2022 9:39am
    - cmm
      
      I agree entirely that the current Nat and (to a lesser extent ACT) policies are violating many human rights.
      
      However it is a choice between
      A) Kicks you in the head and kicks you in the balls.
      B) Just kicks you in the balls.
      
      You could choose the moral high ground and say vote for neither, but until that option turns up you might as well vote for B.
      
      Who else are you going to vote for? TOP? Winston First?
      
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      January 28, 2022 10:31am
    - mawm
      
      I think the most pressing problem is regaining our freedom and democracy. Solve that and 3 Waters can be thrown out.
      
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      January 28, 2022 11:30am
    - Lee C
      
      Yes, Andy,
      They are a bunch of spineless soft-cocks.
      
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      January 28, 2022 12:35pm
    - Observer of Life
      
      Other_Andy:
      Hear hear …
      1000 UP-Ticks for you!!
      
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      January 28, 2022 1:07pm
  - blue collar
    
    I’m almost at the point I’d vote for Brian Tamaki if he ran , at least you know he would free us and repeal mandates .
    I’m not into him but respect the fact out of all the men in NZ he alone had the stones to stand up to this shit , didn’t quaver in the face of tyranny , got hammered by the state and still had the grace to deal with it all with dignity .
    New Zealander of the year right there .
    I’m ashamed I didn’t do more .
    He stood up , he alone , the first …. we all owe him a debt of gratitude .
    
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    January 28, 2022 6:50pm
- Spoff
  
  When will the NZ population…….?
  Maybe when the truckers organise:
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72sKFVjY8PY
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:20am
- Ra Henare
  
  I am continuously amazed at Cabinet decisions.
  Do they ever run some of their schemes. ie Traffic lights, mandates past a Behavioral psychologist?
  
  Ie Population response given the publicly announced information
  a) Omicron is mild compared to previous strains.
  b) Covid catching is currently minute in the NZ population
  c) If you test positive and you dont work for the government then you have to lock you and yours up for at least 23 days. No pay, no recompense, no business
  
  I suggest that the shrink will say. Many will not test.
  
  Keeping in mind what the goal is!!!!
  To stop overwhelming hospitals.
  Best they stick to the goal..
  No play silly buggers with mandates and high Vax rates.
  
  What happened to dishing out self help kits if you have symptoms of covid and test positive.
  Ie reduce the effects.
  The current MOH advice borders on the ridiculous.
  Advice for those who get Covid.
  
  bed rest (if lying down, change position every 30 minutes to two hours)
  taking paracetamol or ibuprofen to relieve headaches, aches and fevers
  keeping hydrated with regular sips of water
  honey or lozenges for a sore throat
  decongestants for a blocked nose.!
  
  Gesus wept!
  
  https://www.health.govt.nz/our-work/diseases-and-conditions/covid-19-novel-coronavirus/covid-19-health-advice-public/advice-people-covid-19
  
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  January 28, 2022 4:04pm
CJames

There was a good speech in the British parliament on the incompetence of modellers. It was reported in that scourge of the left, the Daily Mail. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-10441729/BOB-SEELY-MP-failed-Covid-lockdown-modellers.html
To quote from just part of it “university academics refuted the Imperial study’s claims that NPIs imposed by 11 European countries saved millions of lives. They said ‘their methods involve circular reasoning’ and that the UK’s lockdown was ‘superfluous and ineffective’. There’s a growing body of work which is, frankly, taking apart Imperial’s study. Remember, we have spent £370 billion on lockdown. We shut schools because we were scared the kids would come home and infect older people, who would then die. Well, a paper in the BMJ published last March found ‘no evidence of an increased risk of severe Covid 19 outcomes’.”
The assumptions and methodology in the Imperial College modelling were a major part of that used here to scare the government into shutting down the country. And it is still ongoing in the hermit kingdom. The favoured epidemiologists and modellers still reign supreme. No dissent or alternative views are allowed. When will David Seymour’s article, published in UK and Australian press, and belatedly in edited form in the Ferald, cause him to be villified from the pulpit of truth, Will his thoughts come with a trigger warning?
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January 28, 2022 8:01am
- Lee C
  
  Ah, they’ve found a scapegoat – so it’s teh beginning of teh end.
  
  Notice how Jacinda always presages her statements with ‘After advice from the experts’?
  
  But ‘just following orders’ is no defense in law, Jacinda.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:13am
  - MCōs
    
    The government can remind us they have been taking/acting on advice from the Director General of Health all they want, by it’s them what makes the decisions, which is not the same as ‘just following orders’.
    Ashley Bloomfield implements government strategy. If he profoundly disagrees with what he is directed to do he should resign. If he won’t do what he’s directed to do either the government reconsiders their direction or replace him.
    BTW
    We sometimes hear that the government has ‘ignored Treasury advice’.
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:37am
    - oldfella
      
      MCos: I’m waiting to hear a local politician say they’re ignoring the treaty. Now that would be … interesting.
      
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      January 28, 2022 12:23pm
  - CJames
    
    It would help, Lee, if you actually read the article (or even better the full speech) before commenting. He berated the politicians for following the bad advice.
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:42am
    - Lee C
      
      My view here being that the media, having done such a good job, stirring up the fear-porn at the outset, are now deciding to report on views which propse a new narrative, CJ.
      
      Ergo politicians never take the blame for their messes, ‘experts’ do – and it’s the beginning of the end…
      
      Watch the international narrative unfold.
      
      I predict Ardern and co will be throwing a few ‘experts’ under a ‘Shot Bro-Bus’ in the following months as they try to ethically- cleanse themselves pre-election.
      
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      January 28, 2022 1:02pm
- Philview
  
  I have just read Chris Trotter’s article attacking Dan Wootton and Zinzan Brooke. Per Chris right wing men are attacking Jacinda because she is a threat and also per Chris, Zinzan has had too many knocks to the head. I doubt any leader has ever been given an easier ride by the NZ media.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:20am
Benedict Yu

I recall commenting that Luxon would make National more popular and that the immediate effect would be to take support away from ACT. Sadly it appears I was right.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/300505540/new-poll-national-take-support-from-act-labour-still-ahead

With all that has happened 49 percent of folk would vote for Labour or the Greens.

The polls in the next 6 months will be critical. Labour will need to fall into the 30s.
.
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January 28, 2022 8:05am
- Colville
  
  The first poll with Labour in the 30’s will be cause for a bottle of something nice!
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:18am
  - lifesgood
    
    Better get it on ice, it won’t be long now.
    
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    January 28, 2022 9:35am
- PeeJay
  
  I wasn’t too surprised by the polls. I think what is important is the trend. Ardern is losing popularity every poll and she is undoubtedly their biggest (sole?) asset. Margin of error probably has Labour in the 30’s already to be fair.
  
  Regardless, as inflation starts to bite, and this will be new territory for most, interest rates rise and most importantly, omicron gets going with large numbers of cases and deaths, sadly, on the rise, I think we’ll see the mood turn. Labour need to get Omicron over before winter comes – they need to let it loose. But they won’t, and if it drags into winter (which it could), it could get really ugly, really quickly.
  
  Regardless of the detail, with inflation, interest rates and the cases and deaths on the rise, at that point, much to the disappointment of many of the right on this blog, all Luxon needs to do to win will be to look and act moderate. The election won’t be be won by convincing the electorate to turn to right of centre politics. The closest we ever came to that was with Brash but he still lost (this point seems to be lost on some on here). They will win by not looking scary. I don’t like it but National need to deal with the electorate they have, not the electorate they would like to have. They won’t win by being radical – I don’t really know why, but radical right of centre politics seems to terrify the majority of the electorate. That won’t change, therefore moderate centre right is what will win them the government benches.
  
  When enough disaffected average voters have fallen out of love with Ardern because they are flat broke and can’t afford luxuries, or even basic items, the needle will turn. And nothing the MSM tries, the soft focus shots in the Women’s mags, effectively state propaganda, the red wedding, nothing will work when the mood shifts.
  
  Just my two cents!
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:30am
  - cmm
    
    Unless people get 10% raises to make up for the 6% inflation, then the people will really start to complain.
    
    It’s all very well sucking it up for Cindy, but that only works as long as people don’t feel like they’re going backwards.
    
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    January 28, 2022 10:33am
  - andydownhere
    
    Ardern their sole asset? Definitely.
    Robertson in charge. gone by lunchtime
    
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    January 28, 2022 7:06pm
- slightlyrighty
  
  in 2020, The center Left block was 57.9%
  
  the Center Right was 33.2.
  
  The Poll last night had the Center Left at 49%
  
  The Center Right was 43%
  
  a 24.7% margin is now 6%
  
  A 4% swing will make life interesting,
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:30am
  - I remember when
    
    Dont Know 7%, NZ First 2%, Opportunities 2%,
    New Conservatives 1%.
    So is the difference really 6%.
    
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    January 28, 2022 9:06am
  - Suze Wainwright
    
    @sr – a 4% swing will make life interesting
    
    Yes, possibly. Siouxie, The Spin-off et al will probably start accusing aotearoans of losing their nerve…
    
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    January 28, 2022 9:10am
- G152
  
  I would question those polls.
  After all the nonsense that we have been subjected to and the length of time that we’ve been inconvenienced.
  And its going to get worse
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:32am
  - oldfella
    
    G152, it also came on the heels of news that Cindy sacrificed her own wedding plans. Probably earned her a point or two with the fan club, even though I’m yet to see/hear any confirmation that the wedding was ever on in the first place.
    Lots of speculation, but nothing concrete. Hmm…
    
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    January 28, 2022 12:40pm
- Frank the tank
  
  They will. Likely economic stagflation by winter 2022 will ensure that.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:37am
- westernScientest
  
  The gap is still narrowing though, and adern herself was down to 35. its interesting that labour as a party are polling higher than their leader now.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:48am
- pdm
  
  BY – I am optimistic that will happen especially if inflation continues to trend towards 10% or even more.
  
  Robbo and Orr have both been promoted well beyond their capabilities to manage anything let alone a countries economy so inflation may well be Nationals saviour as it becomes rampant.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:48am
- redeye
  
  Ardern on 35% is the lowest she’s been since Tracey Watkins created the term Jacindamania.
  The extra 5% that support labour and not Ardern must be Robertson’s supporters.
  Still the trend is good. Only six point between the left and the right is the positive to take away.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:56am
- BananaLlama
  
  Well Labour have fallen in every One News poll since the election so it is only a matter of time. I reckon about May or June you will see Nat/Act tied with Lab/Gross once inflation really starts to bite and Labour go stupid.
  
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  January 28, 2022 10:19am
Yvette

RATs – and I mean that
<b<Government priority in rapid antigen test orders ruins businesses' pandemic plans – Food and Grocery Council
… “I didn’t exercise any specific legal power, I was in discussion with one of the companies and then my team followed up with the others and just created an expectation with them that they would fulfil the government’s orders, and again this is an order that is for the entire country, including private businesses.” – Bloomfield
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/business/460293/government-priority-in-rapid-antigen-test-orders-ruins-businesses-pandemic-plans-food-and-grocery-council

“If you are implying we have taken the supply of others, absolutely not,” said Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2022/01/omicron-government-planned-to-have-covid-19-rapid-antigen-tests-for-sale-weeks-ago.html

A seeming direct quote of Bloomfield and a seeming direct quote of Ardern.
One can not be true.

Did the supplier, or suppliers, of RATs, having business orders first, suddenly decide themselves to send everything to the Government without prompting?

Why lie about it, unless it reveals the Government didn’t get in first, which is what the whole matter shows anycase.
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January 28, 2022 8:05am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Why lie about it,
  
  I really think Jacinda Ardern had no idea about the effort to source RATs…she’s just fed the information she needs at each speaking point.
  
  Back in November we were specifically told this:
  Rapid antigen tests will be available for the public to purchase at pharmacies from December 15, and businesses will be able to source the tests from December 1 to use in their workplaces.
  
  https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2021/11/coronavirus-latest-on-covid-19-community-outbreak-friday-november-26.html
  
  Then Ardern disappears for weeks…
  
  and emerges to tell us just 8 days ago:
  rapid testing would be free for the community, and there would be more details released next week on how they would be distributed.
  
  https://www.1news.co.nz/2022/01/20/rapid-covid-tests-will-be-widely-available-in-nz-ardern/
  
  The truth is:
  She hasn’t got a clue.
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:57am
- Hard Cheese
  
  It’s just both of them using semantics and wordplay.
  
  Have they taken the *existing* supply of others – no. That’s the dodge Ardern is using, and Bloomfield tried to use. Have they taken the *future* supply of others – yes they have.
  
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  January 28, 2022 11:44am
CJames

It needs to drop enough so the Greens and Labour are below National and Act. Then all those backbench Labour MPs on their highest paying job ever will start getting very upset. Some may even go rogue. But we live in hope.
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January 28, 2022 8:10am
Paulus

Labour will fall into the 30s when people find out what life is costing them – 5.9% inflation last week and something like 7.5% in six months time.
Oh, it is John Keys fault of course
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January 28, 2022 8:13am
Benedict Yu

Benedict Yu reporting live from Kāinga Ora Land in Christchurch.

There is a ‘mixed development’ where there is a mix of Kāinga Ora and private tenants. Yesterday one of the private tenants phones Kāinga Ora to complain about their tenants. My close associate Kāinga Ora tenancy manager races over there to find the four Kāinga Ora tenants – all single women – brawling and screaming. One had a knife. Two of the units – and these are brand new units – had the windows smashed. And they had then resorted to slashing car tyres.

My associate gave them a lecture, but at the end of the day there is nothing she can do. Lesson is under no circumstances rent privately in a complex where there are Kāinga Ora tenants.
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January 28, 2022 8:13am
- alex Masterley
  
  Lesson No 2 – do not buy a property in a mixed development where KO owns or leases property.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:18am
  - Captain Mainwaring
    
    Lesson No.3 – Never vote for a Government that prioritises the ‘rights’ of feral tenants over their neighbours’ rights for a peaceful existence.
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:29am
    - curry4me
      
      Captain Mainwaring Lesson No.4 – NZ is buggered. Stick a fork in it, it’s done. Buy a one way ticket to Oz.
      
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      January 28, 2022 8:40am
      - RightNow
        
        Bali for me. At least there I know how and when to pay the bribe to be left alone.
        
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        January 28, 2022 9:30am
    - Benedict Yu
      
      In this case the private tenants are desperate. And you know what the result will be?
      
      The private tenants will leave. The owners of the vacant properties will see the writing on the wall and sell their units to KO.
      
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      January 28, 2022 8:42am
      - artemisia
        
        Why would KO buy them BY, if the properties have anti social neighbours who wont / cannot be moved? Why buy foreseeable trouble. (I’m serious, well almost.)
        
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        January 28, 2022 9:59am
      - bronny1
        
        That’s good though for the private owners as KO is known to pay well above the market.
        
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        January 28, 2022 3:07pm
      - NeverMindTheBollocks
        
        KO will buy them because they are cheap.
        
        And hey – why not dump even more terrible tenants next to the bad tenants who caused the owner-occupier to bail out?
        
        It may be true that KO can’t get rid of bad tenants – but nothing stopping KO Managers housing worse tenants next door.
        
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        January 28, 2022 5:09pm
  - artemisia
    
    Quite so alex, but that information is often not known to private buyers until too late. KO has very deep pockets and competes with private buyers of new properties. That would be buyers who have trouble borrowing, developers facing financial strife and a huge social housing waiting list where over half of households have no children – single people (most) or couples. So 1 bedroom apartments are in high demand, can’t blame developers under pressure for taking the money. Sorry neighbours.
    
    Plenty of exemplary social housing tenants, but only need one or two in medium to high density complexes.
    
    Predict an increase in gated communities, including retirement villages.
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:30am
    - alex Masterley
      
      Agreed on the lack of knowledge.
      These days if clients tell me they are buying in a block of apartments or in a regenerating area eg Mt Roskill i ask about social housing in that area. It can induce a change of mind about the property being considered.
      Likewise if they are buying a house adjacent to blocks of apartments or social housing. that has the same effect.
      In Sandringham the area around Haverstock road has become a little bit problematic, theft, car theft and the like, because of a large redevelopment which has some social housing.
      
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      January 28, 2022 10:07am
  - Nickc2
    
    Lesson No 3 – Convince your elderly neighbours not to sell their houses because KO will buy them, put a couple of drug-addled mums and their kids in there, subsidise their rent and not prevent gang members from frequenting the damned place resulting in broken glass oll over the road and wrecked/damaged cars left on the unmown front lawn. This is Akld’s North Shore FFS.
    This is my personal experience and I’m really pissed off with it because there’s nothing I can do about it.
    
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    January 28, 2022 8:44am
- Frank the tank
  
  Sounds like 4 high quality young ladies.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:26am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    I am told they are all in their 50s.
    
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    January 28, 2022 12:55pm
    - Frank the tank
      
      LOL even worse. I’m assuming they have the usual affiliations?
      
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      January 28, 2022 1:17pm
- G152
  
  Dont mend the windows. Winters coming
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:33am
  - artemisia
    
    So if KO don’t fix broken windows, the tenants will issues a 14 day notice and if not done take KO to the Tenancy Tribunal for an order to fix. Tenants may or may not have to pay (depends) but if they do have to pay it will be drip fed for months or years.
    
    Tenants have most of the rights these days, so at least in the private sector landlords are highly risk averse.
    
    Social housing waiting list skyrocketing, now over 25,000 households and a couple of thousand new added each month. Correlation or causation?
    
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    January 28, 2022 10:08am
- Benedict Yu
  
  The other thing – when my close associate KO tenancy manager gives feral tenants an earful, she now frequently gets the reply “We know you can’t do anything to us”.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:44am
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    Not necessarily. Just threaten to house even worse tenants next door.
    
    “I see you have chums associated with the darker hued club. How do you feel about neighbours from the bitser mob club?”
    
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    January 28, 2022 5:12pm
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  If a private owner sells up & gets bought out by KO at a lower price than otherwise because of the behaviour of neighbouring KO tenants; then KO leave themselves open to the charge of deliberately tanking the market for their own benefit.
  
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  January 28, 2022 1:02pm
  - Observer of Life
    
    NMTB: Would they care? Me thinks NO.
    
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    January 29, 2022 12:29am
Pavel

Did anyone notice stuffs article yesterday about the covid outbreak at soundsplash? They were claiming that young, unvaccinated, people were jumping the fence like it was the unvaccinated who sparked it yet on TV3 news it was confirmed a double vaxxed 17yo was the one who had covid. All these outbreaks are happening with people who are double vaxxed yet they try and blame the unvaccinated. The narrative is falling apart. What’s the point of the vaccine pass if a vaccinated person can catch, spread and force everyone who came into contact with them into isolation? Time to stop the spin, admit the vaccine doesn’t work to well and stop scapegoating the unvaccinated as it’s not them spreading covid at large, vaccine pass events.
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January 28, 2022 8:17am
- mandk
  
  I fully expect to be blamed for the fact that the Vax does not prevent covid being spread and caught.
  
  The overwhelming evidence is that omicron is relatively mild, so let’s just allow it to do it’s thing and allow everyone to get on with life.
  
  The costs of the current response are vast: missed cancer diagnoses and treatments etc, poor mental health, businesses going to the wall, kids not being able to have a normal school education, families unable to see their loved ones overseas because they don’t know when they will be able to get back to NZ.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:56am
- cmm
  
  It’s called lying.
  Cindy does it lots.
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:23am
  - Nickc2
    
    If you see her mouth moving (which is a lot), she’s lying!
    
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    January 28, 2022 9:33am
tknorriss

I think there is good hope in the poll from last night.

The gap between the right and left now is only six points. That means it only takes a 3% swing over the next 18 months to put the National/Act combo back in the game.

Who knows, Labour may have already burned that 3% already after the RAT fiasco we have all witnessed.
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January 28, 2022 8:18am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Labour only have Jacinda Ardern propping them up…as she slides down the popularity pole, Labour’s support will weaken.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:22am
  - Nickc2
    
    Someone must be pulling their strings because I fail to see how so many people collectively could be so dumb.
    What’s that again (my PA’s saying something)? I don’t believe it, she’s saying Helen Clark’s on line 2.
    This just proves even Political has-beens pay attention to KB.
    
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    January 28, 2022 9:43am
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    The trend is not her friend
    
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    January 28, 2022 1:03pm
- Paulus
  
  But look at the damage that Labour can do before the election and then blame the new Government for it.
  Usual Labour Party practice – at least Ardern will not be there by then leaving the alternate liar Robertson to try and bluff his way out, and blame Muldoon.
  Cullen did it before remember with the Railways.
  Terrible man !
  
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  January 28, 2022 10:36am
Sparrow

Wow a great article by Mathew Hooton in the Herald. Naturally with the Herald its in Premium cant let the plebs read it. Gets stuck into this incompetent government. Hell as a long time old fashioned Labour voter never thought I would agree with Hooton. Oh how I wish she would remove Mickey Savages photo from her desk she is insulting his memory.
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January 28, 2022 8:18am
- alex Masterley
  
  Hooton gives the government bocquets and brickbats in his columns.
  Todays one is not just one brickbat but a succession of them.
  
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  January 28, 2022 10:09am
Yvette

The inequity of the Government’s Covid-19 response could have been addressed had the Māori Health Authority already been in place, submitters into legislation behind the groundreaking entity say.
Māori health organisations were among the more than 4000 submitters on the Pae Oranga bill, which will also establish Health NZ and disestablish the country’s 20 district health boards.
John Tamihere, speaking on behalf of Te Whānau o Waipareira Trust, said their organisation having to take the Ministry of Health to court in order to get vaccination data for Māori were examples of why an independent Māori-focused entity was essential.
“This legislation is the first legislation in our history that will elevate us into some form of equilibrium,” Tamihere said. [1]

The Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency will consider taking its case to the High Court, Waitangi Tribunal or the Human Rights Commission should the Ministry of Health refuse to share vaccination data for 5 to 11-year-olds.
…
It was the latest development in the data-sharing saga between Whānau Ora and the Ministry of Health, which saw the former take the latter to the High Court twice before the desired data was shared – giving Whānau Ora more information on unvaccinated Māori in the North Island. [2]
… but still, apparently, not what they require

Will the Māori Health Authority just be able to handover data that the likes of Tamihere demand?

[1] https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/maori-health-authority-would-fix-inequity-of-covid-response-submitters-say/GLWJJNKGCHEPEU4FWLP5XC3NHA/
[2] https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/covid-19-omicron-outbreak-whanau-ora-considering-court-or-waitangi-tribunal-action-over-child-vaccination-data/H4YNWTSDMKD5UUSAZKQSFFL7DQ/
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January 28, 2022 8:18am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  Has anyone actually asked Maoris about whether they want their confidential health data handed over to John Tamihere?
  
  Plenty of Maoris will be uneasy about that, not least because it could turn out to be a land grab. Not all want to be associated with Maori politics.
  
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  January 28, 2022 1:07pm
Lee C

What’s the point of voting National?

To get children jabbed, only more effieicntly, and under threat of losing state benefits of being able to shop for food.

You think the likes of Chris Bishop will be able to resist having a permenent hard-on while he dreams up ways to make poeple ‘comply’ – sorry – ‘choose’ to agree with vaccine mandates?

Nope, they will not win, because, people like me will stay at home, or willl join a new kind of party rather than vote for them or for ACT.

And Labour will win on a reduced majority enabled by the frightened, the feeble and the corrupt.
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January 28, 2022 8:19am
- RiP NZ
  
  Bishop and Seymour massive disappointments in my book. Jacinda lied about mandates, lied outright.
  
  Ending mandates, ending exclusionary policies should be a cornerstone of any free thinking party.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:25am
  - kowtow
    
    When all else fails you must vote for ” the least worst option”.
    
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    January 28, 2022 9:12am
    - mawm
      
      Why? It just gives them legitimacy.
      
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      January 28, 2022 11:47am
    - bronny1
      
      Well I won’t be. I’d rather keep the Nats out than let them think their behaviour is acceptable.
      
      4 1
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      January 28, 2022 3:12pm
- Philview
  
  The point of voting National is that Chris Luxon will get other people around the table and be open to ideas on moving the country forward. Jacinda’s Government is a closed shop where only an inner circle are allowed in. Hence the least transparent government tag.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:26am
  - Taieri
    
    The point of voting National is that Chris Luxon will get other people around the table and be open to ideas on moving the country forward.
    ———
    
    Yeah, right, spot the difference…
    
    “National Party finance spokesman Simon Bridges said that while he didn’t support the light rail plan, he did support value capture schemes to fund major infrastructure projects.”
    
    https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/300505493/properties-around-aucklands-light-rail-likely-to-face-value-capture-tax
    
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    January 28, 2022 3:05pm
    - Benedict Yu
      
      Why will houses go up in value because a rail line gets built next to them? Wouldn’t it be the opposite?
      
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      January 28, 2022 5:44pm
- Frank the tank
  
  Yeah nah. By mid-“nec” year covid will be the least of our worries. Sky high interest rates, skyrocketing crime, dropping property values and a ‘fat bastard’ lookalike parachuted into the PM role.
  
  People will be gagging for Junior John Key.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:29am
  - artemisia
    
    Reckon Labour will not be sleeping well at night as their support along with the Greens holds up and looking likely they could form the 2023 government.
    
    A pyrrhic victory. Imagine trying to deal with a wrecked economy with the Greens as kingmaker.
    
    Still time to bed in the ideological, then leave the work and odium to others, while resting up and sniping from the sidelines.
    
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    January 28, 2022 9:04am
- curry4me
  
  Lee C: I guess in the near future; Air New Zealand will have to lay on a lot more flights to Oz. They’ll return virtually empty though.
  
  32 2
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  January 28, 2022 8:42am
  - Frank the tank
    
    Nah Dutton will just load them up with 501 trash
    
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    January 28, 2022 9:17am
    - Steve Otto(North Shore)
      
      And guess who the 501’s will vote for?
      
      13 2
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      January 28, 2022 10:28am
      - Paulus
        
        Can 501s vote as they will not have been in New Zealand long enough to legally register although I understand there is little checking of voter registrations, a bit like the USA.
        
        7 1
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        January 28, 2022 10:40am
      - Batman
        
        Sorry what? Little checking?
        
        You have to present your Voter card to vote, or register and if you’re not valid your vote is removed later on.
        
        Baselessly calling our election systems into question is a real dickhead move.
        
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        January 28, 2022 11:07am
      - Steve Otto(North Shore)
        
        Sorry Batman – forgot the sarc tab.
        Others would have known I was pulling their left tit
        
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        January 28, 2022 11:13am
- MCōs
  
  Apart from anything else people with your anti vaccine way of voting will have no influence on the next election.
  The pandemic appears headed for a crescendo a year out before polling day. By then it’ll be back to the usual stuff; economy, housing, law & order/gangs, unemployment with the blast from the past, inflation and petrol prices.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:54am
- Opie
  
  The mandates (of which I am against in any way shape or form) are the least of the issues we have currently. You are getting mandates in most countries regardless of governments, but the better ones are still keeping their countries afloat. Once they wake up their country wont have burnt to the ground.
  
  The main reason we need rid of this government is to stop the wasteful spending, race based decision making, tax rule changing, increased poverty causing, council asset grabbing, rapid test stealing, hyper inflation muppets causing any more damage to this country.
  
  Not only is our democracy being destroyed, our country is too.
  
  We will wake up eventually and move past this but I fear there will be little left of this country by then.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:57am
  - MCōs
    
    Certain amount of hyperbole in your rant there, Opie.
    
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    January 28, 2022 3:05pm
  - bronny1
    
    Wrong. Human rights trump all that in my book.
    
    7 1
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    January 28, 2022 3:14pm
    - krazykiwi
      
      Agreed. Once the state separates it’s citizens into the acceptable and the dirty unacceptable there is no greater issue to resolve. Perhaps unintended, Opie’s applauding of counties that get economics right while human rights are destroyed is not atypical of the acceptable classes of any fledgling tyranny. Picture a respectable 1930’s Teutonic gentleman enjoying an Arab coffee, reading the commerce section of the Berliner Morgenpost while his Jewish neighbour is hauled away. I’m sure said gentleman was more interested in commodity prices than the human rights of his neighbour.
      
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      January 28, 2022 6:53pm
cmm

eBike injuries and sales up.

Well what do you expect? They’re the new gotta-have for the 60 year old who then thinks he’s superman and crashes.

ebikes are not really bikes. They’re slow motorbikes and should be thought of as such.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/127596365/ebike-sales-up-sharply-over-five-years-and-so-are-the-injuries
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January 28, 2022 8:24am
- Steve Otto(North Shore)
  
  Put a heavy ACC levy on the ebikes to cover the cost.
  Genter supporters in 3, 2, 1
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:10am
  - MCōs
    
    Steady on there, Steve, that’s the thin edge of the wedge.
    Next you’ll want home gardeners’ backs levied, a meter on your diy nail gun . . . .
    
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    January 28, 2022 3:11pm
    - krazykiwi
      
      …or the filthy unvaxxed paying for their own healthcare 🙂
      
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      January 28, 2022 7:06pm
- bronny1
  
  I know lots who ride e mountain bikes. Good riders but in their 50s 60s and up are finding it harder to do the 3 hours in the hills with their mates. They are not the problem. It’s the ones who have barely ridden a bike and have no skills that are having accidents. Maybe they should make them do a skills course before they can buy one?
  
  They are the same people who flout trail rules and destroy tracks in the wet.
  
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  January 28, 2022 3:16pm
- krazykiwi
  
  I’ve ridden bikes daily (or at worst, weekly) for close to 30 years. Anything from a 15min sprint, a daily commute, or a 13.5hr marathon Wellington->Christchurch ride in one go. That was 14,500 calories for those who count! I have developed a very finely tuned ‘radar’ for what’s going on around me, and a whole bunch of risk intuition – intuition simply being accumulated experience that surfaces guidance before your brain surfaces the connected logic. Along with some disciplines (like NEVER wearing headphones) this has kept me pretty safe. Only major scrapes have been in MTB and road races where things can, and do go sideways very quickly.
  
  Much like driving, most of us can identify a novice or poorly skilled driver in front of us, and it’s exactly the same with cyclists. Since the normalisation of e-bikes I’ve seen a massive increase in (a) novice cyclists, (b) average speed and (c) cyclists and pedestrians required to mingle on the same strip of tarmac. The staff article could have been written 10 years ago, put in the top drawer and pulled out to fill space. In other words, all totally predictable.
  
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  January 28, 2022 7:05pm
Maggy Wassilieff

Another piece on the declines of democracy and science education in New Zealand.

https://pointofordernz.wordpress.com/2022/01/27/the-treaty-and-ideology-the-kiwi-way-of-thinking-that-is-corroding-our-democracy-and-debasing-our-science/
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January 28, 2022 8:24am
- cmm
  
  And they wonder why it is getting harder and harder to attract good scientific/technical people to NZ and then keep them here.
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:31am
- Jack5
  
  Great article at Point of Order pointed to by Maggy Wassilieff. Thank you, Maggy.
  
  I liked this bit, quoting Elizabeth Rata:
  
  Dialectical materialism was the ruling ideology in Stalin’s Soviet Union, Christianity was the ideology in the pre-Darwinian centuries of English universities, and…
  
  In post-1980s’ New Zealand it is the racial ideology of two political categories of people defined by their ancestry.
  
  Here’s a link direct to Elizabeth Rata’s article at Newsroom:
  
  https://www.newsroom.co.nz/ideasroom/science-or-ideology-the-nz-university-at-the-crossroads
  
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  January 28, 2022 10:48am
Maggie's partner

Rather than wasting 2 minutes looking up the word INEPTITUDE in the dictionary, just watch how the government hands the Soundsplash outbreak
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January 28, 2022 8:29am
- Frank the tank
  
  bahahahahahaha
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:18am
ecco

Heard about a student signed up for the covid tracing centre. $30 per hour. No wonder no private sector employer can find any staff when the government is spraying money around like that. Apparently there are several hundred of these people on the payroll waiting idly for omicron to hit. Ardern’s hairbrained contact tracing regime, the won’t mean jack soon when the numbers get too big to contact trace every case. You can only imagine that all the testing centre people and vaxx centre are getting paid similar rates. These are the largely unskilled people martialling the vaxx centre car parks etc.

I guess this is just another way Ardern gets the students onside dishing out money like that to them and keeping unemployment numbers low. The students will remember her for that coming voting season. At that age you don’t really care who’s paying for it and where the money comes from. ie the NZ taxpayer. This is a classic labour student bribe and basically pumping money into the economy to her voter base. Same reason she let all the music festivals continue. All these tactics unfortunately, in conjunction with the uni voting booths, will pay off handsomely for Ardern, come election time.

Hate to think what NZ’s debt to gdp ratio will be even by the end of this year. Ardern has already doubled it just about to 34% with her hugely expensive covid but ineffective covid response.
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January 28, 2022 8:31am
- kowtow
  
  ‘These are the largely unskilled people martialling the vaxx centre car parks etc.’
  
  Unskilled ?
  
  I’d say unsuitable . Most of them in the footage look like they couldn’t even do a gentle 50 yard jog , and as such are in the high risk category if they caught this bat lurg.
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:09am
  - ecco
    
    It struck me when I went for my vaxx that MOH had approached the local marae to run the centre I went to…
    
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    January 28, 2022 10:01am
- MCōs
  
  Why don’t you volunteer your services for free instead of grizzling about it?
  
  1 5
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  January 28, 2022 3:14pm
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    Too busy working & paying tax
    
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    January 28, 2022 5:16pm
curry4me

https://www.bitchute.com/video/wOoSl1cWzNj6/
SCOTUS Might Strike Down Affirmative Action for College Enrolment.

So, college enrolments could be decided on merit. About time.
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January 28, 2022 8:32am
curry4me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4t4Id8gOIM

Major Jolt to China’s hypersonic program.

What has now come as a blessing in disguise for America is the defection of a top Chinese scientist to the West. A report published by Daily Express revealed that a senior rocket technician, connected to the state-owned Aviation Industry Corp of China, recently defected to the US with the help of the UK’s top intelligence agency. [5:43]
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January 28, 2022 8:32am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  Well, that’s a man bites dog story
  
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  January 28, 2022 5:17pm
Maggie Pie

JACINDA: “Grant, does printing massive amounts of money cause inflation?”

GRANT: “How would I know, my dad was the Accountant, not me”

😀 😀 😀
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January 28, 2022 8:33am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  I absolutely refute that.
  
  49 0
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  January 28, 2022 8:34am
  - Observer of Life
    
    I reject the premise of that question!
    (And channeling the Swede …)
    “How dare you!!”
    
    7 1
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    January 28, 2022 1:22pm
- Biscuit
  
  Maggie, Labour are so bereft of workable policies that I swear if a chap with the name Low Inflation arrived at our border, Cindy and Grant would ‘requisition’ him as they are doing with the rapid antigen tests…
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:17am
Maggy Wassilieff

The folks at “The Standard” are finally waking up to the destruction Labour has wrought on the poor.

https://thestandard.org.nz/labour-has-overseen-massive-inequality-increase-bernard-hickey/
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January 28, 2022 8:33am
- artemisia
  
  There is a large segment of the population not bothered by rising costs. They are the well off and those whose incomes are CPI adjusted or outside the tax system.
  
  Others not so much.
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:46am
- JimBobJoe
  
  and it wont change their mindset one bit…. the Left are intellectually retard when it comes to human actions and economics
  
  Command economies don’t work forever and are only truly effective under emergency (read WAR) conditions when its all about survival. Once the imminent threat is lifted people want choice and that is what command economies whether full blown communist or dilute hard left socialist in ideology constantly fail.
  
  Planning and chaotic competition are balancing forces both in life and economics…. the mixed market model with some solid restraints on political in my view meddling work best
  
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  January 28, 2022 8:53am
- Paulus
  
  But they all support Cindy and Labour still at the Standard,
  Just piss and wind people.
  
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  January 28, 2022 10:43am
Clownworld

Belgium vs NZ vs any other country.
Is it all the same playbook?
Propaganda used by govts controlling the media’s message. Labelling people to divide between us and them.

https://www.bitchute.com/video/tIXdrbp3JsVp/

I am unconvinced justice is coming in the short term. More likely more engineered chaos.
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January 28, 2022 8:45am
Benedict Yu

I briefly tuned into talk back radio in the car yesterday. This guy phones up. His daughter attended that music festival thing where there have been COVID cases. His daughter now has a sore throat.

The guy says “I will keep her at home but there is no way I am getting her tested because we will all be locked up – and there are five of us in the house – it could be 14 days + 10 days + +…”

Well surprise surprise. This will be the standard response. When this thing gets going expect the numbers of reported “cases” to be a fraction of the actual numbers.
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January 28, 2022 8:53am
- graham
  
  Yep. Time and again we see the glaring idiocy of rules and requirements being made by people who spend their whole day polishing a seat with their backside, and have no idea of how things work in what the rest of us call “the real world”.
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:00am
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    They just don’t understand human nature. Their default mode is command & control, not persuasion via rational argument.
    
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    January 28, 2022 5:19pm
- MCōs
  
  Nobody is ‘locked up’.
  They’re supposed to self isolate.
  If that chap’s daughter has covid it’s odds on she’ll pass it round the family, who will either stay at home (self isolate) or go to work and infect some more people.
  Depending on your point of view that mightn’t bother him much anyway, because plenty of people are saying everyone’s going to get it eventually.
  
  4 25
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  January 28, 2022 9:19am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    I think you are missing the point. If I develop symptoms I am going to stay at home. Mostly. But I can get in my car and go for a drive to an isolated beach or park. If I “report” it I cannot do that for fear of the Government.
    
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    January 28, 2022 10:12am
    - MCōs
      
      What’s the government going to do?
      You won’t be wearing a gps monitor.
      Furthermore
      You might just have a cold, hay fever,
      In a couple of weeks you might go through the whole thing again.
      
      3 8
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      January 28, 2022 12:30pm
      - Benedict Yu
        
        Well if I could get one of those test kits I would know if I had COVID!
        
        And I would not put it past people to dob in positive people for leaving their home. You mention to a colleague that you have tested positive. Next thing the collague or a colleague of the collague spots you on beach. Goes to the police. Next thing you are hauled off to MIQ.
        
        Are you telling me that is a fantasy? Not in the current hysteria it is not. I will be tested if I am sick. Seriously sick.
        
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        January 28, 2022 2:28pm
      - MCōs
        
        Interesting you say that.
        Sarah Palin, who can’t keep her mouth shut, is not vaccinated and announced she has tested positive for covid-19, again.
        She then went to a restaurant in New York.
        Personally I consider that irresponsible, but I accept there are others who have a different point of view.
        https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2022/01/27/sarah-palin-covid-restaurant-elios/
        
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        January 28, 2022 3:26pm
- westernScientest
  
  how long until they start offering kfc to get a test i wonder?
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:20am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    I would need a case of Krug champagne. 🙂
    
    7 0
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    January 28, 2022 2:29pm
    - bronny1
      
      I’d settle for a new mountain bike.
      $15 k should do it.
      
      5 0
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      January 28, 2022 3:20pm
    - NeverMindTheBollocks
      
      Don’t settle for less than vintage, Benedict!
      
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      January 28, 2022 5:20pm
- cmm
  
  Yup, that’s why I reckon we have well over 1000 infected.
  
  MIQ is a complete waste of time, as are vax passports and mandates.
  
  Who would have thought that draconian rules have unintended consequences? Unfortunately that’s all they know.
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:27am
- [email protected]
  
  Is it possible that the new 24 day isolation rule was put in place so people would not report their infections? That would keep the reported numbers down.
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:48am
  - cmm
    
    It’s a bit like not allowing people to use RATs at home.
    
    Making it a hassle (eg. having to go to the pharmacy) over just grabbing another from the stack in your bathroom drawer significantly reduces how many RATs get used.
    
    Also people doing RATs at home can keep the result confidential. The pharmacy doesn’t keep it confidential, so that also adds the threat of 24 day lock up.
    
    This means that RATs will be available in theory, but usage will be lower than it should be. A good soviet move to reduce consumption.
    
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    January 28, 2022 10:52am
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    Yep..
    
    However, I don’t think the Government will be able to hide hospitalisation numbers so easily.
    
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    January 28, 2022 11:32am
    - cmm
      
      But there are fewer of those with Omicron. Far, far fewer.
      
      And if they only test symptomatic people in hospital, the numbers will shift by an order of magnitude.
      
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      January 28, 2022 5:36pm
pdm

Crumbs – the Maggy’s’ies have taken over.
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January 28, 2022 8:54am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Crumbs?????
  
  No –
  Pearls of wisdom
  Nuggets of gold
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:14am
  - Biscuit
    
    If you say so, Maggy, heh heh.
    
    Me, I thought – reading from the bottom post upwards – that pdm was alluding to the fact that all three of the upcoming Twenty20 Cricket Internationals between the Black Caps and Australia will now be played in your neck of the woods.
    
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    January 28, 2022 9:21am
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    Cast before swine!
    
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    January 28, 2022 5:22pm
Other_Andy

Sweden has decided against recommending COVID vaccines for kids aged 5-11, the Health Agency said on Thursday, arguing that the benefits did not outweigh the risks.

“With the knowledge we have today, with a low risk for serious disease for kids, we don’t see any clear benefit with vaccinating them,” Health Agency official Britta Bjorkholm told a news conference.

She added that the decision could be revisited if the research changed or if a new variant changed the pandemic. Kids in high-risk groups can already get the vaccine.

Risks?
Wasn’t the ‘vaccine’ ‘Safe and Effective’?
And this government is still going full steam ahead vaccinating children with a vaccine under threat of penalties for those that decline.
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January 28, 2022 9:03am
- bronny1
  
  I see that sports organisations like Auck Rugby League have announced mandates for kids to play. All over 5 yrs 3 months from (I think)April.
  
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  January 28, 2022 3:22pm
  - Clownworld
    
    Rugby league the most clean untarnished professional sport ever.
    
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    January 29, 2022 1:02am
Warren

Isn’t it ironic that after Labours and the Prime Minister’s poor poll results last night it has only taken less than 24 hours for the sweeteners to be pushed out for Aucklanders to ponder.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2022/01/14-billion-auckland-light-rail-bid-gets-green-light-decision-on-second-waitemat-harbour-crossing-in-2023.html
With such a immediate response Jacinda Ardern and Grant Robertson with Michael Wood have been unusually quick in their billions of dollars bribes.
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January 28, 2022 9:18am
- Captain Mainwaring
  
  So the irresponsible spending continues unabated.
  This ‘bribe’ is going to backfire on them because it does nothing for the 90% of Aucklanders who depend on a car to get around.
  
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  January 28, 2022 10:11am
- alex Masterley
  
  Light rail isnt a sweetner.
  
  20 0
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  January 28, 2022 10:11am
- Dougal10
  
  Why is wellington even involved in this ,when auckland is now a supercity that is supposed to control its own destiny.
  
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  January 28, 2022 10:26am
  - hullkiwi
    
    Because it can’t afford it. Auckland has had 2 Labour (socialist) mayor’s who sing (have sung) from the same song sheet.
    
    Big unnecessary infrastructure, that costs a fortune, and the cost of which is way beyond the city/country. Reminds me of NZ 1960 to 1984.
    
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    January 28, 2022 12:05pm
- Paulus
  
  Have I got a cycle bridge to sell you !
  Nobody except Labour supporters will believe a word of it – we have heard this for the last 15 years.
  
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  January 28, 2022 10:45am
- hullkiwi
  
  Most definitely not a sweetener for Auckland.
  
  It is still a half baked scheme/transport project in search of a problem or as Morgan said of Labour “it is still a pig with mascara”.
  
  This project is wring on so many levels, it is difficult to know where to begin, except to say why?
  
  What is the Transport problem that Wood, Jacinda and Matt Lawrie wanting to solving? Because not one of these three has worked in transport and despite the pretence, not one of these three know what they are talking about.
  
  Finally, given that CRL will not be completed until 2025 (a 9 year project) to deliver a 3km tunnel and 4 stations that was meant to cost $2.5 by, but will cost $10bn. The questions beg:
  1. How long is it going to talk to compete the LRT albatross; and
  2. How much is this albatross really going to cost New Zealanders? The final cost will certainly be far greater than $16bn and the benefit to cost ratio will be way south of 1 (just like CRL)!
  
  Don’t blame Aucklanders for this project, we don’t want it!
  
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  January 28, 2022 12:20pm
- Alwynn
  
  How long do you think it will be before the people of Auckland notice that, in spite of the PM’s promises, they are going to bring in a Capital Gains Tax and apply it to the family home as well as other property?
  The aren’t going to call it a CGT of course. Instead it will be a “value capture tax”.
  
  Robertson says
  “Finance Minister Grant Robertson said they were investigating a “value capture” tax, to take a cut from property owners looking to make “a windfall” from land along the proposed Auckland Light Rail corridor.”
  
  Minister Michael goes further and implies that it will apply to family homes.
  ““It is fair and equitable that those who receive a financial windfall from significant public investment make a contribution to the project. We are clearly signalling that will happen, and that is a live prospect from today,” he said.
  Levying properties to fund new infrastructure has already occurred, with new homes in the Milldale development, north of Auckland, paying an extra charge.”
  and
  “A regime for light rail would be different in that it would apply to existing properties.”
  
  So you can expect a levy on the increase in value of your property anyway at all that they deem was “along the route of their new tram”
  Like anywhere in Auckland?
  Or anywhere in New Zealand?
  
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  January 28, 2022 3:32pm
Maggie Pie

TRENDING

Remember those leaked photos that emerged of the attendees at the ‘Young Labor Conference’ in Waihi ? 🙁

Meet BRITTANY….new President of the Tampa-Bay Young-Republicans.

https://twitter.com/thebrittanyjea/status/1486330477128699915
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January 28, 2022 9:22am
- Frank the tank
  
  Mags the GOP is the party of Hotties:
  
  Nicki Haley
  Joni Ernst
  Kristi Noem
  Sarah Palin
  The knockout Trumpy wants to represent Alaska
  Candice Owens
  The list goes on….
  
  Always immaculately presented and attired in comparison to our frumpy lot.
  
  20 2
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  January 28, 2022 9:49am
  - Maggie Pie
    
    YUP! And as a matter of comparison….
    
    https://www.waitawhetacamp.co.nz/blog/2018/02/18/prime-minister-visits-waitawheta-camp/
    
    SHEESH 😀
    
    15 2
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    January 28, 2022 10:13am
    - Steve Otto(North Shore)
      
      Pre programing future voters
      
      10 1
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      January 28, 2022 10:21am
    - Frank the tank
      
      I’d link a picture of Kristi Noem riding a horse holding an American Flag but the mods would probably flag it as porn.
      
      Makes you want to move to South Dakota.
      
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      January 28, 2022 11:31am
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    Candace Owens. Would like to see her run for VP maybe 2028? Her book ‘Blackout’ is fantastic, explains a lot about the Dems and the black Americans
    
    12 1
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    January 28, 2022 10:18am
  - MCōs
    
    You can add Caitlyn Jenner to the list, Kid Rock, Arnold, who I heard described as resembling a condom filled with chestnuts.
    Even Trump used to look pretty before his body went bad on him.
    
    2 6
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    January 28, 2022 11:15am
- Lee C
  
  Sweet Jesus.
  
  5 1
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  January 28, 2022 12:05pm
I remember when

Have been watching Heaven’s Gate: The Cult of Cults:
At the moment Aotearoa is a Cult.
It has a leader who is out front and constantly in view.
The leader advises the Cult of their expected behaviour and anyone who fails to obey the rules is removed from the Cult.
Everybody in the Cult agrees with the actions taken because they belong and are doing the right thing.
The Cult removes itself from any news or views that don’t fit in with its rules.
This makes it increasingly insular as those on the outside (New Zealanders overseas) are finding out.
As the Cult increases the level of authority it has to weild, the number of members reduces and those members who remain become increasingly enthusiastic.
As long as a large number of our elderly remain in real fear of Covid the Cult has a driving force.
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January 28, 2022 9:26am
- MCōs
  
  “It has a leader who is out front and constantly in view.”
  
  People have just been grizzling because the PM’s been out of view for awhile.
  Unless you’re referring to the Apostle Bishop Brian.
  Wannabe Leader of the Aotearoa Cult.
  
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  January 28, 2022 11:04am
krazykiwi

Favorability Ratings : US Political Leaders from RCP

Biden   40.8%
Harris  36.8%
Trump  42.6%
Pelosi   32%
Schumer; 29.8%
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January 28, 2022 9:34am
MCōs

The same people who demanded we close the borders faster, paid a premium for vaccines, locked up the gangs, built more roads, bailed out businesses, complained we weren’t vaccinating fast enough, wanted to build dedicated MIQ facilities, spend, spend, spend, are wondering why inflation is up??
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January 28, 2022 9:35am
- Frank the tank
  
  100B and no new roads, hospitals, ICU beds……..
  
  Your team – own it.
  
  23 2
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  January 28, 2022 9:51am
  - Batman
    
    Frank I think you mistake Mcos for a Labour voter. They appear to be fairly centre, which I admit would seem to be left wing to people waaaay out on the nationalist fringe.
    
    2 24
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    January 28, 2022 10:59am
    - Frank the tank
      
      Lol. You lot in ‘the middle’ are like immigrant swimmers at Piha blissfully unaware that you’ve been dragged left 400m
      
      But hey Just for you:
      
      https://townhall.com/tipsheet/guybenson/2022/01/27/georgia-biden-approval-tanks-republicans-lead-in-major-statewide-races-n2602453
      
      Jim Jordan is warming up the impeachment articles for the “Felch”.
      
      9 1
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      January 28, 2022 11:28am
  - MCōs
    
    Frank the Tank,
    Apart from anything else nobody asked me whether shitloads of money should be spent vaccinating the population, propping up thousands of businesses, big & small, throwing good money at Transmission Gully, the extension to the motorway from Puhoi north, the Waikato Expressway, the motorway to the airport and stuff around Chch.
    Americas Cup.
    
    1 6
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    January 28, 2022 2:07pm
    - NeverMindTheBollocks
      
      I am sick to the back teeth of trailing around the crappy roads that constitute Centennial Highway & am looking forward to cruising along Transmission Gully in my V12.
      
      Wellingtonians can thank me for my contribution to local warming later.
      
      3 0
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      January 28, 2022 5:28pm
      - MCōs
        
        I used to think the same forty years ago.
        
        0 0
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        January 28, 2022 9:39pm
- bronny1
  
  Isn’t National super inflation adjusted?
  
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  January 28, 2022 3:25pm
krazykiwi

Neil Young to Spotify: “It’s either Joe Rogan, or me”

Spotify to Neil Young: “See ya, Neil. Taking your music down as we speak. That 60% of your worldwide streaming income gone. Got any more ultimatums?”
42 2
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January 28, 2022 9:39am
- Opie
  
  Massive own goal from Neil Young.
  
  They ability to hold a position different to the masses still clings on by a thread
  
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  January 28, 2022 10:00am
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    Hey! Neil has his view & was prepared to put his money where his mouth is. Like him or loathe him, he’s happy to wear the consequences. I don’t have a problem with that.
    
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    January 28, 2022 5:29pm
lifesgood

Best tweet I’ve seen for a while : “Anyone with half a brain would vote Labour”
37 1
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January 28, 2022 9:44am
- patreon_36178434
  
  That would raise the average IQ of Labour voters
  
  8 0
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  January 28, 2022 1:03pm
  - Alan Wilkinson
    
    Even the Labour Cabinet only managed to get three Ministers with half a brain so they have to do everything.
    
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    January 28, 2022 10:23pm
Rusty

Spoke to an old hippie activist from the late 60s/early 70’s who protested over issues fashionable at the time — the bomb, womans lib, apartheid, dope etc,

Asked the old hippie aged in his mid-70s — what do you think of the Govt targeting your aged groups personal rights and freedoms considering you protested over those things?

His answer — Catching covid scares me more than losing my personal freedoms.

Maybe his answer sums up a lot of Nzers thinking on the scaremongering this Govt has installed in peoples minds.
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January 28, 2022 9:47am
- MCōs
  
  I’m in my almost mid seventies.
  What personal freedoms have I lost that bother you so much?
  I can’t duck over to Thailand and expect to return when I fancy, but then catching covid on the way over there makes the trip too expensive anyway.
  What else?
  
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  January 28, 2022 3:38pm
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  He’s lost his nerve. Or maybe is suffering from late-onset conservatism.
  
  1 0
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  January 28, 2022 5:31pm
- JohnRidd
  
  Rusty, that is a very perceptive observation.
  
  Jacinda et al. are shouting “Fire” in the theatre.
  
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  January 28, 2022 7:15pm
kevn

@kk… Just go Neil, no prob.
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January 28, 2022 9:51am
Frank the tank

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/guybenson/2022/01/27/georgia-biden-approval-tanks-republicans-lead-in-major-statewide-races-n2602453

One for Batty.

Gotta hand it to Haley – burn of the year so far.
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January 28, 2022 9:57am
- Batman
  
  Yes the polls show voters are unhappy with a dysfunctional government full of morons making money from insider trading and can’t even pass voting rights or drug price reforms because of fundamentally anti-democratic GOP reps, Jim Crow-era procedural rules, and bought-off politicians which would be cured by said voting reforms.
  
  None of that is new. The question is, what’s the go-around to resolve it. Remove the big corporate influence and gerrymandering right? You have been for that previously, give the voters their rights and power back.
  
  Cute that Nikki is talking tough while openly saying she will bend over for Trump if he runs. She must think she can supplicant her way to a better Cabinet position now that she has realised Trump is still in control and he’s her ticket to power.
  
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  January 28, 2022 10:57am
  - 1920x1080p
    
    You could say all of that in a different way that doesn’t make you seem like a prick. Try it some time.
    
    12 1
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    January 28, 2022 1:08pm
  - Frank the tank
    
    Saltier than your namesake in a Chinese wetmarket. Your first line appears like you were slowly getting it but alas…….
    
    Isn’t it ironic that Democrats want to make it easier to illegally get into the country and vote than order a cheeseburger.
    
    Fear not Bat. Nancy doesn’t want go back to her crypt yet, half the team want to exhume Hillary for 2024 and AOC is happy sculling Tequilas in Miami. Team Blue in fine form heading into the mid terms.
    
    Aaaaand just for some laughs the latest from Dr Hot Mess (would be a great replacement when St Ash goes to 3 on the Labour list).
    
    https://www.foxnews.com/politics/cdc-walensky-google-own-website-pandemic-response
    
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    January 28, 2022 1:32pm
andretti

Productivity has fallen off the cliff in my business (hotel) Before the pandemic it cost $11.50 labour to clean a room,last few weeks the cost is now $24.50.
Room rates have dropped so its entering serious territory for us.
Labour is that short that the inmates are now running the show as they know they have all the power.The situation could get worse before it gets better.
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January 28, 2022 9:59am
I remember when

According to Bernard Hickey, homeowners and businesses are $900 billion richer since the onset of covid, and the Government’s interventions, while the poorest are now $400 million in debt thanks to wage deflation and rents rising faster than income.
Except owner occupiers aren’t, they still live in the same house, with the same contents and if they have one, the same mortgage.
An increase in asset value is relative – it doesn’t make you richer.
Of course the Greens want to tax us for the increase and redistribute the non-existant $1.3 billion.
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January 28, 2022 10:00am
- mawm
  
  A CGT is nothing but a tax on inflation.
  
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  January 28, 2022 12:06pm
  - hullkiwi
    
    Yes, and who is:
    1. Responsible for managing inflation; and
    2. Responsible for helping to Stoke the flames of inflation I’m an economy?
    
    Governments, or put another way a group who benefit from their own incompetence and we the sheeple are powerless to stop them at the trough!
    
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    January 28, 2022 12:33pm
- hullkiwi
  
  Unrealised gains can disappear just as quickly as they grow because of speculative activity.
  
  And yes, the politically jealous want to tax these unrealised “paper” gains. But will they give you a tax credit, if things turn to custard. Of course not, there would be a better chance of making pink pigs fly than making socialists give tax refunds on profits that never were!
  
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  January 28, 2022 12:30pm
Steve Otto(North Shore)

Taxpayers’ Union.
https://www.facebook.com/TaxpayersUnion/photos/a.448026671968025/4467716659998986/
8 2
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January 28, 2022 10:12am
Maggy Wassilieff

Census Year – next year

Another expensive balls-up in waiting?

https://www.newsroom.co.nz/stats-nz-braces-for-250m-census
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January 28, 2022 10:22am
- krazykiwi
  
  A quarter of a billion dollars to run a census? There must be incompetent socialists in charge.
  
  31 1
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  January 28, 2022 10:26am
  - cmm
    
    Or very competent …. depending on how you look at it.
    
    $50 per person is ridiculous. Typing up/scanning/whatever the info costs less than $1 per person. Distributing and collecting the census docs costs less than $1 per person.
    
    That leaves well over $40 per person for the consultants etc to make pie charts.
    
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    January 28, 2022 10:59am
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    It costs a lot of money to pay the right people to count properly
    
    10 2
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    January 28, 2022 11:16am
    - Alwynn
      
      You remind me of Dolly Parton.
      She said “It costs a lot of money to look this cheap”
      You say “It costs a lot of money to stuff up the Census again”
      They’re not going to let James Shaw near it this time I hope.
      
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      January 28, 2022 7:20pm
- kevn
  
  @Maggy… Now, how to ‘cook’ the data? Might not make good reading.
  
  8 0
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  January 28, 2022 10:31am
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    I’ve got a year to decide what Ethnicity I’d like to be known as.
    
    Usual choices are something like:
    
    *European
    (I admit to having spent 8 weeks of my 68 years in Europe….. although I was nearly 50 before I first got there)
    
    *Caucasian
    Never been to the Caucasus region
    (might work for Hubby & our kids)
    
    *pakeha
    perhaps…..but should I be defined by a term that labels me by my skin colour (pale, white) and implies that I am a foreigner or an immigrant?
    (I was born in NZ and have lived here all my life)
    
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    January 28, 2022 11:02am
    - Maggie Pie
      
      Imagine the dilemma Golriz and Ricardo must face.
      
      18 2
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      January 28, 2022 11:23am
      - Jack5
        
        Golriz’s definition is fairly clear: by birthplace and ethnicity she’s from Iran – whose name means Land of the Aryans.
        
        Golriz seems to be coping stoically with her health problem. She’s got fortitude, soldiering on in Parliament. Brave lady.
        
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        January 28, 2022 11:58am
      - NeverMindTheBollocks
        
        Is “tosser” one of the categories?
        
        2 0
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        January 28, 2022 5:33pm
    - Yabster
      
      cross them out an put New Zealander
      
      15 0
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      January 28, 2022 11:23am
  - rangitoto
    
    I will write Yamna/WHG/Neolithic Anatolian mix.
    
    7 0
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    January 28, 2022 12:03pm
    - Maggy Wassilieff
      
      The jury is still out on my lot..
      https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6754546/
      
      11 1
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      January 28, 2022 1:18pm
      - NeverMindTheBollocks
        
        Put African. We all come from the Great Rift Valley.
        
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        January 28, 2022 5:34pm
- MCōs
  
  Last time, as you will recall, it was a debacle because it was done online.
  Previously people came to one’s door with the forms and returned to pick them up again.
  I think it was meant to be a cost saving method instigated by whoever drew the short straw and in the last National administration viz Scott Simpson.
  The hapless James Shaw was left holding the baby and now it’s poor old David Clark.
  If it can be done for $50/head I’d be most surprised.
  Be a good job for the unemployed track & trace people.
  
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  January 28, 2022 3:54pm
  - MCōs
    
    Same cost to the public as the wretched Americas Cup.
    
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    January 28, 2022 3:56pm
BeaB

Remember when John Key was at 42% as preferred PM and Phil Goff or whoever hadn’t broken 20 but Radio NZ announced Labour was ‘closing the gap’?
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January 28, 2022 10:31am
Maggie Pie

So, this government to spend $20Billion on Lite-Rail tunnels running from Wynyard Quarter to MT ROSKILL!!

Remuera residents being overlooked once again 🙁
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January 28, 2022 10:41am
- Captain Mainwaring
  
  Remuera residents don’t need to worry about slow trams apart from having to pay for them.
  They’ve got Bentleys and Mercs.
  
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  January 28, 2022 10:48am
  - MCōs
    
    By which time petrol will be $5/litre & the train will be free to Eden Park from Mangere Bridge pour moi.
    
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    January 28, 2022 10:56am
    - Maggie Pie
      
      If it’s ‘free’ Cossie….who’s paying for it?
      
      17 2
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      January 28, 2022 11:18am
      - Yabster
        
        lol thats socialist speak- “free” means the diminsing pool of net positive tax payers are paying for it!
        
        9 0
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        January 28, 2022 11:25am
      - hullkiwi
        
        Maggie, sadly he is correct, it will be free. It is the way of tram systems, you can’t manage revenue protection!
        
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        January 28, 2022 12:38pm
      - MCōs
        
        Frankly, Maggie, I don’t give a damn.
        Same people that paid for my trip to Waiheke Island the other day.
        
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        January 28, 2022 4:02pm
    - Klondike
      
      $5 a litre will be good, will reduce congestion on the roads and all the Cindy voters who helped create this mess will be the most impacted.
      
      8 3
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      January 28, 2022 1:37pm
      - MCōs
        
        Might be higher if Russia invades the Ukraine.
        
        1 0
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        January 28, 2022 4:04pm
      - NeverMindTheBollocks
        
        Yeah, bring it on, I say!
        
        1 0
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        January 28, 2022 5:34pm
UrbanNeocolonialist

Sweden has decided against recommending COVID19 vaccines for kids aged 5 to 11. The benefits do not outweigh the risks, their Health Agency argued.

If only our govt would see sense on this matter but ideology and embarrassment (of admitting they were wrong) will prevent that.
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January 28, 2022 10:47am
I remember when

Wrongly reported cmm. Sorry.
[deleted, vaccination lie – Mod]
Surely it can’t be that hard to find a way to use them, that keeps them away from the vulnerable if that is felt necessary.
If the patients know they are unvaccinated they can make their own decision.
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January 28, 2022 10:47am
I remember when

Nowhere for Labour to hide on the TV News last night at 6pm.
On TV1 Jessica had to try to dampen down the damage from the poll.
TV3 must have had chilli for lunch.
They piled the agony on.
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January 28, 2022 10:50am
UrbanNeocolonialist

Want to see an appalling propaganda graph? Here’s one published by the Whitehouse. Look closely at the top of the y axis.
https://twitter.com/WhiteHouse/status/1486709480351952901/photo/1
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January 28, 2022 10:52am
- graham
  
  Well spotted 🙂
  
  7 1
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  January 28, 2022 11:19am
- cmm
  
  Cindy: Hold my beer.
  
  11 0
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  January 28, 2022 11:46am
- bronny1
  
  What’s the issue? 6% on one chart and 7 on the other?
  
  6 0
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  January 28, 2022 3:34pm
  - JohnRidd
    
    Hint: Look again at the numbers on the y axis.
    
    It took me a while to spot it.
    
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    January 29, 2022 1:57pm
- andydownhere
  
  Good spotting. And add the last 2 years together, +5.7 -3.3 average is 1.2 growth/annum. Worst growth in 10 years
  
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  January 29, 2022 12:53am
DeepBlue

UK. Plant based meat may have peaked.

Let’s just eat plants and avoid the processing.
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January 28, 2022 11:00am
Jack5

A bone for the Covid mob to gnaw on …

I’m not a Covid debater, but was surprised by an article in today’s Wall Street Journal by a John Hopkins professor talking about “natural immunity” to the disease.

The medical professor, Marty Makary, doesn’t specify for us lay folk what “natural immunity” is, but it seems to be immunity left by a first infection.

Makary says:

For years, studies have shown that infection with the other coronaviruses that cause severe illness, SARS and MERS, confers lasting immunity. In a study published in May 2020, Covid-recovered monkeys that were rechallenged with the virus didn’t get sick.

Makary says an Israeli study, the largest of more than 100 studies on natural immunity, found that natural immunity was 27 times as effective as vaccinated immunity in preventing symptomatic illness.

Makary raises the question of apologies to some unvaccinated people who have lost their jobs — presumably people who have natural immunity because of earlier infections.

If Makary is right, will New Zealand’s high vaccination rate balance our lack of natural immunity?
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January 28, 2022 11:32am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  Why would his parents parents have named him Marty?
  
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  January 28, 2022 5:36pm
  - Jack5
    
    Perhaps his school mates or siblings shortened “Martin” to “Marty”.
    
    Happens a lot: Maggy from Margaret, Jack from John, Stan from Stanley or even Christian, Bill or Will from William.
    
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    January 28, 2022 9:07pm
Maggie Pie

TRENDING…

I see where the Auckland City Council annual wage bill is now at a Billion dollars!!
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January 28, 2022 11:39am
CAKE FACE1

I have noticed something about minor administrative staff over the past year.

Often these client facing positions are staffed by middle aged women. Think, for example, of a pharmacy, or a Council administrative role. They have small but limited authority.
Perhaps they don’t view their service as customer focussed, because there is some small regulatory component, and as such you may need to speak to them (whether you want to or not).

What I have noticed is that these women are often very authoritarian, passive-aggressive and angry. I’m always impeccably polite in my exchanges with them, but I’m bewildered by their attitudes. Today, I enquired of the lady whether she was okay, such was her aggression towards a simple question. Curious.

Yesterday, a middle aged lady told me to move one metre to the side, for my “safety” – otherwise apparently I could get run over on the footpath. I nodded and did this, but I thought the episode was strange.

It used to be that men were angry, and women kind. Has this changed?

Have middle aged women got angrier in recent years on average? If so, why?

I never noticed this trait overseas – only in “Aotearoa”.

In addition, I can’t help but notice that the polls say that these middle aged women vote almost exclusively for Cindy.

Is this observed voting correlation related to their anger and authoritarianism, or is it all a coincidence?

Thoughts welcome…
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January 28, 2022 12:46pm
- Steve Otto(North Shore)
  
  Karens
  
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  January 28, 2022 1:57pm
- Tauhei Notts
  
  CakeFace, thank you for putting into words what I have been thinking of over the past two years.
  I have noticed that unpleasant behavioural trait particularly amongst bank staff. Also amongst librarians. But I have rarely seen that unfortunate behaviour amongst middle aged women employed by private sector outfits with less than 50 employees.
  Weird, eh?
  I have seen it amongst males. Not so much. I write males, as those sorts of males, as distinct from men, give me the distinct impression that they are Green Party acolytes.
  
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  January 28, 2022 2:39pm
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    ‘Males’ distinct from ‘men!
    Burn!!!!
    
    9 0
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    January 28, 2022 3:22pm
- BananaLlama
  
  Look for a wedding ring.
  It has been my experience they are single and not taking their age well, stuck working dead end jobs. You need to add some sugar to your words or they will just stay sour.
  
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  January 28, 2022 3:04pm
  - lifesgood
    
    These very women are the ones who bleated and moaned about being stuck at home and wanted to be just like men and “enjoy” going out to work. Now they have got their wish they realise men didn’t have it so good after all, that it is a daily grind and being stuck at home was better…but it’s too late, going out to work is now the norm for women Moral : you should be careful what you wish for.
    
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    January 28, 2022 4:03pm
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    Look for the tan line where the wedding ring used to be
    
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    January 28, 2022 5:38pm
CAKE FACE1

I doubt that inflation has peaked. The economy is likely to grind lower, in my opinion.

This is the context that I viewed yesterday’s poll result. The Cindy cult is showing cracks. I now suspect that National / ACT will win the next election.

However, I worry how bad the economy will be by then…
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January 28, 2022 1:01pm
Nickc2

Wow, all the anti-National/Act trolls are out today. Cindy’s corrupt brain dead mob must be down on their luck in the polls.
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January 28, 2022 1:03pm
Lee C

National oppose Three Waters.

Meanhwile…https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=976732649945019&set=a.898949884389963
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January 28, 2022 1:06pm
- mawm
  
  This is far more urgent than 3 Waters and yet I hear nothing from politicians or media. The public are unaware of it and unaware of where we are being taken. This is not Jacinda’s agenda, this is the WEF/Schwab’s agenda. She is just the handmaiden.
  
  I’d like to ask her in a public forum who she serves – us or Schwab.
  
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  January 28, 2022 2:43pm
oldfella

So:
Aussie Rules player withdraws from match after refusing to wear pride jumper
https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/women-in-sport/300505955/aussie-rules-player-withdraws-from-match-after-refusing-to-wear-pride-jumper
Just as well this young Muslim wasn’t a young Christian (e.g. Israel Folau), otherwise she would not be getting such … understanding.
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January 28, 2022 1:09pm
Maggie Pie

What the Bible has to say about COVID…….

‘Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth.
I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.
For I have come to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a son-in-law against his mother-in-law.
A man’s enemies will be members of his own household’

– MATTHEW 10: 34-36
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January 28, 2022 1:10pm
- westernScientest
  
  Leviticus 15 might have some more useful rules to stop the spread of disease than our current government.
  
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  January 28, 2022 1:42pm
- rangitoto
  
  This is what Homer has to say (English for convenience)
  
  “And which of the gods was it that set them on to quarrel? It was the son of Zeus and Leto; for he was angry with the king and sent a pestilence upon the host to plague the people, because the son of Atreus had dishonoured Chryses his priest”
  
  Clearly someone has angered Apollo.
  
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  January 28, 2022 2:30pm
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    I never saw that on The Simpsons!
    
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    January 28, 2022 5:39pm
Klondike

Omicron is beautifully seeded around the country now with some super spreader events thrown in. Can’t wait until it explodes, herd immunity in the country with a mild variant before winter sets in. Once everyone’s caught it or is naturally immune, then what have they got ? Better to rip the plaster off in one go then slowly pull it off hair by hair.
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January 28, 2022 1:31pm
- Steve Otto(North Shore)
  
  But you will not know if you have that immunity. Antibody tests are banned
  
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  January 28, 2022 1:50pm
Maggy Wassilieff

Oh Dear..

The “lock-down loving lefties” are upset.

https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2022/01/thousands-react-to-david-seymour-blaming-lockdown-loving-lefties-for-turning-nz-into-hermit-kingdom-in-daily-mail-piece.html
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January 28, 2022 1:34pm
- Maggie Pie
  
  Yet I think David would make a fabulous Hermit King.
  
  Just saying.
  
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  January 28, 2022 1:40pm
- Inandout
  
  Maggy, there are many comments critical of Jacinda, some really so and this coming from ordinary kiwis who have had a gutsful. Seymour, rightly so, is criticised for his climate change mantra. Someone mentioned that Newmarket has gone from bustling to a ghost town, hope not.
  
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  January 28, 2022 1:49pm
  - MCōs
    
    I’ve been to Newmarket a number of times over recent year.
    I bought a car down there and had a look at the flash new mall, but basically just bustled on through.
    The place is dull, like Remuera Rd & Queen St.
    
    1 2
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    January 28, 2022 9:23pm
    - Maggie Pie
      
      Have they finished excavating that Pa site on Mangere Mountain yet Cos …you’d be near the old Kumara pits there somewhere wouldn’t ya?
      
      😀 😀 😀
      
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      January 28, 2022 9:55pm
Truman lodge

What are the odds of another varient between now and the end of the year?
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January 28, 2022 1:49pm
- Steve Otto(North Shore)
  
  Another 3. Control is paramount – cost? does not matter
  
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  January 28, 2022 2:00pm
emmess

Thousands have piled into the comment section of ACT leader David Seymour’s Daily Mail opinion piece

Newshub leaves us with the impression that the comments are negative to Seymour’s opinion piece
Surely that is not on purpose, right?
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January 28, 2022 1:50pm
- westernScientest
  
  haha, the hyperlink to the daily mail article on newshub goes straight to the comments section. The top comment right now is this:
  
  “Ardern has all but ruined New Zealand. Disgusting human.”
  
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  January 28, 2022 1:58pm
  - fightingtemeraire
    
    The day of Dan Wooton’s column in the Mail there was one in the Telegraph.
    
    In the end they closed the Comments section 99% ANTI Ardern
    
    24 0
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    January 28, 2022 2:08pm
- westernScientest
  
  wow, just wow. If you are having a bad day sort the comments by best rated, it will cheer you up.
  
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  January 28, 2022 2:02pm
Steve Otto(North Shore)

Democrats never going to prison:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lE5VV_mksZw
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January 28, 2022 2:13pm
Its only I

Shyt NZ’s Springfield is getting its monorail!!!!….except it’s not springfield or a monorail and it’s not a cartoon on TV.

Dear Labour,
I represent a NZ start up called “insta hole”……
our latest product “insta holes” are, as the name suggests, instant holes………. Insta holes are a by product of other Labour saving devices (pun intended) we have developed called “insta forrest” and “insta home”……..just add 10’s billions for the “Whakapono Tūpato-Kore” upgrade and the roll on holes will link to each other once dry…….
If you buy 10 insta hole packs just before…I mean just before….. the borders open we will include our popular free media weights…… the red ones have been shown to really tipped the scales…..

Your sincerely
Dwain Piper

PS this letter will be fixed in the comments below…hopefully.
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January 28, 2022 2:13pm
Maggie Pie

Just been out by the pool for a quick burst of Perineum Sunning and listening to ZB News.

Can honestly say that I’ve NEVER heard of a case in Remuera, where a woman’s partner has killed her 3 month-old baby.

And what do those two clowns (who are actually broadcasting out of Christchurch) lead off with?
The library is going to abolish ‘Overdue Return Fees’!

What a couple of cringing Nobs 🙁
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January 28, 2022 2:25pm
- Tauhei Notts
  
  I would be pleased to gently apply the sun burn cream, prior to your perineum sunning. Just call me.
  I remain, your obedient servant,
  Tauhei Notts.
  
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  January 28, 2022 2:45pm
- Steve Otto(North Shore)
  
  See a swarm of drones???
  //
  
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  January 28, 2022 3:01pm
AndyW

A female, muslim AFL player, Haneen Zreika, is refusing to play in the upcoming ‘Pride’ round of the AFLW because of her religious beliefs (doesn’t want to wear the special jersey). Her club are supporting her through this, “The club and the AFL have been working closely with Zreika and supporting her as she reached a position this week.”. That’s fine, but where was the tolerance when Israel Folau publicised his (misguided) religious beliefs? He was run out of town, contracts torn up and all because he’s a Christian. Rank hypocrisy from the media.
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January 28, 2022 2:56pm
- Taieri
  
  That’s fine, but where was the tolerance when Israel Folau publicised his (misguided) religious beliefs?
  —————
  
  Why qualify his religious beliefs? For him they are not “misguided”…
  
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  January 28, 2022 6:34pm
Yabster

Atrticle from Muril Newman

Sums up how devious Ardern is:

https://thebfd.co.nz/2022/01/27/the-state-of-our-nation-2/
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January 28, 2022 3:21pm
- krazykiwi
  
  From the link. Ardern: “We must not allow the post-COVID recovery to return to business-as-usual”
  
  (shudders)
  
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  January 28, 2022 3:50pm
- krazykiwi
  
  Also, I do wish The BFD would change their tag-line. It is currently “Your One Source of Truth”, and that is the kind of hubris-filled, Orwellian overreach that sensible NZers are trying to dislodge.
  
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  January 28, 2022 3:55pm
Yabster

very long- but shows how we are far down the road of the Marxist agenda comrade JaXInda has as lined up for:

https://www.nzcpr.com/marxism-it-could-not-happen-here-could-it/
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January 28, 2022 3:26pm
krazykiwi

More than 12 months ago a bio distribution study [Japanese] showed that spike proteins introduced as a result of vaccination did not stay at the injection site. They move around the body and cluster in key organs including spleen, bone marrow, the liver, adrenal glands and in, quite high concentrations in the ovaries. Ovaries control menses, so it’s not surprising that the study Association Between Menstrual Cycle Length and Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Vaccination: A U.S. Cohort found this:

Results: We included 3,959 individuals (vaccinated 2,403; unvaccinated 1,556). Most of the vaccinated cohort received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine (55%) (Moderna 35%, Johnson & Johnson/Janssen 7%). Overall, COVID-19 vaccine was associated with a less than 1-day change in cycle length for both vaccine-dose cycles compared with prevaccine cycles (first dose 0.71 day-increase, 98.75% CI 0.47-0.94; second dose 0.91, 98.75% CI 0.63-1.19); unvaccinated individuals saw no significant change compared with three baseline cycles (cycle four 0.07, 98.75% CI -0.22 to 0.35; cycle five 0.12, 98.75% CI -0.15 to 0.39). In adjusted models, the difference in change in cycle length between the vaccinated and unvaccinated cohorts was less than 1 day for both doses (difference in change: first dose 0.64 days, 98.75% CI 0.27-1.01; second dose 0.79 days, 98.75% CI 0.40-1.18)

So, longer cycles for vaccinated women. On a population basis does that translate to lower overall fertility?
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January 28, 2022 3:47pm
Maggie Pie

For some time now, my partner has received notifications from ‘TradeMe’ whenever a particular marque of motor vehicle is listed for sale.

He was saying in the last month or so, they have now started to referring to New Zealand only as …..’AOTEAROA’

Typical of sh*t-stirring poms he reckons 😀
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January 28, 2022 3:47pm
- Lee C
  
  Very hurtful, Maggie.
  
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  January 28, 2022 4:28pm
  - Maggie Pie
    
    Aww c’mon Lee…
    my posts aren’t targeted at anyone specific,
    but if you’re offended, I’m glad I could reach one person 😀
    
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    January 28, 2022 4:35pm
    - Jack5
      
      TradeMe’s internet address still ends in .NZ.
      
      If it wants .AO for Aotearoa it’s out of luck. In domain names, AO stands for Angola.
      
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      January 28, 2022 8:32pm
- MCōs
  
  Shock Horror
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:27pm
Chuck Bird

I hope that a new government will introduce new laws to deal with this. If one is a gang member then the sentence should be at least doubled.

Mongrel Mob chapter president jailed after ‘cowardly’ attack by 18 gang members on one man

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/mongrel-mob-chapter-president-jailed-after-cowardly-attack-by-18-gang-members-on-one-man/BYCQI5ZDNAAOFARB2XPWSS6ULQ/
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January 28, 2022 3:48pm
- Jack5
  
  Law-abiding New Zealanders aren’t safe while gang mobsters get light sentences like that.
  
  Eighteen attacked a man in his home, in front of his partner and children.
  
  From the report:
  
  The victim suffered a traumatic brain injury, a fractured skull, a deep skull laceration, a burst eardrum and other injuries. Judge Rea said that during the attack, weapons had been used and the man’s head was stomped on.
  
  All after a road-rage incident.
  
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  January 28, 2022 5:27pm
  - Jack5
    
    The source of the report that Chuck links to is interesting: Open Justice, one of the Ardern State-funded newspaper subsidy schemes.
    
    The Ardern subsidy pays for court reporters around the country under this scheme.
    
    New Zealand now has a State-paid media:
    https://www.nzonair.govt.nz/news/110-journalist-roles-funded-provide-public-interest-journalism-across-motu/
    
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    January 28, 2022 7:58pm
Reid

So big surprise. The F-35 pilot who ditched the other day had an adverse reaction to the vax.

https://trusttheq.com/navy-pilot-crashes-plane-ejects-after-vax-reaction/
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January 28, 2022 4:05pm
- MCōs
  
  You believe that dribble?
  
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  January 28, 2022 9:08pm
Warren

Grant Robertson and Michael Wood are trying to really make friends with Aucklanders over the light Rail.
https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/300505493/properties-around-aucklands-light-rail-likely-to-face-value-capture-tax
They believe they can raise over two Billion Dollars over this tax to help pay for Light Rail to the Airport. More tax from a money hungry Government and Finance Minister Grant Robertson.
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January 28, 2022 4:20pm
Maggie Pie

A bit ‘off-topik’ – but I’ll tell you someting else that really pizzes me off 🙁

When you peel the silver-tops off those ‘Aunt Betty Saucy Puddings’ to put in the microwave….. and a little bit gets stuck behind.
They spark like f–k!!
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January 28, 2022 7:13pm
Maggy Wassilieff

The Maori Party wants the Government to compensate Creatives, Artists and Musicians who haven’t been able to work through Summer Festivals.

But why should the taxpayer pay anything for these folks?

What makes them any more important than small business owners and laid-off retail /hospitality staff who lost much of their expected income because of lockdowns and red-light settings?

https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA2201/S00114/govt-must-compensate-artists-musicians-and-creatives-immediately.htm
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January 28, 2022 7:16pm
Lucia Maria

Have been watching the Stew Peters Show on Rumble.com. Would highly recommend it. He has interviewed one of the organisers of the trucker’s protest in Canada recently and so much more.
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January 28, 2022 7:28pm
Sparrow

An example of the division we now have in NZ. I am fully vaccinated but believe its a persons choice to be vaccinated or not. Was at a lovely local cafe which welcomes all in providing only takeaway food and drinks. Was enjoying waffles in a cardboard box (interesting) in a outside seating area. Saw two fully maskedup middle age women approaching from afar on a beautiful sunny morning. I guessed this would be interesting. They got to the door then realised the cafe served the unvaccinated then literally ran off like scalded cats. What have we come to !!!
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January 28, 2022 7:54pm
fernglas

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/jan/28/catastrophic-failure-covid-out-of-control-in-the-nt-say-aboriginal-groups
Coming soon to a headline near you. If you read to the very bottom, you will see that there are 3 (yes 3) people in ICU with Covid in the NT, and they have had no deaths. But the indigenous groups want the whole place shut down.
NZ will be next.
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January 28, 2022 8:03pm
wilderbeast

I notice even here that “misinformation” is deleted, in relation to vaccine matters. When did it become so mainstream to do this? A post here, a story there which isn’t on the money or even just plain devious is still open to rebuttal, crtiticism and debate – hell we might even learn something….
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January 28, 2022 9:57pm
All Bound For Mumu Land

It’s racist as heck because the muhammedans can’t control themselves around blond women. They just rape. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uv3NWMjU4HU
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January 29, 2022 2:53am

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